Chapter 34

“But that’s not at all what even our most gratuitous trajectories were indicating!” whispered Dr. Farley apprehensively to a closed circle of Dr. Clinebell, Alison, Dr. Jeltzin, and a few others who were anxiously leaning their heads together in the main hangar of the Facility. About a hundred yards away, Emma was sitting down on the smooth floor, leaning back on the pillars of her arms, each nearly 17 feet tall, as she delightedly watched Daniel tying up her new high-top wedge sneakers that Miss Bissett had made for her. It turned out that the venerable French fashion designer had anticipated Emma’s most recent growth spurt with much more accurate foresight than the assembled scientists.

“Oh but I didn’t really know what was going to happen,” Miss Bissett had laughed graciously after receiving notice that Emma needed new shoes, “I just thought it best to plan ahead…just in case.”

Daniel was perched on the third rung of a wooden stepladder, awkwardly flopping around the gigantic shoelaces in an attempt to tie them. His difficulty was understandable, considering that the laces were each about twice as long and thick as garden hoses. Emma’s lips kept twitching as she fought to contain her laughter – of course, she could have tied up her wedges in a flash, but it was much more fun this way. Daniel just looked so precious down there on his little stepladder, struggling with her shoelaces, having to start and restart over again a few times. He was so deliciously small compared to everything about her now. Her high-top wedges went all the way up to her mid-shin, right where the bottom of her calf muscle began – a full 6’10 high. Being “only” 6’1, Daniel needed several rungs of the ladder to reach the top of her shoes, and Emma had nearly been overcome with giggles when, upon reaching his desired height, Daniel had caught up one of the shoelaces and nearly lost his balance because of the unexpected weight of the lace itself.

“Haha careful!” she had laughed, lifting one of her hands up to her mouth while bracing the entire rest of her weight on one arm. “I don’t want my little handyman getting hurt!”

“Some boyfriends change the lightbulbs for their significant others,” called Daniel up to her, shaking his head, “Some of them kill the bugs…and some others do the dishes or the laundry. But not me! No…I tie the shoes!”

The two of them laughed together, with Emma’s girlish delight rumbling over Daniel’s like exuberant thunder.

“Now let’s not start getting ourselves all tied up in a tizzy here,” Dr. Jeltzin was whispering, as he flexed and unflexed his hands together in a clasping motion. He performed this motion unconsciously whenever he was excited or anxious. “We had discussed this kind of, um…this kind of size before.”

“Yeah, like in faraway, freakish hypotheticals!” hissed a wide-eyed Dr. Farley back at him. “And nothing, nothing, like we just saw!”

“She just grew 4 feet,” breathed Alison, her shock making her tone deadpan, “In, like…under 2 minutes.”

Dr. Jeltzin opened his mouth to respond, but then closed it, shrugging his shoulders and looking down as he nodded. It wasn’t often that he was at a loss for words, especially when it came to Emma, but there just wasn’t anything he could say in response to the unprecedented growth spurt that had just happened. The rumbling delight of Emma’s laughter filled the silence in between the scientists, as they all looked around at each other, unable to respond to what they had clearly not been prepared for. Inevitably, all their eyes came to rest on Dr. Clinebell, who was the only one among them not staring in amongst the circle. Instead, he was looking up, across the hanger, directly at Emma’s face. She was busy teasing Daniel about not being able to even tie a knot with her gigantic shoelaces, and, in any case, didn’t seem to be at all concerned about anything other than her boyfriend.

Dr. Clinebell’s eyes narrowed, honing in on her expression. Her eyes were sparkling, crinkled up in the corners, with her laughter…her mouth was open in mock-surprise, teasing Daniel, in response to something he had just said…or maybe it was because the weight of the shoelace had nearly caused him to fall off the stepladder…her face, her face. He honed in on that expression she kept making. What was it? She would close her mouth and hold her head high, staring down her nose at Daniel, and her eyes appeared to harden, even as those full lips of hers widened in a trembling smile, a smile that inevitably broke out again into laughter each time. What was she doing?

“Clinebell?”

Jeltzin’s voice snapped him back into the huddled circle. Everyone was staring at him, looking, waiting, searching, for something to go off of, for some kind of reaction from the man who was in charge. Dr. Clinebell blinked, understanding that he needed to say something, but for a few seconds too long, nothing came. He heaved a sigh in and out through his nose. Alison looked particularly anxious as her eyes went back and forth from Jeltzin to Clinebell.

“We’re in uncharted waters,” Dr. Clinebell declared quietly, after a few more seconds. “We’ve got to be honest here. None of us expected this, me least of all.”

He turned back to look at Emma, who had seized Daniel by his foot and was now dangling him upside-down in front of her face, her head tilted to the side, as she teased him with a suggestion of her gently-spearing tongue, tapping him in the face. She was delicately swinging his body back and forth in her hand, so that his face swayed into her awaiting tongue, and then away, and then back into it again. Their laughter echoed off the Facility’s concrete walls…walls which had been reinforced with steel bars for extra durability. They had seemed impenetrable before, but now, the scientists were glancing nervously around, their eyes finding the hanger’s rafters, the vents high in the ceiling, and even the open entrance to the entire Facility, the entrance that they all knew was well-guarded with an array of deterrent measures that would surely keep Emma from escaping. Surely…

“She’s getting TOO big,” Dr. Farley said bluntly in a low voice. “This is too much…we’ve got to think of somewhere else to put her. She can’t stay here.”

“So what, we hollow out the mountain over there and stick her inside it?” snapped Alison. “She’s got what she needs here.”

“But this place is designed for 45 feet…tops,” Dr. Farley retorted immediately. “She’s already far exceeded that, and is still growing, apparently even faster now. It’s a safety issue, Alison. For us.”

“It’s not,” Dr. Clinebell declared quietly.

Everyone turned to look at him again. He stared around at them all, each one in turn, as he continued meaningfully:

“Our deterrent measures are still in place, both for the prospect of her escape, and, as I think Dr. Farley just touched on, the prospect of her disobedience. It may very well be that we have to use some of our more…coercive methods to remind her of the rules here. And we must prepare for that. But we’re still in control here. Her growth has surprised us, yes…but we will not be deviating from our responsibilities here. None of us. Is that understood?”

They all nodded silently. Dr. Clinebell’s words seemed to have reassured them, at least for the moment, but just then, a din of thunderous laughter banged around them. Emma was now standing in her new wedge-heeled converses, a shocking 54’2 with the added 3-foot heel, with her arms folded across her full chest. Daniel was busy trying to climb up her leg, like she was a tree, and whenever she got close to the top of her converse boot, she started flexing her thigh, causing him to lose his hold and fall back down onto the pillow she had laid out on the floor below him.

The following several days proved to be a cyclonic and tempestuous affair for the Facility staff, but as far as Emma was concerned, she was having the time of her life. First and foremost, Daniel was with her…always…and his presence gave her a constant sense of warmth and security, despite the obviously volatile nature of her recent growth spurts. No matter what she was doing, whether it was performing her morning yoga routine, eating breakfast, working out with Dr. Jeltzin, lying down for a series of tests, or just surfing the internet on her increasingly-tiny tablet, Daniel was close by, either watching her, or, if he could, participating in the activities themselves. He tried his best to mimic her flexibility during yoga, but it wasn’t close – because she was a woman, and because she had been doing yoga a lot longer, Emma was far more flexible, to the point where she had taken to routinely teasing him about his inability to mirror her more complex poses.

“Hahaha oh come on, Daniel!” she laughed one day, while she was in the midst of a tittibhasana pose, with both hands planted on the floor in front of her, her arms holding her entire frame airborne, with her legs spread out in an upside-down “V” shape, parallel to the floor. “It’s not really that hard!”’

