10-07-2021, 08:28 PM
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With each breath his costume tightened. Compressing and constricting and squishing. Uncomfortable at first, like a nagging itch, but then it built into something akin to fire. It burned. The material becoming his skin, melding around flesh and bone, his nerves tingling hot as if lashed by a thousand tiny flames. The pain ebbing away once there was nothing left to merge with. He felt a shift inside him too, a gurgle in his belly that craved neither flesh nor blood. What was this? A craving so anciently old he'd forgotten almost what it felt like. He craved grass. Juicy, delectable grass. The saliva already pooling on his tongue. Snapped from his thoughts, that bodiless voice rang out again into the night. Be it in his own head or out loud, Etojo was unsure. He was decidedly sure of one thing though as he processed the words, he didn't feel particularly keen to be a part of it. Monsters… no thanks. He'd had enough of those. Finally shed of that monstrous form, it'd been easy to form an alternative plan. Back to the river he'd go, fatten up on grass and bathe his hide in the sun. Ahead the woods thrummed with a clear and present danger. Perplexed he watched as the others - now far odder looking than he - stepped stupidly into the trees. What possessed them he couldn't possibly fathom. Well he wouldn't be following. Etojo turned to go, or had meant to… except he couldn't? Instead he'd unwillingly taken two steps forward. What? There was an invisible tug, and he stepped forward again. No! Then another... The trees wriggled open, invitingly evil. And Etojo entered the woods very much against his will. Branches and plants crossing and twisting, sealing shut his entry point with a tangle of impenetrable foliage behind him. Still, this was not insurmountable. A blip in the night and no problem. He'd become decent enough at killing all sorts of plants. Without so much as a blink and sporting a scowl, Etojo willed those branches away. Willed them to wilt and untangle, to weaken and break. Branches reached for him instead... He tried again. Harder, with more mental omph. He willed those damn plants dead. The woods pulsed darker, the branches reached closer, and an unnaturally high pitched sound erupting from many mouths rode the air. Laughter. Oh Bugger. It hit him as an angry branch thumped him brutally across the chest. He was a changed beast in more than appearance and hunger, his abilities had vanished too. The laughter came again, layered in waves, surging loud and fading soft like an ocean tide. Time to go. Any direction would do. And Etojo didn't walk, he bolted. Semi awkwardly. For the darkness was almost blinding, the woods thick and trees angry. He punched himself through the thinnest part of foliage that would let him. Forcing his way through webs of twigs and scratchy leaves as they clawed at him, leaving shallow crevices on his chest. The laughter trilled hot on his hooves, giving chase. Somewhere ahead there was a soft light, warm and homely. An exit perhaps? An escape? Etojo forged towards it, the branches parting unnaturally the closer he came, revealing an orange orb shimmering semi-transparent in a section of woods thinner of trees. What is that? He wondered, its ghostly orange glow beckoning him near. Too easily enthralled, Etojo drifted closer, the creepy laughter of thousands fading to childish giggles. Slowly, discreetly, his sense of urgency began to slip away. The woods grew calm around him, a feeling of serenity tinged the air. A part of him realised he was no longer grounded but floating. A bigger part didn't care. The closer he drifted the stronger the orb solidified. But it wasn't an orb, rather a giant pumpkin - a voice whispered. He'd never seen one before. It had eyes as big as boulders, with a mouth opening impossibly wide like a cave. So pretty… he gawked, as he floated beyond the triangle teeth and into a throat of impossible darkness. The jaws closed in his wake - carefully so as not to shatter his trance - once he passed. Darkness reigned… Who really knows how much time passed until he came to his senses. But Etojo came back to himself as a crumpled heap with a rumble disturbing his belly. A sensation small at first but it built soon enough, uncomfortably so. And whilst he was certainly hungry, this feeling, it wasn't the same. His belly bulged and rippled, the lumps somersaulting beneath his skin. It was almost as if something was trying to cut through his intestines from inside to out. Shit, something was! Sharp as anything he'd ever felt before, his flesh began to tear. A tiny hand punching through his underside, followed quickly by another. The pair of hands gripping his flesh and prying it further apart, wide enough for a small body to follow. And then another. Little figures squirting from his belly started as a trickle which turned into a gush. They surrounded him in the hundreds, too many to possibly count. His mini men, his trojan soldiers. And reaching towards their mother - him he supposed - with pokey fingers prodding, urged him up. They led him to a solid wall in the darkness. And hoisting themselves upon one another's shoulders they began to feed. Could this become any more bizarre? Had he known the dark wall to be edible he would have been first. Etojo pressed his teeth to the wall and started munching. They ate their way through. Many mouths chewing and swallowing. A foul bitterness lathered his tongue, stringy threads of vegetable catching between his teeth. He fed for what seemed an eternity, his belly full and bloated. Yet soon enough a lighter darkness funnelled through a hole big enough to fit through. And free of whatever it was that had enthralled him, Etojo and his mini men soldiers ran. Almost instantaneously laughter punctured the night once again, before bleeding into a scream. The giant pumpkin he'd left behind exploded. Chunks of pumpkin, some big, some small falling to the ground behind them like rocks from a volcanic eruption. Etojo chanced a glance behind, hang on… they weren't chunks, but pumpkin heads. A few surged through the air riding sticks, the rest hovering just off the ground. All cursed with pitless eyes flickering yellow as they chased with what he figured must be invisible and very fast legs. But he and his men were fast too. Their little legs impossibly powerful, how they kept stride with him he'd never know. But then again he birthed them, of course they would be strong. Unfortunately for them his paternal instincts died there, for Etojo had a mostly self serving soul. His hooves digging into a mix of damp soil, rock and sand, pulling up on his haunches, his escape momentarily thwarted by the river's edge. Violent and wild, he wouldn't swim across. The pumpkins closing behind them with an avalanche-like momentum. There was one way to save himself! Save himself, and not the rest. "Form up!" He barked. And linking ankles and wrists together, they formed a tall tower ten little men thick, building higher and higher. His men were like ants, seemingly capable of incredible feats. And also like ants, he had more than enough. So when the pumpkin heads buried themselves amongst the tail end of his stragglers, angular teeth gnashing the slower soldiers to shreds. Etojo shrugged his shoulders and with an air of indifference barged the base of his man-made tower with his bloody chest. Within three breaths there was a thump and a sacrificial splash as his men hit the other side. And without much care, Etojo leapt on his soldier's bodies and proceeded to cross, his weight probably crushing the unfortunate ones at the top. "Disband!" he yelled once across. The bridge fell in parts into the water. The soldiers either swept away, drowned or eaten. Sacrifice had always served him well in the past. And Etojo turned away, his normal brown eyes tracing the track of what looked like a particularly perilous mountain path before him. |