"Protecting the beasts"

CONTENT NOTICE AND DISCLAIMER:

1.FANTASY AND ENTERTAINMENT: This story is a work of fiction and recreational fantasy for adults. It is intended solely for the entertainment of mature individuals. The author does not endorse or recommend engaging in these activities in real life.

2.ADULT CHARACTERS: All characters in this story are fictional and 18 years of age or older. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental or they live in a parallel reality.

3.EXPLICIT CONTENT: This work contains scenes of an explicit sexual nature, submission, and simulated harm. If you are under 18 or are offended by these themes, please do not continue reading.

4.SETTING AND 3D ARTWORK: Geographical environments are used solely to set the plot in the near future or in a parallel world or reality. No real people or events were used in the creation of this story or for the 3D-generated images. No models suffered actual damage in the process.

5.TRANSLATION: The author’s native language is not English. An automatic translator is used to share this work internationally. We apologize for any inconsistencies in language.

Author’s note:

This story takes place in a parallel world within a multiverse of possibilities that could exist, a world very similar to our own with only a few differences. The most striking differences in this parallel world are the clones used as ponygirls pulling carriages and the poor, unfortunate meatgirls sold in butcher shops. In grand mansions, other clones are used as servants controlled with neurospinal chips and obedience programs for domestic service. Petgirls are also common, and in agricultural areas , cowgirls are frequently seen , milked daily. All of this stems from the events in Hendaye and the historical shifts that occurred when Franco and Hitler joined forces to defend the Aryan spirit of the superior European race.

Beast of supply

It was a morning identical to any other at the Prince’s Pavilion, an environment governed by the meticulous order of the Protocol Office. The Royal Guard had already mapped out the itinerary for the following day: an armored deployment that would return Princess Leonor of Spain to the San Javier Military Academy to continue her training in the armed forces. However, the inheritance of the throne is sometimes forged in the most ordinary decisions. In the pavilion’s kitchen, Leonor ate breakfast in silence, watching the sunrise through the window. Her mother, Queen Letizia, entered, breaking the stillness with a kiss on her head. For half an hour, the conversation flowed with the ease of any family gathering, until the Queen, checking her watch, reminded her that official duty awaited and that she should begin packing for the royal flight.

“I’ve got my old leather backpack ready, Mom,” I replied with a smile, finishing the last sip of coffee. “I’m leaving in a couple of hours. I’m going to travel alone, using public transportation. I want to do it exactly like my fellow cadets.”

My mother’s gaze froze for half a second. The rigidity of the label seemed to fracture in her eyes.

“No, no, and no,” Letizia repeated to herself, feeling a chill run through her stomach. The mere mention of public transport conjured up a parade of logistical nightmares: overcrowded platforms, security blind spots, and the ever-present threat of that bureaucratic machine that processed masses of people without regard for faces. Her maternal and sovereign instincts, always obsessed with absolute control and the perfection of protocol, collided head-on with a bitter premonition. One mistake, a single lapse in judgment on the street, and the system would devour the Crown. She felt a physical tightness in her chest, the suffocating certainty that they were opening a crack into an abyss from which no one returns unscathed.

—Are you sure, Leonor? That’s very dangerous.

“Come on, Mom, it’s not that big of a deal,” I insisted, softening my tone. “My colleagues do it all the time and nothing has ever happened to them.”

King Felipe considered the request minutes later with the same reluctance and concern, but the sense of responsibility that Sofia and I had always demonstrated ultimately tipped the scales. “Giving her the chance to enjoy a little adventure is good for the soul ,” my father thought. A human concession before the return to military discipline.

The young heiress crossed the threshold of Zarzuela Palace, stripped of her royal regalia, wearing an old light blue blouse, denim shorts, and light brown flip-flops. Upon arriving at the bus station on Caballera Berenice Street, the urban landscape revealed the subtle anomalies of the country’s production system. Beside the ordinary bus stops stood a striking metal structure of gleaming, new tubes, somewhere between an industrial shower and a street light. At the top, a circular iron bar was positioned precisely at neck height. The device was strategically placed close to the roadway to allow for visual inspection by passersby, yet far enough from the shelter of the bus stop that rain or snow would fall directly onto whatever was anchored there.

“What could that piece of metal be for?” Leonor wondered, her brow furrowing slightly as she gazed at the cold contraption. Her rigid, military mind, shaped by the strict manuals of state infrastructure, tried to find some civilian or urban planning logic behind it. She guessed it might be some kind of advanced traffic sensor, an experimental mount for metropolitan surveillance cameras, or perhaps a safety anchor for public maintenance workers during storms.

Leonor quickly looked away as she saw her bus approaching, unaware that she was looking at a standard cattle restraint stand.

Public transport dissolved her into the anonymous flow of Madrid. At Atocha station, she boarded the train bound for Albacete, where she was to transfer to a train to Santiago de la Ribera. The Royal Guard kept watch at a distance. After receiving a report that the princess had arrived safely at Atocha, the monarch reduced the escort to a single undercover agent at a more moderate distance. The aim was to allow her to resolve her own issues during the only transfer on her route.

I leaned against the train window, letting the clatter of the train lull me to sleep as I contemplated the routine of provincial towns. Outside, life went on with astonishing normality. I saw merchant wagons pulled by ponygirls trotting along to the rhythm of their owners’ whips; we passed two butcher shops where meatgirls hung out to dry, their organs, heads, and skins displayed in the windows for the day’s sale. For me, as for anyone my age, this was all part of the scenery. The only thought that crossed my mind regarding the clones was the annoyance that one of those beasts might experience a malfunction in its control chip and cause a commotion in the street or kick a pedestrian. They were stupid creatures, devoid of souls.

I fell asleep with the reflection of my own blonde hair floating on the glass and woke up just as they announced the arrival in Albacete a few minutes early.

As we stepped down to the platform, the visual contrast intensified. Along one section of the tracks stood a row of round metal frames identical to those in Madrid, but this time they were occupied. A row of cattle were trapped by their necks in the live-load anchor points. Due to the industrial standardization of the bars, the taller animals suffered the pressure of the iron on their shoulders, while the shorter ones were forced to stand permanently on their tiptoes, chins raised and eyes rolled back, because the hoops were positioned directly below their ears.

“Ah, of course, it’s a storage and organization point,” Leonor reasoned internally, observing the device with a cool, conceptual assimilation. Her mind, accustomed to resource optimization diagrams and troop formations, deciphered the mechanism instantly. She felt no pity, but rather a simple intellectual satisfaction at having solved the urban planning mystery: the metal structure was a standard immobilization device designed to keep the inventory organized and static, preventing accidents on the railways and facilitating visual counting before loading. An impeccable and pragmatic logistical solution from the State .

Leonor barely gave them a cursory glance before heading to the lobby to buy a coffee.

Dystopian chance intervened on the side street. A group of schoolchildren accidentally bumped into her from behind, causing boiling coffee to spill onto her light blue blouse. With just enough time before her bus departed, the princess sought out the nearest women’s restroom to change.

The bathroom smelled of industrial disinfectant and dampness. I stripped completely, feeling the cold air on my skin, and put the stained blouse in a plastic bag inside my backpack. I was reaching for a change of clothes when the door burst open. There was no warning. A blonde, completely naked figure burst into the stall and delivered a brutal kick directly to my temple.

The impact knocked me sideways. The world went black instantly as my head hit the rough bathroom floor. I lay face down, unconscious, while frantic hands stripped me of my backpack and my identity.

Moving with the desperation of a cornered animal, the fugitive held her breath as she searched through the unconscious girl’s belongings on the floor. A suffocating panic gripped her chest: if the officers in blue entered at that very moment, her fate at the Villaverde plant would be sealed before dawn. However, as she plunged her hands into the backpack and felt the clean, dry fabric of the civilian clothes, a wave of almost electric relief coursed through her. She felt a wild, primal joy as she slipped the fabric over her bare skin; finally, she had something real to cover her, a textile shield that lifted her from the category of live cargo and returned her to the anonymity of the human world. As she adjusted the straps over her shoulders and looked at herself in the broken bathroom mirror, delirious happiness and triumphant pride replaced the terror. She was going to make it. The automated system would swallow the body she was leaving behind, and she, protected by this stolen identity, would be truly free in a matter of hours.

