The overly confident wallet thief would snicker to himself, shielding his eyes only briefly as the grandiose chandelier collided with the glossy tile floors like so much wreckage, leaving shattered glass, diamond fragments and more in its wake. As it sizzled and sparked, there was one thing he didn't notice and that's the pesky brunette occasionally known as ShrinkGirl. The crowd stood in stunned silence, most of them having noticed a young woman under the descending chandelier not even moments before ... was she...??
No.
For at that moment, Lexi came springing triumphantly out from the debris, having sprinted away from the carnage by shrinking herself to bug size and navigating it, dodging some schrapnel in the process but remarkably unscathed as she slid and grew back just in front of the arrogant ne'erdowell delivering swift justice in the form of a powerful momentum aided punch to the jaw. In the process, the malicious man stumbled back but not before lobbing the wallet up towards one of his associates who ran to catch it.
"Shit" Lexi muttered, knowing she had to keep an eye on the pinned criminal but also not wanting to see her friends' wallet get stolen. The young do-gooder's face would droop as she watched the criminal fade down a corridor, and she'd point futilely towards them as if to alert the approaching police and mall security but to no avail, as most of their focus would be apprehending the fallen criminal on which Lexi knelt before getting up and trying to scamper away as fast as she could, actually shrinking briefly when ducking behind a garbage can and growing back.
She'd run back to Chris to see how he was doing and while he had a small bruise on the side of his face, from a sucker punch, he seemed fine otherwise, but he motioned downward on Lexi.
"Hmm? I have something ... on my shirt?" Lexi asked, pulling the end of her shirt out just a bit to have a look. Chris would roll his eyes and point out the belt buckle. It wasn't hard to miss a big shiny "stop sign" on one's waist, after all.
"Oh right..." Lexi sighed, noticing Chrissy and Rachel were fast approaching, she'd shift the medallion into his hands. "Can you hold onto this please?"
"What? Me? Why?" Chris sighed, holding the feminine looking medallion and instinctively holding it to his side so the 2 approaching ladies wouldn't see it or at least it wouldn't be noticeable.
"Just please..." Lexi asked under her breath, "I'll pick it up from you at school"
"...this could be all avoided if you just wore a mask..." Chris muttered, hiding the SG medallion in his pocket even as it stuck out a little but just looked like a purple coin if one wasn't looking at it in more detail.
"...shut up" Lexi would say to him through gritted teeth, a bit too stressed out to deal with the logistics at the moment.
"Oh my god, Lexi, are you okay?" Chrissy sighed, almost in tears as she hugged her brunette friend tight. Rachel seemed shaken up and worried as well.
"Y-Yeah ... I'm good" Lexi nodded, out of breath herself. Of course she didn't want to tip her hand too much that these kind of action sequences were becoming common place for her.
"What were you thinking?" Chrissy snapped a bit, almost ready to smack her friend if she weren't so concerned for her safety, "you could've been killed!"
"I just ... I don't know ..." Lexi shrugged, hanging her head a bit in awkward embarassment, "I couldn't let those guys just rip us off like that ... I'm sorry I couldn't get your wallet back, Rachel..."
"Hey, don't worry about it" Rachel sighed, giving Lexi a hug as well, "There's nothing in there I can't replace, I can always cancel the credit cards and ... yeah, you're more important obviously and I'm stunned you'd do all that just to help me out but ... yeah... what she said ... are you insane? Those guys could've really hurt you"
"If helping your friends is insane, then lock me up now" Lexi said proudly with a bit of goofy grin
"Oh gosh, if you weren't so lovable I'd be more angry right now..." Chrissy chuckled
As Lexi slowly went to go recollect her things, she'd take a visual scan of the mall, mouthing a "thank you" to Chris who was nice enough to help her out as he also went his own way to go find his other friends and hopefully explain away anything odd they may have seen. One thing Lexi didn't see was any sign of the men in black, and not the cheesy Will Smith movie but the actual collective of gentlemen who had tried, and mostly succeeded in ruining Lexi's night.
