Far off in another vista within the Quartzaria realm dwelled the one known as Paradox, his eyes heavy as he watched a wall of monitors for the whereabouts of the resistance. He sighed greatly, looking down and shaking his head. How did things get to this point?
Paradox, the warrior of all things unexplainable was about 6'4 with black and green armor, electricity crackling from his very being as if the armor failed to contain his energy. While he surveyed the various roadways of Quartzaria by way of several floating orbs he had deployed, he was unaware of the approaching woman who walked into the room to join him.
"Dear brother..." she sighed, her name being Pandora. "Haven't you spent enough time obsessing over this?"
"Pandora..." Paradox groaned, "you know what this fight means ... or could mean..."
Pandora shook her head and tsked. Pandora was something of a mystery herself, her dress appearing to be a green and pink mosaic of shards of light, resembling stained glass. She was a great sorceress most known for her box of illusions that could contain beings more powerful than her in a nearly inescapable labyrinth. She had vibrant pink hair and green flashing eyes that lit up or dimmed based on her emotions.
"I just think this feud has gone on long enough ..." Pandora sighed, "just let Vektor have what's his and take what's yours..."
"Easy for you to say ..." Paradox scoffed, "It's been made more than aware to me what your true feelings of him are..."
Pandora let out an annoyed groan
"Brother, you know my loyalty lies solely with you ..." Pandora sighed
"Then you shall continue guarding the prisoner..." Paradox instructed, to which his disgruntled sister fell on a knee and nodded to show compliance, "...and if the resistance comes here for a fight ... you will be among the first to counter their attack"
"Yes, brother..." Pandora answered, her own eyes now growing heavy. There had to be a better way ...
-----
Back in Miniborough, a concerned Trevor Hilfmann stood behind the counter, trying to maintain his composure while worrying dearly about his friend and young charge, Alexis Cole who he hadn't heard from since the day the young man with the drone came in. While he didn't suspect him for the cause, in fact he did remember the boy from his tour of Enormo Enterprises, as well as Dr. Max's attempt to send drones after him, he was still a bit concerned that Lexi's secret identity seemed to be losing its secrecy by the second. Then again, that's bound to happen when one publicly foils a bomb attack with a crowd who's savvy with cell phone cameras.
Speak of the devil ...
Josh and Leah walked into Aztek Parts and More, Josh with his drone under his arm and Leah with a small purse hoisted on her shoulder looking concerned.
"H-Hi" Trevor nodded, recognizing Leah and knowing that she knew of Lexi's secret. "You're ... Leah, right? Lexi's best friend?"
"Yeah! You remembered!" Leah chuckled, "and you're Trevor Hopeman or ... something... sorry, I'm bad with names..."
"Close enough" Trevor shrugged with a bit of a smile himself, "I've been concerned about ... Lexi ... for ... reasons..."
Trevor appeared to be skeptical again of the mysterious Joshua James with whom he had conversed earlier. He didn't want to reveal too much. Thankfully Leah Henderson was there to clear up any doubts.
"Okay so ... I think there's been a bit of a misunderstanding..." Leah said with a nervous grin, "Josh here knows that Lexi is ShrinkGirl but he's also one of our best friends"
"Really?" Josh asked, cutting in, "you ... you consider me a best friend?"
Leah shrugged and gave Josh a playful smile, "well yeah... I mean... you've always had Lexi's back and .. I think you're pretty cool ... y'know outside of the whole dungeons and dragons thing..."
Trevor rolled his eyes a bit but did let out a sigh of relief.
"Okay so then ... my worries were misplaced... my apologies, young man..." Trevor sighed, "just ... with everything that's happened ... and so fast..."
"No no, I totally get it" Josh said with a bit of a thumbs up, "kudos to you for wanting to cross all your t's and dot all your i's ... paranoia is the way to go, I always say"
Leah and Trevor both paused and simply let the awkward line sink in.
"Not your best moral..." Leah commented
"Regardless... how can I help you two?" Trevor asked, noticing a few more people milling into the store. He turned to a young employee of his and asked them to watch the counter. "Here, why don't we discuss this in private then?"
Leah and Josh nodded, walking around the counter and following Trevor to the workshop, a place that Josh had seen briefly while his drone was being repaired but it was all forms of new to Leah who looked around at the combination of computer parts, drawers of tranistors but most poignant of all had to be the "ShrinkGirl" related section with small metallic devices made of nanites and other things that resembled the nightmarish Enormo Enterprises technology, albeit with a more pleasant twist on it.
