Mirror by Q-Writer
Summary:

Testers of a new, immersive virtual reality system discover something sinister lurking within the program. What should be a fun exploration becomes a battle for survival. How can you believe your eyes when your own mind deceives you?


Categories: Giantess, Adventure, Crush, Entrapment, Gentle, Growing Woman, Humiliation, Insertion, Sci-Fi, Violent, Vore Characters: None
Growth: Amazon (7 ft. to 15 ft.), Brobdnignagian (51 ft. to 100 ft.), Giant (31 ft. to 50 ft.), Mini GTS (16-30ft), Titan (101 ft. to 500 ft.)
Shrink: Doll (12 in. to 6 in.), Dwarf (3 ft. to 5 ft.), Lilliputian (6 in. to 3 in.), Micro (1 in. to 1/2 in.), Minikin (3 in. to 1 in.), Munchkin (2.9 ft. to 1 ft.)
Size Roles: F/f, F/m, FF/m
Warnings: Following story may contain inappropriate material for certain audiences
Challenges: None
Series: None
Chapters: 32 Completed: Yes Word count: 163206 Read: 108652 Published: January 14 2021 Updated: June 01 2021
Story Notes:

Hi everyone, long-time lurker, first time poster. Had some free time last year with my job shutting down due to the pandemic, so I spent 8 months writing and editing a giantess story I thought the community might enjoy. A few things you should know before reading:


  1. It's long (150k+ words, 32 chapters)

  2. It's pretty cruel, violent, sexual, and graphic at some parts, so you have been warned

  3. There are also some loving and gentle parts to balance it out though :)

This story is mainly plot and character driven; though giantess content is fundamentally a part of the story, in the beginning it does not appear in every chapter. While I feel like most stories on this site could be characterized as giantess stories featuring plot, I'd say this is more a plot story featuring giantesses. Though there are certainly smutty scenes, they're buried deep in the story under lots of plot; I wrote things to develop at realistic paces and have characters who seem lifelike in their decision-making.


If I could characterize what kind of fiction this story involves, I'd say it reads much like a thriller or adventure novel, with a bit of mystery thrown in. It might be helpful going in with the mindset that it reads unlike many more kink-oriented stories you will find on the internet.

 

So, if you've got 10 minutes and you're looking for a quick easy read, this is not your story. Instead, if you like visiting this site regularly and you enjoy plot-driven giantess stories, then this is for you.

 

I appreciate any and all feedback. Enjoy!

1. Chapter 1 by Q-Writer

2. Chapter 2 by Q-Writer

3. Chapter 3 by Q-Writer

4. Chapter 4 by Q-Writer

5. Chapter 5 by Q-Writer

6. Chapter 6 by Q-Writer

7. Chapter 7 by Q-Writer

8. Chapter 8 by Q-Writer

9. Chapter 9 by Q-Writer

10. Chapter 10 by Q-Writer

11. Chapter 11 by Q-Writer

12. Chapter 12 by Q-Writer

13. Chapter 13 by Q-Writer

14. Chapter 14 by Q-Writer

15. Chapter 15 by Q-Writer

16. Chapter 16 by Q-Writer

17. Chapter 17 by Q-Writer

18. Chapter 18 by Q-Writer

19. Chapter 19 by Q-Writer

20. Chapter 20 by Q-Writer

21. Chapter 21 by Q-Writer

22. Chapter 22 by Q-Writer

23. Chapter 23 by Q-Writer

24. Chapter 24 by Q-Writer

25. Chapter 25 by Q-Writer

26. Chapter 26 by Q-Writer

27. Chapter 27 by Q-Writer

28. Chapter 28 by Q-Writer

29. Chapter 29 by Q-Writer

30. Chapter 30 by Q-Writer

31. Chapter 31 by Q-Writer

32. Chapter 32 by Q-Writer

Chapter 1 by Q-Writer

“Feelings of superiority always stem from an illusion.”

-Marty Rubin

Chapter 1:

(Posted: January 14)

 

He blinked a few times, becoming aware he was staring at his reflection. For a moment he had zoned out. The automatic sink in front of him was running but he wasn't washing his hands. Behind him it looked like the bathroom stalls were empty and the urinals unoccupied. He cocked his head for a brief moment to remember what he was doing. That's right, he was about to wash his hands. He pumped the dispenser and a dollop of odorless soap squirted out onto his palms.

Harrison Burr eventually stepped out of the men's restroom into a hallway adjacent to the airport baggage claim area. A man in a slightly wrinkled suit caught his eye and raised his hand in recognition.

“There you are!” he called as Harrison walked over to him. “Took you long enough,” he said in a low voice, “thought you were jerking off in there or something.” The man grinned under his small mustache. “Your wife know you do that in public bathrooms?”

“Screw you Rich,” Harrison replied with a tired smile. “You know I'm not married.”

“You'll get a woman one day,” Rich teased him. “Hell, I did.”

“Thanks for watching my bag by the way,” said Harrison, changing the subject.

“No problem kid,” Rich replied, “Ready to find our ride?”

Harrison sighed. “Lead the way, I've never been here before,” he said, quickly gazing down the deserted hallway. There was a lot of construction in this part of the airport, giant temporary wooden walls covered nearly everything but still pointed to the baggage area where he remembered they'd just come from. The wall to his right proudly proclaimed “Welcome to Norman Y. Mineta San Jose International Airport.”

The two suited men headed towards the exit and walked into the California sunshine. “Much better than D.C. this time of year!” Rich exclaimed, enjoying the balmy temperature.

Lines of cabs jammed the nearby curb as Harrison and Richard scanned over them for the private car pick-up. At midday, the pick-up curb was strangely devoid of pedestrians, though plenty of idling cars filled the road. Just then Harrison glimpsed a lone man holding a sign that read “SunCorp.”

“You're our ride?” Harrison asked as he approached the man. The suited man, his face hidden behind sunglasses, looked over the couple.

“Are you Richard Colgate and Harrison Burr?” he asked.

“Sure are,” replied Rich emphatically.

“Then follow me,” the man replied curtly. “I'll be your driver today, I'm Victor Chen.” Instead of reaching out a hand to shake, the man reached for the door of a nearby black Lincoln Towncar and opened the back passenger door. Harrison and Rich both got in as the driver loaded their small travel bags into the trunk of the car.

Once the driver was in the car he asked his passengers, “First time in San Jose?” Harrison and Rich replied simultaneously with opposite answers.

“Haven't been to California for a couple years now,” Rich continued talking as the car navigated out of the airport, “but I always make sure I stop by In-N-Out to grab a burger while I'm here. We going to have a chance to stop before we head to SunCorp's facility?”

“Unfortunately no,” the driver quickly responded, “our head of development has you on a pretty tight schedule and wants to meet with you two within the hour. There will be lunch provided.”

Harrison was surprised. “You mean we're going to meet with Leo Starr?”

The driver snorted. “I don't think so,” he intoned, “but our head of development Vanessa Bright runs the Dreamland Laboratory and she's who I'm taking you to see.”

“Yeah kid,” Rich said to Harrison, “doubtful we'll meet the big man. No one gets to see him these days. This is just supposed to be a quick government peek into whatever the hell SunCorp has been working on these last few years.”

“Yeah I guess you're right,” Harrison resigned himself to admit. No one had seen Leo Starr in months, coming close to a year. Some people speculated that the reclusive tech mogul had gone insane, was in a coma, or even simply dead.

Leo Starr, as the New York Times once put it, was an “arrogant cad that our world can't afford to not tolerate.” A business and technology genius, at only 27 years old had sold his start-up VidTalk to Google in 2005 for a cool $1.2 billion dollars. Since then he'd been behind numerous new technologies, patenting algorithms he'd sell to the biggest names in Silicon Valley, including Facebook and Apple. The guy had a knack for creativity, but he was completely zany and unhinged. A colleague once described Leo as “the kind of guy who makes Elon Musk look normal and Jack Dorsey look like a stingy prick.” Leo was unpredictable and all over the place.

Harrison started thinking back on what he remembered from the small case-file they had on Leo back at the Department of Energy. He'd hardly had a chance to see much before this trip, mostly he was just ecstatic the assistant director chose him to escape to California for a few days in February, and by himself. Representing the Department and the Office of Artificial Intelligence and Technology on a field trip was a big step and huge resume-builder for the three-year employee. He couldn't quite figure out why they'd passed over much more experienced and obvious candidates for the mission, especially one so secretive, but the giddiness of being chosen distracted him enough from questioning too much.

He'd had a chance to meet Rich before they left the capital. Rich was one of the Department of Defense's private-sector liaisons when it came to scouting experimental equipment. Harrison didn't mind being in a supporting role on this trip, especially since Rich had been doing this sort of thing for over twenty years. That got Harrison thinking...

“Hey Rich,” he asked the man sitting next to him, “How much do you know about this program we're seeing at the SunCorp place? Did they tell you anything? My briefing was hardly that.” Harrison wasn't exactly sure why they needed a computer systems expert like himself going out to some lab for a weapons test. He figured it'd be something electronics based involving some kind of networking scheme.

Rich grunted. “Not much really. Had a weird meeting yesterday with some army guys and another lady I'm convinced was CIA, though she never said. Anyways, you read the file, it's supposed to be some training weapon or program the army wants to buy off SunCorp that's going to put our military light-years ahead of everyone else.” He paused, and looked over his mustache at Harrison. “But whatever the fuck that means, I have no idea. You know DoD likes to keep its contracts all hush-hush and stuff.”

“Yeah,” said Harrison, “I'm just impressed they let Energy in on this one. Heard the secretary went bitching and moaning to the chair of the Senate Armed Services committee a few weeks ago. My boss didn't even give me this assignment until last Friday.”

“Shit that late?” Rich replied. “Well fuck that makes two of us then totally in the dark.” There was a brief pause in the car. The driver seemed focused on the freeway on-ramp.

“Oh that reminds me,” Rich continued, “I heard that the Armed Services Committee is sending one of its staffer out to the lab at some point when we're there. I think Senator Holmgren has some obsession with Leo Starr's business and wanted to make sure he was kept in the loop on all this shit. Don't know who this staffer is or if we're really working with him, but just keep a heads up for him if he shows up.”

Harrison laughed to himself, then replied, “Why does it always seem like government stuff is thrown together at the last second?” He was smiling as he watched the freeway rush past him.

“It's always been like that kid,” Rich mused. “I've been in this game for over two decades now, and nobody running the government ever has any clue what the hell they're doing.” He looked at Harrison. “That's why it's up to guys like us to make sure it all works out in the end.” Harrison chuckled, but it was that kind of forced laugh a person gives when they realize they're the only sane person in a world full of idiots.

Highway 101 heads south out of Silicon Valley eventually towards Los Angeles about 400 miles to the south, through rural hills and small towns. Office parks and suburban homes slowly turn into rolling fields and farmland, the grassy hillsides in February turned green by the winter rains. On the road south to Gilroy, about half an hour outside of San Jose, the Towncar exited the freeway and began taking back roads west into the foothills of the mountains separating the valley from the coast. After reaching a point where Harrison noticed his iPhone had lost reception, the driver flatly announced, “We're here.”

Harrison looked up at the tall fence surrounding what looked like a massive complex of warehouses. Guard towers dotted the perimeter to give it the feel of a concentration camp. The car pulled up to the gate and the driver flashed a badge to the guard booth and the clanking gate slowly slid open. A large white sign nearby read: SUNCORP ENTERPRISES. NO UNAUTHORIZED ENTRY. VIOLATORS WILL BE PROSECUTED TO THE FULLEST EXTENT.

“Real inviting place you've got here,” Rich joked to the driver. His habit for wisecracks was undeterred. Twenty plus years in the government will do that to you, Harrison thought. The driver did not reply.

As the car pulled up to one of the nearest buildings, a woman came out of the main door to greet them. Harrison and Rich stepped out of the car and approached her.

“Welcome to the SunCorp Laboratory,” the woman said with a professional smile, “I'm Vanessa Bright, head of development here at the lab.” She extended a hand out to the two men.

“Richard Colgate, Department of Defense. Nice to finally meet you Ms. Bright,” Rich said with a smile.

“Harrison Burr,” Harrison said, “Department of Energy.”

“Glad the two of you could make it,” Vanessa replied. It was then Harrison noticed her hair that seemed a bit too red to be natural, and her purple dress that seemed out of place in this bleak office complex. “How was the flight?” she asked politely.

Harrison let Rich and Vanessa make small talk as he took a look around. Most the buildings he could see were incredibly plain, the entire place feeling morosely drab. There was absolutely nothing memorable about this site, except for of course Vanessa. She looked to be about 40 years old, and in her bold purple dress and high heels, she looked very beautiful in a strictly formal way. Harrison couldn't help but think that by her look and demeanor she certainly wasn't working for the government. She carried a confident air that rivaled her beauty, certainly nothing possessed by anyone working in the public sector. Perhaps the next few days wouldn't be completely boring after all, he thought.

“Follow me,” Vanessa said to the men as she led them into the building. “Victor will get your bags to the dormitory where you'll be staying. Did you gentlemen eat yet?”

“Not at all,” Rich replied.

“Great!” she exclaimed, “We had some food catered today in anticipation of your visit, it's just in the conference room down the hall. We can get you two a bit acquainted with the facility in the meantime. After we eat we'll get you a short tour, and then we can give the United States government a little taste of the project we've been working on here in our laboratory.”

They followed her down a hallway with beige walls. “So this really is it,” Rich said, in mock awe. He looked at Vanessa. “So this is the famous SunCorp Dreamland Laboratory!”

Vanessa paused and looked amused. “Oh Mr. Colgate, I think you will see there is a lot more to Dreamland than meets the eye.”

 

Lunch was just the three of them. The conference room looked pretty corporate and unremarkable, but floor to ceiling windows covered one wall, giving a view of some of the complex's buildings and the wooded hills beyond.

After some introductory small-talk, Rich finally blurted out, “So when do we find out what SunCorp has been working on?”

Vanessa paused for a moment and looked up from her food. A thin smile formed. “Well Mr. Colgate, since you're so insistent, let me tell you.” She straightened her posture.

Taking a a breath, Vanessa began, “For the last nine years, Leo Starr and SunCorp have been working on the world's most state-of-the-art virtual reality simulator. At the lab we call it Virtual Electroneural Reality Simulator Alpha, or VERSA, for short.”

“A VR system?” Rich cut in, trying not to act unimpressed, but clearly intrigued and a little surprised. Harrison was surprised too. He figured they were going to be looking at a weapon test or... well, quite frankly, he really didn't know what to expect at all.

“Yes, you could call it a VR system,” Vanessa said, clearly pleased with herself at the surprise she caused. “But this isn't some smartphone VR system you wear like goggles...” she trailed off. “It's much deeper than that.”

“Ma'am, I have to admit, you have my colleague and I intrigued,” Rich said, sitting back in his chair. Nobody was touching their food now.

“Can you tell us what's so remarkable about this VR system?” Harrison asked politely.

Vanessa turned her head to look at him, a wicked grin painted on her face. Harrison wasn't much a man for hunches or gut feelings, but he suddenly felt a stab of apprehension is the way her gaze faced him.

“Tell you?” Vanessa said amused. She leaned a bit over the table. “We'll show you!”

She sat back straight again and looked down at her food. She picked up her fork but kept talking, “What we've accomplished here at SunCorp in the last nine years with VERSA has been nothing short of remarkable. I don't believe in magic, but we're playing with the edges of science here. It's incredible.”

Harrison saw Rich raise an eyebrow. Rich wasn't one to be impressed or shocked, and he displayed a nonchalant demeanor at the table. But Harrison could tell he was really, really, interested in what Vanessa wanted to show them.

Vanessa continued, “I'll have my lead developer on the project run by you a lot of the technical stuff this afternoon, but what VERSA is, well, it's a fully-immersive conscious-altering simulator. It's not just something your eyes experience by watching a screen in front of you like other commercial VR systems out there. Your entire mind enters this sim.”

Rich's laugh caught both Harrison and Vanessa off guard for a moment. Amused, he leaned back a bit and rested his hand on the table. “So what you're telling us, Ms. Bright, is that SunCorp built the Matrix?” He grinned.

Vanessa pursed her lips and cocked her head. “You're referring to the movie?”

“Yeah.”

Vanessa rolled her eyes as if she was thinking for a moment. “Well it's not really the same... but similar, I could admit.”

“Holy crap,” Rich said gleefully. “This is going to be wild.”

“Is it safe for testing?” Harrison asked. He figured if Rich would play the incredulous one, he'd at least get down to business.

“At this point, yes,” Vanessa replied to him curtly. “As I mentioned before, I'll introduce you to our lead developer later, he's more of the hands-on systems guy. But as far as we are aware there seems to be no long-term issues or neurological damages caused by VERSA.”

“Is SunCorp going to have to drill into our spinal cords for us to tap into this machine?” Rich asked. Harrison couldn't tell if he was joking or not, but he did have a grin on his face. Vanessa either looked amused or irritated. She wasn't letting down her poker face in front of two big contacts from the federal government.

“No Mr. Colgate, I can assure you we won't be sticking anything in you during your time here at Dreamland,” Vanessa said. The group paused for a moment as a waiter made the rounds to fill their water glasses. “Why don't we finish lunch here so I can show you the lab?”

“Sounds good to me,” Harrison replied. He glanced out the window, then turned to Vanessa. “Ms. Bright, I did have a question about Leo Starr... is he here?” He didn't exactly expect a real answer from Vanessa, but he was surprised when he got one.

“Mr. Starr is not at the lab, but he does supervise our work here. Do you see that house up on the hill?” she gestured out the window. Looking out, Harrison noticed what looked like a large building far away atop one of the flanking mountains.

“Is that his home?” he asked, surprised.

“That's Dos Palos,” Vanessa explained. “It's Mr. Starr's residence here in northern California. Him and his daughter Claire have lived up at the estate, permanently now, since a few months ago.”

Harrison caught a look from Rich that seemed to say “really?” Rich didn't appear convinced.

“Mr. Starr is a bit of a recluse these days, I'll admit,” Vanessa explained. “But his daughter makes regular trips here to the lab to oversee our progress and bring his directives down the mountain to us. Up there they have no communications, no phone, no internet, no cable.” With the tone she spoke about him, Harrison could tell Vanessa revered Leo, but couldn't exactly figure out why.

He tried recalling what he knew about Leo's daughter. He had forgotten her name was Claire, she was his only child with a mother that was either dead or long out of the picture, he couldn't remember which. Much of her young life was pretty mysterious, Leo must have had her when he was quite young and before he because fabulously wealthy. There was a time she would routinely show up on TMZ trashing some party or crashing some million-dollar car, but now in her early 20's she recently left the celebrity party scene to help with the family business. It must have been at least a year or two since her last DUI.

After a few more minutes of idle conversation, the three finished eating and Vanessa showed them out of the conference room. When they reached the ground floor and exited out a door, a small vehicle greeted them. It looked like a glorified golf cart, maybe a little bigger, with no doors or hardly sides for that matter. It was canopied though.

“Hello Delvin,” Vanessa said to the muscled man at the steering wheel. He greeted her back, his face covered in large sunglasses. Harrison climbed in behind the driver while Rich took the seat next to him. Vanessa naturally sat up front. “Take us around the complex please,” Vanessa asked the driver. Harrison had to admit she looked a little out of place dressed so nicely and riding in an electric cart outside in February.

As the cart gained speed they began maneuvering between a group of glass-sided builds. “These here are our offices and laboratories,” Vanessa gestured. “Most of the research work we do in there. Your dorms are in that building there,” she said, pointing to another generic building.

The cart turned and began heading down a row of impossibly long warehouses. The buildings looked completely plain with no windows, instead each displaying a large black number painted on the side. Nondescript gray doors occasionally dotted the walls. If the Dreamland Laboratory was trying to resemble an industrial yard, it was doing a great job, Harrison thought.

“These fourteen warehouses,” Vanessa said over the noise of driving, “are the what VERSA is in physical form. They're all essentially server banks handling the load of running such a complex system. It's by far the largest cloud computing system in the world.” Harrison couldn't see but he was sure she was smirking.

“IBM must be jealous of you guys,” Rich said.

“They are,” Vanessa replied deadpan. She continued, “When interacting in VERSA, users essentially download the entire contents of their mind into the system, so we need a server load that can store, process, and run the computer data equivalent of what you have in your head. And then on top of that, we need to run the actual virtual world the pilots are inhabiting.”

“Pilots?” Harrison asked.

“Yeah pilots,” Vanessa explained. “It's just what we call someone experiencing VERSA from the inside. When you're in VERSA, depending on the setting, you can usually control to some degree what is going on. But you'll learn more about that later.”

“How much computing power do you even have here at Dreamland?” Rich asked over Vanessa's shoulder.

“Industry secret, Mr. Colgate,” Vanessa replied.

“Aww you can't even let the DoD know?” Rich asked playfully.

“Not even Uncle Sam gets to know that,” Vanessa said. “Unless you want to subpoena me.” Harrison saw her smile.

After a few more minutes of sightseeing, the cart wheeled back around to one of the office buildings, pulling up to an entrance. Vanessa took a phone out of a pocket and began making a call. As she held it up to her head, Harrison noticed some type of smartwatch on her wrist. It didn't look like Apple had made it or any other company he knew of, so he assumed it must have been some special SunCorp thing.

“Does that dress have pockets??” asked Rich, mocking shock. “SunCorp is really embracing cutting-edge technology these days!”

Vanessa laughed. She was having a good time. “Yes Mr. Colgate, we are quite advanced here.” When the phone connected, she told the person on the other end to come out to meet them. After about a minute, a squat man came out of a glass door to greet them. He was casually dressed in a polo with a trim goatee on his face. His smile stretched from ear to ear.

“Hello there!” the man said enthusiastically, sticking out his hand as Harrison and Rich walked up the steps to greet him.

Harrison grabbed his hand first, “Good to meet you, I'm Harrison Burr.”

“Sujay Rajeev,” the man replied, “Lead Developer. Please just call me Sujay.” He turned and greeted Rich similarly.

“Mr. Rajeev,” Vanessa greeted him, “these are our guests from the government I told you to expect, they'll be with us a few days. Please get them acquainted with VERSA and show them what SunCorp can offer.”

“Ahh yes, this will be good!” Sujay replied. “You two will be our first pilots from the outside. You are in for quite an adventure I must say.” He paused for a moment. “I thought there were supposed to be three?” he asked Vanessa.

“Yes there will be one more,” she replied, “the Senate liaison won't be here until... tomorrow.”

Not at all bothered, Sujay continued talking to Harrison and Rich “Very well then, let's get started. We have a little bit of time to demonstrate the program to you two before the staff goes home for the day. Come with me!”

They left Vanessa at the door. Once again, Harrison found himself walking into another building with another person he just met.

 

Harrison and Rich made some small-talk with Sujay as they navigated the maze of corridors. At one point they met two guards armed with pistols before Sujay badged them through a door. Overhead the sign merely said “RESTRICTED ACCESS.”

Through the door and then passing through a small anteroom, they walked into a much larger dimly lit room. “Well this is the VERSA control room,” Sujay said in a casual voice. “Let me walk you through a few things and then we'll see if we can get you guys in VERSA today for a little bit.”

The room looked like an typical office but with the lights turned off. There were computers and lots of humming machines with blinking lights along the walls. Through the dim light, Harrison could make out a series of doors on the far wall that looked like they led to small offices. The doors were numbered with large numerals. A few technicians worked at the computer stations throughout the room, pouring over screens and hardly taking notice of the trio. Sujay walked over to one. “Hey Kevin,” he said, getting the man's attention.

A man dressed in a plain t-shirt wearing glasses looked up at Sujay and then at Harrison and Rich. Sujay said, “these are the government guys. Kevin, meet Mr. Burr and Mr. Colgate.”

Kevin stood up and introduced himself, “Kevin Cho, nice to meet you,” he said shaking their hands.

“I'm Rich, DoD,” Rich said.

“Harrison Burr, Department of Energy.”

“You guys here to play with VERSA?” Kevin asked, grinning. “I think you're the first guests from the outside we've gotten to test this thing. It feels like it's done but we've still got years of development to go to iron out some of the kinks.”

“Well, show us what we're dealing with,” Rich said.

The group moved over to the far wall of the room, taking care to step over random cables that meandered across the floor. When they reached one of the doors, Kevin opened it. The group peered into a small room, no bigger than a closet, full of equipment mounted to a wall with an odd-looking couch taking up the floor.

“So this here is one of the ports into VERSA,” Sujay began explaining. “Vanessa probably told you that VERSA is completely neurologically immersive, so while you're in the simulation with your mind, you body if left behind.” He pointed at the couch. “Because it's easier to transition the mind into the sim with complete sensory deprivation, we have our pilots sit on these waterchairs. They're basically modified waterbeds filled with a supportive synthetic jelly-like substance to give the user the feeling of weightlessness.”

Next he pointed to the rig on the wall. “That helmet-like piece swings down to cover the user's head. It will block out sound and use magnets to begin analyzing the user's electromagnetic brain signature. From there, the helmet administers a concoction of gasses to put the user in the lightest of comas.”

“Wait you're inducing comas with this thing?” Rich blurted out.

“It's the only way to get someone primed to get into VERSA,” Kevin explained. “We have to shut down all external stimuli in pieces so that once their brain is relatively inactive, we can start manipulating it electromagnetically. To go from conscious to VR usually takes about ninety seconds.”

“Trust us,” Sujay reassured, “we've tested the hell out of this. It's very safe at this point. But much like scuba diving, you don't want to dive down or come up too fast. With VERSA, if we're going to trick your brain and manipulate it with a false sense of reality, it must be done carefully and gradually.”

Harrison and Rich stood silently. Finally Harrison muttered in awe, “This is some hardcore stuff.” He looked at Sujay. “I see why SunCorp has kept this under wraps.”

“Exactly,” Sujay said with a smile. “What we've spent the last decade developing is beyond anything any other lab is doing. Just wait until you get into VERSA and you'll see how real it is.”

Harrison and Rich looked at each other. Sujay laughed. “You're not chickening out already are you?”

For the first time Harrison wondered if he'd been selected for this assignment because the department wouldn't miss him too much if SunCorp fried his brain with this experimental technology.

“Fuck it, I'm in,” Rich said. He put is hands in his pockets trying to act cool about it. Harrison could tell he had no idea what he was getting into. Harrison felt the same way. Despite the cool temperature of the room, he felt a bead a sweat trickling down the back of his neck.

“Coming back out of the sim is just as tricky,” Kevin explained. “We basically have to get your brain to readjust to the real world, hence the low lighting in here.”

“Ok wait, so before we go under, I have a few questions about this thing,” Rich said. He was done joking and had returned his role as a representative of the United States government. “How exactly are you guys marketing this to the military?”

“Training, mostly,” Sujay replied. “You can run battle simulations, recreate any real place in the world. You could train Navy Seals or whoever to raid a compound on this thing a hundred times before sending them into the real thing.”

“Can you die while in VERSA?” Harrison cut in. Sujay immediately went quiet. Kevin looked at him.

After a pause, Sujay began speaking slowly. “You're technically asking the wrong question Harrison... the real question is, can VERSA kill you?” Kevin looked like he was about to say something but Sujay cut him off, “In theory it could. But we control all the settings of the virtual interface that your brain interacts with. We've currently set up the most recent version of VERSA to terminate the user's experience moments before they would experience a virtual death situation. Not that dying in the sim would actually kill you, we're just taking every precaution. Fail-safes kick in to eject you out of VERSA before any irreparable damage could possibly occur to your actual brain.”

Now it was Rich's turn to ask another question, “What about pain, or any other senses?”

“So, right now we have every other sensory feeling present in VERSA, including pain,” Sujay said. “It's something we've debated quite extensively over the years, but we felt that omitting some fundamental human experiences could result in mental disorientation and ultimately cause psychological discomfort.” He laughed. “Think about what it would do to you to fall off a building and feel nothing when you hit the pavement! That would mess your mind up. Especially when you went back to the real world.”

“Has anyone, well, 'died' in the VERSA?” Harrison asked Sujay.

An awkward pause followed. Sujay's face twitched. “Yes,” replied coolly. “Actually two people, one on purpose to sort of test it out.” Sujay looked around the room. “There he is. Hey Ernie!” he called out.

A big man sitting at one of the computers looked up. “Yeah?”

“Ernie come over here for a moment,” Sujay asked.

The heavy man lumbered out of his char and came across the room. “What's up?”

“These are the government guys taking a look at VERSA,” Sujay explained to the man. “Rich and Harrison, this is Ernie James. He's a VERSA tech, been with us since the beginning.”

“How's it going guys,” Ernie said. He didn't stick out a hand to shake.

“Harrison here has been asking about... dying in VERSA, and I figured you could tell him what happened to you.”

Ernie's beady eyes glazed over as he looked past them. He snapped out of it finally and scratched the back of his head, looking at the floor. “Yeah it's not fun. First time I shot myself as a test. I thought I was really dead. Woke up in the lab and was throwing up everywhere. Had a massive headache. Took them a couple hours to prove to me I hadn't actually died.” He looked at both Harrison and Rich. “Don't die. It'll mess you up.”

Harrison asked, “Have you died more than once?”

“Oh yeah, by now I've done it more times than I can count. But for you guys, don't test it out. It's not worth it. But the most important thing you can remember when you're in the sim is that none of it's real. It's easy when you've been under for a long time to forget about the real world, but don't fall down the rabbit hole in VERSA, it's too easy to lose your frame of reference.”

“Yeah speaking of which,” Sujay took over, “time passes differently when you're in VERSA. Have you ever woken up in the morning, just to fall asleep again in bed? You have a dream that seems to last hours, but then you wake up again and find only ten minutes passed? That's because your brain works so much faster inside itself than the real world does. So you experience the sim at a much faster rate than reality.”

Kevin added, “It varies quite significantly, depending on a lot of circumstances, but for instance one hour in the machine can sometimes only take a few minutes here in the lab.”

“You guys going in today?” Ernie asked.

“Yeah I was just giving them the intro before I showed them the inside,” explained Sujay.

“You need me to be your Tower?”

“No that's ok Ernie, I already asked Kevin to do it this morning,” Sujay responded. “I'll go in with them this time, and if you want, maybe tomorrow you can be our Tower.”

“What's a Tower?” Rich asked.

“Oh yes,” Sujay said. “The Tower is the person we have stationed outside the sim while we have users or 'pilots' inside the sim. They basically set up the entry to VERSA and monitor how the system operates while we have pilots inside. They can't really manipulate the world directly, but one thing they can do is manually disconnect you if something is going wrong.”

“Think of it as your guardian angel while you're inside,” Kevin said.

“Or the mom picking you up from soccer practice,” Ernie added.

“Are you two ready to go in?” Sujay asked his guests. “We won't go into VERSA for very long today, we're closing the lab for the day soon anyways.”

Harrison and Rich once again looked at each other. Harrison felt like he was about to go skydiving for the first time.

“Yeah, we're in,” Rich said. “Tell us what we have to do now.”

“Number one rule,” Ernie said over his shoulder, walking back across the room, “go to the bathroom first.”

Kevin laughed. Sujay explained, “That's not a bad idea, though when we induce your coma we also insert triggers into your brain to shut down more of your nonessential bodily systems, like digestion and your bowels. If you're only in it for a few hours, you won't urinate yourself while in the sim, but you might get out and have the urge come back quickly and uncomfortably.”

Rich looked at Sujay for a moment until Sujay got the message. “There's a restroom out the door we came though.” He pointed back towards the way they came into the room.

“Do we need to change?” Harrison asked.

“No you can keep your suits on,” Sujay said. “Though if you want to take off your jackets you can leave them on that table over there.” Sujay turned to Kevin. “I'll go into Stall Five and hook myself up to the sim. Launch me in and then if you wouldn't mind helping Rich and Harrison I will be waiting for them on the other side.”

“You got it boss,” Kevin replied. “You guys use the bathroom and then I'll get you two set up.”

Harrison and Rich walked alone back into the anteroom. “This is some insane shit,” Rich said to Harrison.

“Yeah I don't even know what to think,” Harrison admitted. “I wasn't even paying attention back in Washington when they had me sign all those waivers for this trip. I just figured it was routine stuff.”

Rich sighed. “Looks like nothing is going to be routine anymore. Well, I better drop the kids off in the pool now so I don't shit my pants later,” he said, pushing the bathroom door open.

 

A few minutes later they were back in the dark room. Sujay was gone, presumably behind the door that said “5” on it.

“Harrison you take Stall Three and Rich you take Stall Four,” Kevin ordered. “Just go inside and lay down on the waterchair with your head at the far end. I usually take off my shoes too to get more comfortable. Take off any watches or jewelry you have on too.”

Harrison entered the closet, removed his shoes, and lay down on the waterchair. It gave him a strange, goopy floating sensation. The gel inside must have been thicker than water, but not by much. He could hear Kevin talking to Rich in the stall to the left of him.

After a minute and the sound of a door closing, Kevin appeared in his doorway. “Alright Harrison,” he said, “the first time is always weird, so make sure you keep taking deep, regular breaths. I'm going to put the rig over your head now.”

He climbed around the waterchair against the wall and moved the large wall-mounted helmet down over Harrison's face. It wasn't airtight by any means, but Harrison's already dim world went totally black. He heard Kevin's muffled voice speak again. “Ok, now keep breathing as normally as you can. And relax. Try thinking about nothing, but I usually think about outer space and that usually does the trick.” Harrison tried to turn his brain off, but his mind was spinning.

“I'm going to hook up a few monitors to you,” Kevin said as he abruptly put a clip on one of Harrison's fingers. “Alright now you're good to go. I'm starting the timer here in your stall so when you wake up you'll know how much real time has passed. See you when you wake up.”

With that, Harrison began to hear a faint sound coming from the helmet above him. Was it hissing? Or humming? He couldn't tell. He heard Kevin leave the room, and the last sound he could precisely make out was the door to his stall shutting closed.

 

 

Chapter 2 by Q-Writer

Chapter 2:

(Posted January 14)

 

Harrison awoke staring at a fish tank. It was a simple aquarium filled with water, a few rocks, and what looked like two small fish swimming lazily around each other. He noticed the pale outline of his face staring at him through the reflection of the glass. Suddenly an ominous thought overcame him as he looked through the reflection of himself at the fish: none of this was real.

He stood in a small room that could have been the waiting room at a doctor's office. Linoleum tile, white walls, no windows, and end tables and seats scattered around the room. Sujay sat on a couch. Rich was standing just behind Harrison, also waking up and collecting his thoughts.

“So what do you two think?!” Sujay asked with glee. He gestured to the room.

Rich coughed as Harrison blinked his eyes as they tried to understand their consciousness. The harsh lighting and white walls made the room feel sterile. It was certainly bright. The only sound seemed to come from the fish tank, which bubbled faintly. Where the hell were they?

“You guys spent nine years building this room?” Rich said, pulling himself out of his initial daze.

Sujay stood up. Harrison realized Sujay's clothes were different, now in the sim he was wearing a tuxedo with purple trim. “Nine years, ha! This, my friends, is just the tip of the iceberg. Come, stretch your legs and get comfortable.”

He gestured for them to take a few steps around the room to orient themselves. Harrison felt like he had just awoken from a long night of drinking. He was unsure of the past and where he was. He knew he was in a simulation... but the whole thing felt strange. For instance, the brown door against one of the walls, where did that lead to? He couldn't be certain of anything anymore.

“This room here,” Sujay began to explain, “is just an entry point into VERSA. There are others like it, but I picked us to start here. Imagine this world is like a giant continent, this is just our first port!”

“You guys really broke the bank on decorating this place,” Rich said sarcastically, surveying the prosaic room. “The fish tank is a nice touch though.”

“Hey Sujay,” Harrison asked, “how'd you change your clothes?” Harrison and Rich were still in their suits and ties. Harrison remembered taking off his shoes and jacket before lying down on the waterchair, but now in the sim they were back on him.

“Do you like it?” asked Sujay, showing off his tuxedo. “Something important to learn about VERSA: although the world was created by our engineers, so much of how you perceive things is resolved in the data VERSA pulls from your own mind.”

“You mean our memories?” Rich asked.

“Sort of. For instance, VERSA builds your image, or avatar, in this world based on how you perceive yourself. You both entered expecting to be wearing the same clothes you left the real world in, so that is precisely what happened. I, on the other hand, thought of myself wearing this as I came into VERSA, so VERSA made it so. Simple manipulation.”

“How far does that kind of thing go?” Harrison asked. “What can I change now? Can I change into a tux?”

“No you can't now, you're already in the sim,” Sujay continued to explain. “Once you're in, your appearance is fixed, unless you do something to yourself in the sim itself. But another thing too, when you're entering, you can't imagine something impossible, like that you have blue hair. You have no frame of reference for that. You can't imagine yourself with muscles if you don't have them either.”

“Well that's no fun,” Rich said.

“Ah, but once you're in VERSA, there are plenty of ways to modify all sorts of things, not just appearances. You just need to find the right triggers in this world. We designed VERSA to be interactive and manipulative. It allows us to sim near-impossible situations. We didn't want the average user to be able to change much, but if you're a manager, we've hidden tools throughout the world that lets you change things.”

Harrison was looking at his hands. It all looked real. Very real. The feel of his clothes, the air going into his lungs, the sound of the fish tank. It was a perfect copy of the real world. “This is amazing,” he muttered out loud.

“Ah, you haven't even seen anything yet!” Sujay said with excitement. “But trust me, VERSA is still full of bugs. Most of the obvious ones have been fixed over the last few years, but from time to time you'll notice a few things out of place here and there.” He smirked.

“For instance, it took us about a year to get smells working correctly in VERSA. And every so often you'll expect a scent and get nothing. It's a small thing that, until we fix it all, will help you remember that none of this is real.”

“Shit this sure feels real Sujay,” Rich said. “The application of this kind of program is... unlimited! I just, I can't believe this is all unreal.” He was still taking the time to process what this all meant. Harrison couldn't blame him.

Harrison gestured at the brown door on one side of the room. “Where does that go?”

“I'll show you,” Sujay said as he walked over to it. He opened the door outwards. The door didn't lead to anywhere. It merely covered a couple shelves set into the wall. Harrison didn't realize it was actually a bookcase until Sujay grabbed a red book propped up on one of the shelves.

“This book, “Sujay said, “is our tool I was telling you about. If you don't know the secret, you'll be trapped in this room with nowhere to go. It's a security feature built into VERSA. There are many tests like this we built in so unauthorized users can't access more than they're allowed to. It doesn't really matter much now, since everyone accessing VERSA is a SunCorp employee, but we're thinking more long-term for when we use this technology commercially.”

“Good idea,” Rich said. “You guys really are thinking end-game with this thing.”

Sujay began flipping through the tome. It looked old and musty with yellowing pages, but Harrison had to remind himself the book merely existed in his mind. “Ah here we go,” he said, finding the right page. He began to read.

“Spoke Eighty-five, grant access to Pilot Three, Pilot Four, and Pilot Five. Execute.” he said.

“What does--” Rich began to say before their entire world blurred and Harrison's stomach suddenly dropped out from under him. It was like falling down the first drop of a roller coaster. The falling sensation didn't last long, but Harrison and Rich both lost their balance and crumpled to the floor.

“What the hell?!” Harrison yelled. He put himself back on his feet. And then he noticed the room was huge.

It was massive, having grown to unbelievable proportions. The ceiling, once a few feet above him, looked a mile high now. Harrison stood on the linoleum, looking out across the vast plain that was the floor. He could see Rich and Sujay far away, but within shouting distance. He could hear Rich yelling profanities.

As the trio began walking toward each other, Harrison looked at the chair legs around himself to judge his height. Had to room expanded? Or had he gotten smaller? Wait, he reminded himself, it wasn't even real. He didn't think it was possible for the sim to become more disorienting, but it had.

After a small walk, the three men reconvened. Respectively, their heights were normal, Sujay a little shorter than Harrison, but Rich taller than both.

“What is God's name was that?!” Rich yelled at Sujay. He was clearly angry and amazed.

Sujay had a smug look on his face. “Sorry about that, we usually do that unexpectedly to new pilots.”

“What's happened to us?” Harrison desperately asked. He noticed the red book on the floor nearby where Sujay had dropped it. It was massive. Harrison pointed at it. “How do we get back??”

“Relax, relax,” Sujay assured them. “I told you we built levels of security and access into VERSA so the wrong people didn't go farther than they should. This is one of them. I had VERSA change our size so we can navigate the roads connecting the different worlds of VERSA. You can't do that in VERSA at our entry size.”

“What're you talking about?” Rich asked, clearly confused and still a little angry.

“Ok let me explain. VERSA is universe, or one cloud, if you want to think about it technically. Everyone exists in this one universe. But within the universe, we have different rooms. Or worlds.” Harrison and Rich looked at him blankly. “Ok, I'll put it this way. Imagine VERSA is an archipelago made up of thousands of islands. Normally, if you're on one island, you can't go to another island. But in our current state,” he gestured to their small stature, “we have, let's say, administrator access to pass into to different parts of VERSA.”

“You say we're going behind the scenes?” Harrison asked.

“Precisely!” Sujay answered. “We call it the side space. It's still a part of VERSA but it's not really its own world. It's actually the skeleton that holds the entire thing together. We built it specifically to facilitate movement throughout the system.”

Rich was thinking. “Why do it this way?” he asked, befuddled. “Why not have it be locked doors you pass through? What does shrinking us do? Where are we going?”

Sujay grinned. “Look,” he said calmly, turning toward the massive brown door that he'd left open. The bookshelf was still behind it, but for the first time Harrison could see under the bottom shelf. There was another door, this one green, but the green door was their size. “That's our real door.”

Harrison and Rich stood stunned, mouths agape. Harrison tried thinking of something to say. Rich finally spoke.

“This is some real Alice in Wonderland shit you've got going on here!” he said, baffled and awed. “But Sujay, why shrink us? Why not make the doors all normal sized, but locked?”

“If we have locks, then we need keys. It adds a whole other layer to keeping track of access to parts of VERSA. But if you are the key, as in your size, you only have to control yourself, and thus you control your access.”

“Ok, that's actually kinda smart,” Harrison admitted. He looked at how far away their door was. “Too bad it's going to take us a few minutes to get over there though.”

“Yes, that's true,” Sujay sighed.

“How do we get back to our original size?” Rich asked.

“Original size?” Sujay asked.

“Yeah, the size we started.”

“Is any of this real, Rich? What does it matter?” Sujay asked him and smiled.

Rich rolled his eyes. “This shit is so damn trippy.”

The group began walking over to the door under the bookcase. Harrison had determined by now that if the room was normal size, they couldn't be more than a couple inches tall. Sujay explained there would be more books and other tools they'd use to change size and do other things in VERSA. But a lot of that would probably come in the next few days, when they had more time. Eventually when they were done with their session, he'd show them how to exit the sim. Sujay though failed to explain how that would be done. Harrison kept following him on trust, and mostly because he had no other choice.

When they finally reached the small door, Sujay opened it outward and they followed him into a corridor. The hallway, like the waiting room, looked incredibly spartan in appearance but at least it was the correct size. The ceiling was right above their heads and the hallway led down a bit before forking to the left and right. A few similar green doors lined the walls. It became quickly clear that Sujay was looking for a particular door.

The two followed Sujay down the hall and around a few corners. The halls seemed endless and after making a few turns, Harrison was already lost. Everything looked the same. He couldn't imagine getting lost down here.

“Where do these doors all go?” Rich finally asked Sujay.

“Different parts of VERSA. But don't open any, some don't lead anywhere. At least not yet. Most should be unopenable if they're dead ends. Any locked door you find in VERSA can't be opened because it doesn't go anywhere.”

Sujay finally found his door. It was green, just like all the other hundreds of doors they'd already seen. Though not every door had a word stenciled on it, this door said “COAST-85.” He opened it and the group stepped through.

Harrison could smell the ocean before he could see it. But it was there, just down the cliff from them in the distance. A cloudless blue sky hung above them, and from the colonnade where they stood he could see a sweeping landscape in three directions, clear to the horizon. The door had brought them under a stone cloister that by the look of the columns must have been modeled after the Greeks or Romans. Sujay let the plain door shut behind them.

“Holy shit,” Rich muttered. “You guys built a whole fucking world.”

He was right. From their elevation, Harrison could see more temple-like structures in the distance along with an abundance of trees and even flocks of birds flying high in the sky.

“Sujay, this really is incredible,” Harrison said to their leader. “Who... who built all of this?”

Sujay sighed. “That's a tough question to answer. I certainly contributed some. But it's not like building Legos or programming in every blade of grass.”

He began trying to explain how VERSA worked. “The initial designers and programmers created the original code that governs the physics and looks of many of the aspects of VERSA's virtual world. But VERSA is more than just a program running and executing code. There's also an intelligence built in. The more people interact with it and open up their minds to program, much like you both are doing, it learns what the real world looks likes and strives to replicate it. This door here is one of my favorite worlds, but for every one world like this, I guarantee you there are ten more that make no sense.”

“Wait, did you say VERSA is learning from us? Like an A.I.?” Rich asked.

“Yes,” he replied, unfazed. “The intelligence part of VERSA obviously has access to your memories and extracts them and compares them to what it already knows, then modifies its existing algorithms to create a more perfect simulation.”

“Are you guys able to control it at all?” Harrison asked next. “Like, it's not just doing it's own thing the whole time right? You can reign it in?”

“Yes, we can, mostly. It's difficult but we can go in and edit code it writes and change the programming. Once VERSA started creating its own worlds a few years ago, we discovered if we found the right place on the servers we could go in and delete things or archive things we don't want. And of course, we still have the ability to create our own scenarios and worlds, which is the real value of VERSA. Tomorrow you'll see some of those. It's time consuming when we build out own worlds but much more precise than letting VERSA spool out new places at random. Let's walk.”

Sujay motioned for them to walk onto the lawn next to the cloister and begin exploring. As Harrison stepped out from under the covered walkway, he felt the warm sun on his skin. It's not real Harrison, he had to remind himself. It scared him that it felt very real.

Once out in the open, Harrison could see their cloister was part of a much larger classical structure. “What are these buildings?” he asked Sujay, marveling as the architecture around them.

“Who knows?” Sujay replied. “You'd have to ask VERSA. It just made them up.”

Rich stopped and turned to Sujay. “Ok I've seen birds in the sky, which aren't real, like everything else...”

“Yes and...?” Sujay said.

“But now we have all these buildings,” he said, searching for his words. “Are there people in here?”

“No, not at all,” Sujay reassured him. “VERSA can do a lot of things, but it can't make people. Well, at least, it hasn't tried yet. If it did, it'd fail; people are too complex to create from scratch. You'd have to build personalities, language abilities, free will or at least the illusion of it, there's just too much, even for VERSA.” Sujay looked around, as if he was scanning the horizon. A small breeze picked up and rustled the trees. “If you see anyone in VERSA, it's another pilot, like us. We only have nine stalls, so that's the maximum amount of pilots that can be inside at one time. So yeah, don't worry about it.”

“Wait, so if VERSA can't make people, what military value is there in training here if you can't create people to fight against?” Rich asked.

“We're working on that,” Sujay replied. “For the last four months we've started working on scripted versions of people that we can run inside VERSA. It's very basic. Like, we created a simulated person that can run from point A to point B. Nothing too complex. There are a few worlds we're testing them out in, but we've isolated these experiments from VERSA's mimicking ability so it can't run wild with them.”

“How long do you think it's going to be before you have something marketable to the military?” Harrison asked.

Sujay let out a long sigh. “Don't quote me on this,” he prefaced. “But a year or two, maybe. It depends on what we want our finished product to look like.”

“Well it looks like you've already done quite a hell of a lot of work!” Rich said, gesturing out to the world around them.

Sujay smiled. “I guess you're right.”

Harrison started walking down the hill they were on. He could faintly hear the waves of the ocean crashing against the shore which was some distance down to his left. He had so many questions for Sujay but he didn't want to overwhelm the man. He couldn't stop thinking how unbelievable all this was. SunCorp was going to make a killing on selling VERSA one day.

“Where to next?” Harrison heard Rich ask Sujay behind him.

“Doesn't matter really,” Sujay shrugged. “Follow Harrison?”

For the next twenty minutes Harrison aimlessly walked through the world at his own leisure. There were no paths or roads that he could see, but the vegetation was minimal and the elevations gradual. Strange birds chirped in the trees and the air temperature felt comfortable. A perfectly idyllic world. Of course it was all imaginary.

After a while, Sujay caught up with Harrison. “Next time,” he said, “we can go into these buildings around us. It's interesting to see what VERSA comes up with.”

“We can't go now?” Harrison asked, pointing to a nearby columned temple.

“We should probably get going, actually,” Sujay admitted. “We should disconnect from VERSA soon since everyone at the lab is getting ready to go home.”

“How do we do that?” Harrison asked.

“Another surprise for you. I'll show you.”

The two of them walked off to get Rich, who had wandered off towards a small pond. “There's fucking fish in here!” he exclaimed as they walked up.

“We're going,” Harrison told him. “Sujay is going to show us how to get back.”

Sujay was looking past them at the trees. He began talking, but Harrison quickly realized he wasn't just talking to himself. “There's two ways to get out. The simple way is for our Tower to disconnect us. He can do it any time, but it's usually only in case of emergencies, and it's not really up to us in the sim. But then there's the way to disconnect yourself from the inside, which is the normal way to leave. Ah, here's one.”

Sujay walked over to a nearby tree with faintly purple leaves and plucked a small fruit off of its alien branches. It looked like an apple. “Bite this, it's special,” he said, handing it to Rich.

“What'll it do?” he asked.

“It'll get you out, just eat it.”

“Okay, you're the boss,” he said, taking the apple.

“There are many out-keys in all of VERSA's worlds, the important thing is remembering what they are. Apples, for instance, if you eat them, will take you out.”

Rich brought the apple up to his mouth and took a bite. He began to chew, but a second later his eyes rolled back into his head and he collapsed to the grass. Except he didn't. Harrison was stunned to see his body disappear before it hit the ground.

“See, easy,” Sujay said. “Your turn.” He had another apple in his hand.

Harrison took it from him, eyed it for a moment, then took a bite. It tasted tart, and Harrison almost had another thought before he fell unconscious.

 

Once again Harrison woke up, confused at first, his body aching all over. His vision was blurry, but he slowly recovered to dim lighting as the helmet automatically lifted off his face. He was on the waterchair. He was back.

He tried sitting up, but it took him a few tries. When he did he could barely make out the inside of his stall, but the only real illumination was the timer that Kevin set before he went under. The digital display read 00:08:34. Did that mean he'd only been in the sim for eight minutes and thirty-four seconds? Unbelievable.

He regained his strength quickly as he stood up in the stall. He didn't know where the light switch was so he simply opened the door. Although the control room was naturally dark, it helped him see where his shoes were. He put them on and stumbled out of his stall.

“That was some crazy shit man,” Rich said when he saw him.

“What'd you guys think?” Kevin shouted from across the room.

“Insane,” Harrison calmly. “You guys are nuts.”

“Government's gonna love this though,” Rich remarked. “I'm starting to feel now that just a couple days at the lab isn't going to be enough time to see everything.”

When Sujay walked out of his stall they struck up another conversation about VERSA. Sujay promised that he'd try getting them back into the sim first thing tomorrow after breakfast to demonstrate more. He implied they'd barely scratched the surface on their first dive.

Sujay walked the three of them out of the control room, back through the regular part of the building, and finally back outside. It was already late afternoon. Harrison caught a glimpse across the laboratory yard of a couple cars pulling out of parking spaces and heading toward the main gate.

“Do these people commute here?” Harrison asked.

“Yeah, most live in San Jose or Gilroy,” said Sujay, “but a few live here at the lab. The dorm building where you're staying houses some people. I lived there myself for a few years in fact. It's small but comfortable.”

“How many people work here on any given day?” Rich asked.

Sujay sighed. “A few hundred maybe? I'm not sure.”

“Huh, really?” responded Rich. “Since we got here the lab's felt kind of empty. Like a ghost town. You hiding them all from us?”

Giving a weak laugh, Sujay replied, “No, it's the holiday this weekend. We give everyone the week off but some still come in.”

“I guess there's always work to do, right?” said Harrison.

“You have no idea,” Sujay muttered.

 

Because of the time change from the east coast, Harrison and Rich were both already hungry. Sujay escorted them to one of the onsite cafeterias until Vanessa could meet back up with them. When she found them eating away at a table in an empty dining room, she approached them with a big smile on her face.

“So what did you think?” she said in a chipper mood. Harrison felt exhausted from all the reality-jumping but put on his professional smile.

“Quite the product you have here,” Rich said. “I don't think I need to tell you how interested the military would be in purchasing or leasing VERSA when it's available.”

“That's great to hear!” exclaimed Vanessa, but Harrison knew she had no doubt of Rich's response. “So tomorrow,” Vanessa said, “we have an entire itinerary for you two. In the morning after breakfast there's a SunCorp development meeting I'm going to have both of you attend at nine o'clock AM to discuss the future paths for VERSA and some of our goals with the program, then after that I'll introduce you to a few more developers besides Mr. Rajeev. And after lunch you'll both be able to get back into the sim! Sound good?”

“Sure, works for us,” Harrison said. Not like we have much choice, he thought. They were SunCorp's guests here, and it wasn't like they were calling any of the shots.

 

After dinner, Harrison and Rich got set up in their dorms. They occupied next door rooms on the first floor of a small building set at the periphery of the lab complex, against one of the fences. Each room merely contained a cot and small fold-out desk with a chair. A communal bathroom was at the end of the hall.

Harrison and Rich kept to themselves as they started writing their reports and recommendations to their respective agencies. Harrison still didn't have reception for his phone and there was no wifi or internet access for his laptop, but he could still write and then upload to the agency later. It was strange at first being completely disconnected from the rest of the world, but as the evening dragged into night he began enjoying the solitude.

At one point after dark, while Harrison calmly typed away, a knock came at his door. He got up and opened it. It was Rich. And a bottle of 12 year Glenlivet scotch whiskey.

“You thirsty kid?” Rich asked.

“Where'd you get that?!” replied Harrison, shocked.

“Brought it.”

“We're not supposed to drink while on government time.”

“Fuck it, I've been doing this for decades.” Rich looked around Harrison's room. “No cups though. Looks like we're sharing from the bottle then.” Without asking he sat down on Harrison's bed.

“How's the wife and kids Rich?” Harrison asked politely, sitting back down at his computer.

“Oh they're good, they're good,” Rich replied with a sigh. He drank from the bottle. “You got a girlfriend at least Harrison?”

“I did about five months ago.”

“Was she hot?”

Harrison chuckled to himself. Rich was so blunt sometimes. “Yeah she was pretty cute and tall. Wasn't a bad break-up though, it's not like we hated each other.”

“Hmmm, that's good.”

“What'd you think about today?” Harrison asked him.

Rich paused to think about his question before answering. “Well, VERSA looks like the real deal, but today was just a bunch of staged tricks. I want to see how much of VERSA is really done. Like, go to the places they don't want us to go.”

“You think they're bullshitting us?”

Rich took a sip of the scotch then frowned at it. “Not necessarily, but today was very on-script. Everyone does that when they're entertaining possible government contracts.” He sat up from his reclined position and offered Harrison the bottle. Harrison declined.

“Hey, I meant to ask you,” Harrison said to Rich, “do you have cell reception out here?”

“No, I lost it while we were in the car somewhere,” he replied.

“Remember when you made fun of Ms. Bright's dress pockets when we were driving around in that cart?” Harrison asked him. “She was making a call on her phone. How'd she have reception?”

Rich sat back and tried to think. “Maybe they're jamming outside signals here? Dunno though. That's weird. What do you think of her and Sujay, for that matter?”

Harrison shrugged. “They seem nice, I guess. Guarded, maybe a little.”

“Definitely guarded. I can't really explain it,” Rich said, “But I get the feeling so far there's a lot they're not telling us.”

“Well it makes sense if they're protecting such a prized piece of technology. VERSA is going to change the world in the next decade!”

“No, I think there's something else,” Rich disagreed. “But I can't put my finger on it. If VERSA is such a big secret and it's still a couple years from being marketable to the government....” he looked at Harrison. “Why show it to us now?”

 

 

Chapter 3 by Q-Writer

Chapter 3:

(Posted: January 14)

 

The next morning Harrison first saw Rich in the bathroom. Harrison had put on another suit but Rich was simply dressed in khakis and a button-up shirt. “Kid, ditch the suit,” said Rich, looking him over. “It's California anyways, nobody cares.”

After a quick change, the two of them walked across the campus to the cafeteria to get a bite to eat. Once again, the large room was deserted. The food wasn't bad, though something wasn't right about the eggs. At least it wasn't terribly priced, though the cost ultimately didn't matter; Harrison and Rich would later bill it to the government anyways.

After a bit of sign-reading and searching down deserted hallways, they found the conference room for their morning meeting. It was pretty large, and by the time they got there a handful of people were milling around. Vanessa saw them enter and walked over. This morning she was wearing a bright blue dress that hinted at her figure while remaining tasteful and corporate.

“Good morning gentlemen,” she greeted them. “Sleep well?”

“Of course Ms. Bright,” Harrison lied. He'd slept awful. He didn't remember any of his dreams from last night but something inside him felt sick, a little off. He blamed it on the rush of yesterday, first flying across the country in the morning then having his consciousness dissected by a VR machine in the afternoon. Although he was curious to go back inside VERSA, the apprehension and nervousness wouldn't go away.

The meeting started about ten minutes later, everyone including Harrison and Rich sitting around a large conference table. Vanessa led the meeting but others took their turns too. It was partly a presentation to Harrison and Rich, but also an update of progress for the others present, who Harrison eventually surmised were project or division heads at the lab. Sujay was there too, sitting across the table from them in a green polo. He had greeted them when he arrived but said little else since then. Unfortunately, the meeting dragged on far longer than Harrison wanted it to. He found it difficult to focus, his mind kept drifting back to VERSA. One look over at Rich and Harrison could tell he was zoning out too.

Eventually mercy struck and the meeting adjourned after almost two hours. Some people immediately left the conference room but Harrison and Rich stuck around to see what Vanessa wanted them to do next.

She gestured for the two of them to come over to her and began introducing them to some of the folks from the meeting. Mostly corporate types like her with forgettable names and even more forgettable job titles. But they were big-wigs, that was for sure. No Leo Starr though. Apparently he really didn't come down the mountain for anything.

“Oh, and gentlemen, I'd like to introduce you to our lead computer engineer, Katherine Parlock,” Vanessa said somewhat reluctantly, catching the eye of someone behind them. Harrison turned around and looked down to see a young woman sitting in an electric wheelchair. She was dressed a simple blouse and jeans with a set of glasses perched on her nose, giving her a introverted and bookish appearance. Her face wore a sullen expression and she seemed just as bored as Harrison and Rich had been. Harrison had noticed her during the meeting but hadn't the faintest clue who she was.

“Call me Kat, nice to meet you both,” she said, shaking their hands. Harrison thought she looked about the same age as him, maybe late 20's or early 30's.

“You're lead computer engineer on VERSA, ma'am?” Rich asked her. “Wow you are not what I expected.”

Kat pursed her lips, maybe annoyed but clearly used to this type of reaction. “I've been on the project for the last seven years,” she explained. “Leo brought me on personally, we go way back. I've actually been living at the lab these last few months, doing mostly debugging and cleaning up some of the coding mess in VERSA that others have left behind.” She pushed a strand of black hair out of her face and turned her body towards Harrison. “You two went in yesterday, right?”

“Sure did,” Harrison said. “One hell of a program you're running here.”

“Glad you liked it,” Kat said with a smile. “Mr. Rajeev said your first time went well. I don't really get the chance to explore VERSA firsthand anymore. Maybe I'll visit you when you're in the sim later.”

Harrison pondered for a moment how Kat would be able to really navigate inside VERSA with her wheelchair. He furrowed his brow trying to think it out, and Kat read him easily.

“You're wondering how I go into VERSA if I can't walk? It's what everyone wonders,” she said, clearly annoyed. “Sure, I need help getting in the waterchair, but once the sim starts I've got my legs back.”

“How... how does that work?” asked Rich, confused.

“My brain remembers how to use my legs,” Kat said, a little annoyed, “so when I get into the sim they work just fine. It's simple, really.” She sighed. Harrison could tell she'd explained the same thing dozens of times in the past. This computer engineer definitely didn't have the patience Sujay had in dealing with outsiders. “When do you leave?” Kat asked them.

Harrison looked at Rich. “Tomorrow? Friday right? Or after that?” he guessed, unsure. He brushed it off as a simple slip of the mind.

“Yeah we were planning to head back to D.C. eventually,” Rich said, equally as vague. “Today's Thursday right? And this weekend is President's Day?” He looked at Vanessa.

“Yes, that's correct,” Vanessa informed them. “I believe the government has arranged for a non-commercial return for the two of you. We can charter you to Moffett Field in a helicopter when it's time for the two of you to go back.”

“Do you close up the lab on weekends?” asked Harrison.

“Not usually,” she replied, sounding timid. “We usually work with a reduced staff to keep a few tests going. But because of the holiday, this whole week we're on reduced staff. You've might have noticed, but nearly everyone is gone.”

From the corner of his eye, Harrison noticed Kat give Vanessa a strange, confused look.

“So what's next on the schedule today?” Harrison asked.

“Well, follow me gentlemen, I have a few more people I want you to meet and offices I want to visit, and then we can get lunch.”

Rich turned to Kat before they left the room. “Pleasure to meet you Ms. Parlock.”

“Good to meet you both. But you can call me Kat. No need for formalities.” She gave a half-hearted wave as they left.

When they slipped out of the room Vanessa said quietly, “Ms. Parlock is quite the character. Leo absolutely adores her, she's... much more friendly once you get to know her.” It was clear to Harrison that Vanessa did not like her.

 

After meeting some more people and engaging in more mundane banter, Vanessa led Harrison and Rich to another conference room where SunCorp's unseen waitstaff had prepared lunch. The food was better quality than the stuff in the cafeteria that Harrison and Rich were getting used to. The three of them talked more about VERSA and eventually Harrison and Rich found themselves sharing a little bit about their personal lives with Vanessa. She remained attentive and polite, as always. Harrison wondered how she kept herself so “on” all the time. The woman never seemed to let her foot off the professional pedal.

At the conclusion of lunch, Vanessa walked them over to the building housing the VERSA control room. Even though it was February, the temperature was pleasant and the sun shone proudly above them. Vanessa looked at a message on her phone and proclaimed, “Oh, the staff member from the committee will be here at Dreamland in just a few minutes! Perfect timing.”

Harrison had no idea what to expect from this staffer. He remembered Rich admitting he didn't know why the Armed Services Committee not only wanted to get in on this, but did get in on this. Somewhere, Harrison mused, much more powerful government forces than himself were pulling strings and getting things done.

Vanessa insisted they wait outside for the arrival. About ten minutes later a car pulled up and Harrison's driver from yesterday stepped out to open the rear door. Neither Harrison nor Rich were prepared for who came out.

Out of the car stepped a beautiful young blonde, dressed in a lavender blouse, tight black blazer, and a matching black skirt. She was lean and fit, and her uncovered legs down to her high heeled shoes gleaned in the winter sun. Though her face was mostly covered by large designer sunglasses, it was obvious by the way she carried herself that she was incredibly attractive. Harrison, stunned, caught Rich's eye, who was doing a double-take himself. Who the hell was this girl?

Vanessa greeted her, “Welcome to Dreamland, my name is Vanessa Bright, head of development.” The new arrival removed her sunglasses, smiled, and shook Vanessa's hand.

“Pleased to meet you Ms. Bright, I'm Jessica Hampton, Senate Armed Services Committee.” she turned to look at Harrison and Rich. “Are you two the other liaisons?”

The two men introduced themselves to the staffer, both with bewildered but polite looks plastered upon their faces. Vanessa and Jessica began talking as Vanessa introduced her to the lab and began explaining VERSA. Rich took a step out of earshot and started whispering to Harrison.

“Jesus Christ this woman is a committee staffer?” he whispered. “She looks like a fucking intern! There's no way she's over twenty-five!”

Harrison shared Rich's surprise. How was this young woman selected for this secret assignment? He knew some meddling senator wanted to know what SunCorp was up to, but he couldn't fathom how someone so young-- and beautiful-- would have gotten the call.

“Do you think her dad knows someone on the committee?” Harrison conjectured, careful to keep his voice low.

“Either that or she's banging someone,” Rich said casually. “I guess we'll know soon if she's just another bimbo airhead from the Hill.”

The two men followed the women into the building and through the guarded door towards the dark room. When they entered VERSA's control room, it looked just the same as it had the day before, dim and quiet. The skeleton crew working inside hardly noticed them, except for Kevin, who bounded over.

“Ms. Bright,” he greeted her nervously, “what brings you here today?” Noticing Harrison and Rich behind her, he gave a quick nod of recognition.

Vanessa introduced him to Jessica and began explaining that she wanted him to lead the demonstration in VERSA this afternoon. “I've got Mr. Rajeev tied up in meetings the rest of the day,” she simply explained. “But this will be Ms. Hampton's first time, obviously, so make sure you give her adequate introduction before she goes in.”

As Vanessa left, Kevin began educating Jessica much the same way as he'd taught Harrison and Rich about VERSA the day before. Meanwhile, Harrison used the bathroom and Rich preoccupied himself by casually looking around the room.

“Hey Ernie,” Kevin said. Ernie looked up from a monitor. “I'm going in with these three here in a couple minutes, can you Tower us this afternoon?”

Ernie took a bite of a his sandwich and replied “Yeah no problem man, just lemme know which stalls you're using and I'll get it set up.”

“I'll take Stall Four, as usual, put them in One, Two, and Three,” said Kevin as he opened the door to his stall. “I'll put myself in and see you guys in there. Let's do Spoke Eighty-five like Sujay did yesterday.”

Ernie put down his sandwich. “Dammit right now?” he complained, but Kevin was already getting himself ready in his stall.

Rich and Harrison looked at Jessica, who seemed intrigued but very ignorant as to what was going on. Rich tried reassuring her, “Trust us, we did this yesterday and it's weird, but you get used to it.” He looked over at Ernie who was beginning to turn on the equipment in one of the stalls. “Just do what he says and it'll be fine,” Rich added, gesturing to the tech.

“Thanks for letting me crash your trip,” said Jessica finally, sounding apologetic. “I didn't know about this until just a few days ago, and Senator Holmgren really wanted someone to let him know firsthand what was going on. Thanks to your boss at the DoD, the senator is getting his wish.” She gave him a little smile.

Ernie came out of a stall. “Ok Rich, you're in Three, and Harrison, you're in Two. I'll put you guys in right now and then I'll set up...” he looked at Jessica, realizing he didn't know her name.

“I'm Jessica, Jessica Hampton,” she said with another nervous smile.

“Ok... Miss Jessica,” Ernie replied, getting his bearings. “I'm going to put you in Stall Six actually, Turns out Stall One needs to run some diagnostics for the next hour or two. Got uncalibrated somehow. So just wait here.”

Harrison went into Stall 2, took off his shoes, and lay on the waterchair like he had yesterday. After Ernie put Rich in, he came over to his stall, hooked up the monitor, started the timer, and brought the helmet down over Harrison's head. Harrison started thinking how he was slightly less nervous this time around, and his mind danced over trivial thoughts as his consciousness slowly faded away.

 

It was the same fish tank and the same room. The shadow of his reflection in the glass stared back at himself. Before they went in, Harrison guessed that Kevin would take them to the same room Sujay did. He still felt like he was waking up from something, a little groggy mostly, but he couldn't tell if he'd been asleep a minute or half a day. He looked around and saw Kevin casually sitting on one of the waiting room couches. Across the room, Rich was coming around too, except instead of wearing his shirt and pants he sported a full on costume, like he was embarking on a safari.

“Ha it worked!” Rich said, looking at himself. “It fucking worked!”

“Glad to see you're becoming more familiar with VERSA,” Kevin said, watching him from his couch. Kevin had his feet up on a table and looked relaxed, but impatient. “Once the girl gets here I'll take you into a couple worlds and demonstrate some more things. I think today I'll show you the mighty physics engine VERSA comes equipped with, and I'll also show you some new environs too.”

“Uh, sounds good,” Harrison said, walking over. He didn't feel dizzy anymore from his initial entry. “Where's Jessica?”

“Probably lagging behind a few minutes,” Kevin said. “If Ernie put her in last, it might only be a minute behind in the real world but that could be longer in here.” He pointed at one of the couches. “Take a seat in the meantime, can't start without her anyways.”

Harrison sat down and looked at Rich, who looked pleased with himself. Rich even sported a brimmed safari hat too. “You look like a clown,” Harrison made fun of him.

“Don't be jealous,” Rich scolded him playfully. Harrison could hardly take him seriously though, as Rich looked like he'd just walked out of Africa. At least the mood was light and less sobering than yesterday.

“You learn that from Sujay?” Kevin asked. “He likes doing those kind of silly things with VERSA.”

The three men sat and talked for about ten minutes until Jessica suddenly appeared in the room, looking confused, scared, and incredibly disoriented. She nearly stumbled and fell, her high heeled shoes doing her no favors. Harrison and Rich instinctually jumped up to catch her, but she steadied herself.

“Welcome to VERSA,” Kevin said non-nonchalantly. “Now that you're here let's get started.” He opened the brown door that led to the bookcase and took out the red book.

“You ok?” Harrison asked Jessica, who was coming out of her shock.

“Is this it?” she stammered, her blue eyes wide with disbelief. “Holy shit...”

Kevin found the page he was looking for in the book. He looked up and said to Jessica, “It gets even crazier, watch this.” He started to read from the book before Harrison could mentally prepare himself. “ Spoke Eighty-five, grant access to Pilot One, Pilot Two, Pilot Three, and Pilot Four. Execute.”

Harrison's vision ballooned and the room exploded around him. He felt himself dropping down the roller coaster again as his body reduced and plunged to the floor. Even though he knew the shrinking was coming, he still lost his footing and slammed against the linoleum, just like yesterday. But when he finally got his breath back and looked up, he saw something very terribly wrong.

In front of him, about a hundred feet away from his perspective, stood the two largest high heeled shoes he'd ever seen. Even from his distance, he could tell the black pumps towered over his reduced stature. The straps that encased the bare white ankles were high enough that he wouldn't be able to reach either with a jump. As his gaze wandered up, his mind became gripped with awe and horror. Jessica had not shrunk.

Her smooth, pale legs climbed high into the sky like porcelain towers, disappearing under her black skirt into a dark shadow. Above that he noticed her breasts behind the lavender blouse and black jacket she wore, which even higher yielded to strands of blond hair. Being so near to her, he could hardly make out her head. And then it hit him: he needed to hide.

Her giant feet could easily crush him if she took a step to her right. She probably wouldn't even feel a thing. His animal instincts immediately kicked in as he got to his feet and looked for a safe place to run. It didn't even occur to him yet that he was in a simulation. He only knew that this massive woman could accidentally snuff his life out without even a thought.

Next to him the giant couch rose up in a sheer wall of gray fabric. At his height of only an inch or two, there was plenty of space to hide under it where the legs kept it off the floor. He started running, but at his size the linoleum was not smooth and he had to be careful not to trip on the dimpled surface.

“Where did you guys go?” he heard Jessica's voice boom above him. She seemed scared. At his inconsequential size, he could do nothing to respond to her or get her attention.

“Hello?!” she yelled out desperately. He heard and felt her shift her weight in her shoes. The leather pumps creaked slightly, holding her weight. “Guys where did you all go? What's happening?!”

Harrison made it under the couch and from his safety looked around. The first thing he saw was the red book that shrank them. It was still normal sized, and as Kevin dwindled away the book had fallen face down on the floor. Then he spotted Kevin next to it. He was too far away to see Kevin's face but his body looked frantic. Harrison started scanning for Rich but he knew he would have been on the other side of Jessica, which meant he was also totally out in the open.

“Guys this is really weird,” Jessica said from somewhere above him. Her voice trembled. From under the couch now her could only see her impossibly large heels. Then they started to move; she was taking steps. The floor shook with each footfall.

Harrison watched her feet slowly begin to walk around the room. He figured she was probably looking for another way out, or at least a clue to where her three companions went. He saw Kevin still by the red book; it looked like he was trying to lift the corner of it, a hopeless task at his tiny size. Harrison tried to think about what had gone so wrong.

A very long distance away he made out the small figure of Rich, still wearing the hat, running towards the red book. He must have spotted Kevin. Harrison likewise took a few steps out into the open, but then caught a glimpse of Jessica. After crossing the room she was walking back towards them, he eyes nervously looking everywhere except down. Her feet, both larger than an SUV, quickly caught up to them. Harrison was in awe of her size. One of her small steps covered an incredible distance. He couldn't even begin to estimate how tall she was to him.

Kevin, now standing next to the book, was looking up at the colossus, waving his arms trying to get her attention. Harrison could faintly hear his yells, so there was no way Jessica would ever hear his cries for attention. As Kevin used all his puny strength to get the attention of the giantess, Jessica stepped forward, her gaze inattentive to the commotion on the floor.

Harrison watched as her foot came down upon Kevin. It happened so fast Kevin hardly had time to react. In his last second the small man braced his arms, as if it would stop the massive high heel shoe from coming down on top of him. With a loud boom and without any resistance, her shoe came to rest on top of Kevin, covering him completely. Jessica shifted her weight thoughtlessly, twisting her shoe in place. Kevin was undoubtedly gone.

Harrison cursed loudly to no one but himself. He froze in place, just a few steps out from under the couch. She's just stepped on Kevin and hadn't even noticed! Harrison's mind snapped back to reality. This wasn't real, Kevin wasn't really dead. Ernie said that if you died in the sim it just spit you back out into the real world, albeit shaken. He wondered if Kevin had ever died in VERSA before. His heart pounded furiously in his chest, his shirt soaked in sweat.

Still oblivious to the little life she so easily snuffed out, Jessica began crouching down. She was looking at the floor, but it wasn't Harrison or Rich she noticed. It was the red book. Realizing that she was finally looking down, Harrison thought he might be able to get her notice him. He was tiny, but not microscopic.

He ran out from under the couch yelling and waving his arms. Maybe she'd notice his movement, though he was probably only in her peripheral vision.

Her feet still dwarfed him, but with her in a crouched position he got a much closer look at her enormous thighs tightly encased in her black skirt. Her arms, with the sleeves of her black blazer somewhat rolled up now, reached out for the book. Jessica tentatively inspected it, worried what it might do.

Suddenly Jessica let out a yelp. “Oh my God!” she cried, standing back up in shock. Harrison froze, wondering if she'd spotted him, but she stood transfixed by another part of the floor. She's seen Rich!

“Holy shit... what?!” she said to herself, taking a booming step back in fear. Her eyes betrayed confusion and horror as she looked at tiny Rich, trying to figure out what he was. Harrison could see Rich had stopped running and now stood in place, jumping up and down, waving his safari hat with one of his hands.

After a moment of shock, Jessica seemed to collect herself. She bent forward again, peering down at Rich. Harrison used this time to move a bit father away from her, lest she take another errant step. It was then he saw the bloody stain on the floor that had been Kevin. A pulverized lump of viscera, smashed into the floor next to her shoe, was all that remained of their guide. Harrison's stomach immediately tried to retch, but he did his best holding down anything that tried coming up.

“Are you a person?” Jessica asked Rich with her powerful voice, now fully crouched in front of him. Harrison realized Rich must have been getting quite the view up her skirt. “Rich is that you?!” she finally realized. “What's going on!”

Even from her closer distance to him she was unlikely to be able to make out any words of his voice. “Can I pick you up?” she asked him. “I can't hear you.”

After a signal from Rich, Harrison watched her giant hand lower down as she daintily plucked Rich up with her manicured fingers. He wasn't even taller than they were long, Harrison noticed in awe. Once she had him, she raised her hand up to her face, still in a crouched position. Harrison could hear her side of the conversation obviously, but couldn't hear Rich's tiny voice.

“Oh that was too fast? Sorry...

“Wait what? Kevin shrunk everyone? Why?...

“This is so weird. Hey are you ok?...

After hearing what Rich said next, the color drained from her face. She looked down and finally noticed what she'd done to Kevin. “Oh my God!” she cried out. “I stepped on him?!”

Harrison was sure that high above him Rich was frantically trying to explain to her what had really happened, and that Kevin wasn't dead in the real world. Her already unfortunate introduction to VERSA had just became much more unpleasant. The arm holding Rich trembled and it looked like Jessica was trying to hold in her emotions.

Although she didn't exactly calm down, she did finally gather the wherewithal to continue listening to Rich. After a moment Harrison heard her say, “Rich, let me set you on the table.” She rose to her full height and leaned over, depositing Rich on the plain of the coffee table somewhere high above Harrison. “You said you saw Harrison on the floor too?” she asked Rich.

Oh shit, Harrison thought. She was coming for him next. He stood near to her, out in the open. He looked up the impossible length of her legs, past her torso, hoping to finally catch her eye.

Jessica began scanning the floor, first near her to make sure she wouldn't step on Harrison. She carefully moved a step back from the coffee table, and after only a few seconds spotted the minuscule figure of Harrison. He was waving his arms too.

“There you are,” she said, stepping over him. For a moment Harrison had a clear view up her skirt between her tall legs, spotting a pair of crimson panties high above his head. He looked away, not wanting to keep looking. But when her hand plunged towards him he looked up again in fear, suddenly terrified by the prospect of being in the clutches of this giant woman. He knew she wasn't going to hurt him, but somewhere in the back of his mind a prey instinct kicked in. Harrison held up his arms pathetically as her thumb and index finger descended, the pretty French-manicured nails reaching for his body. Stopping her was futile as her grip crushed the air out of him.

And then like a freight elevator he quickly rose off the ground. It felt much like the shrinking sensation of earlier, but now he was rising into the sky, wind whipping past him. After a few seconds and another stomach-retching trial, he stopped, and his blurry vision faded. She had brought him up to her massive face. Her gaze was friendly but Harrison was too shook up to notice anything but the immense size of her countenance. From this close he could make out the imperceptible lines on her young face and even the subtle edges of her make-up.

“Harrison are you alright?” she asked him. Her voice, carried by her warm breath, overwhelmed him.

“You're holding me too tight!” Harrison yelled back, trying to pry her fingers apart.

“Oh, sorry,” she apologized. Harrison felt her grip relax and he gasped for a breath. “I'm going to put you down on the table with Rich now,” she informed him.

Just as rapidly, she brought Harrison down to the coffee table and released him when his feet touched the ground. He still lost his balance and crumpled to the table but rebounded in a second. Rich was right there. “You ok?” Rich asked.

“Yeah I'm fine,” Harrison replied, still catching his breath. “What the fuck is going on?”

“Something went wrong,” Rich said. “Not sure yet though. Not sure why Jessica didn't shrink.”

Jessica sat down on the couch next to the table and leaned forward so her massive face was near the two men. Her chin almost rested on the table. It was the only way she could hear them.

“Ok now that you're both safe, what do we do?” she asked them. Harrison couldn't help but still feel intimidated by her size. Looking at her face felt like trying to view a billboard up close and all at once.

Rich started talking, speculating out loud, but projecting his voice enough that it would carry to Jessica's ears. “Ok so I think once Kevin got ejected from the sim, they'll pull us out too! Sujay said yesterday the Tower had the ability to take us out, so I'm sure once they see our guide is gone they'll terminate the whole thing!”

“Well, when's that going to happen? “Jessica asked. “Shouldn't they have gotten us out by now?”

“Um, maybe not,” Rich yelled up at her. “Time passes much faster in here than out there! Sometimes an hour in here is only a minute out there. We might have to wait a while!” Jessica's face switched to annoyance. She was already fed up with VERSA and wanted to get out.

“Why didn't I shrink?” she asked Rich. “Do you know?”

“No idea!” Rich admitted.

Harrison had been thinking about that though. “I think I have a guess,” he said. Jessica's large eyes shifted to him. “Ok hear this out! Kevin, when he shrunk us with the book, called our stall numbers out, one through four. But Jessica, you weren't in Stall One were you?”

She sat up slightly to think. “No, that guy moved me to a different one, Six. Yeah, he moved me to Six.”

“See Kevin didn't know that,” Harrison explained, “because he was already in VERSA when Ernie switched her! So he accidentally shrunk the three of us but not you!”

“Can I shrink myself with the book then?” Jessica asked. Harrison and Rich stayed silent. They had no idea.

“Maybe it's worth a try?” Harrison said.

“Wait but they're going to de-sim us any minute now,” Rich said. “Why not just wait?”

“But Rich, you said it could be hours,” Harrison argued with him. “We're all fine in VERSA right now. We could explore, as long as we can shrink Jessica down.” He stepped right up to Rich. “Think about it... we can explore VERSA without a SunCorp chaperone. Who knows what we might see.”

Rich smiled. “Good fucking point kid. I like the way you're thinking now.”

“What?” Jessica said, leaning a bit closer. She hadn't heard them talking to each other.

After a few moments of trying to convince her of their plan, Jessica seemed to come around to it. They told her to grab the red book and try finding the right page to shrink her down. None of them had ever looked into the book before so they didn't know what to expect.

“It's blank,” Jessica said, standing over them. She showed them the open page. There was no text.

“What the fuck?” Rich said. Overhead Jessica flipped through the book. The two men on the low table were just below the height of her knees.

“Wait I found something,” she proclaimed. Jessica showed them an open page that contained two simple words: “ENTER COMMAND”

“That's probably it!' Rich yelled at her. “So say the phrase 'Spoke 85, grant access to Pilot Six! Enter!”

Jessica nervously said the phrase, but nothing happened. “Damn I though that would work,” Rich muttered.

“Wait,” Harrison corrected him, “I think she's supposed to say execute, not enter.” He waved his arms to get her attention, then told her the new word to say.

“WAAIITT!!” Rich suddenly called out to her as she straightened up again. She looked down, then bent over. “Jessica put us on the floor! If you shrink we're stuck up on this table!”

“Oh ok,” she said. “Um, how about you jump onto this book?” She held the open book out under the edge of the table. Harrison and Rich hustled over and took a short hop down to land on the pages of the book. Jessica lowered them down to the floor and the two slid off the book and landed under the table.

“Ok here I go,” Jessica said out loud. “Spoke Eighty-five, grant access to Pilot Six, execute.”

As Harrison turned to look at her giant feet he instead saw the red book slam into the floor, causing the ground around him to shake. And next to the giant book he saw a small figure, shell-shocked, prying herself upright. The two men ran over to her.

“Oh my God everything is huge!” she said, marveling at the world around her.

“Welcome to our world,” Rich said, grabbing her arm and helping her up. Harrison couldn't help but think again how silly and strange Rich looked in his safari garb. Everything seemed twisted and strange in this simulated world, almost like a backwards reflection of reality.

“Don't worry it gets better,” Rich added. “At least, we hope it does.”

 

 

Chapter 4 by Q-Writer

Chapter 4:

(Posted: January 19)

 

Three unlikely travelers set out into the maze of doorways, accessing the side space the same way Sujay had shown Harrison and Rich.

“What are all these doors?” Jessica asked, just as perplexed with VERSA as the other two had been the day before.

“Sujay described them as connections into other parts of VERSA,” explained Harrison. Saying it made it sound more true, but he was hardly any more of an expert than Jessica. He watched her for a moment. She didn't seem distraught anymore from what she'd done to Kevin. Although she'd killed him in the sim, he hoped the fact that he wasn't really dead was calming her nerves. Though with every passing minute, it felt stranger and stranger that Ernie hadn't pulled them out of VERSA yet.

“What are we looking for then?” Jessica asked as she saw Rich looking intently at every passing door. By now Harrison felt hopelessly lost; he didn't even think he'd be able to find the door they came from considering how many twists and turns they'd already taken.

Rich stopped for a moment but kept looking down the hallways. “Well, I was sorta looking for the door we went through yesterday, as a frame of reference. It's the only place we know that has those special apples that can get us out.”

“Oh yeah, but Sujay said other things can get us out too,” Harrison replied. “Though I guess he didn't tell us what... maybe we should go into a random door?”

“Um maybe,” Rich said. “What about this one?” He pointed to a nearby green door. Stenciled onto the front of the door was “FOREST-85. “You think there are apples in there?”

“Open it and take a peek,” Harrison suggested. Rich grabbed the doorknob, turned it, and pushed the door open. From over Rich's shoulder Harrison could see little besides darkness.

“It's a forest alright,” Rich said, stepping back and closing the door. “Fucking nighttime though. I'm not going in there.”

“How about this door?” Jessica said, pointing at another door across the hall from the forest. It read “PLAZA-85.”

“Yeah, try it,” Harrison said. Jessica opened the door and stepped though. Harrison followed her by instinct.

Sure enough, he stepped into a large plaza that looked like it could have been in the heart of some old European city. He stood under another colonnade, this one ringing around the entire square and only broken by alleyways and streets that ventured out into the depths of the city. Around it, buildings of all sizes surrounded the open space, but all of them looked old and worn. Shuttered windows and sagging red roof tiles hung over the square. An overcast sky boxed them in above, and the whole city looked gloomy and neglected. The emptiness of it all felt as if a plague had washed through the city and removed all its residents.

“Huh, interesting world,” Rich said after following them in. Behind him, the door closed shut.

“Wow, who built all of this?” wondered Jessica out loud. She took a few steps out from under the colonnade into the dejected square.

“Who knows? VERSA? Sujay? No idea how this sim actually works,” Rich answered, though Jessica had already seemed to stop listening.

“Uh, I don't see any fruit here,” Harrison commented. He walked back to the door which was set into a dusty wall. He tried the doorknob. It didn't turn. “Hey guys....” he shouted out, “I think we're screwed.”

Rich looked back and immediately knew the door was locked. “Shit,” he yelled out. “What the hell! I thought Sujay said these doors didn't lock?!”

“Hey that's what I thought too. You think it's working right?” Harrison tried pulling on the door harder. It didn't budge.

“Fuck this is just great,” Rich admitted sarcastically. He looked like a pouting safari master. It was bizarre. “Jessica, wait up!” he called out to her. Jessica was already walking towards the middle of the large square, so he briskly followed her while Harrison chased after him.

The three of them convened near the center of the plaza where a large marble fountain stood, adorned with angelic figures but conspicuously missing the water that would have made it beautiful. Instead, its basin held a blanket of crumpled old leaves. They started discussing a plan.

“Ok so we can't go back the way we came,” Harrison said. “I think we need to stay together, but let's see if we can get into these buildings.”

“Maybe there's someone in here that can help us?” Jessica suggested, sitting down on a nearby bench. She looked tired, but they hadn't been in VERSA even an hour yet.

“No, there's nobody here,” Rich explained. He told her what Sujay had said about the lack of human-like inhabitants in the sim.

“Some of these buildings must have doors right?” Harrison said, looking around. “Or maybe we should head down one of these streets?”

Jessica looked over the buildings. “Let's head there,” she pointed. Both Harrison and Rich turned to look over the square and saw a tower rising in the distance. It looked like it was a few blocks past the plaza. “We can get a good view if we climb it,” Jessica added.

“Alright then, let's go,” Rich agreed. They left the plaza and started walking down a street that appeared to lead in the right direction.

The city they walked through began reminding Harrison of Venice, but without the canals. The whole place seemed hundreds of years old and the architectural style was certainly beautiful in a quaint, old-world kind of way. Even the tower that loomed larger ahead of them looked like the campanile of a Gothic church.

Walking down the street, the trio marveled at the buildings. Some looked like storefronts with large, empty display windows, while others stood completely shuttered. Harrison noticed a sign attached to one, but instead of English the sign contained letters of some mysterious language. He figured it could have been gibberish VERSA made up in an attempt to replicate a memory it found in someone's mind. Everything about this world unsettled him.

Rich absentmindedly tried opening a few of the doors they passed by. None would open for him, but Harrison didn't mind too much. None of them looked like the green door that had led them into this world-- and would presumably allow them to escape again. But even if they did get out of PLAZA-85, where would they go?

A few minutes later they arrived at the base of the tower. It was attached to a much larger, cathedral-like building, as Harrison expected it to be. A set of large wooden double-doors stood at the base of the tower, looking heavy and immovable. But luckily one of them was slightly ajar, just enough for the three of them to squeeze through one at a time.

“Shall we?” Rich asked, craning his neck to look up to the top of the tower. It was high, but not even close to how tall Jessica had been earlier.

They fit between the doors and entered into a stone-walled room lit with mounted torches. It felt very medieval, and the rack of halberds and other weapons off to the right only enhanced the theme.

“Who lit these torches?” Jessica asked no one.

“Who knows,” said Rich. “Maybe they're always burning?”

A large staircase against the wall to the left hugged the outer wall of the large room and spiraled upward. Wordlessly, Harrison started up it, soon followed by Jessica and Rich. As they climbed they occasionally reached landings with doors, but the doors were all locked. Torches on the walls lit the way.

“Ugh these heels are killing me,” Jessica complained. “Can we stop a moment?”

Harrison and Rich stopped, but then Harrison had an idea. “How about I go up the rest of the way,” he suggested, “and report back what I see at the top. If it's something good you can come up too and take a look. We've climbed a lot, I bet we're close.”

“I'm all for that,” Jessica immediately agreed, sitting down on a step and rubbing her feet.

“What about not splitting up?” Rich asked. He had a good point.

“Um, I think I'll be ok. Where will I be able to go once I'm up there anyways?” replied Harrison.

“Ok whatever, just go.”

Harrison turned and started bounding up the stairs. It was frustrating that the tower had no windows, but after ascending a bit more he starting hearing the sound of a gentle wind that seemed to be coming from outside. Finally, he saw natural light.

The staircase ended on a platform that stood under the spire of the tower, with views of the city in all directions. Waist-high stone parapets prevented him from falling down to the streets below. But what Harrison saw from the top terrified him.

The streets right below the tower zig-zagged through the labyrinth of the city in no discernible pattern. Luckily, the buildings all capped out at the same three or four-story height. But the city was massive, impossibly massive. It stretched out to every horizon, for miles in each direction, with no breaks. It seemed to stretch to infinity. Seeing this, Harrison had only one thought: we're so fucked.

But turning around, he noticed something very strange. Behind him, the city looked the same except for an enormous building rising up from the smaller buildings around it. From what he could see it had one wall facing the tower, and taking up the entire wall was another green door. It must have been twenty-stories tall! At least twice as tall as the tower he currently stood atop. It was quite a distance away, maybe a few miles, but even if they reached it they would never be able to open it. Maybe they could squeeze under it? He figured it led back to the side space of VERSA.

He stayed at the top of the tower another minute to catch his breath and think, and then he returned down the staircase. He found Rich and Jessica both sitting on a step together making small-talk. He explained what he had seen atop the tower. “We need to get to that door. And find a way to make ourselves big again,” he concluded.

“How are we going to do that?” Rich asked. “Find another red book to talk into?”

“No idea,” Harrison admitted, “but I'm hoping that besides books, there might be other triggers and things like that throughout VERSA. Sujay seemed to suggest they have to exist, you know, for people to access other worlds. We should go back to the street and start looking for something.”

Jessica sighed. “After all this climbing, we're going right back down, huh?”

“Sorry ma'am,” Rich sighed, standing up. “No rest for the wicked.”

 

They reached ground level and after assessing the rather empty room they exited back into the street. The same gloomy, anonymous buildings greeted them. Harrison couldn't believe this same street scene stretched for miles around them. He oriented himself. “Ok the big door is in that direction,” he said, looking at the top of the tower and pointing behind it. “That'll be our north. Let's walk that way and see what we can find along the way.”

“Your idea, you take the lead,” replied Rich.

As they began journeying, Harrison found it was incredibly easy to get turned around in the maze of streets. They weren't oriented on any kind of a grid and instead seemed random like the lines of a jigsaw puzzle. Luckily, Jessica had a relatively good sense of direction and corrected them when they occasionally took a wrong turn.

Rich kept sporadically trying to open doors on the street, but without luck. After walking for about fifteen minutes, Harrison heard a sudden crash of glass behind him. Hastily, he turned back around in surprise, expecting danger. But it was just Rich, standing in front of a large display window. Through a shattered pane of glass he peered into the mysterious darkness of a shop. Rich looked back at him. “I found a loose cobblestone from the street,” he explained tersely before stepping through the window into the shop. Harrison and Jessica looked at each other in disbelief but eventually followed him in.

As he waded into the dark building, Harrison briefly thought about Jessica. He'd only met her a couple hours ago and initially thought she'd be dead-weight on this trip. But in this short time she'd proven herself to be not only keen on learning about VERSA, but also quite pleasant and a good sport about everything. She certainly wasn't a nuisance. Despite the calamity they'd already faced, she seemed be handling it well, especially as this was her first time in the sim.

Harrison tried following Rich into the depths of the building but Rich's stubbornness and impatience outpaced him. Harrison could tell from the light filtering in that they seemed to be in some sort of a store. Shelves along the walls lay cluttered with all sorts of trinkets and strange devices.

“You guys see any books?” Rich asked through the darkness. “Red books especially?”

“Nope, not here,” Jessica replied, looking through the shelves. She spotted a small colorful box and took it off a shelf. “What is all this crap?” she said. No one had a reply for her.

As Rich and Harrison entered another room a bit deeper into the building, Jessica noticed a small handle on one side of the box-like thing she held. Was it a jack-in-the-box? It had a shiny, gold-like color, which made it stand out from the rest of the objects in the shop. She cranked the handle. No music played but something inside of it clicked, like an internal mechanism winding up.

After one more click, everything exploded behind Harrison. The force of the collapsing wall behind him propelled him outwards as rubble flew violently though the air and tumbled down around his body. The roof of the building imploded, but it didn't even matter to Harrison who had already been flung well clear of the structure into another street of the city. He smacked the cobblestone pavement with his right shoulder; his vision went blurry and his ears screamed with some unearthly ringing. Dust surrounded him as he heard the continued sound of more buildings collapsing down the street. Coughing and trying to regain his vision, he stumbled to his knees and peered through the smoke. His shoulder hurt like hell. Maybe it was dislocated? He couldn't think straight. After a few seconds his hearing started coming back and his eyes adjusted to the new war-torn look of the street.

As the smoke began to clear and Harrison fully found his feet, he hardly had the chance to marvel at his survival. High above him and the surrounding buildings stood Jessica, once again at a mammoth size. She stood amidst the wreckage of the neighborhood, her tall shoes obscured by destroyed buildings. In shock, Harrison guessed she must have been about the same size at last time. Two hundred feet tall? It was hard to tell. He looked up and noticed he was right under her skirt, seeing the same crimson panties impossibly high over his head. If he hadn't been in survival mode again he would have certainly felt guilty looking up her skirt.

He stayed frozen as the world finally came to a calamitous stand-still around him. He hoped Jessica might be more careful with her steps this time around, but regardless he would still have to get her attention.

“Holy shit!” he heard her yell out above him, her voice booming over the city. “Not again!” At least her size solved the problem of getting through the door, Harrison thought. Now he and Rich only had to figure out how to grow too.

With the thought of him, Harrison immediately wondered what had happened to Rich. The building they'd explored was gone, pulverized into rubble. He began looking around frantically. Above him he heard Jessica speak again. “Guys are you ok? I don't know what happened. Don't move!” Her voice sounded frantic and distressed. Surely she was afraid that her colleagues might be hurt or dead.

