"Yes! How can I puke him up?" Rica replied.
"I've got a bottle of syrup of ipecac," said Vikki, "drink some, and you should puke."
"You'd better drink it, Rica!" said Soledad. "If he dies, you're gonna regret it!"
Rica took the bottle and opened it up, then took a healthy swig.
"I don't feel anything!" said Rica.
"Give it time," said Vikki. The directions say it should take effect within twenty minutes after drinking it.
"Twenty minutes?" Rica shouted. "How can Nick survive down there in my gut for twenty minutes?"
"It might take effect a lot sooner than that," said Vikki.
Not too long after that, it took effect, and Rica puked all over the linoleum. Nick was vomited up and deposited on the dining room floor. Rica carefully picked him up and put him on the table.
"Are you okay, Nick?" Rica asked.
"Yeah, but I wish my cousin Flora would've brought that voice amplifier I built, she forgot to bring it when she brought me here."
"I'll call her and tell her to bring it," said Rica. "Where is it?"
"It's in my bedroom on my desk," said Nick.
As Rica was calling Flora, Anastasia Alvarez showed up. She was kind of burly but with a nice figure.
"I'm here, just like I said I would!" said Anastasia. "Did the shrinking take effect like it was supposed to?"
"Look at all the captives on the table," said Soledad, as she licked her arm to keep her captives contained within a certain area of her arm. "Rica already swallowed some of them, and she accidentally swallowed Nicky Vasquez and puked him back up!"
"Is he okay?" Anastasia asked.
"He's on the table," said Soledad.
Anastasia pulled up a chair and sat down at the table. She could see Nick, who was one centimeter tall, and the other captives, who were the size of ants.
"Now then!" said Anastasia, talking to the shrunken captives. "Are you worms ready for a life of bondage? Are you ready to hail the new master race? Mexicans are your rulers, now! Bow down to me!" Anastasia slammed her fist down on the table for emphasis.
The shrunken people were grouped together out of fear. Most of them were only here because they had initially been convinced that the threats of the Conquistadora were a hoax of some type. Now that they found themselves in a strange place surrounded by angry giants, they felt that by sticking closer together they had a better chance of survival.
I command you to march forward," said Anastasia, "surrender to my hand!"
Anastasia out-stretched her hand and waited for the shrunken slaves to respond. One by one, they marched forward and obeyed her, out of fear. When the first of the tiny people arrived at her fingers, he had a hard time ascending her fingers at ant-size, but somehow he managed. Nick followed them, even though Anastasia's aggression wasn't directed at him. He climbed up onto her hand and waved to her. When the dozen or so other shrunken slaves climbed onto her hand, she lifted her hand into the air.
"Don't hurt him," said Soledad. "He's Flora's cousin, me and Rica are watching him while she's gone someplace."
"I wasn't going to hurt him," said Anastasia. "I feel like we're a race of gods now that these tiny people are so helpless! It's like they're under our dominion!"
"They are under our dominion!" said Soledad. "Watch this, I can prove it!"
Anastasia turned her head and looked in Soledad's direction as Soledad sat straddling the computer chair in front of the computer desk. Her left arm was leaning against the backrest, and five tiny people the size of ants were standing astride her arm including Chad, the guy she had made out with just before he got shrunk. Soledad opened her mouth and carefully lifted her arm toward her face, and with a swipe of her mighty tongue, her shrunken slaves were vanquished and banished to the depths of her belly.
"Those pathetic pawns just surrendered to my Aztec belly!" Soledad started laughing after saying this. Some of the others in the room laughed at this, too. No sympathy of any kind was shown to any of the shrunken captives.
Meanwhile, Flora was on the phone talking to Rica as she drove. "I'll stop by my house and pick up the voice amplifier on my way back, I gotta go!"
Flora hung up the phone and parked her car in front of a house. She grabbed a jar from the glove compartment and walked around the back of the house and found a brick, then went to the rear sliding glass door and broke it open and opened it from the inside. She went in and turned on the lights, and searched the house.
"Shelly!" said Flora. "I know you're here! It's safer for you to come with me than to stay here, I hope you know that!"
Flora walked down the hallway and opened the bedroom doors until she came to a room that might be Shelly's. She turned on the light and looked around. Flora detected movement out of the corner of her eye as she spotted something small moving rapidly on the floor. Flora almost stomped down on the figure, then got down on her knees and swatted at it with her hand. It was Shelly. She was ant-sized now, and trying to evade Flora's hand. Flora licked her finger and grabbed at Shelly, and Shelly stuck to her finger. Flora wiped her onto the inside of the glass jar, then stood up.
"Now to find a few more captives, then I'm taking you to a party!" said Flora.
A short while later, Flora parked near Sharky's house and got out with her jar and the voice amplifier Nick had built. She approached the door and knocked, and someone opened the door for her. She set the voice amplifier on the table, then dumped out the contents of the glass jar. About ten captives fell onto the table, among them was Shelly Schwartz, the young woman who had antagonized Nick the night the Conquistadora showed up.
"Oh my God!" Shelly shouted.
Flora plugged the voice amplifier in, and when Shelly was in range of the microphone, the normal-sized people in the room could hear her cries.
"What's happening to me?" Shelly shouted with tears in her eyes. "What are you gonna do to me?"
"What's the problem?" Anastasia asked the shrunken Shelly.
Nick spoke into the microphone. "She's a racist. On the night the Conquistadora first arrived, this bitch told me to go back to Mexico!"
"Oh, really?" Anastasia asked, then shifted her gaze to Shelly. "Is this true?"
