Salticidae (5 page)

Ricky shook with fear as he
lay beneath the Jeep, looking for the rest of his security crew. He saw Winston’s dead body in the legs of one of the beasts as it drew backwards into the jungle. He saw Manny Gonzales behind a tree, firing at a giant spider, its fangs sunken into a worker’s face, no doubt injecting its poison. The tiny miner was still alive, screaming and beating the furry beast as Manny’s bullets tore into the spider’s abdomen. It burst open with green goo but the man was now spitting up blood and something else, something yellow, as the arachnid’s poison burned away his insides.

“Manny! Over here.” Ricky waved him toward the Jeep.
“Hurry!” Manny stepped from behind the tree, running toward Ricky in combat formation with his gun up to his shoulder, knees crouched to make himself a smaller target, but was cut off as one of the massive spiders charged into his path. Manny stopped, his mouth agape. He raised his gun to fire but the spider was lightning fast, racing toward him and snaring him in a death grip before he could pull the trigger.

Ricky aimed to fire
as well, to save his squad mate, when something incredibly large landed atop the Jeep and started beating its legs against the windshield. The undercarriage of the Jeep smacked into Ricky’s head as the creature scuttled around on top. To avoid being crushed as the Jeep sank down farther, Ricky slid out into the open and rolled into a ball, coming up with his gun trained on the giant spider above him.

It spun in a three-sixty
, following the madness all around it. The way it moved struck Ricky for a moment. It looked like it was on a rotating disc. Whenever another spider or terrified miner raced by it, it twirled to follow the movement. It doesn’t move its head, Ricky noted, but rather its whole body. Spinning fast like a record.

Now it was facing away from him, focused on a
frightened miner trying desperately to climb up a tree to hide. The spider was so still, just watching, getting ready to pounce.

Ricky raised his weapon, aimed
it at the giant spider’s back.

But then he noticed something else. The
two black orbs on the back of the spider’s head.

You’ve got to be kidding me, he
thought. It can see behind it! And to prove him right, the spider spun one hundred and eighty degrees in the blink of an eye, and leapt. Ricky pulled the trigger, but it was too late. Two thick fangs burst through his ribs, piercing his lungs, filling his insides with a fiery liquid that made him pray for death.

***

Shumba
wrapped his legs around the tree trunk and shimmied up with ease. The bees zoomed around his head but he was careful not to make any sudden movements, just as his father had shown him. He slid his hand inside the nest, ignoring the thousands of little legs walking on his skin, tickling him like static electricity, and extracted a clump of honey. He put this in the liana-woven pouch hanging off his belt loop and reached back in for more.

When
the pouch was full, he slid back down the trunk, respectful and cautious of the now agitated bees, and found his bearings. He stopped once more at the edge of the cliff and looked out toward where he’d seen the red flare. He should go back to the village now and tell what he’d seen. But he wasn’t sure exactly what had jumped out from the cliff. It had been big and black and looked like some sort of animal, but he was sure it hadn’t been a panther or one of the mountain gorillas. From this high up, the jump would kill both of them. And what of the human parts that had been hanging under it? Was he even sure he’d seen a human?

His father would know. Or the village elder. Someone would be able to make sense of it.

He swung back out over the ravine again and landed back on the other side, near the tree with the monkey face.

He looked back once, to memorize where he’d seen the red star falling. He h
ad it now. Near the waterfall on the tall mountain they called the Old Man.

T
hen he felt a scream rising in his throat. Because a dozen more giant black creatures suddenly leapt out over the cliff, eight legs splayed outward as they fell through the canopy below. Then they were all gone. This time he knew what he’d seen, impossible as it may be.

Flat-faced and familiar
, it was a type of arachnid he saw every day in the jungle. Only these were many times larger than they should be. Giant jumping spiders.

H
e had only a poor boy’s education about such arachnids from playing with them in his home, but he was aware of their tenacity. They were hunters, predators. They did not run away from humans, but rather approached them with a curious nature. They were fast, and could follow a prey’s movement from some distance.

How could they be so big? It was
impossible. But he’d seen it, and he needed to tell his father immediately. Because if those spiders were out there, people were going to be in big trouble. And here in the wild, there was a code among the tribes.

***

The caterpillar cocoon came out of nowhere and engulfed Jack’s face. He screamed like a little girl and ripped the silken shroud off with flailing arms.

“You could have told me about that!”

Derek doubled over in laughter. “Honestly, I didn’t see it. Keep your head up as you walk, idiot. We’re in the jungle.”

Jack felt like thousands of insects were
now crawling around inside his shirt. “Oh my God, are they on me? Am I covered in bugs? Get ‘em off!”

“You know, you’re right, you should have gone to Europe.”

“I should have gone to Cancun and done a story on fish tacos and fucked the maids at the resorts.”

Ahead of them, Banga was climb
ing over a collection of roots so thick and tall they may as well have been a schoolyard jungle gym. He slowed and regarded his clients with a hint of paternal admonishment. “We should be quiet. Sometimes gorillas come down here.”

“
What? Gorillas? Seriously?” Jack asked, no longer concerned with the webbing on his face. “As in big muscular apes that can tear us limb from limb? Those gorillas? Down here?”

“Yes. Sometimes. But not often. They
no like humans and most of time stay hidden. But if you are loud they may think you are a threat.”

Derek
stopped laughing, pointed at Jack. “I don’t care if you walk into a web or catch on fire, dude, keep your distress silent. I don’t need an anal raping from Koko.”

