In a continued series of cracks, snaps and shuddering agony the tree’s trunk continued to enclose Charles’s hand with such mind-numbing fury that at least one finger was shunted down into the flesh of his hand where it popped out back-end first. Charles’s screams were electric and violent and shrill and would be a full forty-five minutes before whatever forces animated the tree were finished with Charles.

You are quite a man! I’ve been watching you as you chase the trail of breadcrumbs that I leave for you. What should I call you? Do you have a name?

Robert had furiously worked for many weeks to find out who the Wyttick woman was. He had heard her name in hushed whispers throughout the ranks of London for some years but had never realised why she had the reputation she had.

She wouldn’t be a loving mother, she knew that, but she would still be a great one.

I wonder why anyone would ever accept such a gift given the legend that surrounds it. Although I suppose it might be from disbelief; I admit that for much of my life I failed to take these things seriously.

The young man was still stocky and cocksure like he had been in the school the week before, but he was now missing a good two thirds of his neck; Darren would have guessed it to be about three fingers worth.

It immediately enchanted her childish imagination with its heavy, moss-covered stones and its overgrown fauna; a place thick with the sounds of clicking beetles and creaking vines, and the smell of rot in the pollen-laden air. It looked as though it could hide all kinds of half-forgotten secrets.

Well, joke’s on me. Now I know just how God damned painful it is to have a lump of lead tear through your soft belly fat, shredding your small intestines like a shot put tearing through a communion waifer.

He couldn't even imagine who would look at those smooth-brained vat-grown abominations and feel desire. He grimaced with disgust and threw the packet back down on the floor.

After a full day’s trek the desert started to reveal strange things. There were fossils half buried in the orange clay, huge glittering ammonites the size of houses, skeletal remains of dragon-like monsters, and mountain ranges made of needle-like volcanic rock that turned the horizon into some kind of hellscape.

“It’s in the words!” the old woman cried. “My voice was given to me by my dearest lover and it’s not theirs to take.”

I followed your advice. It was a really clever idea you had putting talc down on the dog’s bed. Didn’t really go as planned though. Not that it didn’t work, it’s just that what I found didn’t make a lot of sense.

At one point during their endless hike, he had passed a branch in one of the tunnels and sworn that he had seen some crooked and bent knot of twisted legs fill one of the tunnels. But he knew nothing for sure.

Out of the darkness, it rose up. An unfathomable cacophony of visual noise stood before her, its legs violently belching outwards from some barely discernible central mass and making contact with every surrounding surface until nothing behind it could be seen.

It has been suggested by older members of the Archives that the tree is the result of an unknown entity’s will being imposed upon reality; twisting biological material into a desirable form, from unknown and unseen dimensions.