Part 1: Angela
3:00 A.M. Break time.
Angela hated working night shifts at the power plant. She had recently turned thirty, and she was frustrated with her life in general. She felt she was destined for bigger things, but right now she was stuck here, working the most boring job ever. She had all the science degrees in the world, and with them she was babysitting what the town of Ostville thought was the answer to everyone's money woes: a power plant.
Ostville boasted how little they paid for power because they were willing to have the plant to provide them with it. It was the safest facility in the world, they felt. And Dr. Simon Vance, the man in charge of it, treated the place like his own child.
Of course he was not usually there at three in the morning. Although she would never admit it to anyone, Angela almost wished he was. The dead of night was always the loneliest time here, and the chorus of birds heralding the dawn was always something to look forward to for her.
Her other co-workers were not much in the way of companionship. Drusilla was an big ex-athlete of thirty-nine with stringy hair, Nelly was a petite, flighty girl who was always darting about with the latest gossip, and Sylvia, a svelte redhead, was always dreaming about becoming an oceanographer but never doing anything about it. Each had their own job in the plant, and often whole nights would go by when the women would only meet up in the break room or on computer chats. And even when they did come in contact with each other, each was so different in temperament that the conversations often were dull and short.
So there they sat, Drusilla smashing out a text with her thumb, Nelly and Sylvia giggling about something “cute” Dr. Vance had said, and Angela herself staring at the ceiling, wondering why she continued to work here. She had considered pursuing a job in genetic research, or perhaps something involving nuclear physics. Well, at least she was getting some experience that was nuclear physics-related...
Drusilla sat straight up, which was quite unusual for a girl who seemed in an eternal slouch. Angela had heard that she was once an Olympic candidate, dropping out at the last minute due to a bad leg injury. It sounded like her ego had never quite recovered from the disappointment, and she had been left with an almost unnoticeable limp as well. “Dr. V just texted me,” she announced in a monotone. “He's on his way over.”
Were Angela's prayers for real human contact being answered? Not that Dr. Vance was much in the way of human...
Seconds after Drusilla made her proclamation, the man himself stood in the doorway, smiling too widely for a middle-of-the-night visit. “How are you girls today?” He seemed almost glowing, which was rather uncharacteristic of Simon Vance. Angela had always known him to be a true scientist in every sense of the word – glasses, lab coat, pocket protector – she had been amazed that people still used those... But lately the man had become strangely more attractive. He had bulked up, he appeared stronger and healthier...even his usually thin hair was vibrant and thick. He also spoke with much more confidence.
“We're fine,” Angela mumbled, trying to cover the fact that she was actually glad to see him. “Why are you here?”
The scientist walked over to her chair. “Angela, Angela. I couldn't resist visiting you. I seriously flew through the night,” he grinned secretively to himself, “just to make some human contact.”
“After all the non-human contact you usually make?” Angela snorted. She always was a bit too callous with Simon, but they had somewhat more than a boss/employee relationship. He often expressed interest in her, and they flirted tirelessly, but so far, she had turned him down for an actual date. She didn't hate him, but she had recently come off of a long-term relationship and was not ready to date as of yet. But lately this 'new' Simon was piquing her interest despite her trying to ignore him, and with these recent changes, he seemed to be stepping up his game as well.
He rubbed a spot on the back of her neck. “Missed you, hon,” he whispered into her ear.
She shrugged him off, surprised at how forward he was being. The old Simon never would have been this daring.
Noticing this interplay, Nelly chirped up, “Oh, wow, Dr. V! What's gotten into you lately? You're looking good! Are you working out?”
He chuckled. “What, you like the 'changed me'?” he motioned down at himself with poorly-concealed admiration. “Well, I always wanted to change, so here we are!”
“Uh-huh,” Drusilla uttered under her breath.
“Well, just wanted to say a quick hi. Now I'm out of here, off for a run in the night,” he jumped up and bounded out the door, making sure it slammed closed behind him.
“A run in the night? What, does he think he's a wolf?” giggled Sylvia.
“I know, right? What the hell was that?” asked Angela. “I mean, seriously, he's here all of two minutes, and then he's gone.” She was greatly annoyed with Simon's too-quick exit. A bit more bantering back and forth might have made the night slightly more tolerable.
“He could have at least brought us a snack!” Nelly pouted. “Those cupcakes he got last time were just out of this world!”
Angela smiled secretively. In one of her everyday work chats with Simon, she had mentioned her love for red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese icing, and they had appeared on the break room table the very next day.
