To Walk

Pain

Helloooo!!! This next chapter is where two different story arcs meet yet again...

Hope you all like it! Vote and comment so I know who's reading and all that.

Enjoy!

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RECAP
HIS POV

          Before I could stop myself, see how foolish I was being, I ported myself into the spider chamber, staying hidden on a ledge. Kneeling, I scanned the disgusting mass of chaos and hairy arachnids.

          A pale form, curled up and guarded by five elite spiders, caught my eye.

          She was in a sorry condition, and her heartbeat was thready and weak. I could feel where her blood was and barred my teeth when I sensed it coated the under-queen's fangs.

          Frowning, I focused on the under-queen. She was behaving strangely. I could sense its distress. It was sick, that much was obvious, and it was using the human in a desperate gamble to get better.

          Growling again, I stood. Using human blood would do it no good. She would die. Soon.

          And not by the sickness.

END OF RECAP

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Ava Woods' POV

          Cold darkness wrapped me in a clammy embrace. My head pounded for unknown reasons, the constant screeching of the arachnids only increasing the pain. I was nauseous, my stomach felt abnormally hot compared to the freezing cold that claimed the rest of my aching body. How long have I been down here?

          Shuddering, I forced my eyes open yet again, though it would hardly make a difference. I could only just make out the eyes of hundreds of spiders crawling, ever crawling. My stomach clenched suddenly and my mouth shot open, a silent scream issuing from my throat. Agony blossomed and flowed through my torso in sharp pangs, and no matter what I did to relax, to ease the pain, my muscles locked up in response to the fire, making me shiver constantly.

          Tears streamed down my face as the wave of pain abated, if only by a little. I coughed, feeling something warm slip down the side of my cheek. Blood.

          'N-Notch...why...why me...?' I silently prayed, begging for him to come and relieve me of this terror, this agony.

          Even if death were the only way.

          I shuddered as my mind drifted back to when I'd first arrived in this disgusting place...when the bigger spider had sunk its fangs into my stomach. How long I had laid there, writhing under the horrid fangs, the pain they had caused, feeling my warmth, my very blood get sucked away from me...I do not know... It was like death...slow...painful...terrifying.

          It had happened twice more since my arrival. In the same places. How was I even still alive? My stomach was always sick and churning, unnaturally hot and twitching oddly in random places. No water made my throat dry and sore. I wondered what would become of me if the big spider-queen-thing got better before I died.

          Would I be eaten? Nearly every other spider seemed desperate to get at me, even my own 'guards'. Attacks would happen at random, but every attempt shook me to the core, made me wonder if I were in my final moments.