Blackness took her, the dank depths of the quivering vagina sucked and pulled, the tongue wrapped inside her clothes continuing it's perverse exploration of her body. It's very being seeming to draw Ellie inwards as she gibbered at the insanity of it all.

A vast crash shook the world, spears of light burst alongside her and a vast echoing choir of screams erupted from all around her. Ellie was deaf, blind and... in searing pain! Three sheets of fire pierced her while the tongue that was wrapped around her shattered into horrid waves and chunks of flesh. Her shoulder and hips were in agony, a blazing inferno that pulled upwards as she was dragged through a jagged wound in the surrounding flesh that was already healing shut as she rose through it, shedding chunks of tongue from between her legs and from inside her mangled clothes.

In her terror filled mind she didn't even register what was really going on, didn't see the steel cables running from her right shoulder and hip and left thigh leading through a broken hole blown in the ceiling. Ellie just gaped below, her fear ebbing and flowing, her mind gibbering in shock as she saw the vastness of her 'mother' from above. 'She' spread across the chasm of fire and lava, the size of a football field. Tendrils, tongues and twisted contortions of arms rose towards Ellie but her ascent sped up, her body screaming in pain at the ripping and burning sensations that drew her ever upwards, and she easily outpaced the tendrils that attempted to reclaim her.

She was hauled up into the night faster and faster, cool air giving her goosebumps as tatters of her clothes tore free and fell into the depths below. The darkness enveloped her after the hellish red glow from the cavern underneath receded into a mere tapestry of what horror was so nearly hers. Somehow her mind started to regain control and a hysterical laugh almost erupted from her as Ellie realized...

She was alive!

With a thump she was twisted over, then dropped to a steel floor that tilted alarmingly with her weight. The wind buffeting her cut off abruptly as she landed, inside something. The floor tilted further, but not due to her. An aircraft banking? She looked down below, over the edge of the metal floor, and saw lots of small... shapes, deformed twisted flapping things, shapes with wings, shapes with some sort of knotted corkscrews and other forms she couldn't recognize, streaming into the night from the nightmarish scene of lava and contorted flesh that was her mother. Their flapping bodies reached towards her as she stared down and Ellie gulped in fear. Lances of pure actnic white blazed down from the machine she was inside and they burst into flame, incinerated utterly. No more rose towards her.

Flight leveled off and the door beside her shut with a clang.

With shuddering breath Ellie glanced around, trying to wrap her mind around what had happened... and after a few seconds she realized she did want to know where she was. Her mind recovered to somewhat normal and she took another steadier breath as she considered her surroundings.

It looked like the kind of steel walled interior of a plane or helicopter. Four winches were mounted on a slide rail above her, three of which had cables that led down... to her! She traced one of the steel gray twisted lines with her finger as it led to her shoulder... where something resembling a grappling hook was embedded inside her. She grabbed it and gasped in shock and released it quick. It was scalding hot, her palm sizzled from the touch. A glow seemed to emanate from behind her shoulder and she held her hand down there and found it too hot to hold.

There was a click and a door slid open as Ellie looked up. A man in a day-glo orange jumpsuit stood at the opening, staring in. Slowly he reached up and took off his flight helmet. Ellie had the distinct impression that he was trying to move slowly so as to make no threatening moves. He was tall but not muscular. A small potbelly bulged the middle of his flight suit. His face however was what you might call handsome, though the hard expression it wore ruined the look.

"You are in no danger here Ellie." He said, loudly over the roar of... engines?

The smell of him caught her nostrils. Ellie was burned, cut, battered and sore. A good meal would work wonders for her... but she didn't think she was strong enough to grab him right now. Wait, he had used her name?

With a grimmace Ellie sat up, the burning sensations pressing into her thigh and hip from the lower two grapples. She tried to ignore them but saw him wince as steam rose from them as they shifted to sear different bits of her flesh. Weakness there in him, something she could exploit? Maybe.

"Who are you?" She said, as near to her normal tone as she could manage. He seemed surprised she was so calm, but answered calmly enough himself.

"My name is Harold, Harold Palmer. I can't explain it all to you now, I don't have time. I need to get back to the cockpit to fly us out of here. Right now Granny is out of reach, but her emissaries may be able to get to us. If I can get back to base we should be safe." He reached into a pocket and pulled out a clamp of some kind on a foot long handle. "I can remove the harpoons now Ellie, but you have to promise me one thing."

She looked up at him and nodded questioningly.

"Don't eat me." he said simply.

Ellie's mouth dropped. Somehow, despite all that had happened, the fact that this stranger knew what she was, what she was capable of, shocked her.

"If you... if you know what I am, why are you helping me?" she managed, in a lot more of a nervous sounding voice than before.

"Honestly? Some of it has little to do with you, and more to do with Granny back there. But I did feel it was my duty to try to save you from her as well."

"Granny?" Ellie blinked, then realized he was talking about... "My mother?"

He lips quirked in a half smile.

"Well, grandmother would be a little more accurate I think. That... thing, makes living things with the same kind of idle thought with which you or I would swat a fly. Eats them back up just as readily. You were born of one of it's creations, planned for you to collect large amounts of tasty DNA and bring it back to dear old Granny. Yum." he said tonelessly.

"What do you know about her? What is she, who is she, where is..."

He held a hand up briefly.

"Please, we have little time. I'll answer all your questions later, but I think you'll want those things out of you, right?" He pointed at the 'harpoons' searing her flesh from within "When I get us safely back home I'll explain it all. Promise I'm not on the menu now?"

She paused, considering seriously. He had really saved her from... Granny. The thought that Her own mother, or grandmother, what ever she was, had tried to eat her made her shiver in fear!

"OK, I promise I won't eat you. Yet."

He smiled, glanced briefly over towards the cockpit, then strode confidently towards Ellie. She was tempted, very tempted, but resisted. The smell filled her brain with the tender caress of food promised and awaiting consumption, but instead she bit down on The Hunger and let him connect his tool to the base of the rods stuck in her flesh. Each one was yanked out with a jab of searing pain, not surprising as each was literally glowing white hot! He tossed them in a bucket in the corner where they hissed fitfully.

"Thank you Ellie, I know how hard that was for you to resist." She blinked. Who was this guy? "The trip will be about an hour and a half. Please don't interrupt me. I have no idea who, if anyone, will be following us and I'll need all my wits about me if we're to make it back in one piece. I don't think anyone of our possible pursuers will be happy to see either of us if they catch us."

With no further comment he turned back to the cockpit, but didn't shut the door. Either he was monumentally stupid, or he was trusting that she wouldn't attack him. Probably the latter given his behavior so far.

Ellie sighed, making a wince of pain as she lay back on the floor again. She was alive, that was more than she'd hoped for mere minutes before. Live, and deal with the rest as it comes!

She awoke, shaking in fear from dreams of eldritch horrors. Unfortunately some of that was memory, not mere dreams, but slowly she recovered her senses. The noise of engines was winding down and the vehicle wasn't shaking any more. They must be on the ground. She prodded her wounds and they seemed to be healing, though where the harpoons had penetrated her still were visible holes deep into her bones. As she glanced up she saw the door to the cockpit was shut. He must have closed it a while ago.

Getting to her feet slowly she found she was collected and strong enough to remain upright at least. She walked carefully, as drained and jagged-edged as she felt, into the front of the aircraft but no-one was there. The side door was unlocked and her muscles slid it aside with barely a flick of her wrist. Her strength was definitely coming back!

Jumping to the floor Ellie looked around and took in the scene. A large cavern, dimly lit from the walls, surfaced with a concrete floor on which several shiny aircraft were parked. The one she'd just emerged from was a large black helicopter, though it looked very sleek, long bodied and... heavy somehow. It seemed to have a looming presence as if it was going to leap forward at any instant. She'd definitely never seen anything like it before.

The helicopter was parked close to the edge of the cavern and nearby was a man-made wall, steel by the look of it, with an ordinary door in it. She opened it and walked in, not knowing what to expect.

What she found was a small metal room, white painted with a large shower stall to one side, the sort you often see in makeshift showers for sports events for many people at once. Beside it was a clean towel hanging on a hook, a laundry basket, and a long yellow dress and underwear on a stand. They looked her size and the meaning was obvious. Glancing nervously around she stripped the torn, ragged and soiled clothes she wore off, dropped them in the basket and stepped into the shower. The cleansing stream of hot water did wonders for her moral, though the floor of the shower stall did creak alarmingly as she moved around. Well, if he'd planned all this for her he'd probably already known she'd weigh more than she looked. It'd hold. And if it didn't the couple of inches drop wouldn't kill her.

Once she'd toweled off she carefully dressed and found it rather comfortable, though not really her taste. Too long, almost formal attire for a ball or something! She opened the one remaining door and stepped into a luxurious looking apartment, open plan with multiple levels! This was not what she'd expected! Bright sunlight seemed to stream in through a window to the left, though she thought it may be an illusion of fluorescent lighting. A couple of curved couches, recessed in the upper level by the window, surrounded a large television on a smooth white podium. On the right was a round table with eight chairs surrounding it. Against the right side of the room was a kitchen, the units spread around a slowly curving wall. Ellie felt this was the sort of set up that movie stars or the obscenely wealthy had in penthouses. Her experience in these matters was rather limited though, so she could be wrong.

"Feel free to have something to eat... well, apart from me that is." a voice came from a door in the far wall, startling Ellie.

Harold stepped in slowly, holding a piece of machinery in his hands, polishing it. He'd changed too, now wearing a greasy overall with a tool belt. Out of the baggy jump suit he seemed a bit more imposing, less like a couch potato. His expression was also softer and his eyes seemed to glow with satisfaction. Over her or something else? So many unknowns here that she almost wanted to scream all the questions out.

"You wanted to ask me what was going on, right?" He said, answering her unspoken comments.

Nodding Ellie slowly went over to one of the couches and sat down. Harold followed, casually sitting on the arm of the other sofa and leaned forwards, resting his head on his hands, elbows on knee as he peered at Ellie.

"OK, first off, as I'm sure you can smell, I am human." he said with a smile and Ellie narrowed her eyes. How much did he know about her abilities? "I'm a scientist and engineer. As to how all this happened... Hmm, where to begin?" He closed his eyes and Ellie momentarily tried to figure out if she could jump  across and get him into her mouth before he opened them again... But she stopped herself. Listen first, eat later!

He opened his eyes and she found him with a knowing look staring back. He chuckled and nodded, almost as if saying 'Thanks'. What, could he read minds?

"Well, first I guess you could say I was a bright, if limited engineer as of about eleven years ago. That was when I stumbled onto this and found myself neck deep, if you'll pardon the pun."

"Someone tried to eat you huh?" Ellie said with a grin.

Harold chuckled.

"If I'd come at this from that point of view... well, I don't think I'd have made nearly as much progress as I did. No I discovered something rather different than one of your Granny's emissaries. I was working on maintaining diesel generators, cranes and other equipment at a dig in Egypt and one of the sonar systems I was testing came up with something odd. A huge cavern underground far away from the main temple they were investigating." He stopped and leaned back, eyes to the ceiling as he sighed. "Ellie, there are many things about me that I consider... well, good. I'm generally honest, always truthful (not always the same thing, trust me!), generally polite and helpful, but I'm not a giving person by nature, and that was just too good to pass up! Thus my employers finished their dig and got no hint from their equipment that there was anything nearby."

Harold's gaze lowered to Ellie's eyes again, a very serious expression written on his face, drawn and melancholy almost.

"I'm now very glad I did. I think that if a team of investigators had gone in... well things would have gone badly." He licked his lips dryly. "What I found was, astounding, and almost killed me. When I blasted my way in a couple of months later I found a cavern that seemed to have been made when something crashed a long time ago. A VERY long time ago! Yeah, a spaceship Ellie."

After what Ellie had been through that wasn't quite as much of a shock as she might have expected it to be, but still she would hardly just believe him just on his say so. From his expression he could see what she was thinking.

"This was definitely not some star trek wreck though. No flashing lights, no huge mirrored metal hull, gleaming surfaces etc. It looked like it was made out of pig iron and blown glass, odd shapes curling in the glasswork. The thing looked more like what I'd imagine Salvador Dali would make a space ship like, if he'd had a junk yard for the building materials. It was huge though, more than four hundred yards, long. I'd almost say ornate, but that would give the impression it was pretty. It most  definitely was not pretty! My skin still crawls when I think of what I saw, mostly perhaps due to the odd lighting down there... but probably not all due to that."

