Liquid Helium

“Our little project has come to fruition,” I said. “I think it’s time.”

“I’ll be right over,” she said excitedly, and hung up the phone.

Kim wasn’t fat. Curvy, yes, a little overweight, okay--but as a dancer, well, every line that isn’t straight is considered a detriment. She’d approached me to create a solution that would help her lose weight fast in time for the dance concert. What she didn’t know is that I’d failed spectacularly. Nothing worked, and a handful of lab rats with gastrointestinal distress was hardly a sign of success.

But the research was hardly a failure by other criteria. I’d finally cracked a personal puzzle--how to control the temperature of liquid helium. Yes, it exists--but it’s damned cold, dangerously cold. The trick would be to raise the temp as far as possible without turning it into a gas. And over the course of my botched experiments, I’d found a combination of chemicals that would stabilize the temperature right on the edge of where it needed to be--ten degrees cooler and it’d hurt, ten degrees warmer and it’d evaporate. Tests had all proven my research…but not like this.

Yeah, okay, so I like voluptuous women. Find me a man who doesn’t. I’ll even admit that I like them a bit more curvy than most--pneumatic’s a good word for it. So right away, you’ve got to believe that I could not pass up this opportunity for a friendly proof of technology. I put the clear solution into two beakers and set them on the lab table counter. The rest of the sci building was deserted--big football game followed by bigger drinking binge--so I knew we’d be safe and alone for the next 12 hours or so. Besides, nobody would think twice about me working on assignments--I pratically lived in here, and had snoozed on the examining table more than once.

With everything in place and finally ready, I paced to calm my nerves until Kim tapped on the door’s frosted glass. “Hey,” she smiled, entering. She wore an oversized Oxford shirt and jeans along with her usual Doc Martens. Her wavy red hair glowed almost as much as her luminescent green eyes. “I’m supposed to be in rehearsal now, but…well, this is more important.”

“You sure? I mean, this can wait…” I lied.

“Oh no, the sooner I can get this stuff in me, the better,” she said quickly. I doubted she would back out now, and that worked in my favor. “Is this it?” she said, pointing towards the beakers.

“Yep…looks like water, but definitely isn’t,” I said, grabbing a beaker. “This,” I said with a touch of melodrama, “this is the stuff that dreams are made of.” Maybe not yours, I thought, but mine, anyway.

“And you’re sure it’ll work?” she asked, peering through the beaker to read the periodic chart on the opposite wall.

“No, of course not. But pretty sure, yeah. It passed all the tests.” I handed her a clipboard with the forged test results of the failed project; she was in a lower level of chem this semester, so I made sure that just enough of it would make sense and she wouldn’t question it.

“Okay, it, uh, looks good,” she said, handing back the clipboard with a resolved sigh. “I think I’m ready.”

I could barely contain my excitement. She had no idea what was in store. And actually, neither did I. I mean, I knew most of what would probably happen and my real tests had gone swimmingly, but there was still the thrill of facing the unknown.

I handed her the beaker. “Good luck,” I said. “Drink it all to be sure.”

She downed the concoction in a few gulps, never expecting a thing. “That’s one small sip for woman…” I joked, and she smiled.

A second later a shiver ran down her body. “Brrr…cold,” she said, squinching her face a bit. “And a little metallic. What was in that?”

“Um…helium,” I replied softly.

She stared at me a moment. “I’m sorry?”

“You just drank some liquid helium,” I offered again, sheepishly. “I couldn’t get the weight loss thing to work--sorry,” I added offhandedly, “so I thought you might be willing to help with, uh, this other project I’ve been working on.”

Silence struck the room.

“It’s very cold in its liquid form,” I continued uncomfortably. “But it, uh, it should warm up soon…”

“Warm up? And then what?” She rubbed her arms to get rid of the goosepimples. She was passing through suspicious, well on her way to angry.

“Well, heat makes liquids evaporate and…well, you know, water turns to steam…”

“Yes, but I didn’t drink water--you said I drank…ooh!” She cut herself off mid-sentence and put a hand on her stomach. She looked directly at nothing but looked concerned nonetheless.

“Helium’s warmed state is its natural state…which is as a gas.”

“Something’s happening…inside. I feel…funny.” I could have sworn I heard her voice raise slightly in pitch.

“If it’s started converting, you might feel a little pressure,” I trailed off. “But, uh, chances are…you’ll feel a lot.”

