Warning and disclaimer: This story contains extremely graphic violence and sexuality. If you are offended by descriptions of intense violence and sadism, you are encouraged to stop reading this now. You have been warned.

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Liz laid sleeplessly in her bed. Her eyes were fixed on the ceiling, though she saw only the images that flashed through her mind. Alone in the dark, the goblins that infested her thoughts ran amok, gibbering and laughing.

The knowledge that she was losing her mind did not seem to matter as much as Liz had hoped it would. In the silence, Liz could hear the wash of blood in her ears and the gurgle of her digestion. She imagined the colourless pulp made from the shattered bodies of hundreds of people oozing snail-like through her intestines; imagined the skeletal remains of what had once been her best friend and the object of her desire being slowly kneeded through the twists and turns of her digestive tract.

Liz's mind tried to retreat from the horror of her actions and found the way blocked. Each time her racing thoughts bounded down a dark alley of her mind to escape the blazing light of reality, they encountered a chanting mob of teenagers.

"Liz the lez! Liz the lez!" they jeered, their faces twisted out of true into black mockeries of amusement. Liz groaned and pressed the heels of her hands against her eyes, creating bright blue and red splotches of colour that temporarily erased the images from her mind. The brief respite allowed her to order her increasingly erratic thoughts.

The evening news had been full of special reports about the vanished research institute. According to the reports, one thousand eight-hundred and fifty-three people had vanished into thin air along with the building, including some of the brightest lights in several fields of science. Liz, of course, knew what the reporters, standing wide-eyed in the muddy field that had once been covered by the office tower, did not: that what remained of the tower lay in a small pile of rubble in her basement. And that the whereabouts of most of the people, including Liz's own parents, could be expressed in terms of Liz's anatomy. Some were snaking their way through her alimentary canal as a nutrient-filled mush; some were dead and staring sightlessly in the wet blackness of her womb, drowned in her excretions or crushed by the action of muscles spasming with lust; and unknown others lay smashed in the powdered remains of the institute, down in the basement.

Almost unnoticed in the panic and excitement was the brief disappearance of a convenience store. According to witnesses, it had simply disappeared in a bright flash of light. Less than an hour later it had materialized in the same spot. Several people unfortunate enough to have been standing in the area where it reappeared had been spattered in a gory spray of blood and bone across half a street, as if they had been run over by a train. People were already linking this bizarre occurance to the disappearance of the insititute, some reporters speculating that some experiment must have gone awry. Mention was made of the infamous Philadelphia Experiment.

Strangely, Liz found herself amused by the unexpected return of the convenience store she had briefly stolen. She imagined the authorities finding the roof torn off and all the people missing, and wondered what they would make of it.

Sitting in the living room listening to the reports as they came in, Liz had felt immensely powerful, knowing that no one would ever discover what had happened except her. She had rubbed herself nearly raw gratifying the constant low-grade sexual charge this caused. There was no doubt or remorse in her while that arousal lasted. It was only now, laying in bed and continously aware of her parents' empty bedroom nearby, that she was wracked by the conflict between the tatters of her conscience and her need for vengance -- and power.

"Mmmm, like the taste of sushi, Liz?"

Liz jerked upright in bed, her heart hammering, the taunting voice still ringing in her ears. One of her classmates had said it to her three days ago while grabbing her own crotch in a lewd pantomime and licking her lips. For a second the voice had seemed right in the room, but Liz realized that she had dozed off and conjured the voice herself.

Shame flushed Liz's cheeks and she hid her face in her hands until she felt the crimson glow fade. Samantha. Rich, popular Samantha. Sexy Samantha whose long, elegant legs, bared by an expensive skirt, Liz had often stared at over a book in class. That's who had said it, Liz remembered. The people nearby had laughed, even the ones Liz didn't know. The laughter was like a physical blow but Liz had let her face go blank, turning on her heel and walking away with the laughter still coming in waves at her back. She was careful not to let them see the tears that slid down her cheeks.

"Bastards," whispered Liz into the darkness. "Bastards. Bastards, bastards, bastards!"

The remembered feeling of helplessness at the time was almost palpable. It seemed all the more so in juxtaposition to the power and control Liz now knew and craved. No one, not one person had spoken up in Liz's defence. Not a student, not a teacher, not so much as a janitor had thought to offer Liz a kind word. Fury burned like an inferno in Liz's chest.

Well, she'd make them sorry. All of them. Let them feel weak and helpless before her, unable to defend themselves. Let them cry and scream their fear and helplessness. She'd laugh at them the way they had laughed at her, only hers would be the best laugh of all.

Liz dressed and rose from her bed, her face set and purpose in every movement. In the kitchen closet she got her father's cordless shop vacuum and went to the basement.

With a push of her thumb, the small handful of rubble which still lay on the receiver bed of the Machine was sucked up into the vacuum. The very few miniscule people who had lain moaning and dying through the night in the rubble were silenced at last as they were vacuumed up through the howling air.

While the computer went through its warm-up routine, Liz pulled out a phone book and scanned down with her finger, stopping at a name. Then she pulled out the criss-cross directory and cross-referenced until she had a specific location on a specific street. With unhurried patience, Liz began running through the checklist beside the computer. It was almost morning, but she knew she still had plenty of time. Her preparations would be complete long before it was time to go to school.

 

The first students to arrive at school were treated to the odd sight of Liz counting off paces as she walked alongside the school.

"Whatcha doing, Lizbo?"

Liz stopped and made a jot in her spiral notebook, then looked up distractedly. She added the name Craig Sherwood to her growing mental list and began her pacing again. "The school's four hundred and seventy feet at its longest dimension," Liz called over her shoulder. "Right now, anyway."

Craig looked puzzled for a moment, frowned, then turned to his friends and tapped his temple meaningfully. His friends snickered and they all entered the school together, leaving Liz to her eccentricity.

In the hallway, on the way to her homeroom, Liz felt many pairs of eyes looking at her. Those of the girls held mostly disgust, while those of the boys held mostly leering lust as some peurile lesbian fantasy played in their heads. A few made comments and Liz ignored them beyond making note of their names. Some seemed genuinely surprised at Liz's apparent calm.

The homeroom was all abuzz with news of Ashley's disappearance, and the strangeness of it. Rumours had everyone from UFOs to secret government agencies responsible for it. Unsurprisingly, no one suggested that someone might have eaten her in a fit of sadistic lust, which was actually the case.

I guess they haven't heard the very latest news, thought Liz. Well, they'd soon know, one way or another. The thought made her feel smug and superior, and she watched the activities of her classmates with detachment. With her fingers she lightly stroked the crinkly brown paper of her bag lunch. Soon there would be debts to be paid. Very soon. Liz felt untouchable, already distant from the people around her, as if they were less than human, almost beneath notice.

