The Emporium of Curious Goods 3: The Ol' Switcheroo

Story by Rhuk on SoFurry

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A long-awaited third entry in the series, demons cause trouble for everyone's favorite trouble-prone bird through no fault of his own, for once!

I didn't edit this nearly as much as I should have, so apologies if it's lower than the usual quality you'd expect from me.


The Emporium of Curious Goods

The Ol' Switcheroo

by Rhuk the Raven

Another boring day buying and selling weird objects nobody wanted. Not like the exciting days, where something crazy happened! "...Though I guess I'd like to end the week in one piece for once." Rhuk finished his thought out loud as he wiped the counter for what felt like the tenth time in the last hour. Not a single customer all day! Hell, the only remotely-interesting thing had been when a series of thumps came from Jeremy's room.

Knowing the fox it was just a loud, obnoxious masturbation session. Rhuk sighed and shook his head at the thought, "At least -he's- having fun..." He sullenly finished his thoughts out loud again, a small handful of potato chips finding its way into his beak. All week he'd been just snacking at the counter, bored out of his mind.

He knew he couldn't let himself do this too often, but boredom is what boredom does and--

His train of thought was abruptly interrupted when he felt a pair of paws resting on his shoulders, "Snacking up a storm, are we? You really seem to enjoy eating, Rhuk." Jeremy's voice was familiar, but the cadence wasn't. Smooth, almost seductive, like the fox was hitting on him.

A squawk of surprise erupted from the surprised bird's mouth, and he tried to turn around to explain himself. "W-well, I mean, I've got nothing else to do and if I don't eat these they're gonna go stale and nobody likes a stale chip and--" His words abruptly cut short when one of those paws detached from his shoulder and pushed a couple of chips into his beak. The other started rubbing at his shoulder, turning him around to face Jeremy.

Something was wrong, especially with his eyes. Why were his eyes purple? Rhuk didn't remember Jeremy having purple eyes, swallowing the chips absentmindedly. "Boss, what're you doing? C-c'mon man, this isn't funny..."

Jeremy's muzzle split in a grin, and he seized Rhuk's other shoulder again, starting to guide the raven into the back room. "What do you mean? I'm just observing something. You seem to like eating when bored... I've seen the way you savor your meals, too." Rhuk felt his back collide with the wall next to the break room fridge. It's at that point he noticed the smell hanging in the air, greasy with a hint of cheese.

"Hamburgers?" Rhuk asked quizzically, momentarily forgetting his plight, "Why does it smell like hamburphph!" His answer was provided, very helpfully, by his boss as the leading edge of a hamburger was pushed firmly into his beak.

"Lunch. I picked you up a few things... A few dozen things." Jeremy's strange eyes narrowed as he wormed that hamburger into the raven's gullet, inexorably forcing Rhuk to swallow it. "Because I've seen the way you eat... You like it, don't you? You just want a moment to let loose and just... Gorge, don't you?" The fox's grin widened... And didn't stop, an impossible, predatory smile that seemed like it was going to split his head in two at the jaw. The lights in the room flickered, dimmed, and went out one-by-one.

Rhuk was officially frightened. He struggled in the fox's grip, but soon realized he was being held firmly by the upper arms despite Jeremy's insistent shoving. He was puzzled, but getting a good look at the paw holding the hamburger... It was black and translucent, leaning out of the fox's body by a similarly-gloomy shoulder. Rhuk started to panic even harder, struggling in Jeremy's impossibly-strong grip.

Shadow-hands meant something bad, probably a loose spirit, maybe Jeremy got into some dark magic, or mayb--

"Or maybe it's not Jeremy." The fox's words surprised Rhuk, and his struggles were temporarily halted. "But you want it to be Jeremy, don't you? If you ask, I'll tell you my name." The voice was a little twisted, lilting, almost sing-song. Rhuk opened his mouth to ask and found another hamburger crammed into it. "Mmm, you still haven't said--or thought--'no', have you?" 'Jeremy' asked the struggling, swallowing bird.

"P-please, I'll give you w-what you want, just don't--" Rhuk's pleas were cut off almost immediately by another sandwich.

"You'll give me what I want? But I just want what you want... Even if you're too scared to admit it to yourself, I've been watching you for quite a few days now. Observing. You're just the kind of person I like, Rhuk, innocent on the outside..." Before the raven could clear his beak, another sandwich was invading it, forcing the first one down his throat. "...Rotten and greedy to the core on the inside."

Rhuk was beyond being able to talk himself out of it by now, and soon he stopped struggling in the fox's shadowy grip, realizing just how futile it was. Those taunting words made his face flush red with embarrassment, and he swallowed hard to fight them with his own words. This was met by the same response he'd been getting the whole time; a hamburger crammed into his beak. This time he felt a hand caressing his head, petting him, and he cringed a little.

"Listen to me, Rhuk, you can't fight me... You can't fight your desires. You love to eat, don't you? Food, it's comforting, makes you feel good to exercise that beak of yours, to pack yourself nice and full. Reminds you of being alive, doesn't it? Maybe you even want more." The raven shuddered at 'Jeremy''s words, a crack in his concentration that served to put him right where the demon seemed to want him.

