by Greta Jia-Kang Cabrel

Read this piece’s entry on the Shousetsu Bang*Bang wiki.

Tau Rho Pi was the oldest and oddest fraternity at Blaize’s college, with a marked tendency to induct mad scientists, lovable losers, and other iffy fellows instead of the corporate heirs, former class presidents, and ex-varsity athletes sought after by conventional brotherhoods. Indeed, casual observers often assumed that Tao Rho Pi was a professional rather than social fraternity, given how profoundly serious its members were about the production, preparation, and consumption of food and drink. They were quietly humorless about the keg parties, hot dog eating contests, and other rites of excess cherished elsewhere on campus—not actively judgmental, unlike, say, the public health honor society, but nonetheless dismissive of all exhortations to “be more fun.”

Blaize himself had been told to “lighten up” throughout his life, by classmates and cousins who called him a sissy for heeding his mother’s and teachers’ strictures about specific tools for specific tasks: fabric shears were not to be used on paper; raw meat was to be dealt with only on designated surfaces, which in Blaize’s household were wood cutting boards engraved with the names of cow and chicken breeds; certain soaps and detergents were best for the care of skin, clothes, and implements, and while Blaize would never sneer at someone resorting to one-formula-fits-most products for reasons of budget, space, or time, he was not a fan of guys who readily dropped hundreds of dollars on sports paraphernalia but rolled their eyes at women’s hoards of specially calibrated cleansers and cosmetics.

On good days, Blaize found “lighten up” a hilarious order, given his scrawny build and how terminally offended his uncles were by his inability to care about football. On bad days, he felt doomed to spend the rest of his life alone, because he was a weedy, fussy weirdo, and what self-respecting non-sociopath would willingly hitch their star to that?

By the end of his first year at college, Blaize felt less doomed, at least in terms of companionship. (His GPA was a different story: he was sailing with ease through O-Chem and linear algebra—courses that annually persuaded a dozen freshmen to change majors—but struggling mightily with Shakespeare I, despite its reputation as an easy A, and butting heads twice a week with the social science instructor who regularly made sweeping declarations about how “we all” should feel and think about class, gender, and power.) The one-night stands and flings he’d indulged in had all been agreeably no-strings and low-stakes, albeit not all low-key: things had gotten embarrassingly loud with a dark-haired psych major who’d gleefully edged him for hours, and the threesome with a butch softball captain and her bespectacled sidekick had been so intense that, for weeks afterward, seeing foil-wrapped chocolate-mint candies in checkout lanes and waiting rooms had him blushing violently. An exquisite rendition of Beethoven’s Sonata No. 30 had him falling to his knees with alacrity for the austere blond pianist who’d performed it, and making out with a philosophy major under a large blue blanket had been heavenly: Blaize had little patience or aptitude for critical theory and spiritual speculation, but the guy gave excellent head when he wasn’t sermonizing, and the soft, well-worn fabric felt amazing against his skin.

What also felt amazing was how safe all his trysts had been—not a single one had been a prank or pity fuck, unlike his misadventures in high school. Blaize had not planned on participating in rush to begin with, let alone pledging his time and fealty to whatever clique of gross, judgy boys deigned to deem him worthy of sanctioned bullying—but at a student orientation picnic, the Tau Rho Pi brothers had served taro boba and raspberry hand pies to those daring or knowledgeable enough to taste their wares, and at a study break the following week, Blaize’s RA had served the most delicious tisane Blaize had ever sipped.

Upon asking about its ingredients, Blaize had been invited to a tea-blending party at Tau Rho Pi’s manse a few days hence, and then to subsequent sessions of pea-shelling, oyster-shucking, garlic-braiding, and mochi-pounding. By the time he signed the chapter register, he was well versed in the lore about Tau Rho Pi members: that they were a cult of Satanic squash-fuckers who forced initiates to literally eat dirt and carve sigils on one another with paring knives. That a man fool enough to join their ranks was destined to either live forever or perish mysteriously, given how Tau Rho Pi alumni always seemed to die or disappear at the height of highly accomplished careers as restauranteurs, sommeliers, food stylists, horticulturists, and the like, with never a body visible at inquests, visitations, or memorial services. That there were supernatural forces both mentoring and protecting the men tapped for the fraternity, and nothing on earth would save you if a Tau Rho Pi brother caught you doctoring a drink or claiming a dish like eggplant rolls was nut-free when the filling was primarily walnut paste.

The rumors of hazing were false, although Blaize could see how the chapter’s expectations would seem punitive to men accustomed to regarding kitchen and garden chores as feminine, or menial, and that there would be sour allegations on the grapevine as well by culinary lordlings not admitted to Tau Rho Pi despite their pedigrees and precollegiate prizes. Blaize himself had wanted to throw knives and tantrums at least once a month—at, for instance, his inability to make lemon curd without strands of egg white mucking up the golden spread; at the salted caramel glaze that hardened into a slab impervious even to mallets; at the meringue swans that resembled melted clocks rather than fairy-tale birds during his first six tries at executing the recipe.