A small knot of people had formed around one desk. This was not unusual, for the person at the centre of the cluster was Samantha of the long legs and red hair, whose every word was a pearl of wisdom to be savoured by her sycophantic worshippers. What was unusual was Liz rising from her desk and approaching the band of courtiers. They fell silent as Liz approached, detecting with teenage sensitivity her state of pariahdom, parting for her.

"Hey Lizzy," said Samantha with a sneer. "Eat anyone lately? Shut your mouth, I can smell your last victim."

A few people tittered, mostly girls. Liz was thrown into panic and confusion for a second that turned her cheeks pink until she realized in what sense Samantha meant. Samantha laughed at the discomfort she had caused and turned away. The audience with the princess was over.

Liz, infuriated, clenched her fists. She had come to taunt the bitch and had been humiliated again instead. Liz slunk back to her desk, muttering under her breath. "Yes I have, you numb cunt. Oh, yes I have..."

The bell rang and the students left for their first class, English. The teacher, Mrs. Matheson, was away and the replacement managed to cover only a single canto of the Orlando Furioso, the book the class was reading. To Liz's acute embarassment the whole canto was only thinly veiled, being about lesbianism, and everyone kept giggling and turning to look at her, much to the puzzlement of the teacher, a stodgy bald man who looked like the nearest he came to sex was racy quatrains by Shakespeare.

After class, the students filed out into the corridor for their next one, pushing and shoving good-naturedly in the crowds. Several times Liz felt a hand grope at her breasts or buttocks, but the crush of the students around her kept her from finding the culprits. The rage mounted in her.

"Liz! Hey Liz!"

Liz nearly ignored the voice and the beckoning arm, but she caught a glance at the face of the girl hailing her, a dark-skinned senior with tight, kinky hair, whom Liz did not recognize. The girl's expression was grim and tight-lipped. Curiosity piqued, Liz entered the classroom the girl had entered at Liz's approach.

The classroom was empty save for the girl, who sat herself on the top of one of the desks. "Close the door," she said.

"I'm going to be late for class," said Liz. hugging her books and her lunchbag to her.

The girl got up walked over to the door, sticking her head out. Most of the students had vacated the hallway. She closed the door. "We got to talk, Liz. It's real important. Have a seat."

Liz eyed the girl suspiciously but sat down at one of the empty desks. It wasn't as if being late today was going to matter in a little while.

"My name's Lonnie," said the girl, pulling at a kink of hair in what Liz supposed, correctly, was a nervous habit. "First let me say, you ever tell anyone we had this chat and I'll call you a liar. No one'll believe you. You get me?"

Liz nodded and narrowed her eyes.

"Good." Lonnie seemed to relax a little. "That was some stupid stunt you done, letting that blonde piece of shit get hold of your diary. I suppose you ain't too sad she's gone missing."

Liz said nothing.

Lonnie looked like she was searching for the right words and, not finding any, grimaced. "Look, you think you're the only rugmuncher in this school? We all got our kinks. Some of us are smarter than to write them down where idiots can see them, that's all. You catch what I'm saying here?"

Liz blinked a few times in surprise. It took a few seconds to register what Lonnie was saying. "You...?"

"Yeah, me, and a bunch of other folks too," said Lonnie. "You know what you done? It was tough enough around here without this 'Liz the lez' shit going around. This school isn't exactly progressive. We keep to ourselves and we keep our heads down. Some of us even date outside of school."

All of this came as a revelation to Liz, who knew intellectually that there had to be people like her out there, but never credited the idea in her heart, where it mattered. "I didn't know. I..."

"You didn't think either. Shit," said Lonnie disgustedly. "Okay, catch this. I don't go in for all that pink triangle bullshit and I ain't gonna hold your hand, but I know how tough it is. You feel like you're going to pop your cork, you give me the signal and we'll go somewhere and talk. Maybe when all this dies down I'll introduce you around. As it stands, you got some pretty pissed-off dykes ready to smack your silly head for stirring up the shit."

Liz's face turned grim, her eyes slitted with anger. "I don't think you're going to have to worry about how you get treated around here any more. Listen to what I say very carefully. You go to everyone you trust, and you tell them to go home at lunch and don't come back for anything."

Lonnie frowned. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"If you value your life, go home at lunch," said Liz. Her voice was icy. "Don't come back this afternoon. You've got fair warning. You let them treat me like I was diseased, but I figure I owe you at least this much. Go home at lunch. Got it?"

Lonnie looked like she wanted to say something, but Liz stood up, grabbed her books and her lunch, and left the classroom. There was something Lonnie found chilling in Liz's eyes, and she shivered. Maybe she was feeling a little sick, she thought. Maybe she'd best go home this afternoon after all...

The morning passed quickly for Liz. When the lunch bell finally rang, she felt no nevousness. She had been planning this all day.

The lunchroom cafeteria was packed with students, as usual. Easily the size of a gymnasium, hundreds of teens sat cheek-by-jowl with each other, talking and laughing and eating. A few heads turned when Liz entered, but not many. She scanned the room, then fixed her gaze on one table, threading her way through the crowd with a shoulder.

"Well, look who it is," said Samantha as Liz sat down at the same table with her. Heads swivelled around to look. "It's Liz the lez. Come to seduce me?"

Liz ignored the comment and pulled a small Tupperware bowl from her paper lunch bag along with a sandwich and an apple. Seeing that Liz was not going to react, Samantha turned haughtily away. He followers lost interest in Liz soon after.

When no one was looking, Liz filched a packet of ketchup from her neighbour, a girl she vaguely recognized from the cheerleading squad. Carolyn or something. After opening the packet with her teeth, Liz proceded to squeeze it onto the tabletop, making a small red pool. Then with a steely glance around the table, she pulled the top from her plastic bowl and dumped the contents out in front of her.


     It's an earthquake.

     That was the first thought that ran through her head as Millicent
     Matheson was shaken violently awake. The small two-storey house
     shuddered again, the wood frame groaning audibly under the strain.
     Cracks appeared in the plaster of the walls and ceiling.

     "The twins!" cried Millie as she threw herself out of bed. Roger,
     a heavy sleeper, was still blinking dazedly on his side of the bed,
     trying to clear his head. Millie could hear Cory and Emily in the
     room they shared, calling "momeeee" in the panicky voice they used
     for middle-of-the-night bad dreams.

     The house gave a sudden lurch, throwing Millie from her feet as the
     entire roof tore away from the rest of the structure in a rain of
     plaster and wood splinters.

     Oh God, it's a tornado, thought Millie, sprawled out on the floor
     with her arms over her head. The twins, I've got to get to the
     twins, the thoughts chasing each other like a mantra through her
     head. Then she realized that the shaking had stopped. Light from
     overhead, blinding and shadowless, filled the room.

