ENORMO ENTERPRISES
10:35 AM
THE OFFICE OF DR. MAXIMILLIAN E MUMFORD
-----------------------------------------------------

It was another casual Wednesday morning for the head engineer of Enormo Enterprises, one middle aged grizzly man by the name of Dr. Maximillian E Mumford. Usually he would be shuffling his way into work in a haste, shoving aside anybody unfortunate enough to be in his path, not stopping to gaze or make conversation with anyone.

Today however the Doctor seemed to be in an oddly good mood. In fact it had been about a month of good moods for the otherwise cantankerous Doctor. His plans had taken shape and despite a few setbacks, he felt poised to finally take the next step on a few fronts. Of course he would need to deal with a pesky budgeting meeting later that afternoon. He had put those off for only so long.

Still, Dr. Max was content to simply sit at his computer and begin working on a new schematic -- a way to further improve his robots, known as Maximites -- incredible machines capable of changing size and shape. Each iteration seemed to improve in some significant way -- and despite his last mech falling at the hands of his hated rival ShrinkGirl, he was confident that in time, it wouldn't happen again.

"Hmmm, speaking of ..." the studious doctor noted, glancing over at a monitor (one of the many in his setup) "...she's early"

Doctor Max was of course noting the flashing "INTRUDER ALERT" as it came blinking across his screen in large bold red text. Strangely, the Doctor was content to simply let it continue on with its warning, doing very little to activate any defenses. In fact, it was almost as though there were hardly any defenses at all ...

Elsewhere in the doldrums of the mechanical mecca, a tiny superheroine known as Alexis Cole was making a dramatic dive downward, eyes squinted as she focused on her target well below her. Strangely there didn't seem to be too many defenses activated. She heard only the sound of her fishing reel like grappling hook as more and more line was let out the closer she got to her target.

"Josh, are you there?" Lexi asked, a small apparatus connected to the back of her ear, allowing her to communicate with her friend Joshua James as he monitored the sensitive mission from the comfort of his garage which had slowly turned into a bit of a ShrinkGirl fortress. "I'm getting close to where he's holding the ShrinkMobile but ... it's weird, there's hardly any defenses at all..."

"I agree..." Josh said, although his tone sounded oddly distracted, "I say we fortify the right wall with some extra protection... and ..."

"Josh!" Lexi chirped, landing on a metal girder off to the side as she retracted her grappling hook back into her belt, down on one knee, "are you listening to me or playing D and D online again?"

"I can do both..." Josh replied with a guilty grin.

"Josh!!" Lexi squeaked, regretting her louder tone of voice as she quickly surveyed her surroundings but she didn't see too much save for a security camera slowly moving side to side. It was almost way too quiet in the area. She shook her head as she looked down, it appeared to be a more or less straight shot to the ShrinkMobile if she dove down.

Lexi glanced down one last time, trying to plot out her next few jumps. It looked as though she'd be fine as long as she lapeled down to the beam on her right, then slowly down to the one on her left. A few jumps would easily get her to where she needed to go. She just needed absolute focus and calm.

Unfortunately that wasn't meant to be as a loud BLAST and some even louder clangs threw Lexi off balance and she yelped, grunting as she began to fall. She closed her eyes and focused, growing back to normal size as she fell, hoping to fire off her grappling hook and save herself at the last moment but then it happened ; her falling set off a laser grid, and an alarm began to hum.

Back in his lab, Doctor Max simply sneered and shook his head, "Way too easy..." the Doctor laughed, typing feverently on his computer.

Lexi in a quick panic, fumbled with her slippery but useful "SG" belt buckle, carefully plucking out the "S" and going for the grappling hook to try to swing out of dangers way but she'd find herself quickly detained in a sort of floating fishtank like structure, struggling as her body was locked up from the lower torso to her neck. Struggling uselessly she'd grunt as the door to the secluded room was kicked down by none other than Roxie. She glanced down at the familiar foe from her vantage point but currently had more pressing matters to attend to, such as her capture in the tightening chamber as she noticed a green laser flash across her as if being scanned at a grocery store.

Roxie was of course cogniscent of Lexi's presense but let out only a soft chuckle as she watched the purple and gold clad superheroine struggle while she herself knelt down, peeking at the shrunken ShrinkMobile in curiosity. The car showed many signs of scratches, damage and even a busted headlight but she was remiss to see that her desired target was missing.

Finally, Roxie -- the smug blonde with an affinity for firearms looked up at Lexi with an unamused face.

"Alright, Shrinks, what's the deal?" Roxie asked, as if lecturing the detained brunette.

As if having some kind of control over the machine that had her grasped, Lexi strangely bounced out of it, slinging her grapplng hook precisely at a pipe and swinging herself unceremoniously towards a wall where she'd thud to the ground in pain, thankfully avoiding fall onto (and crushing) the shrinkmobile.

"Smooth..." Roxie sighed, her arms crossed as she still appeared unamused. Such a side was unusual to see from the usual gloating supervillainess.

Lexi quickly recovered, her head shaken as she looked up to see the "fishtank" like machinery had disappeared from view and while Lexi didn't feel anything except for the impact she had just taken, she had to wonder what that machine was even for. It had to have had a more sinister purpose. As Lexi slowly regained her composure, it didn't take too much longer for her to see Roxie charging at her.

"So Shrinks, here to score your ride back, I see" Roxie said, sauntering up to the weakened Lexi with her usual brash attitude, attempting to greet her with a direct punch to the face. Lexi lunged backwards quickly, almost losing her balance again before sticking the landing and remaining upright on her feet.

"Roxie..." Lexi sighed, sounding just as exhausted as her foe, "what the hell are you doing here?"

"Oh ... yknow... thought I'd take the tour..." Roxie quipped sarcastically, now sounding more like her old self as she paced around ShrinkGirl and her tiny purple vehicle on the ground below them. "Maybe hit the gift shop, get some fucking COTTON CANDY!! For fucks sakes why do you THINK I'm here?"

Lexi raised an eyebrow, suddenly putting it together

"Holy shit..." Lexi said, an incredulous smile crossing her face, "You actually DO care..."

As she said that, some thudding could be heard as the increasing volume of metallic legs and claws drew closer. It would appear Enormo had some defenses ready after all, in the form of Max's growing robotic army, but they were slow to arrive, sounding as though taking their time as the ominous noise continued to approach but at a slower pace.

"I don't now what you're talking about..." Roxie replied indignantly, "Can't a girl just raid a science lab without...?"

"You came to save her ..." Lexi said, catching Roxie off guard, "You came to save Rache -- Sugar Rush..."

"I came to go punch that lunatic Mad Max in the face!" Roxie huffed. Lexi actually shrugged a bit in agreement.

"At least that's something we can see eye to eye on..." Lexi said

"Yeah well ..." Roxie sighed, crossing her arms as the sounds of robots approaching grew louder by the moment. "...maybe I WAS trying to save Rush, but that's only because little miss Blue Hair couldn't get the job done ... if she's even still alive right now"

"Little Miss..." Lexi stuttered before the image of Aeris and her ice cold stare returned to her, "...Aeris? From Cybertek?"

"Of course YOU know her ..." Roxie said rolling her eyes, "and thanks to you, she's probably dead or at the very least comatose"

"The hell are you talking about?" Lexi asked

"Do you not watch the news? Geez c'mon, even I stay educated somewhat" Roxie shrugged as a sngle Maximite crossed into the entryway. Roxie blasted it swiftly with a quickly drawn blue tinted pistol, watching as it burst into a puddle of liquid metal, "not now, scumball, we're talking here..."

Lexi watched curiously as the robot was slowly reforming behind Roxie's back but she was also more invested in whatever Roxie had to say about the whereabouts of Aeris, the callous Cybertek agent who had run off with Trevor's files and almost permanently fucked up Lexi's powers in the process.

"What ... happened to her?" Lexi asked

"Fuck if I know..." Roxie sputtered, shooting the robot again and again as it kept trying to reform. This tactic would only work so long as progressively bigger robots started to make their assault on the mechanical room. "Her car was found mangled off the highway ... but the police found no body ... she either got away or ..."

"Or what?" Lexi asked

"Well the fuck do you care anyway?" Roxie asked, jumping over the ferocious houndlike machine as it attempted a chomp of her lower ankle. She'd perform an impressive acrobatic flip before shooting another bullet into the back of its head, only momentarily disabling it.

"What is that suppose to mean?" Lexi sneered as she blocked a laser from an incoming MaxiMech, Max's newer model of machine that acted more like a traditional ballistics robot.

Comprised mainly of solid metal, rather than liquid, these sentry bots were bulky and slow but effective with their fast rate of fire, lasers and even homing missiles. Lexi had dealt with an even larger model on her birthday during a battle at the beach but these smaller sentry bots seemed to becoming more common. One thing had become clear. Mad Max was definitely expanding his army.

"All I'm saying..." Roxie said, jumping over the smaller Maximite again as it futilely lunged at her. She'd use the momentary leverage as she smushed its head with her and, firing a few more shots into the chest of the sentry bot to cause it to sputter, "...is everybody around you seems to suffer some destructive fate"

"What?" Lexi snapped, wrestling a Maximite off of her as the fight and discussion continued, "that's not true"

"Really?" Roxie said, dropping her eyebrows dramatically, unfazed by the approach of more robots who seemed to almost wait their turn to crowd into the entrance. "What about ... Rachel? Officer Charlie ... hell, MOST of the Mini Troop ..."

"Officer ... Charlie?" Lexi asked

"The officer who lost his life the night after the bombing on Mini U campus" Roxie tsked, now pulling both guns and firing them in either direction as the smaller robots were beginning to encircle the two ladies.

"That was YOUR fucking bombing!" Lexi snapped, shrinking briefly and catching the electrical lasso of a Maximite before using it to throw the heavy creature into some air-ducts, "and YOU killed the officer!"