“Wh…why?” she asked, looking at me with a hint of panic behind her eyes. Something was definitely going on inside her.

“The helium gas takes up more room than the liquid. A lot more, really.”

“How much?” she demanded.

“About…um, ten times as much space. So you’re…you’re going to, uh, blow up a bit.”

“Blow up? A bit?” she said--squeaked?--as she put her other hand on her now slightly swollen tummy. “But I already feel…full!”

I watched her stroke the sides of her stomach as it began to swell. “What are you doing to me?” she asked, pressing in on her sides. “I do feel like I’m blowing up!”

She certainly looked like she was. Her buttoned blouse began to stretch and gap, revealing a black leotard beneath. Her tummy rounded slightly, and her breasts followed, inflating with a light hiss. She continued to run her hands up and down her body, clearly feeling the slowly mounting pressure beneath her fingers. Beyond that, she didn’t move, rooted to the spot with a mixture of confusion, fear, and…amusement? I noticed a slight smile or giggle pass her lips from time to time. When she saw my puzzled look, she explained it away with a single, half-whispered word: “Tickles.”

Her body continued to round out now, the buttons pulling more and more, her curves only being accentuated by the straining clothes. “I can’t…believe…you did this…you’re doing…this to me,” she growled between increasingly labored breaths. “Make it…stop!”

“Too late for that now,” I replied distractedly. It was the truth. How are you supposed to stop a liquid from turning into a gas, anyway? There was nothing left to do now but watch.

And there was plenty to watch. Her belly had slowed for the time being; the helium was being drawn into her chest and hips, giving her silhouette an even racier, voluptuous form. One glance in the mirror let her see what she felt, and the cartoonishness of the moment wasn’t lost. “Jessica…Rabbit,” she gasped, “eat your heart out.”

Her already ample D’s had swollen to a full DD, and her blouse was having a hard time keeping things under cover. With a loud PING! a button burst from its thread, zinging across the room and revealing even more of the stretchy black leotard below. Kim, breathing heavily, bit her lip and carefully put her hands on the sides of her breasts--as if she was afraid she might pop with too rough a touch--then slid down to the front where her nipples were now standing erect. She was clearly sensitive, as she immediately bit her lip and gasped slightly from the touch. But the reality of the situation hit her shortly thereafter, and she looked at me with wild eyes. “You…have to…stop this.”

“I…I can’t…” I stammered. “The reaction can’t be stopped. It’s going to keep turning into gas and expanding until it’s all done. Or…”

I suddenly realized the danger of my prank. I figured she’d blow up rounded, an exaggerated hourglass, but stay managable. But I started to think, if I were wrong…if she couldn’t cycle out the helium fast enough naturally…if her body just couldn’t stand the pressure…

“Or what?” she demanded between gasping breaths, now afraid to touch herself at all. “OR WHAT!?”

“Well, if there’s more gas than you can hold…something might give.”

“I’m going to pop?” she screamed, her voice inching higher in pitch. “You just…blew me up…like a balloon…and didn’t think any…further than that?”

“…I don’t know…Maybe I put too …I mean, in theory, there’s no…well, you shouldn’t…” I was babbling now. I was in over my head and she was suffering for it. We were going to have to ride this out.

PING! Another button exploded off her shirt, shattering an empty beaker some 20 feet away. Her breasts forced themselves out further, restrained by the leotard, bulging out of the blouse’s gap with an angry hiss. I thought she started to hyperventilate, but she was just trying to exhale as fast as she could, figuring she could rid herself of the helium that way--a human balloon, desperately trying to deflate itself before it burst.

Her tummy picked up the pace again, adding another curve to match her luciously rounded hips. “Oh god!” she cried. “It’s so much pressure! It’s too much pressure! I think…I’m going to…pop!”

She pressed her hands lightly on her midsection again, and her skin gave much less resistance, which scared her. She quickly unbuttoned her strained jeans and somehow managed to roll them down and kick them off her legs, revealing a full black unitard below. The hissing was getting louder, and her expression was more alarming than ever. Her bottom showed mild signs of swelling now too, now that the jeans were gone, but it was her chest that drew the most air. PING! Another button lost its valiant fight, while the unitard stretched and strained. She looked in horror at her basketball-sized bosom as it continued its inflation.

“Don’t just…stand…there…” she yelled. “Do some…thing! Oh!” The pressure was building, and her torso was rounding out. She could no longer put her arms down at her sides; they, too, had started to puff up, restricting her reach and movement. Nor could she touch one hand with the other in front; her chest was far too inflated for that.

