The Devil to Pay

Epsilon Alpha Tau isn't the brightest collection of young men. There weren't many other options for the small rural community college, except maybe not joining a fraternity at all. Regardless, that's not what Howard chose to do. Seeking the benefits of community, he joined the fraternity as he was fresh in college. He expected some sort of initiation and wasn't caught too off guard by the one given to him: "Steal a goat and sneak it into your dorm."

Fortunately, it wasn't difficult at all to find a goat in town. He knew at least one farmer that kept some goats for a petting zoo-type thing. It would be easy enough to sneak in and get one late at night. Then he'd be a bona-fide member of Epsilon Alpha Tau! Just the thought of it got him excited, so he headed off later that very night after getting the order. His beat-up junker wasn't much, but it could at the very least transport a goat. Hopefully it wouldn't be too rowdy, but his car couldn't look much worse than it already was.

The roads were lonely and only got lonelier as he drove out into the countryside night. The petting zoo/farm was only just out of town, but it was long enough of a drive to make him slightly uneasy. Full moon and all. Nonetheless, he eventually reached his destination. Pulling up with headlights off, he managed to somewhat quietly pull-up, though it still seemed to disturb some animals. Luckily, the petting zoo's barn was a ways away from what was probably the farmer's house.

Turning off his car and getting out, he took a moment to monitor his surroundings. Fortunately, there didn't seem to be anything too concerning, even if the empty farmland was spooky. Quietly closing his door, he headed into the barn. The barn doors were already somewhat ajar, allowing Howard to nicely avoid the sound of creaking. Though, it's not like that would have reverberated out to the house. In the dim moonlight leaking in, Howard tried to hastily identify a goat-like silhouette. It was fairly easy, in fact, since all the animals in the pens were fairly unique in their look. A goat was instantly identified by its long sharpish horns, beard, and notably rectangular pupils.

Grabbing a length of rope nearby, he tied it into a poor lasso and opened the goat's door. He was prepared to try and catch it if it were to bolt or something, but it remained perfectly calm. A bit surprised, though he wasn't one to question good things. The loose lasso went around the goat's neck and he lead the rather cooperative goat out of its pen. He poked his head out of the barn door to check if anyone was around then hurried on over to his car. Opening one of the back doors, he gestured the goat in and it rather eagerly obliged. Glad to escape, I guess? He shrugged, more than happy to get out of there with no problems.

The ride home was peaceful if eerie, with him constantly checking on his exceedingly peaceful passenger. The moonlight created an odd look on him, but the goat was just sitting there. Not even gnawing on the seats or anything. Howard just shook his head and kept driving, not wanting to question his luck of getting the most amicable goat in the region. He guessed it made sense, petting zoo animals would have to be pretty friendly.

As sneakily as he borrowed the goat, he managed to sneak it into his dorm room. It required some odd back paths, but it was easier than he expected. Not many people out at night, he supposed. With the animal safely in his room, he locked the door and closed all the blinds. Wouldn't want any curious visitors while he was holding this goat for Epsilon Alpha Tau. Finally, he turned on the lights, kicked off his shoes, and laid down on his bed. The tension from sneaking around started to fade from his body, but it gave way to an unusual feeling.

It wasn't the somewhat nauseous feeling of anxiety, but something close. Unease? Dread? He looked up at the goat in the middle of his room. The bright lighting allowed him to clearly see the goat now and maybe he wasn't the most knowledgeable person, but he felt something was off. The goat had fur dark as the night, long horns that seemed to have patterns in them, and its eyes… well, no, he was pretty sure all goats had eyes shaped like that. Though they were pretty red. Howard scratched his head a bit, then told it, "Y'know, you're a pretty odd-lookin' goat."

The goat seemed to look directly at him, then said, "Maybe you're an odd-lookin' goat?" Howard blinked for a moment and opened his mouth to say something, but the goat interrupted him. "I mean, after all, why do you only stand on two 'legs'? Where are your horns for ramming or stabbing things? Here, maybe you will be more comfortable if I stand up." The goat then proceeded to lift off the ground, standing fully on its hind legs without any balance issues. It was quite a bit taller than the human standing up, even with the goat's horns flexibly curling to avoid poking through the ceiling.

