The five had collapsed in Jason and Greg's room for the night. There were several reasons for this. For the first part, they were all very tired, and in fact Emily had already fallen asleep (actually she had passed out, but that was pretty much the same thing at this point). Secondly, none of them were willing to let any other of them out of there sight again, who could tell what else might happen to them if they should ever split up again. Thirdly, they were too comfortable already, and moving would require becoming less comfortable, so they decided on not doing that.

     Jason slept curled up on the floor, still a Husky, and he found it was quite adequate, and he was simply too exhausted to try changing back. Emily slept where she had passed out, while Allison slept beside her; Nathan and John shared the other bed for the night.

     The next morning of course, there had to be some serious answering on Jason's part. The dark sky didn't help Jason's mood that much either. The day looked quite unearthly in its foreboding feel, the sky hidden by a mass of dark clouds that threatened the entire desert plain beneath it. Jason found it odd that they would get two storms in a week here, but deigned it beyond his control, so put it out of his mind.

     "So you can turn into a dog," Nathan said, after they had all woken up, and Jason dressed himself appropriately.

     "Yeah, I guess so," Jason replied, as if it were just another of his abilities like playing the piano or painting would be.

     "For how long?" John asked.

     "Since last night," Jason replied. "I don't know exactly why, but I certainly can do it. Don't know how I'm going to explain this to my parents but..."

     "Do you want to be a dog?" Emily asked, still in shock over seeing him turn into a Husky the previous night.

     Jason looked shocked at the question, and two days ago he would have answered a firm no, but now he couldn't find it in himself to say that. Nor could he really say that he wanted to be a dog, as there were so many things about life as a human that interested him. Shrugging, he said, "I really don't know. I like being a human, but I enjoyed being a dog. I don't know what else I can say except that there really isn't much I can do about it any more, I have the capacity in me to be both a human and a dog. It really doesn't get much more complex than that."

     Nathan, thoughtfully scratching his chin, then asked, "Are you the only one in town who can change into a dog?"

     Jason held back a laugh, "No! In fact everybody who stays in town long enough will eventually become a dog. In fact tonight every single one of you has a chance of becoming a dog. All the residents are dogs, even Mrs. Brumfield.", Jason's face then scrunched up as he remembered something that had happened the night before, "Oh gosh, she fed me dog food last night."

     "Did you eat it?" John asked him, a slight smile peeking out from his face. "Yes!" Jason added. "It tasted good too, that's what's disgusting, I can't even abide the thought of eating that stuff as I am now, but when I become a dog again, I'll probably relish the thought of eating the stuff."

     "How much do you act like a dog when you are a dog?" Allison then queried.

     Jason held his arms out in resignation, "When you are a dog, you act completely like a dog! What more can I say? A dog will be a dog."

     "So you lose your intellect?" Allison probed further.

     "No," Jason retorted. "I still had that, but it was not so important as satisfying my doggie desires, so to speak."

     "And this dichotomy disturbs you?" Nathan asked, still scratching absent-mindedly at his chin.

     "All right, Freud!", Jason told him, standing up. "Knock it off! I'm perfectly fine. I just have to get used to all of this, as will any of you if this happens to you."

     "So what are you going to do about it?" John asked. "Me?" Jason replied, smiling, "I'm going downstairs to get some breakfast, then I'm going to head over to the police department and file a missing persons report."

     The others looked at each other solemnly. Brandemas and Greg were still missing, and they too were hungry. They followed Jason downstairs and enjoyed the French Toast that Mrs. Brumfield made for them.

     Greg was dreaming again. He was in a field of flowers, walking with Mary, he knew it was her, as the omnividient watched joyously. They were talking, laughing, holding each other close, and generally enjoying each other's company. They laid down in the field of flowers, smelling the glorious scents, taking in the rich aromas of not only the flowers but of each other. They gently cuddled each other, the warmth of their bodies flowing between them. The bright sun shone in the cloudless sky, and they each lifted their faces towards it, feeling its warmth envelop them both.

     Then Greg gingerly unbuttoned her blouse, as she undid his shirt and pants. Greg slipped her blouse off of each shoulder, one by one, marvelling at her luscious flesh. While Mary undid his shirt and trousers, Greg lay still, slowly removing her bra from her chest. He ignored her bosom after stripping it naked, and proceeded to remove her pants from her, a task that Mary had already accomplished. It took only moments then before both lay naked in the field. They let their eyes meet, and each stared long into the other. Greg felt her very closely, saw her soul, and her loving heart. He caressed it all with his eyes, as he saw more deeply into her than physiologically possible. Greg savoured the feel of her very soul touching against his, and he wrapped himself against her, and they rolled together about in that empty space between their eyes.

     Then as they stared at each other, they began to shift, their irises flooding their eyes, and the texture of the face shifting so that they grew a muzzle. Other changes went unobserved, but Greg could feel the loving gaze of the omnividient approving of his actions. Then Mary bounded off, breaking their eye contact, darting off amongst the flowers, romping about, Greg stared after her, and saw that she was a beautiful specimen, a canine specimen. Their eyes met again, and Greg romped after her, trying very hard to keep his eyes in contact with hers, but of course he couldn't. While nuzzling up next to her, he took a chance view at himself, and he saw that he was a...

