Jake looked over the glossy expanse of his computerized haven, the government-funded laboratory he called home, and couldn’t help but smile with a swelling sense of pride. Growing up a mathematical and engineering prodigy, his family always knew he was destined for great things. However, not even they could’ve predicted he’d be running his own personal mad science project, with the state paying the bills, so the twenty-two-year-old genius could just work on constructing the future.

            He wasn’t alone, of course. This grant allowed him to hire a whole staff if he chose, but Jake preferred to work in a very small team: just himself and one lab partner. Too many cooks in the kitchen, metaphorically speaking, would impede his work. Jake also chose not to hire someone with extensive lab experience, but rather a bright and spunky eighteen-year-old science lover named Julie. The curvy blonde student, smart as a whip and achingly lovely to boot, had done a marvelous job of aiding Jake in the lab over the last year, and he couldn’t be happier to have her around.

            The lanky young man wrapped his lab coat tighter around his slender frame and spun around on his swivel chair. He was here earlier in the morning than usual, but didn’t want to dawdle. Today was a particularly important day for him and Julie. For months, she’d been urging him toward one specific advancement which, if it worked, would evolve human knowledge of biology and physics altogether: a size-changing device. The technology was fine-tuned enough for the first real field-test today. Initially, Jake wasn’t as keen on this invention, instead focusing on other devices, but Julie insisted, and eventually her enthusiasm rubbed off on him. Plus, Julie had a certain way of persuading him in directions she liked best, which ultimately worked out well, so Jake gladly went along.

            In fact, the pair of them had become good friends over the last year, or at least as much as Jake allowed. He hadn’t even known how attractive the girl was upon first hiring her, instead basing his choice off her references and resume, before meeting her in person. Still, Julie was a master of multitasking, able to quickly perform her work without mistakes, while still finding time to cheekily flirt with Jake. At first, he just assumed it to be her playful personality, but as time went by, he wondered if her desires went further. Jake was a man of science, and didn’t want any distractions, romantic or otherwise, to get in the way of his research. Nevertheless, he also wasn’t blind, and steadily found himself noticing Julie more and more, no matter how hard he tried to deny it, given all the time they spent locked in the restricted laboratory together.

            “Good morning!” Julie announced as she entered with a spring in her step. Though she wore the lab coat as usual, the golden-haired whiz had a couple extra buttons undone near the top, allowing her ample bosom to peek through. The girl took a seat beside Jake at the lab table.

            “Morning,” Jake said with a smile, startled by Julie’s sudden entrance after he’d just been thinking about her. “Did you sleep well?”

            “Yes, I did, even though it got really hot in my bedroom last night. I don’t know why, but it was just so stuffy,” Julie nonchalantly explained. She fanned herself, puckering her lips to blow cool air.

            “Ah. But it got fixed?”

            “No, I just ended up taking off most of my clothes,” she shrugged. Her finger tugged at the lapel of her lab coat, and for just an instant teased caused the uniform to tighten around her hourglass figure. She winked. “You know, just pulled it all off, right down to the underwear. Once I did that, I slept like a baby. I highly recommend it!”

            “Y-Yeah, I’ll, um… consider that in the summer,” Jake coughed. He was used to Julie talking like this, and never minded it since it didn’t interfere wit her work, but it also was becoming harder to ignore as a man. When he turned to look at her again, he couldn’t help but imagine Julie’s lab coat buttons popping off, followed by her blouse and skirt beneath, all cascading to the floor, until she was left in her skivvies, revealing her radiant skin, luscious curves, and various hidden assets. Flustered, Jake quickly turned away and pretended to type on his computer.

            “Something the matter, Jake?” she asked.

            “Huh? Oh, no. I’m just thinking about today’s field test. I want to make sure everything’s in place.”

            “It’s all there, just how you like. I triple-checked the numbers, believe me,” Julie encouraged. She leaned nearer to him, resting her cheek against her upturned hand. “It’s going to go perfectly. The thing you’ve wanted to make for so long will finally be real!”

            Jake nodded. Technically, it was Julie who’d wanted him to make this thing for so long, not him, but he also wasn’t against major technologic strides. Indeed, the size-changing device had turned out to be one of his most impressive creations, assuming it worked correctly today. It would serve myriad purposes outside the laboratory, and Jake would again take the scientific community by storm.

            “Do you mind if I grab a snack before we get to work? I didn’t have time to eat breakfast before I came over,” Julie explained.

            “Sure.”

            “Thanks!” The girl opened her purse and extracted a baggie full of multicolored gummy bears. She plucked a green one out, but didn’t toss it directly into her mouth, instead casually rubbing it along her plush lips. “Sorry, I just do better work on a full stomach. I’m sure you noticed already, though.”

            “I did,” Jake said. “Please, go ahead.”

