"Come on, move!" Zoe thought desperately. She was focusing all of her mental effort, hoping to get a finger twitch, a knee jerk, any movement at all from her body. It was no use, though. She remained firmly locked in the pose she had been stuck in for the last week.

She was still in utter disbelief at the situation she was in. She had been attending an anime convention with her sister. After being separated from her sister she had been approached by a young man with a camera who had asked if he could get a picture of her costume. Following the odd blue flash that came from the camera, she had found herself completely unable to move or speak and the room around her appeared gigantic, as if she had been shrunken. It wasn't until the guy turned  his camera on the pool lifeguard who was passing by did Zoe realize what had happened to her.

She watched as the lifeguard became impossibly still and began to shrink. A circular base materialized underneath her and in a matter of seconds the lifeguard was just a plastic figurine and Zoe was left with the horrifying realization that she was also now just a small plastic figure. The flash from the camera had subject her to that horrifying transformation first, and the unfortunate lifeguard was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The guy who had done this to them casually picked them up as if nothing out of the ordinary was occurring. As he carried them, Zoe pondered how something like this was even possible, and frantically wondered what was going to happen to her now. If this strange guy had felt the need to also capture the lifeguard for simply seeing what had happened, she couldn't imagine that he had any intention of letting either of them go, leaving her to mind to wander toward all of the disturbing possibilities of what he plans to do with them.

As the two plastic captives were carried down the hall, Zoe was snapped out of her panic by the sight of her sister walking in the opposite direction. She desperately tried to cry out for help, to do anything to let her sister know she was there. It was pointless though. With Zoe robbed of any ability to make a sound or movement, Madison had no way of knowing that there was anything out of the ordinary about the Ruby figure being carried by this guy. Madison walked by without giving them a second glance and Zoe's heart sank. She wondered if that would be the last time she would ever see her sister.

After a few minutes,  they were at his hotel room. The two figures were set on the nightstand and left there all night while the guy slept. It felt like an eternity for Zoe. Being unable to move or speak in a still and silent room throughout the night was a torture unlike anything she had ever experienced. She hated how awake and aware she was for every second of it.

Things didn't improve in the morning either. After waking up and getting dressed, the guy tossed both figures into a duffel bag. Once the bag was zipped shut, the darkness added to Zoe's dread as she now couldn't even see where she was being taken. She bounced around with they other objects in the bag, causing Zoe to wonder what would happen if her plastic body were to be damaged.

Finally the bouncing stop as it seemed the bag had been set down. Zoe could faintly hear the sound of a car engine starting. Zoe could only lay motionlessly in the bag and wait to see where she was being taken.

When light finally flooded her vision after being taken out of the bag, she saw that the guy had her clenched in his hand. The figure of the lifeguard was in his other hand. He examined his two plastic captives for a moment. For the first time, anger overtook her fear. This guy was treating them as if they were nothing but objects to be looked at. Zoe wanted to scream, to demand that he undo whatever he had done to them, but of course she had no way of doing so.

Crestfallen to come to this realization again, Zoe began to examine as much if her surroundings as much as her locked field of vision would allow. They appeared to be in a bedroom based on the dresser and corner of a bed that she could see. The guy turned around and what Zoe saw next added a new layer of despair to her predicament.

In front of her was a glass casing containing plastic figures of various female characters. These figures looked just like the figures Zoe and the lifeguard had become. "No way..." Zoe thought, "Are all of these actually people!?" The guy set Zoe and the lifeguard in the case with the other figures, closed the door of the case, and left the room. Leaving the captured girls to take in the ordeal they now found themselves in.

That had been eight days ago. Zoe had remained in the exact spot where the guy had left her inside the display case. During that time, the room was completely still except in the evening when the guy climbed into bed and in the morning when he woke up. Apart from that, Zoe spent the entire time staring at a stationary room, with the hum of the house's air conditioning and the birds outside being the only sounds. The alternating of light and darkness allowed her to count the days of her imprisonment.

Was this what the rest of her life would be like? Being trapped like this for eight days was already a hell beyond anything she'd have imagined was possible. The idea of spending years upon years in this state overwhelmed her mind with a crushing despair. She would never see her family or friends again. She would never meet someone and get married. She would never have kids. She'd never get to eat her favorite foods, listen to her music, or be entertained by any books or movies. She would never see other parts of the world, or anything other than this room. The one movement that ever occurred there, the guy getting into and out of bed, only served to remind her that even the simple pleasure of curling up in her own bed was now denied to her.

She couldn't see any hope of escape or rescue. The guy clearly had no intention of undoing this, if he even could. The only one who had witnessed him inflict this transformation on her was now a plastic figure alongside her. Her family and the police would surely look for her, but how could they ever deduce what had really happened. She was of course, unable to help herself, having been robbed of all ability to take action or communicate.

There was no guarantee this would ever end either. She apparently no longer needed food, water, or even oxygen to stay alive in this state. She wasn't even sure if 'alive' was the right word for what she was. She was still conscious, but her body was now made of inanimate plastic that had no more life than the glass that surrounded her. Was it even possible for her to die in this state? If not, then she couldn't even hope for death to release her from this fate. She could be stuck like this forever.

After a bout of mentally wailing in despair, she began to examine the room she was forced to look at. Perhaps she could find some clue as to how he had done this to her, which may lead to a way to reverse it. It was a long shot, especially with her inability to act on any knowledge she gained, but she needed some hope to cling to no matter how improbable.

It looked like an ordinary bedroom. The bed was a few yards in front of her, the dresser was half visible on the left side of her view. She wished the guy's camera was still in the room. It was what had done this to her with that unforgettable blue flash. Unfortunately, she was unable to walk out and go find it. The walls and dresser were strangely devoid of any decorations or belongings. This left her without anything she could potentially look at as a clue on this guy's methods or motivations. Her attention then shifted to the nightstand next to the bed.

On the nightstand seemed to be the only personal belonging in her view. It was a large book that appeared to be rather old. Suddenly, her memory was jolted. She recognized it as the book he was carrying under his arm when they crossed paths in the hotel hallway. However, recognizing it didn't do her any good. She couldn't read it being trapped in a tiny plastic body in a glass case across the room.

Still, her attention was now fixated on it. All of her thoughts were now drawn to this book. The longer she looked at it, the more she desperately wanted to know what it contained. It almost felt as if it was radiating a powerful energy, one that was vivid even to her now plastic being.

Without warning, the book shot open. Zoe was startled by the first unexpected movement she'd seen in more than a week. The book was now the sole focus of her mind. She wondered if it was her own thoughts focusing on it that caused it to open. She couldn't believe that was possible but then again, she wouldn't have thought people being turned into figurines was possible prior to this either. After a few minutes, the book began to glow, with a light that was horribly familiar to Zoe. The light was the same blue color  as the camera flash that had reduced her to her current state.

Zoe was now certain that this book and the camera were now connected. However before she could ponder this, she was startled again, this time by someone's voice.

"Wha-, what's happening?"