Note: It's OK if you havn't read the story "Tigers" yet, but I recommend doing so.
The animals of the forest generally lived together in a peaceful manner-- Oh, sure, the food chain was clearly there, but what I'm actually trying to say is that the animals you see every day lead very different lives when you're not watching them.
When you forgot to feed the dog, the neighbor's dog heard about it the next day. That new cat who seems to strut around like he owns the neiborhood... yup, there's a conspiracy to get rid of him.
But these are just urban tiffs. What if you were to see what goes on in a more unspoiled setting?
Raya had just woken up. He wasn't real sure whether he was ready to face the day. He peered over the edge of a small river at the tiger face that in turn peered back at him. You see, he was on his own now. He took a quick sip of water and began to realize how thirsty he was!
Raya's tongue scooped up more and more water from the lake and as a result was gulping powerful oceans into his throat. Raya quickly realized how much water he could pump down in a gulp as he began to test the limits of his discovery.
Smooth waves could be seen flowing down the front of the tiger's neck-- one after the other. Lap, push, gulp. Lap, push, gulp. It worked like a machine until a small fish found itself quickly lapped up.
It startled him, but he figured the maw-sized fish was worth the trouble of swallowing; he would have breakfast covered. In that spirit, his tongue pressed the fish against the roof of his mouth, and, sort of nonpuropsely let it slip down without any real effort. The fish wriggled as the throat crashed around it and easily slid the fish to its rightful place.
Raya had come upon a group of animals, mostly tigers, but there were a few horses scattered about and maybe a crocodile or two. Predator and prey paid no attention to one another; they were sharing the dell for another reason. Now is the time to listen in:
"Where's Stala? She was supposed to meet me right here!" Maltese scuffed his giant hooves in the grass.
"Hey, maybe she found her dream stallion and blew you off-- sorry, pal!" The other horses laughed and brayed at Maltese's naive little mistake: Trusting 'good values' over natural selection.
Raya sat himself down in front of the humbled horse Maltese. "Hey, come on, now. What does Stala look like?"
"Well, she's the most beautiful thing you ever--"
"No, no, no! I mean like what color is she; does she have spots? I'll bet she has spots, doesn't she?"
"No." Maltese was truly broken. "She's brown, but what do you care, anyway?"
Maltese opened his mouth to pick a fruit off a nearby bush. He just kind of held onto it with his teeth.
"Well, aren't you going to eat that? I'll take it if you don't want it," Raya offered. Maltese sadly rolled the fruit slowly into his mouth. Raya got the idea.
"Suit yourself. Bye!" Raya sprang off, and revealed a horse in the distance.
"Ahalah?" Maltese couldn't call to her with the fruit in his mouth, so he galloped over to see exactly who it was. When he saw it was Stala, relief swept his body. Stala turned away from him and perked her rump up.
She gently shook her tail at him for just a second. As the mare's proud rear gently pressed into Maltese's chest, he pushed the fruit to the back of his mouth. He thought it might be too big to swallow, but he wasn't about to make Stala wait any longer. He rested his head atop her firm behind and hoped for the best.
The fruit was stubborn at best. Maltese strained to plunge the fruit into his throat, but it seemed to stick in the back of his mouth. He gulped time and time again, but every time the fruit stayed at the threshhold of the horse's craw. He conceded and began to spit the fruit out when Stala shuffled a bit and firmed up her hindquarters.
"This fruit is gone," he thought to himself. Maltese pushed the fruit to the top of his throat, took a deep breath, and pistoned the fruit deep into gis gullet. It took time to work the spherical bulge down his muscular neck, and Stala could feel every trying moment as Maltese's head and neck were resting on her backside. He nuzzled her as the lump sank deeper into his body.
Maltese heaved his weight onto the back of the mare before him and did what he needed to do.
Raya, however, was trying to find a tigress for himself. All of a sudden, the roaring shout of the various competing tigers came to a standstill...
A sleek, sturdy tigress slinked into the dell. All the tigers seemed to stare and keep their distance at the same time. Raya scampered up to greet her, but was quickly halted and wrestled to the ground.
"Control yourself!" whispered Labrador, a tiger well in his prime.
Raya struggled to free himself from Labrador's grip. "But look at her! What's wrong?"
"Don't you know what happened to Koro?"
"Koro? Who's that?"
"Koro was my brother, but that's besides the point." Labrador was getting more anxious as he spoke.
Raya was still puzzled. "Well, out with it! What did that tigress over there do to Koro that's so awful, huh?"
"She swallowed him."
Raya glared in disbelief. "WHAT?! You mean, like, she killed him and ate him, right?"
"No, she swallowed him. Alive. No one really knows how."
"Fine. You just go making up stories while I go make a terrific set of cubs with--"
"Absolutely not! Here, you can take my mate! That one over there! Her name is Impala! Tell her I ran off or got killed or something, she's all yours! Just don't ever, ever go near that tigress-- ever!" Labrador squeezed Raya's neck to get his point across.
"Fine!" Raya fought his way out of his captor's choke and stammered off. He did, however, take Labrador up on his generous offer and managed to arouse the interests of Impala.
"Good for him," Maltese saw what the two cats were up to. "But doesn't she usually do that sort of thing with Labrador? Oh, well."
Stala went for a drink at a small lake nearby. She would never return.
