“I’m going to make this brief,” announced Dr. Suzanne Sawyer as she strode into the conference room. The heels of her shoes, which had clicked like a metronome on the tile floor of the hallway, were silenced by the conference room’s carpet. “We have plenty of work to do before the next test at noon tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?!” was the initial collective exclamation of the people—the five members of her project team—seated around a long table in the room. What followed was a cacophony of protests and excuses.

They had all dreaded this moment, though they had been clearly anticipating it before Suzanne had even entered the room. Soon they’d receive a formal reprimand for the failure of the project’s most recent test. Up until that last test, they each had their individual doubts that the project’s objective was even remotely possible. The test, though deemed a failure by the powers that be, was the closest they had come to success. One small step for mankind, but a giant step for them.

“Will you please let me explain?” Suzanne groaned and brushed a few strands of blonde hair away from her eyes before trying to continue diplomatically, “Look, this is Dr. Hargrove’s decision. Not mine. It’s his—”

“This is bullshit!” interrupted the youngest member of the team. Darren Wells, only a few years removed from graduate school, looked like the stereotypical ex-computer hacker turned software engineer. Overweight with stringy dark hair, he wore a faded pair of blue jeans and an old, untucked superhero T-shirt. “You just don’t want to be shown up by any of Hargrove’s other research teams. You’re the one who’s pushing us, giving us these impossible deadlines.”

“We are not in competition with any other team. They have their own projects, and we have his most important.”

“His most ridiculous.”

“Mr. Wells, you might be Dr. Hargrove’s wonder-child, but I’m still in charge here. Maybe you should spend less time complaining and more time debugging your inadequate control program. When we couldn’t shut down last time, could it have been because of some glitch on your part?”

Immediately shutting his mouth, Darren slouched in his seat.

“With all due respect, Suzanne, I don’t think we’re prepared for another test so soon. Our last one was Monday—three days ago.” The comment came from Dr. Jessica Nesbitt, a respected physician who, after twenty years of practicing medicine, entered a post-doctorate program in cellular biology only to be scooped up by Hargrove prior to the first test two months earlier.

“Oh, and what do you need to be ready for?” snapped Suzanne, knowing all too well what Jessica’s role was, it having been her own before she had been promoted to project manager. “Your job is to examine the specimen after the test and see how its cells function. You have nothing to prep for. It’s not like you’ve had to do anything else yet.”

How dare Suzanne talk to her like that, thought Jessica as she scratched her gray-streaked dark hair. She was twenty years Suzanne’s elder, and none of the previous unsuccessful attempts were directly or even indirectly her fault. Before she could say anything in her own defense, the other woman in the room spoke.

“Suzanne?” The woman with short, curly red hair cleared her throat and spoke in a raspy voice. “I’m assuming we will still be using a plant as our specimen.”

“Yes, Michelle.” Suzanne released a quiet sigh of frustration.

Michelle Payne had been Dr. Hargrove’s ethics officer for a few years. Back then, some projects had drawn criticism from animal rights groups, so Hargrove impulsively created the position and hired Michelle straight from the most vocal of those organizations. This probably wasn’t one of his smartest moves, but everyone knew firing her could potentially make already strained relationships worse.

“You are aware, Michelle, that Dr. Hargrove will eventually be testing on animals.” Suzanne then reminded everyone that their superior claimed one potential benefit of the project was famine relief—making the transport of livestock to affected regions much easier.

“Not until there is more than sufficient evidence that the animal will not be harmed. Based on your most recent tests, you’re a long way from that moment. Do I have to remind you what has happened to the plants in those tests? I will not allow the same thing to happen to an animal.”

It was two months earlier that the chamber and the control room were first deemed fully operational. After six weeks of tests where nothing at all happened to the specimen plants, the team’s previous three tests actually yielded results, albeit not the desired ones. Their first test, which had occurred a week and a half prior, resulted in the plant immediately bursting into flames upon exposure to the chamber’s radiation and electric field. In the following test, they had initiated the process but were unable to stop it; they watched it progress for an hour on the monitors in the control room until the plant was gone, never to be seen again. Earlier that week, however, there was some sort of surge, and the plant vanished almost instantly, leaving them with only a pot full of soil. Their current goal was to reproduce that middle test as closely as possible without losing the plant.

