Jill had just made her way to the surface, clawing her way through the viscous chyme that had enveloped her when the carnivore had been walking. She gasped for breath, inhaling the scent of fermenting flesh and bile but still mildly thankful for what little air was left in the surrounding sac. The coyote's stomach lurched slightly with each booming heartbeat from above, making the horrible sludge ripple against her sides. Finally he'd been sitting still long enough for her to gain footing, but even now she was waist deep in a bubbling pool of thick liquid death.
Whatever conversation he'd been having had drawn to a close, which if she made her guess meant she was about to have company. In the pitch black of the predator's stomach she couldn't see anything, but heard the slowly increasing pitch of a distressed roden't terrified squeaks and screams. A scant few seconds later a disgusting wet squelch sounded above her, followed by a louder cry of fright. An instant following that, something landed on top of her with a heavy thud, driving her and her new roommate under the surface once again.
Again she frantically tried to get herself as much out of the rippling acids as she could. The sounds of a similar struggle beside her prompted her to slowly reach a hand out into the darkness to try and identify who or what had just joined her. 'H-hello?' She asked. 'Is somebody else in here?'
'Oh gods!' The new occupant gasped frantically. 'What just happened? W-why?!'
'That... coyote?' Jill answered. 'He was pretending to be a mouse, telling me over the phone where he was... I thought I was meeting another mouse...'
'I can't believe I fell for that.' The newcomer sobbed. 'Wait...' The sound of wet clothes and wet fur being shuffled sounded and in the next few moments Jill's eyes were assailed with a blinding light. After a few seconds her eyes recognized the glowing screen of a smartphone.
'He didn't take your phone off you?' Jill asked incredulously. 'Why? Why would he...' Her voice trailed off as she was able to see her surrounds for the first time. Her breath caught, eyes locking on a cluster of bones floating barely two inches away from her, faint traces of sinews and ligaments still holding them together. More horrifying still, the unmoving form of yet another young mouse girl slumped against the wall of the stomach across from the two of them. Only part of her head was still bobbing above the surface, covered so much in a layer of bile that she was essentially stuck to the stomach wall as the rippling acids lapped her her increasingly reddening fur and skin.
'I was... almost out of battery.' The new girl's terrified expression did nothing to instill hope. 'He didn't bother. I... I won't even be able to make one call on this!'
'Let me see.' Jill said frantically, carefully leaning around to try and glimpse the screen of her fellow prey's phone. She was right. The battery was on a paltry three percent and barely any reception was registering. Any attempt to make a call, assuming the signal could even penetrate the flesh surrounding them, would be over before anything of worth could be said...
There was no further sound but the girl's frantic breathing and tears, drowned out by the steady liquid sounds of the pulsating stomach walls and heartbeat. The two mice locked tearful eyes one more time before the light flickered and disappeared.
'T-that's it then...' Jill mumbled. Her skin felt like a hot shower after a bad sunburn, a horrible burning sensation that she was completely powerless to stop. Her thoughts rushed to the previously unknown occupant already dead across the stomach from her, and she wondered how long that poor soul had been in here before her own unexpected arrival. How long it would be before she too succumbed. Would she suffocate? Would the acid breach her skin and bleed her to death? Would the pain push her to the point of blacking out?
'Rodentia inclusion...' The other girl sobbed. 'I thought... I thought we might finally be able to stop living in fear.' A sigh of despair followed. The introduction of purpose made clothes for rodents, tiny smartphones and even job offerings for rats and mice had all seemed like they could only be positives. Finally, progress had begun! But through it all, the laws remained incomplete. Jill, and too many others before her had believed themselves to be societal equals now. They had believed themselves to be safe.
Their naivety had flushed them out into the open. Lowered their guard. And left them easy to exploit.
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Figured I might start dropping some short stories with some pics. Nothing special. Enjoy, brothers and sisters of the Earth.
