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The Spider’s Web
An unreleased short story from the book:
The Last Breath: Tales of Survival in a Zombie-Infested World
Jonas had long since stopped counting the days. The city he once knew, alive with noise and movement, was now a hollow skeleton—rubble and ash strewn across streets that were once vibrant with life. He had grown accustomed to the silence, the emptiness, the desolation. The sounds of the undead—groaning, shambling, the shuffle of their rotting feet—had become background noise, like a faint hum in the distance, never quite gone but never close enough to matter. At least, that’s what he kept telling himself.
He had lived in the heart of the city before everything fell apart, once part of the pulse of the metropolis. But now, there was nothing left but the ruins. He had become a scavenger, moving from building to building, searching for food, water, anything to keep him alive just a little longer.
It had been months since he had seen any sign of other survivors. The city was overrun. There was no safety. No hope.
But then, one day, Jonas found something he hadn’t expected—something that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up, something that felt wrong.
The entrance was hidden beneath a pile of debris, carefully concealed as if someone had intentionally tried to obscure it. Jonas had passed it before, but this time, something tugged at him, urging him to investigate. Maybe it was desperation. Maybe it was curiosity. But whatever the reason, he moved the wreckage aside and revealed a narrow, rusted door that led into a dark tunnel.
The air was thick and cold, and there was an unsettling smell—something old, almost sweet, mixed with decay. Jonas hesitated, glancing around the darkened alleyway for any sign of the undead, but the streets were eerily still. Swallowing his fear, he stepped into the tunnel and descended into the darkness.
The tunnel was long, and the further he ventured, the colder it seemed to grow. His footsteps echoed against the stone walls, the sound unnervingly loud in the oppressive silence. The only light came from the faint glow of his flashlight, which illuminated strange marks on the walls—symbols, etched into the stone, jagged and cryptic, as though they were warning him to turn back.
But he couldn’t. Not now.
He continued deeper, until the passage opened into a vast underground chamber. The air was thick here, suffused with the scent of something putrid, but also strangely organic—something living, thriving in the darkness. And then he saw it. The webs.
They stretched across the room like a tangled, shimmering maze, their threads thick and sticky, glistening in the dim light. They weren’t the cobwebs of a forgotten place—they were alive, pulsing, moving. The edges of the webs twitched, as though something beneath them was waiting, watching.
Jonas’s breath hitched in his throat. It was like stepping into the heart of a spider’s lair, and something deep inside him screamed to turn and run. But he didn’t. Instead, he stepped forward, drawn by an overwhelming need to understand, to find out who or what had created this.
As he moved through the webs, the floor beneath him shifted, and a low, vibrating hum filled the air. He could feel it in his chest, the weight of the vibration like the thrum of an insect’s wings. The webs parted slightly, revealing figures suspended in them, their limbs twisted at unnatural angles, their faces frozen in expressions of terror. Some of them were human, their eyes wide with fear and pain. Others… others were zombies, their decayed bodies tangled in the webs as if they had been caught, their twisted forms hanging helplessly, unable to break free.
It was a trap. A trap for both the living and the dead.
Jonas recoiled, his mind racing. He could see it now. The webs weren’t just for trapping the undead—they were for catching anyone who wandered too close. They were a means of survival, a way for whatever had created this underground society to thrive.
And that’s when he heard the voices.
They were soft at first, whispers in the darkness, barely audible over the hum of the webs. But they grew louder, closer. He felt them before he saw them—eyes watching him from the shadows, hidden behind the thick threads. Figures emerged, moving like shadows, their faces obscured by the webbing. They were humanoid, but something was wrong. Their movements were jerky, unnatural, and their faces were gaunt, pale, their eyes hollow, filled with a kind of quiet hunger.
“Welcome to our web,” one of them said, its voice raspy, like it hadn’t spoken in years. “You’ve found us, just like they always do. Just like the others.”
Jonas froze, his heart pounding in his chest. The figures stepped closer, and he could see the remnants of their humanity in their eyes, but there was something else—a darkness, a twisted, parasitic hunger.
“Who are you?” Jonas asked, his voice trembling despite his attempts to stay calm. “What is this place?”
One of the figures stepped forward, its face partially visible beneath the webbed shroud that covered it. Its lips curled into a twisted smile.
“We are the ones who survived,” it whispered. “The ones who learned to trap.”
Jonas’s stomach churned. The webs, the dead bodies, the figures that moved like predators—he understood now. This underground society had learned how to survive by weaving webs to trap not just the zombies, but anyone who wandered too close. They had taken control of the ruins, trapping both the living and the dead in their tangled threads.
But the most horrifying part was the realization that he wasn’t just seeing these figures as predators—he could feel them closing in on him, hungry. He could feel the web tightening around him, each step forward drawing him deeper into their grasp.
“Let me go,” Jonas said, his voice rising in desperation as he backed toward the exit. But the figures advanced, their eyes glowing with a dark hunger.
“You can’t leave,” the voice whispered, and the walls of the chamber seemed to shift, closing in on him. “Once you’ve been caught in the web, there’s no escape. Not for you.”
Jonas spun and ran, but the webs seemed to grow thicker, more alive. They wrapped around his legs, slowing him down, pulling him into the heart of the chamber. The hum of the webs grew louder, more intense, and the shadows closed in. He screamed, trying to pull free, but it was useless. His movements grew slower, his body growing heavy as the threads tightened around him.
As his vision blurred and his breath grew shallow, the last thing Jonas saw was the faces of the others—those who had been trapped before him, their eyes wide with terror, their limbs still twitching in the webs. And then, he felt it—the final pull, the suffocating grip of the threads.
He was one of them now.
The web had claimed another victim.
And in the dark, beneath the city, the survivors waited, weaving their deadly trap, eternally hungry for the next lost soul to stumble into their lair.
If you enjoyed this short story you will probably like our latest release available now:
The Last Breath: Tales of Survival in a Zombie-Infested World
$3.99
Prepare to face the terrifying unknown in The Last Breath: Tales of Survival in a Zombie-Infested World, a chilling collection of dark, morbid, and suspense-filled short stories that will keep you on the edge of your seat.
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