A Load of Light (Patreon)

Set in The Rendering Pit, Rabidbadger takes us on a journey with a student who discovers something mysterious in the inky depths of space. The staff respond quick, but light is faster! 

Written by Rabidbadger, Illustration by myself

Contains weight gain, some mind/body control, hive mind implications and loads of expanding butts! 

- - - 

“Hey Nord, try not to stay up literally all night staring at the stars yeah? We have a group presentation tomorrow and we need you for it.”

Looking up from the telescope, the black and white bunny's ears twitched once as he started blushing.

“That was one time! I won't stay up all night again, promise. I just want to finish tracking this rogue light pattern so I can find it again later, when I have more time. I promise, Bea.”

Obviously skeptical, the blue and gold frog that shared Nord's dorm room with him raised an eyebrow and shook his head.

“..Alright, if you say so. I'm going to bed and shutting my bunk capsule so you're going to have to message me and hope I'm feeling charitable if you want me to answer.”

A brief eye roll followed that, Nord knew how his roommate got. Simultaneously aggressively colorful and eye-catching while also being spiky at times, prone to inviting commentary about bright frogs being toxic. It was a sharp contrast to Nord being all black and white, and not the only contrast between the two.

The bunny lifted his set of optics on loan from the university and set them near the dorm room's window while his room mate shut himself off from the world. There was something kind of nostalgic about the heavy, intricate looking device. The Rendering Pit's astronomy program used a combination of advanced materials and computation but it wove that function around the classical form of lenses and mirrors. Also maybe a small portal or two. The net effect was something that would've taken an observatory back in the day but could fit in a window now.

“Alright... double check the mounting, and the charts, and the time... That cluster of stars has been moving way too fast. I've got it though... this time I'll get video proof and then maybe I'll have my Thesis figured out.”
The bunny adjusted his instruments, double checked the measurements and the energy levels for saturating the crystal lattices the lenses were made of, then put their eye to the magnification device. It was a bit too complex to just call it a telescope anymore, even if it technically served the same purpose.

“Gotta find it.. shouldn't be hard. Only thing moving in that entire sector of space. Suppose it isn't even technically there anymore, not really. The light's traveled a ridiculous amount of distance before getting here so I'm stuck watching re-runs of this phenomenon. And I'm still shaking.”

Nord found their quarry without too much trouble. A cluster of stars, five or six of them, that moved around the patch of sky he was watching. Not a sluggish pace either, nor a straight path. No, these things danced. The excitement was over the clarity of the view. For days now Nord had been following their path, catching glimpses while trying to tune the optics to the right sensitivity to see the stars properly, but the wavelengths were strange and hard to pin down. At least, they had been. Tonight? Nord was elated to see he'd nailed them. No longer was he staring at translucent wisps evading him and teasing, they were bright. Brilliant, even.

“They look like they're... playing? Gosh this is fantastic... I wonder if they're actually stars? Maybe they're something else, they certainly seem to be alive. I- are they... getting brighter?”

Squinting a bit, the bunny risked adjusting the magnification a tiny bit.

“Or getting closer maybe?”

Brighter was a certainty. Nord found himself having a hard time keeping his eyes to the device after a few moments of looking, only for the lights to flare abruptly from large to blinding. Literally. A sea of gleaming white that looked as if it were moving like a liquid through space poured itself through the magnifier and into Nord's vision. It was searingly painful – for a moment. Not managing to Bea's attention with the yelp of pain he produced was a testament to how well-built the Rendering Pit's student facilities were. Unfortunately it left Nord with no help as he toppled back, landing hard on his ass and clutching at his eyes.

“I... I'm blind, I'm blind, I.. n-no, this isn't-”

Panic ate at the bunny's reason, but it didn't quite get through enough of Nord's discipline to beat him outright. Blindness was darkness, not overpowering light. Squirming, writhing light inside the rabbit's head. It didn't burn, if anything it felt somewhat cool and maybe even pleasant apart from the intense fear Nord was going through. Though that eased up – a little – when his left eye's vision started to return.

