Feeding Machine Malfunction

Chapter 1

"This the feeding barn?" Jessica called out, her boots squelching in the mud outside the long metal building.

No answer came back except the low hum of machinery and the distant lowing of cattle. She'd been on Jake's farm for maybe three hours now, long enough to drop her duffel in the spare room of the farmhouse and get a quick tour of the property. Rural Ohio stretched out in every direction, fields and more fields, the nearest neighbor probably five miles down a road that turned to gravel then dirt. Jake had disappeared to check on something in the north pasture, told her to familiarize herself with the equipment.

The barn door stood half open. Jessica pushed it wider and stepped inside.

The smell hit her first. Sweet feed, hay, the mineral tang of supplements, and underneath it all the warm animal scent of cattle. But the barn was empty of cows right now. Instead, the space was dominated by a series of metal stalls, each one fitted with what looked like a complicated system of gates, scales, and feeding mechanisms. Everything was stainless steel and clean, almost surgical. Automated, she realized. This was one of those new systems she'd read about, the kind that could identify individual animals, weigh them, and dispense exactly the right amount of feed.

She walked closer to examine one of the stalls. A control panel was mounted on the wall nearby, its screen glowing blue. The stall itself was narrow, maybe three feet wide, with gates at both ends. The floor was a large metal platform, obviously a scale. Above, a hopper full of feed connected to a flexible tube that hung down at head height. She could see the mechanism now, how a cow would walk in the entrance gate, which would close behind it. The system would weigh the animal, identify it somehow, probably with an ear tag scanner, and then dispense feed through that tube. When it was done, the exit gate would open.

Efficient. Modern. She was impressed despite herself.

Jessica had taken this job because she needed the money and the distance. A bad breakup in Columbus, an apartment she couldn't afford alone, and a desperate scroll through farm job listings had led her here. Jake had seemed normal enough on the phone, maybe a little gruff, but he'd offered room and board plus a decent wage for general farmhand work. She knew her way around animals and machinery well enough. Her grandfather had run a small dairy operation before he died.

She reached out to touch the feeding tube, curious about its construction. It was softer than she expected, almost flexible, with a flared end that she guessed was meant to fit comfortably in a cow's mouth. As her fingers brushed it, something beeped.

The entrance gate behind her slammed shut with a heavy metallic clang.

Jessica spun around, heart suddenly hammering. "What the hell?"

She grabbed the gate and pulled, but it didn't budge. Solid steel, locked in place. She turned to the exit gate in front of her and tried that one too. Also locked.

"Okay, okay," she said aloud, trying to calm herself. "There's got to be a release or something."

Another beep, this one longer. The floor beneath her feet hummed, and she realized the scale was activating. A screen on the inside of the stall lit up, displaying numbers that flickered and changed. Her weight, she realized. 142 pounds.

Then the screen flashed red. Text appeared: ANIMAL UNDERWEIGHT. INITIATING FEEDING PROTOCOL.

"No, wait, I'm not an animal, I'm not supposed to be in here!" Jessica shouted. She looked around frantically for a sensor, a camera, anything she could signal to. "There's been a mistake!"

The feeding tube descended with a mechanical whir. It moved with unsettling purpose, angling directly toward her face.

Jessica ducked, pressing herself against the side of the stall. The tube followed her movement, adjusting its position. Some kind of tracking system, she realized with growing horror. It was designed to find the animal's mouth no matter where it moved in the confined space.

"Stop! Override! Cancel!" She tried every command word she could think of.

The tube was inches from her face now. She could smell the feed inside, a thick, rich scent of grains and molasses and something else, something almost sweet and chemical. The flared end was bigger than she'd thought, big enough to cover her mouth and nose if it made contact.

She pressed her hands against it, trying to push it away, but it was stronger than her, driven by motors and hydraulics meant to handle thousand pound animals. The tube pressed forward insistently.

Jessica turned her head away, squeezing her eyes shut. The tube bumped against her cheek, her ear, searching. She couldn't avoid it forever in this tiny space. Her arms were already shaking with effort.

"Please," she whispered. "Please stop."

The tube found her mouth.

