Salticidae

by Ryan C. Thomas

  This is the new king of the jungle, he thought.

  The beast leapt so fast, Shumba’s brain took a second to catch up to the fact the spider was no longer on the ground. He aimed up with his machete. The spider came flying downwards, legs already curling in to grasp him. He thrust his machete up.

  The monster legs engulfed him, the abdomen slamming into him with such force he was driven backwards through the grass. The machete sank into the beast’s underside as the massive arachnid’s grip drew him in closer.

  The fangs came down at his face for the kill. He grabbed one, and with all his might used it to jerk himself to the side while simultaneously forcing the spider’s jaws to shift the opposite direction. He fought to keep it this way but the demon was powerful. The fangs were slick with venom and other juices. He looked right into the beast’s mouth, saw things in the orifice that defied his knowledge of animal biology, moving parts that he had never seen on a spider before. But he had never seen one this big and so close up. The creature was truly a perfectly formed killing machine.

  With the blade still lodged in the beast’s abdomen, he twisted his arm, tearing open wide the slit he’d made there. He felt warm fluid run down his arm, onto his waist. The beast smelled bad enough to warrant Shumba holding his breath, but the weight of the creature, and its attempt to gets its mouth on him had him sweating and gasping for air.

  The legs crushed in tighter, threatening to crush his ribs. Again he twisted the blade, used the slippery fang to push the spider’s face away from his own. The legs curled around him, then slowly began to let up their force. He yanked his blade out from the abdomen and slid up, dragging himself out from under it. When he was able to sit up, he used his legs to push the beast over, and then stood up.

  He looked down at the ghastly thing, and with one mighty heave hacked the head off the giant spider.

  In some deeper part of his heart he felt bad for it. The jungle was a place he respected, as his father had taught him, but it was a place that belonged to everybody. You can’t fault an animal for doing what an animal does. His father’s words, told to him his whole twelve years.

  But this is no animal, he thought. This is a demon. I will respect it, but I will not let it hurt my people.

  In front of him he watched the rest of the tribe battle the advancing spiders. Musa was already in battle, with two dead demons by his side. Ota, who’d protested this battle on the cliff, was currently being shared by two spiders at once. His dead body hung limp between them, fangs piercing both the head and thighs.

  Good, thought Shumba. While they eat they do not fight. These will be easy to kill.

  ***

  Why the hell had he never learned to hot wire a car? Wasn’t that what writers were supposed to do, Jack thought, to learn how to do everything, experience everything. He’d read up on the Congo for months before coming, every travel book, website, blog, gardening brochure, political pamphlet, cereal box, whatever. At no time had he felt the need to learn the electrical system of a Jeep’s engine. He slammed his fist on the steering wheel and cursed.

  “Found ’em!” Derek waved the keys in the air. He raced through the tall grass, tossed them to Jack. “You don’t have to do this. We can just run to the trail. It’s right over…oh shit.”

  Jack saw surprise in Derek’s eyes. He turned, saw the reason why.

  From the trail, three spiders launched themselves out of the trees and landed with bloated bodies, sentries blocking the path. They jabbed at each other for room, like siblings fighting for space in the backseat of a car. They hopped left and right, came back together, flexed on their legs.

  “Jack?”

  Jack looked back at Derek. “You get back, you maybe tell them about this, okay? So I don’t die for nothing.”

  Derek gripped Jack’s forearm. Men did not normally touch like this, with a sense of emotion, unless it was a final farewell. Jack had held his father’s hand like this years ago, while the cancer ate away the old man’s last few brain cells. He’d squeezed hard, like Derek was doing now, in hopes his father could feel him through the morphine-induced coma.

  “You absolutely sure about this?”

  “There’s no getting to the path now,” Jack said. “Not with those big fuckers in the way. And our local boys there are getting pretty much surrounded. If I do this right, they’ll all follow, I’m sure of it. Let me go.”

  “Would have been one hell of a story about mushrooms, dude. Would have been Pulitzer-winning shit, man. I’ll make sure the world knows.”