Rhuk could feel a strange warmth in his stomach, and he paused to contemplate his situation. The food really was delicious now that he paid attention to it, top-quality in every way, juicy as all get-out and just hot enough. In fact, he really did want more, he felt extra-hungry today, and it didn't look like fighting the demon was getting him anywhere.

Another hamburger didn't come, and Rhuk absentmindedly tried to chew at air, "B...Buh? Oh, are you letting me go?"

Jeremy's grin shrunk, a much more personable smile replacing it. Charming, now that Rhuk thought about it. "Please... Please, if that's what you want, let me give it to you. I guess I shouldn't have come on so strong, but I simply want to give you what you desire..." Honeyed words poured from the demon's muzzle, "You can't hide them from me, you know, and nobody has to know. Jeremy doesn't have to find out... Here, I'll even give you my name. I am Indul."

Rhuk smiled and clacked his beak in thought, "W-whatever I want, huh?" Indul smiled and nodded. "I uh... That -was- some good cooking, I mean, I've only eaten potato chips today, I could use with a proper me--" He was honestly getting tired of being cut off, but that brief complaint disappeared as a hamburger met his beak and was promptly devoured. Then another, and another.

Indul smiled the entire time, he loved doing his job so very much. "Mmm, you said the word, you'll get what you want." It took a few minutes, but Rhuk soon tried to open his beak wide, to talk around the food being pushed into him.

Jeremy-Indul's figure abruptly exploded into dark purple smoke, and Rhuk ended up stumbling forward as his balance was so rudely disrupted. Panting for breath, the raven clutched his belly, tugging at his shirt. They were both almost painfully tight, belly stuffed with food, shirt stuffed with belly. The only progress he made on the shirt was to tug it up over his paunch before he began to hack and cough.

The purple smoke was flowing into his lungs, it made them burn, made his eyes stream tears as he tried to cough it back up. Then the burning abruptly ended, and he felt a presence over his shoulder. A shadowy, feathered hand tickled his chin. He turned his head and came face-to-face with... Himself?

No, a moment later it dawned on him, when another of those strange, smokey shadow-hands poured out of his opposite shoulder and started to lift a thermos. He was fascinated by the process, the object forming out of purple smoke before turning solid and gaining color. "Drink... It'll warm you up..." He heard his own voice, lilting and sing-song in his ear. "This is so much easier than pretending to be your friend, isn't it?"

Rhuk never got the chance to respond as his beak opened without his bidding it, the contents of the thermos poured in almost wholesale. Warm, thick, delicious and savory. He took a few moments to even register what he was chugging before it was gone, forever a mystery to him. Rhuk tried to protest, opened his beak, "M-more or l--"

"More you say? Say no more!" His words were stopped instantly by the demon, beak wrenched open as a coffee pot formed in mid-air and once again those shadowy hands did the work. He tried to stop it, grabbing at the arm's wrist. He was rewarded by having his fingers sink into the shadow, drawn forward and forced to follow its movements. "...Ooh, yeah, you're mine now that you did that, bird-boy."

A squawk of protest from the bird was drowned out by the pot's contents. Hot chocolate, warming all the way down, filling his stuffed stomach with the rich, creamy substance. He struggled, trying as he could, but he couldn't even move himself anymore. A veritable puppet in the demon's shadowy hands.

Seconds, minutes, hours, days, Rhuk didn't know how much time passed. The demon seemed to revel in keeping his gaze away from a clock or window as the raven was forced to drink pot after pot of hot chocolate, thermoses of what he identified as beef stew, thick juicy hamburgers and sweet, greasy donuts.

All of it disappeared down his uncontrollable gaping beak, and all he could do was groan and protest around the food. He couldn't see it, couldn't control his own gaze, but he could feel it; his shirt tightening around his chest as the gorging started to take his toll. He could hear it, too, his belt's creaking and inevitable snapping. His face flushed bright red when that happened, embarrassed at the relief he felt once his stuffed middle was relieved of its pressure.

The demon reveled in every single second of it, able to read the raven's thoughts, feel his every emotion. The twinges of shame as he felt his arms dragging against his chest as they thickened, the frustration of his shaking, buckling legs even as his shorts tightened around them, both threatening to give out at any moment.

As the raven grew, he tried to fight harder and harder to no avail. Soon he couldn't even stand, the weight being packed onto his frame too much for his thickened, fat legs. He soon not only lost track of time, but of himself. It was all a blur of eating, of creaking seams as his shirt, shorts and shoes burst in almost rapid succession.

The demon snapped him back to reality when he stopped eating, and the gravity of the situation hit him all at once. Almost literally, as breaths started to come in short, panting gasps. He just didn't have room for any more, groaning, red-faced as he could feel just how much of the floor he was taking up now.

"Yeah, you're right, about 500, 600% increase in original size, as you might want to say~" He let out a groan upon hearing the demon's voice, and tried to plead. Tried to regain control over any part of his body. All to no success. "Oh, aren't you just the cutest? You let me in, and when I turn out to be too much for you, you struggle, you try and get me out. Well, fatso, I'm here to stay for a little longer."

Food started to materialize on the floor next to him, fading into existence with the same puffs of demonic smoke as before. "I'll give you what you really desire, until I'M satisfied." And as one of Rhuk's bloated, pudgy hands picked up an entire pot of spaghetti and brought it to his beak, he realized it was going to be a long time before he could move himself again.