You’ve been working a pretty standard warehouse job for the past six months, an easy job to help you make ends meet while you study at the local community college. The only thing not standard about the job was the company that owned the warehouse. 

ShipShrink was a third party logistics company that was quickly making waves in the industry. Their unorthodox method of using new shrinking tech to make their warehouses, trucks, and workers tiny, proved to be an effective cost-cutting strategy. Now an entire warehouse of goods could be shrunken down and placed on a table, tiny trucks were loaded before getting re-grown and sent out. The profit margins were enormous, saving them tons on property taxes alone. Now operating out of small office buildings around the nation, entire warehouses were stored on desks in small cubicles, each one managed by a full-sized employee.

Back to you. You were unfortunately not one of these full-sized managers. You took an entry position, picking orders to later be packaged and sent out. For the past six months you would come into work, get shrunken down, and spend the next few hours walking around, grabbing items onto your cart, and taking them to packing. Monotonous, but at least you got to listen to music. Most of the time you could easily forget you were roughly the size of a piece of sand. Today, however, you would become very intimate with that fact.

After six months it was normal for new employees to have a one-on-one with their manager. They went over their metrics, goals, all to make sure they were a good fit for the job and worth hanging on to. You weren’t sure when you’d be called for your one-on-one, but you were pretty sure it would be sometime today.

That time came sooner than you thought. After your first break you heard the loud clacking noise of the ceiling latch being removed. Like magic, you saw the tin roof lift away, being replaced by the unamused face of your warehouse manager, Willow.

You’d seen them at least several times a week, as inspections and meetings with other employees happened with some regularity. Every time they had almost that same bored look on their face, and with the warehouse as small as it was, it always felt like they were looking straight at you as they surveyed the entire place.

Now you knew it was you they were looking for.

With no ceremony, Willow reached inside the warehouse with a pair of company-approved tweezers (made specifically for grabbing speck-sized workers) and lifted you into the air. Your stomach dropped as you saw the warehouse below you seem smaller and smaller, seeing it now for what it was: a tiny cube on Willow’s desk, no larger than a pad of sticky notes. 

You were dropped onto Willow’s tan wooden desk only a few (relative) inches from their keyboard. You heard the loud clacking of the gigantic keyboard as Willow pulled up your file.

“Let’s see… Six month follow-up…”

Click click click

“Your metrics are… Average… Supervisor recommendation… she gave you a six.”

Willow continued to click through your documents, their eyes lazily scanning the general information. You felt extremely self conscious just standing there on the wide expanse of desk. Willow wasn’t asking you anything or even getting your input, though to be fair it’s not like they could hear you. You were a speck.

“Ah,” Willow said, the corners of their lips forming a slight smile, “looks like our cameras noticed that someone seems to have a habit of being on their phone while working.”

You felt a chill running up your spine as Willow’s eyes fell on you.

“We can’t have that, now can we?”

“ShipShrink does believe in second chances, so we’re willing to keep you on if you agree to one week of probation under manager supervision. Sound good? Jump if you agree.”

Your heart was beating a little faster now as you felt the weight of Willow’s gaze, waiting for your answer. It’s not like there were a lot of other jobs in the area, and this one was easy enough. Awkwardly, you tried jumping as high as you could, hopefully enough for the giant manager to register.

“Good…” Willow said, a smile spreading across their face. They quickly made a few final entries into your file before you saw them grab the tweezers again.

“Your contract has been renewed, your week of manager supervision starts immediately.”

The soft grippers of the tweezers closed around you, lifting you up into the air up to Willow's massive face. You could barely see your own reflection in the ball of their septum piercing.

“Thank you for staying with ShipShrink,” Willow continued, giving what felt like a script as they shifted in their seat, grabbing something just out of your view.

“We look forward to your continued employment, and don’t forget, no matter how small you are…”

Willow brought their other hand up, now holding their left shoe, a (relatively) massive black size 9 wide pump with a one-inch heel. They held it up so you dangled just above the dark entrance. You could feel the heat radiating from the inside of the freshly worn footwear. Your eyes flash back up to Willow, suddenly breaking into a cold sweat as you look at their devious smile.

“...we’re all walking the same path.”

Suddenly the grips around you separated, too fast for you to grab onto them. You fell for what felt like hundreds of feet into the entrance of Willows shoe, landing on the soft insole without much pain. 

You stand up, uneasily as you feel the world around you jostle and shake until the shoe is placed back on the ground.

Finally, you look back up to meet Willow’s smiling face, now miles away in the sky.

“Enjoy your probation, loser.”

Your view of them disappears, now replaced by the gigantic underside of their sock. You can see the dusty outline of toes reentering the shoe before you instinctually turn and try to run away. All light in the shoe fades before you feel something big and soft hit your back, forcing you down face-first into the insole of Willow’s shoe. 

A massive weight falls onto your back, quickly building in pressure until you’re unable to move. You can feel yourself sinking deep into the insole as Willow’s sole slides fully into place. You can feel the heat rising, and a small amount of moistness all around you as Willow settles back into their desk.

Willow continued to smile as they clicked the small tin roof back onto the tiny warehouse.

Willow knew the other workers had heard everything. And they all knew exactly what ‘probation’ meant. Metrics for the rest of the day were sure to stay high, and after a week you would return to working as the model employee.

Willow looked back at their computer, gently wiggling their toes to try and feel you. Their eyes fell on the time.

Tsk. Not even close to lunch time.