The rift opened and Liam jumped through. It always felt like falling sideways. Hopefully, this world would prove better than the last one he’d visited. He’d stayed exactly long enough to learn that Dan Quail had been elected president and Mariah Cary’s movie Glitter had won best picture. Burr! It still gave him the shudders.  Some things in the universe were beyond horror.

Jumping to parallel Earths was a risky business, but Liam did it in the name of science. To be more exact;  on his first jump he had found a world that had seemingly been populated entirely by females dressed in scant clothing. He hadn’t seen any men. There must have been men somewhere, otherwise where would all the people come from? Initially the lack of men concerned him that things like football, beer and potato chips might not exist in that universe, but the initial panic subsided when he realized that all of the women there could have posed as centerfold of the year in playboy. They had welcomed him with open arms and immediately accepted that he was a traveler from a parallel Earth. All were exceedingly friendly.  One lady in particular, named Jessica, had been particularly friendly towards him. She had been in her late twenties and had explained that she was a PhD in Theoretical Physics at the local university. The fact that she had a body that would have made Demi Moore when she had been in her prime… well that was just gravy. Really, really good gravy.

Hours had flown by like seconds as the two scientists had discussed physics while drinking some really tasty wine. Liam had been hoping he could have stayed longer but had to open the rift to return home, promising to return. Jessica seemed sorry to have seen him go. Liam hadn’t exactly been a player on his home Earth but with the field seemingly cleared of other competition and his occupation as a physicist and parallel-world traveler, his chances of getting with Jessica had seemed extremely good. She appeared to be very interested in him, although Liam wasn’t sure if that was because he was the only man around or simply because he was from a parallel earth.

In a tragic blow to Liam’s sex life, the wine he’d consumed had affected him quite badly. Perhaps it was because he was from an alternate reality and not equipped to metabolize the high alcoholic content of the wine. Perhaps it was simply the company of a woman whose body made Olympic Volleyball players look plain and rival the intelligence of a Harvard Professor of Physics. Whatever the reason; the thought to program the coordinates of that particular parallel universe into his handheld jump device had slipped Liam’s mind. Liam had realized his mistake too late, resulting in him swearing a lot, kicking a door and spraining his ankle for the trouble. Unfortunately none of this gave him the coordinates for Jessica’s universe.

Now, with an infinite number of universes to explore to try and find Jessica again, he made his best estimated guess; and jumped.

Emerging through the other side of the rift, he hopped onto the tile floor he had seemingly just left. The hair on the back of his neck stood up from the electric charge and vortex of energies that swirled around in the rift like a whorl pool between realities. His best friend, Tuppy, arrived a moment later.  Then the gate winked out of existence. Liam looked down at his charger; only fifteen minutes until he was recharged and able to make the jump back. Of course, he had rigged the device so he could stay as long as he wanted two but he would need at least fifteen minutes for a recharge before it   was possible.

Liam stowed the tiny, mobile phone sized device (which he liked to call his Rift Key) in his pocket and looked around himself. He seemed to be in some sort of vast hall that stretched onwards before terminating an indeterminable distance away. The hallway looked almost exactly the same as the one in the university he’d just left, only the size had amplified many times over.

It didn’t take a cleaver cove like Liam long to work out that this parallel earth must have a different size ratio than his own.  It wasn’t much of a jump in reasoning for Liam to hug the walls as he made his way down the passage to ensure that he wasn’t accidentally crushed by anyone who might happen along the hallway. Fortunately Liam’s friend Tuppy was the only person in sight.  

 Liam’s best friend in the physics community was this rather bothersome slightly overweight fellow. Tuppy’s gift for science was marginal at best, but he was a dogged worker and disserved some credit, however begrudgingly Liam gave it to him, for the invention of the Rift Device.

Tuppy was dressed in khaki pants, held in place by a rather thin belt that pressed against a prodigious belly. He had a white shirt with a collar on it that looked marginally clean. Over this was a white lab coat.  For the hundredth time that day Liam held back a scoff at his friend’s appearance.  When jumping between worlds, it paid to be a bit more prepared than to wear lab clothes. Liam was dressed in jeans, a t-shirt that had a Detroit Red Wings Hockey logo on it and a Leather Jacket over that. He felt cool and confident. He was in good shape having wrestled in high school and was on the rowing team for his alma mater.  

