Chapter 10 - Evolution

Sol took the slime’s strike at full force, so focused on dodging he didn’t think to guard. All the built up power in the swing came crashing through his body, shaking him to his core and rupturing his insides. He coughed all the air from his lungs, blood spilling from his mouth as the momentum finally caught up to the inertia of his body and sent him flying across the clearing.

Clint’s gaze followed Sol as he clattered to the ground like a discarded ragdoll. He snapped back without checking if he was okay. There was simply no time for distraction. Whether Sol was dead or dying or somewhere between, he could not falter. If Luna was still in play, their strategy could still succeed. He would play his part, just as intended.

Luna’s resolve was not as strong, however. The power drained all the more from her hands as she watched in horror at her brother being struck down. She’d have covered her face if she could spare a hand, but she could not, so her terrified expression was shown clearly to the world. It was something that she’d never say, never dare to think too overtly, but she revered her brother. Revered him as the strongest. Not literally, her proximity to the nation’s rulers made her humblingly aware of how relatively weak her and her brother were. But in every other way, he was the strongest. Physically powerful, confident, unflinching and unyielding. He was everything she wanted to be but could not. To see him struck down so thoroughly and with such ease. It drove her to the brink of despair.

But as he always seemed to, Sol pulled her back. “Now, Luna!” he screamed, still rolling from the blow he had been dealt.

With his words, she snapped out of her trance. Despite her doubt, she stepped forward, thrusting her diminished ball of energy into the slime, powering it up with as much extra energy she could muster before it left her and settled into the creature’s centre.

It blew a hole straight through the monster, hollowing it out and exposing its middle to the forest air. Luna leapt back, avoiding the barrage of loose slime that came with the explosion. She strained her eyes, hunting for the prize she and her brother had fought so desperately to claim.

The core. It was there, tumbling in a free-fall, shaken loose by the aftershock of her attack. It was a darker green than ever, dense and crystalline, far more complex than the simple things driving most slimes. A wholly unique treasure that housed the very being of a slime that defied all logic.

Clint Morgans intended to destroy it. His eyes sharp and directed, vision straight and perfect like a laser, he took aim. The world around him ceased to exist. It faded until only he and the target remained. His breath was smooth and steady. It only took him a fraction of a second to move his hand into position.

Unfortunately, something else had pre-empted his movement even earlier. A lone slime, smaller, weaker, but swifter and trickier than the others. It had leapt at his hand just a moment ago, signalled into action when Luna’s spell first collided with the main body.

It crashed into Clint’s weapon, catching him off guard and disarming him. Before he could draw his eye away from the core, the slime tumbled off into the woods. In the moment of truth, the key to victory was snatched away.

The core dropped, sitting now on the lower half of the slime, like a precious gem on a pillow for display. Around it, the main body was beginning to reform, quickly blotting out all vision of the glistening core. The once dormant slimes that had been waiting obediently were active now, launching themselves toward their master to aid in this recovery. This was the endgame. This is what the slime queen had been waiting for all along.

Clint was disarmed. Luna had no magic prepared. Sol lay wounded too far away for his strength to be of any use. The future they were trying so hard to prevent was coming to pass. The exponential growth of their enemy was about to reach a point of no return.

Of the three, only Sol could be described as an optimist. Only he would dare to dream that they could still prevent this terrible fate from unfolding.

From his floored position, he raised a weak, but determined hand. It blazed with magic, a more violent, uglier magic than his sister’s. It was rough and ragged and painful, but it was his. “Luna!” he roared, a ball of flame reaching the apex of its size. “Grab the core!”

The fireball bloomed from his hand and coursed through the air. It soon found flesh and melted it away, exposing a path to the core for Luna. It halted the recovery momentarily, offering her a split-second chance to claim it.

The last thing Sol saw before losing consciousness was his sister reaching for the core. He smiled, believing in her to his very last thought…

She hesitated. The trauma of her wrist being snapped at the bone. The weight of expectation from her brother, who she could not be certain was alive. Her own feelings of weakness, a deep-seated self-doubt that one good action could never hope to shake. They gathered in her chest, atop her shoulders, in her fingertips and along her arms. She was crushed, but still she moved. Her mind and body fought their way through, reaching out for the core with all of her being.

But she hesitated. It was a split-second opportunity. Such a thing could not be forgiven. She fell short, and the slime queen resealed itself, whole once more.

One step away.

Just as the Sol, Luna and Clint had been so many times. The slime too was one step away.

One slime away.

One little slime that came rolling up, Clint’s revolver within its body.

It hopped dutifully up, merging with its master, though such a relationship is an ill-fitting metaphor. They were many. They were one. They were separate. They were the same.

They were changing. Rapidly now. The last drop had dripped and the cup now ran over. Its form warped and blurred, unsteady and excited. It jittered and danced and squirmed and raved and, most importantly, changed.

Clint didn’t look at the slime though. Instead at Luna, mouth agape. “Why?” he asked. There wasn’t anger in his voice, but he couldn’t speak kindly to the woman who had just assured their deaths.

“I’m sorry.” Luna muttered. Her headdress hung over her eyes, concealing the wet messes they had become. “I’m just weak.” she croaked.

She was gone then. The slime consumed her, as it had her staff and Clint’s revolver. She could barely be seen within the mass, just a vague outline of a person amidst the murky depths of slime.

Depths that became murkier still as the slime shrunk. It grew denser and denser, smaller and smaller, compounding upon itself over and over until finally Luna’s outline was all that was left, mummified in an impossibly tightly packed slime.

The slime stood up, Luna’s unconscious body limply within it, contained in a perfectly airtight shell. It moved around a few times, testing the solid shape it now possessed. How it felt to have a consistent form. How it felt to move individual parts, rather than one unwieldy whole. How it felt to be human.

Once its understanding seemed satisfactory, it had no use for its template. Luna slid unceremoniously out the back of it, collapsing to the ground, wet and unclean. Clint could only stare in bewilderment. “What are you?” he asked.

It didn’t have a mouth yet, so it formed one. It exhibited a careful control of its body, shifting elements around freely to suit its needs. It made a mouth first, then removed the ears, useless things for it to have. From there it was about aesthetics. It distinguished itself from Luna, its face softer than Luna’s sharp features, though this was inevitable with the squishy material it was composed of. Curiously, it cared for its faux-clothing, warping its lower half into a facsimile of a large, bell-shaped skirt, reminiscent of a storybook princess. On its head, it morphed part of its mass of would-be hair into a sort of crown.

“We are the grief of millions given form.” It spoke horribly, its vocal chords a pale imitation, soft gel resonating in place of firm muscle, creating a sickening voice that barely registered as one. It sounded like the screams of someone drowning shaped into words.

“We are the culmination of our species’ evolution.” It grew more confident with each syllable spoken, taking great pride with each successful word. “We are the first breach into humanity made by slimekind.”

Its face shifted, expressions were new to it too, it seemed. It split its face, attempting to create something like a smile. “We are the Slime Queen.” It took a bow, moving with none of the weight or gravity a real person would. “It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

Current Party: Clint Morgans, Sol Dragoneart, Luna Dragoneart

Bullets Remaining: 5