Outside the restrooms, the undercover special protection agent maintained his watchful distance. He saw Leonor enter and, shortly after, a figure emerge with her blonde hair loose, wearing her light blue blouse, denim shorts, and carrying her faded backpack. Without hesitation, the bodyguard mechanically followed her. However, noticing that the young woman was passing the bus station in an erratic and suspicious direction, the agent decided to intervene swiftly. He stopped her, intercepted her, and, when he forced her to turn and look him in the face, his world crumbled: the face before him belonged to a stranger.

A paralyzing terror gripped him. He felt the air leave his lungs as he grasped the magnitude of his negligence. Desperate, he subdued the imposter, shouted for backup from the local police to hand her over for theft, and ran back to the women’s restroom, his heart pounding with guilt.

In his frantic dash back down the terminal corridor, the agent ran past two burly men in blue uniforms dragging a young, completely naked woman. He bumped into them head-on, but his mind, clouded by the panic of seeing his career and civilian life destroyed, was incapable of processing what was before him. He didn’t see which cubicle they came from, nor did he notice where they were taking her; he only caught the fleeting glimpse of that inert body being dragged along casually. Consumed by the urgency of recovering the royal heraldry, the escort indifferently dodged the group so as not to waste a single second. His desperation was so blind that he paid no attention to what he was looking at, unaware that the blonde hair brushing the floor in that corridor belonged to the future Queen of Spain.

When he burst into the cubicle with the salvaged clothes, the place was deserted. Leonor was no longer there. The desperation of knowing he was finished in the eyes of the Crown drove him to activate the highest emergency alerts.

Minutes before their return, two burly prison security officers in dark blue uniforms had entered the bathroom after receiving an automated alert from the local detention center about a “naked and escaped criminal animal in an urban area.” Upon finding a young, blonde, completely undocumented female lying face down naked on the floor in the stall, the guards were overcome with the joy and relief of a matter resolved. Avoiding any identity verification protocol so as not to delay the end of their shift, they proceeded to close the escape case with blind pragmatism. With expert movements, they bent her arms backward, tying her wrists tightly against her back with industrial rope. They fitted a ball gag to her snout to silence her and dragged her in absolute silence to the dark luggage compartment of the live transfer bus. Feeling relieved to have efficiently fulfilled their bureaucratic duty, they closed the trunk. The machinery of the Meat State had just swallowed the heir to the throne.

Behind the walls of the royal palace, the disappearance of the heir to the throne unleashed a silent and frantic crisis. The Royal Guard, in close coordination with the Albacete judicial police, established a tightly controlled search perimeter. Under no circumstances were news agencies notified; the scandal of such a major security breach within the Crown would have shattered the stability of the State. In the royal office, the King and Queen were gripped by paralyzing anxiety, trapped in an information vacuum where every minute counted. The crisis team considered only two working hypotheses: the first, a politically motivated kidnapping executed with surgical precision; the second, a civilian one in which the Princess had slipped away from her security detail to spend a weekend in anonymity. Neither line of inquiry yielded a single clue. The system was searching for a princess, not a cow.

— Mmgh ! Mmmgh ! —​

The pain of being violently dragged by my hair brought me back to consciousness with a jolt. Rough, institutional hands gripped me without a shred of humanity, exposing my complete nakedness on the pavement outside that connected the bathroom to the bus bays. I felt a paralyzing terror , a sharp chill that froze my chest as I realized my screams were being muffled by a ball gag that crushed my tongue against the roof of my mouth, reducing my voice to a dull, irrational whimper. The rough asphalt painfully scraped my thighs and feet as the workers shoved me to my feet and ruthlessly hoisted me up to force me into a galvanized wire cage.

Just before pushing the carcass into the back of the trunk, the bus driver leaned over the side of the vehicle, resting an arm on the chassis as he watched the maneuver with boredom. Seeing the young woman’s naked and gagged body being forcibly placed on the galvanized metal, he let out a dry laugh and made a biting joke:

—It’s great that they found it! I was about to leave without it and I’m not going to pay the fine for an incomplete lot!

One of the officers in blue, wiping the sweat from his brow with his uniform sleeve, let out a rude laugh and replied with utter contempt:

“That stupid girl hid in the women’s bathroom! She thought we wouldn’t check that place out of pure chivalry.”

The three men burst into laughter, caught up in the relief of having completed the paperwork on time. To them, the stifled complaints that escaped from behind the ball gag were nothing more than the annoying noise of a completed transaction. With a nonchalant gesture, the driver said goodbye to the guards and returned to his cab, leaving the echo of his laughter hanging in the polluted air of the dock.

The bus’s luggage compartment door slammed shut with a metallic clang. The darkness was absolute and claustrophobic.

In that total darkness, my senses were reduced to the painful geography of the metal that confined me. I tried to stretch my legs, but the soles of my feet immediately collided with a cold, galvanized wire mesh. As I threw my head back, gasping for air, my skull struck the cage ceiling with a dry echo, forcing me to crane my neck. My hands, bound and numb against my back, brushed against the side walls every time the vehicle lurched, reminding me that I was trapped in a cubicle precisely sized for me. I could feel the cage’s boundaries with every inch of my body; rigid, unforgiving limits that my eyes couldn’t see, but that were there, pressing down on me, reducing my existence to the bare minimum of a packaged commodity.

The engine roared right beneath me, and a deep sadness washed over me as I felt the vehicle vibrate as it started moving, leaving the station barely twenty minutes after the regular bus I was supposed to take to San Javier. My arms were numb, tightly bound behind my back. The air began to grow thick, thick with the smell of diesel and accumulated dust. My darkest fears surged in that suffocating blackness; I had no idea where they were taking me, or under what inventory code they were transporting me as live cargo against my will.

For two straight hours, the bus devoured kilometers along the highway. On the upper deck, the passengers traveled in their human condition, enjoying the air conditioning and the comfort of the seats; directly beneath their feet, in the stifling luggage compartment, heated by the engine’s heat, Princess Leonor suffered the harsh conditions of transporting livestock. The drivers of the network operated with complete bureaucratic indifference, seeing in the digital dashboard’s load indicator just another number of registered packages. When the vehicle stopped at an intermediate transit station, the side door opened, letting in a blinding beam of light.

The captive cow tried to bring its snout close to the bars of the cage, emitting desperate guttural sounds to attract the attention of a woman unloading her hand luggage. The woman observed the inside of the luggage compartment with complete indifference and class detachment.

“Look, man,” he said to his partner, letting out a short laugh as he walked away, “that animal over there is trying to talk.”

“Look at me!” Leonor’s mind screamed in a flash of pure despair, her pleading eyes trying to pierce the utter indifference of the passersby. “Look at me closely! It’s me, it’s Leonor!” The thought echoed within her own skull like a futile, desperate sound. She wanted to rip off the gag with the force of her heraldry, to shout at them the decrees of the Throne, the laws of the Crown, and the military manuals she knew by heart. But in the eyes of the passerby, she no longer existed as a human being; she was merely a bipedal lump of hair and exposed flesh, a zootechnical anomaly emitting annoying noises. The realization that her entire life, her education, and her identity had completely dissolved in the minds of these strangers struck her with the force of lightning, leaving her plunged into utter helplessness.

Human empathy didn’t extend to undocumented cattle; for civil society, the animals were soulless objects. Minutes later, a transfer worker, a large man in a blue uniform, mechanically and pragmatically following his loading schedule, grabbed her by the hair and yanked her out of the cubicle. Without a word or even looking at her, he shoved her forcefully into the cage of a second meat transfer bus. The door slammed shut again. Four more hours of confinement followed, subjected to high temperatures, dehydration, and constant vibration. Extreme exhaustion and systemic panic finally broke the young woman’s resistance, and she fell uncomfortably asleep on the cage’s foul-smelling floor.

