#17 - Invitations

Player 1

At a height of only two inches, Rafael lay in the crater of the sunken surface of his girlfriend’s pillow, his leg pinned beneath her soft cheek. She wasn’t unaware of what was happening, Cleo had been wide awake for hours, and this was the fourth time her tiny boyfriend had to try and wrestle himself out of one of the many dents her head had made in her pillow, as she kept moving and rolling around in bed, gazing emptily at her phone screen.

It had been a while since the two of them had shot any footage for a new video, the recent news of their friend’s sudden heel-turn weighed heavy on both of them. QT and Treat couldn’t believe someone like Harm was really capable of hurting someone.

If big bro of all people could not control his urges, then what would happen to them. Would the day come where Cleo’s mind slipped, a day where her inner monster was tired of being teased by playing pretend. Would she really squash or eat her little jellybean? She couldn’t risk it. She couldn’t film anything right now. All she could think to do was bedrot.

Rafael did his best to try and cheer her up, but he could feel she was intentionally creating distance, figuratively speaking. Her warm, soft, bubbly cheek was completely burying him into the pillow. It took him a while before he finally wrestled himself free and climbed back up to the flat surface of the pillow.

That’s when he heard it, something rattling like paper being jostled about. The tiny boy turned his head towards his girlfriend’s gaming set-up across the room, from between the slit of one of her desk drawers, a piece of paper shot out.

“Uhm, Cleo!” Rafael said.

His girlfriend responded in bored melancholy, “What is it, Bean?”

She turned her head and saw it too, a white piece of paper, gracefully dancing up and down in mid-air toward them. Cleo sat up, causing the landscape of the pillow to change form again. Her boyfriend fell onto his butt, as she reached out and grabbed the paper. She held it out in front of her, her eyes growing wide as she read what was on it.

Rafael recovered and stood up, “What is it?”

Cleo turned the piece of paper to show him. She looked as if she had seen a ghost, and to Rafael she might as well have.

“What? What it is?” he asked.

“Read…”

“What do you mean, read? It’s a blank piece of paper. There’s nothing on there.”

Player 2

The middle-aged man smiled, as a woman he didn’t even know the name of tightened the restraints, tying him to the bedpost of the dingy motel room. It was risky, exciting. A welcome change from having to deal with his nagging wife. And the best thing, it was all free of charge. The woman he had picked up was doing this out of her own pleasure.

He stared at his mistress with a hungry smile. She was a tall piece of work, well over six-foot, with a skinny frame and a barely visible bosom and butt, nothing her pretty face didn’t make up for; big, nearly bulging hazel eyes, spread apart like the ones of many young Hollywood actresses. She had a slightly longer mid-face than most women, which gave her this powerful domineering aura.

Her style had this youthful alternative look to it; a fluffy sea-green wolf-cut hairstyle, a septum piercing, thick black eyeliner. She was dressed in loose blacks, a silver chain dangling beside her black knife-skirt. Her boots; weighty black Doc Martens, that thudded with every step.

“Before we begin, I have to come clean about something,” The woman said with a raspy voice. “It’s time for me to show you what I plan on using on you tonight, but you have to promise you won’t freak out.”

“Oh, dolly, you ain’t gotta worry about none o’ that. I could tell,” the man said, as he looked over at her skirt, ready for her to lift it and show him the goods; ready to see just how big it was.

Instead, the woman turned around, grabbed the large bag she’d been carrying around, and threw it onto the bed, missing the man’s balls by an inch.

“Good,” she said, with an adorable giddy little blush. “I was getting shy about showing you my toys.”

She unzipped the bag and started to pull out item after item, throwing it onto the bed, next to the tied-up country bumpkin. The man struggled to see what each object was. Some of it looked to be regular toys you’d find at any erotica store, but many other things were too shiny and metallic for his liking.

A small case landed right beside his head, and he recognized the branding on it. His heart sank as he realized it likely contained the same set of kitchen knives his wife used.

“W-Wait, no this ain’t what I signed up for…”

Those big bulging hazel eyes widened even further as the woman cocked her head, “What do you mean, you did sign a waiver, did you not?”

“What? I didn’t sign shit!”

“Mr. Caldwell?” she said, pointing a plastic casing of long nails at him.

“My name isn’t Caldwell, it’s Reed! Clive Reed!”

The woman leaned back, letting her shoulders sag, before speaking in an overly exasperated tone, “Fiddlesticks. Ah well, let’s just make the most of it.”

“What! No, untie me you crazy bitch!”

The woman reached into her bag again, pulling out an instrument that looked not unlike a misshapen flare gun, which she loaded with some kind of metallic cylinder.

The man squirmed, desperately pulling at his restraints, “W-What type of sex toy is that?”

“Oh, this isn’t a sex toy, you silly goose,” the woman said, with an unnerving smile. “It’s a captive bolt pistol, for when I get bored of you. You know, the things they use on livestock to make them take a nap? Right between the eyes, click, thunk~”

“Help!” The man screamed. “Someone help me!”

