Another Night in the Heap

  At first, I could only see darkness when I came to. This was certainly worth a little panic but I willed myself to keep calm and think. My head throbbed, which didn't help. This whole remembering thing was proving a challenge. While I was struggling to think, though, my corneas were doing their thing. They gathered what meager rays of light they could collect and passed this to my retinas. Those cells converted that light energy into electrical energy, which my brain interpreted as a small, fuzzy dot of light, either very tiny or very far away. I stopped wracking my brain for a moment and focused intently on that first nibble of light. What have we here? I blinked and there were a couple more. They weren't there and then they were. Finally, I got it. Hello, stars!

I wasn't blind, which was good. I was still alive, which was even better. Giving up on the memory thing, for now, I tried to get up. I couldn't move and the stars were not providing enough light to really see where I was yet. This downgraded my situation from even better, past good, all the way down to panic again.

I felt pain every time I tried to move but nowhere else. A broken spine would cut off pain signals from my nerves in that way, but I could still feel humid air between my fingers as I waved them about. This head pain felt like maybe a wound had bled out and crusted to the floor. I gritted my teeth, straining to peel my head up, but no matter how I twisted, I still seemed stuck. After each exertion, I noticed my whole body bobbed a few times, as if I was floating in water. I definitely wasn't in water, so this was pretty damn peculiar.

My eyes kept doing their thing, though, and, with the help of the stars above, I could finally see the outline of my body and hands. A few contortions and mental calculations later, I could see the issue. I was suspended in the air on a sticky white net over a trench or pit of some kind. There seemed to be a further insubstantial structure above me, maybe more netting I couldn't see yet. The milky lines I could see reminded me of the clear fiber optic cables running through every nook and cranny of Chronoss. I wasn't paralyzed, which was good, but being stuck to a web was only just slightly better.

The strands had a little spring to them. I had some freedom of movement as long as I had the strength and the moment I stopped straining, I would bounce back to my original position. Feeling more confident about the rules of this game, I muscled my body into a temporary position where I could fish my stylus out of my pocket.

This was my largest maneuver yet and, as I relaxed, my legs sprung back to their original position with some serious force. I could feel the reverberation hum through the web and I made a mental note to move as little as possible while I figured this out. I hoped someone had made this web to be helpful but that seemed doubtful. I deliberately cut off my musings there. That line of thinking was not going to help with this current puzzle.

My stylus was an older artifact, from a time when you still need physical objects to interact with the World-Weave. I could have sold it for some serious digits, but things this old tended to be handy in my line of work. I clicked the blunt end and the pointed tip warmed to a soft yellow glow. I dialed the end nub awkwardly with my thumb, careful not to drop the thing, and the intensity increased enough that I could finally get a good look around me.

I saw Krauser's corpse suspended a few meters from me. Even though my head still throbbed, I did not have trouble remembering anymore after that. I remembered all of it: things getting messed up topside, the Spooks coming at me, my mad dash, Krauser following and yelling something right before we hit the edge. Thinking now, I still could not recall his exact words but the tone and urgency had definitely been a warning. I had gotten my bearings mixed up and ran us off a cliff. Now Krauser was dead and I was alive. He was kind of a prick, always looking at my ass, but he didn't deserve this.

Judging from the unnatural angle of his head and limbs, I guessed he had slammed into one or more beams on our way down. Stretching up above us was a large irregular lattice of metal tubes and beams. It was a ramshackle three-dimensional grid that stretched upwards as far as I could see. The web seemed to be hanging below this, suspended out over another big drop. The stylus wasn't able to pierce that darkness below.

Examining the depth and density of the metallic gridwork above, I really couldn't see what trajectory had gotten me through unscathed. I remembered the end of my fall now. The web must be extremely strong and extremely sticky. It checked my fall and I remained fixed to it even when I bounced back up. This change of direction was what knocked me out. I went from falling down to falling up in just two seconds and blacked out from the g-forces. I would have bounced several more times before finally coming to a rest. My brain felt sloshed because it literally had been sloshed.