“Uggggh! Yes it is!” he replied, crumpling back to the floor after his fifth failed attempt in a row. “I’m not strong enough!”

“It’s not just about strength, silly!” Emma coached, shaking her head as she maintained the pose easily, “It’s about patience and balance too!”

“Well apparently I don’t have those either!” Daniel sighed. He stood up, staring up at the incredible sight before him. He spent all his time with Emma these days, but even still, he hadn’t gotten used to how big she had become. Even holding this pose, she still towered above him, with her head reaching over 15 feet. Daniel couldn’t help but admire Emma’s flawless technique, but the sheer strength in her arms, to hold up that much weight without even shaking, was the thing that impressed him the most.

‘I weigh less than 200 pounds,’ he thought helplessly, ‘And I can’t even hold myself up. She weighs, what? 48 tons? 50?!’ His face was agog with disbelief and admiration. These moments, when the true reality of Emma’s size compared to him, seemed to be piling up on themselves more and more these days.

“You’re giving me that look again,” Emma quipped, sticking her tongue in between her teeth as she grinned down on him. “The one where it looks like you’re afraid I’m gonna eat you!”

Daniel blinked, unable to immediately respond. He was too busy appreciating the enormity of her outspread limbs. She was as wide as an airplane. His silence gave Emma the opportunity to play up her humor, and she stuck out her tongue all the way, screwing up her face into a ferocious snarl as she bared her teeth and opened her mouth wide:

“Rrrrraaaaaauuuuuugggghhhh!!” she roared, shaking her head back and forth rapidly, while still holding her perfect pose. Daniel staggered back a few paces, stunned by the power of her display, but even as he did so, he recognized that Emma’s “outburst” was really anything but. She had tempered her “roar” so as not to hurt his ears. He was well aware that if she had really wanted to, she could have ruptured his eardrums without even trying.

“Oh…ohhh nooooo!” Daniel cried, recovering himself and putting his hands up to his face in mock-terror. “Sh-she’s…she’s gonna get me!”

“Heheheh, wait, wait! Stay right there!” Emma giggled, beginning to shift her pose without letting her body down. “I wanna see if I can reach you with my mouth without…ughhh…let’s see here…without you…ughhh…moving…or the rest of my body…whooooo…touching the floor…”

Daniel stayed rooted in place, watching Emma’s giant limbs unfurl in front of him, all while she kept herself airborne, propped up on her hands. With an impressive series of twists and reconfigurations, Emma shifted into an Eka Pada Koundinyasana pose, leaning forward on her hands towards him, with her arms bent at 90-degree angles, and her outspread legs forming an “L” shape behind her torso. With each movement of her hands, Daniel felt the concrete floor rumble beneath him. It was an astonishing pose, made all the more remarkable by the fact that Emma had managed to shift into it while remaining propped up on her hands the whole time. Her face had started reddening slightly from the effort, and Daniel felt the slight wind of her smile. She had started breathing a bit heavier as well.

“Not…quite…close enough!” she laughed, trying to stick her tongue out to touch Daniel’s face. Her mouth was much closer to him now, but it was still a few feet away. She champed her teeth playfully at him, and even though Daniel knew she was playing, he couldn’t help blinking each time her teeth came together. They were an entire percussion section unto themselves.

“Well…I guess…that’s too bad then,” Daniel sighed, shrugging. “There’s always room for improvement.”

“Oh…you little…” Emma murmured aggressively, her face suddenly set to the challenge. A moment later, she had leaned even further into her pose, putting more strain on her hands and forearms, but maintaining her balance the whole time. Daniel’s eyes widened as her incoming shadow engulfed him completely. Her head was descending…getting closer…her eyes were wide and flashing in triumph. She knew. She knew that she was going to be able to do it. And he could only stand there and watch it happen, helpless prey for her incoming mouth.

“Hahahahaaaaaaaa!” Emma laughed, the victory apparent in her voice, as she opened her mouth wide, directly in front of his body. And then, after carefully figuring out her trajectory, she flexed her neck, rearing up her head like a snake ready to strike, and thrust it down. Her open mouth engulfed the entire top half of Daniel’s body, and she clamped her soft lips down around his waist, high enough so that she could enjoy his legs kicking out wildly in the air under her nose. Once he was secure in her mouth, she jostled herself around on her hands, gracefully folding her legs back in close to her body, as she pivoted around on the mat. It wasn’t lost on her that, during all this movement, the long pink sleeves of her cat shirt (which she wore all the time now) had ridden up past her wrists, up to the bottom third of her forearms, and stayed there. Her arms were thick enough now to where the sleeves didn’t fall back down. And, right as she noticed this, in the midst of her leg adjustments, a loud rip sounded out from the middle of her butt.

“Ughh, sshhrrrrryyyyssslyy!?” she slurred out, Daniel’s kicking form blocking her words as she rolled her eyes. Far from being irritated or discouraged by her yoga pants ripping, though, Emma was only pretending to care, and in fact found it quite funny. She started chuckling to herself as she completed her final pose, a perfectly-executed bhujapidasana, with her legs crossed in a “V” shape in front of her body, which was still held up in midair by her planted hands. For a few long, silent moments, she savored the pose, gently sucking on Daniel’s upper half, delighting in her own power and flexibility, even as she kept trying and failing not to giggle at his cute little legs kicking away at the air in front of her face.

Finally, still holding the pose, she aimed her mouth down towards the opening of her cat shirt and relaxed her jaw, allowing Daniel to tumble down into the soft confines of her shirt, right in between her breasts. She wasn’t wearing a bra that morning (since the new batch hadn’t arrived yet), and so Daniel fell right in between the huge, fleshy globes of her warm tits.

“I win!” she laughed cheekily, staring down into her shirt and watching Daniel struggling to keep himself from being sucked all the way down into her cleavage. Once he managed to brace himself with both hands, each one slowly sinking into her left and right breast, he looked up at her, playful defiance painted across his face.

“Not…yet!” he cried valiantly, but immediately in response, Emma pulled her shoulders back, opening up her breasts. Daniel didn’t have the wingspan to cope, and he was sent tumbling down into the hot, dark recesses of her cleavage.

“No faaaaaiiiirrrrr!” he called, before his voice was finally muffled into obscurity. Emma licked her lips, exhaling hard through her nose as she grinned to herself. She really had lucked out with her man.

For the next few moments, she relished the tickling sensation of Daniel’s body squirming around in between her breasts. It was such a rush for her to feel his tiny body trying to push its way through her surrounding flesh. Looking down into her long-sleeve pink cat shirt at her breasts, she couldn’t even see a single sign that there was a little man in between them. Closing her eyes, she inhaled and exhaled through her nose once again, a bit slower this time, as she relished how huge she was compared to her adorable boyfriend. She opened her eyes and looked down at her breasts again…still no sign of him. She could feel him, alright, but to anyone looking, they would never know Daniel was there. Emma sighed out and tugged her shirt up around her neck. It felt a little tighter than it had the day before. She was still growing; there was no doubt about that. And even though these more recent spurts weren’t as dramatic as the one a few days before, she knew they were happening. She was getting bigger, and everything…everything…was getting smaller.

Emma looked up, staring across the hanger. Far in the distance, right by the door to the control room, she could see the little white-coated speck of someone standing there, watching her. Even without being able to make out the particulars of the person’s appearance, Emma knew that it was Dr. Clinebell. Only he would stand there like that, just looking at her, without moving. The others would pretend to be doing things, or would be talking amongst themselves, stealing glances at her…Emma had seen plenty of that. But only Dr. Clinebell would stand there alone, just staring.

