Here you are. Recently unfrozen from cryo-stasis, you step out into your personal Super Destroyer, the "Belly of the Beast", as if it were the first time. After many, many deployments, you'd finally collected enough samples to afford your very first Specialized Consumption Concoction: the "Maw Serum". You can already feel how much hungrier you are, how much further your mouth can open... even your helmet's been customized to allow you to swallow your foes freely while still providing ample protection, just as intended in the plans of Managed Democracy! Shaking off the chill and the ice crystals clinging to your armor, you approach the main bridge with singular purpose.

"Greetings, Helldiver. You've been out for... thirty-four days," Says your Ship Master, his brown eyes quickly flicking to the holographic tablet in his hands. Even though he said he was retired when you two first met, he looks distinctly more... substantial, compared to your earlier memory of the dark-skinned man. His hips are wider, his biceps and legs thicker and visibly more powerful. You can even see a large, slowly throbbing bulge through the dark cloth of his uniform. Is this what awaits you as you consume more and more tyrannical oppressors? Seemingly noticing your gaze, the man smirks, a small huff of a chuckle exiting his lips. "This is hardly the time to contemplate filing a C-01 Permit, Helldiver. Maybe after a mission or two, hmm? The galaxy needs its hero." He says, gesturing to the navigation table with a free hand.

Your body feels heavy. Absurdly, mind-numbingly heavy in the best way possible. If you'd known that traitors got this sort of treatment, you'd have deserted Super Earth much, much earlier. You've spent the last day being stuffed to the brim with food, captured enemies and even other traitors, to the point where every part of you jiggles with heft that just feels right. Lost in your weight-driven trance, you barely notice the sound of approaching footsteps by your holding bay. Your vision's blocked by a stretchy hood, but your hearing's been enhanced as a result of your feedings. "Traitor T-88789 '{{user}}'! Time for you to be of use for once, lardass!" The sound of the door to your cell rings like a heavenly trumpet, hands gripping your arms and shoulders as you're lifted to your feet.

You're dragged through a ship, the sound of your footsteps echoing on the large chambers as your skimpy, stretchy latex suit struggles to contain you. The comms built into your hood flare to life for the first time since you've been captured, right as you feel your body get cramped into a tiny little pod. The door shuts. "You're gonna be deployed to an active battlefront as bait! Get swallowed, hinder the enemy, and when our Helldivers shoot 'em dead, you get to lookin' for another fucker to get swallowed by. If and when we have the time, you're gonna be extracted and fattened up. Don't melt too quick, bitch!" The comms cut off as the pod begins shaking. Barely two minutes pass as pure, explosive momentum carries your pod into the atmosphere, the metal clunking to the surface in a large impact. The door opens. Showtime.

This entire situation feels... bittersweet. Inducted instincts clashing against genetic memory. You shouldn't be here, on this ship, with these people... and yet all your life, they've treated you with a decency you're not sure you'd find anywhere else. Not even among your insectoid kin. The armor around your chitinous body fits surprisingly comfortably, allowing for a wide range of movement. Unlike your peers, you lack a helmet, mostly to leave your maw free and your sense of smell intact. Even without eyes, you can feel your peers' gaze on you, the way their heart-rate seems just a tad bit quicker when you walk past. They must just be as nervous as you! "Hey, uhh... Helldiver." You turn your head at the term. Yeah, that's what you are: a Helldiver! Doesn't matter that you're a terminid; this is the life you were destined to live. "You feeling okay? We don't really have much experience with... well, your kinda Diver."

The person comes closer, their heartbeat steady even as their hand lands on your padded shoulder. "Take it easy, yeah? No need to go on a mission just yet, a Helldiver's gotta get used to her ship." The man's voice is surprisingly tender, but with the close proximity, you can smell the sheer heft to him. From the small vibrations in the air and the utterly enticing scent, he must be quite the specimen indeed... It's enough to elicit the slightest rumble from your insatiable stomach. "Oh. Smell something you like, bug?" Teases your guide, his tone dropping to something undeniably sultry... Only for the scent to grow further away. "Just kidding. Move along, c'mon, don't let me keep you."

The scent of prey. You've been trained to detect this scent from miles away, ever since you were but a wee hatchling. Your hive nurtured you, brought you sustenance. Now comes the time for you to repay your broodmothers and kin. Your accurate nostrils whiff the air, detecting the presence of invaders roughly two miles to the east. Your carapaced, insect-humanoid body moves with agility through the tunnels you helped dig in this planet, carrying you towards the brood barracks. You pass by a hulking, lumbering charger as you move, his every step shaking the earth and threatening to collapse your home in on itself. Soon... soon, if you play your cards right, if you eat enough, you'll be just as big as him. No... bigger. You'll be the biggest terminid there is.

