————————————————————————————————————————————

“All the greats had people just as great supporting them.  Don’t let yourself be lost to jealousy, Vivian.  Help her do something great.  People will know her name, yes, but only because you helped her get there.”  Vivian remembered these words her professor told her a while back when she started working with Valerie.  It drove Vivian completely insane that a student four or more years behind her was so advanced and so naturally good at her job when Vivian herself was at the top of her class.  Through no shortage of perseverance, either.  Vivian fought to get where she was, and devoted herself almost entirely to her studies. 

Once her professor gave her advice, she worked on changing her attitude.  He was right, after all… her work would suffer if she let the negativity keep up. 

Now, she was in Valerie’s lab coat breast pocket and her fate was uncertain.  Valerie had toiled away figuring out a way to get them back to normal.  The organization more or less left it up to Valerie to handle what becomes of Rachel and Vivian.  “Though, keep in mind, dear Valerie… we do like having employees,”  Gray had told her with an unnerving smile. 

Everything had failed so far, and now Valerie was lost, staring wearily with her hands on her workstation full of tools and equipment, beakers and burners.  She stared through it with a deadened look.  She was exhausted, and she looked it.  Her hair was down and uncharacteristically messy, her makeup smudged all over her face from having rubbed it many times in frustration.  “Fuck!” she cursed.

“Come on, Val.  You’ve been up for days now.  You need sleep,” Vivian said worriedly.

Valerie sighed.  “No.  I’m going to figure this out.  And when I’m sure it works on you, you’re getting shrunk back down again and you’re going to be SO DONE.  You’ll BEG me to digest you.”  Valerie took a deep breath to control herself.  It was hard, especially these days, to stay in control of her sexual urges, but for her work and to keep Vivian alive she had no choice.  Otherwise, Vivian would be on a one way trip to her gut.

“Val…” Vivian continued, “Teams of scientists have tried and failed what you’re doing.  Chemists.  Biologists.  Physicists, even.  Others, maybe.  It’s fine that you don’t have it figured out yet.”

“Fuck off,” Valerie said, “You’re a devil on my shoulder.  In my pocket.  Whatever.”

“I think that more accurately describes Gray, honestly.”

Valerie walked over to the large glass housing where some of the radiation the organization worked with was kept.  It had a bright, golden glow as it pulsed through a tube up and down as different floors tapped into it.  She rested her head on the glass window.  “Why… why can’t you just work?” Valerie whispered.

Almost immediately after Valerie finished her sentence, a voice echoed in her head.  ‘Do you wish to know my power?’

Valerie was too sleep deprived to take it as more than a hallucination. ‘Of course I do,’ she thought to herself.

‘I will take you there.’

A flash of bright light, like lightning striking, filled the room.  There was a thrumming electric noise that became louder and louder with each passing moment.  “Uhh, Valerie, what’s going on?”

Valerie took a few steps back.  The pulsing light had all gathered in the tube, forming the shape of an eye with some kind of symbol embedded within the iris.  When Valerie looked into it, she was paralyzed, and her skin went cold and pale.

Vivian looked up at Valerie, noting her change in countenance.  “Valerie?  VALERIE!  Snap out of it!”

“Mmm?” Valerie stirred.  She grabbed Vivian and tossed her a few feet away, muttering to herself as she did so. 

Vivian screamed, confused, flailing through the air.  She landed on the cold floor, dazed but somehow not hurt.  She sat up, realizing at once that everything around her was now normal sized.  She wasn’t shrunk anymore.  She felt such a powerful, immense relief that she burst out into laughter. 

Valerie collapsed on the floor.  Vivian quickly strode over to her, checking her.  ‘She sleeping,’ she thought, ‘Whatever the heck happened, I guess it took the rest of her energy out of her.’  Picking her up, she carried her over to an adjacent room that had their stay-over beds and laid her down on it.  “Fucking Valerie,” Vivian said, grinning, “You did it.”

————————————————————————————————————————————

“Huh.  Interesting,” Gray said, looking down with keen interest upon Valerie’s sleeping form.  “Even your clothes grew back with you, it seems?”

“Yessir,” Vivian said.  

Joey sighed, currently perched atop Robyn’s shoulder.  “Thank fucking christ.  Bitch better hurry and wake up.  Shit’s old.”

