Shenandoah Surprise - Formerly "Toobin' Down The River"

[MarauderTDL]

FORWARD

Back in the late 1990's and early 2000's, when Yahoo had a Forum Board, the Shrinking Women Forum was bustling with activity. For those of you who remember it, I'll simply say that it was vastly different from what the Internet is today. For those of you who don't, or who are too young to remember, those were the Wild West days of the Internet, where AOL was the king, and Dial-Up Modems were the means to access the Internet. Logging on wasn't a simple click on an icon and off you went...noooo, it required the dreaded modem dial-up screech and "You've Got Mail" blasting out of your speakers before you could go to your favorite chat room.

In any case, the Shrinking Women Forum, or SW Forum for short (pun), was where I met some friends: Minimizer, Samador, LoreKeep, SciDram, and others. We were young(er), doing our thing and having fun enjoying our fantasy with friends. There were live Roleplaying chats, which amounted to little more than descriptions of various SW encounters with willing participants, and the fun that was a part of it, but the most fun came from when some of us would challenge each other to what were essentially Story Duels. This was where we would see who could belt out the most story content in the shortest amount of time. Minimizer and I were usually the two regulars who would do the deed. He would post a chapter of a story idea he had, and I would follow up with a chapter of my own idea, and we'd go back and forth until we were finished, which sometimes took up to a month! The SW Forum loved it because it meant free content coming from some of the more prolific members, and we always tried to satisfy everyone's need for good SW content.

One story that I came up with early in my writing days was originally entitled "Toobin' Down the River". I'll pause while a few of you gasp in realization at the memory of what has, to some people's opinions, been one of my best stories, and to those people who have thought so, I say thank you for your opinions and appreciation. However, over the years, I began to go back to my old stories and re-read them, only to realize just how raw and lacking the stories were. In my opinion, a writer can always improve on their earlier works because you're always learning. A better way to frame a scene, a better way to create good dialogue, etc. And so it was that I went back about five years ago and re-read "Toobin' Down the River" and realized...DAMN! This story needs some MAJOR work to make it better! Seriously, it was one of my earliest stories and it was mainly focused on one thing...SHRINKING WOMEN and all the glories that go with that from a twenty-something guy.

YOU, the reader, saw it as a masterpiece of SW literature...young shrinking women, slipping out of their clothes, naked, exposed, hiding behind soda cans and piles of clothes while leering giants tried to capture them. What I saw was...in serious need of a complete overhaul to make it a real story that could be published, or in this case, shared with friends.

"Toobin' Down the River" or "Shenandoah Surprise" as I eventually retitled it as, went from being 50 or so pages, to becoming over 230 pages long and 20 loooong Chapters filled with content that you never saw in the original story. It also featured something that no one saw in the original...a link to several stories that I'd previously written as well as a link to what I like to call the SW Universe created by Minimizer with his Adventures In Miniaturization and the covert shrinking squad. Not only did it help me flesh out the story, but it added layers of detail and member-berries that long-time fans could say, "Oh my god! I remember that! Wasn't that from the story that he wrote about...?" Uhuh, yes, yes it is. Thank you for noticing. "Shenandoah Surprise" would go on to become one of my most ambitious stories and one of my favorites. It featured a new character: Alex Sharp, a young, impressionable man living in Central Virginia who gets caught up in a web of intrigue and deception and even romance, as he comes to discover who he is, and what he stands for. It's a great story with links back to several of my stories, a few of Minimizers, and a hint at a possible future story arc if I ever decide to continue. I hope that everyone enjoys reading it. For those who are old-time fans, this one is for you, who believed in me so long ago to compliment me for my work and who said that "TDTR" was one of their all-time favorites. It is a passion-project that I hope you will comment on, enjoy, and if I goofed up, be gentle. Because as Toby Keith once said, "I' ain't as good as I once was, but I'm as good once, as I ever was."

ENJOY!

TDL

[MarauderTDL]

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Shenandoah Surprise is a Shrinking Women story of the highest order, which is to say that it hits most of the major key plot points. First, this story is about shrinking women (duh). It does have instances of shrinking men, but those parts are down-played because I'm all about the ladies. Next, this is NOT a simple shrink 'n go story. If you're looking for being immediately aroused and such...go to the local Adult book store and buy a magazine or something. This is NOT that kind of story. Third, this story DOES include...beautiful, young women, shrinking to various sizes, shrinking out of their clothes, sometimes naked, and down to very small sizes. This story ALSO includes violence and depictions of cruelty, but none so graphic as to warn you about. We're talking blood and fight scenes, things blowing up, but no gory bits. Sex? Yes. Language, yeah. Damsels in distress, ooooh yeah. But also equal opportunity for women to fight back. You've got sexism, but also chivalry, evil plots and courageous stands. I guarantee that by the end of this story, if you don't think you've been provided with a absolute winner...I'll...crawl back in my hole and never come out again.

Believe me, I'm positive you'll enjoy it.

[MarauderTDL]

Synopsis: College is a time of forming friendships that last a lifetime. So as Michelle, Sarah and Beth approach the final weeks of their college days at Bridgewater College in Central Virginia, they decide to take time off to spend a day on the Shenandoah River. While their thoughts are focused on sun and fun, they are about to become unwitting participants in a strange and fantastic experience that will change their lives forever.
At the same time, Alex Sharp, a young man raised by his paternal grandfather, is recruited to work for a company involved in biological and scientific experiments that require test subjects via a less than orthodox method. Although skilled and talented, Alex is naïve, believing his role in the company that hires him is for the good of the country. However, he will soon discover that he and the three college girls he is tasked with capturing, are but pawns in a sinister plot that could have global implications.
Shenandoah Surprise is but one story in the vast Shrinking Women Universe, and contains nudity, adult language, sexual scenes and violence.

CHAPTER ONE: Billy Bob
June 2015
Shenandoah Valley
40 miles Southwest of Luray, Virginia

Standing outside the entrance of Billy Bob’s Bait & Tackle Shop, Mrs. Shackleton lazily swept the dirt and dust from the wooden front deck leading into the small convenience store she and her husband William owned. Adjusting the wrap she tied around her head to keep her graying hair in place, she raised a wrinkled hand to block out the brilliant morning sunshine beating down on her. It was only nine o’clock and already the heat and humidity made her want to go back home and sit down in front of the television, but with their portable A/C unit on the fritz, she didn’t want to. What was the point of watching re-runs in a stifling double-wide trailer that smelled of old sweat and hot beer?

Well, at least the breeze helps to keep the humidity from being too oppressive, she thought as she continued sweeping the deck.

Looking out over the valley below, she shook her head. Several miles to the east, just shy of Battle Creek, she could see the big sign for the Sunoco gas station, featuring a full-service eatery, an amusement center, and a rest area for visiting travelers. Situated right off the main road that ran down the eastern end of the Shenandoah, it was the perfect place to stop and gas up before heading to Luray Caverns to the northeast, or down to south to the Massanutten Resort.

For the life of her, Barbara couldn’t understand what possessed her husband, a former chemical engineer, to buy the old Washford convenience store and renovate it with their retirement savings. Everyone in the local community believed he was nuts, since the Washford’s ran the store for over half a century and only sold it because the cost of keeping the store open were more than the money they brought in. Locations like the Sunoco station off to the east were the reason. Old-fashioned mom-n-pop stores like theirs simply couldn’t compete with the big oil corporations who purchased prime real estate next to the busiest parts of the highways and built the fanciest gas stations possible to attract everyone making their way up and down the Shenandoah Valley. When William, although he preferred to be called Billy, told her what he was doing, she called him crazy, along with a number of more colorful descriptions that can’t be mentioned in good company. However, despite her misgivings, something happened…

First, Billy contracted a company to replace the two original pumps that stood off to the right side of the store with modern versions that would accept debit and credit cards for payment. The two original gas pumps were antiques that pre-dated the Korean War and hadn’t worked in several decades. Billy sold the parts to some restoration place up in Northern Virginia who believed they could restore them to their original design and sell them for thousands of dollars each. Of course, Billy didn’t care who wanted the old pumps, only that he made a handsome profit from the rusted relics and the pile of spare parts that old Washford kept in the back storeroom.

Next, the two pumps and a new holding tank were installed and the crumbling pavement was torn up and repaved. A canopy was built over the pumps so they could be used in all sorts of weather and lights were attached to the corners so they could be used after dark. Barbara couldn’t believe the expense that her husband incurred, all for the handful of visitors who might stumble upon their store while taking in the scenery, or the locals who viewed it as being easier to fill up from Billy Bob’s rather than drive all the way to the highway.

Finally, her husband cleaned out the old convenience store and remodeled it. He admitted that there was no chance that he’d ever compete with the big oil companies, but at least he could provide a place for the local residents to stop by, pass the time, and keep him company as he sat in the store each day, looking out the enormous plate-glass window that gave a view of the valley below. Instead of installing soda fountains and a grill for food, Billy instead focused on freezers for ice-cold bottles of soda and beers, as well as racks for bags of chips and other snack foods. The reason, he explained, was simple…why bother to invest in equipment for food preparation, which would require more licenses and inspections for food safety, when he could offer simple, easy items that could be purchased for quick consumption, or for those wishing to pick up items for the road?
And so began the dull, tedious life of a retired couple, living out in the rural area of Central Virginia. Billy would go about his business, opening up the store every day, dealing with locals who stopped by, or the occasional visitor interested in checking out the local area off the regular tourist suggested spots. Meanwhile, his wife would stay back at their mobile home behind the store, wondering what possessed her husband to think that running a convenience store in the middle of nowhere was a smart idea.

Off in the distance, Mrs. Shackleton heard music, the kind that younger people tended to listen to these days: peppy and cheerful, usually filled with catchy lyrics and melodies to sing along to while they drove. Turning to gaze over at the winding one-lane road that wormed its way up from the valley below, she spied a bright orange Jeep Wrangler with both front doors removed and the top missing. Inside, three young women, probably college-aged girls from one of the nearby schools, were laughing and carrying on as the Wrangler made the final wide left turn to bring it past the burnt-out shell of the old Hamilton Inn. The girl seated in the front passenger seat saw her husband’s store and cried out, causing the other two girls to cheer as they eased past the front of the store and alongside of the gas pumps.

Turning off the engine, the three girls jumped out of the Jeep and opened the back hatch to reveal coolers and blankets, as well as three cardboard boxes. As the girl who was driving walked over to the pump to fill up the tank, the other two girls called out and pointed to the store.

“Hey Michelle, do you want us to get you anything?”

“Sure,” the young woman who was pumping gas replied, pushing her long brunette hair out of her face. “See if they’ve got any bags of Doritos, okay?”

“All right,” the girl in the lead called over her shoulder before turning to her friend. “What about you, Sarah? What are you in the mood for?”

The third girl, Sarah, shrugged her slender shoulders. “Doritos are fine, but I’m hoping they have some of those buttered pretzel rods. I can’t find any of them back home and, at the very least, I’d like to get some before we head home for summer break.”

Beth smiled and shook her head in amusement. “Buttered pretzels? Seriously?”

Sarah frowned and swatted playfully at her friend. “Beth, don’t judge me! They’re delicious, and besides…they ensure that I won’t be competing with anyone else for the last one in the bag. I’ve seen how you and Michelle went at it the last time you both had the munchies and there weren’t many Doritos left.”

Mrs. Shackleton watched them approach the store and stepped to the side as they climbed the steps onto the deck. “Good morning, girls. What brings you up to these parts?”

Beth pushed a long lock of auburn hair out of her face as she replied, “Well our friend over there,” she pointed toward Michelle, who was pumping gas and checking the tires. “She suggested we do some river tubing down the Shenandoah, but all the regular sites charge outrageous fees to use their facilities.”

“$50.00 per person,” Sarah piped up, adjusting her New York Yankees baseball cap. “Can you believe that? Just to be able to put our tubes in the water! Since when were they able to charge so much? I think it’s a scam.”

“Well, you’re absolutely right about that there, ladies,” Mr. Shackleton replied, surprising the girls and his wife as he appeared at the open doorway leading into the store. Normally, he preferred to stay inside sitting in his so-called office with his fan blowing air.

“Ever since the local government approved the sale of real estate along the water where it’s easiest to get in, there’ve been one business after another buying out the land, just to make it difficult to use the river. They plop down a dock or some shack, and then they charge people tons of money to park and provide the means to get back to their cars when they’re done. The river is free, but getting to it,” the old man cackled. “Well, that’s another matter. There aren’t a lot of places you can go around here where you can access the river.”

“I told you we should have taken Karl up on his offer to join him,” Beth said, slapping Sarah on the shoulder lightly. “Shenandoah River Adventures wasn’t that far out of the way, and he offered to pay for the parking.”

“No way,” Sarah argued. “Karl is a creep. He thinks because he’s the captain of the lacrosse team that he’s big and bad. Besides, I don’t like the way he looks at me…like I’m some piece of meat or something.”

Beth sighed and shook her head. “Sarah! Taking him up on his offer didn’t include us letting him do anything else, but it would have saved us one hundred and fifty bucks! I don’t know about you, but I’m lucky to have enough money for gas to get home next week when classes are over.”

Unseen by the young women, a sly grin spread across Mr. Shackleton’s face and he nodded to himself before changing his expression to a kindly smile. “Ladies! There’s no need to worry! Look, if you like, I know of the perfect spot where you could go to access the river. It’s only fifteen miles upstream. Admittedly, it is a little out of the way, but most of that part of the river runs through undeveloped forest so you wouldn’t have anyone to bother you. About half of the time you’ll be under the trees, so you wouldn’t have to worry about getting sunburned, although I suggest you pick up some sunscreen if you don’t have any. Sun reflecting off the water can burn you just as easily.”

Beth and Sarah looked at each other with surprised expressions on their faces, but it was Sarah who piped up, “Well, that’s really nice, sir, but how would we get back to our car afterwards?”

“That’s no trouble at all, girls,” Mr. Shackleton said, his smile never wavering. “The average fifteen-mile trip on the river takes several hours if you’re just floating along. There’s a spot not a mile south where the river comes to a sandy embankment. Once you reach it, you give me a call and I’ll come pick you up and bring you back to your car afterwards.”

“That’s very kind of you, sir, but we wouldn’t want to put you out or anything,” Beth said.

“It’s no trouble,” Mr. Shackleton said again. “Besides, it’s not like we get many folks around these parts that often. Closing up the shop to give you a lift back to your car wouldn’t take all that long.”

Still unconvinced, Beth asked, “Aaaand what’s in it for you?”

“Beth!” Sarah gasped as she turned to gape at her friend. “How can you say that? He’s being very nice.”

Cackling softly, Mr. Shackleton raised a wrinkled hand. “It’s all right, young lady. I understand her concerns.” Turning to Beth, he said, “It’s not often you get people offering to help you out, is it?”

Beth’s expression turned apologetic. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to suggest…”

“It’s all right, young lady,” Mr. Shackleton said. “Look, from what I see, your friend over there is trying to get your tubes inflated, am I right?” Both Beth and Sarah nodded, seeing Michelle struggling to remove the tubes from the cardboard boxes. “Here’s what I’m offering…I’ve got an automatic air pump behind the store you can use to fill those tubes up proper. If you’re in need of snacks and drinks, I’ve got plenty inside you can buy, plus any other items you might like. Pay for those, five dollars for the air and twenty bucks for gas money for my truck, and we’ll call it a deal. What do you say?”

Sarah blinked in surprise. “Beth, that’s a great offer! It’s far less than any of the tubing places would charge, and you know they jack up the prices for drinks and snacks. C’mon!”

Between the kindly old man’s offer and the pleading expression on Sarah’s face, Beth rolled her eyes and capitulated. “All right! I guess we can’t find a better deal and still have some money left over when we get back to school.”

“What school are you girls attending,” Mr. Shackleton inquired.

“Bridgewater,” Sarah offered quickly. “It’s only an hour or so to the southwest.”

“That’s a nice little college,” Mrs. Shackleton commented for the first time since her husband’s appearance. “Are you girls local?”
Sarah and Beth shook their heads.

“I’m from Alexandria, just outside D.C.,” Sarah replied. “I thought about attending George Mason in Fairfax, but Bridgewater offered more scholarship opportunities.”

“Michelle and I both grew up in Annapolis, Maryland,” Beth said, pointing at her friend. “We’re all roommates at school.”

“Well that’s not so bad,” Mrs. Shackleton commented. “Only a couple of hours from home.”

“Maybe for Sarah here,” Beth said, pointing at her friend. “As for Michelle and I, most days, the traffic getting through Northern Virginia and D.C. is so bad, it can take up to six hours to reach Annapolis.”

“Well that won’t be a problem here, ladies,” Mr. Shackleton said. “C’mon in and see what you want to get. Barbara, why don’t you show Michelle over there where our air pump is so we can get their tubes inflated.”

Sarah yelped for joy as she followed behind Mr. Shackleton and headed for the racks of chips and snacks, while Beth made her way toward the coolers filled with drinks. After ten minutes of choosing, they met up at the front counter, their arms filled with goodies.

“Sarah! Good Lord, we’re only going to be on the river for a few hours,” Beth exclaimed. “You’ve got half a dozen bags of chips and snacks. I doubt we’re going to need that much.”

“And what about you,” her friend countered. “You’ve got a bag of ice, a six pack of Pepsi, another six pack of Coca-Cola, Coronas and a bottle of…Jack Daniels? Where did you find that one?”

“In the back next to the freezer filled with ice,” Beth said with a massive grin. “I had to decide between getting a Jack, a Jim Beam or a Johnny Walker.”

Glancing around to see if the store owner was around, Beth whispered, “Are you crazy? We’re not twenty-one!”

“Relax,” Beth said under her breath, seeing the old man near the back of the store. “Remember those fake I.D.s we used to get into the club last month?” Sarah nodded. “Well, I brought them along, just in case. Here’s yours,” Beth handed Sarah’s fake I.D. to her. “And if he asks for them, I’ll make sure Michelle has hers. It’ll be fine!”

“William! William!” Mr. Shackleton’s wife stormed into his tiny office, feeling the fan blowing cool air in her face as he pushed something out of sight and turned in her direction. “What are you doing?”

“Nothing for you to worry about, dear,” he replied. “What’s wrong?”

“What are you thinking,” she hissed softly. “You know as well as I do that there’s no place they can park their car along the river without it being towed, and what’s the idea of offering to pick them up yourself and bring them back?”

Sighing heavily, Mr. Shackleton said, “Dear, it will be fine. There’s a spot I know where they can park that the local towing company won’t find them. They’ll have their fun, I’ll pick them up and return them to their car before anyone notices. And why are you upset that I’m helping them? Look at what they’re buying? That’s easily over one hundred dollars in sales that we’ve not made in several days!”

“Try several weeks,” his wife snapped back at him. “Honestly, I don’t understand why you ever decided to buy this place and renovate it. It’s a waste of money, William.”

“Billy,” he reminded her, a dark look crossing his face for a moment before it was gone. “I prefer being called Billy.”

“You’re from Massachusetts, not the Appalachia in West Virginia,” Barbara said. “Honestly, there are times when I wonder why I allowed you to drag me down here to the middle of nowhere…”

“Hold that thought, dear,” Mr. Shackleton said, raising a hand. “I need to cash these girls out.”

As Billy approached the front register, Sarah and Beth pushed their purchases together as Michelle came around the side of the store and climbed the steps to the front door.

“All right, girls,” Michelle said with a smile. “All three tubes are fully inflated and packed back into the Jeep. Did you get everything we need?”

“And then some,” Beth said with a wicked grin, pointing at the Coronas and the bottle of Jack Daniels. “Here!” Holding out the fake I.D. to Michelle, Beth quickly turned back as Mr. Shackleton appeared at the register.

“Well, did we get everything we needed today, ladies?”

“Yes sir,” Sarah piped up. “And thank you again for helping us find a place to go. We were afraid we were going to have to go to the Shenandoah River Adventures place.”

“It’s no trouble at all,” Billy said as he started to ring up their purchases. After scanning all of the chips and snacks, he turned his attention to the drinks. “Well, what have we here? Pepsi, Coke, a bag of ice…” He looked up at the girls. “For the Coronas and the Jack Daniels, I’m afraid I’m going to have to see some I.D., girls. Sorry, but I wouldn’t want to get in trouble selling alcohol to minors. I’m sure you understand.”

“Absolutely,” Beth said, immediately handing over her driver’s license to Billy, who pulled his glasses down a bit to look at the I.D. “Let’s see here…”

Glancing over at Beth, he appreciated her toned and tanned body, although he didn’t show it. According to the I.D., Ms. Bethany Ensley was five feet, six inches tall with brown hair, although the warm glow of her locks clearly showed a touch of ginger. Whether it was natural or not, he didn’t care, but the long locks cascaded over her shoulders and down her back to her slender waist. Green eyes, yes they certainly were, he thought to himself as he glanced up at her, seeing her smile back at him.

Sure, work your charms on an old man, I don’t mind, he thought to himself.

“Here you go, missy,” handing her I.D. back to her and waiting for one of the other girls to give their I.D. to him. Sarah was next and waited nervously as he scanned the information.

Hmmm, Sarah Hilsner, blond hair, blue eyes, five feet, four inches tall. Seems right.

Flipping the license over, Mr. Shackleton noticed a break in the computer strip, splitting the strip in two on the right side. Raising an eyebrow, he thought, Well this isn’t the first time I’ve had someone try to pass off a fake I.D., but given the circumstances, why point it out?

Without any indication that he’d spotted the error, Mr. Shackleton returned the I.D. to Sarah, who breathed a silent sigh of relief. “Last but not least, young lady,” Billy said with a grin as Michelle handed him her license.

Let’s see here…Michelle Swann, lovely name. Black hair, green eyes, five foot, four inches tall. Looking up, Mr. Shackleton locked eyes with Michelle. It was clear to him that she wasn’t five foot, four inches tall. More like eight or nine inches, he thought as he smiled and handed the I.D. back to her. Looks like someone forgot to change the settings on her height after doing Ms. Hilsner’s. That’s all right. Pretty soon, that won’t matter to any of them.

“Well girls, everything looks to be in order. Is there anything else you need to pick up before you go,” he asked with a smile.

Michelle, being the one who double-checked everything said, “So we’ve got drinks, ice, snacks…what about sunscreen? I forgot to pack some. Oh, and plastic bags!”

“Plastic bags, what do we need those for,” Sarah asked.

Holding up her new iPhone, Michelle said, “This is why! Seriously? We’re going to be in the middle of the river? If I get this thing wet, I’ll have to pay for a new one.”

Beth pulled her Samsung Galaxy S9 out of her pocket. It was still fairly new, even though it had a crack across the screen. “Well, I guess it would be a good idea, just to be safe. My phone has already gotten damaged last week. I can’t afford to go without it.”

Sarah glanced at her new Samsung Flip, a gift from her parents for her birthday. “Good idea. I wouldn’t have thought about that.”

Michelle walked back into the aisles until she returned with a bag of Glad-lock plastic bags for sandwiches and a bottle of Coppertone sunscreen. “These will work perfectly.”

With all the items they needed paid for, Sarah and Michelle took their haul back to the Jeep while Beth exchanged contact information with Mr. Shackleton. “So it’s almost ten o’clock now. You say it’ll take us about thirty minutes to get to the site, right?”

“That’s right, young lady,” Billy nodded with a smile. “You girls enjoy yourselves. I figure you should reach that embankment I told you about by three o’clock. You give me a ring and I’ll come to pick you up in less than ten minutes. That should give you plenty of time to dry off and pack up your stuff.”

“Thanks again, sir,” Beth said, grinning with appreciation. “You’ve been really kind.”

“Not at all, young lady,” Billy replied. “I’m happy to help.”

As Beth turned and walked out of the store and back to the Wrangler, he repeated, “That’s right, happy to help.”

Michelle dropped ice in three separate coolers each filled with various drinks. The Jack Daniels, she set aside, preferring to leave that for later. Checking through the bags of snacks, she said, “So we’ve got Cool Ranch and Nacho Doritos, thank you, Sarah. Two bags of pretzels?” She glanced over at Sarah. “Seriously?”

“What,” Sarah asked innocently. “He had my favorite kind, and you know how hard it is to find them back at the stores in town.”

Rolling her eyes as she smiled, Michelle said, “Whatever. Far be it from me to judge your taste in snacks. Oh!” Michelle grinned as she reached into the bag and pulled out a one pound bag of chocolate M&M’s. “We’d better keep these cold, or they’ll melt in the heat.”

As Beth approached, she leapt in the air and laughed out loud. “Ha ha! You see! I told you those fake I.D.s would work! He didn’t even bat an eye at them!”

“The bouncer at the club last week did,” Michelle frowned in irritation. “He caught your mistake on my height! Since when am I five foot four inches tall? I’m five foot nine! He wouldn’t let me in the club and I had to go back to the dorm while you two had a grand old time.”

“Okay, I admit, I screwed up,” Beth said readily. “I’ll fix it when we get back, but at least the old man didn’t catch it.”

“Are you so sure this guy can be trusted? We’re going somewhere that’s not marked on the map and we’ll be trusting that no one tows my Jeep while we’re toobin’ down the river. If this goes wrong, we’re stuck an hour from school and I’m the one who’ll have to foot the bill to get my Wrangler back, not you!”

“Relax,” Beth said, as they climbed back into the Jeep. “In an hour, we’ll be in the water, kicking back, relaxing and having fun. It’ll be fine.”

Looking out from the store window, Mr. Shackleton watched as the three girls got back into the Wrangler, started the engine and headed back out on the road in the direction he gave them for the site by the river. Smiling to himself, he walked over and closed the front door, locking it behind him as he turned off the OPEN sign. His wife saw what he was doing and furrowed her brow.

“What are you doing? We’re open for business, aren’t we? Why did you lock the door?”

Mr. Shackleton glanced at her with a sour look on his face. “I have my reasons, Barbara.”

“Reasons? William, if we’re going to make any money today, we need to stay open. Why are you going back to your office again?”

“I need to do something, dear,” he said, emphasizing the final word with irritation in his voice.

“Don’t you speak to me that way! For the life of me, I can’t understand why I let you talk me into trusting you when you bought this place. We could have been in Florida, retiring on the shores of Pensacola or maybe even St. Petersburg, but no! You thought the rural life in Central Virginia was a better idea!”

Billy growled to himself and entered his office, which was barely big enough for a small desk, the computer monitor hooked up to the tower sitting on the shelf above his head, next to the fan that blew a strong stream of air out of his office to the shelves near the alcohol. Reaching over to flip a switch under the side of the desk, a panel opened up in the corner, revealing a communications unit that was far newer than anything else in the store, including his computer. With a flip of a switch, he turned it on and set a headset on his forehead before touching a button.

“Billy Bob to Riverside, come in.”

“Riverside here, Billy Bob. It’s been awhile.”

“Yeah, I know. Those boys who stopped by last month were the only other folks who showed any promise. Did you take care of them?”

“All accounted for, Billy Bob. The boss is pleased, but what’s the reason for your call?”

“Three young ladies, late teens, early twenties, heading to the site. Say…thirty minutes before they arrive. Give them time to head down the river and you can take their car. From there, you can pick them off at your leisure.”

“Copy that. Tracker two and three will be informed. They’ve been hunting deer for the last week, but this will be much more fun, agreed?”

Billy Bob chuckled. “Agreed, Riverside. Three ladies, all alone? They’ll never know what hit them.”

“Just like last time. Riverside out.”

Nodding to himself, Mr. Shackleton pulled the headset off his balding head and hit the switch to close the panel. Hearing movement behind him, he reached under the desk and removed the gas gun, flipping the safety off. He could have used the other gun, an older one that was energy-based, but he liked this one better.

“So how much of that did you hear…dear?”

Glancing over his shoulder, Billy saw Barbara staring back at him, her mouth agape. “You’re going to do something to those girls, aren’t you? You and those…people? William…what have you gotten yourself into?”

Mr. Shackleton chuckled to himself. “Nothing you need to worry your pretty little head about, dear.”

“You won’t get away with it. I’ll call the police! You’ll be locked up for…”

POP! POP!

Two pulls on the trigger and two capsules shot out of the barrel of the gas gun, exploding just outside the doorway. The fan, set to High, pushed the gas right into Barbara’s face, causing her to gasp and inhale a large amount, while the rest saturated into her bare arms and face. Before Barbara realized what was happening, her clothing loosened around her as she quickly dwindled before Billy Bob’s amused gaze. It wasn’t until she lost a full foot in height before she screamed.

“What did you do to me? William! What do you do?”

Billy watched as his wife continued to shrink. Before long, her blue jeans slipped to the floor around her feet, while her t-shirt ballooned around her, sliding down to her knees. Terrified by what was happening, she froze and gazed up at her husband, her mouth agape.

“William, what’s happening to me?”

Billy smiled wickedly. “Why nothing, dear. Just a little something the boys at Riverside cooked up for me in case nosey intruders poked their noses where they didn’t belong. I never thought I’d need to use it on you, but after all the griping and complaining I’ve had to take from you over the years, now that I think about it…consider this my notice of divorce!” Leveling the gun at her again, he said, “You know, they told me two shots would be enough to shrink a person down to a couple of inches tall. They warned me never to fire three times at the same person…I wonder why?”

Barbara’s eyes widened as Billy pulled the trigger again, the gas capsule exploding right in front of her face, engulfing her entire shrinking body in the mist. She screamed once before the effects kicked in, accelerating her reduction so quickly that within a matter of seconds, she was so small that her t-shirt dropped to the floor. Although naked, she only remained visible for a few moments before she shrank below the surface of her fallen clothing, her tiny screams quickly fading into silence.

Walking over, Billy peered down into the hole left by the collar of her shirt and found nothing left: no body, no blood, and no evidence. Grinning to himself, he slipped the gun back into the slot under his desk and kicked his feet up on the desk as he cackled to himself. “Well now I guess I know why.”

[bigguy123456789]

I remember really liking this story! Wasn't there some great drawings someone made for it too?

[MarauderTDL]

Actually, Minimizer was gracious enough to do some fantastic sketches for a few scenes. I think he's still got them. We love ya, Min!

[Raso719]

The legend returns! This one and Always Follow the Directions getting updated are, like, my dreams!

[MarauderTDL]

(Checks his notes and calls off camera) HEY MIN! DIDN'T WE TALK ABOUT DOING A UPDATE OF AFTD???

[MarauderTDL]

CHAPTER TWO: The Devil and the Details

There he was…magnificent! A ten-point buck, fully-grown and weighing at least two hundred pounds! Sweet Jesus, the skull and perfectly symmetrical set of antlers alone would make a fantastic show-piece on the wall over his fireplace, not to mention the amount of meat the animal would provide him for weeks. Taking careful aim with his rifle, he switched his sight to full magnification and smiled as the reticle centered on the buck’s chest. His finger slowly eased against the trigger as he felt the wind shift, forcing him to adjust his aim and sight again. He was moments away from taking the shot when his headset chirped loud enough to spook the buck. Swearing softly, he attempted to take the shot on the fly, missing the fleeing animal by scant inches.

“Son of a bitch,” he swore as he watched the deer scamper out of sight in the distance. As the headset chirped again, he growled before stabbing the ‘Receive’ button.

“This had better be good,” he snapped before rising up to a seated position. “I had enough meat in my sights to keep me fed for weeks!”

“Perhaps if you didn’t spend all the money we pay you on booze and women at the local brothels, you might have enough left over to afford meals from your local grocery, Tracker Two,” he heard Richard Melendez reply over the comm.

“Sir, my apologies,” Tracker Two quickly replied, feeling a bead of sweat roll down the side of his tanned and wrinkled face. “It was a ten-pointer, sir. Not many of those this time of…”

“Enough excuses, Tracker Two,” Melendez cut him off abruptly. “We’ve received word that three targets will be entering the acquisition zone within the next hour. I require you and Tracker Three to get into position to tag and subdue them once they are ready. Now…can you handle that?”

“Three new targets,” Tracker Two raised an eyebrow in amusement. “What do we know about the targets, sir?”

He could almost hear the annoyance in the director’s voice as Melendez replied, “Three females, ages in their early twenties, considered optimal for testing purposes. Targets will be using the usual route, so detection by outside sources will be unlikely. However, I would prefer that this be done quietly. Allow the targets to enter far enough into the acquisition zone that they won’t be able to escape before it’s too late. Meet up with Tracker Three at Prep Site Three and select dosages marked Alpha, Beta and Gamma. Await instructions to determine which doses to use.”

Tracker Two nodded to himself for a moment before he realized, “Gamma…that’s a new one, isn’t it, sir? I wasn’t aware we…”

“What you’re aware of is beside the point,” Melendez growled, making Tracker Two cringe. “We don’t pay you enough to worry about dosage assignments, just get to the Prep site and load up. Am I clear?!?”

“Y-yes sir, Prep Site Three, Alpha, Beta and Gamma. On my way.”


There she was…beautiful! Next to her, two little fawns, maybe a month old at most, walked beside their mother as she nibbled a patch of succulent, green grass near a stream that fed into the river half a mile away. Sensing his presence, the doe raised her head and turned in his direction, sniffing the air before returning to her meal.

That’s right, little lady. I’m no threat to you or your children, Tracker Three thought as he slowly made his way across the field toward them.

The fawns saw him and the little male hid behind his mother, while the little female turned and cocked her head inquisitively before slowly trotting in his direction. A smile broke out across Tracker Three’s face as the little fawn approached him, rubbing up against his leg before bleating softly as she looked up at him.

“Yes, I didn’t forget,” Tracker Three said softly, taking care not to move quickly as the doe and little male fawn moved in his direction. Slowly, he withdrew several pieces of apple he’d carefully sliced before coming into the meadow. “Here you go,” he whispered softly as the fawn nibbled at the slice before swallowing the rest.

The mother and her other fawn approached him and he slowly extended his hand with the rest of the apple slices. “Here you go, momma. Some for everyone.”

Carefully, the doe extended her head until she touched the apple slice in the palm of his hand. Gripping it, she moved away, but only once the other fawn got his piece. After swallowing it, the doe turned back to look at him, while the two fawns hopped and played behind her. Tracker Three nodded in understanding.

“I know. I just wanted to bring a little something special. I’ll go now.”

Turning slowly, Tracker Three backed away, taking care not to make any sudden movements or step on any branches that might snap and spook the doe or her children. When he was far enough away, he slowly rose up and stood still, allowing the doe to see him and recognize that he presented no threat.

“I’ll see you around, ma’am. Take care of your babies, all right?”

As if in response, the doe bobbed her head once before trotting away with her two babies in tow. Tracker Three smiled and sighed. Sometimes, it was rewarding just to be outside to watch nature.

Grandpa, I wish you could have seen that, he thought wistfully, remembering how his grandfather taught him how to respect nature and appreciate it.

A vibration in the earpiece set against his right temple caught his attention and Tracker Three reached up to touch the ‘Receive’ button. “Tracker Three here, go ahead.”

“Tracker Three, what is your situation?”

Director Melendez, he thought. That’s odd. He usually doesn’t communicate with us directly in the field.

“Two miles east of Fox Hollow, near Heckert’s View Farm. Just taking in the sights, sir.”

“Understood. Collect your gear and meet Tracker Two at Prep Site Three. You have an assignment.”

“Affirmative sir, may I ask the details?”

“Three test subjects, all female, ages in their early twenties. Tracker Two will be the lead on this one. You are instructed to select dosage levels Alpha, Beta and Gamma. Am I clear?”

“Clear sir. Alpha, Beta, and Gamma. Prep Site Three. I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

“Very good, Tracker Three.”


Handing the headset back to the dispatcher, Richard Melendez exited the communications office with Tracker One following behind.

“Are you sure about this, sir,” Tracker One said hesitantly. “I know he’s good, but Tracker Three has only recently been assigned to field duty. He shadowed Tracker Four and I on the last mission, but didn’t participate in their capture. I’m still not convinced he’s ready to carry out the orders we’re expecting him to follow.”

“He’ll follow them or we’ll dispose of him like the last one,” Melendez said in a cold, calculated tone. “Need I remind you that we’ve been forced to waste time training two new trackers since we began our assignment at this location?” Glancing down at Tracker One’s immobilized left leg, he said, “Your unfortunate accident put you out of commission for the next three months at least. As for Tracker Four…”

Tracker One, whose real name was David Quisley, felt a shiver run down his spine at the thought of Tracker Four’s fate. “Sir, it was an accident! The round exploded in the chamber of his weapon. There was no way he could have…”

“If he’d taken better care of his equipment,” Melendez said as they walked down the stark white hallway leading to the administration wing, “there wouldn’t have been a mishap! Tracker Four was a fool; lazy and incompetent, he got what he deserved! He’s lucky he was testing his weapon while inside the complex when India blew up in his face! If it had happened while he was out in the field, the researchers would never have reached him with the antidote and he would have disappeared before they ever found him. I’m informed he might recover, if I allow the scientists in the testing and research wing to work on the follow-up antidote he requires. In the meantime, I feel he’s providing ample data for the researchers to go over regarding India’s effects.”

“Sir, he’s one of our best marksmen,” David argued carefully. “It was a fluke incident…”

“Well then, I’m sure as he experiences life shrunk to the size of a cockroach, he’ll understand the need to take better care of his equipment. Once I decide if he’s suffered enough, we’ll return him to normal. In the meantime, David, I expect Tracker Two and Tracker Three to do their jobs.”

Director Melendez stepped into the administrative wing and turned toward his office, withdrawing his key card from his pocket to swipe across the strip reader. The system recognized his identity and clearance level and the door unlocked, sliding aside to reveal a spacious office. Despite the limitations of their current location, Director Melendez refused to accept anything less than identical accommodations to the ones he was forced to sacrifice when he was promoted to this assignment. An enormous solid oak executive desk dominated the center of the room, with a high-backed padded leather chair tucked underneath the void beneath it in the middle. To either side of the desk sat monitors showing the various departments of the Bio-SciTech facility. Cameras installed in each wing gave him immediate access to everything that was going on in the facility, a fact that wasn’t lost on David Quisley as the director rounded the side of the desk to take a seat in his chair. Leaning back, he speared David with his gaze.

“Old man Shackleton informed us of three young women wanting to float down the river, soak up the sun and have a good time. Luckily, he gave them the location of one of the more remote portions of the river where Tracker Two and Three should be able to subdue them once they’re reduced down to more manageable sizes. With the addition of these three ladies, it should allow us to get back on schedule with our test results for the head office. I’ve been forced to tell them of our issues and I can assure you, they’re not happy.”

“But sir,” David protested. “The data we received from the last three…”

“Last three?” Melendez rose and leaned forward over his desk. “By my count, David, we only have one test subject currently in our possession. The other two are dead! One managed to somehow escape his confines, fall to the floor, where he was subsequently crushed by one of the researchers who didn’t bother to look where she was stepping! She should be thankful I didn’t decide to make her a new test subject in his place. As for the other one who was exposed to the India variant before he’d recovered from the Gamma variant’s effects...he went microscopic before anyone could stop it and we lost him. Now, unless you’d like to volunteer to become a new test subject, I suggest you encourage your two trackers in the field to acquire these ladies and bring them in as quickly as possible! Am I clear?”

David’s face turned as white as a sheet as he nodded, “Absolutely, sir!”

“Good! Now get out!”

Watching Tracker One’s retreat from his office, Richard Melendez smiled and exhaled slowly to release his anger. Recent events only served to increase his frustration with the project. What first appeared to be an easy assignment, given his previous experience, turned out to be a maddening series of events that seemed to conspire to keep his subordinates from meeting their goals. The biggest hurdle early on came in finding a location where Bio-SciTech could set up their facility and perform the necessary research without attracting unnecessary attention. Thanks to a member of the research staff mentioning how peaceful and secluded a recent river rafting event in Virginia was, the company and their parent corporation decided Central Virginia was perfect for their needs. Within a few months, the local police and governmental officials were sufficiently encouraged to look the other way as Bio-SciTech acquired several sites throughout the Shenandoah Valley that would aid in their agenda. The few individuals who refused their offers were beset with scandals to remove them from office, or they met with fates that would never be fully explained or understood.

In any case, Director Melendez and his staff quickly got underway with Project Alice. In the last six months, they managed to acquire over a dozen test subjects, but with the continual refinements to the Sizeol drug, they needed more and the window in which they could acquire those subjects was a narrow one based on weather and river conditions. If they didn’t find more individuals to test the effects of the new variants, Director Melendez would be unable to report his findings with enough certitude to convince the council that the aerosolized version was the way to go.

Easing back into his favorite chair, Melendez reached over to tap his security code into his computer and touched the comm-line to link up with headquarters. After a few moments, the screen lit up and he heard a female voice ask, “Global Resources Unlimited, how may I direct your call?”

“Director Richard Melendez, Bio-SciTech to speak with Hoshi Kuzinoko, please.”

“Hai! At once, Director Melendez!”

After a few brief moments, the screen dimmed and an older man of Asian descent appeared, his black hair peppered with gray.

“Hoshi Kuzinoko, head of research and development. How may I be of assistance? Oh! Director Melendez, what a surprise!”

The director smiled warmly as he leaned forward. “Hoshi, it’s been too long. How are you?”

“I am doing well, Richard. Yes, it has been a while. It is good to hear from you. Am I correct to assume this is in regards Project Alice and our testing protocols?”

“It is, my friend,” Melendez replied. “After a month of setbacks, we are expecting to acquire several female test subjects, ages in their early twenties.”

“Ah! Perfect! The formula is best suited to those between the ages of 18 and 40,” Hoshi said, but he paused. “You say you are expecting…?”

Melendez nodded, knowing Hoshi’s concerns. “That is correct. Three subjects are on their way to our acquisition area. We expect to subdue them and bring them in within the next four to five hours, once we’ve been able to subject them to the initial doses. As instructed, we are continuing use of Alpha as the introductory phase, followed by Bravo, as well as Gamma, if the situation warrants it.”

“Beware, Richard,” Hoshi said cautiously. “Gamma continues to show great promise as the answer to Project Lilliput’s goals, but while it has passed through the initial stages of development, it has only been approved for field study. While we’re confident of its effectiveness, there have been a few unfortunate results.”

“What kind of unfortunate results? Surely not as dire as those we’ve discovered when testing India’s effects, I hope?”

“Not even close,” Hoshi confirmed. “It isn’t a problem with Gamma, per se, rather how it interacts with previous variants. Some have had unexpected results that were…well, let’s just say, they warrant more research.”

“Understood,” Melendez responded. “We’ve informed the field teams as well as the researchers in the lab to document all effects, no matter how seemingly insignificant.”

“That is good,” Hoshi said relieved. “So far, the data your research staff has provided has been of great value to the plan. However, I must warn you that another group has been researching the possibility of introducing the drug via ingestion or direct injection into the body. Some on the council believe that this method, rather than aerosolizing it, may be more effective and predictable in its results than the ones your group is currently seeing in the variants.”

“But our research directly goes back to the original methods used by Doctor Torunaga,” Melendez argued. “His work was groundbreaking, but the power consumption requirements needed for his miniaturization technique to work were simply too much to be kept from being detected.”

Hoshi nodded. “You and I know that all too well, my friend. Only a handful of us were fortunate to escape the island’s destruction, and I agree, albeit off the record, that Torunaga did not do enough to keep his work from being discovered. Taking his work and discovering how to synthesize it into an aerosolized form that retained the original effects was astonishing, to say the least.”

Melendez smiled, “Yes, Doctor Peters was a genius in those regards. It’s a shame he didn’t take the necessary precautions when he was working on the first variation’s design.”

Hoshi nodded again, having seen the footage from Doctor Peter’s work. The explosion that shattered the containment room and allowed the mist to escape and engulf him, shrinking him before he could reach the antidote, were a vivid reminder of the agent they sought to harness for their parent corporation’s future goals.

“We all hope that Peters one day recovers. He’s received the best care possible, but at his size, it is difficult to know whether he will ever be able to continue his work.”

“True,” the director said. “However, he left detailed notes of the baseline work as well as the variations he wanted to design. Luckily, we’ve only had to make minor adjustments to the variants we now have.”

“Are your researchers confident that Gamma will be the variant we’ve sought for Project Lilliput? Mr. Hendricks has been pushing for results, given his efforts to convince the United Nations of the need for this step. He already has some members of the current American administration on board to test it on certain elements of the population once they are convinced it is ready.”

