This choice: ...In a wide, green area • Go Back... Morning. Brilliant sunlight attacked the mediator's sleep-covered eyes. Her first thought was: "the blinds must need replacing again."
But as Watashi yawned, stretching out, she found the room itself had vanished. Gone overnight. Just a bed in a green field. Not only that, the area she woke up in wasn't anywhere in Camphorwood; she couldn't see landmarks of ruined buildings, or the great forest. Merely a few small bumps, rising from the misty ground. She lowered her legs from the bedside. Her shoes landed in a cold puddle - leading the woman to draw them back quickly in surprise. On her bed, Watashi took the footwear off, and held it to the side of her mustard-yellow dress. With a small gap of the thin air, she tested the water with the tips of her toes. It was refreshing on her warm skin, soaking the surface.
She stepped out of bed, waking forward, exploring the land.
---
The sprawling coastal city flew into chaos. Waves battered the shore, washing beachgoers up. They grew larger with each booming footstep, soon flooding the bustling streets.
From out of the blue yonder, a behemoth with draping pink hair wandered ahead. Radars had spotted her earlier; but images of a simmering woman in the sea were nothing compared to this. In the distance, she looked angelic: with bright features; a relaxed, open posture; and a quiet, intrigued gaze. Her womanly figure stood silhouetted against the clouds. Each flutter of her saffron dress in the ocean winds stirred flocks of birds. It gave a supernatural aura about her idle twitches and careful steps. But the tremors formed by her simply stretching her bare feet out in the seas were anything but heavenly. Without a thought, they sunk fleets of trading and fishing ships to the seafloor, with naught but a splash.
Thousands fled for shelter. Proud skyscrapers fell in her shadow. As she neared land, the goliath woman's unreachable, glazed-over eyes disappeared. Her heavy bosom hid her field of vision. Soon, the citizens' view was also blotted out by her soles, stretching leagues with her stride. Waterfalls dripped from each dangling phalange as they rise from the sea, each a Leviathan in its own right.
The region, with a million souls screaming as one, was underneath her notice.
A black dog barked once, at the top of the mountain.
---
:The last thing I remember is falling asleep. I woke up in a mysterious field, wearing my work clothes. There's water on the floor." Watashi's eyes shut. Her finger gravitated to her chin. "Logically showing, I'll walk around a while, wake up in bed, and go 'it was all a dream!' with a dumb smile." Scanning the surrounding green spots, she rubbed her head. "But there were fairies in the room. If it's fairies making up this dream, there's bound to be some secret to it."
The visitor had reached land. But even still, it felt marshy. The soil receded easily against her bare foot, cracks forming in the mud beneath her toes. It was wet and sandy. She wondered: "is this a memory about the beach?"
---
The turmoil in the streets below only grew furiouser. Riots broke out as her quaking soles landed. When she was traversing the foggy sea, it was hard to estimate the height of the misty, ethereal figure. Now, with her dripping feet on land, their difference in scale was frighteningly clear. Her dizzying scale grew clearer the closer she got; even the tallest buildings didn't make it anywhere close to her ankles. It was a challenge to see above the pleats of her dress, which she held up daintily while trying upon the woods.
Cracks jutting out from her footprint consumed houses on the outskirts, swallowing them into the ground. Structures spared from that fate drowned in saltwater floods, cascading from her skin. Weaker office buildings collapsed simply from the tremors - mixed with the moister atmosphere brought by her soft soles. The streets congested with cars, buses, and crowds, wrestling one another to escape Watashi's looming, curvy shadow.
---
The wide-eyed explorer took another step, holding her dress up next to her shoes - careful not to get it must. She called out with a voice doing in lenity: "Fairies! You can come out now." She sighed quietly. It was worth a try.
With a hum, she dragged her toes through the murky soil. They drew straight lines. "Maybe this is some sort of 'Happy Place' my mind's escaping to? The pebbles feel softer and finer than anything..."
---
Her voice was speaking a clear language they understood - but at its increased decibel, it was an echoing declaration that brought them to their knees.
With barely a flick of her heel, this gigantic mediator plowed through acres of farmland, using only her toes. The mighty bulldozers of flesh lifted, proudly dangling through the humid air. Sediments of dirt larger than a grown man clumped between their dexterous segments. When the destructive digit twitched, these clumps descended in a rockslide of detritus and compressed soil. The filthy avalanche crushed cars and trains fleeing the metropolis.
---
No answer. No landmarks in sight. Nothing. In every which way, just unending green and blue. Watashi turned on her heel, glancing in a circle. Her index and ring finger tightened around the shoes.