     "What the hell?" said Roger. Millie turned and watched him swing
     his legs out of bed and shade his eyes against the light, staring
     up at what should have been the sky. The colour drained from his
     face. "Holy fuck," he whispered.

     Millie looked up and felt the bottom drop out of her stomach. She
     barely had time to acknowledge that an impossibly huge head was
     peering down at her before a hand more than twice as wide as Millie
     was tall descended into the room and lifted her from the floor.

     The next few seconds were a confusion of motion, nothing clear
     except the voices of the twins screaming with fright. When the
     world settled down again into some semblance of order, Millie was
     half-lying in a jumble with the twins and her husband in what
     could only be a giant cupped palm. The heat radiating up from
     the gigantic hand made Millie break a sweat. She and her family
     held each other as Roger tried to quiet the twins.

     There was a sense of movement. Millie looked up over the tree-
     like fingers that arced overhead and saw the giant was heading up
     a flight of stairs. This can't be real, she thought. It must be
     a dream. It has to be. Then Millie realized with something like
     shock that she recognized the face of her giant captor. It looked
     for all the world like Elizabeth, one of the girls from the English
     class Millie taught.

     The journey came to an end, and Millie found herself falling
     through space, landing against a hard, cold surface with enough
     impact to knock the wind from her. Roger landed beside her with
     a thud and the twins on top of him.

     Millie didn't think of much of anything until she managed to start
     breathing again. Slowly she climbed to her feet and found herself
     in a round, glass-walled, glass-floored room about thirty feet
     across. There were no doors, and the top of the smooth walls
     stretched storeys overhead. The room sat in the middle of a great
     red-and-white checked plain. Nothing looked right. All the
     perspectives seemed to be off.

     And then Millie realized her mistake. Elizabeth, whom she could
     see bustling around in a housecoat in the distance, was no giant;
     it was Millie, herself, and her family who had shrunk. Everything
     seemed to snap into focus with this awareness, and Millie realized
     that she was imprisoned in the bottom of an empty glass pitcher
     sitting in the middle of a table which sat, itself, in the middle
     of a well appointed kitchen. Millie was no more than two inches
     tall.

     "Millie," moaned Roger. "What are we going to do?" He had the
     twins hugged to his chest. Unlike Millie who had a nightgown
     and the twins who wore pyjamas, Roger wore only his briefs and
     looked cold.

     Millie never had a chance to answer, because Liz had finished
     whatever she was doing and had returned to the pitcher, glaring
     at the miniature family through the side. There was no mistaking
     the rage in her face, and Millie shivered.

     "You just let them do it, didn't you," said the gigantic school
     girl. Her eyes bored into Millie. "You didn't give a damn. Did
     you think it was funny? Did you think I was so perverted I
     deserved what I got?"

     "I don't know what you mean!" shouted Millie. She had a vague
     recollection of something about a diary. She hadn't paid much
     attention to the gossip of her students, and she wracked her brain
     trying to remember.

     "You knew!" raged Liz, her face reddening, her fists clenched.
     Millie felt panic rising in her chest. She could not afford to
     make this girl angry, with her family at the girl's mercy.

     "I'm sorry! Oh God, I'm sorry!" said Millie, willing to say or
     do anything to keep that dangerous flash from Liz's eyes.

     Liz's eyes narrowed to slits. "Yes, you will be sorry, Mrs.
     Matheson. You will. Oh, not right now, don't worry. I have a
     use for you. Him, on the other hand, I don't need."

     Roger's eyes widened and he backed away from the furious girl's
     eyes, which had turned to leer at him. One of Liz's great hands
     reached into the pitcher and Roger turned to claw uselessly at
     the glass wall that restrained him. Millie screamed and pulled
     helplessly at one of the impossibly huge fingers as Liz scooped
     the teacher's husband out.

     Liz carried tiny Roger over to the counter where a large plastic
     bowl sat. With her free hand, Liz lifted the bowl and poured a
     thick, white batter into the waffle iron that sat beside it.

     Oh no, she wouldn't, thought Millie, her hand over her mouth to
     stifle herself from screaming hysterically and terrifying the
     twins any more than they already were.

     She would.

     Millie saw her husband's little two inch body fall from Liz's
     fingers, his arms pinwheeling until he landed in the batter that
     filled the waffle iron.

     "Don't look!" yelled Millie, pulling the twins to her and holding
     their faces against her. "God, no. Oh God. Roger!"

     Roger managed to climb to his knees, covered completely in thick,
     cloying batter. Liz turned to her teacher and smiled, then slammed
     the lid shut on the waffle iron.

     Millie moaned a long, protracted groan that was almost a sigh,
     and screwed her eyes shut. Still clutching the twins to her,
     she tried to turn off her senses, to lose herself in darkness,
     but she could not block it out. The sight of her husband vanishing
     under the steel lid played like a movie behind Millie's eyelids.
     And soon she smelled a hint of something like roasted pork. She
     was horrified to feel her mouth water instinctively at the
     appealing aroma.

     Some time later, Millie opened her eyes. A few tears trickled
     down her cheeks. The twins looked forlorn, unsure how to react.
     Liz was seated at the table, a plate with waffles in front of
     her. Millie could see a dark patch in the middle of one waffle
     and knew instantly what it was. Liz added butter and maple
     syrup, and soon was tucking into her meal with fork and knife.

     "Cannibal," breathed Millie. "Cannibal! Cannibal!" she screamed
     at the top of her lungs. The twins backed away from her.

     Liz smiled and sawed through the dark spot, lifting a chunk of it
     into her mouth and chewing. "Mmm, mmm," she said, licking her lips.
     "Can't be cannibalism," said Liz thoughtfully as she chewed another
     piece, obviously enjoying herself. "You have to eat human beings to
     be a cannibal. I'm just eating bugs." Liz flashed her teacher a
     taunting grin.

     And Millie knew that Liz was mad. What little hope she had
     turned sour. She knew Liz was beyond reason, beyond any kind of
     restraint. Whatever had happened to the girl who was once her
     student, it had completely unhinged her mind. Deep inside her,
     Millie felt her doom with icy certainty. There would be no
     reprieve.

     Liz finished the last waffle and patted her lips delicately with
     a paper napkin before clearing away the plate, exchanging it for
     a bowl, a carton of milk, and box of corn flakes. She filled her
     bowl, poured the milk, dipped her spoon -- and paused. A corner
     of her lip twitched upward, and her eyes slid over to Millie. A
     white-hot poker of terror twisted in Millie's gut.

     "You know, I'm just thinking," said Liz conversationally, "I really
     don't need the rugrats either."

     Millie's breath caught in her throat. "No," she said loudly,
     shaking her head and hugging the twins to her as tightly as she
     could. "No, please, I'll do anything you want. Do whatever you
     want to me. Not my babies."