Melendez leaned back in his chair and frowned. “Hendricks is a joke. The man swooped in after the incident at the island, sheltered Torunaga and has all but taken credit for his work. He may be able to keep that information from Matsuro, but I’m not as gullible as the old man.”

Hoshi’s eyes widened. “Richard, please! Thomas Hendricks may not be the one who created the miniaturization process, but he has worked with enough of the original members and gained their followers’ support to make him a very powerful individual in the organization. He has made other individuals disappear for saying things less controversial than what you’re suggesting.”

“If you mean Babbage and Xi-Shen, I know exactly what you’re saying,” Melendez replied without hesitation. “There are rumors he shrinks anyone who disagrees with him and keeps them as trophies so he can gloat over them. I wouldn’t be surprised if he has them working for him with promises of returning them to normal one day, which is probably just a lie. The man has an ego a mile wide.”

“If I may suggest, he’s not the only one,” Hoshi said, a smile tugging at the corner of his lips.

Melendez raised an eyebrow. “I recognize my limits, Hoshi. I let my work speak for itself and I make sure my subordinates don’t get any lofty ideas of stepping up the ladder of success by knocking me off it.”

“Besides,” he continued. “Torunaga and Hendricks are the leaders of the corporation. I rather enjoy where I am right now. Being the director of a cutting-edge bio-engineering company, situated in the Shenandoah Valley of Central Virginia is quite enjoyable, for now. It allows me to enjoy a little anonymity with certain projects, while we do our masters’ bidding.”

“Projects which will benefit the corporation once Lilliput is put into operation, I presume?”

Melendez’ eyes twinkled with amusement. “Hoshi, have you been hacking into my files to see my latest proposals?”

Now it was Hoshi’s turn to smile. “You know me, Richard. I’m instructed to keep tabs on everyone. However, it appears that I’ve experienced some difficulty in cracking some of your deep-level files. You know the ones that deal with nanotechnology and precise-delivery systems?”

Nodding carefully, Richard said, “Yes, those projects are still in development. Nothing ready to be brought to the board’s knowledge just yet. In time, once we deal with some more pressing matters here, maybe I can spend more time on them to get them completed.”

“I see. Well, in that case, I will let you get back to your work. Oh, and Richard…”

“Yes, Hoshi?”

“Matsuro wants results as soon as possible. The board is expecting to debate whether to continue funding the production of Sizeol in the aerosolized version or going to a serum that can be ingested or injected. The meeting is expected to be set for the end of the year, so they will need data as soon as possible to make their decision.”

Director Melendez felt a tingle of fear at the suggestion that the board was questioning whether to end their efforts on the aerosolized version in favor or the alternative. “I’ll see to it that we get that data to the board as quickly as possible, Hoshi. You can assure the good Doctor that we’re on top of it.”

“Very good, Richard.”

The screen winked out to be replaced with the G.R.U. logo slowly rotating on a black background as the director leaned back in his chair and considered the implications. The aerosolized version of the drug was the preferred delivery method for the last several years, but if Doctor Torunaga and the board were having doubts and considering going with the injectable serum, it would mean the end of their work! Director Melendez refused to lose his hold on the corporation’s most powerful asset, not when the board was planning on going forward with Project Lilliput in the next few years, after the United Nations signed off on it.

Punching up the research department, Richard waited for a response.

A beautiful young woman in her late-twenties, sporting a lovely head of blond hair held back with a hair clip appeared on the screen. “Research and development, Doctor Lithe. Yes Director Melendez, what can I do for you?”

“Doctor, gather all data we currently have on Sizeol and prepare to transmit it once we have added what we find from the new candidates that will be brought in later today. The board wants everything we have in order to make a decision.”

“So soon,” Doctor Lithe responded aghast, her sapphire blue eyes flashing in fear. “Sir, we’re still compiling the results for Gamma, Hotel and India variants. It’s not yet complete! Given the unpredictability of these variants, we’ve been reluctant to expose the remaining subject we have. He’s been stable now for over a month.”

“Then take that fool tracker who got himself dosed with India, obtain more blood samples and then see how he fares with the Hotel variant! We’re out of time!”

“Sir, as you know, using Hotel on him after being exposed to India could…”

“Do it, or I’ll have your assistant use it on you, am I clear?”

“Absolutely sir!”

“And Lithe,” Melendez dropped his voice and leaned toward the monitor. “Don’t screw this up.”

Even on the monitor, it was clear that her face turned several shades lighter as she nodded, “Yes sir!”


Tracker Two frowned as he leaned up against the old barn door for the site designated Prep Site Three. Part of an old farm purchased by the corporation to act as one of several prep sites for trackers in the field, the barn housed weapons, equipment, even food for him and his fellow trackers if they were required to stay out in the elements for days at a time. In addition, several carefully concealed and locked storage units contained doses of the Sizeol drug that Director Melendez had his research staff prepare for trackers to use on targets designated for acquisition.

Designed and prepared in cartridges, Sizeol was delivered by way of specialized ammunition that accepted the tiny ampules. Fired from long-range rifles, although a weapons-specialist knowledgeable in designing ammunition could easily replicate more for other firearms in other calibers, the special ammunition would travel a pre-determined distance. This allowed the trackers to remain out of sight from their targets until after the drug took effect. The round travelled until it quietly exploded, releasing the aerosolized agent into the air to float down upon the unsuspecting target where the drug would be absorbed into the skin. Colorless, odorless, the drug wouldn’t be felt until it was too late.

The drug was based on earlier research and the necessary chemical agents were duplicated in labs to create the drug. However, researchers found that through various combinations, they were able to obtain different results ranging from the speed in which the target shrank, the intensity of the sensations felt by the target. Coincidentally, the researchers discovered early on that the drug had certain effects which included aphrodisia or sexual desire. As they tested various compounds with different combinations of chemical agents, they also discovered the drug could cause mild euphoria or a hallucinogenic state. Depending on the dosage, the stimulation experienced would cause giddiness, an overall sensation of arousal, such as the heightened well-being experienced following sexual intercourse, and in some cases, full-on orgasmic pleasure that reduced victims to a state where they were unable to move or respond.

These doses were categorized based on their effects, ranging from Alpha, which was considered the base drug, necessary to begin the reduction of the target, Beta, which was the first variant, typically used in conjunction with Alpha to produced heightened and intensified effects. Additional variants included Charlie, Delta, which was almost immediately discontinued after lethal effects were discovered to result with male subjects. Echo and Foxtrot variants were also discontinued for various reasons, mainly due to unpredictable results. Gamma, Hotel and India variants were the newest to be created, although these three were still in the testing phases and were not readily available for field use except in certain circumstances. However, according to researchers’ test results, Gamma was considered the breakthrough variant that could be used for Project Lilliput. Rumors were floating about the facility of a proto-type variant named Juliet, but nothing significant had been heard yet.

For now, the drug was being tested in the wilderness of Central Virginia, far from prying eyes who might learn of the drug’s capabilities. Through careful monitoring and the use of trained trackers who targeted innocent individuals unaware that they were to be test subjects, the drug’s effectiveness in its various forms had been tested for the last three years. The Alpha base drug was tested on volunteers in the laboratory, but as the variants were created from the base version, it was felt that finding test subjects outside the lab would allow for a far better understanding of how the drug would function under normal circumstances. After all, Lilliput was intended to be released in large quantities, far from the controlled environment of a laboratory, so it was essential that accurate and consistent data be collected and verified before it was put into use.


Catching movement in the trees, Tracker Two moved out of sight and waited, listening as a single individual approached. Raising his rifle and flicking the safety off, he knelt in the shadow of the barn to aim his weapon when he heard a double-tap coming over his comm-link. Growling softly, he lowered his rifle and engaged the safety as Tracker Three came into view.

“About damn time you showed up. What took you so long?”

Tracker Three came around the side of the barn, his rifle slung over his shoulder. “What are you talking about? I’ve been here for the last fifteen minutes. I was doing recon to make sure no one was following us. What took you so long, John?”

Blinking in surprise, Tracker Two snarled, “Dammit, Alex, don’t use my name! We’re supposed to avoid any identification that could give ourselves away to anyone. And what are you talking about? You couldn’t possibly have been here for fifteen minutes, I would have…”

“I was only over the way near Heckert’s View Farm. It took me all of ten minutes to get here,” Tracker Three said with a shrug.

“How? Where’s your transportation?”

Tracker Three grinned and pointed down at his feet. “Really, it wasn’t that far. Besides, it’s a beautiful day, the sun is shining, the breeze is…”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Tracker Two interrupted him, not interested in hearing him go on about the weather. Pulling out a tablet, he pulled up a detailed map of the surrounding area and focused on the river. “Look, Director Melendez wants us to track these three girls. Old man Shackleton sent them to the Riverside Camping site just south of Fox Hollow. They’ll park their car and we’ll have our folks tow it away once they’re out of sight. Once they get down here past the Newport Reservoir, the channel opens up and the current will slow them down. That will give us the best chance to using Alpha on them and we’ll track them to see if the agent takes hold.”

“And once it does,” Alex asked.

John smiled, “Then we’re authorized to go to Beta, but we’ve got to do it before they reach the far end of the bend in the river past Cub Run. After that point, the channel narrows and the banks rise up, funneling them through at a steady clip making accurate dispersal problematic. In addition, if we’ve done our jobs right, Alpha and Beta will be kicking in sufficiently that they’ll be too small to control their paths and they’ll be helpless to do anything but hunker down in their inflatable rafts. The current should keep them in the middle of the river, far enough away that no one will be able to hear them call for help, not to mention once the banks rise up, there won’t be any places where people will see them until it’s too late.”

Alex frowned, not liking the situation, but he’d agreed to the terms of this assignment, so he know he had to abide by the contract he signed. “So what about Gamma? The director said we were authorized to use it, but why do we need that one if Alpha and Beta will suffice? Isn’t it still in the testing phase?”

“Because if you and I miss one and they haven’t started shrinking sufficiently before they reach Ingham, then they’ll be able to shout for help from anyone along the Grove Hill Boat Ramp area! We can’t allow that to happen. They need to be small enough that their voices can’t be heard from the banks of the river, and they can’t be seen over the tops of their rafts. Basically, they need to be doll-sized by that point or someone will see them. Folks see abandoned rafts floating down the river all the time. The only reason they’d try to stop them is if they see or hear something that catches their attention and we can’t afford to let that happen, understood?”

“Got it,” Alex said. “I still don’t understand why we’re doing this. I mean, we’re kidnapping people.”

John rolled his eyes and sighed heavily. “Kid, look…I get that you’re new at this and it’s only your second op. Bio-SciTech is contracted by the government to develop this chemical agent, but they can’t afford to let it get out to the public. Can you imagine what would happen if people knew that there was a chemical that shrinks you down to a few inches tall? There are some wack-jobs out there who would actually want it to happen. The government is trying to develop this stuff quietly, for a multitude of reasons. Primarily, they want to be sure it’s effective for the reasons Director Melendez told you about. This country is already dealing with over-crowding in prisons, not to mention overdevelopment. If we can show that this agent works as intended, it can be used both as a deterrent and as the means to help the planet deal with starvation, overpopulation and pollution.”

Seeing the doubt in Alex’s eyes, John laid it on thick. “Look, these girls will be fine! They’ll shrink down, we’ll scoop them up and take them back to the lab for study for a couple of days before they’re released. From what I’m told, the drug even makes them feel a little horny, so they’ll get a good time out of it. The antidote not only reverses the effects but it affects short-term memory so that they’ll never remember what happened to them. Trust me! Those three guys we tracked last month? They were in and out in a few days and are back to their regular lives, oblivious to the fact that they helped us improve this chemical agent. In time, they’ll be well-compensated for their involvement, albeit through anonymous channels.”

Alex raised his hands in surrender. “Okay, all right, I get it. We’re doing our duty for the country. I just don’t want this thing being used for some twisted psycho’s perverse sexual fantasy. It just feels…weird. Shrinking people down; I never would have thought it possible.”

John clapped Alex on the back and laughed as he reached up to adjust the worn-out US Marines hat he constantly wore to cover up his balding head. “Welcome to the 21st Century, buddy-boy! Hey, back in the late eighties and into the nineties, the government had me doing some sick shit taking down enemy agents and…well, if I told you anymore, I’d have to kill you!”

“Fine,” Alex said quietly, reaching into the container to remove a standard complement of rounds for Alpha, Beta and Gamma. “Let’s get this over with. I’d like to finish up in time to go home and relax. We’ve been in the field for several days and no offense, but I’m surprised the local wildlife can’t smell us from a mile away.”

Laughing again, John said, “You know what, they probably can, but you’re right. I’d like to call it a night early enough to hit the local watering hole. I could do with a few beers to wash the dirt and grit out of my mouth.”

Alex nodded and headed out, but John held back for a moment as he bent down as if to tie his shoe. Glancing up, John reached over to the container and spied the compartment marked ‘India’.

“Ah, so they decided to give us a few of those babies.” Chuckling to himself, John reached in and grabbed a few, stuffing them into his pouch before closing it and rising to follow after Alex.

Melendez says this India crap is potent stuff. Maybe if we happen to miss one of those girls, I can see what India does to her. Should be fun to watch.

[Raso719]

(Checks his notes and calls off camera) HEY MIN! DIDN'T WE TALK ABOUT DOING A UPDATE OF AFTD???

Oh man don't get my hopes up!

[MarauderTDL]

Chapter Three: Toobin’ Down the River

“So what’s the plan, girls,” Michelle asked the others as she turned off onto Route 340 heading south, slipping her sunglasses over her eyes to block the brilliant sunshine. Feeling the wind rolling over the open top of her Wrangler, Michelle couldn’t help but give her head a shake to let her obsidian black hair wave in the breeze. The wind caught her hair and it billowed out for a moment, revealing the amethyst highlights running down the back.

Despite her early concerns about their intentions, Michelle was feeling pretty excited. Thanks to old man Shackleton, they had a place to go where they would start their journey, and after several hours of fun and frolicking in the water, they’d pack up their stuff, catch a ride with the old man back to her Jeep, and be back to the dorms before the Commons closed for dinner.

“You’re asking us, sweetheart,” Beth replied with a grin. “You were the one who said your experiences of tubing on the river with your grandparents were something you wanted to do again. Now don’t get me wrong, it sounds like lots of fun, but I’ve never done this before.”

“It’s a shame Brad couldn’t come with us,” Sarah said wistfully from the back seat, sighing as she thought about her fiancée. “Cuddling in a tube for two…”

“Oh no!” Beth cut her friend’s daydream off before she could continue. “We agreed that this was a girls-only event, not an opportunity for you and Brad to make out while we’re forced to listen. What kind of fun with that be?”

Sarah sighed in disappointment, but quickly let it go as she opened up a bag of pretzels rods and munched down on one. “Well I don’t have any ideas either. I may have spent summers at the pool, but I’ve never gone tubing down a river before. Is it safe?”

Michelle rolled her eyes and laughed. “C’mon girls! It’s not like we’re jumping in a lake of raw sewage or something. The Shenandoah is considered to be one of the cleanest rivers in all of Virginia because state governmental agencies have enforced a strict ban on dumping garbage or waste. I mean, we’re not talking about water so pure you could drink it, but it’s safe.”

Beth shrugged her shoulders. “Okay, so turning your question back on yourself, what is the plan? You know better than we do what it’s like.”

Sighing, Michelle said, “All right, fine. The three inflatable tubes I brought along are big enough for each of us and have recesses in each of them for a cooler. The tubes are designed to let us lean back comfortably while we let our arms and legs dangle over the sides and into the water if we want. Since we’ll be drifting down the river for a while, we can link the rafts together and get out to swim in some of the deeper portions of the river…”

“How deep is it,” Beth asked cautiously. “Michelle, you know I can’t swim very well.”

Sarah practically dropped her pretzel rod as she leaned forward. “You what? Hang on a second, you’re saying you don’t know how to swim?”

Beth growled back at Sarah and crossed her arms over her chest. “I didn’t say that I couldn’t swim, just that I can’t swim very well. There’s a difference!”

“A difference meaning you won’t drown but you’ll probably do little better than bob in the water, right?” Sarah teased with a smile that disappeared as Beth snatched the pretzel from her hand. “Hey! Give it back!”

“I will once you apologize,” Beth said as she held the captive snack out the side of the vehicle.

“All right, all right, I’m sorry…that you can’t swim,”

“Hey you two, knock it off,” Michelle warned her friends even though she knew they were just messing around. “Seriously Beth, I told you I’d be happy to show you some techniques while we’re in the water. The river in this area doesn’t get deep at all, maybe ten to fifteen feet deep in some of the deepest spots in the wider channels, but most of the time, you’ll be able to put your feet on the bottom without any trouble. In fact, in some of the narrower spots, the water is only a couple of feet deep.”

“Won’t that mean that the rafts will get stuck,” Beth asked hesitantly. “I thought we’d be able to stay in the rafts, not have to drag them over rocks or something.”

“Are you kidding,” Michelle said as she slowed at a stop sign before bearing off to the right onto the old road Mr. Shackleton showed her back at the store. “While we’re in the rafts, we’ll be lucky to sink less than a foot at most into the water. Besides, if you remember, I had us hold off going until after the thunderstorms rolled through last week. The increased water from the rains running down out of the mountains will have raised the water level so we won’t hit bottom. It’ll be fine.”

“Okay fine,” Beth capitulated. “So we do some swimming, we relax in the rafts and get a tan…”

“Oh, oh, that means we can take off our tops, right,” Sarah suggested hopefully.

“We…could…” Michelle replied hesitantly. “Remember Sarah, there could be people around. This part of the river is supposed to be secluded for a little while, but there’s no telling if anyone might be on the river too, or someone might be hiking along the river banks. If you’re not careful, you might give them a show.”

As Michelle accelerated, Beth snorted, “Although not too much of one, considering your tiny boobs.”

Sarah pouted visibly as she glanced down at her chest. Although her breasts weren’t as big as her friends’, they were still large enough to enhance her curvaceous figure. “That’s not nice! I can’t help it if my boobs aren’t as huge as yours. Besides,” she raised her chin proudly as she stated, “Brad likes them and that’s all that matters.”

“That’s okay, Sarah,” Michelle said, reaching back to pat her friend’s hand. “It isn’t a contest. Besides, if it was, you’d win. After all, you found Brad, right?”

Sarah smiled at the thought of her fiancée. Brad Forest was the nicest, gentlest man she’d ever met. This, despite the fact that he was a defensive tackle for Bridgewater’s football team and considered to be the meanest, most aggressive player on the field. As a graduating senior, he was a candidate for the NCAA’s Defensive Player of the Year for Double-A teams and he even attended tryouts for the NFL. Since Bridgewater wasn’t a nationally-recognized school, it was tough to get scouts who would consider players from lesser squads, but that didn’t stop Brad. After a week of tryouts, he managed to gain the attention of a few teams, but nothing would be decided for another few weeks, giving him and Sarah time to graduate and get married before he would receive any word on a decision. However, recognizing that the chances of getting into the NFL were slim at best, even for candidates from the upper-level colleges, Brad wisely chose to focus on obtaining his degrees in the double-major of marketing and communications. All this, and he held down a job in town as a telecommunications technician laying cable throughout Bridgewater, as well as repairing and replacing older cable in customers’ homes. Thanks to his careful planning and wise investments, Brad already owned a small beach-front property down near the Virginia / North Carolina border where he and Sarah intended to spend their honeymoon and start their new life together.

Sighing to herself as she gazed at her engagement ring, Sarah nodded with a smile. “After graduation and the wedding, we’ll spend a couple of weeks at our new beach-front house where we’ll soak up the sun, take long walks in the evening, and spend lots of time making babies.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Beth said, turning around after coughing up her soda. “Aren’t you two going about this rather fast? You’re not even twenty-one and you want to start having kids?”

“Well, why not,” Sarah asked, genuinely surprised at Beth’s question. “Beth, I love children, and so does Brad. You know I’ve always wanted to be a mother. My mom and dad wanted to have a big family, but when mom died giving birth to me, my brother Carl and I were the only kids dad had. Carl doesn’t want kids. In fact, he’s not interested in dating at all right now. Maybe someday he’ll come around, but as for me, I want lots of children. I want Dad to be a grandfather to lots of kids, which means it’s up to Brad and me to give them to him.”

“But what about a career,” Beth asked, unable to believe Sarah’s intentions. “You’ve spent the last four years studying computers to get a degree and you’re going to give all that up to get pregnant right after graduation?”

Beth shrugged as she munched down on another pretzel rod. “Why not? Brad and I already talked about this. Even if a NFL team doesn’t call him up, he’s still got a solid job working for Verizon right now. He’s talked to his supervisor, who agreed to put in his request for a transfer after graduation. There’s an opening near Virginia Beach for a Technical Operations Supervisor, overseeing the kind of work he’s doing right now. He’s got the experience, he’s got the knowledge, and after graduation, he’ll have the college degree.”

Beth sat in the front passenger seat, a finger raised to protest and her mouth open as she considered Sarah’s argument. However, before she could speak, Sarah continued. “With the house already financed and a healthy portion of the mortgage already paid, our monthly payments will be half of most people’s rent in the surrounding area and we both already have cars. The house is a four bedroom, two bath, so we’ve got plenty of space to grow.”

“You mean you’ve got plenty of space to grow,” Michelle piped up for the first time since the discussion began. “You’ve really thought this out, haven’t you?”

Munching on her pretzel, Sarah nodded with a grin. “Absolutely! As for my career, being a stay-at-home mom will be my career for the foreseeable future, but I don’t intend to let my degree go to waste. I spoke with dad and he told me BMW has a satellite company out of Chesapeake that could use a junior systems analyst. I figure I’ll get my foot in the door, Brad and I will work on our family, and if everything works out, we’ll give dad the news when we go back home to Manassas in December.”

“So you’re saying you’re going to be barefoot and pregnant by Christmas,” Beth asked in astonishment.

Smiling at the thought, Sarah nodded. “I certainly hope so!”

Shaking her head in amazement, Michelle said, “Well then let’s have a blast! If this is the last time you’re gonna have to just be one of the girls and not worry about babies and diapers, let’s do this!”

Fifteen minutes later, they arrived at the Riverside Camping site and pulled into the gravel parking lot. Taking a look around, they noticed that the lot was empty and the area for tents and grilling was deserted despite the clean and inviting nature of the surroundings. Tall trees framed the parking lot with a fresh mulch path leading over to a modern playground built for kids to play on, with simple metal grills set into the ground around the perimeter. Benches and tables, all new with fresh coats of weather sealant to keep the wood from warping or rotting from the elementals, were placed along a small rise that overlooked the riverbank that curved around an enormous stand of trees on the far side of the river that continued off into the distance. Smooth concrete slabs, intended as the foundations for camping tents formed a circle off to the right side of the parking lot, with a large fire pit set in the middle. Yet the strangest thing was that while the fire pit held the remains of a recent fire, trash cans set at the edge of the parking lot were empty and there was no other signs of recent activity.

“That’s odd,” Beth commented as she hopped out of the Jeep. “I haven’t seen a campground as nice as this one in a long time, and yet there’s not a soul around.”

Michelle backed the Wrangler to the end of the parking lot closest to the river, where the slope ran down to the water’s edge. “Well, maybe the campground is intended for weekends or something. It is only Tuesday. That would explain the charred wood in the fire pit over there.”

“Maybe,” Beth muttered softly as she continued to glance around the lot. After another minute, she shrugged and came around the back to help the other girls with the equipment. “So, what do we do first? Get the rafts in the water?”

“The first thing we do is unpack everything and take it down to the beach,” Michelle said. “We don’t want to put the rafts in the water until we’re ready. If they get swept off, we’d have to run after them and I’d prefer to avoid that.”

“Something tells me you did that once before,” Sarah commented with a knowing grin. “Let me guess…you did that back when your grandparents took you, right?”

Blushing in embarrassment, Michelle nodded. “Yeah. I was only eight at the time and I was so excited that I put my raft in the water. I was so sure that it would stay put, only to discover when I turned my back that it floated downstream about fifty yards before my grandfather realized where it was. He took off running for it, but by then it was out in the middle of the river. It took him twenty minutes to catch up to it and bring it back.”

“Oops. I guess grandpa wasn’t happy,” Beth said with a smile.

“No, he wasn’t,” Michelle admitted. “Although grandma convinced him that it was only an accident. The rest of the trip was great, but it was also the last time we got a chance to be together before grandpa passed away.”

Gasping softly, Beth reached out to Michelle. “I’m sorry. I forgot about that. That was the week your grandmother came to stay with you and your parents, wasn’t it?”

Nodding, Michelle sighed. “It’s okay. He went in his sleep, so it wasn’t like he suffered. I suppose I stopped coming to the river because it reminded me of him, but now that I think of it, there was nothing to be sad about. I had my best memories of him and grandma on the river.”

Snapping out of her sadness, Michelle indicated toward the Wrangler. “Come on! We should get this stuff set before too long. I want to be out in the river before it gets too hot!”

Unloading the Jeep wasn’t as difficult as they feared. The inflatable tubes were easy to manage, despite their size. Sarah carried each of them to the sandy beach, far enough from the water’s edge to avoid Michelle’s past mistake. Next came the supplies: the coolers, the food, the Jack Daniels, and of course their extra clothing, towels, sunscreen and assorted items. Michelle made sure each cooler was filled and placed in the slots set in the front of each river tube.

“Hey Michelle,” Sarah called out as she came down the slope to the beach where Michelle was getting everything ready. “Where did you find these river tubes anyway? They look heavy-duty to me.”

“They should be,” Michelle said with a smile as she closed the cooler top in her river tube and stood up. “I have a friend in the military who used to do this kind of stuff every weekend. Unfortunately, he and his wife got reassigned to Arizona, where river tubing isn’t as common as they would like. Not to mention, the Navy doesn’t really allow for lots of time to spend tubing on the river on a regular basis, so he knew we were thinking about doing it, so he offered them to me.”

“Why three river tubes? I mean, if he and his wife did it, what did they need a third one for?”

“They used the third one to carry their supplies in,” Michelle replied. “Michael and Marcia, when they would go river tubing, they wouldn’t do it for a couple of hours, they’d do it all day long. Michael told me one time they were down in Georgia on the Chattahoochee River. They started on the shoreline of West Point Lake near La Grange and by the time they pulled in to camp for the night, they found they were just shy of Columbus.”

“Whoa,” Beth’s eyes widened. “How far is that?”

“About fifty miles…if you’re driving by car,” Michelle replied. “When you’re in a river tube just going with the current of the river and taking your time, it’s a lot longer. Of course, there were times when they had to paddle, especially in the lake areas, otherwise they would have been pushed into a dead end.”

“I bet they were burnt from the sun reflecting off the water,” Beth suggested.

Michelle shook her head. “Nope. They learned their lesson early on and never went out without plenty of sunscreen. Why do you think I got some from Mr. Shackleton’s store? I have no desire to get back to school looking like a lobster.”

“They look to be pretty sturdy,” Sarah commented as she set her food beside the cooler in her tube. “Hey, I love the headrest on this thing! That means I can lean back and won’t have to worry about getting a crick in my neck.”

“Michael and Marcia got one of the better river tubes offered on the market. They’re called the Intex River Run Connect Lounges. They’re heavy duty, which means they won’t pop easily if they run over a sharp rock or submerged glass. They’re multi-hulled, which means if the outside skin is torn, it won’t deflate the entire tube, only the portion that gets damaged, so you could keep going.” Michelle pointed to the clasps hanging, two to a side, on each side of the octagonal tube. “These connectors hook up with ones on the other tubes. If we wanted, we could hook them all together. Sarah, you suggested getting some sun?” Sarah nodded. “Well while you do that, we could hook the other tubes to yours, then I could show Beth how to swim better without the tubes going off in different directions. You could stay in your tube, keep them close to us while we do our thing and then we’d just jump back in afterward and unhook ourselves.”

“That’s cool,” Beth exclaimed as she tried it out. “Hey, these things really are tough. How much did he pay for these things?”

Michelle shrugged. “They sold as a batch of sixteen for nine hundred dollars, but Michael only bought three. It was something he and some friends of his went in together to save money.”

“So less than sixty bucks a piece, that’s not bad,” Beth said, impressed as she checked it out.

“That’s not even the best part,” Michelle said with a grin. Indicating to the inner wall of the tube, she said, “There’s a recessed pocket here where you can put your cell phone and other valuables and on the other side, you can rest a glass bottle or soda can on top while you lounge. It’s perfect!”

“Well what are we waiting for,” Sarah exclaimed as she pulled her t-shirt over her head, revealing her orange Lycra bikini top which she’d put on under her clothes. Moments later, she dropped her blue jeans to reveal the rest of her suit, the sexy, shimmering fabric barely covering her trim, tight waistline. Shaking her head, Sarah let her long blond hair settle down her back until the tips were touching the top of her bikini bottom. Sarah turned her head and smiled, her sapphire blue eyes flashing.

Beth arched an eyebrow in admiration. “Girl, if you weren’t already taken by Brad, you and I would be having some fun on this river ride.”

Sarah already knew that Beth was a lesbian, at least that’s what she claimed, but Sarah noticed Beth checking out Brad several times and knew she wasn’t completely firm on the idea. As for Michelle, she admitted being bi-sexual and was willing to have fun playing with either side. Neither choice bothered her, after all, Sarah hadn’t become their friend because of their sexual preferences. It was because of their ability to have fun together and enjoy a good time, but especially how closely they bonded over the last four years as roommates.

“Well what’s stopping you, honey,” Sarah replied in the softest, sexiest voice Beth had ever heard her use. “Don’t let this little ring on my finger stop you from missing out on a little fun. After all, Brad and I aren’t married yet.” Slowly, deliberately, Sarah sauntered over to Beth, her blue eyes flashing as she stepped right up, looking up into Beth’s brilliant green eyes before tilting her head and whispering in her ear, “…and he’s not here, is he?”

The look on Beth’s face was priceless as her eyes widened and her mouth dropped open in shock. “Wait…y-you mean…”

Turning and ducking her head seductively, Sarah said in the sexiest Deep South accent Beth had ever heard, “C’mon now, sugar. All this time we’ve been roommates and now you’re getting cold feet? It’s just us three little ladies today. Let’s see what kind of fun we can have.”

It took everything Michelle had to not burst out laughing at the scene playing out in front of her. She knew Sarah was capable of turning on her sex appeal when she wanted. There were several times over the years at school when she’d watched Sarah dip her head and blink her lashes, causing guys to turn to Jell-O in the palm of her hands. Sarah’s cute, bubbly personality made her popular with just about everyone on campus, but when she turned on the Southern charm, no one was immune, not even Brad. Michelle remembered walking in on them on one occasion just before Christmas. The two of them were going at it with Sarah up against the wall, her legs wrapped tightly around Brad’s waist as he thrust repeatedly into her while she begged in her pretty little Southern accent over and over for him to keep going. The scene was so steamy, Michelle momentarily lost herself and stumbled over to another friend’s room down the hall to run her head under a cold shower. Despite four years as roommates, she’d never guessed how sexy Sarah could be!

“Hey now,” Michelle interjected, decided to join in on the fun. “If you’re going to be coming out, the least you could do is share.”

“Well of course, honey,” Sarah said with a seductive smile on her face. “After all, according to you, those river tubes can be connected. So what’s to stop us from having a little ménage a trois?”

Beth glanced over at Michelle; clearly she was interested in the idea and Michelle couldn’t help but smile in return. “Okay, if you feel so strongly about this, Sarah. I suppose we could take a chance on the river.”

Sarah smiled back. “After all, what happens on the river…”

In unison, all three girls said, “…stays on the river!”


With the river tubes packed, Michelle and Beth quickly undressed and got in their swimsuits. Beth, always preferring the tomboy look, preferred to wear a pink t-shirt with no bra underneath. This had the effect of allowing her voluptuous bosom to press out against the fabric, revealing her nipples. The t-shirt was cut off just below her ribs, revealing her slender, tight abdomen which she took pride in from all the exercise she did every morning. Beth wore a pair of cut-off jeans that reached mid-thigh with the frayed ends decorated in multiple colors.

As for Michelle, she preferred a one-piece latex swimsuit tied off around her neck before running down to cup her ample bosom and lift it up. The latex split off beneath her breasts, wrapping around her back, down to cradle her tight, rounded cheeks, slipping between her legs to press up against her soft, smooth, hairless crotch before reaching up to either side of her rounded hips, attaching at the sides of the back of her suit. It had the effect of allowing her obsidian-black hair to fall down freely to caress her bare back before reaching down to her buttocks, while leaving her tight, slender abdomen bare below her breasts to just above her womanhood. It was a swimsuit Michelle loved: smooth, soft, comfortable and very sexy. Which she noticed as Beth and Sarah watched her put it on.

“Thank goodness we’re going to be in the water,” Sarah whispered to Beth. “’Cause I’m feeling hot!”

Turning to Sarah, Beth replied softly, “Hey, you lit the match, sweetheart. You sure you want to play with fire?”

Michelle sauntered over to them and smiled. “Before we do anything ladies, we need to put on sunscreen. That is, unless you want to burn, hmm?”
By the time they were finished applying sunscreen to each other, their bodies glistened in the sunlight. Michelle closed up the hardtop to her Wrangler and rolled up the windows before reaching in and grabbing her sunglasses. After locking the car, she hurried back down to the beach.
“All right ladies, we’ve got everything packed, the car is locked up…” She stopped as Beth handed Michelle her iPhone 6S, already in a plastic bag for safe-keeping on the river. “Thank you!”

“Hey, it was your idea,” Beth said as she raised her Galaxy S5 and Sarah showed her S6 Edge, both in plastic bags. “A good one too, I might add.”

“Well, if we’ve got everything we need, let’s get going!”

Pushing their river tubes out into the water, the three girls waded out until the bank dropped off to about three feet deep. Sarah yelped as she slipped into the water, keeping a hold onto her tube as she regained her footing, her hair plastered to her back.

“Dammit! I was hoping to stay dry for a while!”

“Don’t worry about it, Sarah,” Michelle said as she and Beth giggled at her friend’s pouting expression. “You’ll dry off in no time. Come on! Let’s go!”

The three girls slipped over the sides of their tubes and plopped down into the centers, their legs raised up into the air as their heads pressed against the headrests. Slowly, but with gathering speed, the water moved them out into the middle of the river, the current pushing them along until the campground and the parking lot were far behind them.


Ten minutes later, a tow truck came up the road and turned into the parking lot of the campground. Backing the truck up to the bumper of Michelle's Wrangler, two heavy-set men stepped out of the truck and looked around. After several moments, the driver turned to the passenger and nodded. As he set about lowering the cable to attach to the Wrangler, the other man raised a phone to his ear.

“Riverside, this is Hauler-two. No sign of the girls. From the look of the beach, it appears they’ve already left. We’re hooking up their car now.”

“Acknowledged, Hauler-two. Take the car to Prep Site Three. Once they’re in custody and processed, we’ll have you drop it off at an impound yard.”

“Copy that. Hauler-two out.”

The driver glanced over at Hauler-two. “This is a nice ride. I wouldn’t mind taking her for a spin.”

“I wouldn’t do that, if I were you,” Hauler-two warned him. “Once those girls are in custody, we have to make this car disappear. You have any ideas?”

“Well, there’s Recycle Management in Stanley, or we could drop it off at Richard’s Auto Salvage in Shenandoah.”

“Are you kidding,” Hauler-two said. “Richard’s Auto Salvage is only a couple of miles away from the complex. We can’t afford to risk it being traced back to Bio-SciTech.”

“And who is going to do that,” the driver asked. “If the car is found, there won’t be a fingerprint on it except from those girls. We drop the car off after dark, no one sees us, the car gets sold off or scraped. Either way, it can’t lead back to us.”

Hauler-two sighed. “Whatever. Look, we take it back to Prep Site Three for now. We’ll ask what they want us to do with it later, okay?”

“Fine,” the driver said as the front end rose up into the air. “It’s ready.”

“Great. Give me a second, I need to do something.”

As the driver set the locks and jumped into the truck, Hauler-two ran over to the side of the road by the parking lot’s entrance. Hidden in the sewer pipe running under the entrance was a sign. Hauler-two pulled it out and walked back over to the hole where it was originally placed and stuck it into the ground.

“Okay, let’s go!”

The tow truck sped off down the road with Michelle’s Wrangler attached to the back. As they disappeared, sunlight shown through the trees to shine upon the sign which read:

Riverside Campgrounds – Temporarily closed due to renovations. Opening up again July 2015. Trespassers prior to this time will be ticketed and towed. – Luray County Police Department

[Raso719]

The hype is so real! Thanks for bringing this classic back!
Out of curiosity, where else are you posting this? We lost these stories, last time, because they were only ever posted in one place.

[MarauderTDL]

Chapter Four: And so it begins

“Tracker Three, what’s your position?”

Silence.

“I say again, Tracker Three, what is your position?”

Silence.

“God dammit…”

“I heard you the first time, John,” Alex responded, clearly irritated by Tracker Two’s insistent calls. “I had to get into position on the opposite bank and there were a couple of cars passing by, so I had to lay low.”

“You could have responded,” Tracker Two said with a sigh. “And stop calling me by my real name!”

John could hear the irritation in Alex’s voice as he transmitted, “Look, there was a family having guests stop by at their house over here. You might not have anyone to worry about on your side of the river, but I’ve got several houses up the hill from me, and I can’t afford for anyone to hear me if I take a shot from here, got it?”

“Don’t take that tone with me, boy,” Tracker Two snarled. “I’m still your superior…”

“I get it,” Tracker Three cut him off. “I’m simply following the protocols to avoid any witnesses.”

“You could always pop off a Gamma at them if it helped.”

“That’s not funny, John,” Alex fired back. “Director Melendez specifically…”

“I know what Melendez said,” Tracker Two said, cutting his subordinate off just as he did a minute ago. “The point is, we needed to be in position already. Hauler-one and Hauler-two indicate the girls started down the South Fork fifteen minutes ago. That means they should be here any minute.”

“I’m in position,” Tracker Three responded. “I needed a clear view of the river and the foliage on this side was pretty thick. Between that and the mosquitos, it’s not easy to get a shot off.”

“Well use some more of that repellant you have and deal with it,” Tracker Two said. Hearing a noise from further up the river, he called out, “They’re coming! Get ready!”


This is the best day we’ve had in months, Michelle thought to herself as they all laughed and kicked water at each other. As it turned out, the water temperature was in the lower seventies, which helped cool them off from the heat radiating from the sun above them. Although the air was humid, the water helped to keep it tolerable as they made their way down the river.

To either side, the landscape rolled on by, the leaves on the trees along the banks were the deepest green and the foliage was thick enough to block out any homes that might be set back in the woods. Once or twice, Michelle thought she saw the outline of a house, but the trees were just thick enough that it appeared as if they were all alone. As they floated along with the current, she could see the banks of the river change from the muddy, flat terrain filled with grass almost to the edge of the water, to a raised embankment, the sides cut out by the water to form lips jutting out over the river, but still easy enough to climb up if they needed to get out. Not that they wanted to.

“I can’t believe how clear the water is,” Sarah remarked as she leaned over the side of her tube. “Look! I can see the bottom! There are fish swimming by us!”

Beth glanced to either side. “I can see the bottom too! Wow, I thought maybe all that rain you talked about would muddy up the water more.”

“That’s what I was thinking,” Michelle admitted as she looked over the side at the waters that sparkled and reflected back the light from the sun like little twinkling lights dancing atop the water. Michelle sighed as she smiled. “I’d forgotten how beautiful it was, just sitting back and enjoying the view as the river carried you along.”

Reaching over, Michelle pulled her phone out of the plastic bag and checked her connection. As expected, the cell strength flickered in and out, barely even registering as they floated along. Leaning over to Beth, she said, “Just so you know…it appears we won’t have cellular service while we’re on the river. I’m barely even getting a signal.”

“Is that bad,” Sarah asked, a hint of concern in her voice. “I mean, what if something happens?”

“Like what,” Michelle replied, slipping her phone back into the bag and securing it into the inner recess of the tube. “Don’t worry. We’ll be fine. I just know how Beth loves her checking her emails and Facebook posts.”

“Hey, that’s not fair,” Beth shot back. “You love checking your posts too!”

“Maybe,” Michelle conceded. “But I also know when to leave it alone. Didn’t Professor Kellogg get on you about being on Facebook when you should have been paying attention in your Drama class?”

“You heard about that, huh,” Beth responded. When Michelle nodded, she said, “Yeah, I was bored. Since we’re almost to graduation, all Kellogg has us do is perform scenes from famous plays to see if we’ve taken the lessons he’s been giving us and are using them to better our performances.”

“So what happened,” Sarah inquired, suddenly interested as she leaned over the side to hear what Beth had to say.

Beth shrugged. “I gave him a bullshit answer about seeing if any of my video posts were getting any ‘likes’. Turns out he liked my response and left me alone for the rest of the class.”

“So what are you going to do after graduation, Beth,” Sarah asked.

“I’d love to get into acting, maybe go up to New York and see if there is an acting group that would take me in to give me a chance.”

Michelle smiled at her friend’s dream. “Hoping to be the next big star on Broadway, huh?”

Beth cracked a smile, but it faded quickly. “Maybe. I don’t know.”

There was something about Beth’s response that didn’t feel right. Michelle saw it several times in the last few weeks, but she’d let it go thinking that it had to do with the end of the year and graduation. Looking at Beth now, she sensed something was wrong and paddled over. Reaching out, Michelle grabbed the handle on top of Beth’s tube and leaned in so she could whisper, “Hey, are you all right? What’s wrong?”

“I guess it’s finally beginning to occur to me,” Beth admitted softly. “College is almost over and it’s time to go out into the big world and make my way. I just wish I knew what that way was.”

“You’ll do fine, Beth,” Michelle replied cheerfully, trying to help take Beth’s mind off her concerns. “You’re graduating…”

“…with a degree in Humanities, Michelle,” Beth confessed as she bowed her head. “I wasted my college career taking classes just to take more classes. Oh, I’ll have a degree all right. I’ll hang it up on my wall somewhere, to remind me of the four years I wasted, never making a choice of what I wanted to do.”

“But…I thought you said you were majoring in Speech and Drama,” Michelle said confused.

“I was,” Beth said. “At least, until things started going downhill at home…until I learned that mom and dad were splitting up.”

Michelle gasped softly, “What? When did this happen?”

“Hey, what’s going on,” Sarah asked, reaching out to paddle in their direction until her tube bumped into Beth’s. “Hey, Beth, what’s wrong?”

“Her mom and dad,” Michelle said softly glancing over at Sarah as tears were glittering in Beth’s eyes. “They’re,” she looked over at Beth. “What? Divorcing?”

There it was…the big ‘D’ word…the word Beth tried to avoid admitting since she’d returned home for Christmas and learned the truth from her parents. Her father, a career military man in the U.S. Army, was a ‘full-bird’ Colonel as they liked to call it. Stationed at Fort Belvoir in Fairfax, Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C., he was attached to the Military Intelligence Readiness Command, which was to say he was involved in projects that were rarely ever discussed around the dinner table at home. Every morning, he would wake up early, drive down from Annapolis, Maryland where they lived, to spend his days at Fort Belvoir. Sometimes he would come home in time for dinner; more often than not, he arrived well after dark, or not at all, depending on the assignment he was working on. It was obvious that her father wasn’t unfaithful to her mother, but Beth could tell that spending all that time at work was just as bad as being with another women in her mother’s eyes. Although he would always tell his wife and children how much he loved them, in the end Colonel Matthew Ensley was more focused on his career than his family.

As for Beth’s mother, she was a dedicated mid-level bureaucrat working in the nation’s capital at one of the myriad of governmental buildings dotting the landscape of D.C. The last time Beth tried to visit her mother for lunch, it took her an hour just to find parking, and then she discovered that her mother was reassigned to another building on the other side of the city near the Smithsonian museum. This little fact was something her mother forgot to pass on when she was home, locked away in her upstairs office where she worked on policy papers and research for political positions. In the end, Beth gave up and drove home to cook dinner for her parents. Unfortunately, both of them were late, so Beth sat alone at the dining room table, eating a plate of pot roast she’d prepared for them, only to see it get cold as she waited…and waited…and then went up to her room to cry he\rself to sleep.