  “Thanks. Gotta go. When they start following, you all head—”

  “Yeah, I know. We’re ready to book it. Godspeed, man. Say hi to the big man in the sky for me. And if you meet Elvis, tell him I wanna jam with him when my time comes.”

  “You play an instrument?”

  “No. But I’m gonna learn if I get out of this. Learn a little ‘Jailhouse Rock’ or something.”

  “Elvis lives in Ohio. Runs a fruit stand. Everybody knows this. It was in the Enquirer.”

  “Here. You’ll need this.” Janet dropped the bundle of dynamite in the passenger seat. The fuses were wound together. “Sorry, I have no matches. Gellis…” her voice broke for a moment. Jack remembered the man she was with, who had disappeared after putting himself between her and a rampaging spider. No doubt he’d been eaten trying to save her. They must have been close friends judging by the way her eyes studied the ground, perhaps fighting off tears. She collected herself, nodded with renewed authority. “You’re going to have to use the Jeep’s cigarette lighter there. Pray that it works. The way this thing looks right now I’d be surprised if it can hit second gear.”

  “Look alive! They’re coming!” Derek backed away from the Jeep, began running into the grass. “It’s now or never!”

  Jack saw the beasts advancing in the rearview mirror. Hopping twenty feet at a time, headed right for them. White trails of sticky webbing falling to the grass behind.

  “Go!” Janet yelled. She slapped the Jeep, turned, added a final sentiment, “And thank you!” then caught up with Derek. Together they ducked down in the swaying razor grass and disappeared from sight.

  With a sudden urge to yell and curse the world, Jack slammed his foot down on the gas, pressing it to the floor before he could rethink his decision. The Jeep spun out, found traction in the soil and launched forward, pinning him to the seat. Mud spit into the air like a geyser as he drove toward the river. The bundle of dynamite lay on the seat next to him. He pushed the cigarette lighter in. Prayed.

  ***

  This spider was larger than the others, its legs twice as long as the previous one he’d fought. That gives me the advantage of avoiding its fangs, Shumba thought, and slashed at the arachnid’s forelegs. The machete sliced through at the joint and the spider fell forward for a second before balancing itself on its other seven legs. The wounded appendage waved high in the air like a detached piece of roof thatch in a storm.

  The spider angled down to bite him.

  Shumba rolled underneath the beast, narrowly missing the lunging fangs and came up under its belly. He pushed the machete into its soft abdomen and cut a wide tear into its guts. Liquid poured out in thick streams. He rolled again, came up behind the spinnerets and sliced them clean off. The monster jumped sideways, landed a good ten feet away, clearly in pain but intent on getting its kill. Inching forward again, more circumspect but no less hungry.

  A second spider appeared beside it. And a third. Shumba heard his father’s voice from somewhere close by but his periphery showed nothing but more demons landing around him. Yellow ones, black ones, orange ones, grey ones. He was surrounded, the spiders all waving their palps in a frantic dance of hunger.

  He did not want to die. Not like this. But he’d known the risk coming into this battle. It was a warrior’s creed and he aimed to see it through to its end despite his fear. His only consoling thought now was that if he was going to die he was going to take as many of these beasts
with him as he could. With an angry roar he raised his machete, waved it above his head.

  Something sped by him, kicking up mud, the sound of an engine being taxed in this unforgiving terrain. It passed by, heading toward the river at a high speed. As one synchronized unit, the spiders leapt over him and tore after the Jeep. They want bigger prey, he realized. They are not as stupid as their smaller kin. Evolution had given these creatures a bigger brain.

  He turned and watched them leaping after the vehicle. From the trees other spiders launched themselves into the chase. Coming out of the jungle alongside the river and from the tall grasses, where they’d been crouched down stalking their prey.

  In seconds, a line of jumping spiders followed the Jeep, ready to devour whoever was inside it.

  ***

  The Jeep hit a rise in the grass, bounced high, threatened to throw Jack out of the seat. He grabbed the dynamite to make sure it didn’t jettison away. The river approached with lightning speed, and all along the edge, up in the trees, spiders sat flexing on their legs.

