The Ant Adventurer

(BiggerBetterBarbie; idea by SerbianGoblin)


World famous treasure hunter Kevin Serian (or so he claims) is slicing his way through seemingly endless jungle vines. Of course, this was nothing new for him. For a few years now, the twenty-something young man has braved many foreign, hostile environments. He always came away with some kind of loot that would grant him fame and fortune, albeit briefly (usually because some other explorer would upstage him). He felt unstoppable… he felt like nothing was going to hold him back, especially not jungle vines! Finally though, he slashed through the last of the vines with his knife and looked at the temple over a hundred yards away. He took a deep breath.
"Ahhhhhh… there you are, my precious. Now let's see what we can bring home." Kevin said as he, without hesitation, rushed towards the temple entrance.

While he was quick to enter the temple, he proceeded cautiously from that point forward. Firmly holding a torch in hand to light up the dark corridors, he made his way slowly so he wouldn't have a pleasant end to his adventure. Like in this one room when he stepped on a tile, and an arrow came within inches of piercing him in the nose, watching as the arrow landed in a nearby wall.
"Whew… they want to make sure you get the point." Kevin joked as he gave a couple taps on the arrow. The next several minutes would be filled with one close call after another, whether it was almost falling into a pit of man-eating snakes, spikes from either the floor or ceiling (or both!), tripping over the skeletal remains of those that explored the temple before him, maces or axes that came swinging down. You name it, he probably ran into it. After wiping his forehead from jumping over another trap door, he once again cracked a joke to laugh at the face of danger.
"All we need now is that giant, rolling boulder that Jones guy had to deal with." Kevin said.
Finally, though, he made it into a shiny room where he sees a golden artifact on the center pedestal.
"Mmmmm… come to Papa." Kevin said as he gently, just in case there were a few more surprises, picked up the treasure. It was surprisingly lightweight despite being a foot tall.
"Jackpot!" Kevin said as he triumphantly held the treasure above his head like a hero picking up a sword in a video game. But he couldn't celebrate for long… as the room started to shake rather violently. As chunks of the ceiling came raining down from above, Kevin felt the temple was probably crumbling apart now that he secured the loot.
"And that's my cue to leave." Kevin said as he stuffed the treasure in his bag.

He darted his way out of the room, remembering what steps he took. He couldn't be careful anymore, not unless he wanted to become part of the temple and its 2 to 3 thousand year history. But by the time he reached one of the hallways, enough of the ceiling collapsed to close it off.
"Damn it!" Kevin shouted. When he tried to take another path, it too was blocked off by the collapsing ceiling. Kevin didn't have that cocky attitude anymore. His life really and truly was in danger as he ran down another hallway, struggling to keep his balance as the earthquake intensified.
Eventually, Kevin ran up to another dead end, and he looked behind him to see he was running out of real estate. At the same time, a blue swirling portal suddenly opened up to the side. The portal confused him… this was something he never expected to see in real life.
"What the… a magic portal? Where did it come from?" Kevin said. He then looked to see the collapsing ceiling closing in fast. He was going to be dead real quick if he didn't act fast. Kevin shook his head.
"Well, given the choice of how I'll die… I know which option I'd rather NOT take." Kevin said to himself as he took a deep breath and jumped right into the portal. A few seconds later, the hallway he was standing in was completely buried in rock as the entire temple itself fell apart, finally bringing an end to the earthquakes.

Meanwhile, elsewhere in the world, Tiffany Nickle was walking out the door of the home of one of her good friends and classmates, Nicole. The two just had a fun workout session judging by the aerobics type outfit Tiffany was wearing, plus the fact her clothing and skin were almost entirely covered in sweat. She was tired, sweaty, and even a little dirty, but that didn't stop her from pulling her cell phone out. But she sighed when she saw no bars in the upper left corner of the screen.
"Ugh… you'd think they'd build a decent cell tower by now." Tiffany said. She then navigated to the Wi-Fi page of the phone's settings menu. She didn't see her home network, but instead saw something else. This network had a bunch of symbols instead of an actual name, like NickleWifi for example, but most importantly… it had 4 out of a possible 5 bars.
"Well, whatever works." Tiffany said as she tapped the network, surprised to see it logged her in immediately rather than ask for a password. As Tiffany walked her way home, she caught up on the day's news.
"Flea infestation grows. Mayor has no answers right now. Well, of course he doesn't. He probably doesn't even know what 2 plus 2 is." Tiffany said, once again rolling her eyes.
"I'm sure Mom's gonna go nuclear and scan me from head to toe for fleas. I suppose it wouldn't be a bad idea…" Tiffany said.

