Symbiosis

1 is sitting in the living room playing video games. 2 enters

2. What's going on?
1.Not much, trying to level up.
2.What's that.
1.What's what?
2.That thing on your stomach.
1. Oh that, that's my symbiote.
He lifts up his shirt to reveal a grey blobbish creature, about the size of a baby attached to his stomach, making occasional sucking noises.
2. Dude, that's a parasite, not a symbiote.
1. No way! We depend on each other.
2. What are you getting from this relationship?
1. Ummmm, enhanced reflexes. Just the other day I was getting a soda from the fridge and a bunch of other ones fell out, but I caught them all before they hit the ground.
2. That's pretty impressive, but you've always had good reflexed, I don't think you can blame it on the parasite.
1. I told you, it's a symbiote.
2. C'mon, it's sucking your blood.
1. Not all symbiotic relationships are mutually beneficial.
2. But this relationship isn't commensalistic, he's drinking your blood, you look like you're wasting away.
1. But this thing's a part of me now. For better or worse. Without it I would feel empty, and were I in a room with my greatest friends and my beloved family, I would feel a terrible, heartrending loneliness.

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This post is an installment in a continuing series of content coordinated by theme or motif with posts from Enoch Allred of Chiltingham, John Allred of clol Town, Jon Fairbanks of Funkadelic Freestylings of Another Sort, Eli Z. McCormick and Miriam Allred of Modern Revelation!, John D. Moore of Whatnot Studios, Davey Morrison, Joseph Schlegel of Sour Mayonnaise, Sven Patrick Svensson of Sadness? Euphoria?, and William C. Stewart of Chide, Chode, Chidden. This week's theme: Symbiosis'.