The greeting from the tall, blond Australian with the prominent belly was a simple "Howdie"—exactly what you'd expect from a typical Aussie. His behavior and language weren't exclusively English, and what followed next was the difference. A terrible punch to the jaw of the hunters' leader, who had been successful in these first months of the crisis.
"Are you an idiot?"
He didn't allow anyone to answer. Most of them were armed, and they knew perfectly well that lethal force could be exercised because they were on a government-authorized mission, funded by private money. Their objective was to eliminate the plague that had been ravaging the country for months, and apparently, they had an excellent success rate.
"You didn't do anything right," was the second thing he said once they showed him the enormous freezing fields where tons of giant bodies—thick-haired, with terrifying tusked jaws—were stacked, with people working overtime to skin them and prepare them for preservation.
"These are female... and sick."
That was the moment when everyone started looking at each other again. The reports spoke of enormous mastodons weighing over 250 kg, but the brutal quantity they were hunting didn't match. The specimens didn't seem to exceed 200 kg, and on some of them, the tusks weren't even larger than those of a wild boar.
"You call me... too late, mate. You greedy pigs."
That stung everyone because, even with the best intentions, they recognized that they hadn't called this experienced hunter until the traps began to fail. At the start, many traps had an unusual success rate: dozens, hundreds fell across the country. Currently, the level was still dropping, and although enormous piles of meat and hair were visible, the reality was that parts of these warehouses already showed the floor—something that wouldn't have happened at the beginning. The statistics marked over 50,000 bodies eliminated, but those same columns indicated that at least two more litters had passed since the danger was detected. And although some local pig farms were annihilated, not all had that luck; there were pigs that joined and probably survived, though scientists insist there's a high probability that several were devoured, and only the females or piglets survived.
The shouts increased in intensity as he inspected the corpses. Some were perforated by high-caliber weapons; others were poisoned and had to be separated to avoid contaminating the food. But when he saw some with completely blackened tufts, he reached a new peak.
"Did. You. Use. Napalm?"
The truth was that this was the worst moment. There were so many animals, and they were hunting from helicopters, that the only thing they could think of was to drop white phosphorus and napalm. The problem was that this gel fuel and the other incendiary agent caused fires in many regions of grasslands invaded by the pigs. And they didn't all die; only those hit by white phosphorus were consumed. The rest knew to roll in the mud to reduce the heat, and now, in addition to the fires, they had to compensate many victims from small towns that were stampeded by flaming pigs. The compensations demanded by society were astronomical, and since they could no longer be profitable, they resorted to hiring specialists. The best were in Australia and the southern United States, where they faced feral pigs with relative regularity.
"We are doomed. Now they will be nocturnal and scared of chopper sounds."
Right at that moment, everyone realized the danger they were in. It wasn't just the expected risk of having to go down to deal with the damned dead animals and eliminate one or two that might have escaped the massacre. Now they weren't going to find any of these animals if they decided to keep searching as they had been. They asked what they could do, what alternatives the great hunter offered them, and even joked about his inability to face this. To which he told them they didn't have the slightest idea of the dangers of hunting at ground level. He had done it when he had to face a particularly dangerous pack leader, but he had never faced more than forty. And what they had done was put tens of thousands of violent, cunning wild animals on alert.
"Talk to the boss. We need silent solutions."
No one believed him, and they left him in the hotel for a couple of weeks—until the hunters themselves started falling. The scenes were terrifying: armored trucks being overturned by four or five of these beasts while the rest piled on for their lunches, leaving behind only chunks of earth, mud, some fabric scraps, and sometimes a metal plate that could identify the victim.
Then they had to swallow their pride. They went back to find the hunter with prior authorization from the company leaders. So they changed their entire strategy. They began equipping themselves with very quiet electric vehicles, and instead of going to hunt them, most made sure to stay near city entrances, aiming to eliminate those that approached and close like pincers on those arriving late to the party.
"Don't let them come back."
That was the only thing he insisted on, over and over. He was sure that the moment even one escaped their nets, the danger to humanity would be enormous. And so they maintained a slow, brutal hunt. They trapped hundreds, but most likely thousands were still reproducing and causing havoc. The worst wasn't the pigs. The worst came when they had finally isolated a huge group of nearly 10,000—not even close to the main population—but it was urgent to eliminate them because they were a few kilometers from one of the country's most important forests: a lung, source of fine woods and impressive biodiversity. It was a site from which these animals should be kept away because, considering the rate of damage they caused anywhere they went, very little of that national pride would likely remain.
Preparations were in full swing. They had accepted purchases of high-caliber, high-penetration weapons. They had gathered practically all the hunters in the region, forming a formidable force of over 200 heavily armed elements with specialized doctrine in eliminating this type of plague—forged over months and getting beaten weekly by a guy with a ridiculous hat. Although after the first bad moments, they had learned to recognize him; his ability to fight even hand-to-hand with those beasts was unquestionable.
