But When She Wakes...

At 3.05am an earthquake with its epicentre in the western suburbs was felt as far away as twenty miles. When dawn broke the city awakened to a changed skyline. A large portion of the west metro area had been obliterated. In its place all that could be seen was a wall of skin, rising upwards towards the clear blue sky. From the ground it was impossible to comprehend what had happened, to visualise the entirety of the situation. It was only through footage shot by news helicopters, and from passenger jets in the sky, that the world began to see the whole picture. It was a woman, a vast woman, who lay asleep on her back. Her head almost reached the downtown area while her feet were somewhere out in the farms and country clubs of the countryside. Her chest rose and fell peacefully and she snored slightly. A gentle, rhythmic rumble that sounded like rolling thunder.

The military immediately attempted to form a cordon around her body, but it was impossible to completely block access to so many streets. A national disaster was proclaimed as thousands of people who were sleeping in their homes were missing, presumed dead, crushed under her immense bulk as she grew. The woman was swiftly identified as Eleanor Brown, a retired science teacher. Former students came forward to describe their memories of her. “Stern but fair.”, “Kind but wouldn’t take no messin’ around.”

A no fly zone was declared above the city, but buccaneering helicopter pilots flew news crews to land on her body and report live from there to astonished audiences around the world. Standing on her body, the size of a mountain, the footage of her skin, every fold and wrinkle, every pore and hair, magnified to titanic proportions, was beamed out to a transfixed audience. As the day wore on, global fear grew. What would happen when she woke up?