Sascha’s Smoky Detour
By Limewah
Patron Reward for Moggers (August 2023)
Featuring characters from Disney properties

–

There were two things that made it clear Sir Hiss was taking his charge, Sascha, through the halls. One was the constant, repetitive jingle and clink of the glittering jewellery hanging off the body of the tall, muscular tigress, as well as the further rattle of coins buried in her very ample cleavage, like a sort of improvised coin-purse.
The other was the constant stream of high-tenor lisping from the snake and echoing through the corridors.
“I mussst sssay, it is ssso deeply disappointing to ssee that you haven’t made even one jot of progresss! I would think that, after having had three full weeksss to practice your mental endurancssse, that you would lassst longer than a few ssseconds under my gaze. And look at you now. Ssso deeply hypnotised. Really, Sssassscha. What is the point of these lessons if you won’t take them to heart? I hope you are lissstening to me now at leassst.”
Sascha was only half-listening. The words were there, but she was having trouble understanding their meaning or their message. Her eyes spun with blue and green rings of colour, her eyes wide, her face a blank mask. The tigress was loping with sleepwalking strides through the castle halls, blank and relaxed as he followed the yellow serpent with the red, feathered cap balanced on his head. 

Sir Hiss had been trying to train her to resist hypnotism, but she had failed quite miserably once again. He was scolding her as he slithered through the castle halls, and she followed in turn.  They were headed straight for his quarters, where he planned to continue his scolding until he fell into a deep sleep, wrapped around her like a ribbon.
“How are you ssssupposssed to rule the kingdom if you can’t resssissst any intrusion into your mind?” Sir Hiss continued. “It almost ssseemsss to me like you enjoy falling under my ssspell. Every sssingle bit of training you’ve excssselled at, everything that will make you a good princess… all will amount to nothing if you can be turned with jussst a glancssse into a sssnake’sss eyes!”

An ornate, violet door opened as the pair passed, not a hint of light escaping the interior. A long tendril of smoke floated from it, weaving a parabolic journey towards the slowly stumbling feline.
Sascha remained placidly dumbfounded, only faintly noticing the strange wisp of glittering grey as it wove around her shoulders in a loop, before tying off into a tight noose that wrapped around her and yanked her - hard - back through the open door.
“Have you anything to sssay for yourssself? Of courssse you don’t. Huff. I’ll have to ssssqueeze some sssenssse into you.”
Sir Hiss tutted, rolling his eyes, not breaking his slithering stride at all, unaware that the tigress was gone as he continued his rant.

Even as she was pulled, Sascha’s eyes remained spiralling, two sources of light in the dimness. She stumbled through, her feet scrabbling for purchase against the carpeted floor. Her nose unconsciously flared at the sweet blueberry scent of vapour from a large golden hookah. A long tube connected it to a thin mouthpiece, cradled in the hands of a blue, multi-armed caterpillar lounging on a thickly upholstered mushroom-shaped sofa. His massive body was curled around it, easily five times the length of Sascha’s body. The caterpillar had a humanoid face, with sleepy eyes and an aristocratic pout. He took a long drag of the hookah, and expelled a rainbow coloured plume of smoke before the quiet tiger. His long exhale lead directly into his first question.
“What is all that racket about?” his voice was languid and slow, and the vapour turned into a question mark as it vanished. 
Sascha’s brow knitted in as she wracked her sleepy, swirl-pickled brains to remember.
“I don’t… know…”
“Well then, who are you?” the caterpillar smacked his lips, his eyes roving along her shapely figure. 
Again Sascha paused for thought, eyes lazily swirling. She was trying to remember her name, but her thoughts just kept going back to the endlessly swirling rings, and what the chiding snake had said to her.
“I’m… deeply hypnotised?” she said. That sounded right…
“If that is the case, deeply hypnotised… come here.” the caterpillar exhaled another long plume, this one forming into a multi-coloured spiral that twisted and braided into a beckoning hand. Sascha’s body processed it, and began to sleepwalk forward. 

