Content
HNTBL: Other Tails
(a “How Not To Become Lunch” spinoff)
Chapter 6:
Party Tricks
“This can’t be so bad. Come on Slee, it’s just ONE human, we can find other ones to eat…” The huge naga took a few deep breaths, then knocked on the door. She felt flustered and had to double check it was Ender’s house. Of course it was; she’d been there before.
Slee was wearing a nice dress today. She usually dressed pretty casually, but for some reason the way Ender looked at her made her feel less like a chubby naga and more like a pretty one.
Andrew Sr. opened the door to see Slee looming.
“Ah, young Slee, you look nice today.” The grisled, older version of Ender pointed toward the little garage to the left of the house. “He is just finishing up in there, I’ll open the door for you.” The gruff old man smiled and hit a remote on a key stand. The garage door started creaking open. It revealed Ender, breathing hard while striking a boxing bag. Seeing Slee he stopped. The pumping music from inside, with the singer proclaiming, “I know the pieces fit, because I’ve seen them fall away,” cut out as Ender paused the song.
“Hey Slee, you look pretty, what’s the occasion?” Ender asked.
“Wow, usually she is so casual, she looks stunning.” Ender admired Slee; when she tried she really was quite beautiful.
She smiled upon seeing him and slithered closer. He grabbed a towel, drying his face as she approached, grinning up at her. “Am I allowed to hug her? No she has a nice dress on and I’m disgusting,” he decided.
“Hey, uh, thanks. You’re not too busy, right? I kinda wanted to ask you something.” Her coils stiffened for a moment, she was pretty nervous. Not so much because she was too shy, but because she knew how risky this could be for Ender. “Today’s my birthday. I’m gonna organize a party at my place, wanna come? I know, I know, I should have told you in advance but… It slipped my mind,” she said, semi-apologetically. “If he accepts, I hope he at least showers before going,” Slee thought to herself.
Ender saw her nervousness. “Absolutely, Slee. Hey, check this out.” He held his forearm up, where a wand was strapped. He turned and faced the bag, moved his arm strangely, breathed deep, and, “Propero!” the bag jolted as if hit hard. “I think I’m starting to get this a little bit,” he remarked.
Slee smiled brightly. “Oh, good job Endy! Hopefully you’ll be able to use magic to defend yourself. I can’t always be there for you,” she replied honestly.
“I’ll just grab a quick shower and change. I might bring a spare shirt as well just in case,” Ender said agreeably.
“I’ll go and start setting up, just come along when you’re ready.” Slee watched him for a second longer, then turned and slithered back to her house.
Ender watched her go and smiled wistfully. “She wasn’t worried I’d say ‘no’ was she? She’s my only friend. Well, and Ethan… probably,” he thought as he watched her slither away towards her house in her pretty dress.
Of course she’d try her best to be there to save him, hopefully it never went as far as it had last week. She grimaced at the memory. And hopefully Ender wouldn’t become a snack for one of her friends at her own party. “Should I invite some random humans too? We could eat them instead.”
With this in mind, she made a group chat for her friends. [[Hey! I’m still not really ready but if you guys want, you can come over!]]
Ender’s phone buzzed and he took it out. He accepted the invite to “Birthday munching at Slee Thering’s” and saw three preds invited to the chat with a +1 next to their names. Gwen, a reddish brown fox girl; Trina, the lizard girl from the mall who had brought him to Slee for… nevermind that; and Kelly, a gator.
His name appeared on the list “Ender” in red. As he asked Slee if he should bring anything, two humans populated the group: Kate and Amy. Their names appeared next to Trina’s and Kelly’s in green. This seemed significant.
[[@Slee did you want me to bring anything, Birthday Girl?]]
Ender considered this entire activity for a moment. His spells really weren’t going to do much against an actual pred, though he really had stepped up training for human preds after last week. He considered leaving his wand, but he wanted to show Ethan his new spell, so he decided to take it. He donned his dark hoodie over his shirt, smiling, thinking of how pretty Slee was in her dress, and then headed on over.
The last human guest populated the chat group: Sasha.
Slee did not respond to his text, probably a tad too busy to do that now. Once Ender showed up, Ethan was the one to open the door. He wasn’t exactly ‘invited’ to the party itself, but Slee gave him the majestic title of ‘door opener’.
“Hey Ender, you look pretty nice! …Uh, you’re probably not gonna spend much time with me today, but I’m glad I got to say ‘hi’ at least.” He got out of the way to let the human boy walk inside. The house had quite a few decorations on the walls, and a large-ish table stood in the middle of the living room with soda bottles and other drinks. No snacks in sight, huh.
