NIGHTMARE AT THE PORTERHOUSE GYM - Part 5: The Cable Guy
Kevin lay on the sofa of the house he shared with Cole and JT. He was laughing hard in front of the TV. The man had tears running down his cheeks. Cole came walking into the room to check out what all the commotion was about. “Oh shit not more cartoons. Dude is that all you watch?”
“Sit down, sit down; this is a classic.” The man could barely talk for laughing but sat up making room on the sofa for the big man.
Cole just sputtered, “Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner, no thanks. Hate to spoil it for you big guy but the coyote is gonna run off the edge of the cliff and he never catches the bird.” Cole was still getting used to his new girth. The outrageously thick man was dressed as usual in tight Nike shorts and nothing else. He had a bandanna tied around his forehead but still had beads of sweat standing all over his outrageously muscled body.
Cole was almost out of the room when Kevin called out, “Hold on this is the one where Wile stuffs an air hose in his mouth and gets all puffed up, come on watch it with me. I think you will enjoy it.” The good natured lifter laughed hard at his dig.
Cole just said, “Hardy, har, har.” The man grabbed a pillow off the back of a chair and with a flash tossed it hitting Kevin smack in the face. The big man continued on toward the kitchen leaving the power lifter to enjoy his toons. Kevin had invited TJ and Cole to share his house after their encounters with the muscle blowing freak had left them so massively hulked out that the men were basically handicapped by their over blown size. The cable guy had plenty of room in the old place that had once belonged to his grandparents and his other three roommates didn’t seem to care. The whole group had known one another from lifting at Greg’s. The other three roommates played football on the college team and lifted at Greg’s on the side.
Kevin liked cartoons almost as much as pushing heavy weights around. Though many guys told him he would be a natural for bodybuilding, the man had no interest in ‘putting on skivvies and prancing around on stage” as he liked to put it. Kevin was muscled and thick but had a healthy appetite that he loved to indulge. Twelve weeks of dieting sounded like torture for the guy. He was happy to lift heavy and eat heavy and always was pushing for more strength.
Kevin glanced up at a clock on the wall. He was almost late for work. The man jumped up and shut off the TV. He worked for the local cable company installing service and internet access. Kevin bounded through the swinging door into the kitchen. Cole stood at the counter eating a bowl of oatmeal. TJ was sitting at the table with enough food spread out in front of him to feed three people. He had two large plates to start with; one covered with a huge egg white omelet another with a steak so big it was hanging over the edges of the plate. Then he had a serving bowl full of oatmeal, a gallon of water and a large protein shake. The small kitchen was barely big enough for the three large men. Kevin was buttoning up the brown shirt of his uniform with the cable company logo on the chest. He grabbed his short jacket off the back of a chair and put the sizeable cooler he took his frequent meals near the door. As he put on his work coat, he asked, “Cole, you want a ride to Greg’s later?” Kevin noticed TJ take his eyes off of his meal as he looked up at Cole standing before the window. The cable guy spotted his opportunity; he picked up the personal trainer’s fork and stabbed a big piece of steak. He had it half way to his mouth before TJ looked down and missed it. Without looking up the big man’s arm shot up and grabbed Kevin’s forearm. The strong man started pulling his arm holding the fork back down. “That’s mine!”
“Dude, if you don’t back off the constant chow line you’re gonna pop!”
“Shut up, I’m starving.”
Kevin laughed and ducked down and sucked the meat off the fork before the big guy got it out of his grip. Talking with his mouth full, Kevin patted the big man’s massive roid gut. “TEEJ, you’re not starving! Feel this thing. It’s like a medicine ball. You keep stuffing it like that you won’t be able to fit through the doors.”
TJ held his fork up, “Damn, you got your germs all over it. Cole get me a clean fork.”
The down stuffed man reached over and opened a drawer and produced a clean fork that he handed to his housemate. He glanced up at Kevin as TJ pushed the chuckling man away from his meal. “Sure”, Cole answered. “What time?” The gym was the only place he didn’t feel like a freak these days. Living so close to campus the sweating man could walk to classes. He had learned to ignore the comments and stares his rapid muscle gain drew. It was harder to ignore the comments about his constant sweating and the questions about him wearing only shorts and a t-shirt in the middle of winter. People just assumed he was a steroid freak who was so fat with muscle that he was hot 24/7.