     "It would be really horrible if something happened to them,
     wouldn't it," said Liz, viciously. "The most terrible thing you
     can imagine. The pain would just go on and on. And no one would
     even know or care. I know all about that kind of pain."

     Millie saw the hand reaching and pushed the twins to the floor,
     covering them with her body. "Nooo! God damn you! They're only
     six years old!"

     Massive fingers easily powered Millie aside. The twins, little
     more than an inch tall, were easily held between Liz's fingers
     and lifted from the pitcher. Millie howled and beat at the side
     of the pitcher with her fists.

     "Needs a little something, I think," said Liz, and dropped the
     two children into the middle of her cereal bowl with a pair of
     tiny splashes.

     The milk was icy cold and reached well over the twins' heads.
     They coughed and sputtered, flailing their arms and legs and
     sending soggy flakes flying. Liz stirred the cereal with her
     spoon, then used it to push Emily to the bottom of the bowl and
     hold her there. "Mommy! Help me!" came the little scream from
     Cory as he splashed desperately in the milk, his sodden pyjamas
     pulling him down. Millie's hands and face were pressed as hard
     as she could into the glass wall of the pitcher, and her eyes were
     pits of bleakness.

     Liz lifted the spoon and Emily bobbed to the surface, coughing
     milk and screaming. The spoon came down again and this time it
     was Cory who disappeared below the surface. It was thirty seconds
     before Liz lifted her spoon again. Cory popped to the surface, but
     he was face down. He wasn't moving.

     "Whoops," said Liz. She spooned up Cory's immobile little form
     along with a pool of milk and a large wad of corn flakes. With
     a glance over at Millie, Liz shoved the spoon in her mouth. It
     came out clean. Liz began chewing, and the crunching sounds were
     plainly audible to Millie, lost in a living hell of horror.

     Swallowing, Liz put down her spoon, lifted the entire bowl to her
     parted lips and began drinking. Millie could not see Emily, but
     she could hear her shrieking. "Mommmeeeeeee!"

     Liz's face filled Emily's whole field of vision. Emily struggled
     and clawed at the floating flakes that surrounded her as she slipped
     closer to the yawning cave of Liz's mouth. Emily wanted to scream,
     but every time she opened her mouth cold milk poured in. Then
     suddenly Emily was caught in a current so fast she hadn't even
     time to try and hold on and she was in hot, humid darkness, and the
     flow of milk and cereal pushed her back over Liz's tongue, and Emily
     screamed and then she was sliding over the edge and falling and Liz's
     throat worked and Emily was screaming and her little feet scrabbled
     for purchase and failed and Emily went tumbling down, down into the
     fleshy, ululating pit gaping beneath her, and...

     And Liz put down the empty cereal bowl. "I can feel her, you know,"
     said Liz. "Paddling around in my tummy. Think she'll drown first
     or smother?"

     Millie face was blank. She felt distant from herself and from
     the horror she had witnessed. Somewhere in her mind she vaguely
     registered the fact that she was in shock and nodded to herself.
     There would come a time for screaming but that would be later,
     much later. Now there was blessed calmness. Millie curled up
     on the floor of her glass prison and stared distractedly at
     nothing at all. She didn't react even when Liz reached in and
     grabbed her.

     "I used to have a crush on you," said Liz, poking at the tiny
     woman curled in the middle of her palm with a finger. "You never
     knew. No one ever knew. Not until..."

     Millie watched Liz blink repeatedly in rapid succession. The mild
     surprise Millie felt at seeing a single, fat tear roll down Liz's
     cheek penetrated even the fog of her shock. "I didn't mean to,"
     said Liz in a whisper. "I'm out of control and I don't know how
     to stop and no one can stop me."

     Even as she was speaking, Liz's fingers seemed to move with a life
     of their own. They effortlessly tore the flimsy nightgown from
     Millie.

     "Please help me," said Liz, hoarsely. "Please."

     And then Liz pulled open her housecoat, and Millie was pressed
     into the soft flesh of Liz's breast, having the breath squeezed
     from her each time she slid over Liz's erect nipple. Liz thrust
     her chest out, massaging her breast with her fingers while her
     palm pushed the little woman against her. Millie's mind remained
     mercifully numb through the whole ordeal, and finally there was
     a short, sharp gasp from her captor.

     "Mmm, that was nice," said Liz, languidly, as she lifted the
     teacher from her breast at last. She spent a few seconds toying
     with Millie's own minute breasts with a finger, then sighed. "I
     better get ready for school," said Liz. It's going to be a...
     big day, today."

     Fetching a round Tupperware container from a cabinet, Liz dropped
     an unmoving Millie inside and closed the lid. Millie could not
     see through the translucent plastic but after her eyes had adjusted,
     she found there was enough light to see. Not that there was
     anything to look at; the container was sealed, and Millie was
     naked. After a while, the container was jerked violently. There
     was a brief instant of freefall, and then painful impact. The
     light vanished.

     Over the course of the next few hours, Millie slowly emerged from
     her daze as her new prison bounced her violently around. There
     would be periods of calm during which Millie could dimly make out
     voices like the distant mutter of cannons and knew that she was
     at school. Then the class bell would ring and the world would
     begin bouncing this way and that again, as Millie tried vainly
     to brace herself on the slick plastic. The air became noticably
     staler.

     Once, between classes, a corner of the lid was thumbed open and a
     shaft of light burst in, blinding Millie. It stayed open just long
     enough to replenish the air, and then everything went dark again.
     Finally, Millie heard the lunch bell ring, followed by the
     thunderous clatter of hundreds of people moving. The usual bouncing
     followed and then a short period of calm while the sound of dozens
     of conversations both near and far filled Millie's ears.

     Suddenly the container was moved again and the lid was unexpectedly
     torn off. The container tipped, spilling Millie out onto a hard
     surface, covering her stinging eyes with her hands against the
     bright light.


No one seemed to notice at first. The tiny two-inch woman laid still for a few seconds, her little hands rubbing at her eyes. Then Millie sat up and looked around with astonishment written on her face. She was in the school lunchroom, on the cold, plastic surface of one of the tables. All around her, as far as she could see, were titanic forms, like what she imagined a conclave of the gods of Olympus must resemble. And yet, these beings that awed her to stunned silence were no more than the students she had taught for year after year. The true minuteness of her scale began to register to Millie.

Carolyn, seated immediately opposite Liz at the table, was the first one to notice the little pink creature on the table. At first she thought it was a mouse or a gerbil but as she leaned closer to look her jaw dropped open, and her sandwich fell from numb fingers. "Ohmigawd," she blurted, causing several people to note the alarm in her voice and turn to look.

Liz heard several sharp intakes of breath and smiled. Like a ripple moving outward from a thrown stone, more heads at the table were turning to see what the commotion was about. One by one the conversations faded away until the table was an island of stunned silence in a sea of babble.

