She pressed down - as hard as she could, on the record button on the reel-to-reel player. "Testing ... one, two, three. Testing ... testing."

"Attention, Doctor Theresa Wilson, Department of Pathology, School of Medicine, State University. This is Jane Richardson, Research Fellow in Pathology, speaking."

"At the moment I am seated on the tape recorder that is recording this message to you. As a point of fact, by the yard stick on my desk, I stand slightly less than twelve inches and I am steadily decreasing in size."

"I am on top of my desk; I climbed up here before I should shrink to a point where I would be physically unable to get from the floor to the chair and thus to the desk top, and the telephone."

"It is a very strange experience to find one's desk an insurmountable object, like a mountain, to climb. However, the phone is by my side now and since it is my last contact with the outside world, it is imperative that I do not become separated from it."

"I calculate, if I continue to shrink at the present rate of speed, it is possible that I will become invisible to the human eye sometime before midnight."

"I have been trying to reach you by phone since eight this morning. But you are not at home, and have not yet arrived at your office."

"Since you are the only person with an adequate scientific background and technical knowledge to save me, it is imperative that my last whereabouts is known to you in the event I cannot contact you by phone. Thus, the precaution of this recording."

"As you will have discovered by now, I have gone against your orders and pursued my theory of cancer cell growth by working in the lab at night after my regular duties."

"This is the same theory I proposed in publication December 1, 2007, and which you publicly ridiculed in the Scientific American Journal, September 3, 2008. Unfortunately, you were wrong, Doctor Wilson."

"I have been trying to prove that the bio-chemical agent not only stops abnormal cell division, but reduces the existing cells in physical size until the neutralizer is induced. The fact that I have shrunk from five and one half feet to one foot should be proof beyond refutation, though my condition is the result of an accident."

"While trying to introduce a more powerful catalyst in the laboratory last night, I inadvertently created an uncontrolled reaction which manifested itself as a white mist which filled the entire lab. The mist lasted no more than a few seconds and, as I observed no effects other than this, I continued working. When I got home, I descended into one of the deepest and blackest sleeps I have ever experienced. I awoke this morning to discover myself literally lost in a sea of blankets."

"I had shrunk four feet, eight inches during the night. Naturally, my first reaction was one of panic, but I soon realized that my only salvation was to remain calm until I contacted you. You'll find a more complete report of my theory, and the experiments which I've conducted to prove it, in the uncompleted thesis here on my desk. This thesis, Doctor Wilson, will open the door to a cure for man's worst disease -- cancer."

"As for myself, you'll find detailed instructions on how to reverse the action which I've accidentally initiated. You'll find this on pages seventy-nine, eighty and eighty-one. No matter how small I shall become, even microscopic, you will be able to reverse the process if you follow the instructions on those pages."

With a supreme effort, the tiny woman levered the massive book open, the air split with immense thud and the swish of papers settling into place.

'To think that the cover of my thesis, the manuscript I used to carry easily in one hand, has become as difficult for me to move as the cover to my grave." She shuddered slightly. "Here now, no time for morbidity."

"I had better place another telephone call to your office, Doctor Wilson, while I'm still big enough to dial the phone."

She crossed the expanse of the desk, winding her away through the papers and pencils, her footsteps barely audible.

"It is just possible that your 'efficient' secretary forgot to tell you that I called. The phone has grown almost half as tall as I am. A strange sensation."

Leaning into the receiver resting in it's cradle, she shoves with all her might. Slowly, the receiver lifts and clatters to the desk with a mighty sound. Putting her back into it, she depresses the buttons on after another.

"Who would think the . . . tensor springs on these . . . buttons would be so strong? And who would think I would have to use both hands to . . . dial a telephone. "Steady - now is not the  time to misdial."

She is rewarded with a series of clicks and a ringing on the other end. She scurries to the receiver

"Pathology, Doctor Wilson's office. Miss Pritchart speaking."

"Miss Pritchart, has Doctor Wilson come in yet?"

"Whom shall I say is calling?"

"This is Jane Richardson, Miss Pritchart. It's urgent."

"It doesn't sound like you, doctor Richardson."

"It - it - it's me, all right."

"I'm sorry, doctor Wilson isn't in. I have your number ..."

"Are you sure?"

Yes, I am sure. Doctor Wilson is not, at this moment, in her office.

"Now look, Miss Pritchart, don't pull that doctor Wilson-isn't-in stuff to me. You tell doctor Wilson I have to talk to her."

"I'm sorry, doctor Richardson, doctor Wilson is not in."


"Look, this is a matter of life and death!"

"doctor Richardson ..."

"Tell him to answer her damn telephone."

