“Bugger this for a lark,” Banks said. “Floor it, lad. If we don’t get through now, we never will.”
The jeep shuddered as the gun in the back fired five quick blasts. The sound was deafening inside, setting Banks’ ears ringing. He tried to check his mirror but all he saw was a gray blur, coming up fast. He braced his feet in the stairwell, anticipating impact but the jeep’s momentum was enough to drive through the strands of web, although they were slowed considerably in the process. The big gun fired, twice more and the sarge shouted from the back, his voice coming to Banks as if from far away, in a wind.
“Incoming to the east. Multiple bogeys.”
Banks wound down his window and looked out. Dawn was close now, a pinkish glow lighting the horizon. It only served to illuminate the roadway back into the town center, from where a mass of the huge spiders some thirty feet deep filled the road from side to side, scuttling as fast as a running dog, coming straight at them.
“Get us the fuck out of here, Private,” Banks shouted.
Wilkins didn’t pause to question the order. He swung the jeep around until they faced across the road, then floored the accelerator as they barreled into an even narrower alleyway, one just about wide enough to accommodate them. Banks’ wing mirror screeched against the wall for a second then ripped off to tumble away behind them. Up top the heavy gun rattled, shaking the frame of the jeep. Ahead of them, the river was coming up fast at the end of the alley and Banks didn’t see anywhere they could turn to get back to the main roadways.
Three black shadows dropped from the rooftops at the far end of the alley and immediately spun web across their exit. He had a matter of seconds to make a decision and there were no exits on either side of them, not even a doorway or window, only a blank expanse of wall looming over them.
“Floor it,” he shouted and braced himself again.
The spiders had managed to spin half a dozen lengths of web across the entrance. The jeep went through them, barely pausing this time. Wilkins hit the brakes as they flew out the alley onto a wooden wharf but their momentum was too great. They skidded in a squeal of brakes and tires on wood, then toppled in slow-mo, off the end of the jetty. Banks felt a split second of weightlessness as they dropped four feet or so into the water, hitting the river with a hard smack.
“Bale out,” Banks shouted and, having to push against the weight of water struggled out of his door as the jeep sank. He managed to stand up, thigh deep, holding his weapon high. He saw Brock trying to save the bodies in the back as the jeep drifted slowly downstream in the current.
“Leave them, lad. At least they’ll get a clean burial here.”
The bodies drifted away, overtaking the jeep and heading away downstream. The vehicle stuck fast as it hit bottom. The sarge stood up on the back. He trained the big gun back to the shore, where half a dozen spiders stood, front legs raised, twitching as if tasting the air.
“Have some of this, wankers,” he shouted and emptied what was left of the belt of ammo into the beasts on the jetty, blasting them into pieces of leg, body, mouth parts, and burst eyes that fell into the water and drifted slowly away alongside the dead bodies.
The gun ran dry, the ringing echo of its boom and roar lasting long in Banks’ ears before a silence fell again around them. All that was left on the jetty was scattered remains of blasted spiders. They waited to see if anything else was going to come out of the alleyway but it stayed shadowy and still.
With the sun rising at their backs, Banks led the men away, wading up river, staying in the water until they were well past the outskirts of the town.
— 8 —
Maggie was at the doorway with more coffee and another of Wiggins’ smokes when they heard, distant but immediately recognizable, the rat-tat of gunfire, which came sporadically for several minutes before falling quiet. She saw the look that passed over Wiggins’ face.
“Trouble?” she asked.
“It wasn’t one of ours, that’s for sure. That sounded like a bloody cannon.”
“Rebels?
“Possibly. But I’m not leaving you to go and have a look, so keep your knickers on, lass.”
“And any more talk like that, you’ll be counting your teeth in your hands the next time,” she said and smiled to show that she meant it.
Wiggins smiled back.
“Glad I know where I stand. Could you go and tell your people not to worry? They might have heard. Keep them calm. The cap and the lads will be back soon. The sun’s coming up.”
She looked out over the courtyard to see light in the sky through between the houses lining the east-side alleyway. It also meant she had a closer look at the dead spider than she’d wanted.
“There’s something you should know first,” she said and told him about the mosaic and the spider depicted in the center.
“Fucking hell,” Wiggins replied when she was done. “And it’s authentic, this mosaic of yours? Not a modern hoax?”
“Nope, totally kosher,” she replied. “Yon spiders aren’t anything new around these parts.”
“You’d think somebody might have mentioned them, somewhere along the line?”
“Aye, you would. I’m guessing they’ve been keeping away from people, wherever they’ve been. And to answer your next question before you ask it, no, I don’t know why they’re here now. Maybe the rebels found them, disturbed them, got them riled up. But I don’t know for sure.”
“I don’t even want to know,” Wiggins said, looking out over the courtyard.
Maggie saw the worry in his face.
“They’ll be back soon,” he whispered.
“And if they’re not?”
“I’m not even going to think about that for an hour or so yet,” he replied. “But if it comes to it, I’ll call in a ride to get you out of here and Davies and I will go and fetch our pals.”
“I hope it doesn’t come to that.”
“Me too, lass. Me too.”
When Maggie returned to the chamber, Kim was on her knees in the dig and had now uncovered two-thirds of the mosaic. There was nothing new to see that was as startling as the initial reveal of the huge spider in the center but there was one thing that hadn’t been noticeable before. In the upper right quadrant of the mosaic there were other spiders, equally as large as the one in the center, depicted as emerging from a cave in a hillside. The contours of the hill were immediately familiar; it was the same escarpment they were on now, down to a detailed depiction of the old city on the skyline.
When she pointed it out to Jack Reynolds, she quickly discovered he’d lost interest in the archaeology.
“So what?” he said. “Does it help? Does it get us closer to home?”
“It’s why we’re here.”
“Not anymore it isn’t. Did your boyfriend at the door make the call? Are we getting the fuck out of here any time soon?”
“He’s still waiting for the others to come back.”
“Yeah? It’ll be a fucking long wait if that shooting was any indication. Yes, I heard it, loud and clear. If the bloody rebels don’t get to us, then we’ve only got the fucking spiders to worry about.”
“They seem to be keeping their distance. Killing one of them seems to have given them pause.”
“Pause? They’re fucking spiders. Don’t credit them with any kind of critical thinking. We’re rats in a trap in here. They’ll get in. We’ve all seen the movies. They always get in.”