"I spent days gaining entry, carefully finding a hatch, having to burn it open in the end, and then very cautiously wending my way through the giant corridors.  It looked like Gieger induced nightmare, ribbed ceilings, streams of odd, dark metal bars lining the walls. The whole thing gave me the creeps. Then I came to the first artifact. It was a simple ovoid metal box. I guess you could call it square, except it looked like all the edges had been melted smooth. It hung in a gap in the wall, like it was suspended on a thread of invisible wire in a cubby hole made just a foot bigger around than it was. I think if there'd been more of us I never would have got close enough to see it before... well."

Harold pulled his shirt up and showed a huge scar up his left side, from his armpit down almost to his pelvis. It looked like a burn mark, but had jagged edges to it and seemed red. Odd if this was from eleven years ago!

"Some kind of electrical discharge hit me, but I saw the box move in time. Seems the thing isn't immune to a shotgun blast, but I fired at pretty much the same time it did. I was out for a few minutes, pretty lucky to be alive. If it hadn't merely grazed me... well I think what's left of me would still be down there. I managed to hobble back to camp and recover in about a week. I was more circumspect in my investigation after that."

Lifting an arm he seemed about to continue but stopped.

"Honestly, I could go on for hours about what I found in there, but most would probably bore the hell out of you. I found technology, I found... well, monsters. I guess organic defence systems would be a better term, and I found remains of the original owners, but not living ones thank god. I've spent the last ten years trying to understand what that tech does, but really haven't got into it that much. New materials and other stuff helped my research, but I didn't exactly understand their tech. Frankly their stuff isn't exactly more advanced than us than just... different. They think differently, feel differently and have motives I don't understand at all. The only thing I know for sure is they transported something here, then had a battle with some of their own  kind... though battle might be the wrong word. I don't think they even have a concept of 'war' exactly. Best guess they disagreed slightly on something, and one side blew that ship to hell and back, but the crew of it survived it's crash and just... died. I think it was voluntary. Maybe because they'd lost? I don't know. But the critical thing, and what leads me to you Ellie, is what they carried, and that was what sparked the 'disagreement'."

Harold pulled a photo out of his overall pocket and handed it to Ellie. When she looked at what it depicted she recoiled. She couldn't help it.

It was 'Granny'.

"One side of the aliens... well, maybe worshiped her? Not sure, but they were the ones that brought it to Earth. The others weren't against it, just against it being brought here. They were miners of some kind, coming here to get minerals and metals of various types. Seems Granny survived the battle and left she ship and has been here ever since. From what little records I could decipher, mostly image based stuff, I was pretty sure that thing could create and control life forms. To me that was enough for me to start searching for it, fearing what it might be doing here on Earth. Doing to us people."

He reached a hand out for the photo and Ellie reluctantly gave it back. Why did she feel so... drawn to it? With a shudder she quickly shoved it into Harold's hand and sat back in the couch.

"I found many references, some apocryphal, some not, but the most recent was the most helpful. About 25 years ago a psychologist found some odd similarities in older records of other psychotherapists. Some patients that had almost identical mind sets in some ways, and very different in others, were spread out across time, maybe over fifty years. There were people with exactly matching phobias, ticks, fears and dreams, but completely different personalities and even sexes. If it had been one case, he'd have dropped the idea, but it was more than that. He found almost forty cases where someone from a long time ago had similarities to someone from much later on, with no family relationship between them. In all cases the original, and sometimes the later one, had vanished shortly afterward, usually amidst multiple missing persons reports in the region. Sound familiar Ellie?"

She shrank into her seat, a slow build of terror seemingly coming unbidden to her mind. She was over this! She'd beaten this and made it her own! Why was this affecting her?

"Needless to say the psychologist disappeared shortly before he could put his case forward publicly. I wonder why?" Harold said sarcastically. "In case you haven't figured it out yet I'll spell it out for you. Granny makes a creature, like your mom, and sends it out into the world. It mates with a local, and produces a child. That child becomes very hungry. It eats and eats, till it gets a taste for human. Once it's eaten 'enough', whatever Granny needed in that case, it feels compelled to eat all that were close to it, usually it's parents, and then return to Granny. Granny then eats it, absorbing all the DNA it had consumed, as well as the child itself." Harold leaned over, a sympathetic expression on his face. "If Granny had eaten you it would have taken more than your body. As far as I can tell you absorb just the genetic build of what you eat. She takes everything of you, including your mind. Those things she makes, those are built with any sort of mind she wants, built as a patchwork from all the minds she's ever eaten. I can't see her ever having need to build you exactly, though I suppose it's possible, but she could take any aspect of you and build a new person with that in it any time she needed to. If you wanted to, I guess you could call that a kind of immortality, but not one I'd choose personally."

Harold stood up at that and walked over to the kitchen.

"Fancy some OJ?" He said.

The sudden shift caught Ellie, but she just nodded absently, trying to hide her suddenly uncovered terrors. It was going to take time to go over this.

It took hours for Harold to explain everything, and sometimes he rambled. But it boiled down to this. He'd found quite a few people like Ellie over the years, and a few more... things, like Ellie's mom, the mother her dad had met, that thing that Granny had made for him. Harold said some of the people with 'The Hunger' succumbed to it completely, becoming ravening things that devoured anything they crossed. Others, like Ellie, had managed to make a blend of themselves to keep their minds from being subsumed. None  that he knew of had suppressed The Hunger completely.

He'd also tried to save a few people over the years too. He'd found a way, using technology of his own design, along with hypnotherapy, to suppress some parts of the mind and even to change a person's DNA to minimize The Hunger's influence over them. It was dangerous, but it worked. He'd only managed to complete the procedure once successfully, and she had been killed not long after when emissaries of Granny had found his home and stormed the place.

"Most people like you seem to be girls, not boys, but there are a few males. All the people I've managed to find, and then tried to save, were girls, and the first two... well one almost killed me, the other killed herself after the first test of my Abater failed miserably. With Alice I got it right. If the bastards hadn't  found me.... well, I'm set up here now, and the defenses here are impressive. I'm sure if they tried they could storm the place, but it would take a lot. It's the closest thing to a safe house from Granny I have."

He slumped down in a chair by the table and Ellie joined him.

"Harold?" she said, the first words she'd uttered in over an hour. "I have a question."

He sighed and leaned back.

"I think I know what it is, but sure Ellie, go ahead."

"Why do you assume I want to be rid of The Hunger?"

He actually smiled at that.

"That's pretty much what Alice asked when I proposed the idea to her. She was older than you, maybe nineteen. She never told me her exact age at the time. Ellie, you're incredibly powerful, but power isn't everything. Do you seriously want to hide from society for the rest of your life? With The Hunger there in the depths of your mind that's pretty much your only option." She rolled her eyes. "No Ellie, you can't control it. I've read reports from many people who tried, and Alice managed to do just that, for about six months. She'd been estranged from her parents at a young age. When she gave in to The Hunger finally it took her a while to find them again and... finish things."

Ellie blushed as she remembered her father's final moments. Well, he really was a pervert! When her gaze returned to Harold his eyes were like ice and her face froze.

"Don't... say anything Ellie." He grated, then stood up and turned, walking slowly to the wall. He continued, still facing away from her. "Let me guess, your father came on to you and you fucked like bunnies, right? Then he offered to let you eat him. I'm sure you think of him as some kind of freak for all that but think on this. Your 'mother' chose your dad carefully, then influenced him very strongly. I'm also sure that the child of those meetings, you in this case Ellie, is made to have very similar features to the mother. Your dad was very much in love with your mother, and he could see her growing up in your face. I've heard the same tale a hundred times in many odd police reports and psychologists papers. He wasn't a bad man Ellie, he was just... tainted, as you are."

Ellie glared at him and he turned at just that moment, catching her gaze.

"Yes, you! Don't tell me that eating someone doesn't turn you on! It's like a sexual drug for you isn't it? Burning through your soul!" She recoiled from the fever pitch he was using, but something was off. The edge of her mind had noticed something about Harold during this, but she couldn't figure out what it was. "You get hot every time you eat someone, during and after, so don't tell me he was some kind of horrible father for thinking those same damn thoughts of you!"

Unable to form that odd feeling about Harold completely she just lay back on the couch, keeping her face closed, expression as neutral as possible.

He closed his eyes, took a deep breath and relaxed.

"I'm sorry Ellie, I've been doing this for a long time and sometimes it gets to me."

There was silence for a long time after that and Ellie pondered all that had been said these last few hours.

"Harold?" She almost whispered "All this, all this preparation. Do you expect me to have this treatment now?"

"No Ellie, I'm sure you need time to get to grips with all I've told you as well as to come to understand that it's necessary for you, not just something that will benefit those around you."

She looked up, unable to resist a hungry smile from emerging onto her lips.

"But then, if I'm to stay here a while... what will I eat?"

Harold stood straight up and, with a grin and a melodramatic flourish, motioned the door he'd come in through a while ago.

"If you wouldn't mind, please follow me and I'll show you the dinner trolley Madame!"

A surprised Ellie saw him stride out of the room confidently. That wasn't what she'd expected! Nervously she followed him. The long hall was rather bland after the luxurious room she'd been in. It looked like a military bunker corridor and there were even stenciled numbers over some of the doors that looked rather military in style as well. After a while Harold led her into a side door that opened into a brightly lit laboratory, large tubes filling the walls, each two foot wide and going from floor to ceiling. They looked filled with some dark greenish liquid that bubbled and gurgled slowly. There were literally dozens of the tubes here and through the dark liquid Ellie could swear she could make out shapes that looked almost, human.

"I learned a lot from the alien ship, most was metallurgy, some useful hints that helped me improve epitaxy and I made a fortune on a new form of chip burning hardware. But this? This is the Pièce de résistance! They had methods of storing human brains in jars, not dead, and some indications I have are that they put them back in the original bodies afterward. Still not sure why exactly. But the bio-tech they had helped with developing all of this. Some of this is to do with the Abater, the retrovirus foundation, the EM field modulators, but one of the main projects I got working, was cloning!"

He flicked a switch and one of the tubes was lit from behind by a florescent light. It flickered for a few moments, hinting at a small human shape... which then resolved into an eight year old girl, naked and floating in the tube.

"She is actually derived from my DNA, grown from cell cultures, then an enhanced metabolism and certain improved sequences in her genetic structure allow her to grow at three times the normal rate. I'm pretty much sure faster is possible but I've had problems getting beyond the zygote stage with those. As you can see I have a lot of tanks, but these are just the main ones. There are a hundred units below us, each with a child in various stages of growth. Has to be if I'm to keep in supply of them while they grow. A variant of the EM field generator suppresses brain development from the start so there is no 'person' in there to worry about. As I said, the perfect dinner trolley for you Ellie!"

Ellie gazed at the child in unadulterated hunger. Oh yes, she'd do!

"Um, why a girl? I mean if it's based on your DNA?"

He chuckled.

"Well it's actually easier. Humans are really two separate species, male and female. From... what, a billion years ago?... the species split into the two genders, but males are almost an afterthought, an add-on to enable the species to function. They may be a distinct 'species' if you want to think of it like that, but not necessary in the long run other than to help make a child. Note the term 'help'. Female DNA contains all the genetic material to make either sex. Male DNA does not. There are several other problems with doing a staged, multi level chromosomal analysis and divisional sub mitocho... well, the details are unnecessary. Basically it's easier to make girls rather than boys, but I do have a few males down there in the tanks. I used some of Alice's DNA actually to fill in the blanks as the starting template for all of them. You'll find they're all slightly different genetically, each one based on the previous template with a minute variance. Alice said it helped the taste."

He said, his voice happily reminiscing... then it finally clicked, that feeling she'd got about Harold.

"Oh my god, You want to be eaten!" she said with a happy grin.

"Er, not exactly Ellie. Things are a little more complex than that." he said, sort of calmly, but not completely. This was the first time she detected a hint of nervousness to him though. She'd hit a sore point in him! "Suffice to say that over the years of studying this it has... affected me, yes. But I don't want to be eaten."

"You want to eat people don't you?"

He licked his lips and sat down by a computer screen.

"Yes and no. Ellie, I won't try to get around this, and as I said before I don't lie. Or at least what I say is the exact truth. Not quite the same thing." Ellie couldn't quite make sense of that, but he didn't give her a chance to ponder it. "But yes, I... find the idea of swallowing someone... erotic, or at least swallowing girls. But not eating them. The idea of killing someone is totally horrific to me. These things are NOT people in any sense of the word. These I don't mind you eating."

