FSE

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Laika, a German shepherd wearing a pair of short shorts and a tube top, was busying herself wandering around the dig site, cataloguing many of the various artifacts that were to be found there. She had been lucky Joey had called her out to help investigate the area. He had actually been out here checking on some strange energy signature that had been detected a few weeks back. He had not really known what he would find out in the middle of the desert where the energy source had been detected, but he certainly had not been expecting to find an ancient city buried beneath the sands. While Joey was good with technology, Laika was better with archeology. So, he had invited her out to help with unearthing the city, as well as his younger brother, Sirus, to help him search for the energy source and another friend of his, Neopuc, that tended to show up where there was a story to be found.

It actually had not taken long to discover the thing, or things really, that were giving off the energy signature. While the city seemed to belong to some primitive ancient civilization, there were the occasional odd objects scattered all over the place. While many of those objects appeared to be damaged, there were some that still seemed to be fully functional. Functional was definitely the word to use since many of the objects had glowing lights woven in intricate patterns all over their surfaces. Laika did not know whether they were just fancy lights or if there was something more to them, but she did know that they were definitely out of place in the much less advanced looking buildings they were in. She left theorizing what their purpose was for to Joey and Sirus while she just tried to figure out why those devices were in these ruins to begin with.

Laika hoped that she would be able to find some clues to those answers in the coming days, especially since the entrance of what appeared to be a major temple had finally been unearthed. They were actually all supposed to go into the temple together, but Laika could see that all three of her fox friends were busy in conversation as they hovered around one of the larger devices they had found. Joey was a brown fox that was looking pretty professional in this setting in his white shirt, black tie, and big round glasses. He thought the look made him appear a little nerdy back in the city, but it also made him look like he knew what he was talking about on an excavation and that made the workers less likely to question his instructions, which was a good thing in Laika's opinion. Sirus, a gray fox, was standing next to him in animated conversation, sporting his characteristic goggles, as well as his blue vest and pants that made him look more like a young adventurer. Neopuc, a red fox that wore a smaller set of glasses than Joey, jeans, and a t-shirt, was there with them and asking the occasional question. None of them were paying attention to Laika at the moment.

It looked like they would be talking for a while and Laika did not feel like waiting for them before exploring the temple. Even though it might have been wiser to wait for them or the other members of the dig crew before exploring the temple, Laika decided to go off on her own for a bit. She felt she was experienced enough to do so without any real trouble. Actually, the temple seemed much safer than many of the other ruins Laika had explored in her lifetime. The structure seemed very stable, especially considering that the temple did not seem like it had seen any upkeep in over a thousand years. It was even fairly well lit, with many of the strange glowing devices lining the hallway of the relatively large temple.

As was expected, various different faded drawings covered the walls of the temple. They seemed to be fairly consistent too. All of them depicted various smaller characters that seemed to be worshiping considerably larger ones. The larger characters in the picture varied, a wolf here, a jackal there, a coyote a little further down, but there was something similar about all the larger characters. They all appeared to be holding one of those odd devices. The one in the picture was a little different than the ones Laika had seen so far though. It was shaped like a diamond with rounded edges and what looked to be the glowing parts of the device were arranged in a different pattern from all the others. Laika wondered what the significance of that was, but she would have plenty of time to figure it out. But, it was probably just some holy symbol or symbol of authority. The larger figures were more than likely either gods or high ranking members of the civilization's society, but it was always possible it could be something much different than she expected and Laika was fully aware of that.

Laika continued exploring the temple for some time. She found plenty of chambers with the occasional odd item that would be interesting for study purposes or would make for nice little museum pieces. There was not much that stood out as being really special though, not until she finally stumbled across what appeared to be the main altar of the temple. It was there that she found the device she had seen in the pictures all throughout the temple. The thing was actually a little smaller than she had expected, only about hand sized really. It still looked fully intact and Laika walked up closer to it in order to get a better look.

While these strange devices that seemed to have drawn Joey to these ruins to begin with may have been fairly common, Laika could not help but notice the device before her was the only one that seemed worthy enough of being depicted in any of their art. Laika could only guess what made this device so important compared to all the rest. Just out of curiosity, Laika reached out to touch the device. It was not like any of the other ones had been dangerous to touch thus far. But, unlike all the other devices, this one reacted when she touched it. The initial part of the reaction was surprising enough for Laika, as the device suddenly glowed blindingly bright, causing Laika to close her eyes and look away as she stepped back from the device.

When Laika opened her eyes again she looked back to the device to see that it had disappeared. Laika looked around where the device had been to see if she had knocked it over and prayed that she had not ended up breaking the thing after a thousand years of sitting there undisturbed. But, no matter where Laika looked she could not find a trace of the device. It was not until she took a moment to calm down and think that she felt something around her neck that should not have been there. Laika felt around her neck and found there was a necklace there now, a necklace that she did not remember putting on. She looked at the jewel tied onto the necklace and found that it was actually a shrunken version of the device she had just touched.

Laika held the device in the palm of her hand, wondering what had just happened. Her first thought was to take the device back out to Joey. He would probably be able to figure out what had just occurred more easily than she could. But, as she was about to head back outside she felt a hand on her shoulder. Laika let out a surprised yelp as her own hand went to the one on her shoulder. The second her hand touched the one on her shoulder, it disappeared. When Laika turned around to see who had touched her shoulder she saw no one there. That was a bit spooky to Laika. At first she had just felt a little embarrassed because that hand must have belonged to someone from the dig crew. Now that she could not see anyone and after the encounter with the strange device she was starting to wonder if something more ominous was present in the room with her.

Laika tried calling out to see if anyone else really was there, but she received no response. She looked around one more time before she decided she must have just been imagining things and started to head outside. But, after only her first step forward she froze in place as she felt something beneath her paw. It was not hard like a loose piece of debris from the temple. What she felt was much squishier and she could feel it squirming in a rather pleasant manner beneath her paw. Laika lifted up her paw, thinking she had just stepped on a bug and received yet another surprise.

Laying on the ground where Laika's paw had just been was a tiny person, no more than the size of Laika's toes. Laika recognized that person too. He was a bear that was a part of the dig crew that she had seen a few times. It suddenly dawned on Laika that the bear was around the same size compared to her as the smaller characters where when compared to the larger ones on all the paintings throughout the temple. To Laika it was pretty obvious that the device she had found was somehow responsible for shrinking the bear, or maybe it have given her the ability to shrink people. That would make sense based on what she had seen on the temple walls. Maybe that was how the civilization had disappeared too. Someone got out of hand and shrank the rest of the civilization.

This certainly was a great power to have and probably would have lead to the person that possessed this device being worshiped in an ancient civilization. The people that did not worship the person possessing this power probably wound up getting shrunk. As Laika thought about the ramifications of someone with this device under his or her control in an ancient civilization she forgot about the bear. But, he made his presence felt again when he started pushing up against her toe and shouted for her attention. Laika looked down at him and smiled at how cute his squeaky little voice sounded to her. She also noticed how nice it felt to have him rubbing against her toe. It was kind of like getting a toe massage without him even realizing he was doing it. Then Laika's thoughts went to how she had stepped on the bear, and it had been with all her weight, without crushing him. Laika became a little curious and decided to attempt a little experiment.

She lifted a paw above the worker and started to slowly bring it down. Once the bear saw what she was doing he only paused for a little while before he attempted to run. His attempt at fleeing only caused Laika to shift the descent of her paw ever so slightly. To her, the bear's attempt to get away was actually kind of cute. She found herself giggling a little as if what she were doing was a game instead of a genuine experiment. Those giggles changed to purrs of pleasure when her paw finally came down on the worker. She felt it as the bear's tiny hands tried to support her weight, to little avail. It was child's play for Laika to pin the worker down and then she started to gradually apply some weight to him.

While Laika did enjoy it as the bear pounded against her padded paw, she was trying to be careful. She did not really want to end up crushing the worker. But, it was hard to ignore just how good it felt to have those tiny hands hitting her paws. Laika had always been one to enjoy a good paw massage and such small hands seemed like they had a lot of possibilities. Despite how much Laika was enjoying herself, she still managed to keep herself under control and she made sure the bear was alright as she kept adding pressure to his shrunken body. Even though his struggles did weaken, Laika never felt anything like a crunching sensation. Laika eventually pinned the worker so firmly against the ground that he could not move, but she still never felt him get crushed beneath her weight.

The experience lost some of its fun with the bear no longer able to move. Laika was sure she had enough weight on him to crush any bug around the same size the bug was now. She lifted her paw off the bear and saw him bounce back to his feet almost immediately. He tried to run away again and that put a smile back on Laika's face as she bent down to scoop him up in one hand. She could hear him screaming to be let go, or rather squeaking to be let go at his size. Instead of letting him go, Laika tried to crush him in her hand. Just like when she had tried to crush him underfoot, the attempt failed and when Laika looked the bear over she could see that he did not have so much as a bruise. For whatever reason, the bear seemed to be invulnerable. This thought excited Laika quite a bit. While she did think that she should at least try to return the bear to normal eventually, for now she was thinking that it might be fun to keep him as a toy, for a little while at least.

Laika's thoughts about what to do with the bear where soon interrupted when she heard someone yell, "Hey Laika? Are you down here?" That sounded like it was Joey. Laika had to think quick. It was a certainty that Joey would want to know about the artifact she had just discovered. Laika thought she might want to keep it a bit of a secret for now. This device just seemed like too much fun to let it be kept stored away in some laboratory for study. Laika made the decision to keep her little discovery, but she planned to turn it over to Joey, eventually.

There was still the matter of the bear to deal with, though. He was a piece of evidence that would be very hard to explain. That did not seem like it would be too big of a problem since the worker was only the size of one of her toes. Laika probably could have just stuffed him into a pocket, but that was no fun at all. Instead, she came up with a more entertaining idea as she looked down at the golden toe rings adorning one toe on each of her paws. Then Laika looked at the bear in her hand and said, "Don't worry little guy, you're in for a fun ride."

The worker just squeaked in surprise as Laika leaned down and pulled one of her toe rings off. Then she held the worker in place against the bottom of her toe as she put the ring back on. As she slipped the ring over the worker she noticed that it was a tight fit, but that was a good thing since she did not need to worry about him slipping out of the ring. He wiggled and squirmed in an attempt to free himself and it was a struggle for Laika not to start purring again as she enjoyed the sensation. Before walking off to meet up with Joey she gave her toes a playful wiggle just to make sure the bear was secured. After she was satisfied she would not lose her new toy Laika set off in the direction Joey's voice had come from.

"Joey, I'm this way," Laika called out. As she walked she found that not only was having the bear constantly squirming against her toe like getting a massage, but she found having the tiny worker there provided a pleasant cushion for her paws. That made her think about what it would be like if she had even more toys to play with. Then Laika remembered what she had thought when someone probably went too far and wrecked the civilization whose ruins she was now wandering through. Laika decided to restrain herself, but she also thought that obtaining just a few more toys really would not do much harm.

When Laika met back up with Joey she apologized for going in ahead of everyone else. Then she started talking with him about her theories for what the pictures on the wall meant and he went about inspecting the various active devices in the temple. Laika neglected to mention anything about the device now hanging from her neck and tucked away in her cleavage to keep him from noticing it. None of Laika's friends noticed her new necklace while they were at the dig site. They were always too busy with other things to do so, whether it was studying new devices or looking into the mysterious disappearance of a member of the dig crew.

A year later...

Sirus turned off the television when Joey and Neopuc entered the room. He had just been watching the news and it was just reporting on the latest disappearance within the city. There had been quite a few of them in the past year, much more so than was normal at least. While it was concerning news, it did get kind of boring after a while to hear about it all the time. They never had any new information on the disappearances either.