A massive hand grabbed my right foot, dragging me outside. I awoke with a start, blinking in the twilight of an unfamiliar city. I was utterly exhausted. Before I could regain my balance, the worker shoved me into one of those metal frames I’d seen in train stations. The iron ring closed around my neck, forcing me to raise my chin to avoid suffocating. I felt a deep unease and growing anxiety as I looked at my bound hands; my once-clean skin was now completely covered in a gray crust of grime and dried sweat.

The horror of the normalization of the environment hit me immediately. A group of school-aged teenagers approached the stand. Amid laughter and obscene comments, they began groping my breasts and buttocks, treating me with the impunity that legal norms granted them over any unbranded meatgirl . property. My doubts about whether I would ever get out of this alive suffocated me as their smooth, childlike hands humiliated me in public, until a local foreman shouted and dispersed them.

But it wasn’t a rescue. The man slipped a thick rope around my neck, tightening it almost to the point of suffocation, and freed me from the metal bracket. He tied the other end of the rope directly to the yoke of a heavy wooden cart pulled by a pony girl . The driver climbed onto the driver’s seat, driven by the pragmatic desire to keep to his work schedule, gripped the reins, and cracked the whip relentlessly across the poor animal’s back.

The pony girl took off at full speed. The rope gave a violent tug on my throat that forced me to run. I was forced to maintain a humiliating, accelerated trot through the cobblestone streets, completely naked, my arms tied behind my back, my long blonde hair swinging under the indifferent gaze of passersby. The hot asphalt burned the soles of my feet. A dull echo of regret settled in my mind: If I had known? If I had known, I would have waited for the Air Force’s direct flight. I would have followed protocol. I would never have boarded that damned train. But the cattle-hunting machine no longer heard genuine cries.

The live freight train remained stuck on a siding at Atocha station for hours, until a worker in warehouse overalls unhooked the ropes from the group of twenty-four head of cattle. With mechanical movements, he guided them through the underground service corridors to the outside loading platform. There, under the harsh Madrid winter and the late afternoon sun, he secured them to an anchor bar in the middle of the street. The naked, grimy bodies of the cattle began to shiver. I felt the sting of the icy wind on my skin, but the crust of dried dirt seemed to act as a shield, miraculously preventing the cold from extinguishing my inner warmth .

As night fell, a local transporter in a commercial carriage pulled by a pony girl took charge of the shipment. He divided the herd into two rows and tied the lead ropes to the carriage’s side supports. At an intersection on the avenue, a red light forced the carriage to a temporary halt. Directly across the road, an official electric car, identical to the one used by the Royal Household, waited. Behind the tinted windows, the silhouettes of two occupants could be seen enjoying the warmth. The light turned green before any visual connection could be established; the carriage driver urged the pony girl on , and the cattle were herded at a two-legged trot south, away from the vehicle. After miles of forced march, the herd entered the Villaverde Processing Plant complex, where it was secured to the supports in the central hall for the night.

The cold concrete woke me in the middle of the night, causing a terrible physical discomfort that made my teeth chatter against the gag. In the absolute silence of the Villaverde warehouse, my fractured mind traveled back years, rescuing a hazy memory from my childhood. I was returning in the official car with my parents after an official event when I saw, through the window, a group of naked and filthy meatgirls crossing an avenue under the whip of the drover. I remembered with terrifying clarity what my childish mind thought at that moment: how delicious and crispy those beasts would taste once roasted and served on my porcelain plate.

Now, the irony of industrial standards closed in on me with crushing sadness. I was the stupid, muzzled beast running barefoot through the winter, destined to be carved up in some family’s dining room. Yet, in the midst of that pit of despair, I felt a strange, grim acceptance. The system had drained me of hope; my doubts evaporated. Whoever buys my loin and legs , I thought with the cold reasoning of a piece of livestock, let them enjoy the quality of this meat.

At dawn, the automated line activated. The distributor’s manager and his operators acted out of pure business routine. Feeling reassured and pleased by the arrival of the scheduled shipment, they followed the guidelines in the meat handling manual. The robotic chassis inserted the mechanical devices into Leonor’s cavities for the emptying enema, immediately injecting the warm, hot fluid that inflated her abdomen to its maximum biological capacity.

Next, pneumatic arms hoisted her up and secured her by all four limbs to the chemical stripping line. The conveyor belt carried her into the washing chamber. A curtain of icy water washed away the surface grime, giving way to a dense industrial foam of disinfectant and capillary corrosive agents. Giant friction rollers passed over her skin, ripping out the matted hair, grayish grime, and knots, as well as her eyebrows, eyelashes, and pubic and underarm hair. The aesthetic transformation was absolute: the princess was left completely bald, smooth, and identical to the rest of the cattle. After a second blast of icy water and a blast of hot air, the cow passed through the pneumatic marking station. A battery of micro-needles stamped indelible barcodes onto the clean skin of her chest, waist, back, wrists, and ankles. For the technicians, this wasn’t cruelty; it was simply the optimal fulfillment of inventory weighing and labeling.

The sharp, searing pain of thousands of needles piercing my skin simultaneously snapped me back to reality with renewed terror. I stared at the barcodes printed in dark ink on my hairless skin. In that instant, my worst fear materialized; I experienced the bitter certainty that the industrial registration was complete and there was no legal turning back. I was no longer human; I was a registered commodity. A crushing anxiety washed over me as I wondered, with almost clinical detachment, how the butchers would dismember me. Would they sell my torso by the ounce? Would they separate my front and hind legs into trays of steaks? Would they use my bald, gagged head as an ornamental centerpiece at some elegant banquet? That would be my biological end, and dejection consumed me completely as they loaded me onto the delivery wagon.

The routine of downtown Madrid was adorned with the hypocritical beauty of the holidays. Under a splendid, luminous December morning, the winter sun made the frost accumulated on the sidewalks sparkle and ignited the reflection of the golden lights, garlands, and Christmas decorations that adorned the windows of luxury shops. In the midst of this festive and dynamic scene, the twenty-four numbered, bald oxen were rigidly harnessed to a daytime delivery cart, which set off from south to northwest through the crowded streets of the capital. As the vehicle moved forward amidst the cheerful bustle of pedestrians and the tinkling of music from the shops, a profound and desolate certainty sank into Leonor’s mind: the biting cold of the wind on her bare skin, mingled with the scent of pine and roasted chestnuts, confirmed with infinite sadness that this was, unbeknownst to the world, her last Christmas on earth . Along the Gran Vía, the group moved barefoot in absolute silence. Leonor felt a reflexive desire for the earth to swallow her whole under the public gaze, but the reality of dehumanization was more indifferent: the passersby on the avenue didn’t even notice her presence. To the urban flow, the group of twenty-four meatgirls with fresh barcodes on their skin was just an ordinary element of the commercial landscape, a supply of protein for the holidays. At every traffic light, pedestrians crossed past them without taking their eyes off their business.

The tour ended in front of the rear facade of a large stone building that looked familiar to Leonor. The workers ushered them through a narrow doorway, marching them along dark corridors and service staircases to the slaughterhouse of a high-end butcher shop. The butchers operated with industrial skill. They took the first two carcasses, tied their wrists, and hung them alive from hooks in the ceiling. The next few animals had their vulvas, anuses, and snouts pierced with textured steel rods for display on the spit, before being taken to the sales area.

Behind Leonor, the process was immediate and bloody: tools decapitated, skinned, and filleted the loins of several animals in a matter of minutes, tossing the remaining scraps into a plastic drum. Four more carcasses were quickly beheaded; a circular saw severed their front and hind legs to be mounted on display trays.

When the worker grabbed me, fear paralyzed me, expecting to feel the axe strike my neck. But it didn’t come down on me. Instead, I was wedged into a rigid, high-pressure plastic frame next to the other bald cow left from the batch. My eyes met hers, and all I could feel was pity ; two silent victims, bound by the same cold and the same impending doom. We were dragged to the main window, our gaze fixed on the display counter where live animals were on public view. Looking at the shop’s layout, a shiver of surprise ran down my spine: it was the gourmet butcher shop where Mom bought the cuts of meat for Christmas and New Year’s Eve dinners at the Zarzuela Palace.

