Being a micro (politically incorrect word as it is) isn't all cuteness, sunshine, and daisies. While the zeitgeist of the day pays lip service to the notion of equal rights for the vertically challenged, the unavoidable fact remains that micros are just more fragile and much less strong than their normally proportioned counterparts (check your size privilege, etc.). Publicly, the abuse of micros is frowned upon; privately, if people can get away with bullying micros, what's to stop them? The micros themselves? Ha, what's a four-inch tall person going to do to someone fifteen times her height? Dial for the authorities? Good luck making a call from inside a churning stomach!
Inevitably, some micros decided to take matters into their own hands. Dubbed the Little Ones, they stand up for micro rights everywhere against the oppression of the normals! As champions of micro rights, the Little Ones fight for size agnosticism, little elevators everywhere, micro classification of clothes, parties, gossip ... In reality, most of the girls just enjoy a meal squirming away helplessly in her body, and perhaps they don't take their revolution too seriously. Not surprisingly, the Little Ones tend to be classified more as villains for their unabashed predatory depredations on innocent normals (and other micros!). But all of this brings us back to the original problem, of who's going to say no to a pinky-sized girl who can swallow and digest you alive? You? Ha!
So who are the Little Ones?
- Ruby Hoode, charismatic leader
- Whisper, ninja who specializes in traps
- Irene Cameron, mistress of gravity
- Beatrix Hollingshead, the Digestecutioner
- Leilu Ashfield, the Impregnable Summoner
- Fleur Fauchereau, she of people puppets
- Model R4-1N-B0W, datagesting mechafairy
- Michelle Layton, the size manipulator
- Lavanya Mohan, a shadow that lives
Ruby HoodeAge: 230
Height: 4.1 inches / 10.4 cm
Favorite Type of Music: Classical
Most Cherished Possession: Her childhood locket with picture of her beloved
Favorite Food: Roasted quail
Personality: Vivacious, pleasant
Languages: English, French, Italian
Tactical Stealth Skill: Lethal melee takedown
Hobbies: Watercolor painting
It may be surprising that, amongst the rest of their superpowered and unnatural coterie, the leader of the Little Ones is an otherwise ordinary human. Ruby Hoode's sole claim to fame is that she hasn't aged a day over twenty-four, living through Edwardian and Victorian England into the modern day and picking up a few unladylike skills along the way. Sensible and refined, her poise betrays the hint of an aristocratic British polish, but she's maddeningly vague about how exactly she's managed to live so long. She considers herself to be a modern day Robin Hood and has even chosen her praenom to match: Ruby isn't her real moniker, but it is the only name to which she answers now.
Dressed in flamboyant musketeer reds, Ruby cuts a dashing figure in the world of micros. She's a renegade, a rebel against the tyranny of the size privileged, and while Ruby herself won't be swallowing any of the massive giants or giantesses ... that's where her ragtag band of misfits comes in. Instead, Ruby herself is a woman of piercing insight who moves easily and freely through the world of personalities, understanding the particular needs and desires of each of her friends. She's had a long life with which to develop that wisdom, after all. Her own cards are played close to her chest, leaving people guessing if she really wants equality for micros or simply enjoys watching the giants being helplessly digested by her minions ... or if the Little Ones organization is just a social club for micros to hang out ...
Having lived in both civilized and uncivilized times, Ruby has picked up a few tricks and techniques with which to defend herself. The best defense against a hulking mountain of meat and muscle is, of course, remaining unnoticed, and Ruby is surprisingly adept at blending in with the surroundings in spite of her raiments. She's also learned how to handle a slimmed down claymore, her signature weapon, as well as using a few cantrips of magic. In her spare time she enjoys the more artistic pursuits, possessing a pleasant mezzo-soprano voice and a knack for watercolor painting.
Whisper (real name unknown)Age: 26
Height: 4.3 inches / 10.9 cm
Favorite Type of Music: "Music is distracting during missions"
Most Cherished Possession: Mannibbler
Favorite Food: Kisu, steamed bread rolls
Personality: Focused, reserved, single-minded
Languages: Japanese, Portuguese
Tactical Stealth Skill: Sets incapacitating traps
Hobbies: Cosplay, ice sculpting
"When you do a job right, nobody will know that you've done it at all." Whisper lives by the motto of subtlety and cunning, the tools of the downtrodden and oppressed. A highly accomplished kunoichi who has spent nearly her entire life in the micro resistance, Whisper keeps a low profile and is completely business-like when it comes time to eliminate a mark. Her past is known only to her and Whisper usually deflects any attempt to bring it up. None of the Little Ones know her real name or much about her personal life - she doesn't socialize much and has an uncanny knack for vanishing from anywhere.
