Hungry Like the...

Another standalone story that started out as a caption. When I put it into the text editor to proofread, it came to nearly seven pages and I knew it had to be a story. Anyway, happy almost-new-year!

---

The ad said:

"Test Subject Wanted for New Spells

Non-magical human preferred to reduce risk of interaction. Come prepared to stay one night for observation. Side effects are expected but reversible; may include weight loss."

The pay was amazing for just one day's "work". Obviously it meant that whatever spells were being tested were probably a lot more dangerous or potentially uncomfortable than the ad writer was willing to directly admit, but the fact that side effects were supposed to be reversible was at least a reasonably good sign. Orion could certainly do with more money, and since he was overweight the fact that weight loss was apparently likely enough to be specifically mentioned as a possible side effect tipped the scales in favor of taking the risk.

He showed up to the appointed time and place. The wizard looked like he couldn't be older than thirty, if even that; certainly not the kind of ancient master who he'd expected would be able to afford to pay as much as was offered for a single day's worth of spell testing. And of course that amount of money had attracted a fair crowd of people, who he called into a nearby office one by one to interview.

One after another, the people ahead of Orion were called in, interviewed very briefly, and apparently rejected. And then it was his turn. He walked inside to find the wizard sitting behind a desk and an empty chair in front of it. After closing the door behind him, Orion stood there awkwardly for a second.

"Please, take a seat," the wizard said after a moment.

"Okay.." Orion went over and sat down. "Waah!" The chair suddenly flared with a white, flame-like energy, startling him. As soon as it had appeared it was gone again. Turning back to the wizard, he apologized: "Um..sorry."

"It's alright. That's a scanning spell," he explained calmly. Just take a seat and relax for a moment."

"Alright..."

Orion sat down again, and this time tried to ignore the energy flaring up around him. The wizard said, "Welcome. My name is Serros." He reached a hand over the desk.

He leaned forward a bit, being careful to stay on the chair, and took the offered hand to shake. "Uh, nice to meet you. I'm Orion." Thankfully, the scanning spell fire stuff dissipated at this point.

After releasing his hand, Serros picked up a piece of paper which Orion wasn't entirely sure had been on the desk before. "Hmm. Would you believe you're the first person to walk in here who wasn't secretly a kitsune or demon or something?"

"R-really?"

The wizard nodded. "I think some of them were surprised to learn about it. Anyway, everything looks in order. I'd like to hire you, if that's all right."

"Well, uh, sure!" Orion nodded.

The wizard led the way out of the office, and then his car led Orion's car to a normal-looking house out in the suburbs. They got out and he followed Serros up to the front door, which opened with a wave of his hand. After Orion followed inside, the door shut itself again.

"So, if you don't mind me asking...what kind of spell are we testing?" said Orion, continuing to follow him. There was obviously some major magic at work here; the antechamber alone looked almost as big as the house had from the outside. Their path continued through a room decorated with a bunch of armor and statues, with all kinds of weapons hanging on the walls.

"Metabolic energy conversion," Serros said. "I'm looking into ways to fuel more costly spells and enchantments with food." As he finished speaking, they entered a lavish dining hall. The table in the middle was spread with more food than Orion could imagine eating in an entire week, and of such variety that he imagined one would need chefs from all over the world to make.

"Oh, wow!" he said, pausing in astonishment at the spread. "Um, so what do you need me to do?"

"Well, stand still a moment, just there," said the wizard, pointing to a spot on the floor near the big table. "I'm going to cast the spell I'm working on, and then you should feel hungry. After that you can eat as much of what's here as you want. I'll be observing and taking notes."

Orion stood in the indicated spot, as still as he could. Serros waved his hands and spoke in the incomprehensible language of magic, creating a bright silvery glow which then streamed out toward Orion. He mentally braced to feel...well, something, at first, but as the magic stuff streamed into him he didn't really feel much of anything at all. Before he knew it, the spell was over.

