"Hey everybody, look at the stupid, ugly little toad!" The little girl loomed over James as she pointed him out to passers by. It was exactly the kind of meaningless insult to be expected from a child, so why could he feel himself getting smaller again?
"Oh this is so cool!" The girl laughed as she realised the incredible power she now wielded. Her younger brother seemed to be watching with a mixture of curiosity and sympathy. James figured he had probably been on the wrong end of this kind of behaviour plenty of times himself.
The bratty child purposefully lunged towards James like a cat might do a mouse and he felt himself flinch, such was the physical threat she currently posed. However, she stopped in surprise when she got a proper look at him.
"Hey, you're not a kid!" She quickly realised "you're a tiny adult. This is so weird!"
James felt himself shrinking again as he felt sure half the store could hear this revelation, but without his regular speaking voice he had no way of encouraging her to be quiet.
"Hey Mummy! Come and look how small this man is!" The girl yelled at the top of her lungs "and I've been shrinking him even more!"
Feeling what was left of him reducing at an alarming rate, and with no better plan coming to his mind, James turned to run. However, the cute toddlers frog costume was now much too big for him and he tripped over it's feet and fell into a tangled mess on the floor. He was bracing himself for what the menacing primary school girl he was now even more powerless against would do to him next when he abruptly felt himself being lifted into the air, his costume falling to the floor behind him.
"James, what happened to you? I only left you alone for five minutes!" Elspeth tutted as she examined his naked, reduced form in disbelief.
"Now he's got no clothes on!" The girl pointed and giggled, taking another inch or so off poor James. He knew for sure now he was no longer the size of any human. He felt more like a toy, which was exactly how he had just been treated.
"Can we go home now?" James squeaked, pleased at least to have his voice back, albeit a comically high pitched version of it.
"I'll need to find you something to wear first" Elspeth scanned the room a moment before inspiration hit. She then carried James urgently towards a row of various dolls and action figures, all dressed in removable felt clothing. They were pretty much the same size as he was.
"You can't be serious!" James whined as he realised what Elspeth was proposing.
"Would you rather spend the rest of the afternoon naked?" She responded with next to no sympathy "Now, I just have to work out which of these would fit you best"