Not all at once of course, it looked like a glistening oil spill running down the inside of his vision, but it did mostly clear. There were still little flecks of something twinkling inside it though, lingering inside his vision in both eyes as the right one started to clear as well. Nord let out a breath, relieved over at least that one aspect of what had just happened, then shakily tried to get to his feet.

“The nurse is a little creepy but I think I'd better go see them, maybe. That was weird, and I don't want to- to...”

It didn't take long for that panic to start creeping back in when Nord's feet stumbled and stopped, holding him in place. The bunny turned his head slowly, looking at the mirror mounted on the wall of their dorm. The panic definitely rushed back at that. The glow was still inside them, it just wasn't in their eyes anymore. Instead it was crawling under the rabbit's jaw and around the back of his head. It nestled there, pulsing briefly, then seemed to sink in a little deeper. Right into the core of his skull.

“Oh.. oh chrome no...”

As the light disappeared into him Nord's body tensed, all of his muscles clenching at once, then began to ease downward into a relaxed pose. One that the bunny was in no control over whatsoever. When Nord started walking after that, even just to turn toward the door and open it, there was not one bit of movement he willingly undertook. His limbs were doing it anyway though, going through the motions, smoothly and calmly exiting into the hallways after hours. Other students were still about of course, they always were, but it was less busy than it could be. Nord quietly tried to do something – anything – to get their attention but nothing came of it. He just placidly walked, as if he had some idea where he was going.

Which.. maybe he did? Nord could feel things in his head, kind of like the light was setting off memories and feelings in him. They were faint impressions but he felt them just the same. It would've been maddeningly confusing if it wasn't so damn simple to sort out. Nord stepped into the hallway, the brightly lit hallway, and he felt amazing.

A pulse ran through the rabbit, like a second heartbeat, and he felt the brilliance around him seeping into his skin. Felt that glow in the back of his mind growing stronger, which just made for an even faster pace as he walked. The lights around dimmed a little, not looking like anything but a power surge perhaps, but noticeable just the same. Only Nord had any notion of where it went. It sank into his body and joined the little dancing motes of it in his head, or at least most of it did? Some lingered elsewhere, causing a buzzing delight in his skin and leaving him feeling warm and soft. Like the idea of basking in the sun on a spring day, but given gross physical form.

Literally, as it turned out. Unable to speak or resist, all Nord could do was experience what was happening to its fullest. Which was why he was able to so clearly feel when his waistline grew thicker on his journey. A little heavier, a little rounder, pushing out against the fabric of his student's uniform. It was a steady thing, one that carried on with him as he crossed the corridors.

There was at least some sense of something being wrong that built as the bunny moved. He was a rolling blackout building entirely different kinds of rolls and while there were plenty of fat students and faculty at the university there were precious few technical problems so mundane as blackouts. Nord was still hoping as he watched himself meander toward astrometrics that someone would pick up on that and notice he was the source. That he needed help.

Nobody did. Not yet, at least. And since he was a student with classes in that area people expected to see Nord wandering around the department. Given the way the university tended to treat its students they didn't even bat an eye at the fact that the rabbit was a good fifty pounds pudgier when he arrived there, that he was just thick and sluggish compared to usual, or that he had wildly dilated pupils and a dopey half grin on his face. All those things went unnoticed while Nord walked unmolested up to the controls for the astrometrics viewing chamber. Normally only used during presentations, Nord found himself alone there.

Which was what he- no

It was what it wanted. The fact that for a moment he'd had a hard time distinguishing between the two was chilling by itself. Nord shook quietly, or he would have if he were able, while watching his hands start to slowly manipulate the controls of the viewing chamber. This wasn't something Nord had done often before, only twice in fact, and his memory of it was shoddy at best. Unfortunately it still existed, and the motes inside his being had found said memory and intended to use it.

