Slugs Read online

  Clive fell to his knees, crushing a number of slugs beneath him as he groped blindly for the lost key. But the black mass covered the floor and his hands only brushed over many thick bodies. One bit into his thumb and he shouted once more in pain. Others were on his thighs now, digging deep into the muscle with their razor sharp teeth. Clive began to weaken, the loss of blood finally slowing him down but still he sought the key, struggling in the darkness.

  Some of the other slugs were busily devouring the remnants of their crushed companions, seemingly oblivious to the struggle before them.

  Clive groaned despairingly and hauled himself upright, swaying drunkenly for a second. He knew he would never find the key and now, as the black horrors continued to feed on his living flesh, he saw his only hope.

  The bedroom window beckoned.

  It was a slim hope but his only one and he blundered towards it, arms outstretched. As he reached the window he looked behind him, at the remains of Donna’s body. One of the slugs was in the process of eating through her tongue, its obscene form filling her mouth as it feasted.

  Clive hoisted himself up onto the sill and, still with a dozen or more of the slugs clinging to him, he jumped.

  For seemingly endless seconds he hung in the air as if suspended on invisible wires then, his body plummeted earthward.

  He hadn’t even had time to think about the cold frame.

  Directly beneath Donna’s window it glinted as the watery moon shone on the thick glass panels in the top of it and Clive’s last sight was of the expanse of glass rushing up to meet him.

  He smashed into the cold frame, the panels shattering with an ear-splitting crash. Lumps of jagged glass flew up as if blasted by some kind of explosion, the wood snapped like matchwood and the entire frame collapsed around him.

  A shard of glass fully two feet long punctured Clive’s body just below the sternum, tearing its way through his chest and erupting from his back. A fountain of blood rose with it. A smaller but no less lethal sliver sliced through his throat and a torrent of crimson gushed from the wound. His body twitched spasmodically, the blood still spurting from the wound in his back, the wind rasping in his torn lung.

  Lights flashed on in houses on both sides, faces appeared at windows. Someone dashed for a telephone.

  The slugs finished eating and slithered back across the bedroom floor towards the window. Then, as quickly as possible, they made their way back down the drainpipe and down into the drain itself, the familiar blackness and dampness of the sewer beckoning them.

  The moon caught the point of the glass shard and it sparkled for a second then faded as Clive Talbot’s blood began to congeal on it.

  Nineteen

  Brady had got home late that evening and Kim was surprised to find that his breath smelt of whisky when he walked in. He had come in at about seven thirty, dropped his briefcase in the hall and then slumped into a chair in the sitting room. The Health Inspector kissed Kim gently on the cheek when she bent over him.

  ‘And where have you been?’ she asked, smelling the whisky on his breath. ‘There I am slaving over a hot cooker while you’re out boozing.’ She smiled.

  Brady tried to return the gesture but it dissolved away into a sneer. Kim perched on his lap and draped one arm around his neck.

  ‘What’s the matter, Mike?’ she asked, realizing that there was something wrong. He rarely drank, not unless something was really worrying him.

  He shook his head and pulled her closer, loosening his tie with his free hand. ‘I just stopped off at the Crown on the way home. I felt as if I needed one.’

  She leant closer, sniffing his breath. ‘Or two,’ she said.

  He smiled thinly.

  ‘The dinner’s nearly spoiled,’ she told him.

  ‘I’m sorry, love,’ he said. ‘But I’m not very hungry anyway.’

  Kim kissed the top of his head, feeling his arm squeezing her more tightly, with an urgency he didn’t usually show.

  ‘Are you going to tell me or do I have to drag it out of you?’ she said.

  ‘What do you mean?’ he asked, looking into her face.

  ‘Come on, Mike. I’m not stupid. What’s bothering you?’

