Shelly began the sequence, and Zoey vanished. And then failed to reappear. "Son of a bitch!" Shelly swore. What had gone wrong now? She started a diagnostic, going over the data, when then the lights dimmed momentarily. Uh oh, had she used too much power again?
Sure enough, there were sparks flying from the junction box, and she was forced to grab a fire extinguisher to prevent a fire. An acrid scent filled the lab, and she was forced to open some windows.
As she sat down, exhausted, she heard a small voice.
"Hey Doc, are you going to let me out of here?"
Shelly turned to look, and there, in the destination pod, was Zoey. Well, what was left of her. Where previously she'd stood about 5' 6", she was now well over a foot shorter, her outsized clothing hanging loosely on her body, making her look like a little girl playing dress up.
Zoey looked around, her eyes wide and scared as Shelly opened the pod. "Well, the good news...Zoey, wasn't it? You've made scientific history!"
Zoey stepped out of the pod, wobbling slightly as she dealt with her oversized shoes. Her short skirt was sliding down off of her now-smaller thighs, and her black leggings were bunched up and comical looking on her. "What...what happened to me?!" Her voice was higher pitched now, and it was obvious she was in shock.
"Well, you were teleported. That's what I do here." Shelly was exuberant. Sure, the girl had lost about 40% of her mass, but what did that matter? She'd been too tall anyways! This was success, and she'd take it!
"But why is everything so much bigger? You shrunk me!" Zoey accused.
"Eh, it's not that big of a deal. I mean, you should see yourself. You look adorable!" Shelly crouched down. "You'll be famous, you know."
"Oh sure, a famous midget. That's just great. I'm going to sue you!" Zoey groused, as she got tired of dealing with her outsized clothing. She kicked off her low boots and let her skirt fall to the floor, then she let her leggings pool to the ground before shedding them as well. Her panties were no longer able to hug her body, so she was now naked from the waist down. She pulled down her Cure t-shirt, but not before Shelly got a look at the girl's surprisingly light-colored pubic hair.
"Not a natural brunette, then?" Shelly smirked.
"Oh fuck you, Doc!" The diminutive girl groused as she reached into her shirt to remove her now-useless bra. "I'm going to have to wear little kid clothes from now on."
"Well, at least you didn't get younger. Probably a good thing you removed your piercings though, that might of hurt. I suppose I should have made you strip before teleportation, I'll remember that next time."
"Next time?!" Zoey shrieked. "You think I'm going to let you put me back in there? As if!"
"Now, now, Zoey, think of it this way. If you don't help me with my experiments, then you'll be that height forever."
Zoey climbed up on a chair, folding her arms like a petulant child. "I guess I have no choice. I can't go back to my dorm looking like this." She huffed.
"That's the spirit! Now, we should weigh you and get some measurements. You were what, 5' 6" before?"
Zoey nodded. "Yeah. Like a quarter inch taller than that."
"M-hm...and how much did you weigh?"
"Uh...last time I was at the doctor's office, they said 126 pounds."
"Then lets get you on the scale." Shelly picked the smaller girl up and set her on her feet.
"Hey, don't just pick me up like that!" Zoey frowned.
Not listening to the tiny girl, Shelly brought her to the scale, and then removed her shirt, leaving her completely nude. Zoey had rather nice breasts, and was probably a b-cup. Though finding a bra that would fit her now would be quite troublesome, she was sure.
Zoey crossed her arms over her breasts as she stood on the scale, more in protest than really caring that she was naked.
"Let's see...75.6...yes, that's consistent. You're at 60% of your original mass."
"Jesus...why aren't I smaller? Like, 60% of 66 inches is, uh, 39?"
"39.6, but that's not how it works. You're now...52 inches tall."
"Fuck. 4' 4"? What's that, like an eight year old?"
Shelly nodded. "Roughly. What surprises me is that you don't seem to be suffering any side effects. For example, your brain is smaller, but you don't seem to have lost any mental faculties."
Zoey shivered. "You mean I could have gotten dumber! Fuck, Doc! I'm having enough problems with my grades as it is!"
Shelly patted the smaller girl on the head. "There, there, Zoey. Fortunately for you, while a larger cranial capacity is somewhat related to intelligence, having a big brain doesn't necessarily make you smarter."
"Oh I'm so relieved." Zoey stepped off the scale. "So now what?"
Shelly grinned. "Were you planning on staying naked?"
Zoey shrugged. "What, it's not like you haven't seen a naked girl before."
"That's an interesting attitude to take. Most women would be mortified."
"Eh." She kicked at an imaginary rock. "Besides, if you're going to teleport me again, I'm going to need to be naked, isn't that what you said?"
"Well yes, but there's no reason to do it now. We'd need to replace your mass."
"What happened to the rest of me?" Zoey asked.
"Well the first stage of the teleportation process converts your mass to energy, which is transmitted to the target pod, and then back again. There was a power surge during the process so...some of you was lost."
"Uh, matter to energy? Doesn't that take a lot more power? Like um, E=MC2, right?"
"Well, there's something in that head of yours. It's a little more complicated than that, but yes, a lot of my grant is used to cover the power bill. I should have chosen a university close to a nuclear power plant." Shelly closed the windows and lowered the blinds, then started to clean up the lab.
Zoey sighed, then started to help. "But that doesn't explain what happened to the energy."
"Well, if a capacitor failed, it probably dissipated into the atmosphere. So the rest of you is now bouncing around as so many particles by now."
"That sucks. So where are you going to get mass to fix me?"
Shelly turned and looked down at her hapless assistant. "Well, ideally, from another lifeform."
"What, like another human?!" Zoey looked shocked.
"Or an animal. The teleporter should be an effective gene splicer."
"Uh...I don't know that I want to be a furry. So what, we kidnap someone, and put them in there with me?"
"That's about the size of it. We should probably make sure they aren't too tall, or you'd be a giant. I wonder what the end result would be, two people merged together?"
"Maybe you should get in there, then." Zoey grumbled.
"Actually..."