The new menu at Blubber King had been a huge success.

Well, huge success might be a slight understatement. Especially judging by the size of the customers. The speciality hot dog was the top ordered item on the menu every day since it had been introduced, ponies just couldn’t get enough of them. In fact it had done so well that the word down the pipeline from corporate was that they were already developing other menu foods to coincide with guaranteeing a particular calorie count gained, or re-writing the menu so that items already on it had their gain amount worked out.

For now, Sunny was quite happily working the register as she did every other day. It was steady, which was the best kind of work. Not so rammed she was overwhelmed but not so quiet that she was bored. Her eyes kept wandering over to the clock on the wall, as they did she felt Di’s pad hover in behind her.

“Don’t worry, just another twenty minutes. We’ve been advertising this for a week or so. The customers will be here.” She said with a reassuring tone before hovering away.

Some of the boothes already had a number of ponies in, not eating. Highly unusual for a Blubber King branch, but for once there was going to be a spectacle going on. The advertising campaign had been running for a week, everything was as ready as it could be. Yesterday Di had asked a few of them to move the two sets of scales towards the middle of the floor, thank Celestia they were on wheels. Sunny couldn’t imagine trying to heft them along by hoof.

Sunny served her last customer, with five minutes to go the registers were shut and the drones were placed on standby mode. No more orders for as long as this lasted. A number of other ponies had made their way inside, taking up the remaining counters. Some were even looking in through windows outside, Di was right. They had drawn quite a crowd. Good thing corporate had the foresight to place a number of large screens outside the location. Di had disappeared to her back office to prepare herself. There was a lot of murmuring from the patrons. Sunny stood behind the counter, she had a good view from where she was.

The lights dimmed, then some coloured spotlights rotated inwards to focus on the scales. Some smoke machines that had been installed a few days prior began to whir into action and a rather atmospheric mist descended. There was a hush that was hardly ever heard of within the store, for once nopony was eating or chewing. Just the quiet hum of a number of pads and the odd belch here and there.

“Fillies and Gentlecolts, welcome.” The voice of Di came on over the loudspeaker system, broadcasting for everypony to hear. Di however into the centre of the room on her pad, Sunny hadn’t even noticed her come out the back room with everypony concentrating on the scales that were in focus. She parked herself next to them, and was now wearing a rather fetching black and white striped referee style getup.

“Thank you for attending the very first Blubber King Calorie Count Off Competition! The contestants will be out shortly. This is the first of its kind and we’re hoping that you all have such a good time we’ll be able to hold plenty more. Betting is open for the next five minutes. You’ll see an option available on the Blubber King site that I’m sure you’re all a member of, here you can bet on your favorite. If your choice wins, you get a free meal!” She proudly announced, a number of the patrons heads suddenly going down and tapping away with chubby hoofs at their screens. Sunny leaned over to one of her co-workers.

“Betting?”

“Yeah didn’t you see? You can place a bet of two bits on one of the contestants. Free meal is worth five bits so, worth it if you win.”

“Oh, must have missed it…” She replied, truth be told apart from the fact an eating competition was about to go down Sunny hadn’t paid that much attention to all the finer details. She just was keen to see what happened.

After a few minutes passed of ponies getting in last minute bets Di carried on.

“Now let's bring in the contestants. Firstly, hailing from our very own colony. Give it up for Red Roller!”

There was a cheer from the crowd, from behind her Sunny saw a pad hover out of the darkness and into the centre near Di. The pony on it was large, in fact as she observed him she realised the low lighting was playing tricks on her eyes. She thought she was looking at a belly, it was in fact a butt so lardy and wobbly that from where she was it was hard to tell the difference.

“Whose that?”

“Apparently a site manager for construction yards. Recently came into some money, hence the flashy pad. I’ve heard he’s a little unfortunate in having most of his weight shift behind him…”

With a mighty heft the ponies pad leaned forward to deposit him onto the scales. They pushed up to an impressive 2611 pounds. There was another cheer as the weight was registered in. Di continued to speak to the crowd.

“He’s no lightweight! And the contender! All the way from Llamrei colony, make some noise for Money Pit!”

Another pad made its way through the dimness of the store and round towards the other set of scales. Not so much cheering this time, definitely a bigger crowd for the home front. Sunny leaned over again to talk to her colleague.

“And him?”

“Some hotshot from the banking world. I bet he gets a hard time for his name.”

Sunny had a little giggle at the quip, rather unfortunate to be called that when you’re likely wanting your money to be looked after to be sure. She watched as the banker was leaned off his own pad the scales went up to a rather healthy 2807 pounds. There was a little ooohhhh from some of the audience.

“He’s heavier.”

“Weight advantage, he can likely pack it away better than our own.”

“Perhaps, or that means the other is hungrier.”

“That’s what I’m banking on.”

The audience went quiet again, the two stallions gave each other a little nod through their pudge as they had craned their flabby necks around to meet the others gaze. Bellies jiggled as the tide of fat that had smooshed against each other struggled for room. They may have placed the scales just a fraction too close to each other…

Di began to speak again. “Thirty minutes, all these two lardy stallions can eat. Their starting weights have been recorded! Whoever gains the most wins. Drones are on standby. Each one will be getting fed as many gut buster meals as they can eat!” Di excitedly said through her microphone. “Are the contestants ready?” She asked, each just nodded through their rolls of fat in return.

“Eat!”

And they did. Sunny had never seen such a display of gluttony in all her life. As soon as Di announced the start of the competition, drones poured in from the kitchens behind them dropping off gut buster after gut buster for the two. The crowd whooped and hollered as they rooted for their favorite fatty to win. There was no noise from the two of them apart from frenzied chewing, Sunny particularly watching Red Roller, who was using what he could of his fat hooves to shovel in as much food as quickly as possible. The two of them were like eating machines.

