started bleeding.

‘What did they do to him? What the fuck is wrong with these people?’

Dolan, if he was still Dolan, was lying engorged on the couch. His skin had turned even darker. It looked as if his entire body was one huge bruise. His stomach cavity was swelling outward, spilling over his jeans and remaining rib cage. You could see that several of the ribs had cracked where bits of bone had ripped through his shirt. Rivulets of pus dripped from little holes in his skin where tiny translucent bulbs had emerged. His eyes were closed and crusted with dark gunk.

Iris kept yelling ‘no’ and pinching her face as if she was trying to wake up from a dream. I’d never been a big fan of Dolan, buttried to project a message of peace and forgiveness.

The pink creature was moving toward the Dolan-orb, inching along like a worm. It stopped and turned to Feather. She was chanting her prayer and pushing with all her might. Then the top of the creature, where the rows of spikes converged on the sphincter, expanded open. The creature bunched up, and, I guess, inhaled.

Feather’s leg got sucked right in up to the knee. She screamed, hopping on her other leg. Her right leg was inside the creature for about three seconds, then the creature spat what was left back out. Fleshless bones hung from her kneecap. She tried to stand on both legs, but the bare bones collapsed with her weight, and she tumbled to the floor. She looked