AS THE FACELESS MONSTER slid his glimmering lock-blade knife through a flap of the dream girl’s cheek, Lewis, who was asleep on the ground, tried to wake up from the fuzzy realm of the dope to no avail. He lay paralyzed as the monster lashed out again with his blade, helplessly watching as the dream girl gagged on her own blood. She rolled over and coughed, groaning.

A blanket-like wave of her essence splashed from her belly wound, flowed over the grass, then rolled up the side of a McDonald’s bag. The crest of the wave twisted upward, grew an enormous head with a face made of red scribbles, and grinned at Lewis, who couldn’t even wriggle his toes. Two more Scribbles spun up from his lower ribcage, their heads grinning, whining without moving their lips, Help her, it’s Serena!

Sleep paralysis. Joys of schizophrenia.

“She’s in rehab,” Lewis heard himself say.

Serena’s molars were right there, shimmering behind the flap of gory lunchmeat this monster, whose form the Scribbles were now flying around, had made of her cheek.

The monster tapped her teeth lightly with the edge of the knife, giggling. Serena jerked her head away from his teasing. A lump of coagulated blood pudding slipped away from the hole in her face, plopping into the grass.

“Elp...Lew...”

The monster shook the toe of his boot in front of her face, tapping her lips. Blubbering, she feebly slapped at the steel-toe. The monster gently planted the sole of his boot on her head just above her ear, still giggling. Serena turned her face away, weeping. “No, don’t.”

The monster stepped up on her face, her head snapped back, and he planted both feet firmly on her skull, smashing it into the grass.

Serena cried, “WAOH-P-p-plee-zz…”

He idly bopped himself up and down on Serena’s head like a child on a mattress it knew it wasn’t supposed to use for playtime. She cried with each bop, uhu-huh-uhhh-no-o-o-o…there was a crack, her face froze, an eye popped out of her skull with a wee squirt. Her jaw, driven against the ground, broke. Blood flowed from behind her ear where the skin was ruptured by splintering bone.

“Ool-oois—”

In a long-ago life that included a driver’s license, Lewis had experienced a couple of blowouts, and that’s what the sound of her skull popping was like. Edges of broken bone split the skin of her forehead. A bulb of stuff that looked like menudo bulged from the wound. The boot slipped from her temple to her cheek, snapping her jaw in half.

Pleased, the monster stepped down from his art and bent over to get an eyeful of the death he’d brought, humming to himself as he poked blood, bone, and brains in the remains of her head with a gloved finger.