Beth’s two older sisters tried to console her, but ultimately, they were forced to admit that they too experienced what Beth was going through: the disappointment, despair, and the depression. Mary and Tanya tried to help her understand that mom and dad truly loved their daughters, they’d simply forgotten how to love each other and make time for the family they claimed to care about. Instead, they commiserated with her during that quiet moment on Christmas Day, after their parents finally admitted their decision.

Sighing heavily, Beth said, “They told me they’d stay together until after I graduate and then they’ll go their separate ways. I guess they knew a while ago, they just wanted to maintain appearances for Mary, Tanya and me. My sisters are already out on their own. Tanya is married and expecting, so at least she’s got someone who loves her. Mary is with a guy who says he loves her, but they still haven’t made the commitment yet. As for me…I don’t know what I’m going to do.”

Now the tears came, now Beth bowed her head and sobbed as everything came crashing down around her. Pulling her legs into the tube, she wrapped her arms around her legs and buried her head into her knees as she cried. “I wish I could just disappear! I feel so insignificant right now! Mom and dad made it look like they were being so brave for all three of us, but in truth, it was all bullshit! They didn’t care about me or Mary or Tanya. At least they have someone they can love. As for me…I guess I’ll find something to do…just another insignificant speck in a big world.”

Glancing over at the bottle of Jack Daniels, Beth grabbed it, but instead of doing what Sarah and Michelle feared, Beth chucked it at the riverbank, hearing the glass shatter as she slumped back down into the tube. “I’d planned on getting drunk and doing really stupid and crazy things. So much for liquid courage,” she said as she started laughing, except the laughing quickly changed into crying.

Michelle and Sarah looked at each other and bowed their heads while Beth softly cried in her tube. “I-I guess this changes things,” Michelle whispered softly.

“No,” Sarah shook her head. “It doesn’t change anything.”

Reaching over, Sarah grabbed the connector attached to the side of Beth’s river tube and slipped it into the matching connector on her tube. As they clicked, Michelle asked, “What are you doing?”

“What I said I would do,” Sarah said as she joined another connector and slowly crept across the gap between the two tubes. Beth finally realized something was going on and raised her head.

“Wha-what are you doing? Hey!”

The water splashed up, making the sides of the tubes slick as Sarah slid into the tube alongside Beth. The river tubes were originally designed to fit one person with room to spare, but seeing as the two young women weren’t very large to begin with, they discovered the inner portion of the tube accommodated them both, so long as they didn’t mind being close, which was exactly what Sarah had in mind. Before Beth could protest, Sarah raised her right hand to cup Beth’s cheek as she smiled. “It’s okay. You don’t have to feel alone. I’m here.”

Confused, Beth stammered, “I-I don’t…I mean, Sarah, I…”

Sarah leaned forward and kissed Beth full on the lips. At first, Beth yelped softly, not understanding what Sarah was doing, but gradually, her body relaxed, the tension fading away as she opened her eyes and saw Sarah staring back at her.

Parting for a moment, Sarah turned to Michelle. “Can you give us a little while? I think maybe Beth and I need some special time together.”

“Are you sure about this,” Michelle asked softly, glancing over at Beth, who hesitated for a moment before pursing her lips and nodding, a gentle, hopeful smile spreading across her face. “Okay you two…just do me a favor and be discreet, okay?”

Easing down until they were lying in the bottom with their feet sticking up and over the sides of the tube, Sarah looked at Beth and smiled as she ran her hand through a lock of Beth’s hair, “Like we said earlier, what happens on the river…”

“…stays on the river,” Beth repeated softly. “Sarah, you don’t have to…”

“You’re my sister, Beth,” Sarah said firmly as she pressed a finger against Beth’s lips. “We may not be blood, but we’ve spent four years together, and there’s no way I would let my sister go through something like this alone. I’m here for you.”

“But…I know you’re not really into being with other women like Michelle and I are. You’ve always been happy with Brad and…I mean, you don’t have to do this,” Beth protested as Sarah slipped her hand under Beth’s t-shirt and gently caressed her back. “I mean…mmmm, oh Sarah…what are you doing?”

Sarah leaned in until her lips were caressing the tip of Beth’s ear. “Brad and I learned a while ago, that sometimes touching was just as stimulating and enjoyable as sex, but more often than not, it helps to ease tension and relax your body. You do realize how tense you are right now, yes?”

Beth gasped as she felt Sarah’s nimble fingers gently caress her spine, running up to her shoulders, before slowly running down to the small of her back, producing a tiny gasp of pleasure.

“Yes!”

“Do you want me to stop,” Sarah asked playfully, smiling as she could tell Beth was enjoying the sensations coursing through her body.

“No! Please,” she begged softly. “Don’t stop! It feels so good!”

Rubbing her nose against Beth’s, Sarah smiled at her as she opened her eyes. “It’s going to be okay, Beth. We’ll get through this together. I promise.”

“There’s nothing you can do. You can’t stop my parents from di-…” Beth’s voice caught on the word.

“No, I can’t,” Sarah admitted sadly. “Why didn’t you say anything to us before? It’s no wonder you’ve been acting so weird this semester. We’ve been your roommates since freshman year and we always shared things going on in our lives, but you didn’t tell us about this.”

“I couldn’t,” Beth confessed, her voice cracking. “I didn’t want to ruin everything that was going so well for you and Brad. As for Michelle,” they both glanced over at their friend who was paddling ahead of them, close to where the river opened up a bit. “She’s been lonely lately, so I tried to be there for her, thinking it would help me in dealing with my situation.”

Sarah hugged Beth. “I guess it didn’t help?”

“For either of us,” Beth confirmed. She heaved a deep sigh. “Did she tell you about the job offer she received?” Sarah shook her head. “I’m not surprised. With the engineering degree she’s about to receive, her father offered to hook her up with a Navy contractor in Annapolis, which would mean she’d be living close to home.”

“That’s great,” Sarah exclaimed in a hushed voice. “So why didn’t she say anything?”

“Because Michelle didn’t take the job,” Beth revealed. “Turns out her father pulled some strings, except the current administration has a dim view of military personnel who try to help family members get jobs with civilian companies that work for the military. Even though her dad is retired from the Navy, he may receive some disciplinary action for what he did. Michelle felt terrible and thought that by declining the job, she’s save him from getting in trouble. For now, he’s okay, but it means she’s graduating without any real career lined up. What’s worse is she had two offers prior to her dad’s attempt to help her, which she turned down before things blew up in her dad’s face. She tried to go back and see if their offers were still available, but it looks like other candidates got them both.”

“That’s horrible,” Sarah said, suddenly feeling bad for Michelle. “God, now I feel terrible.”

Beth turned her head to stare at Sarah in confusion. “Whatever for?”

“Because out of the three of us, I was certain you two would be more successful than me. Here I was, going on about how Brad and I had everything set, and both of you…”

“That’s not your fault,” Beth assured her, placing a hand on Sarah’s shoulder. “Honestly, Sarah, you always look out for other people before yourself. It’s about time you had something wonderful to look forward to.”

“And why shouldn’t you,” Sarah said in return, making Beth duck her head in embarrassment. “No, I’m serious. Your parents getting a…well, separating, is a horrible thing to consider, but that doesn’t mean you can’t be happy. You’ve said you wanted to get into acting, so why not go for it? Georgia is one of the largest areas in the country where the movie studios are filming nowadays. Why not go down there and see if there are any opportunities?”

Seeing Beth’s hesitancy, Sarah said, “Look, I know things are rough right now, but I can tell you that you don’t have to suffer alone. Me, Michelle, Brad, we’ll all be here for you, no matter what. If you like, you can come with Brad and me down to Virginia Beach and stay for a while after graduation. If you decide to take a chance to go down to Georgia to pursue acting, at least some time with us will give you a chance to prepare, make some calls so you know where you’d be going and who you’d need to speak with, so by the time you do leave, you’ll be prepared. In the meantime, it will give you some time to reflect and consider your options.”

Beth gasped in shock. “But what about your plans? I’d be in the way. I don’t want you and Brad to put your plans on hold for me.”

“What,” Sarah blinked in confusion. “You mean what we talked about? Everything related to employment is already going forward, regardless. As for Brad and me…” She smiled and winked knowingly. “Whether you’re there or not, Brad and I are going to conceive and I’m going to get pregnant. There’s no debate there. Now if you want, you can always become ‘Auntie Beth’.”

Giggling out loud at the absurdity of Sarah’s comment, Beth blinked as Sarah’s expression remained unchanged. “Wait, you’re serious?” Beth’s mouth hung open. “Sarah…you don’t have to…”

Sarah cut her off as she kissed her again, this time slipping her tongue into Beth’s mouth as she slipped her hand back under the t-shirt to caress Beth’s back. Beth’s protest lasted for no more than a few seconds before she capitulated and moaned, returning Sarah’s kiss as she raised her hand up to cup one of Sarah’s breasts. Enjoying the touch of her friend’s hand on her breast, Sarah’s moan mixed with Beth’s as they continued touching each other and kissing, the gentle sounds of arousal emanating from inside the tube.


Glancing over at the tube where Beth and Sarah lay, Michelle smiled as she heard their soft moans. Although their faces were obscured beneath the sides of the tube, she could see them moving, their arms gently caressing each other as Sarah helped Beth relax. It made her feel better, knowing that Sarah offered to let Beth stay with her and Brad while she got her future plans in order. Despite Sarah’s soft voice, she heard just about everything they talked about…including her own current situation.

It was true. Her father tried to help her by reaching out to an old friend from back during his time as a pilot for the Navy, before they moved from California to Maryland. The opportunity to work for a friend of the family sounded very exciting, until dad was contacted by his former commanding officer, who informed him that nepotism, even the slightest hint of it, was not allowed in dealing with companies working for the military. The worst part of it was that her father really hadn’t even done anything other than putting her in contact with his friend and telling him of her qualifications and her desire to succeed. Engineering, especially in areas dealing with the military, was a tough career for women to get ahead, but that’s why Michelle loved it. She saw it as just another challenge.

After an interview with her father’s friend at the company’s headquarters outside Annapolis, she received an offer as an entry-level engineering assistant to one of the senior engineers working on some of the Navy’s newest power-plants for Next-Generation fighters. Everything seemed to be going well, until someone complained, and then her father was contacted. Within two days, her father broke the news that the job offer was rescinded, with apologies from her father’s friend, and Michelle was left with no job, no current opportunities, since the other two job offers were since filled, and little time before graduation.

Maybe we should all hook up and stay with Sarah and Brad until things sort themselves out, she thought for a moment before discarding the idea. No, Sarah offered to let Beth stay because she genuinely needed the help. Michelle refused to believe that, with her grades, her knowledge, and her drive, that she wouldn’t find something soon enough. At least, that’s what she hoped.

No sense in dwelling on it right now, she thought as she glanced back over at her friends, who sounded like they were having fun. We came out here to have a day of fun in the sun, and I refuse to let a little setback ruin our day.

Rising up until she was kneeling in the tube, Michelle reached over the side and grabbed the strapline and wrapped the Velcro around her ankle. Wouldn’t want to repeat grandpa’s attempts to catch my tube again, now would I? Michelle smiled at the thought of her grandparents, thankful for the memories of the times she spent with them on the river. It felt nice to be able to share that with her friends. Well, it looks like the channel is widening out of bit. Should be a good spot to take a dip.

With that, Michelle pushed off the tube into a quasi-dive / forward flop. Diving out of a tube in the middle of the river didn’t provide much support to push off properly, but she managed it well enough that she didn’t flop on her stomach. Luckily, the water was deep enough that her arms and head penetrated the water, while the rest of her body slid out, kicking up enough of a splash that the water enveloped a small cloud of vapor that appeared above the tube, depositing it back into the bottom of the seat unnoticed.


A tiny popping noise sounded nearby, echoing out across the river, making Sarah and Beth gasp and look around for the source, but nothing appeared to be out of the ordinary. Glancing at each other, they shrugged before hearing another pop just as Michelle hopped out of her tube and into the water.

“Did you hear that,” Sarah asked as Beth searched the shorelines, rubbing her neck to relieve an itching sensation.

“Yeah, sounded pretty close. I wouldn’t imagine there would be any hunters around here, but maybe someone fired a gun and it echoed.”

“Sounded pretty close to me,” Sarah said as she felt her shoulders tingle and the back of her neck itched, making her scratch. After looking around a little bit longer, she looked over at Michelle, who was swimming ahead of them.

“What in the world are you doing,” Beth asked as she watched Michelle kick her legs up and push out into the widening channel.

“Taking a dip,” Michelle said with a smile. “C’mon, you two! The water’s great! It feels so cool! With all the heat from the sun and the humidity, I thought it would be a good idea to take a swim.”

Sarah and Beth looked at each other and smiled, but Sarah quickly whispered, “Are you going to be okay? Seriously, the offer to join me and Brad stands and I think maybe it would be a good thing for you to get away from your folks while they work out their issues. Besides, maybe with you gone for a little while and your sisters not in the house, they might realize they’re making a mistake.”

Beth averted her eyes, but Sarah reached out and turned her head to gaze into her eyes. “C’mon…what do you say?”

Leaning forward, Beth wrapped her arms around Sarah’s shoulders and hugged her before kissing her cheek. “You’re so sweet. All right, I’ll do it, but only on one condition.”

“What’s that,” Sarah asked, genuinely curious.

Beth raised her lips to Sarah’s ear and whispered, “That you and I have a little more private time after we get back in the tubes, deal?”

Blushing furiously, Sarah smiled. “Okay, it’s a deal. Now c’mon!”

Diving out of the tubes was completely out of the question, so two girls simply rolled over either side of the tube and into the water, squealing as the cool water enveloped them.

“Oh my God,” Beth screeched as her head broke the surface. “It’s cold!”

“Oh, don’t be a baby,” Michelle called out. “Take the leg-line that’s on the side of your tube and strap it to your leg. The Velcro will keep it secured and the line on the side will reach out to twenty-five feet so you don’t have to worry about chasing after it.”

Beth and Sarah both found what Michelle was talking about and secured them to their legs, pulling the tubes behind them as they caught up to Michelle to join her in splashing either other as they let the current pull them down the river.


“Tracker Two to Tracker Three, what the hell was that?”

Alex turned his attention away from watching the three girls in the water to tap his comm-link. “What do you mean?”

“Dammit, you missed the third girl! Your shot didn’t touch her!”

“What are you talking about? I fired just before she jumped in the water,” Alex protested.

Tracker Two growled over the comm. “You idiot! It takes five seconds to disperse and coat the target! You fired just as she was jumping in the water. There wasn’t enough time for Alpha to reach her skin, much less absorb into it.”

“It was the best shot I had,” Alex fired back defiantly. “The foliage on this side of the river is thicker than on your side. You’re dealing with tall grass, but I’m dealing with full-grown trees and thick brush!”

“Director Melendez isn’t going to accept excuses, boy,” Tracker Two snapped. “Remember, we can’t proceed to Beta until after you’ve tagged her with Alpha. The drug doesn’t work unless fifty percent or more is absorbed into the skin.”

“You mean we can’t shoot them while they’re in the water?”

Tracker Two growled again. “Were you paying attention during the briefing on how the drug works? When the drug is released, it needs to settle down on the target in order to absorb into the body. If they’re in the water, most of their body is below the surface. Water dilutes the drug until it’s practically ineffective, so we need to tag them while they’re in their rafts. We can’t even try when they first get out either, because they’ll be too wet. We have to wait until they’ve dried off for at least ten to fifteen minutes.”

“Well what about the other two girls,” Alex asked. “You said you tagged them, but they got in the water.”

“Once the drug comes into contact with the skin and is absorbed, it can’t be washed off,” Tracker Two said. “Seriously, were you even paying attention when they went over this?”

“Oh, you mean how Alpha is the primary version of the drug and how it is the primer for which all other variants are able to function? How you can’t simply fire a round of Beta without first tagging a target with Alpha as the base coat because the primary sequences for the shrinking effect are all found in Alpha and act to trigger the intensified effects found in all other variants?”

Several moments passed with no response from Tracker Two. When he finally did respond, he said, “All right, so you were paying attention, just maybe not to the parts that are most important at this moment. Look, the other two girls are already primed. The effects should be kicking in shortly, but we can’t let the other girl remain untagged. If she’s not shrinking along with the others, she might be able to escape and get help. Besides, if she’s not shrinking with them, the differences are going to become obvious to her, which means they might figure out what’s going on. If they do that, they might reach one of the areas further down the river where folks are likely to see them. We can’t let that happen, understand?”

Tracker Three sighed, “Understood. I’ll move and set up for another try. They’re already moving out of my effective range. Once I get into position, I’ll wait for her to get out of the water and back into her raft to take the shot.”

“Good boy, that’s what I like to hear,” Tracker Two said. “I’m moving further down the river to the next spot for Beta. Don’t screw this up, kid.”


Alex rose from his spot amongst a stand of trees and bushes to watch as the girls and their rafts floated down the river into the larger channel. Their voices echoed back at him, as he slung his rifle over his shoulder and picked his way through the denser foliage to backtrack to the path he used earlier.

What are you doing, son?

Stopping to lean against a tall oak tree, Alex sighed and bowed his head. I’m doing my job, sir.

Son, this isn’t right and you know it. A shadowy government agency that shrinks people to study the effects of this Sizeol drug in order to help people?

You don’t understand, he heard himself respond. It’s a revolutionary breakthrough! Size manipulation and reduction…

At what cost, son? I taught your father to be better at discerning the truth, certainly I managed to pass that on to you too, right?

They’ll be fine! A few days shrunk down and then they’ll be released after their memories are adjusted so they won’t remember a thing.

Son, listen to yourself! When I was alive…

Well you’re not alive, are you? You’re dead! You’re dead and you’re just figment of my imagination! I needed you and you left me…just like mom and dad left me. I had to make it on my own and I did! These people they…they came to me! They recognized that I had a gift!

A gift I helped you develop. They’re using you, boy! If this drug is so fantastic, why would they hide in the wilderness of Central Virginia to test it? Why not ask for volunteers…real volunteers who would accept the risks this drug carries?

If it doesn’t work properly, they can’t let it get out to the public. Once they establish that it works properly, they’ll be able to move forward with it.

To do what, Alex heard his voice ask. Pacifying criminals? Saving the planet? Being responsible by shrinking people? What are they really planning to do with it?

I…

If you can’t answer that question on your own…how can you be certain you’re doing the right thing?

…

Almost six years of living on your own…alone…it’s not what I wanted for you, boy.

Alex blinked and his vision came back into focus as he caught sight of the girls splashing each other, laughing and carrying on. A part of him wished he could join them, just to remember what it was like to have fun and to be with people his own age.

“I know, Grandpa,” he whispered softly. “But you didn’t give me much choice, now did you?”

[MarauderTDL]

Chapter Five: ‘I’m sorry, son.’

June 2002
Alexandria, Virginia

Field Day at Rose Hill Elementary School in Alexandria, Virginia was the highlight of the entire year for the school. It represented the final days before the official start of summer vacation, when teachers were finishing grading papers and sending in student grades for their official records, while the children went outside and to have fun. Every grade, from Kindergarten through Sixth grade, brought their favorite towels to use as blankets on the grassy field and a packed lunch from home. Those who couldn’t afford to bring one picked one up from the cafeteria, and everyone was given an ice-cold can of soda pop to enjoy during the day. The grassy confines behind the school were large enough to hold four baseball fields, a standard-sized track for running, as well as a complete set of recess equipment for the younger-aged children on one side of the building, while a blacktop with two basketball courts were set on the other side of the school. Large trees lined the field, providing spots of shade for youngsters wanting to get out of the sun for a time, before heading back out to play kickball, baseball, soccer, and any other myriad of games.

As a special treat, the faculty over the years developed a series of events for the children to participate in: Softball throws to measure who could throw the farthest, sprint races to see who could run the fastest, relay races to see who could work together to overcome obstacles, and scavenger hunts to test the children’s minds as they searched for random items hidden throughout the field. At the end of the day, before everyone went back inside to prepare to go home, special ribbons would be given out to the children who won the events. No one who participated left empty-handed, even if they received a special ribbon for participation because the games were voluntary, and everyone who was willing to try deserved some sort of recognition.

Alexander Mitchell Sharp stood with his friends and fellow competitors as the teachers announced the results of the Rose Hill Elementary Field Day 2002. He was an average-sized child for his age, thick strawberry blonde hair covering his ears, and brilliant sapphire blue eyes that twinkled when he smiled. Alex fidgeted as he and the others waited for the principal, Mrs. Linville, to announce the winners of the events. He’d participated in several events, including the four-hundred meter relay as the anchor leg, coming from behind to win for his team. Although he didn’t know how he did in the other events, he knew he won one event, and he looked forward to showing his mom and dad the pretty ribbon the teachers displayed on the award table next to the shaded area where everyone congregated to hear the results.

The first events called were for the younger children from kindergarten through Second grade. Each child received their award and trotted back to the shaded area to sit down and stare at their prize while sipping on their sodas. One of the second-graders, a friend of his named Martin, held up his scarlet-colored Second Place ribbon and smiled at him. Alex smiled back and gave him a thumbs-up sign, happy for his friend. They sat together in the cafeteria during lunch time, and they loved talking about the Pokémon card game, comparing strategies they would one day use to become the greatest Pokémon champions ever.

“Now we have the awards for the participants for Third through Sixth Grades,” Mrs. Linville called out, catching Alex’s attention as she slipped the results on top of a stack of papers on her clipboard.

“For the Softball Throw, in Third Grade; third place goes to William Bacherty.”

William, a short, brown-haired kid with chubby arms trotted over to Mrs. Linville and accepted his green Third Place Ribbon, staring at it with wide eyes as he slow made his way back to the shade.

“Second place goes to…Barbara Allister.”

The girls clapped and shouted as Barbara Allister hurried over to the table and shook Mrs. Linville’s hand, accepting her red Second Place Ribbon. Usually, the girls didn’t participate in the Softball Throw, instead choosing other events to play in, but Barbara loved baseball, and since Softball was the only event the school had close to it, she took it as the next best thing. She was already playing baseball on the Little League team that played on one of diamonds on the far side of the field on Saturdays, so this was just practice for her.

“And the First Place winner is…Alexander Sharp.” Most of the boys in his class, as well as a few girls, cheered for him as Alex strode up to Mrs. Linville and accepted his blue First Place ribbon. “Well done, son,” Mrs. Linville said with a smile that lit up her face. “You certainly have a very good throwing arm.”

“Thank you, ma’am,” he replied respectfully as he gazed at the ribbon. “My dad and I were practicing all week.”

“Really,” Mrs. Linville replied, acting very impressed. “Well, I’m sure that certainly had a lot to do with your performance. Well done.”

Feeling a swell of pride, Alex walked back to the shade with his ribbon clutched in his hand. He thought of how proud his parents would be when he showed it to them after school. After all, his father played Minor League baseball after college, and he talked about how he wished he could have been good enough to make the big leagues. However, his dreams of being a major league baseball player ended when Alex was born. His father couldn’t bear to leave for weeks at a time while his wife and baby boy were all alone at home. After all, baseball was just a game, and his family was more important than hitting a home run for a crowd of a few thousand people who didn’t know him beyond his stats on the scoreboard. However, that didn’t mean that, once Alex was old enough, he didn’t pass his love of the game down to his son, watching games with him on the television on the weekends, and taking trips up to see the Baltimore Orioles play a double-header at Camden Yards.

“Wow, First Place!” Dallas Haskins’ eyes were wide as Alex sat down beside him. “That’s neat! Your dad is going to be so proud of you.”

“Yeah,” Alex replied, holding the ribbon carefully to avoid creasing the satin surface. “I’m going to try out for Little League next year. Dad says I have a great arm and good control.”

“That’s great. Didn’t you say your dad used to play?”

Alex nodded. “He was a shortstop for the Prince William Cannons. He still takes me and we get seats behind home plate. I think it has something to do with his best friend being the manager or something.”

“That’s cool!”

“We’re going this weekend. Do you want to come with us?”

Dallas’ eyes became as wide as saucers. “You mean it! That’s great! Thanks!”

As Mrs. Linville was about to continue, a female police officer came into view, walking down the incline from the basketball courts toward the children.

“Oh, oh,” Dallas whispered to Alex. “Looks like someone might be in trouble.”

The officer stepped around a group of sixth graders and approached Mrs. Linville. After whispering quietly for several moments, Mrs. Linville turned to Mr. Hasturt, her assistant, before gesturing in the direction of the third graders. Together, the officer and Mrs. Linville approached, while the children suddenly grew quiet, wondering what was happening. Alex, still staring at his ribbon, was unaware of their approach until the officer stopped in front of him and knelt down.

“Alexander Sharp,” the officer asked quietly, although it was obvious she already knew who she was speaking to.

Looking up at the sound of his name, Alex gasped softly at the young female officer gazing down at him with soft brown eyes. It was clear from her slightly sad expression that something was wrong, but Alex instinctively responded, “I didn’t do anything wrong, did I?”

Officer Michaela Alejandro removed her cap and softly said, “Son, I need you to come with me.”

Confused, Alex glanced over at his principal as he said, “But…Mrs. Linville is still calling out awards. I promised my dad I would show him all the…”

“Son,” Officer Alejandro whispered softly, her voice cracking ever so slightly as she reached out a hand toward him. “There’s been an accident…”


Norman Sharp, Alex’s grandfather on his father’s side of the family, entered the main office of the school and glanced over at the principal’s office. Seated on a cushioned metal chair, he saw his grandson, his head bowed as he stared at the floor, the ribbon for his Field Day event still resting in his hand, now forgotten. Hearing someone approach from the school clinic around the corner, Mr. Sharp turned his attention as Mrs. Linville appeared, smiling sadly as she reached out her hand. Norman shook her hand gently before looking back toward Alex.

“Mr. Sharp, the officer told me you were coming. Thank you for getting here so quickly,” she said.

“I was on the emergency contact paperwork Andrew and Mary filled out for the school. I’m afraid I didn’t get the call until a few hours ago and uh…it took me awhile to drive up here from Luray.”

“I understand,” Mrs. Linville replied quietly, seeing the man’s grief in his eyes. “It was so sudden. No one expected this when the officer arrived to inform Alex of what happened.”

“How’s he…” Norman cleared his throat before trying again, “How’s he doing, ma’am,” the grizzled old man asked respectfully.

Mrs. Linville sighed heavily, the sight of the little boy sitting in her office broke her heart. “He’s still in denial. He kept stating his mom and dad were coming to pick him up after school, but after the buses departed and the cars were all gone, it suddenly hit him.” She raised a wrinkled hand to cover her nose and mouth as she fought back tears. “Dear God, it’s terrible. A head-on collision with a dump truck over by the new high school development. The driver…the police said he was unfamiliar with the vehicle he was driving and lost control, swerving into oncoming traffic. Alex’s parents were killed instantly.” She shook her head sadly. “Everyone heard the sirens out on the back field, but never in a million years would we have thought…”

“I know,” Mr. Sharp responded. “These kinds of things…they’re hard to make sense of.” Norman paused for a moment before adding, “Andrew and Mary…they were returning from a doctor’s visit. Mary must have just gotten off the phone with me when it happened. She told me they were on their way to pick Alex up and tell him the news that he was going to be a big brother.”

Mrs. Linville gasped. “Oh no!”

She saw that Mr. Sharp was trying to contain his own emotions regarding the tragedy as he stammered, “I uh…I assume…with everything that will be happening in the coming days…I don’t think he’ll be back for the rest of the year.”

“I understand,” she said softly, reaching out a hand to touch his shoulder. “The last few days are usually just time for the children to have fun and play before school officially ends. His class finished their last assignments and tests the day before yesterday, so there’s nothing else he needs to do.”

Mr. Sharp flinched momentarily before bowing his head and apologizing. “Mary’s parents passed several years back. She and Andrew were both only children, so Alex didn’t have any aunts or uncles. I’m a...well, my wife died years ago, but I can still take care of him. For the time being, I was going to take him back to my place down in the Shenandoah Valley. We’ll…we’ll see how Alex does over the summer and decide what to do before school starts up again.”

Mrs. Linville nodded. “That sounds like a wise course of action, Mr. Sharp. If you like, I can make arrangements to have any documents you need sent to you, should you choose to enroll him in school down there. I know it would be hard on him, leaving his friends.”

“We’ll…we’ll see how he does and make a decision in a month or two,” Norman said quietly.

“Of course,” Mrs. Linville said. “I’m afraid many of his friends don’t understand what happened. We wanted to tell them tomorrow prior to our final day out in the field…that is, if it’s all right with you?”

Norman sighed and nodded, his voice cracking as he shook his head. “It’s a damn shame. Such a senseless tragedy.” He paused for a moment to wipe a hand across his face before continuing, “Is there uh…any…paperwork I need to fill out or any-anything we need to collect from his classroom before we…before we go?”

“We’ll gather his things and send them to you, sir. I think it would be best not to worry about it for now.”

“Thank you,” Norman said, turning toward her office and indicating with his hand. “May I?”

“Of course,” the principal said, walking over and opening the door for him to enter. “Alexander? Your grandfather is here.”

For a moment, Alex didn’t respond, but slowly, he turned his head to see his Grandpa standing in the doorway. “Hey there, kiddo,” Norman said with a smile, his rough voice warm and filled with emotion.

Before he could say anything else, Alex hopped out of the chair and ran over to him, wrapping his arms around his grandfather’s thighs as he buried his head in Norman’s stomach. The old man reached out a trembling hand to touch the top of his grandson’s head, holding him tightly as the boy cried, his entire body shaking as a little child’s sobs filled the office. Back on the couch, the First Place ribbon Alex was so proud of only hours before, slowly slid off the cushion and floated to the floor to slip unnoticed beneath the chair.

Behind him, Mrs. Linville covered her mouth and turned away, tears streaming down her face as Norman whispered softly, “I’m sorry, son. I’m so sorry.”

July 2004
Central Shenandoah Valley
Mountains west of Luray, Virginia

“There you go…that’s it…train your sights on the target. Take a deep breath…that’s good. Now let it out slowly, but only exhale half-way. Hold it. Steady…Steady…now pull!”

The report from the rifle discharge echoed out across the field as Alex carefully lowered the AR-15 and turned to his grandfather. “Well? Did I hit it? Did I?”

Norman raised his binoculars and focused on the bullseye target he’d installed one hundred yards away near a stand of trees. For several moments, he said nothing as he took in the view. “Well…I don’t know, son. My eyesight isn’t as good as it used to be…”

“Oh, come on, grandpa! Did I hit the target?”

Raising an eyebrow, Mr. Sharp lowered the binoculars and tossed them to Alex. “Look for yourself.”

Fumbling with the binoculars, Alex trained them on the trees and adjusted the focus until he caught sight of the target. At first glance, the target appeared to be untouched, dashing his hopes, until he looked harder and noticed the faint indentation in the exact center. “I did it! Dead center!”

“You did indeed, boy,” his grandfather said with pride in his voice. “That’s one hell of a shot, I must admit. One hundred yards is nothing to sneeze at. I bet, with some further practice, you could even manage that shot at two hundred yards.”

“I don’t know,” Alex said doubtfully as they slowly rose so as to avoid spooking any animals that might be nearby, although the shot from the rifle probably scared any animals away already. “Two hundred yards is a long way.”

Norman Sharp nodded silently, a smile hidden beneath his nearly white mustache. “Yes, it is. But with practice, you can make that shot. How long did it take before you were able to hit targets at fifty yards away consistently?”

“A couple of months,” Alex replied as he bent down and picked up the shell casing before they headed toward the trees where the target hung. His grandfather never let them leave without removing anything that didn’t belong. It was part of his commitment to honoring the heritage he and Alex shared.

“That’s right. At first, you could hit the target, but nowhere close to the center. Now you’re hitting the bullseye at twice that distance.” Norman reached out and clapped his grandson on the back. “When you’re out in the wild hunting for food, you can’t be so close as to ensure an easy shot. Most animals can smell scents like that of a human from the distance you’re only now able to hit consistently. So either you learn to mask your scent, or you improve your marksmanship so you can hit them before they catch your scent.”

Reaching up to pull down the target, Alex said, “But why do we need to hunt animals, grandpa? We can get food from the grocery store in Luray. It’s not that far to travel.”

“True,” Norman conceded as they turned back to house, just visible above the trees to the north. “But what will you do if it’s the middle of winter and a blizzard has shut down the highway for several days or even a week? Granted, we’ll hunt to store up meat before winter sets in, but there’s always the possibility that you can’t make it to a store. Just like I’ve been teaching you how to recognize specific plants and herbs in the forest that can be used for medicinal purposes.”

“There’s always the chance that you’ll find yourself cut off from modern conveniences and the means of acquiring food or medicine.” Norman chuckled as they came out of the trees and stepped onto the long driveway, stretching back several miles to the main road as well as up to the house, “I’m not trying to sound like one of those doomsday preppers, but…you never know.”

“Sometimes I wonder,” Alex said, making his grandfather’s eyes raise in surprise. “Well it’s true! You and grandma lived out here, miles away from most people…”

“There’s the Sandersons, who live just over the ridge there,” Mr. Sharp said, pointing off to the east. “And then there’s Mr. and Mrs. Carmichael down there,” he pointed to the west where a small house barely poked out from atop the tree-line.

“Grandpa,” Alex said with a look on his face. “The Sandersons live four miles away, and the Carmichaels only visit during the summer around August for a month before going back to New York,” he pointed out, the sound of gravel crunching under their feet as they made the slow ascent to the house. “I bet Mr. Sanderson didn’t even hear the shots I fired.”

Norman chuckled to himself. “Probably not. The old coot never liked guns. When he found out I was hunting for food, years ago, he called the cops on me. He spent a half an hour ranting on about gun safety. When Officer Daniels told him that I was ex-military and I commented how I was a trained sniper, he shut his mouth and hasn’t shown his face since.”

“What did you do in the Marines,” Alex asked, for at least the tenth time this year alone.

The slope of the road leading up to the house leveled out and Mr. Sharp sighed, his muscles no longer protesting the strain on his back. As they climbed the broad set of steps leading up to the porch that ran around the entirety of the house, he indicated to one of the chairs set near the bay window that overlooked the valley below.

“Well son, that’s classified, which means if I told ya, I’d have to kill you.” He winked at their private joke before settling into his chair, one padded with a tan, lace-fringed pillow his wife made for him years ago, one of only a few reminders he had of her now. Exhaling softly, he said, “Well, I told you how I entered the military in ’63. I was barely out of high school back then and had no plans on going to college. You see, back then, going to college and getting some degree for anything simple like business just wasn’t done. It was mainly for people who planned to become scientists or engineers; folks who still needed further education to help them in dealing with more complex matters of science and the like. As for me, well, I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life. Your great-great-grandfather, Jeremiah ‘Eagle Feather’ Sharp, suggested I come back to help him on the reservation out in Oklahoma. He thought I might make a good chief after he passed on.”

“A chief? You never told me about that,” Alex said in wonder.

Norman smiled, his tanned face crinkling from many days under the sun. “That’s right...a chief. Our family descends from Cherokee blood. That was, until I married your grandmother Catherine, a beautiful, petite English lady from Great Britain, whom I met while stationed in London back in the mid-seventies. Of course, when your father married your mother that meant you were only one-quarter Cherokee, but that doesn’t matter. You’re still a part of the tribe, and that’s what’s important. So never forget that.”

“Yes sir!”

“Anyway, where was I?”

“You joined the military?”

“Oh yes,” Norman smiled, glad to see his grandson was paying attention. During the first six months after his parent’s deaths, Alex had trouble focusing on anything for more than a few minutes. Now, he was laser-focused on his grandfather’s stories. “Well, in basic training, they determined I had some skill with long-range rifles. It didn’t hurt that my father taught me how to shoot when I was your age, so they put me into specialized training and soon I was picking off targets at two hundred yards with ease. Rain, snow, blazing sun and darkest night, I became the unit’s designated sniper, and I excelled at it.”

For a moment, Mr. Sharp’s face clouded over as he remembered dark memories. “The very first offensive I participated in while in Vietnam was called Operation Starlite. It was the first official American attack on Viet Cong forces. Some five thousand marines, including myself, successfully defeated the First Viet Cong Regiment, but they would later come back. After that, I remained in Vietnam, doing four tours of duty before my unit and I were rotated out.”

“What was Vietnam like,” Alex asked, interested in knowing more.

For a minute or two, Mr. Sharp stared out across the valley. Finally, with a sigh, he shook his head. “Believe me, boy, it’s better if your granddad didn’t tell you everything. It wasn’t some glorified battle like some movies make it out to be, although it wasn’t as bad as others try to make it sound either. It was a different kind of conflict, where some atrocities occurred that no one ever dared consider before.”
“Anyway, after four long tours in Vietnam, Uncle Sam decided to send our unit to Britain for a while, which is where I met your grandmother. She was a civilian researcher I met one night while on leave and we quickly discovered a mutual attraction for each other. Of course, as it happens, she was doing a research paper for her Master’s degree at Cambridge on the various tribal entities of North America, and she wanted to ask me questions regarding the Cherokee. I helped her as much as I could, but eventually we were more interested in other things. By the late seventies, we were married and Catherine was pregnant with your father and that’s when I was redeployed back to the States, so she came with me.”

“Is that when you moved here to Luray,” Alex asked.

Norman shook his head. “Not immediately. I was stationed in Northern Virginia and we lived in Manassas, outside of D.C. While your grandmother raised your father, I was deployed to Beirut, Lebanon to deal with a situation that came up after a Marine barracks was bombed. President Reagan sent us in to deal with terrorists and I was there for a while. Luckily, I was recalled shortly afterwards and we had some time together before I was deployed again. There was a short period in Grenada, Panama, and Nicaragua. By the end of the eighties, after Reagan left office and President Bush Sr. was elected, there was an incident in Kuwait where Saddam Hussein tried to take over the country. We were sent in as a part of Desert Storm as the initial landing force. We secured specific sites for the main body to arrive and then pulled back.”

“Wow,” Alex looked at him in amazement. “You’ve been all over the world!”

Norman smiled at his grandson’s expression. “Well, I suppose I have. The front of my dress uniform is filled with close to two dozen theater of operation bars. It got to the point where it got a little heavy to wear. Do you want to see?”

“Sure!”

Slowly getting up, Norman waited while Alex picked up his rifle and opened the front door, a massive, single piece of oak that opened to reveal the cavernous living room dominating much of the front portion of the house.
Off to the right, a set of cathedral-style windows rose up to the ceiling, with a long, stone chimney rising between them. At the bottom, the fireplace rested on a massive granite base set into the floor, surrounded by polished, stained hardwood that made up much of the flooring throughout the house. A large crescent-shaped couch filled the living room, set far enough away from the fireplace, but close enough to enjoy its warmth during the colder months. In the right corner, a massive bay window gave an incredible view of the Shenandoah Valley below, including Luray and the surrounding towns. On the clearest days, they could see for miles in any direction, and at night, they could look out to see the twinkling of lights from homes and businesses, like stars dotting the valley below.

Norman hung the binoculars on a post set into the rough, log paneling, which matched the outside walls of the house. In fact, the entire house was made out of logs, not milled boards and fiberglass siding, like most homes found in the suburbs or cities. No, when Norman and his wife retired from the military and their son was entering college, they moved to Luray and built this log house as their retirement home. Designed to be in harmony with the surrounding forest and hills, while still providing a comfortable home for them to live in, the house was large enough for them and guests, which they intended to be their son’s family, since he was already engaged to Alex’s mother, who was pregnant with him at the time. Built with as few modern conveniences as possible, there was no television, no microwave, and the kitchen was a throwback to simpler times, with an antique cast-iron stove from the turn of the twentieth century for cooking. Using as little electrical wiring throughout the house as possible, except for lighting in key places such as the living room, kitchen, and bathrooms, Norman and his wife preferred oil lamps to light the house most nights. There was no air conditioning in the house, no central heating, the house was cooled thanks to water pumped through the foundation of the house, keeping it cool in the summer. In the fall and winter months, the house was heated by the main fireplace, which dispersed heat throughout the upper level bedrooms.

Alex followed his grandfather as he turned away from the living room and passed the main staircase, made entirely of hardwood which rose up and arched to the right to connect with the second floor landing leading to the bedrooms. Ahead of them, another set of cathedral windows rose up on the opposite side of the house, casting light into the house from the west as the sun was slowly descending toward the mountainous horizon. There were several hours still before sunset, but already the light shining into the back of the kitchen and dining room was muted. Norman cast a glance out the windows for a moment before reaching for the door leading down into the basement.

“Grandpa,” Alex said, not understanding what they were doing. “I thought you said you were…”

“It’s okay, son,” Norman said with a gentle smile. “I don’t keep my uniform upstairs. There’s someplace I’d been wanting to show you for a little while now. C’mon.”

Following his grandfather, they descended into the basement where meat hung from hooks to cure. The smell of the salted meat filled the cool air, but Norman paid it no heed as he continued back to a corner of the basement where he pushed against a panel in the wall. To Alex’s amazement, the panel slid back and to the side, revealing yet another set of stairs he had never known existed before. Since coming to live with his grandfather, Alex explored the entire house, including the basement, and it was the first time he’d ever seen this.

Seeing his grandson’s reaction, Norman smiled. “You thought you knew everything about this house, didn’t you?”

“I guess not,” Alex admitted as his grandfather ruffled his hair.

“Something you’ll learn as you grow older, boy…even with your loved ones, there will always be some things that you’ll want to keep private. This,” he gestured toward the dark staircase, “is the only thing I ever kept private from your grandmother. When you see it, you’ll understand why.”
Descending down the hardwood staircase, Norman and his grandson reached the landing and turned, going down yet another set of stairs until they reached a door at the bottom. To Alex’s amazement, the door had no knob or handle. Instead, a numeric pad was mounted in the wall with two lights, one green and one red. Mr. Sharp reached out and tapped in a six-digit code then tapped the number symbol and waited while a series of beeps sounded and a mechanism in the wall unlocked the door.

“The day you came to live with me is the code, son,” his grandfather said quietly. “I know it was a sad day for both of us, which is why I’ll never forget it. From now on, if you want to come down here, all you have to do is enter that date.”

Pushing the door open, Norman stepped inside and waited for his grandson to enter before closing the door behind them. With a soft click, the door sealed and lights came on, illuminating a small cavern. Alex gasped as he took in the sight. The entry way wasn’t very tall, perhaps onto eight feet tall at the rocky ceiling, but a hallway extended ten feet to the north, opening up to a large area almost fifteen feet high.

“When your grandmother and I purchased the land for the house, we were told there might be caverns nearby. After all, Luray Caverns is only twenty miles away, so it stands to reason there might be other smaller caves as well.” Norman walked slowly to allow his grandson to take in the sight. Although no more than thirty feet wide and twenty feet long, the cavern was naturally sectioned off by stalactites and stalagmites reaching up from the floor or coming down from the ceiling. The floor was smooth and polished, revealing various minerals beneath the surface.

“Actually, it was your grandmother who discovered this cave,” he said proudly. “We were still in the planning stages of building the house when she found it while walking around the perimeter. It turned out that the cave ran into the side of the hill, so when we built the house, we preserved it by building the house off to one side and the stairs ran down to the original opening.”

“This is so cool,” Alex whispered as they made their way into the main area.

“I’m glad you like it,” Norman said. “The house is actually behind us now and we’re standing beneath the hillside that’s behind the house. We had a few geologist friends come out to assure us that it was safe. Turns out the surrounding rock was cut out by water and erosion a long time ago, forming a pocket cave. Since then, the opening your grandmother found was the only opening and with it sealed, there’s little chance the cave will deteriorate for long after we’re gone.”

“What about air,” Alex asked, glancing around. “You have to change out the carbon dioxide for oxygen, right?”

His grandfather nodded, “Good boy. I see you’re remembering those science classes you took this past year. Actually, we had ventilation shafts drilled through the rock in order to allow for air to get in and out. There’s a circulation unit installed in a small shed above us, just beyond the deck. Periodically, it turns on to keep the air from getting stale, as well maintaining the temperature and moisture levels. It’s a little beyond me, but I was assured everything should be fine.”

