Several days later, Jonas called him to his office. Ambrose rushed over, glad that he had an excuse to leave the palace. That morning, the Tyrant had been content to sunbathe outside, her gargantuan form stretched out across the palace lawn. But although she hadn’t terrorized anyone yet that day, Ambrose was wise enough to know that her mood could change in an instant. “Capricious” couldn’t even begin to describe someone who would tolerate one of their Assistants for a few months and then squash them without any sort of provocation at all.

So he left for Jonas’ office as quickly as possible, afraid that she would find some excuse to call him before her. Ambrose hadn’t been near her since she had murdered her pleasure slaves and then asked him about his name. As far as he could tell, no one had ever been asked their real name. They were just Assistant or Chef or Patrolman, nothing more. The fact that she kept noticing him, singling him out, was unnerving him. Was she toying with him, like a cat with a dying bird? That was entirely possible and he dreaded the idea that she would eventually sink her fangs into him.

By the time that Ambrose reached Jonas’ office, a tiny room that was cluttered with all kinds of forms and logs and spreadsheets, he was thoroughly convinced that he would be dead within a few days. His friend was seated behind his metal desk, a faded poster of the Tyrant behind him. The compassionless eyes in the photo seemed fixated on him; “REMEMBER” was printed on the bottom in big, bold letters.

“Hey, Ambrose. You still up for that trip?” Jonas asked as Ambrose sat down on a wobbly chair that threatened to collapse underneath him.

“Yeah,” he replied. At that moment, he wanted nothing more than to get as far away from the Tyrant as possible.

“Great. It’ll be lots of fun,” Jonas said, grinning. “Although that’s not why I called you here. I have some good news. Well, sort of. You’ve been promoted.”

Ambrose perked up. “Promoted? As in, no longer an Assistant?”

“Not exactly…you’ve become one of the Chief Assistants.” Jonas saw the horrified expression on Ambrose’s face, the way that his cheeks rapidly drained of color. “It’s not that bad. In a month or two, you’ll be in a similar position to mine.”

What he didn’t say is that depended upon whether Ambrose survived that month or two. Just thinking about having to spend even more time with the giantess was awful.

“But why? Why me?”

Jonas shrugged, sifting aimlessly through several forms on his desk. His friend was purposely avoiding making eye contact with him and he understood why when Jonas spoke again.

“I don’t know, although from what I understand, the Tyrant asked for you herself.”

***

“I’m sure that everything will be fine,” Ambrose told the Architect beside him, a lanky man named Rick. They were standing on what had once been a wealthy neighborhood in the Hamptons. Now all the sprawling mansions had been torn down to make room for one summer home, created on a scale that defied human comprehension. It was also the most beautiful house that Ambrose had ever seen, complete with hand-carved statuary and immaculately-maintained gardens. That didn’t mean that the Tyrant would like it, however, and he knew the cost for failure. That was why Rick was perspiring profusely beside him, wringing his striped tie in his hands.

“Oh, God, I hope so,” the Architect said, his face paling even more as they both felt the seismic footsteps beneath them. She appeared in the distance a few seconds later, a dark-haired goddess in a white sundress, inhuman in her size. Ambrose had heard that she could change her height according to her whim. One minute, she could be a normal-sized woman and the next, a vast being who could make a mountain look like an anthill. From what he had understood, she had destroyed entire cities at that unimaginable height, flattening them hundreds of feet into the bedrock with just one step.

Today she was the height that she often used, around twenty stories. She moved with a sensual grace despite her size, casually destroying everything in her path. Tall trees were pushed over, snapping like reeds before a bulldozer, and the remaining mansions were smashed beneath her white high heels, debris and dust rising up into the air as she marched over them. Her enormous eyes were on the small group of people, her expression enigmatic as usual.

Rick’s assistant, a small black-haired woman with wire-rimmed glasses, looked like she was about to faint. Rick continued to tug at his tie as the Tyrant stopped before them, her left foot settling a few meters away. It was close enough that Ambrose could see the detritus decorating it, entire clumps of grass and dirt and bits of wood. Something else too, something brownish-red that looked suspiciously like splatters of dried blood.

