Empty House: A Fable by John Watson (2/34ish)
JW's Blog
1: The Spider
Once there was an evil spider sitting in a web. So clever was this spider, and so intricate his web, that he never needed to catch his own flies. He lured them close with beautiful designs so that they came willingly and lay down at his feet while he sucked out their insides and left them dry. So clever was this spider that, for a long time, no one even knew his name.
Moriarty.
He was the spider king. At the ends of the delicate tendrils of his web dead bodies were piled almost to the sky.
Eventually the spider grew tired of the taste of flies. They were so ordinary, he thought. So boring. He wanted to eat a hero.
So with his many legs he began to pull on the strings of his web. He rose from his throne and spun some new ones. The spider made himself a beautiful face and a beautiful story. The spider spread his sticky web all through London and danced his many-legged dance. He laughed and cackled and wound his web around.
The spider worked. And eventually, just like all the flies that had filled the spider’s belly, the hero came to him.
But the hero was clever too and before the spider could eat him he said:
“I am just clever as you are.”
The spider, being so successful and so well fed on blood, did not believe the hero.
“You are just like all the others,” he answered and opened his clacking maw. “Now that I see you. I see that you are just another fly,” and he bit the hero in the throat.
“I am nothing like a fly,” the hero insisted. He could see that if he did not kill the spider then the spider would live forever, killing and eating and spreading his evil web. “I am like you. And with me gone, there will be no one to appreciate how clever you really are.”
The spider saw that the hero was right. He was too clever for the rest of the world. All he had left to look forward to was a lifetime of dreary flies. So the spider shot himself in the head.
Without the spider to hold it together the web began to unravel in the breeze. But it was too late for the hero; he’d been bitten and he died of the spider’s poison.
2: The End