Mars Needs Inflated Women

“But why?” the Air Force general seated at the large conference table asked loudly.

The number of incidents occurring worldwide was increasing daily. It started over isolated beaches. Flying saucers dropped down out of the sky, followed by arcs of golden lightning emanating from strange apparatuses mounted on the spaceships’ undersides.

As soon as the lightning struck any nearby sunbathers, the unfortunate women began to swell and balloon at an alarming rate, quickly becoming round and helpless. Worse still, the affected women floated lazily up into the sky, where they were easily scooped up by the waiting alien craft.

When these…events…first began, few people paid any attention. Everyone assumed they were all part of some sort of elaborate hoax. But over the next few weeks, as the number of reports increased, the public and the government could no longer ignore the threat. Safety concerns had emptied the beaches as a result, so soon after the flying saucers moved inland. They began targeting other locations such as yoga studios and day spas, indicating this was just the beginning.

“We need to do something,” asserted another general, this one from the Army, “once of those damned alien saucers targeted a female barracks at Fort Benning two days ago. One hundred and thirty two Soldiers blew up like balloons and took off!” The assorted military leaders around the table looked to the two scientists called in to advise on the matter.

Doctor Martin Advena, the world’s preeminent xenobiologist, had been summoned to hypothesize on the nature of the aliens plaguing the coasts and inlands. He was a small, nervous man, barely five feet tall (and that was being generous), with dark hair and even darker eyes.

His fellow academic (and intellectual superior) was in all ways a physical polar opposite to Advena. Doctor Bridgette Solaris was a strikingly tall blonde with long legs and alabaster skin. She also held three doctorates and boasted an IQ of 195. Doctor Solaris was brought onboard because of her deep understanding of astrophysics.

“At best, we can make educated guesses,” stammered Advena.

“Then guess,” demanded a Marine general. Advena cleared his throat.

“We know,” Advena began, “that the beams the aliens are using make the women blow up like balloons. We are still working on the why.” As Doctor Advena trailed off, Doctor Solaris pushed her glasses up to the bridge of her nose and stepped forward. She spoke clearly, without hesitation.

“This we know: all life is a biochemical process. Our bodies take in chemicals…matter…and burn it to create energy. This is a rudimentary chemical conversion process,” Doctor Solaris paused for effect, “as near as we are able to ascertain, the Martians are employing some sort of reverse of this fundamental. Their beams are infusing female bodies with pure energy, and those bodies are converting the energy back into mass somehow.”

“To the extent that they inflate like balloons?” queried one of the other staff officers., incredulous.

“Why, yes,” Doctor Solaris responded flatly, “by the time the women are completely round, they must be brimming with potential energy.”

“And you’re sure of this?” someone asked.

“As sure as I can be. This is all speculation at this point,” clarified Solaris, “I’d have to observe the effects firsthand for myself to be sure.”

“But why only women?”

“Perhaps I can field this one,” Doctor Advena jumped in, “it might be something as simple as the notion that women inflate better than men.” Some of the officers scoffed at the crude statement.

“No, seriously,” continued Advena, “it could be something in the chemical process, or how women store excess energy as compared to men. If the Martians’ goal is to blow up people, we may not know exactly why, but the female form is obviously more conducive to their needs.”

“The Martians inflate women because women inflate better for them,” Advena finished weakly, shoving his hands deep in the pockets of his lab coat.

“Doctor Advena makes a point,” Doctor Solaris reiterated, “The Martians are inflating women, all over. They started with the beaches and when that source ran dry, they moved on to other locations with a higher-than-average female population density.” She looked down at Doctor Advena, waiting for him to weigh in.

“Think about who the Martians are inflating,” Advena said, bolstered by Doctor Solaris’ support, “after the beaches cleared out, the Martians they moved on to other places like yoga studios and spas. Even salsa and ballroom dance studios. And they boldly struck the female Army barracks as well. In all cases, the women they’re going for tend to be younger, more in shape, and toned. That can’t be a coincidence.” Advena wavered briefly, not wanting to randomly speculate more than necessary.

“It’s not,” interjected Doctor Solaris, a look of understanding growing on her face, “not a coincidence I mean. Athletic bodies convert energy more efficiently. Further, because of that they hold on to less excess potential energy…mass, meaning if the Martians truly are ‘filling them up’ for some reason, a slender body could store much more energy before it becomes…full.” Doctor Advena looked up at his esteemed colleague, astonished by her leap of logic and unable to refute it. He gave Doctor Solaris credit, surprised at how well she processed and correlated data as it pertained to this dilemma.

“And how exactly can they make women blow up like balloons?” the Air Force general chimed in again, “it’s not like they’re…not like we’re made of rubber.”

“That one we actually have figured out,” the xenobiologist countered, “well, kind of figured out. The beam changes the women’s physiology slightly, increasing the elasticity of their skin. They aren’t made of rubber, per se, but their skin does gain the ability to stretch far more as they expand to massive proportions.”

