ROYAL REWARD: The Institute: Kaede (Balloonification, Brainwashing, Danganronpa)

Kaede squirmed in her restraints, fighting to break free, as the nurse wheeled her through the halls of the facility. “Let me go! Please, you have to let me go! You can’t do this!” 

“Now, now, dear,” said the nurse, placing an affectionate hand on her shoulder, “there’s no need to be so panicked. We’re only trying to help you get better, after all.” 

“G-get better?! There’s nothing wrong with me!” 

“Oh, I know that’s how you feel, honey, but I promise you…” She leaned in, as if to nibble Kaede’s ear. “Once we’re done with you, you’ll feel like you’re over the moon.” She smiled. 

Kaede whimpered in horror. 

Ignoring her struggles, the nurse brought her to a large door marked with a giant smiley symbol. On the other side, she found a gigantic, dome-shaped chamber with a single chair in the center. Balloons of every type and color clustered around the ceiling, while the floor was filled with enormous gas canisters, each marked with that same sinister smiley. 

A pair of ogre-ish orderlies were waiting to receive her. Unbuckling her restraints, they hauled her out of her wheelchair and plopped her in her new seat, where they wasted no time strapping her straight back in again. As she squirmed, struggling to escape these new bindings, Kaede’s heart fluttered with panic. Just what were they planning to do to her?! 

Satisfied she was properly bound, one of the orderlies grabbed a canister, dragged it over, and attached a hose, which he handed to the nurse, who smiled. “Now, Kaede, I want you to be a good girl and open wide for me.” 

“O-open wide… Just what are you going to…?!” Perhaps she should have kept her mouth shut, because the nurse took the chance to slam the hose right through her lips and hold it in place. “Mmmmphf!” 

One of the orderlies gave the canister’s valve a twist, and with a squeak and a hiss, fat bulges of gas started swimming down the pipe and into Kaede’s mouth. She squealed, her eyes wide and her cheeks bulging and finally, with no other option, forced herself to swallow it. Her stomach groaned, rumbling in protest. “Mmmphf!” 

As bulge after bulge slipped down the pipe and from there down Kaede’s throat, she screwed up her eyes and moaned and whimpered, struggling to bear the growing tension in her gut. With each mouthful of gas she swallowed, her belly strained a little more, stretching her top tight around it as it grew.

Another twist of the valve, and the flow of gas only increased, leaving Kaede to screw up her eyes and moan through the nurse’s hands as she swallowed mouthful after additional mouthful of the stuff. 

It wasn’t just her belly being affected either: the more of the stuff she swallowed, the lightheaded she felt, as if the gas were forcing everything else out of her head and leaving only itself. Woozily, she slumped in her chair, resisting the urge to giggle. As horrifying as the whole experience was, she couldn’t deny there was something strangely fun about it too…

As she lay back and allowed herself to relax a little, more and more of the strange gas continued to pump through the hose and her jaws, making her belly bulge even larger, and stretching her clothing tight around it. Soon, it began to spread to the rest of her form, fattening her arms into a pair of thick sausages and forcing the orderlies to hurry to loosen her straps. 

They were hardly necessary at all now. The bigger her body became, the lighter-headed she seemed to feel. Soon, it was as if she were floating on a cloud, unable to do anything but giggle. Even if they’d released her, she would have sat there and kept drinking, unable to stop. 

She barely even noticed herself rising in her seat.

The nurse looked down at her, smiling like a particularly proud mother, as her body continued to grow, warping the rest of her bloating form around it. Instead of tearing through her clothing, it absorbed it, suckering it to her skin as something like a layer of paint, and continued to grow, larger and larger, rounder and rounder, until at last the nurse gave the sign and the orderlies had to rush to remove her straps entirely, lest they pop her. Freed, she started to rise, but fortunately the nurse grabbed her before she could float all the way to the ceiling. “Just a little more, honey. You’ll be with the rest of the balloons before long, I promise.” 

Kaede could only moan happily. 

Her stomach, or the swollen orb that had once been her stomach at any rate, continued to grow, fatter and fatter, rounder and rounder, tighter and tighter, till the sound of it squeaking was louder even than the hissing of the gas. Stretching her arms and her legs wider, it fused with her neck and spread into her head, widening that as well. Finally, it sucked up her limbs entirely, leaving her with an ovoid shape reminiscent of a giant, floating egg. If Kaede had still been herself, she would have been absolutely mortified, but as it was she could only grin even wider, beaming as if she were having the time of her life. And she was.

“There, that should do it,” said the nurse, looking up at her and smiling in delight. “How are you feeling, Kaede?” She pulled the pipe out of her lips.

“Happy…” said Kaede. “Just really floaty and…” She giggled. “Really floaty and happy.” 

The nurse smiled. “Good girl. Now, up you go…” She released her.

Slowly, Kaede started to rise. As she sailed towards the other balloons bouncing around under the ceiling, there was only one thought on her mind: how good it felt to be a big, happy balloon. 

Squeak!