He felt slightly hungry. Sure, Serros had said the spell would do this, but honestly it didn't feel like much more than the fact that lunch had been five hours ago and the food in front of him looked and smelled so good. Still, he stepped forward and began to dig into something that looked good nearby. Whether he was hungry for normal or magic reasons was basically irrelevant; he was hungry, and he'd been offered this delicious food to try.

At first, Orion tried a few bites of everything. There was just so much here to try, and it all looked too amazing to go without trying as much of it as he could. But to his surprise, instead of getting too stuffed to eat he seemed to gradually get hungrier, and before long he had taken at least a bite or two out of everything that looked good, and he felt at least as hungry as before, if not hungrier. So he began to take more of the stuff he'd liked the best the first time around. There were all kinds of flavors to try: Meat, bread, veggies, fruit, and sweets; sandwiches, soups, grilled fried, baked or raw; sweet, savory, salty, spicy; tender and succulent or crispy and crunchy.

Every bit of it was amazing, and Orion went into such a gluttonous frenzy that only after he began to stop feeling like he was starving did he realize he'd eaten probably a third of all the food that had been laid out in front of him. But oh, he was still hungry, and he kept on eating, paying almost no attention at all to the wizard following behind him writing things on a clipboard aside from being careful not to run into him or step back onto his toes or something.

Eventually, after probably at least an hour straight of eating, Orion was finally full. It seemed like only a few bites from still wanting to eat more to his stomach seemingly realizing how much it had just taken in and declaring that it was stuffed. He sat down at one of the chairs in front of the table for the first time and sighed, before finally remembering he had an audience and looking at the wizard with a mixture of surprise and possibly shame.

"Um, wow, I...was really," he said, uncertain of how to put it. He wanted to apologize for gobbling down so much food, but after all, he'd been told to do so as part of the test. He wanted to compliment the chef or something, but that conflicted with his desire to apologize and got lost.

Serros just nodded. "This is about the expected amount," he said. "You should feel sleepy soon, so I'll show you to the guest bedroom."

"Okay." Orion stood up again and followed the wizard through a few more opulently decorated rooms of varying purposes before coming to an enormous bedroom. He found himself yawning a couple of times on the way, even though the windows they passed showed the sun just now setting.

Serros showed him the adjoining bathroom, and that his small suitcase of clothes for the overnight stay was already here (but, Orion's mind briefly protested, hadn't he forgotten to even get it out of his car? And hadn't the wizard been right there next to him the whole time?), and then showed him how to operate a magic lantern next to his bed. It lit up when its handle was grabbed, and snuffed out again when nobody was holding it; simple enough.

"Feel free to explore the house if you become restless tonight," said Serros. "You will be perfectly safe as long as you stay out of any closed doors—which are locked anyway. Do you have any questions?"

Orion opened his mouth to answer, but a big yawn came out first. He was having trouble not just dozing off on his feet. "Sorry—um, no. Thank you," he said.

"Of course." Serros nodded, and then left.

Orion didn't really want to sleep in his clothes, especially not in a bed as comfy-looking as that, so he mustered as much concentration as he could manage to get out a nightshirt and change into it, taking off his shoes, socks, and pants along the way. Then he turned off the light, shut his bedroom door, undid the covers and crawled into the soft bed, tucking himself in and enjoying the silky-smooth sheets for a moment before drifting off into a deep sleep. He dreamed of the food he'd had for supper, experiencing many of the delicious tastes and smells all over again, some seemingly in more detail and focus than he had the first time around. The knowledge that he might not ever get to eat such delicious food again hung in the background, giving an edge of nostalgic longing to the whole dream.

Eventually, he woke up. He very slightly opened his eyes to glance at a clock on the nightstand, and saw that it was somewhere between 1 and 2 AM, far too early to be awake yet. So he closed his eyes again, wondering why he was even awake. There was something beginning, just on the edge of his perception, which seemed to be the culprit; it took a few seconds to identify it, and in that time it seemed to grow stronger.

