Chapter 2

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"You must be Isabell?" Peter was a plain looking man, not pretty but not ugly either. As normal as they come. "Please, come in. Christine told me you'd come, yesterday."

Isabell was guided into a large room. A table, looking like the ones doctors use to examine their patient upon, stood in its center. Behind it, a large machine hummed softly. It consisted of countless buttons, three monitors and a long, flexible tube, ending in a cap-like shape. A lot of needles protruded from it.

"This is the machine," Peter said, waving at it. "It took us four years to build; now it's ready for testing. I'm glad you want to participate."

"How does it work?" Isabell asked. "Christine told me something about Virtual Reality?"

"Let me explain. You've seen the Matrix?" Peter asked.

"Yes," Isabell answered.

"Well, this machine works more or less like the ones used in "the Matrix". It feeds your brain with images, sounds, odors...all kinds of stimuli. Which means it replaces the senses' information send to your brain with artificially created ones. To your mind, they seem real, though. Just like the machines in "the Matrix" did to humans. Make them believe they lived in a certain world, but in reality, they were in some kind of stasis chamber, being milked of their energy."

Peter smiled. "I called it "the matrixer", by the way. In honor of this fantastic movie."

Isabell nodded, smiling. She liked the movie too.

"Now, this baby makes sure you think you are in another world as well. It fakes senses, feelings of gravity, pressure, balance, pain, hunger and thirst, among other things. You are lying here, but you think you are on a tropical beach, walking in the sand."

"Amazing!" Isabell said. "But what about my body? It lies down here, and sends information to my brain too. Does that cause a conflict?"

"No, I took care of that. Look." Peter showed her a long, rubbery tube. One part stuck in the matrixer, the other ended in a hoop. It looked as if he had a large dog collar connected to the machine.

"You wear this around your neck. It'll block all other signals, coming from your body and senses. Your real senses, I mean. So only the matrixer's stimuli will enter your brain. It works two-way. If you are extremely excited, your real heart rate won't increase, nor will feeling nauseous make your stomach churn. It'll feel to you it does though, but that is stimulation too. The machine interacts with your thoughts. Part VR, part fantasy. Your fantasy. The computer reacts to your imagination, your decisions. Just like in a computer game."

"OK," Isabell said. "And you can make me believe I shoot Mike?"

"Of course. I have to program the machine accordingly, and you'll find yourself standing in front of your ex, holding a gun, and you can shoot him. Without going to jail for it. Of course, in reality, he's still alive and won't know anything about it, so don't expect him to be afraid of you or something. But maybe the experience of shooting him, even if not real, will ease your mind. It's far more intense than a daydream, you know."

"How much does it cost?" Isabell inquired. It certainly didn't come cheap.

"Nothing. It's an experiment, after all. But...." Peter hesitated. "If you want to participate in another experiment of me, I'll give you money. A hundred Euros."

"What experiment?" Isabell asked. It sounded good, a hundred Euros was a lot of money for her.

"Sorry, I can't tell you much about it. Secrecy is part of it. Foreknowledge is a bias, you know. I'll tell you after you had your, let's call it "virtual shooting". You can still say yes or no then. But first, test the matrixer. You can spend a few minutes in VR, on the tropical beach I mentioned earlier. I use that program to make people acquainted with the machine."

"You mean right now?" Isabell asked.

"Yes. It takes just a few minutes. You can still refuse the shooting afterwards. Or now, if you really don't want."

Isabell hesitated. As curious as she was, it all happened a bit too quick for her. She had only come to ask how and what about this machine, this "matrixer", not already being connected to it. But her curiosity won, and she was lying on the table ten minutes later, ready for her first VR trip.

"Ready?" Peter asked, after having her connected. "All right, here we go!"

Isabell saw a flash, and suddenly found herself standing on a hot, sunny beach. Amazed, she looked around. Blue water, soft sand, palm trees waving in a gentle breeze. Was this all fake? She could not believe it. She felt the sunlight on her skin, looking up at the sun made her eyes water. Or so it seemed.

