Edward Lee - Slither

"Got my stows all ready," Jonas said when he came up from the cabin. They'd rigged some panels to pop out just behind the head. "But look what I found." Jonas giggled.

He held up a -severed foot.

Slydes stared with alarm, then remembered. "Oh yeah, that ritzy business-looking chick we carjacked last week." They'd pinched a chunk of change off her, all right. Fancy laptop, big-ass wedding ring, not to mention her Mercedes, which they'd sold to the chop shop. They'd brought her back to the boat for a little party, but as they'd been dragging her clothes off, she'd kicked Slydes a swift one in the nuts. Hadn't planned to kill the bitch, he thought, but, shit, she asked for it. He figured the best way to teach her a lesson was to cut off the foot that had kicked him. They'd had a good goround with her and then rolled her off the deck. In these waters? The sharks took care of them quick.

"We gotta be more careful, brother. Can't be leaving shit like that sittin' around in the boat."

Jonas laughed. "Hey, you're the one who cut off her foot." He threw it over the side with a paltry splash.

"What was that?" Ruth asked, jerking around.

"Beer can. Shut up and watch for boats."

Jonas leaned over to whisper, "How long we keeping her around?"

"I thought you liked her."

"Sure, for a hose bag, and she does the mouth thang mighty fine, but you know, after a while they all get an attitude. Start to think they have power 'cause they know your whole operation."

Slydes knew this but… She sucks a mean one… "Shit, let's keep her a bit longer. She's a good gofer, and she don't mind jacking the ATMs and that shit." Slydes chuckled under his breath. "Besides, she's crazy in love with both of us, so let's ride that awhile. When some better trim comes along, we'll put her in the drink like we always do."

"Cool." Jonas peered out into the night. "There's the island."

"Yep. Be there in a few. Just remember, no fuckin' around. We're in and out."

Jonas pushed long strings of greasy hair out of his face, which the gulf wind immediately replaced. "Photographers, you say."

"Underwater photographers or some shit, takin' pictures of fish or something for a big magazine. Won't be here long. Just grab a couple pounds. We'll get more when they're gone."

Jonas nodded. It would have to do. "Just so I can get me something. Sure as shit don't want to depend on what you make selling gator. I have college, brother. I'm too smart for that rinky-dink stuff."

"Here's your gator," Slydes said, pointing to his groin. He hated it when Jonas implied he was smarter, even though he knew it was true.

Jonas laughed and slapped his brother on the back. "Think I'll grab some quick tail off our hose bag. Have fun steerin' the boat, Captain Tug."

"Oh, I got something for you to tug. Tell me the truth. When you're laying peter on Ruth, you think about all them big rednecks who corn-holed you in county detent, huh? Go on, you can tell your brother."

"Fuck you, Slydes!" Jonas yelled and stepped out of the cockpit. He stalked off down the manway and shouted to Ruth. "Hey, Ruth! Downstairs!"

When Jonas and Ruth disappeared belowdecks, Slydes thought, Jesus. it was just a joke. Made him wonder a little, though.

Slydes checked the tide table again, then his watch. Right on the mark. Out in the murk, the island's obscure shape grew larger.

Of course, he had no way of knowing that things weren't going to go quite as smoothly as he thought.

(II)

Nora and Loren sat up late in the head shack, blearyeyed and hot in the harsh overhead light. Night had come to the island like a fog bank. The head shack's metal door stood open, letting in humid air. This late the woods outside sounded like a jungle.

"You were right earlier," Nora said. "There's no sign of a developing organ system." By now her eyes felt welded to the microscope, whose lighting element reminded her of an optical exam. It was giving her a headache.

Loren sat next to her at the table, wielding tiny forceps and wire-thin dissection probes. For several hours now, they'd been examining several of the things they'd found in the shower. "It's not even a complete animal." He looked up a moment from the legged magnification frame under which the specimen lay. "I've never dissected anything like this in my career. It's almost like this thing is just a tumor or a multicelled cyst."

"A multicelled cyst that moves," Nora added.

"About the only thing we do know is it's not a damn froghopper."

A motile cyst? she thought. A nodular cell cluster that has a system of locomotion? "I wasn't imagining it when I saw these things moving was I?"

"No, they were moving pretty damn fast," Loren assured her. "And they had direction volition. When you moved your foot on the shower floor, these things shifted their direction. I'm positive. We all saw it."

Nora sat back in the fold-down army chair. She rubbed fatigue out of her eyes, or was it confusion? It's impossible. It's fucking impossible.

Loren yawned, a fist to his mouth. "Maybe we really have stumbled on something. Maybe this is a previously unknown infantile mite or something."

"Come on, Loren," she objected. "This big? You and I both know that it's impossible for something like that to get this big. It's contrary to insectoid life."

Loren nodded dumbly.

It was the feeling in her gut that bothered her most. She felt tacky in the gritty humidity. Patches of sweat darkened her T-shirt like blotches. "It's able to move at will," she almost droned, "which means it's functionally-motile. But-"

"No parapods, no legs, nothing even close to a monotaxic foot," Loren finished for her. He looked back a moment at the mag frame, then shook his head at the evidence bright before his eyes.

"It looks like it moves on bristles or cilia."

Loren pointed errantly to the specimen. "Come on, Nora. They are cilia, and we both know that. We're looking right at it."

Nora let out a long sigh. "Which means we're looking at something that's impossible." I can't say it, she fretted. Loren would think I was ridiculous. When she looked back at him, he was staring right back at her.

But it was Loren who broke the ice that she was afraid to, afraid because her peers would think she was being absurd. "We were right earlier, weren't we?"

"The thing on Trent's shirt and the things in the shower are the same, and they're not some undiscovered species of mite or sebaceous parasite. We both know exactly what these things are, but neither of us is saying it. It's a motile worm ovum."

Loren nodded, confusion lengthening his expression. "A motile worm ovum the size of a coffee bean. Which doesn't exist."

Indeed, they'd both seen the same thing before, but under electron microscopes, not little 100x field scopes.

Now Nora rubbed her face in the most bewildered frustration. "There's no such thing as a motile ovum this size. They're all microscopic, they're just simple cell clusters with a cilia-based system of locomotion."

"Um-hmm." Loren held another plastic collection vial up to the light, and shook the bean-sized thing inside around. "Well, this ain't microscopic, Nora. So what do we do?"

Good question. "Collect more samples, look for the annelid that these things come from, and report to the college. That sounds like the best bet."

Loren stared grimly. "Sure, but that's ignoring the consequences of something, isn't it?"

"I know. The annelid that these things come from must be…"

"Really big," Loren said.

She gestured her microscope. "On one side of this one, there are some apertures behind the cilia roots. And I'm pretty sure I saw a stylet ring there."

"So did I, and now that we've decided what this really is, why should that be a surprise? Most other forms of motile ova have them, it's the delivery system to the host, and right now we're both wondering if one of these things could infect a human."