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Mark was the first to hear the footsteps through the underbrush.

It was early morning, and the four members of the scavenging party crept through the woods, collecting nuts and berries and other sustenance as they went. Sometimes, if they were lucky, they would stumble upon a field mouse and kill it with their makeshift spears. Of course, killing the animal wasn’t always easy; at their size, mice were as large as bull moose, and their teeth were deadly.

Mice weren’t the only danger that they faced out here; birds and snakes and even feral cats regularly attacked them. Of course, one-inch tall people didn’t stand much of a chance against normal-sized predators. But the forest was a better alternative to the human cities and towns. The little people (or “ImMen” as they called themselves) had been created by pharmaceutical companies to replace human test subjects. When several of them escaped, the government had decreed them to be threats and they were routinely hunted down and eradicated. So they shied away from human civilization, preferring to face the owls and the cats. At least animals weren’t purposely cruel, not like the giants were. Fortunately, they never really saw humans except for the occasional hiker or deer hunter.

So Wyatt and the others were surprised when Mark froze and gestured for them to stop. Mark was the oldest in the group, one of the original ImMen who had escaped from the labs. He still had the scars all over his body from the testing that the humans had conducted on him, although he never spoke about it. The thick, twisting scars and the haunted look in his eyes told Wyatt more than enough.

The group trusted Mark enough that when he gestured for them to stop, they did. At first, they couldn’t hear anything but sparrows singing in the trees. Then they heard it, the rhythmic sound of something large moving through the underbrush. A twig snapped and Wyatt nearly fled, but a look from Mark stopped him. The four ImMen remained motionless as the human came into view, dressed all in black and moving with a slow deliberateness through the forest. Its clothing was clearly some sort of uniform, a long-sleeved shirt and cargo pants tucked into boots. A metallic canister was strapped to the person’s back, and even more ominous was the axe that gleamed in the human’s hands. It was obvious to Wyatt that this wasn’t a hiker or a hunter.

It was something much worse.

He couldn’t see the human’s face, which was hidden behind some sort of gas mask. The huge round eyes and the protruding air filter gave the mask an insectile appearance, and the awful sight of it sent shivers down Wyatt’s spine. He fought back the urge to run as the human’s vast legs swung closer and closer, huge pillars of flesh clad in dark fabric. When the giant’s left foot landed dangerously close to the group, he actually felt the ground beneath him shudder from the impact. His heart hammered in his chest as he realized how easily he could have been flattened. Relief washed over him as the human lifted its foot and strolled away, crushing the small ferns beneath its tread. The relief quickly turned to dread when he realized where the stranger was headed: toward the colony.

Mark and the others came to the same conclusion. They bolted after the human, who had left a clear path of flattened vegetation and broken branches in its wake. By the time that they caught up, they could see that the giant was peering intently at the dead tree that held their colony. Wyatt wasn’t sure what to do. He had his spear but it was tiny, insignificant compared to the immense being that prodded at the tree where the other ImMen remained hidden. The human probably wouldn’t even feel it. So he silently prayed that the giant would just lose interest and go away.

With one hand, the human tapped at the wood and listened. For the longest time, it didn’t move, just pressed its ear against the trunk. The tinted glass eyes on the mask flashed as the head slowly nodded and pulled away from the tree. With a slow casualness, the human gripped the axe tighter and lifted it high over its shoulder. Wyatt gasped as the giant swung the weapon around in a wide arc, hitting the trunk with enough force to send chunks of bark and wood flying in all directions.

“No,” Wyatt whispered. Not surprisingly, the human didn’t hear him. It continued to chop at the tree, gouging a huge hole in the trunk. Even from the ground he could see the frantic movement inside the hollowed-out sections of the tree, tiny men and women trying to escape from the axe. Blow after blow struck the trunk, little bodies tumbling through the air, unnoticed by the giant. Finally, after the tree had been thoroughly hacked apart, the human dropped the axe with a resounding crash and reached around for the sprayer attached to the metal canister.

Wyatt knew what the assailant had in mind as they inserted the sprayer into the tree’s gaping hole, but he still couldn’t bear to watch as the poisonous gas was pumped inside the colony. The hissing sound of the gas filled his ears and he probably would have been sick if Mark hadn’t grabbed his upper arm.

