It was a sunny June afternoon when the sludgy chemical refuse of the General National corporation exited from its long journey through rusty cylindrical tubes to its eventual home in the boggy creeks of the Lost Hills Nature Preserve, where it mingled with the more natural fluids that had come by way of rain and dewdrops.
A sizzling sound was heard as the black goop perverted the surface of the small lake that adjoining the creek, and the waters began to bubble and the fish swam away in fright. The woodland creatures gathered around in curiosity, observing the frothing waters of their newly polluted lake, which was washing strange bubbles onto the shore.
It was at this strange juncture in time that a human being arrived, carrying a squirming cephalopod in a plastic bag. This mousy individual looked furtively about, as the bag in his hand contained a small, angry octopus, which his daughter had purchased from an ad in the back of a comic book. His wife was disturbed by the pet, and had demanded that this unfortunate man abandon the creature in the woods. Seeing the bubbling, sizzling lake, he emptied the octopus out of the bag and into the black oozing waters and scurried off to civilization.
As one might imagine, the chemically altered lake had unusual effects on the octopus and the natural order of things. When fall came, the octopus laid her eggs. The eggs were a strange blue color, and their mother rejected them, seeking a better life upstream. A group of possums stumbled across them, and took them for their own, because possums aren’t terribly smart. Then one grey October morning the eggs hatched, and among the strange brood that emerged was Slub Glub, who came into the world a mutant creation, with yellow eyes and fevered mind.
To be continued.
Table of Contents: “Slub Glub in the Weird World of the Weeping Willows”
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Illustration & text copyright (c) Andrew Goldfarb