Father/Family Member (5:11)

We pulled into the lot just after lunch, grey sky heaters beating away frost on the edges of the windows. The kids were quiet in the backseat, half asleep from the long drive. I remember thinking it was exactly the kind of day I wanted for this, cold enough to feel like winter, but not so cold they'd mutiny on me. My daughter climbed out of the car slowly, hands jammed into her coat pockets. My son hopped down, almost slipped, caught himself on the door frame, and shot me a quick look to see if I'd noticed. My wife zipped her own coat, slung her purse over her shoulder, and gave me that tired, amused smile she does, which she knows she's about to suffer for. One of my ideas by the office there was a row of pre cut trees bundled in netting and leaning against a rack. You could back the car up, pick one up in minutes, and be home with hot chocolate and a movie. Those would be faster, my wife said, nodding at them. Yeah, I said. But we didn't come here to buy whatever was left by the parking lot. She snorted softly but didn't argue. She knew what this was. I'd been talking about it since Thanksgiving one year. Just once we take them to cut our own tree, not the dried out things in front of the grocery store, not whatever's left in a strip mall tent. A real tree, a family memory. I didn't care that much about the tree itself. I cared about the picture in my head, the kids slogging through snow, taking needles out of their sleeves, later telling somebody, yeah, dad used to drag us way out for the perfect tree, something that didn't just blur with all the other Decembers. We paid at the office, got a loaner's saw, and followed the sign that said CUT YOUR OWN with an arrow. Up the hill the lot opened up into rows and rows of evergreens. Other families moved between them, stamping footprints into the snow. The kids trailed behind us. My daughter's shoulders were hunched up around her ears, her gloved hands buried in her pockets. My son walked a step behind her, kicking at clumps of snow and ice, his breath puffing small clouds into the air. These are fine, my wife said after a row or two touching a branch. The tree she picked was full enough, straight enough, one of a hundred that looked almost the same. I looked past it, up a hill. From here I could see a line of orange tape strung between stakes further up, fluttering in the breeze. Beyond that, the neat rows started to blur into older trees and wilder growth. Down here they all look like they came off an assembly line, I said. Let's go a little further. We're not on a timer. She rolled her eyes, but there was still a smile there. She knew I was stubborn. I knew I was stubborn. We kept going, going. We passed trees that were too skinny at the bottom, too flat on one side. You'd have to hide against the wall. I could feel my daughter's patience thinning. Behind me. My son started falling farther back, between glances distracted by footprints and patches of dead grass poking through the snow. The orange tape got closer. The wind was a little sharper up there, the air smelling more like SAP and cold dirt than generator exhaust. At the line, a laminated sign was zip tied to one of the stakes. NO CUTTING BEYOND THIS point. NO TRESPASSING PRIVATE PROPERTY. Beyond it, the rows loosened into taller, rougher trees that didn't look like they'd been shaped.

Narrator/Host (9:20)

Here. We're at the top. Pick one from this row and call it a day.

Father/Family Member (9:26)

I was about to agree. My fingers were already going numb around the saw handle. The kids were little hunched shapes at the edge of my vision. Then I saw stood maybe 15 yards beyond the tape, on a small rise where the land dipped and then climbed again, taller than the trees around it. By a bit. Branches layered all the way down. Full, no obvious holes. Not too wide at the bottom. The top was straight, not some weird fork I'd have to wrestle with later. It just looked right, like the tree you draw when someone says draw a Christmas tree. The kind that ends up in the front window in every cartoon you've ever seen. That one, I said, before I thought about it. I pointed past the tape. My wife followed my hand, then looked at the sign again.

Narrator/Host (10:26)

The guy said, stay inside the flags.

Father/Family Member (10:30)

It's right there, I said. We're not hiking into the next county. I'll be quick. She hesitated, then shrugged, breath fogging the air.

Narrator/Host (10:41)

Fine. But if they yell at us, I'm blaming you.