“That man is f'ing crazy,” Drusilla pointed out.
Minutes later, as Nelly was discussing how her young daughter insisted that fairies lived in her closet, she was interrupted by the red warning light up on the wall. “What does that mean?” she gaped at it. “I never saw it turn on in all the time I've been here.”
Drusilla rolled her eyes. “Something not good, obviously.”
Angela jumped from her chair. “What the hell–”
Then their world stopped.
The light was so bright that Angela was rendered blind. She was being bathed with a warmness that her terrified mind could only construe as radiation. Was there a leak in the reactor? That was impossible! Everything was sound and tight... Every part was cleaned and checked...
Through her fear, everything felt as if it were tightening on her. Her clothes, her jewelry, even her socks and shoes...
But as quickly as it had occurred, the light was gone, the warning indicator switched off, and the four were left staring at each other.
“Oh, holy shit,” Angela uttered.
Nelly was hysterical, Sylvia was sobbing quietly, and Drusilla was scratching herself obsessively while staring at the warning light. “Did we get irradiated?” she murmured.
Angela glanced down at herself. She did not feel that different; perhaps a little lightheaded... But everything still felt strangely tight. She unbuttoned her pants surreptitiously under her shirt, which helped somewhat. Were the other girls always so short? “I'm going to check us out, and look at the instruments...” She ran off to examine the machinery and the computers, then returned to scan each girl with a radiation detector.
As she ran the detector up and down Nelly's body, the slight girl held up her billowy pants. “Did I lose weight or something?” she mumbled confusedly. But Angela wasn't listening. She did not know whether to be relieved or not at what her machine was telling her.
The radiation readings were virtually zero.
“So what the hell was that? There's no hint that anything happened?” Drusilla questioned.
“There was a power spike, but that's it,” Angela replied stiffly. This was not the answer she wanted to give. She liked to know exactly what was going on, and right now, she had no idea.
“So what do we do next?” cried Nelly.
Angela looked back and forth at the others. “I guess we go back to work.”
Nelly walked in front of Angela. “Go back to work? What if we die?”
“You won't die if you just stood in some light. There's no indication of anything harmful, Nelly. And Sylvie, stop crying. You're fine.”
Sylvie's answer was a soft sob. “I'm itchy,” she uttered.
“So'm I,” Drusilla said. “So?”
Holding up her arm with a gasp, Sylvie shrieked, “I think I have radiation burns! My skin's getting all...scaly!”
As Angela stepped up to examine her, a new voice joined their own.
“What's wrong, girls?”
Simon was there once more, and Angela snorted. “I thought you left.” She studied him, wondering why he appeared so disheveled. His hair was spiky and windblown, and his clothes were all wrinkled, as if they had been left in a pile on the floor. Maybe he really had taken a jog through the night...naked? Well, that sounded strangely appealing...
“I came back. The light went off, which alerts me. So believe it or not, I came back to check on you.”
“Dr. Vance, the light went off because there was some kind of weird power fluctuation,” mentioned Nelly.
“Was there?” he raised an eyebrow.
“At 3:28,” added Sylvia, wiping away her tears. “And there was this bright light, and I thought there was a radiation leak, but the only thing Angela sees is a power spike.” She held up her hand in front of his face. “Now my skin's messed up. What went on?”
“Could just be a sunburn,” he said dismissively. He turned towards the other girls, but his eyes were centered on Angela. “How are the rest of you feeling?”
“Why do you keep asking us that?” Drusilla snapped, leaning over to eat the granola bar she had brought with her and never gotten to eat.
“Yes, why do you?” Angela repeated suspiciously. She watched as Simon gave them each a good look-over.
“Well, I just want to make sure all's well. A weird power fluctuation, lights, sunburns...we have to check this out. Angela, dig a bit deeper. Check the logs. See what you can find to explain what that was.”
Angela nodded. Everything was always up to her. She would do the work, and Simon would get the accolades.
“Good. Call me if you have any problems. Have a good night.”
Angela went back into her office and settled down at her desk, which was riddled with monitors, keyboards, and two computer screens. She kicked off her shoes, resolving to get new ones as these just seemed way too tight. She clicked through the logs, through all the tests and monitoring apps, but nothing could shed light on the odd power fluctuation they had experienced, and it made her grow increasingly frustrated. She was Angela Grandman! She always worked everything out! She always found the answer!
