“Fuzz— check this out!”

Will’s face had lit up and he started charging ahead over the grass. Desperate not to get separated, you chased after him.

Will had seen something up ahead. When you caught up to him, you found him pulling at a big fabric sheet that was half buried in the ground. It was faded and distressed.

“It’s my pants, dude!” he said.

“Are you sure?” you said, automatically. It didn’t look like pants. What he was tugging on was enormous, like a garden bedding mat that covered an entire yard, not clothing. Of course, just because you were small, didn’t mean your clothing was. It still hadn’t sunk in how small you were, how big your clothing would be, by comparison. And the fabric Will was pulling at, was like a half buried hot air balloon.

Will was now following the length of his pant leg, and you hurried after him. The fabric was draped through the grass for many feet, going on and on without seeming end in sight.

When you were both panting, finally Will stopped at the waist of his pants, and began approaching the opening of one of the hip pockets. Before you could ask him what he was doing, he dove head first into the pocket, and quickly disappeared from sight. He was so small the pocket contained generous space for his entire body. It was crazy to see; he became a moving bump inside the pocket, shuffling around like someone crawling around under a bedsheet.

You shivered with a weird feeling. If this really was his pants, it meant you two were really, really tiny. You could scarcely fathom how large a normal person would be if they could fit these pants. How big you used to be.

As you looked on, you kept noticing something that was not right with the pants, apart from the sheer size of them.

Will’s pants were ragged. They can’t have been lying here more than a night and yet they were faded with holes, and even grass growing through them, as if they’d endured four seasons and tenfold exposure.

As you considered this, you noticed the pocket wasn’t empty. Will seemed to be moving around on top of a flat plate. As you watched, he resurfaced at the pocket opening and gave you a look of disgust.

“My phone’s here,” he explained, “but it’s so busted.”

You came closer and peered into the pocket, which Will held open for you. At first you assumed his phone had become waterlogged, but the inside of the pocket was dry. Not just dry, but dried out, wrinkled, starchy with grit, and packed with the smell of soil, so strong like the rich smell inside a cave after rain washed through.

And there was the edge of Will’s cell phone, stuffed in the pocket. You stared in wonder. Not just because of how huge it was compared to the two of you; it was like a table edge. But because – like his pants – it was in an impossible state.

It was cracked and the cracks were clogged with dirt and mush, the screen was broken and the metal was rusting. It took days at least for rust to accumulate, yet Will had only lost his phone for a few hours; this amount of damage was not possible within that time. This was a phone that looked like it had been dug out of a landfill.

Kneeling over the screen, Will punched the phone’s ON button. The screen remained black.

“Nice” he mumbled. “It’s dead.”

“Are you sure?” you asked.

He tried to hold the button down but his whisper-soft touch was too weak. You came down beside him and the two of you pressed the button as hard as you could, each with both hands, holding it down for several seconds.

The screen stayed black.

“Seriously not cool,” Will said. “I didn’t use it at all during the race, and I checked it after. Battery was at 67%.”

“It’s probably not the battery,” you deduced aloud, “It must have got wet and short-circuited.”  

“Yeah,” Will said slowly, but he didn’t sound convinced. “This just gets better and better,” he said sarcastically.” He looked up at you. “Where’s your phone?”

You shrugged.

“I don’t know. Maybe it got stolen by the muggers.”

He tipped his chin up, surveying you loftily.

“You still sticking to that story?” he said.

“Well,” you said uncertainly, “what other explanation is there?”

“Fuzz, look around. We got turned tiny. What kind of mugger does that?”

“Then what, is this just a dream?”

“Huh, yeah,” he put his hands on his hips, which looked much less impressive since he was naked, “not unless this is some folie à deux -size shit.”

As the two of you stared around, something inside the pocket moved. An earthworm uncoiled like a snake waking up. You both let out a scream in unison. Will leapt out of the pocket and sprinted. Panicking, you galloped after him.

By the time you had caught up with him, and the two of you managed to calm down, you both finally reached the end of the swamp. With the curtain of reeds pulled back, you had a broad view across the area, which was a vast field. The big grass was sheared so short it was like regular grass to you, and easier to cross than the swamp—

—which was actually a regular park lawn with puddles. You realized this now.

