You sat on the front porch of your Tinex House, kicked your feet up onto the railing, and let out a deep sigh. A sigh of equal parts contentment, mixed in with a little bit of regret. Regret at all that your life could have been, but contentment with how the efforts of others had pulled you out of the darkness all those years ago.
Twenty-five, to be exact. It was now twenty-five years (almost to the day) from when you'd first been fished out of Cynthia Morrow's gut at half an inch, and then proceeded to shrink daily until you hit your new permanent height of one-sixteenth of an inch. Twenty-five long, fulfilling, but also extremely routine years.
That wasn't to say that a lot hadn't happened in those twenty-five years, of course. It was just that everything that happened had precious little to do with you, and everything to do with those around you. The people still capable of leading full and fulfilling lives with the impediment of being the size of a speck.
Jenna and Piper got married, a wonderful ceremony attending but many. You yourself even attended, watching the events unfold from your Tinex House's living room window (said house being held in the outstretched palm of Lauren). Of course, when your mother got overwhelmed with emotion at seeing her daughter marry, she put your house down on the floor beside her purse to fetch some tissues, didn't pick you back up, and you were stomped on by Cass moments later. Still, that was the only accident that day, which was a plus.
Mari and Selena had also gotten married shortly after (the two waiting longer for their dream resort wedding than your sister had, despite proposing earlier). You'd also been to that wedding, and had been supremely pleased at two key things. Firstly, no accidents had unfolded, even if Cass' world-destroying ass had been a nanosecond away from crushing you and your house before you were spotted by Jenna. Secondly, a certain figure was not in attendance at the wedding: Cynthia Morrow.
The reason for that had to do with your work with Small Wonders, which had continued for years and was even still on-going to this day in a sort of informal consultant capacity.
Because of your frequent tests, check-ups, and blood work done with Doctor Fran, the geniuses at Small Wonders had finally had a break-through. Using all the invaluable data you'd provided to them, they'd managed to synthesize a cure for early on-set Partial Digestion Reduction, as well as an antidote serum a tiny could drink that rendered them immune to the effects of Appetiny for upwards of five years before needing to consume another dose. It was truly some miracle work, and Small Wonders made sure to immediately make their product readily available to the affected population (as soon as they passed the clinical trials, of course).
A truth that had been unveiled because of this came about a few months later, when Selena stopped by Cynthia's bakery and found the woman angrily shouting at a sobbing tiny, demanding they explain where they'd gotten their Appetiny Preventative so that Cynthia could snuff out the dealer at the source. When Selena demanded an explanation, she'd been stunned to realized that, after your departure, Cynthia had simply gone back to 'convincing' more tinies to enter her employ, and used them as Appetiny snacks just like she'd done to you. And, just like she'd done to you, each of her unfortunate victims fell prey to Partial Digestion Reduction, reducing in size until they invariably got lost somewhere on Cynthia's body, and she uncaringly moved onto the next victim.
This revelation came with fortuitous timing, because Selena had just recently confided in you her regret at her anti-affected actions in the past. Seeing your reduced size because of her and her mother's actions, and yet you still didn't lose your faith and optimism really blew her away. That, and her growing friendship with Piper, had led Selena to undergo a change of heart that now saw her as a unlikely but committed ally to affected. And, because of that, she was disgusted by her mother's actions.
Selena had given Cynthia one chance to change her ways, but when she later caught Cynthia trying to abscond with Piper herself (the Morrow matriarch convinced the pinkette was to blame for her precious angel's unsightly change in attitude towards affected), Selena brutally cut her mother out of her life, mere weeks before her wedding with Mari. And she didn't look back, either, something that made you immensely impressed with the silver-haired beauty, and even more happy that Mari had found such a wonderful partner in life.
There was a third wedding too, but you didn't go to that one by dint of your safety being a concern. It involved Dodger, Sydney, and the final member of their polycule, Rosa (who was a fellow affected who'd grown close to Dodger and Sydney after being their band manager for a few months). The trio were as loving as could be, but they were also dangerously flirty and accident-prone at all times, and with the alcohol freely flowing at the wedding, Jenna had told you later that it was a good thing you hadn't gone.