"But I wouldn't have HAD to if you didn't interfere..." Roxie tsked, "the point is, little Ms Cheerypants ... anybody whos involved in your life somehow gets hurt or dead or shrunk or .... all of the above! You're a liability..."

"Says the one who kills and steals for a living..." Lexi sneered, finally doing what she should've done the whole time and shrinking herself again, jumping into the Shrinkmobile and trying desperately to start the damaged vehicle. She let out a great sigh of relief as the mini car whirred to life, even as the engine sounded a bit rough.

"All I'm saying is ..." Roxie started, before noticing Lexi had dropped out of view, "Oh for fucks sake ... yeah ditch me like you ditch everyone ..."

Roxie jumped out of the way as ShrinkGirl's car suddenly took on the size of an actual car, growing back in a flash as she drove over some of the charging Maximites, shrinking the car to slip between the legs of the imposing mech, causing Roxie to give chase.

Lexi looked dejectedly at her rearview mirror, seeing only Roxie's ankles and black boots as they thudded behind her, causing large tremors on the already rough stretch of metal that the ShrinkMobile drove on.

"...she's totally tailgating me right now..." Lexi sighed, trying to floor it but she had very little time as a pair of slender giantess fingers found their way onto either side of the purple car, threatening to crash the already fragile frame with her grip. "Roxieeeee...! What the fuck are you doing?"

"Do you know how fast you were going, Ms Shrink?" Roxie chuckled as the mayhem continued to develop behind her while she held Lexi and her little toy sized car in her malicious fingertips, "Heh, I've always wanted to say that"

"Roxie, stop fucking around!" Lexi squeaked, "you're going to get us both killed...!"

"You'd like that wouldn't you?" Roxie sneered, her interested blue eye simply dwelling on the tiny driver.

"Oh yes... I'd love it ..." Lexi sighed, "now put me down and ..."

"On one condition" Roxie said, matter of factly, blasting another Maximite with her drawn pistol with her other hand. The more impressive thing about her shot is that she didn't even look as she hit the robot. "You grow the car back and get me a lift out of here!"

"The fuck? No way ...!" Lexi squeaked defiantly "You got yourself into this mess -- now get yourself out! Besides don't you have a motorcycle or something?"

"That's ... the purple vixen ..." Roxie sighed, shaking a Maximite off her leg in annoyance, "and yes ... but hey ... wheels and wheels and if I'm not leaving here in one piece, neither are you ... now whattaya say Shrink?"

Before Lexi could respond further she'd hear the crunching of metal as Roxie continued to squeeze.

"Okay okay fine!!" Lexi squeaked, annoyed, "put the car down and you can come with ..."

"I call SHOTGUN!" Roxie taunted, putting ShrinkGirls car down on the ground as she fired a pistol shot behind herself and between the legs, snapping off the arms of a couple encroaching sentry drones.

Meanwhile, while Max was satisfied with how his plan was going, he was perplexed at the appearance of the biker looking girl with the messy blonde hair and the twin pistols. He had familiarized himself with her and knew of her methods all too well. After all, he HAD hired her, indirectly to steal a certain cookie recipe. Still, she was proving to be more trouble than she was worth to the callous Doctor.

"Deploy more Maximites to Sector A234!" Max announced over a loud speaker so that Roxie and Lexi could hear as Lexi grew her car back, the vehicle barely fitting in the wide corridor as Roxie squeezed in the passenger seat.

"Geez, now look what you did..." Roxie shrugged, "You got his attention"

"Yeah, clearly this is MY doing..." Lexi sighed, adjusting her mirrors a bit as Roxie looked back with a bit of panic.

"Shrink what the fuck are you waiting for? Floor it!" Roxie groaned

"Uh... I'm waiting for YOU..." Lexi sighed, glancing over at her begrudging passenger. "Seat belt?"

"Oh for fucks sake..." Roxie sighed, strapping in, "there, you happy?"

"Not really..." Lexi sighed, finally hitting the gas on the Shrinkmobile and making a beeline for an exit, but where to find one?

"You got any snacks in here?" a restless Roxie asked, poking through the glove compartment. Lexi looked over annoyed but also was concerned to see the glove compartment was completely empty. That wasn't a good sign but she didn't have time to dwell on it. "Anyways ... take a left coming up..."

Lexi raised an eyebrow but did as she said, only to be greeted by the sight of a larger MaxiMech as it turned, a single glowing red camera staring down at the larger than life target.

"Hold on..." Lexi groaned, her hand firmly planted on the car's "SHRINK" shift

"For what?" Roxie asked, not sure what to expect but she'd soon find out as Lexi shifted "down" shrinking the car under the robot and therefore giving her more room to navigate, "Not a bad trick ... if not a bit predictable ..."

"You're one to talk" Lexi shrugged, "now where to next?"

"2 more hallways on the right ... there should be a car port we can get through..." Roxie said, kicking the seat of the car back inconsiderately so she was practically reclining into the backseat.

"Okay..." Lexi said, again, glancing over at Roxie annoyed, "could you NOT do that?"

"Geez, you always such a stick in the mud?" Roxie sighed, returning the seat to its usual position, "Oh wait, I already know the answer..."

"Can you just ...?"

"EYES ON THE ROAD!" Roxie yelped, as a Maximite stood in their path.

Usually no bigger than a duck or dog, the robot appeared to be a Godzilla like creature in the cars current state. Lexi acted fast and swerved between its legs before continuing to drive, enlarging the car slowly as she saw more room to fit.

"How do you know this place so well anyway?" Lexi asked

"I do my homework..." Roxie shrugged, "unlike you"

"Hey, I have a guy ..." Lexi replied

"Oh your little science geek friend?" Roxie chuckled, peering back once in a while to see if the coast was clear, "yeah silly me ... you clearly have it ALL under control..."

"Could you just not...?" Lexi snapped, before realizing her chance to escape was slowly slipping away watching as a garage door just ahead of her was slowly closing. While smashing through it could be an option, she really didn't want to risk further damaging her ShrinkMobile. Instead she took Roxie's earlier advice and "floored it" in order to slip under the garage door just in the nick of time as a tardy gathering of Max's robots all arrived at the scene too late.

"Damn it!!" Max shrieked, slamming his fists down on the console, only to attract the attention of his colleague and current assistant, Dr. Giovanni Guillardo as he slowly approached the open lab.

Try as he might, the Doctor, best known for studying interdimensional sciences couldn't help but notice the focus on most of the monitors. One had schematics for ShrinkGirls captured car. Another one had a magnified image of ShrinkGirl's belt with various features highlighted. In fact most of the monitors subtly told the tale of a madman obsessed with a singular objective, the most concerning of all were the schematics of Giovanni's own portal inducer but appearing bigger and bigger each time, as if iterations of the same prototype.

"What is wrong, Max?" Giovanni asked confused.

"Hmmmm..." Dr. Max thought to himself, trying to best frame the recent occurence, "Tell me something, Doctor..."

With that, Dr. Max pressed a button on his console which replayed the past few minutes of security footage from the point that Roxie and Lexi had broke out of the lab by driving a car through some of his mech and out an unauthorized exit to the loading dock.

"Does THIS look like a superhero behavior to you?" Max asked, "breaking and entering? Destroying property?"

"Well ... you DID send those robots after her..." Giovanni said, a bit worried that he may have provoked the already angry scientist.

Surprisingly Dr. Maximillian E Mumford was strangely calm in his response.

"Did you happen to notice who was IN the car with her??" Max asked, zooming in the security footage to show Roxie clowning around in the passenger seat. "Surely you know HER..."

Giovanni let out an audible gulp. He knew Roxie Wright all too well from his time with the Chaos Crew -- a phase of his life he greatly regretted which is why he now felt a tinge of guilt for perhaps unfairly judging Dr. Maximillian who was, in many ways, just doing what he had to do.

"Lexi... ShrinkGirl... is ... friends with ...?"

"I don't know if they're FRIENDS..." Dr. Max said with a slight chuckle, "but clearly they are ... accomplices ... birds of a feather they say ... just some food for thought is all"

Dr. Giovanni frowned at this strange revelation. Although maybe it wasn't true at all ... maybe the two didn't get along and it was just a coincidence. He found it hard to believe those two could be pals in any way.

________________________

"Fuck yeah!!" Roxie chuckled, offering her open palm for Lexi to high five as the two were clear of the factory now, "awww cmon, don't leave me hanging, Shrinks"

Lexi reluctantly high fived her foe and continued to drive.

"...okay I guess that WAS kinda cool..." Lexi sighed "...although we didn't find Rachel..."

"Maybe she fell between the seats..." Roxie joked, "did you check?"

"Not funny..." Lexi frowned, keeping her eyes sternly on the road as she drove at a more normal pace, going about 40 MPH as the duo approached the highway.

"Well anyways ... thanks for the ride, I guess" Roxie said, cocking one of her guns as if things were just business as usual. "You can just drop me off here if you'd like"

"Here?" Lexi asked, "We're in moving traffic..."

"I said what I said..." Roxie shrugged, already unlocking the door.

"You really are fucking insane, you know that?" Lexi muttered

"Awww Shrink you say the nicest things sometimes..." Roxie smirked, "Now seriously, get ready to close the door because ..."

"You are not serious..." Lexi groaned, glancing over to see her cocky rival was all too serious, aready cracking the door open only to jump out of the moving car with a gleeful shout. Lexi rushed to close the door and continued driving on her way after just swerving a little bit while Roxie lay on the pavement laughing maniacally before rolling onto her side and getting back up.

"...I need some new friends" Lexi sighed

"PLAY BALL!!" a loud boisturous voice cried out while a massive crowd of people all cheered, waving their arms up and down in their white and purple jerseys.