She despised the Chaos Crew, as they were born out of a desire to just cause ... well, chaos. They committed crimes all over, seemed to vary in age, race, demographic and motive and were just something that stood for everything she was against. She took this attack especially personal since the Mini Mall always felt like somewhat of a safe haven, but it seemed nothing was safe lately ... heck, look what had happened during the previous years Winter Carnival.
As Lexi scanned the crowd though, and the police who eventually DID show up on the scene to make sure everybody was okay as they taped off the area around the fallen chandelier, she could swear she saw a familiar face in the form of Officer Sonia Sanders. Maybe she was moving a bit too fast and was at too great of a distance to really make it out but the outgoing young officer seemed to be giving her a look of disdain, as if to say "I warned you"
Then again, Lexi, with all of her conscience and optimism, did have a habit of being hard on herself. The attack would've likely happened whether she was there or not and at least she able to stop the criminal from hurting Rachel or Chrissy but the chandelier thing? It's unknown if that would've happened if not for the fact that they were clearly trying to get the drop (some pun intended) on poor Alexis Cole.
Lexi would let out one more sigh as she collected her bag and also attempted to recollect her feelings, Chrissy and Rachel hovering close behind.
"You sure you're okay, Lexi?" Chrissy asked again
"I should be asking you and Rachel that..." Lexi shook her head in response, "Rachel, did he hurt you?"
"I'm fine" Rachel nodded, "I mean, I'm not thrilled but I'm not hurt and that's what's important, I'm just glad YOU'RE okay and thanks again for the second effort... I'm beyond grateful, I don't even know what to ..."
"Don't worry about it" Lexi smiled, "Everybody needs a helping hand"
---------
A very tired Alexis Cole would stumble home that night, letting out a near silent yawn upon entering the door to her parents house. But it was apparently not silent enough. Lexi's worried mom waited her at the door while her dad was far behind, watching TV but still awake as the clock approached midnight.
"Lexi we were really worried about you ..." Lexi's mom said, wrapping her arms around her precious daughter and shaking her head, while simultaneously overcome with relief
"I um... I told you mom...." Lexi stuttered, "I was just going out with a couple friends to the mall..."
"But we saw the news!" Lexi's mother proclaimed in fear. On an unrelated note, the family cat Tiny came scampering by and just dashed around the two, making a beeline for Lexi's bedroom. He seemed to spend a lot more time in there since he learned his owner could shrink and literally play "cat and mouse"
"Oh..." Lexi replied, a bit downtrodden, not sure just how much they knew. Luckily, her dad was tuned into the conversation as well as the TV and filled in some blanks
"Yeah, someone almost got killed by a falling chandelier they say, some thugs attacked the mall and it was just pure chaos..." Lexi's dad reiterated, repeating what he had heard from the breaking news story which was still running as cleanup crews were assessing the damage after the mall had closed
"Why didn't you call us?" Lexi's mom sighed in grief, "let us know you were okay?"
"I'm ... I'm sorry mom ... I was just so scared with everything going on..." Lexi whimpered, of course lying a little bit but it was a rather daunting situation that seemed to go by super quickly.
"Oh goodness, we're just glad you're okay..." Lexi's mom sighed, "that poor girl though or whoever it was... that almost got smushed by the chandelier... I can't imagine anybody DOING something like that ..."
Lexi would simply nod, her body trembling a bit in the embrace with her mom as she fathomed that thought herself, despite having been there. A single tear trickled down her eye but she just nodded along and eventually dismissed herself upstairs. What IF something had happened to her and she didn't come home that night?
Lexi would soon join her cat Tiny in the bedroom and just flop on the bed, Tiny quick to hop atop the mattress and push on her head lightly with his pointy tipped ears as if sensing distress in his owner, something he had detected many times since she made the switch to ShrinkGirl.
