Chapter Text
When they had started recording that day Dandy had been excited, it was a Christmas episode so he got to spend all day with Bobette and because it was a Christmas dinner episode he got to have all the other mains there as well, what more could a flower ask for? Well for starters the camera not to be pointed at him the whole time and for the script not to have him eating in nearly every scene and for them to get stuck reshooting the same scene for two hours.
Dandy was a patient toon, or at least he liked to think he was, what he wasn't however was a bottomless pit. He would've appreciated the Christmas sweater they had him in if it hadn't been tucked into overalls which were starting to get snug to begin with and paired with a silly novelty belt, at this point all he could be grateful for was his petal and the table working together to disguise how entirely and utterly beached he felt.
"Can someone refill Dandy's plate, it's starting to look empty again" one of the handlers called out, his brain was starting to get too foggy to bother distinguishing them. All he could acknowledge was them filling his plate again as he accepted they needed to do another take, his stomachs complaints not heard over the chatter of a film set.
He tried to distract himself, looking over to his wonderful friends to see if any of them were doing something interesting enough to distract him from the tight pain radiating out from his midsection but they were all still in the positions they'd been in for the past two hours.
At the other end of the table sat Bobette, no plate in front of her as the camera hovered over her shoulder. She'd been making silly faces to get him and the others to break character whilst recording which normally would be all good with Dandy, but he found himself a little miffed by it today. Vee sat on her right, she had complained about the script enough that halfway through they changed it so she would play along, in front of her a plate of obviously plastic food and computer chips for a visual gag about her not being able to eat, not that Dandy wanted to think about gags or gagging at this point. On Bobette's other side Sprout was sat, kicking his feet under the table as he played with the serving spoon prop in between takes, his plate had mostly veg on it and wasn't in focus so he could get away with simply moving bits around once he'd had his fill. Shelly sat next to Vee, her plate comically untouched as she'd been given the task of saying the same five facts over and over again at a speed that made Dandy's head spin instead of eating. Finally Astro sat on Dandy's right, his plate mostly full but him not having to pick up the fork as he leaned back into the chair wrapped tightly in his blanket, how Dandy wished he wasn't sitting upright in that moment.
Dandy's eyes were forced to focus and go back to looking into the camera as they called for the next take to start, he attempted to shift slightly, tried pulling on his overalls to see if he could get any more room in them but they were tight against his belly. Dandy slipped into character with ease but had a hard time stopping himself from wincing after each bite, his stomach was strained and slow, nothing was moving it all just piled up getting tighter and tighter with each take.
He'd tried to scrape some food off his plate for pebble in an early take only for Sprout to call him out rather loudly, he played it off as improvising to try and give variety to the scene, they didn't like that.
If he had anything he should thank the directors for it was the fact he didn't eat a whole plate each scene, all he had to do was passively eat the whole time so Vee could make a comment about him "Not even paying attention!" To whatever the argument she was scripted to be having with Sprout was about, then he politely batted his eyelashes and said the same witty comeback he felt like he'd said a million times before at this point.
By time it came for his line he faltered for a second, having the swallow down a burp caused by the air he'd swallowed when they first started recording and he hadn't been paying attention to how fast he was eating. He said it smoothly enough that he hoped they didn't seem to notice luckily.
Even luckier still when they called cut this time there was a small cheer from the camera operators, apparently they'd finally done it good enough that they could stop for the day.
He smiled genuinely for the first time in over an hour, he could feel that it was lopsided and he knew that his eyes must be drooping because of how heavy they felt but he stood up with the rest of the toons and no one said a thing, he'd been just about ready to politely say goodbye before waddling back to his room to die peacefully from a ruptured stomach when Veronica called out that they should take a picture.
Every single time Veronica was on set she insisted they take a photo, it was cute the first few times but it grew old quickly for Dandy as most of his shoots with Vee weren't the most pleasant and he didn't want to have to force a smile and hug her every single time they finished filming her yelling at him whilst he had to act dumb enough to be taught a lesson. Still he scooted in with the other toons to have it be taken anyway, carefully positioning his arms in a way he hoped masked his stomach.
As they all lined up Astro pulled in next to him, Dandy found himself sucking in as much as he could as they could as Astro hugged against him before the flash went off, lower set of arms creeping out from his blanket to loosely wrap around Dandy's "waist." Dandy knew he was wincing after the picture was done because in his attempt to turn and leave his eye caught on Astro, who was giving him a concerned look.
Dandy didn't bother asking him not to follow as they started walking out together whilst the others discussed what to have for their dinner.