Father/Family Member (10:45)

The kids had stopped at the tape. My daughter watched me step over it, jaw clenched. My son fidgeted, looking between me and his mom. You two stay with her, I said. I'll cut it and drag it back. The snow beyond the tape was less trampled. It came up deeper over my boots, crunching differently underfoot. The ground wasn't as even as the neat rows. There were roots, dips, a slight sideways tilt to the hill. It felt more like being in the woods and less like being in a field, pretending to be up close. The tree was even better, needles dark with that faint bluish tint, no big bald spots when I circled it. The trunk was straight. I ran my hand over the bark and felt how cold it was from the air, then knelt and set the saw teeth into it. The first pull stuck instead of that dry rasp and that easy bite. It was like dragging the blade through firm rubber. The teeth went in, but they didn't want to come back out. I had to put my shoulder into it, rock it a little, and then find the right angle. The wood under the bark wasn't the warm tan color I expected. It was paler, almost grayish and damp. Little strings of pulp clung between the saw teeth. With each stroke, more clear SAP welled up along the cut.

Narrator/Host (12:24)

You alright?

Father/Family Member (12:26)

My wife called out. Yeah, I said. Tree's a fighter. I went back to it. Once I got used to the resistance, it went faster. The smell came up as I cut a strong pine punch with something sweeter under it, almost like cough syrup. Once I got used to the resistance, it went faster. The smell came up as I cut. Behind me there was a sudden soft cry, one of the kids and my wife's quick, hushed voice as she knelt to check them. I turned back to finish the job. The trunk was already more than halfway through. The tree gave with a creak and a crack tipping in the direction I'd pushed. Snow cascaded off the branches as it went down in slow motion. When I looked at the stump, the center didn't look exactly right. The rings weren't clearly visible. Instead, there was a kind of web of lighter and darker fibers, almost like strands knotted around each other. Clear SAP still oozed from them, forming slow drops that stretched before they finally let go. Maybe this was just some hardy variety that grew up here. I got my hands on the trunk and the lower branches and started the awkward job of dragging it up the hill once at the top, back inside the flags, the slide down the hill was easier before we had to drag it all the way back to the car. The kids pushed as much as they could. My sign slipped and went down in the snow once, then popped back up, cheeks flushed, hair sticking out from under his hat. By the time we reached the flatter, packed down part of the lot, my arms shook and my breath came out in hard bursts. SAP had made its way all over my jacket, my gloves, the side of my neck where a branch had scraped me at some point. One of the workers jogged over, breath puffing. You get that one from up top? He asked, nodding vaguely toward the line. Yeah, I said. This one stood out. He looked like he wanted to say something else. His gaze flicked to the sign, then back to the tree. Just next time stay inside the tape, alright? We don't maintain the ground up, there. Could be holes, loose rocks. We just don't want anyone to get hurt. Sure thing, I said. Don't think I could convince the family to drag another tree that far anyway. He slapped the trunk with a gloved hand. Nice tree, though. Looks like he found the perfect one. I got it netted and tied it to the roof. The kids climbed back into the warm car, faces pink. My wife poured coffee from the thermos into the lid and handed it over to me while we waited for the windows to clear.

Narrator/Host (15:33)

Happy?

Father/Family Member (15:34)

She asked. Yeah, I said, rubbing my stiff fingers in front of the heater vent. They'll remember this one. The drive home seemed much shorter. The kids went quiet the way they did post outing, staring out at the gray fields and the bare trees lining the road, their eyelids sagging. My wife scrolled absently on her phone. By the time we pulled into the driveway, the sky had that flat mid afternoon winter look that made it hard to tell what time it really was. The neighbors plastic yard decorations were already lit up. Getting the tree off the car and into the house was worse than getting it to the car. The netting snagged on the roof rack, on the poor trail on the front door frame. We had to angle it, shove it, angle it again. At one point a branch scraped down the side of my face, leaving a line that tingled and then burned as I wiped the SAP off my skin. We maneuvered the tree into the corner by the front window, over the old sheet I'd spread out earlier. My wife steered the kids into the kitchen, promising hot chocolate. I stayed with the tree and knelt to wrestle the trunk into the stand. The bark was rough under my palms. When I tightened the screws, the metal bit into that pale inner wood. SAP welled around each screw almost immediately. When I stood up, my lower back twinged. The room tilted for a second. I put a hand on the wall to steady myself, a heavy ache pulsing low in my stomach like I'd done a hundred sit ups. The tree looked good, though. Even with the net still half on, it filled the corner nicely. Once we cut the net and let the branches fall, it would dominate the room in just the right way. We didn't decorate that night. The kids were out of steam. My daughter curled up on the couch with her mug, hands wrapped tight around it, saying nothing but glancing at the tree now and then. My son sat on the floor, back against the couch, legs stretched out toward the stand. My wife brought me a mug, too. I stood near the tree. The smell rolled off of it. Sharp pine and that same odd sweet note from earlier, stronger now in the warmth. See, I said quietly. Worth it. She bumped her shoulder against my arm.

