Damnation!
By Astrogator

Vernon Quentin knew he was dying so he called his
daughters to his bedside and said, 'It is time for me to
join your mother.'
Pamela shook her head. 'No, Papa! Don’t!' Her eyes were
wide. 'Please wait awhile. You’ll get better.'
Vernon Quentin raised his hand weakly. 'No, I will never
get out of this bed again. I am going to do it.' He looked
at Margaret, hoping that she would say something.
'When, Papa?' Margaret said. The gleam in her eyes
saddened him.
'Today,' he said. 'Right now. Bring the Tube and put me in
it.'
Margaret turned with too much alacrity and left the room.
Pamela started to sob and hugged his wasted frame. 'Oh
Papa! What are we going to do without you?'
'You’ll be fine,' Quentin said. 'There is plenty of money
for you and Margaret.'
Pamela caught her breath and turned her eyes away. 'It’s
Margaret’s money, not mine,' Pamela said. 'She invented
the Tube.'
Vernon patted her arm. 'Now, Pamela, your sister loves
you. You will never want for anything. You know that?'
Pamela blinked. 'I guess so. But Papa, I see her looking
at me with this strange look on her face. I wish you and
Maggie had gotten along better. I think that she ---'
Margaret returned to the bedroom carrying a case.
'Now, get out of Maggie’s way,' Vernon said. 'I am eager
to see your mother again. It has been a long time.'
Pamela gave Vernon a final squeeze and stood back
trembling. Margaret opened the suitcase on the side of the
bed to reveal a blue sphere, a headset, and a small
computer. Margaret plugged in the headset and put it on
Vernon who smiled and thought of Gloria. 'She’ll be young
and slender, won’t she?' he asked and Margaret nodded
gravely as she started up the controller software for the
Tube. 'Of course she will,' Vernon said. 'That’s the whole
point of the Tube, isn’t it? I’ll be young too, and I’ll
have all my hair. ' He chuckled. 'It’s not like dying used
to be, is it? This whole life is just a brief unhappy
dream and then we wake up to a new life of perfect health
and endless youth. It is like heaven was imagined. The
world is in your debt, Maggie. You have conquered death
with your invention of the Tube.'
Margaret shook her head. 'Not really,' she said. 'The Tube
won’t last forever. The nuclear battery will only last a
few hundred thousand years. Maybe a million with luck.'
'A million years!' Vernon said. 'A million years with
Gloria! That will do, Maggie. That will do very nicely.
Thank you for giving me that. I probably don’t deserve
it.'
Margaret leaned over him and adjusted the head set upon
his brow. 'Oh, but you do, Papa,' she said, and kissed him
lightly on the forehead. Vernon was startled by the
gesture, and moved, for she had been cold toward him for
many years. She started the recorder and turned to look at
him again. As conscious faded from his brain for the last
time, he was puzzled by the look of triumph on her face.
***
Pamela removed the headset she had been wearing and looked
at Margaret with tears in her eyes. 'I can’t believe it,'
she said. 'How can Papa have been such a monster?'
'You have to believe it,' Margaret said. 'Those are his
recorded memories you were experiencing. And the little
girl was me.'
'He never bothered me,' Pamela said. 'I don’ t understand
it, but now I know why you hated me. Papa was always so
good to me while he .... '
'I never hated you,' Margaret said. 'I hated him and I
hated the way he deceived you.'
'Why didn’t you tell me?' Pamela said.
'I tried,' Margaret said. 'I tried to tell you.'
Pamela’s eyes opened wide as old memories came back. 'Yes,
you did, didn’t you. I thought you were jealous of me and
Papa. Oh Maggie!'
The two sisters embraced for the first time in years.
Margaret ended the embrace and turned to the Tube. She
removed the chip from the playback unit and reached into a
hole in the blue sphere. 'This one is Papa,' she said,
plugging it in place. She picked up a second chip from the
table and kissed it. 'This one is Mother.' She pressed the
second chip into a socket.
'Why are you doing it?' Pamela said. 'Why are you
reuniting them after what he did?'
'It was Mother’s wish,' Margaret said. She picked up a
heavy thick steel plug from the table and screwed it into
the access hole in the tube. 'This will keep the water out
while the Tube is lying on the bottom of the sea.'
'Did she know about Papa?' Pamela asked.
'She knew,' Margaret said. She pulled up the activation
menu on the computer and positioned the mouse over the
START command. 'Welcome to hell, Papa,' she said.
Click!
.***

