You head down the right side of the room. It will make for a longer walk, but looks quite a bit clearer, with less debris and places for predators to hide.
You walk for a while, watchful for hazards as usual. You pass boxes and cans, and head by on old desk safely; you turn along the wall and start heading straight for the steps.
Then, as you’re passing a small rotten cardboard box, giving it a wide berth to be safe, there is a blur of brown movement…
You don’t even have time to register that it’s coming, let alone to defend yourself or dodge it. Something as large as you are and covered in hair crashes down on top of you, and pain flares in the side of your neck…
You finally manage a choked scream, and you kick and punch desperately to get free. You turn your head just enough to see the reflection of your terrified face in eight beady black eyes, and you stare in utter shock and horror.
The jumping spider holds you down and keeps injecting venom. You stare, unable to break free of its grip or its gaze, and your kicking and punching fade quickly as the poison does its work. You manage a soft cry of pain as it withdraws its fangs, then you utter staccato sounds as it turns, grips your bare feet, and drags you unceremoniously across the ground and into the darkness of its box.
Inside are dozens of its previous victims. For the most part, they consist of small beetles, but here and there is a mouse, and there is even a rat in a corner. None of them are particularly wrapped up, so as your wide, terrified eyes look them over you are able to see that many are still blinking, apparently alive… but are grotesquely bloated…
Without a trace of compassion, the spider drags you to an open spot and pushes you against the wall of the box. It strings out a few strands of webbing from its abdomen and threads it lightly over you, just enough to keep you upright; then, it turns and wanders over to a blinking mouse and sinks its fangs into it. The bloated creature does nothing to resist, and as its body seems to shrivel, the spider’s abdomen distends. The mouse stops blinking at last… and the spider settles down in a corner to digest its meal.
You sit there for three days, though you have no idea how long it really is. The spider seems to catch one meal a day, and feeds on one of those it caught previously; the waiting victims, apparently requiring a few days for its venom to work, slowly bloat as their innards liquefy.
