“Bagheera! Wake up!” You grab fistfuls of his fur and shake him in his stock-still sitting position. He wobbles, but he’s too big for you to jostle him awake. You need to try something else.
A scaly tail slips over your head and the lamia spins you away from Bagheera and to her dangerous, glowing, swirling, beautiful, magnificent eyes. You stare once again into her rippling colors, spreading out from her eyes to enshroud the jungle.
Your mind screams that she’s hypnotizing you and taking control, that it’s dangerous to stare and you need to resist, but her hypnotic spell muffles your thoughts. The colors shimmer through your eyes and soothes your mind. You stop trying to turn away and instead stare into her prepossessing gaze, no other action occurring to you as she drops you into a blank state.
“Now human,” she says in a soft, sweet tone, “there’s no need to bother your friend. Just focus on me.” Her smile radiates warmth and friendship, a smile more trustworthy than your own thoughts. “I’m your friend, after all. I can help you with anything you need as long as you give me all your focus.”
Her tail slides down your back and she holds your arm to lead you forward, closer. Someone was behind you, someone you needed to help, but those thoughts fade to the lamia’s presence. You just need to let her help you.
She crowds her thick tail around you, surrounding you and guiding you to her, breaking your universe away from whoever was behind you. She massages her scales over you, squeezing you into her heavy grasp and cutting you off from the outside world as she envelops you in her smothering embrace. Only you and her exist in your world, a world bound by her sinking, sweeping, slithering coils.
“That’s right,” she says, leading you forward, into her world, into her welcoming coils. “I was going to help you sleep, wasn’t I?” She grins as your eyes flutter at the word. The jungle grows darker, her pulsating colors more visible than your surroundings. “I can help you with so much more, though. After all, you can’t look out for yourself, can you?”
A spark of protest is snuffed out as her tail squeezes around you. She rubs her scales over your body, pushing and pulling your arms and legs, your back, shoulders, all your body as easily as she pushes and pulls your mind. Her thick coils wind their way back around you, just as her hypnotic spell winds its way back around your mind. Rather than protest at her suggestion, you become receptive to anything she says.
“But, if you follow me,” she whispers, slithering closer until your faces nearly touch, “I can see to it that you never have to leave this jungle.”
A spark of memory tells you that was something you wanted.
“I can see to it that you never have to leave me.”
The lamia’s hypnotic spell tells you that’s something you want.
“You just have to trust in me,” she says. “Only in me.”
With nothing in the world but you and her, trusting her feels right. She’s in control of the world, and trusting her feels more natural than trusting yourself. You feel your mind sink into darkness as your body sinks into her heavy coils. She squeezes your legs, your torso, your arms, your chest, your shoulders, rising higher around you, thicker and heavier with each new brush of her scales. She has you in her grip again. You asked her for help once before, but you didn’t understand she was helping you at the time. Now you need not ask, you need only give in.
“And I’m willing to forgive and forget, my pet,” she says. As her tail slides atop your shoulders she squeezes a thick coil around your neck. Her tail is so heavy you can’t breathe, but you make no struggle. After a moment she softens her grip and lets you breathe. “Lucky for you.” She laughs and holds your face in her hands, squeezing you into a smile and pulling you directly before her eyes, nothing in your vision but her wide eyes and grinning face.
“As long as you’re willing to forget, and forget, and forget, and forget.” With each word you fall further from any memory of your past. The lamia is all you can sense, the lamia is all that makes sense. You’ve never known anyone else, never needed anyone else. She can protect you. She can control you.
All you have to do is accept her hypnotic pleasure and become hers.
Do you?
Of course you do. The choice is only hers to make. You only exist to submit to and accept her. Become her pet. You’ll never have to leave as long as you let her keep you in her grip.
You wouldn’t last one day on your own. With the lamia, you’ll never be on your own.
(End of path)
If you liked this story, consider joining my Sponsus! I post stories there a few days before they go public, plus you can see WIP previews, info on artwork I’m commissioning, and help me work towards more ambitious projects.
I also have a Discord server if you wanna chat about hypnonsense or other things!
Duth Olec's Cuckoo Cosmos 