Joseph D'Lacey - Meat

‘I’m not sure I want to be party to that kind of information.’

‘It’s too late for thinking about what you want. We have to start thinking about our jobs and our futures. I’m going to need men like you to help me manage the changes. Men I know I can rely on to do their jobs properly.’

Torrance stood up to tell it. Shanti listened in pale shock. Hundreds of Chosen slaughtered for nothing. Flesh dumped by the ton on the borders of the wasteland. Townsfolk starving in the midst of a glut. And now this.

‘The thing is, with the power plant shut down indefinitely, there’s no way we can maintain previous yields. Cattle will age past their prime and be useless to anyone. Less money coming in will mean fewer jobs or, at the very least, pay cuts across the board. Everything will have to be done by hand, without power – at least until we can build up gas reserves again, but that could take years. The trucks won’t run, the chain motor won’t run, the milking machines won’t run. There’ll be no more automation. Not for a long time. Instead of slaughtering the steers, we have to start thinking about reducing the numbers of fertile cows and getting rid of most, if not all, of the bulls. That will halt the growth of the herds. We have to cull the milkers too. There’s just no way we can service them all. So, starting tomorrow, I want you to round up the oldest dairy cows and the oldest bulls. Bring them in for slaughter.’

Shanti waited. It didn’t seem as though Torrance was finished with him. Torrance sat back down and continued to flick the pencil against the cup.

‘Will there be anything else?’

Torrance looked up.

‘Isn’t that enough?’

Shanti shrugged.

‘I…’

But there was nothing else to say. He turned and left.

Behind him he could sense Torrance’s expression. Something like a smile.

He had the children taken straight to the maids to be looked after while he spoke to their mother.

They ushered her into the drawing room – a more fitting place to meet than his study – where he was lounging, still in dressing gown and slippers, and medicating himself with a large vodka. He dismissed Bruno and the boys and poured her a measure.

‘I don’t drink,’ she said as he passed her the chipped crystal tumbler.

He smiled.

‘You do now.’ He gestured towards one of the sofas. ‘Make yourself comfortable, Mrs. Shanti. May I call you Maya?’ He waited neither for her to sit nor reply but sat down once more in his own armchair and put his feet up. The silk dressing gown slipped a little revealing one lumpy, trunk-like thigh. He made no effort to cover himself up. ‘I suppose you know why you’re here?’ No reason not to start testing her straight away. They were all short of time.

He looked her over. Long, dark, straight hair, a nicely curved figure – only a little spoilt by childbirth. Better than most in the town. Her face was too angular though, the eyes too focussed. He got the sense of a woman who manipulated but without any real intelligence. There was an underlying tension there too, some kind of frustration rarely addressed.

‘No, I don’t,’ she said. ‘I don’t know anything.’

Too much protestation already; her words proving his assessment.

‘But surely you can guess. Isn’t it obvious?’

‘Mr. Magnus, we’re a God-fearing family. We abide by the laws of the town. I have no idea why you’ve brought us here.’

Time to stop circling and pounce.

‘Your husband, Maya. Richard. We believe he’s not quite the man he purports to be. Has he been behaving strangely at home? Have you noticed… deviances?’

Her fingers tightened on the crystal tumbler just enough for the knuckles to whiten a shade. Her initially firm stare now skittered around the objects in the room. A little colour came to her cheeks before draining and leaving her pale. Excellent. There was dirt here somewhere.

‘He’s been… working very hard. Too hard.’

Magnus’s vodka hand started to shake. He rested it on his thigh, took the glass in his other hand and drank.

‘I don’t think he’s been quite as dedicated as you might believe. Tell me, have you ever known him to go anywhere else other than work? Does he have friends? Does he ever drink at Dino’s?’

‘Richard is not a drinking man. He’s not a gregarious sort, Mr. Magnus. As far as I know, he’s never done anything but come home after a day at work and collapse in exhaustion.’

Ah, so there it was. Shanti didn’t give out what a wife required, he was one of those rare, sexless automatons that did nothing but sleep and work. Great for MMP. Useless to his wife. Yes, Magnus could see the strain in her neck muscles, sensed the hunger in her crotch. She would want it hard and rough. She would welcome pain. How happy he would be to oblige.

When they’d concluded their business, of course. Not before.

Shanti visited the dairy and watched the dairymen struggling to milk the few cows they had in there by hand. It was obvious from the look of the cows that the process was more painful than the machines. Cows that had been milked had red udders with fingerprint-shaped bruises already appearing. He looked for WHITE-047 but she wasn’t there.

Behind the milking parlour, the rest of the dairy herd were corralled with their calves, allowed to nurse them to prevent their udders from over-distending. He spotted WHITE-047 at the back of the herd against the cracked brick wall. There was no way he could get to her without others in the herd noticing. A couple of stockmen patrolled lazily, waiting to send the next few cows into the dairy. The whole plant was on a go-slow.

Shanti put his hands in his overall pockets and put his head down as he walked towards the bull barn. It didn’t really matter if he was noticed but he wanted to feel anonymous nevertheless. In the barn there were no stockmen. All the pens were locked and secure and with more hands needed elsewhere, the bulls had been partially abandoned. He walked the rows until he saw BLUE-792’s familiar bulk through a gate slat. Using his fingertips and rasps that he’d practised thousands of times when alone, he beat the steel panel softly, breathed the secret language of the Chosen.

This time, when he’d finished, there was a long reply.

It was unusual to come home in the evening and find no light coming from the house. He was accustomed to seeing the glow of firelight and candles at the very least. Of course, with the power down, Maya would be making do with what they had and that would mean trying to stretch every stick of tallow and every fallen branch.

As he stepped past the kitchen he expected to see the flicker of a single wick burning but there was nothing. It was still too early for the girls to be in bed; too early even for dinner to have been served. Perhaps Maya was working out how to cook her filthy meat over flames of an open fire.

Stopping at the back door, he listened. No sound from inside.

Nothing.

Instead he noticed his own heartbeat and realised he was afraid.

He opened the door silently, knowing exactly how to twist the handle and pull the door towards the hinges to avoid any sound. Pushing the door wide allowed a little of the final light of dusk to show him the deserted kitchen and living room. He stood just inside the door for a long time listening for breathing, watching for the slightest movement. There was nothing.

When he was satisfied the downstairs was deserted he checked upstairs. The house was empty.

So. She’d taken them away, just as she’d promised she would.

He ground his teeth together as his anger rose up. That tainted woman assuming charge of his precious girls. She was the one who deserved slaughter. She was the one who should experience death at the hands of MMP stockmen.