Gone Awry

To put it simply, Cody had a terrible life. He had no friends, no kind of social life, worked a dull retail job, and lived alone in a small apartment that he just barely was able to make the rent on. He spent his free time playing video games and browsing the Internet; not what would be considered a fulfilling lifestyle. One could say that at his age of 23, he still had a chance to turn things around and improve his life, but he has long since given up on that ever happening.

In truth, he was tired of his life. He wanted an out, but he didn't want to kill himself. Instead, he was going to make a rather drastic change to his life, albeit one that many would consider unorthodox.

The package had arrived that day, and was waiting for him once he got home from his job. He excitedly snatched it up and took it into his apartment. Not even taking time to change out of his workwear, he placed the box onto his living room coffee table and tore off the tape sealing the package shut. Once done, he opened the box, and within the bubble wrap found a smaller box containing what he had ordered; a shrink ray.

"Oh hell yeah," Cody said to himself as he pulled the somewhat heavy box out of the package. 

Cody had a plan. A plan that he had been concocting for several months. The big change that he was going to make with his life was that he was going to shrink himself down, effectively leaving his present life behind. However, he didn't just plan on living out the rest of his life in his apartment.

First, he had to make sure that it worked.

Placing the box onto the table, next to the packaging that it had been contained in, he opened it and pulled out the styrofoam from within it. With it removed, he came face-to-face with the lavender pistol-shaped device wrapped in plastic; it resembled a ray gun as seen in most futuristic science fiction, with rounded edges and a sleek overall design. It also had a toggle on the side that--according to what he read on the website he ordered from--allowed him to adjust the size of which the target is shrunken down to.

Such a thing seemed straight out of science fiction, but there he was, holding it in his hands.

He tore off the plastic, and took the device in his hand. He flipped a switch, and heard it make a moderately-pitched sound, as if it was starting up. The LCD on the side lit up, displaying "3 in.". He then pointed the gun towards one of his two couches, and pulled the trigger. At that point, an intense beam of light shot out from the nozzle and engulfed the couch in a bright white light.

Cody could not contain his excited smile as he watched the couch rapidly dwindle in size, until, in a matter of seconds, both the shrinking and the glow of the light ceased. Cody walked closer to the minuscule couched and looked down at it in front of his feet.

"This is so worth the almost $2200," he said.