In fact you started to get an eerie feeling you even knew this lawn. But it didn’t click until you saw something that made both you and Will stand together, frozen in shock.

Across the field one of the towering trees was moving. It was far away and yet immense. Your brain battled estimating just how big it was.

As the shape headed towards you, tiny vibrations zapped through the ground. Quickly these got bigger, and accompanied by dull thumps. The huge shape was also rapidly getting bigger.

The two of you yelled and clambered over the grass to get away. The soft thumps became loud thuds, which were followed by rhythmic bursts of air, like steam exhaust from a big machine. You knew, but could scarcely believe, it was the sound of a person panting.

While it took you and Will ages to clear the lawn, in mere seconds the shape had descended upon you, reaching you in several rapid strides. There were a couple of loud thuds right behind you before weight crashed down on you, hammering you into the ground like a nail. Just as quickly, it lifted. You got a view of an enormous, dirt-streaked sneaker sole raising into the air.

The footsteps stopped nearby, though the person seemed to have not noticed you. It seemed they’d stopped to rest.

Your brain whirled with confusion and disbelief. You had just been trampled but were still alive. You didn’t hurt but you were paper flat, and stuck to the ground. Your tiny naked body was etched with grooves from the shoe’s giant tread, like you were made of dough.

After a couple of minutes feeling began inching around your body and extremities. There was a tingling feeling and your arms and legs slowly inflated, and finally the feeling rushed back into your head. You gingerly got to your feet, feeling heady, and noticed Will lying at your feet. He was also flattened and  had treads stamped into his body. He must have been trampled one step after you.

You watched in wonder as his flat body began to inflate back to normal. The tread grooves slowly disappeared.

He groaned and you helped him up. He was blanched and in shock.

Breathing heavily and trembling you stared at Will. He looked back at you, ashen and wide-eyed. It dawned on both of you. This was Reality now. Capital ‘R’. You weren’t just tiny. Everything alive in the world was leagues bigger than you. That python had been an earthworm, and that behemoth had been a person.

You couldn’t think straight for a second.  You should have been dead. But, looking down, you didn’t notice any injuries.

Wordlessly, you both turned and stared again at the gigantic jogger who had paused feet away to catch his breath.

Despite your size, and your puny vantage point on the ground, at walnut size, even you could read the huge insignia emblazoned across his hoodie.

That was your college name. The same college Courtney said she was going to start at. The campus was a couple of blocks from where the charity run started. They gave out those hoodies to the students staying in the campus dorms, in a tote bag, as part of a welcoming gift to those moving in. If you could only follow the guy, you might be able to find your way back to a place you recognized, at least.

“That’s my college,” you said, pointing towards the jogger.

“You know him?” said Will.

“No, but I’m pretty sure he’s in the dorms.”

Will stared up at the jogger, and a hard  look came into his eyes.

“Well, here’s what we need to do. We’ve got to follow that guy. He’ll take us to people.”

You met Will with a look of complete disbelief.

“Are you kidding?” you said. “It’ll take us all night.”

Will fixed you with a determined look.

“Seriously, Fuzz. We can’t stay here forever. Did you see that guy nearly killed us? Anyway,” his eyes narrowed with determination, “we’re not going to follow him. We’re going to get a ride.”

Then he turned and began sprinting towards the guy’s mega-sized left sneaker.

You stood for an instant, utterly speechless. Then, you ran after him, even though your instinct said to back off from anything as large as the jogger was. Even as you were running right into a giant’s personal space, your instinct to stay with Will was stronger.

The closer you got, the more the man’s sneaker seemed to balloon in size, until it threatened to fill up your entire view.

Up close, his sneaker was flecked with wet dirt granules. You felt a shiver of distaste since this same sneaker had just unthinkingly used your tiny body as a platform.

Will began yelling out and waving his arms.

“Hey! Can you hear me? I’m down here!”

Anxiously, you gazed up into the jogger’s face, looking for a sign he’d seen you. The man had just pulled out his phone and was fixated on it. His face was pink and shimmered with sweat. Sweat patches also ran down his sides.

You joined Will in yelling out, but the man kept ignoring you. Your tiny voices died on the wind; you were practically bugs to him.

