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Suijin System, 2339

She reclined upon one of the seats by the small window, gazing out into the darkness that was dotted by a scattering of white stars. Most of the other passengers on the transport vessel had taken Caluixx, a trendy new tranquilizer that helped with space travel-induced anxiety, but she had refused. She needed her mind to be clear for what she had planned. In a few days it would all be over and she would go back to the normal drudgery of her life. Through the window she could see her destination, her own face partially reflected back at her. Her full lips curved upward in a smile as she leaned back…and waited.

***

One more year, that’s what Ava Sterling told herself. Only one more year and she would finally be transferred off of this station. Not that she disliked her work; she actually loved the research that she had been doing. But the feeling of isolation was beginning to get to her. That, and she wanted to feel real soil beneath her feet and real rain on her skin.

She know where’d she go, too. To the colony world of Kleio, where her parents lived. Her brother had long since been drafted into the Alliance army, so he unfortunately wouldn’t be there. Of the many regrets in her life, that was the worst. The Alliance required at least one child from every household for its military and since she was the child with the advanced education, Oliver had been the one to volunteer. So for the past few years, she had been striving to make that sacrifice count, to use her skills to come up with new technology that could help humanity.

She sipped her tepid coffee, alone in the dimly-lit cafeteria, and thought about her future.

***

Lani Station was a relatively small space station located in the Suijin System, orbiting an unimportant moon. Most of the time there were only about fifty people on the station, the majority of them research scientists. Today, however, there was an additional person aboard: a member of the Alliance Council from Earth. Ava watched her as she strode through the airlock, moving with a grace and confidence that the physicist could never hope to match. Naomi Han was a tall woman, easily the height of most of the men aboard, and her silvery-white dress was tailored to show off her long legs and hour-glass figure. There were two scarlet tattoos on her high cheekbones, one under each eye, which were currently fashionable amongst the upper class on Earth. At least, Ava thought they were. She hadn’t been to the homeworld since she was twelve years old. Most of her life had been spent on various colony worlds and now she lived here, on Lani Station.

The commanding officer of the station stepped forward to greet Naomi.

“I’m Captain Ethan Dyson and this is Dr. Liam Cayer and Dr. Ava Sterling. It’s a pleasure to have you aboard Lani,” he said, shaking her slender hand. Ava noticed how Liam was eying the Alliance official, a smirk appearing on his handsome face. What a sleaze her boss could be. God knew that there were enough times that he had shamelessly flirted with her. He was attractive, with his sandy-blonde hair and dark eyes, but he also made her skin crawl. Not exactly the sort of person that she would ever trust.

“Well, it’s good to be here, especially after four Gate jumps and a month on a decrepit starship. I thought that ship would fall to pieces coming here,” Naomi replied, gazing around her. Ava could imagine what she saw. Lani could also be described as “decrepit,” especially since it was one of the oldest research stations in the Suijin System. But the fact that it was old and rundown belied the importance of the work going on there. Ava got the impression that the Alliance liked it that way.

“Shall I show you to your quarters, Ms. Han?” Ethan asked. He was even taller than Naomi, his face boyish and dotted with freckles across the bridge of his nose. The captain usually stayed in his quarters or the control rooms, away from the scientists, so this was the longest time that Ava had seen him around.

“I’d like to see the research facilities first, if that’s alright,” Naomi said.

“Of course. Right this way.”

Ava found that she was more nervous than she would have thought possible as they headed down the dimly-lit corridor toward Lab 1. Her heart fluttered in her chest as she snuck glances at the Alliance official, who seemed coolly aloof as she walked. Oh, she hoped that Naomi wouldn’t find anything wrong. All they needed was their funding cut, especially after their latest project had been going so well.

The glass doors to Lab 1 slid open and they stepped through. Liam immediately began his spiel about the lab and all of its latest technology, gesturing toward the various stations. Naomi didn’t pay much attention to him, though. She strode toward the back of the lab, the six-inch chrome heels of her shoes clicking on the floor. Ava wondered how the hell she could walk in those things.

“And this?” Naomi asked, pausing in front of the glowing energy shield that guarded the SR838 unit. Most of the device was contained in the gleaming black sphere that rested upon a short tripod.

“That is the SR838. It’s still a prototype, but it can increase or decrease the size of objects. It’s based on a set of algorithms that I developed,” Liam explained, and Ava silently fumed. She had come up with those algorithms but she didn’t dare contradict her boss in front of the Alliance official.