“Ethan, who’s that?” came the voice of Gwen, sitting on the couch by herself. Her nose twitched in the direction of Ender. “One of Slee’s friends,” he replied.
“Cool,” then she turned around and put a hand near her head, calling out, “Slee! The first snack is here.”
“Really? Uh-- I mean, awesome.” The large, familiar naga got out of her room, her neutral expression shifted into a huge smile, then a frown.
“He’s no snack, he’s Ender! Ugh… And I even told my friends about him.” Slee seethed. She gave a quick glare to Gwen then slithered up to Ender.
“Hey! Uh, it’s pretty early so there’s only you and her, but I’m sure the others will be here soon enough.”
Ender watched the exchanged expressions, foxes were usually playful, and… mischievous, but Slee had obviously told her about him.
He took a moment to bump knuckles with Ethan and tell him, “Got a trick to show you later.”
Ethan was happy that Ender talked to him again despite being with the ‘old kids’ now. Usually when Slee was with her friends she barely even acknowledged her brother. “Woah, really? I can’t wait to see!!”
“Yeah dude it’s a real Cracker,” he promised, then he shifted to Gwen. “Hi Gwen,” he grinned, “I think I’ve seen you around. How long have you known Slee?” “Do not say ‘my what a big smile you have’ for any reason” It was a big smile though, he noticed.
“Ever since we were little,” Gwen replied, quite uninterested in talking with a human. “We went to the same primary school and just sort of became friends like that. We haven’t seen each other that often lately, you know, life’s life, but I’m glad to be here today.”
Then her eyes shifted to her smartphone, dismissing Ender. Slee glanced back and forth between her fox friend and her not-quite-as-much-fur-covered friend. “Uh yeah, that’s how it went. So like, we’ve known each other for almost 10 years!”
Ender was not forcing a conversation with an uninterested pred, or she might ‘end it permanently’.
“10 years, wow. I’ve never been in the same spot for a whole year, dad’s job moves us everywhere. Always the new kid, always the outsider.” Ender was at a complete loss as to what it might be like to be in the same place for so long. At least Slee and Ethan were his friends. “Be calm, be polite, be nice, don’t look afraid, things will work out.”
Ender smiled, looking over at the soda bottles and then to Slee, remembering their conversation about burps. He didn’t say anything about it; that might not be a thing she shared with Gwen.
Ethan just sort of stood there, excited and looking forward to whatever Ender wanted to show him, even if that would have to wait a while. Gwen didn’t have much else to say and wasn’t exactly planning to do much until the other invited predators made it to the party.
Slee had a few dozen thoughts buzzing in her mind, but her unassuming glance remained fixated on Ender. She noticed what he was looking at and remembered their discussion around burping.
“Oh, you’re still thinking about that? I was… actually planning to do that later with my other friends.” Predators took pride in belching; predator standards of polite dinner discourse were a little different compared to a human’s. “But uh, you’re free to join. Or to just, uh, watch, hehe.” Slee smiled broadly at him.
“So, uh, who’s the longest belcher?” he asked the pair of preds. “Kelly has to be pretty epic.” He referred to the as yet absent gator. “I doubt mine will even count. I can do the alphabet though.” He laughed. “What else do you guys do for fun on each other’s birthdays?” He looked for a place to sit, plunking in a large single chair that he sunk into.
Gwen shrugged. Slee chuckled, slightly nervous; she was asked so she had to respond. “Err, we eat people, play truth or dare, things like that.” The naga slithered closer to the chair but didn’t wrap herself around it.
Speak of the devil, Kelly the gator knocked and was ushered in by Ethan.
“Hey guys! Slee, you look great!” Her reptilian tail wasn’t as flexible as a snake’s, but she managed to close the door behind her, stealing half of Ethan’s job. She waved at Gwen, who was happy to see a guest that she could be bothered to acknowledge the existence of, then looked at Ender. “Oh, he looks totally tasty, great job on the snacks so fa--”
“He’s a friend,” Slee cut her off. Kelly raised an eyebrow and glanced at Gwen, who in response just rolled her eyes and shrugged.
“Just go with it,” Gwen said. “It’s Slee’s birthday.”
Ender felt a chill go down his spine when Kelly casually remarked about his taste. Her long jaws looked capable of snapping him up in one gulp.
He didn’t want to be too familiar with Slee in front of them, so he listened patiently. Each of them were quite different but deadly predators.
Each of their bellies also seemed quite empty.