“Fuzz,” Will said, “get aboard or get left behind!”

He launched up, agilely scaling the man’s sneaker up one of the laces, like a rope, until he made it to the top of the shoe.

Your heart hammered. You didn’t want to get on the man’s shoe, but the top of the shoe was, admittedly, one place you couldn’t be stepped on. Taking a deep breath you gauged the man’s sheer size. His sneaker alone was the size of a moving van compared to you. You were about the size of a large marble compared to him, maybe a little smaller than his big toe, but bigger than his second toe.

Will leaned over and offered his hand. Grabbing it, you climbed the side of his sneaker. The mesh fabric gave you tiny handholds, and since you were so light, climbing took remarkably little effort. Will was able to help pull you up with one arm.

You tugged on a length of shoelace and squeezed yourself in against the sneaker’s laced tongue, before belting part of the shoelace over your chest to keep yourself in place.

As the man took a step, the shoe bounded upwards and then dropped like a hammer. A tremendous quake ran through your whole body. You gritted your teeth and your knuckles went white from clenching the laces so hard.  This happened again, and again, sending you hurtling through the park at what seemed like great locomotive speed. Every step shook you like dice, but you managed to stay on.

The man’s pace went from walking to jogging, sending rocket fuel into his stride. The world was turned into a bouncing, blurred amusement park ride. Your tiny body was so squishy, it safely absorbed the shock of each step.

It seemed like forever, but within a few minutes, the man’s pace slowed again as he crossed the park, and passed an oddly recognizable sight. You stared in shock at the expansive flat ground that made up a small parking area, filled with monstrously large cars, lit under some strobes that hit your face like suns.

It was only an hour ago, that Will, Courtney and you were heading to this very parking area, for Will’s car.

Will noticed because he yelled something in alarm, but as the jogger took another step, whatever he said was snatched by the rushing air.

“What?” you yelled.

“My—!” he began, before another plummeting step shook the words out of him. You assumed he was going to say ‘car’. It must have been still parked there, where he left it. But now you were heading past the parking lot, Will had no way of getting to it. While in rapid motion, you were both trapped on the man’s shoe for better or worse.

But now you knew where you were; beyond the car park you knew was your college dorms, which meant familiar shelter, at least, and maybe some recognizable faces who could help you.

The man followed the pavement beyond the parking area to the face of a building that was cruise ship size to you. When you realized where you were, your heart plummeted.

In the space where your old, reliable college dorms used to stand, there was a mammoth shopping center, glassy, and modern, in bright friendly colors. Your dorm building was nowhere in sight. There was just the gargantuan shopping center, across from a new suite of single storey apartment buildings.

You gazed out in despair. Your dorms were just past Fountain Park, and in view of the parking area. The nearest shopping center was a couple of blocks away, and there were no new apartments. This place was somewhere else.

Meanwhile, the man came to a long set of buildings adjacent to the shopping center. It looked like an apartment front. He walked you inside, and as he swept through the lobby, walls flashed past and you briefly glimpsed some regalia pinned to a billboard that had familiar colors and name.

It was the name of your college. So this was the college dorms. But there had to be a mistake, you were certain you had never been in this building before. 

Before you could figure anything out, generic apartment building interior swept by, giving you mostly a view at ankle height, of carpet, wall and skirting boards. The landscape flew past too quick to make out specific details.

Riding out the rocking trembling footsteps, you were planted right in front of a door. With a rustle and clink of keys, the door swung open and you were shuffled into the room.

Here the ride finally stopped, as the giant man let out a big breath, like a machine piston, and went to remove his shoes. You didn’t jump off in time, and found yourself in focus as the man bent to undo his laces.

And saw you, strapped onto the top of his shoe.

Will and you both froze, and stared up at the man’s giant, bewildered face. He frowned and squinted at you, trying to figure out what you were.

You were naked and vaguely human shaped, but the shock and recoil from riding his shoe, and the pressure of his tight laces, had deformed you until you were thin and floppy. Unbeknownst to either you, the man assumed you were a tiny piece of cooked pasta that had accidentally got caught in his shoelaces.

Without a pause, his hand came speeding down for you, and in two seconds, he had plucked you up between his forefinger and thumb, which caught you by the head. Since you were belted tight in his laces, you stretched a little before snapping free, and were then lifted high up into the air.