"And I'm sure you don't mind watching me eat?" Ellie said, a sensuous grin on her face as she walked up and placed a hand on the tank. "Could you unlock her?"

Harold paused, staring hard at Ellie. His eyes seemed to be looking straight through her for a moment and the look was chilling. She wondered if this was what others must feel like when they faced her resolve, her need, her Hunger when it descended upon them.

"Enjoy yourself Ellie." he said quietly and hit a switch.

The gurgling rose in pitch and the liquid drained from the tank. Ellie was surprised there were no cables, tubes or anything feeding it... her. As it's buoyancy disappeared the girl slowly crumpled in the bottom of  the tube and finally the tube itself slid into the floor leaving an aroma faintly reminiscent of almonds drifting on the air. Ellie reached down and drew the head upwards and was surprised as it shifted to her touch on it's own. Nothing else moved however.

"Alive, but nobody home huh?" She said, tapping the girl's skull with her other hand idly.

Harold simply nodded and she leaned in and took a long, slow lick up the girl's face. She felt more than tasted the string of chemicals, that which made this girl what she was. Prime sustenance. Food.

"Heh, and this is nearly you? You don't taste half bad Harold." She smirked, then before he could respond cricked her jaws and lifted the girl's head upwards, sliding the girl effortlessly into her wide maw. Out of the corner of her eye she saw him stare, unable to look away, as she eased the little girl's shoulders inside. She paused, something making this so very hard mentally somehow... It was a child and that was a line she thought she'd never cross. But this line didn't really exist. There was no 'child' here, just a body, a lump of delicious flesh for her to consume. No inconvenient soul inhabiting it. This she could get used to!

A soft slurp drew in the girl's smooth chest, her jaws spreading across the small body, hardly straining at all with such a small meal. She slowed, seeing a straining in Harold's pants, despite his fixed, serious expression, and traced her tongue out ahead, tasting the firm abdomen, then groin of the meal, loving the smooth body and getting excited despite herself from seeing him watching her eat. The only shame was that the meal didn't struggle, just twitched a little as she oozed within her, filling her insides in the familiar hunger satiating press. She traced fingers down the long legs, lifting them above her head as they slid slowly from sight, toes curling as she dipped a tongue into the tight, virginal folds of the young girl's slit. Nothing worthwhile there in one so young unfortunately, and without a mind in there it'd hardly be worth it anyway.

She savored the taste as those legs vanished into her mouth, head thrown back. She sighed through her nose as those pink toes popped in, licked sucked and finally swallowed. Her belly swollen with meat once more. It clenched, crunched and she burped lightly, hand covering her mouth with a smile. She stroked her hands across her swollen belly, her yellow dress amazingly untorn despite the stretching it endured. Maybe it was made from spandex? Didn't feel like it though.

"Thank you Harold." she said, walking over to him as her belly dealt with it's meal with a mix of loud gurgles and bone snapping crunches. Ellie leaned over and placed a hand on his groin, the hardness there making his feelings obvious. "She was delicious!" and she leaned in for a kiss. He didn't stop her, but also didn't kiss back. She curled her tongue inside his mouth but it felt odd with him unresponsive and she pulled back.

Suddenly he stood, almost knocking her aside... though he'd have probably knocked himself out if he'd actually hit her.

"Goodnight Ellie, I'll show you your room." and he strode past her to the door.

Blinking Ellie stared after him for several moments before following him quietly while her belly slowly shrank to loud gurgles that Harold pointedly did not notice. He led her down the corridor and she carefully noted both the number of the room he led her to, and the lab they'd come from. She felt fairly sure she could find the penthouse room too if she need to. Opening the door he motioned her inside.

"Sweet dreams Ellie." he said in a monotone, then walked off.

Ellie stood there watching him walk off and tried to think what to say... but nothing came to mind. She hated being this powerless! At least with the meal she'd be herself again soon, physically at least. She slumped tiredly into the room and shut the door behind her. The room was pretty large, maybe thirty foot to a side and with a large king size bed. Wardrobes covered one wall, a painting of a lakeside view the other. It looked simplistic, rather detailed but lacking in feeling, but the view it showed was still nice.

Jumping onto the bed she sighed, feeling the last of  her meal digest, her stomach back to normal proportions, unfortunately. Feeling full of person was something she missed after a meal. Maybe next time she'd let them sit, not crunch them up, and just revel in the feeling of being totally full. She jumped up and checked the rooms fittings, but it was all empty. Wardrobes, cupboards, draws, all were empty. Sighing she stripped and jumped back on the bed. At least the sheets were nice and clean, fresh and silky. She chuckled a dirty laugh as she imagined Harold watching her naked on these sheets... then it faded as she remembered how he'd just treated her.

Yeah, he was a cold one! Out there right now he must be...

Ellie's supernatural senses sensed a distant noise. There was no air conditioning noise, no buzz of fans or noise of appliances nothing to drown out that distant.... crying? Ellie's eyes opened wide as she realized Harold was sobbing in a room up the hall, probably behind several thick steel walls, but she could still hear it, and she could also hear the  name he gasped between sobs.

"Alice. I'm so sorry!"

Fury and pain burned in Ellie, but she couldn't have said exactly why. Blinking back tears herself she jammed the pillow over her head to try to drown out the distant sounds.

It didn't work.

A long, sleepless night later Ellie got up, showered then dressed in the same clothes she had worn yesterday. Maybe she could find a wider selection of clothes somewhere in this place? Some perverse sense of humor made her slip off her panties before leaving the room. Yeah, he'd LOVE that now wouldn't he! But he'd never know!

It didn't make much sense, but she was still reeling from the overwrought emotions of the previous night.

She found herself wandering into the lab again, staring at the tubes of clones. She wasn't hungry right now, but she supposed she could do with a snack... no, later. With a sigh Ellie sat down at a computer. This place reminded her that Harold had control of all this. Had control of her! Anger boiled in her, more than she had felt in a long time. His petty dealings were all some sort of sham, this was all to get his grubby hands on HER, it had to be! He couldn't be the Mr Perfect he pretended, no high goals of freeing people from Granny's clutches. He just wanted to make sure that Ellie wouldn't eat him and he could do what he wanted to her!

With a groan she dropped forwards, holding her head in her lap. Was she insane? If Harold wanted her he could have HAD her yesterday! Heck, he'd held off Granny with an array of high tech weapons, Ellie would be no trouble! Why was she being so idiotic over this? That anger burned still in the back of her head, ready to boil over once more but she jammed a lid on it as best she could. Explore the whys and wherefores later.

"Morning."

Ellie jumped and turned to see Harold walk in dressed in casual wear for a change. It actually suited him.

"See you like the dress." he said.

Ellie blinked in confusion, and her expression must have shown because Harold stopped and frowned himself.

"But you're still wearing.... Oh Damn!" he said, slapping his forehead. "I forgot to fill the damn closet! I'm sorry Ellie, I'll get it sorted!" and he started to leave the room.

"Wait!" she said, erupting to her feet without really knowing what she wanted to say. For one heart aching moment she just did not want to be alone. Even if it was just him filling the void.

He turned, seemed about to ask something, then to her relief he just nodded and stood there.

"Harold?" she said a few stretched silences later. "How did you know to find me with... Granny?"

"Ah!" he said simply and walked over to a bench and hoisted himself up to sit on it. "Well, it wasn't easy. I learned there was someone like you near here about four years ago. Animals disappearing was a give away, but other sightings nearby of... Granny's helpers, confirmed it. I started looking, but didn't have anything concrete to go on. When kids started to disappear a few months ago, well that was the clincher!" Ellie frowned, remembering the loss of her friends, and one boy she didn't even know the name of!

Harold paused a while when he saw her face droop, perhaps in his usual way realizing what she was thinking of again. She hated he could read her so easily!

"It took a while," Harold continued, "but I finally found someone who obviously knew something. A detective by the name of De'Vries." Ellie sighed and Harold nodded. "Yes, I gathered you'd met. He didn't give you up, and to be honest I almost wondered if he was the predator himself, but that was unlikely. I've never heard of them being older than early twenties before they go to visit Granny. Eventually I got some hints from him, then others nearby. Finally I ran into one of the weaker Granny helpers. She doesn't make them all like your mom you know, strong, sexy and confident. Some just blend in, weak, sickly or just plain ugly. Well Mr Black definitely fell into the latter category. Ah, I see you know him!" He said as her eyes jumped up to stare at him "Yes, well it took some work but I got some info on the connection. It's not as straightforwards as it might have appeared to you, but I did find the station you left on."

Harold paused at this point, an odd far away look in his eyes. He suddenly looked a lot older.

"No trains ever ran that track Ellie, I checked. Satellite footage shows nothing there for months. The guy insisted you left on a train though and I called in my chopper to attempt to follow."

"Well, satellite photos, robotic planes scouting ahead, managed to get me the only train that could have come here... and it only appeared on some of those scans." She shivered at the look in his eyes. "I know this is... strange, but I still don't understand what is going on exactly, even after all I've uncovered. It's not missing clues or not following things through to their destination, it's more that the information I do have is totally contradictory. I've seen other things that didn't make sense like this before, and it still floors me. I'm a scientist by nature and still assume that somehow I can understand things by just experimenting with and examining everything, if I have enough time and resources. Somehow I suspect this might not be as easy as all that. Suffice to say I did finally get there, just in the nick of time by the sound of it. Blew a hole in the roof with a missile barrage and saw feet slipping into that... thing. It was possible that it wasn't you, given the multitude of... things Granny was making and then eating back up, but I didn't see any other human forms there, so I took a gamble. Was tricky to hit you when Granny had mostly eaten you, and one of the harpoons missed, but it was enough."

He placed his hands on the bench and leaned back, staring at the ceiling.

"Ellie, I don't know what you've been through really. Well I know 'What' you've been through, just not... what it must have been like from your point of view... If you see what I mean." She smirked. Yeah, he'd love seeing life from her point of view! Especially the view of bodies slipping down his throat! "I just... couldn't leave you there, you know?"

" 'Cos I remind you of Alice?" She said quietly.

"Ellie, can you talk to me WITHOUT trying to piss me off?" He grated out "Just once?"

He stood up abruptly, a fierce look on his face and she did likewise, stepping towards him.

"Why should I?" Ellie bit out, fury bubbling up once more eagerly to the surface "Because you were the gallant hero? Because you saved the lilly white, wonderful Electra from a fate worse than death? Am I supposed to hear this tale and wilt before you, gladly doing whatever you want now?"

"Oh and when have you EVER done what I want girl!" He almost shouted, glaring at her from a foot away. "Would it hurt you to try and see things from my perspective on occasion? You think you have the monopoly on pain and suffering? You have no clue girl, no clue!"

She leaned forwards, eyes boring into his.

"Of course, you are just dying here from the pain of living in this luxury down here?" She says, waving around the hi-tech, well decked out room.

His eyes burned and slitted as he brought his face near hers, her own eyes mimicking his... and then she grabbed his head and yanked him to her, surprising herself as their lips met. He didn't even pause, tongue weaving around her own, his arms wrapping around her and grasping frantically as she did likewise. The two lovers desperately groped and fondled each other, pressing hard against each other's bodies. Ellie needed him, wanted him like nothing she'd ever felt before, a burning fire worse than The Hunger, and she knocked him over onto the work bench, landing on top hard and hearing a rib crack as her heavy, strong body crushed down on him. He didn't even flinch, his hands pulling her dress up, hers tearing his clothes from him by the handful till they were both naked.

It was passionate, rough and quick, but nothing like with her father, and Harold seemed, even through the fury and need, to focus on her. His rasping fingers stroked over sensitive spots she didn't know she had as he drove into her body again and again from beneath. Somehow, even with her strength and her being on top he guided it, drove it, his raw sexual need more even than hers, and she screamed a deafening yell of pleasure as she came hard, then jammed down as he still moved within her harshly, swallowing his head just before he spasmed. He didn't try to extricate himself from her jaws, just lay there, and slowly she pulled back, leaving his head dripping with saliva, both of them panting and heaving.

Ellie tumbled to one side, confused, scared and so very, very satisfied. The pair lay beside each other for several minutes in silence. Something finally had been filled, an emptiness from the horror of dealing with granny, that she never knew she still felt. This was... right.

"Pizza?" She muttered a few minutes later. He chuckled and sat up.

"That'd work." He finally winced as he got up and headed to the kitchen, but didn't even give an accusing glance at her, just wiped spit from his hair with one hand. She decided not to mention it. He may be a little overweight, but still had a cute butt that she followed as he left the room, still naked.