“Care for a demonstration?” Liam gave Naomi an ingratiating smile.

“Certainly.”

Liam held his palm up to the shield; after the AI had scanned his biometrics and lowered the protective barrier, he picked up the controller. He winked at Naomi as he strapped it onto his wrist. His fingers tapped in a few quick commands on the interface and he aimed his arm toward a wastebasket. There should have been a spectacular burst of light or something similarly flashy, but the SR838 just beeped once. And then the wastebasket was gone. Liam strode over to where the wastebasket had been, bent down and then smiled again. He held out his palm, where a wastebasket smaller than a pencil eraser rested.

“Voila!”

“Amazing,” Naomi whispered.

“The prototype is top secret, of course,” Liam added. She nodded solemnly and replied, “I promise you that this secret won’t get out.” Her eyes were still on the miniature trashcan.

“Would you like to see the rest of the station, Ms. Han?” The captain asked and she told him that she would. As soon as they left Lab 1, Ava turned to Liam. He was still smiling smugly.

“ ‘Your algorithms’? What the hell, Liam?! Those were my goddamn algorithms and you know it,” she growled, her face burning. He glanced over at her and there was something in his dark eyes that she didn’t like at all. Liam had been unstrapping the controller from his wrist but he paused, his fingers lingering on the interface.

“Just remember who’s in charge here, Ava,” he said.

***

Encrypted Transmission, 23:03

“Yes, it definitely works.”

“Proceed, then.”

“Affirmative.”

***

If asked to recount the events of the next morning, Ava would have said that everything started out like any other day. She got up at her regular time, showered for exactly five minutes because of the water restrictions, and then went to Lab 1. There were about ten others already there, busy at work. Ava sat down at a workstation and began editing her technical report, lost in her thoughts. She was only half-aware as Naomi entered the lab.

One of the techs, Brad Michaels, rushed to greet her. Ava didn’t pay much attention to them, scrolling down through her report. Then, for some reason, the hair on the back of her neck stood up. She turned her head and saw that Naomi had held her hand up to the blue energy shield that protected the SR838 unit. The AI should have read her biometrics and refused her access; but strangely, the shields lowered. That wasn’t supposed to happen…

“Hey, I don’t think you’re authorized to do that,” Brad protested.

But Naomi was already wearing the controller, admiring it as though it was an expensive piece of jewelry. There was something about her expression that unnerved Ava.

With the slowness of a feverish nightmare, Naomi raised her arm and pointed it toward a group of researchers near the doors. One moment they were looking at tablets or talking with one another; the next, they were gone. No, not gone, they had been shrank. Ava rose from her chair, refusing to believe what she was seeing even as Naomi swept her arm across the room, reducing everyone in her path. Her eyes darted toward the glass doors and then she was running for them, moving as fast as her legs could carry her. Ava was about ten feet away from the doors when she felt a dizzying sickness seize her entire body and suddenly she was dropping down toward the floor.

Ava found herself on her hands and knees, trying to fight off the vertigo. She knew what had happened yet she still felt astonishment as she glanced around. Everything was so ridiculously big, the ordinary tables and workbenches looming high above her like multistory buildings. She stood up, her legs wobbling, and glanced upwards, where the ceiling and the lights seemed to be miles and miles away. Tiny. I’m tiny, she thought and a hysterical laugh escaped her lips. Perhaps it was all an accident, perhaps Naomi hadn’t meant to shrink them…

The floor shook as something huge moved across it and Ava saw that it was Naomi, sauntering across the lab as though she owned it. She craned her head so that she could look up at the gigantic woman. Was that what people looked like to bugs? If so, they were damn terrifying. Naomi’s shapely legs seemed to stretch up forever, disappearing into the confines of her black pencil skirt, and if Ava tilted her head all the way back, she could see the beautiful yet frightening face. Frightening because of its enormity and because of the malicious gleam in the massive eyes.

The giantess’ attention was on several researchers who looked justifiably confused. She moved with that same catlike grace despite her size, strolling toward them with a horrible grin on her face. The miniaturized scientists gaped up at her as she paused before them, her hands behind her back.

“What a marvelous invention this is. I must say that I’m impressed,” she told them. Ava remained where she was, some gut instinct instructing her not to move. The smile widened on the giantess’ face as she continued. “It’s a shame that I have to kill the inventors.”