The clamping forceps opened with a hydraulic click, depositing my body directly onto the stainless steel display table in the showcase. Just above me, a chain of hooks descended from the ceiling, displaying a row of amputated hind legs dangling in the gloom. I stared at these pieces with an unexpected surge of surprise and fascination; they were the limbs of females who had never worn shoes, legs that had never been manicured, reduced to pure muscle. As I looked at the relief of that exposed flesh and compared it to the pain in my own limbs, a hypnotic curiosity flooded my mind: “Will my legs look as mangled, strong, and muscular as those legs hanging from the ceiling?” I wondered internally, marveling at the realization that the carousel’s rigor had molded me with that same perfect, animal anatomy.

I forced my eyelashless eyelids shut to stay awake. Between the humiliation of the shop window and the pain of the rigid posture, a desperate, childlike joy ignited at the thought of seeing my mother arrive, clinging to a final glimmer of hope before the end. However, the biomechanical exhaustion of seven weeks on the carousel and the pressure of the plastic frame finally broke my resistance. My eyes closed in the gloom, surrendering to a merciful swoon, with the sole wish of never waking up inside a slow-burning oven.

Minutes after the princess lost consciousness, Infanta Sofía entered the establishment accompanying Queen Letizia. The annual holiday protocol required the direct selection of raw materials. Despite the profound sadness that gripped the family over the mysterious disappearance of the heir to the throne, Infanta Sofía examined the counters through the strict and dehumanizing lens of the meat trade.

As her gaze swept over the displays and steel hooks, Sofia observed the available product with complete nonchalance, noting that the meatgirls looked truly delicious and ready for consumption. Her technical assessment then took in the butchered pieces hanging in rows: they were bodies stripped of all humanity, perfectly decapitated, skinned, and gutted down the center of the torso. Hooks pierced the tendons of the suspended limbs, exposing completely clean cavities, emptied of all internal organs and skinless, revealing only the lean, pink, and muscular fibers, the result of physical conditioning. The butchering reflected the slaughterhouse’s skill, with trays organized by cuts of loin, ribs, and neat ounces ready for weighing.

Sofia lowered her gaze from the hooks to the central display table, where the establishment displayed whole animals ready to be roasted over wood or in the oven. She assessed a first Caucasian-type meatgirl , somewhat tanned, and then shifted her eyes to the second cow, also Caucasian, but with lighter skin.

With the expert detachment of someone selecting the gala menu for the Palace, Sofia analyzed the qualities of this second piece. The specimen remained forcibly fitted into a heavy mechanical structure of gray plastic and metal that brutally restricted its anatomy. Its thighs were fully flexed and compressed forward against the central panel, forcing its hind legs upward, the soles exposed and the toes clenched with tension. The front legs were blocked and stretched rigidly backward, the elbows tied behind the support, while the udders were violently crushed against the concrete floor. The metal bar of the collar forced its neck into an extreme ninety-degree extension, raising its chin toward the ceiling and straining the neck tendons to their limit above the red ball gag that obstructed its mouth. Its hide exhibited impeccable heat retention; the musculature of its back and hindquarters appeared compact, fibrous, and stretched to the maximum by the brutality of the support. It was a gourmet commodity of excellent biological density, ideal for Christmas carving; Sofia was completely unaware that she was contemplating the perfect and dehumanized anatomy of her own sister.

The animal lay motionless, its skull completely bald, smooth, and bare, exposed under the harsh light of the counter. The gray bar of the mechanical collar pressed against the base of its neck, forcing its face upward in a rigid posture. What froze Sofia’s blood wasn’t the metal, but the cow’s eyes: they were wide open, staring blankly into space, pupils dilated into a glassy white, lost in a deep lethargy. Beneath that vacant stare, black leather straps tightened across its cheeks, forcing its open mouth around a shiny red plastic ball from which a thick trail of saliva dripped. Sofia studied the perfect line of the nose and the structure of the forehead. The click in her mind was instantaneous and devastating as she took in the features trapped by the straps. An icy chill stopped her heart, and the air escaped her lungs in a silent thought:

“It’s... It’s Leonor... my sister.”

It was at that moment that the Infanta froze, recognizing her sister’s features in the skeletal structure of the bald head displayed on the counter. She squeezed her mother’s hand tightly. Letizia ended her cell phone call and looked in the direction of her daughter’s finger.

—Yes, Sofia —Letizia commented with institutional fatigue—, that meatgirl will be fine to roast.

“No, Mom!” Sofia whispered, her voice breaking. “Look at her face, it’s Leonor!”

The queen immediately put the device away, transforming clinical detachment into a whirlwind of bureaucratic authority as she entered the manager’s office. Without alerting security forces to protect state secrets, Letizia finalized the transaction. Half an hour later, after paying the invoice to legalize the removal of the item from the store’s inventory, the queen closed the trunk of her electric car. In the rear cargo area, on the carpeted floor, lay the two intact “meatgirls” removed from the window: the convicted parricide and the Princess of Spain, secretly rescued under the guise of a legitimate meat delivery for Christmas dinner at the Zarzuela Palace.

Queen Letizia and Infanta Sofía placed the two bald, lifeless, and numbered carcasses on the central stainless steel table in the Palace kitchen. At that moment, the service doors burst open to admit King Felipe. Sofía, overwhelmed by a mixture of jubilation and pent-up tension, approached the table, desperately caressing the smooth, bald, hairless scalp of the lighter-skinned cow.

“Look, Dad!” exclaimed the princess, her voice breaking.

The monarch glanced at the meat supply with the usual cold indifference of someone evaluating the culinary inventory of the festivities.

—Yes, daughter —Felipe replied indifferently—. Those animals will be fine for dinner.

The response broke the patience of the Infanta, who confronted the monarch with a vehemence that bordered on rebellion.

—DAD, DON’T BE AN IDIOT AND LOOK AT HER FACE!

Surprised by his daughter’s lack of respect, the king stepped forward and examined the features of the cow that Sofia continued to stroke. Recognizing the lines of his eldest daughter beneath the baldness, the monarch’s face contorted in horror.

—But... how?

Sofia detailed the discovery on the counter while the King, acknowledging the gravity of the system’s failure, established direct communication with Mr. Suarez, Director of the Kingdom’s Judicial System. The order was unequivocal: launch an immediate audit to trace how the Princess of Asturias had ended up integrated into the supply chain like any other commodity. Following the Queen’s instructions, Felipe and Sofia managed to remove Leonor from the rigid plastic support and carried her to her bedroom so she could sleep and allow her body some temporary respite .

A few hours later, a dense warmth and a soft, plush texture brought me back to consciousness. I awoke in a pleasant, very comfortable bed covered by a warm, thick blanket. I looked around the room and recognized it as my bedroom in the prince’s pavilion at Zarzuela Palace. I sat up a little to stretch my back, and as I rubbed my eyes, a sudden rush of joy and relief escaped from my chest. “God, what a horrible nightmare!” I thought to myself, wanting to shake off this strange, seven-week-long dream .

When I reached up to my head to untangle my hair as I did every morning, my fingers found nothing. I felt my bare scalp, warm and smooth.

Animal terror struck me like a blow from an axe. My world collapsed. I opened my eyes with a start and looked at my wrists and chest; there were the numerical sequences of the barcode, gleaming with their indelible relief. The hell of the farm had not been a dream. I burst into screams like a desperate madwoman, an animal shriek that pierced the palace corridors, overwhelmed by utter despair at the knowledge that I was destined forever in the stockpile of consumption. My parents and my sister came running to my room when they heard my desperate cries. Mom was the first to enter; she sat beside me on the bed and began to speak to me in a soft, soothing voice :

—Calm down, Leonor. You’re safe now, nothing’s going to happen to you.

“I’M A MEATGIRL AND THEY’RE GOING TO EAT ME!” I screamed desperately, shaking my head in panic. My fears were uncontrollable, my doubts about my own humanity suffocating me. “They’re going to put me in the oven!”

He repeated the same phrase over and over until Dad raised his voice and said:

—LEONOR, SHUT UP ALREADY!

