. . .

Amelia smiles at the little thing. She is lost in the baby’s squiggly little face. She doesn’t hear the doctor, and the doctor has to repeat himself.

“He’s an abomination,” the doctor says. “We should probably just kill him. I mean, if you won’t withdraw your funding for this hospital. I mean.”

“They have to cultivate a spirit pill in them for centuries,” Amelia says. She hefts the baby. She puts it down. “For centuries, little Tom! You have a thingie so I think that will have to be you. Then they turn it into a baby and eat it. But I’m going to drink reverted cinnabar instead.”

“You shouldn’t —” says the doctor.

“Not while I’m pregnant!” Amelia agrees. “I mean, later.”

“It’s just,” the doctor says, and finally comes out with it: “I think that he has parasitic snake DNA.”

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