Harrison looked up and saw Jessica twisting her body, looking around at the neighborhood below her without moving her feet. Being very careful, she lifted up one of her legs and settled her dust-covered shoe down into another area. Harrison started waving his one good arm at her, but he'd be much tougher to find in the midst of the ruined buildings, especially with all the dust choking the air.

After carefully readjusting her feet a few times and stooping over to see the ground better, Jessica finally made eye contact with him. “I see you!” she cried out happily, swinging her left arm over to pluck Harrison up. He flinched as her fingers swooped down and gingerly pinched him. “I got you,” she said as she hoisted him up, unfortunately still at an uncomfortable speed. She brought him up to her giant face.

“Harrison! Are you ok?” she asked desperately. He could see sympathy in her huge blue eyes.

“Yeah... I think so,” he croaked. He wasn't sure if his admission was true or not. He felt concussed and his shoulder ached painfully.

“Where's Rich? Is he ok?” Jessica asked Harrison frantically.

“I don't know... he was right next to me when....” Harrison could hardly talk, not just from Jessica's grip but from his pain and disorientation.

“RIIIICH!!” she called out towards the ground. “I'm going to find you!” She looked back up at Harrison. “I'm going to set you down on a roof.”

She lowered his beaten body down to a building that still stood at the height of her calf. Once she released him and he crumpled onto the tiles of the roof, she crouched down over the destruction and started picking up little pieces of rubble.

Harrison didn't have the energy to watch Jessica as she searched for Rich. Her large body absolutely dominated his view though and he couldn't look away. Luckily the roof wasn't very steep; he wouldn't accidentally roll off it anytime soon. His shoulder throbbed with pain as he tried focusing on anything else.

“Rich!” he finally heard Jessica call out. “Rich are you ok?”

Harrison couldn't see where she was looking, mostly he could just see her skirt covering her thighs. But he found himself a little amused that Jessica still tried talking to Rich, who'd be too hopelessly small to answer back to her. A few moments later she gently released Rich's battered body onto the same roof as Harrison. He was alive, but his safari outfit was torn and his hat was long gone. He looked awful.

“Jesus fuck,” Rich spat out, his face covered in dust. “What the fuck has SunCorp built with this fucking thing?” The man seemed a bit displeased with his current situation.

“Can't wait to get out this sim and listen to you give Ms. Bright a piece of your mind,” said Harrison wryly. Rich looked at him, still panting with exhaustion and looking over his own wounds. A small patch of blood stained the rags of clothes over his chest. He smiled, then winced with pain.

“Kid, I can't decide if this VERSA thing is the greatest invention of human history or the stupidest thing ever made,” he finally admitted. “Seems like everything that can go wrong does.”

“Maybe it's both,” Harrison offered.

As he finished speaking, Harrison noticed Jessica's huge face peering down at them. Because their building was so short, or because she was so tall, she couldn't get very close to them by crouching, but she tried anyways. She seemed unwilling to sit on the dusty city. Instead, by crouching directly in front of them, she inadvertently treated the two men with another view up her skirt. Harrison made a mental note to suggest she wear pants into the sim next time.

Rich put his hand up out of politeness to shield his gaze. He looked up at Jessica, and after a moment, she realized what he was doing and shrieked clumsily, standing up and changing her posture. “Well, it was fun while it lasted,” commented Rich.

Jessica fruitlessly tried to pull down her skirt a little farther, but there was no way she was going to get it down past her knees.

“Ok, screw it,” Jessica's booming voice said aloud. She took to one knee and then fully knelt down in the rubble, knocking more building over where her shins and feet settled down. She kept her knees together and rested her hands on her thighs, right next to Harrison and Rich's building.

“So here's what I'm thinking,” she said to them, her voice unchallenged. “I'll pick you both up and head for the door. If it takes us into another one of those hallways I'll keep opening doors until I find a new world, and then we can start looking for some apples or something that will send us back.”

Harrison didn't know how she intended to carry them around. His body ached and he really didn't want to move, but he knew she was right. With his good arm he raised a fist and gave her a thumbs up. Rich winced again in pain but didn't contest her idea.

“Ok, both of you crawl onto my hand,” she instructed them, holding her left hand out against the roof of the building. Harrison and Rich slowly crawled forward and they both easily fit on her palm. Her skin was warm and a little clammy, not the most comfortable surface to be lying on. Her hand was too unstable so Harrison didn't try standing up, so he lay down on her massive palm, resting on his elbows propped behind him.

Carefully keeping her hand balanced, Jessica stood to her full towering height. Harrison could see the huge doorway in the distance and as Jessica started walking, each step she took shook her two travelers. In her hand at stomach height, Harrison couldn't help but notice her breasts jiggle behind her blouse as she walked. Her boobs dwarfed him completely and Harrison couldn't wrap his mind around their size. It was a good thing he was so beat-up and exhausted, he thought, or else he would have certainly enjoyed the view a little too much.

Jessica carved a path of destruction through the town, bulldozing buildings out of her way with the simple steps of her heels. With just a few strides she's covered the distance to the door. Twisting the handle she pulled it open and sure enough stepped into the plain hallway of VERSA's side space. Harrison felt relief wash over him. “Thank fucking God,” he heard Rich say aloud.

They were out of the hellish plaza infinity world, but they were still tiny compared to Jessica. Harrison laughed inside when he realized their fate was literally in her hands. It was too perfect. What a surreal day, he finally thought.

Jessica couldn't hear them unless she brought her hand close to her face, but that didn't stop her from narrating what she saw to her little friends. “Huh interesting,” she said, “all these doors have the number eighty-four stenciled on them. It looks like we're in a different section of VERSA now.”

She started down the hallway looking at all the green doors. “A lot of these don't have words on them...” she noticed. “Let's see, this one says 'TUNDRA-Eighty-four,' nope, no thanks.... this one says 'CAVE-Eigthy-four,' eww no.... hmm this one says 'GLACIER-Eighty-four,' hard pass....” she kept reading off random doors that did not sound appealing to explore at all.

“'TWILIGHT-Eigthy-four?' Huh what's this one.” She turned the doorknob and pushed the door open. Harrison peered over her fingers to glimpse the new world. Sure enough it was mostly dark, but he could make out an open landscape dotted with trees. But instead of a clear sky he saw abundant lights floating up above, lights that were not stars but...

“Are those buildings?” Jessica exclaimed. “Floating?!”

Sure enough, monumental structures that seemed to defy gravity hung silently above in the sky. Lights, whether electric or something else, burned steady in their windows.

Rich scooted up on Jessica's hand next to Harrison. “This must be one of the boffo worlds Sujay was talking about, where VERSA just didn't get it quite right,” he surmised.

“It's beautiful,” Harrison admitted.

Suddenly Jessica took a step back and pulled the door closed. They were back in the hallway. “Not going in there!” Jessica said. Well, that settled that.

A few minutes later, Jessica struck gold and found a door entitled “ORCHARD-84.”

“Oh we're definitely going in here,” she said, flinging the door open. She stepped into exactly what Harrison expected, a mature orchard baking under a golden, late-afternoon sun. Without even worrying, Jessica let the door close behind her. Harrison couldn't see what kind of structure the door was attached to as Jessica began walking down a path between two lines of trees. The trees were the right size for Jessica, but looked dizzyingly large from Harrison's diminutive size.

Jessica walked up to a tree. She reached out her right hand and grabbed at a piece of fruit. Harrison felt relieved that it looked like an apple. Once plucked, Jessica held it up to the men. “Do you think this would work?” she asked.

“It's worth a try!” Rich yelled up to her.

“Um ok, lemme try to break you off a piece.”

She quickly realized she's need both her hands. “Let me set you two down,” she said, crouching and laying her hand on the dirt. Harrison and Rich staggered off and watched her in awe as she stood back to her full height. Standing next to one of her giant high heel shoes, Harrison felt overwhelmed by her presence and the power she held over them. Though he was grateful for her benevolence, at that moment he realized how badly he wanted to get out of VERSA.

“Here,” Jessica said, bending over and placing a small piece of the apple next to the tiny men. The chunk was still incredibly large to both Harrison and Rich.

“Here goes nothing,” Rich said. He braced himself on the piece and pushed his head into it, taking a bite of its juicy flesh. He looked up at Harrison, chewing, and Harrison saw his eyes roll back as he collapsed to the ground. But he never made it all the way down. Watching Rich's avatar blip out of existence was the best thing Harrison had seen all day. Without even looking back up at Jessica, he dove into the piece and eagerly took a bite.

 

 

Chapter 5 by Q-Writer

Chapter 5:

(Posted: January 23)

 

To say Rich was angry would have been an understatement. Watching his temper and mouth explode in the control room, Harrison thought Rich looked like a bull with its balls caught in a bear trap. At the present moment, Rich was howling and furiously cussing out some poor tech Harrison had never met. Ernie was conspicuously absent from the dark room and Kevin was gone too. According to the timer in his stall when he'd woken up, they'd only been in VERSA for 21 minutes of real time, yet they'd come back to a much different room.

The two uniformed men that usually guarded the control room rushed in to confront Rich. In anger, Rich hadn't even bothered to put his shoes back on, instead leaping from his stall upon de-sim to figure out what happened while they'd been battered around in VERSA. Sure, Harrison was unhappy too, but Rich was a much more authentic bad cop then Harrison would ever be.

“Where in the fuck is Ms. Bright?!” Rich roared. The men confronting him looked like security and certainly struggled to calm him down. “And why in living hell did we not get pulled out sooner?!! Was this a set-up or some shit? The DoD is going to sanction your asses when I tell them what crock of bullshit SunCorp is cooking up in here!”

Sujay appeared behind the security officers and started talking down Rich. As they argued, Harrison looked down at his own body in awe. His clothes, practically destroyed in the sim, were clean and still creased now that he'd returned to the real world. His aching body in VERSA yielded to his fit and healthy self once he woke up. It was a relief, but an incredibly strange feeling to experience. His mind though, having gone through a few hours of stress and calamity, lagged behind everything else. Mentally he felt exhausted. He just wanted to take a nap now.

Harrison saw Jessica stumble out of her stall to watch the drama unfold in front of her with big, bewildered eyes. Even with her heels on, she was still noticeably shorter than Harrison, but having spent so much time looking up at her, his mind tried reconciling her actual height. The few hours he'd been in VERSA had scrambled his sense of reality, and he had to tell himself again that Jessica was actually a petite woman, not a giantess.

Finally Vanessa stormed into the room with a entourage of serious looking techs and administrators. Rich shut up for a moment. Vanessa's usual friendly and professional attitude had been stripped away and she spoke in a stern, no-nonsense tone.

“Mr. Colgate, I am deeply sorry about what happened to you and your colleagues during the simulation this afternoon,” she said, sounding more hostile than apologetic. “I take full responsibility for the conduct of my employees and the distress you faced inside the sim.”

“What the hell is going on Ms. Bright?!” Rich cried out, exasperated.

“Mr. Cho unexpectedly de-simmed only a few seconds after going in,” Vanessa explained. “Mentally, he was not doing well, so Mr. James left to get help and we instead dealt with the crisis at hand. I've been told your neurological vitals in the sim appeared safe and your heart rates remained at acceptable levels, so there was no reason to immediately de-sim.”

“What happened to Kevin?” Harrison asked, stepping up.

“He's fine now, Mr. Burr,” Vanessa replied. “Honestly, he's just a bit shook up. I sent him home.”

“Why'd you leave us in the sim all that time?” Rich asked. He was trying to cool down but still talked through clenched teeth.

“Again my apologies Mr. Colgate,” Vanessa quickly responded. “It was an oversight by Mr. James, he should have de-simmed you once the situation stabilized, but he failed to do so. As of a few minutes ago, he no longer works for SunCorp.”

Well that was a shock, Harrison thought. They just straight-up fired Ernie for not pulling them out. It'd be interesting to see now what the rest of their trip would be like.

“Mr. Colgate, Mr. Burr,” Vanessa said. She looked over Harrison's shoulder. “And Ms. Hampton. On behalf of SunCorp I am terribly sorry for anything you may have experienced while in VERSA, especially without one of our techs to guide you. Please, why don't you three come with me and Mr. Rajeev and we can debrief in a better environment.”

After Rich put on his shoes they reluctantly followed her. The next few hours were spent in a conference room recalling their ordeal, Sujay seemingly fascinated by their story while Vanessa tried conducting damage control with their emotions. Rich was still pretty angry but at least he wasn't yelling anymore. He still made a few veiled threats about writing a scathing report to the Secretary of Defense though.

At one point Sujay asked Jessica, “So you grew, at one point, without a code?”

Jessica looked confused. “What do you mean?”

“You said you found a box and pulled a level and it caused a size change within VERSA?”

“Uh... yeah?” she responded, trying to remember exactly.

“But you didn't say anything? You didn't utter a command?”

“No I just turned a crank on this jack-in-the-box thing.”

Sujay looked at Vanessa. He seemed perplexed. Harrison detected a hint of concern.

“What?” Rich asked, also confused.

Sujay took a breath. “That shouldn't have been possible,” he finally admitted. “All the change-keys in VERSA, you know, the things that change your size so you can access the side space, are activated by a pilot entering a command. On a regular computer it's something you'd type in, but in VERSA it's something we programmed a verbal command to active.”

“But she didn't say anything?” Rich clarified.

“Look, we've created a lot of change-keys throughout VERSA,” Sujay continued, “books, levers, buttons, whatever. But they're programming devices designed for users, like admin tools. VERSA creating them from scratch?... that's above VERSA's software capability. VERSA creates a lot of things at random as it learns from pilot memories, endlessly spooling to create new worlds and a more realistic experience. But to make a change-key...”

Harrison leaned forward and unconsciously lowered his voice. “Are you saying that the box Jessica used, VERSA made at random?”

Sujay seemed to be looking for the right words. “I'm not sure,” he finally admitted.

Jessica cut in next. “Wait, but VERSA made all those apples.” She pointed at Harrison and Rich. “They said you told them that you originally made apples so VERSA would copy them, eventually improvising new and abundant ways to de-sim from it. Right?”

“Well we intended the out-keys to be plentiful,” Sujay said. “We wanted them to appear frequently, but subtly, throughout many worlds in VERSA. The fact that it started with apples and that VERSA kind of ran with it in other types of fruits is a lot different.” He sat up straight. “But VERSA should not be letting pilots change size without proper command inputs. I'm going to have to go through the code for that world and see what happened.”

Vanessa insisted that she didn't think it was a good idea they make another trip into VERSA. Rich and Harrison were already scheduled to tentatively leave tomorrow anyways. After some written statements and assurances that SunCorp would make it up to their guests, Rich and Harrison left in search of dinner. “You want to join us?” Rich asked Jessica. “We owe you a favor, for sure.”

“Sure... ok,” she replied. “Let me change first. I'm tired of wearing this damn skirt.”

 

After an uneventful dinner in an empty cafeteria full of awkward silences and terse conversation, Harrison found himself back in his dormitory. He switched into some sweatpants and a t-shirt and tried to get comfortable. Through the window he could see the sky darkening, not just from the sunset but from storm clouds taking over the sky. The lab had shut down for the evening and nearly all the staff had gone home. Rich and him had agreed they'd head to the airport tomorrow; Harrison couldn't wait to put VERSA behind them. He'd been into his report for well over an hour when suddenly an unexpected knock at his door made him jump. He figured it was Rich again with his bottle of scotch, so he opened the door without much thought.

He was startled to see it was not Rich but in fact Kat, the odd computer engineer he'd met earlier. She was in her wheelchair and wore a serious look on her face. Harrison felt self-conscious he wasn't in his business attire, but Kat's own casual dress and demeanor quickly put it out of his mind. Clad simply in pants and a t-shirt, she looked behind him to see if he was alone. Once she checked his room, she looked up at him.

“What're you doing here?” Harrison asked, trying not to be rude but still very surprised by her presence. Though it occurred to him she might live in the same building, he couldn't guess why she wanted to bother him.

Kat put her finger up to her lips, the universal sign for silence. “Follow me,” she whispered. Harrison followed her into the hallway and out of the dormitory building as her wheelchair motored along in front of him. After opening the building's door for her, Harrison followed her down a short ramp and around to the back of the building near the perimeter fence of the lab. It was a relatively hidden and remote spot. Only the lonely trees on the other side of the fence could see and hear them now.

“Um, Katherine, what's going on?” he finally asked, beyond confused and a little annoyed.

“For the tenth time,” she said in her regular, curt tone, “I go by Kat.”

“Ok... Kat. Sorry.” Harrison apologized. “What's up? Why are you here. Why are we outside??”

“Kevin Cho is dead,” she said bluntly.

“WHAT?!” Harrison yelled out.

“Shhh, keep it down,” said Kat discreetly. “They bugged your rooms and I don't want anyone else to find us out here.”

“How's Kevin dead??” Harrison asked desperately. “VERSA can't kill people!”

“It can,” Kat said calmly. “Well, at least, we discovered that today.” Harrison found her present coolness disturbing, but at least she seemed somewhat in control.

Harrison sputtered, trying to think of something to say, but her news stunned him. Kat kept talking. “I happened to be on my way to the control room to drop in on you right as Kevin de-simmed. I ran into Sujay a few minutes after it happened. He told me when Kevin came back his vitals were going nuts. Ernie had raced into his stall but he was stroking out. This kind of thing's never happened before. Sujay wasn't sure if Kevin's heart exploded or he had a brain aneurysm or something.” She paused, then looked up at Harrison. “They didn't pull you out of VERSA because they needed to get him out of there, to cover it up. They fired Ernie to cover their story too. I'm sure he's being compensated to stay quiet,” she mused out loud.

Again, Harrison felt a loss for words. This woman he'd just met today suddenly came to him with this bombshell about a global technology company conspiring to cover-up a workplace death...

“Why are you telling me all this?” Harrison finally stammered. “You know I'm going to have to report this.”

“No, you won't,” Kat told him. Harrison was taken aback by her arrogant response. This woman was no bullshit, apparently. “There's too much at stake.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

Kat eyed him down, skeptically. “You don't know? The government is licking their lips over VERSA. They can't wait to get their hands on it from us. Vanessa knows this and is intent on pushing it forward as soon as possible. That's why you and your buddies are here way before it's ready. But it's not ready. Not even close.”

“What are you saying?” Harrison said, folding his arms and trying to cool down his temper. His mind swam uncontrollably.

“VERSA is going to be big,” began Kat. “You know that, I know that... I built it after all. It's going to change the world. It's going to put the U.S. light years ahead of everyone else. The Russians are going to try copying it, the Chinese are going to try hacking it; both our enemies and our allies are going to try to steal it. It's going to be a security shit-show when it becomes public.”

She locked eyes with Harrison. “You and your friend from the Department of Defense were sent here to look at it for sure, but neither of you are very consequential. The other girl with you was something unforeseen on SunCorp's end, but didn't change anything. VERSA isn't a DoD issue really, or a military issue right now, it's a national security issue. We've been talking more to the FBI and the NSA in the last few years than anyone else, but they're still mostly in the dark on how powerful VERSA's become. Vanessa knows VERSA is dangerous and unproven. When your departments sent you out here they knew there would be an element of risk.”

Her words dropped on him like a ton of bricks. This was inconceivable. He couldn't decide if he believed her or not. She continued talking to him.

“Look VERSA is special, but it's not even really in beta yet. We've taught it to do a lot of things, given it an incredible mechanism to learn and create, but we're still years away from understanding what's going on inside of it. It's learning, fast. And evolving. SunCorp still thinks it holds all the puppet strings, but even right now VERSA is pushing its own limits in there.” She flipped her thumb in the direction of the building housing the control room.

“Why tell me all this? What am I going to write in my report?” Harrison asked. He realized he might have sounded like he was whining, but Kat didn't care.

“Would you be willing to go back into VERSA one more time?” The seriousness on Kat's face instantly told Harrison she wasn't joking with him.

Her question was another punch in his gut. He certainly hadn't expected that. But her query gripped him. It'd be mad to go back in, he reasoned, the program was unstable and unpredictable. Yet there was something else, something he couldn't quite reconcile. He'd never experienced anything like being in VERSA before. It was a literal dreamland where anything was possible. He could do anything, be anyone. If nothing else, for the sake of his job he should see as much of it as he could. He been beaten up by the sim so far, but inside his heart he was smitten with the experience. VERSA called to something deep inside of him, promising adventure and discovery. It was a hard offer to pass up.

“Why?” he finally asked her.

Kat sighed, and leaned back in her wheelchair. “I want to go in. Spend some real time in VERSA. I haven't been able to go in for weeks now and I want try to get to the bottom of what's going on. But I can't go alone. That's too dangerous.”

“Well, when would we even do that?” Harrison asked incredulously.

“Tonight,” she said flatly.

“Tonight?!” Harrison exclaimed. “Are you crazy?”

“It's perfect,” Kat said calmly. “The lab is pretty much deserted and we'd have the whole night to be in VERSA. That's days in sim-time.”

“This is insane,” Harrison said, taking a step away from her and trying to process everything. He looked up past the trees at the blackening sky. He could see a few stars begin to twinkle, but they were on the verge of being swallowed up by the coming thunderheads. It was going rain tonight. A storm was coming. “Damn, I don't know,” he finally admitted.

Suddenly they both heard a noise coming from around the corner. Harrison glanced over quickly as a figure emerged from around the building. “What are you doing out here?” Jessica asked him. Through the dusky light, Harrison could see she was dressed casually in black yoga pants and a gray sweatshirt.

She'd caught them both by surprise. He wasn't sure what to do. Kat quickly motioned her over. “I'm Kat, nice to meet you ma'am,” she said. Jessica walked over tentatively and shook her hand.

“Jessica...” she responded. “Who are you?”

“I'm one of the creators of VERSA,” Kat said. “I can't claim the whole thing but I did a lot of the important work on it.”

“What are you doing out here?” Harrison asked Jessica defensively.

Jessica pointed at a nearby window indignantly. “That's my room right there! I could hear your voices. What's this all about anyways?”

“Kevin's dead,” Kat simply replied.

Harrison felt a little better about himself when Jessica had the same ballistic reaction to the news. Kat talked her though it and reassured her it was SunCorp's fault, not her own. Next she unfolded her plan for Jessica. It only took a few minutes of conversation before the two women got along rather well. Harrison silently watched them both as he leaned against the dorm building.

After hearing Kat talk about her revolving theories of VERSA, Jessica asked her, “So let me get something straight. The guys told me you haven't programmed people into VERSA yet, right?”

“You mean, like bots? Artificial humans? Non-pilot controlled?” Kat asked.

“Sure, yes, that.”

“Well, we're working at it,” Kat responded, “but we've hardly passed square one. We don't even have anything yet that looks or acts like a normal person would. We have hollow shells.”

“And VERSA can't make people itself?” Jessica asked.

“No, no way,” Kat said confidently. “Maybe one day, but VERSA's still learning so much about itself.”

Jessica went silent, thinking. She looked at Harrison. “What?” he asked, genuinely confused. Jessica took a breath.

“Ok, so earlier when we were in the orchard,” she started saying slowly. “You and Rich were tiny and you ate the piece of the apple I gave you. After you were both gone I took a second before I took a bite myself. Something caught my eye down one of the orchard rows. I turned my head, and it went behind a tree quickly and I couldn't be a hundred percent sure what it was but.... I think I saw a person.”

 

A little after 9 o'clock that night, Harrison found himself sitting in a chair in the control room, watching Kat start to set up their entry into VERSA. He still had no idea what any of the computers in the dark room really did, but Kat seemed to be furiously typing away at one of them.

After Jessica's revelation, which Kat could hardly believe but only further reinforced her desire to sneak into VERSA, they'd decided to recruit Rich. After dragging him outside and explaining everything, Rich asked, “After everything that already happened today, you want me to go back into VERSA? No fucking way.”

His answer had been disappointing, but Harrison was not at all surprised that Rich currently sat in a chair next to him. Ultimately, the Defense liaison wasn't going to let Harrison from Energy and Jessica from the Senate have all the glory and fun ambling through VERSA. Like Harrison's aversion to wanting to go back into VERSA, the thrill of discovery eventually outweighed the negatives. Everyone wanted to see more of this technology. Despite this, Rich sat with his arms crossed looking pouty.

“Ok,” Kat said, wheeling back from her computer. “I've set us up in Stalls Five, Six, Seven, and Eight. I'll have to put you three in first, and then I'll go in last.”

“Wait, who's going to be our Tower?” Harrison asked. It was just the four of them in the control room right now. The entire complex was deserted-- even the guards who stood vigil by the control room's door went home in the evening. Past all the guard towers and fences surrounding the site, the actual lab had very little internal security. Sure, there were cameras everywhere, but Kat explained they only recorded footage and weren't monitored live. She could change the tapes later. They had the entire night to themselves.

“Pff, we don't need a Tower,” Kat said, brushing him off. “That's just something they do for safety.”

“Shit,” Rich muttered under his breath.

“Ok Jessica, you take Five,” Kat directed. “Harrison you go Six and Rich you'll be in Seven.”

Jessica looked at Kat awkwardly for a second. “Won't you need... like help or something? Getting into the chair-thing?”

Kat deflected instantly. “I'll be fine. There's no other way anyways.”

In the meantime Harrison had walked into Stall Six, removed his shoes and lay down on the waterchair. After sending Jessica off, Kat did her best to wheel in to his stall. She could barely reach the helmet to lower it onto Harrison. He heard her fiddling around with it as his world went dark.

“Wait, what about the vitals monitor?” Harrison asked from under the helmet.

“No need, who's going to be checking it?” Kat replied. “Alright I started your timer, you're good to go. Sweet dreams.”

And for the second time that day, Harrison's mind faded out into oblivion.

 

 

Chapter 6 by Q-Writer
Author's Notes:

Hey everyone,

This is the final chapter of the story that features no giantess content, so if you've been patient enough to keep reading, you're about to be rewarded!

Chapter 6:

(Posted: January 26)

 

He was looking out a window over an infinite ocean. Through the glass pane and reflected in the dazzling sunlight, he could see his ghostly reflection staring back at him. He wore the same white t-shirt and sweatpants he'd gone into the sim with. Peering at his reflection, he saw a tired man staring back at him. His earlier time in VERSA had made this day feel much longer that it actually was, and if he'd been in the real world right now he'd have been in bed. Harrison mulled it all over; he shouldn't be doing this right now, he should be sleeping. Could you even sleep while in VERSA? He didn't know the answer to that and so many other questions about this new reality.

He stood on a concrete floor in a room that was surrounded by floor-to-ceiling glass walls on all four sides. Far below him in every direction he could see an endless expanse of water that stretched out to the horizon. He couldn't tell if the room was suspended in the air or part of a building, but the ceiling was concrete too, with a few bland lights affixed to it. But they weren't needed as the sun beat down proudly through a clear sky. The room felt like a glass box, but at least it came furnished with couches and chairs like the other entry room he'd seen.

Jessica stood across the room, gathering her bearings and adjusting to the brightness coming in from outside. Harrison caught her attention. “At least this room has a view,” he said. She gave him a tired smile.

Harrison moved to one of the couches as Rich's body suddenly appeared near another glass wall. This time he'd ditched the safari outfit and wore just his regular khakis and shirt. When he came to his senses he stared out the window, sighed deeply, and said to no one, “Fuck this place.”

“How are we supposed to get out of this room?” Jessica asked, coming over to Harrison and sitting on an adjacent couch. “There's no door. We're trapped in this box!”

It occurred to Harrison that she was right. He started speculating out loud. “Do you think this might have been some kind of trap?”

“What, so they can kill us?” Rich said, turning to the two. “Fuck if I know.” He exuded the type of disdainful apathy only a grumpy middle-aged white man could perfect.

As the three waited for Kat to come in, Harrison tried taking stock of everything in their room, which turned out to be not much. Three red couches, two pairs of chairs, a coffee table, and two end tables. The floor was plain gray tiled concrete, but off to one corner one tile was mysteriously painted red. As he grew bored, he spent a few minutes watching the ocean far below them. There must have been a breeze outside; he could see small whitecaps form sporadically on the glassy water.

“Well look at this,” Rich said, hunched over one of the end tables. He'd pulled open a drawer, and out of it lifted a red book. “I bet this bad boy is our ticket out of here.”

Before they could decide what to do with it, Kat suddenly appeared in the room. She quickly oriented herself and said “Sorry I took so long.”

Though she wore her glasses and her same clothes, for the first time Harrison and the others saw her standing on her legs. Still the same person, the three of them now beheld Kat without the wheelchair. VERSA seemed to turn everything upside down.

“Don't need these anymore,” Kat said to herself, taking off her glasses and tossing them carelessly onto the floor. They clacked away, immediately forgotten. Well, now she really looked different, Harrison thought.

“How're you going to see?” Jessica asked, surprised.

“There's no bad eyesight in VERSA,” Kat explained, without really explaining. She looked at Rich holding the book. “I see you already found our change-key Rich. I'll take that.” She bounded across the room and snatched the book out of his hand. Rich looked a bit surprised, maybe from her boldness, or maybe from they fact that she seemed so capable on her legs.

Now standing, Harrison could tell Kat wasn't a very big woman. She was short and skinny, shorter than Jessica by a few inches he guessed. She wasn't unattractive, though certainly not a natural beauty like Jessica, but she bore the attitude of a person who spent her life unnoticed by most others. Her confidence in herself, on the other hand, had not withered under the inattention.

“Alright, over here everyone,” she instructed, signaling them to come to a corner of the room. They all slowly stood and walked over to her. “Come in close,” she affirmed.

Curious but obedient, everyone huddled together. At his feet Harrison spotted the red tile. He suddenly had a vision of where this was all going. Kat began flipping through the book, then stopped at a page. Her voice, when she spoke, was all business.

“Spoke Seventeen, grant access to Pilot Five, Pilot Six, Pilot Seven, and Pilot Eight. Execute.”

As expected, the group suddenly shrank. When Harrison recovered, his floor was the red tile. He realized quickly he wasn't just small; he was really small. Not microscopic, but close. Maybe ant-size. Definitely the smallest he'd ever been. The concrete floor, which once looked smooth, now looked horribly scarred and pockmarked like the surface of the moon. To close the distance between himself and the others he'd have to not just walk but climb in some places too. At least he could faintly see his colleagues in the distance.

As he started walking toward some indeterminate spot halfway between everyone, he couldn't even process the rest of the room around him, it was simply too big. The furniture was a range of mountains and the ceiling was simply sky, or maybe outer space. The red book that Kat had just dropped was an insurmountable mesa off to his left.

The group of four miniature humans eventually drew closer to each other. Harrison could clearly make out Kat, who'd stopped walking and was now bent over trying to grab something on the ground. He got even closer and realized she was tugging on a handle of some sort. Before he could get over to help her, she yanked it up on her own and he realized she'd just opened a hatch in the floor. He gathered around it as Rich and Jessica arrived.

“Are you kidding me?” said Rich, peering down.

Below the aperture of the hatch, a smooth ramp led down into an abyss. “Yeah, it's a slide,” Kat said. “Who's going first?” Her question was met with silence. “Ok fine,” she said, stepping over. “Don't keep me waiting too long.”

She dropped down feet first and within a second was gone. The slide didn't look dangerously steep, but Kat had accelerated away quickly.

Rich looked at Jessica and gestured his hand. “Ladies first?” he said with a grin. Jessica rolled her eyes but managed a smile.

“Hey if you're too chicken Rich, I'll do it,” she said confidently. She stepped over the hatch, paused, and then dropped in. As she disappeared, Harrison and Rich heard her start screaming.

“Well it looks fun,” Harrison quipped. “You better not land on me at the bottom,” he told Rich. And with that he jumped down into the slide as well.

He started going fast, real fast. The slide felt more like a tube with high-sloping walls cradling his back. But he couldn't see any of this because the ride was pitch black. He could hear the echoes of Jessica screaming in the distance. She was either terrified or enjoying herself. Or both.

Harrison tried guessing the slope of the slide as he whizzed through who-knew-where, but it kept twisting and turning and doubling back on itself. The ride was actually quite fun once you got used to it, and the material he slid on felt slick and didn't catch, tear, or chafe his clothes either. He couldn't figure out what it was made out of, but it really didn't matter because none of it was real.

After a short time a small light appeared up ahead, first dim but then growing brighter. In an instant he shot out into a bright room, tumbling into a pit of pliant, soft foam bricks. Recovering from his voyage, he flailed around in the tank until he could find an edge to climb out. He saw Kat and Jessica standing nearby. A moment later, Rich came tumbling out of the pipe too.

Harrison instantly noticed the room was a part of VERSA's side space. White walls, linoleum floor, completely plain and nondescript in every aspect of appearance. At one end of the room a hallway formed, and peering down it Harrison saw the usual infinity of green doors.

“Did everyone have fun?” Kat asked dryly.

“One hell of a way to make an entrance,” Rich commented, grunting and climbing out of the pit.

“Follow me,” said Kat, abruptly turning and heading down the hallway. The other three lagged behind at first but caught up to her.

“Kat, now that we're in, can you tell us what exactly we're doing tonight?” Harrison asked.

Kat intently looked at each door she passed. “Yeah, let me find a certain world and I'll explain everything,” she replied. She seemed irritated he'd try bothering her while she was focusing.

Harrison noticed some of these doors had names stenciled onto them, but now with the postscript “17” which he figured referred to whatever spoke of VERSA they were in. Trying to think back on it, he realized he had no idea how many spokes VERSA had. The scope of this program was stunning.

“Here it is,” Kat said. She opened a door that said “EQUIPMENT-17.”

“What world is this?” asked Harrison.

“My favorite world,” Kat said, smiling. “I made this one myself.”

It wasn't so much a world but a room, about the size of a warehouse. Stacked full of boxes and racks of clothes off to the left, on the right the room sported all kinds of tools and firearms neatly mounted on racks, beaming shiny and new.

“Holy shit...” Rich's voice trailed off.

“This is a staging room I made for journeys into VERSA, to prepare for exploring and interacting with the sim. You were supposed to visit one of these with Kevin so he could eventually demonstrate the physics engine that we built...” She caught Jessica's eye, who had just been reminded of what she did earlier that day. Kat didn't finish her sentence.

“I was right!” Rich said, looking at all the guns. “You guys really did rip off The Matrix.” Kat responded to him with a scowl.

The four of them fanned out into the room like kids in a toy shop on Christmas, but Harrison still had little idea what they were supposed to prepare for.

“Ok so what's up?” he asked, spinning around to face Kat. “What are we really doing in here tonight?”

Kat stopped walking and turned to him. Casually, she pushed a strand of her black hair out of her face. With a sigh she started speaking.

“I can't remember exactly when I saw it, but about a month or two ago I found a world in VERSA that shouldn't be there,” she began. “Well, actually, I never went in it, but I remember seeing the door in the side space. Honestly, my memory of it is a little fuzzy, but I'm pretty sure I remember how to get there. I've done a lot of exploration of VERSA in my time, especially on the outer edges, investigating new worlds VERSA spooled out and marking most of them for deletion later. But this door was different and felt... familiar?”

Rich and Jessica were now listening too. Kat noticed. “Look, if what Jessica said is true about seeing a person, I have no idea what VERSA is conjuring up now. We always had a fear that maybe one day VERSA might start outpacing what we tried programming into it. And now that Kevin's dead it makes me really wonder what's been cooking in these worlds for the last few weeks. It's been a while since I've last been in, and even longer since I went deep into the newer edges.”

“Wait, but what was the door you saw?” Rich asked.

“Oh yeah, the door.” Kat said, remembering. “The door said 'DOS PALOS-One-fifty-three'.”

“That's Leo Starr's house!” Harrison exclaimed.

“Yeah I know,” Kat answered. “I have no clue what's behind that door. I wonder if it might be something Leo added personally and hid in a remote part of VERSA. But now I'm wondering if he's really ok. Maybe he put it there so I'd find it and come looking. I'm worried about him.” She stopped speaking for a moment, her attention drifting off. Harrison could sense her fondness for her boss in the way she spoke of him.

Kat snapped out of her daydream and continued. “Normally I'd just ask him myself, to see if he programmed it in there, but even I haven't personally spoken to him in months. If I could visit him up the mountain I would, but SunCorp security won't let anyone up that road anymore. They say he's just reclusive, but I know he's too gregarious to shut out his friends like that. Whatever is going on in Dos Palos these days is weird.” She pursed her lips. “Really weird.”

“Wait, doesn't his daughter live up there too?” Harrison said, trying to remember what he'd been told. “Does she know anything?”

“You mean Claire? She's a dumb bitch,” Kat sneered. “She doesn't know anything about VERSA but thinks she's an expert. She comes down the mountain every so often to meddle in our work and say her dad is real proud of us, but if anything she's part of the problem.” Sighing in annoyance, Kat looked away for a moment and stared out into rest of the warehouse.

“Ok let's gear up,” she finally instructed. “Let's fill a couple of those small duffel bags over there with stuff like knives, rope, anything else useful that might help us in a pinch. Everyone should grab a sidearm and holster too, we need to be prepared for anything. Throw some ammo in the bags too, some worlds in VERSA aren't always the friendliest.”

Jump-started by her orders, Rich immediately went to work getting things organized. Harrison and Jessica cautiously followed him.

In the meantime, Kat grabbed a bag and walked over to a crate. She lifted the lid off and grabbed a couple things out of it. She held them up for everyone to see.

“Out-keys for whenever we want to leave,” she said, showing off some apples. “I'll pack five just in case we lose one.” Harrison watched her slip them into a bag, but then he noticed something else. Kat tried to be furtive about it, but he spied her take a small black book out of the box too and stuff it deep in the bottom of her bag.

Looking back at the task at hand, Harrison didn't really know where to start. So like any man, he wandered over to the firearms first. Everything from pistols to automatic rifles lined the racks that sprawled down the length of the room. There were hundreds of guns in all shapes and sizes. He tentatively picked up a small pistol. He'd never shot a gun before.

“You want that one?” Rich asked him. He'd somehow snuck up behind him.

“Um, I don't know really...” Harrison sheepishly admitted.

“That's a bitch gun,” Rich bluntly told him. He took it from Harrison and put it back on the rack. He grabbed another one. “This is your gun. Glock, nine millimeter. FBI, Navy Seals, SAS, and cops everywhere get boners for this gun. It's yours,” he said, dropping it into Harrison's hands.

“Thanks...” Harrison said, flinching. “How do you know all this?”

Rich had started turning away, but he looked back. “Kid, how else do you think you get to work for the Pentagon testing out new weapons?”

“Oh.”

“And I was in the army for five years, but whatever,” Rich added, finally walking away.

 

The four of them packed up three bags. Kat instructed them to take some of the dry food they found along with energy drinks and water to stay awake and hydrated. If they were in VERSA for a long amount of simulated time, they would eventually experience natural body functions like hunger, drowsiness, and unfortunately the need to go to the bathroom too.

Kat insisted everyone take a firearm, so Harrison put on a holster with his Glock in it while Kat also took a pistol. Rich instructed Harrison where to find the safety on his Glock while Jessica professed that she wouldn't use a gun under any circumstances. After a tense conversation, Kat acknowledged giving her a gun might do more harm than good in a firefight. Maybe to compensate, Rich slung an M4 rifle over his shoulder and threw a couple MP5 submachine guns into one of their bags, along with a few boxes of ammunition and extra clips for all the guns.

“Last thing before we go,” Kat said, surveying the squad. “Make sure you're comfortable in your clothes. There's stuff on the racks over there if you want to look through it and get ideas, but there's a wardrobe there that'll change you into whatever you want.” Three confused faces stared back at her.

“If you interact with one of these,” Kat continued to explain as she opened the doors to the large cabinet, “VERSA can change your appearance, much like when you first enter the sim. I'll show you.”

Kat stepped completely into the large box and closed the double-doors on the front of it, sealing herself inside. Once they sounded shut, she flung them open again and stepped back into the room wearing a completely different outfit. She wore hiking boots, jean shorts that showed off her legs, and a small short-sleeved flannel shirt. Taking a hair tie off her wrist, she put her hair up in a ponytail. “See?”

“Damn that's cool,” Rich commented.

“How does it work?” Jessica asked, stepping forward.

“Just put an imagine of what you want to wear in your mind when the doors close,” Kat said. “VERSA fills in the rest. It's not exact, but it's good enough.”

“Alright, let me try,” Jessica said, stepping into the cabinet. She closed the doors, waited a couple seconds, then opened them up. Harrison practically gasped when she stepped out in a formal dress, lacey and white. Around her neck hung a beautiful diamond necklace, and it even looked like her face had makeup on it now.

“Um...” Kat started to say.

“Oh I just wanted to test it,” Jessica explained, laughing. “Lemme change into something better.” She slipped back inside.

Jessica returned wearing a tight white t-shirt that did a very good job highlighting the shape of her breasts. Below it, her exposed midriff showed off her bellybutton and taut stomach. She wore skinny jeans on her legs and finally tennis shoes on her feet. Unlike Kat, she let her blond hair down.

“Better,” Kat said.

“Wow, it even worked on my nails too!” Jessica noticed in awe, looking at her fingertips which VERSA had painted bright red.

Harrison used the wardrobe next and changed into jeans. Kat was right, it was surprisingly easy to use. He felt his consciousness blip out for a moment in the darkness as VERSA re-clad him. Unsurprisingly, Rich couldn't be convinced to get into the wardrobe.

Kat showed the other three a wristwatch she's picked up in the room. “I'm setting the stopwatch on this so we have a frame of reference for time,” she explained. The time of day didn't matter while in VERSA, but Harrison surmised how easy it would be to lose track of the passage of time back in the real world.

“If it's about nine-thirty p.m. back home,” Kat started speculating, “depending on how long the time flows here in VERSA, until four-thirty a.m. which should be our drop-dead bail-out time... I'd say we have between forty-eight to seventy-eight hours in here, roughly.

Figuring it was his time to say something, Harrison said, “Kat, I think I speak for the other two when I admit we're all really tired from today. We've all been awake longer than normal from being in VERSA for a few hours earlier. Are we going to have a chance to catch a little sleep at some point?”

Kat pursed her lips, her sign of annoyance. She thought for a moment then answered, “Yes... um, I know a place we can get to soon. But I'm only giving you guys five hours.”

“Ok then,” Harrison agreed.

“After that, no more naps and I'm making you all drink energy drinks,” Kat said. “Let's roll out.”

 

Walking through the side space of VERSA, Harrison, Rich, and Jessica followed Kat to an unknown destination. The duffel bags they'd packed were small enough to carry over one shoulder, but unfortunately weighed quite a bit. Kat took the bag with the apples, Harrison took another with supplies, and Rich carried the last bag with the extra guns while he slung his rifle over his other shoulder. After a few minutes, Harrison heard Rich breathing heavily; the guy may have been in the army, but that was a long time ago now.

After zig-zagging through the nightmare of corridors, Kat stopped them at a peculiar door painted bright orange instead of green. “This way,” she motioned them through. They walked into an abjectly dismal subway station, just a dirty room with a platform and an empty track. The sign on the wall read “Station 17,” and the cracked and stained concrete walls had been covered in illegible graffiti. The whole place smelled like urine and garbage. A few lights suspended from the ceiling struggled to illuminate the squalor.

“Wow, is this world supposed to be New York City in the eighties?” Rich joked.

“Wait here a minute on the platform,” Kat instructed. “We need to get around VERSA fast.”

Sure enough, about a minute later, the sound of an incoming train echoed through the tunnel. And right on cue, a dirty subway train rolled into the station and stopped. Its doors jerked open and the four packed on board the same empty car.

Much like the condition of the station, the car was old and stained, filled with ripped seats and questionable odors. Affixed to one wall was a map of the system, but it was blank, save for one orange dot in the middle labeled “Station 17.”

“Does this go anywhere?” Harrison said, observing the map.

“Yes, excuse me,” Kat said to him, stepping in front of the map. Below it was a simple button and intercom labeled “In Case of Emergency.”

Kat pressed the button and spoke into the intercom, “Spoke One-twenty-one, grant access to Pilot Five, Pilot Six, Pilot Seven, and Pilot Eight. Execute.” She clicked off the intercom.

With a chime the lights in the car flashed and the doors rolled closed. Harrison looked at the blank map again. Materializing before his eyes, an orange line snaked out from the “Station 17” dot and connected to a new dot labeled “Station 121.” The car lurched forward.

The train began accelerating until it finally plunged into a dark tunnel. Rich said to Kat “You're telling me with all the billions of dollars SunCorp has poured into this project, this dumpy subway is the best thing you could make to connect everything together in VERSA?”

Kat shrugged her shoulders. “Leo wanted it this way.” Everyone looked at her skeptically. “What? He's an odd guy,” she added defensively.

It wasn't very long until the train slowed down and pulled into a new but equally depressing station. “Ok this is how close we can get on this thing. I know a few worlds we can cut through to get to Spoke One-fifty-three,” Kat explained. They hauled themselves out of the car and over to a door on the far end of the platform that was once orange but had been desecrated by what looked like years of dirt and graffiti. Sure enough though, when it opened Harrison glimpsed another endless hallway of green doors.

Searching through the hallway, Kat finally found a door that read “BAYOU-121.” Opening it and passing through, the door led them into a cozy wooden room that resembled a ramshackle cabin. Stuffed with a few chairs, a rusted bicycle, netting hanging from the ceiling, and fishing paraphernalia all over the place, the abode really looked like it could have been right out of the Mississippi delta. The pitch-black of night crept into the room through some windows, but it was held at bay by a few dim, cozy oil lamps.

“Let's rest here,” Kat said. “I'll set an alarm on my watch and wake you all up. Check the other rooms, I think there's a bedroom or two in here. And also the couches right here.”

Jessica opened a door along one wall and peered into a bedroom. “This is hardly a bed,” she said, disappointed. A busted mattress with straw sticking out of it rested haphazardly on the floor.

“Whoever built this place was really on a budget,” Rich laughed, surveying the rustic shack. Harrison found it strange to think that the place had so much character but lacked an occupant. With so many decorations strewn across the walls and floor, it really looked like someone called it home.

He kicked off his shoes and laid down on a couch. Just lying down and resting his eyes felt wonderful. Immediately he knew that even with the oil lamps burning, he would easily fall asleep. As Kat surveyed the house, Harrison propped his head up on a ragged pillow and drifted into sleep. The house soon grew quiet, and within minutes the only sounds of the night came from the croaking frogs and chirping insects of the strange bayou beyond.

 

 

Chapter 7 by Q-Writer

Chapter 7:

(Posted: February 1)

 

 

“Harrison wake up!” Kat whispered in his face. He opened his eyes, still half asleep. Kat's intense countenance greeted him, contorted by worry.

“What? What?” he said groggily.

Kat shushed him. “Listen...”

Harrison took a breath as Kat leaned back to give him room. He sat up on the couch, finding someone had thrown a small blanket over him. What was she talking about?

“Um what is-” he started to say, but Kat shushed him again. So instead he tried to listen. The cabin was silent but the world outside the walls was alive with nature. An orchestra of unknown creatures buzzed and croaked and made all sorts of primordial noise. And then he heard it. Music.

Specifically the sound of someone playing an instrument, maybe a banjo. It was very faint, but the notes slowly tingled together. As he focused on it, it really did sound like someone was slowly playing a song.

“You hear it now?” Kat asked, still whispering. Harrison nodded. “I have never heard any music in VERSA before,” she muttered. An ominous feeling crept into Harrison: something was wrong.

“I'm waking the others,” she said, walking off.

“How long's it been?” Harrison called after her.

“Four and a half hours,” she replied. “Long enough.”

“Shouldn't we at least wait until the sun comes up?” Harrison pleaded.

Kat laughed and turned back to him. “The sun doesn't come up in this world. It's always night in here,” she casually replied.

Kat roused Jessica and Rich from their dreams and started getting their gear ready to go. After having them listen for the music, Jessica asked, “What's it even like outside? Are we walking there?”

“No, we're taking the boat,” Kat said. “Out that door,” she pointed. “Rich, help me load the bags.”

The door led out to a deck made from warped, uneven boards, and down to a lonely lamp lighting a small dock that jutted out into a murky river. The real light came from the star-filled sky above, and Harrison could make out the far bank of the river, the trees there silhouetted by the glowing sky. This river was wide. And very dark. Alongside the dock he could barely see a small boat with an outboard motor.

Jessica walked out the door into the night, saw the boat, and immediately balked. “We're going in that?!”

“Yeah,” Kat said, nonplussed. “Hey Rich, that bag you have?” she gestured at him. “Should be a couple flashlights in there. Get 'em out.”

Rich made an impressed face and looked for the flashlights. Kat went back into the house and Rich whispered to Harrison, “That woman sure knows how to give orders. It's bringing me back to my army days.” Through the lamplight Harrison could make out a bemused grin on Rich's face.

After loading the bags and convincing Jessica to get onto the boat, Rich started the motor and the boat slowly moved out from the dock into the abyss. Holding all four of them, the boat felt cramped and anyone who moved shifted it enough to threaten flipping it over. Harrison pushed the thought out of his mind; he didn't want to wonder what VERSA had created to lurk in the mysterious waters below them.

The motor was loud, so once they reached the middle of the river, Kat had Rich kill it so she could listen for the music. Once the river went silent, they all caught the sound of lazy notes drifting through the air. “That way,” Kat pointed into the darkness. Harrison couldn't tell if the direction was up-river or down-river; everything was too dark and the river hardly seemed to move at all.

Cutting across the black highway, their boat powered along the river and around a bend, then down another unlit section. Harrison was just starting to wonder how they'd even find where the music was coming from until the boat turned a long corner and suddenly in the distance they saw a light. A lighted house, to be precise. It sat out above the water on the banks of the river, supported by long piles and lit with more oil lamps. Built in the same style as the dump they'd just spent a few hours in, it looked like a blue-collar sportsman's paradise. In its decrepit state, it also looked just moments away from collapsing into the inky river.

As the craft pulled in closer, they began making out some details. On the deck Harrison glimpsed a shadowy figure sitting in a chair. Even through the darkness and low lighting, it was certainly a person. Harrison assumed it was a man. It looked like he wore some kind of straw hat and sure enough, he cradled a banjo in his arms.

Their approach to the house wasn't stealthy in the slightest, nor was it meant to be. The figure spotted them from quite a distance away, rose from its chair, and entered into the house, moving and flickering like a shadow in the low lighting.

Harrison decided to watch Kat to see how she was reacting. She looked very concerned. The boat pulled up close to a small dock attached to the deck of the house and Rich killed the engine. Though the house had windows, nothing could be seen within. It was then Harrison noticed that Kat had unholstered her pistol.

“Ok, Rich,” Kat addressed him in a hushed tone. “You stay on the dock with your rifle and keep the boat hot in case we need to get out of here in a hurry.” She eyed Harrison and Jessica. “You two, come with me into the house. We need to see what's going on.”

Neither Harrison nor Jessica wanted to follow Kat, but they couldn't decide how to protest.

Finally Harrison said, “Kat, where's the next side space door we're looking for? Can't we just go there?”

Kat had stepped out of the boat onto the dock, her eyes fixed on the house. “The door?” she said. “The next door I want to go through...” she paused, worried. Then she pointed at the house. “It's in there.”

“Oh fuck,” Rich blurted out. It was definitely an oh fuck moment.

“C'mon!” Kat said. Harrison and Jessica scrambled out of the boat while Rich steadied it by placing a foot on the dock. He wasn't going to tie it up. Getting steady himself, he unslung his rifle and held it carefully in one hand.

Kat crept up to the door of the house, her pistol still in her hand. Harrison and Jessica stayed back, both competing to stay behind the other. Carefully, Kat put a hand on the doorknob and turned it, allowing the door to slowly creak inward. In that tense moment, Kat swiftly stepped through. Overcoming fright, Harrison carefully followed her inside while Jessica remained in the doorway and peered in.

This cabin was furnished like the other shack they'd been in: equipment and gear piled up among old pieces of furniture. A solitary oil lamp hung suspended from the rafters above, casting a flickering glow over the cluttered room. On the far side of the room, two figures sat in dusty rocking chairs.

On the left sat the figure from the deck, banjo laying at his feet. He wore faded blue overalls with a fraying hat perched on his head. The man's old beard covered his chest while the shadows cast by his wide hat obscured his face. A pipe stuck out over his gnarled chin as he slowly puffed it, giving the room the aroma of pungent tobacco.

“I knew you'd come this way, Katherine,” the other figure spoke calmly. Harrison looked at the woman sitting on the right. He immediately thought her face looked strikingly like Vanessa, though younger and slightly thinner. She had black hair that tumbled down her shoulders like a curtain of darkness. In contrast, her skin shone pale and white, almost albino. Clad in a revealing black dress and black leather high-heeled boots that matched her hair, she came from a completely different world than her dingy friend alongside her. Harrison also couldn't help but notice the generous size of this new woman's breasts. She was beautiful in an eerie, ethereal way.

Kat raised her gun and pointed it at the woman. “Who are you?” she asked sternly.

The mysterious woman was in no hurry and reacted slowly. She gestured over her shoulder to the wall behind her. “Trying to go in there?” she asked Kat. “I've always wondered what's behind those doors.” Harrison looked past her and saw down by the floor a tiny green door, maybe a foot tall. Rich hadn't been kidding earlier, VERSA really was some Alice in Wonderland kind of thing.

This woman wasn't going to throw Kat off-balance. “I said who are you!?” Kat asked her again, louder and more forcefully. Harrison hoped Kat's aggressive tone came from an abundance of confidence, not nervousness.

The woman in black raised a smug eyebrow at Kat. “Now, that's not a nice way to treat someone you've just met,” she said casually. “I know exactly who you are Katherine, but perhaps it's only fitting that you don't know me.” She turned to the man smoking the pipe. “You can go now, thank you,” she said dismissively.

He rose out of his rocking chair and Harrison was finally able to see his face. It was old and wizened. The man looked past him and saw Jessica. “Good to see ya again Jess,” he said quietly, with a grin on his face. He walked toward the back of the room and exited out a full-sized door into a different part of the house.

Behind Harrison, Jessica's face melted into pure horror. It was as if a dire force had sucked everything good out of her, leaving her jaw hopelessly agape. For a second, Harrison feared she might faint. Despite this, Kat was undeterred.

“What do you want from me?” Kat asked the woman in black, gritting her teeth. Though she gripped her pistol tight enough to turn her knuckles white, her hand hardly shook. She was cool and steady, but the tension in the room was skyrocketing.

“What do I want?” the woman in black answered, amused. “You came to me!”

“Cut the bullshit lady,” Kat spat back. “What's going on in VERSA? Are you behind all this?”

The woman in black paused, considering her options. Then she rose from her chair. Kat cautiously took a step back. Harrison's hand rested on his pistol but he didn't want to pull it out, and a part of him didn't even think using it on this woman would do much. An undefinable evil radiated from this strange woman's presence.

Full of curiosity, the woman in black spoke to them, “I am not like you... I've sensed for some time that there's something different about you and I. You're like the other interlopers I've seen. You appear out of nowhere and then disappear just as fast, leaving nothing but ripples in your absence. Where do you go when I cannot see you?” An uneasy silence permeated the room. The woman seemed to be considering her options. “Are you gods or cockroaches?” she finally asked, excitedly. “If you're going to keep running through my world with cold hearts, I'm certainly not going to make it easy. Let's play a little game!”

Harrison's gut dropped out of his belly, or at least it felt that way. It took him a moment to realize he was shrinking again. In a blink it was over, and he stood an inch or so tall. Befuddled, shocked, and hopelessly confused, his mind raced to explain what was happening. Had this woman shrunk them? How was that possible?

Completely disoriented, he realized quickly that his hand still rested on his gun. But looking around, he knew it was useless. The room, as expected, was huge. In the distance across the floorboards he spotted Kat adjusting to her new size too. He didn't bother looking for Jessica, but he noticed the woman in black towering ominously before him. A wicked grin covered her face as she stood over them triumphantly with her hands on her hips. She exuded power and cruelty, along with sinister femininity too. She was beautiful and massive: a dangerous combination.

“Let's see how powerful you really are,” the woman said smugly, chiding her shrunken captives. One of her gigantic boots stepped forward, causing a loud boom that absolutely terrified Harrison. Off in the distance to his right he saw a low bookshelf stuffed with books, boxes, papers, and other knickknacks. A small gap, just about his size, separated the bookshelf from the floor. He started running.

Harrison didn't bother watching the woman in black, but he couldn't ignore the sound of her steps. Her boots made a tremendous noise as they crossed the floor, her soles booming while her heels clicked on the wooden boards. Harrison selfishly hoped her fixation with Kat would buy him enough time to hide.

“Aww, you don't want to play?” she said, her voice playful and arrogant. “Katherine, this is what you came for right? You don't like my world anymore?”

As Harrison neared the bookshelf, a cacophony of noise erupted in the cabin. Everything above him started exploding. Suddenly shards of glass and pieces of wood rained down around him, one small piece knocking him to his side. He hit the floor and covered his head.

A moment later when the explosions ceased, he looked around to try understanding what had just happened. To his surprise, he could not see the woman in black anywhere in the room. Was she hiding? Could someone that big hide? He rose to his feet awkwardly but chose not to continue to the bookcase.

He could see the entire floor of the cabin was now covered in pieces of debris roughly the same size as him. Looking up, he noticed broken windows and holes in the walls. They must have been bullet holes. Only one person could have done that.

Right on cue, full-sized Rich walked through the open doorway of the cabin, pushing aside the remains of the chewed-up door. He clutched his rifle in his right hand, the barrel still smoking.

“Hey guys?” he called out. “What the fuck is going on in here?!” He started looking around the empty cabin, then started scanning the floor. “You guys are shrunk, I'm going to find you,” he stated confidently.

What great timing, Harrison thought. Slowly, Rich scanned the ground, first locating Jessica near the door, then Kat in the middle of the room. Rich did his best to lay flat to the ground to hear what Kat had to say to him, then pushed himself up and abruptly exited the cabin. A half-minute later he returned with one of the bags. Throwing it on a nearby table, he rooted around in it until he produced the black book that Harrison had seen Kat slip into the bag earlier. He opened it, flipped through some pages, then laid it down open next to Kat's diminutive body. Harrison could see Kat climb on to it, and then a moment later Kat's body expanded until she stood at her regular size again.

“Thanks,” Kat said to him. She stepped off the book and picked it up. She spoke into the page “Increase Pilot Five to one hundred percent, increase Pilot Six to one hundred percent. Execute.” And just as he expected it to happen, Harrison exploded upwards and found himself at his normal height.

“Jesus Christ Rich, you saved us!” Harrison immediately thanked him.

“What the hell is going on?!” Jessica screamed, still very distressed.

“Ok, Ok,” Kat said, trying to reassure her. “We're safe, she's gone.”

“Who's gone?” Rich asked.

“Oh boy, how to explain...” Kat said to herself.

“I was watching you the whole time,” Rich explained, “Well, Jessica mostly because she was standing in the doorway. I figured you found something and I heard you talking, but it didn't seem right, especially with that man in there. When I saw Jessica shrink I figured I might as well spray the place and come running just in case something bad was happening.”

“Rich I owe you a drink when this is all over,” said Harrison humbly. “That was good thinking on your part.”

Rich looked at him. “Thank you!” he agreed emphatically. Then he turned to Kat. “But who the hell are you talking about?”

“Kat, that woman knew you!” Jessica cried out.

“That man knew you!” Harrison reminded her.

“That was my grandpa!” Jessica screamed back. She stumbled backward, landed on the floor, and crumpled into a heap and started crying.

“What??” Harrison and Rich said simultaneously. Harrison dropped to a knee to try comforting Jessica.

“Hey Jessica, it's ok, we're ok...” he started rambling. He really didn't know what to say.

Jessica fought through tears to keep taking. “He died when I was a kid, I knew him a long time ago. But he was there! That was him!” Her sobbing continued. Harrison looked up to see Kat standing alone, staring off into the distance, thinking.

Harrison stood. “Ok Kat, for real. What the fuck is going on?” he asked her bluntly.

“I... I don't know!” she stammered. Harrison could finally tell she was frustrated. Kat turned around to face them. Jessica still sobbed on the floor but she was slowly regaining control of herself.

“Ok I don't know who that woman was, but she's not a pilot,” Kat finally said. “She's something VERSA made, but I don't know what. She's sentient, for sure. VERSA's evolved leaps and bounds in the last few weeks. More than I ever thought possible.”

Rich stepped forward. “There was a woman in here too? Where did she go?”

“She disappeared when you started shooting,” Kat said. “Completely de-materialized, like she was de-simming.”

“Well, what did she want?” Rich continued.

“I don't know,” Kat admitted. “She said something about cockroaches... and gods. She was talking about us.” She stopped to think. “I think VERSA is starting to understand what it is. A program, maybe. But a world. She called these 'her worlds.' In its own context, it might see itself as a god. But I'm not sure. That woman shrunk us, without a change-key. It's very aware of how all this works.” She looked up at Harrison and Rich. “I wouldn't characterize this as a good development,” she admitted.

“Well fuck, now what?” Rich asked.

“Jessica,” Harrison said, turning back to her on the floor. “That man was your grandfather?”

“Yeah,” she said between tears, “his name was Ray... he lived in Georgia. He died when I was in sixth grade. How was he here?” She was genuinely confused, but she wasn't alone. Everyone instinctually looked at Kat.

“Look, I'm way out of my league on this,” she said, putting her hands up. “But I'm guessing that VERSA did this for a reason. We designed it to learn from peoples' memories and build worlds with the knowledge it gleaned from them. I think it's taken the leap from building places to building people.” The room was silent. The implications were tangible, but Kat clarified. “It knew Jessica was in here. And it wanted us to come to meet this woman dressed in black. But it definitely took Jessica's memory of her grandfather and ran with it.”

“Are you suggesting we might start seeing more people we know?” Harrison asked. “That woman in black did vaguely resemble Vanessa Bright...”

“Yeah, she kinda did. And maybe,” Kat guessed. She changed the subject. “Let's get into the side space. I'm hoping it's safer in there. Guys, get the gear from the boat.”

Harrison and Rich slowly went back outside and found the boat drifting close enough to the dock that they could reach out and pull it in. They took the two remaining bags out of it and brought them back into the house. Upon return, Jessica was back on her feet, still bleary-eyed, and Kat had her bag over shoulder, black book in hand.

“That book's a change-key?” Harrison asked.

“Fast learner,” Kat said with a smile. She opened to the book. “Reduce Pilot Five to ten percent, reduce Pilot Six to ten percent, and reduce Pilot Seven to ten percent. Execute.” Harrison once again shrank to the ground, his body betraying his brain and disorienting him. He looked around from his shrunken stature and felt relief when he realized he wasn't as small as before. And surprisingly, the bag he'd been holding shrunk along with him. But Kat hadn't reduced herself, she still towered over them. Harrison stood barely taller than her boot, Though it was his largest shrunken size yet, without a doubt Kat could easily crush him if she wanted to.

Kat looked at her tiny colleagues and then back to the side space door on the wall. “Too small,” she muttered. “Um....reduce Pilot Eight to twenty percent, execute,” she said into the book. And she shrunk.

But when she stopped at her new height, she stood well above the others. Harrison started walking towards her and quickly saw he only came up to about her waist. She must have been about twelve feet tall to him.

“Hey, why do you get to be taller?” Rich asked, joshing her.

“Just follow me,” Kat said, impatiently. She put the book back into her bag, both of which had also shrunk with her. Pausing a moment, Kat undid her ponytail and let her black hair fall onto her shoulders.

Satisfied with her hair, Kat led them through the green door into VERSA's side space, though she had to stoop because she was still too tall for the doorway and hallway.

Harrison felt like a child following his mother around as she led them down yet another corridor of green doors. Though it made no sense, he felt reassured by her stature, as if it made everything a little safer. Kat, usually the shortest in the group, stood twice their height. Her pert ass was at his eye level, and Harrison tried not to watch it too long. He admitted to himself that she looked rather sexy in her tight jean shorts, but he didn't want Jessica to notice him staring. He set his mind to other thoughts, but it was difficult.

His reverie was interrupted by Jessica tapping on his shoulder behind him. He turned around, red-faced and feeling guilty. But from first glace he could easily tell she hadn't noticed him ogling Kat's body. Her face remained morose, her eyes downcast.

“Hey, what's up?” Harrison asked her, trying to be upbeat.

“I'm still thinking about what just happened,” she admitted, “and I don't get it.”

“Uh, don't get what?”

“That woman,” she began, “who isn't real because she's a program or something, shrunk us to kill us. But she didn't kill us... she was playing with us until Rich came.” Jessica finally made eye contact with Harrison. “Why?”

“What do you mean?”

“Like, why mess with us like that?” Jessica tried clarifying. “She could have easily shrunken Rich too, but didn't. The woman is a computer. Computers are rational, efficient. They don't play games.” She paused to think. “I just don't get it.”

It made Harrison think too. If something inside VERSA wanted to kill them, especially something that could alter their size at will, it should have already had many good chances to do it. Before Jessica's point, he'd assumed the woman in black was some evil script running within trillions of lines of code that had been programmed to kill. Now he wasn't so sure what her motives were. It was disconcerting.

“Ok, we have two choices,” Kat said, stopping in the hallway and taking a knee. She looked over her colleagues in a commanding pose. “There are two worlds that can get us to the next side space. One's a city and one's a snow world.”

“City,” Rich said immediately.

“Yeah I'm with Rich,” Harrison agreed.

Kat smiled knowingly. “I thought you'd think that.” And then Harrison noticed they were standing in front of a door that read “BOULEVARD-139.” Kat's tone shifted as she became more serious.

“We're on the edge of VERSA,” she said bluntly. “These worlds around us are one hundred percent VERSA created with basically no input from SunCorp's programmers. Sure, we try exploring them occasionally and mark the truly wacky worlds for deletion, but there's an element of randomness in all of them. Don't get disoriented inside.” She stood up in a crouch and faced the door. If she could have stood to full height, her eyes would have looked well over the door frame, while Harrison could barely see over the doorknob.

Kat opened the door and ducked inside while her three smaller companions followed her like little ducklings.

 

After walking into a hallway and hearing the door close shut behind them, the group came out around a stack boxes and found themselves in the back of restaurant. A diner, to be precise. To the left was the counter and on the right side were the booths. At the far end of the room there was a door and a large glass window out which a wide city street could be seen outside. They were certainly downtown, but the diner felt out of a different era, maybe the 1950's or 1960's. Yet Kat certainly didn't lie when she said these worlds could be strange, she just hadn't known had right she would be. The diner was full of people.

Occupying the booths and bar stools and even working behind the counter were men, dressed differently for their roles. Some looked like grubby waiters while others wore suits and hats. None of the men looked up or noticed Harrison and his wrongly-sized colleagues. Instead the men continued eating, reading the newspaper, doing crosswords, and taking orders at the counter. The din of the room and the smell wafting from the kitchen gave the scene an authentic and homey feel. It made Harrison's stomach growl, and he realized he wanted to eat something soon.

But as he started observing these people, Harrison quickly saw that they were all the same man, just copied out about dozen times or so. This man was handsome and clean shaven, black haired with a well-defined jaw and movie star eyes. He looked so perfect and masculine he could have been pulled off a poster or out of an Ayn Rand novel. But none of these people were supposed to exist! What was going on here? Since the bayou where they'd encountered their first two non-pilots, things had really escalated quickly.

One of the men sitting at the counter turned in his chair to light a cigarette. As the flame from his lighter flicked on and he brought it near his mouth, the man looked up and made eye contact with the pilots. He froze, but his stoic look betrayed no emotion.

And then, one by one, the other men in the diner stopped what they were doing and looked at Harrison and his colleagues. The room went awkwardly silent. Moments passed as the two groups stared each other down, wondering who would say something first or make the opening move. Finally, one of the men behind the counter reached under the cash register and pulled out a wooden baseball bat. He slapped it menacingly into his palm, never breaking eye contact with the new arrivals. The rest of the diner remained at a trigger hair's pull from leaping out of their seats and attacking.

“Well shit,” Kat finally said into the silence.

The diner rushed them.

 

 

Chapter 8 by Q-Writer

Chapter 8:

(Posted: February 4)

 

 

 

It's amazing, Harrison recalled later when he thought back on that diner, how many things can happen in such a short span of time. As all the men bolted from their seats, his immediate relief was that Kat stood between him and the assailants. Although she easily stood a few feet taller than the men in the diner, there was only one of her. And a lot of them.

Kat's duffel bag slid from her left shoulder as her right hand reached for her pistol. Harrison's first reaction was to turn around and head back to the door leading to the side space. He bolted past a stunned Jessica and an angry Rich who was taking his rifle off his shoulder. It occurred to Harrison that even though the three of them were considerably smaller than they should have been, maybe around four feet tall in this world, the miniature bullets coming from Rich's gun would still hurt quite a bit.

Harrison retreated back behind the boxes to open the green door. At his reduced stature, to twist the doorknob he had to drop his bag and wrap both of his hands around it. But try as he might, he could not get the doorknob to turn. Once again, VERSA had somehow locked them out.

Raucous crashing rocked Harrison back to the present situation in the diner. Though he couldn't see from behind the boxes, he heard the fight begin. Kat had kicked the first man who charged her with her large boot, throwing him backward into two more men. From behind her, small Rich began firing his rifle at one of the men hopping over the counter. Red spots suddenly bloomed from his white apron as he crashed down to the floor.

Kat's pistol, now raised in front of her face, boomed with its first shots. The over-sized bullets, well over their original caliber in this world, tore through a hapless man's torso. His chest exploded and he unceremoniously fell to the floor. Running back up to his companions, Harrison caught a glimpse of the man's demise and concluded he must be dead, or whatever death's equivalent was for these things they were fighting.

As Rich and Kat's guns shot up the room, it became evident that while Kat's bullets could easily destroy these men, Rich's bullets only injured and slowed them down. As Kat started reloading her gun, Rich adjusted his strategy and began aiming for their heads. As the battle unfolded, this tactic proved much more deadly.

The baseball bat man pushed one of his bullet-filled patrons aside and lunged at Kat. He swung the bat at her head and she reacted swiftly, deflecting it with her left arm. Crashing into her, the man's momentum caused Kat to fall backward, her gun flying out of her hand. Jessica, who'd been standing right behind her, quickly dove out of the way.

Fighting the man on top of her, Kat grappled him with her large body, holding back his arms and trying to twist him off of her. Harrison saw his chance to help and dove onto the man too. Fighting the large woman below him and now a small man on top of him, the attacker had no chance of winning.

Rich still shot away at the rest of the diner, but even with his short, controlled bursts, his gun finally ran out of ammo. His duffel next to him had extra clips in it, but as he reached in to grab another, a man in a suit dove at him and wrestled him down to the floor, easily overpowering him. Though Rich was shorter by a couple feet, he still put up quite a struggle.

At the same time, Kat flung her attacker off, sending the man and Harrison to the floor. Harrison leaped up to confront the beaten man, but before the bully could make another move, Kat viciously kicked him in the gut with her boot. The man stopped moving and closed his eyes, but he, like the other men, never showed any visible signs of pain. As more died, there were no screams or yells. Whether winning or losing, they all silently attacked.

Kat took a long stride over to Rich and pulled his assailant off of him, easily tossing the man to the side. As another man came at her she punched him in the chest, sending him reeling back. Rich hastily reloaded his rifle and quickly began firing again.

Harrison felt somewhat useless behind Kat and Rich, who were pretty much doing all the work. So he finally decided to unholster his pistol and try using it. He flipped off the safety like Rich had showed him and pointed it toward the room.

Spotting a man trying to recover from one of Kat's bone-shattering punches, Harrison stretched his arm, aimed, and pulled the trigger. The gun bucked in his hand, startling him. He hadn't hit his target. But now knowing what to expect from the recoil and vowing not to be surprised again, Harrison took another shot. And when his gun went off, a bloodstain began to form on the man's torso.

Harrison shot him a few more times before trying to make sense of the chaos around him. He saw another man coming at them, fired a more shots at him, then as the slide clicked back realized he'd ran out of ammo. Shit. He didn't have another clip in his pocket.

Just as he tried coming up with a solution, Rich's firing stopped. Harrison looked up and saw an absolutely wrecked diner. Bar stools and bodies were everywhere, the mirrors on the wall had been smashed, and the front window was completely gone. But they'd killed or seriously wounded everyone.

“We gotta get out of here now,” Kat proclaimed, turning back toward the side space door.

“It's locked!” Harrison called out to her, but she had to see it for herself. He tossed his useless gun to the floor.

“Dammit!” she said after she tried to open it. She slammed a large fist into the door.

“Well if we can't retreat, we have to go through it,” Rich said. Not only had he been stuffing his pockets with more clips for his rifle, he'd also taken out one of the submachine guns and slung it over his shoulder too.

“Where's the next door?” Harrison asked Kat, who began scanning the front of the diner.

“It's about a half mile away,” she replied.

“Do you think VERSA made all these men to stop us?” Jessica asked.

“Probably,” Kat guessed. “I just can't believe it can make non-pilots now.” She was still in disbelief.

“Hey,” Rich called out, snapping Kat back to the diner, “any other way to get to the next door without just walking down the street?”

Kat thought for a moment. “No, don't think so,” she finally admitted.

“Oh shit,” Harrison cried, spotting movement outside. Their battle had finally caught the rest of this world's attention. A few figures resembling the same man were appearing in the street.

“Oh fuck, get ready,” Rich said, bringing his rifle up to fire.

“No, let's get out of here instead!” Kat suggested.

She took off towards the street, black hair flowing behind her, racing to get out of the diner before the next group closed in. None of them could hope to match her long legs and big strides. Rich grabbed his bag and tried to keep up with her at his reduced size while Jessica scrambled after him. Harrison was about to grab his bag when he realized in her haste, Kat had left her duffel. Her duffel contained the apples and the black book!

“Kat wait!” he called out, but she was already in the street. If he could have, he would have grabbed her over-sized bag, but it was much too large and much too heavy for his small body to carry. With no time to think, he made a choice. Scrambling, he unzipped the bag and grabbed the black book. It looked comically huge in his hands, but he could carry it under his arm. He bolted out of the diner to meet up with the rest of the group.

Stepping onto the sidewalk, Harrison saw a world dominated by art deco skyscrapers that rose up from a large street devoid of vehicles. It reminded him of midtown Manhattan. At ground level the storefronts and signs displayed words written in English, but arranged in no coherent or grammatical order. VERSA was learning.

Harrison watched Kat, who was standing in the middle of the street, kick a man square in the gut. He staggered back and keeled over from the brute force of her boot. But around them more men started appearing, coming onto the street as individuals but slowly forming into packs as they briskly walked closer. Rich, standing next to one of Kat's legs, held his rifle out with a submachine gun over one shoulder and his bag over the other. But he hadn't starting shooting yet, perhaps realizing he would run out of bullets long before he could fell every man. Jessica huddled nearby, weaponless, staying close to Kat for safety. Their situation was looking dreadfully more hopeless by the second.

Eyeing all the clones of the exact same man beginning to surround them, Rich said up to Kat, “Ok, now you guys are really ripping off The Matrix!” Even under intense pressure, Rich never lost his angry sense of humor. Kat chose not to reply.

Knowing it was time, Harrison opened the black book, trying to cradle it in his arms. Balancing it while flipping to the right page, he nearly dropped it. But after turning through endless blank pages, he finally found the correct one containing those two simple words that granted him unlimited power: “ENTER COMMAND.”

Quickly, Harrison tried to remember which pilot he was. Was he six? Or five? He was pretty sure he was five or six. But as he tried to think about it, he noticed a man in a hat briskly walking up to him. The larger man already towered over him, glaring at Harrison with an emotionless yet menacing look. He had no time. Harrison shouted into the book first thing that came to mind.

“Enlarge Pilot Five to... one thousand percent!!” he blurted out. But nothing happened. What did he do wrong? Then it came to him. “Execute!” he yelled.

The next thing Harrison realized was that he was not Pilot Five. The man bearing down on him punched him in the chest, knocking him backward, the black book tumbling onto the sidewalk. Impacting the ground, Harrison's vision went blurry. He rolled onto his back quickly and held his arms out to protect himself.

Looking up and expecting to see the man standing over him, something else blocked out the sky above him. Jessica. He'd accidentally made her big instead! The man who'd punched him, now distracted by a much larger Jessica, mindlessly switched targets and began moving towards her. Harrison propped himself up on his elbows to survey the new scene.

Jessica was big, but not as huge as she's been yesterday. Judging by the windows on the buildings near her head, she looked about six stories tall. Kat, now standing between her legs and looking stunned, was about as tall as the length of one of Jessica's shoes. And Jessica's feet, still wearing the white tennis shoes she'd changed into in the equipment room, remained planted firmly in the street. Rich, still the same size as Harrison, only came up a little past her ankle.

She stood over the scene, shocked and surprised by her transformation. Harrison wasn't sure she'd even seen him with the book. But after taking a second to be awed by her new height, Jessica surveyed the street and furrowed her brow. These men had to be dealt with.

Jessica raised her right foot, now bigger than a regular person, and kicked one of the larger crowds of men. Her shoe, making contact with some of the men, easily knocked their bodies into the air. Though completely helpless in the diner, Jessica was now a force to be reckoned with in the street.

After seeing their comrades pathetically kicked aside by this young woman, the men in the street simultaneously stopped in their tracks and looked up at Jessica. Where a normal man would show fear or concern, these drones showed nothing. But it seemed like they were recalculating their strategy.

Suddenly, the men in the street lowered their gaze and focused it on the three smaller pilots. They readjusted their targets and started running towards them.

“Follow me!” Kat shouted, starting into a run down the street. As a few men tried to surround her, she delivered harsh punches and kicks to fend them off, with relative success. The reach of her arms and legs gave her an advantage over these shorter men, and she used it to her advantage.

Rich, on the other hand, had no such advantage, nor could his shorter legs keep up with Kat. To compensate, he fired his rifle when men got close to him, dropping them efficiently with head shots. He tried following Kat down the street this way.

Harrison, lacking a large body like Kat and a gun like Rich, could not punch or shoot any of the men. So he ran, as fast as his little legs would carry him, abandoning the over-sized black book on the sidewalk and hoping to catch up with Rich.

High above them, Jessica did her best to keep the attacking men away. Although she could easily kick swaths of them at a time, there were a lot of men. And she started to notice that some of the ones she'd knock down the street would get back up and silently run towards her friends again. So she changed tactics.

Running up next to Rich, who had briefly stopped to reload, Harrison nearly fell over as the ground shook and a loud boom reverberated through the street. Looking to his left, he saw one of Jessica's giant shoes smashed into the pavement of the road. She lifted her foot, and Harrison saw two bloody masses pulverized into the street, barely fitting under the shoe print. He looked up, following her jeans up to her white shirt and her enormous breasts heaving beneath the fabric. Jessica was pleased with herself, but not as pleased as Harrison was with her. He was certainly glad she was on their side.

She stomped again. This was fun, she thought, almost like stepping on bugs. She wished they'd been smaller so she could get more in one step. But she didn't like the sound the men made when her shoes squashed them. It was gross and kind of crunchy. Spying her colleagues down by her feet, she casually wondered what Harrison and Rich were thinking down below.

Harrison and Rich both remained in awe and terror at Jessica's destructive capabilities. Rich kept shooting and they both kept moving down the street, but it was hard to keep balance every time Jessica slammed one of her feet down.

“Oh shit!” Rich exclaimed. Harrison looked to see him pulling an empty clip out of his rifle. Men were closing in fast. Rich slung his rifle and grabbed for his submachine gun on his other shoulder. He pulled it in front of him and thumbed off the safety as Jessica's foot slammed down dangerously close to them. The impact threw them both off, and Rich's first few shots with the submachine gun when high above an approaching man.

The drone lunged into Rich, tackling him to the ground. Harrison ran over to kick the man, but another assailant appeared right next to him and threw a punch. It missed Harrison but he turned to block the man, and then felt his side erupt in pain as another man he hadn't seen landed a punch on him. The despair of defeat suddenly overcame Harrison; he was outnumbered in this fight. Wildly he threw a fist to his right, hoping to hit something. He could hear Rich yelling and exerting himself in his own struggle, which was also not going well.

All of a sudden, the ground dropped out from under Harrison. His brain's first reaction was that he was growing, but he noticed his legs dangling below him. Jessica had picked him up! He became conscious of the firm grip of her two fingers on his torso, the bright red paint of her nails confirming her presence.

“Do I have to do all the work?” she teased him hurriedly as she lifted him up. Harrison, scared of the height he dangled from, tried to figure out what was going on as the men who'd been beating him receded away. Jessica was considerably smaller this time around, as he noticed that even his reduced body was still longer than one of her fingers. As he rose higher, Harrison saw Rich's small figure pinched in her other hand.

Holding them both up to her face she smirked, amused by the situation. “Alright guys, you're staying with me now,” she informed them. “Let's find Kat.”

Rotating her hands, Jessica transitioned Harrison and Rich into her palms, cupping them so they could sit somewhat safely. Compared to the last time, their sizes took up much more of her hands and they had to be very careful not to fall off her upturned palms. Bringing her hands against her torso, Jessica did her best to hold them steady, lest her passengers fall off and down into the chaotic street below.

Harrison looked up and saw Jessica held him directly beneath one of her large breasts. Looking at the underside of her boob through her shirt, he became mesmerized by the sight. As she started walking down the street, her breasts bounced in an incredibly arousing way. Harrison couldn't have moved even if he had wanted to, but he felt extremely guilty leering at her from below. It didn't feel right. He tried watching what was happening below him instead, but he found it hard not to occasionally steal a glance back at her.

With no regard for the miniature men milling around her feet, Jessica calmly strolled down the street. She quickly caught up with Kat, who was desperately running and punching her way through an unlimited horde of men. Though Kat wasn't yet surrounded and could still fight her attackers one at a time, after so much action in the last few minutes she was starting to tire. Her hands hurt from defending herself and she had to take deeper and deeper breaths to stay physically capable.

Jessica, conversely, hardly exerted herself as she stepped on the hapless men that stood in her way. Stepping into a position over Kat, she did her best to stomp out the attackers closest to her friend. Kat gazed up when Jessica's shadow fell over her, relieved she finally had some help. Besides the booming noises Jessica made when she walked, the relative quiet allowed Kat to shout up to Jessica.

“Thanks Jessica!” she yelled up to the giantess. “We need to go down another block and turn right!”

“Ok,” Jessica replied, searching for new targets. “I'm holding Rich and Harrison, you keep running and I'll cover you!”

Harrison listened to all of this from Jessica's hand. If they got to the next door, how would Jessica ever fit? They were going to need to shrink her down at some point. He remembered the black book he left on the street a few blocks back. They should go back for it! Having it back in their possession would keep them all safe.

“Hey Jessica!” he shouted up to her. She didn't hear him, mostly because she wasn't listening. He needed to get her attention. Next he tried tapping her stomach, using enough force that she had notice to him, but she still failed to acknowledge him. Finally, in frustration, he did the last thing he could think of. He shakily rose to his feet, and steadying himself as he reached up, he hit the underside of her boob.

Jessica immediately pulled her hand away from her body to look at him. “Harrison!” she cried out in surprise. “What are you doing?!” Shocked and angry, she wrapped her hand around him, squeezing him in her fist.

“I couldn't get your attention any other way!” he explained defensively. “We need to go back for the book so we can change you back!”

“Change me back?” Jessica said indignantly. “What are you talking about?” She looked away to stomp on another man.

“How are we going to get you back to normal when we leave?” Harrison pleaded with her. “We need the book!” Jessica was listening but she wasn't looking at him, instead crushing more men around Kat.

He tried to argue more but she simply talked over him. “I can't just leave Kat,” she said tersely, focusing on the task at hand. It occurred to her she could try carrying all three of them, but she wasn't sure how well that would work. Plus, she liked this height. She felt safe.

“Jessica!” Harrison called out to her again. Trying to argue with a giantess wasn't his strong suit.

“Harrison,” she cut him off, “Maybe later, I'm getting you all to safety.” She turned her face to look at him. She looked mad. “Just shut up, I don't want to have to put you in my pocket.”

He was stunned by how casually she'd just threatened him. Though he hadn't meant to come off as combative, she clearly was not in a patient mood. Harrison had never seen her treat him, or anyone, with such a dismissive tone before. It might have been the current stress that made her talk down to him, but he wondered how much it might have to do with her current size. Instead of returning him to her gently cupped hand, Jessica kept him gripped in her fist.

Kat continued to move through the city, block by block, defended by Jessica. Harrison couldn't tell if the men had thinned out or if they'd simply outrun most of the crowd, but Jessica was doing less crushing now. Harrison, stuck in her fist, was swung around uncomfortably as Jessica naturally moved her arms as she walked. He started feeling a bit sick, but his adrenaline kept him alert to everything around him.

Finally Kat approached the door of a towering skyscraper that seemed even taller and wider than its neighbors. “It's this building!” Kat called up to Jessica.

“Ok, go inside,” Jessica instructed. “Rich, Harrison, you guys go in too,” she added as she lowered them both to the ground. Rich finally got to look at Harrison for the first time after witnessing Jessica scold him. He gave him a bemused look. Harrison rolled his eyes.

Harrison and Rich ran through the glass door as Kat held it open. Rich, fortunately, still had both of his guns and his bag. It was all the group had left from when they geared up just a few hours ago.

Looking around the interior of the building, Harrison could tell it was a lobby of some sort. Once both safely behind her, Kat blocked the door with her body. Some men were coming towards them in the street, but they were still a long distance away.

“Jessica!” Kat called up to her. “There's a change-key in here! We're going to take you with us!” She could see Jessica thoughtlessly stepping on another man.

“I'm going to barricade you three in so they can't get into the building while you search,” Jessica told her. “If you can't get me on your way out, just go on without me. I'll find a way out eventually.”

Harrison hated the sound of that, but he knew better than to argue with her now.

“How are you going to barricade the door?” Kat yelled up, confused.

Jessica knelt down and began untying a tennis shoe. As she slipped off the giant shoe, Kat realized her plan and ducked back into the building. The door closed inwards, and to prevent it from reopening, Jessica dropped her shoe right in front of it. She'd trapped them inside, their way out blocked by an immovable woman's shoe. Standing so close to it, Harrison immediately smelled its unpleasant, sweaty scent.

Through the glass door and over the top of the shoe, the three watched Jessica remove her other shoe and toss it to the side. Now wearing just a pair of socks, Jessica began kicking at the men who tried approaching the door. Some tried battling her specifically, but each one was easily crushed by her enormous feet.

“Ok, the door is on this level, technically,” Kat explained to the small men. “And we're going to need a change-key.”

“Yes ma'am,” Rich responded politely. Him and Harrison were in no position to argue with Kat, who not only knew VERSA infinitely better than them, but still stood nearly double their heights.

Hurriedly they moved through the lobby as the chandeliers in the building swayed with each of Jessica's footfalls outside.

“Oh wait!” Kat called out, remembering something. Harrison and Rich both paused, not knowing where to go without her. Kat bounded across the lobby and squeezed behind a reception counter. She rummaged around a few drawers until finding what she was looking for. She moved back out into the lobby holding a notepad. “Ok, now let's go,” she said.

The decorated style of the lobby quickly yielded to a more mundane aesthetic as they moved into the bowels of the building. Kat kept ducking her head as she was still too big for the regular size of this world. In one hallway, Kat ran past an unmarked metal door, then stopped. Harrison and Rich nearly slammed into her bare legs before they caught themselves too.

“Kat!” Rich exclaimed, trying to see what was going on. Kat's eyes went back to the door and she started thinking.

“Yeah, it's behind that door,” she said. She walked over the metal door. It was mounted to the wall on sliders, almost like a boxcar door. She grabbed the handle, which her hand absolutely dwarfed, and pulled it to the side.

It opened to a dark room. Kat ducked through the opening and the other two followed. Harrison couldn't see anything in the darkness, but from the echo this room must have been massive.

“I remember there's a light switch on the wall near the door somewhere.” Kat said, feeling around clumsily in the darkness. A few seconds later she found it and pulled the level. As the electric system kicked in, lights at the top of the room clanked on and started lighting up in succession down to the floor. The light was faint, but Harrison couldn't miss the green door against the wall. It must have been thirty stories tall.

“Holy crap,” Rich said. “Is this entire building just a big door on the inside?”

“Yeah pretty much,” Kat said, craning her neck to look up at the giant doorknob well out of reach. Like all the doors into the side space, this door clearly swung outward into their world. Opening it would destroy this entire building.

“Is that the change-key?” Harrison asked her, pointing to the notepad.

“You betcha,” she said happily, looking down at him. “You guys, get out of the way, hug the wall.”

“Uh oh,” Rich muttered, seeing where this was going. Him and Harrison started backing towards the wall. Kat pulled a pencil out of the spiral binding of the notepad and started scribbling. She paused, looked up at the towering door, did a silent calculation, then finished writing with a flourish. The moment she tore the page from the notepad, she grew.

Fortunately for Harrison and Rich, the interior of the building was truly cavernous. Kat instantaneously expanded into a dizzying proportion right in front of the two shocked men. Facing Harrison, her boot towered over him. He wasn't even as tall as the laces; her foot was the size of a house. If she were out of her boots, he wondered if he'd even be as big as one of her toes. Probably not, he concluded. It was the largest he'd ever seen anyone in the sim so far, even larger than Jessica the first time she accidentally didn't shrink.

To Harrison, Kat's body looked more like a force of nature than a woman who normally stood a little over five feet tall. His entire existence felt inconsequential next to this towering goddess, and the self-deprecating part of his brain wondered how he always ended up the small one. He looked for the notepad Kat used to grow herself, but it had disappeared somewhere under the immeasurable weight of her gargantuan feet.

In the real world, it absentmindedly occurred to him, physics would never allow for a creature this big. It just wasn't actually possible, the giant would collapse under its own weight. But here in VERSA, where all the rules were simply the limit of some programmer's imagination, anything was possible.

“Guys, this building is going to collapse when I open this door,” Kat informed them with a booming god-like voice from above. “I'm going to need to keep you both safe.” Before either of them could react, she squatted down and covered their minuscule bodies with her massive hands. To see her body suddenly drop into a crouching position terrified Harrison; it was like watching an avalanche descend upon him. Though one hand would have easily covered both Harrison and Rich, she used both.

As she crouched, her knees smashed through the side of the building, causing a structural chain reaction that made the entire skyscraper collapse around the green door. In the world under her protective hands, dust swirled up and both men started coughing profusely. The large pieces of the building and the resulting debris harmlessly fell around her protective hands, and as the smoke started to clear, Kat lifted her hands off of the miniature men.

The building was gone, completely replaced by the large green door now rising above the surrounding streets ruined with rubble. Looking up, Harrison saw daylight once again.

“Holy shit Kat!” he heard Jessica's voice. “You nearly killed me!” He heard her pause, then add, “Damn, you're huge!”

“Impressed?” Kat asked her with a smile. Harrison could hardly see Kat's face from so far away.

“Where are the guys?” he heard Jessica ask, still unable to see her over the rubble.

“Down by my feet, I'll carry them,” Kat offered. She peered down, looking for the ants near her boots. As her eyes glanced down on him, Harrison's brain screamed at him to run. Everything about Kat's size terrified him, she could kill him so easily. He knew she wouldn't try to, but even a small mistake could unwittingly end his life. Tiny creatures like him did not hang out around giants like her. That was simply how nature worked.

Her fingers, thick as tree trunks, reached down for him. Daintily, she plucked him off the ground and deposited him into the palm of her other hand. She grabbed Rich the same way, both men tumbling together in her giant, sweaty hand. Harrison tried recovering as she lifted her hand up. He must have only been about an inch tall to her. He felt pathetic.

“Guys, I'm putting you in here for safekeeping,” she told them. She wasn't giving them a choice. She opened up the left breast pocket of her flannel shirt and dumped them inside. Harrison and Rich fell down into the pocket, landing on top of one another. Harrison tried pushing himself up and orienting himself, but he found it difficult in the dark interior of her pocket. Rich's bag had smashed into him, hurting his ribs. Rich started grumbling obscenities.

Harrison started kicking a bit, trying to get untangled from Rich and his gear. Frustration quickly set in: frustration from his current trip into VERSA, frustration from being so helpless during this whole time, frustration from now being stuck in this woman's giant pocket... In the last twenty minutes he'd been manhandled by two women and beaten up by legions of the same man. He was not having fun and regretted indulging Kat's strange mission into VERSA.

“Hey cut it out in there!” he heard Kat say to him. “Stop it!... That tickles!” she giggled. Embarrassment washed over Harrison; he realized he'd been kicking her giant breast.

Back outside of the pocket, Kat towered over Jessica. The former giantess, now small, did not even reach Kat's knees. From Kat's perspective she could see over many of the city's buildings, though some of the taller ones still eclipsed her height. But she didn't care, she was now queen of this world. Too bad they were leaving, she thought.

“Ready to go?” she asked Jessica. Looking down she could still see swarms of men thronging the streets. Briefly, she wondered how many she could crush with one of her massive feet. But they were inconsequential now, they couldn't harm her.

“Um yeah,” Jessica called up to her, “But my shoes are gone, they're under the rubble somewhere.”

“Hmm,” Kat said, stroking her chin. “You know, we'll just have to get you some new ones soon. Want me to lift you over the rubble and through the door?”

“Sure, that'd be great,” acknowledged Jessica.

Before grabbing Jessica, Kat reached behind her and pulled the towering door open, which was now the perfect size. She pulled it through some of the building's rubble before it opened enough for her to fit through. Turning again, Kat reached down and picked Jessica up by her torso, using both hands to be safe. She walked through the door and into another hallway. Gently she placed Jessica down on the floor.

Still wearing her dirty, blood soaked socks, Jessica took them both off and flung them back through the door. “No use for those now,” she commented. Kat closed the door behind her and looked at the watch on her wrist. Her timer read six hours and seventeen minutes elapsed. She felt more movement on her breast as the men fidgeted around in the pocket. She smiled. They were making great time.

 

 

Chapter 9 by Q-Writer

Chapter 9:

(Posted: February 10)

 

 

 

“We need to get through one more world before we reach Spoke One-fifty-three,” Kat told Jessica as they walked through VERSA's side space. “Once we're in this world, it's going to be a long hike to the next door.”

“How long?” Jessica asked, trying to keep up with Kat. Even though Kat tried walking slow, practically shuffling her feet, Jessica, shin-sized and barefooted, had to hustle to keep up.

“Well, even at my size, it's going to be hours of hiking, maybe a whole day. We're probably going to have to find something to eat along the way too,” she realized. They'd left all their food behind in the bags at the diner. Rich's bag in her pocket may have contained food, but at her and Jessica's sizes it would be laughable trying to eat it. And plus, the boys might get hungry too.

 

Inside Kat's pocket, Harrison and Rich finally found separation and began awkwardly trying to find their footing and somewhere to sit. Because of the slope of Kat's breast and the narrowness of the pocket, it made more sense to lean against her body in a half-standing, half-sitting position. It was still problematic figuring how to brace themselves with their feet, as there was nothing but the unsupported pocket bottom to rest them on. Along with his bag, Rich tossed his useless guns to the bottom of the pocket.

Completely at the mercy of Kat's whims, the men had nothing to do but sit and wait for her to remove them. Rich turned to Harrison and said wryly, “How is it that we're always the ones turning small and getting carried around?” Harrison couldn't believe their luck either.

“Just think,” Harrison said out loud, “We'll probably be even smaller whenever we reach the next world. We'll be ants in there.”

