“So,” Dr. Mundo leaned forward on his chair and looked at the couple seated on his loveseat. “Tell me about your week?” He asked both of them. The wife, Esther, had been visiting him on her own time. Through those sessions, she gathered enough courage to reveal her deepest secret to her husband, Carlos. She confessed in Dr. Mundo’s office and Carlos took the news surprisingly well. Now the greying doctor wondered how they did outside of his office.
“It’s been amazing, doc,” Carlos said. “Now the everything is out in the open I feel like there’s more time for us. She can use her spiders to take care of all the household chores while we relax.” Dr. Mundo chuckled.
“I hope you’re not just using them for trivial tasks,” he said. Esther shook her head.
“I’ve learned a lot about spiders from other universes since last week,” the woman said. “I can do so much that I couldn’t do before, just by thinking about it. No matter what I want to do somewhere out there is a spider that can help.” As she spoke tiny bright yellow spiders crawled out of her pores and rested on her arms. “If I say I’m going to run an electric current up my arm,…” Esther trailed off but arcs of electricity began to crackle on her arms. The spider’s legs moved rapidly along their neon yellow abdomens. “…electricity runs up my arms.” The yellow spiders disappeared into her skin again; then, several larger, bright red spiders crawled out of her arms. The yellow ones appeared to be tiny beads with legs; the red spiders were tall with long, spindly legs.
“If I say I’m going to start a fire in your trashcan…,” A red spider skittered down to her hand and turned around. It released a string of flaming webbing that landed directly in the trashcan and lighting the papers inside. “Or if I want to put it out,” The red spider burrowed into her hand as a crystalline blue spider appeared. It shot a white, thick, sticky string of cold at the trashcan. It looked like silly string but it instantly froze anything it touched. The metal trashcan was now covered in ice.
“Very impressive,” Mundo said. “I can see you’ve been putting a lot of work into learning about your abilities. What else can you do?” Esther smiled.
“I do have my favorite,…” she glanced at Carlos and he nodded. At his approval a giant, single, green furry spider crawled out from under her hair and to the top of her head. It suddenly leaped upward and stuck to the ceiling. A swarm of baby blue spiders crawled out of her hand and onto Carlos. He did not fidget as they climbed his neck and positioned themselves around his mouth and nose.
“It’s okay,” Carlos said to Dr. Mundo. He was looking nervous while another swarm of blue spiders crawled up to his mouth. The spiders continued to dance in a clockwise circle around their mouths. In moments they wore masks made from webbing covering their mouths.
“If I say I’m going to fill the room with deadly, toxic gas,… A hiss came from above. Dr. Mundo looked up to see green gas coming out of the large spider on the ceiling. “…I’m about to fill the room with deadly, toxic gas.”
