Third Pill Part 2 : The Long Haul 

“What have you been doing out here this whole time? Trying to cheat I bet.” A displeased, Ms. Brooks assumed while impatiently tapping her foot as she waited for a response.

“I wasn’t cheating…” It was far too tempting for Neil to try and explain, but seeing how well that’s worked for him before he refrained from doing so. Besides, the story was so outlandish it would do more to confirm her suspicions than refute them.

“Whatever, get back to class, the next part of the exam is about to start.” She ordered and turned to walk away.

“Ms. Brooks wait!” Neil exclaimed trying to ensure his professor heard his voice before she was too far away. He heard an audible sucking of her teeth when she stopped to look down at him again.

“…What?” She spat, drumming her nails against the wall.

Neil had every reason to suspect his request wasn’t going to go over well, but it couldn’t be helped. The time it’d take him to get back to the classroom would extend well beyond the allotted test time. Being that she was the only person around right now to help him options were limited. “Can you… carry me back to class?” 

The drumming of nails came to immediate halt and she stepped closer to Neil. “And why exactly do I have to carry you back to class!?” She bellowed, placing both hands on her hips and stared down at the nuisance of a student. While he knew she could be quite… volatile, Neil didn’t expect such a hostile reaction to what he thought was a reasonable ask given his stature. Beads of sweat formed on his skin as he stood in the midst of her shadow. She’s lost her cool a few times during the classroom before, but that was aimed at the class in general. Having her focused ire on him while in such a diminutive state left Neil feeling like he was treading too close to an active volcano that was due to blow.

“Sorry… it’d take me a long time to get to class by myself.” Though he was already minuscule in her presence, the rage emanating from his colossal professor had subconsciously rendered him feeling tinier under her scrutiny and speaking in an even softer tone in a passive attempt to appease her.

“Tch, do I look like your Mom brat!?- Y’know what, c’mere.” Though she was obviously irritated still, Neil somehow managed to avoid stepping onto a landmine and delay the impending eruption.

Grunting, Ms. Brooks stooped down and picked up her shrunken student by the collar of his shirt between her digits and began moving without further thought, leaving her hands utterly relaxed which left Neil dangling nearby her waist. Every inch of the way introduced a new wave of fear as he was haphazardly swung back and forth akin to pendulum with each of the massive strides of the professor. In such a lax grip each step taken left him with an impending sense of doom that he’d slip through her fingers out of her sheer carelessness. It was risky, daring even; but the risk of plummeting to grave injury or his death far outweighed the inevitable chewing out he was about to receive from his next request.

“Um… Ms. Brooks can you carry me, a little safer?” As soon as he uttered the question during mid-swing of her arm, he felt his entire body jerk upward and found himself staring at his irate teacher who could probably turn Medusa to stone if she were to make eye contact.

He honestly expected to receive a verbal lashing, but instead she simply closed her fist around the majority of his body leaving him exposed from only the chin up having went from one end of the extreme to the other, with his professor now being more likely to crush his body in her bare hands if she applied a smidge more force than to drop him. Aside from being able to turn his head, the rest of his body was immobile.

“Better?” She growled. Neil shook his head in agreement, he didn’t dare try fate for a third time in asking her to be gentler and opted to remain silent as his professor resumed walking, returning her hands near her sides to hang free only now letting her runty student reside in her fist.

Stopping at the door she raised her student to her face once more. “I wish the rest of them were like you.” In the closest thing to a smile she managed all day a crooked grin emerged on her face. “Quiet…obedient…” Stopping mid-sentence the moody professor took a couple of seconds to admire the fact she had one of her students… or rather brats, completely subdued in her fist and helpless to do anything about it. “And small.” With a quick snort, she entertained the thought of actually enjoying her job in an imagined scenario where all her student brats were puny pests.

“Then I’d talk down to you all in more ways than one.” The grin further etched onto her face as she fantasized of the classroom layout; herself full-sized in the center surrounded by her miniaturized brats. They’d start off at half their normal height and then she’d watch them dwindle as she really cuts them down to size with each belittling word she spoke until they looked like little dolls to her.

“When I get bored of that I’ll make sure to ask several post lecture questions to make sure you all were paying attention.” Snickering, she visualized picking out students to answer incredibly difficult questions and with each incorrect answer she’d say “Wrong!” and the entire class would continue to shrink further until they were all at her feet looking up at her larger than life body as if she was a Goddess to them. “Oh, and if any of them were to get lippy like you did earlier…” Her lips curved into a full-on smirk as she got to the best part of her fantasy where one of the little shits would get bold and complain. With such a massive size advantage in her favor she was at no shortage of options of how to handle it. Perhaps crushing the runt mid-sentence underneath her shoe like the insignificant bug they are? Maybe toying with them a bit before doing so would be more entertaining. In that case she’d just slowly hover her shoe above their body and watch them run for just long enough to give them some false hope that they could actually escape before she introduced them to the bottom of her sole.

