Giant Solidarity G/T

Chapter XIX. Teamwork

Explicit Warning: Sex Content

Outside, the sun was beginning its retreat behind the treetops. We weren't sure when exactly the GRUDATs had planned to firebomb and ransack the Human Shelter, but we had to assume it could happen any time after sundown. All we had to go by was Troy specifically told me Tuesday night. Any information I interrogated out of Evan couldn't be trusted, so when Harley brought me a roll of duct tape, I went straight to work restraining his knees and elbows behind his back, with layers of adhesive binding. As I taped up the injured Giant, he blinked his bloodshot, unfocused eyes and hurled insult after insult at me. He pretty much ran through the dictionary of human-lover epithets. I finally silenced him with two layers of tape around his mouth to the back of his head. Like moving a live, resistant futon, I dragged him down the stairs from the second floor, then I simply opened the basement door, and rolled him down the carpeted stairs on his side, like a bowling ball. Hearing an angry moan when he hit the throw rug, I was satisfied and deadbolted the cellar.

Dropping Evan's truck keys on the counter with a clang a few minutes later, Harley reported. "I parked his pickup behind my garage. Out of sight, like you said."

Since tossing Evan down the stairs, I had been sitting with Reagan in my palm, rubbing her back with my thumb. "Good going Har," I said nodding. I pointed to wide-screen TV in the den. "Could we sync up the camera feeds to your TV?" I got an affirmative, and minutes later, six images of the surrounding property were displayed onscreen. We assigned shifts watching the footage.

Daniel, the aide soon came downstairs to refill the human water cooler, while Reagan laid on my kneecap, and I sat on a barstool by the kitchen. I checked in with him. "How's Alma doing up there, Dan?"

"Starting to come around," he replied, topping off the water jug and sealing it. "Crystal's comforting her as she comes around." Dan smirked. "Crystal had a sprained ankle and sprained wrist from jumping on jerk, but she's insisting on working through the pain."

"What about Peggy?" Reagan asked, still sitting cross-legged on my lap, practically weightless. Peggy was the name of the poor brunette human who hit the floor after Evan tried to devour her.

Sighing, Daniel gathered the water and prepared to resume duties. "Peggy will be on the mend a while. That GRUDAT giant broke three of her ribs and fractured her tailbone between his fingers."

Once Daniel returned upstairs, I looked down at my tiny girlfriend. "Maybe after all this bedlam's over, we let Alma and Peggy take a little vengeance on Evan, somehow." I shrugged. One thing at time.

While I eyed the video feeds on the TV drumming my fingers on the counter, Reagan was peering up unblinkingly at me. "What else is wrong, Vic?" she asked, climbing up my thigh.

I exhaled slowly. It was impossible for me to hide feelings from her. At her current size, maybe emotional signs were more impactful. "Why haven't you grown back yet?" I blurted, no longer able to hide my concern, looking down at her by the seam of my pocket.

"I don't know!" said Reagan throwing up her hands. "They did say something about how they've been experimenting with the longevity factor." Both her hands massaged my finger, trying to comfort me. "Don't worry Vic. I'm not worrying."

I pinched between my eyebrows and looked back to the projections of Harley's backyard, front yard and side yards on the monitor. "Rey, I would just feel a lot better if you were back at seventy-seven feet if and when the GRUDAT gets here." Earlier, that moment of panic, thinking Evan may have swallowed Rey had been almost more than I could tolerate.

"Hey!" To my surprise, I felt a little fist punch the back of my hand. Rey was giving me her patented stoic I'm-an-independent-woman face. It was so much cuter on that tiny visage, I noticed, ironically. "Vic, just because I'm small doesn't mean I can't fend for myself." Being that little didn't stop her from owning arguments. "I corralled fourteen of the humans under that end-table, by myself."