A message pinged on Alice's headset- a chat invitation from "HotStreak". The rather plump redhead was hesitant to accept . . . but then decided that she could close out if it was someone unsavory. "Heyo, PsychoGirl28 here," she said jauntily, going for bold. When she played as Saeko, she felt nigh-untouchable.

"Hey, Alice," a familiar voice giggled on the other end of the chat- Lillian, Alice's old friend, who'd been scrimping and saving up to buy Titan Legion . . . apparently she'd managed to buy it. "PsychoGirl, really?"

"Fuck yeah, really," Alice laughed, selecting a match of "Morale"- she felt devious. Alice's main, Saeko, was quite honestly OP to crap in the mode. It was designed to be newbie friendly, apparent in its inherent handicap system of making players who dropped behind in kills smaller and harder to hit, but Saeko had . . . distinct advantages. Alice didn't even need to think before selecting the slim, beautiful, and absolutely ax-crazy character on the selection screen. 

"So, um, I couldn't find a tutorial, so I hopped into a match . . . how do these characters work?" Lillian asked softly on the other end of the chat, obviously nervous.

"Okay, quick rundown," Alice said, speaking very quickly as there was only one person in her lobby who hadn't chosen a character yet. "Top left, the black guy, that's Jakob. General-purpose shooter character, designed for people who still play regular shooters. Assault rifle, pistol, grenades, it's just like playing an old early-21st-century FPS. All about the firepower, no complex strategies. To his right, the skinny white guy, he's Dmitry. Cold Russian sniper, he can turn invisible, for short periods of time, he's got mini-missiles. Hard as fuck to use right, ignore him. To his right, we have Joaquin, the Hispanic dude. Tricky fucker can climb walls and shit, uses double pistols, jump jet boots, basically all about moving fast as all hell and putting holes in everybody- doesn't do loads of damage, but fuck all is he annoying."

"Okay, so the top row of three dudes done," Lillian murmured an affirmative. 

Alice bit her lip . . . each row had a fourth character, but those either cost money or required you to beat the storyline for all other characters on their row. "Yup. Three dudes. Anyway, the second row is girls. On our left, we have our French girl, Jacqueline: Unless you're in a teamplay mode, she's kinda useless, if admittedly fun as fuck- she just Spider-Mans all over the place, healing and occasionally defending herself with a dart gun that can't even one-shot on a headshot. Dead center in the grid of nine is Saeko, our Japanese girl. She likes melee. A lot. Shotgun, knife, a gravity weapon to get people closer to her, and several personalized melee attacks. Center right is limber, vaguely Middle Eastern Djamila, our dance battler, and I mean you need to do flips and breakdancing moves and shit to use her, because while her flamethrowers- which are on her hands and feet by the way- are pretty long-range and have theoretically infinite ammo without reload stations, she gets more fuel by movement, and just walking or running doesn't cut it. Also, she can deflect bullets with kicks. Somehow."

Lillian hemmed and hawed on the other end of the line. "And the bottom row?" 

"Aliens. Hard to use, weird specials, and God does it feel weird not being human. Playing as the dudes might be uncomfortable, but with the aliens I just can't figure out how to move!" Alice was growing impatient, and fidgeted in her gaming chair. This asshole was taking forever to choose!

"Whatever, then, I can learn on the go," Lillian grunted, closing the chat out of annoyance at her friend.

*** LILLIAN ***

The thin, gymnastically-bent young brunette went for Djamila, deciding that since she knew how to breakdance, playing as a character who fought via breakdancing would be easy. She'd chosen a match of "Morale", a game mode that openly advertised its capacity for teaching new players the ropes . . .

Lilliene suddenly felt stronger, more limber, and very jumpy. She went to put her hand to her chest, see if she was sick . . . and felt different. Very different. Like, the presence of tits where there had been no tits before. She gasped in a voice that was not her own.

The realism was insane! She could feel Djamila's body as if it were her own, being hugged by a shamelessly skintight outfit, as well as cold metal fingerless gloves on her hands and feet. However, as she got used to this body, and this feeling of power, a cold chill went through her system- and a generic, robotic announcer declared: "First Kill: Saeko!"

Lillian grunted in annoyance- she'd spent so long feeling herself up that she'd fallen behind! Immediately, she started cartwheeling, tumbling, enjoying being even more limber than she usually was, and without any of the normal fatigue. She could even occasionally see Djamila's beautiful, silky black tresses flit before her eyes, before retreating out of sight as she would land.