“It looks like a larger version of our own college,” said Liam, annoyed.  “But maybe we can learn something from a little exploring. It’s a quarter of an hour until the key is recharged and were ready to jump again.  It doesn’t appear to be too dangerous so maybe we should split up to cover more ground. Why don’t you go the other way and see if you find anything interesting. We’ll meet back here in fifteen minutes.

“Okay,” said Tuppy reluctantly. He seemed disappointed that Liam wanted to split up. Tuppy was not a brave man which was why Liam preferred to leave him behind when going on jumps. Lately however, Tuppy had insisted on coming along. Liam believed it had to do with his descriptions of an all female supermodel world. While it was true that Tuppy would be helpful in pinpointing the coordinates to the universe, Tuppy’s presence made jumps a lot more of a bother. The man clung to Liam like a leached affixed to his arm, always getting in his way and slowing things down, causing Liam to become rather short tempered with his friend.

 Liam knew he had hurt Tuppy’s feelings by brushing him off like that, but he didn’t care. If he didn’t want to explore then he could have stayed in the lab.

Tuppy proceeded onwards alone towards a nearby classroom. Hearing voices emanating from behind a closed door, Liam found his curiosity grow. He very much wanted to see the inhabitants of this Earth. Squeezing under the crack in the door was tight, but proved no real problem to him. He hurried off to the side in case someone entered the room in a more traditional fashion, found a reasonably safe corner, and then took stock of his surroundings.

He found himself in a nearly identical classroom to the one in his university back on his Earth, once again allowing for the stipulation that everything here was about a hundred times bigger than he was used to. The foreground of his vision was taken up by two young ladies, whom like everything in this world, appeared normal aside from size. They towered over Tuppy like skyscrapers. They were however, quite pretty and Tuppy found it hard not to stare at their bodies’ curves, impossible to ignore at his comparatively negligible size.

“How many do you have?” said the girl with short black hair. She spoke English. This was good. It would be hard to learn a language that was not based on anything he knew. Lucky they spoke his language. They continued to do this at once; “I’d really appreciate a pick-me –up. Do you mind sharing?”

“You know Clare, you really need to remember to bring some snacks yourself. What would you do if I weren’t here?” asked her friend, seeming to imply that her absence would mean disaster to her friend Clare. This girl’s hair was more of a brown color, slightly curled and hung just past her shoulders.  She reached into a backpack and began rummaging around for something; presumably an apple, a granola bar, or some other portable snack.

Tuppy looked at her backpack. It’s tag said “TUG-TOTE” with the outline of a mountain being climbed by a stick figure with long hair to imply a woman. Below the caption read “a backpack for the outdoor girls out there.” Tuppy had never heard of the company but it was hardly surprising; he was in a parallel universe after all. Not to mention that he was far from athletic. If such a company did exist on his own earth, Liam would have been the authority.

The backpack had several buttons and patches fixed onto it. There was a patch of what looked like a flag but Liam was unfamiliar with it. The buttons had captions like; “I climbed Sleeping Mont Rock!”and,  “PLAY, Just Push It!” and finally; “Betsy’s Barr’s Bakery.”

That was a good sign, especially the bakery part. Tuppy would hate to find a world that didn’t include pastry. He wondered what the girls were going to eat. Maybe it would be a donut or a muffin.  He began to speculate on how the women might react if he introduced himself and asked for some of their food.

“Here they are,” said the long haired girl, extracting a Tupperware bin from where it had obviously slid to the bottom of her bag. She set her bag down, which actually caused a slight tremor to run through the floor, probably unnoticeable to the two giant women but Tuppy felt it keenly in his knees. He steadied himself and looked back up at the giantesses who were now opening the bin. It had tiny holes in it, which struck Tuppy as odd. He wondered what they considered a good snack in this world and why it would need air holes.

The long haired girl reached in and plucked an object from the bin. Tuppy was startled to see that whatever it was seemed to me moving. He tried to get a closer look but the way that the girl was holding the object prevented him from getting a good look.

“Are they fresh?” asked Clair, reaching in herself and grabbing another object.

“I bought them yesterday. They usually last me a few days, assuming I don’t run out early by giving them all to my friends,” said the other girl, with a sideways look at Clair. She popped whatever object was in her hand into her mouth and swallowed it. “But they still struggle fine if that’s what you’re getting at.”

“Hey, sorry.  I’ll buy you dinner this weekend,” said her friend, holding up both hands defensively.

It was the defensive posture on the part of Clair that allowed Tuppy to observe the object in her hand. It was struggling too. It was waving its arms and legs…

With a cold chill Tuppy realized that the object in her hand was a tiny man, about his size. He even appeared to be screaming, although Liam couldn’t hear him from this distance.

