Mad Caterpillar Disease

Prologue: Underground Detour

Clutching a rope, I swung over the river. At the apex of my swing, I let go of the rope and tucked my body into an aerial somersault. SLAM! Another belly-flop. Although I could hear nothing but the whooshing of water and bubbles, I just knew that my cousins were laughing their heads off. I swam along the bottom of the river for about twenty-five yards, then surfaced. I swam into a small cove enclosed by the roots of a couple of bald cypress trees that towered overhead, each wide enough for a yak to hide behind. Water striders skimmed the dark water.

Just then, the quotidian squawk of the Big Ol' Murfle Tree reverberated through the air. I call it a squawk, but it's a noble-sounding, goosebump-inducing squawk. Every day, not too long before sunset, the tree releases dozens of seeds that fly through the air and find somewhere to grow. They look like those samaras that maple trees release, but they are as long as my arm, and they navigate as they fly. They are quite fun to play with, and useful for pranks, which I might tell you about later.

I looked up at the sinking sun as I heard the tree squawk. It was Tuesday--time to rush home to hear Grandpa tell a story! I scanned the river bank in front of me. Ant piles and tall grass blocked my way, so I swam back to the rope swing. "Don't tell me you're leaving," said Mottslinker, as I climbed out of the water, hoping my belly was no longer red.

"Is it storytime?" Smeelia taunted in a baby voice.

"Hey, check this out," I told her, crouching and pointing down into the water right next to the bank.

"What?" Smeelia said, rolling her eyes. After a second, she came over, and I pushed her into the river, laughing mirthfully. Then I dashed off to hear Grandpa's story.

I followed a lightly-worn trail across a field dotted with mesquite trees and bristly plants, carefully pulling aside, or ducking under, branches that blocked my way. The comforting chorus of cicadas droned all around me. It was hot, and I was glad I was all wet; even so, sweat soon began to stream from my armpits. My friend Rodrick wouldn't mind the heat, I thought. Rodrick was a walking, talking human skeleton, the only one in the village.

A couple of times, I used a large stick to poke ant piles I passed. Mottslinker and I often dared each other to kick ant piles without getting our feet bitten, but I wasn't as foolhardy when I was alone.

As I picked my way along the trail, I reflected upon the Big Ol' Murfle Tree. Why was it the only tree of its kind that released seeds? Most of the saplings probably got eaten by animals, but even the ones that grew tall never produced seeds. I was painfully aware of how little I knew of our world; perhaps that's why I was always so eager to hear Grandpa's stories.

Although I hadn't departed the river until I had heard the sound of the tree's squawk, I wasn't worried about missing any of the story. Grandpa was probably still warming up his voice, a process that entailed the placement of a few very gooey black slugs on his bare back. The slugs would crawl up and down his back, making him inhale sharply, shudder, and then scream in disgust. According to village tradition, it was the perfect way for a storyteller to warm up his voice.

As I approached the junction of the lightly worn trail with the Rambling Road, I slowed down and took silent, measured steps. Dog-sized ground-spiders hunted in this area by digging 6-foot-wide pits, capping them with silk, and concealing them with grass. Where did they put the dirt from the holes? I don't know. Checking for spider pits was a sine qua non of passing through here unharmed. I glanced around, spotted a fallen stick about the size of my lower leg, and picked it up. It flailed in my grasp. It was a stick bug! I hadn't seen one of these in a while. Surprised, I hastily threw it at a grassy spot on the ground. Sure enough, the ground collapsed, delivering a snack to a furry, brown spider waiting inside the pit.

I had taken a couple of steps when I did a double take. Had I glimpsed something unusual in the pit? I turned around. The spider had put on a bib and was busy sucking the juice out of the stick bug, so I deemed it safe to lay on the ground at the edge of the pit and peer inside. The brown spider scuttled back a few steps. I saw a pitch-black hole in the shadowed wall of the pit. Was it just a nook where the spider kept his fangbrush, or was it a traversable tunnel? It was the kind of place my mom would exhort me not to enter, so, of course, it intrigued me. My desire to rush home instantly evaporated, giving way to my curiosity.

I needed to distract the spider in order to enter the tunnel. A little bit of magic should do the trick. What would a spider appreciate? Not food-- I should get the spider's mind off of eating. How about 4 pairs of new shoes? I scanned the ground for some rocks that were about the same size as ground-spider shoes. I could only find 4, so I also grabbed 4 glossy leaves. They ought to suffice. Now came the magic part. I faced the spider, with the mock shoes balanced on my arms, my back to the wind, so the leaves wouldn't blow away. I imagined that the rocks and leaves I was holding were moccasins; I conjured up false memories of toiling for days as I crafted them; I mentally placed myself in his shoes and summoned feelings of admiration and gratitude.

"Hey, man, I got you some sweet kicks," I said, contorting my face into a multitude of ridiculous expressions as I uttered the sentence. (Facial acrobatics is a magical catalyst.) For a second, I thought my spell had failed, but then I coughed out some blue dust, which blew toward the arachnid, putting him into a trance. Whew! What a lot of work! I could have just maimed him with the rocks in the first place, but oh well. Magic is fun, too. I threw down the mock moccasins.

I crossed my toes for good luck, hoping this ground-spider was a bachelor. I jumped into the pit, crouched, and entered the hole in the wall. I crawled on both knees and one hand, using my other hand as a mouse uses its whiskers. After about seven yards, I felt the ceiling rise enough for me to stand up. I walked slowly, with my arms extended, like a zombie. I didn't want to bash into a stalactite with my face. Were there stalactites down here? In a moment, anxiety crept over my skin as I thought of what could happen to me down here. I could plummet into a chasm, and no one would ever find me. I could walk right into a mound of daddy-longlegs. I shuddered. Snap out of it, I told myself. I'm a big boy. I'm 16...or 17. My parents hadn't bothered to note my exact birthday.

I got a grip on myself and realized that it was cooler down here than it was above ground. This might make a good secret resting-spot on the way home from the river, if I could find a way to permanently evict the ground-spider. I stopped and felt the ground. The dirt was packed down enough to suggest that there was occasional foot traffic in here. That didn't please me, but I can't say it surprised me. Something must have made the tunnel. A managerie of menaces, real and imaginary, paraded through my mind. My breathing grew louder and more rapid, until I realized it might give me away, and I managed to control it.

A soft rattle of bones startled me; in the silent tunnel, the sound was as prominent as the squawk of the Big Ol' Murfle Tree. Although my cousin Smeelia often referred to her cousin Rubbleworm as a "sack of bones," I doubted it was him. About twenty seconds of silence elapsed before I mustered enough gumption to whisper, "Rodrick?"