Fish of Filth

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Alec’s legs struggled to paddle through the dirt. The faster he moved, the more it felt solid. The massive mole monster crashed ever closer. Dirt cascaded over Alec’s head and down his neck like it was raining again. A dirty shadow rose over him and an alien, musty smell tickled his nose. Dirt, dirt, dirt, dirt, dirt, he kept thinking, but it wasn’t dirt that was troubling him now.

A vast blanket enveloped his torso and thrust the wind out of him. He was lifted right out of the dirt and there was nothing he could do. His eyes reeled, trying to focus through the ticklish fur that enveloped his face. His arms were still free, but his efforts to pull himself out of the animal’s grip were fruitless. Each of its ebony claws was as thick as his neck. It groped him with both hands now, turning him upside down and right side up again, fondling him like a new toy. Alec would have been nauseous and afraid, but the nugget in his head turned and twisted again, always pointing down no matter how much the animal waggled him about.

In between bouts of shaking, Alec took closer looks at the bug eater. It really did look like a giant mole sticking its head out of the ground. But where its head should have been, there was only a roundish mound of black fur, dry and well kept like a toasted towel. Where its face should have been, there were only uneven ridges and valleys covered in verdant pastures of hair. He wasn’t sure if its eyes and ears were hidden somewhere among the fur or gone completely. It looked as if plowing through the dirt all its life had weathered away its facial features, grinding away its eyes, shearing off its ears and filling in its mouth. The only thing that could have been part of its face was its trunk, a little ways below the vestigial head as a tunnel right into its throat.

The creature’s hands held Alec steady as the trunk came fully out of the dirt, showering him in the stuff. He swallowed dirt and gagged, watching helplessly as the bug eater’s long trunk rose towards him, observing him in curious silence. That musty smell came on him in waves – insect matter from millions and trillions of swallowed bugs. Alec detested the way the little tubes seemed to stare at him and examind his disheveled body. He swatted them away and the trunk moved just out of reach.

Then it gave him a squeeze and Alec gave a shout of alarm. But the animal didn’t hear him and amped up the pressure on his chest. His lungs screamed for freedom and his vision began to flicker…

A vibration ran through the dirt, faster than the blink of an eye. Alec didn’t know where it came from, but at once the creature loosened its grip and paused. There was only the silent whispering of waves of dirt.

Another vibration from the deep below, and the dirt on the surface was tossed up in a ripple. The creature spurred itself into action. It dropped Alec entirely and its arms went straight into the dirt, supper forgotten. Alec coughed up lumps of sticky dirt and inched away from the creature, practically floating over the waves.

A third ripple through the earth, gripping Alec’s body for a fraction of a second and sending spits of dirt high into the air as it passed. The bug eater was frantic now, harrying the dirt and sinking its body back into the sea. The entire surface was shaking and boiling, a puddle of corn ready to pop. Alec was having trouble paddling thorugh it, having trouble staying afloat. Grains of dirt danced about, jittering, liquidising. A massive whomph, and both he and the bug eater abruptly fell and rose as a great something displaced the dirt right under their feet. The bug eater’s great furry arms reached out and silently screamed, realising its doom, its eroded face contorting and wailing without sound. The dirt tossed itself up and down, up and down, up and down…

An utterly new scent filled Alec’s nose, replacing the dry earthy smell of the sea. It was wet, soiled, filthy; a horrendous, aerated muck pouring down Alec’s nostrils. A great rumbling quivered his bones, melting and freezing them in tumbling waves. An animalistic sense awoke and consumed everything within him, imploring him to flee, to fight, to flee, all at once; only the nugget in his mind was spared, flaring wildly and pointing directly down, down, down…

A hole appeared under the bug eater as it floundered. The hole yawned open, long and dark, and the creature careened into it. Its claws sought a handhold, but then the foaming dirt rushed in from all sides and the creature toppled wholly into it. At last, the bug eater gave an ear-piercing scream, its skin-sealed mouth twisting, tearing at its own flesh – the first and last sound Alec would ever hear it make. The wormlike tubules of its trunk squirmed for a final salvation at the wan light of day. Then the hole closed up as quickly as it had opened. The bug eater was gone.

The dirt subsided and rushed away. Alec’s bare feet felt land again, but surely this wasn’t the ocean floor? The waves were calmed now, as if consuming that huge beast had sated their violence. Alec’s chest rose out of the water, the ground raising him up, and he choked at the stench of muck, faeces and a midday fish market. At his feet, skin and scales poked their menacing eyes through the mucky dirt that clung to them. The mud squelched underneath his toes and he did his best to kick it off them. It only uncovered more muck, and more of these rock hard scales lined in perfect lattice: silver, leaf shaped, complete with ridged veins. Each one was the size of his hand. It looked to him like the back of a dragon, resurfacing some rather unpleasant memories.

Alec stood upon something alive. Judging from the foaming filth it had brought up, it was as wide as a train and as long as half a dozen carriages. It must have come from the deep – deeper than deep – a place where the sea was not of dirt, but of water. And as it rose to the surface to hunt for prey, the humours of dirt and fluid combined into this filth.

A light rose out of the water – 4 lights, muted by the fingers of soil that were thrust up by the creature’s back. Alec took two hazardous steps, barely believing his eyes, and stooped down. The moment he grabbed the Tablet of 4612, he felt like he could fly again; his fluttering heartbeat cooled in an instant; his burning limbs were doused; the pooling sensation in his stomach – nausea – evaporated in the blustery wind.

Its magic did nothing to quell the terrible stench of filth, though. He wiped mud off the Tablet as it purred in his hands. The little nugget purred in just the same way; it brimmed with eager impatience.

Running out of time, it whispered.

There was an ear-splitting crack, and a massive dorsal fin rose out of the murk like a metal sail, almost sheering off Alec’s right arm at the shoulder. A dozen masts rose up before and behind him, creaking against the breeze, showering him in mud and the instinctual scent of sea spray that almost cut through the smell of manure.

A loud thump echoed from the beast, a deep vibration he could hear in his bones. It came again, thump, thump, thump… A deep rhythmic pounding, the very same pounding he had heard deep in the sea of dirt a few minutes ago.

A ripple raced through the dirt, and it was as if time had been frozen and now it had restarted. All the glittering scales vanished at once, and Alec now sank back into the dirt. The waves surged in from all sides as the great warship sank, veering forwards as the multi-masted dorsal fin relaxed with a scale-crunching clunk. The sound of soil raced into his ears and clutched at his soul, eager to take him back in and isolate him.

Alec clutched the Tablet like a baby. As the sea came in to catch him, blind him, drown him, he felt nothing but calm. He felt no pain as the dirt scratched at every little patch of skin and filled his nose and mouth and ears. Those animal feelings were gone now, swept away by the power that he held in his hands. A power that could take him away from this world and its grievances, this sea of dirt, in an instant. Like a ripple through the waves, faster than the blink of an eye.

Sea of Soil: FIN

This is a revised version of a story from 4 May 2023.