“I’m thinking!” I yelled back, now as angry as I was scared. What could I do? I hadn’t thought to come up with something to reverse it. I couldn’t just prick her with a pin--she might burst.

“I can feel…feel it expanding…pressing from…inside…” She started to look lightheaded. Her tummy was arcing out, her breasts had swollen to an impossible size, and she was having trouble keeping her balance. “You’ve…got…stop…blowing,” she whimpered, no longer angry, but clearly frightened. “Dan…don’t…let…me pop…” Beneath the muffling of the unitard, I swore I could hear her skin stretch, like the rubber on a balloon. The hisses sounded more hollow now, and they weren’t slowing down.

At that moment, she started to rise off the ground, ever so slightly. I rushed forward and grabbed her sides--I couldn’t reach all the way around her--and held her down. I could feel the pressure inside; she felt taut. Her skin couldn’t stretch any further--her curves were maxed out--but the pressure was still building, slowly. “Please…” she whispered into my ear. “Save…me.”

I had no idea what to do. “I’m so sorry…” I mumbled, and, on a mad impulse, kissed her.

Whether it was coincidence, I’ll never know, but at that moment, the hissing began to slow down--but it didn’t stop. I could feel Kim’s skin pulse slightly beneath my fingers, as if she had expanded as much as it was physically possible, and perhaps a little more. I loosened my grip for fear of squeezing her too hard.

“Too…full…gonna…burst…” The leotard’s seams creaked, and the immense pressure made the pulse I’d felt before visible. The hissing, however, had all but subsided.

“It’s…stopping…” she said with no small hint of amazement in her voice. The helium was just enough to make her begin to float, but not actually go anywhere. She looked like she was in zero gravity, bouncing slightly with each unsteady footstep.

I began to hear another hiss, slower, less angry…a deflating whisper. “You’re going to be okay,” I offered weakly. The deflation hiss must have been there all along--she had been cycling out the helium the whole time, but not fast enough to stop the swelling. There was too much building up for either of us to notice what might be leaking out.

Slowly but surely, Kim’s form shrunk while she let out a noisy combination of scared sobs and relieved laughs. I didn’t dare go near her. It took about 20 minutes, but she slowly calmed herself and returned to her normal size and shape. Almost.

“What’s this?” she said, running her hands down her body. Her hips and chest were still a little swollen, maybe an inch or two larger than when we began. “This your idea of a memory?”

“No, that should go away too, but it will take a little more time,” I explained. “It’s just trapped. You know, the first 90% of the air goes out of a balloon fast, but the last 10%, you kind of have to coax out.”

“And…how do you do that?” She arched a suspicious eyebrow in my direction.

“Should happen naturally as you move…bending over, moving around, stuff like that.”

“So, you could…squeeze it out of me?” she said, approaching me with a…twinkle in her eye? What the hell was she doing? Was I reading this right?

“Um, sure, if you, um, want me to touch you.” I couldn’t understand why she was suddenly being so forward and amorous--not to me, not after what she’d just been through. If this was a side-effect, I couldn’t have guessed it.

“Why wouldn’t I want you to touch me?” she asked in a sing-songy voice. “That was a wild ride…quite a rush. It was like a tickle that built and built…” She draped her arms around me and shoved her inflated bosom into my chest. “Very thrilling, extremely exciting. Sort of like….something else I can think of.”

I couldn’t believe it. She pushed herself into me further, causing me to stumble back a few steps and bump into the examining table. She swayed her round hips and pushed me backwards lightly with a single finger. Suddenly weak in the knees, I fell backwards onto the table with no trouble. But trouble wasn’t through with me yet.

In a flash, Kim grabbed and fastened the table’s lower restraint around my right ankle in one swift motion. “Yes, I can think of something very exciting,” she said, the sexiness leaving her voice. “I’d like to watch you inflate.”

“Now wait,” I stammered. “I told you I was sorry, I didn’t mean--”

“No, no,” she said sharply, shoving my left arm into a restraint. “You really seemed to enjoy watching me, so I intend to find out what was so fascinating.” She locked down my right arm, while I made funny grunting noises to accompany my futile attempts to squirm loose.

Kim strutted to the counter and grabbed the only remaining beaker. “Besides,” she snarled. “It tickles. At first.”

“Now,” she said, holding the beaker to my lips with a look of pure malice and revenge. “Drink.”