Spider-Bots Rising

Chapter Eighteen: A Shadow of Doubt

Chuck was going to be okay. He was still weak, but he was awake now, and talking. He was talking a lot. Everyone took this to be a good sign. They propped him up against the cave wall so he could sit up.

"So what happened?" Chuck asked excitedly, looking around at everyone. "How did we get outta there? How did we beat 'em? Did we take down the Web? Are we hometown heroes yet?"

Abby and Nigel began filling him in on what had happened.

"Well after you dove right into that sea of spider-bots–" Nigel began.

"To save m-me!" Abby interrupted.

"Yes, right. Well, after that the Dreamseeker went running after you. Then this gigantic spider-bot named Ararack came crawling down–"

"He was huge!" Abby chimed.

The Dreamseeker didn't feel like going over it all again. She left the others to explain and walked over to the mouth of the cave. She stared out into the pouring rain.

She was relieved that Chuck was okay. She was so grateful. But she also felt guilty, and scared.

What if something terrible had happened to Chuck? she thought. What if he hadn't woken up again? And Abby, too. I let her go down into that swarm all by herself! She could have been killed!

A shiver ran down her spine at the thought of it. Lightning flashed outside.

Maybe it is finally time to give up and go home. How can we move forward from here? We don't know how to get into the orb. And even if we did, how are we going to fight off Queen Arachni and all the bots under her control? And if we did fight them off, how will we shut down the Dark Web?

With all these questions swirling around in her head, the Dreamseeker felt hopeless. She pulled the compass out of her pocket, hoping for a clue. But the compass didn't show her anything. It sat dull and lifeless in her hand.

Nigel and Abby continued chattering to Chuck behind her.

"And all that imaginanium the bots were carrying in," Nigel said. "It was enough to power all of The Center three times over!"

"I-Imaginanium," Abby said. "Imagine. Nanium. Image. Many. Many imaginanium. So much m-m-much imaginanium."

"Um... right," Nigel said. "There was lots of it."

The Dreamseeker stared down at the compass. She felt more frustrated than ever. Why couldn't she understand how it worked? Maybe if she could just get it to work for her she would be able to get them out of this mess. But it just sat there in her hand. She had a sudden urge to throw it out into the rain.

Suddenly Nigel called out from over her shoulder. "Abby! What are you doing?"

The Dreamseeker turned around to see Abby standing very still just behind her. Her eyes were locked on the Dreamseeker, but they were dim and flat. They didn't seem to recognize her at all.

Then Abby's red sensors began glowing brighter and brighter. Her gaze was locked on the Dreamseeker.

"Abby, what–" the Dreamseeker said.

"Lasers. Activate."