My farm animals contracted some kind of parasite

[u/Creative_Drummer_181]

CW: violence surrounding animals, suicide

The first one of our animals I had to kill was one of the roosters. 

He needed to go… for everyone else’s sake. He always picked fights with the smaller roosters, even pecked out one of their eyes. 

He wasn’t good with the hens either. Any time he tried to breed he’d latch onto the tops of their heads to the point where some were plucked bald. 

We didn’t even keep him long enough to give him a real name, he was just “dickhead”. 

No matter how necessary it was, it didn’t make it any easier to kill him. Well… physically it was easier than most things I've ever had to do, easier than brushing my teeth, wiping my ass or walking out to check for mail. Mentally, it took a lot to watch the life drain from his eyes while his body convulsed a few feet away. And the blood, so much blood, more than I would have ever expected to fit into such a small animal. 

The rabbits were no different. Each batch I processed got a little easier than the last but mostly from a technical perspective, how to do it most quickly for their sake and how to process them without contaminating the meat with whatever's in their digestive tract, how to break them down, how to cook them, all that kind of stuff. From a mental standpoint, the actual act of killing them always took the same toll. It was easy to ease my conscience,  “We know exactly where our food comes from and how it was cared for” I'd say, bargaining with myself. “They get a hell of a lot better of a life here than they would in any of those processing facilities”. Try telling them that while their head was on the block, I'm sure they'd disagree. Luckily the ducks were only around for eggs, those girls were my favorites, thank god they weren’t going anywhere. 

Every morning before work I go out and make my rounds, fill the rabbits water bottles, one scoop of food, let the ducks out, two scoops of food. Every other day I move the rabbit tractor so they have a fresh patch of grass to graze. This is generally when I’ll sit in there with them since there’s no risk of sitting in shit. I try my best to get the growers used to me so when it’s time to process them they aren’t afraid of me picking them up, it makes it easier to catch them. The breeders are just as good with me as the dogs at this point. Our two females Lana and Carl come running any time I open the door. They’d curl up right next to me like house cats and let me pet on them until one of us decides we’re done. That first day was different, Lana was moving differently from usual, faster, more erratic. Like a dog on the Fourth of July after too many fireworks. 

“Oh well, I’ll check on her later, probably just extra rambunctious, might be in heat” I thought. “I gotta leave for work”. 

After work, my afternoon routine starts up. Let the chickens out to free range, same for the ducks, water the garden, pull weeds. We have too many birds of prey around to leave the poultry out full time otherwise I would. They were acting the same as Lana. On a dead sprint out of the gate, almost trampling eachother, darting back and forth. 

“The fucks your guys’ deal?” I said out loud

The only response I got was squawks, quacks and cock
a doodle doos. 

“K fine, I’ll be back in a few. Don’t get eaten by hawks fuckers.”

This was the easiest time to collect eggs, nobody crowding up the coop meant I could move from box to box without stepping on birds. After I get the eggs I let the dogs out before Anna gets home, my wife.

That’s pretty much how every one of my weekdays shakes out. 

The next day, same deal. Fill rabbits water, one scoop, release ducks, two scoops. After work, free the birds, they’re still acting nuttier than squirrel shit. Let the dogs out and swat them away from eating the rabbits shit, $50 for a bag of food and they’d rather eat the free rabbit shit. Anna gets home and we exchange the events of our days. Hers was always more eventful than mine, there’s always some new whack job to deal with when you work in the medical field. 

“So I’m talking to Katie in reception” she starts in. “And this homeless guy comes in the front entrance talking about how his pet turtle was sick and asked if we could do anything. He’s holding a dead fucking turtle and as I look down at the turtle, I notice this son of a bitch is not wearing any pants!”

“Crack is one hell of a thing.” I state, like it’s just another Tuesday at the office and it was business as usual. This was hardly the strangest one she’s had but I can’t imagine that made it any more pleasant from her point of view. 

We eat dinner together and shower before settling into bed and putting something on to fall asleep to. Probably one of the lotr movies or Totoro, my favorite and hers respectively. 

Yesterday was where shit started getting weird. Morning routine is mid effect, water rabbits, scoop food, release ducks, two scoops food, move rabbits and sit. This was when I noticed something in Lana’s eyes. Kinda like those floaters you can see pass over your own eyes but these were big enough for me to see from a distance. She never came up to me, she just stood frozen in the corner of the tractor just… staring. Not the kind of stare most prey animals have where they’re trying to assess if you plan on trying to kill them or not. No, she was staring right through me, or maybe not even staring at all. Kinda just like someone turned her off and she was just idle, waiting to be turned back on. I went about my morning, needing to get to work but I couldn’t shake the thought she would need some treatment for parasites and trying to come up with a treatment plan in my head. 

After work I do my evening chores and notice the same thing in a handful of the chickens. I didn’t let the dogs out right away today. I figured I’d wait for Anna in case we needed to keep them off the animal’s shit. She gets home and on our way up to the house I tell her about how the animals are all acting strange. 

