King of Pigs by J H Archer

Author:J H Archer
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2022-09-09T09:53:31+00:00

Day 4998

I blacked out again today, just as I did on the riverbank. As I was woken for my next shift, the air seemed to turn rancid. The man who woke me, Rex, blurred and then melted away. The room spun, and I fell.

I found myself on soft turf. I could hear the sound of birdsong. I could feel the breeze. A strong hand grasped my own and pulled me up, and I came face to face with the old man. He grinned at me and took my hands, placing his own upon them. When I looked at them, they seemed to be filled with some sort of radiance.

‘You should stay here. In my garden. It’s all yours, if you want it.’

‘Yes, Grandfather.’

He pointed me towards a small ramshackle hut on the other side of the small patch of turf.

‘She’s waiting. In there. Go to her.’

I stumbled over as pain began to bloom behind my eyes. No, not pain, calm. Pleasure, almost. Or maybe it was pain, but I could no longer tell the difference between the two. I made it to the hut. The wood was damp, rotten, covered in some sort of moss. I opened the door, which swung creakily on its hinges.

Inside was a bathtub. I did not want to go further but could not stop my legs. A pair of pale hands grasped the side of the aluminium. The fingernails hung off. Sal sat up and stared at me. She was blue, and swollen, her eyes replaced by squirming larvae. She looked at me and squealed like a stuck hog.

I woke up. I was back in the abattoir. The workers looked at me with a mixture of fear and disgust. My hands felt like they’d been dipped in molten metal. I finished my shift and was given the evening off. I rowed over the river and could smell the cordite from the shellfire as it screamed overhead. How long now? The Emperor would protect us.

Wouldn’t He?

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