Madison

"Mom?"

Madison barged through the front door, ignoring the rule to take off her muddy shoes, and made her way to the living room. She'd met Claire's eyes, who sat slumped in a chair at the kitchen table, gobbling up a sandwich while focused on the mobile phone in her hand. She looked up when Madison's feet clomped through the house like she was still outdoors.

"Hey," Madison said, heaving.

"Hey," Claire replied, returning her attention to her phone.

"Mom here?"

"No,"

"Well, where is she then?"

Claire shrugged. "Not here."

Some help you are!" Madison fumed. She made her way towards the stairs.

"Mom? You there?" Madison climbed the stairs. She knocked on the door of her mother's bedroom. Nothing. She turned the doorknob. Locked, obviously.

A thing she does more often lately.

Knowing her mother, Madison made way for the bathroom, opened the medicine cabinet, and smiled as her hand reached out to grab a key. Madison felt so out of character to break into her mother's bedroom. But she just felt this craving to snoop around, hoping she would find answers to the questions that were lingering in her head about her mother for some time. Things just didn't add up.

Turning the key, a clack was heard, indicating that her mother's bedroom door was unlocked. Madison took a deep sigh before entering. The last time she had been here was quite some time ago. With regularity, Madison's mother used to keep the door ajar, indirectly inviting others to come inside if the wish was there. Lately, however, her mother's room was sealed shut.

Upon first glance, the room looked impeccable, as usual – apart from one ankle sock lying all forlorn beneath the bed. Probably not detected by Madison's Mom's inquiring glance. Things had changed in the room, a lot of things actually. Madison moseyed over to multiple shelves that weren't there before, neatly arranged above one another at the wall. On top of it, Madison could see many objects cleanly ordered next to one another. Cars, buildings, houses, ships…

They appeared like things snatched away from the human kingdom, given their size. However, on closer inspection, the scale did not match up. Some were bigger and some were smaller even than you would expect to see with the humans. One object that caught Madison's attention was a ship, a majestically looking one. Her curious cute countenance drifted in front of it, covering it all with shadow before Madison's hand reached out to pick it up.

"The red majestic…." Madison read the ship's name, proudly imprinted with eye-catching figures on the ship's hull. Where had she heard that name before?

With the ship still in hand, Madison sauntered through her mother's bedroom while drooling at the sight of various miniature objects stationed on shelves, a table, and in a glass cupboard. Her eyes fell on a bunch of naval ships and amphibious vehicles.

Could this be?...

While scrutinizing it up close, Madison saw movement in the corner of her eyes. Tiny beings, smaller even than rice grains, were teeming about on the deck of The red majestic – seemingly waving and calling out to her. Madison gasped.

Those aren't Lillis, and neither are they humans…

Madison recalled Kelvin's words from earlier.

Words that did not make sense at that time. However, hearing them echoing in her head once more combined with the things she was now seeing and the things she now knew definitely gave them more appeal than they did before.

"We dwindled, Madison! The whole city dwindled down! Something on your mother's hand was causing it."

Things started to click in her head.

Madison's eyes observed the hive of activity on the ship's deck. More tiny people came streaming on deck.

Images of a recent newsflash ranted by in her head, like photographic slides being projected at a rapid pace.

This was the missing ship!

Madison's head spun, eyes locked on the naval objects. And these are the missing naval units!

The Lilliputians weren't the evildoers. For some inexplicable reason, Madison's mother could shrink things and beings even.

Madison was about to dash downstairs when she almost stumbled against a terrarium standing on a side table near her mother's bed. The thing was utterly empty. There was a sign glued in front of it with text written on it with a black marker.

Southford

Madison left her mother's bedroom with the cruise ship still in hand and some other shrunken stuff.

Claire

Claire's thumb tapped on her phone screen, opening up a file Haisley had just sent her. According to Haisley, this one was filmed from a more personal perspective than the last.

