FSE

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Vel wasn't sure that he believed the idea that no good deed went unpunished, but he was getting strong evidence for it as he looked down at the stuffing that was creeping out of a wound in his palm, just above the heel of his wrist.

"I...I am so sorry, sir! That's never happened to a customer before!" The panicked employee was trying to remember to worry more about the injury than the fact they'd likely lose their job over the incident, but they were clearly struggling. "The nozzle is supposed to be rounded to avoid exactly this kind of thing happening! Someone must have nicked it when they were cleaning it off the other day...s-shoot, this is bad...this is _really_bad!"

The wound was minor at the very worst, drawing so little blood that the fluff upon it soaked up the whole of the mess, but if any of it slipped back into the machine that tossed the stuffing around, they'd have to throw out the whole supply and shut down the store to have every other part of the machine sterilized.

It was a worthwhile reason to be concerned, but Vel had a more pressing issue to worry about than the incessant worries of the apologetic employee.

"Excuse me, miss...? This fluff isn't supposed to be so sticky, is it?" he asked, keeping his composure better than any of the employees; the manager included. "And wasn't there only a little bit?"

Thinking it a kind gesture to get a stuffed bear for his friend from a local build-your-own shop, Vel went to slide an empty bear over a stuffing nozzle and ended up with the tiny cut that was being turned into a big deal, but the longer he tried to keep his composure, the more his hand felt as though it was starting to swell with rapid infection.

He was also sure that he'd only seen a little bit of the plush, white stuffing get into his cut, but there was no denying the sight of it multiplying around the thin, shallow cut. His face went pale as he watched the cloudy, white material move like a living thing, pushing itself into the crease and sealing up the wound entirely.

"Oh, o-oh no! You've probably got some kind of infection!" The employee losing her cool wasn't helping the situation in the least, but Vel could clearly see more of the fluff emerging from the spot, as if it was feasting on his flesh, using his body as a host to build more of itself. "I'll, uh...I'll call for an ambulance! Don't go anywhere!"

"It's just a minor cut," Vel trailed off as he looked down at his hand, thinking that the employees were making far too big a deal of the whole injury...until he saw how inflated his fingers had become.

They were growing massively wider, each one almost as big around as the flat of his open palm. He expected a little discoloration of the skin, but the brilliant tones of yellow were finally enough to make him lose his cool as he slumped down to the floor.

"Okay, _oooookay,_stay calm," he was talking himself down now as the manager stood behind the front desk, viciously digging through the assorted forms that they'd have to fill out to prevent any sort of legal action. "There must have been something funky on the nozzle; that's all. You're fine. Your hands aren't getting any bigger."

He knew he was lying to himself, and the eyes of previously stuffed animals stared at him with a sense of judgment as he tried to deny the inevitable.

Gulping became a struggle as the fluff crept back up along his arm, some of the material moving under his skin while the rest of it crawled over the top, keeping Vel just on the verge of passing out at the sight. The process wasn't painful, but he'd been sleeping on his arm for a week, only to have his nerves stirred back awake by lumps of fluid warmth crawling across his muscles.

There wasn't a smiling face left in the store, save for the animals that watched from the sidelines, their expressions hinting at a knowledge that was greater than what cotton fluff should be able to hold.

"Sir, the paramedics are on their way! We j-just need you to sit there and stay calm!" the employee felt like a hypocrite knowing that they were running around in a fevered panic, but worse still was the way they reacted when flesh yielded to the expanding fluff, puffing Vel's arm up to a cylindrical shape that was delightfully soft to the touch.

At the elbow, his body was caught between looking very normal up to the shoulder, and very unusual down to what used to be fingertips. They were soft, padded ends, each one looking like it belonged more to a stuffed avian creature than a human being.

In his own panic, Vel never even bothered to look and see that his left arm was starting to mimic the right, complete with the same inflated look upon his flesh.

"At least I'm n-not bleeding anymore," he tried to look on the bright side as his skin _somehow_contained all the excess stuffing that grew under his skin, turning what could have been a gruesome tragedy into something that was truly fascinating to watch. Small ridges appeared along yellowed wrists, as if a magician were crafting enchanted stitches into Vel's arms, until the lines carried over the end of each of his digits. "Heck...I'm kinda cute, aren't I?"

Stay positive in the face of something he couldn't explain or control, Vel cracked a tiny smile from the corner of his lips...but they didn't stretch quite the way that he expected them to.

He didn't want to look at his reflection in the recently polished stuffing machine, but he knew that he'd have to sooner or later.

"We're my cheeks always _that_yellow?"

The employee at fault was too mystified to reply.

As their lower lip trembled, they watched Vel attempt to bring himself back to his feet, but from the confines of tennis shoes, flesh began bursting forth, sending the usually reliable and durable footwear into a scattered mess. Tightly tied laces could do nothing to stop what had begun, their lengths flung to the side as Vel's feet continued to artificially inflate.

He couldn't imagine standing on such swollen feet would be comfortable, but every part of his body was so soft that the harsh, cold tiles of the floor didn't bother him that much.

In a puddle of tattered socks and mingled fabric, massive toes began to wiggle about, still holding the color of his human flesh...but the skin upon his ankles was turning such a rich, deep black that no one could explain what was happening to him.

Standing upright was easier than he thought it would be, but he also had an extra pair of hands to assist with the process, and they didn't come from the useless employees.

"That's weird. Did my center of balance ju...just...s-shift..." his eyes muted and shrunk down as he looked back past his growing feet to his sides, just above the spot where recently discarded love handles were growing anew. "T...That's not right."

Just to the front of his hips, flesh was wiggling and gurgling to life under his t-shirt, but Vel was still able to keep his calm, as if there was a greater sense of being to the new form that he was taking. What he thought would be a painful process was just unusual, and even when something began bursting from the skin above his hips, he didn't feel a horrendous sensation.

