Maple's Story Part 8 (Patreon)

As evening rolled around, Maple was glad she'd managed to squeeze into the cockpit of The Kit. It had become clear she wasn't going to be able to reach the various consoles and control panels that piloted the ship manually, but she didn't care. The cockpit housed the most comfortable chair in the ship and for that reason alone she was happy she'd been able to haul herself into it, its gears whining and supports creaking as she rested her full, sweating, heavy body down, before she fell asleep.

Later, she woke to the familiar sight of stars sliding past the cockpit. During FTL space itself seemed to form a cylinder for her ship to fly through, she could see she was approaching the end. Her destination, a massive gas giant, sat squat in the middle of the space in front of her, green and brown like an ugly toad waiting for a fly. Scylla, named for some legend long forgotten, was a fat old gas giant on the Rim famed for its supply of rare and volatile gasses. It was where entrepreneurs went to die, the bloated ball of gas having sucked up more than one atmohab. Many were unable to withstand the frequent storms and incredible fluctuations in temperature, as well as the occasional belch of toxic rain, taking dreams of fortune with them as they fell into the gas giant. Yet for the larger corporations and the rare few habitats that managed to survive, it was a goldmine, the only source of half a dozen compounds and elements that were yet to be found anywhere else. This fact alone made it a popular destination for scientific communities and (although Maple had never heard anything beyond rumours) the darker hand of the hypercorps. People always said, you can hide anything among the whirls and eddies, buried in Scylla's gluttonous body.

Maple had made the journey this far out only a couple of times, the sight of the planet never failed to inspire awe in her. It was a huge reminder that not everything had been tagged, categorized, logged and sold. The universe was huge beyond mortal comprehension and known beings only inhabited a tiny fraction of it. Nobody knew what wonders were out there to be discovered.

Today however, there was no pleasant curiosity, no sense of the magnificent splendor of the cosmos. Only a burbling fear that bubbled up from deep within her morbidly obese gut and culminated in a cross between a belch and a hiccup. She knew that landing meant people seeing her, which brought on a certain number of complications.

First there would be the humiliation of her colossally bloated figure. Barely able to walk, she's the fattest being she's ever seen, certainly the fattest porter. On a refinery and scientific outpost like the ones on Scylla, most other beings would no doubt be slender, likely even modified to lift and repair heavy equipment or withstand the harsh conditions of the planet. She would be a ball of lard among living gods.

Then there would be the hit to her reputation. A few posts to the local relay about the living marshmallow vixen panting and heaving her way through the landing bay would eventually be picked up by the Porter's net, and someone was bound to trace it back to her. No doubt she would be messaged in the space of hours by concerned friends and amused rivals.

Finally, there was the very real and haunting possibility that she may be double crossed. what if the perverted badger doesn't send the codes to get her collar off? She'd have to check to make sure there were medical facilities that could deal with such a possibility and there was no guarantee it was treatable, either. As another belch wobbled up through her sloshing frame Maple realised that she probably wouldn't last another week in the ship at this point. If she didn't eat herself to starvation she'd certainly outgrow the already crowded rooms, so if there weren't medical stations that could deal with the collar planetside she was effectively screwed.

There was a lot riding on everything going smoothly.

"I see you're awake again." Syn's voice chimed, ringing softly in her mind.

"Yeah…" Maple's voice sounded foreign in comparison, muffled she realised, by inches of blubber around her neck and throat. She grunted at the effort of lifting one of her arms to wipe the sleep from her eyes, the mundane task now seeming like it took actual effort. She couldn't ignore the sensation of her arm flab wobbling like thick, jello-wings, nor could she ignore the stirring feeling between her legs that indicated how much she enjoyed it. The weight. The wobble. The way her entire body jiggled as her hand slapped down on her stomach.

A moment passed where the only sound to be heard was the slightly laboured strain of Maple's breathing and the whir of the engines as The Kit pushed its way through space towards Scylla. The balloon of a vixen wondered what her A.I was thinking, what did Syn make of the last few days, the transformation of her host from slender, athletic porter to barely mobile dough ball.

"The station sent us a ping a few hours ago," Syn finally piped up. "Doctor René Lalique will be meeting you on the landing pad to personally oversee the handover."

Maple sighed. There would be no getting around her humiliation after all, especially if Dr Lalique wanted the exchange done in person. There was nothing strange about the request, in fact it was custom for porters to do so when practical, but what it meant in her current condition was exertion and embarrassment. And then there was the prospect of dealing with René. The moment she picked up the contract she'd had Syn do a dig for information on the reclusive scientist and there was no shortage of disturbing stories to sift through. Hermit like tendencies, a family rich beyond compare and dubious views on morality all made it seem as though it were no wonder he and the Badger were in business together. According to the local relays, René was a few stops ahead of his fleet for once, staying on Scylla not doubt to conduct experiments that would be impractical at other locations due to the sheer volume of rare resources readily available in the planet's atmosphere. He was housed in one of the largest aerohabs on the planet, with a pig-like grunt, Maple knew she couldn't think of a more public place to have to stumble out of her ship.

