Floretta lay back in her comfy writing seat, running her hands again through her black curls. Her keyboard lay at her twitching, dark fingers, with a blank document onscreen - "Essay.odt". She'd done everything possible to procrastinate writing this: cleaning her apartment to a spotless condition; scrolling through a dozen news articles; showering and dressing herself in a white button-up shirt and red skirt, even though she was staying at home today.

Nowhere to be but here, facing her writer's block head-on. With agile keystrokes, she began typing an intro: "Why I Am Still A Vegetarian".

"With the advent of planetary snacks, it's more convenient than ever to eat meat. Stores and restaurants are lined with the civilizations, at a low cost. Is a vegetarian lifestyle still relevant in our new ecosystem?"

The writer looked over her words, and with a gulp, quickly erased "lifestyle". In its place, she wrote "vegetarian diet". With a nod, she continued typing.

"I don't want to preach, or convert anyone. But here are the personal reasons I've still kept up a diet without meat products."

Upon typing that, Floretta's mind went blank again, sweat forming on her thin, black brow. Cursed writer's block! When she was just stating facts, or showing the results of research, everything fit in place; she could piece together a simple article with no problem. She was able to distance herself from the equation. But when it came to something that touched her so closely, something that was subjective, this document was laying herself bare. It was exposing. The white space mocked her. The novelty clock above her ticked loudly. Why had she promised Elena she'd write this post? What if people thought she was self-righteous? What if her arguments had all been said before? What if history and science would laugh at those who refused to swallow millions of living people?

What if... her feelings were wrong?

*Groooan...*

Food. Eating something, Floretta decided, would help her focus. From a cabinet, she took out a snack bag from the supermarket, crinkling its corners. Her gentle fingers plucked out a tiny planet, which she brushed in her fingerprints. This one had cold, rocky regions coating its surface. With a long "aaah," she brought the orb to her wet lips, and plopped it in. Her tongue explored its intricate mountains and valleys, lathering its dust surface in an even mass of liquid. With a slow gulp, she swallowed the gobstopper-like planetoid, letting the celestial body fall into her own body.

Floretta pulled the next planetary snack out, freshly inspired to begin writing again. "First of all, populated planets may have undiscovered ecosystems and innovations. We're consuming what we could be researching." The writer plopped the miniature red world into her mouth, rolling out around her tongue.

And millions of rocky, hard-skinned humanoids screamed, seeing the monstrous taste buds approach them - lapping up the great structures that they'd known all their lives. This distant wonder's fingers, each longer in diameter than their entire homeworld of Kruzon, had already obliterated the North and South poles, remnants of the icy surfaces embedded in the whorls of her index and thumb. Massive rumbling noises sounded out merely from her cautious breaths and rising heartbeat - nervous about her deadline. A priest screamed up to the uncaring woman's spectacles, reflecting their proud landscapes: "Mercy! Please, why are you doing this? We've never harmed your kind!" Dozens prayed with him, hoping to reach her. The entire altar simply stuck to her taste buds. Those inside held to the pillars hopelessly, the ancient structure stripped from the earth with the rest of their city - like salty dusting licked off a chip.

But why was she eating them, if she said she was a vegetarian?

Food companies still had imperfections in their processing. To determine if a planet had life - whether it was "meat" or "vegetable" - they measured traces of methane and pollutants in the atmospheres. It never occurred to anyone that some tiny beings could live on other energy sources, and exhale other chemicals - like the inhabitants of Kruzon, who had achieved a limitless source of energy from crystals at their world's core. Unfortunately, the secrets of their utopian lifestyle and mindsets would be forever lost in a nervous writer's snacktime.

Floretta's tongue lazily grazed the spherical surface. She hummed happily, rattling the mouth-borne planet to its very core - practically splitting their nations with tremors and rocky avalanches. With a few more curious rolls over its bumpy texture, and a few more strokes of her keys, she swallowed it down in a whole gulp - letting it tickle her throat.

"No!"

"Why, why?"

The populace shouted in a thousand languages, as pink, pulsating throat muscles replaced their skies. Each subconscious movement tore their rocky landmasses apart; entire cities with eras of history ground against the wet, sticky surfaces. Humid gasses from her innards filled their atmosphere - smelling vaguely like broccoli and nuts. And in a terrifying freefall, millions of buildings flew off Kruzon, all of them scattering amid the growling, bubbling stomach acid. A massive splash spelled their doom - their "uninhabited" world sunk deep into the vegetarian's stagnant bowels.

*splash.*