Content
He sat there with his signature expression: wide, innocent eyes fixed firmly with curiosity and interest. His unnaturally natural light shone bright, glistening off the walls of slime-coated muscle draped around him. The object of his attention was clearly illuminated.
It was, to put it in less-than-glamorous terms, a carcass. Of some rather small creature, with hard, protective plating covering most of what Toby could see of its body. But much more to the point, and much more of interest to the little boy, this creature, roughly half his size, was a meal. It was a meal stewing in his sibling’s belly.
And Toby had a front row seat. Also, a stick.
The stomach walls rolled again. A large, distinctive wave ran through the glistening folds, starting from behind him, pressing in tight against him, before passing him by to travel the length of the chamber in front of him. It passed over the meal as well, squeezing it, pushing it at first farther from him, and then closer again as the contraction reached the far end.
The carcass came to rest nearly between his legs along with a drawn-out wave of chyme. Toby reached out with his stick again and poked it, marveling. It definitely felt softer that time. Yes, definitely! His prodding nudged it back to the center of the chamber, just a short distance away, where he again waited for the next wave of contractions to wash over him and his temporary companion.
He’d been watching the process for quite some minutes now. He’d gone in diligently after this fresh catch- him and his trusty, newly-acquired stick, which luckily hadn’t snapped inside his kin’s tight-squeezing gullet. That hard skin this creature had, which seemed almost like strange, big dragon scales, had definitely been pretty hard before. It had felt almost like he was poking his stick at a rock. But now it kinda bent a little, like wood that had been out in the rain too long.
Maybe it’s just my stick? Toby wondered. After all, it had been in this stomach the whole time too, so it was also being digested.
Another wave rolled through, mixing and squeezing all the food within. The steady, methodical movements of a stomach at work, accompanied by all the familiar sloshes and gurgles.
The meal washed up toward him again, and once again Toby diligently poked it with his stick. No, he could see it that time. Definitely. When he poked that big scale, it squished and bent a little. It was getting softer.
He continued to watch, as intent as ever, the little sounds of his breathing filling the gaps between lapping liquids, a constant steady heartbeat, and the much louder, fuller sounds of air rushing in and out of his sibling’s nearby lungs as the dragon rested.
The contractions rolled through again, and he poked the meal back into place. The stomach walls squeezed again, and again he diligently prodded with his stick. Another in an endless line of contractions washed over him and then the stewing meal, and once again as it washed back in his direction he raised his little stick and gave it a firm poke.
But then something happened. That particular scaley plate broke loose. It fell away and slipped softly into the murky chyme with a quiet plop. And as it went, it nudged against other nearby bits of tough armor, which in turn nudged against others, and several came loose and slid softly away into the stew.
Toby could see now that most of the creature itself had already been dissolved. The acids had eaten their way up from below, and dripped in from above, and leaked in from the sides, and melted away at the meat inside, the important bits that his sibling’s growing body would need for food. The bits of hard protection that were left were more like an empty shell now, like a hollow, cracked egg.
Another squishing wave passed over the boy. He watched as it reached what remained of the digesting meal. The bits that were left collapsed in on each other. There were burbles and glorps as the still solid plates trapped bubbles of air with them as they were squelched below the rising chyme. One or two quiet little cracks could just be heard over the gentle rush of the mixing stomach contents.
And then the wave passed, and the creature was all but gone. Some small mass floated, mostly submerged, where it had been, and tiny bits were still recognizable, but it hardly resembled an animal anymore. Now it was just more of what Toby had come to know. A particularly thick bit of this familiar soup that filled the bellies of his family and helped them grow.
Toby looked down at the opaque slop surrounding him, covering most of his legs. He brought a hand through it and up toward his face, watching it run off him. He marveled at what this stuff could do, how big and strong his family’s stomachs were, and felt once again how special he was. He pressed backward into the slick folds, snuggling in a bit tighter as if to thank the belly around him for letting him stay and watch. He smiled and his light shone just a tad brighter, as the belly groaned and burbled around him.