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Future-Proof
by Miss Mouse
The beast roared, turning itself to hide its wounded flank from the knight. Its head—not quite lupine, not quite equine—lowered to point its lethal horns against its adversary, readying itself for their next pass.

The Dwarven knight was breathing hard, her gleaming breastplate splattered with blood and dirt, the steel cut open at the waist, baring a patch of torn flesh. She raised her longsword to ward the creature off, her other hand beginning the motions of a spell of curing, hoping to recover some strength before the fight came to its end.

Seeing the knight’s attention split, the chimera pounced, throwing its full weight atop the warrior, who fell backwards under it. There was commotion, the beast flailing and clawing wildly as it struggled to finish its prey, the point of a sword standing out between its shoulder blades.

The movement stilled, and the knight rolled the monster off of herself, drawing out her sword and wiping blood from her lip. As she got to her feet, she watched in anticipation as corpse began to smoke, its material body dissolving, sublimating into the ether.

The beast faded, leaving behind a small pile of gold coins.

“Oh come on!” The knight shouted in frustration, kicking a nearby rock off into the forest. “That’s the fifth one in a row! What does that old man even need fifteen chimera livers for, anyway?!”

She rubbed her eyes and logged out, the world vanishing and being replaced by her Workspace. Here, she pulled up a desk chair and plopped down into it, still fuming about the unfairness of RNG. The Realm was a fun game, but it was a grind.

A soft light appeared in the air, and a pleasant “Ding!” rang out, drawing her from her self-pity. An email, probably someone at work looking for a shift covered. She tapped on it without checking, her eyes looking down at the readout on her wrist to check her heart-rate.

As much of a workout as playing the Realm felt like, it really didn’t do much other than cardio. She wasn’t actually moving, after all; her implants kept her paralyzed while in VR. Still the adrenaline rush was real and that meant it was exhausting.

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The spam mail did not improve her mood.

Edith dismissed it with a wave of her hand before jacking out and returning to the real world.

She’d modeled her Workspace after her room, though in reality she was lying on her bed, not sitting in her chair. She stayed on her back for a bit, waiting for the tingling in her nerves to subside before getting up to eat.

Workspace and its many add-ons, plug-ins, and extensions (including games like the Realm, communication systems, and even stock-market apps) made use of Dyson-Weilig brand implants, originally created for medical applications, but now readily available for recreational purposes. Most people had them and used them daily for everything from teleconferencing to ordering pizza off of a website.

All you needed was the neural implant, allowing the program to intercept signals between the brain and the body, which it used to make you see and feel whatever it needed. Lots of people had additional implants—some medical, some recreational—and these all networked together through a single system.

A patient with an artificial heart could upload status reports to their doctor’s office, or two people with muscular implants could arm-wrestling using their actual strength. The future was cool, but Edith wasn’t really interested in making her VR any more realistic than it already was.

She went to the kitchen, made a sandwich, and got a message from her co-worker and friend, Jane, not asking for a shift to be covered, but asking if she wanted to try out the new “Toxic Depths” dungeon in the Realm once she got off work. As fed-up as she was with the game, she did want to see what new gear they’d added…

—

“What seems to be the problem, Miss Addison?” Dr Vance came into the room, her eyes on the tablet displaying Edith’s chart. There was a three-dimensional model, showering a short, dark girl with big eyes and curly hair.

“I feel really ‘blech’ today. Dizziness, my stomach’s upset… I feel weak.”

“And these symptoms just started today?”

“Well… I was playing some games with co-worker last night and got hit with a ‘poison’ condition. It’s not quite the same, but I was wondering if maybe there was a problem with my implant, maybe causing some lingering effects.

“It’s possible, but I’ll need to take a closer look. Lay back on the table for me let’s see how you are.”

Edith laid down and shut her eyes, feeling a soft pinging in her head as her neural implant connected to Dr Vance’s tablet and began to undergo diagnostics.

“Now, I’m not saying there’s no issue with your implant, but your entrance check-up showed that your iron is low; have you had any issues with anemia before?” Dr Vance kept her eyes on the tablet, looking or any abnormalities in the read-outs.

“No, I don’t think so.”

“Well, I’ll prescribe you a supplement and we’ll see in a few weeks how your levels are. Anemia could very well be the issue here, but we’ll check everything just to be sure.”

Edith twiddled her thumbs impatiently as she waited, careful not to move around too much and affect the reading.

“Your neural implant is functioning perfectly, according to this. Your body temperature is slightly elevated, though, and I see an ongoing process in your uterine implant, but there’s no worklog available; do you have a menstruation module installed?”

“My uterus? No, I don’t have it doing anything.” Edith had had a hysterectomy in college after a scan revealed a tumor. It was benign, but given her family history, they opted to remove the uterus and implant an artificial one, which would continue to provide hormones in the organ’s absence and allow her to have children eventually.

“Well, it’s definitely producing...something…your blood-test showed some elevated hormone levels; it may be overproducing. I’d like to do a sonogram and a diagnostic test on your uterus, just to see what’s going on, exactly.”

This made Edith nervous, but better to do the tests and find the problem than to live in ignorance and find out too late. After a short stint in another waiting room (which she passed by anxiously checking and re-checking her news feed), they led her into the exam room and had her lay down on yet another table. A tech came in, wheeling the ultrasound machine next to the table and setting it up. Dr Vance was close behind her, looking over the results of the already in-progress technical scan of her uterus.

“Could you roll up your shirt for me?” Asked the tech in a polite and well-rehearsed tone.

“What do you expect to find?” Edith did as she was asked, revealing her soft, brown stomach. She wiggled her skirt a little lower on her hips so the tech had more room to work.

“Well, I don’t know what to expect, honestly.” Dr Vance adjusted her glasses with a sigh. “Your uterus is processing a build-order as if you were undergoing pregnancy, but there’s no entry in your worklog for it to be doing anything other than hormone production.”

“I thought it couldn’t do that without getting an additional implant?” Edith’s voice rose in pitch as her worry grew stronger.

“Well, that’s just to provide the organic seed for creating a child. Basically, we take DNA from your partner and create an egg from it, which we implant and the uterus then processes, injecting your DNA and using the product as the base for the child it creates. See, the artificial uterus is effectively and expandable 3D Printer, and the seed gives it the information needed to create a child based off of the two parents’ DNA sets. Once the first few cells are finished, nature takes over. It’s the same technology it uses to regulate your hormones, just making a baby instead of estrogen.”

Edith listened to this, wide-eyed as the technician placed the wand against her abdomen, a vague, three-dimensional imagine beginning to form on the screen.

“So, I’m pregnant?”

“Not necessarily—your body’s making something, but it’s probably not a child. In fact, I highly doubt it is.”

“What else could it be?” She looked at the screen, a colorless image of her uterus becoming clearer and clearer as the wand took more readings.

“Well, have you installed any unknown VR programs lately? Done anything usual with something that had access to your implants?”

“Doctor, take a look at this.” The tech pointed at the screen, which now showed a fully-formed three-dimensional model of her uterus. She made a gesture over the screen and it split the model in half, showing the inside to the observers. There was a small amount of amorphous material inside of it, which seemed to be moving very slightly.

“What’s that?” Edith gauped at the screen.

“Well, based on the amount of carbon and silicone being produced, I would say…some sort of electrical system. A machine, perhaps.”

—

Initially, Edith had taken the news of her pseudo-pregnancy very poorly, but after the sedatives wore off and she was safe and sound in her hospital bed the next day, eating a bowl of nutritionally-enriched Jell-O and watching reruns of The Match Game, she felt a lot better about a lot of things.

Extra food intake had done wonders for her symptoms, ensuring that her womb wasn’t taking so much of her nutrients that there wouldn’t be any left for her, and all the doctors had assured her that she was perfectly safe.

“Unfortunately, whatever virus got into you is doing a good job of keeping us out,” a hospital technician had assured her. “Yours is an older model and its security software is outdated. You should have received an email about two years ago?” The technician’s tone told her that she knew full-well that Edith hadn’t bothered to come in and get it the new chip installed that would allow her to update to the more modern firmware.

“Oh, uhm, I must have missed that,” Edith lied. “Maybe my spam-filter caught it.”

“Well, it certainly didn’t catch the virus you opened that got you into this mess. Same thing happened to a woman in Oregon last year.”

Snarky techs aside, things weren’t so bad; her insurance covered this as a “medical implant mishap,” and as such she was on sick-leave from work for the foreseeable future. The doctors said it could take a little while for them to unlock the system and remove the mass, so until then she was sleeping, eating, taking walks around the hospital, and playing games.

What was less-relaxing was the rate at which stomach had begun to swell. Her uterus was still adding to the Blob (that’s what she called it, based on its appearance on the scans), and the more she ate the bigger it got. By the end of her first day in the hospital (about forty-eight hours after she opened the spam email) she looked nearly six months pregnant, her belly rounded out under her gown.

Dr Grey, who was in charge now that she was in the hospital, theorized it should have stopped growing already, so as to prevent detection, but any number of things could have caused a hiccup in the program.

Her breasts were also growing, her uterus producing pregnancy hormones alongside the Blob. This was a source of discomfort for her, but they gave her some cream and told her to massage herself with it three times a day to help with elasticity and prevent stretch-marks.

She elected to do this ritual in her shower, which had a seat she could sit on and be alone. The bathroom was bright and roomy, and the warm water felt good on her skin, so she’d taken to showering twice a day, using the cream after each time, and once at noon in between.

Edith’s chest had always been modest—she’d put on some weight in college and had been excited to go up to a C then, but once she started working she’d shed the excess weight and her bust-size with it. Now, she’d recovered that size, and was likely to keep growing, still.

In the bathroom, she examined her profile, placing her hands at the top of her rounded belly so that her breasts rested on top of them. Her nipples had darkened, grown larger, more sensitive, and they rubbed uncomfortably against her gown as she walked.

Beneath her hands her stomach felt warm, solid. It had very little give, just a layer of fat for cushioning, with no amniotic fluid. The Blob was a machine, and it was processing something—mining cryptocurrency was the prevailing theory—and that meant it was putting off heat. It wasn’t hot, more like pleasantly warm, and the heat was soothing on her sore back.

Aside from rate of progression, the largest divergence from a regular pregnancy was the weight. The Blob was more dense than a baby, and she was already beginning to feel the strain on her hips and spine.

Rubbing slow, gentle strokes over the curve of her belly, feeling the odd sensation of the tightening skin beneath her fingertips, the faint vibration—imperceptible unless her hands were moving—as her womb and the Blob thrummed away.

She was bigger than she had been that morning.

—

“We’re making progress,” Dr Grey assured her. She was an older woman with hair to match her name. “That’s the important thing.”

“Well, I’m making progress, too.” Edith gestured at her stomach, a smooth dome under her blanket. “And I don’t like it.”

Dr Grey sighed.

“Keep taking your supplements and we’ll have you out of here in no time.”

Edith was unconvinced. Her second day in the hospital, and she looked VERY ready to give birth, her belly heavy and sensitive, a dark line running down its center. Her belly button poked out through the gown like a nipple.

She had just settled in from dinner, and was planning to take a shower, but as Dr Grey left, someone sent her a message.

Hey, want to hit the Depths again? I read online that there’s a secret in the Fungal Arboretum that lets you into a hidden quest area.
-Jane

It was Jane, which lifted her spirits considerably.

Yeah, I’ll meet you at the Survivors’ Camp in 15.
-Edith

She didn’t really feel like playing (she’d probably talk Jane out of doing any strenuous adventuring) but she had no friends in the hospital, and the Blob wasn’t good for conversation.

Laying back and shutting her eyes, Edith touched the initiator on her implant’s contact plate, just behind her ear. She was briefly nowhere, and then she was in her Workplace, sitting in her chair.