There was a gentle tingling sensation running across Orion's face. And as it grew stronger, it began to spread up and out along his scalp, and down his neck and then onward through the rest of his body. Everywhere it appeared, it began too faint to fully identify and slowly progressed into a quite noticeable, strangely pleasant sensation, just as it had on his face. He felt something else odd, too; as the tingling faded off from his face and intensified across his scalp, he could swear there was more and more hair falling around his head. There was the feeling of its weight on the side of his neck, and then his shoulder too, making it seem quite certain that it was growing longer and longer.

"Mnh..?" Orion reached a hand up to his head and touched his cheek, and found the skin there soft and smooth, and completely free of hair. By now the tingling had spread all the way out to his fingers and toes, and was fading off from his upper torso, so he moved his hand down along the chin and neck to his chest, discovering the very same kind of skin all the way across. This must be...the side effect, right? Not exactly weight loss, but...

He was interrupted in his thoughts by another strange sensation. His nightshirt was falling across his stomach...again, and again, and again, as if it was flapping away and then back onto it. But paying a little more attention to this, Orion began to realize that there was less there to feel the nightshirt falling onto it each time; in fact, his belly was receding. Orion smiled to himself, hoping the wizard wouldn't insist on reversing that particular effect. But it was soon apparent that even that wasn't all that was happening.

Even as the tingling faded off from his extremities, it only grew stronger on a certain something between his legs. And that wasn't all; he could swear the bed was growing larger around him, his body pulling steadily closer despite his not moving around at all. "Hmm?" His voice sounded a little odd, but Orion was concentrating instead on stretching himself out on his side, trying to make sense of what he was feeling. Once he had, he could feel his feet slowly sliding up the sheets toward him, even as he pushed them out away as far as they would go. He was...shrinking? Losing not just weight, but height, too?

His nightshirt began to pull closer against his body somehow, shrinking itself, it seemed. His shoulders felt a little narrower than before, and then still moreso; the shirt pulled close against thinner arms than he was used to. He felt one hand with another and found both shrinking in size, the fingers turning smaller and thinner. As the shirt pulled closer still, he felt the big gut he'd lived many years of his life shrinking to just a little bump, and then diminishing still more. He couldn't help but celebrate that, even in the midst of all the other strangeness.

The tingling between his legs grew even stronger now, and he started to realize that there was actually less down there than there had been before, too. "Nnh...?" Orion paused, realizing his voice sounded rather odd. He tried clearing his throat, and heard a sound like a young boy doing the same. What was happening to him..? He was interrupted from thinking about that yet again, this time by an odd stretching sensation from his ears.

They felt the way his arms did when he stretched them out after waking up in the morning, only..they were his ears. He could feel the right one moving across his pillow, becoming bigger and taller. On top of that, they both started to tingle ever so slightly, and reaching a hand up he discovered soft fuzz beginning to grow all over the left ear. And then he felt another something happening, a pushing sensation from his lower back. Something that hadn't been there before began sending his brain signals of itself sliding out along the sheets as it grew in size, signals sent from the base of a thick mass of long hairs all along it.

Orion's attention was drawn back between his legs. "Nm..mrrn..!" A voice like a young girl's came from his throat as he moved his legs back and forth, trying to make sense of the deeply pleasant inward slipping sensation down there. He was...it was..soon there wouldn't be anything down there at all! But why did it feel so nice? Orion's cheeks burned with a blush, and he let out a soft, canine-like "Rr..rrf!" His voice was deepening again, but in the wrong way somehow...it still sounded very feminine.

His ears and the—well, it had to be a tail from his back—continued to grow, the ears slowly twitching themselves around and the tail swishing up and down under the covers. His shorts felt awfully tight all of a sudden, and he noticed that his stomach was now completely flat, only to have found another direction to shrink in. The nightshirt pulled still closer against a gentle inward curve there while his hips began to push their way out to the sides, his rump plumping out behind him too. His underwear's leggings were completely gone, and now it squeezed tight between his legs, against something which threatened to be completely gone soon.

