Withania pays a visit to a different kind of bakery intending to try the special offers - and ends up being one of them. CW: Soft Vore
The problem with being a baker who eats most of their clientele is eventually someone would notice a lot of missing ponies – that's why Mulberry Tart has a rather unique solution involving reformation and short-term memory erasure. The problem is, she can't resist her new customer Withania, and after a few rounds Withania is catching onto her tricks.
Contains: Vore, soft-digestion, absorption I guess. Does not contain Scat.
She squirmed, bound by something she could feel but not identify. She was enclosed in something soft, warm, and slimy. She felt like she should panic, but she didn’t seem to be in urgent danger, and if anything it felt nice. She was wrapped up and being massaged by constant and gentle movement, slowly being compressed and molded into a round shape, her fore and hind legs being pressed into each other until they–
Withania’s eyes snapped open, her body jolting into the waking world with a start. The duvet had tangled up around her legs, restricting her movement and overheating her. The earth pony carefully unravelled the sheets and starfished out on the bed to stretch her cramped muscles.
What a strange dream, she thought, Where was I? What was happening?
It had felt pleasant enough, but it seemed odd to take pleasure in such a strange and unknown sensation.
Donning her saddlebags she left the house to make her rounds, delivering herbs to the cafes, and collecting other resources to maintain the greenhouses. She was a botanist by trade and had greenhouses to attend to today, and the sooner she completed the manual labour, the sooner she could sit down with a book about plants or magic and a herbal tea. She liked books about magic as despite being an earth pony, her mother was a unicorn and Withania felt the stir of magic inside her, and wanted to use it in her gardening, if only indirectly.
As she passed the bakery on the end of Mane Street the owner stood outside, setting up an easel to hold a special offer sign.
“Free samples on everything Maple and Pecan today!” called out the pink unicorn with a bright smile, waving to Withania, “Drop by later perhaps? Before they’re all gone!”
Withania waved back but didn’t reply. She felt a strange sense of deja vu seeing the baker, that long flowing mane tied loosely on both sides that made her slightly jealous. But Withania had certainly never met her. Without stopping she cantered on to make her deliveries. She was partial to maple and pecan pastries, pecan pie, and pecans in general. She would stop by on her way home and treat herself, she thought. Visit somewhere new as well.
Her delivery rounds took Withania into the afternoon, and having not stopped to eat at lunch time it was with a salivating mouth that she poked her head around the door of the bakery.
“Hello?” he she called, tip toeing in. She wasn’t sure why she was sneaking around, this was a public shop after all.
“Ah!” came the voice of the baker, appearing in the kitchen doorway with a beaming smile, “You’ve come to sample my treats after all, miss…?”
“Withania Nightshade,” replied the earth pony, “And yes, you made them sound very enticing this morning… I hope I’m not too late, it almost looks like you’re winding down?”
“Not at all! It’s Mulberry, by the way, Mulberry Tart. Lovely to eat you – ahem, meet you sorry! Take a seat, let me get you some fresh samples - I’ve been making them fresh all day!”
Withania cooed at the thought of fresh pastries, her stomach rumbling and the saliva taps back on in her mouth. She watched Mulberry perform a lap of the display counters in a practised motion. The pink unicorn was noticeably padded on the flanks - which made sense, thought Withania, since if she were a baker making food that smelt this good she’d probably have trouble staying trim as well. It was a good sign.
“Okay! Let’s get started!” said Mulberry excitedly, sliding a tray onto the table with one hoof, and sliding a plait pastry into Withania’s mouth with the other, “I want to leave a lasting impression with you that’ll make you want to tell all of your friends about my business!”
There was an odd, almost practised tone to the way she said this line, but the earth pony was too distracted by food to really think about it.
Withania munched down the pastry in order to clear her mouth, and before she could do anything else another one was put in her hand.
“Oh, thank you!” she said, taking a bite out of it.
“A drink to wash it down?” asked Mulberry, “Juice, Tea?”
“Mmmpff, Chi please!” mumbled Withania.