“Well, this is it,” Rick called up to her. Sweat was pouring down his heavily-lined forehead as he gestured toward the summer home behind him, built to the giantess’ scale. It had taken several years and teams of laborers to build the mountainous building. Ambrose had even heard that some of the construction workers had died, driven by unforgiving schedules and horrendous working conditions. Those in charge of the project had simply shrugged off these deaths, saying that they were a small price to pay to make the Tyrant happy.

He sincerely hoped that it pleased her. The giantess’ gaze shifted from the tiny people below to the new summer house. Thoughtfully, she raised one hand to her chin, obviously appraising the huge building. All that Ambrose could hear was the blood pounding through his ears and the sound of her burgundy-painted fingernail tapping her face.

“It’s awful,” the Tyrant finally said.

Rick’s mouth dropped open. “B-b-but…”

“It looks like a piece of shit.” The giantess’ foot lifted, the white leather of the pump creaking ominously, but it didn’t come down on them. Rather, it swung ponderously overhead as she strode toward the summer house, growing bigger as she did. The clothing didn’t keep up with her, ripping and tearing along the seams as her body expanded. Gigantic pieces of cotton drifted to the ground as she advanced on the house, her titanic footsteps causing the earth to heave beneath her. By the time that she reached the building, she was easily a thousand feet tall, as tall as her target. She was also nude, her toned body on full display, although she was too colossal and terrifying for Ambrose to appreciate it much.

The three of them, the Architect, the Architect’s assistant, and the Tyrant’s Chief Assistant, looked on in horrified astonishment as the giantess reared her massive arm back, her hand curling into a fist. When she struck the building, it was with incredible force, her punch causing deep cracks to snake up the length of the wall. Rick let go of his tie, his hands falling down numbly as the Tyrant dismantled the house that had taken years to create, hammering the structure with blows strong enough to make it crumble like stale gingerbread.

With a deafening rumble, the building finally imploded in on itself and the giantess stood there, her pale arms powdered with drywall and chips of paint. For a moment, she seemed pleased, her full lips curving in a satisfied smile. Then her head pivoted and she regarded Rick with utter contempt.

“No! Wait!” He screeched as she reached for him, her gargantuan hand blotting out the afternoon sun. The immense pillars of the giantess’ fingers plunged down, pinching the man between them. Muffled shrieks spilled out as the Tyrant raised her hand to one eye, squinting at her minuscule victim.

“Pathetic,” she proclaimed and then popped Rick between her fingers, his little body exploding in a spray of crimson. Ambrose said nothing, although the Architect’s assistant sucked in her breath sharply as the Tyrant nonchalantly inspected the mangled corpse staining the pads of her thumb and index finger. Then the giantess glanced down her nose at the petrified woman.

“You are the Architect now. I suggest that you design something better than he did,” the Tyrant told her, wiping the bloody remains of the previous Architect on the rubble.

***

Rain pattered against the palace windows and whenever Ambrose glanced out, all that he could see was the lead-gray sky. He had just started his shift and he could already tell that it was going to be a long day. Frantic screams had greeted him as soon as he walked through the door, echoing throughout the labyrinthian hallways. The Tyrant was evidently in one of her moods again.

The hellish shrieking had stopped and now there was only an uncomfortable silence, which meant that whoever she was tormenting was dead. Ambrose was hoping that she had gone for a nap when his tablet chirped loudly, startling him and the willowy Assistant who was standing near the opposite wall. She glanced over at him, her dark eyes betraying her relief that he had been summoned and not her.

Ambrose didn’t have time to dwell on that, though. He ran down the hallway, gripping the tablet to his chest. His lungs ached by the time that he reached the throne room, where the giantess was seated in an arrogant position, one shapely leg dangling over the arm of her marble throne. She was wearing more jewelry than usual; her enormous rings alone contained more gold than the former Fort Knox and they twinkled whenever she moved her hands.

The Tyrant began issuing her orders as soon as he entered the room, not even waiting for him to catch his breath. Ambrose struggled to keep up, tapping quickly at his tablet.