Howard felt inclined to stand up in the presence of the tall goat-thing, but a cloven hoof on his shoulder kept him sitting on his bed. "Oh, do not get up. You went through all this trouble to bring me here, you can just keep on relaxing."

"W-What are you…?"

They nodded. "The question everyone is always dying to know! Nobody ever asks, 'who are you' or maybe more philosophically, 'why'. Just 'what'. Well, what I am is a demon. Or at least, I think that is what you guys call my sort. And you, Howard, may call me Phazyx."

While the goat… demon… looked down at him, he couldn't help but consider how crazy this had become so quickly. A demon stood in his room, a towering presence compared to the goat he had brought in. He could barely even think about his fraternity initiation at this point. He had no idea what to do… did he need a cross? Holy water? Silver bullets?

The demon shook their head and sat down on the bed next to Howard, who uneasily backed away before they brought him back in with their arm. "Howard, I have been around for a long time. I have met all sorts of people over the centuries. Frankly you just are not that significant to me. I want to ask you, what were you doing in bringing me here? Do not lie to me either. I can tell. Most humans are pretty easy."

Not that a supernatural demon would be needed to tell. Howard was sweating bullets and way in over his head. He muttered, looking down at his shoes next to their hooves, "Was supposed to steal a goat for an initiation."

Phazyx laughed a reverberating laugh that seemed to not escape the room. "Bad luck you got me, then." They smiled and scuffed up the human's hair with their left hoof, then moved it back down to their chest. "It could be good luck from a different perspective. After all, remember how lucky you were to be undetected and how agreeable of a goat I was?" They sounded as if they were reminiscing, while Howard's eyes shifted uneasily between looking up at his captor to looking at the rather paunchy middle.

"You know, Howard, all those people are still with me today. Well, most of them. Right in here," they pushed Howard's head down against their belly, filling one of his ears with nothing but the grumbles of their gut. A particularly loud growl from it shook Howard down to his very core. "Hmm… I have always been known for a particularly large appetite. Howard, Howard, Howard…"

"I-I…"

"Trespassing on and stealing your neighbor's property… I believe that is still a sin, correct?" The demon licked their lips with a rather long tongue as they looked down as the human. Howard could barely see the gesture from his angle, but he saw enough to be afraid. They bent over very close to him and sampled some flavor from the young man's face. "Mmm. I always love how tasty you humans are! And you come in so many layers…" They dragged the tongue down somewhat, riding down his neck, the t-shirt he wore, and jeans on his legs. "Most people do not like the fabrics, but they are pretty interesting! This might be the first time I have had this kind of shirt…"

Catching him by surprise, Howard was suddenly carried into the air at head height of the demon and rotated to face them feet-first. He looked awkwardly across his body at the goat-like maw as it opened, freezing him with fear. "Do not worry, Howard, this will be pretty painless as far as consumption goes… a few people over the years have even found it pleasurable." Their long tongue came out to gather his feet into something easily inserted into his mouth. His socks became uncomfortably wet as they tasted them and soon enough they were compressed in the demon's throat.

They continued swallowing his legs steadily, but the thick fabric between his flesh and the demon's prevented him from realizing the reality of the situation. Instead he was focused on how strange it looked in the demon's throat, his own legs and feet distorting its shape. He was shocked back to reality when he suddenly felt the demon tasting his chest, with his loose shirt allowing their tongue to get at his flesh. Howard shuddered, yelped, and started trying to somehow squirm his way out. Phazyx looked at him skeptically but amused and mentally communicated to him, "A bit late, is it not? You might as well enjoy the rest of the trip, you are already halfway there." To emphasize the point, an audible swallow pulled Howard all the way in to his arms.