He even smiled as the digits began to emerge from his torso; they were proving useful as they gave a quick push to help Vel back up to his feet.

"I don't think you guys need to call that ambulance, after all. I think I'm gonna make it."

Being comforting to those around him was quickly becoming second nature for Vel. He couldn't stop smiling, as if the stuffing that was spreading through his body and augmenting his muscles was laced with mood enhancers; eerie as it was at first, he thought he could feel happiness not just in his heart and soul, but in the very flesh of his being.

He desperately wished that he could share it with the employee who had fallen over and passed out in their panic, or the manager that was struggling to keep their jaw lifted. They didn't dare to turn off the security cameras in the store, both for fear that they might still be sued into the ground for injuring a customer, and that no one would ever believe what was happening if they didn't see it on video.

In such an innocent place, it was a shame that the loss of clothing was inevitable, but there wasn't anyone to shame Vel as his belt expanded to the breaking point. The metal buckle whined and leather strained as stuffing continued to multiply inside of his body, giving his entire form an appearance a plump, squeezable aura.

Even before the change was complete, he was just like a full-sized teddy bear, ready and waiting for someone to snuggle up to.

"Guess I'm gonna have to make a stop at AE Benny's or something," he groaned, but there was an ethereal joy to his tone, even when he tried to sound frustrated about the snapping of his belt, or the tearing of the seams on his jeans. His shirt was quick to give way as well as stitching moved further up his arms and over his shoulders, the stuffing turning his torso so plump that his clothes couldn't hope to hold it.

A long, satisfying riiiiiip threw cotton to the floor in even tatters, revealing a startling discoloration: the soft, sandy tone that was crawling up the front of his torso was shocking enough, but where sleeves once covered his biceps, jagged stripes of blue crossed over a small field of brown.

Vel needed to see his reflection in the glass portion of the stuffing machine again, and on first glance, he noticed that there wasn't even an inch of human skin remaining.

"You guys should really be taking a picture of me to add to the product line. I'm cute enough to be up on one of those shelves!" Vel found it impossible to say anything negative about the change. "I don't think I'd quite fit next to these smaller guys, though."

He tried to reach up and gather one of the smaller plush toys from the shelves that decorated the build-your-own store, but with such thick, wide digits, dexterity was at a premium. His extra set of paws, still growing further out from his torso, were able to make a basket for the toy and keep it from hitting the ground, but Vel was finding he had a lot to learn about controlling his new form...and he still wasn't done changing.

He thought that the extra limbs coming from the front of his torso were small wrists and hands, but as they continued to grow impractically long for that purpose, his spine grew out, as well. Internally, he could feel the odd sensation of his bones turning fluid and dripping down within a seemingly hollow tube, but again, he felt no pain from the change.

It was eerie enough to leave him a little nauseated and off balance, but the startling tear of his jeans as a growing body forced them away kept him from losing consciousness. The sandy underbelly that spread down from his chest covered up any concerns of modesty between his legs, but he didn't realize how much further away they'd moved from the rest of his body, until he leaned over to look back and see where his lower half went.

They were hind legs now; he was about to fall over and lose his balance as he looked through, but the mistaken identity of his front legs was revealed as they caught him and stood, albeit nervous and uneasy.

He'd have a lot of changes to get used to, but he couldn't decide if having four legs was the strangest among them.

"Woulda thought that standing on four legs was easier," he tried to whirl his head around and nearly fell over in the process as each of his legs tried to decide which one was supposed to carry the load at which times. Natural as the new body might have felt to him, coordination was a different subject entirely.

After all, he still wasn't quite used to the feel of felt pawpads as they rubbed over the front of his face, able to feel the bones in his cheeks shifting about as the final part of his change. Ears crawled up from the side of his head toward the back as stuffing and faux fur crawled up over his bare back and warmed him, and with each inch that it crawled up toward his neck, a new bump formed on either side of his spine and began to fill with the last of the stuffing.

The change was coming to a head, literally and figuratively, as feathers grew from each of the tiny bumps, blowing up with stuffing and wiggling about just a little bit as if Vel was testing their range of motion.

He didn't think he'd be able to hear the very subtle brush of faux fur against itself as the wings began to spread, but his ears were getting longer and softer as they neared the top of his head. Fur rose to cover the last bastions of human skin with rich brown and a bright loop of blue around the upper rim, the shade matching perfectly with the zigzags that were already present around his biceps and thighs.

There were just two things left missing, and as Vel admired his own reflection in the glass, he blocked the sight of the changes as they happened. One was subtle, as a smooth, white tag grew from the side of his hind leg, reading "Velux" in brilliant, striking blue.

The other was violent, as seams ripped on the back of his hind legs and stuffing burst out into the air. Vel whirled his head around with concern to see what had happened as the manager passed out on their desk, having feared the very worst when they heard the riiiip of what must have counted as flesh.

A final blessing came as Vel felt no discomfort from the change. Instead, his fully transformed beak spread in a pliable, genuine smile as faux fur spiraled up around the length of stuffing and encased it anew, the very end pointing out as a sharp, but soft tip of white, complete with a ring of contrasting blue before orange fur blended in to the rest of his lower back.

There wasn't a single stuffed animal in the whole store that looked anything like him. Even he wasn't sure what to call himself, as the tail of a fox, the multiple legs of a taur, and the wings and beak of an avian creature created a plush hybrid out of him...but he wasn't worried about putting a title on the form just yet, especially when his name was so finely emblazoned on the tag sticking out from his leg.

He was just worried about getting used to his new form before he strolled out into the mall to give the business a little free advertising: Who wouldn't want to hug such a cute and cheerful plush?

Of course, this plush could hug you back...