"So ... this is like ... Lexi's bat cave?" Leah commented, as always trying to lighten the mood
"Something like that ..." Trevor replied
"You're really on a Batman kick, huh?" Josh replied
Leah ignored the comment and continued
"So ... we have a bit of a problem ..." Leah sighed
"If you would allow us to show you the drone footage I captured of Lexi chasing Roxie, maybe I ..." Josh started
"Roxie...." Trevor sighed, "why does Lexi keep mixing herself up with that dangerous woman?"
"I think she's ... trying to ..." Leah stuttered, trying to understand it all herself.
"I know what she's trying to do..." Trevor lamented, hunching over his workbench and trying to contain his emotions, "...I get that she's a good person, I do. Probably has the truest purest heart of almost anyone I've known but ... I mean, she's going to put herself in danger, she's going to put those closest to her in danger and ... there's only so much I can do to help..."
Leah and Josh both exhcnaged concerned glances as the former Doctor continued to speak.
"Tell me..." Trevor added, "is Lexi still having the ... well, problems?"
"Problems?" Leah asked
"Yeah ... you know is she still having those..." Trevor started
"...Cramps?" Josh asked naively. Leah gave him an annoyed look
"No...." trevor said, a bit perplexed that the two of them didn't know what he meant, "Lexi has been experiencing some fairly significant aftershocks from what happened to her at the Enormo facility ... I ... I figured she told you"
Leah looked gravely concerned as expected
"N-No ... she didn't say anything about that ... is she alright?" Leah asked
"She seems to be doing better yeah ... I've been doing my best to inject her with counteractive nanites to balance out her polarity ..." Trevor explained, "whatever happened to her threw off her molecular balance ... she's stable for now ... but she has these moments where she seems disoriented ... lost even, like the electricity in her body and mind is overloading her... I just ... worry what could happen if it's unchecked..."
Again Leah and Josh looked concerned
"So yeah ... if she stays missing for too long, I can't give her the dosages she needs to hopefully balance her out..." the conrerned Trevor Hoffnung said, "...hopefully the problem is subsiding but ... who knows for sure?"
"Lexi has her secrets ... that's for sure..." Leah sighed, a bit upset that her best friend never confided this with her.
Josh, noticing Leah's worries and sadness decided to hastily change the subject.
"S-So ... shall we review the drone footage?" Josh asked
"Of course..." Trevor nodded, "hopefully it'll illuminate what's happened to our dear Alexis..."
"I should warn you..." Josh said, "it's some pretty weird stuff..."
"I'll be the judge of that..." Trevor commented, "I've seen some pretty weird stuff myself ... I DID work with Mad Max, after all..."
----
Speaking of weird stuff, it was the start of summer for siblings Spark, Lark and Mark at the Fenster Forest, otherwise known as the "Fairy Forest" for its legendary, but likely mythical fairy colony that existed in the shadows of a great lake at its very center. That on its own wasn't weird, but Spark seemed a bit recluse of late and it wasn't helping matters that the siblings, as well as the colony at large had felt a radical shockwave of sorts recently that was affecting them all in similar but different ways.
Spark in particular had a pounding headache since the incident, which may have led to her not being as social, although both Lark and Mark noticed her sneaking off more often to see somebody, who they suspected was one of the humans they had met not too long ago. Except it wasn't the elf, Mara. Nobody had seen her since the fairy festival ... it wasn't Lexi or her friend Leah although they had stopped by a couple times to say hello. That really only left one other possibility.
"I... I've gotta go ..." a monotone Spark said upon floating out the threshold of the familys stump shaped house
"To see your boyfriend?" Lark teased, but Spark didn't answer and simply levitated off the ground, a trail of glitter following in her wake until she vanished from view. Mark gave his sister an annoyed look
"You know ... this is probably why our family never engages in any meaningful communication..." Mark suggested, just shaking his head as he himself retreated to his quarters, leaving Lark alone and confounded for the moment.
"Oh sure, make ME the jerk here..." she said to nobody in particular, before huffing and stomping off.
Spark, meanwhile whizzed her way through the trees, closing her eyes and letting out a long exhale. It was the kind of sound most would make when they were feeling pent up stress but for Spark, she felt peace. She only seemed to feel such a feeling when she got out of the constant surroundings of the colony, something she usually hated doing but lately, good long flights away from home eased her frazzled nerves, especially since whatever happened.