Jack pushed past Derek, climbed the roots and follo
wed Banga deeper into the wet jungle. “Koko was a female, dumbass.”

They continued over the roots, past
trees wound together in helixes. Jack checked his cellphone again for good measure but still got no signal. “Nothing,” he said.

Derek shook his head.
“Der. Ya think? Put that thing away, man, there’re no towers out here.”

They emerged into a small clearing where
the canopy opened overhead. Here, they could see the mountain with the falls getting closer.

Derek took out his camera and snapped a picture of a green tree snake coiled in the branches above their head
s. Jack watched it with caution. It was a tiny snake, thank God.

“That poisonous?” Derek looked to Banga for some education.

“Don’t know. If it bites you and you feel sick, then I say yes.”

And they said the locals had no sense of humor, Jack thought.

In the air in front of the falls, the red contrail from the flare was still dissipating. And now Jack was sure he heard the sound of gun shots coming from up there as well. It made the hairs on his arms stand up. Maybe it was rebels or poachers after all.

“You hear that?”

Derek nodded. “Hell yeah, man. That’s fucking gunfire and it doesn’t sound good. Fucking poachers or something. Banga, do the gorillas live up there too?”

The guide’s face was stony, perhaps even worried. “They can be anywhere they want to be. They are in charge of their own territory.”

“Perfect. Just want I needed to hear.”

Am I really going after this story, Jack thought, noticing for the umpteenth time how alone they were way out in this alien realm of hungry animals and labyrinthine
trees. What if we get there and find gorillas feasting on poacher remains. Would they shoot the apes if it meant escaping unharmed? He was pretty sure that was illegal.

“I hear screaming,” Derek said. His hands balled into fists by his side. “I gotta say I don’t like this plan anymore.”

Jack had to agree. “Yeah. Me either. Maybe we
should
go back to the village and call the rangers.”

“I’d like to think you mean that
, Jack. But I can tell you’re not going to, are you? Even if we start to head back, even if I try to drag you, at some point you’re gonna want to come back.”

“Is it that obvious?”

“A bit. I’ve gone on expeditions with your kind of writer before. You smell a story, and you want it. Even though we’re hearing guns and screams and Koko might be up there looking for a date. But I guess I’ll ask for the sake of making it official: do you seriously want to go back or keep going?”

Ahead of them, Banga sat on a root and checked the safety on his rifle.
He wasn’t humming anymore. Over the last couple of days Jack had come to take the guide’s bouts of silence as a sense of alertness; the man was always listening to the trees around them. And that was fine with Jack. That’s what he was paying the man for. His familiarity with the unfamiliar.

“Well?” Derek asked.

Jack thought hard about his decision. He knew if he took one more step he’d be committed to this journey. It would be a step over rational logic. They’d pretty much already passed the point of no return, being closer to the mountain and waterfall than the village, but he knew that was only a minor detail. They could go back without an issue. Problem was he’d hate himself for giving into fear rather than satisfying his journalistic instinct. Bottom line was: stories on mushrooms paid the bills, but guerilla warfare and/or illegal poaching was how you got respect. “Fuck it. I’ll just wonder what we’re missing all the way back and drive you nuts.”

“I knew it. Mr. fucking Al
lan Quatermain over here. What if I start back myself?”

“I can’t stop you. But it’ll be just you. Banga seems
to have a curiosity as well.”

“
You guys are idiots. I mean really. Godammit. Okay, well if we’re doing this then we should check our supplies before going up there. I want to know where I stand with everything that could save my life.” Derek withdrew a water purification tablet from his pack. “Banga, is there a place we can fill our canteens?”

The guide slung his rifle back over his shoulder and stood up. “The water from the mountain
empties into a small river. It should wind somewhere close by. I will do my best to find it.”

“How will you do that?”

“Simple. Follow the sounds of the animals. They are always thirsty.”

With a shrug, Derek resumed wa
lking. “Fuckin-A, let’s go join the tea party, gang.”

***

The local tribes had many names for the large
hippopotamus. In their native languages, they referred to him as The Chief, The King, The Beast, and even The Gray Warrior, but almost everyone knew him as Big Death. The massive bull weighed nearly three tons, was over forty years old and ruled a harem of over thirty cows. Over the years he’d been attributed to some fifteen human deaths, the most recent a village boy who’d strayed too close to the river just four months ago. But of the other fourteen, his murders solely involved poachers and illegal fishers. He would tip their riverboats over with his mammoth head, spilling the occupants into the water, and charge along the river floor, engulfing the humans in his massive jaws and breaking them in half. The natives, aware of the illegalities these victims were engaged in, did not see it necessary to bother trying to remove the bull. They knew this was his section of the river, and they let him have it.

Park rangers
rarely made an effort to report these murders to the park committee, the government, or the Associated Press. They were well aware of the aggression of Big Death, and had clocked him at a running speed of twenty-seven miles per hour. They’d witnessed him chase down and ram into the trucks of murderous poachers on several occasions. As far as the rangers were concerned, Big Death was doing them a favor.

To punctuate his reign as judge and jury of this part of the river, Big Death was covered in a lifetime of scars. Each jagged raised ridge was testament to a battle he’d won over other bulls encroaching on his territory.
Many had tried to fight for leadership of the harem over the years, but Big Death was not yet ready to give up what was his. And though to observers he merely appeared to spend his days lazing in the shallows of the river, he was in fact constantly aware of all the nearby young males who watched him with a false sense of ambivalence.