“I’m going to be traveling, so I want you to find some transportation. Something nice…tell Maserati to build something for me by next week. They can make it normal-sized, if that helps. But it had better be a beautiful car or else,” she said in an almost bored tone. Ambrose nodded and typed, not saying a word.

“I also want new outfits made in a variety of sizes. And I don’t want any of that synthetic silk this time. Tell them real silk, even if they have to ramp up production somehow.”

Again, Ambrose nodded, still staring at the tablet screen in front of him.

“Oh, and tell them to make a new outfit for you, since you’re coming with me,” the Tyrant told him and Ambrose stopped typing, looking up fearfully at the giant woman. She gazed intently down at him, as if challenging him to utter a protest.

But he just nodded.

***

It didn’t take much to get everything that the Tyrant demanded…a few phone calls and emails later, her vast supply chain was working to deliver the car and the clothing and anything else that she desired. One of the benefits of the system was that it was incredibly efficient, at least when it came to serving the giantess. By the end of the week, the car was brought up to the palace, its black exterior polished to such a degree that it practically sparkled. Ambrose was standing outside admiring it, dressed in a new uniform that was much more comfortable than his old one, when there was commotion amongst the Assistants. They swiftly stepped aside to let a woman through, her face partially hidden behind her darkly-tinted sunglasses.

Ambrose had never been a tall man; in fact, he had been frequently picked on for being so short. But the woman was almost exactly his height, her hour-glass figure accentuated by the scarlet dress that clung to her body. It took him a moment to recognize her and when he did, he felt the familiar panic.

“Hello, Assistant,” the Tyrant said, brushing right past him and opening one of the back doors of the sedan. She peered inside, examining the custom-made car with its gleaming leather seats. Apparently, she found it satisfactory because she slid inside with an almost practiced poise. No one moved, including Ambrose, until she frowned and pointed to the seat next to her. He understood and hopped in, closing the door behind him.

He didn’t want to look at her, painfully aware of how close they were to one another. Her perfume filled the car and through his peripheral vision, he saw her cross one leg over the other. She had beautiful legs, like the legs of a dancer, although he had never really noticed because they had always been so monstrously gigantic.

The Driver started the car and the noise startled him. Thank God that he didn’t bump into her by accident, though. Knowing the Tyrant, she would probably gouge out his eyes with her nails for the offense. She did glance over at him, the sunglasses reflecting his face back at him.

“You need to relax,” she said, “If I wanted you dead, you would be. Understand?”

Ambrose swallowed hard. “Y-yes.”

Still looking at him, she took off the sunglasses, revealing her gray eyes. It was difficult for Ambrose not to think of her as a normal person. A part of him understood that she was still the same murderous creature as before, but it was hard for him to reconcile that with what he was seeing. She could have been anyone at that instant and he wondered who she really was, besides the Tyrant.

He didn’t ask, of course. If she even had a previous identity or name, she sure as hell wouldn’t tell him.

“Good,” the Tyrant replied, sprawling out across her seat with the boneless grace of a lioness. Then, to Ambrose’s surprise, she said, “Tell me about yourself, Assistant.”

The question caught him off guard, but he managed to recover quickly. “I, well, what do you want to know?”

He shook as the predatory gray eyes examined him. “Whatever you want to tell me.”

Desperately, he tried to think of an adequate response. “I’m twenty-three years old. I have a brother and a sister.” Even as he said the last part, he regretted it. Everything that he told her was most likely being filed away for later and he hated the thought of her somehow punishing his siblings. With greater care, he continued, “I went to school for Agriculture but I never actually ended up using the degree. What I wanted to study was Medicine but I never made the Benchmarks.”

“A pity, since saving people’s lives is an admirable goal,” the Tyrant said and he wasn’t sure whether or not he detected a hint of sarcasm in her voice. “I worked in Medicine for most of my career. Only it wasn’t called that at the time.”

She’s referring to The Time Before, he thought. It appeared as though she was going to say something else but she didn’t, instead slipping her sunglasses back on and turning her head to look out the window.