Narrator/Host (18:21)

We'll see how worth it it is when we're vacuuming needles until March.

Father/Family Member (18:25)

We pried the kids off the couch and sent them down the hall to their rooms. After teeth in pajamas, I went back into the living room, alone before bed. I don't know why. Habit, maybe just to look at it one more time. While it was quiet. Street lamp glow filtered through the blinds and caught on strips of SAP around the stand screws. I stepped closer, put my hand on the trunk. The bark under my palm was warm. Not just room temperature warm. Warmer than the wall, warmer than the air. My stomach gave a slow, dull throb. I pressed my hand against it and felt a hardness there that didn't match the way I'd eaten that day. I told myself it was just a long day. Cold air, hot car lifting more than I should have. Nothing a night of sleep wouldn't fix. The kids doors were cracked open an inch. I heard my son shifting in his bed. My daughter's soft hum of some song stuck in her head. That night I woke once with a sense that something in the house had shifted. The room was dark and quiet. The ache in my stomach pulsed. I rubbed at it through the blanket until the pain dulled enough that I could fall back asleep. When I woke again, the alarm was going off and the room was cast in that dim winter light that made it impossible to tell if it was morning or evening. My mouth was dry. My muscles ached. When I shifted, something deep in my stomach pulled, a slow, heavy cramp that made me stop. Halfway through sitting up, my wife was already on the edge of the bed, shoulders slumped, hair yanked into a knot. Congratulations, she said, not quite looking at me. Her voice was husky, like she'd been yelling.

Narrator/Host (20:32)

We're all sick.

Father/Family Member (20:34)

All of us. My tongue felt thick. I had to force the words out. She nodded.

Narrator/Host (20:43)

They both came in burning up, coughing, stuffed up. I told you we didn't need to be out there that long. We froze them for a tree.

Father/Family Member (20:55)

I wanted to argue, but I could barely get up right when my feet hit the floor. My vision wavered for a second, the room sliding sideways. I had to sit there and breathe until it steadied. I feel like I got hit by a truck, I said. Good, she muttered.

Narrator/Host (21:18)

Then we're even.

Father/Family Member (21:21)

The kids were a heap on the couch, buried under a blanket. My daughter's cheeks were flushed, hair plastered to her forehead, eyes half closed. On the tv. My son had his knees tucked up, arms wrapped around them, breathing through his mouth. On the way to the kitchen, I noticed the water in the tree stand. I'd filled it last night. It was already almost empty, the remaining water cloudy and greenish, a faint film, the smell coming off. It wasn't fresh pine. It was sour with a metallic edge, like old mop water and pennies. The day blurred into sick day routines. My wife handed out pills and cough syrup. We pushed fluids, coaxed bites of toast that mostly went uneaten. The kids slept on and off. My wife moved like she weighed twice as much, eyes dull and tired. The ache in my gut worsened as the hours passed. It wasn't sharp, just present. A stone lodged under my navel, dragging every time I bent or twisted. By late afternoon, my wife's patience was gone. She stood in the kitchen doorway, looking at our little heap on the couch, me sunk into the cushions, kids on either side, a box of tissues like a centerpiece.

Narrator/Host (22:57)

This was stupid, she said.

Father/Family Member (23:00)

Her voice shook, more from exhaustion than anger.