Satisfied with the results, he placed the shrink ray onto the table and began making preparations for his grand plan.

~~~

The wait seemed like forever, but the next day--a Saturday--finally came. Cody could barely get any sleep, as the thoughts of the big change that he would be making kept him up all night. The thoughts of what his new like could, or would, if everything goes as planned, would be like.

He got out of bed and quickly ate breakfast and showered, before he put on a black T-shirt, jeans, and his running shoes, grabbed the shrink ray, and stepped out of his apartment for the last time, leaving everything else behind. After all, where he was going, he wouldn't need them.

He headed downstairs to the first floor, and then headed out of the apartment complex. There were very few people outside, which in his view was good, as he was openly carrying the shrink ray and did not want to draw suspicion. Wasting no time, he walked across the street and headed towards a specific two-story house about three lots away. Upon arriving, he found the driveway empty; just as planned, he thought to himself.

He opened the wooden gate of the fence surrounding the house and headed into the back yard. From there, he walked into the backyard and headed towards the back door, making sure that there were not any watchful eyes from within the nearby houses. Upon arriving, he stood with his back against the door, changed the shrink ray's size setting to 2 inches, and pointed it towards him. After taking a deep breath, he pulled the trigger.

Cody's vision went completely white, and there was a slight ringing sound in his ears. He felt a bit dizzy, and his body tingled. Once his vision returned, his world was completely different than it was mere seconds ago. The wooden fence that he was once taller than rose high above him, and blades of grass to his sides proved to be quite imposing, not to mention some of the insects that were thankfully ignoring him.

He turned around to face the now gigantic door, which now rose over him like a tall building, and that was not getting to the rest of the house, the top of which he could not even see from his angle. He stepped closer to the door and examined at the very bottom of the heavy wooden door, finding just enough space for him to squeeze under.

Pulling himself as hard as he could under the door, he was able to infiltrate the home. Standing to his feet, he found himself in what looked like the kitchen, with the refrigerator in the distance, a stove nearby, a sink and a dishwasher a bit further away underneath some cabinets, and a table with chairs in the middle of the room. The sun shone through the open windows, giving the room plenty of natural light.

Cody sighted another doorway, and promptly ran towards it. He knew beforehand that he'd have to do a lot of running, but in the end, he knew that it'd be worth it for the reward.

The reward of Elise.

Elise was the young woman who lived in this house, and one that he had caught sight of many times. She was a physically fit woman with blond hair and blue eyes, and tended to wear light outfits, including tank tops and skirts or capri pants, and finished the ensemble off with sandals or flip-flops that showed off her almost always pedicured toes. He knew that someone like her got a lot of attention from guys, but he never noticed any other guys stopping by her house.

The two were on a first name basis with each other, and he would wave and greet her if she was outside, and she would return the greeting with a smile. However, beyond their very first introduction to each other, he could not work up the courage to actually talk to her; he had always been shy among the fairer sex, even as an adolescent. Instead, he tended to admire her from afar, either from the front his apartment complex or from his third story apartment window.

His plan, the plan he spend months working on, involved shrinking himself and infiltrating her house; that part was completed. Afterwards, he would wait for her to come home, and hopefully head into the kitchen soon after. Then, he would call out to her and convince her to keep him as a sort of pet. Some would consider this an extreme change to make to one's life, but Cody saw it as the only way for him to get up the courage to be with the woman that he was smitten with.

He didn't even mind if Elise decided to step on him and end his existence under the bottom of her foot. He could not think of a better way to go out, and could even picture it in his head, with him fully accepting her sandaled foot as it fell upon him and grinded him into a fine paste. It was not as if he intended to go back to his old life anyway, nor did he have anything that he would have missed about it; if she refused to take him in as a pet, then he would have to convince her to crush him underfoot.

He had always had a fascination with shrinking and giant women, and still could not believe that he would actually be able to combine everything he loved--his macrophiliac fantasies and Elise--and experience it firsthand.

That was also why he chose now to act. Elise usually leaves to run errands on Saturdays at the same time, but would return soon. It was only a matter of waiting.

Having arrived closer to the doorway, on a normal-sized person's scale several feet away from it, he stood in place and waited.

He waited patiently and anxiously for what seemed like an hour, until he heard what sounded like a car pulling up outside. His heart began to race as he could hear the closing of the car door and, several seconds later, the sound of the front door being opened.

After the door closed, he could hear footsteps approaching, each one accompanied by a slap of what seemed to be flip-flops. Cody expectantly watched the doorway, doing nothing to fight the huge grin that had grown on his face.

His grin soon quickly transformed into a frown, struck with deep disappointment as he saw someone else instead walk into view.