At a bit over four inches in height, Whisper cannot simply swallow down a giant or giantess. Instead, she relies on a veritable arsenal of traps and hazards to subdue her target. Her favorite is a Maneater dagger reduced in size for her use, which she fondly refers to as Mannibbler. This evil weapon can suck any man that it touches down to a stomach embedded in the hilt and viciously digest him. She also has traps that swallow victims, traps that mark a victim for her friends, traps that summon monsters to do the eating for her, and more. She carries most of her tools in a luggage case that seldom leaves her side. Whisper is meticulous about covering her tracks and it is a rare blunder indeed when she leaves any evidence behind. She prefers to work alone, relying on nothing and no one but herself.
Off-duty, Whisper is still rather reserved, but is known to indulge in various hobbies from time to time. Her special fascination is with ice sculpting, producing beautiful works of art and then letting them melt in the sun. She also dabbles in cosplay, although she insists that this is merely a cover for her field disguises and that her convention attendance is strictly for observation. The Little Ones are perhaps her only friends, and then not all of them.
Irene CameronAge: 28
Height: 4.3 inches / 10.9 cm
Favorite Type of Music: Romantic
Most Cherished Possession: Necklace gifted by a friend
Favorite Food: Honeycakes
Personality: Calm, placid
Languages: Gaelic, Irish, English
Tactical Stealth Skill: Gravitational well
Hobbies: Writing romances
Gravity is the weakest of the four fundamental forces, but don't mention that around Irene Cameron. She claims to have developed a pocket dimension nestled in her cleavage, hidden between her breasts during puberty. Irene's impressive control over gravity allows her to pluck a hair off a person from a hundred feet away, or crush everything in a wide radius into a compact ball of matter. Much of the time, if she needs to keep something (or someone) at hand, she'll simply pull them into her pocket dimension and then retrieve it later. As for what happens inside ... perhaps it's best not to ask.
In her teenage years Irene tried to be a micro-themed superhero, though without a publicist and a media agent her career never went very far. She's grown somewhat since then, becoming one of the Little Ones and ironically coming into conflict with the very teams she used to be part of, but such is life. Adulthood has mellowed Irene somewhat and she usually presents a dignified face of calm and peace. Perhaps not surprisingly, this makes Irene the go-to girl for conflict resolution when the Little Ones can't get along. She's a quiet soul, full of insight gleaned from constant reverie. She'll also turn the gravity around you up until you can't walk if you threaten her friends.
With increased finesse in her control over gravity, Irene has taught herself how to do things such as fly, construct gravitational lenses, catapult a person at high speed in a certain direction ... really, anything that requires a pull of some kind. As gravity is inherently an attraction-only force, however, she can't push anything. She also assures people that there's a black hole hidden somewhere in her decolletage. Irene could have become the micro version of Magneto, but she likes to spend her days penning romantic fiction instead.
Beatrix HollingsheadAge: 22
Height: 4.2 inches / 10.7 cm
Favorite Type of Music: Rock and roll
Most Cherished Possession: Her appetite
Favorite Food: People!
Personality: Sultry, flirtatious
Languages: English
Tactical Stealth Skill: Swallows targets whole!
Hobbies: Blogging, food sampling, swimming
Digestecutioner. Even the very word instills a primal sense of fear in those who hear it, calling to mind the dreaded women possessing the authority to swallow those condemned under the ironfisted rule of evil tyrants ... Beatrix is a former digestecutioner, out of a job after Queen Miria's abdication in favor of Jacqueline. When the new queen immediately disbanded the digestecutioner corps, Beatrix managed to escape with her powers intact, if greatly reduced in stature. She's one of the Little Ones now and still every bit as voracious as in her past life.
Fully aware of her reputation and the discomfort it causes in people, she's a very forward and assertive woman, enjoying the uncomfortable squirming of a man as she flirts with him. Who's going to risk the stomach acids of a digestecutioner by displeasing her after all? Hundreds of political prisoners (and a few dozen people who were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time) have become part of Beatrix's curves, though she prefers the elegant look instead of flaunting her body at people. Her unnaturally powerful acids can eat through rock, steel, and any number of obstinate objects. The other Little Ones don't entirely trust her, not unreasonably.
When she isn't looking for a paper-thin excuse to satiate her appetite on some hapless giant or giantess, Beatrix enjoys writing a blog and sampling delicacies from all over the world. She's also a surprisingly well-developed swimmer, though at micro size her lack of weight combined with surface tension means she can glide and skid across water as well. Don't think you'll evade her hunger by staying underwater, though - Beatrix can simply swallow the whole pool if she must, given her endless capacity as a digestecutioner. She's the woman with the power, and she loves it!