The moment the flared end made contact with her lips, something clicked inside the mechanism. A seal formed, surprisingly gentle but absolutely firm, covering her mouth completely. She tried to keep her lips pressed together, but then the feed started flowing and her options became very simple. Swallow or choke.

She swallowed.

The feed was thick, almost liquid, pouring into her mouth in a steady stream. The taste was overwhelming, sweet and rich and strangely compelling. Her throat worked automatically, gulp after gulp, because there was no other choice. The machine didn't pause, didn't slow. It just kept pumping feed into her at a relentless pace.

Jessica's hands flew to the tube, trying to pull it away from her face, but that seal was airtight. She couldn't get her fingers between the flared end and her skin. Panic surged through her and she thrashed in the confined space, but the stall was designed to hold struggling animals. There was nowhere to go, no way to escape the tube's attachment.

Her stomach began to feel full. Then fuller. The feed kept coming.

She tried to slow down her swallowing, but that just made the feed back up in her mouth until she had no choice but to gulp faster. The machine seemed to sense her resistance and adjusted, the flow increasing slightly. Her eyes watered. This was insane. This couldn't be happening.

How much feed did the system think she needed? How much did it give a cow?

The answer came to her with sickening clarity. Cows weighed anywhere from 1,000 to 1,500 pounds. The system had registered her at 142. It thought she was severely, dangerously underweight. It would keep feeding her until she reached whatever target weight was programmed into its system.

Oh god.

Her stomach was distended now, pressing against the waistband of her jeans. She could feel it swelling with each swallow, growing tight and uncomfortable. The feed kept pouring in, that thick, sweet, relentless stream. She lost track of time. There was only the rhythm of swallowing, the pressure in her belly, the mechanical hum of the machine.

Finally, mercifully, the flow stopped.

Jessica gasped as the tube released its seal and retracted upward. She bent forward immediately, hands on her knees, breathing hard. Her stomach felt like a boulder, heavy and tight and aching. She'd never been so full in her life.

The scale hummed beneath her feet again. The screen flickered.

144 pounds.

Two pounds. She'd gained two pounds in however long that feeding had taken. Maybe ten minutes? Fifteen?

The screen flashed: ANIMAL STILL UNDERWEIGHT. REST PERIOD: 30 MINUTES.

Thirty minutes. Then it would start again.

"No," Jessica said, her voice hoarse. "No, no, no."

She threw herself at the exit gate, slamming her shoulder against it. Pain shot through her arm but the gate didn't move. She tried the entrance gate again with the same result. She looked up at the tube, wondering if she could somehow disable it, but it was far above her head now, retracted into its housing.

The control panel. There had been one on the outside. Maybe there was an emergency release on the inside too.

She searched the walls of the stall frantically, running her hands over every surface. Smooth steel, no buttons, no panels, nothing. The stall was designed to be simple and inescapable. Cows didn't need emergency releases.

Jessica sank down to sit on the scale platform, her back against the wall. Her stomach gurgled ominously, struggling to process the massive amount of feed she'd been forced to consume. She felt nauseous and exhausted and terrified all at once.

Jake would come looking for her eventually, wouldn't he? He'd said he'd be back before dinner. What time was it now? She'd left her phone in her duffel back at the house. There was no clock in the stall, no windows, just the blue glow of the screen counting down her rest period.

28 minutes remaining.

She closed her eyes and tried to think. The system had to have some kind of failsafe. It couldn't just keep feeding indefinitely. Could it? What if a cow got stuck in here? What if...

But cows didn't get stuck. Cows were the right size, the right weight. The system worked perfectly for what it was designed for. It was only her presence, her human body in a space meant for livestock, that had created this nightmare.

The minutes ticked by with agonizing slowness. Her stomach gradually stopped feeling quite so painfully full, though it still felt heavy and distended. She could feel the feed digesting, her body processing all those calories. Two pounds in one feeding. How many feedings would it take to reach whatever weight the system wanted? How long would she be trapped here?

The screen flashed: REST PERIOD COMPLETE. RESUMING FEEDING PROTOCOL.

"Wait!" Jessica scrambled to her feet. "Please, I need more time!"

The tube descended again, that same mechanical whir, that same inexorable purpose.