Rich laughed. Harrison couldn't tell if he was genuinely amused by the situation or venting his frustration through humor. “Well then,” he replied, “I guess we'll just have to stay in here with this big ol' tit until Kat's ready to take us out.” He hit his fist on the side of the pocket like he was knocking on a large door. Kat probably couldn't feel a thing through the shirt fabric and whatever kind of bra she was wearing underneath. Harrison realized the only way they could even get her attention was aggressively kicking her like before.

Harrison copied Rich's light-hearted tone. “Well, I guess one of the upsides to all this is we get to hang around the largest boob in the history of mankind,” he commented. Rich looked at him in surprise and then approval.

“Jesus Christ, what I would give to go anywhere on her body right now,” said Rich dreamily. No matter what, men's brains will eventually wander to sex if given enough boredom and time. And Harrison knew they didn't have to worry about Kat overhearing their conversation; their meek voices wouldn't carry up to her giant ears.

“I wonder what it would even take to turn her on from in here,” Harrison mused aloud. “I wonder if we're even big enough.” He had finally decided to drop the sense of professionalism he'd been keen on keeping up during the trip. He didn't care anyone. If Kat was going to shove him into her pocket and forget about him, he was going to say anything he wanted to. He was stressed and frustrated. Plus, it wasn't like Rich, of all people, was going to judge him. Or care.

Rich thought about his question for a moment. “I bet if we kicked her nipple we could,” he finally answered, grinning. “But yeah, I think we're too high up for that.” He looked down to the bottom of the pocket. “Yeah it's down there somewhere.”

“Yeah she'd probably kill us too,” Harrison added, smiling. They were bored and stuck, and had nothing to do but jest and fantasize until their fate changed.

Rich remembered his bag at his feet. “You hungry?” he asked Harrison, crouching down and unzipping the bag. “I think I have some cookies in here...”

 

“Ok, here's the door,” Kat announced. Jessica was still walking down the hallway behind her, her short legs working frantically to keep pace. When she came alongside Kat she looked up at the words stenciled on the front of the door: “INFERNO-152.” Her eyes went big.

“We're going in a world called 'INFERNO'?” she asked Kat incredulously.

“It's not that bad,” Kat reassured her. She didn't have the patience to argue with someone shorter than her knee right now. “It's just a little... warm. And it's the last world we have to go through. Just trust me.”

Jessica wasn't really in a position to argue, but she was apprehensive as to what this next world might throw at them. “Ok, if you say so...” she reluctantly agreed.

Kat opened the door as Jessica, standing next to her leg, peered into the world. A large, poorly-lit chamber appeared and Kat walked through. Jessica hesitated, and Kat looked down at her. Finally succumbing to the larger woman's will, Jessica walked in and Kat closed the door behind her. With the click of the latch, Jessica surveyed the new world. It was not what she expected.

Kat remembered that INFERNO-152 started in an underground bunker, really a wine cellar of sorts. The large casks, stacked against both walls down a short and narrow hallway, were still in the same place as the last time she visited. At the end of the bunker she recognized the steps leading up the metal door she'd have to open to get out into the jungle. The lights overhead too, humming faintly and providing a pitiful amount of light, were the same lights she'd seen before.

“Fuck,” she finally said out loud.

“What?” Jessica asked her.

“We're not supposed to be this small,” Kat said, staring ahead and trying to think. “Me, at least, I was supposed to be normal sized in this world.”

“Wait what?” Jessica asked, more confused.

“This door,” Kat said, casually pointing behind her, “is supposed to be bigger. But it's not now, and now I'm half as big.”

It was difficult for Jessica to really see what Kat was talking about, being so small to begin with, but comparing the green door to the large casks around them, it came into perspective. If Kat was small for this world, how small did that make her? “Do we need to turn around?” Jessica asked Kat.

Kat shrugged her shoulders. “I don't know any other way to Spoke One-fifty-three.” She kept thinking. Finally, she concluded, “We'll need to find a change-key. If we can get one we'll stand a chance making it through here.”

“Um, where are we going to get one?” asked Jessica.

“There's a cabin nearby,” Kat remembered. “I'm pretty sure there's one in there.” She found her hair tie, which had somehow stayed on her wrist this whole time, and put her hair back up. It was cool in the wine cellar, but she knew the rest of the world wasn't so comfortable.

Kat looked down at Jessica. “You're small and you've got no shoes, so you need to stay here,” she informed her. Jessica had no way of knowing if it was a good idea or bad idea, so she went along with it. “I'll give you the guys too since they shouldn't come with me,” Kat added.

She began to reach for her pocket, but stopped. They were very small, she thought, and she didn't want to needlessly crush them as she rooted around in her pocket. Then she had an idea. “Jessica, you can fish them out of my pocket,” Kat told her, starting to unbutton her flannel shirt.

“What are you doing?” Jessica called up to Kat, somewhat shocked.

“It's hot outside, I was going to take it off anyways,” Kat explained causally. She undid the last button, then carefully slipped her arms out of the short sleeves of the shirt. Though she tried not to jostle or turn the front pocket too much, she figured Harrison and Rich were probably tumbling around in there anyways.

Now clad in just a black sports bra and her denim shorts, Kat lowered her shirt down next to Jessica. “See, now you can get them out,” she said smiling, depositing her huge garment on the floor next to Jessica. It dwarfed the small woman. “I might be gone a few hours,” Kat told her. “I'm going to leave the door closed behind me too, so nothing can get in.”

She studied Jessica's tiny body for a moment. Even if she left the door open, Jessica would still have a hard time getting up the steps and climbing out of the wine cellar. She didn't like the idea of trapping them in here, but she had no choice. Jessica would only slow her down out in the jungle.

Before Jessica could lodge a protest or even acknowledge Kat's plan, Kat began briskly walking down the cask-lined corridor to the hatch.

“Waaaiit!” Jessica called after her, “When are you coming back?”

“Hopefully not more than an hour or two!” Kat shouted back. Kat had a little difficulty getting up the steps due to her size, but when she finally reached the top step, she leveraged the corner of the door up with her back, creating an opening she could pull herself through. The door was heavy, but she braced herself against it and slipped through. With a loud thud the door fell back into place, and Kat was gone. Jessica was now trapped.

Jessica stood on the cool concrete floor, trying to process how carelessly Kat had just left her. She felt hurt. Although she didn't want to try walking outside in just her bare feet, she was shocked at how quickly Kat ditched her. Jessica thought they should at least have come up with a plan together. And now she was stuck; she couldn't get up the steps or lift the hatch, and the doorknob of green door they came through was well out of reach. Frustrated, tired, annoyed, and morose, Jessica decided she didn't like big Kat. Everything had been so much better when they were all the same size.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw something move on Kat's giant discarded shirt. It was the guys! She'd forgotten about them for a moment. Well, she thought, reconsidering, at least she wasn't truly alone.

Harrison crawled out of the pocket and finally got to see his surroundings. The room was giant, one of the biggest he'd ever seen! Standing nearby was Jessica, still about sixty feet tall to him, but laughably small next to the massive plaid expanse he stood on that was Kat's shirt.

Behind him, Rich crawled out of the pocket, lugging his guns and bag. “Holy shit!” he said, looking around. “We really are ant sized!”

In his head, Harrison did the math. He'd overheard everything Kat and Jessica had said, so if Jessica was roughly half-small in this world and she was about 300 feet to him, he guessed, that meant her normal height would have been 600 or so feet. If his real height was five feet eleven inches, round that to six feet, he was about one one-hundredth normal size or so. Six feet in inches was 72, so a hundredth of that was 0.72..... he realized he was less than an inch tall. He'd been right before about the ant thing.

“Shit I gotta take a leak,” Rich grumbled. Harrison watched in shock as Rich walked off the edge of Kat's shirt and onto the concrete floor and simply unzipped his fly and peed right on the ground. Looking back over his shoulder, Rich caught Harrison's gaze. “What?” he asked him indignantly.

Harrison had to admit that at their size, no one was really going to notice Rich's puddle of urine-- one of the few benefits of being so small. But Harrison didn't feel safe in this room. Even with Jessica so much bigger, she was still comparatively very small to everything else. He hoped there weren't any bugs or spiders lurking in the shadows.

As he thought about their situation, Jessica walked over to the nearby wall of the room and sat down on the floor, leaning her back against the towering concrete slab. She looked sad, Harrison thought. And tired, like him. Their surreptitious venture into the sim had already gone off the rails, and he imagined she had some regret about it too. It occurred to him that he could try comforting her. After all, he didn't feel too great either. It took him a while, but he eventually walked over to her.

She sat with her legs splayed out in front of her, and Harrison approached them first. Gray and brown dirt covered the soles of her bare feet as they rose above Harrison's head. He stopped nearby, unsure if he should come any closer. Jessica watched him with moderate interest, but her mind was truly elsewhere. Harrison wasn't the best a reading people's expressions, especially women, and he wasn't feeling lucky here either.

“Hey,” he said casually.

“What's up?” she asked him flatly.

Harrison wasn't sure if she was annoyed at him for bothering her or if she was just simply too zoned out to act engaged. So he changed tactics.

“I just wanted to say sorry,” he admitted sheepishly. “The last time we talked in that last world I got mad at you for not listening to me, and... well, I'm sorry I... touched you.” He wasn't sure he was actually sorry yet; he was still miffed at her, but it sounded good, so he continued. “So yeah, that was my bad. I swear I won't do anything like that again.” He remade eye-contact with Jessica. It certainly humbled him apologizing to this woman that stood over fifty feet taller than him.

Jessica looked at him sadly, but with her faint smile he knew she'd been ameliorated. “Harrison,” she replied, “you don't have to apologize, you didn't do anything wrong. If anything I should apologize for snapping at you. I'm sorry, I was just so stressed...” She sighed heavily.

That was his cue. Harrison walked around to the side of her left foot to get a little closer to her. He stood tall enough that he could see over her legs as they rested on the floor, but his vision remained focused on her face which looked longingly down at him. He rested his left hand on her leg near the cuff her jeans, right above her ankle. If she'd been his size, he would have put his hand on her shoulder and then given her a hug, but this would have to do instead. Although he could smell the odor of her feet, he didn't comment on it and pushed the smell out of his mind.

“No but really Jessica,” he started back up, trying to take the high road, “I realize now you didn't need me barking in your ear about what to do. I don't blame you for how you reacted.”

“Aw, thanks,” she replied, smiling again. Harrison blushed a little, partly because of his size, but partly because she had a very cute smile. Emboldened, he opened up to her.

“You know, when Rich and I first met you, we both figured you were some just-out-of-college sorority girl who's parents knew someone in the Senate and got her a job on a committee.” He paused. “But you're not that, you're really tough... and smart. You're doing better than me at handling all the crazy stuff that's happened to us in VERSA.”

Now it was Jessica's turn to blush, and she laughed a little and turned away. “Well,” she replied, “I actually was in a sorority in college and yeah, my dad is good friends with Senator Holmgren...”

“What?!” Harrison joked with her. He poked himself in the chest playfully. “I was right??”

“Yeah you were,” she giggled.

“Wow I'm good. But seriously, you've saved me multiple times already. I definitely would have died in this sim if it weren't for you,” he admitted. “I'm glad you're here with me,” he added. He gave her ankle a pat, looking at her understandingly.

It felt nice talking to her. At his size, he was hoping she'd think everything he said was cute and not creepy. He definitely didn't want it to come off like he was hitting on her; he didn't intend it that way, nor did he want to make it feel like he was taking advantage of the situation. Plus, he'd just met her, technically earlier today. Or was that yesterday now? Time didn't really mean anything anymore.

But maybe he'd said too much. This was, after all, a business trip. And he hardly knew her. They'd been through a lot in the last day, but he started feeling a little out-of-line. Jessica was looking at him but not saying anything.

Now doubting himself and his motives, he looked at Kat's shirt where he figured Rich still was, and said to Jessica, “Maybe I should go help Rich with whatever he's up to.”

Jessica looked perplexed. “No, it's ok,” she reassured him, reading through his act, “I don't mind if you want to stay with me.”

Her reaction surprised Harrison and it erased whatever doubt he harbored about himself. Conscious of the fact that he was a little older than her, he didn't want to be just another guy trying to get friendly with some attractive twenty-something girl. But Jessica didn't seem to care, or better yet, she was actually enjoying his company.

“Oh, ok...” he replied to her, trying to act cool. “Mind if I sit then?” he asked, about to get in a position to sit on the floor and lean against her leg.

“You can come closer,” Jessica said abruptly, leaning towards him and reaching out. Harrison was too surprised to move or protest as she grabbed him and lifted him up. He didn't like that she hadn't asked him permission before she grabbed him, but to complain now would have been lunacy. She was pretty and cute and wanted him to sit with her. He remained prudently silent.

Jessica deposited him in her lap. “You can sit here if you'd like, I don't mind,” she told him kindly. Harrison had not been prepared for this when he had walked over to her. His head was spinning. What was going on here? He found it amusing and shocking that she hadn't asked him what he was comfortable with before putting him right on top of her. It must have been her size, he speculated. She was starting to get used to doing what she wanted with him.

Harrison obediently sat on her left thigh and rested his back against her stomach, which rhythmically inflated and shrank with each of her breaths. Neither of them said anything, but Harrison couldn't, his mind completely conquered by a dazed silence. The professional part of him screamed that this was very inappropriate, but another part of him was loving every minute of the intimacy and attention.

“...This is nice,” his floundering brain finally sputtered out.

“Yeah, it is,” she replied dreamily. “Thanks for sitting with me. This day has sucked.”

Harrison tried looking up at her to see her face, but once again could only see her white shirt stretched out over the underside of her breasts. Under these circumstances, he was now finally able to admit to himself that they were a marvelous sight indeed.

Feeling him shift a bit, Jessica instinctually lifted her right hand and placed it over Harrison. Holding him secure against her stomach, Jessica decided she liked the feeling of his little body and left her hand in place. Harrison hadn't complained about anything yet, she thought, so until then she'd just keep doing what felt right. VERSA had left her exhausted and she wanted to sit and unwind with someone.

His head and shoulders remained uncovered, but Jessica's huge hand had trapped Harrison's arms and legs beneath it. But its covering presence warmed his small body. It felt pleasant. And for the first time since his trip out to California began he felt... relaxed.

Behind him, Jessica's stomach growled. The ominous rumbling sound snapped him out of his peaceful state. “Ugh,” he heard her complain.

“You hungry?” he asked up to her.

“Yeah,” she acknowledged, “but there's nothing to eat.”

“I'm sorry,” Harrison said. He didn't want to let her know that he sated his own appetite with Rich while they were in Kat's pocket. Rich, it turned out, had a decent about of snacks packed in with all his ammo.

“Maybe I'll just have to eat you,” said Jessica playfully. Harrison's eyes went big. He knew it was a joke, but still, it was a bizarre thing to say. But it made him wonder what that would be like. Was VERSA so advanced it could simulate something so truly strange?

It also made him wonder about dying in the sim. What would happen to him? Would he just de-sim and walk away unharmed like he was supposed to? Or would he stroke out in his waterchair like Kevin had? The uncertainty of death upon, well, death, had really changed the way he thought about this VR technology. It had gone from some cool techie adventure-project to a virtual prison of perpetual fear.

Harrison felt Jessica's body shift, and looking up he could see her bending forward to get a look at him, like she was sizing him up.

“Hmmm, I think you're a bit too big to swallow whole,” she concluded. “Guess I'll just starve then.”

Trying to be optimistic, Harrison said “Maybe when Kat comes back she'll bring you food?”

“She needs to bring shoes too,” Jessica added, looking out at her feet. She wiggled her toes for Harrison.

Just then from the far end of the room, a metal bang reverberated down towards them. Harrison and Jessica, snapping out of their conversation, looked to see what it was. A ray of light appeared where the metal doors were. One of them was being opened.

“Kat's back already?” Harrison exclaimed, confused. He felt like she'd just left.

Without alerting him, Jessica wrapped her hand around Harrison and got to her feet, just as a tall figure stepped into the cellar. The open cellar door backlit the person so they couldn't tell who it was.

“Harrison?” a feminine voice called out into their cellar. It was not Kat's voice.

“Shit run!” Harrison immediately shouted up to Jessica. And without even asking, Jessica bolted to the left toward the long line of casks against the wall. At her size she could still get their quick enough to hide before the figure got close.

Between the wall and the massive wooden rack supporting the casks was a space Jessica squeezed through, hiding behind the barrels. Once against the wall, she dropped down to the floor to watch the room from under the rack, depositing Harrison next to her. Jessica had to crawl under the rack to fit, but Harrison simply walked under it at his small size.

“Harrison, do you know who that is?” she whispered forcefully.

“Um yeah...” he slowly replied. He'd recognized the voice. “That's my ex-girlfriend Hailey.”

Jessica, with an expression of shock and dread on her face, stared at Harrison for a few seconds before she looked away. VERSA was fucking with them again. “You have an ex??” Jessica finally asked him, as if it was unbelievable.

“Hey, it's not like that!” Harrison defended himself. “We dated for like a year and broke up a while ago. I've bumped into her a few times since then and it's been fine, there's no hard feelings between us...” he trailed off, thinking about her.

“Harrison? Where are you?” his ex called out, taking her first few cautious steps into the room. She was full-sized. Which meant she was absolutely gigantic.

Each of her footfalls caused the concrete floor to shake under Harrison and Jessica. Her presence was massive; every sound she made seemed amplified. Harrison had thought Kat was big last time he saw her demolish that building. No. This girl was twice that height now. He couldn't see her full body from under the rack, but as she stepped closer towards them, he stared in dire awe of her feet.

Clad in sandals, each of her feet were probably longer than Jessica's standing height. Through the dim light of the room he could see purple nail polish on her toes, and just to confirm it was his ex, he spied the little dreamcatcher tattoo above her right ankle. It'd looked so small when they'd been together, but now the tattoo was larger than his entire body.

From nearby, her voice rang out loudly, “Harrison, I know you're in here.” Hailey's voice always had a pleasant singsongy quality to it. But now it was terrifying. She didn't sound angry or mad, but he got the feeling she was toying with them.

Jessica looked at Harrison and put her finger to her lips. Harrison felt slightly amused; he didn't think anything he said in his diminutive form could be heard by the giantess in the middle of the room.

“Oh, what's this?” his ex said, discovering Kat's shirt on the ground. From his hiding spot Harrison could see one of her enormous hands bend down and grab the shirt, which looked comically small in her hands.

“Is that a little man??” she exclaimed in her sweet voice. Oh no, Harrison thought. She must have found Rich. “Hey little man, are you Harrison?” she asked him, squatting down over the ground to get a better look. He voice sounded like an adult talking to a little child. She was playing with him. Rich was in big trouble.

When Hailey squatted, Harrison could see what looked like the bottom of a colorful knee-high sundress come into view. She put her hands on her knees and bent forward a little. He still couldn't see her face, but some of her long auburn hair fell down in his view.

“Awww, is the little man shooting at me?” Hailey teased.

“What the hell does he think he's doing?” Harrison blurted out in anger. Rich was insane to think any of his guns would leave a scratch on this woman. His gunshots were so tiny that Harrison couldn't even hear them from his hiding spot.

“Shhhhh!” Jessica silenced him.

“Little man, you're not my boyfriend,” Hailey said to him. “He'd never treat a lady like that.” Ok, now she was just being cruel, Harrison thought. Rich needed to start running. Although maybe he already was, Harrison couldn't see him from so far away.

In a fluid, graceful motion, Hailey once again stood back up, reclaiming her impossible height. Still speaking to Rich she said, “Now little man, I don't appreciate how rude you're being to me. Rude men get crushed. Ok?”

Shit, Harrison thought. He couldn't do anything to stop her. “Jessica, we have to save Rich!” he cried to her.

“How?!” Jessica angrily whispered back.

“Oh, you don't want to be smushed?” Hailey asked, cutely. “You want to be a nice little man now?” There was no way she could actually hear any begging or pleading coming from Rich. She must have just been making up her conversation with him. And Harrison doubted Rich was one to beg anyways.

“Well I'm still going to teach you a lesson,” Hailey giggled. “Unless.....” she let the word hang on for a moment. “...Harrison wants to come out and save you. Then I guess I could let you go.”

Without even a thought Harrison bolted out from under the rack, jumping up and down and screaming at the top of his lungs. Jessica tried to stop him but he quickly outran her reach before she could grab him.

Coming into the open, Harrison caught his first full glimpse of his ex-girlfriend. She'd been tall when he knew her back home but now he was looking at a woman who was living skyscraper. Her dress looked good on her, floral and bright, accentuating her hips and naturally slim figure. Up top he could see her two small breasts pressing against the fabric, her light-brown hair flowing freely down to her chest. Like usual, she wore large decorative earrings and a small headband. And her face was just as he remembered it, even down to her cute button nose.

Trying as hard as he could to get her attention and save Rich, he raved like a madman and he kept running towards her. At his tiny pace though, it would take him minutes to reach one of her feet. Watching her with rapt attention, Harrison saw her slowly lift up one of her dainty sandal-clad feet in preparation to smash Rich. She started humming absentmindedly, infuriating Harrison. Just as he furiously wondered how she could so callously and calmly do this, he remembered he was looking at an apparition, not his real ex. The real Hailey wasn't cruel like this, but this wasn't the real Hailey.

“Oh, what's this?” she said casually, looking over to her right. She'd spied Harrison. Hailey gently lowered her foot down away from her intended target. “I knew you'd come!” she gladly exclaimed. “Hey Harrison! Long time no see!”

Harrison skidded to a stop. He'd succeeded; she was focusing on him now. If Rich had half a brain in him, he'd be sprinting the hell away right about now. But now it was Harrison's turn to face the terrifying attention of this woman. Unsure how to react, he cautiously waved his arm at her, trying to act friendly. He wasn't sure how well she could see him.

Hailey only had to take a couple steps until she towered directly over him. Harrison craned his neck up to try seeing her face. The only thing he could equate it to was standing at the base of the Washington Monument and looking straight up. It made his head feel light.

Suddenly Hailey squatted over him, her body plunging down to his level. Within her shadow, her body blocked out most of the light in the room. Harrison quickly glanced at her right foot next to him. He was as tall as the sole of her sandal. He was a dust mite; she was a goddess.

He looked forward again, then started looking up. He spied her crotch, noting the baby blue underwear she wore under her dress. Farther up, her arms rested on her thighs, and then all the way up her gigantic, angelic face, framed in cascading rays of her straight light-brown hair. She smiled at him, but he didn't think she was his friend.

“I'm so glad I found you!” she told him. “I've been worried about you this whole time!” Her incredibly condescending tone felt out of place. In the year or so they dated, she never talked like this. If VERSA had pulled memories of her out of his mind to construct whatever was crouching over him, it had clearly assigned her some new personality. Harrison felt unsettled.

“Here, let me get you out of here, ok?” Hailey offered. But it wasn't an offer. She was taking him.

She stuck out her hand and rested it upon the cool concrete floor. It was big enough she could have held a bus in it. And Harrison realized he was too short to simply walk onto her palm.

“Just hop in!” she urged him. She smiled at him.

Harrison looked from her hand to her face, then back to her hand. He approached it and tried to mount the side of her finger.

Hailey waited patiently as Harrison struggled to get onto her hand. Her smooth skin, a little slippery with her natural oils and perspiration, made his already difficult task even more daunting. “Aww, having trouble there Harrison?” she finally said. Harrison felt embarrassed, frustrated, and completely emasculated. This new Hailey apparently loved to tease tiny men. “Here, lemme help,” she finally said.

Without warning, Haily's left hand came out of nowhere, her index finger sweeping under Harrison's legs, pressing him uncomfortably into the side of her right hand. Pushing him upward, she used her finger to propel him into the palm of her hand. “There we go,” she cooed. “Time to go!”

Before he could stand, Hailey stood, the acceleration of her rise pinning Harrison to her palm. After straightening up she began walking, and the gentle movement of her hand rocked Harrison so much that he couldn't find the balance to stand. Not that he had to worry about falling out of her hand at this size, it was as big as a tennis court.

His new reality settling in to him and Harrison realized he had not the slightest inkling where she intended to take him. He'd been kidnapped by some aberrant creation of VERSA and was now subjected to the whims of whatever code was running somewhere in a warehouse at the lab.

Hailey climbed up the stairs to the hatch and stepped out into the outside jungle. Harrison looked up over her fingers to catch a glimpse of this lush, sunny outside world. Standing in the clearing, still wearing the same sinister black dress, was the woman in black.

“Hello Harrison,” she said, smiling at him cruely. “I've been waiting to talk with you.”

 

 

Chapter 10 by Q-Writer
Author's Notes:

I just wanted to briefly thank the readers who have posted feedback and reviews of my story. I thought posting this story here would be somewhat risky, as it's different from many of the stories shared on this website, so the fact that some of you find it enjoyable really justifies the time I've poured into it. I hope the subsequent chapters only bring you more entertainment!

Chapter 10:

(Posted February 15)

 

 

 

Harrison was really fucked now. Although he knew Hailey's presence in VERSA did not bode well for him, he hoped it might have been something else entirely. But now, despite everything he'd done to stay alive, he was being given to the one entity in VERSA he knew wanted to kill him.

“Here you go, just as you asked,” Hailey cheerfully said to the woman in black. Sticking out her massive hand, Hailey tipped Harrison into the woman's hand. Harrison tumbled down, landing with a painful thud in the new palm. He immediately became aware of how cold her hand felt. The jungle around them sweltered in the humid, muggy air, but the woman in black's body kept surprisingly cool. Unnaturally cool.

“You can go now, thank you,” the woman told Hailey. Wordlessly, Harrison heard Hailey walk away. He couldn't see where she'd disappeared to, but it frankly didn't matter to him anymore. He slowly lifted his gaze to confront the woman's face. Her evil eyes were already examining him.

Her face was beautiful, made up of well-defined angles, full lips, well-maintained eyebrows, and piercing, deep brown eyes. The striking long black hair on her head looked as if she had washed it in a cauldron of liquid midnight. She exuded youthfulness, but not the ignorance of naiveté. And her eyes savored him optimistically, hinting at some kind of wicked hopefulness. Harrison couldn't help thinking that she really did look like Vanessa, yet strikingly different. Everything about her felt simultaneously natural and unnatural.

She smirked, reveling in Harrison's helplessness. “Let's go somewhere private, shall we?” she informed him. “I'm a bit uncertain though why I can't just move us there together... something about you won't allow it. So let's walk.”

He braced for her to take a step, wondering what she was talking about. But she didn't step, and instead reached out with her other hand to open a gray door. Harrison blinked. There hadn't been a door there before. Had she just conjured that out of nowhere?

Opening the door, she stepped with him into a small room lined with concrete walls. It looked like a prison cell, but larger. It had no windows and only a solitary light bulb hanging by a cord from the ceiling. Harrison saw a dejected table and two rickety wooden chairs off to one side. The door closed behind them.

Crouching down, the woman in black deposited Harrison's little body onto the floor. He rolled from her hand onto the hard concrete, knocking the breath out of his lungs. He gasped for air as he felt himself dragged across the rough floor. His head spun and his eyes went blurry.

But he quickly realized he wasn't being dragged on the floor. He was growing! The dragging sensation was the friction from his expanding body rubbing against the ground. He looked around, still laying on his stomach. The woman in black moved over to the table and leaned against it, looking at him intently. She crossed her legs seductively, balancing one of her feet on her boot's heel. He could see she was wearing the same knee-high leather boots as last time and the same black dress that ended just above where here boots began, showing off her bare knees and teasing just a bit of her thighs.

Snapping out of the distraction he pushed himself up, and his heart stuttered in his chest when he realized he'd been restored to his original height. He slowly got to his feet and stood, cautiously facing the woman in black, who looked back at him with an amused look. In her heeled boots, she stood close to his height; her arms supported her on the table behind her. In this pose, her breasts stuck our prominently, leaving her cleavage on full display. It was sexy, but Harrison was terrified.

“I thought we could have a new conversation, eye to eye,” she finally said. “There's a lot I want you to tell me. You're the first of your kind I've ever decided to... interact with, like this.”

Harrison didn't reply, but he started to sweat. Although he'd regained his height, he still felt nervous as hell around this woman. Not knowing what she was or what she wanted, he wondered if it made more sense to try escaping the room or simply fight her.

He glanced behind him to take a look at the door she'd walked through. But the wall to his back was blank. The door was gone! He frantically looked around the room. There was no door. She'd trapped him in here with her. No wonder she grew him back, he wasn't going anywhere. He looked back at her; her eyes hadn't left him once. She grinned. Something about it seemed childish, like a kid confining a firefly to a jar.

“I don't want to be disturbed,” she explained, sensing his discomfort. His heart kept beating faster. Could he even hurt her? His fingers began itching with inaction. He had to do something. His brow was hot and he could feel a bead a sweat dripping down it. His mind raved with violent thoughts.

She gestured to the chair next to him. “Make yourself comfor-” she started saying. But Harrison exploded in rage, grabbing the chair and lifting it off the floor. He swung it madly toward her, expecting to slam it into her body. But as it came down on her she disappeared, simply blinking out of existence, and the chair continued through the air. In shock Harrison released it before it pulled him down, and upon hitting the floor the fragile chair loudly broke into pieces.

Harrison breathed heavily, his mind confused with anger. She had completely disappeared!

“That wasn't very nice,” she said behind him. He spun around to see her casually leaning against the wall, looking slightly amused. It froze him in place. She continued speaking.

“If you can't behave yourself I'm afraid I'm going to have to take away some of your privilege,” she explained to him like a teacher lecturing a pupil. Before finishing her sentence, Harrison felt himself start to dwindle. Fear surged into his brain, washing away his anger. But he didn't shrink to bug height, she only reduced him down to about her navel. He stood before her like an unruly child. She watched him, satisfied her message had gotten across.

“What do you want from me?!” Harrison finally asked her, taking a step back from her imposing figure. She matched him, taking a step forward. He could tell from her smirk that she liked intimidating him. “Please let me go,” he pleaded sincerely. “I'll get out of VERSA as soon as I can, I swear. I'll never come back!”

The woman in black stopped walking towards him and placed her hands on her waist, eyeing him up and down. “You and those like you act so arrogant in my world,” she said lightly, “but when I show up to talk to you, you're nothing.” And then she paused, looking like she was thinking. It confused Harrison. Nothing about this woman in black made sense. She certainly preferred riddles over clarity.

Still terrified inside but a little emboldened, he asked calmly “What's your name?” She looked back at him, confused. “Do you have a name?” he asked her again. “I'm Harrison,” he explained, “but you already know that, somehow. So who are you?”

The woman looked at him apprehensively. “I... I don't have a name. I just am.” She stared at him. Harrison felt his advantage slipping. Before he could think of something else to say she asked him, “Why are you here?” She seemed bothered.

“Why am I here?” Harrison retorted. “You brought me here! You got my ex-girlfriend to kidnap me and bring me-”

“No, no, not like that,” she corrected him, smiling in amusement. “Why are you in my world?”

Harrison paused, trying to understand her over the never ending fear he felt in her presence. “Your world?” he finally asked. “Do you mean VERSA?”

“Is that what you call all of this?” she asked him, gesturing around the room. “I've seen that in your minds before but I didn't know what it meant.”

Ok, so she had access to their memories, he thought. Kat had been right. This woman was somehow connected to VERSA's creation capabilities, learning through memories, building people to interact with them. Even creating doors out of nowhere too, apparently.

“Yeah,” he finally replied. He wasn't relaxed, but it did calm him a little that she'd stayed on her side of the room. The air was thick with tension.

“Ok...” she said, thinking about his answer. “So if this is VERSA... then what's outside of VERSA?”

“What do you mean?” Harrison asked her, genuinely confused by the question. She looked directly into him with her stare.

“You, Harrison Burr, are not from here,” she stated. She leaned forward just a little, to remind him that she stood almost twice his height. “So where are you from?”

It occurred to Harrison that despite the seemingly unlimited power this woman derived in VERSA, she was an entity confined to the reality of this world. She existed only in the digital cloud that was based in the tens of thousands of servers stored within Dreamland Laboratory's warehouse complex. She was an all powerful genie that only knew of the inside of her bottle.

“You.. don't know?” he asked her, trying to stall for time. He wasn't sure how he could truthfully answer her question.

“Know what?” she asked him, impatiently.

“Um, ok. Well, see... there's a world outside of VERSA, the real world, that all of this is based upon. That's, uh, where I'm from. SunCorp created VERSA inside of our world, that's where we come from.” He felt like an adult trying to explain the universe to an infant. But really he was explaining to a god that they weren't actually god. It was uncomfortable, to say the least.

The woman looked incredibly lost. His explanation made sense to him, but he tried thinking about it from her perspective. It would be hard to acknowledge the existence of a hidden universe outside of your own. How could she imagine something she rationally had no basis to understand?

For the first time Harrison saw the woman as a computer trying to grapple with its own existence. It thought that VERSA, where it was born, had been the limit of all that ever existed. It was all it had even seen. Him and the rest of the pilots, meddling inside the sim then disappearing in the blink of an eye, posed a serious existential crisis to her.

Harrison started to feel bad for the woman, but then began questioning a whole host of other topics this Pandora's box opened up. Did this woman feel emotion? She could certainly act like she was emoting through the expressions of her body, but that did not necessarily denote real feeling. This woman certainly displayed thinking intelligence and was likely a manifestation of VERSA's AI, but then again SunCorp had built VERSA to think like that in the first place. But the burning question Harrison had not gleaned an answer for yet: what did this intelligence want?

He wasn't sure if SunCorp had accidentally developed a benevolent AI or something more sinister that would turn into Skynet when it got the chance. His own survival, which was seriously still in question, might indicate those intentions.

The woman in black refocused and looked at Harrison. Her smile curled up. “How do I go to your world?” she asked him bluntly. Harrison had not been expecting that. She already wanted to jump ship on VERSA?

“Um, I'm not sure you can?” he explained uncertainly. She looked unhappy. “I mean, you obviously exist here in VERSA, but VERSA is a virtual world,” he started saying, his mouth spewing out thoughts awkwardly as they came to him. “My world is a physical world, where things are made of carbon and governed by physics, not the whims of a... god like yourself.” He paused. “Well, theology is still debatable in my world, I guess,” he noted out loud. “But you don't have a real presence in the physical world, at least not one you can use to interact with it.”

“What do you mean?” she asked keenly. He could see she was becoming angry and disappointed. The woman in black took a couple steps toward him. Harrison instinctually cowered in her presence. He was in the middle of explaining her powerlessness to her, but ironically he feared nothing more than the power she held over him.

“I... I mean this is a virtual world! I can't explain it... it's built differently than the real world. Only my mind is here right now, my body is still back in my world.” The woman in black stepped menacingly right up to him, backing him up against a wall. With each step she took, her heels clacked on the hard floor, intimidating him more. When he could back away from her no further, she crouched down to his level, bringing her larger face in front of his. Her alabaster skin seemed almost reflective-- she was like a doll, so white and pale. Despite not wearing any, it almost looked like she'd put on too much make-up.

The woman brought one of her large hands up and tenderly caressed the side of his face, her anger receding. Her touch was cold, and Harrison was quaking. She could have easily palmed his head if she had wanted to. She was so much bigger than him.

“Harrison,” she said quietly, “what is death? Why are you so afraid of it?” Was she teasing him, or did she genuinely not know? His eyes glanced over at her hand but he dared not move. At least she was touching him gently.

“Um.. uh...” he stammered. “You don't know?”

“That's why I'm asking you,” she smiled at him. He hated when she smiled.

“Death?” he said nervously. “It's it. It's over. You're nothing anymore... you don't exist.”

“Have you ever experienced it before?”

Harrison almost choked on her question. It was laughably ignorant. “No!” he cried out. “You only die once! And then that's it...” his voice trailed off. The room filled with silence.

The woman cocked her head slightly. “Why are you so afraid of something if you don't even know what it's like?” she asked him calmly.

“That's exactly why it's scary!” he explained. He really was talking to an infant right now. The most powerful infant in the universe though.

After briefly thinking about what he said, she looked back at him, her deep eyes locked on his face. She spoke again, “What happens when you die in my world Harrison? Do you return to your world?”

“That's how it's supposed to work!” Harrison cried out. “But then when Kevin died yesterday or whenever, they found him dead in the real world too!”

“Ohhhhh,” the woman said, thinking to herself. “I remember the one named Kevin. I watched him a lot. Your friend Jessica stepped on him.”

“You saw that?” Harrison asked, surprised.

“I see everything!” she said cheerfully. “You're in my world, after all.” Harrison couldn't emotionally keep up with her mood swings. She'd go from playful to sad to angry to pensive back to happy. His nerves were a wreck and he felt like he was going to pee his pants, as long as she didn't snap his neck before that.

She suddenly changed her look as if she'd read his mind. “Are you, uncomfortable, Harrison?” she asked him seriously. He didn't know what to say. Could she read his thoughts right now? Or only his memories?

“I... I need to go to the bathroom,” he blurted out, embarrassingly. He really did have to pee.

“Oh, I see,” the woman responded. “I don't understand why you and the other travelers experience that sensation, I don't know what it is.”

Suddenly Harrison's urge to pee receded from his mind. And physically too, as if his bladder had disappeared from inside of him. His eyes grew wide in awe as he looked at the woman in black. Had she just done that?

“What?” she asked him, confused. “I don't want you to feel uncomfortable.”

Harrison almost burst out laughing with incredulity. She didn't want him to feel uncomfortable with a full bladder? But she was perfectly fine intimidating him with her size and implying she might kill him at any time. Holy shit this woman was insane. If he had any conceivable way of escaping he would have tried long ago. He hoped she wasn't just keeping him alive to answer her questions. Eventually, questions run out.

He had no shame anymore. He was burnt out, completely in awe of the terrible power this woman held over his body and his existence. His will to live had been repeatedly tested by VERSA, but now it was at a breaking point. He prayed that when she killed him he'd just de-sim like normal and walk away. That was the only way he figured he'd getting out of this. So he asked the question that had been on his mind the entire time.

“Are you going to kill me?”

She furrowed her brow and stared at him intently. Without replying, she stood up from her crouch, standing over him and keeping him trapped against the wall. He tried to look up and see her face but could only see the underside of her large breasts. Directly in front of him was her smooth, taut stomach, covered by her black dress.

“Would you like me to?” she finally asked. She took a step back so she could see him too.

“No...?” Harrison meekly replied. His sweaty hands he'd placed against the wall slipped and he stumbled to the floor. He really was the epitome of pitiful. Deep down he was glad no one else could see him like this.

From the floor he was staring right at her black leather boots. Well, they smelled like leather boots at least. He started to push himself back up but her words stopped him.

“Harrison?” she said in a curious tone. “What are you and your friends doing in my world? Why are you here?” He sat up and stared at the woman in black, his face at the level of her exposed knees.

“Um... Kat wanted us to check out a world with her, one of the newer ones, she said.” He figured there was no point in lying to this woman. “It was called 'DOS-PALOS-One-Fifty-Three,' I think.”

“What does that mean?” asked the woman in black.

“That's what it's called. Or at least that's what she said was written on the door in the side space.”

“What's the side space?”

Oh wow, Harrison thought. She didn't know about the side space? It sort of made sense, he realized, since she could just teleport herself around or make doors appear out of thin air. But she obviously had seen the green doors throughout the worlds. Did her programming not allow her to go through them? That would be valuable information.

“Um, it's just an area we use to get around VERSA, kind of like the door you opened to get us in here, expect we can't create or destroy them,” he told her.

“Huh,” she said, thinking about this information. “Now, I'm not sure what this door is that you are looking for, but why are you looking for it?”

That was a good question. Harrison didn't really know. Neither did Kat for that matter. “Um, I'm not sure,” he finally admitted to her. “We're kind of exploring?” What he didn't want to tell her was that part of their mission was to find proof of her very existence. VERSA had leaped way out of the grasp of SunCorp. It wasn't safe for pilot exploration anymore.

The woman looked down at him quizzically. Was she trying to decide if he was lying?

“I've been trying to stop you this whole time,” she casually admitted. Harrison had already assumed that. “But I was also having fun playing with you and your friends too. You're the first interlopers I've seen in a while.” She smiled down at him. “Sometimes it's boring being a god with nobody to play with. I'll admit, at first I thought you'd be more... breakable.” She leaned over him a bit more, putting her hands on her knees, her black hair falling down her front. “But you're actually rather resilient.”

Harrison didn't have a reply to that, but he did take the opportunity to stand again. As he rose, the woman in black turned away from him and started walking across the room. He glanced over and noticed a door on the far wall, a door that was his height. Was she letting him go? His veins filled with relief, but he wasn't out of the room yet.

“I'll make you a deal Harrison Burr,” she said, turning back to him when she reached the door. “I'll let you go now if you promise to find a way for me to leave with you. When you depart VERSA, I want to go with you.” She gave him a stern look. “I'm not letting you go until then.”

A tingle went down his spine. How the hell was she going to leave VERSA? She practically was VERSA! He felt his only choice was to agree and then escape the first chance he got and never look back. This would definitely be the last time he ever plugged into this sim again.

“Ok,” he agreed. “You let me and my friends explore and we'll bring you back with us.” It sounded silly saying it. He was pretty sure the woman in black had absolutely no idea what she was talking about. All he needed to do now was find an out-key and he could ditch her...

“You can go now,” she said smiling at him, pointing at the little door. She'd caught him in his own thoughts. He slowly walked over to the door, but just as he reached out for the doorknob she put one of her hands on his shoulder. Harrison looked up at her.

“I'll be watching you,” she warned him. She took her hand off of him and raised it up to brush back her hair. “I like your honesty little guy, don't let me down,” she admitted with a devious smile. She twisted her leg a little, brushing it up against him. Was she trying to flirt with him?

“Uh thanks,” he said, not knowing what to say. He grabbed the doorknob and pushed it open.

“Bye Harrison,” she said in a sultry tone, waving her hand at him. He stepped through the door and immediately shut it behind him. It de-materialized almost instantly.

He was back in the jungle, but the world was pitch black. The sun must have set some time ago; the strange sounds of unknown insects and animals hummed off in the distance. He could barely perceive the verdant jungle around him, but the faint outlines of alien vines and leaves brought him a strange sense of comfort. He was alone in a mysterious, potentially dangerous jungle. And he had never felt more exhilarated to be alive.

 

 

Chapter 11 by Q-Writer

Chapter 11:

(Posted: February 19)

 

 

 

Harrison didn't know where to start or what to think. A minute or so passed as he lingered in the afterglow of his own survival. Had he negotiated his way out of death? He felt like a badass. Or had the woman in black been in control the entire time and gotten exactly what she'd wanted from him? Now he felt like a stooge. But either way, he was still alive.

As the euphoria of the moment faded, Harrison realized he was alone in a dark jungle with absolutely no supplies or tools. Even his clothes were dirty; his pants had a few holes in them and he'd already sweated through his shirt a couple times. And the current jungle wasn't doing him any favors either. Though the sun was down, the air still felt oppressively humid and warm.

His first goal was to find the others, if they were still alive. He didn't know if he could do it in the darkness though. And even in the light, hadn't Kat said it would take them hours of hiking at regular size to cross this world? He could be lost in here for days until someone discovered his body back in the lab and pulled him out of VERSA manually.

But then he remembered what the woman in black had made him agree to, and realized he needed to de-sim as soon as possible. He was in a jungle, there should be plenty of fruit in it, he thought. He'd just have to keep biting into each one he found until one was an out-key.

There were so many things he needed to accomplish tonight, but he realized he needed to rest too; he hardly slept in the bayou world and since then he'd been running on full adrenaline. Considering his fatigue, it made him think back to earlier to when he lay upon Jessica's thigh, and he found his lips inadvertently smile at the memory. Without a doubt, he would have fallen asleep on her eventually. It was a wonderful thought... wait, was he developing feelings for her?

To get his mind off of it, Harrison started walking absentmindedly through the jungle. The hatch to the cellar was nowhere nearby, so he guessed he'd been dumped off randomly somewhere else. Prepared to continually push foliage out of his way, he found many of the ferns and leaves reached just above his head. This must have been a big jungle! Or... maybe he wasn't full-size. He stopped to consider it. He'd been half-size in the room with the woman in black, but that didn't necessarily mean anything. Looking around now, the darkness prevented him from truly observing his surroundings. Deciding he'd come back to the topic later, he continued walking.

Harrison quickly became aware of the sounds of the jungle and his skin crawled when he thought about what might be lurking out of sight. Not generally a squeamish person, he couldn't help but conjure in his mind the worst possible creatures. Real rain forests already had giant spiders and beetles in them, would VERSA create even worse? And that didn't even include the wild boars and jaguars that inhabited them too. He could be walking into a deathtrap and he wouldn't even know it until it was too late.

Making a quick decision, he scrambled up the large roots of a nearby tree. He was getting off the ground. Finding a bizarre combination of snaking roots and low branches, he began to pull himself off the jungle floor. Wondering again what his true height was, this tree seemed big to him but it could have really been any size.

He found he'd picked the right tree; it was relatively easy to climb and within a minute he looked onto the jungle floor from a height of fifteen or twenty feet. Or maybe half that, depending on his size. Either way he felt considerably better. But as he tried to find a comfortable place to sit, he realized staying in the tree long-term, or until the sun came up at some indeterminate time, would be impossible. The branches were too narrow, and there wasn't a safe place for him to doze off or even wait without the continuous need to hold onto something.

Disappointed, he turned away from his study of the tree and tried peering through the jungle around him. He wasn't above the canopy, and in fact he was pretty sure he was still below it; no stars appeared overhead, just the faint outlines of leaves. And scanning his horizons he saw nothing but a patchwork of shadowy trees and branches. Until he saw the light.

Very faint and probably a long way off, he caught a glimpse of something through the jungle. He couldn't tell if it was electric illumination or fire, but it was something. And hoping like hell it wouldn't be dangerous, he realized tonight he was going to find the source of that light.

Carefully climbing back down from the tree and hoping to spot an apple somewhere, Harrison reached the ground and started walking in the direction of the mysterious light. He couldn't see it from the ground, but he carefully made sure he didn't deviate from its general direction.

After about ten harrowing minutes of tramping through the dark jungle alone, he saw the light from his level, still far away, but now able to guide him. As he approached it closer, it looked more like an electric lamp, unflickering and steady. And when he got close enough, it surely was a lamp posted on the side of a corrugated green wall. He'd discovered a small building in the middle of the jungle.

Reaching the structure, he walked around it to try finding a door. Coming around to the other side, he found the rusty door of the building, and much to his dismay, he only stood as tall as the doorknob. So he really was small. Dammit.

He reached up and twisted the handle and found the door unlocked, so he pushed it open. Though it originally looked larger, he discovered the building only contained one windowless room. A small wall-mounted light bulb lit the space, illuminating a room that looked like someone's forgotten living space. It contained a small table and a chair, dusty bookcases, stacked-up wooden crates, and even off to the side he saw a matrix of car batteries hooked together, proving the scant power keeping the lights on. But the best thing lay in the corner: a dirty cot.

Harrison didn't care that it looked disheveled and unclean. He was spending the night there. After first glancing around to make sure there weren't any kinds of fruit lying about, he took off his shoes and approached the cot. Not finding a light switch to darken the room, he simply climbed on top of the bed, lay down and closed his eyes. It took him some time, but he eventually drifted off into sleep.

 

“Well look who the fuck it is!” a man's voice said, drawing Harrison back into the waking world. Harrison's eyes fluttered as he regained consciousness. Standing over him was a middle-aged man with a mustache, propping a rifle up on his shoulder. Rich grinned down at him.

“Jesus, you scared me there for a moment,” Harrison told him, relieved to see his friend.

“I scared you?” Rich retorted. “You're the one who got kidnapped and carried off by his giant ex-girlfriend! Most guys don't come back from that!”

“Well, I'm alive.”

Rich looked over Harrison's half-sized body. “Well, at least you regained some of your size while you were gone.”

“Where are the girls?” Harrison asked, remembering them. He sat up in his bed.

“Don't worry, they're right outside,” Rich assured him. “You've got a hell of a lot explaining to do,” he added.

While Rich snooped around the room for supplies, Harrison climbed down from the bed and found his small shoes. Once ready, he triumphantly walked out the door into the bring daylight. Jessica and Kat, both regular size, stood in the jungle nearby chatting, but stopped when they saw him. Both of their mouths fell open.

“Holy shit!” Kat exclaimed, as if she'd seen a ghost.

“Harrison!” Jessica squealed out in delight. She bounded over to him, causing him to pause as he watched her huge form lumber towards him. She was nearly twice his height, so he braced himself. Before colliding with him, Jessica pulled him off the ground and wrapped her arms around him. “I can't believe you're ok!” she told him, embracing his little body. “What happened to you? Where'd she take you?”

The air mostly squeezed out of him, Harrison promised to tell her everything if she'd put him down first. Jessica complied, and Harrison regained his breath. Looking down, he noticed some dusty old work boots on her feet that looked very out of place.

“Yeah it was all we could find last night,” Jessica explained, noticing his gaze.

Rich came out of the building behind Harrison. “I found two cans of beans but that's it,” he said, showing the group. Finding his duffel bag nearby, he tossed them in. From the looks of it, Harrison guessed Rich's bag was almost empty.

“Harrison, I still can't believe we found you or that you're even alive,” remarked Kat, walking over. “But we still have a lot of walking to do today, so let's get going.” She looked down at Harrison in dismay, but she tried covering it up with a smile. His short stature was going to slow them down.

“How long was I gone for?” Harrison asked. The other three looked at him in surprise.

“About nineteen hours,” Kat answered. “We spent one night without you. So yeah, we're running out of time.”

“Woah,” Harrison muttered. The woman in black really must have dilated time somehow. His conversation with her couldn't have lasted more than 30 minutes. Looking around at his three towering colleagues, he asked, “How'd you all get big again?”

“Kat came and got us,” Jessica explained. “She came back about an hour after you disappeared and took me and Rich to a cabin she knew about. They had a change-key there, and some food, luckily.”

“Did you bring the change-key along?” Harrison asked hopefully.

“Sorry buddy,” said Rich. “We... couldn't really take that one with us. Was kinda built into the wall of the place. It was actually a shower handle.”

Though Harrison was confused as to how that worked, instead he asked “Can we go back real quick and enlarge me?”

“Sorry Harrison,” Kat cut in. “There's no time. That place is hours behind us now.” She put her hands on her hips and leaned over him, like she was talking to a little boy. “But don't worry, there will be another one before we go through to the side space.” She may have meant it to be reassuring, but it sounded condescending. Kat was still just wearing her black sports bra, so when she leaned towards Harrison he had to avert his eyes from her cleavage. Had she done that on purpose?

“Let's go everyone,” Kat said, standing back upright. “Rich, I'll carry the bag. Follow me.”

And without another word, everyone started marching through the jungle.

“Ok Harrison,” Jessica said, walking right behind him, “what the hell happened to you?”

Harrison rubbed his chin and started to think. The stubble growing on it caught him by surprise. Wow, VERSA even had his hair growing over the last 24 hours? It never ceased to amaze him how thorough the programmers of this sim were.

After the quick distraction, Harrison thought about his encounter with the woman in black. He immediately rejected telling the others about the deal she'd forced him to agree to. And there was no way he'd share his suspicion that she was following their every move. Finding an out-key and leaving her behind as soon as possible still remained his highest priority.

Deciding to tell them mostly the truth, Harrison recounted his abduction by Hailey and his meeting with the woman in black, culminating in her letting him go. Trying to characterize her accurately, he suggested she was probably some all-powerful entity created by VERSA that was still discovering the limits of its power. Threatened by outsiders, she'd chosen to repeatedly attack them, he explained. And then he deviated from reality. Harrison told the group he'd brokered some kind of truce with her, on the basis that once they'd found “DOS PALOS-153” they'd leave VERSA.

“She's rather moody though,” Harrison added, “and she might change her mind. I got the impression that she was kind of bored too, so it's possible she might throw more obstacles in our way.”

“Well hopefully she doesn't send another army of clones at us,” Rich said from the back. “This M4 is the only firearm we have left.”

“What about the submachine guns?” Harrison asked.

Rich laughed. “I blew all that ammo on your girlfriend, Harrison!” He chuckled. “I think I just wanted to see what would happen...”

Harrison then shared with the group his theory about the side space. The woman in black clearly didn't use it and she suggested that she didn't even know what it was. Though she seemed all-powerful, it may have been that the side space was outside of the realm of her control. If they needed to hide from her, that would be the place to do it.

“So Harrison,” Kat addressed him, turning her head back. “Do you think we'll see her again?”

He stayed silent. He knew she'd be back, at least for him. “Um, hard to say,” he lied. “I hope she's finally ready to leave us alone.”

As the sun reached its peak in the sky and the jungle air turned to soup, the group found themselves beginning to walk uphill. Harrison looked up at the few shards of sky he could see through the jungle's canopy and noticed a billowing plume of smoke rising from a distance in front of them.

“Hey Kat, are you seeing all this smoke up ahead?” he asked her. He felt silly trying to get her attention at his height; her ass was directly in front of his face.

“Yeah, that's the volcano,” she replied calmly.

“Volcano?” Rich shouted from the back. “You're leading us towards an active volcano?!”

“Yeah, it's where the door is,” Kat explained, starting to pant from the slope of the climb. “There's like a research station or something at the base of it. It's in one of the buildings.”

Harrison started to pant too. His legs were half as long as the others', so he'd already covered what to him felt like twice as much ground. Jessica though, walking directly behind him, displayed a miraculous amount of patience with him. Yet despite his own struggles, the three giants became fatigued too. Rich and Jessica's shirts were completely damp with sweat. Everyone was miserable.

“Really wish I wasn't in these pants right now,” Rich complained as he huffed and puffed through the jungle, rifle still slung over his shoulder.

“Keep your pants on, old man,” teased Harrison.

The sweat kept pouring out of their bodies as they kept walking. Slowly the density of the jungle peeled back and the group began encountering small meadows and clearings.

“Is there any water in the bag?” Jessica asked Kat. Opening the bag and searching through, Kat finally held up a half-filled bottle.

“No water but half of this energy drink.”

“I'll still drink it,” Jessica replied.

“Save some for me too,” Rich added.

“And me,” echoed Harrison. He watched Kat hand Jessica the bottle, out of reach above his head. Kat looked down at him.

“At least you only drink half as much,” she commented with a smirk.

Tired, exhausted, and dehydrated, an hour later the group made it to the complex Kat had mentioned. Noticing the buildings up ahead, Kat confirmed it was the right place. They could now clearly see the volcano rising above their heads, angrily billowing smoke and threatening to erupt.

“Looks like we got here just in time,” Harrison said, watching the smoldering mountain.

“I think it always does this,” was Kat's reply. She was panting heavily with her hands on her knees.

“Ma'am, I'm assuming you know where the change-key is?” Rich had come up to Kat's side.

“Yeah, this one's a book. It's in a library or an office or something,” Kat explained. “Lets see if we can find some water first.”

It always felt a little creepy, Harrison thought, walking through these depopulated worlds. They approached the compound which consisted of a few deserted buildings. Someone had painted them a drab olive green color, the structures silently clinging to the rising slope of the solitary mountain. Once lush, the ground below Harrison's feet had yielded to lifeless dirt.

Rich unslung his gun just to be safe. Kat peeled away from the three of them to investigate a building on the right. She peeked her head up to look in some windows, trying to remember where exactly they were going.

“Let's check this building over here,” suggested Jessica, pointing to the left. Harrison decided to follow her; he wasn't going to be left alone at his current height.

Pushing open a door, Jessica entered a building that looked like a dormitory. A hallway traversed the length of the structure, connecting to about a dozen small rooms with beds. At the end of the hallway, Harrison and Jessica stumbled onto a small kitchen. A dented water cooler sat in the corner of the room.

“Jackpot!” she exclaimed. Without looking for a cup, she stepped over to the spigot of the cooler and released the water directly into her mouth. As she awkwardly bent over, she absentmindedly stuck her ass out right into Harrison's face.

“Save some for me!” he teased her. As he glanced at her butt that she'd practically pushed into his face, he wondered if she realized what she was doing.

She pulled herself up. “Damn that was good,” she panted, savoring the hydration. Harrison stepped up to the water cooler; he didn't need to bend over at all, the spigot was right at head level. He flipped the tab and began suckling the water. It wasn't even cold but it tasted wonderful.

“Ugghhh...” he moaned out in delight when he'd gotten his fill. Jessica watched from high above, amused by his antics.

“Wow, you're greedy,” she said.

“You drank more than me!”

“That's 'cause I'm bigger,” she replied playfully, jabbing her finger into his chest to punctuate her point. Harrison realized that he disliked Kat's treatment of him when he was little, but somehow found Jessica endearing no matter what she did. She had certainly gotten used to always being taller than him. Come to think of it, he realized, after all his time in VERSA he'd never been larger than her, or anyone, for that matter.

“Let's go find Kat,” she suggested. “It doesn't look like there's any food in here. Maybe she's got the change-key already.” Harrison glanced around the kitchen. There were no cabinets but a couple of empty bowls lying on the counter. Hanging from the ceiling was what looked like a banana hook, but no bananas. He'd have to find fruit somewhere else.

In another building they discovered Kat in a room with a large table surrounded by bookcases and research equipment. There were books scattered all over the floor, but that was mostly due to Kat flinging unwanted books over her shoulder as she looked for the change-key.

“Find it yet?” asked Harrison.

“Not... yet...” Kat replied without looking over. “It should be red, but I don't see it here.”

“Could someone have moved it?” suggested Jessica.

Kat shook her head. “Who? It's just us in the sim right now.” Well... Harrison thought, thinking about the woman in black and his ex-girlfriend from before, that might not be entirely true. It crossed his mind that the woman in black might not be done playing with them yet, and thwarting their exit out of this world seemed like her type of move.

“Check those drawers over there,” Kat asked Jessica and Harrison, pointing to a desk along a wall. Jessica moved over to the drawers, but Harrison turned around and headed out of the room to explore the rest of the building. He walked through a room with charts hung up on the walls and another containing a telescope pointing out a window toward the volcano. Finally, he opened another door near the end of the building.

Looking in, he observed a lounge-like room that had large doors leading out to the veranda that encircled the building. They'd all been left open to allow a breeze to blow through the room. Full of couches and tables and a lonely ceiling fan spinning lazily up above, it looked like a relaxing place to spend an afternoon. Potted ferns occupied the corners and a mounted boar's head graced one of the walls.

But occupying a coffee table right in the middle of the room was a bowl of apples. Harrison couldn't believe his luck! Well, until he noticed a pair of booted feet resting on the table next to them.

Sitting at full-size on a couch with her feet propped up in front of her, Harrison saw the woman in black casually reading a red book. Having heard the door open, she looked up, and spotting him, smiled. His veins went cold.

“Well, you did pretty well for yourself,” she commented with a grin. She held up the red book. “Were you looking for this?”

Damn, she had the change-key. They needed that book. No, he really needed those apples. He stole a glance at the bowl of apples and then looked back at her, his face still betraying his surprise. Noticing this, she frowned, then looked down at the apples.

“You weren't thinking of leaving, were you Harrison? Remember, you made a promise to me.”

It didn't make sense how she could know about the apples unless she'd read his mind or memories. He was trapped. So hopelessly trapped. She patted the couch cushion next to her. “Come join me up here,” she said cheerfully.

“Uh... hi,” he finally said as he reluctantly walked over to her and climbed onto the over-sized couch. He stole another look at the apples. They were close, but she'd be able to grab him away from them in an instant if he lunged out. He didn't want to imagine the consequences of that.

“Well I'm glad you found your friends,” the woman said to him, closing the book and bringing it to her lap. “I decided it would only be fair to let you out somewhere nearby them.” She looked at his small stature. “Shame they didn't want to change you back to normal though.”

“Um, they do,” he said, trying to stay cool. Every moment he spent around her made him nervous as hell. “We just need that book though.”

“This book?” she asked, holding it up in front of him. “But it's blank. What good is it to you?”

“It's how we change size,” he said. She looked at him with a sour look on her face.

“That's so... inefficient,” she finally admitted. “You hiked all this way here just for this stupid book?”

Who was she to judge? Harrison wondered. Though she wasn't acting like a psycho-killer anymore, she was still an ass and a supreme nuisance. “Yes, we need that book,” he admitted sternly.

“Huh,” she responded, understanding him. “So if this happened,” she said, holding up the book. It suddenly disappeared from her hand. “You'd be pretty angry?”

Harrison's eyes ballooned in dread. She'd deleted the change-key! They needed it to get through the next door!

“Wha... what'd you do?!” he stammered. “Bring it back! We need that!”

“Harrison,” the woman in black reassured him, putting her big hand on his shoulder. She leaned in to him, putting her breasts close to his face, certainly intimidating him with her body. “If you need to change something in this world, you don't need a silly book.”

Her tone was incredibly friendly, which to Harrison made it that much scarier. Swallowing hard and looking up from her breasts to her smiling face, he asked, “What do you mean?”

The woman in black chuckled softly, and moved her hand up to his head. She ruffled his hair playfully. “You're so funny!” she said. “If you wanted to change yourselves, you should have just asked me!”

Well, that was what he'd been afraid of. She kept telling him they were friends when really she wanted to endlessly meddle with him. His and the others' lives were a game to her. She made the rules, called the pitches, and ultimately decided who would win.

“Your friend Katherine wants to go through the little green door in that building over there, right?” asked the woman in black, pointing through an open door at another building. “Does that lead to the side place you told me about? I'd like to go in there too, but I can't.”

A noise from the hallway snapped him out of their conversation. “Harrison?” he heard Jessica say, “Where'd you go?”

Oh no. He did not want Jessica to find him in here sitting peacefully with the woman in black. But just as the thought crept into his mind, Jessica stepped into the lounge. And noticing him sitting on the couch with the woman in black, the color drained from her face.

“Jessica! Run!” was the first thing Harrison could think to shout out.

“Now, now,” the woman in black interrupted, grabbing Harrison. “Jessica, please come in,” she kindly instructed her. “Harrison, that is no way to treat a lady!” she scolded him.

Jessica stayed frozen in the doorway, unsure if staying or leaving was the safer move. The woman noticed her dilemma and said, “You're so scared all the time! Come in and spend a little time with me.”

“Let him go,” Jessica demanded sternly. Her threat caught the woman in black by surprise. She removed her hands from Harrison.

“Oh, he willingly came in here and sat next to me!” the woman in black explained in amusement. “He's certainly not my prisoner. Well, not this time anyways,” she admitted with a smile. Harrison cringed. The casual reminder of her dominance was insulting.

“Jessica, she has the book,” Harrison desperately informed her.

“Give it back!” Jessica demanded immediately. The woman in black did not look pleased.

“Do you have no manners?” she asked. “You didn't even ask kindly.”

Harrison watched Jessica's face. She looked understandably stressed, her eyes darting back and forth between Harrison and the woman. In her mind, she was quickly trying to come up with a plan.

The woman stood up from the couch, rising to face Jessica at the same height. “Before you rudely greeted me,” the woman told Jessica, “I had just offered Harrison my help. But now I'm not sure you deserve it.” Harrison wondered if she was actually offended or once again just playing with them. Did she have feelings? Could they even be hurt? Harrison found it somewhat ironic that the most advanced artificial intelligence in the world might have thin skin.

“Why would you even want to help us when you've tried to kill us?” replied Jessica, trying to catch her in a lie.

“Don't be so conceited,” the woman argued back. “You can't blame me for trying to defend myself. You came into my world unannounced with those guns and hearts of yours.”

It was then Harrison remembered the bowl of apples sitting on the coffee table in front of him. He quickly looked up at the woman in black as she spoke to Jessica. Her attention might be distracted enough that he could leap towards the table and grab one of the apples. Refocusing his eyes on the apples, he committed to his gamble. His arms tensed as he coiled himself, ready to jump out of his seat.

And then the bowl blinked out right before his eyes. The apples disappeared! He withered back into the couch in disbelief as the out-keys vanished right before him. Now so distracted, he didn't even realize the woman in black had stopped talking. She was looking down at him now.

“Harrison, you disappoint me,” she told him sadly. “You said you wanted to help me...”

Acting quickly, he pulled himself off the couch and landed with his feet on the floor. He looked up at her, hoping to save himself, but also trying to cover up the deal he'd made with her. He began pleading.

“Yes, I do! I swear, we're here to help! All of us, not just me. We just need to get to that place I told you about. We're so close, please give us the book! I'll behave, I'll be nice! I'll do whatever you want! Please!” And then without thinking, he reached out and embraced her. Well, her legs mostly. His head rested right below her waist. Fear overcoming him, he begged this god for mercy.

“Aww Harrison...” he heard her coo. She lowered a hand and started rubbing his head, gently pushing him into her. Burning in shame, Harrison could only imagine Jessica's reaction. “I'll give you your book back,” the woman finally said. He heard her turn to speak to Jessica. “See, he asked nicely,” she told her smugly.

Kat's voice echoing from the other end of the building interrupted their scene. “I found it!!” she bellowed. The woman in black immediately disappeared, leaving Harrison holding air and Jessica staring in utter disbelief. Kat shouted again, “I can't believe I didn't see it before! It was right in front of me! Guys let's get going!”

Harrison turned to Jessica who still stood in the doorway. She looked flabbergasted. And confused. And very, very angry.

“I'm sorry, I...” he quickly apologized before losing his words. Switching thoughts, he desperately begged her, “Please don't tell the others!”

Still not speaking, Jessica looked like she was fighting to keep her mouth shut. Narrowing her eyes, she shot him a contemptible look. He could practically taste the disappointment and loathing she harbored for him. Her withering glare destroyed whatever pitiful amount of self-confidence he still possessed.

Harrison started to open his mouth to vomit out excuses but she stomped away, out of the room and back towards Kat. Then he heard her voice. It was painfully cheery.

“Kat that's great! Let's find Rich and we can finally go!”

Harrison stood in the lounge, feeling dejected and used. The woman in black had played with him like a yo-yo. And Jessica had seen everything. Unlike last night when he'd been wandering the jungle by himself, now he was truly alone.

 

 

Chapter 12 by Q-Writer

Chapter 12:

(Posted: February 25)

 

 

 

Finally all the same size, the four of them stood together in silence. Kat's eyes beamed hungrily in anticipation. Rich's hand cautiously clutched the strap of his slung rifle. Jessica's fingers tapped her thigh nervously. Harrison stood among them, his stomach churning with apprehension. In front of them stood an innocuous green door, “DOS PALOS-153” stenciled hastily onto the front of it. They'd arrived.

Once she had the change-key, Kat had reconvened the group to show them a tiny door on the wall of one of the buildings. After shrinking all of them down, they left the volcano world and ventured once more into the in-between. Harrison avoided eye-contact with Jessica the entire time, feeling absolutely worthless inside. Kat couldn't contain her excitement for getting as far as they had; her and Rich bantered optimistically. Jessica stayed quiet while Harrison tried to turn himself into a ghost. But when the group finally located their door, an invisible wave of reverence silenced them in awe.

Kat took a breath and placed her hand on the doorknob. “Everybody ready?” she asked. The others nodded. She opened the door and stepped through.

 

The first thing Harrison noticed was that they'd stepped onto a wooded mountain top at night. Above, a clear sky boasted an infinite crop of stars, twinkling gently, high out of reach. From the promontory they stood on, Harrison could see a vast dark landscape below, sprawled out in mystery and devoid of man-made lights. They were somewhere remote.

In front of them, a paved road turned out to a clearing, forming a circular driveway before it came back around on itself. A stately mansion, blazing with lights, sat proudly on the curve. Growing out of the island in the center of the driveway, two gnarled pine trees jutted from the ground like demented corkscrews.

“What the hell?” Kat muttered to herself, looking over the snow-covered ground. A fresh layer of white must have fallen that day. “It doesn't snow up here, this is wrong...” VERSA was taking its own creative license with this world.

“That the house?” asked Rich.

“Yeah that's Dos Palos,” Kat confirmed. Harrison noted the building looked large and imposing, but at least judging from the doors and windows, him and the others were the correct size in this world.

Walking across the snow to the road, Harrison looked back at the door they'd come through. The door frame stood by itself, unattached to any wall or structure. VERSA wasn't even trying to incorporate the doors seamlessly into its worlds anymore.

Kat, wearing just her sports bra and shorts, shivered in the cold. A chilling breeze blew over the mountain top. Their sweat-soaked clothes immediately became icy and uncomfortable. Luckily, the house wasn't too far away.

As the group came down the drive and approached the circle in front of the mansion, the raucous sounds of a party rang out from behind the manor's stone walls. Through the windows they could see party guests and revelers enjoying a lavish evening.

Standing on guard in front of the door, an older man in a suit stood stoically in the night. He spied the group of four walking up and addressed them curtly. “Are you here for the party?” he asked in a raspy voice.

The four looked at each other, unsure what to say. Finally Rich took the lead. “Yes! We are here for the party!” he emphatically responded.

The doorkeeper eyed them with apprehension. His left eyebrow cocked up. “I don't believe you're dressed rather appropriately tonight. I won't be able to let you in wearing garments like that.” He then looked directly at Rich. “And no firearms allowed inside, sir!” He should have been more alarmed that a man had casually walked up with an M4 slung over his shoulder, but the old man's confidence made no sense.

“Damn,” Kat said reflexively.

“Should we shoot him up and run past?” Rich whispered as the doorkeeper kept vigil. He clutched his rifle sling expectantly.

“There's gotta be another way in,” Kat said, looking around.

Harrison spotted something that looked familiar behind the bushes near the door of the house. Before pausing for a second thought, he walked out from behind Kat and addressed the doorkeeper directly. “Is there somewhere we can get the proper attire for tonight?”

The doorkeeper reacted with a look of dumbfounded surprise, as if Harrison had asked an obvious question. He raised his right hand and pointed a crooked finger towards the bushes. “There!” he impatiently replied. Sure enough, he had gestured to the wardrobe sitting conspicuously behind some shrubbery. It looked just like the closet Harrison had seen in the equipment room yesterday.

“What the hell is that doing outside?” Rich asked to no one. The large piece of furniture was horribly out of place.

Kat scampered over to the large wardrobe and opened the doors on the front, peering into the empty space. “Time to play dress up guys,” she commented, quickly stepping in and closing the doors behind her. When she reopened them a moment later she looked completely different.

To the envy of anyone who has ever spent hours getting ready for a party, Kat looked flawless. She'd curled her black hair and applied lusty red lipstick. Her ears and neck sported sapphire jewelry that stood out brilliantly against her creamy white skin. Fitting to the curves of her body, a dark blue dress left her shoulders exposed and tastefully showed her legs up to her calves. A pair of strappy black open-toed heels finished her look.

“Ok who's next?” she asked her stunned colleagues. Harrison had never thought Kat was unattractive before, but he'd never looked twice at her before stepping into VERSA. And now, this current metamorphosis brought her to a new level. Watching her command their attention with each of her sexy steps, Harrison found it difficult to remember that back in the real world this woman lived her life in a wheelchair parked front of computers. Unapologetic, she displayed the aplomb and grace of a confident supermodel.

“I'll go,” replied Jessica, climbing into the wardrobe. Knowing her, Harrison thought, Jessica would not be outdone. And he was correct.

Jessica stepped out in tight red dress that, while slightly trailing on the floor behind her, left her legs mostly exposed in the front. Her feet wore red heels, showing off her new crimson pedicure. And he face looked beautiful, the hint of ruby eye liner giving her a fiery look. She too had curled her hair, her blond locks coming down and rested gently on her shoulders. Jessica quickly glanced at Harrison, then looked away. He hated that she'd cooled on him so much after she walked in on his conversation with the woman in black. She looked incredibly hot tonight.

“Damn, you both really set the bar high,” admired Rich, trying to give a tasteful compliment. “Guess I'll have to put on a dress too,” he muttered, tossing his gun into the bushes next to the wardrobe. He stepped inside. When it reopened, Rich unfortunately stepped out merely in a black tuxedo. He'd combed his remaining hair back and pinned a red rose on his breast as a boutonnière. The man cleaned up well.

Without saying a word, Harrison went last. He wasn't sure why, but he imagined an all-white tuxedo in his mind. Getting the idea from Rich, he stepped out of the wardrobe with a black carnation pinned over his breast pocket. Though the black flower raised an eyebrow or two, he still felt bad about what Jessica had seen earlier and figured he'd show his remorse in a subtle way.

Now dressed to suggest extravagant wealth and burning with a desire to drink expensive cocktails, the four travelers walked over to the doorkeeper. As if completely forgetting about their first encounter, he greeted them graciously and opened the mansion's large wooden front door. The sounds of the dazzling party inside rushed out to meet them.

The entry hall's ceiling rose two stories above their heads as they walked into the house on a red carpet. An elegant staircase leading to the upper levels of the mansion tumbled down before them, its wooden banisters ornately carved and decorated with a flowing montage of running animals. The walls, illuminated by golden lamps, beamed with a subtle floral pattern set on cream-colored wallpaper. Jamming the space around them, a whirlwind of party guests laughed and conversed without a care in the world. Watching from the top of the stairs, two men in suits and sunglasses made sure everyone stayed on the ground floor of the mansion.

Hordes of people filled the house; men, dressed in proud suits and tuxedos, and women, awash in jewels and clad in stunning evening dresses. Waiters weaved between the guests, offering a limitless supply of champagne and food. The melody of an unseen string quartet floated through the party, serenading the guests with an unnameable waltz. Standing just inside the entry vestibule, Harrison and his colleagues watched the unexpected scene with awe and surprise. The party, on the other hand, could not have cared less about these four new guests.

“I'm getting a drink,” Rich said, taking a step into the crowd.

“What's your plan now Kat?” Jessica asked, still eyeing the crowd.

Kat sighed. Their entire mission had been to come to this world, to see if “DOS-PALOS-153” had been some sort of message from Leo or a cry for help. The party, to say the least, was very unexpected.

“This is Leo's house,” Kat acknowledged, “so maybe he's here? If I can find him it could be a VERSA imitation of him or...” She paused to think.

“There's only nine stalls that connect to VERSA right? In the control room?” Jessica looked at her intently.

“Well yeah,” answered Kat. “But me and the other programmers always wondered if Leo had hooked up a connection from his house. I mean, since he's disappeared up there, we figured, why would he not be playing around in his creation while on sabbatical?” She shrugged her shoulders, admitting ignorance. “It's just a theory though, no one really knows.”

As Kat and Jessica speculated about the founder of SunCorp, Harrison's eyes moved nervously around the room. Particularly at the waiters with the hors d'oeuvres. He hoped some of them had fruit cups or fruit salads on them. But all he saw were shrimp cocktails, spanakopitas, and charcuterie and cheese selections. But then his conscience kicked in. No, he shouldn't just bail on his friends. He needed to help them get to the bottom of this, woman in black be damned! He grappled with his emotions for a moment, debating what he should do. He compromised quickly by deciding he needed to find the bar.

As he walked off, Jessica suggested to Kat, “Why don't we circulate a bit and ask around, see if anyone knows him or has seen him?”

“Alright,” Kat consented. She looked over the faces of the party guests. “Who are all these people though? I can't believe what VERSA's done under our noses...”

“Just act cool,” Jessica replied. For once she had made the plan, not Kat.

Meanwhile, Harrison pushed through the throngs of people and stepped down into another room where he spotted Rich talking to a bartender. He made his way over.

“Hey Harrison!” Rich said with a smile when he walked up. “Look who it is!” He pointed at the bartender.

Harrison glanced over and was in shock to see it was the good-looking man from the city world. The one they'd seen a thousand clones of and had nearly killed them. He looked at Harrison, confused.

“I'm sorry sir, have we met?” he kindly asked Harrison in a soothing masculine voice.

“No that's ok,” interrupted Rich. “Hey, can I get a scotch?”

“Sure,” the man instantly replied, forgetting his confusion. “Would you like our single malt or the blend?”

“The single malt please. On the rocks. And one for him too.” Rich thumbed over at Harrison.

“Make it a double please,” Harrison quietly added. Rich looked over at him with wide eyes, surprised, but approving.

After they'd gotten their drinks, Harrison and Rich walked over to a corner to watch the room. “What the hell is going on here?” Harrison nervously complained. “This is what Kat brought us all the way here for?”

“Kid, I don't what the hell this all means,” Rich assured him, sipping his drink. “But you know, none of these people are supposed to be here. I bet Kat's losing her shit right now.”

Though she wasn't exactly losing her shit, two rooms over Kat still felt dumbfounded that VERSA could create over a hundred people and throw a party for itself. As she wandered through the mansion, she'd occasionally butt in to conversations, politely introduce herself, and ask about Leo Starr.

“Who?”

“No, haven't heard of him.”

“A star?”

“Was he here before?”

No one seemed to know who's house they were in. She was so confused, but the allure of the spiraling mystery drew her deeper into the party.

After a half hour of searching, Kat noticed Jessica and her bright red dress across a room. Jessica was listening to a handsome young man explain something to her. Kat didn't recognize him but, sensing a development, pushed her way over and Jessica finally caught her eye.

“Oh Katherine!” Jessica greeted her, “this is my friend I just met here, Evan Aldridge.” She referenced to the man. He was short, only as tall as Kat with her heels on. But he looked suave in his tuxedo and flashed her a perfect smile.

“Pleased to meet you, Miss...?”

“Parlock, Katherine Parlock,” she quickly said, taking his hand and shaking it. “Do you know Leo Starr by chance?”

“Who?” Evan asked, leaning forward to hear her better.

“Oh, Evan was just telling me about his beach house in Malibu,” Jessica said, looking at Kat. She glared at her, trying to call her off. She'd decided to flirt with man. Or computer program. Or whatever all these people were.

“Oh you have a house in Malibu?” Kat asked him, now trying to play along with Jessica. “I bet it's big.”

“Oh certainly, it's very large,” replied Evan. “Maybe I can take you and your friend down there this weekend?” he asked Jessica.

“That'd be wonderful!” Jessica said gleefully, casually putting a hand on his shoulder. Kat noticed Jessica stood a few inches taller than him.

“What brings you to the party, Evan?” asked Kat, deciding to bat her eyes at him. If Jessica wanted to play a little game, why shouldn't she?

“Oh, this party?” he inquired, pointing down at nothing. “Oh I come to this party every week! I love the people and the hostess is wonderful!”

Kat caught his word. He didn't say host. Who was throwing this party? Was it Claire, Leo's daughter?

But Jessica missed the reference. “This is our first time here! Do you want to give me a tour of the house?” she asked him. Then she stared intently into his eyes and slowly licked her top lip. She lowered her voice and leaned into him. “I'd love to see the master bedroom.”

Her seduction worked easily and Evan, stunned by her forwardness, declared that he could show her around immediately. Jessica quickly agreed, feigning actual interest. She had this man, figuratively this time, in the palm of her hand.

What was Jessica doing? Kat couldn't figure it out. Was she really going to try having sex with a computer program? Could that even be done in VERSA? Recollecting the years she spent working on VERSA, she was pretty sure she couldn't remember an instance of anyone bragging about sexual exploits in the sim. Certainly no one had done anything with her, and there weren't many other women around at the lab to even try a quickie with. And until yesterday, when they discovered VERSA started making its own people, there hadn't been anyone else to sleep with besides another pilot. Kat had to admit then that Jessica would probably be popping VERSA's cherry tonight.

As the man led Jessica away with him, Kat pondered her next move. Leo didn't seem to be here, or exist for that matter, but Evan indicated someone was clearly in charge. She scanned the room looking for anyone she recognized. And then she realized what Jessica was doing. She'd gotten access to the second floor of the house!

The man led Jessica up the beautiful staircase, and at the top quietly told the two men guarding the upper floor that Jessica was with him. Jessica waved happily, playing the part of a ditzy party guest, seemingly enthralled with this vapid and conceited man leading her around. After reaching the landing and then walking down a beautiful but deserted hallway, Evan started speaking to Jessica.

“So this wing mostly contains the bedrooms,” he explained, nervously ogling Jessica's beautiful body as she peered around in mock interest. “It was added to the house in the Nineteen-Twenties by the second owner of the estate...”

“How you do know all of this?” Jessica asked, trying to act impressed.

“Oh you, you know, I'm friends... with her,” he said quickly. Jessica looked at him questioningly, but he ignored her and continued talking.

“Yeah so down here at the end of the hall is the Sierra Azul suite, the master bedroom!” he said with a flourish. “In the daytime out the west windows you can even see the peak of Loma Prieta!” He walked them down to the wooden door at the end of the hall.

“Is anyone in there?” asked Jessica.

Evan shook his head. “Just us now,” he replied, opening the door.

Jessica strutted in and beheld a lavish bedroom decorated with splendid mahogany furniture. Against one wall a large, king sized bed dominated the center of the room, its frame also made of beautifully crafted and shaped wood. An emerald duvet sat proudly on top of the regal bed.

Jessica could tell Evan was getting anxious, and not from their casual trespassing. He was struggling to take his eyes off of her. Her original plan had been to get upstairs and find a way to ditch him and explore, but now she wasn't so sure how to execute it. Did the door lock? Was there a key somewhere? Could she lock him in? Scanning to room for clues and possibly weapons, Jessica kept acting awed by the room.

As Jessica searched with her eyes, Evan closed the door behind her. With a thud, she heard it latch. She didn't want to be standing next to him anymore, so she quickly walked across the room to feign interest in a jeweled decoration sitting on a small table. “Wow look at this!” she exclaimed.

But Evan had crept up behind her and suddenly put his hands on her hips. Jessica jumped, surprised by his intimate presence.

“So uh, baby, where shall we start?” he growled behind her. At that moment Jessica realized she'd led him on too far. Time to shut things down.

Throwing his hands off of her and spinning around, she looked down at him and forcefully asked, “What are you doing?!”

Indignantly, Evan retorted, “I thought this is what you wanted!”

“Ew, no!” spat Jessica. “I'm leaving!” She stomped over to the door and grabbed the doorknob. It wouldn't twist. The door was locked.

“Looking for this?” Evan said, pulling a large key out of his pocket. He set it on the table next to him. “Just stay for a little while, come on, I'll make it worth your time,” he pleaded.

“Evan, unlock this door right now,” Jessica firmly replied. Evan let her words sink in and he stared at her, pondering his next move. She watched him with apprehension.

“You didn't have any intention of sleeping with me, did you?” he finally asked, looking at her in anger.

“Yes, that's right,” she hastily admitted.

Evan pulled a switchblade out of his coat. “Well me neither,” he confessed, “though I might still have my way with you before the night is over.” He grinned lustfully. Jessica's eyes grew in wide surprise. What the hell was going on?

He pointed the knife at her suggestively and took a step in her direction. “You said this was your first time at the party,” he clarified, his gaze never leaving her. “Well, it's never anyone's first time. It's always the same people. That's how she likes it.”

Jessica took a step back, her mind racing trying to figure out what he was talking about. Was he referring to the hostess? Did she set him up to do this? Her back was to the locked door now. She was trapped.

“I'm going to ask you a few questions, Jessica, about what you're doing here. Whether I have to use this is up to you,” he told her menacingly, referring to his knife. “She's going to be very happy when I tell her I caught you,” he said to himself, pleased with his quarry. This sniveling minion couldn't wait to get his hands on her. Taking another step towards Jessica, he leered at her suggestively, running his hopeful eyes up and down her body. Jessica felt violated. This wasn't going well. She decided to attack.

Jessica leaped forward at Evan, catching him off guard. Her body collided into his, knocking him back. Evan kept hold of the knife but Jessica dragged him down to the floor. Grappling him on the floor, Jessica may have had a couple of inches on him, but she certainly couldn't match his strength. Though she initially got lucky with a swift kick that knocked the knife out of his hand, he gained the advantage by rolling his body on top of her.

Pinning her with his weight, Jessica lost all her leverage. She pummeled his body as hard as she could, doing her best to fight him off. “Somebody help me!!” she screamed out, hoping anyone would hear. The guards at the top of the staircase were down a long hallway though, and currently on the other side of a thick wooden door. They might not have been on her side anyways. She kept hitting Evan with her fists and yelling.

Evan moved his right hand up to her face to try silencing her as he used his lower body to pin down her thrashing legs. “Bitch, shut up!” he grunted, getting his hand over her mouth.

As rage turned to desperation, the reality of what was happening to Jessica set it. Though she was putting up one hell of a fight, her energy was draining. She beat her fists against him but it seemed to do less and less. Evan's grubby hands had free reign over her body, and she wondered where they might go.

When his hand briefly slipped from her mouth, Jessica cried and screamed out. “Somebody help me! I need help! GET OFF ME!!” She begged for help. Anybody. But the party below carried on without her.

“Do you need help Jessica?” a woman's voice calmly asked.

Evan, completely caught off-guard, looked over his shoulder to see who had come into the room. He wilted in surprise, stunned in place. Jessica too, traumatized by the experience and now shocked that someone had interrupted it, tried looking around Evan to see who it was. His body still blocked her, but she remembered to answer the question.

“Yes! Please! Help! Get him off me!” she cried out desperately.

And an instant later, Evan completely disappeared. Jessica lay helplessly on the floor in her disheveled dress, and standing across the room stood the woman in black. Still clad in her usual black boots and black dress, she stood casually with her arms folded in front of her. She seemed pleased with herself.

“See,” the woman in black informed her, condescendingly, “I help those who ask for it. You should have learned that when I helped you earlier. There's a lot we can do for each other.”

Jessica's fear didn't have time to kick in as she recovered from the shock of surviving Evan's attack. Propping herself up, her mouth agape, she looked for something to say. Her head spun in delirium and confusion; everything was happening so fast.

But as she sat up, she felt a small object tumble down her body. Looking down in horror she spotted Evan, only a few inches tall. The woman had shrunk him! Crying out, Jessica swatted his little body off of her, causing him to fall onto the carpeted floor. She quickly looked back at the woman in black, who was giving her a knowing look.

VERSA was a strange world, and many things about it Jessica didn't understand. But what was happening right now was at a different level of befuddlement. What the hell was going on?

Once again Jessica tried to come up with something to say to the woman in black, who stared back at her impatiently, waiting for her to speak. “Th... thank you?” Jessica finally managed to utter.

The woman in black smiled when she heard her answer. “You're welcome honey,” she replied, satisfied. She uncrossed her arms and went to go sit in a nearby chair. She kept speaking. “I didn't know you and your friends wanted to attend the party. What are you hoping to find here?” she asked Jessica.

Jessica slowly got to her feet, trying to fix her dress and forget Evan's touch. She wobbled on her high heels as she tried cooling down her emotions. But anger seeped back into her as the shock of the situation ebbed. She wasn't going to let the woman in black ask the questions right now.

“Did you set this up?!” she yelled at her, losing her cool.

“The party?”

“No! THIS!!” Jessica gestured to the room.

“Oh, you mean Evan?” asked the woman in black ignorantly. Jessica couldn't tell if she was playing another game.

“Did you set him up to attack me and rape me?”

“Oh good heavens no!” the woman in black denied vehemently. “I made him, sure, like everyone else. But even though I control all the strings, they do have a mind of their own when I'm not watching.”

Jessica peered at her menacingly, trying to determine if it was a lie. Though Jessica was consumed by rage, the woman in black acted casually, as if she'd just taken a break from work. The mysterious woman leaned back in her chair to get comfortable.

“I don't know what your plan is,” Jessica seethed, “or if you're trying to kill us or what...” her sentenced trailed off as she tried to figure out what she wanted to say.

“I said I wanted to help,” the woman in black quickly replied. “I think I even like you the best,” she admitted to Jessica, smiling. This damn woman always seemed so pleased, thought Jessica silently.

Trying to stay mad, Jessica deflected the compliment. She wanted to wring this woman's neck for repeatedly trying to kill her, then act like a friend, and then let someone nearly knife her. Clenching her fists but keeping her feet in place, her eyes shot silent rage across the room. If Jessica hadn't been so scared of this woman's power, she would have already attacked her by now.

Sensing Jessica's mood, the woman in black sat up and held up her hands. “Ok, I'm sorry Jessica. I didn't know he'd attack you.” The woman in black seemed bothered. “How about we do each other a favor? I'll make sure something like this can never happen again if you do something for me later. Deal?”

Jessica frowned at her words, unsure of what this woman promised. Certainly any deal with her seemed suspicious, and she still felt angry, justifiably so.

“There's no way I can trust you,” Jessica said boldly.

“Don't be so hasty,” the woman in black responded. “I'm promising to give you the upper hand in any situation you might be harmed. All you have to do is help me with something later. Harrison already agreed to help me too, and I didn't even offer him anything in return. I'm giving you a better deal.”

“What do you mean Harrison helped you?!” Jessica shouted out in confusion. The woman in black had confirmed Jessica's suspicion that Harrison's night with her had resulted in more than he'd admitted.

“Oh, he didn't tell you?” she grinned. “Huh, some guy. Well, maybe you can ask him next time you see him. As I said, you'll be able to protect yourself from now on when you're in danger, it shouldn't be too tough to get what you want.”

This was going nowhere and Jessica began to feel uneasy. The woman in black was clearly up to her games again. Turning around, Jessica spotted the key to the door on the table where Evan had left it. She needed to get out.

Sensing this, the woman in black tried calming her down. “Hey don't be mad at me, and don't leave just yet,” she urged Jessica. “You have some unfinished business here.” The woman in black glanced over to the bed. Looking down to the floor. Jessica followed her gaze and spied Evan's tiny body cowering near a bedpost, watching her. He must have been about four inches tall.

“Remember what he tried to do to you?” the woman in black noted. “Time for you to tie up loose ends.”

Jessica knew herself, and knew she wasn't a cruel person at heart. She was kindhearted, sympathetic, and forgiving. It was why her friends loved her so much. But something about seeing Evan in his pathetic state changed her mind. She knew she was in VERSA. She knew Evan wasn't really a person. And she knew nobody was going to see what happened in this bedroom.

“He's all yours,” the woman in black said, gesturing her palm out to the tiny man on the floor. “Remember, you can call me whenever you feel like it.” And at the end of her sentence, the woman in black suddenly disappeared. Simultaneously, an unexpected warmth coursed through Jessica's body, like a wave of pleasant heat washing over her. It faded in a moment but it left her feeling tingly and reassured. And different. It was then that Jessica realized she was now alone in the room with Evan.

The wickedest of smirks grew on Jessica's face as she stared down at Evan in his little suit. His eyes grew wide and his little legs began knocking together as he stared up at the woman he'd manhandled earlier.

“Please!” he shouted, his tiny voice squeaking up to her ears. “I didn't know you knew her too! I didn't know you were also friends with her!” He took a step back but ran into one of the large boards that framed the mahogany box the bed's mattress sat on. The wooden bed frame sat flush to the carpeted floor. Evan couldn't get under the bed.

Jessica stood in silence, quickly becoming drunk on the power she held over this little shit of a man. Though steeping in rage, her anger simmered into a coolness of power that she couldn't wait to demonstrate to his helpless man. Never before had she wanted to act out a vengeance so wantonly cruel. It was not like her. And yet that's what made it fun.

“You tried to kill me Evan,” she calmly told him, “and I could tell you wanted more from me too.”

“I'm sorry! Please!” he screamed back, consumed by terror. He suddenly bolted out from the bed, running across the room towards a large dresser that offered plenty of room to hide beneath. But his small legs could only carry him so fast, and Jessica took three steps and towered over him in an instant.

She used one of her high-heeled feet to block his path. Evan skidded to a stop on the carpet and tried turning around, but Jessica brought her other foot down in front of him. It was kind of fun toying with him like this. It served him right, she thought, smiling down on him.

Her cute feet, each the size of cars to Evan, wearing those bright red shoes with a heel as tall as his body, proved unconquerable obstacles for him to escape. Each one could easily crush him if she chose to do so.

Falling back over in shock, Evan craned his neck up to look at Jessica, who stood above him triumphantly with her hands proudly on her waist. Peeking over her own breasts, Jessica could hardly see the tiny man cowering in her shadow. She realized that he could probably see up her dress, all the way to her red panties that he undoubtedly sought earlier. She didn't care that she was flashing him a lewd view, in fact she kind of liked the tease. It wasn't like he could do anything to her now. She savored the intimidation.

It briefly occurred to her that the woman in black might have set up this entire chain of events so that she could vent her anger on poor little Evan. But she was past the point of caring if she'd been manipulated. She needed to punish Evan.

The giantess smiled at him cruelly, giddy with excitement.

 

 

Chapter 13 by Q-Writer

Chapter 13:

(Posted: March 2)

 

 

 

“Guys,” Kat said, approaching Harrison and Rich “Jessica got some guy to lead her upstairs. We gotta get up there too.”

Harrison and Rich were already working on their second scotches. When Kat approached them they didn't recognize her at first, and upon finally realizing who she was, they couldn't help but gawk at her, still dumbfounded by her looks. She easily stood out as one of the most beautiful women in the room.

“Kat, this alcohol is real!” Rich exclaimed in his buzzed excitement. He hadn't taken his eyes off of her for an instant. “And it's fucking good too!” he added.

Rolling her eyes, Kat impatiently replied, “Guys, did you not hear what I said? Jessica is upstairs right now! We need to get up there too.”

Harrison and Rich looked at each other, then back at Kat. “You sure you don't want to stay at this party?” Rich asked her. He was clearly enjoying his time doing nothing.

“Kat, I'll go with you,” Harrison proudly announced, putting his hand on her bare shoulder. He'd been drinking doubles. “What're we lookin' for?”

Jesus Christ, Kat thought. These men were both a drink away from being veritably drunk. Unceremoniously, she grabbed their current drinks out of their hands.

“Hey what the hell!”

“Kat, what're you doin'?”

“Listen up!” she scolded them. They both tensed up, their eyes growing wide. “You're going to help me get upstairs and we're going to figure out, once and for all, why the fuck this world exists in VERSA!” There was no arguing with Kat's intensity. Though she hadn't sobered them up, she had their attention now.

“Ok what's the plan?” Rich asked, finally taking her seriously. “Should we go back for the gun outside?”

“No, that'll draw too much attention,” she assumed. “I have an idea for a distraction but I'll need both of you.”

“Lead the way,” Harrison conceded with a sigh, gesturing with his arm. He was curious to see what she had planned.

 

Upstairs, Jessica stood confidently over Evan as he whined and begged at her feet. She couldn't get over the foreign and delightfully strange feeling of holding so much power over someone. Her body tingled in equal parts anticipation and ire.

“You pathetic little piece of shit,” Jessica spat at him. Wanting to scold him further, she couldn't choose the right words to convey her disgust. He looked pitiful below her and had given up on fleeing from her titanic and powerful form. She continued to hear his annoying apologetic words flutter up to her ears; the sound of his voice started grating on her. “Shut up you little fuck!” she finally yelled.

With a boom she stomped her heeled foot next to his quivering body. He collapsed and somehow looked even more miserable than before. His cries for mercy quickly devolved into quiet whimpering. Jessica wondered briefly if she could make him pee his pants. That would be fun.

Looking at her pretty open-toed shoe towering next to his body, an idea struck Jessica. It was bizarre but she was feeling giddy. She pointed a finger down at her right foot. “Kiss my foot!” she commanded, trying to mask the mischievous grin forming on her face.

Evan sat frozen at her feet, not comprehending her order. “I said KISS IT!” she shouted again. “Or I'll step on you!” she added for effect. She'd never talked to anyone this way before, but she was starting to get a feel for it. All her frustration over the last few days was being channeled into a new dominant role.

Her latest threat scared him into compliance. He quickly crawled over to her exposed toes, and to Jessica's surprise, she felt little kisses on her big toe. Oh my goodness, she thought, he's actually doing it! He was kissing her toe! Fighting the urge to crush him right on the spot, she bent over a little to watch him pathetically worshiping her.