"Doctor Richardson, I assure you Doctor Wilson is not in her office. I will have her call you as soon as she comes in. I'll tell her when she comes in. In the meantime, is there anything I can do?"

"There's nothing anyone can do but doctor Wilson. She's the only one in the world that can help me. Do you understand that?"

"Well, I'll tell her as soon as she comes in."

"Yeah, you do that, Miss Pritchart."

The conversation is interrupted by a click on the far end. Slowly, wearily, she struggles returning the giant receiver to it's cradle.

"Why, Doctor Wilson? Why, of all days, did you have to pick today to change your routine? For the last ten years you've been in your office from nine until twelve. Why in hell did you have to pick this morning to change?!"

"Yes, self-preservation is the most powerful instinct. It is now three-thirty in the afternoon and I have shrunk to the unbelievable height of six inches. And I am continuing to shrink, yet I am taking every precaution to guarantee that I stay alive."

"But what have I got to live for? What am I? A twenty eight year old, old woman  with no friends and no life because of The Research. What have I got to show for it? A cheap furnished room, a meager position as a research fellow, which doesn't pay enough to live like other people. Not enough to have a husband or children. And no dignity certainly. All that I can call mine is in this room: a couple of dresses; some stockings with runs in them, piles of heavy books; the microscope on my desk; and a tape recorder to record my notes on. That's all that will be left of doctor Jane Richardson, research fellow."

Above, a flutter of wings, blotting out the sun. She jumps back at the sound.

"Oh, excuse me, Doctor Pasteur. And one green and gold parakeet with the name of Pasteur."

"To pose a hypothetical problem, Doctor Pasteur, who's going to change the water in your cage if I return to dust? Certainly not doctor Wilson. She might steal what little water you had, but she wouldn't change it."

"Who will? If I don't contact the doctor, it may be a week before the landlady comes up here to clean. He'd starve to death. I've got to open that cage and let him loose. But - how?" she glances around the table top, her eyes brightening at an idea "Of course! The yard stick!"

Scrambling across the desk, she levers the yardstick over her shoulder and lifts with great effort. "I can push the latch open with that - -" The yardstick falls into place. "Yes! Yes, I can just reach it!"

The latch removed, the cage slowly swings open.

"You're free, Pasteur. You're free. The window is open across the room. There's a whole world ahead of you. Fly away and make a name for yourself!"
 
She slumps to the desk. "The whole world. I've got the whole world ahead of me, too, if I live. After I publish my thesis, I'll be famous. I'll have everything I ever dreamed of. But not unless Doctor Wilson gets the instructions. So, we resume taping. But I can't reach the start button on the recorder!"

Glancing around, she spots several paperback books in a pile towards the back of the desk. "These - these books, they're like a grand staircase to the tape deck."

She clambers to the top of the pile, then crosses the recorder. She leans into the REC button with all her might and the reels start spinning again.

"There we go! Doctor Wilson? Doctor Wilson, this is Jane Richardson recording again. I have still not received your phone call, but I have not given up hope. The call will come. I am convinced of that."

"In the meanwhile, I have made the necessary precautions for isolating myself in the event that you do not call before tomorrow morning. I have made a ramp -- or the ruler -- to the stage of the microscope. Glued to the microscope is a transparent glass petri dish. As soon as it becomes apparent that I'm in danger of being lost from view on the desk, I will make my way to the petri dish."

She stops for a moment.

"But what if you haven't called by that time? I could be lost in the petri dish!" she leaned against the microphone, thinking. "Ah! I could prepare a slide for myself. If I diminished to the size of a one-celled organism, I would have no difficulty in crawling under the cover glass and taking up a position directly under the lens. Perhaps I should prepare a slide now."

The air is split by the sound of the desk phone ringing.

"You've called, Doctor Wilson. You've called at last!"

Without hesitation, she leapt from the reel-to-reel recorder and sprinted to the phone. The sounds of her bare feet slapping faintly as the runs across the desk. She throws herself at the receiver.

"No! I - I can't lift it!"

. . .RING. . .
 
"I'm too small. I can't lift it off the cradle!"

. . .RING. . .

"Don't stop ringing, please! I'll lift it somehow. But how? A lever! Give me a lever and I can move the world."

 . . .RING. . .

"A pencil! I can do it with a pencil. Don't hang up, Doctor Wilson! I'm looking! I'm looking!"

. . .RING. . .

"Please don't hang up, Doctor Wilson! I'm coming, I'm coming!"

. . .RING. . .

 "Just don't stop ringing! Please don't stop ringing! Please!"

. . .RING. . .

"Just don't hang up, Doctor Wilson! I've almost got it! Just a little more!"

With all the strength in her tiny body, she lifts the cradled receiver, where it clatters to the desk. .. . and to the floor below.

