A box-shaped head, a barreled torso, he was a study of geometry. Not particularly tall - which was what kept him out of "real" professional football - but above-average height, and handsome in a rugged, football coach kind of way. Certainly nothing anybody would ever deem special, even with the masculine fantasy-trappings of being a coach.

Well, he thought, the Leonardi's party would certainly change all that! He was standing there talking to a small circle of guys - Pete Weir, the athletic trainer at school, Sam Hamilton (everybody called him "Sham"), who owned a restaurant/ bar over on the west side - where Lidster often went for happy hour - and Will Donnelly, the dentist. They were laughing it up and raising the volume way past the level of their buzz - like men who'd had far more to drink than they'd had - in truth, they were riding a different high.

When the Leonardis entered the room, Lidster turned and glanced at them. Jesus-H, they were huge! LOOK at Tony - who'd always been on the line, so he wasn't any small pup - but now, he was gigantic, bloated with the muscle of a seasoned, mature man. He and his dad were nearly identical in build - the only thing separating them was Tony's obvious youth, a teenager with an adult body.

They led that science teacher - what the fuck was his name? - Oh yeah, McIntyre; the kids called him "Mr. Mac" - to the room with the flowers. As they were about to enter, McIntyre made eye-contact with Coach Lidster. They nodded to each other.

As they went in, Lidster had a moment, a fleeting thought. In went pretty fast in real-time, but it's worth taking a few sentences, slowing it down and exploring it. As the Leonardi's led McIntyre into the pollen-laden sun-room, Coach Lidster thought, "They better lead him to the right plant - not to mine." Just like that, real quick. But did the reader notice his possessiveness, his aggression? Why didn't that bring some sense of warning?

Instead, Coach Lidster adjusted his half-hard cock, his obvious growing erection, and turned back to the conversation. He wasn't embarrassed about his hard-on - just the opposite, in fact. He was feeling really masculine, really pumped, like he USED to feel after a major victory, the jocky-bonding of the locker room.

More, he knew the other guys were in exactly the same condition. He could see Pete's erection, pushing out hard from his dress pants, and Sham was touching himself with enough frequency to consider it masturbation.

But the thing was, none of them cared -- that ALONE enhanced the Coach's buzz. This growing feeling of masculinity, of camaraderie, to be around other sexually-stimulated men felt surprisingly natural. Surprisingly hot.

A couple of minutes later, McIntyre joined them. Like the rest of the guys, his mouth and nose were covered in pollen dust, thick and clingy. A shy smile on his face, they opened the circle and warmly welcomed him. He only tried to hide his rod for a minute or so.

When the older Leonardi, playing host, stopped by and suggested they re-visit their plants while he freshened their drinks, they took him up on it.

McIntyre too, though clearly he'd been trying to resist the impossible sense of pleasure. Lidster couldn't imagine why. The coach put his arm around the science teacher's shoulders and led him to the sun-room.

Even without the name-tag in the dirt, he could've spotted his plant immediately - it was like he'd bonded with it - it stood out from the others. Almost as if hypnotized, he dropped his arm from McIntyre and walked directly to it. The other guys - Mac included - did the exact same thing. They stepped to their plants, they buried their noses in the blossoms, or they enveloped the bud completely in their mouths, like they were giving blow jobs, and they almost simultaneously took their next hits.

This time, back in their former circle, they focused on their bodies, stripping off clothes piece by piece and posing for each other. McIntyre had his shirt off and his pants around his ankles, flexing his incredible ab-wall for the guys, his obliques, showing off his monstrous hard-on, thrusting like a stripper at a show - he'd lost almost any sense of inhibition. As he grew, it seemed to shrink.

Same with everyone else. The entire HOUSE had become a meat-market, muscular, horny men parading themselves to their best advantage, stripping shirts or stepping out of trousers. With the sense of freedom that only comes from liberation, these normally straight men were ENJOYING their new sexual expression, their shared feelings of masculinity.