She stayed there for a bit, enjoying the familiar space of her home. Homesickness coiled in her chest, and she went over and plopped down on her bed to try and relieve it. As she opened her eyes, she saw her round belly arching up above her, her avatar’s shirt having grown to accommodate it, stretching out the band logo on its front.

Edith sighed. Her ersatz uterus was part of the network; its condition and size were integrated into the system that made the VR so realistic, same as her neural implant. Even in the virtual world, she couldn’t escape the Blob.

At least it didn’t weigh anything here, and she could adjust her avatar’s settings to remove it, but instead she opened up her app menu and logged in to the Realm.

The Toxic Depths smelled like dirt and rotting vegetation, and with her body full of pregnancy hormones, it was almost too much for Edith to take. It was enough to make her dizzy and nauseous, but she used a Teleport scroll and was whisked away to the Survivors’ Camp on the outskirts of the Plaguelands. The Toxic Depths were just underground and the smell lingered, but it was covered by the scent of smoke and civilization.

There was no inn here, but a drinkhouse overlooking the ruins of the old castle served meat and ale. We should have met somewhere else, Edith thought as she sat on one of the makeshift stools at the counter. The air was damp and the food the bartender brought her was little more than scraps of meat on skewers, grilled over coals.

The ale was watery, too.

“Edy!”

Edith turned to see a tall, slim High Elf walk into the bar, a row of gleaming daggers in her belt. Jane played the game with a sense of flair, spending money on cosmetic gear and other niceties. Her gold-detailed boots and Everian Silk Blouse made her stand out among the refugees that populated the town.

“Hey, Jane, how’re you?” Edith said, obviously tired.

“How am I? How are you?! Look at yourself!” She gestured wildly as she crossed to the bar and took a seat. The bartender immediately brought her food and drink, and she started on it almost as quickly.

“Oh, I’m alright, more tired than anything.” Edith leaned back on the bar, sticking her belly out in front of her. Like in her Workplace, her armor had adapted to her new shape, which quite frankly looked ridiculous.

Jane poked the metal shell of her friend’s breastplate, and took a swig of ale.

“So what’s it like being pregnant?”

“I’m not pregnant, you weirdo.”

“You look pregnant to me,” she shrugged. “Can you fight like that?”

“Yeah, it doesn’t weigh anything here, but IRL it weighs a freakin’ ton.” Edith patted her stomach, causing a ringing sound. “Yesterday I walked around the hospital a lot, but it was too much, today.”

“We were talking about getting a group together to come visit you. Y’know, bring flowers and a ‘get well soon’ balloon.”

“Oh PLEASE don’t do that!” Edith was horrified at the idea. “I don’t want anyone to see me like this.”

“You look fine to me,” Jane smirked, taking a bite of her kebab.

“I feel like a whale.”

Jane shrugged.

Edith started to pick at her food, but never really ate with the same gusto as Jane. The two of them made a good team, though Jane was always the more enthusiastic player.

It was good to spend time with a friend after two days in the hospital with no one to talk to but nurses. It felt good. It felt…normal.

They spent almost an hour talking and eating, and when they got up, they both found themselves quite dizzy with drink.

“Ugh, I shouldn’t be drinking.” Edith held her head. She’d changed out of her armor and was now wearing a rustic tunic, fitting her character’s background as a farmer. She was a dwarf, short broad and brown, and with her big belly she looked adorable (or so Jane said).

“I thought you weren’t pregnant?” Jane smiled devilishly.

Edith looked at her and smile cracking into laughter, and Jane fell to laughing along with her.

“And don’t you have work in the morning?” Edith and Jane walked out of the drinkhouse and down the path to the castle. The Plaguelands were desolate, but there was a beauty to their emptiness, and they smelled better than the Survivors’ Camp.

“You can’t get a hangover if the alcohol isn’t real,” Jane winked, tapping the side of her head.

Edith shrugged. It was true, the Drunk effect wasn’t quite the same as real alcohol, and it wore off as soon as you logged out of the Realm (or jacked-out of VR, depending on your settings), but it was still fun, and Edith had really missed her friend.

The sun was setting as they walked the old switch-back trail down the cliffside, and at the base they came to the old courtyard of the castle. There wasn’t anything there, no enemies, no quests…It was all part of an old event that was over and done with, but Edith and Jane had explored it top to bottom in their idle days of playing. Now they wandered up the one tower that remained standing and sat facing west out towards the sunset.

“Ah, I still need to shower tonight.” Edith yawned, leaning against one of the crenelations.

“Yeah, it must be hard work lying around in a hospital all day.” Jane teased, taking a seat beside her.

“Ugh, you’d be surprised. I feel like I’ve gotten bigger since we started hanging out.” She shifted a little, sticking out her round belly and patting it. It did look bigger.

“Oof, yeah you look huge.”

“I feel huge.”

The two spent a few long moments looking at her stomach, thinking how strange it was.

“Hey, can I feel it?” Jane’s voice cracked, and she looked nervously at her friend.

“If you aren’t afraid it’s contagious.” Now Edith was doing the teasing. She hiccuped once, and then slowly rolled up the hem of her tunic, revealing the great curve of her belly.

“W-wow,” Jane swallowed audibly, reaching out one tentative hand to touch it.

“I hadn’t actually looked at it in-game yet,” she said, looking down at the brown skin of her stomach. Its scale was changed to fit her Dwarf body, but with her relatively short arms and legs she looked even bigger.

“Does it look different?” Jane pressed her fingers against its surface, finding it hard and smooth, not quite what she expected.

“Yeah, there’s no line, and the skin doesn’t look stretched. I dunno, it’s just…different. My belly-button is still in, too.” Edith put her finger in her navel.

Jane had both her hands fully on it now, rubbing big circles across its surface. She just stared, mesmerized.

“What does it feel like?” she asked at length.

“Sensitive, tight. It’s heavy, too.”

“Does it hurt at all?”

“No. My boobs do, though.”

“Really?”

“Oh yeah, you should see me now.” Edith held her hands out in front of her chest to indicate an exaggerated size. “I guess there’s nothing there to let the system know it’s changed.”

Edith opened her character menu and went to adjust the build sliders, moving her bust size back and forth rapidly between two extremes. After laughing to herself for a second, she settled on what she estimated to be her new real-world size and exited out, taking a moment to lift and play with her breasts and see if it looked right.

“Oh my gosh,” Jane stared, openly shocked at the changes in her friend’s body.

“Yeah.” Edith said proudly. “They do hurt though. The doctors gave me some stuff to rub on them and my stomach to help with the stretching. Here,” she grabbed the rolled hem of her shirt and pulled it up over her head, revealing her plain, developer-designed bra, and her two, full breasts within it.

Jane still had her hands on Edith’s belly, her wide eyes moving slowly up from belly, to breasts, to Edith’s round face. They stared at each other, both feeling what was happening, neither thinking to—wanting to—stop it. Jane slowly leaned in, her hands sliding to hold Edith at the hips, chest pressing against the generic softness of her breasts.

Edith shut her eyes, her mouth opening slightly, head leaning back in anticipation, acceptance. Jane felt her breath, felt her heat, and through the drink-haze of the evening, she saw her.

And she pulled back.

“I—uh, I have to go. Work. Sorry.” She half-stood, fading away as she logged out, one last “Sorry” hanging in the air.

Edith sat alone on the tower, and the evening felt cold.

—

The Drunk effect was gone instantly, but Edith felt dazed, unable to think as she stumbled across the floor to the bathroom. What was that? Was that real? It all felt like a dream, but it didn’t fade away, didn’t change and morph in unreality.

She dropped onto the shower seat like a bag of sand.

It was…unexpected. She hadn’t thought of Jane like that—not seriously, not soberly—but at the time, it felt so right. It felt so…natural. She sat and looked over at the mirror, seeing the strange thing she had become through tear-blurred eyes.

Loneliness weighed on her like a cold brick.

Her mind was a boiling mix of emotions, one she couldn’t sort through, couldn’t begin to decipher. She was tired. She was different. And the more she tried to examine what had happened, what she felt about it, the more one single question surfaced in her mind:

Why did she stop?

Edith cried until the tears stopped, then sat under the running shower until she was done. Her towels were soft and warm, and she lay on her side on the bathroom floor, her hands on her monstrous belly.

She wasn’t sad. She wasn’t hurt. She just felt so terribly alone.

Eventually, Edith pulled herself to her feet and started to leave, only to see the bottle of lotion sitting on the counter. She wanted to go to sleep, but the skin of her belly was itching, and her breasts were sore and swollen, so she took the bottle and sat back down on the shower stool.

The lotion was cool in her palm, white and creamy, but it spread a tingling, soothing warmth over the tight skin of her stomach. Gosh, she was huge; what would she have thought just a few days ago, if she had seen herself like this?

It was strange, alien. Cold and violating. She was suddenly a pregnant woman with no child to love, no support to help her through. Inside her, the Blob hummed away, vibrating beneath her fingertips as she rubbed slow, smooth circles. It felt so weird, so hard and sensitive and unlike anything she’d ever known before.

The warming sensation of the lotion had a way stimulating the nerves; as if waking them up from the long, numbing strain of stretching more and more around her heavy burden. Now, they sang with electricity, soothed and refreshed by the medicine and touch.

Slowly, Edith’s circling hands moved up to her breasts, which sat perched atop her belly, round and full. It was sometimes easy to forget about them—they were smaller, weighed less, did not hum or vibrate—but when she began to knead them in her palms, they lit up like fireworks. Where once her modest, well-formed breasts had been a pleasant handful, now they large and impressive, their soft, fatty give growing into a lovely firmness. Because of this, they kept their round shape as they wobbled atop her belly, not flattening out despite their weight.

Her nipples were dark and swollen, the bumps of her areolas clear beneath her fingertips, their jutting points hard and electric as she began to work the lotion in. It felt good, and the feeling only grew as she lifted them, squeezing the smooth curves of her breasts gently—then a little harder, enjoying the sense of fullness and pressure.

For a while, at least, her mind was on the sensations of her body, and that was all that mattered.

Edith repositioned, leaning back against the wall of the shower and feeling the weight of her belly as it pressed against her. She could feel it, deep inside her, vibrating as it settled in the bowl of her pelvis. Wrapping her arms around her belly, the buzzing sensation amplified, no longer dissipating through the tissues and fat of her abdomen, but directly moving directly against her nerves and skeleton.

She gave a slow and stuttering exhale, her fingers jittering over the tingling skin of her stomach, feeling strange through the effects of the lotion. Slipping down the smooth, round sides of her belly, she moved her hands beneath it, feeling its immense weight, and then lower, finding herself warm and ready.

Though her heart was tired, confused, her body had responded eagerly, and in the interim had waited, unfulfilled, until the need had grown into a suffering ache. Now Edith traced her fingers over her lips, gently parting them and feeling the warmth they contained. Her clitoris tingled, and she brushed her thumb against it, savoring the jolt of almost-painful need, her gentle, glancing touches increasing her desire rather than sating it.

Carefully inserting two fingers into herself, she rubbed up, pressing against her inner walls and feeling a shock race through her whole body. A tremor ran down her leg, kicking and twitching in sudden, inexorable excitement. She couldn’t stop herself, her fingers rubbing and spreading, tracing shapes in her depths, her thumb stroking against her clitoris, struggling to keep going, to maintain a rhythm long enough to finish.

Edith could feel the machine her body had built, so close now, humming like a vibrator in her womb.

Her other hand came back up, pressing the strained nub of her belly button, forced out by the pressure beneath. The muscles of her abdomen twitched, reacting almost ticklishly, but unable to contract over its heavy, metallic contents.

