As usual, the dinner was out of this world. Literally and metaphorically. It’s Sundance Piglin Stew that originated from the planet Promethea, Cassius and Callum’s homeworld. It was a treat for them because their birthday is coming next week and they’ll turn 20.
After dinner, Ray was supposed to load all the dishes to the dishwasher when the twins suggested that they do it since Ray cooked the wonderful meal for them. Ray liked washing dishes but the thing in the Conservatory is a lot better so, with a smile, he thanked the twins and went on his way.
Chip was already in the Conservatory when Ray got in. He’s watering the tree and by the sound, the tree is making, it likes it. The thrumming organ inside is hushed and the hums sound like the cooing of a kitten. It’s like a baby animal when you come to imagine it.
“So, let me get this straight one more time. You want your soul sucked again?” Chip asked.
“Yes, but there’s more.”
“What is it?”
“I’ll say it after the tree did its thing. Now, where’s the sucker?”
“Sucker? You’re calling it a sucker? That’s kinda gay.”
“It sucks souls. It’s a sucker. And you’re the gay founder of this tree. Sucker is a perfect name.”
Chip groaned.
“I placed a chair below the ‘sucker’” Chip air-quoted, “So I won’t need to drag your body and break my back. You’re far heavier than the sacks of fertilizer I carry in our farm.”
“First off, ouch. Second, enough talk and show me the ‘sucker’” Ray air-quoted sarcastically.
Ray sat by the chair and wore the sucker like before. The tree grumbled and one minute later, the tree spat out his body and his soul is stuck in the transparent tree trunk. Ray called on to Chip, who sprayed a window washing liquid on the surface and washed it off.
“So are you happy that you’re stuck in there?” Chip asked.
“No, but I’m about to be. It’s your turn to wear the sucker.”
“What!? You want me to get stuck with you in there?”
“You won’t get stuck in here. I promise.”
“How would you know? The tree magically told you how to operate it?”
“Yes,”
“Wait, what?”
“Yes, the tree did say that you won’t get stuck in here. With me.”
“And you thought I was the crazy guy pranking you this afternoon.”
“Just wear the damn thing and see.”
“N-O. No. I don’t do something just because the tree told you.”
“I’m going to cook you an Apple Pie after this,”
“Where’s the hell is the sucker!?”
“He- works every time,”
Chip pushed Ray’s lifeless body on a chair to the left while he positioned himself underneath the sucker. He relaxed his shoulders, kept his posture straight and with shaking hands, he placed the sucker in his head. It was bright inside, the light from the polyp flooded the innards of the sucker surface. Then the light flickered and circled him. The seams of the sucker tightened its hold and a pressure pulled high into the air. In an instant, everything went bright. Chip closed his eyes but the light managed to seep through his eyelids. His heartbeat rushed and for a moment, he felt himself syncing with the heartbeat of the tree. His hold on his body dissipated starting from his legs. He couldn’t feel them anymore and the loss of feeling crept higher into his body. Until all that was left is the conscious feeling of his existence. And that too got ripped out of his physical body and sucked into a system of tubed until, for a moment, he felt something warm caress through his surface. It wasn’t a regular warmth that you could feel with just your skin. It was something else. It was more innate, a feeling to be exact. This feeling washed over him until the vestiges of this warm sensation left him, leaving him in the dark glassy surface of the tree. Chip looked around and he felt constrained and smalled as if he was a helpless child. In front of him is the wide view of the outside world. Above is the beating heart of the tree. He could feel its rhythm as if it was his own heart.
“Ray?” Chip called out. He expected that he would be here, in the darkness of the trunk. But he was gone, and he was the only one in here. “Ray!?”
“I’m here,” Chip heard. It wasn’t Ray’s voice. It’s a voice he recognizes but he couldn’t pinpoint who it belongs to. “I’m here,”
Chip looked outside and saw Chip's lifeless body still hanging on its chair. But wait. His body, it’s nowhere to be found.
“BOO!” A figure suddenly preyed at the glass surface. Chip couldn’t believe what he’s seeing. It’s his body moving without his command. It’s his breathing, living, smiling, flexing body moving on its own.