Lexi would roll onto her sigh and accept her kitty into an embrace
"It's not your job to worry about me Tiny..." she'd smile as she smushed her head into the cat's warm fur, Tiny responding by arching his head up to try to kiss her cheek, "But you're a great cat, love that you don't eat me when I'm mouse sized"
-----
Elsewhere, that next afternoon the police were investigating into a more private matter but one that was of the utmost importance to the cookie lady herself, Cindy Rutschmann. A group of officers were taking a picture of a cracked open safe, which now contained nothing, it's doors almost off the hinges from whatever had cracked it open.
"I just don't understand..." Cindy sighed, relaying the story to the officers once again, "the security system HAD been malfunctioning but we just had the codes reset ... I'm the only one who has them and I never would've ... I just ..."
She was clearly distraught which was fairly rare for the confident founder of the world renowned (well, Minnesota renowned) cookie recipe, the one responsible for bringing so many smiles to the faces of people all over the tricounty area. It was therefore more ironic that the person behind such a creation was herself so cold and bitter by comparison.
"And you said your daughter was the victim of a robbery the night before?" the officer confirmed
"Yes..." she sighed, nodding her head, although her expression seemed neither angry nor upset, it was more like she was stating a fact merely to confirm it, "some hooligan took her wallet at the Mini Mall ..."
At that very moment, another officer was interviewing the daughter Rachel Rutschmann in the other room. That officer's name was Sonia Sanders, a diminuitive but strong willed cop on the force who, despite her hardened nature and need to excel to prove her point sometimes, would be one of the best when it came to relating to people of all ages and walks of life.
"I'm terribly sorry about what happened to you last night..." Sonia reiterated, "I'm sure this is an awful time to be asking but we just need to check on every detail of this case"
Rachel simply nodded, seeming equally as expressionless as her mom but she still in shock. Not only had she been robbed of her wallet the night before but overnight, the family's vault was cracked into and their most sacred possession (in her mother's eyes anyway) the Rutschmann Cookie recipe had gone missing.
"Did you have any ... enemies?" Sonia stuttered, struggling to think of the words. After all, this young college aged girl seemed nice as they came, it didn't stand to reason somebody would try to use her to infiltrate the vault but then again, the mom didn't seem very likable so it was more likely an act staged by a competitor. Still, she needed to cover all bases
"Enemies?" Rachel shook her head, "I ... no ... not that I know of ... the guy at the mall who jumped me was wearing a mask, I have no idea who he was"
"Could've been an ex maybe? Maybe somebody your mom knew?" Sonia asked, offering a suggestion as the whole thing DID seem very peculiar. She was also too familiar with the Chaos Crew and their MO which was usually just that -- completely random and peculiar. Their victims usually didn't match up or follow a pattern and this was done purposefully to ensure they'd always stay at large in some capacity.
Rachel simply shook her head shyly. Sonia nodded and began to walk away, knowing she likely wasn't going to get any more information out of the stunned young woman.
"Thank you for your cooperation..." Sonia said, before departing.
Once the police had left, Cindy seemed miffed, crossing her arms and simply watching the Mini Troop police cruisers evacuate the premises.
"Mom?" Rachel asked shyly, "wh-what did they say?"
"Useless as ever" Cindy sighed, shaking her head, "they don't seem to have any leads, they couldn't find any evidence of anybody logging onto the computer ... there must be SOME way to get into that hard drive and see ... hmmm..."
Rachel would just sigh and take some steps away.
"Thanks for asking if I'm okay mom..." Rachel thought to herself
"This was clearly a stunt from a competitor..." the elder Rutschmann thought as she paced around the area, the break in was fairly clean aside from the prying open of the safe and the alarm itself never went off. The laser grid also wasn't tripped. Whoever this was had an in somehow ... perhaps a disgruntled former employee? God knows she had plenty of those but she had no way to get any intel ... if only she had someone who could either spy on the competition or assess the security system from a closer vantage point? Maybe even someone who was a bit more familiar with the criminal types around the city since it seemed the police were never on top of things.