She grabbed her breast—a little too ungently at first, being so eager that she sent a bolt of pain through herself. Taking a moment, she lifted its spilling heft, bringing the engorged nipple to her mouth and taking it in her lips. She licked and sucked, pulling deeply at her nipple, hand moving to her other breast, the other still diving and rubbing at her nethers.

Her hips struggled to move beneath the weight of her belly, trying to twitch and buck against her hand. The passion of it all consumed her, moving through her body like a rushing stream. It worked her into a frenzy, breaking at the crest and coming down in an intense and bone-shaking orgasm, threatening to knock her from the shower stool.

Edith felt her mouth fill with warm, sweet milk, coaxed out by her ministrations and the pressure in her breasts. It overflowed her, spilling out and running down the sides of her belly in two trickling lines.

Weak and trembling—her hand still rubbing her clitoris through the long, lingering aftershocks of her orgasm—she lowered herself to the floor of the shower, the weight of her belly almost pulling it down to the tiles as she crouched on her knees.

Unable to support her burden on her knees and one arm, she rolled onto her side and laid there, pinching and playing with herself with growing laxity until—after long minutes—the shudders and flashes of ecstacy subsided, and she was alone again.

—

“Are you feeling alright today, Miss Addison?” The nurse asked, pausing in the process of hooking up an IV.

“I’m fine,” Edith replied with a hollow distance.

“I noticed you’ve stopped taking your walks around the hospital. Is it too heavy?”

“Yeah.” She lay on her side, the weight of her belly too much to bear otherwise.

“If you’d like, I can get you a wheelchair. Fresh air might make you feel better.

“I’m fine,” she repeated, sounding no more convincing than before.

After finishing with the IV, the nurse left, closing the door with one final look of pity. She wanted to help, but Edith didn’t want it. All she wanted to do was lay in bed, the thing inside her running processes or mining crypto or doing whatever it was that it did.

She felt fine, just empty.

It was the early afternoon, but her memories still played over and over in her head. Why had she done that? What had possessed her? It was stupid, and had done nothing but embarrassed her. Now she just stared at the IV in her hand, not even listening to the drone of the television.

Hey,
I wanted to talk to you. About last night, I mean.
I just… I have some things I want to say.
-Edith

She’d sent Jane the message, pressing the button before giving herself a moment’s thought to reconsider. She put herself out there, and silence answered her.

The hours passed without a response. Even if Jane was working, she’d have checked her mail on her break. Edith had had one person to comfort her, and she’d chased her off.

“Am I really that disgusting?” she muttered through tears, her eyes on the oversized hospital gown that now strained uncomfortably across her front.

No one answered, no one said she was wrong. No one said anything, and so she laid there, passing in and out through the borders of sleep, not knowing where her dreams ended and her memories began.

“Miss Addison?”

Edith was jolted from her half-sleep, finding the room orange with the light of evening. Dr Grey was standing by the bed, holding her charts. She saw her dinner sitting in its tray on the nightstand.

“Sorry to wake you, Edith, but I’ve got good news!” Dr Grey paused, waiting for her patient to fully awaken before continuing. “Our systems have cracked the virus’ code, meaning we can now unlock your uterus, and put and end to this whole, weird mess.”

Edith half-tired to sit up, but fell back to her pillow after it proved more trouble than it was worth.

“Like, tonight?”

“First thing in the morning, actually. Our lead synthetics technician has already gone home for the day, and we want her there to supervise the delivery.”

“Delivery? You’re not just going to…cut it out?”

“Well,” Dr Grey put her hands on her hips and sighed, obviously hesitant to deliver the difficult news. “As you know, most surgeries are done laparoscopically nowadays. Cesarean sections haven’t been common practice in decades—there’s just not really a need for them with our modern healthcare practices. Your uterine implant isn’t designed to be cut open, and doing it under these kinds of conditions would destroy it. Simply put, your insurance isn’t willing to pay for such drastic actions, and certainly wouldn’t pay to replace the device. Vaginal delivery is the only real option here.”

Edith stared wide-eyed down at her huge belly, wondering how it would ever fit out of her.

“Don’t worry, although it may seem like one big mass, it’s actually a colony of nanobots, and is malleable rather than rigid. Your synthetic uterus is more than capable of squeezing it out of you, and the best part is: no cramps! There may be some discomfort, but none of the muscle cramps that cause so much difficulty in organic births.”

Edith still looked dumbly between herself and her doctor, mouth slightly open as she tried to listen through her shock.

“Just take it easy tonight, and be sure to eat your dinner. I noticed you didn’t finish your lunch.”

“Not hungry,” she said, shaking her head clear. “Too full.” She put one hand on her belly, feeling its soft thrumming through the gown.

“Well, your uterus may be a machine, but it’s powered by you. We’ve been supplementing your diet with IV nutrients to prevent malnutrition, but you still need calories for energy. Take your time, but make sure you eat it all, you’ll need the strength for tomorrow.”

Dr Grey left her to lie quietly in bed and stare at her dinner.

It was hard to believe that in the morning, it would all be over. Harder to believe that in the morning, she’d be giving birth! That seemed an impossible task for a woman who could hardly walk, but the doctor seemed confident in her ability to do it.

She wasn’t hungry, but she knew she should eat, so she took her cup of Jell-O and sipped at it, her mind empty, thoughts seeming to slip from her consciousness as soon as they arrived.

Eating was hard. There wasn’t much room left for her stomach to fill up with food, and the pressure from her womb meant nausea came quickly. So she picked at her meatloaf and mashed potatoes for an hour or so until they were all gone, having adjusted her bed to let her sit upright, her belly between her legs.

There was nothing on TV.

A soft ding drew her attention from a Lingo re-run, an AR notification popping up in her peripheral vision. Her eyes moved to look at it, causing the little envelope icon to expand into a bubble of text, showing the name of the sender and a preview of the message. It was a short message, the whole thing fitting in the preview:

Come to my place in Highdam, 9:00pm
-Jane

It took a few readings to sink in, Edith’s mind not sure what to make of it. Jane wanted to meet with her? Tonight? And in Highdam…the pastoral getaway was haven for the Empire’s nobility looking to escape the hustle and bustle of the city. For player characters, it was one of the most sought-after places to have a personal home. Jane, who took The Realm as seriously as one could with her budget, had one such house, a beautiful Elven villa amidst the falls and streams that came down from the Mountains of Ossin and watered the sloping grasslands below.

Eldewin (as she called it) was Jane’s favorite place to go and be alone and, although she might throw a party here or there to entertain her friends, none but her spent much time in it, not even Edith.

She didn’t even consider not going, her thoughts jumping immediately from the message to the time. It was 8:45; if she logged in now, teleported back to the city, and took the portal to Upmeads, her mount would get her to Highdam just in time.

Edith touched the contact plate behind her ear and the room vanished, fading into the brief darkness between the real and the virtual.

—

Eldewin was a breathtaking construction of air and arches, falling water and sunlight. The Sedenni river flowed through and around it, the house being built on low islands in its midst, its walls seeming to rise right out of the water like the graceful trunks of willow trees. “Walls” wasn’t the right word; the place seemed to have no walls—seemed hardly to be a house—rather, it was like an open garden, its arches hanging banners of watervines, flowers blooming around its pools, fountains filling the air with prisms, and all throughout it was as clear and airy as lace.

Yet, inside, it seemed quite private, remote. Indeed, the shepherd huts and weaving houses of Highdam were a good walk back down the winding road, hidden by the turns of the mountain. The white arches divided the innermost places with silken curtains, and lower rooms dug down into the stone of the mountain hid new and wondrous sights.

Edith approached the entryway, moving from the stepping-stones that let one cross the water to the last, flat rock before the threshold. As she set foot on it, a small notification appeared, indicating that the homeowner, Lerana (Jane’s character), had put her on the whitelist for entry.

She took one last look back at the wet stones glistening in the evening light, then stepped through the white silk curtain to the open entry hall.

Jane was sitting there on one of the marble benches, her usually tomboy-ish avatar now sporting long, gold-white hair and dressed in a traditional Elven gown, which left her shoulders bare and trailed from her wrists. She looked worried, and was caught off-guard by Edith’s arrival, standing up suddenly to her full, graceful height. Her brow was adorned by a circlet, small gems sparkling among the weaves of silver.

Edith looked down, feeling very out of place in her jerkin and tunic, the dust of the road and the waters of the river mixing to mud on her traveling boots. She’d picked a Dwarf because she wanted to play a Fighter, but now was wishing she was something more presentable than a short and dirty sell-sword.

“Edy,” Jane said almost sadly, but her voice was tinged with relief. She looked down at her friend apologetically.

“H-hey…” Edith didn’t know what to say either.

“Do you…Let’s go to the sitting room.”

Edith followed her a short way to a round section of marble flooring, where the middle was sunken down around a reflecting pool. Around this were a number of chaises for lounging, each covered in a shimmering, white fabric.

The waters of the pool glowed in the warm light of dusk.

Jane waited for Edith to take a seat, then sat beside her. They both looked at the pool for a time, listening to the music that filled the air, one of Jane’s favorites, played by a magic harp that needed no musician. The tinkling of the fountains seemed a part of the song.

“I—” they both began in unison, looking to the other, and then down, embarrassed.

“I’m sorry!” Edith blurted out after a few moments of awkwardness.

“You’re sorry? What for? I was the one… I mean, I tried to uh, to uh… kiss you.” That last was barely audible, the Elf’s graceful countenance crumbled beneath the weight of her mortal emotions.

“For this,” Edith gestured at her body, her round belly looking ridiculous in her computer-generated clothes. “For being…unkissable.”

Jane’s laugh was harmless, warm, a sound of commiserate comedy.

“Gosh, Edy, I didn’t stop because of that.” There was a hint of exasperation in her voice, but it seemed targeted at herself. “I… I stopped because I was afraid you might not…” She sighed, took a deep breath, straightening up and brushing a bit of hair from her face. “I like you, Edy. I like you a lot, but we never talked about it! You never hinted that you might…I didn’t want to be wrong. I didn’t want to ruin this.” She gestured between them.

“You like me? Even like this?” Edith looked down at herself, wondering how that could be possible.

“YES!” Jane said much louder than she intended. “You look beautiful,” she said, more restrained. “Especially like this. I didn’t want to freak you out. I feel bad, because this whole thing’s been so weird and hard for you, and here I am thinking about… about how…” she swallowed hard. “It’s selfish.”

Edith leaned over, putting her hand on Jane’s.

“If it makes you feel better…I like that you like me…like this.”

“Really? You’re not upset? I—I’ve always liked you, y’know, not just now—not just because of this. It was just…” She said defensively.

“I know, I understand.”

“I just thought…” Jane sighed pathetically. “I just didn’t want to take advantage of you because you were drunk.”

“Well,” Edith said quietly, scooting closer to her on the chaise. “I’m not drunk now.” Her eyes, big and dark like jasper, gazed longingly from behind a flutter of lashes.

Her head tilted back, Jane leaning down, careful, as though any sudden movement might break the moment like glass. Their lips touched, a kiss real with affection, if not proximity. It felt good. It felt right. For the first time since this whole thing started, Edith felt right.

In the private confines of a player-owned house, there is no such precept as developer-mandated undergarments, and two adults may be free to enjoy each other’s company, however they choose.

—

“Oh, Miss Addison, I’d thought I might need to wake you up.” Dr Grey entered, clipboard in hand. “You look different; are you feeling alright?”

“I feel great,” Edith said with a smile. Her hands were folded atop the barely-covered stomach, which lay between her legs like a boulder. “Are we ready?”

“We’re ready if you are; the delivery room is prepped and our technician is standing by.”

“Then let’s go!”

A nurse helped Edith into a wheelchair, now fully being too heavy to walk. She looked big enough to be carrying sextuplets, but the weight of her belly was much greater than even that, and everyone agreed it was best to not put undue strain on her body.