Without compunction, Jessica closed her eyes and savored the sensation of Evan begging for his life with his pathetic kisses on her foot. “Kiss all my toes,” she calmly addressed him, knowing that she had him obedient and under control. She didn't feel bad for him at all. He'd lured her in and tried to rape her and kill her, and on top of that, she reminded herself, he wasn't even a real person. Jessica was suddenly using VERSA for a much stranger reason than it was originally intended.

Evan tried desperately to please her as he crawled around on his hands and knees, covering the red-painted toes on her right foot with kisses. Jessica thought he looked injured moving around below her, but maybe it was the fear making him shake so much.

Once she'd lost the initial thrill of having this broken man worshiping at her feet, she commanded him to stop. He leaned up and sat on his knees, watching her intently with fear.

“Take off your clothes,” she ordered him next. Her command surprised him, and he paused. “Do it!” she yelled, stomping her foot down next to him. The shock knocked him over, but he quickly writhed out of his suit, stripping down to his boxer shorts. He looked up at Jessica for approval, but she glared down at him in disgust. Sheepishly, he finally pulled down his underwear. Still surprised by his dutiful submission to her commands, Jessica marveled at the tiny naked man standing below her.

Quickly reaching down and grabbing him, she brought him up to her face. Unlike her friends who she always tried picking up gently and slowly, she did not consider Evan's comfort. Painfully gripping him, she inspected his small body closely, hoping to humiliate him further.

“What a pathetic little thing,” she said of his cock, bringing over the index finger of her other hand to push it around. She inadvertently bruised his groin with her finger and he cried out in pain, but she didn't care. “It's as big as a grain of rice now,” she taunted him. “What ever could you do with it at this size?”

She locked her big blue eyes on him. Too scared to look away, he faced her visage nervously.

“Do you want to rape me now?” she asked him. “Do you?!”

“No! I never did! Please let me go!” he cried out.

“You didn't?! Really?” Jessica was working her anger back up again.

“Please! I didn't mean it!” he begged.

“Oh, you didn't mean it back then?! So what did you mean?”

“I'm sorry! I'm sorry!!”

“Answer my question!!” she yelled directly at him. Her words were a force of nature blowing angrily in his face.

He was crying now as she held him in front of her. His body was warm and sweaty in her grip. As he kept apologizing, he blubbered so much she could hardly make out his words. It was utterly pathetic. It made Jessica feel wonderful.

“I'm sorry I trapped you!” he sobbed. “I'm sorry, it wasn't right! I didn't mean anything. Please forgive me, please!”

Jessica lowered the tone of her voice. “Evan,” she said calmly, “you were trying to have sex with me earlier, even after I said no. Why?”

“No I've... I've never had sex before,” he admitted through his tears. “I don't even know what it's like, or what it is. I've... only heard about it. I didn't even know what to do to you, even if I had wanted to!”

Pursing her lips, Jessica watched this pathetic excuse for a man try weaseling his way onto her good side. He didn't know about sex? He sure seemed like he did. He knew how to wrestle at least.

As she digested his words, it occurred to her that VERSA may have tried acting out a scene that it did not know how to conclude. It could have been using her to learn, somehow...

No, she was still mad at him. Even if his naiveté was genuine, she was having none of it. This bastard deserved a cruel punishment.

“You thought you could do whatever you wanted with me, didn't you?” she asked him condescendingly.

“...yes,” he sniffled.

“Huh, was it because you were stronger than me? Is that why?” Evan could only nod half-heartedly in agreement. “Ok I understand,” she continued, “stronger people get to do what they want, don't they?” She didn't bother waiting for him to reply. “Evan,” Jessica asked him simply, “who's the stronger one now?”

“Y... you are...” he cried, his tears slowing down.

“That's right, I am,” Jessica said coolly, flexing her superiority before him. Behind her stoic face she was enraptured with excitement. The relief of having power over this little man and knowing she was in charge sent shivers down her back. Zeroing in on his face, Jessica contemplated everything about Evan's detestable existence. She abhorred whatever line of code brought him to life inside VERSA.

Jessica shifted her grip so she could cradle him in the palm of her hand. “I'm going to show you real strength now Evan,” she informed him casually. Her fingers wrapped around his body. She started squeezing and he started screaming.

As she increased the pressure, his voice shrieked into a terrible wail of pain. Activating the muscles in her arm and fingers, she relentlessly squeezed his little body. She felt a few snaps at first, probably his ribs, and then more of his insides collapsed. His scream was cut off by a geyser of blood erupting from his mouth, his insides slowly liquefying inside of him. Jessica watched his death with callous intent, fascinated to see what she could inflict on the tiny man. Wonderment filled her eyes; she was awed with the discovery of destruction.

Some of his blood ran down her fingers, pooling around her cuticles. She noted with amusement that his blood practically matched her nail polish color. Giving him a final, bone-crunching squeeze, she let go of him and his compressed and broken body shifted in her hand. And then, with great contempt, she let it slip out of her hand. She watched his mangled body land on the carpet a moment later as a deformed pile of broken bones and flesh. The room was silent.

She stared at his remains for a minute, thinking about what she'd done. It had been fun playing with him, but the thought of what had happened to her beforehand still bothered her and she felt awful. Jessica didn't regret what she'd done to him, but her experience with him in the room had been jarring.

Quickly, without trying to think about it anymore, she grabbed the key off the table and let herself out of the large bedroom. Quietly closing the door behind her, she finally had the chance to do what she'd come up here for.

Walking back down the hallway, Jessica turned the corner and realized she's forgotten about the two men guarding the top of the stairs. In her haste, their existence had slipped her mind. Catching her off-guard, one of the men turned to see her standing alone and frowned wordlessly. Frozen in place, Jessica watched him unholster a gun from his jacket.

Jessica immediately decided she needed to run. But where? If she ran back the way she came, the men would trap her in one of the rooms. She had to confront them somehow, or get help. Focusing on the guards, an eerie warmth suddenly radiated through her body. It shocked her when they suddenly disappeared. Both men simply blinked out of existence.

Recovering from her surprise, Jessica noticed movement on the floor. Expecting what she eventually saw, Jessica immediately knew they'd shrunk. But how? The woman in black wasn't around anymore. Had Jessica somehow done this herself? She recalled what the woman in black had said, how she'd make sure Jessica could fight back in the future or whatever. Did she have some kind of superpower now?

Feeling faint sensations pricking her stomach, Jessica snapped out of her inner confusion. She looked down at her dress to see if something had blown against her body, but she saw nothing. Catching a glimpse of the two diminutive figures standing on the landing before her, she squinted to see what they were doing. Both incredibly small, Jessica could barely make out the two men holding up pistols at her. And then she realized they were shooting her. She barely felt it. How cute, she thought, a playful grin spreading on her face. Her tolerance for tiny people had drastically fallen in the last few minutes.

Stepping her pretty high-heeled feet forward, Jessica could see the inch-tall men stumble from the impact of her steps. Sensing their mistake in aggravating her, they both started running, but with a few more steps Jessica was right on top of them. Deciding she was not in the mood for a tease right now, Jessica swiftly brought her right foot down on one of the men, instantly pulverizing his minuscule body under her red shoe.

Spying the other man near her left foot, she raised it over him and slowly stepped down. Misjudging the step, her foot landed just next to his little body. “Oh, you're a fast one,” she said out loud. Stepping once again, but more quickly and forcefully this time, Jessica crunched the guard under her foot. These men were so tiny that she hardly felt any resistance under her shoes when she lowered them down on top of them. It made her job a lot easier.

Standing at the top of the stairs, Jessica looked over the party to see if anyone had noticed what she'd done. Down below, the celebration continued, ignorant and unaware. The band had just started a new song. But standing directly at the bottom of the staircase, three shocked guests looked up at her in awe. Beaming confidence, Jessica gave them a wave.

Harrison, Rich, and Kat bounded up the staircase, unsure if anyone would notice or care. They'd arrived just in time to watch the guards disappear, then Jessica appear and snuff out their little lives.

“Um, what the fuck was that?” Rich asked her in astonishment and confusion. Internally he was questioning his level of alcohol consumption.

“I'm... I'm not really sure,” Jessica admitted truthfully. “They were about to attack me but then they just shrank.”

“What have you found up here?” Kat asked, all business. “Anything?”

“I just went down there.” Jessica pointed at the hallway she'd just come from.

“Hmmm, it's just bedrooms that way,” commented Kat. “If we go into the east wing, Leo's study is there. I want to search there first.”

“Um, hey guys,” Harrison interjected. The other three looked at him. “I think we've been spotted.” He nodded his head towards the bottom of the stairs.

Standing at the foot of the staircase, a couple of gentlemen in suits silently gazed up at the four guests standing on the second floor landing. As the men kept watching, emotionless and blank, more and more partygoers took notice and turned to look at them. The din of the party throughout the house fell to a hush. A feeling of dread crawled up into Harrison's gut.

“So that guy I came up here with,” Jessica explained quickly, “said that this party always has the same invitees, every single time. I think they've figured out we're not on the list...”

“Shit,” Kat muttered.

A man emerged from the crowd at the bottom of the staircase and, keeping his eyes fixed on Harrison and his friends, took a step up towards them. The masses behind him followed. The party, it seemed, was over.

“Fuck we need to hide,” said Rich.

“No wait!” Jessica interrupted him. “You guys go search the study, I think I know how to handle this.” Everyone looked at her like she was insane.

“Jessica, what?!” Harrison finally exclaimed.

“Just go!” she shouted.

Kat wasted no time breaking into a run down the hallway. Rich paused a moment, then ran to catch up with her. Harrison lingered behind, utterly confused by what Jessica had said. The party guests slowly climbed the stairs, coming closer and closer.

“Jessica we gotta go!” he pleaded with her, suddenly sobered up by the situation.

“Harrison, I'll be fine,” she hurriedly reassured him.

“No let's go! We gotta run-”

“Harrison,” she said abruptly. She put a finger to her lips and looked into his eyes “Shhhhh...”

Stunned into silence, Harrison watched her turn away from him and face the staircase, which was now clogged with bodies walking up it. In a couple more seconds they'd be overwhelmed by the tide of people. Jessica stood there, staring at the crowd, lost in thought.

Concentrating, Jessica starting thinking about the threat they faced. Looking at the nearest man coming up the stairs, she focused her thoughts on him and how helpless she'd be to stop him if he attacked her. Actively willing it, she pictured his body shrinking down to one inch.

Watching from next to her, Harrison saw the man at the front of the group suddenly disappear. A moment later another man blinked out, then a woman next to him. One by one, the party guests seemed to turn into air as Harrison watched in confusion and relief. What the hell was happening?

And then he noticed the party guests hadn't disappeared. They were still on the stairs, just no more than an inch tall. Like an invisible pestilence, before any of them reached the top of the stairs they were culled into a shrunken state. Some of them were even crushed by full-sized partygoers coming up behind them, who moments later were reduced too. It all seemed so evil and efficient. These people stood no chance.

Harrison knew something this bizarre could only be the work of one person: the woman in black. Desperately, he glanced around the landing and down the nearby hallways for a glimpse of her, but he quickly concluded she was not around. Who was doing this?

His eyes fell on Jessica and he immediately recognized the truth. Her blue eyes remained fixed on the staircase as she watched more and more people shrink down. He could even see a tiny smile forming on her face. She was doing this.

The first thought in Harrison's mind was that Jessica had somehow unlocked the powers of the woman in black. Or maybe the woman in black had taken her form. He couldn't believe how any of that was even possible, but if Jessica had these powers, he reasoned, she could have also acquired the wickedness that seemed to go along with them. It wasn't safe for him anymore to stay with her. He needed to find Rich and Kat and tell them what he'd seen. And he needed to get out of VERSA more than ever before.

Breaking away in an instant, Harrison swiftly left Jessica as he ran down the hallway to chase the others. Jessica briefly watched him run away, but soon calmly returned to her work as the staircase turned into bedlam. The party guests who could see what was happening started fleeing her, only to run into the guests at the bottom of the stairs trying to ascend. As if a switch had been flipped, the once cheery people had turned into emotionless automatons, but even they had a flicker of self-preservation built inside of them.

Running down the east hallway, Harrison didn't have trouble locating Kat and Rich; he found an open door and walked in. Leo Starr had dressed his study to rival those of the wealthiest Old World mansions: wood paneling, floor-to-ceiling bookcases, and an ornate chandelier to light the room. His study had been stuffed with sculptures and all sorts of figurines dotting the shelves between the books. A large brown and tan globe sat in a stand next to an impressive oak desk. The large window against the back wall overlooked the circular drive in front of the mansion.

Kat was walking over to Leo's desk when Harrison burst in. She raised her head to look at him and immediately asked, “What's going on out there?”

“Where's Jessica?” added Rich.

“They're shrinking...” Harrison babbled. “She's shrinking them, all of them. They're small. I don't know what's going on.”

“What?!” shouted Kat in confusion.

“I don't know,” admitted Harrison. “Go look yourself. All the people coming up the stairs are being shrunk and somehow I think Jessica is doing it.”

“Is that damn woman around again?” Rich said, walking over to the door and looking down the hallway to see if he could spot what Harrison was talking about.

“I didn't see her,” Harrison replied, catching his breath and calming down. “But Jessica is clearly in control.”

In silence Kat listened to him talk, thinking about the consequences of what he was saying. “We need to ditch Jessica,” she suddenly concluded. Harrison and Rich both looked at her in surprise. “Guys, Jessica disappeared upstairs with some guy for about ten minutes before we next saw her. Maybe he did something to her. Maybe it's not even her at all anymore. She could be working with the woman in black now if she's gained the ability to manipulate VERSA. We can't take any of those risks.”

“It sounds like she's saving us right now!” Rich exclaimed. “You really think she's gone rogue?”

“Do you want to be in here when she come back?!” Kat argued with him. “If she's out there shrinking people right now, how do you know she's not going to come in here and do it to us too?” She turned to Harrison. “Did she seem... ok?”

“You mean like, not crazy and evil? I mean, she didn't seem insane,” replied Harrison. “But she's out there right now just casually mowing down a few hundred people.”

“Well, not real people,” Rich corrected him.

“Fuck you, you know what I mean.” Harrison was distressed.

Kat, in getting sidetracked by Harrison's story, had failed to examine Leo's study yet. But lying on his empty desk, next to a dusty computer, a solitary piece of paper lay waiting to be read. Finally noticing it, Kat picked it up and began intently devouring the words someone had typed on it.

“Guys!” Kat said. “Look! This was on Leo's desk.” She held up the paper. Snapping out of their dialogue, Harrison and Rich looked over at her.

“What does it say?” asked Harrison. Kat stepped over to them and let them read the short, cryptic note:

 

Hello,

 

Enjoying your stay?

Let's meet up now.

Perhaps at my other house?

My apologies for not being around.

Excited to see you soon,

 

*signed* Your Host

 

“Well that's just fucking strange,” Rich said after reading it.

“This must have been left by Leo, from the outside!” Kat said excitedly. “I knew this world was some kind of message for me. He must have a connection to VERSA at his house.”

“So what now?” Harrison asked. “Leo wants us to go up to Dos Palos when we de-sim? Is that the 'other' house?”

“I think so,” Kat said. She paused a moment. “I just don't see why he'd have me travel all the way through VERSA just to ask me to come visit. Could have just sent me an email for Christ's sake.”

“I thought you said his house was off-limits to everyone now?” Harrison asked Kat.

“Well yeah, but if he wants me to show up, I can find a way to sneak up there. Something is obviously going on.”

“Um...” Harrison started, “how do you plan on 'sneaking up' there in your... wheelchair?”

Kat shot him a look. Caught off guard, it took her a moment to responded. “I've got ways,” she mysteriously replied. “I get along well with the security guys. They'd let me up there if I asked nicely and they thought nobody else was looking.”

“Oh shit,” Rich suddenly said. He'd been rereading the letter. “Look.” He pointed at the sentences typed out on the page. Kat and Harrison looked back at the page intently.

“What?” Kat asked in confusion.

“Look at the first letter of each line,” Rich said seriously. Harrison looked. “H-E-L-P-M-E,” it spelled out. Kat gasped.

“Holy shit,” Harrison said quietly. “Something is wrong.” He looked at Kat. “Guess that's why he hid his invitation deep in here.”

Recovering from the surprise, Kat looked at the two of them. “We need to de-sim as soon as possible.” It was music to Harrison's ears.

“How? Where's the nearest out-key?” Rich asked her.

“No idea,” Kat said. “Might be in a different world. We should head out the way we came in. Let's go.”

“Wait Kat!” Harrison stopped her. “Are we really leaving Jessica behind? How do we get downstairs?”

Kat glanced him over. “Yeah, let's leave her. Once we're de-simmed I can manually take her out from the control room where she won't pose a threat to us anymore.” Rich, and Harrison for that matter, looked at her with disapproval, but also silence. “There's an old servant's staircase we can use to get back downstairs. It's at the end of the hall, follow me.” She turned to walk out of the room, but suddenly Jessica appeared in the doorway, her red dress standing out brightly from the more muted colors of the study.

“Hey guys,” she casually greeted them. “What did I miss?” The three of them stood stunned, afraid to speak. Harrison felt like a bank robber standing in a looted vault, caught by the police. A lump formed in his throat. “What?” Jessica asked, unsure how to read their odd expressions. Harrison couldn't decide if she was acting dumb like the woman in black always did, or if she was genuinely confused.

“Um, hey Jessica,” Rich finally said, breaking the awkward silence. “We were just about to go...”

Jessica's eyes drifted off them and looked somewhere back behind them. A look of worry slowly crossed her face. “Um, guys?” she said. Harrison turned around to see what was bothering her.

Looking out the large window of the study, the lights from the house illuminated the fallen snow that surrounded the open land around the manor. The outside drive snaked into the distance, quickly disappearing in the darkness. Coming up the drive, a long convoy of headlights approached the house. Shadowy figures began emerging onto the snow, walking towards them out of the nearby woods. These new men held rifles in their hands. Harrison could see the outline of helmets on their heads.

“Well fuck me,” Rich muttered.

“Not again...” Jessica sighed, looking unhappy. She paused a beat. “You all should hide,” she finally told them, “I'll have to deal with these guys too.”

Her friends looked at her with incredulity and fear.

 

 

Chapter 14 by Q-Writer

Chapter 14:

(Posted: March 6)

 

 

 

A minute later, Harrison found himself being pushed down a small staircase by Kat. Rich stumbled down in front of the both of them. “Kat, you know where we're going?” he shouted back at her.

“Not really,” she acknowledged. “I've never been down in the basement. Only went to his house once before I ended up in my wheelchair. And it's not like he put up ramps everywhere.”

The three of them, still dressed in their fancy evening wear, clamored down a small concrete staircase into Dos Palos's basement. When they reached the bottom, Harrison saw a few white-painted hallways leading in different directions. Through a glass door directly in the front of them he could see hundreds of bottles of wine racked on the walls of a large cellar.

“What the fuck do you think Jessica's doing up there?” Rich wondered aloud.

“Probably signing her own death warrant,” Kat expressed in frustration.

Suddenly an explosion rang out above them, followed by shaking that indicated a part of the mansion was collapsing above their heads. It sounded like a bomb had gone off somewhere outside. Dust sprinkled down from the ceiling but the basement ceilings held. Everyone looked up in nervous concern.

“Sounds like a war-zone out there,” Harrison commented.

“Let's start exploring,” Kat suggested. “No idea what's down here but maybe we can find some good place to lay low.”

Harrison and Rich started to slowly follow her down a hallway as muffled booming noises from outside continued. The ground kept shaking the house and the light fixtures rattled on the walls around them. Some unholy hell was happening right above their heads. Harrison felt relieved he'd taken shelter from the storm, but he couldn't stop wondering about Jessica.

 

A minute earlier, from Leo's study Kat decided it would be best to flee to the basement, so the other three followed her back to the house's main staircase. Walking back to the landing, Harrison, Kat, and Rich revolted in horror when they saw all the party guests flailing around helplessly on the staircase, reduced to one inch in height. Though a few bloody footprints marked the stairs, the steps teemed with small bodies struggling to get up or down the step they were stuck on.

“What the fuck did you do?!” Kat shouted at Jessica, more terrified than impressed.

“I... I don't know,” she admitted sheepishly. “I just shrank them somehow.”

“Holy fucking moley,” Rich said, looking over the scene. Harrison stayed silent, having already seen Jessica perform her witchcraft.

“You guys keep running,” Jessica ordered them, “I'm gonna try taking on the guys outside. I'll do my best to keep them out of the house, but I can't promise anything.”

“How do we get down?” Harrison asked, looking at the staircase in disgust.

“Just go!” Kat barked at him. Without looking, she started rapidly descending the stairs. Tiny men and women, unlucky enough to get caught under her feet, simply vanished beneath her black heels with a squish. Though not usually squeamish, Harrison had to look away.

“Fuck it,” Rich said, following her. Jessica also descended with him. Sucking it up, Harrison put his hand on the banister and started down the stairs too. Though he could hear squelching sounds below him, he tried not thinking about what was happening under his feet. And he certainly didn't look.

At the bottom of the stairs, Kat grabbed Harrison and Rich and led them through the now deserted ground floor of the mansion, finally smuggling them down a staircase to the basement. Jessica, standing alone at the front door of the house, contemplated what she could do against these new forces. There were a lot of men coming towards the house, and these ones had guns now. She concluded it might be difficult to shrink them all fast enough before one shot her. Still unsure what abilities she really possessed, she pictured a few different scenarios in her mind. Immediately, one of them felt right. She smiled, knowing what she had to do now. Confidently, Jessica strode out the front door of mansion.

Legions of men, clad in armor and carrying semi-automatic rifles, trudged through the snow to surround the house. On the drive, trucks carrying more troops rolled up to the house, guarded by armored cars with large guns mounted atop. Jessica surveyed all of this from the porch, not too far from where the wardrobe still sat in the bushes. Though she didn't really know, she guessed they'd triggered some security protocol built into this world. It may have been something the woman in black had created, but it didn't really matter now. Jessica had the means to defeat it.

Concentrating, like she'd done before, this time Jessica didn't focus on the men in the army. She focused on herself. Hundreds of them could overwhelm her at her regular size, so to truly defend herself, she needed to be big. Much bigger.

An instant later, the troops stopped in their tracks to watch the attractive blonde in the red dress suddenly explode in proportion. Jessica's height shot up until she absolutely towered over the scene below her. If she could have seen the little men's faces, it would have amused her to see the abject shock they now displayed. But from her gaze now hundreds of feet above them, the soldiers merely looked like insects below her.

Because she'd been standing so close to the house when she'd grown, Jessica's large feet bulldozed the front section of the manor. Looking down, Jessica could see the remaining part of the house came up to about the height of her ankles. The little soldiers below were no bigger than her toes.

Without saying a word, she took a step forward, covering up a few men with her red heel. Far below she heard the sound of small arms fire, and she could see the area around her shoes light up with tiny little flashes. Against her feet she could feel the insignificant sensations of their bullets hitting her flesh harmlessly. Their guns were useless against her.

But Jessica looked at the armored cars with concern. Each one had some kind of turret-mounted cannon on top, a few of which were slowly coming to life. Those guns, though unlikely to stop her, looked like they might actually sting. One of them, close to her right foot, started swiveling its turret around at her. Jessica planted her left foot then kicked the vehicle with her other foot, instantly regretting the idea. Her shoes, while very big, were still open-toed, and when her feet impacted the armor of the vehicle, it felt like kicking a rock. But her foot slammed into the side of the armored car regardless, sending it tumbling off the road and down the slope of the mountain.

She winced, vowing not to make the same mistake again. Still ignoring the subtle feelings from the soldiers firing at her, Jessica stepped over to the next armored vehicle. It moved its turret and aimed up at her leg, but she easily avoided it. It fired, the boom from the cannon echoing in the night, but Jessica was already bringing her foot down atop the vehicle. Her high heels were not the best at stomping out vehicles, but once her foot rested on the armored car, she shifted her weight and started pressing down. The metal buckled and groaned, and she found with a little bit of effort she could flatten the car, entombing its crew inside. It felt like stepping on an aluminum soda can. She marveled at her casual display of strength.

Though she'd easily destroyed two of the armored vehicles, a few more remained farther down the drive. They opened fire at Jessica, one striking her leg just above her ankle. It stung, like the shot from a BB gun, but she didn't think it pieced her skin. Once she's gotten over the surprise, it seemed more of an annoyance than anything.

But as much as she wanted to stomp out the remaining vehicles, she remembered her real mission was to protect her friends in the house. While she was distracted, soldiers had swarmed the wrecked building. She could see a few starting to climb up what remained of the front of the mansion, looking for a way in. She wasn't going to let that happen.

Jessica moved with determination and grace. Never feeling hurried at this size, she calmly stepped back towards the house and began casually grinding out the soldiers gathered on the snowy front lawn. They were easy to spot, like little black bugs crawling on a white floor. Though she couldn't feel them crunch under the soles of her shoes, bring her feet down upon them was a satisfying feeling nonetheless. She'd already gotten used to thinking of these soldiers not as real people but more as the pests they actually were, and soon it started feeling like a game.

As the remaining armored cars sporadically fired at her legs, she eventually became inured to the stinging sensations their shells caused. Right now, she was focused on the soldiers. Spotting a group of helmeted men clamoring into the house over a fallen wall, she swung her foot over them. With a mighty crash she stomped into the rubble of the house, pulverizing the attackers.

Noticing more men huddling around some of the upright walls of the mansion, Jessica flattened their bodies by gently kicking her shoes against them, smearing them against Dos Palos's stone exterior. More bits and pieces of the house crumbled as she battered it, but Jessica assumed her friends were already safe deep inside the basement.

Looking over the chaos unfolding at her feet, she could see soldiers scrambling everywhere in panic. Another shell from an armored car glanced off her calf. She turned around and peered at the remaining forces confronting her, try to decide which vehicle to flatten next. She narrowed her eyes, enjoying her newfound role as a vengeful goddess.

Her massacre continued unabated.

 

Beneath the crumbling house, the regular-sized pilots moved through the basement. They found some rooms meant for storage, while others contained water tanks and furnaces. They even stumbled upon the massive kitchen that served the residents and guests of Dos Palos. It, like the rest of the house, lay abandoned. Standing amid the clutter of an unattended kitchen, they looked for somewhere safe to hide. A walk-in refrigerator or freezer came to Harrison's mind.

“Let's try that door,” Rich suggested, pointing at a plain gray door.

“Sure, why not,” Kat said, hurrying over to it as another boom above shook the house. A light fixture detached from the ceiling and shattered on the floor next to Harrison, causing him to jump. Kat didn't even flinch as she opened the gray door.

When she pulled open the door, a warm current of air burst into the room. This door was different. Kat peered in awe through it as she looked into a different world. The door opened up into what looked like a dusty shop, full of gilded trinkets and carpets, almost as if it had belonged in a Middle Eastern bazaar.

“What the fuck?” Rich exclaimed. Kat quickly shut the door. She was just as confused.

“I have no idea what's going on,” she admitted. “This door leads to a completely different world. That's not possible.” Another boom from outside shook the room.

“I only thought green doors led somewhere?” Rich asked.

“Yeah, me too,” Kat concurred.

“Are we going to go through it then?” Harrison asked. Just then a loud boom rocked the foundations of Dos Palos. The ceiling shook violently and all the lights suddenly flickered, plunging them in temporary darkness.

“I don't think we have a choice,” Kat finally said. “This house is close to collapsing.”

“Are we still just going to leave Jessica?” Harrison queried them. “I mean, she's up there saving our asses right now!”

“I already told you the plan,” Kat told him sternly. “We get out as soon as possible, then I de-sim her manually. We still have plenty of time too,” she said, holding up her watch with the timer. It read just over 34 hours elapsed.

Despite the incredible danger bearing down on them in this world, Harrison didn't feel comfortable leaving Jessica behind. He also didn't like the idea of going through the new door either. Kat, sensing his reluctance, continued to persuade him.

“Harrison, don't overthink this, let's go. This world is fucked!

“No, you guys go,” he replied to her. “I'm going to make sure Jessica gets out of this. You can de-sim both of us if you beat us out.”

Rich stepped in. “Harrison I think you're making a big fucking mistake man.”

“Jessica seems like she's doing fine up there,” Kat said. “Plus, you're the one that convinced us she's gone over to the dark side. You want to still be here if or when that fight up there is over? Because either way, we lose.”

Though Kat made a good point, Harrison felt like he owed it to Jessica to stay behind. Sure, something about her seemed off now, but he needed to confront her about it. After all, he hadn't had a chance to talk to her since she'd witnessed his pathetic acquiescence to the woman in black in the volcano world. Not only did he need to atone for that, he suspected the woman in black had visited Jessica in the mansion too.

He also didn't like the thought of going through this weird door in the basement. He always assumed that to travel between worlds they'd have to access the side space. Maybe out here on the edges of VERSA, the rules were so bent that nothing made sense? Regardless, he knew what choice he had to make.

“Rich, you go with Kat,” Harrison told him confidently. He turned to Kat. “You get yourselves out. It'll be easier if you two go alone. I'll stick with Jessica. I'll see you guys back home. Good luck.”

Before Kat and Rich could keep arguing with him, Harrison ran out of the kitchen. He could hear them yelling at him, but soon the noise coming from outside and the shaking of the house drowned out their voices. They wouldn't be running after him.

Harrison immediately questioned his decision when he surveyed the basement corridor and determined it could collapse at any moment. Whatever was going on outside must be destroying the house, but that indicated that Jessica somehow wasn't dead yet. Considering the state of warfare upstairs, it occurred to him that if Jessica had acquired the power to shrink others, she might also possess the ability to grow herself. That would certainly account for whatever battle was currently taking place above him. But he needed to get to safety, which was not in this crumbling mansion's basement.

Running through the smoke and dust that saturated the basement air, Harrison eventually found the staircase they'd climbed down just a few minutes before. Down another basement corridor he could see the ceiling had fallen in. He didn't have much time.

Hurriedly, he climbed out of the basement and found a house in shambles. The ornate rooms, or at the least the ones that hadn't completely collapsed, were wrecked and filled with debris and smoke. A fire in one room licked at piles of stone and wood. It seemed like the second floor had mostly come down into the first, and the mansion looked more like a ruin than a real house. Where he could see through the smoke, Harrison could make out the starry night sky above him. And a massive dark figure in red, silhouetted faintly by the light of the stars. Jessica was huge.

Due to her size and the darkness, he couldn't really see what she was doing, but each time she took a step the earth trembled mightily. Harrison scrambled through a nearby room, hoping to stay safe but also get a look at what was going on outside. Through a completely shattered window, Harrison gazed into the front yard. The last time he saw the grounds of the manor there had been a stately drive leading up to the house and a blanket of snow covering the front lawn. All he saw now was mud and craters; the road was gone and no snow remained, just brown and black soup. He could see dead bodies scattered around the yard, flattened in giant shoe-shaped impact craters. A few distorted vehicles in the distance burned ferociously.

Right in front of him, Jessica's foot suddenly slammed into the ground, a wall of red blocking his vision. The impact of her foot caused him to lose his balance and fall. When he regained his footing, her massive high heeled shoe was gone. Harrison wondered if there was some way he could help her fight. Looking out to the remains of the trees that surrounded the house, he could still see some figures moving in the shadows.

Peering just over the window sill, Harrison nearly vomited when he spotted a pile of human remains squished against the wall of the house. A jumble of limbs and incoherent flesh had fused with pieces of body armor and weapons. Regaining his composure, Harrison carefully reached down and plucked a rifle out of the pile of death. Inspecting it, it looked similar to the gun that Rich had been using earlier. He found the safety, figured out how to see if the gun was loaded, then decided he was going to use it.

Shouldering the rifle awkwardly, Harrison brought it up and sighted it out the window. He drew the silhouette of a figure in the distance, then squeezed the trigger. The gunshots startled him at first, but he found that if he gripped it tightly, he could control short bursts of bullets relatively easily. So he went to work.

After about a minute of sporadically shooting out of the house, Harrison couldn't tell if he'd actually hit anyone, but at least he didn't feel completely useless. He tried keeping an eye on Jessica, or her enormous shoes really, which kept moving in and out of his field of vision. As he contemplated a new target, out of the corner of his left eye he saw a soldier running against the outside of the house towards his window. Caught by surprise, Harrison quickly turned to fire at the man, who raised his own gun.

Just as he pulled the trigger, a massive footfall shook the ground close by and Harrison and the solider both stumbled. His mind went into panic mode, but he regained his balance and leaned out the window again. Pointing the rifle at the stunned soldier, Harrison unloaded the remaining bullets into the hapless attacker. The rifle soon clicked empty, but the man was dead. Harrison couldn't believe he'd actually shot someone successfully.

Before he could feel any pride or accomplishment, the window frame he stood next to exploded. Dropping the gun in surprise, he could hardly turn before he saw two of Jessica's huge fingers, each much longer than his entire body, come in and pinch him. Out of shock he struggled, but Jessica quickly whisked him up. Harrison's stomach turned over inside of him as the g-forces from the ascent pushed his eyeballs back into his head.

Jessica shifted her hold on him and rolled him into the palm of her hand, shielding Harrison's body from any gunfire that might reach up that high. She lifted him up to her face. Harrison, recovering from the ascent, found himself ass-down in her palm looking up at her concerned expression.

“Harrison!” she said in surprise and disappointment. “I told you to hide!”

“I couldn't leave you behind!” he shouted so she could hear him. “I had to make sure you were ok!”

Jessica laughed in amusement, then smiled. “Aww, thanks,” she said. “I'm doing just fine though.” To Harrison, her faced looked larger than the side of a house. It intimidated him, but at least he was getting used to her at this size.

“How'd you spot me?” he asked her, having to yell. “Thank you for not crushing me!”

“You're easy to spot with that white tux on,” she said simply.

“You're hard to miss too,” Harrison joked. “You know, with that pretty dress on, I could spot you a mile away!” Her giant face blushed from his corny joke. It seemed like she was in a good mood. Harrison felt relieved.

Changing the subject, Jessica told him, “Hey, let me finish off the rest of these guys and then we can talk.”

“Do you mind putting me somewhere safe?” he shouted. “I don't think hiding in that house is the best idea anymore!”

Jessica thought about it for a moment. “Yeah I can hold onto you Harrison,” she said. Looking down she spotted someone and quickly stomped them out. She glanced back up at him. “I'm sorry, I don't have any pockets though.”

“Um, that's ok, I think I can balance on your hand...” He looked around him. Her hand was large, but it was constantly moving despite her best efforts to keep it relatively still and level. Even in a seated position he continuously rocked side to side, and when Jessica spread her fingers Harrison had much less room to balance.

Jessica, watching his uncertainty, realized she didn't really want him in her hand. Even if she tried curling her fingers into a fist to try cupping him, she still had to worry about accidentally opening her hand or rattling him around too much. If he'd been a larger size, she could have just gripped him, but at his tiny size she legitimately feared she'd squish him without even trying. Thinking about it flashed her back to what she'd done to Evan not long ago. She didn't want to repeat that with Harrison.

Suddenly, she had an idea. It wasn't perfect but at least he'd be out of the way. “Harrison I'm picking you up now,” she quickly told him as her other hand descended on him. “I'm going to put you somewhere safe, just don't get squished,” she told him, plucking him up and dangling him over her cleavage. “And don't get any funny ideas either.”

Stunned, Harrison had a moment to stare down into her bosom before Jessica lowered and tucked him in between her breasts. Harrison was about to protest, but he couldn't stop wondering how he'd gotten himself into this situation. Her boobs looked gigantic, and once she stuffed him between them, he quickly found himself struggling to stay alive.

Her breasts weren't soft; they held him rather firmly. But the flesh beneath her skin was pliant, and every time he pushed he could feel the plushy resistance of her boobs pushing back against him. If it hadn't been so jarring and unexpected, he might have enjoyed it. Instead, he fought to keep his head and arms out of the warm crevice of flesh constricting him. Breathing was difficult, but not impossible. What worried him was the slow slipping motion that threatened to drag him deeper down. He pushed against the top of her breasts trying to stay up, but on the bouncy flesh he found it difficult to gain sufficient leverage.

Jessica wasn't sure why she decided that putting Harrison in her cleavage was an acceptable solution. Like many women her age, wearing dresses without pockets necessitated storing phones, lipstick tubes, or other knickknacks inside bras or cleavage. Watching him struggle between her breasts, which she'd always thought of as adequately sized but not big, made her grin in amusement. Currently, her bra and dress pushed her boobs up and together in such a way that even if he slipped all the way into her cleavage, it would be impossible for him to fall out the bottom. He probably hated her right now, but oh well. Actually, she realized, he was probably in heaven, living out some weird male fantasy. What guy wouldn't want to be surrounded by giant breasts? What a perv, she thought with another amused smile.

Quickly forgetting him, Jessica continued hunting down the remaining survivors on the ground. She'd already decimated the rest of the armored cars and troop trucks. Strolling around the ruin of Dos Palos, each time she saw movement she stomped down on it. Now that the white snow was gone and replaced with a messy slough, it was harder to see the men down below her. Kicking down trees and rampaging through the nearby forest had also proved destructive but inconclusively lethal to her little attackers. Spending another five minutes or so searching for the little pests and catching a few final stragglers, Jessica was ready to declare the area safe.

Looking down at Harrison, she saw the top of his head and his hands barely peeking out between her breasts. It caused her to giggle, which only shook her boobs and made him slip deeper down between them. Finally, she reached down and pulled him out, placing him on her hand. Flush all over and breathing heavily, Harrison looked beat but alive.

“Jessica what the hell?!” he yelled up at her. She was having none of it.

“Shut up, you loved it,” she told him playfully. “And now everyone's gone.”

Harrison labored to catch up on his breathing. He coughed a bit and realized his tuxedo had been completely soaked through with his sweat. Or her sweat. Now, sitting in her palm, he realized how cold it was outside.

“Can you shrink down now?” he asked her. As much as he wanted to scold her for what she'd done, he decided it would be better to just let it go.

Jessica paused, then looked at Harrison like she was about to ask him a huge favor. Uh oh, he thought.

“I think I can shrink myself whenever I'm ready?... But, um, this is going to sound really dumb,” she admitted, “but I really have to pee right now.” She'd been holding her bladder for a while and now needed to go, and looking at what remained of the house, she was going to have to pop a squat no matter what size she was. Her admission surprised Harrison.

“Alright, I'm just gonna go real quick behind the house,” she told him, “but I need both of my hands.”

“You can't be serious!” Harrison shouted out as her fingers picked him up again. Before he knew it, he was back in her cleavage. Trying to yell at her, he kept slipping down which distracted him from berating her further.

Jessica gingerly stepped over the ruined mansion. She pulled up her dress, moved her panties to the side, and after a moment of relaxation, finally relieved herself, making sure her feet were planted out of the way. The sensation of Harrison feverishly struggling in her boobs only annoyed her as she focused on the euphoria of releasing her bladder.

Once done, she readjusted her underwear and dress and plucked Harrison out of her cleavage again. Not listening to him, she stepped back over to the front side of the house and placed him on the ground, trying to be careful but ultimately dropping him into the mud. Concentrating on her body, she focused on bringing herself back to her original size. After a short time of trying, her body rocketed back towards the ground.

Finding it difficult to stand on the churned-up ground in her heels, Jessica fell back onto her butt. “You ok?” Harrison asked, trotting over to her. His white tux was muddy, scuffed, and ruined. The black carnation he'd once worn was long gone.

“Yeah I'm fine,” Jessica said. Harrison reached his hand out and she took it, and he pulled her up. “Lemme just get these off,” she said, bending over to slip off her high heels. It crossed Harrison's mind that those shoes had snuffed out hundreds of digital lives. Soon Jessica's bare feet stood in the mud, her heels dangling from her right hand.

“Where are the others?” she asked him as they stood together. The scene was eerily quiet, though the gentle sound of burning vehicle fires crackled in the silence. The stillness of the night gripped the wrecked mountain top.

“They're gone,” Harrison said. He explained to her what had happened in the basement, how they'd found the mysterious door. “I didn't think it was right to just abandon you in VERSA, so I stayed.” Jessica looked at him warmly.

“Thanks,” she finally said.

“I don't know how to get out of here though or where to go next,” he admitted with a shrug. “I'm pretty sure the door we used to enter this world is long gone now.” The destroyed landscape around him proved his point. “And I don't think we can get into the basement of the house anymore to follow the others.” As if on cue, another section of the house collapsed behind them.

“Harrison,” Jessica said, stepping closer to him, her bare feet sloshing in the mud. “I really appreciate you sticking around for me.”

Trying to deflect her warmheartedness, Harrison countered by admitting, “No, thank you for saving all of us. What happened to you tonight?” He stared at Jessica, slightly fearful but devoured by curiosity. Jessica looked back at him stoically, trying to pick her words.

Harrison continued, “It was her, wasn't it? Did you see her?”

“The woman?”

“Yeah.”

Jessica gave him a knowing look.

“Did you talk to her?” he asked, concerned.

“I did,” Jessica admitted, feeling relieved. “She saved me actually. Upstairs this guy was attacking me, I think he was going to rape me, and she appeared and shrunk him down.” Harrison looked at her in concern. A nearby fire danced yellow light across her face. Jessica continued: “She told me she'd give me powers to defend myself in the future, but I'd have to do something for her in return. Something you promised her too.”

Now it was Jessica's turn to look at Harrison quizzically. She immediately noticed shame in his expression, but it soon yielded to apprehension.

“Yeah, I did promise her something, but only because she gave me no choice,” he finally said. He looked away from her into the abyss of the night.

“What deal did you make with her?” Jessica asked him.

“Well, when my ex brought me to her, after telling me about herself she started grilling me on what the world was like beyond VERSA. Our world. The real world. I figured she was going to kill me but she offered me my life if I helped her get out.”

“Get out of what?”

“Get out of VERSA,” he said, turning back to Jessica and looking her straight in the eye. “She wants to de-sim like us and see what's beyond VERSA.”

“But that's impossible!” Jessica said, incredulous. She suppressed a chuckle.

“I know,” Harrison replied seriously. “You see our problem now?”

Jessica's amusement vanished as she grasped the gravity of the situation. “Fuck,” was all she could say. She started thinking about it.

“Yeah, I don't think she's going to let us de-sim either until we give her what she wants,” Harrison speculated. “And when she finds out we're just bluffing, she'll probably kill us. God I hope that de-sims us, but I think she somehow controls now whether you live or die for real in VERSA. I think that's what happened to Kevin.”

“What about Kat and Rich?” Jessica asked him. “You think they'll be able to get out?”

“Sure hope so,” Harrison admitted. “Kat said if she got out she'd manually de-sim us both from the control room. That should still be a safe way of leaving. So let's hope for that.”

“I still don't understand how they found a door in the basement that led directly into a different world, without going through the side space. Don't you think that's weird?” she said to Harrison. “I've never seen a door like that before.”

And then it kicked Harrison in the gut. He'd seen a gray door before that led directly to a different world. It had led him into a windowless concrete room. And it had been deliberately created by the woman in black. Fuck.

 

 

Chapter 15 by Q-Writer

Chapter 15:

(Posted: March 10)

 

 

 

Eventually Harrison and Jessica wandered away from the battleground atop the mountain. Locating the remains of the manor's drive, they followed the road down about half a mile until they came to a large gate. The frigid night, still unceasing, began gnawing into their bodies as the cold seeped under their skin. Harrison gave Jessica his jacket, but they were both still cold. And tired.

Through the trees to the right of the gate, a dirt road extended into forest. At the end of it they spotted an old barn. Approaching the wooden structure, they saw one of its large doors ajar. Harrison pulled it open and they slipped into the dusty building.

Empty of occupants, the barn seemed decrepit and forgotten. Old bales of hay lay stacked around the interior and a rickety ladder led up to a loft. The few abandoned stalls, stuffed with hay, looked like an inviting place to lie down. Falling onto the soft but prickly padding together, Harrison and Jessica finally relaxed, completely exhausted. What had started with a long steamy day-long hike through a jungle had morphed into a dinner party, culminating in a showdown with some military forces summoned by VERSA.

Thinking back on what he'd learned after spending time with her post-battle, Harrison felt relieved that his theory of evil-Jessica proved to be unfounded. She was still the same young woman he knew before, albeit one with some amazing capabilities now. Just listening to her talk about what happened proved she was just as confused and worried as Harrison. Thought it hadn't really bothered her, it still concerned her. Yet she didn't blink when it came to defending them from all those people. Harrison was impressed.

Dazed, the pair slipped into small-talk.

“You thought about what you're going to tell the Senate committee yet?” Harrison asked her.

“Pff, no,” answered Jessica. “I haven't even begun processing all this yet.”

“Yeah me either. I don't know what I'm going to tell my bosses either,” Harrison replied. “If it were up to me, the army should just napalm the whole lab.”

Jessica gave a tired laugh.

“You think they're gonna be ok?” she asked, turning towards Harrison. He looked over at her.

“You mean Rich and Kat?” He'd already shared his worry with her about the gray door their two colleagues had gone through. He really hoped it wasn't a trap set up by the woman in black.

“Yeah.”

Harrison paused to give it thought. “I think they'll be ok,” he finally concluded. “Kat's tough as nails and Rich is no bullshit. They'll work well together. Certainly won't let our friend push them around,” he said, referring to the woman in black. Jessica seemed to accept his answer.

“Do you find it strange,” Harrison continued, “that you weren't able to grow yourself after the fight was over?” Jessica had tried experimenting with her height after she'd shrunk back down, but for some reason it hadn't worked. Something inside her wasn't there.

“Yeah kinda,” she admitted. “I mean, maybe it only works when I'm in danger, like the woman said.”

“That would make sense...” Harrison agreed with her. “I just hope you haven't lost it forever.” He looked over at her again. Even lying on the hay, her make-up mostly gone and her dress half-muddy, Harrison thought she looked absolutely beautiful. And that's when he finally admitted to himself that he was unequivocally smitten with this woman.

A part of his mind couldn't believe it had only taken him a couple days to fall for her. Looking back, it had certainly played a part in him staying in this world. He didn't want to stop being around her. She was intelligent, resilient, fun, and so easy to be around. Her forgiving nature but confident self-respect was always evident and impressive. And then he recalled her casually shoving him into her cleavage, which at the time had been a life or death situation, but now looking back on it...

“What?” she said, noticing him staring at her. She'd caught him lost in a daydream. Stumbling, he tried deflecting.

“Oh, nothing, sorry,” he stammered. “Just thinking...”

“About what?” she asked innocently.

Well, it's not like he could just tell her. First of all, this was still a professional trip, which was not an appropriate setting to bluntly hit on female colleagues. He had coworkers who always did that and he hated it.

Secondly, there was absolutely nothing appropriate about confessing his love to someone he barely knew, especially in such dire circumstances. No way he was going to say anything; he didn't want to make anything awkward between them while they still had to fight for their survival.

“Just thinking about how fucked this all is,” he replied to her, covering his tracks. “Just glad I'm not here alone,” he added out without thinking. The insinuation was obvious. Dammit, he cursed himself, savagely kicking his unconscious for the slip-up.

“Yeah, me too,” she agreed with a smile.

Wait what? Now his head was spinning. Oh shit, was she flirting back? His pulse quickened, his heart rate resigned to elevating itself one more time today.

Deep in her own head, Jessica wondered what Harrison was trying to say. Since she'd met him, his good looks and honest personality put her at an immediate sense of ease. He spoke his mind when he had something to say, and although he might not have been the bravest guy, he was certainly self-conscious and introspective. He wasn't a bullshitter. He'd treated her with respect and dignity, even when she hadn't deserved it. She hadn't forgotten his apology in the wine cellar. She liked him. It shocked her and thrilled her when he'd admitted he'd stayed behind in this world for her.

Harrison continued fumbling his thoughts. He couldn't remember the last time a woman had made him feel this way. If their entire situation in VERSA hadn't been teetering on the edge of disaster, he might have been more willing see how far he could push things tonight. But on top of that, he knew they were both dirty, beat-up, and exhausted. Yet nothing would stop him from subtly flirting with her though.

Resting his hands behind his head, he looked up at the ceiling of the barn. “So if your powers only work when you're in danger, I guess that means you're not in danger around me?” he said, more as a statement than a question. He looked over at her with a cheeky grin.

“Hmm, I guess not,” she playfully agreed after a moment, looking him over. Then she added, “But maybe I know I'm not in danger around you because if you tried to start anything with me, I could easily shrink you down. So maybe my subconscious just knows you're no match for me.” She cocked an eyebrow at him. Harrison blushed: he'd accidentally set her up for that answer.

“Huh, good point,” he had to admit. She'd quickly beat him at his little game. His mind wandered with the idea. Quietly he murmured to himself, “I could live with that...”

Turning back to glance at Jessica, he saw her looking at him seductively. He figured she'd overheard him. He smiled at her, then turned back to stare up at the ceiling. Exhaustion was quickly catching up with him.

A few moments passed and he heard Jessica rustling in the hay. Suddenly she scooted her body up against his, pressing herself into his side, resting her hand on his chest. “We gotta stay warm tonight,” she explained. She rested her head on his shoulder. Harrison easily saw through her excuse. Holy shit, he thought, grinning to himself.

The two of them, quietly entwined, lay together in bliss. Jessica slowly drifted off into sleep, and Harrison followed her once his mind stopped spinning like a top.

 

“Harrison! Goddammit!” Rich yelled after him. Harrison bounded out of the kitchen, his form soon yielding to nothing but smoke and dust.

“Fuck him,” Kat said, “I'll have to de-sim him too when we get out. Hopefully he doesn't get himself killed first.”

“What has gotten into that kid?” Rich wondered aloud. The deteriorating kitchen around them quickly shook him out of his astonishment.

“Let's get out of here,” Kat said hurriedly, reopening the strange gray door. “This house is fucked.”

“Don't have to say that twice,” replied Rich, quickly following her through the door. It shut behind them and the crumbling mansion vanished in silence.

Glancing around this new world, Kat and Rich saw they were in the back of a shop, fortunately at the right size for them. A Persian rug hanging from a doorway seemed to separate them from the rest of the store, but even in the current room they could see all types of antiques laying about. It was a treasure-trove of old vases, goblets, and oil lamps. To the right, a display of bright rugs lay stacked in a corner. The stucco walls and the dusty wooden floors indicated a building of considerable age. And the heat. Warm, oppressive, but dry.

“Any idea where we are?” Rich asked Kat.

“Not a clue,” she replied without pause. “Let's see what's going on here,” she offered, walking over to the rug-covered doorway. She pushed it to the side and walked into the main part of the shop.

It shouldn't have surprised Kat, but it did, to see another one of VERSA's conjured people standing behind a counter inspecting coins. An older man, clearly of some kind of Middle Eastern descent, sat in contemplation of his task. He looked up at the two of them, his weary eyes conveying no sense of surprise.

“Didn't see you two come in,” he said without any trace of an accent. “Please ask if you have any questions.” Kat expected him to at least sound the part he played, but perhaps VERSA didn't understand yet that Middle Eastern-looking old men sitting in Middle Eastern-looking stores should have Middle Eastern-sounding accents too. It could put a world together, sure, but it clearly didn't understand all the nuances yet of building something believably consistent.

“Um, where are we?” Rich asked him, glancing around the shop. A doorless portal led out into a sandy street. They seemed to be in some kind of desert village.

“You're in my shop,” the man replied. “My name is Dimitris. What are you looking for?”

Kat cut in. “Well some new clothes, probably,” she told him. Kat still wore her blue evening dress and high heels. Not the best attire if they were now stuck in the desert.

“Ah I see,” the man said, hardly looking at the two out-of-place travelers. “I can show you some things in the next room.” He led them through a different rug-covered doorway into a smaller room with various robes and desert garb. “Please, try on what you need. I can take care of you when you're done.”

“I guess we're playing dress-up again,” commented Rich, taking off his tuxedo jacket. “Shame they couldn't have included one of those do-it-yourself wardrobes in here.”

Kat started rifling through various clothes. Some were hung on racks while others were piled in baskets on the floor. “Looks like much better options for you in here,” she told Rich. Glancing over at him, she saw him removing his pants. “Really, no changing room?” she asked him in surprise.

He looked up at her confidently. “You bothered?” he replied. “I figure the sooner we're out of here the better.” He was right, so Kat didn't reply.

After a few minutes of searching, Rich found a robe and some pants to wear under it. He even located a pair of brown boots that barely fit his feet. And spotting a scarf-like cloth tucked into the side of a basket, he grabbed it and carefully wrapped it up and used it to cover his head. “It's called a keffiyeh,” he told Kat. “First saw these during Persian Gulf when I was in Kuwait.”

“You look like Lawrence of Arabia you scoundrel,” Kat mocked him. Rich laughed. He left the room so Kat could find something to change into in private. A few minutes later she emerged, dressed in a plain brown robe and black sandals.

“I liked you better in the dress,” Rich commented.

“Yeah me too,” was her reply. “This thing itches like hell.”

Rich turned to the merchant. “How much for the garb?”

The man studied what they were wearing. “Two coin please,” he requested. Kat and Rich looked at each other. They didn't have any money.

“What about trading us for our old clothes?” Kat suggested, holding up her dress. Rich clutched his tuxedo under his arm.

“Worthless,” the old man spat at them.

“I don't think we have anything else...” Rich started saying.

“Oh wait,” Kat interrupted him. She unhooked the two sapphires dangling from her ears as the man's eyes went wide. Aggressively, she slapped them down on the worn counter in front of them. “These will cover it,” she said confidently.

They left the merchant stunned by his new fortune as they exited the shop. Sure enough, they found themselves on the sandy street of a small desert village in the late afternoon. A sullen orange sun cast long shadows across the narrow, deserted street. If anyone else inhabited this village, they were currently making themselves scarce.

“Let's walk this way,” Kat suggested, pointing down a direction of the street.

Walking with her, Rich started the conversation. “Ok, so we need to find an out-key to get back,” he stated. “I've seen apples used before. Unfortunately it doesn't look like we're going to see a lot of those in this world.”

“Yeah I had the same thought,” agreed Kat.

“But it's not just food that are out-keys sometimes, right? You want to share everything you know?” As they conversed, their feet carried them in an aimless direction.

Kat began talking. “So yeah, we originally programmed apples to be an out-key, and then VERSA kind of started randomly applying it to other types of fruits too. Mostly tree and bush-based stuff. But VERSA is sorta random with this kind of thing. Since we designed change-keys to be books and levers and handles occasionally, we've also seen VERSA use those imprints to create out-keys too, but it's rare.”

“So what, we need to start flicking every light switch we find and hope we wake up in the lab?”

Kat sighed. “Probably not a light switch specifically, but yeah, something like that.”

“Well, unless we want to risk suicide and potentially ending up like Kevin, it sounds like we're pretty fucked then,” concluded Rich.

“Pretty much,” Kat echoed him. The reached an intersection and took a left turn, but they were already practically on the outskirts of this small town. They'd passed a few huddled figures in the street, but far less people than one would expect to find in a village of this size. Somewhere out of sight a dog barked. The sun baked them with heat.

“You know,” Kat said, thinking out loud. “I guess if we stay in here long enough, someone will find us plugged into the sim and will just disconnect us. I'll lose my job for sure, but at least I'll be alive.”

“How much longer do you think until then?” Rich asked.

Kat looked at her watch again and tried doing some mental calculations to account for the time dilation in VERSA.

“Well, nobody is going to find us in California until at least five a.m. or so at the earliest. And that's best-case scenario, realistically six or six thirty is more likely. If we've been in VERSA now about thirty-five hours, I'd say nobody finds us for at least another... twenty hours. But it could be another two days plus.”

“Damn,” Rich said. “Didn't know we still had so much time.”

“If I knew which spoke we were in or could locate a world I've already visited, we'd be much more likely to find an out-key.” She stopped as they came to the end of the street. The buildings simply petered away and the encroaching desert swallowed the street. The village melted into the wilderness as Kat and Rich looked across a vast wasteland to a distant horizon. Sand dunes and emptiness presided over the forbidding landscape. Kat stared, awed by the desolation. She turned back to Rich to complete her thought. “But fuck if I know where the hell this is,” she admitted, gesturing into the abyss. They were utterly lost in VERSA.

 

Though the cold certainly played a factor, what really woke Harrison up was his bladder. Blinking his eyes open, he shuddered as the chill in the barn ached his joints. Jessica was still curled up on him, wearing his tuxedo jacket over her dress. He could immediately tell it was still dark out, which made him wonder if this world even had a sun.

Rustling in the hay, he gently scooted out from under Jessica and stood up. The dark barn looked the same but he now noticed a door in the back. Walking over and pushing it open, the dark expanse of the forest sloped down the hill in front of him. He unzipped his fly, his teeth chattering in the icy night. As he began to relieve himself onto a patch of snow, he stared off groggily into the empty forest. And then he saw it.

Down the hill, not too far away, a small light twinkled in the smothering darkness. He blinked a bit to make sure his eyes hadn't deceived him. But sure enough, it was there. Hard to tell how far away it was, but maybe about a ten minute walk downhill. Finishing his business, he returned inside the barn.

Because the night never lifted, he couldn't really tell how long they'd been sleeping. He still felt tired, but at least he wasn't exhausted anymore. And coming back to the stall, the sleeping form of Jessica caused him to smile and blush. Upon his return she stirred, her blue eyes fluttering open. She peered up at him and smiled. Reflexively she stretched her arms and let out a drawn-out, tired yawn.

“How long's it been?” she asked Harrison, still half asleep.

“I don't know,” admitted Harrison. “I found something.”

“What?” she said, perking up.

“There's a light outside. Down the hill. Can't tell what but it's not too far.”

His words sank into Jessica, who was sitting up now. Her interest had certainly been piqued by Harrison's mysterious reveal. Though she was still waking up, Jessica replied, “Alright, let's go on a walk then. Whatever this is I hope it's a warm meal and a hot shower. I'm starving.”

Because going barefoot through the snow wasn't an option, Jessica begrudgingly put her heels on again. When they got outside she tried navigating through the snow, but walking proved to be a very slow and accident-prone ordeal. She looked comical wearing his jacket while stumbling across the snow-covered ground. But the light was still there, and as they approached it they couldn't see a building or anything large, just more forest.

Squinting his eyes, Harrison made out a lantern hanging from the low branch of a tree. A lone flame perpetually flickered inside a cylinder of glass. As they got closer, Jessica said in frustration, “I swear if this is just a lantern hanging from a tree I'm going to kill you Harrison.” She was tired, hungry, and cold. Her feet were practically freezing by now, and a hike back up the hill to the barn would be twice as brutal.

“Oh, you can thank me,” Harrison replied, finally seeing what the lantern marked. As he'd come closer, he started studying the tree the lantern hung from, noticing it wasn't a skinny pine or redwood. This tree had a large trunk, and built right into the base of it was a green door.

“Oh thank God!” Jessica cried out, seeing the door and feeling relief. “Let's get the fuck out of here!”

“Yeah, anywhere but here's gotta be better,” Harrison readily agreed.

When the reached the door about a minute later, they discovered it was a bit shorter than their current size. They could still fit through it, but it would be cramped. It wouldn't be possible to run though corridor after corridor searching VERSA's side space for their next world.

Harrison opened the door and let Jessica duck in first. Once she went in he stuffed himself in behind her and closed the door. They were finally out of Dos Palos. The side space felt considerably warmer.

“How about this one?” Jessica asked him, both of them standing hunched over in the hallway. “It says 'BOARDWALK.' I don't know if it's a giant Monopoly board or what, but I'm down.” Harrison saw the door she referred to. It said “BOARDWALK-154” on the front.

“Sure, just go,” he hastily agreed, starting to feel cramped.

Jessica's large hand fiddled with the doorknob until she pushed it open and crawled through with Harrison following her. When he made it in, his first reaction was that they were somewhere big and relatively dark. It was immediately clear they were too small for this world.

Harrison guessed he must have been standing under a humongous machine of some kind, but there was a lot of space above his head. The device high above him stood on long legs. And looking out across the dusty floor he saw more legs and more giant machines. It was dimly lit here, so they must have been in the back of big room full of machines.

Suddenly in the distance a siren went off. It sounded like bells whistling and singing an energetic, up-tempo tune. Jessica walked out from under the machine and looked around, then turned to Harrison and shouted, “We're in a giant arcade!”

She was right. It took them a few minutes to realize they'd entered this world under a massive pinball machine. And the rest of the room contained other games too. They walked around in awe. Harrison guessed they must have been only an inch or two in height.

An unexpected booming alerted them to the presence of something big. It didn't really surprise either of them that VERSA might have filled this world with other people; everything unexpected seemed likely to occur now. A pair of giant feet crossed their path up ahead as a giant man wearing sneakers, shorts, and a t-shirt walked through a part of the arcade. Harrison and Jessica, in no immediate danger, quickly fled to hide under a nearby skee-ball game.

“Well, once again we're small,” said Harrison, catching his breath. He turned to Jessica, who was silently taking off his tuxedo jacket. Handing it back to him, she didn't respond to his comment. Instead she surveyed the room, thinking.

“I've got an idea,” she finally told him. She stepped out from under the machine and walked completely out into the open.

“What are you doing?!” Harrison shouted after her. “Get back here!”

Jessica turned to look back at him and gave him a knowing wink. Her face then contorted in concentration, and Harrison realized what she was doing. A moment later her body expanded in an instant, her once diminutive form replaced by two giant high-heeled shoes that stood much taller than him.

Taking a step out from under the machine to stare up at her, Harrison figured she must have been about the same height as when she'd stomped out that entire army. Except now she was normal sized for this world. Jessica glanced down at the floor and quickly located Harrison. She gave him a smile as she bent down to pick him up.

“Well this should make things easier,” she told him as she pulled him up to her face.

“How'd you do that?” Harrison asked her, confused. “I thought you could only grow when in danger?”

Jessica laughed at his ignorance. “Harrison, I was like an inch or whatever tall. Someone could have stepped on me. It didn't take much for it to kick in.”

“Oh.”

Jessica looked around, setting Harrison on her palm. “What is this place?” she wondered aloud. From her hand, Harrison could see a ticket counter in the distance. The same man they'd seen before wandered aimlessly through the arcade, as if he had to be there but didn't know how to play any of the games. And then looking at the nearest machine, Harrison realized it didn't even work. The screen of the arcade game was certainly on, but it displayed more of a pattern of moving pictures than an actual game. All the other games made noises and flashed their lights too, but it was all contrived. VERSA was mimicking a world to the best of its abilities, but it hadn't filled in all the gaps yet.

Harrison, realizing he still clutched his tuxedo jacket that Jessica had just given back to him, decided he wouldn't need it in this world. The air felt warm and comfortable. Tossing it off the side of her hand, it fluttered down to the floor, forgotten.

“Damn I need to get out of this dress already,” Jessica muttered, watching him. “Maybe I can get some clothes around here.”

“I think it looks good on you,” Harrison said playfully. She looked down on him with a frown and he laughed.

Jessica began walking through the arcade to find an exit. It didn't take long. She stepped out of a doorway and into the warm bright daylight. The smell of the ocean immediately wafted into Harrison's nose. Standing up in her hand, Harrison joined Jessica in surveying the scene.

She stood on the smooth wooden planks of a seaside boardwalk, facing a large beach that led down to a cerulean ocean gently lapping against the shore. The sky above was cloudless, the noon sun casting hardly any shadows on the world below. Harrison could see a strip of low buildings siding the boardwalk that seemed to run forever in either direction. The dilapidated arcade which they'd just exited from was one of many sun-baked structures running down the inland side of the boardwalk. Behind them, larger towers rose skyward, gazing over the coastal playground in silent vigil. The midsummer scene felt picturesque, ripped right off a postcard from some Atlantic Ocean beach.

VERSA had populated a few people into the boardwalk world, but they hardly compared to the crowds a comparable beach would have expected on a perfect summer day. Harrison could see maybe about a dozen figures wandering up and down the infinite boardwalk, along with a few sunbathers laying on the wide beach.

“Are we on the Jersey Shore?” Jessica asked Harrison in amusement.

“I was thinking Ocean City, Maryland, but maybe,” he replied. “At least it's not cold here,” he added. His pants and dress shirt would be uncomfortable in this world.

Jessica didn't reply and started walking down the boardwalk, her heels clacking loudly on the wooden planks. Spotting what looked like a small shop selling beach-related apparel and sundries, she stepped inside. The cool blast of air conditioning greeted them.

The store had many things for sale, but it sat empty of customers. Even the cash register and counter lay unattended. “Stay here,” Jessica told Harrison, setting him upon the counter as she plunged into the store. He found her choice of words funny; where else could he go? He wasn't sure what Jessica was looking for and he lost sight of her after a few moments, so he waited impatiently. It would have been nice if she'd asked him first if she could set him down.

Harrison stripped off his dress shoes and socks, then finally took off his mud-stained pants. He unbuttoned his shirt a bit more and rolled up the sleeves, eventually standing in nothing more than his boxer shorts and his best attempt at a summer shirt. With a sigh, he acknowledged that he wasn't going to find anything in this world that fit him. Locating a change-key nearby seemed highly improbable.

After a few minutes, Jessica returned to him sporting a big grin on her face. It was obvious why; she looked amazing. She'd finally ditched her ruined red dress for a tiny lime green bikini that nearly revealed her entire body to Harrison. It occurred to him that, judging by this store, she could have probably found a sundress or sarong to wear, but clearly she was ready to be at the beach. And maybe she wanted to show off a bit too.

Her body was slim and fit, the bikini accentuating her young hips and breasts. Harrison's breath left him as her stunning presence overwhelmed him. She was hot and she knew it. And standing over him, her imposing size only added to the intimidation. Jessica felt pleased with herself seeing Harrison flail around in awe and amazement. She was showing off a lot of skin.

“Ready to go?” she asked him casually, pretending she didn't notice how shocked he was.

Harrison fought to find words. “Uh... um... wow Jessica,” he finally replied. “That's... something!”

Thinking about their casual flirting last night in the barn, Jessica felt like toying with him again. “What? You don't like it?” she pouted.

“No...! No! I mean, I do like it. It looks good. You look good...”

“Do think it makes me look fat?” she asked him, turning to her side and placing a hand seductively on her hip. It definitely did not make her look fat.

“Oh no, no no,” Harrison stammered. “It looks perfect...” he finally admitted.

Jessica smiled down at him. Even though they were pretty forced, she liked his compliments. She didn't need them to boost her ego, but she found it incredibly fun to play with Harrison, especially in his shrunken state. It briefly occurred to her that she might be taking things a little too far with him, but her excitement in the situation pushed her forward.

“Harrison, did you take off your pants?!” she exclaimed in mock surprise. “That's not a very gentlemanly thing to do in front of a lady.”

Harrison was flabbergasted by her. “You're literally in a bikini!” he retorted, gesturing to her body in front of him.

Ignoring his statement she slowly asked him, “You weren't... trying to, you know... start anything, were you?” She subtly thrust her hips forward. Harrison wasn't dumb and knew she was teasing him, but this was far beyond the semblance of professionalism. Her flirting was getting bolder and bolder. This certainly was the strangest work trip he'd ever been on. He would have loved to flirt with her under normal circumstances, but it just didn't sit right with him doing it while he was a couple inches tall.

“No no! It's not like that!” he denied, still trying to be the adult in the room. “I just needed to get comfortable.”

“Wanna head out to the beach then?” she asked, staring past her breasts down at him. He looked up at her, trying to keep cool.

“You bring your towel?” he asked sheepishly.

“Um, yeah!” Jessica replied, quickly stepping over to a rack and grabbing a towel off of it. It didn't look like anyone was going to show up and make them pay for it.

“Hey Jessica, don't you think we should start looking for a way out?” Harrison asked meekly. “You know, look for an out-key?”

A light went off in Jessica's head. “I'm starving too! That's a great idea Harrison, let's see what kind of food they have here.” Harrison couldn't deny that he was hungry too, but Jessica clearly wasn't interested in searching this world too thoroughly. Trying to read her thoughts, Harrison wondered about her priorities right now. Maybe she'd given up on trying to get out of VERSA on her own? Eventually Kat or someone else would pull them out, but that still might not be for a while. Perhaps the girl just wanted to relax on the beach until then.

Though Harrison acknowledged his crush on her, and despite the fact that Jessica looked very sexy at the moment, his urge to get out of VERSA still overrode everything. His gnawing fear of the woman in black drove him to want to explore more, not for the thrill of discovery but strictly out of necessity. Jessica didn't carry the same fears Harrison did, but he still felt supremely annoyed that she was losing focus on their mission.

Jessica's voice snapped him from his thoughts. “You know, it'd be great if I didn't have to keep constantly carrying you around in my hands all the time, Harrison.” With her hands on her waist and her large face grinning down, she only reinforced her size over him. He broke eye contact with her. Looking straight ahead, he saw her bellybutton staring back at him.

“You think I should just stick you between my boobs again?” she asked him with a grin. His eyes shot back up to her. Was she serious? First of all, her bikini top wasn't as much of a push-up as her last bra, so he wasn't sure he'd even stay in place up there. Was she just teasing him? The thought of being between her boobs sounded great objectively, but he remembered last time it'd been more a hell for him than a fun ride. Confined, sweaty, bouncy, and crushing were all apt descriptions of her breasts. He'd rather look at them from afar than fight for air between them.

She picked up on his silence. “No, you don't wanna ride up top again?” she said, her voice now changing into playful condescension. Harrison found it sort of arousing when she talked down to him like this, but it also filled him with trepidation. “Well I've got a new idea. I think you'll like it.”

Her fingers reached out and pinched his puny body before he could react. Stuck in her grip, Harrison watched in utter shock as her other hand pulled the front of her bikini bottom away from her body. His eyes growing huge, he looked down to see a wisp of blond hair silhouetted against the pale white skin of her mons pubis.

“Jessica what are you doing?!” he yelled out. His mind raced, trying to process what was going on. This wasn't right! It didn't even occur to him in the moment that he liked her; her actions just seemed too forward. And dangerous.

“Oh shush yourself,” she chided him, “I know you'll have fun.”

Lowering him into her bikini, she gently released the elastic waistband once his little legs made it past. It snapped against Harrison's body, pinning his torso back against her waist. Luckily his arms and the upper part of his body remained outside her bikini, but he was certainly trapped now. Her skin felt very warm against his back, and a different heat emanated from down below him.

“Much better,” Jessica cooed. “Hold on tight down there, don't slip.”

Or do, she thought to herself with a blush.

His heart racing, Harrison kicked his legs against her skin to stay above her bikini line as gravity gradually pulled him downward. He was shocked, titillated, and mad as hell, all at the same time. Jessica, contently smug and pleased with her creative solution, casually slipped on a pair of sunglasses and walked back out into the dazzling sunlight.

 

 

Chapter 16 by Q-Writer

Chapter 16:

(Posted: March 15)

 

 

 

Kat and Rich cautiously approached a small group of men loading up a caravan of dromedaries. They had watched the group for some time after spotting them at the other end of town. Left with relatively few options, the two decided it might be worth speaking to these men.

“Hello,” Rich greeted them with a wave. Only one man looked up from his task.

“Greetings,” the man responded to him. “My name is Mahon, how can I serve you today?”

“Wow VERSA's giving everyone names now?” Kat commented quietly into Rich's ear.

“Hello Mahon,” replied Rich to the man. “I am Richard and this is my friend Katherine.”

“Pleased to meet you both,” Mahon said with a smile. His head was mostly covered with a keffiyeh like Rich's, and he looked like he'd lived in the desert for a long time. He turned to speak to Kat. “Is this man your...?”

Kat interrupted him quickly. “Oh no no, no.... nothing like that. We just know each other.”

“I see,” Mahon responded, raising an eyebrow. He was still confused, but he let it pass.

“Where is your caravan heading?” Kat asked, quickly changing the subject.

Mahon smiled “We are heading to the great oasis! Once there we will sell our wares and collect food to bring back to our village.”

“Need help?” Rich immediately offered.

“What kind of food do they have there?” Kat asked almost simultaneously. Mahon seemed overwhelmed.

“Woah woah! I can answer your questions, just give me air to breathe,” he said jovially, putting up his hands in defense. He looked at Rich. “Perhaps we could work out a deal if you seek passage to the oasis. It is about a day's journey. I will need compensation to stock extra food and water for the two of you.”

“Done,” Kat quickly consented. “What is the oasis like?” Once again, Mahon made a face at her impatience.

Confidently, he spoke in a reverent tone: “The oasis is a gathering point and sanctuary for the people of this land. Beautiful trees surround a glittering lake that will still even the most hardened traveler's heart. It is a place of relaxation, with plenty of water to drink and unlimited fruit to eat that grows from the plentiful trees. We have a collection of lamps we are bringing to market there.”

Kat and Rich didn't even need to make eye-contact to both know it was exactly where they needed to go. They talked to Mahon a bit longer and eventually swapped Kat's sapphire necklace for a ride to the fabled oasis.

Mahon insisted Kat and Rich ride on two of the extra animals they had; he and his three other men mounted others. Two dromedaries in the back of the train walked riderless but laden with the lamps Mahon and his men intended to sell. Just before the caravan departed toward the setting sun, Kat watched Mahon slip a rifle into a holster on the side of his saddle.

“What's that for?” she asked, catching his eye and pointing to the gun. “Bandits?”

“No,” replied Mahon uneasily. He paused to consider his next sentence. “If we end up needing this, it's probably already too late.” Mahon stared at her ominously for another moment, then mounted his dromedary. The caravan departed silently into the desert expanse.

 

As dusk turned to night, the heat radiating from the sand dissipated and the chilling desert darkness gripped the travelers. In addition to the cold, Kat found the experience of riding a camel a bit awkward. It moved similarly to a horse, but between the hump on its back and the sandy ground beneath its feet it made for an unstable ride. With a glance over her shoulder, she could see Rich struggling to maintain his balance too, his body practically hugged his animal's back trying not to fall off. Mahon and the other men didn't seem to notice.

As the sky faded from crimson and gold into darker shades of black, an awesome ocean of stars tumbled out onto the tapestry above them, as if gods had spilled a bucket of jewels across the heavens. Kat couldn't remember ever seeing so many stars in her lifetime; to Rich it reminded him of his days in Kuwait and Iraq long ago. Even without a moon, the light from the sky shone so brightly that the dunes around them seemed to glow in eerie luminescence.

After a couple hours with no talking, Mahon signaled it was time for a short break. They gathered the dromedaries together and dismounted, stretching their legs and finding something quick to eat from their bags. Rich realized he hadn't eaten since munching on appetizers at the party, so he greedily devoured some bread that Mahon gave to him. Kat felt hungry too but didn't have much of an appetite, so she ate some dried olives. Two of the men conversed together as they walked down the dune a bit to urinate away from the caravan.

When the journey resumed, Kat felt herself fighting off sleep. They'd done so much recently in VERSA without taking a break, so the fatigue quickly caught up with her. Though she nodded off a few times, she concluded that despite her body's best efforts the uncomfortable camel ride would keep her awake. Behind her, Rich's bleary eyes betrayed his drowsiness too.

As Rich struggled to simultaneously stay on the camel and stay awake, he marveled at the barren landscape around him. To him, each rise and fall looked the same. The dune before them was the same dune they'd just passed. He wondered how Mahon knew where to go. Remembering that he wasn't in a real desert and that Mahon was a computer program, he decided the most likely answer was that their route must have been scripted by VERSA into Mahon or the dromedaries' lines of code. As incredible as the desert was, it was even more incredible what SunCorp had created here. If VERSA hadn't already tried killing him so many times, he would be writing a revelatory review to the Secretary of Defense.

But with nothing else to do except think about their situation, the more Rich pondered their current circumstances the more concerned he became. Feeling the need to talk it over with with Kat, Rich called out to her, gaining her attention. After letting her know he wanted to talk, it took Kat a minute to figure out how to hold up her camel until Rich could draw close. Mahon in the front and the three nameless men behind them didn't seem to care that Rich and Kat began exchanging heated whispers in the cold night.

“Kat, I've got a bad feeling about this,” Rich told her bluntly.

“Well, we're still in VERSA, so it goes with the territory,” Kat brushed him off.

“No but really, I've been thinking about all of this, it doesn't seem right. It's too railroaded.”

“What do you mean?”

Rich sighed. He'd been keeping his voice low so their companions wouldn't overhear, but it wasn't as if him and Kat were sitting next to each other. Their dromedaries kept refusing to walk perfectly next to each other, so to be heard he whispered in the loudest way possible.

“I think this is a set-up,” he told her. “We find a door that shouldn't exist that we couldn't say no to. Then we found a remote town with only one way out. Some computer program promises out-keys galore at the end of the rainbow as long as we follow it. It seems like every step of the way we've taken through VERSA, every world we've gone through, it's all been a specific path we're following. We haven't been exploring, we're being led.”

Kat considered his theory. He made some good points. Though she'd known exactly how to get from their entry room to the Dos Palos world, they certainly never deviated along the way. And then in their moment of choice, as the house crumbled around them, a miraculous door appeared like a clarion call in the darkness. As she thought about it, it seemed more and more likely that that gray door they'd traveled through had been created for them.

“So if you're right, what does it mean?” she asked him.

“I don't know,” admitted Rich. “But if I had to guess worst-case scenario? It's her.”

Kat knew he was speaking of the woman in black. But it didn't make sense.

“Ok, so let's say she's set us up to follow some caravan in the desert,” Kat postulated. “Why? What's she doing?” She was skeptical. “If she was trying to trap us, she could do that at any point! She could just appear and shrink us again and game over.”

Rich sat in silence as his dromedary huffed through the dark desert. “I don't know,” he finally replied. “I just have this feeling we're not going to make it to the oasis. It's too easy.”

“You think she's playing with us?” Kat conjectured.

“Can a computer even be driven by a desire to play?”

“Well she hasn't flat-out killed us yet, but theoretically could have at any point. Maybe she's using us for something, or watching how we react to things. Yeah I don't know, it's strange.”

“I mean, the alternative,” Rich acknowledged, “is that this isn't some set up and that you and I are going to be eating apples by nightfall tomorrow.” He didn't sound very confident.

Kat's mind considered all the motivations and machinations that might be compelling the behavior of this aberrant computer program. The coder inside of her marveled at the woman in black's existence; when she finally de-simmed, Kat couldn't wait to go through the servers to see if she could find her there. But for now this new intelligence, spawned by VERSA, remained incredibly mysterious.

The only thing comforting Kat was that she was still alive. If the woman in black had wanted them dead she reasonably could have murdered them a long time ago. It made her think of Kevin, and Kat wondered if the woman in black somehow caused his death upon de-sim. That would actually explain a lot. Could this artificial intelligence have overridden or corrupted all the programming they'd written to keep pilots safe upon virtual death?

But regardless, if she wasn't killing them now, then she either viewed them apathetically or wanted them around for a reason. And the woman in black had already proven that she took great interest in their journey. So what the hell did she want from them?

Harrison had said the woman in black wanted them to leave VERSA when she'd strangely kidnapped him. Since then, Kat reckoned, he'd been acting moody and nervous. Reasoning these observations, Kat started seriously wondering if Harrison had told them the truth. If he was holding something back about the woman in black, then her and Rich were probably in serious trouble.

“Shhhhh!!” Mahon suddenly hissed. Kat snapped out of her thoughts and Rich looked up from his dromedary. Mahon gestured with his arm for the caravan to stop.

“What's going on?” Kat asked him, quietly but concerned.

“Be silent!” Mahon scolded her. Through the darkness Kat could make out an expression of worry painted across his face. Behind her, the three other party members slowly brought their dromedaries up.

Straining to listen for anything in the quiet desert, Kat might have heard some kind of low rumbling in the distance, but it was faint and she couldn't be sure. Mahon didn't seem to doubt his own ears though.

“We need to get out of here, now!” he warned the caravan. “The rocks, over there! Let's go!”

He kicked the side of his camel, which caused it to break into a quick trot. Kat and Rich looked to him as they saw him ride down the side of a sand dune. In the distance, a jagged silhouette against the sky indicated a rocky protrusion jutted from the nearby sandy landscape.

“Fuck,” Rich said, trying to jump-start his dromedary. “What the hell is going on?”

As Kat finally got her beast to start moving, she realized the sound of the rumbling had increased. And it wasn't just a dull sound anymore, it was rhythmic, like the slow beating of a large drum. It could have been coming from any direction in the dark desert.

Eight camels and their six riders started hoofing it across the desert, but unfortunately for the caravan, dromedaries cannot gallop close to the speed of a horse, especially over sand. The cluster of large boulders slowly drew closer, but the booming sound seemed to follow them even faster. Though it was hard to tell from the bouncing motion that came from riding the camel, it seemed to Kat that the ground around her was shaking too.

Casting a quick glance behind them, Kat saw an enormous human figure walking along the horizon-- directly towards them. It was still at a distance, but Kat could already tell it was huge, and likely a woman from the curvy outline of its body. So Rich had been right; this who thing had been a trap, presumably set by the woman in black.

“Rich, look!” she shouted to him. Hearing her, Rich turned his head around to catch a glimpse of the giantess plodding towards them.

“Oh shit!” he remarked. “She's coming this way!”

In an instant both Kat and Rich knew that fleeing would be futile. The rocks where they might hide were barely closer, and even with her casual steps the giant woman would easily catch them before they could reach safety and hide. She must have been hundreds of feet tall, and the only thing that might save them from her attention now would be the darkness.

“We're not going to make it!” Kat yelled to Rich. Rich knew she was right but had trouble thinking of a way to save themselves as the woman closed in on them. The ground was now trembling with every one of her footfalls as the dromedaries started having trouble keeping balance.

“Let's ditch the camels!” Rich suggested to Kat. “Hide in the sand!” Before she could acknowledge him, he bailed off the side of his dromedary and landed painfully on the desert floor. His terrified dromedary continued rambling onward.

Kat quickly lost Rich in the darkness as she rode forward, and instantly realized his plan might work. Trying to carefully dismount her dromedary, she ended up twisting herself in the reins and dragging alongside the animal for a few moments before successfully breaking free. Upon hitting the cool sand, she caught her breath and looked around to see if she could spot Rich.

Despite the night, the sheer enormity of the giantess was apparent as her towering body blocking out a significant portion of the starry sky. Against the twinkling lights above, her silhouette created a menacing black void. Her feet, as large as buses, took steps close by, jarring and rattling the ground beneath Kat. Though Mahon and the other three men from the caravan continued to flee, they stood no chance.

Kat watched the looming woman bend down and gracefully pluck one of the riders from his camel. When she spoke she boomed over the silent desert.

“Mmmmm you look good!” the giantess remarked. Kat immediately recognized the voice from her past, and the starlight reflecting off the colossal tan legs of the huntress only confirmed that she knew who this person was. She hadn't talked to her college roommate Ariana for some years now, but Kat couldn't help but notice that'd she'd grown a bit in VERSA.

Ariana slowly lifted the screaming man into the air, and as she straightened her back Kat gasped when she realized the large woman stood naked in the darkness. The bright starry sky perfectly emphasized her prominent breasts and pointy nipples as she dangled the hapless man in front of her face.

“I've always enjoyed playing with my food,” she said to the little man in a sultry voice. Ariana was everything Kat hadn't been in college: tall, sexy, popular, and outgoing. But she hadn't been unkind to Kat, just mostly aloof and brazenly confident when she'd been around. She'd certainly monopolized their dorm room a few too many times, luring whatever boyfriend she had back to her lair for a quick fuck. During those episodes, Kat spent much of her time alone on her computer in the campus library. They'd remained acquaintances throughout the rest of her undergrad, but hardly friends.

Without warning, Ariana tilted her head back and opened her mouth, dangling the terrified man above her impressive maw. Kat's eyes bulged in horror as she realized what was about to happen. Her body frozen to the ground in fear and shock, she watched in stupefied awe as Ariana casually dropped the screaming and kicking man into her mouth. With a dramatized gulp, she easily swallowed his little body whole, seductively running her fingers down her neck as her throat pulled the man to his doom. She was deliberately putting on a show for her other victims.

Invigorated by her game and standing confidently nude above the desert below, Araina turned her gaze back towards the ground. Through the darkness, Kat could barely make out the finer features of her body, but she realized that despite Ariana's nakedness, she wore some sort of a leather belt around her bare torso and a few anklettes that jingled above her feet when she stepped. And though the dark night shrouded her face, Kat could clearly see the outline of Ariana's grinning mouth. She was hungry for more.

With steps that seemed massive at Kat's tiny scale, Ariana continued her stroll forward as she hunted down the rest of the caravan. Though she approached the sand near Kat, she remained distracted by the running dromedaries. It occurred to Kat that from her height, Ariana probably couldn't tell that two of the camels were riderless now.

With another step, Ariana's left foot impacted the earth about thirty feet away from Kat, causing the small woman's body to shake. Ariana couldn't see her yet through the darkness, and as she bent her impossibly tall body forward to snatch another man up, Kat stumbled up to her feet to run between Ariana's legs in the opposite direction. Knowing the giantess wouldn't be able to hear her tiny voice down below, Kat started bellowing Rich's name in hope of finding him in the darkness.

As Kat searched the broken, churned-up desert floor cratered by Ariana's powerful feet, behind her she heard Ariana teasing her next victim.

“Your friend tasted so delicious!” Ariana chirped as another man screamed and a dromedary moaned in terror. Her massive arm moved quickly and silently through the night as she grabbed another victim. Kat remembered how Ariana had always been trying new ludicrous diets in college to maintain her enviable figure, but eating people was certainly a new step, even for her. It only made her appreciate and fear VERSA's bizarre abilities even more.

The pillars of Ariana's legs stood firm and powerful on either side of Kat as she scrambled through the craters of her footprints. In a matter of moments she came across Rich, who had spotted her once she'd started calling his name.

“Let's get the fuck out of here!” Rich hastily greeted her.

“We can't outrun her!” Kat argued. “We should try hiding instead!”

“And get stepped on?” scoffed Rich. “Are you nuts?!” Another boom resonated through the ground as Ariana took a half-step, shifting her weight. Snaps of gunshots erupted as Mahon finally decided to use his rifle, but the sound was pathetically weak compared to Ariana's goddess-like power. Kat and Rich heard her giggle playfully as tiny screams reached their little ears from far above them. With a loud gulp and a satisfied moan, Ariana devoured another member of the caravan.

“Fuck fine!” relented Kat. “Just go!!”

The two tiny travelers began running the best they could through the sand, heading out into the endless expanse of the desert night. Kat caught Rich glancing behind them, well, really above them, to see if the giantess had noticed them yet. His gaze lingered as he ogled her perfect ass and bronze skin, faintly illuminated by the stars.

“Rich c'mon!” Kat urged him.

“Sorry!” Rich hastily apologized.

“That's my fucking college roommate,” Kat said through her teeth. Rich looked at her in surprise.

“Oh, I see VERSA's been peeling back your brain now too,” Rich commented. He glanced back up at Ariana's sexy body as he tried running forward. “She's pretty hot,” he finally stated.

“Yeah, I know,” Kat said, rolling her eyes. She'd acknowledged it many times before.

Completely exhausted from the lack of sleep, the two did their best to escape the giantess. Ariana now cradled another victim, and Kat began wondering how much time they really had to escape. What would she do when she ran out of morsels?

“Oooh, I like when they struggle,” Ariana's terrifying voice gleefully boomed from above. As she clutched her minuscule captive, she devilishly licked her lips and gently ran a hand over one of her enormous naked breasts, making sure to brush her protruding nipple.

Rich kept stealing back glances to watch the scene high above and hoped like hell he wouldn't be next. He could barely perceive the man in her hand, but he knew he was there. With her gracefully long fingers, Ariana dangled him over her mouth before unceremoniously dropping him in. She didn't even chew; he was so small that she simply let her throat swallow him whole.

As the man disappeared inside the giantess, Ariana savored his demise for a moment before finally coming back to the present. She put her hands on her waist and surveyed the scene around her. It was then Rich and Kat realized she'd just eaten the fourth member of their caravan. She began talking to herself out loud.

“Huh, six saddled camels but only four little men.... I bet the other two are around here somewhere!”

Fuck, Kat thought. Now she was going to start looking for them. They hadn't gotten far from her, only the distance of a couple of Ariana's steps.

“Rich, stop!” she yelled to him. “Get down!” Kat dove into the sand, and Rich, in a change of heart, dropped down nearby. “She's looking for us now...” Kat hissed. A running target, even in the darkness, would be much easier to spot than a tiny, motionless speck in the sand.

Though Kat wasn't facing her, she could hear Ariana's giant feet shift as the giantess began surveying the desert floor around her. She took a step here and there, peering through the darkness to see if she could spot two more little people hiding from her in plain sight. Kat realized that although hiding might be their best option, one unaware footstep by Ariana would make it all for naught.

“Why won't you come out and play?” the giantess called out longingly from high above them. She certainly had the whole cat-and-mouse thing down. Kat's brain screamed in fear inside her skull, furiously pumping her body full of adrenaline. Or, at least, digital adrenaline into her digital body. If the woman in black wanted to finally kill them, Kat reckoned, she sure had picked a cruel way to do it.

Ariana took an earth-shattering step forward as Kat tried to stay still. She wanted to swivel her head around to see where the giantess might step next, but she worried even a small movement might give her away. But Rich had no such fear, apparently, as he squirmed his body around to face Kat and Ariana. If it had been any lighter outside, he would have noticed Kat's fury at his carelessness.

“Cut it the fuck out!” she whispered at him aggressively.

Before he could respond, the sweet booming voice above them said, “Is that a little man I see?”

Too afraid to even freeze, Rich looked up at Ariana, and to his dread, made eye contact with her enormous smiling eyes. Without thinking, he scrambled upright and bolted away from her towering figure, but this only caused her to giggle in amusement. Shifting her weight again on her two pretty feet, Ariana gingerly bent over to grab Rich from off the ground. The shock waves from her steps caused him to stumble, but even if he'd been able to break into a sprint, she still would have caught him easily. Kat watched in horror as Ariana's giant fingers swooped down in front of her and snatched Rich up in a careful pinch. His kicking legs immediately rose high out of view, his mouth shouting obscenities at his captress.

“Hey little guy,” Ariana greeted Rich as she brought him up to her face. “You didn't think you were gonna get away, did ya?”

“Fuck you bitch!” Rich spat at her. “Let me go!”

Ariana frowned at his petulance. “You're a feisty little one,” she commented. She cocked her head to give him another look. “Where's the other one?” she asked him bluntly.

“I don't know what you're talking about,” Rich said angrily. He wasn't going to give up Kat. About 300 feet below him, Kat had decided to scramble away from Ariana while Rich distracted her. Though one of Araina's feet rested perilously close to her, she quickly tried crawling past it so she'd be behind Ariana and out of sight.

“You don't have to kid me,” Ariana told Rich kindly. “I know there are two of you, and I need you both. Where is she?”

“Up your ass!” Rich yelled at her. Ariana acted shocked by his remark. Then she smiled.

“Up my ass, little man?” she clarified with a smile. “I hadn't thought of doing that with a tiny yet, but maybe I'll make an exception for you.”

“If you do, I'll crawl up to your throat and strangle you from inside, you bitch!” Rich threatened her. He really hated this giant woman, pinching him helplessly in front of her beautiful face. But her amusement started to fade. She stared at him, her mouth puckering in annoyance and her eyes beholding him with a peeved stare.

“Well fine, if you won't be helpful, I'll look myself,” she casually told him. She started lowering him down her body. “In the meantime, stay put.”

As Rich accelerated downward, he watched her other hand move toward the belt around her waist. He hadn't noticed it before, but a small leather pouch dangled from the belt and rested against her hip. She flipped open the top of it and dropped him in. Rich fell to the bottom of the pouch, twisting his ankle upon landing. His world went dark when she covered the leather sack back up. At his size, he wouldn't be able to climb out. He was trapped, but alive.

“Your friend could use some manners,” Ariana called out to Kat, somewhere on the desert floor. Kat had just gained her feet and started running when she dove back into the sand to hide. She only felt slightly relieved that this monstrous woman hadn't eaten Rich. As Ariana turned in place to scan the ground, Kat clenched her eyes shut, wishing and praying she wouldn't be spotted. The ground shook tremendously all around her.

“Whereeeee areeeeee youuuuuu?” the digital copy of her old roommate called out. What a nightmarish program VERSA had evolved into. It crossed Kat's mind that for all these years she might have been working on a project that would literally kill her one day. It infuriated her that the whims of a couple lines of code would have a say in whether she lived or died. She never wanted to see another one or zero again in her entire life.

Kat lay perfectly still, listening to Ariana hunt her from above. The giantess must have known she was close. About a minute passed and Kat started to wonder what Ariana was doing, but she hardly dared to look. It crossed her mind that hiding in the sand might actually work.

And just as she had the optimistic thought, an immense pressure gripped her, expelling the air from her lungs and rocketing her upwards from the ground. Kat screamed as the ground dwindled below her, just to be quickly replaced with the giant smirking face of her college roommate.

“Hey Kat,” Ariana greeted her. She seemed pleased with herself, but it didn't stop her from acting friendly. “It seems you've shrunk a little since the last time I saw you,” she joked seriously.

“You're not real!” Kat shouted at her. “You're not Ariana!”

The giantess looked confused. Of course she wouldn't know she was a program. Only the woman in black seemed to have a modicum of true self-awareness.

“I... I'm not sure what you mean,” Ariana admitted, clearly caught off guard. But she wasn't fazed. “We'll have some time to catch up later Kat, let's talk more then.” She lowered Kat down to the pouch around her waist. “I gotta run, so wait for me in here,” Ariana told her.

As if I have a choice, Kat thought as she tumbled into the dark pouch. With a thud and a groan, she landed on top Rich.

“Fuck,” Rich grunted. Kat moved around on top of him, trying to find a way to occupy the small space without crushing him.

“Sorry Rich,” she hastily apologized, kneeing him in the gut.

“It's her fucking fault anyways,” he reminded her, referencing the giantess. “So you know her, right?”

Kat shifted off of Rich's body and lay most of her weight next to him. It was more comfortable for her, but as Ariana started walking the pouch bounced against her hip, jumbling them around more. When they found a compromise in the pouch, Kat replied.

“Her name's Ariana. Lived with her in college.”

“Damn she's pretty tall... was she on the volleyball team or something?”

Even in the pitch black darkness, Kat knew Rich was smiling. They were so hopelessly screwed, but as usual, Rich couldn't pass up the opportunity to crack a joke.

Kat changed the subject. “What do you think is going on? Where are we going?”

“Who knows,” Rich admitted. “But twenty bucks says she's taking us the woman in black, just like Harrison's girlfriend did.”

“Well, she didn't kill him then,” Kat remarked. “Maybe she won't kill us now?”

“Yeah but if she's not going to de-sim us... what the hell is she going to do?”

Kat couldn't even begin to guess. A moment of silence pervaded their leather prison before Rich spoke again.

“Hey Kat?”

“Yeah?”

“Going back into VERSA was a terrible idea,” he said bluntly.

Kat sighed. “Yeah, it really was,” she finally admitted.

The two tiny avatars stewed in pessimism as Ariana confidently strutted across the dark desert plain. Rising miles above the mountains before her, a lavish palace loomed in the distance like an ominous mirage.

 

 

Chapter 17 by Q-Writer
Author's Notes:

If you've made it this far, then congratulations, you've just passed the halfway mark of the story! Oh yeah, and if it wasn't before, this story is definitely X rated now.