I kept exploring with the stylus and I could see our pursuers, the Spooks, had followed us over the edge. They were pretty dumb like that. Like Krauser, their humanoid forms were similarly splayed out and suspended at horrific angles. This sort of damage would not normally keep them down for long but the Weave was pretty well tangled down here. I did see an occasional twitch but they would never have the bandwidth to fully reconfigure. I didn't have to worry about these ones. They were no longer a threat to anybody.

I had to assume whoever or whatever had made the web was long gone. I examined the gridwork above and the stars beyond. I could definitely climb the metal. I might be able to get a connection at the top. If not, I'd just have to work my way up the cliff and reconnect with the crew. You got this, girl.

With a grunt, I transferred the stylus to my mouth. The strain and release caused me to bob up and down on the web again. This was my biggest move yet and with my head pulled upwards as far as I could bear, I came quite close to the gridwork at the height of my rise. I started rocking my body up and down deliberately, getting progressively closer to a bar. I finally got a grip on a beam with my right hand and held firm against the rebound. With my other hand, I worked free my cutter, a ridiculous serrated blade nearly twenty centimeters long, and started cutting away my fatigues where they were stuck to the filament. The blade was way too big for this job but, thankfully, it was sharp. I had it just for looks. This may have been the first time I used it for anything. If a Spook, Crawler, or something else got close enough that you could actually cut them, you'd be screwed anyway.

As I worked a leg free, I swung it over the beam I was hanging from. The second leg followed. I hacked through my plaits, freeing my head. I think I had to cut through some skin as I noticed some blood on the blade after that. I kept my chin up as I worked through the mental mechanics of cutting my torso and arms free. After a moment, I sheathed the blade, unzipped my jacket, and slid out completely onto the beam. I am a genius if you forget about the jumping off cliffs part.

Perched with all four limbs on the beam, looking down, I had a new perspective. I looked at Krauser again. He would probably have made a comment about my tank top. That train of thought ended abruptly when some movement caught my eye. Something was working its way towards me through the gridwork.

Naturally, it resembled a spider. This one was the size of a small car. It had eight huge shiny eyes set very orderly in two rows of four. At this distance, maybe twenty meters, I could not tell whether it was a biological or a mechanical menace. If it was eating Spooks, it would be well on its way to the latter even if it appeared the former. It didn't matter too much either way if something was already eating you but they would respond to pain, fear, and frustration in different ways. I desperately wanted to dial down the light but this gal (something about her gave me a motherly vibe) seemed at home in the dark. I cranked the illumination up to max instead and waved it as aggressively as one can wave a short twig.

It did not seem like my sorcerous gesticulations had any effect as the spider continued scuttling towards me. I could see it was mostly legs now. The core body was maybe a meter in diameter. The pitch of that body and those unblinking eyes did not change as her legs pulled her through the gridwork.

I popped the stylus back in my mouth and reached for my pistol. The holster was empty. I must have lost the old hand cannon in the fall. That would set me back quite a few digits. I still had my cutter but it did not seem so big anymore. I looked back down to Krauser, totally decked out in his combat gear. His assault weapon, secured both by a strap around his body and a sticky strand of filament, lay next to him. I glanced back towards my new gal pal and confirmed that, yes, she was not interested in the Spook buffet.

It was time to move. I started climbing horizontally towards Krauser as best I could. Given the layout of beams, I could not move directly towards him. I had to circle around a gap first to get within reach of his weapon. I slipped on my third step, putting a boot directly onto the web. My body sagged unexpectedly as it gave under my weight. I had been holding a bar overhead and was able to keep from plummeting over face first. I steadied myself, grabbed a fistful of bootstrings with my free hand, and yanked hard. I freed my foot of both boot and sock on the second try.

