Short Fiction
The Meat Of It
In flatlands beneath a towering sheer cliff lies the infamous town of Mignon. The word ‘mignon’ has two meanings. The first is “a tender piece of meat.” This refers to a putrid stench, akin to rotting flesh, that saturates its neighbourhoods and is so fetid that visitors don gas masks. It is the smell of the drug Baste, addiction to which grips Mignon. Its production, like sizzling meat, releases plumes of smoke so dense that it blocks sunlight and obscures addicts scattered on the pavements, lying amidst litter and discarded needles. In their restless sleep, they twitch and gasp for air.
The second definition, “a young, attractive woman,” alludes to Mignon’s rampant prostitution and crime. The people sell their dignity for pleasure and squander money on Baste and thus cannot afford homes. People in Mignon reside in suffocatingly small rental apartments or tents by the road. Many fear meeting the same fate as their friends found overdosed and dead, undiscovered until they were consumed by maggots and contributors to the town’s stench.
Atop that cliff is Such Fortune, a thriving epicentre for groundbreaking innovation. The world’s brightest and most passionate journey there to actualise their ambitions. Its people are renowned for their steadfast diligence, productivity and fiery spirit. Proud, vermillion superstructures of cloud-piercing height dot the landscape, within which the world’s richest and mightiest sow the seeds for revolutionary advancement and look down upon the rest of the world.
Mignon, far below, appears as a speck of obsidian haze. But the sight is so grotesque that people in Such Fortune want Mignon’s problems, or perhaps Mignon itself, gone.
The Such Fortune City Council is holding a hearing on Mignon. In a majestic white hall with soaring ceilings, the Duchess steps onto a wooden podium.
“Allow me to unveil our robust strategy,” she announced triumphantly to townsfolk and journalists. “We’ll embark on a vigorous campaign, increasing housing budgets to create not simply dwellings but sanctuaries for solace and security! Additionally, makers of the cursed elixir Baste will be swiftly banished! Not forgetting the vital significance of the body and spirit, food programmes will be so boldly bolstered that they’ll eat cake!”
The room erupts with noise and protest. People stand and proclaim:
“Verily, such exceeding generosity only lures undesirables to Mignon, fostering idleness in their hearts and a culture of dependency.”
“Exactly! If these folks yearn for a better living, they ought to demonstrate the work ethic and toil we exemplify!”
“People with initiative and discipline should be prioritised over those who shun self-help. Why not cast your gaze upon us? Housing now is ludicrously expensive!”
The hearing goes on with debate so fervent it inspires the following day’s headline: “MIGNON: The Duchess’ Pledged Reform.”
In a tiny apartment in Mignon with windows sealed by cellophane tape, a little girl gets out of bed, showers in the community washroom, pours herself a small bowl of cereal and gets dressed before heading downstairs. She is only eight years old but is praised as an intellectual prodigy. She grabs a copy of the morning paper and reads it quietly in the musty lobby.
The door opens. The girl’s mother has just returned from work to pick up and send her daughter to school. She works through the night, every night, fuelled by ambitions of affording her daughter a prestigious school in Such Fortune. She wants nothing more than for her to live a better life. She was younger than one might expect a mother to be, but appeared older from responsibility and exhaustion.
Her daughter runs to her, holding up the newspaper.
“Ma! Look! The big people say they’re going to send us help,” she gleamed. “Maybe then you won’t have to work so hard.”
Her mother’s porcelain smile fractures for a moment, but it’s fixed before her daughter notices.
“That’s amazing, sweetie. Let’s get to school.”
The mother returns, sleeps for a few hours and showers thoroughly to erase her ‘Mignon stench.’ She heads to her first job stocking shelves at a grocery store, handling foods she’ll never taste. In the evening, she goes to her second job in a brothel on the edge of Mignon, which is popular among men from Such Fortune.
Their pockets are bottomless from collecting rent in Mignon. They own Baste factories and keep generous helpings for themselves. Their gas masks embolden them with anonymity and erase any sense of shame.
Today, one of their regulars has brought a friend: a government official. She thinks the official is different. He looks young, kind… and manipulable.
“I hope you enjoyed it, Sir. Would you be so kind as to leave a little extra for my service?” She says in a woeful tone, striking a seductive pose.
“Well, what considers you worthy?” He asked, appearing intrigued.
“It’s not me, Sir, but my eight-year-old daughter. She’s incredibly bright and deserves a quality education in Such Fortune, but I can’t afford—”
He chuckled sinisterly. “Neither you nor your child will ever belong in Such Fortune like this. Should you wish to salvage yourselves, work harder and earn it rightfully.” He stood to leave.
She snapped.
“I was born in Such Fortune!” She cried. It was true. “At sixteen, I gave birth, and my parents threw me out. I had nowhere to go. Rent was exorbitant. I had to come here!”
“Enough! You’re nothing but a strain on our society! We would be much better off without the likes of you.”
He whips out something from his pocket.
A flash of metal.
A shriek.
A loud boom.
She should have died that day.
Dozens rallied to offer her tireless care, keeping by her bedside at all hours and concocting remedies from their meagre resources. The sheer strength of Mignon’s community is monumental.
She lived another three months before succumbing to infection.
“At least the maggots won’t get to me,” she chuckled. She held her daughter till her final, pained breath— a bare whisper: “Never surrender.”
She will be burned, and her body will emit a nauseating smell and thick, black smoke.
Another day in Mignon.
In a tiny apartment in Mignon with windows sealed by cellophane tape, a young woman gets out of bed, showers in the community washroom, pours herself a small bowl of cereal and gets dressed before leaving for her first hearing as a lawyer specialising in pro bono legal service. On her way, she grabs a copy of the morning paper. The front headline read: “MIGNON: Massive Drug Dealer Exiles Promised.”