Narrator/Host (23:04)

We should have grabbed one from the rack and come home now we all feel like garbage, and you look like you're about to keel over.

Father/Family Member (23:13)

It's a bug, I said. Cold doesn't do this. We just hit bad timing. She pinched the bridge of her nose.

Narrator/Host (23:24)

If we're not better tomorrow, I'm calling the doctor. I don't care if they put us on hold for an hour. This isn't worth it.

Father/Family Member (23:34)

That night the ache in my stomach woke me. I rolled onto my back and stared at the ceiling, hand pressed to my middle. The skin there felt tight under my palm. The alarm clock digits glowed 2:17. Beside me, my wife was hot to the touch, skin damp with fever sweat. By morning, no one was better. If anything, we'd all slid one notch down. My wife's voice was almost gone. The kids coughs had moved from their throats and into their chests, that wet, rattling sound. My head felt stuffed with cotton. When I sat up, the room lagged for a second behind. My stomach had changed. Standing in the bathroom, shirt lifted, I saw it clearly. I wasn't imagining it. My abdomen was rounder than it had been two days ago, not huge, but pushed out in a way that it hadn't been. The skin looked tight, a little too shiny. When I pressed with my fingers, it resisted one solid mass instead of soft give. Bruising had bloomed out from my navel overnight, faint brown and purple veins branching toward my hips. My wife caught me looking when I came back to the bedroom. She squinted, then lifted my shirt without asking. Her fingers prodded gently at my side. Her mouth tightened. There's no sharp pain, I said. Just. I just feel full. Heavy. Outside, the snow had picked up overnight and kept going. The forecast on my phone was full of warnings. Black ice accidents Avoid unnecessary travel. Neither of us looked like we could drive anywhere anyway. My wife could barely stand long enough to make toast. The kids moved like sleepwalkers. I made it as far as the hallway with a laundry basket before something inside me yanked hard, like a rope being jerked. Pain shot through my core, a white hot band from side to side. My knees buckled. I dropped the basket and hit the carpet, hands going automatically to my stomach. My daughter's feet appeared in my line of sight. Her socks were damp at the toes. There was a dark rust smear on one foot. She swayed for a second, then reached to steady herself on the couch. My wife's hand landed on my shoulder. Okay, she said, sounding winded.

Narrator/Host (26:40)

That's enough. You're done. You're going to bed.

Father/Family Member (26:45)

Between her and the kids, we got me off the floor and into the bedroom. Every step was a lesson in how many muscles your guts are connected to. By the time they lowered me onto the mattress, I was shaking, my shirt soaked with sweat.

Narrator/Host (27:03)

You need a doctor, she said.

Father/Family Member (27:06)

Her face was red, hair stuck to her neck.

Narrator/Host (27:10)

This is not just the flu.

Father/Family Member (27:13)

If I if we don't feel better tomorrow, call, I said. It wasn't bravado. I couldn't imagine getting dressed, let alone sitting in an ER for hours after braving the terrible road conditions. She looked almost as bad as I felt. The kids were in no shape to be dragged anywhere. She stared at me for a long second, weighing that against the way my stomach looked. Then she nodded once. Tomorrow, she said.

Narrator/Host (27:47)

If this gets worse, I'm dialing 911. I don't care about roads or insurance premiums.

Father/Family Member (27:55)

She pulled the blanket up. Her hand rested on my forehead for a moment I could feel her heat even through my own burning skin. Then she swayed. Her other hand went to her own ribs, pressing below her bra line, like something there was hurting her too.

Narrator/Host (28:14)

I told you we shouldn't have stayed out in the cold that long, she.

Father/Family Member (28:18)

Murmured, more to herself than to me. She left the room, one hand on the door frame as she went. I heard her footsteps dragged down the hall, then the TV click on in the living room, volume low. The kid's coughs rose and fell under it. I lay there staring at the ceiling, the pressure in my gut slowly spreading outward. Eventually, exhaustion won out over the pain.

Agent Conroy/Redwood Bureau Narrator (28:51)

Warning signal Interruption detected.

