"Wake up!" The booming cry was immediately followed by a powerful blow to Katherine's torso. The tiny woman let out a long, wretched gasp, clutching her stomach and rolling onto her side. Zara grinned, her head propped up on her hand as she lay on the floor. "Naptime's over."

When Katherine didn't respond right away, Zara forced her onto her back, pinning her arms above her head with one finger. She delighted in the little squirms and squeaks of her new pet, and how easily they were overpowered by anything she decided to do. This thought sparked something inside her mind; while she was happy to demonstrate this truth to Katherine physically, she wanted to make sure the woman understood how powerless she was.

"Do you like Chinese food?"

The tiny woman looked up, stunned by the curious nature of the question. "W-what?"

"I asked if you like Chinese food. You know, egg rolls, rice, noodles, maybe some dumplings or something?"

"I... what does that have to do with anything?"

"Well, you see, I was just thinking about it because I don't think I've ever seen you eating it, and I've worked here for a couple years now. It got me wondering what other experiences you've never had, things you put off or decided probably weren't for you." As she spoke, the giant woman pressed down harder on the tiny wrists beneath her finger, and Katherine's struggles grew more frantic and desperate in accord. "It's a shame, really, because now you've missed out on them forever. You don't get to do anything human ever again."

Katherine had nothing to say to this. Though she was preoccupied with the mounting pressure on her limbs, Zara could see she was internalizing what she was being told.

"No more people food. No more people TV shows. No more internet, or sleeping in beds, or using a bathroom. No more privacy. No more freedom."

"Stop it! Fucking stop it!"

"Aww, what's wrong? Isn't this exactly what you were going to do to me?" Zara twisted her finger, and felt a small pop against her skin. Katherine's eyes shot open wide and she threw her head back in a protracted howl of agony. "Whoops. Did I getcha?"

"Please!" The shrunken woman sobbed through the pain. "Please, I'm sorry! I'm sorry I tried to shrink you, I'm sorry I cheated on my husband, what the fuck do you want me to say!? I'm sorry!"

A sly smirk spread across Zara's lips, and she held it in silence, letting Katherine writhe herself to exhaustion. She could see the blood drain from her face when her fallen employer finally looked up, noticing the smile. Good, Zara thought to herself. She gets it.

"I just want you to know, Katherine, that whatever happens to you in the future, it's because I allowed it. Just like you can't even free yourself from my finger, so too can't you free yourself from my power." Zara sat up straighter, lowering the angle of her eyes further. For the girl pinned to her back on the ground, it was more intimidating than even Zara herself believed it to be. "You've become a little trophy for me. My very first slave."

"S... sl-l..." Katherine couldn't bring herself to finish the word aloud.

"Yes, that's right!" The twenty-year-old said, beaming. "Slave! You'll do everything I tell you to do from now on, and in payment I won't turn you into a messy smear on these bedsheets. And believe you me, I am definitely going to be messing these bedsheets up, if you know what I'm sayin'." She lifted her finger and raised herself up, lifting up just enough to sit on the foot of the bed. Katherine gasped and clutched her wrists, gingerly cradling them to herself.

"I don't deserve this," she whimpered, just loud enough for Zara to hear.

"Neither here nor there," the giantess said, dismissing it with a wave. She slid her right foot forward, presenting her foot wrapped in tan pantyhose to the matron-in-miniature. Her toes wiggled up and down as she gave her first command. "Kneel before my toes."

Physically, the motion wouldn't have taken much effort on Katherine's part. She was already laying on her side, and the act of rolling onto her front would be a simple one. Psychologically, however, she wasn't ready to submit to her maid. Though the thrill of powerlessness still festered in the pit of her stomach, to kneel before her sweaty toes was too much. Instead, she pulled herself slowly to her feet, glaring up defiantly at Zara.

"No?" the young girl asked with a chuckle. Katherine braced herself for a swift, violent repercussion. "That's fine. So tell me, Katherine: what's your plan from here?"

"I... w-well, uh... what?"

"Well, you must have some idea of what you're going to do, right? Some foresight into possible futures? You clearly weighed your options and decided that the best thing for you to do, in the long run, was defy me. So what's the game plan, hmm?"

The smug, condescending tone in which Katherine was being spoken to filled her with venom. She wanted to hurt the little bitch, to get her on the ground and keep kicking her teeth in, one by one, stuffing them down her throat with her toes and watch her gag on the blood. She wanted to work the heel of her stilettos in through Zara's eye sockets, feel it squish and pierce through her brain and enjoy the final, dumb noises of the impromptu lobotomy patient. She could almost feel the way her sk-

"Hey!" Zara swung her foot forward, the big toe catching Katherine in the chest and sending her sprawling out across the carpet. "I asked you a question, and I expect an answer. What do you really think you're going to do from here? Because it sure as shit ain't escape."

"...I could," Katherine insisted.

"Oh? How? You're the size of a very small mouse, and a tenth as fast. You have no ability to fight me, no ability to hide from me." She giggled and shrugged. "But sure, let's have some fun. Let's pretend you sneak out the door while I'm not looking. What then?"

The pantyhosed toe settled on Katherine, keeping her firmly pressed against the ground. Pathetic though she knew it was, the tiny woman did her best to seem stoic. "I... I'd get discovered by Paul!"

