I walked out of my room, well rested after a good night sleep, and headed for the kitchen to start my breakfast.  Turning the corner from the hallway to the kitchen, I ran headfirst into a giant wall of unyielding flesh.  I landed on my ass, thankfully on the soft carpet of the hallway. I looked up and saw the tired, sheepish looking face of my roommate Erik.

“Oh no, sorry about that Justin! I wasn’t paying attention,” Erik said despite the incident actually being my fault. Erik was like that. He might have looked like a giant Viking at his age of 25, 6’5, thick reddish-brown beard, and heavyset.  But on the inside, he was just a big old teddy bear. Maybe a bit of a pushover, but harmless overall.

“It’s my fault bro, I wasn’t watching out. Besides, I’m way shorter than you and you can’t possibly keep looking down all the time,” I said as I stood up to my full height of 5’4.  I was the polar opposite of Erik. I was relatively petite to his wide, thick body. While he was gentle and sweet, I tended to be hotheaded and assertive. Call it a mild case of Napoleon complex.

“Still though, I was practically falling asleep while going back to my room,” Erik said while looking down at the ground, almost deferentially to me.

I ignored it as I walked past him towards the kitchen and started to pour some coffee.

“Still not sleeping, big guy?” I asked as Erik leaned back against the wall. He had dark circles around his eyes and did not look as alert as he had before Covid-19.

The quarantine has had an effect on all of us, but it seemed to hit Erik especially hard. He was definitely an extravert. Since everyone had to isolate due to the pandemic, Erik hasn’t had the ability to see his friends or even fly out to his family. So, it wasn’t surprising that the frustration of the entire event was causing insomnia.

“Third night in a row. I’m going to see the doctor today. Maybe I can get something that’ll let me sleep?” Erik said with a sigh. I shrugged as I sipped my coffee.

“It’s worth a try, what’s the worst that could happen?” I asked.

*

I sat in the living room, binge watching the new season of my favorite show. It was practically the middle of the night but I didn’t really care. With the pandemic, my graduate school classes has been moved online so there was no longer any schedule to keep except to turn in the assignment on the due date. I essentially ended up staying up at all hours of the night.

I was completely absorbed by the show so I was startled when I heard a bang behind me. I quickly turned around and saw that Erik had knocked over a lamp and was now standing in the middle of the hallway behind me.

“Shit, you scared me bud,” I said as I stood up and stretched. Erik said nothing, he just stood there.

“You okay bud?” I asked as I walked over to Erik, unsure why he was just standing there. Once I got close, I realized his eyes were barely open. He must have been sleepwalking!

“You asleep bud?” I asked. Erik grunted a deep grunt, which surprised me. He sounded almost…wild when he did it, reinforcing the Viking imagery I had in my head.

Erik just stood there, unmoving. I considered waking Erik up when he turned away from me and began to slowly walk towards the front door.

Shit. I definitely don’t want him leaving the house.

I ran ahead of Erik, and stood in front of him.

“Stop! Bro, I can’t let you leave the house, it’s too dangerous” I said. Surprisingly, Erik stopped and stood right in front of me. I smiled that Erik let me stop him before he went out and got into a situation.

Suddenly, Erik pulled his right arm back and pushed me so forcefully that I fell onto the ground, on my back.

I looked up in shock at the sudden and violent act committed by my teddy bear of a roommate. But at the moment, from this point of view, he looked so much like a fucking Viking raider that I was struck with a sharp feeling of fear. Erik went to sleep shirtless and in his underwear, so he stood over me with that massive hairy chest and giant bulging manhood that made me question my own.

“Fucking bug,” Erik mumbled before he raised his massive foot. Before I could react in a meaningful way, the size 15 foot came down hard on my stomach. It knocked the wind out of me, struggling underneath the unyielding muscle and flesh of his foot and leg.

Erik didn’t move as he literally stood with one foot on me. I tried my hardest to move as his masculine foot just stood on my stomach. Erik didn’t care, he was just using me as his floor. I began pawing at his foot, trying to move it but it was like there was steel beam right on top of me. How the fuck did Erik get such a muscular leg?!

