by David Oliver
But I guess overcoming massive odds is what Imperators are all about. It’s what we’re trained for. To do the impossible.
I steeled myself and pointed my sword towards the hanging larder that hopefully contained our friend. “We move together, nice and slow. If the torches start dying, get a new one up as soon as possible.”
Ella waved her torch at the nearest spiders and together we all stepped into the gap made by the recoiling beasts. Bit by nightmarish bit we inched our way through the sea of limbs, the incessant hissing and spitting of the creatures marking our every step. The further we made it the more thankful I became that the spiders didn’t have the ability to spit venom or some other twisted concoction like some of the monsters we had heard about in the world. If that had been the case, we surely wouldn’t have survived.
They did have something else to fire though. Something sticky, white and very unpleasant to get on your face.
Our journey through the swarm was going relatively well until the giant spiders got within range. By which I mean we had moved all of fifty feet and no one had yet died. At first they tried to pierce the ring of fire with their mighty legs, but a thrust of the torch was enough for them to recoil, leaving behind a deep hiss of frustration. And so we continued on, delving into the masses and burning a path to Rikol.
Whether it was the giant spider itself or the monstrous queen that dreamt up the thought I do not know. But I had barely a moment of warning to shout and tug Sophia to the ground before spiderweb as thick as my wrist shot out of the dark above our heads. In an instant the two other giants decided to join the game and our world became a spinning haze of fire and webs.
Have you ever tried Kaschan whilst holding a flaming torch? It’s a tricky business. You attempt to move swiftly in the standard evasive patterns but if you move too fast then the torch starts guttering and you have to slow down. And when the torch starts guttering in the midst of a thousand hungry mandibles you realise something vastly important.
Life is bollocks.
One of the watching ceiling spiders would have had an interesting view of intermittently fast and slow swirls of flame dancing around the cavern floor as Sophia and Ella sped up to dodge web and slowed down to keep their torches alive. It probably would have looked quite pretty, but in the end it was only a matter of time before something got through.
That something was a thick cord of web which lanced out of the shadow to strike Cassius in the stomach. The first I heard of it was a strangled cry and I whirled to see him vanishing into the edge of the torchlight. Roaring with anger, I leapt forward and caught his outstretched hand, pulling with all my might. He screamed as the fibres of the web pulled taught but didn’t break, leaving him as the centrepiece of a tug of war. Quickly Sophia and Ella darted into view, bringing the circle of firelight back around us, but their blades made barely a dent in the thick cord. With my muscles corded, veins popping and Cassius screaming I barely saw Ella move in and thrust her torch directly at the web. I felt however, an immediate loosening in the hold on Cassius and pulled harder, determined to get him back. The torch seemingly melted the web strands, not burning them as such, but they vanished and dissipated before the heat, quickly leaving Cassius back on his feet, sore chested and gasping for air, with a heavily bruised arm from my grip.
But there was no time to rest. Threads continued erupting from the nearby giant spiders and I quickly realised that the way things currently were we were going to take forever to get near to the larder. I flung a third torch at Cassius, who lit it quickly, wincing as he did so. I pretended not to notice. If he knew that he wouldn’t be able to keep up then he would have said, the Imperator Academy does not make for stupid Imps.
“We run,” I barked, ducking another thread. “Stick together, but charge as fast as you can with those torches lit. We have to do this fast or not at all.” Everyone nodded, faces set in grim determination. “Go!” I roared, flexing my lungs to their full. The shout was like a thunderclap in the cavern, causing the momentary silencing of the hissing around us. Quickly we set off, sprinting into the mass and relying on the fear of the fire to drive the spiders away from us faster than we could run. I brought up the rear, hoping that I could grab anyone in time if they were struck by the spider silk and trusting that I had the reactions to dodge anything that came my way.
That sprint reminded me, in some strange way, of running through the forests at the Academy. The extending branches of the enclosed trees made you feel like you were sprinting through a tunnel, giving an even greater sensation of speed. Replace branches with spider legs and it was a pretty similar sensation, just filled with infinitely more peril.