“We’ve seen reports from all over,” Advena persisted, “in one instance listed in the reports, a healthy female mother of two was struck by a beam in her backyard and she naturally began blowing up. This occurred in plain sight of her family. When her college-aged daughter went to grab her mother before she drifted away, the energy glow surrounding the mother enveloped the daughter and the girl began swelling up as well. The family got the whole thing on their cell phones.”

“And the two women? The mother and daughter?” asked one of the military aides, a sliver of hope in her voice.

“They both floated away,” Doctor Advena said to her sadly, shaking his head, “the aliens took them.” There was a moment of silence after he finished his statement. After a long pause, the admiral cleared his throat.

“One thing that puzzles me,” confessed the Navy officer, “in all of the recorded evidence I’ve watched, of almost every one of the women who get inflated, they stay fully clothed. Swimsuits, dresses, business attire…” he looked to his Army counterpart, “…uniforms. A few shredded their outfits as they blew up, some popped buttons or burst open belts, but most remained dressed even after they turned into giant balls. How is that possible? Do the Martians have some strange sense of decency?” Advena waited a moment before answering.

“For the same reason that the women themselves can be made round,” stated Doctor Advena, “it however appears to be an unintentional side effect. The same energy that changes the women’s physiology to increase elasticity seems to also inadvertently affect the clothes they’re wearing, increasing pliability and stretchiness especially if the fabric is all natural.”

“Artificial materials seem not to gain the same level of flexibility compared to their natural fiber counterparts,” Doctor Advena cited an incident that occurred last week on a local campus, “Four university coeds, cheerleaders, were in the commons after practice playing with hula hoops. All four were struck by the aliens’ energy beam in the middle of some sort of hula hoop face-off. All four expanded at a frightening rate. The hula hoops ended up cinched around the poor girls’ waists while their cheerleading uniforms strained but held. The hula hoops eventually burst open when the students became completely round, right before they lifted off.”

“Trust me, the Martians could care less about the female body as it relates to any sense of human decency,” he concluded. The senior officers murmured amongst themselves briefly.

“You’ve made some pretty outrageous statements here today,” challenged the Army general, “most of which provide very little help explaining why Martians are running around blowing up women. You haven’t even explained why the women fly away. If all of that energy is converted to mass, shouldn’t they each weigh a ton?”

“Well, yes,” Doctor Advena conceded, “to be honest, no one has any clue as to why.  The women’s weight should increase exponentially as the expand. We don’t know-“

“Anti-gravitons…” Doctor Solaris whispered to no one in particular. She was staring into the distance, out the giant plate glass windows lining the side of the room. Doctor Advena looked up at Solaris, seeing an intense expression on her face. It was obvious her brain was spinning faster and faster like a cyclotron, gathering and processing data, putting morsels of information together. It was as if she was piecing together a giant puzzle, building the picture until…

“What was that?” the Air Force general queried.

“Anti-gravitons,” Doctor Solaris repeated, bolder this time, “Particles that are opposite in nature to gravitons. Similar to how matter and anti-matter are opposites.” She started talking faster, staring at an imaginary chalkboard in her head, spinning equations and making adjustments. The other people in the room ceased to exist to Doctor Solaris as she focused solely on the problem at hand.

“It would explain everything,” she said, confidence reverberating in her inflection, “if the energy of the Martians’ beams was based on anti-gravitons, and that is what the women were filling with, then it all makes sense. Their own bodies would become a force against gravity, like when magnets repel one another.” The generals tried to intercede with questions but Doctor Solaris ignored them. She was too focused, speaking out loud but not addressing the crowd directly.

“That’s why, when the women expanded, they didn’t sag when full but remained spherical like balloons, not to mention why their bodies didn’t crush them under the increasing weight,” Doctor Solaris was on a roll, “I should’ve seen it when the women grew round, not pear-shaped. If the women’s bodies were…immune…to gravity, even though their mass increased, they’d become giant, round balls. And most important, that would explain how and why they float. Their bodies would be naturally repelled by gravity. They would just need to absorb enough energy to achieve buoyancy.”

Everyone sat in stunned silence. What came next shocked the room.

“It also explains why the Martians are doing this,” Solaris declared with finality, “why would anyone charge something completely full of energy? They’re being used as batteries. The inflated women are obviously anti-graviton batteries. With that much energy, the Martians could theoretically power anti-gravity drives on their ships, and we’re the energy source…”

Doctor Advena’s eyes grew wide, astonished by Doctor Solaris’ ability to piece it all together. He couldn’t believe she figured it all out. Doctor Solaris came out of her reverie to face the assembled senior officers, ready to answer every last question, including how to combat the aliens.

Doctor Advena pressed a button on the small device he retrieved from his lab coat pocket. All of the high-ranking officers, their staff and their aides were suddenly frozen in a field of cracking blue energy. Their bodies were fixed in whatever position they held the moment prior. Only their eyes moved, darting helplessly about as they could only observe what transpired after.

“Doctor Advena,” Doctor Solaris demanded, turning toward the smaller scientist, “what’s the meaning of this?”

“I’m sorry, Bridgette,” Advena replied, aiming the device at Solaris’ midsection and pressing a different button. An arc of golden light leapt out of the device to engulf the woman. The beam lasted several seconds, pumping untold amounts of energy into Doctor Solaris’ waiting body.