Across the street is a beautiful mural of her mother. Her death became a political symbol of oppression, her dying words now a rallying slogan. Visitors never see these artworks through the black fog.
The young woman stops by it, as she does every day.
The second definition, “a young, attractive woman,” alludes to Mignon’s rampant prostitution and crime. The people sell their dignity for pleasure and squander money on Baste and thus cannot afford homes. People in Mignon reside in suffocatingly small rental apartments or tents by the road. Many fear meeting the same fate as their friends found overdosed and dead, undiscovered until they were consumed by maggots and contributors to the town’s stench.
Atop that cliff is Such Fortune, a thriving epicentre for groundbreaking innovation. The world’s brightest and most passionate journey there to actualise their ambitions. Its people are renowned for their steadfast diligence, productivity and fiery spirit. Proud, vermillion superstructures of cloud-piercing height dot the landscape, within which the world’s richest and mightiest sow the seeds for revolutionary advancement and look down upon the rest of the world.
Mignon, far below, appears as a speck of obsidian haze. But the sight is so grotesque that people in Such Fortune want Mignon’s problems, or perhaps Mignon itself, gone.
───※ ·❆· ※───
The Such Fortune City Council is holding a hearing on Mignon. In a majestic white hall with soaring ceilings, the Duchess steps onto a wooden podium.
“Allow me to unveil our robust strategy,” she announced triumphantly to townsfolk and journalists. “We’ll embark on a vigorous campaign, increasing housing budgets to create not simply dwellings but sanctuaries for solace and security! Additionally, makers of the cursed elixir Baste will be swiftly banished! Not forgetting the vital significance of the body and spirit, food programmes will be so boldly bolstered that they’ll eat cake!”
The room erupts with noise and protest. People stand and proclaim:
“Verily, such exceeding generosity only lures undesirables to Mignon, fostering idleness in their hearts and a culture of dependency.”
“Exactly! If these folks yearn for a better living, they ought to demonstrate the work ethic and toil we exemplify!”
“People with initiative and discipline should be prioritised over those who shun self-help. Why not cast your gaze upon us? Housing now is ludicrously expensive!”
The hearing goes on with debate so fervent it inspires the following day’s headline: “MIGNON: The Duchess’ Pledged Reform.”
───※ ·❆· ※───
In a tiny apartment in Mignon with windows sealed by cellophane tape, a little girl gets out of bed, showers in the community washroom, pours herself a small bowl of cereal and gets dressed before heading downstairs. She is only eight years old but is praised as an intellectual prodigy. She grabs a copy of the morning paper and reads it quietly in the musty lobby.
The door opens. The girl’s mother has just returned from work to pick up and send her daughter to school. She works through the night, every night, fuelled by ambitions of affording her daughter a prestigious school in Such Fortune. She wants nothing more than for her to live a better life. She was younger than one might expect a mother to be, but appeared older from responsibility and exhaustion.
Her daughter runs to her, holding up the newspaper.
“Ma! Look! The big people say they’re going to send us help,” she gleamed. “Maybe then you won’t have to work so hard.”
Her mother’s porcelain smile fractures for a moment, but it’s fixed before her daughter notices.
“That’s amazing, sweetie. Let’s get to school.”
───※ ·❆· ※───
The mother returns, sleeps for a few hours and showers thoroughly to erase her ‘Mignon stench.’ She heads to her first job stocking shelves at a grocery store, handling foods she’ll never taste. In the evening, she goes to her second job in a brothel on the edge of Mignon, which is popular among men from Such Fortune.
Their pockets are bottomless from collecting rent in Mignon. They own Baste factories and keep generous helpings for themselves. Their gas masks embolden them with anonymity and erase any sense of shame.
Today, one of their regulars has brought a friend: a government official. She thinks the official is different. He looks young, kind… and manipulable.
───※ ·❆· ※───
“I hope you enjoyed it, Sir. Would you be so kind as to leave a little extra for my service?” She says in a woeful tone, striking a seductive pose.
“Well, what considers you worthy?” He asked, appearing intrigued.
“It’s not me, Sir, but my eight-year-old daughter. She’s incredibly bright and deserves a quality education in Such Fortune, but I can’t afford—”
He chuckled sinisterly. “Neither you nor your child will ever belong in Such Fortune like this. Should you wish to salvage yourselves, work harder and earn it rightfully.” He stood to leave.
She snapped.
“I was born in Such Fortune!” She cried. It was true. “At sixteen, I gave birth, and my parents threw me out. I had nowhere to go. Rent was exorbitant. I had to come here!”
“Enough! You’re nothing but a strain on our society! We would be much better off without the likes of you.”
He whips out something from his pocket.
A flash of metal.
A shriek.
A loud boom.
───※ ·❆· ※───
She should have died that day.
Dozens rallied to offer her tireless care, keeping by her bedside at all hours and concocting remedies from their meagre resources. The sheer strength of Mignon’s community is monumental.
She lived another three months before succumbing to infection.
“At least the maggots won’t get to me,” she chuckled. She held her daughter till her final, pained breath— a bare whisper: “Never surrender.”
She will be burned, and her body will emit a nauseating smell and thick, black smoke.
Another day in Mignon.
───※ ·❆· ※───
In a tiny apartment in Mignon with windows sealed by cellophane tape, a young woman gets out of bed, showers in the community washroom, pours herself a small bowl of cereal and gets dressed before leaving for her first hearing as a lawyer specialising in pro bono legal service. On her way, she grabs a copy of the morning paper. The front headline read: “MIGNON: Massive Drug Dealer Exiles Promised.”
Across the street is a beautiful mural of her mother. Her death became a political symbol of oppression, her dying words now a rallying slogan. Visitors never see these artworks through the black fog.
The young woman stops by it, as she does every day.