Seeking Sherwood (Interlude 2 - Veronica) (Patreon)

Chained to another's gluttony for another's sins, Veronica is anything but complacent with what's happened to her. Try as she might, avoiding Garth's fate and what awaits her is a more complicated challenge than she thought. 

Written by the wonderful Rabidbadger writing, illustrated by me!  

Characters/Owners:

Garth - Nackvixen 

Veronicas - Veronacus 

Temperance - Paris  

- - -   

  Veronica tugged shut the shutters to one of the cargo bays. A task that took her a couple of tries, the mechanisms were archaic and in need of maintenance, which she was considering making her next task. Cleaning the ship was only going to last her so long as a means of keeping busy and getting some exercise, and she was running out of ship to clean. That, and there were bots doing half the work that she couldn’t shut down or avoid. Little disc shaped things with two arms apiece dusting, scrubbing, mopping, sweeping, polishing, getting to places she couldn’t just climb or jump to.

Of course, that distance was diminishing as it was. Veronica’s ability to climb and jump was hindered by a subtle layer of pudge that had crept across her body, and a not so subtle pot belly she was growing into alongside the matter. Evidence that the Vice Regent’s devices worked, at least. Every few minutes it seemed she felt another fluttering in her body and another heavy weight enter her middle. No amount of exercise was going to cover it, and she was hamstrung besides – her body’s natural inclination to exert itself and burn fat was sabotaged already by her augmentation package. 

Her ass was hard wired to get fat, like it or not. Which did not mean she was giving up, but the ship left Veronica with sorely limited options, and no freedom to call her brother until they got to port. Something about avoiding commercial shipping lanes. Which meant they hadn’t stopped in a week and were just eating the stockpiles that had been brought on board, which seemed to be universally horrible if one wanted to avoid packing on flab. Which, clearly, the Vice Regent didn’t care about. Cakes, cheesecakes, ice cream, vats of uncooked pasta, sauces, cheeses, rich meats, rare eggs – a conspicuous absence of fruit or vegetables that weren’t either preserved in sugar-dense sauce or insanely salty. All of which had left Veronica facing down a new problem.

Going a week without eating, even if your body is being fed, is hard. Even if she didn’t want the calories it wasn’t exactly an easy habit to break, given that it was necessary for life as the animal parts of her brain kept screaming at her. Only if she ate anything around here it would exacerbate her already growing gut, which she was now grabbing at in spite as she watched another pair of cleaner droids float by to get ahead of her on the workload. The frustration was agonizing, leaving Veronica briefly flirting with insane notions – escape – assault – all things that she knew were pointless, hopeless, and would only make matters worse. 

Exhaling, Veronica brought her hands up to her face and rubbed at it a bit. She couldn’t even trust the nutrient paste on the ship, she was fairly sure. It tasted funny, and she could swear she immediately got hungrier after having some.

“I’d kill for there to just be some normal fruit around or something…”

That had been part of Veronica’s motivation as well, people didn’t look at the help after all. If she could pass herself off that way she could nose around the ship and look for what she needed without being bothered about it, except that as of yet she hadn’t found any such thing. Just sweets and savory treats, everywhere. Which she kept getting encouraging messages from the Vice Regent about.

VR-A: Your counterpart is really taking to his new position well, you know. You could learn a thing or two from that boy about living right. And about taste in pastries.

It took everything Veronica had not to spit back something that would get her in trouble. That, too, had been a trial. The Vice Regent was flippant and blunt about them being doomed to become what she should have been by now. The bird’s appetite was obscene, and it infuriated Veronica to no end that money and influence bought her this consequence-free life whereas it had stolen all the agency out of hers so recently.

Standing quickly, then immediately regretting it as she felt her balance fail her, Veronica stumbled ahead with one hand on the wall for balance. She could still feel her wings hidden under that outfit she was forced into, the skintight thing that shunted them into some other space entirely, left her looking a bit more mundane. The problem was they weren’t really ‘here’ enough to help her balance anymore, and that gut that was cresting over the edge of her waist was all too real. Worse yet, she couldn’t even walk without her thighs rubbing together if she didn’t intentionally keep them apart. 

Veronica could neither fight this off, nor ignore what it was doing to her, and the indulgence she wanted most wasn’t available. All she could do was watch things unfold around her, and in her. Including, apparently, watching her fellow Lard-Slave waddle his already terrifyingly fattened ass toward the helm with the pilot dragging him along like an obedient pet. 

They came and went, and the ship went back to its relative quiet. Not entirely quiet, no ship ever was, she heard fluid transfer systems at work and the bots buzzing around, somewhere nearby the Vice Regent’s messy gluttonous indiscretions were at work too if her belly’s sudden gurgling and then fluttering tightness were any indication. All this cramped space and everyone had what they wanted, except her, and maybe the Vice Regent’s assistant, but she didn’t understand that one yet.

Stopping short, Veronica growled a little as she nearly fell again. Her gut wanted to keep going forward, and her leg got caught on her other leg in her first movement to counterbalance, but the idea that had crossed her mind couldn’t be ignored.

This ship had rooms she hadn’t checked yet. The assistant’s one, the Vice Regent’s quarters, even the captain’s ones. Veronica had no real desire to intrude upon her owner at this point, but the other two? It wasn’t out of the question that the captain might have some things stowed away just for herself, and the assistant… 

Whoever the perpetually nervous looking bat was, she might just have keys for these collars. Might need someone to talk to. Might be persuadable, or just prone to misplacing tools or keys. Maybe, Veronica thought, there was a chance to do something after all. If she got the collar off, and then-

“…And then get my nervous system remotely shut down until they collect me. Unless I can find a nanotech chop shop. Which, I mean, considering… but that needs money, and that-”

Squinting a bit, Veronica glanced behind her. That meant the Vice Regent. Nobody here had credits or goods for trade that would be in the amounts needed except maybe that ebon feathered villain. 

To get into that room and root around Veronica suspected she’d need to play her owner’s game, at least a little. That, she thought soberly as she reached down and squished her belly, watching her fingers half vanish in the soft mass of it, would cost her.

But if she played her cards right? It would cost the Vice Regent more.