"You open a package of M&M's and get the
surprise of your life."
Queen of the
Arachnids
©2003 by W. E.
Lopez
Rotten Rodney Dwyer and Clayton Fuzzy Winter sat in the ninth row of the darkened theater, gleefully
munching unbuttered popcorn while they watched the murky celluloid scenes
unfold on the screen.
“This is where the security guard exits stage left,”
Fuzzy said, “it’ll be curtains for him.
We’ll see his name in the credits at the end of the movie, Guard #3, or
something.”
The actor had been sitting at his little desk, eating
a sandwich and watching a portable TV, when suddenly he heard scraping sounds
on the floor of the manufacturing plant he was tasked with guarding. Unbeknownst to the guard, but not the theater
goers, somewhere above the plant, pollutants were seeping into the small river
from a chemical plant and raising havoc with the eco-system surrounding Murfeesborough.
The guard cocked an ear in the direction of the
suspicious sound, then put down his sandwich and went to the window of his
office overlooking the plant floor. The
lighting director, cued by the movie director, intentionally kept the scene
dark while the cameraman panned over assorted implements of manufacture,
concealed and obscured in heavy shadow.
Although the guard could see nothing, the suspicious sound occurred
again, louder this time. Guard #3
slapped the pistol on his thigh, hitched at his belt, and strode ominously
toward the stairwell leading down to the plant floor as the music swelled with
intensity designed to suck the audience into the scene.
“Why don’t he just continue
to eat his sandwich and watch the game?” Rotten said to
Fuzzy. “Don’t he know he’s gonna be history?”
“Cripes no,” Fuzzy answered. “He’s like the babe who can’t stay where
she’s told and unwittingly walks into the hands of the villain. No matter how much you yell at her, she’s
doomed to replay the same celluloid scene in this movie and a thousand like it,
‘cause that’s the way the director wants it.”
Guard #3 descended the stairway, playing the beam of
his flashlight over the industrious look props.
The audience could see a work-light somewhere, narrowed to a slit
shining through the darkness and coming to rest upon the naked breasts of… of… something.
This was what Rotten and Fuzzy had come to see. After spending $29.95 online for fake ID so
they could get into the “Rated R, 17 and Over” movie, the high school juniors
ogled the female charms before them.
“Where’s the rest of her?” Fuzzy asked. “Why don’t they show the rest of her?” he
whined, secretly hoping the sweater cloaked charms of Gloria Stephens in his
English class would look as yummy, if he ever got the pleasure to behold them.
“Shutup,” Rotten
hissed. “It’s called suspense, dummy.” Rotten secretly knew the more than life size
boobs on the screen could not compare to Denise Williams who sat next to him in
US Government. In his flights of fancy,
the undraped form of Denise would more than twice fill the silver screen in
front of him.
And then they did see the rest of her, the Queen of the Arachnids, spawned by the
unlikely combination of pollution and common spiders, she lurked in the shadows
waiting to seize the unlucky security guard.
Her hideous face was a combination of The Fly and the alien Predator
from the Schwarzenegger movie. Glossy black eyes the size of basketballs
leered above horizontally opposed mandibles dripping with slime and raspy
breathing rose above the music on the sound track. Four arms with hook-like accoutrements
apparently borrowed from a mantis swept the air. Beneath the objects of affection Rotten and
Fuzzy had come to see, the remainder of the creature’s body consisted of two
dark and glistening ovoids supported on four
additional legs like Sigourney Weaver’s Alien. The only part of the creature resembling a
human was the nursing equipment on the torso.
The audience was not supposed to ask what purpose the silicone enhanced
boobies played in the scheme of life, they were merely for the pleasure of the
movie director and the trailer which would entice movie goers into paying $7.50
a ticket in hope of greater treats once inside the theater.
The creature silently scrambled atop nearby equipment
which hid her hideous body from the luckless actor continuing to advance into
the shadows. Stealthily he drew his
pistol as he prepared for the imminent encounter with the unseen horror. While mandibles dripped and forelegs rasped like
the fiendish hands of some villain in an old silent movie, the guard slowly
moved into the ambush area arranged by the creature. Suddenly, the guard looked up (why is it
people never look up in horror movies until the last, fateful moment?). The guard was paralyzed by the horror above
him, or was he mesmerized by the boobs of the creature? No matter, he was incapable of screaming,
incapable of running; he couldn’t even bring himself to fire the pistol in his
right hand. The Queen of the Arachnids sprang from her lofty perch as the guard
raised his arms in ineffectual protection with a grotesque look of horror on
his face.
The director cut to a shot at floor level and the
movie goers watched the computer generated images of a corpse being sucked
dryer than raisins by the arachnid-monster.
“Wow, cool!” Rotten Rodney whispered. “That makes me hungry; I’m going to the snack
bar.”
“Bring me back a large coke,” Fuzzy said, never
taking his eyes off the creature created by the special effects artist.
“In your frigging dreams, tightwad!” Rotten Rodney
squeezed between the seats and up the aisle toward the rear of the
theater. The lobby was deserted this
late in the evening, the movie was scheduled to be over and the theater would
close in another hour. Rodney stepped up
to the counter where a long-haired brunette was beginning to lock the shutters
over the candy and other confections.
“Is it too late for me to get a large bag of
M&M’s,” he asked.
“Not for you, handsome,” she said with a coy smile as
she laid the candy on the counter.
Rotten Rodney smiled.
It was the first time any woman had called him handsome, much less a
woman at least five years older than he.
The brunette had a perky nose between dark, olive-shaped eyes. Rodney assumed she was Hawaiian or Philippino or something, he had never seen an Asian woman
with boobs straining like a TV wrestler to escape the sheer blouse hiding them.