Nord was through two layers out of three for safety protocols when the door opened and another student wandered in. An ermine Nord recognized but didn't know, not personally anyway.

“H-hey, you out looking for this thing too? The Professors are saying to go to our bunks but I was thinking I could-”

When the last lockout was bypassed Nord's guest stopped speaking, being too busy shielding their eyes and backing quickly out of the room while shouting about having found something. It didn't matter though, Nord's passenger had what it wanted. The shield doors were peeling back like a great eyelid and letting in the light of the dwarf star the Rendering Pit was currently located next to. Blazing, brilliant waves of energy flooding the entire chamber in blinding incandescence. And flooding Nord's body with it too.

He would've been terrified of going blind if he hadn't already dealt with this.

Inside, the motes moved again. They slid into the back of Nord's eyes and then washed over the front of him, but they did not leave his mind either. Nord could still feel them there, he could feel more in fact, and that spelled it out nicely when his whole body started to faintly convulse in a waves of unwanted pleasure.

The motes were eating and growing. And so was he. It felt like sinking into a warm bath, but one that crept underneath his skin rather than just covering it. The rabbit's body suit uniform stretched quickly as he grew heavier by the breath, soaking up light and weight in equal measure as the star outside saturated everything in the room. Alarms were going off somewhere but Nord wasn't being allowed to feel any fear or worry about it, not with those little sparks in his mind caressing him from the inside out. Nord did want to sit down, though. At least, he felt like he did right up until a loud 'ka-chank' rang through the hull of the astrometrics lab and left the bunny with the sudden rush of a lapse in gravity. Vertigo set in quickly as he began to drift up away from the floor.

Still, it did make him more comfortable. Nord was grateful for that – and had the strangest impression it was indeed something the presence in him did on purpose. The bunny shivered quietly as his body rippled and thickened. He could just about see it happening, mostly because his vision seemed to be altering itself. There was a tingling in his eyes that drew him away from being blinded by all this brilliance and left him able to see the outlines of the lab around him, and himself.

Nord had been fairly svelte before, but now? The bunny had grown into a thick ass. Big yoga ball sized mounds of flesh that were gently undulating in the air as if he were underwater. His belly was larger still, dangling over his waist, never sitting still. Even a little bit of exploratory prodding made the gelatinous heap undulate – and from there the growth kept it going. Growth, and light. The bunny could tell, watching himself, that parts of him were so saturated now they were as incandescent as the motes inside his skull. Like a blob in a lava lamp, the bunny drifted and undulated gently.

There was some dim awareness of a banging at the door but Nord couldn't do anything about that, or wasn't inclined to anyway. He was too busy savoring the way the light tasted. The star's coruscating wavelengths were like different flavors being tasted by every inch of him – and there were more inches by the moment to do it with. A huge swath of furry blubber soaking in energy and using it to grow. Using it to keep its host sedate and happy.

After a few more bangs at the door Nord started to recognize a bit of it. There were plenty of voices, sure, but most of it was just noise that didn't seem to matter all that much when his body was singing to him constantly about all this light. One of them, though...

“...Bea?”

More pounding, but Nord couldn't do much of anything about it anyway. Not even if he wanted to, and the bunny really didn't. Their frame was losing more definition by the second but it didn't matter, it was more flesh to store all that energy in and what else could he want? The gleaming in his brain assured him everything was fine, and even as he felt his legs pressing each other apart from sheer bulk and his tail slipping away into the folds of his ass and his back fat it was nothing to worry about.

Nord did still find himself wiggling a bit and reaching for the doorway when it opened and he saw Bea among the people on the other side. All of them except the two drones recoiled from the light in the room, crawling away from it. The drones adapted to the light quickly, their latex covered bodies were meant for that kind of thing, and they promptly set about trying to get the shield lids closed. That, Nord felt, wasn't going to do at all.

What he was going to do about it? That was a harder thing. Nord's arms were thickening to the point where they were shaped more like lumpy cones of blubber than functional limbs. He could wiggle them a bit, his legs too, but it didn't really accomplish much apart from making his gelatinous bulk shake and jiggle that much harder.