Back to Kevin Serian. It seemed like only seconds ago when he was running for his life out of the collapsing temple. He rubbed his eyes to get his vision readjusted. What he saw was unlike any place he had ever seen before… and he's been around almost the entire world! All around him were titantic yellow branchless trees that swayed back and forth in the wind.
"Where am I? This is not Curacao, that's for sure." Kevin said. As he took a few steps forward, the ground felt incredibly slippery and greasy. Kevin had to clutch onto the trees to maintain his balance. He planted his feet and the ground felt squishy on top of all else.
"Man… any slicker and I might as well be in a swamp." Kevin said. The adventurer nevertheless pressed on in the seemingly endless yellow forest, though there were occasional car-sized spots of white that seemed to drip endlessly.

Here's what he didn't know just yet:
Those dripping spots of white? Dandruff.
Those towering yellow trees? Strands of hair.
The greasy and slippery floor he was walking on? Oil drenched skin.
That portal he jumped through? Opened as a result of Tiffany logging into that mystery Wi-Fi network. He was now deep within the hair of Tiffany Nickle. So small that fleas would look quite big. But you probably figured all that out by now. ^_____^

Speaking of Tiffany, she opened the doors to her home and walked inside, closing the doors behind her. She tried to quickly walk up the stairs and into her room, but…
"Tiffany!" another female voice shouted. Tiffany sighed and turned around, walking into the kitchen where she saw her mother, Doreen, cooking lunch.
"Yes, Mom?" Tiffany said.
"Tiffany, for goodness sake, where have you been!? Your brother and father will be home from the golf course any minute." Doreen said.
"Geez, sorry! I was… out for a walk." Tiffany said, stopping short of revealing where she really was.
"Well, never mind. I'm almost done making lunches anyway." Doreen said.
"Yeah, yeah. I'll be in the living room watching TV." Tiffany said as she swung around and walked out of the kitchen. Doreen just rolled her eyes. She remembered acting like that in front of her own mother when she was that age.
Before Tiffany sat down, however, she felt a small twinge in her hair… immediately thinking some of it got tangled from her workout with Nicole earlier. As luck would have it, there was a hair brush laying on one of the tables. She picked it up and gave her hair a few quick strokes. She looked to see one single strand of hair… and the whole brush covered in sweat.
"Eww." Tiffany said. She put the brush back on the table and turned on the TV with the nearby remote. She sat down and slipped her feet out of her flip flops, breathing a sigh of relief to be in her bare feet again.

Meanwhile, inside Tiffany's hair, Kevin continued to walk around what he thought was just a steaming hot yellow jungle. Along the way, he kept speculating on where he might've ended up, especially after he wiped the sweat coming off his forehead.
"Maybe I'm somewhere in Brazil. I don't remember it being this hot. Or Iceland? Bleh… forget there. It's always chilly." Kevin said. But his train of thought came to a stop when the sky suddenly went dark. He looked up wondering if maybe there was a cloud in the sky. What he saw instead made him gasp.
"Holy shiiiiiiiiii…!!!" Kevin said. He didn't know what it was (it was the underside of a hair brush), but the titanic wall of plastic with huge spikes was going to crush him if he wasn't careful. The spikes touched down, and as he danced around, white globs of goo (that was really dandruff) and gallons of the slippery water he had been walking in (really sweat) got pushed or pulled depending on the direction of the spikes. And as those spikes moved, it caused a breeze that almost blew Kevin off his feet.

After what felt like an eternity, the 'wall' (aka the brush) withdrew, returning the light to the 'forest.' Kevin was a few hundred feet away from where he last was, but more important than that, he was still alive and kicking.
"Ha. Haha. Hahaha!!! Once again, Kevin Serian laughs in the face of danger. I eat it with a spoon… wipe it off my chin, and ask for seconds!" Kevin said, gloating in his triumphant victory of certain doom.
It was a moment that was quickly broken by the sounds of voices behind him.
"Whoa whoa whoa! Check this out, dudes!" a male voice said. Kevin looked… and he looked like he had seen a ghost. In front of him were three fleas… all of them the size of a small house.
"Mmmm… most interesting. This creature looks like a normal person, only like a million times smaller." one of the fleas said, this one with a female voice.
"Who cares what it is or where it came from!? Let's eat it!" another flea with a male voice said.
"Ooooookay… what kind of science fiction movie have I been transported to?" Kevin said. He watched as the fleas quickly closed in.
"I better not wait to find out!" Kevin shouted as he took off running with the fleas giving chase from behind.
The chase went on for a few minutes, and Kevin was showing clear signs of exhaustion. He looked behind to see how quickly the fleas were closing in, but he didn't watch where he was going and he slammed into one of the yellow 'trees' which was actually one of Tiffany's strands of hair. He hit so hard it actually dislodged the 'tree' from the ground and Kevin fell almost unconscious to the ground.