Mulberry proceed to tell Withania all about her baking process in great mouthwatering detail, while her patron rhythmically alternated between eating pastries or tarts and drinking the complementary dark tea. She only intended to come in for one or two, but while entranced by Mulberry’s captivating performance she slowly cleared most of the tray in front of her.
“And that’s how I get that little bit of bite in the pastry without it being too crunchy or too doughy!” concluded the baker, taking note of Withania’s progress.
“Amazing!” said Withania, liking her lips and finishing her tea, “Phew… I’m stuffed. I’m so sorry- I didn’t mean to hog all of these, they’re just so good and I accidently kept eating! Let me give you some bits for all of this…”
But Mulberry waved her words away;
“No no, they’re all samples! I insist. In fact,” she said, turning toward the kitchen entrance, “Let me give you something for the road - or when you get home - it’ll be ready to serve right about now. Come and see…”
Having just been educated on the wonders of baking Withania was all too eager to see where the magic happened and didn’t hesitate to get up and follow, now feeling distinctly padded around the midriff herself.
“After you…” offered the baker politely, inviting her guest to go first.
Withania looked around eagerly, noting the ovens and cookers and racks of dishes for all manner of pies or muffins or cakes and more. In front of her was a central countertop upon which had been placed a baking tray of exquisitely decorated tarts, beautifully bronze with a syrup glaze and a dark chocolate curl in the centre. She put her forehooves on the edge of the counter to get a closer look, subconsciously swishing her tail behind her.
Without warning a pair of pink and surprisingly strong forelegs wrapped around her middle, pinning her own forelegs against her chest, and her entire head enveloped in something warm, humid, and pulsing.
Withania wanted to shriek in surprise, or fight the iron grip - but she was so busy trying to straighten her hind legs and not fall over that before she could do any of these things she was enclosed down to her shoulders, surrounded by the sound of squelching alternating with rushing breath, the pulse of blood pumping, and– moaning?
She’s eating me! thought Withania, the penny dropping, and suddenly a confusing flashback of last night’s dream flashed back into her mind.
Mulberry meanwhile found her surprise attack going swimmingly well. She had opted for the big first gulp in order to get control of her victim’s head, but was now able to take her time. Attacking from behind was always slightly awkward because the prey had to bend over backwards going down, but it did make the initial attack very easy. It also gave ample opportunity to dig her hooves into the pudge she’d loaded onto Withania’s belly for that satisfying preview of what was about to enter her mouth.
Half way down her host’s throat, Withania squeaked incoherently, quite unsure of what to do about her predicament. Her full stomach tipping upside down made her feel queasy for a moment, her front hooves were pinned at her sides by the rippling walls of Mulberry's throat, and her hind legs were bending backwards to support her.
Her predator soon took the decision on how to react out of her control however - Mulberry took another huge gulp, moving down to Withania’s abdomen and sat down so that the earth pony was almost on her back.
Mulberry paused for a moment, and then with a grunt tilted her body back, lifting the bottom half of her prey’s body into the air above her, eliciting another yelp from inside.
Her recently augmented weight now working against her, Withania felt herself descending steadily downwards, assisted by steady undulations around her. She felt wrapped up, cocooned in a warm wet sausage that stretched but hugged her tightly - and also a strange sense of weightlessness as she was now suspended off of the ground, supported on all sides except for her legs that twitched in the comparatively cold air outside.
She managed to get her breathing under control and found that she was falling into rhythm with her captor, whose body expanded and pulsed steadily all around her. The vibrations of Mulberry moaning in pleasure resonated into her core.
The slow, downward motion paused for a moment as the obstruction of Withania’s rump entered Mulberry’s mouth - but the predator was clearly practised at this, and with another huge gulp, the widest part of the earth pony entered the salivating jaws. With nothing left to slow her descent, Withania now slipped all the way down to her destination in the baker’s belly.
Falling into a pile of her limbs, mane and tail, Withania twisted about to right herself. The stomach walls around her were soft and spongy, but also slick with fluids so that she naturally came to rest at her center of balance, like a ball in a swimming pool. But there was no time to be relieved at the movement space, as Mulberry celebrated her victory with a booming belch, and with a sudden rush of escaping air the enclosing sack that trapped Withania hugged her even more tightly.
