The afternoon sun hung high in the sky. Its rays beat down, warming the green grass of the hilly plains land. The sky was clear blue, not a cloud marring its azure expanse. The wind blew through the grass and around the hills, cool with the chill of late October. 

	Joe lifted his backpack out of the bed of the truck and swung it over his shoulders, watching his partner, Larry, doing the same. “So we’ll meet you back here at this time in a few days, right, Ron?” the rat asked, his silky black fur rustling in the cool breeze. 

	Ron, a river otter, was sitting in the truck’s cab. “Yeah, you guys enjoy your camping. It’s supposed to be beautiful the next few days.” 

	“I hope so! I’m looking forward to a few days by ourselves.” Larry, a ferret, grunted as he too swung his pack over his shoulders. 

	“I’m sure it will be; look at the sky! Not a cloud to be seen. This will be the last chance to camp out here before the snows come.” Joe agreed, the rat’s large ears flopping against the back of his skull as the wind blew them down. He shook his head, stepping away from the truck so Ron could turn around. The otter did, and then rolled down his passenger side window. 

	“Ok, you guys have a good time. I’ll see you both in a week.” he said, waving a hand in farewell as he drove away up the dirt road back toward civilization. 

	Joe stood and watched the truck for awhile until it was out of sight among the hills, then turned to his partner, Larry, and grinned. “Just you and me, sexy. We’re gonna have a good time.” 

	“Yeah we are. Let’s get hiking. I wanna find the best spot we can to make camp and settle in. Those hills over there look good.” The ferret agreed, pointing toward a cluster of smooth, low hills in the distance. 

	“Looks good to me. Let’s go.” Joe said, nodding. The rat and ferret both headed off, looking forward to spending a week alone together before work pulled them both apart once more. 

	Joe and Larry were long-distance lovers. The rat lived several states away from the ferret and both of them had jobs that kept them very busy. Through sheer luck, they had both gotten to take their vacations together at the same time. They had met halfway and a mutual friend, Ron, and suggested the solitude and intimacy of camping together on the plains. After spending so much time apart, being entirely alone together sounded very appealing to both the rat and the ferret. 

	It took almost 2 hours for the two lovers to reach the hills, and they set up camp at the top of one of the low hillocks where they could get a good view of their surroundings. There was a shallow stream that ran near the hills and Joe collected water from it to boil for their use. Once the camp was set, the two lovers sat up folding chairs to sit in around their fire and spent some time just being together as the water boiled. 

	“How’s your novel coming?” Joe asked Larry, prodding at the embers of the fire with a twig. There were few trees around on the plains and they were burning fuel that they had carried with them in their backpacks. 

	“It’s coming. Work has me so busy that I don’t get to spend much time on it. Or with you, for that matter. I’m glad this worked out for us.” The ferret replied, watching the stream glisten in the sunlight as it wound its way through the hillocks. 

	“Yeah, I am too. Work is just as bad for me. You should see my apartment! It got so messy I had to hire a maid service to start coming to keep it clean. I should hire a cook too, with all the fast food I eat. I’m getting fat.” the rat chuckled, patting his pudgy stomach. The  rat was stockier than the ferret, his fur dark black all except for a white splotch on his face that covered most of his head. His eyes were dark brown and his build lent itself to girth rather than height. 

	Larry smiled. “I like it. I think your belly is cute.” 

	“Pfft, I wish I looked like you. All svelte and lithe. Sexy.” Joe replied, grinning. 

	“More like a bean pole. I’ve never been able to put any weight on. I eat as much as I can, but my metabolism has always been like that. I put stuff in and it’s like a drop in a hot bucket.” Larry laughed, touching his own flat midsection. The ferret was tall and lanky, with green eyes and smooth grey, white and black fur. 

	“I wish I could do that. I look at a doughnut and gain a pound.” Joe laughed, watching the embers shift around as he prodded at them.
	
The conversation lulled, and Larry looked up at the sky. It was still entirely empty and blue, and in the distance he could see the black outline of a large bird circling lazily around and around. The bird seemed very far off, as Larry couldn’t make out any of its details. He looked down at the tent they had set up, a simple two man affair with green and silver vinyl. 

