Arachnids on an ACPB, part 13

*62 hours from port*

"Nav!"

The desperate cry stopped Nav in her tracks, and she peered into the galley. "Woah. Wow." The floor was a sea of brown bodies and hairy legs, as hundreds of spiders crawled over and around one another.

"Little help?"

Nav looked all around the galley, unable to find the owner of the nervous voice. "Bomber?"

"Up. Left."

"What are you doing up there?"

"What do you think I'm doing up here?"

Bomber was perched precariously on the side of the bench. Her left hand was gripping the closest cupboard as she struggled to keep her balance, her right brandishing a frypan at the arachnids trying to climb up towards her. At that moment, a Stripy broke free of the group and started scaling the sink. Bomber promptly flattened it.

"Hmph," Nav muttered, glaring at the remains of the spider. "How'd you get so many friends, anyway?"

Quickly assessing her possible answers, Bomber replied, "Well, I decided that you were right, and I needed to try befriending them. So I gave them some food. But now there's too many and they're coming after me."

Nav stared at her flatly. "I'd like to believe that, Bomber. But I can't imagine that you willingly fed them, after you spent all morning working out bizarre new ways of killing them."

"Well, you explain how I got them all into the galley," Bomber said primly.

With a perplexed frown, Nav looked around the floor. There was a dull thud as Bomber obliterated another Stripy with the frying pan. Then she noticed something... odd.

"Bomber?"

"Yes?"

"That one's not moving." Nav pointed one finger into the galley and, after a moment, Bomber was able to discern the still corpse of a Boblet.

"Yes," she hissed. "Took you long enough, you stupid –" She froze at the look on Nav's face.

"You poisoned them."

"Maybe... yes... just a little bit." Nav's nostrils flared. "Nav, please. Berate me about it later. Right now – hey, no! Nav! Ma'am!"

Open mouthed, Bomber watched the officer walk away. She couldn't remain dumbfounded for long, however; more and more of the writhing mass was stilling, but those that weren't were looking for a way up.

***

They stood back-to-back, weapons raised. They were surrounded, and there wasn't even the slightest chance of fighting their way out. But they wouldn't give in.

"It's been a pleasure serving under you, sir," Kate said grimly. All the spiders she could see clicked their fangs together, apparently laughing at the predicament of the humans.

"And I love working above you," Mike replied, a smirk touching his lips.

Kate rolled her eyes, then swallowed. "Let's go down fighting," she snarled, and the spiders laughed again.

"Yep. We're taking as many of these bastards with us as we can. But first..." He swung around to face her, his deep blue eyes glinting passionately. "I want to kiss you."

She blinked. Well, why not?

"Kate?"

"I want to kiss you, too," she murmured, leaning forwards.

There was the briefest touch of soft skin against her lips; then she heard a startled, "Ma'am?"

She blinked, frowned. Swain stared into her face, one eye flickering with a strange brightness. Oh no, that wasn't his eye... a torch. She squinted, shoving the bright light away from her face.

"What?" she asked, pushing herself up. She was in the bridge, on her back, Swain leaning over her. The last thing she remembered was Mike saving her from the massive Stripy... well, not saving her. She could have dealt with it. But, as it was...

"You fainted," Swain informed her.

"No," she retorted. A nearby snort alerted her to the presence of the captain. "When? Why?"

"I brought you up here to see Swain after I saved you from the Stripy," Mike said helpfully.

She glared. "You didn't save me."

"Alright. I arrived in time to see you singlehandedly take on three approaching arachnids, then you collapsed."

"Probably exhaustion," Swain said, answering before she could ask the question. "Because of the early morning watch, you've been up since 0400 this morning. That's fourteen hours with no rest and no food."

Sitting up, she pushed a hand to her forehead and muttered a denial. "Everyone's in the same boat, literally. And I've had longer shifts, before..."

"Maybe you're coming down with something," Mike suggested, voice low with concern. He quickly stepped forward, resting the back of one hand against her cheek.

She promptly pushed him away, lifting herself to her feet. Swain opened a mouth to protest, but she spoke first. "The ship is infested with spiders, and the XO gets sick. Not happening."

"Ma'am, you should really take it easy..." Swain insisted. "Now, any double vision? Nausea? Dizziness?"

Kate was unable to fix a glare to her face, so moved her hands to cover her eyes. "Headache."

"Felt unwell recently?"

"No."

"Not a spider bite, is it?" Mike asked dubiously, one eye on Kate and the other aimed out the front of the bridge.

"Are there any points of excruciating pain?" Swain checked. Sighing, Kate shook her head. "Any chance that you could be pregnant?"

"No!"

There was a moment of silence. Swain and Kate each raised an eyebrow at the captain, who grimaced, and looked as if he would rather be facing the entire force of spiders alone and unarmed.

