Tunnel Rat

Chapter 143: Iron Spider

Once she was P'tashPak'r, the Exalted General of the 10th Host, beloved of the queens, champion of the Many-Legged Army.

Once she was P'tashPak'r, the cripple.

And only a few days before, she was P'tashPak'r, the abomination in exile.

No more. She was going back, returning to her exalted rank of general. She would command an army and lead it to glorious victory with the bonus of killing her most hated foe. This was how she had dreamed things would happen one day, and now it was so. It had been so many years in coming, that she had almost lost her dream...

It had all begun with Gilad and that final duel. She had been so proud when she was named to fight in the ceremonial duel that would end the war. Her opponent was weak, with barely half her number of limbs. She knew that no rat could prevail against her. He should not have been able to be beat her. It was only through some travesty of fate and the power of the enemies’ insidious cheesy snacks had had caused her loss. He had gone berserk when she wounded him, foaming at the mouth, and his limbs possessed a hideous strength. The ratkin champion had broken her limbs one by one even as her poison worked to kill him. He had gone entirely crazed at the end, his claws tearing at her body and ripping parts off of her limbs, one by one. The final insult was him standing on her back as his army cheered him. To her dismay, she had heard the hissing laughter of many spiders. Spiders like winners, and had nothing but contempt for those who failed.

That had been the end of her time as a warrior and the start of many years of pain and slavery. First had come the humiliating years after she had lost the duel with her enemy, and the subsequent defeat of her army. No one came to carry her from the field of battle, or to end her life. Barely alive, her spiderlings had carried her legless body from the field of battle, and cared for her wounds. She found herself bumping along in an empty, discarded wagon pulled by two lobotomized humans that her spiderlings had stolen from the slave pens. The stupid things barely lived long enough to get her back to the edge of the great nest.

No family or clan came to her aid. To the rest of the Spider Clans, she was an embarrassment. An example of what happened when you lost a duel and an enemy could pull off your legs one by one. No thanks were given for her loyalty during the wars. No one came to pay homage to her. She was forgotten and tucked away in a dingy little web with only the last of her progeny to aid her. Only the thought of one day finding Gilad, Warlord of the United Tribes had kept her from despair.

It had galled her that one day, as she lay helpless, a dwarf of the Dark Tribes had walked into her lair. She'd heard the noise as he had slaughtered the spiderlings that vainly tried to defend her. He'd made war on them in the traditional way of the dwarves, smushing foes beneath the tread of their heavy iron boots. When he saw her, he whistled long and loudly, proclaiming her to be, in his words, 'One dented little bit of defective trash heap'.

She'd wanted to kill him for that, but he'd stayed out of the range of her fangs, sitting on a pile of spiderling corpses, drinking beer, and showing her pictures of 'upgrades and repairs' his shop had done for other creatures. Cousin Lemmy's Repair Shop: 'Nature makes them, wars break them, and we put them all back together again with iron and steel, stronger than ever.' It was the clever slogan that convinced her to sign the contract. What was a couple of decades of labor fighting in the armies of the Deep Dwellers compared to regaining her legs? Nothing. She missed the small print about slave collars and repairs being taken out of her wages and increasing her time of servitude.

Hammer and forge had made new limbs for her. Fire and pain had taught her how to use them. Armored plating made her a walking fortress. On her back were mounted two Nakamura Mark 19 Scatterguns. Across battlefield after battlefield she had marched, two Dwarven gunners on her back mowing down the enemy, and her new limbs spearing the wounded as they marched onward. It had been mostly a glorious time. She owed many years of service to the two dwarves that had bought her, but Harshank and Krankar had been bloodthirsty, greedy bastards had made sure she wasn't bored.

The not glorious part was when she was parked in a mechanics' shop after each battle to have the damage repaired while her gunners went out drinking and lining up new jobs. Sometimes they had money for repairs and upgrades. Other battles didn't go well and she had to limp into the next battle with only a few legs working. Finding out that it was her cut of the money they earned that went to repairs had galled her. But the slave collar on her neck left her no options.

The end of her servitude had come not on a battlefield, but in some nameless dwarven backwater but after a great victory. With barely any damage, she was left to guard the large chest of gold they had earned, and the backpacks of looted treasure. Her two dwarven owners had gone off to 'Drink and poke the Dragon'. Whatever that meant, and they hadn't come back from it.

There was a story around town about two drunken dwarves trying to steal a mechanical flyer to kidnap a Dark Elf princess. Whether that was true or not, her gunners were found dead in a pile of mechanical wreckage that had crashed into a church of Grugnark the Destroyer. The priests were thrilled with the damage and conducted the funeral.

With the deaths of her owners, the magical hold on her mind had dispersed, and the collar fell off. She took the treasure, hired a goblin gear smith, and started for home. The journey was long, but Grobit had stayed with her, content to repair and service her mechanical limbs, napping up top with the treasure and supplies, or fire one of the guns at some creature when they needed fresh meat.

She had left the nest a cripple, but returned a decorated veteran of a hundred or more battles. She expected to welcomed with honor, given a web near the queen, and countless small mammals to eat. Instead, they had shunned her, called her 'Abomination', and told she smelled of oil and sulfur. With a choice of disdain, or exile, she chose exile. Her riches couldn't buy her respect, but they did buy an endless supply of small mammals, and cheap dwarven beer. Harshank claimed a drunk spider was tougher to target and had gotten her drunk on the stuff before many battles. She craved it now the way a rat craved cheese.

Grobit maintained her mechanics, although parts were hard to get. One of the guns was turned into spare parts, which was no loss. Grobit could barely handle firing one of the oversized, pintle mounted blasters, let alone two at once.

And now, now she was back! They needed her desperately. The lesser generals had failed the queen, and it was her genius in battle that they trusted. Her army was assembling and she would march upon Limburger Hollow, slay Gilad, and become again one of the Queen's trusted generals! She saw it all in her mind, over and over, as she marched through the caverns, trying not to trip on the uneven flooring.

"Has the abomination showed up yet?"

"No, your majesty, it's still slowly walking along like some drunken beetle. It has to use the caverns, not the web way. It is far too heavy and clumsy."

"Fine. When she finally gets here, send her over to Big Cavern with Spotted Shrooms. It's flat and she'll trip less. Start lining up her troops in there and let her have the fun of reviewing them, while they feel the shame of serving such an abomination of nature. Add 1 contingent of the Queen's Own, two banner bearers, and Six units of wolfen shock troops. That should look good."

"!!!! You're giving that mad-thing all of that?" The queen contemplated eating her latest advisor for questioning her, but decided that the statement was one of those times that any good advisor really should speak up. The thought of wasting good troops in this little war was abhorrent to her.

"Of course not! They'll line up with the dregs we are sending with her to Limburger Hollow, march out behind It, and then peel off at the cross-roads and rejoin the regular army. Its force is a blunt instrument that will deliver a shock to our enemies, maybe even break into the Hollow and start killing civilians. My hope is that she draws off their military and keeps it tied up. My army will be the one achieving victory!"

"Whew. Sorry I doubted you ma'am. That...thing makes me uneasy."

"Understandable, and my condolences. I'm sending you to It as Its second in command to keep things organized. Try to fade into the back of her forces as she charges, and sneak back to us. I value your services greatly."