Speccie Chill Factor by 10 April
 

I once saw an old horror film about giant man-eating rabbits. If failed to grip, in Wodehousian phrase.

No. 2793: chill factor

James Herbert, author of The Rats and the UK’s very own Stephen King, has just died. You are invited to submit a short story in the genre featuring the animal of your choice (150 words max.). Please email entries to lucy@spectator.co.uk by midday on 10 April.

The terrifying secret was out. The country had been infested by a ravening horde of predatory creatures that were bent on conquest. They closely resembled human beings, so it was impossible to recognize them until it was too late. They infiltrated boadrooms and shareholders’ meetings, cunningly spreading their deadly poison in the form of foreclosures, repossession orders and insane gambles on the Stock Exchange, eating away at the savings and possessions of ordinary people while glutting themselves on obscene rewards. The very words “banker sighted!” sent a chill down people’s spines, yet there was no escape.

It could only end in one way. At a general meeting, the Alpha Banker, a monstrously bloated figure still dribbling blood from his lunchtime 40-ounce steak, announced to the simulacra of humanity that were his minions the words that told them that the final victory was theirs: “Gentlemen - we have achieved economic meltdown!”.

To me, the all-time great Rat Story is H.P. Lovecraft's "The Rats in the Walls."

In summer’s dusk, not far underground they wait – attentive. In the valley below, the farm quietens. Eventually their scouts return: “Lights out, all abed, no sounds from house - bar snoring.” Dog too dozes, half-out of his kennel this warm night. Five specialists are sent onward, approaching carefully upwind against gently flowing sultry air. Soon comes their well-rehearsed collective pounce, grasp and bite; from under that muffling grip, only a brief choking sound and warm trickle escape. Dog has been despatched.
Summoned now from their tunnels, massed forces shuffle downslope, under fitful clouds and moonlight: a battalion paralleling the sky, striped and silent.
The strict Darwinian outcome of Man’s long persecution now emerges. Unwittingly he has crafted them, his nemesis, by leaving alive only the most evasive, deepest-digging, tenacious of their species: a brooding intelligence, accumulating. Finally, across England’s counties, timed to this historic moon, Badgerkind attacks.

Their existence had been known for a long time, but they were so small that no one paid them any attention. And apart from provoking the occasional allergy, they seemed perfectly harmless.

But now a massive mutation was underway. People began to notice that their mattresses had become lumpy, and that strange protuberances had appeared beneath the carpets.

The genetic revolution completed itself overnight. Grown suddenly to the size of small rats, present in their millions in every household, they tore their way through the mattresses and ripped out the throats and entrails of their sleeping hosts. The carpets erupted, and the creatures that had been skulking beneath them scuttled to join the feast. Those that were already living in eyelashes simply reached out with their steely pincers and snatched the eyeballs from their sockets, slurping contentedly on the delectable jelly.

It was the dawning of the Age of Acarians.

Brian,

Very good, but maybe your last sentence should be "It was Dawning of the Age of Acarians."

Thank you, Douglas. For me, it was the haziest of memories of a kind of music that was never mine. I've adopted your suggestion.

Removed******

It's well-written, Rob, but sorry - I don't get it! I may have missed some topical news item... so I'm guessing, but is the idea here that fishermen have lost thumbs overboard, in accidents with equipment, and that these thumbs have evolved into sentient and hostile sea-creatures?

Graham, I think the idea is that whales have evolved thumbs, have built harpoons from undersea materials, and have used those weapons to fight back.

Thanks Chris! Yes, I see the phrase 'Norwegian whaling ship' plainly offers a guide... I was rather slow on the uptake! (My alternative confabulation now strikes me as thoroughly bizarre !)

'Yes, the garden's coming along well, but the seasons are all skew-whiff these days,' she laughed into the phone. 'Last summer with all that rain – remember the slugs and snails everywhere? And this May it was weird, with all those bright yellow caterpillars. Never seen anything like it. Should make for a beautiful butterfly summer.'
It was when she switched off the phone that the first butterfly landed on her, its wings intricately patterned with bronze and deep orange and rich purple. She was quite charmed by the confidence with which it sat on her sleeve, but then more came towards her, zig-zagging as butterflies will, but with an odd determination. They settled on her so thickly that her screams were quite muffled. When they left her face, nothing was left but white skull, flecked here and there with shining pink fragments of cartilage.

At first I thought I was imagining it, the soft murmur of a deep voice seeming to say "Why did you name me Fido? Fido is a stupid name." I rolled over and went back to sleep, but suddenly I woke to the same words, only this time spoken with unmistakeable menace. Fido's cold wet snout was in my ear. I bolted upright -- or I would have done, had I not discovered that my body was fastened tightly to my bed by Fido's metal leash. Fido calmly walked to the door and nuzzled it open. The German Shepherd from down the block wandered in, and though his mouth did not move, I plainly heard him say, "Is this the fool who named you Fido?" Fido nodded before his friend began, slowly and methodically, to tear apart my flesh with his pointy fangs.

I'm glad you lived to tell the tale, Roger.

This stuff is truly awesome. Spherians have found their metier. Flesh-eating butterflies could make it to Hollywood.

Yeah, they might suck all the Scientology out of Tom Cruise.

Brian, I became one of the walking dead, a zombie who wanders the earth in search of human flesh while occasionally pausing to enter magazine competitions.

What? You turned into a Tory?

I so wish that this had been what I meant, Graham!