They had pizza for breakfast in the penthouse kitchen. Home made and he seemed an OK cook at least. They didn't say much during breakfast, or for the rest of the day. By some unspoken agreement neither dressed, though later on Ellie saw a bandage around his chest. Nothing else sexual happened that day, they just... stayed unclothed. Perhaps it symbolized something, no lies or falsehoods? She wasn't sure, but since they didn't speak much they didn't get into any heated debates either that could have pulled things down again. He hadn't even mentioned that she'd part way eaten him during sex.

He kissed her gently before she went to bed that night, alone. Somehow sleeping together didn't seem right yet to either of them. They weren't exactly even friends yet, though something had changed permanently between them. She heard no crying that night.

The next day Harold showed her around the base, both of them clothed, and she thankfully in different clothes. He had filled her closet.

This facility was huge and she saw a sports court, a swimming pool, several workshops, over a dozen bedrooms, another kitchen, an entertainment room and a computer facility. It was rather overwhelming and when he'd finished giving her the tour she took her leave, grabbed a towel and went to the pool to relax. Some part of her almost wanted him to come in and interrupt her, especially as she didn't bring a swim suit, but she swam alone. It did relax her, even though swimming naked in the water did make her think of Ditmar wistfully.

In the afternoon he showed her the cloning facility underneath the lab she'd seen before. Hundreds of tubes and large, odd looking machines making babies. She had to bite her lip at that thought given what they did yesterday. Finally, in the evening, they wound up back in the 'penthouse' room again, lounging on the couches.

"So, is there anything else you want to show me?" she said, idly sipping a drink.

"I'm not sure you're interested in the aircraft works. I build my own you know, though a lot of the parts are shipped in. A couple out there are commercial models, but the others are mine." He paused, staring openly at her and she flushed. "Ellie..." yet again he paused and she felt a little odd as his expression became more serious "About yesterday..."

She closed her eyes. They'd managed to avoid mentioning it all day. She could tell this was going to be unpleasant. He put his own drink down and leaned forwards

"... I didn't hurt you did I?" he said carefully.

Ellie laughed, a booming laugh that filled the room. It took a while for it to subside.

"Harold... I was more worried about you." She said, motioning to his ribs. He winced, but smiled as he looked down himself.

"Nah, I'm OK. Partly numbed there from various injuries in the past, though it burns a bit internally. Dont worry about it." again his expression drew serious and he looked into her eyes. "What happened Ellie?"

"Well, when a boy really likes a girl," She said in a childish voice "He takes his pee pee and..."

"Ellie!" He couldn't avoid chuckling, but soon stopped "You know what I mean. Not the sex. What happened to us? I was ready to hit you after that comment about Alice." She winced at the name. "Don't hate her Ellie. Yes, I cared deeply for her, where I hadn't for any of the other's I've helped. You know once I tried to help one of Granny's creations? It didn't really seem to know what it was. I don't think she included those memories, at least on the surface. That ended bad of course, he tried to kill me, but I think it was more programming she'd left in him than his conscious mind. Difficult to tell when she made him from scratch of course."

This was getting into dangerous territory for Ellie and her mood darkened. Reminders of Granny she did not need!

"What's the difference really?" She said acidly "Made or born? Do think I'm less or more because of my heritage, and besides I WAS born, not made by... her."

"That's not what I'm talking about Ellie! I was just trying to figure out what made him try to kill me!"

"So you can erase it in me?" She bit out, regretting it after she said it... almost.

"I'm not trying to erase anything, and I'm not forcing anything on you either Ellie! I'm... pretty anti-social, or un-social, whatever it is. But I don't get on well with people. This..." he waved a hand first at Ellie then at him, "... between us. I don't have any experience at relationships Ellie."

"Except fucking Alice."

The icy look Harold pierced her with made her realized she had gone too far. Slowly, deliberately, he stood and leaned over, glaring at her.

"Ellie." He said in a quiet monotone "Three things. One. This base is heavily defended, as I've mentioned. Internally as well as externally. Those defenses are perfectly capable of incinerating you completely. Two, if the base monitoring system sees you attempting to kill me, or sees you eat me it will kill you. Not 'might', not 'try to', it WILL kill you. Three." He paused and leaned in further, inches from Ellie's face. "If you ever say something like that about Alice again... I will hit you."

Ellie blinked, almost laughed, but the serious look on his face floored her. Then something inside her twisted as he turned away and strode out the door without a further word. Somehow that last threat actually mattered to her. He could hardly hurt her, she doubted she'd feel it, physically. But... ah yes, there was always a 'but' wasn't there. She could feel the tears building, that nervous tension rattling and knew she had to get out of here. She ran down the corridor and collapsed in her room, bawling into the bed.

An hour later the agony, fear and rejection had transformed into rage. How dare he judge her! How dare he threaten her for a simple comment like that! Boiling fury rose in her, and despite the late hour she couldn't sleep, couldn't even think of getting ready for bed like a meek, subservient little girl. Harold had her trapped here, and now she dare not even touch him? Anything she did,  the base would see, it's cameras... wait.

Ellie shot up in bed, tears dying on her cheeks as her eyes became slitted and cold very suddenly. Oh yes! You thought were so clever Harold! But if the base can't see what she does...

Slowly she changed into light weight clothes, just a pair of shorts and a baggy short T-shirt, nothing else. She wanted to be limber for this. A few minutes searching through draws found nylons enough for what she wanted and she grabbed those and a sock and shoved them in her shorts' pocket. Barefoot she trotted down the hall towards Harold's bedroom. It was late and the halls were on reduced light, almost like night lights strewn down the top edge of each wall. Dim enough for her to see that no light shone out under his door. Likely he was already asleep! She'd have to do this really carefully and do it right.

All the doors in the base were very well made, unfortunately for Harold. That meant no squeaking as Ellie slowly pushed it open. Peeking in she saw him sleeping on his front, arms wrapped around a pillow with the covers in disarray all about him. Seems he wasn't sleeping well. Well, he needn't worry, he'd be somewhere much more comfortable soon. Well, comfortable for her anyway!

Edging in slowly she approached his bed in the dark, LED illuminations from the clock just barely lighting the way. She wanted to just ease under the covers and slurp him up while he slept, but it was too risky. Maybe the computer could understand spoken commands from him? If he shouted something it could mean Ellie's death! Plus, the more she thought about it, the more she wanted to eat him feet first and let him watch while she ate him. She wanted him to really know what was going on as she took him body and soul!

Shaking a little, cheeks still tear stained, she slowly, gently, got on the bed and started to crawl over him, kneeling astride his prone body. It was tricky to do this and not disturb him, how did married couples manage this? But eventually she got all the way over him and gently tugged covers away from his arms and head. Luckily for Ellie's tastebuds it seemed he didn't like pajamas and her face split in a decidedly nasty grin.

Shimmying forwards a little and putting her weight on her knees she slid her left hand down near his torso, ready to grab his body and pin his arms to his side. The other held the sock which was now stuffed half way down one of the nylons, most of the others wrapped around it in a twisted braid. His head was on it's side, breathing fitfully on the pillow, and she nudged the sock and nylon mass towards his lips.

One long, deep breath in... then out focused her and she tensed in readiness. A snap, jerk, and the sock was jammed into his mouth, and Ellie's other arm wrapped around him, trapping his suddenly twitching arms.

He jerked in his sleep, not even waking, and she smiled, stretching the nylon gently on either side of his head, then tying it tight. It seemed he was a deep sleeper, she hadn't needed to worry after all! Calmly she lifted his arms from their grip on the pillow and bound them behind his back with a spare nylon. His head twitched and his eyes blearily opened while Ellie threw the sheets off him completely. She sidled down the bed towards his feet eagerly, drooling. Although it'd only been a few days it seemed like an age since she'd eaten an adult. The kids were, nice, but this would be special!

A muffled, rather calm querying sound came from his gagged mouth as Ellie tasted his feet, then slid them into her. Her lips stretched and jaw bones popped in the familiar dance as she crawled up the bed over him. As she sucked his calves down her throat, feeling his feet twitch and tickle deep inside her, she could see his body start to edge back and forth, probably trying to figure out what was happening. Reaching forwards she gently, almost delicately, took hold of his hips with both hands, and laying languidly on the bed she pulled him towards her hungry maw, his body stroking across the sheets. His thighs jerked as she pulled them in, the taste divine. She loved it when a meal struggled, but then this meal started to slow in it's movements.

She slipped a hand under his groin and almost chuckled as she held his rapidly swelling shaft in her hand. Well, so much for him not wanting to be eaten! Slowly her tongue edged up ahead of her lips, teasing under his scrotum, feeling him jerk at the tender caress. He knew now, knew that he would end inside her, his final thoughts of how he had wronged Ellie and what the price was! A few tiny gulps edged her lips wide across his large hips. As developed as she was now this was hardly  a challenge any more and her tongue tasted it's way across his groin, feeling his cock dance and twitch to it's touch. Lingering here she savored his flavor, a rich taste she knew well. Arousal seemed to improve the taste, and Harold was VERY aroused!

His breath was ragged through the gag, and his movements got more intense. With one last jerk he spilled his seed into her mouth and she swallowed his still shuddering hips down her esophagus. She shoved his hands under her upper lip, deeper into her as she ate his body, then froze as she saw his head twitching, the gag half off. A twitch got it finally off and he looked down at her calmly.

"She never loved me back Ellie." he said simply.

Ellie's mind was ablaze, conflicting emotions tore through her; The Hunger and her feelings of betrayal, though those were falling apart as she realized WHY he had been so sensitive about Alice. It wasn't that he loved her more than Ellie (And she was only now realizing that was why she had felt so awful herself!), it was that his feelings had never been returned! She couldn't stop though, and even while crying she made several heavy gulps, his shoulders then head rapidly sucked down inside her.

Rolling on her back she cried into her hands as he settled into her gigantic midsection, swollen and gurgling loudly.

"Oh god! What have I done?" She bawled as the acids churned around his body.

"It's OK Ellie, just don't squeeze, OK?" came a muffled response from her belly.

Her crying stopped almost instantly and she sniffed, staring in shock at her stomach. Those acids could digest anything, and he was just sitting there inside her! Gently she wrapped her arms around the huge bulge he made in her belly, tracing his curled over back, his rump, then down across his thighs tucked against his chest.

"How?" She squeaked, sniffing again as she stared at her Harold-shaped stomach.

"Well,” He said in a childish tone, “when Ellie loves someone a lot she takes her mouth and sucks his pee pee... and the rest of him, aaaall up."

She couldn't have stopped the laughter if she'd tried and bawled and laughed hard, rolling over the bed, arms and legs wrapped around the laughing Harold within her. It was several minutes later  when they both managed to laugh themselves dry, though Harold did have to ask for her to gulp air down for him. After several more minutes of her just staring at him inside her she sat up and then stood, swaying her enlarged body over to his mirror. She was tempted to switch the light on, but the computer might take offense at seeing her with Harold inside her so she put up with looking at her silhouetted reflection in the dim light. The sight of him inside her was... electrifying.

"You didn't answer my question though. How did you survive?"

"Acids are easy Ellie. Years ago I made a coating that would protect my skin against this stuff. That wasn't perfect, eyes and mouth... and other openings, weren't protected well. But since then I've found ways of adapting DNA so the body's skin grows that stuff in it's outer layers. I'm naturally digestion proof Ellie. Of course your stomach is REALLY strong. If you squeeze now... well, bye bye Harry! My insides aren't digestion proof! I'd rather you didn't crush me if you don't mind.” He paused, then continued in a more subdued tone “If you promise not to I'll let you do this again when ever you want Ellie."

She stroked a finger over the bulge his head made inside her as it shifted under her skin. Just watching that sent a sensuous shiver through her. She needed him now... outside!

"That's, an incredible offer Harold... and the answer's yes! But right now, I think I want... no, NEED something else!"

Ellie had never had to throw up a meal before and it was a challenge. Slowly she leaned over the bed and hurled and heaved, steam and smoke rising from the covers as her digestive juices started reacting with the bed. He came up fast, and gasping. He shuddered and fell onto the collapsing, melting bed, waving off acidic smoke and coughing, but grinning wide up at her.

"I love you Ellie." He said simply and she fell on him... then promptly  jumped away. It seems her insides were proof against acid, but her outsides were just resistant. It didn't damage her, but that stung! Laughing again she dragged him to the shower while the bed, and then some of the floor, dissolved unnoticed by the couple. Their lovemaking was rough, but Ellie was careful this time not to damage Harold again. He got a little bruised in places, but no broken bones! When they were through the shower was a wreck, but neither cared, Ellie, laying curled in the corner on broken tiles with Harold's larger body curled around her, his arms and legs tight about her, his head curled tight over, buried in her chest. They lay like this for maybe half an hour without words, just nuzzling each other. Finally Ellie broke the silence.

