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“Aww, thanks, Rei!”

Chris ran a hand through his spiky hair, leaning back across his couch as he voiced his gratitude and surprise.

Thoughts of the near future festivities and those involved made him smile. That the celebration would start off closer at hand hadn’t been overwhelmingly surprising, but in the early hours of the morning it was easy to forget that you weren’t the only one who laughed at that kind of close-minded silliness. Should have known that every second of today would be dedicated to him alone. He’d hadn’t been awake that long before Rei had invited himself in, and had let his preliminary gift do the talking.

It was masterfully made, a greater-than-bite-size cupcake. It fit in his loose hold like it was made for it--not as far-fetched a notion, given its creator. The swirls of frosting were hypnotic, rich and velvety, like a section of deepest space spangled with stars. Like Rei had drawn the dark and light of the cosmos into this spiralling topping.

Which may have genuinely been the case.

And if it was…

Chris grinned. He knew for a fact it’d taste great, regardless of whether or not it were true.

His attention was drawn to something amassing atop the cupcake, piecing itself together with commanded intention. It looked like a tiny sun, rotating lazily above the stretch of stars and sending out the cutest little flares. Golden all over, untouched by any sunspots, Rei’s influence was obvious even with the lack of any actual candle below...and the speed at which it grew and changed.

Small as it was, a supergiant that rested between his fingers, it was still quite the arresting sight. Blazing orange taking the place of gold, before supplanted by eerie blue. Swelling, bathing both of them in a ghostly light, bits of itself curling off in white-hot lashes that didn’t so much as tickle his skin. Searing white, casting the frosting below in ethereal glow. Then dark, blacker than the spacial swirls.

Chris watched it disappear--that was the only way to describe it. The air around it bending and enfolding the star as it ran its course, ushering it from sight and mind. The cake sat there, so appetising, waiting for his appreciation. Even with the ‘candle’ gone, it still possessed a kind of beauty...eh...more like cuteness.

Something about such a personalised little show being put on for him...he couldn’t fight the coming smile off of his face.

“You’re so extra, Rei,” he snickered.

“You know you love it.”

“Sure do.” It really was the only way to be, sometimes. And he sure as hell wasn’t complaining, especially not on his special day.

Without really being aware of it, he was already raising the cake towards his mouth.

The beginning of the end was something they were barely able to comprehend.

Like they were always there, unraveling not only across the boundaries of existence but seemingly beyond it--searing, colossal gales that drove entire stretches of space-time before them. By countless degrees of magnitude below, not a single being with two brain cells to fruitlessly rub together could realise the rhythm to the domineering, all-razing gusts--

Rushing in, holding reality taut as the largest of celestial objects trembled, like insects pinned for vivisection, awaiting it with baited breath. Galaxies were drawn together with freakish speed, warped out of shape by the encompassing, greater power. Myriads of celestial bodies were converging, played by these above-astral winds, stretching the rubber band taut.

Then, out-- as superclusters were scattered in phantasmagoric splashes of colour, supernovae and nebulae bursting in subjugation to the cosmic catalyst. Solar systems were sent unravelling as gravity wells played with orbits--planets were dashed to pieces against each other, flung into the suns they orbited, shattered and evaporated, burned, reduced to dust.

Countless civilisations of countless planets were subject to skies of explosive colour, scores of meteorites and comets painting the air in terrifying splendour. It was like fingers of fire curling around the horizon, beginning to clench and claw it apart, rocking existence in its cradle: the air feeling thick despite the lack of any debris, the earth shuddering with subterranean force.

They were unable to grasp the gravity of the situation. Couldn’t so much begin to question what was about to unfold. Only fruitlessly prepare for it.

“I’ll admit, it looks amazing, but you’re not just gonna eat it with your eyes, right?”

Without moving his hand, Chris absently licked his lips, undergoing quite the internal debate over the simple action he was about to take.

Rei’s amused question made him blink slowly. The thought of some sort of silly joke had passed through his mind. Some sort of hidden mental trigger that would activate once he bit it, or some ridiculous crap like that.