They have to eliminate these beasts; they cannot allow them to enter the city.
So they positioned themselves at various highway points and rural entrances, all in silent vehicles with weapons that tried to muffle sound as much as possible. The first shots came in the witching hour: dry detonations that scattered through the dead night. The animals didn't see who had attacked them, but they were alert, nervous. The stench of their waste flooded the entire region. Whenever the wind blew, it was clear they weren't so calm either, though that didn't stop them from devouring all the crops surrounding the city. The police had managed to move most potential victims away, yet every now and then, the screams of someone who refused to leave their home, their field, or even some bastards who thought this hunting business was easy could be heard, followed by rapid semi-automatic fire that could do little against animals as tenacious as these pigs—especially because they had learned that if they followed the sound and it was scarce, they could eliminate the source and eat at the same time.
Fortunately, the plan worked quite well over the next few hours. The pile of corpses began to block the streets as everyone watched every access point—whether paved or even the small canal that ran through fields originally of flowers, now being used to plant emergency food to sustain the city while imports stopped being chased by these bugs that attacked trailers and anything that seemed vulnerable to tons of meat charging.
When dawn's light hadn't yet cleared but showed signs of existing, the problems began. First came a rapid thud of flesh fleeing; footsteps sounded quite hurried but were few. Not five minutes had passed when other hurried, abundant footsteps began to surround the meat barriers and try to drag pieces—from parts to entire bodies—while they shouted joyfully.
"Greedy bastards! Move! You're in danger!"
The warnings from a man jumping desperately from a rooftop were useless. The population, accustomed to looting any source that legally existed in a gray area, had decided that these enormous piles of protein had no owner. If they could take them, extract some lead pieces, skin them, and then paint some kind of symbol on them, they would claim they were theirs and that they had only made an early sacrifice because the animal already had the right weight. Some would even say it was due to food shortages—even though stores still had access and, despite everything, there was no shortage of trucks distributing all kinds of products. At the end of the day, the best agro-industry companies were financing the entire protocol for collecting, processing, and selling wild boar meat, so the channels were open and the trucks, although sometimes attacked, generally went escorted. So there was no excuse.
Soon, people who had only fled with some animals became people who lit bonfires and began roasting right there, draining the blood from everything they could and preparing traditional dishes that used that vital liquid seasoned with herbs to either take home or sell. The aroma of spices, blood, prepared meat, meat on display, and the shouts of everyone celebrating—including those who started pulling out sound systems to celebrate the excess—disconcerted everyone carrying out the hunting operation. They hadn't even reached half the animals, and there was already a risk of ruining the project.
"Keep shooting! We need to save those idiots!"
None of the hunters had understood the reason for the screams until the first shriek froze their blood. It was an old woman pulling a small wild boar while defending herself with her cane and swearing it had escaped from her small pen, so it was hers and no one present was going to touch it. The impact came from behind everyone. She had moved far enough that the shadows before dawn hid a pair of eyes from a mother who was not in the mood and had escaped the hunters' detection. She didn't even try to bite her offspring's attacker; she ran over her, and her tusks lodged and tore the woman's side as she screamed in desperation. That was the beginning of a counterattack few could have anticipated.
"If you kill humans, also kill the friggin' hogs!"
The next two hours saw ammunition continue to be used to the point where weapons overheated, forcing them to bring out backup weapons. In the end, they could only watch as men and women who still believed they could take something from this massacre—perhaps in revenge because one of those animals had eaten a relative—lunged at them with butcher knives and machetes as if an animal almost a meter and a half tall, with skin so thick that low-caliber weapons did nothing, cared that some weaklings who had never faced anyone who fought back decided it was going to be a battle between meat and corpses.
By the time the dust settled, they had lost almost all their members. The only one still with ammunition and functional weapons kept trying to eliminate some enormous animals in the back that were shouting what seemed like a retreat. It hadn't been worth it. Everything they'd lived through that day. That same afternoon, the Australian took a flight back to his nation. The reason for contract termination was well described, even if the language wasn't his native one.
"You guys are dumb as a block of wood. I don't care anymore."
The hunters looked at each other. They understood the insult, and the worst part was that they themselves felt like turning on the population and insulting them because they were now receiving multiple lawsuits for failing to guarantee the health and integrity of poor civilians who had only gone out for an evening stroll and were suddenly attacked for no reason. They were tempted to abandon these people. But for now, as long as there was money, they would have to swallow their pride—though most had already started keeping a semi-automatic clip in case they had to clear the streets, even if they left bait for the pigs in the process.