“Oh,” moaned Mulberry, her voice resonating from somewhere above, “oooh the taste of magic. Half unicorn ponies, without the horn. I should’ve thought of this years ago…”
Withania was still trying to find some kind of footing without slipping onto her back again, but her movement seemed to be succeeding only in covering herself with the pooling liquids around her. The slow massaging movement around her struck into Withania’s memory again, as she was slowly mushed about in the belly of the beast, stomach fluids squelching around her. She saw this in alarm, but didn’t seem to be in any discomfort. If anything they seemed to be soaking into her skin like a salve or cream. She experimentally pressed her front hooves together to find that they were softening, becoming malleable.
“Aaaah… I’m glad I taste good but uh… Maybe I could pay you those bits after all?” suggested Withania in a shaky voice.
“Don’t worry dear,” replied her prison, “I’ve already gotten my money’s worth I can assure you! Let me make you more comfortable…”
At this Mulberry sat up and twisted onto her front, holding herself up for a moment and then slouching down onto her belly.
Inside, Withania found herself righted by the movement, and then a great weight compressed her between a flat surface below that must’ve been the floor of the kitchen and the not inconsequential weight of Mulberry. The sudden press, followed by slow and deliberate rocking motions began to press Withania’s limbs into each other, and she suddenly panicked and gasped for the lacking air before passing out.
“Whoops,” remarked Mulberry, feeling her victim go suddenly limp, “Maybe that was a bit fast for you…”
Not that it mattered, thought the pink unicorn. As nice as it was to have a wriggler in the belly, she didn’t need her victim to be conscious to savour the flavour and the feeling.
And by Celestia what a feeling, the warming and almost slightly tingling sensation of another’s magic inside of her! Unicorns had a truly unique and delectable flavour, but the magical horn made eating them inconvenient as best and dangerous at worst. Mulberry had managed it in the past, but they definitely weren’t worth the hassle.
Mulberry laboriously got up and teetered back and forth to make her gloriously sagging belly sway, loving the sensation of its contents being almost heavier than she was. And of course, having a steadily softening pony curled up in there, ready to take a trip to all the best places on her body.
It was by chance she’d learned that the fern-coloured earth pony that cultivated herbs and other useful plants had a unicorn for a mother, and as a result apparently had especially potent earth pony magic in her. The flavour wasn’t quite as strong as proper full-fat Unicorn, but the ease of devouring Withania was well worth the trade-off.
All that was left now was to take a leisurely walk home and perform her digestion rites spell, which itself was a desert of pleasure. The spell would magically siphon off the eaten pony and restore them body and mind at whatever they considered home, which solved the issue of Mulberry not taking on more weight than she could handle, and then a little memory magic mixed in ensured that her victims awoke in the morning none the wiser to what had happened to them.
Little Withania was fortunate, or perhaps for her unfortunate, enough to be so tasty that today was the second time that Mulberry had tempted her back to her kitchen. It had been worth it, but in order not to test her own good fortunes she would have to ignore the delicious gardner for a while so as not to arouse suspicions.
In the midst of a dream, she felt fluid. She swirled as if she were caught in a whirlpool, yet she was the water. She took the shape of her container, which swayed and rippled, and caressed her. It was pleasant, but confusing. Her brain wanted to understand what was happening, but her body just wanted to enjoy it.
Withania snapped awake, breathing heavily and once again tangled up in the bed sheets. She’d had that crazy dream again, about being eaten- only this time that unicorn baker from town had swallowed her! She hadn’t even been to that bakery.
She shook her head to shake the memory of the dream, and to get her fuzzy mane behind her head and not in her face.
This is crazy, she thought, I need to check that there’s nothing funky in the green houses giving me these weird dreams.
Withania spent the dwindling remainder of the morning in one of the two green houses behind her house, watering plants, taking trimmings, and planting new saplings to replace the ones she had sold. Her mind kept wandering off of her work, thinking morbid thoughts of being dominated and controlled and used to the fullest extent possible.
A spattering sound woke her from her reverie as the plant pot she was preparing overflowed with water. She gasped and put the watering can down. The plant required a fairly fine mix of sand and soil, which under the torrent of water had turned into a viscous slurry.