I remained silent out of pure military conditioning. My father extended his arm, pointing to a man in a dark suit who was waiting by the doorway.

—Do you remember the director of the judicial system?

I nodded, stifling my whimpers, as Mr. Suarez approached the bed with a strictly calming whisper.

—Your Highness, relax, you have nothing to fear, trust me, I know what I’m saying and if you calm down I’ll explain it to you.

The princess’s breathing gradually stabilized. The director of the Judicial System waited until the recovered livestock showed signs of human rationality before outlining the statutory framework .

“Your case is complex, but I can assure you that, for you, no one has the right to eat you like some ordinary meat girl …” Suárez cut himself off abruptly, holding back the words just before uttering the final thought that haunted him. He glanced at the monarch’s silhouette and swallowed hard in the silence of the room, gauging the political abyss of his own audacity. “ First of all,” Suárez declared, “you were kidnapped, and the kidnapper in this case is the owner of the farm, who will be tried for kidnapping you…”

“It wasn’t him,” Leonor interrupted, her voice breaking.

“What?” Suárez asked.

—In the women’s bathroom at the Albacete train station, two large, strong men in dark blue uniforms caught me, tied my legs tightly to my back and gagged me, then dragged me by force to a bus and put me in the cattle cage in the trunk... they were the ones who captured me.

Mr. Suárez and the king looked at each other and exchanged only facial expressions. The pieces of the puzzle were beginning to fall into place.

“Well, let’s leave that for later,” Mr. Suárez continued, regaining his composure. “Besides, you should know that there’s the livestock trade law…” “The law here is very clear,” Suárez explained, raising a cold hand to point directly at the bed. “Once a farm meatgirl is registered and sold as an edible animal, whoever buys the animal has every right to decide what to do with it. In this case, your mother has the invoice for two meatgirls with their respective barcodes, and as you can see, she, and only she, can decide what to do with you and the other meatgirl .”

Mr. Suárez allowed a moment of silence for Leonor to understand and, especially, to process the information, letting a somber acceptance of the circumstances settle in her mind. Her discontent over the marks remained, so the princess inquired about them on her skin.

“Don’t worry about that,” Mr. Suarez replied. “In a few months they’ll be completely gone, and in about a year or two your beautiful hair will grow back, at least to your shoulders, and before you know it, it’ll be as long as it was before.”

A shy smile began to form on my lips as I understood the protection afforded by the commercial invoice. My doubts about how to rejoin humanity vanished at once in the face of a perfect revelation.

“Up to this point, what we know is the following,” Mr. Suárez continued, “your sister Sofía saw her in the butcher shop window and told her mother so she could buy her; now the butcher shop has shown the purchase invoice issued by the distributor of Meatgirls in Villaverde Alto; the distributor, for its part, had the sales invoice for the batch from the Almería breeding farm and the delivery slip from the public transport courier company, and now you’ve told me that it wasn’t the farm owner who kidnapped her, but two court officers from Albacete. Your Highness, do I need you to please tell me everything you remember about that day?”

—I left here to catch the bus that... —I began to explain, but Mr. Suarez politely interrupted me.

—Your Highness, what’s relevant? Let’s say, shortly before arriving in Albacete where I was supposed to change trains!

I smiled at his accuracy and continued:

—I fell asleep leaving Madrid and woke up arriving in Albacete. The screen indicated we’d be there ten minutes earlier than expected. As I got off the train, I came face to face with a row of twenty-four very dirty, naked, and gagged meatgirls , anchored to those new supports on the train platform. I looked at them for about half a second; I don’t know, I think what caught my attention was that they were all my size and the same age as me... or at least that’s what it seemed like at the time.

I paused briefly before detailing the breakdown of my identity:

—Like I said, I only glanced at them for half a second and continued on my way inside the Albacete station. There I bought a coffee and went outside... on the sidewalk there were two school kids playing and they bumped into me from behind. I wanted to scold them because I spilled coffee all over my clothes; my blouse, shorts, bra, and panties, everything was soaked, and the hot coffee had soaked my skin. I went to a women’s restroom and undressed, took off my clothes, and put them in a plastic bag, then put the bag in my backpack. I started washing the coffee off my skin at the sink, and when I went back to my backpack to put on the clean clothes I had in it, a girl my age came into the bathroom completely naked and kicked me in the face... the next thing I remember was those two big, strong men in blue uniforms tying my legs to my back and gagging me, then they dragged me by force to a bus and locked me in the cattle cage in the trunk, where I felt the bus rocking, but I couldn’t see anything in there.

Mr. Suarez stopped the scoring with a rigid gesture.

“I knew this sounded familiar!” the director declared. “That same day, a very strange report was added to the judicial system, indicating that in Albacete, a girl who had been sentenced to be sold as a meatgirl for the murder of her parents somehow managed to escape from the prison security officers who were to send her to the breeding farm in Almería. Shortly afterward, she was found unconscious on the floor of the women’s restroom at the train station. The report states that they thought the girl had slipped on the water in the restroom and hit her head; they picked her up, tied her up tightly, and gagged her before putting her on the bus that took her to the breeding farm in Almería. But there is also a report from a special protection officer who apprehended the criminal and handed her over to the police in Albacete. She was sent to the breeding farm the following day, and that meatgirl was sold in the same batch as you, Princess Leonor.”

Mr. Suárez displayed the digital photograph from the criminal record on his tablet. Sofía immediately leaned over the screen, recognizing the bald features.

I fixed my eyes on the image of the terminal the judge was holding. All the compassion, pity, and silent kinship I had felt for the other bald cow on the counter evaporated, leaving an icy void that was immediately filled with savage fury. The face of the Albacete parricide stared back at me from the screen. A dull, primal roar vibrated in my chest as my mind clung to a single thought: “That damned woman! Because of her, I’m an animal .” The sadness vanished. My mind, tired of suffering for an invisible enemy, found a real target, flesh and blood, that I longed to strike, tear apart, and destroy with my bare hands.

“Mom, that meat girl downstairs in the kitchen is her!” exclaimed the princess.

Queen Letizia stood up with implacable fury, unleashing a severe and decisive distributive justice.

“DIVINE JUSTICE!” the queen declared aloud. “That damned woman who turned my daughter into a meatgirl is now in my kitchen waiting to be roasted for Christmas dinner, and that damned hussy won’t get away from here.”

In the afternoon, when Leonor was calmer and looked at the meatgirl immobilized on the kitchen counter, the princess spoke directly to the gagged snout:

—Because of you, you damn bitch, I was also registered as a meatgirl , but look at my good luck: I went back to my family and you, you damn whore, will be Christmas dinner.

meatgirl ’s eyes , but Queen Letizia cut through the air with her voice:

“Those crocodile tears won’t do you any good; nobody here will take pity on a damned murderer who didn’t care that my daughter was registered as a meatgirl . You only have two days left to live. You wretched bitch!”

That night, the industrial procedures were rigorously followed. After the palace massacre, Princess Leonor experienced the grim pleasure of placing the parricide in the oven. The Royal Family and their guests consumed the marinated remains of the criminal, completing the cycle of consumption with complete normalcy. As Leonor and her mother collected the bare, charred bones to put them in the medical waste bag, the princess stared at the parricide’s remaining head. A sudden despair gripped her .

“Shit!” I exclaimed instinctively.

“What’s wrong, love?” Letizia asked, surprised.

—Well... you always buy two meatgirls for Christmas and New Year’s Eve, and now they still need to buy one for me. Mom, what are they going to do? All the live animals have already been sold for today!

“That doesn’t matter,” replied the queen. “Tomorrow I’ll go with Sophie to the butcher shop and buy another meatgirl from the window.”

“Yes, fine, but you have to go to other butcher shops !” I warned, feeling a wild panic as I realized I was the entire stock available at the Palace. “You have to look in other butcher shops to avoid any alerts, Mom! If you don’t find a new cow, I’ll be the only thing left for New Year’s dinner!”

Colonel Rivas, head of palace supplies, intervened from the threshold, consulting his digital terminal.

—Don’t worry about that, Your Majesties.

“Why not?” asked King Philip.