“I’ll swing back by after work.” Kevin looked over at the personal trainer stuffing his face. “You need a ride, hungry man?”
Between bites of food the man grunted, “Nah, Greg’s picking me up later. Got clients all day.” Kevin tried to snatch a piece of the omelet off his plate only to have the big man slap his hand away like a gnat.
Laughing, Kevin headed for his back door and service truck. He swung by work and picked up his assignments. His first stop was at a professor’s house near the college. After three years on the job he wasn’t familiar with the address. He thought the area that he was directed to was undeveloped but was surprised to see a 1920’s English Tudor at the end of the block. He pulled in the drive and grabbed his tool box. He approached a side door by the drive. Near the door was a high window with a bench under it. The window must have opened into the kitchen as there was a fresh baked pie sitting on the wide sill. Kevin had never seen anybody cool a pie like that except on TV where it was easy for someone to swipe it. He knocked at the door as he inhaled the tempting aroma of the pie. It smelled so good he could imagine snatching it and downing the whole thing. He grinned at the image just as the door swung open. A bald man in a lab coat stood there.
“Professor Bruder?”
“Yes, yes…”
“Here to install your new internet service.”
“Great… good timing. Just ran in from work to meet you. Come on in, young man.”
The professor escorted the man up a short flight of stairs into the kitchen. “Smells good in here.” Kevin said.
“Oh my wife was baking before she left for work.”
The man led him through a wood paneled dining room to a small room set off with French doors. The house was finished in a retro fashion as if nothing had changed since the day the house was built – heavy furniture, rugs, tapestries on the walls, old light fixtures. The small room had been set up as a small office and Kevin set to work running the new service to the computer.
The professor stood by and spoke to him with an almost patronizing tone as he quizzed him about his interests. After a few minutes of conversation he asked if Kevin was a bodybuilder. “No, not at all – just like to lift. I like to eat too much to ever make it as a bodybuilder.” The man was on his hands and knees under the desk and was aware of how tightly his work pants were stretched over his muscled legs and ass. Kevin was past due for some new uniforms as the ones he owned were starting to be stressed by his growing muscles. Kevin tugged at his shirt trying to pull some slack over his big pecs suddenly self-conscious about the man’s attention. The cable guy thought back to the man’s reference to his wife when he first got there. He might have pegged the man as gay with all the interest he showed in Kevin’s build and eating habits.
Twenty minutes later Kevin had finished his work and was gathering up his tools. After he was packed up the thick man stood filling out some forms on a clipboard for the client to sign. The professor walked in with two pieces of apple pie on plates and sat them down on the table. “Dig in, Kevin.” The man poured a couple glasses of water from a pitcher. The bald man sat at the end of the table and started to eat his piece of pie.
Never one to refuse an offer of food, Kevin grinned, thinking ‘now this is more like it’ as he sat down in the heavy oak chair and slid up to the table. He shoved in a large bite of pie into his mouth. It was the best pie he had ever eaten. “Oh man this is great.” He exclaimed.
“Plenty more where that came from.” The professor grinned at him over his glasses.
“I could eat the whole pie easy.” Kevin smiled as he shoved the food in his mouth. In no time he had devoured the piece of pie and sat back with his arms on the arms of the chair. He started to slide the chair back as he said, “Thanks a lot for the snack. That’s was great.” The cable guy noticed the man opening a wooden box near his plate. Kevin figured he would pull out a cigar. Suddenly metal bands rose out of the arms of his chair and clamped his thick wrists to the chair. Slowly the bands cinched in tighter and tighter. Kevin laughed for an instant and then tried to pull his arms free but couldn’t move them free of the padded bands. His arms were held tight with his palms up as if his upper body was resting on his elbows. His short sleeved shirt clung to his straining muscles as he tried to free his vein covered arms. His big biceps swelled with the futile effort. The cable guy started to panic.