  Brady exhaled deeply. Should he tell her? The conversation he’d had with Foley that afternoon had unsettled him. No, that wasn’t really the word. To hell with it. He was scared. For the first time in his life, and he didn’t mind admitting it, Mike Brady was frightened. Not just for himself, but for the rest of the town. And, most of all for Kim. He pulled her closer to him now, wondering whether he should burden her with his newly acquired knowledge. The words whirled around inside his head and he tried to dismiss them as ridiculous. Indeed, the idea of common garden slugs turning on human beings was ludicrous. As was the thought of some of them reaching lengths of six seven and even eight inches. But, he had seen it. He had seen these creatures at first hand and, he had seen what they could do and for fleeting seconds the image of Ron Bell’s remains flashed into his mind. The vision of David Watson and those monstrous worms replaced it. But, more than the problem, the solution worried him. How the hell were they going to wipe out the menace? Dare he go to the police with such information?

  Brady gently moved Kim from his lap, got to his feet and crossed to the drinks’ cabinet. He took out a bottle of Teachers and poured himself a large measure, dropping a couple of ice cubes in as perfunctory afterthoughts. Just to give it the appearance of respectability he thought, taking a hefty swallow. He closed his eyes, feeling the amber liquid burn its way to his stomach. He turned and looked at Kim, holding the bottle before him.

  ‘Join me?’ he asked.

  She was beginning to get annoyed. ‘Mike, please.’

  Brady exhaled deeply. ‘All right. But what I say now is just between you and me.’

  She shook her head, disconsolately. ‘Mike, if you can’t trust me after all these years…’

  ‘It’s not a matter of trust,’ he snapped, angrily and she was startled by the vehemence of his outburst. They regarded one another silently for long moments then Brady’s tone softened. ‘I spoke to Foley this afternoon.’ He sighed, sipping at his drink.

  ‘About the slugs?’ she said.

  He nodded. ‘They’re ordinary garden slugs:’

  ‘But garden slugs don’t attack human beings,’ she said.

  ‘That’s exactly what I said,’ echoed Brady going on to repeat his conversation with the curator. Kim listened intently, the hairs on the back of her neck rising slightly.

  ‘Can you be sure about it, Mike?’ she asked when he’d finally finished, her voice shaky.

  ‘All the evidence supports my ideas. Foley’s investigations just confirmed them,’ he said worriedly. He downed the rest of the whisky and poured himself another.

  ‘So you think that Ron Bell was killed by slugs?’ asked Kim.

  ‘Yes,’ he told her, flatly.

  ‘Then what’s to stop them killing someone else?’

  His answer sent an icy ripple of fear up her spine.

  ‘Nothing.’

  Kim sat back in her chair, the colour drained from her face. She took off her glasses and wiped both eyes and, for a second, Brady thought that she was crying but, as he looked he could see that she wasn’t.

  ‘What can you do?’ she wanted to know.

  He shrugged. ‘Foley’s working on a new poison. If only, somehow, there were a way of trapping all of the bloody things together in one place perhaps we’d have a chance of destroying them.’ He took a hefty swallow from his glass.

  ‘It’s hard to believe,’ said Kim, softly. She looked at him, her eyes beckoning.

  Brady crossed to the chair and sat on the arm, Kim clung to him, her head resting in his lap. He stroked a hand through her hair, conscious that he was shaking slightly.

  ‘There’s something else,’ he said. ‘A man died today at the City Hotel. He died of a disease transmitted by slugs.’ The Health Inspector decided to spare her the details.
/>   Kim sat up. ‘So the trouble is worse than you first thought?’

  He nodded. ‘Not only are the slugs themselves attacking human beings, the slime trails they leave contain a lethal fluid and, the man who died ate part of one of them.’

  Kim put a hand to her throat. ‘Oh God.’

  ‘Foley agrees that they could be using the sewers to move around in. I saw slime trails when I was down there with one of the sewage men.’

  ‘Then they could come up anywhere?’

  ‘Yes.’

  She clutched his hand.

  ‘There’s nothing we can do at the moment,’ he said. ‘If I go to the police they’ll laugh in my face. We can’t put a warning in the papers, people will panic. We’ll just have to hope that Foley can perfect a poison in time.’

  ‘In time?’ Her words echoed in the room.

  ‘He thinks there must be thousands of them already. We’ve got to destroy them before they can reproduce in even greater numbers.’ He swallowed the rest of his drink.

  ‘Do you think you can?’