Narrator/Host (28:57)

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Sponsor Voice/Ericast (29:26)

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Narrator/Host (31:00)

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Father/Family Member (31:35)

I woke up with my shirt up around my chest and cold air on my stomach. They were around the bed, my wife on one side, the kids on the other. All three of them looked emptied out, eyes too big or faces too thin, skin pale except where it was red. My stomach felt tight, like somebody had over inflated me. Then I saw the cut. A straight line a few inches long just below my navel. Not a scratch, a real opening. The edges were parted slightly. Inside was dark meat and shine. There should have been blood everywhere, but there wasn't. My wife put her hand inside me up to her knuckles. It didn't feel the way I would have imagined. Not a sharp stab, more like a deep, blunt pressure that made my body try to do three things at vomit, void my bowels and stop breathing. When she curled her fingers, something inside of me gave with a wet snap and my vision went grainy at the edges. I tried to jerk away and I couldn't. My body was there, but it wasn't listening to me. I kept thinking that this had to be a nightmare, but pain wouldn't let me lie to myself for long. I must have made a noise because she looked up for a second it was just her. Not the fevered, drifting version torturing me. My wife, wide eyed, terrified, fully present. Oh God, she whispered, her face pinched like she was about to cry. Her lips trembled. Then her gaze slipped out of focus, like someone had reached in and turned her off from the inside. Her hands never stopped moving. They kept searching around inside me, like they were looking for something. My daughter stepped closer from the foot of the bed. Her T shirt was ripped around the stomach. The fabric stretched and stained on one side. Below her ribs. A long gouge ran diagonally through the skin. It was only open, but it wasn't bleeding the way it should have. A thin yellowish film covered it, glossy in the dim light. The bruising around it was faint and purple. Tears filled my eyes so fast that my vision blurred. She was 10. She was supposed to be complaining about being cold, about missing cartoons, about about how long I made them walk, not standing here with a hole in her side like it was normal. I tried to say her name. My throat only produced a dry croak. She leaned over me. A strand of saliva hung from her lip. It was too thick, stringing instead of dripping, clear and viscous like the SAP that had dripped out of the tree. Then she put her mouth to my skin. The saliva burned along the open edges of my stomach. It soaked into the tissue and tightened. It stopped, I managed. It came out thin and ruined. My wife flinched for a heartbeat. Her mouth twisted like she'd heard me, like she wanted to stop. Her eyes shone with something human. Then her fingers clenched around something inside me. There was a tearing sensation, an explosion of heat and agony in a place I didn't have words for. Something came loose from deep inside me. I felt space open up and everything around it shift. She drew her hand back. A heavy, dripping piece of me sat in her palm, glistening. I tried to turn my head away. Even my neck wouldn't cooperate. My eyes watered harder. My stomach convulsed uselessly around the hole. She dropped it on the floor. Floor with a wet, final sound. My son's face was gray and slack, eyes half lidded, like he was sleepwalking through a fever dream. His foot dragged when he moved. The front of his pajamas were wet. He didn't look at me. He didn't really look at anything. Then they did it again. My wife used the first slit below my navel like a doorway, until the tissue around it was more of a hinge than a cut. The corners tore wider every time her Fists went in and out, ragged splits crawling outward. I tried to beg, to scream. My throat had given out and turned everything into a hoarse wheeze. My body kept trying to fold in half, away from our hands, but nothing listened. Every time I got close to blacking out, every time the pain hit that bright, blinding peak and my vision tightened into a tunnel, something inside me shoved me back awake. My son and daughter acted like assistants to her. My daughter leaned in whenever my wife needed the tissue to stop leaking, her saliva stringing and stretching between her mouth and my torn skin, leaving behind that resin stink, and it burned like nothing I've ever felt before, like being flayed and then salted. She'd pulled the opening below my navel wider with her fingers, and the skin stretched in horrible, softened ribbons. At some point my wife was done with whatever she'd been working on in there. She followed the branching bruises up my side, those ink vein lines spreading from my belly, and then she pressed something sharp until the skin split. I felt it separate all the way down to my hip as she dragged it, and my whole body