When Shelly didn't say anything, Anastasia slammed her mighty fist down like a hammer and demanded an answer. "I said is this true! I command you to answer me! Mexicans have been elevated to a race of gods, and you've been reduced to nothing more than a pathetic pawn! Unless you want to end up as the food of the gods, I suggest you answer me!"
"No, he's lying!" said Shelly. "I never said anything to him!"
"She's lying!" said Nick. "Sharky can even verify it! He picked me up and gave me a ride that night! He's the one who told me what her name was! I'm from San Luis Obispo, I don't even know that many people around here, how could I have known who she is?"
"I'll swallow that bitch myself!" said Soledad, getting up from her computer chair.
"No, I want to swallow her," said Anastasia. "I think I could do a better job!"
"No way!" said Soledad. "I can do just as good of a job as you can! What makes you think you're more qualified?"
"I'm huskier," said Anastasia, "and more imposing. They fear me more!"
"Well this is my brother's house," said Soledad, "and he makes the rules!" Soledad shifted her gaze from Anastasia to another part of the room where her brother was watching television. "Sharky! Who gets to swallow this racist bitch, me or Anastasia?"
Sharky got up from what he was doing, and came over to survey the situation. Gordo, Chuy, and Nacho followed him, as well as Sharky's girlfriend Cameron and Gordo's girlfriend Flaca.
"Nick?" Sharky asked, looking at his shrunken friend. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah, I'm doing all right," said Nick.
"Why don't you let Nick be the judge and have him take a vote?" said Sharky. "Maybe the little racist chick can decide for herself who she wants to get swallowed by!"
"How can one person take a vote?" Soledad asked. "She either gets swallowed by me, or by Anastasia! That's one person's decision!"
"Okay, I guess I didn't think this through!" said Sharky. "All the shrunken people should take a vote. Whoever the majority decides is the winner will be the one to swallow her. Nick can delegate the voting proccess."
"Do you agree to that, Soledad?" Anastasia asked.
"Yeah, I guess that's fair," said Soledad. "but I hope I'm the one who gets picked!" Soledad licked her lips.
"Okay!" said Nick to the ant-sized captives at his feet. They were all standing on the table right in front of Anastasia. The shrunken people were the size of Lilliputians to Nick, because he was only a centimeter tall, while they were all ant-size.
"For everyone who thinks Shelly should get swallowed by Soledad, raise your hands!"
There were a dozen captives including Shelly, and five of them raised their hands.
"For everyone who thinks she should get swallowed by Anastasia, raise your hands!" said Nick, and five other people raised their hands.
"Two of you didn't vote!" said Nick. "Shelly, and you next to her! Who do you vote for?"
Neither of them raised their hands.
"We've got a problem!" said Nick. "We've got a little rebellion on our hands! Shelly and another shrunken guy refuse to vote, and we're tied five-five!"
Anastasia slammed her fist down on the table again. "I command you to vote for your conqueror, or all of you will end up in my belly!"
"Again," said Nick, "who votes for Soledad?"
Eight hands went into the air.
"Who votes for Anastasia?" Nick asked.
Three more hands went into the air, and Shelly didn't vote again.
"It looks like Soledad wins, eight votes to three!" said Nick. "Anastasia, I think you scared them into voting for Soledad!"
"It's not going to do them any good," said Soledad. "I'm just as merciless as she is! Shelly! Surrender to my hand! You're conqueror has spoken! This is the night you will surrender to the depths of my Aztec belly!"
Soledad stretched her hand out palm-side up, but Shelly huddled down and refused to move.
"You can make things a lot easier on yourself by just obeying me!" said Soledad. "Sharky! Get me some hot sauce! I'm going to make this bitch rue the day she disrespected Nicky! I'm going to make her experience in my gut as intolerable as possible!"
Sharky went and got a jar of home-made hot sauce and placed it in front of Soledad. There was a spoon sticking up out of the jar. Soledad grabbed the spoon and scooped up a lot of sauce, then licked the sauce from the spoon, but didn't swallow it. She licked her right index finger and touched Shelly until she adhered to Soledad’s finger, then raised Shelly to her mouth. She quickly shoved Shelly into her mouth and gargled with her before swallowing Shelly and the sauce. Soledad raised her hands in victory, and everyone cheered.
Shelly was still alive when she plunged down into Soledad's belly. Just as it had been for Nick when he had journeyed to Rica's belly, Shelly found a safe haven where there was a pocket of air near the top of the stomach. Shelly tried to conserve her air, but her efforts would be in vain. Nick had journeyed to the belly of a woman who cared for him and had swallowed him accidentally; Shelly was in the belly of an unforgiving titaness who believed that Shelly was being punished justly. The other five captives Soledad had swallowed were still alive, also. Shelly could hear them scream occasionally. No matter how long any of them could hold their breath, eventually they would all succumb to the same destiny: Soledad's belly would be their final resting place.
Meanwhile, in the normal-sized world, there was talk at Sharky's party that someone should invite Narcisa Navarro to the party.
"Flora," said Rica, "don't you have Narcisa Navarro's phone number?"
"Yeah," said Flora.
"Can you call her and invite her to the party?" Rica asked. "A lot of people want to see what she thinks of swallowing the shrunken captives!"
Flora pulled out her cell phone and called Narcisa. "Hello, Narcisa? I'm at Sharky's party. My cousin built a voice amplifier so it's easier to hear the shrunken people's voices. Captives have been getting swallowed! A lot of people were wondering if you're coming to the party. Okay, see you in a few!"
When Flora hung up her phone, she said: "She's on her way over right now!
To Be Continued!