For several moments, it almost seems like it won't be deterred even by that. Its exterior crawls away with a pitched digital squeal. Every bony, rake-thin mechanism bares itself in an amalgamation of stitched-together barbed wire, pulsing organs that contract like a fist squeezing over one's own heart.

It doesn't see the fire as it leaps along the wood and latches hungrily to fuel it knows will burn forever.

"Back, back!" Tim barks, snapping one hand around Jay's wrist. He has little doubt that once it realizes it's doomed, it'll do everything in its power to take them both down with it.