"No! No! No!"

After a few moments, a voice is heard on the other end, distant and muffled.

"Hello?"

"Miss Pritchart?!"

"Doctor Richardson?"

"Can you hear me?! Get Doctor Wilson!"

"Hello?"

"Miss Pritchart, I'm on top of the desk! The phone fell on the floor!"

"Hello?"

"I'm only six inches tall! You've got to get me help!"

"Hello, are you there, doctor Richardson?"

"Yes, I'm here! I'm here!"

Another voice, hard and gruff is heard on the other end. "Richardson?"

"No, doctor. I called doctor Richardson's room but she doesn't answer or something."

"I'm here, Doctor Wilson, I'm here!"

"What do you mean she doesn't answer?"

"Well, I rang and rang and then the phone just went dead."

"No! The phone didn't go dead, it fell on the floor!"

"Well, call her back in about an hour. See if she answers then."

"No please, don't hang up, Miss Pritchart! I can't put my phone back on the hook!"

"Well, what if she doesn't answer then? When she called this morning, he sounded very strange."

"Don't let her hang up, Miss Pritchart!"

"Richardson's been very strange since the day she joined the department. If you can't get her today, I'll talk to her when I see her tomorrow."

"No! No! Please!"

"Yes, Doctor Wilson."

"No, no, no! Please don't hang up! I'm still here! Please don't hang up! Doctor Wilson, please!"

. . . .CLICK. . . .

"I almost gave up when you hung up, Doctor Wilson, but then I remembered a simple law of mathematics. No matter how often you divide a thing, there's still something left. So I went ahead with the preparation for my survival. And a good thing, too. It's not yet six o'clock, and I estimate I am now only a quarter of an inch tall."

"But everything is now arranged. In the center of the Petri dish on the microscope stage is a prepared slide complete with slip cover and label. The only thing lacking is the specimen, and that is me. If I become so small that I am in danger of being lost in the Petri dish, I will make my way to the exact center of the slide and take up a position there. You should be able to see me for some time to come because I focused the microscope. All you have to do, Doctor Wilson, is look -- just look to see me."

"My world is such a different place now. Books are as huge as buildings and pencils seem like telephone poles. I wonder what my world will look like if no one ever finds me."

"Oh, yes, Doctor Wilson, the slide under the microscope is labeled carefully. Of all the slides I've labeled in my lifetime, I hardly thought the last one might become my epitaph. Specimen: Jane Richardson; Species: Homo Sapiens; Condition: Excellent."

Her thoughts are interrupted by a sound of wings overhead. A titanic parakeet swoop near.

"Oh, Doctor Pasteur! Haven't you flown the coop yet? Is your loyalty so great that you refuse to leave so long as the last particle of me remains?"

She ponders for a moment.

". . . . or are you hungry?"

"Gods, what an ugly monster you are when viewed from this perspective. Your feathers are like scales of armor, infested with lice, I see. And that beak!"

The monster moves slightly closer, chattering loudly and pecking at the desk

"No! No, Doctor Pasteur! No! Stay away!"

"Wait. Wait. I must back up slowly. Don't run. Slow. Back between the books and the microphone. Slowly.. . . slowly"

She slips into a nook between two gargantuan text books next to the microphone.

"Now! I'm safe here ... until he loses interest. I should have let him starve to death in his cage."
 
"I wonder if the tape's still recording? I can see the spools still turning, high above me, the clear plastic reflecting the last rays of the sun setting outside my window. But I can't see if there's tape."

She yells at the top of her lungs. "Are you still there?! Am I recording, Doctor Wilson?! This is Jane Richardson! As soon as that bird loses interest, I'm going to make a break for it!"

"I'll make the microscope, Doctor Wilson, don't you worry! Treat that slide marked 'Jane Richardson' just like it was me! You understand? Even if you don't think I'm in it!"

"If you can't bring me back, publish my thesis for me! You hear me, Doctor Wilson?! Publish my thesis! I can't die smaller than dust. unknown! I have nothing left, Doctor Wilson! Not even my body! Give me my thesis!

She stops with a gasp, a dark realization crossing her face.

"You wouldn't dare publish it in your name, Doctor Wilson, would you?! All you'd have to do is change the name on the title page! You wouldn't stoop that low, would you?! No, no! Give me my thesis, Doctor Wilson! Give me that much! Do you hear me?

Am I recording? Give me immortality, Doctor Wilson! I want the world to know I lived! Publish the thesis in my name! Do you hear me, Doctor Wilson?! Give me immort--"

A massive beak descends from the heavens. Tiny doctor Jane Richardson is devoured instantly, the parakeet fluttering away. . . .