Before he knew it, Orion's ears and tail finally finished growing, both covered in thick, soft fur and deeply sensitive to their every movement across the silky sheets and pillow. They moved around excitedly as his blush deepened, a mature woman's voice escaping his throat in a soft "Mrrrrrrf!" as with one final, slipping tug, the panties came to fit between Orion's legs snugly and comfortably. Her manhood was all gone, and with a gentle easing off of the tingling down there something entirely new formed in its place. She could feel an upward push, toward the pit of her stomach, as everything needed for her to be completely female grew into place.

It wasn't over yet. Orion's chest began to tingle once again, the skin suddenly growing deeply sensitive, the nipples beginning to grow larger and longer. The movements of her nightshirt across this began to give her new, pleasant sensations between her legs, drawing a deep, mature "Aah..aah~," from her mouth. Soon she could feel the rest of her chest following the nipples forward, steadily swelling out larger and larger...the tight shirt was all too tight, squeezing and rubbing against the forming breasts. Her small, delicate hands reached up and fumbled with the buttons, managing to undo the first few and draw a pleased, womanly sigh of relief from her lips.

"Hhhaaah." The feeling of her breasts released from that pressure, and continuing to grow, was a deep relief to Orion. The sense of relief grew; she felt as if she had been bound up for so long, and finally her body was being released to its full, beautiful form. The enjoyment of her growing bust was more than the sparks of physical pleasure from her newfound womanhood, extending deep into her being, her sense of self. By the time they finally stopped growing as a pair of nice, big globes, she felt deeply at home in her new, quite female form.

"Hmmn~," Orion smiled to herself, already feeling rather good about her deep, womanly alto voice. She swung herself around, her shortened legs hanging off of the bed but shy of the floor, and then dropped herself down and stood up, picking up the lantern on the nightstand and looking around in the pale white light it provided.

Everything looked so much bigger; she must have lost at least a foot of height. her hair tumbled down across her shoulders, all the way to the small of her back. Her ears twitched and turned, catching every little sound in the mansion of a house around her, and her tail swished back and forth in a pleased wag, somehow helping maintain her balance at the same time. She was quite curious about her new appearance; if only...there! Of course a lavish bedroom like this would have a big, full-length mirror over by the dressers. The new girl skipped happily over to it, holding up the lantern to give herself a good once-over.

Her hair was a silver-gray color, and some of her fur as well; her ears and tail faded from that to a pitch black near the tips. Her eyes had turned bright yellow, and her teeth, especially the canines, were a bit longer and sharper than before. In fact, sticking out her tongue she could see that it was longer than before, even though it hadn't seemed so inside of her mouth. She was a gorgeous woman, with nice, wide hips and a full-sized butt, a slim waist and nice, big, round breasts to finish it off. Her face was lovely, and even her strange new ears and tail seemed cute enough to enhance rather than detract from her beauty. The collar around her neck she hadn't even noticed appearing helped that along, too.

She reached a hand up and back, running it through her hair; it was silky-soft, even as messy bed hair, which was just unbelievable. Had Serros's spell really been intended to do this? Well, probably not; it seemed like quite some side-effects, though. She would have to let him know about all this...and beg him not to reverse any of it, she thought.

Well, all of this excitement had left Orion wide awake. She'd been invited to explore the house, so she walked over to the bedroom door to go do just that, enjoying the strange new feeling of her hips gently swaying back and forth with each step. Off she went with her lantern through the house, sniffing the air every now and then and catching all kinds of scents she was sure wouldn't normally have been noticeable before. Orion wasn't really sure what she was looking for, if anything, but found herself changing direction instinctively almost every time she sniffed the air. Eventually she stopped in front of a closed door with the distinct feeling that this was what she'd been after.

But she wasn't supposed to go into any of the closed doors, right? Something dangerous might be in there! Orion's ears twitched and turned forward, listening carefully, and picked up the faint breathing of someone asleep. A blush rose to her face as she realized what she'd been doing this whole time: Somehow or other she knew Serros's scent, and had followed it all the way to his bedroom! What did she want with..him in his bedroom? Surely letting him know about these...side effects could wait until morning. But even as she thought that, she raised her free hand to gently rap on the door a few times.