The ride to the birthing room seemed endless, the path turning this way and that, and Edith wanting nothing more than to be finished with all of it. She felt like she was up for anything, and waiting was agonizing.

The technician was waiting in the delivery room, a middle-aged woman with a stern face and glasses. Her labcoat and name-badge set her apart from the doctors.

“This must be Miss Addison,” she said, coming over and extending a hand.

“I am,” Edith shook her hand, feeling like she should be standing up.

“I’m Dr Neal—that’s phD, not MD—Don’t worry, you’re in good hands. We’ll have you back up and about in no-time.”

“Obviously, this isn’t going to be a normal birth,” said Dr Grey. “But we’ll do our best to keep you comfortable.”

“Your implant has certain advantages, such as being able to contract powerfully without cramps, and not needing to wait for your cervix to dilate. Normally, the main limiter in births with an artificial uterus is the safety of the child, but that’s not an issue here, obviously.”

“We’ll be controlling things, just let us know when you’re ready to push, and we’ll give it a go.”

“Thanks,” Edith said, still trying to take in all the information. “Should I get in the bed?”

“If you want to,” said Dr Grey. “Whatever’s most comfortable for you. We have a pool set up, if that sounds better. No water in it, but we can fill it, if you’d like.”

“I’ll try that.”

They wheeled her over to the other side of the room, where a kiddie pool was set up. Dr Grey helped her up out of the wheelchair, then supported her as she sat down in the empty pool with a thump.

She sat there awkwardly for a minute, catching her breath, before realizing she should probably remove her gown.

Naked and a little embarrassed, Edith sat in the pool and felt enormous. Her belly almost reached her knees, spreading her legs a little more than what was comfortable as it fought for space. Her back arched, and she tried to lean back to get comfortable, but found that her womb—pinned down by the immense weight within—refused to move, and leaning back strained her skin painfully.

“Everything alright?” Dr Grey crouched beside the pool, putting the plugs of her stethoscope into her ear.

“Yeah,” Edith winced, using her arms to help her adjust how she was sitting. “Just a little—oof—heavy.” She flinched as the cold bell of the stethoscope touched her warm, sensitive skin.

Dr Grey listened intently for a few moments before looking up.

“Are we ready, Dr Neal?”

“Ready.” Dr Neal held up her tablet and pressed something on the screen. “Alright, I have just shut off production.”

“I don’t feel any different.” Some part of Edith’s mind had expected a sign that things were changing.

“The implant is intentionally quiet and unobtrusive—Dyson-Weilig makes only the best. Now, if you’ll get into position, I’ll initiate the birth.”

With Dr Grey’s help, Edith got into a crouching position, leaning forward a bit to gently rest the outer curve of her belly against the bottom of the pool. From here, she could help balance and support herself either with her hands in front of her, or by holding onto the edge of the pool behind.

She took as deep a breath as she could, and gave Dr Neal the signal to go ahead.

At first she felt nothing. So much nothing, in fact, that she was about to ask if it had started, but as she opened her mouth, she felt the pressure. It was a slow and gentle sensation deep inside her, and when she placed a hand on her belly, she thought she could feel a bit of movement in her womb.

“Your implant is beginning to contract. It will increase the power slowly until it finds how much necessary to reduce its volume by a certain amount. Effectively, it needs to figure out the resistance of the object, and then overcome that to...erm...extrude the mass of nanobots.”

“Ugh, I’m like a Play-Doh toy.”

“Or a pasta machine, if that makes you feel better,” Dr Grey smiled.

“Even though there’s no real chance of injury, it’s best we take it slowly. The implant needs a lot of energy, and it’s going to get that from you. Doing this in stages will reduce the draining effects and allow your birth canal to dilate more naturally.”

Edith was still tripped-up by the idea of squeezing the Blob out of her like toothpaste from a tube, but was very quickly caught off-guard by new sensation: movement.

“H-hey, I think something’s happening!”

“Yes, it looks like we’ve found the correct pressure setting. The nanobot mass has begun to enter your birth canal.”

“Now, Edith,” Dr Grey put a hand on her arm supportively. “If anything feels wrong, let us know and we can stop it at the drop of a hat. If you get tired, we can take a break to rest up and recover.

“I’m good, I’m good. Let’s do this.” Edith draped one arm over her belly and held the edge of the pool with the other, preparing herself mentally. “Hit it!”

Dr Neal pressed another button and immediately, the pressure resumed. It was just at the base of her stomach, right above her pubic bone, and very slowly moving downwards. She wasn’t actually pushing—couldn’t feel the contraction except as the slow relieving of tension in her overtaxed skin and the stretching of her birth canal—but the uterine implant was in full operation, squeezing hard as a ball of iron inside of her.

Her breathing hitched, then began to speed up, her body demanding more oxygen as her cells were depleted of their energy.

“Your heart-rate is up, is everything alright?” Dr Grey pressed the stethoscope against Edith’s back to listen.

“Yeah, just feeling that drain you mention. And…I think it’s about to come out,” she panted.

“I’m not surprised it’s tiring you out—your implant is outputting almost ten times the normal amount of pressure for a birth. That’s almost a full atmosphere, or the equivalent of diving around ten meters.” Dr Neal’s eyes were on the tablet.

“That…” Edith paused to breathe. “Doesn’t sound like much.”

“Well, when it’s inside your body it’s a lot.”

“Are you okay? Do you need a break?” Asked Dr Grey.

Edith nodded mutely, and Dr Neal switched it off. She leaned forward on her belly for support as she rested.

“Can you feel where it is?”

Edith nodded again, and reached down to find her lips bulged outwards, slightly parted to bare a sliver of something hard and smooth—the end of the pseudopod her body was trying to expel.

“It’s no good, she doesn’t have the strength to keep it up.” Dr Grey patted her reassuringly and looked back to Dr Neal.

Edith tried to indicate otherwise, but decided it wasn’t worth the trouble. Instead, she sipped at the apple juice Dr Grey was offering her.

“Well, we could reduce the pressure and increase the size of the cervical aperture, but that would put more strain on the birth canal.”

“What?” Edith managed, already feeling a little better for her break.

“If we make the Play-Doh hole bigger, it’ll take less energy, but we need to make sure it’ll still fit out of you.”

“What are we at now?” Dr Grey used a towel to dab at Edith’s forehead.

“9cm, which means we’ve got some room to spare. The average size of the female pelvic inlet is around 135mm by 110mm, and depending on how much relaxin she’s been producing those numbers may be negotiable. 100mm is what we usually look for in birth.”

“I can do it.” Edith nodded.

“Take another minute to rest first, it’ll also help with the stretching,” said Dr Grey.

It was a long minute, and Edith felt the undeniable urge to push. Feeling the Blob filling her—now on the threshold of emerging—some instinct demanded she continue, relieve the pressure and birth her “child.”

She waited, trembling, until she couldn’t take it anymore, and was about to try and push when Dr Grey asked if she was ready.

“YES.”

“Alright, 100mm.”

The odd sense of movement returned, and Edith felt her lips slowly opening around the rounded end of the Blob. It wasn’t as quick this time, and not as tiring, but there was a feeling of resistance within her, the now-wider section beginning to work its way into her birth canal.

She bore down a little, but found it made no difference if she tried to push or not. Better not to waste the energy, she decided, distracted herself with the burning sensation that began as the Blob crowned.

Edith bit her lip, wiggling her hips a little as if to work the mass downward, and did her best to breathe as Dr Grey was instructing her. It was less comfortable, but also less tiring than before, and she thought she got the better half of that trade.

“Can we go bigger?” Her eyes were shut as she focused.

“Let’s hold off a little longer,” said Dr Grey. “Let’s see how you continue to handle the 100mm. If I may?” she got up on her knees and reached underneath, her fingers moving along the length of the silvery protrusion. Edith could feel her touching it, the gentle pressure being transferred to her body as the Blob was moved a little this way and that inside her. “I’d say we’ve got about 3 inches out.”

“There’s a lot more left.”

“Once I feel the diameter increase, if things are still going well, we’ll try going bigger.”

Edith’s eternal contraction continued, and Dr Grey stroked her hand up and down the smooth length of the emerging mass, now and then feeling her labia for signs of strain. There was a gentle but noticeable difference, the sensation of tightness growing more intense as the girth increased by another centimeter.

It was strange. The Blob was smooth enough that she hardly felt it moving against her inner walls, instead she experienced an incredible fullness, her body trying to expand around the massive load it was expelling. It didn’t hurt, it wasn’t uncomfortable, but it was a wild and all-consuming sensation, something like being impaled without injury.

“Okay, that’s 10cm,” Dr Grey announced. “How are you feeling?”

Edith gave a thumbs-up, continuing to breathe rather than talk.

“I’ll up it to 105mm, and if that goes well we’ll add another 5.”

Things seemed to be progressing with glacial slowness, the steady increase in pressure told Edith that it was speeding up. Already her belly felt lighter, a little less strain on the skin and her legs as she crouched. When she was fully up to 11cm, she called for more.

“No, that’s too much.” Dr Neal’s voice was flat and final.

“She is doing well with the new size.” Dr Grey dissented.

“I need another rest,” said Edith, leaning back against the edge of the pool. For the first time, she looked down, seeing the nanobots lying in the bottom of the pool. Though stiff, the Blob was beginning to flatten under its own weight, seeming to melt into a pool of silver. “Just one minute.”

She regretted saying a minute, as she was once again struck with the urge to push, the pressure even stronger now than before. On a whim, she grasped the Blob as it hung out of her and tried to pull, but it was far too smooth to grasp firmly, and she made no progress. She wanted to just grab the thing and pull it out in one go, but it was only a fantasy of her tired mind.

“Okay,” said Dr Neal at the end of the minute. “I’ll go to 115mm, but you keep an eye on her.”

Dr Grey gave a reassuring thumbs up and helped Edith get back into position.

Edith was determined to get this over now, no more resting. She’d get it all out in one more go.

“Give me thirty seconds,” she said determinedly. “Then another 5mm.”

Dr Neal looked at her doubtfully, but Edith would not relent.

“Whatever, it’s your body.”

Edith’s belly was greatly reduced now, seeming to be an almost-reasonable pregnancy, except for the amorphous lump of chrome emerging from her. She tried to focus on her goal to keep up her strength, but the pressure, the stretching, the ever-growing ache in her pelvis consumed her mind. She could feel it—this was her limit, and yet when Dr Neal asked, she found herself nodding for more.

She was hardly able to stay on her feet, feeling like her hips would pop, but she had to press on—had to get it over with. As the width grew by the last, slow millimeters, she did push down, squeezing her rounded belly and hoping she didn’t break anything.

With one last, echoing THUMP, the Blob dropped out completely, and Edith fell forward on her hands. The next moments were a blur, the doctors helping support her, making sure she was alright. Words passed through the air, seeming to miss her ears as she reeled.

When her mind cleared, she found herself lying in the bed, an IV already in her hand and an indescribable sense of exhaustion deep down in her bones. One of the doctors—Grey, she thought—was next to her.

“Forty-one pounds, ten ounces,” she said, patting Edith’s hand. “A new hospital record, for sure.”

“What are you going to do with it?” she asked distantly.

“Well, it’s technically yours, and we cut it off before it transferred any of the cryptocurrency it mined, so I guess that’s yours to keep. If you hook it up to power, it should keep functioning.”

Edith drifted off even before the answer was complete.

—

She came back to a vague awareness as she was moved back to her room, seeing the nurse finish positioning her bed, then go to the door, which opened before she could reach for the handle.

Standing there was a tall, thin woman with bright red hair and an expression of mingled worry and relief. One hand held flowers and the other the leash of a mylar balloon bearing the inscription “Get Well Soon!!”