“What the fuck?” Kevin grunted. As he struggled, Kevin slid his thick legs back against the legs of the chair. The professor flipped another switch in his box and instantly metal bands strapped his muscled legs to the legs of the chair. “What the hell is going on? Let me out of this crazy thing.”
“All in due time, my friend.” The once mild mannered professor rolled his head back and laughed manically. “Just a little treat for you, Kevin. Don’t worry, you’ll like it.” The man stepped up behind the cable guy as he bounced the chair off the floor in his efforts to break free. The professor grabbed Kevin by the hair jerking his head back against the high back chair. The man reached over to his box and tripped another switch and bands came out and cinched tight around Kevin’s forehead until he couldn’t turn or pull his head away from the chair. He could feel the blood throbbing in his temples as the band almost cut into his forehead. The man was helpless to fight now that he was bound so tight.
This all seemed vaguely familiar to the cable man yet he couldn’t place it. The whole scene reminded him of something he’s seen in a movie once.
Professor Bruder reached into his box and tripped another switch. This time a wide section of wall paneling slid open revealing a brightly lit room beyond. The giggling scientist picked up a remote control and with another flip of a switch Kevin felt his chair rise as wheels came out of the thick chair legs. The man started to wheel Kevin toward the opening in the wall. After the two entered the room, the panel slide closed behind them. They were in a laboratory. The walls were stainless steel and the room was filled with stations of some sort.
Bruder reached down and locked the chair in place and came around to face Kevin.
“What are you going to do to me?”
“Just a little experiment. You’ve heard no doubt about the studies into myostatin blockers?”
“The stuff that regulates your ability to gain muscle?”
“Yes, myostatin regulates how much muscle you can gain, limits it in fact. Back down the evolutionary ladder many ages ago, the average man needed only a certain amount of muscle in order to survive; to hunt down his next meal or to fight off a foe. There was a point of limited returns as too much muscle would have been counterproductive, slowing down the hunter while increasing the amount of fuel needed to live. So myostatin fits into the puzzle to limit man’s ability to hulk out. Oh there have been a few genetic freaks here and there whose bodies don’t have the ability to produce myostatin but these people are few and far between.” While the man talked the professor had pushed Kevin’s chair onto a metal platform and was poking away at a computer keyboard. It was a platform scale and a light screen on the wall flashed 228 pounds.
“You think my body doesn’t manufacture myostatin? Trust me Doc, I built my body the hard way in the weight room and at the kitchen table. I’m no genetic freak.”
“No, not at all, Kevin. Here is where my studies come in. The myostatin blocker removes those limitations. That is what I need you for - to see if I can block your myostatin.” The professor came up to the front side of the trapped man and knelt down. Bruder started to unlace his work boots and remove them. With a little effort he had cut away his socks until Kevin’s bare feet rested on the cold metal platform. Then a quick calculation on the computer and the display screen read 14% body fat. The professor cocked his head as he did some mental calculations, “Just under 32 pounds of fat, so that leaves about 196 pounds of lean body mass.” The mad doctor reached down and patted Kevin’s meaty pec before sliding his hand down to his slightly pouting belly. “Perfect starting point.”
“You’re not gonna use me as a guinea pig!” Despite the demand, Kevin knew he was in no position to negotiate. He shifted his eyes over toward the doctor. “Hell, I’d think you could get tons of volunteers at any hard core gym. Why all this?”
“Well there was a setback on some of the early animal tests. Great gains in muscle – double and tripling of muscle mass with an incredible loss of body fat. But after a certain point the muscle sort of turned to jello.” The professor slid several photos of before and after pictures of skinned mice onto a table in front of the bound man. The before looked fairly ordinary rodent but the after shots looked like the skinned hindquarters of a bodybuilder; huge leg muscles, narrow hips and wide back.
“Jello??” Kevin repeated.
The professor shoved another photo forward that showed bones of the rodent in a puddle of red slime. “Yes, and when word got out a lot of interest dried up…as well as funding and the like. That put my research into what you might call the private domain and has lead to you as my first human test subject.” The man smiled at Kevin.