—I’m seeing in the integrated inventory that the San Javier academy has a surplus of meatgirls from the military ranches, and there will continue to be surpluses since they’ve already made another supply purchase that will be delivered to the academy on January 8th. So I’m filling out the form to request that they send that animal by public freight transport in the king’s name , and it will be here in one or two days at most.

“How does that work?” Felipe asked.

“Just like those cattle arrived at the butcher shop from the farm,” Colonel Rivas explained. “It’s not that difficult! I place the order in the system for the animal that’s in the San Javier inventory. Captain Arroyo from the academy’s supply department handles the online shipping contract with the public transportation courier service and sends it with the QR code that shows the ′ meatgirl ′ shipping requirements . Arroyo attaches a tag to her ear with a tack and a safety pin and leaves her on the rack at the bus station. Each driver is responsible for picking up and dropping off the animal at the next transportation point so she can continue on to her destination. If the ′ meatgirl’ needs to be taken to another location, a local employee from the courier service meets her at the bus or train station and takes her to the next waiting point to be sent to her next destination. If everything goes well, she only takes 24 hours to arrive, and if there’s a delay, it will take a maximum of 48 hours!” He’ll be here Friday afternoon or Saturday morning at the latest!

I stroked the indelible marks on my wrist, feeling a flawless logistical revelation to solve my military dilemma without raising the scrutiny of the press.

—Can all animals that have this printed on their skin—I pointed to my barcode with my finger—be shipped like that across the country?

“Inside and outside the country, anywhere in the world!” confirmed Colonel Rivas.

I looked at my father, smiling boldly. Felipe, immediately understanding what his daughter was thinking, crossed his arms and sternly stopped the gesture.

—FORGET IT! DON’T EVEN DREAM ABOUT IT! IT’S NOT GOING TO HAPPEN!

“What won’t happen, Felipe?” Letizia asked.

—Your daughter wants to take advantage of her registration as a meatgirl to travel to San Javier and wants us to send her as a public transport parcel stuffed in the luggage compartments.

“Dad, it’s the perfect and safest way to travel!” I argued, fully accepting my animal nature. “Besides, Colonel Rivas can send me directly to General Ordóñez, just like that beast was sent by you. You just have to explain to the general how I’m going to travel—he already knows what happened to me! Or doesn’t he?”

—Yes, of course, I already explained it to her—admitted the king, rubbing his forehead at his daughter’s animalistic submission .

“Don’t say no yet, Dad!” I insisted, bringing my front paws to his back, pressing my right hind paw over my left, and looking at Dad with puppy-dog eyes as I explained.

—If the surplus beast from San Javier arrives safely at Zarzuela within the expected timeframe of twenty-four to forty-eight hours, between Friday the 26th and Saturday the 27th of December, it will mean that the parcel delivery protocol is flawless. If so, Colonel Rivas will proceed with my shipment as live cargo on Thursday, January 8th. I will travel under the quartermaster’s QR code and arrive at the military academy between Friday the 9th in the afternoon and Saturday the 10th in the morning, January 10th, ready to join the classes on Monday the 12th without arousing suspicion among the civilians. Is that alright?

My father gazed at me for a long silence, weighing the audacity of my proposal. I felt a slight displeasure at his hesitation, but also a deep concern to arrange my return as discreetly as possible.

“I’LL THINK ABOUT IT!” Felipe finally replied, maintaining his composure. “I’M NOT PROMISING ANYTHING, I’M JUST GOING TO THINK ABOUT IT!”

I lowered my head a little more, hiding my face from Dad’s view as a mischievous smile spread across my lips. I knew I had won. Behind his shouts and his feigned resolve, his resistance was completely broken; his animalistic submission had cornered him, and whether he liked it or not, he would proceed with sending me away in the trunks.

I accepted my father’s position without adding a single word. A calm acceptance washed over me; I knew that the rules of the trade would ultimately prevail due to their own bureaucratic efficiency, and I didn’t pursue the matter further for the next few days. During the following days, the Prince’s Pavilion regained its protocol-like tranquility while I concentrated on reviewing my notes, dispelling my dejection and doubts through the technical study of the air force.

The following morning, the palace routine incorporated the legal requirements of the current biological registry. Colonel Rivas returned to the pavilion and entered the princess’s apartments carrying an industrial hemp rope, which he fastened securely around her bare neck. As he was about to lead her through the service corridors toward the carriage area, King Philip stopped them in the vestibule.

—Colonel, where are you taking Leonor?

“She’s still a registered product, sir,” Rivas explained, keeping the tension high. “By strict legal requirements, we must keep her in good condition. I have to take her to the warehouse to feed and clean her, and then I’m going to put her through her paces all morning on the carousel so that the quality of her meat remains as good as it has been. But don’t worry, Your Majesty; I’ll bring her back to you this afternoon. She doesn’t have to sleep like the other meatgirls in the warehouse refrigerator, and she must continue preparing for the exam on Friday, January 2nd.”

Leonor raised her chin, forced by the tension of the rope around her neck.

“Why can’t I stay in the refrigerator, Colonel?” asked the princess.

“Well, the thing is, they sleep hanging by their wrists,” the supply director explained. “And to keep them warm, we hang them in groups of three on the same hook!”

“How many meatgirls are left in the refrigerator right now?” I inquired, feeling a mixture of concern and curiosity.

“We’re out of stock right now, and the next order won’t come in until Friday, January 2nd,” Colonel Rivas confirmed, checking his digital spreadsheets. “Well, the staff returns from the holidays on Monday, January 12th! And I always buy them around this time to check the meat in the order and finish strengthening the animals that arrive a little weak from the breeding farms.”

I turned my head toward my father before Colonel Rivas pulled the rope. My initial fears had transformed into a cold determination. The prospect of hybridization was becoming clear in my mind.

“Dad, since I’m taking the exam on Friday, January 2nd, would you give me permission to keep the new batch of meatgirls arriving that day under the colonel’s supervision? Well, until I have to go back to the academy!”

Colonel Rivas intervened immediately, nodding his head to reassure the monarch about the rules of confinement .

—I will take care of her as if she were my own daughter, Lord.

My father surveyed my bald silhouette, the barcodes on my wrists, and the noose around my neck. He nodded slowly, understanding that Leonor wanted to experience all the ways meatgirls could be treated , and spending four days with the new batch of edible livestock didn’t seem like a bad idea, mainly because Colonel Rivas would be the only one in charge of the warehouse. I felt a grim joy and complete acceptance knowing I would have total mastery of the system’s mechanics. The rail tightened, and I broke into a barefoot trot toward the loading quarters.

The rail tightened, and I broke into a barefoot trot. Colonel Rivas moved a few steps ahead on the metal observation walkway, resting his hands on the railing with a professional calm that defied the icy December wind. Sofia stood beside him, her eyes fixed on the open-air circular track where my bald body moved forward alone under the gray Spanish winter sky. There were no other animals on the circuit; I was the only moving piece, a numbered beast running on the loose gravel that crunched under the impact of my bare feet. The officer extended a finger to point at my silhouette exposed to the cold, engaging in an intimate and unhurried conversation with the Infanta.

“Sofia, look at the strength of its hind legs,” Colonel Rivas explained, his calm voice treating me as a mere object of observation. “Notice how the musculature changes and hardens with each stride against the gravel. Notice how, with each breath, the ribcage expands and contracts to its limit beneath the icy skin. The continuous effort draws, through perspiration, all the fat from the animal’s body, cleansing the fibers and transforming them into pure, usable muscle, while it alone is forced to run constantly at thirty kilometers per hour. That beast is much stronger, denser, and more resilient than your sister Leonor ever was.”

Sofia gazed at the ridges of my thighs and the bulging veins that stood out on my flesh with each turn of the carousel, silently absorbing the chilling perfection with which the livestock system reshaped my anatomy in the middle of the frost.

On the morning of Saturday, December 27, the Royal Household’s supply chain completed its first logistical link. Colonel Rivas crossed the service gates of the Prince’s Pavilion escorting a meat girl of African phenotype, sent directly from the surplus supplies of the General Military Academy of San Javier. The officer secured the animal’s rope to one of the rings embedded in the kitchen tiles. King Felipe, who was overseeing the delivery, inspected the animal before addressing the colonel.