It was always the same. Somebody would disappear without a trace, no sign of a struggle, no indication that the person planned on traveling, nothing. None of the victims ever had any connection to each other. The people disappeared in different places throughout the city. None of the authorities could figure out any motivation for the kidnappings. Since no dead bodies had been found and the authorities did not want to start calling this a string a serial killings yet, they were starting to call the kidnapper the "Serial Collector." It was hoped that title would make people believe that those who had disappeared would eventually be found.

Sirus had noticed that all those people had started disappearing around the time they had started digging up those ruins. In fact, that worker in the dig crew had been the first disappearance. That seemed to be too much of a coincidence in Sirus' mind. Joey and Neopuc also thought much the same thing. When Sirus walked up to the two of them he jokingly asked, "You don't think we unleashed some sort of pharaoh's curse on the city do you? Maybe we have some mummy running around sucking the life out of everyone."

"Ha ha, very funny Sirus," Joey responded, "But, we probably did unearth something there. I'm just having trouble figuring out what. None of the devices I've found seem like they have the capability of doing this."

"Maybe someone from the dig site decided to take a pretty artifact home," Neopuc remarked.

"That's definitely a possibility. Probably going to have to investigate everyone who was working there. Maybe that one bear who disappeared made off with something," Joey sighed.

"So we've got some guy running around with an alien disintegrator ray or something," Sirus said.

"We still don't know if that stuff was alien or not Sirus," Joey said.

"Well, I'm leaning towards aliens too," Neopuc said, "Everything else in those ruins did not make those people look like they could build those things."

"True, but I'd like to try and be absolutely certain before I use the aliens explanation for everything that's been happening," Joey sighed.

"That sounds reasonable enough," Neopuc said, "But, we probably should do a little bit of digging around on our own. Seems like the responsible thing to do."

"Definitely couldn't hurt," Sirus agreed.

"Sure, we might as well," Joey said and paused for a moment to think. "I might as well check up on the devices that we brought back with us, try and see if anything is missing. Sirus, how about you go check up on the dig crew, see if anything unusual has been happening around them. Neopuc, you go talk to Laika. She might have seen something in those ruins that we missed that might explain why all these people have been vanishing."

With a plan settled, the three split up and went about completing their tasks. Sirus went to look up the files for everyone that had been working at the ruins, Joey drove off to the secure facility where all the devices that had been discovered were being stored, and Neopuc went to meet with Laika. Joey had quite the drive ahead of him since the storage facility was on the outskirts of the city. Sirus did not have as far to travel to get to his workplace downtown, where all the files were stored. Neopuc had already planned on meeting up with Laika for dinner and her home was within walking distance already. Talking with her about something like this might provide for some good conversation, maybe give him a good idea for a story.

The three promised to keep in touch with each other about what they found out and then they departed for their destinations, Neopuc arriving at his first. Laika was a little surprised and flustered when he arrived earlier than she had expected he would. That was to be expected as far as Neopuc was concerned. She was not quite ready to go out yet and she did not want to keep him waiting. Neopuc tried to calm her down and make sure she knew it was alright to wait a while, explaining, "Don't worry about the wait. I need to talk with you about something anyways."

"And what would that be?" Laika asked curiously.

"Well, Joey, Sirus, and I were talking about those disappearances. We thought it might have something to do with those devices we found in those ruins and we wanted to see if you might know something," Neopuc said.

Neopuc thought Laika looked more surprised than when he had first come into the house. That was a little odd since Laika tended to like talking about these sorts of things. He thought that might just be because she had not expected anyone to think she knew anything about those disappearances. Her look of surprise did quickly vanish, though, as she went on to say, "What did you think I might know?"

"We were hoping that there might have been something in those ruins that you noticed that we didn't. Maybe there was statue or painting that might explain what those devices do besides glowing that might explain these disappearances," Neopuc said.

Laika took a moment to think carefully about her response before saying, "There's nothing that I can think of off the top of my head, but the more technological aspects of things tend to go over my head anyways. That stuff tends to be Joey and Sirus' area of expertise."

"I'm just hoping someone from the dig crew didn't take one of those devices home as a souvenir and then stumbled onto some function of the device that we did not know about," said Neopuc.

"How likely do you think that is?" Laika asked dubiously.

Neopuc just shrugged his shoulders and responded, "I have no idea. Since Joey and Sirus still haven't figured those things out it's difficult to tell what any of them could be used for. We were hoping that something in the ruins might have provided you with some insight about what those things could do."

"Well, like I said, I can't think of something at the moment, but if I can I'll let you know," Laika said.

"Are you sure? I swear I remember something about pictures on a wall with a bunch of small people around larger ones," Neopuc said thoughtfully.

Laika quickly responded, "That's fairly common in ancient civilizations. Larger figures can depict things like authority figures or deities. I can't see how that would have anything to do with those devices."

"If you say so Laika. Here I was thinking that we might be dealing with someone going around shrinking people or something like that," Neopuc laughed.

That look of surprise crossed Laika's face again. Then she nervously laughed, "Shrinking people? Leave it to you to think of something like that."

Neopuc noticed that hint of nervousness and asked, "Is there something wrong Laika?"

"You know, I think I might have just thought of something. Could you come with me into my study?" Laika asked.

"Sure," Neopuc said and followed Laika as she led him through her home. She stopped at a room that Neopuc had not been in for a while. It had used to be a guest room, but Neopuc just noticed that she had kept it closed for the past few months. He also saw that the door locked from outside the room instead of inside. Neopuc was fairly certain it had not always been that way and he tried to think back to when Laika had first changed that. There was something else unusual about the door. The bottom of it looked as well blocked off as a door going into and out of a home. It looked almost like she was trying to keep bugs out of the room, or maybe trying to keep them in. While Neopuc had not paid much attention to the room before, he was starting to get curious about what Laika was keeping in there now.

When Laika did unlock the door and opened it up Neopuc was impressed by what he saw. All the bedroom furniture appeared to have been moved out and in its place was a scale model of the city and its surrounding suburbs. Neopuc had no idea how long it must have taken her to put something like that together, but it must have taken a while. An awed Neopuc then said, "Wow, this is all very impressive Laika, but what made you want to show me this now?"

Since Neopuc was still staring at the city he did not notice just how close Laika was standing to him until he felt her touch him on the shoulder. Then there was a sudden falling sensation followed by a feeling of disorientation. Neopuc's vision went blurry for a few seconds and he had to wait until that cleared up before he could figure out what was going on. What he saw when that happened made him wonder what was going on. He somehow seemed to have gotten outside and was standing well outside of the city, or at least he thought he was until he looked down to see he was standing on a wood floor.

Neopuc gave everything in front of him a more careful look. What had seemed like the city at first now looked a little off, as if all the buildings were fake. He also realized that the light shinning down on the city was not from the sun, but from what looked like massive lights in the ceiling almost impossibly high above. It started to become obvious to Neopuc that he was standing inside of a massive room, the very room Laika had just shown him. And when he turned around he was greeted by the sight of an unbelievably massive paw. The brown furred boulder sized toes on that paw where the same size he was and he could not help but stare at them before looking up a pillar like brown furred leg. Up and up he continued to look until he reached the head of Laika, now towering over him like a skyscraper, and stared at her in stunned disbelief.

"Looks like you guessed right about that whole shrinking thing," Laika smiled awkwardly down at Neopuc, "Sorry about this. I really meant to tell all of you eventually. This is just so fun. I promise I'll only keep you like this for a little while, but I'm sure you'll have fun being my toy until I decide to grow you again, if I figure out how to grow you again."

At that moment Neopuc was not exactly happy to have found out he had guessed right about what had been going on. His mind was racing, thinking about how he should react to the situation. He wondered if there was something he could say to get Laika to undo what she had done to him and then he remembered how uncertain she sounded about her ability to return him to normal. Then he tried to think about all the people that had disappeared and he wondered what Laika had done with all of them. That was when it finally became obvious why the door had been blocked off.

There had to be other people in this room, but when Neopuc looked back at the model city he could not spot anyone, at least not at first. It took a little while, but Neopuc did spot some other figures hiding out in various spots. They were hard enough for him to find at the angle he was currently looking from, but from a giant's perspective they would have been even harder to find. A few of the people Neopuc had spotted were staring right back at him while others were paying him no attention at all and were busy just trying to stay out of Laika's line of view.

Neopuc did not take the fact that they were all hiding as a good thing. While Laika was a friend, Neopuc was not exactly looking forward to finding out what had everyone else so terrified that they were hiding the way they were. Not really knowing what else to do, Neopuc ran. He hoped that his friendship with Laika would keep her from doing anything drastic to him and he also wanted to get out of the room before Laika ended up closing the door. Once that now huge door was closed Neopuc knew he would not be able to get out of the room. Neopuc had hoped that he would be able to take Laika by surprise, but she just giggled and said, "I love playing this game."

Wondering what Laika meant by that statement, Neopuc looked back to see that Laika was slowly walking after him. Of course, with the size difference, a slow walk for Laika was more than enough to help her keep up with him. She had no problem at all making sure she was no more than a step behind Neopuc at all times and that made running even more difficult than he thought it would be. At his size, Neopuc could now feel the thudding of Laika's paws against the floor. It was like little earthquakes were sent echoing through the floor with each booming step. That was not the only thing that made it difficult for him to maintain his footing either. The displaced air from her footsteps was threatening to pick him up and blow him over. Once he fell, Neopuc knew the game would be over.

"You wouldn't really step on me, would you Laika?" Neopuc attempted to ask.

"You're about to find out," Laika responded with an amused chuckle. As Neopuc watched Laika bring her dark padded paw above him he thought that she might just step on him. He tried to scramble back up to his feet, but Laika's paw was coming down too fast. By the time he managed to get up to his knee he already felt the smooth pad of Laika's paw on his back. In no time at all Neopuc was forced back to the ground. He tried to resist as the paw pressed down on him, but he was no match for its immense weight. Neopuc thought the amount of time he had left before he became a stain beneath Laika's paw was about to be measured in seconds. It was hard to believe that Laika really planned to crush him even with her titanic paw weighing down heavily on his body.

Despite his best efforts Neopuc found himself pinned flat against the floor. He expected to pop like a grape at any moment. But, something odd happened. Neopuc found that no matter how much pressure Laika placed on him her paw never became more than mildly uncomfortable. He could tell that Laika now had her paw flat against the floor, could tell that he should not have been anything other than a stain beneath her paw at that moment. Even when Laika started to grind him into the floor he did not feel anything close to pain or feel that his life was in any danger.

At first he wondered if that had something to do with Laika's paw. Now that he was trapped under her paw he was noticing how soft the smooth leathery pads were. There was even a slightly pleasant odor emanating from them. That indicated that she did take good care of her paws, which Neopuc was very grateful for at time. He could not imagine what it would be like to be stuck in the same situation, but with a much rougher and smellier paw. Still, it did not seem like he should be able to survive getting stepped on like he was no matter how soft Laika's paw was. There had to be something else that happened to him besides getting shrunken. And, at the moment, Neopuc was grateful for that extra side effect.

Still, Neopuc wondered just what Laika had planned for him. Since she had all of those other shrunken people Neopuc was fairly certain Laika had to be aware she would not crush him by stepping on him. Then Neopuc thought about those other shrunken people he had briefly seen in the model city and guessed he was probably going to be added to the collection. It seemed like Laika wanted to play a bit more before she bothered to introduce him to the rest of her toys though.

As Laika lifted up her paw Neopuc found he was stuck firmly to it. All that grinding appeared to have been done just to do that. Without all that pressure on him he started to come unstuck quickly enough though. When that happened he fell back to the floor with a soft thud. Fortunately, Laika had not lifted her foot too far up. His freedom from her paw was short lived as it came back right down on him. The only difference was that this time he found himself trapped between her boulder sized toes. The fact that he could not see over her toes really emphasized just how small he was.

