When the big goose opened his eyes in the fishy smell, this was the first thing he tasted. It's not the cold drink with lemon slices in the pantry of the radio station, nor the turbid water mixed with sediment on the flood fighting front line, but the rain that smells like rust and can make people cry.
He sat up suddenly, and the dull pain on the back of his head made him gasp. What he could see was a dusty thatched roof with a few rotten wooden beams standing crookedly on it. It looked very much like the old shantytown that was to be demolished in the people's livelihood news that he had approved just the day before. But what he was covered with was a burlap crotch, the stitches were so crooked that they could run a horse, and the skin ached from the abrasions.
"Hiss..." Dagoose rubbed the back of his head and felt a sticky wetness on his fingertips. He looked down and saw dark red blood on his fingertips in the dim light coming from the hole.
