Stella and Hammy
By Strega

	Hammy sped to and fro, tail flickering as he looked first under a bush and then beneath a rock. "Are you sure it's here, Stella? I don't see it!"

	A sweet smile curved her muzzle as Stella brought the cookie from behind her back. "It's right here, Hammy. Do you want it?"

	Hammy nodded.  “I like the--” The squirrel's eyes went wide as the skunkette lifted the cookie to her lips. "No!" He darted forward and grabbed at her forepaws, but too late to keep her from popping it into her mouth.

	"Give it back!" The frantic squirrel pried open her jaws and stuck his head in. Stella tilted her head back just enough so the cookie rolled to the entrance of her throat, and was rewarded as the squirrel stuffed half his body into her mouth.

	"I want it!" said the squirrel, but Stella just smiled and swallowed gently. The cookie slipped slowly into her throat, pursued by the squirrel's forepaws as Hammy climbed even farther into her mouth. Helpfully Stella yawned, allowing Hammy enough room to crawl past the teeth and into her gullet.  He didn't seem to mind her tongue as it lathered his fur down with slippery saliva; if anything, he appreciated that it let him squeeze in after the cookie more easily.

	"Got it!" squeaked the squirrel, but Stella only heard a muffled mumble as she tilted her head all the way back. Hammy was up to his hips in her gullet already and as her throat muscles tensed he just giggled and squirmed. He was too busy pulling the cookie toward his mouth against the resistance of her throat to care what was about to happen.

	Stella swallowed, taking in Hammy's haunches, and the squirrel's fate was sealed. Her tongue pushed his rump into her throat and down he went, his body pulled inexorably toward her stomach. His hindpaws gave a last kick outside her lips before disappearing, then all that remained was his fluffy tail. Over the course of several seconds its fur flattened as it followed the rest into her jaws. There was a coarse, dry taste to the fur and it tickled on the way down, but the skunkette didn't mind. She'd woken up hungry this morning and Hammy was helping her with that problem.

	The last bits of tail slipped in and Stella's mouth shut, lips curved in a satisfied smile. She rubbed her middle as her belly swelled, squirrel head, body, haunches and tail slipping down her throat to curl up in her stomach. Hammy made her a sizable meal and her pelt was tight around the bulge, but it was nothing she couldn't handle. 

	It was not her first meal like this, nor the largest. That honor went to an annoying raccoon she'd hit over the head with a rock the previous fall. He was bigger than she, and it'd taken more than an hour to work her jaws over him from his black nose to the tip of his ringed tail. It was an exhausting meal, especially as he woke halfway in and struggled. With his hands already pinned to his sides he couldn't stop her, though, and she'd stuffed inch after inch of her reluctant dinner in.  Afterward she lay bloated and immobile for days as her stomach processed the bandit. When the last bits of raccoon dissolved her weight had nearly doubled from newly added fat. That one meal had seen her through a whole winter's rest, and she'd woken less ravenous than usual. Still, she had to build up her reserves for the next winter, and that was where Hammy came in.

	There was no sign of protest from her latest meal. She felt him eat the cookie, the excited squirrel nibbling at the treat even as her stomach juices began to saturate his fur. He no more cared where he was now than he'd cared when her throat muscles gripped down and sent him there. Eventually he'd figure it out, though, so before the dim-witted and excitable rodent realized what was going to happen Stella burped up the air that'd gone down with him. One long, satiated belch and Hammy settled down in the dark, comfortable and full and with no inkling that the sleep he drifted into was his last. 

	Stella, too, settled down to rest after her meal. It'd take at least a day to digest the silly creature. Sometimes she had to cough up a hairball afterward when a particularly furry squirrel-tail left behind a mass of hair too large to easily move into her intestines. This was her third squirrel – and her third Hammy, the local rodents being particularly unimaginative when it came to naming their young – of the spring and much of the padding on her ample body had once been part of one bushy-tailed rodent or another. 

	Other years her fat built up from more varied meals; besides the raccoon, opossums, a house cat, and even a family of porcupines (consumed very carefully) had added to her fat reserves in recent memory. The largest of the local turtles had shells just a bit too broad for her jaws, and could rest safely in her line of sight when her belly grumbled...except the ones she lured out of their shells for a kiss.  Those, like her other meals, got more of a kiss than they bargained for.   Of course there were things too big to eat, like deer and (sadly) humans, but anything smaller was fair game.

	Her eyes drifted upward as a scratching noise alerted her to a new presence. A small, probably young, and very curious squirrel came nosefirst down a tree-trunk to look at her.

	"Hi!" chirped the squirrel. "I'm Hammy."

	"Of course you are," said Stella, and flicked her tail playfully. She felt around in the bushes and found the crackling plastic package she'd stashed earlier. The raccoon had taught her much about raiding trash cans before he disappeared down her throat.

	"Would you like a cookie, Hammy?" Stella said with a friendly grin. She was full and he a bit small, but in a week or so, with some feeding....