There seemed to be some kind of potent energy present in Fesnteria at almost all times... she couldn't believe most of the others couldn't feel it but to her it was like being exposed to an allergen or just feeling zapped of energy all the time. Now some days were better than others and the phenomenon had only started about a week ago, but everyone in the colony did agree a dimensional disturbance of some kind was likely the cause.
While Spark took a moment to land, her tired wings showing their fatigue, she just looked down at the ground, for her a large rock and let out a sigh. Finally, she saw the shadow she had grown accustomed to,. Not her own, but rather that of a large young human male ... although all human males, or all humans for that matter were bigger than the diminuitive Spark.
"You okay?" the young man asked.
"I'm fine, Chris..." Spark sighed, pacing around and grabbing hold of a towering dandelion as if it were a lamp pole and she were about to twirl on it like in a 1950's musical. Unlike in a musical though, she lacked the needed grace and instead flopped onto the grass, letting out a yelp and a squeak.
Chris, always one to help, if not a bit snarky himself, scooped up the fallen lady and chuckled, brushing her off lightly as she laid in his palm.
"Careful there ..." Chris said, with an uncontainable grin, "That was rather cute though"
"Oh shush..." Spark smirked, again feeling like herself again, but only when she was around this human in particular ... this Chris ... the elemental wizard. They had been spending perhaps the most time together since things went down with Lexi and her cohorts in the Forest earlier in the winter time.
"So what's been going on, lil miss?" Chris asked, a bit concerned about his friend and not because of the recent tumble, "you've seemed a bit quiet, especially the last week or so ..."
"It's just ... thing..." Spark exclaimed, grunting a bit as the mild headache hit her again. It came in waves, and this one seemed particularly strong. So much so that she paused her standing motion and instead went into a full on kneel in Chris' hand, just rubbing her head. Spark could sense the concern dripping off her larger friend and shook her head before he could speak, "Chris, I'm fine ... it's just ... a dimensional rift was opened..."
"Dimensional rift, huh?" Chris nodded
"Can I just say, and I'm being serious..." Spark nodded, a smile finally rearriving on her face once the headache left her a bit more free to stand and talk, "...that when I proposed to you the dimensional rift theory you didn't just laugh me off the face of the earth"
"Well gosh Spark, that wouldn't be very nice" Chris shrugged, "and also, I kinda felt it too ... I mean I didn't get any of the after effects you're having or you mentioned others having but ... I sensed something too and it was around the same time ... and I mean .. magic's real ... YOU'RE real, my friend Lexi is real..."
"Lexi..." Spark paused, "have you spoken to her ... since the incident?"
Chris had to ponder this for a moment but a doubful look crossed his brown eyes after several moments
"You know... I haven't ..." Chris frowned, "heck, I'm not even sure she likes me all that much"
"Why would you say that?" Spark asked, "I've only seen her the few times but ... she seems super nice"
"Super nice, yea but that's just it" Chris shrugged, "She's one of those people who likes everyone so you don't know if she actually likes ANYONE..."
"That seemed like a needless bit of overanalyization..." the quick to point out Spark mentioned
"Overthinking..." Chris said, "it's just one of the many uncalled for services I offer... and mandatorily I may add"
"Heh ... well ... maybe call her ... doesn't have to be right now but... now you got me thinking... hope she's okay" Spark squeaked and sat back down on Chris' hand, enjoying the feeling of having somebody hold her for once rather than needing to fly everywhere.
"You sure? I could call her now if you wanted..." Chris shrugged
"You can... if you want" Spark shrugged, "but ..."
Chris looked down at her, his phone had slid into his other hand but upon hearing his fairy friend's comment he paused and slid the phone back into his pocket. "Yes?"
"It's just ..." Spark sighed, overplaying the melodramatic angle just a bit, "...my wings are soooo sore..."
"Oh no..." Chris smirked, "...not again, c'mon..."
"Pleeeeease..." Spark grinned, then turning her face into a pout with a rather bloated upper lip.
"Okay okay ... geez..." Chris sighed, gently rubbing behind her wings to soothe her. She let out a soft but peaceful squeak as a few sparkles surrounded the affected area, "are all you fairies so needy?"