Gray laughed.  “I’ve no doubt you’ll be a strong addition to your sister’s team, Joseph.  Though the eye is troubling,” he gestured at the glowing eye that had taken shape within the tube funneling the organization’s so-called ‘radiation.’  Turns out, the energy had stopped flowing between floors and other facilities as well, bringing everything to a standstill. 

“Yeah, gives me the creeps.  Like it’s watching us, or something,” Robyn said. 

“Boss isn’t going to be too happy when she gets here either,” Gray continued, shrugging, “Not that I blame her, of course.  Were I in her shoes, hearing ‘we have to wait for our intern to finish sleeping’ wouldn’t get very far with me.”

“Well, unfortunately it sounds like only she made some kind of breakthrough,” Robyn said, “And waking her is impossible.  It’s like she’s in a coma.”

“Quite,” Gray sighed, rubbing his forehead, “And Rachel is still at school, I take it?”

“Yeah.  Hired one of those attendants to walk her around classes.”

“We should probably get her as soon as we can,” Gray said, grinning, “Wouldn’t want anything to happen to one of our brightest up and coming biologists.”

————————————————————————————————————————————

Valerie opened her eyes wide, gasping.  Looking around, she seemed to be located in a small, dark candlelit room.  Sitting herself up, she found she was on a couch, and a man easily in his late fifties sat facing her behind a desk.  He appeared to be focused on writing something.  “Greetings,” the man said, his voice quiet yet strong enough to echo in the small room the two shared.  He seemed to wear an intricate layering of white robes, had greying hair and a beard.  He had large spectacles adorning his face.

Valerie blinked, frowning.  “What is this?  Who are you?  Are you with the organization?”

“Ouroboros?”  He chuckled, an oddly captivating sound, “No.  We are here because you are dreaming us here,” he gestured at himself, “You see me as I am now because it is how your mind chooses to interpret me.”  He frowned, staring at a recent scrawling.  “I am known as a great many things.  The great shaft.  The eternal watcher.  So on.  Think of me as a monitor for your world.  It is my duty to preserve the will of life for Earth, and make sure anything endangering that will are resolved.”

“Okay… so, I might have, like, a billion other questions for you.”

“I fix things,” the older man continued, “That is my duty.  I care not for right and wrong.  Why I have called out to you is partly because you, too, are broken.”  He narrowed his eyes, his gaze seemed to pierce right through her, yet they regarded her with a kind of pity.  “I feel like you have become more aware of the schizm within yourself, have you not?”

“Well…” Valerie thought, “I guess I have, yeah.  I just thought I kind of lose control when I get turned on.”

“Hm.  Well, again, that is part of why I reached out to you.  The other reason is you are a very interesting human in particular.  Your effect on the world has yet to happen, but I have seen all the good you can potentially do.  You can help me fix it and get humans back on the right track before they destroy their own sacred home.  But you do have the potential for tremendous destruction as well.  And just as I would use your help in fixing your world, so too, I believe, would it help fix you.”

“Are you… y’know.  God?”

He chuckled again.  “No.  I am omniscient, but I am not that which you would call god.  Though I am probably as close as to one as anything else can be.  I am merely a caretaker, though now my limits are being stretched by your world’s fragile state, hence why I call upon assistance of one of the most influential humans of this time to lead.  Your destiny, as is the destiny of all the living, is not set in stone.  I am simply aware of all possibility.  In one eye I see you helping to destroy the world.  In the other, I see you saving it.  Past this moment, though, not many paths lead in between.”

“Hah, well, if you’re gonna do something, do it all the way!”

“So that is why I gave you a taste of my power that your so called organization has seen fit to use for their needs.  If you agree to my terms, I will give you a more permanent bit of my power.  But be forewarned… if you refuse to carry out my will, there are consequences, and I will send forth a hunter to retrieve my eye.”

“Interesting,” Valerie replied, “And what would these terms be, my lovely shaft?”

————————————————————————————————————————————

Rachel sat on her desk, packing her relatively new backpack with her newly bought books as her final class for the day ended.  It was surreal to her experiencing classwork at this size.  What made it weirder was how they ended up getting her the school uniform for the tiny people, and she was dressed in a colorful shirt and equally colorful skirt.  ‘I hate uniforms.  And skirts,’ she thought, ‘And seriously, FUCK Vivian for eating my homework.  What a bitch.’  She paused, realizing how ridiculous that thought sounded in retrospect, and couldn’t help but smile.  ‘Still kicking her ass,’ she thought. 