     No. No, its not right! No it can't be possible! NO!

     Greg nearly jumped out of bed as he awoke from his dream. He looked about himself feverishly, he was still in the same drab room as before, in the same bed as before, with the same hurt left arm and right leg in a splint. He eased himself up in the bed, trying not to put pressure on his left arm. He did so with only minimal discomfort. Looking out the window he could tell it was some time after dawn, a few hours perhaps, but the day looked rather dark, and he supposed it probably wasn't that hot out either.

     He looked to his bedside table and he noticed that the bowl was gone. He silently cursed to himself, looking about the room rather impatiently. Here he was stuck in this pit of demon infestation, and there was nothing he could do about it. And he kept having dreams that seemed so pleasant, with Mary!, that kept ending with him turning into a dog! No, it would not be! They were slowly tempting him though, and he could feel in him the resistance already breaking down, as he was so increasingly tempted to try to use the better hearing of a dog to sense what was going on about him. He resisted though.

     He sat there for nearly ten minutes before anything happened. Mary walked in the door again, smiling, bright and cheerful, and with her came the most delicious scent, and it all came from the bowl she was carrying. "Here's some more soup for you Greg. I hope you're feeling better today." She laid the soup down in his lap, and then sat down on the end of the bed.

     "Not really," Greg replied, taking the spoon in his hand. He began to slurp the soup in a slightly sloppy manner, but it was simply so good, and he was famished, so he didn't care.

     "I see you like my soup again," she smiled some.

     "Mmm," Greg said between slurps, "Very good."

     Mary smiled, and then looked out the window, her smile fading. "It just looks frightful out there today. I'm glad I don't have to go out in it."

     Greg nodded, but not saying anything till he finished the soup. He then put the bowl to the side and looked around the room, till his eyes fell on Mary. Their eyes met, and for a few moments, they locked tight on one another. Greg felt that same surge in his heart as he gazed into her eyes, and Mary smiled in response. Greg then became overcome by fear remembering how the irises swelled, and they became dogs, so he wrenched his eyes from hers and resolutely set them on the bowl.

     Mary sighed, and scooted a little closer to Greg. She began smoothing out the wrinkles in the top cover while Greg continued to glower at the bowl. Then a smile crossed his lips, and he returned his gaze to her, avoiding her eyes though.

     "Would you help me get out of this bed, it's quite stuffy lying down here all the time," Greg appealed.

     "I don't know that I should help you at all, what with what you said yesterday," Mary returned, turning away from him momentarily.

     Greg found it quite amazingly easy to lie to her, "I'm sorry for what I said. I was wrong, I don't know what got into me. I'm sorry."

     Mary sighed, and then reached over towards him, and draped his left arm across her shoulders. She then helped him ease his legs out of the bed, and she gently lifted him up off the bed. He gritted his teeth at first, the pain being all to real, but then as he stood there for a few minutes, he turned to face her and smiled, "I think this is working."

     "That's good," she smiled back, all traces of her enmity gone now.

     Greg reached over with his right hand and gripped the bowl firmly. He then sent it sailing through the window, shattering the panes of glass there into millions of shards. Before Mary could even utter a shriek of horror, Greg had gripped the nearest one in his right hand, and had brought it up to her throat, gripping her about the waist with his left hand, the adrenalin racing through him deadening the pain.

     "We're going to go for a little walk," Greg whispered into her ear.

     Mary nodded, too stunned to disagree.

     The noise did not go unnoticed however, for Albert Barclay came to the door a few seconds later, "What happened?!" he shouted before seeing Greg holding Mary quite carefully.

     "Get back!" Greg hissed at him, and Al was too stunned to do anything else.

     The five other church youth were out walking the streets one last time before making their way to the police station. Allison said she felt uncomfortable going into a police station, didn't say why, but claimed that she just wanted to do one more search before giving up and putting it in the police's hands. The others had agreed and so they wandered the streets in a pretty regular pattern. As they passed one house that had a false brick facade, Emily noted something unusual. "Look, they have a broken window."

     Jason turned to see it, and then noticed something else lying on the ground, "Is that a dish there on the ground?"

     "Yeah," John nods. "There's glass everywhere too, I bet that window was just broken quite recently."

     Suddenly, the front door opened, and out stepped two figures, the one shouting, and the other cowering. They turned to watch this spectacle with a bit of fright. They recognized the first figure, who had a splint on his right leg, how he was walking on it they couldn't fathom, as Greg. The second figure Jason recognized as the girl whom Greg had been obsessed with.

     "Oh, no!" Jason said, his face white with terror. Jason ran up to them, but Greg turned around in time to see him, and shouted, "Back, get back all of you! We have to escape, don't you understand they're demons bent on corrupting us!"

     Albert Barclay, his wife, and their younger son stood in the doorway, watching with fright in their eyes as their daughter was being dragged off by a raving lunatic, and there was nothing they could do to stop it. They each moved out of the doorway, offering calming words to Greg, who spat expletives back at them each time.