Languidly, Naomi moved her right foot, nudging the petrified scientists so that they fell to the floor. One of them tried to crawl away and she raised her mammoth high-heeled shoe over him, bringing it down on his body with a terrifying deliberateness. Look away, Ava’s internal voice urged her. Close your eyes, don’t watch…but she looked on with appalled fascination as the giantess began to step down. The man’s crazed screams rose higher and higher, the cries of a small animal caught in a trap. Then, as she applied more pressure, he ceased shrieking and the only noise was a sharp, wet crack. A horrid stream of blood and pulped flesh squirted out from the front of Naomi’s foot as she squashed him like a cherry tomato. The giantess laughed and smeared his smashed body across the floor in a wide arc of red. It was when she brought her foot down again, grinding the others into paste with a twist of her ankle, that Ava fled for her life.

She started to run for the glass doors, which seemed like they were now several blocks away. When one of Naomi’s feet crashed down in front of her, blocking her path, she scurried to the left. The giantess’ attention was on someone else so Ava was able to dive behind a table leg. She leaned up against the enormous leg, as large to her as a sequoia tree trunk, and tried to catch her breath. Her mind quickly assessed the situation: the Alliance official had stolen the SR838 controller, gone insane, killed people. She needed to warn the other people aboard the station.

The doors were blocked by the giantess but a quick glance around her revealed that there was an air duct a few feet away. She didn’t have much choice so she darted toward it, Naomi’s footsteps shaking the floor each time that she flattened someone underfoot. It took some wiggling to get through the slit in the cover and the entire time Ava wished that she had lost that extra ten pounds that she had been carrying around. Luckily, she was able to squeeze her way through and she landed on the floor of the ventilation shaft, disturbing the dirt gathered there. The only sounds were her panting respiration and the screams of agony from the lab.

What to do now? She was an inch tall or so by her calculations, helpless to stop the crazy bitch outside. But if she could find someone still normal-sized…yes, that’s what she would do. She glanced around, unsure which way to go. She chose left and then started heading down the shaft, feeling her way along. The metal wall was cool under her probing fingertips and Ava followed it as it twisted and turned. She had no idea where she was, although she thought that she may have been near Lab 2. No matter, she would just crawl through the next grate and find someone normal-sized. Assuming that anyone was left…she remembered what had happened to the people in Lab 1 and her gorge rose. It took some effort not to be sick.

Ava froze when she heard a light scrabbling sound behind her. Her first thought was that it Naomi, come to get her. But the sound was too faint to be made by a full-sized human. Rats? But there weren’t any rats on the station, at least she hoped not. Whatever it was, she wished that she had better weapons than her fists. She watched as the two figures came into view…and then breathed a sigh of relief. It was two of the lab techs, Joanna Singh and Isaac Hopkins. They both looked the way that she felt, terrified. There was a disturbing crimson splatter across the front of Joanna’s lab coat although it didn’t look like it was her own blood. She was crying, great sobs that shook her entire body as she leaned against Isaac.

“Did anyone else make it?” Ava asked.

“A few, I think. I wasn’t really looking…we just ran for it,” he said, his face ashen. Again, she felt her stomach churn with nausea. She gritted her teeth, willing herself to stay calm.

“We need to find help,” she told them. Joanna swiped at her puffy eyes with the back of her hand, smearing her mascara across her eyes.

“Do you think we’ll be okay?” She asked in a small voice.

God, she hoped so.

***

The tiny man let out an agonized cry, which, at his size, sounded like the shrill chirping of an insect.

Naomi pursued him at a leisurely pace. All of the other researchers in Lab 1 had been reduced to flattened smears on the floor and this man was the last one still alive. She found that she liked playing with him. Every other assignment that she had been on had been so…mundane. This was strangely thrilling, especially since her quarry was so utterly helpless to stop her.

She finally trapped the man against the glass doors. He was a fat little fucker, his lab coat straining against his body. When she moved her gore-stained foot forward, he screamed again, raising his minute hands to try to ward her off. It was pathetic, really. There was no way that he could hope to stop her and Naomi smirked as she pushed him forward with one foot until he was pressed against one door. With expert agility, she raised her foot and the struggling man up, higher and higher against the glass…and then she applied more pressure. The chittering, screaming sound that the man was making crescendoed and then abruptly stopped as his body smashed, his blood running down the glass. Naomi laughed, removing her foot. The mashed body remained on the door, the face still horribly recognizable.

Yes, this was definitely the best assignment that she had been on.

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