Lindsay was 12 when it first started. One morning she awoke to find odd little crumbs in her bed. At first she thought they were crackers, but as she was getting dressed for school she noticed a small little tan ‘O’ laying on the floor next to her nightstand. It was a cheerio. She picked it up and looked at it for a moment, its wholesome oaty contours seeming perfectly harmless. She threw it away, assuming that her bratty older sister was responsible. Little did she know that it was an omen of the pure mind bending horror which was soon to follow. That weekend her mother went shopping.

She had gotten in the habit of doing all the grocery shopping for the month at once, so the kitchen was packed full of bags and boxes as the girls went about putting things away. Lindsay was disappointed when she noticed that the only cereal her mother had gotten was Cheerios. It was always Cheerios. Four economy-sized boxes worth, no less. Lindsay had never liked Cheerios, even though her sister seemed to love them. They were too plain. Too boring, She thrust the boxes carelessly up onto the shelf above the refrigerator and went searching through the other bags to see if her mother had gotten anything that was actually edible. Later that night she was tossing and turning in bed, her stomach full of slightly too much Butterfinger ice cream. The house was silent. Everyone else was in bed. Or should have been. Lindsay had almost dozed off when a soft, dry rustling sound brought her back to wakefulness. At first she thought it was the cat scratching at her door, but as she sat up she realized it was coming from somewhere inside the room. A twinge of fear shivered through her body. They’d never had rats or mice in the house before. Was it a bug?

Whatever it was, it sounded big. Lindsay was scared. She felt the urge to huddle underneath her blankets and hide until it went away. Instead, she gathered her courage and reached out to turn on the lamp beside her bed. Just as she touched it, the noise suddenly stopped. She flicked it on and jumped back into the center of her bed, clutching the sheets tightly around her as light spilled out into the room. There was nothing there. She peeked carefully over the sides of her bed, seeing only the rug and a few Girls’ Life magazines. Taking her heaviest pillow to use as a weapon, she got out of bed and padded slowly towards the door. Right as she reached it she froze. looking down. Peeking out from the crack beneath her round half-circle of a cheerio. Puzzled, she opened the door. Before her loomed a seven-foot wall of cheerios.

They covered the doorway completely as the entire hallway had been filled with them. And they were moving. They were alive and crawling over each other like a mass of legless insects, filling the air with the heavy smell of whole grain oats. Lindsay ran and jumped back onto her bed. She huddled and clutched the pillow over her head, and screamed. She was still screaming when her parents came in. Her mother soothed her, wanting to know what was the matter. The cheerios were gone. Lindsay told her that it was just a nightmare. She didn’t want them to think she was crazy. After a little while her parents left, her father muttering something about ‘night terrors’ as they walked back upstairs.

When they were gone, Lindsay stuffed her blanket under the crack of her door and sat up with the light on. She tried her best to stay awake all night, but after a few hours she finally fell asleep. When she awoke there were a handful of crumbs in her bed. For a few weeks afterward Lindsay was able to sleep on the floor in her sister Susan’s room, though she had to use all of her allowance as a bribe. Then her parents found out and made her go back to her own room. Lindsay’s dad got her a lock for the door, telling her it would help her to feel safe. It didn’t.

The very first night she was back in her room, she heard the rustling noise again. She’d kept the lamp on but this time the light didn’t seem to help. She huddled there, watching the door and hoping it would go away. Then the blanket moved. She’d stuffed it under the door again as tightly as she could, but now the corner of it was being pushed back into her room by something on the other side. Lindsay was pretty sure she knew that something was. The cheerios were coming for her. Just then the lamp went out and the room plunged into darkness. She stifled a scream, telling herself it was just a nightmare.

Cheerios couldn’t move or unplug lights. They didn’t come after people. Then something light and dry brushed against her cheek, and all rational thought left her mind as she was seized in the cold grip of terror. She opened her mouth to scream, gagging as it was immediately filled with tiny rings of cereal. She felt it moving all over her body. She bit and chewed and spit, trying to clear her mouth so she could call for help. But no matter how much of it she crunched up, more always took its place. The cheerios seemed to collect into narrow tendrils as they snaked over her body. She shuddered in shock and disbelief as she felt the buttons of her pajama top being pulled open one by one. Suddenly she was grabbed around the arms and ankles and lifted up above the bed, her face toward the ceiling.

Dry, searching fingers of cereal probed into the waistband of her pj bottoms and yanked them down just as her shirt was pulled up over her head. She was still too young to wear a bra, and she immediately felt the cheerios coil around her small, developing breasts and squeeze them roughly. Lindsay whimpered and kicked as her panties were stripped off. No, she thought, it couldn’t want that. *Please* let it not be that… Her legs were quickly restrained while another tendril slid up slowly along her inner thigh. thousands more gripped her buttocks, holding her up and kneading her firm athletic flesh as more began circling over her nipples. Lindsay gasped through her nose, her mouth still full of cheerios. It was weird and horrible, but the touching felt good at the same time.

Then she felt the tendril rubbing lightly over her exposed labia, and she thrashed about uselessly as it began nudging and probing at her most private spot. It caressed the lips of her young vulva almost tenderly for a few long minutes before she felt it nudge harder at the entrance to her vagina. Her body stiffened as she felt it pushing inside her. It felt rough, even though the surface had been moistened by her fearful sweat and the natural wetness within her. The cheerio tendril entered her slowly, relentlessly. It didn’t thrust in and out like she’d expected it to, instead it seemed to be pouring itself into her, filling her vagina with tiny cereal O’s.

She could feel them snapping and crunching inside her as she clenched down to try and keep them out. The tendrils on her body seemed to get stronger. groping at her breasts and ass and tugging hard at her nipples. She felt her pussy stretching as it was packed full of rapacious cheerios, the growing pressure sending mixed tingles of pain and pleasure rippling through her body. Then she felt the presence of yet another narrow tendril rubbing insistently against the tight pucker of her butthole. Lindsay came as it pushed inside her, her body shivering uncontrollably as she was reluctantly overcome by pulsing waves of ecstasy. At that moment there was a quiet knock on the door. Her mother’s voice called out, asking if she was okay. The cheerios quickly drew away, vanishing into the darkness just as abruptly as they’d arrived.

Lindsay could still feel some remnants in her vagina and ass as she got up weakly and pulled her pjs back on. Her mother looked concerned when Lindsay opened the door, but the explanation of another nightmare seemed to put her at ease. When she’d gone back up to bed, Lindsay went into the bathroom and sat on the toilet, feeling ashamed and violated as she let the last of the soggy cereal mush drip out of her body. She still hated cheerios. Now more than ever.