Emma stared back. A slow, humorous calm welled up inside her, and her mouth curved upward into a pleasant smile. She knew he could see her expression, even though she was far away. She wanted him to see it.

‘That’s right, keep staring at me,’ she thought, feeling that quiet glee seeping through her. ‘I’ll just keep staring back at you. You can’t believe I’m this big, can you? You’re just standing there, trying to figure me out…well good luck with that, Clinebell. I know I’m not done yet…not even close.’

Emma certainly knew her body better than anyone else, as the events of the next few days showed. The following morning, Daniel was just beginning to wake up from a restful night’s sleep on his specially-made bed on Emma’s nightstand. Previously, he had been sleeping at the head of Emma’s pillow, but after her most recent growth spurt, much to Emma’s dismay, the Facility staff had assembled a new bed for Daniel on her nightstand. Emma had protested vehemently, insisting that there was plenty of room for both of them on her bed.

“But that’s not the issue, Emma,” Alison had explained gently, as she tried to talk Emma out of her misty-eyed reaction. “It’s all to do with safety…Daniel’s safety.”

“He IS safe!” Emma had responded, upset. “He sleeps on top of my pillow and everything’s totally fine!”

“But your growth spurts, Emma…l-look…look, I’m not trying to upset you, ok? This isn’t your fault – it’s not anyone’s fault. But that recent spurt you had was…well, it was a larger one than you’ve had before, and…we really don’t know why it happened or when it will, uhm…happen again. And it could be in the middle of the night, when you’re both asleep, and…you get the picture, right?”

Emma had taken some convincing, but she finally relented when Daniel had gently mentioned that it might not be the worst idea for him to have his own little spot to sleep.

“But then I can’t cuddle you,” Emma had murmured sadly, encircling him with her fingers and rubbing his cheek softly with her thumb.

“Pshh, no, no of course we can cuddle!” Daniel had laughed. “You’ll just wake up and…and you can, like, just snatch me out of my bed – haha, I don’t even have to be awake yet!”

Now, a few days later, Daniel had just started waking up. He generally liked to sleep on his left side, which meant, in this new arrangement, that he was facing away from Emma’s bed. He opened his eyes, taking in the bright morning light that was shining through the open hanger door, about 100 yards behind him. Far away, down the hanger, he saw vague shapes moving…and as his eyes adjusted to the new light, he saw that it was the staff getting their breakfast carts ready. Crate after crate of food, stacked on top of each other, piled high on all these carts…Daniel couldn’t help but chuckle a little to himself.

‘Geez, I really hope all those guys are getting paid well enough,’ he thought humorously. ‘They sure do have to work for it…and all because Emma just needs that much to eat everyday…whoowhoo boy, did they really know what they were getting themselves into before they…before they captured her…’

His thoughts faded back into the painful memories of that night they had taken her away. It seemed so long ago, in a time somehow separate from the present reality. Daniel blinked the sleep away from his eyes as he parried away the less happy memories. It had been a totally different time; so much had changed in between now and then. He and Emma had gotten through it all, and, in a strange way, the adversity had strengthened their bond. He had never felt closer to her, or more affectionate. It didn’t matter that neither of them really knew where this was all headed. They had each other, and that’s all that really counted. Their estrangement had very nearly broken Daniel’s spirit completely, but now that they were back together, he felt invincible. Daniel could handle all the adversity in the world if he knew that Emma was by his side.

It occurred to him that Emma was probably still asleep, since she hadn’t snatched him out of his bed yet. She had been pretty upset about the new rule stipulating that he sleep on the nightstand, and even though Daniel had been touched by her reaction, he wasn’t going to offer much resistance himself. Her most recent spurt had really hit home the volatile nature of her growth, and the possibility had arisen before in his mind, of her accidentally crushing him in her sleep.

‘I bet she looks super cute, all passed-out after that workout she had yesterday,’ thought Daniel, recalling how she had deadlifted over 52 tons…easily…while he watched in awe.

Already planning how he was going to sneak onto her bed, so that she would wake up with him curled up next to her, Daniel grinned to himself as he turned over on his right side. But almost immediately, he was yanking his covers up over his chin and scrambling backwards on his mattress. His back hit the headboard. Emma’s huge face was right there, looming over him, filling his vision. She had been silently watching him the whole time.

“Smaller,” she cooed. Even though her voice was barely over a whisper, Daniel felt the vibrations of it rattle through his entire body.

“Wh-what!?” he asked shakily. The trembling in his voice caught him off-guard; she had rattled him.

“You’re smaller this morning,” Emma declared, nodding slowly as she spoke, and blinking her big eyes down at him. For several moments, Daniel could do nothing but cower back on his bed. The immensity of Emma’s giant face in front of him was imposing enough, but he had been truly startled by how she had been able to get that close to him without him even realizing she was there. The prospect of something so huge being so silent had spooked him. But after a few seconds, he managed to recover himself enough to sit up straighter and attempt a cracked grin.

“I’m…I’m not smaller, Emma!” he laughed, speaking louder than he intended to because of the effort of his coping humor. “You’re the one who’s gotten bigger, obviously!”

For evidence, he showed the sleeves of his own pajamas, which fit him perfectly, and then pointed to the long sleeves of Emma’s cat shirt, which were now beginning to ride up on her shapely forearms. She glanced down at her sleeves, and her mouth seemed to twitch upwards at the corners in a little spasm of a smile. But almost immediately, she had turned her gaze back down to Daniel, and the appreciative humor had vanished from her face. There was no negative emotion there either – she was simply looking down at him blankly, like she was staring at something inanimate. Daniel felt something uncomfortable crawl inside him, even as he marveled at the innocent beauty of her face.

“It’s all the same to me,” she murmured quietly, almost half to herself, “What does it matter, who’s growing or shrinking?”

“E-Emma?” Daniel ventured uneasily. “Are…uhh…is everything ok?” He had quickly recovered from his shock of seeing her so close, but now he was feeling a different kind of disquiet. Emma blinked slowly, softly, a couple more times, brushing her auburn hair back with one enormous hand as she cocked her head slightly to the side. For several long moments, she didn’t give any indication that she had heard his question. She was studying him.

And then, with slow and deliberate tenderness, her full lips pursed together as she gently extended two gigantic fingers down towards his face. Daniel sat rooted in place, not knowing what to expect next. Another close-lipped smile twitched at the corners of Emma’s mouth, and, with incredible deftness, she brushed his face with the fleshy pads of her index and middle fingers. Daniel felt the warmth of her flesh, and couldn’t help but close his eyes as his body absorbed her heat. It felt so good to be touched like this by her, even if he was still disconcerted by the expression that had been on her face moments before. Her body temperature was hot…so hot that his cheeks actually began to sweat slightly at her touch.

Emma was definitely smiling now, and the warmth spread lovingly across her face as her two fingers began slowly traversing down Daniel’s body, gently prodding him everywhere with their fleshy pads, as if testing him for size.

“Sooooo tiiiiiiiny,” Emma giggled softly.

A day later, when the kitchen staff were carting in Emma’s breakfast, she made a similar remark. She was lounging on the floor, belly-down, propped up on her elbows, with her feet kicking slowly up in the air behind her. Daniel was sitting on the floor nearby, eating his own breakfast, while noting the wind current that Emma’s legs were creating. It wasn’t unbearable, since Emma was barely even moving her legs, but they were so huge (and 15 feet up in the air) that they didn’t need to move much to create a noticeable disturbance.

“Winds West-Northwest at 10 to 15 miles per hour,” Daniel quipped in his best “weatherman” voice, looking up from his cereal bowl. He thought it was a pretty funny remark, but, looking up, he realized that he hadn’t said it loud enough for Emma to hear. In any case, she appeared to be focused in on the man who was pushing the first cart of food crates up to her. A slight uneasiness fell over Daniel; he could tell that she was up to something, and in a playful mood.