Neopuc tried to force the brown furred toes apart, but the only reaction he got was a giggle from Laika. After that she gave him a playful little squeeze, playful to her at least, that forced the air right out of his lungs. Neopuc was fully aware of just how little good struggling would do for him after that. When Laika's toes went into motion Neopuc found him a himself going into motion with them. He was surprised by just how nimble Laika's toes proved to be as Laika used nothing but her toes to move him between one set of toes to the next and back again. It might have been a dizzying experience if Laika was not so good at it, but she probably had a lot of experience with the others she had shrunken.

After a few seconds of being used as a toy Neopuc realized that he might be able to try an escape again. As she was passing him between her toes he was not being held so tightly. That seemed like a good enough opportunity to make a break for it even if he would probably get captured again. But, when he actually did try to free himself from her paw she seemed ready for it. Every time Neopuc thought he was nearing freedom Laika's toes moved in just the right way to keep him in their grasp. Laika's giggles showed that she found the situation pretty amusing while Neopuc wondered just how much practice she had been getting with her other victims in order to get her toes so nimble.

Eventually, Laika sighed and said, "It's been fun Neo, but that's enough playtime for now. I do have some other things I should do, like trying to come up with an explanation for what happened to you for Joey and Sirus." Laika's toes finally stopped moving and gripped Neopuc by his waist so that he could actually look up at her as she talked.

"So, I don't suppose you're letting me go now are you?" Neopuc asked.

Laika laughed in response as she said, "No, not for a while at least. For now I think I'm just going to make sure you get further acquainted with my paws. You're going to be spending quite a bit of time around them now that you are one of my toys too."

"And, uh, just how do you plan to get me even further acquainted with your paws? I would have thought stepping on me would have done that well enough," Neopuc said a bit sardonically.

"You'll see," Laika said with a smile as she pulled some different colored strings out of a pocket. "Which color do you like the most?"

Neopuc thought about not playing along for a brief moment, but he did not think that would do a whole lot of good in the end. He also noticed something that Laika did not at the moment. She had left the door to this room open and while she was busy playing with him there was another shrunken guy sneaking out of the room behind her. Neopuc thought that if he played along with Laika he might be able to keep her distracted long enough to let that other guy get away, maybe get some help. With all the other victims she seemed to have, if all the other people that had disappeared in the news were really here, she probably would not notice one disappearance.

"Green, I think I like that green string the most," Neopuc said after looking over all the strings Laika was holding.

"Alright, green will do," Laika said with a smile, "And it's nice to see you playing along already. It normally takes my other toys a couple of days before they learn to play along properly." Then Laika plucked Neopuc off the ground and held him against the bottom of one of her toes. With practiced ease, she then tied him to that toe with the green string he had selected in a matter of seconds. When she was done she wiggled her toes a bit, as if testing to make sure he was secured tightly. Neopuc did a little testing himself and could tell he was tied securely enough to her toe that he would not be able to wiggle free.

"How's that Neopuc? It's not too tight is it?" Laika asked friendly enough.

"Nope, it feels just fine," Neopuc responded.

"Good," Laika said cheerily, "I know you may find this a little hard to believe right now, but I do want this to be fun for you too. It really wouldn't do for the string to be so tight that you were more worried about it than getting to enjoy being my little paw toy." After that Laika put all her weight on her paw and on top of Neopuc as well. He felt that strange feeling again, of knowing that he should have been crushed by all the weight on top of his body, but only feeling like there was just enough pressure on him to keep him pinned against her paw. Laika flexed her toes against the floor and Neopuc could feel all the power in what should have been a simple enough motion for Laika. Whatever force was protecting him from harm was the only thing keeping him from being a stain beneath the now seemingly giant paw of Laika's. Neopuc had thought that Laika's other toys had started playing along with her out of fear. But now he was starting to think that they had played along because it really was kind of interesting to be able to interact with a being so huge when compared to himself that she might as well have been a force of nature.

"I usually tie one little guy to each toe, but since this is your first time I'm letting you get some alone time with my paw," Laika giggled. Before Neopuc could say anything in response Laika started walking around. What was a simple step for Laika was a much more memorable experience for Neopuc. When her paw moved up it was like he was lifted dozens of feet into the air. That could be a little dizzying, but the ride back down to the ground was faster and considerably more terrifying for the first few steps. The ground would rush at Neopuc as Laika's paw came down and even though she was just taking a normal step, it was like he was being slammed into the floor with near cataclysmic force to him. Just being able to survive that experience was a considerable rush for Neopuc and after her first few steps he found that he actually was having a bit of fun.

Still, Neopuc did not want to be stuck in his miniature state for that long. It might be fun for some afternoon amusement, but getting stuck like this for days might prove to be a problem. He hoped that the other shrunken person had managed to avoid getting Laika's attention. What type of help that person could get was a mystery to Neopuc. There were not many people that would have a clue about what to do. Maybe if the authorities got involved they would eventually get in contact with Joey and Sirus. Neopuc thought that they might be able to figure something out. He also hoped that if the person did manage to get away that he did not just end up as someone else's toy.

That person still had to get out of Laika's home too. Despite how small everyone was, getting under the front door was not going to be easy. Neopuc had already seen it and it definitely looked like it was capable of keeping bugs out of the home like a good front door was supposed to do. Opening the door was definitely out of a question for anyone of Neopuc's size for obvious reasons. So, the only way anyone was getting out of Laika's home was if some normal sized person opened the door. If Laika happened to be on the lookout for any escapees while she left the house that would pretty much put an end to any escape attempts.

Thoughts of escape did start to fade from Neopuc's mind after a few minutes. There really was not much he could do about an escape with the position he was in. It was also hard to concentrate on much of anything while he was tied to Laika's toe. Neopuc was not sure if she needed to walk around the house as much as she did or if she was just enjoying having a little fox acting as some extra padding for her toe. That did not matter much in the end. Laika was going to have her fun and Neopuc just enjoyed it as much as he could too. She also made sure to let him know she had not forgotten he was there, occasionally giving her toes a playful wiggle and giggling as she did so.

Neopuc was starting to feel really used to be trodden upon by Laika when he heard the doorbell. It looked like the escapee from earlier would have his chance to get out of the house if he had managed to make it to the front door by now. He had certainly had the chance to make it that far. Neopuc was certain it had been around an hour since Laika had first tied him to one of her toes. As Laika walked toward the door Neopuc tried to keep an eye out for that escapee. He did not see anything at first, but he did eventually spot someone's head pocking out from behind a piece of furniture near the door and quickly ducking back behind that furniture to stay out of sight from Laika.

Since Laika did not seem to have spotted him yet Neopuc thought he just might have a chance of getting out of the house. It did not look like he was going to get a chance to see whether or not that person succeeded though. When Laika stepped up to the door the weight of her paw on top of him did not really let him look up to see anything. But, as Laika opened the door she lifter her toe up just enough that Neopuc could see some of what was going on. He wondered why she would do that at first, at least until he saw a giant pair of grey furred fox paws. There was a chance it could be someone other than who he thought it could be, but he doubted that.

"Hey Laika," Neopuc heard the familiar voice of Sirus say, "I don't suppose you've seen Neopuc in the last hour or so?" The sound of Sirus' voice was of great relief to Neopuc. If that escapee could get his attention this whole situation might get resolved much more quickly than Neopuc had hoped. Of course, getting Sirus' attention without getting Laika's attention was going to be a little tricky. If Laika noticed him too she just might try to shrink Sirus to keep her little secret like she had done with Neopuc.

"No, we were supposed to meet up to get something to eat, but he never showed," Laika said. While she was distracted talking to Sirus the shrunken man made a run for the door. Neopuc wished him luck as he did so. As the man neared Sirus Neopuc wondered what he was going to do to get Sirus' attention. Then Neopuc noticed that the person was not slowing down at all. It looked like he was going to end up running right past Sirus. Neopuc thought it was possible the person did not want to risk getting Sirus' attention when he might get Laika's attention as well. He also hoped that the person was not just running in blind panic. If that were the case, Neopuc did not think the shrunken man would be trying to get the attention of any of the now seemingly giant inhabitants of this world. That would certainly delay any rescue attempts.

"Really? That's odd. I hope nothing happened to him," Sirus responded to Laika. While he said that Sirus adopted a more thoughtful posture. At his normal size, Neopuc would have barely noticed that. But, at his current size, Sirus changing his stance was a much more grand gesture. His massive paws moved just slightly to him, but more than enough to catch the fleeing person under one paw as he was just running past the gray furred fox. Neopuc did not think that would be so bad at first. It might have even helped to get Sirus' attention, but that was not how things happened.

Neopuc heard a soft crunching noise as Sirus' paw covered the shrunken man. Neither Laika nor Sirus seemed to notice that noise and Neopuc hoped he had just imagined it. Then, much to his horror, Neopuc saw a small trickle of blood leak out from beneath Sirus' paw. That left Neopuc with little doubt that the other shrunken man had been crushed, truly crushed and not just in a playful manner like when Laika stepped on someone. Neopuc wondered why that had happened. Had Laika just practiced how not to crush someone? No, Neopuc knew she had not used any tricks when she had stepped on him and that she had placed all her weight on top of him. There had to be something else going on. It would take some experimentation to confirm, but Neopuc was starting to wonder if Laika was the only one it was safe to interact with since she was the one that had shrunken him. If that were the case it would certainly make trying to get the attention of other people, people that could crush him without noticing, a much more difficult task than he had originally thought.

Even if Neopuc managed to free himself from Laika he knew it would not be as simple as walking right up to Sirus and asking for help. He would have to come up with a plan in order to safely interact with Sirus, or any other normal sized person for that matter. Still, as long as Sirus managed to stick around for any length of time he thought he would be able to get his attention eventually. Then Laika said something that made Neopuc realize he might not have all that much time to get Sirus' attention.

"I'm sure he's fine, but I do hope he shows up later. There is something I really wanted to show him," Laika said.

Sirus asked, "Really? Was it something important?"

"No, nothing important really. I just thought he would be interested in a little collection I have been amassing," said Laika.

Sirus looked at her a little curiously as he asked, "And what type of collection would that be?"

"Follow me and I'll show you," Laika said with a little smile. Neopuc knew what was about to happen and he wanted to warn Sirus, but while he was stuck beneath Laika's toe he really could not do much about anything. All he could do was sit back and deal with being repeatedly stepped on as Laika made her way back to the room with the model city and the rest of her 'little' collection. Neopuc was at least able to scream at Sirus whenever her paw was in the air, but being half the size of a toe, Neopuc's voice did not carry that far.

Upon arriving in the room with the model city in it Neopuc was able to witness Laika spring her trap. It was actually a kind of fascinating process to watch as Laika touched Sirus and the gray fox began to shrink. The shrinking process was fast, very fast actually. If you blinked you would have missed it. Despite the speed, Neopuc still caught enough to make him interested in what happened. Neopuc remembered how things had seemed to blur for a moment while he shrank and he was able to see why that was. It was not just his vision that had blurred if what was happened to Sirus also happened to him. Sirus' entire body seemed to blur for just a moment and it shrank rapidly as it came back into focus.

It was all over in a second. Sirus was left looking just as confused as Neopuc had been when he had first been shrunken. But, like Neopuc, he also figured out what was going on fairly quickly. Sirus did not bother asking questions or running for the door though. He made a dash straight for the model city, hoping to get lost in there with the other shrunken people that he spotted. Upon seeing Sirus' approach those within the city retreated deeper into its shadows than they had before. Sirus made note of the directions that they were heading, thinking that they probably knew the best places to hide.

