Hallway Bullies

Some short fiction for you all! This is based on one of my older one-shot renders. You can probably guess which one. Also I may have forgotten the title of it and used it more than once.

This is a work of fiction. All characters are at least 18 years old, and so should you if you're reading this. Etc. etc.

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The hallway stretches on for miles. The lockers on either side tower like skyscrapers. Your bare feet slap against the dull, cream-colored tile, a sound so small it doesn’t echo in the huge space. You’re short of breath—but that was from before you even started running. You fight the panic, choke back the sobs, but you can’t stop the terrified tears from escaping every time you think about your situation.

Shrunk! In freaking school of all places! You should have just stayed in class when you started to feel sick, instead of asking to go to the restroom. At least the teacher would’ve been there to help. Probably. Microphage guidelines were changing all the time, but it would’ve been better than where you are now, running—naked and afraid—desperate to find help before class ends and everyone rushes out into the hall, where you’d be squashed under someone’s foot, maybe without them even noticing. The thought makes your chest tighten, and you stop, hands on your knees as you gasp for air.

That’s when you hear it—and feel it—footsteps, and giggling voices rumbling like distant thunder.

You press yourself against the wall at the base of the lockers just as two towering figures round the corner. You recognize them immediately: Natalie and Larissa. You knew them as a pair of jocks who were usually goofing off in class, and while they’d never bullied you, you think it might just be because they didn’t know you. You were beneath their attention before, but now that you‘re a shrinkie, there’s no telling what they might do.

You try to stay still, hoping they just won’t notice you as they pass by. You can’t help flinching when you feel the earthquakes from their steps.

They’re taking their time, probably trying to waste as much as possible before going back to class.

You stare, wide-eyed, at their enormous sneakers—each one the size of a bus. Your eyes travel up their towering, bare, legs, to their distant faces… and you freeze. Larissa is looking directly at you. You watch her excited grin form in slow motion.

“Oh fuck! Nat! Look!” She grabs Natalie by the shoulder and shakes her.

Natalie grunts in annoyance before following Larissa’s gaze down to the floor, to you. She smirks.

Larissa is the first to move. Her gigantic form barrels toward you. You panic. You turn and run, stumbling over yourself. You feel two bone-rattling impacts behind you before a massive wall of white rubber slams down in your path. The force of it knocks you back, and you land hard on the cold tile.

“Uh-uh, you’re not goin’ anywhere!” Larissa laughs, her voice thundering overhead.

You scramble to your feet, turning to run in the opposite direction. You barely take three strides before a matching sneaker cuts you off. A scoff pulls your attention upward.

“Another Microfreak,” Natalie says, gum snapping between her teeth. “What a loser.”

She and Larissa close in around you, trapping you against the wall. Their footfalls rumble around you, and the piercing squeak of their sneakers against the tile makes your skin crawl. You press yourself against the wall, craning your neck all the way back to look up at them.

With a quivering voice, you call out, “H-help!” Your cries sounds small, even to you, lost in the vast space between you and them. “Please! I—“

You’re cut off as Natalie puts an arm against the locker above you, the metal banging like thunder. She squints and leans her head down, as if to get a better look at you, still smacking her gum as she smirks. Then, her towering legs shift, and you look ahead to see her foot rising.

She taps her toe on the floor next to you. You flinch, hiding feebly behind a raised arm, and they both laugh. She does it again, harder. You catch a glimpse of the white treads of her sole, stained orange from the clay track, before it slams down with enough force to knock you off your feet. As you try to get up, the same shoe comes flying at you, slamming you against the wall and pinning you there. The toe of her sneaker digs into your stomach and chest, making it impossible to move. You claw awkwardly at the rubber, your shoulders barely able to reach over the top of it.

The both of them laugh, watching you squirm.

When her foot finally pulls away, you collapse to the floor, flat on your face. Before you can do anything, Natalie’s foot crashes into you again, striking you from the side.

It’s like getting hit by a car. You’re sent flying, rolling and skidding, landing on your back in front of Larissa. Her smile carries a hint of a disgusted sneer as she raises her foot high above you.

Your eyes go wide as it comes rushing down. You scream, curling into a ball, but she pulls her foot back right before it hits you. They burst out laughing at your reaction. Larissa does it again, several times, and you can’t help flinching with every pretend stomp, so close that you feel the wind, until she brings her foot down hard next to you. You scream, but you can’t hear your own voice above the ringing in your ears. With a flick of her ankle, she kicks you back toward Natalie.

They giggle, kicking you back and forth between them. Your world is a blur of, flashes of white rubber slamming into you from every angle, battering you so roughly you can’t even catch your breath. The impacts come harder and faster. You feel something crunch—you can’t tell where. You bleed from your mouth and nose. Your vision spins, blurs, darkens.

They stop several kicks after you’ve gone limp. You lay on the ground, gasping for breath, writhing in agony.

Natalie crouches above you, and the world darkens even more as her hand comes down.

You try to crawl out from between her colossal fingers, but you’re shoved face-first against the floor by the weight of her index finger on your back, and as you kick and squirm beneath it, her thumb pinches roughly around your leg and lifts you into the air.

You ascend in a blur, dangling upside down. For a moment, you’re weightless, before Natalie’s cupped hand rises up from below to meet you. You land in a heap, the warmth and softness of her palm a sharp contrast to the cold tile. It would almost be comforting, if it weren’t for the billboard-sized faces scrutinizing your every move. Natalie tilts her hand back and forth, rolling you across her palm.

Larissa leans in and prods your torso with a fingertip larger than your head, aggravating your broken ribs. You yelp in pain, and they giggle.

“Ha,” Natalie scoffs, “listen to it squeak.”

“We fucked it up pretty good,” Larissa laughs.

You reach out with a trembling hand. “… p-please…” You stammer.

Natalie’s other hand swoops forward and flicks you hard in the face, snapping your head back. Your ears ring, but above it, you hear her voice.

“Shut the fuck up,” she snaps, “no one cares what you have to say, freak. We should just flush you down the toilet.” She puckers her lips and blows a hurricane wind that rolls you onto your back.

“Dude, did I tell you I accidentally stepped on one at the last cross country?”

“No!” Natalie laughs.

You lay helplessly in her palm, momentarily forgotten.

“It was right in the middle of the trail. I think it was half-crushed already, but I got all the squishy bits. It fucking splattered half way up my leg.”

For a moment, you consider crawling over the edge of Natalie’s palm and plummeting to the floor below, but she turns her attention back to you.

“You want that to be you? Huh, freak?” She says, lifting you up to her face and sneering at you. “We could just leave you out on the track while we run sprints.”

The closeness of her voice reverberates through your bones, makes you wince.

“Yes!” Larissa answers for you.

Before you can protest, Natalie’s fingers close around you, sealing you in hot, peach-scented, darkness. The last thing you feel is the rhythm of her steps, each distant tremor rocking you out of consciousness.