Entangled Whispers
Even after the dinner rush that left her constantly on the move, she still found time to carry the next morning’s ingredients into the kitchen before sitting down to her own late meal. “Where did these threads get tangled again…?”
She usually stayed hidden in the kitchen, convinced her appearance would frighten the other management staff working on this floor. But when the threads connected to the supplies refused to budge, she had no choice but to venture out. Even then, she first checked her surroundings, then quietly climbed along the ceiling to move unseen. Watching her like that only made the tightness in my chest grow heavier.
“Ah, so this was the problem.”
She had memorized every pipe the threads were wrapped around so she could fetch ingredients easily from the kitchen. It didn’t take her long to find the knot and untangle it. With the ingredients now cradled in her arms, she was about to head back when two voices drifted up from below.
“Come to think of it, I haven’t seen that new counselor around lately.”
“Yeah. It was convenient whenever we needed something from the isolation rooms—he’d pass messages along for us.”
The two staff members were checking an inventory list, completely unaware that Arachne was hanging directly above them on the ceiling. The moment they mentioned the counselor she had been quietly worried about, she held her breath and listened.
“He’s really something, though. Not scared at all of that pitch-black kitchen. Just walks in and out like it’s nothing.”
“Still, spiders are creepy enough on their own. One that big? You only see stuff like that in fantasy movies.”
The kitchen door was always open, but Arachne rarely left her isolation room, so the two chatted freely, never imagining she was right above their heads.
“I don’t know the details, but I heard he deals with those kinds of monsters face-to-face.”
“Wouldn’t be surprising if he ends up dead one day without anyone noticing. Next counselor shows up and we just keep going. Shame, though. He seemed like a decent guy.”
Private conversations were technically forbidden, yet they spoke without a care. A sigh escaped me—not because they broke the rules, but because their words were exactly what I had expected, and that hurt more.
“Still, I caught a glimpse of him last time… His voice and everything made him seem kind of feminine, right? But his figure was pretty nice to look at.”
“Even so, that huge spider body of hers…”
Arachne’s appearance gave off the impression of a cool, reliable older colleague or superior—someone who would quietly take care of things behind the scenes if you did your job properly. At first glance, most people probably wouldn’t notice her as a woman. I had been the same; her lower half had completely stolen my attention at first. But once I realized she wasn’t threatening, everything else came into focus: her smooth, flawless skin, the slim waist and clearly defined abs earned from years of intense kitchen labor, and her sharp, beautiful features. Of course, the pale blue-tinged skin, ominous red eyes, and massive spider lower body made it easy to overlook all that.
“Right? Even a pervert would have trouble with that. I still get nervous eating in the staff cafeteria, wondering if baby spiders are going to crawl out of my food.”
“If the other floor staff ever find out who’s actually cooking their meals, they’ll freak out.”
“Exactly. The cafeteria’s always packed, but that’s only because they don’t know…”
If that had been the end of it, Arachne might have simply felt a little down. She wasn’t particularly shaken, nor was she angry at them. That fact itself saddened me. She had already sensed how others viewed her, so she didn’t seem to take their words as a heavy burden. But then—
Plop. Roll…
The mesh bag of onions she was carrying hadn’t been tied properly. She reacted quickly, catching most of them with her threads just like she had once saved me from becoming a pincushion. A few, however, slipped through and tumbled to the floor near the staff members’ feet.
“…”
“…”
The two froze. Their gazes followed the rolling onions, then slowly, stiffly, lifted toward the ceiling. Their faces drained of color the moment they saw her hanging upside down, staring back at them.
“I-I’m fine…”
Arachne had tried to speak first, knowing she had been eavesdropping. But the words that came out of their mouths were—
“P-Please… spare us…”
“W-We’re going to be eaten…”
I could feel the sting of it as clearly as she did. Years of quietly working in the kitchen, trying to provide better meals for everyone, reduced to nothing in an instant. She had never expected warmth, but she had still hoped—secretly, foolishly—that someone might one day see her as more than a monster. That fragile hope shattered under their terrified stares.
She had already told herself she would never escape being seen as a monster. But hearing and seeing it directly hurt far more than she had imagined. A bitter, mischievous thought crossed her mind, and she gave them a cold look.
“Get out of my sight. Right now.”
“Eek! Aaaah!”
“Aaaah…!”
She had never tried to approach them before. She had stayed locked in the kitchen partly to avoid making them uncomfortable, but mostly because she feared confirming this exact reaction. Still, she had held onto a small, stubborn hope that if she just kept working quietly, something might eventually change.
“…Yeah. Run far away. Before the scary monster eats you.”
She watched their retreating figures stumble away on unsteady legs, then looked down at her own lower body with a hollow expression. Even she thought their fear was understandable. That realization made the ache in her chest throb painfully.
She couldn’t tell if she was sad, angry, hurt, or strangely relieved. The emotions were a tangled mess even to me. Pressing a hand to her chest, she turned and walked back to her isolation room. The constant clicking of her spider legs echoed loudly in the silence, as if mocking her. The webs throughout the floor, influenced by her state of mind, began to droop and stick together messily, but she didn’t spare them a glance as she stepped inside and closed the door behind her.
“Hah…!”
I jolted awake, gasping as if surfacing from a short dream. The heavy, complicated ache in my chest remained, lingering from the connection. I took slow, careful breaths, trying not to let it overwhelm me. Back when Dorothy was still Prisoner 13, I had endured her crushing self-loathing through our link. That experience seemed to have strengthened my mind; Arachne’s negative emotions didn’t drag me under as easily.
“Are you… all right?”
A worried voice reached me. When I focused, I saw Arachne looking back at me. Even now, she was worried about me. She really was such a kind person. It pained me to think how much she must have suffered alone all this time. Despite the cold treatment she always received, she had somehow remained gentle and unbitter. What I couldn’t accept was that she rarely expressed anger or sadness outwardly—yet the wounds were still there, quietly accumulating.
“Arachne… you really are a good person.”
“H-Huh? Suddenly…?”
“It’s not sudden. I’ve always thought so, but now I’m certain.”
I understood exactly why she was hurting and what she wanted. That meant my next steps were clear.
“But first…”
“…?”
To talk properly—and to prove, through action, that I wasn’t afraid of her—I reached out.
“Kyaaah?!”
“I’ll make you feel comfortable right away.”
“W-Wait, why are you touching—?”
I decided to deal with the easier problem first.
“Kyaaang…?”