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ne they went, their emaciated bodies clad in grey overalls, their backs bent under the weight of their dreadful cargo. Many howled and groaned in terror and their voices joined in a sorrowful cacophony that lingered over the roar of the fires.
In deep shock, I stared at the boundless horror before me. Beside me stood Corporal Meng, his freshly-shaved face as emotionless as before. When I turned to face him, he looked at me. His mouth smiled, but his eyes did not.
"We use the energy to operate Huoshenshan," he said. "We save the state considerable resources in this way. And look," — he waved at the gallery of the dead — "there are so many of them here. You could almost describe it as renewable energy." He laughed and waved his hand in a strangely camp gesture.
I stood speechless and stared at the infernal scenes before me. Men in black uniforms screamed like daemons at the wretches who were disposing of the corpses for them. They stripped the dead of anything that had value — jewellery, cash, expensive clothing — and tossed these items onto an enormous pile next to the furnace. When I asked the Corporal what would be done with the items, they said that they would be used to pay for the "healthcare expenses" incurred by the patients’ stay in Huoshenshan.
I vomited in the toilet. When I flushed and came out of the stall, Corporal Meng stood by the door and looked at me. His face was as blank as before, but in his eyes I thought I registered a very faint trace of contempt. You are ten years my senior, the look said, but you are soft.
I thanked him for his service and went home.
When I arrived, I saw that I had received hundreds of updates on the encrypted device the Party uses to communicate to insiders. The news were unimaginably grim. The State Legal and Economic Commission had allocated funds for the construction of dozens of facilities like Huoshenshan all throughout China. The Agent had spread not only to every single province of the motherland, but to most other nations in the world. Fortunately, we had agreements in place with other governments — they agreed to pretend that the infections were due to a coronavirus. They were just as worried as we were that a panic might break out in their countries. The Americans in particular were terrified that the S&P 500 might decline. This, they said, would be unacceptable in an election year, so we could count on their full support.
Of course the World Health Organisation also helped us. For a long time, the only issue with the WHO has been that we have been locked in a contest with the Americans about who bribes them more. They released all sorts of sophisticated misinformation about having decoded the DNA of the so-called coronavirus. All this has allowed us to stave off a global panic.
For now.
Yet the situation was worsening with astonishing speed. I am reluctant to reveal too much on this point, as it would make it too easy for my enemies to identify me, but we quickly began to implement measures to protect our most senior leaders. If you look at the world news, you will see that Xi Jinping, our President, disappeared for approximately one week after the outbreak, before being seen again with the leader of Cambodia.
You should know that the person who met the Cambodian leader was not President Xi. It was a body double who had, for many years, been trained to look and sound just like our President. President Xi is of course not careless enough to risk his own death. He is safely ensconced in a secret bunker underneath Zhongnanhai, the headquarters of the Party in Beijing.
Nor was he the only leader who is in hiding. In fact, I can assure you that over half of all senior Party members are currently being imitated by trained actors who are following instructions given to them via special implants. Do you really think that our Prime Minister would risk his life by going to Wuhan?
All of this means that our government has become utterly paralysed and the functions of the state have been taken over by the military.
It became clear to me that our efforts were pointles