The monster stood to his full height. “She looks like a Scream Mask.” He turned, looking at Lewis. The Scribbles swirled around his masked face, up his legs, and around his torso. Static crackles popped from their etheric flesh, causing the hair on the monster’s head to stand up. He scratched his scalp, smoothed it out, and cocked his head as if studying the homeless junkie who’d watched the whole thing happen. His leg twitched, Lewis saw a wall of black, then knew no more.

~~~

“Get your bitch ass up ya fuckin’ scoundrel!”

“OOF!” A tennis shoe collided with Lewis’s gut. His hand instinctively went to his pocket to feel for his dope, the other cocked over his abdomen, and he curled into the fetal position. He let Unk kick him in the side and in the ass until the blows stopped, then rolled over and looked up at the wiry ex-con. “What the fuck, bro?”

Squatting, Unk grabbed Lewis’s greasy long hair, pulling, evidently not worried if he broke his scrawny target’s neck. The other homeless in the camp pleaded with their tribal leader to leave Lewis alone…no dice. Lewis slid across the ground, kicking, his scalp stinging and loose, gripping the thick wrist above the clutching hand to give his thin flesh a little slack. Unk grunted, lifting Lewis, who only weighed about 130 pounds, up to his chest, which was heaving.

“LOOK AT HER!”

Lewis flew toward the ground, and his face collided with a cold pudding full of tiny razors.

“Dude, stop!” It was Big Ant. “You’ll ruin the evidence!”

Unk jerked Lewis’s face out of the pudding so the junkie could see what he’d just kissed. The muck of Serena’s facial remains, squashed, split, chunky with coagulated blood, a messy ripple of unidentifiable muck. Lewis wiped his mouth and cut both his arm and his lip on bone chips. He spat, and a small pile of them spattered into coagulated blood, wobbling like gelatin among the remains of her brains.

“You goan spit on the bitch now?” Unk pulled Lewis to his feet, then punched him above the waistline. Lewis cocked to the side, protectively moving his elbow over his side abs. He went down, for he knew that’s what guys like this wanted.

Some of the camp pleaded. “Don’t kill him!”

“Just make him leave.” He thought her name was Lisa.

“We got to call the law, man.” A guy named Jake.

Unk laughed through a sneer, gesturing to Lewis. “This son of a bitch just watched her die, and y’all dumb asses feel sorry for him.”

“Jake’s right, fuck him, she’s still warm!” Big Ant said. “She ain’t been dead long. Where ya at, motherfucker? Fight me, ya little bitch!”

Unk gripped Big Ant’s arm. “The killer burned off, brah. You think he’s kickin’ it.”

Panting, Big Ant scowled at Lewis. “Get the fuck outta my camp. Don’t even bother to get your shit. You ain’t got no shit anymore, bitch. It’s ours now. Go before I decide to strip you the fuck down.”

“Jesus, Ant,” Lisa said. “He’s a skeleton, man.”

Oddly calm now, Lewis looked into the eyes of people he thought were his friends. Behind their heads, the Scribbles were waiting in the woods, whispering in a voice only he could hear. Just do what the mean people say, and we’ll go elsewhere and get high. They looked like a child’s drawings, only real...at least to him.

“HEY! I said GO!” Big Ant kicked the sole of Lewis’s shoe, hard enough to test the ankle behind it, and Lewis snapped out of his trance. “Get up and go right fucking now.”

“But—”

Unk kicked him in the thigh, hard enough to charley horse. “Walk, fool.”

Lewis struggled to his feet. A Scribble floated past Big Ant’s head, dipped, and swirled around Lewis’s body. Some of the pain in his leg abated. Forget everyone, we need something now, or we’ll throw up.

This truth gave him the strength to hobble out of the woods. Just a little pain, then he could have a morning lift-off.

As he passed Paul’s Truck Stop, he heard a creak and looked toward the sound. A man well above six feet and as broad as Unk and Big Ant put together climbed out of the cab of an eighteen-wheeler. He took the oh-shit steps, touched down on the concrete, saw Lewis, and grinned, the sides of his lips seeming to lift some of his long, curly hair toward his large ears.

His heavy moon face split with a grin. “You look like you had a nightmare, brother.”

Oh, oh no, go, just go.

Silent, Lewis pointed his eyes at the intersection and walked.

~~~

He and the Scribbles skulked up the viaduct, relaxing in the darkest of the bridge cubbies at the HWY 80 exit ramp. Someone had been here before, and Lewis pushed their trash away. They’d left a lock blade knife with a cat’s eye handle behind.

Shit, if only he’d been here last night. Oh, well.

The cocktail hit different this time as it burned through his veins.

The Scribbles danced in the air close to his head, wriggling, stretching, coiling, their molecules visible. Little trilobites jumped from them and passed through the concrete, the utility poles, and Lewis himself. The Scribbles became a single face made of thick black lines and ice. A wide, grinning mouth opened, and without making words, the mouth spoke.

The day is pretty; the world is too.

Pigeons tap-tap-tapped their way up the viaduct and snacked on what was left of a bag of chips someone had left behind. Heads stab-stab-stab at food, pluck, eat, do they chew, yes, they do, and other bits of static song fell from their unmoving grins. Hungry, they whispered at last, and Lewis’s hand butted up against the knife.

Feed the birds!

What a wonderful idea. Lewis picked up the knife. He lifted his shirt and pinched a flap of skin, pulling it up as if readying himself for a skin pop fix.

Cut. Not a lot!

Lewis sliced, bringing a burning sting whose volume, turned down almost all the way by the dope, barely registered as painful. The laceration yawned, un-bleeding and pink, then began to leak.

Sweat trickled down the back of Lewis’s neck. His throat clutched. The severed pores under his knife puked sticky red crayon that made his fingers almost useless. One good tug and the lump of flesh flopped dead in his hand.

Lewis let go and licked his fingers clean. The pigeons gathered around the meat, their beaks poking, tiny drops of blood landing on their faces. Soon, they were tossing the treat back and forth like children with a beach ball at a church picnic.

Vertigo fluttered through Lewis’s head. He gasped at the amount of blood he was losing. The large Scribble flew forward until it bumped into him, and his hand felt the shape of a torch lighter in his pocket.