A camera panned around the crowd and cut between high energy shots of fans celebrating, players striking a large softball and great diving catches as a deep voiced sports announcer took his cue (and his job) very seriously.

"COME OUT AND SEE YOUR MINITROPOLIS MINIONS THIS FRIDAY THROUGH SUNDAY FOR THEIR LAST SERIES OF THE REGULAR SEASON! THEY'LL BE TAKING ON THE TEXAS TUMBLEWEEDS, WHICH WILL MARK THE RETURN OF MINITROPOLIS NATIVE, MOLLY ANDERSON, NEW STAR SHORTSTOP FOR THE TEXAS SQUAD! IS THAT NOT ENOUGH FOR YOU? OUR VERY OWN SHRINKGIRL WILL BE THROWING OUT THE FIRST PITCH THIS FRIDAY EVENING!! SO DON'T MISS A SECOND OF THE MINIONS ACTION!! LIVE AT THE MINI DOME!!"

Watching the advertisement from a couch were Leah and Lexi, both somewhat interested in the ad but for different reasons.

"Ugh, those jerseys are hideous..." Leah scoffed, "look at them, they don't fit any of the players right..."

Lexi giggled a bit before tilting her head, making an observation of her own.

"You know what I never got about baseball or softball?" Lexi asked

"...No cheerleaders?"

"No cheerleaders!" Lexi reiterated, "like seriously, every sport gets cheerleaders except baseball!"

"Not hockey" Lexi's dad said, entering the room to join in on the conversation as he casually strolled through the living room to get his phone.

"How exciting is it...?" Lexi's mom said, coming into the room with a bright grin, "that our daughter is throwing out the FIRST PITCH at the game.. are you excited Lex?"

"It's ... exciting..." Lexi replied shyly, "I just hope I don't chuck it into the stands or something..."

"Lexi's more excited about the return of MOLLY anyway ..." Leah said in a bit of a teasing tone as she flipped around on the couch to be looking up at the ceiling, her body draped over the sofa awkwardly.

"M-Maybe a little..." Lexi said with an even shier grin, "I mean her and I were friends like 12 ...13 years ago ... I doubt she even REMEMBERS me..."

"I don't know ..." Lexi's mom commented, "you two were pretty inseperable that one summer"

Leah frowned a bit but listened all the same.

"Well, Leah knew her too ... we were all friends back in elementary school" Lexi said, quick to steer the discussion, "in fact we all had third period gym class together..."

"Yeah..." Leah groaned, "then she stole my boyfriend..."

"Kevin Patterson was not your boyfriend, Leah ..." Lexi sighed, "he was some guy you had a crush on..."

"Who took one look at perky pants and her sporty little ... sportsmanship and ... yeah..." Leah mumbled, not really sure where she was going with that.

Lexi frowned

"We could've been friends ... I mean all of us, if she had stuck around longer..." Lexi nodded

"Whatever did happen with you girls?" Lexi's mom asked

"She transferred to another school after 6th grade..." Lexi said, "then her family moved down south ... she got a scholarship to play college ball and ... made her way to the softball circuit ... she's suppose to be really good..."

Leah gave Lexi a bit of an eye roll.

"Not that I've... kept in touch" Lexi chuckled nervously.

"Uh-huh....sure..." Leah sighed, seemingly tired of the conversation already.

Lexi pouted a bit, offering Leah the complimentary and patented Lexi smile after some time had passed.

"C'mon Lee... what's the matter?" Lexi asked

"Sorry Lex ..." Leah sighed, "just... a lot of stress ... school starting up again ... and Sally's got me running things for the fashion show..."

"Fashion show?" Lexi's mom asked, listening in a bit more

"Oh my god mom, it's so awesome!!" Lexi exclaimed, causing her best friend to break out into a flustered blush

"It's ... nothing..." Leah said, trying to downplay it.

"It's not nothing!" Lexi grinned, "Leah's been KILLING it over at Sally's Boutique ... and they're going to be showing off some of their new fashions at the upcoming Mini Fashion Show this week and Leah is one of the consultants!"

"Leah, that's fantastic!" Lexi's mom beamed with pride, "why didn't you mention this sooner?"

"It's ... not a huge deal, Mrs. C...." Leah chuckled nervously, "I mean ... there's only like 3 employees at the boutique anyway and ..."

"Yeah but she picked YOU1" Lexi said, "I get you're nervous but c'mon, nobody knows fashion like you, and it's not like you're the one walking the runway, you're just picking out some of the outfits ..."

"Regardless..." Leah said with a huff, "You're going to be there, right?"

"Of course I'm going to be there!" Lexi scoffed, "I wanna see what my girls working with! I wouldn't miss it for ... that's Wednesday, right?"

"Wednesday around 8, yeah..." Leah said

"Yeah, I'll be there" Lexi said

"...you paused" Leah said with a hint of worry in her voice

"Well ... I just have a shift at the Shack that afternoon but I should be able to make it ... no... I WILL make it, you know I will!" Lexi said with a friendly nod.

"Okay ... and you know it's not at the shop, right?" Leah reminded, "it's at the Minitropolis Auditorium across from..."

"Across from the medical center..." Lexi nodded, "...I know"

"Okay, just wanted to make sure you didn't get confused like the time I invited you to the comedy show to support the Jordanville Fire Department" Leah scoffed

"Well how was I suppose to know it wasn't AT the fire department?" Lexi said rolling her eyes, "...those firemen could've been a bit nicer about redirecting me..."

Leah just shook her head in wonderment, always curious how Lexi could be both so reliable and yet so scatterbrained at the same time. But it was one of the quirks Leah strangely admired about Lexi, her ability to balance everything despite her chronic ADHD and poor sense of directions.

"Speaking of getting places..." Leah continued, "I know you have your car back and all but is it ...?"

"Drivable?" Lexi cut in, "...for the most part ... I've actually got Josh buffing out some of the scratches and running diagnostics as we speak..."

"Geez, how did you get your own master mechanic?" Leah teased, "and on a car that nobody's ever heard of before ... think you could get him to check out the weird noise my Toyota's been making? It's only when I go over 30..."

"Hey, he's not just a mechanic for hire ..." Lexi scoffed, before being swayed by Leah's sad pathetic and needy face at that moment, "...I'll see what he can do"

"Please and thank you!" Leah giggled, as Lexi could be seen responding to a sudden phone call that popped up. Naturally, it was Josh.

"Yeah, Josh?" Lexi asked

"Okay, car seems to be running fine..." Josh commented, running it in an open garage to test out the engine. He also had most of the scratches buffed out, "I've just gotta replace the head light ... you'd be surprised how hard it is to find a perfect match for this thing..."

"Hey, whatever you can get will be fine" Lexi said, "I really can't thank you enough for all of this ... send me the bill when you're done, okay?"

"Eh, just take me for a joyride and we'll call it even" Josh chuckled, peeking into the inside of the car, "I DID notice something curious though, concerning the glove compartment"

"Right?" Lexi said, suddenly changing the topic, "It's like I told you before, those Quartz crystals are gone..."

"Yeah ..." Josh said, a bit perplexed himself as he flipped open the glove compartment for what felt like the 6th time, half expecting them to be there this time. They WERE magical crystals after all. Nothing would surprise him at this point. "You don't think...?"

"That's what I'm afraid of ..." Lexi said with a shudder, drawing Leah's concerned reaction behind her. "Anyway ... thanks again ... I'll talk to you soon, hon"

With that, the phone call was concluded. Lexi looked back and saw Leah looking both concerned and a little smug.

"What? ... What?" Lexi asked

"You realize you just called him 'hon' " Leah smirked

"I call everyone hon" Lexi said, "I call YOU hon"

"You call GIRLS hon" Leah giggled, "you generally don't call GUYS hon unless..."

"Moving on ..." Lexi sighed, "We were talking about the Quartz crystals that had been in my glove compartment"

"Oh right ..." Leah said, only half understanding "Those magic crystals you got from your adventure to the other dimension ... damn your life sounds so much more exciting than mine sometimes"

"Trust me, it's not everything you'd want it to be ..." Lexi groaned, "Anyway ... those crystals are super powerful ... and they're missing ... the only one who's had access to my car lately besides me is ... well ... Mad Max..."

"Huh. And you're worried he ... took them..." Leah stuttered, "well wait, wouldn't they be like super tiny if they were in the car while it was shrunk?"

"You would think so!" Lexi exclaimed, "but who knows with that maniac? He had my car for like 2 weeks... I'm honestly surprised he didn't melt it into scrap ... I'm even more surprised he didn't capture me when he had the chance"

"What do you mean?" Leah asked

"He had me ... like dead to rights..." Lexi sighed, "he caught me in this weird holding chamber but then ... he let me go ... there were some robots that chased us but ..."

"Us?" Leah asked with a raised eyebrow, "who else was with you?"

"Oh yeah ... heh..." Lexi sighed, "Roxie ended up crashing the party..."

"Roxie was there too?" Leah said, enthralled in the story as if listening to a thrilling new novella on tape, "I swear you have some of the most badass adventures"

"I'd rather be just ... not having them" Lexi shrugged, "but yeah ... I got out of the lab FAIRLY easily and other than a few scratches on the ShrinkMobile, I seem to be back in business ... for now anyway..."

"You sure that's the best idea, given what happened recently?" Leah asked, still worried about her best friends well being given her recent power surge and the difficulty ahe had been having with her size powers.

"Well... I've been 'okay' lately..." Lexi sighed, "I'm not going to go all out ShrinkGirl mode but ... I should be alright .. I'm seeing Trevor again shortly, he's finally returning to Aztek after his retreat ... we're going to run some tests and see how I'm doing officially..."