“I thought a few other humans were coming?” Ender asked. Slee turned to him with an awkward look on her face. She parted her jaws to speak, but Kelly spoke first.
“Yep! If they actually show up then I don’t think I’ll be able to stop laughing… I mean, what kind of human would accept the invite?”
Slee frowned “…I had to. Ender, you’re okay with, uh, us eating people, right? Maybe you can, like, talk with Ethan while we do that or something?”
Kelly was puzzled. “Was Ender actually friends with Slee?”
What was Ender going to do? Ask Slee to change? There wasn’t enough soda, potato chips, and birthday cake in the world; some humans made it, some didn’t, that was just life since the predators became dominant.
“Yeah, I’ll go hang with Ethan, when ah, that starts. Aside from me, how did you guys convince them to… come over?” Memories of Slee ejecting him carefully from her jaws came to mind.
“Uh, well, I just tried to be friendly and that was enough to convince them. I didn’t even tell them there’s a party, just that we could hang out,” Gwen explained.
Kelly looked ready to explain further but there was a knock at the door, which Ethan answered dutifully.
The lizard girl from that day at the mall arrived. She wasn’t surprised to see Ender, but she wasn’t pleased either. She said nothing and joined the other girls on the couch. Slee sighed quietly, perhaps being friends with Ender might damage some of her pre-existing friendships.
Ender wondered how Slee’s friends might feel, but there had been another human who seemed to hang around with a pred in the school, so maybe they thought it would be okay. He worried, though, looking around at the four gathered predators, who’d eaten people for fun at the mall.
“But he and Slee were different right?” Last week’s events should have made him feel safe with Slee, but you only had to be wrong about these things once. “Yes, she saved your life like four times now,” he reminded himself.
Ender could see his status provided by Slee as “not on the menu” was having some effects on her friends. She wasn’t asking them to stop eating humans, just NOT him.
“But, why am I different?” he wondered. The only thing he could figure out was that Slee genuinely liked him, and so had decided he wasn’t to be eaten. He noticed that Kelly was the only one who seemed to have no immediate problem with the idea.
Kate, Amy, and Sasha had walked to Slee’s together, and Sasha knocked on the door hard, hearing the excited conversation inside. This time, Slee was the one to greet the guests. She gestured at Ethan to go to his room, then she opened the door.
“Heeeey! You’re free to come in.” She moved her coils out of the way, allowing the humans to see the other predators inside, as well as Ender.
The three preds on the couch were delighted by the sight, but things didn’t add up. There were only three guests they could eat, but there were four- including Slee- predators! Of course Slee’s friends thought Slee had Ender for herself.
The trio entered. Amy and Kate were happy to see another human had been there a while. Sasha had other thoughts on her mind as they all came to stand in the center of the four preds.
Ender waved at them from his seat. Kate was a taller girl in contrast to Amy’s petite form and Sasha’s slightly pudgy build.
Slee put on some decent music in the background, just loud enough to serve as ambiance, then she used her coils to basically create a seat for herself, between the couch and Ender’s chair.
“So, uh, for those who didn’t know-” the humans “-today’s my birthday! So I decided to invite you to get to know me and my friends.”
Just in case, Slee had locked the entrance door after ushering the trio of human girls inside. “So, uh, why don’t you introduce yourselves?”
“I’m Kate,” the taller girl said, smiling winningly. “I love dance and modeling, and I couldn’t resist the chance to meet Gwen, she’s such a graceful fox.”
“My name is Sasha, I’m in history class with Slee and she is always so quiet and nice.”
Ender grimaced. Slee had history class directly after lunch, he thought. So she was full, that’s why she was quiet and nice.
“Aaand I’m Amy,” the short blond said. “I do art with Trina!”
Ender had heard of her, people thought she was crazy for painting predator mouths in detail and asking them to model for her. She was quite good, but it seemed like a short lived career.
Slee didn’t feel bad about murdering these three at all. In fact, she had her eyes and her stomach set on them for quite a while, and what better day to eat them than her birthday? Her friends couldn’t wait to dig in as well, barely able to keep the drool in their mouths.
There was another knock on the front door and Ender was surprised.
“Uh, I’ll go check,” Slee said, keeping an eye on Ender while she went for the door, then opened it. “Yes?”
Ender saw Slee’s retreating form, though, yep, some of her awesome tail was still right there with him.
“No one else was in that chat group. Who could possibly be here?” he wondered.
Ken heard the large door unlock with a click and suddenly he was face-to-belly with a big, red naga, whose lumpless body extended back into the house. Maybe his idiot sister wasn’t snake food yet.
