Variations on a Theme by William Meikle

Author:William Meikle
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: horror, mystery, short story, scotland, dark fantasy, collection, weird fiction, meikle
Publisher: William Meikle

At the Trial of the Loathsome Slime

The slime was truly ugly, the ugliest thing ever seen on Earth, uglier even than a bowl of rhubarb and custard left to congeal for a few days then coated with chocolate sauce, which it resembled most.

That afternoon it was held in a box of clear plastic, a six foot cube against whose walls it slithered and splattered with dismaying regularity. The trails of yellow mucous left behind when it retracted boiled violently before finally hardening into brown crayons etched on the inside walls. It had been calculated that the plastic would last fifteen minutes, more than enough for the court to reach a verdict.

Scenes were flashed across the holo-vid in heart-stopping sharpness: the return of the deep space probe, the sudden growth of jelly on its surface as the slime discovered it liked oxygen, the slime escaping from the research lab by the simple expedient of melting its way through everything in its path, the slime snuggling up to a dog and devouring half of it before moving on, the slime melting its way into and through a the servo-motors of a cross-town aero-bus, and, finally, the high point of the prosecutor’s case, the slime pouring over the Multivac port, the casing and chips and melted copper fusing into a blob before themselves being consumed. The camera drew back to show the slime sitting contentedly at an intersection, small pustules bubbling on what passed for it’s skin.

The jury gave a long sign as the prosecutor rumbled back to the niche with the parting words, “The prosecution rests, M’Lord.”

The room was hushed, a quiet broken only by the splashing of new ridges on the walls of the slime’s cage.

An aperture opened beside the vocalizer and a black rectangle of cloth was placed on top of a weary grey wig.

The vocalizer adopted a stern bass register as it intoned the verdict. This menace to Earth’s security was to be destroyed. Analysis had shown that only by breaking the slime into its constituent cells could its effects be neutralised.

Therefore the court judged that the slime was to be taken from the courtroom to the Virginia Mountains on the planet Blue Ridge, where it would be poured through a micropore sieve until it was dead.

“And may Multivac have mercy on its circuits.”

There was no one present at the demise of the slime, which was a pity, because proof of its great intelligence emerged at the last second as its cells communicated with each other in one last message in an attempt to cheer itself up on the way to oblivion…

“Well! This is another fine mesh you’ve gotten us into.”

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