Tender Is the Flesh

by Agustina Bazterrica

  No one knows he’s incapable of killing the female in his barn.

  10

  Krieg hangs up.

  “I have two job applicants waiting. Didn’t you see them when you came in?”

  “No.”

  “I want you to give them the test. I’m only interested in hiring the better of the two.”

  “Got it.”

  “When that’s done, give me the updates. Filling the position is more pressing.”

  He gets up to leave, but Krieg motions for him to sit down again.

  “There’s something else. An employee was found with a female.”

  “Who?”

  “One of the night guards.”

  “There’s nothing I can do about it. They’re not my responsibility.”

  “I’m letting you know because I’m going to have to change the security company again.”

  “How did they catch him?”

  “The security footage. We’ve started checking it every morning.”

  “And the female?”

  “He raped her to death. Then he tossed her in one of the group cages with the others. He didn’t even put her in the right cage, the idiot.”

  “What happens now?”

  “The FSA has to be called and a police report filed for destruction of movable property.”

  “The security company will have to reimburse us for the value of the female.”

  “Right, that too, especially because she was an FGP.”

  When he gets up to leave, he sees Mari with the coffee. She comes across as fragile, but he knows that if this woman were told to slaughter a whole shipment, she’d do it on her own, without a single muscle in her body twitching. He motions to her to forget the coffee and asks to be introduced to the job applicants. “They’re in the waiting room, didn’t you see them when you came in?” she asks, and offers to take him down. He says he’ll go alone.

  Two young men are waiting silently. He introduces himself and tells them to follow him. He says that they’re going to take a short tour of the processing plant. As they walk to the unloading yard, he asks them why they want the job. He doesn’t expect elaborate answers. He knows that applicants are in short supply, there’s constant turnover, few people can handle working in a place like this. They’re driven by the need to earn money; they know the job pays well. But before long, necessity isn’t enough. They’d rather earn less and do something that doesn’t involve cleaning human entrails.

  The taller of the two applicants says he needs the money because his girlfriend is pregnant and he has to start saving. The other man looks on with a heavy silence. He doesn’t answer right away and then says that a friend who works at a hamburger factory suggested he apply. He doesn’t believe the man, not for a second.

  They reach the unloading yard. Men are using shovels to pick up excrement from the last shipment. They place it in bags. Other men are washing the cage trailers and the floor with hoses. All of them are dressed in white and wearing black rubber boots up to their knees. The men greet him. He nods without smiling. The taller applicant goes to cover his nose, but right away he lowers his hand and asks why they keep the excrement. The other man looks on silently.

  “It’s for manure,” he tells the applicant, and then explains that this is where the shipment is unloaded, weighed, and branded. The head are also shaved because their hair is sold. Then they’re brought to the resting cages, where they take it easy for a day. “The meat from a stressed head is tough or tastes bad, it becomes low-grade meat,” he tells them. “It’s at this point that the antemortem inspection is done.”

  “Ante what?” the taller applicant asks.

  He explains that any product that shows signs of disease needs to be removed. The applicants nod. “We separate them into special cages. If they get better, they return to the slaughter cycle, and if they don’t, they’re discarded.”

  “By ‘they’re discarded,’ do you mean they’re slaughtered?” the taller man asks.

  “Yes.”

  “Why aren’t they returned to the breeding center?”

  “Because transport is expensive. The breeding center is notified of the head that had to be thrown out and later they’re discounted.”

  “Why aren’t they treated?”

  “Because it’s too large an investment.”

  “Do they ever arrive dead?” the taller applicant continues.

  He looks at the man somewhat surprised. Job applicants don’t usually ask questions like these, and the fact that this one is doing so intrigues him. “Few arrive dead, but every so often we get one. When that happens, the FSA is informed and they come take the head away.” He knows that this is the official truth, which makes it a relative truth. He knows (because he sees to it) that the employees leave a few head for the Scavengers, who slaughter the meat with machetes and take what they can. They don’t care that the meat is diseased; they run the risk because they can’t afford to buy it. He lets it go and tries to see the gesture as an act of charity or perhaps of mercy. But he also lets it go as a means of appeasing the Scavengers and their hunger. The craving for meat is dangerous.

  As they walk to the resting cage sector, he tells them that at first they’ll have to do simple jobs, related to cleaning and waste collection. Once they’ve demonstrated their ability and loyalty, they’ll be taught other tasks.

  There’s a sharp, penetrating smell to the resting cage sector. He thinks it’s the smell of fear. They climb a set of stairs to a suspended balcony from where it’s possible to observe the shipment. He asks them not to talk loudly because the head need to be kept calm. Sudden sounds disturb them, and when they’re edgy they’re more difficult to handle. The cages are below them. The head are still agitated after the journey, despite the fact that unloading took place in the early hours of the morning. They move about in a frightened way.

  He explains that when the head arrive, they’re given a spray wash and then examined. They need to fast, he adds, and are given a liquid diet to reduce intestinal content and lower the risk of contamination when they’re handled after slaughter. He tries to count the number of times he’s repeated this sentence in his life.

  The shorter applicant points to head that have been branded with a green cross. “What do the green marks on their chests mean?”