Description
Future-Proof
by Miss Mouse
The beast roared, turning itself to hide its wounded flank from the knight. Its head—not quite lupine, not quite equine—lowered to point its lethal horns against its adversary, readying itself for their next pass.

The Dwarven knight was breathing hard, her gleaming breastplate splattered with blood and dirt, the steel cut open at the waist, baring a patch of torn flesh. She raised her longsword to ward the creature off, her other hand beginning the motions of a spell of curing, hoping to recover some strength before the fight came to its end.

Seeing the knight’s attention split, the chimera pounced, throwing its full weight atop the warrior, who fell backwards under it. There was commotion, the beast flailing and clawing wildly as it struggled to finish its prey, the point of a sword standing out between its shoulder blades.

The movement stilled, and the knight rolled the monster off of herself, drawing out her sword and wiping blood from her lip. As she got to her feet, she watched in anticipation as corpse began to smoke, its material body dissolving, sublimating into the ether.

The beast faded, leaving behind a small pile of gold coins.

“Oh come on!” The knight shouted in frustration, kicking a nearby rock off into the forest. “That’s the fifth one in a row! What does that old man even need fifteen chimera livers for, anyway?!”

She rubbed her eyes and logged out, the world vanishing and being replaced by her Workspace. Here, she pulled up a desk chair and plopped down into it, still fuming about the unfairness of RNG. The Realm was a fun game, but it was a grind.

A soft light appeared in the air, and a pleasant “Ding!” rang out, drawing her from her self-pity. An email, probably someone at work looking for a shift covered. She tapped on it without checking, her eyes looking down at the readout on her wrist to check her heart-rate.

As much of a workout as playing the Realm felt like, it really didn’t do much other than cardio. She wasn’t actually moving, after all; her implants kept her paralyzed while in VR. Still the adrenaline rush was real and that meant it was exhausting.

ert+
y76p; '0lu8jykee;u4p;e'/Rh
edi15456`-------++++++gf
+++++-//==========/*8901ikg

The spam mail did not improve her mood.

Edith dismissed it with a wave of her hand before jacking out and returning to the real world.

She’d modeled her Workspace after her room, though in reality she was lying on her bed, not sitting in her chair. She stayed on her back for a bit, waiting for the tingling in her nerves to subside before getting up to eat.

Workspace and its many add-ons, plug-ins, and extensions (including games like the Realm, communication systems, and even stock-market apps) made use of Dyson-Weilig brand implants, originally created for medical applications, but now readily available for recreational purposes. Most people had them and used them daily for everything from teleconferencing to ordering pizza off of a website.

All you needed was the neural implant, allowing the program to intercept signals between the brain and the body, which it used to make you see and feel whatever it needed. Lots of people had additional implants—some medical, some recreational—and these all networked together through a single system.

A patient with an artificial heart could upload status reports to their doctor’s office, or two people with muscular implants could arm-wrestling using their actual strength. The future was cool, but Edith wasn’t really interested in making her VR any more realistic than it already was.

She went to the kitchen, made a sandwich, and got a message from her co-worker and friend, Jane, not asking for a shift to be covered, but asking if she wanted to try out the new “Toxic Depths” dungeon in the Realm once she got off work. As fed-up as she was with the game, she did want to see what new gear they’d added…

—

“What seems to be the problem, Miss Addison?” Dr Vance came into the room, her eyes on the tablet displaying Edith’s chart. There was a three-dimensional model, showering a short, dark girl with big eyes and curly hair.

“I feel really ‘blech’ today. Dizziness, my stomach’s upset… I feel weak.”

“And these symptoms just started today?”

“Well… I was playing some games with co-worker last night and got hit with a ‘poison’ condition. It’s not quite the same, but I was wondering if maybe there was a problem with my implant, maybe causing some lingering effects.

“It’s possible, but I’ll need to take a closer look. Lay back on the table for me let’s see how you are.”

Edith laid down and shut her eyes, feeling a soft pinging in her head as her neural implant connected to Dr Vance’s tablet and began to undergo diagnostics.

“Now, I’m not saying there’s no issue with your implant, but your entrance check-up showed that your iron is low; have you had any issues with anemia before?” Dr Vance kept her eyes on the tablet, looking or any abnormalities in the read-outs.

“No, I don’t think so.”

“Well, I’ll prescribe you a supplement and we’ll see in a few weeks how your levels are. Anemia could very well be the issue here, but we’ll check everything just to be sure.”

Edith twiddled her thumbs impatiently as she waited, careful not to move around too much and affect the reading.

“Your neural implant is functioning perfectly, according to this. Your body temperature is slightly elevated, though, and I see an ongoing process in your uterine implant, but there’s no worklog available; do you have a menstruation module installed?”

“My uterus? No, I don’t have it doing anything.” Edith had had a hysterectomy in college after a scan revealed a tumor. It was benign, but given her family history, they opted to remove the uterus and implant an artificial one, which would continue to provide hormones in the organ’s absence and allow her to have children eventually.

“Well, it’s definitely producing...something…your blood-test showed some elevated hormone levels; it may be overproducing. I’d like to do a sonogram and a diagnostic test on your uterus, just to see what’s going on, exactly.”

This made Edith nervous, but better to do the tests and find the problem than to live in ignorance and find out too late. After a short stint in another waiting room (which she passed by anxiously checking and re-checking her news feed), they led her into the exam room and had her lay down on yet another table. A tech came in, wheeling the ultrasound machine next to the table and setting it up. Dr Vance was close behind her, looking over the results of the already in-progress technical scan of her uterus.

“Could you roll up your shirt for me?” Asked the tech in a polite and well-rehearsed tone.

“What do you expect to find?” Edith did as she was asked, revealing her soft, brown stomach. She wiggled her skirt a little lower on her hips so the tech had more room to work.

“Well, I don’t know what to expect, honestly.” Dr Vance adjusted her glasses with a sigh. “Your uterus is processing a build-order as if you were undergoing pregnancy, but there’s no entry in your worklog for it to be doing anything other than hormone production.”

“I thought it couldn’t do that without getting an additional implant?” Edith’s voice rose in pitch as her worry grew stronger.

“Well, that’s just to provide the organic seed for creating a child. Basically, we take DNA from your partner and create an egg from it, which we implant and the uterus then processes, injecting your DNA and using the product as the base for the child it creates. See, the artificial uterus is effectively and expandable 3D Printer, and the seed gives it the information needed to create a child based off of the two parents’ DNA sets. Once the first few cells are finished, nature takes over. It’s the same technology it uses to regulate your hormones, just making a baby instead of estrogen.”

Edith listened to this, wide-eyed as the technician placed the wand against her abdomen, a vague, three-dimensional imagine beginning to form on the screen.

“So, I’m pregnant?”

“Not necessarily—your body’s making something, but it’s probably not a child. In fact, I highly doubt it is.”

“What else could it be?” She looked at the screen, a colorless image of her uterus becoming clearer and clearer as the wand took more readings.

“Well, have you installed any unknown VR programs lately? Done anything usual with something that had access to your implants?”

“Doctor, take a look at this.” The tech pointed at the screen, which now showed a fully-formed three-dimensional model of her uterus. She made a gesture over the screen and it split the model in half, showing the inside to the observers. There was a small amount of amorphous material inside of it, which seemed to be moving very slightly.

“What’s that?” Edith gauped at the screen.

“Well, based on the amount of carbon and silicone being produced, I would say…some sort of electrical system. A machine, perhaps.”

—

Initially, Edith had taken the news of her pseudo-pregnancy very poorly, but after the sedatives wore off and she was safe and sound in her hospital bed the next day, eating a bowl of nutritionally-enriched Jell-O and watching reruns of The Match Game, she felt a lot better about a lot of things.

Extra food intake had done wonders for her symptoms, ensuring that her womb wasn’t taking so much of her nutrients that there wouldn’t be any left for her, and all the doctors had assured her that she was perfectly safe.

“Unfortunately, whatever virus got into you is doing a good job of keeping us out,” a hospital technician had assured her. “Yours is an older model and its security software is outdated. You should have received an email about two years ago?” The technician’s tone told her that she knew full-well that Edith hadn’t bothered to come in and get it the new chip installed that would allow her to update to the more modern firmware.

“Oh, uhm, I must have missed that,” Edith lied. “Maybe my spam-filter caught it.”

“Well, it certainly didn’t catch the virus you opened that got you into this mess. Same thing happened to a woman in Oregon last year.”

Snarky techs aside, things weren’t so bad; her insurance covered this as a “medical implant mishap,” and as such she was on sick-leave from work for the foreseeable future. The doctors said it could take a little while for them to unlock the system and remove the mass, so until then she was sleeping, eating, taking walks around the hospital, and playing games.

What was less-relaxing was the rate at which stomach had begun to swell. Her uterus was still adding to the Blob (that’s what she called it, based on its appearance on the scans), and the more she ate the bigger it got. By the end of her first day in the hospital (about forty-eight hours after she opened the spam email) she looked nearly six months pregnant, her belly rounded out under her gown.

Dr Grey, who was in charge now that she was in the hospital, theorized it should have stopped growing already, so as to prevent detection, but any number of things could have caused a hiccup in the program.

Her breasts were also growing, her uterus producing pregnancy hormones alongside the Blob. This was a source of discomfort for her, but they gave her some cream and told her to massage herself with it three times a day to help with elasticity and prevent stretch-marks.

She elected to do this ritual in her shower, which had a seat she could sit on and be alone. The bathroom was bright and roomy, and the warm water felt good on her skin, so she’d taken to showering twice a day, using the cream after each time, and once at noon in between.

Edith’s chest had always been modest—she’d put on some weight in college and had been excited to go up to a C then, but once she started working she’d shed the excess weight and her bust-size with it. Now, she’d recovered that size, and was likely to keep growing, still.

In the bathroom, she examined her profile, placing her hands at the top of her rounded belly so that her breasts rested on top of them. Her nipples had darkened, grown larger, more sensitive, and they rubbed uncomfortably against her gown as she walked.

Beneath her hands her stomach felt warm, solid. It had very little give, just a layer of fat for cushioning, with no amniotic fluid. The Blob was a machine, and it was processing something—mining cryptocurrency was the prevailing theory—and that meant it was putting off heat. It wasn’t hot, more like pleasantly warm, and the heat was soothing on her sore back.

Aside from rate of progression, the largest divergence from a regular pregnancy was the weight. The Blob was more dense than a baby, and she was already beginning to feel the strain on her hips and spine.

Rubbing slow, gentle strokes over the curve of her belly, feeling the odd sensation of the tightening skin beneath her fingertips, the faint vibration—imperceptible unless her hands were moving—as her womb and the Blob thrummed away.

She was bigger than she had been that morning.

—

“We’re making progress,” Dr Grey assured her. She was an older woman with hair to match her name. “That’s the important thing.”

“Well, I’m making progress, too.” Edith gestured at her stomach, a smooth dome under her blanket. “And I don’t like it.”

Dr Grey sighed.

“Keep taking your supplements and we’ll have you out of here in no time.”

Edith was unconvinced. Her second day in the hospital, and she looked VERY ready to give birth, her belly heavy and sensitive, a dark line running down its center. Her belly button poked out through the gown like a nipple.

She had just settled in from dinner, and was planning to take a shower, but as Dr Grey left, someone sent her a message.

Hey, want to hit the Depths again? I read online that there’s a secret in the Fungal Arboretum that lets you into a hidden quest area.
-Jane

It was Jane, which lifted her spirits considerably.

Yeah, I’ll meet you at the Survivors’ Camp in 15.
-Edith

She didn’t really feel like playing (she’d probably talk Jane out of doing any strenuous adventuring) but she had no friends in the hospital, and the Blob wasn’t good for conversation.

Laying back and shutting her eyes, Edith touched the initiator on her implant’s contact plate, just behind her ear. She was briefly nowhere, and then she was in her Workplace, sitting in her chair.