Withania poked a sapling cane into the pot and stirred it, eliciting a wet squelching noise that made her ears subconsciously twitch.
That’s probably not far off what I looked like… melted down, reduced, ready to be absorbed into the…
“Stop it,” she aloud to the rows of other pots judging her, “What is wrong with me this week?”
She needed to distract herself, she thought. Get out the garden and do something different.
“I’ll go to that bakery!” she declared to the silent plants around her, “Just a normal bakery. I’ll get myself something nice, come home for some tea and reading, and forget about these weird confusing dreams. It’ll be fine.”
With decision came action, and the earth pony shrugged off the tool belt around her neck before leaving the greenhouse, sliding the glass door closed behind her.
Walking into town without her saddlebags and cool breeze in her mane cleared her mind somewhat. It was nice to be off-the-clock and not need to worry about the rest of the day.
“Hello?” called out Withania, leaning around the bakery door.
A well-curved pink Unicorn sat behind the counter leaning on one elbow and looking up at the clock. She nearly fell off of her stool in surprise as the gardner appeared in the doorway.
“Ah! Welcome to Mulberry’s Bakery! I’m Mulberry!” she blurted out automatically, and then seeing who her customer was, narrowed her eyes in concern. “Oh- it’s you…”
“Yes…” said Withania self-consciously brushing her mane behind her face, “I meant to come in yesterday, but I must’ve fallen asleep early and forgot. Are you still serving Maple and Pecan specials?”
Mulberry stared at the earth pony in disbelief, not sure if she had been rumbled or if her favourite flavour of the year had just walked back into her bakery of their own volition.
“I sure do…” she said slowly, “Let me get you some tea as well.”
Mulberry backed through the kitchen door, keeping up her smile, and then threw together an assortment tray along with a teapot.
This earth pony must have some one-track-mind, she thought, To keep coming back despite me flashing her short-term memory. Maybe I should’ve upped the spell strength to account for her magic…
Withania took a seat at one of the tables and looked around at the displays and menus that adorned the walls. She suddenly frowned as she realised that the bakery looked exactly like it had in her dream- yet she had never been in here before.
“One special tray for my special guest!” said Mulberry brightly, sliding a tea party in front of Withania, “I recommend that one first, let me pour some tea for you!”
Withania picked up the nearest pastry and took a mouthful, and her dejavu suddenly doubled as the taste brought back her crazy dream.
“Did I come here yesterday?” she asked the baker, staring at the tray in front of her in confusion.
Uh oh, thought Mulberry. She could pounce now, but the table was in the way and she’d likely miss on the first try, then there’d probably be a tussel. Mulberry was no light-weight, but her prey was an earth pony who clearly got her exercise and would likely be able to escape- or even overpower her. Or she could do something even more reckless, but with an even bigger reward…
“Perhaps you dreamt it?” she suggested slyly, picking up one of the mini tarts and popping it into her mouth.
“It’s funny you should say that… I was having a very strange dream. And also the night before last too…”
“Maybe you still are,” prompted Mulberry. She had been ready to ignite a very bright flash from her horn at a moment’s notice - a trick to distract or even stun another pony to help her gain the advantage - but she decided to try something else. She focused her concentration on her memory spell- not the full incantation she usually used to wipe out an evening, but she enough to fuddle her patron.
This wasn’t a tactic she normally employed, but she was sensing something very uncommon from Withania, a morbid fascination, perhaps even a hidden longing for what Mulberry could offer.
“You know those dreams when you wake up and fall asleep again halfway through them?” she said, as the earth pony’s eyes shifted in and out of focus under her spell.
Withania chuckled nervously, eating the rest of the pastry she had almost out of compulsion, “If that’s true then this is about to get really weird…”
“Why don’t you tell me about it?” said Mulberry in sultry tones. She started getting up slowly as she spoke, carefully lowering her magic so she could use her horn to flip the lock on the front door, followed by closing the window blinds.