As they continued, they turned a corner and Alex’s eyes grew wide. At first, he thought someone was standing in the corner, but it turned out to be a mannequin, wearing a U.S. Marines dress uniform. Looking at his grandfather, he asked, “Is this yours?” Norman nodded, a smile on his face as Alex reached out to touch one of the many medals hanging from the uniform. “You got all these? There are so many!”

Norman chuckled. “You have to remember, I served from Vietnam up through Desert Storm and Desert Shield. That’s almost thirty years. I served in a lot of places around the world.” He pointed at the bars lined up across the chest area. “These represent every theater of operations I served in. Some are a little more specialized than others, and there are a lot of them.”

After examining his grandfather’s dress uniform, Alex looked at the other items on display, including Norman’s personal side-arm, a M1911 semi-automatic pistol. Seeing his grandson’s expression, he said, “That was the very first weapon I was issued when I joined the Marines. It was and still is the best weapon I ever carried. There were a couple of times where it saved me from coming home in a casket.”

“So you killed a lot of people,” Alex asked quietly, turning to look at up his grandfather with a sense of fear.

Sighing heavily, Norman placed a hand on his grandson’s shoulder. “That’s what people in the military do, son. We fight wars to stop bad people from doing bad things. Sometimes, that means we have to kill people, so yes, in all the years that I served, I had to kill people. There were times when it was to stop them from attacking us, other times, it was simply to keep from being killed by them, so we could come home to the people we love.”

Reaching over, Norman pulled a stool set against the wall and had Alex sit down as he knelt down in front of him. “Son, there’s going to come a day when I’m no longer around and you’re going to be on your own. As you make your way through life, I hope you remember one thing…life is precious…it is something to be enjoyed and appreciated, because you never know when it will end.”

“Like when mom and dad died?”

Norman knew Alex would bring this up someday. As he heard him speak the words, he smiled sadly and nodded. “Yes. They didn’t know that the driver of that truck would lose control and hit their car. I’m sure the only thing on their minds was coming to see you win those ribbons you received for your Field Day events. They loved you very much, and while they’re gone, I can assure you that they’re looking down on us now and want you to grow up to make them proud of the man you’ll become, just as I am.”

Alex bowed his head and was quiet for a moment before asking, “Do you think grandma is looking down on us too?”

It was a question Norman hadn’t expected from his grandson. Catherine passed when Alex was only a baby, a freak accident while out hiking the trails along the ridge as Norman was working on the house. By the time he found her, she was gone, having stumbled and fallen over a ledge to land on a pile of rocks twenty feet below. It took a moment for Norman to recover enough to answer.

“I-I’m sure she is,” he said in a rough, emotion-laden voice. “Your grandmother loved nature. She loved the Shenandoah Valley. It’s where we were going to grow old together.”

For a moment, neither of them spoke, sharing a brief time to reflect on their own personal experiences. When Norman looked up into his grandson’s eyes, he sensed an understanding as Alex nodded and reached out to hug his grandfather. “It’s where I want to be too,” Alex said quietly.

After another few moments, Norman rose up and indicated toward the back of the cave. “I’d like to show you something.”

Around a series of stalactites which acted as a wall, Norman revealed a large executive desk with a series of monitors connected to a computer installed off to one side. As Alex examined the room, he noticed several cables running up the side of the wall and into the ceiling. Seeing his grandson’s expression, he said, “The only way to get a strong signal to have internet access was to have a cable run up to the surface and connect it to satellite dish. It’s probably the most technological piece of equipment I had installed.”

“What’s it for,” Alex asked, sitting down at the terminal and looking at the dark monitors.

Reaching under the desk, Norman flipped a switch and the monitors flared to life, revealing a series of images and data from sources Alex couldn’t understand. “There came a time when my skills in the field weren’t as good as they once were. Oh, I could still bullseye a target at two hundred yards with ease, but long stretches in the field took their toll on your grandfather’s body. Arthritis, broken bones that didn’t heal properly, difficulty breathing from too many packs of cigarettes when I was a young man, it all caught up with me. However, my superiors discovered early on that I had a knack for decryption and hacking, skills which are valuable even when a soldier can’t spend a week out in the field in miserable conditions. Over the years, they sent me to learn all about computers. As the years went by and my body couldn’t take the physical beating it once could, I spent more time accessing enemy secrets in order to help my buddies in the field. By the time Desert Storm rolled around, I was assigned to military intelligence, hacking into Saddam Hussein’s computer network, not that he really had one to begin with. With the information our unit discovered, we helped the guys in the field avoid some nasty traps his military intended to spring on us.”

“That’s cool!” Alex’s eyes lit up as he looked at the monitors. “What is all this stuff on the screens?”

His grandfather chuckled, although a tickle in his throat made him cough. When he recovered, he said, “Actually, what you’re seeing here are monitors I placed all around the house, all the way down to the main road, as well as out in the backyard above us, and…” Hitting a button on the keyboard, a series of images popped up on the far right screen, revealing various parts of the house, the exterior porch, and even the deck and surrounding yard. “I bet you never realized we have a security system set up, did you? I could sit down here and know exactly what is going on throughout the house, and anything within a mile radius of the house. If someone attempted to come on the property without my approval, I would know it.”

Reaching down, he unclipped his keyring and showed Alex a small rectangular box the size of a key fob, with a red light on it. “This tells the system that I’m authorized to be here, so no warning is sent. It’s the same as the key I gave to you. The one I have you keep with you all the time. It sends a signal so I know where you are.”

“You’ve been spying on me,” Alex asked in disbelief.

“Consider it keeping track of you, boy. I don’t know what you’re doing, I simply know where you are, so if you ever get lost, I can find you.”

“Oh…okay. So, is this just a security system? Or is it something more,” Alex asked.

Norman smiled. “You guessed it. I have a connection with some friends in Quantico, Virginia on the Marine base up there. They allow me access, so long as I don’t go snooping into any classified materials, although I could if I wanted to. With this setup, I can go online and do some very nasty things. However, that’s not what it’s meant for.” Sitting on the edge of the desk, Norman looked down at Alex with a serious expression. “Son, let’s face it…it’s the twenty-first century. Computers are going to make a big impact on daily life and I think it might be a good idea if you learned some skills that would help you later in life. I’m offering you a chance to learn some of the things I know, so that when you’re grown up and on your own, you can use those skills to make a better life for yourself.”

Alex’s face lit up. “You’d teach me about computers and hacking and stuff like that?”

“Let’s start with computers first,” Norman cautioned him. “Hacking can get you into a lot of trouble if you do it for the wrong reasons. Let’s start with the easy stuff and go from there, all right?”

“Deal!”


September 2010
Central Shenandoah Valley
Mountains west of Luray, Virginia

As promised, Alex’s grandfather taught him everything he knew about computers, and eventually passed on what he knew about hacking, decryption and other skills. As Alex got older, Norman upgraded the equipment and monitors so he could keep up with the times. In addition, Alex continued to improve his skills with firearms and archery, impressing his grandfather with his abilities. However, Norman grew weaker, his health declining rapidly. A visit to a doctor at the Veterans Administration revealed advanced-stage cancer spreading throughout his body, and the prognosis was not good. Stage-four lung cancer, which had metastasized to several lymph nodes throughout his body. At this point, surgery to remove the cancer was out of the question, and other options offered little if any hope of recovery. Not wanting to worry his grandson, Norman kept this to himself, although he knew Alex wasn’t blind. He could see that his grandfather was sick as Norman lost weight and moved slower. Eventually, his eyesight worsened until he couldn’t shoot properly, missing the target repeatedly one day while competing with his grandson. Even the short walks outside were taxing on his strength, leaving him weak and out of breath. It was enough that Alex, now sixteen, voiced his concerns as they sat out on the porch, watching the sun setting in the west one evening.

“Grandpa?”

“Yes son, what is it,” Norman replied, his voice frail and whispery.

“Why didn’t you go to see your doctor last week?”

Norman closed his eyes and removed the glasses he wore for the last year to see. “When did you find out about that?”

Alex raised his cell phone. “He called me. You did put me down as a contact last year, remember?”

Coughing softly, Norman’s shoulders shook as he lifted a handkerchief to his lips, seeing the faint blood stains on the fabric. “I supposed I forgot about that, son. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”

“About the visit, or about the cancer? Grandpa, Doctor Alberts told me you haven’t been to see him in over six months! He’s concerned.”

“There’s nothing they can do for me, son,” Norman responded quietly. “Surgery wasn’t an option when they discovered it. It was too far advanced back then, and chemotherapy…they weren’t optimistic about that either.”

“But he told me you may not last to the end of the year!”

Norman sighed slowly, listening to the wind blowing through the trees. He loved listening to them, especially in the fall, when the leaves would rustle along the ground. “They told me I wasn’t supposed to make it to your fourteenth birthday…that was two years ago.”

“Grandpa, I’ve known something was wrong for a while now, but I’m afraid you’re going to die soon.”

Pursing his lips, Norman sat up and turned to his grandson. “Son, I won’t lie to you. I promised your parents that I never would. Yes, I’m going to die soon. I don’t know when. It could be tomorrow…hell, I might just be stubborn enough to make it to Christmas, but the fact remains that I’m going to die.”

“You could have prolonged your life,” Alex argued softly. “The chemotherapy…”

“Would have killed us both,” Norman slapped his hand on the wood surface of his chair, but he lacked the strength for it to do anything significant. “I knew what it would do to me if I chose to accept Doctor Alberts’ recommendation. It would have left me unable to function, and it would have crippled you when you needed me to teach you what you need to know in order to survive in this world! If the treatments didn’t kill me outright with the toxic mess they would put in my body to try and stave off the cancer, it would have certainly left me an invalid, incapable of doing even the most basic things. What’s the point in prolonging the inevitable if I wouldn’t be able to function? All it would mean was that I’d be bed-ridden, too tired and too sick to do anything except lie there waiting to die. As for you, you would have had to devote every waking moment to caring for me…wiping my mouth every time I ate, wiping my ass every time I went to the bathroom. I wouldn’t…I couldn’t force you to do that! Son, you’ve got a bright future ahead of you. You’ve taken everything I taught you, whether it was tracking, long-range shooting, computers, hacking…every skill I ever learned during my years in the military, and exceeded each and every goal I set for you. You can hit the center of the target at three hundred yards every single time. You have a skill with weapons I only dreamt of having. You’re capable of surviving off the land without leaving a trace behind you. You’ve learned everything I ever knew about computers, and you continue to learn more every day. I’ve seen you down in the cave. I know what you’ve been doing.”

Norman leaned forward and placed a frail and shaking hand on Alex’s knee. “You’re going to be okay, son. When I’m gone, you’ll have a place to live, money from your parents to take care of you for the rest of your life, if you want to stay here and be a hermit…or you can go out into the world and become something greater than anything your parents or I ever dreamed!”

“But I won’t have you,” Alex said, a single tear streaming down his cheek. “I lost mom and dad and my baby sister, and I learned to live with that! Now you’re dying, and I don’t think I’m ready for it, not yet!”

“You’re ready, son,” Norman said, feeling a tightness in his chest as he gazed into his grandson’s eyes. “You’ve been ready. You just have to believe that you’re ready.” Coughing again, Norman managed to say, “There comes a time when the bird must leave the nest, when a parent has to let go of the handlebars and let their child ride the bike on their own. It’s that time, son. You have to believe you can do this, as hard as it will be, you have to believe it!”

Alex rose to his feet and turned away. Something inside him told Norman that he had to say what was on his mind. Calling out to his grandson, he said, “I’m proud of you, son! As proud as I was the day your father walked across the stage and received his college degree…as proud as the day he married your mother. He was a good man, an upstanding man…the kind of man I believe you’re going to grow up to be.”

For a moment, Alex stood at the top of the steps to the gravel drive leading down the hill to the main road, his shoulders squared back defiantly. Refusing to turn around, he slowly made his way down and quietly walked off into the woods as the sun set behind the mountains in the west. Norman tried to watch him go, but his failing eyesight could no longer see him in the dimming light.

Sighing softly, Norman closed his eyes and thought about the last eight years they had together. Questions plagued him as he thought back over those years. Did he do enough? Was Alex really ready to be on his own? When the doctors first gave him his prognosis, Norman knew he needed to plan ahead for the eventuality of his death. His will was in order, all the accounts were already in Alex’s name as well as his own. His grandson already knew all the passwords to his computer files, except one.

In that moment, Norman felt a weight settling on his shoulders. His heartbeat skipped and his breath caught in his throat for a moment before he gripped the arm of the chair. It’s time, he thought to himself. You’ve done all you can. Now you have to step back and let him make his own way.
Rising unsteadily to his feet, Norman reached for the cane he started using several months ago. With it, he turned and slowly made his way into the house, down the flights of stairs to the cave, and over to the desk where the monitors and keyboard sat. The equipment was far more modern than what he originally showed to Alex only six years earlier. The three monitor displays were over twice the size of the CRT models he once used, two of them scrolling through images Alex used for screen savers. The keyboard, a sleek, shiny black model configured with a curved design to the keys rather than the old version, lit up when he touched the space bar to enter in his password. Even with his dimming eyesight, Norman easily tapped it in and clicked the wireless mouse to a file embedded several levels down in the system’s hierarchy, the only one which he’d never revealed to his grandson. The file was marked with Alex’s full name, created over two years ago when Norman received his diagnosis. Since that time, he updated the file with information he knew his grandson would need, along with a solitary video file, one which Norman uploaded a few months ago. Norman’s heartbeat skipped again and he felt himself fade out for a moment before he regained consciousness. Knowing he didn’t have long, he clicked on the file, causing the system to demand a password which he immediately provided.

As a flashing prompt appeared on the main screen, Norman leaned back in the padded leather chair and exhaled softly. Although his arms felt heavy, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a single royal blue ribbon made of smooth, soft satin. Gazing at it, he felt his eyes water with tears as he closed his eyes and pressed the ribbon against his chest, the sound of the computers covering his soft exhale.


It was nearly midnight when Alex emerged from the forest surrounding the house. With all the emotions rolling inside him, he needed to take a walk to try and make sense of his feelings, something his grandfather told him his grandmother used to do sometimes after some of their heated arguments when they were younger. As he looked toward the house, he noticed there were only a few lights on inside, mainly the ones powered by solar charges, intended to dimly illuminate the hallways at night. Climbing the steps to the front door, he found it open and looked around in the dim light. The kitchen was dark, and the couch where his grandfather sometimes fell asleep when he couldn’t climb the stairs was vacant. Checking upstairs, Alex found his grandfather wasn’t in his bedroom, which only left one place he could be. Heading downstairs, he passed through the basement, opened the secret panel and descended down to the cave.

Entering in, he saw the lights were on and he heard the soft sounds of the ventilation system kicking in to circulate the air. Passing through the main room, he glanced over at his grandfather’s dress uniform before continuing on to the computer room. There he found his grandfather, leaning back in the chair, his eyes closed and his head turned to one side with a hand against his chest. Thinking perhaps he’d come downstairs to look at Alex’s latest work, his grandson slowly walked over and placed a hand on his grandfather’s shoulder.

“Grandpa, let’s go upstairs to bed.”

There was no response. Concerned, Alex leaned over the side of the desk, brushing the wireless mouse and activating the monitor. As the screen lit up, he saw a prompt flashing, demanding action.

Press ‘Return’

Without thinking, Alex tapped the button and found himself staring at his grandfather’s image on the screen. From his appearance, it was clear that the recording was made several months ago, as Norman’s appearance wasn’t as weary as he appeared in the chair.

“Alex,” his grandfather’s voice sounded through the speakers mounted behind the desk, as well as those on the corners of the desk itself. “As much as it pains me to say this…it’s time. As you’re listening to this, I’m sitting in the chair beside you and yet I’m no longer there. The cancer has taken me, and now you’re on your own. If I’m right, we fought about my stubbornness for not seeing the doctor about my condition, and you’ve gone on a walk to cool off and think about what to do next.”

Turning to look down at his grandfather, Alex felt like his heart was being crushed. He slowly dropped to one knee, reaching out to touch his grandfather’s hand, confirming that there was no pulse.

“I’m sorry that I’ve put you in this position, son. By the time I learned of my condition, it was too late. All I could do was try to hang on as long as I could, and hope that what I taught you in these last eight years we had together…would be enough.” The video showed his grandfather pause to wipe away tears before continuing. “You’re going to be okay, son. I know it, here!” His grandfather touched his chest over his heart. “You don’t have to worry about money…that’s been taken care of. And you don’t have to worry about where to stay…the house is yours. It was since the day you came to live with me. I made all the arrangements long ago so that no matter what, you’d be okay.”

Alex’s chest heaved as he struggled to breathe, bowing his head as he listened to his grandfather speak.

“Officer McDougal and I go back a long time, and he will make sure no one will bother you. According to the law here in Virginia, you’re able to live on your own, so long as you’re sixteen and you already are. This recording will serve as legal proof of my consent to allow you to live on your own, so there’s no worry that anyone will try to force you to leave. Everything is in your name, son. The house is yours, the bank accounts, everything. Now, it’s up to you to decide how you’re going to live your life.”

His grandfather took a slow breath to steady himself before he said, “Son, I love you very much, and I wish I could have made this part easier for you…but death is never easy. It wasn’t easy when your parents died, and now you’re forced to deal with it on your own. Please, son…don’t despair. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that you don’t have anything to live for, because you do. You’re smart, you’re talented, and you have your whole life ahead of you. God willing, you’re going to go out there and find a lovely young woman who will see the good in you, even if you can’t see it for yourself. She’ll show you love on a deeper level than you’ve experienced up till now, and you’ll realize how fortunate you were to find her.”

“Live for that day, son,” Alex heard the passion and emotion in his grandfather’s voice. “Trust me to know that what I’m saying is true. Your parents, myself, your grandmother, we’ll all be there, watching out for you…believe me when I say that. You may think you’re alone, but you aren’t. Make us proud of you, son.”

The image of his grandfather on the screen frozen as the video ended, with Norman smiling back at him. Alex turned to look up at his grandfather seated in the chair, his head now slumped over. As he gazed up, he noticed something pressed between his grandfather’s hand and his chest. A faint blue strip of fabric swayed back and forth as the ventilation system blew cool air down from above. Reaching up, Alex caught the satiny fabric in his fingers and pulled it free from his grandfather’s hand. The silvery lettering was just as bright as the day Alex received it, over eight years ago, reading:

Rose Hill
Field Day Event 2002
First Place
Softball Throw

All these years, Alex never knew his grandfather kept this, thinking it lost amidst the confusion following his parents’ deaths. Unable to hold back the tears any longer, Alex pressed his head against his grandfather’s chest and cried out, a deep, mournful sob of anguish and loss, the kind he had never truly been able to give for his parents. The sounds of his cries echoed through the cave, up into the basement and into the house above as he thought back on that day and his grandfather’s words to him…

“I’m sorry, son. I’m so sorry.”

[MarauderTDL]

Chapter Six: Down, and down, and down they go…

“Tracker Three, what in the hell are you doing?”

Coming back to his senses, the image of his grandfather seated in the computer chair faded as Alex reached for his comm and snarled, “What is it?!?”

Glancing over his shoulder, Alex realized the girls were out of sight, probably just around the bend of the river as he could hear their voices, but it was clear several minutes had passed. “Shit!”

Grabbing his rifle, Alex bolted through the brush, taking care to avoid making too much noise as he hurried along the river side. His comm unit finally crackled. “Don’t talk to me that way, boy!”

“I’ll talk to you any way I please, John,” Alex snarled again. “And don’t call me that, do you hear me! You aren’t my grandfather and you know as well as I do that I could kick your ass if I wanted to.”

“Yeah, in your dreams, kid,” Tracker Two fired back. “Just get your ass in gear! While you were day-dreaming, the girls floated down to the next bend. Remember, they have to be shrunk before they get…”

“I remember what you said earlier,” Alex snapped, angry that he’d let himself drift like he did. “I’ll be in position in a minute or two. It’s not like they’re paddling with the current.”

“You should be so fortunate,” Tracker Three responded. “No, they’ve been splashing and having fun. Kinda makes me wish I had my camera and a telephoto lens to get some really nice shots.”

“Knock it off, you pervert!”

Tracker Two chuckled over the link. “Hey, don’t be such a prude. Besides, once they shrink down really small, we’ll both get a good view of them before we take them in.”

“I get it,” Alex said in disgust.

“What’s the matter,” Tracker Two said, taunting him. “You didn’t react this way the last time.”

“The last time I was only an observer and we were subduing three young men.”

“Oh, so are you into guys?”

“Fuck you, John! You said these people we subdue for testing don’t remember anything afterward, but what’s to say they won’t be traumatized enough that something doesn’t get caught? We shouldn’t be pushing it by taking advantage of them.”

Tracker Two’s laughter came over the comm. “If you only knew…”

“What’s that supposed to mean,” Alex demanded as he leapt over a fallen log and rolled down a small hill. Up ahead, he could hear the sounds of the girls’ laughter getting louder so he slowed down and took greater care in his approach.

“Boy, you might be Director Melendez’s golden boy for your abilities at tracking and sniping, but you’ve got a lot to learn about the world.”

With that, Tracker Two cut the line, leaving Alex to wonder what he was talking about. Sprinting through the tall grass that grew along the riverbank, he saw movement past a stand of trees along the bend in the river. Heading back into the trees, he hurried along, up a rise until he reached the spot he used the last time with the three men, a small bluff overlooking the length of the river that stretched for two hundred yards. The best part was that the river slowed in this area, the bottom rising up to only three feet deep, which would mean the girls would be forced to get back into their river tubes for a while. It was the perfect spot, allowing him an excellent view long enough to fire up to four shots if he had to, plenty of time to get the third young woman with Alpha, and then dose all three of them with Beta. Although Tracker Two, John, wouldn’t involve himself with this portion of the operation, he was sure to be watching Alex’s progress further down the river, and would report to Director Melendez if he missed.

I won’t miss this time, Alex told himself, setting his backpack on the ground and removing the Alpha round from his belt to load into his rifle. Laying down on his stomach, Alex parted the grass enough to get a clear view of the river as it came around the bend, revealing the girls splashing and laughing at each other. I won’t miss…


“Oh, oh,” Michelle said as she turned to the other girls. “Looks like the river bottom is getting shallow. We can either walk our way, or get back in the tubes and let the river do the work.”

“Sounds good to me,” Sarah replied, yelping in surprise as Beth scooped a handful of water and dumped it on her head. “Hey! That’s not fair!”

“What are you talking about? You were the one who dunked me back there,” Beth said, pointing back toward the section of river that sunk deep enough that Sarah was able to completely submerge Beth. It was all for fun, but now Beth was soaking wet, her pink t-shirt plastered to her chest such that her generously-sized breasts were visible for all to see under the damp fabric. As for her jean-shorts, Beth squirmed as they stuck in every nook and cranny of her legs and buttocks.

However, before she could complain more, Beth felt a tiny shiver run down her spine and the uncomfortable sensation between her legs disappeared, followed by her t-shirt pulling away from her boobs. Breathing a sigh of relief, Beth reached down to tug on the ends of her shirt.

“Now that’s better,” she said to herself before reaching down to grab the line connecting her to her tube. Pulling the tube toward her, she grabbed onto the side and pulled herself over the edge to flop into the center as she reached for her towel. “Now I can dry off for a while.”

Michelle laughed at her friend’s antics before pulling her own tube to her and hopping in. Turning to watch Sarah, she said, “What are you waiting for? C’mon! Get in. We can have some snacks while we float through this part. It really looks like a nice section to relax.”

“I’m coming,” Sarah said as she paddled over to her tube, connected with Beth’s. “I’m just having a little trouble…”

Beth glanced over at her. “What’s wrong?”

“My top must have come loose,” Sarah said, turning to show where her bikini top was slipping over her shoulder. “I swore I tied it properly before we started.”

Laughing at her friend, Beth said, “Maybe while we were fooling around, I loosened it or something. C’mon girl! Get in the tube and I’ll help you re-tie it, okay?”

As she reached the tube, Sarah grabbed the side, but appeared to be having trouble. “I swear, I must be standing in a hole or something!”

Shaking her head, Beth reached over and grabbed Sarah’s hand to pull her into the tube. Once inside, Sarah exhaled. “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it,” Beth said with a wink. “You promised we could continue what we started earlier.”

Sarah giggled. “Well…it seems somebody is in need of a little attention.”

“You could say that,” Beth whispered softly as she reached an arm over the side and caressed Sarah’s shoulder, causing her to lick her lips. “I know I can make it worth your while.”

Glancing over at her friends, Michelle rolled her eyes and shook her head, not even bothering to hide her smile as Sarah slid over the side and joined Beth in her tube. As her two friends giggled and laughed softly, Michelle heard a pop off to her left. Turning to see if she could detect what made the noise, all Michelle could see was an open field with trees to her right, while on the other side of the river, the forest grew thick, obscuring anything that might be hiding.
No need to worry, Michelle thought to herself as she reached down and pulled a cold twenty-ounce bottle of Pepsi from the cooler nook in the side of her tube. Freeing the top, she tilted her head back and savored the sweet, satisfying taste of the soda as she reached for the Nacho Doritos. Opening the bag, Michelle felt a faint sensation on the back of her neck, like ants crawling across her skin. When she reached up, there was nothing there, and she shrugged to herself. Besides, no one would do anything. There are three of us.

Moments later, two separate pops echoed across the river and Michelle immediately looked around for signs of movement. Those sounded like gunshots, but who would be hunting in these parts?

As she scanned the river banks, Michelle felt the tingling sensation return, a little stronger this time, but within moments, it passed and she sighed to herself. Don’t get yourself worked up, Michelle. We came here to have a good time. No sense in worrying about nothing.


“Tracker Three to Tracker Two. The third woman has received Alpha and Beta, while the other two girls have received their dose of Beta,” Alex communicated to his partner.

“Good job, Tracker T-…wait, you said the third woman received Alpha and Beta? At the same time?”

Confused, Alex responded, “Well no, not at the same time. I fired the Alpha round at her first, then I shot one of the Beta rounds at the two girls who are together, and then I fired the other Beta round at the third girl.” When Tracker Two didn’t respond, he said, “Hello? What’s wrong?”

“Give me a second, Tracker Three,” his partner replied before switching radio frequencies. “Base, this is Tracker Two, get me Director Melendez immediately!”


Sarah and Beth, oblivious to the fact that anything was going on, lay in Beth’s tube, their arms wrapped around each other as their legs were entwined, hanging over the side of the tube. As they touched and kissed each other, neither of them were aware as Sarah’s feet slowly moved along the outer edge of the tube, no longer sticking out past the edge to hang down. Nor did Beth notice as her cut-off jeans loosened a little more and the bottom end of her t-shirt inched its way down to cover her exposed belly button. The only thing either girl felt was a warmth radiating through their bodies, which they mistakenly assumed was caused by the sunlight shining down on them.

Michelle, however, had a completely different experience. Leaning back in her tube against the head rest, her arms and legs hanging over the sides of the tube, she drifted off into a light slumber, still aware of the sounds of the river and the sensation of the breeze that wafted across her body. As she lay quietly, a tingling sensation formed between her shoulder blades and slowly made its way down her back, causing her to moan softly. Upon traveling down to her hips, the sensation spread out, wrapping around until it merged between her legs right at…

Gasping softly, Michelle’s eyes shot open as her lips parted, a soft, intense groan of arousal escaping as she unexpectedly experienced an orgasm, causing her head to snap back against the head rest. As she shuddered, Michelle felt her arms draw in toward her, her hands no longer hanging over the sides to touch the water. With another jolt of sexual arousal, her feet lifted out of the water and slid along the outer edge of the tube until the back of her heels came into contact with the tube. She tried to comprehend what was happening, but the sensations were so good, so intense, she didn’t bother to think of any nefarious motives, only that she was becoming aroused…and she enjoyed it! Reaching down, Michelle slipped a hand through an opening in her swimsuit and touched herself, intensifying her arousal as she moaned softly.

“Oh God, yes! Whatever is causing this, don’t let it stop,” she whispered to herself as the sensation slowly faded, leaving her drained and exhausted.

Slumping down into her tube, Michelle failed to notice that her sunglasses now hung on the very tip of her nose. However, in her condition, she ignored it and sighed before falling into a deep, satisfied sleep.


“Jeezuz, Tracker Three, what the hell were you thinking,” Tracker Two’s voice came across the comm without warning, surprising Alex as he continued to monitor the girls.

“What are you talking about,” Alex responded in confusion. “I did what I was supposed to do, right?”

“According to Director Melendez and the research staff, we’re not supposed to subject a target to two variants of the drug within a five-minute time period. You said you fired Alpha and then Beta at the third girl, right?”

“Yeah.”

“How soon after you fired the Alpha round did you fire the Beta round at the same girl?”

Alex shrugged. “Probably less than two minutes at the most? Why?”

“John, what’s going on,” Alex demanded to know. “No one told me to…”

“Tracker Three, this is Director Melendez,” Alex suddenly heard the director’s voice coming over the comm-link and felt a cold knot in his stomach. “Please acknowledge.”

“I-I hear you, sir,” Alex said, now wondering what was going on. “I wasn’t aware that there was a problem administering two doses in a short time period. According to the orientation, none of the variants even work until the prime dosage has been administered. I was simply trying to get us back on schedule so all three girls would be shrinking at the same time.”

“I understand your reasoning, son,” Director Melendez responded calmly. “I also applaud you for attempting to keep within the timetable we requested.”

“It wouldn’t have been a problem if he hadn’t missed with the first dose,” Alex heard Tracker Two interject on the line.

Director Melendez’s response was swift and brutal. “Tracker Two, had you been paying attention and backed Tracker Three during his first round of live-fires, you could have helped him to avoid this situation.”

“What? With all due respect, sir, Tracker Three missed the shot moments before the girl jumped into the water,” Tracker Two argued. “From that moment on, there was no opportunity to fire another shot until she got back into the raft.”

“So you’re saying that Tracker Three’s subsequent shots were after the subjects returned to their rafts, is that correct,” Melendez inquired.

“That is correct, sir,” Tracker Two confirmed.

“Well then, it appears that Tracker Three made a decision intended to, as he stated, get us back on schedule. Is that correct, Tracker Three?”

“Yes sir,” Alex responded, almost feeling the disgust in the director’s voice directed at Tracker Two for his attempt to impugn Alex’s actions.

“Very well,” the director responded. “In answer to your concern, Tracker Three, normally the administering of the base drug and then a subsequent variant is intended to have a minimum of five minutes between each dose.” There was a pause before he continued. “However, the research team has performed some studies about the result of administering the base drug and a subsequent variant within a short time span, as well as the administering of two variants within a similar time period.”

After a pause that seemed to go on for a while, Alex dared to ask, “May I ask what the results were, sir?”

“As you both are aware, Alpha is the base drug and contains the blueprint of the chemical and biological changes that take place in the human body once it is administered. Beta builds upon the foundational changes Alpha causes and accelerates them. However, when Alpha and Beta are administered in less than the five-minute window, not only does it accelerate the reduction, it also intensifies the sensations the subject experiences. Please, Tracker Three, if you can get a good view of the third woman, do you notice any significant changes yet?”

Wondering what was going on, Alex raised his rifle and peered through the scope toward the third girl floating by herself ahead of the other two. The slow, lazy spin with which the tubes took following the current put the girl out of his direct sight, with the exception of her arms hanging over the sides, and her feet and lower legs reaching out the front. Only her head and body were obscured behind the head rest. For a few moments, nothing appeared to be happening and Alex was about to report that to the director when suddenly there was movement. Thinking it was simply her own movements, Alex waited and was shocked to watch as her arms slowly withdrew inside the tube, her fingers, which had been touching the water, rose up and then inward until her wrists came into contact with the outer rim of the tube. Adjusting his scope, Alex saw similar movement as Michelle’s legs also slid along the rim of the tube, her feet rising up out of the water to hang in the air.

“Uh, Director…it appears that target three is showing signs of accelerated reduction,” Alex said, unable to believe how quickly the effects were taking hold. Normally, the first signs of reduction were supposed to take place over the course of fifteen or twenty minutes, and then only in small increments, not visibly detectable at first. However, in her case, it was clear that Michelle had lost at least several inches, if not more!

“Is the target aware of what is happening to her?”

The tube must have bumped a rock or some other obstruction under the water as the tube swung around slowly, exposing Michelle’s sleeping form lying in the tube, her head resting on her shoulder. As Alex watched, the sunglasses she wore, which had been on the very tip of her nose, suddenly slipped and dropped into her lap, but Michelle gave no indication that she was aware of this. Alex moved his rifle so the scope could let him see her entire body. The black latex swimsuit she was wearing was very sexy, exposing her in all the right places without being too suggestive. When he first saw her further up the river, he noticed how tightly the swimsuit fit her, almost like it was painted on her skin. However, as he looked closer, Alex could see that the suit bunching up in several spots that clearly were intended to be smooth and tight.

“Um…sir, it appears that she is asleep at the moment. She was wearing some sunglasses that have since slipped off her face, but she didn’t appear to notice it. From what I can see, her swimsuit is getting loose, so when she wakes up, she may be able to tell something is wrong.”

There was a pause on the link, and Alex wondered what the director was thinking. No one told him in the orientation period about restrictions on when or when not to fire the rounds so he assumed, since he’d missed her during the first attempt, that firing both Alpha and Beta wouldn’t be a problem. Now, it appeared there was.

“Tracker Three, for now, continue to monitor the targets and their conditions. Tracker Two will move ahead to scout the area to be sure no one is nearby to interfere. Your instructions are to monitor the three subjects as they continue to shrink. Please take care to monitor the third subject for any changes that appear to be excessive based on the standards you were given during orientation.”

“Acknowledged, Director,” Alex said, feeling a sense of relief which was cut short as Director Melendez responded.

“One other thing, Tracker Three…”

“Yes sir?”

“Good job, son.”

For a moment, Alex froze, unsure how to respond. “Ah…thank you, sir!”


Back at the facility, Director Melendez cued the communications link to contact Tracker Two. “Mr. Carlton.”

Hearing his name, Tracker Two keyed his mic and responded. “Yes sir? I thought we were supposed to avoid using real names in the field, sir?”

“That obviously hasn’t happened, given Tracker Three’s repeated use of your name, wouldn’t you agree? Regardless, you are to move ahead and scout the area to ensure no one can render assistance to the three subjects as they continue their reductions, am I clear?”

“Understood, sir. May I ask…if anyone…”

Melendez interrupted him. “If anyone is on the river or the river bank, you are instructed to follow standard protocols as you have been instructed. Am I clear?”

“Y-yes sir, standard protocols acknowledged.”

“One other thing, John…Tracker Three’s inadvertent mistake is actually of great scientific use for us. Our researchers didn’t think to advise us of the effects of Alpha and Beta being deployed on the same target in such a short time period. The girl’s condition is very interesting, but that doesn’t change the secondary instructions you were given.”

“So you still want me to initiate Gamma, am I correct sir?”

“That is correct, John. Choose one of the two girls who were properly dosed with Alpha and Beta. Neither of them are showing any significant reductions yet, so it will allow us to see just how Gamma works when combined with Alpha and Beta.”

“I thought Gamma’s effects were already shown to be…spectacular.”

The sound of Melendez’s laughter came back over the comm. “Oh John, your ability to be so grandiose in your descriptions makes me laugh.” Melendez’s voice took a more sinister tone as he added, “One of the girls is to be the control subject, one of the two who were exposed to Alpha and Beta. Thanks to Mr. Sharp’s unintended mistake, we have a new variation we can document, but the Gamma variant was planned for this mission and we will fulfill that scenario, am I understood?”

“Y-yes sir, completely.”

“Excellent,” Director Melendez’s voice returned to its regularly neutral tone. “G.R.U. will be very pleased that we’ll be able to provide them with more data than they expected. As for the girls, as they shrink at different speeds, it will cause even more confusion amongst them, and make it harder for them to help one another. Thus making our job of capturing them even easier, wouldn’t you agree?”

“Yes sir, I agree completely,” John replied, feeling a trickle of sweat running down his neck.

“Good. Carry on, Tracker Two and please…no more surprises.”

“Understood sir!”


David Quisley, Tracker One, waited outside the communications wing as the door opened and Director Melendez exited. Unwilling to slow down, he brushed by Tracker One, forcing him to hurry after the director, stumbling as fast as he could to keep up. Aware of the situation through his own link to the other trackers, David tried to suggest, “Sir, Tracker Three is still new. His skills are remarkable, but he’s young and hasn’t been let in on exactly what our plans are.”

“I should think not,” Melendez replied, turning to take the stairs down to the research level instead of heading to his office. “This is only his second outing and the first one was extremely supervised, so he was only privy to the barest of exposure to the drug’s effects.”

“What I mean, sir, is that he doesn’t know the real purpose of our facility.”

“Of course not,” the director called out over his shoulder to the sound of Tracker One’s attempt to keep pace with him. “When we approached him with the offer, we didn’t want him to know our true intentions. Thus far, he remains in the dark, which is exactly as it should be.”

“I knew his grandfather,” Quisley said as the director reached the security barrier to the research level. “He was a hell of a marine in his day. I’m sure that’s how Alex managed to become proficient as a sniper, not to mention his tracking abilities.”

“Of course,” Melendez replied, seemingly unfazed by Quisley’s assessment. “You think we didn’t do our homework before we had you contact him? He’s lived in the area for the better part of his life, he more knowledgeable of the terrain than even Mr. Carlton claims to be. He’s lived, for the most part, alone in the house his grandparents built. From time to time, he ventures out and meets people, but he prefers solitude, which makes him clumsy on an interpersonal level. That’s what makes him so useful. He has a desire to please, so he doesn’t ask questions.”

“Which means that if we ever cut him loose, he won’t know enough to hurt the operation,” Quisley remarked. “I see where you’re going with this.”

“Plausible deniability, Mr. Quisley,” the director said as they passed through the second level of security and entered the research wing. “Alexander Mitchell Sharp is the perfect tool. He’s intelligent, but lacks the common sense that would focus that intelligence, which would make him dangerous. His skills are what we need, and he wants to prove himself. So he sometimes overlooks the obvious. For now, we leave him in the dark about Bio-SciTech’s true intentions, until such time as he’s involved himself so deeply that any attempt to break free would implicate himself along with the rest of us. That…” he turned to raise a single finger, “is how we will control him.”

The two men made their way down a long ramp to the lower level where multiple scientists were going over research results from Sizeol’s variations and their effects. In another room, closed off and sealed, several scientists were analyzing blood samples from previous subjects. At the far end of the room, a row of cages, all but one of them empty, sat in a recessed alcove by one of the counters. In one of the cages, covered by a thin white sheet and illuminated from the back, the outline of a tiny figure could be seen moving back and forth before sitting down in a corner.

On the other side of the room, two tubular chambers filled the corner, large enough to hold human subjects inside. The director and Tracker One walked past these chambers, although Mr. Quisley still didn’t know what they were doing. Rounding one of the counters, Director Melendez approached the lead scientist who was having a conversation with two of her assistants.

“Doctor Lithe, I was told you had some news for me?”

Surprised by the director’s arrival, the attractive young woman quickly dismissed her subordinates and turned to face him. Doctor Lithe was a brilliant and very lovely woman, whose demeanor was well-liked by the staff. She had the ability to charm the men working under her without creating any negative feedback from the women on the team. Smiling at the director’s approach, she lowered her gaze and replied softly, “Ah, yes sir. As you instructed, we subjected Tracker Four to the India variant, but we were unable to obtain significant data from his experience before he…disappeared.”

Quisley’s expression turned to one of shock as he turned to the director. “Sir! Tracker Four was our best…”

To the surprise of everyone in the room, Director Melendez’s arm shot out and grabbed the front of Doctor Lithe’s lab coat. Before she could react, he flung her into one of the tubular chambers hard enough that she was momentarily stunned and collapsed to the floor. Without a word, Melendez calmly walked over to the control display mounted beside the chambers, pulled out a key card, and slipped it into a slot beside the display. Even as Doctor Lithe slowly regained her bearings and lifted her head, Director Melendez punched a series of commands that sealed the chamber. Melendez turned to Quisley as the chamber door shut, a soft hissing sound escaping as the vacuum seal engaged, trapping Doctor Lithe inside. Coming to her senses, Doctor Lithe realized where she was and shot to her feet, pounding on the glass and calling out, but no one heard her. The glass was tempered to be bullet-proof and was thick enough that even her pounding could barely be heard.

“You see, David…you don’t mind if I call you David, do you?” Quisley felt a shiver run down his spine at the cold, calculated way the director spoke to him.

“N-no, s-sir. I-I was j-just trying to…”

Ignoring David’s stammering, Melendez smiled as he looked down at the display which listed a variety of commands to engage. “The fun part about this job is I have full authority to decide how to discipline my subordinates.” Taping a button, he turned and smiled as a faint, white mist slowly filled the chamber, much to Doctor Lithe’s horror.

“The problem is…discipline can breed dissention or the desire to betray the company’s goals out of fear, or incompetence, or a mistaken belief that what we’re doing is wrong and needs to be stopped.” He turned to the other researchers before catching sight of Specialist Morinoru, who was trying to avoid looking at the director. “Ah! Specialist Morinoru, I was hoping to see you here! I trust you’ve recovered from your experience earlier today?”

“Hai, Director Melendez, sir,” the meek, young Japanese woman said quietly.

“Such a shame, what you were forced to endure. After all, what happened to Tracker Four wasn’t your fault, now was it?” Morinoru didn’t speak, only shaking her head as she caught sight of Doctor Lithe in the chamber and looked away. “I understand that you were reduced to just under three inches before Doctor Lithe introduced the antidote, isn’t that correct?” The specialist nodded again, hugging herself as she shivered at the memory, but Director Melendez reached out a hand to gently pat her shoulder. “There, there, Specialist Morinoru…there’s no need to worry. I promise you, you’ll never have to suffer the consequences of another person’s mistakes again.”

The mist slowly descended, rolling over Doctor Lithe’s head, down past her shoulders, and collected on the floor, engulfing her feet as more filled the chamber. Melendez turned to Doctor Lithe and smiled. “Isn’t that right, doctor? It was your error that led to Tracker Four shrinking away to nothing.” He punched the intercom button so they could hear her.

“We did what you told us to do,” Lithe pleaded with him as her expression quickly changed to horror as she realized what was about to happen. “Please don’t do this, sir! I’ve been loyal! Please!”

The director shook his head and frowned. “Doctor, we both know that you tried to cover up your error by blaming Specialist Morinoru. If I recall, I gave you permission to discipline her myself after your initial report. It seems you took great pleasure in using variant Charlie on her, even though it had been retired from use due to causing…intense erotic experiences?”

As the chamber continued to fill with the mist, Doctor Lithe’s voice trembled as she replied, “Sir, please! Don’t do this. I returned her to normal!”

“That may be, doctor,” Melendez said casually, not bothering to look at her. “However, what you fail to realize is that I went back and checked the video myself. You must realize we have the logs and footage showing how you instructed your assistant to administer the India variant without sufficient safeguards. There was a ten-second window in which you were able to administer the antidote, but while Specialist Morinoru tried to get your attention, you were too busy chatting with another staff member about your weekend plans with one of the men at the local bar. I’d like to think that it was a simple mistake…”

“It was! It was, sir,” she confessed, even as her lab coat slowly engulfed her hands down to the knuckles. She looked down to gasp before raising her head, just in time to see Melendez moving his hand over to tap another key on the display. The mist above her ceased and she appeared to sigh in relief, despite the loss of several inches of height. However, to her horror, another mist, this one tinged in a slightly pink hue, began to drift down from the ceiling, engulfing her head and shoulders as she cried out. “Sir, no! Please!”

Doctor Lithe squealed in fear even as the combined effects became evident to everyone watching. Her glasses slipped down her nose, even as she reached up a dwindling hand to push them back up.

“A fascinating discovery, Doctor Lithe,” the director said calmly. “Apparently, Tracker Three discovered that the combination of Alpha and Beta within the standard five-minute window of recommended exposure actually accelerates the process.” Watching the doctor shrink another few inches, he raised an eyebrow. “Strange…despite the multiple subjects you’ve been given over these last six months, I don’t recall any data mentioning this accelerated rate in your reports.”

“It was an oversight, sir,” Lithe cried as her hands were now completely swallowed up inside the coat, which originally reached down to her hips, but now was passing her knees on the way to her feet. “I was sure we’d performed that sequence early on, but I must have been mistaken! Oh!”