  Brady walked back towards the drink’s cabinet. ‘I don’t know.’ Somewhere, a voice in his head was telling him that they didn’t have a hope in hell. The Health Inspector closed his eyes for a moment until the voice went away then he reached for the bottle once more.

  Kim got to her feet and walked slowly towards the kitchen.

  ‘You don’t want any dinner?’ she said, dreamily, the knowledge she had just acquired seeming to have numbed her senses.

  Brady smiled and shook his head. He walked back to the chair and flopped into it, the drink held firmly in his hand.

  ‘Kim,’ he called and she paused at the kitchen door. ‘It’ll be all right,’ he said but the words sounded empty and reassured neither of them.

  She pushed open the kitchen door.

  The single scream which she unleashed seemed to shake the house. Brady leapt to his feet, the glass of whisky falling to the floor. He dashed across to her and, together they stood in the doorway, eyes riveted to the sight before them.

  Slithering silently over the edge of the stainless steel sink were half a dozen of the slugs. The leading one, a huge monstrosity about six and a half inches in length, had already reached the floor and was sliding across the lino towards the two terrified onlookers. The others were close behind it and, as Brady stepped into the kitchen, he saw more crawling over the edge of the sink, the slime from their bodies making them glisten.

  ‘Get back in there,’ he shouted at Kim, pushing her into the sitting room, slamming the door behind him. The Health Inspector snatched up the broom which lay propped against the wall nearby and, using it as a club, he brought it smashing down onto the leading slug. The aim was good and the broom hit its mark. The black creature’s body seemed to explode, half of it flying across the kitchen, the eye stalks still waving about silently. Brady stepped past the pulped thing and drove the bristles of the broom against two of the other slugs, watching as they dropped to the floor. He stamped on them, hearing the foul squash as they were scrambled beneath his shoes. Using the broom as a weapon he literally swept the others back over the lip and into the sink itself where, to his horror, he saw dozens more of the creatures slipping and sliding over each other.

  One was on the draining board.

  The Health Inspector snatched up a carving knife which lay on the drying rack nearby and sliced the foul thing in half. A gout of thick, foul smelling pus-coloured liquid spurted onto his sleeve and he tore his jacket off in disgust. He pushed the severed slug back into the sink with the blade of the knife suddenly realizing how he could destroy them.

  He reached for the button which activated the waste disposal unit but his hand wavered as he looked once more into the sink, the horrific realization of how they had got there finally hitting him.

  As he watched, one of the slugs eased its obscene black form from the tap.

  It hung there for a second then, trailing mucus behind it, the vile beast dropped into the sink. Almost immediately, a pair of eye stalks emerged from the tap, behind it, signalling the arrival of another of the animals.

  Disgusted, Brady punched the waste disposal button and the vicious blades roared into action slicing and crushing anything which came their way. Brady used the end of the broom to push the last of the slugs down into the murderous revolving blades, watching with something akin to satisfaction as their bodies were torn and pulped by the machine. He turned on both taps, flushing the last of the black creatures from its hiding place. Propelled by the powerful jet of water, the slug was hurled from the outlet and straight into the grinding jaws of the waste disposal. The water also helped to wash away the evil mixture of pus-like blood and slime which coated the bottom of the sink. Brady left the taps and the disposal unit running then bolted through the living room and up the stairs, heading for the bathroom.

  As he hurtled up the stairs, visions of what he might find whirled through his brain. A bath full of the foul black animals? The whole room seething with them?

  He flung open the door.

  Nothing.

  Breathing a sigh of relief, the Health Inspector crossed to the bath and turned both taps on full blast, the water splashing up violently when it hit the enamel. He watched for long seconds then crossed to the sink, repeating the procedure there.

  Once more, there was no sign of the slugs.

  Gasping for breath, Brady watched the gushing conduits finally turning them off. He reached for a towel and wrapped it around the sink taps, blocking the outlet. Then he repeated the procedure with those on the bath. Satisfied that they were secure, he hurried back downstairs. Kim looked up at him as he passed, her eyes red and puffy. Brady, breathless from his exertions and also from fear, walked back into the kitchen and switched off first the taps and then the waste disposal unit. A sudden silence descended. Only the Health Inspector’s low, guttural breathing interrupting the solitude. As he fastened dishcloths around both taps, he could hear Kim in the sitting room, sobbing softly.