“The failures are no fault of mine,” spoke a man with a thick German accent and white frizzy hair. “The radioactivity from the selected isotopes behaved as expected in the electric field. Ultimately, the experiment accomplished what it was intended to do.”

Suzanne rolled her eyes. Another country heard from, she thought. Why did the Einstein-wannabe always have to be so damned paranoid and defensive about everything? “Then there shouldn’t be a problem with tomorrow’s test,” she snapped. “Right, Niels?”

Dr. Niels Ulrich was originally a professor of particle physics at Stanford University and had been so for over thirty years. Almost immediately after announcing his retirement, he received a telephone call from Dr. Hargrove explaining the project and offering a position with a handsome salary. Being a former student of Ulrich’s, Hargrove could not think of a more eminent mind in the field. It was Ulrich’s modifications of Hargrove’s initial theories that pushed the team closer and closer to their goal. Suzanne Sawyer might have been the project manager, but Niels Ulrich was definitely the genius of the organization. If anyone truly deserved the credit for the project’s success, it would be Niels, and thus it would become the biggest contribution to science of his long and distinguished career.

“We think we know what happened last time,” said Keith Driscoll, the team’s electrical engineer. He was a tall, handsome man in his mid-thirties, somewhat well-built with brown hair and dark, brooding eyes. “There was a power surge at the moment of initiation. Fried a slew of capacitors in the system.”

Suzanne folded her arms in front of her and asked, “And have they all been replaced?”

“Working on it.”

“You have until noon tomorrow. Actually, you have until ten-thirty tomorrow. I want you out before the specimen is set.”

After politely raising a hand, Jessica said, “Since I am the one who will be taking a sample before and studying it after, I feel I should place the specimen instead of merely sitting around and waiting in my lab. Suzanne, aren’t your interests better served in the control room supervising? Aren’t we in agreement that the problems we have stem from the apparatus and not from the placement of the specimen?”

Suzanne glared at the elder doctor. “But Jessica, you should not be sitting around waiting. You need to make complete measurements of the plant before it can be taken. You will be busy all morning, and when I take it, you’ll be starting your cellular analysis of a cutting from the plant.”

“It’s not an inconvenient walk from the bio-lab to the chamber.”

Suzanne snapped back, “I don’t want to waste any time, and I want to be sure everything is done properly. Tomorrow is Friday, and I’m sure none of us wants to stay into the night analyzing another botched experiment.”

“I insist that I be there,” said Michelle. “How do I know that you won’t secretly place a lab mouse or any other animal inside with the plant? You wouldn’t want me to have to file a report, would you?”

“Is that an ultimatum?” Suzanne again brushed some hair out of her face as she glowered at Michelle. “If you must be that procedurally obsessive, then you can put it in there yourself like you usually do.” She watched Michelle squint her eyes and put her hand on her temple as if she had a headache. Suzanne quickly interpreted the gesture as an indication that Michelle didn’t want to touch the plant. “I plan to have the specimen in the chamber one hour before the initiation sequence. The countdown procedures are all fixed, right Darren?”

“Yeah, yeah.” Darren flitted his fingers at her. “Door controls, radiation shields, everything in the final ten minutes programmed fine.”

“And it won’t start five minutes late like last time? Has the computer’s internal clock been fixed?”

He nodded and then turned away.

“Maybe we should lower the exposure rate this time,” suggested Keith.

“There is nothing wrong with the radiation rate,” growled Niels. “Full exposure is necessary.”

“That’s great, Niels,” said Suzanne patronizingly as she glanced at her gold wristwatch. “I expect tomorrow’s test to run smoothly. Dr. Hargrove will be making a personal appearance, so everyone should be here by eight o’clock.”

“Eight o’clock!” Darren threw his arms back. “As in eight a.m.? Jeez!”

“No further discussion. Be here by eight, and that’s final.” With that, she left the room, the sound of her clicking heels trailing off into the distance.

“Why do I waste my time with this?” Jessica removed her eyeglasses and placed them on the conference table. “I’ve been considering tendering my resignation. I was promised a position in cutting-edge biotechnological research, but all I’ve done is take cell sample after cell sample from those darn ferns. Any graduate student could do that.”