She stayed there for a bit, enjoying the familiar space of her home. Homesickness coiled in her chest, and she went over and plopped down on her bed to try and relieve it. As she opened her eyes, she saw her round belly arching up above her, her avatar’s shirt having grown to accommodate it, stretching out the band logo on its front.

Edith sighed. Her ersatz uterus was part of the network; its condition and size were integrated into the system that made the VR so realistic, same as her neural implant. Even in the virtual world, she couldn’t escape the Blob.

At least it didn’t weigh anything here, and she could adjust her avatar’s settings to remove it, but instead she opened up her app menu and logged in to the Realm.

The Toxic Depths smelled like dirt and rotting vegetation, and with her body full of pregnancy hormones, it was almost too much for Edith to take. It was enough to make her dizzy and nauseous, but she used a Teleport scroll and was whisked away to the Survivors’ Camp on the outskirts of the Plaguelands. The Toxic Depths were just underground and the smell lingered, but it was covered by the scent of smoke and civilization.

There was no inn here, but a drinkhouse overlooking the ruins of the old castle served meat and ale. We should have met somewhere else, Edith thought as she sat on one of the makeshift stools at the counter. The air was damp and the food the bartender brought her was little more than scraps of meat on skewers, grilled over coals.

The ale was watery, too.

“Edy!”

Edith turned to see a tall, slim High Elf walk into the bar, a row of gleaming daggers in her belt. Jane played the game with a sense of flair, spending money on cosmetic gear and other niceties. Her gold-detailed boots and Everian Silk Blouse made her stand out among the refugees that populated the town.

“Hey, Jane, how’re you?” Edith said, obviously tired.

“How am I? How are you?! Look at yourself!” She gestured wildly as she crossed to the bar and took a seat. The bartender immediately brought her food and drink, and she started on it almost as quickly.

“Oh, I’m alright, more tired than anything.” Edith leaned back on the bar, sticking her belly out in front of her. Like in her Workplace, her armor had adapted to her new shape, which quite frankly looked ridiculous.

Jane poked the metal shell of her friend’s breastplate, and took a swig of ale.

“So what’s it like being pregnant?”

“I’m not pregnant, you weirdo.”

“You look pregnant to me,” she shrugged. “Can you fight like that?”

“Yeah, it doesn’t weigh anything here, but IRL it weighs a freakin’ ton.” Edith patted her stomach, causing a ringing sound. “Yesterday I walked around the hospital a lot, but it was too much, today.”

“We were talking about getting a group together to come visit you. Y’know, bring flowers and a ‘get well soon’ balloon.”

“Oh PLEASE don’t do that!” Edith was horrified at the idea. “I don’t want anyone to see me like this.”

“You look fine to me,” Jane smirked, taking a bite of her kebab.

“I feel like a whale.”

Jane shrugged.

Edith started to pick at her food, but never really ate with the same gusto as Jane. The two of them made a good team, though Jane was always the more enthusiastic player.

It was good to spend time with a friend after two days in the hospital with no one to talk to but nurses. It felt good. It felt…normal.

They spent almost an hour talking and eating, and when they got up, they both found themselves quite dizzy with drink.

“Ugh, I shouldn’t be drinking.” Edith held her head. She’d changed out of her armor and was now wearing a rustic tunic, fitting her character’s background as a farmer. She was a dwarf, short broad and brown, and with her big belly she looked adorable (or so Jane said).

“I thought you weren’t pregnant?” Jane smiled devilishly.

Edith looked at her and smile cracking into laughter, and Jane fell to laughing along with her.

“And don’t you have work in the morning?” Edith and Jane walked out of the drinkhouse and down the path to the castle. The Plaguelands were desolate, but there was a beauty to their emptiness, and they smelled better than the Survivors’ Camp.

“You can’t get a hangover if the alcohol isn’t real,” Jane winked, tapping the side of her head.

Edith shrugged. It was true, the Drunk effect wasn’t quite the same as real alcohol, and it wore off as soon as you logged out of the Realm (or jacked-out of VR, depending on your settings), but it was still fun, and Edith had really missed her friend.

The sun was setting as they walked the old switch-back trail down the cliffside, and at the base they came to the old courtyard of the castle. There wasn’t anything there, no enemies, no quests…It was all part of an old event that was over and done with, but Edith and Jane had explored it top to bottom in their idle days of playing. Now they wandered up the one tower that remained standing and sat facing west out towards the sunset.

“Ah, I still need to shower tonight.” Edith yawned, leaning against one of the crenelations.

“Yeah, it must be hard work lying around in a hospital all day.” Jane teased, taking a seat beside her.

“Ugh, you’d be surprised. I feel like I’ve gotten bigger since we started hanging out.” She shifted a little, sticking out her round belly and patting it. It did look bigger.

“Oof, yeah you look huge.”

“I feel huge.”

The two spent a few long moments looking at her stomach, thinking how strange it was.

“Hey, can I feel it?” Jane’s voice cracked, and she looked nervously at her friend.

“If you aren’t afraid it’s contagious.” Now Edith was doing the teasing. She hiccuped once, and then slowly rolled up the hem of her tunic, revealing the great curve of her belly.

“W-wow,” Jane swallowed audibly, reaching out one tentative hand to touch it.

“I hadn’t actually looked at it in-game yet,” she said, looking down at the brown skin of her stomach. Its scale was changed to fit her Dwarf body, but with her relatively short arms and legs she looked even bigger.

“Does it look different?” Jane pressed her fingers against its surface, finding it hard and smooth, not quite what she expected.

“Yeah, there’s no line, and the skin doesn’t look stretched. I dunno, it’s just…different. My belly-button is still in, too.” Edith put her finger in her navel.

Jane had both her hands fully on it now, rubbing big circles across its surface. She just stared, mesmerized.

“What does it feel like?” she asked at length.

“Sensitive, tight. It’s heavy, too.”

“Does it hurt at all?”

“No. My boobs do, though.”

“Really?”

“Oh yeah, you should see me now.” Edith held her hands out in front of her chest to indicate an exaggerated size. “I guess there’s nothing there to let the system know it’s changed.”

Edith opened her character menu and went to adjust the build sliders, moving her bust size back and forth rapidly between two extremes. After laughing to herself for a second, she settled on what she estimated to be her new real-world size and exited out, taking a moment to lift and play with her breasts and see if it looked right.

“Oh my gosh,” Jane stared, openly shocked at the changes in her friend’s body.

“Yeah.” Edith said proudly. “They do hurt though. The doctors gave me some stuff to rub on them and my stomach to help with the stretching. Here,” she grabbed the rolled hem of her shirt and pulled it up over her head, revealing her plain, developer-designed bra, and her two, full breasts within it.

Jane still had her hands on Edith’s belly, her wide eyes moving slowly up from belly, to breasts, to Edith’s round face. They stared at each other, both feeling what was happening, neither thinking to—wanting to—stop it. Jane slowly leaned in, her hands sliding to hold Edith at the hips, chest pressing against the generic softness of her breasts.

Edith shut her eyes, her mouth opening slightly, head leaning back in anticipation, acceptance. Jane felt her breath, felt her heat, and through the drink-haze of the evening, she saw her.

And she pulled back.

“I—uh, I have to go. Work. Sorry.” She half-stood, fading away as she logged out, one last “Sorry” hanging in the air.

Edith sat alone on the tower, and the evening felt cold.

—

The Drunk effect was gone instantly, but Edith felt dazed, unable to think as she stumbled across the floor to the bathroom. What was that? Was that real? It all felt like a dream, but it didn’t fade away, didn’t change and morph in unreality.

She dropped onto the shower seat like a bag of sand.

It was…unexpected. She hadn’t thought of Jane like that—not seriously, not soberly—but at the time, it felt so right. It felt so…natural. She sat and looked over at the mirror, seeing the strange thing she had become through tear-blurred eyes.

Loneliness weighed on her like a cold brick.

Her mind was a boiling mix of emotions, one she couldn’t sort through, couldn’t begin to decipher. She was tired. She was different. And the more she tried to examine what had happened, what she felt about it, the more one single question surfaced in her mind:

Why did she stop?

Edith cried until the tears stopped, then sat under the running shower until she was done. Her towels were soft and warm, and she lay on her side on the bathroom floor, her hands on her monstrous belly.

She wasn’t sad. She wasn’t hurt. She just felt so terribly alone.

Eventually, Edith pulled herself to her feet and started to leave, only to see the bottle of lotion sitting on the counter. She wanted to go to sleep, but the skin of her belly was itching, and her breasts were sore and swollen, so she took the bottle and sat back down on the shower stool.

The lotion was cool in her palm, white and creamy, but it spread a tingling, soothing warmth over the tight skin of her stomach. Gosh, she was huge; what would she have thought just a few days ago, if she had seen herself like this?

It was strange, alien. Cold and violating. She was suddenly a pregnant woman with no child to love, no support to help her through. Inside her, the Blob hummed away, vibrating beneath her fingertips as she rubbed slow, smooth circles. It felt so weird, so hard and sensitive and unlike anything she’d ever known before.

The warming sensation of the lotion had a way stimulating the nerves; as if waking them up from the long, numbing strain of stretching more and more around her heavy burden. Now, they sang with electricity, soothed and refreshed by the medicine and touch.

Slowly, Edith’s circling hands moved up to her breasts, which sat perched atop her belly, round and full. It was sometimes easy to forget about them—they were smaller, weighed less, did not hum or vibrate—but when she began to knead them in her palms, they lit up like fireworks. Where once her modest, well-formed breasts had been a pleasant handful, now they large and impressive, their soft, fatty give growing into a lovely firmness. Because of this, they kept their round shape as they wobbled atop her belly, not flattening out despite their weight.

Her nipples were dark and swollen, the bumps of her areolas clear beneath her fingertips, their jutting points hard and electric as she began to work the lotion in. It felt good, and the feeling only grew as she lifted them, squeezing the smooth curves of her breasts gently—then a little harder, enjoying the sense of fullness and pressure.

For a while, at least, her mind was on the sensations of her body, and that was all that mattered.

Edith repositioned, leaning back against the wall of the shower and feeling the weight of her belly as it pressed against her. She could feel it, deep inside her, vibrating as it settled in the bowl of her pelvis. Wrapping her arms around her belly, the buzzing sensation amplified, no longer dissipating through the tissues and fat of her abdomen, but directly moving directly against her nerves and skeleton.

She gave a slow and stuttering exhale, her fingers jittering over the tingling skin of her stomach, feeling strange through the effects of the lotion. Slipping down the smooth, round sides of her belly, she moved her hands beneath it, feeling its immense weight, and then lower, finding herself warm and ready.

Though her heart was tired, confused, her body had responded eagerly, and in the interim had waited, unfulfilled, until the need had grown into a suffering ache. Now Edith traced her fingers over her lips, gently parting them and feeling the warmth they contained. Her clitoris tingled, and she brushed her thumb against it, savoring the jolt of almost-painful need, her gentle, glancing touches increasing her desire rather than sating it.

Carefully inserting two fingers into herself, she rubbed up, pressing against her inner walls and feeling a shock race through her whole body. A tremor ran down her leg, kicking and twitching in sudden, inexorable excitement. She couldn’t stop herself, her fingers rubbing and spreading, tracing shapes in her depths, her thumb stroking against her clitoris, struggling to keep going, to maintain a rhythm long enough to finish.

Edith could feel the machine her body had built, so close now, humming like a vibrator in her womb.

Her other hand came back up, pressing the strained nub of her belly button, forced out by the pressure beneath. The muscles of her abdomen twitched, reacting almost ticklishly, but unable to contract over its heavy, metallic contents.