Meanwhile, the man also took Will with his other hand.

You quickly found yourself suspended right under the man’s giant face, where you were rotated all around, so he could inspect you from all sides. Seeing you closely, he decided you weren’t a piece of pasta. In fact, you looked like a tiny, stretchy doll.

Unconcerned, he put the two of you down on his bedside desk, before leaving the room.  Now the two of your were on some college's gigantic desk, in his dim dorm room, and no clear way of leaving, if you wanted to. You still didn't know where you were, or how to find someone you knew. It was starting to feel too much. For a moment, heart beating inside your skull, you said nothing. You could barely believe a person just picked you up and inspected you like a little toy. To your side, Will let out a groan.

“That was weird."

Once you both caught your breath and your head stopped spinning, Will said:

"Someone took my car.”

“It wasn’t in the parking lot?” you said.

“Nope. Gone.”

"It wasn't Courtney?"

"She doesn't have my keys." He added without humor, "unless she's the person who beat up us up and mugged us."

"So," you said hesitantly, "you believe me; we were mugged?"

Will gave a half-hearted nod.

“Okay, but you’re still missing something. We shrunk. So how did that happen?”

“I’m still working that part out,” you said. To be honest you had bigger things to worry about. Literally. You didn’t want to be plucked up and inspected again. It was demeaning, objectifying. But you were too small to get down off the desk. Although your body seemed to be softer and gravity didn't affect you the same, you still didn't like to risk a huge drop like the one to the floor. Also, the guy had left the bedroom door slightly ajar, leading into the lit main hallway. You jumped at every little sound, worried some new person would burst into the room and eye you with interest. You were basically a sitting duck, waiting to be picked up again, and there was nothing you could do about it.

For several moments you heard activity coming from a kitchen further in the building. It sounded as though the man was fixing himself something to eat or drink. Then a TV played from outside the room, down the hallway, probably from the dorm common area.

Will and you stayed on the desk, since it looked too high to climb down. Will was pacing across the desk, scrutinizing the stationary on one end. You turned to watch him. Not looking at you, he suddenly said:

“We’ve got to get out of here, Fuzz.”

You just stared at him, thinking how dangerous the outside hallway could be, even more than the bedroom.

“I think we should tell that guy who we are,” you said. “And where we live.”

“No,” said Will, turning away from you.

“He might help us,” you said, incredulous.

“He might not. To him, we’re dirt that got stuck on his shoe.”

That was probably true, you admitted, but you said:

“That’s why we have to tell him we’re human.”

“And what if that makes things even worse? He keeps us like a prize he won at some two dollar carnival sideshow? Or sells us to some top secret lab coats at an alien research laboratory—?”

Will went quiet, and so did you. But your mind was still running. Then you said,

"What do you mean 'alien'?"

"Which part?" Will frowned. "I said science lab. Research. Study us. You want to be a test subject?"

You persisted:

"Why do you think aliens have to do with anything?"

"I don't. I thought it's muggers. That's what you said."

"Yeah...I thought so."

Then the man returned to change into some pyjamas. From outside, the TV was still going, but it was probably someone else in the building watching it. The man put his phone down on the desk close to you. The impact sent a vibration of shock through your tiny delicate body.

The man's gaze fell onto the two of you. Once again, his curiosity won out. To your utter dismay, he once again picked you up, catching you in a perfect trap between his forefinger and thumb. His firm touch caused your torso to be squeezed inward, narrowing your chest and stomach from the width of a walnut, to a pencil. For a moment you felt like your sides would meet together. He held you right up under his face, and then you found yourself get rolled back and forth between his fingertips, allowing him to idly examine every inch of you close up. After a couple of agonizing minutes, he put you down onto the table. You realized with regret that as long as you stayed in this room, he was probably going to keep picking you up and taking a look at you out of curiosity.

Then the light was switched off, throwing you into near darkness, as the man got into bed, barely paying either of you a second glance. After a sigh, he closed his eyes. Cautiously, the two of you watching the man. Within several minutes he rolled over, and soon, his low bass snoring trembled the air.

“Over here a second,” said Will suddenly, “I’ve got an idea.”