"It's rare anyone heads for the city instead of for the door. I have to admit you caught me off guard Sirus," Laika said with a laugh. Indeed, she really had been caught off guard despite how easily she was laughing things off. That only gave Sirus a two second head start. Due to their size difference that two seconds could be covered in a single step by Laika. Sirus was not sure what Laika planned to do with him, but he was counting on her wanting to just toy around with him rather than trying to finish him off. If she just wanted to play he thought she would let him get away long enough to amuse her, which he hoped would give him enough time to get lost in the model city.

"Yeah well, you caught me a little off guard too with that whole shrinking thing and whatnot," Sirus called back to Laika in as joking a tone as he could manage.

Laika giggled as she said, "I really am sorry about having to shrink you too Sirus, but I think you are going to make for a fun little toy."

"We'll see about that. You have to catch me first though," Sirus said, a little relieved to hear that Laika did intend to keep him as a toy rather than crushing him or something like that. Still, the thudding of her paws right behind him was not exactly comforting to him. He was also certain that Laika could have crushed him whenever she wanted. It was a good thing that she seemed to want her play to last for a little while since she did let him make it to the city. Once in the city Sirus immediately ducked down an alley he had seen a few other people head down. Laika was close behind him, but she was slowed down a little bit as she tried to avoid stepping on any of the fake buildings in her little city.

Sirus had a hard time spotting any of the other shrunken people in the city at first. It looked like they had disappeared completely. Sirus looked around and tried to think quickly about where they had managed to get off to. Even if Laika did not plan to kill him he still wanted to avoid getting captured. As long as he stayed free long enough he was certain that he would be able to find a way to get help. He had seen that door when he entered the room and he knew that he would not be able to get out once it was closed now. But, if he could ditch Laika and keep her in the room looking for him for a while she might just forget to close the door and then he would be able to slip out of the room, maybe even find a way out of the house entirely.

"Sirus, where did you get off to?" Laika called out. Sirus looked around and saw that he could not see Laika from where he was at. If he could not see her then she probably could not see him. He reasoned that the other people in the city already knew this and they probably had an even better place they could hide in while they were out of sight. Sirus just had to find that place before Laika could find him again. He probably only had a few seconds, but he did not panic and managed to spot something strange in the side of one of the buildings. There was something off about one of the doors in the side of a building.

While this city was a very good model, it was still a fake city. None of the buildings were real and none of the doors looked like they could really open. But, the door Sirus was looking at looked like it had been carefully cut out and put back in place to conceal that fact. When Sirus ran up to the door and pushed on it, sure enough, it did pop right out of place. Sirus quickly ducked into the building and put the door back into place. He did that just in time as he heard Laika walk past just seconds later, calling out for him as she passed.

Inside of the building it was so dark that Sirus could not see a thing. He knew there were other people in the building though. There were some other people breathing heavily not that far away from where Sirus was. No one dared to say a word and Sirus was not about to start up a conversation with Laika still around. There was no need to ruin a perfectly good hiding spot with unneeded noise. Sirus doubted Laika would be able to find this place without the noise. The cracks left behind from cutting the door open should have been very difficult to see for any normal sized person.

Laika did sound like she was walking away after a short while and Sirus hoped that meant she was starting to look in the wrong spot. Still, he did not rush out of the door. He wanted to wait and see what the others did first. Once they decided to leave he figured it would be safe for him to do so as well. Unfortunately, before any of them had the chance to do that the building suddenly disappeared from above them. Laika had somehow found out about the hiding spot and was now holding the building in her hand. The light flooding into the area left Sirus blinded for a second before a shadow appeared above him. He looked up to see a giant paw and something he had not expected to see attached to one of the boulder sized toes on that paw. As Laika's paw slowly descended Neopuc called out, "Hey Sirus, nice to meet you here."

Even though every fiber of Sirus' being told him he needed to dodge that huge paw, but he could not help but stare at the sight of the other fox. All the other people did not even hesitate to get out of the way themselves. That made Sirus think they were used to seeing things like this by now. As Laika's paw fell on him he hoped that he would live long enough to get used to this situation too. He was sure that Laika had to be joking around, that she would not really step on him. Sirus asked himself how else could Neopuc have survived being tied to her toe if she had not been playing around.

As Laika stepped down onto him Sirus let out a little yelp. It was hard to not have doubts that Laika was just playing around when those huge padded paws were pressing down on him. Sirus was forced down to the floor and his face was squished deeply into her paw pads. He heard Neopuc trying to say something to him, but it only came out as a mumble due to the both of them being pressed so deeply into Laika's paw. Sirus figured that Neopuc was telling him not to worry about what was happening. He guessed that because he could feel Laika putting all her weight onto him and the fact that he was not crushed like a bug said there was more going on here than he thought.

Sirus felt Laika grinding him into the ground, her twisting paw rolling him around on the floor. It was actually a kind of interesting experience. Being able to survive something that should have killed him was something worth going through at least once. There really was no pain at all involved with what was happening. Sirus thought Laika was doing something else to make getting stepped on more pleasant than it should have been. There was a faint pleasant scent rolling off her paw and it was also very smooth and soft to the touch. Laika was obviously taking care of her paws exceptionally well, knowing that she was going to be stepping on people with them. Sirus chuckled to himself. He had been shrunken and was probably going to be made a toy, but at least Laika was being nice about making him a toy.

Laika did eventually lift her paw up after grinding him into it very thoroughly. Sirus found himself stuck to her paw for a little while before falling back to the ground. After getting back on his own paws Sirus looked up at Neopuc still tied to her toe. Sirus looked at him questioningly and Neopuc just shrugged his shoulders and said, "Looks like we found the person behind the disappearances. You wouldn't happen to know how to undo the effects of ancient alien shrinking devices would you?"

"Afraid I don't, not yet at least," Sirus responded lightly.

"Alright, I'll just hang out here for a while until you figure it out then," Neopuc said with a sigh.

"I'll try not to keep you waiting too long," Sirus said.

Then Laika giggled as she gave her toes a little wiggle and said, "It's nice to see you two joking around. Makes me feel like having some more fun too."

Sirus looked up from Laika's paw as she placed it back on the ground in front of him, blocking Neopuc from his view. With her so close to him it was actually a little difficult to look all the way up her huge body and make eye contact with her. It was a bit of an intimidating sight, but it was not as bad now that it did not seem like Laika's idea of fun was lethal. Still, he did have to wonder whether this titaness' idea of fun would be all that fun for him too.

"I don't suppose it might be fun to return me to normal, would it?" Sirus asked with an awkward smile.

Laika laughed, "Don't be silly Sirus. I was thinking more like having a game of paw tag."

"Paw tag," Sirus said, "What's that?"

Laika explained, "It's simple. I tag you and anyone else in this city by stepping on you. When the game is over the top eight people who got tagged the most win the opportunity to get tied to my toes for the rest of the day. Well, there would normally be eight winners, but since Neopuc is already tied to a toe I'm afraid there can only be seven winners today."

"Wait, aren't the people that get tagged the least supposed to be the ones that win the game," Sirus objected.

"Of course not Sirus," Laika explained, "The people that get tagged the most in this game obviously like my paws the most and deserve to get to be with them. You are already one ahead of everyone else Sirus. I think you and one of my toes are going to have a lot of fun together." Then Laika lifter her paw above Sirus and he realized that the game was already underway. He tried to run, but he ended up getting mashed under her paw once more. It did not seem all that fair to start off like that and he wondered if she was just going to keep stepping on him like this until he managed to 'win.'

Fortunately, that did not seem to be Laika's idea of fun. When her paw lifted up once more Laika walked off in search of some other people to tag. Sirus enjoyed his little reprieve and took some time to think. While getting tied to Laika's toes did not look like it was going to be lethal it was not something Sirus wished to happen. He would not be able to do anything about reversing the shrinking process while he was tied to a toe. Getting to be a shrunken little fox running around on a giantess' floor might be a fun experience for a little while, but he was certain he would want to get returned to normal before Laika would want to return him to normal.

Sirus tried to find a good enough hiding spot that he thought would keep Laika from tagging him so much. He wished he had gotten a better look at the model city when he was still at his regular size. It would have really helped to have a feel for the layout of the city. Then again, that would have probably only helped but so much. Sirus could already see a few other people running around from hiding spot to spot, being careful to stick to shadows and using hidden entrances. He tried following those people around, but some of those secret entrances were hard to spot even after seeing them being used.

Sirus also tried to pay attention to Laika as she made her way through the city. By the way she was giggling Sirus could tell that she was enjoying herself. It was hard to see her movements around all the other buildings blocking his vision, but he could see her lifting up the occasional building and dramatically stomping down on some group of people or another. Sirus wondered how she was finding them all as he tried to follow another person into a different building. The inside of that building was hollowed out like the first building had been and it was completely dark inside as well.

He wondered how long he would be able to hide in there and he soon found out that the answer to that was not long at all. This time when the building lifted up around him he was not as surprised as the first time that had happened. He tried to run as a paw quickly descended onto him, but found himself get stomped on with about four other people that had been hiding in the building. Then Laika just walked off again in search of others to tag.

Sirus eventually found out that either he was not all that good at this game or that Laika played it often enough for the others to get in a lot of practice. No matter where he hid Laika always managed to find him. There were a few others that seemed to be in the same situation he was while there were others that seemed to be relatively good at staying one step ahead of Laika. Sirus did think that everyone he came across got stepped on at least once and he did not want to think about how many times he got stepped on.

Laika also seemed to have a lot of practice at this game. There were a couple of occasions where Sirus found himself running right under her paw when she predicted where he was going to run. There was that time he had tried to cross a street and Laika had been hiding right behind a building. When he came out in the open her paw had been waiting and Sirus got another up close and personal experience with her soft pads. Then there was an entire building that turned out to be a trap. She had cut out an opening large enough to fit her foot in on one side and on the other side was an opening large enough for only shrunken people. Sirus had hoped the fact that not many people had been heading for that building meant it might keep Laika from being interested in it. He had not thought that was because they were actively avoiding it until he got inside only to find Laika's paw ready to step on him once more.

The final incident for Sirus came when he found his way onto what passed for a main street in this model city. Laika had uncovered a few buildings all at once and sent people fleeing across that street and straight at him. Then Laika walked along the street, her huge paws playfully stepping down on everyone in her path, her stride carrying her along far faster than anyone could run. Sirus also tried to get away from those paws, but he found himself under a giant paw once more. Unlike everyone else, Sirus found himself getting stepped on in between her toes this time. Much to his dismay, he found himself stuck between those boulder sized digits as well. He tried to free himself, but he found that he had to ride through the rest of the game acting as Laika's toe jam.

Sirus hoped that getting stuck between her toes only counted as getting tagged once. But, he could still see Laika's face and he could tell by the way she was smiling that she knew he was there. He doubted that she would let him off that easy since she did not seem to be interested in anything else other than mischief at the moment. Instead of worrying about what he could not control Sirus decided to observe the other players in Laika's little game of paw tag. He was sure in a good enough position to do that. The next time he played this game, if there was a next time, he planned to do much better. It was not like he had to do all that good anyways, just better than eight other guys.

Laika's game lasted long enough for the shrunken people in her model city to start to get tired. At that point it seemed to lose a bit of its fun to her. Unless Sirus was wrong and there was someone who could hide exceptionally well Laika had managed to stomp on everyone in the city at least once. Of course, there were others that she had managed to flatten a lot more than once with her seemingly mammoth paws and according to her rules they were the "winners." Now that the game was over it was finally time to give those winners their reward.

Laika called out the names of two winners and then she looked down at Sirus, still stuck between her boulder like toes, saying, "Sirus, you are definitely the biggest winner of them all. Getting stuck between my toes like that, you must have really wanted to get to know my paws better." She gave her toes a playful wiggle which helped Sirus dislodge himself. Once free he thought about running, but considering how poorly he had just done at Laika's game he was fairly certain he would only make it as far as she wanted him to.