This time she tried to fight it more strategically. She kept her mouth clamped shut and turned her whole body away, pressing her face into the corner of the stall. But the tube was patient. It bumped against the back of her head, slid down to her shoulder, traced along her neck. The tracking system was sophisticated, designed to deal with uncooperative animals.

When it found her mouth again, she lasted maybe thirty seconds before she had to breathe. The moment her lips parted, the seal formed and the feed started flowing.

Swallow. Swallow. Swallow.

Her stomach, which had barely begun to settle, was forced to expand again. The pressure built faster this time, more painful. She whimpered around the tube but the sound went nowhere. The feed kept coming, thick and sweet and horrible.

This feeding lasted longer than the first. Or maybe it just felt longer because her body was already struggling. By the time the tube finally released her, Jessica was shaking. She slumped against the wall and slid down to the floor, cradling her swollen stomach with both hands.

The scale registered her weight: 146 pounds.

Four pounds total now. The system was satisfied with her progress. The screen displayed another thirty minute rest period.

Jessica wanted to cry but she was too exhausted. She sat there in the dim blue light of the stall, feeling her body betray her with every gurgle and shift of her overfull stomach. The feed was digesting. The calories were being absorbed. Her body was doing exactly what the machine wanted it to do.

The third feeding was worse. And the fourth. By the fifth, Jessica had stopped fighting. She simply stood there when the tube descended and opened her mouth to accept it. Resistance was pointless. The machine always won.

Her jeans had grown uncomfortably tight around her waist, the denim biting into flesh that felt softer, more yielding than it had been hours ago. She could feel the difference in her body already, a thickness spreading across her lower belly that hadn't been there before. Her stomach stayed perpetually distended now, never fully emptying before the next feeding began. The waistband cut a red line into her skin, and when she shifted her weight she felt how her belly pushed against the fabric, testing it.

148 pounds. 150. 153.

The numbers climbed with mechanical precision. The system was pleased with her progress, she thought hysterically. She was being such a good cow.

Time lost all meaning. There was only the cycle. Feed, rest, feed, rest. Her world had narrowed to the confines of the stall, the taste of the feed, the pressure in her belly. She dozed during the rest periods, exhausted, and woke to the sound of the tube descending.

Her body was changing in ways she could feel but couldn't see clearly in the dim light. Her belly was rounder, softer, pushing insistently against her shirt with each breath. She touched it during one rest period and felt how it had begun to hang slightly, a small curve of new weight that hadn't existed before. Her thighs pressed together when she stood now, rubbing with each small movement. The friction was constant, unfamiliar, frightening. Her breasts felt heavier, straining against her bra until the underwire dug into her ribs. Even her arms felt thicker when she lifted them, a heaviness in her upper arms that made every gesture more effortful.

157 pounds. 160. 164.

She'd lost count of how many feedings she'd endured. Ten? Twenty? The screen never told her anything except her weight and the countdown to the next feeding. The system didn't care about time, only results.

Jessica's jeans finally gave up. The button popped off during a rest period, pinging against the metal wall. The zipper slid down on its own, unable to contain her anymore. She watched it happen with numb horror, saw how her belly immediately pushed through the opening, pale and round and soft. The relief was immediate but shameful. She should have felt humiliated, but she was too tired. She just let the jeans hang open, the waistband cutting into the soft new flesh of her hips, which had widened enough that she could feel the difference when she touched the stall walls.

Her shirt had ridden up at some point, exposing the pale curve of her stomach. She touched it tentatively during a rest period, feeling the taut fullness after a feeding, the way it had rounded out and started to develop a distinct lower belly that hung over her open jeans. This didn't feel like her body anymore. It felt like something the machine was creating, molding her into a new shape with each feeding. Her belly button had started to shallow out, and the skin felt tight, stretched, like it was struggling to keep up with what was happening underneath.

170 pounds. 175. 181.

The feed kept coming. Her body kept changing. And somewhere in the back of her mind, underneath the exhaustion and fear, Jessica felt something else starting to grow. A strange, shameful acceptance. Maybe even something darker than acceptance.

