Ongoing Serial Saga of the Sisters Slothang

Next Installment

What Peytonia saw, standing there waste deep in vomit inducing spludge after having slid through some kind of opening in the floor of a mall store which suddenly appeared under the Sisters Slothang when they were hiding in a hanging rack of sweaters, was a rat. At least she thought it was a rat, but it was huge, and its fur was tawny, not white with black spots like the ones in the pet store. It had the same eyes, and the same pointy nose and buck teeth and it was munching something. It stood on a shelf above the stream of slop that the sisters had fallen into. Its fur was greasy, slimy, grimy, it was gross, and it was looking right at her. It was at least the same size as them if not bigger. Peytonia froze. Then it looked over at Sophina heavering.

“Yo, don’t blow it in there! Blow up here where we can eat it. That’s a complete waste. What is the matter with you?” The big rat said moving toward them.

Peytonia backed away as it approached, Sophina stopped puking and looked up at the huge ugly rat with wide eyes.

“I’m serious, you got any more?” The rat asked.

Sophina swallowed hard and shook her head tentatively.

“Man, you gottta be smart about these things. Good food is hard to come by around here.” The rat complained walking back over to its snack.

The girls looked at each other. They appeared to be standing in a muck stream in a stone tunnel that was built by someone. The stones were cemented together in a large arch shaped passageway that went off farther than they could see in either direction. Just above them was the pipe that they had slid out into this stream. On the side with the rat was a walkway along side the stream, on the other side was flat wall all the way to the ceiling. Since the rat did not seem at all ferocious they decided to climb up on the walkway behind it. They had to help each other up out of the spludge since it was a little too high for them the climb up on their own, but after a bit of a struggle they were sitting on the ledge in their own personal puddles of ickiness.

They looked down the tunnel away from the rat. There was no lighting, but light entered through holes in the ceiling that appeared at regular distances as far as they could see. One was almost directly above them. They could see it was a passage way to a grate that seemed to lead outdoors. They could see what looked like blue sky above them, but it was far too high for them to climb out. The view was the same in the other direction, of course, except for the giant rat whose large backside was jiggling while it worked on whatever it was munching.

They sat still for a little while not sure what to do. Finally Sophina whispered to her sister, “Ask it how to get out of here.”

“I don’t want to talk to it, you talk to it.” Peytonia whispered back.

“No.”

They were still for awhile longer, then the rat turned around and looked at them again. “Well,” It began, licking its lips, “it wasn’t much, but it was something. Now what’s your story? Do you have anything to eat?”

Both the girls climbed to their feet so they didn’t feel so small beside the rat, but they just stared at it with wide eyes; the whites shining out from within the dark spludge that covered their faces.

“Hello? Anything to eat? I know you speak the language, I heard you whispering.” It repeated.

Both heads wagged back and forth rigorously.

“Aye, more competition, there’s barely enough here for me.” It declared.

“We won’t eat anything.” Peytonia promised.

“Good. That’s fine. Then why are you here?”

The girls looked at each other wondering how to answer.

“Anyone?”

“We fell.” Sophina said.

“You fell?” It asked.

“Where are we?” Said Peytonia.

“What do you mean, ‘where are you’? You are here, where else would you be?” The rat told them.

“Where is here?” Peytonia repeated.

“You make no sense, little one, here is here. Look around you.”

“We don’t want to be here.” Sophina declared.

“Most of them who come through say the same thing. I never know how to reply.” The rat confessed.

“There are others?” Peytonia asked.

“Many. I’ve been here a very long time. None of them ever want to be here. They all leave.” The rat told them.

“Where do they go?” Peytonia asked eagerly.

“I don’t know, some go that way and some go that way.” They rat answered.

“Where do those ways lead?” Demanded Peytonia a little impatiently.

Suddenly the huge pipe above them spit a load of stuff out into the stream. None of it was identifiable, all of it was gross.

“Oh look, there might be food in there, ‘scuse me.” With that the rat plunged into the nasty stream head first making a bit of a splash with its large derriere.

Peytonia looked at Sophina who was looking down the passageways, first one then the other. “Which way should we go?” She asked Peytonia.

TO BE CONTINUED