“C’mon. We need to get out of here,” Mark urged. Wyatt was turning to run when he heard a piercing shriek followed by a tremendous burst of sound. The giant had stopped gassing the colony and was turning its attention on the survivors at its feet, stomping one person after another. There was a cold, almost detached, quality to its movements. It didn’t matter if the InMen screamed or begged or simply cowered; it squashed them one by one, leaving behind corpses embedded deep in its footprints.

When the human raised one mammoth foot over his friend Deirdre, Wyatt couldn’t take it any longer. He dashed toward the hovering boot and saw to his horror that the sole was caked with viscera and the flattened remains of several ImMen. Somehow, he managed to lift his spear and throw it, heaving it with all of his strength. But his weapon simply bounced off the boot leather, falling back down to the ground. Wyatt’s attack didn’t faze the human, although it did stop the descent of the foot long enough for Deirdre to crawl away. She sobbed hysterically as she tried to stand up, her auburn hair streaked with something dark, blood perhaps. Wyatt was helping her when the shadow fell over them both, blotting out the sun. The human’s colossal body bent as it reached down, its outstretched hand grasping for them.

He tried to ward off the fingers but they pinched his entire torso, sending blasts of agony throughout his entire body. As he opened his mouth to scream, he gazed up into the terrifying face of the giant, the round eyes of the mask clearly inspecting him. With the other hand, his captor reached into the pocket of its pants and pulled out a mesh bag. Wyatt finally screamed as he and Deirdre were shoved inside.

They twisted and writhed in the bag, trying to sit up. The human paid them no heed, plucking up more survivors and depositing them in the sack. Wyatt found himself suddenly upside down, pressed against countless other bodies as the giant tied the bag to its belt and snatched up its axe. All around him people moaned and wept, squeezed together. The ImMen in the tree were all dead, as were those on the ground. With a sinking heart, Wyatt knew that he would probably be dead soon as well. His prison banged against the hard wall of the human’s thigh as it started to walk, carrying the survivors with it.

***

What happened next was a blur, especially since Wyatt couldn’t see much besides a tangle of limbs and heads around him. He tried again and again to pull himself up but he couldn’t, so he just remained upside down, the blood rushing to his head. By the time that the bag was finally tilted enough so that he tumbled right side-up, his head was pounding terribly.

The giant had untied the bag and was dangling it in one hand. Before them was a silver-white machine, monstrous in its sheer size. It took Wyatt a moment to comprehend that he was looking at a truck, a vehicle that others had described but which he had never seen. He stared in wonder as their captor opened a door and dumped them on the tan seat inside. The idea of actually being inside a human vehicle was amazing, but his attention was quickly diverted when the giant reached up to take off the gas mask.

He didn’t know what he had been expecting. A man, perhaps, because of the brutal way that the others had been murdered. He was surprised to see that the human was female and relatively young, with curly hair that was such a dark brown that it was almost black. Despite her size, she was pretty in an everyday sort of way, her mahogany eyes surrounded by thick lashes. The woman’s cheeks were flushed from wearing the mask as she leaned down, silently studying them. Wyatt decided that he didn’t like the look in her eyes at all. There was something sinister lurking behind them, something that turned his blood to ice.  The human continued to stare; then she put the mask in the footwell and slammed the door.

Wyatt clawed at the interwoven cords of the bag, trying to find a way out before the human returned. By the time that he realized that the bag was inescapable, their captor had already opened the other door and slid into the seat next to them. She turned her head slightly, her full lips parting in a devilish little grin. Then she started the truck.

***

It took ten minutes to reach her cabin. Well, technically it wasn’t Melissa’s cabin; it belonged to the United States federal government. She was just another bureaucrat, assigned to this particular outpost in the middle of nowhere. Her official position title was “Wildlife Control Expert,” although really, the sole purpose of her existence out here was to locate and exterminate ImMen and their colonies. For two years she had been doing that. The pay wasn’t great but she certainly was never bored.

She didn’t get out of the truck right away. Instead, she took some time to fill out the standard form reporting eradication of a colony, listening to the chirping of birds outside. The tiny ImMen in the bag on the passenger’s seat chittered as well, completely unintelligible to her without her sound amplification unit. Melissa would put it on later, when she actually needed to speak to them. Halfway through the form, she paused and looked over at the little creatures, each one smaller than her thumb. They were trying to wiggle their way out of the bag and failing miserably. Their predicament made her chuckle.