“Erik! Stop! You’re hurting me!” I yelled at the man. Erik didn’t react, he just stared off into the distance, in his strange sleepwalking mode.

He stood there for minutes, making me endure half his body weight.

Then, Erik moved again, this time moving his other leg so that his foot hovered over my face.  For some reason, he hadn’t stepped down, he just held his leg in the middle of the step. It was as if he was tormenting me, making sure I saw all the detail of his huge Size 15 foot. It was quite the sight, he was absolutely massive. I knew his feet were long and wide but it was quite another thing to see it from this angle. The sole of his foot was smooth and tough looking, probably from the rugby that Erik occasionally played with his friends at the park.  Though, I wasn’t usually a fan of feet, something about the way Erik was utterly dominating me was causing me to see him in a different light.

Then the foot came down hard, on my head. No warning. I was able to turn my head slightly and I felt the unyielding foot push my head hard into the carpet.

“Holy shit!” I yelled out at the pain of a 300lb Viking stepping on me.

“Yes, admiral. I can march.” Erik mumbled as he kept dreaming, unaware of the pain he was causing me.  My eyes widened as the implication of Erik marching.

“Erik! Wake up! If you march on me, you’ll kill me!” I yelled, banging on his legs. Erik didn’t react at all. It was as if I was banging on the wall, for all the good it did for me.

Then he began marching.

He raised his foot that was on my head and stepped back down hard. An involuntary whine of pain came out of me.

Then the one on my stomach came up and back down, causing me to cry out.

He did again and again.

I saw and felt his feet come down over and over as he marched on me. I knew exactly how a bug felt when my Viking of a roommate crushed it. I was utterly being crushed and no matter how much I yelled, Erik never responded.

I don’t know much time passed but I felt like I was almost ready to pass out. Then it stopped. Erik just stood on me for a second before moving off of me. First his foot that was on my stomach moved, leaving his massive weight on my head for a long second before he pushed off my head and walked off of me.

Erik walked away. I didn’t care where as long as he didn’t come back.

I just laid there for a while, recovering from my ordeal as Erik’s floor.

Eventually, I tried to get up but I failed from the pain that was inflicted all over my body. In the end after trying many times,  I ended up slowly crawling down the hallway back to my room.

But before I could turn into it. I saw that Erik was standing right in front of the doorway.

I looked up at Erik and stared at the bearded man in awe. He was no longer a teddy bear to me. This man was something else. He was clearly a descendant of Vikings and now he had taken up the mantel in my eyes. This man, if he wanted to, could ravage the countryside. He was so powerful and masculine, that I could barely tolerate the feelings of inferiority that I was feeling.

I don’t know what came over, I crawled over to Erik and began kissing his feet.

“You are clearly superior to me sir. It was an honor to be crushed under you,” I said, between kisses. Erik wordlessly turned from me and walked away from my room.

*

I groaned as I got out of bed, bruised and beaten. I barely slept from the constant soreness and pain that was racked my body.

I was able to stand up but I ended up limping to kitchen. It would take weeks to recover from Erik.

“Good morning!” Erik said cheerfully from the kitchen table. He was eating a massive breakfast and was looking well rested.

I mumbled in greeting as I slowly poured myself a cup of coffee.

“I’m so glad I took those pills. I slept like a baby last night,” Erik said. I walked over to the table and slid into a chair. Erik looked up from his food and frowned slightly.

“Damm, you need some sleep man. Those dark circles around your eyes look almost like black eyes,” Erik said before turning back to his food.

I considered telling him about what he did to me, but something held me back. Instead I said something that surprised me.

“Do you plan on taking the pills again tonight?” I asked.

“Definitely. I feel fucking amazing from all the sleep I got. Though, the pills gave me some weird dreams. I had a dream that I crushed a bug that looked like you and that I was ordered my admiral to march on the bug,” Erik said with a dismissive chuckle.

“Wow really, that does sound strange,” I said, knowing what had happened in real life.

“It certainly was. I can’t imagine what kind of weird dreams I’ll have tonight,”

“I can probably imagine,” I said as I looked over at my Viking roommate’s godly Size 15 feet.