Burn it shut.

Lewis lit the wound on fire. This time, the pain was crisp, a little like the high from narcotic withdrawals. He giggled, wriggling in his seat, watching blood flow and bubble, listening to the hiss as he seared himself, its whisper comforting, mixing with the reassuring words of the Scribble.

Finished, Lewis set the lighter down in the bridge dust and caught his breath.

More pigeons came and, without prompting, Lewis chose another piece of superfluous belly and hacked. The severed flesh took on an otherworldly hue.

The light went out, the Scribble said. What you’re holding feels fake.

To the pigeons below, the dead flesh was real. He watched them feast, their pleasure emboldening his self-mutilation. More severed chunks of his loose belly plopped to the ground. Two pigeons played with a piece, one tossing it up, and his fellow caught it and began gnawing. Lewis caught sight of one of his grown folks’ hairs poking up from the morsel before it slid down the bird’s throat.

He popped one of the gaping, pus-crusted wounds on his belly open. Uncanny, orange-white blobs popped out at him, and for some odd reason, he thought of the president.

That’s your fat, the Scribble chimed as it reproduced itself from one in to being into seven, the sentence flowing from each of their mouths in a different octave. Their words spiraled around in his ear canals, echoing, static, and analgesic. He dug into the wound between his fingers with the knife, sweat soaking his scraggly hair. Every stinging centimeter of slicing stiffened his dick as the octaves caressed his brain. A wash of fresh blood leaked from underneath the blob, which then disappeared into a crimson pocket of endodermis, and Lewis, in a panic, began to dig.

Oh, Lew, the birdies will love it!

Whimpering, he popped one of the chunks free. His hips bucked involuntarily. Satisfaction filled the crotch of his jeans in a hot wad of snot as he studied the tip of the knife. Pleased, he held the blade high above the heads of the pigeons, voraciously clucking next to his feet.

The bravest of them flapped its wings, rose, and plucked the blob from the sticky edge of the knife blade. With two swift clucks, the blob disappeared down its throat. It stared up at Lewis with its little button eyes and screeched like a puppy barking for a treat.

“Yummy, huh?” He licked his teeth and pinched the wound in search of another hunk of orange fat. The pigeons clucked, walking around in a circle as if they were creating a cone of power, and the Scribbles floated around them, speaking words of encouragement to their host. He dug back into the wound, this time releasing a gout of blood that splattered into his eye. Now he winced, and the knife clattered to the ground.

“Fuck you doin’? That’s my knife, dude.”

Lewis snapped out of his trance, and the etheric Scribbles fucked off like they always did in times of danger.

“Nasty fuckin’ flying rats!” Lenny’s steel-toe boot scattered the birds. The bravest of them didn’t want to leave, and Lenny snap-kicked it in the chest. His boot crushed the bird’s weak skeleton. It made a lame arc in the air and plopped to the cement, feebly spreading a wing and moving around in a circle until Lenny advanced and squashed the rest of the poor creature like a roach.

A string of gut that looked like it belonged on a guitar trailed from its bloody, broken tail feathers. Lenny, who had a reputation for being even worse than Unk, was irate.

This was the first time they’d officially met.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” A fist collided with his face. “You’re cutting your fucking self!”

A filthy palm collided with Lewis’s face, and he smelled like fish and dirty laundry. The back of his head slammed against the concrete, and he saw stars.

“Fuck is your gig, bro?” Lenny lifted Lewis’s shirt to get a better look at the wounds. There were seven mouths, five of which he’d seared shut, another still wept, and the one from which he’d plucked the orange aperitifs de pigeon leaked like an unclosed faucet, still soaking his thigh.

Lenny let go of his face and backed away to get a better look at the weeping wounds. He sneered, chuckled, and planted the sole of his boot right into the worst of them, grinding dirty rubber into the excavated tissue. “The dirt in my boot will stop the bleeding,” he laughed.

Lewis screamed. “Let me up! Let me go, fucking stop.” He could feel this just fine, “I swear I’ll get off your block!” As if they were magic words, Lenny removed his boot. Too fast to see, he snatched Lewis up by his rotten shirt and all but chucked him down the viaduct. The schizophrenic junkie stumbled and slid across the cement on his knees.