The machine wanted her bigger. Her body was obeying. There was a simplicity to it that was almost peaceful. She didn't have to make choices anymore. She just had to swallow.

By 175 pounds, her face had begun to soften. She could feel it when she touched her cheeks during a rest period, a fullness that hadn't been there before. Her jawline was less defined, and when she swallowed she felt the new thickness in her neck. Her fingers looked puffier, the knuckles less prominent. Even her wrists had thickened.

Her thighs had grown substantial enough that they rubbed together constantly now, the friction making her skin hot and irritated. She had to stand with her legs slightly apart, and even then she could feel them pressing against each other. Her hips had widened dramatically, pushing out to the sides in a way that changed her entire silhouette. The jeans that had popped open were now sliding down, unable to cling to her transformed shape.

Her ass had grown too. She could feel it when she leaned back against the wall, a cushion of new flesh that hadn't been there before. It pushed her forward slightly, changed her center of gravity. She felt heavier in a way that went beyond the number on the scale, like her body was becoming denser, more substantial with each feeding.

When the tube descended for what might have been the thirtieth feeding, or the fortieth, Jessica opened her mouth without hesitation. The seal formed. The feed flowed. She swallowed and swallowed and felt her stomach swell outward, pressing against her thighs as she stood there. The weight of it pulled at her lower back. She didn't fight at all.

She was so tired.

The system registered 187 pounds and gave her another rest period. Jessica slid down to sit on the floor, her back against the wall, her legs spread because her thighs were too thick now to sit comfortably any other way. The movement was harder than it should have been, her body heavier and less cooperative. Her shirt had given up entirely, rolled up under her breasts, which had swollen enough that they rested on top of her belly when she sat. Her jeans were barely clinging to her hips, the denim stretched so thin she could see her skin through it.

She looked down at herself in the blue light and barely recognized what she saw. Her belly dominated her lap, round and full and soft, marked with red lines where her clothes had cut into it. Her thighs spread wide on the floor, thick and pale. Her arms rested on her belly because there was nowhere else to put them, and she could feel how much heavier they'd become. Even her hands looked different, puffier and less defined.

This was only 187 pounds. The machine wanted her at 1,200. She'd gained 45 pounds and her body had already transformed into something she didn't recognize. What would she look like at 200? At 250? At 300?

The thought should have terrified her. Maybe it did. But she was so tired, and the feed was already digesting, and in thirty minutes the tube would descend again and she would open her mouth and swallow and her body would continue changing whether she wanted it to or not.

She closed her eyes and drifted in a haze of exhaustion and fullness.

The sound of the barn door opening didn't register at first. Then voices, distant and muffled. She tried to call out but her throat was raw from all the swallowing, and only a weak croak emerged.

Footsteps. Getting closer.

"Jesus Christ."

Jessica's eyes flew open. A man stood outside the stall, staring at her through the metal bars. Jake. It had to be Jake, though she'd barely gotten a look at him during her brief tour of the farm. He was tall, broad shouldered, maybe in his late thirties, with dark hair and a weathered face that might have been handsome under different circumstances.

Right now he just looked shocked.

"Help," Jessica managed to whisper. "Please. It won't stop."

Jake's eyes traveled over her, taking in her torn clothing, her swollen body, the feeding tube hanging above her head. His expression shifted through several emotions too quickly for her to read.

"How long have you been in here?" His voice was rough, a rural Ohio accent softening the edges of his words.

"I don't know. Hours. Please, you have to let me out."

He moved to the control panel outside the stall, his fingers flying over the screen. "Shit. The system's locked in feeding protocol. It thinks... Christ, it registered you as a severely underweight heifer. The target weight is set to 1,200 pounds."

The number hit Jessica like a physical blow. 1,200 pounds. She was at 187 now. The machine had barely started with her.

"Override it," she begged. "There has to be an override."

"There is, but it requires a code from the manufacturer. I don't have it. I'd have to call them, and..." He trailed off, looking at her again with that strange expression.

"And what? Call them! Get me out of here!"

Jake was quiet for a long moment. When he spoke again, his voice was different. Softer. Almost gentle. "The system's gonna start the next feeding in about five minutes. I can't stop it. But I can stay with you. Make sure you're okay."