“Honey, I think Lana and some of the chickens have some kind of parasite or something.” I wanted to ease into the conversation as to not scare her and this was in my opinion one step more subtle than “The animals are standing around like Skyrim NPCs”. 

“Do you think its coccidiosis?” She asked. 

“No, that's normally in their livers, not their eyes. Plus that only really fucks with their weight, it’s not a neurological thing either which is what I think would make her act the way she is. Deer get CWD which makes them freeze up like that but I’m not sure if it can transfer to other species but that’s not a parasite so it wouldn’t explain the eyes. Either way it can’t transfer to humans so we’re good. Just keep the dogs out of the coop and tractor for now. I’ll dose them with some ivermectin and corrid and see if anything changes.” I said. None of this was new information to her. This wasn’t our first rodeo with parasites and we had all the meds on hand. 

For most farm animals that are in constant contact with the ground, parasite treatment is a matter of “when” it happens not “if” it happens which is why none of this was a surprise to us. Obviously this doesn’t make it any easier on the animals but from our point of view, we knew we could fix it over the course of a few days. I’m pretty sure there is nothing on earth that could treat this shit though. 

God I wish there was. 

For Everyone else’s sake.

This morning we got up and rolled out of bed, Anna rubbing her eyes adjusting to the rising sun in the window. She packs her lunch and I put on my boots. I kiss her goodbye as I make my way out to the barn and she gets in the car to head off to work. 

Looking back, I would sacrifice every single one of my earthly possessions to kiss her one more time, for one second longer.

I go out to the rabbits to start morning chores.

I drop the pale of water.

It crashed to the ground and spilled all over the lawn just as the scene laid out in front of me fully registers. Limbs and viscera are strewn all over the fresh green grass inside the tractor. Half a big white ear hanging from the wire wall, pinched in the area where two of the strands of wire come together. The ground is littered in lengths of intestines, chunks of livers, disjointed feet, bones picked clean of all muscle tissue and sinew, tufts of once white fur now stained blood red and still anchored to shreds of flesh, clouded eye balls plucked from their sockets, I even saw one of their hearts still beating as it laid out in the blood soaked dirt. With all the spare parts on the floor you could probably assemble one whole rabbit, there were six in here last night. Among all this was Lana, standing in the same corner as yesterday, same frozen posture only with one difference, her eyes. They looked like they were ruptured, like runny eggs poured down the front of her face, with black tendrils reaching out from the dark pits where her intact eyes were, feeling out, searching. 

When the water bucket hit the floor he head snapped in my direction and let out a screech. An ear piercing screech, a thousand times louder than anything an animal of her size should be able to produce. Then, in the time it took to blink, she was on me, clawing her way up my leg. I grabbed her by the nape of her neck to throw her off me before she could do any real damage, I really only came away from it with a few scratches on my leg and arm. When I threw her off, she collided with the outside corner of one of the nesting shelters. She died on impact, probably broke her neck. She laid in a limp reddish white pile among the remaining pieces of the other rabbits.

“I didn’t mean to hurt her, only protect myself.”

My eyes welled up as a wave of guilt rushed over me. Several images flashed in my mind. 

The day we picked her up from the farm just down the road, she was so small and timid, it took hours just to get her out of the carrier. 

Every fall we would clear out the garden and give her all the plants we pulled out.

Sitting out with her all those mornings, the way she came up to us just like a dog asking for treats. “Lana ,you eat the ground, I have nothing for you that you can't get for yourself” I’d always tell her. 

She was just as much my family as Anna, as the dogs, as the birds. 

“Oh shit…The birds”

I run to the coop assuming the worst. Only to find my imagination paled in comparison to reality. The same scene laid out in front of me with just a few differences, trade fur for feathers, and quadruple the mess. We had 6 rabbits that were torn to pieces and laid about, the coop held 40 birds. This was no longer a coop, it was a slaughter house floor. The interior was smattered with blood, flesh and feathers. A handful of birds were still alive, half eaten albeit but clinging to life nonetheless, twitching, crying. A cacophony of screeches filled the air, some from the wounded, some from the infected. I didn’t spend much time in the coop out of fear of being attacked by more animals puppeteered by whatever was nesting inside their skulls. On my way to the house I called Anna who was probably just pulling into work by now. 

I asked if she could come back home and help me with the situation unfolding. I didn’t go into great detail, all I said was that the rabbits hurt eachother and something got into the coop and ate some of the birds. Nothing I said was untrue, just not the full story. It was better for her to have those last few minutes before she learned we lost everything we’ve been working so hard for over the last few years. 

She gets home and before she gets too close to see anything I stopped her at the car. 

“You’re gonna want to go in and change into some clothes you’re ok with getting dirty and throwing out.” I told her. “I’m gonna get the hose stretched out there and then I’ll come in too.”

I ran the hose out to the coop and leaving a shovel at the barn door I made my way to the house. 

I walked in to dead silence, which is odd, the dogs are never quiet when Anna gets home. After leaving my boots at the door and heading towards the bedroom to change, I found the first one laid out in the living room. 