"I think he was asking me," Kate said eventually. Mike looked down. "And no."

At that moment ET burst into the bridge, grinning. "Comcen's clear," he announced. Then caught sight of the trio's faces and hesitated. "I, uhm... you can try sending an email now."

The awkward silence stretched out for a few more moments, before Mike cleared his throat. "ET, the X fainted. How about you go get some water."

"Yes, boss," ET replied immediately, relieved to be given an escape route. Nearby, Kate sat down on the closest table, once again glaring at the word 'fainted'.

"Leave the Spidacide," Mike instructed as ET turned to leave. "I'll need it." Nodding, ET carefully detached himself from the tank, and placed it on the floor; the mask had long since disappeared. After he had left, Mike continued. "I'm going to get back to clearing out the cabins. I'll do yours next, X, and then you can get some sleep. In the meantime, you and Swain take the ship, keep us heading for port."

Kate's first reaction was to snap back that she didn't need sleep. The headache chose that moment to pound painfully and, with a sigh, she bit back the words. "Where'd Charge go?" she asked instead, for the first time realising the engineer was no longer in the bridge.

"Went to check that the spiders weren't returning to the engine room," Swain replied, moving to sit at the helm. "He said he'd look in on the austere boys while he was down there."

***

Halfway down the stairs, ET paused. Water. Galley. Oh... spiders. Grimacing, he moved forwards. There would probably only be a few, and he could easily squish them... if only the boss hadn't taken his Spidacide...

"ET! Help!"

He frowned, tried to see where the high pitched voice was coming from. "Bomber?"

"I'm on the bench at the end," she called, and he moved towards the galley door.

Looking inside, he stopped, aghast. "Bomber?" he repeated, unable to take his gaze away from the hulking mass of spiders. There had to be hundreds, possibly even a thousand.

"Help, please?" Finally lifting his gaze, he saw her crouched on the bench halfway along the length of the galley. Apart from the spiders on the floor – some of which, he now noticed, weren't moving – there were also over a dozen beginning to make their way up towards Bomber. Even though it was easy to dispatch a spider or even several as they approached, sheer numbers would soon overwhelm her.

"What the hell happened, Bomb?"

"Fabulous invention called Spidacide two-point-oh," she replied, using a rather dented frypan to flatten an approaching Boblet. "Help me out of here and I'll tell you all about it."

"Any suggestions?" he asked, absently shoving away a Stripy which had decided to check out the new arrival. "Maybe they'll go away..."

"Some might," Bomber growled. "But not enough."

"Okay, okay... I'll think of something..."

"I don't have time for you to stand there thinking!"

"This many of them... we need something... grenade!"

"No, no, ET! ET!" It was too late. As soon as the thought of a small round explosive device entered his head, ET was gone. "You can't use a grenade without blowing me up!" Bomber hissed after him, and viciously decapitated the next arachnid to come her way.

***

It wasn't until he was in the armoury that ET realised he needed a key for the gun cabinet. By the time the thought had fully penetrated his mind, however, his hand was already on the door, and it was... swinging open. He frowned. Hadn't he locked it earlier? No, Nav had locked it. Or not, obviously...

Choosing not to look this gift horse in the mouth, he eagerly looked for the remaining grenade. And found the horse decidedly toothless. There were guns – but they wouldn't help. Or would they? He pondered for a moment before dismissing the notion. Loading a gun would be just asking for trouble.

But that didn't solve his – and Bomber's – problem. Hurry! he told himself sharply. There was nothing here, so he needed a new plan – and fast.

Look at the problem. Okay. Many spiders which all needed to be killed. He needed a WMSD. An explosive WMSD. But there was no grenade. So make one. With what? Fuel? Could he somehow get fuel from the engines and set it on fire... No, they needed the fuel.

Think! he commanded himself. His brain felt like sludge, he needed something to... The answer came to him in a flash of genius. Turning on his heel, he ran back towards the galley.

"Bomber!" he called as he approached.

"Please tell me you have an idea," she muttered. Several dozen spiders were now scaling the bench, and Bomber was clearly flat-out keeping them away.

"Can you reach into the fridge from there?"

"I can try, what for?"

"I need beer."

***

Satisfied with his inspection of the engines, Charge knocked on the door to austere. "How you boys doing in there?" he called, unable to hide the amusement in his voice.

"We're good," came RO's muffled voice. "Are the spiders gone yet?"

"Well, they seem to be avoiding the engine room." He paused for a moment. "Can you open the door?"

"Why?" RO asked cynically.

"I need to get into aft steering and check that everything's on track in there."

In the short silence that followed, Charge could almost hear the austere boys considering the problem. He didn't need to check the steering any more than he needed to check what the walls were made of... but he was hoping they didn't know that.

In his pocket, a small Stripy resumed wiggling furiously, looking for a way out of its prison. And then the door to austere began to open.