Art, Part Two Ch. 03

Art, part two. Ch. 03

Art meets laboratory staff charged with making him "normal".

It was a long night with lots of thoughts or maybe more like nightmares and I felt lousy when I finally did wake up. I could hear Suzanne in the bathroom, but for some reason I didn't join her. I was still deep in thought when I heard her say, "Good, you're awake. I'll order us some breakfast and then I want to talk to you."

I lay there with a sinking feeling as Suzanne called room service. When she finished she came and sat on the bed. "Arty, I did a lot of thinking during the night and you were so restless I can only imagine what was going through your mind. I promised you I'd be with you when you made your decision and I will, but in the meantime I'm a distraction for you. You need to be focused on evaluating the investigation that Berger and his group are conducting and making your decision.

"I'm going to leave you with Dr. Barrington and then I'm going home. There's plenty to do at the Research Center and I really do need to get back. We can be in touch by telephone and I'll come back whenever you ask. I really would prefer to be at your side through this, but I think going home will be the best for both of us."

I thought,"What a bummer. OK, deal with it." Suzanne was staring at me waiting for a response. I said, "I'll miss you, but you're right, I need to concentrate on how Berger conducts his study. They may even have to modify the equipment and I'll have to have my wits about me. Hey, I've been complaining about you being too much of a mother, so go on home, mom, I'll be fine. Now I'm going to use the bathroom and get washed up before room service gets here."

In the taxi on the way to the Barrington's I couldn't help thinking,"Last night was the last hurrah for Suzanne and me. She went as far as she could go with our sexual relationship. From now on it would be, 'Good buddies' or 'What's up?' between us. So now I'm back to where the "Professor" accidently zapped me. So where do I go from here? I have to find an alternative to just letting Berger take his shot at restoring me to full size no matter how dangerous. Come on, you've always believed in rolling with the punches and making the best of it."

Suzanne didn't say a word until we reached Barrington Manor and then it was only to point out Berger's laboratory. It was a newer building that had been carefully designed and landscaped to blend in with the historical nature of the property. The taxi pulled up in front of a small cottage that looked like it had been one of the original buildings. Suzanne asked the driver to wait so obviously this would be a quick goodbye. I could hear loud music coming from the building. I'm hardly a judge, but it sounded like somebody inside is a fan of Lady Gaga. Suzanne rang the bell and we stood there looking at each other with nothing to say.

When the door opened I thought,"Oh Suzanne, why didn't you warn me." I thought the young woman who opened the door was a teenager until I looked at her body. She was wearing skin tight leggings and a tank top that revealed a body that was hardly a young girl's. She had a band around her head and there were beads of sweat on her forehead. She motioned for us to wait and went to turn the music down. When she came back I had a chance to observe her better. She was probably close to my age, but what struck me was she was barely a head taller than my height. I'd guess her to be four foot seven or eight.

She said, "Ms. Joyce, you told us the subject was an adult male." She looked directly at me and said, "Why are you dressed as a young girl?"

Suzanne jumped in, "That's my doing, Dr. Barrington. Initially I did it to hide Mr. Jones' identity. We were trying to keep him from being recognized as a missing Research Center employee and opening us up to negative publicity. On this trip I chose to continue the masquerade as a matter of convenience. It's simply easier for a single woman to travel with a young female companion."

Dr. Barrington's only response was, "I see you've had your driver wait so I'll leave the two of you to say your goodbyes. I'm in the midst of an exercise routine, Mr. Jones, come see me after Ms. Joyce leaves." With that she turned on her heel and left us.

Suzanne said, "It looks like the daughter of Lord and Lady Barrington may be an insufferable bitch. I'm sorry, I wish there was another choice." She knelt down and wrapped her arms around me. "Arty, I'm going to miss you."

"Don't worry Suzanne, it will work out. I'll stay in touch and let you know what's happening." I put my arms around her neck and gave her a hard kiss on the mouth. She started to get up and I opened the door for her. She hurried out without looking back.

I followed the music and found Dr. Barrington in a sort of workout room. She was immersed into moving with the music and I didn't want to interrupt. Actually I was enjoying the view. The good doctor was very well proportioned and was bending and stretching in what was probably a cool down exercise. She had the sinewy moves and I could see her fine muscle tone with her skin tight outfit. Her tank top allowed me to watch her arms as she flexed and released. When she finally stopped, she seemed truly startled to see me sitting there watching her.

She said, "Come on, grab your suitcase and I'll show you your room." She led me to the back of the cottage and showed me a small comfortable looking bedroom. "Do you have any other clothes besides little girls?" When I shook my head 'no' she said, "Then get out of that ridiculous outfit and I'll try to find you something more suitable. Pack them all in your suitcase and I'll find a place to store them."

I finished packing my wig and clothes and was standing in my underwear when she returned. "Throw your underwear in the suitcase as well."

She stood there watching me so I said, "How about some privacy?"

"Mr. Jones, I'm a medical doctor and I'm familiar with the adult male body. You do realize I'm going to be running a lot of test on that body of yours and I'll be poking and prodding every orifice you have. I'll know more about your body than you do so get out of those girly underclothes."

"What the hell, Doc, I should be used to this by now." I stripped off my underwear and stood there nude under her gaze.

"I see you're a well proportioned male with all of the required equipment. I was beginning to wonder and, Mr. Jones, my name is Doctor Barrington, not Doc.

"OK, you want to play the role of 'ball buster', be my guest, Doctor Barrington."

