Not all shortcuts are safe!

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Today was a nice, ordinary day for Hyndrim. The young lizard walked under the bright and peaceful sun, taking pleasure in feeling the warm breeze against his bronze-skinned body and the soft ground against his soles. He was headed to a small secluded beach that he had found a while back. There, he would be able to enjoy the clearest blue water he has ever seen,  without having to contend with screaming children, irresponsible parents, or groups of drunken arse-holes trying to show off to girls. Nope! None of these annoying personages in this little hide away spot!  Pristine waters and, should the weather get too hot, a shady line of vegetation and palm trees to relax under.

Hyndrim was visiting the tropical island as part of a cruise. He had spotted the beach from atop a nearby hill, during a solitary trek. There was no visible road or trail leading to it, but it seemed like he could cut through the palm trees and the tall bushes, alongside old ruins hidden among the palm trees and the tall bushes. Hyndrim learned from tour guides that similar ruins were spread all around the island and a major asset of the island’s tourism industry. But judging by the large amount of foliage and vines overgrowing the old stone structures, these ones seemed to have been forgotten. Nobody visited or tended to them for a very long time.

The young man readjusted his clothes. He wore a loose shirt and a pair of swimming shorts, something he would be able to easily and quickly remove once he would be at the beach. If, as he guessed, no one was around, he would strip down and take a pleasant skinny dip. He would enjoy the warmth of the tropical sea water on his smooth skin, while fantasizing about a chance meeting with some luscious, over-endowed, and likeminded companion, who would decide to enjoy many lurid things with his handsome self.

The lizard was so wrapped up in his enjoyable thoughts that he failed to realize he had wandered off the general way. He almost bumped into a large heavy clump of thick, tall ivy, instinctively stepping to the side at the last moment to avoid it. The lizard smiled to himself; it was not the first time that he caught himself being lost in deep thought. He shook his head lightly and kept walking. The wall of greenery suddenly came to life in his peripheral vision. Thick tendrils coiled around and grabbed his striped limbs, while others pulled at his clothes with almost impeccable coordination, jerking and tugging him this way and that. His loose summer clothes proved little challenge for the strange green overgrowth. Once the plant finished disrobing its victim, it pulled him against the center of the green mass and began covering his body.

The captured lizard squirmed and buckled. He tried everything: he kicked, shook his body, tried to pull and claw his way out with his arms, to push himself off the green wall with his thick tail. To no avail. An uncountable number of vines of various shapes and sizes quickly encircled and restrained his body. One of them looped around his neck and held his head upright, preventing him from leaning forward and being seen by an accidental interloper, an instinctive behavior born from countless centuries of natural selection.

The plant was massive. It could heave up on either side of him, and effortlessly bury him under its amalgamation of vines. More tendrils took hold of Hyndrim’s limbs, clenching and squeezing them with surprising strength. Smaller vines wormed up his back, pushing his dreads aside as they made their way to his head. A thicker mass pushed between his thighs while more of them squeezed through his underarms and his groin and grabbed each other, forming him a vegetal harness which forced the young lizard to stand straight and immobile.

The panicking reptile breathed loudly and tried to scream. The thick vine around his neck squeezed instantly, hard enough to turn his call for help into a gurgle. The vine relaxed after a few seconds, and repeated the motion when its prey tried again. On the third attempt, the plant squeezed much longer, not letting the lizard breath until half a minute passed.

Hyndrim, his vision made blurry by the choking, sputtered and coughed violently. The end of the tendril rubbed against one his right cheeks and his black lips. The message was clear: “No calling for help! Or else…”

The brown-skinned reptile’s heart sank, witnessing the plant display such a cruel yet cunning display of control. The plant pulled his arms behind his back, then forcefully folded and tied together, making the space between his sides a bit more accessible to its vines. Hyndrim trembled, terrified of what it might have in store for his captive and naked body. The plant continued its work, undisturbed by the lizard’s struggles. The young man’s resistance was actually making things worse: the more strength he used, the more rigid the network of thick vines and tendrils criss-crossing his body, all the way down to his fingers and his toes, became. The more it forced him to lean back and rest his weight on the central mass of the creature.

Story by Sashi138 and KLN