tried to evacuate itself. My daughter leaned in immediately, her spit coating the ragged rim, making it glossy and firm, keeping it from gushing a new hole in me, then another and another. I couldn't even track where the pain was coming from anymore because it was everywhere, layered and overlapping, the raw pull of skin, the deep tearing from inside my open stomach. My body kept trying to escape in the only ways it knew. I tried to vomit, I tried to faint, I tried to. To shut down every time I reached the edge, vision tunneling, something inside me caught me and hauled me back. Then my wife stopped and turned toward the door, and the kids went with her in that same guided, obedient way, like they were all hypnotized. They came back carrying kitchen knives. The sight of them in my children's hands made my stomach convulse around the open hatch, and the raw rim burned where it stretched. My son held his blade with both hands at first, arms trembling, the tip wavering like he didn't understand why he had it. My daughter gripped hers tightly, knuckles pale, her mouth working as if she were chewing on fear. My wife climbed onto the mattress beside me. Her eyes had that faraway focus again, the one that looked through me instead of at me. She put her hands into my abdomen, adjusting the cavities she'd made, pressing, shifting, opening, opening me wider with a casual strength that didn't belong to a sick woman. The ragged corners of the largest opening tore a Little further as she worked, and my throat ripped itself around, a sound that came out thin and animal. My daughter leaned in, saliva stringing from her lips, and coated the torn rim. The burn hit like acid on a fresh scrape, multiplied a thousand times. My wife shifted her attention to the kids. My son brought the knife to his own belly and pressed for one breath. He looked up and his eyes found mine. That look contained everything. Confusion, terror, a child's instinct to ask for help. His lips trembled. Tears spilled without sound. Then his face went slack. The blade dragged down with a decisive pull. The sound he made wasn't loud. It came out of him like. Like a broken breath. His knees dipped and then locked again. My daughter moved instantly, leaning in close to him, coating the rim of the new wound with that resin saliva. It glossed his cut skin. It firmed the edge. It kept the opening from collapsing while his own small hands disappeared, appeared into his body. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't blink. My mind kept trying to reject what I was seeing, and the pain kept my mind pinned to reality like a nail. My daughter went next. She traced the knife across her own side, where the earlier gouge already existed, extending the seam in a single dragging motion that made her whole body shudder. The thin yellow film on her skin split, and beneath it, the tissue opened with disturbing ease. Already softened, already prepared. She wobbled, shoulders shaking, and for a heartbeat, her eyes sharpened and filled. She looked at me like she just noticed what was happening. Then her jaw slackened again and her eyes went dull. The saliva gathered. Her hands went into herself. My wife hovered between them and me, directing the motion with her own body without ever speaking it. When my son's fingers freed something from inside him, him, my wife took it immediately, warm and slick. She shoved it deep into the cavity she'd made in me, forcing my insides to rearrange around it. My body reacted with a violent internal pull, everything inside me shifting, sliding, compressing, until the new mass settled and the cluster thudded in approval, a heavy pulse that rippled the stretched skin of my belly. She fed another piece through one of the holes she cut above my hip, threading it under layers of tissue, like wiring being run through walls. I felt it travel inside me in a slow, nauseating slide. And then the rhythm of my torso tightened, pulses sinking, pressure redistributing. My wife moved from my body to theirs and back again, hands slick, eyes distant, using knives when fingers weren't enough. My daughter coated every new tear, every ragged rim, turning red wounds into durable openings. My son stood until he couldn't, held upright by whatever drove him, shaking, leaking, still being used and stripped. The sounds changed as the minutes stretched, the wet drag of skin pulling wider, the small clicking scrape of a knife on something hard, the soft hitching breaths of small lungs. My own wheezing, useless and constant, was the only thing I could still contribute. They would break through in flashes, and those flashes hurt worse than anything that was done to me. She would pause with her hands deep inside me, eyes snapping into focus as if she'd just woken up. Her face would contort, horror pouring in all at once, and she'd look at my abdomen open, ragged, then at the kids, their bodies almost as ruined as mine. I I'm trying, she whispered, voice cracking, tears sliding down into the mess.