"I take it you're a cheeky bastard."

"If you mean I'm a smart ass, you got that right."

She ignored my comment and said, "One of the house staff has boys and I found you some male underwear that should work for now. You can use a set of my scrubs until we get you something else. Go ahead and get dressed and I'll take you over to the lab where you can meet everyone.

When we were walking over to the lab I couldn't help thinking it was sort of nice to have someone my size to talk to, but did it have to be this one with a chip on her shoulder? Dr. Berger and another woman were waiting for us and I made a mental note to thank Barrington for my new outfit so I didn't have to explain my little girl getup. I recognized Berger from a picture back in the Professor's office at the Research Center. He's got to be at least in his mid 70's and painfully tall and thin. He looked nothing like the Professor, but knowing he was his friend should make this easier.

He welcomed me warmly. "Arthur, I'm so glad to finally meet you. Ben used to write about me about his young technician that held so much promise. I can almost see his reaction when he thought he'd killed you. Fortunately, we really believe we can reverse what's happened to you and we're about to start with lower animals. Oh, forgive me; let me introduce Dr. Heidi Wagner. Her background is physics as well as physiology and she's taken charge of assembling the machine you built.

Dr. Wagner said, "So this is the man we called 'technician'. I have to tell you, most of the time it was my question you were answering by e-mail. John told me to send them over his name so not to confuse anyone at the Research Center. You and I have a lot of detail to discuss."

"Dr. Wagner, I have to tell you that in our e-mail I was amazed how quickly you grasp the concept of what the Professor was doing. I'd grown up with it, but you forced me dig for answers."

"Please call me Heidi, we're pretty informal here aren't we, John."

"Of course, of course, and do you prefer Arthur or Art?"

"Either one is fine, but mostly I go by Art. Lisa's already told me how informal you are here and that just great as far as I'm concerned."

I glanced at Barrington and she looked mad enough to hit something, probably me.

"Heidi and Lisa, would you please bring Art up to date on what we've accomplished so far."

The two women went into more detail than I could follow, but it gave me an opportunity stare at them without being too obvious. Lisa went first and I began to get an idea why she reacts the way she does. She has a pretty face, but it's unlined and she appears very young. With a lab coat that's too long on her short body, she looks like a young girl trying to act like a grownup. Also, she has the kind of kewpie shaped lips that people only see on dolls. She's a serious woman who probably isn't treated as a serious woman very often.

Dr. Heidi Wagner was something else. I was trying to visualize what she would look like with that lab coat off. I'm guessing she has a very interesting female body. Her breast did not appear to be large, but they thrust themselves forward with authority. I could see the distinct outline of them even covered as they are. Her shoulders aren't very broad, but oh my, her lower half. When she turned to the blackboard to make a point her rear haunches reminded me of a lioness ready to pounce. There was real power there. When I looked up at her face I was startled because she was staring at me so intently. Suzanne said I undressed women with my eyes and I do, in fact I just did, but now I'm being undressed by Heidi's eyes. I can almost feel her licking her chops.

All of a sudden what she was saying clicked in, "So our test program is ready for Phase Two where we'll attempt to restore to full size the lab rat provided by the Research Center. Success or failure will give us direction for the next step. That will be "

"Wait a minute! Stop right there. I don't know how much veto power I have here, but if you want my participation in this project you have to change your plans. I don't want you to use Fred; sorry, I mean the small lab rat, for your first attempt to restore an animal."

John said, "Why in heaven's name not, Art? It's the most logical next step in restoring you to your normal size."

"I'm sorry, John, it's a long story. First, the three of you are out of my league in this discussion and my reason may not be logical to you, but I'll try to explain. I'm basically a gadget guy and until Professor Ben hired me as a technician, I'd never worked with animals or even had a pet. He gave me the task of taking care of the lab animals and I got sort of a kick out of it. I could even see personality differences between them. Anyway, I named the pair of mice, Mickey and Minnie, and the pair of rats, Fred and Ethel, after an old TV show.

"The mice really didn't behave any differently when they were larger, but after the rats were reduced in size, all Fred seemed to be interested was boinking Ethel, and well maybe eating to keep up his strength. Ethel got pregnant and we didn't notice. She died horribly because her fetus early on was too large. I blamed myself, but the Professor would hear none of that. He said it was his responsibility, not mine. Afterwards, Fred was sort of listless and didn't react unless I gave him a special treat. Then I got accidently zapped and I knew how Fred felt. I spent a lot time early on commiserating with him. Anyway, I told Fred that if anyone found a way to restore us, I'd go first. If something happened to me I'd see he got a chance to live out his life as a small rat and maybe someone might even find him a lady rat that wouldn't eat him. That might not seem like a good reason to you for insisting on going before Fred, but it is for me."

I looked around at their faces after I finished. John looked like I had just said the dumbest thing ever, but I couldn't read the women's faces at all. John said, "If that's your wishes then that's what we'll do. Heidi, if we change the test program does that present any problems?"

"No, and it might even work out better. I'm attempting to better focus the radiation before we try to change the magnetic field size. It will set the timetable back a ways, but if that's alright with Art, we'll change the test program."

Lisa said, "You're saying a promise you made to a lab rat is why you're willing to place your life at greater risk?"

"It might not make a lot of sense, but commitment means a lot to me. If I wasn't single or had anyone depending on me, I might think differently, but as long as I'm responsible only to Art Jones, then that's the way it's got to be."