The top of the tent was highly uneven, a network of rises and dips in the canvas as the material stretched from supporting pole to supporting pole. The material also was not in the best of conditions, with some areas appearing to be thinner than others, having frayed or perished a bit, and some having been patched with large colourful squares of fabric.

They moved slowly over the unnatural footing, sticking to the low-lying sections to reduce the amount of climbing that they would have to do. Tension kept it generally stiff, but even the tautest sections still deformed slightly under their feet. Having eight legs to distribute weight was a big help, but their sharp toes complicated the matter. They were useful to climb with, but could poke holes and weaken the canvas. All in all, the whole experience was a bit like walking on eggshells and progress was slow.

“So… any idea where we’re going?” Rita asked after a while when the silence began to linger.

“I wish I knew why you were asking me,” Alice replied. “I’m not walking in front because I’m leading, I just think I’m more observant than you are.”

“You seem to be heading in a specific direction, that’s all,” Rita explained.

Alice shook her head. “I’m just following the folds in the canvas between the tent pole protrusions in a direction that’s generally away from where we started. If you have a suggestion for a specific direction, I’m all ears.”

“No, nothing like that, it’s just… my legs are starting to hurt, and we have no idea where we’re going. Maybe we should take a quick breather and figure out what the plan is?”

Alice stopped and turned to face Rita. She looked as if she were about to say something scathing, but then checked herself.

“You know, you’re right,” she admitted. “We have no idea what we’re looking for. We’re just walking for the sake of walking. So, let’s take a stop here and figure out what we’re doing.”

Rita nodded and carefully lowered herself down into a seating position on the canvas.

“Long term, our long term goal is to get out of here and go back home to Cardale City. Our Cardale City, since we are working under the assumption that this is not the future, but rather some kind of crazy parallel universe, right?” she said.

Alice nodded. “Right. If we end up being wrong, we’ll re-evaluate. And I agree with that goal. However, we have a problem. We’re rocking a couple of spare sets of legs, never mind the spare body we currently possess since I am guessing that’s only because we’re inside this weird place,” she said, waving her hand at their surroundings.

“If we go back looking like a half-spider I’m going to flip my shit,” Rita snorted. “But let’s throw all that into long term goals. Get back home, become human again. So, what about medium term goals? How do we achieve that?”

This was a technique she had used in her own life a couple of times to figure out priorities. Normally she would just jot her thoughts down on a scrap of paper but bouncing ideas off Alice worked just as well.

“If we beat the guardian of this place, we can apparently get any question answered. That could be a medium term goal?” Alice suggested.

“Will that mean entering the creepy circus tent?” Rita asked.

Alice nodded. “Somehow I don’t think we will get a question answered if we just bypass the guardian by running along the outside of their arena.”

“Right. In that case, pass.”

Alice scratched her head. “Are you sure about that? This could be our ticket home.”

“Absolutely. This guardian can go sit on its question and spin. I’m not setting foot inside this tent,” Rita insisted, patting the material by her side.

“Is that because it’s a creepy ass tent or… because what happened?” Alice asked quietly.

Rita gave her the blankest stare of her life.

“I don’t want to talk about it. And neither do you,” she stated.

“We don’t need to… look, never mind. Forget I said anything. You’re right. Going in there is dumb anyway. We’re not fighters, we’d probably just get killed. But what are we doing here then?”

“Getting out,” Rita said flatly. “Coming in here was a mistake, so we are leaving as soon as we can. There was a silvery portal that led inside. I am guessing we find a similar one in here and bam, we’re out. Make sense? That means we crawl over the top of the tent until we get to the other side, slip down and hopefully find the other portal.”

“That’s an awful lot of assumptions,” Alice cautioned. “Most notable is that this stupid tent has an other side, something I’m starting to doubt at this point. But what the heck. Not like I have any better ideas.”

“Good, then it’s settled!” Rita exclaimed and sprang to her feet with perhaps a little too much enthusiasm at the idea of not having to go anywhere near the inside of the tent.

One of her sharp toes snagged the edge of a nearby orange patch of fabric and there was a ripping sound as the edge tore loose.