The spiders drew back, throwing themselves backwards to get away from the onslaught of flame. The giant arachnids continued firing strands of web but fortunately nothing came close enough to worry about - the jumble of retreating spiders around us providing something of an effective shield. Swiftly we drew close to the hanging larder, looping around the rear of the queen beast whose attention was solely on the advancing and seemingly unstoppable troll. The smaller spiders kept pace with us, and the giant ones were seemingly content to turn back after the troll.
Or at least, that’s what I thought.
The furious run combined with the constant movement, hissing and web slinging of the spiders around us wore on my senses and so when the web struck me squarely in the back and I started being lifted into the air, I was just as surprised as anyone.
“Go! Get Rikol!” I yelled as the others started to turn. To their credit, they paused only for a split second before continuing the run to the larder, leaving me to deal with the gigantic, yet sneaky, son of a bitch that was perched on the ceiling and hauling me in to be its next morsel.
It was a weird feeling, ascending through the air like that. If it didn’t end with sharp teeth and disgusting mandibles it could have been quite pleasant. As it was I struggled to try and see my opponent, but I was hesitant to flip over and embroil myself yet further into the spider silk given how strong and sticky it was and so I hung relatively still, my limbs hanging loose but ready, hands clasping my ichor covered daggers and my neck craned as far back as possible trying to judge the distance to the ceiling - if it was anything like the one that took Rikol I could likely expect a large stinger ready to meet my innards when I reached the top.
In short, I had one shot at getting it right.
I concentrated on my senses, drowning out the sibilant spider sea beneath me, the panicked breathing of my friends as they desperately began looking for Rikol amongst the swinging larder and the roar of the thing-troll as it continued to eviscerate everything that fell into its hands. Slowly, carefully, I searched for my prey; breathing in its scent, listening for its breathing, the movement of its hairs, a tell-tale muscle twitch. My foe, like all spiders, was very difficult to detect but by straining to my limits I could just make it out. I kept limp, letting the arachnid think me incapacitated or resigned to my fate and when I judged the time was right I struck upwards, driving my daggers into the flesh of the creature above me, and, hoping that the carapace was as hard as the one that had stolen my sword, I twisted, levering my body as close to the creature as possible and avoiding the thrust of the deadly stinger by mere inches. Quickly I wrapped an arm around the bulbous flesh surrounding the stinger and with my other hand wrenched out the supporting dagger; trusting the stinger to hold my weight.
Thankfully it did.
It also made the spider go berserk.
Have you ever seen a rodeo? Imagine that but upside down, on the roof of a hundred-foot-tall cavern, oh, and the mount is a giant spider. In other words, it was pretty fun. I stabbed repeatedly into the flesh of the stinger before realising that cutting apart the only thing holding me to the roof might not have been the wisest of ideas. So using each thunking drive of the dagger into its soft flesh I crawled up the length of its sting, leaving gooey green trails that dripped down onto the masses below. The spider hissed and screeched, a
ttempting to crush me against the roof with the mass of its stinger but it couldn’t quite get the leverage. It tried to pull me off by reeling in the web, but I had my grip locked down tight. Slowly and stabbily I made my way to its underbelly and there I set to work with gusto. Ripping, stabbing, shredding and tearing I clawed my way deep into its guts, the creature scurrying along the roof this way and that in an effort to rid itself of the pain. I didn’t care. I just kept cutting until I was hitting bits that looked important and then I cut some more. Eventually the creature began to slow with deep, pained shudders emanating from its body. And then I enacted the second part of my plan - curl up inside the spider and hope for the best.
The fall actually wasn’t that bad. A juddering impact that resulted in an exploded spider. Getting spider blood up my nose? That was unpleasant.
I stood up out of the gory mess and attempted to wipe some of it off, flinging it from my eyes in thick globs. It was when I looked up that I realised where the spider had fallen.
Right between the troll and the queen.
