* * * * *
MIAMI INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT,
MIAMI, DADE COUNTY, FLORIDA
(SIX MONTHS EARLIER)
"Chet! Chet Northfield."
I turned around at the mention of my name. Almost missing him in the process. Which, callous as it might sound, wouldn't have been too difficult...
...seeing as how he was only five feet/eleven inches tall.
"Aryc? I don't believe it! What are you doing down here?"
Aryc Omcic and I had been undergraduate classmates at Columbia University. That is, before he'd gone on to get a teaching degree from Auburn University, while I went back to the West Coast for a journalism degree from USC. The American-born son of Slovak immigrants, he still looked as thin, now, as he had then. And, he still showed a preference for buying suits the same shade of brown as his eyes and hair.
"I'm on sabbatical from U-Conn, Torrington, to do some research for a new story."
"You mean, you're still moonlighting as an on-line author?"
He nodded. Reluctantly adding that his latest submission, to the website called "Greatly Thrilling Stories," had been rejected.
"Some right-wing group of Bible thumpers is suing the publishers over their alleged 'over-abundance' of Greco-Roman mythology-based urban fantasies! So, I decided to use the opportunity to come down here and do a little research on the Coral Castle.* I have an idea for a story that will link it and the Easter Island statues with a race of ancient astronauts possessed of hyper-evolved psychic powers. Including the ability to telekinetically shrink objects and people!"
"Sounds promising!" I replied: "E-mail me a rough draft when you finish it. I'd love to read it."
"You got it. But, what are you doing, here? I thought THE NATIONAL INTELLIGENCER employed you as a West Coast stringer."
My luggage arrived, just as he asked that question. Which gave me an opportunity to do some fast thinking.
"I'm commuting up to Gainesville for a football game between the Gators and the Marshall Thundering Herd. Some VIP, who's been ducking an interview with me, is an alumnus of the visiting team's school. So, I thought this would be a perfect opportunity to corner him!"
Aryc grinned: "Uh-oh! He must've been done something really naughty to have _you_ on his tail."
"No comment," I replied (with a similar grin).
It was at this point that his luggage arrived. So, we shook hands and wished each other luck. I then headed for the nearest taxi stand.
What I had just told Aryc was slightly more than a half-truth. General Ira C. McCoy, of the USAF Office of Special Investigations, was an alumnus of the University of Florida (Air Force ROTC). And, for several weeks now, I had been trying to see him with regard to an Aeroflot jetliner that had crashed on the slopes of Mount Rainier, Washington.
With no survivors.
According to one of my regular tipsters, that jetliner had been under the control of Chechen rebel hijackers at the time it went down. Yet, none of the bodies recovered at the crash site had been those of armed men. So, had my tipster been giving me a bum steer? I initially thought so.
That is; till I entered his apartment to find him shrunken to the size of a doll by a trio of kunoichi in midnight-black unitards!
tbc
Giantess World
Author's Chapter Notes:
A new point of view.
Chapter End Notes:
*Coral Castle: historically famous landmark built (in imitation of prehistoric megaliths) by eccentric Latvian immigrant Edward Leedskalnin, in early 20th century Florida, reputedly using mind-over-matter.
ROTC: Reserve Officers' Training Corps.
Kunoichi: female ninja.
ROTC: Reserve Officers' Training Corps.
Kunoichi: female ninja.