The village fete offered prizes for preserves, marrows, knitted animals, runner beans, and, inside a smaller cream-colored marquee near the hedge, people. A sign outside read FINE HUMAN. The queue included most of the village, all dressed neatly and pretending there was nothing peculiar about entering.
The judge wore a linen coat and examined each person with agricultural seriousness. She checked teeth, fingernails, posture, reflexes, and the whites of the eyes. She pressed a thumb into the muscle of his shoulder, listened to his chest through a brass instrument unlike any stethoscope he had seen, and asked whether he slept alone, suffered recurrent dreams, or had eaten much salt during childhood.
He answered because everyone else had.
The judge pinned a red rosette to his lapel and congratulated him on excellent development, though she recommended another year before showing him in the highest class. Outside, neighbors compared ribbons with embarrassed pride. The baker had blue. The postmistress had yellow. Nobody could identify the winner.
By evening, he noticed the rosette would not come off.
The pin had vanished into his shirt. Red ribbon lay flat against his chest as if growing from beneath the skin.
During the following weeks, changes appeared. His teeth straightened. Old scars faded. His eyesight sharpened. Foods he had loved became repellent while raw vegetables developed an almost irresistible sweetness. At night, he dreamed of standing beneath bright lamps while unseen people discussed his shoulders.
Everyone wearing ribbons changed.
The baker grew taller. The postmistress lost twenty years from her face. An elderly man developed the gait of someone half his age and began weeping whenever livestock trailers passed.
The village doctor called it remarkable.
The fete committee called it preparation.
By spring, invitations arrived for the next show.
His was different.
CHAMPION CLASS.
He went to the manor house to demand answers and found the previous winner grazing peacefully behind an electrified fence, still recognizably human except for the serenity.
The judge met him at the gate and explained that the village had produced unusually fine stock for generations. Selection improved temperament, health, longevity, and yield.
He asked what she meant by yield.
She glanced toward the house, where something large moved behind curtained windows.
Then she praised his condition and asked whether he had been sleeping alone.
This time, he understood why that question had mattered.
©2013 Rhyan Scorpio-Rhys
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