She, for I presume she was a she, was a grotesque sight. A bulbous mass of hideousness that groaned, hissed and squelched its way closer with ponderous steps. I suppose that she could afford to be ponderous though, for she was fucking gigantic. I could see myself refracted in several of her rheumy, black eyes and knew that she was watching me. Doubtless she had earlier thought the troll more of a threat, but landing in the carcass of a spider may have given her cause to re-evaluate me. Just what I needed.
Balls.
To make a bad position worse, there were several giant spiders that flanked the queen and I had had enough of their shit already. I could hear the troll behind me, still bloodily roaring its way through the smaller citizens of the cavern. It was one tough bastard, that was for sure.
I cautiously took a step backwards, feeling behind me with my toes through the gooey, slime covered floor for solid footing. If I could let the troll take the brunt of the spiders’ interest then I could possibly get out of the cavern with the others without having to do more fighting. Another step. Still no movement from the watching spiders. Maybe they were just going to let me go? That would be nice.
A third step, and my watching admirers acted almost as though on cue - in an instant all hell broke loose.
The great wobbly spider queen let out a deep, ear throbbing hiss and her lackeys sprang into action sending flying tendrils of web in my direction. Quickly ducking and weaving between the threads I sprang sideways, narrowly missing a furred leg that crashed down near my head, and then my world was a dance of crashing pillars and stingers. As more spiders joined the fray I knew I had to do something to change the dynamics of the situation. Every now and again I could see a bobbing flame making its way steadily along the cavern which gave me hope that my friends were still alive but I didn’t have the time to make out if they had Rikol with them or not.
And then with a mighty roar the dynamics changed.
The troll had flung itself through the air. This by itself was interesting - whilst most normal trolls had similar characteristics to gorillas they tended to do very little jumping; preferring to lumber around in an angry manner until something made its way into their mouths. Granted they could put on a turn of speed when they wanted, but rarely would they soar, majestically through the air. Especially majestically. Trolls don’t do looking good.
This one did. It had flung itself thirty feet through the air, its arms outstretched and claws extended. Looking like a blood-soaked nightmare it landed on the queen’s face and dug in. Ichor splattered as eyes popped with a satisfying sound. The troll’s mighty claws raked at the gigantic face and its powerful arms levered back to deliver more brutal cuts. The queen shook, wobbled, hissed and grunted, attempting to dislodge the tenacious creature but to no avail. The troll held on grimly and just kept tearing. In under a minute half the eyes on the queen’s face had turned into mush and the troll quickly shifted positions to deliver the same to the other set.
The howls of the queen sent the spiders harassing me into fury. They forgot all about me in their haste to get to the creature that was tormenting their squelchy leader and a quick look around the cavern confirmed that the now much reduced sea of spiders was converging on the queen as well. The others were free and clear, sprinting down the cavern with an unmoving, grey wrapped figure on Cassius’s shoulder. I ducked out from the fight and bolted for the cavern wall; the surrounding spiders taking no more notice of me than of a speck of dirt so intent they were on stopping the hurt to their queen. In a matter of moments we were back together, the others greeting me with grim nods and quickly we made our way to the tunnel entrance that we had arrived in. Rikol bounced along on Cassius’s shoulder wrapped in spider silk, alive but unresponsive with his face pale and grey and his skin giving off a strange odour. Some kind of poison I surmised. Hopefully it would wear off and not leave him long in a state of unconsciousness.
We reached the tunnel entrance, leaving behind us a battlefield. Spider corpses coated the floor, some in scattered ones and twos and in other areas there were mountains of dead, and over it all was a liberal coating of green ichor. But thankfully, it was over.
Except it wasn’t. All thanks to Cassius. Cassius and his integrity.
We reached the tunnel and he put an arm out to stop me. “What about him?” he asked.
“What about who?” I replied, knowing full well exactly what he was asking and trying in vain to put a stop to it.
A roar of rage and pain echoed through the cavern and we turned in time to see the troll wrenched off the queen’s face and disappear under a pile of stingers.
I sighed. “Oh, you mean him.”
