Doc stayed on his feet, gritting his fine teeth against the pain now throbbing between his bony shoulder blades. “I am no man’s monkey, Mr. Strasser.”
“That’s what you think.” Strasser jerked a thumb in a downward motion. “Let me have him, Baron. I’ll find a use for old Doc here. Train him up good and when you least expect it, I’ll drag his sorry ass out for a show.”
Teague nodded, the bored mask back on his fleshy face. The drugs were in his left robe pocket and it took all of his self-control to stop from pulling them out and lighting up. “He’s yours, Cort. You found him, you’re responsible for him. Now leave me, all of you. I need time alone to think and meditate upon my current affairs of state.”
Strasser bowed. “Yes, my lord.”
“UNHAND ME, SIR!” Doc yelled at the sec man.
The bearded man obliged, pushing Doc into the filthy basement room. The walls were a mix of earth and heavy stone; the floor damp and muddy. The room was barren, no furniture or windows, only the single wooden door with the tiny window cut in the upper section for viewing.
“You just don’t get it, do you, old man? I think you need a lesson in manners.”
Strasser slapped Doc across the face with the back of his hand, sending him stumbling sideways into the wall. While Doc was no coward, he wasn’t a seasoned fighter either, and the events that had seen him taken from the end of the year 2000 and dropped nearly one hundred years into this future hellhole had robbed him of almost all his strength.
Doc raised an arm, managing to block a second punch. He felt his entire shoulder go numb from the force of the blow. Strasser gave a nasty snort of laughter and feinted with his right fist, taking advantage of his victim’s hapless avoidance to easily kick out with a booted foot, catching his prisoner in the kneecap.
Doc screamed in pain and went down on the earthen floor.
“Strip him,” Strasser ordered and the two sec men bent down to comply, pulling away the well-worn clothing, the grimy long underwear.
“You animal.”
Strasser laughed, and his amusement was as false and cold as his smile. “No, you’re the animal here, Doc, and I’m going to enjoy proving it. I hope you can get it up, because I’ve got a special job for you. One you’re gonna like.”
“Get it…up?” Doc asked, confused by the slang.
The second sec man laughed, pointing at Doc’s genitals. “Even if he does pop a boner, I don’t think it’s going to amount to much!”
Strasser strode over with his hand on his hips and looked down. “Doc, you’ve just been appointed
Mocsin’s ambassador of swine, and as such, your number-one duty is to service all the female members of your entourage. You might as well save your strength-you’re going to need it all for your harem.”
The sec men gathered around and laughed heartily at Strasser’s edict.
Doc looked horrified. “Bestiality?” he said, a shudder of revulsion running down from his nape to the back of his thighs.
Strasser laughed again, slapping Doc on the back. “See? Quips like that are what make you the top funny fellow in Deathlands. ‘Bestiality,’ he says. That’s a mighty fancy word for fucking, old man, and that’s what you are to me now, Mocsin’s very own piggy-humper.”
Doc wasn’t smiling. The joke was taking a nasty turn. “I’ll not lie with swine,” he declared as firmly as he could, but to his own ears the declaration came out in a breathy quaver of a voice.
Strasser kept the pasted-on smile. He reached out and poked a heavy finger in the center of Doc’s scrawny chest, catching him right at the top of the breastbone with each painful jab. “You’ll do whatever the hell I tell you to do, and come back asking for more, you crazy old loon! Take pride in your new position, and thank me for not chilling you right now.”
“Frankly, sir, I would rather be dead,” Doc said.
“That can be arranged. Bring him.”
Too exhausted to really care anymore, Doc offered little resistance as he was taken through the halls of Baron Teague’s manse and out a back door to a waiting wag. The ride to the compound where the pigs were kept was short, and soon Doc found himself standing in front of a wide wooden gate looking at the dozens of muddy sows within.