"Yeah, hooray, I won," Sirus said a bit sarcastically, "So, do I win anything besides getting to be tied to one of your toes?"

"Of course you do. You get to pick the color string you want to be tied to my toe with since you are the big winner of the day," Laika said with a pleasant smile.

Sirus sighed, resigned to his fate, and asked, "I don't suppose you have blue, do you?"

A big grin spread across Laika's face as she said, "Of course." Then she scooped him up along with the other winners of paw tag. She took them out of the room with the model city and over to a desk with a box on it that contained nothing but sewing string of just about every color. There were already a good deal of loose threads that appeared to have already been cut to just the right length to tie someone to her toes with. Sirus could tell that this was a game that she had definitely played a lot even if she had not seemed like she had practiced it so much in the city.

The way she was able to tie the other two winners to her paw so quickly was also a demonstration of just how often she did things like this. Then it was Sirus' turn. Laika had reserved a spot right next to Neopuc for Sirus. He gave Sirus a sympathetic nod as Laika secured him to her toe. Fortunately, she did not tie him so tightly to her toe that the string bit into his skin. Unfortunately, he could tell that he was secure enough that he was not going to wiggle his way free anytime soon. That did not stop him from at least trying though.

"Welcome to the party pal," Neopuc said as he watched Sirus.

"So, I don't suppose you have figured out a way to get free?" Sirus asked the other fox.

"Nope," Neopuc said, "All you can do is sit back and enjoy the ride. Shouldn't be hard to do considering this isn't exactly a nightmare situation for either of us. Laika's nice enough to keep her paws well cared for too, so no bad smell or anything." Upon closer observation Sirus did notice those things as well. There was the faint flowery smell wafting off Laika's paw that he had noticed before and the pad of the toe he was tied to was smooth and soft to the touch. When Laika started walking around her house, doing whatever she needed to do, that helped to make things considerably more pleasant. This was going down more like a paw lovers fantasy rather than like a more realistic scenario, which was definitely a good thing since the realistic scenario would have ended up with him being a stain beneath her toe.

Then a thought occurred to Sirus and he asked, "Uh, hey Neo, do you think Laika keeps her paws this nice on her own or do you think we'll have to help out with that?"

Before Neopuc could respond they both heard a giggle from above as Laika interrupted their little conversation, "Why wouldn't I let you help keep my paws clean? It helps all my favorite little toys and my paws get to know each other better."

Sirus considered the fact that Laika had quite a few other shrunken captives, around two dozen if he had been counting them right during the game of paw tag. But, they were all only around the size of marbles. That was a lot of paw to take care of. Sirus thought back to the game and did not remember seeing a single fat person there. Everyone looked fairly fit and with the activities that Laika seemed to have everyone participating in it was no wonder why that was.

Neopuc and Sirus gave each other a look as they both realized that at the same time and Neopuc said, "Oh joy, I'm sure looking forward to that."

Laika ignored the sarcasm in his voice and responded with a gleeful laugh, "I'm glad to hear that because my paws are scheduled for a thorough cleaning tonight."

Sirus and Neopuc shared a resigned sigh and decided to sit back and relax. If what Laika said was true they had a good deal of work to look forward to later in the night. It could have been worse though. At least they did not have to help dig through more ruins like the one Laika had acquired her new found powers in. It looked like they might get some additional help too. About half an hour after Sirus had been tied to Laika's toe they heard a knocking at the door.

"And that would probably be Joey, wondering where the two of us are," Sirus said. That assumption turned out to be correct when Laika opened the door to reveal their third friend.

As some small talk followed Sirus asked Neopuc, "This is exactly like how it happened with me, isn't it?"

"Yeah, exactly," Neopuc said with a hint of hesitation in his voice. He chose to omit the fact that Sirus had stepped on a shrunken escapee, discovering that Laika was more than likely the only normal person it was safe to interact with in the fashion they were now. Besides that, things did go just like before. The small talk lead to Laika leading Joey through her house, then to the room with the elaborate model city in it. There, Joey was so surprised by the model city that he did not notice what Laika was doing behind him. All it took was a touch. Joey blurred out for a moment and then he was no taller than the size of Laika's toes.

As he stood there stunned Laika moved to step on him in the same playful manner she had done with Neopuc and Sirus. He looked like he would have run if he had not seen the two of them tied to her toes. That was enough to keep him frozen in place as he looked quizzically at the strange sight while Neopuc and Sirus both said, "Hey Joey."

Laika's paw came down with Joey right between the toes that Sirus and Neopuc were tied to. Those toes easily trapped the fox while Sirus and Neopuc noted that was probably no coincidence. After seeing what she was capable of they guessed Laika was probably making sure they could all have a little reunion. And sure enough, Laika said, "Sorry I can't play with you longer Joey, but I think I may have played around a bit too much already today. Neopuc and Sirus should be able to fill you in on everything you need to know."

Joey did get over being stunned by the situation he was in quickly enough to listen to Neopuc and Sirus explain things to him. They explained the obvious part about Laika being behind the series of disappearances in the city, that she had turned into some sort of serial shrinker that was amassing quite a collection of shrunken captives. Then they discussed how it probably had something to do with the artifacts that they had all discovered at that excavation site. Neopuc also explained how it was safe to interact with Laika but how other normal people could still harm them. Then the discussion finally turned to how they could return themselves to normal.

"So, do you think there is any way the two of you could figure out how to undo all of this?" Neopuc asked.

"I suppose," Sirus said a bit doubtfully, "But without getting a good look at the artifact that gave Laika her powers I don't know that for sure. I don't even know if she even still has the artifact with her."

"She does," Joey stated confidently. The other two foxes looked at him, awaiting further explanation. "I saw her wearing a necklace and there was an object poking out of her cleavage for me to see it. The entire thing was not visible, just enough for it to remind me of something. Now that this has happened, I'm sure it was a smaller version of the other devices we found."

Neopuc responded, "I never even noticed that. Good catch Joey. Now all we have to do is figure out a way to scale someone that is a few hundred feet tall compared to us so you can get a look at the device. Oh, and we also have to go crawling around in Laika's boobs without her noticing us long enough to figure out how to work a shrinking device that we have very little experience with."

"That sums things up nicely," Joey said with a smile, "I'll say we get back to normal in a day or two." Neopuc and Sirus both laughed a little at that remark. All three of them continued discussing plans since they really could not do much else while they were still prisoners of Laika's paw. As Laika promised, they really did have quite a bit of time to get to know her paws since it took a few hours before Laika was willing to free them. In that time each one of them did get to know the specific part of her paw that they were stuck to rather well. They became aware of the way muscles flexed as her paw pressed down, lifted up, flew through the air, and descended to the ground once more. It started to get easy to predict just how far they would be pressed into Laika's flesh depending on what type of surface she walked on. Then there was the way they would be rubbed against her paw when she pivoted her paw against the floor. None of it was unpleasant and it did make for an entertaining ride that actually was kind of soothing after getting used to the motion of Laika's steps.

The three foxes thought that their time tied to Laika's paw would soon be coming to an end as she returned to the room with the model city. That turned out not to be the case. They were only able to catch brief glimpses of what went on while they were in that room since they spent most of the time pinned against the floor by Laika's paw. But, they were able to see her gathering up a couple other people before she exited the room. From there Laika quickly made her way to her room where everyone was finally freed from Laika's paw, temporarily at least.

After being untied and plucked from between her toes they all found themselves gathered up and dropped at the end of Laika's bed. Laika sat down on the bed next to them and yawned and stretched a bit before saying, "Alright, Joey, Neopuc, Sirus, since you're new I'm letting you know that you know have a choice. You can either spend the night tied to my paws or you can give me a paw massage until I fall asleep. If you opt to give me the paw massage you can go to sleep wherever you want after I fall asleep. I personally like it when my little toys choose to sleep on my paws for the night by the way."

"Why give us the choice?" Joey asked.

Laika just shrugged her shoulders and said, "While I do like to go to sleep with a good paw massage I've found that my toys get tired faster than I do some days. So, if they are really that tired I can just tie you all to my paws again and toy around with you myself until I fall asleep and none of you have to do that much work."

"That's nice enough of you, I suppose," Neopuc chimed in.

"See, I can be a nice owner," Laika said with a pleasant smile and gave Neopuc a little pat on the head. Then she stood up and started getting ready for bed. "You can make your decision once I'm ready for bed."

While Laika made her preparations the three foxes discussed what they wanted to do. They kept their voices hushed as they talked while the others that Laika had captured seemed to be readying themselves to give Laika her a paw massage. Getting tied to Laika's paw was probably not a good idea. They needed to be free to see if they could get to the device that Laika had used to shrink them. While being tied to her paw would leave them more rested than a paw massage would have, Laika just seemed too good at tying people to her paws. It would probably take them the better part of the night to get free, if they could get free at all. They would have to give Laika that paw massage and hope that they did not exhaust themselves so much that they ended up falling asleep along with Laika.

The three foxes where in for a little surprise when they found out that Laika planned on sleeping in the nude that night. Laika was pleasing to the eyes, but they only got a brief look at her before she crawled under the covers, grabbing up all her toys and stuffing them under the covers as she did so. It was dark under those covers, but enough light filtered under them for everyone to see by. They made their way down to Laika's paws as she laid on her belly, making it easier for everyone to climb up on her paws with them laying pads up.

From there the three foxes just followed everyone else's lead and started massaging. They discovered that pressing into those thick pads was a bit more difficult than they thought it would be. While Laika had been walking they had pressed into it easily enough, but without the weight of the rest of her body it was taking some real effort to press into those paws. That was making things more tiring than any of the foxes thought it would be, but once they observed how the others were doing things they were able to settle into a rhythm that seemed to help out a bit.

There were a dozen people working on Laika's paws altogether. While that did help out some that was still a lot of paw for people that were under an inch in height. If the foxes had been forced to give those paws a massage all on their own they were certain they would have been too exhausted to do anything afterwards. The help they were getting was just enough to make the experience a little tiring rather than completely draining though. Actually, with the help, it was possible to enjoy the situation a bit since this was exactly the type of situation a few of the people on Laika's paws had wanted to find themselves in, in their fantasies at least.

Everyone was once again reminded that it was a good thing that Laika had such smooth pads. That made them much easier on their own hands as they continued to massage them. There were little wrinkles, folds, and valleys scattered all over her paw, but they were not a problem. Joey, Sirus, and Neopuc all noticed that the others on Laika's paw seemed to be using those features as landmarks to find her most sensitive spots. They were often rewarded with little rumbles of pleasure from Laika. The three foxes had to go with a bit of trial and error as they worked. Both Sirus and Neopuc managed to hit ticklish spots that made Laika giggle and wiggle her toes, threatening to dislodge the people on her paws. Joey managed to hit a spot that made Laika groan in a way that certainly seemed like much more than a relaxed groan. He seemed like he was contemplating playing around with that spot a bit more until Neopuc gave him a 'stop playing around' glare. Joey just smiled and moved on, but made a mental note of that spot for later.

Everyone continued massaging Laika's paw for as long as it took for her to fall asleep. That took quite a while too. In the time it took Laika to finally drift off it seemed like everyone had time to go over every last inch of her paw. The pads on the ball of her foot had been covered, the pads on her toes too, they had managed to do the furry parts of her paws, and the more experienced people had even managed to get in between her toes, as did the three foxes once they had been shown how to do it in a way that Laika enjoyed.

