It was toolate, of course. Max had already captured Sheryl. His sad, brown, puppy dogeyes stared helplessly at me. Sheryl ran a hand through his drenc...ed locksof hair. Ding! Round over. It was a technical knock out. I had lost thefight."Max got kicked out of his house," Sheryl continued, "He doesn't have anyplace to stay."It was a challenge. I knew one when I heard one. I had played the sensitivemale and now she wanted me to prove it. If I wanted to get into her panties,if I ever wanted to. I needed to hear that.’ ‘Anytime, Penny Collins-Lynch, I’m glad to help.’ ‘Mike, do you work on the weekends?’ If he said yes, I would need to come up with an explanation why I would be here at my desk. ‘I’m off on Saturday and Sundays, but I’m usually helping someone move.’ ‘Oh, I said, ‘I hate moving! Why on earth would you want to help someone move?’ He smiled that crooked smile again. ‘Because everyone hates to move, it’s stressful and hard work. All too often, the friends who promised to. “Right now, Sam needs to be left alone so that the replicator can work uninterrupted on taking care of him. Once that phase is over, it will be up to all of us to keep him from dying of boredom as he lies on his bed. Sarah, you do not need to worry about feeding him because the replicator can feed him everything he needs exactly where he needs it without going through his normal digestive system. That is important because the bullet did some damage to his intestines and stomach.“Here, let me. Dorian gleefully smiled when a swipe of his sworddrew blood from my arm. I grimaced a bit in pain, but I still fought on.But something wasn't right. Dorian is about as tall as me. But he lookssmaller now. I could still feel the power in each of his swings.Strange, He was swinging upwards? I'm sure of it, Dorian was definitelyshrinking.With each sword strike we exchanged, I started noticing other things.Dorian's skin was changing color. And on his cheeks there were some darktattoos forming. I.