"Harold." She said softly, her cheek pressing down against his hair. "I promise if you say no I'll let it go, but I have to ask, OK?" He nodded slightly "Can you tell me what happened with you and Alice?"

He jerked against her as if she'd bitten him, but slowly he pulled back, a sad look in his eyes.

"I don't know." He said honestly. "I... I've never talked about it with anyone. Never wanted to!" That last was with some bitterness, but he bit it down and calmed. "OK Ellie, I'll try."

He leaned in and kissed her lightly on the cheek before sliding back down again, nuzzling his cheek against her chest.

"I... I found her almost by accident. I was searching for one of... Granny's helpers. She'd been eating people in a small town in Colorado and I was just trying to put an end to it, one way or another." Ellie winced at that, remembering  all the people she'd eaten. Hunger or no Hunger it was still her. "I caught the helper as she was trying to devour someone... Killed the helper and pulled the girl out of the remains. That was Alice. Seems she hadn't made the grade or something. I don't know. Alice said that when she finally managed to... catch her parents she got the message to meet one of the helpers. She'd taken way too long though. Seems when she got there he called someone else, and when Alice left... she was followed. I'm not sure what exactly was 'wrong' with Alice from Granny's perspective, but something was obviously. Anyway, I got her semi-conscious body back to my house and lab and got to work putting her back on her feet again."

"It was hard, watching her pull through. She'd been pretty badly burned. Acid plus my Thermite gun will do that. I couldn't nail the helper without getting her a little. She was half inside the woman after all! She panicked when she awoke, but I knew how strong she was likely to be and had sufficient restraints... just. It took days to calm her down to the point where I could be sure she wasn't going to kill me... and by that time I was... well, smitten. Yes, she was beautiful, like you Ellie." She blushed at his offhand comment, not sure why this talk of Alice no longer hurt her. He had loved her after all, but apparently it didn't stop him from loving Ellie. "I think most like you are, but that wasn't what drew me to her. Her sad tale, her struggle her whole life to accept and become one with the hunger had been rough on her. She was the only one I found, other than you, who had totally melded their minds like that. For her it had taken many years to do. I gather it happened pretty quickly for you?"

Ellie sighed, painful memories surfacing.

"I... succumbed Harold. The Hunger took me totally." He gasped from her chest and looked up in sympathy, not fear. She smiled back down at him. "I simply started to eat, anyone I decided would do. Slowly it became more and more of my life, and I became less and less. Eventually... I tried to eat a child and somewhere deep inside I rebelled. I could feel it. It's like... having two sides of an argument going on in your head at the same time. I was both, me and The Hunger, and I won. I... starved." Ellie shivered remembering. Remembering the pain, the aching need to eat anything, and..."But it was a temporary victory. My body needed people by then. I couldn't live without them. The more I resisted the more I... faded. I was dying. On the edge, right before I couldn't stay awake any more, my mother, my adopted mother I mean, came to me." The memory was both pleasurable and painful but Ellie had long since reconciled this part of her horror "I ate her, and my dad watched. He jerked off while I gobbled her up and digested her, then... we fucked." She said simply "I... it seemed so right, and even now I love the memories of that, eating him I mean." Then, in a voice like a school girl caught with a hand in a cookie jar she added: "I came from it."

Harold actually chuckled and she stroked his head.

"I can believe that! Having been eaten myself now I can safely say I understand why some people like that."

Looking down Ellie frowned.

"But you don't do you?” She said curiously “You said that before but I... you came when I ate you?"

"That wasn't because you were eating me Ellie, it was because YOU were eating me, if you see what I mean." tears blinded her for a moment and she blinked them away, hugging him tighter to her.

"I... I don't know what to say? Oh, I interrupted you." She said, stopping herself. "You were talking about Alice?"

Harold sighed as one finger traced a delightfully ticklish line down her back to her rump.

"Yeah.” He sighed, trying to regain his resolve to complete his painful tale. “As I was saying, she was the only one who had blended themselves together, though I had no idea someone with The Hunger could revolt like you did Ellie! That must have taken a lot! Alice... well, she was like you, but perhaps less so. She was merging slowly together in a way I guess, but her mind was still two separate, if accepting, parts. She was sort of like someone with a dual personality and I never knew which I was talking to."

Ellie shivered. That description was too familiar to her. The last few months she'd been that way, switching between Ellie and The Hunger, till she merged with it. She sniffed and wondered what she had lost, what was eaten inside her by her acceptance of The Hunger. Did she even know? Saying she was less innocent wasn't really an answer. But she knew that was true.

"Alice had never gotten over what her 'mother' had tried to do to her. She was angry all the time, though usually not at me. I couldn't not love her Ellie, but I tried to hide it. She showed no signs of returning it and I just offered the cure. She took it with open arms, her near death experience shook her too much I think. She wanted to be different, changed, maybe to forget, though if that was what she wanted she was disappointed. It doesn't remove the memories or the pain Ellie. It just makes The Hunger dulled, more easily controlled."

He blinked back tears and unconsciously nuzzled his face down into Ellie's chest again.

"I... I guess I assumed she'd never noticed my feelings towards her, and I went through the procedure in as scientifically proper a way as I could."

"Hmm, did you... by any chance... peek at her while you were doing it?" Ellie asked softly, with a slight smirk.

A flinch of pain came to his face, unseen by Ellie in her cleavage, but he held it, then, slowly, as if a great weight were released, he shuddered a weird laugh into her chest.

"Oh yes! Oh god yes! Oh Ellie, I don't know why I loved her, but I really did. You know, at one point, one desperate moment, I even considered taking her while she was unconscious, drugged up. I just... couldn't do that to her."

"And she couldn't do it to you?" She said, in as sympathetic a voice as she could.

"No, she couldn't. Immediately after we found that the cure had worked she told me. She'd known how I felt about her all along, and she found me... well she called me a pervert, a dirty old man oogling young girls."

Ellie hid her wince, remembering her thoughts on her father after she'd eaten him. After she'd fucked then eaten him! Who was more the pervert then? He or she? Somewhere inside her though The Hunger still laughed at the thought. It knew what he'd been without a doubt.

"I was... broken, but she stayed and helped with my research. I think she wanted revenge against Granny way too bad. She'd never met her, and perhaps the reason her mom tried to kill her was precisely that. She had no urge to return home. Whatever it was we never found out. Five very strong helpers raided my house a few days later. It was... a bloodbath. I'd already built quite a few weapons, and Alice was strong, but we only managed to kill three. They seemed, up to that point, to want to take her alive, bringing her back to Granny probably, not sure why then but not before. Then, with two left, they decided the rules had changed and tried to kill us."

He shifted back from her a little, reluctantly lifting away from Ellie's soft bosom and looking up into her eyes.

"Ellie, both of us fought well, but they were stronger, faster and had a lot more experience than me back then. We got one, but the other grabbed Alice and... jammed a phosphorous grenade into an eye socket, using her inhuman strength to... well it wasn't pretty, even before the grenade went off, Alice screaming madly till the end. I... still have nightmares about that." Ellie nodded, remembering his crying in the night. "After... well, I killed the burning remains of the assassin, buried Alice's remains and burned my house. I didn't want to stay there any more. That's pretty much it Ellie. I've been struggling to get back at Granny ever since."

"I'm so sorry. I... I don't know what to say to..." and then Ellie's stomach gurgled loudly, interrupting her speech.

Harold's and Ellie's eyes tracked slowly down to her belly.

" 'Say?' " Harold finished for her. "If not, your stomach does. Very eloquently too." and he patted it and grinned. "I'm available if you want a snack."

She stared at him, and very nearly ate him right there.

"N... no. As  nice as that would be, I need food right now, not play time... well, play time as well..."

Harold grinned as he stood and helped her to her feet. Awkward with as much as she weighed, but he didn't complain. Ellie's stomach complained again however, almost echoing in the shower from it's volume.

"You REALLY need some sustenance it seems. You know, I have just the place. Romantic work bench, flickering light of computer terminals, the soft lick of waves on bio-sustenance liquids." Ellie laughed at him as they ran, naked, to the cloning lab, her stomach gurgling louder than any time she remembered, except possibly when she'd starved herself. That had been bad!

Giggling as they entered the lab they opened a tube and Harold helped the unresisting girl into Ellie's lips, He lifted and helped her in, and Ellie pressed her legs around him and took him there while she ate, both of them shuddering as curling little toes disappeared down her throat. He flinched a little when her belly clenched, scrunching the girl up and finishing the meal, but he didn't stop hugging her, and his grin never left his face during the long digestion. Clutching each other tight both of them raised eyebrows when Ellie's stomach STILL rumbled loudly, even after it's meal.

"Hmm, not enough huh? I'll get the second course." He said, pulling free of her embrace and opening another tube. Harold dragged and lifted the ten year old boy to Ellie's lips and she greedily helped stuff him in. She just could not get enough! Arms slid down her throat, the clone's torso tasted lovely and he even had an erection to tease, but it was over all too soon. Harold pressed and squeezed the kid's feet down her throat till it settled inside her. She reveled in the brief feeling of his hands in her mouth, then she felt this meal too crack and crunch down and digest. Now it seemed only to take ten minutes, with the small clone kids at least, but afterward her stomach gurgled and groaned.

"Ya know, maybe it's something special it's after?" Harold said and patted Ellie's middle affectionately again.

Getting up he strode over to the computer and started typing.

"Like I've said, it takes a two years to grow a six year old kid, three to grow a nine year old. Growing enough to feed you one a week forever takes well over a hundred tubes, them all at different stages of growth. But... I haven't had anyone here feeding for about a year!" He smiled as one of the empty tubes closed, filled, and then a shadowy body came through a hole in the floor of the tube, slipping up to fill it. "This might be more filling for you Ellie."

The tube drained and opened and Ellie's eyes goggled. A woman fell out, helped by Harold, to end up sprawled before her. She looked utterly tasty! A six foot blonde, very well built and deliciously curvy she simply lay there, eyes open and staring into space with a vacant look on her face. Kneeling down by the girl's feet she licked across the toes and closed her eyes in bliss.

"Oh the food is good here!" She murmured.

"And hopefully the service is satisfactory too?" Harold said as he lifted the girl's feet towards her. "Allow me madame!" and he pushed the girl's feet inside.

Tongue roved over sweet flesh and decided that it was definitely good! A tender swallow and heels plopped into her mouth. She looked up and saw Harold's rather swollen erection, and had a deliciously dirty thought. She reached forwards, grabbed his knees as he crouched beside the girl, and yanked. He gasped and fell over backwards while Ellie lifted the girl with barely any effort, over him. He gasped as his shaft was plunged up the unresponsive girl's rump with a tight squelch, then she fed his feet in alongside the meal's.

"Ellie! Oh god!" He groaned, but grinned as he said it, and clasped his hands to the girl's body.

She could feel the heat in herself rise as she ate both of them down, her lips ascending rapidly across knees as Harold pumped hard into the meal, his hands grabbing those beautiful breasts. Ellie sucked in heaving thighs, then stretched wider than she'd ever stretched before, encompassing two hips at once. It didn't help that the hips were moving rather rapidly against each other! He grunted as she shoved her tongue into his behind. She just couldn't resist it, and used the grip to ease him in deeper. The girl jerked and danced on him, her gaze distant and bland... but not quite. Ellie could see some odd movements coming to the girl's features, eyelids rising, eyes widening, mouth parting slightly as her breath gasped. Automatic reaction to getting buggered maybe? She couldn't say, but she reached up and pressed those bouncing breasts towards her lips eagerly as the girl and Harold sank inside her.

"Yes, Oh Ellie. I LOVE YOU!" he screamed as his hands were jammed against the soft flesh of the girl's breast as teeth crested them. Ellie reached forwards, held his head gently, and stood up, feeling her meals settle deeper. She tipped her head back and yawned wide as she felt him shudder in orgasm. She grabbed the work bench hard to support herself as she came herself, both heads disappearing from view, oozing down the dark pit of her gullet as they shuddered hard, inside and out.

It was hard not to let her stomach clench and squeeze, but she managed. Harold obviously enjoyed this, bucking and humping the slowly digesting form of the girl as Ellie's stomach acids did their job. It took almost an hour with out the bone snapping squeezing but eventually she could feel him grind to a halt, as the focus of his attention came apart in his arms.