When she was finally finished with her report, she picked up the bag with its thrashing contents and headed into the cabin. It was a small four-room building and her understanding was that it had once been a forest ranger’s outpost. The cabin probably hadn’t been updated much since the 1970s but it served her needs well enough. She placed the bag on one of the Formica countertops and hunted through the closet until she found what she needed. The ImMen cage was on the top shelf, next to a spare gas mask. Knowing the federal government, they had probably paid some vendor a ridiculous sum of money to give them what was basically a hermit crab tank.

Melissa set the cage down and opened the bag, glancing inside. The bug-like people crawled away from her, still chittering madly. She noticed the expressions on their faces, mostly horror and desperation, and it made her smile despite herself.

It had been too long since she had had the pleasure of interrogating the little fuckers.

Reaching deep into the bag, she pulled out handfuls of ImMen and dropped them into the plastic cage. Some of them struck the bottom of the cage too hard and didn’t move. Whether they were dead or simply injured, she didn’t care. She had more than enough of the creatures for her purpose. When the bag was empty, she placed the top on the cage and, giving her captives one last look, went into the bathroom.

Melissa stripped off her uniform and stared at herself in the mirror over the sink. She tried not to scrutinize her body too much but it was a difficult habit to break. Gently, she cupped her breasts, weighing them and wishing that they were bigger. When her eyes had picked out all her flaws, eyes that were too far apart and legs that were far too short to ever be elegant, she stepped into the shower.  There she stood, her head bent, until the hot water ran out. Her mind was blissfully empty when she finally turned off the faucet and grabbed a towel, wrapping it around her body. She took her time getting dressed, pulling on a plain gray t-shirt and faded shorts.

The cabin was eerily silent as she walked back into the kitchen, her footsteps echoing around her. Melissa purposely didn’t acknowledge the ImMen in the cage, instead taking a bottle of water from the fridge and taking a sip. When she finally looked at them, they all stared back, wide-eyed behind the clear walls. It was amusing to see how her every action drew their attention, their faces following her in unison like marionettes pulled by invisible strings. She drank more water and then reached forward to tap on the cage with one finger.

The ImMen all fled away to the opposite side.

Melissa’s eyes moved around the group of tiny people until she spotted him, the one who had thrown his spear at her foot. Now that had been one of the most foolish and bravest things that she had ever witnessed. In a way, she admired him. She probably wouldn’t have had the courage to stand up to a rampaging giant.

She studied the tiny man huddled in the corner. He was a handsome little thing with his dirty-blond hair and sinewy body. It looked like his clothing had been constructed from tatters of fabric by a half-blind seamstress and she wondered if the ImMen had taught themselves to sew or if they had watched humans doing it at one point. The pitiful state of their clothing suggested the former.

The spear-thrower met her gaze and again, she marveled at his bravery. He really was quite attractive and if he had been a normal human, she never would have dared to look at him twice. But since he was the size of a cricket and she held all of the power over him, she leered at him while he stared back. The staring match continued until she took the top off the cage and poured in some of the water from her bottle. The ImMen screeched and scattered as the torrent of water bore down upon them.

Melissa chuckled as she carefully placed the top back onto the cage. She glanced at the spear-thrower one last time, who was dripping wet but not yet defeated. Then she went to type up her daily activity report for her supervisor.

***

They were all relieved when the human left, disappearing into the other room. Wyatt stood in cold water up to his thighs, shivering and trying to decide what to do. Escape from the cage was impossible; the plastic walls were easily fourteen or fifteen times his height. And the human was bound to return, once she was finished whatever she was doing. He heard an incessant tap-tapping from the other room and once, there was a deafening ringing noise. Her voice interrupted it: “Hello, Melissa speaking. Yes, I will. No, only one this week.”

So her name was Melissa. Wyatt mentally filed this information away.

Deirdre sloshed through the water toward him. The blood in her hair had dried into long streaks but she didn’t seem to notice.

“What do you think she’s going to do with us?” She sounded terrified.

“I don’t know,” Wyatt answered honestly. It didn’t make sense that the human would eradicate everyone else in the colony only to let them go. But why would she be keeping them alive? To give them back to the pharmaceutical companies or the government? Wyatt doubted that. They all wanted the ImMen dead.

When the tapping in the other room stopped, everyone held their breath. The human (Melissa, he supposed) appeared in the doorway, looking more bored than anything else. She strode right past them and dug through the closet again, this time pulling out a nondescript case. Inside were all kinds of strange machines and she selected something small and silvery that she clipped over one ear.