Okay, Rodney admitted to himself, I’m addicted to
tits. If mom had only nursed me instead
of giving me sterilized bottles at feeding time, I probably wouldn’t be this
way. I had a deprived child hood and I’m
a teen-ager with enraged hormones now.
“Will there be anything else before I close?” the
erotic apparition asked.
Rodney pushed aside the juvenile double-entendre which
had risen to the forefront of his conscious and said, “Thank you, no.”
“That’ll be $1.75,” the boobs said. While Rodney fumbled a dollar out of his
wallet and smaller change from his pocket, she opened the M&M’s, slid
something inside, and closed the package with a strip of cellophane tape.
Rodney laid his money on the counter and the woman of
his fantasy said, “Enjoy the rest of the movie.
I hope to see you later.” Her
eyes sparkled and her lips hinted of surprises yet to come.
When he squeezed in next to Fuzzy he could hardly
give his attention to the movie. His
thoughts and lust remained with the dark haired beauty in the lobby and he
fantasized about going back and taking her in his arms and smothering her with
kisses. Her body would be warm and soft
next to his and her breathing would become intense as she hesitantly but
willingly succumbed to his charms….
“Oh, gross, here it comes,” Fuzzy said while the hero
and heroine of the movie advanced to slay the movie monster in the final
moments before the credits.
The hero dragged a portable propane tank with a weed
burner attached and sprayed to the sides and overhead as he and the lovely
starlet beside him fought to escape from the ropy snare of The Queen of the Arachnids. Thick
dark ropes arranged by the set crew and draped with spun sugar like cotton
candy caught fire and were reflected on the shiny cheeks of the female
star. The spider creature appeared
again, slithering from the center of her web toward the hero and heroine and
the director tantalized the movie goers with an even lovelier view of the
mammalian torso Rotten and Fuzzy had come to see, but Rodney was no longer
seeing the attractions on the screen.
While the movie played, he had eaten half the bag of M&M’s and he
received the surprise of his life when his fingers touched something hard and
plastic. He pulled it from the bag to examine in the
reflected light from the silver screen and was suddenly thankful Fuzzy was
watching the spider creature on the screen and not looking at what Rodney had
found.
It was the key to a room at the Tropic Isle Motel,
and it could only have come from the dark haired beauty at the candy
stand. The beat of Rodney’s heart
quickened with anticipation as he examined the key. Room 109, it said. He turned it over and saw
“See, I told ya,
Rotten. Security
Guard; Ed Dawson. They didn’t
even include a name for The Queen of the
Arachnids, so I guess she wasn’t a real actress at all, just a composite of
steel and silicone and computer imagery.”
Rodney looked at the screen and it dawned on him the
movie had finished and the credits were rolling. The house lights came up and people began
filing to the rear of the theater.
Rodney swiftly hid the motel key in his pocket and made a show of
pointing at his watch.
“Oh, hell,” he said.
“It’s nearly eleven and you know how pissed my mom gets if I’m not home
before ten on a school night. Why did
you let me do this, Fuzzy?”
“Me? Cripes
you were the one who begged me to come after we got the mail with the fake ID’s
today. Hey, you wanna go over to the
Pussycat Theater tomorrow?” Let’s see
what they have at a real XXX movie theater.”
Rotten Rodney hoped, if he played his cards right, he
might still be shacked up with the candy-lady by this time tomorrow night. “Not for you, handsome,” she had said.
“I’ll probably get grounded after tonight,
Fuzzy. Look, I better scoot. Let’s get the heck out of here.”
The two boys left the theater and Fuzzy headed for
The motel was way over on the other side of town and
Rodney decided to jog for part of the distance, then slow to a walk so he
wouldn’t arrive all out of breath, but he didn’t want to be late either. He circled around Dunkin Donuts to avoid a
police car in the parking lot, having no wish to be questioned why he was out
so late at night. Three blocks from the
motel he slowed to a rakish saunter, at least a walk he thought was casual and
cool, and entered the motel parking lot.
He spied the numbers on the doors: 106, 107, 108, 109… there it
was! The answer to his hopes and
prayers! Rodney could hardly believe his
good fortune.
Before he knocked on the door he paused to compose
himself. Don’t go saying anything
stupid, he thought. Should he knock, or
should he just let himself in? She had
given him a key, hadn’t she? What if he
was early? Should he just go in? Of course, she would expect that, or else how
would she get in? He never thought his
fantasy lover might have two keys.
He moved the key toward the lock before stopping
himself and deciding to knock anyway.
Years of polite upbringing demanded he be courteous.
“Come in, handsome,” the woman said. “I’m making myself comfortable, use your
key.”
Emboldened, Rodney opened the door and found the room
dark, perhaps she was shy. The drapes of
the only window were partially open and a security light from the parking lot
cast a narrow beam of light into the room.
Across the room, Rodney could see a sliver of light beneath the bathroom
door, and then it winked out and the room was dark again.
The door of the bathroom opened and she emerged. In his mind, she was the glorious crescendo
at the conclusion of the symphony of Rodney’s teen age years. Still in shadow, she leaned against the wall
of the motel room where the spotlight of the open drapes focused on her
goddess-like treasures.
“You like?” she asked, knowing she had Rodney’s
attention.
Rodney was speechless for the first time in his
life. His mind was stricken blank by the
often-dreamed-of vision before his eyes and he could find no words. He wanted to move closer to her and take her
into his arms, but his feet would not obey.
Rodney could not move. He stood
there like the high-school simpleton he was while she moved close to him. His eyes grew wider and wider as the
loveliness before him grew closer and closer….
At the last moment, in the light of the still open
door, Rodney glimpsed the head and thorax of The Queen of the
Arachnids. Still his feet remained
steadfastly in the same spot as she wrapped her mantis-like legs around his
shoulders and her slimy, dripping mandibles bit into his neck.