Narrator/Host (46:28)

I'm trying, but I can't.

Father/Family Member (46:31)

The fog rolled back over her eyes and she was gone again. Toward the end they stopped taking what could be spared and started taking what mattered. My son's legs finally gave and he fell to the floor, forehead against the mattress, clutching the sheets. My daughter swayed beside the bed, her breathing shallow and rapid, her eyes glassy, her mouth wet with resin spit, her hands trembling as they returned again and again to tear things from the open wounds. My wife pressed a hand to her own chest and found a spot between her ribs. The skin parted under the knife, the cut was almost bloodless. At this point she didn't look at me. She didn't hesitate, didn't even seem to register the sound I made. She simply reached into herself and pulled free something heavy and vital, warm and pulsing in her palm. She turned and drove it under my sternum, forcing it in until my insides shifted and compressed around it. The change was immediate and cruel. The last of her strength went out of her as if it had been spent on that single act, and she folded against my arm, her weight warm for only a moment before it started cooling fast, my daughter swaying at the foot of the bed, lowering herself and curling against my shin like she'd fallen asleep mid movement, eyes half open and unfocused, her breath shrinking into tiny quick sips that abruptly stopped. My son had fallen beside the bed frame with his cheek on the mattress near my hand, fingers clenched in the sheet, mouth parting on a breath that never arrived, and then the room went still in a way that was so empty and so wrong that I didn't want to be a part of it anymore. From the open cuts in their bodies, pale fibrous things began to ease out, corded and slick. They left. My wife first, then the kids. They crossed the sheets climbed over my legs and slipped into me. Lying there with my family collapsed around me and on me, I couldn't move or fight. I could do nothing but watch as the worm like things that had butchered me and my family slithered into my open torso one by one. And the last thought I had as my own was that this was all my fault. I had wanted to do something my family would never forget.

Agent Conroy/Redwood Bureau Narrator (50:11)

I don't have anything clever to say at the end of this one. What happened in that house was undeserved. And it was ordinary right up until it wasn't. This didn't have anything to do with the Redwood Bureau, though. If they had shown up instead of us, they would be keeping those parasites alive and studying them, probably even propagating them. We caught the trail of this case the way we always do. A lot of hard work and an un unhealthy reliance on dumb luck. We only just managed to grab the information before any escalation triggered the Bureau's detection algorithms. When Sam and I stepped inside the house, the air was warm and humid. The smell like a slaughterhouse set up in a chemical plant. We found him in the back bedroom. He wasn't just swollen. His torso had expanded into a layered, bulging mass covered in branching bruises. There were a few gashes spread open, the edges ripped, under which was a pale, writhing mass under the skin. Multiple deep pulses moved at different rhythms, making his midsection lift and settle in heavy waves while his eyes tracked us awake. He looked like he weighed over a thousand pounds. We ended it fast. There are mercies you can still offer, even when you're too late. We took a single tissue shaving no more than we needed for study and for memory reconstruction, because understanding is the only tool that scales. Once our lab got what they needed, we destroyed that sample. We douse the bodies with an accelerant and torch the house. It doesn't just burn, it erases. No ash, no bone, no Christmas morning headlines with pictures of charred, mutilated remains. Here's what we think happened. The organism survives and spreads by passing as a tree in winter. It stays dormant. Come warm season. It likely relies on contact to spread animals rubbing, scratching, bedding down against it. The family gave it something better. They cut it, dragged it home, stood it upright, fed it water, and sealed the house to hold heat. They slept near it. They handled it. In a human environment, it didn't behave like a normal infestation that just spreads until the body fails. It somehow used communication and available tissue to construct turning several hosts into one optimal host for reproduction. And that wasn't the end. The lot worker who helped handle the tree was exposed before we connected the dots. He'd already come into contact with a love interest by the time we caught up, three more families had to be put down and burned the same way for the same reason. There was no stopping what was happening. We adapted a thermal scan drone to spot abnormal heat signatures among the surrounding forests and destroyed every target we could find. If you take one thing from this, take this Lines, signs and rules exist for reasons you may never understand or or agree with. Sometimes the best choice is the boring one. Even on Christmas. On Christmas. On Christmas.

Narrator/Host (53:52)

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