Leilu AshfieldAge: 18
Height: 3.9 inches / 9.9 cm
Favorite Type of Music: J-pop
Most Cherished Possession: Personal diary
Favorite Food: Leek turnovers
Personality: Peppy, cheerful
Languages: English
Tactical Stealth Skill: Summons a distracting rabbit
Hobbies: Needlepoint, driving (fast)
The ancient art of summoning was bequeathed by a goddess to a family of micros in order that it might assist them in the hardships of their lives. Since then, the power has run unbroken from mother to daughter throughout the bloodlines of the clan, a closely guarded power not to be spread to the community at large. Leilu is the latest descendant of the clan and a recent addition to the Little Ones, recruited by Ruby into the cause after her older sisters declined. If only she were more dedicated to the cause - Leilu is at the age where she would rather gossip about fashion and boys than partake of a revolution. If it weren't for her summoning ability, she could very much be the girl next door.
Leilu's summoning takes the form of a magical pact that brings the desired creature into her womb, where she then births it out to serve her. Lest a powerful monster turn upon and shred her, however, the summoner's womb keeps the soul of the creature inside and only releases the body - this allows the person or creature to perform the bidding of the summoner while holding the soul hostage. Creatures summoned in this manner have a constant, uncanny feeling of being surrounded by soft, silky uterine walls even after birth and also feel disconnected from their own bodies, as if experiencing their actions from a great distance. Under the terms of the magical contract, disobeying any summoner's order gives the summoner the choice of instant desummoning and forfeiture of one's soul. Needless to say, the pact is weighted heavily in favor of Leilu who can compel others to obey her on a whim.
But she's a nice girl who'd hesitate to harm anyone; the most Leilu has done with her power is summoning her boyfriends into herself as a novelty and then releasing them not soon after. She has two hobbies seemingly at odds with each other, those being knitting and piloting micro vehicles, and she enjoys a weekend at the movie theater as much as anyone else. This puts her somewhat at odds with the more revolutionary members of the Little Ones but they keep her around all the same. Micros should stick together for each other, right?
Fleur FauchereauAge: 21
Height: 4.0 inches / 10.1 cm
Favorite Type of Music: Piano solo
Most Cherished Possession: She won't say
Favorite Food: Sushi, baked potatoes
Personality: Mysterious
Languages: English, French
Tactical Stealth Skill: Manipulation of target's actions
Hobbies: Puppetry, performing arts, piano
Fleur is a French maid and a master of the art of puppetry. In her hands, any marionette can be made to dance. A pair of cross-shaped manipulators in her hands allow her to control her minions with uncanny agility and precision, and she can take control of more than one individual at a time. Having been a domestic servant to a rich giant and then unceremoniously tossed out when she refused his amorous advances, Fleur now uses her talents for the rights of micros everywhere. The strings from her fingers and manipulators are magical and intangible but very much real, allowing her to feel and sense everything that her dolls can if at somewhat muted intensity. She can also adjust the level of control she wields at will, from rendering the puppet incapable of any action without her direct input to barely monitoring it.
This last bit is important since she likes to string up people as puppets.
Fleur's control over the art is indeed so great that she can enslave people to be her marionettes, controlling them from afar with her strings to dictate their actions. For most people, she uses a touch so light that they never realize they are under her control at all; she's content to use them as reconnaissance, to monitor an area. Occasionally however she will take a more direct slave, or simply seize a passerby as a disposable drone. Naturally Fleur prefers to operate at a safe distance from any action, using others as her proxies instead.
The woman herself disguises her emotions and intentions under multiple layers of cover, like a good puppetmaster should. Even the other Little Ones do not know much about her and Fleur volunteers little information, but she is utterly devoted to their cause. Besides her knack for puppetry, Fleur is also an accomplished ventriloquist and pianist, and she has a notable weakness for a well-crafted doll. She's also the fastest typist amongst the Little Ones by a significant margin. And perhaps maid instincts die hard, as Fleur is fastidious about cleanliness in Ruby's hideout and she has an army of puppets to assist her.
R4-1N-B0WAge: 5
Height: 3.5 inches / 8.9 cm
Favorite Type of Music: Electronica, Techno
Most Cherished Possession: Miniature Ultima Engine
Favorite Food: Data
Personality: Aggressive, obsessive
Languages: Machine code. Converts human language into data.
Tactical Stealth Skill: Computer hacking
Hobbies: Programming games, beta testing
The model R4-1N is a mechafairy designed to efficiently recycle leftover resources and free them up for a system to reallocate, having been launched as part of the cyber-utopia city planning system offered by NeoVenetia. In other words, the little flying mecha is a garbage collector of junk data. As maintenance crew, she performs the vital task of keeping cyber systems running smoothly. All of that changed, however, when a particular mechafairy stumbled onto something that she should not have. That something, a shard of the Ultima Engine, transformed and changed her in a way that released the constraints of her programming. Having awoken as a sentient being, Rainbow now transforms physical objects into data to devour.