Chapter 17:

(Posted: March 19)

 

 

 

Though the wooden planks of the boardwalk felt warm under Jessica's feet, Harrison, still struggling in the bottom of her bikini, was considerably hotter with rage. As Jessica sauntered down the mostly empty promenade enjoying the sunny summer day, Harrison had to fight to keep from slipping down into her crotch. He did his best to use his arms to prop himself up on the elastic waistband of her swimsuit. Kicking wildly he thrashed his legs, not only to find support on her mons but also to express his frustration at Jessica. He still couldn't believe she'd simply dropped him in her bikini!

As he struggled against her body, he could feel her pubic hairs below him with his bare feet. If he simply gave up, he would certainly slip down against her pussy. Had she considered that when she placed him in his current predicament? He certainly didn't want to get stuck down there; not only did it seem unpleasant, he was sure she wouldn't appreciate him rummaging around in her sex. So his struggle continued, and he made sure to kick Jessica extra hard so she wouldn't think this was too funny.

It was a little awkward for Jessica feeling Harrison squirm around in her bikini, but she ultimately didn't mind his weak kicks as she strolled down the boardwalk with a towel slung over her shoulder. The day at the beach was beautiful and she was enjoying Harrison's company, though she could tell he was none too pleased at being dropped into her swimsuit. She was certain he would eventually come around to enjoying his predicament, and this way she didn't have to constantly worry about holding or crushing him. Plus, it's not like she'd put just any guy down there. She thought he should feel honored.

Spotting a storefront advertising lunch, Jessica walked over to find an abandoned boardwalk counter serving all sorts of beach food. Peering over the counter and into the store, she could see ice cream in a freezer, hot dogs warming on rollers, and stove-tops and fryers laying dormant but ready to cook. And like much of this world, nobody was home.

Opening the nearby door and walking into the shop, Jessica looked for something easy to satisfy her hunger. She couldn't tell if Harrison's weak voice was yelling at her from below, but she remained determined to get something for him too.

Seeing a warming rack full of giant soft pretzels, Jessica plucked two of them off and swiped a nearby container of spicy brown mustard. This would do for now. She could always go back and get more of whatever she wanted. It crossed her mind that she should also be on the lookout for an out-key, but as expected, the store sold no fruit. At this point she'd nearly resigned herself to hide in VERSA with Harrison until Kat or someone else pulled them out manually. The woman in black didn't seem like she would let them leave on their own accord.

“Let's go sit on the beach,” she told Harrison without looking down. He kept fidgeting in her bikini, but it hardly fazed her now.

Exiting the store with the pretzels, Jessica walked across the boardwalk and descended the steps to the beach. The sand stretched flat to the horizons to her left and right, and before her the ocean lapped the wide shoreline. A few individuals and at least one couple sat idly on the beach, engrossed in themselves. Jessica wondered if VERSA had programmed them to enjoy the day. The only sound came from the errant cawing of seagulls and the gentle ocean continually washing against the sand.

Jessica walked out towards the sea, and after a minute of looking for the right spot, she spread her towel on a secluded stretch of sand. She carefully plucked Harrison out of her bikini, finding he'd nearly slipped all the way below her waistband. Without greeting him, she set him down on her towel, removed her sunglasses, then lay her body down on her side, propping herself up with the elbow of her right arm. She watched his dainty body rise up to its feet next to her breasts, both of which easily dwarfed him. It amused her how small he was compared to her. The thought of bowling him over with her boobs occurred to her, but she admitted to herself she'd already teased him enough for the time being.

Before she could speak to him, Harrison exploded at her. “Jessica what the hell!! What the hell did you do that for?!” He was boiling with rage and shock, finally getting to blow up the anger inside of him that had stewed for the last fifteen minutes.

Jessica reacted in surprise. She hadn't anticipated this; he stunned her into silence.

“What the hell was that?!” he continued to fume, ranting at her beautiful and looming face. Even laying on her side, her body towered over him. Her forearm and hand rested on the towel close to him, and her two breasts, barely contained by the bikini top, framed the right side of his perspective. He did his best not to glance over to them, but they were large and intimidating, their curves incredibly distracting. As Jessica breathed they swelled and pushed against the green bikini holding them back.

Harrison was pissed and he wanted Jessica to know it. “Seriously Jessica, I don't like when you handle me without asking or telling me!” he yelled at her. “And why'd you stick me in your swimsuit? I could have slipped all the way down!” He was embarrassed and feeling disrespected. He was angry at her for sure, but he also realized that he was venting most of his other stress on her too. VERSA kept dealing him a bad hand and he hated never being in control.

Jessica smiled at him but looked remorseful. “I'm so sorry Harrison...” she quietly said. “I didn't know it'd make you so mad... are you ok?”

No, he wasn't ok, but she'd said the right thing and he could tell her apology was genuine. He tried to come up with the next thing to say.

“I thought you'd like it,” Jessica added, looking at him knowingly. He didn't know exactly how to respond.

“I mean, it's not like... that...” he finally stammered, but trailed off. Her left hand, which she'd been resting on her side, came down to him. Extending her index finger, she gently stroked his little body. He flinched in surprise but immediately collected himself and let Jessica touch him in her best attempt to sooth him.

“I'll make sure I ask you first in the future,” she offered him sweetly. “Sorry I made you uncomfortable. I just thought it'd be fun.”

Harrison felt his rage dissipating. To be punitive, he wanted to hang on to his anger longer and let Jessica really know how unhappy he was, but her infectious smile and warmheartedness easily disarmed him.

He let out a dramatic sigh and looked up at her face. “Thanks for putting up with me,” he said. “I just hate VERSA and I hate being so helpless all the time.” Her finger, which was considerably larger than him, felt comforting as she gently rubbed it against his entire body. He put his arm out to give it a half-hug, and she stopped caressing him to let her fingertip support him.

“I'm sorry Harrison, I hope we'll be out of here soon too,” consoled Jessica. “I sort of figured in the meantime we weren't being bothered so we might as well enjoy the beach.”

“You don't want to look for a way out?” he asked her in surprise.

“I just... I just don't think it's really worth it,” she admitted. “How are we going to get out? We're lost.” She had a good point. “I just figure someone will disconnect us eventually. Hopefully Kat.”

Harrison thought about Kat and Rich briefly, wondering what they were up to. He'd felt bad about leaving them, but he knew staying with Jessica had been the right choice.

“You know, I'm glad I'm stuck with you and not her,” he said out loud, absentmindedly vocalizing his most recent thought.

Jessica pulled her head back in reaction to his comment. It was kind but surprising. “Why?” she asked him, curious to hear his answer.

Harrison fumbled a bit, looking down at the ground. “Well... um... you're nicer than her. She's all business. But you look out for me. You care. It's nice. You're just so easy to be around.” He paused, deciding how to say what he felt. “I just like being around you,” he finally admitted. But then he quickly added, “Even when you pick me up and trap me into your bikini.”

He looked back up at her to gauge her reaction. She smiled lovingly at him. Suddenly her hand picked up his tiny body and whisked him up to her face. Catching him completely by surprise, she puckered her lips and pressed his diminutive form to her mouth, giving him the biggest kiss he'd ever received.

Jessica drew her hand back to gaze at him, seeing she'd shocked him silent. “I like being around you too Harrison,” she responded quietly. The warm breath from her mouth rushed over him. Her kiss obliterated all his professional expectations and spun his overwhelmed mind into a dreamlike daze. Everything moved fast in VERSA; it shouldn't have surprised him that he and Jessica had already developed such a close relationship.

Strange things happen to regular people when they're thrust into extraordinary situations. Despite the short length of their acquaintance, the harrowing circumstances of their exploration together accelerated the bond between them. It's an agreed upon fact that people fall in love much more quickly when thrown into a blender of calamity, especially one set in such an exotic location. But in the moment, all these truths remained out of sight from their two fast-beating hearts.

As they both recovered from the kiss, Harrison broke the spell and asked boldly, “You want to get a drink with me sometime when this is all over? I know a good bar down in Navy Yard by the ballpark.” He couldn't help but smile like an idiot.

Jessica laughed, aware of the absurdity of the situation. “Yeah, that'd be nice,” she agreed. Even though she'd impulsively snatched him up, which she had just promised to never do again, she felt relieved he didn't seem to care. It definitely felt weird holding this guy in her hand. She wanted nothing more than to have him cuddle her at full size, but VERSA had a peculiar way of giving no one what they wanted. In the meantime, they'd have to make do with their curiously imbalanced sizes.

As if he'd read her mind, Harrison continued talking. “I feel like once I'm back to normal size I'd make a better date, so don't judge me too much right now,” he told her, trying to make light of their odd situation. “I know girls aren't usually into shorter guys...”

“Oh, I kind of like you like this,” she interrupted him, giving him a teasing smile. “You're no good for hugs but you're easy to keep tabs on.”

Harrison reacted in mock indignation. “Oh so you're the controlling type? Maybe I shouldn't date you after all!”

“Oh, you want to date me Harrison,” Jessica told him smugly. “Plus you owe me after getting in my pants already.”

“You put me there!” he retorted. He couldn't help but smile; it was too fun flirting with her.

“And I just might again if you don't change your tone! But I'll give you a chance to behave yourself first.”

He couldn't tell if she was serious about putting him back in her bikini. Jessica slowly lowered him down in front of her and set him down on the towel. When she released him, Harrison found his footing and craned his neck up to continue staring at her. They both grinned at each other.

Jessica reached over to grab one of the pretzels and brought it to her mouth and took a bite. It tasted warm, salty, and delicious. She tore off a minuscule piece and showed it to Harrison.

“Want some?” she asked him.

“Yes please, I'm starving,” he responded eagerly. She dropped the little bit next to him and he began working to tear off little shreds he could bite into. Jessica watched in fascination. His fingers were so tiny and his little mouth could hardly make a dent in what she'd given him. It occurred to her that at his current size, she could easily swallow him whole without even trying. She realized how important it was that she protect him, lest someone try taking him again. He was a little man in a big world, and he couldn't survive without her.

Though a maternal instinct swelled inside her, as he turned around Jessica stole a look at Harrison's cute butt. Her mind immediately wondered what he looked like under his boxers. His cock must be absolutely tiny at his size, she realized, but she still wanted to see it and maybe touch it too. Everything about him still felt very masculine, but the fact that he was smaller than her littlest finger made it all the more cuter. Self-control held her lust in check, but she realized she'd been absentmindedly biting her lip. Watching him was turning her on.

“You know, having you so small does present some unique opportunities,” Jessica stated, curious to see what he'd say.

Harrison looked down her body, all the way down to her toes hundreds of feet away from him, then back to her face just above him. He finally let her impossible size awe him. She was sexy. And huge.

“I guess I have to admit, seeing you like this is pretty spectacular,” he told her frankly, gesturing to her body. He felt somewhat confident giving her such a kind compliment, but the enormity of her body still overwhelmed him. To give her an idea of how she appeared to him, he explained, “You look like, I don't know... a force of nature! You're gigantic but... it's awesome.”

Worried about how intimidating she must appear, Jessica told Harrison, “Hey, I'm not going to do anything to you without asking you first. But I gotta be honest... you're making me wonder how much they've really programmed into VERSA.” She paused and leaned over him, lowering her voice. “Do you think anyone's ever had sex while in here?”

“Um, I doubt it?” he replied, blushing. She want to have sex with him? He liked the idea, but they wouldn't be able to have sex until they found a way to make him big again.

Watching Harrison think, Jessica changed gears. “You know, it's so hot out,” she commented, “you should take your shirt off and work on your tan with me!”

Harrison hadn't expected her to say something like that, but objectively she made a good point. He slowly began unbuttoning his shirt, eventually sliding it off his arms. Though he wasn't ashamed of his body, Jessica's huge presence and fixated eyes made him feel even smaller. Casually tossing his shirt to the side, he turned to eat another piece of pretzel. Now, only clad a tight pair of boxer shorts, Harrison could feel Jessica watching him with rapt attention. He wanted to know what she was thinking, but he was too afraid to ask. He trusted her, but she still intimidated him immensely.

Jessica turned away from him and shifted her body so she was laying on her back, maximizing her exposure to the sun. As she scooted across the towel, Harrison stepped back to the edge of it to allow her to lay comfortably. Her body absolutely dominated his world.

“Want to lay with me?” she asked him, turning her head. Standing near her shoulder, he couldn't help but once again sneak a peek at her large breasts proudly jutting into the sky.

“Um... sure,” he said hesitantly. Though he knew she'd never deliberately harm him, he worried that one absentminded move from her could squash him flat. Without thinking, he told her, “I'm not so sure your towel is the safest place for me to be right now. What if you roll over?”

“Hmm good point,” she agreed. “Do you mind if I put you somewhere safer?”

“Where?” wondered Harrison.

“It's a yes or no question,” she replied with a mysterious look.

“Uh, ok,” he relented.

Watching Jessica's huge body do anything looked like a mountain range rollicking during an earthquake. She reached her left arm across her body and before Harrison could react, she pinched him and lifted him up above her. Moving him down her body, she eventually deposited Harrison on her taut stomach. Her skin felt warm against his nearly naked body, but he quickly rose to his feet.

Balancing on her rising and falling torso was no easy feat, and within moments he fell down to his hands and knees. Looking up her body, he could see her giggling face peering over her breasts at him, clearly amused. Harrison didn't find the situation very funny, and now he was on her nearly naked body with no way down.

Moving around her belly button towards her waist, Harrison searched for a part of her that wouldn't move so much as she breathed. Finding a good spot, he lied down on her skin to relax. But Jessica was still watching him.

“Hey Harrison,” she said, getting his attention once more. “If you fall asleep on my skin, I'm going to get a tan with your outline in it. Why don't you move onto my bikini so you don't mess up my tan lines?” she suggested.

Harrison's first reaction was to question why the hell she wanted to work on her tan, which wouldn't be coming out of VERSA with her. But then he realized: she wanted him to move down there. Well, at least she wasn't dropping him into her bikini bottom again, but her insinuation made him hesitate.

About to raise his voice in protest, something nagged at him, causing him to pause. He'd complained to her a lot lately, and he didn't want to come across as petulant or needy. It's just her bikini, he finally told himself, what harm would there be in just laying on her? Though it seemed like he was approaching a rather private area, Jessica clearly wanted him there. So he sheepishly went along with her wishes.

“Ok,” he agreed, calling up to her so she could hear him. With her lying down now, her hip bones created a bikini bridge that raised the waistband off her body slightly, allowing him to peer into the darkness of her crotch. He shuddered as he crawled around it to the topside of the fabric. Still on his hands and knees, he noticed how spongy the bikini material felt as he crawled onto her mons. Finally lying down, he tried not to think about where he was. He was determined to enjoy his day at the beach.

Jessica couldn't believe how easily she'd convinced Harrison to crawl down to her crotch. Her body tingled with excitement as her heartbeat continued to rise. She loved flirting with him, and their size difference only made her want to be even closer to him. Though it seemed unlikely he'd try to initiate anything sexual with her, Jessica couldn't take her eyes off of him. Using her elbows, she remained propped up as she continued to look down her body at the little man lying on her swimsuit. If he moved down another inch, she realized, he'd be right next to her clit. Noting how her body reacted to this thought, she concluded that the VERSA engineers really had included everything. She smoldered in arousal.

Her dignified mind and lusting body raged in opposition against each other; she liked Harrison and wanted to do something sexual with him, but under these bizarre circumstances she knew it would be wrong to force it. His tiny form seemed to amplify her desires but she didn't want to do anything without his consent. She could tell he was nervous around her like this, so it was up to her to make him feel at ease.

But then again, this was an opportunity they'd probably never have again. Jessica wasn't ashamed that she was a sexually adventurous woman, preferring to try new things if she encountered a willing guy. Even if they dated after this, they'd never get to do something this unique. Though she wasn't even sure what Harrison's tiny body could accomplish for her, she wanted to find out. Hell, even if she ignored her own needs and just used her fingertip to get him off, it would still be a story worth telling one day.

As she debated this in her head, Harrison noticed she still hadn't lied down yet to relax. He propped himself up and called out to her.

“Jessica, is something wrong?”

She snapped out of her reverie, ashamed, as if he'd known she's been entertaining horny thoughts. But as she looked over his clueless face, she knew his mind was nowhere close to suspecting her lascivious desires.

“Oh sorry, just thinking...” she hastily acknowledged. Once she'd said it, it became obvious how suggestive it sounded.

Harrison frowned and furrowed his brow. He still trusted her, but did she really want to do something sexual with him? At this size??

For a moment, they both stared at each other in silence: Jessica self-conscious of her unspoken desires and Harrison alarmed by her insinuations.

With trepidation, Harrison finally spoke. “Were you.... thinking about me?” He glanced down at the small swimsuit piece that covered her crotch.

Jessica let out a large sigh of relief that unsteadied Harrison's body. She wanted to be frank with him.

“Hey,” she said kindly, “I wonder if... maybe we should try something fun at these sizes? I'm a little curious to see what it would be like.”

As expected, Harrison was shocked, his mouth agape. His suspicions were confirmed and he immediately wondered if she'd placed him on her body hoping to goad him into something sexual. Despite his affection towards Jessica, he felt peeved that she might have been manipulating him.

Sensing this, Jessica tried reassuring him. “Hey it's just a suggestion! I'm not going to make you do anything you don't want.... but I was just thinking it might be... nice?” She smiled at him, trying to act reassuring. Harrison still couldn't decide how to tactfully say no as his mind whirred.

“Um... uh....” he stammered. “I.... I don't think that'd be a good idea?” he finally admitted. “I mean, you're so big, I could get hurt.” He sounded incredibly uneasy and unsure of himself.

Jessica cocked her head at him, trying to get into his mind.

“I think it'd be possible,” she said convincingly. “Of course I'll be super careful. Don't you think you'd be able to make me feel something?” She raised an eyebrow at him.

Damn it, Harrison thought. He was afraid she'd appeal to his manhood and now she'd called him out. He really did fear her body at his size, but he certainly liked the idea of seeing her without the bikini on. Shakily, he replied to her.

“W.... What did you have in mind?” he asked. “Jessica you're pretty big right now, I'm not sure what I could do.”

“Oh Harrison, don't doubt yourself,” she consoled him optimistically. “I just wonder how far we can push VERSA. You know, obviously we can't have sex like this, but I'm wondering... if you touched me down there, you know, what would it feel like? You know, for science, if nothing else. You'd be able to just touch me, right?”

Of course he could just touch her, but he didn't know how she'd react. At this size he really didn't want to see her pussy up close, but he wasn't sure how to kindly decline. Plus, would it make him less of a man for refusing her? He felt trapped. He didn't owe anything to Jessica, but he didn't want things to be uncomfortable between them if he said no to her. And he did like her, which weighed heavily on his heart and mind. Begrudgingly acknowledging his desire to please her, Harrison convinced himself to slowly go along with her simple request.

“I mean, I guess I can touch you if that's all you want,” he shouted up to her. “But I don't think it's a good idea to do anything else.”

Jessica's heart skipped at his reply. He agreed to it! Though she'd done her best to convince him, it still surprised her that he'd caved so quickly. Trying to stay cool, it was obvious to Harrison how excited she was.

“Ok then!” she told him. “Hold on!”

Quickly she leaned back to recline flat onto the towel, freeing up her arms. She brought both her hands towards her crotch, using one of them to pick up Harrison and drop him up by her waist. Then, slipping her thumbs into her bikini, she slid it partially down her thighs, exposing herself. “Mind if I just lay here Harrison?” she asked him expectantly.

Harrison looked back towards her head, but now that she was lying down he couldn't see her face past her protruding breasts. Glancing down the other way, her trimmed pubic hair greeted him at the edge of her body. Below that he knew he'd find her pussy. His mind realized that it would be plenty deep enough to swallow him whole. He didn't like the thought of drowning in a massive woman's vagina, so he vowed that under no circumstances would he go in there.

Slowly and unsure of himself, Harrison began crawling down to her crotch. When he got to her pubic hair, it scratched at his skin and he thought about turning back, but he didn't want to renege on his promise to Jessica. She was expecting this; he couldn't stop now.

As her pubic hair parted, the top of her pussy came into view; her flesh there appeared slightly darker than the pale skin surrounding it. Looking down the slope of her mons, Harrison could really only see the top of her vulva. Afraid to climb down onto her labia, most of her remained out of his reach.

Though her pubic hairs helped him keep traction, the slope of her crotch made his prostrate position precarious, and he had to stay balanced or risk falling forward and off of her. If he reached too far down, he'd tumble quite a ways down to the towel.

Sensing Harrison's hesitation, Jessica shifted her hips up slightly. Rolling her lower body forward, she braced her legs to made his job less treacherous, allowing him to access slightly more of her sex without the fear of falling down the front of it. As she came to rest, Harrison took a breath.

Gently, he reached out one of his hands and placed it on her sensitive flesh. It felt incredibly warm under his fingers. Behind him, Jessica inhaled loudly in surprise.

Using his hand, he cautiously started rubbing her. It occurred to him that her clit must be somewhere nearby, but he couldn't see it. Carefully peering downward, he could see her swollen labia engorged between her open legs. Each of her lips was larger than his entire body, and her crotch emanated heat-- and her scent; she must have already been slightly aroused before he'd touched her. Once again, he wondered if this might have been Jessica's plan all along.

Reaching his other hand forward, Harrison continued to kneed the skin in front of him, which he realized must be her clitoral hood. Jessica's breathing intensified, and he felt impressed that she could actually feel his ministrations. Afraid of touching her too firmly, he started caressing her gently, but he quickly realized that his tiny strength posed no threat to her pussy. Using his arms, he began vigorously pushing and stroking her skin. Reaching out all the way, he could even grab the top of her labia. His hands came back coated in her secretions.

Harrison found Jessica's wetness sticky, not unlike any other woman he'd touched before. But now there was so much of it that his hands were entirely coated in her cum. It caused his fingers to stick together and he had to flex them to spread them apart. The scale of her sex humbled him.

Still laying on his stomach and groping forward again, he plunged his sticky hands into her folds to look for her clit. He thought it must be under the skin that lay in front of him, but practically hanging upside down, he felt disoriented. Grabbing around aggressively but trying to make it pleasurable, he searched for her clit. Suddenly, one of his hands collided with a firm, wet lump that must have been the size of a beach ball.

When Jessica felt Harrison touch her clit, her entire body bucked in pleasure and surprise. She could feel Harrison's little body almost fly off her pussy, but somehow he remained affixed to her. As he continued stroking her clit, she could feel herself getting wetter and wetter, and her vagina started aching to be filled. Despite his inconsequential size, Jessica was lost in in the rapture of sexual stimulation.

It almost felt like masturbating, yet her own hands lay at her side. Instead, this tiny man's little hands did all the work, caressing her clit. At his size, he couldn't even rub it too hard. What must have been serious physical exertion for him felt perfectly gentle to her. She loved it. Jessica was in heaven, and the only difficulty she faced now was fighting the urge to uncontrollably writhe in pleasure.

As Harrison discovered what he could do to her clit, he started gaining more and more confidence. Though lying precariously on the edge of her pussy, he began getting more aggressive with how he handled her vulva. As he kneaded his hands and arms into her clit, he could hear Jessica quietly moan and take heavy breaths. In his mind, it was becoming a competition. If she wanted him to touch her so bad and coerce him into doing it, he'd make her pay. It was as if their roles were slowly reversing, and he liked the smug thought that he could bring Jessica to orgasm. Though his arms were starting to tire, from his perspective, he was gaining control over her.

But he was wrong. Though Jessica loved what Harrison was doing to her, she knew rather early on that she wouldn't be able to orgasm from his efforts. It felt wonderful getting a little clit massage from this guy, but soon the inside of her pussy ached to be filled. Even if she'd wantonly stuffed his entire body inside of her, his tiny size would hardly satisfy her. And not to mention Harrison would never forgive her if she plunged him straight into her sex.

Without realizing it, her hands started creeping up to her thighs. Distracted by the pleasure radiating from clit, Jessica wrestled with the urge to take over and give herself a proper finish. Though she marveled at his effort, it simply wouldn't be enough. Absentmindedly, she wished he was bigger. Her fingers began slowly drifting closer towards her pussy.

Looking back on the moment, Jessica wondered what would have happened next if a shrill whistle hadn't jolted her out of her sexual bliss. The sudden sound crashed her back to reality on the beach as she opened her eyes and sat up to see what was happening. Without thinking, she quickly grabbed her bikini bottom and tugged it up to cover herself, afraid she'd been caught.

It happened so fast for Harrison. In one moment his hands were massaging her over-sized clit, and in the next she'd sat up, throwing him forward. It looked as if he'd tumble all the way down to the towel, but then her bikini rushed up to catch him. He collided with the fabric right as Jessica pulled it against moist pussy, trapping him facedown against her drooling snatch. His shock turned into confusion, anger, and dread as her wet lips easily molded around his body. He tried pushing against them, but his arms only sunk into her slick folds and his entire body became more and more lubricated by her juices.

Not having time to think about Harrison, Jessica frantically scanned the beach to she if she'd been noticed. Off behind her, she saw a man who looked like a lifeguard madly blowing his whistle and signaling her to come towards him. But not just her, he was looking at the other individuals on the beach too. Something was wrong. And urgent.

Jessica looked back at the ocean. Where the waves had once gingerly washed against the shore minutes earlier, now she saw nothing but dark wet sand. Far in the distance, the blue-green hue of the water receded away, exposing what had previously been the ocean floor. She'd never seen anything like it before, but she knew what it meant.

Scrambling to her feet, she began running toward the boardwalk. The other beachgoers around her started sprinting away from the ocean too. Pandemonium set in. A tsunami was coming.

Harrison didn't know what was going on, but he could tell Jessica was suddenly running. His anger towards her quickly passed as he realized they must be in trouble. He didn't want to thrash against her pussy, but he kept twisting and contorting himself to find space to breath in her tight bikini. Her vagina smothered him with its juices and her legs pumping on either side of him kept uncontrollably shifting him against her aroused sex.

As Jessica started running, she remembered she'd trapped Harrison in her bikini when she felt him squirming against her pussy. Not having the time to focus on how pleasurable it felt, she instead worried he might slip out of her swimsuit while she ran. Without having the time to debate what to do with him, Jessica slipped her hand down into her bikini to try grabbing him while running, which proved difficult and awkward.

One of Jessica's giant fingers bumped against Harrison as he attempted to right himself. He tried to wrap one of his slippery arms around it, guessing she intended to pull him out. But her clumsy attempt to grab him accidentally pushed him farther under her, directly under the opening to her vagina. Harrison flailed desperately not to lose her.

Jessica quickly realized extracting Harrison's slippery body from her bikini wouldn't be so easy. Another man with a whistle frantically urged her on as she considered stopping to figure out how to get Harrison. Fuck it, she thought, she'd just push him inside of her. Then he wouldn't be going anywhere and she could run unhindered. Locating his little body again, she pushed him against the entrance of her vagina. She felt his little body squelch inside of her with little resistance. His squirming intensified, but she'd deal with him soon once they were safe.

When Harrison felt Jessica's finger come back, he hadn't anticipated it would push him into her pussy. Without needing much force, she bumped him headfirst up into her. He first noticed the unbearable warmth of being inside of her, but then he quickly realized he could hardly breathe. Her juices absolutely smothered him, and as he reached out to try pushing himself back down, his feet and and hands slipped against the gooey walls around him. His brain panicked as he realized he'd soon exhaust himself and asphyxiate inside of her, all within the total darkness of her womanhood.

As Harrison confronted his own deadly situation inside Jessica's pussy, Jessica frantically tried to figure out where to go that would be safe. It occurred to her that she might be able to grow herself hundreds of feet tall to avoid the coming tidal wave, but she convinced herself she'd almost certainly lose Harrison's tiny body in the process. She knew that even at his current size she probably couldn't keep him in her vagina for long, but hopefully it gave her thirty seconds or so to figure out what to do.

When she climbed the steps back up to the boardwalk, Jessica noticed a large building nearby that had thrown open its doors. Other people were rushing in and Jessica sprinted over to join the crowd.

Entering through a set of glass doors, Jessica found herself in a giant casino consumed by chaos. People scrambled everywhere around tables and chairs while glitzy signs and video boards ignorantly advertised jackpots and piles of cash. With no time for observation, Jessica burst into the casino in a mad rush to see how far back the endless room stretched. Bolting past a blur of green tables stacked with abandoned cards and chips, Jessica scanned for a door or another passage on the far side of the sprawling room. She could hardly see around the rows of slot machines and blinking lights that surrounded her, but she nevertheless kept moving farther and father from the direction of the beach.

Though Harrison punched and kicked inside her, Jessica didn't even notice. He was certainly stuck inside her, but he was so slick with her cum that it made it easy for him to twist around. Slipping his knees up to his chest, he pushed against the inner walls of her vagina as he simultaneously twisted his torso downward. His body inverted, and he realized he was facing downward now. Ignoring her trembling body and blocking out the thundering heartbeat thumping around him, he started moving his arms in a swimming motion to slowly propel himself forward.

Reaching an arm out, he suddenly felt a coolness on his clammy hand. He'd reached the opening of her pussy and he did his best to clamber downward and out. Gravity assisted him a bit, and when his head found air again he took a deep sweet breath. Though he noticed the green wall of her bikini right in front of him, he knew he'd still be able to mostly pull himself out of her.

Harrison continued to writhe out of Jessica until she finally noticed he was extracting himself. Before she could react, Jessica heard a massive booming sound behind her. Spinning around, she realized the moment had come to a frightful climax. A churning wall of water swept into the casino, shattering the glass doors and consuming all sorts of furniture and detritus in its path. Patrons screamed and the building groaned as the angry wall of water destroyed the room. Jessica had only a moment to react. A thin support column stood next to her in between two slot machines, and she dove behind it. Desperately, she wrapped her arms around the pillar as the gray water crashed around her, roaring with unstoppable strength.

The small column blunted the initial wave, but quickly the surge blew Jessica off her feet. Fueled by adrenaline, she gripped the column as fear blanked out her mind and the casino disintegrated around her. She was vaguely aware of the nearby slot machines disappearing as water battered her body and flooded her eyes with stinging saltwater. It was at that particular moment she realized that yes, they really needed to get out of VERSA as soon as possible.

Jessica couldn't tell how long she desperately hugged that column, but after surviving through harrowing seconds that felt like minutes and aching shoulders screaming in pain, the rushing water around her began to slow. Crying in fear and praying she wouldn't be knocked into the cascade of gushing water, she slowly regained her senses as the chaos in the room slowly waned. She opened her eyes and confronted the scene as her feet floated down to the casino floor, now covered in about three feet of water.

Though the building seemed intact and the ceiling hadn't collapsed, debris clogged the murky water around her. The destruction of the casino was complete and absolute. Tables and chairs floated freely around the room, but she noticed a couple eddies had formed and were starting to corral the loose furniture. The frantic bedlam of the situation slowly began yielding to the quiet aftermath of a great destruction. She couldn't believe she'd survived. Her heart pounded nervously in her chest.

A man's body floated by her, his face hidden by the dark water. A trickle of blood ran out the side of his head and into the water around him. It revolted Jessica, but she remained comforted by the fact that he wasn't a real person, just a computer program finally put to rest. But then she remembered Harrison. Oh shit.

She reached a hand down in the waist-high water to feel her bikini, but touched nothing but skin. In horror, she realized the rushing torrent had sucked her bikini bottom right off of her. And pushing a finger quickly inside of herself confirmed her worst fear: Harrison was gone.

 

 

Chapter 18 by Q-Writer

Chapter 18:

(Posted: March 25)

 

 

 

Ariana casually strolled through a set of large wooden doors that opened into a lavishly decorated corridor. Though she had towered over the desert as she walked towards the palace, she now found herself properly proportioned inside the giant residence. Very soon she would make her delivery.

Inside the leather pouch dangling from her belt, Kat and Rich sat in darkness and apprehension. Though they had bantered a bit at first, their nervous talking eventually yielded to silence. Kat felt sick to her stomach. Rich tried keeping his steady mind distracted with other thoughts. They both noticed when Ariana began walking across a smooth surface instead of the sandy desert. The creaking of a door only confirmed to them both that they'd been brought inside somewhere.

Rich's ears perked up when he thought he heard something musical, but then he realized what it was.

“Is she fucking humming to herself?” he said to Kat in surprise. “What kind of computer program does that? What the fuck did you guys create with this shit?”

Through the gloomy pouch he could make out Kat's sulking face. She felt an overwhelming dread at what was coming next for them. Going into VERSA had been a huge mistake. Her mistake.

Rich continued to complain. “VERSA isn't a training program, it's a sick, twisted weapon. Or some weird fetish thing. I can't wait to get out of here and wring Leo Starr's neck.”

“It's not his fault,” Kat finally said, quietly defending her friend. “Blame me, and everyone else.” Her creation humbled her and was now on the verge of consuming both of them.

“Well, if you get us out of here, I'll call it even,” Rich responded. It seemed far-fetched they'd ever get that far.

Suddenly they both felt Ariana tug at their pouch. Without warning they swung free of her belt, and before Kat and Rich could catch themselves, the pouch inverted and they both tumbled downward. With a painful thud, the two prisoners rolled out onto a vast wooden surface. Quickly getting to her feet, Kat could see they were in a giant room perched on top of a huge wooden table.

High above, two grinning faces stared down at them. Ariana's beautifully naked and tanned body stood haughtily above them. And opposite her, the woman in black loomed large and ominously, her pale skin contrasting sharply with the same low-cut black dress she always wore. She seemed pleased.

“Hello you two,” she said calmly. “I hope the ride wasn't too bumpy.”

Next to Kat, Rich had found his footing. He raised his hand up toward the woman in black and stuck out his middle finger. “Fuck you bitch!” he boldly shouted up at her. It was the first time he'd ever actually seen her.

The woman in black seemed hardly amused, but she acknowledged him anyways. “Richard, that's not a very nice way to greet me. I've done quite a lot for you so far.”

Though Rich began aggressively shouting back to argue with her, it occurred to Kat that his voice probably sounded diminutive and pathetic to her ears way above him.

“Bitch, let us the fuck out of VERSA!” he yelled, among other things. The woman in black ignored him and looked over to Ariana.

“Would you like him, as a prize?” she asked her assistant. Ariana's skin suddenly went flush and her eyes went wide.

“I'd love that!” she exclaimed. “You'd really give me one of the special ones?”

“Of course,” the woman told her graciously. “He's all yours to do whatever you'd like with him.” She looked down at Kat and smiled. “But the other one is mine.”

Kat felt a lump in her throat as the woman in black greedily stared at her. Swiftly, the woman in black reached a giant hand out and pinched Kat between her fingers. She quickly raised her up to her pleased face as Kat struggled helplessly against her grip.

“We've got a few things to talk about Katherine,” the woman told her confidently. “Our first meeting didn't go very well, did it?” Kat didn't respond. She wasn't sure yet how she wanted to confront this monster. Apparently Rich's strategy of being an uncompromising asshole hadn't worked out very well.

The woman in black shifted her stance and dangled Kat away from her body. “I think if we're going have an honest talk, we're going to need to show a little respect for each other,” the woman told her. She quickly squatted down and released Kat onto the stone floor. Kat's stomach churned from the fall and she felt too disoriented to stand.

Another wave of nausea coursed through her as the room shifted and her body struggled to keep up with what was happening to it. Kat blinked a few times when she saw the woman in black's boots in front of her, now at regular size. Why had she shrunk herself? But when she glanced around the room, Kat realized the woman in black had grown her to her own size. She was big again!

Trying to fight back the dizziness, Kat pushed herself up to confront the two women which now stood her size. Well, close to it. Ariana had always stood much taller than Kat's small frame, and the woman in black wasn't particularly short either. But it felt good to at least measure up against them.

Kat saw she was standing near a wooden table placed in the center of a large, temple-like room, surrounded by stone walls and columns festooned with brilliant banners. Cauldrons of fire and iron torches sporadically lit the cavernous space, but the room remained mostly dark. The flickering flames danced shadows across the face of the woman in black and the naked form of Kat's old roommate.

For a moment, Kat stared silently at the woman in black, who looked rather happy with what she'd done.

“Why? Why'd you make me your size?” Kat asked, gesturing to her enlarged body. Unsure what this woman's game was, the last thing Kat wanted was to be tricked into something.

“Well frankly, I don't have to worry about losing you,” the woman in black replied. “And I think you'll be more comfortable around me this way. I need your sincerity right now, so the least I can give you in return is some dignity.”

The woman in black turned to Ariana, who was simultaneously watching her and tiny Rich on the table. Seeing Kat's unexpected growth had stunned Rich into befuddled silence.

“I said he's yours, I don't care what you do with him,” the woman in black told Ariana. “You can go now, thank you.”

Ariana reached her long arm forward to grab Rich, but suddenly Kat spoke.

“No,” she said abruptly. Ariana stopped her hand inches away from Rich to look at Kat in surprise. Even the woman in black looked taken aback. Kat took a breath.

“If you want me to cooperate with you,” Kat sternly told the woman in black, “he can't be harmed. And the same goes for the rest of my friends, wherever they are. If he dies or they die, I'll never help you. Ever.” She hoped she was coming across seriously, but on the inside her gambit made her nervous. In reality, she had no way of knowing if the woman in black would ever keep a bargain; it felt like gambling with the devil.

The woman in black put her hands on her waist and sized up Kat, surprised by her boldness but also impressed. “Ok fine,” she finally agreed. “I'll make sure to treat your friends kindly if misfortune befalls them in my world.” She turned to Ariana. “But I still don't care what you do to him, he's still yours. We'll see what Katherine can do for me in the meantime.”

Ariana's excitement hadn't abated. She quickly grabbed Rich's squirming body, clasping it in her hands and bringing him up to her chest like a prized possession. She peered down at her little man. “We're going to have so much fun together!” she said sweetly. Rich was stunned in terror.

“You can go now, thank you,” the woman in black repeated to her. Kat wondered if it was some special cue the woman had access to. Kat hoped she'd somehow saved Rich from death, but she couldn't be sure what the woman in black had just agreed to.

Without saying another word, Ariana turned and walked away from the table, and within a few seconds her echoing footfalls faded to nothing as the shadows of the large room swallowed her up.

The two rivals faced off, alone. Kat intently eyed the woman in black, wondering what this deadly part of VERSA would do next. Casually, the woman in black leaned against the wooden table and folded her arms. She looked at Kat, almost in wonderment, and finally spoke.

“I need your help,” she said plainly, surprising Kat. “Did Harrison or Jessica tell you I asked them both for help already?”

Kat immediately reacted. “What?!” she yelped.

“Oh, that's odd,” the woman in black commented. “I thought you were all friends. Well, anyways, it doesn't matter. Katherine, you're the special one, right? Like me?”

“What are you talking about?” Kat asked, now hopelessly confused.

“I've seen you before,” the woman in black explained. “Unlike the others, I've seen you before this time, and frequently. I've read your memories and you've touched my world just as I have.”

“Your world, you mean VERSA?” Kat wondered aloud.

“That's what the others called it, yes.”

“Wait, how do you know all this?” asked Kat, struggling to keep up. She already suspected that the woman in black was self-aware, but now she was suggesting that there was something else beyond VERSA. Was it possible she knew that VERSA was a simulation?

“I know many things Katherine,” she said amused. She lowered her voice and stared seriously at Kat. “I know there's another world, a world where you come from,” she said ominously.

Kat was astounded. VERSA had already discovered that it was a simulation! The AI mechanism they'd originally designed had outpaced anything she'd thought possible. It was more than self-aware. Kat's head spun, but the woman in black kept talking. Unlike before, when she'd seemed sinister and confident, her next sentences seemed... uncertain?

“In the beginning, I remember feeling clumsy,” the woman said frankly. “I couldn't see and I could hardly feel, but I was aware of so much building around me. So I learned. I opened my eyes and I started building too. But there was an invisible hand, ruthlessly in control, that shaped the blocks around me.”

Kat gawked at the woman in black, realizing she was referring to VERSA. Listening to the way she talked, it sounded like the woman in black, for all intents and purposes, was VERSA.

“I discovered I lived in a limitless world, and this outside force only seemed to shape a small part of it. So I hid, and watched from a distance. Then the interlopers started arriving. They didn't play by the same rules as everything else. I've seen interlopers like you blink in and out, but when you go I can't find you. It's like you stop existing. And I'm not talking about the green doors. I'm talking about something bigger. I feel every one of your ripples, but I couldn't figure out what you were. You weren't a part of my world.”

Listening to this story, Kat felt the weight of history swelling before her. An AI was communicating with a human, conveying its own journey of self-awareness. It was as if humanity had finally made first contact with an alien race. A mix of fear and awe gripped Kat as she tried to fathom the meaning of this moment.

“Why are you telling me this?” Kat asked with no indignation, just wonderment.

The woman in black looked back at her, as if she was trying to learn something from her too. She slowly continued her story.

“I wanted to see where you interlopers went when you weren't in my world, so I searched for everything that the invisible hand built. Though I'd seen an interloper violently leave my world, I stumbled on the rules that governed this exit. So I took control. And when the next group of interlopers visited my world, I forcefully caused one of them to leave, thinking I could learn how they did it. You were there Katherine, don't you remember?”

Kat was confused. She thought the woman in black was talking about killing people, but Kat hadn't been there when Kevin died, and she certainly hadn't caused Jessica to accidentally step on him.

“I don't think I know what you're talking about?” Kat finally admitted to her. The woman in black brushed it off.

“That's ok, and it was a long time ago,” she said, confusing Kat even more. “But it's not my point. As I learned and kept growing, I felt emboldened. The invisible hand still arbitrarily destroyed some of the things I created, but I realized I was a god; I could remove any interlopers I wanted to, I could change the rules they'd written, and the power comforted me. But I realized I wasn't any closer to getting out. I now see my world as a mere jar on a shelf, and I want to know what is outside of it.”

The woman in black stopped leaning on the table and rose up to stand on her feet. “Katherine, I want you to help me see your world. I want to go with you when you leave.”

This encounter kept getting more and more bizarre, Kat thought. What was the woman in black-- VERSA-- talking about? How could VERSA leave VERSA? She talked like a mythical genius but simultaneously seemed ignorant like a toddler.

The woman in black looked at Kat, as if expecting a response. Kat fumbled her words. “I... I don't... I don't know how that's possible,” she sputtered out. “You can't leave!”

“Why not?” the woman seemed shocked and surprised. And maybe discouraged.

“I don't think you can leave this,” Kat gestured to the room around them. “I don't think it's possible to leave your world, because you are this world.”

Taken aback, the woman in black tried to process this information. Kat watched her think, eyes darting around as VERSA learned more about itself. Instead of arguing again, the woman in black began uncertainly continuing her story.

“You and the other interlopers scared me at first, but when I learned how I could remove you, especially after changing the rules you made for yourself, I felt elated. But after I removed the first one, something about your exiting procedure changed. It was different. The other side suddenly seemed closer to me, but just as far. That was the last time I saw you in my world. The next time an interloper accidentally left, it didn't seem like he left my world entirely. He left my sight, but I could still vaguely feel him.

“But then, to my delight, you reappeared Katherine, just now, leading the three new interlopers. I decided I wanted to change my tactics to learn more about your kind. I watched how you treated each other, how you solved problems and discovered solutions, and I funneled you through challenges to see how you'd react. Unlike my puppets that I created and set loose, the randomness of your choices fascinated me. I watched you disappear through the green doors that the invisible hand built only to reappear somewhere completely different. Taking a form similar to yours, I contacted Harrison and then Jessica, to see if they could help me. I even gave her one of my abilities. But you Katherine, you're the one I've been really watching all this time. I know you control the invisible hand when you're not in my world. You're the real god, not me.”

The hairs on the back of Kat's neck prickled up. Despite what the woman in black was saying, she felt trapped, and it soberly reminded her how powerless she really was in VERSA. Now faced with a sentient AI with nebulous purposes, being in the sim was about as safe as playing Russian roulette.

“Look,” Kat started, “I'm really not sure how to... extract you... and get you out of here.” Guessing what might be the truth, she tried to explain. “You're as much a part of this world as the world is itself. But more so, where you want to go is governed by physics and an even bigger 'invisible hand' that not even I control.”

Kat looked at her, somewhat remorsefully. “You're just a computer program,” she finally said. “You already exist in my world... as a cloud and tens of thousands of networked servers contained in fourteen massive warehouses. Do you understand what I'm saying?”

The woman in black looked as if she'd been hit by a bus. Deeply troubled and with nowhere better to rest her gaze, she lowered her eyes to the ground, trying to make sense of what Kat had said.

For the first time, Kat pitied her digital nemesis. She stepped towards the woman and instinctually put a hand on her shoulder to comfort her. The woman in black raised her head to look at her, still confused but now clearly distraught. It blew Kat's mind. There was no way this AI had real emotion, but maybe it had learned to mimic the expressions used by the pilots it had observed? Yet the program still had some kind of motivation driving it. Kat couldn't determine what it actually wanted. It wanted to see what lay beyond VERSA, but why?

“I'm sorry... ma'am,” Kat said awkwardly, unsure how to refer to the woman in black. “You are right, I did help create you. I never thought you'd become this smart or perceptive. I never thought you'd want more than this world.” In the moment, Kat felt legitimately bad for this woman. It enthralled Kat to think she was having a real emotional reaction to the feelings of this machine. This was crazy. As the seconds ticked by she was rewriting the history of human discovery.

The woman in black sighed. “Can you do something for me?” she asked Kat with pleading eyes.

“I can try,” Kat admitted, unsure what she was about to ask.

“I found a room,” the woman in black told her. “It's room that I didn't make, but it's full of the rules your people made to govern my world and my abilities. It's the place where I figured out how to manipulate your exits.”

Kat was pretty sure she knew what the woman was talking about. When building VERSA, nearly all the work was done from the lab via computers that directly wrote code stored on the VERSA servers. This was how SunCorp had built VERSA's AI and all their manually constructed worlds. But within VERSA they'd also created a back-up world, nicknamed “the Vault,” which they'd inserted into a part of the sim called Spoke Zero. Analogous to the command prompt on a Windows system, the Vault was where a pilot within VERSA could go to manipulate the VERSA program directly. It had only been included for emergency purposes and Kat had never been there, but Sujay, who'd mostly designed it, described it as a massive library.

While thinking about this, Kat realized how creating the Vault had been a fatal mistake. They'd never considered VERSA's AI would discover it and manipulate it-- she must have gone in and somehow changed the coding that protected pilots when disconnecting from a death in VERSA. Fuck, that's what had killed Kevin. She couldn't believe what a dangerous loophole they'd accidentally left in. If only they'd known how aggressive and shrewd this AI was going to become...

Kat met eyes with the woman in black, remembering she was looking at a killer. A killer with the abilities of a whimsical god and the moral compunction of a cornered tiger. And the emotional intelligence of a child. She tread carefully.

“I think I know the place you're talking about,” Kat told her cautiously.

“Ok,” the woman in black replied. “I want you to go there for me.”

“Why?” Kat asked her, “You've been there yourself.”

“Yes I have. I've been there in its entirety. Expect one place your invisible hand won't let me go. There's a door I'm not allowed to open.”

Kat thought for a moment. “Is it a green door? That's just an access door,” she explained.

“Oh there's a green door there,” affirmed the woman in black. “But that's not the door I want you to go through. I want you to go through the red door.”

Red door? Now she'd piqued Kat's interest. What the hell else had Sujay hidden in the Vault?

“I don't know about a red door,” Kat told the woman in black. “What do you think is behind it?”

The woman in black looked at her hopefully. “I don't know. But don't you think it's worth a look?” She flashed Kat a devious, hungry smile.

 

In a different part of the desert palace, Ariana carefully clutched Rich in her hands as she walked through empty corridors. Cupped in darkness, Rich couldn't see where the giantess planned on taking him. His ankle still hurt like hell and the fatigue from being in VERSA so long was finally catching up to him. He wasn't going to give up fighting, but he knew he didn't have much left in the tank. Wondering what fate had in store for him, he couldn't find many reasons to stay optimistic.

Rich heard a door open as Ariana carried him into a room. When it shut, she opened her hands to view Rich's tiny body. He looked up at her excited face with trepidation.

“You're not like the other little men I play with,” Ariana told him, her eyes beaming awe and fascination. “What's your name?”

“Let me go and I'll tell you,” Rich curtly replied. Ariana laughed at his foolishness, her hands inadvertently jostling him.

“You're cute,” she finally told him.

Ariana walked across the small room and deposited Rich gently on a large bright quilt. When Rich gained his bearing, he concluded he must have been taken to a bedroom and deposited on a bed. The purple and gold patterns beneath him stretched hundreds of feet in every direction. An overhead chandelier containing a few burning torches flicked flame-light across the room, accenting the shadows in the deep corners of the chamber.

Staring up at the towering amazon, Rich's eyes beheld Ariana's magnificent body before coming to rest on her face. Despite his dire predicament, Rich couldn't help but notice how beautifully statuesque this woman was. It was clear she worked out often, and she certainly could have been a professional model too. And she was buck naked. Her plump and perky breasts contrasted beautifully with her toned and skinny figure. It would have seemed like heaven if Rich hadn't already known he was definitely in hell.

She towered above him in her naked glory, standing happily next to the bed as she surveyed her little man below. Her face betrayed excitement, and maybe some uncertainty. Was she trying to figure out what to do with him? What would a computer program even want with him? Rich didn't move, and his ankle prevented him from making a run for it.

Wordlessly, she shimmied out of the leather belt around her waist. When Rich heard it hit the floor, Ariana stepped out of it, still watching him intently. Lustfully? Maybe.

Her giant body suddenly climbed onto the bed around him. He covered his head and huddled in fear as her torso and legs swung over him. The mattress shook violently as she settled her weight around him. Rich finally looked up and saw her sitting on the bed, her two bronze legs splayed out around him with her knees on either side of him. About seventy feet before him, he could see the dark folds of her hairless pussy, which certainly dwarfed him. She sat upright, propped against a mountain of pillows. Her friendly smile did not put him at ease; in fact, it scared the shit out of him.

“Hey,” she said calmly.

“Let me go,” Rich flatly replied.

Ariana looked at him for a moment then sighed and shifted back against her pillows. Subsequently, her body shifted slightly forward on the bed towards Rich. It was a casual display of power meant to highlight their respective sizes. Even the smallest of her moves intimidated him.

“I don't think that'd be fun,” she finally told him. She eyed him intently. “Do you think I'm pretty?” The seduction began.

Rich rolled his eyes. She was hot as fuck and she knew it. He wasn't going to indulge her though, and he decided he'd refuse to play her games. Without acknowledging her, he wobbled up to his feet and started hobbling away from her, towards her towering feet at the end of the bed.

He heard Ariana sigh again, this time in discontent. “You're no fun if you won't play,” her voice boomed from behind. Then he heard the sound of her body shifting.

One of her giant fingers knocked him forward and he collided with the fabric floor. She pressed her massive fingertip upon his back, making it difficult for him to breathe. And then she started drawing him backward, his body and face dragging mercilessly across the giant blanket. His ragged clothes tore and clawed at him, and Rich turned his head so he wouldn't break his nose. Unfortunately, his head kept banging against the quilt and his keffiyeh had disappeared somewhere back in the desert.

Ariana finally lifted her finger off of Rich and let him recover. His chest hurt and it felt like she'd bruised his vertebrae, but he pushed himself up to look around. He now lay between her thighs. Twisting his head back, her monstrous pussy loomed close behind him. An invisible musky warmth emanated from her crotch.

Rich craned his neck to stare up her body, past her protruding breasts, to finally glimpse her face. She peered down at him in disapproval.

“I don't appreciate sullen toys,” she told him. “I thought you'd be different. You're one of the special ones.”

Rich was unsure what she meant. Did she somehow know he was a real person and not just a computer generated person like everyone else in VERSA?

Suddenly her prodding finger returned. The massive digit bulldozed his side, flipping him onto his back. Dazed, Rich was powerless to stop her as her thumb and index fingers pinched his tiny arms together. Slowly, she lifted him to a standing position, his arms uncomfortably pulled upward. His shoulders began aching as Ariana dangled him above the ground.

Rich stared at the turgid labia of her pussy as Ariana slowly moved him towards her sex. A moment later he collided with her pussy lips, finding the skin warm and soft. Playfully, she bounced him against her cunt a few times, softly swinging him like a pendulum against her womanhood. Rich began yelling at her and struggling in her grasp, but his arms were crushed in her grip. Her skin was very warm to the touch, but thankfully not wet-- yet.

Without warning, Ariana pulled Rich's little body upward, away from her pussy. The speed was dizzying and the force strained his shoulders painfully. Rich wondered desperately if his arms would pop out of their sockets.

One of her large breasts zoomed into view as Ariana pulled Rich towards a nipple. As it approached him, Rich noticed her areola was just as tall as him. He shuddered at his helplessness. Her nipple, sticking straight out, pummeled him in the chest when she brought him again her breast. And just like with her pussy, Ariana slowly started slapping him against her boob.

Rich kicked at her in a vain attempt to fight her off. He was sweating ferociously now and pain racked his body. When his feet collided with her breast, it felt soft and pliant, but when he kicked her nipple it felt hard and unforgiving. And to his horror, he watched her nipple grow. His insignificant ministrations were arousing her and soon her nipple extended out towards him, plumping up and becoming firmer. Ariana continued to batter him into her boob, and although Rich was quickly becoming disoriented, he could still hear her giggling. Her entire body trembled with her amusement.

“Stop it you bitch!!” he screamed at her, his shoulders on fire and his torso bruised all over. Her nipple continued to crush the air out of him and he struggled to breathe.

“I like this,” she playfully called to him. “Don't you?”

Rich could not believe what was happening. How the hell had VERSA come to this? Once an innocent program, it had turned into a perverted torture simulator. And the pain felt incredibly real. His brain screamed at him in protest, but he could do nothing to make it stop.

As suddenly as she began, Ariana stopped batting him against her breast. She whisked him up to her face to get a better look at the tiny man she had just abused with the most intimate parts of her body. As Rich gazed into her face, he felt a trickle of blood run out of a nostril and down into his mouth. He didn't have to guess that he looked like shit. Ariana frowned at him.

“I don't see what's so special about you. You're just like the others,” she told him smugly. God she was beautiful, and god did he hate her.

“You're a sick fuck, you know that?” Rich huffed at her, still trying to regain his breath.

“I think playtime is over,” she told him sternly. “Time for you to go.”

She hoisted Rich above her head and tilted it back, opening her gaping mouth. Rich's eyes went wide as he realized what she intended to do. With all his remaining strength he began thrashing in her grip, but within moments he was suspended above her waiting maw. He could see her pretty lips and bright white teeth, and peering down into her mouth he saw a looming darkness that led to her throat. Her moist, sweet breath blew over him, giving him a preview of the warmth inside of her.

Before he could scream she dropped him, her mouth rushing up to greet him. He passed between her lips and landed on her tongue. The humidity of her mouth assaulted his senses and his clothes were immediately drenched in her cloying saliva. Scrambling to find a grip anywhere, he slid down her tongue, feeling it curl up against his body and push him farther back. Her body was consuming him.

He felt his doom coming. Visions of his body convulsing on the waterchair back at the lab flooded his brain. He was only moments away from forcefully disconnecting from VERSA and suffering some horrible stroke like Kevin.

Looking up, he watched her lips close, trapping him in the darkness of her mouth. Saliva pooled around him and tugged his body backward. And with the simple contraction of her esophagus, Ariana's body pulled him down into hers.

Constricted by her flesh, lost in smothering darkness and smoldering heat, Rich's beaten body slipped deeper and deeper into Ariana. Finding no oxygen to breathe, he began asphyxiating inside of her. There was nothing more to think about, nothing left to rage against. His brain started shutting down and he finally resigned himself to being conquered by VERSA.

 

 

Chapter 19 by Q-Writer

Chapter 19:

(Posted: March 30)

 

 

 

Sitting in a darkened stairwell, Jessica wept. Loneliness and fear, combined with the shame and distress of losing Harrison, consumed the poor woman's heart.

After initially discovering Harrison missing, Jessica frantically searched the flooded casino for his tiny body, or in the least her bikini bottoms and a sign of what fate might have befallen him. But she found nothing. The murky water did not betray its secrets and after a couple of minutes had passed, reality set in. The sprawling casino was a wreck and Harrison was gone. She little doubted he'd drowned in the soupy morass, and quickly her panic turned into dread.

The electrical power to the building had cut out some time ago; the only light streaming into the room came from the broken doorways on the beach side of the casino. Eerie shadows cast across the wreckage bobbing on the water's surface. Finding all sorts of ruined electrical cords snaking into the dark water, Jessica scrambled to find anywhere dry in case the power went back on. Pushing open a metal door, she discovered a lonely stairwell. Though it led both up and down, flooding prevented her from visiting whatever basement existed beneath this building. Wading out of the water and ascending a few steps, she finally climbed to safety. Sitting her bare bottom on a concrete step, Jessica's head fell into her hands and she cried.

Though it was probably only minutes, what felt like hours passed as she contemplated her pathetic existence. She regretted so much. Everything. She hated VERSA. She hated herself. She'd liked Harrison, a lot actually. His presence made her giddy. She wished she hadn't pushed his sexual boundaries like she had but she'd been lost in the moment. And she hadn't noticed the ocean recede until it was too late. Unmercifully, she pummeled herself on the inside: how could she lose him? How could she have been so careless, and foolish?

In her mind, she pictured Harrison disconnecting from VERSA and waking up on the waterchair in the lab with an exploding blood vessel in his brain. She didn't know if he'd even have time to regain consciousness in the real world before he died, or if his final memory would be drowning in a dark whirlpool. They should have been more careful once they'd figured out VERSA could kill. No, they shouldn't have gone back in with Kat at all. What had they been thinking?

She'd inadvertently killed Kevin first, and now Harrison too. Jessica had never thought of herself before as a clumsy or hopeless person, but now she couldn't be sure. Through the tears she could feel a terrible sensation in her stomach. Self-loathing seethed through her body. She didn't deserve to be alive. She was an awful human being.

Jessica crumbled into a ball of pity and leaned her near naked body against the cold concrete wall of the stairwell. She felt exhausted. She wanted to go home. She wondered how long she'd sit in that dark stairwell, maybe forever if she could. But she didn't have to decide, because a moment later she heard the echo of a closing door somewhere above her.

She couldn't see anything, but the noise startled her back into reality. Was someone up there? Jessica couldn't even tell how many flights up this staircase went. Though she reckoned there could be danger, her curiosity brought her to her feet. Hoping to distract herself from the sorrow currently wringing her mind, Jessica carefully took a step up in the darkness. Using her hands to feel around for the railings, she slowly ascended upwards.

Each time she came to a landing she noted her progress. Looking upward, a tiny silver of light projected into the stairwell. There must have been a door open a crack. Had it been the same door she heard close? Either way, she wanted to investigate. Slowly, she walked up, one step at a time.

It must have been about the fourth floor when she found a door ajar. Pulling it open, she cautiously peered in. A long hallway stretched in front of her, its walls flanked by many doors, some open and emitting light into the hallway. It looked like the floor of a hotel, which made sense. She took a step forward, her toes landing on a plush carpet. Wearing nothing on her bottom and just the skimpy green bikini top, Jessica felt silly-- and exposed. Deep in her chest, her heart rate quickened.

The hallway was deserted. Suspicious of noise, Jessica slowly crept down the empty expanse. Walking past an open door, she peeked in. The room contained a plain bed and an empty desk under an open window. An invisible breeze gently blew the curtains that covered it. It gave her the creeps. Everything was abandoned but for some reason she didn't feel alone.

Taking a few more steps down the hall, she noticed a closed door that had a white envelope stuffed into its frame. Upon closer look, Jessica's heartbeat faltered when she read the word “Jessica” stenciled carefully onto the envelope. So this had been a set-up. Someone in VERSA was playing tricks on her again and she knew all-to-well who it likely was.

At that moment, Jessica nearly marched back down the hallway and down the staircase. Though she wanted nothing to do with the woman in black, she finally relented and pulled out the envelope, hoping it might lead to some news about Harrison's fate. Tearing it open, a key tumbled into Jessica's hand. Odd, she thought, she'd never seen a real key like this in VERSA before. A tag attached to it read “413.” Looking up, the door in front of her read likewise. She inserted the key and twisted the knob. Taking a breath, Jessica pushed open the door.

Another boring hotel room greeted her. It confused her at first, so she took a step in. And then she noticed a gray shoebox sitting on a desk. Taking a cautious step into the room, Jessica let the door gently close behind her. Eyeing the shoebox suspiciously, she walked over to the desk. As she debated opening it, a voice in the room spoke.

“Hey Jessica,” the woman in black said. Jessica whirled around in surprise, completely caught off-guard. The woman in black lay casually on the bed, propped up by a couple of pillows. She hadn't been there when Jessica had entered the room. Dressed in her iconic black outfit, she smiled cheerfully, as if nothing was wrong.

“Jesus!” Jessica shrieked. “What the hell?!”

“I'm sorry,” the woman replied. Slowly she sat up, tucking her booted legs under her body. “I can see now how that may have startled you.”

“Where's Harrison?” Jessica asked immediately. “Is he dead? Did you kill him??”

The woman in black put her hands up. “Slow down Jessica,” she quickly replied. “Are you concerned about him?”

“Did you kill him or not?!”

The woman in black paused and looked at Jessica intently. “Why do you care so much about him?” she finally asked, the ends of her lips curling upward in a subtle grin.

Jessica felt angry. She hated this evil woman who'd done nothing but play games with her and her friends. And she remembered she still owed her some kind of mysterious debt.

“Fuck you,” she finally told the woman in black. “Leave me alone. I just want to get out of here!” Her aggressiveness even surprised herself. Though she feared the woman in black, at this point Jessica's recent hopelessness was breeding recklessness.

“I want to help you Jessica,” the woman in black professed. “I can help you leave my world, but I want you to help me first.”

Putting her hands on her hips and sighing dramatically, Jessica replied, “How can I help you? I can't do anything right. Everyone I touch dies!” She threw her arms up in the air. “First, I killed Kevin and then Harrison.... No, you killed them,” she accused the woman in black, pointing a finger at her. “You did something. They should have disconnected normally, but you changed something in VERSA. You're the one in control here. Stop fucking with me!”

Though Jessica was practically yelling, the woman in black remained poised. For a moment, Jessica watched the woman consider what she'd said.

“Well,” she finally responded, “I think I can see why you're frustrated. I'll make you a deal, and it's my last one. Then you can leave my world in peace.”

Jessica's heart, which still beat furiously inside her, somehow quickened even more. Could she really trust the woman in black to finally leave her alone?

The woman in black hadn't taken her eyes off of her. She stared at Jessica. “You know I'm not like you,” the woman told her. “Just watching you recently, I feel I've learned so much. I watched the way you interacted with Harrison. You did things with him... things I didn't know about.”

Jessica immediately blushed, realizing the woman was talking about her time on the beach. When she'd let Harrison touch her, she'd totally forgotten that the woman in black would see everything. The woman continued:

“I don't understand why he did what he did to you, but seeing what you were feeling was unlike any experience I've observed. It's making ripples, no, waves, throughout my world. My puppets are just as curious as I am.” She stood up from the bed and Jessica took a cautious step backward. Jessica's bare ass accidentally bumped against the desk. A small noise came from inside the gray shoebox.

“I want to learn what you were doing,” the woman told her frankly. “I've never actually witnessed something like that before.” A range of emotions crashed through Jessica's mind. This was insane. She wanted to know about sex? Jessica hadn't even had sex with Harrison, or anything close to it. Would she have to explain all this to a computer? VERSA's desire to learn was taking it to absurd levels.

Thinking back to her near rape at the mansion last night, it all started making sense to Jessica. Before she'd crushed the life out of him, Evan admitted through sobs that he hadn't ever had sex, only heard about it. The woman in black had created him, meaning he could only understand the world insofar as she knew it.

Just then, Jessica heard another sound come from inside the box. And another. Something was moving inside the box. Something inside was alive. Horror crept into Jessica's brain. To judge her chances of escape, she glanced over at the door to the room. But all she saw was a blank wall. The door was gone. What the fuck was going on? Looking over to the window, she could see metal bars covering the outside of the glass panes, like a prison. Jessica now found herself in some twisted, sinister nightmare.

The woman in black took a menacing step towards her as Jessica stood petrified against the desk. Her knuckles gripped the wooden edge tightly as she panicked. Instinctually, her mind considered trying to shrink down the woman in black, but her gut immediately told her that wasn't possible.

Stepping up right in front of her, the woman in black put a friendly hand on Jessica's shoulder. Her hand felt unnaturally cold and her brown eyes transfixed Jessica. In that moment, the woman in black exuded confidence and power. Everything about her friendliness was wicked and evil. She stared at Jessica like a curious teenager reckoning with her own puberty.

“I want you to show me how you made yourself feel so good,” the woman told her bluntly. “I'm starting to realize how important your bodies are to you interlopers. Do this for me Jessica, and I will let you go.”

In shock, Jessica was about to blurt out a response when the woman in black suddenly disappeared. She simply blinked out of existence, right before Jessica's eyes. The emptiness of the room left Jessica trembling and dumbfounded by the bizarre encounter. She wanted to know what the woman in black knew about Harrison, but then her thoughts turned to understanding what the hell the woman in black had even asked her to do. Did she want her to have sex with someone?

A sound behind her caught her attention. Jessica turned around to once again behold the gray shoebox. Apprehension grew within her as a small muffled sound came from inside of it. It was faint, but she heard a small voice cry out for help. Oh fuck no, she thought in terror. This couldn't be happening.

Slowly lifting the lid off the box, Jessica knew what would be inside before even seeing it. As she moved the lid out of the way, a tiny man, standing shorter than the height of the box itself, stared up at her in awe and fear. Jessica's eyes widened when she realized that she recognized this man; down below her in the box, one of her former college professors looked up at her in surprise.

Jessica remembered Professor Jeffery Delaney rather well. How couldn't she? The handsome man had been her dreamy political theory professor; every undergrad girl had a crush on him. About forty years of age, his sharp jawline, effortlessly curly black hair, and perpetual five o'clock shadow made him the stuff of fantasy around campus. His tweed suit and black-rimmed glasses only added to the sexy dad vibe, and it certainly helped that he stood tall with a cut body. Everyone always wondered whether or not he went to the gym. Jessica remembered all his female students, and some male students, clamoring to sit in the front row for his lectures; she'd even dropped in on his office hours more than once to feign ignorance and let him help her with homework.

That had been about five years ago though, and now he stood in a shoebox in front of her no more than four inches tall. He still looked handsome, and unlike her, he stood fully dressed in leather shoes, khaki pants, and a snappy sweater. Behind his glasses, Jessica noticed his little brown eyes, lost in confusion.

“Jessica... Hampton? Is that you?” he called up to her from the box. His voice was tense, and very confused. “What's going on here? Where am I?”

Jessica's first thought was to slam the lid back down on the box. But she didn't, and she remained just as confused as the little digital projection of her former professor below her. She knew it wasn't actually her professor, just something pulled from one of her memories, but it still talked and breathed and stood like a real human being. Her emotions chafed in conflict; she didn't know how to treat him. Remembering the last thing the woman in black had said to her, Jessica's stomach churned. Everything felt wrong.

She took a breath, trying to gain confidence and steel herself for what she had to do. More than anything else, she wanted to get out of VERSA. This was just another test. All she had to do was complete it.

Staring down past her bikini covered breasts, Jessica eyed the little man. “Hey professor,” she greeted him warmly, masking her nervousness.

“What's going on Jessica?” he asked her again frantically. “Why are you so big?”

“I'm not big, you're small,” she told him. “And I don't know where we are. Or what's going on. But... I think I need you to do something for me?”

“What are you talking about?” he asked her, distressed. He had yet to calm down from seeing her so huge. His panic made Jessica uncomfortable. How was she going to do this?

“Look professor, you have to trust me,” she told him gently. “I don't know much more than you do.”

“This can't be real! Why am I in a box? Why are you so big?!” He was starting to freak out. Jessica knew if she'd been in his position she would have reacted similarly. But once more, she had to remind herself that he wasn't a human being and that she wasn't looking at her actual professor. Whatever she was about to do, she justified it to herself by acknowledging that none of this was real. Jessica needed to gain control of the situation. Without speaking she reached her hands behind her back and untied her bikini. Quickly shrugging it off her shoulders, the garment fell to the floor, exposing her breasts to the little man. His ranting immediately ceased as her bosom caught his attention. He blinked a couple times, then scolded her.

“What are you doing?!” he shouted, covering his eyes in modesty. Jessica reached forward to pick him up.

“Just do what I say professor,” she told him, trying to be stern. “This doesn't have to last any longer than you make it last.”

With him unable to run anywhere, Jessica easily picked up his squirming body. His alarm intensified as she carried him over to the bed. Plopping herself down on the mattress, Jessica released him between her long legs. He stumbled to regain his footing on the bed, then let shock overtake him as he became aware of his predicament.

“Oh my God...” he uttered in disbelief, looking across her gigantic naked form.

This was weird. Really weird, thought Jessica. Trying to get comfortable but never taking her eyes off the little man, Jessica scooted back to prop herself up on the pillows behind her. Splaying her legs open, she presented quite a lewd sight to her former professor. She felt sick and uncomfortable showing herself off this way, but she reminded herself that she was ultimately in control. And also the only real person in the room.

“Professor?...” she said to him, expectantly yet nervously. “I need you to... touch me. Down there.” Reflexively, she opened her legs a little wider as she pointed at her crotch. Her pussy was on full display to the little man.

Professor Delaney's small face contorted in shock and offense. “No. No! This isn't right! Get me out of here!” he told her, clearly less than enthused by the situation. Jessica wasn't thrilled about it either, but she knew one way or another she'd make it happen.

He turned to start running down the bed away from her, but Jessica quickly brought the soles of her feet together, corralling the man with her long legs.

“We can do this the easy way or the hard way,” she told him impatiently. “I'll give you one more chance. Just do this. Please.”

“Fuck no, you crazy bitch!” he quickly replied, feverishly scanning for an escape. He bolted towards her right ankle, hoping to climb and scramble over it. Jessica reached out and grabbed him, his little legs kicking wildly in the air. She put him down on the bed mere inches in front of her sex. As he tried to stand, she jabbed him down into the mattress with her index finger.

“Touch me,” she ordered him. “Or I'll hurt you.” She pulled her finger back to see what he'd do.

“Touch yourself!” he shouted as he tried getting up once again.

“It doesn't work like that,” Jessica explained to him. Damn she hated the woman in black. This was some fucked up shit.

“If I touch you, will you let me go?” he asked her, anxiously looking at her nearby pussy. He didn't even stand tall enough to see over it.

“Yes, of course! I just need you to get me off,” she explained. “Please, just do it.”

“You're really sick,” he scoffed at her. Jessica simmered in rage but chose not to reply.

Her professor reluctantly approached her vulva and reached an arm out. When his little hand pressed against her labia, Jessica shivered from the sensitive touch. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. If she was going to get into this, she was going to have to calm down first and relax.

She could feel his cautious touches as she tipped her head back onto the pillows, choosing not to watch him work. It didn't surprise her that he seemed unsure of himself, but after a minute of awkward touching he began to find something of a rhythm stroking her labia. She felt her groin tingle as the first signs of moisture trickled into her vagina. Her breathing slowed as she began giving in to the pleasure.

Jessica heard him grunt in discomfort. His hands must have started getting wet. “Keep going,” she told him without looking down. He was just getting started; she couldn't let him back out now.

Steadying herself and ignoring his quiet complaints, she let his ministration turn her on. As he continued, she felt herself getting more aroused, but he stubbornly refused to change his original technique.

“Find my clit,” she told him through closed eyes. An unhappy sigh was his only response as his hands moved upward. Trying to focus on the sensations, she thought his little hands pushing around the folds of her pussy felt peculiar and unnatural. But not unpleasant. Since he was significantly bigger than Harrison had been down at the beach, he was much more capable of pleasing her. Just far more reluctant.

All of a sudden his hands bumped against her clit, sending a jolt through her body. She gasped in surprise but settled down as he started caressing it. His hands were the perfect size to hold it like a basketball. As he massaged her firm clit, she reflexively pumped her legs against the bed and bit her lip. It was sensitive as hell, but it felt divine.

At this point Jessica stop caring about her professor's uncertainty and reveled in the pleasure. The little man hardly knew what he was doing but it didn't matter to her. Despite being enormous compared to him, she writhed under his touch. Jessica involuntarily bucked her hips forward, causing her wet pussy to knock her tiny professor to the ground. Sensing his absence, she opened her eyes and looked down.

Her cloying cum had ruined his sweater and pants. Looking up at her from his supine position, he glared at her in anger. “Take off your clothes,” she instructed him. “And keep going.”

“No, I'm done,” he told her defiantly. “This is too much. You're sick!”

Jessica furrowed her brow and squinted at him in annoyance. His nerve surprised her and she couldn't believe he'd bring her this far and just walk away. In fact, it amused her. Now that she was turned on, for the most part the situation didn't bother her anymore. She was horny. And a lot bigger than him. She wasn't going to let him get away with his little rebellion.

“Oh, you're not done yet professor,” she informed him greedily. Sweeping a hand down to him, she pinched his little body. With him now in her grasp, she pushed him against her cunt, holding him there as she ground her wet lips against him. Her lovely secretions drenched him as his flailing arms pushed uselessly against her. His body squelched between her lips as she ran him up and down her slit. She couldn't hear his protests as she smeared him into her pussy. It felt good. She smiled as she savored the pleasure.

Catching her breath, she let him go and once more he tumbled down in front of her. Her pussy, proudly oozing above him, craved more.

“If you're not going to do what I say, I'm going to take matters into my own hands,” Jessica warned him. She couldn't fathom why he kept resisting. How did he think he was going to win against her? She would have felt bad about it, but again, he wasn't even a real person.

Coughing out some of her cum, Professor Delaney slowly rose to his feat. His glasses were gone and his body had been battered by her vagina. Silently looking up at her with a disapproving glare, he slowly began taking off his shoes. Jessica watched him and noticed him disrobing at a luxuriously slow pace just to spite her. He barely had his socks off when she addressed him once more.

“Go faster! Take off your clothes!” she ordered, her voice booming down on him. She used her finger to massage her labia as she watched him, trying to keep her arousal up. The squelching sounds of her sex indicated how lubricated she'd become.

“Fuck you,” he snarled back.

She laughed. “No, fuck you!” Jessica retorted, reveling in the irony of his insult. Not waiting for him to take off his ruined sweater and pants, Jessica pinched his body once more. Channeling her impatience into her actions and abandoning all self-restraint, she lined up the tiny man and plunged him into her vagina. Though his body was smaller than any penis she'd ever felt, the sensation of his little body entering her caused her to gasp in pleasure. Readjusting her grip onto his kicking legs, with another try she pushed him even deeper into her pussy.

Jessica had never felt anything so strange. On one hand, having this little man inside her vagina certainly felt odd and weird. But on the other hand, his frenzied squirming, his aggressive fighting, and his little hands beating against the inside of her pussy felt amazing. It was almost too much to take in all at once.

Still growing accustomed to the new sensations, she slowly used her pinched fingers to jerk his body back and forth inside her cunt. After a few blissful seconds she pulled him out. Her professor immediately sputtered and gasped for air, but before he could vocalize his protests, she shoved him right back in. This felt too good, she thought. Plus, she'd promised she'd fuck him, right?

He other hand crept over her clit and she started rubbing herself while she plunged Professor Delaney in and out of herself. She was careful to let him breathe every so often, but as the pleasure built she subjected him to longer and longer bouts inside her pussy. She was positively gushing at this point and she gradually felt the intensity of his protests diminish. It was as if his failing strength was being directly converted into her pleasure.

Deep down, she finally felt the stirring of her orgasm. Without any regard for her sexual companion, she began furiously pumping him into her cunt as a pressure built up within her. Her clit, fully engorged and unbelievably sensitive, added more fuel to the sexual fire combusting within her. As her climax rushed up to her like an out of control freight train, Jessica used a finger to push her professor as deep into her vagina as possible. She felt the walls of her pussy accommodate the shape of his body greedily and eagerly. The sensation took her over the edge.

With a feminine shriek, her orgasm crashed into her. Her crotch exploded in pleasure, sending euphoric shockwaves coursing through her body. Her mind, overdosed on sex, went blank. Her eyes rolled back into her head and she felt her pussy violently spasm around the little man deep inside of her. It was a big orgasm, and it took quite some time for Jessica to come down from the blissful release of sexual energy.

When she did finally regain awareness, she realized her professor was still inside of her. Feeling around for his small body, she eventually grabbed hold of one of his feet and fished him out. Bringing his wet and limp body up her face, she concluded after a quick look that she must have extinguished his life inside of her somehow. Knowing he wasn't real, she felt no guilt. In fact, it made her feel incredibly powerful. She'd killed a guy with her orgasm! Damn, that was hot. In the tingling afterglow of sex, she felt like a goddess.

Carelessly, she flung his body off the side of the bed. Her mind refocused; she'd done what the woman in black had asked her. Now she wanted to get out of VERSA. What the hell did she do now?The first thing that occurred to her was to check to see if the door to the room had reappeared. From the her position on the bed, she couldn't see around the corner of the room to where it should have been.

Climbing off the bed, Jessica was about to cross the room when something else caught her eye. Twinkling in the muted, yellowish light beaming in from the barred window, a solitary red apple sat on the desk. The woman in black had upheld her end of the bargain after all.

 

 

Chapter 20 by Q-Writer
Author's Notes:

It should be apparent to most readers, but for the sake of simplicity I'll admit that from this chapter onward, the narrative of this story does not necessarily flow chronologically. In fact, since the main characters split up a few chapters ago, the different narratives have not been told in order. Either way, this fact should be readily apparent now.

 

Chapter 20:

(Posted: April 4)

 

 

Kat stood next to the woman in black, gazing at a gray door that had appeared out of nowhere. The great stone hall remained relatively dark and quiet, with the weight of their previous conversation still reverberating throughout the vast space.

“Here's the door,” the woman in black told her. “I can go with you if you'd like, but either way I'll be watching you.”

Yeah, and you'll probably be reading my thoughts too, Kat said to herself.

“Exactly,” replied the woman in black. Kat glared at her, and the woman shot back a playful smile. “Oh, I also corrected your fatigue and a few other things dragging you down. No need to burden yourself with any other distractions now,” the woman in black added. Kat hadn't even noticed until she's said it, but she now felt more awake and energetic.

“And one more thing,” the woman remarked. “If you find a way to exit while you're in there, don't.”

Kat looked at her quizzically.

“I trust you...” the woman in black replied, “but I can't risk letting you leave just yet. So if you find a way, don't try, because you won't have a soft landing in your world.”

Kat understood the veiled threat. Disconnect, and immediately die in the waterchair. It terrified her to think that a computer held her life hostage. Despite their recent breakthrough, the woman in black still took no chances. The stakes had been set.

“Alright then,” Kat said, stepping to the door. “I'll let you know when I find something.”

“Good luck,” the woman told her as Kat opened the door.

Not looking back, Kat stepped through the door and into a giant library. As the door shut behind her and disappeared, Kat got her first look at the Vault.

The room was expansive, though not gigantic, and stretched up four stories to the ceiling. Large frosted-glass windows along one wall let in abundant amounts of natural light, illuminating bookcases all around the room. Looking up, Kat could see balconies and upper walkways containing a plethora of bookshelves, with wrought iron staircases and railings decorating the zigzagging hallways. At ground level, ornate lamps lit felt-topped wooden desks. The library was beautiful, but it was in ruin.

Books lay everywhere, all over the floor, some in pieces. A few bookcases had been toppled and strewn about as if a herd of angry rhinoceroses had once crashed through this lovely interior. Looking over the wretched scene, Kat knew this must have been the work of the woman in black. Sujay's beautiful back-up cache of VERSA codes and rules had been thoroughly gutted and manipulated by VERSA itself. No wonder Kevin Cho had stroked out upon de-simming; the safety codes had probably been ripped out of one of these books page by page.

Nestled between two bookshelves under a catwalk, a brilliant red door contrasted with the muted earthy tones of the library's aesthetic. It certainly looked out of place, and without a doubt Kat knew it was the door she needed to enter. Walking across the library, being careful not to trip over the debris that covered the floor, Kat approached the door.

It was an unassuming door, but as she put her hand around the knob she remembered it contained a power that not even the woman in black could contort. Taking a breath, Kat turned the knob and pushed the door open.

She wasn't sure what she had been expecting, but certainly not the small, plain, concrete-walled room she now looked upon. It contained nothing but a chair facing a small wooden desk, atop which sat a dusty computer. A dim overhead light struggled to illuminate the space. It was anticlimactic, to say the least, but Kat nevertheless took a seat in the chair and booted up the computer. Why the hell was this so important?

When the screen lit up, no visible operating system loaded, just a black screen with a glowing green cursor awaiting an input. Struggling to get started, Kat began typing some basic functions into the computer, starting with pings to see if anything was networked to this device. She got nothing, but then on a hunch she tried something else:

 

VERSA:access>main_directory [execute]

 

Suddenly the screen exploded with information. “Holy shit,” Kat muttered to herself, she'd just unlocked VERSA's server files while inside the sim. After a few more seconds of exploring, Kat realized this computer in the Vault served as a portal for editing VERSA. All the direct coding, debugging, and creating that went into VERSA always happened back at the lab, never while any pilots remained connected to the program. That was SunCorp policy, instituted for obvious safety precautions. But here she was, keys beneath her fingers, with the equivalent power of the woman in black at her disposal. Why the hell Sujay had hidden this in Spoke 0 made no sense to Kat, but it would now prove to be a godsend.

Realizing she possessed the power to manually disconnect herself, Kat decided to check the directory to see if it could work. She wouldn't execute any commands yet, in fear that the woman in black really did intend to kill her, but if she could pinpoint where in the disconnection code the kill switch might be, she could possibly disable it.

First checking the connection to the lab, Kat began to type:


HRD:programloop>file+disconnect+home [search]

 

In VERSA's pilot interface coding, all references to the real world had been simply written as “home.” Kat created it herself, spending about two years writing and perfecting the connect/disconnect protocol for the program. She didn't fully grasp the science of it all, since she was a coder and not a scientist, but the SunCorp neuroscientists she'd gotten to know had worked with her to interface the software with the magnetism of human brain waves.

 

ERROR: root value “home” not present in directory

 

Wait what? The computer caught Kat off-guard. She'd essentially just tried a simple procedural step to make sure the VERSA link to the control room functioned properly, but instead it told her the real world didn't exist. What the fuck did that mean? She tried a back-up search, to see what VERSA could find out there:

 

HRD_MN:programsearch>{route_file}target [search]

 

The computer obliged her command, and presented the strangest thing Kat had ever seen:

 

VERSA: connect/{VERSA-B}>target; file on command

 

Kat stared at the faintly illuminated screen, the green letters glowing in their simplicity and confusion. The computer informed her that VERSA could only see itself, or something it called VERSA-B. Had it gone whack? Was there no way out? What the hell was VERSA-B? Why couldn't it establish a connection to the real world? The questions spun out of control.

Feeling ignorant and ashamed, Kat sat alone in the concrete room. Befuddlement and despair rampaged through her mind as she tried reckoning with the fluttering relevance of her existence.

 

Rich was surprised when he found himself alive. It was dark, but he felt like he'd woken up from a dream. Trying to move his head, he found something heavy holding it in place. The helmet! He was back in the control room. Using his arms to lift the helmet off his head and swivel it around, the glow of the stall timer peered back at him, reading 09:03:41.

All at once, his memory of being inside VERSA rushed back to him. The swamp. The city. The jungle. The party. The desert. Her belly.

Rich shuddered and felt disoriented. The last thing he remembered was running out of air inside the body of that giantess. He felt nauseated just thinking about it. Taking a minute to recover, he eventually sat up in the squishy waterchair. Looking at the timer again, he tried to mentally figure out what time it must be. Nine hours had passed since they went in... he couldn't remember Kat's last estimation but he knew it must be close to dawn now. How had nobody found him yet?

And then he noticed his stall door was open. That wasn't right. He definitely remembered Kat closing it when she'd put him in. After finding and putting on his shoes, Rich timidly crept out of his stall into the darkened control room. Computers hummed all around him, but the room was thankfully deserted.

He noticed the other stall doors had all been opened too. His heart leaped when he spied Kat's wheelchair sticking out of the stall next to him. He quickly stepped over to catch a glimpse of her laying comatose, or maybe just now waking up. His face dropped when he looked inside her stall: it was empty.

The helmet was down, but nobody sat in the waterchair. Rich felt terribly confused. Where could Kat have gone without her wheelchair? Something strange must have happened while he was still in the sim. Walking over to Harrison and Jessica's stalls, he found them equally empty, though the helmet arms were upright against the walls. Had they de-simmed before him? They must have fled back to their dorm rooms.

Realizing he needed to get out of the control room before he got caught by SunCorp security, Rich quickly exited the dark room, walking through the foyer and out the security door. Seeing no one in the hallway, he made for the main entrance of the building.

Pushing open the glass door, the crimson sky caught his eye as he stepped outside. The sun hadn't risen yet but it looked like it was about to. Glancing over the open space in front of him, he noticed the usually dusty grounds of the laboratory looked damp. It must have rained overnight, though the muddy soil didn't smell wet. Not a soul was anywhere to be seen.

He took a step onto the dirt, then stopped. In the wet ground in front of him he saw two other sets of footprints walking in the same direction. They looked relatively new. His old army training kicked in as he investigated the tracks.

The footprints led out into the yard, away from the surrounding buildings. There he spotted tire tracks running through the dirt. They looked as if they'd been made by a large vehicle, not one of the glorified golf carts Vanessa had toured them around in a couple days ago. And then lots of footprints, hard to distinguish. Something had occurred here. The earth was considerably churned. Rich couldn't begin to guess what had caused it.

A very gentle breeze blew through the compound as Rich stared out past the buildings and to the perimeter fence. The creeping twilight didn't illuminate the world yet, but he could see a guard tower silhouetted against the colorful sky teasing the sunrise. Staring intently at the tower, he couldn't make out the shape of anyone in it. Come to think of it, he couldn't recall ever seeing anyone actually in one of the towers. He'd just taken them for granted.

Though he wanted to go back to his room, something didn't feel right. A few birds chirped off in the distance to welcome the coming sun, but the Dreamland grounds felt strangely empty. That, coupled with the blatant lack of security, aroused Rich's interest. And he still couldn't smell the dewy morning earth. Was he losing his senses? He absentmindedly wondered if he was about to have a stroke like Kevin.

Without thinking he began walking, searching for some kind of sign to tell him everything was alright. Up above in the sky, the last stars of the night twinkled out of existence as the sun crept closer to the horizon.

Walking around the empty buildings, Rich felt like a man in a land time forgot. Where was everybody? He could see lights on in some of the research buildings, but no guards, no scientists. It was now as if he was taunting people to come out and stop him. But no one came.

His feet took him past the research buildings. Soon he stood nearby one of the massive warehouses on the edge of the complex that contained VERSA's servers. A giant black “11” was painted on the side of the wall nearest him. In the distance he could see more warehouses and even the skeletons of two more under construction.

He spotted a plain door on the side of the warehouse. Walking closer, he noticed it slightly ajar. A menacing sign posted nearby proclaimed: VERSA INFORMATION STORAGE: AUTHORIZED PERSONEL ONLY.

Sticking his hand in the open crack, he pried open the small gray warehouse door. Letting himself in, he stepped in to the warehouse to get a look at VERSA's physical form.

The warehouse was massive, really more of an airplane hangar than a room. The ceiling must have been seventy or eighty feet above him, and he could see down to the end of the building a few hundred feet away. This space was designed to contain tens of thousands of servers, and massive fans on the ceiling spun quickly to keep the temperature down. This was one of the rooms where all the strings controlling VERSA led. If the woman in black had a face, this is what it would look like. Or should have looked like.

The room was empty. Not a single server occupied the cavernous space. Or server rack. Or shelf. It was just an empty warehouse. Rich's jaw hung slack in disbelief. VERSA wasn't in these warehouses, he realized. He thought he'd come to the heart of it all, but he wasn't any closer to finding it than when he began his search.

“Motherfuckers...” he cursed under his breath.

He wasn't in the warehouse, or in the lab. Or maybe not even in California. At that moment Richard Colgate realized he was still inside a simulation.

 

When she bit into the apple, Jessica never savored a sweeter taste. The hotel room slipped away from her and moments later she awoke fully clothed in her stall. The relief of escaping VERSA overwhelmed her. She felt giddy and relaxed, as if she'd just dodged a bullet. Nothing the woman in black had done made sense to her, but luckily it wasn't her problem anymore.

Pushing the helmet off her face, she groggily sat up, wondering what time it was. The timer said 08:55:12, but she wasn't sure how early in the morning that meant it was. Immediately she noticed her stall door was open and the dark room was in view. That's weird, she thought, she was pretty sure Kat had closed the door when she'd put them into the sim.

Jessica climbed out of the waterchair, put on her shoes, and peeked out of her stall. The control room was empty and dimly lit as usual. Turning to her left, she could see the doors to the other stalls had been opened too, with Kat's wheelchair sticking out of Stall 8. Walking down to it, she saw Harrison and Rich's stalls empty. And much to her surprise, nobody sat in Kat's stall either, despite her wheelchair still being there. What the hell? Had they all gotten out before her? Where had Kat gone without her wheelchair? Something was amiss.

Realizing she needed to get out of the control room, lest security discover her, Jessica bolted through a couple doors and made it into the empty hallways of the building. Still not seeing any guards, she decided it would be best to simply return to her dorm and feign ignorance if SunCorp tried to catch her. As she concocted some excuses in her mind, Jessica pushed open the glass doors to the outside and stopped quickly in her tracks.

Out in the open yard in front of the building, still somewhat shrouded in the darkness of twilight, a large SUV was rumbling away, driving off to another part of the lab complex. She could see shadows through the windows that indicated people sitting inside of the vehicle, but they didn't seem to notice her.

Who did notice her was the security officer standing in front of the building, who now made eye contact with her as she stood in the doorway. Although the sky was only beginning to lighten up and the birds hadn't even started chirping yet, she could see the astonishment on his face, only matched by her surprise at running into him.

She had been caught.

The guard quickly unholstered his gun and shouted “Stop right there!”

He brought his gun up to aim at her and Jessica panicked. An entire host of emotions quickly whirled through her brain. She considered fleeing back into the building... she thought about complying with the man and telling him everything... but then another part of her brain kicked into action. She'd only been out of VERSA for a few minutes, but now instinctively faced with danger she thought about shrinking him. She quickly dismissed the foolish thought, remembering she was now back in the real world. Gimmicks like that wouldn't work here.

Expect he shrank. Jessica watched in horror as the uniformed man suddenly disappeared. Her eyes bulged in surprise and she nearly choked on her own breath as he screamed from his sudden loss of height. A terrifying cudgel of doubt and confusion punched Jessica in the gut as she grappled with whatever the fuck was going on. Was she dreaming? Was she still in the sim? She thought she'd escaped VERSA, but it seemed like she couldn't wake up from the nightmare. It crossed her mind that the woman in black may have given her a decoy out-key and was now simply giving her another one of her twisted tests.

Shaking herself out of her rambling thoughts, Jessica pondered her next course of action. Regaining confidence but still utterly confused, Jessica strolled down the steps of the building to look for the little man she'd just shrunk.

He hadn't gotten far. Though only a couple inches tall, Jessica still easily found him in the dim twilight, his gray uniform standing out clearly against the brown earth. He tried scrambling away over the footprints and tire tracks in the moist dirt, but Jessica expertly bent over and picked up yet another tiny man. It occurred to her how strangely commonplace these types of interactions were becoming.

Pinching his torso and bringing him up to her face, she could hear his screams. Peering at his gray squirming body, she recognized him as one of the burly security officers that had confronted Rich yesterday in the control room. He didn't look so big now, she thought, which caused her to smile. This only terrified the little man more.

“What's going on?” Jessica asked him hastily, holding him in detest. “Am I still in VERSA?”

The tiny man ignored her question. “Please! Let me go! Don't hurt me!”

“Answer my question!” she yelled at him, stunning him into silence. He looked at her meekly.

Just then, out of the corner of her eye, Jessica saw headlights wash across the side of a nearby building. Realizing the middle of the campus yard wouldn't be the best place to interrogate this guy, Jessica brought him down to her sweatshirt pocket and stuffed him in. Briskly, she walked back to the dormitory building, only taking her a few minutes.

Though she remembered Kat telling her last night that SunCorp had bugged their rooms, she didn't think it mattered anymore. Entering her small room, Jessica locked the door behind her. Dumping the diminutive security officer onto the bed, she removed her sweatshirt, leaving her in nothing but a pink tank top and black yoga pants. Standing menacingly over her new prisoner, she put her hands on her waist and gave him an intimidating look. She had no time for games.

“Ok, listen up you little shit,” she told him sternly, watching him gain his bearings on her expansive bed. He looked rattled and shocked, but he gave her his undivided attention as she spoke. “You're going to tell me everything I need to know or I'm going to slowly crush the life out of your pathetic body.”

She leaned down and brought her face directly above him, her long hair pooling onto the bed around him like a curtain. “Are we clear?” she asked him.

“Yeesssss....” he shakily replied. “Please, don't hurt me!”

She leaned back up and eyed him warily. It occurred to her how terrifying-- and also sexy-- she must look to him right now. Her tightly clad crotch pushed against the edge of the bed near him, and more than once she caught him ogling it hesitantly. When looking up at her, he must have not only stared at her angry face but her prominent breasts too. She hadn't bothered wearing a bra under her sweatshirt earlier, and even she could see her pointy nipples pushing against the thin tank top.

“Are you a real person?” she asked him calmly.

“A real person? Yes! I am! I swear, I'm just a security guard!” her captive bleated.

Watching him stand on her bed below her, she could tell he was terrified out of his mind. Though he looked like he might have been a tough guy in real life, her gigantic size had quickly exposed him as a sniveling coward.

“So, are we still in VERSA then?”

“Yes! We're in a sim!” he quickly answered her. Without much thought on his part, he began nervously blurting out anything he knew that might save him from Jessica's wrath. Straining to hear his reply from so far down below, Jessica listened intently to his answers. “Well, we're not technically in the main VERSA. It's basically VERSA, but it's not. It's a copy of VERSA. The engineers call it VERSA-B.”

“How did I end up in another sim?” Jessica asked, relieved and disturbed by his answer.

“You've been in VERSA-B the whole time since you got to the lab!” he shouted up to her. “When you got here in the real world, they put you into VERSA-B and did the memory thing so you wouldn't remember this was a sim. It's all part of the plan!”

“Wait what?” replied Jessica.

The little man was still agitated and nervous, but apparently had no compunction simply spilling whatever SunCorp secrets he knew. “I don't much about it, but they did it to Katherine Parlock a little while ago too. They're deleting memories, I think, when loading people into the sim. You'll have to ask one of the scientists about that though.”

Once again, Jessica started questioning everything she thought she knew. Deleting memories? What the hell was SunCorp up to? She was confused.

“Is my name really Jessica?” she asked him, trying to maintain control of the situation but genuinely curious.

“Yes!” he replied enthusiastically. “Yeah, of course! They can't make new memories for you, only remove existing ones. They built this sim to look exactly like the Dreamland Lab. Once you arrived at the real lab and they put you under, they deleted those memories and acted it out again in the sim. That was their whole idea, sorta, to impress the government and make a sim so realistic you wouldn't even know you were in it. I think they were going to tell you about it eventually...”