Rita and Alice both froze in place. Then, when nothing happened after a few moments and Rita carefully stepped away from the tear, Alice breathed a sigh of relief.

“Be more careful, you klutz,” she said. “Listen, I think we should tie ourselves together with silk. Sticking ourselves to the canvas is also an option, but I think it would slow us down too much to have to keep repositioning as we go.”

“Sounds good…” Rita agreed, her heart still pounding in her chest. The problem with tears in this fabric was that they would spread as they put weight on it.

It was weird to watch Alice curve her abdomen around and begin to thread out silk in a long, sticky thread. Kind of like watching someone on the toilet. It felt like she should be giving her some privacy, but at the same time, it was fascinating. She could see the spinnerets wiggling about and the white thread take form, something not usually visible when she did it herself.

Alice paused and glanced up from what she was doing. “You’re staring. What’s up?”

“Oh! No nothing, it’s just the first time I see that from this angle. It looks a bit fucked up. There are things moving in there,” Rita replied, pointing at Alice’s abdomen.

“Well, deal with it. This is what you look like too.”

“I know, that’s the fucked up part.”

Soon they were tied together via silk thread with some extra slack to allow for movement. After some experimentation, Alice had managed to make the thread not sticky, unlike all the previous webs that either of them had made.

“… so just focus on holding that bit still and move the rest. It’s a kind of sideways massage,” she explained as they walked.

“Wait, so I hold the outermost bit still? Or the top one?” Rita asked, trying to copy the trick.

“No, the outermost bits. Then if you waggle the other stuff a bit left and right in a slow, kneading motion, like you’re doing a massage, you still produce webs, but it comes out dry. Kind of like a stretchy rope.”

Rita scratched her head. “How did you figure this stuff out so easily?”

“Because I’m not too scared to try things,” Alice responded. Then she looked back at Rita. “It’s your body. Our body. You’re going to have to stop being afraid of it. Touch. Move. Explore it.” She wiggled her abdomen to illustrate.

Rita gave her a doubtful frown.

“And get your head out of the gutter. I meant see what it can do! See what it feels like! Figure out which bits are hard and rigid and which bits are soft and pliable! And see what happens when you move your muscles. Think spider-yoga,” Alice suggested.

Rita shuddered as the mental image of doing yoga while covered in spiders flashed briefly through her mind. “No thanks. I’ll pass on the yoga. But thanks for the advice, I’ll consider it.”

Alice shrugged. “You’re going to need to get used to the skin you’re in eventually.”

Before Rita could reply, there was a loud rip and Alice was just gone. Where she had been moment before was a jagged tear in the canvas, starting about several metres ahead of Rita and ending at her feet. Through it, she could see the gloomy inside of the tent.

They had been moving along the bottom of a ‘valley’ between two spigots, trying to stick to the flattest areas they could. Unfortunately, a section of canvas appeared to have perished or frayed under the strain.

Rita stared, dumbstruck, at the dark rift for a moment or two, before she remembered the thread tied around her waist. She had just enough time to dig in her feet before Alice’s fall reached the end of the tether and yanked on the rope. With her feet dug in, she managed resist the sudden strain on the web around her waist and avoided getting dragged in as well.

What she did not avoid was the way the length of web cut into her skin. It was like a steel cable! Rita had the impression it would cut her in half before it would break.

Unfortunately, the thread was also cutting into the canvas. It was pressed right up against the corner of the tear and was slowly ripping it further open. Rita watched with horror as it slowly crept between her legs, barely able to move from the weight. She could feel her feet spreading further and further apart.

“Shit shit shit shit…” she mumbled as she looked around, trying to find a way out. The only idea that came to mind was more webs. Gritting her teeth, she lowered her abdomen and smeared thick, sticky webs all over the piece of canvas she could reach, as much as she could.

Then the canvas under her gave way entirely and she too slipped into the darkness below.

Rita found herself dangling over a vast, empty space. The only source of light was the rip above her, bathing the inside of the tent in a gloomy twilight.

The glue that she and Alice secreted out of their backsides really was something else. The webs that she had hurriedly smeared over the canvas up above had somehow held, mostly, leaving her suspended in mid air, her back legs holding on to the thread going back up, while her arms and front legs did their best to hold onto the thread biting into her waist which disappeared into the darkness below. Presumably, it had an Alice on the other end of it.