  He cut the Jeep to the left, circled around a copse of rubber trees, spun back toward the water. In the rearview mirror he watched the horror now forming behind him. The spiders had taken the bait, had let their instincts to chase overcome them. They jumped with zeal, gaining on him, hunters conditioned to catch their prey no matter the means of the chase. Two hairy legs caught the back of the Jeep, sent it spinning sideways. Jack gripped the wheel and steadied it.

  Just need to get it a bit farther away from the trail, he thought. Just need to give Derek and the others a viable means of escape.

  A spider landed in the back of the Jeep, its massive abdomen blocking out the sun. The head came down and Jack laid himself into the passenger seat. Two wet fangs pierced the dashboard, tearing the plastic away in chunks. Still gripping the steering wheel, Jack spun the Jeep fast to the right, skidding out in a wide arc. The spider rolled off the Jeep and landed on its back, quickly righted itself and leapt after the vehicle again.

  Finally, Jack grabbed the dynamite, popped the lighter from the socket. It was glowing orange, and the reality of imminent death finally sank in.

  I do not want to die, Jack realized. In the span of a second, he grasped the unbelievable sacrifice so many humans had made in the name of saving others. Every solider who’d ever gone to war. Every police officer who’d ever been shot at by a criminal. Every fireman who’d ever braved an inferno to save a citizen. Every man and woman who’d ever died for their family and friends. Yes, the romanticized idea of sacrifice made for good stories, but at the end of the day, good people died, never to return, so others could go on. How many names of heroes did he actually even remember? None. He’d written his piece on the September 11th attacks. He’d interviewed missionaries in Burma who’d survived tortures, whose coworkers had been killed or were permanently jailed in death camps simply for bringing medicine to refugees. He remembered his grandfather’s stories about fighting the Nazis in Bastonge, remembered the old man’s choked voice when he mentioned friends who’d not been lucky enough to return from the front.

  But he did not remember any of their names.

  I am either a coward, or experiencing the same final thoughts they did, he realized. I do not want to die. This was a stupid idea.

  A spider landed on the hood, pressing the front wheels into the ground. As the Jeep slowed the spider climbed up over the front window, legs coming down into the front seat with Jack. He saw the Jeep completely surrounded now, saw the trees empty, the spiders having jumped down to join in the hunt.

  He lit the fuse. Dropped it in his lap. Looked up into the set of onyx eyes glaring down at him. Just be quick, he thought.

  And then he was being yanked from the front seat and someone was yelling in his ears: “Run! This way!”

  It was Gellis.

  ***

  It took a second for this man Jack to realize what was happening. His eyes spoke of a resolve all too common in Africa, the look of a man who’d given up, who expected his life to be meaningless, who’d accepted an unnecessary fate. Gellis hated that look, especially how it characterized his wife these days. She’d never fully recovered from her trauma, and despite his words of love and his assurances he would protect her with his life from here on out, she never relinquished that look of lost hope.

  He was not going to let this American suffer the same fate when it was worth the risk of trying to get away alive.

  They were running now, weaving between a forest of hairy spider legs. Gellis hefted a broken tree branch, swung it like a bat at the approaching spiders. He heard the joints crack on the foreleg of one, the eye pop on another. Behind them he heard the sounds of clicking fangs on the Jeep’s metal frame. The engine coughed and sputtered, spiders tipping the vehicle over onto its back now.

  “The dynamite,” Jack said. “The radius. It’ll kill us.”

  “Then run faster, friend.” He shoved Jack sideways as a spider came crashing to the ground in between them. It was up and jumping again toward the Jeep. In the rush of so many beasts, Jack and Gellis were hidden amongst the sea of legs. But dodging them was not easy. Gellis ran smack into one, the hairs jabbing his skin, the impact knocking him back as if he’d run into a wall. This time Jack was lifting him up, repaying the favor, and once again they ran for all they were worth, Gellis swinging his makeshift club to clear a way.

