Of Men and Spiders

The new appendage was almost ready, and She was eager to try it out. So much of what these tool users did was ingenious, if counter-intuitive. Still, other things seemed less effective, to the point of being detrimental. Perhaps with some actual communication, She could learn the means and motives behind these actions and gain further clarification. For instance, right now, the female was instructing the male to dig out an extra sticky mud she called "clay" while the female was making a wide tube of more normal mud on the ground. If this was some sort of storage place, why not build it closer to the structure the female had made the day before?

Once the male had gathered enough sticky mud, the female switched to a new task: beating the sticky mud and placing it in a rectangle made of sticks to form relatively uniform sticky mud rectangles, half of which she molded a small nob onto the top of one end. It then put those rectangles over a long, straight stick so the rectangles curved in a mostly consistent pattern, creating what looked like small half-tubes of sticky mud. Once the whole branch was covered in sticky mud half-tubes, it began digging out the ground under its large normal mud tube, in which it started another controlled fire.

At least this explained why the tool user hadn't placed the mud structure closer to its nest, but what was its purpose? Was this a new way to cook its animal flesh? The directed airflow from below and how the fire rose into the tube from below meant it was burning considerably hotter than the open fires they usually used for cooking. It was hot enough that the outside flesh would be rendered into inedible ash before the inside flesh was adequately seared.

The female tool user seemed happy with its progress and directed the male tool user to wash himself in the flowing water, then they stopped to eat, letting the fire burn itself out. What was the purpose of the fire at all? This is why She needed to be able to communicate. She needed to ask questions about seemingly pointless behavior like this!

-

After lunch, Scott checked the kiln and decided it was ready, or at least he hoped it was. There was one surefire way to find out, so he placed as many dried clay tiles as he could fit and lit a new fire underneath before placing a long, flat stone overtop, allowing just a little airflow around some of the edges. While the roofing tiles were cooking, he started making another batch, placing them over the same sapling as before so they'd all have a relatively similar form.

Once the fire burned out and the kiln had enough time to cool, he carefully withdrew the stone and pulled out the tiles. A few hadn't kept their shape, but most came out just as he'd hoped, and he carefully set them aside as he started cooking the next batch and prepping a third. It took him almost all day, but soon enough, he had enough tiles set aside to cover the better half of the hut's roof, so he started mixing things up by placing the tiles between making batches.

Scott used the tiles with a notch on the top as the bottom layer of each groove to secure the tiles against the branches that formed the frame beneath the tiles. He then overlapped them at the top with another smooth set of tiles, securing them in place with more of his mud and plant "cement" mix so any water would slide from one tile to the next with no chance of falling between a crack. With the bottom rows in place, he placed a row of the upturned curved pieces between each of the bottom rows, forming a cap between grooves to ensure there were no gaps between rows, creating a wavy pattern reminiscent of an ancient Spanish roofing style. By the time the sun set, he'd covered almost half the roof, and given much of the prep work was already done, he'd probably finish it tomorrow.

Of course, the whole time he worked, the spiders watched. He noticed they kept out of his way, backing away whenever he needed something near where they were. By now, he was starting to think of them as something akin to ugly cats, as they seemed more interested in watching him work than doing anything productive. Though he supposed that was fine, so long as they didn't start expecting him to feed them. He had enough on his plate keeping himself and his sister alive. These spiders were on their own!

As they settled into the lean-to for the night, Scott couldn't help but notice a slight musty smell that hadn't been there before. The leaves were likely starting to mold, so it was good timing on getting the hut ready. He didn't think he could figure out how to make a fungicide in these conditions...

-

She was very curious about the odd firm, sticky mud the tool users created. It behaved more like rock than dried mud. Since She had a vibration-sensitive appendage in place, She even noticed the vibrations they produced were a much higher frequency.

She had a hand, and one of her eyes move closer to one of the pieces that had yet to be fitted onto the top of the new nest. As she suspected, it was tacitly more like stone than mud. Curious about the changes, She consumed some of the pre-seared sticky mud tiles and a piece of one of the post-cooked tiles and analyzed them to see what was different.

Amazingly, the mud was different on a chemical level. Of course, much of the organic material had been seared into two parts, oxygen and one part carbon, but the fire had also been hot enough to drive off the fluorine and sulfur oxygen components, sintering the sticky mud particles together! This mud was no longer mud at all! It would easily withstand rain and heat alike at the small cost of becoming significantly more brittle.

In many ways, this was an external version of what She did when She imbued new characteristics into one of her new appendages. Did the tool users fully understand what they'd done, or was this something they'd learned through simple trial and error? There was only one way to find out. She needed to communicate with them as quickly as She was able.

There was far too much She didn't know or understand about these tool users. If they kept advancing in this way, finding more and more complex ways to use tools to make tools that could create new and unique crystalline structures and chemical bonds, they could be capable of so much more than the primitive lives they were living. With some help and guidance, these tool users might become something new...tool masters, capable of very similar feats as a proper She! It would likely only take a few dozen generations to guide them into becoming worthy partners for She.

Though that begged the question, would they be of help or a threat if that ever came to pass? Still, if She wanted to reclaim her former position of success among the She, once again having a say in deciding the paths of the collective She, it might be a risk worth taking...

-

Scott awoke, ready to finish his most ambitious project to date. Eager to wash away the last vestiges of sleep, he walked down to the creek, where he splashed water into his face. Apparently, he wasn't the only one eager to get going because his sister spoke up beside him. "Brother, She has questions."

Maybe she wasn't as awake as Scott thought because that didn't make much sense. He turned around to ask what she meant and then froze. There standing before him was a whole new spider monster. It looked like a slightly smaller version of the giant spider-mantis-monster-thing from the cavern, standing only seven feet tall rather than ten. But instead of huge scything claws, it had what almost looked like human arms and hands, if that human were wearing an insect carapace that hid any skin. Even its head was slightly more human-like. It was enough that if he squinted in dim light, he might have thought the top half of the monster was human.

Scott was so stunned he fell back into the creek, soaking his pants and a good part of his shirt as the creature spoke again in his sister's voice. "Brother, She has questions."