	“Have you been camping before?” he asked, feeling slightly awkward having Joe near him in person after being apart for so long. 

	“A few times, back when I was a kid. It was fun. My brother liked it a lot more than I did, though. I was always more the type to spend my time reading inside, rather than hiking around outdoors. I like this though, here, just me and you. It’s beautiful.” Joe responded, smiling at the ferret. 
	
	“It is just us around here, isn’t it? I don’t even see any smoke or anything. No cabins. This is a beautiful place. How did Ron know about it? Did he say?” 

	“No, he just mentioned he’d camped out here before. Said he brought one of his own boyfriends out here awhile back and they really enjoyed it. Wanted us to have the same experience.” Joe looked around, clasping his hands between his knees. The cool breeze blew the smoke from their fire away over the hills, drifting lazily upwards until it dissipated. 

	The two lovers sat talking together for awhile, until the sun began to set. They set the water aside to cool once it was safe to be filtered and consumed and began to cook their supper. The minutes became hours and the ferret and rat bonded over their meal, the awkwardness fading as their comfort grew. By the time they had finished eating, the full moon was rising in the sky, casting a bright milky glow over the plains. Even without the campfire it was bright enough to see by. 

	“This is really wonderful.” Joe said, the chubby rat now lying on the grass beside the fire with Larry beside him. 

 	“It really is.” Larry agreed, looking up at the myriad of stars above them in the velvet blackness of the night sky. The moon looked huge among the tiny twinkling specks of light around it. 

	“I can think of only one thing that would make this even more wonderful...” Joe said, turning over to look at Larry, his head resting on his upturned palm with his elbow on the ground. 

	“I think I know what you’re going to suggest and I agree.” Larry said, smiling. The ferret snuggled in close and placed his hand on Joe’s side, rubbing the chubby rat’s belly slowly. He leaned in and kissed Joe on the lips, savoring the moment of their first kiss. 

	Joe grunted softly as Larry kissed him, the rat’s own hand coming to rest on the ferret’s hip. They kissed softly for several long moments, before gently coming apart. 

	“I’ve wanted to do this for so long, Larry.” Joe said. He slowly stood up and began to take off his clothes. He shed his flannel overshirt and the t-shirt he wore underneath it, baring more of his silky black fur to the cool night air. It was refreshing to feel the chilly air on his warm fur, blowing through it to tickle his skin. The rat’s belly was cute and round, nothing obscenely large. Simply a pudgy paunch that made him seem even more adorable. 

	Joe’s hands went to his belt and he opened his pants, dropping them down around his ankles. He was wearing briefs underneath, white ones that contrasted with his black fur. The front of them bulged roudly under his small gut and the rat grinned blushingly as he pulled them down too. The rodent’s large balls dropped out between his legs, his penis far dwarfed by the size of his testicles. He rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly as he bared his nudity in person for the first time. 

	“Well...” He said, unsure of what to say. He wasn’t the most experienced rat in the world with this kind of thing. His job kept him from having many opportunities to date, and Larry had been the first one in a long time that had seen him naked in person. 

	“You’re beautiful and adorable and sexy.” Larry said. The ferret sat up and ditched his own shirt. He laid back down on the soft grass and lifted his rump off of it so he could push his shorts down. His boxers came with it. 

	Larry lay there grinning at Joe, his lanky body on display as well as the naked rat’s. Larry was the typical mottled coloration of his species, the mix of white, grey and black spreading over him from head to toe. Where Joe’s testicles dominated the landscape of his groin, Larry’s sheath was the larger of the two parts of his sexual anatomy. The ferret was well endowed enough that it looked almost disproportional to his skinny frame. Joe stared, his dark eyes widening. 
	
	“Damn...you really are that big...” Joe breathed, shaking his head in amazement. 

	“Yeah, I am.” Larry said with a cocky smile. He liked the fact that he was better endowed that his lover. He thought it was cute the way the chubby rat blushed but also grinned excitedly at him as the ferret sprawled on his back, with his hands behind his head. 

	“Why don’t you get the lube and get acquainted?” Larry asked playfully, shivering lightly in the cool night air. Joe nodded, blushing, but still smiling. He went to their supplies and got out a bottle of lubricant, before kneeling back down beside Larry. 