“Ray!?” Chip said, “Is that you?”
“Who else would it be?” Ray smiled. He twirled around and with a swift movement of his hand, he undressed his apron and ship attire. “Damn man, I didn’t know you’re dense under these clothes. Fuck! You’re strong. Carrying sacks of dirt and cow shit have its perks doesn’t it?”
“Hey! Stop doing that?” Seeing his body flex is just surreal. Seeing it move is already weird as it is.
“Stop doing what? Doing this,”
Ray busted his lean pecs and made them bounce.
“How the hell are you doing that? I don’t even know how to do that?”
“It’s all in here,” Ray tapped his forehead. “Anyway, are you enjoying yourself in there?”
“If you call seeing your body tease enjoyment, then yes. But actually no. Get me back to my own body and we’ll sort this out. I can’t even begin to process this.”
“You don’t need to process when you can look at this,” Ray unbuckled his belt and splaying his bare crotch into the wind. “Holy shit! I didn’t expect it to be this big. Last time we bathed together, I was bigger than you are.”
In front of Chip was his smooth, uncut and shaven 8-inch flaccid dick. With his diminutive form, the rod of flesh is a humongous thing dangling like an angler in front of him. If he wasn’t constrained here, he could already imagine himself giving that thing a blow job. Oh god. What is he thinking? Blow Job is own dick? There’s auto-fellatio for that but what he’s imagining is different. Very different.
“We were children and you measured our dicks while I’m flaccid and you’re hard. Now get me back to my body and stop before you do what I’m thinking.”
Ray smiled.
“You’re not going to stop are you?”
Ray nodded disapprovingly while retaining the smiling mockery of Chip's youthful face. “The moment the tree told me how it works, I already had this little fantasy cooked up” Ray grabbed a handful of the glowing polyps and squeezed the everliving juices out of them. He rubbed the natural lube around the shaft, giving it a faint yellow glow and a slick reflection from the lights above.
“You’re sick, get me out.”
“Ah ah ah… I’ll get you out, once I finish doing my thing.”
Chip thought that Ray would just masturbate with his body but when Ray pushed his old body on the floor and stripped it naked, he knew his expectations were wrong.
Ray laid with his old body side by side and admired its sleeping figure. The view of his own body was indeed strange, like a living reflection viewed from a different angle. It’s him but not him right now. He wonders if his body is dreaming or there’s nothing inside. But one thing’s for sure and that is Ray realized that he has a thing for his old body. This attraction, this feeling inside him, was it truly him that was the source. Ray knew he is no narcissist but the feeling does not lie. His heartbeat is racing and his dick is starting to go hard. Ray looked at the tree trunk and asked, “Do you like me?”
“Ho- Why are you asking?” It’s true. He did not like Ray romantically per se. But when he started cooking half-naked two years ago on a mid-summer day, there’s this itching feeling brewing inside of him. It made him hard and it would take another year for him to realize what’s happening. Chip is attracted to Ray. How he looked, how his sweat glistens in the reflection of the kitchen light. He liked how he smiled, how his subtle muscles become defined underneath the thin clothes he would sometimes wear. He’s attracted to his body. Fuck. Even without a body, Chip could feel himself going red from embarrassment. “Okay, I am attracted to you. I guess my body kind of remembered it. Like a muscle memory.
“Whoa,” Ray said. “And here I thought I’m just going to fulfill my self-fuck fantasy. We’ll get back to that after I’m done with this.”
Ray ran his hand through the chest of his old body and felt the steady rise and fall of its chest. He was bigger than Chip but mostly due to a slow fat he built these few years. Ray turned around and sat on his body’s stomach. His body looked cute from this view. It slept like an angel with its pink-colored bangs shying his eyes from view. He lowered his head and began to take a nip at its nipple. It tasted like flesh but the smell coming from this proximity is filling him. It’s invigorating him and making him more erotic. As he was busy biting his flesh, Ray’s lubed left hand began scouting the innards of his old body’s ass. It’s warm inside and it squirms in an undefined pattern.
“Oh yeah…” Ray mentioned.
“Oh for fuck's sake, you’re just going to fuck your own lifeless body? -”