The tiny teacher leaped to her feet. "Help me!" she squeaked in a mouse-like voice. "Someone help meeee!"

"Mrs. M-Matheson?" said Carolyn in a shaky voice.

Millie took a step in Carolyn's direction, and then felt something huge hit her in the back, slamming her to the tabletop. Several people gasped as Liz used a finger to smash the tiny woman down.

"Somebody! Please save me!" Only those sitting closest to Liz could hear the little woman pleading, but everyone saw her spread her arms wide in supplication. Millie staggered to her feet again, only to collapse once more as something cracked her a stunning blow in the side of the head. Liz had flicked a finger at her, sending her sprawling.

"Holy shit." Samantha's voice was loud and clear, but other than saying this she did nothing but stare, goggle-eyed. Everyone else seemed to follow her lead, staring and gawking, but frozen in place.

Millie had started crawling across the table, her head spinning from the vicious impact of Liz's finger. Liz pinched the teacher's tiny foot between thumb and forefinger and dragged her back. Millie opened her mouth to scream again, and suddenly Liz shoved with her thumb against the back of Millie's head, pushing her face first into the pool of ketchup. Millie's arms and legs thrashed helplessly.

When Liz finally allowed Millie to lift her head, she had time only to snatch a quick breath before having her face shoved back into the condiment which now covered most of her. The vinegar from the ketchup stung Millie's eyes terribly and filled her mouth and nose and ears. Just when it seemed she must surely smother, Millie felt fingers grasp her firmly by the hips and lift her up.

Liz turned Millie back and forth in her fingers, seeming to examine her minutely. "She's crazy!" shouted Millie as loud as she could. "Someone stop her! Oh please, why won't someone help me!"

With a wide grin, Liz held the tiny struggling form up for everyone to see. Then, very carefully, Liz placed Millie head-first onto her tongue and drew it in so only the wildly kicking legs could be seen. With a wet slurp, the legs vanished.

A number of people jerked spastically, as if they had been shocked by an electrical charge. Liz opened her mouth for a split second, allowing Millie's gut-wrenching screams of terror to come floating out, then slammed her lips shut again. For a while, Liz simply enjoyed the feel of the hot, slippery little body thrashing around in her mouth. Then, when she was certain that everyone at the table was watching her, horrified, Liz swallowed with an audible gulp.

For exactly one second there was absolute silence in the lunchroom, as if the people at the other tables sensed something was amiss. Then Carolyn gave an ear-piercing scream and the room went crazy.

In the ensuing pandemonium Liz made her escape. Chairs were overturned and people seemed to be screaming everywhere, most of them unsure why they were screaming, but caught up in the near-riot of panic. Some who had seen what happened were sobbing openly and others just sat very still as if they did not believe what their eyes and ears had told them. At the doors, Liz turned around once and glanced back. Her eyes caught Samantha's from across the room and Liz was gratified to see terror in them.

Millie screamed in the hot, wet darkness of Liz's stomach, clawing futilely at the walls of damp flesh that stretched upward around her. Her lower legs and feet, immersed in liquid, stung with the first hint of the acidic agony that was to come. Eventually, after screaming herself hoarse, the putrid atmosphere that stank of rot and decay overcame Millie, sparing her greater suffering. Millicent Matheson toppled into liquid beneath her, and sank into the welcome embrace of the oblivion that had claimed her husband and children.

It was fifteen minutes before one o'clock by the time Liz arrived home. There was no mail and no messages had been left on the answering machine, so Liz knew no one had had time to contact all the families of people who had vanished with the tower yet. She wasn't surprised. There were any awful lot of people, and their records had vanished with the building.

Ten minutes of preparation and Liz was ready. She had left the computer on, so it was warmed up and ready to go. Mrs. Matheson's miniaturized house, its roof shattered, still sat on the receiver bed. Easier just to send it back, thought Liz. Wouldn't give any clues as to what happened anyway.

Very carefully, Liz selected a rectangular box on the city map displayed on the screen that took in the location of her school. When the computer asked her for a ratio, Liz entered eighty to one. After carefully pacing off the measurements of the school, she knew that at that scale, the whole school would fit easily on the six foot receiver bed. After a few minutes, the computer chirped and threw up a window:

                              analysis complete
                              ratio 80:1
                              proceed? (y/n)

Liz checked her watch. It was two minutes past one o'clock. Perfect. With her soul exulting in music that would not have been out of place in the heart of a Mongol warrior, Liz pressed the 'y' button, twice, barely registering the "clear receiver? (y/n)" that flashed briefly on the screen. With a burst of light, the ruined house disappeared and was immediately replaced by a large, low structure in a rough L-shape.


     Samantha sat in the changeroom with the other girls, relieved
     that Liz was not there. The last thing she wanted was that
     pervert staring at her naked body as she changed. After that
     trick Liz pulled at lunch -- almost everyone had by now
     admitted that it must have been some kind of sick stunt --
     Samantha's patience had run out. If the little lesbo wouldn't
     do the decent thing and switch schools, she would make life so
     miserable Liz would be forced to leave.

     Just as Samantha was pulling her shirt over her head the
     lights went out, leaving the room only dimly illuminated by
     the red emergency lights that ran on their own batteries.
     For some reason, Samantha found herself unaccountably
     nervous, and kept remembering the look in Liz's eyes as she
     left the cafeteria.

     That was the last coherent thought she had as the ceiling
     collapsed.


Liz examined the school critically, walking around the receiver bed to orient herself. She quickly identified the spot where she knew the gymnasium was located. It had a motorized wall that could be moved to separate it into two halves, one each for the girls and boys. If that was the gym, she thought, then the girl's change room had to be right about... there.

Liz's fingers punched through the roof as if it was made of paper. She flung the chunk of concrete, steel beams, plaster, and fluorescent lighting away. Inside the hole she had made, Liz spotted two dozen tiny girl-shaped forms running or crawling or staring upward. None of them were quite a full inch tall.

Most screamed at the sight of Liz and made for the door to the gym, but Liz scrabbled about with her fingers, grabbing at them. By threes and fours she snatched them, gathering them in her other hand where they clutched each other and cried, terrified of staying, but more terrified still of leaping from the hand and falling what seemed to them to be hundreds of storeys to the ground. A few managed to escape, but not many. Liz wasn't concerned. They had no place to run.

Leaving the rest of the school for the moment, Liz took her tiny prisoners upstairs to the kitchen, where she dumped them onto the table. One girl dressed in shorts and a t-shirt, whom Liz recognized from the track team though she didn't know her name, started running the second she landed, and Liz snatched her up with her fingers.

"Watch carefully," said Liz. "I'm going to show you what happens to people who don't do what I tell them."