“Fuckin’ feeding himself to pigeons!” Lenny’s voice carried, echoing up and down the viaduct, passing through the ears of the other homeless people there. Lewis hadn’t noticed them before. Nor had he noticed the two tourists standing on the sidewalk below with their hands over their mouths. One clutched a phone. On the corner next to the exit, a hobo took a greenback from a giant hand extending from the window of a big truck’s cab. A harsh honk filled the sky, and as the big cab turned under the bridge, the giant hand waved at everyone.

Lewis didn’t give a shit. Crying, but trying to maintain dignity, he peeled his scuffed knees off the concrete, took a limping step, then hurried the rest of the way down the viaduct. He stripped his shirt off and pressed it hard against his belly. Lenny was a stupid bully. That dirty boot hadn’t stopped any blood.

~~~

You didn’t hear us say stop.

“Oh?” Lewis said to the Scribbles. “You never said stop. Y’all were like cheerleaders.”

That’s why they all saw you.

“Fuck off.”

There’s no off to fuck to.

“Don’t I know it. Shit’s bullshit.”

Don’t be mad at us. Lenny is mean.

Bickering, he followed the Scribbles. His belly wasn’t bleeding anymore, and he felt fine after a little snort from the bag. He sucked back drainage, and a cop passed, slowing, but he didn’t stop walking.

The cop’s gone, the Scribbles said.

He had some idea where they were going. To a vacant building just past Rita Mart, which was the only place around that had glass roses for the heads. There was an abandoned office building you could get into if you wanted. It was just on his left, but he didn’t go in. It’s not like they sold rigs.

A few Scribbles floated out of the abandoned building’s broken second-floor windows, telling Lewis the coast was clear in their harmonious voices. One good use the etheric clowns had was checking things like that. And they were always right. He hurried through the glass entrance, sidled through the dead revolving door, and they were in.

“Y’all really didn’t see Unk or no one?”

No, it’s clear.

Clear!

Yes, Lew.

His eyes strafed around the walls and floors, checking for danger. It was safe, unless you counted filth. Some dickhole had taken an Olympic dump on the receptionist’s desk, then spraypainted SAT TO SHIDD N HOLY FACK on the wall behind it in huge red letters. The only thing freaky was a large stain on the carpet that might have been blood or puke. It was scary, but now he needed a shot, so he grabbed an empty 40oz bottle off the floor in case. Everything hurt terribly: his belly, his face, his ribs, his heart.

They found a nice place to cook up in what used to be a kitchenette. Lewis set the empty 40 on the countertop, set himself up, and pushed, then leaned against the beige brick wall and slid slowly to the floor. He got the blinks, fentanyl blinks, the kind that cost time itself.

Blink. The 40 was there. The Scribbles hovered, crackling to one another, and Lewis smiled.

Blink. The 40 was gone. The Scribbles were frantic. Get up!

“Is it Unk?” That was the last thing he needed, for one of the guys to show up at Rita’s and come in here for a smoke. He rubbed his eyes and shook his head. Blink. One of the Scribbles cried oh no-oo-o, and Lewis pushed himself up, eyes on his shoes, making sure the tiles didn’t turn into pudding. He idly reached for the 40 that wasn’t there.

A hairy bowling ball smashed into his gut, then clattered to the tile floor.

Lewis jumped, kicking at it, thinking it was a Nutra rat. Instead, Lenny’s head rolled across the floor, nose-over-chin, butting up against one leg of a little lunch table. Lenny’s mouth was open, one eye shocked, one half-lidded, and his tongue was gone.

“Ain’t so tough now, is he?”

Lewis looked at the boots, the huge boots, on the tiles in front of his feet. His eyes traveled up the oaken legs to a groin that looked more like a codpiece. The black sweatshirt over the abs and chest did almost nothing to tame the roiling meat of the monster’s muscles as it clapped its sirloin hands together with glee. The mask’s face did not change.

“I was always liked kicking a tough guy’s ass,” the monster said. “Everyone’s a tough guy until they meet the Beast.”

Lewis shook his head slowly.

“You haven’t heard of me? Papers call me the Beast. Because I ravage shit with no pattern, man.” He gestured to Lenny’s head. “I used cleats. I caught him nodding, just like you. Broke his jaw so he’d shut the fuck up. Got him somewhere chill. I read in the paper once about this Irish football player who used his cleats to sever a guy’s head, and I wanted to find out if that was just journalist bullshit or what, and since I always intended to bring you his head, well, why not give it a whirl? Cleats suck, dude. All I did was ruin my clothes. And I still had to use the saw. Goddamn reporters.”

