Butterball
A request done for Icefyer on FA.
Butterball
By Luther
"Oh no, is not good!" exclaimed Yap. "Was right here! Where did it go?!"
The little pink kobold searched frantically around the cave floor. He had come to this warren to find treasure, not lose it! The golden band he kept on his tail was missing. He never heard it hit the ground, he never even felt it leave him, but now it was clearly gone from his tail.
This ring was very important to him.
"You looking for this?" A jet black scaly creature, another kobold like him, stepped from one of the many darkened tunnel-ways. In his hand was Yap's ring. A thief? Surely not! How could one of his own kind steal from him? Yap was good-hearted but perhaps a little naive at times.
"That! Give back!" Yap dove forward but stopped himself, falling into a half pleading posture.
"Relax," said the dark-colored kobold who ran his clawtips along the golden circle. "Just wanted for you to tell what it was. Doesn't look like much. Though now . . . might just keep it."
"No, you don't understand. Yap needs that back befo-" a loud rumbling sound interrupted him, coming from his stomach. It didn't sound like the growling of hunger, it was different. He could already feel the change overcoming him.
The other kobold raised an eyebrow. "Excuse you?" he said through a hint of confusion.
The ring was important for a very good reason. Like any good kobold, he venerated a certain draconic deity and was allowed to channel his patron's divine power through his body. However, this influx of power tended to accumulate within him in a unique way. The ring helped keep things manageable.
Without it, things would quickly become unmanageable.
"That belongs to Yap. Plea-" Another rumbling followed cut him off once more and was likely loud enough to drown out anything he said anyway.
It was too late.
Though it was difficult to tell under his robes, Yap's entire body was pushing outwards. He looked a bit fuller in the cheeks, a small roll of fat ringed his neck where there used to be none. He tried to hide it, leaning his head back and reaching up top, nervously toying with the nubby horns on his head. It didn't work. That coupled with the kobold's terrible ability to pretend like nothing was wrong gave him away. Yap tried to slouch and angle his burgeoning size downward but that also failed.
Yap's robe no longer hung loose from him, it no longer billowed. Instead, his gut did. The yellowish-gold softer scales of his belly began to part the front of his robe to expose themselves even though he tried to fight them, to hold the garment shut, but there was just no fabric left. He felt himself getting heavier and heavier, the generous tire around his middle was developing and folding in with the smaller one under his arms.
Distraction!
"So Yap would maybe like to be friends. What is your name?" Yap tried to keep things civil and polite despite the rising urgency in his voice.
It was impossible to hide at this point. Jax had seen. His eyes were too wide not to. But Jax had seen many things before: a great plethora of varying curses that he had no small part in bestowing onto others, though this was purely accidental. While many others would take this time to flee magic poorly understood to them or at least try to help, the black kobold took a strange interest in this. It was like watching two carts on a collision course and choosing not to do anything about it.
"Some sort of pleading appeal?" The other kobold cocked his head as he slowly circled the ballooning reptile. "Name is Jax -and you getting all round!" he answered. "Jax maybe return ring later. Am correct in thinking it will stop you fat-ting up? Would be less interesting to stop."
That was that. He wasn't going to get it back the nice way. Yap tried to jump and grab for it but Jax was quicker and didn't have the jiggling disadvantage the pink kobold did. He made a heavy sounding thud as his feet hit the ground again, much louder than a kobold should. His belly shook up and down as he did so, staying in motion longer than the rest of him.
"Yep! Getting all fat!" Jax laughed. "What evil witch you make angry?"
The pink kobold tried jumping for the ring again and again but it was held out of reach and each jump was less capable than the last. His hope in that course of action dwindled, not like there was much else he could do.
Yap's clothes were like a sausage casing on him right now. The poor robe would he drawn skin tight on him and burst open over too much kobold fat if it didn't have that fortunate flap in front to part ways and reveal an overly bloated kobold belly. Was this planning on Yap's part or pure happenstance? Considering his helplessness in this condition, it was probably the latter.
Yap's arms felt like they were getting shorter as fat continued to pile around his shoulders, under his arms, on his chest, though in reality they were just being partly subsumed by the blubber. They were, however, definitely getting heavier. He tried to move them but met minimal success as they were both weighed down and propped up by folds in equal measure. His legs stumbled slightly as he tried to move, tiny baby steps being all he could really manage, though he had no idea where he'd even go.
He was getting a lot bigger than he normally would. Was he being punished for allowing the ring to be stolen? Was this some kind of odd reward? The divines work in strange ways and they were definitely working their ways on him. The truth was that he had no plan. Maybe he'd wait until Jax passed out from laughter and take it back that way?
"Look at butterball!" the dark kobold jeered. "You actually kind of cute this way."
'Butterball' was a word that encapsulated his current condition rather well. If balls of butter were scaly and had little arms and legs that wiggled about but didn't really get very far, this would apply. By this point, his gravid gut was swinging down in front of his legs, nearly covering them entirely as it approached brushing the ground. Standing was a feat in and of itself and every pound added onto him was a solid argument to just let gravity win and take a rest on his fantastically plump behind.
In surveying his troubles, Yap had let his attention drift from the other kobold. He jumped a bit in surprise, at least as much as he could, when he felt tiny clawtips run themselves along the pudgy surface of his sides. It seemed that Jax was acting on his fascination. Yap turned his head as much as he could and saw the fellow touching the swelling expanse of pink scales.
Poor Jax couldn't help himself. It was soft and warm and moved like a gelatin dessert. He would press inward only to have it spring back into place. A gentle shove sent it rocking back and forth. If there was any shyness or hesitation it had melted away as he dove in with both hands open-palmed and rubbing the sides of that immense belly.
At last Yap felt the stone floor touch his belly, likely the other way around, and gasped at the sharp coolness which sent undulations throughout his body, setting it to a near perpetual jiggling motion. Try as he might, his wobbles to move were in vain. Yap had reached the point of immobility, he was as wide as he was tall! Jax pressed his entire body against the giant fatty, not having to strain his ears in the least to hear the near constant rumbling and groaning noises coming from the growing gut. It was taut but not overly tight. There was always more room to expand into and more to flesh to expand! At last, Jax seemed to snap out of his reverie, speaking:
"Maybe take you home, make you a scarecrow? Maybe use you like feather mattress or to weigh things down? You would make good roadblock." Jax punctuated each idea as it came to him by poking a finger deep into the pliable and giving folds of Yap's front. It was obvious he was jesting . . . probably.
Jax laughed one last time, seeming to reinforce the notion that it was all a joke, much to Yap's relief. He coughed and regained composure. "Now you will get ring back. Many apologies, could not resist."
He disappeared behind the fat-bold. Yap's head was unable to swivel and quickly lost sight of him. Some time passed, a curiously long period to do something as simple as slip a ring back on. At last there was some sign, some answer.
"Ah . . .there is slight problem," Jax said at length.
"What's that?"
"Tail too fat for ring to fit!"