Tiny though the girl was, Liz could hear her little chirp of terror as Liz's fingers began to compress. The girl's fists beat at the tips of the fingers that were cruelly crushing the breath from her. Slowly, very slowly, Liz brought her fingers together, holding the girl up so every one of her captives could see. As ribs started to snap, blood started leaking from the girl's mouth and nose. Finally, she threw her head back and let loose a soul-wrenching howl that culminated with a geyser of blood that exploded from her mouth. Liz pressed her fingers completely together, and there were small snapping sounds. The girl sagged brokenly, coils of glistening intestine spilling from her ruptured flesh. With a flick of her finger, Liz sent the crumpled body flying to the tabletop where it landed with a wet smack.

Some of the girls were screaming hysterically, some were sobbing. It was too much for one, who made a break for the edge of the table farthest from Liz. Liz's fist came hurtling down on top of her. The impact threw all the other girls from their feet. The runner simply exploded, throwing jets of blood in all directions. What was left of her did not resemble anything human.

"Anyone else?" asked Liz with a nasty grin. No one moved. "Didn't think so." The terror of the tiny girls in front of her was almost a physical force, coming off them in a cloud. The sight of all those fear-creased faces, their eyes staring, their cheeks pale and streaked with tears, was maddeningly arousing to Liz. Most were familiar to Liz. Many had joined in her persecution. All were at her mercy, and Liz had none.

"I watched you all in the showers," said Liz. "For years. Gorgeous young bodies, soft and supple, begging to be touched and kissed. None of you knew. You stood there with your luscious tits hanging out and your nipples ripe and rosy and I couldn't do a fucking thing. Carolyn's got such amazing tits. Hey Carolyn, show us your tits."

Liz reached out a finger to sort through the girls in front of her, and they parted like magic. A girl near the back tried to hide herself in the crowd, but no one would let her get near. Carolyn fell to her knees with her face to the ground and her arms over her head, her whole body shaking with the force of her sobs. Liz's forefinger easily flipped her over, and when Carolyn tried to crawl away, the finger pinned her to the table.

"Come on," said Liz. "We all want to see those luscious tits of yours. All those soft blouses you wear that show off your nipples. We want to see them. You know what happens to to people who don't do what I say. Take off your fucking shirt."

Released by the finger, Carolyn lurched to her feet and, sobbing hysterically, pulled her sweatshirt off.

"Bra too," said Liz, eyes fixed on the little captive.

Carolyn pulled at the athletic bra with shaking hands, managing to get it off, then stood with her hands by her side, head bowed and shoulders hunched.

"Mmm, nice," said Liz. With a fingertip she knocked Carolyn to the floor, then ran the very tip of her finger back and forth over the tiny breasts. "I think I'll keep you. You always said you were too cool for me. Guess now it'll be true."

Liz snatched Carolyn up, leaned back, and opened the freezer door on the refrigerator. Carolyn squeaked once, and then Liz flung her in a short parabola into the depths of the freezer. The door swung shut.

"There. I'll be able to take her out and look at her whenever I like. And Carolyn will be the coolest kid in school. Now," said Liz, a leer on her face. "The rest of you. I want to see naked bodies in about five seconds. The last one out of her clothes gets to be an example."

Most of the girls shucked their clothes as quickly as they could and stood covering themselves with their hands. A half-dozen were curled up on the ground and would not move. Only one stood defiantly with her hands on her hips, glaring up at Liz. Samantha.

The six who did not move, Liz swept up with her fingers. At her touch, all but two shrieked and tried to run, to no avail. Liz lowered her lips to her hand and shoved all six into her mouth. Wails and screams came from the doomed girls. With her mouth open so those on the table could witness the carnage, Liz began chewing. Slowly. An arm crushed. A leg. Someone's hip ground between her molars. A hand severed by scissoring canines. All accompanied by wet snapping noises. The shrieking was horrible and it went on and on as Liz carefully and painfully ground the six girls to pulp. A dark red drool dripped from Liz's lower lip and down her chin. There were still moans and sobs coming from within when Liz closed her mouth and swallowed.

After picking her teeth with a fingernail, Liz extracted a bloodied and torn pair of panties, which she dropped in front of Samantha.

"I was hungry," said Liz. "I didn't have much of a lunch." She laughed at her own joke.

"Go to hell!" screamed Samantha, at the top of her lungs. Liz could barely make out what she was saying. "You're going to kill us all anyway. I'm not going to put on a show for you, you... sick pervert!"

Liz stared at the miniature Samantha, whose terror was subsumed by an even greater fury. It was too bad Samantha was such a bitch, thought Liz. She could almost admire courage like that. Liz broke out in a wide grin as she realized that all of Samantha's protests were worth exactly nothing. Still grinning, Liz grabbed the girl by one leg and began stripping her by pinching the clothes between her fingernails. It was tricky work, and Samantha made it as hard as she could be struggling and squirming.

"Fuck off! You fucking lesbo pervert! Let go of me this second!" screamed Samantha, keeping up a constant flow of abuse.

When Samantha was completely naked, Liz lifted the tiny pink body to her lips and ran the tip of her tongue over it, from end to end. With her fingers, she ground Samantha's groin over the very tip of her tongue, unable to feel much but beginning to breathe heavily with the mere knowledge of who she was molesting.

A thought occured to Liz. She lowered Samantha to the table, laying her on her back and pinning her there with her arms over her head with the tip of one finger.

"Okay, you," said Liz, pointing to one of the other girls. "Get over here." Trembling, the girl obeyed.

"Alright," said Liz, with a wide, sadistic smile on her face. "Get between Samantha's legs and start licking."

The girl hesitated for only a second, then looked up at the gargantuan form looming overhead and shuddered. She went down on all fours in between Samantha's legs.

"No!" screamed Samantha. "Oh fuck! Kelly, you touch me and I swear I'll fucking kill youuuuuu-- ooh!"

Samantha's hips bucked as the girl's lips touched her mons. "You're all perverts! You're all a bunch of God damned fucking lesbo dykes! You--"

As Kelly's tongue probed inside her, Samantha's rage grew in direct proportion to her arousal. Shamed by her body's betrayal, Samantha screamed obscenities. "Rape! Kelly, you fucking rapist! I hope you burn in Hell, you cunt-sucking dyke!"

Liz enjoyed the scene immensely. She wished she had a video camera to record it, but guessed that the images would stay with her forever in any case. "You and you," she said, pointing to two more girls. Most had turned away, but a few stood staring in shock. "Get over here and help."

With weak knees, the two girls did as they were told, each using their hands and mouth fumblingly on Samantha's breasts.

Sweat was beginning to bead on Liz's forehead. Her whole body vibrated with the power of her arousal. "You are turning me on like you wouldn't believe, finger-food," gasped Liz, shifting uncomfortably in her seat. "I think it's time to move this little party somewhere more interesting."

