At the end of Diggs Road

Bubba had been around for a long time. Longer than he could reckon. The years blurred together, slipping through his mind like grease down a drain. He couldn't remember dates, not really, but he knew enough to realize that when the world shifted-when the superhuman became ordinary, when quirks stopped being strange and started being expected-he was no boy anymore.

Texas would always be home. His heart. His blood. His family. But Texas was gone to him, burned out of reach. The law had seen to that, hounding him like a pack of dogs, driving him out first from his own dusty fields, then out of the state, out of America, and eventually out of countries he couldn't even name anymore. He had stopped keeping count after a while. What was the point? Every place ended the same-sirens, guns, screams, fire. Always running. Always hiding.

No matter how far he went, his hunger followed. It gnawed at him, patient but merciless, a constant weight in his gut that never let him rest. And wherever that hunger led him-through cities, across oceans-there was always a man with a badge or a cape at his heels.

Now, after so much wandering, he had found this place. A sagging, half-forgotten farmhouse on the outskirts of the city. The boards were warped, the roof caved in places, the porch eaten with rot, but to Bubba it was beautiful. It smelled like home. It was home.

He had lived here for years now. Long enough that the locals whispered. Long enough that the smart ones stayed clear. Fear had spread, and the road had grown quiet. But quiet was fine. Quiet meant nobody watching. Nobody interfering.

Because it didn't matter in the end.

Not to Bubba.

Meat was meat.

And meat would always be butchered.

This art is not mine!