“Ooooooh here comes the teeny little people, pushing their teeny little carts!” Emma giggled. The rumbles of her mirth shook the furniture and floor around her, and she held up her thumb and forefinger close together in the universal indication of “smallness.” The food attendants were smiling as they stared up, obviously in an attempt to humor her, but Daniel could tell that her sheer size, coupled with her playful mood, were making them uneasy.

They were about 30 feet away from her, but Emma clearly didn’t want to wait for them to reach her. She had reached a huge, overarching arm out, and started plucking wooden cartons off the food carts, three or four at once. At the same time, she had chopped her other hand down into the concrete floor directly in front of them, blocking their path.

“Whoops…can’t go that way!” she giggled, and the air was suddenly full of the sound of cracking wood as Emma broke the cartons with her fingers, dropping the food straight into her mouth. The food attendants chuckled nervously to each other, and tried to go around to the right of Emma’s sideways palm, which rose up over 3 feet off the floor. But they found their way impeded again, as Emma had lifted up her hand and chopped it down, blocking their path once more. She smiled down at them, her eyes sparkling with play, like she was daring them to find a way to get closer to her. Meanwhile, with the wooden remnants of the first few boxes still in between her fingers, she reached her arm over and plucked a few more boxes off the cart, cracking them in the same way and spilling the food into her mouth. She barely even seemed to chew the food. It didn’t matter that each box contained full fruits (including unpeeled pineapples), pounds and pounds of sausage, mountains of scrambled eggs, and towering stacks of pancakes – it all just seemed to go straight down Emma’s throat.

“Heheh…can’t go that way either!” she teased, winking down at the food attendants. “Come on, come on! Can’t you find a way around!? Haha, come closer! You’re not afraid of me, are you?”

“Of…of course not, Emma!” called up a young man, one of the braver attendants. Daniel had seen him gawking up at Emma before, and wondered if maybe this guy had a crush on her. But he caught himself in the midst of these thoughts, shaking his head and having a little private laugh at his own expense.

‘Come on, Daniel,’ he thought, ‘Everyone looks up at her like that…and so what if the poor guy has a crush on her? Look at her! Can you really blame him!?’

Having already dealt with the bizarre ordeal of Aiden, Daniel felt emotionally prepared to handle pretty much anything, at least as far as he was concerned. He hadn’t thought about it consciously, but the real reason why he wasn’t irritated at the prospect of this guy crushing on Emma was simple: Daniel knew that Emma probably didn’t even really see this guy as an actual human anymore. He was just a little creature who brought her food. Aside from Jeltzin, Alison, Clinebell, a few others, and obviously himself, Daniel didn’t really think Emma had the capacity for seeing anyone else as a person in their own right. She had just gotten too big. But Daniel hadn’t consciously dwelled on these thoughts, since they were a bit too unsettling for him to wrap his head around. It was enough for him to feel that Emma saw HIM for who HE was – that was really all that mattered…as long as she didn’t hurt anyone.

“Ooop! Ooooop!” Emma laughed, shaking Daniel from his thoughts. She was moving her palm again, blocking the attendants’ path. “Not that way! Can’t go that way! Ahahahaha…”

She suddenly seemed distracted, and she looked up at her outstretched hand, which now held the snapped remnants of 5 or 6 boxes…enough wood for a good-sized bonfire.

“I think I need a little more fiber,” she muttered out to herself, and dropped about half the wood down into her open mouth. The squeezing, popping sounds of her chewing the wood vibrated through Daniel’s body, and he found himself jumping to his feet and running over to her, hands raised.

“Emma! W-Wait, don’t!” he called. She turned around to face him, blinking down at him curiously in between chews.

“What?” she asked innocently. “Don’t what?”

“Don’t…uhhhh…don’t eat the…the…wood…” Daniel finished lamely. The conviction had drained out of his voice, because with each passing moment, he could see that Emma’s teeth were making quick work of the boxes. He didn’t even have time to finish his exhortation before she had swallowed it all down. Some water from the wood pulp dotted her chin, which her teeth had literally squeezed out of the wood. Daniel could do nothing but gawk up at her, amazed by her effortless show of strength. Those boxes…crates, really…weren’t that small. And Emma had just eaten them like they were nothing.

“Mmmmm, no, no, you should try it!” Emma urged enthusiastically, as she traced the line the crates were taking down her throat with a finger that was nearly 3 feet long. “I can already feel the fiber working.” She glanced down at the food attendants, who had finally been allowed to approach her closely, and smiled at them pleasantly. “Whatever these little guys got in their crates…heheh, it taaaaastes good, but fiber’s important, right?”

“R-Right!” answered the young male attendant, blinking up at her in awe.

“Here, Daniel, take some,” Emma ordered, and she plucked another 6 boxes off the cart, cracking their contents into her mouth, and swallowing the myriad foods down all together, with absolutely no distinguishment between flavors. Eggs, fruit, pancakes, meats – they all went down together. And just like that, Emma was snapping the boxes into pieces with her fingers again, and tossing the snapped wood into her mouth. This time, though, she saved the smallest piece for Daniel, which she held delicately in between her thumb and forefinger, and lowered it down to him.

“It’s good for you!” she nodded brightly at him, handing him the broken piece of wood. Daniel accepted it silently, staring down at it, not knowing what to do. It was the smallest piece, yes…and it was surprisingly touching how Emma had specifically made sure to give him the smallest one…but Daniel was at a loss. He was holding a 3-foot jagged plank of wood, several inches thick.

“Emma…” Daniel began, his comparatively little voice trying to rise above the sound of her teeth squeezing and popping twenty times that amount of wood in her mouth, “I…I can’t eat this.”

“Huh?” Emma asked genuinely, rolling all the pulped wood into a ball and sticking it into the side of her cheek, making it bulge, as she leaned down towards him. “Whaa?”

“I…this is too big for me, Emma,” Daniel said simply, holding up the wood to her. “I…uh, haha, I think I get enough fiber as it is.”

Emma continued to look down at him, blinking every once in a while, like she was trying to understand. As she stared silently, she rolled the huge ball of wood pulp back in between her teeth and resumed chewing it, only this time she went more slowly and deliberately, almost like she was trying to squeeze every last drop of water out of the wood itself. Every few seconds, Daniel saw her throat flex, and he realized that she was swallowing the water. It was incredible – it was like she was a child, chewing thoughtfully on an apple slice, to see what would happen when only the fruit pulp was left. The constant, high-pitched squeak of the constricting wood was only partially deadened by her lips, and by her smooth cheeks, which flexed powerfully off and on, off and on.

“You, uh…you like that wood, huh?” Daniel ventured.

Emma nodded silently, transferring the ball of pulp to her back molars. It was difficult for Daniel to locate what exactly she was looking at, since her eyes and face were so big. Was she looking at him? At the wood in his hands? He couldn’t tell.

“So you don’t even want that small piece?” asked Emma in her best attempt at a quiet voice. At first, Daniel was worried that he had offended her, but quickly he understood, by the working of her jaw, that she was just asking a simple question. Somehow, Daniel knew that if she had been offended, she wouldn’t be chewing.

“Uhm, I…no…no, I don’t think I need this,” he replied, smiling up at her. She had just swallowed down the huge ball of wood pulp and leaned over even closer towards him, pursing her lips and blinking her eyelids expectantly. Whenever she got this close, Daniel couldn’t avoid feeling overwhelmed by her presence – her size, her sweet scent, her wind current, the vibrations her slightest movements sent through the floor and through the air…everything – she was just so much, so huge, that it continued to boggle his mind.