"That's ... that's a stereotype..." Spark sighed in pleasure, tuning out the world for a moment, "but I'll ... worry about that later ... you just keep rubbing..."
"Aye aye Queen Sparkster..." Chris smirked with a dopey grin, continuing to massage his tiny friends backside and relieve some of the fatigue she had been through.
Although Chris was similarly enjoying the moment for what it was, it didn't go unnoticed to him that a strange lantern of sorts was emmitting a distinct fiery glow from a distance. He decided to let it go for now but perhaps if there were still time, and the light didn't vanish, he would go investigate after his time with Spark. As for now, he had a mission to embark on.
----
Lexi was determined as she began ramping up the speed on the Stratocruze ... uh ... purple car. She glared out of her window with just one thought on her mind as she entered the dazzling city.
"I have a mission to embark on."
The city streets in Crystacyon were unlike anything she had ever seen. Certain things and landmarks such as large spires that served as street lamps or borders on the sides of the roads that reminded her of curbs made the driving somewhat familiar to her but after that, most comparisons were invalid. While the traffic was surprisingly light, what stood out to her right away is that instead of lanes, the roads seemed to weave up and down like ribbons, sometimes even twisting over and under one another like strands of DNA.
Naturally, Vektor and his crew navigated these streets with ease as they had probably driven on them all their life. It wasn't dangerous per se, but nothing that Lexi had ever expected to see, let alone drive on. It almost felt like she was inside some kind of surrealist painting. A sort of optical illusion where your eye doesn't know where to go next. All she knew for sure was, if she kept hitting the gas and staying straight, she'd likely be okay as there seemed to be very few turns in this road. In fact it was more or less a straight shot to their final destination, a deep glowing mountainside that seemed to be many miles away and yet much like everything else in this realm, the velocity at which it approached also made very little logical sense.
As Lexi pondered this, still somewhat mesmerized by the fact that she was actually driving a car that was "hers" (even if only temporarily) a red speeder pulled alongside her and Ruby's face appeared, grinning over at Lexi
"You doing okay in there, newbie?" Ruby asked, her eyes darting from the spiraling road in front of her, back to Lexi in her purple car alongside her.
"Y-Yeah ... I just ... wow... this town is .. something..." Lexi stuttered
"I... suppose you could say that..." Ruby replied with a shrug, her voice soon droned out by the shouts of various crowds below and technically on the same level as them.
Quartzaria seemed to exist on multiple planes of existence. One that you could see through the transparent road, which is where some people dwelled but also some that were off on the sidewalk as you'd see in a more traditional city layout. Still some were up in golden clouds although they were less common and harder to notice, especially while driving.
The crowds people below had signs. Some of them said "DOWN WITH VEKTOR!" while others said "STOP THE DOX!"
"What... what's going on...?" Lexi asked.
As if sensing her concern yet again, Lexi's dashboard comm activated and Vektor appeared on screen briefly.
"Ignore the propaganda if you can!" Vektor warned, "it's everywhere and an unfortunate side effect of what's happened to your kingdom... people are torn apart, not sure who to trust and Paradox has built a strong following, convincing some to join his side ... we need to take the Kingdom back but it will not be a quick fix ... it could take many months or years..."
As Vektor laid out the terms of months and years, Lexi couldn't help but get a bit worried. Just how long WOULD she be stuck in this new realm? Pretty cars were nice, but she missed her family and friends desperately.
Rather than dwelling on that, the determined young woman simply stared ahead at the golden laden path that laid in front of her. She kept her foot on the gas but not with so much pressure that she shot off like a rocket but rather enough to keep up with her colleagues and get used to the cars surprisingly intuitive handling.
As she whizzed down the city streets, she noticed what appeared to be the equivalent of a gas station with a price of $4.42 posted. While not completely sure if currencies translated even closely to the same, she shrugged and thought to herself "huh. gas prices are a problem here as well..."
The purple armor clad heroine wasn't able to enjoy the leisurely drive for too long though as she soon would be interuppted by a slight loud beeping sound that would grow louder and faster as she drove further into the horizon.
"Lexi!" Ruby warned, only her voice emitting from the car speakers, "watch your left side??"
"My ... left?" Lexi eeped, looking up and quickly spotting the formation of a thunder cloud, a single cloud that was maybe a few feet in width producing a quick burst of lightning. She yanked the steering wheel right, lurching her car along with it and missing the surprise crack of thunder.
