>>21171029>>21171032Bob didn’t respond. He continued to chew, his shoulders rising and falling with deep, guttural breaths as he tore into their child with savage hunger. A dark pool began to form beneath them on the kitchen floor.
Helen’s legs trembled. This couldn’t be real. It couldn’t be. Her mind raced, grasping for any explanation. Was she dreaming? Was this some horrible nightmare? But the metallic smell in the air, the horrifying sight of her husband devouring their son—it all felt too vivid. Too real.
With a surge of adrenaline, she snapped out of her paralysis. “Bob! Stop!” she screamed, her voice now full of terror. She lunged forward, her body stretching out in desperation to pull Jack-Jack from Bob’s monstrous grip. Her arm wrapped around the baby, yanking him away as Bob growled like an animal, his eyes wild and unrecognizable.
“Don’t!” she screamed, her voice cracking under the weight of her disbelief. She pulled Jack-Jack close to her chest, his tiny body limp, cold—too cold.
But it was too late. Jack-Jack was gone.
Her breath came in shallow gasps, her heart shattering into a million pieces. She looked up at Bob, tears streaming down her face. This wasn’t the man she married. This wasn’t Bob.
“Why?” she choked out, her voice barely audible. “Why would you do this?”
For a brief moment, Bob’s expression shifted. His eyes flickered with recognition, as though some part of him—the real him—was fighting to come back. But it was fleeting. He let out a low, guttural laugh, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, smearing blood across his face.
“Because,” he said, his voice cold, devoid of the warmth she once knew, “I was hungry.”
Helen screamed—a sound of pure anguish, horror, and betrayal that echoed through the empty house. She staggered backward, clutching Jack-Jack’s lifeless body in her arms. Everything she had known, everything she had built with Bob, was gone.
