Tim's last clear memory was of a raging inferno that housed a shadowed figure he could neither explain or ever describe with any certainty. The only certainty in his mind was the fact that he was about to die and the calm acceptance of his fate.

There had been darkness, a peaceful sort of darkness marked only by a sense of time passing. Blistering heat and the scent of burning flesh giving way to a hard, cool surface that smelled of stone, rather than metal. Tim opened his eyes and stared up towards what he felt should be the sky; only it was a velvety black without a single kiss of starlight.

"What the ..." his voice cut off as he heard the skittering of legs on stone and a figure rose up from the floor to his left.

"Oh good, you're despierto!" Claimed a warm, cheerful voice that drew Tim's attention and his slow focusing eyes. "We've been warten for you to wake to croeso you!"

Something about the voice made Tim think of his grandmother, of Raylan, of Art. Voices that were soothing, voices that meant safety and he blinked to bring the figure into focus.

...

A giant tick, creepy little legs wiggling, loomed over him with it's serrated proboscis flexing open and shut as it spoke.

Tim Gutterson, decorated Army Ranger Sniper, U.S. Marshal, proceeded to scream at a pitch that would put a six year old to shame as he yeeted himself in the opposite direction. He sent himself flailing off the edge of the altar he'd been laying on, to land in an gangly heap of limbs and clothe on the floor.

"Oh goodness, goodness!!" The giant tick exclaimed as it came skittering around the altar in all its horrific limbs. "Don't be hurt, per favor don't be slasaður! Here let me he..."

As the misshapen limbs reached towards him, Tim yelped again and scurred backwards on his hands, butt and feet like an upended turtle.

The tick stopped and worried its little hooks together.

"Dear, dear. You seem afraid. But I choose this form to be soothing," the creature fussed.

"Soothing??" Tim squeaked (yes squeaked) "I LOATH ticks!"

"You ... you do not like ticks? But in your head I ... oh dear. I always get likes and phobias confused, what a muddle, what a muddle. Human brains are so simple but not simple at all with the way things hide about."

Tim's eyebrows pinched as he tried to determine whether or not to be offended. "Is this Hell? Have I died and gone to Hell, where giant ticks roam?"

"Hell? What? Oh no no no. Wait, wait ... I know!" Between one blink of his eyes and the next, the giant tick morphed into an eight foot tall, smiling penis. "This is better, yes?" It said, sounding hopeful.