"Th-Thanks..." Lexi sighed, heart beat beginning to race as the car did, sensing this wouldn't be the only source of trouble.
"Unfortunately..." Vektor chimed in, "This won't be the only source of trouble ... we've got bogeys, up in the air!"
Lexi wasn't 100% educated on all the terminology this strange realm used but she was more than familiar enough with the term "bogey" to know it spelled bad news, and her fears were confirmed as she looked upwards to see a trio of green creatures in the sky forming a small cluster. They were bird like in nature but had green lightning crackling with their wings as they swung them, spreading that electricity onto the road which seemed to absorb it like a mobius strip.
Sensing that Lexi seemed a bit out of her element here, Emerald took it upon herself to accelerate past her, the woman's large tank like vehicle pulling up alongside her, the blonde haired female inside shaking her head with a tsk, throwing up a plasma shield to deflect the blasts of the three crystal birds above.
"Wh-What?" Lexi blushed, almost smiling with a cheeky look on her face, "I'm new at this"
"Just giving you a hard time..." Emerald shrugged, driving forward a bit more to reveal the crystal birds had been all but vaporized by a well timed and aimed array of machine gun fire, but they had more enemies approaching. Some of the climbed right up onto the road from beneath and they were the hulking green crystal beasts that Lexi had briefly seen before in her world, except there were five of them and above them rose more airborne avarians with lightning sparked wings. She had a feeling she had only seen the tip of the ice berg here.
"RUBY! EMERALD!" Vektor instructed, his voice being heard through the entire squadrons car. Lexi watched on meanwhile to see Vektor jump off of his chariot like ATV to evade an attack only to backflip in the air long enough to slam his red laser blade through one of the bird creatures and land back on the ATV smoothly, leaving the bird in shambles as a pile of green crystals which slowly reabsorbed into the road. Lexi raised an eyebrow, even as she had to admit the display was impressive, "Flank Lexi! Make sure the crystal beasts don't hurt her and Lexi ... remember your car can shrink..."
Lexi nodded, understanding the sentence but in her moment of high speed panic not quite knowing how to internalize the concept. As she looked about the array of buttons her mind just continued to race while the encroaching crystal foes got bigger and bigger in her window, and not because she was shrinking but rather due to the closing of distance that was taking place at an alarming speed.
The car can shrink ... the car can shrink ...
Well ... Lexi thought, noticing the crystal being not too far from her was in the mood to fight.
"If I can shrink, so too can the car!" Lexi repeated aloud, a statement that resonated with obvious undertones and yet sparked a great significant energy to form within her. Perhaps empowered by the world's atmosphere itself or her own inner gumption, Lexi engaged a lever on her shift stick that slid it to "SHRINK" rather than DRIVE and eeped as a whirlwind of purple lightning whisked her and the car down to a toy size, with which she was able to masterfully weave under the foot of the large and confused crystal beast.
Once she clear, she shifted the stick the other way and let out a loud yelp as she was briefly thrust back into her seat, full size and for now, clear of the wall of defense the beasts had been offering to impede her. From behind she could see an array of small explosions level the beasts, and one of them was actually plowed straight through by Emerald's war chariot.
"W-Wait..." Lexi stuttered, noticing that it seemed fairly effortless for Emerald to drive through the 6 foot plus tall lurching beast, "how durable ARE those things if you can just ... drive right through them? Could I have done that?"
"Oh heavens no..." a slightly amused Emerald responded on comm, "I mean, you maybe could have but there wouldn't be much of that cruiser left if you had ..."
"Battling Crystal Beasts is not an exact science, unfortunately..." Vektor added, "it's about knowing their weaknesses, their structural integrity and ..."
"BAM!! YEAH! TAKE THAT!!" Ruby yelped, her voice nearly deafening all as its distorted properties resonated through the built in comm, her victory shouts loud and not clear as she obliterated another small fleet with some powerful gun fire.
"Or... you could try that approach" Vektor chuckled
"You still never answered me if this car has..." Lexi started but then yelped as a green crystal bird now lay smushed against her windshield, splatting up there much like a pigeon might on a busy rush hour day in the city, but unlike a pigeon, Lexi wasn't sure how to proceed here. Chuckling nervously, she merely flipped the switch for the windshield wipers and watched as the large bird was swept away like a large chunk of snow, chuckling a bit to herself even though the circumstances remained dire.