“What made you change your mind?” asked Keith. “About resigning?”

“The latest breakthroughs. I only wish there had been cells left to analyze after the previous two tests.”

“We should have been celebrating. Instead, Suzanne reprimands us for failure.” Niels ceased his tirade and sighed. “Oh, it was a sight to behold.”

“I will say that I was skeptical about this whole project since the beginning,” commented Michelle. “Completely absurd, or so I thought.”

“You’re fortunate, though,” Jessica pointed at her. “You at least get to check on Hargrove’s other research teams instead of staying here all the time measuring ferns.”

“You think my job is better? Sometimes I think I’m in a comic book or a bad sci-fi movie. You should see some of the other harebrained schemes Hargrove is up to. What a great waste of money around this building, if you ask me. At least your team made some progress. You actually managed to shrink something.”

“Yeah,” scoffed Darren. “Shrunk so small we can’t find it anymore. Maybe it’s still shrinking. If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I’d think this project was a great big pile of crap.”

Finding a way to reduce the size of organic material sure sounded ridiculous when they were first assigned to the project, as if Dr. Hargrove, the president, founder, and CEO of HarTech were off his rocker. His motives seemed honorable when he explained them, however. Worldwide famine could be relieved as surplus foods could be reduced for easier transport and then restored to original size at their destination. If they could focus the effect and pinpoint particular cells, there was the medical possibility of eradicating cancer and other tumors. Sure, there were flights of fancy like a miniaturized team of surgeons operating from inside the human body, but Dr. Hargrove and Niels theorized effective reduction to so small a size was completely impossible and best left for the storytellers.

But what they had built—a shrinking chamber, for lack of a more concise way to state it—was straight out of science fiction and perhaps into science fact. The original project manager resigned when Hargrove insisted they had results by a specific date, and Suzanne Sawyer somehow slithered into the position. At the time, her initial role on the team was somewhat superfluous—no need studying test specimens before the apparatus was anywhere near built. She had been transferred in from another project and actually had seniority over the rest of the group. A few of the team members contemplated quitting along with their former manager, especially when they had learned Suzanne would be his replacement, but they were all getting paid very well—at least well enough to deal with Suzanne as their supervisor.

“It is not crap, as you so crassly say.” Niels raised his bushy white eyebrows. “Cellular miniaturization is possible.”

“Yeah, we know, Einstein.” Darren paused for a brief moment and then burst into laughter. “Wouldn’t it be sweet if we could shrink Suzanne instead?”

“I’m afraid that would be quite unethical,” said Michelle. Then she cast a wry grin. “But a fun notion to entertain.”

“Shrink her down to insect size.” Holding his thumb and forefinger close together, Darren displayed how small he meant. “Then I could debug her!” He quickly slammed his palm down on the table, squashing an imaginary pest.

“Too small.” Michelle removed a small paper packet from her pocket and tore it open while she spoke. “More like mouse- or rabbit-sized. Then we can lock her in a little cage like a lab animal. That would teach her.” She popped the two tablets of pain reliever in her mouth and sipped from a glass of water in front of her.

“What about you?” Darren turned to Jessica. “How small would you like to see Suzanne?”

“I couldn’t.” Jessica shook her head. “It isn’t right to talk like this. It’s disrespectful.”

“When was the last time she showed much respect for you?” asked Michelle.

Jessica tried to maintain her composure by putting her glasses back on her face, but she knew Michelle’s comment rang true. Suzanne never showed any respect for her. Each generation shows less and less respect for their elders, she thought. Weren’t those values being taught anymore? “Child size,” she said sternly. “About the size of a toddler, so I can teach her a thing or two.”

“All right!” Darren clapped his hands. “That’s three of us in agreement. Niels?”

Clutching the lapels of his lab coat, Niels leaned forward. “The size of a proton. I am positive she would get a charge out of that.”

“A proton?” groaned Darren. “What good is that? We wouldn’t be able to see her squirm.”

“It was a pun, Junior. Positive. Charge. Or do they not teach that at university?”

