Despite his fear and the weight of the eager vines, Flowen remained upright. From all sides, surrounding him in a broken ring of red and yellow, the plants watched and waited while drooling their insidious gas. Several dangled from above, larger and more aggressively dancing overhead, and the smaller mouths which seemed safer and less ambitious for their time to strike swung and bobbed closer to his waist. Flowen paid them no mind, though not intentionally. The largest bulb, its central split more than the span of his arms, and the thick ring of leaves blocking entire trees behind it. The focus of its attention was the human beneath it, frozen in shock for a few seconds upon its arrival, and unconsciously inhaling the thick swathes of pleasant poison down its throat.

Has it given up already? Rather than passively drooling the pink-ish gas over him and waiting for the human to wheeze and gasp under the slow fall of toxin, the largest bulb actively exhales it. Without lungs it manages to push a torrent of it forward, and each droplet of it begins to collect on the jungle floor. Out of Flowen’s notice, the colossal vine beneath the gargantuan bulb has encircled the mild clearing with itself. Stacked in a circular wall around the human, the gas will build until it becomes a sea.

Flowen’s strength returns with an urge to run. This is not a fight to be won, he must escape, return to the beach, his raft, and the open sea. Far away as possible from this alien plant. Digging his fingers around the thinner vines entangling his neck, Flowen rips them back as best he could. The pliable surface and flexible nature gives no easy victory, and Flowen takes what breath he can. It’s a wheeze, a desperate gulp of imperfect air after potent exercise. One is not enough, he needs more, more to fuel his fight. As he opens his mouth to gasp, and after so long with the vines around his throat he expects the fresh taste of untainted air. But without eyes, it saw this. It saw as he bent over slightly and opened his mouth wide. It had been building a special puff just for him, and when he begun to breathe in, then it struck.

For just a split-second, the plant’s bulb bulged with the pressure of the fumes inside. Timed exquisitely, the fat rubber lips opened and blasted the small human with a thick wall of toxic fog. Flowen had no time to react, in fact no time to change his inhale before the cloud reached him. He would have gasped in shock anyway. The treacle sweet taste of the toxin scorched on his tongue and was pushed down his throat by the speed of the flooding gas and the inhale of the breath he needed so much. It crystallised on his eyelashes, though he was more focused on trying to avoid it. The human’s reactions were so slow, Flowen bore the brunt of the poisonous wave before he even realised it was upon him. All he could see, taste, and smell was that opaque pink mist, and it had even intruded on his mind. The toxin worked fast, dulling his movement and senses, dropping his head, closing his eyes. It all told him to just lie down, let it happen, be overwhelmed. Give up.

Movement! Adrenaline pushes Flowen to one foot. An animalistic roar tells of the effort needed to lift the weighty necklace of girthy vines. Smaller bulbs, the size of his eye, rise up and laugh at him as they are suspended on their roots and float like bees buzzing around his head. Immediately as his foot touches the earth and half a lap is made there is a vine to lay across it. The bulb hovers behind Flowen’s head and opens its lips. Had he not been so distracted, avoiding might have saved him. The humongous mouth opens to lick its rubbery lips, distributing saliva-like sap across the green seal. He should have felt the mist on his ear, it would have warned him better. He should have had the foresight.

It’s you, the one I have to get away from the most. Flowen shuts his eyes and pins his lips together. It had never touched him physically, if he shut his eyes it would stop mentally disarming him too. No fear or terror from the sight of it to well inside of him, he would almost be free already. He lifts a hand to push away from one of its lips, and his right arm is immediately set upon by eager mouths and vines. Several come from below to pull him down, some come from the hole of his open shirt to do so. His left hand is kneaded in the mockery of a throat of one bulb, with the lips forming a wet seal past his wrist.

As a swimmer must time their breaths to occur above the surface of the water, so must Flowen now pick when his next inhale will occur. He turns away from the main bulb, pushing with one leg and one hand. The vines would fall away, the lips would pop off, the gas would still affect him but if he got away then he would be fine. His eyes open, and instead of far off green and brown, Flowen sees nothing but an eclipse of red and yellow, and the inside of the bulb whose vine lays across his leg. But the unseen bulbs behind him waits, its lips open wide to puff the sweet toxin at him.

Flowen turned away, keeping his eyes off the gigantic bulb ahead of him. The adrenaline still pumped within him, and he did all he could to keep his gaze from returning. His sight was momentary blurry, and then one of the red and yellow bulbs framed by acrid petals was there. An inch from his face he almost bumped into it. He froze, and stared into the thick flesh of the alien plant. It opened its lips, and poured the toxin onto his face. The gas immediately flows into his nose, and set about dyeing the pale skin a much more appropriate pink.