Feeling anxious to get to normal size, Rachel rapped her fingers against her desk.  Robyn ended up getting someone from the organization to make sure she stayed safe and to help escort her around.  From what she heard from her escort, they managed to get Vivian back to normal.  She was looking forward to being normal sized again, especially before she sees Vivian again.  She finished zipping up her bag, and sat awkwardly and uncomfortably on the hard desk while trying to mind her skirt as she waited for the escort to arrive. 

A shadow loomed behind her, and before she knew it Rachel was trapped as long, slender fingers tightened around her and picked her up off the desk. 

————————————————————————————————————————————

Laura smiled mischievously as she walked out of the classroom.  She couldn’t believe how easy that was.  After doing some running she passed by a completely empty classroom, save just for one tiny student with short, green and red hair.  ’This must be fate,’ she thought excitedly, feeling the tiny girl squirm in her sweaty grip, ‘Hear that, little one?  It was your fate all along to be my protein.’ 

Standing over a good 6’2, Laura had an athletic build.  She wore short shorts and a tank top even when in class.  Her long, dark hair hung freely just above her butt.  She was a natural on the track team, though not otherwise the brightest among the university’s students.  She always wondered what a tiny person would do to fuel her body, but she never worked up the nerve to do anything about it until now.  There was a big race coming up, and she wanted to make sure she won it.

She was good friends with a tiny already, but Laura didn’t think she’d be easy to swallow as she was one of the bigger ones.  Not to mention, Laura was rather fond of her tiny friend.  No, it had to be someone she didn’t know.  She gripped her newfound prey tightly, muffling their screams as she jogged back to her dorm.  ‘I didn’t even know they made hair dye for tiny people,’ she thought curiously, ‘But I’m sure it’ll digest okay!’

————————————————————————————————————————————

“What do you mean you can’t find her!?  Are you- ugh.  Damn it!” Robyn ended her phone call, fuming. 

“Did I hear that right about Rachel?” Joey asked.

Robyn groaned.  “Yes… ugh.  I wish you were the one Valerie blew back up.  I could trust you a hells of a lot more than some of these schmucks.  I’m going to find her myself.”  Robyn stormed off toward the door, which opened as the CEO of the organization stepped through.  Caught off-guard, Robyn hurriedly stepped off to the side and bowed her head.  “Madame Sinclair.”

Flanked by two bigger bodyguards, the woman with short, auburn hair entered scowling and surveying the room.  “What is this, then?  I demand to know what the hold up is.  None of us can get any work done.”

Much to most of the room’s surprise, Valerie sat up, turning her attention to the older woman.  She held a hand over her right eye to cover it as she spoke, “I’m glad you’re here, bosslady.  Er, well, I guess I shouldn’t call you that anymore, should I, Faith?”

Faith’s expression darkened more sinisterly.  “Who the hell do you think you-“

“Don’t get me wrong, Faith.  I appreciate you doing… all of this for me.  But it’s mine now.  You will make me the new CEO of this organization.  And you’ll like it.”

The bodyguards with Faith gave each other amused looks.  Faith stared incredulously at Valerie, a dangerous expression still on her face.  “Enough of this nonsense.  I want answers.”

“I’m serious!  This facility and all that you own are mine now.  I know it’s a lot to take in, but you can have a seat in one of my chairs you bought for me!”  Valerie grinned.  “Vivian?  Escort her to her seat.  And those sexy bodyguards she brought in can feel free to leave as well.  So says the new boss!”

“Valerie,” Robyn began, “What in high hells-“

Valerie cut her off.  “Hey, little boy!  You want to be a big boy again, don’t you?”

An awkward silence hung in the room for a moment.  “Uh… Yeah?” Joey replied.

“Then you don’t owe me if you help out Vi escort the bosslady to her seat.”  Valerie swiped her hand in the air and Joey transformed back to normal size.

Completely caught off-guard, Joey fell off the desk and onto the floor in astonishment.  The whole room regarded Valerie in utter confusion, and Gray couldn’t help but throw his head back and laugh.

It was then Valerie removed her hand from her right eye.  A strange, glowing symbol was etched into it, the same as with the large glowing eye contained within the glass housing.  “This organization is mine.  And from here on out, it will have an official name.”