“A…I’m still hung up at the part where the muscles turn to jello?”
“Not to worry …not to worry, that’s all been taking care of more or less. The results will be permanent this time.”
The doctor pulled out a syringe and filled it a clear liquid. “First for a little genetic manipulation.”
“Hold on don’t do it. Please man, I’m begging you?”
The man ignored Kevin plea and shoved the needle into one of Kevin’s fat veins standing out on his forearm. “Now that didn’t hurt.”
It in fact burnt like hell, Kevin winched as he watched the serum being pumped into his vein. The professor rubbed cotton over the injection sight and taped a bandage over it.
“Now for a little appetite stimulant. Ya gotta eat to grow you know.” The professor shoved up the sleeve of Kevin’s right arm exposing his meaty delt. He rubbed a finger over the round muscled shoulder. “Good I can feel scarring no doubt, from injections from your own experimentation in muscle building pharmaceuticals. It will help and further our aims here.” The man grinned evilly and shoved the second syringe in. “Since the change is on a genetic level, you shouldn’t need much stimulus to grow just food to fuel the growth. Lots of fuel.”
Kevin was burning up and felt sort of nauseated. He tugged at the cuffs holding his arms, not believing what was happening to him. He rolled his eyes toward the man busy at his computer controls entering data. “I’m not your fucking guinea pig. Let me out of here.”
The man glanced up and chuckled, “Pigs is pigs.”
Kevin’s chair started to roll toward a chrome tank with a black plastic pipe sticking out of its side. “Pigs is Pigs! That’s IT!” Kevin remembered one of his favorite cartoons growing up was an old one about a glutton of young pig who gets fattened up with an automated feeding machine by an evil scientist. The house, the pie, the crazy professor Bruder – it all was part of the cartoon. The power lifter shifted his gaze to the man in the lab coat working levers and buttons on his control panel all the while laughing.
“Prepare to bulk up, big guy.” Bruder laughed. The man reached back and pulled along lever down. As he did his lab coat spread open revealing a red and white pinstriped tie.
Kevin saw the pipe begin to extend toward his face as his chair automatically rose until the pipe was in line with his mouth. The end of the pipe had a mouth piece similar to teeth protectors worn in sports. The man tried to hold his mouth closed though his belly was already rumbling with a gnawing hunger. The mouth piece bumped against his lips and hummed as it pressed harder feeling like it might bust out Kevin’s teeth. Finally a thin plastic wedge appeared on the front of the bit and slide between his lips and then teeth, forcing his mouth open. Once it had broken through his resistance the piece slid firmly into Kevin’s mouth. Next he felt a thick mixture flowing into his mouth. The man was helpless to do anything but swallow.
“A protein rich mix to start you off.” The professor pulled the lever open a bit more and the flow increased.
Kevin’s stomach ached even though he felt as though he was starving. He could see the numbers on the scale slowly spinning as his weight increased from the forced feeding. The panicked man could see a blurry refection of himself in the tank before him. The band around his head kept him from looking down. In the reflection the cable guy could see his gut swelling up and his buttons starting to strain.
The scale rolled past 229 … 230 …231. When it hit 235, the professor hit some switches and the pipe was retracted from Kevin’s mouth. The man sucked in air. His belly had such a bloat that he had patches of hairy skin showing between the buttons.
“Now for some fruit!”
The chair swung around to a machine that had spikes with pealed bananas on them. Two prongs came down slowly and hooked into Kevin’s nose while two other rose up from below his chin and hooked over his lower jaw. The contraption started working Kevin’s mouth up and down as the bananas came closer. Then one by one the fruit was sucked in by the automated eating machine that Kevin had become. The muscled man tried to count but by ten he was having trouble remembering his name.
Then the chair spun again as rolled up to a tank that held a rice mixture. A tube and mouth piece extended out into his mouth and the man was stuffed once more. Next came a hose supplying him with water.