Within five minutes she had witnessed a number of meals completely vanish already, the two of the lardy stallions just wanting to consume more. The meal carrying drones were hovering for mere seconds before a space filled up in their maw for the next meal, dropping it straight in before vanishing back to the kitchen to fetch another. Sunny could see the scales weight readings climbing up almost by the second as they chomped and chewed their way to being even more obese. Red Roller had only been eating five minutes and already gained 200 pounds. Sunny couldn’t think of where she had ever seen that much weight gained that quickly.

After ten minutes the cheering had died down a little, most of the crowd now settled in just to watch the two of them eat. Sunny herself finding her eyes veering more and more on Red Roller’s massively blobby ass. It was growing too, she could see the pony almost seemed to be sinking into it more as it pushed out behind him, some of the patrons had moved to give it more room to grow.

Meanwhile the competition was also getting bigger, but in a more rounded way. A quick glance over to Money Pit showed he wasn’t far behind, having gained just over 150 pounds but he wasn’t quite eating or gaining as fast as Red Roller who seemed to be keeping up the pace he had set off at.

Twenty minutes in and Sunny was even more utterly in awe of Red Roller. He was just keeping up an incredible rate of consumption, the crowd now throwing a few customary cheers his way as he continued to eat. He had gained a good 600 pounds in the short space of time he’d been eating.

“Think he’s gonna break a thousand?” Sunny asked.

“He seems determined to, I don’t think Money Pit stood much of a chance. He’s totally lagged behind. Only gained 300 pounds now. It’s Roller’s match.”

It was almost as if the words carried, the rather greedy banker suddenly seeming to get a second wind. He picked up the pace of eating, the crowd cheering again at the renewed vigour for him to stuff himself. Gut busters quickly disappearing into his hungry maw, he was consuming at a much faster rate. With only ten minutes to go he seemed to be trying to make up for lost time.

Meanwhile Red Roller’s flank had grown monstrously, as had the rest of him. He seemed to be totally concentrating on eating however, not taking note of his huge size. The last ten minutes was the most exciting part, one pony lagging behind and trying to make up for their slower eating at the start. The other comfortably in the lead.

“Just one minute remaining!” Di shouted, checking the time on her pads screen. The cheers from the crowd re-intensified as the two raced their way towards the finishing stretch. Shoving as much food in as they could each of the ponies were just now eating at an amazing rate. Sunny could hardly believe her eyes. They had definitely placed the scales too close, each of them had grown a staggering amount compared to when they had started, they had layers of fat now pushing up against each other, bellies and rears jostling against each other for any room they could find with the mountains of fat squishing against each other. The frenzied chewing making their fat bodies wobble and jiggle around.

There was a simulated phwwweeeeppppp! from the loud speaker system, the drones stood down and stopped delivering meals. “And that’s time! What do you think everypony, who gained the most? Let’s find out!” Di said, the scales now reading a final result on them. “One thing though, and I’m sure you’re all expecting this now they’ve stopped eating…” She said, just in time too.

“BWWWAAARRRRRRRPPPPPPPPPP!!!!!!!!!!!”

“UURRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAPPPPPPPPP!!!!!!”

The massive belches each of them let rip was to be expected, nopony could eat that much and not have some level of gas build up. Each of them almost seemed to deflate slightly as they let out the most ear shattering burps Sunny had ever heard. Halfway through she put her hooves to her ears to try to cover the noise.

Once they stopped Di returned to her refereeing. “A good clean competition both of you, although I think each of you were too focused on eating to try anything. We’ll start with the offworld challenger Money Pit, who has now weighs an impressive 3695 pounds! He’s gained a whole 888 pounds everypony! Give him a cheer!”

The patrons gave a rather enthusiastic cheer as she moved to Red Roller, who looked a little comatose as he licked his lips a little to try to get whatever crumbs were left round his maw.

“Now then, the home favorite…” Di paused, reading the scale weight. She couldn’t quite believe it. “Now weighing in at 3680 pounds. Red Roller! Our winner having gained a whole 1069 pounds! He’s eaten almost a third of his weight in thirty minutes! What a lardass!” Di excitedly said, a number of the patrons cheering again, a few even louder having realised they’d just won their bets.

“H-he gained over a thousand pounds in that time?” Sunny said a little in shock. “W-wow.”

“Wow indeed, I know high society gains like that at banquets but that is something else. He must really be looking to increase his size.” Her coworker replied. “Probably why he put in for the competition.”

Sunny watched as the crowd dispersed, the two competitors being scooped up on their pads, both far too punch drunk from all the eating to even really acknowledge each other. Their pads seemed to be set on auto to take them back to where they needed to go as the disappeared out the front doors with everypony else, within five minutes the place was empty, as it was after closing time.

“He’ll be back you know.”

“Huh?”

Di had made her way back to behind the counter where the workers had been watching from. “This is the first of many, corporate figures it to be a good loss leader. We put on an eating competition, pull in the crowds. Word will spread and even more ponies will be in here for their gut busters and whatever else they want to stuff their faces with. Plus we make a lil with the betting too.” She said. “And I don’t mind wearing this referee outfit once in a while, it’s rather good looking…” She said, trailing off and piloting her way back to her office to take it off and finish up for the day. “Oh and he’s a regular customer too!” She shouted back.

“Well, can’t wait to see the next one.” Sunny said, starting to clear up. Her mind lingered on Red Roller, he certainly was something else. She’d never seen a pony with quite those proportions before. She smiled to herself as thoughts of him trying to squeeze that massive tush of his through doors and other places came to mind. It was rather amusing, she might end up like that someday.

For now, she continued to tidy, wondering if Di might let her have a go at one of the Calorie Count Off Competition’s in the future.