The man seemed to be reaching out towards the Tupperware bin where, presumably, more little men were kept. Whatever his reason, Clare popped him into her mouth easily and without even bother to chew him, swallowed. She reached in for another object and extracted another man.

“Oh yeah that was wiggily. Good ones. Where did you get them?” said Clare, eating this next man just like the first. Tuppy watched in horror as a bulge moved quickly down her throat.

“At the local farm on Ashburn Road,” said her friend. “I always try to support the local man farms. And they taste so much better and wiggle more on the way down than those store bought kind. I can’t help but think that those guys at the store have already been through the ringer and don’t have any more fight left in them. These guys however. Nice and fresh.”

She picked up two more men and tossed them into her mouth together, gulping them simultaneously.

   Tuppy had seen enough. He began to run, hurrying back out the door and down the hallway. He had to find Liam.

He’d made it about halfway down the hallway, keeping his eyes peeled for his friend, when suddenly doors up and down the passage opened and people poured out.

Tuppy hurried into a classroom to escape the hallway. He ducked in a corner and took stock of things. A lecture in this classroom was still going on, but seemed to be wrapping up. Tuppy looked around.

Size difference non-withstanding, something strange struck Tuppy in this room. It took him a moment to put his finger on it; everyone in the classroom was a woman. All were exceedingly beautiful, which was a pleasant thought, but it struck Tuppy as odd. Come to think of it, everyone in the hallway had also been female. They had all been pretty too but Tuppy had been too preoccupied with avoiding being stepped on to take much notice of that.

Now, safely in the corner and out of site of the giant women, he had time to observe. They were all giantesses. They were all beautiful. And if those girls in the other room were anything to judge the rest by; they ate human beings his size. He had to find Liam and get out of here before any of them noticed him!

On the other side of the classroom, Liam checked his Rift Key. It needed three more minutes to charge. Hopefully in that  Liam could locate Tuppy. This world had plenty of women, in fact it looked like it was all women. That was nice but they all were about a thousand feet tall and if he and Tuppy didn’t leave they were bound to be stepped on.  

Liam had slipped into the classroom and listened to the end of a lecture about parallel universes. How appropriate. The teacher was assigning reading. Liam was in the process of ensuring that he was out of danger of being stepped on when he saw the teacher’s face.

Jessica?! Liam looked again. There was no doubt about it! This was the same woman with whom he had discussed physics on a parallel Earth, a woman who had shown every intention of being intimate with him before he was forced to jump back to his own Earth.

“And so, it is theoretically possible to bridge this gap between parallel worlds. Please read up on assigned reading in your syllabus for today and make sure you have the theory in mind before next lecture. That is all for today.”

The immediate scraping of chairs being pushed back resounded throughout the room as grateful legs were stretched after an hour of straight sitting. Lines of beautiful women streamed out of the classroom, girls chattering to each other, calling friends on cell phones, or just hurrying from class. Liam was holding the rift key. Two minutes! Don’t get stepped on!

Most of the students had left now. Liam even realized that he recognized a few of them. Amazing, he thought, but he had not time to dwell on it now.

“Excuse me!” came an accusing voice. Liam realized that the woman Jessica had spotted him and was now advancing towards him. “Stay right where you are little man,” said Jessica.

Liam looked for a place to hide. In looking around he spotted Tuppy, waving to him to him in an animated manner  from the corner of the room. He looked very excited. Liam understood why; he was no doubt worried about them being stepped on. But it was alright. Jessica had seen him and wouldn’t step on him.

 With Jessica appearing to be a physics professor in this universe, and just as beautiful as when he had met her in an alternate universe, maybe they could discuss physics together and perhaps even get some guidance on how to continue exploration of other dimensions.

“Hello Jes-“ started Liam as she loomed before him and bent downwards.

“Gotya!” said Jessica as her hand closed around him. She lifted him skyward and the ground fell away to an alarming distance. Liam was now held before her beautiful face which had a rather smug expression.

“Hello Jessica! I’m from a parallel universe. I found a way to jump between worlds. I wouldn’t know that because I met you on another Earth. I must say I’m happy to see you again. Just last time we met we were the same size.”

“Hmmm,” said Jessica. She looked as beautiful as ever. “Well you might just know my name because you sat through my lecture. Interesting story about being from another universe. Very clever of you but I’m not buying it. my whole discussion was about parallel worlds today. Don’t you think it’s a bit suspicious that you would come up with that excuse after my lecture on it?”