The obese vixen was interrupted from her thoughts by the tapping of a platter against her massive flank. With a grunt she realised that her own blubber blocked her line of sight, and it took her grunting and pushing her gut down to see a scuttler holding up what appeared to be half of a roast pig. She knew it was fab'd, like everything she'd eaten but as the scent of succulent pig met her nostrils she remembered that she didn't care.

"I thought you would be hungry." Syn's voice piped up as, grunting, Maple struggled to haul the heavy tray of pig up onto her fatty folds. She grabbed a chunk of grease dripping meat off of it with her paws and cramming it into her mouth. This is criminal, Maple thought. Here she was trying to stave off being a walking blob of lard for her landing, and yet at the very sight of food she turned into pig herself. She couldn't ignore the rumbling of her stomach though, it seemed like the near fifty pounds of food she quickly worked through barely put a dent in her appetite. Her stomach pushed out perhaps only a foot as the tray clattered to the ground empty and a belch rattled from Maple's mouth.

"You should eat more." Syn's voice came back to her as another Scutler pushed itself up high enough to rest another platter atop her stomach, this one piled with even more lamb meat, covered in gravy and decorated with mountains of mashed potato.

Maple couldn't help herself. She knew she shouldn't, that it would only hurt her in the end, but the food was right there in front of her and she couldn't say no. She pushed her face into the mountains of potato and the chunks of meat, gulping and grunting, straining even to find room to breath as she pushed as much food into her mouth as she could, her cheeks bulging before every swallow. She no longer used her paws to grab food, instead using her arms to pull huge piles of meat and potato close enough that it splattered against her breasts and into her maw. By the time she was done slurping the last of her impromptu feast off of the metallic tray, her stomach had risen like the puffy marshmallow it was, almost completely obscuring the view of the cockpit behind it. Groaning once more, Maple strained herself and lifted her paws up to her face, cleaning them of gravy, meat and crumbs.

She felt the familiar nudge of a tray against her swollen flank and Syn's voice gently rang out in her mind with, "More."

"More?" Maple found herself murmuring, trying not to look at the food. She knew how much she enjoyed it, how much she enjoyed getting bigger, if she saw the delicious meal she knew she wouldn't be able to help but start eating again. "W-why more, surely you can feel that I'm full…" The feeling was there, buried among feelings of desire. Maple knew that her AI would be able to feel it, as closely integrated into her nervous system as it was.

There was a short pause, Syn must have been considering what to say. "Of course I can." Came her voice in Maple's mind after a moment. "I can feel that you're full with the same accuracy as I can feel how you yearn for more. I can trace your desires, your melting inhibitions, and I know that you want more. You want to taste. To gorge, to grow and strain your pelt until there's no more room in the cockpit, until you can barely walk or even better, until you can't walk at all."

Maple's cheeks flushed with the colour of ripe tomatoes - fitting since it looked as though she could easily stash a whole tomato in each. Her mouth hung open for a moment, a strand of drool collecting as she tried to work up the voice to tell the AI that it was wrong, that Maple didn't want to be a fat blob of a vixen, but there was no use lying to a program that had access to your thoughts almost before you did. Syn was right. There was some part of her, some deep voice, primal and heavy, that wanted this. It delighted in the idea of her showing off her massive weight. It revelled in the thought that she would grow, and continue to grow. It was the part of her that wanted to feast without end, to grow until she couldn't walk, could barely talk or see, until she was nothing but fat, and fur.

The vixen gently pushed her empty tray away, deliberately not looking at the new one as it gently nudged her doughy side.

Syn knew all this, before even Maple did. Is that why she always had so much food prepared? Her stomach churned loudly and a belch wobbled its way out her mouth, causing her to blush again.

"I… I can't…" Maple said as soon as she found her voice. The tray at her side disappeared, she heard the Scutlers withdrawing back into the ship.

"I understand." Came Syn's reply, was there a hint of disappointment in it, or was she going crazy? "You have to deliver the package in person and don't want to outgrow the landing ramp."

Maple blushed again at the thought, already all she could see was her stomach, it eclipsed the view in front of her making her feel fatter than she was - and that was no small accomplishment. "I don't… I don't want to get fat, Syn…" She struggled with the words, knowing the AI saw the lie in them.

"As you say, my little piglet. Breakfast will be at 8. Since you can no longer see the nav consoles, I suggest you nap until then."

Despite Syn's little tease, Maple couldn't help but feel like a nap was maybe the best course of action, even if she'd only just woken up. Dinner sat heavily in her gut and if she could just digest some of it, maybe she wouldn't look so bloated and obese. Maybe she'd be able to actually see out her cockpit. A Scutler arrived to drape a blanket over the swollen mound of her gut, which barely covered half of her. She sighed, slumped into her seat, and squeezed her eyes shut. Sleeping wasn't going to be easy with so much on her mind and so much in her stomach.

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