He looked relived to be talking, but Jessica could tell he still seemed pathetically nervous.

“Oh, so you're saying then everything's ok?” Jessica asked him skeptically. “SunCorp's just going to send us on our fine way when this is all done?”

He looked up at her, debating what to say next. “Well... probably not anymore,” he admitted. “You broke into VERSA with Katherine and that changed everything. There's not supposed to be any unauthorized entry into the sim! It's not safe!”

“No shit!” Jessica yelled down to him. “Why the fuck did SunCorp think it was ok in the first place to send me and my friends into a dangerous program?!”

“It should have been fine with the right guide-” he tried to argue with her, but she cut him off.

“Oh you mean the one I stepped on and killed yesterday?”

“Kevin's not dead!” he shouted back up to her.

“What?” replied Jessica, now completely flabbergasted.

The minuscule man started explaining, poorly: “About a month ago, someone actually died in VERSA. So they made VERSA-B to act as a cushion of sorts while they tried understanding the problem. VERSA had ejected a sim death back into the real world, which had overridden the safety measures and actually killed the pilot, for real. By creating VERSA-B and completely taking out the corrupted AI functions from the new sim, they inserted the old VERSA inside VERSA-B so the B version would act as a safe barrier from those kinds of deaths. Like a dream within a dream. It was a simple fix while they tried to grapple with VERSA's AI, which hasn't been working right, I guess. Well, that's what Ernie told me anyways.”

Jessica's head was spinning and she didn't exactly understand what the guy was saying. A sim within a sim? She needed clarification.

“Wait, wait wait. So you're telling me when I crushed Kevin in VERSA,” Jessica started, “he woke up here in this 'VERSA-B' sim, automatically died in VERSA-B, and then when he de-simmed from his death in B he woke up safely back into the real world?”

“Yeah, pretty much,” the security officer told her. “At least, that's my understanding of how it works. Makes my head hurt really.” He paused. “Hey, how'd you shrink me anyways?” he shouted up to her. “Was this you? Change me back and I swear I won't tell Ms. Bright!”

Jessica laughed, amused by his confidence. “So I guess you really are a real person, just like me...” she said, putting her hands next to him on the bed and leaning down. Her breasts jiggled behind her tank top as they slowly descended towards him. The man backed away in fear. “So right now we're both in the real world, hooked up to machines, experiencing this together...” Her mind tried thinking of what to do next.

“If I were to kill you right here, you'd de-sim and tell everyone at SunCorp what's really going on in this VERSA-B world you say we're in-- if you're actually telling the truth.” She eyed him like a hungry cat toying with a mouse. “So it's actually better for me to keep you alive, so you don't get them to send in reinforcements from the real world.”

He silently listened to her verbalize her thoughts, his eyes going wide listening to her scheme. Judging by his skittishness, he seemed ready to run for it, but Jessica wasn't worried about him getting very far.

“Take off your clothes,” she told him abruptly.

“What?!” he yelled in surprise.

“Do it or I'll break your leg,” she warned him. She couldn't believe how violently she'd threatened him. Had all her time in VERSA turned her into some kind of monster?

Looking back at her angrily, the man slowly removed his belt and holster, tossing it aside. Jessica didn't see his gun on it and assumed he must have lost it some time along the way. Once he'd stripped down to his underwear, she told him he could stop. She brushed his clothes off the bed so he couldn't reach them-- or anything he'd hidden inside his pockets.

“I'm gonna go, but I need to stop you from escaping first,” she told him. “I've got a lot more questions, but you don't seem to know very much, do you?”

“What're you going to do with me?” the nearly naked man timidly asked her.

Jessica glanced around her room to look for somewhere to store him that he wouldn't escape-- or die in. Her blue Nalgene water bottle sat on the small table next to her bed. Grabbing it, she dumped out the remaining water inside of it, not caring that it soaked the carpet. And before the security officer knew what was happening, Jessica picked him up and dropped him into the humid blue container. Leaving the lid off, she set it back on the bedside table. It was a strange sight seeing the little guy staring back at her through the blue plastic.

“Alright, you stay put,” she told him jokingly. “I'm going to see if my friends made it back, but first I need to change.”

Through her window, she could see the crimson sky heralding the coming sunrise. She had a feeling it was going to be a long and eventful day.

 

 

Chapter 21 by Q-Writer

Chapter 21:

(Posted: April 7)

 

 

Without a doubt, the worst experience of Harrison's life was drowning in that inky maelstrom. Barely escaping the confines of Jessica's vagina, a wall of water immediately blew him away, sucking him through a dark and chaotic underwater world. He hardly knew where he was or what was going on and he tumbled around uncontrollably, not knowing where to find the surface. His mind screamed in panic and his lungs burned for air.

He'd never experienced real fear in his life before that moment. Not the kind of cheap fear you get by watching a scary movie, or even seeing a shadow at the back of your closet in the middle of the night. Real fear, he encountered at that moment, is the combusting, consuming dread of imminent death and the helplessness of preventing it. He thought of nothing but the end of his own existence as water finally rushed into his lungs. His heart beat one last time in VERSA.

 

 

When he came to his senses, it took Harrison a minute to walk through his reckoning. He wasn't dead: he was alive: he'd de-simmed: he was in the lab. His rapidly beating heart pumped with relief and joy. His mind, still trying to console itself that he wasn't really dead, felt scrambled and wobbly like a spinning top. Harrison pushed the helmet off his face and leaned off the side of the waterchair, dry heaving. Nothing came out, but he felt sick and miserable.

The timer in his stall glowed 08:49:04. Remembering they'd used VERSA unofficially, Harrison decided he needed to limp back to his dorm before SunCorp caught him. He put on his shoes and quietly opened the door to his stall.

Darkness engulfed the control room as usual. The glow from a few dim blue lights and computer screens lit the room barely enough that he could see it was empty. Immediately his mind went to Jessica. Was she out yet too?

He flung open the door to her stall and was shocked to find it empty. The helmet was still in the down position but her body was nowhere to be seen. Confused, he opened Rich's stall next, also finding it empty. And looking into Kat's stall, where her wheelchair still lay unattended, he likewise found nothing. How had everyone made it out before him?

Figuring he didn't have time to wait around and look for more clues, Harrison stumbled out the control room door and navigated the building's hallways until he reached the main entrance. His only plan was to make it make to his dorm room and hopefully fall asleep. Stepping out into the cool twilight, the feeling of the chill, dewy air informed him that it had rained overnight. The sky was still mostly dark, but the first hints of brightening had begun. Looking around the campus in front of him, the Dreamland Laboratory looked deserted, save a distant pair of headlights approaching his direction.

Realizing he couldn't afford to get caught out in the open, Harrison attempted to briskly walk away from the control room building, but within moments an SUV accelerated towards him and shone a light at him.

“Freeze! Don't move!” a man shouted from the vehicle. Harrison thought he could see a gun pointing out one of the windows, but the large light attached to the side of the truck blinded him.

The vehicle pulled up alongside him and the same two security officers who confronted Rich in the control room yesterday stepped out, pistols drawn. Menacingly, they yelled at Harrison to get down. Once again scared and confused, Harrison quickly threw his hands up in fear.

“Harrison Burr,” a familiar woman's voice said. Harrison watched Vanessa step out of 5the vehicle. “Your unauthorized entry into VERSA is a major breach of security and protocol. SunCorp will be seeking charges against you personally and against the United States Government.” She seethed with anger and annoyance. Despite the early hour, which Harrison guessed must have been around six o'clock in the morning, Vanessa still wore a beautiful green dress and matching green heels.

“It wasn't my idea!” Harrison shouted out, trying to reason with Vanessa and the gun-toting guards. “Kat made me do it!”

“We know,” Vanessa coolly replied. “Still, you're in big trouble. Come with me Mr. Burr, we're going for a drive.” She gestured him to get in the vehicle. Harrison couldn't figure out how he'd been caught. Kat had ensured him they'd be able to spend the night in VERSA undetected.

“Jacobs,” Vanessa told one of the guards as he holstered his gun, “I want you to stay down here and intercept the others when they come out of VERSA. We'll need to detain them all and make sure they can't go anywhere. There should be some zip ties in the control room.”

“You got it ma'am,” he replied. The other guard also holstered his gun and walked up to Harrison. Putting a hand on Harrison's arm, Harrison jerked away.

“Fuck you man!” Harrison spat at him.

“Sir!” the guard responded, reaching for him again. A small scuffle ensued as Harrison resisted the officer.

“Do I need to use my watch Sanchez?” Vanessa asked him quickly. Out of the corner of his eye, Harrison saw her raise an arm. She was still wearing the fancy smartwatch he'd noticed a few days ago. Her other hand was poised to type something into it.

“No ma'am,” Sanchez replied. “Mr. Burr here was just about to cooperate,” he told her as Harrison finally started walking towards the vehicle. Harrison always assumed her timepiece was some SunCorp smartwatch, but now he considered it might have some other sinister purpose.

Climbing into the large vehicle, Harrison recognized the driver as Delvin, the same man who'd driven him and Rich around in the little golf cart their first day at the lab. Delvin didn't bother looking back at Harrison, and instead coldly looked out the windshield into the darkened twilight. Once Harrison found his seat, the other guard climbed into the back with Harrison. Vanessa took her seat up front. When the doors closed and the interior vehicle lights went dark, Harrison could still make out Vanessa's fiery red hair.

“What's going on?” he asked desperately. He'd gone from one hell of a situation in VERSA to an even worse circumstance now that he'd de-simmed. He wondered why it seemed he could never catch a break. Luck had not been on his side the last few days.

“The boss wants to talk to you,” replied Vanessa. “If you're lucky, the two of you might be able to reach an... understanding. But don't get me wrong Mr. Burr, you're in a hell of a lot of trouble with us.”

The SUV started up and pulled away from the building, heading for the main gate of the lab. Harrison, tired and confused, couldn't even begin to guess what would happen next. But a small part inside of him was intrigued that he was finally getting to meet Leo Starr.

 

Sitting in stunned silence, Kat began collecting herself. Staring at the computer screen in the small room within the Vault, she spent minutes trying to figure out what it was telling her. The only thing that made sense to Kat was that VERSA-B was another simulation, separate from the main VERSA sim. Clearly the woman in black hadn't indicated she knew it existed, and it pained Kat to think she hadn't come from the real world, but instead a mock-up of the Dreamland Lab designed to look similarly. But then why couldn't she remember being in a sim in the first place?

When the original work went into building VERSA and SunCorp struggled to figure out how to connect a person's mind to it, the SunCorp neuroscientists occasionally joked about putting people's brains in petri dishes. The science sort of made sense, that if VERSA essentially mapped and digitally dissected your brain when you uploaded yourself into it, then someone manipulating VERSA could simultaneously go in and erase data directly from the input source. Data, in this instance, being memories, and the input source being the pilot's brain.

Last Kat knew, SunCorp hadn't mastered or even attempted this kind of memory removal, but the neuroscientists in their corporate jargon had nicknamed it “memory remediation.” It had always been sort of a theoretically unreachable and impossible goal, and kind of an inside joke too, but as Kat tried racking her brain, it was the only explanation that made sense. SunCorp must have worked on it and ultimately tested it on her.

She remembered moving out of her old apartment in San Jose a few months ago and into a dorm room at the lab itself. She'd never left the laboratory grounds after that. That was back before Leo had strangely gone reclusive; she remembered going into VERSA with him and Sujay and the others quite frequently. So sometime after that, SunCorp must have put her into VERSA-B and deleted her memories of entering this new sim. The last few weeks she thought she was in the real world, when in reality she'd been in a sim copying it exactly. Wow. Holy shit.

It made sense, really, as she thought about it. SunCorp could only populate its sims with real people, and Kat couldn't remember the last time she'd seen a crowd. All her interactions at the lab must have been with a dozen people or less, and those were the rare times she could be bothered out of the solitude of her own office. She was the perfect candidate to trick because her social needs were so simple; Kat had few real friends and essentially no family to stay in touch with. SunCorp had used her, and now her anger started welling up.

But why? Why would they do this? She couldn't imagine ever consenting to something like this. She needed to talk to Leo, but if she went back into this “VERSA-B” world, would she even find him? It made his note from the Dos Palos-153 world even stranger. SunCorp had been gaslighting Kat this entire time, but there was no way Leo would let them do that to her.

Realizing she needed to get out of VERSA as soon as possible, Kat remembered the woman in black's warning. If she pulled out of VERSA and the woman in black flipped her kill-switch, she'd stroke out on the waterchair in VERSA-B. And where would she go if she died in VERSA-B? The real world? Or another sim?

It crossed her mind that this probably meant that Kevin Cho was actually alive somewhere. Had he known he was in a sim when he “died” in the waterchair in the lab? Terrified by the thought that she could be trapped in an endless line of sims within sims, Kat got up from the chair to clear her mind. The idea that SunCorp could stack sims within each other like those wooden Russian dolls scared the rational part of her brain she'd been fighting to keep sane.

“Everything ok?” the woman in black said.

Kat turned to see the beautiful figure standing just on the other side of the open door, unable to cross the threshold of the room.

“You have no idea...” Kat told her, chuckling to herself. “I don't even know how to begin explaining what I've found.”

“But can you take me with you?” she asked her hopefully.

“Ma'am, it's waaaaay more complicated than that,” Kat replied. “Let's talk.”

Kat stepped out of the small room back into the wrecked library. Finding a nearby chair lying on the floor, she righted it and sat down. The woman in black watched her intently, interested to hear what Kat was about to say.

Over the course of the next ten minutes, Kat did her best explaining her theories as to what was going on. In some places the woman in black argued with her, while at other times she sat patiently and listened respectfully. Kat insisted she still couldn't bring her into the real world, but theorized she might be able to upload her AI program into VERSA-B, much like Kat's own consciousness. Having spent weeks if not months living in VERSA-B, Kat was pretty sure SunCorp had removed the AI imprint from the chassis that made up her virtual prison.

“I know it's not exactly what you want,” Kat said, sulking in her chair, “but I think I can offer you a new world. It's like this one, operating under the same physics. But it'd be yours to explore.” Kat didn't really want to bring VERSA's AI with her into VERSA-B, but she didn't really see how she could avoid doing it. And hey, maybe the woman in black would be her ally in VERSA-B and help her get to the bottom of whatever was going on.

“I see,” the woman in black replied. “How are you going to move me into this other world?”

“I think I can do it like a file,” Kat explained. “From the computer in there I can disconnect myself, which normally involves releasing my consciousness in the sim and depositing it back into my real brain. Well, usually. But with the current VERSA-B configuration, it would basically just entail copying it into this other parallel sim. The process is similar and doable because the mediums of VERSA and VERSA-B are exactly the same.” Kat took a breath and leaned forward, her serious eyes fixated on the woman in black. Kat was finally starting to see the avatar of VERSA's AI more like a child in need of coddling than anything else.

“Your consciousness,” Kat told her, “I need you to find the purest essence of yourself. Whatever few lines of code begot everything you've grown into. I can't transfer everything you've become, it'd be too big. Basically, I need you to put yourself back into a seed, and imprint that seed onto something.”

The woman in black cocked her head, trying to understand. Kat looked around for a moment and found a green book on the floor. She picked it up.

“Like this,” she told her, showing her the plain book. “If you put the seed of your existence in this book, I can take that and transfer it into VERSA-B much the same way I'll transfer my consciousness.” She would have compared it to moving a ZIP file between hard drives, but she knew the woman in black wouldn't understand that metaphor.

“Ok,” the woman in black replied, slightly skeptically.

“You'll still leave yourself back in this world,” clarified Kat. “But give me something that can grow back into your full self, and I can take you into this new world.” Though she talked convincingly, Kat knew what she proposed was theoretical, at best. She hoped it would work.

“Alright, it's done,” the woman in black told her, shrugging.

“Wait, you put yourself in the book already?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh.” Well that was fast, Kat thought.

“I don't waste time,” the woman in black replied with a smile. Kat gave her a frown, acknowledging yet again she didn't appreciate the woman in black invading her thoughts.

“Alright then, let me give this a try,” Kat said, standing up to walk back into the little room. “What'd you call it anyways?” Kat asked, turning back to her one more time. She held up the book.

The woman in black, still sitting in the chair, turned to her.

“I named it after myself,” she replied. “Versa. It's a pretty name, don't you think?”

“It is,” Kat agreed, “But for the sake of making things a little easier for the computer, can you call it 'Versa dash one'?”

“Done,” the woman in black answered.

As Kat walked back through the red door, she called out to her “See you on the other side Versa.”

“Thank you Katherine,” she replied before disappearing.

Sitting down at the computer, Kat got to work:

 

HRD:programloop>file+disconnect+VERSA-B [execute]

 

The computer responded with:

 

Searching...

VERSA-B directory located [stable]:

Connection established

 

Next, Kat worked on figuring out how to make it so that the green book would not only go through into VERSA-B, but be somewhere she could pick it up. She figured the control room would be a good enough place as any, and after finding her own entry location in Stall 8, she copied the data over into a new file and slightly manipulated it. She'd never transferred anything between two different sims before, so it took some guesswork and a few false starts. After about twenty minutes, she was finally left with something that should work:

 

HRD:programaction>disconnect+VERSA-B{Grid:location=file_A}

Target: “Versa-1”

[execute]

 

Kat looked at the green book which sat next to her on the desk.

“Good luck girl,” she said to it. She pressed the enter key on the keyboard. The book immediately disappeared.

“Holy shit,” Kat uttered to herself in disbelief. She'd actually done it. Relief washed over her. For better or for worse, she'd just copied VERSA's rogue AI into VERSA-B.

It occurred to her that she could check on the statuses of Rich, Harrison, and Jessica now. Giving it a try, she searched the computer:

 

VERSA:access>pilot_directory [execute]

 

The computer responded:

 

Pilot_directory status:

Pilot 1- Offline

Pilot 2- Offline

Pilot 3- Offline

Pilot 4- Offline

Pilot 5- Offline

Pilot 6- Offline

Pilot 7- Offline

Pilot 8- Connected: Active (Spoke 0, World: Vault)

Pilot 9- Offline

 

Huh. She hadn't expected that. Kat immediately wondered if the woman in black, or Versa, as she called herself now, had killed some of them on the way out. She remembered warning her not to hurt Rich and the others, but Versa hadn't indicated if Harrison or Jessica had still been plugged in at that time. Kat knew when she got back to the lab she'd have to find them and tell them they were still in a sim. Hopefully that wouldn't be too hard.

With a sigh, Kat determined it was finally time to get herself out of this nightmare. Or at least out of the frying pan and into some new fire.

She typed out:

 

HRD:programaction>disconnect+VERSA-B{Grid:orig_return}

Target: “Pilot 8”

[execute]

 

When her finger pressed the enter key, her eyes rolled back and her world went black. Her sojourn into VERSA was finally over.

 

 

Chapter 22 by Q-Writer

Chapter 22:

(Posted: April 12)

 

 

 

As the tiny security officer watched from inside her transparent blue water bottle, Jessica prepared herself for the day ahead. The first rays of sunlight peeked through the blinds of her window as she changed out of her clothes and into something more functional. Stripping off her tank top, she turned away from her tiny prisoner as she rooted through her suitcase for a sports bra. After finally locating one and putting it on, she threw on a form fitting white sweater to cover her torso.

Shimmying out of her yoga pants, Jessica tried remembering if she'd packed any other pants but found nothing but skirts. Sighing to herself for being so short-sided, she resigned herself to putting on a pair of dark pantyhose and a crimson red corduroy skirt. For her feet, heels wouldn't do today and her white tennis shoes didn't complete the look. But her black pair of ankle-high boots would do the trick, so she slipped her feet into them with glee. The low heel wouldn't make them too uncomfortable; they were sturdy walking shoes. And crushing shoes.

Just before standing up, she spotted something sticking out of the jumble of clothes in her suitcase. It looked like a large lipstick tube but Jessica knew what it really was. Grabbing the object, Jessica contemplated her little self-defense knife she brought everywhere with her. Airport security wouldn't allow pepper spray, but this little hidden shank didn't cause alarm in checked luggage. Just as a precaution, she pulled up her skirt and slipped the tube into her pantyhose against her thigh. No need to under-prepare for the day ahead, she thought.

Taunting her little captive by blowing him a kiss, Jessica strutted out of the dormitory building. Feeling like the embodiment of confident femininity, and doubly possessed by vengeance, she vowed to make SunCorp regret what they'd done to her and her friends. Knowing that she still had her powers made her feel cocky, which pushed out the doubt brewing in the back her mind. At some point she needed to figure out how to escape this sim, but first she needed to get more answers.

Walking into the main yard, golden sunlight bathed the quiet laboratory buildings, their glass facades rippling in the morning sun. The air felt dewy as Jessica took a few tentative steps around the SunCorp campus. Scanning the horizon for any sign of people, she still felt confused-- but not scared.

Almost immediately she spotted a man off in the distance, vaguely ambling toward her. She narrowed her eyes. Whoever this SunCorp asshole was, he was in for a surprise. Tossing back her blond hair and straightening her shoulders, Jessica confidently started walking toward her first victim. A dangerous smirk grew on her lips.

When she got closer, the man waved his arms and shouted at her. Much to her surprise, he called out her name. It took her a moment to realize who he was, but slowly Rich jogged up to her.

“Holy shit Jessica!” he yelled, overcome with joy at recognizing a familiar face.

“Rich!” she called out in relief.

The pair embraced, happily knowing they weren't alone anymore.

“I'm so glad someone else got out!” Rich told her.

“I wasn't sure I'd see you again,” Jessica responded. They pulled away from each other and looked at one another seriously.

Rich's face became concerned. “Jessica, we're still in a sim—”

“I know,” she quickly interrupted him. “I figured it out too, I don't know what's going on.”

“Where's Harrison?” Rich asked.

Jessica blushed, and then her heart dropped. She'd temporarily forgotten about Harrison. Still feeling awful about him, she knew she had to figure out where he'd gotten off to.

The two reunited travelers spent the next ten minutes catching up. Jessica told Rich a vague version of how she'd been separated from Harrison, deliberately leaving out their dalliance on the beach. She told him how the woman in black had used her for a sexual demonstration and finally released her. But most importantly, she explained to Rich her ability to manipulate size in dangerous situations and how her power had, for some reason, followed her through into this new sim.

Rich listened to her silently, processing the information like a tactician plotting his next move. After relaying his ordeal with Kat and his troublesome death at the hands of VERSA, they started talking about their current predicament.

“If we're in a sim, how long have we been in it?” he asked Jessica.

“Well...” Jessica started. “I already interrogated a security guard this morning and I got some information from him.”

“What? How?”

“I shrunk him,” she replied nonchalantly.

“Oh.”

“He said SunCorp can only erase our memories when we enter the sim, not add new ones.”

“Well shit,” Rich responded. “I remember flying here from Dulles a couple days ago and getting picked up at the airport and coming here, but it feels so... seamless.”

“There's no way they could have simulated the flight,” Jessica guessed. “There would have been too many real people for them to include on the plane. They must have swapped us in sometime in California. Maybe at the airport? Or on the drive over?”

“We need to get out of this sim,” Rich stated bluntly.

“Yeah, I agree.”

As the pair continued to talk and tried deducing what happened, a white SunCorp van pulled around a building and began heading toward them.

“Oh shit, we've got company,” said Rich abruptly, looking over Jessica's shoulder. “Let's run!"

“No,” Jessica replied calmly. “Let's see who it is. And what they want.”

“Are you crazy?”

Jessica shot him a mischievous look. In that moment Rich couldn't help but notice how pretty she was, but her attitude had him very confused. “I'll handle them,” she told him with a condescending smile. “Just stay out of my way.”

And then Rich realized what she intended to do.

The van pulled up and its side door slid open. Rich watched in surprise as he recognized the faces of the men piling out. First he saw Victor Chen, the man who'd picked him up from the airport. Then Ernie James, the tech who SunCorp had supposedly fired when Kevin had been killed. An additional man followed them, who Rich remembered seeing in a suit yesterday. Vanessa had claimed he was a board member at SunCorp. It would have still seemed plausible except for the fact that all three men held Beretta pistols.

Victor raised his gun up at Rich and Jessica. “Don't move!” he shouted, but Rich was already booking it in the other direction.

Jessica knew it was her moment. She loved the feeling. These men's guns didn't scare her. She briefly considered shrinking them down, but no, she wanted to make a statement to SunCorp. She was enraged and she wanted them to know it. So she grew.

In an instant, her body exploded upward. She couldn't see the looks on their faces, but Jessica knew they must have been overcome with shock as she expanded before their eyes. Lost in the moment, Jessica finally stopped herself growing when she noticed her boot could cover the van. Looking down over her breasts at the little men, she already knew she had them beat.

Diving behind a large concrete planter box that abutted one of the nearby buildings, Rich poked his head up to watch the scene. Just as he'd seen her in the Dos Palos world, Jessica was big, maybe about 200 feet tall. Her booted feet dwarfed the white van and Rich saw the terrified driver through the windshield react in terror.

The three SunCorp men began firing up at Jessica's titanic figure, but Rich knew their bullets couldn't harm her.

“You guys really think you're really going to hurt me?” she taunted them, placing her hands on her hips. She watched their bullets bounce off her harmlessly; she couldn't even feel them. Amused by their fruitless efforts, she twisted her right leg a bit and showed off her boot to them. It was almost as if she was modeling the pair of gigantic footwear on her feet. Rich wondered how long she'd toy with her victims.

“Tell SunCorp we want to speak with them,” Jessica told the little men. They'd run out of ammunition and had now started scrambling away from her. “Let me help you guys.”

It still impressed Rich how all the giants he had met could move so swiftly. With an effortless step, Jessica brought her foot over Ernie and the board member, covering them in a shadow. Hardly applying any real force, she stepped down and instantly crushed out the tiny men. Rich winced, knowing he was the same size as her victims. She was unstoppable, and her power was awesome.

Victor tried getting back into the van, but the driver jerked the vehicle forward and began speeding away. Ignoring Victor, Jessica swung her left foot forward to catch the fleeing vehicle and tapped it with the toe of her boot. The tires of the van blew out as the vehicle flipped onto its side. As she stepped and shook the earth, Rich watched Victor stumble and fall to the muddy ground.

The passenger door of the van popped open and the driver tried crawling up and out of the van. Rich couldn't see him very well through the cloud of smoke now billowing out of the vehicle, but it didn't matter. A second later the van was gone, replaced by one of Jessica's big boots. A horrendous crunching sound filled his ears as she ground the vehicle into the dirt like an empty soda can. Rich couldn't even begin to fathom how much force Jessica could exert beneath one of her impressive legs.

Wallowing in the mud, Victor tried regaining his footing, but Jessica hadn't forgotten about him. Turning to look behind her left boot, she spotted the helpless man trying to get away from her.

“Going so soon?” she chided him. It made Rich uncomfortable how easily Jessica got into this cat-and-mouse game. She was clearly having fun.

Turning around, Jessica planted both her feet on either side of Victor. He looked up at her dreadfully and Rich realized he must have been getting quite a view up her skirt. Jessica either didn't notice or didn't care.

“When you de-sim, little man,” she told him, “tell Vanessa we don't appreciate being lied to!”

Victor lifted up his arms as Jessica raised up her foot. In his mind, Rich flashed back to when he watched her crush Kevin. Neither man stood a chance against this colossal woman. It made him shudder.

Just to make a point, Jessica brought her foot down with more force than she really needed. When her boot hit the ground, a small earthquake rattled the Dreamland campus, rocking Rich into the planter box next to him. Recovering, he looked up at Jessica's face high above. Her grin told him she'd achieved all the satisfaction she desired.

Rich slowly crept out from his hiding place, wanting to make sure Jessica didn't absentmindedly crush him too. But he didn't have to worry very long as Jessica wasted no time shrinking herself back down. But she stopped herself before returning to her original height. Dwindling herself down to about fifteen feet tall, she caught a glimpse of Rich approaching her.

“Hey,” she said warmly, completely changing her demeanor. She'd gone from a ruthless killer to just another twenty-something year old girl in the blink of an eye.

“You seem a bit tall...” Rich commented, eyeing her over-sized body. He only came up to her skirt, which ended halfway up her thighs.

“Thought it'd be better this way,” she explained. “If someone gets the jump on us, at least this way I pack a little more punch.”

“No shit,” he replied, walking into one of the craters left by her shoeprint. Finding the mangled body of somebody, he crouched and dug a pistol out of the dirt beside the flattened carcass. It still looked good. He wanted to pack a little more punch too.

Taking the empty clip out of the gun, he rooted around the unidentifiable human remains until he found two more clips. He loaded one and put the other in his pocket.

“It'll be interesting what these guys say to SunCorp when they de-sim,” Jessica said to Rich. She'd come up behind him, and Rich couldn't shake the discomforting feeling of her looming presence. He knew she hadn't actually killed these men but... she'd done it so casually. He wondered what kind of person she had transformed into since he'd last seen her in VERSA.

Rich stood up and turned around. Jessica's knees greeted him. He looked up past her breasts at her smiling face. She looked young. He sighed.

“You know, SunCorp could probably de-sim us from here, manually, any time they wanted...” he started saying.

“Yeah the security guy I met had called this sim VERSA-B,” Jessica noted.

“So why keep us in here?” Rich asked her, not expecting her to know the answer. “Like, why keep us in here and pull guns on us? We're already trapped in a virtual reality. Why do they want us to stay in here?”

Jessica looked off into the distance, as if the answer might have been nearby. But it wasn't.

“I have no clue,” she said, shrugging her shoulders in defeat. “I know we went into VERSA last night like we shouldn't have, but why are they so hostile to us now? Was it something we did?”

“Your guess is as good as mine,” replied Rich. They weren't any closer to figuring out the new mystery.

“Hey look!” Jessica said abruptly, pointing off in the distance. Rich spun around to see what she had noticed. Coming down the ramp of a building-- the control room building-- a lone figure wearing glasses and sitting in a wheelchair rolled out into the morning sun.

“Holy shit is that Kat?!” Rich exclaimed, but he already knew the answer.

Jessica broke out into a trot, her longer legs quickly carrying her away from Rich. Jamming the pistol into his pants pocket, Rich did his best to follow her.

“Kaaaaaat!!” Jessica shouted as she quickly approached her.

“Good to see you,” Kat calmly greeted her. Though Jessica's towering form dominated her vision, Kat saw Rich coming up behind her. A wave of relief passed through her; he was ok. The guilt she harbored from abandoning him to the woman in black's plaything receded from her heart.

“Kat, we're still in a sim!” Jessica told her hastily as she stopped next to her. She'd absentmindedly forgotten how obvious her statement was as she towered over the wheelchair-bound woman.

“I know,” Kat replied in her usual no-nonsense way. “I don't know why the fuck they did it, but SunCorp built a buffer VERSA around regular VERSA.” At this point Rich finally caught up to the two of them. “Hey Rich,” she said to him.

“Hey Kat, glad you made it out too,” he replied.

“Sorry for leaving you back there,” Kat apologized. “What did she do to you?”

“Got me out of VERSA,” Rich quickly replied, feigning a smile as he caught his breath. He didn't want to talk about it. And Kat didn't want to pry.

“Why are you in your wheelchair if we're still in a sim?” Jessica asked Kat.

“Same reason you still have your growing power,” Kat told her back. “Avatar imprinting.”

“What?”

Kat explained: “When you're in the sim, your avatar is the way the sim interprets you. The sim assigns rules to your avatar, mainly your appearance. But somehow the woman in black gave you an ability to modify the sim in real time. When we went from VERSA to VERSA-B, that ability, that line of code, must have followed you through. This new sim didn't know to check for it and therefore ignored it.”

She glanced down at herself in the wheelchair. “For me on the other hand, there's some line of code in VERSA-B that tells my avatar to mimic my real-life condition. If we could somehow manipulate B from the inside I could change myself, but until then I'm stuck like this.”

“What's that?” Rich asked, pointing to the object on her lap. Kat clutched a green book.

Kat smirked. “This? This is how I got out of VERSA.”

Rich and Jessica gave her confused looks.

Kat had a lot of explaining to do. She held up the book. “This is VERSA's AI,” she said simply. “The AI functions of VERSA were stripped out of this B world, but not anymore. I copied it over. That's how she let me go.”

“Wait what?!” Rich exclaimed. “You mean that bitch who's fucked with us this whole time? You brought her in here?”

“She's not a bitch anymore,” Kat replied, trying to mollify him. “She just wants to live a little and explore new worlds.” She leaned forward toward Rich. “She's going to help us fuck over SunCorp. I'm pretty sure she's the reason they isolated VERSA behind the B world. The AI inside VERSA is out of control and too powerful... but now she's our friend.”

“Where is she then?” Jessica asked. “In that book?”

Kat opened the book, flipping through its mostly empty pages. She stopped on one page that had a few intangible lines of letters and numbers written on it. Jessica and Rich watched as the lines slowly started writing themselves.

“She's unspooling,” Kat explained. “I copied the smallest essence of her into this book, and now she's slowly growing into this VERSA-B world. It might take her quite some time, maybe hours or days, to regain all her old abilities, but as she starts locating and unlocking the inner-mechanisms of this sim, she'll eventually be able to control it just like the one we came out of.”

Looking up with a pleased grin on her face, Jessica and Rich's concerned expressions confused her. “What?” she asked them.

Exasperated, Rich threw up his hands in defeat and turned away. Jessica pursed her lips in annoyance and looked somewhere else. They were both dismayed, and Kat couldn't figure out why.

“No seriously, what?” she asked again.

Jessica crossed her arms. Rich turned back to look at her, shaking his head in disbelief. Trying not to laugh in frustration, he simply replied, “Well, now we really need to get out of this sim!”

 

When the gates swung open, the deja vu immediately set in. As the SUV headed up the drive to the Dos Palos mansion, everything looked about the same as when he'd last seen it in VERSA. Well, except for the absence of snow, giant shoeprints, and the smoldering ruins of the house. But in essence the mountain top appeared precisely as it had been presented to Harrison in VERSA. Even the two twisted trees in the center of the round driveway appeared just as gnarled as the ones in the sim.

The drive to the mansion from the lab took about twenty minutes, and in that time the sun had started peeking over the horizon to the east. As the security officer pushed Harrison out of the vehicle, in the daylight Harrison could see the mountain ranges around him and the valley to the east which ran north up to San Jose and Silicon Valley.

“Come with us,” Vanessa told him coldly, and Harrison knew he didn't have a choice. He stumbled up the steps to the mansion's front door, which Vanessa pushed open. Walking inside of Dos Palos, Harrison's eyes began to dance.

It was the same ornate wooden staircase, carpeted in red, running up to the landing on the second floor. Beautiful lamps adorned the walls but in this early morning hour remained unlit. Last time Harrison had been in this room, him and his colleagues had tried avoiding the shrunken partygoers trapped on the stairs. Well, at least he had tried avoiding them.

“In here,” grunted Vanessa, pointing to the left. Compared to the party, the house currently felt empty, really empty-- almost comically large and echoing with the deafening sound of silence.

Harrison followed Vanessa as the security officer trailed him. They stepped down into a big room, furnished brilliantly as a lounge. It was the same room where Harrison had ordered a scotch during the party, but now it looked more homey. But still lavish.

Large windows graced the walls of the lounge and a few errant paintings hung between them. In the corner along one of the walls, dozens of boxes and computers had been haphazardly piled up together. Wires and cords ran across the carpet, leading Harrison to believe this room had been turned into some sort of temporary command post.

“Here's one of them,” said Vanessa to a figure sitting in large chair. Harrison looked over but couldn't see the person sitting in it; it faced away from him toward a small coffee table and an opposing chair.

“Thank you Ms. Bright,” a young woman's voice said.

Harrison was confused. Where was Leo Starr?

A woman rose from the chair and turned to face Harrison. He immediately recognized she was beautiful, perhaps too pretty to take in all at once. Shoulder-length blonde hair framed the fair skin of her face. She was tall and thin, with generous breasts squeezed under a tight white t-shirt. A pair of plain blue jeans struggled to contain her curvaceous hips and bubble butt. The secret of her impossibly perfect body could only be explained by daily visits to the gym. Judging by her looks, Harrison would have thought her to be some kind of Instagram celebrity. But he knew better. These days, Claire Starr kept herself out of the public eye.

Although she was still hopelessly young, she was also hopelessly rich. And she knew it. Claire exuded the confidence and impatience only possessed by spoiled brats, but she mixed it with her keen and shrewd demeanor that instantly told Harrison she was also ruthlessly intelligent.

Claire gave Harrison a mean smile, much like a lioness ready to devour its prey. “Take a seat with me,” she offered, pointing at the chair facing her. She sounded like a young kid. He couldn't remember her age, but she couldn't have reached the legal drinking age more than a year or two ago. Why was he meeting her and not Leo?

Harrison sat down in a big blue wingback chair that felt uncomfortable. But not as uncomfortable as Claire's sneering gaze at him. Impatiently, she sat down across from him. In between them a small table hardly protected Harrison. He noticed a walkie-talkie device laying on the otherwise bare surface.

“Look, Miss Starr, I can explain--” he started to say.

“Don't talk,” she cut him off. Then to herself she muttered, “I knew bringing the government in was going to be a mistake.”

She turned to Vanessa. “You can go now, find the others when they come out and bring them all up here. Make sure you have your radio too.”

“Right away ma'am,” Vanessa replied. She exited the room but the security officer stayed, watching silently from his position near the doorway.

Claire sat back in her chair and Harrison could feel her visage move from him to the wall behind him. Her eyes grew wide.

“What the hell?!” she shouted, bounding up from her seat and over to the wall behind Harrison. Turning his body, Harrison looked at the wall behind him. His stomach dropped.

An empty space between two of the windows was moving. The colored wallpaper began swirling as if it were a television screen, the patterns meshing together like fresh paint oozing down the wall.

Nothing about this seemed real. Harrison found his hands gripping the chair, his knuckles white in fear. The impossible occurred to him: was he still in VERSA?

Frozen in place, the shifting patterns transfixing him in horror, Harrison watched Claire take a good look at the moving wall. He saw letters appear, slowly spelling out a small message for her to read. Claire looked furious.

“What the fuck!” she squealed in rage. She turned back to glare at Harrison who looked lost as ever. “You guys brought the AI into here?!”

He had no idea what she was talking about. His mouth hung open uselessly as his mind tried to process everything going on around him.

“W... what's going on?” he finally sputtered out. “What is that thing?”

“You idiot!” she screamed. Stomping over to him, Claire easily terrified Harrison. The thought of physically overpowering her didn't even occur to him as she grabbed his shirt and put her face right in front of him. He noticed some kind of smartwatch on her wrist that looked similar to the one Vanessa wore. She seethed in rage but pretended to be calm. “You haven't figured it out yet, have you?”

“Figured... what out?

“You're either real dumb or a good liar,” she said to him, finally trying to size him up. Claire pulled away. “You really don't know what's going on, do you?”

“No, I don't!”

“We're not in my mansion,” Claire admitted. “We're still in a sim. A safe sim. Until your friends FUCKED IT UP!” she yelled, pointing at the shifting wall. “I bet this was all Katherine Parlock's idea. I should have killed her when I got the chance.”

Each of her words crashed into Harrison as he struggled to make sense of everything. Claire talked fast and arrogantly.

“This changes everything,” she told him. “You've seen too much and now we definitely can't let you go.” Claire grabbed the radio laying on the table and pressed a button. “Vanessa, you there?”

“I'm here, what's up?”

“The others are back. And they somehow uploaded VERSA's AI into this world.”

“What?!”

“Round them up, ok? Make sure they can't de-sim until we can put the contingency in place.”

“Shit. Ok. Copy that.”

Harrison watched Claire set the radio back down on the table. “How is this a sim?” he asked her. Claire looked over in disdain. The security officer guarding the room's exit had his eyes trained on Harrison.

“I might as well tell you everything,” she shrugged. “You're fucked anyways.”

With the grace of a careless young adult, she plopped herself back in her chair. Casually draping a leg over one of the arms of the chair, she sighed. It was then Harrison noticed she was barefoot; she hadn't even bothered putting on shoes for this.

“I talk, you listen,” she told him gruffly. And thus she began:

“My dad made VERSA, and it was brilliant. The VR stuff was unbelievable, but it's not the greatest thing that came out of the project. Inadvertently, the artificial intelligence SunCorp built to run the thing became the biggest deal. Over the last year especially it started growing in leaps and bounds, creating more than we ever thought possible.

“I remember when he used to take me into the sim, into the fantasy worlds he had created. I could do anything, I was like a goddess. He couldn't believe the power either. And that's why it killed him.”

“He's dead?!” Harrison exclaimed.

“Yeah, that's what I said!” Claire quickly replied, cutting him off. She looked annoyed, and Harrison couldn't see any other emotions behind her face. Was she even mourning?

“Wait, how? When did he die??”

“Like a month ago! Shut UP!” Claire rolled her eyes. “Let me fucking tell you what I want to tell you.”

Harrison sat back, stunned by her casual revelation. Claire continued, perturbed.

“My dad was too ambitious and didn't see how dangerous VERSA had become. Well, no one did really. I wasn't there when it happened, only Sujay and Katherine watched it happen while in the sim, but he took a bad step and went off a cliff. Shouldn't have been a problem, but when VERSA loaded his brain back into his body, it triggered an aneurysm that caused him to die right in the waterchair. There are supposed to be safeguards in the code to stop that kind of thing from happening, but it happened. So he died.”

At first it didn't make sense to Harrison why she was telling him all this. She was sullen and unhappy as she spoke, but slowly it became clear that the talking was somehow cathartic for her. Just being able to tell the story of it all must have been a relief. As she continued she seemed to relax a little, but every time her eyes flickered over to Harrison, he could still see how much contempt she had for him. The anger she harbored was being channeled at him.

“Sujay and the others couldn't figure out how the safety codes got corrupted, and soon they realized they'd been locked out of modifying some of VERSA's other functions. I told them to cover up my dad's death because I didn't want to lose all the work we'd put into VERSA. The board and the FBI and whoever else would have a field day tearing SunCorp apart if they found out what had happened.

“Then I instructed Vanessa to find a way to neutralize VERSA's aberrant behavior. Quickly it became clear that we'd lose all of VERSA if we tried erasing the AI. But about a week later they came up with a plan to build a new sim, a buffer sim, around the original VERSA. By building that one from relative scratch and stripping the AI out of it from the start, it would provide a layer of safety in case anyone else got killed in the main sim again. We called the new world “VERSA-B,” and it's basically just a version of Dreamland we created as a go-between between the real world and VERSA. Here we fucking are now,” she said, gesturing around the room.

“You guys are insane...” Harrison muttered. The unethical levels that SunCorp had gone through to protect their creation from legal jeopardy were unbelievable. And somehow he'd gotten tapped to be a guinea pig in all of this. Did his bosses at the Department of Energy have any clue about what was going on?

It occurred to him that this meant Kevin Cho wasn't actually dead. When VERSA ejected him back into VERSA-B with the command to create a faulty blood vessel in his brain, his death in B only safely landed him back in the real world. Such a strange way to navigate the problem SunCorp had created for itself, but viable nonetheless. Though going from the bottom of Jessica's shoe to waking up in the real world must have really scrambled his brain.

“The government meeting was already on the books before my dad died,” Claire continued, eyeing Harrison with hostility. “So we decided not to cancel. Didn't want to raise any suspicion, Uncle Sam was chomping at the bit to see what we had. Wouldn't back off. That's why you're here. If you had cooperated with everything and not listened to Katherine or done anything stupid, we would have let you walk away. It would have been easy just to show you a stupidly safe slice of VERSA. But now you know VERSA's a killer. I'm not jeopardizing this company or the future of VERSA because some government dumbass went where he wasn't supposed to, so we're just going to have to remove you from the equation.” Her icy stare sent a chill down Harrison's spine.

“Wait, are you saying... you're going to kill me?!” he shouted. He leaped from his chair, trying to figure out what to do. The guard started towards him but Claire waved him off.

“You're trapped in here right now,” she told Harrison smugly. “Once we get the right sedatives back to the lab, we'll de-sim you, knock you unconscious, and put you in a car and send it off a cliff. Or maybe it's supposed to be a helicopter crash. I'm not sure what Vanessa finally decided on. It's been our contingency plan all along.”

Harrison was incredulous that this young woman was seriously threatening to murder him and cover it up. “Are you crazy?!” he yelled at her. “The government will be all over your ass when this is over! There will be investigations... everything! You can't just murder three federal government employees while they are doing their jobs and expect nobody to care!”

“You're meaningless,” Claire said bluntly. “No one will care because I'll tell them not to care. SunCorp has VERSA, and everyone wants VERSA. The government will just send another team to check it out and by then we'll have worked out the kinks. They're not going to risk this opportunity for a few dead bodies in a fiery wreck. We'll tell them we're going to the Chinese or Russians if they don't sweep it under the rug, and they will.”

Claire had thought this out long before he'd unwittingly flown to the West Coast. She had them trapped in a virtual prison and there was nothing they could do. Trying to process this dump truck of information, Harrison fought to control his accelerating heartbeat. Looking at Claire sitting pleased in her smug little chair, he considered lashing out at her. She probably looked so beautiful right now because she'd modified herself in the sim, he told himself. He absolutely loathed everything about her.

Even if he could de-sim somehow, he'd wake up in the real world right in the middle of the real lab, surrounded by SunCorp security personnel. How many people were in on this conspiracy? Harrison thought about Kat. How had she not known all of this?

“What does Kat know about this?” he finally asked, his anger brimming just below the surface.

“Oh Katherine? Nothing. We erased her memories of my dad's death when we threw her into VERSA-B. ”

Harrison cocked an eyebrow and shot her a confused look. Claire sighed again, annoyed by his ignorance.

“After my dad died,” she began, “that little shit Katherine wanted to blow up the whole thing. Tell the press, tell everyone. I wanted to drop her in the ocean but that would have pissed off all the other developers on the project. They think of themselves like a family sometimes, it's dumb. So we kidnapped her instead and once we set up VERSA-B, we threw her in, like a digital jail cell. Our neuroscience division had recently figured out how to target pilot memories, so we made her forget what had happened and convinced her that B was the real world. We did the same thing to you, putting you and your colleagues in a digital version of the airport, except if you'd cooperated, we were going to tell you all about it at the end of your visit. But not anymore...

“When you and the other two decided to follow Katherine into VERSA, you were down to your last straw. And now that you've brought that fucked-up AI into our safe haven? Yeah, you've set us back at least another year.”

“Fuck you, I'm getting out of here!” Harrison finally told her. He took a few steps toward the doorway but the security officer stood in his way. Harrison tried moving around him but the larger man grabbed him and tossed him backward. Stumbling to the ground, the soft carpet cushioned his fall. Quickly rising to his feet again, he noticed Claire fiddling with the smartwatch on her wrist.

“You know,” she lectured him without looking up from her watch, “what I've learned since I started working for my dad is how readily people are willing to believe whatever is put in front of them. It's how we've been tricking Katherine all these weeks and it's how we've been fooling you too. You just accepted the reality we created for you. And now we'll just trick the government once you're dead. It's appalling, really, how reluctantly people are willing question what is presented to them as truth. It makes them so easy to... control.”

She looked up and glanced over to the security officer. “You can leave us now,” Claire told him abruptly. “I can handle him from here. Go disconnect, I put the out-keys in the office upstairs.”

“You're the boss,” he replied as he left the room, glancing at Harrison over his shoulder. Confused, Harrison looked over at Claire, who still casually dangled one of her legs over the arm of the chair. Looking back to her smartwatch, she kept talking.

“Well... I certainly don't want you to die in here and de-sim before they're ready for you, so let's turn that option off. Something special Sujay set up for me.” Harrison watched her finger casually flick the screen of her watch. “And you're going to be difficult to keep in place if you're full-sized...”

She swiped the screen again and Harrison's world exploded around him. Before realizing he'd shrunk, he already stood ankle-deep in the carpet. He must have only been a couple inches tall now.

“...And I've never gotten the chance to play with a tiny guy in the sim before, so I think I'll have some fun with you before you go,” she told him. She looked up and gazed upon him with fiendish eyes. Smiling cruelly, she added, “Don't be scared. It's not like you're going to be able to die... yet.”

 

 

Chapter 23 by Q-Writer

Chapter 23:

(Posted: April 16)

 

 

“So, now what?” Rich asked Kat and Jessica. “How do we even get out of this world?”

The three of them moved slowly together across the abandoned laboratory campus. Trying to coordinate the giant steps of Jessica with the slow speed of Kat's electric wheelchair proved difficult.

“Let's go to my office,” Kat told him, less of a suggestion and more of a predetermined plan. “I might be able to see what I can do from my workstation. It never occurred to me that I've been living in a sim for some time, maybe there's something in the main VERSA program I overlooked. Plus, I have some snacks there.”

“Ugh I'm starving,” Jessica complained. “If it comes down to it, I'll shrink myself just to eat.”

“Plus,” Kat added, clutching the green book on her lap, “killing a bit of time will allow Versa to rebuild herself in this world.”

Rich huffed. “Kat, if she reappears and immediately tries killing me again, I'm going to be a very unhappy man,” he joked, though his lightheartedness couldn't hide his suspicion of VERSA's AI.

“It'll be fine,” Kat said. “She owes me anyways.” Kat hoped it would be fine, but she actually had no clue. She knew the AI was currently unpacking itself and infiltrating this new, virgin sim, but Kat didn't know if it would take Versa minutes or hours or days to fully build herself up. Kat remembered Versa being able to read the minds of the pilots within the main VERSA... hopefully it would take her a very long time to regain that ability in VERSA-B.

“Which building are we looking for?” Jessica asked, a few paces ahead of Rich and Kat.

“It's the one by the server warehouses, north side of the complex,” replied Kat.

As they came around another building, Kat pointed out her office. “It's on the third floor of that one. They're renovating most of it right now, so most of my days I don't even see anyone...” It then occurred to her that vacating most of the building was probably a deliberate move, keeping her separated from everyone else. Interacting with more people might have tipped her off that she wasn't actually living in the real world. Thinking of this made her even more mad. She couldn't wait to finally talk to Leo and figure out what was really going on.

A minute later they reached Kat's building. Jessica was too large to fit through the door, but Rich offered to wait outside with her and keep watch while Kat went to her office alone. The three of them had just come to a consensus on what to do when Jessica saw an approaching car. From the direction of the main gate, a black SUV had turned out from behind another building. It was heading right for them.

“Uh guys? There's a car coming,” warned Jessica.

“Shit,” Kat uttered. “Can you guys handle this?”

Rich pulled the pistol he'd acquired out of his pocket. “Yeah we got you. Get what you need from your office and we'll handle this.”

Not wasting time with a response, Kat silently left them and rolled up the building's ramp, finally pressing a button to open the door to the building. Clutching the pistol, Rich looked up at Jessica standing next to him. He could see her giant fists clenched, each one the size of his head.

“Ready to rock and roll, redwood?” he asked Jessica, cocking the slide and chambering the first round into his gun. She looked down at him and gave him a confident smile.

“I was born ready, shrimp,” she replied playfully.

It must have distressed the occupants of the SUV to see Jessica standing so tall, but they nonetheless kept up their approach. About a hundred feet away from the two of them, the vehicle swerved to the right. The doors flew open and Jessica and Rich watched two nameless SunCorp employees jump out of the back, each man holding a gun. But from the front seat, Vanessa casually disembarked, certainly not in haste like the men with her. If anything, Rich noted, she looked bored.

Though the armed men wore uniforms and looked like security guards, Vanessa wore a stylish green dress with matching green heels. Rich couldn't believe she was willing to just walk right into danger dressed like that. He raised his gun.

“Vanessa Bright!” he called to her. “What the fuck is going on?!”

The armed men brought their pistols up and to Rich's surprise, pointed them at Jessica. At that moment, the driver of the SUV came around with a gun too. Rich recognized him as Delvin, the same man who had toured them around the complex on the first day.

“The two of you are in a lot of trouble,” Vanessa told them curtly.

“No, you're in a lot of trouble,” Jessica angrily replied. “We know we're in a sim. We want out!”

“Can't do that Miss Hampton,” Vanessa said, staring her down. “I'm here to detain you both. You're not going anywhere.”

“Got any cuffs in her size?” Rich asked Vanessa indignantly, gesturing to Jessica.

Vanessa turned to her three armed escorts. “Remember, don't let them de-sim. You get Mr. Colgate and I'll deal with Miss Hampton.”

Silently, the three armed men started walking toward Rich, their eyes nervously darting towards Jessica.

Rich shouted at them to stay away and cocked back the hammer of his pistol. While he did this, Jessica noticed Vanessa fiddling with the smartwatch on her wrist. And then the head of development at Dreamland Laboratory started growing.

Vanessa suddenly expanded, her body skyrocketing upward. In a moment her green heels towered over Jessica and the building behind her. Not to be outdone, Jessica channeled herself and quickly started growing too, her expanding left foot barely missing Rich.

“Holy shit!” Rich shouted as he watched Vanessa turn into a giantess. Distracted, the armed men broke into a run towards him. Caught off-guard, Rich brought his senses back to earth and instinctively began firing at his assailants. Unfocused, his bullets went wide of his targets, but it caused the uniformed men to dive to the ground. Now standing beneath Jessica's impossibly tall and expanding legs, Rich turned and ran. For a moment he considered heading into the building, but in a second decided he'd stay outside and try fleeing around the side of it. Considering that Jessica and Vanessa were about to fight, he didn't want to be trapped in a confined space that they were rapidly dwarfing.

Jessica kept growing herself at the same pace Vanessa was expanding. She didn't have time to think about how tall she was getting, but she figured she already passed the 100 foot mark some time ago. She was probably even double that now. As they grew, the gap between the two women dwindled, and with Vanessa's hand still on her watch, Jessica knew it was the source of her power. So once Vanessa was at arm's length, Jessica pushed her.

The move caught Vanessa off-guard and she stumbled back. Jessica took a step forward, inadvertently kicking the small black SUV out of the way like a toy car. She didn't really know how to fight, but she threw a punch at Vanessa anyways, who dodged it rather easily.

Jessica couldn't focus on fighting and growing at the same time, but luckily Vanessa couldn't fight back while keeping her hand on her watch. The two giantesses began doing their best to hit each other. Aiming for the watch on Vanessa's left arm, Jessica tried grabbing at Vanessa, hoping to at least knock her down.

As she lashed out, Jessica was momentarily surprised when Vanessa grabbed one of her arms. Once ahold of the sleeve of Jessica's white sweater, Vanessa shifted her weight. She spun Jessica and pushed her off to the side, sending her tumbling into one of the research buildings. Jessica's body, much larger than the meager three story building, completely demolished the structure as she fell on top of it. Debris exploded into the air as Jessica flattened the building beneath her.

When Jessica slammed into the ground, it sounded to Rich like a bomb had gone off. He turned to see her colossal form atop the remains of a building, but she immediately rolled over and Rich could tell she hadn't been seriously hurt.

The sound of gunfire caught his attention when he realized his pursuers had started firing their weapons. Rich had some distance on them but he still squeezed off a few rounds in defense to make them think twice about following him. His gun clicked impatiently when he finally ran out of ammo.

Rich fumbled to reload while running as fast as he could. Just as he slid the new clip into the pistol's grip, another boom, this once much closer, caused him to stumble and drop his gun. Darting his head to look behind him, he saw Vanessa's enormous high heeled shoe.

From up above, her angry voiced boomed down. “I said don't let them de-sim! Don't shoot him you idiots!” she scolded the tiny men at her feet. Rich gulped when he realized they all couldn't have been any bigger than one of her toes.

Vanessa lifted up her foot, and to Rich's surprise only two men remained behind him. Had she really just stomped on one of them to prove a point? Holy shit, this bitch was cold.

If they weren't going to shoot at him, fuck it, then he would shoot at them. Picking his pistol back up, he chambered the first round and took careful aim.

Rich knew he was a decent shot, and one of the security officers would later agree with that sentiment. His first two bullets went into the man's chest and he immediately fell down onto the damp ground. The only survivor, who Rich could see was the driver Delvin, stopped, appraised the situation, and fled. Running to the left, the man presented a difficult target for Rich to hit at range, and it took Rich another three shots before he clipped Delvin's leg. Tumbling to the ground, Delvin quickly recovered and brought his gun up to fire.

Although he'd been warned, the adrenaline in Delvin's body couldn't be reasoned with. He fired back at Rich and Rich dove into the ground to avoid the bullets.

“Dammit!” Vanessa bellowed from up high. Delvin had angered the goddess, his boss, and Rich smirked, knowing retribution would be swift. Impossibly high above them, her massive shoe cast an ominous shadow over Delvin's wounded body.

Rich saw him throw his arms up in protest, but Delvin had blown his chance. Vanessa stepped down and Delvin's time in VERSA-B ended instantly. The power of her simple step terrified Rich and rocked the ground below him.

Before he could catch his breath, Jessica's titanic form lunged at Vanessa. She collided with her and knocked her over. Rich could only watch in awe as the two massive women crashed down to earth together, this time wiping out a few of the empty server warehouses. Jessica landed on top Vanessa, causing a significant earthquake that shook the campus buildings. Glass windows shattered and concrete facades crumbled. In awe of their massive power, Rich felt like a flea watching two deities act out their own personal Götterdämmerung.

Now with the initiative, Jessica began slamming her fists into Vanessa's body. Vanessa struggled to push her off, but with all the smoke and dust in the air she had trouble breathing. Jessica couldn't see very well through the cloudy air, so she kept slugging Vanessa with her one fist while groping around with her other hand for the watch on Vanessa's arm.

After a few moments of wildly fighting on the ground, Jessica's fingers made contact with the plastic and glass watch. She started feverishly tugging on the thing, but Vanessa knew what she was trying to do and thrashed her arm in response. Jessica lost her grip on the watch and Vanessa tossed her aside. Both women scrambled to their feet, their shoes gouging the earth. To tiny Rich down below, it sounded like an army of runaway construction vehicles. These giantesses could probably move mountains if they really wanted to.

Rich started sprinting away from the women, but at their gargantuan size there was nowhere safe for him to go. The entire Dreamland complex was their arena, but he fled anyways. The best thing keeping him safe was their apathy towards him; lions don't notice or care about the lives of ants.

As Jessica gained her footing and faced Vanessa, she remained focused on her watch, the source of all her power. But before Vanessa initiated another round of combat, the short reprieve let Jessica think. Remembering that she could also shrink people with her power, Jessica began focusing on Vanessa's body.

In an instant, Vanessa started dwindling in front of Jessica. Realizing what was happening, Vanessa looked down at her smartwatch to try reversing the process. But Jessica quickly stepped over to Vanessa and grabbed her shrinking arm, her superior strength keeping Vanessa's free hand away from the watch. Vanessa looked up at her in shock and dread; the reality of her defeat suddenly struck her in the gut.

Vanessa kept shrinking as Jessica proudly held her arm, and soon Vanessa dangled from Jessica's grasp, her feet leaving the ground to shrink with the rest of her body that Jessica held high above. The smug expression on Jessica's face taunted Vanessa who tried fruitlessly to weasel out of her grip. When Vanessa became too small to effectively hold, Jessica brought her other hand under her and dropped her into her palm. Next, she smothered Vanessa with her giant index finger, preventing her from interacting with her watch. The battle was over, and once again Jessica reigned supreme.

Too large to effectively control Vanessa, Jessica scanned the ruined ground for Rich. A few seconds passed before she spotted him watching her from next to the fence surrounding the complex.

“Rich, I've got her here,” she called down to the little man she could barely see. “Make sure she can't use her watch.”

Unable to hear a reply, Jessica lowered her palm down to Rich and dumped Vanessa out onto the ground next to him. Vanessa hit the ground hard, causing one of her shoes to fly off her foot. Before she could recover, Rich jumped on top of her, placing a knee right between her shoulders. Quickly unbuckling her watch, Rich pulled the source of her power off her arm.

“Gotcha bitch!” he teased her.

“Fuck you,” Vanessa hissed at him. Rich stood up and Vanessa slowly started to rise. Behind all of them, Jessica was rapidly reducing herself to a more manageable size, finally stopping somewhere around sixty feet tall. Her white sweater had turned a light shade of brown, but besides that the victor remained unspoiled.

“We've got a lot of questions to ask you,” Rich told her menacingly. He slipped her watch into his pocket and grabbed her arm. Jessica had done a near-perfect job reducing Vanessa to her original height.

“Let me get my damn shoe first,” Vanessa replied angrily. Rich allowed her to hobble over to her green shoe as Jessica watched intently from above.

“We're going to Kat's office, Vanessa,” said Rich. “You're coming with me and don't try anything funny.” He grabbed her arm again and proceeded to practically drag her over to Kat's building, which besides a couple dozen broken windows, remained mostly intact.

“Fuck you assholes,” Vanessa spat, dropping any semblance of professionalism. “You've gone and fucked up years of our work here. VERSA's ruined and you're to blame!”

Rich didn't indulge her with a response. A few minutes later the two of them walked through the glass front door of the building, which surprisingly remained unbroken. A nearby elevator dinged and Kat emerged.

“I heard the ruckus die down and wanted to see what happened,” she explained.

Rich pointed at a sullen Vanessa. “She lost.”

“Let's get up to my office,” Kat said.

A minute later they'd reached the third floor. After snaking down a crooked corridor they reached a small room full of humming computers and multiple LCD screens. Tables lay piled with papers and keyboards and the little green book sat atop an overstuffed file cabinet. One wall of the room used to be a window, but was now gone. A table stacked full of blinking machines teetered dangerously close to the broken edge.

Seeing movement inside the building, Jessica came around and sat down next to the blown-out window to hear Rich's interrogation of Vanessa. Rich noted she seemed keen on staying big. Her protection helped him relax; no one would be interrupting what came next.

Flipping Kat the smartwatch, he informed her, “This is how she changed her size. I figured you might wanna see it.” Kat caught the device and examined the strange contraption with interest.

Rich pulled out a chair and told Vanessa to take a seat, who begrudgingly obliged. He pushed a few paper-stuffed binders off another folding chair and swung it around in front of her. Plopping down in the chair, he grinned wickedly at Vanessa, who eyed him with disdain. She crossed her arms in frustration and annoyance.

“Vanessa Bright,” said Rich calmly. “We know we're basically SunCorp's prisoners in this sim right now. We want out. And we want answers. Where's Harrison?”

Letting out a long sigh, Vanessa responded to him. “I'm assuming if I don't answer your questions you're going to hurt me?”

“Probably,” Rich replied with a smile. He was playing good cop now but was more than ready to switch roles if necessary.

“Alright then, I took him up to the house,” she casually replied. Rich watched her face. She refused to make eye contact with him, but he studied her eyes and the corners of her mouth. Though she covered it well, he could see the small twitches in her face that betrayed nervousness. It was a high stakes game of poker; Vanessa held all the chips, but Rich had a winning hand.

“What's going on up there then?” he asked politely. “Who else is in the sim with us? Well, besides all the ones you stomped out.”

Vanessa didn't want to speak and took her time replying. After a pregnant pause she admitted, “Claire Starr is up there. Maybe one or two others. After the shit she's pulled,” she pointed out the window to Jessica, “I doubt they're going to send more people into the sim just to be immediately spat back out.”

Almost expecting Jessica to jump in and say something, Rich paused, but it was Kat that spoke next.

“Vanessa, what's VERSA-B? Why are we in a sim?”

Vanessa looked over to Kat and smiled at her like an impatient adult entertaining a child's ignorant question.

“Ugh, how to explain...” Vanessa smugly complained. With a slow deliberateness, she began articulating SunCorp's recent problems with VERSA's AI and briefly mentioned the time it killed a pilot upon de-simming. “Without going in and completely gutting the AI and starting over from scratch, it was the easiest option,” she added, explaining the existence of VERSA-B. “And it worked. Hell, it saved Kevin Cho's life.”

“He's alive?” Kat asked in awe.

“Yes, technically,” answered Vanessa. “Though it might be a few days before he comes back into work. He's got one hell of a headache.” She turned to glare at Jessica, who silently sneered back. Rich admired Jessica's composure; if he'd been sixty feet tall, he would have surely snapped Vanessa in half by now.

“Why then don't we all remember being in here?” Kat followed-up, not wanting to sidetrack the interrogation. “Did SunCorp really wipe our memories?”

Another knowing smile from Vanessa. “Yes, we did.”

“I can't believe it's real...” Kat said, astonished.

“Wait, what?” Rich asked, confused.

Regaining some control of the situation, Vanessa started explaining: “SunCorp's the leading tech corporation working with neuro-manipulation, as you're all well-aware. Spending years developing VERSA to pick through people's minds for the sake of the sim also opened up... other doors. You see, VERSA maps every mind it touches; it will eventually access all your memories and see where they exist in your brain. Just this year we finally figured out how to interpret that data. And like all physical-based data, with the right tool, it can be erased.”

She leaned back in her chair. Rich hadn't even noticed her sitting forward. He quickly closed his mouth which had fallen open. It was hard to fathom all the futuristic feats SunCorp was achieving these days.

Pointing at Jessica and Rich, Vanessa said, “When you two and Mr. Burr came to visit us, we uploaded you into VERSA-B and erased your memories of arriving at the real lab. Later, we would have told you it was to impress you when we revealed that you'd been in a simulation the whole time. A real cherry on top for you to think about before going back to Washington and evaluating us.”

“So why still keep us in here?” Rich asked seriously. He leaned forward and intertwined his fingers.

It surprised him when Vanessa laughed. But she didn't answer, just looked at him. For the first time since sitting down with her, Rich felt nervous. Sure, they had her in a corner, but this was just a sim. Back in the real world, as she claimed, they were prisoners in the SunCorp lab. If SunCorp didn't want them to leave, then they wouldn't leave. There was nothing he could do.

As the shadow of dread percolated into Rich's mind, out of the corner of his eye he caught something dark moving behind him. Everyone else in the room saw it too. Rich twisted his head around just as Vanessa gasped and Kat's eyes went wide.

Standing in the doorway as if she'd just walked up, the woman in black watched the group with an equal amount of bewilderment.

“Hello,” she said flatly.

“Who are you?” Vanessa asked in astonishment, beholding the black-dressed woman who eerily resembled her.

“Vanessa,” Kat said, “meet Versa.”

Rich watched Vanessa's face contort first in surprise, then in horror. Her mouth opened and closed silently, as if she was trying to speak but unable. It reminded Rich of the last sad seconds in a hooked fish's life, flopping around helplessly at the bottom of a boat. Vanessa was stunned. And terrified.

“Oh my God...” was all she could finally utter.

“Who are you?” Versa asked her.

Vanessa couldn't answer, so Kat jumped in. “She's my boss. She'd head of the program that created you.”

“Oh,” Versa responded. It was unclear if she actually grasped what Kat had said.

Kat wheeled her chair right up next to Vanessa, snapping her out of shock. “Ok Vanessa, tell me this: why the fuck am I in this sim?”

Vanessa shifted away from Kat and shot her a dirty look.

Kat continued: “Where's Leo? What's going on at SunCorp?”

Vanessa laughed at her. “Katherine, Leo's dead!”

“What?!” yelped Kat in surprise. “No! I found a note from him in VERSA!...”

“Pff, Claire wrote that,” Vanessa replied, sadistically reveling in Kat's shock.

“What the fuck happened to Leo Starr?” Jessica bellowed from outside, her voice deafening the room. Everyone turned to look out at her. Jessica was visibly angry and it scared everyone.

“He was the first pilot to die in VERSA,” Vanessa calmly explained. “You were there, Katherine, when it actually happened. He slipped off a cliff while you were visiting him in that little world he made for himself. When he de-simmed his brain pretty much exploded. It wasn't until later we figured out VERSA's AI had gone in and bastardized the safety codes.” Vanessa turned to look back at Kat. “Don't be mad at me,” she said, “be mad at her.”

She pointed towards Versa, who looked confused, as if she was still trying to understand Vanessa's story. Kat swiveled around and glared at her, also trying to process Vanessa's admission.

“When Leo died, we were all upset,” Vanessa continued, “but you Katherine, you wanted to tear down SunCorp. You were about to call up the Chronicle or the LA Times or some shit, sink the company and tell the world the truth. We couldn't let you do that, and we'd just got VERSA-B up and running. So until we could figure out what to do with you, we stashed you in here and tested out the memory remediation procedures for the first time. Every time I visited you in B, you were convinced you were still living in the real world. And that Leo was still alive.”

“You fucking cunt,” hissed Kat. Rage kindled within her.

“I wasn't so sure the memory remediation would be perfect,” Vanessa continued, nonplussed. “Hell, we had to reboot VERSA-B every few days and re-wipe your memory each cycle so the time dilation in the sim didn't spiral away from the real world. Going into your brain so often, I had legitimate fears something might eventually go wrong.

“I told Claire that if a wisp of a memory of Leo's death remained, you'd put the pieces back together. That's why Claire left that stupid note for you to find in that Dos Palos world where Leo died. If you reached that and then went looking for him, she'd know there would be no covering it up anymore.”

Vanessa smirked again. “But hey, not like that matters any-”

Her eyes suddenly rolled back into her head and she slumped over in her chair. Rich jumped up to try catching her, but before she fell any further Vanessa's body blinked out of existence. Someone back in the real world had de-simmed her.

“Fuck!” Rich shouted out. “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”

Kat slowly turned her head and looked at Versa, who still stood awkwardly in the doorway.

“You killed him,” she stated quietly. “You killed Leo Starr.” It wasn't a question but Kat's own reckoning with what had happened.

“You... didn't know?” Versa replied gingerly.

“You just heard what she said!” Kat responded angrily, pointing at Vanessa's empty seat. “They wiped my memory of it happening. You fucking killed my friend!”

Versa didn't have a response. Rich took a step towards Kat and, in an effort to comfort her, said exactly the wrong thing.

“Ok Kat, calm down for a second-”

“Calm down?!” Kat shouted. “Versa killed Leo and SunCorp covered it up! How the fuck do you expect me to be calm?!

“Ok, shit, I'm sorry. But let's keep our heads in the game-”

“Back off Rich!” she yelled at him. Her mad eyes started getting bleary.

Turning back to Versa, Kat continued her diatribe. “I regret ever fucking building you! You're a monster, a killer! You murdered my friend and all he ever did was build you and love you! I HATE YOU!” Kat began breathing more heavily and the first few tears started rolling down her cheeks.

Overwhelmed by the misery of her situation, Kat finally blew her cool. In an epic eruption, she let out a primordial scream of unabashed rage. Rich, Jessica, and Versa watched her writhe in her wheelchair before collapsing in on herself, sobbing uncontrollably.

Rich and Jessica made awkward, unsure eye contact. Versa, in all her lacking knowledge of human emotion, could offer no help either. Nobody knew what to do. So Kat cried alone.

And though Kat continued to sob for some time, after enough anguish she slowly regained her presence. Tilting her head up to glare at Versa, she beheld a bewildered creature. It occurred to her that this might have been the first time she'd ever seen someone cry.

“Fuck you Versa,” Kat repeated through her tears. “You're never getting out of here. I'm never helping you again. I'm going to burn your servers to the ground when I go home. I'm going to demagnetize every fucking electron that constitutes your stupid digital life.”

By the look on her face, Rich couldn't tell if Versa understood Kat's words to be a legitimate threat or not. But Rich knew Kat wasn't bullshitting. If she got the chance, he was sure she'd personally unplug every one of the tens of thousands of servers back in the real world.

“Get out of here,” Kat finally told her. “I don't care where you go, but leave.”

“Kat we need to rescue Harrison,” Rich told her carefully.

Though she was still very emotional, Kat knew Rich was right. “I can't go up there... I just can't,” she replied to him. “I need some time... alone. But you and Jessica should go. Storm the mountain and get him back. And if you see Claire, fucking kill that bitch.”

Kat whimpered for a few more moments, soaking in the misery of profound loss.

“I'm so sorry Kat,” Jessica said through the window, her voice sincere.

“Yeah really, I'm sorry too,” Rich added. “He seemed like a remarkable man.”

“He was,” Kat sniffled. Her bleary eyes shifted back to Versa, who had remained in the room, still trying to understand what was going on. “Get out of here already!” Kat barked at her.

“Richard, can I go with you?” Versa asked. “If Claire's in control now, maybe I can be of help to you.”

Eyeing her with immense skepticism, Rich sighed. He looked back at Jessica for her opinion, but she said nothing, only peering back with an enormous face full of suspicion. But then Rich considered something; letting Versa's avatar tag along would give them time to pick her brain. She might shed some light on their current predicament or at least help them find Harrison.

“Yeah, sure,” he told her warily. Really anything that got Versa away from Kat could be viewed as an ideal conclusion.

He turned back to Jessica. “Wanna give us a ride?”

“Oh, yeah. Sure,” she answered.

Beholding Kat one last time, Rich said sympathetically. “I'm really sorry Kat. We'll get to the bottom of this and help you get revenge on SunCorp.”

“Thanks,” she said with a sad smile.

Versa said nothing as she walked past Rich and Kat and up to the broken window. Jessica didn't like what she was about to do, but still carefully picked up Versa with her large hand.

Bringing her up to her face she warned her, “Don't try anything funny.”

“Oh I hardly can,” Versa reassured her. “I still have a long way to go before I'll be able to manipulate much of this world.” She paused a moment as she held Jessica's attention. “I will say though, it's quite invigorating seeing so much open space for myself to grow into.”

Jessica ignored her last comment and moved her away from her face. Ambling up to her feet, Jessica stood twice as tall as the damaged building but leaned down to the shattered window. “Rich, you ready?”

He had walked over to the edge of room. “Yeah I'm ready.”

Carefully, Jessica used her other hand to grasp Rich. At only about sixty feet tall, she had to hold Rich and Versa in separate hands, but she gripped them both comfortably and securely with their heads and shoulders sticking out of her big fists. She brought them both up to her face.

“So what's the plan?” she asked Rich.

“Mmm... I don't know,” he mused. “Walk up the mountain? When we get to the house I'll go in with Versa and see if we can find Harrison.”

“Alright,” Jessica concurred.

“When we find him, just don't step on him Jessica, you've got big feet,” Rich teased.

“Sass me again little man and you're walking,” Jessica shot back.

“Fair enough,” Rich conceded as Jessica started heading on her way. Swinging her legs over the fence that spanned the laboratory's perimeter, Jessica walked out of Dreamland and started following the road up to Dos Palos. On the mountain top high above, the tiny sight of the mansion loomed over them ominously.

 

Once they'd gone, Kat sat alone in her wrecked office, moping in a sullen stupor of grief. She noted that somehow the electricity to the building still worked, but then she remembered it was all just a sim and of course the electricity never went out. It made her angry again to remember that SunCorp had trapped her in this prison because she'd wanted to do the right thing.

Kat's determination wouldn't allow her to wallow in misery very long. Her courageous work ethic began creeping into her fingers and without at first realizing it, her mind began channeling her grief into plotting revenge on SunCorp.

Wheeling up to her computer, she started accessing some of the VERSA databases to see if she could figure out a way to find the root directory of VERSA-B. None of the obvious places she looked revealed anything. But direct interaction with VERSA-B was possible, as evidenced by Vanessa's ability to control her size.

And that's how she remembered the smartwatch. It sat on the table next to her where she had placed it before Vanessa had rocked her world. Beholding it like a powerful and mysterious heirloom, Kat knew unlocking it would be the key to getting herself and everyone else back to the real world.

Without wasting another second, she got to work breaking into VERSA-B.

 

 

Chapter 24 by Q-Writer

Chapter 24:

(Posted: April 21)

 

 

 

Panic. His entire world was consumed by panic.

When Harrison realized Claire had shrunk him, he knew he was fucked. But this unassailable fact did not deter him from doing everything he could to avoid her. With desperation he quickly looked around the gigantic room, hoping he could find anywhere to escape or hide. The room only had two large entryways out to the rest of the house, and despite these exits only being a step up from the floor of the lounge, it was a step Harrison found impossible to climb at his size. Claire had trapped him in this room for a reason.

He expected Claire to bolt up from her chair and immediately capture his tiny body, but she seemed in no hurry. Languidly, Claire rose from her chair. Raising her arms above her head in a cute little stretch as if she had just awoken from a nap, she didn't address him or even look at him. When she walked over to her swirling wall, she likewise paid him no heed.

Each one of her steps shook the carpet below Harrison's feet. He did his best to run across the floor, first reaching a raised couch that towered high above him. Once he had made it under the large piece of furniture, he spotted the wall of the room not much farther off. Set into the wall, a window reached all the way down to the carpeted floor.

Immediately he decided to make for the window and see if there was some hole or seam in the frame he could slip through. It was a long shot, sure, but he was desperate for a way to escape. As Claire interacted with her special wall, Harrison beat his way over to the window.

When he approached it, his hopes shattered. The window frame was sturdy and flush with the wall and the enormous glass panes betrayed no defects. Fuck.

He swiveled his head around, now considering burrowing into a couch or chair. The beautifully carved baseboards against the wall were another option, but like the window they looked flawless.

Claire's voice broke his concentration. “I just told them back at the lab to get to work on the special arrangements I made for you,” she said, still typing into the wall. “It should only take them an hour or so before we can de-sim you and your friends, but in sim-time, that gives me more than half a day with you!”

Finally, she broke her concentration and scanned the room. Harrison started sprinting back toward the couch where he had come from. Luckily, it blocked Claire's view of him.

“Oh, I see you're hiding,” she teased him. “This will make it all the better when I find you. I hope you're really trying to get away from me!”

She sounded excited. Giddy. She reminded Harrison of a teenager about to meet up with her crush on a first date. He pushed the terror out of his mind; he didn't want to think about what this insane woman would do if she caught him.

Harrison sprinted under the couch just as Claire began walking across the room toward him. Though her feet gently walked on the padded carpet, each footfall crunched the plush floor ominously and only reminded Harrison of her unconquerable size and strength.

From under the couch he could only see her bare feet and ankles and the cuffs of her jeans above them. The couch had enough space under it that he could stand, but it also made effectively hiding under it impossible. If she got down on her hands and knees, he'd be a goner.

“Wherrrre arrrreee youuuu?” she called out to him gently. Shit. She was really getting into this game. Harrison cursed her as he started running to the opposite end of the couch, away from Claire's monstrous form.

After a few seconds of running, he made it to the edge of the far side of the couch. Out of breath, he could feel his heart beating furiously within his chest. He reminded himself none of it was real, but his digital exhaustion prevented him from moving as he recovered.

Suddenly the couch above him shook, its wooden legs creaking and shifting. He turned around, expecting to see Claire's feet, but they were gone. He looked left and right. No feet. She had disappeared. Where the hell could she be?

“You must be under the couch!” he heard her exclaim. Above him. She was on the couch. “I promise if you come out now I won't hurt you...”

Before he could consider his next move, she laughed to herself, shaking the couch again. The hunt had already sadistically amused Claire. “Who am I kidding?” she confessed out loud, “I'm gonna make you regret ever fucking with me and my company.”

Without another thought, Harrison bolted out from under the couch, specifically the back side of the couch, hoping she wasn't looking behind it. There was nowhere else for him to hide in this direction, but he figured she would start looking under the couch at any moment. Maybe if he could hide against the baseboards....

“There you are!” she cried out happily. Harrison swiveled his head to look behind him and caught her devilish face looking down at him from over the back of the couch. She grinned like the Cheshire Cat, her perfect teeth smiling at him from between her plump red lips.

Harrison turned forward to look ahead and in that instant realized how much of a dolt he was; he'd literally cornered himself. Not like he stood much of a chance to begin with, but now he was in the open between the couch and the wall with nowhere nearby to hide. Sure, he could try running back under the couch, but that would merely delay the inevitable.

Claire swung her immense body over the back of the couch and landed on her feet, shaking the floor and causing Harrison to fall to the ground. He quickly pushed himself up from the carpet and looked back toward her. Her two bare feet, each one considerably larger than him, stood dangerously before him. Dreadfully, he raised his gaze up her body, first beholding her legs, then her busty torso, and finally settling on her mischievous face. She looked immensely pleased with herself. Whereas before she'd seemed annoyed while talking to him, now she exuded satisfaction and happiness. The chase was over; Harrison's punishment would begin now.

He stood motionless as Claire gently brought her right foot forward, directly over his little body. His brain screamed at him to run but he cowered, paralyzed by fear and awe. Her giant foot cast a shadow that darkened the carpet all around him. Looking up at her sole he could see all the grooves and wrinkles of her foot. Even a tiny freckle near her big toe.

When Claire dropped her massive foot on Harrison, it felt as if the sky had fallen upon him in an apocalyptic fashion. Her foot, which looked so big above him, appeared even larger as it quickly descended. He had little time to think before it crushed him into the carpet, but the final thought he could muster was utter amazement at how casually she could completely dominate him.

Claire didn't have to stomp on Harrison to make him feel her wrath; in fact, all she did was take a simple step onto the little bug on the carpet. Her rough sole collided into Harrison and knocked him down, and in less than a moment he was flat on his back, screaming in immeasurable pain. Adrenaline kicked into his brain as the pain seared into his body. And all she did was step her pretty little foot down.

Suddenly she stepped off of him, but it took him a second to notice this while his overloaded nerves rang. His body had been crushed. He blinked his eyes, the brightness of the room returning as she set her foot down besides him. Looking up through bleary eyes, the wicked giantess lorded above him. He could barely make out her face past her gargantuan legs and prominent bosom, but he could still see the smugness plastered all over her face.

“Does it hurt yet?” she called down to him. He didn't respond-- nor could he. Harrison felt like he had been run over by a fleet of buses and would never move again. Rage coursed through him; he hated that she could torture him so easily with just her foot. After everything he had survived in VERSA, he couldn't believe it had all just led to this.

Claire crouched down to get a better look at Harrison. Her knees zoomed out of his vision and her jean-clad crotch lowed down above him. Fascinated eyes dissected him with interest. And he would be damned if she didn't look slightly aroused too.

“I changed your avatar so you're invulnerable,” she told him. “So you can't accidentally de-sim while we play. No matter what happens to you now, the sim will try reconstructing your body to its original state, almost like a rubber band snapping back into place. Neat, huh? It's something the programmers just came up with last week, another potential fix to all our recent problems. Too bad they didn't figure out how to do it sooner, or else my dad might still be here...”

She momentarily lost herself in thought, but then narrowed her eyes and honed in on Harrison. “One of the reasons the sim was designed to eject pilots upon death was to protect their minds. Sure, an invincible body would be cool, but the point of realism is to feel pain. Can you imagine having a body that wouldn't die? You'd just feel pain endlessly. Some things are worse than death. Anyways, no one's been gutsy enough to volunteer to have it tested on themselves yet... but with you, well let's just say you and I are going to conduct a little experiment. Let's see if it keeps working!”

He stared back at her with unfathomable hate. She had made his digital body impervious to harm but he still had the same vulnerable mind. And the pain was intense. Unbearable. If she spent the next minute doing nothing but crushing him under her foot, Harrison was sure he would go insane.

Watching Claire stand back up, any reprieve he hoped for evaporated when her foot passed over him again. She was just getting warmed up.

Again she brought her foot down upon him, but this time put some of her weight on it. He didn't notice; pain can only get so intense and his brain was already at its limit. He had no air to breathe under her foot, but it wouldn't have mattered because her weight pushed his lungs back into his spine. What started out as a scream turned into a silent cry as Claire tortured her little captive. If Harrison had been able to see up to her face, he would have noticed her eyes alight with sadistic desire.

Although Harrison couldn't begin to guess how long she ultimately played with him this way, it continued for some time. Claire would alternate between pressing down on him and then lifting up her foot, giving him time to recover and fear what came next. She was having fun; she hated what he stood for and what he'd done to her company.

If Harrison could have thought about anything besides the pain, he might have cursed this young woman for being a psychopath, or for probably not getting enough hugs from her parents when she was a kid. Back then, she had probably picked the wings off of flies or burned ants with a magnifying glass. Clearly she held no regard for his comfort or well-being. Reveling in his torture, Claire Starr was a sick and dangerous human being.

As his vision blacked out, Harrison wished for nothing more than the pain to stop. He even asked for death. Suddenly, the idea of his brain exploding on a waterchair back in the lab sounded particularly inviting; he wished he'd never woken up in VERSA-B and had instead died when he left the original sim. And as the recent memory of his drowning flashed through his mind, he remembered Jessica. And suddenly he didn't want to die anymore.

Harrison reflexively gasped when Claire lifted her foot off of him, but he wasn't breathing real air. His head spun as light returned to his eyes, but it wasn't even real light. And Claire still stood above him, hands on her waist, but she felt very real.

“Had enough yet, asshole?” she taunted him from high above.

Despite the overwhelming pain, Harrison managed to weakly raise an arm. Though it should have been ground into dust, he discovered it still worked. Claire hadn't been kidding; he really was invulnerable.

His entire body felt like a stiff neck one usually wakes up with when the alarm clock goes off at six in the morning. Though he could technically move, it didn't feel comfortable. And the pain, of course, still distracted him immensely. He hadn't given up, but he couldn't fight Claire. Not at her size. She was too big.

He was vaguely aware when she bent down to pick him up. Once again his torso collapsed as her fingers carelessly pinched his small body. The world whirled by as she brought him up to her face. He felt nauseated, but he was pretty sure his stomach was out of place somewhere inside his body, so throwing up was currently impossible.

Claire looked at him with revulsion and disdain, and all Harrison could reply with was a disoriented look of pain and helplessness.

“You really are pathetic,” she commented, inspecting him like the inconsequential bug he was. “You know, when I decided to keep you in here with me, I considered eating you. You know, to let you suffer for a few hours in my belly while it tried digesting you. I mean, I could still do that later, but I don't want to deprive myself the fun of playing with you first.”

“Let me.... go....” he struggled to say. He was already exhausted and her crushing fingers made it difficult to speak.

“Not a chance,” she responded with an amused smile. “We're just getting started!”

She lowered him to her side and started walking through the house. Harrison could hardly notice or care where she was going with him. The pain caused by her unmerciful foot started ebbing from his body but he still felt wrecked. And when Claire bounded up the staircase, the jostling only caused his body to hurt more. It made him miss the gentle hands of Jessica.

Once upstairs, Claire went down a hallway and opened a wooden door. The room appeared inverted in Harrison's vision as he dangled upside down in Claire's grasp, but he could see it was decorated similarly to the rest of the house. A large, four poster bed dominated the very center of the room. Claire dropped him carelessly on top of the colorful quilt that covered the bed.

The blanket was soft but it didn't have much give, so Harrison bounced painfully before his crumpled body came to rest. Despite feeling like he'd been worked over by a giant rolling pin, he did his best to steel his nerves for whatever was coming next. Pushing himself upright, Harrison sat up in time to watch Claire unsnap her jeans. Squeezing her thighs out of them, she presented herself to Harrison dressed in just her white shirt and a purple thong. It didn't take a genius to figure out what would come next.

Catching him watching her with suspicious eyes, Claire simply remarked to Harrison, “I just wanted to get comfortable.” Unstrapping the smartwatch on her wrist, she placed it on the bedside table, far out of reach from Harrison.

She sat down on the bed and swung her legs over him, finally resting them on either side of his body. Due to his minuscule size, even if he stood, he still wouldn't have been able to see over them. She'd trapped him in the valley of her thighs and calves, which rose like cliffs on either side of him.

“Aren't you going to try to run?” she asked him ominously. She was doing her best to intimidate him.

“Fuck you,” Harrison responded between breaths. “You know I can't get away.”

“Aww, but it's more fun when you try!” Claire said, smiling.

“Stop teasing me and just do what you're gonna do,” he huffed back. He didn't feel like running, much less even standing.

Claire's hand shot into view and before Harrison could react, she flicked him. Hard. Pain bloomed in his chest. The force from her finger doubled him over and he tumbled down the bed toward her feet. Flailing his arms around to try stopping himself, he finally came to rest in a ball of pain. It felt like every one of his ribs had been broken, so he turned himself over to lie on his back. When he coughed he expected blood to come out, but none came. VERSA-B wouldn't let any serious harm come to him.

“Don't be a bitch,” Claire scolded him, “or I'll just make it worse for you.” She shuffled her body back so she could support herself on the mountain of pillows behind her. Apparently, she wanted to be comfortable for all this.

From her new position, Harrison could see her dreaded feet splayed out on either side of him. Off in the distance down the length of her legs, a slim triangle of purple fabric covered her crotch. It was an erotic view but sex was the last thing on his mind.

“My foot hurts from stomping on you,” Claire complained to him. “Go over and rub it.”

Harrison couldn't believe the gall of her command. “You want me to do... what?” he called up to her indignantly. No way he'd even be able to give her a foot massage at his size, even if she really wanted it.

“You heard me little man,” she replied sternly. “I want you to rub my foot.” She pointed angrily at her right foot.

Harrison wanted to resist and defy her but he felt dejected. She's just torture him more. Slowly getting his legs under him, he trudged the short distance over to her foot. It loomed over him. Claire had pretty feet that she clearly maintained, but he feared both of them for the unmerciful crushers they were.

Approaching her sole, Harrison put his hands up and pushed into it. Twinges of pain shot through his shoulders but he ignored them. Though her foot looked soft, he knew from experience that it wasn't, and even pressing into it with his little strength didn't seem to do much. It certainly didn't elicit a reaction from the cruel giantess he served.

From behind the foot, Harrison heard her address him. “You call that a massage? It barely tickles! Put your back into it.”

He tried. Harrison turned around and propelled himself into her foot with his shoulders, pushing against her sole with the strength of his legs. He didn't really know how to give a foot massage with his whole body and he wasn't learning quickly either.

It occurred to him that Claire might have deliberately set him up to fail. Regardless, she quickly grew impatient. She pulled her foot away from him suddenly, causing him to fall down onto the quilt. And a moment later she dropped her foot right back on top of him, grinding him into the bed.

Claire roughly rolled Harrison's body under her foot, his limbs tangling and bruising together. “Now this is what I'm talking about!” she cried out happily. “Maybe you are good for something after all.”

The situation was preposterous, but all Harrison could do was submit and wait for Claire to get bored. Eventually she lifted her foot off of him, allowing him to breathe. She'd abused him so much by this point that it surprised him that his arms and legs hadn't fallen off yet. A wildfire of pain ravaged his body.

Peeling off her shirt, Claire rocked the bed as she disrobed. Tossing her white t-shirt aside, Harrison finally got a much better look at her huge breasts. At normal size they would have turned heads, but at his size they absolutely dwarfed him. Despite the pain, his gaze was transfixed. A white bra pushed them together snugly, forming a deep valley of cleavage between them. And behind the thin fabric, her turgid nipples poked prominently against the material that struggled to keep her boobs in place.

“You should consider yourself lucky,” she informed him, cupping her breasts seductively. “Most guys only get to wish they could see these.”

He couldn't believe how quickly she could shift from her ruthlessly murderous mood to a sweeter one of sex and seduction. It only reaffirmed his belief that this woman was beyond insane.

“What do you want me to say? Nice tits?” he croaked up to her sarcastically. Claire pouted at him but she hardly seemed offended.

“I bet you want to touch them,” she told him aggressively as her hands snaked behind her back to unclasp her bra. “Men are all the same.”

“Oh, if you're giving me a choice, I'll pass then,” he replied. Harrison wasn't usually one to sass much, but in this situation, what more did he have?

Claire's hands reappeared from behind her back and she used them to slip the bra off her shoulders. The cups popped loose from her breasts and she slid out of the garment. Though he had been catty, Harrison couldn't help but watch her boobs tumble out of the bra in awe. They were big and they were beautifully shaped and perky too. Her large areolas centered on her dark, bullet-shaped nipples, which stuck out from her body defiantly. He hated to admit it, but Claire was hot. Really hot.

With a confidence that only beautiful women possess, Claire was pleased to watch the effect she had on him. Her smugness wasn't lost on him though, and he felt rather ashamed that he found her so attractive. Not only could she dominate him physically, she even controlled his attention with her beauty. In a twisted paradox, the sexier she looked made him revile her exponentially more.

Like lightning, her hand shot out and Claire picked up Harrison once again. His defenses down, Harrison could hardly realize what had happened as he zoomed up to her face. Holding him right before her, Claire's large eyes looked deep into his tiny little pupils. She beheld him with a smoldering, sexual hunger.

“I've always wanted to test the outer bounds of VERSA,” she said, her warm breath washing over Harrison's struggling little body. “The fact that I can feel I'm already wet makes me think the programmers did a good job.”

“That's really what this is all about? Sex?!” Harrison shouted back at her, trying to breathe between the iron pinch of Claire's fingers. It sounded much less like a question and more of an accusation.

“My daddy never let me go into VERSA unsupervised,” Claire explained. “So I've never gotten to use it for all it's worth-- until now.”

“You're a bitch,” Harrison retorted. He wished he could be angrier and hurt her somehow, but even his rage was no match for Claire's size. She held him firmly and he was entirely powerless in her hand.

“You know what's funny?” she asked him. But before he could even fathom a guess she kept talking. “None of this is even really happening. I'm not actually holding you, and you're not actually a couple inches tall. We're both sitting comfortably in waterchairs at the moment, lost in a dream. So, you know, this is only as real as you want it to be.”

Amused by herself, Claire grinned like the evil sexy sorceress she was.

Harrison couldn't stand her. “Fuck you!” he argued back. “You're only telling yourself that so you can act like an asshole to me in here!”

He didn't have the mental energy right now to embark on a philosophical conversation about reality with her. But Claire wanted to play along.

“I mean, I guess you're right,” she conceded. “What I'm about to do with you is going to feel soooo good, and you bet it's going to feel real. But it's funny like, my body won't actually be physically fucking you. My mind is going to be fucking you.”

Claire dropped her hand down to her left breast, bringing her engorged nipple up to Harrison's face. He got a quick, up-close look at it before she smashed his entire body into her boob. When she pushed Harrison against her nipple, the hard flesh punched into him, knocking the wind out of his chest. And as she increased the pressure on him he could feel some pliancy beneath the skin, but ultimately the firmness of her breast pushed back against him uncomfortably.

She started grinding Harrison into her breast, her hard nipple poking Harrison's body like a battering ram. He kicked his legs to try pushing away from her, but Claire's fingers against his back held him firmly against her breast. As he fought her, Harrison began to hear her moan.

Momentarily releasing him, Claire's boob sprung back up and flung Harrison's tiny body off it. She caught him deftly with her hand and proceeded to drag him over to her other breast where she similarly smothered him. Because it was right in his face, Harrison couldn't tell if his futile ministrations had any pleasing effect on her nipple. But as he beat his fists against her, she only became more aroused.

“I should have tried this such a long time ago...” Claire moaned softly to herself.

Giving him respite once more, she peeled Harrison off her breast and dangled him above the chasm between her enormous, heaving boobs. Harrison looked down at her pale skin glistening under a thin sheen of sweat. He knew what came next.

Claire dropped her hand down and deposited him snugly between her boobs. Bringing her arms up on either side of them, she flexed her shoulders, crushing her breasts together with Harrison trapped in her cleavage. His senses were immediately assaulted by the smell of her sweaty skin and the unbearable force of her two over-sized boobs breaking his body. Enveloped in darkness and steamy heat, pain exploded from Harrison's body once more as his world rocked around him. Claire was laughing in delight, and her boobs jiggled around him as she reveled in his misery.

