The journey home is tough for Ben. His mind keeps drifting back to thoughts about his failed bid for the promotion. Whilst waiting at some traffic lights, he bangs his head against the steering wheel.
“Whatever will I tell Ana?” he laments, “I was sure I was the right person for that job. Who could possibly have been more qualified than me?”
Somebody directly behind him honks their horn, snapping him out of his trance. He looks up and notices that the traffic light has now turned green. He speeds off in the direction of the setting sun and soon makes it home, without any further mishaps.
The lights guiding him home reveal an evening city with many happy families, seemingly without money woes. At each set of traffic lights he can’t help but stare and feel envy. Ben thinks back to his own family and wonders how they will pay for things Ela’s college fees without relying the extra money for testing out the drugs for Amazcorp.
“We could really do with that money,” he say, thinking aloud, “but I just don’t know if I want to be taking those medicines.”
As he parks the car in the driveway, he sees, Ana, his blonde haired and blue eyed ‘trophy wife’, talking on the phone in the front room. She wears a huge smile and is pacing about the room, as she usually does when she’s excited and on the phone. What could she possibly be excited about? I hope I don’t ruin her day with my news!
When he opens the door, she join him in the hallway to greet him. She puts the phone down on the shoe rack and leans in to hug him. Being about a head shorter than him, she is able to lean on his shoulder.
“Welcome home dear. Dinner is in the oven,” she says, patting him on the back.
“Anybody important on the telephone?” he asks.
“Some lady calling herself Madam Executive. Obviously I don’t think that’s her real name. Bear with me one moment whilst we finish up our conversation.”
Ben’s heart starts racing. He moves his lips to speak but she has already gone off into the other room to continue her conversation. He hears her talking about the medicines.
“Yeah sorry, Ben just got home,” she says down the phone, “so Friday it is then? Yep, Friday is good for me.”
Whilst his wife finishes up her telephone conversation, he goes off into the kitchen to gawk at the dinner. The oven is on and Ana has prepared a few enchiladas – a classic Mexican dish – for them. The Enchilado cheese she used, is melting nicely all over, creating a thick white blanket of dairy. Ben is almost salivating.
“Ben, dear,” she says, snapping him out of his trance, “I’ve said to your boss, Madam Executive, that she can come over on Friday. I trust this is okay with you?”
He looks at her dumbfounded. She’s coming so soon? Things seem to be moving so quickly. Too quickly perhaps.
“Oh, uh, sure. I guess that’s okay,” he replies, his face filling with dread, “that’s to have us sign the paperwork, right?”
“That’s what she said.”
“Okay. We can discuss this in more detail later.”
“Ela is home for dinner today, so we could discuss the medicines then?”
“Right. Let me go and get changed out of my work clothes and I’ll be back down to help with the dinner.”
“Thanks dear.”
Ben makes his way up the stairs and sees his daughter coming out of the bathroom. Like her mother, she has blue eyes and her hair is blonde, but it’s done up in a ponytail. He waves at her and she waves back. As her mind is focused on her telephone conversation, she doesn’t stop to say “hello”. She continues walking towards her bedroom.
“What was that Jasmine?” she says with a chuckle, as she walks through the door to her bedroom, “You’ve started going on dating websites to find lonely virgins to tenderise?”
Ben shudders as he hears what Ela is talking about. As her voices fades away in the distance, he hears her let out an evil laugh, clearly amused by her friends antics. I don’t know what Ela sees in that girl; all the teachers seem to say about Jasmine is how much of a cruel bully she enjoys being. Of course, they don’t want to expel her because her family has put a lot of resources into the school.
As he removes his work clothes, he takes a moment to look at his figure in the one of the mirrors in the master bedroom. His body is certainly lithe, from all of the years he used to spend going to the gym. Yet, there is very little muscle. Damn, a girl like Jasmine could easily dominate me! And from what Ela tells me, she has never even entered a gym!
Once he has changed into some more casual clothes, Ben goes back downstairs to help finish off preparing the dinner. Served alongside the enchiladas will be a bowl of salad, which Ben dutifully prepares, by cutting a selection of lettuce leaves and some tomatoes. When that’s done, he calls for Ela, the table having been laid whilst he was upstairs changing.
At first she seems to ignore him, so he calls again. Still no answer. He decides to head up the stairs to find her. As he approaches her door, he can hear her still talking on her mobile phone and laughing madly. He decides to wait for a moment, curious to find out what they are talking about.
“Yes, of course I remember how you tenderised little Charlie,” she says to Jasmine, “how could anyone forget that? Poor kid. You fucked him up real good with that strap-on of yours. He never came back to school after that. Hilarious!”