It was Nick, Elise's younger brother.

Elise's brother, who was supposed to be at work. Considering his get-up--brown logo T-shirt, light blue jeans, and brown flip-flops--it was clear that he did not go in today at all.

"Just walk past, just walk past," Cody repeated to himself, hoping that the giant man would bypass the kitchen and head somewhere else.

No such luck, as Nick entered right into the kitchen and headed in his direction. His eyes were fixed head ahead, paying no attention to anything on the floor. Paying no attention to the fact that he was primed to tread on the tiny person below him.

As his deafening footsteps drew closer, Cody pointed the shrink ray at the sandy-brown-haired giant and pulled the trigger. ...However, nothing happened. In a panic, he squeezed it a few more times, but the result was the same. Bewildered, he looked at the LCD display, and noticed a flashing battery symbol. Its charge had run out.

"You're kidding...!" Cody exclaimed, miffed that the device had only shipped with enough of a charge for two shots.

The shadow of Nick loomed over him, and Cody looked up just in time to see the sole of the giant's left sandal right overhead. Wasting no time, Cody bolted towards his right, just narrowing avoiding being flattened by the unaware giant. The force of the giant's step, however, was enough to knock him off of his feet and onto the hard floor.

Laying there, Cody watched as Nick walked on, headed towards the refrigerator. He let out a sigh of relief; being crushed by a guy was not his idea of fun, and at that moment, he wanted nothing more than to get as far away from him as he could before his fantasy truly turned into a nightmare.

With the giant preoccupied with searching through the refrigerator, Cody took this chance to stand up and run towards the doorway ahead of him. He figured that once he got there, he could hide out somewhere until Elise got home.

Seconds later, he heard more footsteps from behind and the sound of wood moving against the marble floor. About a minute into his run, he looked back and saw that Nick was sitting down at the table, a carton of orange juice to his side, as he fiddled with his smartphone in his hand. Seemed like Cody was completely outside notice. That was good, he thought.

A few more minutes passed, and Cody seemed to be making good headway towards his destination.

"Is that a bug?"

Cody's heart sank in his chest as he looked behind him and saw Nick looking right in his direction, and then almost immediately get up from his chair and walk in his direction.

"No, no no no no NO!!" Cody tried to run faster, but he knew that there was no escape. Perhaps wearing a black shirt was a mistake, as it was the perfect contrast against the almost pristine while floor.

In no time at all, the giant young man had reached Cody, standing in place over him and watching him on the floor below him. Cody knew that he was not going to be able to escape him at this point, and the only way out was to go for diplomacy, especially before Nick decided to deal with him like the bug he thought he was.

Cody turned around and began waving his hands at the giant. "Hey!!" he yelled as loud as he could. "Hey!! Don't step on me!! I'm not a bug!!"

It seemed that his voice had reached him, as a look of surprise appeared on Nick's face, and his mouth dropped in disbelief. He then kneeled down, bringing himself closer to Cody's level. Cody looked into Nick's eyes as they seemed to fully examine just what they were observing; Nick had the same eyes as Elise, he noticed.

"No way," Nick said in amazement. "It's a person, a tiny person."

"Yeah, I'm a human," Cody said, trying to hide his nervousness. "Could you please not kill me? I'm not ready to die quite yet." He figured that he could concoct a story that could get Nick to take him into Elise's room. "Actually, I'm looking for-"

Suddenly, a look of realization appeared on Nick's face. "Wait, I know you!" he said. "You're that guy from across the street who's always creeping on my sister!"

"What!?" Cody couldn't believe what he was hearing. "That's not true!"

"Dude, I see you all the time from your apartment. You're always staring at her. And now you've managed to sneak in here? How did you even get small enough to do that?"

Cody saw no point in lying, and held up his currently-dead shrink ray. "I used this on myself."

"Is that a shrink ray?" Nick looked closely at the device for a few seconds, and then back at him. "Just what were you planning to do, shrink my sister and kidnap her!?"

Cody's heart was racing at Nick's indignation. "What, no! I wasn't going to do that! And even if I wanted to, I couldn't, because the charge is gone."

"So you're stuck like that?" Nick asked.

"Yeah, which is why I need to get to Elise. She can help me."

"'Help' you, how?"

"Oh, well..." Cody did not exactly have an answer for that. He wondered why he even said it in the first place. "I just want to talk with her."

"Wait, if your shrink ray's not working now, and we definitely don't have one, how are you planning to get back to your normal size?"

Cody shuffled through his mind on how to answer that question. If his bid to see Elise was successful, he would effectively be their new roommate. If not, then at least Nick would not have to deal with this so-called "creep" anymore. It was just a matter of convincing Nick to let Elise decide what to do with him.

Cody let out a sigh. "I'm not going back. This is a permanent change for me."

"Okay, and why do you need to see my sister?" Nick asked. "...Wait, you're not planning on staying here--like THAT--are you?"

"If Elise wants me to, yeah."

Nick shook his head. "You're unbelievable."

"But if she says no, then she's free to get rid of me."

"'Get rid of you'? Since you said that this is permanent, you mean that she can just kill you if she doesn't want you around."

