Hell-Pig

The ballad of Hell-Pig, at Battlecry II:

The Sunday Night's Feast was being sponsored by the Valley of the Crimson Sun and as to such we had purchased a whole Pig and the Autocrat & Feastocrat had arranged for a smoker. We got our 167# mostly thawed pig out of the crate and onto the spit, chained him to it and started to roast our good little piggy.

It went well for five minutes and the fire went out. The smoker service had not refilled the twenty gallon tank on the smoker so we scrounged a five gallon tank and restarted the process of slow cooking the pig. After an hour the smoker started to rattle and thump with every revolution of the spit so we shut it down and checked the situation. The collar for the shaft driving the spit had slipped and needed reset so we loosened, it reset the pin, and tightened it correctly. It worked for twenty minutes or so and then it started thumping again and almost tilted the smoker.

I Shadow Corvus bent down and turned off the motor just as Sajish Nar-l aka Dragon and Malkav lifted the lid on the smoker. Now all of you that have seen Backdraft can imagine what happens when super heated space gets fresh air. Yes the fire was coming my way at eyeball level, needless to say I practically jolted straight up to the handle and slammed it shut and thankfully we were all okay. But now the pig was on fire and blazing flames shot out the smoker from every direction.

Well being trained in Damage Control in the Navy I looked for a way to extinguish the fire and finding Mary of CG standing there with the dishwater from the breakfast cleanup I had her come with me and I said to her, "Throw that on the fire." She acknowledged and came with me and Sajish Nar-l and I lifted the lid and stepped back, and she froze in shock as the Hell-Pig was revealed. Imagine if you will a 167# pig charred black and brown across its back with Fire Shooting out every and I mean each and every orifice, all the way down to its curly tail burning like a fuse on a powder keg.

I took the water pan and threw the water so it sloshed the pig top to bottom and as the water separated the flame from the fuel the soap rode the grease and water surface to smother the flames in the bottom of the cooker. We now had 167#, charred, soapy, wet, and stinky Hell-Pig. Dinner feast was to be at 1800 and here we are at 1030 trying to save a dead meal. So we de-spitted the pig, got Gobo Ninetails to run to each camp and get as much firewood and a bucket of red coals so we could jump start our new fire pit we were digging and modifying. Faelin Glic was digging and Sajish Nar-l was getting ready to butcher the pig. I made a run to the local Walmart thirty miles away for the essentials we now needed including a Maul and axe so we could split would for a cooking fire.

I came in just in time to see the best real steel event ever. Sajish Nar-l drew his samurai sword and in one fluid motion, beheaded the pig,he then placed the skull in the fire to cook away the flesh and have the skull for a Trophy. So now the debreeding of the pig could commence, all of the fat and charred skin had to be removed by hand, not for the squeamish. We finished that and started butchering the pig into roast sized pieces and over an open fire with only wood and fire and water to knock down the flames.

Sajish Nar-l made a most tasty pork dinner, which many of the feasters complimented him on. The skull sadly was incinerated in the blazing hot fire, and it melted the iron screen in one spot. We persevered and one great story later you have Hell-Pig.

Hell-Pig's skull in the fire-pit.

Hell-Pig September 2004