 “Really! I am. You’re going to be amazed! Wait another minute and I’ll show you!” said Liam. “Besides, how else would I be this size?”

“For the same reason that every other man is your size,” said Jessica.

“You mean all guys here are my size? How interesting!” said Liam.

 “Yes,” agreed Jessica. “So you can imagine how skeptical I am about you being from a parallel universe. I think you’re just trying to say something that you think would prevent me from eating you. I can’t imagine how you escaped from a holding pen. Maybe a girl brought you as a snack to class. Did one of them do that? Can you tell me which one? I’ve spoken to them about eating in class.”

“No. No you can’t be serious! I am from another universe!” pleaded Liam

“Har, har but the joke is over and  I’m hungry so in you go!” She opened her mouth wide and slid the protesting Liam in. With a large gulp. Liam was pushed into her throat and down her esophagus. He fought and struggled for all it was worth not knowing that Jessica enjoyed his struggles.

He landed in her stomach. It was dark and wet and smelled of chemicals. He took out his Gate Key and looked at the timer. The dim glow of the digital counter said 00:30. Thirty seconds. Liam held his breath. He was being thrown around now, most likely Jessica was walking somewhere. Perhaps her stomach was starting to digest him too. His skin was beginning to burn. Finally the timer reached zero.

Liam pressed the button. The swirling vortex appeared before him and Liam dived through, to appear on his lab floor on the other side.

Tuppy was trapped in the giantess universe! Before he could lose the coordinates, Liam punched “Save” on the Key. Now

The rift faded like the mist on a sunny morning.  Its evanescence might have made an observer wonder if there had been anything there at all. Indeed, several members of Liam’s would be rescue team seemed to be pondering that very question. The motley group was looking at one another as if to confirm that everyone else was seeing the same things they were.

They were in a room practically identical from the one they had just left, assuming that one ignored the size difference. Stepping through the rift seemed to have caused everything to simply grow about a hundred times over. Desks and chairs shot into the heavens like skyscrapers. The very room itself stretched out before them like vast world. The ceiling seemed to be bordering on the reaches of space.

Aside from the terrific size of the room there was very little to suggest that they were in a parallel universe. Had Liam said they he had invented a shrinking device it would have been plausible.

Everyone looked around in wide eyed amazement for a few more minutes. Liam let them gape and take things in, letting the reality of the situation strike home. Predictably, the loquacious Taco was the first to break the silence.

“Holy shit. Are you kidding me?”  His eyes were as big as saucers as he regarded the immense world before him.  “It’s like everything fucking grew man. I mean it grew. Right before my eyes, you know?” He spoke as if he alone could witness the terrific sight before them.

“Yeah no kidding retard. We all have eyes!” chimed in Mud, in true nonchalant Mud form. He was wearing a T-shirt that said; “Home is where the Hottie is,” displaying a well endowed female clad in an immodest bikini. He had also recovered enough from the shock of multidimensional travel to reaffix the expression of nonchalance that nearly permanently adorned his face. He regarded the world before him with Olympic grade boredom.

“I know but shit man. It’s so fucking….big, you know?” Taco looked over at Mud, half expecting Mud to argue with him on principal. That was exactly the sort of Mudlike behavior one could have expected. Instead it prompted a reaction from another member of the group.

“Course it is,” said Dale, in his Dixie accent. “It ought to be perfectly obvious what we just did. “We’ve entered a parallel universe. You can hardly expect it to be just like our own.” He pulled his camouflage John Deer baseball cap lower over his eyes.  He was wearing jeans, a Led Zeppelin sleeveless shirt and an unbuttoned plad shirt over that.  Dale was a backwoodsman from West Virginia who was on the University Lumberjack Team. He looked like the Village Blacksmith’s older, stronger brother.

“Liam, I gotta’ tell you that I’m impressed with this. You might just have got yourself the Nobel Prize for physics.”  Despite his six foot tall, two hundred fifty pound frame and an accent that sounded like he’d grown up with Larry the Cable Guy as a next door neighbor, Dale was probably the smartest guy in the university. Liam had heard rumors that he had an I.Q .of over 140. Any sort of praise from him on an intellectual topic was worth remembering. Liam was about to respond when Taco butted in.

“I know man but that’s the thing man. I mean it’s so like our world man but it’s just so…” Taco spread his arms wide as if attempting to encompass the room in a hug.