The person inside woke up, and there were footsteps on carpet up to the door. Part of Orion wanted to run off and hope he thought it was his imagination or something, but she found herself smiling instead, still blushing, and her tail beginning to wag even faster behind her as the door opened. Serros was in a robe that did nothing to hide his chest, which was now a little above her eye level, and her first thought was how cute he looked. "Um.." For once, the wizard was at a loss for words.

"Hey, uh, it's me, Orion," she said. "I woke up a few minutes ago and then, well, this happened." she made a vague gesture to her body's state.

"I...see." Serros rubbed an eye, thinking. "Hmn..the spell isn't venting excess anywhere near as safely as it's supposed to. This is honestly much more change than I expected, but it still looks purely physical, nothing I couldn't put right."

"Oh, but.." Orion's ears drooped slightly. "I, kinda like this. In fact I really like it. Can I keep it?"

"I don't see any reason why not," said the wizard, tilting his head slightly. "Can you tell me why you like it? It might help make sense of how it happened."

"Well, I..this just feels really good," she said, not sure how to put it into words. "I like being small and cute and pretty and soft and..things. And, I like the wolf bits too. Something about it all feels right, like I'm supposed to be like this..even though, that doesn't really make any sense?"

"Hm." Serros put a hand to his chin. "I believe I know what happened. My spell is supposed to vent excess energy by improving the body—things like weight loss, mild muscle gain, healing scars, that kind of thing. But I didn't set any parameters on what 'improvement' means exactly, so if some part of you wanted to look like that, the magic vented by..changing you to look like that."

"Do you like it?" she said eagerly, and then paused, unsure where that had come from. "Uhm, I mean, uh," she fumbled for a moment, blushing even brighter.

"I-it's, quite attractive," Serros answered. "Beautiful, in fact." Wait, was he blushing too?! She forced her eyes up to his face to see him trying not to stare down her partially-open shirt.

The wolf-girl's instincts took over again, and she pounced up at him, throwing her arms around his neck and hanging herself over him in an embrace. "Err...I dunno, w-what I'm doing," she said, and giggled nervous. Her face was right in front of his..!

"It seems obvious enough to me." To her surprise, he didn't push her off. In fact, she could feel the wizard's arms slowly making their way around her, beginning to return the embrace. "This...isn't really an appropriate situation," he said, his face as red as hers felt. "Your hormones are probably running wild just after, a-and you're not used to having animal instincts yet, either.." Orion replied by pushing her face into his in a kiss, which he returned just as willingly and eagerly as she gave. Only after their faces had been locked together for well over a minute did they let go, and Serros gently set her down on her feet an arm's length away from him.

"Y-you should, I mean. It would probably be best to give it a day or two and see whether you feel the same way still." He wasn't clear on which way she felt he meant, but she nodded. "Um, you can stay here during that time if you'd like."

"Okay," she said, giving a wide grin, almost a smirk. That new animal instinct felt just as if she had her prey right where she wanted it. But for now she let him go back inside and close the door, and went back to her room, curling up on the soft bed to sleep for the rest of the night.

A few days turned into a week. Every bit of the food she'd eaten the day before had been Serros's doing, through some magical means of cooking, and she got to have more of it. Orion suggested the wizard could continue using her to test his spells to make up for her taking up space in the house, although it was obvious to both of them he was enjoying her company. A week turned into a month, and not even the regular pain of being a woman discouraged Orion from staying just as she was. After all, her boyfriend was just as fond of it as she was, from the way he returned her every kiss. She became familiar enough with his work to help him in more ways than just spell testing and stress relief.

She knew his habits and routines well enough to hunt him down any time of the day, and took advantage of that to surprise him with a proposal, which of course he accepted. His assistant became his fiancée and only flirted with him more, which he clearly enjoyed even through the protests. It was only another couple of months before they became partners for life, and then her prey was completely at her mercy, there in the bed with her. It had all felt so natural and impulsive, but as she drew close to her husband to take what she'd really wanted ever since first seeing him as a woman that night, a part of Orion's mind couldn't help but think things had gone exactly to plan.