I could see the outline of someone very large backing through the door, pulling the screen shut behind them. Even in the dim light I could tell they were a) feminine; b) dressed for a night on the town; and c) very annoyed. “Rin!” the new-comer yelled in a deep, rumbling voice. “You in the mood to listen to me bitch for a while? I got a good one for you, this dude was the WORST. Oh – and how’d your date go?” She turned on the lights.
The woman looked down at us, tangled and tiny on her kitchen floor. She looked surprised – but only marginally so. “Pretty good, I see.” The titaness set her bag down, stepped past us, and poured herself a glass of water. “You know you’re supposed to ASK before you go digging through my things. Plus I’m pretty sure we have a, ‘text if you’re going to be fucking in common areas’ rule.”
By now Rin had managed to lift herself off me, was trying to stand while awkwardly protecting her modesty. “Um, sorry. Things kinda, you know…they happened fast.”
The larger girl waved her hand dismissively as she drank. I guessed she might be a bit on the tall side, though of course EVERY girl was tall for ME at the moment. She was blonde, curvy, just a tiny bit on the pudgy side, and dressed to kill. Her make-up was immaculate, her dress black and form-fitting, her heels verging on a safety hazard. She noticed me sizing her up, no pun intended, and rolled her eyes.
Swallowing at last, she dropped her glass into the sink, and turned back to Rin. “Well. Let’s put in pin in THAT issue. As far as I’m concerned, no harm no foul. At least SOMEONE’S having fun tonight. Plus, hey – extra-tiny boy. You’ve been talking about getting one of THOSE for awhile right? And this one’s pretty easily trained, from the way you were riding him.”
Rin looked back to me, blushing. “I mean, it wasn’t my plan. He, er, requested it.”
The enormous woman gave a short, bark of a laugh. “Of course he did.” Her heels clacked alarming on the floor as she came to stand before me. She smirked down at me from what seemed like miles above, a cold, appraising sort of look on her face. At last, she offered me a hand that was almost as wide as my chest. “Hi there. I’m Cheryl. Besides tiny, naked, and a little bit sticky, YOU would be…?”
“Alex.” The word came out squeaky, but I imagine that’s what she expected. Timidly, I took her hand, shook it as best I could. She allowed this for a moment, then closed her fingers around my forearm, hauled me to my feet as if I weighed nothing.
“Well, Alex, it’s a pleasure to meet you. My somewhat sincere apologies, but you’re going to have to watch me have a fight with Rin. It’s probably going to kill the mood, but I AM going to have to scream at her for a bit. That shrinking potion she fed you was MINE, see, and it’s a huge pain in the ass to replenish my supply.”
“It um, it wasn’t the shrinking potion,” Rin said. The tiny amazon came to stand at my shoulder, as if she were trying to defend me. “I wasn’t SURE I wanted to be bigger than him. Not at first. So I figured….”
Cheryl’s eyes widened. Her head snapped toward the end of the kitchen counter, where the inlaid box still lay half open, eight more vials resting inside. “You’re fucking serious?” she snarled, advancing until Rin had to crane her neck to the maximum to meet her vision. “You’re playing SIZE ROULETTE with this guy? On a FIRST DATE?”
“That’s worse?” I asked, not considering until the words were out of my mouth how stupid it was to jump into this conversation. Both their heads snapped toward me, their looks confirming that.
“It’s MUCH worse!” Cheryl snarled, and I took several steps back on instinct. “The brewing, the testing, the color-matching. Never MIND cost of packaging! And for some random hookup? It’s like bringing out the fine china to eat a TV dinner.”
“I just…we were having a really good time,” Rin answered, in an impossibly tiny voice. “I like him. He’s really nice, and he’s really good at….” She trailed off to silence as the giant girl’s eye’s narrowed warningly. Rin swallowed, and seemed to decide to try a different tact. “Plus…it’s been so long since you and I have played. You never have time for me anymore.” Cheryl softened the tiniest bit at this, and Rin went on, pouncing on her advantage. “You c-could play too, if you want? We only just finished our first turns so there’s still time. And you look like you had a rough night. You could use some…some fun?”
Cheryl looked at me. Somehow in the midst of this, I’d halfway hidden myself behind Rin, using the apparent seven-foot girl to protect myself from the ten-foot one. She studied the two of us for a long moment, her lips pursed in irritation. “This is LITERALLY the oldest trick in the book.” She let out an over-dramatic sigh, went to the fridge, pulled out a can of beer. “Fine,” she said, popping the top, and taking a long pull on it before she went on. “You’re still paying me back for the reagents. AND you’re going help me brew replacements. The dirty, grunt-work parts.”
Rin nodded at once, gave me an excited look, and shot me a thumbs up when Cheryl looked away. I returned the gesture half-heartedly, entirely uncertain what I was getting myself into. I appreciated Rin’s chess-playing, that she may just have salvaged the night, and then some. But I’d just MET this girl. That wasn’t really my style. Besides that, tonight had already been SUPER-weird. I wasn’t sure how much more I could handle.
I think Rin could sense my hesitation. She came over, stood behind me, letting me rest my head against her chest as the two of us watched Cheryl finish her beer. Very gently, she stroked my neck and shoulders, digging her hands into the soft places of my back. A very large hand wrapped around to lightly stroke my chest. Man, I really liked this girl. And, as it turns out, it’s hard to feel anxious when a giant girl is giving you a massage.
Get in the fucking robot, Shinji.
Cheryl’s heels clacked over to the box. She leaned down, shot the two of us a dark look, and said, “Five foot nine” quite clearly into the box. With that, she selected one of the ampules…and began to drink.