I backed up until my spine hit the cold, metallic frame of the dead cremation furnace. There was nowhere left to run.
“Daniel,” the voice echoed, sweeter this time, mimicking the exact tone Clara used when we sat on our porch on quiet summer nights. “Don’t be afraid. It’s just us. Your family is finally ready to meet you.”
She raised her hands, reaching out for my face. Her fingers were freezing, the black fluid smearing against my cheek. I looked down at her stomach.
The skin of her abdomen parted.
But there was no baby inside.
Through the tear in her flesh, illuminated by the dim red emergency light of the dead furnace, I saw a pulsating, iridescent mass of flesh, eyes, and teeth. And in the center of that horrific mass, resting safely within the nightmare, was a small, golden vial attached to a mechanical pump—a device bearing the unmistakable, embossed logo of Vale Pharmaceuticals.
The device was injecting something directly into the entity’s core. A glowing, blue serum. And on the digital display of the pump, a timer was counting down.
00:03… 00:02… 00:01…
The device beeped once, a clear, electronic chime that shattered the silence of the room.
Clara’s black eyes suddenly snapped wide, her head jerking violently as the blue serum fully integrated into her system. A collective, deafening roar vibrated from her chest, and the windows of the chapel shattered into a million pieces.
From the darkness of her open abdomen, a pair of long, pale hands—much larger than a baby’s—reached out, grabbed the edges of her torn flesh, and began to pull the rest of its body out into the room.
And as the creature looked at me, it smiled with Clara’s te