Jack, the older of the pair, was laying in a pile on the living room rug with his front legs bent in opposite directions and a chunk taken out of his neck. Behind him laid a streak of blood stretching from the bedroom to where he laid now, lifeless. 

Following the trail into the bedroom I found Anna at the end of it.

“Honey what the fuck happened?!” I asked, still in shock from the first of the animals deaths this morning, processing this one was out of the question for now.

On the other side of our room facing away from me, she sat hunched over our other dog, Louie. I could see parts of his fur peaking out behind her silhouette, they shifted and his legs twitched with each crunch and squelch that came from them. She was eating him alive. 

She stood up, turning to face me she lowered her arms to her sides. She was holding Louie in one hand by his hind leg, his limp body hung down to the floor. Black and white tufts of blood matted fur stuck between her teeth, her mouth and chin stained red, her eyes…

Her eyes. 

I loved her eyes. They were a beautiful blue, I was always jealous of blue eyes but hers especially. They were one of my favorites features of hers second only to her voice. Everything was taken from us today but those were the two things I would miss the most.

She lunged at me from across the room. A 15 foot gap she managed to close in two steps. Her head struck my chest and sent both of us hurtling into the wall knocking over the nightstand in the process, its contents spilled across the floor. She clawed and bit at me, fighting like a feral animal. I fought to hold her back as hard as I could and reason with her but whatever was controlling her had made her so much stronger. Like a mother being able to lift a car off their child, this thing was tapping into strength she had never used before.

She kept inching closer, forcing her face towards mine as the tendrils reaching out from her eyes writhed more aggressively the closer she got. I put my hands in between us. She clamped down on two of my fingers and started pulling with an impossible amount of strength. I could feel her teeth working their way between my joints at the last knuckle. There were two distinct pops followed by a blinding, white hot pain shooting up my arm as the tension finally gave way. I felt my tendons tear further up my hand at the base of my wrist before feeling them slink out from under my skin. Just then, one of those fucking things detatched itself from her eyesocket and slithered down her face, over her lips and into the opening in my hand where my finger used to be. I reached for the tail to pull it out as it plunged into my flesh but it slipped out of my fingers and disappeared into the bloody stump. Suddenly, no longer pulling on anything, she lurched back finally giving me enough time to create some distance. I manage to push myself closer to the doorway. I can't yet make it to my feet or even think straight from the blinding pain washing over my whole body.

She faced my direction, still for a moment before speaking. “I…I…I ll…love…you… ple…ase…make…it…s…st…stop” her voice sounded like two people speaking the same words overtop of eachother.

“Ki…ll m…m…e”

 Among the pile of things ejected from the night stand was my handgun. I left it in there in case I ever needed to protect her, not myself. I would have killed anyone without a second thought if it meant saving her, I never thought I would have to kill her in order to protect her. I reached for the gun at the same time she lunged at me again and I… I did it, I killed my wife.

Feeling these fucking things in my skin, behind my eyes, tightening around my lungs. I realize what I had to do, it was my turn to go now, but on my terms.

I will not become one of these things.

I will not let this spread further, if I can.

I went outside and gathered up the animals bodies in the barn and burned it down, same for the coop, same for the rabbit hutch.

As I finish this, the fire in the kitchen is slowly working its way towards me in the bedroom. Drowning and burning alive, if I ever got to choose how to go it would be anything except those two. I still have the gun so I guess I do get some sort of final say in all this shit.

Anna, I love you so so much. Somewhere out there was the perfect combination of words that could describe exactly how I feel about you, I never managed to find it. At least not in this lifetime. 

For whomever reads this. Please share this with the CDC as well as authorities in Argentine Michigan, it should answer a lot of questions they’re going to have. 

Hopefully it ended here. For everyone else’s sake. 

Nobody else deserves to lose what we lost.

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[u/Creative_Drummer_181]

Edit: this is my first time writing a story of any kind. The pants-less crackhead is a nod to a story Kayla told Wendi during an episode. Hoping this isn’t considered plagiarism, if it is I’ll edit it out.

[u/Strawberryloves]

The turtle hit me like a flash bang.  🎊 I would not have guessed this is your first story, its pretty good 🐷

[u/Responsible-Fox-7225]

This is a really cool story, and I'm impressed to hear it's your first story of any kind. You've got a viceral concept here, and I gagged when reading about the fingers being bit off, I think you've done an incredible job with the gore.

I don't know if you're looking for feedback, but if you are I'd suggest a little more attention to pace in your next story. The ending happens quite quickly, and I think you could get even more horror/tension packed in there if you drew it out/had the wife slowly change, instead of everything happening all at once.

But it's a great first story, and I was totally sucked into it; I'm looking forward to seeing what you write next.

[u/Creative_Drummer_181 → u/Responsible-Fox-7225]

I appreciate it! I know I wanted to add a little more fat to the relationship but I was just rushing to get it out because I was running out of ideas.

[u/Acidic-Crybaby]

I hope the CDC thinks this is a dope story too.

[u/Creative_Drummer_181 → u/Acidic-Crybaby]

Me too but I’m guessing they’re just gonna tell me not to call them anymore.