—Did the transport company just deliver it, Colonel?

“Not really, sir,” Rivas replied, adjusting the knot of the guide. “The parcel carriage completed the transfer last night, after midnight. I considered it more practical, for strict security reasons and to conceal the carcass, to formalize the delivery in the kitchen of the Prince’s Pavilion early this morning.”

The monarch approved the maneuver with a sober gesture. At that moment, Queen Letizia, Infanta Sofía, and Leonor entered the enclosure. Upon noticing the presence of another beast like herself , the African cow’s face visibly changed, its eyes narrowing sharply. Leonor immediately grasped the stimulus .

—If that creature were capable of forming a rational thought—the princess remarked, holding the animal’s gaze—, it would be wondering why the administration has spent resources on billing it from San Javier when they already have a meatgirl available in the kitchen inventory to be roasted at any time.

The laughter of the royal family dissolved the tension in the room, highlighting the immobility of the muzzled African cow. The monarch, however, regained his formal composure as he turned to Leonor.

—I’ll think about it, Leonor, but it doesn’t seem safe for you knowing that those impressions on your body keep you registered as a meatgirl .

“Relax, Your Majesty,” Colonel Rivas interjected, defending the logistical protocol with a degree of technical complacency. “I can assure you that it’s the safest means of transportation available today—and it’s safer than the way we travel to work or home every day! And by the time you finish the academy, those marks will have faded, and your hair will at least reach your ears.”

King Philip suppressed a gesture of severity at the insistence, fixing the colonel with a rigid look of absolute warning.

—I’LL THINK ABOUT IT! I’M NOT PROMISING ANYTHING, I’M JUST GOING TO THINK ABOUT IT!

Leonor accepted her father’s answer with a silent and disciplined military acceptance , and did not continue with the subject for the following days, concentrating on her technical studies.

King Felipe established confidential contact with General Ordóñez to discuss the logistical details of the mission. Upon hearing the plan devised by the “princess,” the reaction of the high command in San Javier was not one of rejection, but rather one of profound tactical convenience. The general immediately advised the king that this was the best idea and the safest way for the “cadet heir” to arrive at the academy safely and well protected, completely eluding the attention of the press agencies.

Under strict state secrecy, General Ordóñez, relieved to have secured the princess’s return without arousing suspicion within the garrison, coordinated the operation with Captain Arroyo and Sub-Officer Jiménez. The three officers meticulously arranged with the king and Colonel Rivas to schedule the delivery windows using the digital platform of the public transportation courier company.

For my part, I devoted myself entirely to the discipline of the Air Force manuals. On Friday, I underwent the official tests that I had been unable to take last November due to my animal processing . I passed all the exams with flying colors, dispelling my academic doubts. Duty fulfilled, I claimed the benefits of my status: I spent the next six consecutive nights sleeping on the suspension hooks in the warehouse with the meatgirls of the new batch, and during the day I spent my time training intensely at full gallop on the gravel carousel or spending time in the barracks with my family. My body and mind operated under absolute and tranquil acceptance.

On Wednesday, January 7, Colonel Rivas returned to the Prince’s Pavilion to carry out the mandatory live cargo dispatch protocol. In the presence of the Queen and Infanta Sofía, the officer outlined the itinerary.

“Under Her Majesty’s supervision, the entire digital process for sending the ‘princess’ via courier has been completed,” the colonel announced. “Public transport will pick up the goods tomorrow before seven in the morning. I will proceed with the mandatory phytosanitary requirements.”

Rivas retrieved the handling tools. With a swift, precise motion, he nailed the plastic transport tag to Leonor’s ear cartilage, securing it with the high-pressure safety pin. He then administered the mandatory stabilization injection in her back, a requirement for the transport of live animals and an indispensable prerequisite for all interprovincial livestock transport.

Without delay, the colonel activated the bladder-cleaning and automated feeding systems, which had to be applied at that precise moment before the journey: the hoses administered the enema and pumped the warm, caloric fluid until the cow’s abdomen expanded to its maximum biological capacity. Once Leonor was fed, her bladder clean and the travel tag behind her ear, the colonel secured the hemp rope around her neck and tied it firmly to the central ring in the kitchen. Queen Letizia observed her daughter’s upright immobility with a clear grimace of bitterness.

—Is it strictly necessary to leave Leonor tied up there like a meatgirl for the rest of the day and night, Colonel?

Rivas stopped abruptly, removing his industrial gloves with an apologetic expression.

—Please excuse me, Your Majesty. I’m so used to doing that automatically with all the meatgirls who arrive in the supply sector that I do it without even realizing it.

When Colonel Rivas reached out to loosen the hemp knot of the ring, the princess physically intervened, stiffly shaking her bald head from left to right several times.

“What’s wrong, Your Highness?” the colonel asked, halting the action.

A deep feeling of dejection , combined with a cold discontent , dictated the following words to me as I stood upright before the tile:

meatgirl again right now ?

The supply manager remained silent, not understanding exactly what I meant, so I asked him to analyze the system variables :

—Well, he’s already fed me to my maximum caloric capacity, he’s already completely emptied my bladder with the drainage tubes, and he’s already attached the travel tag to my ear with the safety pin. Doesn’t that make me a meatgirl again ?

My mother and Colonel Rivas exchanged a nod of agreement.

—Actually, Leonor —Rivas admitted neutrally—, you never stopped being a registered meatgirl in the Villaverde Alto system.

“Then let’s enforce the ordinance,” I insisted, feigning complete acceptance of the rules. “If I am, or am, a meatgirl again, then the proper thing to do is for me to stay here, chained to the ring, until they come to take me to the supply depot, where I must spend the night like any other meatgirl being sent off on a public transport parcel. I only have one question, Colonel: why haven’t you put the ball gag on my snout yet?”

The officer smiled slightly, putting the live load forms into his leather briefcase.

—As you’ve already noticed, you’re a registered product. You have the barcodes that register you as livestock and the travel tag in your ear. Why do you want the gag if you already know perfectly well that meatgirls shouldn’t speak or move on their own unless directed by a person, a real human being with rights, duties, and responsibilities? Silence is already inside you.

—Don’t ask me to see you as a meatgirl , Leonor—my mother interjected, with a deep sadness in her eyes.

“I’m not asking you to cook and eat me, Mom,” I replied. “I just want you to treat me like the meatgirl I am.” And when the microneedle marks fade and my hair grows back, I’ll be your daughter again. Until then, I’m merchandise .” My doubts about the future vanished with the complete acceptance of my reality.

A few hours later, in the middle of the dark night, King Felipe made his way down the ground floor, turning on the lights as he went to illuminate the path to the pavilion’s kitchen. As he pushed open the door and flipped the switch, the monarch stopped dead in his tracks, surprised to see Leonor’s bald, naked silhouette pinned to the wall, ready to be sent like a package to San Javier. With his dispatch forms in hand, he approached the perimeter of the ring.

“What are you doing here?” the father asked his animal.

“I’m waiting for them to come and pick me up and take me to the supply depot,” the “princess” replied. “I’ll spend the night at the anchorage so that Corporal Rojas can take me early in the morning to the Caballera Berenice bus stop. They’ll pick me up there to begin the journey back to San Javier.”

The king gazed at the plastic tag hanging from Leonor’s ear.

—Yes, I understand the logistical sequence... but why are you here alone in the dark?

“ Meatgirls are always alone at night in the dark, Papa,” Leonor replied, fixing her lashless eyes on the monarch. “Since I’m a meatgirl , I must be here alone waiting to be picked up.”

The father walked forward silently, kissed his daughter on both cheeks, and as he left the kitchen, turned off the light, leaving the meatgirl alone in the dark again.

The transfer took place at the change of the night watch. When the sergeant major arrived to collect me, my parents and my sister Sofia said their goodbyes in the lobby; Sofia is leaving for university next Saturday, so that hemp knot marked our last sisterly embrace in the pavilion—until we meet again . I felt a pang of worry for her, but my mind was already focused on the mechanics of the move. I was taken in absolute silence to the palace supply depot. The operator placed me on an exterior anchor stand that was just level with the roadway, next to the loading dock. I spent the entire night shivering in the winter cold and darkness, letting the temperature stabilize my back as I waited for morning.

