Full Circle

Nick Sprouse was dying. Although blessed with amazing talent, alcohol abuse had destroyed his liver. At age 18, he had enrolled at an art school. After graduating, Nick had created a graphic novel that turned him into a multi-millionaire overnight. That was over thirty years ago.

“The Regulators” fell under the giantess sub-genre, and was the first graphic novel of its kind. It was about a group of college girls who fought crime with shrink-ray guns. That was before the days of the Internet, when the online giantess community was unheard of. When that first graphic novel was successful, a slew of sequels followed, which were all equally successful. Success turned Nick into a full-blown alcoholic. Now, decades after the initial success of his first graphic novel, Nick Sprouse had been diagnosed with cirrhosis of the liver.

Nick sat so he had a view of his driveway, which overlooked the ocean. His home had been purchased for just over a million dollars, but his only house guest was a nurse named Ramona who lived on the property. A pack of cigarettes rested on Nick’s night stand. What did he care? His condition was terminal, and quitting now wouldn’t make a damn bit of difference. Besides, that morning a doctor had informed Nick that he now had a week to live. Nick debated whether or not to grab a smoke and risk upsetting Ramona. Just as Nick reached for the cigarettes, headlights flooded the driveway. He wasn’t expecting anybody.

The vehicle stopped, and the engine died down. Someone exited the vehicle. The bedroom sliding glass door slid open, and a man stepped in. The stranger looked like Nick, but twenty years younger and fifty pounds slimmer.

“Who are you?” Nick asked.

“I’m you!” said the stranger. “Actually, I’m your counterpart from a parallel universe, where I made different choices in life than you. I’m here to make you a deal!”

“What kind of a deal?” Nick asked. He wasn’t in a position to be skeptical; what did he have to lose?

“We trade lives. I’ll use my time machine to heal you, then you take my place on my world, and I’ll take your place here. I’ll have my time machine create a duplicate of itself that I’ll give you, so you’re not stuck there.”

“Sounds good, but what’s the catch?”

“The catch,” said the stranger, “is that my life sucks. You’re a millionaire, but you’re about to die. That’s why I want to trade places with you. I’m perfectly healthy, so I’ll be able to enjoy your wealth. But when you go to my world, you won’t like it.”

“Yeah?” said Nick. “Why not?”

“I’m dirt poor, and I’m on parole for attempted robbery. Everything I do is monitored by my parole officer! He’s a control freak!”

This was a no-brainer for Nick. If he refused, his counterpart would leave without healing him. If he agreed, Nick would be healed and they would switch places, for better or for worse.

“I’ll go with you right now!”

Nick and his counterpart made their way to the time machine, which looked like a conventional automobile. After they sat down in the front seat, Nick’s counterpart said, “Computer, execute healing command!”

The pounding in Nick’s chest went away, and fifty pounds of belly seemed to evaporate instantly. For the first time in years, Nick could breathe without feeling short of breath. Even his clothing conformed to his new body shape.

“I feel like a new man!” said Nick.

“Now you’ll probably live to be a hundred and twenty! Let’s go!”

Nick’s counterpart ordered the door shut and told the computer to take them to the driveway of his house in his own reality. The driveway of a house on a suburban street materialized around them. Nick’s counterpart ordered the computer to create a duplicate of itself, and another time machine appeared next to the one they were in.

Before Nick exited, something occurred to him. “What kind of alternate universes can I travel to in that thing?”

“Any work of fiction exists as an alternate reality. Even your own graphic novel!”

Nick got out and said goodbye to his counterpart, and the original time vehicle faded away as it journeyed to Nick’s home reality.

Nick decided he’d go for a joy ride before he got settled. If he could journey to parallel realities, why not travel to the world where his first graphic novel was real? Nick ordered the computer to take him there. The computer complied, and he pulled up in the driveway in front of the mansion of Penny Gwynn, the lead protagonist of his “Regulators” graphic novel. Penny was standing nearby when Nick’s time machine appeared.

Nick introduced himself to her. Penny was the 18-year-old leader of a group of girl vigilantes who used portable shrink-ray guns to fight crime. Nick asked Penny to explain how her shrink-ray worked. He was pleased to hear Penny describe neutrino dissimilation, a theory Nick himself had developed for his graphic novel that involved stripping neutrinos from the quark and gluon particles that composed protons and neutrons.

“So I was right! My theory does work! And that chick with the physics doctorate in that chat-room thought I was crazy!”

“And the diminishing force of the charge of the negatively charged electrons,” Penny continued, “means there is less force pushing atoms away from each other, and that pushes the shrinking atoms closer together as they shrink, so they maintain the same proportionate distance apart from one another compared to normal size! Same goes for the positively charged protons. As they shrink, there is less resistance, so the atoms move closer together.”

Nick knew nothing about this aspect of the theory.

“How does your time machine work?” asked Penny.

Nick turned his back to Penny as he explained how to use it. When he turned back around, Penny was pointing her portable shrink-ray gun at him.

“I’m sorry it has to be this way,” said Penny as she pulled the trigger, reducing Nick to an inch tall. “You’ll make an exceptional pet!”

On the day Nick had been told he had a week to live, things had come full circle; he had been given his life back, only to have his freedom taken away by a character he had created!

The End