"Oh, you think your husband would save you?" She seemed to think about this, nodding. "Yeah, I suppose he would - at least at first. He probably wouldn't be so pleasant once I showed him these photos, though. And when I told him that you tried to turn his favorite fling into a bug."

"You... you are not his favorite!" Katherine spat.

"Uhh, yeah, I totally am." Zara rolled her eyes. "We did it yesterday. When was the last time you two did it?"

The little woman's face flushed red and she stayed silent, refusing to meet her captor's gaze. Zara chuckled and continued.

"So yeah. You get found by him and you're basically dead in the water. You'd have to get out of the house altogether, but then you run the risk of getting scooped up by some owl or something, right? Or maybe you'd get eaten by a raccoon. Doesn't that sound fun, Kate? Being animal food?"

Another flash of anger welled up inside her. She couldn't let Zara be right! "I could find a phone! I could call the police and have you fucking arrested!"

The giant woman nodded again. "Oh yes, yes, my angry little girl, you could try! But... do you really think they're going to believe you're shrunken? I'll just scoop you up, nestle you back down in my bra again, and deal with the police while hiding you directly in front of them. You wouldn't even be able to squeak loud enough for them to hear you!"

"I am not a fucking animal!" Katherine shrieked at the top of her lungs. "I'm a fucking human being, and you will treat me with respect! You will take your fucking foot off of me, you will apologize, and then you will do exactly what I fucking tell you to do, you low-life, vapid, insignificant speck of a person! Am I fucking understood?"

Zara stared down at her tiny prisoner, stunned by the outburst. She slid her foot to the side, settling it beside the woman. "I... I don't know what to say. I'm sorry, Katherine. I'm so, so sorry."

Getting to her feet once more, Katherine pressed her advantage. "It's not uncommon for people to forget their place, girl. Now return me to my proper size. There's a restorative function on the device as well, it's labeled appropriately."

The maid got to her feet, walking over to the dresser where she'd left the shrinking device several hours before. She reached out to pick something up, but when her hand came back into view, Katherine could barely make out what she was holding.

"What is that? What are you doing?" The tiny woman's questions were at once ignored and answered as Zara silently lifted the cotton swab to her ear, overtly swirling it around, giving her ear a thorough cleaning. "What are you doing?" Katherine repeated, taking a tiny step forward as if to assert her presence.

Extracting the swab from her ear, Zara inspected it for a moment before turning it around in her fingers, applying the other end to her left ear. The entire time, she kept her gaze up off the floor, making the shrunken woman feel overlooked. "Hello!? Answer me, servant!"

At that, the giantess' eyes flicked down to the ground, granting Katherine her attention. "I said I was sorry, Kate." Zara lowered herself into a squat, picking up the little person in her free hand. "And I meant it. I'm sorry I toyed with you. I apologize for not making myself more clear. You need a blunt-force lesson in our new dynamic, I can see that now."

The little woman knew the answer to her question before she asked it. "Zara, what are you going to do with that swab?"

"Open."

In the coming weeks, Katherine would remember this moment as the last time she felt as though she had any shred of dignity.

Using the nail of her thumb, Zara easily held her employer's lower jaw down, and slipped the yellowed end of the swab inside her mouth. Katherine screamed bloody murder from behind her disgusting gag, and the young woman grinned from ear to ear.

"Now that I have your attention, I think it's time I tell you something." She slowly swirled the swab back and forth in her fingers as she spoke, running the foul, bitter taste of her fresh earwax over Katherine's tongue. The sickening combination of warm wax and cotton made the little woman retch, but she was powerless to do anything but endure.

"I hated being your fucking maid. Don't get me wrong, I don't take issue with the profession - but you made it nearly unbearable. You looked down on me, treating me like I was nothing. Like my paycheck was some kind of favor, rather than a fee for services rendered. I spent months daydreaming about getting back at you, so this, this right here? This is kind of a dream come true for me. That expression on your face right this moment is one I'm never, ever going to forget."

The sickness of submission again flared up within Katherine, stronger than it had ever been before. It was so simple for this girl half her age to subject her to any manner of cruelty and humiliation that she desired. She was being put in her place and lectured to like a dog that hadn't been housebroken. The sour taste of earwax sat on her tongue and ran down the back of her throat.

"Sucked that side clean yet, honey?" Zara pulled the swab out, marveling at how much yellow had been removed from the fibers. She snickered, spun the swab, and stuck it back into Katherine's mouth, all before the little woman could utter a single word. "So the point I'm trying to make, little Kate, is that I'll win no matter what. You could have bowed to my feet and submitted to me that way, and I would have been happy. Or, you could have your wimpy little outburst and get a mouthful of earwax - and I'm still happy! That's the point I was trying to make, but I guess your tiny little brain isn't wired for subtlety:

No matter what, I win and you lose."

The two women looked into each other's eyes for a long while. Katherine had never noticed how green her maid's eyes were, but more importantly she had never seen the cold malice in her pupils. This was not being done on a whim. It was deliberate torture and domination because deep down, at her core, Zara despised the little Katherine. She shuddered to think what that could mean for the future.

Without breaking gaze, Katherine began to earnestly suck on the swab, running her tongue against the rough cotton and working the wax out with the tip. Zara beamed, giggling with giddy exhilaration. "Oh yes, little one, that's it. Lick it all up."

Tears stung her eyes, but she continued to lick. Nothing was more important than obeying her Mistress.