[merritstone]

-July 21st (3 hours later)-

Let?s go back to the tip of Mai?s nipple.

Meg and I had decided that this was a great spot to hold our meeting. It?d certainly keep everyone?s attention. Mai laid comfortably on the futon. I stood on her nipple, and although Meg was far too big to join me, she kept close by standing on Mai?s breast. Cassy laid a few pillows on the floor and sat next to us with a thump.

Meg laid out the bad news first. She didn?t think that there was any real chance of any of us returning to our normal size and shape by Monday morning, or even the next week or two. Work would have to be called and in some cases (i.e. Meg and me) someone else would have to make the phone call. Meg and I had to accept that we were probably going to have to change our vocations.

?I?d bet I could get a job stripping,? Mai laughed.

?So could I- if table dances came equipped with a microscope,? Meg added.

?And I?ll be the bouncer,? Cassy chimed in.

Joking aside, there two major options.

We could wait it out. We could wait and hope that our bodies? natural sense of homeostasis kicked in and began pulling ourselves back into shape. This might take a very long time, Meg wasn't sure how long exactly, but she remembered reading stories of polymorph potions that went array. One potion too many and a fun weekend of living life as a cat resulted in a six months of coping with a tail and a taste for mice. Other stories describe people who never fully recovered.

Of course that was half the problem. Witches and Alchemists in their hearts were artists, not scientists. Most of the old stories were just that- stories. Few analytical reports ever made it to the 21st century, but the stories were everywhere. Even the modern day witches who posted their exploits on their blogs were surprisingly low on the documentation. It was really hard to tell what was artistic license, what was bragging, and who was downright lying.

Option two was Meg whipping up a permanence potion. Truthfully she would have to direct Mai in making it. Meg was still much too small for the actual labor part of it.

A permanence potion reassigns your current state as a new baseline. Once that potion was taken, whoever/whatever you are is how you?ll stay. Witches could, theoretically, turn someone into a toad, but they?d just turn right back without a permanence spell.

?Well, that sounds like a terrible idea,? Cassy said.

It did to me, too, until Meg explained further. From that new baseline we could start experimenting with additional potions and try to push the body beyond its natural limits again. Only this time we?d be doing it in the direction we wished things to go.

We?d have to be careful not to push too far or too much, and we?d need to take days and perhaps weeks off at a time between issuing new permanence potions. The rest periods were needed to ensure that a new homeostasis had been established. And an overdose is still an overdose, if we went too fast we could damage ourselves.

In either case it wouldn?t be easy.

?I?m still going with option number one,? Cassandra said, ?I?m huge, but I?m hoping it?ll wear off. I can always change my mind later, yes??

?Sure,? Meg said.

Meg and I opted for the permanence potion. I was so damn small I didn?t think that I had anything to lose. Growing back the slow way sounded way too slow. In five years I might still be only as tall as Barbie.

?Well, how long does the natural way take,? asked Mai.

?Depends on the person,? Meg said. She had moved to the edge of Mai?s boob so she could speak more directly to her face. ?Jeff and me might never get back to normal, but I?d think you?re looking at at least a week.?

It turned out that it?d be a lot shorter than that.

Suddenly there was a rumble, Mai gasped ?WHOAH!?, and my viewpoint seemed to be rapidly dropping. Meg yelled and tumbled out of sight over the edge of Mai?s bosom, rolling down onto her chest and collarbone.

The nipple I stood on seemed to shrink underneath me. Its 25 foot summit dropped in elevator fashion down to about ten feet. Even its radius contracted some, and the areola was considerably reduced in circumference.

And that was only the beginning. Her whole mountainous breast was deflating. Reducing in size as if a million years of erosion was hitting it all at once. The edge of her breast contracted and grew more gradual with each passing second. Soon I could see more and more of her stomach and upper chest- depending on which direction I was facing. The slope of her breast became increasingly gradual. What had once been a near vertical climb lessened into a steep hill and then to a modest rise as Mai?s breasts shrank back into her chest.

Eventually I sat on a smallish nipple that was located on slightly higher ground on a relatively flat plain. The minor mound I sat upon lead to a subtle depression and then to another small swell where I could see this nipple?s twin. The land curved and swooped with the grace of her belly and thighs, but it was also uninterrupted. To the south I could see a small pubic forest hundreds and hundreds of feet away on the other side of her stomach. Looking north I could see where Meg had tumbled to the base of Mai?s neck.

The giant blonde was already getting to her feet and looking around our flat-chested landscape in wonder.

?Wow! Total reversion!? Meg said. ?Or at least a far as I can tell.?

?HOLY CRAP! Are you guys OK?!? Mai said. She obviously wanted to move but was afraid to do so.

?That wasn?t supposed to happen,? Cassy said. ?Was it??

?Not really,? Meg said. ?And certainly not that quick.?

This began a long series of questions for Mai and a little new hope that we might all return to our true shapes sooner than we thought.

The truth was weirder than that. Mai had, indeed, returned to her original shape and height. It turns out that her body really, really likes its true shape. There had been evidence of this all along, but everyone had been too distracted to notice.

When she had first taken the breast-expanding potion on Friday night its effect was supposed to last until Sunday night. Mai?s body had nearly shaken off the effects by early Saturday morning. And then later when she began the sexifying brew a single swig was supposed to last an hour, but she admitted that it seemed to last less. And every time that she returned to normal her body seemed to make the change faster than the time before.

Even with the significant overdose she had taken before the rescue, her return transformation had lasted less than ten seconds.

Mai is what those in the alchemy world call a Natural Balance. They are so rare that they were almost creatures of legends. Perhaps only one in 50,000 is a Natural Balance, and since there are also very few practicing witches most of the NB?s never discover their nature.

What does this mean for Mai? Potions certainly affect her, but her body quickly recovers. While it is possible for a Balance to take a fatal overdose, anything less than that will leave no lasting change. Meg doubted that even a permanence potion would leave lasting effect.

This was great news, but not the great news we were looking for. The potions still had a grip on the rest of us. Over the next series of days Cassandra had only shown a minimal shift toward her natural state (she had shrunk to 7?11? and looked a little less She-Hulkish). Meg and myself had not changed at all.

The real benefit to the rest of us was that Mai was now our official taste tester. We had someone we could try things on with no worry of them permanently altering her. This was going to speed up the experimental process of our restoration immensely.