The Fart

It was sunny outside, but still gloomy, as the parasite slithered its way through the streets of the neighborhood. It passed other parasites as it moved along; they moved faster than he did lately. He knew he was sick, and that definitely bothered him, but he tried to ignore it. The humans tried to step on them like usual, he was about half the size of their feet, and normally he could avoid them pretty well; he sometimes even got a bite in even though they were moving, but they nicked him here and there this time. 

He slithered underneath a bench outside of a bakery. The smell that came from bakeries usually bothered him, but it wasn’t so bad right then. He was tired, and resting there where he was shaded from the gloomy sun in slits forced him to relax. 

The relaxation didn’t last long, though. Soon the slits of shade melted into a block as a chubby human sat down over him. So stupid, thought the sick parasite. I could bite his leg so easily; he’s not moving at all. 

He thought about digging his tiny little teeth into the back part of the human’s ankle; it was fleshy enough that his teeth would go all the way through. The human would howl and stand up and whip his leg around and try to step on the parasite, but the parasite would hang on until he was ready to let go. 

The parasite didn’t feel like it, though. It sat there, thinking about the havok it could wreak, about how awesome it would be to ruin this human’s day. He just didn’t have the energy.

That is, until something happened. Something that the parasite wasn’t expecting; something that had never happened before. The human started to stand up, and as it did, the parasite heard a loud “phhhhhbbbt.” He felt a slight breeze slide over him, and everything started to smell. Bad. The parasite was already a pretty smelly guy himself, but he never smelled anything like this before.

Not only that, but he had never felt anything like this before. He started to feel… stronger. Stronger than he was before he got sick. He left the shade of the bench and watched the chubby human waddle away. He twisted over onto his back so he could sit up and look at himself. His veins started to pop out of his milky, slimy skin. His tail grew longer as his body grew thicker. He no longer felt sick; the larger he grew, the better he felt. 

He began to slither around the humans, expertly dodging thick soles and pointy heels. He used the new meatyness of his body to hop up and bite people in the calves and thighs. The humans yelled in pain as they tried to swat the parasite away, but he held on for as long as he wanted to. 

He slithered on and on through the streets, ripping out chunks of flesh as he went. The other parasites watched in wonder and horror as the growing parasite did this. He watched as their barely visible eyes widened in wonder about how he got this way; how this sick and dying parasite had gotten so strong all of a sudden. 

He laughed to himself. They had all known he was struggling, yet they watched him live in pain. He had been slowly losing hope for days, but no one had tried to help him. He let go of the old man he had been attached to and fell to the ground. He turned and looked back at all the parasites. He could make them feel just as badly as he had with a single shove, a single body slam, a single bite. 

Finally, he was the one with the power. What could they do? They were nothing against him now, and neither were the humans. He doubted there was any living thing who could face him with this great power running through his body. He braced himself, ready to strike. 

But then, he saw the fear in their eyes behind the amazement. He saw the parasites he once loved look at him as if he were a monster. He felt like a monster, he realized. He might have felt alone before, but he knew he would feel even more alone without any of his own kind. For a moment, he had seriously considered turning on them.

He sighed and hurtled himself onto the canopy of a nearby shop so that he could see above everyone else. The human who had farted on him before was still pretty close; he was trying to run, but he wasn’t making it very far. 

The parasite jumped over to the human, landed on its shoulder, and sunk his teeth into its neck. The human howled and let out a series of phhhbbbttt phhbbbttt phbbbbtttts. The parasites near the human were showered with the stinky wind, and they began to grow. The rest of the parasites flocked to the human to receive this growth serum as well.

Soon, all of the parasites were unstoppable. They began hopping and chomping on all of the humans who had tried to step on them, who had tried to bring them down. They continued to chomp until they could chomp no more. They all layed down and basked in the sun that wasn’t so gloomy anymore to recharge and move on to another neighborhood. It was chaos, but it was beautiful.