It's shit watching a loved one die. It's even worse having to move to another town just so you can care for them.

It's been seven years since we've been to my wife's hometown.

Five years since the onset of cancer made her mother look more like a skeleton than a woman. We tried to care for her the best we could. That's where it all started. Her mother is a keen arachnologist. Scares the shit out me, but my wife, being brought up with them, was more than happy to keep her dying mum's wish of keeping her "special" pet safe.

That thing is massive. And hairy. And scary. Cynthia is her name. Pure white, with a blade is gold on her back. I wasn't pleased about it. As you can tell. It sat off to the right in its glass prison at her mother's wake. I shuddered everytime I looked at it.

Being a small town, the local mortician delivered her mother back to our house for the service and wake. After the tears dried up, we stood one last time beside the casket. That's when I noticed the white hairs standing up on her withered arms.

Jenny, my wife, didn't notice through her grief, but I did. I bent down to see what it really was. Fine cobwebs spurting out of her skin.

That's when the first person fell down. Foaming at the mouth. Then another dropped like a sack of shit. White cobwebs sprung up along their arms and faces. Eyes rolled to white. They dropped around us like flies. Shaking. Foaming. White cobwebs growing.

That's when I noticed that Cynthia was gone.

The presence of death made the room eerie quiet. My wife and I looked around at the dead. Twenty five in total, prone on the floor. Then the casket creaked.

Her mother sat up, fully covered in cobwebs. Like a fucking cotton candy zombie. Even Jenny knew it was wrong. Then another moan made us turn. The dead, almost all covered the same, rose up. When Cynthia crawled out of one of their mouths, I lost my shit.

They stood there. Twitching. Not moving an inch toward us. I heard the scraping of feet behind us, and turned. They stopped. The ones behind, now in front. Then those behind us started to move. Everytime we turned our backs, they inched towards us.

I don't need to tell you we ran. We ran out of the house. Didn't stop until our car ran out of petrol. We haven't been back. We are never going back. I've heard the town was quarantined. God help those that went to eradicate Cynthia and her horde.