“I can’t it’s too embarrassing…” replied Withania, staring off into space while picking up another pastry out of habit. She felt distant and unable to focus - maybe this was still a dream. It would certainly explain a lot…
“Was it about being somewhere soft and warm?” prompted Mulberry, leading on her prey, “Giving yourself to something else entirely…”
Withania’s breathing was quite audible at this point, as she started imagining things again while slowly and deliberately swallowing. Mulberry had moved around the table so she was behind the earth pony now, and could whisper sweet nothings into her ears.
“Did you… like it?”
Withania’s ear twitched.
Unbelievable, thought Mulberry, marvelling at her luck, She’s into it! She doesn’t know it, but she’s into it!
“Y… yes,” admitted Withania in a tiny voice.
“Let’s let this dream run its course then, shall we?” suggested Mulberry, gentle placing one hoof on Withania’s flank with a reassuring press, “Harmless fun. Pleasure. Do you want it?”
Withania nodded slowly, looking down at the hoof touching her.
Mulberry wasn’t sure how committed Withania was to the idea that she was dreaming, but she only had to keep it up for a little bit longer and then it wouldn’t matter anymore. Although this ‘roleplay’ was taking her to new places, a prey who was subconsciously willing. Not throwing herself down Mulberry’s throat, but doing nothing to resist. It was giving Mulberry all kinds of new ideas.
“Get on the table. Lay on your back,” ordered the pink unicorn, softly. She magicked the tray onto the counter where it was nearby but out of the way, and with a bit of a reach she levitated a saucepan from the kitchen- filled with fresh maple syrup.
Withania pushed herself up onto the table and twisted onto her back. She felt ridiculous, but the promise of that strange pleasure she’d previously felt was fiercely calling to her, a strange primal urge that made her dismiss her concerns.
I don’t care, she told her common sense, This must be a dream, I don’t care how real it seems, there’s no other explanation why this mare would act like this.
She didn’t want to say to herself ‘why this mare wants to eat me’ - she knew it, but she didn’t want to say it. Not even in her mind.
“We’re doing a special offer on maple and pecan treats this week,” said Mulberry, standing at Withania’s feet, “Aren’t they delicious?”
She magicked another pecan tart from the tray and lowered it into Withania’s mouth, who automatically opened wide to accept it.
“Let me show you how I make the plaits,” continued the baker, now levitating the syrup.
She hovered it over the laying pony’s head and, giving her plenty of time to see what was about to happen, poured a trickle into her mouth. She paused so Withania could taste and swallow, and then in a zigzag pattern generously poured the entire pot out over the barrel of Withania’s chest.
“And now come the pecans…” she continued, grabbing a nearby bag from the counter. This time she started from low down, gently shaking the bag so the buttery flavoured fruit fell between Withania’s hind legs, then across her chest, and finally her head and mane, sticking everywhere the syrup had landed, slowly oozing down her sides.
Withania raised one foreleg to look at the glaze on it, and experimentally brought her hoof to her mouth.
“Now,” asked Mulberry, crossing her legs to contain her desires, “Are you delicious?”
“Mmmmm,” mumbled Withania, lifting her head to look down her pastel coloured body, where a pair of hungry eyes and licking lips awaited her.
“In that case I’d better taste test. Keep your arms at your sides for me- it’s unfortunate when the pastry comes apart…”
Mulberry wasted no more time in leaning forwards and gently scooping the earth pony’s hooves into her mouth, and quickly followed with her hind legs.
Withania gasped, and shuddered with pleasure, feeling her legs wrapped in a warm wet enclosure. She gently wriggled them to test the boundaries and found them firmly stuck as if in quicksand. Mulberry couldn’t speak with her mouthful, but Withania felt the vibrations in her legs as the unicorn moaned.
With a wet gulp, Mulberry took in Withania’s stout thighs up to the cutie marks, and her tongue found the start of her syrup and pecan trail making her eyes close in bliss. Withania rested her head on the table and rubbed the maple syrup into her fur. She was a delicious maple and pecan treat now, and wanted to get everything out of this sensation.
Mulberry had paused for a moment, but having readied herself, pressed forward and took in the rest of Withania’s hindquarters and then pulled back again, dragging the earth pony toward her.
