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Bronstein Institute

Richland, Virania

February 12, 1984 RE

I couldn't believe this meeting was still happening with no delays whatsoever. The government was acting like a giant battle dragon had not attacked any airport. In fact, when I had arrived at Grace's hotel to check her in the news of the airports destruction had been all over the news. What was different was that the government spokesperson was claiming that it had been caused by some terrorist group. Some of the survivors had already talked to the media about the battle dragon, but that was not the story people wanted to believe. So, people were accepting the government's explanation and it was just considered a national tragedy. Frankly, I could not blame the government for what it was doing. People were not ready for the truth yet and they would not be ready until they knew the government was doing something about the problem. If the government did not have a rock solid plan of action by the time the truth came out there would be widespread panic.

That did not excuse them for holding this meeting like nothing had happened in my mind. Every time I close my eyes I can still see broken and shattered bodies as well as the horrified looks of people as they were pulled into the battle dragon's maw. I would have at least liked to have an entire day to deal with the issue even though I doubted I would ever get over something like that. Then there was Grace. Once we had checked into the hotel she had been forced to leave her kids behind. A babysitter had already been waiting for us when we got to her room, but it was still unpleasant for Grace to have to leave her kids behind in the state they were in. They just did not have the security access to even get inside of the building while this going on.

Security was unbelievably tight. That was probably necessary. If the government had a plan to deal with our little problem then there would be others that would be interested in knowing what that plan was. Virania was a fairly powerful country, the most powerful in the region actually, but it was not invulnerable. If Firanel and Galvanta could actually get along then they might actually prove a threat to Virania. People were already blaming them for the attack on Robertson. The truth is that either of them probably, no, definitely would have done it if they could. If we had a plan then it had to do with ancient technology and those two would want to find a way to use that technology against us.

It was just a good thing those two hated one another. Galvanta was a country dominated by xenophobic humans that did not tolerate the existence of anthros. Only a very small number of animals had been affected by what had mutated many of the world's animals so long ago and if they were still in Galvanta they were either hiding very well or they were dead. They consider anthros to be unnatural and have long sought to expand their borders with the express purpose of exterminating every anthro from the face of the Earth. Currently they share a 400 mile long border with us and they have not been able to expand any further south because of it. Firanel was almost the exact opposite. Up until two centuries ago it had been a human controlled country as Galvanta had. They did not try to wipe out their anthro population though. Instead the anthros were used as slaves. Those slaves had rebelled and taken control of the country. Unfortunately, those former slaves had a burning hatred for humans. Even though they did not have their human population wiped out, the living conditions for humans were not all that great. For one thing, beating or killing a human was perfectly legal for an anthro in Firanel. That attitude toward humans has made it very hard for Firanel to coexist peaceably with its neighbors.

At least we had Caressee to the south of us. They had proven to be pretty amicable neighbors. That was probably due to the amount of financial and technological aid we gave them. One of the reasons Virania was so powerful was because we had a wealth archeological sites that provided us with information we could actually understand. That meant that it was mostly children's learning materials that we had found, but those materials had been useful in pointing our researchers in the right direction here and there. Our aid has helped Caressee drastically outpace the development of its age old nemesis, the Southern Alliance. In about a decade or two they would no longer be a threat to Caressee. That is probably why there have been rumors going around that the Southern Alliance is preparing for one more big all out attack on Caressee before that happens. And they will probably lose like they have once or twice every century. Once that happened Caressee would probably roll right over the four countries that made up the Southern Alliance and they would finally be in a position to return some of that aid we have given them over all this time.