The caterpillar’s legs scuttled forward, bringing the end of his body in front of her. She stepped gracefully onto it, her jewellery and coinage still tinkling and jangling with each step she took. Her arms dangled, as her eyes fell closed. She stepped along each segment of his body and turn, feeling it squish under her weight with a water-bed bounce.
The caterpillar laid on the couch, watching her with an expression that would have looked like boredom. But he did not take his eyes off her - particularly the heave and bounce of her breasts - each step making them shake and ripple, just a hint of coinage poking out shyly from the cleavage. 
He took another deep pull from his hookah, and when he exhaled this time, it created a thick cloud of fog.
He allowed her to step off of his coils, directly into the cushioned, cloud like plumes of smoke. An impromptu staircase of sorts, a series of platforms that continued to lead her higher into the darkness of the caterpillar’s boudoir.
“Can you feel the letters below your feet?” the caterpillar asked. Spell them out for me as you walk, if you please, my dear.”

Sascha took her time on each one, pushing her paws into each individual letter to get a feel for them. The first one was two lines, with another line connecting them…
“H…” 
The next one was a line that forked off in two directions.
“Y…”
The hole and the circular shape made the next one clear.
“P…”
Soon, she spelled out the whole word. Hypnotised. The word she had used to introduce herself. Each word had lead her upwards, like she was on a spiral staircase. As she stepped off the last one, she fell into a smoky slide that slid her straight down - this time back onto another letter. This one curved.
“C…?”
“Good. Continue, dear. I think this will remind you of what your name actually is.”
She did not see through the multi coloured fog, but the caterpillar was licking his lips. Savouring the vapour… or, perhaps, something else sliding between his lips.
The next letter was a forked pair of lines, with another connector.
“A… T…. E…”

Some were familiar to her, faintly, distantly. She felt her lips curling into a little smile as she began to anticipate the answer.
“Caterpillar…?” she asked.
“Not quite…” a wagging finger made of smoke appeared before her. “Almost, though. Please, do continue.”
Sascha nodded, stepping onto the next one. 
“F…? She felt the textured vapour press against her back, and felt herself tilting onto her side as she took a step onto a loop of smoke that wrapped around her ankle.
“O…”
Her other foot stepped forward, and got the same sort of manacle around it.
“O…?”
The smoky bonds lifted her upside down as she walked, defying gravity in the dense, soupy mist. 
“Reach out to touch the last one,” the caterpillar said.
She did so, slowly and gingerly feeling the round shape on one end, and the flat shape on the other.
“D… Food?”
“And together, that makes you…
“Caterpillar Food!” Sascha’s voice was dreamy, but there was a beaming smile on her face, as though she’d just won a prize.
The smoke vanished, and the sleepy tigress tumbled, sliding straight back down into the long lengths of the worm-like creature. They wrapped her tightly like a parcel, only her head and her feet sticking out as they lifted her towards the lazy smile on the caterpillar’s face.
“That’s right, my darling,” The Caterpillar said. “Caterpillar Food.”

-

The door to the boudoir burst open, and Sascha raced out from it, before throwing the door shut behind her with loud, desperate gasps. She slumped against it for a moment, trying to catch her breath. She still stank of the caterpillar’s smoke, spluttering and trying to waft the scent away from her face, to no avail.
“All right…” she said, watching as multicoloured wisps issued from her throat. “All right… Just gotta find Sir Hiss.”
She had a lightness to her step that surprised her… not to mention, her breasts weren’t jingling anymore. She reached to her cleavage to see if it was there, and watched her hand simply disintegrate into vapour. As did her chest, for that matter, a hole now lingering in it like a hole in a cloud. As she looked at her other paw, she realised that it - and the rest of her body - was just smoke and vapour.
Her head turned back towards the closed door, as her wispy form came apart and melted away as if on a light breeze.
There was one last thought on smoke-Sascha’s cloudy consciousness before she faded to nothingness.
I’d love to go one week without getting eaten…

Meanwhile, inside the boudoir, The Caterpillar hummed to himself as he blew rings, shapes, and spirals into the air. He played with the coins between his fingers, and glanced down at his long blue body, and the bulge slowly sliding down it.

To read more work like this early, head to my Patreon!
www.patreon.com/limewah 

Subscribe to my Telegram Channel if you’d like, too!
https://t.me/Limewah