“Thanks?”

The Beast surveyed the room. He pulled a smartphone out of his back pocket, flicked the screen a few times, and set it up against a napkin dispenser on the table. “I can’t believe this thing’s still full. How long do you think this place has been abandoned?”

“What are you doing?” Lewis asked.

“I have a red room. Gotta sate the people. Get that bitcoin, baby.”

“No!” Lewis bolted for the exit, and the Beast caught his much smaller body against one granite shoulder. The one-armed hug that circled his thin ribcage felt strong enough to break bone.

“No is right. Bad dog. You’re not goin’.”

The Beast shoved hard, and Lewis’s head rebounded off the bricks. He advanced, landing a hammer-fist to Lewis’s sternum. The air whooshed out of the scrawny junkie, but he didn’t go down. Another huge fist slammed into his ribs, and he felt something give. His knees buckled, and he kicked his legs out, trying to breathe.

“Told ya.” The Beast knelt, undid Lewis’s pants, and released his penis. The thick, long fingers encircled his shaft and began to stroke. Shockingly, Lewis got hard. He didn’t want to be, but the drugs weren’t helping, and the Beast, grinning, snatched Lenny’s severed head up by the jaw. He snapped his wrist, not too hard, and the toothless jaw cocked wide open.

Lewis cried out as the Beast screwed the severed head’s throat over Lewis’s erect dick. It felt a little like the first time he’d tried anal sex, a lubeless hole, and he giggled.

“Do ya like that?” The Beast asked gruffly, working the severed head harder. “Pretend it’s me. Ooh. Yeah.” Hawking throat noises. Self-loathing or no, Lewis felt kind of good. His glans kept smooshing against something slick that shouldn’t have been, and he saw the Beast spitting phlegm through Lenny’s severed neck cavity.

Lewis heard himself moaning.

The Beast stopped for a moment and grabbed Lenny’s dead lips, rubbing them up and down on Lewis’s shaft. “A little gob action, right?”

Unable to help himself, Lewis grabbed Lenny’s dead hair and finished himself off. A wad of semen flew out of the back of Lenny’s neck. Lewis cried.

The Beast looked at Lewis as though he’d never seen him before. Indignantly, he stood up and planted his hands on his hips. A chopped hiss caught in his throat, and his mouth made an O like a woman in a huff. “How dare you?”

“What?”

“You’re cheating on me!” The Beast kicked the head as hard as he could. His boot slid under the chin, and the front of his ankle smashed the jaws, which Lewis realized, still their teeth closed, his toe slid under the chin and caught in the cleft between Lewis’s cock and balls. He felt everything in that region rip, and he was in pain. This hurt like fuck. He wasn’t sure he had his cock.

The Beast wrenched the head free from Lewis. This time, they both heard the rip. Lewis’s ruined penis was not severed. It held on to the spurting side of his groin by a glistening hank of spongy tissue. Huge fingers wrapped around the remains of the gnawed, hanging shaft, life still causing it to bop around a bit, and agony turned the world white. Lewis screamed so loud that drops of blood flew from his throat.

He’d been de-pricked by the Beast, his groin now a big red circle with a yawn stretching toward his thigh, yellow pus flowed from the yawn, and hot blood spurted up against the bottom of his shirt like vampire cum.

The Beast yanked Lewis’s head to the side and said, “Calm down and hold still.”

A familiar prickle pierced his jugular vein, then bliss took away almost all of the pain. Lewis no longer even wanted to leave. His savior reached into his back pocket. Lewis saw a torch lighter and thought perhaps meth was coming into play. Instead, the sharp flame found his wound.

“BWAHHHHH!” He jittered, the drugs gone, his body in full revolt, and yet not in shock, what the hell had he been hit with? The pain was horrid, like the cold burn of every kick he’d ever gone through all wrapped into one cockless journey through Hades.

“HOLD STILL!” The Beast worked with one arm, his other hand circled around Lewis’s throat. To stay alive, he stopped moving, even though it hurt so much worse to stay still. If he couldn’t breathe, he was dead. Every jerk tightened the hand. He watched his blood bubble and his flesh singe. The flame traveled over the wound until the blood became a slow trickle. Lewis gritted what teeth he had and held still.