“This is all a joke, right?” Keith stood. “I pray to God that’s all it is.”

“Chill out, dude.” Curling his mouth, Darren looked around. “We’re just kidding. Jeez, I don’t think any of us has the balls to actually go through with it.”

Jessica cleared her throat. “Darren, your language is unprofessional.”

“The people in this room are unprofessional.” Keith walked towards the door. “You can have whatever opinions you want about Suzanne, but discussing them in the open and joking about shrinking her is not the way to express those opinions or avenge how she may have treated you.”

After Keith had slammed the door behind him, the room fell silent until Darren spoke up. “Yeah, we’re wasting our time. She’d still be a bitch no matter what size she was.”

“Maybe she’d become a bigger one,” added Michelle. “To overcompensate for a smaller stature.”

By this time, Suzanne had returned to her office. Sitting at a desk outside the door was the research team’s secretary Audrey, a dark-haired, slim, twenty-something who looked only a few years out of either secretarial school or, by her measurements, possibly modeling school. She didn’t notice Suzanne’s presence, or if she had, she ignored Suzanne and continued about her business, which was filing her fingernails and chewing bubble gum.

“Any of these messages important?” Without looking at Audrey, Suzanne picked up a short stack of pink while-you-were-out papers and flipped through them.

Audrey snapped her gum. “Dr. Hargrove called. He, like, wanted to confirm the time of tomorrow’s test.”

“It’s at noon.” Suzanne rolled her eyes. “You should have known that. I dictated the memo to you.”

“Like, I forgot. Sorry, Dr. Sawyer.”

“You’re supposed to be on top of these things, Audrey.” Suzanne opened the door to her office but turned back. “And do some work around here for a change.”

Inside her office, Suzanne felt a slight twinge of guilt for snapping at Audrey and treating her like an infant. The girl was doing a fairly good job since Suzanne had become manager. When Suzanne’s predecessor left HarTech, his secretary resigned with him, so Dr. Hargrove specifically transferred Audrey from somewhere else in the compound. Audrey’s presence was somewhat threatening to Suzanne because, until her arrival, Suzanne was clearly the most attractive female on the team. How could she compete with Audrey’s youth?

Suzanne opened the double doors of a tall wooden cabinet and hung her pristine white lab coat on a hook on the inside of one of the doors. On the inside of the other door was a full-sized mirror. Placing her hands on her already flat stomach to hold it in and push her breasts forward, she eyed her reflection. Even at thirty-four years old, she still had it. The tight red business suit served to show her slender figure and ample bosom. The hem of the skirt, which had been hidden by the long lab coat, hung just above her knees, putting her long sleek legs on display. Her body had to be perfect; any impurity would be perceived as old age and obsolescence. As long as she had both her brains and her looks, she was a force to be reckoned with in the corporate world.

Staying in shape was no easy task, but it was a necessity. With a Ph.D. in biochemistry, too many men she had dated had been intimidated by her intelligence. She needed her stunning looks to offset that and to keep them coming around. A strict regimen of exercise and good eating kept her body firm, and whenever she even glimpsed a stray gray, she’d remove it and re-dye her long straight hair to keep it platinum blonde. She was sexy, she told herself, far sexier than ditzy little Audrey.

Suzanne flipped through the messages from Audrey and stopped on the final note. She stepped to her desk and hit the speaker and speed-dial buttons on her phone, which beeped several times and rang, until a scratchy voice said, “Hello?”

“Hello, Dad,” said Suzanne, talking towards the phone.

“How’s my little girl?” chuckled her father.

Irritated, Suzanne reached for the receiver to keep the conversation less audible. “Dad, I’ve asked you not to call me that. I’m in my thirties now.”

“But you’ll always be my little girl. Now tell your father what’s bothering you.”

Suzanne dropped the stack of messages into the trash. “Nothing’s bothering me.”

“Of course something’s bothering you. You only return my calls when you’re stressed.”

“Same old stuff, Dad. Work.” Suzanne sat back and reclined in her chair. “It’s not like I can tell you the details, proprietary information, non-disclosure agreements, and everything, but sometimes I get the feeling everyone is conspiring against me. No one seems willing to put in that extra effort to really