Minutes to Burn

The mantid ran a tibia up and across her face, her antennae bristling. Her head rotated smoothly on her slender neck as she focused on Szabla again. She glanced down at the branches covering the hole, then tested one with her lead foot.

"Come on, you motherfucker," Szabla hissed. "Move forward now."

The mantid withdrew her foot and started to circle the hole rather than cross it.

Savage cursed, saliva flying from his mouth. Szabla tested one of the branches with her foot, then put more of her weight on it. She stepped out over the hole, wobbling on her feet to keep her balance. The branches bowed under her weight, stretched nearly to breaking point along the notches Savage had carved with his knife.

The mantid froze, watching Szabla with ravenous curiosity.

"What the fuck are you doing?" Savage growled.

"Live bait."

"What if you don't get off in time?"

"Dead bait."

Escaping air hissed from the mantid's spiracles, nearly scaring Szabla off her feet and into the hole, but she recovered her balance just in time.

"Keep calm," Savage growled. "Keep your movements smooth and slow."

One of the branches started to roll beneath Szabla's foot but she stayed with it, easing her weight down to nestle it back into place.

"Keep it together, Szabla," Savage said, "and get her up onto the trap."

Szabla waved her hands and the mantid darted forward a few steps, thrusting her head forward like a punch. Emitting a half-cry, Szabla stumbled back, almost falling between the branches. The mantid reared up, her front legs spread wide, revealing the eye markings on their insides. The upper part of her abdomen scraped against her underwings, screeching. Szabla swayed on her feet.

"Calm the hell down!" Savage yelled. "She's fucking with you, testing how you move. If you go into that hole, you're finished."

"Come on!" Szabla screamed. She threw her arms wide. "Come get me!" She crouched down, snapped a twig off the branch beneath her feet, and hurled it at the mantid. The twig struck the mantid between her front legs, and she reared up again, spreading her underwings. Her wingspan nearly filled Szabla's field of vision.

Szabla wondered whether Cameron, Justin, and Tank were watching right now, somewhere in the darkness. She stepped back, stammering something to herself, and Savage tried to even her out with his voice. "It's all right. Doesn't matter how big she is if we get her in the hole. Just get her to come forward."

Her raptorial legs raised hungrily, the mantid stepped onto one of the branches veiling the hole. It creaked under her weight. She pulled another leg up, easing forward toward Szabla.

Szabla turned and looked frantically behind her, gauging how far she'd have to jump when the branches started to give. She was standing on the second-to-last branch from the end, the uncovered strip of the hole looming ominously between her and solid ground.

As she glanced back, the mantid stepped forward with one of her back legs, finding and hooking the branch expertly. Her last leg trailed it, and then the mantid was standing with her full weight on the creaking and groaning branches, facing Szabla, her razor jaws mere feet away. Her front legs weren't yet coiled to strike.

"It's gonna give!" Savage said. "Get off!"

"Not yet," Szabla whispered. "Not yet."

The mantid folded her raptorial legs to her chest, pulling them up and readying them to explode. The rows of spikes meshed perfectly, like cogs in a gear. She took another step forward, directly above the explo-sives. With a strangely peaceful expression, she started to sway.

One of the branches cracked, and the mantid sank a few inches, but it didn't give.

"It's perfect!" Savage yelled. "Get the fuck off before it goes!"

Szabla turned to jump, but the last branch rolled under her boot, and in a moment of terror, she felt herself go weightless. Her hands flew up over her head as she fell, and she saw Savage's bearded face in a blur as she dropped into the hole.

She hit the ground hard on her back, breaking one of her elbows and sending pain throbbing through her shoulders and tailbone. She bit back a cry, determined not to make a sound. The earth smelled of clay and rot. It was astoundingly dark, but she could see glimpses of the torch's light between the crisscross pattern of leaves and branches above her, narrow slivers of gold that fell across her arms and face like cuts. The red tissue wrapping of the TNT was visible a few feet away. A broken fern tickled her cheek.

In the middle of the network of branches was an immense dark blot, the underbelly of the creature. The branches started to bow beneath her weight and then one of them cracked, held barely together by bark and pulp. Dirt was pouring in on Szabla from the sides, the ends of the branches digging jagged paths down the loose rock of the walls, and then the veil gave.