“I really am sorry,” he repeated, “I didn’t think you would figure it out so quickly. We were supposed to feed them a little bit of information,” he motioned to the gathered military members locked in stasis, “just enough to keep them running in circles.”

Doctor Solaris felt a tingling sensation all over her body, as well as a rapidly building sensation in her abdomen. “But why?” she pleaded, earnestly clutching her stomach.

“Because I’m not a xenobiologist,” replied Advena, who began morphing before Solaris’ eyes, “I’m actually a run-of-the-mill biologist. Just not a human one.” His skin greyed and his body shimmered. Doctor Advena’s clothes hung loose as his arms and legs atrophied into spindly appendages. His mouth shrunk and his hair disappeared, revealing a mottled bald scalp covering an enlarged cranium. His eyes grew wide, wider than any human’s eyes should ever be, and they became dark. It was like looking into portals of blackness.

Bridgette Solaris couldn’t watch Advena’s alien change any longer because she was drawn to the perilous transformation that she herself was undergoing. Her ears filled with an electric hum emanating from deep within her belly. As she grasped her gut, her splayed fingers unintentionally spread out against her emerging girth. Where her waist previously narrowed sensuously above her hips, it now widened all the way around, growing fuller and rounder by the second. Doctor Solaris attempted a few awkward steps, hoping to escape through the door but her ambling gait only got her a few feet.

She audibly groaned as the pressure within her built. Her eyes were locked on the distending globe of her body, her hands desperately cradling her waistline, pressing inward with no effect. Her lab coat fell open, exposing her burgeoning midriff. The hem of Doctor Solaris’ skirt pulled taut against her middle, the zipper inexorably forced downward by mounting tension, but the material did not rip. Doctor Solaris felt heavy, but at the same time not. Her brain was petrified into inactivity, unable to directly comprehend what was happening to her own body. The bottom-most buttons on Doctor Solaris’ crisp blouse popped off one at a time, gradually revealing her now-shallow navel through the enlarging gap in the fabric.

“I didn’t want it to come to this,” a strange voice said. Bridgette craned her neck toward the diminutive alien still wearing Doctor Advena’s clothes, “but you did say you wanted to observe the effects firsthand. This is about as firsthand as you can get. I guess for that alone you should be grateful.” The audience trapped in the blue forcefield raptly watched Doctor Solaris’ predicament as well, unable to turn away as the tall scientist blew up to enormous proportion right in front of them. Tears streamed down Bridgette’s cheeks as her panicked countenance silently begged the immobilized military leaders for help

Doctor Solaris’ eyes went back to her own distending shape, unable to see anything below the immense circumference of her waist. She stumbled in her heels but did not fall over. She felt as if something were holding her up despite her awkward stance. Bridgette also found it increasingly difficult to keep her arms wrapped around her torso; her own blossoming body pushed them upward and outward against her will. As her inflation continued, she lurched periodically, trying to maintain her balance as her stance spread wide to accommodate her expanding frame.

When she was completely round, Doctor Bridgette Solaris’ body gently bounced a few inches above the floor. She could tell she was full, dangerously close to bursting. Doctor Solaris imagined all of those other helpless women, each of them aware they had been filled to the point just before exploding, each of them knowing how close they came to bursting. Solaris was pulled from her musings by the small, grey alien that was Doctor Advena pushing her casually toward the plate glass windows. As he ushered along the sphere that was Doctor Solaris along, he spoke.

“We’re not actually Martians,” he intimated to the lightly bobbing woman, “we’re originally from Proxima Centuri. But you are correct as to the reason why we need inflated women.” Doctor Solaris’ body rolled slowly in the air as she went, affording her a shifting view of the conference room, the servicepeople suspended in the blue energy field, and the plate glass windows quickly approaching.

“We could draw vast amounts of energy from your sun, but we needed a way to store it after converting it to anti-gravitons to power our ships’ drive engines,” Advena expounded, “I’m a little ashamed to admit, but we miscalculated our requirements to travel from Alpha Centuri to Sol and back.” The grey alien aimed his handheld device at the thick sheet of glass up ahead. The transparent material glistened and melted away like wax, leaving an enormous gap exposed to the outside. Doctor Solaris could feel the warm afternoon air brush across her tightly drawn flesh. It would have actually felt pleasant, had not her situation been so dire.

“I shall enjoy picking your brain on the ride home,” Doctor Advena said as he pushed Doctor Solaris through the fresh opening. She felt her stomach somersault as she drifted free of the building and began her slow ascent toward the waiting spacecraft. Doctor Advena turned back to the others still locked in place. He sized up the female aide, the one who asked about the mother and daughter earlier.

She seemed a viable candidate, and it felt such a waste to leave her here. As Advena fired a golden splash of energy at her, he lowered the portion of the forcefield restricting the uniformed woman. The first thing she did was grab her midsection in distress. True to what Advena said earlier, the Alpha Centurians felt nothing when it came to the female human form but he had to admit, it was fun watching them inflate.