Even though they could not see Laika's face they could tell when she fell asleep easy enough. Her entire body just seemed to relax as she drifted off into a deep content slumber. That relaxation could even be felt by the tiny people on her paws. While the three foxes wondered if they should wait around and not move for a while to let Laika drift into a deep slumber, the other little people climbed off her paw immediately. They took that as an indication that they did not have to worry about waking Laika up. With Laika asleep they also wondered if they might be able to inspect the device still around her neck. But, the other people that were with the foxes seemed to have other plans in mind.

"Hurry up, we need to climb down the bed and meet up with the others," one of the shrunken people, a tallish wolf, tall for one of the shrunken people, said to the foxes.

"Why do we need to do that," Sirus asked, "Is Laika a violent sleeper or something?"

"Nothing like that," the wolf responded, "We've been planning an escape attempt and tonight's the night."

The foxes shared a look and Neopuc said, "I don't think that's such a good idea. You see, it's probably not safe to venture out in the open with other normal people since..."

"Since you're friends with the dog," the wolf interrupted. "You wouldn't be planning on ratting us out to her would you?"

All of the foxes noticed everyone else glaring at them a bit ominously. Then they shared a look with each other before Sirus spoke up, "Nah, we wouldn't do anything like that." None of the foxes bothered saying what might really happen. From the looks that they were getting it was unlikely they would be believed anyways. They were just going to have to go along with the others for now and just try to keep anybody from getting killed.

Keeping everyone from getting killed looked like it was not going to be all that easy either. The group of shrunken people were even better prepared for the escape than any of the foxes had thought they would be. They meet up at a pre-designated location with all the other shrunken people, where the foxes found out that they had already managed to cut a few holes in the walls of Laika's home that lead right outside. The foxes had hoped that they would be unprepared for the climb down the stairs. Laika lived on the tenth floor of an apartment complex. Of course, there was also the chance they could have used the elevator, but that would have been risky at the late hours of the night they had chosen to escape. Lakia was just as likely to wake up and use the elevator as anybody else on her floor. So, they had chosen to use the stairs and, much to the foxes dismay, they had managed to fashion the climbing equipment needed for the climb.

They managed to make it to the stairs without any incident and everyone seemed in good enough shape to make the climb downstairs. Things went well enough for the first couple of floors. No one even seemed winded yet from the climb. Unfortunately, despite how late it was, someone came stumbling up the stairs. That someone seemed to be very drunk, certainly too drunk to notice a group of toe sized people climbing down the stairs. At first the only people in the group to react to the drunk giant raccoon's presence where Joey, Neopuc, and Sirus. While everyone in the group was practiced at dodging giant paws, they just did not see the need to do so now. They thought they were invincible after all. The three foxes tried to warn them that they might get stuck to the raccoon's paw and end up even further upstairs. That seemed to work and everyone tried to make space for the raccoon.

It had taken some time to convince anyone to do anything about the raccoon. He was only a couple of steps away by the time everyone tried to get out of his way. Dodging his paws was not going to be as easy as it was with Laika either. His drunken swaying was making it very difficult to predict where his paws were going to land. But, even with all that, the three foxes did not have much of a problem. They had long since huddled against a wall and would have had to be very unlucky to be stepped on. If not for how quick the reflexes of some of the others were they probably would have been stepped on. Everyone did manage to stay out from under those paws too, but a couple of people did take glancing blows. Do to the phenomenal size difference between those people and the raccoon they were sent flying through the air and right over the edge of the stairs. They fell screaming down the stairwell until they could no longer be heard.

Everyone except for the foxes seemed to shrug that off as not being all that important. They thought those people would just fall all the way to the basement. That was going to be inconvenient since they did not have any climbing equipment and would not be able to get back up to the ground floor and out of the building. They thought they would be able to send for help once they got someone's attention though. Only the foxes realized that those people had just fallen over eight stories when they were only around the size of pebbles. The chances of them surviving that fall where practically nonexistent. Keeping everyone safe was starting to seem like a much more daunting task for the foxes. While everyone did seem like they had the skills to survive thanks to their games with Laika, they were just so used to being invulnerable that they were now entirely too careless in a world of giants.

It was a very fortunate thing that no one else used the stairs that night. That made getting down the stairs easy enough and to the ground floor easy enough. Some people even tried calling for the people that had fallen into the basement since they felt they had time. When neither of the people that had fallen responded everyone just assumed that they had tried to find some other way upstairs to the ground level. Getting out of the apartment building might have been a problem if the door had not been left slightly ajar, most likely by that drunk raccoon from earlier. All anyone had to do was simply walk through the opening and they were back in the great big outside world for the first time since any of them had been shrunken.

While some parts of the city were still busy at this time of the night, the area around Laika's apartment was not one of those areas. Everything was pretty quiet, a fact for which all three foxes were very grateful. The other members of their group did not seem to realize just how fortunate they were as they set off on their journey away from Laika's apartment. They seemed more concerned about getting some distance between themselves and Laika than actually acquiring some help at the moment. That made some sense to the foxes. They wanted to go someplace where they could take their time getting help and did not have to worry about Laika stumbling onto them right away when she eventually came searching for them. The foxes just hoped they would be able to find that help before disaster befell all of them.

Despite their small size they did manage to make it a few blocks away from Laika's apartment in a reasonable amount of time. The sun was probably an hour or two away from rising and the city still was not all that active. If they could make it a few more blocks Laika really would have a hard time finding them. Joey, Neopuc, and Sirus also noted that it would probably be that much harder to make it back to Laika in the event of an emergency, but they kept thoughts like that to themselves for now. They had not noticed any signs that the people they were traveling with doubted their invulnerability yet and they probably would not until they saw something go wrong with their own eyes.

The incident that would start to open everyone's eyes to the truth did not take that much longer to happen. They were all crossing a street when the first moving car they had seen that night started coming down the road. Most of the shrunken people in the street were positioned so that they would be in between the cars wheels when it passed over them. A few of them were not in so fortunate a position and they were not doing much to change that situation. They just had such an air of confidence that they would not be harmed and they seemed to think that getting stuck to the car's wheels would probably just help them get even further away from Laika. The three foxes tried to warn those people to get out of the way anyways, but their warnings went unheeded.

In an instant, the car roared past, buffeting everyone with powerful gusts of wind as it did so. The force of that wind was enough to knock over a few of the people, but that was nothing compared to what happened to those that car ran over. No one noticed the crunching noises made by the tires crushing those unfortunate people that had been in the car's path. While the foxes were a little happy to be spared having to hear that noise it did not make convincing the others to look and see what had happened any easier. What was left of those people was little more than a red stain in the road with bits of gore here and there that should have been enough to convince everyone else that they were not invulnerable. Unfortunately, everyone in the group was more concerned with moving forward than listening to some foxes that they thought were just imagining things in the dark.

At that point the foxes started to grow very worried. It was like the group they were traveling with were making a conscious effort to ignore the fact that they really were as vulnerable as any other bugs in a world full of giants. They wondered just how many of these people would have to suffer fatal accidents before they finally realized the danger they were in. The thought of just sneaking off and trying to get back to Laika crossed their minds, but the foxes did not want to just abandon these people since it was their friend that shrank these people. So, they chose to stick around for now and try to find some way to convince these people of their own mortality.

Regrettably, some people seemed to have to learn things the hard way and as the foxes already knew, the hard way tended to be fatal for people that were not even close to being ankle tall when compared to everyone else on the planet. It was not long before the next accident happened. While the accident should have been easily avoidable no one but the foxes thought they needed to avoid it. That accident happened to be in form of a group of friends, three wolves, a jackal, and a husky, that looked like they were stumbling home together after a night of drinking. While the others in the group did not see much of a problem, the foxes saw ten titanic bug crushing paws walking down a sidewalk right in their direction. All anyone really had to do was stick close to the buildings along the street, but the foxes were the only ones that saw the need.

"This is going to be a massacre," Sirus said.

"Yeah, but what can we do about it. It's not like anyone's willing to listen to us yet," Neopuc sighed.

Joey looked like he was trying to think of something and then just shrugged his shoulders, "Not much we can do, but let's at least try and save a few of them."

"And how do you propose we do that?" asked Neopuc.

"Try and wait for the right moment and then just grab somebody and try and drag them out of the path of those giants," Joey explained. Picking that right moment was going to be the thing. It was not all that simple. If they tried to do anything too early the rest of the group would probably respond by fighting back. Should that happen they could find themselves being restrained and stuck in the path of the giants. If they waited too long they might not have the time to drag anyone out of the way before those mammoth paws turned everyone into paste.

The foxes tried to pick their targets carefully. They looked for people that looked like they could actually grab and force aside while making sure that they were close enough to the edge of the group that they would be able to get out of the way quickly. Then they waited until the group of giants was only about three of their enormous strides away before they finally made their move. It actually helped that the other shrunken people tried to scream and wave to get the giants attention. No one even noticed the three foxes grabbing three members from their group and dragging them aside with all the noise they were making. Things were not going all that smoothly for the foxes, though, as the people they were trying to save were really putting up a fight. However, the massive steps of those giant paws coming right at them gave the foxes quite a bit of motivation to move very quickly.

Sadly for the shrunken people trying to get the attention of the normal sized people, they just were not loud enough to be noticed by anyone not already paying attention to them, especially not with the group of normals engaged in a boisterous drunken conversation. The foxes did not know what a group of drunks would have done with a group of shrunken people if they had noticed them. It may not have been such a good thing, but it had to be better than what happened to most people in the group as the blissfully unaware giants strode right into the group of shrunken people. The three foxes managed to get out of the way just in time, but they were still close enough to feel the gusts of wind generated by the mammoth paws as they passed by. They were also close enough to clearly see the unimaginable carnage that occurred, as were the three people whose lives they had probably just saved.

No one bothered to dodge the paw that came down in the group on three of the people. One second they were there, and the next a white furred wolf paw was where they had once been. A series of crackling noises echoed through the air as their bodies were crushed in an instant and the other shrunken people just stared at the source of that noise, trying to understand what could have caused that noise but refusing to believe what they knew had to be true. The group of shrunken people did not have the time they needed to accept and react to the reality of the situation they were in. Those giant paws were already upon them and everything would already be over in the seconds it would take them to realize that they needed to run.

The foxes could only watch as the group of shrunken people just stood rooted in place as those titanic paws decimated the group. There were a couple of people crushed under a gray wolf paw, a little bit of gore spraying from beneath it as it flattened them. Nearly a half dozen people were crushed beneath the jackal's paw, one person being crushed beneath a boulder sized toe alone. One unfortunate person found himself right beneath one of the husky's claws as it came down. That well cared for sharpened claw cut that person in half from head to crotch in the blink of an eye. There was someone that managed to initially survive getting caught in between the toes of a black wolf, but as that wolf flexed his paw in preparations for his next step the added pressure made that person pop like a grape. The person Joey was holding seemed to struggle more with holding in his meal after that than fighting against Joey anymore.

While the scene of death did not last long it was certainly gruesome enough. Those paws were just so large and the people were so small. The giants never even bothered to look down either. What did they care about stepping on a bunch of bugs? None of the shrunken people found the nerve to move until the first gore covered paw passed overhead, with some of their shrunken companions stuck to the leathery pads of those paws like grotesque pieces of gum. It was far too late to move by then. People were crushed by more of those paws as they panicked, everything they had learned from dodging Laika's paws fleeing their fear filled minds as the realization that their lives were on the line finally struck home.

The people did not seem to know where to run, surrounded by the mammoth paws like they were. Fleeing seemed to do them no more good than standing in place had done. More lives were snuffed out in an instant as one giant paw or another fell on top of those people. The crunching sounds of bones being reduced to dust and the popping noises organs and flesh made as they burst seemed to go on forever in the minds of those that still remained, but it could not have lasted for more than the few seconds it took for the inebriated titans to pass. What was left of the victims of those giant paws was not something the few survivors wanted to look at. It was better if only stains had been left behind, but there was more gore left behind than anyone would have liked. The stunned survivors tried to avoid eye contact with that gruesome stuff as they made their way out of that grisly horror show. There were barely any people left to avoid making eye contact though. Counting the foxes, there were only nine people left from a group that had once numbered in the dozens.