Lexi sped up to keep with the pace of the others as the platoon of cruisers dominated the road.
Vektor pulled up alongside Lexi and peeked inside her car, a slight smirk crossing his face to see how well she was doing, considering it was all uncharted territory for her.
"Lady Lexington" Vektor asked, peeking over into the car, "how's the cruiser handling?"
"It's great!" Lexi grinned, momentarily losing her focus, as was Vektor.
Thankfully, they were both able to regain their concentration long enough to swerve out of the way as a large crystal encrusted chain came busting through the road from below, causing a large fissure to spread across the crystalline surface of the road.
"Shit." Ruby muttered, trying to swerve her vehicle to avoid falling through.
Lexi checked her rearview mirror as her and Vektor took the lead but was aghast to see Ruby's wheel shaped hovercraft getting stuck in the spreading fissure as the chain now began to wrap around her and the vehicle like a living tentacle.
"Vector!" Lexi eeped, looking back, "it's got Ruby!"
"Emerald can handle it" Vektor noted, ignoring the fact that Lexi again got his name wrong.
Lexi just frowned as she watched Vektor continue jetting ahead, firing off a healthy round of machine gun ammo to clear the path ahead where more crystal beasts were spawning. Lexi began to slow down, even as it left her more suceptible to any enemies that may find their way onto the road.
Meanwhile, Emerald watched her sister getting wrapped up by the chain and peered down to see where the cursed bind was coming from, seeing it originated from a lady dressed in a green and pink mosaic colored dress with electricty crackling off her body as she floated onto the scene.
"Pandora..." Emerald muttered, shaking her head as she sped up to try to save Ruby who was currently in the process of having her sturdy cruiser compacted in under the brute strength of Pandora's constrictive chain as she added another one for good measure.
The menacing woman now yanked on the cruiser as if towing a car in mid-air, her strength simply astouning as she was able to hoist Ruby out of the jagged hole in the road and pull her and her cruiser up into the air.
Ruby, trying to think quick, glanced down at her wrist but noticed she had no gemstones to help her out. Emerald on the other hand, had another idea.
Lexi on the other hand was slowing down to try to keep up with the two ladies and the new villainess who took to the scene.
"Ruby!" Lexi shouted out, trying to get her attention. Ruby wasn't ignoring Lexi but she was trying to somehow escape the vehicle despite the fact that more chains blocked her escape. Within a matter of seconds, she was soon too far off the ground to be reached by either Lexi or Emerald.
Emerald shook her head, pressing on her wrist. Lexi glanced over at Emeralds large green tank-like vehicle and saw a bright flashing emitting from it. Rather than gawk and find out what it was, she sped up to stay out of the way and for good reason as she watched Emerald vault herself out of the vehicle now standing atop it and about 10 feet tall and still growing.
"Oh great ... more size powers..." Lexi sighed, letting out a yelp as a crystal warrior blocked her path yet again. She tactfully shrank and unshrank her car to get around it, shaking her head a bit.
"That's... gonna take some getting used to..." the dazed Lexi sighed, keeping an eye on the action unfolding behind her as Emerald had grown into a behemoth of 25 feet tall and gently jumped off of the road, her feet landing on the surface below them as she seeming to be jogging to keep up with Pandora and her captive.
"C'mhere little lady!" Emerald growled, grabbing at Pandora and squeezing her out of the air like a doll.
"Hmmmph, cheater!" Pandora sneered, electrifying her very body so that Emerald couldn't hold onto her for long, her hand burning from the momentarily paralyzing shock.
With Pandora now occupied fighting her giantess foe, Ruby's cruiser was about to make a forced crash landing onto the road below, or so it would've, had a giant phoenix not now scooped it up in its talons.
"To the castle with her!" Pandora commanded the phoenix, breaking free of Emerald's large grip and floating off in a trail of lightning. Emerald growled, able to keep up but even at her giant size, she wasn't sure how to catch Pandora without incurring more damage and she didn't want to accidentally hurt Ruby who was currently trapped in the talons of the large firebird.
Lexi drove up alongside the giant Emerald, looking up at Ruby as her ascent took her higher and higher up. She stopped her car and got out, standing on the edge of the road, about level with Emerald's forehead.
"Emerald!" Lexi shouted, "I need you to do me a favor ... and throw me...!"