Something lurched in her, and for a moment, she felt as if the room had gotten smaller around her. “Damn, I'm tired,” she whispered, eyes focusing back on the screen.
3:27:15...OPERATION NORMAL.
3:27:27...OPERATION NORMAL.
3:27:48...OPERATION NORMAL.
There was a hole in both of her socks. Her toes were showing through. “They weren't like that this morning,” she commented to the empty room, shedding the ripped garments and tossing them into the trash. She gazed at her feet a moment. She never realized she had such big feet, honestly...
3:28:00...OPERATION NORMAL.
3:28:30...POWER LEVEL +200
3:28:59...OPERATION NORMAL.
“Nothing else! Nothing! Nothing! DAMN!” She jumped up, and with a sickening jolt and much tearing of clothing, her body grew several feet taller.
“What the hell?” This fear-reaction only served to push her body to get progressively larger. Her shirt fell to the floor in tatters, her pants had ripped down the crotch, and her legs literally exploded through the fabric. The sudden forceful height increase made her smash her head through the flimsy ceiling tiles, into the space between the beams, and suddenly her top half was in the middle of Nelly's upstairs office. Thankfully, the girl didn't seem to be present, although there was some kind of annoying bug that kept flying at Angela's head...
Shaking in fear and effectively naked, Angela pulled herself back through the floor and curled up as well as she could to fit in her office. “I'm huge...What happened to me?” It was like a scene from Alice in Wonderland, only she was terrified. “It had to have been that flash. Some kind of...”
Simon! He had to know! He'd been acting so...smarmy! Was he behind this? “That damned bastard, if he did this to me...” She grabbed up the phone and dialed him. “Simon! What the hell did you do to us?”
“What's wrong, Angela? Problems?”
“Problems? I'm ten feet tall!”
The man was silent for a moment. “Really? That's amazing! Can I see?”
A very outraged Angela repeated, “Can you see?”
“A huge giantess-Angela? Damn, I'd die to see that! A dream come true! Can you control it?”
More enraged by his response and questioning why he was not mocking her outlandish claim, she echoed, “Control?”
“Can you get bigger and smaller? Concentrate on it.”
She did, and found herself shrinking back to her normal height. She let out a relieved breath. She was fine. She was normal...
Simon prompted her, “Well?”
“I did it!” she paused, pondering this. If this was something she could do at will, it might serve to help her reach objects high up on the shelves, and she could clip the bushes outside her house without a ladder...“You know, if there's no bad health effects from this, it's actually kind of cool.” Holding the phone away from her ear, she allowed herself to get larger once more. “This is awesome! I could stomp down a whole town if I get big enough!”
“Come over my house. Now.”
As Angela walked up to Simon's door, she gathered her ripped clothes around her as best as she could. She had thrown a lab coat over what remained of her shirt, but the pants were unsalvageable. So she tore off the tattered legs and used what was left as makeshift shorts/underwear – and she prayed that the lab coat covered the rips.
Simon threw open the door and ran to her. “Get tall!” he demanded.
Angela surveyed the neighborhood. There were people outside of the neighboring house, but they were busy weeding their front bed. Nonetheless, one never knew who was watching though a window... “Right here?”
“Grow a tiny bit. Please. No one will see if it's a tiny bit.”
“Simon, I need clothes.”
“Grow!”
She did.
“Oh...my...God,” Simon gasped, and yanked her inside.
“More!” he cried, and Angela grinned. For whatever reason, she was liking this. Immensely.
She grew to well over six feet, and smiled down on the five-foot-eight scientist, who was balling his hands into fists. “More, please more,” he whined like a baby, removing the tatters of her lab coat and shirt from where they hung off of her arms.
“This is good, huh, Simon?” She shot up to eight feet, her head skimming the ceiling. “Better?”
Simon was nearly drooling. “God, you're beautiful.”
She pushed another foot or so of height, but then was reduced to slouching over. Simon was left wordless.
“What, Simon? What are you staring at?” she raised her eyebrow alluringly.
Now there really was a small bit of drool pooling on the outside corner of his mouth. “You...you're just...wonderfully, supremely tall and just...” he gulped, wiping away the drool, “gloriously...so very gloriously...”
“Yes?”
“...naked.”
At the very same time, they pounced at each other. Locked in embrace, they rolled around on the floor. Angela tried not to hurt her much smaller partner as the activity grew more and more heated. “I don't want to crush you, little man,” Angela giggled, ripping off his clothes and rubbing her big hands down his body.