	The chubby rat smiled playfully and leaned down, beginning to nudge and nuzzle against Larry’s fat dick between his legs. He cupped the ferret’s much smaller testicles and squeezed them, his hand warm where the air had been cold enough to make them tighten up. As the rat teased and squeezed, the ferret’s cock swelled and Joe quickly collared it with his lips and began to suckle, coaxing the ferret’s large cock to grow very erect. Joe couldn’t take it all at once, but he pumped what he couldn’t take of the shaft with his free hand and bobbed his mouth over the head, making the ferret moan and squirm beneath him. 

	Joe gagged as Larry’s hips jerked, the rat’s eyes watering as the ferret’s cock jabbed the back of his throat. Joe pulled back, grimacing as he felt the dinner in his stomach shifting uncomfortably from the gag. 

	“Urgh...you’re too damn big, Larry.” Joe said, coughing and clearing his throat, sniffling. He kept stroking the ferret’s cock as he tried to get his dinner to settle in his gut. 
	“Why don’t you just cut to the chase then, Joe?” Larry said proudly. He wasn’t one to turn down a blowjob, but what he really wanted was to see Joe bouncing on his cock. 

	“I’ve seen you sit on that huge great dane dildo you own. The one of the porn star, Roland? I know you know how to use that ass of yours better than you do your muzzle.” Larry teased playfully, reaching down to cup Joe’s fat balls and squeeze them gently. The rat blushed but nodded. 
	
	“I’ve had way more experience with that, for sure.” He agreed as he picked up the bottle of lube. He squirted some into his hand and applied it to the ferret’s already wet and glistening dick, before tucking the same hand under his own tail and lubing his tailhole with it. He made sure that both he and Larry were very slick before he stood up and straddled the ferret’s body, his ass hovering over the ferret’s spire of male flesh. 

	Larry grinned as he looked down the length of his body, seeing Joe’s enormous balls dangling low even in the cold. The rat’s average sized cock had grown hard between his legs, and it bobbed and jostled as Joe positioned himself. The ferret moaned as Joe squatted, and the tip of his cock found the bullseye of the rat’s asshole on the first try. Where once his cockhead had been cold and wet, it was now surrounded by clenching, receptive flesh that was quite warm. Joe let out a small gasp as his tailhole began to spread easily around the bulbous head of the ferret’s cock. It took almost no time for the rat to sit down on that huge erection, his well-trained backside seeming to swallow Larry’s cock with barely any resistance. 

	Joe’s fat balls sat on Larry’s belly as the rat’s ass cheeks came to rest on Larry’s groin.  The ferret groaned, feeling his entire dick engulfed in soft, warm flesh. “Oooh god yeah, Joe, I’ve wanted to feel your ass on my cock for so damn long. Ride me, lover, bounce on my big dick like you do that great dane dildo.” 

	the rat blushed hotly as his lover encouraged him, but his cock twitched and leaked a blob of precum that dripped down his shaft as he started to lift himself up and down along Larry’s big dick. The ferret panted, reaching down to place his hands on Joe’s hips and help him plunge up and down, the heat of their pairing quickly banishing any notice of the cold air around them. 

	Joe squeaked as he felt Larry’s huge cock scraping over his prostate, mashing his sensitive pleasure button on each plunge toward the ferret’s groin. The rat shuddered happily and grabbed his cock, beginning to rapidly jerk himself off as he rode his lover’s erection. 

	Larry began to thrust up to meet Joe’s downward plunges, the two of them getting into a smooth and easy rhythm. He grit his teeth, excited to be having sex with his lover at last. He could feel the rat’s large balls slapping down on his groin on each bounce, and his thick cock spreading the rodent’s backside wide around his girthy shaft. 

	“Oh fuck, Joe, I’m getting close already. Your ass is just perfect!” Larry groaned, his head pressing back against the ground as he continued to thrust. He could feel his balls tightening as he was ridden, his orgasm growing nearer with each passing second. 

	“Nngh! Me too, Larry, fuck...Your cock is just too much!” The rat groaned, shaking in pleasure as the ferret fucked him hard, his guts stretched around Larry’s enormous rod. 