One of her rings slipped off her finger and clattered on the floor, followed by another.

“No…not a simple oversight, I’m afraid,” Melendez stated, his hand now moving to the display, looking at the options available to him. “About Specialist Morinoru…when she pointed out what was happening to Tracker Four, you hesitated when you turned and saw his condition. It took me viewing the recording several times to determine what happened, but it appears that you actually enjoyed watching him dwindle away to nothing.” Doctor Lithe tried to argue, a comical attempt given her now three-foot stature, but Melendez stopped her. “Ah, doctor, please don’t lie to me. After it was over, and Tracker Four was gone, you told your assistant to claim it happened too fast to save him.” He raised an eyebrow as he looked at her, the doctor now several inches shorter as he asked, “You did hesitate, didn’t you?”

Doctor Lithe nodded, tears streaming down her face as she begged, “Please sir! I didn’t mean to…”

“To what,” he cut her off. “Mean to shrink him down to microscopic size? Or perhaps you didn’t mean to hesitate? Maybe you actually did intend to save him, hmm?”

“Yes! I did! I tried!” The watch on her right wrist slipped off her hand to drop to the floor of the chamber as she cried out. “Please! I don’t want to shrink!”

“Hmm, I’m sure that’s what the test subjects say when you studied the effects of the variants you’ve tested on them.” Melendez moved his hand over to the antidote button. Lithe, seeing his action, dropped to her knees and clasped her hands to beg him to push it, but the director’s expression turned cold again. “You know, I like you better this way. Smaller, less pretentious. Perhaps shrinking you has made you realize you’re not so important after all. You do realize your assistants consider you to be arrogant, don’t you?”

Now shrunk to less than three feet tall, Doctor Lithe’s lab coat looked comically large on her dwindling frame, the long sleeves now flopping over on themselves as her delicate hands receded even further inside. Already her feet had slipped out of her shoes, revealing the pantyhose encasing her dwindling feet. However, despite her continued reduction, the elastic material couldn’t retract fast enough, remaining loose and deflated as her toes continued to slide up the shimmering fabric. She looked almost like a child playing at dress-up. As if to emphasize that point, the clips holding her long, blonde hair up slipped out of place and her long, thick tresses tumbled down to cover her shoulders and her back.

“I do, yes, I do sir. Please…please change me back,” Lithe pleaded, her voice now comically higher in pitch, making a few of the researchers snicker at her condition.

The director turned in their direction and raised an eyebrow, causing all of them to gasp and quickly look away. However, he smiled and turned back to the dwindling doctor inside the tube. “You see? They’re laughing at you, laughing at your condition, as if it’s a joke to them. You have to admit, it is quite amusing, given how much you seemed to enjoy shrinking all those subjects you studied. Where you once towered over them…now you’re the one forced to look up at everyone else. Despite your intelligence, doctor, you’re nothing but an insignificant waste of space.”

“Mr. Quisley,” the director said, snapping David out of staring at the dwindling scientist before his eyes.

“Yes! Yes sir?”

“I see you’re enjoying the show. Doctor Lithe’s failure to act cost you the life of one of your best trackers and has set our project back as a result.” Behind the director, Quisley could see Doctor Lithe continue to shrink, one side of her lab coat slipping off her dwindling shoulder, revealing a silky black bra strap that quickly followed after it. Lithe gasped and struggled to pull it back up, her condition continuing unchecked. “If you like, I could stop the shrinking process, return her to normal if you feel I should be merciful? Or…maybe I could let her shrink some more, maybe turn her into a pet? That is an option that G.R.U. has considered, you know. Using the drug to shrink unsuspecting men and women and turning them into little pets to be purchased by the public. We could claim they’re clones, but in reality, we could simply lobotomize them and no one would ever know.”

Seeing Quisley hesitate, Melendez punched another button, not bothering to look at which one it was. At this point, it didn’t matter. Doctor Lithe’s condition was already continuing unchecked, so even if he did nothing, she would continue to shrink. He simply wanted to introduce a random factor into the situation, leaving everyone to wonder what would happen. Director Melendez knew that his choice had the chance of returning the doctor to normal…but given the various other options, there was a far greater chance that she wouldn’t.

“It’s fun to watch the effects, isn’t it, Mr. Quisley? Watching her dwindle away to nothing, smaller and smaller.” He glanced down at the button he’d pressed and smiled as the pink-hued mist ceased and Doctor Lithe looked up at him with hope in her eyes. By now she was almost two feet tall, the lab coat pooled around her tiny body, barely holding on to her slender shoulder, although she was almost completely exposed down to the top of her voluptuous bosom. Her silky bra hung off one shoulder, the top of her right nipple just visible beneath the fabric. “You know I’m being nice, doctor. The manner in which you exposed Tracker Four to the drug’s variants was deliberate, calculated. You intended to shrink him away…after all, you were lovers on the side, sneaking away from your work when you didn’t think anyone would notice.” He leaned down until he was staring directly at her. “But I noticed.”

Doctor Lithe shivered again, understanding her situation. Everything she thought she’d kept secret was exposed, just as she was now. As if to emphasize this, she shrank another inch and the lab coat finally slipped off her other shoulder to slide down, taking the rest of her clothes with it. The naked scientist yelped pitifully as she reached for the coat, trying in vain to remain covered, as if it would protect her from the director’s intentions.

Shaking his head in disappointment, Melendez stood up and glanced at the control panel, seeing the next command was accepted by the system. “A shame really. You held such promise when we first brought you onto the project. Of course, you were only Doctor Peters’ assistant then.” He tapped his chin thoughtfully. “I wonder…was the accident that shrunk him really an accident?” Glancing down at the tiny woman in the chamber, he raised an eyebrow before leaning over to the microphone so only Doctor Lithe could hear him. “We both know the truth…don’t we?”

“No! No, please, Director Melendez,” Lithe pleaded with him as she looked up to see another mist emitting from the top of the chamber, this one with more of an amethyst hue to it. Recognizing the variant, she cried out, “No! Director, please! I’ll do anything! Anything!”

As the mist reached the top of her head, Doctor Lithe’s eyes rolled back as her back arched and she fell back onto the top of her lab coat. The mist quickly absorbed into her skin, causing Lithe to shudder as she quivered in obvious pleasure by the look on her face. A tiny squeal of ecstasy escaped her lips and several of the female scientists watching nearby gasped at the high-pitched sound of their boss’ voice.

Stepping back from the chamber, Melendez smiled as he glanced at Quisley, who was watching the doctor’s reduction intently. “I must admit…watching how a woman reacts to the Charlie variant…reminds me of just how much I enjoy my position,” Melendez said as he watched Doctor Lithe dwindle further atop her clothes.

Maybe it was the combination of the variants, or perhaps it was how quickly they were administered, one after another, but Doctor Lithe’s body quickly shrank, even as she moaned and her body endured one arousing spasm after another, dragging her further and further down in size. Unable to control herself, the young doctor ran her hands down her supple waistline, over her tight, smooth stomach, until her fingers reached between her legs. No longer caring about what was happening, Lithe massaged herself, with soft, tiny yelps of arousal escaping her lips as she dwindled further and further.

“Director,” Lithe begged in a high-pitched, panting squeak of a voice, now less than a foot tall. “Please…I’m s-sorry! Oh God! I’ll do…anything! Mmmmm! Anything you want! Just please…don’t…” She struggled to get the words out, but her body quivered as she was overcome by another orgasmic arousal that gripped her entire body, stealing yet another few inches from her as she shrank down.

“Yes, I’m sure you would,” Melendez said, dispassionately. Glancing over at Quisley, who continued to stare in awe at Doctor Lithe’s tiny body, the director looked disgusted. “Fine, if you won’t decide…”

Quisley, seeing the director’s hand move over the display screen, cried out, “No wait!”

Too late, as Melendez punched another random button and stepped back. The amethyst-hued mist ceased, only for a deep royal-blue mist to begin falling down. Quisley gasped as he’d seen this color recently, in one of the demonstrations given for the newest variant…India.

“Director,” he said, turning to Melendez quickly. “Four variants in less than ten minutes? No one has ever received that much before!”

“Really,” the director said innocently. “Well then we should record this to be sure we can document it for later.” Calling out to no one in particular, he said, “I hope we’re recording this? I wouldn’t want the main office to miss out on any data that this experiment could provide.”

Smiling as he heard several of the researchers scramble to set up the recording devices to save everything for later, Melendez placed a hand on Quisley’s shoulder. “I must thank you, David. Doctor Lithe’s experience will be of invaluable benefit to our research. By hesitating, you gave her hope that she would be spared. That’s a doubly-rewarding form of discipline, wouldn’t you agree?”

All David Quisley could do was watch as Doctor Lithe squealed and moaned, her body gyrating and twisting as her sex-induced mind played out whatever fantasy filled her head as she continued to dwindle down. So deeply aroused as India coated her body, Lithe didn’t even realize that it was accelerating her reduction. As the assembled scientists, Quisley and Director Melendez watched, Doctor Lithe’s head snapped back and her eyes widened as India’s effects gripped her. She only had seconds to squeal before her body contracted again, and again, and again, each reduction stealing half her size, her sex-induced cries of pleasure growing so soft as to become inaudible just before she disappeared from sight.

A full minute passed as the assembled researchers gasped and covered their mouths in disbelief. Glancing toward Director Melendez, they all felt a chill of fear as he casually walked over to the control display and punched the purge button. A gray mist filled the chamber, this one recognizable as the antidote as it filled the inside to neutralize any lingering traces of the variants he used on the former doctor. Once the cycle was complete, the chamber opened up to reveal Doctor Lithe’s clothes, shoes, glasses and other accessories lying in a pile. No one moved as Melendez walked over to the chamber and reached in to pick up the identification badge attached to her lab coat. With a flick of his wrist, he pulled it off and handed it to the security chief.

“Do me a favor, Mr. Quisley and be sure that security deactivates Doctor Lithe’s key card from the system? After all, she no longer has a need for it.” Turning, he faced the other scientists, who stood frozen, afraid to move or speak for fear that they would meet the same fate as their supervisor. Seeing their fear, Melendez smiled. “Return to your work, people. We still have data we need to compile and send to G.R.U. before the end of the week.” Glancing over at Lithe’s senior assistant, he walked forward until he stopped directly in front of her. The assistant, Miranda Tyson, didn’t move as she looked up at him, a slight tremble running through her shoulders.

“W-we’ll have the data completed immediately, sir…including everything from Doctor Lithe’s…experience,” she whispered before ducking her eyes.

“Doctor Tyson,” he said calmly, reaching out a hand to gently touch her auburn hair. Tyson flinched for a moment but he paid it no mind. “There’s no need to fear. I have no intention of shrinking you for your supervisor’s failures.” Heading toward the exit, he turned back and smiled. “Just be sure you don’t give me a reason to do so based on your own actions, am I understood?”

“Y-yes sir! Absolutely!”

Casting a glance at the rest of the scientists, he said, “That goes for all of you as well. Do your jobs and everything will be fine. Fail me…” he indicated toward the chamber where Doctor Lithe’s clothes lay. “…and you can join Doctor Lithe as a microscopic speck.”

[Knightstable]

This story is so awesome! Thanks again for sharing.

[Raso719]

This story is so awesome! Thanks again for sharing.

It's a classic made better by the original legends who wrote it!

[MarauderTDL]

Chapter Seven: Strained Relations

As Michelle lay in her tube, a pop sounded nearby, awakening her from her slumber. Blinking, she felt the warmth of the sun beating down on her, only to squint as she found the blinding light was too much. Realizing that her sunglasses were no longer on her face, she fumbled around until she felt them lying in her lap.

I guess they must have fallen off while I snoozed, she thought to herself as she slipped them back on. However, as she did, Michelle noticed that they felt different, almost…bigger? Despite setting them squarely on the bridge of her nose, the nose pads pressed down on the lower part of her nose instead. That’s odd. Maybe I rolled over on them while I was asleep and bent the arm pieces?

Adjusting them, she slipped the glasses back on and was relieved as the brilliant sunlight was blocked out and she could see again. Unfortunately, she still felt like they were too large for her, the tips of the temple pieces pushing just past her ears. For a moment, she considered this but shook her head, refusing to recognize that something was out of place. Instead, she reached out and pushed off the sides of the outer rim to sit up against the back head rest. In doing so, her feet, originally bent down over the side lifted up until her feet were sticking up in the air. Again, Michelle didn’t see anything wrong, so focused on enjoying herself that she didn’t even notice how big the inner portion of the tube appeared.

Pushing herself up to get a good view of where they were, Michelle was surprised to find that the riverbank on either side of the river was much different than before she fell asleep, rising up anywhere from five to ten feet above the river itself. Thick stands of trees on either side leaned over the bank, casting shade on most of the river, except for the middle where Michelle was floating. As she took in the surroundings, she saw that the water was moving faster thanks to the narrow channel they were in, no more than twenty feet from one side of the river to the other. Glancing over her shoulder, Michelle heard Sarah’s voice from her tube mentioning something about her pretzels, while Beth called out from her tube, telling her to come back. Their tubes were about ten yards behind her, still connected. Beth’s feet were barely visible over the top of the outer rim.

That’s odd, she thought to herself as she adjusted her swimsuit. I would have imagined Beth’s legs would stick out more over the top, but I guess she might be curled up in her tube.

Shrugging to herself, Michelle reached over and grabbed her Pepsi, happy to see that it was still cold. However, as she gripped it in her hand, she noticed that it felt different, as if it was larger than before.

Don’t be silly, she thought to herself as she reached over to grab some Doritos to munch on. Strangely, they tasted better than before, as if the nacho flavor was even more intense. After grabbing a few more, she quickly ate them before reaching for her Pepsi again, washing the taste down with the cold, crisp, sweet soda. Setting the soda aside, Michelle reached for her phone and noticed that they’d only been on the water for an hour and a half. If the information Mr. Shackleton gave them was accurate, they still had about two hours to go before reaching the spot where Rt. 340 crossed the river, just past the Grove Hill Boat Ramp, which was where he said he would be to pick them up. That meant they had plenty of time to have fun and enjoy themselves. Sighing to herself, Michelle leaned back and smiled as she soaked up the sun.

That’s when she heard Sarah scream.

Sitting up in her tube, Michelle called out, “Sarah? What’s going on? Are you all right?”

“Michelle, get over here, quick,” she heard Sarah call out as she was staring over at Beth.

Afraid something must have happened, Michelle bent over the side of her tube, only to feel her swimsuit bunch up as one of the shoulder straps slipped down her arm.

“What the…” Michelle couldn’t figure out what was wrong, but she pushed it aside as she reached over the side and started paddling to turn herself around and get back to her friends. As she watched, Sarah hopped over the side of her tube and stared down into Beth’s tube in disbelief.

“Michelle! Hurry!”

“What? What’s going on,” Michelle asked as she managed to turn the tube and slow herself down enough to allow their tubes to catch up with hers. As the tubes collided, Michelle quickly reached out and grabbed one of the connectors to attach her tube to the others before she pushed up and leaned over the side to see what was wrong with Beth.

“Beth are you okay, I…”

To Michelle’s amazement, Beth was sitting in the middle of her tube, her arms stretched out to either side of her as she looked at Sarah and then Michelle in disbelief. “What’s happening to me?”

Michelle gasped in horror as it became clear what was wrong. Beth, normally five feet, six inches tall, sat in the middle of the tube, her legs tucked under her. Even with her arms stretched out as far as they would go, her hands barely reached either side of the tube and the headrest came up to the back of her neck. Looking at her clothes, there was no doubt that Beth’s pink t-shirt was way too big to fit her, despite the fact that when they started, it fit her like a glove, showing off her ample bosom as well as her toned stomach for all to see. Now, the bottom of the t-shirt was touching her jean shorts as the sleeves, which once reached down to her biceps, now reached her elbows. As for her jean shorts, where they were once tight-fitting, now there was a gap between her slender abdomen and the waistline of the shorts, providing a view of her silky white panties.

Beth stared up at Michelle and then over at Sarah in horror as they all realized what they didn’t want to admit...Beth was smaller, much smaller than she should be!

“This isn’t happening…this can’t be happening,” Beth cried out. “Somebody please tell me this is a nightmare. I want to wake up! Please, let me wake up!”

“Beth, what’s going on? When did this start,” Michelle asked in shock.

“How should I know,” Beth said frantically. “One minute Sarah and I were having fun, the next minute Sarah hops over to her tube to get her pretzels and I feel a weird, tingling sensation and everything around me starts getting bigger!”

As if to emphasize the point, Beth gasped and before their very eyes, Michelle and Sarah watched as Beth shrank another couple of inches, her t-shirt sagging even more as her panties peeked out above her sagging jean shorts.

“No,” Beth squealed in frustration. “Not again!”

Michelle was dumbfounded as Sarah stared over at her and asked, “What are we going to do?”

“How should I know,” Michelle responded. “I don’t even know how this could be happening in the first place.”

“Well look at her,” Sarah said as she gestured toward Beth. “She can’t be more than…what? Four foot ten?”

“More like four foot eight, I’d say,” Michelle said, shaking her head.

“Well how are we going to make it stop,” Beth cried out, covering her face. “This can’t be happening!”

“That means she’s lost eight to ten inches,” Michelle said. “What could cause that? Beth, do you remember coming into contact with anything while you were in the water? Was there any chemical or…I don’t know…substance that you touched?”

“No,” Beth said, weeping. “Everything was fine. Sarah and I were having fun when I suddenly felt warm and then a tingling sensation ran down my back. I thought it was Sarah doing another one of her touch techniques she said she and Brad liked to do, so I didn’t think anything of it. But when Sarah went to get her snacks, I sat up and that’s when I noticed everything looked so big.”

“What are we going to do,” Sarah asked, visibly shaken by what she’d seen. “We can’t just sit here and let her continue to shrink.”

“We don’t even know how it started,” Michelle said. “On top of that, we’re in the middle of the river, with no way to find someone to help us. The only thing we do know is that we’re supposed to meet Mr. Shackleton in about two hours at the spot he said he’d meet us at.”

“Maybe we could get out, find a road and flag someone down for help,” Sarah suggested.

“First, we’d need to know where a road is, second, if we managed to find it, we’d have to hope that someone would come by soon enough for us to get Beth to a hospital or somewhere to help her.”

“Help me? We don’t even know what’s causing me to shrink,” Beth said.

There it was. She’d said it. Beth was shrinking…a preposterous notion for anyone to consider, but given her current circumstances, what other explanation did they have to go on? Beth was shrinking, and they didn’t know how to help her.

“Can we call someone for help,” Sarah asked, but Michelle shook her head as she lifted her phone and showed that there was no signal where they were, not even the acknowledgement of service. “We’ve got to try! We can’t just sit here and watch her shrink away!”

“Okay, okay,” Michelle said, attempting to dial 9-1-1, but the phone immediately gave a busy signal. “It won’t work. I don’t know if we need service, or if the fact that the riverbank could be blocking our attempts to call for help. All I can think is that we should keep trying to call out until we get a signal. We can’t be that far from a cell tower.”

“And how much smaller is Beth going to become before we do,” Sarah said, reaching over to take Beth’s hand in hers, but Beth pulled away.

“Don’t…” Sarah attempted to say something, but Beth stopped her. “I know you’re trying to make me feel better, but to be honest, right now even you trying to hold my hand is creeping me out.” Sighing heavily, she said, “God, everything is so much bigger!”

“We’re going to figure this out, Beth,” Michelle said firmly. “I know this is weird, but we can’t start panicking. I think…ah!”

Sarah turned at the sound of Michelle’s gasp and squealed in fright as Michelle suddenly began to shrink, her latex swimsuit now sagging as her body dwindled in size. Even Beth’s eyes widened in shock as they watched Michelle fall back into her tube, her sunglasses falling off her face as she arched her back and slipped a hand down between her legs.

“Oh God, what the hell is happening?!?”

One inch, two inches, a third and then a fourth. The right shoulder strap of her swimsuit slipped down her arm and the front of her suit drooped to expose her breast as Michelle gasped and felt the surface of the tube move under her. Except it wasn’t the tube that was moving, it was her, shrinking. When the episode ended, Michelle collapsed, feeling completely spent as she stared up into the sky.

“What the hell? Oh my God, that was so…”

“Freaky,” Sarah supplied.

“Familiar,” Beth said, embarrassed.

“No,” Michelle said, shaking her head. “Arousing! Oh God, it felt like the time when Kristiana Markenson and I were making out at the Halloween party. She went down on me and…” Realizing what she was saying, Michelle’s face turned bright red. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that.”

“Wait,” Beth leaned over the side of her tube. “You’re telling me that when you were shrinking, you were getting turned on? Seriously?!?”

“It wasn’t like I could help it,” Michelle said as she slowly pushed up and leaned back against the head rest of her tube. Only now, her head barely cleared the top. Sarah was the one to notice first and she gasped in shock.

“Oh my God! Michelle! You’re smaller than I am!”

“That’s not possible,” Michelle argued. “I only shrank a few…”

The two girls faced each other, only now Sarah was looking down at Michelle, who normally stood five feet nine inches tall, to Sarah’s five feet four inches.

Realizing Sarah was right, Michelle felt a sense of dread as she whispered, “Oh shit!”

“What are we going to do,” Sarah asked again. “If you’re both shrinking…”

“You’re shrinking too,” Beth pointed out. Sarah turned to deny it, but Beth said, “Look at your shoulder…the strap is falling off. You already told me you’d tightened it once already. There’s no chance it came loose again so soon.”

Sarah squealed in fright as she saw the strap slip off her shoulder. “Oh God no!”

“What’s causing this,” Beth asked, now seeing how big the tube was to her as she sat up. “Shit, this thing is huge compared to just a little while ago.” Looking over at Michelle, who was still staring at herself and her loosening swimsuit, Beth called out, “Hey! Michelle! Get a grip! What’s causing this?”

“How should I know,” Michelle snapped before she ducked her head in embarrassment. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that. I’m just…”

“Freaking out, I get it,” Beth said as she leaned over and reached out her arm to Michelle. For a moment, Michelle stared at her in confusion before Beth added, “Don’t just sit there! If we’re shrinking, the last thing we want to do is be stuck inside our tubes alone. Get over here.”

Although neither of them were so small that they couldn’t climb over the outer rims of their tubes, it was clear that they were both unsure of themselves and the changes in their sizes compared to everything else. Michelle stumbled as she tried to step over the top of her tube, misjudging the distance as her foot slipped between the two tubes and into the water. She yelped as she tumbled forward and over the top of Beth’s tube before she landed on her back beside Beth.

“Ow.”

“Are you all right,” Sarah called out as she peered over the side of the tube. “That looked like it hurt.”

“I thought I stepped properly, but my foot was wet from the water in the bottom of my tube and when it hit the side of Beth’s tube, I slipped,” Michelle explained as she rolled over on her side. “Dammit! This suit is falling off me!”

Sarah gasped. “Did you shrink again?”

Michelle shook her head. “No. This suit is meant to stretch to hug your curves and accentuate your figure. Seeing as my figure appears to be dwindling away, the latex isn’t stretching as much as it’s slipping off my shoulders.”

“I-I’ve got a t-shirt that would probably fit you, if you want it,” Sarah offered.

Michelle smiled and nodded. “Thanks. I never imagined ever wearing your clothes, Sarah.”

Reaching into the duffle bag she’d set in the corner, Sarah said, “Well given your sexy figure, you’ll probably make it look better than I would.”

Blushing at her compliment, Michelle thanked her. “That’s sweet of you to say, but if we don’t figure out what’s going on, I’m afraid a t-shirt won’t do any of us any good before l-…” Michelle’s voice caught and her eyes closed as her breath caught in her throat.

Beth, seeing Michelle’s distress, sat up and caught her as Michelle toppled over on her side. “Michelle? Michelle! C’mon sweetheart, talk to us!”

Squealing again, Michelle twitched as several additional inches melted off her slender figure. Sarah gasped and covered her mouth to keep from screaming as she quickly leapt into the tube with the other two. “Michelle? Honey, talk to us, please!”

“Oh God, Oh God, Oh fuuuuuuck!” Michelle’s body convulsed as the t-shirt fell from her twitching hand to drop to the damp bottom of the tube. Sarah and Beth both gasped as Michelle dwindled again. After several long and frightening moments, her muscles relaxed and Michelle collapsed into Beth’s arms like a wet noodle, completely unable to move as she moaned softly.

“Oh my God, Beth,” Sarah whispered in shock. “We can’t stay here! We’ve got to find help!”

Cradling Michelle in her arms, Beth looked back at Sarah. “Weren’t you listening to Michelle? We can’t! Our phones can’t get a signal, and seeing as we’re all shrinking, we can’t take the chance of getting out and getting lost. I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to shrink so small that a bird or a squirrel decides that I’m a tasty snack!”

“Squirrels wouldn’t eat you,” Sarah argued.

“You know what I’m talking about,” Beth snapped. “Look, in less than ten minutes, Michelle has shrunk probably about a foot. If she’s shrinking that fast, what’s going to happen to us if we decide to hop out of the tubes and start traipsing around the countryside looking for someone to help us?”

“I-I don’t know,” Sarah replied meekly as she gazed down at her friend, laying in Beth’s arms like a doll whose strings had been cut. “She’s gotten so small. How big do you…”

“Sarah!” Beth looked at her in disbelief. “What does it matter? She’s shrinking, I’m shrinking, and you’re shrinking, although from the looks of things, it appears that you’re not shrinking as fast as we are, but you’re definitely smaller than you were before.”

“I’m sorry,” Sarah cringed at Beth’s rebuke.

Sighing heavily, Beth set Michelle down and reached over to Sarah. “Come here.”

As Sarah leaned over, Beth wrapped her arms around Sarah and gave her a big hug, causing Sarah to cry. Trying to sound brave, she whispered, “I’m scared too, honey. To be honest, seeing what just happened to Michelle, I’m freaking out inside. I wish I knew what was causing this to happen to us.”

“C-could it be the river,” Sarah suggested as they parted and looked over the sides at the water all around them. “We didn’t start to shrink until after we got in. What if there is some sort of pollution that was dumped into the water?”

“Seriously,” Beth asked with a doubtful look on her face. “Sarah, you think that we wouldn’t have heard about such a toxic spill? Something like that would be affecting people all over the place. I mean, anyone who would get out on the water, or drink it…”

“Drink it,” Sarah looked disgusted, but Beth raised her hands.

“Look, you can drink water if it’s been properly filtered. For the most part, all you have to do is boil it to kill any bacteria in the water.”

“I…doubt that this is the…result of bacteria,” Michelle managed to whisper, catching Beth and Sarah’s attention.

“Oh my God,” Sarah gasped as Michelle sat up, her swimsuit collapsing around her to expose her breasts and most of her upper torso. Reaching over, she wrung out the water from the t-shirt she’d attempted to hand Michelle minutes before. Smiling faintly, Michelle reached out to grasp it as she stood up shakily in the tube and let her swimsuit drop to the bottom. After slipping the t-shirt over her head, Michelle looked down to see the hem roll down to cover her privates and halfway to her knees.

Stunned by how small she’d become, Michelle collapsed against the outer rim of the tube, her shoulders barely clearing the top. “This is a nightmare,” she whispered.

“How do you feel,” Beth asked softly. When Michelle rolled her eyes, she added, “I know, I know, look let’s put aside the obvious, okay? Sarah has a point. We’ve got to do something. I don’t want to sit here while we each shrink and have our own private little orgy. I like orgasms as much as the next girl, but the thought of shrinking away to nothing in the midst of one doesn’t sound very appealing right now.”

“You wouldn’t say that if you experienced what I felt,” Michelle said in a voice barely above a whisper. As Beth stared at her in shock, Michelle shook her head. “Don’t look at me like that! It’s intoxicating just as much as it is terrifying, the thought of dwindling away as an orgasm grips every inch of your body? Beth, this isn’t like any orgasm you’ve ever experienced before. Every single inch of your body is gripped in this sensation, even your toes. Whatever is causing this, it overwhelms everything in your mind except the sensation of pleasure.”

“You can’t be serious, Michelle,” Sarah shook her head in disbelief. “Do you realize what you’re suggesting? Are you saying you want it to continue?”

“No,” Michelle shouted in frustration before hanging her head. In a soft voice, she admitted, “Yes.”

Both Beth and Sarah gasped.

Michelle shook her head. “You don’t know what it’s like, either of you! I guarantee when you experience what I just experienced, you’ll want it too! Sarah,” her friend blinked as Michelle turned to her. “Brad couldn’t possibly make you feel this good.”

“Don’t say that,” Sarah said in disgust. “This isn’t natural! Something is making us shrink and it’s messing with your mind. Michelle, whatever this is, it’s shrinking us and if we don’t do something about it, we’ll shrink away to nothing. I don’t want that to happen, not to me, not to you or Beth. I want to make it back to Brad and get married and have babies. How could I do that if I’m shrunk?”

“If we keep shrinking, we won’t have a choice,” Beth replied. “But Sarah’s right. I don’t want to shrink out of existence.”

“We don’t even know how small we’re going to get,” Sarah argued. “It could stop at any…oh!”

As if to prove Michelle’s point, Sarah felt an arousal blossom between her legs and she sank down on all fours, quivering as her Lycra swimsuit loosened. However, despite her moans, Sarah sucked in air through her teeth as she hissed, “I won’t give in! I won’t! Nooooo!”

Michelle watched casually while Beth’s eyes widened in shock as their friend shrank several inches before the effect wore off. Exhausted, Sarah leaned back against the side of the tube as Beth reached out to steady her.

“You see,” Michelle said calmly. “You can fight it, but you can’t stop it.”

Beth turned on Michelle angrily. “How can you say that? Dammit, Michelle! If any of us have something to look forward to, it’s Sarah!”

“Oh God no,” Sarah’s voice caught their attention as she held up her hand to reveal her engagement ring, which obviously didn’t fit her finger. “My ring…it won’t fit anymore!”


“Tracker Three, this is Tracker Two, what’s your status?”

Alex pulled away from his scope, feeling revulsion at what was happening to the young women in the tubes. From his vantage point downstream, he saw each of them dealing with their individual reactions to the drug and the variants. The first one wearing the t-shirt and the jean shorts couldn’t be more than four feet ten inches tall, looking comical as she continued to wear her clothes despite the fact that they were quickly becoming too large. As for the second one, the one he’d dosed with Alpha and Beta so quickly, he was shocked at the rapid reduction she was experiencing. Already, she was forced to discard her swimsuit for a t-shirt, but she looked no less sexy than before, her long black hair now cascading down the back of the t-shirt with the amethyst highlights…

“Tracker Three! Respond!”

Hitting the button to broadcast, Alex replied, “I’m observing the women as instructed, Tracker Two!”

“And how much have they shrunk so far, Tracker Three,” John’s voice sounded almost condescending.

“The one with auburn hair, call her Number One, she’s shrunk about eight or nine inches, call it about four feet nine. The one with black hair, call her Number Two, she’s actually shrunk faster. She’s the one I dosed with Alpha and Beta together. Apparently, she’s already shrunk twice in front of the other two. She’s lost at least a foot, so she can’t be more than four feet eight inches tall.”

“And the third one,” Tracker Two inquired. “I kinda like that blond-haired girl. What about her?”

Disgusted by the lecherous tone of John’s voice, Alex replied, “She’s probably the tallest of the three, I figure she’s four feet, eleven inches. It looks like she’s got an engagement ring that no longer fits. She’s really upset about it.”

“Aw, isn’t that sweet,” Tracker Two responded with a heartless laugh. “Hope her fiancée likes midgets.” After a moment, Tracker Two said, “You need to prepare to hit Number One with Gamma.”

“What? Why? They’re all shrinking, isn’t it enough?”

“Boy, Director Melendez may see you as the golden child for your lucky discovery, but with that kind of attitude, he’ll have you yanked just as quickly. Don’t push it. Now you knew this was going to happen, so find a good spot and when you get the chance, hit her with Gamma.”

“I can’t do it right now,” Alex tried to say. “They’re all grouped in the same river tube. If I fire at them, I’ll get all three. Given that Number Two is experiencing accelerated shrinking already, I’m worried that hitting her with Gamma could speed it up too fast and…”

“What,” Tracker Two asked. “You’re worried about shrinking her too small?”

“Well…yes! No one seemed to know that Alpha and Beta combined together would cause the rapid reduction Number Two is already dealing with. If I accidentally hit her with Gamma, there’s no telling what would happen.”

Tracker Two laughed on the other end. “If you’re lucky, you’ll get to see her shrink out of her clothes and then out of existence.”

Alex’s eyes widened in disbelief. “You’re saying that’s happened before? John, you said the government is testing the drug for safe usage. If someone shrinks out of existence, that’s murder!”

“It’s not murder,” Tracker Two argued. “Besides, if they go microscopic, they’re still alive…for a little while at least.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, you gotta think, there’s all sorts of microscopic life floating around. Hell, there’s probably thousands or even millions of microscopic life crawling all over you every day. Single-celled organisms cleaning up all sorts of junk just lying around. Think back to your science classes, kid. Amoebas, paramecium, things science probably has discovered and just doesn’t know what to call them.”

“And you’re okay with test subjects shrinking so small that they’d be helpless against these microscopic creatures that would what…?”

“Beats me, kid,” Tracker Two said. “They’d probably just absorb the poor bastards.”

“And this is what we’re doing? John, I…”

“Kid, listen to me,” Tracker Two responded with irritation in his voice. “You’re here to do a job, which is to dose these girls with the drug and help me bring them in to be tested and studied to determine how the drug affects regular everyday people. The reason they chose you is because you’re supposed to be some hotshot sniper thanks to your grandfather. Now can you do the job, or not?”

“Yes,” Alex responded reluctantly.

“Good! Now like I told you, if everything goes well, these girls experience some fun thanks to the drug, we capture them, they’re studied and released after being returned to normal. The antidote erases their memories and they won’t remember a thing. So do your job, like you say you can, and there’s nothing to worry about.”

“I can’t shoot now,” Alex said as he trained his scope on the tubes and saw the three girls together. “I have to wait until they split up. Problem is, given their conditions right now, I don’t know if they’ll do that.”

“Then you’re going to have to take a chance at some point,” John replied. “One way or another, we need to know how Gamma will work on her. Either you do it…or I will.”

“You can’t make that shot,” Alex responded defiantly. “Right now, I don’t even know if I can do it.”

“Well you better find a way, kid. They’ve already passed Star Hill Farm and are almost to Papa Bear’s River Cabin. Soon after that, they’ll come up on Steam Hollow. I’d suggest that you find a way to separate those tubes to isolate Number Two. Right around River View Drive, the river splits in two branches for a short while before merging back together. If you can isolate her, you can pop her with Gamma, she’ll shrink down like they want her to, and by the time they come back together, she’ll be too small to get out of the tube. The other girls will keep shrinking and we’ll be able to scoop them up after they pass by Grove Hill Boat Ramp. Am I clear?”

Alex frowned, discovering the more he learned about this assignment, the more he wished he’d never accepted it. “Clear,” he said in disgust. “I’ll find a way.”

“Good! Now I suggest you reposition yourself. Tracker Two out.”


Not wanting to leave each other alone, Sarah, Beth and Michelle moved their supplies to the sides of their tubes so they could reach them if necessary. Realizing there was little they could do for now, they sat in Beth’s tube, drinking soft drinks and eating snacks. It was Michelle who pointed out the effects of shrinking appeared to intensify their taste buds after Sarah noted how her Coke tasted sweeter.

“My Pepsi tastes the same way,” Michelle said as she took another gulp from the bottle and set it into the inset on top of the outer rim. “After the first shrink, I noticed that. It’s weird.”

“What about beer,” Beth asked, to the surprise of the other two girls. “Oh come on! We’re shrinking, and you’re drinking soda? Why not see how it makes Coronas taste?”

“Are you sure,” Sarah asked doubtfully. “I mean, if we’re shrinking, that means the alcohol in the beer would affect us faster.”

Beth rolled her eyes. “Oh come on! I only bought a six pack. There’s no chance that we’re going to get drunk off of two beers each.” For a moment she thought before saying, “Now that I think about it, I’m regretting tossing the Jack Daniels.”

“You only tossed the regular Jack over the side,” Michelle said with a wicked grin.

Beth looked confused as she looked at her roommate. “What are you saying?”

“Check the cooler in my tube,” Michelle said, watching as Beth stood up and leaned over the side to open the cooler in Michelle’s tube.

After a moment, Beth stood up holding a bottle of Jack Daniels Honey. “You didn’t tell me you got this!”

“I did,” Michelle said with a shrug. “I just hid it so you wouldn’t try to hog both bottles. I know you like it.”

“Like it,” Beth said as she twisted the top and lifted the bottle to take a swig. “Oh damn, that is incredible! Whatever is shrinking us, it’s making this stuff taste fantastic!”

“Michelle! Beth! What are you doing,” Sarah leaned forward to try to snatch the bottle from Beth’s hands, but she pulled it away. “Coronas might not get you drunk fast, but that certainly will in your conditions!”

Beth rolled her eyes. “Yeah, Seventy-percent proof? I seriously doubt it.”

“Beth, it isn’t the fact that it’s seventy-percent proof, it’s the fact that we’re all getting smaller! The smaller we get, the stronger the alcohol becomes. We’re all under five feet tall now. Shots of this stuff could easily get us drunk after only a couple, and if we keep shrinking…”

“We will,” Michelle said confidently, making Sarah stare at her in disbelief.

“Okay, AS we shrink smaller, it’s going to make us drunk even faster. If we’re going to have any chance of escaping this situation, we can’t afford to get drunk.”

Now it was Michelle’s turn to roll her eyes. “Sarah, for someone who liked to get it on with her fiancée in our dorm room, you’re sounding like an absolute prude right now.”

“Because I want to get back to Brad,” Sarah shouted, angry at how dense her friends were acting. “I can’t believe you two! It’s like you want to die.”

Taking another swig from the bottle, Beth scoffed at her. “Sarah, honey, we’re not going to die. We’re certainly shrinking, but I doubt…”

“Doubt…you doubt…doubt what,” Sarah demanded to know. “You doubt that whatever is causing this will just as quickly stop and leave us shrunk to the size of kids? The problem is we don’t know what’s going to happen, and it’s scaring the shit out of me that for some reason, you both suddenly don’t seem to care!” Turning to Michelle, who was leaning back with her eyes closed, Sarah asked, “Michelle, you’re an intelligent, beautiful woman who is about to graduate with an engineering degree and you could probably find a job before September, not to mention you could probably pick up a guy just by walking into a bar.”

“Not now,” Michelle said in a defeated tone. “They toss me out, thinking I’m some kid playing a joke.”

Sighing, Sarah turned to Beth. “You want to be an actress. What good is it going to do you if you give up and don’t try to figure out what’s going on here?”

“Who’s going to take me seriously like this,” Beth said, indicating her shrunken stature. “I’d be laughed at and would be lucky to play parts as someone’s kid.”

“What about finding someone special,” Sarah persisted. “Am I the only one who cares about being happy with the love of my life?”

“Sarah, we’re both happy for you,” Michelle said. “Right now, I don’t want to think about this. Hell, if I start shrinking again, I think I might like it. It certainly has provided me with a lot of fun.”

“At what cost,” Sarah asked. “You’re shrinking, Michelle!”

“We’re all shrinking,” Michelle fired back, irritated at Sarah for her persistence. “So unless you’ve got the cure tucked up your bikini, we’re stuck this way for now!”

“And what are you going to say when you’re so tiny that you’re helpless and can’t function without help,” Sarah asked softly. “What if you don’t stop, and something you can’t see right now decides you’re going to be their next meal? I remember my biology classes from high school when we examined microscopic creatures. If I remember right, those creatures don’t eat their food…they absorb it.”

Michelle shivered at Sarah’s suggestion. “That won’t happen,” she said defiantly. “We’ll find help before then.”

Sarah looked at Michelle in disbelief, unable to fathom how her friend could possibly accept her fate without wanting to fight it. Granted, they didn’t know how to yet, but there had to be something causing this and they’d eventually discover the cause…right? Shaking her head, Sarah stepped over the side, back to her own tube. Glancing down at the connectors, she saw the length of cord attached to the side and loosened it to let her tube drift away from the others while remaining attached.

Seeing what Sarah was doing, Beth rose up and watched as Sarah’s tube floated several feet away, but to Beth, it seemed even further. “Hey! What are you doing? What if you start shrinking fast and need our help?”

Pulling a pretzel rod from her bag of snacks, Sarah frowned and looked away. “According to Michelle, we’re going to shrink anyway. I might as well leave you two alone while you get your freak on when it hits you. If I’m still big enough to help, you’ll know where I am.”

“Leave her be,” Michelle called out. “We’re stuck floating down the river for the next hour or two. When we get near the point where old man Shackleton is waiting for us, we’ll assess our situation to see if we can still get out and have him help us.”

“And if we’re not,” Beth asked, the thought of them being absorbed by microscopic creatures suddenly creeping her out. “What if Sarah’s right? What if we don’t stop? I don’t want to be absorbed…”

“Don’t think about it,” Michelle said as she got up and walked over to take the bottle of Jack Daniels Honey from her hand. Lifting the bottle, she took a long swig before handing it back. “That’s smooth stuff. Maybe we should break out the Coronas too.”

Beth began to lift the bottle before hesitating and grabbing the top to seal the bottle. “I think I’ve had enough for now. I’m sorry, Michelle, but I just don’t feel good right now. Maybe if I took a nap.”

“Fine,” Michelle said, suddenly regretting how she’d spoken to Sarah, but knowing that Sarah wanted her space for now. She only hoped there would be time later for her to apologize. “I’m…gonna go back to my tube, okay? If you need anything or something happens and you need help, just call out, okay?”

“Yeah…I’ll do that,” Beth said, turning over so Michelle couldn’t see her tears streaming down her face as she thought, God, what’s going to happen to us?


Further down the river, near the bend near Steam Hollow and the Grove Hill Boat Ramp, John Carlton saw movement along the shallows. While Alex continued to monitor and track the three girls, John was clearing the way along the river. Per Director Melendez’s orders, John’s assignment was direct: ensure that no one was either on or near the river who could otherwise see the three girls in their river tubes as they went by. Of course, since John had been with the company for the last six months, he was well aware of what Director Melendez meant.

Spying movement, he saw a kayak making its way up the river with a single occupant, a lovely nineteen year old Hispanic woman who was oblivious to the fact that she was in danger. Listening to her music with a pair of earbuds, she hummed along to the beat as she slowly paddled along through one of the slower, deeper portions of the river, where the riverbanks spread out to almost fifty yards apart.

John smiled as he loaded the Alpha cartridge and trained his sights on the lovely lady, wearing a tank top, a pair of shorts and a baseball cap over her dark, chestnut brown tresses. Enjoying the rhythmic beat, Maria Santonio moved her shoulders side to side, taking care not to rock the boat too much as she dipped the paddle in the water to move around a submerged log and into the middle of the channel.

“That’s right, senorita,” he whispered as he trained his sights on the woman. “Sorry, but orders are orders and right now, you’re just another lovely lady who is about to experience the sensation of a lifetime.”

With the ear buds drowning out noises around her, Maria was unaware as the shot from John’s rifle delivered the drug precisely on target, exploding with a pop that sent the aerosolized agent directly in her path. In moments, Maria felt a tingling engulf her arms and chest as she released the paddle with one hand and moved to rub her shoulders. The strange sensation disappeared almost as quickly as it appeared and Maria shrugged to herself, unaware of what was to come next.

John reached into his pocket and pulled out India. Although he’d not received authorization to use it, he knew that every new variant so far had been more powerful than the previous ones, so John was confident that India would do the trick.

“Say goodbye, senorita,” he said with a sadistic grin as he chambered the round and trained his sights on her again. “I hope you enjoy the trip.”

As he lined up the shot, he could already see that Alpha was kicking in, although not enough for Maria to realize what was happening. Her hair was beginning to slip out of her baseball cap to fall down her back and over her shoulders. In addition, the tank top she wore became looser as Maria felt the faint tingling moving down between her legs. With her distracted, John adjusted his sights and reached down to squeeze the trigger. With a soft pop, the cartridge shot across the distance between him and the young woman before exploding over top of her, coating her in the experimental drug.