Which felt amazing.

“J-just... a few more minutes of this, please you two? I really... it's... so nice~”

As his frame expanded further the bunny found that even wiggling his limbs was getting to be tricky. He felt like he was wrapped in a body suit made of pillows with thousands of tingling fingertips under his skin massaging him in every nook and cranny at the same time. Every blubbery fold. Nord felt that calm descend on him again, the one where the motes inside started to promise him things were alright and seemed to know what to do?

Which, embarrassingly, seemed to be to just jiggle in place while the bliss he was experiencing spiked. A lot, actually. Nord shivered and gasped as he felt stirring underneath that gigantic apron of a gut he'd grown. Right before a clench and a wave of raw, ragged bliss flooded his nerves.

And a trickle of light left his body.

“W-what... what's... h-happening...?”

Unable to see around his own gargantuan frame, Nord could only keep wriggling as the divine sense of sucking up all that energy from the star made sure he kept leaking.. something. It felt a little bit like being squeezed, like he were a giant sponge full of pleasure. Which didn't seem all that far from the truth.

Not until he'd been at this for about twelve solid seconds and he'd drifted around in enough of a circle to be almost upside down did Nord actually see what was going on. There was indeed something leaking out of him, and it as more of that liquid gleaming. It oozed down, floating through the weightless air, catching the attention of one of the drones and drawing it away from the iris controls before two more droplets split away. One headed for the drone moving for the gravity controls, the other...? That one went for the door.

Nord watched in rapt fascination as the lights moved while feeling himself thicken further, losing any renaming trace of usefulness in his limbs. The drone working at the shield controls had the droplet of light touch it in the back of the head, which promptly sank into the drone and left it standing stationary at the controls. The one that was working at the gravity system for the room went through the same results – about a half second too late to stop it from turning the room's system back on. The bunny didn't quite have the control to feel startled or afraid when he started falling, but surprise still worked. Nord was surprised – and then found himself giggling dimly as the landing left him quaking in place like a pudding that had been dropped to the floor.

It also left him, useless flabby heap that was, still growing in place and thoroughly beached. Which meant Nord could see but not really do anything about the fact that the stream of light leaking out of him was now crawling across the floor toward the only other bodies still anywhere nearby. A handful of drones approaching at a steady, relaxed pace – and Bea's almost prone frame. The frog was as close as they could force themselves to get and was still calling out Nord's name. Right until the puddle, which was making sure the drones all stepped in it and left them sluggishly stumbling to a halt, took a detour and crept up the frog's shivering body.

This time around the bunny was able to watch. The frog's whole frame relaxed in an instant as the light took root inside them, forming little rivers and webs inside their head, tying all of those together with their nerves. It did more than that though. When Nord saw his friend's agony from the overexposure to this light ease into the first few hints of the pleasure he was wallowing in? Nord couldn't help but be relieved – glad for his friend, even. And Bea felt the impulse, sending back one that mirrored how the bunny had felt not too long ago. Confused, but being eased into things by that luminous presence shutting off his capacity to be afraid. Making sure that, as he basked in the glow of the star, he felt nothing but a creeping, slightly greasy bliss under his skin. One that had the frog crawling sluggishly closer.

By the time Bea was leaned up against Nord's ponderous, gumdrop shaped mass the frog was already starting to get visibly fatter as well. Nord felt his friend's thoughts slip into his own as fast as they were formed.

This is all your fault... but uh, it's uh...

Nord smiled, which took some effort given how thick and puffy his cheeks were.

It's so nice~

A body-wide shudder ran through the frog as he couldn't help agreeing. Bea was fairly sure there'd be faculty arriving soon who could handle this, but for the meantime? Neither he nor the bunny cared that much. That light from ages away had found a nice, comfy home – and they wanted to make sure it was a roomy one with plenty of space for their luminous family to grow.