H.G. Peterson is a lovely person endowed with many talents, among them the ability to use three swords simultaneously whilst dueling with noted German princes.
Sometimes on streets the rain collects into dark patches of mud and corrosive filth fit only for the consumption of a few lesser-known spirochetes, all of whom are a bit low down on the pecking order, for spirochetes that is. Now, in these little splotches trod thousands of feet daily, and only about seventy or so of those are attached to brains that think at all about how the feet they are attached to disrupt the lives of spirochetes. Two of these feet belonged to Thalmudge.
As a small child he had thought often about the ants and microbes who feared his feet as the harbingers of destruction. These creatures lost everything to a foot or to a sneeze and had entire worlds devastated in the common game of kickball. Thalmudge never felt exactly sorry for the ants, he simply noticed their destruction. Sometimes a pile of dead ants slightly amused him. Throughout his childhood, and even into college, he had spent many a summer’s afternoon playing vengeful god to a pile of fire ants. When he was young he used water, sticks and shoes, and as he grew older he began using more advanced implements of destruction such as fireworks, shotguns and high powered rifles fired at close range.
He was always of the quandered sort and today just thought about the spirochetes, their civilization was gone and would never develop anything close to jeeps or artificial satellites, if they even began evolving in the first place. Humans seemed to have the monopoly on evolution. They thought it up, so they get to do most of it. Spirochetes and fish never even think about evolving. They simply had everything they needed and never realized that another avenue was available.
Thalmudge realized this, too, but instead went into a small diner on Twelfth Street where he ordered toast and ate it with some butter. While the toast was a bit burnt it was decent, not exactly worth the eighty-five cents and dollar he left for tip, but still worth eating. Thalmudge spotted a small kitten crossing the street. Had it had been hit Thalmudge would have been a bit unnerved, but it made it across alright. He wondered what the cat was thinking as he read an editorial about milk.
The cat was actually thinking about the rocks on which it was walking and the insects darting about in the street attempting to drain enough heat from the air to continue their cold-blooded lives. The cat really didn’t know it’s own name or if it had a name, although its servants called him Edgar. Edgar’s servants were nice to him, they fed him a good-tasting, chewy, dirt-like substance which they placed into an odd shaped sort of rock. Next to the food rock was a little puddle that was always filled with water. Edgar only really liked water. He had tried the human drinks, but they were terrible. Most of the human food was terrible too. They obviously saved the best food for their God.
Edgar was worshipped as a god, or so he thought. He was given possession over a large cave with moss-covered ground and big moss covered rocks which the humans liked to sleep on. The cave was safe from predators, although the servants hid themselves under animal skins while they slept. They were quite cowardly. Night seemed to last a shorter time in the cave, as the day continued on even while it was dark outside. This would sometimes confuse Edgar who would be awoken from sleep by the sudden coming of day, even though it had, only moments earlier, been the darkest night.
Edgar spent his time being petted by his servants, sleeping and looking outside at the food. There were lots of little things to eat; birds, squirrels, bugs and even lizards. The humans often let Edgar out to hunt and they opened the door for him again when he wished to return to the cave. The humans were rather stupid creatures. Despite their size they had no claws or fur or teeth. Their only real purpose seemed to be to serve their God Edgar, who apparently kept the big creatures away. The big creatures slept most of the time. Edgar saw them outside a lot. They were rather docile, they even let Edgar sleep under them or on top of their thick armor plating. Some of the big creatures, however, yelled a lot and ran around. They had shining eyes like the others of Edgar’s kind.
Edgar disliked the others. They always tried to come into his territory and he had to hit them. He hit the dogs too who were often tied to trees. The humans had tied them there to allow their gods to hit the dogs so that the gods could be entertained. The humans just sat there all day. Sometimes they ate, but mostly they just sat there. They only slept once a day. They were pitiful creatures. He understood why they worshipped him. Edgar had nice black fur and was terrifying to his enemies. He could fool them by bushing out his tail and they all ran when he hit them. Edgar was the God of everything, or so he thought.
Thalmudge paid and left. He breathed out, killing millions of the protists and monerans who were busy at their microscopic lives lived out in his nasal passages. A new civilization began in his lower intestine, but it would end with his next bowel movement. In his mouth dwelled more creatures than there were people on the earth. They fed on bits of gum and some pieces of toast so small that they would make a microscope squint. Throughout Thalmudge’s digestive and circulatory systems lives came and went by the minute and a billion little worms burrowed into his skin to eat the pieces of flesh that flaked off when he moved and somewhere in his lungs a group of viruses was winning the life and death battle against Thalmudge’s Killer T cells and was ready to start their own civilization.
Thalmudge, et. al., then walked to the edge of the street, pulled out a .45 millimeter and as the bullet coursed through his head Thalmudge felt a bit of sympathy for the viruses in his lungs. Then he died and took a hell of a lot of civilizations with him.