She grabbed her breast—a little too ungently at first, being so eager that she sent a bolt of pain through herself. Taking a moment, she lifted its spilling heft, bringing the engorged nipple to her mouth and taking it in her lips. She licked and sucked, pulling deeply at her nipple, hand moving to her other breast, the other still diving and rubbing at her nethers.

Her hips struggled to move beneath the weight of her belly, trying to twitch and buck against her hand. The passion of it all consumed her, moving through her body like a rushing stream. It worked her into a frenzy, breaking at the crest and coming down in an intense and bone-shaking orgasm, threatening to knock her from the shower stool.

Edith felt her mouth fill with warm, sweet milk, coaxed out by her ministrations and the pressure in her breasts. It overflowed her, spilling out and running down the sides of her belly in two trickling lines.

Weak and trembling—her hand still rubbing her clitoris through the long, lingering aftershocks of her orgasm—she lowered herself to the floor of the shower, the weight of her belly almost pulling it down to the tiles as she crouched on her knees.

Unable to support her burden on her knees and one arm, she rolled onto her side and laid there, pinching and playing with herself with growing laxity until—after long minutes—the shudders and flashes of ecstacy subsided, and she was alone again.

—

“Are you feeling alright today, Miss Addison?” The nurse asked, pausing in the process of hooking up an IV.

“I’m fine,” Edith replied with a hollow distance.

“I noticed you’ve stopped taking your walks around the hospital. Is it too heavy?”

“Yeah.” She lay on her side, the weight of her belly too much to bear otherwise.

“If you’d like, I can get you a wheelchair. Fresh air might make you feel better.

“I’m fine,” she repeated, sounding no more convincing than before.

After finishing with the IV, the nurse left, closing the door with one final look of pity. She wanted to help, but Edith didn’t want it. All she wanted to do was lay in bed, the thing inside her running processes or mining crypto or doing whatever it was that it did.

She felt fine, just empty.

It was the early afternoon, but her memories still played over and over in her head. Why had she done that? What had possessed her? It was stupid, and had done nothing but embarrassed her. Now she just stared at the IV in her hand, not even listening to the drone of the television.

Hey,
I wanted to talk to you. About last night, I mean.
I just… I have some things I want to say.
-Edith

She’d sent Jane the message, pressing the button before giving herself a moment’s thought to reconsider. She put herself out there, and silence answered her.

The hours passed without a response. Even if Jane was working, she’d have checked her mail on her break. Edith had had one person to comfort her, and she’d chased her off.

“Am I really that disgusting?” she muttered through tears, her eyes on the oversized hospital gown that now strained uncomfortably across her front.

No one answered, no one said she was wrong. No one said anything, and so she laid there, passing in and out through the borders of sleep, not knowing where her dreams ended and her memories began.

“Miss Addison?”

Edith was jolted from her half-sleep, finding the room orange with the light of evening. Dr Grey was standing by the bed, holding her charts. She saw her dinner sitting in its tray on the nightstand.

“Sorry to wake you, Edith, but I’ve got good news!” Dr Grey paused, waiting for her patient to fully awaken before continuing. “Our systems have cracked the virus’ code, meaning we can now unlock your uterus, and put and end to this whole, weird mess.”

Edith half-tired to sit up, but fell back to her pillow after it proved more trouble than it was worth.

“Like, tonight?”

“First thing in the morning, actually. Our lead synthetics technician has already gone home for the day, and we want her there to supervise the delivery.”

“Delivery? You’re not just going to…cut it out?”

“Well,” Dr Grey put her hands on her hips and sighed, obviously hesitant to deliver the difficult news. “As you know, most surgeries are done laparoscopically nowadays. Cesarean sections haven’t been common practice in decades—there’s just not really a need for them with our modern healthcare practices. Your uterine implant isn’t designed to be cut open, and doing it under these kinds of conditions would destroy it. Simply put, your insurance isn’t willing to pay for such drastic actions, and certainly wouldn’t pay to replace the device. Vaginal delivery is the only real option here.”

Edith stared wide-eyed down at her huge belly, wondering how it would ever fit out of her.

“Don’t worry, although it may seem like one big mass, it’s actually a colony of nanobots, and is malleable rather than rigid. Your synthetic uterus is more than capable of squeezing it out of you, and the best part is: no cramps! There may be some discomfort, but none of the muscle cramps that cause so much difficulty in organic births.”

Edith still looked dumbly between herself and her doctor, mouth slightly open as she tried to listen through her shock.

“Just take it easy tonight, and be sure to eat your dinner. I noticed you didn’t finish your lunch.”

“Not hungry,” she said, shaking her head clear. “Too full.” She put one hand on her belly, feeling its soft thrumming through the gown.

“Well, your uterus may be a machine, but it’s powered by you. We’ve been supplementing your diet with IV nutrients to prevent malnutrition, but you still need calories for energy. Take your time, but make sure you eat it all, you’ll need the strength for tomorrow.”

Dr Grey left her to lie quietly in bed and stare at her dinner.

It was hard to believe that in the morning, it would all be over. Harder to believe that in the morning, she’d be giving birth! That seemed an impossible task for a woman who could hardly walk, but the doctor seemed confident in her ability to do it.

She wasn’t hungry, but she knew she should eat, so she took her cup of Jell-O and sipped at it, her mind empty, thoughts seeming to slip from her consciousness as soon as they arrived.

Eating was hard. There wasn’t much room left for her stomach to fill up with food, and the pressure from her womb meant nausea came quickly. So she picked at her meatloaf and mashed potatoes for an hour or so until they were all gone, having adjusted her bed to let her sit upright, her belly between her legs.

There was nothing on TV.

A soft ding drew her attention from a Lingo re-run, an AR notification popping up in her peripheral vision. Her eyes moved to look at it, causing the little envelope icon to expand into a bubble of text, showing the name of the sender and a preview of the message. It was a short message, the whole thing fitting in the preview:

Come to my place in Highdam, 9:00pm
-Jane

It took a few readings to sink in, Edith’s mind not sure what to make of it. Jane wanted to meet with her? Tonight? And in Highdam…the pastoral getaway was haven for the Empire’s nobility looking to escape the hustle and bustle of the city. For player characters, it was one of the most sought-after places to have a personal home. Jane, who took The Realm as seriously as one could with her budget, had one such house, a beautiful Elven villa amidst the falls and streams that came down from the Mountains of Ossin and watered the sloping grasslands below.

Eldewin (as she called it) was Jane’s favorite place to go and be alone and, although she might throw a party here or there to entertain her friends, none but her spent much time in it, not even Edith.

She didn’t even consider not going, her thoughts jumping immediately from the message to the time. It was 8:45; if she logged in now, teleported back to the city, and took the portal to Upmeads, her mount would get her to Highdam just in time.

Edith touched the contact plate behind her ear and the room vanished, fading into the brief darkness between the real and the virtual.

—

Eldewin was a breathtaking construction of air and arches, falling water and sunlight. The Sedenni river flowed through and around it, the house being built on low islands in its midst, its walls seeming to rise right out of the water like the graceful trunks of willow trees. “Walls” wasn’t the right word; the place seemed to have no walls—seemed hardly to be a house—rather, it was like an open garden, its arches hanging banners of watervines, flowers blooming around its pools, fountains filling the air with prisms, and all throughout it was as clear and airy as lace.

Yet, inside, it seemed quite private, remote. Indeed, the shepherd huts and weaving houses of Highdam were a good walk back down the winding road, hidden by the turns of the mountain. The white arches divided the innermost places with silken curtains, and lower rooms dug down into the stone of the mountain hid new and wondrous sights.

Edith approached the entryway, moving from the stepping-stones that let one cross the water to the last, flat rock before the threshold. As she set foot on it, a small notification appeared, indicating that the homeowner, Lerana (Jane’s character), had put her on the whitelist for entry.

She took one last look back at the wet stones glistening in the evening light, then stepped through the white silk curtain to the open entry hall.

Jane was sitting there on one of the marble benches, her usually tomboy-ish avatar now sporting long, gold-white hair and dressed in a traditional Elven gown, which left her shoulders bare and trailed from her wrists. She looked worried, and was caught off-guard by Edith’s arrival, standing up suddenly to her full, graceful height. Her brow was adorned by a circlet, small gems sparkling among the weaves of silver.

Edith looked down, feeling very out of place in her jerkin and tunic, the dust of the road and the waters of the river mixing to mud on her traveling boots. She’d picked a Dwarf because she wanted to play a Fighter, but now was wishing she was something more presentable than a short and dirty sell-sword.

“Edy,” Jane said almost sadly, but her voice was tinged with relief. She looked down at her friend apologetically.

“H-hey…” Edith didn’t know what to say either.

“Do you…Let’s go to the sitting room.”

Edith followed her a short way to a round section of marble flooring, where the middle was sunken down around a reflecting pool. Around this were a number of chaises for lounging, each covered in a shimmering, white fabric.

The waters of the pool glowed in the warm light of dusk.

Jane waited for Edith to take a seat, then sat beside her. They both looked at the pool for a time, listening to the music that filled the air, one of Jane’s favorites, played by a magic harp that needed no musician. The tinkling of the fountains seemed a part of the song.

“I—” they both began in unison, looking to the other, and then down, embarrassed.

“I’m sorry!” Edith blurted out after a few moments of awkwardness.

“You’re sorry? What for? I was the one… I mean, I tried to uh, to uh… kiss you.” That last was barely audible, the Elf’s graceful countenance crumbled beneath the weight of her mortal emotions.

“For this,” Edith gestured at her body, her round belly looking ridiculous in her computer-generated clothes. “For being…unkissable.”

Jane’s laugh was harmless, warm, a sound of commiserate comedy.

“Gosh, Edy, I didn’t stop because of that.” There was a hint of exasperation in her voice, but it seemed targeted at herself. “I… I stopped because I was afraid you might not…” She sighed, took a deep breath, straightening up and brushing a bit of hair from her face. “I like you, Edy. I like you a lot, but we never talked about it! You never hinted that you might…I didn’t want to be wrong. I didn’t want to ruin this.” She gestured between them.

“You like me? Even like this?” Edith looked down at herself, wondering how that could be possible.

“YES!” Jane said much louder than she intended. “You look beautiful,” she said, more restrained. “Especially like this. I didn’t want to freak you out. I feel bad, because this whole thing’s been so weird and hard for you, and here I am thinking about… about how…” she swallowed hard. “It’s selfish.”

Edith leaned over, putting her hand on Jane’s.

“If it makes you feel better…I like that you like me…like this.”

“Really? You’re not upset? I—I’ve always liked you, y’know, not just now—not just because of this. It was just…” She said defensively.

“I know, I understand.”

“I just thought…” Jane sighed pathetically. “I just didn’t want to take advantage of you because you were drunk.”

“Well,” Edith said quietly, scooting closer to her on the chaise. “I’m not drunk now.” Her eyes, big and dark like jasper, gazed longingly from behind a flutter of lashes.

Her head tilted back, Jane leaning down, careful, as though any sudden movement might break the moment like glass. Their lips touched, a kiss real with affection, if not proximity. It felt good. It felt right. For the first time since this whole thing started, Edith felt right.

In the private confines of a player-owned house, there is no such precept as developer-mandated undergarments, and two adults may be free to enjoy each other’s company, however they choose.

—

“Oh, Miss Addison, I’d thought I might need to wake you up.” Dr Grey entered, clipboard in hand. “You look different; are you feeling alright?”

“I feel great,” Edith said with a smile. Her hands were folded atop the barely-covered stomach, which lay between her legs like a boulder. “Are we ready?”

“We’re ready if you are; the delivery room is prepped and our technician is standing by.”

“Then let’s go!”

A nurse helped Edith into a wheelchair, now fully being too heavy to walk. She looked big enough to be carrying sextuplets, but the weight of her belly was much greater than even that, and everyone agreed it was best to not put undue strain on her body.