  “We’re not gonna make it,” the American said. “There’re too many. They’ll get us. And the dynamite-“

  Gellis grabbed him, shoved him forward as a dozen spiders catapulted over them.

  Through the creatures bodies he could see Janet and the other American, running with that local guide, all headed toward the ranger trail. They disappeared into the tall grass for a moment, then reemerged, running for safety. If nothing else, Gellis thought, at least they would get away, perhaps make it to an outpost and radio for help. Whether he and Jack would get that far was anyone’s guess. But he wasn’t going to give up. Not now, not after making it this far.

  “Hey, Gellis? Gellis!”

  “What?” His breath was ragged. He could barely speak. What did this American want? They needed to shut up and run, conserve energy.

  “Duck!”

  Gellis felt Jack’s arms around him, driving him to the ground. They landed with a forceful impact that made his insides feel like they were shattering. The tall grass folded in over them, and as Gellis rolled onto his back and looked up past Jack’s bruised face, he saw a perfect star of legs pass over him, leaping so gracefully he was almost reverent enough to acknowledge that perhaps these creatures were gods of some sort.

  And then the Jeep exploded.

  The fireball lit up the trees and water, turned the grass bright orange, whipping out lashes of flame as engine oil and gasoline arced through the air. Even in the daylight, the flash was blinding, the sound deafening. The concussion wave slammed into Gellis and Jack and drove them through the weeds like they were work plows. Jagged spears of Jeep metal shot into the ground around them, hot glass fell like embers on their legs. A tire shot by Jack’s head so fast if it had been an inch to the left he would be nothing but a bloody neck.

  Then the spider parts began to rain down. Legs and bits of abdomen fell out of the sky and landed in wet splats all around them. Half of a spider’s head hit Gellis in the arm, the brains charred black, and he shoved it aside before the fangs could accidentally pierce him. A yellow and gray striped thorax hit Jack square in the back and pinned him to the ground. Gellis pulled it off, keeping his head shielded from the falling debris.

  “Are you okay?” He shook Jack to make sure the man was conscious.

  Jack rubbed his back, winced. “You get the number of that truck?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Bad American joke. Yeah, I’m peachy.”

  “Stay low. I think we can make it to the trail now, friend. It’s time to get out of here.”

  “I’m right there with you. An
d hey, thanks for pulling me out. I would have never made it by myself. And truthfully, I didn’t want to stay there. The radio didn’t even work.”

  “You are brave. You hide it in your humor because you do not like compliments.”

  “You double as a therapist or something?”

  “I think you deserve to stay around to prove your bravery some more.”

  “You’re a good guy, Gellis. You’re gonna make some lady very lucky.”

  If only this American knew how hard it was to make his wife happy these days. He said nothing and began crawling toward the trail.

  ***

  Derek stopped running when he heard the sound of the explosion, felt his stomach ache. Vomit bubbled at the base of his throat but he swallowed it back down. That was that, Jack was dead.

  He watched as debris floated to the ground near the river. Spider parts flip flopping through the air. A column of swirling black smoke and fire carved upwards towards the clouds.

  “We have to keep moving.” Janet gave him a gentle shove. “Don’t think about it right now, just keep moving.”

  “I can’t believe he actually did it. It doesn’t make me feel like a very good person.”

  “He did it so we’d get out so let’s not bloody well screw that up. C’mon.”

  Banga was suddenly beside him, head hung low, a frown of sadness curled tight. “I am sorry for your friend. I like him a lot. I will pray for him always.”

  “We all will,” Janet said. “But later. Right now we have to move. Quickly, into the path.”

  He let her shove him forward and found his stride again, doing his best to shut out the sudden sense of loss welling inside. Jack hadn’t deserved to die over this. But they’d all be dead if he hadn’t sacrificed himself. What was worse, Derek wondered, sacrificing yourself for someone, or living with the guilt of knowing you let someone else die for you?

  He would make sure the whole world knew of Jack’s heroism, even if he had to write the damn story himself.

  They emerged from the tall grass and stood at the edge of the ranger trail.