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Lunch Break By Strega

Yellowstripe learned something important on his lunch break that day.

He was at a booth in the bar, picking at scraps from a platter of raw meat, when he let out a sudden snarl. A passing waitress looked over as his naked pink tail drummed the floor, thump-thump-thump, and she smiled at the glazed look in the big tiger-alien's eyes. No one else seemed to notice in the noise and chatter of the bar, where natives of dozens of worlds and dimensions got together to drink, discuss, and more than occasionally fight.

Yellowstripe made a show of taking a bite from the body-temperature meat as a little raccoon-female appeared on the bench across from him. If they had stood side by side she would scarcely have reached half his eight-foot height, and a tenth of his five hundred or so pounds. Of course they were not standing; he was seated on the red-padded bench and she had until a moment before been out of sight beneath the table.

"Thank you," Yellowstripe muttered, and slid a coin across the table to her.

"You couldn't concentrate," the little raccoon-lady chirped. "You stank of lust and you have another half-shift yet today, yes?" She still took the coin, though.

Yes, he did. There was a surprising amount of training required before they would even let him work as a bouncer here at the bar, and positions higher in the Ziggurat were simply out of the question until he was more trusted. He could leave, but then he would not be allowed to so much as enter the place again, even to use it as a transit to another world. And where would he go? His own captain had sold his contract to the management. He had no home or ship to return to and no contacts.

He put that depressing thought behind him.

"I felt you unhinge your jaws," he growled, his voice even lower than before.

"What do you mean," she piped, a picture of fuzzy raccoon innocence spoilt somewhat by what she had been doing a minute ago.

He had a cup of blood and one of water and he drank from then from the other. On his first day they had told him his breath stank and to do something about it. At the very least, they said, rinse your mouth when he ate. Then there was something called a 'toothbrush'...

"Hold out your arm," he said, and she did. "Make a fist. You just swallowed -that-."

"Just like a male to exaggerate," she said as she rolled her eyes, but though it wasn't much of an exaggeration - in terms of girth it was even an understatement - he would not be diverted.

"Hazel," he said, and her ears went up in a more serious mein. "I have swallowed men and women whole. I have a box of my fur in my room that was coughed up by a weretigress after she digested me. I know what it feels like when jaws unhinge, and yours did when you swallowed my cock."

She had done such a neat job of it that not a drop of semen marred her fur. He had been deep in her when he came, her nose pressed against his groin and fourteen or so inches down her throat.

Her eyes went shifty and for the first time since he'd met her a week before she looked uncomfortable. "Do you know why I work here?", she chirped, voice as low as his.

"No," he said, and glanced around. She wasn't the only raccoon-person to work here, and from their different builds and heights he suspected they weren't even all from the same worlds. A bewildering variety of humanoids (and some not) came to the Ziggurat. If the place didn't translate for everyone he wasn't sure he'd even be able to communicate with most of them.

"The same reason as you," she said. "I like to eat people too much."

That made him pause. He had his reasons for eating people, mostly humans, but backed into a corner he had to admit that he did it because he enjoyed it.

"In each of our villages, there are one or two like me," she went on. "We petition our Maker to change us so we can swallow prey whole."

He had heard of this Maker in passing, some wizard on a magic-heavy world accessible from the Ziggurat. Some of the other animal people here were from that world, too, including the were-tigress wolverine who had eaten him.

"One of my duties was to execute criminals," she chirped. "Small ones, to you. My size or less. But one day there was a wandering minstrel, a halfling not even as tall as me. He was smitten with me, and I lured him to a private place. I was tempted."

There was a long pause. "I know a little magic. Enough to hide my belly until the bulge was gone." That sounded awfully familiar. "There were others. In the end I was found out and ran. Eventually I came here. If I went home, my replacement would do to me what I did to those others. Here, I am safe...and here I can still eat people. Occasionally. A treat, but not too many."

She was so small, almost childlike compared to his bulk...but she wasn't a child. She was as adult as he was, and, it turned out, just as wicked.

"And Reida," he growled. "Her too."

"That's right," she chirped. "It is the same story. Some of us enjoy the struggle too much. It is why she ate you."

"What?" He peered across the table. "Why did she eat me?"

"Because you remind her of herself," the raccoon chirped. "Her younger, foolish self. You were out of control."

Yellowstripe growled low in his chest, because she was right. Some of the people he'd eaten had deserved it. Most of them hadn't. Even now the sight of naked human skin made him salivate.

"But think," she chirped. "Once you are out of your trial period, why, occasionally someone needs to be gotten rid of. A customer that can't be trusted, usually. Or an employee is punished by being eaten. You could even rape them if you want. Employees reform, and there are few who like being eaten. Or you could fight in the arena, maybe get to eat your opponent.

"I often get the small ones, but Reida and Bloodfeather and a few others get to ask for the larger ones. And you, pretty soon. It's a lottery, you see, or who has enough time off saved up to digest them."

"So we get to eat customers," he growled. He was fishing, but he was sure he knew what she was going to say next.

"Not just any customer. Rules. Do that without permission and you get punished, fined, maybe eaten, maybe banished."

"Reida ate me, and I was a customer," he growled. "Why didn't she get in trouble?"

She reached across the table and picked a chunk of meat from his plate, His claws came out and his fangs showed for a second but she just smiled and ate it. She took her time chewing and swallowing before it joined his semen in her belly. A bit more protein to add to the mix.

But she could only stall so long. Eventually she shrugged. "Sometimes a customer pays for another customer to be eaten. If they also pay for reformation..."

"Or sell the victim's contract to the staff." he said.

"That's right," she chirped. "That is probably what happened."

She reached out again and put her little furry hand on his huge leathery one. His claws, fully unsheathed now, were as long as her fingers.

"Yellowstripe," she chirped. "It's for the best. Your captain thought that you had a problem. You can work it out here. Get stronger, get better. Kzinti come here pretty often. Maybe you could join another crew eventually, if that's what you want. And you'll still get to eat people."

"I could eat you," he growled, but his claws were shrinking back into their sheaths.

"I wouldn't enjoy it," she chirped. "I'd reform, you might get in trouble, and the next time you were horny at lunch, who would suck your dick?"

He couldn't help it. He smiled as he stood up. He had some interesting questions for the weretigress who taught unarmed combat to employees, next time he saw her.