Trying to maintain some semblance of control, he stiffened his arms out to prevent his descent. Phazyx just smiled and swallowed some more. Howard could feel his feet become free, kicking in a free space that was no doubt their stomach. Not that it bothered them at all, nor did his arm strategy. With so much of him inside, Phazyx was able to let go and use their hooves to push his arms into the maw with the rest of him. Then they swallowed to ensure his hands were trapped at his sides and in their throat. "There will be plenty of time for struggling later."

The rest of the trip went smoothly with Howard unable to do much of anything as more and more of him slipped inside the demon. The wriggling in their gut didn't help either, only serving to pointedly distort their belly. It would round out soon enough though, with Howard's head passing between Phazyx's teeth. "See you around, Howard!" As that thought entered his head, their teeth clacked behind him, sealing him in the hot darkness. He could feel the tip of a tongue around the back of his head, the sides, and even a bit of his face. Finally, a wet gulp around him pulled his head down into their throat.

His way down was tight and unbelievably pressing, dampening his ability to tell what was going on. On the outside, Phazyx felt the bulge of his head with a hoof as it moved down their throat. Their tongue lolled out in delight as they enjoyed the rhythmic movements. The human was curling into their stomach, bloating it slowly. Howard disappeared behind their ribcage and then reappeared in the now-bulging belly, though it wasn't much given his size compared to theirs. They sighed contentedly, patting on their gut. "See? That was not so bad, was it? I mean, we are not quite done, but…" As Howard shuffled around in an attempt to get comfortable, Phazyx was forced to release a soft burp. "Mmm. Excuse me."

The belly of the beast was, in this case, glowing with some sort of permeating light from beyond the walls. It wasn't much but it allowed him to easily see the slick pink walls and the orange liquid pooling, dripping, and soaking his clothes. The humidity made it harder to breathe, along with a general shortness of breath. "Let me… Let me out!" He shouted, trying to kick out against the stomach walls. They didn't budge much. Instead, the stomach groaned around him and pushed back.

Phazyx burped again, smiling all by himself as he stood up and stretched. "Nobody has ever managed to break out once they were in there, but I still appreciate the struggling."

"You… you demon! I--"

"Excuse me! I told you my name. It is Phazyx. I have been using your name, you can use mine."

Hesitantly, he continued with his anger. "...Phazyx! You can't just… just… eat me! People will notice I've gone missing!"

"And?" They paced around the room, looking around at some of Howard's belongings. "What will these people do? Try and deliver harm to me?" They rubbed on their stomach, much to their prey's discontent. "Silly boy. I will be gone by later this night. I only come to Earth as a pastime, for my own amusement. Or if I am feeling hungry. Or both."

Howard was finding it hard to stay awake, though it was somewhat comfortable, too. Above him he heard an odd sound; there was something like crunching, then a swallow. Plastic rained down on him. "What… are you… doing…?"

"Mm." They slurped up the rest of a wire, quickly chewing and swallowing the rest of it. "You have some things I have not had the chance to try yet. Sorry if it bothers you, but you were not that filling." Phazyx searched around Howard's desk, picking things up, tossing them away, tasting some, and eating others. The electronics had a particular zing to them that they liked. Howard could barely even pass out properly with his chewed-up belongings raining down on him. But pass out he did.

Only moments later, to him, did he wake up. He did so jerkily, feeling different than when he passed out. He looked around, he was still in the demon's stomach. Though it was more cluttered then when he passed out, with melted plastics and a higher acid level. Despite the mess on top of him, a feeling of weightlessness permeated his body. In an attempt to move out of the junk, he lifted up his arm and completely split from his body. Howard looked down at his arm, transparent and ghostly, seeing through to his own body. The rest of him was the same. I'm… dead? He thought to himself. His body still seemed to have business with the demon's guts, but he smiled at the thought of being free. Ascending to heaven, perhaps…? He let himself float up, closing his eyes to brace for the unusual experience of phasing through someone else.

