10

With her hand-hoe, Effie weeds the garden. Peeta can't really tell from his size, but he has no doubt that there's no imbalance in the Abernathy-Trinket garden.

While Effie works hard, heavy, and loud up there, Peeta gets therapy...from a caterpillar. He knows that none of these caterpillars are Absalom...but he's got no one else to do it with, and in this moment, he's overcome with a REALLY powerful urge he doesn't know he can say no to.

"Effie is so...magnificent." Peeta chuckled. "And you've gotta believe me when I say I NEVER use that word to describe anyone-not even Katniss. I've just...never been this small in Effie's presence."

He lies on a leaf, as if it were a sofa in a therapist's office. Aloft, the caterpillar eats away at the leaf its on, with little or no regard to Peeta below.

"And even among the District 13 rebels during the Revolution, I never got used to what Effie looks like when she hasn't...peacock-ified herself...for lack of the more proper term. And it seems like she does that less often now that she's with Haymitch."

The caterpillar keeps eating.

"And speaking of Haymitch, I know that what I want to do right now is going to upset him if I do it. Effie's his girl, after all, and if I did this, I'd be trespassing in his territory-not that I haven't done that before. Except before, I was volunteering to protect him from the Quarter Quell. This time, I'm trespassing what he cares about...with all due respect to that one time we were on the train to the Capitol, and he was drinking, and I was hounding him for advice about how to survive the Hunger Games, and I got so impatient that I ripped that bottle out of his hand... Right; not about him. And yet...how not, right?"

The caterpillar keeps eating.

"I don't think she can see me down here. I think maybe I can sneak into her without being seen...you think?"

The caterpillar keeps eating.

"But women are sensitive. I daresay Effie's more sensitive that Katniss. Not that Katniss has never overreacted to anything; but Effie likes her perfection, and she likes her balance. I'm just worried that she might be more sensitive to my touch, whereas Katniss would probably think I was a bug, and..." Peeta sighs. "Effie's probably going to think I'm a bug too."

The caterpillar keeps eating.

"And if I wouldn't die doing this, then I probably shouldn't. OTOH, I am alone out here. I got no guarantee that I'll ever get home. And with Katniss as she is, I'm sure as hell am in no hurry to get there. This could be my last chance. In fact, every ticking second on the clock could be, as things are now."

The caterpillar keeps eating.

"You're right. I've gotta do this. It's what I was made for, after all. With luck, Effie won't think I'm a bug, or squash me like one." He senses her giantess presence, still weeding farther away. "With me at my size, she wouldn't have to squash me very hard to kill me."

The caterpillar keeps eating. At any moment, Peeta expects him to run out of leaf to lie on, and fall.

"But how to get to her? It seems like every way to her is..."

Something touches Peeta. He overreacts, and nearly falls off the leaf. He grabs the edge of it, and hangs by his chest. From there, he gets a prolonged look at his poker.

It's a garden snail. It leaves slime in its wake, all behind it. It's sliding towards Peeta. And Peeta's pretty sure it wants the same thing the caterpillars want.

The snail approaches. Peeta looks down. It's a long fall. For some reason, Peeta isn't afraid. He lets go. He screams as he falls.

Aloft, Effie stops as she's weeding. She blinks, smiles, and continues weeding.

Peeta lands on the ground, of course. He's mostly surrounded by dead plant tissue, soil, and the bases of plant stems.

And he's not alone. Those worms still haven't gotten used to the messed-up ground. They're still crawling about. And here and there, they've been joined by slugs and more garden snails.

Peeta blinks. He thinks he can see tiny bacteria on some of the dead plant tissue. He blinks...but can't tell whether he actually sees it. It's dark down here.

"Wow," Peeta mutters. "I think I took too many Omega-101s!"

He climbs a stem. It's a long climb...but at least the top will be a long way away from those scary slugs, snails, worms, and bacteria...if he can really see them...

There are flowers at the top. They're big, and bell-shaped. They're so violet, they're almost black. They're perfect...and they've got big pistils.

Peeta's on the petal of one. It's like a mountain slope to him. Even from here, the flower smells great. And he can see its pistil...

He gets to the top of the petal, and looks down. It's like a bottomless pit. And there's nectar down there; he can smell it. It smells sweet.

He wants some. But then he'd get stuck-and not to mention fat-and Katniss would never take him back if he lost his figure.

Wow...is he to philogynist?

That's a big jump, from here to one of the stamens. Many surround the flower's pistil-like a colony of giant tube worms that surround a hot vent at the ocean bottom. Only rather than big red lips, these tubes are equipped with anthers, which are equipped with many, many grains of pollen. And they all want the same thing-and it's the exact same thing a man's sperm needs lest it ever end up on the ambitious end of an ejaculation.