            “Don’t mind if I do!” With that, Julie tossed the gummy over her teeth and sealed her lips. She didn’t begin gnashing the candy between her molars, thought, but instead slurped it from cheek to cheek, pressing it hard enough that a nub shape formed on the outside for just a moment before she pulled it to the back of her throat. With a hard, melodramatic gulp, the girl swallowed the bite whole. A moist glomp sound accompanied the act of dragging the bear into her gullet. “Mmm. I love gummies when they’re fresh and squishy. You always have to eat them before they go stale, or they’re no good. You know what I mean, Jake?”

            “Y-Yes,” he said. He was having a hard time focusing on his computer when Julie was making such a show right beside him.

            “They’re really delicious, but the problem is, they’re so small and basically just made of sugar and jelly, you have to eat a handful at least to feel full,” Julie said. Her fingers dug through the bag again and grabbed another, the color red this time. She teased it against her teeth, only pushing through the bear’s buoyant head, which she nibbled off with her gleaming pearly whites. Her eyes never wavered from Jake, and he was keenly aware of it. After sucking on the gummy piece until it melted in her warm mouth, Julie tossed the body in as well, and gulped it away too.

            Jake pulled at his collar, feeling a little stuffy himself now, and not due to the lab’s temperature. Part of him wondered if it would truly be so terrible to indulge a little, and answer Julie’s constant flirting in kind? Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Julie swallow several more rainbow-hued gummies whole, while her gorgeous brown eyes remained glued to him. It was hard not to picture those gelatinous candies being tossed around the circumference of her pretty mouth, marinated in her saliva, mashed on her cheeks, squeezed under her tongue, and finally nuzzled into the dark tunnel of her esophagus, where it was slowly constricted by the slime and pressure on the way toward her stomach. Such a simple act, and not overtly sexual, yet Jake found himself strangely enraptured by Julie’s snacking.

            The pair sat in relative silence in the lab for several agonizing minutes. The only sound came from the intermittent tapping on Jake’s keyboard, plus the damp, suckling sound effects of Julie’s cheeks massaging her gummy bears into their dank new home. In such a large lab, an echo effect was created from the blonde’s over-the-top eating habits, and Jake could hear slurping and tongue-wagging all around the laboratory, as though the room itself had transformed into a gigantic version of Julie’s mouth.

            “Why don’t we get started?” Jake said, when he could handle it no longer. If he didn’t busy himself with the experiment soon, his self-control would surely be tested. He still felt Julie’s innocent gaze zeroed on him, unblinking, studying his twitching reactions to her sticky snacking.

            “Sounds good to me!” Julie repacked the gummy bag in her purse, which she tucked under the lab table, then gave her waist-long hair a ravishing toss over the opposite shoulder. She licked her lips slowly, her tongue stained with red and green gummy dye, and broke a strand of gooey saliva strung from the roof of her mouth to the basin. A giggle rumbled in her throat. “Lead the way, Jake.”

            “Right. Let’s get to work.” Jake unlocked the storage unit on the opposite counter, removing the case which contained the size-altering device. He set it down on the table. As he unlatched it, Jake couldn’t help but notice Julie’s eyes were big as dinner plates; she was practically drooling with interest in the invention, though maybe that was just residual from swallowing gummies whole.

            “It’s funny, I’ve run a lot of the diagnostics for the simulation tests, but I haven’t actually… you know… learned all the finer details of this thing,” Julie said as Jake picked up the pistol-shaped device from its foam casing.

            “I’m sure you’d know more than you think,” Jake said. “You’ve seen me messing around with it for a couple months now.”

            “Well, sure, but we haven’t talked through how it works beat-by-beat. Don’t you think I should know all the mechanics of it, too?” Julie suggested. “As your lab partner, I want to be able to know as much as I can, and be as useful to you as possible.”

            Jake regarded his eager employee: beaming, beautiful, and hopeful. How could he say no to her, especially when she was so determined to further her own scientific knowledge? He smiled.

            “Of course. So, take a look here,” Jake began. He demonstrated each feature, pointing out the metallic segments while he spoke. “It’s designed to be user-friendly, since theoretically this will have everyday uses, if we can get it to work like I think it will. We want everyone to be able to operate it. So, here’s the barrel, and the nozzle at the end, where the particle ray will be transmitted. Anything it hits directly will have its size altered according to the settings chosen on the touchscreen. Speaking of which, you can see here on the reader how easy it is to select a new size for the subject, either in imperial, metric, or simple fractional measurements. Then of course you have the trigger here. Once the device is primed, indicated by the green light in the corner, all you have to do is take aim, squeeze the trigger, and the energy will flow. The size transition should take place in less than a second.”

            “Wow. That really is pretty simple!” Julie agreed. She reached out, touching the barrel of the pistol. “So what will we be testing it on today?”

            “I thought we’d begin with wooden blocks. After we’ve had multiple successful rounds with those, we can try other such materials. Then, if we’re lucky, in a few months, we may even be able to try it on organic material.”

            “Oh,” Julie sighed, looking disappointed. “You mean we can’t try it on a living thing just yet?”