Sea of Silver Light

VO: The networks uniformly deny any collusion between writers and creators of the shows cited.

(visual: Ruy Contreras-Simons, GCN)

CONTRERAS-SIMONS: "It's a trend, sure, but it's nothing anyone has decided to do. I guess it's just in the air. . . ."

The trip down into the burrow had been horrible, the four of them carried like pieces of dead meat, which was clearly how the mutant web-builders already thought of them. Paul had fought back, but with his limbs tightly held had managed only to get himself dragged along sharp rocks and to earn a stinging blow on the head from a misshapen claw that was not quite either a hand or a hoof.

The only bit of good fortune was that they were not bound. The sticky cables remained as part of the web; the creatures had needed to drool some putrid-smelling fluid on their captives just to pull them free of it.

Several dozen of the monsters were in just this open part of the burrow where the captives had been thrown down, but Paul, his senses raw in the darkness, thought he could hear chattering voices down the side tu

The things were not human. He had to keep reminding himself of that, both to ease the horror and to keep the embers of hope smoldering. The spider-buffalos showed little or no organization, and were clearly used to prey that was either stu

Trying to decide what the things actually were, with an eye toward discovering a weakness, was little help. They were just some wild mutation of the simworld, possibly intentional—perhaps there was even a cruel joke in the way they resembled the buffalo of the American West that had been so completely and swiftly slaughtered for their hides, massacred by the thousands, ski

As if to underscore this, Paul put his hand down on something sharp. He felt around, expecting to discover another jawbone, and found instead something small, square and hard which he held up to catch the faint light. It was a rusty belt buckle, bent as though the belt itself had been torn open with great force while still fastened. Paul's stomach lurched. It was not hard to imagine these fierce, hairy creatures doing just that in their haste to make a meal of the tender flesh beneath it.

Despair swept over him like a cold rain. What could they do? Fight the monstrosities with bare hands and a belt buckle? Or take up jawbones, like Samson, to smite their enemies?

But I'm no bloody Samson, am I?

"Paul?" It was Florimel, a short distance away. "Are you there? You cried out—are you hurt?"

"Just put my hand on something." He stared up the slope at the grotesque figures moving in the half-light—probably performing the mutant equivalent of setting the table—and tried to keep the hopelessness out of his voice. "Any ideas?"

He could not see her, but he could hear her grunt of misery. "Nothing. I can barely crawl. I landed hard when we fell from the wagon."

"How are the others?"

"Martine is alive, but I think she is hurt, too—she is very quiet, talking to herself just over there. T4b . . . T4b is praying."

"Praying?" It startled him, but he could not claim to have any better ideas.

"There are so many of these monsters, and we are all so tired. I am frightened, Paul."

"I am, too."

Florimel fell into troubled silence. Paul could see no reason to make her talk. It would be one thing if they had a plan, but the situation was too bleak for peppy chats.

So it is me, then? Is it down to me to come up with something? I didn't bloody well ask to be here in this network in the first place. At least he didn't think he had—he still couldn't remember, but it would be hard to imagine: "Oh, and if you have a few spare moments, Mr. Jongleur, how about locking me up in a World War One simulation and torturing me a bit, all right?"

But why, then? He was a nobody, a museum employee, a university graduate with less power than a classroom teacher or a shop steward. If he had interfered in the raising of Jongleur's daughter, why hadn't they just fired him? If he had somehow discovered something of the Grail Project, as seemed likely, why not just kill him? Perhaps they had not wanted the irritation of arranging an accident or a suicide, but it seemed bizarre to think that people like Felix Jongleur and his associates would lavish so much attention on a nonentity.

Even if the World War One simulation had been something already built. Finch and Mullet, otherwise known as Fi

Shuddersome memories of his escape from the trenches came back to him, made worse by the similarity to his present situation. The mud, the bodies, the shattered pieces of men and their machines lying beneath his feet. . . .

A thought sparked. Paul, who had been crouching on his heels, suddenly dropped back onto all fours and crawled down the slope, feeling with his hands. It was disgusting work. Not only were the human and animal remains more common as the slope descended, but many of them had not been completely cleaned of meat, remnants perhaps from days of great feasting when all the spider-creatures ate their fill with some left over. The bleak realization struck him that he and his friends probably represented a similar bounty—that they had been unharmed so far only because they were to be the centerpiece of some grisly festival meal.

The stench near the bottom of the pit was terrible, the ground and remains alike active with small creatures taking advantage of the web-builders' generosity. Worst of all, the farther he crawled the less light he had, and he was forced to handle every collection of remains as he looked for something which might save his life and the lives of his companions.

Clambering across the rot and muck, it was hard to put the last hours of the World War One simulation out of his mind. Ava—Avialle—had appeared to him there as well, lying in a coffin like a vampire princess. "Come to us," she had said. Was she simply speaking lines the Other had given her, as Martine guessed? Trying to bring Paul and his companions together in a sort of fairy-tale-inspired rescue mission? But why? And what was Ava's part in it? Why did she pick such strange ways to contact him?