DEFINITELY too philogynist...

And there's no smoke coming out of that vent. As a matter of fact, smoke is more likely to go INTO it...

Peeta isn't ready. But he must. He stands, breathes, raises his arms over his head, acknowledges where he's diving, and dives. It's a scary fall...but at least the landing will be controlled.

Peeta almost feels like Aeon in Aeon Flux, when she leaps onto those streaming tethers that hang from the bottom of the Relical as it flies around Bregna... Alas, Charlize Theron was funner to watch doing that stunt, and Josh Hutcherson couldn't even make history by doing anything similar in Journey to the Center of the Earth...

Peeta grabs one of the stamens...and yes, the landing is VERY reminiscent of Aeon's dive onto the Relical's tethers. Now he knows how much that must've hurt Charlize Theron to film.

He tunnels through the stamens, to the pistil. He climbs it. He gets past the anthers. They're hard to bear.

There's pollen. Its hormones are even more overwhelming from down here. Peeta isn't even sure how this flower can stand to have a man live in her. His pollen can't stop being horny.

This might be worse than a cuckold fantasy. Not that Peeta has never fantasized about Katniss with other men...or Effie with Haymitch, for that matter...

He gets to the top of the pistil. He lies down atop it. He plunges his dick into it. He does minor exercises while stuck there.

This is his backup plan...in case he never gets inside Effie. He feels like Jason Biggs in American Pie-and the kebab at the end of a skewer at the same time.

Yeah, this is definitely "third base," as the cast of American Pie would call it. The pie isn't warm, and it isn't homemade...but it sure as hell isn't served at a fast food place...

Not relevant, I know. But that movie was SO memorable...

There's a sudden shadow, and a brief quake. And Peeta's got a feeling that someone behind him is taking a "moon shot" of him with their giant globe-shaped eyes.

It's a butterfly. To Peeta, it's like an aircraft with really big wings. It's lowered its proboscis into the flower. It's drinking its nectar.

This is Peeta's next chance. He sure hopes Effie loves butterflies as much as she loves ladybugs, or this could get dangerous.

At least a bird won't eat them in mid-flight. They say the more brightly colored a butterfly, the more poisonous it is.

Peeta tries to push himself off the pistil. He's stuck. Or rather, his dick is stuck. He wiggles. The female half of the perfect flower is stubborn. She thinks she's found the right man-or the right pollen grain, just as likely...

Peeta calms down, and places his mouth dangerously close to the pistil's surface. "I don't want to marry you," he whispers.

Peeta falls off the pistil. He brushes the pollen during the fall. His eyes water. He can't see where he's falling.

He doesn't know how he grabs the proboscis in the right place. But he does. Wiping his eyes and watering his nose all the way, he climbs the butterfly's proboscis. He stops, and waits for it to stop drinking.

The butterfly takes off. Peeta's plan is to ride on its back. But it's cold and noisy up there. He somehow finds one of the butterfly's front legs, and hangs from it as it flies. His eyes are still wet, and his nose is still running. He waits desperately to start seeing and breathing again.

Alas, that won't likely happen anytime soon. It seems grains of pollen are stuck to all six of the butterfly's legs. At least there's not as much. Alas, it's still enough to keep Peeta blind and breathless for as long as it lasts.

The butterfly lands in a bunch of other flowers. This does NOT make Peeta's problem better...

Peeta's getting tired. He can't cling to this bug's leg indefinitely...

He can't see, but he sees a white sea below. It feels feminine. He hates to drop in on her like this. But he must at some point.

He doesn't have to. The butterfly lands on her knee. At long last, he legs go of the bug's leg, and falls onto the sweet-smelling and -looking nourishment of Effie's. He's still tearing and running mucus, but hopefully that'll all go away as soon as the butterfly does.

He wants to see her. He can't see her. That butterfly won't go away. There are still pollen grains on its legs.

Peeta gives up. He crawls over to the bug's leg, and bites it. The bug flies away. At long last, no more pollen...

His eyes and nose both stabilize. By now, he's left a puddle of his own tears and snot on Effie's knee...which she'll probably mistake for a drop of dew.

At last, he can see. And he can breathe. He'll soon be SO glad he can. Because what he'll see next will take every gas molecule of breath from all that's left of him.

Effie's sunbathing. She's in a revealing yellow bikini. Her knees are up, but her legs are relaxed. And they are THE sexiest peaks Peeta's ever been atop of.

Peeta did it. He made it to Effie. And he's getting hard. Being able to see Effie's upskirt from where he is-as well as how much bigger it is than him-is helping VERY much with that.

The hard part of today's work is over; now he must get inside her. And he has no idea how he's going to do that.