Cody nodded. "And that's why I want you to take me to her room, so I could wait there for her and let decide on what to do."

"Don't you have people who will miss you?" Nick asked.

"No. Believe me, no one will notice or care that I'm gone."

Nick smiled. "Okay, then. You don't have anything to worry about, little guy."

Cody became anxiously excited. "So you'll take me in there, then?"

Nick shook his head. "No. You don't have to worry because I'm going to put an end to this right now," he said as he stood up.

Cody's heart began to race as the imposing giant once again stood over him and began to lift up his right foot. "Nonono, wait!! Don't do this!! Don't step on me!!"

"Why, so Elise can do it instead?" Nick replied with a bit of an angry tone. "If you want to get stepped on so badly, why would it matter if a guy or a girl does it when you'll be dead either way? Besides, I don't want to give a creep like you the satisfaction of going out on your own terms."

There seemed to be nothing else that could be said to change the situation. Cody had no choice but to run, turning around and making a full-speed dash towards the doorway that he had been targeting before. He was unsure if he'd even make it and get away from the blood-thirsty giant, but he had to try.

"Are you seriously running away from this?" Nick said. "You know you're too small to get away from me, right? Besides, I thought you wanted someone to step on you."

"Yes, but not you!!" Cody foolishly blurted back at Nick.

Nick chuckled. "Well, guess what? I've always wanted to see what it was like to crush a tiny person, and I guess at least one of our dreams is about to come true."

A dark shadow appeared around Cody, and he looked up only to see the sole of Nick's flip-flop coming right down on him.

"NOOOOO!!!" Cody screamed as he tried to put in more of his strength in an effort to run faster, but deep down, he knew that it was over.

He was soon pushed off of his feet by a heavy force and pinned against the floor, causing him to lose his grip on the shrink ray that he had been holding up until then. Despite this, he still struggled, trying to crawl for the open space ahead of him, but as the pressure upon his body began to increase, he found himself unable to do nothing more than claw at the floor.

"Dammit! Not like this!" Time seemed to slow down, allowing for him to mull over the events so far. He could not believe that his plan had failed so utterly. He hated that he was about to be crushed by a guy, and not the woman that he had been pining after for so long. Even more, there was nothing he could do about it. He was destined to become nothing more than a stain on the bottom of some guy's shoe.

"A shitty end to a shitty life," Cody mused, just as the pressure upon his body increased.

He felt a sharp pain as his body was compressed and collapsed in on itself, before everything went dark, and he felt nothing at all.



Nick's foot pressed completely down on the floor, and as he did so, he could hear and feel tiny Cody's body crunching and breaking underneath his sandal with a wet squelch. He applied as much pressure as he could, crushing the body as flat into the floor as he could, before lifting his heel slightly and twisting his foot. With each motion, more sounds of Cody's bones crunching could be heard as he further pulverized him into a pulp, until eventually they ceased as well.

Once that was done, he removed his foot from the spot and looked down on what remained: nothing more but a red splatter of blood and bones, littered with bits of flesh and torn clothes. He could also make out small metallic pieces, coated with the blood; likely belonging to the shrink ray that Cody had. Nick lifted his right foot and held it at the ankle as he looked on the sole of its flip-flop, finding more visceral remains of the pervert that was plastered on it.

He smiled in satisfaction and felt himself becoming physically excited in his pants. He lowered his foot back onto the floor, and applied pressure with it on the floor as he pulled it backwards, smearing the remains on the floor in a red trail along with it.

"That was better than I thought it'd be," Nick said to himself. Never in his wildest dreams did he expect to ever be able to carry out his deepest wish in real life, nor did he expect that it'd happen on what was his first Saturday off in months. "Too bad that shrink ray is broken..." He wondered just how Cody managed to get his hands on such revolutionary technology, and began to ponder how he could get his hands on one.

But first, he had to clean up the mess on the floor before Elise returned.

~~~

Nick sat on the couch in the living room, watching an action-comedy film on TV when he heard a car pull into the driveway. Soon after, the house's door opened and his sister Elise entered inside. In her hands were several bags of goods, mainly from clothing and shoe stores, as well as a paper bag from Wendy's.

"You buy anything for me?" Nick teasingly asked as she walked into the room.

"You had your chance to come, and you said no," Elise replied. "So no." She stuck her tongue out at him.

"Oh well... ...Hey, can I ask you a question?"

"Yeah, sure."

"You know that guy from across the street, who lives in the apartment? I think you told me his name is Cody."

"Yeah? What about him?"

"What do you think about him?"

"Hmm..." Elise seemed to ponder over this question. "He's okay, I guess. But I don't like how he's always staring at me from over there. I notice it a lot of the time I'm going out or coming home, and I can even see him in his apartment window doing it. It's weirding me out. In fact, I'm thinking about talking to him about it." She sighed.

"Oh I see," Nick said.

Elise stepped out of the room and turned towards her left, where the stairs were. "Why do you ask, anyway?"

"No reason," Nick answered as he turned his attention back towards the film on TV.



[THE END]