As the piglet's eyelids drooped, Howard's ability to concentrate faded, like a creeping vertigo. A sibling bumped into him and he fell over. Another walked over him, the pressure of one little trotter squeezing the air from his lungs for a half second. He struggled to get his footing again, and stood up. Refocusing, Howard found himself looking around for his—er, the piglet's—mother.
There she was, lying on her side close by, separated from the piglets by bars. They could reach her udder through the gaps but would never be able to cuddle her. Surprised to find his desires so at one with the piglet's, Howard fought for a place to nurse and drank with great gulps until full; vaguely aware in his periphery of a couple of detached, shivering runts. When he finished nursing, his instinct was to explore the enclosure and spend more time contemplating his peculiar situation. Instead he succumbed to sleepiness, drifting off into a milk-induced slumber.
When he awoke, he woke as one might do from a bad dream. With a sense of relief. Not as from a nightmare per se, but certainly from a dream perturbing in nature. Unpleasant, but not horrific. Yet as his vision came into focus, a sense of dread welled up within him, for all about were mounds of pink: to be precise, little pink bodies with frizzy fur. He was still a piglet.
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The sow was standing up now, eating from a machine-fed trough. It released a specific portion of food and water for her daily. Howard knew this because Howard was a hog farmer. A third generation hog farmer. He also knew that the sow had just enough room to stand and lie down; turning around was impossible. Chewing on the bars was about the only thing she could do. And she would live her entire life this way, a truncated four or five years. He trotted over and peered up at her. She looked like a giant. His whole life he'd been looking down at pigs—this was the first time he'd ever been dwarfed by one. On her shoulder was an ulcer, one that appeared to be partially-healed in some areas and fresh in others. A chronic wound, no doubt. She likely had one on the other side too. He'd seen it many times throughout his career. A difficult problem to avoid in farrowing crates, but he'd learned to keep it out of mind.
But how could he be here, inside a piglet's brain? His last memory was of being deathly ill in a hospital bed. Had he died and been reincarnated? No, that's not how it worked; at least, he didn't think that's how it worked. Could it simply be a dream within a dream? He sure hoped for the latter, though what would he awake to if it was? The grim faces of his middle-aged son and daughter-in-law sitting next to his death bed? And then what. Ah yes, he remembered now. He'd signed papers promising the donation of his brain to science. He'd also bequeathed the farm to his eldest son only—not because of favoritism or birthright, but because his younger son was dead, and wouldn't have wanted it anyway.
A couple of hazy weeks or so went by and Howard revisited these thoughts again and again throughout the days, in-between nursing and sleeping. Each time he awoke it was with a sense of long-suffering, calmly waiting for the dream within a dream to end. For despite the passage of time, he figured it was quite possible that he—the man—had only been asleep for a few hours. The mind was funny that way. But he had to admit that each time he awoke to the same plight he grew a little more discouraged, and a little more frightened.