Liz stood, and with her free hand, pulled at her skirt until it puddled down around her ankles. Her cotton briefs had a damp patch that covered the whole front, and pulled away in sticky strands when Liz hiked them down. Her labia was puffed out and drooled a thin stream of viscous liquid at the bottom. The smell of her sex was strong to the tabletop prisoners who cowered away from it, terrified by its nearness and immensity.

Liz dipped a finger inside herself and rubbed gently, then extracted it wet and shiny. She dabbed the finger at the three girls who surrounded Samantha, wetting them down, then pushed them aside and ran her finger sensuously up and down Samantha's tiny body. At last she released Samantha, and placed her whole hand over top of both her and the three other girls, making a jail of her fingers. Carefully she drew them into her hand and lifted them before her flushed face.

"You morsels are going to make me very happy," said Liz, and blew them a kiss. "And hey, Samantha... if you see my folks tell them I said hi."

Then with a wicked leer, Liz lowered her hand to her pubis and rubbed the tiny, hot bodies against her labia while they screamed and fought with all of their miniscule strength. Slowly, Liz rubbed them into her folds, working them ever deeper inside herself. When all four had slid inside, Liz used a finger to push them in as deeply as she could.

"Uh," grunted Liz as she felt them start to squirm. The little tingles their struggling caused were maddening but insufficient to satisfy. Her hand reached out and grabbed a handful of little pink bodies from the table and shoved them rudely inside. The rest of the girls began screaming and running in all directions to escape their fate but not one escaped. By ones and twos and whole handfuls, Liz snatched them up and fed them into her ravenous cleft. They filled her totally in a way Liz had never experienced. Each tiny girl exerted her own pressure as she writhed in the grip of Liz's vaginal muscles. Liz had to pinch herself shut with her fingers to keep her little occupants from falling out, so stuffed full was she.

Two girls who had the dubious luck of being last and hence unable to fit inside were held pushed against the Liz's outer labia by her squeezing fingers and were quickly crushed to death, their blood mixing with Liz's juices to make her slick and lubricated.

Unable to remain standing on her increasingly wobbly legs, Liz let herself fall to her knees and then to her back on the kitchen floor, gasping for breath and bearing down as tremor-like orgasms rumbled through her from end to end, slowly gaining force, until it was a full-fledged tower-toppling earthquake that threatened to tear Liz's heart apart with its intensity.

"Uhhhhhh!" Liz threw back her head and howled as she let the two broken bodies in her fingers fall to the floor where her bouncing buttocks smashed them to paste. Shoving her fingers inside herself, Liz pushed and probed, feeling tiny bodies breaking under her thrusts.

Half the girls failed to survive Liz's climax when it came. Some had smothered in the press, but most had simply been crushed by the walls of wet, rippling muscle around them, Liz's thrusting fingers, or both. Of those who lived, none escaped unscathed.

When Liz's final orgasm had run its course, she pulled herself open and began extracting battered little bodies. Among those that still survived, there were many broken bones and internal injuries. Few were capable of moving, having shattered bones poking brutally through shredded flesh. The worst injured simply laid where they landed between Liz's thighs, moaning softly.

In the heap of dead and wounded, Liz picked out Samantha's red hair and extracted her. One arm was bent at an unnatural angle but she looked, other than that, relatively uninjured. At last her nerve had broken and when Liz picked her up, Samantha begged and pleaded, and kissed the fingers that held her. "Please Liz, I don't want to die, I'll do anything you want, anything," she sobbed, hugging her wounded arm to her.

Liz eyed her coolly. "So long, bite-sized," she whispered.

Tilting her head back, Liz opened her mouth and lifted the tiny redhead until she hung suspended over the canyon of her mouth.

"Liz! No! Noooo!" screamed Samantha.

Liz let go, and the little body tumbled into her waiting mouth. Liz gave her fifteen seconds to get good and terrified -- as witnessed by the shrieks coming from inside her -- then swallowed. The screaming faded away and then vanished altogether. Samantha spent the last few horrible minutes of her life surrounded by the bloody, mashed and partially chewed remains of six of her classmates.

After fetching a whisk and a dustpan, Liz swept up the pile of dead and wounded girls and dumped them into the sink. Bloody and mangled, covered in Liz's juices, and now brown with adhered dirt from the dustpan, they were an unappealing, not to mention unappetizing, lot. Liz thought for a moment, then went to one of the cupboards.

The lucky ones were already dead. The others writhed in unimaginable torment as Liz sprayed the whole lot with oven cleaner. Those who were not already dead quickly followed as the foam dissolved their flesh. Within minutes not much but the larger bones were left, and these Liz washed down the drain.

Liz's blouse and bra, the only pieces of clothing she still wore, clung to her sweat-soaked skin and she removed them, throwing the damp articles into the living room. It wasn't as if her parents were going to complain, she thought, smirking.

Padding over to the fridge, Liz opened it and stood staring at the contents, pondering. Her little living snacks had piqued her hunger and, after all, she hadn't really had much to eat for a couple of days. Tiny people were fun to eat, but they weren't exactly filling. As she stood there, it suddenly occured to her that she still had an entire school full of little, terrified snacks in the basement. A wide, cruel grin filled her face. The refrigerator door slammed shut, and Liz stalked down into the basement in search of screaming morsels.

She found lots of them.

In the time she had been gone, hundreds of students and a few teachers had vacated the school and stood staring up at the sheer, steel walls of the receiver bed. At the first sight of her, a collective shout went up from the little people, and the whole crowd began fighting to press their way through the crush of people into the school. It made it easy for Liz to simply reach out into the mob and grab a handful of people.

There were maybe twenty people clutched in her hand, and Liz examined them briefly. She spotted a teacher she knew, and smiled. "Hi, Mr. Edmund," she said, waving to her astonished History teacher with her other hand. Then she started stuffing them into her mouth and chewing, making smacking noises as she did it. Clothing and body parts fell in a grisly rain from her lips onto the crowd, driving it into a frenzy.

At first, she dipped her cupped hands into the mob, taking person-sized bites from the crowds in her hands. She was barely making a dent in the size of the mob, though, so she simply lowered her head and began snapping mouthfuls of people up as quickly as she could swallow, not even bothering to chew. By the time most of the remaining people had made it into the school, Liz had eaten about three hundred people and was beginning to feel bloated. The last few Liz held in one hand and tossed them pinwheeling into her mouth one at a time, like popcorn. They crunched the same way, and they were kind of salty too.

"Whew," said Liz, collapsing back into the chair by the computer terminal, one hand on her stomach. She was stuffed. "Whoah, cooool," she said, as she realized that with her hand on her bare abdomen, she could feel the collective struggles of the hundreds of people smothering in her stomach. She dipped her head and sure enough, a kind of mass groaning and screaming could be heard from her stomach.