A few years after that, and children entered the picture.
Jenna and Piper gave birth to Aiden, an adorably shy tiny guy, while Mari and Selena gave birth to Daniela, an energetic and beautiful girl with a heart that longed to love on affected. It was little surprise that she fell head-over-heels for Aiden, and he for her. You spent many days helping to coach your nephew on how to be the perfect tiny boyfriend, making sure he knew not to make the mistakes you had when dating Mari. This closeness was easy to achieve thanks to Jenna and Piper taking over the house from Lauren, meaning they didn't move away after their wedding.
In fact, you rarely saw your mother anymore, as she'd retired from her fashion business (after passing it to Jenna), and had begun using her accumulated fortune to travel the world and see the sights. Rio had tagged along as well (similarly passing the Focused Fitness franchise to Mari and Selena), and Cass completed the trio while also still doing some international modeling work along the way.
Alongside the fashion business, Jenna had also started an organization known as the Fair Tiny Treatment Foundation, or FTTF. It was intended to be the anti-CTC, and it did a wonderful job in that capacity. In both little and big ways, Jenna and her crew fought back against the rampant anti-tiny horrors that the CTC tried to infect society with, and slowly-but-surely started to grab back some rights and freedoms that had been stripped away by the cruel dystopian organization.
Watching all of your friends and family grow up, you were as proud as could be. And, given your circumstances, about as happy as could be too. Which, while enough to give you going, was lacking in a few areas that your new size simply couldn't accommodate.
Truth be told, you were frequently quite lonely. Because of your size, affected were still the only people you could talk to. Without a fellow tiny around to translate, you couldn't interact with the giantesses of your life at all. And fellow tinies were in pretty short supply, outside of Piper, Aiden, and Rosa.
For a while, you tried to re-enter the dating pool, but found no success. There simply weren't all that many tiny girls in your local area that shared the same interests and preferences as you. You went on a few dates, but it was your size that kept ruining things. A cute redhead fainted at the sight of you, your size no doubt awakening a fear of shrinking even smaller that she hadn't known she'd had. A bubbly blonde had been a bit too flirty and intimate, overwhelming you with hugs and kisses, and another girl had crushed you without realizing no less than five times in the single date. It just wasn't meant to be.
And that wasn't even to mention the fact that, as close as you were to Jenna, she couldn't dote on you forever. There were plenty of times that her family and Mari's went on vacation, and it just wasn't feasibly safe to bring you along. You were left to idle at home while the rest of your friends and family celebrated life and camaraderie, all while you watched movies at home with nothing else to do to pass the time.
A grand total of once Dodger, Sydney, and Rosa had offered to housesit you during a vacation, but they'd quickly had their privilege revoked. No sooner had Dodger carried your Tinex house inside did she trip and send the house flying. Upon recovering you, Rosa had the shortsighted idea to open the door and shake you out so they could make sure you were okay, wherein you proceeded to tumble out onto the couch right as Sydney sat down. And, your terrible luck willed it, you got sat on right where there was a hole in Sydney's perpetually ripped jeans, splattering you to her gargantuan pale glute. It took Rosa three days to comb every inch of Syndey's butt cheek to find you after that.
And at this current moment, another blow had been struck: Aiden had just moved into an apartment with Dani. And with the kid out of the house, Jenna and Piper had left on yet another, much longer vacation. It'd be weeks before they got back home.
So there you sat, on your front porch, sighing, in a conflicted state of mind.
Reasonably, you knew not to be upset. Those closest to you had done all they could to make your one-sixteenth inch life comfortable. But, it wasn't hard to dream about how things could've gone differently. The more fulfilling life you could've led had Cynthia never got her hands on you. The job you could've had, the family you could've made, the legacy you could've built.
Ah well. You sighed again. It might not be perfect, but it's not terrible either. This is a decent life.
Getting up, you walked back inside to return to your shows.
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