---------
Meanwhile, Lexi was just sitting at a table, kicking back on her day off yet still occupying her work place, the Krazy Kookie, just doodling a bit in a small notebook she had out while Leah and Josh shared a table with her. Somebody walked by them and a wayward cookie wrapper would flutter slowly to the floor before Lexi swooped up and pounced on it, sure to return it to its rightful place ... a nearby garbage can.
"Yknow..." Chrissy shrugged, currentling donning the green and gray uniform which represented the Kookie's colors, "if you wanted to work today, you could've ..."
"Heh, sorry ... just was bored and ... I don't know, Leah's only been here a few times... thought I'd take her here for llunch" Lexi commented, continuing to draw intently, while Josh peeked over, also peering at his phone, seemingly now preoccupied by whatever had come through on there.
"I don't know why I hadn't been here before" Leah swooned, eating a couple of the doughy chocolate chip cookies, "These cookies are amazing"
"You need a moment alone with the cookies?" Lexi winked and giggled
"Speaking of cookies" Chrissy chimed in with glee, wiping the counters for a moment before taking a turn, "I've gotta head to the back to restock ... mind manning the fort, Mara?"
"Consider the fort manned ... er ... womanned... you know what I mean" Mara giggled, working behind the counter over by the barista side where not much was going on for the time being. The red head would salute her blonde colleague before almost immediately zipping over to the table containing her recently made friends.
"What we doing?" Mara giggled, leaning over the table a bit, "planning some trouble?"
"What? No..." Leah shrugged, nibbling on a cookie "what makes you say that?"
"Lexi's doodling and looks like Josh is canoodling..." Mara commented before pausing, "hmm, that's not bad ... I should write that down"
"I was just reading on the site..." Josh said, glancing at Lexi, as 'the site' was usually code for the ShrinkGirl website. The secret ShrinkGirl website that only ShrinkGirl afficianados knew about. That ShrinkGirl website. "...that Ms. Rutschmann got robbed last night"
"What? No way!" Lexi shook her head, confirming it by reading that the latest plea for help came from the cookie queen herself, Cindy Rutschmann. Josh then glanced at Mara, feeling a bit silly as he himself remembered a crucial detail
"Oh right ... you already knew that Lex is ... Shrink...Girl..." Josh stuttered, realizing he was among many colleagues who knew the not so secret secret.
"Not only that but I've seen her naked" Mara smiled proudly. Funny enough, nobody at the table questioned this. Not even Lexi who knew it not to be true. It was just said with that much confidence.
"So who do you think might've done it?" Leah asked, her voice utterly distorted by the sounds of cookie chewing
"I'm noffff surrrffff" Lexi answered in jest, mimicking her best friends speech pattern before continuing to scribble away at her doodle
"What are you drawing anyway?" Leah remarked, after swallowing the cookie
"What I would look like with a mask ... it's not flattering..." Lexi shook her head
"Why would you wanna hide that pretty face anyway?" Leah teased
"Hmmm, maybe it's the Kekse" Mara remarked, nodding with a moment of serious pondering
"The what now?" Lexi asked
"Kekse" Mara replied, "it's this new cookie shop that's suppose to be opening soon ... they claim to have some amazing cookies ... so guess they're our competiton ... or at least, will be"
"We really need 2 cookie shops on a relatively small campus?" Lexi asked herself out loud
"I found it strange too ... but hey, they don't pay me to think" Mara shrugged, before hearing a customer ring the bell that was at the counter, "oh right, I should probably get that but nice chat ... also ... something to ponder ... isn't a bra like a mask for your boobs?"
Once Mara had left the table, the 2 girls stopped to ponder that while Josh just shrugged
"Yeah I guess she's ..."
"Yeah yeah ... got a point..." Leah tsked, "...so what are you going to do about the Rutschmann thing?"