On the one hand, she was glad the weight meant that Alice likely hadn’t fallen to her death. On the other, it was like suspending two people from a steel cable wrapped around your stomach. It fucking hurt. Tying it around her waist suddenly did not seem like such a smart move.

“Alice!?” she shouted, gritting her teeth in pain.

“I’m okay…” the reply drifted back up and Rita sighed in relief.

“Are you near the ground?” she called again, hopeful that she could just cut Alice loose.

“I don’t think so… please don’t drop me,” Alice called back. “I can see you. Can you climb back up?”

“Not while holding you!” Rita replied. “I can barely hang on as it is!”

“Okay… hold tight. I’m going to try to climb up and over you…”

The thread in Rita’s hands began jerk and bounce, making the loop around her waist cut even deeper. She also felt a sudden lurch as the movement made the canvas above tear a bit further.

“Stop, stop, stop!” she shouted down and the tremors ceased. “You’re making the canvas tear even further!”

“Shit. What do we do then?”

Around them, there were several things hanging from the ceiling of the tent, from ropes, to swings, to small pieces of torn safety netting hanging limply from above. Some were on the same level that she was hanging, and some were lower down or higher up. Several of them even hung down into the gloom, past where she could see.

“Can you see the swings and ropes?” she asked. “Are any of them close enough for you to grab onto?”

“I can see them but… no. I’m too far down. But I can see the tent pole… maybe swing me over that way?”

Of course! The tent poles! Rita could see the two tent poles stretching past her at the very edge of her vision. They had small platforms haphazardly attached to them in random directions and at different heights, all the way to the ceiling. If Alice could reach them, she might even be able to climb up or down.

“Ok! I’m going to try!” she shouted down, then began the slow, arduous task of trying swing the thread from side to side with her arms.

Back and forth, back and forth, she slowly worked the thread while it threatened to saw her in half. With each swing she managed to make it go a little further, but even with her eyes starting to adjust to the darkness, she couldn’t see Alice. They had perhaps put just a little bit too much slack in the line.

“Okay, you’re doing it, just a little bit more…” Alice called up from below.

Twice more Rita swung backwards and forwards before the swinging suddenly stopped.

“I got it!” Alice called back. “I caught the pole! Give me a few moments while I… okay! You can cut the cord! I’ve reached a platform!”

With a sigh of relief, Rita did just that, snipping the thread with the sharp bits on her front feet and feeling like a sudden weight had been lifted off her stomach. A quick inspection under her sweater revealed an angry red and purple line of bruising around her stomach that was tender and painful to touch. In one or two places, it had even broken the skin and several drops of blood were oozing out.

“Rita! Watch out! Something’s coming up from below!” she heard Alice call out.

Quickly, she stopped inspecting her injuries and scrambled to reach the nearest other thing hanging from the ceiling. It was a swing, the kind used by acrobats to do death defying aerial stunts.

The sudden, unbidden memory of a body bending unnaturally as it struck the ground far below nearly made her scream and push it away, but by then she could also make out something moving below, rising steadily higher.

Pushing down her apprehension, Rita grabbed the swing with her arms and a few of her legs without releasing the strand of web still stuck to the canvas far above, leaving her sort of hanging from both. When she looked down again, she nearly fell out of the swing anyway.

When she had been nine years old, her mother had taken her to the circus that had passed through town. It been her first time, and she had been a little overwhelmed by all the strange sights and sounds.

Then, during the acrobatic show, tragedy had struck. One of the acrobats, an athletic young man with blonde hair and a purple leotard had slipped off one of the platforms next to the pole. His attempts at catching himself only managed to push him further away from the pole and to the edge of the safety net, which did not quite manage to catch his fall.

She could still recall the memory of his body impacting the sandy floor with a crunch that was audible in the deathly silence of the tent, his neck bent at an unnatural angle. The sight of someone dying right in front of her had put her off circuses her entire life.

And rising from the darkness below her, standing on the shoulders of other acrobats in similar outfits, it was impossible to mistake the golden hair and purple leotard for anyone else.

It was him.