She strolled across the beach. There were no other people; she had a tropical paradise all for herself. She felt the breeze, heard the waves, saw the sand. Everything seemed so real, she could even make out separate grains of sand on her shoes if she looked closely.

Then, another flash, and she was back in Peter's lab. It was quite a strange feeling, so suddenly being torn away from a warm beach, now feeling her body lying on his table.

"WOW!" she exclaimed. "That...that was wonderful! I...this..." She was at a loss for words.

Peter smiled. "Thanks! Now, if you want to shoot your ex-lover, tell me so and I start programming the matrixer tomorrow. Come back in three days then. If you want, that is," he concluded.

"Yes! Yes, I want to! Oh, this is great! I can do everything with Mike, without committing a crime! I'm gonna shoot that bastard!" Isabell was overjoyed. Soon, she would feel much better. The real Mike might still live, but the virtual one wouldn't. And he would never know what she did to him in this virtual world. That secret alone was enough for Isabell to make her feel better.

Three days later, Isabell was in VR again. She found herself standing in a plain room, a large rifle in her hands. Mike was there, too, calling her names and challenging her. "Come, hit me, bitch! Hit me, carrot nose!" he cried.

"OK, I hit you," she replied. Isabell aimed the rifle, and pulled the trigger.

BANG! Mike's head started to bleed. His eyes rolled up in his head, and he fell down on the floor, blood dripping out of his forehead. Dead.

"That was awesome!" Isabell was excited. Peter had just turned off the matrixer, and Isabell was sitting on the table, overjoyed. "I could even smell the gunpowder! That bastard! Oh, I hope these matrixers become commercially available! I'll buy one and shoot him every day!" Isabell rubbed her hands at the thought.

"Glad you liked it," Peter smiled. "Now, as for the other experiment," he continued, taking a bottle out of a cupboard, "I need you to drink this." The bottle was thin and as tall as a hand. It contained a pink liquid.

"What's that?"

"This liquid just passed its test phases in the lab. We are looking for a cure for people who suffer from midget growth. Dwarfs, you know."

"OK..." Isabell said, puzzled. At 5'9, she was certainly not a midget.

"It is able to make you grow," Peter went on, "by merely wanting to. You just have to wish to get bigger, and you grow. It connects to your nerve system, see?"

"How much bigger do I get?" Isabell was satisfied with her height. She didn't want to grow much more, if at all.

"That, we don't know. It hasn't been tested on living tissue yet. We usually use animals for that kind of experiments, but one cannot make an animal "want" to grow. Wanting food, yes. Growth, no."

"And if I don't want?"

"No offence taken. It's just a question. But no hundred Euros either."

Isabell wasn't sure. Her height was fine with her. She stared at the bottle, and wondered what she should do. A hundred Euros was a lot of money, but what if the experiment failed? It could kill her. She could get cancer. She could become ill for the rest of her life.

But what if it worked? She thought of Mike, as he stood in front of her, a full 6'4, hitting her. If she was bigger than he was, he would think twice hitting her again. Or even insult her. That'd be nice. Very nice. Never humiliated again!

"All right! I do it!" Isabell said, and drained the bottle.

"Great! Now, go home and wait for a couple of hours. It takes a while before it works, see? Come back tomorrow and we'll see if you can make yourself grow. Or, wait, better yet, try to grow at home! I want to know how long it takes before it works!" Peter said.

At home, Isabell measured herself every five minutes. "Grow...grow...grow...I want to grow...," she kept thinking. But nothing happened. Still 5'9.

She had worked out a plan already to take revenge on Mike, should the stuff work. Her imagination had taken over; she pictured what she would do to Mike. Towering over him, seven, maybe eight foot tall, hitting him like he was a child. You don't care if one is too weak to block your blows, after all. His words. She imagined him licking her feet when she ordered him to do so. Isabell pictured her wiping her ass with his face, using his hair for leverage. Making him feel small and insignificant. Like an insect....yes, that was an exciting thought. Mike, the bug at her feet! How big could she get? She was certainly going to find out.

"Grow....grow....grow...," she kept thinking.

She measured herself again. It had been two hours since she drank the liquid now.

Her heart skipped a beat. 5'10! She had grown!