Week 9 Story: The Slug

There once was a man named Hugo. Hugo lived in a humble house with his wife, Margot. Hugo and Margot were a very happy couple and had very little to dispute about. That was until one day, a slimy, fat slug crawled out from under the refrigerator and into the middle of the kitchen floor. Hugo and Margot, a fairly young and newly wedded couple, had never encountered a slug before, and neither of them knew what to do. They both screamed at the fat brown squishy body inching its way across the floor leaving a slime trail behind him. Hugo, not knowing what else to do quickly grabbed a bowl off the counter and tip toed over to the intruder. Carefully and with haste he dropped the bowl on top of the slug, trapping him momentarily until they could figure out what to do. Margot ran to the computer and googled "what is a brown squishy slimy insect type thing". The first thing that popped up was an exact replica of the disgusting creature trapped under the bowl. "It's a slug!" she screamed. "It says we should sprinkle salt on it to kill it!". "Oh no," said Hugo. "I used the rest of the salt on my french fries last night." Margot exchange an annoyed look at Hugo before he abruptly said "I'll grab the key's," and made a mad dash to the store.
 

Margot thought it would be a good idea to keep watch of the slug while Hugo went to buy more salt so that it did not cunningly escape.  It seemed like hours before Hugo returned, and when he finally did with salt in hand, Margot was very relieved.  However, they still had the big battle of killing the slug.  Hugo scooped a big cup of salt out of the bag and approached the bowl on the floor. "Okay, on the count of three lift the bowl and I will dump the salt." "One.......Two.......Three!" Margot quickly lifted the bowl and Hugo dumped the salt all over the little guy.  What followed was quite disgusting.  The slug began to squirm and smoke and ooze even more slime than before.  It was like it was melting like the Wicked Witch in The Wizard of Oz! After a few minutes the slug stopped smoking and laid there in a giant gooey puddle.  Hugo and Margot learned two valuable lessons that day- 1.  It's a good idea to get the house sprayed for pests, and 2. always keep a never ending supply of salt nearby just in case. 

The Slug.  Web Source. 

Author's note: My inspiration for this story came from "My Lord Bag of Rice" from the collection of Japanese Fairy Tales written by Yei Theodora Ozaki.  In the story there was great warrior named Hidesto.  Hidesto was given the task by the Dragon King to kill and evil centipede that had been terrorizing his kingdom. This was no feat for the the brave warrior Hidesto, however when he first attacked the centipede, he found that his arrows simply bounced right off the centipede.  He then remembered that human saliva is toxic to centipedes and the next arrow he shot, he first put it into his mouth to coat it in saliva.  This arrow went right through the centipede's brain and killed him.  In return the Dragon King gave Hidesto a bag of rice that never seemed to run empty.  When reading that human saliva was toxic to centipedes, it reminded me of how salt is toxic to slugs and inspired me to write the story of Hugo and Margot.  I wanted the story to be funny and whimsical, and I can imagine a newly wed couple trying to figure out the feats of owning a house together and encountering things like gross, slimy slugs.