He inhaled. The same kind of deep gasp that comes after being submerged for so long. Pure, unfiltered, poison was drawn into his lungs. His tongue lit up with the sugary, delicious, taste that came with it. It was potent enough to trick his brain that he had bitten into the sweetest dessert. The body does as the body does, it is good at merely responding to what it is told. He had not eaten for almost a full day, and the burst on his tongue told his body to begin salivating. Curiously enough, that saliva was slightly pink.

He drew back his head as the plant dropped away with a silent cackle. It took a generous second for his body to realise where it was now. The short time inside its maw was enough time for him to collapse again. His bare chest did not meet the earth, but instead the squirming and flexing lengths of the vines. A small, pink tongue licked at his chin, captured by a single set of green lips. The chin-rest refused to be shaken off as Flowen lifted his head off the ground. His tongue lolled out, ensuring his mouth would rarely be closed anymore, and now the gas would seep into a gulping, hungry, body even faster. His right hand touched the ground, gripped through the earth in an attempt to push himself back up, back onto his feet where he could escape. His left arm was no use, and now that bulb was halfway down his arm up to his elbow. By now the fingers would be permanently changed to the hue of the sweet poison.

A bulb pushed its head against his, not so that the lips were sealed around the side of Flowen’s ear, but instead to guide his head towards something. Blurry eyes focused on something of a deep green in front of him. His chin-rest did not let his head sink down so he could break eye contact, and whenever his head did push down, it would return and keep his head level. The halo of leaves that each bulb had in proportionate terms could evidently be used to push and guide things, and two were helping Flowen stare forward. One went over his head, one went below his chin. His eyes cleared with a blink or two, and then Flowen wished he had never seen it. Yet another bulb was in front of him, drooling its gas, slurping its tongue, and sucking on its own lips.

That did not shock him, rather it was the way the vine behind it was piled. Bent and flexed in tight, elastic, curls and loops, the creaking of its body through twitches said this one was just waiting to be unleashed. Flowen guessed right that the rest of it was hiding beneath the soup of viscous gas that swirled and flowed around his knees. From the constant, comparative, droplets of the gas from the smaller mouths, to the belching fumes from the colossal bulb, it all began to build up. Even now, what he inhaled regularly was half-gas and half-air, making his head start to spin. Was it getting thicker? Not like mist, but like a misty soup instea-

And in the blink of an eye, it lunged. The energy contained by twisting and turning to mimic the striking force of a serpent erupted into movement. Flowen heard just a small creak above his own panting as it shot forward and lunged at him. Every moment of its movement to latch onto his prepared face was preserved in his mind. The maw opened to display its shiny interior and the misty depths of a face-sized mouth. The gas was drawn back as it launched forward with all the speed of what it imitated, and in a split-second an image of a terrified and overwhelmed pale face with white hair was reflected in the sheen of well licked lips. Then he was blinded for as the lips closed around his features. His chin to his brow was taken into the plant’s mouth, with the force ensuring he would stay like that for a while. Less than half a second after the lips had closed around Flowen’s head, the tensed vine impacted against his chest and upper body. Thick and weighty, it made a dull thump and knocked the young man backwards.

Flowen cried out as his back impacted against the earth a few feet back from where he had been laying. His shout barely reached his own ears, muffled and muted so powerfully by the rubber-like lips. The sheer impact had tackled him back beneath the lips of the gigantic bulb, with the vines already spread out over his torso and legs like sentient rope. The sheer weight half-winded him, urging him to inhale more. The lips turned sideways like a passionate lover’s kiss, freeing his eyes to see the silent roar of laughter from the huge bulb above him. Rather than sound, it belched walls of the poisonous mist down on him. The cruel plant on him had let him see the incoming wall of rose-tinted fog, but he was winded by the impact that dragged him a foot across the ground, and in the absence of rational thought, was consumed by instinct.

Beneath and around him, his shirt lay in ripped tatters. The sea had done it no good, and the constant writhing between the fabric and his skin had not helped. Pushed along the ground underneath the watchful mouth of the belching giant, Flowen’s top had practically disintegrated. Holes had already formed and been exploited by the weaving, interlocking, vines. They had held onto his clothes as the mockery of reptilian fury drove him through it. Over the lip of the plant clasped firmly to his face, he could see the vines reform and head back in his direction. Their unpredictability pushed the blue fabric in unknown directions, and it shredded.

Something coiled around the top of his head. A humiliating crown that clenched around his scalp and held his skull in place. Flowen could not turn left, or right, or nod, or look away from his body being overwhelmed.
Sit up! Sit up! Sit up! The burst of adrenaline hit again, swiping away some of mind-clouding poison from his consciousness. But the vines were so strong and so heavy, that he could not push himself up.
You must! You must! You must! He must! He must lift off this ground and push away this bulb on his face! Flower lifted an arm and pressed his palm against the rubbery lips and surface of the bulb. He must. With all his might, Flowen pushed at the seal it had made, trying to peel it off or get some proper air beneath to loosen it. At the same time he willed himself upwards, pulling with his abdominals to rise to at least a sitting position. The lips had so much give, and were so slick with nectar that his fingers could get no grip. No, his weakened fingers made no dent. He must.
Come on! Last try, you must get out of this! He did, he swore he did. He really tried, he really put all his effort into freeing that mouth from his face, into lifting himself up and escaping the plants.