After that incident it was not difficult convincing the others that they were not invulnerable, at least when it came to interacting with anyone other than Laika. That did not make deciding what to do next any easier for the other shrunken people. While the foxes argued returning to Laika was a good idea, the others were not so certain about that. They did not want to spend the rest of their lives as her toys and the fact that they were still in a state of shock at what they had seen seemed to be clouding their thinking. Joey explaining to them that getting to the device around Laika's neck was probably their only chance of returning to normal just did not seem to sink in. They just wanted to get away, to find someplace nice and quiet where they could collect their thoughts and think about what to do next. The foxes decided to go along with them for the moment, hoping that once they calmed down they would be more reasonable.

One good thing did come out of that tragedy. They were all willing to be much more careful now. No one else dared to get in the path of any other giants that they came across. Not everything went the way the foxes would have wanted it to, though. The other people just could not be convinced to return to Laika's home. Instead, when they came across an apartment building they decided to go inside. It was nearing sunrise and people were going to be waking up soon. They hoped to get in contact with somebody in that building while they were waking up. None of the foxes thought that was a good idea, but the others did not seem inclined to listen to them.

Getting inside the apartment building was not the least bit difficult. The early risers were already heading off to work and it was not difficult slipping into the building when one of those people exited the building and the door closed slowly behind him. It would have been better if they had to make a long climb to find a specific apartment to get into in the minds of the foxes. They had hoped they would be able to talk to others out of their present course of action during the climb. Unfortunately, there was an apartment with a door missing its sweep right on the ground floor, leaving just enough room for their group to slip in beneath it.

The foxes hoped the occupants of the apartment had already left for the day. At least they thought there were multiple people in the apartment. It was dimly lit as light filtered through closed blinds, but everyone could still make out numerous pictures of the young couple that seemed to live here. That couple looked like a female arctic fox and a male dingo. There were no signs that either of them were active at the moment, but everyone was being cautious and assumed that at least one of them might be walking around somewhere in the house.

The shrunken people made their way carefully to the apartment's bedroom, and much to the pleasure of the everyone, they found that the giant couple was still asleep. Why that was to everyone's pleasure was for different reasons. The foxes were happy that no one was awake and walking around that could step on them, but the others were happy that they could get into position to get the giant's attention easier. Once again, the foxes did not think that was a wise course of action, especially after they found out the others wanted to climb up the bed sheets and get as close to the giants' ears as they could in order to scream for their attention. Sleeping or not, those titans were still dangerous, especially since all it would take was for one of them to roll over to crush everyone.

Even after explaining that to the others they still insisted on getting in contact with the couple rather than going back to Laika. This time the foxes opted not to follow the others. If they tried to force the issue it would only be six on three now, still not good odds for the foxes, but probably even enough that no one could easily force them to do anything. So, the others let things be and the two groups split up. The foxes would have liked to help the others, but when they chose to get that close to the giant couple there really was not much they could do. But, they did not want to completely abandon their shrunken companions. While the others started climbing the sheets, the foxes started climbing a lamp's power cord up to a nearby nightstand. There were enough things there to hide behind if they really needed to and they would be able to keep an eye out for danger and warn the others if they had to.

Both groups reached their destination around the same time without incident. The foxes hoped nothing happened to the others and they did wish them success. Their luck did not hold out for long. As the others were walking up the bed to the giant couples heads an alarm clock went off. The titanic couple started shifting around in bed causing the sheets the shrunken people were walking on to shift violently. It was enough to knock most of the people off their feet and a couple of them were even thrown completely off the bed. They did have a hard landing on the floor, hard enough that one of them was left bleeding and unmoving, most likely dead, while the other one just seemed to be moaning in pain.

Since the clock was right next to the foxes they chose to back away from it as the white furred hand of the arctic fox tried to turn it off. They were happy they had done that as the half awake fox was not all that coordinated at the moment and her hand seemed to hit every area around the clock but the clock itself. That hand could have easily crushed all of the foxes, but they seemed to be just out of reach. The clock itself was not so lucky as the giant arctic fox accidentally knocked it off the bed stand. Even more unlucky was the shrunken person still living on the floor that the clock fell on top off. Actually, it only fell on half the person, but the weight of the clock was more than enough to leave that half of the person crushed as flat as a piece of paper. While he had survived the fall he certainly had not survived that.

The foxes did notice that the four others that remained on the bed seemed to be doing fine. They could not keep track of those people for long, though, as the giant couple threw their sheets back and covered up the tiny people on their bed. It did not seem like those people should have been harmed by just having sheets thrown over them, so the foxes assumed they were still alright as the giants moved to get out of bed. There was even a good chance those people would have been noticed if the dingo and arctic fox had started to make up their bed. But, the giant couple went about doing other things, flirting with each other a bit as they did so. To the shrunken foxes they sounded like newlyweds and they seemed to have the energy and vitality that such couples did. That was why their flirtatious talk soon turned into something much more as they moved back to their bed, seemingly determined to have a quick round of morning sex before getting ready for work.

The four people that were still trapped on the bed were unaware of any of that. They had just barely made it out from under the covers. The three foxes tried to shout a warning to them, but the arctic fox was already laying back down on the bed. Those shrunken people had to move quickly or risk getting flattened beneath her massive form. They scattered in every direction to mixed success. Only one person was partially trapped beneath the fox's firm looking rear, but he did not look like he was being crushed just yet. Two of the people ended up trapped between the fox's legs and the final person ended up on the opposite side of the fox that the one trapped under her rear was.

While the one trapped under her rear and the one on her opposite side did not seem to be in any imminent danger, the ones trapped between her legs definitely were. Her dingo lover was already between her legs, cock fully erect and was pulling himself up the bed and toward her femme. His member was dragging lightly against the bed, herding the two shrunken people toward her pussy as well or risk getting plowed under by the dingo's huge rod of man meat. Eventually they did run out of space as they backed completely against the fox's pussy. The fox did react with a shiver of pleasure as they came in contact with certain sensitive areas, but she must have assumed that was due to her lovers touch.

It did not look like the dingo ever noticed they were there. His member rammed lightly into the shrunken people and forced them into his lovers femme with little resistance. It was hard for the shrunken foxes to tell if the dingo or the fox even felt the little people in there. They seemed to be concentrating harder on getting their quick bit of fun in before they had to head off to work for the day. What happened was fast and hard between the dingo and the arctic fox. He pumped into with such speed and force that it was hard to imagine that those two shrunken people could have possibly survived. They were not even the size of the head on that dingo's monstrous rod of flesh and repeated pounding from it must have surely turned them into paste. Sometimes the foxes thought they could hear slight crunching noises, but they hoped that was just their imaginations.

The person that had been stuck under the fox's rear was not fairing so well either. If nothing had been happening to the fox he probably would have been alright, but the dingo was making love to the fox vigorously enough to rock the bed. Each time he pumped in the pressure on that shrunken person must have increased dramatically. He tried to claw his way free, but one pump on the dingo's part just seemed to do it. This time the three foxes watching all this were certain that they heard a crunching noise as the arctic fox's rear crushed him beneath its weight. He never moved again after that.

It did not take long for the dingo to come. When he extracted his member from his partner the foxes observing it all noticed slight red stains as his cock, making it pretty clear what had happened to the two that had been trapped in the fox's sex. That left only one other shrunken person alive and that person seemed to be trying to make his way toward the fox's head. He had been having trouble moving since the bed had been rocking violently enough, but he was making better progress now. At least he was making progress until the arctic fox decided to flip over in bed and get ready for another go with her lover from a different position.

The person that had been trying to get her attention found himself right in the path of a mountainous boob rolling over on top of him. He tried to run, but was completely engulfed by the massive white furred mound of flesh. The fox let out a startled yelp and quickly rolled back over. The shrunken foxes hoped that meant the person was alright, but as the arctic fox peeled a bloody little mass of flesh off her breast that hope was quickly dashed. The arctic fox just blanched a bit, tossed the clearly dead person into a nearby trash can, and complained, "I keep telling you were need to get that door sweep fixed. It keeps letting all these bugs in."

That made the dingo mutter a few words about getting it done. He probably would too. The mood was clearly ruined and they would not be making love again that morning. That should provide motivation enough for him to make any repairs. The shrunken foxes decided to stay out of sight though. It did not seem like a good idea to expose themselves to two giants that were already very annoyed with bug sized creatures. They just waited for the two titans to finish getting ready for the day and eventually left. Then the foxes snuck out of the house and finally started heading back to Laika's home, recovering what climbing gear they could from their deceased comrades as they went.

It was frustrating that they had not been able to save any of the other people and their slow progress getting back to Laika's apartment was almost as frustrating. The city was alive now that the sun was up and people were headed out on their daily activities. They had to be much more careful now, but they were still able to make steady progress without any significant incidences. They just hoped they could make it back to Laika's place before she got bored and decided to get more toys. It would not be any good at all if this tragedy had to repeat itself.

The trip back to Laika's apartment building took nearly triple as long as before. Walking along the sidewalk was not all that bad as long as they stayed close to the buildings. It was when it came time to cross a street that things got bad. They had to leave the safety of buildings then and they had to wait until there were no cars at all in sight before they crossed. That was not something that happened often due to the morning traffic rush. But, with a healthy degree of environmental awareness, the three foxes were able to avoid anything that would have turned them into little red stains.

Getting back into Laika's apartment building was not all that difficult either. There were enough people coming in and out of it that the foxes were able to pick their moment to reenter the building easy enough. It turned out they did not need the climbing gear they had obtained either. Walking down the stairs as they entered the building was none other than Laika. While most other people probably would have missed the three shrunken foxes on the floor, Laika spotted them easy enough since she actually was on the lookout for her missing toys.

"There you are," Laika said with a sigh of relief. "After I woke up this morning and couldn't find any of you I was really worried. What are you doing out here and where's everybody else?"

"We're trying to get back to you," Sirus said.

"Yeah, it turns out you are the only one that's safe for us to be around," Neopuc added.

Joey then further explained, "Everybody else is dead. This world is very dangerous for people of our size."

Laika asked, "What do you mean I'm the only one that's safe for you to interact with? You guys are practically invincible. Why would I be the only one that's safe for you to be around?"

"It must be how the device you used on us works," Joey explained, "You have got to un-shrink us and stop shrinking other people."

Laika took on a thoughtful expression for a moment before smiling and saying, "You nearly had me for a moment there. That just sounds ridiculous though. Who would make something that shrinks people and only makes it safe for those people to be around the one that shrank them? The others are just hiding aren't they? If you don't tell me where they really are I'm going to have to find a way to make you tell me."

The shrunken foxes tried to convince Laika that they were telling the truth, but she was in denial just as much as the others had been. She thought this was all just some elaborate game of hide and seek. They even tried to come up with good theories on why the device worked the way it did, but Laika did not believe any of it. Instead, they all ended up getting tied to Laika's toes once more and this time they had to go through the experience for the entire day.

That meant they had to endure a walk to work, her idling away the time at work toying with them between her paws, some more walking as she walked home and made a few stops to shop on the way, and she did not let them free once she got back home either. They stayed tied up as she walked around her room and had to endure getting toyed with some more whenever she stayed still for more than a few moments. While Laika did have nice soft paws, it was surprisingly tiring to get repeatedly stomped on and messed around with by boulder sized toes. Still, that was better than getting stepped on by anyone else and they were grateful to be kept so close to Laika's paws rather than anyone else's.