But he’d persevered, without being an asshole about it, because that was expected of him too, and on the seventh day with the swans, a pâtissier who had reportedly drowned forty years ago walked into the kitchen and then walked Blaize through all the adjustments needed to shape and set the meringues. Chef Peizhi periodically stopped by afterward, gently proffering advice even when Blaize’s brain wasn’t on the verge of melting down from trying to “get” Hamlet (neither the ghost nor the hero of the play made any damn sense to him) or char grapes properly.

So, yes, belonging to Tau Rho Pi did mean encountering laws of mortality beyond human ken, and standards of morality, too: its leaders held the adage about great power being inseparable from great responsibility as close to their hearts as the wondrous pairings of wine and cheese and fruit and spice they were privileged to consume, and that meant exercising vigilance over what Tau Rho Pi members put in their bodies—not in terms of calories or “guilty pleasures,” which no true Tau Rho Pi had any interest in policing, but in permission to be sticklers about safety, no matter how obnoxious or officious others found their queries. Tau Rho Pi members were notorious for refusing cocktails and other concoctions with secret ingredients, and there were cautionary tales galore about cocky Sigma Alpha Epsilon bros (it was always a jackass from ΣΑΕ or PIKE) meeting unattributably grisly ends after thinking they could get away with a little roofie here or kratom powder there in the presence of men from Tau Rho Pi.

By the start of his sophomore year, Blaize had become privy to another reason Tau Rho Pi was home and haven to champions of consent: to be granted agelessness, immortality, and preternatural powers with knives and fire required acts of surrender and submission performed with full awareness of the transaction. In addition to the currency of kitchen labor, such as toiling over croquembouche towers, kabocha buns, kouignoù amann, and enough croissants to pave College Street ten times over, Tau Rho Pi members paid their dues toward senior membership by tending to larders and cellars, helping with harvesting and preserving the bounty of orchard, field and forest. They were continually observed and sometimes joined by existing Great Pumpkins—the brothers and alumni who possessed the magical powers to terrorize pretenders and inflict vengeance on grifters across generations.

Not everyone could bear such scrutiny, or the responsibilities that mandated it, and fellows choosing to leave the fraternity invariably accepted a final glass of ale that veiled their memories with a happier story than their failure to stay the course. Blaize, however, thrived amid the making of dried apple garlands and pressing of cider and Peizhi’s unvarnished instruction on everything from preparing choux to preparing himself to become a Great Pumpkin.

It was a dark and stormy night when Peizhi bestowed on Blaize a grave, pleased smile and said, “You are ready if you feel you are.” They and eleven other members of Tau Rho Pi were comfortably ensconced in the parlor of the fraternity manse, with a roaring fire and everyone glowing with satisfaction after the sumptuous twelve-course feast they’d assembled for themselves. Blaize’s contribution had been to carve up a quartet of striped pumpkins, slicing up the flesh for soup and de-sliming the seeds for roasting, and rolled and braided thin ropes of dough into delicate lorighitta pasta rings until his hands ached.

“I did not know that this was a final exam,” Blaize said, gripping the arms of his chair.

“It’s not,” Peizhi said, his voice gentle as his brushwork when painting chiffon cakes. “None of us will take you further until you are sure. I have told you all along that there is no going back, past this step.”

“I am sure,” Blaize said, unclenching his right hand. “It’s just a lot, even though I’ve wanted it since I found out it was real.”

Yinka, the RA who’d served Blaize the splendid spice tea at the start of his journey, grinned at Blaize’s admission. “It is a lot. We wouldn’t consider you right for this if we didn’t think you understood how huge it is.”

With a shaky laugh, Blaize folded both hands into his lap. “I understand. Peizhi made sure I understood what’s about to happen.” He looked at his mentor and softly said, “Thank you.”

Peizhi nodded and stepped up to the fire, placing two more planks on it. Blaize admired the surge of rising sparks for a silent minute before taking a deep breath, standing up, and letting his gaze travel to every face in the room, locking eyes with each man in turn before speaking the words Peizhi had taught him: “I am of sound mind and sound body, and I welcome with both the beauty you are to grant to me, ever ancient and ever new.”

“We welcome you,” twelve voices responded, and then Blaize was engulfed in the most alive embrace he’d ever been in the center of. He’d been sandwiched between bodies before—at concerts, in subway cars, that threesome with the shortstop and the bookworm—and he’d unfortunately wasn’t a stranger to mob action, either, thanks to pantsing attacks during junior high PE, but being caressed and kissed and stripped by the cluster of Great Pumpkins felt like falling into a heap of warm, favorite blankets.

They weren’t all on him all at once, of course—there wasn’t enough of him for that, and there were deep, dark rituals embedded within the sheer pleasure of shared gratification. Any last traces of fear Blaize had harbored about being the butt of an elaborate joke—yes, he trusted Peizhi and the other brothers, but—that all vanished when the first strong tongue swirled around his hole and then plunged in.