"What do you mean? I've got to at least investigate ... see what's up, yknow?" Lexi commented
"Right ... but didn't you just hang out with Rachel the other night? What if she sees you there being all superheroic?" Leah asked
"Ohhhh... oh I hadn't even thought of that" Lexi sighed, shaking her head in annoyance, "why does this all have to be so complicated?"
"I always figured the shrinking and not getting stepped on was the complicated part" Josh commented
"I always thought it would be finding outfits to wear that are your size" Leah added, as usual focused on fashion
"Har de har har..." Lexi sighed, "maybe I could ..."
Josh raised his hand, as if to suggest something,
"I'm NOT wearing the Luchadore mask..." Lexi commented, quickly shutting down Josh's recurring idea, much to his dismay.
"Well if you're not going to wear that ..." Josh added, "there might be something else we could work out..."
------------------
"Hmmm.... well, thank you for coming over Ms. ShrinkGirl is it?" a very grateful yet perplexed Cindy Rutschmann would say, "but ... don't you usually not wear a mask?"
"Oh it's uh ... something new I'm trying..." Lexi sighed, from underneath a fairly thick black mask over her face, which seemed even odder when contrasted with the rest of her outfit which remained largely the same, consisting of her purple crop top, goldenrod skirt and purple boots. The mask extended just to her neckline with some stretchiness and had a replica of the SG logo on printed around the forehead area. How did she get a custom mask printed on such short notice? Let's just say Josh knows some people. To that end, he would be on the other end of a communication device tucked into her ear. Oh how she tried to talk him out of THAT idea.
"Well who am I to argue with the experts?" Cindy shrugged, walking Lexi through the well kept tiled floors of her mansion like home, past some elegant railings and expensive looking vases and straight towards the vault room just below the first stairwell. Lexi did have to wonder why the thieves would only go for the vault and cookie recipe? Granted that is very valuable but pretty much anything they took from this home would've cost a pretty penny, especially a painting on the wall which was very well done called "A Pretty Penny"
"Is that a penny?" Lexi would hear a static distorted voice warble through her ear. She'd tap her ear for a moment in confusion.
"Yes, it's a penny" Lexi would mutter
"Oh, sorry" Josh nodded in response, out in a car about a block away but monitoring Lexi's current progress through a fuzzy 80s camera installed in the mask, "just found a penny in my car, nifty .,.. 1972 ... good year"
Lexi would roll her eyes, not really sure why this new tech was even needed but Josh seemed especially eager to try it out and well, it did make her feel more like a secret agent or something.
"Walk a little slower..." Josh whispered, watching Lexi's movements but the footage was a little shaky with each step she took, "I'm trying to scan for clues"
"I am NOT walking slower ..." Lexi muttered under her breath, "this was a stupid plan and I don't know why I agreed to it!"
"I'm sorry?" Mrs. Rutschmann asked, continuing to lead Lexi down towards the vault,
"I said, you have a very nice place here, Mrs. Rutschmann and might I say I'm a big fan of your product" Lexi said enthusiastically, both to save face and well, it was true she enjoyed the signature cookie crunch of a good Rutschmann cookie.
"Oooh ooh!" an ambitious young Joshue James would comment from the safety of his car some few blocks away, "ask her for free samples"
"I am NOT asking for free samples..." Lexi muttered, sounding a bit more obvious this time, "Um... lead the way, ... sorry"
Lexi would awkwardly and uncomfortably find her way around the labyrinthine home, the checkerboard tiled floors finally coming to an end as they reached the cellar and things took a slightly more "normal" tone despite the presence of a large bank like vault, something you don't see in most homes. Still, she wasn't quite walking her normal casual pace so that Josh could 'take evidence' or whatever, and also she wasn't use to wearing a mask and her eye holes seemed to be a bit off as she'd see traces of gray on either side of her pupils and basically had no peripheral vision.