***

They drove all day, stopping on occasion to refill the Maserati. The Tyrant didn’t speak to him again, which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. She just watched the landscape as it rushed by, staring at the farms and small cities. There were also the burned-out remains of large metropolises, the remains of skyscrapers standing out bleakly against the sky. The person responsible for that devastation was sitting a few feet from him and he stealthily observed her reaction. She studied her work with a cruel gleam in her eye, clearly delighted by seeing entire cities that were now huge graveyards.

Afternoon had given way to dusk by the time that they reached their destination. In The Time Before, it had been called Washington, D.C, the capital of the old United States. Now it was a deep canyon the size of a city, hundreds and hundreds of feet deep. The Driver parked the Maserati and the Tyrant stepped out, strolling toward the edge. As much as he wanted to stay in the car, Ambrose reluctantly followed her.

She stopped close to the edge of the crater, looking down. Far below, Ambrose could see the soft glow of street lamps and the headlights of cars. There was a town built in the bottom of the canyon, complete with a hospital and a school. From this high up, everything looked miniature, as though the buildings were part of a model railroad set. This was probably how the Tyrant viewed things most of the time, tiny and insignificant.

“I remember stepping on this entire city,” the Tyrant said quietly, still staring down into the crater. Ambrose’s head jerked up. Perhaps he hadn’t heard correctly. But then she continued on, “They fought me, the little fuckers. It was a joke, really. Even their nukes couldn’t stop me. But they wouldn’t give up. So I grew, bigger than I ever had before. I didn’t stop growing until everything looked like like patches of brown and green.”

Ambrose felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up.

“Can you imagine being that big, large enough to actually see the curvature of the planet? It was exhilarating, really, knowing that I could kill hundreds of thousands of people with a single step. I headed straight for the capital, to teach the microbes a lesson.”

As the Tyrant spoke, an unwanted vision came to him. He imagined himself in that old city, one of thousands, looking up as the sky was suddenly replaced by a red-tinged sole, so unbelievably enormous that most people couldn’t accept what they were seeing. Ambrose could almost hear the frenzied wails as people tried to run, but he knew that escape wasn’t an option. How could someone hope to outrun a being who made mountains look like anthills?

“And once I got there, I crushed them all. One stomp and the capital of the mightiest nation on Earth was nothing more than dust,” the Tyrant said and Ambrose actually saw the immense foot descending, the tops of buildings crumbling and collapsing as it bore down upon them. Then he blinked and he was once more looking at the miles-long crater. No, not a crater. It was a footprint, a permanent mark upon the planet and testimony to the giantess’ might. If he were to fly up high enough in an airplane, he was certain that he would see a whole series of canyon-like prints, the trail that she had left behind as she had marched toward her target.

The Tyrant smiled, a terrible expression that oozed across her otherwise lovely face. “I always punish those who disobey me, Assistant.”

“As it should be, Tyrant,” Ambrose muttered.

“I honestly never thought I’d return here. It’s too bad for them that I have,” she said, heading toward one of the sets of stairs that were ingenuously carved into the side of the crater. There were also huge glass and steel elevators everywhere, but they took the steps, the conversation dying away by the time that they reached the bottom. Ambrose took a second to crane his head back and gawk at the towering walls surrounding him, taller than most skyscrapers. Despite what she had told him, it was still mind-boggling to think that he was standing in a single footprint and that the ground beneath him was made up of compressed buildings and people and vehicles, all reduced to their molecular components beneath the giantess’ astronomical weight.

They reached the town as the first stars began to appear, the sky slowly becoming a dusky violet color. Most people were rushing to get inside before Curfew began, men and women hurrying along the sidewalks or getting into their vehicles. The Tyrant seemed amused at this, stopping now and then to watch them. No one paid any heed to the short woman in red until the Patrolmen noticed her.

The Patrolmen, two hulking men and a woman whose face was a collection of impressive scars, marched toward them. Ambrose had always been nervous around Patrolmen. A lifetime of seeing them commit all kinds of atrocities, from breaking noses to beating suspects to death, had conditioned him to feel fear whenever he saw the black and gold uniforms. So he meekly lowered his head, afraid that one of them would decide to bash in his skull. Then he remembered his companion and he did something that he never dreamed of doing…he looked them in their eyes.