"OK, that was possibly the weirdest fuck I've ever had Ellie.” Harold said in a surprisingly calm, if exhausted sounding voice “I guess I should be horrified and grossed out at the whole thing. Somehow, I'm not. Thank you. I mean it!"

"Oh you're welcome Harry. Trust me I enjoyed it just as much!"

He chuckled in agreement deep within her as she felt her stomach empty the liquid portion of it's contents down into her intestines to absorb. Another hour of cuddling with Harold within her and she was back to normal size... well, normal with a Harold bulge!

"I think tummy is finally satisfied!" Ellie pronounced calmly and then smiled. "Lets get you out of there before I forget myself and go for dessert!"

A very satisfying few minutes later and Ellie lay beside Harold on the floor, cuddling him contentedly.

"I'm sorry about before Harry." She said quietly "I... I was enraged, angry... jealous. Hah! Jealous! I just forced you to fuck a girl in my mouth. How can I do that and be jealous of some one who's de... I... I mean... I'm sorry."

"Ellie, it's OK. Alice IS dead." He said calmly, with maybe a twitch. "I'm sorry I over-reacted before. It's been hard here alone in this place."

With a grin Ellie's hand fastened down on his groin.

"Hmm, you know? I think you're right."

They both chuckled as he swelled in her hand... then Ellie winced. Something shifted down in her belly tightly. She'd never felt anything quite like that before.

"Hmm, guess I shouldn't have had that much to eat!"

"Oh, I think it looks good on you!" Harold said, grinning and gazing across at her still slim figure.

"Heh, I probably put on two hundred pounds in one sitting! Talk about going over the top! Oooh." She winced as her belly quivered. "That feels weird."

Harold pressed his hard warmly against her abdomen in an attempt to comfort her, and felt a jerk.

"OK, that IS odd."

Both stared at Ellie's tummy while Harold felt the warm skin, trying to figure out what was going on.

"Um, Ellie, you aren't pushing your gut out are you?" She shook her head, then stared as she noticed it too. Her stomach was larger there, bulging slightly. They watched for half an hour and got more and more worried as her tummy stretched and grew slowly. It shifted in jerks, swelling and making odd little gurgle noises as it got larger. After another half hour she looked almost five months pre...

"Oh god!" Ellie gasped."I can't be! I mean, this can't be... no!"

"What, Ellie?" Harold asked, seeing her distress. He felt the bulge nudge at him.

"I think that was... a kick." She squeaked, and Harold's eyes widened.

"Oh you are kidding me!"

"No, but give me a few hours and I probably will be!" she said, then gave a rather nervous laugh. That really wasn't as funny as when she thought it.

"How.. How can you be pregnant? Is this from sex a mere couple of hours ago?"

"Maybe. And the baby just had an awful lot of food to help it along its way!"

Both of them stared at the ever growing mass. This was ridiculous!

They got to their feet and ran to the medical lab he had set up for the 'Abatement' treatment. By that time Ellie looked over seven months pregnant and the baby showed no signs of slowing it's growth.

"Maybe something to do with the clone's accelerated growth hormones? But why...?" Harold petered out as he started searching through reams of data on Ellie's condition.

Ellie clutched her swollen belly. This felt so similar to having eaten someone, but the squirming inside was... well, quiet, cuddly almost. Like Harold when he was inside her.  Smaller of course, but getting larger all the time!

"OK, there are some odd readings here, but everything I have shows the hormone levels are good, chemical balance is fine we..." he turned back and gasped. She looked nine months pregnant now!

"Um, is it time?" She grunted, feeling it squirm still, holding the growing mass with both arms.

"I.. haven't the slightest clue." Harold said. "No contractions?" She shook her head.

"It isn't even uncomfortable. Feels rather nice, in a rather scary way. It's weird feeling something grow inside you like this!"

"I'm sure! OK, I guess..." Harold felt the lumpy bulge of her stomach and she smiled at his warm touch. "...that's the head, there.. yeah, it feels like a normal baby Ellie." Her face froze as she realized why he was worried. Oh god, what if this turned into some monster? Some horrible thing born of Granny's Genetic tinkering!

"Harry! I'm scared!" She said, and he briefly hugged her, the still swelling bulge between them.

"OK, hang on. Do you feel... stretchy down there Ellie?" he said, pointing down between her legs. She blinked, smiled and nodded.

"Well, I think so. When we've had sex it certainly didn't feel tight."

"OK, just relax, I'm going to try something to scan the baby. This may pinch a little. Just try to relax the muscles down there as much as possible, OK Ellie?"

Nodding she watched him pick up a tool that looked like  a fat pen with a ball bearing on the end easily two inches in diameter. He plugged it into a cable leading to a computer, then brought his hand with the 'pen' down between her legs. She gaped at  him, and then at the wide ball on the end of the pen.

"Um, could you... stroke me first? This might be tight after all!"

He smiled and laid the pen between her thighs as they parted for him, then his other hand slid fingers into the folds of her labia and teased around her clit. She bit her lip as she squirmed. Oh he was good at this! He hadn't even touched the... Ellie's eyes wend wide as the large bulge of the ball slipped inside her.

"Oooh!" She grunted. "I... oh, that was easy?" She said gasping, and felt Harold's whole hand, with the pen, slide inside her while he still stroked her. She could feel herself swelling there at his touch, heat rising, but her belly still rose larger. It looked the size of a beach ball now, but not spherical quite, she could see slightly bulges of elbows and knees in the taught skin. Then the pen pressed into something incredibly tight and tried  to edge through! Closing her eyes she tried to just go with it, but it was hard... then something relaxed. She could feel the pop as it slid through her cervix and into her tightly packed womb, shortly followed by his whole hand!

"I... it's OK, that doesn't even hurt!" She said, as bemused by this as his expression said he was.

"OK, hold a minute Ellie." He said, and with his free hand started to type on the computer, staring at  the scrolling figures and odd displays that popped up. "OK, looks good so far Ellie, genetics looks human, a girl it looks like, physiology also human as far as I can tell. As human as you or I."

He stopped and they both looked at each other, then down at the bulge which was now nearly as large a bulge as Harold had made in her stomach before.

"That, is big!" She managed.

"Yeeeah." Harold murmured, staring at the screen. "If I read these scans right, then she is... well..."

*UNGH!* Ellie grunted as a contraction hit her, squeezing her 'baby'. "Oh, that was uncomfortable!"

"I thought contractions hurt? Just uncomfortable? That's good news!" He tried to pull back, but felt the cervix clench on him, then something jammed against his hand, something large and warm! "Uh, Ellie?" and then liquid pooled over his arm and trickled to the floor. Ellie's water just broke!

"Oh shit!” Ellie grunted “She's coming out!"

Harold gaped where his arm was between her legs and saw her hips literally come apart at the seams. Her hip bones seem to almost wriggle, twist and then spread hugely as the large mass of the child slid downwards. It pushed down on his hand, shoving him and his scanner pen out before it as her sex spread massively wide. A huge bloody mound emerged as his hand plopped free, spreading her wide and making Ellie groan. She could feel the surging mass wriggle slightly as it oozed out, but it... didn't hurt! Quite the opposite! Throwing her head back Ellie screamed as the massive, warm, wriggling ball of flesh was driven forcefully out of her taught vagina, labia sucking across blood covered shoulders, then torso as it emerged. Another scream of pleasure and feet plopped free and the girl half fell to the floor, Harold slowing her descent. He wiped the blood from the girl's head in amazement. He turned to Ellie, remembering her screams from moments before. She simply gazed at him with a very satisfied look on her face.

"Ooooh yes!" Ellie moaned, and Harold slowly grinned as he recognized the expression.

"I take it child birth pain is over rated in your case?" He said, chuckling. She just nodded, a warm fuzzy smile emerging, her eyes half lidded, her hand pressed contentedly to her slowly shrinking pussy. He could practically see the bones re-arranging themselves back to normal under her skin. Incredible!

Turning back to the 'child' he dealt with the afterbirth in a nearby trash, tied the cord, then proceeded to rub the girl down with the towel.

"I can't believe we have a baby!" he said happily. "Although she is a little on the large side."

It was obvious she was no child. She looked slightly taller than Ellie! Bubbles rose from her lips and her eyes looked a little distant, just like a baby's though. He cleaned her face and froze. It wasn't quite there, but it almost looked like...

"Alice." he said in shock. "She looks like Alice!"

Ellie heaved herself up on her elbows tiredly and stared at her daughter.

"Can I hold her?" She said automatically, then reconsidered. Well her daughter was probably too big to... oh, yes! She'd forgotten her strength!

Harold tried to lift the girl up, but it was awkward. She was all arms and legs, still slippery from the blood, and didn't really co-operate, though her eyes looked more focused now.

Ellie chuckled, leaned over, gently took hold of the girl's shoulders and pulled her up from Harold's grip. With an easy grace she hefted her daughter up and snuggled the huge girl in her arms. Harold gazed at the odd scene in amazement.

"She really looks like Alice." he said again

"Alice!"

Ellie and Harold jerked. That had been their daughter.

"Pardon?" Harold said. The girl turned to him,  her eyes locking with his and she smiled.

"Alice!"

"Our girl... can talk." Ellie said, gaping. "Um... My name is Ellie, I'm your mommy. Can you say Mommy?"

"Mommy!"

"That's too fast!" Murmured Harold "Way too fast! Um, I'm Harold, I'm your daddy."

"Daddy!"

"How... I wonder." Harold muttered as the girl giggled to herself and Ellie grinned, ticking her under the chin to still more giggles. Their daughter then pointed a bit clumsily at Ellie.

"Mommy!" then at Harold. "Daddy!" then slapped herself on the chest. "Alice!"

Harold winced and looked at her.

"Well, you said she does look like her." Ellie said carefully.

"I... guess. But there is something else. Her motor co-ordination is going up very quickly, her speech is developing way too fast and her eyes have become much more controlled. Most of that isn't genetic Ellie, it's developed. Kids learn to follow people's eyes, they learn to match hand to eye co-ordination and they learn to mimic other people's speech, then the grammar. It isn't spontaneous. How is she doing it?"

"Mommy warm!" Alice said, and snuggled against Ellie.

"Her grammar is improving." Harold said a little nervously. "Maybe... hang on a minute."

While Ellie played with Alice Harold 'played' with the computer. A few minutes later he turned back.

"OK, that is weird. Alice?"

"Yup." came Alice's response

"Can you understand me?" he said, peering into his daughter's eyes.

She nodded vigorously. He glanced up at Ellie, then looked back to Alice.

"OK... what am I thinking of?"

Alice frowned, concentrated, burbled, then shrugged.

"Dunno Daddy." her voice seemed slightly more mature already. More like a four or five year old's.

Harold frowned too, then brightened and spoke to Alice again.

"Right, what does a hippo look like Alice?"

"Big purply. Two big white teef, all fat and jiggly." she giggled.

"Purply. I was thinking of a cartoon purple hippo earlier. She can' t read minds, but something... maybe her subconscious can. It read me, and she learned what a hippo looked like. She's... well, reading us to learn. Not consciously, but subconsciously!"

The next couple of hours were astonishing. Mentally Alice grew from a baby to a teenager very quickly and seemed fascinated with everything. She wanted to learn about it all, and found she could learn it faster than Ellie and Harold could teach it. Soon she was sitting, still naked, on the computer chair, working on Harold's own research, while the blood from her birth still dried on her in places.

"Daddy? I think I know why I look like Alice." She said, turning to look over her shoulder at her father with a smile. "Mommy's food is made of you, right? But you enhanced it's gene sequence with parts of Alice's DNA. Ooh, sounds weird talking about someone named the same as me! He he! Alice! He he!" she looked up at Harold and frowned "Oh, sorry Daddy. You really loved her didn't you?"

"He really did." Ellie said softly, and drew Harold into an easy embrace and comforted him.

"Sorry," Alice continued, a little more subdued, "but the DNA from her in the food clones went into Mommy, and then into me! I'm a girl, so I got the bottom of the Y chromosome from Alice, and some other bits from her as well. Some triggers must have come from the botttom of the Y and set off some facial characteristics in the growth sequence."

Harold pulled back from Ellie's warm embrace and stared down at his daughter.

"You were born less than three hours ago, and conceived only about five hours ago Alice! Now you're using words like 'characteristics' correctly, plus of course solving genetics puzzles that I hadn't managed yet! This is... I think my brain is starting to drip out of my ears!"