Meanwhile, this was an act that did not go unnoticed to Tiffany. The hair fell from its follicle to a few inches away from her eyes and it momentarily distracted her from the TV. The hair landed harmlessly on the ground.
"Ugh… stupid hair!" Tiffany said as she reached up to scratch where the hair came from with her fingernail while continuing to watch her show.

Kevin was too scared to move as the fleas licked their chops and leaned in on him.
"Mmmmm… I wonder how many calories this thing has." the female flea said.
"Who cares, just as long as he tastes like the hairs of that dog we rode last week!" one of the male fleas said.
"Wait a sec, guys…" the other male flea said as he looked up in the air, as did the other fleas. All four gasped in horror as a giant finger, and its nail, descended from the heavens.
"INCOMING!!!" one of the male fleas screamed as the fleas backed away. The female flea jumped one way while the male fleas jumped another way. It would prove to be a fatal mistake for the male fleas as Kevin and the female flea watched the male fleas get crushed into nothingness.
"REX! REN!!!" the female flea screamed with tears coming out of her eyes. Kevin wasn't out of the woods yet… he watched as the nail moved towards him, heaving the sweaty and filthy surface, and bending the yellow trees, like he were witnessing an earthquake similar to one of his temple escapes.
"God dammit!!!" Kevin said as he got up and ran as fast as he could from the massive nail (though he didn't think it was that, instead thinking it was some giant white wall). The incredible destruction of the ground was hard to put into words as he looked back, but he kept sprinting ahead.

Eventually, the noise went quiet and the nail disappeared. Kevin stopped running and breathed a sigh of relief.
"Man, I've had some close calls before but… WHOA!" Kevin shouted, only to suddenly get grabbed by one of the giant fleas.
"You monster! Those were my best friends that got crushed!!" the female flea shouted.
"Ack! Look… lady! You've got the wrong murderer!" Kevin said as he struggled to break free of the flea's grip.
"I will enjoy slowly eating the flesh off your bones…" the female flea said as it flexed its fangs.

After Tiffany was done scratching, she tilted her head down. She was looking away from the TV and scanning the remote for the channel change buttons.

This simple act caused both the female flea and Kevin to lose their balance and go sliding on the oily and dirty surface. Both tried desperately to find something to grab onto to, but eventually they both ran out of room and found themselves out of the forest. They both screamed for their lives, but Kevin looked down and saw he had one last chance. There was a series of small black platforms underneath him. He started flapping his arms and legs in mid-air to try and manuever around. He was successful in landing on one of these platforms, and he held on for dear life, watching as the flea kept falling and falling.
"NOOOOOOOOOooooooooooooo…!!!" the female flea screamed until she could no longer be heard, even her echoing cry for help. Kevin could only assume the monster would have an unhappy landing eventually. He was just glad to still be alive.
"Whew… well, at least I'm out of that yellow forest, but now where am I? Out of the frying pan and into the fire, like the old saying goes." Kevin said.

What Kevin didn't know was that he had landed on one of Tiffany's eyelashes and the simple act of her blinking was about to send him flying off his safe haven.

Kevin suddenly felt the platforms drop down at a high rate of speed, and then they rose at the breakneck speed. The sudden changes in momentum caused him to fly up in the air.
"Aaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh!!!" Kevin screamed as he flew up and then fell down. He felt like he had been airborne forever as long as he was falling, but he knew it would be an unhappy landing just like for the flea he escaped from.
"Wait! What am I thinking!?" Kevin said as he suddenly unraveled the scarf he had been wearing for his temple expedition. He used it to glide down and down and down until finally landing in a desert-like area. Like the yellow forest from earlier, this desert looked vast and endless, and was riddled with cracks and holes in the sand-like surface. However, this definitely didn't smell like a desert. Kevin took one whiff and his face turned green. He then collapsed to his knees and threw up.
"Ugh… my God! That's like a hundred thousand piles of used gym socks!" Kevin said to himself as he finished vomiting and coughed out the rest. It didn't help that the surface was very hot, and he had to dance around to keep his feet and hands from burning.
"Well… petter bress on." Kevin said, not realizing how broken his words were from the extreme heat and exhaustion. He hoped to find an end to this desert or some random oasis.