Cassius, his face grim, handed me his sword. “He gave us the opportunity to save Rikol. The least we can do is return the favour.” His eyes roamed over the blood-soaked girls and unconscious friend on his shoulder and his face turned apologetic. “In this case though, by we I think I mean you. You know I-“
I held up a hand and cut him off, “Save it. The curse of being amazing. I know.” I jerked my head up the tunnel. “Go, all of you, get out of here and get Rikol help.” I turned back to the cavern floor, in what I assumed was a significantly heroic posture. “I’ll see what I can do here.”
Chapter 14
Asp
One thing about Imperator training is just how hardened you become to events, activities and swallowing orders. Sophia and Ella didn’t so much as argue as I turned away, just turned and continued the mission. We all knew that emotion at this point - this deep in such a desperate and perilous mission - would do little to help. Besides, no matter what we had each said I don’t think any of us were one hundred percent sure that what we were doing was real. There was always an underlying uncertainty - after all how can you know what is true when your mind has been tricked in such a realistic way? But real or not, that troll had whether by intent or coincidence helped us save Rikol and so it was time for me to return the favour. I hefted Cassius’s blade, twirled it a few times to get a feel for the weight and with a wild grin plastered on my face to cover my fear, sprinted out into the cavern anew.
The first positive was that the troll was still alive; if the noises emanating from the spider mountain were anything to go by. The second positive was that we had been completely ignored by the spiders. All their focus was on the beast that had injured their queen, which meant that I had free reign to approach how I wanted. Judging by what had happened earlier with the troll, if it was unhurt for a few moments it would soon regain its full strength and so my plan was decided for me. Afterall, there was only one sure-fire way to attract the attention of all the spiders that were currently stabbing and cutting at the injured creature.
I dashed through the outer ranks of lesser arachnids, keeping my blade close and relying on my senses to keep my feet fast. I doubt most of the spiders I passed registered my approach before I was gone. I sprinted through the towering pillars of the giant spiders, resisting the
temptation to slice upwards. The queen was the target and I couldn’t afford to get bogged down fighting my way towards her. The less the surrounding spiders knew of my presence, the better.
Getting there, in the end, was almost too easy. The spiders were practically hypnotised in a frenzy of killing whoever had dared harm their queen. I imagine that I could have strolled through the surrounding legions of eight legged monstrosities and not been bothered. Their mistake.
The back end of the spider queen was an unpleasantly gooey place. She dragged some kind of sac behind her that was seemingly made up of a thin, sticky membrane that protected tiny little spiderlings within. At least, that’s what I guessed they were as I clambered up along it, step by sticky step with my face far too close to the disgusting film - if I survived I knew that I would be having flashbacks to this moment for a tremendously long time. I certainly wasn’t wrong.
I eventually reached the top of the sac and crouched upon the top of the spider queen, covered - and I mean covered - in goo. Spider ichor, sac goo, blood and viscera - I had it all. I had no time to give in to my disgust however and forced my revulsion to one side as I began moving along the top of the arachnid. After a painstaking journey and covered in ichor and bristling hair, I reached the top of the queen’s head and crouched down behind the range of its eyes.
My perch atop the spider queen's back allowed me to survey the chaos that lay beneath. Thousands - or what appeared in my adrenaline addled mind like thousands - of dead spider corpses littered the ground, soaking the floor in green ichor. The troll was still going, despite bleeding from hundreds of wounds as his regenerative abilities worked hard to keep it alive, but it wouldn't be long before it succumbed.
Gearing myself up for what had to come next I took a deep breath, drew Cassius's blade and swung over into the damaged face of the queen. Hissing sounds, like hundreds of snakes being thrown in a bag, emanated from its mouth as I began to systematically stab any remaining eye that the troll had missed. I hung on for dear life as the queen began to buck and rear. It wiggled and jibed - trying to dislodge whatever was sticking a needle into its vast eyes. With manic laughter I began enjoying myself, perforating each segmented eye with a deluge of stabbing and hacking; relishing the juices and spatter that poured out of each wound until the eye finally went dark and then I would move onto the next.