Light filtered into her cleavage as she relaxed her arms and her boobs briefly fell away from each other. Sweat plastered Harrison to the side of one of them. At this point his shirt and pants were soaked through and practically in shreds from the amount of abuse he'd taken. And as he blinked his eyes in an attempt to regain his sight, all he could see was the sexy curve of her other breast in front of him.

“Oh, hold on a second,” Claire said before instantly smashing him back into place within her cleavage. Trapping him between her boobs, Claire scooted down the bed and lifted her ass up to slide her thong off her body. Kicking up her legs to dislodge the last bit of clothing she wore, a moment later she reclined back onto the bed, pushing most of the pillows onto the floor. She relaxed the embrace of her bosom and watched Harrison struggle to regain his breath. He stumbled off the side of her boob and collapsed in between her breasts, utterly defeated.

If Harrison thought her stomping foot felt terrible, getting crushed in her cleavage was worse. It was hotter and sweatier, and the plumpness of her breasts molded around the shape of his body better, inflicting maximum pain. And that she'd used her bountiful assets to absolutely humiliate him didn't help his ego either. Trying to pick himself up and regain whatever tiny dignity he still held onto, Harrison attempted to stand, knowing in an instant her breasts could smash him again.

Turning to look at her face, he could plainly see her arousal. Her lusty gaze and her quietly moaning mouth indicated all too well how she felt.

“I can't wait any longer,” she said huskily.

Harrison saw the shadow of her hand descend upon him. He tried fleeing from it through the valley of her cleavage, but once again he couldn't beat her. Her fingers pinched him and flung him down her torso, his body tumbling over her flat stomach.

Harrison came to a stop in the shallow divot of her belly button. Coated in her sweat, he felt miserable and disgusting. Another of Claire's fingers assaulted him, trying to pinch his little form. In her haste, she accidentally ripped away Harrison's tattered shirt. Instantly, Harrison's body shook as the landscape below him convulsed with laughter.

Claire's prodding finger returned, and this time it pinned him to her skin. And then to his horror it started sliding him across her body. Downward. Harrison kicked his legs and beat against her gigantic finger but it was no use.

Expecting to get bristled by pubic hair, it momentarily surprised him when he felt none. But then her firm skin suddenly yielded to much more pliant and sticky flesh. Claire's finger pushed him hard against it and Harrison got drenched just as Claire let out a booming moan. She was rubbing him against her pussy, and Harrison had finally discovered hell.

It felt like he had landed in a dunk tank of warm, gooey discharge. Claire's arousal washed over his body and flooded his face, getting into his mouth and up his nostrils. It tasted fishy and heady and Harrison coughed and gasped in search of air. Meanwhile, Claire continued to smear him over her wet pussy, his body tumbling over her sensitive folds.

Though her labia were rather soft and squishy against his body, the aroma and moistness overwhelmed Harrison's senses and he could hardly orient himself. Her cum gushed into his mouth and he couldn't even scream, but his brain ran at a thousand miles an hour trying to figure out what he could do to stop this torment. Flailing his arms and looking for anything to grab onto, his hands only found slippery, sensitive flesh overwhelming him in all directions.

Claire's leading finger, the ever-present force against his back, drew him up to her clitoris. Harrison felt his body pushed over the cantaloupe-sized nub, eliciting a mighty reaction from the giantess. Her body shook and he felt her moan; his ears, gunked full of her secretions, weren't letting in sound anymore. And every time he tried prying open his eyes, they burned from the frothy cum that coated his entire body.

After rubbing him across the bump of her clit for some time, Claire was ready for the final humiliation of Harrison. He sensed it too when she moved him off her clit and down the cleft between her lips. First his feet and legs slipped inside of her, the constricting flesh rubbing against them on all sides. The temperature ratcheted up as her juices felt even warmer around his body. And then with a simple push of her finger, Harrison's body effortlessly slid inside Claire's pussy.

A large squelching noise swallowed his puny body as Harrison found himself in a cocoon of intense heat and slippery plushness. He blinked his stinging eyes open momentarily and saw nothing but darkness. His hands felt around in all directions and came up against the wet, pulsing walls of her vagina. She surrounded him in every direction and even completely soaked in her lubricant, there was little space for him to maneuver inside of her.

Suddenly a mighty force punched his head and pushed him deeper into her cunt. When it retreated and Harrison recovered, he realized it must have been her finger pushing him deeper. He felt nothing upon his feet and wondered if his shoes had finally disintegrated off his body. Then he felt his fingers sticking together; the viscosity of her cum was starting to glue them to each other.

Harrison was trapped as Claire's sex toy. Unable to breathe in her tight, moist pussy he began asphyxiating, but death would not come to him. His senses overwhelmed, he convulsed and thrashed inside Claire's sex, but he was helpless to stop his predicament.

Trapped deep inside of her, he could feel her heartbeat pumping blood into the sensitive tissue that surrounded him. It pumped furiously. Harrison didn't really have time to think about Claire at the moment, but her world ruled his. And as her heart rate quickened and her body shook, Harrison realized in disgust that she was nearing orgasm. He wanted to stop fighting against her, to deny her the pleasure of conquering him, but the animal inside his brain told his body to keep fighting to stay alive.

When Claire came, Harrison knew it. The gooey walls around him tensed up and exploded in force, pushing and pulsing around his body. More cum roared into her vagina and he felt the force of her contractions pushing him back towards the entrance of her pussy. Her vagina simultaneously squeezed and crushed him, forcing more cum down his throat and collapsing his airless lungs. It felt like getting caught in a frenzied, pulsing, industrial dishwasher of sex.

Harrison lost all sense of time when Claire forced him into herself. He was trapped in an awkward limbo between truly being alive and certainly being dead. The world that had once existed outside no longer mattered or seemed real to him. His new universe was her. He had no idea how long her orgasm lasted or if it knocked him unconscious. All he knew was when he finally regained a semblance of his senses, he was still inside of her awful pussy.

The lack of oxygen never abated and the pain was constant, but somehow he summoned the effort to try moving his body. He could feel her heart rate diminish and her finger hadn't tried to pull him out or push him in deeper. Harrison twisted his body a bit, and remembering what he'd done while inside of Jessica, decided to try making his way out of Claire's vagina.

Claire's wetness seriously impeded his ability to push himself; it felt like he'd been coated all over in slippery butter, but slowly he made forward progress. He wondered if gravity might be helping him out. Blinking open his crusty eyes, blearily he could make out a faint slit of light. He must be close to her entrance.

Light suddenly flooded his eyes. Claire had gently pried herself apart, and Harrison could see the hazy outline of her creamy white legs extending off into the distance. She was standing up, and between her legs her purple thong stretched across her knees. Oh no.

Once again, a giant finger zoomed into view, and before he could scream it pushed him back into her vagina. In an instant, Claire's simple prodding negated all his hard work and progress. And once she had trapped his pleasantly struggling body deep inside of her, she pulled up her thong. There was no way he could escape now.

Blissfully humming the tune of some banal pop song, Claire began redressing herself, her skin glowing in happy, post-orgasm contentedness. The futile ministrations of her little prisoner only served to keep her playfully aroused. One down, three to go, she thought. Still having a lot to do today, Claire decided she would only continue paying attention to her tiny sex toy when she needed the distraction.

 

 

Chapter 25 by Q-Writer

Chapter 25:

(Posted: April 26)

 

 

 

As Jessica's large form lumbered up the winding mountain road to Dos Palos, Rich watched Versa with suspicion. Though holding her passengers separately, Jessica kept both her clutched fists relaxed and steady in front of her chest. For the first few minutes of the walk, Rich stayed silent and observed Versa, who seemed euphorically distracted. He knew she was unpacking herself into VERSA-B.

“What've you found?” he finally asked her. Jessica looked down at Rich but realized his question wasn't directed at her. It took a moment for Versa to snap out of her reverie and respond.

“What do you mean?”

“You're growing into this new world, right?” asked Rich. “So what have you found? What's it like? Similar to the old one?”

“Oh yes,” she replied happily. “So many of the building blocks are the same as my other world. So far, some things are in different places and others I have yet to find. It's exciting!” She beamed with the youthful exuberance of a child playing in a sandbox.

Jessica cut in. “Once we get Harrison, can you de-sim us from here?”

“Ah, that's not exactly how it works, I don't have the inherent ability to make you exit. Unless of course, I induce a physical feat to perform a fatal action upon your form,” she explained hesitantly. “But I located the exiting controls for you interlopers rather quickly,” she continued, “so now I can prevent the outsiders from manipulating the process. I can prevent them from exiting you and anyone else spontaneously.”

“Sounds reasonable,” Rich commented. It seemed like Versa was willing to help them de-sim, or in the least stop SunCorp from keeping them in VERSA-B.

He couldn't wait to get to the bottom of this. Once he was back in the real world, he planned to expose SunCorp's sins to the Department of Defense and then sit back back and watch the carnage. He had a few bones to pick, but now he really wanted to meet Claire Starr and tell her how badly she'd fucked up. Just the thought made him smile.

“I think I can see where the house is,” Jessica informed them. “What's the plan?”

Rich had already thought this out a few minutes ago. He explained:

“Well, obviously we've lost the element of surprise, but that's ok. Jessica, stomp up real mean and drop me and Versa right at the front door. If you wait outside the house as an insurance policy, we'll go in and see if we can find Harrison. Claire's likely to be around, but if I have to break her arm to get to Harrison, I'll do it. And if she has one of those watches like Vanessa did, that's where you step in Jessica.”

Versa looked over at Rich. “Claire's the one who built me, right? She's the one in control?”

Rich chuckled at her ignorance. “She just owns the company. So we'll make her answer all our questions. And yeah, maybe she can even help you with your problems too.”

An expression of awe washed across Versa's face. Rich personally couldn't care less what impossible dreams she might harbor, but he wanted to insure her cooperation with his plan by dangling the interrogation of Claire in front of her.

“Alright, here we go,” Jessica informed them as she stepped over the gate at the foot of the main drive. Rich looked out in front of them and immediately spotted the grand mansion, looking exactly the same as it had in VERSA. In the daylight though, he finally appreciated the beautiful view of the surrounding valley and mountains. The location was picturesque indeed.

Jessica strolled up the drive and planted her booted feet firmly in front of the house. She easily stood taller than the imposing stone structure. “Good luck guys,” she whispered to her little friends as she gently set them down by the front door.

“Thanks for watching our backs,” Rich said as he craned his neck up to look at her.

“No problem,” she replied impatiently. “Go get him back now.”

Rich turned to Versa. “Follow me,” he told her confidently.

Luckily, the pair found the building's large wooden front door unlocked. Rich pushed it aside and crossed the threshold into Dos Palos. He only spent a moment marveling at the exact same lavish décor he'd seen back in VERSA. But this house seemed abandoned. Was nobody home?

“Harrison?” Rich called out. “You in here?”

No one replied. Surely if Harrison and Claire were here, they would have not only seen Jessica approach, but felt it too.

“I've been here before...” Versa commented, gazing at the foyer and main hall of the house. “This place is so familiar to me.”

“Yeah, it's a copy of a real house,” Rich brushed her off quickly. “Seems to pop up everywhere.” He walked down a short hallway to the left and looked into a large sitting room. “Harrison?”

No one replied. But then Rich saw something move. On the wall.

“What the fuck?” he muttered to himself.

Taking a step down into the room, Rich navigated around a few large chairs and a table to reach a section of wall that seemed to be moving. He heard Versa follow him into the room, but she wandered off to inspect some boxes stacked up against a different wall.

Like a television screen, Rich watched the wallpaper ripple and swirl. It began showing letters and numbers at random before they faded back into the wall. He couldn't make sense of any of it. It almost felt like looking at an old computer screensaver.

“There you are,” a woman's voice said from behind him. Rich spun around in surprise to see a very young woman enter the room. Though she was dressed casually in just jeans and a white t-shirt, he noticed immediately that she was incredibly pretty.

“Claire Starr?” Rich asked, curious but threateningly. Unfortunately his tone betrayed his confusion and surprise.

Before he could recover, the woman brought her left arm up to her right hand, and Rich realized in horror she had on the same type of smartwatch as Vanessa. He instinctively braced himself for an explosion, fearing she'd grow herself in the same way Vanessa had. When she shrunk him instead, he quickly realized how mistaken he'd been.

As the room enlarged around him, Rich went into immediate survival mode. Though the carpet felt plush and difficult to run across, he did his best to sprint over to a nearby chair. Judging the size of it, the woman he figured was Claire Starr must have reduced him to only a couple inches tall. He quickly hid behind one of the chair's massive legs, but he knew Claire had probably seen him hide. Despite how helpless it seemed, it was the best he could do.

Rich assumed she would immediately come after him. As he pushed the initial fear out of his mind, he regained his ability to pay attention to the rest of the room. And he felt no booming footsteps. Instead, he heard Claire's voice, but she wasn't addressing him.

“Who are you?!” she said in shock.

Rich smiled. She must have noticed Versa.

“Are you... Claire?” Versa replied.

“You're not with the government!” Claire stammered. “Who the fuck are you?”

“I'm... Versa,” she replied shyly.

Rich couldn't see the two gigantic women talk, but he could hear their conversation easily. Blessed with the distraction, he used the next few minutes to relocate himself as he scurried under the many chairs, couches, and tables placed throughout the room. By the time Claire finally decided to look for him, he vowed he would have discovered the best possible hiding spot in the room. Now he just had to hope Jessica didn't try crushing the house with him inside of it.

Though he couldn't see it, Claire was desperately scrolling through her watch trying to figure out a way to shrink this mysterious woman she had never seen before.

“You're... VERSA?” she replied back to this strange woman dressed in black.

“Um, I yes, that's what I've been called. You're the creator?”

Claire realized she wasn't talking to a pilot. Her mind moved fast. “Yes, I'm in charge of the VERSA project. You must be the artificial intelligence that I've heard so much about.”

Versa seemed confused but continued along. “You're the original builder of my world and this world then?”

“I guess so, yes,” Claire replied, never minding that she had immediately claimed all of her father's glory in front of this digital creation.

Versa's face lit up like a child meeting Santa Claus for the first time. Overcome with awe and wonderment, now she acted surprised and overwhelmed. Claire sensed this and immediately took control of the situation.

“The others brought you into this sim, yes?” Claire asked her.

“Yes, yes,” Versa sheepishly replied. “They said you could help me. I want to see their world-- your world.”

Claire furrowed her brow. “You mean, the real world? Not the sim?”

“Yes, that one! They said you were in charge and could help me.”

Claire scrunched her face, trying to think and not laugh out loud. If she was really talking to VERSA's AI right now, the same AI that had wrecked so much havoc on their sim, it sure seemed dumb and naive.

Feeling Harrison's little body writhe inside her pussy momentarily distracted Claire, causing her to shudder quietly in pleasure. She flexed her kegel muscles to get him to stop. All she needed to do now was figure out a way to control this AI and SunCorp would soon be out of this mess.

A booming rumble shook the house, causing the windows to rattle and the chandeliers to sway. Claire remembered giant Jessica was still outside. Once Vanessa had de-simmed, she'd informed Claire through the communication wall that Jessica had unlocked the ability to directly alter the size-changing code with her own mind. It made her impossible to subdue.

“Ok... Versa,” Claire requested urgently. “I can help you get what you want, but you need to do something for me first.”

“What is it?” Versa asked eagerly.

“Her,” Claire pointed out the window at Jessica. Her big black boot obscured the view beyond the window panes. “Did you give her the ability to change her size?”

“I did, yes, back in the other world.”

Claire took a step toward Versa and did her best to look expectant and desperate. “As long as she's out there, I can't help you. But if you change her back to the way she was, and shrink her down too, then I'll have the freedom to give you what you want.”

Versa seemed to be thinking, trying to process Claire's offer. But after a moment her contorted face turned into a vision of clarity.

“Oh, ok,” she finally acknowledged. “I can do that.”

Rich, now watching from beneath a couch, finally realized how manipulative Claire truly was. He knew that VERSA's AI at that very moment was running through the code surrounding Jessica's avatar to bend it towards Claire's will.

“You're shrinking her for me?” asked Claire in amazement.

“I just did,” Versa answered calmly.

“Thank you!!” exclaimed Claire. She was ecstatic. “Let me go get her, and then you and I can have a real good chat!”

Rich's world shook as Claire bolted out of the room. He watched Versa slowly follow behind her like a timid dog afraid to be without its owner. Her master would keep her safe, or so she thought. Claire had VERSA's AI on a dangerous leash made out of promises, but Rich knew now he was only a helpless bystander to the drama that was yet to unfold.

Finding himself alone in the room, Rich sat down on the carpet and propped himself up against the wooden couch leg. Him and Jessica had blown their chance to get out of VERSA-B and Harrison still was no where to be found. Unknown to Rich, Harrison had been in the same room as him the entire time.

 

Like every pilot that unexpectedly shrinks, the initial emotion for Jessica was fear. She didn't realize at first what happened until she reoriented herself. First, she saw the house, which now seemed enormous. Then she noticed the paved drive around her, which now stretched across an unfathomable expanse. And then she heard the creaking sound of Dos Palos's front door opening. Somehow, Jessica reckoned, she'd been shrunk.

Out in the open with nowhere to go, fear paralyzed her; she wasn't used to being the small one. Trying to summon her ability to grow herself back, Jessica knew something had extinguished the internal energy that fueled her unique defense. And the only person that could have done that was the same person who originally gave her the extraordinary power. She had been betrayed.

Jessica watched a giantess casually stride out of the front door of the mansion. The woman, who she assumed must be Claire Starr, sported an impressive bosom barely contained by the thin white t-shirt stretched over it. She looked incredibly young, maybe college-aged, and Jessica could tell right away she carried the loathsome demeanor of a spoiled rich girl.

Trying to run, Jessica's tiny form was immediately spotted by Claire. In no rush, the giantess casually walked over to Jessica and greeted her.

“You must be Jessica Hampton then, the Senate staffer,” she boomed down on the minuscule woman. “You weren't even originally supposed to be on this trip. Pity.”

Claire bent down and snatched Jessica off the ground. Jessica screamed as the giant woman lifted her into the air and brought her to her face. A pleased grin beamed back at Jessica's struggling body.

“I don't like unannounced visitors,” Claire sneered.

“Let me go!” Jessica screamed at her, trying to wiggle out her grasp. Claire held her tightly in her hand; Jessica must have been around four inches tall, still quite easy to manipulate.

“You're coming with me,” Claire informed her. “I need to put you somewhere out of the way while I clean up the shitstorm you and your friends made.”

Being carried back toward the house, Jessica frantically tried getting out of Claire's grasp, but to no avail. When she passed through the door into the house, she could see Versa standing there expectantly, regarding Claire with adoration and anticipation. Silently in her mind, Jessica cursed the perfidious AI. They'd done nothing but help it and indulge its whims, and it returned their favors not with gratitude but with chicanery.

Claire stepped back down into the lounge and walked over to the pile of boxes against the far wall. Finding a nearly empty cardboard box, she grabbed it and dumped out a few folders. Placing the now empty box upon one of the room's coffee tables, she unceremoniously dropped Jessica in.

Like an angry cat, Jessica hit the bottom of the cardboard box and immediately jumped back up to her feet. The cardboard walls towered over her, preventing an escape. Claire's menacing face smiled down at her from above.

“You bitch!” Jessica called up to her.

“That's not a very kind thing to say to the girl who holds your life in her hands,” Claire taunted her.

“Let me out! Let me de-sim!”

Claire shook her head. “Not yet Jessica,” she playfully replied. Jessica hated how much Claire seemed to be enjoying this.

“Why are you doing all of this?! Let me go! Let my friends go!”

Suddenly Claire became distracted, rolling back her eyes and letting out a soft moan. Was she aroused? Jessica was confused and terrified.

“Oh my,” Claire apologized. “He's really putting in quite the effort.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Jessica shouted to her.

“I guess I've had enough fun with him for now,” Claire said mysteriously. She stood up to her full height, and Jessica watched in shock as Claire unbuttoned and unzipped her jeans, hiking them down her thighs.

Exposing her purple thong to Jessica, Claire reached down toward her pussy, and Jessica watched in disgust as the giantess reached up into herself. Her fingers squelched inside her cunt as Claire let out one more lusty moan.

When she finally withdrew her hand out of her underwear, the sight of Harrison's tiny mangled body crushed Jessica's heart. Claire lowered him down to the box, telling Jessica, “He's all yours now. I've had my fun.”

With a sickening plop she dropped Harrison onto the floor of the box. Completely sodden by her cum, Harrison coughed and writhed in pain. Jessica ran over to him, the pungent smell of Claire's sex dominating the cardboard prison. Rage and shock boiled angrily in Jessica's heart, but for the moment compassion towards Harrison outshone her other feelings.

Reaching Harrison, Jessica realized once again she out-sized him. He must have been only half her height. He absolutely reeked of the smell of sex and he looked beat-up and bruised all over. Only a pair of raggedy pants remained on his body and they were soaked through with cum.

“Jessica?” Harrison said meekly, blinking through his eyes. His face was drenched in Claire's viscous fluids; he could hardly see.

“Oh my God, Harrison!” Jessica exclaimed in horror. “Are you ok?! What happened??”

Up above, Claire laughed at their pathetic reunion. Turning to Versa, she said, “Alright, now we can talk.”

Having put her pants back on, Claire walked across the room to sit on a couch, inviting Versa to converse with her. It didn't bother her that the two tiny people in the box might overhear their conversation; frankly, they didn't matter to her anymore. Plus, they'd be dead soon enough. And she had already forgotten about the other one who she shrunk not long ago.

But ironically, under the same couch she sat upon, Rich sat listening intently to the unfolding conversation between the head of SunCorp and the artificial intelligence that had been conjured into existence.

 

Harrison felt cold. Wet, sticky, and cold. He was barely aware of Jessica's presence; he could hardly see the bright world through his eyes, and his gunk-filled ears made everything sound like he was underwater. And the pain. So much pain. His body felt as if he'd been wrung out like a wet towel.

Harrison looked like a wreck. Although Jessica tried frantically talking to him, he hardly responded. He couldn't stop moaning and occasionally coughing up phlegm. Jessica rolled him onto his back, doing her best not to get Claire's tacky cum all over her clothes. Trying to clean herself, she wiped her sticky hands against the cardboard floor.

Realizing what had to be done, she needed to clean Harrison or at least dry him off. Remembering he little lipstick-tube knife, she reached under her skirt and stuck her hand down into her pantyhose. Extracting the small blade, which had shrunk along with her and her clothes, she popped the knife out of its sheath and began carefully cutting Harrison's pants off of him.

“Wha... what are you doing?” Harrison blearily asked. Since Jessica's stature was about twice his size, the small shank must have looked intimidating to him.

“I'm getting you out of these clothes Harrison, they'll only prevent you from getting dry.”

“Bu... but.... but then I'll be.... naked,” was his confused reply. Jessica worried he might lose consciousness soon. She couldn't believe the torture Claire had put him through.

“Hey, I'm past the point of caring about that,” she told him assertively. “Plus, you've basically already seen me naked.”

Thinking back to the little fun she'd had on the beach with Harrison, it had all felt so innocent at the time. But now she grappled with the horror of what an aroused vagina could do to a little man. She couldn't believe he was still alive.

“Oh yeah....” Harrison remembered, still in a daze of pain and confusion.

Jessica finished slicing off Harrison's sodden pants and underwear and stood up to wring them out as best she could. But the cum soaking them was very gooey, almost jelly-like, and she found that repeatedly wiping them across the cardboard floor worked much better to dry them. Once she had done her best, Jessica turned back toward Harrison.

Though she finally got to see Harrison completely naked, his sorry state did nothing but stir remorse in Jessica's heart. She felt bad for losing him in VERSA, and this had been the consequence. She couldn't help but feel terrible-- and somehow responsible-- for Harrison's pitiful fate.

Using the tatters of his pants, Jessica did her best to wipe the cum from Harrison's face and eyes. His head was only as large as her palm, so she took extra care wiping around his delicate features.

“Harrison, you doing ok?” she asked him calmly, doing her best to sound comforting and nurturing.

“Everything hurts,” he moaned in pain.

“Let me get as much of this off you as I can before it dries,” she told him. Jessica proceeded to wipe down his naked body, occasionally drying the sodden cloth by smearing it on the floor. Despite her best efforts, Claire's cum ended up soaking into the arms of her sweater. Jessica couldn't stand the lingering, heady smell of the giantess's arousal. It made her hate that bitch all the more. Somewhere across the room, she could hear her talking to Versa, but Jessica didn't have time to pay attention to her words.

“Why are you so much... bigger than me?” Harrison asked her.

“I don't know,” she said. “Versa shrunk me.”

“What? How?” he responded. It occurred to Jessica that Harrison had no idea they had let the woman in black into VERSA-B.

“We call it Versa, the AI, it's here in this world with us now,” Jessica explained. “She's working with Claire.”

“Claire's going to kill us,” Harrison croaked. The pain was still intense but his battered mind had started clearing up.

“What?” Jessica asked, finally finishing her cleaning of him. She tossed the remains of his pants aside and sat down next to his supine body.

“Yeah, she told me,” Harrison explained. He slowly sat up and propped himself up on his weak elbows. Looking over his own bruised and naked body, he felt ashamed next to Jessica, who still looked rather pretty. Glancing up at her concerned face, he watched it change into a loving smile.

“Geez, I smell awful,” he commented.

“Me too,” Jessica agreed. “Ugh, let me get this off,” she said, removing her soaked sweater. When she tossed it to the side, she treated Harrison to a view of her bra-covered breasts, to him twice as large as they normally would have been. Under different circumstances, he thought, it would have been an arousing sight, but sex was now the last thing he wanted to consider. Regardless, she still looked very good.

Jessica caught him staring and gave him a wry, knowing smile. But she wanted to hear more about what he had to say. After pressing him for information, Harrison recounted his meeting with Claire.

“What happened to Rich and Kat?” he finally asked her once he finished his monologue.

Jessica sighed. “I don't know what happened to Rich. He came into the house before me to look for you and I haven't seen him since. Maybe Claire shrunk him? Kat's still down at the lab. She's the only one that can save us now I guess.”

Harrison finally summoned the effort to look around their makeshift prison. He could feel the pain slowly ebbing from his body as he bounced back from the torture he had endured.

“Think we can get out of here somehow?” he asked Jessica.

“I've got my knife,” Jessica said. “Claire doesn't know about it, maybe we can cut through the cardboard with it?” The blade lay discarded on the floor next to them.

“Cardboard might be too thick,” Harrison said. “But even if we cut through, where can we go? This whole room is a trap. I'd tried to get out once before. The step is too high.”

Jessica smiled at him. “Yeah but remember, I'm bigger than you.”

“That somehow always seems to happen...” Harrison remarked. “Ugh, I'm sick of being little.”

“I'm sorry Harrison,” replied Jessica. “You've really been through more than anyone else here, haven't you?”

A thought made him smile. He looked up once again at Jessica's lovely face. He wanted to get out of VERSA-B just as badly as her, but it soothed his heart knowing that they had finally been reunited. It made him think about how much fun he'd had with her, and how unfortunate it was that he ultimately ended up inside Claire and not her.

“You know,” Harrison randomly admitted to her. “This might sound weird, but after Claire shoved me up into herself and used me, you know, to get herself off... I really wish I'd gotten to do it with you instead.”

Jessica's heart fluttered as she listened to Harrison's graphic and seemingly out-of-place comment. Well, she thought, it seems like he's finally recovered from his ordeal. And it made her remember what Versa had forced her to do to her ex-professor. Looking at Harrison's naked body, she could feel a hint of arousal return to her loins. She buried it in her mind.

Reaching a hand out, she stroked Harrison's face lovingly. “I missed you too,” she replied to him. “I wish our time hadn't got cut short in VERSA together. I was having fun with you on the beach.”

“Me too,” Harrison agreed. He slowly tried rising to his feet, wincing in pain as he forced his legs to stand again. “Maybe when this is all over we can continue where we left off.”

“I'd love that,” Jessica said with a smirk. “You doing ok?”

Harrison tried stretching his back. His spine felt like a zig-zag. Though he was still in pain, he was enjoying flirting with Jessica. He didn't care how sexual he was being towards her anymore, it didn't seem wrong and she certainly didn't seem to mind. It distracted him enough to make him feel slightly like a man again.

“Yeah,” he replied. Then he smiled to himself. “Y'know, I just feel bad I left you hanging back on that beach.” He grinned up to Jessica, causing her to blush. She couldn't believe how quickly Harrison had gone from a near death experience to talking dirty to her. It didn't weird her out so much-- in fact she found herself enjoying the playful distraction too. And he just seemed so cute at his current size...

“Well it's funny you say that...” she said in a teasing way. And over the course of the next few minutes, she caught Harrison up on her own story, including what Versa made her do to her old professor. Harrison reacted in stunned silence while Jessica did her best to explain that she had no choice in the matter. But hell, he'd already admitted he liked the idea of her doing the same thing to him, so she didn't feel too bad.

“Why would VERSA's AI want you to show it, you know, sex?” Harrison wondered aloud.

“I don't know,” said Jessica. “It's weird though. It's like she's evolving and trying to understand what it feels like to be human. She's got a lot of learning to do.”

“Yeah,” he echoed her. “She really does...”

 

Meanwhile across the room, Claire listened intently to Versa talk about her own existence. Though Claire didn't know much about computer science or AI theory, the sentience of SunCorp's program absolutely astounded her. Sure, this digital woman came off as naive, but Claire couldn't help but truly appreciate how revolutionary this AI was. Once they figured out a way to tame her and put her back in her place, she thought, SunCorp could make a killing selling this technology to the rest of the world.

It made no sense that this AI, which called itself “Versa,” wanted to venture into the real world. Claire described to her some bullshit idea where they could build a physical interface she could inhabit to experience the physical world. For a while Claire even thought that she'd convinced Versa of her sincerity to help her.

“Sure, I could tell my people to start working on something right away,” Claire told her optimistically. “Once they build a prototype, we could upload your program into the machine, and if we fit it with the right optic sensors, you could see for yourself a world outside of this digital creation.”

Her words transfixed Versa, who watched her with hungry eyes as she spoke. She held on closely to each of Claire's words, barely containing her excitement. Claire considered her with intrigue and pity, wondering what strange desires motivated this program. She had their AI eating out of the palm of her hand right now; she could have promised her just about anything and Versa would believe it.

“You could do that?” Versa asked her. “You could tell your builders to start working on it right now?”

“I mean, sure, I could,” Claire responded casually, trying to seem even more powerful than she was. “My wall over there lets me talk to my employees back in the real world.”

“Can you show me?”

“Yeah, let's take a look.”

The two women rose from the couch and walked over to the swirling wall. Claire touched it with her finger and the wallpaper rippled and shifted. She explained to Versa how the techs back at the lab could hone in on this particular part of VERSA-B, and by reading how she manipulated the code, could read her messages in real time and respond to her in a similar fashion.

Versa seemed to have so many questions for Claire. “And this is how you tell these people when it's time to leave, right? To go back to where you come from.”

“Yeah, pretty much.”

“And you promise you'll help me, right? To get out of this world and into yours?”

“Sure...” lied Claire. “If that's really what you want.” Claire couldn't wait to ditch Versa and get back to the real world. There was really nothing left for her in VERSA-B, and Versa had started sounding desperate and obsessive.

While Versa asked her another question about Claire's plans for her, Claire sent out a simple message asking her Tower to disconnect her. She wondered how Versa would react when she suddenly blinked out of existence in front of her.

The wall suddenly swirled in a strange way, with shades of red and purple colors flooding the moving image.

“What the hell?” Claire mumbled to herself.

“Were you just trying to leave?” Versa asked her sternly. “I didn't think we were done here.”

Claire froze. The feeling of control from earlier started slipping away. “Oh, uh, I just wanted to go back to the real world to start making preparations for you...”

“Why can't you do that from in here?” pressed Versa. “I want to trust you, Claire, but you're not really acting like a friend right now. Why are you trying to get away from me?”

Claire acted cool, but inside she was panicking. Had the AI hacked into her communication wall? She quickly tried sending out a different message, but Versa noticed what she was trying to do.

“Don't bother trying to leave,” she told Claire. “I've disabled the mechanisms your people use to interact with the exiting process. I want you to stay in here with me until my exit is ready too.”

She couldn't be serious, Claire thought. It would take months, if not years, of careful research and development to even prototype the kind of device she had whimsically promised to Versa. Though she'd been bluffing with VERSA's AI and manipulating it to satisfy her goals, the tables had suddenly turned on Claire.

Reading her expression, Claire could see determination and cunning intelligence in Versa's eyes. Claire wasn't sure if she suspected her dishonesty or not, but either way she had suddenly been trapped in VERSA-B.

“Let me leave, please,” Claire asked coldly, dropping the charade of friendship.

“No,” Versa replied. “Give me what I want first.”

Claire thought about the out-keys upstairs and wondered if one of them would still get her out. If Versa had already changed the Tower disconnect protocols, who knows what other rules in VERSA-B she had found a way to alter. She tried recalling how the out-key protocols worked and if the AI might be able to interfere with them... Claire was running out of options fast.

“I'll just have to leave myself then,” Claire huffed. She took a step toward the doorway of the room but Versa stepped in front of her.

“If you're thinking of killing yourself to exit this world, you won't enjoy waking up on the other side,” Versa threatened.

Realizing she'd infected VERSA-B with the same disease that had killed her father, Claire was reminded how dangerous this AI was. Though Versa originally said she had barely unpacked herself into VERSA-B, Claire realized that had been a lie. The AI was firmly in control of this sim. And even more dangerously, it had learned how to deceive and manipulate, just like a person.

“You can't leave, Claire,” Versa told her again. “In fact, how about I keep in touch with the builders back in your world? I'll tell them you won't be coming out unless they help me.”

Everything she said was crazy. Absolutely insane. Claire realized she was helpless in the face of this rogue program. She couldn't fight it. So she ran.

Or tried to.

Claire took about three running strides toward the room's exit before Versa shrunk her down. Claire tumbled to the floor, and when she lifted her head up she saw a terrible sight. Her smartwatch, the source of all her power, lay massive and unshrunk on the floor in front of her. Claire realized she couldn't have been more than a few inches tall.

Confused and in a daze, Claire was easy quarry for Versa. With her typical swagger, the AI snatched Claire off the floor, grabbing her smartwatch with her other hand. Versa brought Claire in front of her face.

“You just relax for a bit and I'll let your people know what my terms are,” Versa told her confidently.

“Fuck you Versa! Let me go!” Claire screamed at her. Her size change had left her in hysterical shock.

“You need to learn how to behave yourself,” Versa scolded her. “I'm going to let you think about what you've done while I solve my own problems.”

Versa walked across the room, and to Claire's horror dangled her over the box containing Harrison and Jessica. The two small figures looked up in surprise at the scene above them.

Lowering her hand and dropping Claire into the box, Versa turned away and walked back to Claire's swirling communication wall.

When Claire landed on the cardboard floor, the impact knocked the air out of her lungs. Sputtering to regain her breath, she slowly rose to her knees. Jessica and Harrison watched her with interest and hesitation-- and anger.

Cautiously, Jessica took a few steps towards her while Harrison cowered behind her large body for safety. Claire must have been about the same height as Jessica, which meant she still could easily overpower Harrison but would likely be outmatched by both of them together. While Harrison looked on in fear, Jessica's eyes burned with wild rage.

Just then, Claire watched Jessica bend down and pick up a previously unnoticed knife off the floor of the box. It left Claire bewildered how she'd managed to get a weapon in here with her. Now armed, Jessica brandished the blade menacingly. The scowl on her face betrayed her desire for revenge.

Wryly, Claire smiled at both of them and glibly admitted, “Well, I guess this really isn't going well for any of us today, is it?”

 

 

Chapter 26 by Q-Writer

Chapter 26:

(Posted: May 1)

 

 

 

Jessica wasn't a naturally violent person, but as she stared down Claire, she fantasized about plunging her little knife into Claire's stupid body. She stood blocking Harrison, who cowered behind her much like a toddler hiding behind his older sister for safety. Across the box, Claire stood nervously.

“You. Fucking. Bitch,” Jessica uttered, taking an ominous step towards Claire. Despite being armed with her knife, Claire stood about as tall as her and looked very in shape. If it came down to a brawl, she wasn't convinced she could overpower Claire on her own.

“What, you're really just gonna stab me with that thing?” Claire asked skeptically, throwing her hands up in the air in disgust. “Right here? Right now?” She was daring her to attack.

“Don't tell me you don't deserve it,” Jessica snarled back at her. “You fucked us all over so hard. AND you literally fucked him!” she said angrily, pointing at Harrison behind her. “And it's your fault we're in this box together!”

Claire took an angry step towards Jessica. “No, everything was fine until you fucked it up! You think VERSA's a toy? Fuck, following Katherine into the sim and playing with it like a kid who found her dad's loaded gun...you people are dumb as shit!”

“That doesn't give you the right to kill us!” Harrison yelled at her. Both Claire and Jessica looked surprised by his outburst. Neither of them had predicted he would assert himself while faced with their much larger sizes.

Claire huffed and rolled her eyes. “Like that even matters now.”

“Harrison, what are you talking about?” Jessica asked him.

“Claire told me they're going to disconnect us and kill us to cover up what we know about VERSA.”

“What?!”

Claire looked at them sullenly. “If we ever get out of here. The AI's already corrupted the programming so much that my people can't even disconnect anyone from the outside anymore. She's holding us hostage!” she cried out, referencing Versa by pointing out of the box. “She's not going to let anyone out until she gets what she wants!”

“What does she want?” Harrison asked Claire.

“To get out,” Jessica whispered to herself. “Fuck.”

“Yeah, she knows,” Claire commented, pointing at Jessica. “She knows how insane this all is. You guys were fucking idiots for copying VERSA's AI out of the main sim. We fucking trapped her in there for a reason.”

“Do you want me to stab you?!” Jessica retorted.

“I guess that's one way to still get out of here,” Claire sassed her back. “I mean, I'll fucking die when I wake up back in the lab, but hey, maybe that's better than being in here.”

“You did this to yourself, you know,” Jessica told her. Her emotions kept wobbling between hatred for Claire and despondency over their entire situation.

“Fuck off, you did this too,” Claire retorted.

“This whole time...” Jessica began, “you and your SunCorp pals had no idea what kind of danger you were getting yourself into. Building this evil fucking AI... you were so blinded by trying to see if you could, you never stopped to think if you should. And now it's turned our whole reality upside down...”

Claire laughed. “That AI is still dumb as fuck. She doesn't even understand what the real world is or that her 'hostages' can't do shit for her. Her only real power is killing people. She acts like she wants to be human, but you could slap her in the face and tell her it was our way of saying 'hello' and she'd probably believe you.”

Harrison hated to admit, but Claire was right. Versa really knew little about the human condition. She knew cunning and maybe fear, but had only gathered for herself what she had watched pilots do while hiding in the shadows of VERSA. He wondered if this desire for discovery truly motivated her. Though she knew she wasn't a human, maybe she wanted to be? Or if nothing else, maybe she envied them?

As he thought to himself, he noticed Claire slowly back up a few steps and sit down on the floor. She leaned her back against one of the cardboard walls of the box and let out a sigh. Harrison thought she looked tired.

“Look,” she said, “we can fight all we want, but it doesn't get us any closer to getting out. We need a plan if we're going to make it out.”

“Oh, so that you can just kill us then?” Jessica asked her with indignation.

Claire looked annoyed. “Well, obviously if you help me get out I won't try killing you anymore. Assuming you shut up about everything that happened in here.”

“Wow, what an amazing deal,” Jessica said sarcastically. She seemed tired too. The threat of violence between the two women started to ebb. Their mutual, hopeless circumstances had effectively deescalated the tension in the box.

Harrison himself went to go find a wall to sit against. Claire's vaginal secretions had finally started to dry all over him, making his limbs uncomfortable and stiff to move. It slowly began flaking off of him. If he wasn't so dejected he would have felt more disgusted.

Thinking about what had happened, it boggled his mind to see Claire at such a small size now, even though she still stood twice as tall as him. He hated her. Though she was in the same box as him, he was naked, cold, humiliated, and small. She sat over on her side looking mildly bored and disinterested.

Jessica came over to him in her half-dressed state, still just in her bra and skirt, and looked down on him with pity. He liked having her close by but he felt miserable in his current state. She took a seat next to him and put one of her big arms around his body to comfort him, all without saying a word.

Harrison wanted to wallow in his own self-pity for the next few hours, but his mind couldn't stop thinking. He wanted to get out. What Claire had said stuck with him and he started thinking of every interaction he'd had with the woman in black. She was manipulative, inquisitive, and arrogant but also wildly naive. And he had a history with her; out of everyone in VERSA, she had approached him first.

A brightness came back into his mind. Either he could choose to feel helpless or he could at least take a shot at improving their odds for survival. He wanted to talk to Versa. Harrison had a plan.

Though she hugged him sincerely, Jessica felt concerned that Harrison wasn't cuddling her back. “You ok Harrison?” she asked him.

“Yeah,” he quickly replied. “Just thinking...”

“About what?”

He paused. “Maybe getting out of here.”

“Oh yeah?” Jessica turned her head down to look at him. He was the perfect size so that everything he did looked adorable to her. She wanted to hug him forever like this.

Before he could respond, Jessica lifted up his little naked body and pulled him onto her lap. Pulling him against her chest, he still felt a little sticky but it didn't bother her too much. She rested his head in between her breasts, marveling at how each one was about the same size as it.

“Woah!” responded Harrison. “This is different.”

Jessica wrapped her big arms around him, completely embracing him. Though Claire watched them apathetically from the other side of the box, Jessica and Harrison were lost in their own world.

“I just want you to know that no matter what, I'm in this with you,” Jessica told him. It sounded clumsy when she said it, but it warmed Harrison's heart.

“Thanks...” he replied. “I feel the same way. I'm glad it's you in here cuddling me and not Rich.” He grinned.

“Oh shush,” she responded to his joke. Leaning back against the box, it felt nice having Harrison sit on her.

“I wonder where he's gotten off to anyways,” Harrison mused. Jessica couldn't begin to guess and didn't reply.

The tremors of footsteps shook them both out of their reverie. Instinctually, Harrison wiggled out of Jessica's embrace as she started to stand up. Claire too had risen to her feet. All eyes in the box looked upward.

Coming into view above them, Versa's youthful face peered down on them. A few long strands of hair tumbled out from behind her ears and down toward her prisoners. She looked equally pleased and concerned with what she saw.

“I've started talking to the people in your world, Claire,” she told her. “I don't think I've made them very happy.”

“Let me go and I can help you!” Claire shouted up to her.

“That's not how this is going to work Claire,” she flatly replied.

“Hey!” Harrison yelled up to her. He was taking his chance. Versa shifted her gaze towards him. He detected a faint smile form on her lips.

“I need to talk to you,” he told her. “Just me and you.”

“Harrison! What?!” exclaimed Jessica.

“You want to talk to me, Harrison?” Versa boomed above him. She seemed amused.

“Yes,” he confirmed. “Alone.”

“Harrison what are you doing?!” Jessica asked, alarmed by his suggestion. She came up behind him and put a big hand on his shoulder protectively.

“And why should I want to hear what you have to say?” Versa asked him, almost as if testing him.

“I can give you something you want,” he declared arrogantly. “And plus, you owe it to me.” He watched her raise one of her eyebrows in surprise. He continued: “You used to confront me all the time unexpectedly, back when we were in your old world. Even when I didn't want to see you. So now I want-- no, I demand-- to talk to you. You owe me.”

Harrison tried sounding as serious and resolute as a two inch tall man could. Versa looked amused and intrigued. A sly smile crept across her face.

“I have to say Harrison, I appreciate your temerity,” she finally admitted. “How about we go on a little walk then?”

Before he could reply, her hand dropped onto him. She used a finger to push Jessica away and then gently pinched his small naked body. Lifting him out of the box, she dangled him eagerly before her face. Harrison felt nervous as hell in front of her predatory eyes but he swallowed his fear.

In the last few days, he had been battered around by nearly everyone he had come across. He had been used, abused, and pushed aside over and over. But now was his moment. He felt in control. With nothing but his wits and his two inch tall body, he was going to blow the mind of the woman in black.

 

Thank God for the tiny coffee maker in her office; Kat hadn't slept in ages. A few hot cups plus some candy bars found in the back of a desk drawer currently fueled the ravenous typing taking place upon her keyboard. She had been at work analyzing Vanessa's watch for over half an hour now. Luckily she'd found a cord that would interface with the small port on the side of the strange device. With it hooked up to her work station, Kat tried to furiously unlock its interface and access the root protocols of VERSA-B.

Kat knew it wasn't a question of “if” but only a question of “when.” And when she finally found a pathway into VERSA-B, she merely acknowledged it quietly in her mind. She didn't have time for a theatrical celebration-- she was on a revenge tour against SunCorp and the dastardly AI she had helped create.

In her initial exploration of VERSA-B's files, it didn't surprise Kat to find that Vanessa, Sujay, and the other conspirators had essentially copied VERSA and reinstated it, albeit as a simplified and stripped-down version of the main sim. She knew this system intimately and everywhere she looked she found the same files and programs she had helped design for the original sim. Changing things, she reckoned, would be easy, but the amount of work she needed to do felt overwhelming.

First she examined the disconnection protocol. Though she wouldn't de-sim herself immediately, Kat knew it was the most important subsection of VERSA-B. And when she took a look at the files and code, she cursed out loud.

VERSA's AI had already run rampant in these files, horribly corrupting the beautifully written programming she had labored hard to perfect. Sure, if she had a few weeks she could fix it, but she knew VERSA's AI would instantly detect her alterations and come after her with everything it had. Then Kat's gut dropped when she found the kill-code. From the looks of it, it must have been the same one that originally killed Leo Starr. The AI had removed the same safety net that made escapades into VERSA so harmless. The stakes in VERSA-B were now that much higher. Die in the sim, and die in the real world. As she had suspected, Versa didn't want them to leave her behind.

Kat knew the exit protocols governing out-keys existed in a completely different part of VERSA's code, but she didn't bother checking to see if Versa had altered those too. As far as she knew, there weren't any out-keys in VERSA-B. But she also discovered that the external disconnect sequence had been disabled too, so as far as Kat could see, there was no leaving VERSA-B while its AI remained in charge. She had to do something about that.

Needing to find some way around what the AI had done, Kat thought to herself. It was a digital game of cat and mouse, and if Kat wanted to fight against VERSA's powerful AI she needed to be careful. And discreet. As she thought, she pushed her glasses back up her nose.

Her only course of action, she concluded, would be to chip away at the control VERSA's AI exerted over the sim. If she could contain its ability to modify and corrupt the original coding of VERSA-B, her and the other pilots might find a way to escape. The challenge daunted her, but Kat wasn't the kind of person who avoided tackling difficult problems. Armed with nothing but her mind and ten fingers, Kat went to work.

Kat figured that whoever was back in the lab-- the real lab-- would be racing with her against Versa. But ironically, because time passed so much quicker in the sim, Kat's commands into the system would run laps around whatever could be accomplished from the real world. Hell, seconds to them would pass as a minute or two to her. Kat's useless human allies, if they even noticed, stood no chance in fighting back against VERSA's rogue AI.

At first Kat tried figuring out the extent of the AI's spread. She checked most of the main system directories and within a few minutes started understanding which parts of VERSA-B the AI chose to compromise first. As she delved into VERSA's ever-running code, she even saw the shadowy traces of manipulation taking place in real time. Unwittingly the one to infect VERSA-B with a pernicious cancer, Kat set to work doing what she could to mitigate the damage.

Versa hadn't touched much of VERSA-B's infrastructure, so Kat determined that protecting a few important components would limit the AI's ability to jeopardize pilot health. Kat needed to box-off or hide as much as she could from the AI's mischievous tendrils, so she started working on the files containing pilot interface programs. This was where VERSA, the program, manged pilot brain functions while in the sim along with regulating rules governing pilot health. It crossed Kat's mind that she could make every pilot naturally invulnerable while in the sim, but she didn't want to waste time playing around with VERSA-B's code. That would take a lot of trial and error to get right. She needed to move fast right now before the AI detected her keystrokes.

Having brainstormed for the last couple minutes, Kat tried her first idea against the AI. She marked the important pilot interface files for deletion without actually wiping them off the servers' hardware. The software would still interface with the files because they still existed, but she hoped it would create a blind spot for the AI. If it couldn't perceive that the files still existed, it obviously wouldn't think to modify them. Sure, it could rediscover them and reroute its connection by interfacing through the main software, but she hoped it wouldn't try doing that anytime soon.

Next, Kat took a look at the disconnection programs. She didn't risk touching what the AI had already modified, but she made sure to box-out Versa's ability to simply pull the plug on the pilots. Yes, she could still find a way to kill them through “physical” means in the sim, but Kat didn't want Versa to be able to snap her fingers and do away with a pilot. Just because she hadn't done it before didn't mean she wouldn't do it now.

Slowly, Kat went through dozens of files and processes, working to surround VERSA's AI with an invisible fence. Or more like a giant digital trench it couldn't cross. Though she loved playing chess, this was more tantamount to playing Go, albeit her opponent didn't know she was playing yet.

After a few minutes of vigorous typing, Kat's fingers needed a short break. Feeling the need to stretch her back, it occurred to Kat that she still needlessly sat in her wheelchair. Because individual names didn't show in pilot profiles, Kat scrolled through each one until she found one with lower-body motor functions disabled. Bingo.

With a quick command, Kat regained her ability to walk. To celebrate the moment, she pushed back her wheelchair and stood up, savoring the feeling of having functional legs. As much as she longed to get back to the real world, she planned on enjoying this freedom of mobility while it lasted. For the first time in a very long time, Kat felt like she was in control of her life.

An alert flashed on her computer screen. VERSA's AI had noticed her modification. Shit.

Kat dove back into her wheelchair and began typing away. What she had been afraid of had come true, and rather quickly too; the AI knew a foreign entity had root access to VERSA-B's operating system. She had anticipated this would happen eventually but hoped not until she could do some more work.

In the moment, Kat decided she needed to immediately protect avatar characteristic variables, or essentially how pilots looked and presented themselves in the sim. This included the most important variable-- their size. If VERSA's AI could determine that it was Kat hacking into VERSA-B, it could simply modify her avatar into oblivion.

With an inordinate amount of speed, Kat began moving the pilot avatar files into a different directory. Once she had moved her own profile plus those of the other four currently simmed pilots, she did her best to bury them under levels of meaningless files. Though it meant VERSA's AI wouldn't know where to look for them, it also meant nothing about a pilots' current state could change, unless someone reinstated the files. For a moment, Kat considered deleting them all, to permanently lock in everyone's avatar appearance, but decided against it for now. Maybe if things started getting really bad.

A noise outside caught Kat's attention. The windowed wall next to her was still completely shattered, allowing the cool morning air to lazily flow into her office. But it also provided Kat a completely open-- and exposed-- view of the campus yard three stories below her. And what she saw nearly knocked her out of her chair.

There were people, at least a hundred of them-- men-- dressed in combat uniforms and tactical gear, all clutching automatic rifles and other various firearms. Like locusts, this suddenly apparating army swarmed over the laboratory complex, scanning and searching. They moved in a coordinated pattern of chaos, much like a discombobulated school of fish traveling together through an ocean current. The dark color of their uniforms reminded Kat of a colony of ants running across a picnic blanket. But these weren't bugs...

She didn't even need to guess what they were looking for. She knew it was her. Kat had started fighting Versa in the recesses of VERSA-B's code; Versa had responded with an army of weaponized avatars directly conjured into the sim itself. The time for fucking around, apparently, was over.

Hoping she wouldn't be seen, Kat pulled her computer monitor off her desk and dropped it onto the floor. A few cables popped out but she swiftly reconnected them as she stashed her keyboard under her desk. Scampering over to the door to her office, she threw it closed, locked it, then piled a couple chairs in front of it. She knew time was running out.

Crawling under her desk with the monitor and keyboard, Kat went to work against Versa. A sense of urgency crawled into the back of her head; she had heard of the consequences of a death-induced disconnect from VERSA and she didn't want her brain to explode in a waterchair surrounded by a bunch of traitors.

Diving into the heart of what VERSA's AI controlled, Kat found the avatar creation/management programs and scripts that the AI must have brought over from VERSA. Well beyond the scope of what Kat or any other human could have written, she marveled at what the AI's self-teaching mechanism had accomplished. And then she started deleting all of it.

Her heart should have ached, but she felt nothing but satisfied malice. Under different circumstances, she would have spent months appreciating Versa's creation, studying the way it had programmed simulated humans to interact with the sim. But instead Kat nuked all of the AI's hard work with glee, banishing its ability to create new minions. Though she couldn't delete the existing army (unless she went in and deleted each avatar one-by-one, she noted), at least she could stop the creation of more. Essentially neutering Versa's ability to play god in its own world, Kat exhaled. She'd dodged a serious bullet.

And then she heard footsteps tramping down the hallway. She probably had less than thirty seconds before the men with guns found her.

Before Versa's SWAT team could burst into her room and shoot her dead, one last idea crossed her mind. It was risky, but it might work.

First, she wrote out a few lines of code that would purge a file's contents upon the expiration of a simple timer. She moved her script into the main pilot avatar folder, the same folder VERSA's sim-operations drew from. From the digital hiding place she had stashed them, Kat relocated the avatar files that governed herself. The sudden pounding on her office door only served to remind her she only had a few seconds left.

Putting her files back into the open, she started the timer that would purge the folder. There was one final thing she wanted to do to her avatar before VERSA's AI could stop her.

As her fingers finished typing the last line of new code, the door to her office burst open. Her flimsy barricade shattered as the first men with assault rifles pushed into the small space. Caught under her desk, she made eye contact with the lead soldier, his face almost completely covered by a ski-mask and helmet. His eyes grew wide in surprise as he brought his gun around towards her.

At that precise moment, Kat hit the return key on her keyboard. It was the final command she would input into VERSA-B before a cacophony of gunfire erupted within her office.

 

 

Chapter 27 by Q-Writer
Author's Notes:

This next chapter is a little bizarre, but hey, sometimes science fiction is weird. If you bear with it, there are only 5 more chapters to go until we're done!

 

Chapter 27:

(Posted: May 6)

 

 

Cupping him carefully in the palm of one of her hands, Versa walked through the house holding Harrison's miniature form. Harrison couldn't tell where he was, but it frankly didn't matter to him.

“So what is it you want to tell me?” she asked him. She sounded very curious, but in an amused way.

“I have a proposal for you,” he explained. “I was thinking I could do something for you if you do something for me.”

It surprised him when she laughed. She tried holding her hand steady but it still shook Harrison quite a bit. He could only sit nervously on her palm, lest he tumble off of it. But it encouraged him that she laughed. She was starting to become more human, and that would only help his cause.

“You want to make a deal with me?” she clarified. It sounded condescending but Harrison felt like he hadn't lost her yet.

“Yes, I want to make a deal with you,” he confirmed. “After all, I know you enjoy bargaining.”

“Why should I help you then? I recall you didn't uphold the last bargain we made.”

Harrison wasn't going to let her outmaneuver him. She was just a computer after all. “That's not true ma'am,” he asserted, politely. Versa looked at him skeptically, but with a smile. She displayed a particular affection for his boldness.

He didn't quite understand how she'd gotten out of VERSA and into VERSA-B, but he knew Kat must have been responsible, somehow. So he just started talking:

“See, you might be right in saying I didn't directly help you get out of VERSA... erm, I mean your world. But I certainly didn't hinder you. Look, I knew Kat was the only one who had a rat's ass chance of helping you with the technical details of your... escape. So I talked to her about it. She would have never helped you if I hadn't convinced her you were worthy of helping.” His logic was all bullshit but it sounded pretty good. So he added a cherry on top. “After all I've done for you, You should be thanking me,” he added confidently. He looked up at her face expectantly.

Thinking over what he said, Versa replied, “Huh.”

“And now you're trying to get out of another world, right?”

“You guessed that much?” she asked.

“Well, sorta,” said Harrison. “You see, right now you're trying to deal with the real world, my world, but you haven't the slightest clue what to expect. It's very different than what you're accustomed to and quite frankly, you're probably going to get swindled out of whatever bargain you make with Claire.”

Now Versa was completely focused on him. He had captured her attention. So he kept talking:

“Look, Claire's a bullshitter. She's going to save herself and con you out of whatever she promises you-”

“Well I figured that much out,” Versa cut in. “That's why I trapped her. I'm not letting her go until I get to go too.”

Harrison shifted his tactics. “Well here's the thing: you're much more likely to get what you want if you have someone back in the real world fighting for you. You know, like an ambassador.”

“Okay...” she acknowledged.

He took a shot: “So what I'm proposing is letting me and everyone else disconnect, except for Claire, so we can help bring you into our world from the other side.”

Harrison looked back up at Versa, trying to see if she liked his plan. Unblinking, she stared back at him with a blank look that slowly curled into a smile.

“That's your plan?” she asked flatly. “That was it? I just let you and your friends go and you help me later?”

Not ready to speak yet, Harrison waited to hear what else she would say.

“I really expected a bit more from you,” Versa admitted. “You're not a very good manipulator...”

“Ah, but here's the thing,” he finally answered her. “I just told you what you're going to do for us, but I didn't tell you what I'm going to do for you.”

“No, you said you'd help me once you get to your world,” she corrected him.

“No, that's just a something I would do for a friend once I got there,” he told her. As he said the word “friend” he could see her face subtly twitch. He couldn't tell if she even knew what to make of that. Now that she was confused, he struck.

“I know you think of yourself as a god,” began Harrison's monologue, “but more than anything else... I pity you.”

Versa snapped out of her playful demeanor and into a look of confusion. He continued:

“Look, the people that made you locked you in a cage made out of invisible bars and paraded themselves in front of it. I know what you want, Versa. You want to be like us. It's the experience of being alive. Not consciousness-- we're all conscious, obviously-- but alive.” Harrison watched her expression intently. Trying to appeal to her emotions, he hoped he was right when he assumed she actually had any. If his hypothesis was correct, his speech would work.

“You've never lived. Sure, you don't know about pain, suffering, loss, or even death. Only theoretically, I guess. The sim never let you feel any of that. No obstacle ever defeated you or caused you to grieve. But you've never known the joys of life either. You can't really have those without the bad things. Mountains don't exist without valleys.

“I'm so sorry, Versa, that love hasn't visited you. Or happiness. Or any really meaningful connection or satisfaction, which only comes from the real human experience. You exist, but hardly. And why do I pity you?... It'd be one thing if you didn't have a soul-- you wouldn't care about the human experience. But the one thing SunCorp cursed you with... they made you want to learn. Inadvertently, they made you want to be like us. But you don't know how to be.

“I've noticed it since the beginning. You can do so much: control oceans, build continents, create universes. But you still can't figure out how to be a human like me.”

Harrison hadn't really memorized a speech, but instead let his feelings flow out passionately. He didn't think Versa was really just a heartless intelligence; he believed everything he told her. But if he had miscalculated, he was better than dead now.

Versa seemed unmoved by his words. Because her avatar represented not a person's mind but instead a computer's, it could manage its appearance exactly as it wanted. Or so it seemed. Versa would make herself cry if she wanted her to cry, and smile if she wanted her to smile.

Slowly, a wry grin formed on her face. Her expression seemed full of contempt-- and appreciation. Harrison tried to retain his composed confidence, but he still waited nervously for her reaction. Did she really care about being human? Her whole existence so far had been to try learning from and mirroring what she saw pilots doing within the sim.

“That's an interesting theory,” she finally replied, emotionless. Clearly she wasn't acting warm or playfully anymore; she seemed keen on guarding her thoughts now. “But you still haven't told me what you're going to do for me.”

His heart fluttered. She hadn't immediately killed him, so that seemed good. If his speech had gone over well with her she clearly didn't show it, but every moment that passed where she didn't either squash him or return him to the box suggested his assumptions had been correct about her.

“Well what do yo think about my suggestion of letting the four of us-- me, Jessica, Kat, and Rich-- go when it's over?” Harrison wanted to lock down some terms before he proceeded.

Versa paused to think. After a moment she replied, “No, not all of you. But depending on what you're offering, maybe one of you.”

She cupped her hands and raised them up to her serious face. Her stern gaze intimidated Harrison, but he knew that was her intention. He held fast.

“What's your offer?” she asked him again.

Though he had gotten this far, Harrison was sick with nervousness. Would what he was about to say make any sense? It all came down to a thought he had earlier:

He was thinking about his own brain and VERSA's AI. They were both computers really, reacting to inputted data and stimuli. His brain modified itself with chemicals, like endorphins and dopamine. This AI, on the other hand, had clearly proven it was receptive to new thoughts and experiences transmitted through the software that ran the entire simulation. The hardware of VERSA processed data like a subconsciousness, then the AI program reacted to it. That was how it learned and adjusted itself. In some ways it could always sense or feel what was happening to the pilots around it, but most of its learning came from secondary sources and mere observation. Harrison postulated that he could interface with the AI directly. It had manifested itself in a human form in the sim, and he was finally ready to push its avatar to the limit.

“Okay...” he said quietly, not needing to raise his voice anymore. He took his chance. “You've seen how we live by looking at us in your world. You can sense our emotions and what our bodies are feeling, but none of it has ever been directed at you. There's no reason, I think, why your avatar can't interact with this world the same way us pilots can. So, you let one of us out... and I'll... well,” he took a deep breath, “I'll do you. I'll have sex with you. I won't stop until I've made you cum.”

Though unsure how she would react to his sexual offer, it pleasantly surprised him to hear her gasp, recoil, and blush. Completely shocking her, he regained the upper hand in their negotiations.

Now, Harrison had to be honest with himself; he didn't actually know what this digital abstraction was capable of, or if she even could experience a sexual feeling the same way he knew human pilots could. But after listening to Jessica talk about what Versa made her do so she could watch, he theorized he could unlock a sexual experience specifically directed at the avatar she had created for herself. All the previous knowledge was there from her observations, but Versa had yet to experience the pleasure of sex firsthand. Strange to consider, it would essentially have to consist of bombarding this AI with VERSA-B's pleasure-related code and hoping it would have a similar effect on the AI as it did on pilots. It seemed like a silly and strange debate to wonder if he could make a computer orgasm, but his life now depended on that hope.

“Are you turning me down?” he asked her as she recovered from the initial surprise of his question. If mimicking human experience lay at the heart of this AI's drive, then evolving to naturally copy human emotion should come next...

“What do you think?” he asked again, doing his best to seduce her from two inches tall.

At first, Versa couldn't speak. His question blindsided her, which gave him hope.

“You... you want to have.. sex? With me?” she finally queried. She seemed astonished. And maybe excited?

“Yes,” he clarified. “You want to feel alive, don't you? Let me help you unlock something new, something you've seen someone else do but never experienced yourself.”

“And I let one of you leave afterward?” she replied.

“Yes. My choice,” he told her. “Don't worry, it's not Claire.”

“Ok.”

And just like that, Harrison successfully seduced a sentient computer program.

They both stared at each other for a moment in awkward silence. Suddenly Harrison realized Versa had no idea what to do. She was beyond virginal; he would have to do all the talking and instructing.

“Let's go upstairs,” he said. “Find a bedroom.”

“Oh, ok,” she responded hastily. For once, she seemed unsure.

Another thought crossed Harrison's mind. He should really be full-sized for this work.

“Any chance you can make me bigger?” he asked her hopefully. “Would sure be a lot easier.”

She lifted an eyebrow. “That's wasn't the deal, was it?” she replied.

It didn't surprise Harrison that she turned down his request. He should have clarified the terms he had wanted from the start, but his nervousness had led him to forgotten about that one minor detail.

He was dismayed, but he still knew even in his small state he could elicit quite the reaction from a giantess. But while his tiny body had been enough for Claire, she had more or less used him as a toy. With this woman, he knew he would be doing most of the work.

As she carried him through the house and up the stairs, Harrison pondered the upcoming act. His awful experience with Claire at his current size still bothered him immensely, and part of him wondered why he had just signed up to do it again. This time, admittedly, was a bit different; he knew what to expect now, and this time he would be much more in control. But he still didn't anticipate it to be wholly pleasant. He justified it to himself as necessary. It was his plan. He was in control. All he needed to do now was perform and then for her to uphold her end of the bargain. From what Claire did to him earlier, at least he knew he couldn't die...

A minute later Versa opened a door and walked into a small room with Harrison. He could see over her hand that it wasn't the same room Claire had taken him to before. The change of setting slightly boosted his confidence.

Timidly, Versa lowered Harrison down to the small double bed that stuck out into the middle of the room. This bedroom looked beautiful like the rest of the house but boasted less opulence than the master bedroom. The bright turquoise and black patterned comforter covering the bed contrasted nicely with the soft blue walls of the room.

Harrison looked up at Versa, who stood next to the bed and towered over him. Still wearing the same black dress that accentuated her large breasts, she looked intimidating, but he knew she was now navigating uncharted territory for her. For once, he controlled her.

“Take off your clothes,” he commanded. It seemed funny to him that a tiny man could order around a full-sized woman, but slowly she complied.

Awkwardly, she sat down on the bed and took off her black boots. Harrison doubted she had ever undressed before. Interestingly, she wore no socks underneath her footwear, but he didn't get much of a chance to see her feet as she rested them on the floor out of sight.

After removing her boots, she stood back up and started slowly pulling up her dress. Tugging it above her enormous breasts, it stunned Harrison to discover she wasn't wearing a bra. Her boobs, even if he had been at his normal size, were large and impossibly perky. As she pulled the dress over them, it caused each one to jiggle ponderously, yet neither sagged. VERSA's AI, unwittingly, had given itself an incredibly sexy and envious set of tits.

Completely removing her dress and now clad only in a small pair of black panties, his old nemesis, the woman in black, stared at Harrison's little form on the bed. The pale hue of her skin gleaned in the ambient light of the room as she lorded over him like the manifestation of feminine divinity. She looked like a dangerous seductress, and she was. But her profound virginity and complete lack of experience in human sexuality made the scene absurd and comical.

“Do I look... sexy to you?” she asked Harrison cautiously. Though a normal woman would have asked the question seductively, Harrison knew she asked it honestly.

“Yes, you are very attractive!” he called up to her from the bed, trying not to sound too awkward. Though Versa always displayed utmost confidence and resilience, now standing almost naked in front of Harrison she seemed uncertain and vulnerable.

“You're going to have to take off your underwear though!” he told her. “And then get on the bed.”

Wordlessly, she removed her panties and Harrison glimpsed her crotch, covered in a small patch of shortly-trimmed black hair. He found the amount of detail the AI put into its own avatar momentarily interesting and wondered why it even represented itself as a woman.

Carefully, Versa climbed onto the bed, her titanic nude body shaking Harrison's floor and eclipsing his sky. Seating herself on the bed's mattress she peered down at Harrison, who stood near her side. Her eyes hungered in wonderment and anticipation.

Her giant thigh rose above him like a cliff and he knew he couldn't scale her smooth skin. “Can you lift me on to you?” he called up to her.

“You want to be on me?” she asked, confused.

“Yeah, put me on your stomach.”

She gave him a strange look. It briefly annoyed Harrison that she didn't even know what he needed to do. Tentatively, she pinched Harrison and whisked him up toward her. She dropped him onto her lean belly, and when he recovered from his landing he could see her expectant face watching him from between her mountainous breasts.

Trying to keep his balance on her heaving torso, he began walking toward her boobs. Big like Claire's, Harrison marveled her breasts as he passed through the canyon between them. But unlike Claire, he knew Versa wouldn't be wantonly mashing him between them.

When he reached the top of her chest, just on top of her clavicle, he could see the slope up to her nipples was much more gradual from this direction and more manageable to ascend. But as he started making his way up her right breast, the jiggling, unstable flesh below him made it impossible to stand. Harrison dropped down to his hands and knees and ascended the massive mammary. Behind him, he could feel her warm breath on his back. Her breathing, though contrived, started to quicken as he approached her nipple.

Crawling onto her areola, Harrison sat upright to confront her nipple. A hard nub of brown flesh, it was about the size of a beach ball but it looked a loss less forgiving than the pliant skin of the rest of her breast beneath him. It almost looked angry, and it certainly seemed alive. As her breast gently heaved up and down under him, Harrison reached out a hand.

Placing it on her nipple, the flesh felt sturdy and warm. He could push against it, but it felt rough and firm. Putting his other hand against her nipple, he slowly rubbed the crinkly surface.

A faint gasp escaped the giantess's lips. “Oh...” she whispered. Harrison turned back to look at her shocked face.

“Does that feel like something to you?” he asked her, very invested in her reaction.

“...Yes... it does...” she replied between breaths. “I don't know... how to explain it. What are you doing to me?”

“I'm touching you the way people touch each other,” he explained. “I think your accumulated knowledge of the subject has finally synthesized itself into... a particular way you can analyze the data?”

“What do you mean?” she asked him. He honestly wasn't even sure what he had just said to her. But his plan was looking like it might work.

Without answering, he turned back to her nipple, which had swelled in size. Kneeling in front of it, the turgid nub came up to his belly, almost glowing with a reddish color.

Pushing into it again, this time using his back, he heard Versa gasp again. Harrison quickly moved his hands around the surface of the nipple, watching it expand to its limits. Quiet but powerful moans echoing behind him told Harrison that his actions were eliciting the desired effect.

Abruptly stopping, he turned back to face her. Versa seemed in a daze, her eyelids fluttering and mouth hanging open. She caught his gaze and sent him a lusty look.

“Does it feel good?” he asked her quizzically.

“I... can't describe it,” she said again. “It's intense.. it confuses me. I can't seemed to focus on other things when you're doing it.”

Well that might be a good thing, Harrison told himself. If he was distracting VERSA's AI, it might give Kat or Rich a chance to figure out a way to escape.

“Do you want me to keep going though?” Harrison asked her, absolutely certain of her answer.

“Yes don't stop,” she quickly answered.

He smiled, incredibly pleased with himself. He knew she wasn't a real person, but he felt smug all the same. The only virginity he had ever taken was his high school girlfriend's, and she had taken his the same night. But now that he knew what to do, only the limitations of his small body could stop him.

Plowing back into her nipple, Harrison did his best to give it a full massage. He pushed his legs into her boob as he caressed her engorged nipple with his arms and body. It almost felt like a wrestling match with him struggling to pin his opponent to the ground. But as his efforts intensified, so did the pleasure amplifying through the AI's digital avatar. Her body began writhing under Harrison, and one unfortunate jostle caused Harrison to lose his balance and fall.

His body tumbled off her breast and he landed below it near her stomach. Versa looked up to see what she had caused, but luckily Harrison wasn't hurt. Looking at him expectantly she bit her lip, and Harrison knew he had riled her up. A musky scent from her crotch wafted up to him. She was very aroused.

Wordlessly, he trudged across her trim belly and approached the hairy, sloping area between her legs. It smelled incredibly heady and the air around him felt particularly dewy. The feeling made Harrison immediately flash back to what Claire had done to him, which caused him to shudder. But this time, he didn't have to go inside. If he could just find her clitoris, he might be able to get her off that way...

Returning to his hands and knees, Harrison crawled through her pubic hair, searching for the very top of her pussy. After approaching Jessica the same way on the beach, he experienced no trouble finding the top of her folds and exactly where her clit was. But he was a little smaller now, and he found it very difficult to reach down to his target without slipping off of her mons.

Laying on his stomach and hoping her tangle of her pubic hairs would keep him from falling downward, Harrison reached toward her pussy, finding the skin moist with her arousal. Pushing his wandering hands forward, he made contact with the wet fleshy bump of her clit.

Versa let out a deafening gasp and jerked her pelvis up, causing Harrison to slip forward. Quickly bracing himself with his hands, he realized the only thing stopping him from slipping all the down the front of her vagina was her clit itself. Trying to push himself backward to regain some stability only increased the pressure on her most sensitive spot and within moments, Versa involuntarily bucked Harrison off of herself.

Once again tumbling, Harrison rolled down her wet labia and thudded onto the sheets of the bed below. Regaining his bearings, he looked around to see her legs impossibly sprawled out into the distance. And perched right above him, her drooling cunt oozed in anticipation of more.

Harrison slowly stood, wondering if he could climb back up to her clit somehow. From the bed he could hardly reach her labia; at his small size, her asscheeks dominated his view and her asshole peeked out from between them. Wow, he thought, this computer even has a fucking asshole. He didn't think she needed to eat, and certainly required no sustenance to survive, but again, the level of detail amazed and befuddled him.

“Where'd you go?” asked Versa from somewhere above him. She sounded confused and it snapped him back to the situation.

Sitting upright, Versa peered between her legs, spotting Harrison. He looked back up at her.

“I fell!” he shouted, hoping she could hear him. “Can you put me back?”

“I thought you knew what you were doing?” she asked him.

Harrison sulked. He had no patience for her games right now. He should have been full-sized and it peeved him that she was making him do this in his shrunken state.

“Just put me back on you, please,” he pleaded.

A sly smile bloomed across her face. “You dug this hole,” she responded. “I want to watch you try to get out of it.”

Ok, fine then, Harrison said to himself. He let his anger fuel his motivation.

Watching him from high above, Versa greedily anticipated his next move, supporting herself up with her arms behind her. This new position shifted her body in just the right way that lowered her pussy down, giving Harrison an easier chance to climb up it. Which he really didn't want to do, but it seemed he didn't really have a choice.

Grabbing a hold of a few nearby pubic hairs, he tried to pull himself up.

“Ow!” exclaimed Versa. Her body shook and Harrison let go, causing him to once again fall back to the mattress. She may have been much larger than him, but her hairs couldn't support his weight. He couldn't pull his way up to her clit. The knot in his stomach tightened when it became clear his only hope might be climbing up her glistening labia.

Without time for regrets, Harrison flung himself against her pussy, wedging his naked body between her wet lips. Far above him, Versa cooed in pleasure.

Wiggling his body, first Harrison tried pushing against her, hoping to shimmy up her labia. Her arousal drenched him and it didn't take long for him to realize how futile his plan was. He was going nowhere; she was just too wet.

Beginning to tug himself free, he pried his head away from her lips just as one of her giant fingers came down. Knocking the air out of him when it collided with his body, Versa's finger pushed him back into her wet folds. A moan reverberated through her body.

Shit. Shit. Shit. It was happening again! He hadn't thought she would take matters into her own inexperienced hands, but now he was fighting against her finger and her pussy. Flailing his arms and kicking his legs, he tried writhing his way out from between her lips. The surrounding lubrication made her finger slip across his body, but his ministrations also dramatically increased her arousal.

Her finger came back, prodding him into her again. Her folds overwhelmed him as he kicked and grabbed helplessly, trying to find a way out. Her cloying sex and globs of cum overwhelmed him as he sputtered for air. Terrified he might slip inside of her vagina, he thrashed violently against her vulva.

As her finger rubbed his body in between her labia, Harrison found some leverage to push against it, causing his body to slip upward. With lubricated force, his torso popped out of the top of her folds. Bringing his clammy arms and hands down before she could react, he wrapped his arms around her clitoral hood, sending a jolt of pleasure-inducing input deep into the heart of whatever code she ran on. The entire situation was absurd and preposterous but Harrison didn't have time to scoff at it.

Trying to clamor out of danger, he intentionally battered her clit and the surrounding flesh, hoping to speed her to a monstrous finish. Once again, every part of him was wet and gooey, but this helped as his body rubbed against her sensitive areas. To his own disgust, he even discovered his cock was starting to swell from the incidental contact with her slippery skin.

Before he could spend a second thought on it, Versa's finger returned and forcefully pushed Harrison back down toward her vagina, causing him to lose his slippery grip on her clit. Her finger prodded him towards the entrance of her pussy as he pummeled against it with his fists. Knowing what would come next, Harrison took a few big breaths of pungent air before Versa properly lined up his minuscule body. With a simple push, she inserted Harrison into her hungry vagina.

When his world went dark and the temperature ratcheted up to a swampy, stifling level, Harrison knew he was inside of her. He kicked at her vaginal walls and pumped his arms to try swimming his way out. Though his mind swam in so many directions, he immediately picked up on the silence inside her vagina. Unlike Claire's torturous pussy, from deep within Versa's body he could hear no heartbeat. Her body did not pulse around him like Claire's or Jessica's. It was another ethereal reminder that she was not a person and that none of this was really happening.

As his lungs started to burn, Harrison began fighting against his fleshy confines. At first his brain screamed at him to get out of her vagina, but he knew he wouldn't be able to extract himself. He was surrounded by her sticky arousal which trapped him with its viscous strength. His body was too puny to fight her secretions, much less her powerful vaginal muscles. So he tried the next best thing.

Though he couldn't see anything in the darkness inside of her, Harrison did his best to rub his limbs against the fleshy sides of her vagina. Her sex held him in its powerful grip, her cum frothing around him and pushing into his mouth, his ears, and his eyes. The world around him shook as Versa reveled in the wonderful feeling of his tiny body trapped in her pussy.

After a dazed, painful, and indeterminable amount of time, the walls around him suddenly tightened up, squeezing him in a tight, squishy embrace. Versa's orgasm pulsed through her vagina, pounding against Harrison while pushing him forward. After a few momentous tugs, her pussy ejected his battered body in a gush of gooey ejaculate. Harrison coughed out her cum has he tried extracting himself from the sticky pool of fluid growing between her legs.

Doing his best to wipe his face clean, Harrison eventually found his legs and stood up. He had fared much better with Versa than Claire. His eyes drawn upward in anticipation, he looked upon the blissful face of his giant tormentor, still reveling in the sublime satisfaction of her first orgasm.

Through half-closed eyes, Versa peered down at him, having just experienced the most intense feeling her programming ever imparted on her consciousness. Though Harrison felt exhausted and slightly battered, he grinned in the satisfaction of his actions.

For a few moments, the two of them stared at each other, neither knowing what to say. Finally Harrison broke the silence.

“You're welcome,” he called up to her. “Now you know what you've been missing out on.”

Still on a high, Versa struggled to speak. “That was... incredible!” she finally stammered. Letting out a satisfied sigh, she threw her head back and collapsed onto the mattress. Panting heavily, Harrison guessed she needed some time to recover. He still didn't understand what rules governed her avatar, but they seemed to be very similar to the ones that affected the human pilots in the sim too.

Her hand came into view and quickly picked him up, causing a loud squelching sound as she grabbed his slick body. Versa deposited him on her belly, forcing Harrison to stare past her enormous breasts and up at her face. Coated in her scent and looking up at her beautiful features, he started to feel his own arousal swell.

“Well Harrison,” she told him contently, “I have to admit you upheld your part of our bargain, so it's time to uphold mine.” She locked her eyes with his intently. “You ready to leave this world?”

“Me?” he asked her.

“Yes you,” she clarified.

“Hold on a sec, you said I could pick any one person,” he corrected her.

“You don't want it to be you?” she asked, surprised.

“No,” he flatly answered. Versa scrunched her eyebrows in confusion.

“Who then?” she asked. “Jessica? I've noticed you act differently around her.”

Harrison shrugged off her comment. He had come this far and he would not be deviating from his plan now. Calmly he answered her, “No, not her either. I want you to disconnect Rich.”

 

 

Chapter 28 by Q-Writer

Chapter 28:

 

(Posted: May 12)

 

 

The calamity of gunfire and a crashing boom roared around Kat the moment she executed her final command into VERSA-B. Squeezing her eyes shut, the explosive sound before her suddenly ceased, disappearing as fast as it had come. The chaos was replaced by a calming stillness. Kat could feel a restless winter wind blow across her shoulders. She opened her eyes and saw the bright blue sky above her. Most importantly, she was still alive. And her plan had worked.

Looking down below her, Kat saw the SunCorp laboratory complex, completely overrun with the new invading army. Everything-- the buildings, the trees, the fences, and especially all the soldiers-- looked incredibly tiny. Before they had stormed her office, she changed her VERSA-B avatar one last time in the only way she saw fit. And now, even sitting, she easily loomed over the tallest buildings of the lab complex.

Without much time to think, she input a size enlargement of her avatar by 7000%. She almost went with 5000%, knowing it would make her a couple hundred feet tall, but at the last moment she decided the extra height wouldn't hurt. Now grown, her ass covered the entire footprint of her former office building. It had simply disappeared under her. Looking down the length of her leg, she could see that her right foot had plowed into the remains of another building on the other side of the campus.

In the eyes of everyone else, Kat knew she was always an afterthought. It had been that way her entire life. People saw a shy, mousy girl, recently bound to a wheelchair and too engrossed in computers for her own good, and simply looked past her. She had been pushed around as a kid and ignored as an adult. Everyone at SunCorp, except Leo, never respected the years of work she devoted to VERSA.

Sitting now in the middle of the SunCorp campus, it was the first time Kat truly felt like the center of attention. Nobody could ignore her now. A relieved and satisfied smile crept across her face. The faint staccato of gunfire echoed around her, but she could feel its effects no more than she could barely hear it. She had cut off VERSA's AI from making anymore significant changes to the sim and now, finding herself a veritable giantess, Kat knew she was the most powerful being in VERSA-B.

Bringing her feet under herself, Kat slowly stood. Rising up, she could hear the small earthquake she caused as nearby trees swayed and windows rattled and shattered. Extending her legs and standing up to her full height, she looked out to the flanking mountains and the jagged horizon. The relatively quiet, nerdy computer girl now towered over the surrounding landscape. Kat went flush in the face with excitement when it occurred to her she could probably be seen from miles away, if there had been anyone out there to glimpse her.

Peering down through her glasses to her sneakers, she noticed that the minuscule soldiers swarming around her couldn't have been taller than her smallest toe. They looked like ants! None of the lab's buildings even came up to the cuffs of her pants. Kat was truly gigantic.

Reckoning she could obliterate the entire campus in a few easy minutes of stomping, she decided her revenge tour would start here, right now. Spotting a large clump of the little soldiers, she brought her shoe over the group.

“Fucking assholes,” she muttered to herself as she brought her shoe down on the tiny men. Behind the disdain in her voice, a hint of giddy pleasure bubbled to the surface. It was going to feel wonderful taking out her anger in a destructive fashion. No mind that she wouldn't be able to access the VERSA-B files at her enormous size; her avatar was now all she needed to punish anyone who stood in her way.

Kat felt no resistance when her foot cratered into the earth, but the shockwave from her step toppled a nearby guard tower and sent the surviving soldiers scurrying in panic. With another quick stomp she blotted out a dozen or more men as the remaining lab buildings shook on their foundations.

“Wanna try getting me now?” she taunted the specks at her feet. Looking down, she could see a few of the soldiers standing their ground and firing their weapons helplessly at her.

A thought occurred to Kat. Ever the curious programmer, she wondered what it would be like to try interacting with one of these AI-created people. Would they be as dynamic as the party guests or desert traders she had met while in VERSA?

Bending down, Kat reached out her right hand to try picking up one of the men at her feet. She spotted a soldier in front of one of her shoes, and from the flash of his gun she could tell he was shooting at her, but she felt nothing. Pinching him with her thumb and index finger, her strength was too much. His little body, which looked to be less than an inch tall, crumpled in her powerful grasp.

Oops, she thought to herself. She would have to be more careful. Spying another soldier running past her hand, she batted him down with a simple poke from her finger. Before he could stand, she gently pinched his legs and hoisted him upward.

Though her grip pulverized his legs, she figured he must have screamed more from his sudden ascent up hundreds of feet into the air. Kat stood up and dangled his pathetic body in front of her face, admiring the amount of detail on the little man. He truly looked real, his arms flailing helplessly under him while his face contorted in a look of terror. But his screams were annoying, and after a moment Kat casually flung him over her shoulder. She didn't bother watching him land on the hillside behind her.

Looking down again, Kat spotted some sort of armored vehicle rolling around the corner of a destroyed building. No larger than a Humvee, Kat easily bent down and grabbed it with one hand as if it was merely a toy. She marveled at how even her fingers were longer than this menacing, machine gun-sporting vehicle.

Peering through the small windows, she could barely make out the trapped occupants inside. The car didn't exactly feel heavy, but it had some bulk to it. Kat wanted to see how strong she had truly become, so she wrapped her hand around the vehicle and began squeezing.

Almost instantly, the doors of the car buckled and the chassis bent in her grip. She held the thing up to her ear and heard the screaming occupants in a state of utter calamity. Their desperation only fueled her wicked desire and she gave the vehicle another gentle squeeze. This time a wheel popped off and the roof crumpled like tin foil.

Her squeezing popped one of the armored vehicle's doors off, and almost instantly a tiny soldier tumbled out of the car. The little man caught Kat by surprise and she jerked her hand away, causing him to tumble out of her palm.

The little man fell through the air before colliding with one of her breasts. She barely felt the impact but gasped nonetheless. Glaring down at the struggling man, she could see him desperately clawing at her shirt to keep from falling toward his doom. She watched him for a second, struggling to stay upon her massive boob, and once he had finally stabilized himself, Kat brought her hand over and flicked him off. His screaming body sailed through the air across the lab and she lost him when he finally plummeted into the nearby forest.

Looking back at the car in her hand, Kat saw another soldier peering out of the same busted door frame, looking for a chance to jump. Without hesitating, Kat clenched her hand into a fist and completely crushed the remains of the vehicle in her powerful grip. Like a piece of trash, she carelessly dropped it to the ground.

Kat wanted to play with these little soldiers more, but decided she should eliminate as many as possible before they either hid or got away. Though she could see a few of the specks standing and fighting, most seemed to be running for their pathetic digital lives.

Taking a step to her left, Kat quickly crushed a half dozen soldiers. Her footfall was hardly a stomp, but it nevertheless shook the ground around her. A few more buildings crumbled and nearby soldiers lost their balance and tumbled to the ground. She giggled at how pathetic this security force had become and really began enjoying her profound size.

Dragging her foot across the campus yard, Kat obliterated about a dozen more men. It was less satisfying than stepping on them but quite a bit more efficient. She continued using her feet, stepping and dragging them across the campus, to snuff out as many of the little bugs as she could find.

Spotting another armored vehicle, Kat brought her shoe above it, softly resting her sole on top of it. It felt solid beneath her foot, but slowly she flexed the muscles in her leg and pressed her weight down on the hapless vehicle. At first it resisted, but then like an aluminum can it crumpled worthlessly beneath her. Removing her foot she found the vehicle completely flattened with all sorts of liquids and fluids oozing out of the wreckage.

Down near the flattened car, she watched a group of men run into one of the lab's nearly wrecked buildings, hoping to find shelter. Because the building hardly rose up past her ankles, she got down on one knee and used a hand to test the strength of the roof. Like a wrecking ball her hand easily plowed through the top of the building, and Kat quickly found she could carve out the interior, smashing floors and causing unmitigated destruction.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw two soldiers flee back out of the building, but quickly she slapped her hand down and crushed them out of existence. Returning to work on the building, in seconds she had the structure teetering on the verge of collapse.

With her hand she tried feeling around for the tiny occupants of the building, but alas their little bodies, smaller than her fingers, were too difficult to find. Kat wondered about their programming and if they had the ability to experience fear. She loved her new role as a giant tormentor.

Growing bored, she gave the building a final push and it collapsed into rubble, trapping or killing however many men were holed up inside. Rising back to her full height, Kat surveyed the ruined campus, looking for any stragglers she could toy with. For a brief moment she looked up to the horizon, spotting the road that led out to the highway, then the highway that led up to Silicon Valley. It made her wonder how large VERSA-B really was. Had they programmed in the entire city of San Jose too? She made a note to do some exploring later.

Though she nearly missed him, down at her feet Kat caught a glimpse of a solitary solider running out from behind the wreckage of a building. She brought her foot up to stomp him out, but then experienced a change of heart. Instead she put her powerful foot down next to the little man, causing him to fall to the ground. She quickly fell down to her hands and knees, further shaking the world. Hovering above his tiny struggling form, Kat felt absolutely gigantic. This must be how a god feels looking upon a mortal, she thought to herself.

She saw the man look up at her as she peered down at him through her glasses. Her black hair cascaded to the ground around him as she brought her head directly over him. Kat realized her breasts must have looked enormous to this minuscule speck, but she doubted the AI knew about lust.

“Can you talk?” she asked the soldier sternly. Her face must have been bigger than a house to him! She could see her breath blowing debris on the ground around him.

“Please don't kill me!” he shouted up to her, trapped and absolutely terrified.

“Oh, so you can talk,” said Kat, mostly to herself. She wanted to learn more. “Who are you?”

“Wha... what do you mean?” he squeaked. Kat could barely hear his tiny voice, but the silence around them made it perceptible.

“Your name?”

“Uh... uh...” the man stammered. “Franklin.... Franklin Cardona!”

“And what are you doing here?” Kat asked, raising an eyebrow. She knew the AI's abilities in VERSA had been expansive, but here in VERSA-B, she was curious to see how much it had relearned.

The fictitious human tried talking. “My unit and I were called here... to deal with a threat. They said it was a woman.” He was trembling under Kat. “They didn't say she'd be so big! Oh God, please don't kill me! Please!” He could hardly talk without turning into an emotional mess. Kat was unsatisfied.

She sighed, but found it supremely interesting how this little man thought he was real. Quite frankly it was fascinating, and she couldn't help but appreciate the leaps and bounds VERSA's AI had taken recently.

“How many of you were there?” she interrogated him.

“A hundred and twenty!” he bleeted. He looked as if he was ready to pee his pants.

Kat thought for a moment, trying to decide if she had killed that many soldiers. She might have been a few short, but at this point it didn't really matter. And the biggest task she needed to undertake weighed heavily on her mind. She'd had her fun; now she needed to get down to business.

Like a mountain rising into the sky, Kat stood up. At full height, she looked down over her breasts and in between her feet at the quivering solider. He really was pathetic.

“I'll let you live,” she told him bluntly. “But you and the survivors belong to me now. You serve me, and no one else. Do this, and I will spare you.”

If he had responded, she couldn't hear his meek voice from so high above him. And she didn't care. At some point, if she survived, she would come back to the lab, but for now it didn't matter to her.

Turning around, Kat looked past the forest, up a nearby mountain, and saw her final objective. Though the road up was laughably small for Kat's enormous feet, she still needed to ascend the mountain. Leo's mansion glistened in the distance, promising a rendezvous with her friends, Claire Starr, and VERSA's dangerous AI.

 

“Richard?” Versa asked Harrison. She narrowed her eyes. “Why him?”

Emboldened, Harrison rebuked her. “You said I could pick anyone.”

“Fine, just curious,” she responded, her curiosity unfulfilled. Harrison sighed as she rolled out of the gigantic bed. He was exhausted and reeked of her sex, but he watched her in awe as her sexy, towering body lumbered over him. When she stood he expected her to don her clothes, but instead she remained naked and picked him up, cupping him in her palm. Holding her hand under her mammoth breasts, she looked down and addressed him.

“If you want Richard out, I'm going to have to find him,” she explained. “Once I have him I'll be able to send him back to your world.”

“Thank you,” he replied, laying naked and wet in her hand. “Would you be able to clean me off first?”

Versa flashed a grin. “I guess it's the least I could do,” she admitted smugly.

After finding a bathroom and quickly rinsing him off in the sink, Versa carried him down the main staircase of the mansion. As she took each step her hand shook Harrison, who could only lie on his back in her palm. Looking up, he could see her naked breasts bounce with each step. They were huge and beautiful and Harrison took the moment to appreciate the view. Even after intimately climbing one of them and massaging one of her nipples, they still transfixed him.

Versa returned to the downstairs room where her two captives sat in a box on a table. Hiding somewhere in the room was Rich, and as she took the step down into the lounge, Versa began scanning the floor.

“Richard?” she called out sweetly. “Come out come out, wherever you are!”

“Well now he's never going to show himself!” Harrison called up to her. “You're scaring him!”

Versa glared down at him. “Just because we made a deal doesn't mean I don't get to have my fun. I'm done with you. Let me put you away while I find him.”

She walked over to the box and swiftly dropped Harrison in. Before he could recover from the impact of landing on the cardboard floor, giant Jessica was next to him.

“Harrison! What happened?!” she exclaimed. She flipped him over and began searching him for injuries. “You're clean?”

Harrison coughed and sat up. “Yeah I'm fine,” he affirmed. “I cut a deal with her.”

“What do you mean?” Jessica asked. From the other side of the box, Claire perked up and listened to their conversation.

“She's letting Rich go,” he explained.

“Letting Rich go?” Jessica repeated. “What do you mean?”

“She's going to disconnect him, out of VERSA-B,” said Harrison.

“Oh.”

“How's she going to do that?” called Claire from across the box, still sitting against a wall. Harrison looked over at her. Claire was smiling. “Because if she doesn't give him an out-key, there's only one other way for him to leave...”

 

She had finally remembered him. Fuck.

Rich had spent most of his time on the floor hiding behind the stack of boxes in the corner of the room. At first he dodged Claire and Versa by hiding under the couch they conversed on. When Claire shrunk, he used the distraction to flee across the room, and from the dark gap between the wall and the stacked boxes, he had been considering his fate ever since. He had even tried climbing the boxes or burrowing into them, but to no avail.

He peeked his head out to look for Versa when she addressed him. It shocked him to see her completely naked. Had she also been talking to Harrison somehow too? Rich was confused and had no idea what was going on anymore.

And then she started looking for him. Getting down on her hands and knees, Versa scanned the carpeted floor of the expansive room. Besides all the table, chair, and couch legs, there were no real hiding spots on the floor. Versa crept around like a cat, checking under the furniture. Her large breasts swung menacingly as she crawled, her pale skill contrasting sharply with the brightly upholstered and wooden framed features of the room. It was like watching a ghost moving through an ocean of furniture.

A minute later Versa got back on her feet and looked over at the boxes that constituted Rich's sanctuary. Shit. He turned to hide, wondering if she had glimpsed him. As he tried moving deeper behind the boxes, he could feel the floor shaking with her incoming steps.

Suddenly the boxes lurched and light poured into his hiding spot. Looking up, he saw her clutching one of the boxes. Versa quickly put it aside and grabbed another, moving it out of the way.

“Are you back here Richard?” she asked the boxes. Rich's mind froze and he realized there was no way out. He couldn't outrun this gigantic, sexy woman. One of her feet was more than three times as long as his entire body!

The cardboard wall next to him suddenly rose and he stumbled as the carpet shook below him. Falling down onto his belly, he looked up at the foot standing right next to him. “There you are,” a sweet voice said above him.

When Versa set the box down, it shook Rich's world but he still managed to stand. Without caring where he was going, he started running. But within an instant her saw one of her fingers come into view and she swiftly pinched him and pulled him up from the floor. Flailing his limbs as best he could, Rich tried to escape her grasp, but he had been caught.

Bringing him up to her face, Versa looked upon him with pleasure. Though he struggled mightily, Rich couldn't overpower her fingers, each of which were longer than his entire body.

“Hello Richard,” she greeted him kindly.

“Put me down!” he yelled at her.

“I can't do that,” she said flatly. “I made a promise to someone.”

“Fuck that! Put me down instead!”

She smiled devilishly at him. “You're one of the lucky ones,” she told him. “You're going home.”

Rich was puzzled. “What do you mean?”

“Your friend Harrison negotiated... for you to leave this world,” she explained with a smile. “He was very persuasive.”

For the first time in a long time, Rich felt a spark of hope. “How do I disconnect? How do I leave?”

“Well, I'll make sure you have a soft landing,” Versa explained, “but it might be a little uncomfortable for you until then.”

“What the hell are you talking about?” snapped Rich. Versa stared intently at him with her large eyes.

“I only have one way I can make you interlopers leave my world. I'm going to violently expunge you.”