The prospect of simply discarding them in her drawer for hours on end was amusing too. It wouldn’t give her the immediate satisfaction as watching them run for their life, but it would be more than worth it when she occasionally opened the drawer and heard the desperation in their pathetic voice begging for her to let them out.

Though it sounded cliché and lifted straight out of a monster movie script, she was curious about giving them a one-way express ticket to her stomach. Though she doubted that brats would taste any good, it sent tingles of power down her spine to fantasize of a student struggling inside of her. They’d scream, beg, and cry until the very end and the last thing they’d ever see was the inside of her mouth. The rest from there was easy, she could passively layback and take nap in her chair as her body went about its natural metabolic process. Sure her little morsel would struggle tooth and nail, and to that she’d simply smile and rub her belly in an almost soothing manner as to subtly tell them to give up and accept their demise. Then in tandem she’d slowly drift off into her catnap as her morsel, worn out from struggling and her own stomach acid would cease resistance and succumb to digestion. The amusing irony dawned upon her that after she woke up, they’d be little shits for real. Truly she could go as far as her imagination would allow.

Neil nervously swallowed, never wanting to know what was going through her mind right now and remained complacent as Ms. Brooks opened the door. 

“Alright students it’s time for the second part of the exam!” She announced upon entry. “I want you all to write the following sentence.” Beginning her statement, she reverted back to her flimsy grasp of Neil’s shirt collar as she held him up for the class to see. “Compared to Professor Brooks Neil is _______. I want you all to fill in the blank with at least 15 adjectives. Try to flex your brains, I do not want to see any remedial answers like, ‘Compared to Professor Brooks Neil is small, or tiny, or little’.” She warned, purposelessly dangling her student mid-air as she listed off the examples she did not want to see and completely aware that it was scaring the wits out of him. “You have 20 minutes, starting now!” Huffing in relief that she had the students out of her hair for almost a half hour, Ms. Brooks dismissively dropped Neil onto her desk and sat down in her chair to catch a quick nap and hopefully sleep off the remainder of her hangover. Of course the student she neglected had something to say about that.

“Uh, what about my exam?” He asked.

Arching her eyebrow upwards Ms. Brooks responded. “What about your exam?” 

“I still need to finish it!” He explained what he thought was an obvious fact. Perhaps he missed the joke but whatever he said must’ve been funny, evidenced by his professor’s snickering.

“Right and how exactly are you going to finish the exam?” She questioned. Seeing that he was still confused, she pointed towards a stray writing utensil on the desk with a cocky grin. “Go on, lift that pen.”

An apprehensive Neil stepped towards the pen, justifiably afraid that he was about to prove his professor’s point as he sized up the pen. It was about as thick as his torso and about an inch and a half taller than he was, which relatively speaking was a lot. Upon visual analysis alone, he could discern that it was far too thick for him to pick up with just his hands. Squatting into a pose that bodybuilders would assume before performing a dead lift, Neil lifted up the pen as high as he could before attempting to wrap his arms around it. Though it took a large effort on his part he eventually got it up over his shoulder. Stabilizing it was another matter, despite managing to lift the pen he was severely off the center of mass and it left him stumbling backwards into a total fall on his back. Losing his grip, the pen rolled out of his grasp and off the edge of the desk to the floor.

“Tsk, tsk, tsk. How unfortunate.” Ms. Brooks mocked with a smug snort. “I think it’s safe to say you’re not going to be able to finish your test. I’ll just write down a reminder to give you a 0.”

“What!? That’s not fair, you can’t do that!” Neil argued.

“Oh, can’t I? And what are YOU going to do about it!?” Ms. Brooks fired back, leaning forward and placing her forearms onto the desk, practically issuing a direct challenge for him to make a further fuss about it so she could really lay into him. Instantly Neil bit his tongue realizing he was about to jump into a battle where victory was impossible. Sitting back in her chair Ms. Brooks gritted her teeth. “Tch, that’s what I thought runt. You better think of something because at the end of this 20 minutes I have an F with your name on it.” She reiterated and turned her chair around to shut her eyes for a few moments.

It was more than obvious to Neil that he wasn’t going to be able to complete the exam and as disheartening as that was, he had no time to sulk, he needed to think of a plan. That plan consisted of one major goal, getting back to Grace. Whether the case maybe if the events going on are real or fake, she was the only person he could rely on now. Trying to explain to anyone else has been either useless or resulted in disaster. Despite being skeptical, she has been the only one to at least hear him out and at all costs he had to get back to the most dependable person he knew. What came after that was beyond the scope of his plan but somehow, he’ll make her believe him about Angel and then they’d put an end to this once and for all.

