He opened his mouth, trying to shape the right response, something biting, something to reassert control of the moment, but the boy spoke again, quicker this time, not giving Gon the chance.
"Guess I'll dial up the power a bit now," he said breezily, as though adjusting a volume knob, as though pain was just a mild inconvenience.
Then, with deliberate slowness, the boy straightened his spine. He winced, barely, but his expression didn't change.
That grin only deepened. He looked taller now, somehow. Bigger. As if shaking off the injury had peeled back a layer of performance and revealed something rawer beneath.
And then it happened.
A sudden, sickening movement stirred beneath his clothes.
From under his tunic, from the folds of his sleeves, even from the tops of his boots, they came. One after another, snakes began to slither out from his body like nightmares pulled into daylight.