“Big,” said Deanna simply, coming up behind Mud and Taco to get a better view of Creation.

“Yes. Big,” said Liam. “This really shouldn’t be coming as a shock to anyone. I did warn you about this parallel universe if you all will think back.”

“But really man. I thought you were like high or something. I thought all that talk about giant women and whorl pools that lead to another dimension meant you were on some really loopy high man. I thought we were going to get high, not actually travel to another dimension right? That’s why I brought the weed.” Taco pulled out a zip lock bag half filled with grass and shook it in front of Liam, as if daring the rest of the world to argue with sound stoner logic.

“Dude you better share!” said Mud immediately. Taco nodded and they both immediately began rolling joints.

“I brought you here on a rescue mission for our friend Tuppy!” said Liam, his voice heavy with indignation.  “We’re supposed to divide into teams. Look; Me, Dale and Mud and Rich on group with, Taco, Deanna, Steve and Earl in the other.”

“Okay, okay,” said Mud, dispassionately as he fished around in his jeans and brought out a lighter. “But this is just a little bit more than I can take right now. Me and Taco are going to take five. We’ll catch up with the rest of you cats in two shakes of a stripper’s ass.”

“Actually the expression is two shakes of a lamb’s tail,” said Steve, a rather diminutive and quite nerdy fellow. “That’s how I’ve always heard it.”

“Good. For. Fucking. You,” said Mud, a joint hanging from between his lips. He thumbed the lighter.

“Fine,” said Liam with resignation. “You want to stay here? Fine. Someone needs to search this room anyway and see if Tuppy is in here. Just be sure to stay out of sight if anyone comes in here. The last person I met literally tried to eat me. I barely escaped. Now the rest of us will split up and look for Tuppy. It’s only been about three hours since I left. With luck he won’t have gone far. If anything happens, or if you find Tuppy, use your radios to contact the rest of us.” Liam indicated the radios they had brought with them by waving his in his hand. “This is classroom 105. I saw the number last time I was here. We’ll meet back here when we find him.”

“You guys be sure to hurry after us once you’re done looking through this room,” urged Earl. “Liam is the only one with the gate key and we all want to get back home when we find Tuppy. It would be no good if we had to find you guys after we find Tuppy.”

Taco made a face as he exhaled a puff of blue smoke. Mud, not even bothering to look, waved Earl away with one hand, like one would when trying to dispel annoying fly. Earl left them to their drugs and turned to catch up with Liam who was leading Dale, Deanna, Steve and Rich, (the last member of the group) towards the door.

“Remember what I told you about the women here. Don’t let yourself be seen! Just check all the surrounding classrooms and labs. Once we’ve checked everywhere we’ll meet back here.” Liam looks from the face of one group member to another. “Questions?”

“It’s going to take us forever to look everywhere. Are you sure we can find him?” asked Rich. “We’re so small.”

“So is Tuppy and he is not built for speed,” said Liam. “We should look as close as we can. It’s only been a few hours since I left him here. With luck he’ll have found a place to hunker down out of sight and stayed there. He’s likely not to have gone far. ”

“Agreed,” said Earl. “The plan is that we divide into pairs and then start looking. Three down that way and three down this side. Remember to use your radios once you’ve found him.”

Earl was the only one who had been in the military so everyone agreed to his plan more or less without issue. The group split. Dianna, Rich and Steve forming one group to search the east side of the hall.  Liam, Dale and Earl teamed up to search the western side.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

“Fuck man,” said Taco. “We need to get up man.”

“Go fuck yourself,” suggested Mud from where he sat with his back against the nice cool wall. He was baked out of his brain and didn’t feel like doing anything except getting a drink and maybe a slice of pizza. He wondered if he could find any nearby. He reasoned that giant pizza would be totally killer!

“Seriously. We need to, like, get a move on or something?” Taco said. He staggered to his feet and brushed the ash from his joint off his chest. “I don’t feel like living in giant world all my life man. I think we should go find Liam with his fancy whorl pool maker thingy.”

Neither man had made any effort towards searching for Tuppy in the classroom in which they had found themselves. Instead they had spent a half an hour smoking most of Taco’s bag of weed.

“Right,” said Mud. “You go find the others. I’ll stay here.”

“Okay man but seriously. We should stick together. Right?”

“Nah. I’ll stay and, uh… I dunno. Wait for Tuppy or something.”

“Oh. Right, right. Good idea,” said Taco and began to wander towards the door.