The problems between nations seemed almost a bit trivial now. If the technology that was keeping people at their current size had really failed it could eventually result in the end of civilization once again. I could see the government was taking this situation seriously too. You could feel the intelligence in the room I found myself in. If there was anyone that had made a name for themselves in any field of science that actually mattered then they were here. Since the meeting had yet to officially begin there were a lot of whispered conversations going on and the inevitable shouting matches that were going on about one theory or another. It was not until a gray wolf in the typical black suit many government agents wear ascended a stage at one side of the room that the conversations began to die down. There was no way the wolf could have passed for a secret agent. His features were very sharply defined, even for a wolf, and he had eyes that were so intense they felt like they were boring into my soul whenever his gaze passed over me. Those are not very good traits in a secret agent. He looked more like the type of person that commanded attention and he was already doing a pretty good job of it without even speaking a single word.

"Good day ladies and gentlemen. I am sure you have all been anxious to find out exactly why we have gathered you here," said the wolf. "Well, I'm sure you have heard a few rumors and stories recently. If you will direct your attention to the screen we have a little presentation that should clear things up. I would like to ask that you hold your questions and comments until after the presentation."

What proceeded was a one hour presentation about every case where something or someone had grown in the nations of Virania and Caressee. Most people had been stunned speechless during the entire presentation. A few were able to utter comments about their disbelief, but that was all. Apparently, the first reliable report about a growth incident had come in about two months ago. Deep in the Tarkel jungle in Caressee a group of explorers had been witness to the incident. Almost overnight, one of the already huge jungle trees had grown to nearly eight miles in height. The explorers had been about 15 miles away and the pictures of the tree were a little fuzzy, but they were still very good. It actually looked like something straight out of a fantasy. I had to admit it was a very beautiful picture in an ominous sort of way.

There had been numerous other incidents as well. Most of them had been isolated to small towns by some miracle. That did not mean things were just fine though. In one of those towns a stray cat had grown to the size of a house, eaten seven people, and injured 14 others. Only six of those were expected to survive. Then in another town they had been celebrating at some festival when a young lioness had started growing. In the process of reaching 800 feet in height she had accidentally killed a dozen people. When she became disoriented and fell over she killed close to 100 people. That lioness had been distraught by what had happened and turned herself over to the authorities. She was now being studied in a secure facility at an undisclosed location.

The most horrifying incident that even dwarfed what had happened at the airport had happened in a place called Applewood. There had been over ten thousand people living there before. Whatever had happened to the town had left no survivors. The pictures that were shown displayed nothing but devastation. Every building in the town had been destroyed. Bodies, crushed mangled bodies, rested at the bottom of enormous footprints. They said multiple culprits had been responsible for what had happened. From the shape of the footprints a bear and a pack of wolves, actual animals and not anthros, were to blame. By measuring paw size they could tell that the bear was around 400 feet tall and the wolves were around 350 feet tall each. They never told us what had happened to those animals.

The list went on for some time. As it turned out most incidents were not that bad. Many just involved a person growing a few inches or maybe a foot. What did surprise me was how well the government was covering this up. It was surprising I had only been hearing rumors about this stuff. Then I remembered I had not really believed those rumors myself. The government had a powerful ally on its side, intelligent minds. If a person did not want to believe something their mind could come up with a string of false logic to justify that belief. That was just something that came with being a sentient being I suppose. It was always amazing how even the most intelligent people were subject to fooling themselves into believing what they wanted to believe.

When the presentation ended I sat in stunned silence. A few people immediately stood up and started lobbing accusations that the photos in the slide show were fakes. More people started rambling out of fear of just how bad things looked like they could get. It was actually Grace that stood up and asked in a very clear voice, "What can we do to fix this?" It was surprising that the agent on stage had been able to hear her, but wolves did have good ears.

The speaker responded, "That is what we have gathered all of you to find out. Over the years many of you have said that the devices of the past would eventually begin to fail. Until now nothing significant enough to threaten civilization has gone wrong. As you can see that has quickly changed. As you know, it is said that thousands of years ago humanity had itself and most other forms of life reduced in size, even the geography of the planet was altered to compensate for this. We don't know exactly how they did this, but the devices that actually control this are tucked safely away in orbit and out of our reach. Nothing we have is capable of reaching orbit anymore, so we have no way of reaching these devices and conducting some much needed repairs."