It only took moments before the drug took effect, gripping the young woman’s body in a steamy, arousing sensation that caused her to moan as she fumbled with her paddle, losing her grip as inches quickly melted off her body. In the span of fifteen seconds, the girl shrank a full twelve inches, moaning as she dropped the paddle into the water, no longer caring about it as she slipped her hands down between her legs, seeking to aid the arousal that was building inside her. Unable to comprehend what was happening, Maria tried to cry out, but it felt like her lungs were being squeezed, making it difficult for her to make a sound as her hair now completely tumbled down over her dwindling shoulders, the tank top sliding down to pool in her lap as the straps quickly slipped over the sides of her shoulders, exposing her shrinking breasts for anyone to see…but then again, John planned it so that no one was nearby to hear her try to call out for help, and no one except John could see the young woman’s struggles as she sank down inside the kayak, unable to believe what was happening to herself as the ear buds fell out of her tiny ears, one bouncing to land at her feet, while the other one dropped over the side and into the water.

In the course of a minute, Maria Santonio went from five feet, seven inches tall, to just over three feet tall, and still she continued to dwindle away. Her tank top sank to the bottom of the kayak and her shorts no longer fit her as she struggled to free herself from their cumbersome weight. Maria managed to stand up, but the intensity of her arousal was so strong that her legs gave out and she collapsed back into the kayak, her head barely clearing the top of the hole her torso filled only minutes before. The lovely woman tried in vain to cry out for help, but no one could hear her, not even John as he watched her through his scope, taking great pleasure in watching her dwindle smaller and smaller with each passing moment.

Unwilling to give up, Maria managed to jump up and catch the edge of the kayak to pull herself up onto the top where she looked around for someone, anyone to help her. Unfortunately, the drug overwhelmed her desires and forced her to her knees one last time as she quivered in ecstasy before she rapidly dwindled from one foot tall to six inches tall, then three inches tall. As John watched, Maria raised her hand in vain one last time, as if at her tiny height, someone might see her and come to her aid, but the drug’s effects gripped her one last time, forcing her to shrink into oblivion, leaving the kayak empty and adrift, the girl’s clothing and one ear bud the only clues that she ever existed. Even the baseball cap, having fallen over the side, slowly sank into the waters to disappear.

“Tracker Two to base, third individual neutralized near Steam Hollow, the way remains clear for Tracker Three and the three test subjects, confirm?”

After a moment, a response came back. “Tracker Two, confirm third target neutralized. Keep up the good work.”

“My pleasure,” John said as he watched the empty kayak surrender to the current and head back down the river where it and Maria previously came.

[Raso719]

I do wish you would get more into what the girls experience when they dip below an inch. There's SO MUCH SIZE between 3 inches and 0 inches to explore!

All the same I'm super thrilled you're posting this and adding in even more opportunities for ladies to shrinkgasm down to nothing!

[MarauderTDL]

Raso,

This story was originally one of my first, and it was back during the height of the SW Forum. Back then, shrinkgasms, as you call them, were a big component for some and were thoroughly enjoyed so...I decided that would be a great addition to my story thus...what you see here.

[Raso719]

Raso,

This story was originally one of my first, and it was back during the height of the SW Forum. Back then, shrinkgasms, as you call them, were a big component for some and were thoroughly enjoyed so...I decided that would be a great addition to my story thus...what you see here.

Yeah I'm so stoked you've added more where possible! It's what made this one and Always Follow the Directions so hot!

Thanks so much for working on making this classic even better!

[MarauderTDL]

Chapter Eight: A Whole New World

Sitting down, Michelle sagged against the head rest and bowed her head as she heard Beth’s soft weeping over the top of the tube. She wanted to go back and console her friend and roommate, but the truth was, she didn’t know how. What good would it do to hold her when at any moment either of them could start to shrink again, only making the situation worse? As if to confirm her fears, the tingling sensation returned, wrapping Michelle in its fiendishly arousing grip as she squeezed her eyes shut and tried to fight the sensations that spread throughout her body.

No, no, no! Please, make it stop! I lied! I really don’t want this to happen! Just make it stop!

Tears trickled out of the corners of her eyes and slid down her cheeks as she trembled with each inch that slowly melted off her body, making the t-shirt she wore slide further down into her lap. By the time the sensations lessened and faded, Michelle opened her eyes and gasped as she turned her head to find that she was looking up at the top of the head rest. Turning back, she saw that her legs were stretched out across the bottom of the inner floor and her now bare feet only touched the side of the tube if she stretched her toes. Even her arms had trouble reaching the sides of the tube and Michelle sank back against the head rest to heave a sigh.

This is happening so fast. I don’t even know if we’re going to make it to the place where we’re supposed to meet Mr. Shackleton. God, I don’t want to die! Sarah’s right. I want to live, but how am I going to do that if I’m so tiny that I can’t even function in the regular world?

“S-Sarah?” Michelle gasped as the sound of her own voice as she called out. It sounded different, higher in pitch than before. God, even my voice is changing!

Off to her left, Michelle heard the sound of water splashing softly and after a minute or so, she looked up to see Sarah leaning over the side of the tube.

“Oh my God! Michelle?” Reaching over the side, Sarah clipped the connector to fasten her tube to Michelle’s before sliding over the side to join her.

Michelle gasped at how large Sarah appeared compared to her now. Even though Sarah had shrunk too, it was obvious that she hadn’t dwindled as much as Michelle had. Looking up at Sarah, Michelle noticed that her head barely reached the top of Sarah’s shoulder.

Her face filled with concern for her friend as Sarah whispered, “God, look at you! I wish I knew how to make it stop. You’re dwindling away to nothing!”

“H-how tall am I now,” Michelle asked, cringing at the sound of her voice, which now sounded more like that of a little girl than a young woman.

Sarah must have noticed, but she didn’t say anything as she shrugged. “I-I don’t know. There’s nothing to measure you by, and I can’t even use myself to judge your size. While I was by myself, I shrank again. It caught me by surprise and was so intense, I blacked out for a minute or two.”

As if to confirm what she said, Michelle noticed that Sarah wasn’t wearing her bikini anymore. Instead, it looked like she’d used one of the towels to wrap herself in, like a toga, except it covered her from above her breasts, down past her knees…and Michelle remembered that Sarah hadn’t packed any of the bigger towels, expecting the sun and time they would spend tanning to help them dry off. Instead, she’d grabbed the medium-sized ones.

Seeing Michelle’s stare, Sarah nodded. “I know. I should have brought the bigger ones.”

“It wouldn’t have done us any good,” Michelle whispered. “By now, they’d be too big to use to cover us, and we’re too small to have the strength to tear the fabric.”

Nodding in agreement, Sarah stared at her friend until she quietly said, “I’d say you’re a little over three feet tall now.”

Surprised that Sarah would mention it, Michelle asked, “What makes you say that?”

“Well, from what I could tell when we first got in them, the inner portion of the tubes is about three feet wide from end to end. The way you’re sitting, there’s a gap between your feet and the other side of the…” Sarah stopped and gasped as Michelle shuddered and her feet slowly slid along the bottom, pulling away from the side. As Sarah looked down, she saw Michelle squeezing her eyes shut and balling her fists.

“Stop it! Stop it! Stop it! Noooo!”

When Michelle’s episode ended, she sank back against the side and exhaled. Between the sensual arousal she felt and her attempt to fight the effects, she was exhausted, but it made no difference. When she looked again, she could tell that she’d lost more height.

“About three inches, that time,” Sarah confirmed for her. “I guess that means you’re under three feet tall now.”

A tortured cry escaped Michelle’s lips and she pounded the inflatable floor, but her efforts had little effect at her size. Her fists bounced off the bottom and only had the effect of making her look comical at best.

“God, I wish I could find who was responsible for this! I’d force them to go through this, except I would stop until they were gone!”

“Michelle, don’t say that!”

“I’m serious,” Michelle fumed. “Someone’s responsible for this! This started once we got on the river. Either it’s something in the water that we came in contact with, or maybe it’s something hidden along the riverbank…”

“If that was the case, don’t you think someone would have found out about it by now?”

“Not if they were shrunk like we are,” Michelle said. “For all we know, there’s someone whose clothes are lying on the riverbank somewhere who was affected like we’ve been and…”

“Don’t say it,” Sarah warned her. “Michelle, we can’t think like that.”

Sighing, Michelle sagged back against the side of the tube. “So I guess we’ll just wait and see what happens? Just watch each other as we shrink smaller and smaller? God, this is so frustrating!”

Sarah sniffed softly as she hung her head. Michelle, seeing her reaction, suddenly realized what must be going through her mind and got up to walk over and wrap her arms around Sarah as much as she could to give her a hug.

“You’re thinking about Brad, aren’t you?”

Lifting her hand, Sarah revealed the finger where her engagement ring once rested. “It slipped off,” Sarah said in a voice barely above a whisper. “When I came to after blacking out from the last episode, I found it had fallen off in the tube. I tried to put it back on, but it’s too large now.”

“Where is it,” Michelle asked.

“I put it in the bag with my phone. It just bothers me that I can’t wear it anymore. I promised Brad that I would never take it off before we were married. Now I feel like I broke my promise to him.”

Michelle watched as Sarah covered her face and cried. “Hey, hey, Sarah no! It’s not your fault! How in the world could you predict something like this would happen? Brad would never blame you if he knew about this.”

“If Brad knew about this, he’d be excited,” Sarah hung her head in shame. Seeing the confusion in Michelle’s eyes, she admitted, “Sometimes…when we make love…we fantasize about different things. One of the fantasies we’ve explored has been…”

“Oh my God,” Michelle’s eyes widened. “Seriously? You two have been fantasizing about shrinking?”

Sarah nodded, a guilty expression on her face. “It’s called microphilia; basically it’s a love of things that shrink or that are smaller.” Exhaling, Sarah said, “It was months ago. We were both going through a rough patch.”

“I remember,” Michelle said, sitting down beside her friend. Although the size difference made her have to look up at Sarah. “You told us that Brad was going through a stretch where he hurt himself and was worried that if he didn’t heal in time for tryouts, he’d miss his shot at having the scouts assess him for the NFL.”

“He was so worked up, so worried that a simple sprain would keep him from showing them what he could do, he had difficulty…you know. So we decided to play a game. It was silly really. I went online and did some research of ways to spice up a couple’s sex life and found a suggestion of roleplaying where we choose a role and then we have to play out that role while making love.” Sarah looked embarrassed, but she continued. “At first, we both thought it was silly. You wouldn’t believe the number of suggested ideas that I found.”

“Oh I’d believe it,” Michelle said. “There’s all kinds of…what?”

“You know about this?”

Michelle rolled her eyes. “Honey, you forget, I’ve played both sides of the fence, which means that I’ve seen double the weird ideas that people come up with just to have a good time.” Sighing, she admitted, “Although based on some of what I’ve experienced, I’m beginning to wonder if I shouldn’t just go back to dating guys. You wouldn’t believe some of the stuff we girls can come up with to get laid.”

Sarah shrugged. “I won’t argue with you there. Anyway, Brad and I tried some different ideas until we got to microphilia. Seeing as Brad is already taller than me by half a foot, it wasn’t hard to imagine where I would be smaller than he was. It turned out to be fun, really, but now…I don’t know. The illusion isn’t the same as the reality.”

Michelle pushed up and leaned over to grab her Pepsi, which had fallen down and lay on alongside her snacks. It seemed huge to her now, almost like a two liter bottle. Grabbing the bag of Doritos, she offered it to Sarah, but she shook her head.

“Thanks, but I’ll stick with my pretzels.” As Michelle sat down again, Sarah leaned over the side of the tube and grabbed them. Glancing over to look into Beth’s tube, she found her leaning back against the head rest, her eyes closed as she appeared to be resting peacefully. “Beth? Honey, are you awake?”

“If she’s sleeping, leave her be,” Michelle said. “I don’t think she’s willing to admit it, but what’s happening to us is probably freaking her out. I know it is to me.”

“So what? I’m now the wild girl of the bunch,” Sarah asked amazed. “She’s a lesbian, you’re bi-sexual and I’m the straight white girl, but because I’ve experimented with the idea of shrinking, I’m now the wild child?”

Michelle chuckled at the thought as she slowly, carefully lifted her twenty-ounce bottle and drank some of her soda. “Wanna know a secret?” When Sarah nodded hesitantly, Michelle whispered, “I don’t think Beth is really a lesbian.”

Sarah blinked in surprise. “You’re only now figuring that out?”

“What do you mean,” Michelle asked, surprised at Sarah’s comment.

Accepting the bottle from Michelle, Sarah took a sip before handing it back and grabbing a pretzel rod. “Have you even seen her with another girl? She claims to be interested in them, but I’ve watched her check out a number of guys the last time we went to the pool on campus. There were a number of girls who were hot, you know, like Andrea Mikelson? The hot girl from Egypt? She was laying out in the tanning area, but when I pointed her out to Beth, she didn’t seem interested, but while Orlin Cambrine, the exchange student from the U.K., was doing laps in the pool, she couldn’t take her eyes off him.”


While the two girls were chatting about their friend, Alex was scoping out the terrain and the river. After delivering the last dose, he’d moved further down the river, keeping out of sight as he kept an eye on the tubes. Several times he checked on their conditions, noticing that each of the girls was shrinking, although the girl he’d marked as Number Two with the auburn hair, hadn’t experienced a reduction in size recently. The blond-haired girl was probably just over four feet tall, while the black-haired girl with the amethyst highlights couldn’t be more than three feet tall.

Damn, this stuff is working fast. Slipping a tablet out of his thigh pouch, he pulled up the data feed and silently cursed. Not fast enough if this is right.

According to his tablet, they were approaching the Papa Bear’s River Cabin lodge. With the intended extraction site no more than four miles off, it was doubtful that all of them would be small enough to capture in the manner in which he and John were instructed.

Maybe the black-haired girl, he thought as her continuing reductions in height seemed to shrink her every ten to fifteen minutes. By the time they reached the extraction point, it was likely she’d be small enough. As for the blond-haired girl…he wasn’t sure. Granted, the dosage and variants she’d been exposed to were different than those he used on the black-haired girl, but if she didn’t start…wait…

Hearing noises coming from upriver, he lifted his rifle to peer through the scope just in time to watch as the blond-haired girl’s head snapped back. As he watched, her mouth opened in an expression of ecstasy as she quickly dwindled down five or six inches until the back of her neck rested against the side of the tube. By the time she slumped down, Alex estimated she was probably three and a half, maybe three feet nine inches tall.

That’s weird. She didn’t have an episode even close to that intense before, and she’s supposed to be the one who is shrinking normally while the other two will shrink faster. Glancing down at the cartridge of Gamma that John wanted him to use on the girl lying by herself in the other tube, Alex wondered what would happen to her if…no when he used it on her.

Are you so sure you want to do this, he heard his grandfather’s voice in his mind. Alex, think about what you’re doing. What is this stuff going to do to her?

“It’ll be okay, Grandpa,” he whispered softly. “Nothing bad is going to happen.”

How are you so sure of that?

Shaking his head, Alex glanced down at the tablet. If he was going to take the shot on the auburn-haired girl, he had to separate her from the other two…but to do that, he’d have to disconnect them from each other. Doing that might reveal his presence, but Alex knew he didn’t have much time left. Glancing at the topographical map, he zoomed in on the local terrain along the river. Just past the Papa Bear’s River Cabin lodge, he noticed that the river swung to the left for about a half a mile before it came to the point where the river took a hard right turn just before reaching the Grove Hill Boat Ramp. As the river bore to the left, he saw two small islands that split the river. They weren’t very large, but given their placement in the river, it was clear that there was a point where the current would pull anything caught in that area in two different directions. If he planned a shot just right, he might be able…

Slipping the tablet back in his thigh pocket. Alex leapt to his feet and hurried down the riverbank, taking care to avoid being seen. Soon, he saw the top of the lodge and as he glanced down the river, he saw the first of the two islands. Passing it by, he caught sight of the second island just behind the first one, with only a small passage of water between them. Despite the water level of the main branch, the gap between the two islands wasn’t enough to allow enough water to pass through them, so it would keep anything on opposite sides of the river apart long enough for him to fire Gamma at the auburn-haired girl, let the drug’s effects take hold, and by the time the second island was past and they came back together, she would be well under the effects of the drug.

Are you sure you want to do this?

Hurrying back to the first island, Alex checked out the surroundings to be sure no one was around. Even the lodge, less than a half mile away, was blocked from view by the nearby trees. Glancing back up the river, he saw the river tubes coming into sight and ducked back into the trees to be sure he wasn’t seen. Turning to watch the river, he saw where the current hit a shallow where the water parted to either side.

I’ve got to do it just before they reach that point. If I time it right, they’ll separate. The blond-haired girl’s tube is attached to the black-haired girl’s tube. Get it to swing around and…

It wasn’t easy, doing the calculations in his head, but his grandfather taught him all about angles and trajectories as well as momentum while training him how to shoot. Backing into the woods, he leveled his rifle at the tubes and scanned them to find the connectors between each. Ignoring the sounds of the girls as they worried about their predicaments, Alex focused on the connectors between the auburn-haired girl’s tube and the black-haired girl’s tube. Careful inspection found that the blond-haired girl’s tube was connected to the black-haired girl’s tube on the opposite side from the auburn-haired girl. With a good shot and a little luck, he might be able to do it.

If you miss, you could puncture one or more of the tubes. Even some shrapnel could damage them, he reminded himself. Seeing that the angle was wrong, he slipped out of his position and moved to a better one that would allow him to fire from the side. By now, the girls were less than two hundred yards off and he felt the pressure as he scanned the tubes, finding the connectors and trying to determine how to pull off the shot.

Come on, Alex, you can do this, he told himself. Hit the connector just right, shatter it so the tubes separate and let the current pull them apart.

Feeling the pressure, Alex wiped his face as he felt sweat sting his eyes. Level…you have to be level with the tubes. A high elevation shot could risk hitting the tubes instead!

Moving again, he slipped into a thick patch of brush and reset himself as the girls were now one hundred yards away. Pulling Gamma out of his pouch, Alex removed the clip from his weapon, pulled out several rounds, placed the Gamma cartridge in the clip, and then one additional round for the intended shot before sliding the clip back into place. Reaching down, he pulled out a silencer and attached it to the front of his rifle. This close, he knew they might still hear the sound of his shot, but without the silencer, it would definitely get their attention and he couldn’t afford to let that happen.

Fifty yards!

Leveling the rifle, Alex judged the distance, watched as the tubes slowly, gently carried the young women down the river. Glancing to his left, he saw the water ripple at the split and sighted the connector he was searching for. One shot was all it would take…shatter the plastic, the two tubes would pull apart and, with a little luck, float in different directions.

Forty yards!

Something wasn’t right. Alex heard the two girls talking to each other, but blocked it out as he swung his sight to scan the river near the first island. The current appeared to gain speed as it approached the first island and he carefully scanned the water, checking for anomalies that could affect his shot.

Thirty yards!

You’ve got this, Alex. Take the shot here…no!

Focusing on a swell in the water, Alex suddenly realized that the river went shallow just before the island, too shallow. In fact, as he scanned the waters, he noticed rocks jutting out of the water.

It’ll screw up the shot, he thought to himself, feeling the pressure as they approached the point of no return.

Twenty yards!

If he fired too early, the tubes wouldn’t separate and he’d lose his chance to dose the auburn-haired girl without risking the other two being exposed. Given their current sizes, he didn’t want to risk it. The orientation only gave him information about Alpha and Beta, everything after that was considered confidential, at least to him, and he didn’t want to endanger the other girls.

Ten yards!

Alex! Take the shot!

He was out of time. Swinging the rifle around, Alex caught sight of the connector holding Michelle’s and Beth’s tubes together and focused on the hard plastic casing that held the joining pieces. With one final glance at the river’s direction, he sighted the connector and pulled the trigger. Luckily, the silencer did its job as the rapport from the bullet sounded like a firecracker at best. The bullet whizzed through the air so fast that it not only hit the connector, but shattered it into multiple pieces. Freed from each other, Michelle’s and Beth’s tubes drifted along, Beth’s tube directly behind Michelle’s as they approached the island. However, while Beth’s tube was free, Michelle’s tube was still attached to Sarah’s, which was in front of the other two. Sarah’s tube bottomed out and slowed both tubes enough that Beth’s tube bounced into the back of Michelle’s, pushing the joined tubes over the rocks to bear off to the right side of the fork, while Beth’s tube, not influenced by anything except itself and its occupant, who was still larger than her friends, bottomed out sooner than Michelle’s tube did, twisting in the current to the left, until the deeper and more powerful current on that side grabbed the tube and pulled it apart from the others.

Alex felt the thrill of victory as Beth’s tube slowed, rolled with the current, and then bore off to the left, while Michelle and Sarah’s tubes continued down the right side fork, neither girl realizing what just happened. As he was about to report his success, Alex noticed something odd about Beth’s tube. Swinging his sight to train on the outer skin of the tube, Alex noticed several deformities close to where the heavy-duty strap attached to the shattered connector hung down into the water. Looking closer, Alex felt a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach as he saw the damage to the tube. Apparently, while he successfully shattered the connector and separated the tubes, the exploding plastic shards tore through the heavy-duty PVC plastic. Even now, he could see one side of the tube sagging as air slowly escaped through the miniscule, ragged tears. Although the other chambers of the tube didn’t appear to be damaged, he wondered how long it would be before air escaped from those chambers as well, potentially endangering the auburn-haired girl.

Maybe if I use Gamma now and she shrinks fast enough, her weight won’t put so much pressure on the chambers and it will slow the tube’s deflation, Alex thought as he turned to the other two tubes. Any remaining pride in his shot faded as he saw damage to Michelle’s tube as well. It was even worse than the damage to Beth’s and it appeared that the girls were beginning to stir as they noticed something was wrong.

You have to take the shot now, Alex, he told himself as the tubes separated and were cut off from each other by trees growing on the island.
Take the shot, expose her to Gamma and let it shrink her down. By the time they join back up together, they’ll be able to use the third tube and it will be big enough to hold all three of them at once.

Alex hated the situation, but he knew it was his only choice at this point. If he didn’t expose the auburn-haired girl now, the tube might not make it to the other side of the two islands, and she’d trapped as it sank into the deeper waters further downriver. While ten feet might not be deep for someone of normal size, in their conditions, with their continued reductions, it could become a deadly situation for any of the young women.
Cursing the situation he’d put them in, Alex made his decision. Chambering the Gamma round, he rose to one knee to get a better angle on Beth’s tube before it moved out of range. Judging the distance, he waited until he was certain of his shot, watching as the tube continued serenely down the wider, calmer left fork of the river. Taking careful aim, Alex pulled the trigger, hearing Gamma’s report as the cartridge fired on target, exploding directly over top of the tube.

Swaying slightly, Alex realized he hadn’t taken a breath the entire time and stumbled back to land on his rear end as his eyesight became fuzzy. His rifle still gripped tightly in his left hand, Alex reached back with his right hand to brace his fall onto the soft, muddy ground. Laying in the mud, Alex sucked in gasps of air as he thought to himself, Get up! You have to check on her! If Gamma works faster than Alpha or Beta, she’ll start showing a reaction and you need to let Director Melendez know what’s going on!

Sucking in gasps of air, Alex reached up and touched his comm link. “Tracker Three…to Tracker Two.”

“Tracker Two here, what’s the situation, boy?”

“I’m just…south of Papa Bear’s River Cabin lodge where…two islands split the channel. I managed to separate the tubes to isolate Number Two and I’ve administered the dose of Gamma as instructed. I have to…double-back to follow her, but I should have visual confirmation on the effects within ten minutes.”

“Good job, boy! I didn’t think you had it in you,” Tracker Two responded derisively. “We may yet make a marksman out of you yet.”

Alex frowned at John’s sarcasm. “Save your congratulations, John. In order to separate them, I had to shoot the connecting clips holding the tubes together. It seems that shrapnel tore into the outer skin of two of the tubes.”

“Ah, so our golden boy isn’t the model of perfection after all, hmmm? How bad is it?”

“Number Two’s tube is leaking air, but I’m hopeful as Gamma’s effects kick in, it will lessen the pressure her weight will…”

“Okay, okay, I get it,” Tracker Two responded impatiently. “What about the other one?”

“I don’t know. I think the girls in the other tube must have noticed something. I saw them stirring just before they disappeared behind the trees down the other side of the channel. The tube was damaged, so they’ll likely move into the third tube. I’m thinking once they meet up around the islands, they should be able to abandon Number Two’s tube and use the third one. By that time, they should be small enough to fit in one tube.”

There was silence on the other end of the link, a silence that grew, making Alex nervous. What was John thinking? Was he contacting Director Melendez without his knowledge? Realizing it didn’t matter, Alex picked himself up out of the mud. Moving down to the edge of the river out of sight of the girls, he reached down and washed the mud off his uniform. The cool water felt refreshing on his hot skin, under the restrictive garment. While Alex appreciated the camouflage that aided in keeping him from being detected, the fabric was better suited to cooler climates or colder temperatures, not the middle of summertime in Central Virginia in the heat and humidity. With the mud mostly removed, Alex climbed up to the lip above the river bank and moved to follow the auburn-haired girl’s tube.

“Tracker Three, you’re instructed to follow the target you tagged with Gamma and report back all effects she experiences. According to base, this is the first use of Gamma in the field and they want complete details of the target’s reactions.”

Thanks for telling me what I already knew, Alex thought to himself as he picked up the pace to catch up with the girl’s tube. “Tracker Two, what about the other tubes?”

“Ignore them for now, Tracker Three. Their exposure levels should be sufficient to reduce them to the predetermined levels necessary for capture once they arrive at the extraction site.”

“What about anyone on or around the river? I haven’t seen anyone this entire time.”

John’s laughter came over the link, a low, sinister chuckle that bothered Alex. “Don’t you worry about that, boy. Nobody is going to get in your way. I’ve already taken care of that.”

As if to emphasize John’s point, Alex looked over at the back end of the first island and noticed a fishing pole laying at the water’s edge, the line attached to a bobber floating in the water, swaying back and forth with the current. Slowing down, he noticed two sets of clothing, one set a pair of jeans cut off at the knees along with a regular black t-shirt and ball cap, lying just above the water line on the shore. The second set of clothing lay atop of small folding chair that leaned up against one of the trees. In front of the chair, a pair of sandals sat, while daisy-duke shorts and a low-cut t-shirt with a plain, white bra and a thin, gold chain hung over the metal arm of the chair. Another glance revealed hiking boots lying in the water, one turned on its side while the other one was standing up, submerged just off the bank, the socks still inside them. For a moment, he didn’t realize the truth of what he was seeing, until he noticed a cheap plastic watch lying near the fishing pole, as well as a ring and a pair of sunglasses. Alex’s blood ran cold as he stumbled and his eyes widened in horror at the realization of what he saw.

“Tracker Two, what in God’s name did you do?”

John’s laughter came back over the link. “Aw damn, kid. Did you find the couple’s clothing on the island? Shit, I thought you wouldn’t notice it.”

Alex reached out to grip the side of a fallen tree to remain standing as he asked, “Did you…? John, tell me you didn’t…”

“Had to be done, boy,” John’s cold, calculating voice came back over the link. “There was no chance they’d miss seeing the girls or you for that matter. They’d know something was going on and our operation would be blown wide open. The guy…well, I figured I’d find out what India did, so I popped him first. Gotta say, the results were spectacular. It appears the boys in R&D combined Alpha with one of the newer variants to create one that didn’t require Alpha to initiate the effects. He went down before he even realized what was happening. As for the lady…damn, she was a looker. Couldn’t have been more than twenty-four years old. I wouldn’t have minded getting to know her. ‘Course, that’s not possible now.”

“You’re telling me that you killed them?” Alex’s voice shook as he glanced down the river in the direction where the girls were going. “What in the hell is going on here?”

“I did what was necessary to accomplish the mission, boy,” John’s voice chilled Alex’s blood at the lack of emotion. He didn’t care, only that it was done. “Hate me all you like, but clearing the way was my job all the time. You were tasked with getting the girls ready for transport. My job…well, let’s just say it was a lot more fun.”

“You bastard,” Alex whispered in shock. “Those were innocent people and you just…snuffed them out of existence?”

“Like I said, boy, I did what I needed to do in order to accomplish the mission. Maybe they’re dead, maybe not. Maybe they’re running around in the forest, trying to stay alive, no larger than bugs. I don’t know and I’m not being paid to care…and neither are you. What I do know is this…if you don’t get up off your ass and follow your targets, they could likely shrink and either get hurt or get into trouble. So if you care so much about them, I suggest you get moving!”

Hearing the sound of a woman’s scream down river, Alex turned and hissed, “This isn’t over, John. I’m going to speak to Director Melendez about this.”

A chuckle came back over the link as John replied, “You do what you want. See if I care.”


A soft crack rang out, echoing through the forest as a shudder reverberated through the side of the tube. Beth felt the tube move and stirred, blinking as she rubbed her eyes and stretched. For a moment, she glanced around, having forgotten where she was before everything came crashing back into vivid detail. Glancing down at her clothes, she noticed they were hung a little looser on her body, indicating that she probably lost a few more inches while she slept. She only hoped that Sarah and Michelle were faring better than she was.

Sitting up, she closed her eyes and stretched again, just as a soft pop sounded right over her head. The noise made her gasp and jerk around to search for the source, but after a moment, she calmed down...that was until she realized that she couldn’t see Michelle or Sarah’s tubes! Gasping, Beth leaned over the side of her tube, her heart pounding as she searched for them in vain.

“Michelle! Sarah! C’mon, this isn’t funny! Where are you?”

Something landed on the back of her neck but when Beth reached up to run her hand over her skin she felt nothing. Well I felt something, she said to herself, just before a shiver ran down her spine, making her arch her back as she gasped out loud and squeezed her eyes shut.

“O-oh my G-God! What is t-that?” The familiar sensation gripped her body as Beth felt her t-shirt sliding over her shoulders, threatening to slip off one side as her mind realized what was going on. “No, no, no, no, no! Stop! Please! Ah!”

Fear mixed with sensual pleasure as an unseen force gripped her body, stealing away inches at an alarming rate that made Beth hyperventilate with each passing moment. Beth tried to fight the sensations, but the more she struggled, the more powerful the sensations became. Soon, she was panting for breath, even as she tensed her muscles, refusing to surrender her height to the tantalizing arousal that was throbbing between her legs. Unfortunately, despite her resistance, she felt her bare legs sliding along the slippery plastic bottom of the tube, hearing the rubbery surface protest her movements as her legs shrank in on themselves, along with the rest of her body. Soon, Beth couldn’t help herself. The arousal was so strong and so enjoyable that she simply gave up fighting and collapsed against the head rest and side of the tube, her hands slipping down into the enormous gap forming between her bare skin and her oversized clothing. Beth gasped as her slender digits touched the skin surrounding her womanhood and her body jerked in surprising reaction as they pressed against the insides of her thighs, feeling the skin radiating with a heat she’d never experienced before.

Oh my God, she thought as she closed her eyes and heaved a massive sigh. What’s happening to me? God, it feels like I’m on fire. I’m burning up and yet it feels so good!

Beth didn’t even have to pleasure herself. The surface of her skin was so sensitive that the merest touch of her finger tips was enough to make her body quiver with delight. However, despite her mental protest, it seemed as if her body was being controlled by someone else, as her fingers probed and pushed, feeling them grow slick with her juices as an orgasm erupted between her legs. Beth gasped and moaned, enjoying the pleasure, forgetting about the fact that her clothes were continuing to engulf her dwindling body as she gave in to the sensations that were too powerful to ignore.

Stop, a tiny part of her mind tried to warn and beg at the same time. Don’t do this! Please!

In spite of her mental desire to fight, her body sagged to the floor of the tube, watching in an almost out-of-body experience as the wall on other side of the tube slowly moved farther and farther away from her bare feet and rise higher and higher above her. Every attempt to move felt like she was on a fast-spinning carousel, the vertigo gripping her senses made it impossible for her to move in any controlled manner. Each time she managed to get an arm underneath to prop herself up, the vertigo returned, making her head swim and she would collapse yet again to the soft, smooth surface of the tube.

Beth lost all sense of time as she felt wave after wave of conflicting sensations wash over her body. At one point, she would feel a stir of arousal rise up from between her legs, only to have it fade as the vertigo and dizziness turned her limbs to jelly. Moans of pleasure merged with sobs of frustration as she was left to lay helpless, knowing that her body was undergoing further reductions in size as the sensations built to a crescendo, only to fade away like waves crashing on the shore and then being pulled back out to sea. Her vision blurred and her head lolled to one side as she lost consciousness again, almost thankful for the blessed release from the sensations she couldn’t control.

When she finally returned to consciousness, Beth could still feel the sensations coursing through her body, but unlike before, they were more of a gentle memory of the earlier explosion that rocked her body. Periodically, Beth could feel a shiver run down her spine, followed by a brief tugging that she came to realize was her body contracting again. However, the overwhelming orgasmic pleasure was gone, leaving behind a numbness, like a limb when it loses blood flow, producing a sensation of pins and needles. Taking a deep breath to try to center herself, Beth carefully pushed herself up to a sitting position. Feeling something slide down her stomach and into her lap, Beth noticed an enormous pink blanket that covered everything up to her hips. Reaching down, she gripped the edge of the blanket and turned it over, confused by the coarseness of the material, as she couldn’t recall bringing along anything that resembled it.

Attached along the underside of the blanket was what appeared to be a tag, a gigantic tag by the look of it, and Beth felt her breath catch as she saw the writing along the surface of it. Fruit of the Loom – Ladies – Size Large

“No! No, it can’t be!”

Lifting the blanket up, Beth noticed the curvature of the edge and suddenly realized that what she was holding in her hands was the back edge of the collar of her t-shirt! The tag she was looking at was the one stitched to the back, and it was so large that her hand barely reached from one end of it to the other.

Feeling strength return to her legs, Beth stood up, still holding the edge of her t-shirt in her tiny hand. As she looked around, she could see the rest of the shirt lying around her, crumpled into a pile upon which she rested. Off to her left, she could see her cut-off jeans lying empty, as well as her shoes, one sitting up in a corner, while the other one was on its side, the opening looking like the entrance to a small cave now.

As she took in her surroundings, Beth burst into tears and fell to her knees as she realized that she’d shrunk so small that the inside of the river tube now looked closer to the size of a baseball infield. The sides of the tube were so high that even if she stood on her toes, she might be able to look over the top, but just barely. The head rest, which she looked forward to using prior to the beginning of this nightmarish journey, now towered over her. Glancing over to one side, Beth saw her soda bottle lying on its side, the massive letters of Coca-Cola staring back at her in the standard white cursive style, surrounded by a red background. Even the bag of chips she’d been munching on before everything turned upside down was taller than she was. At best, Beth couldn’t be more than seven or eight inches tall, completely naked, and absolutely terrified.

Oh God, what’s happening to me! Someone please help me!

“Sarah! Michelle?” Beth gasped, hearing her voice as she tried to call out to her friends, only to be shocked at how strange she sounded. There’s been times back at school when she and the other girls sucked down on helium from party balloons, giggling at each other at the hilarious ways that their voices sounded, high-pitched and child-like. Beth’s voice sounded almost exactly like this, except now, it wasn’t being caused by inhaling helium…this was her voice in her newly shrunken state.

Gasping in shock, she reached up to touch her neck, unable to believe what was happening. “This is a dream, a hallucination maybe…” she said, almost begging for it to be true, but the strange, high-pitched sounds coming from her lips only confirmed the reality of her situation.

Collapsing to the floor of the tube, Beth curled up into the fetal position, covering her face as her shoulders shook with despair. She was alone…her friends were gone, and now she was shrinking small enough that she doubted anyone would ever find her. Maybe it would be best if she just shrank away to nothing…maybe it would be a kinder way to go than to endure an Alice-in-Wonderland experience, so tiny that everything would tower above her. There was a time when she loved the thought of shrinking like the girl from the famous literary novel. Now, she couldn’t comprehend how she would possibly exist in such a world…alone, with no one to help her or protect her. Unable to cope with the situation, Beth crawled back under her t-shirt and hid, crying uncontrollably as her fears overwhelmed her.

Thirty yards away, Alex pulled back from his rifle’s scope, a devastated expression on his face as he stared down at his rifle in disgust before pushing it away into the brush. Leaning back, he gripped his hands behind the back of his head and looked down at the ground in shame.

This is all wrong, he thought to himself as he struggled with the image of the auburn-haired girl sobbing beneath her shirt in terror. God, what was I thinking?

[MarauderTDL]

Chapter Nine: Job Interview
December 2014
Central Shenandoah Valley
Mountains west of Luray, Virginia

Alex was alerted to the approaching vehicle long before it pulled up to the front of the house, the sensors his grandfather installed years before setting off a soft warning alarm from speakers set in the corners of the living room. He doubted anyone from the CBS / Viacom Corporation would be upset with him appropriating the U.S.S. Enterprise’s Red Alert warning for his own use, given that it was a sound file he downloaded online. It sounded cool and compared with the serene and quiet sounds Alex preferred, it was jarring enough that no matter where he was in the house, he was guaranteed to hear it no matter what. By the time the midnight-blue 2014 BMW X5 came to a halt, Alex was already standing at the top of the stairs outside the front door, his grandfather’s shotgun in his hands as the driver’s-side door opened. The driver glanced in Alex’s direction, his lip curling up in amusement before coming around the vehicle to open the passenger-side rear door to allow the occupant to exit.

“Stop right there,” Alex commanded the well-dressed man wearing sunglasses. “Since I obviously don’t recognize you, and I certainly didn’t invite you, I’m going to suggest you get back in your car and leave before we have a problem.”

“Mr. Sharp,” the well-dressed man replied calmly, neither acknowledging the weapon in Alex’s hands, nor doing anything to provoke him. “I just came from speaking with Sheriff McDougal down at the Luray Sheriff’s Office. He told me I could speak with you about an opportunity which I believe you might be interested in.”

“Sheriff McDougal knows that I don’t like unannounced visitors,” Alex responded, giving no emotional response to the man’s attempts to sway him with knowledge of his grandfather’s old friend. “Whenever he comes up here, he makes sure to call first so I don’t shoot out his windshield like I did the first time.”

“Yes, he said as much,” the man admitted as he removed his sunglasses, squinting momentarily as his eyes adjusted to the brilliance reflecting off the snow surrounding the house. “Perhaps he felt it might be interesting to see if you did the same to my windshield, or if you would restrain yourself enough to wait and hear me out. It took me several minutes to explain my reasons for wanting to speak with you before he finally agreed to tell me how to find you.”

“That’s because he knows I’m not very sociable,” Alex said. “He also knows that I’ve made it a point to defend my property from trespassers.”

“Mr. Sharp, if you’d allow me to discuss with you what we could offer for your services…”

“You don’t have anything that I want, mister,” Alex said defensively. “I have everything I need here: food, shelter, fresh air.”

“But what about companionship? Or better yet, a sense of purpose?” The man waited, watching Alexander Sharp to see how he would respond, and as he predicted, Alex hesitated for a moment before frowning back at him. That’s right, boy. I already know enough about you to see you’re lonely. Time to bring you back to the real world.

“What do you mean,” Alex demanded, gripping the shotgun tighter.

Indicating to his driver and himself, the man asked, “Would it be too much to ask if we might discuss this inside? It is quite frigid out here and it might be easier to discuss this sitting down in more comfortable conditions.”

“Comfort is a luxury, mister…”

“Melendez,” the man replied immediately with a broad smile. “Richard Melendez. I’m the director of operations for Bio-SciTech, a cutting-edge research firm that recently moved out to the Shenandoah region to work on some very important governmental projects. Projects we believe you might be able to assist us with.”

For several moments, Alex stared back at him, unreadable and stone-faced. However, he slowly lowered his weapon and indicated toward the house. “You have ten minutes to say what you’ve got to say and then leave. As for him,” Alex pointed at the driver. “He can stay with the vehicle, since the only reason he’s here is to try and intimidate me, and believe me, it’s not working.”

The driver frowned and snorted at Alex’s insult, but didn’t say anything as Melendez looked in his direction and indicated he should get back in the car. As Alex turned back toward the house, Director Melendez reached up to tap the communications link in his ear. “Stand down, Tracker Two. Take up a position at the end of the road near the highway. Notify me if anyone approaches.”

“Acknowledged boss,” Tracker Two responded. “Gotta say, this kid is serious about his privacy. I disarmed two traps he set up along the ridge. Nothing fancy, but for anyone who stumbled into them, they’d be hobbled for a few days.”

“You’d be well-advised to re-arm those traps, Mr. Carlton. I suspect he checks his land regularly and any traps he discovers that are not set the way he intended would give away that someone was snooping around, understood?”

“Got it, sir.”

Turning to his driver, Director Melendez said, “Remain here. I think he’d feel less threatened if only I go in.”

The guard hesitated. “Sir, he’s a loose cannon. The sheriff said so.”

“He also said that Mr. Sharp has lived here alone since his grandfather died almost six years ago. The only reason he is so defensive is because he lacks the kinds of social skills most people learn growing up. If he feels threatened, or he thinks those he tries to protect are in danger, he reacts,” Melendez countered. “The boy is a classic protector, probably got that from his grandfather. No. I’ll go in alone. I think I can handle myself in this situation.”

As the guard nodded reluctantly, Director Melendez climbed the stairs and approached the front door where Alex stood on the inside, holding it open for him to enter. Once inside, Alex closed the door and indicated to the curved couch overlooking the valley below as he set the shotgun on a mantle by the door.

“A very beautiful view,” Melendez commented as he slipped out of his dark suitcoat and sat down on one end. “I suspect it must look quite lovely when it snows.”

“It does,” Alex responded from the kitchen, pouring water into two cups from a kettle sitting on the hot iron stove. “Although I prefer the view in the morning when the sun rises in spring time.”

While Alex was preparing drinks, Director Melendez carefully inspected the living room and the portions of the house he could see from his seat. What struck him most was how austere the interior appeared. There were no paintings and no wallpaper on the walls. The house was clearly designed with an eye on natural components as much as was possible. The walls were all formed by logs, stacked and fitted together so carefully that there appeared to be no need for insulation. In spite of the crude materials, Director Melendez couldn’t find a single flaw in the design, whether it was the smooth, hardwood floors covered with simple rugs, the joints holding up the roof, or the beams supporting the second floor. Clearly, Mr. Sharp’s grandparents went through a lot of effort to build this house. Of course, Director Melendez knew this as well, having already inquired at the courthouse in downtown Luray for information about Mr. Sharp and his family.

The few decorations he could see consisted of animal skulls adorning the walls, pieces of wood carved into beautiful shapes and forms before being mounted, and a full-sized mirror, encased in what appeared to be rough bundles of branches that were fitted and assembled so that the mirror set perfectly within the natural casing. Several simple dreamcatchers of varying sizes hung from various posts throughout the house, although one enormous one, almost three feet in diameter, hung above the stone mantle of the fireplace. The design was exquisite and Director Melendez found himself staring at it intently.

Seeing the director’s gaze, Alex commented, “It was designed by my grandmother when my grandparents finished building the house. According to my grandfather, she created it after walking the trails in the mountains, taking inspiration from the surroundings. He told me it was meant to ward the house from evil and protect those who live here. It’s the only thing left of her that I have, since she passed before I was born.”

In spite of himself, the director couldn’t take his eyes off it. The design was one of the most intricate he had ever seen before, the webbing within the wooden loop forming multiple rings that appeared to intersect randomly. Where intersections occurred, small crystalline pieces of quartz, carefully cut, smoothed and polished, held the webbing in place. Each piece of quartz was unique in shape, size and color, and it took Melendez several minutes before he realized what he was looking at!

Noticing Alex’s stare, Richard continued to gaze at the dreamcatcher until Alex said, “I see you noticed the patterns?”

“Yes,” Melendez said in quiet amazement. “You say your grandmother designed this?”

Alex nodded. “That’s what my grandfather tells me, and he had no reason to lie to me.”

Turning back to stare at the design again, he realized that what looked random at first glance was actually a stellar design of the solar system, consisting of nine quartz crystals of colors and sizes resembling the planets, with a giant orange-red crystal embedded in the center for the sun. Hanging from the willow hoop were five thick strands of leather. The two on the outside edges ended in long, beautiful feathers of white, the next two strands ended with long canine teeth, while the center-most strand held what appeared to be an obsidian arrowhead. The design was incredible, like something he might see in a museum.