It took him the better part of three minutes to traverse what amounted to be about a football field’s distance. He was moving slowly but eventually managed to reach the door. He ducked underneath, squirming through the crack, stood up and dusted himself off.

It was at that moment that the door was opened by a giantess. It swung open into the classroom Taco had just vacated. This was somewhat fortuities for Taco as it might have broken his spine had it opened into the hallway. Unfortunately, having it swing open behind Taco also had its disadvantages, namely the air rushing in to fill the vacuum left by the door. The gust of wind literally swept a startled Taco off his feet and shot him back into the classroom.

Taco had landed on his back with a thump. Fortunately nothing appeared to be injured. It was then that he looked above him and noticed the giantess standing above him. She was pretty, with dark brown hair and green eyes. She was also looking directly at him.

“Hello,” she said.

“Hello,” said Taco, getting to his feet. “Er, my name is Taco,” said Taco. “Actually my name is Jose but everyone calls me Taco,” Taco clarified.

“I’m Ann Marie,” said the woman. “And I like your name Taco. It reminds me of food. I wonder if you’ll taste as good as you sound.”

“What me? Oh no, no, no. I’d taste horrible-”

Taco was interrupted by the giant woman scooping him up and bringing him to her face.

“Mmm. Taco I must admit that you look awful tasty. I think I’ll eat you.”

“Eat me? No! Bad giant woman!” admonished Taco. “Mud! Help me out man!” he said, trying to turn around in the woman’s grip to face Mud.

“So there is another one of you out there?” asked the giantess. “ Did you say his name was Mud?”

“Er. No. No one,” said Taco. “Only me, Taco.”

“Interesting. He doesn’t have as appetizing a name as you but you never know. Maybe he’ll be good. After I’ve eaten you I’ll look for him.”

“No!” screamed Taco. “You don’t understand! I’m not a real taco!”

The giantess opened her mouth wide. To the baked out man in her grasp, it appeared as if a gigantic cavern was opening before him. She pushed the diminutive Taco in. He flailed and fought but to no avail as the giantess easily gulped him down alive.

Mud stood still as a statue as he watched the giantess’s throat bulge briefly with the passing of food. She had just swallowed his best stoner buddy. The giantess, a pretty specimen, continued into the room as if nothing out of the ordinary had occurred. She withdrew a water bottle from her backpack, unscrewed the cap and took a pull to help wash her meal down.

By coincidence, Mud happened to be a biology student. He had received high marks in most of his classes, despite hitting the booze pretty hard on the weekends. Still, he remembered his anatomy and physiology classes about digestion. Mud nodded to himself. Taco’s prospects of survival were exactly zero.

He watched the giantess who had just eaten his friend. She was rummaging about in one of the closets. She extracted several high tech pieces of machinery and started to fiddle about with them.

It occurred to Mud that there was exactly nothing he could do about his recently devoured friend. However, he could warn the others that there was a giantess on the prowl. Looking around, Mud found the radio he and Taco had kept to talk with the others. He was happy Taco hadn’t grabbed it. Otherwise it would be inside the stomach of that giantess and he would have no way to contact the others. He picked up the radio and found that Taco must have turned it off. He switched it on and started to speak.

“This is like looking for a needle in a haystack,” said Dale. They had just finished looking through the classroom down the corroder from the one where they had left Taco and Mud.

“Well if you have a better idea then I’d be happy to hear it,” said Liam.

“Hell yes I have a better idea,” said Dale. “Why in the world didn’t we bring a truck on through the gate? We’d get a whole mess of searching done in the time it takes for us to walk from one classroom to another on foot.”

“But we’d draw more attention,” argued Earl. “We’d be much nosier, be in a bigger car and be easier to spot.”

“Well the way I figure things we may as well be more visible. It’d make things easier for Tuppy and us if one of us is more visible. ‘Sides. We’ve seen neither heads nor tails of any of the giants Liam here described.”

The trio exited the classroom just in time to watch a beautiful woman with dark brown hair stroll by. She was smiling about something, listening to an I-pod and passed them by without even looking in their direction.

The trio watched her walk down the hallway and enter the classroom where Taco and Mud were. She disappeared as she walked into classroom 105 and swung the door closed behind her.

“Told you so,” said Liam.

“We better warn the other’s that there’s a giantess around,” said Earl.

“Ya’ll think she’d be interested in dating a feller like me?” asked Dale mischievously, gesturing after the giantess.

After calling Taco and Mud for about thirty second with no response, everyone was starting to get worried. Finally the radio crackled and Mud’s voice came over the speaker.