A chill goes down Ben’s spine as he listens to the horrific details of Jasmine’s licentious behaviour. He takes a deep breath and taps on the door. When he opens it, Ela sneers at him.
“Yes?” she says derisively.
“Dinner is ready and getting cold,” he says, trying best to remain composed.
“Sure, I’ll be right down. Sorry Jas, I was just talking to my dad. Keep on describing to me how you want tenderise every nerd in school – I love it!”
Ben walks back down to speak to Ana, who is still in the kitchen. He looks at her with a concerned face. She smiles at him, trying to reassure him.
“Don’t you think Jasmine is a bad influence on Ela?” he asks, “I just heard about something horrible that she did.”
“Hmm, and what was that?” she replies as she takes a bottle of salad dressing out of one of the cupboards.
“It sounds like she loves really, really rough anal sex. Really rough...”
Ana puts a finger on his lips, shushing him. Ben moves to try and remove her hand but she grabs that arm with her other hand gently pushes it back to its resting position. She then gazes into his eyes longingly.
“That’s your concern? That she loves anal sex? We were all young and adventurous at one point.”
“I suppose you’re right.”
As they take in the last few bits to the dinner table, Ela begins her descent – still chatting merrily on her mobile. Ben looks at her sternly but she ignores him. She sits at the table, phone in hand, much to the annoyance of her parents.
“I still can’t believe your mother threatened to sue the hospital into oblivion if they ever spoke about what happened,” says Ela with glee.
“Ela, please!” snaps Ben, “can’t you at least put the phone down when we’re all the dinner table?”
“But dad…”
“We’ve got important things to discuss today, isn’t that right dear?”
“Yes. Come on Ela, this involves you as well. It’s about those medicines we’ve been promised.”
“Oh! Jas’s mother is a big investor in Amazcorp.”
Ben and Ana are taken aback by her statement. The both look at Ela with surprised expressions. Ela smiles at them.
“She is?” he remarks.
“Yeah, Jas’s mum is a good friend of Madam Executive. Isn’t that right Jas?”
Ela taps on her phone to put Jasmine on speaker-phone. The first thing they hear is a sadistic sounding giggle. Then the sultry voice of Jasmine is heard.
“Mm-hmm,” she begins, “my mother has been friends with her ever since they met each other at university. Most of the profits from her own hotel business go into her business. She’s a major investor, yes.”
“Sorry, do you know if the woman has an actual name?” questions Ben, “nobody seems to know what Madam Executive’s name actually is.”
“Oh, they don’t?” says Jasmine in a rather mocking tone, “that’s too bad. Sorry, I can’t help you there...”
“Help me,” croaks another voice down the phone, barely audible.
They hear a feminine growl from down the phone, followed by some heavy breathing. Then, all of a sudden, a loud slap is heard. There is a pause and then a thump is heard, as though something big has just hit the floor.
“Huh? What’s going on?” asks Ben, his heart now racing.
“Sorry, Mr. Miller,” says Jasmine in a sweet as voice as she can, “that was my new toy, you know, like a Furby, except bigger and more human-like. I understand you need to have dinner now, so I’ll say goodbye to Ela and her loving parents.”
The phone promptly clicks off before anybody can reply. Ela places it on table beside her napkin and smiles sweetly at her parents, as if nothing untoward has gone on. Her mother smiles back, seemingly unconcerned with what she just heard down the phone. Only Ben looks concerned.
“Did you hear that?” he protests, “that did not sound normal.”
Ela sighs and rolls her eyes. She then looks at Ben with a grin. He responds with a look of confusion.
“But what is normal?” counters Ela, “who can even agree on the parameters used to define ‘normal’ actually is?”
He looks at Ela and bites his lower lip. Not able to think of a comeback of his own, he looks down towards his plate of food and sighs. Ela grins.
“Okay, let’s talk about the project,” Ana says, as she begins cutting her first mouthful of enchilada, “I’m sure your dad has a few words he wants to say.”
“Oh right, yes, the medicines,” he says, almost coughing, “what does everyone know so far?”
“I don’t really know anything,” replies Ana.
“Ela?” he asks.
“I only know what Jas has told me,” she replies, “and that isn’t much. When she found out we were taking part in this project she told me a bit about them.”
“Oh? What sorts of things did she tell you?” he asks, about to take another mouthful of food.
Ela turns to focus on her mobile. With a few quick taps, she opens up the SMS application and starts to scroll through some of her messages from Jasmine. Ben is about to tell her off for again using her mobile at the dinner table but she starts speaking before he has a chance to say anything.
“I think she said she’s going to test out the medicines too. I said I wanted to take them be taller and to look even sexier, but she said I’m thinking too superficially as they can do more than simply reverse the ageing process. She told me that she doesn’t care much for losing weight and mainly wants to use the medicines to make herself bigger and stronger for self-defence purposes.”
