The gloves arrived on a tuesday. They were attached to a pair of disembodied, animated, and deeply passive-aggressive hands, which floated into town demanding to speak to “the living ambassador.” Apparently, Lorgnette had been chosen by some eldritch bureaucracy to mediate between the Deadlands and the Still-Wet-With-Meatlands. Hank tried to sell the hands for cigarettes and got throttled. Larry cheered.

The gloves offered Lorgnette a deal: wield the Hands of Necromancy, gain the power to resurrect the dead, and in return, keep a ledger of everything he raised, re-killed, or traumatised. The fine print included something about “soul garnishments.” “I have no soul,” Lorgnette muttered, accepting the contract. “Just indigestion and vague resentment.” The moment he slipped the gloves on, he knew. The island, the zombies, the hands—it was all the prelude. He could feel it now. A wrongness winding through the world like a tumour with teeth.

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