At dawn, Corporal Rojas unlocked the support and freed me from the anchor. He started walking along the side path without looking back. I remained motionless, my hind legs planted firmly on the cold asphalt. When he noticed no one was following him, he turned back to me with a mocking smile he tried to hide.

“What are you waiting for? Come here at once,” he ordered, holding back laughter beneath his military gruffness.

I shook my head, keeping my chin up because of the tension of the carrier collar.

“Right now I’m a commodity, and these animals don’t walk on their own,” I replied, forcing my voice through the rigidity of my muscles. “You have to lead me by the rope so I can walk. Those are the rules.”

Corporal Rojas let out a dry laugh, turning to walk away from me, amused by the stubbornness of his new burden.

“It’s your decision; if you want, you can stay here all day,” she replied, continuing on her way with morbid amusement. “The cargo truck isn’t going to wait for your princess whims.”

An unexpected wave of joy and ease washed over me as I realized my rank had been completely demystified. I started laughing and then ran to catch up with him along the path. Along the way, I tried to get him to take the other end of the rope, but Corporal Rojas didn’t take it until we reached the entrance gate of the Zarzuela Palace grounds; only then did he firmly grasp the hemp rope and lead me out like the meatgirl I am.

The threat of the truck had an immediate effect on my survival instinct. Seeing the corporal drive away with no intention of slowing down, my static submission shattered with the panic of being abandoned on the asphalt. I broke into a hurried, barefoot trot along the side path, forcing my hind legs to pick up speed so as not to lose him. Rojas didn’t stop, but subtly turned his head, reveling in the result of his trap. From his position, the soldier morbidly enjoyed the spectacle of my run: he stared intently at how my unprotected chest suffered from the impact of the speed, and how my breasts bounced and swayed violently with each stride I took to catch up with him in the morning chill. His supposed haste had only been the perfect excuse to devour with his eyes the exposed anatomy of his target.

Once Corporal Rojas had led the princess to the gleaming metal structure of the Berenice Cavalry Parade, he fitted Leonor’s neck into the round metal frame, locking the industrial latch to secure the live cargo to the morning’s harsh weather.

Once the cow was immobilized with its chin raised toward the road, the young corporal took advantage of the isolation of the corral and the complete dehumanization that legal right granted him in the presence of a registered animal . With his calloused infantry hands, Rojas squeezed its breasts and buttocks tightly, digging his fingers into the marked skin. The officer continued the fondling while bringing his face close to the muzzle, which was now free of its muzzle.

“Never in my life will I have the opportunity to grope a ‘princess,’ much less one who will be a ’queen,’” Rojas hissed, increasing the pressure. “But right now you’re neither one nor the other, you’re just a meatgirl , and I can grope those animals however I want.”

Leonor offered no resistance. She fixed her eyes on the cadet and nodded, showing complete acceptance of the outrage as he continued groping her and taking pleasure in exploiting her body. When he had finished, he wiped his hands on his military uniform and left her there alone on the stand, waiting for the transfer bus that would take her to Madrid.

the meat girl trapped by the metal hoop, began to spin in place to ease the numbness in her back from the morning chill. The echo of footsteps interrupted her exercise. An elderly woman turned the corner of the avenue, heading for the bus stop with her shopping bag. Reaching the shelter of the road, the old woman stopped dead in her tracks at the sight of the completely naked, bald, and calloused figure waiting, anchored to the iron post at that hour of the morning.

The woman showed no distress or panic; she simply adjusted her glasses and calmly examined the plastic tag hanging from the cow’s pierced ear. On the side visible to passersby, a large QR code flashed in the winter light. On the back of the tag, the imprint of the Zarzuela military headquarters revealed the shipment details. The old woman read aloud the first line of the transport tag :

Sender:Supply Office, Zarzuela Palace, Madrid.

Addressee:General Ordóñez, General Air Academy, San Javier, Murcia.

The woman looked away from the safety bolt and down the smooth back of the cow. With a familiarity devoid of malice, she reached out a wrinkled hand and firmly squeezed its right udder.

“What a waste, you’re a very beautiful girl,” the old woman murmured, letting her rough hand fall onto my icy skin to feel the firmness of my back. She dug her fingers casually into the fibers of my shoulder blade , lowering the pressure to assess the consistency of my unprotected breasts and the density of the legs that had been running on the gravel. Adjusting her bag on her forearm, she clicked her tongue with a cold, market-shop familiarity. “What a shame that all this excellent biological density is good for nothing more; what a shame that you’re nothing more than a stupid piece of meat.”

The passenger boarded the first bus that arrived and left, leaving the bus bay behind. Leonor remained wedged into the frame of gleaming tubes. Just inches from her hind legs stood the comfortable metal chair of the bus stop, a seat designed for human rest; however, under her status as a cow, vertical immobility was a requirement of the inventory.

After a few minutes, the Madrid sky darkened into an intermittent rain that quickly turned into a torrential downpour. The icy water soaked her completely in a matter of seconds. Due to the rigidity of the industrial latch that clamped around her neck and prevented her from moving, the poor creature had to remain there in the rain. For the next two hours, several buses passed by, but none of them were the one that was supposed to pick her up according to the QR code on her package.

The icy water ran down my bald head, causing a physical discomfort that made my teeth chatter against the rope collar. With only a few minutes left before the bus that would take me to Moncloa arrived, I saw my father’s electric car approaching, in which he was traveling with my mother and Sofía. Looking through the windows, I noticed they were all smiles at the sight of me soaking wet. The king parked and returned with an umbrella, but he didn’t do anything to shield his “daughter.” A deep feeling of sadness and dejection gripped my chest, but I understood immediately: there I was just a meatgirl , and meatgirls receive no mercy from anyone on the public transport system.

When the bus arrived, the driver got out to pick me up with his optical scanner. My father approached the operator to ask him to explain what he needed to do to load the merchandise onto the bus.

The cargo hold door swung open, revealing the enormous, dark void to my family, who had their backs to the camera fixed on the platform. The driver, in a very polite and routine voice, began explaining to the king the steps he needed to follow for the live cargo shipment. From the outside, the driver’s actions remained hidden inside the trunk, but the harsh crunch of my front legs being forcibly bent against my back and the muffled gasps of my body, treated like the mere animal I was at that moment, resonated in the air. Above ground, Letizia’s hand gripped Felipe’s arm with desperate pressure, digging her fingers into the fabric to restrain the monarch, whose body had tensed completely, to the point of attacking the worker for the mistreatment of his daughter’s face. Felipe and Sofía remained motionless, swallowing their horror in absolute silence as the queen’s submissiveness supported the weight of the Crown on the platform. The driver shoved me roughly into the transport cage. By the time he slammed the door shut, darkness enveloped me, reigniting my fears of confinement.

“Good! Your Majesty, that’s all!” the chauffeur told the king, putting away his optical reader as if it were perfectly normal.

Even from behind the heavy luggage compartment door, shrouded in absolute darkness, I heard my father thank the attendant. Seconds later, I heard the muffled roar of the engine, the driver returned to his seat, and the bus continued on to its next stop, leaving me behind in the cold of the trunk.

Inside the car’s climate-controlled cabin, Queen Letizia looked in the rearview mirror with an expression of deep discomfort.

—I don’t understand why Leonor wants to be treated in such a humiliating way because of transport links —the sovereign commented wearily.

“It’s not that she wants to be treated in such a humiliating way, Mom,” Princess Sofia countered from the back seat, maintaining a dispassionate lucidity. “Right now, with the registration and the barcodes on her skin, her reality is the same as that of the other meat girls . If she can take advantage of her current situation to get through security without causing a media scandal… isn’t it better for her to travel like this than putting herself in danger again like last time in Albacete?”

King Felipe and Queen Sofia looked at each other in the mirror and ended up agreeing with Sofia. Then they returned to the Zarzuela Palace.