“Oh, uh, did my sister Amy come over?” Ken asked. He was a bulky 16 year old. A little arrogant, his wand was displayed on a holster even though his skills were known to be… unimpressive.
Ender looked around, hunger was nearly a palpable force in the room. How could these other humans not sense it?
Slee shrugged and got out of the way. “Uh, your sister should be there, wanna join us?” “How convenient!” she smiled, “another volunteer.”
Meanwhile, Amy’s precocious, chirping voice came as she walked up to the gator Kelly. “Can I get a photo of your mouth for my work?”
Kelly was slightly weirded out by the request, but it’s not like she fully opposed it. “Sure thing! I brushed my teeth so it should smell ok,” she opened her slimy, saliva covered jaws and just let it stay on display.
Ken looked past Slee at Kelly’s massively wide jaws, a small seed of worry growing inside him. “Probably for Amy’s art. Besides, I’m like, a mage, I’ll just zap her and walk out of here,” he told himself, envisioning his ability to deal with four hungry preds with only his wand and his wits.
He entered the house behind the big naga. He saw drinks and chips and cakes laid out on a table with decorations and balloons everywhere. “Well SHE doesn’t need to eat any more.” He eyed the plush form of Slee with something approaching open disdain.
Ender saw Slee returning, her jaws beginning the strange working motion of unhinging in preparation as she led Ken to join the humans in the living room. He looked over at Amy, standing in front of Kelly, whose massively open jaws waited in front of her like an invitation.
“It might be time to go hang with Ethan,” he decided
“Why don’t you sit with your sister? I’m sure she’d appreciate it,” Slee said nicely to Ken. She was right about to shove her jaws onto his head, barely able to resist. She gestured to Ender saying, “Uh, you better go!”
NOM. Slee’s unhinged jaws descended on Ken, his head and shoulders slickly entering her hungry mouth.
And that was a signal for her other friends. The gator leaned forward and gave Amy a really close look at her mouth. The bottom of her jaw tripped up one of the human’s legs and the she-meal fell face first on the waiting tongue. Kelly tilted her head up and excitedly started gulping the diminutive girl down.
The lizard dug in as well, taking some time to run her tongue across Sasha’s face, savoring her meal, before a wet GULP indicated she had started swallowing.
Gwen was just about to eat as well, but she came up with an idea.
“If Ender really is Slee’s friend, then he better be okay with all that comes with being around her.” She slid to the edge of the couch and grabbed Ender’s arms.
“Relax, I’m not going to eat you,” she said, even if she might have wanted to. “I just want you to see your friend a little longer.” She smiled slightly cruelly. “If you’re Slee’s friend, really her friend, then you have to accept this.”
Slee kept swallowing. Sure, Ken might have been prepared, but his arms were already pinned to his sides, practically useless as he began the wet descent into her throat. He felt for his wand but fumbled it. It slipped from his hand, falling somewhere in the naga’s mouth amidst her teeth.
His wand was the least of his concerns as another strong gulp left him waist deep in the fat naga’s throat, his wand had become a magic toothpick at this point. His arm had scraped along Slee’s sharper teeth just right and a searing pain entered his awful sticky terror-filled experience, as his blood met her tongue. Below him, gurgling in anticipation, Slee’s belly demanded…
Amy’s last sight was of Kelly’s dripping throat opening to receive her. The view was absolutely everything she thought she could achieve with her art, and apparently the gator didn’t have to close her reptilian mouth. Light shone down into the wet tunnel that now held half the human girl’s body in a warm, loving embrace, saliva soaking her clothes.
Sasha was simply gone, Ender noticed. Trina had eaten very quickly and her jaws were closing on a pair of calves and feet. The curvy girl was already beginning to curl up in her softly growling belly.
Held tightly by Gwen, he looked down at Kate who seemed horrified into immobility then screamed, “You Fucking monsters I knew it!”
“Oh shit,” he actually said aloud. Her launching abuse right after she’d tried to ingratiate herself to Gwen probably pissed the fox off worse than Ender’s… existing did in this moment. Ender breathed, remaining calm as he watched the horror dutifully. “Slee is your friend. Gwen is right, if you’re friends with Slee you have to accept this,” he told himself.
Kate went running from the room, screaming as Gwen let go of Ender with one paw to take a swipe at her.
In the distance, Ethan could be heard asking, “What are you doing in here?”
The gator had already eaten her victim whole by this point, not like it was difficult, seeing how willing the girl had seemed. She shrugged, belched, then just caressed her stomach as the others also completed their meals.
