They groaned in the dead still of night and as the sun heated their hunger and sticking pads. Their groans were painful on the ear and a sign for all to flee from structures on the daily Steeler smörgåsbord. Jumping from steel to steel they would demolish anything that they stuck to; the steel they processed through digestion; glass, cement or human they vomited out. They tasted via the sticking pads on their heads and feet and ate through their anus. Able to survive against all weapons we knew, the steelers grew in strength and hunger as they devoured our cities, steel morsel by steel morsel.

Many had already lost their life. Some had been eaten and vomited out in a bulimic gorge. Others had been crossing the cities many bridges when the bridge gave way into the ocean below. Some, whole families, had been anally engulfed while trying to escape in their cars.

No one knew where the Steelers had come from. There was rumour of them being bred by the military in germ warfare labs. A lab accident, an escape, a devastation used against us that we only read of in horror stories. Yet other rumours had the super giants of the industrial world inadvertently creating life with the toxic mixes their plants and smelters disposed of. All that was known as fact was that the Steelers ate steel and grew in appetite with every bite. They did not eat ships at berth or at sail but ships in dry dock had all been eaten.

An unassuming chemistry student, with trendy thick green glasses, pimples and wild curly hair, emailed NASA his observation. It appeared to him that the Steelers were not consuming from steel junk yards. Why, he asked. Was their something in the chemical compound of rust that the Steelers could not tolerate? A solution may be to rust up steel to starve the Steelers out of existence.

News flashes resounded throughout the world. Every news channel, every air wave, was taken up with the declaration of the end of the steel invasion. NASA scientists had created a weapon of mass destruction against the Steelers. A think tank of the world's most brilliant minds had hypothesized that the chemical compound of salt melted the steelers and took life from their form.

Onto ships, liners, boats and junks, the people of the industrialized world moved. Combined nation's budgets pooled and sprayed our oceans over cities, countries and towns. Ocean water was dumped from above, sprayed from the shore, and pumped through fire hydrants and sprinkling systems. The world was turned to salt.

The groaning stopped. Steel structures were left intact and the Steelers were ground to rust dust. Curly haired chemistry student remoted his Plasma screen to sleep mode. He lay back in his ergonomic chair, hands grasped together behind his head, a look of consternation on his face. His cat jumped to his lap, wanting some loving. Instead of a pat, his cat flew across the room, hit the door and slid down to the tiles. In fear, the cat ran to hide from his crazy owner.

Unassuming student paced the tiles. His anger at NASA for taking the credit of his steely brilliance further fed his psychotic need to destroy what everyone took for granted. He paced and thought of another way to have his brilliance of creation and destruction recognised.

The cat. He would mutate cats to suck blood rather than lap milk. In his suburban den he would breed them up, a vampire breed, release them and hold the cure until the world was again bled to near annihilation. Only then would he send a simple email wondering if the cats were avoiding people with high blood pressure for a reason. Could it be the blood thinners they were on that perhaps the cats could not tolerate?

Unassuming student with the beautiful thick green glasses, the gorgeous curly hair and the looks of the boy next door, cracked a half smile. His left side pulled up and was swiftly followed by a belly laugh of floor rolling proportion. In joy, he kicked his socked feet repeatedly on the tiles and was mindful not to laugh so much that a little urine escaped his urethra. That would be uncool.

He was brilliant and now the world would know it.


If you wish to join the Writers Prompt Daily simply use the above photo as a prompt and post a short story, poem or paragraph to your blog. Leave a comment and the link here so that all participants can come to you and read/comment/encourage. Story above is copyright and is Megan Bayliss' writing around the above picture prompt.