"I don't care what the others say ..." the stubborn young heroine thought to herself, "after this mission, I'm done with the mask ... I don't know Batman stood this kind of thing ... eh, he was rich, probably had it custom fitted or something"
"Um... Ms... SG... or however we call you ..." Cindy Rutschmann commented in a sort of pretentious way, "Are you ... okay? You've been kind of spaced out since you arrived"
"Oh I'm perfectly fine" Lexi said, coughing a bit and disguising her voice even a bit for reasons even she didn't understand. Cindy had already more or less heard Lexi's true voice but now she was deepening it a bit as if to continue the secrecy. "Just uh ... gathering evidence"
"I see..." Mrs. Rutschmann muttered, but it again was filled with an air of dismissiveness towards the masked wonder. With that, she'd type in a few codes to open the vault and one would think that would be it but no, this vault simply would let them down another hallway which led to a much smaller wall vault at the very end. The vault had been cracked to the point that the door was hanging off a single hinge. It wasn't hard to wonder how the criminals got to it though. The place seemed devoid of security aside from needing the keypad to enter. At least ... that's how it appeared
"Hold on there...." Cindy warned, holding her hand in front of Lexi so she couldn't progress further and then pulling out a small remote which engaged an intricate laser grid as well as security cameras that were now more visible with their blinking red lights on as they swiveled to capture every possible angle of the protective hallway.
"Okay ... that's more what I expected" Lexi nodded, as Josh rambled on the other end of their communications system
"Oh my gosh, that is highly advanced!" he commented, even just seeing it on the fuzzy footage on screen in front of him, "ask her if those are centigrade 2 or 3 lasers... that's important because..."
Lexi would slowly turn her earpiece to "mute" and continue her conversation with the robbery victim
"So you're telling me the criminals got in here without tripping ANY of these alarms?" Lexi asked, to which Cindy would nod, crossing her arms with a tinge of impatience, "and what about the security cameras? They didn't pick up anything?"
"They were disabled ... it was as if the robber had inside knowledge of the entire system ... around 1:32 am last night the cameras went black. By the time they were re-engaged, the robbers had long since departed..." Cindy sighed, describing the situation again.
"And all they stole was..."
"All they stole?" Cindy asked, with a bit of indignance, "They may as well have stolen the entire Rutschmann name! They stole one of the original copies of our Rutschmann signature chocolate chip cookies recipe, down to every last secret ingredient and how to make them ... do you know how much that could go for on the black market of baked goods and commodities?"
"Oh ... that's a thing?" a confused Lexi responded before adjusting back to her over the top superhero voice, "I mean yes yes ... of course ... one musn't be too careful..."
After another pause, Cindy would snap her fingers and a gruff man would show up, seemingly out of nowhere, dressed to the nines and about 6 feet tall.
"Harris?" Cindy asked, receiving only a grunt in response from the apparent personal bodyguard type, "please escore Ms. uh ... ShrinkGirl ... off the premises"
"Huh?"
"You're not needed, dear" Cindy shrugged, already turning around and going for her cell phone as if to search for an alternative, "it's obvious the news was right about you ... you're more of a publicity stunt than a hero..."
"H-Hey ... that ... really hurts..." Lexi sighed, her bravado fading quickly as the man tugged on her arm gently to show her out. "I may not be like ... the most heroic hero that ever hero-ed but ... I'm no...."
Cindy would simply hold her hand up, as if Lexi was the one with the audacity to interuppt her phone call which she was now on.
"Yup. Yup. No." Cindy said, her words short and halted as she continued on with her new phone call, "Yeah... like you said, completely and utterly useless..."
Lexi would growl under her breath as she was shown the way out.
"I'm not going to fight you, yknow..." Lexi sighed, crossing her arms as she kept a good distance apart from herself and Harris the apparently silent bodyguard. Even he would shrug and nod, eventually letting her leave of her own accord, Josh just a short way away to pick her up again.
"Nice lady..." Lexi thought to herself facetiously, "can't imagine why Rachel's not a fan..."
Giantess World