Simon's lips still on hers, he murmured, “My God, this is like my deepest fantasy coming true...I'm yours, I always have been...I worked on this all, changed myself, just for you...”
“Did you now? You did a nice job,” she said, planting a wet kiss on his neck.
“My friend Alan's developing a material that grows with you. I bet you could use some of that.”
Angela chuckled. “Well, this isn't something I plan to be doing often, if it continues.”
“I hope you like it,” he murmured into her hair. “I'm so glad I did this...my very own giantess...”
Angela paused. “You...did...this?”
He beamed up at her. “I've been working on it for so long...a new type of radiation – yes, really! And it's undetectable except for the power surge you saw...”
“You DID this?”
“It seems to draw on your personality, your strengths, rolling them together making you a more powerful version of them...You've always felt strong and too big for your britches...And here you are, my personal giantess...”
“You slimy bastard!” Angela jumped up and began to take on foot after foot in height. She meant to instill fear into the scientist, but he was laughing manically and clapping his hands in delight. He was clamoring for more, which made her even angrier. She deliberately smashed through the ceiling, through the attic, and through the roof, meeting the morning air with some surprise.
“Like me now?” she yelled down to him.
“God, yes! How tall are you at this point?”
“You stupid bastard, experimenting with four innocent women!” She scooped him up in her hand, staring down at him in alternate waves of rage and amazement. Having Dr. Simon Vance in the palm of her hand was most...satisfying.
He curled himself around her thumb, kissing at it. “Even your fingers are sexy.”
“You ass!” She clenched her fist around him, she could swear he was enjoying the increasing pressure on his flimsy body. Leave it to her to find a man with a giantess fetish. Everything she did now was a turn-on for him. “Hey, watch this!” She turned her hand around so he could view his house far below. Then she raised her enormous foot above it.
Simon, startled back into reality, gave a shriek. “No! Not my house, Angela! Please!”
The foot came down, leveling the structure with a sickening smash.
“Oh, God, my house!” Simon exclaimed, all excitement drained from his voice. Now anger was setting in. He looked up into Angela's enormous features. “Angela, how could you do that? What should I tell the insurance company?”
“Tell them a disgruntled co-worker trampled it.”
“Oh, Angie, that's not fair. Look what I've given you! You have a superpower now! You can be a superhero!”
She gazed down at him in shock. “What the hell am I supposed to do like this? Crush bad guys? If anyone even sees a woman this tall I'll end up locked up in a lab somewhere.”
“But you can get big and escape! Oh, God, Angela, it feels so good to be cupped in your hand...so warm, so comfortable... Let me kiss those glorious lips...”
“Kiss them?” Completely furious, Angela picked him up by his arm. She let him dangle in the air, wondering if this would break his little arm, but he wasn't complaining. Instead, he was gazing worshipfully at her face.
“Oh, God, this is all the right stuff for a giantess fantasy...have you ever read any of the stories? I mean, it's like you're following a script!”
“That's it! I've had enough of you, Simon! Experimenting on people with potentially life-threatening results...who knows what this will do to me? How dare you do this without knowing?”
“Oh, I know.”
“What do you mean, you know?”
“You'll be fine. I'd never do anything to hurt you.”
“You little shit!” She held him over her mouth. “You want to kiss these lips? Do it while I EAT you!” She opened up her mouth, realizing too late that this was probably also part of the man's fantasy.
“You wouldn't hurt me.”
“Oh, no?” She lowered him closer to her lips...
Simon grew nervous. “Angie...”
“Liking this part of your crazy fantasy?” she said, letting him get even closer to her mouth. She had no urge to actually devour him; the whole idea was repugnant to her, but she was enjoying the fact that it definitely was possible...and it was truly scaring the hell out of the great Simon Vance.
“Angie, enough, I...”
“Dinner is served!” She let go of his arm, but instead of feeling his negligible weight on her tongue, Simon vanished in a puff of light, and a small bird took his place. It flew past her immense ear and yelled, “I tested this radiation out on myself first. And the effects were beyond what I thought were physically possible! You know how I always wanted to change? Well, now I can change into anything I want! I've become a shapeshifter!”
“A shapeshifter?” the giantess breathed, forgetting to be angry.
“You should see me in action. Oh, well, you have work to do. So does my contractor, unfortunately. Good-bye, my love!”
Angela couldn't even see the bird flutter away. She was too tall.