He instantly knew it was Jacques who was rimming him—not because Jacques had ever licked him before, or made any other prior contact with mouth or fingers, but because with each sweep and thrust of tongue, Blaize felt himself caramelizing into something half-flesh, half-soul: he still had a body, and that body was happily melting into the pleasures being meted to it by Jacques and the three other men kneading, stroking, and pinning him down while Jacques ate him out, but he could feel his essential self somehow becoming as sweet and salty as the bacon-wrapped dates Jacques was known for serving at balls and galas.

His own come tasted like devils on horseback when Yinka fed it to him, right before fucking his mouth until his veins sang as bright as the tea they’d blended, and he was unsurprised when the next man—Mathias, a specialist in vegetable soufflés—dribbled tea-infused semen between his lips before rolling his knees up to his ears and taking him, with Nicolas the vintner pressing into the same hole a dozen strokes later. Blaize felt tears leaking from his eyes as they smoothly slid against each other inside him, and tongues on both sides of his face lapping up those tears.

As Blaize moaned, overwhelmed by everything happening to him, one of the tear-drinkers paused and rested a cool hand on his forehead. “Not in pain, no?” 

“Not pain,” Blaize said. “Don’t stop.”

“We won’t.” He sensed rather than saw the tear-drinker—Luc—smiling as the cool hand brushed his damp hair away from his face. “Every ounce of you is so delicious.”

He could feel another man replacing Luc at his face as Luc moved down to Blaize’s cock, cupped hands catching the deliciousness erupting from Mathias and Nicolas’s joint effort. Blaize tasted asparagus, thyme, and champagne in the liquid Luc dripped onto his tongue. 

“Notes?” Yinka asked.

“Peach, pear, and toasted brioche,” Blaize said. “Maybe some ginger and peppercorns, too.”

“Very good,” Luc said, having licked his own palm to check the flavors himself. “Nic, some of us should rehydrate.”

“You’re as subtle as your roasts, which is to say, not at all,” Nic grumbled, but even in his dazed, exceedingly stimulated state, Blaize could tell that it was a longstanding bit between the two, borne out a few minutes later as Nic handed around flutes of the same champagne to everyone in the room. Blaize was helped up into a sitting position, with Yinka behind him as a stable seat-back, and Luc holding the flute between Blaize’s small, careful sips from it.

Blaize felt glorious. He felt filthy. He felt like he’d pulled a sixteen-hour shift in the kitchen, with triumph and exhaustion pervading all his senses. He felt bullet- and knife-proof, the protective shell of Great Pumpkinhood around his mortality becoming ever thicker with every Tau Rho Pi spilling in and onto him, every challenge they’d conquered settling into his skin and bones and soul the way heat turned raw dough and flesh into fuel and feast.

After the break, living up to Nic’s potshot, Luc was all muscle and brazen domination as he pounded into Blaize, his earlier gentleness nowhere in sight as he mercilessly drove Blaize right over the edge, and then hauled him up and fucked him even harder until Blaize was incoherent with the Luc-ness of it all—Luc sinking his teeth into Blaize’s shoulder, Luc’s hands clamping his hips hard enough to leave bruises, Luc’s cock hammering him until he felt he would crack open from all the power claiming him. He sagged forward as he came, spurting into the mouth of Owen, crouched in front of him in happy anticipation, and Luc tipped him back and cradled him as Owen released the catch into his mouth, this time with the flavors of pomegranate-glazed lamb.

Luc continued holding Blaize as Owen massaged his throat and cheeks and jaw both on the outside and inside until it was clear that every drop had been swallowed, and then Luc stuffed his fingers into Blaize’s mouth while Owen closed his lips around Blaize’s cock. Blaize moaned around Luc’s fingers in near-delirium as Owen sucked another orgasm out of him, this time carrying the flavors of rabbit and turnips back to Blaize’s tongue.

The next man was gentler still, content with cleaning out Blaize with feather-light stroking and licking, though Blaize felt every touch like hard rain striking sunburned skin, and the come brushed against his lips bewilderingly tasted like the most aggressive blancmange ever boiled. He was followed by a burly fellow who fisted him with eerie ease and rested fingers coated with hot honey on his tongue until Blaize revived enough to choke on the burn, prompting Nic to return to his side with a flagon of water. 

It was a feast that had gone on almost too long, Blaize half-hysterically thought, where one didn’t stop eating even after one was full, for fear of missing out on some rare delicacy or preparation. The eleventh man had a knowing, sympathetic gleam in his eye as he pushed into Blaize, pinching his nipples with “stay with me” urgency rather than intent to arouse. The spoonful of semen he wrung out of Blaize tasted like morels, and Blaize was not too far gone to marvel at every astonishing molecule fed to him over the course of the night. 

As Peizhi—last but not least—drew Blaize into his arms, Blaize again mouthed “Thank you” against Peizhi’s chest. 

“You chose this,” Peizhi said, not without pride.

“You chose me,” Blaize said. “And you taught me the proportions to expect.”

“Not everyone I teach manages to absorb what I can give them,” Peizhi said.

Blaize inhaled deeply—a great gulp of air. “I’ve proved that I can. That I do. Haven’t I?”

“Yes. Yes indeed,” Peizhi said, and wrapped his hand around them both.

Read this piece’s entry on the Shousetsu Bang*Bang wiki.