“What the hell are you doing on the street? Don’t you know it’s Curfew?” One of the Patrolmen snarled, an older man with a shaved head. Ambrose was taken aback, shocked that they would dare to address the Tyrant in such a way. Unless they didn’t recognize her at her current height, which seemed to be the case.

“Of course I know,” the Tyrant replied insolently. From the giddiness in her voice, Ambrose decided that she was enjoying this, toying with the three Patrolmen as if this were all a game for her personal entertainment.

“You should learn some respect,” the older Patrolman growled, reaching down for the baton at his belt. Before he could grab it, the Tyrant lunged forward, her slender fingers digging into the black fabric of his uniform. The man cried out as she heaved him effortlessly into the wall of a nearby building, an amazing feat for such a seemingly-petite woman. As Ambrose and the other two Patrolmen watched in mute astonishment, she began to grow, shedding her scarlet dress as she did. She suddenly shot up to ten feet tall, then fourteen, then twenty, her body expanding like something in a surreal dream.

The woman with the scarred face looked from the giantess to Ambrose, finally noticing his uniform. She mouthed the words “Tyrant” and “Assistant,” although it was obvious to everyone who they were at that point. The giantess had leaned down and wrapped one enormous hand around the older Patrolman’s leg, lifting him up like a small doll. He hung there, upside down, as she sneered at him.

“So should you,” the Tyrant told him before she wound her arm up and swung him around in a brutal arc. The man’s head connected with the sidewalk, a meaty cracking noise ringing out. Smiling viciously, the giantess lifted the Patrolman back up and then smashed him against the sidewalk again. And again. And again. By the time that she finally let go of the body, the man’s face resembled raw hamburger.

Having seen their colleague pulverized, the two other Patrolmen fell to their knees, groveling at the giantess’ feet. She looked down at them, still wearing that cold-hearted smile. Without warning, she placed her oversized foot on the back of the female Patrolman’s head and back, forcing her closer to the ground. The woman squeaked as she was shoved down to the sidewalk, her forehead bumping the concrete.

“Please, we apologize for our mista—,” the female Patrolman started.

“Be quiet,” the giantess interrupted her, leaning forward and forcing more pressure onto the woman’s back and neck and head. Weeping in fright, the Patrolwoman began to plead again, her words again cut short when the Tyrant stepped down. There was a sickening crunch as the woman’s neck and spine broke, her arms fluttering spasmodically. The giantess lifted her foot and then slammed it down once more, hard enough that fine droplets of blood sprayed onto Ambrose’s shoes.

The third Patrolman was obviously going to be executed as well…at least, that’s what Ambrose believed. But the Tyrant didn’t reach down for the quivering man. She calmly removed her foot from the woman’s corpse, which still jerked as the muscles slowly died, and said, “I heard that some of the rebels are here.”

“I-I hadn’t heard…I wasn’t aware—,” the Patrolman sputtered.

“That’s because you’re an incompetent idiot. I can’t trust any of you to do anything right, so I came here to deal with it myself.”

“Deal with it myself…” Ambrose could imagine what those words meant and his imagination turned out to be correct. The Tyrant began to grow, doubling her height and then doubling it again, her broad hips and shoulders brushing up against the facade of a neighboring building and gouging great tears in it. Behind the windows, several people gasped and watched the woman expanding in front of them. She took an earthshaking step forward, still growing at an alarming rate. There was a car directly beneath her foot and she trod on it as if it wasn’t there, pancaking the vehicle into a flattened wreck of metal and broken glass. The next step was even worse, her ever-growing foot landing in the midst of a crowd of onlookers. Again, she took no notice and when her foot rose up again, there was glistening blood and the contorted shapes of bodies decorating the sole.

Ambrose wasn’t sure what to do, transfixed by the sight of the colossal woman plowing effortlessly through an entire row of buildings, wood and other debris crashing down in her destructive wake. No, woman wasn’t an accurate way to describe her. Force of nature was a much better description. She was as unstoppable and uncaring as a hurricane, ravaging everything that happened to be in her way. Ambrose saw her walk through a tenement building, leaving it torn in half. Tiny bodies tumbled down through the ragged opening, unnoticed by the giantess as she continued on her destructive path.