“Dude. Something wicked, wicked, wicked bad is going on right now!”

“Mud, be advised; a giantess is in your classroom, over,” said Earl.

“No fuckin’ shit man! She’s a thousand feet tall and kinda’ hard for me to miss you military retard asshole.”

Earl waited for more information but after a few seconds of silence he decided to press for more details. In the military he had learned to say “over” whenever he was done talking. Trying to talk to a stoned civilian who learned radio etiquette on a playground was a pain in the ass.

“Mud, what is your current situation and position, over?”

“Totally fucked up man. The giant chick ate Taco!”

A collective shiver went down the spines of everyone in both groups (Deanna, Steve and Rich were listening to the conversation on their own radios.)

“Roger understand Taco has been eaten. Request you confirm, over.”

“The chick ate Taco like a pizza bagel! One bite and goodnight. I don’t think she chewed him. She just swallowed. I’m talking swallowed him! Whole! Like Jaws eating a baby on an inner tube! Only without the inner tube. I’m fucking freaking out man. She’s still in the room with me! I’m fucking freaking out!”

Mud’s voice dissolved into some unintelligible words and something sounding suspiciously like crying. Earl waited patiently for Mud to take his finger off the key so his radio could receive.

“Mud, this is Earl…” said Earl.

“Who the fuck else would it be?” said Mud.

“Mud, this is Earl,” repeated Earl. Calm down. Can you relocate to the corridor? If so, we will be able to assist you. We’re one classroom down and in a good position to hide should she come around. How copy, over?”

“I… I don’t know if I can make it. If she sees me-Wait. She’s leaving the classroom. She’s leaving. Hide!”

Earl ducked back under the door, quickly followed by Liam and Dale. The watched as the giantess exited the classroom and started walking away from them, down the hallway.

“You know she’s got an awful nice can,” observed Dale. Earl started to giggle.

“ May I remind you two that she just ate our friend!” said Liam

What? I’m just making an observation,” said Dale. “Besides. Never did like Taco too much. The food or the person. Although come to think of it, the person is food now too. How’s that for coincidence?” Earl started laughing harder.

“Dale! That’s horrible. He was a person. Our friend!”

“Your friend,” clarified Dale. “Never did like him any. Mud neither.”

“My best advice is to laugh,” agreed Earl. “If you don’t, you’ll go crazy. Trust me on this.”

Earl started speaking into the radio again; “D, Steve, Rich; you guys have a giantess heading your way. She has eaten Taco and will probably do the same to you if you’re spotted. Get to cover now. Do you copy?”

“We copy,” said Deanna’s voice. She sounded like she was running somewhere.

As the giantess neared the end of the hallway, another giantess came into view; this one with blonde hair. The two began to talk.

The three men under the door watched as the giantesses spoke for several minutes, snippets of their conversation audible to them but not enough to understand what they were discussion. If it weren’t for their size they might have been two girls in their own university.

“Bye,” said the blonde, apparently wrapping things up. The brown haired girl waived and then walked off, disappearing out a door and the far end of the hall.

The blonde continued down the hallway and entered a classroom with the number 103.

“A new giantess has just entered 103. I repeat one-zero-three. D, what is your location?” asked Earl.

Deanna’s hands shook as she heard the last transmission. “Oh my-!” she said.

“Fuck!” said Rich as he watched a beautiful woman enter the room. She was tall as a building, had long blonde hair and deep blue eyes. She also had a cute body too.

“We’re in here. We’re in here with her!” hissed Deanna over the radio.

“Come on!” urged Steve, grapping Deanna’s arm and pulling her after him as he tried to catch up with Rich. Rich was already hurrying towards a giant pile of rocks at the far end of the room.

“OH SHIT!” screamed Deanna as she looked back. “Run! She’s seen us!”

Rich made it to a large lump of coral that was lying on the ground.  It was obviously there for demonstrations for marine biology or something but it would make an excellent hiding place for the hunted. Rich was crawling into a large crevice made from what must have been damage to the coral, since it had sharp jagged edges around the crevice that didn’t look natural. Deanna figured the classroom for some sort of life science lab. The coral was a spectacular sample but Deanna didn’t have any time to appreciate it. She dove into a crevice after Rich.

Sliding on the cool linoleum floor, Deanna came to her hands and knees and tried to crawl further into the crevice, only to find that there was nowhere to go. Rich was already against the back of the coral, his breath hot against Deanna’s neck as she pressed close to him.