The footage she saw – filmed from a phone – was quite turbulently taken, oscillating every which way. Claire's eyes fluttered when a pitching high feminine screech blasted from her phone's speaker. She turned down the volume a bit when several other throats started screaming also.

It showed a night scene of great turmoil in a packed street amidst rows of soaring high rises on both sides. People and cars were scurrying off every which way, bouncing and crashing into one another, headlights flashing every which way. The screams peaked louder when a great distant rumble was heard. Further on, a few blocks away, Claire saw an immensely huge finger jutting above the city. Luckily, the one making these footages could curb his emotions well enough so that he was able to shoot stable video material.

It had just pulverized a skyscraper to a compressed heap of rubble and relentlessly killed hundreds of Lillis with that simple poke. Above it all, the finger was attached to a shadow projecting hand of godlike proportions - Haisley's hand.

Even in this nightly darkness, Claire recognized the gold-plated sorority ring attached to one of her fingers. Its two engraved initials – symbolizing the sorority's name – were clearly readable as each figure was vastly larger than a lilli house even. The finger and its hand skyrocketed upwards, seemingly disappearing in the sky's void where it came from. A peal of booming laughter followed. And a moment later, a humongous figure showed up above them – filling the entire panorama these doomed citizens had of the star-littered sky.

It was odd for Claire to see herself from this perspective. She honestly looked like a Goddess to these pitiful beings and their even more pathetically looking point of view. There was a moment of awed silence among the Lillis as the auburn-haired teen Goddess above them crouched down to scrutinize them from up close. Her whole face filled the entire lens, merely framed by soaring infrastructures where the one who was filming this stood among.

Time seemed to stand still as Claire saw her own moon-sized eyes darting around, scrutinizing the city beneath her like an omniscient Goddess as if she was assessing her subjects and contemplating their possible punishment.

Her attention lingered on a specific point for a few moments. Claire smiled as she knew she was treating a particular building at that moment – one which stood out compared to the rest due to its unorthodox design – on a thorough observation. When her curiosity was sated, she stood up to her full godlike height. The next moment was expected but startled Claire nonetheless when a huge lively plateau – which was nothing more than the underside of Claire's shoe – tumbled down from the skies, obliterating everyone and anything beneath. For a split second, screams rose up before it became awfully silent. Her screen went blank and the footage was over.

Approaching footsteps made Claire look up from her phone.

"We need to go! Now!" Madison said.

Claire's eyes followed her sister's hand when she placed something on top of the table in front of her.

Claire frowned. "What's this?"

"Take a good look and make a guess."

Claire lowered her eyes, scrutinizing the tiny cruise ship. She'd seen it before. It was from her mother's bedroom. One of the manufactured miniature objects she was obviously collecting. But wait, she saw movement on its deck.

"Those aren't Lillis," Madison said, reacting when she saw Claire noticing the little people on deck.

"No shit," Claire said.

"Have you seen the ship's name?"

"The red majestic," Claire read.

"And that's not all. Here, take a look at this." Madison placed some more miniature objects on the table. A pair of smaller scaled warships and amphibious vehicles were placed carefully on the table in front of Claire's crossed arms.

"These are all from Green Hill's Naval Station."

Claire looked puzzled. "I-I don't understand. The lilli–"

"Have nothing to do with this, Claire! This is all Mom's work. For some reason, she can like shrink stuff. And she's only warming up. I believe she is about the shrink the Capitol."

"That's impossible!" Claire chuckled.

"Is it?"

Claire remained silent while looking at the miniature objects stationed in front of her.

"I looked out the window, and Mom's car is gone. I think she is on her way at this very moment, Claire. We need to go. We need to stop her! You can drive, right?"

Claire snorted. "Of course, I can!"

"Good, let's take Aunt Kaya's car. She only lives a few blocks from here."

"But that poor woman has pre-dementia!"

"Great! Maybe she'll forget she has a car."

Claire cocked an eyebrow. "Since when did you become so impertinent?"

Madison grabs a quick drink and dashed outside through the frontdoor.