Withania screwed her eyes shut, feeling the larger part of her weight transfer off of the table and into the stretchy tube that was engulfing her. She felt the tips of her forehooves brush the sides of Mulberry’s muzzle, and quickly held them to her sides as she’d been told. She didn’t like the idea of being trapped with her forelegs above her head.
The baker was taking her time now. Although her prey wasn’t past the point of no return, it was fairly clear that she was enjoying a guilty pleasure far too much to turn back, so Mulberry was just savouring the taste. It wasn’t often she could go this slowly and let her gullet do all the work, where the slow ripples that brought food from the back of her throat to her stomach would leave her tounge free to explore - and her hooves free to massage her neck and front of her chest, feeling the bulge the squirmed inside.
Withania had been fairly passive up to this point, but with three quarters of her body now in the confines of Mulberry’s expansive maw, she could feel the involuntary ripples and waves tugging her deeper in - and she discovered that if she squirmed at just the right time, the convulsions massaged her as she slipped further off of the table and deeper into the wet sack.
Suddenly there was movement as Mulberry sat back onto her rump, raising her neck to lift Withania into the air. The earth pony opened her eyes, and her vision was filled with the wide open jaws surrounding her shoulders. Her legs were pinned to her sides long ago, and she could feel her hind legs in the slightly more open space that would be the baker’s stomach.
As her shoulders cleared the back most row of teeth, the hard work was all over for Mulberry and with a sudden and decisive gulp, she swallowed Withania’s head in one go, eliciting a yelp of surprise.
Mulberry took another couple of swallows to clear the stringy last bits of mane and then gasped for air, taking deep breaths that shuddered throughout her whole body. She could feel the earth pony settling in her stomach, curling into a ball to rest her joints.
“Oh I outdid myself this time,” said Mulberry, speaking half to herself and half to her belly, “That was the best one I’ve made yet.”
Through the layer of fur and padding on the baker, Withania was almost eagerly squirming in a rising puddle of saliva, syrup and stomach fluids. She knew this bit now and was almost desperate to see what came next. Her body was on fire with anticipation as she bathed herself and rubbed her shoulders and legs against the soft walls of her enclosure.
“Alright, you’d better be ready this time,” said Mulberry, placing her hooves on the floor to push herself up. Using her huge round middle as a pivot, she rolled forward into what was mostly a standing position, had her belly not been touching the ground, and then relaxed her legs to rest on her meal. Withania had obviously been having fun in there, as Mulberry felt the tell-tale and satisfying squish of her stomach compressing far too much for a pony to stay in shape.
She began rubbing her sides with firm circular strokes, cooing in pleasure.
Inside, Withania felt her body move in ways quite unlike she’d ever experienced. It was slightly scary, feeling her hind legs get squashed into her middle - but she had become like cookie dough, soft and pliable, oozing outwards as the weight of Mulberry above pressed into her. She couldn’t really move as there was no space, her body had pressed into the walls of the stomach and curved into an amorphous blob that pressed and squeezed back into her core.
And she was in the seventh heaven of ecstasy.
Mulberry could tell that her meal had not passed out this time - not because of a lack of wriggling, she was too far gone for that now - but the way the contents of her stomach pulsated and moved of its own accord. She couldn’t put a hoof on exactly how she knew, but she could always tell when her prey was still conscious. She made a special effort to press her belly back and forth against the floor with her hind legs, kneading the pony inside into liquid goop, ready for a trip to her flanks.
Withania had lost track of time, still aware but not really awake. It might as well have been a dream for her at this point, but one giving her unparalleled pleasure. She had become more liquid than solid now, and felt her mass swirling as a viscous soup that had no direction or orientation. And at this point a new sensation entered her fuddled mind - from a single point of her round mass she was being pulled or sucked away. She had no real notion of legs or other appendages but felt like being pulled at her extremities into a much smaller tube. It started slowly, and began to increase in intensity as more of her mass was drawn out from the stomach and into the deeper reaches of Mulberry’s body. Her elongating form twisted and turned in ways her pony body would never experience, her warm round home now pressing her into a tangled tube that seemed to have no end.