What Kevin didn't realize was that he was walking on the surface of an old, cracked, worn-out flip-flop Tiffany was wearing. They were the same flip-flops she had been wearing since she was 9-10 years old. No matter what, she refuses to let her mother toss them away. And speaking of her mother…
"Tiffany! Lunch is ready!" Doreen shouted from the kitchen.
"Coming!" Tiffany said as she powered off the TV via the remote she had been holding. After setting the remote aside, she reached down and picked up one of her flip flops. She took note of how old and worn out they looked.
"Wow… they sure are old and dirty. But so is our station wagon." Tiffany said. She tipped the flip flop forward so she could slide her foot into it.

While all this was going on, Kevin would once again feel the earth move beneath him. He tried grasping onto the 'sand' but eventually found himself sliding downward towards the ground. On the way down, Kevin looked up. He rubbed his eyes to make sure he wasn't hallucinating.
"Is that… a girl?" Kevin said. He thought the fleas he encountered were gigantic. If this girl was any bigger, he thought, she'd eat up the entire planet like a loose grape. Kevin eventually landed with a thud on the dirty, wooden floor.
"Ooooof!" he shouted as he watched the giantess plant one flip-flop covered foot down and eventually the other foot as she put the other one on. Tiffany then stood up, and Kevin almost broke his neck trying to look up at her giant face. She was so high up… he really couldn't even see her upper body!

Tiffany, meanwhile, made another quick scratch at her forehead, dislodging another lonely hair from its follicle.
"Ugh… worst bad hair day ever." Tiffany said before she stepped away and headed for the kitchen.

It was almost super slow motion watching the titanic girl move away. Kevin felt a powerful gust of wind as Tiffany swung one foot over where he was standing and walked away. It was like watching the apocalypse come to life before his eyes. He then looked up at a lonely strand of hair falling towards him. It grew bigger and bigger and bigger… Kevin quickly realized he was a dead man if he didn't get out of the way.
"Yikes!" Kevin said as he dove out of the way, just as the strand of hair landed on the ground behind him with a resounding THUD. He turned around and saw the strand was as big as a skyscraper. He got up and walked away, thankful to still be alive once again, only to suddenly bump into something. He looked to see what it was… it was the bloody remains of the female flea that formerly chased him. Only her head somehow was intact… everything else was spewed out all over the wooden floor. He gagged from seeing this violent picture.

But it led to a revelation for the young man, like when he discovered the solution to a puzzle in a temple.
"That flea must've gotten crushed by the giant girl and her flip flop. I think I understand now… I've been transported into the home of a typical American family… shrunken beyond my wildest imagination. I'm probably making Ant-Man jealous by now!" Kevin said excitedly.
But he quickly wiped the frown off his face. He looked around his surroundings. Flea remains… the floor… the tables… the television set… everything was big beyond comprehension of the young man's always curious mind. He sighed.
"I feel… insignificant… useless… all thanks to being this size." Kevin said. He used to think he was looking down on top of the world each time he conquered a temple and found a new treasure. Now he felt like the very specks of dust he was always brushing off his desk at home.
But then he shook his head.
"No… I am Kevin Serian! I never give up! Somehow… some way… I'll get that young lady's attention and see if she can help me out." Kevin said. Even if it would take 1-2 days at the size he was at, he got to walking towards the kitchen, taking the same path the giantess Tiffany took earlier.

Tiffany sat down at the counter, half smiling over seeing the sandwich there. She immediately dug in while Doreen walked away.
"Enjoy, honey. I'll be in the living room cleaning up." Doreen said as she held up a broom.
"Yeah, yeah. Sure, Mom." Tiffany said. Doreen just rolled her eyes, knowing Tiffany was in her own little world as usual.

Kevin had rounded his way around one of the tables when he heard thunderous booms once again, the same kind that Tiffany made as she was walking away. He got the sense that the giantess was returning already.
"Oh? That didn't take long." Kevin said. Instead, he watched as a much bigger giantess came walking into the living room.
"Oh no… it's someone else. Another goddess, but this one… holy cow…!" Kevin said. He was so mesmerized, he didn't realize she was holding a broom and sweeping the floor with it. Eventually, Kevin thought for a moment that Doreen was looking straight at him.
"Miss! MISS! DOWN HERE!!!" Kevin screamed as he jumped up and down and waved his arms, thinking he was saved and he would get the help he needed. Of course, it was of no use. He was nothing more than a speck amongst the many other specks of filth on the wooden floor. Doreen just kept on sweeping, and that's when Kevin finally realized something… that broom was going to crush him if he wasn't careful.
"Eeeep!" Kevin said. He ran towards the kitchen with the broom now landing behind him. Kevin ran as hard as he could, but there was no outrunning those giant bristles. One of them whacked Kevin right in the back, sending him flying through the air.
"Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!" Kevin said as he went flying through the air. Another unsuspecting whack from the broom sent him even higher in the air.
"Well… my friends always send I would die like the clown I am. I'm flying through the air like a circus clown." Kevin said to himself.

