DUMB CREATURES
By Krishan Coupland

Ingleman kills penguins for God. They were a mistake, you see, in the first instance. God realises now just how stupid they look. He is embarrassed he ever created them, graceless waddling monsters that they are. So he and Ingleman spend their days driving from one zoo to another, gradually erasing the mistake. God drives and Ingleman does the killing. 

Ingleman is 31 and an IT technician. Ingleman is a man whose childhood was _defined_ by jealousy. Asthma on the inside and eczema on the outside; he never could fit in. The scratchy, huffy, moist little fuck-up. That's what Ingleman thinks about when he kills the penguins. That's why God chose him for the job. Ingleman doesn't hate the birds, but he enjoys killing them, and it pays well too; he's saving up for a place of his own. It's the off-season right now, and they're working zoos. When winter comes they'll take a plane down south and track the birds’ migrations. The great hosts of them tottering solemnly across the snow. Ingleman _lives_ for those holidays. Bundled in furs like an Eskimo, alone with God in that wild snowy expanse. The cold, mechanical weight of the rifle. More things to kill than could be killed in a year. Nobody to ignore or be ignored by; to pity or be pitied by; to hate or be hated by. He looks forwards to the nights when God and he sit around their campfire and cook penguin meat, and God gets drunk on wine and sometimes, _sometimes_ God hugs Ingleman like Ingleman's father never hugged him and whispers to him that you, my boy, you were the only child I ever wanted, the only one I ever cared for. You're just what I was trying for all along. 

Ingleman's saving up for a place of his own. Ingleman breathes through his mouth. Ingleman loves his job.