An unsuspecting traveler trucking their way through a hiking trail would likely stop in bewilderment if they saw it: a nearly two-foot-long, Slinky-like contraption made of plastic and rubber, clambering forward like an inchworm. That confusion would shift to unease when scanning up and down its bendy, elephant-trunk-like body and seeing pairs of snapping claws at either end. Unabashed horror would inevitably take over as our traveler watches another one of the soulless Slinkies appear, inch toward the first one, and connect at the claws, creating one much larger, lifeless…