Slee idly removed the wand from her teeth and then, shrugging, used it to pick those teeth clean. This was such a lit party! Everyone seemed to love it! Uh, the predators at least. They got the best thing out of the way first and could enjoy their gurgling, digesting bellies throughout the night.
“Whoo-- hic, better than ANY cake!” the naga said, “Maybe we should ask Ender to come ba--” Slee turned around as she spoke, her eyes shot wide and she dropped the would-be toothpick. He’d been there the whole time?! “Uh… Hey? Are you good?” she asked nervously.
Ender Looked from Slee to Gwen, meeting Gwen’s intense amber eyes.
“Am I good, Gwen?” he asked, feeling grim, but ensuring his voice carried so he was asking everyone in the room, the same room that was filled with the sound of glorping, churning bellies, satisfied sighs, and tiny muffled screams. He looked up at Slee.
The act of holding Ender still had cost her a meal as well, and her belly let out a long, low GROOWWWLL. With slow determination she let go of Ender’s deliciously muscled arm. The other predators were just pretty satisfied and sat there with their wriggling guts.
Gwen nodded slowly. “I owe that kid an apology. Pretty brave hanging around without panicking,” she thought idly. “Yeah,” she said softly, “you’re good.” She patted his shoulder roughly.
“This is Slee, accept it or don’t, but be honest,” Ender acknowledged to himself
Even amongst her friends he could find no room for embarrassment about his feelings. You only meet one beautiful naga who doesn’t immediately Nom you after all. He did want to move things along to distract himself from the screaming, churning, hungry growls the three full predators were emitting from their full bellies.
“So… burping contest?” He pointed at the bottles of soda, his wand still strapped in that unique way to the inside of his right forearm.
Slee was actually surprised that Ender didn’t seem phased in the slightest. And even more when he just… nonchalantly suggested to move on and do something else. “Oh, uh, sure thing! Let me just--” she stretched out her tail and reached out to grab the bottles with it, one full, rather big bottle for each. There was even one for Ender if he cared to join. “You guys ready?”
Ender was surprised when he got an anthro bottle of cola. “I don’t rate my chances, but this should be fun.”
“Gotta participate or you’re just another human outsider; be their friend inside their group, or be an outsider, inside their bellies for liquidation.” He avoided grimacing.
“Who wants to go first? Most cheers wins,” he offered, looking around at the satisfied Kelly, Gwen, Trina and his favorite: the Crimson Naga. Idly he noticed a human sandal on the floor.
The girls were moving slowly, wanting to enjoy the struggles of the humans in their hungrily churning guts for a moment or two. A look of pure bliss pained across all of their faces.
Slee shrugged and said, “Well, I’m the birthday girl so, uh, I’ll go first.” Her movements were slower and lazier than usual, understandably so, but she managed to gulp down nearly the entire thing in one go. She rubbed her arm against her lips and sighed, satisfied.
Unsurprisingly, Slee’s belly offered something that shook Ender like being front row at a concert. “URRRRRRP!!” …Yeah.
“So? Did you like that?” For certain the seats trembled for a moment while she was belching.
Ender just sat down with his back against Slee’s tail, watching the room shake with her resounding belch. “Holy crap, I don’t know if that can be topped,” he said. “Some poor meal is taking a soda shower. Oh well, just bear with it. It’s Slee’s day.” Ender opened his own bottle and gulped a couple times. He didn’t get soda very often at all. He let out a burp, a completely normal human burp.
He smiled up at Slee. “Right, well, that was anticlimactic.” He looked at the various bulges wiggling in their new homes. It was impossible not to remember a couple of his recent experiences. It had turned out for the best so far, though. He was pretty sure one of the other girls chuckled under her breath at the rather pathetic outcome.
Slee smiled and just clapped her hands slowly. “Well, not bad for a human. Who wants to go next?”
Kelly shot her arm up in the air. “I will!” Then she enthusiastically emptied her bottle and let out another monstrous belch. Maybe not quite as ground shaking as Slee’s, but echoing and loud nonetheless. “How was that?” She shot glances around the room for approval, even at Ender.
Ender clapped and chuckled. “Yeah! Hell yeah, you’ve got some acoustics in that big… uh… big… you know what I mean.” Ender had stalled a bit, remembering Amy just falling in. He pulled himself back; there were two more to go. “Trina or Gwen?” he asked each of them. He drank a bit more of the Soda and waited patiently.
The remaining preds nodded at each other and ended up drinking together, gulping and gulping, and then unleashed their belches in unison. On their own they weren’t that powerful, but together they surpassed even Slee’s!
