Constance Shrunken Science Experiment - VR360

Description:

Dr. Constance had always been the quiet one in the lab — soft-spoken, meticulous, and often dismissed. Her colleagues paid more attention to their own flashy projects while she toiled for years perfecting a serum that could alter physical mass at the atomic level. Shrinking matter — particularly organic matter — was no small feat. And she had done it. The math was sound, the initial trials successful. But the ethics committee refused human testing, citing risk, uncertainty, and her "emotional investment" in the project.

She had been walking home, fuming, the tiny vial warm in her pocket. That’s when she saw him — a man at the corner market, chatty, cheerful, unsuspecting. He smiled. She smiled back. And then everything happened so quickly.

Now, he stood — or rather, staggered — on the smooth surface of her coffee table, no more than a few inches tall. Constance sat down across from him, eyes wide behind thick glasses, hands nervously clasped in her lap. "I… I’m sorry," she said, voice barely above a whisper. "I didn’t know who else to use. They wouldn’t let me try it properly. And you're... you're a healthy subject." Her fingers twitched with nervous energy. “I just need data. I need to know what your senses can handle at this scale.”

She propped up the sneakers she had worn that day. They were worn, with a familiar musk that she knew well — but now she wanted to know what he thought. She placed them near him with clinical detachment. “Smell these. Tell me if it's overwhelming. I need to test your sensory thresholds.”

Bit by bit, she grew bolder. Off came the shoes. Then her socks, her bare feet pale and warm from the confines of the sneakers. She hovered them above him, then lowered one near him — not quite touching, but close enough to cause him to stumble. “And my skin oils,” she muttered, less shy now. “Do they smell different? Feel different?” She pressed a toe lightly against him, observing the way he struggled to stay upright. Her eyes gleamed with curiosity, no longer clouded with doubt.

Next came the breath test. She lifted him in one hand, her grip surprisingly steady now, and exhaled gently. “Your lungs… can you handle a normal-sized person's carbon dioxide at this proximity? Tell me what it feels like.” Her voice had lost its tremble.

By the time she pressed him down slightly under her bare sole, noting how he flinched but didn’t break, she was no longer the mousy woman with uncertain ethics. She was a scientist in full command of her experiment — and her subject. "I need to know what pressure your body can withstand," she said with cool detachment. "You understand, don’t you? For the data."

She didn’t ask if he wanted to be returned to normal size. She didn’t mention the reversal serum — though she had one in a separate vial, safely tucked away in the lab. Whether she’d use it, she hadn’t yet decided. After all, some experiments require long-term observation. And Evelyn, now free of hesitation, was ready to explore every angle.