But most especially, it was the proximity of her big blue eyes that seemed to root Daniel’s feet to the floor. Had her eyes become…an even deeper blue, somehow!? They certainly seemed that way – or maybe it was just because her irises were so close, and as big as dinner plates. And the way that Emma was lusciously blinking her eyelids, it was like she was opening up an entire sea of blue to him, then hiding it, then opening it up again.

‘No, there’s…there’s no way her eyes were like that before,’ Daniel thought to himself, transfixed by the deep cerulean of her irises, which had little rivulets of pale green running through them. ‘They were blue, yes, but…but they weren’t that blue.’

He felt a mighty rush of air blow back his head, and Daniel had to shut his eyes tightly to avoid them getting burned by the rushing air. His hair blew back on his head, and he had to actually stumble backward a pace and brace himself with his leg to keep from falling over backward. When he opened his eyes a couple seconds later, all he could see were the red, upturned contours of Emma’s smiling lips, and two rows of hard, sharp, white teeth, two-and-a-half feet wide. It suddenly occurred to Daniel that Emma hadn’t even blown on him – she had merely exhaled in his direction in a gentle huff of laughter.

“Then I’ll take that,” Emma whispered through her smile. Daniel could only see her mouth moving – she was so close to him that the rest of her face was obscured from view. There seemed to be something suggestive, something…sexy in her voice. Was she just being silly and playing around? Or was she meaning to be provocative?

“RRRAUGH!”

With a short, funny, animalistic grunt, Emma opened her teeth and snapped up the piece of wood sticking out from Daniel’s hands. He uttered a forced exhale and jumped back out of sheer protective instinct. But almost as soon as he had done so he had to laugh a little, because he could see Emma’s whole face again as she backed away from him and sat up straighter on the floor. She was smiling broadly, with the 3-foot piece of wood in her mouth, and she navigated it sideways, so that its entire length was in between her teeth. And then, arching an eyebrow down at him in an unabashedly suggestive expression, she clenched her jaw ever so slightly, and the water from the wood immediately began to run down her chin.

The following morning, Emma had just finished joyously lacing up a new pair of black high-top converse that Miss Bissett had made for her. Daniel and Alison were watching from about 30 feet away, giving her enough space to move about excitedly. The truth was, neither of them wanted to be too close to Emma when she was busily tying her shoes. The way she haphazardly threw around the heavy, hose-length laces was incentive enough for them to keep their distance. After tying her shoes, Emma hopped up on her feet with a huge grin on her face, as the concrete floor visibly shook under her weight. That morning, she had weighed in at just under 71 tons. The blue skirt that had fit her quite well a couple days before was now riding up noticeably on the solid, curvy tops of her thighs, to the point where it almost looked like a tutu. The pink cat shirt was definitely no longer “long-sleeve” now – its sleeves rode up on the upper portions of Emma’s forearms, and the cat face was now beginning to look distinctly distorted by her burgeoning breasts. The shirt’s fabric was beginning to show visual signs of strains, especially around the area of her breasts and forearms, and a long sliver of her creamy lower belly was now visible where the shirt was beginning to ride up on her torso.

“Oh my GOD these are totally PERFECT!” she cried, kicking her right foot out and then bouncing up and down in her new shoes. Daniel and Alison exchanged worried and pitying looks.

“Uh…well that’s…uhm, that’s nice, Emma!” called up Alison, using her cupped hands as a voice amplifier (since she knew Emma didn’t like the sound of the megaphone). “But…but just remember what we talked about before…even though they may fit perfectly now, try not to get too attached to the –”

“Hahaha what are you talking about!?” Emma laughed, and the next moment, Alison was staggering back, because Emma had suddenly closed the distance in between them in one stride and flopped down on the concrete beside her. Daniel had been expecting this abrupt behavior, and took it in stride. From Alison’s perspective, though, it was like a huge tree had suddenly fallen right next to her, and her heart jumped into her throat as she absorbed the shock wave of Emma’s gigantic body next to hers. An immense palm, well over 3 feet wide, was planted on the concrete a few feet away from where Alison was standing, supporting the huge pillar of Emma’s arm. The therapist couldn’t help but gawk for a moment at the sheer size of Emma’s fingers; her middle finger was 3 feet long. And even though, sitting down, Emma towered above her by over 20 feet, Alison could still catch the sweetness of her excited breath as Emma spoke down to her.

“No, no, these are waaaaaay too big!” Emma laughed, but then she seemed to recognize that she was closer to Alison than she realized, and made an obvious effort to lower her voice. Alison’s quickly throwing her hands over her ears might have had something to do with it.

“Heheh, sorry,” Emma chuckled, then switched straight back to her excitement. She took her right foot and stood it up right next to Alison, with her sole perpendicular to the floor. Both Daniel and Alison stared up in awe at just how tall the shoe was – it rose up past 8 feet, around 8’5.

“See, look!” exclaimed Emma happily, pinching the top of the shoe with her thumb and forefinger, “Check it out! See all that empty space!?”

“That…oh wow, yeah!” remarked Alison, obviously making an effort to carry on the conversation normally, “That’s…that’s a lot of space there!”

Emma nodded enthusiastically, as she aggressively pinched the top of her shoe over and over again, to show where her toe was. Looking up, Daniel could see that she had a good few inches of free space, which was astounding, considering how huge her foot already was. Not for the first time, he found himself admiring the foresight and ingenuity of Miss Bissett.

“Yeah, it IS a lot of space,” Emma replied, turning to look down on them. For several seconds, she simply sat there, unmoving, with her giant heel on the floor and her shoe in the air next to them. Both Daniel and Alison felt the intense weight of her gaze, and the sudden lack of expression on Emma’s face conjured a tension in the air that had not been there before. The immensity of her body seemed all the more imposing, with her just sitting there, staring at them like that. Her solid, elegant torso (now visibly confined by her cat shirt) rose up before them, connected by her long, graceful neck to her gorgeous head of red hair, which framed a beautiful face that was staring down at them from 25 feet up…and she was sitting down. Her legs weren’t even factoring into her height right now…and they were 33 feet long.

Alison swallowed and tried to think of a way to continue the interaction normally; in her mind, Emma was going into one of her “dissociative modes,” one characterized by blank confusion, and all that could be done was to wait it out without calling too much attention to it. Daniel, however, was having an altogether different reaction. A few weeks before, he might have felt profound discomfort under Emma’s expressionless stare, and it was true, especially when she was very close to him, that he continued to feel overwhelmed by her presence. But he had already started getting used to the quirks and eccentricities of her behavior, so much so that much of it just made sense to him now.

‘It’s all hitting her at once,’ he thought, staring up at her in awe, ‘How giant she is compared to us…how small we are…and she’s just taking it all in…just absorbing it…it’s so much better than before, when she hated it, when it depressed her, when it drove her crazy…now she’s just…embraced it…she loves it…and I…I love her.’

He started getting hard, purely out of the desperate awe he was feeling in that moment. In the back of his mind, Daniel knew that this arousal was something new, something he hadn’t quite felt before. There was a kind of submission to it, a prostration in the face of something so much bigger than himself. Before, Daniel had been primarily attracted to Emma because he loved her – in many ways, he was just a sweet, simple man, and Emma had always been gorgeous to him. But now there was something else in the mix: the way she had pushed through her unimaginable adversity, and insanity, and everything terrible that had happened, to come out on the other side with the ultimate, enthusiastic ownership of her condition…something about that just made him even more head-over-heels for her. To see her so fresh and huge and strong and…cheerful…was so hot.

“It IS a lot of space,” Emma repeated, nodding again as a knowing, determined smile spread slowly over her face, brightening her pretty features. She was speaking softly, but Daniel could actually feel the quivers of her excitement vibrating through the concrete beneath his feet. “A lot of space to grow into.”