Their growth.

Those who hadn't taken off their clothes were busting out of them now. Sounds of cloth tearing came from every which-way, followed by the laughter of the men around it. Even the piano player had become a monster, tearing out the shoulder seams of his shirt while he played. And he played like a man who knew his fingers would soon be too big for the keys, full of passion and good-byes, yet still rhythmically aggressive - (Was he playing Bernstein?)

And of course, inevitably, ultimately, one by one, they went back into the sun-room. They felt this pull, this need. Somehow, they knew it was time for the next step. While the others capered and cavorted, someone would slip silently out - distracted and drawn.

As the focus of his own group changed to Sham bursting out of his pants - while screaming "I'm hulking out! I'm hulking out! Look you guys, I'm hulking out!" - Lidster noticed McIntyre quietly step away, almost as if called by something in the sun-room.

Lidster followed him, leaving the group laughing at Sham's transformation and the obvious erection he now proudly displayed.

The atmosphere in the new addition reminded Lidster of a public men's room, waiting at the line of urinals. As the coach walked into the room, several guys were standing with their backs to him, facing their plants and staring straight off ahead, wearing the self-imposed blinders of pissing men.

But instead of pissing, these guys were slipping their erect cocks into the flower buds, like big, phallic bees. It's what McIntyre was doing right now, pushing his cock almost lovingly into the petals - the sudden look of rapture on his face.

Lidster wanted to understand. He wanted to know why...

And then he glanced at his plant, there next to Mac's. God, it was so beautiful. It actually gave him an erection, he was so attracted to it. He wanted to fuck it - fuck it the way a man should. The plant was calling him.

He was aware of McIntyre next to him - just like two guys at the urinals - he was even aware that McIntyre was growing larger, more powerful - but Coach Lidster was really only interested in himself, his own feelings of power, his own muscle size.

As he slipped his cock into his flower, he and McIntyre stood there next to each other staring off in front of them, focused only on the pleasure and the changes.

When the time came, the each gladly accepted their Symbionts.

And when they were done, they moved out of the way so other guys could get to their own plants a little easier. It was difficult to get around them at their new size.

Very soon after that, it became a whole different kind of party.

* * * * * * * * *

Where haven't we looked in a while, gentle reader? Have we been so busy in the branches that we've neglected the root structure? Plants grow so quickly, unless someone's there to prune them to keep them in control - the same with stories. Let a sub-plot go by, or give a minor character a major scene, and suddenly - weeds in the garden!

Ah, but with careful trimming and soilent structure, a well-tended story bears exacting fruit. Unfortunately, that's not what's been happening here, within the pages of this garden. Our story has been out of control, growing every which-a-way, taking the spotlight of the sun by whatever means necessary.

It's chaos.

Like that poor branch over there - let's pull it out into the sun here so we can get a better look.

It's Snake. Remember Snake?

God damn, he's hot. Looks kind of like pro-wrestling's "The Undertaker" with his motorcycle overtones, and his Harley-Davidson imagery. Of course, Snake is far more muscled than the Undertaker, stretching his leathers until they're almost a second skin - but clearly the Undertaker was the visual inspiration.

Last we saw Snake, before his branch got over-grown by another, he'd been slowly travelling North to Canada, to whatever mysterious business he had there. On his way, he was transforming weekend warriors into motorcycle muscle-daddies. Hot stuff, that. We need to get back to Snake.

And sure, everybody loves the General and the Staff-Sargent, but what about good-ol' Sheriff Lane?

We're so busy with the new growth at the end of the branches, we forget the supporting structure - the trunk, the heavy base. And Sheriff Lane is one of the best characters of all, not just because of his size, his superiority even among superior men, but his learned ability to create human slaves. Hell, Sheriff Lane pretty much owns that town in West Virginia, the one that first saw the Symbiont re-birth.