“Woah! That was great, you two!” she congratulated them, clapping her hands - genuinely this time.
As their contest came to a close, Ender laid back amidst Slee’s coils, letting his worries diminish. Pulling out his phone, he tapped through it. “I don’t know if you guys do presents, but I ordered you this off Anthrozon, Slee.” He held up his phone to show her a red bow for her tail. “I hope it’s not dumb or something.”
Slee looked at his phone and was pleasantly surprised. She didn’t expect him to actually get a gift for her, that was really nice of him - and she liked it! “Aww… Thanks Ender!” She squeezed him in her arms for a moment before letting him go.
He turned his phone for the other preds to see. He’d started to notice a change in them as they seemed to grow happily tired, lazy smiles on their faces with half lidded eyes, enjoying their post-meal torpor. They smiled acknowledging the thoughtfulness of the gift.
Slee certainly loved the bow, she couldn’t wait to actually have it in her hands! Or rather, on her tail.
The conversation lulled further, so Ender just sat quietly with them, willing to chat idly, or not. This was so much different to him than the sugar-and-cake-fueled human birthday parties that it was interesting.
“Okay so, uh, what next?” the naga asked after a while.
“How about truth or dare?” Trina suggested, smiling lazily.
“What is ‘truth or dare’?” Ender asked innocently enough, he thought he kind of got it, but he hadn’t spent any time with predator kids besides Ethan and Slee. All eyes turned to Ender.
“How could he not know? And besides, didn’t the name of the game give away what it was about, anyways?” Gwen wondered at his apparent innocence -- or ignorance, she couldn’t tell.
“Uhm.. you, basically you ask questions or dare people to do things. That’s… That’s it.” Slee explained.
“Should we ask Ethan to join us? He’s been awfully quiet,” he suggested. “I did promise to show him my new trick,” he thought to himself.
“Yeah, sure, I dare you to go ask him if he wants to join us!” Slee usually would have said no, but she did feel a bit bad for her brother. “He’s been alone all night, and besides, he and Ender could have a chance to bond some more,” she thought. The other girls didn’t object.
“She DARED him to ask Ethan to join them? Strange game,” Ender thought.
This seemed fairly innocent. He made his way to Ethan’s room, hoping to find him there, and called out, “Heya Ethan, wanna come smash some chips and pop? Your sister says you can play truth or dare with us.”
“Easy,” he thought, “I’ll be good at this game… Did Ethan hear me?” He looked around the room for some sign of the young naga.
There was no response at first, but a muffled noise could be heard… “Ethan’s voice?” Ender was concerned; something was off. He turned the corner and was confronted with the unexpected.
There she stood, Kate, the human girl who’d managed to run before being turned into a snack. She had her arms wrapped around Ethan’s mouth. He was probably under the effect of a few spells, since there’s no way she’d actually managed to overpower him, right?
“Dammit, what was the belly stretching spell again? Why do I keep forgetting-- Oh.” She noticed Ender. “Hey! You’re still alive too? Help me! We can’t get rid of all of them, b-but we can take our revenge on this snake! Pull out your wand and do something before they notice!”
Ethan looked incredibly uncomfortable and rather upset, who knows what she might have done or said to him earlier. He glanced at Ender, begging for help, his frightened eyes meeting Ender’s.
Ender didn’t hesitate. “GUYYYYSSSS COME HERE!!!” He knew this mage had to be pretty good to over power the young naga. With his own wand strapped to his forearm, he breathed, aimed, and pushing his magic thru the wand he yelled, “Propero!”
He knocked the girl right off Ethan - HIS FRIEND ETHAN!! - just as intended. Trusting the others would come quickly, he immediately charged the girl, attempting to tackle her onto the floor as he yelled out, “Ethan, free yourself!!” “Hurry up guys! If this girl turns out to be more than just a low-power mage I might be screwed!” Ender screamed in his mind.
Before the others could get anywhere near Ethan’s room, the young naga quickly got back to his senses and sprung onto the girl. He somewhat gently shoved Ender aside, smiling at him, then he mercilessly descended upon the female mage.
Ethan wasn’t really hungry, having eaten before Ender arrived to avoid any urges regarding his human friend. Still, he fed Kate’s long legs into his maw, unhinging his jaws easily and securing her wrists in his hands. He lifted her straight up into the air, while also pulling down to let her slim form fall into him.
She was screaming denials and depredations at him and Ender both, but that was largely muffled when he closed his jaws over her frightened, angry face, leaving just her arms sticking straight up in the air, waiting to be slurped down.
Something Ethan did quite promptly, and that was the end of Kate.