Mulberry had long since fallen asleep to the gentle massaging of her huge belly. She was sprawled out on her back in the middle of the bakery, thankfully hidden behind the window blinds. As her digestive system went to work, her hoof subconsciously moved to rub her abdomen, feeling her belly shrink and its mass transfer deeper inside.
The pulsing ripples that had steadily pumped Withania out of her host’s belly had faded away now, and been replaced with yet another new sensation, a kind of expansion, a feeling of spreading. The tube that had constricted her mass now seemed permeable, and she was passing through its walls through its length into… she wasn’t sure where. In an afternoon of strange new sensations, this was the most alien to her, a hollow feeling where her mass seemed to be nowhere at all, like an out-of-body experience.
The sun’s rays had swept across the closed blinds of the bakery, and hours later Mulberry opened her eyes suddenly as her mouth gargled excess saliva that had pooled at her throat. She looked down and saw her belly mostly down to normal size, and a generous expansion on her rump and thighs.
“Mmmmmm,” she moaned, pressing a hoof into her stretched cutie mark, “Looks like it’s time to get you home… Up we go!”
Withania’s foggy brain felt something; a hard object pressing into her, followed by a weight bearing down on top, squashing her so that she spread across the floor. She realised she hadn’t lost her mass at all, it had somehow transferred in a way that she hadn’t noticed. She didn’t feel any sensation of wanting to move, but the feeling of being soft and pliable like this re-lit what senses she had left.
Mulberry sat on her rump and yawned, and then with a grunt of effort got up onto her hooves, making her way over to the door.
Withania felt the weight lift off of her, and then she settled into a new position and felt a rolling rhythmic sensation spreading all over, alternating on both sides.
Am I here? her brain asked, Where is here? I feel part of something… I’m part of… Her!
“Phew,” remarked Mulberry aloud as she waddled down the quiet streets to her home, “You sure did a number on my behind this time. I hope you enjoyed yourself as much as I did… maybe I’ll see you again!”
Withania heard none of this, and bathed in the sensation of being part of a greater whole.
Withania’s eye snapped open in her bed, the covers hiked up over her head and enclosing her in a hot and humid dome. She stretched her hind legs out to pull the duvet down, and threw the top half back in one motion and took several gulps of cool air from the room.
“Ohhh,” she moaned to the room, “Oooooohhhhh…”
Was this deja vu? Had she had the same dream all week, or had she just woken up in the night several times and drifted in and out of the same vision of being eaten, digested, and absorbed into the body of another pony?
“It can’t have been one night…” she told herself, “I went out the day before yesterday, and yesterday, I remember… I think I went out three days ago as well…”
Withania fell out of bed and stumbled about in the bathroom to freshen up and get her mane under control, before descending to her sitting room and poking through her bookshelf.
“Something is going on… it has to be…”
Plants At Home, A History Of Earth Pony Magic, The Big Book Of Growing Stuff, she pulled out all her books relating to magic until she found the one she was looking for.
Detect Magic, A Level One Spell - this book was a unicorn’s school book about identifying magic, Withania had used it to help measure the magical properties of some of her special plants in the garden. She flicked through the appendix under the letter M. “Medicinal, meditation, melamine- ah, Memory Magic…
“Memory magic is a vast sub category of mind-affecting magic with roots in many schools of sorcery equine and otherwise, but due to the complexity and nature of adding, modifying, or even removing a pony’s memories there are consistent theologies that can be observed.”
Withania scanned through the introduction until she reached the next section titled ‘symptoms’.
“Okay, symptoms of ponies who have been affected by memory magic often include confusion, deja vu and often persistent dreams of partial memories that the brain is trying to reconstruct!”
Withania snapped the book closed looking out the window in the general direction of the town centre.
“She fuzzed me!” she exclaimed loudly, and then as she suddenly realised the full extent of what had happened in these apparent dreams, added in a quieter voice, “Oh my. I suppose it was… nice. Perhaps I’ll visit again some time. No need to let her secret out… if we both know what’s going on and neither of us mind… well it would go without saying really. If we both pretend the other doesn’t know... I wonder if I have time tomorrow...”