I had to wonder why we had all been gathered. They could not possibly think that we would be able to just whip up a new shrinking device for them. We did not have theories to explain how they had done some of the things they did when they had shrunk everything. We think the virus that affected the anthros had something to do with the process. Many of them changed sizes when they became anthros. Whether they shrank or grew had to have something to do with the process. Nobody was able to prove that though. Then the wolf smiled and addressed what I had just been thinking about. "Some of you may be asking why we gathered you. No, it is not to make a new shrinking device, especially not one that could blanket the entire planet. A certain Dr. Larry Sanders stumbled onto something of importance to this situation about seven months ago. It was considered too difficult to follow up on the clues to a facility indicated in the findings of Dr. Sanders. Some of you may be asking what type of facility it was. Well, it was actually used to manufacture commercial spacecraft."

Grace looked at me when my name was mentioned. I did remember what the agent was talking about. That was one of many facilities I had found clues to over the years. But, they were all located in such remote locations that I knew I would never be able to get the funding to go looking for them. I had completely forgotten about the place since I had first come across it. When I thought back on it, something in the presentation stood out. They had more than one reason for showing the incident with the tree first. I recognized the topography of the area. It was no more than 200 miles away from the facility that I had discovered.

"If we are going to get that facility online in a timely fashion we will need some of the best minds on the planet. We have already received permission from our neighbors to the south to send a sizable expedition into their territory. All we require is that you accept our request to join this much needed expedition and the team we will need supporting it here at home," the wolf explained, "We need to get that facility operational before we can even hope to try and fix this giant problem. And for those of you that are thinking of rejecting our request, keep in mind that nothing has returned to its normal size at this point. According to our data, if someone were to return to their normal size he or she would be around 10 to 11 miles tall. I ask you to imagine what a person like that could do to the rest of us by complete accident, or on purpose if that person chose to."

After an ominous warning like that I knew what I had to do. Besides, I had always wanted to get to a facility like the one that had been mentioned. This was not the best of circumstances, but it was the best chance I was ever going to get. I was one of the first people to choose to go along on this expedition. It was not like I was going to be in much more danger if something grew while I was in a jungle or in a city.

Port Ridgetan, Caressee

March 3, 1984 RE

It has been a long time since I visited Caressee. This is also my first time on one of their military bases. It was too bad Grace had to stay behind with her kids as a part of the support team. I had to admit I was impressed with the operation. Overall, Caressee's armed forces were of an even higher quality than those of my own country. Having four countries trying to invade your country once or twice a century required that it be that way. Virania often had officers and soldiers from Caressee assist in the training of Viranian forces to make up for the lack of combat experience.

This was also the first time I had been anywhere where the anthros outnumber the humans. Due to all the anthros that had emigrated from the Southern Alliance this was one of very few countries where the anthros outnumbered the human population and where anthros had true equal rights. Virania liked to think it had granted the anthros equal rights as well, but one trip to Caressee was enough to disprove that notion. My home country was getting close though.

The docks had been separated into a civilian and a military section. When I had stepped into the military section the number of anthros as compared to humans had gone up drastically. That kind of made sense since we were going on a jungle expedition. As much as the ancient humans had altered the Earth, a jungle environment just was not very human friendly. Most of the anthros I saw were ones that had evolve in jungle environments and should be able to operate in them better than the best of humans. And I also had to admit that many anthros were just physically superior to humans. Some anthros were naturally four times as strong as a human of the same size, they were faster, they had better reflexes, and they had matching or superior endurance. That was what caused many humans to fear them in some countries. Personally, I thought that fear was still unjustified because anthros did not go around starting fights any more often than a human would. And even when they did get in a fight they could be amazingly gentle when they fought a human. I could testify to that after some friends got me drunk on my twenty-first birthday as a joke and I wound up picking a fight with an eight and a half foot tall lion. After that I only had to spend a night in the hospital and the lion had still come in to apologize for what he had done.