But once again, his luck took a turn for the better as he wound up landing on top of a rose. Several yards away was the mega 'giantess,' Tiffany. He immediately figured he landed in the kitchen.
"Woot! I've been saved by the rose!" Kevin said as he thrust his arms up in victory. But then he gulped nervously as he watched Tiffany get up and move away from the counter.
Tiffany had finished her lunch and was about to walk away and out of the kitchen, but then she saw the flower pot full of roses.
"Oh? I don't think I've seen these roses before." Tiffany said as she hovered her nose a couple inches above the tallest rose. She took a quick couple of whiffs.

To Kevin, those whiffs were more like black holes sucking him in. He tried holding onto the rose, but lost his grip and went flying up towards one of the giantess's nostrils.
"Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!" Kevin screamed until he went splat against a single, snot-covered nosehair inside the right nostril. He couldn’t move, due to the thick muck holding him on the hair. The powerful smell of the other snot in her nose was quickly overwhelming him, and he had to try and break free and get back to the outside world before he ran out of strength.
"Got… to… break… loose…" Kevin said as he fought with all his might. He eventually got the hair to swimg from side to side, although his arm movement was still restricting the use of his arms.

Just like with her head of hair, this act would not go unnoticed by Tiffany. Something was irritating her nose and she felt the rising urge to sneeze.
"Ah… ah… ahhhhhh…" Tiffany said as she tried to fight it off, but it was too late to even cover up her face.
"CHOOOOOOO!!!" Tiffany sneezed. It was a powerful sneeze, causing saliva and snot to go splashing onto the nearby wall. Tiffany gasped when she saw the couple pieces of snot.
"Shoot! Don't let Mom see that… don't let Mom see that…" Tiffany said as she quickly ran to another side of the kitchen, looking for something.

As for Kevin? He may have been out of Tiffany's nose, but he was dizzy. Between the sudden in change of pressure inside the nostril… the high speed he and the piece of snot he was trapped in were ejected, and then crashing onto the wall… he had a hard time remembering his own name even. And worse? He was still trapped in the snot. A fall from where he was trapped would surely kill him.
He'd never get the chance to think of how to escape this latest catastrophe. The next thing he saw when he looked up was a huge wall of white. He just caught a glimpse of Tiffany behind that wall. Unknown to him, Tiffany had grabbed a lone tissue to wipe the snot off the wall.
"Oh spi…" Kevin said before he was completely engulfed in the tissue.

Tiffany wiped the snot and saliva off the wall and then took one look at the mess at the tissue paper. Immediately she was disgusted.
"Ewww. Ugh." Tiffany said, seeing all the green/yellow snot, along with few specks of filth.

This gave Kevin Serian, the so-called greatest explorer on planet Earth, one last look at the woman who was about to unknowningly kill him. He could barely move even without being trapped in snot, as he felt every bone in his body shattered or bruised. He felt the maximum amount of depression knowing he was probably going to die soon, but he did manage to flash a disgusted face at the giantess… not that she could see it anyway. Finally, though, there was no more seeing the giant Tiffany as she crumpled up the tissue paper into a messy ball, throwing it towards the trash can as she walked out of the kitchen and eventually up to her bedroom.

The ball, however, wound up bouncing off the edge of the trash can and fell onto the floor. Tiffany didn't notice this as she was already gone.

When all the shaking and bumping around was done with, Kevin couldn't help but laugh a little. Somehow he was still alive. He could barely get his words out due to still being drowned in snot and his strength fading from his broken body.
"Ha… haha… that's right… world… I'm Kevin… Serian… I AM KEVIN SERIAN! I AM INVINCIB…" Kevin screamed before a split second later, the top of the tissue suddenly came falling down like something was stepping on it.

CRUNCH!
Kevin Serian was dead.

Doreen walked into the kitchen and set aside her broom. She then felt something get stepped on under the 2 centimeter heel of her boot. She looked down and saw it was a ball of tissue paper. It was a filthy mess of green and yellow snot, clear saliva, and a micro-sized spot of blood red. Doreen had no idea this was the crushed body of Kevin Serian. All she cared about was seeing the messy ball on the floor before she picked it up.
"Ugh… Tiffany. Where are that teenage girl's manners?" Doreen said to herself as she looked at the ball of tissue paper in disgust. She finally tossed it in the trash can, leaving Kevin Serian's bloodied remains to decompose in the snot.

As far as Tiffany and Doreen Nickle were concerned… it was just another day. ^_____^


END