"Don't worry, I'll catch it Daddy!" Alice said and winked at him, turning back to the computer."Why don't you and Mommy go and fuck while I sort this all out, hmm?"

Both of them gaped at the girl as she typed away.

Ellie looked across at Harold and frowned.

"Which of us do you think she got that idea from?" she said as they headed off to Ellie's room.

"Might be both of us? You know this is going to be tricky. And this is only after a few hours!"

Ellie stared down as Harold slept, gazing at his eyes. OK, physically he was... so so. Not very muscular, not exactly movie star material. Mentally and emotionally? That was another matter. A smile crossed her lips and she decided she could live here. She wanted to know what it felt like to be with Harold. If the last hour was anything to go by the sex at least would be worth it!

She nuzzled her head against his chest, then heard his breath heave out in his sleep, and she hastily lifted her head back up again. Have to be careful about that! Her weight had disadvantages unfortunately.

"He asleep?" a voice whispered from across the room, and Ellie saw Alice creeping around the door. Ellie nodded at... her daughter. The thought alone was incredible! She had a baby... OK, a full grown woman. Still her daughter! "Good, cos I think I've refined his Abater. Do you think he'd mind? I think I need it as much as you. I haven' t had my period yet, but I think... I think it'll be bad."

Ellie's face fell suddenly as the prospect of what her daughter would go through hit her.

"You've got it working?" she said.

"Oh it was working, I just made it a bit quicker, a bit more effective. The hunger should be minimized in our subconscious rather than be a separate entity, even as combined as you are I can see it surface at odd times, Mommy. One minute it'll flow up then away. Weird. I... don't want to be like that."

"I understand sweety, me either." she turned to stare at Harold "Now."

"So, wanna surprise him when he wakes up? His process took about a day, I can do it in a couple of hours!"

Ellie gave a smile at Harold and slowly got out of bed.

"Yeah, lets surprise Daddy."

The room was pretty much as it had been during Alice's birth a few short hours before, but the girl seemed blase about it and had Ellie hooked up to the machinery quickly as Ellie sat nervously in a chair with steel bands holding her limbs down.

"Look, I really don't think these are necessary Alice." She said looking at the arm restraints.

"I'm afraid they are. When the change happens it... well gets a little funky. Muscles will fire and you'll kind of go nuts. Don't worry, it won't hurt, just feel very very weird."

"Now she tells me!" Ellie muttered, wondering if she could back out now.

Suddenly the room went black.

"What?" Alice said, standing up abruptly. "We've lost power, everything!"

A heavy clang sounded and light spilled in from the corridor's emergency lighting as the door, bent and buckled, skittered across the floor to clatter against the far wall. Three women entered that Ellie had never seen before... except that one of them she knew. Instinctively.

"That's you!" Alice said, before a quick backhand slung the Ellie's daughter across the room. The Ellie lookalike sneered as she crumpled in a corner.

"Weak little thing. She hasn't even fed yet has she daughter?"

Ellie stared in horror at the beautiful woman as she strode up to her chair and peered down at her. This was her mother? The condescension, the superiority, the sheer lust shone from her face like a lantern and her mother leaned in to lick across her daughter's face.

"Oh, taste runs in the family doesn't it? Almost as good as your daddy, but you'd know all about that wouldn't you?" As she laughed at Ellie she saw one of the other women hump something off her shoulder. It was a body, a moving body. Harold!

"Harry!" Ellie strained at the bands, but Harold had done his job way too well.

"Yes, this one has been a royal pain in the posterior. And he thought this place would protect him against us! Hah! He got lazy I think, letting his machines do all the work.” She turned and peered at Harold over her shoulder. “Mother wants to deal with him herself. Me, I'm going to ask if I can have you for a snack. I think I'd like that very much, daughter dear."

From behind a moan came as Alice tried to sit up.

"Noooo!" Ellie screamed as her mother raised a gun and it barked in the darkness. A scream formed, then cut off abruptly, followed by a dull thud and Ellie clenched her eyes shut tight. She couldn't even see what remained of her daughter! Two more shots rang out, just to be sure, but no more screams emerged.

"Not worth it really. You really should do better than this Elecktra!"

Her mother simply wrenched the entire chair off the floor to a screech of metal and tossed it and Ellie over her shoulder as she walked out to a waiting truck.

"Lisa here will drive, while you and I, daughter dear, get very,  VERY well acquainted!" She slammed the chair down, pinched the bands off with fingernails, grating screeches heard as impossibly strong nails punched through titanium alloy like butter. Arms much stronger than hers lifted Ellie out of the seat and pressed her to a wall as her mother started to strip herself one handed. "We have a long drive ahead of us. What WILL we do for the next five hours Elecktra?"

Screams echoed out of the vehicle as it sped into the night, away from the dark place that once had seemed so safe and happy.

Ellie stared at the scene she had hoped never to see again, the boiling mass of Granny, pus and glistening wet boils forming as readily as bodily parts in it's churning surface, glinting red in the illumination from the lava pits.

"I'm so glad we've had this time to ourselves Elecktra." her mother simpered, holding Ellie up by her neck with one hand as she walked naked towards the hellish landscape of liquid flesh. "But I'm afraid Mother has decided I can have you, oh and your boyfriend will be becoming one with her soon." She nodded to one side where one of her helpers was carrying Harold's struggling body effortlessly under one arm.

Mother/Daughter/fuck/consume

Echoed the monstrosity from a multitude of mouths, loathsome acrid smells rising from the pit. Ellie screamed, reliving her nightmare but this time finding a more human looking ending right in front of her. Slowly the jaws of her mother elongated and she drew Ellie's head towards her by the neck, her body dangling uselessly, feet not touching the floor. But a brilliant flash of light suddenly threw long shadows as the ceiling dissolved into rubble again!

The scene was eerily familiar, spears of light flashing in the dark, screams from hundreds of  Granny's mouths as she was burned and fried, but this time Ellie looked up in shock, as did her mother, to see the black chopper crashing towards them rapidly.

"NOOOOOOO!" Screamed her mother, and she let go of Ellie's throat, trying to jump forwards, maybe to protect Granny, Ellie wasn't sure. She didn't wait to find out and seized her chance, having already been pulled so close she barely had to lean as she fell from her mother's grip, her rapidly stretching  maw covering the surprised features of her parent. Pain blossomed inside her as her mother bit, clawed and rent at her. She was VERY strong, and she felt a heaving wrench, Ellie nearly fainting as her right arm was severed at the elbow, somersaulting across the cavern into the depths of Granny. But now she had a good grip and swallowed, her tight throat pinning mother dear's arms to her side and allowing her to savor a chest that must be very similar to what her own must taste like. An odd thought, but since she was eating her own mother, and possibly dieing of blood loss, she could forgive herself.

The explosion of the crashing helicopter ripped through the cavern, and tossed Ellie and her mother away from the abyss of flesh that gibbered in the hellish red glow. They landed in a tangle of arms and legs against the cavern wall, Ellie barely able to remain conscious, but sheer force of will kept her going, and kept her swallowing. Slowly, inch by inch, the screaming struggling mass of her mother's body slid into her. She'd never felt so satisfied. Even her father and adopted mother hadn't been this good! tongue roved over her flesh, tasting everything as it  slid by her maw on the way into the ravenous pit of Ellie's belly. When she finally crammed those wriggling toes down she collapsed on the ground, and felt her belly contract, shuddering crunches and gurgles echoing Ellie's vicious sense of victory over her own Hunger's origin.

"That was for Daddy!" She said, tears dripping down her cheek.

Now though she started to fade. Her arm was a sea of fire, blood pooling on the ground, her mouth torn up and she was bruised where her mom had managed to land punches. Plus she was in Granny's cavern! She managed to look up to see what the horrific thing was doing... and nearly fainted in shock. Something was spreading over Granny's surface. Ripples of flesh oozed up to snatch at the something, but the surface of the thing just lifted, stretched over whatever had reached up and contained that too. Ellie peered at the thing as it spread over half the enormous bulk of writhing flesh, multiple mouths echoing a resounding chorus of astonishment and curses... and she realized that what was spreading over Granny was a mouth. An inhumanly stretched set of lips was eating the monster whole!

As Ellie sat she saw it creep slowly over the gurgling sea of flesh, swallowing everything in sight. A football field size mass of flesh disappeared into a smooth flesh colored ball and on the leading edge, as it neared her, Ellie saw the familiar shape, although distorted, of Alice's head and body, Granny swelling her stomach to lake sized proportions. It was utterly impossible, but given what else had happened today she wasn't complaining.

Slowly the remaining bulge of tentacles, arms legs and tongues was sucked in, diminishing till one leg remained and that too disappeared into Alice's maw with a slurp.

"Ahhhh, Oh not bad. Could have done with some ketchup though." Alice said tiredly, and then winced as the gigantic bulge of her stomach writhed.

A shape jerked forwards from Ellie's right, inhumanly fast, and Alice Looked annoyed as a helper pounced on her, having to jump high to reach the girl's body, resting on the massive, wobbling girth of her gut. The vicious girl managed to slurp down Alice's arm and seemed to be trying to bite it off.

"Stop it, that tickles!" Alice said, giggling. Her other arm casually drew the girl off her and towards her maw. After her giant meal this was barely a pinprick and vanished literally in seconds.

Another shape stood to Ellie's right, but this time it was Harold, shaken, bloody and bruised, but seemingly OK. That last girl must have been the one carrying him earlier. He blinked as he noticed Ellie and ran over to her, kneeling by her side in the pool of blood.

"Oh god Ellie, stay with us!" He looked around, but there was nothing here he could use as a tourniquet, her arm still bleeding. Where was all the blood coming from? Shouldn't she be dead by now? She did feel really sleepy. "Don't you die on me girl!" His gaze became more panicked, but she realized they were hours from help, miles from anywhere, his transport destroyed when it crashed. She guessed that must have been Alice arriving? Maybe she jumped before it hit Granny?

A noise distracted him, and he and Ellie turned to see Alice with a curious, surprised look on her face as... her stomach dwindled. The vast bulk quivered, groaned deafeningly, and shrank. Cracks and gurgles emanated from within, but as minutes dragged by the sounds merged into a cacophony of liquid sounding slurping noises, like a drain emptying fed through an amplifier. It shrank and shrank, it's motions getting more rapid, less strong, till finally Alice's feet touched the floor once more, now standing in lava. She didn't seem to even notice as she sank to her hips in the stuff, then walked through it as her tummy gurgled finally, flat once more. She stepped out of the pool of lava and shook a foot clear of the red, drippy mess and strode over to Ellie and Harold.

"You two look in a bad way, are you OK?"

Ellie laughed, waving her still bleeding stump of an arm.

"I'm dying Alice." Harold winced at her comments, but just held her tightly as she felt herself fading. Alice lifted the remainder of her mutilated arm up and slipped it into her mouth. She felt a horrible burning feeling, then it stopped. When her arm emerged from Alice's lips the end was cracked and blackened, but no longer bleeding. "Oh god that hurt." Ellie moaned, then fell over backwards.

"ELLIE!" Harold said, unable to hold the heavy girl up.

"I... I don't think I'm gonna make it guys. You... you go without..... me." She smiled weakly as Harold cried fitfully into her chest, hugging her as she lay on the floor, her huge weight crushing his hands as he hugged her. He barely seemed to notice. Ellie noticed her belly was only half shrunk from her meal of her mother. She really must be dying if her digestion was failing her. Maybe it was best this way, maybe she deserved to go after all she'd done. "Please, just go Harold. Take Alice out... of... here?" Ellie ground to a halt, not from losing energy herself, but because of the look on Alice's face. She was holding her belly hard. "Alice?"

The girl staggered back, and Ellie couldn't help but notice foot shaped craters as she stepped backwards. How heavy was her daughter now? But her weight was not the problem.

"Mommy! I... *UNGH!* Oh I don't feel good!"

No, not her too! Harold here alone after she went? How could things go so bad? They'd won! Ellie could feel herself fading, fast, then her eyes widened as Alice fell over backwards into the pool of lava, disappearing under the boiling surface.

"ALICE!" Harold cried, but Ellie's heavy body pinned him in place. It felt to Ellie as if his arms were broken under her, and he hadn't even said anything!

There was a massive splash and a huge deformed shape rose from the turgid, glowing red surface of lava. Misshapen and twisted, Alice's face recognizable for a moment on top before it shifted and the twisted mass of flesh surged up, filling the pool with an horrendous splash. Ellie felt her leg burned by searing hot rock, and Harold screamed, his leg on fire and twitching as red dripped from it, black greasy smoke rising into the air.

