chunk: The second plotline features fantasy elements. Unbeknownst to most of the other characters, Alan and his brothers are not quite human. Their father is a mountain and their mother is a washing machine. Alan's eldest brother can see the future, his second-eldest is an island, his younger brother is undead, and his three youngest brothers are a set of Russian nesting dolls. Alan is the most normal-seeming of his family. Outwardly, he looks human, but he heals at an incredible rate, and if part of him is cut off, it will grow back, and the cut off part can be made to form a new copy of him, much like an earthworm does.