Ambush

It was so green and alive, I could feel the energy thrumming through the trees, tiny insects weaved through the branches at high speeds, one tried to pass by me so I swatted it with my paw. It fell onto the branch I was on and I bit into the little thing quickly, the first bite was full of energy, making me yelp in surprise.

Mother looked back and nodded, I finished the insect quickly and followed closely behind the group, tripping on only a few vines here and there. The tree we just exited was massive but it wasn't the tallest by far, there were several others near and far that were many times its size. Mother explained as we went from one tree branch to another that we were low on the food chain, and though we might be a snack for some beasts, most wouldn't care about us due to being so small.

Of course, they just might kill us just because we were too close when they were feeding that or because they just wanted to kill something small.

Each of us killed a tiny insect here or there as we moved from one tree to another, trying to keep up with mother was proving difficult, she easily navigated the treetops.

She turned back to us and motioned for our group to lay low before she silently moved ahead and out of sight. Curious, I looked over the edge of the branch to see if there was any prey below. There were a few trails below but nothing moved, actually it was eerily quiet, the hairs along my spine started to stand up.

I slowly looked around, there was nothing to my left or right, and still nothing below. I looked to my siblings, they were also looking around for what was causing our discomfort. I sniffed the air with nothing out of the usual, where was it coming from?

A soft creak of a branch came from above our group.

Looking up and seeing a large spider three times the size of our mother, hanging from a long rope of webbing, its eyes were a sickly yellow, it stopped its descent when I looked at it. Its eyes and mine met for a brief moment before it screeched at me. I let out a few chirps to warn my siblings to move away, they bolted away not knowing what was happening.

The spider dropped from its web and landed where my sibling had been a moment before, it lunged at one of them as they made a dash away from this large insect. It had turned away from me to lash at them, I dashed forward and swiped my claw against its backside. My claws barely broke the surface, before I could move away a large leg kicked my side and flung me into the trunk of a nearby tree.

I heard a crunching sound before sharp pain exploded along my side, the world started to go black before new waves of pain crashed into me. I opened my eyes and looked up, I was now on the ground, there were bloodstains on a few branches which must have broken my fall. Wincing, I turn my head towards my siblings, the spider was chasing after one of my sisters and was about to catch her, a black and silver blur slammed into the spiders face right before it reached my sister.

"Mother!" I thought and chirped aloud.

She clawed out the spiders' eyes and leaped away, the spider lashed about, mother circled around and waited. When the spider turned and lashed at a vine, she lunged and she began to claw and bite at the spiders' legs. She detached the legs quickly until the spider fell over due to imbalance, it struggled to get up and it fell from the branches and landed on the forest floor.

Breathing hard I looked up at my mother, that's when I saw them, we were in a nest of spiders. Dozens of the eight-legged beasts were in the trees watching, "Behind you!Run!" I chirped at them, mother looked at me and back up into the trees, she chirped at my sibling to run back to the burrow. They ran and leaped away even as the spiders dropped among them.

I crawled to a bush nearby trying to hide in the brush, spiders started to slowly land on the ground, my legs felt weak there was no way to run away, the last I saw of my siblings and mother only a few of my brothers and sisters got away. I could hear the shrieks and cries briefly before there were only silence and the clicking of jaws.

I knew my time was limited, I didn't want to die so I dragged myself into the bushes before collapsing. I watched through the leaves as the spiders descended slowly to the ground, the many dozens of eyes looking for any prey they might have missed. They had reached their dead clansman and started to wrap its body up in webs, there was only a single spider near me only a few dozen steps away.

It started moving in my direction, this was it, this is how I'm going to die.