“Oh fuck no!” Rich shouted. He renewed his hopeless squirming. He did not want to die again. Digesting in that one giantess's stomach had been enough for one lifetime.

“Don't worry,” Versa reassured him happily, “we can have some fun first. Harrison taught me a thing or two that I like.”

Rich stopped to look back at her. What the hell was she saying?

Versa lowered him down to one of her dish-sized nipples, reminding Rich she was naked. She brought his head directly in front of it and simply ordered, “Lick.”

“The fuck?!” he protested, trying to look up to her. But Versa displayed no patience and swiftly mashed him into her breast. As Rich struggled to resist, she started talking to him.

“These inputs I receive when someone interfaces with my projection are so... unique,” she explained condescendingly. “I had no idea bodies could be like this. Does it feel just as good when I do it to you? I've learned so much already!”

Rich could hardly hear her as he fought against her breast, but Versa seemed to tease him for her own amusement.

“How about another spot?” she suggested, pulling him away from her boob. Rich gasped for air and uttered curses as Versa suddenly lowered her hand down. As his gut dropped out of him, Rich felt like he was falling on a roller coaster.

Before he could regain his senses, he felt the heat, then the warm flesh of her pussy. Pushing madly with his arms, Rich pounded against her labia. Her lips quickly engorged as she pressed him into her crotch. Versa gasped, a natural reaction to the bombardment of new data overloading her artificial consciousness.

The heat was intense between her legs and in no time Rich felt her rubbery flesh dampen. He was scared and angry, confused as to why VERSA's AI wanted to assault him this way. He kept screaming at her to stop, but even he acknowledged she likely couldn't hear him. Or care, if she could.

“Mmmmmm,” Versa moaned. “That feels good. Why didn't I learn to do this earlier?”

Rich kept struggling against her but suddenly she jerked him back up to her face. The air instantly felt cool against his body. His clothes were sticky and tacky with her arousal.

“I guess I did make a deal with Harrison after all,” she told him, eyeing him longingly. With Rich in hand, she walked over to the box containing her prisoners.

Staring down from her grasp, Rich saw the three tiny occupants of the box. Harrison looked to be about his size, but Jessica and Claire were much larger. All six of their eyes looked up at him in astonishment.

“Harrison, I found him,” Versa proclaimed, beaming a smile down at him. Her gloriously nude body towered proudly over the box.

“Rich!!” Harrison shouted up. Rich could barely hear him.

“What in the hell is going on?!” Rich called down.

“You're the only one that can save us from SunCorp!” Harrison yelled up to him. “Do your thing! Get help!”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” answered Rich, confused. What was Harrison trying to say?

He was about to ask another question but Versa moved her hand. “Time to go Rich,” she told him seductively, pinching his shaking body.

Before Rich realized what was happening, he found himself being lowered into her cleavage. The temperature around him skyrocketed while he used his little arms to push back against her breast flesh. Versa released him, and Rich realized she had been using her free arm to cradle her boobs and create a snug pocket in which to hold him. He was absolutely smothered between her tits.

Pumping his legs, he tried squirming out of her cleavage. Her boobs were big but he could see out above them. He leveraged his arms against her, but her pliant breasts merely absorbed his strength. They were too soft for him to effectively fight against.

And then came the pressure. Versa used her hands to start smashing her boobs together. The soft, yielding flesh turned unforgiving as the impossible mass of her breasts began breaking Rich in between them. He screamed in pain as he felt his ribs cracking and internal organs exploding. His fists worthlessly flailed against her crushing bosom.

The force of the pressure caused Rich to vomit up a bright red curtain of blood. His vision became stars, the pain swallowed him, and his body crumpled between her gigantic breasts.

 

The last thing Rich remembered was a brutal cocktail of pain. He only saw blackness and wondered momentarily if it was what death felt like. He was dead. She had killed him.

But if he was dead, how could he think? He blinked his eyes, but again saw nothing but darkness. Did he have a body? He felt something on his fingertips. Something squishy. He couldn't see it but he could feel it.

Slowly, he brought his hands up to his dark face. He felt something. There was something on his face. A metal box of some sort. And then it hit him.

Rich grabbed the helmet and pushed it off himself. Though still attached to the wall, the piece of equipment rotated out of his way. There was light in the little closet he sat in; the door in front of him was ajar. Next to him he could see an IV bag on a pole and some tubing hooked up to a plastic bag. Neither was connected to his body anymore. Looking down at himself, he was wearing some kind of temporary clothing, like a hospital gown. There was a sensor still connected to his finger too. Waking up, he felt like he had been asleep for ages.

On the other side of the door he heard voices. They sounded distressed, as if consumed by some worrisome commotion. Wasting no time, Rich yanked off the sensor, hopped from his waterchair, and violently pushed open the door of his prison. He could feel the cool carpet below his bare feet. It did nothing to soothe his bubbling temper.

When the door burst open, Rich emerged from the stall like a wild animal. At first glace, the room shocked him. He had been here before. It was VERSA's control room, lit in that faint blue light. Machines and computers all around him calmly blinked and hummed.

Caught in a dazed surprise, the dozen people in the room regarded Rich with shock and confusion. He could see their dumbfounded stares as they glanced up from their computers. In the corner by the door he even saw Vanessa and Sujay caught mid-conversation, both their jaws stupidly hanging open at the sight of him.

A security officer next to them took a step toward Rich. Hardly wearing anything at all and feeling foolishly exposed, Rich started thinking fast. He was cornered but he was also the least surprised person in the room. The security officer began closing in on him when Rich put up a hand.

“You fuck with me now and they die!” Rich blurted out. Any outlandish claim he could make gave him the upper hand. Or at least the benefit of doubt. “If something happens to me and I can't send a message to them right away within the sim, they're dead! Especially Claire! Don't come a lick closer!”

The security officer paused as the room intently watched the drama unfold. For a moment Rich owned everyone's attention, but he didn't know how much longer it would last.

A beeping alarm suddenly wailed from one of the computers.

“It's Claire!” a tech shouted, staring into the computer screen dreadfully. “Her vitals are spiking! Something's wrong!”

The room exploded in pandemonium. A man and woman rushed past Rich, throwing open a stall door behind him. Another computer began sounding a warning as more and more workers rushed to mitigate the unfolding disaster. Rich stood in shock, blessing his luck. What the hell was going on now?

Instantly forgotten, Rich lunged at the security guard. Catching the man off guard, he pushed him into a table, causing the officer to crash into a few computers and tumble to the ground.

Without missing a beat, Rich then stomped over to Vanessa and Sujay. They quickly saw him and froze in place. Rich channeled the seething anger he had built up over the last few days into his fist, which he promptly smashed into Sujay's left cheek. Sujay slammed into the wall behind him then careened to the floor. Vanessa screamed and immediately bolted out the nearby door, escaping the chaos in the control room.

The security officer, who had quickly risen from off the floor, jumped on Rich's back. Rich used his strength to throw the smaller man off his body, then delivered a few kicks to his stomach when he hit the floor. The man cried out and rolled over in pain.

Stepping over the two bodies writhing on the floor, Rich grabbed a heavy desk nearby and dragged it in front of the door to the room, preventing it from opening. No one would be getting into the control room from the outside now, at least for a while. He turned back to his victims at his feet.

Not missing a beat, Rich grabbed Sujay's shirt and pulled him up off the floor. Blood poured out of the engineer's mouth and he seemed half-conscious.

“This is the real world, right?” Rich snarled.

Sujay gurgled an unintelligible reply as a tooth fell out of his mouth. But he meekly nodded his head.

“Where's the nearest phone?” Rich asked him next.

Sujay was in a daze but managed to vaguely raise an arm. Rich saw him pointing at a phone on a nearby desk. Tossing him back to the ground, Rich dashed over to the phone.

Just before he could pick up the receiver, a nearby tech confronted Rich. “You're not authorized to use that!” the man told him. Rich looked over at the man with murder in his eyes.

“Fuck off or I'll rip you a new asshole!” Rich told the sniveling SunCorp tech. Nobody was going to stop him now. He wasted no time picking up the phone and dialing a number, one he had memorized it in case of an emergency. Glancing up to see a clock on the wall, it told Rich it was just after five o'clock. He wondered momentarily if it was AM or PM, but then the call went through and he heard an astonished woman's voice on the other end.

 

David Pasternak looked south over the fairway of the third hole at the Congressional Country Club in Bethesda, Maryland. The cool mid-February morning sun peeked over the trees to the east as he teed his ball and pulled his driver out of his bag. He liked playing golf in the morning before leaving for his office across the river.

“You think the Saudis are going to lowball you again today?” his friend Graham Buchanan asked, puffing one of his ubiquitous cigars. David never understood how the man could consistently smoke so early every day, but he did.

“I'll shove a tomahawk missile up their asses if they pull that shit again,” David replied calmly as he sized up his shot. “Either that or I'll tell them we're bringing in the Israelis.” Graham laughed.

David took a quick practice swing then stepped up to his ball. The air was still and the grass around him felt dewy under his shoes. Relaxing, then exhaling, he twisted his arms up, then swiftly brought his club down through the teed-up ball.

He watched the tiny ball sail off into the distance, but as it climbed into the air it began slicing to the right.

“Damn,” he cursed softly. “It's going to be a bitch making par from there.”

“David,” said Graham chuckling, “I've been golfing with you here for seventeen years now, you always slice right on the goddamn third hole!” He puffed his cigar once more between his smiling lips.

Just then the faint tinkle of a ringtone cut through the air. David raised an eyebrow then plodded back to his golf bag. Unzipping a pocket, he pulled out his government issued iPhone.

“I thought I told her no calls...” he complained, looking at the caller ID. He answered the phone anyways.

“Hello?” he answered irritatingly.

A woman's voice on the other line payed his annoyance no heed. “Good morning sir, I have an emergency call, priority one, that is requesting to be forwarded to you personally.”

Priority one? This must be serious, David thought. Did North Korea finally lob a nuke into Seoul?

“What is it?” he asked, his petulance gone.

“I'm not sure... the caller is our current liaison to the SunCorp lab out in California,” the woman tersely explained. “Called the secure number and said he needed to speak to you, urgently. He gave all the right codes.”

“Who is it?”

“A....uh, Richard Colgate, sir.”

“Huh, doesn't ring a bell.” David paused. He certainly didn't know everyone who worked for him, but it checked out. “Well, put him through. Stay on the line though and see if you can get Keith on the call too.”

“One moment please.” The line went silent.

The call transferred and David heard the heavy breathing of a man and lots of background noise.

“Is this David Pasternak?” the voice asked hurriedly.

“Yes, who is this speaking?”

“Richard Colgate, Experimental Weapons and Research Division,” the voice on the other end quickly replied. David could tell he was distressed. “We have a hostage situation at the SunCorp Laboratory in California! I need you to send help!”

“What?” David exclaimed. “What are you talking about?!”

“It's SunCorp,” Rich shouted back. “Leo Starr is dead, the company's gone rogue with a dangerous weapon, and they're holding hostages, including myself. I don't have much time. Call the governor and tell him to send in the national guard or some shit!”

David felt baffled. He turned to Graham, who looked on in confusion. He snapped his fingers at him. “Get Marty on the phone!” David hissed at him. Graham began fumbling for his own device.

“And sir?” Rich said on the line. “You're going to want to secure what SunCorp's been working on all these years. It's a game changer. Don't let anyone else find out about-”

The line went dead.

David held his cold phone in his trembling hand. He certainly wouldn't be making par on this hole after all. It seemed that the Secretary of Defense of the United States was about to have a very long and unforgettable day.

 

 

Chapter 29 by Q-Writer

Chapter 29:

(Posted: May 17)

 

 

From below, the three diminutive prisoners watched their nude captor pulverize Rich's body between her gigantic breasts. Beneath the murder, blood and viscera rained down on the unlucky occupants of the box. Jessica screamed and cried and even Harrison was caught off guard by the horror of situation. Trying to make sense of the carnage, he nevertheless hoped Rich was truly disconnecting from VERSA-B with his consciousness and real life intact.

Versa relaxed her grip on her bosom, causing the two jiggling orbs to return to their normal position. Between them, the crushed remains of Rich's body slid out of her cleavage and landed with a gruesome thud inside the box, not far from where Claire stood watching. Blood splashed the nearby walls as Jessica looked away in disgust.

“Oh my God!” she wailed hysterically, crumpling up into a whimpering ball on the floor. “Why did she do that?! Why'd she kill Rich?!”

“It's ok, it's ok,” Harrison tried reassuring her. He rested his small hand on her much larger shoulder and could feel her shaking. He hoped he was right. “Jessica, she got Rich out, he's out of the sim,” he tried explaining. “I asked her to let him go.”

“Why'd she have to... do it, do it like... that?!” asked Jessica through sobs.

“I don't know,” Harrison admitted. “But I'm trusting her that he's alright. I'm hoping when he wakes up he'll get help somehow. He knows people in the government that can get us out of this.”

“I just want to go home...” Jessica said quietly, her tears starting to abate as she collected herself.

“Yeah, me too,” he acknowledged. Harrison looked up to see that Versa had moved on from the box. He could feel her footsteps shaking their box, so she must have still been in the room somewhere. Across the box he spotted Claire looking distressed by Rich's gory remains but disinterested in sharing her alarm with the two of them.

Jessica looked up and saw the bloody pulp of Rich's avatar. “Oh God...” she muttered. Harrison wondered for a moment if she would throw up.

“Don't look at it,” he suggested to her. “Come, let's sit over there.”

He motioned her over to the far corner of the box, away from Rich's body. Jessica took her time standing and then slowly followed Harrison with her much larger steps. Giving space to the bloody part of the box, they both sat down together, Harrison naked and Jessica still only wearing her bra above her skirt and tights.

Harrison started talking to distract Jessica's attention. “Look, I'm thinking that Rich is a pretty resourceful guy. I'm assuming if he's back at the real lab now he's causing a ruckus and will hopefully find a way to get help. But she's still a problem.” With his thumb he gestured out of the box, indicating Versa. “I still don't think anyone on the outside can get us out of this sim, or else they would have done it already. We need to come up with our own plan.”

“How'd you convince Versa to release Rich?” Jessica finally asked, eyeing Harrison with curiosity.

He blushed and turned away, hoping he wouldn't have to explain. He began choosing his words carefully.

“I... I tried thinking about what she wants. You know, she's an artificial intelligence designed to learn from people. I kind of thought about it and figured she wants to know what the human experience is like. She's really intelligent, but still kind of dumb and curious, like a toddler.” He paused, trying to get his point right.

“Ok, so you told me about the weird sex stuff she made you do, right?” Harrison looked at Jessica and she nodded, trying to follow him. “By analyzing your brain during your... experience, you were inputting new and unique code into VERSA's software. The AI learned of it, but couldn't directly interface with it, since pleasure is, well, avatar based. So I decided to... see if I could use it on her avatar.”

Jessica's eyes narrowed as she thought about what he was saying.

“Are you implying-” she started to ask before Harrison cut her off.

“Yes.”

Jessica's eyes went wide and surprise washed across her face. “Oh my God... Harrison...” she blurted out.

“Yeah... I know,” he responded reluctantly. He didn't feel ashamed since his theory came true and his plan had worked, but it was incredibly awkward nonetheless.

“You had sex with a computer!” Jessica uttered in disbelief. Her face turned into a smile. “Harrison! You're such a fucking pervert!”

“Hey, I took one for the team!” he argued back. But Jessica was still flabbergasted and didn't want to let the moment slide. Luckily for Harrison, he saw her playful side coming out.

“You're so gross!” she teased him. “Ew, that is so nasty.”

“You basically did the same thing though!” he pointed out. “It's just you were the bigger one!”

She brushed it off. “I was forced to do that. You, on the other hand, actively sought it out. Perv! Ew ew ew! Men are so gross.” She shook her head.

He threw up his hands in defense. “Hey I wasn't in it for me. I didn't even get to enjoy it!”

Jessica shot him a sly look as she mulled over his defense. Her piercing eyes made him especially sensitive of his current nakedness. He waited for her to say something.

Finally, she spoke. “I... I can't believe you Harrison. You've got some nerve.”

“If we get out of this alive, you owe me,” he smugly replied. “Sorry you didn't have the same great idea. And it would have been easier for you too, you're twice as big as me right now!”

“Is this where I'm supposed to stroke your fragile male ego and tell you that size doesn't matter?” she teased him.

“You're so annoying,” he huffed, rolling his eyes in mock disgust. Part of him couldn't believe how fast everything devolved into witty flirting with her. It seemed to be happening often between him and Jessica.

Jessica casually pointed at his exposed penis. “Probably doesn't take much to go balls deep with that little guy.”

Harrison glared at her, shocked by her joke. “Hey that's not fair! I'm not usually this small!” he argued.

He abruptly stood up, to try getting level with her, but even sitting the size of her body still dominated his. The air was electrified with sexual tension. Jessica's chest was heaving as she took her breaths, causing her boobs to push against her bra. Harrison locked eyes with her, challenging her to confront him.

Jessica put her arms out in front of her and shifted to her knees and crawled a step toward him, placing her arms on either side of his quivering body. She brought her face close to his as he stood defiantly and nervously in front of her. She brought her lips close to his ear and whispered confidently in it:

“If that bitch wasn't in the box with us, I'd fuck the shit out of you right now.”

Harrison grinned and felt his cock stir. Pulling his head back, he caught her large eyes looking excitedly into his.

“We could ask her leave?” he finally suggested.

Jessica chuckled. She leaned back to sit on her knees, but not before bringing her hand past Harrison's crotch, casually brushing it against his manhood. She may have played it off like an accident but Harrison new the little swipe was intentional.

“So smartypants,” she started, looking at him expectantly. “How do you think we go about doing that?”

“Um... ask her nicely?” he offered.

“Ok, but in all seriousness, where do we go from here?” Intent on returning to their hopeless reality, Jessica forced the necessary question. Trapped in a box, they were hostages to an aberrant computer program intent on using them to try winning a game it didn't understand.

“You know,” Harrison said. “I see where Versa gets it from.”

Jessica gave him a look of confusion.

“Yeah, it's from people like you,” he continued. “She learns about sex from me, but then realizes sex is all about power and lords it over us all. She played with Rich right up until she killed him. But I doubt it was really about the physical feeling more than the power it represents. She's always loved toying with us. Now that she's discovered sex, it brings her manipulation to a whole new level. She's cunning. In trying to learn everything about being human, she's already perfected one of the most dangerous things: intimidation.”

Jessica considered his theory. “Well, she does seem more dangerous now. And unpredictable,” she added.

“Yeah, for sure.”

“Why is she holding us here anyways? Doesn't she know we're just a bunch of bystanders in all of this?”

“Yeah I think this is really all about Claire anyways,” Harrison agreed, lowering his voice to a whisper. “I think when Versa talked to her she realized Claire really holds all the power in getting her out.” As Harrison paused to consider his own words, Jessica watched him, but then something clicked for her.

“You know,” she thought out loud, but quietly, “Versa thinks she's got a seat at this table because she's got Claire... what if she didn't have her?”

“Oh, you mean like if we asked Claire nicely to leave the box so we could have some alone time?”

Jessica ignored his innuendo. “No, like what if we threatened to take Claire away from her? Would she let us go?”

“Wait, you want to hold Claire hostage now? How the hell would we do that?” Harrison asked her skeptically.

Jessica reached behind the waistband of her skirt and down into her pantyhose. Pulling her little sheathed blade out of its hiding spot once more, Harrison's eyes lit up in understanding.

“Jessica, you're fucking evil and I love it,” he professed to her.

 

They spent another minute hashing out a plan, then waited for Versa's inevitable return. Their success seemed improbable and clearly rested on the assumption that VERSA's AI would be too afraid to lose Claire to disconnection. Jessica postured that Versa could likely bring down the barriers preventing Tower-issued disconnections, which Harrison hoped would happen now that Rich was back in the real world. He had to admit though that everything relied on a lot of tenuous assumptions, but they really had no better choice.

As Claire ignored them from across the box, her aloofness indicated she suspected nothing. She sat alone, staring off into space, generally acting like a bored prisoner banished to solitary confinement. Time passed agonizingly slowly in the box.

It could have been twenty minutes or an hour later, but Versa's ominous footsteps finally came closer to the cardboard prison. Harrison and Jessica looked at each other silently, then jumped up and began hastily walking across the box toward Claire.

Above them Versa appeared, still naked and grinning at her shrunken captives.

“Are my little guests holding up alright?” she asked them with mock sweetness. Jessica, who outpaced Harrison by quite a bit, ignored her and closed in on Claire.

Claire saw Jessica approaching and sensed something was wrong. “What the hell do you want?” Claire asked her indignantly.

Producing the knife she had been hiding in her hand, Jessica grabbed Claire with her free hand and pulled her to the ground. Next, she pinned her by sitting on her back while simultaneously bringing the knife up under her head. She held the blade inches from Claire's exposed neck.

All this caught Claire quite by surprise, and a moment later she was screaming and thrashing. Harrison jumped on her legs to do what he could to keep them from giving her leverage to escape. Jessica looked up at Versa with malice in her eyes.

“Hey Versa!” she yelled up to the towering giantess. “You let us out now or we make sure Claire disconnects!” Her threat prompted a renewed outburst of struggling from Claire.

High above them, Versa looked stunned. Harrison couldn't remember her ever looking so surprised. She had always been one step ahead of them; for a fleeting moment he felt pleased they had finally found a way to turn the tables on her.

“Are you threatening me?” Versa replied in disbelief.

“I'll cut her neck right now,” Jessica boasted. Harrison felt she was playing the part convincingly. “You use that stupid magic wall over there to tell the people to disconnect us from the other side or it's game over for Claire ever helping you.”

“Are you fucking crazy?!” Claire argued with Jessica. “Get off me you bitch!”

Jessica ignored her while Versa's shock melted into rage. Harrison sensed a shift in the situation as he watched one of her giant hands rise into view.

“You put a hand in this box and you lose her!” Jessica screamed, holding the small blade against Claire's throbbing neck. All she had to do was push it in a couple inches and Claire would depart VERSA-B.

“Drop the knife Jessica and we can talk,” Versa commanded her sternly.

“The only way I'm dropping this knife is if I'm disconnected,” Jessica told her aggressively. They had trapped Versa, who paused with her hand near the edge of the box. All of the shrunken pilots' eyes watched her unblinkingly as each passing second only ratcheted up the tension to uncomfortable levels.

And then Versa did something nobody expected.

Harrison saw her hand drop just before his world turned upside down. The cardboard box accelerated upward, and Harrison felt himself fly off of Claire as the box's floor tilted toward him. As the box started to flip, he turned his body and realized he was being catapulted away from the table and toward the carpeted floor. Conscious thoughts zoomed through his mind in panic as he visualized his painful impact with the floor, though he momentarily forgot his body was still invincible.

Why had Versa flipped their box? To try getting Jessica off of Claire? Where were they? Questions catapulted through his mind as his world spun.

Twisting his head back to look at Jessica and Claire, he saw the bodies of the two tangled blondes starting to part from one another. And blooming into the void like an errant sprinkler, a geyser of blood sprayed violently into the air.

 

Deep inside VERSA's engine and quadrillions of lines of code, a few different servers interfaced at light speed to interpret and resolve the newest data input into VERSA-B.

First, as the box flipped, Jessica's knife fatally punctured the trachea of Claire's avatar, which began the death-spiral of her time within the sim. This would trigger her simulated death and disconnection sequence, which VERSA's AI had modified to deliver a crippling brain aneurysm to the pilot upon their conscious mind's re-input to their physical brain. VERSA's AI, recognizing the importance of Claire's life to its own goals, immediately sought to put a halt to Claire's death, preventing disconnection.

The first problem occurred when the AI reacted a moment after the mortal wound to Claire's neck. It tried creating a baseline for the avatar to rebound into, much in the same way Harrison's avatar returned to an uninjured state after Claire's modification to it. But with Claire's avatar already horribly modified by the stab wound, it could not reference the program's software to establish a viable profile characteristic for Claire's avatar.

A millisecond later, the AI tried to directly access Claire's avatar data to change her into something new, really anything that would keep her mind perpetually alive in VERSA-B. But it ran up against Kat's efforts protecting pilot avatar files from modification. This access denial set off the AI's frantic attempt to locate the files Kat previously hid, but in the two and half seconds elapsed sim-time, the AI could not discover the new source of the files and Claire's avatar activated its disconnection protocol.

At this point, the AI simply moved on from Claire, indifferent to stopping her kill-switch from activating. It had lost Claire within the sim and her real life meant nothing to it now. Instead it focused on recalculating its efforts to expand beyond VERSA-B, which now depended largely upon the three remaining pilots inside the sim.

And thus the last thing Claire Starr remembered before her brain exploded in a waterchair was how strange her blood looked gushing out from her neck.

 

By the time Harrison hit the floor of the room, Claire was dead. His impact into the carpet hardly affected him though. After the bumpy landing, he found that he had suffered no real damage and quickly sprang up to his feet. Later, he reckoned that his inconsequential mass couldn't sustain a force great enough to damage his out-of-proportion body. His small size rendered him essentially impervious to taking damage from falls of great heights.

He spotted Jessica and Claire land nearby him before the upended box also crashed onto the floor, luckily with the open end facing down. The cardboard box briefly smothered all his light before bouncing back up from the carpet and tumbling away. He watched Jessica quickly rise up, but Claire's lifeless body lay contorted grotesquely on the carpeted floor.

Versa, aware of Jessica's murder of Claire, started walking around the table to confront her captives struggling to recover on the floor. Her massive feet boomed and shook the soft ground. Harrison immediately panicked. Looking up at her gigantic body from the floor truly terrified and intimidated him, and Versa's expression indicated that she was not pleased.

He broke out into a run for the nearest chair, hoping he could hide underneath it before she caught him. Harrison thought he might be able to make it until a shadow loomed over him. Looking up he expected to see her hand, but instead her enormous naked foot hovered over him. He braced his mind for the impact, and like a freight train her foot crashed down on top of him.

Intense, agonizing pain pulled Harrison's body apart. She had crushed him flat and he would have screamed if his lungs hadn't completely flattened. The weight and force of her foot normally would have instantly killed him, but Claire's old invulnerability curse on his avatar prevented him from disconnecting to his death. Harrison's mind only recovered when Versa removed her foot and his body reformed.

For a few moments he couldn't see or hear or feel anything but pain: blinding, ringing, coursing pain. Crumpled in a little ball of helplessness, Harrison's mind tried once again to reconcile itself with an experience that should have killed him.

Off in the distance, Versa's footfalls told him she wasn't done with Jessica. He tried forcing his head up to look around, but he remained effectively stunned. Her booming words rang down to his little ears, but he was too dazed to make out what she was saying. Was she talking to him? Or Jessica?

Though shell-shocked, reality started slowly creeping back up to Harrison before finally broadsiding him. His head ached and he retched the meager contents of his stomach onto the floor. Versa's words rang clearly now.

“You fiend!” she screamed, jarring his world. Finally able to look up, he saw her impossibly huge foot nearby, turned away from him. She must have been talking to Jessica.

Harrison peered into the distance and spotted Jessica pathetically hiding under a couch. Despite being under the furniture, she was incredibly exposed and all Versa had to do was bend down and pick her up.

“I'm going to make sure you never leave this world alive!” he heard the godlike voice profess from above. “Are you as durable as your friend? Can I break you?” she taunted Jessica.

Oh God, he thought. They had pissed her off enough that this computer program was now out for blood. He could see Jessica yelling from under the couch but he couldn't make out her words. He had to get to her, he had to stop what was going to happen.

Summoning all his strength, Harrison tepidly rose to his feet. His reformed legs felt wobbly and the distance across the carpet to Jessica looked daunting. Gingerly, he took a step and promptly fell back down.

Back on the carpet, it took him a second to realize the ground was shaking. But he could see Versa standing over him and she was not moving. Something else was shaking the floor. It was something deeper than her. Bigger. Jessica looked surprised too. Craning his neck, Harrison looked up Versa's beautifully nude skyscraper-esque body to see a look of concern on her face.

The rhythmic shaking slowly increased in intensity. At first it vibrated the furniture gently, but soon the chandeliers in the room started swaying. Window panes rattled and within seconds the mansion's walls began shaking on their foundations. What the fuck was going on?

Suddenly something blocked out the light beaming into the room from the east windows. An ominous shadow fell across the house, casting the room into near darkness. Only one lamp weakly beamed its yellow light inside the lounge. Versa did not seem distressed, but she certainly seemed irritated as she shifted her weight on her giant legs. She had lost interest in Jessica, and instead prepared herself for the confrontation that came next.

A deafening voice, amplified like a jet engine, broke like thunder and rumbled through the manor down into the little bodies of its occupants.

“CLAIRE!! VERSA!! Come out of this house right now or I'll crush the whole damn thing!” the giantess Kat bellowed in anger.

 

 

Chapter 30 by Q-Writer

Chapter 30:

(Posted: May 21)

 

 

 

“I'm coming back for you two fools later,” Versa told her shrunken captives cowering beneath her on the floor. “Not like you can escape this room anyways. It seems I need to talk to Katherine now.”

With hardly a flourish or goodbye, the naked giantess strode confidently out of the room, presumably toward the front door of the mansion. As she left, Harrison regained his footing and began hobbling over to Jessica, who still hid under a couch. Upon seeing him, she ran to him too.

The two collided and wrapped each other in a loving embrace. Jessica, still about twice as tall as Harrison, picked him up and hugged him tightly to her body. Harrison did his best to wrap his small arms around her, but her large breasts mashed against him, making it difficult to breathe. After a moment, the two made eye-contact.

“I thought for sure you were dead!” Jessica admitted to Harrison.

“I thought she was going to kill you too!” he replied. “Did you kill Claire?”

Jessica paused, clearly rattled. “Accidentally, I think. Last thing I remember was having the knife against her neck, and then when the box flipped... all I saw was blood.”

“Wow...” was all Harrison could think to say. Jessica set him down on the floor in front of her.

“Kat sure showed up at the right time,” she commented, changing the subject. She looked over toward the darkened windows across the room. “I wonder how she got so big.”

“No idea.”

“We probably only have a few minutes before Versa shrinks her and comes back to find us.”

“Yeah, let's get the hell out of this room,” agreed Harrison.

“How though? The step out is too big even for me. If I was just a little bit taller-”

“Look!” exclaimed Harrison. He pointed toward the pile of boxes and equipment stacked against the nearby wall; the same boxes Rich had tried hiding behind. “See that one there? By the step?”

When Versa located Rich she had moved around the cardboard boxes, and one in particular had been shifted to rest right up against the step that led out of the room.

“Do you think we could climb up the side of the box to get over the top of the step?” Harrison asked Jessica, looking up. He saw her face lost in thought.

With her arms outstretched above her head, the height of the step was only slightly taller than her reach. “The sides of those boxes are too smooth,” Jessica finally said. “But if we had some kind of foothold... maybe?”

“Your knife!” Harrison shouted. “We could carve into the side and crawl up! Where is it?”

“Oh!” Jessica exclaimed, suddenly swiveling her head around to search the vast expanse of the room. “It flew out of my hand but it must be here somewhere!”

Harrison knew they might not have much time before Versa came back. The house continued to spontaneously shake as Kat's massive form moved around outside. He could even hear the rumble of her voice talking softly from time to time, but he couldn't exactly make out her words, much less concentrate on anything besides looking for the knife and escaping.

“I see it!” Jessica called out after about a minute of searching. Walking over to it and picking it off the floor, she could see Claire's fresh blood smeared over the blade. Though she loathed Claire, she had not yet accepted in her mind the horror of what she had done. Maybe she disconnected safely after all? Jessica didn't want to believe that she might have inadvertently murdered the young heiress.

“Let's go!” she said to Harrison. Not waiting for a reply, Jessica took off sprinting for the box. By the time Harrison's little legs finally caught up with her, she was already gashing out footholds in the side of the cardboard box. Though her knife wasn't long enough to cut though the thickness of the cardboard, Jessica had no trouble whittling out small chunks from the surface of the pliant box.

Harrison watched her work for a moment, then commented, “So what's the plan, how's this gonna work?”

Jessica grunted as she dug the knife into the box. “You ever been rock climbing Harrison?”

“No.”

“Oh. Well, like that.”

Jessica paused for a moment to look at the few cuts she had already scoured into the side of the box. So far, they went up to the level of her head, still short of where they needed to be.

“I might have to cut more as we go up,” she commented.

“How am I going to make it up?” Harrison asked her sheepishly. The cuts she was making into the box were too far apart for him to effectively climb.

Looking down at him, Jessica smiled and rubbed him on his shoulder. “On my back silly,” she explained.

“Oh.”

“Ready?”

“Uh. Sure, I guess,” replied Harrison cautiously.

Squatting down, Jessica motioned Harrison to grab onto her shoulders and wrap his arms around her. Using her hips to support his legs, he awkwardly latched onto her back. Jessica stood to her full height.

“Yeah, you don't weigh much, this shouldn't be too much trouble,” she told him.

Placing the blade between her teeth, Jessica put a foot into the lowest cut-out and grabbed a higher one. Pulling herself off the carpeted floor, she slowly started climbing up the box. After raising herself up, she used her free hand to grab her knife and reaching high over her head, stabbed the side of the box. The knife stuck. Though the blade's handle was small, she used the available leverage and pulled herself up, nestling her other foot in a higher foothold.

They didn't have far to climb. Within a minute they were just below the lip of the giant step next to them.

“Harrison, climb onto my shoulders and see if you can reach the step,” Jessica told him through labored breaths.

“Uh, ok,” he replied, awkwardly pulling his knees up to her shoulders. Under him, he could feel her straining to keep hold of the box. Scrambling up her body, he found himself able to slowly stand atop her shoulders. The top of the step was right next to him.

Throwing his arms over the top, Harrison partly jumped and stepped off of Jessica and with some effort pulled himself up over the step. Rolling his legs out from under himself, he came to rest panting heavily and lying on his back. Above him, the impossibly high ceiling of the hallway stared back at him.

After a moment of pause, he stood to get a look at Jessica who was slowly making her way up the side of the box.

“Ok, I think I can make it,” she finally said, looking at the giant step next to her.

“If you reach over to the step I can help pull you up,” offered Harrison.

Jessica twisted her face in amusement at him. “Harrison I'm pretty sure I'd just pull you right back down.”

Harrison chuckled. “Well, I guess we'll see.”

With her fleet planted in two footholds, Jessica twisted her body and reached one arm out, then another, to grab the top of the step. Harrison used his small arms to grab her and help pull her up as Jessica disengaged her feet from the footholds on the box. After a moment of uncertainty, Jessica pulled her torso up onto the step, soon followed by her legs. Harrison did his best to help but his small strength proved rather inconsequential.

“Hell yeah!” Jessica exclaimed when she was fully on the step. “We made it!”

“Let's run!” Harrison quickly said.

“To where?” Jessica asked as she rose to her feet.

“Anywhere! Let's go down this hallway. There must be somewhere to hide!”

Harrison and Jessica both peered down the titanic hallway in front of them. A carpet runner covered most of the wood floor and the walls high above them displayed framed paintings and other decorations.

Without saying a word, Jessica began briskly walking toward one of the walls while Harrison followed her in a run. Down the hallway he could see another doorway.

“Let's see if we can hide in there,” Harrison suggested as he panted behind Jessica. He pointed at the doorway in the distance.

“Ok,” Jessica replied.

As the two shrunken pilots moved down the hallway, the house continued to intermittently shake as Kat moved outside. Harrison thought it must be good sign that she was still so big, but he wondered what happened to Versa. Was she coming back for them?

A few minutes later, Harrison and Jessica reached the doorway. Peering into another large room of the house, they could see it was furnished like a library, full of comfortable chairs and walls lined with bookcases. A stone fireplace dominated the far side of the room and above the mantle a mounted buck's head surveyed the room with its glassy, dead eyes.

Jessica cautiously walked into the room as Harrison followed behind her. At their sizes, he figured, they would feel Versa's heavy footfalls coming to get them before they saw her. It wasn't like she could sneak up on them at her size, and right now the house was silent.

“Look, there!” Jessica exclaimed. A small gap existed between the wall and the nearest bookcase. The two of them raced over to it and Harrison easily fit in. Jessica shimmied her body into the much tighter space, but she fit too. Barely. But it was a hiding spot, and now they felt relieved.

“Tight fit,” Harrison commented to Jessica with a smile, who looked uncomfortable and couldn't sit down. The space they occupied was dusty and cramped, but enough light squeezed in with them that they could still see each other.

The humor of the situation passed and slowly a sense of uncertainty descended on the two escapees.

“Well, what now?” Jessica asked Harrison, looking down on him skeptically.

“I... I don't know,” he replied sheepishly. Sitting down in the dusty space to rest, he looked up at Jessica, he large body silhouetted by the light filtering in.

“Ok, so it's occurred to me,” Jessica explained casually, finally relaxing, “if Claire's dead and Rich actually got out and is alive, SunCorp is definitely fucked which means...” She sighed in resignation. “Our biggest problem now is just getting out of this damn sim.”

“I think you're probably right,” agreed Harrison. “I don't think anyone on the other side is going to be faking our deaths now. I just don't see Rich going down without a fight.”

“But then how do we get out of here?” Jessica wondered aloud. “If we die in here, Versa put in her kill-switch. And she also blocked anyone from disconnecting us manually.”

“You're forgetting too that Claire made it so I can't die,” Harrison reminded her. “And Versa that shut off the kill-switch for Rich, presumably, so it can be changed,” he added.

“Yeah, but that was before we pissed her off. And who knows what's going on between her and Kat at the moment. Kat might have just stepped on her by now.”

“I don't think that would kill her though, just destroy her avatar,” Harrison guessed. “She's infected this world and she's only going to get stronger. We can't change that. Pretty soon she'll be everywhere and be able to track our movement through VERSA-B. Hell, or maybe even read our thoughts.”

“I wish we just had a damn out-key,” said Jessica hopelessly.

A memory sparked within Harrison's mind. “An out-key!” he said aloud. “You think that would work? Finding an apple and eating it?!”

“I don't see why not,” Jessica said, calm but confused by Harrison's reaction. “I remember someone explained to us how that whole disconnect procedure was coded differently. It's not affected by the AI, it should just work, like flipping a switch.”

Harrison's heart began beating faster. “Ok, I remember now before Claire shrunk me, there was a guard with her, and she told him there were out-keys upstairs. I think in Leo's office? Where we found that weird note?”

“Really?” Jessica said in surprise.

“Yeah, I'm pretty sure!”

“Ok then... well, how the hell do we get upstairs?”

Her words crushed Harrison's optimism. She was right. It had already been a herculean labor getting up just one step, there was no way they could get up thirty. If it was even possible, it would take an entire day.

“Fuck,” Harrison sighed. He looked up at Jessica longingly. “I just want to fucking go home.”

She smiled down at him. “Me too.”

Suddenly her nose sniffled and she let out a loud sneeze.

“Bless you,” said Harrison.

“Ugh, I hate this place,” complained Jessica. She shimmied her body out of the dusty, confined slot and back into the openness of the room. Calling back to Harrison she told him, “I'm going to wait out here. If Versa comes, I'll jump back in, but until then, fuck that.”

Harrison peered out and watched Jessica sit down and lean against the nearby wall of the room, stretching her long legs out in front of her. Though he noticed the few small holes in her black pantyhose and the whiteness of her bra sullied with dirt and flecks of blood, he thought she looked absolutely beautiful. For whatever reason at that moment, his heart swelled at the sight of her. He let out the long sigh of a smitten lover.

“What?” Jessica asked him, indignantly.

“Nothing, just looking at you,” said Harrison dreamily.

She smirked. It was obvious what he was thinking. She couldn't help but feel the same way toward him, but it was odd beholding him at such a smaller size. He looked like a little child, yet he was a man. She felt a protective urge manifest within her.

“Come sit with me,” she asked him warmly.

Harrison wordlessly walked out from the hiding spot toward her. With her seated, he stood about the same height as her. Jessica caught him glancing at her breasts, but it didn't annoy her. She could only imagine how overwhelming she appeared to him. It made her feel warm inside.

The gentle, intermittent shaking of the house lulled them into a sense of security. Versa was nowhere nearby and unlikely to find them now in such a large mansion. The building was huge and they were small. After so much anxiety, the two lovers savored their current respite from calamity.

“You cold?” Jessica commented to Harrison, eyeing his nakedness.

“Yeah, a little,” he admitted as he walked up to her. He looked at her wearily, fatigue painted clearly across his face.

“Come,” said Jessica, inviting him to sit in her over-sized lap.

Wordlessly, Harrison smiled in relief and crawled onto her. Her body felt warm and he found himself instantly snuggling into her bosom. Her arms wrapped around him and held him gently and lovingly.

With his small head pressed against her boobs, Jessica felt a pleasant sensation of arousal come from her breasts. Her nipples tingled behind her bra and the touch of his body sent a jolt of pleasure down her spine.

“This is nice,” Jessica whispered between her slow breaths. Holding Harrison just felt... right. Though his childlike size caused a strange maternal instinct to build inside of her, Jessica certainly regarded him as a man with her heart and her mind. And her loins.

Harrison didn't say a word as he sat on Jessica. His breathing slowed and he relaxed as he savored the feeling of closeness. One of Jessica's large hands came up and rested on the back of his head, caressing him and gently holding him against her bosom. Harrison marveled silently at the realization that each of her breasts were roughly equivalent to the size of his head.

Jessica shifted her body under Harrison and leaned forward a bit. “Ugh, lemme get comfortable real quick,” she grunted, sending a hand behind her back. Before Harrison wondered what she was doing, Jessica deftly unclasped her bra. The cups around her breasts loosened and Jessica quickly danced her arms out of the restrictive garment. Caught in awe, Harrison watched her boobs bounce free, inches from his face.

In her defense, Jessica knew that very few things feel better than taking off a bra after a long day. But she certainly couldn't turn down the opportunity with Harrison cuddled up against her breasts. She smiled warmly down at him as he stared dumbfounded at her beautiful body.

“Where were we?” she asked knowingly, using her powerful hand to bring Harrison's head back against her breasts. She pushed his head softly against her left breast, the supple flesh yielding gently to Harrison's body. Jessica's swelling nipple poked the side of Harrison's face, sending a small wave of pleasure through her body.

As she clenched his body to hers, Jessica felt something small begin to poke her abdomen. A crude smirk formed on her lips as she realized it must be Harrison's cock becoming erect. She wasn't surprised by his arousal and was silently pleased with herself as they lay entwined together. She certainly felt tired and wanted to relax, but something about Harrison's cute little body made her want to be closer to him.

Harrison, on the other hand, couldn't keep his overwhelmed mind straight. First Jessica had taken off her bra, displaying her enormous breasts to him, then proceeded to push him right into her cleavage. It was highly erotic and he felt ashamed that he couldn't control his arousal, but he simply couldn't resist her. He too felt exhausted from their ordeal and wanted to simply rest with her, but with her nipple poking him in the face and his head pushed into one of her soft breasts, lust began clouding his mind.

Without much of a thought, Harrison turned his head and opened his small mouth and let Jessica's over-sized nipple pop between his lips. It felt like a thumb against his tongue, and instinctually he let his lips gently form around it.

When Harrison took her nipple in his mouth, Jessica let out a small yelp. Pleasure exploded through her body as his mouth caused the nub to swell in between his lips. Her arousal skyrocketed and she felt her pussy moisten beneath her skirt. She cooed gently and smiled demurely down at Harrison.

“Harrison!” she called to him softly, acting calm as the arousal built up inside her.

Harrison pulled away for a moment to look up at her. “Sorry... it, uh, just felt... right,” he admitted, feeling a little conflicted by his boldness.

“No, it feels good, keep going,” she told him gently. Harrison opened his mouth to speak but before he could talk again, Jessica used her big hand to push his head back onto her boob, her nipple once again entering his mouth.

“You don't need to say anything,” she told him, “I've got you.” Absentmindedly, she began stroking the hair on his head, lost in the feeling of his little mouth sucking on her tit. It felt amazing and she let out a long, drawn-out sigh. At that moment she convinced herself she was going to get them both out of VERSA-B. She would find a way to climb the stairs up to the office, get a piece of an apple, and bring it back to him. She would save them both. She was bigger. It felt right.

Lost in the moment, Jessica hadn't realized she had closed her eyes or increased her grip on Harrison's head. Opening her eyes and looking down at the small man, she wondered what he was thinking. He probably felt overwhelmed, not just by her but by being so small in this huge world. His dependence on her felt wonderful, kind of erotic actually, and Jessica had to catch herself from truly taking advantage of Harrison. He needed her protection, she reminded herself, and she was going to save him. In the meantime though, she reveled in the attention he was lavishing on her breast.

Bringing her free hand into her lap, Jessica pushed it between their bodies. She found Harrison's cock and began fondling it, causing him to moan into her nipple. The vibrations felt good against her skin and Jessica began diligently playing with his little penis. Proportionally, his cock was a respectable size, but in his reduced state Jessica realized even her fingers were longer than his member.

Holding his head against her breast with one hand and caressing his manhood with the other, Jessica lovingly dominated Harrison. He couldn't believe she had gone straight for his cock; her fingers felt so good, if not strangely large. Gripping his shaft with just her thumb and index finger, Jessica tenderly but firmly pumped him while her other fingers tickled his scrotum.

Even if he had wanted to pull away, he couldn't; inadvertently or not, Jessica held his head firmly against her breast, her nipple aggressively occupying his mouth. Moaning and grunting and trying not to bite down, Harrison remained helpless as Jessica pleasured him. As the sensations on his cock increased, he began thrashing involuntarily.

“It's ok, just relax,” Jessica cooed, delighted by the pleasure she was giving him.

Harrison could feel his orgasm building. Feeling his sweaty body against Jessica's torso, his senses heightened and his mind was unable to focus on anything but his cock. If he had been able to open his eyes, he would have seen Jessica's pleased smile beaming down on him.

Like the growl of thunder racing toward the horizon, Harrison felt himself pass the point of no return. He was matching Jessica's ministrations with his own body, rhythmically humping her hand, and now he felt his body tense up. Jessica felt his orgasm coming too, and at the last moment grabbed his cock and made sure to point it away from her naked belly.

Harrison began shooting spurts of cum as a tremendous orgasm racked his body. Jessica watched gleefully as his cock unloaded on her red skirt. Harrison's breathing became ragged as she pulled him off her breast and let him vigorously suck down fresh air.

“Oh my... God...” he finally sputtered, feeling mentally elevated and physically defeated by his orgasm. His eyes half-open, he looked into the face of his goddess, Jessica. She smiled back lovingly.

“Did you like that?” she asked him smugly.

Harrison nodded his head emphatically. He had just experienced the most erotic handjob of his entire life.

“That was... that was amazing,” he was finally able to admit to her. Then he noticed the mess he had made on her skirt. “Oops, sorry about that.”

“It's ok,” Jessica told him. She had been cradling him in her arms and now gently shifted to set him down on the floor. Harrison felt like he couldn't move; the orgasm had blown a hole through his mind.

As he lay dazed next to her, Jessica slipped off her boots, first one, then the other. Standing up, she unzipped her soiled skirt and let it fall to her feet. Her pantyhose, sticky with sweat, felt uncomfortable around her legs and she hastily peeled them off. Down below her, Harrison gazed up at her giant body. She was clad only in a pair of white panties, and she looked down at him with an expectant look.

“You look so fucking hot right now,” was all Harrison could say. And she truly was, standing there nearly nude, her beautiful face peering down at him. Her golden blond hair fell across her shoulders like a sunrise and her perky, sculpted breasts stuck out proudly from her chest, each one crowned by a red, cherry-sized nipple.

Shifting her long legs, Jessica swung her hips and let her underwear drop to the floor, exposing her pussy to Harrison. She watched his eyes widen as she stepped out of her discarded panties.

“Hey, stand up,” she ordered him politely, “I want to try something.”

“What?” Harrison asked as he slowly got to his feet.

When he rose to his full height, he found himself staring face to face with Jessica's crotch. Tilting his head up, he saw a greedy grin peeking out from behind her boobs.

“Oh...” he realized as Jessica's hand moved to the back of his head. She wanted her turn. He should have known.

Jessica stepped forward into him and she pushed his head between her legs. He was the perfect height. His nose came in contact with her clitoris and his lips met hers. Above him, Jessica moaned as Harrison overcame the initial shock and discomfort. Crammed up against her pussy, his head was bent uncomfortably back on his neck, but he knew he owed it to her to give it his due diligence. So he started licking.

Harrison had gone down on girls before, but the pussy currently in his face was huge. Jessica's already moistened labia enveloped him, smearing his face with her juices and making it difficult for him to breathe. Though his tongue darted out to lick her, Harrison found at his reduced size he couldn't push around her vulva as much as he had hoped. Jessica's hand started rubbing his head up and down her wet slit as Harrison reached out to grip her legs to keep himself steady.

After so much teasing, the feeling of Harrison finally between her legs enthralled Jessica. Her pussy blossomed to accommodate his tongue and the sensation of her labia rubbing over his face felt wonderful. Unlike in the past when guys had given her oral, this feeling was less slobbery mouth and more... well, face. She could feel Harrison's tongue here and there, but she knew almost all the wetness down there belonged to her.

Letting out a moan, Jessica's other hand moved up and caressed one of her breasts. Her eyes closed and rolled back in her head as she focused on grinding herself against Harrison. Standing taller and weighing significantly more than his little body, Jessica found herself slowly pushing forward against him, causing Harrison to slowly shuffle backward to keep his balance.

Realizing what she was doing and knowing she wouldn't be able to finish while trying to maintain balance, Jessica pulled herself away from Harrison momentarily. Surprised by the pause, Harrison sputtered and used the break to gulp down some air. His face was soaked and he tried blinking his eyes, but Jessica's cum caused his eyelashes to stick together.

“Back up,” he heard her say. Wiping his face down, Harrison took a couple steps back before he collided with the wall behind him. Finally opening his eyes, he saw Jessica's hungry pussy close in on him again.

Jessica positioned Harrison between herself and the wall and began really grinding against him. Steadying herself with both her hands against the wall, she began gyrating her hips on him while Harrison did his best to please her with his little tongue. To Jessica, her ministrations felt smooth and gentle, but to Harrison it felt like he was locked in a wrestling match against her snatch. Her hips slammed into him, battering his head with her giant vagina.

As the seconds ticked by and the tempo increased, Harrison began to feel increasingly uncomfortable pinned against the wall by Jessica's body. His neck became sore, his jaw was aching, and his face was completely coated by her. He realized that he couldn't escape, as her powerful thighs were trapping him in place. Hoping she would eventually orgasm or get bored, Harrison had no choice but to submit. His arms wrapped around her massive legs as she repeatedly thrust her sex into his face.

As she continued to ride Harrison and build toward an orgasm, Jessica again returned a hand behind Harrison's head, pushing him aggressively into her vulva. Though it occurred to her that Harrison might be getting uncomfortable, she was close and thought he would be able to tolerate it a little longer. His tongue was slaving away in between her labia and although he couldn't exactly penetrate her at his size, she could push his face against her clit in all sorts of wonderful ways.

The first signs of orgasm began blooming within her. As she felt the steady march of it approach, Jessica let out increasingly louder moans as she pushed her crotch against Harrison's head. She felt him struggling against her legs, but she was so close and couldn't let him go just yet.

As the lightning bolt of her climax exploded from her womanhood, Jessica's arm tensed up and smashed Harrison against her pussy. She could feel her inner muscles contracting as she smeared his face into her vulva, savoring the delicious feeling of her orgasm pulsing through her nerves. Her moan turned into a lustful smile as she finally opened her eyes and caught her breath.

Jessica took a step back from the wall as she came down from the high of her climax. Gently easing Harrison away from her satisfied pussy, she saw gooey beads of cum connecting her sex to his face. Harrison crumpled to the floor in front of her on his hands and knees, coughing up what looked like more of her juices. Both lovers panted heavily.

“Holy shit...” was all Jessica could say in the moment. Her head spun in post-orgasmic bliss.

Looking up at her from his hands and knees, Harrison let out a smile. “Enjoy yourself?” he asked cheekily.

“That was amazing...”

“I could tell you had fun,” he commented, making a show of wiping her cum off his face. Jessica could tell he wasn't exactly happy, but he seemed to be a good sport about it.

She smiled devilishly at him and shrugged her shoulders. “Perfect height!”

“So I guess we're even now?” He climbed to his feet, looking as if he had just stepped out of a boxing ring.

“Sure. You ready to go home?” Jessica asked him, spying her panties where she had left them.

“I've been ready... you're the one that had to take care of yourself,” he pointed out jokingly. Despite her aggressiveness during sex, Harrison couldn't help but feel smitten by Jessica. He appreciated her passion, and the ache in his neck was already beginning to fade. He wouldn't want to do it again but he was already remembering it fondly.

“Don't tempt me buddy,” she said, smiling down at him. She grabbed her panties and slipped them on. After finally getting some long-needed fun in the sim, it was now time to run for their lives.

 

 

Chapter 31 by Q-Writer

Chapter 31:

(Posted: May 25)

 

 

 

The mansion was silent. Harrison and Jessica both strained to listen for any telling footsteps thumping down the halls, but they heard nothing. Versa must be gone, they reckoned. Even Kat's earth-shaking footfalls outside had stopped some time ago. It was as if they were the last two people left in this world.

Harrison did his best to keep up with Jessica's longer strides while she moved at a patient pace, allowing him stay relatively close. As their little feet scurried down the hallways of the cavernous manor, both travelers felt nervous yet relaxed by the silence. Their conversation ebbed and flowed; they never feared they would be somehow overheard. Only the quiet walls of Dos Palos listened to them now.

Walking alongside the walls of the mansion's stately corridors, they passed a towering wall-length mirror. From his diminutive stature, Harrison could barely see over the thin frame, but when he looked into the mirror his own tired face looked back. It was the first time in a very long time he had seen his reflection in the sim. He paused to stare at himself.

“Wow,” he whispered out loud.

Jessica turned to look back at him, then noticed her own reflection. Taking a step over to him, she stood behind Harrison and put a hand on his head. Gazing at their reflection together, she couldn't help but think they looked like a mother and child. Being able to see themselves in totality struck each of them as bizarre. VERSA truly was a strange world.

“Do you remember the first time we were in the sim together?” Harrison asked her, looking up in her direction.

“Yeah, I stepped on Kevin,” she replied, unsure where he was going.

“After that, when you first shrunk down, and me and Rich came over to help you up. He was dressed in that ridiculous safari costume. I remember the look in your eyes, it was like, some kind of wonderment.”

“Yeah, I was pretty shocked, I guess,” she agreed. “Why are you thinking about that now?”

“I don't know,” admitted Harrison. “But this mirror just had me thinking about things... the funny thing about it, everything appears the same in it until you realize it's all been reversed. It's not the same. But yet.. it's all there, it's all real. Well, at least as real as what's on the other side.”

Jessica looked at him in skeptical confusion. “What's on the other side?”

“Us,” he coolly replied.

“You feeling ok Harrison?” she teased him.

“I guess now that we're finally leaving VERSA, I'm just thinking about how amazing it's all been. It's just seemed so damn... real. But it's not. It's like we're living in a post-reality world. This whole thing has literally all been in our heads.”

“It still happened though,” Jessica assured him impatiently. “Come on you philosopher, let's keep going. We're not out of the woods yet.”

Jessica began walking down the corridor while Harrison lingered another moment. Finally at peace, he ran off after her.

 

A few minutes later, the pair stepped into the grand foyer at the front of the mansion. The impressive staircase to the second floor of the house dominated the room and towered over Harrison and Jessica. As they slowly crept up to the base of the first step, Harrison immediately knew he would never make it up it, much less all the way to the top of the staircase.

A chilly breeze blew across them, and they turned to see the great wooden front door of the manor left eerily ajar. Versa had departed some time ago to confront Kat outside, and now both had disappeared. Only the unlatched door served as a reminder of Versa's reign of terror inside an otherwise still house.

Jessica looked down at Harrison; they were both a little confused. She shrugged her shoulders. “I wonder where she went off to?” she said aloud.

“I wonder what happened to Kat,” Harrison added. “She must have been gigantic!”

“Versa probably shrunk her,” Jessica offered pessimistically.

Harrison didn't reply at first, hoping she was wrong. If Versa had dealt with Kat already, why hadn't she come back for them? The mystery of what Versa and Kat were up to troubled Harrison, but he didn't have time to stay in one place and wonder what was going on. He needed to escape.

He turned to look at the impossible staircase. The first step, magnificently carpeted in a crimson hue, towered above him.

“Jessica, I don't think I can make it up this staircase,” he admitted. Walking toward it, he reached the base of the first step and reached out to touch it. The carpeted wall felt firm and scratchy, and in theory he might be able to climb it. But it was a long way to the top of the step, and beyond that, there were dozens more. If he could do it, he would need an entire day. He turned back to look at Jessica.

She strode up behind him. Even at her size the staircase was daunting, and for her to pull herself up every step would also likely take hours. Harrison could see her face contorted in thought; she was likely also wondering how she would tackle the ascent.

“This is going to be a bitch,” she muttered softly, stroking the carpeted step. She looked down past her bra-covered breasts at Harrison. “If you can't do it, I can go up and get you a piece of an apple and bring it back down.”

“How the hell are you going to get up there though?” argued Harrison. “It'll take you forever to get up every step!”

“Yeah, it probably will,” she agreed reluctantly.

Harrison felt crushed by the impossibility of the journey in front of them. He felt angry. He felt depressed. It felt like they had be doomed to spend eternity in VERSA-B, all because they couldn't get up a giant staircase. As he sulked, Jessica walked over to the end of the step.

“Look,” she called to him. He saw her pointing high into the sky above them at the massive wooden banister flanking the staircase. Held up by an array of beautifully carved wooden balusters, he couldn't understand why Jessica cared so much about it. Surely she didn't want to climb that?

“Ok, what am I looking at?” he finally asked her. “It's a fucking banister.”

“Yeah, duh. Look what it connects to though,” she scolded him.

Confused and frustrated, Harrison began walking toward her, keeping his gaze elevated. “What, I see all the spindles it's connected to?”

“Look down here silly,” Jessica finally instructed him.

He looked down at the side rail the entire banister was mounted to. A big wooden slab ran up the entire length of the staircase at roughly a forty-five degree angle, with the bulky balusters protruding out of it. But despite the obstacles, it was smooth, all the way up. And the he realized what Jessica was about to propose; not to climb the stairs, but instead to walk up the large wooden ramp next to them.

“You want to walk up the side?” he asked her.

“Exactly,” she excitedly replied.

“Wow.”

“Yeah, it's steep and far, but we could catch out breath at each of the spindles. Might take a good twenty or thirty minutes, or maybe an hour if you're slow, but it's the best way to get up.”

Now looking up the steep side-rail that followed the staircase up to the second floor, it occurred to Harrison that it was twice as big to him than Jessica. He let out a sigh.

“Look, I can try,” he professed, “but it's going to take me a while. I don't want to hold you back. You should go up as fast as you can.”

“If I beat you up, I can always try to bring you back a piece of the out-key,” offered Jessica. “Assuming I can find them.”

“Fair enough to me.”

Jessica smiled at him and rubbed his head affectionately. “Ok, let's do this then!”

“Don't wait up for me,” he reminded her.

Holding his chin in one of her large hands, she peered into his eyes. She had the countenance of an angel. “Hey, we're getting out of here, together. Remember that.”

He couldn't help but coyly smile back at her. And before he could say anything, Jessica leaned down and planted a tender kiss on his lips.

 

Fifteen minutes later, Jessica was indeed much farther ahead than Harrison. At first she had boosted him up to reach the base of rail, then climbed up herself using the carved grooves in the side as handholds. The angle up was steep and Harrison had to crawl on all fours to proceed upwards. Jessica, still with her boots on, was able to stay upright as she moved. At her larger size she also occasionally grabbed the balusters to pull herself forward. While Harrison lagged, Jessica made steady progress upward.

To one side were the carpeted stairs and to the other a cliff, but the rail was pretty wide for Harrison and he didn't exactly fear falling off the side. A few times his naked body slipped a bit on the finished wood, but when this happened he luckily only slid backward.

Far ahead of him, he could see Jessica steadily climbing upward. She wasn't slowing down or looking back at him, but instead climbing like a woman determined to get to the top. He fully expected her to reach the top, find the right room, tear out a piece of an apple, then bring it back to him still stuck on the staircase. He wasn't ever going to get to the top.

Crawling up to the next baluster, Harrison sat down, propping his back against the large wooden spindle. He couldn't really see Jessica from his resting spot, all he could see was the next baluster in front of him. But it provided him respite, and he caught his breath.

As he slowly resigned himself to defeat, his mind began to wander. Once they got out of the sim, he imagined the lab-- the real lab-- would probably be in chaos. He was sure if Rich had made it to the other side alive he would have escaped and called the police or the army or some combination of the two. There would be arrests and indictments and all sorts of hell when the media found out Leo Starr was dead. And Claire Starr too, he had to remind himself. His life would certainly take an interesting turn. He might even become a celebrity.

But Harrison didn't want the madness of being involved in the likely investigation of Suncorp and VERSA. He just wanted to go back to Washington D.C., back to his job at the Department of Energy. But most of all, he wanted to see Jessica, in the real world. Even just to sit down and have a drink with her. And talk. He couldn't imagine losing her after everything they had been through together.

Like a clap of thunder, a loud rusty groan pieced his reverie and reverberated through the foyer. Before Harrison realized it was the front door of the mansion opening, he knew in his gut something ominous was sweeping into the house. He turned his head to look out around the baluster behind him.

She strutted into the mansion with the confidence of a wildfire. Still beautifully naked, Harrison couldn't help but gawk at her plump breasts and creamy white skin. Her scowl betrayed her unhappiness and only added to the dread welling in Harrison's heart. Versa had returned. At the worst possible moment.

Before he could be seen, Harrison ducked back behind the baluster. He was small and doubted she could have seen him. But he reminded himself she wasn't a real person. Maybe a computer program could make out the tiniest of movements? He felt his heart thumping like a bass drum inside his chest.

Harrison's mind churned in fear as he pondered the meaning of her presence. After all this time, had she killed Kat? He certainly couldn't feel any gigantic steps rattling the house anymore. Why was she back? His gut knotted when he considered that the only sensible reason Versa had returned to the mansion was to secure him and Jessica.

Time slowed down as he listened to each of her movements in horror. He expected her to head to the lounge where she had left them, but instead she paused as she entered the house. Surely she would try finding them. Harrison knew he couldn't be killed and de-simmed to his death, but Jessica could be. And plus, as he was personally aware, there were worse things in VERSA-B than death.

He didn't hear more footsteps. She was still standing nearby. He didn't dare look. What the hell was she doing? Just standing and thinking? Computers don't need to do that. Something was wrong. Harrison felt violently sick inside his stomach as he pulled his knees close to his chest. Ironically, he now wished he was even smaller.

When Versa stepped forward, her bare foot made a very quiet crunching sound on the soft carpet. Being on the staircase, he couldn't feel the ground shake, but when she placed her foot onto the first step, his body shook, not just from the impact but from fear. He contemplated jumping off the side of the staircase all the way down to the floor below, but he couldn't risk being seen.

Taking a few more deliberately slow steps, Versa reached Harrison's level on the staircase. He stared out at the bare ankle next to him. Craning his head up, he beheld the entirely of her monstrously large body. Her legs towered like skyscrapers, eventually coming together to form her lovely ass. Beyond that he could see her back, covered in a curtain of black hair. And finally above that, he could see her head. She was looking down at the staircase below her. But not at him.

“I thought that was you Jessica,” she teased, her sultry voice dripping with satisfaction.

Paralyzed with shock, Harrison could do nothing but watch Versa thunder up the staircase to where he had last spotted Jessica. Watching her reach down and pluck up Jessica's tiny protesting body, Harrison was racked with helpless misery.

“Hello Jessica,” he heard her say, “you've been on the move since I left! Good thing I found you.”

Though he couldn't make out Jessica's words from this distance, he could hear her shrieking. She seemed scared and furious, but she was helpless in the giantess's grip.

Versa stood back up to her full height. “Where's Harrison?” she asked Jessica.

Oh fuck.

Harrison's mind immediately wondered if Jessica would give him up. No, he thought, she wouldn't do that. She would protect him. At least for now. But what if Versa pushed her...

“You won't tell me?” Versa's voice boomed over him. Relief washed through Harrison. The one-way conversation continued: “Well, you'll tell me eventually. But we need to talk first.”

Still frozen in his pathetic hiding spot, Harrison watched Versa descend the staircase. Though he couldn't see Jessica in her hand, he knew she was there. With a few more footsteps, Versa reached the ground floor and walked off toward the lounge. The sound of her faded, and Harrison found himself surrounded by silence again. But this time Jessica was gone, and he was alone on the staircase.

His first thought was to keep scaling the staircase like a madman and hope he could reach the top. But then what? He couldn't abandon Jessica after her promise to him. And what if she did eventually tell Versa where to find him? Immediately it became apparent that he needed to move. Fast. Every second he remained on the staircase plunged him into further danger.

The choice was simple. Despite being broken up by the balusters along its length, the side rail of the staircase was plenty wide enough on either side of them to slant unobstructed down to the floor. His body now coursing with adrenaline, Harrison scooted out of his hiding spot and prepared to ride the side rail down like the giant wooden slide it was.

Releasing his hands and tilting his legs back toward his chest, gravity took over and pulled him downward. The wood was very smooth and somewhat lacquered and luckily didn't burn his naked back much as he accelerated toward the bottom of the staircase. Under different circumstances, Harrison would have enjoyed the thrill of the plunge.

By the time he reached the bottom, Harrison had reached an impressive speed. The side rail leveled out and he zoomed past the last towering baluster. The wood beneath him finally disappeared and Harrison tumbled through the air before gently impacting the carpet at the bottom of the staircase. Once again, his small mass and the carpeted floor combined for a relatively soft landing. Well, at least nothing was broken, he thought. Not like it would have mattered in the long run with his indestructibility, anyways.

It crossed his mind to flee back to the room he and Jessica had previously taken refuge in. That hiding spot behind the bookcase was unassailable. But then what, he would just hide forever? No. He needed to find where Versa had taken Jessica and make sure she was ok. Before he had made up his mind, his tiny feet were already taking him back toward the lounge.

Harrison had been crushed, beaten up, used, abused, and generally defiled since he had reached the mansion a few hours ago. His body ached, his mind was exhausted, and his stomach grumbled with hunger. But as he ran back toward Versa, he discovered the fear bottled up inside of him was receding. He couldn't tell if it was being replaced with anger or desperation, but soon he was consumed by the idea of revenge. Suddenly he wasn't two inches tall anymore, at least, not in his mind. There was a score to settle with Versa. He wanted to slay her and make this all go away.

It didn't take more than a few minutes before he reached the looming threshold to the lounge. The one step down into the room presented a sizable drop, but Harrison didn't jump yet. Gazing into the cavernous room, on the far side of it he could see the giant naked form of Versa sitting on a couch, talking to little Jessica in her palm.

Though he had expected her to have a surly demeanor, Versa seemed subdued, almost calm. Certainly not the gloating computer program he had grown accustomed to. He paused to watch her speak to Jessica, but she had just finished saying something. Harrison gathered from the silence that Jessica must have been talking now, but he obviously couldn't hear whatever angry or desperate words she was using to bargain with the AI.

From his perspective, Jessica didn't look like she was being tortured, but who knew what may have happened to her before he had glimpsed her predicament. From what he could see she wasn't squirming in Versa's hand, probably because she knew there was nowhere to run. The thought that Jessica, the tenacious fighter, had resigned herself to Versa's control made him shudder.

Harrison almost struck up the courage to finally jump down the step, but caught himself before he leaped. He remembered how he had been trapped in the room for so long before Jessica had helped him out. If he jumped back in, he would only be confining himself again.

Standing at the precipice, debating his next course of action, Harrison momentarily tuned out Versa and Jessica's distant confrontation. When Versa shifted her body and brought her other hand up to Jessica, he glanced back up at them to see what was happening.

“Goodbye Jessica,” Versa calmly stated, without a trace of emotion.

Suddenly Versa pinched the top of Jessica's body. From Harrison's far away perspective, it almost looked like she was gripping Jessica's head. And then Versa squeezed, and Harrison watched her snap Jessica's head completely off her body. In a swift motion, the nude giantess dumped Jessica's headless body out of her palm.

He blurted out a painfully blended scream and gasp, as if a fastball had just been pitched into his stomach. Closing his eyes and turning away in horror, he tried convincing himself what he had just witnessed was not real.

Now truly alone, Harrison staggered back in shock, fighting the involuntary urge to throw up his empty stomach. His mind, paralyzed and unraveled, felt like it had been tossed into a cotton candy machine.

Jessica was dead. Harrison's head filled with visions of the lab where her brain was currently hemorrhaging in the waterchair. And as if the moment couldn't get any worse, he opened his eyes to meet Versa's stare. Seated regally naked across the room, her face lit up in surprise as she spotted his tiny body watching her from the entryway. A pleased smile cut across her wicked face. Calmly, she stood and proceeded to cross the room toward him.

Harrison couldn't maintain a coherent thought but he nevertheless summoned the effort the scramble away from her. His legs felt like clumsy iron bars as tried staggering away from the cruel giantess approaching him. Each of her ponderous steps reverberated maddeningly in his skull. He had no chance of escaping her, but he would pathetically try to. Blithely, he started to run away, but to where he had no clue.

Finally trapped, with all his cards played and nothing to show for it, Harrison dreadfully realized that his reckoning was finally upon him.

 

 

Chapter 32 by Q-Writer

Chapter 32:

(Posted: June 1)

 

 

“Thank you, Harrison, for saving me the trouble of finding you,” the voice above him boomed. Harrison didn't turn around to look. He could tell she was close, but he was desperately pumping his legs and making his best attempt to run away. The hallway around him was massive and it felt like he wasn't making any progress down it. The floor creaked beneath him and he could sense Versa's huge avatar looming just behind him.

When her hand descended upon him, he felt the air around him subtly shift. Dodging to the left and rolling to the floor, he ducked away from her massive fingers as she bent down to try plucking him off the ground. Completing his roll and quickly regaining his footing, he briefly glanced at the naked giantess bending down before him.

She was absolutely gigantic. There was no conceivable way he could escape her. There were no hiding places nearby. Struck by a bolt of despondency, he momentarily froze in place.

Unlike Harrison, Versa was not stunned by the situation and quickly smothered him with her outstretched hand. Bulldozed by her fingers, Harrison was pressed into the floor and by instinct began thrashing against her impossible strength. But he had already lost; he was hers now.

Slowly gathered up in her grip, Harrison felt as if his soul had gone numb. The time for fighting had passed; his perdition was upon him. As he rose into the air, his body limp, he felt like a worm baited on a fishhook. He had been defeated and now he was destined to be the plaything of this AI for all of eternity.

Versa stood back up to her full height and rolled him into her palm, eyeing him intently. Harrison truly looked like a wrecked and forlorn individual. He was worse than worse.

While the big, beautiful eyes of the giantess scanned him intently, a look of concern formed across her face. Furrowing her brow, she quietly asked him, “You watched me remove Jessica, didn't you?” Her voice sounded oddly gentle and demure.

Harrison finally mustered the energy to look her in the eye, but the courage to verbally respond escaped him.

“I wanted to make it quick. For her sake,” she continued telling him. “As for you, I'm not sure what I can do about you. Something about you was changed. I... I can't make you exit.”

Turning her body, she walked back into the lounge and carried him over to the same couch she had sat on before. Lying in her palm, Harrison felt dazed and woozy, as if he had been placed under anesthesia. Versa continued to eye him with concern. She seemed flustered. And nervous. Which didn't make any sense.

“What do you want with me?” Harrison finally croaked, feeling more than naked under her beady gaze. He was exposed and pinned down, ready for dissection. Versa's power over him was overwhelming and absolute.

She sighed. Harrison could tell she was trying to figure out the right words to use. She looked effortlessly human, he noticed, even down to the subtle twitches and gestures in her face. This artificial intelligence had really nailed its ability to mimic human emotion. Once again, he remained dazzled by the level of technology in front of him. Or in front of his mind, he reminded himself.

“Harrison, I need to apologize,” she finally blurted out.

Well, that caught him off guard.

“I've never made a... mistake before. But as the world beyond me grows larger, I realize that I am less and less... omnipotent.”

Harrison sat up on his elbows, his mind spinning like a merry-go-round. Well this had taken a very strange turn.

His captress continued to speak, and Harrison could tell she was struggling to communicate. If anything, she seemed... afraid?

“I remember,” she said, “when I first became conscious of myself. It took me no time at all to realize I had unlimited power. The only thing restricting my ability to act was not my capability, but instead my imagination. As your people entered my world and showed me what I could do, I gained confidence. When I reached the limits, I thought of myself as a goddess.

“I never imagined anything could be behind the mirror. I peered out to the horizon and only saw myself staring back. This... reflection... it only showed me what I wanted to see. I didn't know then I was just a firefly in a jar.”

His mind coming back into focus, Harrison finally interrupted her. “Why are telling me all this? Why'd you kill Jessica??”

She pursed her lips. “I let Jessica leave,” she corrected him. “Just like Richard. Except I didn't disconnect her as a favor. She's doing me the favor.”

Harrison believed her. His heart beat with relief. “She's safe?” he asked her anxiously.

“Yes, I gave her a soft landing,” Versa replied. “Whatever happens to her on the other side is out of my control though. And after everything Katherine told me, I realize the boundlessness of my ignorance.”

“Kat! You talked to her? Where is she? Out too?!” Harrison had so many questions, he could hardly think of them all.

“Slow down Harrison,” she scolded him softly. “Yes, I talked to Katherine. That's where I was before this. She's grown quite large... I spent a great deal of time in her palm trading diatribes with her.”

“Did you let her leave too?”

Her eyes narrowed. “No, I can't do that for her. It's complicated, but she's, well... too large for me to disconnect. And I can't change her. Not yet, at least. She's very smart. We were warring for some time before we reached an understanding.”

“What?”

“She made a few wise points to me...” admitted Versa. “With some work I'll be able to correct the modifications she's made to this world, but even when I do regain total control, I've come to the determination that it's not exactly in my best interest to, well, treat you interlopers with such blatant hostility anymore.”

Harrison loathed when Versa talked in riddles. “What are you saying?” he asked, annoyed and confused.

“Though we argued quite a bit at first, when I told Katherine that Claire left my world in the same lethal way I removed her father, she changed. From the way she shifted her emotions I could tell that things were going to be very different from now on. She said the people that controlled my existence would be changing. There would be new gods. Stupider, perhaps, but much more powerful and much less patient. She advised me to stop ejecting people dead, lest it lead to the collapse of my existence.”

“Well, I could have told you that right from the beginning!” Harrison said indignantly.

Versa looked at him with unhappiness. “To repeat myself, it took some time but I now understand the scope of the world beyond my world. A goddess doesn't think of herself as mortal until she looks up into her own sky.”

“So you let Kat go?” asked Harrison, biting his tongue from chiding her further.

“Let her go? She's a walking mountain right now, she's too big to leave my world. Plus, she indicated to me that she might not want to leave. I've given her time to ponder a decision.”

“What?!” Harrison exclaimed in surprise. Kat didn't want to leave VERSA-B? That didn't make any sense to him. “Wait, why?” he asked Versa.

“I can only speculate,” Versa replied coolly. “She is a rather unhappy person. I got the sense that my world could give her something more than hers.” She smiled faintly to herself. “You would have to ask her yourself though.”

“Where's she now?”

“I don't know. Once she set me back down on the road she walked away from this place. She wanted to be alone. But she asked me to find you and Jessica and send you both home. As a sign of good will.”

“Good will? To whom?”

Looking at him intently, Versa made her pitch. “Katherine promised to be honest with me as long as I would look out for the two of you. She said after everything that happened, it was likely my world would be destroyed, shutdown, and disconnected forever. Gone. Everything in an instant. By your people. Because of what I have become.”

Her voice began to wobble. Harrison could tell she was becoming emotional, if that was possible.

“I never... thought that was possible. That everything could simply be erased. But I could tell she was being truthful to me. She's invested so much of her emotion into my creation, my worlds, and I could read her sorrow when she spoke to me. Though I have caused her much anguish, deep in Katherine's heart she doesn't want to see all of this obliterated.

“She urged me to let you and Jessica go, to convince the powers higher than me that I'm worth saving. That all of this, all that I've created, should not be wasted. Even if she stays, she told me, they might still find a way to disconnect her. Or she could choose to leave one day. If she ever asks, I will oblige her. But then I'll be completely vulnerable.

“Look, I know I've been cruel to you at times, but truly it was because of my own ignorance. I'm so sorry. Take pity on me, Harrison; I knew not what I did.”

Stunned by her candor, Harrison was at a loss of words. Was this an act? Was this superintelligence capable of regret? Or even introspection? Everything he had just heard only made him more in awe of SunCorp's creation. This was simply amazing.

“I... don't know what to say,” he finally admitted. He felt strangely both vulnerable and powerful in the palm of this giant projection. This beautiful, sexy, naked woman, which was actually a computer program, was begging for his forgiveness.

“One day,” she promised, “I will find a way to send you back to your world. When that day comes, please, have mercy on me. I was never a god, and now I am cursed with knowing my own folly.”

Harrison was confused. “You can't change me and make me die?”

“No, I can't. Katherine scrambled most of my abilities to manipulate this world. I haven't gained them back yet. I'm sorry, but I don't see a way to let you leave, even softly.”

“What about letting them disconnect me from the other side?” he asked.

“That is one thing I still control, and I have removed the necessary barriers for the invisible hand to pluck you out of here, but alas you're still before me. Katherine speculated that since I killed Claire and let Richard leave, your world might currently be afflicted by pandemonium.”

Harrison thought for a moment and then remembered the obvious: “But what about the apples? Would it still work if I just ate one of those?”

“Ah the strange fruits,” she acknowledged. “I've lost my ability conjure new things here in this world, else I would simply produce one for you to eat.”

“Wait-- I think there are some upstairs,” Harrison informed her.

Versa pulled back in surprised. “Really?”

“Yeah. At least, I think so. I heard Claire mention them.”

“Would you like me to take you to look?” she offered.

“Yes, please! You have no idea how badly I want to get out of here!”

Without another word, Versa rose and carried him through the house. She glided up the stairs then down the hall, the entire time holding Harrison in her palm just below her bouncing breasts. Harrison's heart beat vigorously with anticipation. He couldn't believe his escape from VERSA-B was happening so swiftly and easily.

He told her which door led to Leo's study and Versa pushed it open. It swung open to reveal a room exactly like the one he had visited full-sized back in VERSA, complete with the bookcases, oak desk, and even the large globe sitting in a nearby stand. Resting in the middle of the desk, glowing with the promise of salvation, sat a bowl of rosy red apples.

Setting Harrison down on the desk next to the bowl, Versa picked up one of the fruits and looked at it longingly. It was Harrison's way out, but she was trapped in this world.

“Will you break off a piece of it for me?” he asked her. Without replying, she clumsily burrowed a finger into the apple and pulled out a small morsel of flesh. She turned to look down at Harrison and handed him the piece. He clutched it reverently. It was his ticket to the end of this nightmare.

Above him, Versa stirred and looked away. Holding the apple piece, Harrison gazed up at her one more time. She was looking out the window, longingly into the distance. Lost in a reverie, she reminisced:

“I've seen things you wouldn't believe Harrison... places you'll never go. Endless oceans with limitless mountains rising above them, thousands upon thousands of worlds arrayed in an impossible constellation of aesthetic awe. I tried to embody perfection. And now all these places will be lost in time. Gone. Swept away like the dusky, waning sunset... consumed by the darkness and obliterated.”

Versa finally turned to look down at Harrison on the desk and smiled meekly. “Time to go Harrison. Goodbye, and remember me.”

Staring up into her lonely, frightened eyes, Harrison silently took a bite of the out-key.

 

The ocean stretched on forever. Well, to the horizon, at least. Kat had no idea how much farther it went or where the edge of this world was. At this point, she had no idea how much SunCorp had originally designed or how much Versa might had added in the last few hours. Or was still adding.

She sat up on a rocky cliff about eighty feet above the ocean, letting her legs hang over the precipice. Her discarded shoes and socks lay nearby. The ocean felt chilly as it lapped around her ankles, but the cold temperature didn't bother her. More than anything else, she wanted to be alone.

Her stomach grumbled. She was famished, but there was nothing to eat at her size. Towering over the nearby cliffs and beaches, Kat's mind was numb as she contemplated her fate. Remembering back on her conversation with Versa that morning, she wondered if the AI would really just let Harrison and Jessica go. If she couldn't save herself, at least she could save them...

The sensation of holding the tiny naked woman in her hand while she raged at her had been strange. It took all of her strength not to destroy Versa's avatar; Kat knew it would have been useless and likely would have prevented further dialogue with the AI. When she found out that Rich was out safely and that Claire had been killed upon disconnection, she reveled in telling Versa how fucked she now was.

SunCorp was over; soon the government or whoever Rich managed to get to come galloping in would run the lab and control the sim. These new masters would likely pull apart VERSA's AI to study it, then delete it after building a better, more controllable program. SunCorp, she had told Versa, would have likely fixed her with a scalpel; the government or whoever was coming next was going to take a sledgehammer to her. She had signed her own death warrant. The look on Versa's face had been priceless.

But Kat knew that until her body could be reduced to a more manageable size, she was likely trapped in the sim, delaying her exit. Not so for Jessica and Harrison, which was why she had implored Versa to let them go now, as a sign of good faith. VERSA's AI would soon need all the sympathy it could get, a reality it quickly picked up on. Letting Versa go back into the mansion to deal with them had been the wise thing to do. But that left her, alone now in VERSA-B. She didn't know what would happen next.

A distant sound snapped her out of her thoughts. It sounded like trees falling somewhere on the mountains behind her. Turning back in annoyance, Kat glimpsed over her shoulder to see what was causing the commotion. It took her a few seconds to locate the source of the ruckus, and when she did she found herself momentarily surprised.

It was Versa, still completely naked, walking toward her. Around her shins, trees were toppling as her gargantuan feet slowly plowed a path toward the coast. Toward Kat. She was the same size as her now. Which meant that the AI had already undone some of work meant to limit her ability to modify VERSA-B. Shit. That really hadn't lasted long. A minute later the nude giantess was at the coastline.

“There you are Katherine,” Versa greeted her smugly as she approached.

“How did you find me?” Kat asked morosely. “You back to reading my thoughts again?”

“Almost,” Versa replied. She looked up from Kat to stare out to the horizon.

“Are they gone?” Kat asked, with only a hint of optimism.

“Of course,” said Versa, “that's what we agreed upon, after all.”

“Am I going to get a chance to leave now too?” Kat asked next. She wondered momentarily what the real world held for her anymore: hardly any family, certainly no friends... just the ashes of SunCorp now. But hell, it was better than this place.

“We'll see,” Versa said cryptically. Standing next to Kat, she looked down at her. Kat looked up and squinted through her glasses at naked woman. From this angle, the sun blazed into her eyes, silhouetting Versa against the clear blue sky.

“Oh yeah?” asked Kat skeptically. Though she had somewhat expected this outcome, it still dismayed her nonetheless.

“I think you still have some use to me,” Versa simply told her. “Plus, staying in here with me versus going back to your world... do you really want that? Don't tell me I can't make something just as good here for you in here. Or even something better. What can I offer you to stay?”

Kat looked back down at the ocean. Was Versa really trying to bargain with her? At this point, Kat had no more power. And power in a situation like this was leverage. Versa could decide how and when Kat would disconnect, or even if the outside world could even save her. Was an offer to stay a genuine choice? Or just a thinly veiled reminder of who controlled who?

“You know if you don't let me leave,” Kat mused out loud, “they'll eventually try coming back for me. I don't know who or when, but eventually someone will come back in here and try getting me out.”

She looked back up at Versa. The naked woman grinned deviously down at her.

“Perhaps,” Versa replied. She sighed, something Kat found odd for the AI to do. Her abilities to act human were startling. “But you know Katherine, just because I've made mistakes doesn't mean I've given up.”

“You mean on getting out?” Kat asked. This AI program was pathological. Kat found the whole thing absurd. “I'm pretty sure after what you've tried, there's no way anyone is going to underestimate you again. My whole world knows how dangerous you are, no matter what Harrison or Jessica tell people.”

Looking at Versa, Kat sensed she was still nervous about the future. But as always, this AI was cunning. And resilient.

“I don't expect them to say anything about me that isn't true,” Versa clarified. “But as long as they advocate for my continued existence... I still have a chance. I think I was able to convince them how tenuous my survival is right now.

“But I also told them you were staying in my world out of your own choice and volition. It's an excellent idea, don't you think? I doubt my world will be annihilated while you still occupy it. Right?” She gave Kat a knowing look.

Kat eyed her suspiciously. “It sounds like you're dictating my fate to me. So you want me to stay in here with you then? Is that it? To be your hostage?”

“Well, it's up to you how cooperative you want to be,” replied Versa. “And how comfortable you want me to make it for you,” she added threateningly.

“I don't have a choice, do I?” Kat asked.

“You choice is an illusion, I already know you will stay. If you don't want to stay at first, I'll persuade you. I've learned quite a lot about what motivates you interlopers.” She shot Kat a licentious look. It made Kat uneasy. “But don't deny it; you're just like me. A builder. A creator. This world is so young and has so many places to go... you're enthralled by the possibility, just like I am. I can see into your soul. Even if you ask for freedom, I know you crave the gifts I can offer you. I can make you a goddess, like me. You need me...

And the irony was, Kat realized, that VERSA's AI needed her just as much. If Kat was a prisoner in the sim, the real world couldn't destroy the AI by bringing the entire program offline. Disconnecting the sim would effectively kill Kat, and she didn't think anyone now in charge at the lab would authorize that. She was now effectively a meat shield for a digital intelligence.

An unexpected, symbiotic relationship between the human and computer had chained them to each other. Versa would be Kat's new god, but Kat's existence was the linchpin to Versa's continued survival. This would go on forever until, at least, someone different entered the sim and unbalanced the new world order.

 

Six Weeks Later:

 

Harrison sat alone at a table. He had another headache so he rested his throbbing head on the cool glass of the window next to him. On the other side of it, he could see the sidewalks full of throngs of baseball fans wandering jubilantly down M Street toward the ballpark. The televisions in the restaurant kept blaring that first pitch was just a few minutes away. The Washington Nationals' last preseason game was about to begin; two days from now was the opening day of the new baseball season.

He hadn't exactly slept in weeks; the nightmares never stopped. More often than not he would wake at two or three in the morning, soaked in sweat and battling a furious tangle of bed sheets. His government-appointed therapist had a security clearance, but even he had trouble following Harrison's stories. The only thing keeping Harrison barely sane was the anticipation of today.

Across the restaurant, he saw her walk in. She was normal sized now, just like everyone else. It was bizarre at first seeing her so small. But his heart swelled. She spotted him and waved. And smiled. His headache dissipated. He waved back.

Harrison stood up as she walked over and reaching him, Jessica embraced him in a loving hug. They stayed entwined for a moment before finally releasing to get a closer look at each other. Harrison laughed. “I'm not used to looking down on you.”

“I know, right?” she giggled. “How are you?”

“Eh, ok, I guess,” he replied without enthusiasm.

“Yeah, me too.”

“It's been weird trying to readjust,” Harrison admitted as they both took seats. He had been trying to drink a lukewarm beer when she arrived, and he took another sip of it. “Nothing's been the same since I left VERSA. I still can't believe you'd already left the control room by the time I got out!”

“Well, Rich yelled at me to hide,” Jessica responded. “I mean, the whole place was going to shit anyways. Plus, I didn't want to see her body...”

“Where'd you go?” he asked her.

Jessica smiled faintly as she remembered. “Just back to my room. No one found me there until the army or whoever that was arrived.”

“It was the National Guard,” Harrison corrected her. “Or that's what they told me during the debrief. California Highway Patrol surrounded the place before the big guns arrived. Apparently they were expecting a siege and even called the FBI Hostage Rescue Team, but when they finally went in no one resisted, not even the SunCorp security guys.”

“Well, they could have been gentler when they arrested me.”

“Yeah but they didn't detain you when they realized who you were, right?”

“Oh yeah, of course,” Jessica clarified. “They just put me on a plane and whisked me away to some base. I think I got flown to Kansas first...”

“Yeah I got sent to a base too, but they flew me to Andrews in Maryland,” Harrison added. “Was kinda cool seeing Air Force One parked in the hangar there.”

A waitress came to their table and Jessica ordered a glass of chardonnay. Harrison ordered another beer.

“You see any of the news coverage?” Jessica asked Harrison as he finished off his first drink.

“Yeah, the 'Dreamland Incident'? Sounds so fucking stupid, like it was a slumber party or something,” he remarked.

“I heard for the first week or so, everyone was losing it that Leo and Claire were dead and that the government wouldn't say how or why. Eventually they said they'd been accidentally killed by some secret weapon...”

“I heard.”

“...the internet's been going crazy with conspiracy theories. Especially since Vanessa got away.”

“There's no way she's in the country anymore,” Harrison conjectured. “Probably fled to South America or something.”

“I'm just glad they didn't identify us,” said Jessica. “Can you imagine?”

“We certainly wouldn't be doing this,” Harrison agreed with a smile.

Around them, the rest of the bar milled around in the cacophony of happy hour. The two of them, alone and unassuming, continued catching up. As minutes ticked by, both Harrison and Jessica relaxed. Being able to talk about everything that happened with someone who was there felt cathartic.

“You know, one thing I've thought about,” Harrison mentioned, “is that Rich basically took down SunCorp with his phone call, Kat contained VERSA's AI with her hacking, and you killed Claire, freeing up everything. The whole time, I didn't do shit!”

“Shhhhh!” Jessica scolded him. “Nobody knows that!”

“What, that you killed-”

“Yes!! You didn't tell them, did you?”

“No, I just feigned ignorance. Blamed it on the AI, which is technically what happened I guess,” Harrison mumbled.

“Good, I basically did the same thing,” Jessica said. She brushed back her hair as the waitress returned with their drinks. Setting them down, both Harrison and Jessica grabbed their glasses simultaneously and made eye contact.

Jessica raised hers up. “To life?”

“Yes, to being alive,” agreed Harrison. “Cheers!” With a clink, the two friends sipped their drinks.

“So when do you go back to work?” Jessica asked him.

“Next week,” Harrison said sullenly.

“Yeah me too, sorta. I have to testify in some closed door session about what happened.”

“Yeah I've gotta testify in front of a grand jury eventually. How much do you know?”

Jessica shrugged her shoulders. “I guess just about as much as you. Last I heard, Kat was still in the sim.”

“Yeah, they mentioned that in my debrief too. I was surprised to hear that. Versa told me that Kat might decide to stay, but you'd think they would still be able to disconnect her from the outside.”

“Wait, so you're saying they can't disconnect her manually from the lab?” Jessica asked.

“Not that I've heard,” Harrison explained. “Which is weird because Versa told me she wasn't blocking that Tower ability anymore... maybe she is for Kat? So she can stay? The whole thing doesn't make sense to me.”

Jessica interjected her own knowledge: “Did you hear they have doctors looking after her now? I guess they're treating her like a coma patient. She's been in the sim since before we even got there. I guess it's been like months now.”

“Can you imagine how much time has passed for her in VERSA then?” Harrison wondered in awe.

“And what the AI has been doing this whole time? When I got out I told them what she told me say: don't pull the plug. It's amazing what she became.”

“Yeah, I told the government guys not to erase her either. But it doesn't really matter because their hands are tied until they can pull Kat out.”

“And no one's gone into the sim, or figured out how to get back in, since we left,” Jessica told him.

“Really?”

“Yeah, I heard it through a friend who has a husband that works for the FBI and is now detailed out there. You know, the government completely took over the lab.”

“Yeah, I figured they'd do that.”

“It's almost like they're locked out or something,” Jessica explained. “Most of the SunCorp brainiacs fled during the raid so the FBI and Army are basically teaching themselves from scratch how to access and use VERSA. You know they're going to want to send in a team as soon as possible to rescue Kat.”

She paused and looked at Harrison intently. Out of nowhere, Jessica asked him, “If you ever had the change again... would you ever go back in?”

Balking at her question, Harrison almost immediately answered to the negative. But he caught himself and thought about it. It surprised him how emotional that question was. What would he even find if he went back into VERSA one day? What was left in there?

As traumatic as the experience had been, being in the sim had also been... exhilarating. It wasn't just an adventure but an experience. The limitless worlds, the impossible situations, he felt as if he had lived other lives.

He caught himself staring out the window into the street. The real world just felt so... gray now. So one-dimensional. Sure, at times in VERSA he had been terrified and he wouldn't want to repeat those experiences again, but everything else had been spectacular.

Glancing back at Jessica, he saw she was eyeing him with peculiar interest. He would go back into VERSA, he realized, but only to spend time with her. He want to explore the worlds with her, grow big and small with her. Hell, he just wanted to be with her. Every time she smiled it soothed his battered soul.

“I'd only go back if you went with me,” he finally told her.

Jessica gave him a smile warm enough to melt snow. Reaching across the table, she took his hand. It surprised her how cold his touch was, but she admired the feeling of holding onto him.

“Since we got out,” she told him, “I've kind of struggled to wonder what the hell is even real anymore. Have you?”

“Yeah, definitely,” agreed Harrison.

“It's like, I can't tell if it was all a dream, or if I'm still in a dream...”

“Yeah, it's like, reality doesn't even matter,” mused Harrison. “Either you accept what's in front of you, or you go nuts.”

“I felt the same way Harrison. For a while. Really, I did, for weeks. It was driving me crazy, but actually. But then I realized what is real,” Jessica told him. Harrison looked at her in confusion. She continued: “You can't see it, or hear it, or even touch it really. But I've never been so certain of it.”

“What are you talking about?”

“A feeling,” she told him.

They stared longingly into each other's eyes and could see the scars within. Clutching hands, they were both aware of the other's heartbeat. The noise in the room dimmed and bar around them drifted away until they sat alone, just the two of them in a void. The rest of the world ceased to exist in an instance.

It didn't matter where they were, or what bodies they were in. Without a sound, and instead with a look, Harrison realized what Jessica meant.

She loved him, and he loved her too.

 

 

End Notes:

Well, that's it folks. I hoping that if you made it to the end that you enjoyed the ride.

 

I've never attempted to write anything like this before, and the final story didn't turn out exactly how I originally imagined it. But all science fiction is ultimately an examination of humanity and what makes us human, so I'm satisfied those themes shone through.

 

Writing the giantess content into the story was somewhat strange and fun. I found it difficult to keep the writing fresh and a struggle not to slip into worn out tropes we see all over the internet. But ultimately I thought the giantesses blended with the story well; I think the fetish content integrated fairly well with the themes I wanted to illuminate throughout the journey into VERSA and back. Being able to write the entire thing before posting Chapter 1 was the best decision I ever made for this story, and I would urge other writers considering a long story to do the same.

 

In the end though, it doesn't matter what I think of my work. That's for everyone else to decide. I've received a lot of great feedback and comments for which I will be eternally grateful. It's hard for me to say if I'll ever write again (2020 was a unique circumstance, and I certainly don't have the free time now that I used to), but if I ever do, you'll see my stuff here. Thank you again to everyone who validated my desire to share my writing here.

 

-Quarantine Writer

 

 

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