Astro didn't speak until they were halfway down the hallway to Dandy's room "Are you okay?" It was a simple enough question but when Dandy went to sigh and respond he felt a tight stabbing sensation right behind his ribs, an air pocket trapped underneath the mountain of food he had shovelled into himself he was sure, completely harmless but it was still painful enough that instead of saying "I'm alright!" as he had intended to do all he instead let out was a pathetic little whine as he stopped still with a hand on his belly.
He felt Astro dance his hands to his shoulders but he couldn't find the strength to unclench his eyes as Astro no doubt checked him over to see if he was injured, he felt the hand touch his forehead before Astro murmured "What's wrong, I can't see anything and you don't feel sick?" Whilst Dandy disagreed with that last statement he knew Astro only meant he had no fever.
"I'm fine, Astro" he managed after a beat too long, it came out far more exasperated than he had intended but when he looked to his friend he seemed to have taken no offence.
"Clearly you're not, if you don't tell me now I'll just find out later tonight when it's plaguing your dreams so please just tell me" Astro made a good point as they arrived at Dandy's door, he fumbled with the doorknob for a second before walking in, allowing Astro to close it behind himself.
"It's nothing, really Lune, I just ate too much whilst we were recording" he said shamefully as he walked over to his bed, kicking his boots off and removing the belt as fast as he could, though leaning over to do so made him feel sick and sucking in felt like asking for something to go wrong.
He wasn't too surprised when he felt Astro's weight on the bed next to him whilst he struggled with the zipper on the side of his overalls but he couldn't help to jump when Astro's hand slipped under his own to pull the zipper for him.
"You're going to need to suck in, Sunflower"
"I am" he whined pitifully, breathing out as he did as if to drive the point home.
He heard Astro gasp slightly and felt his face flush slightly, the heat not helping with the mild if slowly building nausea.
"How much did you have?" His voice had an air of panic to it and something else that Dandy didn't quite recognise.
He tried to think but gave up rather quickly "I don't know but it hurts and I need out of these overalls and my pants as soon as possible!" He knew he sounded pathetic, if it were anyone else he might've had more shame to at least pretend he was okay or to act more confidently but this was his best friend, Astro had seen him sick as a dog, helped him get dressed into costumes ordered the wrong size and literally seen his dreams. If Dandy could trust anyone whilst he was in this state it was Astro.
"Okay, breathe baby, I'll get you out of them just" Astro fumbled for a moment to get a good hold on the zipper. "Breathe in" if it didn't require his full attention to breathe in and hold it right now Dandy might have questioned his life long best friend calling him baby for a second longer.
Astro pulled hard and the zipper didn't budge, he seemed determined though as another hand pushed some of Dandy's still soft under gut out of the way and yanked hard again, releasing the zipper so fast he took the slider off on the way down. "And out"
Dandy gasped, his face was definitely flushed but he couldn't tell if that was just from holding his breath, before he could question Astro or object to being manhandled in such a way his stomach let out a loud, high pitched whine.
Instead of saying anything Dandy got back to the task at hand, get undressed as quickly as possible and find a position that didn't actively hurt or make him want to throw up so he could fall asleep for the next million years before Shelly dug up his fossil.
Pulling of his sweater and the blouse that had started to ride up underneath as fast as he could without winding himself in this state, as he found himself pulling both shirts over his head he felt a pair of hands on the edge of his boxers, lightly pulling at the elastic.
"Astro!" He breathed in sharply as he spoke, making his stomach gurgle quietly at the movement.
"You looked like you needed some help, I'm sorry if that was too much" Astro's voice was soft and his eyes doe like as his hand didn't move away from Dandy's boxers but didn't continue to move either.
Dandy thought for a moment, this was most certainly something they shouldn't be doing but Dandy really didn't not want to have to bend down at all to take his boxers off. He weighed the pros and cons, deciding that as long as no one else knew, he could take the shame of Astro seeing him nude and beached, his stomach would probably obscure him anyway.
"Okay" he managed, quiet and high pitched as Astro pulled his pants down for him before climbing back into the bed and helping him lie down.
Astro gently shuffled them both around until he was loosely spooning Dandy, his upper set of arms loosely across the top of his belly, the lower ones rubbing slow and gentle circles into the lower part of his aching gut. Slowly working out small pockets of air as Dandy's quiet purring got interrupted with small burps.
Dandy would have to ask him why he knew how to help in this situation in the morning, for now he decided to as quietly as he could accept the help.