This was a pretty small dock since it was only on a large river and it was at the very edge of the developed portion of Caressee. It was going to be a long voyage over land and water to reach or destination. I could see signs that the docks had been enlarged rather recently. Even then it still looked packed to capacity. There were going to 15 guides for the expedition, 100 of Caressee's most elite troops, and 30 scientists and engineers going on this expedition. Expeditions of this size just were not launched anymore and the amount of equipment and supplies that was coming along for just the scientists was staggering for me. I really hoped we could fit everything onto the boats and then be able to carry everything once we had to get back on land.

I was going to get to find out as well. Because I had been the one to discover the location of the factory I had been elected to lead the scientific portion of this mission. It was also because no one else wanted the added duties of being the leader to interfere with their own work. That was why I found myself looking for the leader of the military escort, Colonel Miller. After I asked a few of the soldiers bustling about where he was I finally found my way to the building Col. Miller was in. I had to go through a few checkpoints in the drab looking building before I was able to reach the colonel's office.

There was one thing I had to admire about the military and that was how clean they were. Everything was so neat and organized despite the influx of equipment and personnel they had received. The building the scientists were staying in already looked like a disaster zone and we hadn't even been here for an entire hour. When I was ushered into the colonel's office I noticed that it was small and a little uncomfortable. That was a good thing in many occasions though. Big empty offices usually meant big empty heads. Sitting behind a desk was a busy looking officer that was in jungle camouflage gear instead of dress uniform. Like most of the soldiers outside the colonel was an anthro, a jaguar to be specific. The jaguar finished what he was writing before looking up to say, "Dr. Larry Sanders, I am Colonel Jonathan Miller. I've heard a lot about you and I hope we will be able to find this facility of yours in a timely manner. We have received reports that we won't be alone in that jungle for long. Our group should be able to make better time than anything our wonderful neighbors can send, but I wouldn't like to test to see if that's true or not."

He was a straight to the point sort of guy. That unbalanced me a little. His eyes did that even more. No matter how much I see them, the eyes of a predator like Col. Miller had an affect on me. It was hard wired instinct for a human to feel fear under a gaze like that. It was even worse when someone like Col. Miller looked at me. Unlike many anthros which had never killed a thing the colonel had a proven capacity for violence and had probably killed before. The Southern Alliance never stopped making minor incursions into Caressee and someone had to stop them. Still, his tone had been friendly enough and I managed to speak before the silence between us became uncomfortable. I decide to try and be as direct as the colonel had been. "I'm happy to have you with us Colonel Miller. You and your men may have a few, um, difficulties dealing with some of the personalities on my team. They are all brilliant, but a few of them are a little...eccentric and a few don't care much for the military. If there are any major problems just bring them to me."

The colonel just grinned at me and said, "Dr. Sanders, my men are trained professionals that have been shot at for a living. If their feelings get hurt by a few snide remarks and they cannot do their duty because of it I will be sorely disappointed in them. In the event that happens, my soldiers will then answer to me and you will probably never know there had been a problem." That toothy smile was considerably more intimidating than his gaze. I still wonder if anthros picked up the habit of smiling from humans or if it was just something they did as a result of their mutation. Their faces were considerably more flexible after their mutations and their expressions did seem to come as naturally to them as they did to humans. Like humans, a smile could have a double meaning though and I was certain there was a little aggression in that smile. The colonel's size might be making me imagine that though. Even while sitting I can tell that he is considerably taller than me. If I had to guess, which was difficult while he was sitting, I would say he was at least seven feet tall.

We discussed a few details about the mission. I was distressed to find out that the Southern Alliance had received word about this expedition and was sending its own forces into the jungle. The colonel assured me that he and his soldiers would be able to handle that part of the mission though. I was informed that we would be sailing in two days in order to make sure everything was here and to give everyone a one day break before the mission got underway. Those days went by fast.