Feeling Alex’s gaze upon him, Director Melendez pulled his gaze from the dreamcatcher and cleared his throat before returning his gaze around the room. For a man of Alex’s age, he might have assumed that the house would be colorfully decorated for the season, but it appeared that the only nod to the coming holiday were the strands of fir that hung along the walls, with boughs of holly and berries.

Seeing the director’s interest, Alex commented, “The fir and holly produce a pleasant scent during the winter months. Since I don’t like wasting energy, I don’t see the need to have strands of colored lights, so I prefer the holly berries to add a little color to the room.”

“A nice choice,” Melendez commented as he continued to glance about the room until his eyes caught sight of a compound bow and a sling near the fireplace. The sling, meant to hang over the back, housed a dozen steel military-grade broad-head arrows, all gleaming silvery-white from the razor-sharp edges and tips. “A deadly accessory, wouldn’t you say?”

Glancing over at the bow, Alex didn’t respond as he slowly made his way from the kitchen into the living room, placing the tray on the wooden coffee table between them. “Maybe,” he responded in a noncommittal manner. “Depending on who’s using it.”

“Are you proficient with it,” Melendez asked calmly.

Alex sniffed as a faint smile crossed his lips. “My grandfather was a tracker and sniper in the U.S. Marines. He taught me how to live off the land. Before he showed me how to fire a gun, he taught me how to shoot a bow. This bow,” he nodded in the direction of the fireplace. “It’s a Martin Cougar II compound bow, designed for right-handed shooters. I saw one used in the Sylvester Stallone movie Rambo from a few years back.”

“As I recall, that movie was considered quite graphic,” Mr. Melendez commented. “I’m surprised your grandfather would allow you to watch such a movie at such a young age.”

“Like I said, my grandfather was a member of the Marines. Over time, he told me more and more about his tours of duty. When I asked him about Vietnam, he balked at first, and then he let me watch that movie. At first, I was horrified by the violence, but he used it to teach me that war isn’t something glamorous. It’s brutal, cruel and deadly, something to be avoided at all costs.” The corner of Alex’s cheek pulled back into a smile. “Despite what he showed me, I still asked if he would teach me to do what Rambo did, so he had me practice until my fingers bled. By the time my grandfather passed, I could hit a target at one hundred yards, dead center.”

“Impressive,” Director Melendez said in complete honesty. “I’m surprised you never considered trying out for the Olympics. Archery is still a very popular sport. Your skill would make you very famous.”

“I don’t want fame,” Alex snapped back quickly. “I want to be left alone.” For a moment, he paused and closed his eyes. “I apologize. That was rude of me. For everything my grandfather taught me, I never had the chance to develop my social skills as much as I should. Please,”
indicating to the cups of steaming liquid, he said, “Earl Grey tea. I apologize for the lack of beverages, but I don’t have guests that often and I tend to use what I have before getting more. The tea helps keep the chill at bay so I don’t have to keep the fireplace going all day long.”

“Sensible,” the director commented as he accepted the cup and breathed in the smell. “Citrus,” he commented. “I see you use the blend with dried bergamot orange rinds rather than the variant infusing bergamot oil into the leaves.”

Alex glanced at him quizzically before shrugging casually. “If you say so. It was the tea my grandfather used to drink and since he kept a lot of it in the store room, it’s been what I drink when it’s cold.” After sipping from his cup, Alex set it down and turned his gaze to Melendez. “If you didn’t already know, I’m a bit of a recluse. I have been for a while now. You’ve learned more about me than I’ve been willing to divulge to anyone else in a long time. So I suppose I should ask you to get on with your proposal. Your ten minutes are running out.”

“So they are,” Richard acknowledged. “Mr. Sharp…Alex…my company is in need of trackers like yourself. Sheriff McDougal tells me you’re the best in the valley. He’s employed your skills on several occasions when searching for lost hikers in the surrounding forests.”

“I make it a point to know the land around me.”

“A sensible thing to do,” Melendez agreed. “Sheriff McDougal also says your skills are the best he’s seen, that you take after your grandfather.”

“If he says so,” Alex responded. “I never worried one way or the other about it.”

“He also tells me that you keep to yourself except to come down to the town once a week for groceries. For a while, you became something of the unofficial bouncer for the largest bar in town. You started doing this two years ago when you walked in on a drunk biker who was getting…well, let’s just say…”

“He didn’t know how to accept the word ‘No’,” Alex said, his expression turning fierce. “The waitress was scared and he was hitting on her, not hitting like trying to get to know her, he was actually hitting her, and no one was doing anything about it! So yeah, I got in his face and told him to stop.”

“And did he,” Melendez asked curiously, sipping from his tea.

Alex grimaced and turned away. “No.”

“And what happened next?”

Now Alex was looking embarrassed as he admitted, “The paramedics had to haul him and his buddy out on stretchers with a broken arm, broken leg and a shattered jaw between them.”

“That seems a little excessive, don’t you think?”

“You weren’t there,” Alex snarled, clenching his fists. “You didn’t see the fear in the woman’s eyes as the biker slapped her around. Even with my help, she left that night with a black eye.” Sighing as he looked down at his hands and slowly unclenched them. “But no one messed with her after that.”

“Why did you do that,” Melendez asked intrigued. “You didn’t have to involve yourself, but you did. Why?”

“Because it wasn’t right,” Alex said immediately. “No one would help her, so I did.”

“Was the owner thankful for your intervention?”

“At first,” Alex said as he looked away. “He appreciated that I was willing to help keep the peace when the police couldn’t arrive in time to stop things from getting out of hand. For a while, he let me come in, grab a meal and keep an eye on the place. I thought it might be a good idea to go out, meet folks, and maybe interact more so I wasn’t such a recluse. Seems I made a reputation for myself as being the town hermit, living up here all alone.”

“So what was the problem,” Richard asked quietly. “It sounds like you had a good thing going there.”

Alex sighed. “One night, a few months back, it was late and I wasn’t paying attention. A couple came in and were getting loud and drunk, but I didn’t know that they were just fooling around. The woman screamed and I lashed out at the guy. Before I knew it, the guy had a broken nose, and the woman was screaming at me instead of her date. I didn’t realize that was their way of having fun before they’d go home and…well…you know.”

“From what Sheriff McDougal told me, the bar owner told you to leave and not come back. That must have been embarrassing?”

“Yeah,” Alex looked away and sighed. “Look, you still haven’t told me why you’re here.”

“I need someone with a moral compass, Mr. Sharp,” Director Melendez said immediately. “Someone who can perform a task that could considered murky at best, and yet still be able to conduct himself with a sense of honor.”

“Why? What kind of task are you talking about?”

Gotcha, Richard thought to himself as he hid his smile behind a raised hand. “It’s classified. Bio-SciTech has acquired several lucrative governmental contracts for experimental agents that are being proposed for some solutions to situations around the country. The problem is that some of these solutions are radical to say the least, and until we’re able to know exactly how these solutions will work, we need to maintain security around our sites. One such site is less than twenty miles south of here.”

Leaning forward as he looked directly at Alex, Director Melendez said, “Your grandfather was a Marine as you said?” Alex nodded although Melendez already knew the answers to the questions he was asking. “He raised you after your parents died, taught you how to shoot, instructed you how to track and avoid detection, am I correct?”

“Yes sir,” Alex said.

Melendez smiled as he sensed the shift in Alex’s demeanor, the subtle lowering of his defenses as he felt at ease. “Your skills could be of use to us, Mr. Sharp. Foremost, to keep people from intruding upon our property, but also to aid in the capture and then release of test subjects for a top-secret government program that will help aid our country for years to come.”

“Capture?” Melendez senses Alex’s defenses going up again as he leaned back. “You’re talking about holding people against their will, you can’t do that.”

“No one would be harmed, Mr. Sharp,” Melendez tried to convince him. “The only reason we’re forced to consider these methods is because if it were to leak out to the public too soon, the lack of understanding would turn what could become a ground-breaking discovery into a trivialized and misunderstood joke.”

“But what about those you’d want to capture, wouldn’t they reveal the truth? You couldn’t hold them indefinitely, and any extended detention would be considered illegal and unconstitutional.”

Melendez admired the young man’s intelligence. He certainly wasn’t a fool, that was sure, but Richard knew this before he even proposed recruiting Alex Sharp into the program. “Under certain circumstances, for national security and defense, the government can authorize actions which would circumvent that, so long as the individuals are released and compensated for their involvement. Based on our current projections, we’re confident that anyone selected as a test subject would be detained no longer than one week, during which time they would be unaware of what was happening to them. They would endure no lasting harm and afterward, their memories would be carefully manipulated to remove any trace of their experiences, and they would be compensated for their involvement through confidential and totally anonymous sources.”

“Why come to me,” Alex inquired, leaning back defensively. “I’m a twenty-one year old man who wanders the hills in this area.”

“It’s because of that fact that we’re interested in your skills, Alex,” Melendez said. “We’ve determined that the best method for acquiring subjects is during the warmer months where people use the Shenandoah River for recreational use. Boaters, kayakers, canoeists, even young people tubing down the river for enjoyment will serve as the kind of individuals who can help us determine if this project is viable to move forward on a larger scale. The river attracts all sorts of folks, and yet it isn’t so overrun that we would be forced to detain large numbers of people. A handful at a time is all we’ll need. We subdue them, study them, and once it’s done, they’re released with no knowledge of what happened. By the time we’re finished, we’ll pack up and any trace of our activities will be gone until we can present our findings to the government and the United Nations Council.”

“United Nations? What do they have to do with any of this?”

“If our findings support moving forward with this operation, it could be done in other countries as well, helping us ease problems across the globe.”

“What kinds of problems,” Alex asked, now leaning forward, much to the director’s delight.

“Over-population, starvation, food management, urban-creep, prison reforms,” Director Melendez replied. “These are but a few of the applications that we’re looking into implementing. With your assistance, we can complete our tests ahead of schedule and report our findings to the federal government for approval. You’d be doing your nation a great service, Alex.”

“I-I don’t like the idea of holding people against their will, it isn’t right,” Alex said firmly. “If this project is so important, why can’t it be revealed and have volunteers? Surely there would be enough people who would see the benefits of this project.”

Melendez sat back and sighed, rubbing his forehead. “Alex, sometimes the law doesn’t address these things. Who, in their right minds, back in the time of the Founding Fathers would have imagined some of the things we have today? Hmm? Computers? Space flight? Electricity? The modern automobile? Now consider some things like polio, small pox, the Spanish Flu, these and other life-threatening issues plagued our country until we found a way to overcome them. Some methods of testing were not as nice as we’d like to think, and others were very controversial, but thanks to those methods, we have what we are today, a nation built on strength and freedom.”

“Without divulging classified material, I can tell you that the project involves changes to an individual that, if it were known to the general public, would become misunderstood and would invite radical elements from multiple groups who wouldn’t understand that what we’re trying to do is actually help people. Our country is facing some very difficult issues involving food shortages, housing, and a growing prison population. These experiments we’re working on will help ease these problems on a scale not realized in years.”

“I won’t lie to you, Alex…what we’re proposing would be seen by some people as unnatural, a perversion of nature or inhumane, but we’re not advocating for people to die…we’re looking to prove that this project can help save lives. I’m betting that your grandfather instilled that kind of moral character in you before he passed. I need people like that to ensure that our efforts remain focused in the right direction. I’d like you to join us, shepherd test subjects through the process so we can advance our project, and when we’re through, they’ll be released safely and unharmed.”

Richard could see the indecision on Alex’s face as he rose to his feet and walked over to the window overlooking the valley. For what seemed like minutes, Alex stared outside and said nothing. Director Melendez knew he had to say something that would convince Alex that their intentions were good, anything that would turn him to their side.

“Alex, I’m sure your grandfather was a good man. He raised you when you lost your parents, he gave you a home, taught you right from wrong, taught you skills that are not easily learned. You’ve spent the last few years alone, wondering what to do with your life. I’m asking you to be a part of something that will, in years to come, be seen as the beginning of a new way of life for all people, not just Americans.”

“For the last decade, our company has seen some very promising results in the lab, but now we need to step outside the lab, into the real world, and see if those results can be replicated. While we do that, we need people with character, to ensure that we don’t compromise our convictions of seeing a better tomorrow for everyone. Now Sheriff McDougal speaks highly of you, which is why he told me that he didn’t press charges after that misunderstanding at the bar. We need people like you to help us, not only to complete our tests, but to maintain our goal of bettering humanity without losing sight of its inherent goodness.”

“You flatter me,” Alex said quietly, his back to Melendez. “I’m no saint. I’m just a man, trying to do what’s right.”

“That’s what we need, Alex,” Melendez said in his most convincing voice.

When Alex didn’t respond, Richard waited for several minutes before turning to reach for his suitcoat. As he rose, Alex responded, “No one dies, is that what you’re telling me? This project you’re asking me to be a part of won’t result in any deaths?”

“Absolutely not,” Richard said. “The project moved beyond any stage where loss of life was of any concern years ago. At this point, it focuses solely on the practical application of the experiment in the field.”

“I assume there are aspects that you can’t tell me about, but tell me again what my role will be?”

Encouraged by the young man’s response, Director Melendez said, “Your role is on target acquisition, subjugation, and retrieval.”

“Subjugation…that sounds like someone could be harmed.”

“Absolutely not,” Melendez countered. “The process we’ve perfected, while unusual and disturbing at first, is actually quite enjoyable for the targets. After they’ve been captured and brought in for examination, they’re well treated until such time as they are released. No harm comes to anyone at any time.”

“All right,” Alex said, turning with his arms crossed as he leaned against the window. “If we’re talking about employment, what are you offering me for this important position?”

Surprised by Alex’s directness, Richard said, “This isn’t a standard employment arrangement. It's more of a contract position with the option to renew your tenure with us after the appropriate period has been reached.”

“So I would be a contracted third-party. Not necessarily working directly for Bio-SciTech, but having the appropriate clearances to perform the duties you wish me to carry out. Correct?”

Alex’s detailed understanding of the arrangement the director was proposing nearly caught him off-guard. For a twenty-one year old, this young man is smarter than he lets on. Mr. Carlton better be on his toes around this one, he thought. With a careful smile, he said, “It seems you’re familiar with the general parameters of a contractual agreement.”

Alex shrugged. “The bar owner used the same kind of arrangement with me. I had access to the bar, but I didn’t have authority over anyone who worked there. So long as we’re clear what my duties are and what I’m allowed to do, that should be fine with me.”

“Well, in that case, you will receive one hundred thousand dollars for each successful assignment.” Seeing Mr. Sharp’s raised eyebrow, Melendez asked, “Is that acceptable?”

“One hundred thousand dollars…to track, subdue and then release individuals you want to use as test subjects for your classified projects. That seems a little excessive, don’t you think?”

“Not at all,” Richard responded. “You’ll also perform regular security checks of the perimeter of our facility, as well as several satellite sites throughout the valley. Any expenses for gear you require will be reimbursed immediately, but the amount we’re offering is considered fair given the delicacy of our operation and the need for secrecy.”

Alex turned and slowly walked across the room until he came to the fireplace where he reached up and gripped the mantle. After a few moments, he stared directly at Richard. “You said no one would be harmed.” When Director Melendez nodded, he said, “Give me your word, sir.”
For a moment, Melendez hesitated before Alex repeated, “Give me your word that no one will come to harm. No one will die. If I think for an instant that you’re lying to me, I’ll contact the authorities and have you and your company shut down before the day is over, contractual agreement or not. There is one thing that my grandfather left me that I never thought I would need, but in this case, it would be enough.”

“And what is that, son,” Melendez inquired, curious to know what Alex was speaking of.

“Integrity. My grandfather was a man of integrity, and he knew people who, if I were to contact them, would know that I’m not doing so on a whim. If you tell me that what you’re asking me to be a part of is legitimate, and will help save lives without the loss of life, I’ll work for you, but if I find out you’re lying, I’ll destroy you. Do we have an understanding?”

Melendez looked down at Alex’s outstretched hand and grasped it firmly, shaking it as he responded, “Absolutely, son. You have my word…no one will die from this project. You honor your grandfather with your integrity. It’s a pleasure to have you join our team.”

As they parted, Alex stepped back. “When should I expect to begin this assignment, sir?”

Melendez smiled as he slipped his suitcoat over his shoulders. “It’s Friday. Enjoy the weekend. On Monday, I’ll send your supervisor, John Carlton to pick you up and bring you to our facility on the outskirts of the Shenandoah Historic District. Our satellite facility is located there and we’ll get you started on your new career. It’s been a pleasure, son.”

“Thank you, sir. I look forward to contributing to this project your company…”

“Our company,” Melendez reminded Alex with a smile. “As of now, you’re a part of it.”

Alex nodded. “Yes sir. I look forward to contributing to our company’s future success.”

“That’s good to hear,” Melendez said as they walked toward the front door and out onto the porch. Taking a deep, bracing breath of the cold air, he said, “I’ve got to say, this is a fabulous view you have up here. Your grandfather really knew how to pick a spot for a home.”

“Yes he did,” Alex said reverently. “It’s a shame we didn’t get a chance to spend more time together. I always hoped to show him what I could do with everything he taught me.”

“I’m sure he knows, Mr. Sharp,” Director Melendez said as he slipped his sunglasses back on and stepped down the stairs to his waiting ride. Turning back to look up at Alex, he added, “I look forward to seeing you on Monday. Enjoy the weekend.”

“The same to you, sir,” Alex responded as he nodded and watched as the vehicle pulled around and disappeared back down the driveway toward the highway below.

In the car, Director Melendez pulled out his smart phone and dialed a number. After several rings he said, “Mr. Sharp has chosen to join our team. Please be sure we’re ready to welcome him at the beginning of the week.”

As he put the phone away, he turned to the other passenger. “I trust you did as I instructed, Mr. Carlton?”

John pulled the mask away from his face. “Yes sir. The traps are back the way they were before I found them. So? What do you make of our golden boy? Is he everything you thought he would be?”

“Everything and more,” Melendez said with a grin. “He’s so stuck on integrity and doing the right thing that he’ll be blinded to what we’re really doing. The boy even had the guts to threaten me if I was lying to him.”

“You were lying to him,” John countered. “We’re using him, Director. Once he’s performed his service to the company, he either does what you tell him to do, or he joins the other washouts as another test subject for the drug. He’s no different.”

Looking out the tinted window at the snow-covered forest passing by, Director Melendez shook his head. “No…he’s different all right. There’s something about him that reminds me of you, except there’s a hunger to prove himself. Maybe he feels his grandfather died before he could show him what he could do with what he learned. We’ll find out. In the meantime, I expect you to get him up to speed before spring time. Once the snows melt and the river is ready for target acquisition, I want you both to get me test subjects. The corporate office has been hounding us for more data on the drug, and the few stray homeless people we’ve been able to pick up aren’t of sufficient quality or quantity to allow us to move forward.”


Watching the luxury vehicle disappear down the hillside, Alex turned back and walked into the house, closing the door behind him. Heading downstairs, he walked past the hanging meat to open the panel leading down into the cave. Once inside, he walked over to the computers and pulled up the monitors so he could set search parameters. However, before doing so, he engaged the virtual private network his system worked through to cloak his investigations from any prying eyes.

Entering in a search for the director as well as his company, Alex leaned back in his leather chair and watched as the screen filled with Google searches for Bio-SciTech and Richard Melendez. Both searches came up with surprisingly little concrete information other than bland reports from sycophantic reporters wanting to improve their credentials in their news organizations.

Bio-SciTech was touted as a cutting-edge technology and research firm established in the late 1990’s and was originally based out of the United Kingdom, before moving to United States a decade ago. Articles discussed how the company was coming up with all sorts of technological and scientific breakthroughs in critical areas of the economy, but none of them specifically went into any details. As for Richard Melendez, he was described as a man ahead of his time by the same reporters. His employment history read like the dictionary, filled with roles in obscure companies where he appeared to do little and succeed at it time and time again. He rose to the position of Director of Operations for Bio-SciTech only five years ago, succeeding the previous director whose name Alex could not find, despite repeated searches. Since his rise to power, Richard Melendez took part in the company’s acquisition by another larger firm, this corporate entity known as Global Resources Unlimited or G.R.U. If Bio-SciTech’s performance was sketchy, Global Resources Unlimited was even more so, with information listing them as a powerhouse on the New York stock exchange, but lacking in any detail what they actually did. After several hours of exhaustive searching, Alex leaned back in his chair again and sighed. He’d hoped to have more to go on by now, but there was nothing he could find, either good or bad.

“What do I do, Grandpa,” he said out loud as he closed his eyes and listened to the computers soft hum echo off the natural ceiling. “My first real job and it looks like I’ll be working for a company that I have nothing to go on, for a man I know very little about, and performing a function which is sketchy at best.”

He gave you his word, son, Alex imagined his grandfather telling him. Sometimes you have to go with that and see where it takes you.

“And what happens if he’s lying,” Alex asked out loud.

You already told him what would happen if he was lying. Did you mean what you said?

“Absolutely,” he whispered to himself.


Present Day

Sitting atop a fallen tree, Alex stared at the ground, disgusted by what he’d done. Seeing the poor auburn-haired woman lying alone and terrified in the bottom of her river tube was beyond anything he ever thought would happen when Director Melendez first approached him for this project. Even after being initiated into the company and receiving the orientation of what he would be involved with, it didn’t seem to be real. He was shown how the drug worked in theory, how it would reduce people to the size of dolls over the course of several hours. They explained how he and his fellow trackers would watch over them as they shrank before capturing them and taking them back to the research lab. Once there, they would be examined over the course of a week to see how the drug affected them to ensure there were no lasting negative side effects. Lastly, they would be returned to normal with their memories erased through chemical means, with implanted suggestions of what happened during that time.
When he saw it for the first time with a group of three young college men found camping near Forest Grove, he was understandably shocked. It was one thing to be told what to expect, and be shown simulations of the effects, but to see them actually shrink was something different. Unlike the women he was currently tracking, the three men were taken at night time while sleeping in their tents. Before they had time to wake, they were shrunk, subdued and quietly taken to the facility for examination. Doctor Lithe, the lead researcher, assured him that everything was proceeding exactly as expected and that by the end of the week, the three men would be returned to their camp site. Just to be safe, he’d even followed their progress to ensure they were released after their week-long examination was over. According to the doctor, everything went as predicted and their time under examination provided significant data for the drug’s future approval.

However, what he was witnessing with these three young women was completely different from what he’d experienced the first time. All three girls exhibited reduction rates faster than those of the young men, and the stimulation they received was nothing like what occurred previously. It was almost deliberate in its intentional humiliation of them as women, reminding him of the waitress he’d defended back at the bar that first time. However, what troubled him the most was their reactions to what was happening to them. The first two women struggled to deal with the changes, but appeared to be handling themselves well enough that he was confident they would be okay, but not the third woman. Seeing her rapid reduction and her response to it was the hardest thing he’d been forced to endure since joining the company. She wasn’t just alarmed at her situation, she was terrified by it, and he worried what it was doing to her. What treatment could the company possibly have that would help her deal with what she was going through?

That wasn’t the worst of it though. Alex thought back to his first meeting with Director Melendez in December of last year. At that meeting in his house, he told Alex that the project was meant to help people, that it was being done with the best of intentions, and that ‘no one will die from this project.’ Alex fumed at the memory of the director looking him in the eyes and lying to him! No one would get hurt and no one would suffer, he said, but based on Tracker Two’s own admissions, the director was aware of the heinous acts John committed, using one of the newest variants of the drug simply to eliminate anyone along the river who might discover what they were doing. How many people suffered being turned into microscopic specks, helpless to save themselves from any number of horrible fates? Alex discovered two poor souls, or at least what remained of them. To anyone outside of the company who didn’t know of the drug and its effects, they would simply chalk up discovering clothes and personal items strewn on the ground as some unexplainable occurrence. No one would believe what he knew to be true, and John had the gall to dare him to do something about it!

Clenching his fists in anger, Alex trembled with fury. He wanted to act, to make John and everyone else involved pay for what they’d done, except that included him as well. He knew what the drug could do and he trusted the director’s word when he told him that it wouldn’t be used to kill anyone. It didn’t matter that he could claim ignorance to the acts, if he didn’t do something to stop them, he was just as guilty as they were.

What was worse, if he tried to go to the press, or contact someone and tell them what happened, there was no way he could convince them he was telling the truth. A drug that shrank people? He’d be laughed at before he got more than a few sentences out of his mouth, and even if they humored him and listened, how would he prove it? Any attempt to walk into Bio-SciTech’s offices without definitive proof would be stopped in an instant, and all they had to do to hide the truth would be to lie, and Director Melendez had already shown that he was quite capable of doing that. Once the investigators and the reporters left, he’d find himself with a target painted on his back, looking over his shoulder for one of the director’s men who would do to him what John did to those poor people along the shore. He’d be shrunk out of existence, and they’d go on as if he never existed. There was no way John could claim that he didn’t have approval to use the India variant from the director. It was too new, untested, and based on what it did to those people, deadly.

Rising to his feet, Alex bent down to pick up his rifle, seething inside at the thought of them getting away with what they were doing. They had to pay!

Pulling the comm-link from his ear, Alex grimaced as he recalled the director’s own words: You have my word…no one will die from this project.

“Liar,” he growled, pacing back and forth, feeling his blood boil with each passing moment.

Alex, don’t do anything stupid, he heard his grandfather’s voice. You can’t barge into the facility and confront him. Director Melendez may have manipulated you, but if you go at him and admit what you know and that you’re against him, you’ll be lucky not to become one of those poor souls shrunk out of existence. He’s a dangerous man, and right now you need to do something about those poor girls.

“I swore that I would make him sorry if he lied to me,” Alex hissed softly. “I can’t just let that go! Think of all those poor people. This drug isn’t meant to help people, it’s meant to control them!”

You’re wrong, boy, his grandfather chided him. Like I taught you, nothing inanimate is bad. A gun isn’t evil because it can kill. It is a tool, nothing more. This drug isn’t evil. It’s how it’s being used that makes it wrong.

“How can I stop them? If I don’t do anything, they’ll keep shrinking people. I can’t keep pretending that I’m not bothered by this. I thought I could handle it, but now that I know the truth, I can’t be a part of this.”

First things first, son, his grandfather warned him like he used to. Those young ladies need your help, but you can’t let John Carlton or Director Melendez know that you’re opposed to what they’re doing or they’ll shrink you too and then those girls won’t stand a chance. You need to come up with a plan, like I always taught you to do…think before you act. It’s the only way.

Alex closed his eyes and thought of what he needed to do, trusting his grandfather’s wisdom would guide him. He considered his options carefully. If he showed any sign of being against what was going on, they’d turn on him. If he tried to act before he had hard evidence to prove what was going on, they’d stop him. If he acted before the girls were free and able to escape, they’d be eliminated and their blood would be on his conscience. No, he had to be careful. He had to outsmart them and let them think he was still on their side. Convincing John shouldn’t be that hard, since he didn’t consider Alex to be much of a threat, but Director Melendez, he wasn’t so easily fooled. After all, he’d manipulated Alex in the first place, now Alex had to turn the tables on him without him knowing it.

The easiest way to convince them that you’re on their side is to take the girls in, he heard his grandfather’s voice say. I know you don’t like the idea, but it’s the only way they’ll trust you.

Gritting his teeth, Alex growled softly at the thought of the young women in the clutches of Director Melendez or John. Doctor Lithe might be able to help him, perhaps even agree to join him in setting them free. Perhaps he could ask her to delay any tests until he had a chance to find a way to release them.

That’s not a good idea, son, his grandfather’s voice sounded in his mind. The more people you involve in this plan, the more likely something is going to go wrong. Doctor Lithe might seem nice, but she’s the head researcher for the company. Why would she jeopardize her position just to save three young women?

As he tried to come up with more ideas, Alex heard the comm-link chime, catching his attention. Slipping it back into his ear, he heard John’s voice. “Tracker Two to Tracker Three…hey there, boy, you still there?”

Taking a deep breath, Alex steeled himself to do what needed to be done. “Tracker Three here, sir. I took a spill into the river and it took a few minutes to be sure everything was okay.”

Laughter came over the link as John enjoyed hearing of Alex’s misfortune. “Oh that’s rich, boy. So what’s the status of Number Two?”

Heading out at a brisk jog, Alex followed after the auburn-haired woman’s tube. “Last visual sighting showed that Gamma was in full effect. Target was last confirmed as being eight inches tall, possibly smaller.”

“Damn! Now that’s what I want to hear! Catch up with her and determine how she’s doing. You should be coming back up on the right fork of the river, which means you’ll find the other two girls soon. Be careful not to let them see you just yet. Let’s allow them to cook a little more before we take them in for observation. Satellite tracking shows that they’re almost to the river bend that turns toward the Grove Hill Boat Ramp. They’ve got about another mile or so, which should be enough time to shrink down to the target size for us to scoop them up and take them in.”

“Copy that, Tracker Two. I’m catching up to Number Two right now. She appears to hiding in her clothes, unresponsive, so I doubt she’ll see me. I have the point where the river joins back up again. Looks like I can see one…no, two of the tubes floating by now. One is almost completely deflated, so they probably got into the other one. We’re not that far behind them.”

“Excellent work, Tracker Three. Damn, boy. You had me worried for a while there. I thought you were going to go all righteous on us, but it looks like you’ve seen the light.”

Grimacing as he responded, Alex responded with a fake laugh. “Yeah, I uh, I just was a little shocked that you were using the drug on people like that. I guess I got insulted that you didn’t think I would be able to take care of the situation on my own.”

“Director Melendez wants to be sure no one gets a whiff of this,” Carlton replied as Alex slipped deeper into the woods while passing the tube where Beth lay unresponsive. “You were doing your part, making sure those three girls have a wild time as they shrink down to the target size. He didn’t want you distracted. He’s proud of you, boy. You’re doing a great job. Hell, if we’re lucky, we’ll make it back to the facility with those little ladies in hand before dinner time and then I can head off to the bar in Luray for a night filled with lots of beer and maybe a little action of my own, know what I mean?”

“Y-yeah, sounds like fun.”

“If you like, you can join me for a round or two.”

“Can’t,” Alex said, trying to keep from throwing up at the idea. “I guess I’m a light-weight when it comes to alcohol. Never developed the taste for it.”

“Seriously? Aw well, maybe another time. Look, catch up to the other girls and see where they stand. You’ve got the inflatable containment systems in your gear, right?”

“Affirmative, sir,” Alex replied, thinking of the item John was referring to. “I packed three before we set off earlier.”

“Good job. Now, if you find that they’re six inches or smaller, you can go ahead and capture them. The globes inflate big enough to handle them at that size. Better we try to snatch them up before they get to Grove Hill so no one sees them.”

“I thought you took care of that already,” Alex said, barely containing his hatred for the man for what he did.

“Grove Hill is too busy a spot to be shrinking a whole bunch of people down. That place is usually crawling with folks, sometimes a dozen or more at a time. Shrinking that many in one place would surely set off red flags that would alert the local authorities.”

“How many have you taken out already,” Alex wanted to know.

John’s laugh came over the link. “Curious, huh? Well, there were those two folks you found on the river’s edge, then there was this lovely little Hispanic girl, couldn’t have been more than twenty. She was in a kayak at the time. Watching her go down was a treat. There was a hunter down along the bend, you might catch his camouflage gear lying along the water’s edge. He had a sweet AR-15 decked out with some nice gear on it. I’m taking that back as a souvenir.”

Disgusted at John’s callousness, Alex didn’t respond as he came to the junction where the river came together again, watching the river tube with the two girls pass him by as the one with the auburn-haired girl slowly approached. “Yeah, you’ll have to show it to me when we get back to the facility. I’ve not had the chance to try one of those before. My grandfather taught me how to fire a PTR-91.”

“Holy shit, are you kidding me? That’s a powerful weapon there.”

“I can get a center-shot with it at two hundred yards, and that’s without a scope.”

John’s whistle came back over the link. “Gotta say, that’s some nice shootin’ boy. Maybe sometime we’ll have to get together and fire off some rounds for fun at your place, what do you say?”

Alex imagined using his PTR-91 on John before responding, “We’ll see. For now, let’s get this job over with.”

“Sounds good to me.”

[MarauderTDL]

Just so folks realize...

No, Alex isn't crazy. He believes he is actually speaking with his grandfather, even though he's dead. In my mind, I always imagined that since his family was part Native American, there was a connection to the spirit world, and that his grandfather was speaking to him in that way...or so Alex believes. Whether that's true or not, I let the reader believe what they will. The one thing I should have mentioned early on is that I imagine Alex's grandfather being like a Kris Kristofferson, or a Sam Elliott kinda guy. Hope that helps to give you a better sense of what you're hearing when you see his thoughts.

[MarauderTDL]

Chapter Ten: Trapped!

Sitting next to each other in the tube, Michelle and Sarah heard a crack that made them both jump in fright, followed by a shudder that shook the entire tube around them. After looking around, they moved to sit up and check on Beth when a massive force struck the back of the tube, sending them both flying forward. Luckily, the head rest was in their way and they both bounced off the extra padding and rolled to the center of the tube, with Michelle laying on top of Sarah.

“What in the world just happened,” Michelle asked in shock. “Is somebody shooting at us?”

“I don’t think so,” Sarah said, raising a hand to her head as she swayed a little. “Wow, I don’t know what happened, but I feel like…oh! Oh no! Michelle! Help me!”

Glancing back at the sound of Sarah’s voice, Michelle gasped as she watched her friend dwindle before her eyes. Sarah slipped onto the bottom of the tube, her breaths coming in short, aroused gasps as her body contracted, almost in time with her breathing. Soon, the towel Sarah wore crumpled around her as her legs slipped under the fabric, almost all the way up to her feet. At the very end, Sarah tensed as she let out a cry of pleasure and then collapsed. The towel, now serving as a blanket, covered her up to her neck, but Michelle could see where Sarah’s feet were poking up through the fabric and she realized that Sarah was now shorter than she was!

Leaning down, Michelle called out to her. “Sarah? Oh God, Sarah, talk to me! Talk to m…ah! No! Please! Oh God!”

Unable to fight the sensations that gripped her, Michelle collapsed next to Sarah, her voice becoming even higher in pitch than before as her body surrendered even more size to the unseen force that was stealing it away from her. The only benefit was that the orgasmic sensations were getting stronger the smaller she became, and she couldn’t stop herself from enjoying them. After one last jolt and a loss of another inch, she mercifully blacked out atop Sarah’s chest.


When Michelle woke up, she yelped in surprise at Sarah’s face looking down at her. Seeing Michelle was awake, Sarah breathed a sigh of relief.

“It’s about time,” Sarah exclaimed as she helped Michelle sit up, only to cringe as the t-shirt Michelle was wearing slipped off both shoulders, completely exposing her naked body.

“I’m sorry,” Sarah apologized, reaching down to lift up the mass of fabric and set it behind Michelle so she could sit on it. “I’ll see if we have something you can wear, but I’ve got to admit, we’re running out of options. Soon, we’ll both be running around naked.”

“How long was…oh!” Michelle gasped at her own voice which sounded like a one of those cartoon Chipmunks from the movies in the early 2000’s. “I sound ridiculous.”

Sarah giggled. “Actually, you sound adorable, although I can’t say my voice sounds much better.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Michelle protested. “You’re much ta-…” As Sarah sat down beside her, Michelle realized that Sarah wasn’t that much taller than she was now.

“Yeah,” Sarah confirmed for her. “I shrank a lot more than you did while we were out. Based on my less-than-perfect measurements based on an empty soda bottle, you’re about thirteen inches tall now, and I’m lucky if I’m sixteen inches tall.”

Confused, Michelle looked around and noticed that they weren’t in her river tube anymore. “When did we move to your tube and why?”

“When I woke up and found that your tube was sinking.”

“Sinking?!?” Michelle leapt to her feet and tried in vain to look over top of the tube. Using the cooler, she hopped up and caught sight of her tube, or at least what was left of it floating behind them, although most of it was submerged now.

“Oh my God,” Michelle whispered at the sight of the deflated tube. It appeared as if Sarah managed to get herself and Michelle into her tube, as well as most of the food and drinks.

“Sorry about your phone,” Sarah apologized, the towel she originally wore prior to her recent reduction now wrapped around her like a thick robe. “When I woke up, you were still unconscious and I noticed that your tube was sinking. I got you, the food and drinks and some of our clothes into my tube, but before I could reach your phone, the current pulled it out of the panel and it sank.”

“I think my phone is the least of our worries right now,” Michelle said, still weirded out by the chirpy sound of her voice. “What happened? The last thing I remember, we were tossed around my tube and then we both started shrinking.”

“I remember,” Sarah said. “I don’t know what it was, but somehow your tube was damaged and started leaking air. After getting everything over here, I managed to undo the connector and release your tube. However, it wasn’t until then that I realized…Beth’s tube was gone.”

“How? We were connected together!”

Helping Michelle back up on the cooler, Sarah joined her and they leaned over the side so Sarah could point at Michelle’s tube. “Look at the right side, see there?”

As Michelle followed her finger, she saw what Sarah was pointing at. “What the hell? The connector looks like it was blasted apart!”

“That’s probably what caused your tube to deflate. Pieces of the connector must have penetrated the tube’s skin and caused it to lose air. What has me worried is that the only way that connector could have been destroyed like that is if someone shot it.”

Michelle looked confused. “Who would shoot the connector of a river tube? If they intended to pop the tube, all they’d have to do is aim for the side. It would blow a hole in the chamber large enough to sink us almost immediately.”

“But what if they didn’t intend to do that,” Sarah suggested. “What if they were aiming for the connector?”

“Why?”

“Well the connector held your tube and Beth’s tube together. If they shot the connector, it would separate us from her, right?”

“So?”

“So maybe they intended to do that.”

“It still doesn’t make sense though,” Michelle argued. “Where did Beth’s tube go? She’s not in front of us, and she’s not behind us.”

Turning so they could see what was ahead of them, Sarah pointed to what looked like the mouth of a river coming out of the side of the embankment. “What if there was a split in the river back there and someone wanted to separate us to isolate Beth from you and me?”

“None of this is making any sense! What is the point of isolating Beth? We’re all shrinking.”

Sarah shrugged. “How should I know? What I do know is that just before this situation, we were all about the same size, but now you and I only a little over a foot tall. That would make Beth the tallest of the three of us, unless something has happened to her.”

“You’re thinking that this isn’t the work of something in the water, are you?”

“Not anymore,” Sarah confirmed Michelle’s guess. “Up until your tube was damaged, I was in agreement that whatever was shrinking us was naturally occurring, but now, it’s got to be something we’ve been deliberately exposed to. None of this was an accident. Someone meant to shrink us, and they must have intended to separate Beth from us. Whether they meant to damage your tube in the process, I don’t know, but it was definitely deliberate. However, you realize that this means someone is out there watching us, probably waiting until we’re so small that we’re unable to fight back.”

Michelle gasped as another inch melted away from her body, making her tremble in anger. “Dammit! If this continues, they won’t have to do anything except scoop us up by hand!”

“I know,” Sarah agreed just moments before her breath caught in her throat and she dwindled down before Michelle’s eyes. Only this time, she didn’t stop until she was shorter than Michelle and the towel refused to stay on, tumbling down over the side of the cooler to reveal her naked body. Sighing in frustration, Sarah raised her hands to show off her slender, tiny body. “See, I told you. Now we’re both naked!”

“We’ve got to do something,” Michelle said. “We can’t just wait here for someone to come and take us away!”

“At this point, I don’t think we’ve got much of a choice,” Sarah pointed out their situation. “Now that I think about it, I’m beginning to wonder if old man Shackleton wasn’t involved with this.”

Michelle blinked in surprise. “Really? I know the guy was weird and everything, but you actually think he’s involved?”

“Look at the facts, he practically told us where to go. He assured us that everything would be fine, and he said he’d be at the pickup spot just after the Grove Hill Boat Ramp to take us back to your Jeep so we could go home. Something tells me he isn’t going to be there, or if he is, he’ll be waiting to pick us all up and take us somewhere.”

“So what do we do? Do we grab what we can and jump out of the tube? Run into the forest and pray that we don’t shrink so small that we’re killed by some wild animal? We’re already small enough that anything larger than a cat would be dangerous, and if we keep shrinking, we could wind up fighting off bugs or something. And what about Beth? We can’t just abandon her. She’s got to be out here somewhere.”

Sarah slumped atop the cooler and shook her head. “No. You’re right. If we tried that now, we’d probably be dead in a matter of hours.” Sighing heavily, she wondered, “I hope Beth is okay.”

“Wait! What’s that?” Michelle pointed off to the left where another part of the river joined up with their portion. “Hey! That’s Beth’s tube! Beth! Beth!”

There was no answer.

“Oh God, you don’t think that…” Sarah looked at Michelle, fear in her eyes. “We’ve got to find a way to reach her.”

“How? You’re less than a foot tall, and I’m not that much taller. I don’t know how we could…” Michelle’s eyes lit up. “Your charger cable! It’s six feet long! We could anchor one side with something to weigh it down and toss it into her tube to bring it next to ours.”

Sarah gasped as she looked back at Beth’s tube. “Well we’d better hurry, because it’s sinking! Look!”

To Michelle’s horror, she saw that Sarah was right. Beth’s tube was deflated and barely floating on the surface. One side of the tube had already collapsed and was slowly sinking into the water. Behind it, they could see an empty Corona bottle and a Pepsi bottle bobbing on the surface, while a half-eaten bag of Doritos with some chips floating around it, sank below the surface.

“We’ve got to hurry! If she’s still in the tube, we’ve got to save her! Beth! Beeeeth!”

A tiny hand reached over the top of the front portion of the tube, waving frantically as they heard a tiny voice, much like Michelle’s call out, “I’m here! Help! The tube is sinking!”

Sarah looked at Michelle. “She must have shrunk while we were separated. Look at her hand, she must be smaller than us!”

Michelle leapt down into their tube and ran over to the pouch holding Sarah’s cell phone. It took every ounce of effort just to pull the zip-lock seal open, something Michelle never believed would be possible, but at her size, the seal was tough. Just before she gave up, the seal broke and the plastic bag opened so she could reach inside. Pulling out the charging cable, she wrapped one end around Sarah’s bag of pretzels, much to her dismay. “Look, if we somehow manage to get out of this, I’ll buy you a case of pretzels, all right? For now, this bag is the only thing I can pick up that is heavy enough for us to use to pull her tube next to ours, okay?”

Sarah nodded and helped her drag the bag up onto the cooler as they saw Beth’s tube coming closer. “It’s going down! Michelle, we have to hurry!”

Beth’s tube swirled around in an eddy of the current before being released, except that the deflated tube was moving out of reach! Fearing they were too late, Michelle flung the bag with all the might her tiny body could muster. The bag sailed through the air, bouncing off the top of the tube before falling over the side into the inner section. Sarah and Michelle heard Beth squeal before an arm popped into the air, swinging back and forth.

“I’ve got it! Pull me over! The tube’s sinking!”

Between the two of them, Sarah and Michelle pulled the charger cable back, watching as Beth’s tube slowly changed course and moved in their direction. However, as it appeared that the tube would reach them, another eddy caught the deflating tube, yanking the two tiny women against the side of their tube, almost causing them to lose their grips on the cable.

“Don’t let go,” Michelle cried out as she tried to hold onto the thick cable in her diminutive fingers. “If that tube sinks, she’ll drown!”

Sarah understood what she meant. Despite the slow speed of the current, it was the depth of the water that was now a problem. For her and Michelle, now around a foot tall each, the channel which might have been five or six feet deep was more like twenty-five or thirty feet deep, and at their tiny sizes, even the slow current would be too much for them to handle, feeling more like a jet stream than a gentle flow. If Beth was their size or smaller, with her inability to swim well, she’d never survive being immersed in the river.

Gripping the cable with both hands, Sarah looked over the side and gasped. “Oh no! It’s going under!”

Another eddy, this one stronger and looking like a whirlpool as it caught the sinking tube in its grip, pulled Beth’s tube under, all but the front rim slipping beneath the water. Michelle screamed in horror as the cable flexed, grew taunt, and then was pulled out of their grip, sinking beneath the surface along with the tube.