The ocean haired woman walked up to him with a ball-gag to shut him up. As she forced it into his mouth and wrapped it around him, a piece of paper slid between the door of the motel room. It danced through the air before landing on her victim’s chest.

“What’s this?” she said, as she picked it up, the muffled frothing screams of the man sinking to the background as she read it. “Interesting~”

Player 3

A messy dark-haired nineteen-year-old boy, dug his arms into the shelves at his local superstore, raking in the entire row of trading card packs, and letting them tumble unceremoniously into his shopping cart.

His entire outfit looked to be stolen off a Pinterest mood board, messy greys and blacks, baggy pants, and a long flannel shirt the size of a trench coat drowning his short frame. His eyes were completely shadowed by messily applied black, which almost looked like war paint.

He swung his cart around, one-hundred-and-eighty degrees, ready to drag his haul to checkout. These babies would resell like hot cakes online. Before he could move, he heard a squeak.

“Hey, you can’t just take the entire stock asshole,” A tiny man shouted from the shelf across the one he’d emptied.

The boy looked around, to see where the little bug’s guardian was. Another guy walked a little further down the aisle, checking out collectable figures, too distracted to notice the boy stepping towards the tiny.

“What? You wanted one, little guy?” He said, as he pulled one of the packs out of his cart, before holding it over the tiny’s head. “You sure?”

The little man cowered, as the giant grinned, threatening to drop the entire thing on his frail little body, “Dude, the hell! Chill out!”

“Oh, I’m chill,” he said. “Are you?”

“F-Fine, forget I said anything, please don’t kill me over cards, you psycho!”

The boy’s grin widened, as he pulled back the case of trading cards, sparing the tiny, who would’ve easily flattened under them.

“That’s what I thought,” he said, as he threw the cards back into his cart, leaving the tiny man behind, quivering.

Before the boy fully made it to checkout, a piece of paper fell into the pile of card packs. He reached into the cart, and read it, his satisfied smile turning to one of child-like wonder.

“Fucking finally, let’s go!”

Player 4

Caleb sat cross-legged atop the uncomfortable little bed he’d been sleeping on for days, locked inside his small six-by-eight-foot cell, donning the classic orange jumpsuit.

Wr8 had ruined his life, made him the monster he had grown confident he would never become, and for all the world to see. Not a night went by where he didn’t dream of the look of horror on Elena’s face, as it got destroyed between his fingers.

No one deserved to die like that, especially kind but assertive little Elena. Maybe one person did. If he ever got his hands on that mind controlling witch, he’d squash her to bits, full size or not. Out of revenge and in defense of all the other people she could hurt.

She was still out there. If she could do what she did to him, what chance did Rot and QT have to resist? They didn’t even know what she could do yet. The thought of QTpopper crying over the ruined body of Treat was an image he could not shake once he imagined it.

He saw the movement in the corner of his eye, a piece of paper floated between the bars of his cell, gracefully landing in his lap. As he turned the paper to read what was on it, his heart sank. He jumped out of his bed and ran over to the bars.

“Guards, I need to talk to talk to my lawyer,” he shouted. “Guards!”

Player 5

The engine roared, as a lime green sports motorcycle sped along the highway, its rider revving the engine for no other purpose than to announce himself to the obstacles in his way. The man was clad in all-black riding gear, accented by streaks of cyan blue, his helmet; a silly cat-ear design.

He swung his weight around, moving from side to side, swerving like a maniac, and digging in between lanes of cars, barely missing their side mirrors. He was Mozart, and the sound of car horns blaring behind him was his symphony.

A part of his orchestra that was particularly ticked off by his antics sped up beside him. The dark blue sports car rolled down its passenger-seat-window, just so the woman inside could show him the middle finger, before they drove up ahead of him, and he could see a paper cup fly out.

The cup bounced alongside the car, before the projectile hit him bullseye on his steering wheel, exploding upon impact into a sticky shower that was more sugar than coffee.

“Sonuvabitch,” he cussed, before muttering to himself, “Oh, you wanna fuck around, huh? Let’s find out together.”

The rider leaned forward, and began to speed up even more, racing the car to get ahead of it. Those idiots probably thought that would be the end of it. As he managed to get ahead of them, he swerved in front of their car, before break checking them lightly.

The car took a sharp turn into the other lane, tooting its horn, as its driver looked at the man with a face of anger and shock at the stunt he pulled.

“What? Was that not as good for you, as it was for me?!” the rider shouted for no one to hear, as he accelerated again to get ahead of the car. “Baby, come back, I’ll do better this time!”

He once more sped in front of them, and without a single care for his own safety, hit the brakes. The tires of the blue car shrieked, as it swerved into the lane next to it. The loud bang and clatter of metal could be heard as a grey family sedan in that lane crashed into the side of the sports car.