After the twenty minutes passed the phone in Ms. Brook’s pocket vibrated signaling the testing period was over and she stirred around in her chair until she rotated it towards the front. “Alright everyone, pencils down; bring your tests up front as you leave!” She announced and then looked down to Neil who as expected wasn’t able to do anything. “Well, well, what a surprise. Looks like you’re getting that F after all.” 

Ignoring her barb, Neil responded. “Can you at least get someone to take me out of class so I’ll be out of your way?” He was sure to word it in a way that’d the bring attention to him being out of her sight rather than it seeming like he was asking her directly to do something for him.

“Whatever.” Ms. Brooks grunted and looked up towards the last student to hand in their test. “Hazel, take this brat off to wherever he needs to go.” She said with a shooing motion of her hand before turning her chair back around to finish napping before her next class.

“Oooh, it’s you!” She said with enthusiasm, recognizing the familiar face that was sitting at the desk. “No problem Ms. Brooks!” The eager notoriety seeking student obliged.

Biting on his lip Neil wanted to curse his misfortune that it had to be Hazel of all people, but he was determined not to get discouraged. “Hazel please, you don’t have to show me the video or anything! I just need you to take me to Grace please, PLEASE!” 

The entire time he begged, Hazel was more focused on retrieving her phone from her pocket and toggling with its settings. She didn’t completely disregard his words however, seeing how he wanted a favor from her, this was an opportunity to get something in exchange. “So, you want to see Grace huh? Then I'm going to have you to do something for me.”

Neil stood in a stupor afraid to know what she was going to ask of him and watched as the biggest of smiles appeared on Hazel’s face as she held the phone in front of her.
“Alright, here we go in 3… 2… 1…” She counted down and pressed the record button.

“Hey there Hazelnuts it's ya’girl here in class about to do her good deed of the day for… my tiny friend!” Hazel paused halfway into her opening upon the realization that she didn’t know Neil’s name and had to think fast for a substitute. 

Tapping her phone screen twice the camera perspective swapped to recording Neil who stood mouth agape beginning to realize what was happening. “As you can see he’s reeeeaaaally teeny, say hello to the viewers!”

“You’re making a video at a time like this!?" Neil berated.

“Ugh, for the love of God!” The camera shook as Hazel grimaced in anger and paused the recording. Seeing her hand come down at the desk was more than enough warning for Neil to know he needed to run. The trapped student arced and zig-zagged as much as possible during his purposeless avoidance of Hazel’s hand. Given that he was on a desk there were no suitable places to hide nor a way for him to safely descend to the ground, all he was managing was to make her efforts to grab him a minor annoyance.

As anticipated Neil eventually wound up near the edge of the desk between what would be an open fall to the hard ground and Hazel’s oncoming hand. Resigned, he had no choice but to let the zealous student grab him.

“Got’cha twerp.” She huffed. “Now listen up, I’m going to resume the video and you’re going to do everything I say on my cue or else instead of Grace you may find yourself in a garbage can or in the toilet, got it?” 

It was a convincing argument and now that he was in her clutch’s noncompliance would practically be suicide. Neil agreed with a nod. 

Hazel set Neil back down on the desk and got back into her position. “Starting again in 3…2…1.” She tapped the record button. “As you can see, he’s reeeeaaaally teeny, say hello to the viewers.” Offering up the bare minimum, Neil gave a straight-faced wave. Though she would’ve liked for him to ham it up more for the camera she was able to play off his minimal reaction.
“As you can see my poor tiny friend is feeling a bit down; he has to get back to his friend all by himself.” Hazel then switched the camera perspective back to herself. “But that’s why ya’girl is going to give her tiny friend a BIG helping hand.” Again, she switched the camera to Neil as she lowered her open hand down, gesturing for him to step on. “All aboard!” 

Repressing the urge to roll his eyes Neil stepped onto her palm. Given he was about to get a lift straight to Grace he should have little to complain about, but having to play along to Hazel’s video as she acted like he was some helpless creature while not inaccurate still stung.

At the very least the fame hungry girl was earning way more brownie points than Ms. Brooks, the former doing him the courtesy of waiting while he found his balance before gingerly raising her hand to her shoulder and waited for him to step off.

“Better grab onto my hair little buddy because it may get bumpy!”

Obliging Neil grabbed onto a few strands of her loose hair using them to help maintain his footing. He didn’t feel comfortable hanging too far out on her shoulder and had to shimmy over closer towards her neck to give himself an added bit of security of something to lean against; much to Hazel’s delight believing it made her look much more inviting and friendlier on video.
“Aw, my little friend feels safer hanging closer to me, don’t you?” She plastered her biggest smile while she rubbed her finger against his back. Again, Neil had to hide his irritation in wake of her patronization and careless caressing which came close to making him lose his balance.