The foxes were not freed again until it was time for bed that night. Laika considered leaving them tied up to her paw for the night to keep them from running off again, but after they promised not do that, she decided to trust them since they were friends. They really had no plans of sneaking off either, not after what had happened last night. When Laika fell asleep the foxes decided to go back to their original plan of figuring out how the device around Laika's neck worked. Getting to the device would probably be easier while Laika was asleep and laying down. They just hoped Laika would not notice a few tiny people moving around on her body.

Laika had left them by her paws like she had done the first night. They tried to make their way up the bed close to its edge. It was possible that Laika would have knocked them off the bed if she moved around much, but it seemed like a better idea than walking up her belly fur and risking waking her up. They did not want to risk walking around on her any more than necessary. Fortunately, Laika did not move around much in her sleep and they were able to make it up to her shoulders without incident. They feared what would happen when they tried to crawl up her shoulder, but that fear proved to be unfounded as Laika kept on sleeping undisturbed.

The device they were looking for was not all that hard to find. It was located right in the valley of Laika's breasts. All of the foxes were a little hesitant to enter that area. They did not know how Laika would react if she woke up and found them there. There was also a slight intimidation factor. Being little more than toe sized, Laika's breasts towered over them by a considerable margin. Still, they proceeded to the device to see if they could figure out how to operate it before Laika really did wake up.

While Neopuc had been expecting the device to be incredibly difficult to operate, Joey explained that it would probably be pretty simple. Most of the devices that had been found at the dig site were not that complicated to use, even if they were more difficult to figure out how the components inside the devices worked. He said that it was pretty much the same concept that you did not have to know how all the parts of microwave worked in order to use one. The devices that had been found at the dig site only had but so many buttons or switches on them. It turned out that the ones that had provided illumination in the temple really were just lights and the only things the switches on them did was turn them on and adjust the brightness of the light.

The device that Laika was using only had a few switches on it as well. What was even better was that the switches were labeled. Of course, they were labeled in an alien script, but Joey had managed to translate a bit of the language from the other devices. He could tell that the device seemed to be set to go off automatically at the moment, probably whenever the user wanted it to, and there was also a manual trigger that the user would have to touch to make the device go off. Fortunately, that manual trigger was just small enough for any of the foxes to activate on their own.

There was a reverse switch on the device too, but there was a problem. Instead of just one reverse switch, there were two of them. They were labeled and probably did tell which switch reversed what, but Joey had not translated enough of the language to understand just what each reversed. It was not a big leap to believe one of them reversed the effects on them, but they had no idea what the other switch would reverse. None of the foxes thought this was the best time to experiment, but it was not like they had much of a choice. So, Joey decided to set both switches to their reverse position at first. But, when he hit the button that should have manually activated the device nothing happened.

That was a little disappointing, but at least nothing bad happened. The three foxes decided to set one of the switches back to its original position and as Joey was about to try and activate it once again they felt Laika shifting beneath them. Before Joey could hit the button all three foxes found themselves sliding deeper into Laika's cleavage as she suddenly sat up in bed. The device around her neck did not fall as deep into her cleavage as they did and it was just out of reach for any of the foxes. That did not stop them from trying to reach it as they looked up to see Laika yawning as she awoke from her slumber.

While the foxes attempts to climb out of Laika's valley of fur and flesh did not help them reach the device again, their efforts did help get Laika's attention. She looked sleepily down at them for a moment before understanding seemed to hit her and she smiled mischievously. Laika chuckled a little as she said, "You guys should have told me you were in the mood for a little erotic play. I'm certainly willing to indulge the three of you."

The foxes attempted to stutter an explanation for what they were doing. All three of them ended up trying to make up a different story for where they were at the same time. Laika just laughed at the obvious lies they were trying to tell. Then she scooped them up in one hand and held them in front of her face as she said, "Don't worry. I'm not mad. The rest of my toys aren't normally up for this type of fun and I'm kind of looking forward to this."

Whatever protests the foxes had after that were quickly muffled as Laika brought the hand they were resting in down to her breast. Laika cupped her hand gently, but firmly, around her breast, pressing the foxes into the palm of her hand as well as her sensitive breast flesh. As the three foxes squirmed and tried to get out of the awkward situation they had found themselves in they felt Laika rumble in approval of their actions. Laika just let them squirm for a little before she started fondling her breast, massaging the foxes against her short soft fur and enjoying the way they felt as they continued to struggle in her grasp.

The foxes were grateful that Laika seemed to have such a gentle touch and was not rough with them, which could not have been all that easy due to the size difference. As the scent of Laika's growing arousal began to fill the air they could not help but start to enjoy the situation as well. It was hard to resist such a sweet heady aroma. Their squirming attempts at escape soon turned into efforts to caress the hill like mound of flesh they were being pressed into. Their efforts were rewarded with a shiver of pleasure from Laika that seemed to shake their entire world.

Laika only massaged them into her breast for but so long though, only for as long as it took her nipples to grow erect. Once Laika felt her breasts had enough attention from the foxes, she moved them down her body to another sensitive area that she thought needed attention. For the foxes there was no mistaking where they were being moved to. Even if they could not tell the direction they were being moved in the increasingly powerful alluring smell that was assailing them made it very clear. It was not long before the lips of Laika's sex came into view and she brushed them lightly against those slightly moist folds.

It was obvious that Laika intended to use them all as her pleasure toys and none of the foxes really objected to that at that moment. It was hard to resist the sight of a pussy that was larger than all three of them put together. Laika did not make them wait for long outside of her femme either. She was not in a rush though. Instead of stuffing them into her all at once, she slowly eased them one by one into her. Laika started out with Joey, pinching him in between two fingers and sliding his legs into her nether lips, then letting her pussy seem to pull him most of the way in on its own. As Laika moaned in pleasure she used a finger to finish off the job, pushing lightly on Joey's head and making him disappear within her. Finally, the process repeated with Sirus and then with Neopuc before Laika moved on once more.

The three foxes were only left alone within Laika for a short time, just enough for them to take in their new environment. Moist fleshy folds surrounded them and seemed to pulse with desire. Feminine juices were welling up all around them and seemed to intensify the already overpowering aroma that surrounded them. Each of the foxes found themselves moving toward the fleshy walls around them almost without thinking. They could not help but start humping against those moist folds in an attempt to satisfy the great being that they were inside of. When Laika gave a slight rumble of approval that only made them intensify their efforts.

Laika did not make them do all the work. Her fingers entered her pussy and started moving the tiny foxes around, moving them to her most sensitive places. Those fingers danced around inside of her, nimbly moving the foxes from one area to the next as Laika tried to make sure that they were able to give all of her favorite spots the attention they deserved. The entire experience was physically taxing for the foxes, but they did not mind. They were focused on nothing more than making sure Laika reached her peak. As the juices around them continued to well up, almost to the point of threatening to drown them, they knew that they were succeeding. Then the muscles around them started to shift and tense. Laika's muscles tightened up around them with a vice-like grip in an instant. If it were not for the effects of the shrinking device they probably would have been crushed. Instead, they found themselves stuck in place, but with a torrent of Laika's juices trying to dislodge them. Eventually, that torrent did win, taking Sirus, then Neopuc, and finally Joey along with it and letting them flow out of Laika.

They were left resting in what seemed like a pool of Laika's juices, feeling physically exhausted. Laika could also be heard panting a little as she recovered from her orgasm. The foxes had to wait for Laika to help them before they could get out of Laika's sex fluids, which were getting sticky very rapidly. Laika held them in front of her face once more with a lazy smile on her face as she said, "That was fun guys and I would be up for another round, but it is kind of late, so how about we pick this back up in the morning?"

Laika did not wait for a response. She just stuffed the three foxes, still soaked in her juices, into her cleavage. Then she flopped back in bed and quickly fell back asleep. The three foxes were more than a little tired themselves from that previous, if not entirely unpleasant, distraction. But, at least they were right back where they needed to be with Laika's device right next to them. The changes Joey had made to the device were still in place and all they had to do was hit the button to activate it.

When Joey did hit the switch they did not get the results they had been expecting. It actually came as quite a surprise when Laika's giant body disappeared out from under them in an instant. They wondered what had happened until they searched around on the bed and discovered that the device had shrunk Laika. It seemed that Joey had set the device to affect the person wearing the device instead of everyone else. Laika appeared to not have noticed anything since she was still soundly sleeping as the foxes walked up to her. They did not bother waking her up either, instead just slipping the device, which had shrunken with Laika, off her neck and Joey placing it around his own.

Joey then reasoned that the other switch controlled whether the device would shrink things or return them to normal. All three of the foxes thought it was a good thing the device did not grow things past their normal size. It would have really created a problematic situation during their first experiment if they had ended up turning Laika into a true giant. Joey set the device back to effecting others and then set it to return people to their normal size. Then he touched Sirus and Neopuc in turn, quickly filling up the space on Laika's bed. The two suddenly returning to normal size also caused the bed to shift around enough to wake Laika up, who definitely looked a little confused at her giant surroundings.

"Sorry to wake you up again Laika, but I had something I really needed to take care of," Joey said as he reset the device once more. This time he set it to effect himself and when he activated it his vision blurred like it had when he had first been shrunk. Then he found himself standing on top of Laika's bed at his normal size looking down at a toe sized Laika.

"It's nice to be back to normal," Neopuc said, stepping off the bed along with Sirus.

"Yeah, but what are we going to do with that device, and with Laika for that matter?" Sirus asked.

Joey took a moment to think about that before responding, "We'll probably have to turn this thing in for safe keeping eventually. As for Laika, I'd say a little bit of payback is in order, make her understand what it's like to be the little guy."

Sirus and Neopuc smiled at that remark. Laika just let out a little squeak as Joey picked her up and placed her on the floor as he got off her bed. Then Joey lifted up his paw and Laika took off running. The other two foxes chuckled a bit as Joey started chasing Laika around the room, stepping on her carefully at first to make sure he would not really crush her, then doing so a little more forcefully once he found out that he would not do so.

Then a thought seemed to occur to Joey and he took the device from around his neck and handed it to Sirus, saying, "Here, wear this and then try stepping on Laika. Make sure to be careful."

"Are you sure about that," Sirus asked as he took the device.

Joey nodded," Yeah, but keep in mind this is to test a theory of mine, so use some caution."

"Alright, if you say so," Sirus said as he took the device. Then he went after Laika, quickly finding her but having some trouble actually stepping on her. Obviously, she had learned a few tricks from chasing shrunken people around and she was putting those tricks to good use. But, it was only a matter of time before Sirus did managed to catch her and pin her beneath a paw. He looked a little perplexed as he placed more and more pressure on Laika, but never managed to crush her. Then understanding seemed to dawn on him.

"That's right," Joey started to explain, "It's not that it is safe for shrunken people to interact with the person who shrunk them. It is safe for them to interact with whoever possess that device."

"Then it's safe for me to engage in a vigorous game of paw tag after all," Sirus said with a smile. Laika let out another surprised squeak as Sirus started chasing her around the room, but once again she still managed to do a relatively good job dodging Sirus' paw. It was looking like a good game to Neopuc. Laika seemed to be able to dodge Sirus' paw every other time he tried to stomp on her. That might have also been because he looked like he was trying to catch her between his toes like she had done to him and he just was not as practiced as Laika was. But, when he did eventually manage to capture her he let a happy little shout of glee and he started walking around the house with his squirming little captive.

Neopuc just smiled at the scene as he stood next to Joey and asked, "Are you really going to turn that thing in? It seems like something you might like to keep for your own personal amusement."

Joey sighed as he said, "That device does seem like it could be fun. But, you've seen how dangerous it can be too. I really should turn it in." Joey paused for a moment before smiling and adding one condition. "Eventually."