Francis of the Filth - Chapter 2

All children, except one, grow up. And all children, except one, are born of woman. In the spring of 1945, a fetus-like infant was retrieved from an open-air sewer beneath a public toilet in a slum in the Lorong Village of Jakarta. He was named Fransiskus (meaning 'freed from filth') and from the first moment of his existence, and in spite of his squalid genesis, he demonstrated an unparalleled genius. At first there was a moment of crying, then cooing, very shortly followed by clear linguistic utterances. By the time the authorities arrived some hours later he was writing quadratic equations on the wall in his own excrement (excrement on walls was nothing new to the locals) and explaining them in Aramaic to the crowd which had gathered. For the next two weeks he was taken in by a family of twenty-eight running a local temple. They lived over a feted brown creek with the smell of a pig farm, and there he was fed and clothed and loved. Because of his brilliant mind and progressive knowledge, he was quickly treated as a god in the village and people would line up to pet his head in the hope of having knowledge imparted to them. He thrived in the grime of his environment, growing rapidly in stature and intellect, and soon had the appearance of a toddler while engineering sanitation, transport systems and birth control for the whole community. This way, he no longer needed to circumcise the women Word spread quickly about Fransiskus and soon the Indonesian military were on where his doorstep would be if the temple had had a door step. There was much wailing and moaning as the young prodigy was ripped from their arms and a torment of semi-naked bodies followed along the vehicles as they departed, banging on the windows and doors and begging them to return him to them. Their hopes were never realized. They were gunned dowm, all of them: the temple family, their neighbors and all who had come out to protest, their bodies piled as high as horses shoulders for as far as the eye could see. "Salaaang kalamankang!!" a soldier yelled at the families. This was not Indonesian. He had a speech impediment. Fransiskus was taken to a top secret facility deep in the mountains where, after a brief period of quarantine, so-called experts (though they had never seen anything of Fransiskus' like before) began to feed his voracious curiosity, intellect and abilities. They were in awe. They began with Little Golden Books and tic-tac-toe but were before long working on James Joyce and global thermonuclear warfare. Apart from the odd foray into hentai and erotic art, Fransiskus adhered strictly to academic and ethical pursuits. Scientists from all over the world began to hear rumors of this prodigy and would try to arrange secretive visits to Fransiskus' cell. There, the lucky few would marvel over the possibilities he brought into the world. Was he a god? they wondered. A mutation? Should he be encouraged or stopped? Their audiencewith Fransiskus was inevitably inspiring and humbling, and was often coupled with an intoxicating agenda. Despite the highly classified nature of the 'project' (to which Fransiskus was now referred), and how the isolated location of its facilities, one day several months into operations, a blonde-haired man in every dark suit turned up unannounced at the front gate. He flashed some identification and was escorted into the heart of the complex. There, he was introduced to the overseer of the program. Looking his Indonesian colleague in the eye with a curious expression that could have been mistaken for contempt, he removed his spectacles and raised a palm. "Heil Hitler." In the summer of that year, the Pacific War was brought to an end with two cataclysmic explosions. They destroyed everyone and everything for miles around and left a simmering, scorching layer of radiation to last for the ages. The lucky ones were those right under the detonations who were immediately reduced to ashes and outlines etched in concrete. It was those who survived the initial blasts who learned the true meaning of suffering. They wandered about aimless, hopeless, with melting flesh, groping about in near or total blindness for help. None came and that which did, came too late and with little or no means alleviating their agony. (Continuing in progress)