Stala lowered her head daintily as she sipped at the water's edge. As she opened her eyes, she saw another set of eyes looking back. Reptilian eyes. The crocodile snapped at Stala and captured her head in his jaws! He easily held Stala in place as he forced her head into his throat. She struggled to pull out, but the jaws prevented her escape.
"Let me go! Maltese!" She was muffled by the grasp of the crocodile's monolithic gulp, but Maltese's ears were particularly attuned to the voice of Stala. The crocodile glutted his throat with another bulge of flesh. Maltese stood before the scene.
"If you even gulp her down one more inch, you'll get a kick so hard you'll swallow your own teeth!" Maltese was exhibiting more aggression than usual, but he meant business. The crocodile's bulging neck began to relax, and Stala knew that her mate had saved the day.
Just then, the crocodile lunged forward and crammed Stala's chest past his razor-sharp teeth! Maltese ran over to deliver his vengeance but halted when the crocodile craned his head up and let Stala's graceful form settle into his throat. She glided down slowly, but the crocodile made it clear that this was the last that Maltese would see of Stala.
Stala could feel herself sink deeper into the reptilian gullet. She knew it was over as the warmth of the crocodile slid over her fleshy rump, and in so fell out of consciousness. Maltese could not bear to watch as the crocodile's neck stretched, tightened, and prepared for the task ahead. Stala's tail was all that hung from the crocodile's jaws, but that was quickly pulled in as he swallowed the massive horse in one hard gulp. The crocodile savored the feeling of a pair of hindquarters such as Stala's slide down his throat.
A bereaved Maltese strode away in tears, replaying the scene of Stala deep inside the craw of the crocodile. Just then, Raya loped across the horse's path and let out a sigh. Maltese halted as not to trip over him.
"Listen, whatever it is, I can't help you right now," Maltese wept as he sagged his head. Raya sighed again.
"What? What's so awful?" Maltese snapped as Raya pointed towards Impala walking alongside Labrador.
"Oh, well listen good. One: Impala and Labrador grew up together; all they have is each other. And two: At least you can still talk to her if you want to," Maltese said. "What?" Raya looked quizzically at the horse before him.
"At least your mate wasn't gulped down the throat of a merciless killer!" Maltese galloped away crying rivers of grief.
Just then, a tigress imposed herself in front of Raya. She was the forbidden one... but why should Raya listen to a double-crosser like Labrador? He would choose whomever he wished!
"Hi there," The strong tigress spoke with a surprising confidence.
He looked into her eyes and spoke: "Hey... uh..." and he lost his words.
"Sheba."
"Uh... huh? What?" Raya was enthralled in her female stare.
"Sheba. That's my name."
"Oh, right..." Raya began to regain himself. Sheba. How could anyone overlook such a powerful, sleek example of a female such as her? "I'm Raya."
"Raya... well," A rabbit crossed Sheba's path. Raya lifted his paw to catch it in hopes of offering it to her, but Sheba quickly snapped it up, pushed it to the back of her maw, and worked the struggling lump down her throat. Raya watched the bulge getting crammed down her neck, passed a sensual half-smile, and quickly mounted her.
Night was fast approaching, and Maltese only felt worse. He decided to go to the lake one last time. There was the crocodile. Stala was long since gone, but the crocodile was not particularly hungry. Maltese stood before him.
"Listen. I won't try to get away, OK?" Maltese looked inside the crocodile's open mouth. He watched the dark throat expand and contract as it breathed. He walked up and worked his nose in, and eventually coaxed the throat to push him down. The crocodile didn't mind; he was practically sleeping in the cold night. Maltese began to feel the involuntary gulping around his shoulders flowing down the gullet. He watched the muscles labor and cram around him as he slid down the crocodile's body. He felt the strain as the crocodile's throat passed the crest of his rump, and slipped Maltese down into a digesting mix. The crocodile was too busy watching Raya thrusting himself into his mate to pay much attention to the horse that shoved himself down its throat. The two roared in climax, and Raya flopped himself to the ground.
Raya was panting from exhaustion. Sheba, on the other hand, was ready again. She pressed her lips to his, and gradually worked him off the grass. He slid his tongue inside, and pressed his lips harder. She drew her maw open and tickled Raya's nose. No sooner was that when Raya slid his whole head inside Sheba's maw and touched his tongue deep inside her throat.
Sheba pushed forward, and allowed Raya's head to slide into her throat. Her neck tensed! Startled, Raya tried desperately to pull out, but her muscular throat, sensing the escape of live prey, rhythmically pumped Raya's shoulders deeper into the biological machine. Lap, push, gulp. Lap, push, gulp. Sheba began to gulp harder as her throat gorged her gullet with the struggling tiger. She let her pumping gullet take over and let Raya slide down by himself. The pending quiet allowed for Raya to listen to the last sounds of his life: a drumming noise, soothing to the body. It was Sheba's heart. He listened more closely, for Sheba required a gulp to swallow him once and for all.
Labrador stared from a distance as all that could be seen was Sheba, stomach taut, and a strong backside draped over with a long tail all hanging from her mouth. "I warned him..."
Sheba took a deep breath, and fiercely swallowed Raya with a vicious gulp. Her neck began to funnel him into her gullet, squeezing him to her distended belly. He did not fight... he merely fell asleep as her stomach tightened. Soon, he gave up altogether and her stomach began to firm up as tightly as it could. Satiated, Sheba laid down to digest her meal