"I suppose until then, you got your 'honey' Josh to check in on you and hey maybe he can track down those crystals too" Leah teased

"Omigosh, just ... stop" Lexi chuckled, "and besides, I was just ... I've been ... under a lot of stress lately, that's all ... I doubt he even noticed that I called him that"

"...did she just call me hon?" Josh wondered, back in his own garage.

_____________


In the deep twilight of Fenster Forest floated two siblings by the names of Spark and Mark.

It was just your usual walk through the woods between brother and sister, save for the fact that these siblings were both fairies with cute fluttery wings who stood at about 3 inches tall -- about the norm for the hidden Fairy Colony of Fensteria. Most fairies preferred to stay in the secure tranquility of the colony which remained cloaked from the view of potential human antagonists, but Spark wasn't like most.

Spark was a bold and brash young woman with crimson hair that matched her usual mode of dress, which she employed that night, wearing a fashionable red top with slight cutouts around the shoulders as she floated alongside her brother Mark who ... for the most part never quite fit in with the traditions and dispositions of Fensterian life.

While most of Fensterian's denizens lived a positive and upbeat life of sorts, Mark was usually the skeptic, the paranoid one and for that he would be mocked and thought of oddly by his fairy colleagues. Even though his sisters Spark and Lark loved him in his own way, they also thought he needed to tone it down a bit when it came to the doom and gloom. Still, he HAD successfully predicted the invasion of a witch a while back and try as they might, there was a new crisis brewing that Mark's paranoia may just have been right about.

"See? You feel it too, don't you?" Mark said, trying to draw some kind of admission out of his spry older sister as she floated just a bit ahead of Mark along the soft but slightly damp grass which glistened with midnight mist. Spark could only exhale, slowing down for a moment to acknowledge her frightened brothers concerns.

"Okay ... so ... yes ..." Spark said, trying not to peer at what was so obvious as she watched another bright flash of light streak across the night sky.

Most would easily mistake it for lightning, but the fairy siblings knew better -- especially in light of recent happenings.

It had started about a month ago when an interdimensional disturbance rocked the fairy colony. Despite some quick spin from their leaders, some were beginning to grow suspicious about the walls between dimensions falling. If that were to happen, it would spell true disaster.

Some Fensterians were uniquely gifted with the ability to sense such a disturbance. In her past, for example, Spark herself was able to detect a rift between dimensions around the time local superheroine ShrinkGirl went missing into a portal that was later determined to lead to Quartzaria -- a warlike kingdom from ancient times that was once thought to be a myth. While she tried not to let it show, the fact that the dimension was real opened the door to the other realms existing as well and this frightened the usually unshakable Spark.

Mark on the other hand, was all too shakable, trembling a bit in his black and gold garb which resembled that of a toga, with an opening for his wings.

"Look ..." Spark said with a long sullen pause, "even IF what we think is happening ... is happening ... what can we do about it?"

Mark let out a long exhale and just peered down at the ground. He knew his sister was right. It would take all the power of Fensteria to even attempt to seal a dimensional rift and it seemed like the threat was growing stronger by the day. Sometimes it would only be for a moment but other times, portals clear as the lake water would open up and reveal themselves for several moments at a time, long enough to gaze into the worlds on the other side. But who would be crazy enough to expose such danger?

"I suppose you're right ... I just ..." Mark stuttered, before pushing his sister out of the way of what appeared to be a sizzling comet heading their way at a dangerously fast velocity.

"Mark?!" Spark exclaimed, "what are you --?!"

Spark gasped, laying beneath her brother and glancing nervously over at the projectile that had just missed pummeling them both into the dirt. Now grateful, Spark nodded as Mark let her up and the two went to investigate carefully.

In the ground now sat a large growing crystal, its light pulsating so brightly neither of the two could get close enough to have a thorough look, but in their hearts they both knew what they were looking at. The large cylindrical gem was about the length of their very bodies and it gave off so much power that both of them could feel a repellant force upon getting too close.

"Is that a ...?" Spark gulped nervously

"Looks like it to me ..." Mark sighed, before shaking his head in dismay.

"Now what's wrong?" Spark asked

"...I hate being right."

________________

The first week of activities on Miniborough University's campus brought with it a large crowd of students to sample the surprisingly tasty cookies of the new Kekse cafe and bakery which had opened on campus over the summer. The trendy eatery, adorned with a "Starbucks-like" dark green and white facade played host to a batch of cookies that tasted suspiciously like those of the former campus cafe known as the Krazy Kookie -- which also served as Lexi's former place of employment.

The new cookie place served as the current place of employment for Justin Wright but he was far from content there. Between the lousy pay, understaffing issues and many strange occurences in the past few weeks, Justin was beginning to regret accepting a job at the place, even if he did need the extra income. Sometimes he considered just up and leaving.

As if reading his mind, a bulky gentleman with a military style buzzcut wearing a dark green shirt that had a ripped off sleeve slunk into the shop.

"Hello..." Justin said, a bit more confused than usual, "may I help you sir?"

"Are you Justin Wright?" the man asked, wasting little time before slipping behind the counter.

"Um yes ... I am ... um... I'm sorry, sir you can't be ..." Justin stuttered. Of course he was on his own again, he very rarely ever saw his boss or even his coworkers as of late.

"I'm here to relieve you of your duties, effective immediately" the man said in a stern tone. Justin raised an eyebrow.

"I'm sorry?" Justin asked, as his bewilderment would only further fuel the anger of the intimidating young man.

"You're being let go. Vamoose..." the man said dismissively, giving Justin a wave of his hand, gesturing for him to step aside as the sudden new hire took his place with assisting customers.

Justin would normally be more adamant about standing his ground but he had already decided the job wasn't worth the hassle. Still, none of this added up.

No sooner was Justin out the door of the restaurant, he glanced back to see the man not focusing so much on customers as he was pulling out a rolled up piece of paper and stretching it across the counter, only half paying attention to the growing crowd at the counter.

"...so this is our busiest week yet and they're letting MORE people go?" Justin thought to himself, also noting the young man who replaced him looked very little like somebody who would want to be working customer service. He almost appeared more like an engineer type, with a strong military background. But what would Justin do? Even if he told anybody about the weird drone pieces he had seen one fateful night or what just happened, nobody would think anything of it ... not even ...

"Leah!" Justin stammered, not meaning to be so loud but it just so happened that he crossed paths with his ex-girlfriend as she was intertwined in the crowd of students making their way to class.

"Oh uh... hi..." Leah sighed, noticably uncomfortable but moreso because she was trying to keep all of her thoughts straight.

"Hey ... Leah ..." Justin sighed, seemingly more nervous than anything, "I know this is going to sound kind of ... strange but ... could you tell your friend Lexi to maybe ... keep an eye on the cookie place?"

Leah gave Justin a confused look as she kept walking, books cradled to her person.

"I know ... totally weird..." Justin sputtered, "it's just that ..."

"Look." Leah sighed, seeming a bit fed up now, "I'm not mad. I'm just stressed ... and I've got a lot on my plate right now ... I've got this big fashion show thing coming up ..."

"Oh the thing for Sally's?" Justin asked, "my friend Britney is one of the models"

"Oh no kidding?" Leah asked with a slight smile, "she's really pretty ... I mean ... ugh, look ... it's not a good time ... why don't you ... talk to Lexi yourself?"

"She's uh ... not my biggest fan..." Justin sighed

"Can you blame her?" Leah said with an eye roll as she kept walking

"Ugh okay ... I deserved that ... I just ..." Justin stuttered again, but eventually realized that he was fighting a losing battle as he watched Leah fade into the crowd without so much as a goodbye.

Maybe it was all just in his head but something didn't feel right ...

fix·a·tion
/fikˈsāSHən/
noun

definition: an obsessive interest in or feeling about someone or something

Currently the hyperfocused and always hard to talk to middle aged scientist known as Dr. Maximillian E Mumford had something of a fixation. It had only grown since he had first planted the seeds in his own mind of such things as interdimensional travel and the implications it could have. Inspired by once colleague Dr. Giovanni Guillardo from his earlier days, Dr. Max never gave up on potentially finding out more about the universe, what's really going on beneath the surface and how there simply had to be more than what appeared in "reality"

It had seemed his work, whether in transformative nanites or size manipulation had always received similar criticism to that of his long thought to be deceased fellow scientist Dr. Giovanni. Max was often times mocked -- openly or covertly -- for his weird obsessions that often yielded no results outside of a massive bill for the company and little to show for it. Outside of the Enormite -- a trinket with minor transformative properties, Enormo Enterprises made most of its money on more traditional ballistics and military applications -- building finely functioning drones and things of the like.

That's what the public would mostly believe.

Conspiracy theorists had always suspected the worst from the shady monolith -- wondering what kind of "secret projects" were being worked on behind closed doors. Surely Max, despite his often times callous and one tracked mind had something more up his sleeve, some would proport. Usually these conspiracy theorists would be subject to the same kind of mockery that Max had received. But sometimes ... the conspiracies had merit. For indeed, the past year had seen more progress on the front of "experimental technology" than any year before it.

It started with "Project Delta" -- although this was not the first of its kind. It was to be a size manipulation procedure that -- if successful could produce super soldiers with size changing abilities. In addition to mere size changing though, the subjects exposed to such tech would also attain a strength boost making them more durable and useful than any kind of soldier ever seen. Such a sustainable success would not only put Enormo on the map internationally but it would finally give the much maligned Dr. Max the credit he thought himself to so rightfully deserve.

Project Delta didn't turn out quite as planned though. There were certain elements to the project that were never employed or perfected -- mainly because the project was inadvertedly set into motion well before it was suppose to. A certain troublemaker by the name of Alexis Cole -- somebody who had NO business activating such equipment exposed herself (and in some ways the company itself) to the experimental technology and the fact that she gained ANY benefit from it was a miracle unto itself. That she had survived without any long term health defects (to this point) was also impressive. But one person wasn't quite so impressed.