“Well…haha, I think…I think you’ll get to enjoy those shoes for a while, then!” Alison laughed, apparently glad that the silent tension was over. But Emma just blinked and looked straight down at her, as her brow furrowed slightly, and her smile widened.

“What are you talking about?” Emma blurted out, her body now shaking slightly from her pent-up laughter, “I’m gonna grow out of these tomorrow.”

A bit later on that morning, Emma was lying on bed, on her stomach, with her shoes kicking up in the air behind her. She and Daniel were giggling together, watching stand-up comedy routines on her giant tablet. A couple days before, Emma had become so fed up with her inability to use the touch-screen that Daniel had volunteered himself for the job, telling her to sit back and relax while he did all the work. Emma had huffingly agreed, and, after some practice, Daniel had actually been able to get the hang of it, using both of his palms at once to achieve the right amount of pressure. Emma’s fingers had just become too big for the proper finesse required…even though the tablet was the size of a large car. Watching Daniel move things around on the screen with both hands had instantly cheered Emma up, and she hadn’t gotten over it. Every time she watched him working her tablet, Emma couldn’t avoid tumbling into a fit of giggles, which inevitably ended up with her wrangling his little body with her fingers, and snuggling him into the side of her cheek with her hand as they watched videos together.

This particular morning, Daniel noticed that he was feeling hotter than usual, with his body pushed up against the smooth plushness of Emma’s cheek. For a while he didn’t say anything, but eventually, the heat became almost unbearable, and he had to wriggle himself out between her fingers, stepping away from her a couple paces on the bed to get some cool fresh air.

“What’s wrong?” Emma asked, “Get back here!” She spider-crawled her fingers over to him, and was about to wrangle him back to her, when Daniel threw up his hands.

“W-wait…wait! Emma, just…heheh, just a second!” he called up to her.

“What?” she asked again, pouting slightly.

“I…everything’s fine,” Daniel began, “But…uhm…are you…are you feeling ok?” He didn’t want to sound concerned, but her cheek had felt like she was burning up.

“I feel…amazing,” she replied, after staring out into space for a few moments to find the right word. “Just…whoooooo, just amazing, Daniel.”

“You do?” he asked, and then he quickly spoke again, as he didn’t want to sound overly skeptical. “I mean…that’s good to hear! I was just…well…your cheek felt really warm, and I was…well, kinda worried you might have a fever or something.”

“Oh I totally do,” Emma replied instantly, and she lifted her thumb up to his face, holding it quite close, so that Daniel could feel the heat radiating off it.

“Feel that?” Emma asked, grinning down at him crookedly. Daniel nodded. He was surprised at her immediate response. He had expected her to dismiss his worries, or claim that she just felt hot to him because he was so small, or something like that. But no, she was openly acknowledging it, owning it completely.

“Yeah, I’m burning up alright,” Emma chuckled. “Kind of making me a little dizzy sometimes, haha.” She purposefully crossed her eyes when she said the word “dizzy,” and despite his concern for her, Daniel felt his cock twitch in his pants. Whenever she acted playful like this, it was just so…sexy.

“Oh…oh yeah?” he asked, trying to say the right things, “Maybe we should…uhh, call Dr. Farley to come take a l–”

“Noooooo, no,” Emma laughed, shaking her head so that her red hair parted. Daniel could see little beads of sweat on her flushed forehead. “He’ll just get all serious and use it as an excuse to stick needles in me and take my blood pressure and get a reading of this and that and get a glucose count or whatever-the-heck he does for all those tests…hahaha and it won’t get him any closer to figuring out what I already know.”

“What…uhh…what do you know?” Daniel ventured.

“Well it’s obvious!” Emma laughed, sitting up on the bed (inadvertently knocking Daniel dowoff his feet from the mattress earthquake her movements caused) and spreading her arms wide. “I’m having another growth spurt!”

With her arms spread like this, Daniel could see that the pink long-sleeves of her cat shirt were beginning to show visible signs of strain, especially around her forearms. He could even see the long white slivers developing….tears in the fabric…that revealed her creamy skin underneath. And with her sitting up like this, he was able to see that the entire lower half of her stomach was showing. The cat face on her shirt barely even looked like a cat face anymore.

“I…w-wow, yeah, I can see that!” Daniel exclaimed, blinking at the incredible sight before him. Emma happily thrust her leg out, and an audible rip sounded out through the air. The side of her blue skirt had torn, but she didn’t seem to care one bit. In fact, she actually seemed buoyed by it – energized by it.

“Hahaha whoooops, there goes that!” she laughed, holding her shoe up to Daniel as he stood back up again. “I could feel it straining against me all morning…heheh, I knew it didn’t stand a chance! Now look, look! Reach up and feel the space at the top of my shoe!”

“I…look Emma, I can’t,” Daniel chuckled, demonstrating his inability to reach past 8 feet, even on his tiptoes. Emma stared down at him, appearing momentarily confused.

“Huh?” she asked blankly, “Yes you can – look, my shoe’s right there, silly! Just reach up and feel the top of it!”

“But Emma, I can’t!” Daniel laughed. “Look, I’m literally…heh, literally on my tiptoes!”

Emma blinked a few times, processing the sight, and then her tongue issued forth, wetting the middle of her lips, as her chin dimpled and trembled humorously.

“Oh my god…you really can’t reach it, can you?” she giggled. She started pressing her toes into her shoe, so that the converse fabric bulged outward, far over Daniel’s head.

“Come on Daniel!” Emma teased, laughing delightedly through her already-flushed face, “Come onnnnn! Touch my toes! Stand on your tippy toes and touch them!”

“I caaaaaan’t!” he replied desperately, laughing himself, and feeling another spiking surge of arousal deep inside.

“You caaaan’t!?” Emma laughed, shaking her head, “Awww why nottttt? Are you too little!?”

She stared down hard at Daniel, unblinking now, and he felt utterly cowed under her eyes. In that moment, he had never felt so small, so tiny, in his life…and he could feel the blood rushing up through his neck and into his face…he was blushing crimson, stunned with arousal. It had come on so suddenly that he felt like the wind had been knocked out of him. He couldn’t breathe.

“Jump!” Emma ordered abruptly. Daniel’s eyes had watered slightly at the sound of her voice. She wasn’t speaking loudly by her own standards, but she wasn’t speaking softly now either. Daniel obeyed without thinking, jumping up and managing to touch the top of her protruding toe through the converse fabric.

“Gooooood, you touched it!” Emma giggled, now playful again. “Now do it again, and try to hold on – see look, I’ll make it easy for you!”

She stuck her toe out even farther, making a kind of overarching protrusion above Daniel’s head. He jumped again, and managed to grab onto the top of Emma’s toe with both hands.

“Yaaaaaay!!” she called out, clapping her hands behind him, producing a series of deafening, thunder-like sounds, “I knew you could do it! Hahaha, now hold on!”

Emma proceeded to wiggle her toe back and forth through her shoe, causing Daniel’s entire body to sway left and right. He could feel his hands beginning to slip from her toe, but he was able to hold onto the fabric of her shoes, preventing himself from falling. The sound of her giggles throbbed through the air, and the fact that Daniel was dangling in midair made the vibrations of her levity seem all the more encompassing – even though he knew Emma was watching her volume, he could feel her sound hitting him.

“Whooop…ooooops! Are you slipping!?” she laughed, speeding up the movement of her toe. “Are you gonna fall?”

Daniel couldn’t answer; he needed to focus all of his efforts on trying to retain his hold. But even so, just a few moments later, his grip failed and he tumbled back down onto the bed.