She didn’t appear to be searching specifically for the rebels; rather, everything that moved seemed to be a target. The streams of panicking people were crushed into human paste beneath her feet, ground deep into the mammoth footprints. Vehicles were flattened as well, or kicked into nearby buildings, exploding into gigantic balls of fire. Seeing her move amidst the buildings, which now only came up to her shins, he could understand why no one dared to defy her.

Except someone apparently had. The idea that rebels could exist was ridiculous, but yet here he was, watching as the Tyrant razed the town in her pursuit of them. How could anyone hope to stand up to someone with the powers of a god? It was evident that they couldn’t and now they were her facing her wrath, like something out of the Old Testament. Ambrose saw her pause before the city hall and bend down, her hands ripping off the roof and upper story with incredible ease. Shrieks and loud crashes rose up from the building as she sifted through it, frowning. When she withdrew the handful of people, they weren’t who she was searching for and so she tossed them aside, their bodies landing somewhere in the distance.

He still couldn’t decide what to do, torn by whether he should head toward her or try to escape with the swarms of people who were rushing by him on their way to the stairs and elevators. Although fleeing seemed like an attractive option, he knew that he could never get away from her. She would find him, especially now that he was a Chief Assistant, even if it took years and countless innocent lives to do so. And then she would do the same sort of thing to him as she was doing to the rebels.

All around him, the ground rocked crazily with the giantess’ movements. Ambrose stumbled several times as he made his way toward the center of the city, the smoke from the fires stinging his eyes.  Even squatting down, the Tyrant was an impressive sight, titanic enough that she dwarfed everything around her. Her long brown hair, inky-black in the darkness of night, covered most of her face as she ripped apart city hall, flinging the rubble carelessly around. A huge portion of the building careened through the air, landing with a thunderous rumble on a crowd of people.

The explosion happened suddenly, brilliant orangish-gold fire blossoming up from the Tyrant’s left calf. She didn’t seem to feel any pain, although annoyance and surprise registered on her massive face as she tried to follow the source of the blast. Another explosion, this one aimed at her knee, followed closely behind. There was a tremendous burst of noise and Ambrose could actually feel the intense heat of the blast against his skin, but the attack didn’t slow the giantess down. The only thing that it did was give away the rebels’ position in a clock tower that was a few blocks away.

“There you are,” the Tyrant said, delighted. Another rocket spiraled through the air, somehow missing the giantess and striking a building instead. She didn’t look behind her as yet another explosion lit up the night. To Ambrose’s dismay, the Tyrant was growing again, stretching up toward the towering walls of the canyon. Beneath her, the clock tower was pathetically small, no longer than her forefinger, and the entire structure trembled as she planted her feet on either side of it.

“This is what happens to those who rebel against me,” the giantess announced, kneeling down and positioning herself over the tiny tower. Reaching down, she parted the swollen lips of her sex and Ambrose couldn’t help but wonder what the rebels saw from below. It was probably nightmarish, terrifying, especially when she moved her hips and brought herself down upon the structure, the tower vanishing deep into her. It should have been crushed into oblivion, reduced to wreckage within her monstrous vagina. But when she raised herself back up, the building was still standing, albeit sodden with her slimy secretions. The wind shifted and he could actually smell her excitement, an earthy female scent that mingled with the odors of burning wood and blood.

When the giantess brought herself down again on the tower, she wasn’t quite as gentle. She ground against it as if it were a sex toy and not a building with people inside of it. And oh God, it was horrible to envision what those people were probably seeing, having to watch the walls of smothering flesh slide past and knowing that they were nothing more than a minor diversion, a moment’s entertainment for the inhuman being.

She began to move faster, baring her teeth in an expression of bloodthirsty lust. Each time that the tower reappeared, there was more damage: huge sections of the exterior scraped off, windows cracked. It looked like there were fearful, pale faces at some of the windows but it may have been Ambrose imagining things. There was nothing that he could do for them, anyway. The Tyrant was too absorbed in her own pleasure to even notice if he spoke up. And if she did hear him, she’d swat him like an irksome fly and he’d just be another body leaking its life fluids into the ground.

