Gage stood eye-to-eye with Alicia for the first time, and for the first time the cruel woman knew of his existence. Charis and Rima had swiftly disposed of the other girls by stomping them flat – their deaths were anticlimactic, and not at all proportionate to the pain they had caused. They would simply respawn a few moments later, but without the power boost of the Magic Beans, Rima could easily handle any rescue attempt they might stage. That left Alicia, the ring leader of the sordid group.

“That Paralysis spell should keep you from killing yourself,” stated Rima evenly. If she felt any vengeful joy at turning the tables, she hid it well; and if she felt any lingering pain from the torture inflicted on her, she hid that as well. Gage glanced at his own previous shattered leg and shuddered. Despite getting it completely healed, he still felt phantom tremors up and down the limb. “Now then,” she continued. “Tell me everything you know about the Beans.”

Once she had been reduced to Gage’s size, all of Alicia’s self-assurance had vanished. Gage would’ve loved to have seen her immediate reaction, but he had passed out after activating the shrinking device – and his memory surrounding the incident was hazy as well. Why the device hadn’t simply shrunk Alicia and her cohorts to Rima and Charis’s size – as opposed to his further diminished height – remained a mystery to him. He supposed it had something to do with how he amplified items, and since he was the one who wielded it, perhaps it had a double-shrinking effect. Regardless, he was happy to find Alicia and the others on the complete opposite end of the stick once he had been revived, good as new. Their fearful looks took away a little of the sting of his obvious failure: he was still shrunk.

Presently, Alicia directed her pleading gaze towards him, preferring not to crane her neck up towards where Rima stood behind and over her. Following Rima’s lead, Gage kept his face expressionless as well, and instead looked past Alicia towards Rima’s tremendous barefeet. He didn’t know how it was possible, but her toes looked absolutely menacing behind Alicia, as if they were waiting to pounce at any moment. Meanwhile, Charis stood over on one side, her boots towering above him. Gage didn’t mind at all that the feet surrounding him gave off a sharp odor – everything he smelled, Alicia smelled too, and he was just fine with that.

“I’m only going to ask you one more time – the Beans.”

Alicia began to stammer uncontrollably. “T-t-they’re g-g-gone!”

Rima’s voice came down like freezing rain. “What do you mean, ‘they’re gone?’”

“T-t-the Beans only d-d-drop once a S-s-s-season.”

“She’s right,” confirmed Charis, stamping her boot in frustration. The impact sent ripples through the bed, knocking Alicia over with ease, while Gage managed to ride it out without falling. “Let’s step on her and be done with it,” she said, raising her blue footwear over the now-pathetic woman. She resembled a beetle stuck on its back, limbs scrabbling futilely for purchase.

“No!” screamed Alicia shrilly. “You’ll kill me.”

“Wait, what?” Rima muttered. As Charis’s foot descended, Alicia’s eyes widened and she began to beg. “Wait!” snapped Rima.

The building-sized boot hesitated, then withdrew. “You don’t think she’s...” Charis trailed off.

“You’re jailbroken?” asked Rima, her evident curiosity overcoming her cool self-restraint. “At such a low level?”

“Y-y-yes,” Alicia affirmed, nodding vigorously.

“Interesting,” murmured Rima, more to herself than anyone else. Gage could hear the gears turning in her head; he had some thoughts of his own. “Put her in your boot, Charis. She should be able to survive, so long as you don’t actively try to stomp her. Plus, it’ll give her a taste of her own disgusting medicine.”

“With pleasure,” said Charis. She reached down with her hand, a wicked grin on her face. Unlike Rima, she had no reservations about displaying her vengeful glee. Ignoring Alicia’s panicked protests, she quickly scooped the woman up and dumped her into her boot, shoving her undoubtedly smelly foot in after her. Gage could just make out her muffled screams through the material.

He lingered on the spot for a moment before looking back at Rima, who had already lowered a hand to the ground for him. “Come on, Gage, let’s get out of here.”

…

Back in Rima’s penthouse, the three of them rested on various plush pieces of furniture. Aside from Alicia’s occasional sobs, and a fleeting haggard expression on Rima’s face, there was no evidence of their recent ordeal. The tiny former dominatrix sat in a cage on the table.

“So you’re telling me someone is offering to jailbreak low-level characters – for a price?” asked Rima pointedly.

“Yes,” replied Alicia. She had managed to get over her earlier hysterics to some extent, but she still spoke as meekly as possible.

“And you paid for it just so you could fulfill your disgusting fantasies?” cut in Charis, her voice quivering with anger.

“Yes,” confirmed Alicia. “I met those other girls in a chatroom for… like-minded individuals.”

“Sickos…” muttered Charis.

“You paid him money?” asked Rima.

“Yes. I needed… the release.”

“This actually is becoming more common,” Gage explained. “I mean, it’s still exceedingly rare, but people are willing to jailbreak themselves just to take advantage of the virtual world’s infinite possibilities. They save enough to pay for their basic life support indefinitely and then get it done. I know I did.”

“But has it always been so… commercialized?” asked Rima.

Gage rubbed his chin. “This is the first I’ve heard of it.” They were on to something big here, but the revelation skirted just outside of reach. Something occurred to him. “Exactly who can perform the jailbreaking procedure?” he asked.

“Well, the designers of the game performed mine,” answered Rima. “It was a charity case, and it caused a lot of controversy. While I did push the envelope, the backlash was such that I thought no one would want to do it again, at least not in public.”

“Right, that’s how I got jailbroken,” said Gage. “By some obscure… institution… that I had dig to find.”

“Exactly. Up until now, they had strictly jailbroken only level 100 players – sort of like an elite guild that wanted to be powerful yet mysterious. But now someone is coming in and jailbreaking just anyone for money.”

“So why do we care?” asked Charis.

“I’m not sure…” murmured Rima. The group fell into an extended, thoughtful silence.

“Excuse me?” asked Alicia timidly.

“What is it?” spat Charis.

“I don’t mean to interrupt, but there’s something I think you should know.”

Rima stared coolly at the little blond. “Yes?”

“I don’t know what he,” she pointed at Gage, “is talking about when he says life-support and all that.”

“What do you mean?” prodded Rima.

“Well, what I mean to say is… the man who jailbroke me…”

Charis tapped her boot impatiently. Even Gage wanted to slap some sense in her, tell her to get on with it.

“He can reverse it.”