“Awwww, you were doing so well!” Emma chuckled, tongue-in-cheek, obviously enjoying the spectacle. She held out her huge hand and felt the space at the top of her shoe with her fingers as Daniel shakily stood up. “See that?!” she asked excitedly, turning her face down to Daniel with wide eyes. “See what I’m talking about?”

Daniel was discombobulated, but he had enough of his wits about him to look up at the top of Emma’s shoe, and notice what she was calling to his attention. There couldn’t be any doubt – her fingers were closer to the tip of her shoe than before. Already, her shoes were becoming noticeably less roomy.

A few hours later, in the early afternoon (and after a monstrous lunch for Emma), she and Daniel had just finished taking a stroll around the spacious Facility. For a couple weeks now, Dr. Farley had been insisting that Emma get in some light physical activity immediately after eating. At first, Emma had rolled her eyes at his insistence, feeling slightly annoyed at his orders that didn’t make any sense. But by now she had already deduced what lay behind his emphasis on her after-eating routine.

“You always start laughing to yourself whenever we start walking,” Daniel observed, perched on her shoulder, as the two of them stared out the open hanger doors at the mountains, shimmering grandly in the afternoon sun. “How come?”

“It’s always just so funny when Farley comes in with his little megaphone,” Emma chuckled, imitating him in her best impression of a high-pitched voice: “All right! Afternoon walk, Emma! Gotta get that digestion going! It’s good for you! Good for you!”

“Heheh, well…isn’t it, though?” asked Daniel. It was surreal, sitting on the shoulder of a giantess who was doing an impression of a regular person. Daniel realized that, to Emma, Dr. Farley’s voice sounded abnormally high-pitched, almost like a child. Was that how he sounded to her too?

“Sure, maybe…whatever, I don’t know,” laughed Emma, “The point is I know what’s going on with him. Do you see his face when he looks at the mountains of food I eat every day? Haha, he tries to hide it, but he can’t – he can’t comprehend it, and that bothers him, since he’s…you know…the nutritionist. I think he’s worried about where it all goes! And so he’s gotta feel like he’s doing something to help, since he has no idea what’s going on…”

“That’s…well, that is how he’s feeling,” Daniel replied. He really didn’t know one way or the other. “I guess he’s just…you know, doing the best he can, trying to give good advice.”

Emma sighed, and Daniel felt another chuckle ripple through her body. It wasn’t derisive or mocking – it was appreciative, and even pensive.

“Heh…he really is just trying his best,” she murmured, staring out at the mountains. “They all are. And none of them know…none of them really have a clue. They’re totally off the map now.”

Daniel pivoted on her shoulder and turned to look at her, but he was so close to her that it was paradoxically difficult to get a clear reading of her expression. But from the tone of her voice, Emma didn’t sound the least bit upset or troubled. Instead, she sounded…amused.

The sound of something stretching suddenly became noticeable, and Daniel felt an alarming surge of heat emanate from Emma’s shoulder where he was sitting, and from the side of her cheek as well.

“Uhhh, is that…is that –?” he began, but Emma had already broken into a smile and was nodding knowingly.

“Mmhmmmmmm,” she breathed. “Been going on now for a few minutes…haha you’re just noticing it now?”

“I…w-well I didn’t…I wasn’t sure,” Daniel responded. He was trying to rise gingerly to his feet, since Emma's shoulder was becoming uncomfortably hot to sit on. As he rose up to steady himself, he leaned his hands against her cheek…she was sweating again.

“Here, relax, let me take care of you,” Emma smiled softly. The tender humor of her voice contrasted so starkly with the immensity of her body, and the stifling heat that was emanating from it. Daniel felt Emma’s giant fingers wrap lovingly around him and lower him carefully down to the smooth concrete floor. He liked being close to her face, but he had to admit that it was a bit of a relief to feel the cool air coming in from the hanger doors on his face – Emma was burning up.

But she didn’t seem to mind one bit. In fact, she seemed positively giddy. From down below, Daniel saw her inflate her gigantic chest out with one huge, inhaled breath, and the stretching sound intensified. Her cat shirt was certainly looking worse for the wear now, and Daniel actually saw some of the strands of fabric breaking around the shirt’s bottom-most extent, which was right above her belly button now. As she sighed out her breath, she stretched her huge arms up towards the ceiling, and Daniel saw her muscles rippling pleasantly underneath her flesh. The stretch certainly looked like it felt good. Daniel turned his gaze toward Emma’s feet, and was surprised to see that her toes were already pressing up against the insides of her shoes, to the point where there were visible bulges at the rounded end of her converses. Even with the apparent knowledge that Emma wasn’t too bothered by this most recent growth spurt, Daniel felt a sudden stab of intense pity that almost made him tear up. She was trapped…trapped in her shoes, in this Facility, in her own body. It was just awful.

“Uh…Emma?” he called up, not knowing what he was going to say before he started speaking. She lowered her arms from her stretch and peered down at him curiously.

“You…uh, you can…I’m…I’m sure they wouldn’t mind it if you just, you know…took your clothes off…your shoes too…and just…let your body kinda, uh…breathe a little.” He felt like his words hadn’t conveyed the intensity of his feelings, but then again, he remembered that he wasn’t trying to make her feel upset or discouraged. He had to deal with his own feelings and emotions himself, rather than project them onto her. But his internal monologue was dissipating almost as soon as it had started, because Emma was now laughing openly out in reply:

“Hahaha but whyyyyy would I wanna do that!?” she burst out, spreading her hands out as she wiggled her fingers playfully. “I LOVE when I feel everything getting tighter and tighter!”

“You…you do!?” asked Daniel.

“Yeah!” she laughed, pressing her toes up into her shoes, straining the fabric audibly. Daniel wouldn’t have been surprised to see her toes beginning to break through. He looked back up at her face, high up above him. But even though it was far away from him, Daniel could still see the crimson flush in her cheeks, and the eager, almost hungry look in her eyes.

“I can feeeeeel the spurts as they come!” Emma continued throwing her shoulders back and pushing out her chest. “Everything gets tighter around me…smaller…uugghhh it feels AMAZING! I bet I could just…just SHRED everything right now just by flexing but…heheh, but I don’t wanna end it all yet! I wanna see how long it can last on me…I mean, just look at this shirt, Daniel! Remember when it was waaaaay too big for me!?”

Emma stepped back and spread her arms out again, to give Daniel a full view of herself. The pink “long-sleeve” cat shirt was beginning to look cartoonighly small on her. Daniel couldn’t believe that it had only been a few days since Miss Bissett had made it…her growth really was beginning to accelerate in a new way.

“So it’s…it’s not too uncomfortable?” Daniel called up to her. It certainly looked that way.

“No way!” laughed Emma, putting her hands on her hips as she rose up to her full height (she was approaching 59 feet now). Her eyes sparkled wide with excitement. “I LIKE filling the space…and there’s never enough…heheh…I’ll always fill it!”

It was the oddest thing to Daniel how, despite her size, Emma’s enthusiasm and freshness seemed almost childlike…and it made her all the more appealing.

“And…and the growth spurt?” Daniel ventured, “It’s not…not hurting you too much? Not too sore?”

“Oh I’m TOTALLY sore,” Emma giggled, throwing her arms around herself as she crossed her feet over each other…‘almost like a silly teenager,’ Daniel thought, even as he felt himself helplessly drawn to her positive attitude.

“It kinda feels like I just got out of a hot bath,” she continued, wiping her brow humorously. “Except all the heat is coming from the inside…from inside ME.”

“But you’re ok?” Daniel asked, trying not to sound too anxious.

“It hurts,” Emma smiled, “But I don’t care…I know how to deal with it now. And it just means that I’m getting bigger…and bigger.”