“No! Beth! No! No! No!” Michelle dropped to her knees atop the rim of their tube, watching as Beth’s tube was sucked down, the only things left were soda bottles and chips that rose to the surface to bob serenely along the water as they were carried off downstream. Tears streamed down her cheeks as she watched the tube slow and catch on a branch, the deflated remains pushed beneath the surface by the force of the current. After several minutes, and no sign of Beth, Sarah reached down to pull Michelle back from the edge, hugging her as her friend sobbed against her shoulder. As they were swept away from Beth’s tube, Michelle watched in agonizing despair as the tube finally sank beneath the surface and disappeared, taking Beth with it.

“Oh God, she’s gone! We had her, she was right there and we had her!”

Sarah cried too, unable to get the sight of the tube going under out of her mind. What must Beth have been feeling as the tube took her under? It was so surreal, drowning in a slow-moving current of a river that couldn’t have been more than five feet deep. If Beth had been normal-sized, she could have simply stood up and been fine, but being shrunk, the river was now her watery grave.

“I know,” Sarah whispered as they held onto each other. “We were so close!”

“Guys?!?” They heard a voice call out.

Lifting their heads until they were looking at each other, they quickly scrambled up to the top of the tube to look over the side. What they saw was the strangest sight they’d ever seen!

Beth was clinging onto the back side of the tube, with one pretzel rod under each arm acting like floatation devices. She couldn’t have been more than four inches tall, as the pretzel rods were almost as long as she was tall!

“Don’t just sit there,” Beth called up to them in a high-pitched voice that made Michelle’s squeaky voice sound normal. “These pretzels are getting soaked pretty fast and I don’t know how much longer I can hang onto the side of the tube! It feels so slick, the only reason I can hold on is because I found a seam large enough to grip!”

Michelle gasped before jumping off the rim of the tube into the inner portion, bouncing as she impacted the surface, before rolling to a stop next to the bag containing Sarah’s phone. Grabbing another charging cable, she pulled it over to the cooler and lifted it up so Sarah could pull it to the top while Michelle climbed back up. When she reached the top, she helped Sarah dangle the cable over the side of the tube, down to where Beth’s tiny body bobbed in the water.

“Wrap the cable around your waist and we’ll pull you up,” Sarah called down to Beth.

“That would be a great idea, except I’m too small to bend the cable! It’s too rigid for me to bend,” Beth called back up to them. Yelping, she felt one of the pretzel rods break apart as the water turned Sarah’s favorite snack food into pieces of mush that collapsed beneath her armpit. “Hurry! These things won’t hold together much longer!”

“What’re we going to do,” Sarah said breathlessly. “Neither of us could jump down there to help her. We don’t have the strength to pull the other back up alone.”

Michelle looked down along the side of the tube. Spotting one of the connectors dangling by a thick strap in the water, she had an idea. However, Sarah saw what she saw and shook her head. “Don’t do it, Michelle! You’d have to swim alongside the surface of the tube to get to the strap and there’s no telling what could happen. You might shrink before you reach it and get sucked under water.”

“Well I’m not going to leave Beth to drown,” Michelle snapped. Seeing the fear in Sarah’s eyes, she reached out a hand to rest on her bare shoulder. “It’ll be all right. Trust me.”

Before Sarah could say anything, Michelle slid over the side of the tube and into the water with a splash. Pushing up immediately, her head broke the surface and she found herself struggling against the swirling current to keep from being pulled away from the tube. Beth saw her and called out to her.

“What are you doing?!? The current will suck you under, you idiot!”

“Well I wasn’t going to leave you to drown down here all by yourself,” Michelle fired back. “We’ve got to hurry. For all I know, I might start shrinking again any minute. Climb on my back and I’ll swim over to that connector. Do you see it?”

To a normal-sized person, the connector and strap might have been a couple of feet around the side of the tube and easily reached, but with Michelle shrunk to one foot tall, and Beth only a quarter of her friend’s size, the distance looked much farther.

“I see it,” Beth cried. “But the water will drag us under!”

“No it won’t,” Michelle argued. “Now hold on tight!”

Feeling Beth’s arms wrap around her neck, Michelle grabbed the seam Beth held onto and pulled as hard as she could to gain momentum. Luckily, she caught a shift in the current just as she released the seam and felt herself thrust forward. Seeing the strap dangling in front of her, Michelle reached out and grabbed it, only to feel the tightly-stitched fabric slide in her fingertips. Refusing to give up, she dug her fingernails into the strap, coming to a stop even as the current attempted to pull her downstream. With every ounce of strength she had left, Michelle pulled herself up out of the water, digging her bare toes into the tight stitching of the strap as she slowly climbed up the side of the tube. Above her, Sarah watched in apprehension as her friends slowly made their way up to the mid-way point, where a seam with a lip bowed upward. Pulling herself and Beth onto it, Michelle grabbed onto the cable that Sarah now dangled down to them, letting Beth climb up onto her shoulders to get her into reach of Sarah. Once Sarah pulled her over the side, she turned to Michelle, who couldn’t quite get a grip of the surface, the slick plastic making it impossible for her to find any purchase to pull herself up.

“What are we going to do,” Sarah called down to her. “I can’t pull you up with the cable by myself.”

Feeling the familiar tingling sensation returning, Michelle looked up at Sarah. “You need to trust me, can you do that?”

“Sure, but what are you talking about?”

As if on cue, Michelle gasped as her body was once again gripped by the tell-tale sign of her impending shrinking. “It’s happening again. Quickly, toss the cable down!”

Not understanding, but trusting Michelle’s judgement, Sarah slipped the cable down to her, even as Michelle felt another inch melt away. Feeling the cable smack into her, Michelle reached out and wrapped one end around her waist to form a loop that she slipped under her armpits. Feeling another inch melt away, the loop grew larger as she gripped the length of cable with both hands as tightly as she could.

“Pull me up,” Michelle called out, yelping as the sensation peaked and stole another inch from her. “I’m shrinking, so I should be small enough for you to lift me up on your own, but you’ve got to hurry! If I shrink much smaller, I won’t be able to hold on!”

Realizing what she meant, Sarah dug her heels into the tough plastic surface and pulled with all her might. Now less than nine inches tall, Michelle was becoming lighter with each inch she lost, and since she was still wet from plunging into the water, it made her body slick enough to slide along the outer surface of the tube. After several long and grueling minutes of pulling, Sarah finally got Michelle up to the top and over the edge to tumble down into the inner portion of the tube where she bounced harmlessly and came to rest in between two of the inflatable chambers with her feet sticking up in the air.

Sarah leapt down to help Michelle, only to stare in disbelief as she saw her two friends sitting together on the bottom. “Oh my God,” she gasped as she slipped down off the cooler and stepped carefully across the floor of the tube until she reached them.

Beth sat on top of one of the air chambers, her legs split in an open ‘V’ as the chamber spread her legs apart. As Sarah stood next to her, she towered over Beth, her friend’s head only reaching up to her waist. Michelle hadn’t fared much better, as she appeared to be twice Beth’s height and came up to the bottom of Sarah’s breasts.

“This is so surreal,” Sarah gasped as she sat down beside them, taking care not to jar the air chamber with her weight.

“You think this is weird for you,” Beth asked Sarah. “Consider how it feels for me! I’m so tiny, nothing fits me now. Oh!”

Beth blinked in surprise as Sarah lifted her friend up into her arms and hugged her against her bare chest. “I’m so glad you’re okay.”

“Uh, to be honest, ‘okay’ is kind of a subjective term for us right now, wouldn’t you say,” Beth replied. “I’m three or four inches tall, Michelle’s not much taller, and you’re what…a foot tall or close to it? Believe me, we’re definitely not ‘okay’.”

“You know what I’m talking about,” Sarah frowned as she released Beth and gently set her down on top of the rounded air chamber on the floor of the tube. “We were so worried about you. Even when we realized you were gone, we knew there was nothing we could do to try to find you. It was only luck that the portion of the river you went down merged with ours again. If you had gone down a smaller stream or a dead-end creek, we would have never found you again.”

“Sarah’s right,” Michelle said in her squeaky voice as she walked over to pull a chip from the Dorito bag, frowning when she discovered it was water-logged and mushy. Tossing the enormous chip aside, she returned and sat down beside Beth, almost double her friend’s height. “However, we managed to determine that our being separated wasn’t an accident. The connector holding our tubes together was shot apart, which caused my tube and yours to be damaged and leak air. Sarah’s tube was the only one that didn’t get damaged.”

“Well I lost everything when my tube sank,” Beth said, hanging her head. “Now I’m naked, and my phone sank with the…” It suddenly dawned on Beth just how silly her concern about her phone was. “What’s it matter now? At my size, I couldn’t even operate the damn thing.” Sighing, she asked, “So you’re saying someone did all this to us? That our shrinking was deliberate?”

Sarah shrugged, looking down at her tiny friends. “It makes sense, doesn’t it? Michelle and I figured someone is doing this to us. It’s the only reason they would shoot the connector holding our tubes together so you would be separated from us. Before then, you were taller than both of us. I guess you started shrinking again after you discovered you were alone?”

Beth nodded, pulling her legs up to her chest to hide her nakedness. “It couldn’t have been too long after that point that I felt an overwhelming arousal. I tried to resist it, but that only made it worse. I shrank down so fast that it made me black out. When I came to, I wasn’t much larger than I am now. All I could do was huddle in the middle of the tube and wait for whatever was going to happen. Problem was…that was about the time that I noticed that the tube was deflating and sinking, but I couldn’t do anything to stop it. I can only hope that I’ve reached a point where I don’t shrink anymore.”

“Don’t hold your breath,” Michelle said dejectedly. “I’ve got a bad feeling about this.” Glancing up at Sarah, she said, “I hate to break this to you, but if we’re this size, I’d prepare yourself to join us soon. If these people, whoever they are, meant to shrink us so small, they certainly won’t want someone as tall as you who could possibly struggle and get away.”

“So we’re just going to sit here and wait for them to come get us?” Beth stood up defiantly, until she realized how silly she must look at only four inches tall and then her shoulders slumped as she sat down. “I guess we are, huh?”

Michelle shrugged, hating the suggestion herself. “I don’t see where we have any choice. Escape isn’t an option now. Even Sarah, at her size, wouldn’t last long out here in the forest, and you and I certainly wouldn’t. I guess we just sit and wait for them to come get us, and then pray that some miracle helps us return to normal.”

“You really believe that we’ve got any chance in hell of returning to our normal lives after all of this,” Beth asked incredulously.

“I’ve got to believe it,” Michelle said softly.

“Why,” Beth demanded.

Michelle bowed her head and pointed upward at Sarah. “Because I don’t think Brad could bear to go on without Sarah. Am I right, Sarah?”

Beth turned to look up at Sarah, who turned to stare at the plastic bag in the side pouch of the tube containing her cell phone, but also her enormously-sized diamond engagement ring. The sunlight caught the solitaire diamond and glittered brilliantly, illuminating the inside of the tube with tiny sparkles of light for a few moments before the trees blocked the light. At Sarah’s currently size, the ring looked to be more the size of a hula-hoop as she reached out with her hand to touch it through the clear plastic.

“Y-yeah,” Sarah said in a voice barely above a whisper. “We’ve got to stay alive and find a way back. I wouldn’t want to live if I couldn’t be with Brad.”

Sighing softly, Sarah reached over and grabbed the t-shirt Michelle had been wearing before her rapid descent. Pulling at the fabric, she managed to get it to tear around the mid-section, furthest from any folds or stitching. With a little effort, she fashioned crude dresses for Michelle and Beth, using some twist-ties she’d brought along for the snacks to help them hold the pieces of cloth in place.

“I guess, if you shrink any more, you can adjust it a bit. Let’s just hope we don’t shrink much more.”

Seeing that Sarah had set aside another piece of cloth, Michelle asked, “What is that one for?”

“For me,” Sarah replied. “If what you’re saying is true, I’m going to be joining you soon enough, so I might as well have my dress ready for when I do. I have no desire to give whoever has done this to us a free show.”

“At our sizes, it’s not like we could stop them if they wanted to take them away,” Beth stated.

“Let’s just hope they don’t,” Sarah whispered as they sat huddled together, waiting to see what would happen.


“Tracker Two to Tracker Three, what’s your situation?”

Alex looked up from his rifle scope to activate his comm-link. “Tracker Two, it looks like all three women are together again. Number Two’s tube sank, but the other girls were able to save her before she drowned.”

“That’s good to hear,” John replied. “What are their current conditions?”

Despite hating himself for what he’d done, Alex knew he had to continue to play the charade of accepting his role in the poor girls’ situation. “It’s tough to be certain. Currently, they’re all sitting in the center of the tube and it’s hard to get a good view without compromising my position.”

John’s laughter came over the comm. “Are you serious? You’re afraid they’re going to see you? It’s not like they can do anything about it now, right?”

“I thought we were supposed to avoid detection until we’re authorized to secure them for transport to the facility,” Alex reminded his partner. “Anyway, from what I could see before they sat down, the one I separated from the others is about four or five inches tall. It appears that Gamma accelerated her reduction faster than we anticipated.”

“Four inches,” he heard John say in astonishment, the first time John sounded surprised throughout the entire operation. “Damn! That stuff worked faster than the researchers expected. I’d heard them suggest that it would take twice as long to shrink her that small.”

“What’re you complaining about,” Alex asked. “We’re coming around the bend to where the river straightens out and passes by the boat ramp. With two of the tubes deflated and lost, no one will question a lone tube that passes by apparently empty, right? By then, the drug should have shrunk them all down to size and we can pick them up along that small chain of islands half a mile past the boat ramp. The foliage in that area will block us from being seen and no one will be able to hear their cries while we scoop them all up.”

“Good point there, boy,” John said. “I’ve gotta say, you surprise me. I was worried for a little while that you were going soft on us. You managed to recover well.”

“Well, I think I’ve taken a liking to Number Two. She has spirit. Even when her tube was sinking, she didn’t freak out or close down. She’s a fighter. I admire that.” Hoping to keep John in the dark about how he felt, Alex added, “Listen, is there any chance the researchers might let me spend a little time with her before they, you know, fix her memories and release her and her friends?”

“Hmmm, I don’t know about that, kid,” John said seriously. “They don’t have a lot of time to perform the tests they need to do before they introduce the antidote, wipe their minds and get them back to their vehicle. If you like, I could check with the director and ask him?”

Not wanting to involve the director, Alex quickly responded, “No! That’s okay. I wouldn’t want to bother him. I guess I’ll just have to fantasize about her tiny body.”

John’s laughter came back over the link. “I’ve had to do that for months now, kid. Of course, between you and me, I’ve managed to stockpile a few extra cartridges of a few of the variants for personal use over at the old Prep Site Four, the one we decommissioned last month, remember? There’s a lady down at one of the bars in Luray who suggested she might have a thing for this kind of stuff.”

Alex was shocked to hear John suggest that he would use the drug for anything away from the testing area. “But what if Director Melendez finds out?”

John laughed again. “He knows, boy. I’d be stupid to claim otherwise. The only stipulation he made was that there no witnesses after the fact…get it?”

Alex felt his blood chill as he realized what John meant. He was using the drug for his own personal use, and then killing the victim by shrinking them! “Uh, wow…yeah, I get it. That’s a shame though. You’d think you could have more fun with someone who is used to it and wants to have it happen to them. Think of the fun that would bring you.”

“Rules of the game, boy,” John said. “No witnesses. We always clean up our messes.”

Hearing his superior speak this way, Alex knew their claims that they would release the women after the testing was complete were lies. Why bother with trying to create false memories and explanations for days of being missing when you could simply shrink the witnesses out of existence and be done with it? The realization of this fact made Alex’s blood boil, but he calmed his emotions, knowing that any slip up would mean that he’d join the young women as they were eliminated. Instead, he continued trying to come up with a way to stop what was happening, but the more he thought about it, the more he knew that any attempt to stop this before the women were captured would be suicide.

Patience, boy, he heard his grandfather’s sage words echo in his mind. Don’t act before you have a plan.

“So what are the conditions of the other two,” he heard Tracker Two ask.

“The black-haired woman is almost the same size as Number Two, about seven inches or so. She’s brave, I’ve got to say. She jumped in the water to save Number Two when her tube was sinking. She was about a foot tall at the time, but that didn’t stop her.”

“And the other one? The blonde?”

“She’s still about a foot t-…wait a second.” Alex trained the scope on the tube and watched as Sarah’s head slowly dropped down behind the top rim of the tube. “She just shrank again. I can’t tell how small she is now because she shrank out of sight, but she had to have lost at least two or three inches.”

“So that puts her around nine inches or so. Good,” John said, pleased with the results. “With all of them shrunk that small, I doubt anyone will see them from the shoreline, and they certainly won’t hear them if the girls try to call out for help. From what you’re telling me, they should pass the boat ramp in less than half an hour. I should meet you just past the ramp near the islands. By then, they should all be at the desired size and ready to be transported. See you in thirty, kid.”

Hearing John drop off the line, Alex pulled the comm-link out of his ear and sat back against a tree, sighing in frustration. “Dammit! How could I have been so stupid?!? I should have known better!”

You thought you were doing something positive with your life, son, he heard his grandfather’s voice say. How long since I passed? Almost six years? Since I brought you here, you’ve spent your entire life living in that house or roaming the hills and forest. I should have helped you integrate more with kids your age, helped you learn how to socialize, not become like your grandfather…a reclusive old man who hid away from the world.

“You didn’t hide,” Alex said softly to himself. “If that was true, you never would have come for me when mom and dad died.”

There was no one else, son. I couldn’t let my grandson become a foster child when you still had me.

“You gave me so much, you taught me how to survive.”

Surviving isn’t enough, boy. I never showed you how to live! Tell me you’re happy, and I’ll leave you alone. Tell me this is the life you want, and you’ll never hear from me again.

...

That’s what I thought.

“I always hated when you were right,” Alex whispered.

His grandfather’s gentle laughter echoed in his mind. Son, you know what you need to do.

“But I don’t know how to do it,” Alex hissed in frustration. “Look at what I’ve done! God! A drug that can shrink a living person until they’re only inches tall, or if John is to be believed, even smaller, and they gave it to me for what I thought was a worthwhile cause. Now…there’s no way this could be a government-sanctioned operation. I feel it in my bones, but I don’t know…” Alex’s eyes lit up as he suddenly had an idea.

Son, what you’re considering is risky at best. If you go through with this, there’ll be no turning back. They’ll come for you.

Breathing deeply, Alex said, “Let them. First things first though. I need to do my job and escort them to the facility and then we’ll see if an opportunity presents itself.”

Grabbing his rifle, Alex shot to his feet and took off at a sprint alongside the riverbank. Soon, he was running parallel to the river and could faintly see the tube floating downstream. Up ahead, he saw the main road where it turned and came down the middle of a row of trees, ending at a large pavilion where picnic tables sat behind the parking lot, and a large concrete slab cut through the field to run down to the water’s edge.

Grove Park Boat Ramp.

[MarauderTDL]

Chapter Eleven: Captured!

Michelle, Beth and Sarah huddled in the middle of the tube, hearing birds singing somewhere off in the trees and listening to the soft sounds of the river as they floated along helplessly. Everyone was exhausted, and after Michelle and Sarah’s most recent episodes, the three women were nearly the same sizes now. While Alex may have seen Sarah’s head dip below the top of the tube’s rim, what he hadn’t seen was Michelle’s experience. Just prior to Sarah undergoing her reduction, Michelle felt it wrap its sinister grip around her body, dwindling her down until she was able to look Beth directly in the eyes. However, before she could say a word, Sarah cried out and the other two girls watched her shrink as well. When she was done, she was only slightly taller than they were by an inch.

Sagging against the bottom of the tube, Sarah rolled over and crawled to the scrap of fabric she’d deliberately prepared and pulled it over her head. After slipping her arms through the holes in the fabric, she wrapped the twist-tie around her waist and twisted it to hold the fabric in place.
“Well…I guess I was right,” she said, heaving an exhausted sigh. “Now we’re all shrunk about the same size. I wonder when they’ll come for us.”

“You really believe that someone is deliberately doing this to us,” Michelle asked. “What kind of perverted nut-job would do such a thing, and how? I’ve never heard of anything that could shrink a person like this.”

“If there was some sort of way to reverse it, I wouldn’t mind having Brad use it on me,” Sarah said out loud as she hung her head in despair. “Who am I kidding? Whoever did this to us isn’t going to let us go.”

Michelle gasped at Sarah’s comment. “Sarah! Don’t say that! There’s got to be a way out of this.”

“Oh come on,” Beth snapped as she sat atop one of the rounded air chambers. “You really believe that? You really think that we’re going to go back to our old lives like nothing ever happened? If we don’t shrink away to nothing, it’s only a matter of time before whoever did this comes to collect us.”

Michelle turned to Beth in disbelief. “Not you too? C’mon girls! We can’t think like that! If we give up, we might as well shrink away.”

Beth shook her head and crossed her arms. “Michelle, your optimistic approach has always been nice, but in this case, it absolutely sucks! We’re shrunk to the size of kids’ action figures and we’re trapped as we float along down the river. If we tried to get out of here, we either drown in the water, or die some horrible death in the forest. If we stay here, someone is going to come for us…but I doubt they’ll be nice about it. Admit it, we were set up. Old man Shackleton set us up!”

“Okay, okay, I admit it,” Michelle said, raising her hands in surrender. “How was I supposed to know that this was going to happen?”

“You weren’t,” Sarah said softly. “How could you? No one could ever imagine something so strange occurring to us. Beth is just frustrated, like we all are. She’s just venting, which I don’t blame her for doing.” Sarah sighed again. “Brad, I wish you were here right now.”

Suddenly, the three girls heard something off to one side and they all got up and helped each other climb up to the top of the cooler. Even standing atop it, it was still difficult to see over the rim, but Sarah, being slightly taller, gasped out loud.

“Oh my God! Girls, we’re floating by a campground! There are people sitting at picnic tables over by a covered pavilion! Maybe if we scream loud enough, someone might hear or see us!”

All at once, the three young women cried out at the top of their lungs, jumping up and down and swinging their arms in an attempt to get someone’s attention. For several minutes, they tried, even as the tube floated quietly down the slow-moving channel.


The Grove Hill Boat Ramp was as its name described it to be, a boat ramp for those who wished to back their boat into the water. Located half a mile from Route 340, it offered the local residents a place to fish, place their boats in the water, or even tube down the river during the summer months. Where the ramp went down into the water, the channel was anywhere from twenty yards to almost fifty yards from one shore to the other, depending on water levels as determined by the rain fall the local area received as well as runoff from the mountains. Unfortunately for the girls, thanks to Michelle’s plan to allow thunderstorms to pass through the area the previous week, the rains swelled the river’s width, and their tube was caught in the middle of the river, some twenty or thirty yards from shore.

Unlike their departure location, which was developed and created to be a campground and picnic area, Grove Hill wasn’t as developed, and so not as many people used it all at one time. Local residents tended to use it on the weekends, after long weeks of working their regular jobs, but on this weekday afternoon, one local family chose to spend the day along the banks of the river.

Alan and Carol Monroe and their children, Bobby Monroe, who was six years old, and his baby sister Alice, stopped by the grassy knoll overlooking the river and set up a blanket to have enjoy the wonderful summer weather. After a late lunch, Alan Monroe was walking back to the car to pack up their food, while Bobby ran around down near the river, and his mother Carol watched over little Alice.

Taking care not to get too close, as his mother had already warned him not to go into the water or get muddy playing along the bank, little Bobby was tossing rocks into the water when he looked up and saw what appeared to him to be a giant river tube, floating along down the middle of the channel. “Mommy! Mommy! Someone must have lost their tube, look!”

Carol looked up from taking care of her baby daughter, who was becoming fussy and cranky from not getting her afternoon nap. Glancing in the direction her little boy was pointing, she saw the tube moving down the river. What was odd was that no one appeared to be sitting in it.

That’s odd, she thought to herself, hearing little Alice’s voice squeal loudly before she reached for her tiny feet, trying to keep Alice preoccupied while her husband packed the car for their departure. We’ve seen kids tubing up and down these parts for weeks now. How could someone lose track of a tube and let it drift down the river?

Little Alice murmured softly before she yelped again and then grew quiet, just before spitting up all over herself. Mrs. Monroe groaned as her baby daughter started crying, upset that she’d messed herself. “Bobby, come up here where I can see you. Someone probably left it on their dock and it got blown off or something. They’ll probably come searching for it later.”

“But mommy, I could get it for them.”

Pulling out a Tidy Wipe from the package she kept nearby, Mrs. Monroe started wiping her daughter as she lifted her gaze to the water. For a moment, she thought she saw three tiny figures standing atop the rim of the tube. “What in the…?” She gasped as she rose to her feet, trying to get a better look as the figures appeared to look like miniature people! That’s impossible, Carol thought to herself as she took several steps toward the river to try and get a better look. However, her daughter’s cries brought her back to reality and she quickly turned back to care for her daughter. When she looked up again, the tube was gone, having disappeared behind a large stand of trees to her left. “Bobby, come back here at once! Leave the tube alone and help mommy clean up your sister. Apparently, the yogurt she ate didn’t sit well with her and now she’s spitting it back up.”

“Yew! That’s gross! Do I have to mommy?”

“Young man, you were the one who forgot to wear your swim shorts like I told you, so you don’t get to go into the water today. Now come over here and help me clean your sister.”


Seeing the young mother stand up and look in their direction, Sarah gasped as she cried, “She sees us! Keep waving! If she comes closer, she may just…”

Beth’s gasp off to her left caught Sarah’s attention and as she turned to see what was wrong, only to watch in shock as Beth doubled over, wrapping her arms around her waist as her head snapped back and she fell over the side of the cooler. At their current height, the cooler was almost three times their height and Sarah screamed as Beth disappeared over the side. As she reached the edge, Sarah saw Beth hit one of the air chambers squarely in the middle, bounce off the surface before landing again and rolling down between two of the air chambers.

“Beth!”

Michelle, still trying to get the young woman’s attention, turned as Sarah screamed and gasped as she caught sight of Beth rolling to a stop, moaning and twisting at the base of the cooler. “Oh my God! Sarah, what’s happening?”

“No! Not again! Please, not again,” they heard Beth cry out, her tiny voice loud enough for them to hear her plea as she squeezed her eyes shut and moaned softly.

Michelle leapt from the top of the cooler, counting on the fact that the inflatable tube would soften her fall. As she hit one of the air chambers, her feet slipped out from under her and she landed in a heap off to one side. Standing up, she hurried over to Beth just as Sarah finished climbing down from the cooler.

“What’s going on? What’s wrong,” Sarah asked in confusion.

“I don’t know,” Michelle said, cradling Beth’s head as Sarah squeezed her hand. “Beth, what’s wrong? Speak to us!”

Beth’s head snapped back and she started to convulse, her eyelids flickering as her eyes rolled up in her head.

“Oh my God,” Sarah cried. “She’s going into shock! Beth!” Thinking quickly, she glanced over at Michelle as she said, “Quick! Lift her head! If we don’t, she might choke on her tongue!”

As Sarah repositioned Beth’s head, Michelle moved until she was kneeling with Beth’s head in her lap, lifting her shoulders up so her head was above her chest. “What do we do now?”

“I-I don’t know,” Michelle admitted in confusion. “Is she having some sort of allergic reaction to whatever is…?” Michelle yelped in disbelief as she felt Beth shift. “Oh my God, she’s shrinking again!”

Even as she continued to convulse, Beth’s body shrank inside the piece of cloth she was wearing. In a matter of seconds, she was smaller, her entire body drawing up inside the cloth until only her feet and hands were visible. Even her head slipped under the fabric, except for the very ends of her long, auburn hair. As her convulsions ceased, Sarah reached down and gently pulled the piece of cloth away, revealing Beth’s tiny body. Sarah and Michelle both gasped in horror as they realized that Beth was small enough to fit in their arms like a baby.

“Oh my God,” Sarah whispered. “This can’t be happening! She’s so small!”

“If we’re three or four inches tall now, that means that Beth can’t be more than an inch,” Michelle said, covering her mouth in horror. “What happens if we all shrink that small?”

“Michelle!” Sarah gaped at her friend. “That doesn’t mean anything right now. What’s important is trying to find a way to ease Beth’s condition. Something is wrong, and I’m not talking about us shrinking. There’s got to be something about this that’s causing her to have a negative reaction.”

“Only now? Sarah, we’ve all been shrinking for the better part of the last three to four hours, and none of us reacted like this!”

“Maybe,” Sarah conceded as Beth’s breathing was shallow and rapid, her eyes closed as she was unresponsive. “However, she was cut off from us for a while, and remember, she hadn’t started shrinking quickly until after we were separated. What if those people we’re so sure have been behind our situation went after her while we were apart? What if something they gave her didn’t react well with her body?”

Off in the distance, the girls heard a sound that caught their attention. At first, it sounded like a low rumbling, but as the minutes passed, the noise grew louder. By now, Beth’s convulsions had eased and she had fallen into a deep, unresponsive state. Wanting to know what was making the sound, Michelle and Sarah lay the piece of cloth Beth wore before her current episode over her to keep her warm. Hurrying over to the cooler, they climbed the webbing in the side of the tube’s outer rim to reach the top of the cooler before peering over the top of the rim. The sight before them filled them with dread.

Located west of the Grove Hill Boat Ramp, before the river passed underneath the Route 340 Highway leading south, was a series of cascading waterfalls. Man-made in design, the waterfalls were built over a decade earlier with the purpose of damming the river to create a small pond to act as a natural reservoir for the local towns during the summer months. Dredged by the Federal Corps of Engineers, the pond was used by the locals as a spot for fishing as well as recreation. Constructed to appear as natural as possible, the waterfalls would allow any spillover from snow melt to summer storms to flow down and onward to the south, passing the towns of Shenandoah and Elkton.

At their current size, Michelle and Sarah couldn’t actually see the waterfalls at the far side of the pond, but they recognized the sound of the water cascading over the edge of the concrete lip, and they saw the wake that was stirred up just prior to the edge, where the water picked up speed before going over. While the waterfalls were no more than ten feet high, at their current size, Michelle and Sarah knew that none of them would survive the drop. Even if by some miracle they did make it, it was likely that they’d be thrown from the tube like riding a bucking bronco, tossed out by the repeated bouncing that the tube would encounter.

“Oh my God,” Sarah screeched in panic. “We’ve got to get out! Michelle, quick…let’s get Beth and…”

“And do what,” Michelle said, not taking her eyes off the far end of the pond. “How are we going to escape? We’re in the middle of the channel. I don’t know about you, but I don’t think we’d make it to the shore. Not before the current sucks us over the edge.”

“Well what are we going to do,” Sarah demanded as the tube was almost to the pond.

As if in answer to her question, the girls felt the tube come to an abrupt halt, which was so unexpected that the two young women lost their balance and fell over the edge of the cooler, back down to the bottom of the tube. Michelle was the first one to recover, rising unsteadily to her feet as she carefully made her way over to Sarah to help her up.

“Are you okay? What did we run into,” Michelle asked.

Sarah shook her head. “I don’t know. I didn’t see…” Looking over Michelle’s shoulder, Sarah’s eyes widened in terror as she screamed and fell backward.

Michelle turned in time to see an enormous hand reaching for her and she also screamed in terror as the hand wrapped around her tiny body and lifted her up into the air. She found herself face-to-face with a man wearing camouflaged body armor, a black mask that obscured his face, and reflective sunglasses. Even through the mask, she could hear the sadistic delight in his voice as he clenched his fist so tight that she was barely able to move.

“Well, well, well, what do we have here? Three teeny, little girls floating down the river in a tube. How sweet. Oh, and look…they fashioned little coverings so they wouldn’t be naked. Now that is a surprise. Even after being shrunk down to the size of mice, they still worry about their modesty.” The hooded man chuckled cruelly before adding, “Pathetic. After everything that’s happened to you, you still worry that someone will see your little boobies?”

“Let me go,” Michelle squealed, her tiny, high-pitched voice making the man laugh even harder.

“Oh, I’ve got to say, I thought the last three we captured sounded funny, but this little lady is adorable. She sounds so cute this way.”

“Let me go,” Michelle repeated, only to yelp and look away as the gigantic man lifted her up until she was looking at his face, only inches away from her own.

“You’d be wise to choose your words more carefully, little lady,” the man growled softly, causing a chill to run down Michelle’s back. “If I did as you asked, you might not survive the fall.”

As he turned her over and began to open his fingers, Michelle squealed and frantically tried to hold onto his thumb as she felt her legs dangle freely. “Please! Don’t drop me!”

From below, she heard Sarah cry out, “No! Don’t hurt her!”

The masked man chuckled again as he turned his wrist and cradled Michelle in the palm of his hand, closing his fingers to trap her. “This is too much fun, boy. Honestly, if we didn’t have to bring them in, we could have hours of enjoyment doing anything to them.”

Realizing what the masked man was saying, Michelle turned her head and noticed that a second, younger man was standing at the opposite side of their tube, keeping it from floating any closer to the falls. Like the first man, he was wearing camouflage body armor, although his outfit appeared to be dirtier, with patches of mud still clinging to the elbows of his uniform, as well as the thighs and knees of his pants. Also like the first man, he wore a mask over his face, obscuring his features, although unlike his partner, this man wasn’t wearing sunglasses. As she gazed up at him, she could see his eyes, those brilliant, emerald eyes looking at her intently. However, where his partner seemed to enjoy leering at her tiny body, there was something in his eyes. Was it regret? Disgust? Before she could figure it out, his partner pulled her away and poked a finger against her chest.

“Hmmm, she might be tiny, but she’s certainly got a hot body under those rags. Maybe before we take her and her friends in, we could have a little fun, hmm?”

Michelle cried out as the man reached down and tugged on the fabric that served as her dress, kicking and screaming as he smiled at her futile attempts to stop him. She heard the threads tear one at a time and Michelle fought even harder, refusing to let him see her naked, but before the cloth tore any further, she felt him stumble back as his partner grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled him around.

“Enough! Jo-…Tracker Two, this is against protocol and you know it! Our orders are to subdue these women and prepare them to be taken to the facility for testing. I refuse to allow you to treat her this way. Shrunk or not, what you’re attempting to do is rape and I will not allow you to do this!”

Tracker Two growled and reached out with his free hand to grab the other man by the throat, forcing him to his knees in the muddy waters. “How dare you! I am your superior, Tracker Three! Do you understand me? Where do you get off telling me what to do? These girls are property of the company now and I’ll do whatever I please to them, do you understand? Do you?!?”

“You said they wouldn’t be harmed,” Tracker Three struggled to say, his face turning red as Tracker Two continued to squeeze his throat. “Was that a…lie?”

As Tracker Two hesitated, Tracker Three reached up to grip Tracker Two’s hand and twist it, forcing him to release his hold on Tracker Three’s neck. Tracker Two cried out in pain as Tracker Three fell backward, one hand dropping into the water to find stability as he bowed his head and coughed through the mask.

In a raspy voice, Tracker Three said, “You specifically told me that they would be taken to the facility, tested to see how the drug affected them, and they would be released. You never said anything about forcibly molesting them!”

Tracker Two chuckled as he flexed his injured wrist and glared down at his partner, still holding Michelle in his other hand. “Always the white knight, is that it, boy?”

“I’m doing my job,” Tracker Three fired back defiantly, rubbing his throat as he slowly rose to his feet. “There was nothing said about raping and molesting the test subjects while they’re shrunk and helpless. Besides, what are you going to do if the director happened to come down to check on them and overheard them mention what you were planning on doing to them? How do you think he’d react?”

Seeing Tracker Two hesitate, Tracker Three continued, “I’m not trying to be a white knight here, sir. I’m trying to avoid having to explain to the director why I didn’t stop you before you did something that might affect the results of the tests. The sooner we get them back to the facility, the sooner the researchers will begin their tests and find out what they need to know.”

Tracker Two stared at his partner for a moment before nodding. “Fine! I’ll grant you that. The director probably wouldn’t like me having fun with them, and knowing the way he deals with disappointments, I don’t want to become the next one he disciplines for others to see.”

Reaching down to his side, Tracker Two pulled out a small canister and pulled a tab on top to reveal a small opening. Dropping the tiny woman inside, Tracker Two gripped the side of the canister and twisted the bottom. With a popping sound, the bottom of the canister released and fell to the ground and a globe of rubbery plastic expanded with the sound of rushing air. In the span of a ten seconds, the globe grew to eight inches in diameter and then with another twist, the two men watched as the tiny woman squealed as she dropped into the inflated globe and landed on her back. The globe was translucent, obscuring her features from view, although her shadow could be seen inside. After a few moments, the woman recovered and began pounding on the rubbery confines of her prison, demanding to be released.

Tracker Two laughed out loud. “Oh this girl just doesn’t learn, does she?” Shaking the globe, they heard her cry out as she bounced back and forth uncontrollably. When Tracker Two was finished, he lifted the globe up to his face and said, “Now if you don’t want to go through that again, I suggest you shut up and accept what’s happening to you.”

Inside the globe, the shrunken woman moaned softly and slumped to the bottom of the globe. “That’s better,” Tracker Two said before tossing the globe to his partner. “Now, I suggest you do the same thing with the other two.”

Catching the globe that contained Michelle, Alex set it down on the bank of the pond and reached out to grab the side of the tube. “There’s a problem with that.”

“Huh? What are you talking about,” John asked in annoyance. “There shouldn’t be any problem with... Oh.”

During their time arguing and dealing with Michelle, Sarah had returned to Beth’s side, cradling her tiny body in her arms. When Alex approached the tube, she cried out, “Leave us alone! Haven’t you already done enough?”

“Ah shit,” John said, shaking his head in disbelief at the woman cradled in the arms of the taller one. “This is the one you called Number Two, right?” Alex nodded and John cursed loudly as he gripped the top of his head with his hand in frustration. “Dammit!”

“What happened,” Alex asked, bending down to look at the two women. Sarah backed away as best she could, but at her size, the air chambers that lined the bottom of the tube were like low walls, blocking her attempt to escape his intent gaze. She shielded Beth from view until Alex turned away. “I used Gamma like you told me to. No one said this would happen!”

Sarah watched as the one called ‘Tracker Two’ shook his head. “How should I know? Gamma was supposed to have already passed through all the trials and been approved for standard use. They must have missed something.”

“Missed something? Look at her,” Tracker Three said incredulously. “They told us the target height was three, maybe four inches. She’s not even close to that tall! She’s an inch tall at best!”

Without warning, Beth cried out and she arched her back as the drug worked its effects on her. To Sarah’s horror, she felt Beth dwindle a little more in her arms. Although it wasn’t much to the men watching them, to Sarah, it was significant. By the time Beth’s spasm ended, she’d lost another quarter inch.

“What did you do to her,” Sarah shouted at the top of her lungs, although her tiny, shrieking voice as barely loud enough for the two men to hear. “You’re killing her! She’s having some sort of allergic reaction to whatever you used on her!”

“Jo-…” Tracker Three hesitated before speaking again. “Tracker Two, what do you mean they must have missed something? If Gamma is the reason for this, then she might not stop shrinking. Didn’t you mention that Hotel and India…”

“Yes, yes, yes,” Tracker Two said dismissively. “Those two variants are still unpredictable and can reduce a target to microscopic size.”

“Well is it possible that they made a mistake,” Tracker Three asked. “What if they missed something? What if Gamma isn’t as stable as they believed?”

“Then that means that we should get her to the facility so they can examine her, shouldn’t we,” Tracker Two said, although it was clear he was enjoying the show. “Look, secure them both in the same stasis bubble if you have to, but make it quick. We can’t stay here any longer. We’re still too close to the boat ramp. Someone might see us.”

As Tracker Two turned away, Tracker Three reluctantly bent down to reach for Sarah and Beth, although as he caught sight of Beth’s miniature body lying in Sarah’s arms, he hesitated for a moment. Sarah must have seen his action as she cried out, “Please! Help us! Help Beth! She’ll die!”

“I-I can’t,” Tracker Three said reluctantly as Tracker Two walked away to notify the facility that they needed extraction. “The researchers…they’ll know what to do. The best thing for now is for you to keep her close and watch over her. She’ll be fine. You all will, trust me.”

Sarah stared defiantly at Tracker Three. “I don’t believe you! You’re a liar! If you cared, you’d do something about this! It’s wrong and you know it!”

“I’m s-sorry,” Tracker Three said as he reached down and scooped Sarah and Beth into his hand.

Sarah moaned softly while Beth remained unresponsive as Tracker Three reached to his hip and pulled out one of the stasis bubble canisters, like the one Tracker Two used for their friend. With a twist of the top, he opened it and gently slipped Sarah and Beth inside before closing it and twisting the bottom. Like the last time, the canister hissed and the stasis bubble expanded beneath the tube, growing in size until it reached full inflation. At eight inches in diameter, the bubble ceased its growth and the bottom opened up to deposit Sarah and Beth inside the bubble, with only their shadows visible from the outside. Setting the stasis bubble next to the first one, Tracker Three pulled his mask off and called out to his partner.
“Hey! What about the tube and their belongings? Shouldn’t we take them with us?”

“What for,” John asked as he turned back to glare at him. “They’ve got no use for their stuff now. Let the tube go so it can tumble over the falls. The contents will scatter and no one will think anything of it except some stupid tuber probably got drunk and lost their tube.”

Glancing at the two stasis bubbles and hearing the soft, high-pitched cries from within them, Alex hung his head and gritted his teeth. This is wrong!

“Got it,” he called out to John, although Alex bent over the side of the tube and checked the contents, especially what was stored away in the side pouch behind the cooler. He discovered a plastic bag containing a cell phone, some identification, as well as what looked like an engagement ring. With John’s back to him, Alex pulled his shirt down to slip the bag and its contents inside his body armor before pulling it up again. After one last check of the tube, and only finding snacks and drinks, Alex reluctantly released the tube to watch it slip over the edge of the falls and tumble down, bouncing end over end as the water carried it down the multi-tiered formation to land in a torn and deflated heap in the pool at the bottom. The snacks and drinks scattered across the rock faces, some sinking beneath the water at the bottom, while the rest were dispersed to various spots.
Turning his attention to the two stasis bubbles, Alex chanced a glance in John’s direction and scowled as he appeared to be enjoying himself. John ended a call which must have been to the director and turned back to join him.

“Director Melendez wants us back at the facility immediately. I told him about the one girl and he’s very interested to have the researchers take a look at her, although they’ll probably wait until tomorrow morning since it’s getting late.”

Alex looked at him in confusion. “Late? It’s only four-thirty! Come on! They need to examine her immediately! If she’s having a negative reaction…”

“Negative reaction?” John’s barking laughter echoed across the pond. “Seriously boy, you need to relax. By the time our transportation arrives and we arrive at the facility, it will be close to six o’clock. There’s no chance the researchers will be doing anything for them tonight. Better to let them settle in, relax a little bit, and then they’ll examine them in the morning.”

Seeing Alex’s expression, John said, “C’mon! Look, we’ve been in the field all day long. I don’t know about you, but I’m looking forward to grabbing some beers and a nice, juicy steak at the local bar. You should join me.”

Realizing that trying to argue with John was pointless, Alex appeared to surrender the point. "I can’t. I need to head home and check on things. Maybe a good night’s rest at home in bed will help me relax.” He raised a finger at John and said, “But I fully intend to come in tomorrow early to be sure they get checked out as soon as the researchers arrive. I don’t want to find that Number Two shrank out of existence.”

John rolled his eyes and sighed. “Fine! We’ll be going through after-action reports and giving the researchers full interviews in the morning anyway. Once we’re done, you can stop by the lab and check on them. How’s that sound?”

Glancing over at the two stasis bubbles, Alex nodded, although he was already thinking of something else. “Yeah, that’ll be fine.”

“Good, now let’s move out. The extraction vehicle will be here in five minutes. We’ll meet them at the bridge downstream on Route three-forty.”

John brushed by Alex dismissively as he headed in the direction of the road while Alex walked over and picked up the stasis bubbles. “I’m sorry,” he whispered softly, even though the women probably couldn’t hear him. “I’ll make it right.”

Alex, what are you doing, he heard his grandfather’s voice ask.

“What I should have done when I first learned about this.”