Things got a lot more crowded a moment later. The sudden impact of Steve into Deanna’s back launched her painfully into Rich. For his part, Rich was punched back into the hard, dead coral. He let out a shout of pain as Steve continued to try to crawl further into the crevice in the rock.

“Ow! Stop it Steve. There’s no more room!” shouted Rich.

 Deanna looked back at Steve. He was pressed up against her and pushing in on her back but try as he might, his legs protruded from the crevice.  Outside, the giantess’s foot, came down next to the coral.

“There’s no. More. Room!” screamed Rich, kicking out.

His foot caught Steve around the color bone and Deanna heard a “pop” sound that could only be Steve’s collar bone breaking. Steve was propelled out of the crevice. Unfortunately for Deanna, Steve was pumped full of adrenalin and his grip around her legs was unbreakable. She was subsequently pulled along with him. As she slid backwards out of the crevice, Deanna looked up at Rich’s shocked face. It was as if he only then realized what he had done. Then the fingers of the giant woman lifted Deanna and Steve skywards, leaving Rich breathing heavy, alone in the crevice.

Deanna’s feet kicked through emptiness as she dangled in space. She was suspended by her right arm which was held with bone crushing tightness between the thumb and forefinger of the blonde giantess before her. Deanna desperately wanted to wiggle her arm to release some of the pressure put on it by the giant lady but was terrified that the woman would lose her grip on her arm and leave her to plummet to the floor.

 She could hear her own heart rate in her ears as her cardiovascular system switched into overdrive. Ever since she was a girl, Deanna had hated heights. No, not hated, been terrified of heights. Now there was exactly nothing between her and the linoleum floor a thousand feet beneath her sneakers.  Meanwhile the blonde giantess considered the two of them. She seemed rather baffled by Deanna, but her gaze softened as she looked at Steve.

Steve didn’t seem to be as worried about falling Deanna she was. He was being suspended by his right arm too, on the side that Rich had kicked. Steve obviously wasn’t enjoying the experience because he was screaming in agony as he clutched his collar bone.  The giantess studied him for the briefest of moments, before bringing him towards her mouth and opening wide.

Deanna was perfectly position to observe the vast pink cavern of a mouth. It was clearly illuminated to the back of the throat. Steve, his pain suddenly forgotten, screamed again, this time in terror, as he was brought into the mouth. The giantess placed him on her tongue and Steve appeared remarkably tiny there. Then her mouth closed and with a gulp that Deanna heard, she watched the giantess swallow him whole.  As near as she could tell, the woman hadn’t even chewed Steve first. That meant that he was still alive inside her, until her digestive juices got to work on him.

Deanna’s sympathy for Steve was somewhat overshadowed for her terror that she was soon to join him, helpless and alive inside the giantess’s belly. The giantess turned her attention to Deanna and Deanna felt overcome with horror as the giantess opened her mouth.

She started screaming. It was all she could do. Just scream and scream until she ran out of air to scream with. Then she took a deep breath and started all over again.

With a thud, Deanna landed on a flat, featureless plane. The giantess had placed her on a desk.

“Would you relax? And for Heaven’s sake stop screaming. I’m not going to eat you,” said the giantess as if it were the most unfounded fear in the world.

This seemed to contradict the general trend of recent events but Deanna did cease her screams, if only because she was afraid the giantess might reconsider eating her if she didn’t.

“However did you get down to that size?” asked the giantess kindly. This was a confusing statement too, as she had accepted Steve’s size readily enough. “It’s a good thing I recognized you were a woman. Otherwise I might have eaten you too!” she added.

Deanna was too worked up to speak. And even if she could she would probably say the wrong thing and end up as a snack.

“Was it the shrinking device down the hall? I hear it’s been acting up. Professor Clark will have a fit when she hears a woman was shrunk using it. Why don’t I take you there now and get you back to normal size?”

She grabbed Deanna and whisked her away. Rich was left watching the beautiful giantess go. On the floor before him was the radio Deanna had dropped. 

“Help me. Someone!” crackled the radio. It was Steve’s voice. He still had his radio in the belly of the giantess.

Rich tried to get his breathing under control. “Steve,” he whispered. “I’m sorry!” Realizing that he should use the radio he picked it up and pressed the key. “Steve. It’s Rich. Can you hear me? I’m sorry!” 

The only response was static. The giantess was either out of range or the radio had stopped working in the acidic environment. Rich could only guess if Steve heard him apologize.