And just as quickly as the unbidden questions arose, they were suppressed. Rei was quite the tricksy sort, but it came part and parcel with their...position, in the grand scheme of things. He knew him well enough to cast the funny business aside.

There wasn’t much he couldn’t handle. And he wasn’t impartial to something adventurous if it did occur.

Chris huffed out a laugh, then sank his teeth into the proffered treat.

It was hard to say where the luckiest place to be was.

Crushed instantly between colossal teeth, flattened into space dust, the dust crackling away instantly under the moist surface, under the thin layer of saliva that was enough to destroy all that it slid over in less than a second, in conjunction with a bite force so unbelievably powerful.

Sluicing across a plane of undulating tongue, rolled and ripped apart by the tiniest of motions--every tiny fleck of saliva making the strongest nuclear weapon seem like some kind of toy with how it tore into space-time so viciously. Whole clusters of galaxies slewed about, fizzling and dissolving into powdery froth. Stars and planets fizzed and popped, a mess of bubbling universe slithering across an endless carpet of tongue. They sluiced over and around taste buds that dwarfed them.

Or remaining on the remainder ‘outside’, under the thrall of yet another burst of massive air that scattered any systems still clinging to coherency...with only an unnerving sense of offness, shaking them down to the atoms.

A sound that made the greatest of thunderclaps sound pitiful heralded the end of stage one--a tempestuous tide of froth whirling the spacial slop down into an abyss that the largest of black holes would be pitiful in the face of. Enormous walls drove together in a great rush, reducing most of the ‘larger’ globules of universe to more liquidy slime. A scant few pieces of reality were able to bypass the initial shuddering, sweltering, slick impact.

And those fragmented remnants of cosmos only bore witness to an even tighter assault, endless walls of rippling, velvety muscle bearing down on them, ensnaring them ever further in warm, wet pressure. An uncompromising journey that seemed to take aeons in the minds of those involved, while as a matter of fact only lasting some seconds.

The sound of some vast maw yawning open solidified the situation in the minds of so many. A haunting, guttural cacophony could be heard from behind it, nearing by the moment as the clashing walls brought the countless victims closer. It yielded in acceptance of the coming treat, and by no means due to the efforts of any pitiful, desperate parties pushing back against it.

Churning ominously below, storming and thundering, the depths of stinking acid were beyond both reach and comprehension to almost all of those level-headed enough to try and meet it. Whether tendrils of clinging saliva snapped over them and ensnared them in the comparatively acidic goop, or the rise of gastric fumes roasted them into shimmering vapour, or a stray rock of clenching mucosae crushed them down, most of the objects not reduced to stellar slush soon joined the mixture after breaching the portal of sphincter.. Again, but the tiniest few bits of universe made it to the fermenting pit below.

Thankfully for them, it was over before they could even realise what had went down.

(...Them.)

“ Damn! ”

“That good?”

His friend’s easy smile hadn’t changed, but the tone of his voice indicated some pride.

“...Better than good. Thanks, dude.” He regretted having swallowed on instinct: that piece deserved to have been truly savoured. It needed to last. Just the thought of it got him salivating…

But there was still a fair bit left, of course.

“You don’t want me to, like…” Trailing off, Chris figured that the implication was clear enough.

And of course, Rei read him loud and clear. “Of course not. It’s your birthday. Your treat.”

“You sure I can’t--”

“Quite sure!”

In all honesty, Chris felt the tiniest bit guilty. In his time with Rei he’d grown used to giving back as much as he received...whatever that entailed in their current situation. Watching the sky-blue eye of his friend look him over, content to just indulge in Chris’, well, indulgement? It wasn’t what he was used to.

There were some things that seemed more satisfying when others did them for you, and about a thousand possible ways to pay back Rei for the present had flitted through Chris’ mind before being shot down.

“Just seeing you enjoy it is payment enough.”