"What?" Emerald gasped, her large blue eyes staring down the daring little heroine on the highway. "Are you sure?"
"You got this" Lexi nodded supportively with a thumbs up, "but we don't have much time ... throw me up towards Ruby's car ... cruiser thingy ... I can get her out and then you can catch us... please..."
"If you're sure...." Emerald nodded, holding out her hand at a close distance for Lexi to hop on.
The determined and steely blonde woman narrowed her eyes, concentrating hard on her target before heaving Lexi as hard and high as she could, watching with bated breath as Lexi flew through the air like a courageous purple comet, although it appeared as if her trajectory would land her just short of being able to clutch onto the underside of Ruby's cruiser. Emerald tried her best to catch up in case she needed to make an emergency catch but Lexi had something up her sleeve, or rather, in her belt.
Sensing that she wasn't going to quite make it, Lexi dislodged the G on her SG belt and employed the grappling hook to snag the underside of Ruby's crumbling vehicle which thankfully was still sturdy enough to hold her weight as she swung around like Spider-Man to break in through the expoded side. She noticed Ruby was in pretty bad shape, her body trembling as a small fire began forming on the dashboard.
"Ruby!" Lexi exclaimed, the car seeming to crunch in around them as the merciless phoenix tightened its grip. Pandora was seemingly nowhere to be found at this point, perhaps taking solace in her perceived victory but Lexi wasn't about to give her the pleasure. She gently wrapped her arm around Ruby's waist and tried to hoist her up.
Emerald just shook her head in wonderment, getting ready to do her part when a small squad of crystal warriors leapt off the highway trying to attach themselves to her. Emerald grunted and eviscerated them handily, resulting in a cascading shower of crystal fragments while she dashed to the rescue.
"Ruby, just hold on, okay?" Lexi instructed, prompting a nod from the weakened crimson clad warrior. Lexi took a deep breath surveying the situation. Down below was the highway zipping by and Emerald was closing in on them. Thankfully her hand was a pretty large target so Lexi was fairly confident she could make it. She just had to be careful as she held onto Ruby tight and took the leap, diving out and feeling weightless for a moment as her grappling hook disengaged in the nick of time, Ruby's cruiser being reduced to scrap as the phoenix let out a forlorn caw, continuing to fly off towards the castle now empty handed.
Lexi yelped as she landed in Emerald's giant hand, holding Ruby close to her.
"Ruby, you okay?" Emerald asked
Far ahead, Vektor was watching the scene unfold and couldn't help but feel impressed watching Lexi's heroics, the way she dove so fearlessly into action and saved one of his finest warriors. He would make sure Paradox and her sister Pandora paid for what they were doing to his kingdom and his trust guild. But for now, he just kept his razor sharp focus on the road ahead, noticing the enemies seemed to be subsiding.
Ruby nodded, as Emerald set the two down on the highway by Lexi's Stratacruze. Lexi helped her into the passenger seat, noticing the enemies were retreating, including all the crazy looking birds, crystal beasts and Pandora herself who hadn't been seen in quite some time as it was.
"How much further to the castle?" Lexi asked the giant blonde in front of her
"Not much further ... " Emerald nodded, climbing back onto the highway as the growth effects were beginning to wear off and she'd soon shrink back to her regular size, back on the road and looking a little exhausted, "I'll ... I'll be okay ... just go on without me..."
"You sure?" Lexi asked
"Yeah ... you did great by the way, lil purple" Emerald quipped
"Heh, you weren't too bad yourself big green..." Lexi smirked before noting something, "you know... you never told me you had growth powers..."
"You never asked" Emerald replied, matter of factly, "but we'll talk about that later ... there seems to be a peace at the moment ... so let's take advantage of it and get to the mystic forest just before Paradox Peak"
"I feel like I'm in some kind of weird JRPG..." Lexi would mutter quietly, to which Ruby would raise an eyebrow, "...never mind, let's head out"
With that Lexi would hit the gas and speed off into the mystical unknown while Emerald boarded her tank again and followed closely behind.
A while down the road, the green crystal bird that struck Lexi's windshield like a bug was stirring on the stellar pavement. It lurched and slowly shook itself off, beginning to undergo a profound transformation, purple sparks surrounding its form as it became that of a human woman. But not just any woman. It looked to be an exact replica of Alexis Cole.
"The things I do for this job ..." the fake Lexi sighed, before vanishing without a trace.
Giantess World
