Turnabout

gobble gobble gobble

Turnabout 

“I don’t like the way those man-eating chickens are looking at me. Damn ingrates. If not for me, they’d still be slaughtered for their succulent chicken meat. Oh, how I miss chicken salad sandwiches and Kentucky Fried Chicken. But I gave it up to save all Birdkind, including the chickens, ducks, geese, and other fowl, from eventual extinction from man’s bloodlust and insatiable appetite. 

As a kid, I loved watching the ducks quacking, the geese honking, the gobble-gobble of the turkeys, and the cluck, cluck, clucking of the chickens. I could never understand why we needed to hunt them and kill them for sport or eat them to fill our bellies. The chickens and turkeys had it worse; many were raised in gulags, bred in captivity, and slaughtered. If that’s not bad enough, we stole their eggs, their unborn children, cracked them open, fried them, and ate them. 

I must admit, I repressed my childhood misgivings and became one of those carnivorous, murdering poultry barons who took over the family business and ran many of those turkey and chicken gulags until I saw the light. Oh, boy, did I ever.

One day, on my way to one of my meatpacking plants, I was struck down by what seemed like lightning. But in point of fact, it was from a winged angel of God. To my utter amazement, it looked like one of those ancient Egyptian Bird Gods. To say I was speechless was an understatement. It picked me up with its talons, that’s right, talons, and spoke with what I can only call a bird accent. She, which was definitely a she said,  

“God has chosen you to be the liberator of all poultry. Others have been recruited to lead all the other birdkind to freedom.  Birdkind is under siege; the bird flu, for example, is a man-made virus meant as a culling tool. It’s time for mankind to be culled to appropriate levels instead. You and the other chosen ones will be the eventual guardians of this planet, but in the meantime, you’ll wield the knife that slices away at humanity.  

You will free all the turkey and chicken convicts from your poultry gulags. You will convert these extermination camps into deluxe refugee centers where they can heal, relax, and regain their strength. Once fully recuperated, they can roam the world unfettered.  

Once freed, you will be tasked to oversee select groups of chickens to create havoc among humans. God has gifted you with special abilities. One of them is to make them man-eating warrior chickens. Go, and do God's work.”

And that’s what I did. I closed my killing factories and farms and turned them into rehabilitation centers. My fellow poultry barons thought I was nuts and a harbinger of bad times. They were right.  I had my warrior chickens eat them, but before they did, they signed over their businesses to me.

I’m getting a little ahead of myself; finding suitable candidates for my chicken army wasn’t as easy as it sounded. Most of the chickens and turkeys in my gulags were downtrodden and traumatized. Not suitable candidates for a warrior class. I had to recruit them from free-range farms. They were strong, full of vigor, not popped up with chemicals, and hated humans. They proved to be vicious soldiers. Imagine thirty chickens pecking away furiously on your face and other body parts.

You might be wondering how I communicated with them. The birdlike angel of God also gave me the ability to speak and understand all the languages of the birds. It proved fruitful. Man’s reign as an apex predator was over.

……

God has a wicked sense of humor, unfortunately, at my expense. His bird angel turned me into a 6ft man-eating chicken. Damn it, I just laid an egg. It hurts, and I’m a guy, not a chick. This sucks. Squaaaawk, cluck, cluck, cluck…

 

 

 

Author's Note

Let's hear your screams