In the pool the familiar shape of Granny surged amidst the red mass, and tongues oozed out towards the smoldering pair as they held each other.

Mother/daughter/love/fix

Came the hauntingly familiar, yet also strangely different tone as the slippery appendages grabbed the burned and battered lovers and dragged them into the mass of boiling, dribbling flesh, huge lips slurping over their bodies. Ellie managed to hold Harold tight to her before she felt a burning over her whole body.

She screamed and....

Suddenly she was whole and complete, flying up in the air. Dizzyingly spinning and looking down on the mass of Granny. She arced over and gazed down in horror as a huge vagina opened beneath her, spreading wide in her path as she disappeared into it with a squelch. It gripped her and a light burning feeling...

Ellie shuddered, huge tongues licking everywhere, one invading her mouth, anus and sex... but didn't feel any pain, just pleasure. Wait, she'd died? Twice? She was in a moist cavern of flesh, rippling and bubbling, then the top broke in a boiling pop, and she rose up amongst the mass of tenticular tongues, unable to hold back the glorious feelings as they roamed over and through her completely. Somehow they knew exactly where to touch, where to probe and a scream of pure pleasure rocked the cavern. She collapsed and fell into the remains of the flesh bubble and felt herself disolve painlessly...

Harold pressed against her and Ellie grunted, him inside her, hard and pumping. She looked into his puzzled face and realized he wasn't doing it. Where was she? Arms gripped her everywhere. Her arms, legs, head and all up and down her torso. Looking over the same was true of Harold. They panted and gasped, a multitude of hands passing the forced lovers across a liquid lake of skin.

"What the... *ungh* Hell is... OOOH!" Ellie managed, before a massive orgasm shook her body, Harold joining her moments later. She gasped, grunted and the pair fell into a huge anus, buttocks pressing them in as they were folded in and melted...

"Wha?" Ellie was again tossed in the air, but this time landed on her feet, shakenly stumbling back against the wall. Harold stood next to her, equally shaken it seemed as the pair stared at the mass of writhing flesh before them. They stared wordlessly at the mass, their gaze fixated on shapes rising and falling in the mess. Their own shapes! Ellies and Harolds emerged from the chaotic flesh, tossed in the air, passed across the surface or just violated as they sat on the softly bubbling flesh, then disappeared into it once more. Slowly less and less Harolds and Ellies appeared and the surface boiling lessened, finally seeming to calm.

A single, huge, wet vagina formed in the low wall of flesh before them and opened slowly. A shape squeezed out, glistening in the red light, and Alice stepped out of the hole before the shuddering, giant folds of skin melted back into the massive fleshy mound behind her.

"Whoah! Um, tricky. I think I've got it under control guys." She said, shaking her head, dizzy it seemed, but with a silly grin on her face. "Wow you two taste good!"

Ellie and Harold stared at her.

Mother/Love/Father/Daughter/Love/Blend/Love

Came the weird, muted gurgle from the quiescent mass beyond.

"Alice?" Ellie said, shakily lifting a hand to her daughter's cheek. "What happened? You... you were dead! I saw mother shoot you! Then this..." and she waved at the mass behind her.

"Um, your mom did surprise me when she knocked me back, and I got pretty mashed up, but I knew she wouldn't leave it at that, so while you and she talked I put a couple of steel trays in front of me, pulled some heavy fabric over them, then draped some medical sheets over me. In the dark she didn't see, so, when I made sure she noticed me get up... I just got bruised from the shots. After that, well I just crawled to the lab and smashed a few of the clone tubes. Eating them is hard at first!" She said, "But, I soon stretched. After a dozen I felt much better." Ellie blinked, staring across at Harold. A dozen? OK, the clones were small, but still! Then she remembered what the last thing Alice had eaten. Granny! Alice could REALLY stretch!

"OK, so you ate till you were healed, then what... learned how to fly a helicopter?" Harold said, still sounding a little dazed.

"I don't think so. I think I'd already got a fair bit of that, from you, but you weren't there so I had to struggle to get it." She looked sheepishly down at her feet and bit her lip "I'm sorry I crashed the helicopter Daddy. I just couldn't figure some of it out."

"You're less than a day old and yet you saved us from a hell spawned demon!" Harold said, chuckling "Trust me, I don't blame you for that. Besides, I can always build another chopper."

"Weeeell, a little more than a day." Alice said, and Harold and Ellie looked back and forth at each other nervously "Um, you see... I kinda got worked up when... I changed. It took me quite a while to take a hold of myself and stop... er, playing with you. Maybe... oh, about a week.. ish." Alice blushed beet red and a slight 'blurp' erupted from behind her and an Ellie was tossed in the air, a tongue massaging her to obvious sounds of orgasm before she vanished into the rippling flesh once more "Oops!" Alice said "Promise I'll stop now! It's just... hard to give up, you know? Feeling you two there, inside, around and with me all the time. *sigh* I love to feel you cum!"

Both stared at Alice hard. Their daughter... the hundred foot mass of writhing flesh that was now their daughter... apparently liked to fuck them continuously... several of them at the same time?!?

"Um, Alice," Harold said, staring over Alice's shoulder at... the rest of her? "I understand that this is difficult, but please don't do that again... at least without asking first."

Ellie jerked, turning towards him.

"What?" She said, staring at Harold. "You'd consider... that?"

"Hey, come on! Seriously the worst bit of that was...well, not understanding what was happening. It was scary as hell, but... mostly because I didn't know it was Alice!"

Ellie blinked and a nervous laugh escaped her lips.

"Oh you finally got to... No, not gonna say it!" she said, trying to clamp down on her sniggers.

"I finally got to fuck Alice." Harold said simply, then drew Ellie in for a hug. "It's OK, that is still a little, raw, but you don't have to pussy foot around that any more Ellie. I love you, I'm not going to let that get between us any more."

"Could I get between you sometimes though?" Alice said sweetly. "I mean... it's hard to resist you know?"

Harold turned, still hugging Ellie, and stared at the mass of Alice beyond the human shaped... extension? He guessed she was like Granny's helpers but with a chunk for Alice's brain rather than being the pre-programmed things that Granny had made. Ellie could feel him considering something for almost a minute, Alice kind of shifting from one foot to another, almost looking like she wanted to run to the bathroom. Slowly he lifted his head from Ellie's shoulder and let go.

"OK, how about this Alice. Don't form any us's from those... er... patterns in there any more. Instead take me now," Ellie gasped and stared at him, "and use that template to... play. As often as you want. Just make another me out here to be, well, me. Oh, and just one in there at a time please. It's weird enough to think there'll be another be inside you all the time, let alone dozens!"

Ellie stared, then switched her gaze to Alice, her face lit up with obvious glee.

"Me too Alice." She heard herself say, not believing it herself.

"WAIT!" Harold gasped, and turned to Ellie. "First Ellie, understand what this really means. When she takes us we've got to accept that we could stay in her for... how long anyway Alice?" He said, turning briefly to his daughter.

"Forever. Don't worry. When I make you each time it'll be with the same body, just the mind changing. You'll always be young in me!"

Both Ellie and Harold took a few seconds to take that in.

"OK," Harold said, continuing and turning back to Ellie, "So forever... whoah!... forever inside her. But you've also got to accept that you could be here, outside aswell. It's no good just 'knowing' one or the other could happen, cos you could wake up in the other situation. In fact you will, both. Um, did I explain that OK? This is kinda confusing."

"I got it Harry." Ellie said and leaned in to kiss him. "And I'm ready for either, or both depending on your point of view. But Alice?” She said, turning to her daughter “Please, give the ones of us in you some time to rest. Continuous... um, play like that could get real weird." Harold nodded, grinning. Alice nodded eagerly.

With a smile Harold let Ellie go and walked over to Alice, hugging her briefly he turned and then abruptly took off running towards the boiling mass of Alice.

"Catch me!" He yelled, then jumped, diving towards the rippling flesh.

A huge mouth formed in front of him with a squelching sound and opened wide. A bright red tongue oozed out, rolling low as Harold dived right inside, plunging down the gullet as the tongue whipped up to cup his rump as it shot past. The lips closed as his feet vanished from view and an audible 'Gulp' resounded as the mouth melted away.

Ellie stared at where Harry had been a few moments before and took a deep breath.

"OK Alice, I'm r.. ready."

Alice smiled and took her in a big hug.

"It's OK Mommy, I'll never hurt you, and any time you want me to stop just say so, OK?" Ellie managed a weak smile and nodded over the girl's shoulder as the hug lingered. She was finding it rather erotic to be this close to Alice. How could she consider having sex with her own daughter? She remembered how her father had been, enthralled with her, unable to resist being with her, and even letting himself be eaten.

Ellie blinked, realizing that that automatic revulsion, the feeling that her father was perverted had... gone. She looked down at Alice and pondered. She tried to think how Alice would taste, how it would feel to be with her... and the ravening hunger that usually enveloped her with such thoughts was not there. She quickly pulled back from the girl.

"Alice! You cured me?" Her daughter grinned and nodded enthusiastically, then leaned back in to hug Ellie tightly. "Thank you Alice, I... thanks." and she went with the hug as she saw two long, feminine arms exude from the flesh wall and come towards them. Huge hands slipped gently under their arms and gripped Ellie and the human Alice while they hugged.

"Don't worry Mommy." Alice said against her shoulder as they were lifted off the ground. "I'll go with you. Just relax! This'll be fun!"

Ellie stared down Alice's back as they were lifted over the rolling waves of skin beneath. Her breath quickened as a ripple formed, then spread into a huge slit, a quivering, giant vagina forming beneath their feet.

"No, not that please! Not yet. Too many memories of Granny." Ellie said remembering when she'd almost been devoured the first time. She held her daughter tight as Alice nodded, and the shape beneath them melted back into the flesh. A vast mouth opened instead, ruby red lips spreading wide under her and a huge tongue unrolled, beckoning her in. Smiling Ellie tried to relax as Alice had asked while her feet dropped into the maw. She looked to the sides as flesh walls and tongue and teeth surrounded her, then slowly, sensuously, the mouth closed, pressed in tight on the two girls within.

Ellie shivered in the dark, Alice hugging tightly.

"It's OK Mommy. You're with me now, for as long as you want."

With a tingle Ellie felt herself and Alice melt away, no pain, just total su...

With a grunt Ellie felt herself lifted from a dripping pustule of flesh, long tongues wrapped around her. They deposited her on the ground lightly and a soft burp from a smaller mouth on the side heralded a grinning Alice plopping back with them. Yes, them. Harold wrapped his arms about her and hugged.

"Glad to see you again love... and again." he said looking back over her shoulder. Ellie looked back and saw... herself and Harold amidst a mass of arms and tongues, making love hanging in the air over the flesh beneath. She turned to watch the couple and couldn't help but wave at them. The other Ellie waved back, then nudged Harold who pulled his head from between the other Ellie's chest and waved as well, shortly before they slid noisily into a huge rump that slipped up out of a crest of flesh.

"Yeah, you like bums don't you." Ellie said, nudging this Harold.

"Hey, can't help it, though I think it was you who pushed that meal onto me like that before." They both chuckled.

"Oh," Ellie said, smiling at Harold, "by the way, you don't need to do the Abater thing, Alice fixed me herself. No more Hunger." He looked suitably shocked.

"Aww, I don't get to mess around with my wife-to-be's genetics? Dang!"

Alice walked up to them and hugged them both affectionately before Ellie could stammer at Harold's rather abrupt suggestion of marriage. He had a nerve! He was also right though. Ellie decided to instruct him in the proper way to propose however. Later.

"Well you could always just eat her instead Daddy." she said, and Harold blinked in confusion "Oh, didn't I mention that? I not only fixed Mommy, I fixed you too. You're both the same now."

Ellie and Harold looked at each other in a new light as they slowly walked out of the cavern, Alice between them, all three arm in arm.

"Ya know, it's gonna be tricky," He said idly, "but I think my pool back at base could be extended for you Alice... I mean the other Alice. You know." and he waved at the boiling mass of flesh behind them.

"I know Daddy. But whatever happens, you'll always be with me. One way or another."

As they walked into the dark tunnel, the forms of another Alice, Harold and Ellie cavorted in the frothing mass of flesh, sounds of pleasure erupting from them and the mass beneath.

Father/Love/Daughter/Mother/Hug/Love/Kiss

Echoed in the red lit cavern, and the three naked people walking away smiled. Hey, it couldn't get any weirder at least Ellie thought to herself! Yeah, right!