With everything set she held the camera overhead. “Alright, our passenger is set and here we go!” She cheerfully announced.

The first couple of yards she traveled were the most difficult for Neil as he got used to the ascents and descents of her footsteps. The fact Hazel kept a consistent pace however allowed Neil to adapt and maintain his posture without much trouble, though he was suspected that was not out of courtesy to him but so the video wouldn’t be so jerky. The only spotty moments of caution came when she traversed the more congested hallways where some students came dangerously close to bumping into her. Nonetheless for now, he had a reprieve while Hazel let her personality and charisma take the forefront as she padded out the time they were walking by giving her followers updates about what was going on in her life and video ideas she had in the future, including trying to feature her 'little buddy' in more videos.

“We’re almost there everybody, you guys could only imagine how hard it’d be for my tiny friend if he had to do this by himself.” Hazel tilted the camera so it faced the ground showcasing her own footfalls as well as those of the other students walking by the periphery. “He’d be all the way down there at my feet! I probably wouldn’t see him down there while I walked and once I get too close all I'd hear is CRUNCH!” Hazel tilted the phone back to her face where she bore the shocked expression she’d wear if said incident were to happen. “We definitely don’t want that do we little guy?” She rhetorically asked before stopping at the doors to the gymnasium.

“Here we are everyone, this is where we drop our little buddy off!” Hazel said holding her palm for Neil to stand on again.

A red flag entered Neil’s mind as he stepped back onto Hazel’s hand. Grace did not have physical education this semester and he remembered her telling him that she needed her friends to forcibly drag her to the gym before, so this would be one of the last places he'd expect to find her, what was Hazel up to?

“Before we go let’s give my favorite little guy a goodbye kiss!” Hazel announced and Neil visibly cringed knowing what was about to come. Though still bearing her excessively sweet smile, her eyes communicated the simple message of ‘If you know what’s good for you, you’re going to stand there and accept it.’. If it wouldn’t come at the cost of his life, he would gladly tell Hazel to fuck off, but his pride wasn’t worth his wellbeing and given the last couple of days he’s had he could compartmentalize that this was not the worst form of humiliation he’s had to endure. 

Standing docile, Neil waited as Hazel pursed her lips into an obnoxious duck face and pressed them square on his face. “Mwah.” She dramatically emphasized before pulling away with a smirk seeing how her act left Neil flushed in the face was perfect footage for the video.

“Whoops, looks like I embarrassed my little buddy everybody. Maybe I should kiss him again to make him feel better?” She winked at the camera. “Don’t forget to like the video and follow me on Instagram. Bye Hazelnuts!” Hazel dropped the smile in an instant once she pressed the stop button, taking mental notes of the areas she’d likely have to edit. “Hold your pose.” She instructed to Neil as she held out her phone again, summoning her smile one last time for a quick selfie. "There." She said, lowering her device and started typing away.

Now that she wasn’t recording, Neil was free to run his hand down his face and groan at the sight of her uploading the photo to Instagram. If that wasn’t bad enough, his stomach churned as he saw her input the photo description and hashtags. 

My favorite little Hazelnut in the palm of my hand. #GiantWoman, #GiantMe, #LittleMe, #Hazelnuts.

Once the photo posted, the gym doors opened to several students flooding out looking to head to their next class. Hazel keeping on the lookout until she spotted the distinguishable curly ginger haired student she was looking for. “Wait up, hey Ann!” Hazel tailed her down before she walked too far.

“Ann?!” A perplexed Neil repeated. He knew her as one of Grace’s friends, he recalled seeing her in several photos on her Facebook and Instagram account and more importantly as the person she went to hang out with at the party. Why Hazel brought him to her though was making him uneasy.

Turning around the ginger girl greeted the fellow student. “Oh, what’s up Hazel?” Looking down she took notice of Neil and offered him a shifty smile. “Hello there Neil.” 

“Nothing much, he just wants to see Grace REALLY badly.” Hazel emphasized and both girls chuckled between themselves leaving Neil feeling even more out of the loop than usual.

“Is that so? Hand him here.” Ann laughed and extended her arm out.

Sick of being talked about like an afterthought in this Neil spoke up. “What the heck is so funny, what’s up with you two!?”

“Mouthy little aren’t ya?” Ann quipped as she opened her purse and plucked Neil into her hand.

“Hold up! Stop, what’re you doing!?”

“Exactly what you want. Hang tight, we’re about to go see Grace.” She smirked as she dropped the small boy in and closed her bag.