Flowen inhaled. Again, he drew in a hearty gulp into his lungs. His mind, at least, delighted itself with further addiction towards the syrupy taste that flooded his mouth. It was not doing much more than that, and after a second, deep, gasp would do no more than that again. The plant slid its lips up his face towards his brow. Its seal never broke, and all the gas sank into his nostrils. Flowen’s mouth came free of its maw, and he gasped into the rising mist with desperation. Its tongue lathered messily across his nose and eyes, spreading the saliva almost uselessly across his skin. Almost. It would be absorbed and be as potent as its breath. Even if he did escape, the slow intake would ensure he would eventually collapse.

He panted and panted as though he had been exercising furiously. There was a new taste, a new, fresh one on his tongue. It had been left there. He panted. It had left it there. He ran his tongue against his upper teeth to scratch it off. No luck. The taste was growing, a rich flavour not unlike fine dining. There were no sparks or fireworks of flavour, but a slow build up to the most gorgeous meal he would never have. Even at the thought, and a time like this, the gathering sensation urged him to salivate heavily. He began to drool, and that only worsened the situation. Now it was a full meal at once; powerful, aromatic, spices he didn’t know the name of, but had experienced before. All at once, encouraging him to demand it more. The flavour also requested he keep his mouth open, relax his tongue, settle his throat until the trio barely moved, and for this gorgeous sensation, Flowen would not resist.

A silent cheer and ruthless cackle rose up among the plants, who sought to dye his skin a toxic pink. Flowen’s last acts were forthcoming, with a spark left in him waiting to alight. The swarm of numerous, uncountable, vines with their insidious bulbs descended on the human. His legs were quickly entangled in the thick trunk of several green knots. As a loop closed his ankles together and slid along the underside of his bare feet, another slithered like a snake and closed over the bridges. Flowen’s toes gave their last flex, and were set upon by the smaller mouths. His knees were pushed apart, letting vines crawl beneath his legs and onto his chest. Lips attached to any patches of bare skin and pumped their poison on his skin. The pale skin of the unlucky human disappeared beneath the flexible green lengths slowly, but inevitably.

The vines slithered beneath his back, beginning to coil around the human’s body. Lashes of organic rope wound around his knees and drew them together. A second later there were just flashes of skin like sunlight through dense forest. Plenty of flowers rested on his torso, kissing and sucking at his flesh with their lips so abundantly that their petals overlapped four or five times with others. A vine fell across his right arm, and lazily pinned it against another. Winding, turning coils spread their grasp over him. He must. But the weight was growing and growing, moreso than his own mass until the pressure of the warm vines was welcoming. Or was that the gas? Or was it the gas telling him to relax? Flowen’s left arm was swallowed completely; hand, wrist, elbow and shoulder all long away into the mouth of a hungry bulb. He could see the lips come all the way up to his shoulder, until they were brushing against his chin. And what remained of his mouth just an inch above that? It sat in the maw of a larger bulb, who had the lower half of his face in its grasp. It left his eyes free to stare blurrily through the mane of acrid petals. Most of his sight was those now, and the yellow bulbs with their red warning dots. There was another on his head, and the thick petals of that drooped and interlocked like cogs by his eyes.

He must. Give up. Flowen’s eyes rolled back in his head, and his fingers lost their grasp on the face-sucking bulb. The rubbery lips slipped up his face until they also engulfed part of his hair. Nectar dripped from the bulbs, all of them, soaking his skin with the toxin he now craved. Flowen’s chin was free for a second, and another bulb pressed itself over his lower lip, chin, neck, down to his clavicle. His right arm went limp, and was pulled away from his face to hang by his side. His mind turned the sensation of a licking tongue around his fingers, wrist, elbow, pleasurable. Long along he had swallowed his last breath of clear air, but now the mix of foul air and syrupy toxin was exclusively the latter. Flowen allowed the smaller bulbs to entangle their vines around him, then the medium ones whose mouths matched his head. When they joined, the smaller mouths popped away with a soundless cackle. All over his submerged body, the plants kissed him. Sucked on his skin, lathering his body with their toxin. Where they detached, his skin was pink, and the smallest mouth gleefully extended their tongues to smear his skin. His ears were invaded by their tongues, his eyes were invaded by their leaves, and they took it in turns to transfer what droplets of rich nectar they made onto his panting, awaiting tongue. Bound in several layers of the warm vines, Flowen closed his eyes and steadily breathed the syrupy poison, and drank their rich nectar...