Humming loudly, she strode over to the cage. Wyatt and the others all looked up as the top of the cage was taken off yet again, Melissa’s gigantic face looming far above them. The human’s hand reached in and began snatching up ImMen at random, the massive fingers closing around them and lifting them from the cage. Wyatt was the last and he debated whether or not to fight the hand when it dove down for him. In the end, he realized that resisting wouldn’t do him any good, so he stood still while the hand scooped him up. The human’s skin was soft yet rough, the raised ridges on the pads of her fingers brushing up against his own body. By now, he had been picked up enough times to appreciate the power behind those fingers, the strength that could reduce him to a jellied mess with ease.

The others were clustered on the counter below and Wyatt expected to be placed down there with them. But Melissa didn’t lower her hand; instead, she brought him closer to her face. He found himself frightfully close to her right eye, the pupil constricting slightly as it focused on him. The eye swept over his entire body in such a lustful manner that he felt violated somehow.

He jerked, startled, when she spoke. ImMen were engineered to be able to understand human voices, which made them more cooperative test subjects. Still, he found her voice to be terrifying at this close range, the sound vibrations reverberating through his chest.

“So you’re the one who threw that spear at me,” Melissa said.

Wyatt nodded, painfully aware of how her fingers were still squeezing him. She stared at him, her lips curling slightly. He couldn’t tell if that signified disgust or annoyance or amusement.

“That was pretty stupid,” she commented at last. Again, he nodded.

The human moved her face slightly closer, and he flinched. “What’s your name?”

Wyatt hesitated until the enormous brown eyes narrowed dangerously. He swallowed hard and muttered, ”Wyatt.”

“Ah.” Melissa looked him over once more in that uncomfortable manner; then she lowered him to the counter with Deirdre and Mark and the other ImMen. She picked up the cage and emptied the water into the kitchen sink. Briefly, Wyatt considered trying to run while her back was turned but he was too high off the ground to get very far. He gritted his teeth in frustration as she finished dumping the water and began loading people back into the cage. Melissa saved him for last, her gaze lingering on him before she opened her fingers and allowed him to crawl free.

She remained standing over the cage, her hands on her hips. When she addressed them, it was in an almost friendly manner, although Wyatt could detect the underlying malice in her voice.

“I know that you can understand me and this…” she indicated the silver device wrapped around one ear, “…will let me understand you. Now, I know that there’s at least one more colony in that forest, but damned if I know where it is. However, I’m willing to bet that one of you knows exactly where it is. Am I right?”

No one answered. So that was why they were still alive. The human wanted to know where the other colony was located. Wyatt could guess why she was so interested in that knowledge. The memory of the destruction of his own home filled him with gut-wrenching horror. He sucked in his breath as she smiled broadly, still regarding them as though they were all pals. But her eyes remained cold and hard, glittering in their sockets.

“Who’d like to tell me where the other colony is? Anyone?” The smile vanished when they all remained silent.

“Fine. Be that way.” And with that, her hand darted back into the cage, grabbing a raven-haired woman named Sophie. Sophie howled with terror as she was pulled out, kicking spasmodically in the human’s grip.

“Now, where is the other colony?” Melissa demanded, each word punctuated by a tightening of her fingers that made Sophie yelp. The poor woman’s face was ashen as she shook her head, mumbling over and over again that she didn’t know. Which was the truth. Wyatt knew the location, but that was only because he was one of the scavengers who had routinely left their own colony. Sophie, on the other hand, wouldn’t have known the whereabouts of the other ImMen settlement. Her ignorance clearly irritated the human, who grasped Sophie’s head with between the thumb and forefinger of her other hand.

“Wait!” Wyatt shouted and to his surprise, Melissa paused and glared down at him.

“Please don’t do this,” he pleaded. “We’re people too…”

Melissa snorted and grinned wider. “Right.” Then, with a single simple motion, she compressed Sophie’s head between her two fingers. A crimson jet of blood and shattered bone and brain matter squirted out, splattering across the front of the cage and obscuring Wyatt’s view. Behind him, the other ImMen cried and shrieked as Sophie’s body dangled limply from the human’s hand, but he pounded his fists against the cage.

“Bitch! Fucking bitch!” Wyatt roared, hitting the plastic wall until his hands ached. Melissa rubbed her red-stained fingertips together, mashing Sophie’s body further. Then she tilted her head to look down at him. He thought that her face would contort would anger, that she would strike the cage or crush him like she had Sophie.

But she just laughed.

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