She quickly found someone playing as one of the aliens, and tumbled towards them, feeling flames dancing at her fingertips and beneath her feet, a truly elegant way to kill- and then pain exploded in her back, and in the back of her head. "FUCKING HELL!" Lillian yelled, as "Killed By: Saeko" flashed before her eyes.

*** ALICE ***

Playing as Saeko never got stale, the redhead decided. The lovely Japanese girl had a power to her, it was such a head rush. And, in Morale mode especially, there was a benefit to her style . . .

Perfect. A Joaquin player who had managed to get killed a dozen times in a minute and a half. Fast little fucker probably felt invincible at less than an inch tall, he was an ant with fantastic annoyance capacity. 

"Activate Pulse Suit," Alice laughed, her voice coming out with a pretty accent and a dangerous purr. She could see the fear on the mini-man's face as he was pulled, quickly and inexorably, to the laughing, open mouth of the psychotic Japanese femme fatale.

Were Alice playing as any other character, this moment would be wasted. No other character had tastebud mapping set up . . . but Saeko did. She could taste the miniscule man's fear, and due to Saeko's programming, she loved it. The geek behind Saeko's frantically giggling beauty bullied whoever this Joaquin player was in her mouth, battering him from side to side with her tongue, smacking him with her teeth. Because of an ult where Saeko would cannibalize bits of a caught victim, the Japanese beauty was the only human character with damage hitboxes on her teeth, which meant that the little person in her mouth was feeling excruciating pain right now . . . this ult also meant that Saeko was the only character who could swallow anything, and her stomach was a very painful one-hit kill to prevent abuse with one of the alien characters' regeneration ability. With a dainty gulp, Alice scored another point, bringing her up to 22 kills in 2 minutes with nothing but her shotgun and her body.

*** LILLIAN ***

"Okay, calm down," Lillian murmured in Djamila's soothing voice, "fourth place isn't so bad," she said calmingly.

But it was. Djamila was 5"4" to start with, a very short character, the shortest in the game in fact, and in fourth place she was a mere 8 inches tall. All the cartwheels, flips, and dance skills in the world couldn't help her score points if someone could get out of range by taking a single step . . . and on that note, Lillian fell to fifth, reducing her to 4 inches tall.

"Goddamn this game!" Lillian screamed, thankfully getting a kill on a Joaquin player who wasn't moving at all, just standing and murmuring, so she didn't fall to sixth. A score of -4 was frankly embarrassing, but that was how it went sometimes, she supposed.

*** ALICE ***

This had to be the most easymode match Alice had ever had- she hadn't even taken damage all game! Suddenly, out of the corner of her eye, she saw a teensy Djamila player on the ground.

Every inch of Saeko's body was a hitbox she could inflict damage with, so said Saeko's character trailer, and Alice could feel her toes excitedly moving inside the combat boots the character wore- a nice touch, but given that one couldn't take the boots off without hacking the game, pointless in the end. However, the boots themselves . . . Alice stomped heavily towards the bug-sized little woman, eyeing the skintight outfit on the ever-mobile Djamila . . .

*** LILLIAN ***

Of course the Saeko player that had caught her with a cheap shot had to be in first place. Lillian backflipped away as quickly as possible, getting a good look up the body of the titanic psychopathic character. 

Huge, iron-gray combat boots . . . sensually tight skinny jeans . . . a flat, toned stomach, framed by an unbuttoned bomber jacket . . . perfectly pert tits held in a blue bikini top . . . long arms ending in beautifully long fingers . . . and vividly, shockingly purple hair. In fact, were it not for the crazed look in her eyes, the psychotic grin, and the slashing scar from her left temple to the left edge of her upper lip, one might just mistake Saeko for being a "sexy tomboy"-type character, instead of the barely-contained menace she was designed to be.

"Sayonara, little bug," Saeko practically purred, her accent and voice files combining to sound like she was in the midst of an orgasm, before lifting the boot over Lillian and squashing her like a cockroach. Lillian's vision went black, and agony overwhelmed her, as "Killed By: Saeko" flashed before her again.