Daniel had no response to this, and so he just smiled, nodded, and turned to look out at the mountains. This certainly beat how she had felt about her condition before, Daniel mused, when she was miserable…and out of her mind. But even still, her enthusiasm was undoubtedly intimidating. She wasn’t just getting bigger; she was LOVING it…almost obsessing over it.

A minute or so later, Daniel turned back to look at her. He had expected Emma to be looking out at the mountains with him, but instead, she was looking straight up at the ceiling, unmoving.

“So, uhh…Clinebell had mentioned you taking a cold…uhm, bath after lunch?” he began, not knowing why he felt a bit uneasy at the prospect of her just standing there, staring up at the ceiling. For a few moments, she didn’t respond. It was like she was fixating on something hanging from the ceiling that he couldn’t see.

“Emma?”

“Hmmm?” she asked, glancing down at him before turning her gaze up to where it had been before.

“What are you, uhh…what are you looking at?”

“I was just thinking,” she murmured out after a few seconds of silence, “Just wondering if maybe…” And with her feet planted firmly on the floor, she reached her arm up as high as it could go. Daniel could see her stretching herself, and he heard the fabric of her shirt and blue skirt stretching and complaining in response. Her hand stopped at its highest point, and she wiggled her fingers in vain. There was still a fair amount of space in between the tips of her fingers and the ceiling, even though Daniel couldn’t believe how close she had come.

‘That ceiling…’ he thought, ‘It’s…they mentioned it was 70 feet high…way high enough to contain her, but…’

“Arrrrrgh, still too short!” growled Emma in mock-disappointment. She stood on her tiptoes and tried again. Daniel could see her fingers get closer, but there was still a good foot of space left. From his perspective, though, it looked like she was basically touching the ceiling.

“Did you…can you touch on your tiptoes?” he called up.

“Nooooooo,” she whined, coming back down off her tiptoes. She broke out of her affected disappointment and flashed him a knowing grin. “Not yet, at least.”

The rest of the afternoon was taken up by a workout with Dr. Jeltzin and the cool bath that followed. Usually, Emma was quite excited for her workouts, but today, she seemed uncharacteristically bored. She achieved a personal best with an 81-ton deadlift, but in the midst of Dr. Jeltzin’s uproarious praise, she had simply held the barbell up for a few moments, then dropped it down…and then lifted it up again. Everyone watching had been utterly flabbergasted, and even Dr. Jeltzin himself was left speechless.

“81 tons…!!!” whispered Dr. Ossford to Daniel, “That’s…unbelievable…”

“Yeah the…the freaking space shuttle weighs like 70 tons,” Dr. Farley added, breathless with awe.

“Are you serious!?” Alison whispered, “So she just…she lifted that and more!?”

“Twice,” nodded Dr. Farley, shaking his head, “Like it was nothing.” Daniel knew they were the “experts,” but in this moment, he felt completely equal to them in his awe. None of them had anticipated what they were seeing now, and none of them knew why it was happening.

“Whoooo! All right, yeah!” Emma breathed out, slightly out of breath as she dropped the weight down with unbelievable lightness of touch. “That was…ok, that felt good.” Normally, she would do a little dance or pump her fist when she had achieved a personal best, but today, she just blew out a buzzing exhale in between her lips and shrugged her shoulders. “Alright, soooo…I guess that’s it for today, huh?”

“E-Emma,” Dr. Jeltzin began, “That was…girl, that was incredible! You just picked that up like it was a…like it was a…paperweight!”

“Yeah, it was way lighter than I expected,” Emma replied mildly, shrugging again. “Guess I’m just getting stronger, huh?”

She looked over to Daniel, and her eyes suddenly scrunched up playfully. Daniel swallowed and felt himself blushing. Emma was usually intently focused on her lifting when she was working out with Jeltzin, and only after their sessions did she return her attention to Daniel. But right now, she didn’t seem interested in the weights – she seemed interested in him. A couple of thundering paces later, she was looming over him, her cat shirt now visibly torn down the sides, as her toes continued to press up into her shoes. Daniel thought that he caught a glimpse of her red toe nail polish through the fabric.

“Well whad’ja think of THAT, boyfriend?” she chuckled down at him, sticking her tongue into the side of her cheek as she put her hands on her powerful hips. “Impressed?”

“Y-Yeah! Very!” Daniel stammered, getting instantly hard again.

“You like watching me?” she asked, straightening up, lifting her right arm, and flexing her bicep as she stared down at him suggestively. “You like watching me getting stronger?”

“Of course!” Daniel laughed. His face felt like it was on fire. Emma held her pose for a few moments, making her eyebrows go up and down sexily. In the back of his mind, Daniel laughed a little at her exaggerated silliness, but at the same time, another thought was eclipsing all others: Emma wasn’t being silly…she was being serious. She was openly flirting with him…in a dominant way.

“Oh my GOD you’re cute,” she muttered, almost to herself, and she made all the scientists jump back as she abruptly swooped down, swiping Daniel up off his feet. He had been the only one who hadn’t jumped back, because he had anticipated what she was going to do. And now she held him up, close to her face. He felt like her flushed skin and the sweat dotting her brow were more from her growth spurt than the 81 tons she had just lifted.

“Let’s take that bath!” she giggled at him, “Together!”

Emma’s bathtub was a 52-foot-long behemoth of a structure, undoubtedly built many times oversized to accommodate a 30, 35, or even 40-foot giantess. When Emma had taken her first bath here, months before, she had almost been able to swim around in the tub, totally submerging her body in the process. But now, she could barely fit in it – her huge legs stuck out in a “V” shape as she relaxed in the cool water, with Daniel floating in between the twin islands of her breasts. Her skin had been so hot that, as she had stepped into the cool water, some of the surface water had even started steaming.

“Comfortable?” Emma cooed at Daniel as he treaded water.

“Mhmm, yes,” he nodded. He was far enough away from her head that he could actually see her expression…and he could tell that there was something different in her face…something that was focused on him more intently. It was certainly intimidating…but Daniel couldn’t pretend that he didn’t like it. There was something sexual in her look, a kind of wry naughtiness that made him feel even more aroused than he already was. He was glad his midsection was under water, because he was completely erect right now.

“You look like a cute little minnow down there,” she murmured, blinking her eyes slowly down at him. “A little tadpole…”

“If only I had a tail like a tadpole,” Daniel replied, “Then I’d be swimming around like this!”

He lay face-forward into the water and started swimming freestyle away from Emma, except that he made a point to wriggle his butt exaggeratedly back and forth, as if he had a tail. For almost a minute he swam around like this, going in between her breasts, and around the hulking pillars of her thighs. He had expected Emma to burst out laughing at his little stunt, and was a little discouraged when he didn’t hear her react. After a minute or so, he swam back in between Emma’s legs, treading water between them, as he looked up into her face again. She was watching him intently, her brow slightly furrowed, and Daniel could see that she was lightly flexing and unflexing the muscles in her cheeks. It wasn’t quite the expressionless look she had when she was confused, or trying to mentally work through her size dysmorphia…but it was an inscrutable expression nonetheless, and it left Daniel wondering what she was thinking.

Emma blinked quickly a few times.

“Sorry,” she murmured, her voice causing little ripples in the water, “I was just…mmmmmmm…I can’t wait…”

“Can’t wait?” asked Daniel, shielding his face from the ripples of water that were splashing up against him, “For what?” He suddenly realized that the water wasn’t cool anymore – actually, it had become quite warm. Emma’s body had heated it up.

Emma blinked again and Daniel saw the top of her lip bulge; behind her closed mouth, she was slowly, back and forth, licking the top of her teeth. When she spoke, he thought he felt the current of something huge moving underwater beneath his feet.

“For tonight.”