The Slug Inception

by Matthew Pelly

The Slug Inception

  By Matthew Pelly

  Copyright 2014 Matthew Pelly

  License Notes

  Chapter: Prologue - Travels

  The Slug

  Yet again, our ship happened to be zooming through space. The cosmos, I mean. Of course, all of our external identifiers were off. Yet again.

  We'd been having some interesting conversations lately; we had a great agenda to accomplish, that would be quite difficult to accomplish. Unless we were lucky. Which we most likely won't be. So it will be quite difficult. To accomplish, that is.

  My blasted friends had managed to convince me that we should be working towards a peace between the Slugs and Cyborgs. An actual peace. Meaning, an end to the war. This didn't seem to bode very well for the Slugs, but Phill could be pretty persuasive when he wanted to be.

  We were on our way to Slugenis for the second time. I had no idea how long it had been since we were last there; the Slug King from the last time might have died and been replaced again. We had gone from the Slug homeworld to Earth and then out to PDN - deep in Cyborg territory - and we were now coming back.

  My time on Earth means that I tend to think in years now, instead of cycles like every other Slug, but we don't use light years as a measure of distance. So, in short, I had no idea how long it'd been. Hopefully the old King was still alive; I'd prefer to talk to a Slug that already knew me, even if it was only for a short time.

  According to our wonderful plan, we had to somehow convince the Slug King that we should strive to achieve a peace with the Cyborgs. That wasn't going to be easy. But Phill assured us that the Cyborgs wanted the same thing, based only on Rabadootime's and Slob's behaviour. I wondered if we would ever see those two again. We'll see.

  Assuming that we succeeded in this initial endeavour of our long list of nigh impossible endeavours, I had a plan for how to go about arranging the actual thing. A truly wondrous plan. At least, I think. That is, I hope. What I mean by that is, I hope that it is a truly wondrous plan. Although I was pretty sure.

  It concerned how we'd actually meet with these Cyborgs; it's not like we could just bring them to Slugenis. That would be a bad idea. And very awkward.

  But that wouldn't be happening anytime soon. It will happen anytime later, but not soon. So I didn't have to worry about it now. Although I would have to worry about it later.

  And so our travels continued. Ethan spent more time in thought than was usual for him; it seemed he was struggling with some kind of concept that he had yet to bring up. Well, it's not like I didn't have many things to explain to him that I still hadn't. It brought me a strange sense of satisfaction to hear his perspective on things before he knew what was truly going on.

  As usual, I spent lots of time with Boy; even though Frank, Rosetta, and Carmen were all my equally best Slug friends now, Boy and I were still closer. They didn't question this or fault us for it. We were age-old friends, from long before their time. Such close bonds didn't happen often, but when they did, even the Empire knew to stay out of the way.

  How unfortunate it was that I had to go on that one mission out to Earth without him... and yet how fortunate it was at the same time. Looking back now, I wondered what would have happened if it was anyone but Boy who had tried to rescue me. No one else would have circumvented an order directly from the Slug King just for what another Slug believed, especially one in my state. Only Boy would have done it, and only for me. This brought me a satisfaction that was altogether not strange.

  Phill continued to spend a lot of his time deep in thought, but he didn't seem to be as morose as he used to. If he ever was; you never know with those Cyborgs. But he also spent much more time than was normal for him talking to others. As much as he puts on an act of being depressed and bored, I had a good feeling that he was quite enjoying himself. And I was happy for that, as Phill was beyond just an ally now; he was one of us, no doubt about it.

  The remainder of the voyage progressed like this. We ate. We slept. We planned for how we would end a war that had been fought for longer than any one of us could fathom. Needless to say, we had lots of different ideas.

  But they all came back to the same point; there needed to be a way for those Slugs still stuck in the Honour ideology to achieve that which they craved the most - and that was why we needed to use my wondrous plan. It wouldn't be easy, that was for sure. But the way I see it, if life could always find a way, then as proponents of life I suppose that we could as well.

  Oh, and something about a glorious fight, too.