	Larry only lasted another minute or so before he felt his balls draw up tight to his groin and he crossed the point of no return. Joe was throwing his head back, staring up at the sky as he rapidly jerked himself off. They were about to cum for the first time together, at the same time. 

	Suddenly, just as Larry was about to fire his first spurt, an earsplitting screech shattered the night’s stillness. Larry opened his eyes just in time to see a dark blur swoop low over Joe and then the rat was just gone. Larry shivered, still in the midst of ejaculating as his lover was suddenly stolen from him by an unknown entity! The ferret’s cum shot out high into the air without the rat there to catch it, the ferret’s body on autopilot as he tried to process what had just happened. He screamed in horror as he finally realized that Joe was gone, the ferret left alone in the darkness of their campsite with no explanation possible as to what had happened to his lover. 

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Joe screamed. He had been so near orgasm when the searing pain had shot down through his chest like a wildfire. His orgasm had been driven into retreat by the pain, his cock softening quickly between his legs as he squirmed in midair. He didn’t know what was going on, at first, all he knew was that cold air was rushing all around his body, he was bleeding, and his feet didn’t touch the ground. 

	The rat looked around in frantic horror, seeing that he was suddenly high in the air. He had been riding his mate one moment, the next he was flying. The more he looked around, the more he realized just what was happening to him. 

	Something had grabbed him and was now carrying him through the open night air! 

	Joe looked up, finding a pair of huge talons gripping his upper arms and shoulders. His flesh and fur was stretched away from the bones of his arms as it was forced to support his weight. Blood was pouring out of the wounds, falling into open space in red droplets. He followed what he could see of the huge talons up to the body of whatever was holding him, but all he could make out against the starry rush of the black sky was a silhouette of what looked like a bird. 

	The rat squirmed, screaming in terror. He had been picked up by some kind of unnatural creature. There was no bird that could pick up a rat of his size and fly with him. He knew that, instinctively, he was dealing with something out of the ordinary To his further horror and agony, Joe’s skin was tearing under the weight of his chubby body. 

	Joe tried to reach up to grab the monster’s legs but his arms couldn’t bend that far upwards without extreme agony, due to the huge black talons that had punctured his tearing flesh. He shuddered and trembled from the mix of fear, pain and cold. That high off the ground it was much colder than it was back on the ground with Larry. 

	Larry! 

	Joe sobbed for breath as he realized that his lover would never know what happened to him. He couldn’t believe the horrible nightmare his dream vacation with his lover had turned into. He screamed as his flesh tore open more, slowly. He could feel himself slipping, bleeding copiously from the rent skin. He struggled, trying to find some way to save himself, but the bird just kept flying. Heedless of the plight of its prey. 

	Finally, Joe’s skin ripped open entirely around the razor sharp talons that held him and the rat fell. He plummeted, blood streaming from his shredded flesh around his shoulders and arms. It happened so fast he barely had time to scream before his body turned in midair, looking toward the black ground rushing toward him. In the darkness it was like looking into a great ebony expanse of starless sky. The rat didn’t have time to think, hardly had time to scream at all before he hit the ground with a resounding and sickening splat. His body was obliterated. 

	By some cruel twist of fate the rat had fallen onto a rocky outcropping amongst some of the hills, a crumbled boulder that spent centuries falling apart into a jagged pile of stones. His head shattered like a melon across one of the stones, spreading everything that was Joe across their rough surface in a macabre splatter-wheel pattern of gore. 

	The creature, meanwhile, wheeled in the air, circling over the spot that it had dropped Joe. Cheated of its meal, the creature whirled around and flew back toward the spot where it had taken Joe from, intent on having itself a meal that night at any cost.

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Larry was hysterical. The ferret paced, sobbing into his hands. He didn’t know what to do, he felt like he was losing his mind. He had no way of calling for help, no way of finding Joe. Worst of all, he had no explanation for what had happened to his lover. One moment they had been enjoying the peak of physical intimacy together for the first time, the next, Joe was just gone. Ripped off of him like a fruit plucked from a tree.

	Larry hadn’t seen what had grabbed Joe. His eyes had been closed. The rat had just simply vanished. The ferret didn’t know what to do. He felt trapped in some kind of horrible  nightmare. He hadn’t even gotten dressed. He was too distraught to do anything other than pace and sob. He felt like he was losing his mind. 