  “Those head have been selected for the game reserve. The specialists examine them and pick the ones in the best physical condition. The hunters need prey that challenges them, they want to chase after the head, they’re not interested in sitting targets.”

  “So that’s why most of them are males,” the taller man says.

  “That’s right, females are generally submissive. They’ve tried with impregnated females and the result is very different because they become vicious. Every so often we get requests for them.”

  “And what about the ones with the black crosses?” the shorter man asks.

  “They’re for the laboratory.”

  The man tries to ask him something else, but he keeps walking. He has no intention of saying anything about that place, about the Valka Laboratory. Even if he wanted to, he wouldn’t be able to do it.

  The employees examining the shipment greet him from the cages. “Tomorrow the head that have just arrived will be taken to the blue cages and from there they’ll go directly to slaughter,” he tells the applicants, as they go downstairs and walk to the box room.

  The smaller man slows his step to look at the head in the blue cages and motions to him to come over. The man wants to know if the head are going to be slaughtered that day. “Yes,” he says, and the man looks at them silently.

  On the way to the box sector, they pass special cages that are red in color. The cages are large and each of them contains a single head. Before the applicants can ask, he tells them that this is export-quality meat, that these head are First Generation Pure. “It’s the most expensive meat on the market because it takes many years to raise the head,” he says. Then he has to explain that al
l the other meat is genetically modified, so that the product grows faster and there’s a profit.

  “But then is the meat we eat completely artificial? Is it synthetic meat?” the taller applicant asks.

  “Well, no. I wouldn’t say it’s artificial or synthetic. I’d say modified. It doesn’t taste all that different from FGP meat, though FGP is upper grade, for more refined palates.” The two applicants stand there in silence, looking at the cages containing head that have the letters “FGP” written all over their bodies. One set of initials per year of growth.

  He notices the taller applicant looking a little pale. It’s not likely he’ll be able to handle what comes next, he thinks; he’ll probably vomit, or faint. He asks the man if he’s okay.

  “Yeah, I’m fine. I’m fine,” the man answers.

  The same thing happens every time with the weaker applicant. The men need the money, but the money is not enough.

  He’s so tired it could kill him, but he keeps walking.

  11

  They enter the box sector, but stop in the lounge, which has a large window that faces the desensitization room. The place is so white it blinds them.

  He has the applicants wait there and the shorter man asks why they can’t go in. The taller man takes a seat. He answers that only authorized staff wearing the required uniform can go in, that all the necessary measures are taken to ensure the meat isn’t contaminated.

  Sergio, one of the stunners, waves to him and then comes into the lounge. He’s dressed in white, and has on black boots, a face mask, a plastic apron, a helmet, and gloves. Sergio gives him a hug. “Tejo, where have you been, man?”

  “On the meat run, dealing with clients and suppliers. Let me introduce you.”

  He goes for the occasional beer with Sergio. He thinks he’s a genuine guy, one who doesn’t smirk at him for being the boss’s right-hand man, who’s not trying to get something from him, who has no problem telling him what he thinks. When the baby died, Sergio didn’t look at him with pity, or say, Leo is a little angel now. He wasn’t silent around him, not knowing what to do, and he didn’t avoid him or treat him any differently. Sergio hugged him and took him to a bar and got him drunk and didn’t stop telling him jokes until the two of them laughed so hard they cried. The pain was still there, but he knew that in Sergio he had a friend. Once he asked him why he worked as a stunner. Sergio answered that it was either the head or his family. It was the only thing he knew how to do and it paid well. Whenever he felt remorse he thought of his children and how the work enabled him to give them a better life. He said that even though the original meat, from before the product was bred, didn’t eliminate overpopulation, poverty, and hunger, it did help fight them. He said that everything has a purpose in this life and the purpose of meat is to be slaughtered and then eaten. He said that thanks to his work, people were fed, and that was something he was proud of. Sergio kept talking, but he couldn’t listen any longer.

  They went out to celebrate when Sergio’s eldest daughter started university. He asked himself, while they raised their glasses in a toast, how many head had paid for the education of Sergio’s children, how many times he’d had to swing a club in his life. He offered Sergio the chance to work by his side, as his assistant, but the man was blunt: “I prefer striking.” He valued the answer and didn’t ask for an explanation because Sergio’s words are simple, clear. They’re words that don’t have sharp edges.

  Sergio goes up to the applicants and shakes their hands. “His job is one of the most important, stunning the head. He strikes them unconscious so their throats can be slit. Go ahead and show them, Sergio,” he says, and tells the men to climb up steps that have been built below the window. This way they’ll be able to see what happens inside the box.

  Sergio enters the box room and gets up onto the platform. He grabs the club. Then he shouts, “Send in the next one!” A guillotine door opens and a naked female, barely twenty years of age, walks in. She’s wet and her hands are held behind her back with a zip tie. She’s been shaved. Inside the box there’s very little space. It’s almost impossible for her to move. Sergio places the stainless steel shackle, which runs along a vertical rail, around the female’s neck and clamps it shut. The female trembles, shakes a little, tries to free herself. She opens her mouth.