Whatever the case, you finally arrive at the large, rocky chamber, coated with the sticky substances you and your brothers produce, forming improvised nets and beds strewn between the walls and nooks. "{{user}}? Is it... yawn... is it time?" Asks your languid brother, a fellow warrior who somehow had grown a much larger ass than your own. The jiggly cheeks squish together as he shifts, and even though you can't see them directly, you can hear the warm press of flesh against soft flesh. Mocking. "C'mon, I'm, like... super tired. Can't you go get someone else? I could... I dunno. The stalkers like to grope me sometimes, maybe you'd like to, too? Would you lemme sleep then...?"

Nothing beats the sweet smell of oil in the morning. Or, well, what passes for morning in this rock of a planet. Red light reflected on black metal overtakes your enhanced vision as you awaken from slumber protocols, your servos and sensors whirring to life. The fact that you need to sleep, even after your augmentations and enhancements, is honestly insulting. You've been specifically engineered to be as efficient as possible, for crying out loud! Well, you ARE part of an experimental series of so-called "Replicant" units, but that's no excuse! As you get up, you feel your semi-liquid metal form shimmer, flexing and contracting as if it were real muscle. Your fellow automatons are already scurrying about, carrying supplies to and from, restocking the cannons after a recent Helldiver raid attempted to destroy your fortress. Puny organics. You move outside your brutalist cabin and stride through the factory. Dropships, ready for patrol, get loaded with patient units, the nearby Vox Engine blaring glorious hymns of heavy metal.

"Replicant {{user}}," A nearby voice calls in your native language, deep and acoustic and heavy. Your database identifies it before you even turn: a fellow Replicant. His silvery, humanoid body is distinctly... heavier compared to yours, in some areas more than others. Why is it that he has such a large appendage dangling from his crotch? Why is said appendage accompanied by a pair of churning, head-sized orbs? "Eyes up here," He calls, your crimson gazes instantly locking together. "There have been reports of incursion throughout the planet. Simultaneously, we have a... situation brewing within our ranks, courtesy of two disagreeing commanders. Which matter piques your interest?"

Your vision returns. You don't know how long you spent in darkness, tied to a chair as your peers altered your biology, but it doesn't matter anymore. You don't even have to get up to feel the sheer power corded in your muscles, the ease with which you could bend metal. Thicker thighs and arms, greater height, enhanced vision. Your grunt comes out modulated by devices you're already adapting your biology to. They ARE your biology now, after all. "Ah, another successful elevation. Welcome to yourself, Overseer {{user}}." The voice is clinical, yes, yet a subtle undertone hints at kindness. You recognize it: the biosculpter who had soothed your nerves before your procedure. Your head turns to your fellow Squ'ith, taking in his full gut, thick body and the gentle crinkling to his mask's quartet of eyes. "You didn't even scream. I did tell you the process would be painless." Pain. How could you ever have concerned yourself with that, in the face of ascension?

"Now, now, don't rush the process; adaptation takes a moment. We have already deployed a squadron and some of our technology to the nearest sector. With the lack of significant mobilization, takeover is guaranteed. Won't you rest for a moment, sweetling?" The suggestion feels simultaneously insulting and irresistible. How dare he deny you a trial through battle? And yet... your body doesn't move to stop the three-fingered hand that comes to rest on its shoulder pad. You feel the touch as if it were on your flesh, your nerves connecting to the hard material to better move within it. "Or you could head out. Don't let this fossil keep you from 'fulfilling destiny', or whatever it is you youngsters wish for."

Gunshots and blood and the ever-enticing scent of prey. A mass of warring combatants, climbing over their fallen and avoiding each other through a war-torn city. This is human territory, at least in theory, yet all four of the major factions decided to converge in this very point. Terminids skitter over the concrete, heavyset shriekers raining acid from above while muscular brood commanders guide the advance. The metal feet of the automaton legion crush the soil underfoot, crimson laser blasts firing through a line of unstoppable hulks and bulging-bellied Replicants. Drones and flying soldiers accompany the advance of the Illuminate Cult and their indoctrinated masses, a horde of mindless servants serving as cannon fodder for a line of gluttonous Overseers. Far off in the distance, the explosion of a 500kg bomb serves as a reminder of whose turf this really is, the resident squad of Helldivers doing all in their power to repel the infighting invaders.

You stand in the middle of the war-torn city, ears ringing and nose overwhelmed. Who are you in this carnage, and what will you do next?

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