Jennifer had all but given up on finding the thing that was shrinking her. She had searched her entire room and bathroom from top to bottom...well, bottom to halfway up, anyway. Nothing even remotely suspicious turned up. Perplexed, she hopped up onto the bed and sat on the edge, staring at her dangling feet while she contemplated the situation. There was no mad-scientist device in her room. She hadn't been exposed to any radiation or anything recently. She couldn't recall angering any witches, gypsies, or anything else recently. So--why was she shrinking?
As she thought more about it, she realized there wasn't even any discernible pattern. It didn't hinge on what she thought about or did, and didn't happen at set intervals of time. Just the weird tingle and the shrinking. She absently began to swing her feet while trying to come up with something-ANYTHING-that unified the whole mess.
Craig had paused in his shrinking work to have a snack. He scraped the last of the ice cream out of the bowl and tipped the can of Coke straight up to drain it. He watched his screen saver for a few more moments (it too, of course, was SW images) before moving the mouse. "Well, Jennifer, did you miss me?" Without waiting for the image on the screen to reply, he typed in another 3 inch reduction and set to work.
"OW!" Jennifer's swinging foot tapped against the bed frame, again administering a shock to her. She jerked her foot up, holding the heel. The pain of the shock quickly faded and was suddenly replaced by the terribly familiar tingling sensation. The robe shifted again on her shoulders. Her panties again moved and loosened on her diminishing hips. She could even see her feet creeping slowly up the side of the bed. When the tingle faded seconds later, she knew she was 3 feet tall without even bothering with the tape measure.
As she looked at the bed's headboard, she thought of something. She stood up on the bed (noting with unhappiness how little she pressed it down now) and walked up to the headboard. She was still an inch or two taller than it, but not for long. She reached down and picked up her pillow, which weighed more like several couch cushions at this point. She was also about 3 inches taller than the pillow was long, but not nearly as wide anymore. She wouldn't have any chance of getting her arms around it.
She stepped over to the edge and hopped off the bed. She scolded herself for not thinking of this sooner-she should call a doctor. However, her phone was up on top of her bureau, which presented a severe problem. "No problem," she said aloud. "I'll just have to let Mariana know what's going on." She turned to face the door-and her heart stopped for a brief moment. She ran over to the door in disbelief...but disbelief, as it so often did, failed to change reality. The intercom in her room was normally at face height to her-which put it almost 5 feet off the floor. She simply couldn't reach the talk button.
"Great!" she yelled. "I'm COMPLETELY cut off from the outside world!" As she said this, she shivered. She realized it had been cold in her room since she had gotten home over an hour ago. The A/C must be on. The chill made her think about her balcony. Not only was it likely to be warm out there, but that was the one place she hadn't already searched for any possible device that could shrink her. One of the double doors leading out to it was ajar, so she stepped over to it and out into the warm night air. It was disconcerting to have her eye level at the top of the railing. The gaps between the rails now looked almost as wide as doorways. She stepped over to the rails and held on as she leaned over to look out momentarily over the surroundings.
She had a great view of the hills behind the collection of Hollywood superhomes masquerading as a normal neighborhood. Many a night, she had come out here and just sat, staring at the panorama or the sky to relax. Even now, given her predicament, the pretty picture had a momentary calming effect. However, she didn't have all night to watch the stars while her body dwindled indefinitely. She took up the search for any mysterious devices.
Craig finished up the editing and got ready for the next 3-inch shrink. "I don't know what kind of person you really are," he told the on-screen image, "but I wonder what you would say if you could see this right now?" He clicked the APPLY button and sat back to watch the program do its work. "What, indeed."
"Damn." She had searched the whole balcony and still nothing out of the ordinary. She thought she had seen a flash of light from somewhere in the neighborhood below, but there had been no tingle, so it couldn't have been associated. She finally gave up and started to go back into the room. As she did, she turned for one last look at the view and leaned on the rail.
"Ouch!" She got another shock. "Damn! Bad enough that I'm a midget on my way to becoming a doll, but I have to keep getting electrocuted?!" At that exact moment, it finally hit her. She slapped her forehead for missing such an obvious connection. The shocks always preceded the shrinking, and it had all started with the treadmill in the health club. As if to confirm her sudden realization, the tingle returned, as strong as ever. She watched helplessly as the railing rose above her eye level, stopping just above the top of her head. She was now a meager 2 feet, 9 inches tall.
The whoosh of air behind her didn't register for a moment-then she realized the air conditioning had come on. She thought nothing of it and turned to go back inside, only to see the door slam with the change in air pressure. Her blood turned to ice and her dinner became a lead weight in her belly as she reached up and found she couldn't grasp the doorknob. She was trapped out here! Refusing to accept that, she jumped for the doorknob.
She missed, and landed awkwardly. The impact of her landing caused her perilously loose panties to drop around her ankles while her foot was still moving back. She caught her foot on the fallen undergarment and stumbled backward. Her other foot slipped off of the loose fold of robe it had landed on, and she tumbled. Things couldn't POSSIBLY get worse, she thought, bracing herself to crack her head on the concrete. Instead of the impact, she kept falling. Evidently they CAN, she countered, as she realized that she had pitched between the railings and was now falling from the second floor down to the ground...