When he awoke in a circle of light, he was lying on his
back on a hard surface. He saw the face of Gloria, now
eighteen again, looking down at him. The rest of her was
in shadows. 'Gloria!' he cried. 'It’s really you!'
'Yes, Vernon,' she said, and smiled.
Vernon put out his hand to touch her face, but he felt
nothing. Puzzled, he raised his head and peered around
him, then said, 'Why is it so dark? Why can’t I see all of
you?'
'I’ll turn on the light,' Gloria said.
Vernon sat up and looked down at his body. He was naked,
but his body was that of a young man. The muscles of his
arms and legs were thick. His body hair was now dark again
and the wrinkles had gone from his flesh. He looked up
just as the light came on and he could see the room
clearly.
'Hey! Something went wrong!' he cried as he stared around
the room in horrified dismay. The room was like his study,
but enlarged many times. He was sitting on a colossal
version of his own desk and Gloria was seated at the desk,
but she was now eighty feet tall!
'No, everything is working perfectly,' Gloria said,
smiling at him. 'Doesn’t it seem real?'
Vernon got to his feet slowly, staring at Gloria’s
enormous body. She was wearing her 'Sunday' dress, the
black one with the short skirt which she had not been able
to get into since Margaret was born. As Vernon watched,
she crossed her enormous legs and the hem of her dress
slipped back revealing a glimpse of creamy thigh. He ran
his eye up the length of her body and paused to gaze at
her generous breasts, now standing high, full, and
colossal. He looked up at her face and said, 'It does seem
real. But why am I so small?'
Gloria leaned closer and rested her elbow on the desk. 'I
like it this way,' she said. 'Margaret arranged things so
I can control the environment and your relationship to it.
I can make you bigger or smaller.'
Vernon gazed up at her in dismay. 'You are in control? '
Gloria smiled. 'I can do anything I want,' she said.
'While you are helpless.' She reached for him with her big
hand. He instinctively fled from her, but she grabbed him
and lifted him up.
'What are you going to do?' he cried, as he squirmed
helplessly in the grip of her huge fingers.
She brought him near her face and held him on her palm. 'I
never realized what pleasure it is to have total power
over another being,' she remarked. 'But you know all about
that, don’t you?' She lifted him up, tilted her head back
and said, 'Down the hatch, Vernon.' She opened her mouth
and let him drop. He fell screaming inside, writhing with
unbelievable terror. He died in agony as she began to
chew, slowly.
***
He awoke in a circle of light, lying on his back on the
desk. He saw the enormous face of Gloria looking down. He
recoiled from the memory of being eaten alive. 'How did
you like that, Vernon?' Gloria said, and reached for him.
'Gloria! Don’t hurt me!' he begged as she lifted him up
above her face and tilted her head back.
'This time, I promise not to chew,' she said and dropped
him into her mouth. Crushed between the huge tongue and
the roof of her mouth, Vernon screamed for mercy. 'Don’t!
It hurts!' he cried. 'It hurts!' Her mouth flooded with
saliva and the tongue moved beneath him, shoving him back
to the rear of her throat. He fought to keep from slipping
down, but his strength was nothing compared to her tongue
and the saliva made everything slippery. He managed to
grab one of her teeth, but the enormous power of her
swallow pulled him down her gullet. He went down, down,
and the air grew nauseous. He fell into a liquid that
burned and the pain was hideous.....
***
He awoke in a circle of light, lying on his back. The
memory of being swallowed alive was vivid and searing. He
saw the enormous face of Gloria looking down on him.
'Now for something different,' said Gloria. She picked him
up and put him on his feet on the floor.
Vernon stared upward at the overwhelming height of Gloria
rearing high above him. Her face showed grim satisfaction.
'I had to put up with you for the sake of the girls, but I
have wanted to do this many times,' she said as she lifted
her enormous, high heeled shoe and brought it down with
overwhelming force that erased the world in a flash of
pain.....
***
He opened his eyes in a circle of light, lying on his
back. The huge legs of Gloria rose above him and he jumped
quickly to his feet. He raised his hand before his face as
she lifted her foot. 'Please stop!' he screamed. 'Please
stop!'
'I’ll never stop,' said Gloria. She lowered her foot and
slowly, slowly crushed him. He died in prolonged agony....

***
He was awakened by the shock of cold water. Vernon coughed
to clear his lungs and treaded water to stay afloat. He
seemed to be floating in a tank of water. The walls were
glass and the enormous face of Gloria was looking in at
him and smiling. He was in a blender....