	Larry abruptly couldn’t breathe anymore. There was sudden blow to his chest and then pain was everywhere. He couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe. His eyes felt like they were going to pop out of his skull and roll away. The ferret squirmed, instinctively trying to free himself from the massive clawed talon that had pinned him to the ground like a bolt of lightning. His hands did nothing to budge it, and he could feel blood running through his fur where the huge claws had pierced his chest and stomach. 

	In the light of the campfire, Larry laid eyes dazedly on a creature unlike anything he had ever seen before. It seemed to be some horrible mix of harpy eagle and bat. Feathers covered its crested head, but on either side of the crest, two large leathery ears protruded. The feathers extended down the bird-like head to a curved, knife-like beak and beyond it down to the bird-like breast. The feathers gave way, however, near the shoulders and down the monster’s back, turning to dirty fur. Its wings were massive, and leathery like a bat instead of feathered like a bird’s. Its legs were scaly and bare of fur or feather, tipped with the horrible dagger-like talons that had pierced Larry’s flesh. 

	The ferret couldn’t scream as the bird-like creature turned jet black eyes toward him. He couldn’t do anything but bleed and squirm uselessly as that hooked and terrible beak lowered itself to his body. The bird creature was standing on him, off to the side of Larry’s body, so the beak had access to his entire form. He shivered in horror as that scissor-like weapon dipped between his legs and sheared carelessly through the soft flesh of his cock. It twisted its head, and Larry wheezed as he saw his big beautiful cock lifted up in that beak and swallowed down like an earthworm in the beak of a robin. 
	
	The ferret could feel blood running down his legs, soaking into his balls and spreading under his ass into the grass. He couldn’t do anything. He was helpless as the beak dipped down again between his legs and this time dug into the defenseless pouch of his scrotum. Apparently the creature favored the easiest parts first, making an appetizer of the ferret’s precious masculinity. He could feel the cruel beak rooting around his scrotum, catching the flesh of his left testicle and wrenching the smallish orb free with no more effort than picking a cherry from a tree. Larry’s eyes rolled in their sockets as the agony tore through his lower insides like a buzzsaw. He didn’t see the bird eat his testicle, but he did see the beak dip in again and finish castrating him, plucking his remaining ball free with a succinct jerk of its head. 

	Larry could do nothing. He couldn’t even beg for mercy from the horrible monster that was devouring him. He struggled, of course, but like a mouse caught in the talons of an owl, it made no difference. He turned his head as the bloody beak came back down toward his face, those emotionless black eyes glistening in the fire light. They were the last thing Larry ever saw before that hooked beak gouged his eyes out. The ferret couldn’t protect his face. He tried to cover it with his hands but the monster clipped his fingers off with its beak every time he tried to. His eyeballs were plucked out just as easily as his testicles had been. 

	He felt the bird shift, then, and air rushed into his lungs as the foot came off of his chest. He let out a mournful howl of agony that hardly sounded human as he could breathe at last. It rose in pitch as the bird’s beak came down again and ripped his stomach open. It tore a chunk out of his abdomen, exposing the glistening bulk of his intestines. Larry tried to squirm away blindly but he was pinned down by that huge talon a second time, as the bird’s beak went to work disemboweling him. His soft, vulnerable organs were easily picked out and devoured. 

	To Larry, it seemed he had already died and gone to hell. He couldn’t see anything, couldn’t even scream as the bird’s beak tore his insides apart and feasted on them. He was trapped in blackness filled with excruciating pain, and he could not escape it. He felt the bird’s talons clench down around him and he heard the beat of the creature’s huge leathery wings as it took flight. He was bleeding to death, as the monster carried him off to its lair to be finished off later. He died in the air, a morsel for a monster he couldn’t explain, his torso ripped apart and empty, eye sockets staring sightlessly at the moon. 

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Ron came back a week later to find that his friends were not waiting for him. He waited for a few hours alone in the bright light of day, but they never showed. He hiked into the hills to find them, but eventually found only their campsite. No trace of his friends were found besides the bloodstained grass beside the tent and the deep ruts in the dirt where the creature’s talons had dug into it. 

	No trace of Ron was ever found either. 

End.