She tumbled for what seemed an eternity, briefly wondering whether the impact would kill her or merely break every bone she had. She braced herself for the hard crash that was sure to come and.
*SPLASH!*
She suddenly found herself floundering in her swimming pool. She had stepped out on the OTHER balcony...and she was safe because of it. Or at least, less endangered. The robe was rapidly soaking up water and its increasing weight was starting to drag her down. She struggled and fought to escape the garment twisted around her diminutive body. Finally, she pulled free of the robe. She had landed in the shallow end of her pool-but since she was now less than three feet tall, it was still too deep. She swam toward the edge, which seemed very far away, but finally she dragged herself up and out of the pool. She lay on the rim, her heart pounding and pulse racing from two near-death experiences in as many minutes.
"Come on, dammit!" Craig thumped violently on the computer. It had frozen up and it refused to unlock. Even CTRL-ALT-DEL wasn't working. Disgusted, he whacked it one last time and stood up to stretch. Suddenly the computer made a strange noise and the screen blinked, then came back. Cautiously, he moved the mouse and typed a few things. It seemed to be back to operating as normal. "Ok, that was weird...well, back to work then!" And he entered the next reduction.
Jennifer lay beside the pool, still trying to calm her racing heart and slow her breathing. Gradually, she relaxed and got her mind settled (at least, as settled as it could be given the circumstances.) She lay there another minute or so and might have remained there all night if she hadn't suddenly felt a tingly jolt from the water and a strange scratching against her backside. She felt as if she were sliding along the tiles, yet she knew she wasn't moving. Then it hit her-she must be shrinking again! She jumped up and had to resist the urge to scream. After all, it wouldn't do any good for a neighbor to look out of a window and see her two and a half feet tall (if the pattern was indeed continuing) and naked. Naked! She hadn't thought about it until this moment, but with her grossly oversized panties up on the balcony, and her sunken robe beyond her grasp, she was totally nude! Panicked anew, she searched frantically around for something-ANYTHING-with which to cover herself.
All the beach towels had been taken inside for washing, and she never left any bathing suits outside. She had no idea how to get back into the house, but she had no intention of wandering around outside naked and smaller than the average first-grader. Finally, she spotted a hand towel draped over the back of a pool chair. She estimated it would at least do the job, even if she would have to hold it up the whole time. She started toward the chair.
Craig was being very careful. He was worried that his computer might lock up again at any time, so he was saving after every change he made. He was about to add his most recent image to the video. Crossing his fingers, he blended it in and re-ran the video to test the new addition. It ran according to plan. Keeping his fingers crossed, he went back to the shrinking.
Jennifer grabbed at the towel and pulled it down. Unfortunately, it snagged on the top of the chair. She reached up and tried to get it unstuck. As she did so her hand brushed the pool chair's metal frame and she received another shock. "Aw, damn, not again." Unfortunately, the tingle followed exactly as it had been doing and she felt the slight disorientation of her world growing around her. She should now be 2 feet, 3 inches tall. She HAD to figure out what was causing it and stop it before she got too small to do anything at all...or before she had a conflict with being zero inches tall.
She wrapped the hand towel around herself. It covered her...but she immediately noticed how oily it felt. The smell of cocoa butter made her groan--she was wrapped up in the towel she used to wipe her hands on after applying sunscreen! The towel did what it was supposed to do, though, and she now had a toga-like cover that extended from below her shoulders to nearly her knees. Then realization REALLY sank in-she was wearing a hand towel, and it was large enough to be a party dress on her! That, combined with the fact that the top of the pool chair was slightly over her head, gave her an idea of just how small she had gotten, and how small she could get...