Rei smiled, the look graduating subtly to a smirk as he watched Chris shrug and take another bite.

Whatever wound up between his monumental teeth was destroyed far more quickly than even the first, testing bite could have managed. The entirety of existence exploding in sparking showers, the furthest planes of comprehension munched up, all amounting to a slight burst of flavour in a god’s mouth.

The filling now savoured, pressed among countless tonnes of tongue-flesh, crumbling and bursting and stirred with spit into powdery sludge. Meteors shuddering like Pop Rocks among the river rapids of saliva, the dark cavern lit now and again in lurid bursts of colour. The enzymatic fluid mixing with clusters of stars, pushed into the flesh of a colossal cheek, spreading their tang.

Continued universe-shaking peristalsis, juddering the foodstuff apart at the atomic level, dragging it bubbling and oozing and sparking to the fermenting, fizzling depths of his almighty gut.

It all seemed to blend together in a medley of explosive destruction. Bits of reality blinking out in droves. All swirling down the greatest gravity well of all.

So many universes were coming into being, and leaving it just as quickly. Their lifespan was accelerated to a ridiculous degree, cooked by the endless ocean of acid, expanding and reducing in not-so-big Bangs and Crunches. Evolution speeding by in the blink of a cosmic eye, all to the same cauldron of conclusion.

And what did trillions upon trillions of lifeforms feel, watching all they knew bubbling away?

They were resigned by now to their fate, unfamiliar as it was, which did not surprise them--and this in itself was a surprise. Whimsies of monstrous forces beyond the understanding of the brightest of minds...were all bowing down as something more positive took centre stage. Even base fear, although only diluted and not quite dissolving completely, soon found itself overcome by plain amazement. As the omnipresent force drove down over them, digesting, dominating, they met it with no real resistance--not that any could have arisen to begin with.

With a look to the shuddering skies above, right before they darkened for good, each and every being on every dissolving planet met their fate with growing calm. Planets crumbled, moons shattered, and inhabitants looked on intently before joining their homes in oblivion. The terror of before had dispersed, while the mania stayed on in a new kind of fervour. Scores of minds, infinitesimal by comparison to the roiling chaos that engulfed them, met it without any fruitless, terrified theorising that would incite them to cower.

Only a sense of feeling, ironically, uplifted. Elevated. Drawn into something bigger, grander than what even their greatest minds could even start to try and comprehend.

Chris gave a hum of pleasure. “This tastes so damn good.”

“I’m glad!”

“What’s in it?”

This had been asked more as an obligation than anything else--Chris didn’t exactly mind, given how he knew Rei had put a lot into it, and it had paid off for sure.

“...Love and care.”

“Yeah, yeah.” He was used enough to roundabout answers. And he felt like being difficult back. “But seriously.”

“A lot.”

“Isn’t there always?”

Chris chewed on a larger piece, humming in contentment at the starburst of flavour that spread to his eager tongue.

“Just eat it.”

“Thought this was meant to be my treat,” snarked the birthday boy. An idea struck him, and he leaned forward, letting his lips part and his tongue hang out. “ Bleeeeh… ”

He was rewarded with a flush of colour to Rei’s cheeks, his friend looking over to take in the sight. The taste of the cake hadn’t left Chris yet, but he knew that there were larger chunks remaining in his mouth to owe that to. He snickered, confident he had Rei figured out, and fairly certain what had really went into the present.

Rei wasn’t so interested in the inside of his friend’s mouth. (Currently.)

Rather, what he expected was strayed about in dying, fizzling remnants.

“I really am glad you liked it,” Rei said eventually, his voice soon circling around behind Chris.

“Win-win,” came the response.

“For sure. Happy birthday.” Platinum blonde hair appeared in Chris’ peripheral vision, Rei’s face nestling into the crook of his neck as he eyed the remainder of cupcake.

“Hope it’s fulfilling.”

With a knowing smirk, Chris pulled away, and took advantage of Rei nearly toppling over to give his head a playful rub. “I know it will be, with friends like you~”