Regaining my balance on the cold steel, I looked back to see the big girl closing. Her overall bulk seemed to impede her progress but I still wasn't going to have enough time to go all the way around. I pulled out the strings on my other boot, loosened the tongue, and took a big step with that foot directly on to a strand across the gap. Having experienced it once already, I compensated for the dip and my second step was a barefoot directly onto Krauser's chest. I pulled my foot out of the trapped boot onto a beam on my third step, keeping my sock this time. This put me directly next to Krauser and his weapon.

I squatted down and leaned over as far as I could with one hand still wrapped around a metal pole. I just barely got a grip on the stock. I pulled it a little closer, got a better grip, and braced myself against the bar for the pull of a lifetime. I heaved with all my might but the web would not let go of its prize.

My hand slipped and the sudden removal of that anchor spun me backward. I flexed my arm around the support pole even harder as I twisted back, cracking my knuckles on an adjacent bar. I bit down hard on the stylus and painstakingly contorted myself back to my original squatting position.

My fangirl was just on the other side of the gap now, where I was a moment ago. I could see her fangs under that double row of eyes. They didn't seem that big. At least she wouldn't be able to swallow me in one go. She'd have to take little bites out of me. Or was she a bloodsucker? One of her legs tentatively bridged the gap. And then another. She started to wiggle her booty. I decided that confirmed my gender hypothesis.

I reached for my cutter, remembered my earlier wisdom, and fell sideways instead. I dropped my body hard, too hard, down on the cold beam. My light flickered as I involuntarily crunched the stylus a second time. This beam was not really wide enough to lay on and I felt myself starting to teeter over. I checked the fall with one leg, hooking it on the pole I had been holding on to. I was in range of the assault weapon again and would try a different tactic. I held the beam with one arm and lowered myself underneath, careful not to graze the web. From this position, I extended my arm long to grab the weapon by the grip. I angled the muzzle up towards the eight-legged dancer to see the two rows of four eyes had already adjusted their trajectory to my new position. Sorry babe. I pulled the trigger.

Nothing happened. I frantically felt around for a safety, flipped something, and squeezed the trigger again as she launched herself across the gap. There was a pink flash and a familiar high pitched whine that followed filled me with glee. The spiral of darts punched completely through her, leaving huge, ragged voids. The quick succession of impacts checked her inertia almost perfectly and she hung suspended in the air momentarily. If she fell forward on to me, I was screwed. I pulled the trigger again but nothing happened. Her legs finally went limp and she toppled backward. Her body bobbed several times before nestling against the intersection of several beams and bars. The relief of sweet victory was fleeting. After several experimental tugs, I realized there was no way I could pry the weapon off the web. My head started to throb again from the hanging so I pulled myself back on top of the beam. I noticed my knuckles were swelling as I pushed up to a squat and I felt a new pain in my side as I finally got to a stand.

I looked down at my comrade.

"Kwauser."

I pulled the stylus out of my mouth.

"You beautiful bastard."

The wand flickered twice, noticeably fainter than before. I couldn't help but examine the distinctive bite marks left by my molars. I expected the value would take a hit but, with a good story, you never knew. I dialed the light down as low as it could go.

I reached out to Krauser one last time, relieving him of his sidearm. It was something a little older, cruder, and louder, but would do the job. I wanted a sock as well but the thought of first handling his caveman feet, and then sliding the moldy cotton on to my own foot, brought more revulsion than the eight-eyed nightmare that had just tried to eat me. I acknowledged him one last time with a salute from his pistol and then slid the weapon into my holster, making sure to secure the latch. I cut my pants down to shorts, decided no socks would be better than one, and started my long climb. It seemed chilly now but once I got going, I'd warm up. I can do this.

Ascending the metal lattice, I could see the stars again. They seemed brighter now but also different. Some of the constellations didn't seem right. Stars were out of place, moving. I could see the same pattern repeating itself over and over – two rows of four. I frowned. They seemed to be coming closer.