Free Shadow Knight's Mate by Jay Brandon

the sky. “It dropped something.”
    You couldn’t have proven that by Mabel, who squinted and saw nothing, but if Len said such a thing it was true. He had spent twenty-two years in the Air Force, the first two as a pilot in Vietnam. His vision was still perfect, which irritated her no end.
    Just as the object neared the ground it began to glow, perhaps from heat friction, so that she saw it too. A cylinder that looked small, but no telling how far away it was, except for Len. She looked at him and he said, “‘bout a quarter of a mile that way. Almost seemed like I felt it thump down.”
    â€œLet’s go see,” Mabel said impulsively. She stood up.
    Len continued to sit. Going to look at the thing, whatever it was, struck him as a bad idea. “Come on, come on,” Mabel said, holding out her hand. Just like when she was a young wife trying to talk him into an adventure. He was the fighter pilot and world traveler, but Mabel was the adventurer, even if the adventure was only going to a new mall.
    Len said quietly, “It might’ve been the pilot, honey. Some kind of new-fangled ejection seat that didn’t open right.”
    â€œOh.” She dropped her hand. She certainly didn’t want to see something like that.
    Len looked up at her. In the dimness her gray hair looked blonde and the lines in her face were invisible even to his sharp eyes. She looked like the slender young girl he had married, mainly because she was more fun than anyone he had ever met. That was still true.
    In the end, they didn’t have to decide whether to go look at the fallen object. It came to them.
    The mobile home park was mainly for transients, though there were a few permanent residents. Some had even planted trees, and stayed long enough to see them grow high enough to throw shade. In a few minutes there was a rustling sound like wind through the leaves, except that there was no wind. People who were sitting outside stood up. Neighbors drifted over to neighbors’ yards, saying, “Did you see— Do you hear—?”
    They were no longer looking up at the sky, which had grown dark, but out toward the distance, from which the rustling sound came.
    The creature that came drifting along the road between the homes made everyone who saw it smile. It was a short cylinder, maybe three feet tall, with a rounded top that featured flashing lights. Wheels carried it forward. It looked, in other words, like R2 D2, from “Star Wars.” Kid’s toy, people thought, or maybe the movies were being re-released.
    When “R2” drew to a stop, people gathered around. Mabel would have been one of the first, except that her husband stoppedher. He had been in too many dangerous situations to take this one at face value. What the hell did he know about Arkansas, anyway? The tranquil setting had suddenly turned foreign to the veteran Len.
    â€œOh, come on, honey, it’s probably going to give out movie passes. Let’s not be last in line.”
    She tugged at him, he resisted, and their hands parted. Mabel Dawes ran toward the cute little robot.
    Half a dozen people were standing right around it, pointing at the lights, trying to figure out its beeps. Another dozen people stood a little farther back, folding their arms and shaking their heads, as if the inner circle were careless children. Mabel had just broken through this ring when the little cylinder went dark. People made accusatory remarks at each other, until it rumbled and the top popped open.
    â€œMabel!” Len yelled then, but the top’s opening made people think the prizes were about to pop out. Mabel leaned forward as curiously as the rest.
    And Len turned and ran.
    The spiders came crawling out of the opening of the cylinder. Golden spiders the size of a big man’s hand, metallic, obviously manufactured. Nearly everyone has an instinctive fear of spiders, but these glittered like gold, like prizes. People