Once the vengeful girl was turned into a wildly wriggling bulge, the naga wrapped his arms around Ender. “Thank you! She tortured me for like an hour!!” Urp --That’s what she deserves! Anyways, what did you need me fo--”
“WHAT IS IT?” Slee shouted, a tad worried, bursting into the room. But her help was no longer needed.
“Ethan, who did you even eat?”
“Uh, one of your guests, urp,” Ethan replied.
“Huh, okay, neat. Wanna play truth or dare with us?” Slee asked. “What had Ender been so panicked about?”
“Heck yeah!!” He let Ender go, but wanted to do one last thing before heading out of his room
“Fist bump? I only do this with really cool people.” He presented his clenched fist.
Ender couldn’t break Bro Code there, he smacked Ethan’s proffered fist; whatever could be said about Ender’s human frailty, he had hard knuckles.
“So I can help save a pred with no fear, except disappointing Slee is frightening as hell.” He shook his head, bemused. “Holy shit, this is an intense party, Slee,” he observed.
Ender followed the naga siblings back to the living room. He stepped over the multiple slithering tails a few times, but then giving up he jumped on Slee’s like a mobile walkway in an airport. He tried holding his balance against the back and forth slithering motion.
Slee turned her head nearly 180° to face Ender. She raised an eyebrow and shrugged, Ethan chuckled a bit at the scene.
Ender managed on the swishing tail pretty well, though he nearly fell when Slee gave him that look, which seemed to fall somewhere between “What the hell do you think you are doing?” and “You realize you are the only human alive who has lived through even attempting something so hyperbolically stupid/insane.”
“Number of people who’ve surfed naga tail and lived?” His immediate guess: “ZERO”.
Once they got back to the living room, Ethan slithered by Slee, snatching Ender off her tail with his own yellow tail.
The girls sat down again. By now, they seemed to accept Ender a little more and were willing to include him in the game, it could be fun.
Ender felt the familiar, insistent pull of one of the Thering family nagas wanting him close. Giving over to it, and figuring there are things humans get choices about, and naga hugs were not among them, he found himself loosely imprisoned, sitting between Ethan and Slee.
Kelly’s decidedly musical voice at odds with her near draconic appearance sounded through the room. “Are we ready?”
Slee nodded enthusiastically. Ethan did as well.
“Who goes first then?” Kelly asked.
Ender looked around the room, estimating that recent events had elevated him in all their eyes in some way. He probably wasn’t safe from their hunger on all occasions, but he had gained some… “What would you call it? ‘Pred cred’? Yeah, I should probably wait a while before mentioning that idea to Slee,” he decided.
“Can someone else go? I feel like that last round didn’t go normally.” Ender waited patiently for their decision. “I could change my battle tag to NagaSurfer01. Yeah… Riiighht, I’d live through that.” He chuckled distractedly
“Alright, I’ll start,” said Gwen the fox, shifting her position on the couch slightly before looking around the room. “Slee, truth or dare?”
“Uh, truth,” the naga replied with an innocent looking smile.
“Have you ever wanted to eat Ender?”
“Err-- Well… Only once, when I first saw him.” Ender knew that himself, which is why she didn’t have too much of a problem giving the answer. Though, still, she shot a glare at Gwen.
Ender looked at Slee more than a bit thoughtfully, all thoughts of the game of truth or dare fading into the background. He was remembering being stickily deposited on a bathroom bench. A girl’s bathroom bench.
“Why was the girls’ bathroom so much cleaner than the boys? It really hadn’t been even tempting.” If she was telling the truth it was pretty amazing to him.
Slee noticed Ender’s glance and looked back at him with a small, slightly awkward smile.
“Okay, let’s see… Kelly! Truth or dare?” Slee asked, moving her coils a bit.
“Dare!” Kelly responded.
“I dare you to--” she did the ‘give me a sec’ gesture with her hand and barfed up that guy’s wand. Apparently she had swallowed it at some point. “--Break this in half!”
Kelly shrugged, stood up, grabbed the thing and tried as hard as she could. That… was definitely a weird request, but Slee thought it’d be mildly amusing.
Ender watched Kelly attempt to break the tiny stick. “Have you ever broken one?” he asked Ethan, marveling that the gator was even coming close to having a hard time with the tiny wand. He remembered the old man, making him punch and kick through boards. At some point, it became clear the stick was not breaking.
“Ah,” Ender said to the group, snapping out of his reverie. “I think I kind of get it.” This seemed like mostly a big sleepover game for groups of friends, no wonder he hadn’t heard of it, he’d never slept over at a friend’s house.