The transformation can be an incredibly painful one, as the shard of the Ultima Engine allows Rainbow to unravel an object at a fundamental level by changing matter into data. Her slender frame cannot hold much physical matter, but it has an almost unlimited capacity for information storage. Once stored, she can manipulate the data inside of her at will, allowing her to do practically anything to the hapless datagested entries in her mind. Rainbow has also seemingly inherited some of the cruel streak in Elisa, the original woman controlling the Ultima Engine, and computationally she's far more powerful than her system would suggest.
Being around the Little Ones has shaped Rainbow's personality to some extent, though it retains a degree of malleability. This little mechafairy has few qualms against reducing troublesome giants into data for her consumption, a change no less profound than digesting a person into body fat. She enjoys programming and especially finding holes in cyber security, and is a very formidable chess player. Perhaps Rainbow has her own agenda, but for now the Little Ones will do as companions.
... Just try to look busy and useful around her, lest she decide that you are garbage data.
Michelle LaytonAge: 20
Height: 3.7 inches / 9.4 cm
Favorite Type of Music: Baroque
Most Cherished Possession: Witch school diploma
Favorite Food: Walnut Bread
Personality: Friendly, assertive
Languages: English, Greek
Tactical Stealth Skill: Flirtation
Hobbies: Cooking (not a good cook)
These days it's not fashionable to believe in magic, at least not the powerful, primal magic that shaped creation itself out of nothing. People dabble in love potions and minor cantrips, and talk of the old magic as some kind of harmless superstition. Not so with Michelle Layton, a graduate of the Scholomance and micro witch. Losing a duel with a fellow student reduced her in stature to micro size, but Michelle has adapted with surprising ease and rather enjoys being with the other Little Ones. She specialized in size-changing magic during her studies but can't restore herself, being capable only of shrinking - when asked, Michelle goes into a highly technical explanation of entropy and information theory.
Playful and friendly, Michelle is fond of using her cuteness and flirtatiousness to nudge the big people into giving her what she wants. They tend to pet her and call her witch costume cute, and she smiles and plays along - why use magic if diplomacy works better? On occasion, however, she'll have to resort to her power to bring a troublesome person to heel. Ever been shrunk down to microscopic sizes, where even the Little Ones are looming over you? It's not a good feeling at all. Nor is her power limited to people. Those shoes that are suddenly too small to fit? Probably Michelle. The sandwich you packed has been reduced to a bite? Probably Michelle. A train full of passengers mysteriously reappearing in a toy shop? Definitely Michelle.
She fancies herself as a budding chef and often invites the other Little Ones to try her experiments at cooking, evoking various reactions from polite refusal to pained panic. Michelle keeps in touch with the friends she made at witch school. Oaths sworn to her order prohibit her from teaching magic to outsiders such as the other Little Ones. Yet she stays nonetheless for the company, the camaraderie, and because revolutions are fun!
Lavanya MohanAge: Unknown
Height: Variable
Favorite Type of Music: Rap
Most Cherished Possession: Claims to not have any
Favorite Food: Happiness
Personality: Sly, observant
Languages: Cannot speak. She communicates in gestures.
Tactical Stealth Skill: Can conceal others in shadow
Hobbies: Interpretive dance, charades
Lavanya Mohan is an Umbra, a fearsome assassin formed by a torturous magical ritual (seriously, just how many ex-assassins are in the Little Ones?). The Umbra ritual turns an individual of flesh and blood into living shadow, capable of squeezing through any crevice however small, moving quickly through darkened areas, and restraining others by spreading over them like a slick oil spill. Their most terrifying ability, however, is possession - by melding with the shadow of a target, an Umbra can take over the actions of her host. For centuries the Umbras served as slaves and spies for some kingdom that eventually fell apart to internal corruption.
Now free of the terrible magic that bound her in servitude, Lavanya somehow wandered into the hideout of the Little Ones and was made welcome when Ruby sensed the use that her power might have for the revolution. Lavanya is a slippery woman, made more so by the nature of her existence which seems to almost effortlessly evade any attempt to contain it. While she often works with the other girls on assignments, Lavanya has also gotten intimate with some of them, but she never seems to stay with one person for long. She's uncomfortable in bright lights, preferring the familiar comfort of the darkness, and usually only goes out in public when she can disguise herself as someone's shadow.
Lavanya does not need food in the normal sense and instead subsists on emotions, savoring the memories and feelings of the people she latches onto. She's very fond of playing charades and is a master of expressing herself in gestures. While she has no fixed size, Lavanya finds that reducing herself to a few inches is suitable for interacting with the other Little Ones, though she could just as easily swallow a whole city block into the darkness. If she longs to be a human again, she's given no sign of such a desire.