"Then he realized what it really was: a possum. It looked like a cat-sized rat that had got its nose stuck in a pencil sharpener. The long, bare pinkish tail seemed vaguely obscene. Lieutenant Colonel Torricelli was looking in the same direction. “If that’s not the ugliest thing God ever made, damned if I know what it is,” he said. “Now that Jake Featherston’s dead, I agree with you.”"