Dr. Maximillian E Mumford.

Of course his technology worked -- it HAD to work. He designed it. Dr. Max never made miscalculations. He was in fact, infallible, if only in his own deranged and fixated mind.

"Dr. Max!" a shrill voice announced, obstructing the Doctors view on the video screen on which he had so studiously been working. "You've made a grave miscalcuation here and it is my responsibiliy as Queen of Fensteria to not only let you know about it but ..."

"Could you please ... lower the volume?" Max scoffed, seeming more annoyed with the fairy queen's presence at all than any message she may have had concerning "mistakes" on his part. After all, the mad doctor simply didn't MAKE mistakes. Perhaps one that he could admit was not having already put in headphones to keep the audio private, something he was hasteful to rectify as he fastened a pair of ear tight headphones to continue his correspondence with the mysterious woman who appeared in a small video window on his already overcrowded monitor. "We do not need the whole building hearing you"

"...yes and I don't need my entire colony flocking to me in a PANIC!" the woman on the other end said -- going under the name of Esmerelda. The stern blonde haired fairy was the notable leader of the Fairy Colony known as Fensteria. "Yet your portal machine has been causing just that!"

"Surely you do not think I am doing this on purpose!" Dr. Max said, an innocent if not insincere sneer on his face

"I dont care HOW you're doing it" Esmeralda said sternly, "it needs to stop ... I allowed you to build that facility along the borders of the human forest in exchange for protection and so far not only have we been in more danger than almost any point in our history, you are now on the verge of potentially starting a civil war ..."

"Civil War..." Dr. Max repeated, a hint of laughter in his voice, "My dear ... fairy queen"

"Please never call me that." Esmerelda was quick to retort, "Queen Esmerelda, please."

"Yeah ... I just ... don't see myself doing that" Dr. Max quipped matter of factly, "The fact is this is no DISNEY movie ... so you go ahead and be Queen Emerald of the magic candy kingdom..."

"That is not at all what I said ..." an increasingly annoyed Esmerelda said, leaning closer to the monitor.

It was worth noting that in Esmerelda's realm, she wasn't speaking into a computer monitor at all but rather a small magical cauldron through which she could see her correspondents visage. Her appearance was merely translated onto a computer screen for Max to see -- almost like some kind of Human to Fairy Skype communication.

Max was nearly ready to abandon the conversation before he realized a potential use for the fairy after all.

"Okay ... my apologies ... your ... magesty..." Max said, almost throwing up in his mouth from having to use such vocabulary on such a silly looking monarch. "Perhaps ... we can help each other out"

"You can help ME out right now ..." Esmerald said, "by ceasing your experimentation on other dimensions ... I've already warned you and I won't warn you again ... you're tampering with things you don't understand ... just recently we've been showered in ancient crystals from a distant world..."

"Crystals, you say?" Max smirked, only trying to confirm his suspicions. It was then he realized that this self proclaimed "Queen of the Fairies" COULD be of help after all. "What ... kind of crystals?"

"That ... is unimportant..." Esmeralda pouted, playing things close to the vest.

"All due respect here ... Esmerelda..." Max said, "..you have as much at stake in this as I do ... or perhaps I should have my drones make an announcement that the Queen of the Fairies is working with a conniving human..."

"You wouldn't ..." Esmerelda said, "...besides, they'd never hear you ... the colony is cloaked and you know that ... it's off the sights of your drones which means its also shielded from any outside noise"

"Ah but I've gotten through that before..." Max shrugged with a sense of arrogance

"That's because I ALLOWED you to..." Esmeralda reminded, "and you abused your powers then..."

"Abused is such a harsh word..." Max lamented, "had it not been for that ShrinkGirl and her cohorts, my drones could've operated peacefully and nothing would've come of it..."

"I ... don't completely disagree..." Esmerelda sighed, "That ... human showing up here led to some trouble outside of just the drone attack"

"See? She even pesters OTHER cultures..." Max tsked, "but my experiments, among other things, seek to rid the world of ShrinkGirl ... that could be beneficial for both sides and on top of that ... I have ANOTHER proposal..."

"Why am I not surprised...?" Esmerelda sighed, growing tired of the conniving doctors constant spin.

"These crystals that have appeared in your realm? This is ... problematic, yes?" Max suggested

"It's being mitigated as we speak..." Esmeralda said, "but yes ... these crystals possess powers foreign to even us Fensterians .. er ... fairies ... it would be best to dispose of them or send them back to where they came from ..."

"May I propose a ... third option?" Max sneered. Esmerelda knew already where the Doctor's mind was at and became instantly filled with dread.

"No." she repled sternly. "No way."

"Can you REALLY afford to wait?" Max grinned, feeling his advantage over the disarrayed fairy kingdom growing, "I can discreetly remove the crystals and this whole thing can be behind us...?"

"And the portals?" Esmeralda asked

"I can't always predict where the portals will open ..." Max sighed, in a rare show of honesty, "but I assure you I'm not TRYING to open them anywhere that will cause suspicion ... you must believe me because such suspicion is not good for either party involved here..."

The conversation was about to proceed further before Dr. Max heard a familiar voice from behind, standing in his doorway. It was Dr. Joseph Wright.

"Ummm sir?" he asked, only able to vaguely make out the fairy woman and some of the other imagery on his cluttered computer screen, "what are you doing?"

"Oh! Uh... nothing!" Max said in a huff, quickly closing his conversation with the fairy queen, "I was simply dabbling in one of those uh ... roleplaying video games ... quite addictive I must say ... I can see why the kids love them so..."

"Well sir..." Joseph said, "...while it's nice to see you doing ... something else ... it's time for the fiscal meeting or did you forget again?"

"Of course I didn't forget" Max replied, "I just figured I'd avoid it ... you know ... like usual"

"It's your call, sir" Joseph said, "But this one ... wasn't on the schedule ... and it seems to directly involve you ... in fact the board has been called in ... including Edward..."

At this name, Dr. Max could almost feel his grizzly fingernails digging into the keyboard on which they sat. EDWARD ENORMOLOGATTI ... owner of Enormo Enerprises. What the fuck could that old geezer be doing around these parts again? He only showed up on very rare occasions. This caused the Doctors usually cold demeanor to shift as he got up.

"Oh ... Edward's coming..." Dr. Max said, faking some enthusiasm as he lifted from his chair, "why didn't you say so? Let us ... go to the fiscal meeting ..."

With that, the Doctor departed his desk, even as his mind was swimming with thoughts as he glanced back at the computer screen which had seperate tabs open -- one for investigating the properties of Quartzarian Power Gems, another with stats on ShrinkGirl's car and still another one with hidden schematics labeled PROJECT EPSILON.

_______________

Back at the Cole residence, things were a bit more relaxed for the time being. Lexi's father handed her an envelope as his bubbly daughter whisked her way on upstairs, no doubt focused on her school work and things to come as the new semester had just arrived. In fact she was so involved that she simply set the business looking correspondence on the edge of a desk before focusing on the more pressing matters.

"Heya Tiny! You little cutie!" Lexi cooed, leaning down to the level of her fluffy orange cat and snuggling him gently, ruffling his bristly fur with her fingertips. She'd giggle as the cat passed on by, loosely escaping her commanding hug and tickling her nose in the process with her long bushy tail. She shook her head and grinned watching him leave the room.

Lexi would then flop onto her bed, gazing up at the ceiling for just a moment or two before receiving a phone call. She didn't recognize the number which usually meant one thing.

"Hey Spark" Lexi said casually, knowing that fairy phone numbers didn't always show up on traditional caller ID.

While she was right, and could hear Spark's voice, it sounded extremely staticky as if something were jamming the signal.

"Spark, you there?" Lexi asked, a bit concerned to only hear clips of Spark's (and what sounded like Mark and Lark behind her) voice as it flickered in and out of coherence.

"Lexi!" Spark finally said, "Hey ... hope you're well"

"Oh you know ... just usual school stuff" Lexi shrugged

"I forgot you humans go to school in the fall ... we actually just wrapped up for the time being" Spark said, her voice stll hard to hear but the signal appeared to be momentarily stabilizing.

"Heh, so you go to school in the summer? That's gotta be weird" Lexi asked

"No weirder than being a fairy living in a pocket dimension at the edge of the woods" Spark smirked, "...anyway, we have a situation..."

"Oh? Is everything okay?" Lexi asked, leaning up with concerned concentration

"Well ... we're not sure..." Spark said

Spark's less "diplomatic" brother Mark could be heard sputtering in the background

"What do you mean we're not sure?" Mark said, audible to Lexi on the phone call, "we've got an interdimensional crisis on our hands ..."

"We don't KNOW that ..." Spark said, in response to her ever jumpy brother, "...anyway, ignore him"

"Not sure I can" Lexi said with a shy grin, "You need me to come by?"

"If you can..." Spark said, watching in her periphery as Lark and Mark bickered about 'choosing ones words more carefully', "I don't mean to disrupt you ..."

"No, it's cool" Lexi said, "I mean ... not cool that you're having problems but cool cuz ... yeah ... I'll be over in a bit ... hey, maybe I'll call Leah and see if she can come too"

"Ummm sure!" Spark said, again distracted by her siblings incessant fighting "I mean, it's not going to be like a fun girls outing or anything"

"Oh I know" Lexi replied, leaning the phone on her shoulder now, "but Leah likes to visit the colony from time to time ... she'll also never admit it, but she kinda likes when I shrink her"

"Is that like a ... friendship type of thing?" Spark asked, unfamiliar with such a human custom.

"It's a ... Leah type of thing" Lexi chuckled, "anyways, I'll be by as soon as I can ..."