  His task completed, he stepped back, nearly treading in the pulped mess behind him. All that remained of the slug he’d killed with the broom. He stepped back until he was leaning against the kitchen wall, his breath now slowly returning to normal.

  ‘Mike.’

  He heard Kim’s subdued plea and hurried into the sitting room. She was crouching on the floor beside one of the chairs. He knelt beside her, enfolding her in his arms, rocking backward and forward as if he were comforting a child. She held him tightly, her tears staining his shirt.

  ‘Mike,’ she repeated.

  ‘It’s all right,’ he said, reassuringly but couldn’t resist a sly glimpse over his shoulder at the kitchen taps.

  If the bastards were using the water pipes to move about in too, there was no telling where the horror would end.

  Or even if it would.

  The entire water supply of Merton could be contaminated. The thought hit Brady like a sledgehammer and he swallowed hard.

  Kim looked up at him, her eyes red and bloodshot. Her glasses were steamed up and Brady removed them, wiping the big salt tears away with one finger. He held her tightly.

  Brady could feel her shaking but he gripped her firmly, wondering if she could feel the powerful shudders which racked his body.

  Twenty

  Charlie Barnes struck the match, his face momentarily illuminated by the yellow light. He tossed it away, hearing it hiss on the damp grass. He sucked hard on the roll-up, leaning against the tree impatiently. The hands on the church clock had crawled on to one fifteen a.m., bathed in the cold white light of the moon, they stood out starkly against the stone face of the clock. The weather vane at the top of the spire rocked gently back and forth in the cool breeze, its squeaking carrying a long distance in the stillness of the night.

  Charlie watched the metal clock hands for a few more minutes and then decided that it was now or never. He walked slowly from his hiding place behind the trees, heading towards the open g
rave which lay about twenty yards from him. He kept to the grassy verges, conscious of the noise his boots would make on the gravel of the path. But, he reasoned to himself, who the hell would be up and about at twenty past one in the morning? And especially in a bloody graveyard. He forgot his caution and chose the path instead, his heavy tread rattling the pieces of shale. It sounded like someone walking over a hundred bags of crisps.

  His spade propped over his shoulder like some kind of mock rifle, Charlie marched up to the open grave and peered in. The moonlight glinted on the polished wooden surface of the coffin and, for a second, he could see himself reflected in it. He stood beside the grave, finishing his fag. One large lump of ash fell from the end and dropped onto the coffin lid. What the hell, Charlie thought, it wasn’t going to bother the poor sod inside was it? He smiled and dropped the roll-up, grinding it out beneath his boot. Then, he rubbed his hands and drove the spade into the mound of earth at the graveside.

  Charlie had been grave digger in Merton’s cemetery for the last six years. Ever since he got out of the Scrubs. He’d been in and out of nick all his life, ever since he was a kid and all the people in the town knew him for what he was. But there was nothing malicious about Charlie. No GBH or mugging for him. He hadn’t graduated to that, probably never would. His life of crime had consisted of things like nicking bikes or stumbling on things which had fallen from the backs of lorries. At fifty-two, Charlie was treated with something bordering on affection by the older members of Merton. ‘A likeable rogue’ one of the old ladies used to call him and he smiled at the recollection. The last judge had called him ‘an incurable villain’. Charlie grunted indignantly to himself. Silly old sod he thought, remembering how the bastard had sat there, looking at him over the top of his horn-rims like some red robed God with a plaited wig. Charlie had been caught in possession of fifty cases of Johnny Walker which had disappeared from a warehouse in Milchester, about twenty miles away. It hadn’t been a case of a quick trip to the magistrate’s court and a hundred quid fine (his sentence for having stolen three lawn mowers from the local garden shop). No, this time, he was hauled up to a Crown Court. The case had only taken two days and the end result had been that he’d got eighteen months in the Scrubs. A bit harsh Charlie had thought at the time but, at least, while he was in there he had had time to catch up with a couple of old friends. He smiled to himself.