Another shot in the neck came, this one slightly less strong, but just as soothing.

“That’s CIA dope.” The Beast said. “Now you know something about me.”

Lewis whimpered.

“We’re not done.” The Beast squatted again. He picked up the coat hanger.

“I can’t take care of a baby.”

“Whu…what?”

“He made you cum, so now you’re pregnant. That’s how it works with severed heads. Not like people, dude.”

“WHAT? You’re fucking insane!”

“No, you’re insane.” The Beast proceeded to dig the coat hanger into the poorly cauterized wound. There was a pop. A rippling gout of blood splattered on Lewis’s leg, his shirt, and the ground. The cold end of the coat hanger wriggled around inside of him, pushing this and hooking that, and the Beast gave a great heave that made Lewis feel like he was being folded in half.

The Beast whooped with joy as a length of Lewis’s intestine slid like an olive-green jelly roll from the place where his cock used to be. The strip tore. A plop of fecal matter, soft, hot, and reeking, landed on Lewis’s exposed calf.

The Beast whooped. “There’s the baby!”

Screaming, the Scribbles returned and flew into Lewis’ mouth. The Beast’s eyes widened, he laughed, and grabbed at one of the Scribbles' tails. His fingers passed through it harmlessly, and the whole thing slithered down Lewis’s throat.

“What are those things?” The Beast asked absurdly, the coat hanger with intestine attached still in his fist. “I saw them at the Truck Stop, it—AUGH!”

Lewis’s heel collided with the Beast’s knee at an angle, strong enough to make something snap. The Beast dropped the coat hanger and went to one knee.

Lewis tried to get up, but his abdominal muscles wouldn’t accommodate the will of his hips. He flailed, catching the edge of the table. His hand closed around the napkin dispenser, still holding the Beast’s phone in place. Lewis had time to wonder if the red room was watching, then a heavy hand clutched the nape of his neck. The Beast jerked Lewis back like he wanted a kiss, and the junkie, not thinking, smashed the corner of the napkin dispenser into The Beast’s temple. The corner sank into soft flesh.

“AH!” The Beast let go.

Lewis grabbed the countertop for leverage, then smashed the Beast’s head with the napkin dispenser as hard and fast as he could. The mask cracked in half, and the Beast pawed it away from his face, revealing a bloody, scowling moon.

Lewis brought the dispenser down in a hammer motion, catching the Beast in his open lower jaw. Teeth scattered through the air. The Beast grabbed Lewis’s face, but Lewis, sweaty and bloody himself, slipped his grip. He swung the napkin dispenser a final time, this time impacting the Beast in the bridge of his nose.

Howling, the evil fuck fell to his knees, clutching his head. “This can’t be right.”

Lewis spotted the empty 40oz bottle sitting next to the exit.

We tried to tell you.

He took it.

That bad Beast man.

Lewis went to town on the depressed Beast with it, slamming the thick glass against the mat of curly black hair until it broke. Invigorated by the pain, the Beast turned, and lacerated hunks of torn flesh sneered at the junkie, who stabbed him in the face with the broken neck of the 40oz bottle.

With his last bit of life, the Beast grabbed Lewis’s exposed intestine and yanked as hard as he could. A dick-thick rope of dark, burgundy intestine wetly slid from the hole, making a tacky sound like pulling a fruit snack off a piece of plastic. He pulled one loop, then two, before finally collapsing. Lewis collapsed with him.

“I won’t die,” the Beast said. “This ain’t shit. I--”

“FUCK! LEWIS?”

Big Ant and Unk were standing at the doorway with Lisa.

“Serena,” Lewis said, pointing at the Beast.

Unk saw Lenny’s head on the floor.

Big Ant pulled his knife, strode right up to the Beast, and stuck it into the side of his thick, corded neck. The Beast gurgled. Big Ant slid the knife out, leaving the neck to gush.

He handed it to Lewis, who had no problem taking the knife, for he knew the subterfuge game. It was he who had killed the Beast. Lisa stayed with him, for Big Ant and Unk had bad paper and didn’t want to be around when the cops showed up. The Scribbles were nowhere to be found, at least not outside of Lewis, just as they never had been.

About the Author:
Rob Tannahill is the author of the Prince Junkie. His writing has appeared in Strange Sex 3, Yale Program of Community Health (PERCH #7, Substance), Weird Fiction Quartertly (Masquerade), and others. He is a regular contributor to Dark Moon Rising Publications anthologies as both author and editor. He is a recovering addict/street urchin.