"Sounds good" Spark said, and just as the phone was hanging up, Lexi could hear Spark scold her siblings, "can you guys keep it together for ONE --?!"

"Fairies ... supervillains ... term papers..." Lexi sighed, "I sure am living the dream..."

With that, Lexi would turn her focus to calling Leah, waiting a few rings before the pleasant voice of her best friend came through on the phone.

"Hey Lex, um... what's up?" Leah asked, sounding a bit preoccupied as faint noises could be heard from around her

"Was heading down to the forest to visit the fairy siblings" Lexi said, as though she were proposing a hangout at the mall or something, "did you wanna come?"

"Oh Lex, I'd love to normally but I'm actually on my way to the auditorium for rehearsal..." Leah said, juggling some books as she walked towards her car, currently in between the end of class and her extra curricular activity of being fashion consultant for Sally's Boutique. She could already sense the disappointment in Lexi's body language. "But we'll hang out soon, I promise"

"Yeah ... yeah no problem Lee" Lexi said, still sounding a bit deflated, "I mean, I think it's awesome you got this fashion thing, I just ... we don't really see each other too much these days ... really since after my birthday..."

"I know ..." Leah sighed, "but the school year just started, I've been working a lot ... you have been too and ... I'm sure things will calm down soon ... not gonna lie, I wish you had gotten that dorm on campus ... then we could've at least seen each other between classes more often"

"Or had that shrunken slumber party..." Lexi teased

"Heh, yeah we still gotta do that!" Leah said, clumsily spilling her books onto the passenger seat of her car. They fit in nicely with the scraps of paper and other disarray that littered the car floor. "But hey, I gotta go ... talk soon, okay?"

"Sure, Lee ... I love --" Lexi said, but already heard the click of the phone before she could conclude her sentence "...you"

______________

Sitting in his chair at a tense meeting in the Enormo Enterprises Headquarters sat Leah's father, Dave Henderson -- accountant for the company. In his years there, he often had to crunch some numbers to make things work and the company was routinely just at or over budget but his latest finding was simply too incredulous not to report.

Members of the board sat along a long boardroom table including a few of the engineering team who would best be able to explain some of the financial allocations of late. Of course, this team wouldn't be complete without the head of Engineering himself, Dr. Maximillian E Mumford who gingerly took his seat, peering across the long table at none other than head honcho, Edward Enormologiatti.

Edward founded the company back in the 1990s, making Max a sort of "co-owner" and share holder which Edward was mainly brought on to provide business expertise and funding. The company, despite a rocky start did start making him money and so Edward generally took a hands off approach while managing other smaller properties. Max shot his old "friend" a bit of a nervous gaze, waiting for him to announce the intention of the meeting.

"So ... " Edward sighed, "We know that the company's big project from last year didn't exactly ... perform well..."

Another board member simply shook their head in dismay, drawing Edward's attention.

"Was there something you'd like to add on that matter, Mr. Cafferty?"

"Well..." the businessman stuttered, peering nervously over at Max as it seemed the domineering scientist intimidated almost everyone, even his superiors. "Um... if you're referring to Project Delta ... which I assume you are ... yes. The project was a massive financial loss for the company but more importantly it caused a lot of PR issues that we are still recovering from to this day ..."

"Could you be a bit more specific?" Edward asked

"Well quite simply ..." Mr. Cafferty replied, "...the bad publicity from not just the experiment and rumors but also the reports of drone attacks..."

"I'm sorry, did you say drone attacks?" Edward asked

"That is correct, sir..." Mr. Cafferty meagerly stated.

Another board member who seemed to have a bit more bravado went on record, interuppting the nervous Mr. Cafferty.

"Yes, Mr. Billson?" Edward asked, gesturing over to the younger man in the navy blue blazer.

"The drone attacks made the news ... and while..." Mr Billson started, only to be interuppted by an irate Dr. Max

"Those drone attacks were isolated incidents and never traced back to our company!" Max shouted, "any implication of such is merely a hoax..."

"Be that as it may ...." Mr Billson said in a calm sort of tone, while also hinting strongly that he didn't believe Max's verbal defense, "we've had at least 2 reported drone hits in the past year ... some of them caused casualties, others were in violation of air traffic laws ... these were unlicensed drones, and may I add, they were armed"

"So we have armed drones..." Edward said, furrowing his brow. "...running amuck in the city with the Enormo name on them"

"Nein nein!" Dr. Max said angrily, "what this man says is a lie! There have been drone attacks yes but those are not our drones! I'd highly suspect Cybertek is behind those attacks!"

"That was my other point ... um... sir..." the more shy Mr. Cafferty said, returning to the discussion. "With all of the bad press ... we're losing clients ... many of them are turning to Cybertek for their weapons needs, seeing us as ... well, unfortunately ... reckless"

"But these are lies!" Max said again, his fists resting on the boardroom table as he sprung up from his chair.

This time, Edward Enormologiatti wasnt having it.

"Dr. Maximillian!" the gruff owner said, "please ... sit down."

Max reluctantly grumbled and did so, crossing his arms like a petulant little child as the board discussed their growing concerns.

"So ... between the loss of clients, the failed experiments ... and the recent news from accounting..." Edward said, which instantly drew Max's ire towards the already nervous and dead silent Dave Henderson who simply gulped and adjusted his tie. "this is a big problem ... which is why we called this meeting. Normally we would have our quarterly financial meeting a little bit later in the month but the way this was described to me seemed ... too urgent to ignore. Hence why I'm appearing here in person along with the rest of our board members who were graciously able to make themselves available today..."

While not named directly by the owner, it was well known that Dave Henderson was the head of the accounting department so any information received would likely be from his end. Max's sneer towards the tenured employee didn't go unnoticed by Dave himself but he simply sank lower in his seat, trying not to get involved. He had simply been doing his job after all.

"I'm ... I'm sorry ..." Dr. Max said, a hint of restrained anger in his voice as he raised his hand for the board, "What ... news from accounting are we here to address? Is everything ... not in order?"

At that question, Dr. Max again gestured with his eyes over towards Dave. While never signed off in writing, it was generally Dave's job (along with the rest of accounting) to make financial discrepencies "disappear" -- fudge a zero here and there, move some funds around, that kind of stuff.

"That brings us to the main topic of the meeting yes..." Edward announced, as an already anxious Dave leaned over to turn on a projector which was focused on a screen on the wall. "Mr Henderson if you could ... yes, thank you"

With that was your usual "pie chart" type of graphic to represent spending and expenses. It appeared fairly normal -- the usual wedges of color represented what kind of projects the budget was being spent on.

"This would be ... acceptable ... except for one thng ... not being accounted for..." Edward said, "Next slide please"

Dave Henderson would nervously advance the powerpoint showing another pie chart. This time the chart showed a very small chunk of the graph with no description.

"This unallocated money on its own would be concerning ..." Edward said, "but it was more the name of the project associated with it that raised eyebrows to the board ..."

The next slide would show a sizeable amount of money being dedicated to something called "Drone Enhancement"

Max would again remain skeptical.

"Yes and?" Max asked, "Drone work is very expensive, especially with the recent shortage of parts..."

"The thing is ... you've already allocated quite a bit to drone enhancement... robotics and the like" Edward said. "In fact ..."

Edward now zoomed in on the pie chart to show that "Drone Enhancement" was listed twice. One wedge was a much bigger one, representing the usual budget, so that smaller one now looked even more suspicious -- as if it had been added last minute and given the same name.

"Thankfully, some invoices turned in recently by the financial department found where the descrepency may lay ..." Edward said, "While some of the materials ordered could easily be justified as drone related purchases, there are others that are ... well quite unique and unfortunately all too familiar of past failures ... Mr. Henderson, could you please explain?"

Mr. Henderson looked like a deer in the headlights as he had to face not only the board but the already seething Dr. Max.

"Um... y-yes sir ... upon looking at our ongoing projects for the upcoming quarter ... I saw one that hadn't been officially announced or even discussed..." Mr. Henderson said with a gulp

"I was not aware I had to divulge projects to our ACCOUNTANTS" Dr. Max said with a sarcastic sneer.

"N-No .... of course not, sir" Mr Henderson said, "so we asked around and ... nobody in engineering or any branch of the company knew anything about ... Project Epsilon..."

With that the Doctor's face turned red, both from anger and a touch of embarassment.

"Project Epsilon..." Edward sighed, looking regretful but also angry himself, "Dr. Max ... I may not be well versed in the Greek alphabet but that sounds to me to be a follow up to ... the Delta Project?"

"S-So what if it is?" Dr. Max said, again standing from his seat, getting resentful looks from the members of the board while Dr. Wright sat just near him looking nervous as all hell. "Are we not to TRY AGAIN? Science is not a one size fits all ..."

"Interesting choice of words ..." one of the board members muttered

"Science takes months ... no YEARS to perfect ..." Max reiterated, hoping to be more convincing of his point

"In this case, it also takes money ..." Edward said, "and your last attempt at this, and quite frankly, a project I was NEVER on board with, failed immensely"

"Failed...?" Max said, his angry growing, "FAILED?! Have you not SEEN the news? ShrinkGirl! THE ShrinkGirl! How do you think that happened?! People don't just go around SHRINKING!"

"...it was never traced back to Enormo though" a sarcastic Mr. Billson said with a thinly veiled snicker.

"I'm sorry, what is this? You want to be doing the LAUGHING at a time like this?!" Dr. Max snarled, looking as though ready to strangle the know nothing business man.

"Settle down, both of you!" Edward said, before gesturing over to Billson.

"It's just ... when a drone attack is reported against us, you say it's not our business ... it's not proven ... it's a hoax ... yet you want to take credit for the ShrinkGirl ... and say she's an Enormo success story when she is in no way affiliated with us and in fact you've gone on record MANY times saying she's a menace to society so even if she WERE affiliated with us, that would also just add fuel to the fire!" Billson explained sternly.