He's given some men plants of their own, but not all - the players in local politics, etc - most of the townsmen have been turned into his lustful servants, that seems to be what really motivated him. It takes only a healthy dose of his cum to make a man his, as he proved over and over again in earlier West Virginian chapters. We really owe him the respect of returning to his sub-plot, it's one of the primary roots of our story.

And okay, we've been following Tony Leonardi, but what about the rest of the boys? We'll be looking in on Danny and Donny Wall in an upcoming chapter, but what about little Chuckie - and do you remember W.B. (the Hulk) and Keith? The transformation of those boys is what really established this story as one of the strongest plants in the garden - even if it IS growing out-of-control at the moment. They've been producing some really beautiful, but over-looked flowers - Chuckie with his two younger brothers, and what they did to their father, wow! Those are the stories that need to be told, that desperately call for the sun.

It's a cornucopia of forgotten sub-plots, dense foliage at the base of the theme, perhaps choking the lighter green buds forming at the tips of branches, the new growth that aches to be exposed. We're bad gardeners - we have short attention spans. We're so distracted by the stuff we see, we've neglected the stuff it's grown over.

A garden is ordered - Nature is chaos. It's time to force this plant to grow the way we want it to - it's time to get it back under control.

All we really need is the character to do it. And by "character," we don't mean the moral resolve - we are definitely resigned to telling this story - no, we mean an actual character.

Fortunately, he's waiting right here in the wings, in the margin, over the turn of the page. He's been ready for his entrance since chapter five, but as usual, we got distracted by back-story. Well, honestly, we were sort-of stalling until the sun was at the right angle so you could see him the way we wanted you to. The right lighting is so important for plants - and this one likes high-exposure.

But nobody likes to be introduced in a cryptic, editorial voice. Let's switch back to the narrative and give a character the entrance that a character is due. And in that way, we can look in on ANOTHER of our primary dramatis-persona, and perhaps you'll see some editorial gardening take effect.

Always keep your eye open for god-like gestures, good reader, and for our sake, step back and look at the entire plant once in a while. Maybe, like us, you'll see what you've been missing.

Back to the branches!

* * * * * * * * * *

Finally! he thought. The fields are finished.

Acres of land that he had to till himself - it hadn't been used as a farm in almost a decade, remember, overgrown and improperly nourished. It had taken him nearly a week, but finally it was done. He surveyed his handiwork from the top of the tractor, the fields of turned-earth, and he found himself strangely proud.

Agent Wolf Murdock would never have thought himself capable of the task - nor particularly interested, but that's something else altogether - and he felt that strange mix of surprise and pride that one gets when one accomplishes something unexpected. Even as short a time as a month ago, Murdock never would have seen himself so driven to farm.

Of course, all that had changed once he'd accepted his Symbiont.

Something nagged at him, though. He felt there was something he was supposed to do now. The tiny part of his mind that was still human remembered: once he'd finished the field, he was supposed to...

From the overalls that he wore - he'd taken to wearing them constantly now, enjoying the way his uncovered upper-body exploded out of them - Superman back in Kansas - he pulled his cell-phone out of his pocket. Well, not HIS cell-phone - the one Sheriff Lane had given him all the way back in West Virginia.

The Sheriff's number was the only one programmed in.

Without hesitation - as a matter of fact, Murdock found himself excited to be following the orders of the Sheriff, whom he'd always considered an equal - he dialed it up.

Not even a full ring before it was picked up.

"This is the Sheriff."

"This is Murdock," said the Agent - who hadn't thought of himself as just "Murdock" in quite a few days. "The fields are ready."

"Excellent," said the Sheriff, though there was none of the underlying emotion that usually accompanies that word. "And what of the Great Plant?"

Murdock sighed, the most human response of the conversation, then said, "It seems the Great Plant has found a Host, though we don't think it likely that the human will survive the encounter - he was a fairly decrepit old man."

The Sheriff grunted, and said, "Well, keep us appraised. Are you ready to start the Seeding?"