Before Lillian-as-Djamila could even think of revenge, however . . . three minutes were up. The match was over. The results screen proved just how much of a curbstomp it was:

Saeko - 52 Kills

Kel'duur - 4 Kills

Jakob - 1 Kill

Jacqueline - -6 Kills

Djamila - -8 Kills

Dmitry - -15 Kills

Joaquin - -48 Kills

Frustrated, Lillian signed out of the game . . . and didn't see her room as it should be. The pillow which had supported her head now held her entire body, her bed stretched out far further than she remembered, and the walls seemed miles away. Quickly, using the headset which had thankfully shrunk with her, the itty-bitty brunette called her redheaded friend . . ."

*** ALICE ***

"I had heard that happened sometimes," Alice said into the mic after Lillian had finished explaining herself, "that if first place in a Morale match wins by too much, the losers might not grow back . . ." She was deep in thought. From Lillian's story, it sounded like Alice herself had been the Saeko player that bullied the game that far. The thought was horrific, but honestly . . . it was quite arousing. Who knew if Lillian was the only person who'd been caught by the technical bug this time? Alice's vicious winning streak might have resulted in 6 unfortunate victims scattered around the world . . .

"Grow me BACK!? Why did I shrink at all!?" Lillian screamed furiously.

"It's a realism thing," Alice explained, "helping you really become your character by really shrinking away to nothing." As she said it, the thought hit her . . . Lillian was at home. Alone. Mere inches tall. A home that Alice had a spare key to. "Y'know what? See you in a bit . . ." It might have just been the rush that came with abusing the capacity of Saeko to indulge her own sadistic fantasies, but . . . Alice wanted to own little Lillian. Wanted to crush her.

"What? No! ALICE!" Lillian screamed, but Alice was already hanging up and putting on her shoes.

*** LILLIAN ***

It was terrifying, being mere inches tall. Lillian tried to get help by posting on the forums for Titan Legion, but she was just advised to "chill the fuck out, it's just a game" by anyone she talked to. It was horrible. 

Suddenly, Lillian heard the door. Maybe her parents were home early! She was saved! "In here! Over here!" Lillian squeaked.

However, it was not Lillian's father or mother walking in the door. It was Alice, clad in a dress far too short for this cold weather, and besides . . . in Lillian's humble opinion, the plump, geeky redhead looked her best when more casual, in a T-shirt and jeans, heavy boots on her feet.

Just the thought of jeans and boots in combination terrified Lillian, reminded her that she'd been painfully stomped on earlier by some sadistic Saeko player, and now it could happen for real . . . but this thought was interrupted by Alice's reverberating voice, quaking Lillian's entire body.

"So, Lil, I felt you deserved to know . . . we were in the same match. I stomped on you, and quite honestly, I enjoyed it," the comparatively deific dork said, without a hint of remorse about it. Lillian backed away in fear, but it wasn't like she'd be able to get anywhere. "In fact, I'm kinda tempted to do it again . . . stomp your little lights out, that is. But, I'm a nice girl, so I'll give you a choice . . . how will I end you, little girl?"

Lillian backed up more and more, falling off the bed and onto her nightstand and dislocating- if not breaking- her shoulder in the process. "Wh-what? Alice, you don't mean that . . . we're friends . . ." Lillian pleaded, fearing a gory end by the purple-painted toes of her only real friend. 

"Which is exactly why I'm doing this," Alice purred as she approached, obviously enjoying herself. "You see, this is still urban legend stuff . . . no one will believe you, and even if they did they'd never be able to help. I'm preemptively putting you out of your misery! Now, tell me how you want to die. It'll be painless, promise."

Lillian practically deflated at Alice's words. The bigger girl was right . . . the travel-sized brunette was doomed from the start. It was also determined from the start how Lillian would want to go: Not only did she have a minor thing for butts, Alice's plush posterior was practically on display. "Sit on me, Alice," she held her head down in defeat.

*** ALICE ***

The redheaded geek giggled, plucked her dinky dame of a friend up between two fingers, and dropped her on her own hard plastic desk chair. "Thought you'd never ask," Alice chuckled, her round, pale behind hovering doom before Lillian . . . and rather unceremoniously dropping onto her.

Alice waited a bit, sitting in her miniature friend's chair for a brief moment before Lillian began to thrash for air- and then she promptly ground down, smearing the brunette bug to nothing. 

"Welp, I have a murder fetish now," Alice laughed . . . playing as Saeko had taught her more about herself than she'd realized.