"...I am simply SAYING..." Dr. Max sighed, "That the science is sound ... it CAN work ..."

"Then why hasn't it?" Billson said, "even if you want to say that ShrinkGirl thing worked, that was not the projects intent! Or need I remind you of the last trials BEFORE the ShrinkGirl incident?"

Max even had to cringe a bit before sighing, trying to return to his point.

"You think Thomas Edison was successful inventing the lightbulb on his first try?! You think ... Sir Isaac Newton got hit with the first apple to fall from the tree?!" Max shouted.

"...we're running in circles here" Edward sighed. "The point is ... I am heavily against this project even being proposed... even MORESO seeing it snuck into the budget like this"

"I would have HAPPILY tapped into the funds from the Delta project ..." Dr. Max said

"But that was defunded" Edward said, with a definitive tone of voice, "and so will this project..."

"Nein, you can't be doing this!" Max said

Edward sighed as the board members gave him annoyed looks, also shooting tense glances back at the head of Engineering himself.

"You have 2 weeks" Edward said, much to the chagrin of the others.

"Excuse me?" Max said

"You have 2 weeks to show me and this company that this project is worth ANY further investment" Edward said "but frankly... I have my doubts..."

The board members began to collect their suitcases and stand up, shaking their heads as they looked at Max with disdain. Edward lingered and stayed behind as an angry Maximillian approached. Before he said a word though, Edward leaned in to speak to him.

"...and you should be lucky, I'm not calling out your OTHER transgressions..." Edward whispered.

"What is that suppose to mean?" Max asked

"Please ... I know not all of the money is going where it says it is ... I also know you have Dr Giovanni on your staff ... SOMEHOW ... did he rise from the dead or something?" Edward asked

"He was never dead, sir" Max explained, "he was in a ..."

"Let me guess... other dimension..." Edward sighed, "Look Max... when I was younger, I really liked and believed in what you and Giovanni preached ... pushing the limits of known reality ... the possibility of more... whether it was size manipulation or dimensional flux or what have you ... but seeing Giovanni devoured by an exploding vortex didnt exactly help my confidence. But then you convinced me ... in his memory to start a company ... to work on not only traditional sciences but new ones ... I believed then in your vision ... but I have to be honest ... Im a much older man now, and I've seen a lot but I haven't seen anything like what you both believed in... maybe it's time to give up on the fairy tales and fantasies... you have 2 weeks, Max. Show me your project is capable of doing anything more than hemmoraghing money and MAYBE I'll keep you on..."

"Keep me ON?! KEEP ME ON?!" Max screamed, drawing more attention from the retreating board members as Max verbally assaulted his former colleague and now boss. "What are you saying sir?"

"I'm saying this is your last warning ... your shareholder status and co-ownership with be rescinded if this project fails the way I see it failing and then ... you'll be out on the streets..." Edward said and he didn't mutter another word as he made his way for the exit.

Max was steaming mad, but rather than focus that anger on Edward, his eyes seemed fixated on one individual who at that moment wished HE could shrink.

None other than Mr. Dave Henderson himself ...

The setting was Fenster Forest, a picturesque getaway located on the outskirts of town. Its tall trees, tempid weather and soothing sounds of nature made it the perfect place to get away for fatigued residents of Minitropolis.

While the addition of the larger Enormo Enterprises sister location created a bit of an eyesore and an obstruction over the otherwise tranquil horizon, the azure visage was relatively untouched as it pertained to the sparkling lake in the center and the foliage which surrounded it.

At least, that had been the case before Max's latest chaotic experiments were causing portals and dimensional disruptions. Things seemed calm for the moment which left Lexi to wonder what was going on.

Lexi herself took a bit of a stroll through nature but this was not ones ordinary stroll. Standing at just 3 inches tall in a clearing, glancing up at dandelions the size of redwood trees and smiling a bit at the wonderment of something so simple as a blade of grass was a truly serene experience. Her bewilderment at the sheer size of things was soon broken up by the appearance of a similarly sized friend -- the female fairy known as Spark.

"Spark..." Lexi said, swooning a bit and giving her fairy ally a hug. "Its great to see you again"

"You too, Lex" Spark said with a friendly nod, "just wish it was under better cirumstances..."

"You gonna tell her?" Mark asked, suddenly poking out from behind a thicket.

"Yes ... also you didn't have to follow me here, yknow" Spark said with a hint of annoyance in her voice.

"You think I wanna stay back there?" Mark said with a wince, drawing another annoyed gaze from his sister.

"Is ... he okay?" Lexi asked

"Is he ever...?" Spark retorted, resting most of her weight on one hip as she shook her head in disapproval towards his behavior, "He's just a little unnerved ... about everything..."

"Something's going on, Spark" Mark said, in an out of character but demanding tone of voice, "People are freaking out ... our leaders haven't spoken up once. Nobody's even seen Dani since this started..."

"Hon hon hon..." Lexi said, trying to calm the male fairy down, "since what started? What exactly is going on?"

Spark winced as she fought through another of her headaches. Lexi watched as the fairies' knees buckled briefly.

"It's ... the interdimensional disturbances..." Spark sighed, "They ARE very real ... and they're getting worse..."

At that moment Lexi glanced up to see for herself as a small tear in reality formed overhead depositing a large comet like object into the grass up ahead. The object, no bigger than a stone caused massive tremors for the trio of tiny folk.

Lexi got a running start to investigate while Spark and Mark followed closely behind, allowing their feet to leave the ground as their wings did the rest of the work.

"Do you remember...?" Spark asked, "when you got sucked into the Quartzarian realm?"

"Heh, you mean when I fought futuristic looking crystal monsters, had some creep try to MARRY me and got the same size changing car I currently drive?" Lexi retorted, "that tends to be something you don't forget..."

"Told you she'd remember..." Mark huffed

"I never said she wouldn't..." Spark sighed as they got closer to the glowing crater ahead, "Anyways ... the nearest realm to us is Quartzaria ... and while not all of these strange disturbances have been from there ... a lot of the Quartzarians technology has been sometimes briefly appearing or even falling through the portals... such as ... well ... this"

With that, the three came to a dead stop to explore the craters contents. It was a starship vessel sized boulder glowing bright yellow. Lexi recognized it immediately as a shrink stone that her cohort Emerald wore in her battlesuit, although she had never activated it. Rather it was another color stone Lexi remembered a bit better.

"...have you been seeing any ... RED stones??" Lexi asked

Spark nodded

"Yeah ... and normnally I'd be thrilled ... red is my favorite color after all" Spark smiled

"and how great do you look in it?" Lexi giggled, checking out the fashionable fairy.

"Can we focus...??" Mark grumbled

"Right right ..." Spark sighed, "Well yeah ... NORMALLY a sort of uh ... meteor shower of red would be something kind of awesome ... but ..."

"They're growth stones" Lexi said, already realizing the issue or at least identifying the problem.

"Yes... and there's more ... other colored gems that we're not even sure what they do ..." Spark sighed, "but some Fensterians are more than happy to try and find out ..."

"You mean?" Lexi asked

Spark nodded.

"The stones are very hot to the touch, nearly impossible to pick up, at least until they've cooled down for a while but even then... you'd imagine something this big would be hard for a Fensterian to transport..." Spark explained, "but with a GROWTH gem..."

"...fairies are able to grow" Lexi said, finding the idea strangely cute but also a bit concerning when considering what might happen if a creature who spent their entire lifetime a certain size found themselves to be an opposite size. Then again, it wasn't too unlike what Lexi herself faced since unintentionally acquiring her superpowers.

"Right..." Mark said, then turning to Spark, "and tell her about the fractured crystals..."

"You know, she's RIGHT here..." Spark grumbled, "you're welcome to chime in anytime!"

"Fractured....?" Lexi asked

"Some of the gems we've been finding are broken, but it doesn't appear they were broken from the fall..." Spark said

"My guess is the Gallant Gang or the Brash Brigade has seized some of them ..." Mark continued, shaking his head with worry.

"Gallant ... Brash ..." Lexi stuttered, "wait ... fairies have CRIMINALS?"

"Well ... yeah" Spark said, sort of matter of factly. "There's crime or evil in ANY society of course... I guess what keeps our village fairly peaceful is that our powers are more or less equal."

"Even in larger numbers, most crimes don't amount to much because we neutralize each other ... there's never much fighting and hasn't been for many decades because of this..." Mark said, "but if one side or another was suddenly able to acquire extra powers ... especially from a dimension known for WAR..."

"...yeah... that ... that sounds like Quartzaria..." Lexi lamented, remembering how chaotic everything was despite having what was otherwise a beautiful realm to live in. "I definitely understand your concern ... but ... how can I help?"

"We don't know for sure ..." Spark sighed, "We just know you're the only human who's BEEN to Quartzaria ... we're not asking you to go back of course but ... even if you could help us figure out who's behind all this ..."

"Hmm... who would cause dimensional disruptions like this and why?" Lexi sighed, "Nobody even knows that place exists ... except..."

Lexi stopped all of a sudden, cold in her tracks.

The dimensional researcher ... Dr. Giovanni Guillardo!

It wasn't HIM so much that she was worried about though ...

______________________________

As it appeared a vein on the forehead of Dr. Maximillian E Mumford was just about to rupture, the angry middle aged man burst into his lab, taking his hands and placing them on a cacouphony of disassembled robot parts. He tossed them all to the ground with reckless abandon and screamed over the ensuing noise.

"What the fuck?! This is my COMPANY! They can't DO this to me!!" Max shrieked, pacing around a bit more and looking at all of the work he had assembled over the past months.