The rider looked back over his shoulder, “Oh-ho-ho-ho, shyeet…”

As he turned to look in front of him, a piece of paper flew right into his helmet, blocking the view through his visor.

“Motherf-“

He could feel the motorcycle beneath him come to a sudden halt, while his body continued at full speed. The metallic sound of his poor mistress screaming in pain, was followed by him flying into the air, blind, weightless until he landed, shoulder first against the concrete, his body slamming against the ground and bouncing a few more painful cracking rolls before he finally came to a broken halt.

“Arrgh, come on!” he squirmed in agony, until the mark at the back of neck began to burn, and he managed to push himself up, hearing the popping of joints and clacking of bones snapping back together.

He pulled the paper off his visor, read it, then looked at the two crash sites he had caused, his motorcycle lying in ruin beside the road, “Rabbit better pay for the damages...”

Player 6

“Please stop, I-I have a family,” the tiny man screamed, as Eve twisted her finger on the poor guy’s leg, slowly turning it to splinters and goo.

“You sure about that?” Eve said, grinning. “Blonde house wife, good-for-nothing adult sons with no jobs, all of them this big.”

With her free hand, the woman showed him her thumb and index finger, spread only two inches apart.

“No!” the man cried in horror.

“Oh, yes.”

A piece of paper shot up from under the couch in Eve’s living room. As she saw it float up beside her, her attention shifted away from her tiny victim. The messy, black-haired woman grinned and snatched it out of mid-air with her bloodied fingers, her hungry eyes sifting through the words on the page.

“P-Please!” the tiny man shouted. “Please tell me you didn’t hurt them!”

“Shut up,” Eve said, and in classic Wr8-like fashion, lowered the piece of paper onto the table, covering the tiny man with a sheet of white. “I’m reading!”

Eve raised her arm and swung her fist down like a hammer, slamming it on top of the paper, in the exact spot where the tiny man lay crying for his family. There was a quick cacophony of cracks and a pathetic squelch, as a red stain began to form, seeping through from the backside of the letter.

Eve grinned, “I can’t wait for my friends to join me.”

Player 7

The way Robin had handled Theo had slightly damped the group’s anxiety. While Elias kept everyone at arm’s length, Jade, Oscar and Theo all seemed to have regained some cautious faith in their giant friend.

Robin hated it. They were so eager to believe she was the woman they had always imagined her to be, that they’d cling to any hint of that ideal version of her. The giantess felt the urge to scare them back into seeing her for what she was, not one born out of her usual sadistic malice, but out of a twisted responsibility to make sure they wouldn’t grow too trusting.

She couldn’t do it though. Because deep down, she wanted them to trust her again. There was now this glimmer of hope that even though she had shown her true face, her friends could still go back to seeing her as Robin. Not born out of her secrecy, but out of their own desire to delude themselves the monster could be tamed.

Maybe she could have her cake, right up until the very second she’d snap and ate it. Scaring them off would be kinder than the false hope she was giving them by playing along.

She was lying back in the couch, letting the TV play, trying to ignore how this dynamic had become their entire lives, both to her and the bugs at her mercy.

A piece of paper slid out behind the TV, floating through the living room. Elias had been the first to see it, not calling anyone’s attention to it. It landed on Robin’s chest only a split-second after she’d noticed it fly up to her.

She raised it, and as she read the contents, it was as if she could hear the inner voices of six other people reading it with her.

To all Reapers and Invited Prospects who receive this notice,

You and any mycosized individuals we deem to be closely tied (excluding blood relatives and those not yet of age), are hereby summoned to participate in one of the upcoming Ascension Games.

These trials are designed to test those marked with the potential for Apotheosis and to entertain She Who Dreams the Waking World.

Prospects who have not yet acquired a Reaper’s Mark will be subjected to a localized instance of the Winnowing, separating those with potential from the lesser lot.

Reapers who achieve High Triumph within one of these trials will be awarded trial-specific rewards, and if not yet attained, their first step towards Apotheosis; Awakening, granting them an individualized ability, which will aid them in the trials to come.

The step thereafter; Advancement, will be granted by default to all Awakened Reapers once enough games have passed, and a sufficient number of Reapers have Awakened. This in turn will open up the possibility to reach the third step; Ascension.

Reapers who suffer Abject Defeat, or resist participation within one of these trials will have their mark struck and will be mycosized.

The upcoming event will take place this Wednesday at 10:00 PM (UTC). At this exact time, all those invited will be transported to the event. Those who intentionally cause this sudden disappearance to happen within public view will be severely penalized.

May you rise,

- Mrs. Hat and Master Rabbit

The entire group gathered in front of Robin, who stared at the letter in disbelief.

“What is that?” Jade said.

Just as Cleo did with Rafael, she showed them the letter.

“It’s just empty paper,” Oscar said.

“It’s not,” Robin said. “It’s insane…”

Elias ground his teeth and sighed. “Can you tell us what you’re seeing?”

Robin bit her lip, unsure if she should freak them out further, before she read the letter again, out loud.