Kelly kept trying, but she still couldn’t quite do it. “Are these things sealed with magic? Ugh--” she was just about to give up.
Ethan shrugged. “Don’t know, maybe you can give breaking it a try, Ender?” Meanwhile, Ethan’s stomach gurgled and groaned quite happily, as Kate struggled in vain.
Kelly heard Ethan, then looked at Ender. “Do you think you can actually break this? I mean, no offense but we’re predators, that means we’re kinda stronger than you.” She didn’t sound condescending, just matter of fact.
Ender considered the wand seriously, if he was going to make a serious attempt at this… “Hmmm.” He eyed the wand more closely. “Can one of you hold this on, like, some bricks, so it can’t flex or move easily?”
He had stopped breaking bricks and wood because… well it just wasn’t that relevant to fighting. Breaking hard things wasn’t as important as being a hard thing. He looked up at the gang of predators.
“Maybe outside in the garden, where I can’t do damage to Mrs. Thering’s house,” he added. He thought of the big naga who had barely spoken to him in much the same way as these guys initially.
“I’ll chop it and cast propero at the same time then maybe?” he planned. “What do you say, Ethan? Let me up?” It would be pretty cool to impress these guys.
They definitely weren’t against the idea. Matter of fact, they were all pretty interested in finding out how this would go.
Ethan gladly allowed Ender to get up and slithered around him, while Slee made her way to the backyard. She too was curious to find out whether Ender would impress them or embarrass himself in front of them.
The other girls followed behind, talking to each other somewhat quietly, occasionally glancing at Ender and snickering.
Ender stacked 4 bricks on each end of the wand, brick wand brick. He adopted a stance, feet more than shoulder-width apart. In his mind he took the time to focus that actual combat would never give him. His tiny spark of magic; he didn’t clench tightly to that tiny spark, he blew it into a roaring flame, imagining the word “propero” as an ax hitting the wood.
“They probably think I look dumb as hell sitting here like some kind of retarded monk.” But he put that out of his mind as well.
He poured all his feelings about the two human preds he’d met into that rising fire of a spell, till it almost hurt to contain it. To this he added Slee’s smiling naga face and memories of his times with Ethan. He opened his eyes, and declared, “Propero!!.”
The wand broke… It was the least dramatic thing ever… Also, unimportant really, since one of the Thering family garden’s juniper bushes and a few lilies were now 30 feet in the air, with a new three-foot trench below them.
The group of predators was at least a little impressed when the wand broke, but of course that wasn’t the focus of their attention. A couple gasps could have been heard as the dirt and flowers were blown into the air.
Their eyes glanced up, then back down when all that stuff landed, then at Ender. At first, silence.
“Holy fuck,” he thought turning to Slee and company. “Holy fuck,” he said, a stupid, bewildered look on his dirt covered face as even more dirt began to rain down on him in little particles. Why would nagas even have nice gardens!? At length the dirt stopped falling. “Uh… so, I guess I might owe your mom some gardening?” He looked up at Slee, his blue-hazel eyes shining from a face that desperately needed to be washed. The plants landed around him like broken toys.
“Ender,” Slee began, slithering a little closer to him, “that was… Awesome!”
“Yeah! You broke the stick and had enough strength for that too?!” Ethan added.
The other girls also seemed impressed.
“I thought this guy sucked at magic. I mean, he probably didn’t mean to do THAT, but still, cool,” Trina the lizard girl thought to herself. The others probably had similar words forming in their heads.
“And, uh, don’t worry about this! I’ll just ask Ethan to clean up.” Slee smirked at her little brother.
“Hey!” The younger snake narrowed his eyes and hissed quietly. Then he laughed, and one after the other, the other preds chuckled and giggled as well.
All things considered, the party had been pretty great.
Ender was kind of brushing himself off, resisting the urge to wipe his face and smear the damp gardening loam into his skin.
He looked at Ethan smiling. “Sorry, dude.” Then, to all of them, “I couldn’t do that without prep time like that.”
“I have dirt in places dirt shouldn’t be.” He felt the loam under his clothes and in his ears and nose.
He bumped fists with Ethan, and said to Slee, “I’m going to go wash off at my house I think, happy birthday again.” And then to the others, “See ya guys, nice meeting you.” Ender sprinted across the park, which had become a habit, on the way to his house.
Gwen and Slee’s friends looked on, watching the retreating figure of Ender. “That is an interesting human you’ve found for yourself there, Slee,” Gwen commented.
Slee nodded. “Yeah he’s different.” She smiled.