By squinting at the school, Liz was barely able to make out hands and faces pressed against the glass on the second floor, watching her. She realized she was naked, and she frowned. The idea of her little toys peeping at her made her both angry and highly aroused. With a full stomach, she felt she might be up to a little more sex.

Before anyone had a chance to react, Liz was on her feet. Her hand darted out, demolishing part of the side of the school. She felt around inside until she had a handful of little squirming bodies, then returned to her seat. There, she thought, that ought to keep them on their toes.

Of the five tiny people she pulled from the school, three were boys. These she held in her right fist, loving the feel of them struggling against her fingers, and crushed them until blood began to run from her hand, which she lapped up like a cat. When she opened her fist, she popped all three broken bodies into her mouth and chewed them slowly, like gory chewing gum. The two girls she held in her left hand, and treated them to the full display of what she did to the boys.

Liz gave the trembling girls a frightening smile. "You saw what I did to them. Unless you want the same to happen to you, I want you to give me a show."

One of the girls squeaked, and though Liz couldn't make it out, she guessed, correctly as it turned out, that she was asking what kind of show Liz wanted.

"Kiss each other," said Liz.

The girls balked, and Liz began closing her fist. Quickly, they pushed their lips together and stared out of the corner of their eyes at the mad giantess.

"That's not what I mean and you know it. Let's see some tongue," said Liz, leering and leaning closer.

Reluctantly, the girls did as they were told, sobbing into each other's mouths.

"Good, that's really good," said Liz. "Now, take off your clothes and fuck each other."

The girls broke apart, and one went into hysterics, screaming something at Liz over and over again.

Liz frowned and leaned closer. Finally, she realized what the girl had been shouting: "We're sisters!"

Liz giggled. "Coooool," she said, feeling incredibly perverted. "I want to see you both naked and giving each other the works, or you're not going to be anything at all except lunch." She licked her lips for emphasis.

Awkwardly, crying and stopping often to hug each other, the two girls pulled off their clothes, which Liz disposed of with a puff of air. Forced against their will, the two sisters nonetheless showed great dignity in their act, making it as easy on each other as they could, their love expressing itself in their tenderness. To their surprise, they realized eventually that the titanic head that hovered over them was crying.

"No one will ever love me," whispered Liz. "No one will ever want to make love to me. Who could love a... monster?" Liz looked over at the sisters, still locked, thighs and faces, in a sexual embrace. "I hate you!" said Liz, through her tears. "I hate you! I hate you!"

With one swift movement she threw the girls to the floor and brought her heel down on top of them with a sickening crunch. Wet warmth pooled under her foot and soaked into the carpet. Savagely, she ground her heel until nothing remained but a discoloured spot.

Liz rose from her chair like the angel of death and stalked over to the receiver bed. With a roar of fury, she brought her fist down on one edge of the miniature school sending brick and steel and glass flying as though a bomb had exploded. Dozens of bloodied and mangled bodies were thrown everywhere. Growling, Liz pushed her hand through two walls, crushing dozens more in the wreckage, and began slamming her hand down over and over again on the tiny, screaming, scuttling forms, as if they were insects. Her rage was utterly terrifying for her tiny victims to behold and many lost control of their bowels as her blazing eyes raked across them.

More than a hundred people were killed and a quarter of the school demolished before Liz's anger burned itself out.

Liz returned to the desk and sat with her head down in her arms, sobbing, until she spent herself and fell asleep. Hours passed, and the sun slipped lower on the horizon. Inside the school, the wounded were hurriedly treated in silence, and hiding places searched for. Evening came and Liz stirred.

"Daddy?" said Liz, waking muddle-headed. She smacked her lips at the funny taste in her mouth. "Ouch," she said, as she flexed the hand she had bruised smashing the school. Look-outs posted on top of the school crept back inside and passed word. Liz was awake. A terrified hush descended.

Slowly, things came back to her. The school. Liz twisted in her seat, grunting at her stiff back. There it was, just the way she remembered it. Well, maybe a little more... destroyed than she remembered. Liz grimaced. She had really lost it. Wistfully she wondered who the sisters had been, and realized that she would likely never know.

Ah well, thought Liz, she'd chalk it up to lack of sleep. At least she had grabbed a few hours. Her stomach growled, and Liz was surprised to find herself hungry. She hadn't thought she'd slept that long. Well, she knew where to find supper, didn't she? A smile played across her face.

Upstairs in the bathroom, Liz relieved herself and emptied the waste basket, which she brought down with her. For the next hour she tore the roof off the school and pulled it apart room by room, brick by brick, searching for the tiny little micro-meals that were once students and teachers. Each time she found them, they went into the basket. After an hour, the school was rubble and four hundred tiny people trembled in the bottom of the waste basket. Liz knew she had missed a few that no doubt had found a good hiding place in the wreckage. She wasn't worried, she knew they had no place to go, and they would probably make a nice breakfast.

Liz climbed the stairs to the kitchen, got a pair of manicure scissors, and began to snip the clothes from her captives as if she were shelling shrimp. If an arm or a leg got snipped along with the clothes, well, she wasn't too concerned. Those she popped into her mouth and chewed slowly as she worked. Many in the basket chose to strip themselves rather than risk those terrible limb-slashing scissors.

From under the stove, Liz pulled the largest roasting pan her mother owned and threw half her captives into it. Their little squeaks of terror were adorable, and Liz grabbed a handful of the cutest looking girls to amuse herself with, keeping them in a mixing bowl. Into the pan went a few tomatoes and onions and a drizzling of oil. All those in the pan knew what was going to happen, and their cries were pitiable. Whistling, Liz placed the lid carefully on top and popped the pan into the oven. She set the oven for 325 degrees. She didn't want them to cook too quickly, after all.

On top of the stove, Liz heated a huge pot of oil, the one her mother normally used for french fries. When it began to bubble, she grabbed a handful of naked little bodies from the waste basket and held them over the oil. Liz thought they screamed quite loudly for such tiny people, but it was nothing compared to the shrieks they made when she dropped them into the pot. Not that it lasted long. Within a couple of minutes, the kitchen smelled strongly of cooking meat. With a strainer, Liz lifted the tiny, fetally-curled bodies from the oil and patted them dry on a paper towel. They were golden and crisp, and Liz found them quite acceptable with salt.

While the weakest were collapsing with heat stroke in the oven, Liz made batch after batch of deep-fried little people. When less than a hundred remained in the basket, all of them sobbing and waiting for the end, most resigned but some hysterical, Liz half-filled the blender with milk. To this she added as many tiny people as she could fit, about seventy in all. Those at the bottom were crushed or drowned, but those at the top lived long enoug