No such thing occurred. Howard bumped harmlessly against the top of Phazyx's stomach and made it gurgle a bit while it continued to work down his flesh and personal electronics. From the outside, a hoof hit him on the head and bounced him back down to the bottom of the stomach. Though he seemed submerged in the stomach acid, he could hear Phazyx laugh clear as day. "Welcome back, Howard! At least for the time being. You still have a little more to go."

He wanted to question what the demon meant by that, but before he could, their stomach gripped him somehow. Both his hands were grabbed by a sphincter that had appeared beneath him at some point, pulling him somewhere else. Like many of his other struggles, they had no effect on the demon around them or their body. Phazx leaned back against a wall of his room as their meal shifted around. From the outside it appeared as if the major bulge in their gut suddenly duplicated, with the new one moving on down to a second stomach.

"Ahh! I always forget to leave room for this part. Even though I have two stomachs, they still take up the same chest-space." As they slid down the wall to the floor, the movement of Howard further into their digestive system let out a long buuuurrrrp. "Excuse me, Howard."

The passage to the next stomach was much shorter, with Howard soon spilling into it. It was darker than the last one, but he could still see a dark blue, fleshy wall. A fluorescent blue fluid pooled around his… ghostly body, seemingly managing to affect it too. "What… what is happening…?"

"Well, though I am not really a goat, I do have multiple stomachs like a goat. That first one can digest… well, just about anything physical. I figured you did not want to see your body react to that. Even the people who like being eaten do not usually like seeing that. This stomach…" They pressed in on the stomach holding Howard, squeezing him uncomfortably into the bottom of it and the strange fluid. "This stomach is used to digest spiritual things. Your soul, in this case."

He couldn't believe what he was hearing. He always believed that there was something after death, but this wasn't it. Kicking out as he did in the other stomach, he complained, "What about the afterlife? Heaven? Hell?!"

Phazyx simply rested their hooves on their belly to enjoy the kicks of one stomach while the other gurgled happily. "Those places do exist! Happy to confirm that for you. Maybe not exactly as you imagine them, but they are there. If it is any consolation, this is much better than 'Hell', which is what you would have been heading to for any number of reasons." They burped, rubbing over their meals. "Well, better for me at the very least."

For the rest of the night, Phazyx relaxed in a corner of Howard's room while enjoying every second of his digestion. In the first stomach, the meaty parts of their meal broke down in a very traditional way, dissolving into nutrients and fat that would be used to make the demon ever so plumper in their true form. Plastics, bones, and clothes were more resistant, but they would succumb too. Except for what they wanted to keep for a private collection. In the next stomach, Howard's soul kept up a very lively fight for much of the night, even as he painlessly melted down into a rather glowing soup. Nutrition for the soul, powering the demon further much to their delight.

When the daylight came in and somebody knocked on Howard's door, Phazyx simply vanished. They went to their private chambers, a large room with an old aesthetic that existed elsewhere. Standing near their desk, they started to heave up leftovers. Though all that was left of their food was a jumble of clothes and an acid-stained human skull. They smiled at the skull, picking it up and carrying to over to a glass display container that had an empty slot. It was too bad they all looked so similar, but it impressed some of the lesser demons.

These clothes, though! Phazyx skipped back over excitedly to their desk and started sorting apart the clothes. Even acid-stained and a bit ripped, humans always had such unique designs! Never the same from decade to decade, let alone century to century. Hubert… Hawthorne…? So hard to remember names when their soul breaks down. Whatever his name was, his clothes would be a wonderful addition to their collection. They separated his shirt and jeans, tossing the socks back in their maw. Not much use for those. Phazyx got dressed a bit awkwardly, stretching the shirt as they fit it over their horns and ripping the jeans in places as they tried to fit it up their ungulate legs. Fashionable! It'd certainly attract a few lesser demons that could fit their gut pretty well.

But that would wait. They were still working down a previous meal, after all. Without all the clutter, Phazyx's belly was smooth, round, and sloshy. The human's body would last maybe a week more. Then they could get some demons and maybe more 'sinners' from the living world.