"Maybe it's like before, where there's an invisible wall somewhere..." She leaned forward, and took a step. A powdery patch scrunched under her right foot. "Oh." Internally, this sensation wasn't a surprise. It felt as if she'd read the script to this dream earlier. "Did I step in moss?"
---
Whooooosh...
The citizens still remaining, huddled together, stared at the dirty sole eclipsing their sun. It happened too quickly for any military or police to react; and yet, three million lifetimes flashed before them. In a single fell swoop, the mighty foot descended. Buildings across the sky buckled and collapsed into the uncaring, fleshy ceiling. They popped like grapes, glass spewing from the sides. Everyone on the streets panicked, spoke their last words, made peace with their duties, or bowed down in worship, as they were buried underneath layers of soft, somewhat-salty skin.
KA-THUUUD
Each of the terrifying toes obliterated a different residential area. Upper-class neighborhoods and slums were indistinguishable beneath the inadvertent destroyer. They broke equally to thin dirt sediments under massive wrinkles.
The sources of the city's power, bustling industrial zones, terrifying structures at the very height of human progress... Those were below Watashi's all-encompassing heel. They offered no resistance before splintering off into scrap metal.
The mediator had a fairly low arch; but it was tall enough to fit wide swaths of stores and restaurants. Shoppers got a close-up view of the slopes of skin above, emanating a musty, smothering air. It wasn't to last, through. The Earth couldn't support the weight resting atop it. Cracks branched out from the rest of her magnificent sole, swallowing and trapping any unlucky person they crossed. With a harsh roar, the once-solid ground became putty, as her heel sunk in deeper. The structures downtown met with the same inevitable fate, as they joined the mile-wide footprint.
Rumble... Her step echoed across the empty sea.
The sounds of tearing concrete ended.
The screams ended.
All that remained was the low heartbeat of a confused girl.
---
Watashi peeked down in confusion. The mist still covered everything - and it was getting thicker, as of her body heat added to it. She dug her toes in the earth, squeezing dirt between them, trying to identify it by touch. Dusty pellets broke off between the joints, clinging desperately to her flesh. She lifted her foot up from the ground, and examined the curious mixture. "The fairies must've left a powder candy lying around. Whatever it was, I guess I broke it. Well, if nobody saw..." She looked left and right, then brushed her foot against her calf, rubbing the evidence away.
---
Surrounding cities witnessed the scene in shocked silence. The dizzying perspective from below the mega-scale Watashi made it hard to tell what happened; until, with a great rumble, her sole raised from the soil. What lay on the underside made them sick.
A whole city. A whole city, caked under her sole. Flattened chunks of skyscrapers dripped off the ball. Rubble caught between her toes. It was surreal, dizzying - the way the ruins danced through the clouds.
Her hand descended from the sky, like the hand of God, fingers wrapping around her sole's dirtied wrinkles. To someone her size, Watashi's giant feet would look delicate, even dainty. The behemoth had slender toes that wiggled constantly, curiously exploring the world; a perfectly round heel, with a slightly rosy tint from field work; and straight, cleanly-cut nails that had a gentle luster in the sun. By the confused expression in her brows, and the show motion of her feet, it was evident that the pink-haired mountain wasn't aiming for human settlements. She had the poise of a gentle woman at a tea party. That just added salt to the wound: their lives were snuffed by something so elegant and graceful.
As her finger brushed across the canyons and hills of her foot, debris avalanched off. It was as if this monolith was showing off the ruins to them; showing humanity exactly what they were.
To neighboring cities, this was a great center of commerce and trade.
To the inhabitants, it was a proud, safe haven, all they'd known.
To Watashi, it was itchy dirt that stuck to her skin. Itchy dirt that she rubbed off on her leg.
---
With a last rub, it was gone - but she was no closer to finding an answer. Watashi decided to...
(Inspired by https://gs-uploader.jinja-modoki.com/upl... )  indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
| Members who added to this interactive story also contributed to these: |
View Portfolio
Visit Notebook
Send Gift Points
Awards
Badges
Send Email
Community Newsfeed
General Discussion
Sponsored Items
Book of Trinkets
Static Items
Books
Groups
Interactive Stories
Audio
Campfire Creatives
Community Notes
Crossword Puzzles
Documents
Folders
Images
In & Outs
Madlibs
Photo Albums
Polls
Product Reviews
Quizzes
Survey Forms
Web Pages
Word Searches
More by this author