"That's why we called," said Murdock. "How soon can you have them here?"

"If we put them on a transport today, then you'll have them by tomorrow night at the latest. You haven't transformed any locals, have you?"

"Only the old man - and that was an accident. As we said, we don't expect him to live through..."

Ah, timing - the saving-grace of the short-story - (remember God-like gestures?) - it was exactly then that there was an explosion behind Murdock, from the house. A sound like someone was breaking down a wall with a battering ram. He spun around in time to see the raining debris and the dusty cloud, and the creature rise up from the ashes.

"We take that back," said Murdock into the phone. "Seems the old man came through it just fine. Proceed with the plan." Without breaking his stare, he turned the phone off and slipped it back into his pocket.

It was hard to believe that was the old man - he was so different. At least two heads taller, making him about eight feet, with a musculature to rival (and probably beat) the Incredible Hulk, except the old man wasn't quite so thick through the middle. He had the proportion of a bodybuilder, not power-lifter, so his waist and joints were surprisingly thin.

He had a greenish tint though, as if his blood was colored from chlorophyll, not gamma-rays, and the veins that interlaced beneath his paper-thin skin looked more like roots than anything human. He faced the sun, leaning his head back and opening his arms like he was welcoming a lover - he absorbed the power. His muscles seemed to grow - to achieve a pump - while he stood there.

After a moment, he turned to face Murdock, fixing the Agent with a gripping stare. Slowly, a smile broke out on his face - one that never touched his eyes.

Murdock couldn't stop looking at the old man - couldn't break the stare - the hairless, green-hued, hyper-muscular...

He couldn't move. It walked toward him and Murdock remained frozen - he just kept staring into this creature's beautiful, sparkling green eyes. Not until they were standing next to each other, this massive creature dwarfing him, did Murdock move - and that was only to pop an erection.

"The fields are finished," it said, not a question. A statement - like it'd read Murdock's mind. Had its lips even moved?

"Yes, Great One," Murdock said - or thought he said. He was so captivated by this creature's power that he wasn't sure if he was responding or not. How did he know this thing's title?

"Excellent," said the Great One, reaching out its over-muscled arm and gripping the side of Murdock's neck, right at the base of the skull, its thumb behind Murdock's ear. Its touch was cool, but there came with it a wave of power, a buzz of pleasure. Murdock's erection throbbed - if he'd been a cat, he'd have purred.

With its free hand, the Great One unhooked the straps of Murdock's coveralls and the denim fell to about his mid-thigh, where the muscle was too thick for the material to continue - Murdock didn't struggle.

The Great One reached down, and cupped Murdock's balls - the home of his Symbiont - holding Murdock by the base of the skull and by the package - both of his brains.

And the pleasure began for the Symbiont, too. Murdock could sense his other's arousal.

It continued. And rose. And grew another notch, besides. The level of pleasure got higher and higher. Murdock couldn't take it.

He opened his eyes slightly, and the last sight he had before his orgasm began was the passionless face of the Great One looking down on him, the inhuman stare.

And then he came. Murdock's orgasm began - his untouched cock exploded with cum, shooting an almost unending load.

But it didn't end. The pleasure didn't stop.

The orgasm wasn't the peak - it was the beginning. Even as he climaxed, the level of pleasure rose - a notch, another notch.

He shot and shot and shot - he shot until he lost consciousness. And even then, the pleasure didn't truly end.

The Great One dropped Murdock's lifeless body to the ground, watching emotionlessly as Murdock's physical mutation began, as Murdock's muscle swelled even larger, as his skin took on a slightly greenish-tone and his human hair fell out, even while he still gently bucked his hips and dribbled cum.

The fields were ready for Seeding - the old farmer buried deep inside the Great One could smell it in the air. Calling the others here would have to be a priority. As Murdock thrashed on the ground and continued to evolve, the Great One found the private field behind the barn and did a little planting of his own. •