     Jason then caught Greg's attention by summarily declaring, " They are not demon spawn, Greg, but you are."

     Greg's eyes went wide, and he looked at Jason a moment before saying, "We must destroy them, so they cannot corrupt us."

     "What's happened to you, Greg?", Jason asked, looking disgusted at his friend. "Whatever happened to love thy neighbour as thyself?"

     "They're devil-spawn!" Greg insisted.

     "Why?" Jason asked back.

     "Because they can turn into dogs!", Greg retorted, the shard of glass in his hand starting to cut through his skin, as a trail of blood began to drip down his arm.

     "Do you think I am demon spawn?" Jason asked, masking his fear behind a shield of resilience.

     "No," Greg told him, now on the street proper, still holding Mary tightly. "Get out of here before they claim us all!"

     "I can turn into a dog, Greg," Jason told him calmly. "I've done it twice now."

     Greg's mouth dropped, and for a moment it looked like he was losing his resolve, but then the shield of hate rose up again, and he steeled himself from Jason's words. "You are demon spawn too then! Repent! Repent and be saved!"

     "I have done nothing wrong," Jason countered. Just then he noticed that the situation was attracting quite a crowd. Various doors along the street had opened up, and there was even a large pack of dogs that came to watch, the leader of which was a thick Collie, who seemed to take a peculiar interest in the whole scene.

     Greg noticed the Collie too, and turned to face it, shouting, "Back, demon! I'll kill you if you come any closer!"

     Then they all watched with amazement as the Collie transformed, revealing the quite naked Rev. Brandemas. Greg gasped in horror, and the others were also quite surprised. Brandemas rose to his full height, towering over Greg, but speaking in a gentle loving voice, "I am not demon spawn, I am as human as you. Put it down, Greg; let's not scare her or her family any more."

     Greg gulped a few more times, not sure what to do, but his hand gripped the shard of glass all the tighter, letting the blood flow even more.

     Jason then saw that from behind Brandemas was a man pulling out a gun and aiming it. It was Randy Kempe, and he was pointing it directly at Greg. Jason pointed it out, and shouted, "Look out!". Brandemas turned, saw Kempe, and then stood with his arms outstretched between Kempe and Greg. Kempe was too caught up in the situation to stop pulling the trigger as Brandemas stepped in the way, and to his horror, he realized that he had shot Brandemas, and not Greg.

     While he stood there, mouth ajar, watching Brandemas fall to the pavement, John and Nathan jumped him, wrestling the gun from his hands, and holding him at bay with his own weapon. This was not his brightest hour, but he had never shot the wrong person before. Why had Brandemas stepped in front of Greg, why save a boy who was so full of hate like that? Why give his life for somebody so full of evil like that? Randy simply didn't understand.

     Allison and Emily ran to Brandemas as he lay there on the ground. The looked over his body, and saw that the bullet had hit him in the shoulder, so he would live. He was loosing blood fast though, and so the two ripped off their sleeves and patched the wound up as best they could. The blood quickly soaked the rudimentary bandages, but they would have to do for now.

     Greg stared down at Brandemas who lay bleeding in front of him. His eyes were wide with amazement. He then heard Jason's voice behind him, and he turned to face him, his face empty of hate, but full of confusion. "Would a devil give his life for you, Greg? I don't think so. Greg, love thy neighbour as thyself. Love thy neighbour as thyself. If thou cannot love another like thou lovest thyself, then thou cannot know the Father." Greg stared at Jason, his face showing no signs of registering Jason's words. Jason repeated his mantra over and over again, "Love thy neighbour as thyself! Love thy neighbour as thyself! Love thy neighbour as thyself!"

     Greg's face began to sweat, and as he did so, his grip on the shard of glass was loosened, until it dropped from his hand to the pavement. He then gripped Mary's shoulder's and turned her around in his arms, staring deeply into her tear soaked eyes. She stopped sobbing, her eyes looking back into his, probing that eternal darkness, seeing that which had clutched round of Greg's soul; seeing it's eldritch blackness stain every corner of him. As she watched she saw it be expunged from his soul, as it vanished, destroyed by a pulsating beacon of light within his soul, so bright, brighter than the sun, yet it didn't hurt her eyes to look into it.

     Greg felt some horrible weight lifted off of him as he stared into her eyes, seeing her very essence stop trembling in fear, and then be filled with an innumerable joy. Suddenly, he realized just who was watching him lovingly, and just what that person wanted him to do.

     Breaking eye contact, he fell to his knees, the splint snapping in half as he did so, eyes raised heaven-ward, where the clouds had parted to reveal the sunlight streaming downward upon them all, he pleaded in one excruciatingly painful voice, "Forgive me, Lord!". He then crumpled his head and arms into one heap on the pavement.

     There as the others watched, Jason, the Barclay's, John, Nathan, Allison, Emily, Randy, the horde of dogs, Brandemas, and every neighbour who was at their door, Greg finally succumbed to the spirit of Barken, and let his transformation begin.