The ride to the birthing room seemed endless, the path turning this way and that, and Edith wanting nothing more than to be finished with all of it. She felt like she was up for anything, and waiting was agonizing.

The technician was waiting in the delivery room, a middle-aged woman with a stern face and glasses. Her labcoat and name-badge set her apart from the doctors.

“This must be Miss Addison,” she said, coming over and extending a hand.

“I am,” Edith shook her hand, feeling like she should be standing up.

“I’m Dr Neal—that’s phD, not MD—Don’t worry, you’re in good hands. We’ll have you back up and about in no-time.”

“Obviously, this isn’t going to be a normal birth,” said Dr Grey. “But we’ll do our best to keep you comfortable.”

“Your implant has certain advantages, such as being able to contract powerfully without cramps, and not needing to wait for your cervix to dilate. Normally, the main limiter in births with an artificial uterus is the safety of the child, but that’s not an issue here, obviously.”

“We’ll be controlling things, just let us know when you’re ready to push, and we’ll give it a go.”

“Thanks,” Edith said, still trying to take in all the information. “Should I get in the bed?”

“If you want to,” said Dr Grey. “Whatever’s most comfortable for you. We have a pool set up, if that sounds better. No water in it, but we can fill it, if you’d like.”

“I’ll try that.”

They wheeled her over to the other side of the room, where a kiddie pool was set up. Dr Grey helped her up out of the wheelchair, then supported her as she sat down in the empty pool with a thump.

She sat there awkwardly for a minute, catching her breath, before realizing she should probably remove her gown.

Naked and a little embarrassed, Edith sat in the pool and felt enormous. Her belly almost reached her knees, spreading her legs a little more than what was comfortable as it fought for space. Her back arched, and she tried to lean back to get comfortable, but found that her womb—pinned down by the immense weight within—refused to move, and leaning back strained her skin painfully.

“Everything alright?” Dr Grey crouched beside the pool, putting the plugs of her stethoscope into her ear.

“Yeah,” Edith winced, using her arms to help her adjust how she was sitting. “Just a little—oof—heavy.” She flinched as the cold bell of the stethoscope touched her warm, sensitive skin.

Dr Grey listened intently for a few moments before looking up.

“Are we ready, Dr Neal?”

“Ready.” Dr Neal held up her tablet and pressed something on the screen. “Alright, I have just shut off production.”

“I don’t feel any different.” Some part of Edith’s mind had expected a sign that things were changing.

“The implant is intentionally quiet and unobtrusive—Dyson-Weilig makes only the best. Now, if you’ll get into position, I’ll initiate the birth.”

With Dr Grey’s help, Edith got into a crouching position, leaning forward a bit to gently rest the outer curve of her belly against the bottom of the pool. From here, she could help balance and support herself either with her hands in front of her, or by holding onto the edge of the pool behind.

She took as deep a breath as she could, and gave Dr Neal the signal to go ahead.

At first she felt nothing. So much nothing, in fact, that she was about to ask if it had started, but as she opened her mouth, she felt the pressure. It was a slow and gentle sensation deep inside her, and when she placed a hand on her belly, she thought she could feel a bit of movement in her womb.

“Your implant is beginning to contract. It will increase the power slowly until it finds how much necessary to reduce its volume by a certain amount. Effectively, it needs to figure out the resistance of the object, and then overcome that to...erm...extrude the mass of nanobots.”

“Ugh, I’m like a Play-Doh toy.”

“Or a pasta machine, if that makes you feel better,” Dr Grey smiled.

“Even though there’s no real chance of injury, it’s best we take it slowly. The implant needs a lot of energy, and it’s going to get that from you. Doing this in stages will reduce the draining effects and allow your birth canal to dilate more naturally.”

Edith was still tripped-up by the idea of squeezing the Blob out of her like toothpaste from a tube, but was very quickly caught off-guard by new sensation: movement.

“H-hey, I think something’s happening!”

“Yes, it looks like we’ve found the correct pressure setting. The nanobot mass has begun to enter your birth canal.”

“Now, Edith,” Dr Grey put a hand on her arm supportively. “If anything feels wrong, let us know and we can stop it at the drop of a hat. If you get tired, we can take a break to rest up and recover.

“I’m good, I’m good. Let’s do this.” Edith draped one arm over her belly and held the edge of the pool with the other, preparing herself mentally. “Hit it!”

Dr Neal pressed another button and immediately, the pressure resumed. It was just at the base of her stomach, right above her pubic bone, and very slowly moving downwards. She wasn’t actually pushing—couldn’t feel the contraction except as the slow relieving of tension in her overtaxed skin and the stretching of her birth canal—but the uterine implant was in full operation, squeezing hard as a ball of iron inside of her.

Her breathing hitched, then began to speed up, her body demanding more oxygen as her cells were depleted of their energy.

“Your heart-rate is up, is everything alright?” Dr Grey pressed the stethoscope against Edith’s back to listen.

“Yeah, just feeling that drain you mention. And…I think it’s about to come out,” she panted.

“I’m not surprised it’s tiring you out—your implant is outputting almost ten times the normal amount of pressure for a birth. That’s almost a full atmosphere, or the equivalent of diving around ten meters.” Dr Neal’s eyes were on the tablet.

“That…” Edith paused to breathe. “Doesn’t sound like much.”

“Well, when it’s inside your body it’s a lot.”

“Are you okay? Do you need a break?” Asked Dr Grey.

Edith nodded mutely, and Dr Neal switched it off. She leaned forward on her belly for support as she rested.

“Can you feel where it is?”

Edith nodded again, and reached down to find her lips bulged outwards, slightly parted to bare a sliver of something hard and smooth—the end of the pseudopod her body was trying to expel.

“It’s no good, she doesn’t have the strength to keep it up.” Dr Grey patted her reassuringly and looked back to Dr Neal.

Edith tried to indicate otherwise, but decided it wasn’t worth the trouble. Instead, she sipped at the apple juice Dr Grey was offering her.

“Well, we could reduce the pressure and increase the size of the cervical aperture, but that would put more strain on the birth canal.”

“What?” Edith managed, already feeling a little better for her break.

“If we make the Play-Doh hole bigger, it’ll take less energy, but we need to make sure it’ll still fit out of you.”

“What are we at now?” Dr Grey used a towel to dab at Edith’s forehead.

“9cm, which means we’ve got some room to spare. The average size of the female pelvic inlet is around 135mm by 110mm, and depending on how much relaxin she’s been producing those numbers may be negotiable. 100mm is what we usually look for in birth.”

“I can do it.” Edith nodded.

“Take another minute to rest first, it’ll also help with the stretching,” said Dr Grey.

It was a long minute, and Edith felt the undeniable urge to push. Feeling the Blob filling her—now on the threshold of emerging—some instinct demanded she continue, relieve the pressure and birth her “child.”

She waited, trembling, until she couldn’t take it anymore, and was about to try and push when Dr Grey asked if she was ready.

“YES.”

“Alright, 100mm.”

The odd sense of movement returned, and Edith felt her lips slowly opening around the rounded end of the Blob. It wasn’t as quick this time, and not as tiring, but there was a feeling of resistance within her, the now-wider section beginning to work its way into her birth canal.

She bore down a little, but found it made no difference if she tried to push or not. Better not to waste the energy, she decided, distracted herself with the burning sensation that began as the Blob crowned.

Edith bit her lip, wiggling her hips a little as if to work the mass downward, and did her best to breathe as Dr Grey was instructing her. It was less comfortable, but also less tiring than before, and she thought she got the better half of that trade.

“Can we go bigger?” Her eyes were shut as she focused.

“Let’s hold off a little longer,” said Dr Grey. “Let’s see how you continue to handle the 100mm. If I may?” she got up on her knees and reached underneath, her fingers moving along the length of the silvery protrusion. Edith could feel her touching it, the gentle pressure being transferred to her body as the Blob was moved a little this way and that inside her. “I’d say we’ve got about 3 inches out.”

“There’s a lot more left.”

“Once I feel the diameter increase, if things are still going well, we’ll try going bigger.”

Edith’s eternal contraction continued, and Dr Grey stroked her hand up and down the smooth length of the emerging mass, now and then feeling her labia for signs of strain. There was a gentle but noticeable difference, the sensation of tightness growing more intense as the girth increased by another centimeter.

It was strange. The Blob was smooth enough that she hardly felt it moving against her inner walls, instead she experienced an incredible fullness, her body trying to expand around the massive load it was expelling. It didn’t hurt, it wasn’t uncomfortable, but it was a wild and all-consuming sensation, something like being impaled without injury.

“Okay, that’s 10cm,” Dr Grey announced. “How are you feeling?”

Edith gave a thumbs-up, continuing to breathe rather than talk.

“I’ll up it to 105mm, and if that goes well we’ll add another 5.”

Things seemed to be progressing with glacial slowness, the steady increase in pressure told Edith that it was speeding up. Already her belly felt lighter, a little less strain on the skin and her legs as she crouched. When she was fully up to 11cm, she called for more.

“No, that’s too much.” Dr Neal’s voice was flat and final.

“She is doing well with the new size.” Dr Grey dissented.

“I need another rest,” said Edith, leaning back against the edge of the pool. For the first time, she looked down, seeing the nanobots lying in the bottom of the pool. Though stiff, the Blob was beginning to flatten under its own weight, seeming to melt into a pool of silver. “Just one minute.”

She regretted saying a minute, as she was once again struck with the urge to push, the pressure even stronger now than before. On a whim, she grasped the Blob as it hung out of her and tried to pull, but it was far too smooth to grasp firmly, and she made no progress. She wanted to just grab the thing and pull it out in one go, but it was only a fantasy of her tired mind.

“Okay,” said Dr Neal at the end of the minute. “I’ll go to 115mm, but you keep an eye on her.”

Dr Grey gave a reassuring thumbs up and helped Edith get back into position.

Edith was determined to get this over now, no more resting. She’d get it all out in one more go.

“Give me thirty seconds,” she said determinedly. “Then another 5mm.”

Dr Neal looked at her doubtfully, but Edith would not relent.

“Whatever, it’s your body.”

Edith’s belly was greatly reduced now, seeming to be an almost-reasonable pregnancy, except for the amorphous lump of chrome emerging from her. She tried to focus on her goal to keep up her strength, but the pressure, the stretching, the ever-growing ache in her pelvis consumed her mind. She could feel it—this was her limit, and yet when Dr Neal asked, she found herself nodding for more.

She was hardly able to stay on her feet, feeling like her hips would pop, but she had to press on—had to get it over with. As the width grew by the last, slow millimeters, she did push down, squeezing her rounded belly and hoping she didn’t break anything.

With one last, echoing THUMP, the Blob dropped out completely, and Edith fell forward on her hands. The next moments were a blur, the doctors helping support her, making sure she was alright. Words passed through the air, seeming to miss her ears as she reeled.

When her mind cleared, she found herself lying in the bed, an IV already in her hand and an indescribable sense of exhaustion deep down in her bones. One of the doctors—Grey, she thought—was next to her.

“Forty-one pounds, ten ounces,” she said, patting Edith’s hand. “A new hospital record, for sure.”

“What are you going to do with it?” she asked distantly.

“Well, it’s technically yours, and we cut it off before it transferred any of the cryptocurrency it mined, so I guess that’s yours to keep. If you hook it up to power, it should keep functioning.”

Edith drifted off even before the answer was complete.

—

She came back to a vague awareness as she was moved back to her room, seeing the nurse finish positioning her bed, then go to the door, which opened before she could reach for the handle.

Standing there was a tall, thin woman with bright red hair and an expression of mingled worry and relief. One hand held flowers and the other the leash of a mylar balloon bearing the inscription “Get Well Soon!!”