Gasping, the giantess dug her gargantuan fingers into the surrounding buildings. In one instant, her orgasm destroyed the tower, the structure imploding within her. This time when she rose up, the remains of the building poured out of her, bombarding the town below like meteorites. At that point, Ambrose would have thought that she’d be finished with her mission, since the rebels were now reduced to mashed meat or drowned within her molasses-like vaginal fluid. But the Tyrant began to systematically tear down the rest of the town, wiping it from existence. It was then that he feared for his own life, afraid that he would be just another casualty of her divine rage.

She moved toward him, churning up dust and debris as around her, growing yet again. This is how I die, Ambrose thought, too paralyzed by the sight of the approaching giantess to even blink. Her immense body filled his vision, her head seeming to touch the starry sky overhead. Far above him, her hand swung around, the fingers curled, and despite the darkness, he could see the detritus dusting the enormous expanse of her palm. She was reaching down for him.

“I almost didn’t see you, Assistant,” the Tyrant boomed, her colossal hand enclosing him in tons of flesh and bone. How she could pick up such a tiny person up without squishing him like an overripe blueberry was beyond Ambrose’s comprehension. Warm flesh pressed up all around him and if he concentrated, he could feel the steady throb of her pulse. All light had been cut-off and so he felt rather than saw the hand moving upwards, lifting him up with it.

Although Ambrose was relieved when she loosened her fingers and allowed him to see again, he was horrified at how high up he was. The Tyrant’s hand was at shoulder level; below him he saw the heavy globes of her breasts, frighteningly massive as they swayed slowly from her movements. Farther below, he saw the powerful pillars of her legs, which seemed to stretch on and on until they eventually vanished into a sea of ruined buildings and vehicles.

She started to move toward the walls of the canyon and he hunkered down in the center of her palm, trying to prevent himself from falling to his death. It was proving to be difficult though, since she didn’t seemed concerned with keeping her hand steady. With each jolting footstep, Ambrose counted down the seconds until she stopped. The giantess did eventually pause, inspecting the elevators as they traveled up and down the sides of the cliff wall.  Her smile was chilling and the yellowish light from the raging fires illuminated one side of her face and hair, giving it a demonic look.

“I-I don’t believe those are rebels,” Ambrose piped up, regretting it immediately. The gigantic eyes rolled down, glowering at him.

“And your point is what, Assistant?”

“N-nothing, ma’am.”

“I thought so.” Balling her other hand into a tremendous fist, she smashed one of the elevator cars, driving it deep into the rocky wall. She destroyed another car the same way, flattening it beneath her hand, and then pinched the third one between her fingers. Metal screeched as she ripped it free, holding the car and its battered occupants up to her eye. She squinted, appraised the tiny people pounding on the glass. To the gigantic woman, the car was smaller than half a domino and the occupants were little more than frantic insects. Seemingly satisfied, the Tyrant moved the car down to her mouth and ripped off the top with her gleaming white teeth, spitting out the metallic fragments.

The people inside began to scream louder as she tilted the car, allowing them to slide out and plummet down between her lips. It was like watching a woman gulp candies, although these candies screamed and begged as they fell into her gaping mouth. One older man landed on her lower lip, clinging to it before the huge pink mass of her tongue swept him away. Once the elevator car was empty, the Tyrant released it, allowing it to fall between her feet as she swallowed the mouthful of people.

Underneath him, the giantess’ hand began to stretch out, expanding. She was growing again, the burning town seeming to shrink beneath them. Soon she was tall enough that the walls of the canyon only came up to her midriff and she reached out, dumping Ambrose ungently on the ground near the Maserati. Ambrose took a moment to roll himself over, afraid that she may have broken something. As soon as he was certain that no bones were broken, he sat up, wincing as the first bruises formed. In the distance, he could see that the Tyrant had swung back around, making sure that the town was completely annihilated. Once again, he contemplated running away and once again, he remained where he was, waiting.