Kevin was dazed, stuffed, and starving. His belly felt as blown up as a car tire. Above all the man couldn’t pull his attention away from the escalating numbers that rolled by on the scale. The scale read 257 by the time the water hose was stuffed in his mouth. At 267 the hose was retracted.
“Crazy fucker, let me out of here.”
“Not just yet.” The professor reached over as the chair rolled up in front of him and felt Kevin’s 18” arm. “Feeling any stronger, big guy?”
Kevin didn’t feel anything but stuffed and as if his body was on fire. He glanced up at the scale and noticed that the numbers were inching higher even though he wasn’t currently being stuffed. 285…289… His muscles felt pumped as if he had just finished working out every muscle on his body. Kevin’s clothes were tight as hell. 290…291… He could feel seams popping open over his shoulders and chest as his whole body felt as stuffed as his belly.
“It’s starting my friend!” The professor laughed nervously as he pulled another lever at the control.
Kevin felt nauseated as the chair swirled again as he started on another feeding session. Again the man was force fed at the various station, protein slop, water, fruit, rice goop, and again. Kevin could keep track as he swirled around the room and numbers clicked past on the scale: 314…326…346…357… How long he was fed the man couldn’t say – hours; days? Who knew? He felt his clothes rip away as his morphing muscles blew up. His undying hunger grew as his belly seemed to swell and shrink again and again. His body fat also rose and dropped faster than a Wall Street Report. All the while the crazed Professor watched his experiment play out as he laughed and pulled his levers.
Finally the chair swirled around toward the wall as the panel separating the lab from the dining room slid open. Kevin looked around. The scale flashed 457 pounds with 3% body fat. He felt huge and weighed down. Kevin’s traps had blown up around his thick neck and brushed against his head as he tried to turn his head from side to side. His upper body was so muscle bound that he felt as if he was shrugging. His clothes hung in tatters over his hulked out body. Kevin’s eyes rose back up to the blinking read out on the scale. 457 pounds at 3% body fat!
There was a hum and the bands slid back releasing his limbs. Kevin raised his arms. They only seemed to move maybe four inches before his bulging arms muscles locked out. He reached over and rubbed his right wrist in his left. It felt fifteen inches around.
Kevin felt a hand on his shoulder and became aware that it felt five feet away. The professor grinned at him and said, “Well, you’re free to get up and move around. Nothing stopping you.”
The dazed muscled man sat for a moment before pushing himself to his feet. The mad scientist walked into the dining room with one arm out stretched to his guinea pig. Kevin walked slowly; each foot hitting the ground like a load of bricks. His shredded pants fluttered about his legs like a grass skirt. “What have you done to me?”
“Well have a look for yourself.” Broder held an arm out directing Kevin to a huge gold framed mirror on the wall.
There was reflected a freak of a bodybuilder who looked as though his father had been a massive bull. Kevin a man who prided himself as a power lifter and if pressed he might have admitted to having the build of a football player. The man he saw standing before the mirror looked like Mr.O times ten!
Kevin turned toward the mad professor who watched his experiment move proudly. “Stay away from me, you bastard!” Kevin backed toward the front door as he held a muscle packed arm out pointing toward the man. He barely took two steps when his stomach rumbled loudly. Loud enough for both me to hear. How could he still feel hungry? Kevin looked over at the table where the biggest turkey he’d ever seen sat browned to perfection.
“Hungry Kevin? Help yourself.”
He didn’t want to eat but he was so damn hungry. His skin felt packed so tight he doubted he could take anymore pressure and yet Kevin waddled up to the table. The cable man grabbed a huge leg and ripped it off the bird and stuffed it in his mouth as he saw the crazy scientist clap his hands and laughed. The meat was so good and juicy.
BAM! A loud explosion ran through Kevin’s ears. The next thing he was aware of he was laying flat on his back in the back of his service truck. He could see stars in the night sky over head. He reached up and pulled himself to a sitting position. He looked around. There was nothing to see just dried grass and brush of a vacant lot. No house – not anything. Anything other than his muscle packed body that now weighed 457 pounds at 3% body fat barely covered by the tattered remains of a uniform that had been to tight to start with.