  Sergio looks her in the eye and pats her a few times on the head, almost like he’s petting her. He says something to her they can’t hear, or sings to her. The female becomes still, she calms down. Sergio raises the club and hits her on the forehead. It’s a sharp strike. So swift and silent it’s crazy. The female is knocked unconscious. Her body goes slack and when Sergio opens the shackle, it falls to the bottom of the box. The automatic door opens outward and the box’s base tilts to expel the body, which slides onto the floor.

  An employee enters and binds her feet with straps that are attached to chains. He cuts the zip tie holding her hands together and presses a button. The body is raised and transported facedown to another room via a system of rails. The employee looks up into the lounge and waves at him. He doesn’t remember the man’s name, but knows he hired him a few months back.

  The employee gets a hose and rinses off the box and floor, which have been splattered with excrement.

  The taller applicant climbs down from the steps and takes a seat on a chair, his head hanging. Now is when this man vomits, he thinks, but the man gets up, composes himself. Sergio comes in with a smile, proud of the demonstration. “So what did you think? Who wants to give it a try?” he says.

  The shorter man steps forward and says, “I do.”

  Sergio laughs loudly and says, “Not so fast, man, it’ll be a while before you’re doing that.” The man looks disappointed. “Let me explain a few things to you. If you strike them dead, you’ve gone and ruined the meat. And if you don’t knock them unconscious and they’re alive when they go to slaughter, you’ve also ruined the meat. Got that?” He gives the man a hug and shakes him a little, laughing. “Kids today, Tejo. They want to take on the world and don’t even know how to walk.” All of them laugh, except for the shorter applicant. Sergio explains that beginners use a captive bolt pistol. “There’s a smaller margin of error, but the meat doesn’t turn out quite as tender. That make sense? Ricardo—he’s the stunner who’s taking a rest outside at the moment—uses the pistol and is training to use the club. He’s been here for six months.” Sergio finishes off by saying, “The club is only for those who know what they’re doing.”

  The taller man asks Sergio what he said to the meat, why he spoke to it. Meat, he thinks with surprise while they wait for Sergio’s answer, and wonders why the man called the stunned female that, and not a head, or a product. Then Sergio says that every stunner has his secret when it comes to calming down the head. He says that every new stunner has to find his own method.

  “Why don’t they scream?” the man asks.

  He doesn’t want to answer, he wants to be somewhere else, but he’s there. Sergio is the one who says something: “They don’t have vocal cords.”

  The shorter applicant climbs up the steps and looks into the box room again. He puts his hands up against the window. There’s eagerness in his gaze. There’s impatience in it.

  He thinks this man is dangerous. Someone who wants to assassinate that badly is someone who’s unstable, who won’t take to the routine of killing, to the automatic and dispassionate act of slaughtering humans.

  12

  They leave the lounge. He tells them that they’re moving on to the slaughter sector. “Are we going in?” the shorter man asks.

  He looks at the man severely. “No,” he says, “we’re not going in, because, as I told you, our attire doesn’t meet regulations.”

  The man looks at the floor and doesn’t answer, then impatiently puts his hands in his trouser pockets. He suspects this man is a fake applicant. Every so often people pretend to want the job so they can witness the killing. People who enjoy the process, for whom it’s a source of cu
riosity, an interesting anecdote to add to their lives. He thinks they’re people who don’t have the courage to accept and take on the weight of the work.

  They walk through a hallway with a wide window that looks directly into the slitting room. The workers are dressed in white, inside the white room. But the apparent cleanliness is stained with the tons of blood that fall into the bleeding trough and splatter the walls, the coveralls, the floor, the hands.

  The head enter via an automatic rail. Three bodies are hanging facedown. The first has had its throat slit, the other two wait their turn. One of these is the female Sergio has just stunned. The worker presses a button and the body that’s been bled dry follows its course along the rail while the next body moves into place above the trough. With a swift movement, the worker slits the head’s throat. The body trembles slightly. The blood falls into the trough. It stains the worker’s apron, trousers, and boots.

  The shorter man asks what they do with the blood. He decides to ignore the man. The taller applicant answers for him, and says, “They use it to make fertilizer.” He looks at this man, who smiles and explains that his father worked briefly at a processing plant, one of the old ones, and that he taught him a thing or two. When he says “one of the old ones,” he lowers his head and his voice, as though he feels sadness or resignation.

  “Cow blood was used to make fertilizer,” he tells the man. “This blood has other uses.” He doesn’t say what they are.

  “Like to make some good blood sausage, am I right?” the shorter applicant says. He glares at the man and doesn’t answer.

  He looks into the slitting room and sees the worker talking distractedly to another employee. It’s taking too long, he realizes. The female that Sergio stunned begins to move. The worker doesn’t see this. She shakes, slowly at first, and then more forcefully. The movement is so violent that she frees her feet from the loose straps that hold her up. She falls with a thud. She trembles on the floor and her white skin gets smeared with the blood of those whose throats were slit before her. The female raises an arm. She tries to stand up. The worker turns around and looks at her with indifference. He grabs a captive bolt pistol, puts it to her forehead, and pulls the trigger. Then he hangs her back up.