“That’s admirable,” chimes in Ana, “you never know who or what might be lurking in the streets in the evening.”
“Exactly.”
“Interesting,” says Ben, stroking his chin,“I didn’t know the medicines did more than reverse the ageing process.”
“Yeah, the medicines can apparently do more than just make you appear sexier, although they aren’t going to suddenly make you thin. Bigger boobs and a bigger but will certainly cause you to gain weight. Plus, as my personal trainer always says to people, it’s mainly your diet that going to make you loose weight. If you keep on eating the same things you will fail to loose weight. Jas knows that, but then I suppose her plump figure has served us both well so far.”
“Really, in what way?”
“Erm, like protecting me from all those annoying boys. You know the ones mum. She put them in their place.”
Ana nods in agreement. Ben looks at the two women with a worried expression. He lets out a long sigh. It appears they will have all of the fun whilst I have to shrink. Maybe if Ela is the one to convince Madam Executive not to shrink me I won’t get fired.
“Listen,” says Ben, almost whispering, “I’ve been doing some thinking and I’m not sure I’m ready to take part in this project.”
Both women look at him with shocked faces. Ela’s expression quickly turns into one of frustration and she puts her hands on her hips, apparently annoyed at Ben’s words. Ana is more restrained in her disdain.
“Come on dad,” moans Ela, “you know we need the money. You said so yourself. Remember? How are we supposed to pay for me to go to college otherwise?”
“I’ll find a way. I’ll get a second job. Something.”
“Why are you scared all of a sudden? Madam Executive told me you seemed fine to sign your portion of the documents.”
A chill descends Ben’s spine. He scratches the back of his neck nervously. Crap! How does she know about that? Oh right, she phoned home.
“Come to think of it, how did Madam Executive get our number?”
“I don’t know. She just seemed to call out of the blue. When you got home that was the second time today. I don’t know where she could have obtained our number. Do you remember giving it to her Ben?”
“No, that’s why I’m asking.”
Ela waves her hand in front of Ben’s face. He flinches and then shoots her with his best attempt at an angry face and then turns back town to look at his plate.
“We were talking about how much we need the money,” moans Ela, “please don’t change the subject.”
“Ana can you talk to Madam Executive,” says Ben, “if she hears it from you she’ll be less inclined to fire me.”
“Ben,” says Ana with a sigh, “let’s at least talk to Madam Executive on Friday first. She will have more information. Then we can make a more informed decision.”
“Don’t you always tell me not to make rash decisions dad? I think you’re being a bit rash.”
Ben is about to open his moth but stops himself. He pauses to take a sip of his water. Ana and Ela both have another mouthful of enchilada as he ponders their words.
“I guess you’re both right,” he finally replies, “plus, I wouldn’t want come across as hypocritical.”
“Exactly dad. Plus, think of all of the nice things we could buy. Jas always has lots of nice jewellery. You could treat us a bit more with all that extra cash. How much was it again?”
“In addition to my usual salary, we’ve been promised an extra ten-thousand dollars a month.”
“That’s a lot of money which would go a long way dear,” says Ana.
“It is, but I’m still not sure. I agree that we should at least for Madam Executive to visit us on Friday though.”
“Okay, who wants to know about day at school?” asks Ela.
“Sure,” answers Ana.
The rest of the meal is spent talking about more frivolous topics. Once everything has been cleaned and the dishes placed in the dishwasher, they each go into separate rooms. Ana goes to watch her favourite soap opera on the television, Ela goes into her room to browse her social media feeds and Ben sits on the bed of the master bedroom on his laptop.
He has remembered to look up what In-Q-Tel is. What he discovers is fascinating. Based out of Arlington, Virginia, they appear to be an organisation with links to the United States' Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). The CIA has apparently been using In-Q-Tel as a front organisation to fund tech-start-ups and high-tech companies generally. Ben’s jaw drops.
“This is concerning. I must let Ana know,” he says, thinking out loud, “but will she think I’m a crazy conspiracy theorist? That is the question.”
The list of start-ups and technologies In-Q-Tel have invested in is long. Although bio-engineering isn’t really their forte, it is clear Amazcorp is a company producing something which they are interested in; and they have invested in some science projects in the past. Maybe they would shrink operatives in the field?
He sinks into the bed cushions and pushes his laptop to one side. With a sigh, he rubs his face with his hands in despair at his current predicament. He sits silence for a few minutes and eventually decides to keep quiet about In-Q-Tel for now. Maybe I can ask Madam Executive about it on Friday.
Giantess World
Chapter End Notes:
The story will pick up, rest assured. It's slow to start, I know. If you like it so far: a reminder that I am able to be commissioned.