Kicking an office chair would be his last act of rage for the time being as he watched the chair flop against his computer console before wobbling back to an upright position and remaining there like a bowling pin. He was just about to strike again when he heard a voice from behind.

"Um... Doctor ... um... Mumford, sir?" the shy young woman asked. Normally she wasn't so shy but seeing a grown man lose his mind had that kind of effect on even the most headstrong of people, and Gloria Graff was certainly one of those under normal circumstances. "...are you okay? I heard a crash..."

It didn't take the intelligent Miniborough U student long to surmise that the crash arose from the self inflicted racket of the Doctor's tirade but she still, despite her better judgement, ventured further into the office, as the Doctor remained with his back turned, both hands pressed on his console, his bloodshot eyes staring at the flickering monitors. At this point, he saw those monitors more often than he saw other human beings.

"I'm .. fine ... Miss... Graff, was it?" Maximillian said. Gloria was low key surprised the Doctor actually remembered her name, given his usual propensity to treat employees, much less interns as nameless worker drones.

"Um... yes ... sir" Gloria replied, walking more into the office and carefully navigating the shells of robot parts that littered it. "Does this have ... anything to do with that big board meeting you were in?"

"Oh! So you heard!" Dr. Max said, his voice raising a little bit as he flailed his arms, "I suppose the whole world has heard now! This is probably BIG news ... everybody LAUGHING, always LAUGHING AT ME!!"

"Huh? No no no..." Gloria said, making her best attempt to reel things back, "I just ... saw you were in a big meeting is all ... in fact wasn't one of those guys ... the owner of the company?"

"Yes..." Max sighed, a bit dejected as he let his head rest on the sleeves of his smooth white lab coat, "Edward Enormagiatti ... used to be a good friend..."

"Used to be?" Gloria asked

"Don't ask..." Dr. Max lamented, "business ... hell even science ... only leads to pain in the end..."

Gloria frowned a bit. Cheering people up (despite her prior time as a cheerleader) wasn't really something she specialized in, but she was willing to at least venture a try. At the very least, it may lead to a good recommendation letter in the future from her eccentric but highly ranking scientist boss.

"You don't mean that Dr. Mumford, sir..." Gloria said, "your inventiveness is what has always sustained the company ... you know? And science is all about discoveries ... which sometimes means trial and error..."

Dr. Max peeked back, a bit surprised to hear the phrasing as it was very close to a paper he had written and published recently in the self serving newsletter from Enormo.

"I... read your stuff sometimes ..." Gloria sighed, "Not many people see me as a science buff ... you know ... cuz I look like this..."

Dr. Max wouldn't answer but simply nod

"You'll uh ... keep my secret, right?" Gloria said with a half laugh, "Don't need the other kids on campus thinking I'm some kind of nerd... heh ... no offense of course"

Max would chuckle a bit, a rare sight indeed before spinning in his chair to face the young intern with the flowing brown locks.

"Secret is safe with me, Ms. Graff" Max said, "Looking like I do, I'm often thought to be a crazy mad scientist..."

"W-Well that's ... that's not true..." Gloria said, trying to keep the tone of the conversation civil. She was conversing with a man who had seemingly trashed his own lab not too long before.

"Oh maybe it is ..." Max sighed, "You see... that ... SHRINKGIRL... that monstrosity that runs amuck in our streets... it's partially my fault ... it's this company's fault ..."

"What ... do you mean?" Gloria asked

"How do you think she is the way she is?" Dr. Max asked, "she was exposed to an unfinished project .. a project that would've revolutionized so much in our world had it only ..."

"Holy shit, we can shrink people?!" Gloria gasped, almost sounding part excited but also worried as her loud voice echoed a bit, prompting a harsh shushing by the scientist in the chair.

"Okay okay ..." Dr. Max said, a bit miffed now, "that was partially the goal yes ... but it doesn't matter now ... the original prototype was destroyed by that ... by that ... GIRL, that reckless girl..."

"I'm just glad you're one of the few who doesn't buy into her whole ... 'look at me, I'm a fairy princess'!" Gloria said, briefly breaking her professional tone to offer an unflattering impression of Alexis Cole.

"Oh trust me..." Dr. Max said, shaking his head, "When you get to be my age ... you see through that kind of stuff very fast ... most people either lack the maturity or intelligence to see that girl for what she really is ..."

"...a menace?" Gloria asked, attempting to finish the Doctor's thought.

"Ehhhh ... yes" Dr. Max replied, "but more than that ... she is reckless ... she puts people in danger but most don't see it or care because of the flashy purple suit and the gold wings and jetpack!"

"Um... I don't think she HAS a jetpack... or wings..." Gloria said nervously

"Whatever, you are getting my point ..." Dr. Max said, "...I probably shouldn't be telling you this but what's the difference at this point? I'm likely going to be yesterday's news pretty soon unless I can get this new project to work and fast..."

"New project?" Gloria asked curiously

"After Alexis destroyed the original machine, I was able to quickly get another prototype up and running..." Dr. Max explained, recounting the events of another fateful night, if not omitting some key details, "unfortunately that machine too was destroyed, and just before I was able to find a willing and ready test subject"

"Maybe you're right, maybe I shouldn't be hearing this..." Gloria stuttered, beginning to feel that uneasy feeling again. Even as she found herself in agreement with the Doctor, she often felt conflicted.

"It's just ... that project was called Project Delta ... I am trying to rectify things ... I'm trying to ... try again ..." Dr. Max said, "but what's the use? It didn't work last time, it won't work this time ... and worse yet, as much as I hate that Alexis girl ... there's no telling what side effects her exposure had on her..."

"H-How so?" Gloria asked

"Well that's just it... we'll never know!" Dr. Max said, "I've tried to send her briefings, and requests to come get tested but she always turns me down... she calls me MAD MAX ..."

"Ugh, she's a petulant child!" Gloria sighed

"Tell me things of which I do not know!" Dr. Max chirped back, "but yes ... Project Delta was not perfected. But the board said I have two weeks to show them that the successor, codenamed Project Epsilon can produce the results that I KNOW it can ..."

"They're only giving you two weeks?" Gloria said, sounding appalled.

"Yes... and for this I am upset ..." Dr. Max said, "this and a great many things but yes..."

"Huh... I am so sorry Doctor, I didn't know..." Gloria sighed, slowly having retreated to the threshold of the doctor's lab, "I'm uh ... about to go out to grab some food at Kekse ... you want anything...?"

"Oh I couldn't possibly..." Max groaned, throwing his head against the keyboard, "I'm much too sluggish right now..."

"... I understand" Gloria said, beginning to walk away before the Doctor would stop her one more time.

"...actually if you're going anyway ... maybe get those ... snickerdoodles? you know the ones?"

____________________

Elsewhere in a remote location, a determined Officer Sonia Sanders was investigating something that was much less lighthearted than a bag of snickerdoodles.

The weary police officer who was used to pulling double or even triple shifts in the wake of recent happenings, narrowed her eyes as she took a closer look at a wrecked drone, carefully inspecting the bend on one of its metallic wings. She'd run her fingers through one of the rudders and shake her head.

"...something isn't right here..." she said to herself, recalling the drone attack itself.

There were many wounded and others endangered, despite the best efforts of the Mini Troop and the vigilante exploits of the superheroine known far and wide as ShrinkGirl but thankfully the drones were neutralized, save for one. The one drone that was brought down to the ground still intact had been taken back to an evidence lockup in the basement of the Mini Troop office. Most had simply glazed over it but Sonia was determined to find some kind of evident proof to trace the weaponry back to Enormo Enterprises.

The only thing was ... the drone didn't quite resemble the one she remembered, even if it had been mangled on a city street.

Weirder still, there were no traces of bar codes or any kind of identifying numbers on the drone, a legal requirement of any kind of airborne object, especially one that would belong to a well known company like Enormo, or even Cybertek.

Sonia leaned over the shattered evidence with a look of resignation on her drawn face as a door slowly opened behind her. She'd turn to see Officer Scolex standing, walking in slowly.

"Still looking over these drone parts?" Officer Scolex asked

"It just doesn't make sense..." Sonia sighed, "I could swear we had busted those bastards this time..."

Carl shook his head, trying to pull Sonia from the evidence.

"I know, Officer Sanders ..." Carl Scolex said, "But our forensics team has already given this drone the once over ... there's no definitive proof to trace it back to Enormo Enterprises ... although I always appreciated your thoroughness..."

"I just don't get it ..." Sonia sighed, "we collected the drone pieces that day ... had them loaded onto the armored car ... this doesn't even LOOK like the same drone ..."

"You think we were duped?" Scolex asked

"I... I don't know ..." Sonia sighed, as Scolex again tried to guide her away from the wrecked drone parts.

"You need some rest, Officer ... that's an order..." Scolex said with a hint of a smile.

Sonia shook her head but admitted Carl was right, heading out of the evidence lockup.

Carl Scolex let out a bit of a sigh after Sonia had cleared the room. He glanced back at the suspicious evidence with a worried glance before closing the vault door.

_________________

Back on Miniborough Campus, an anxious Gloria Graff made her way through the swinging glass doors of "Kekse" only to see that besides a few patrons sitting in their chairs, the place seemed nearly abandoned. There was nobody behind the counter, and only a sign just by the register that said "BACK IN 15 MINUTES"

Gloria grumbled under breath as she approached anyhow, hearing the odd sounds of power drilling emanating from somewhere nearby.

"...I don't have 15 minutes..." Gloria sighed, looking at her watch.

Stepping up closer towards the counter, she'd hear the sounds of drilling, building and hammering getting louder, raising an eyebrow.

"Hello?" Gloria asked, an impatient tone in her shrill voice as she tapped her foot, "Can I get some help here?"

A few customers gave her annoyed looks but ultimately rolled their eyes.

Gloria, never one to be ignored, peeked over the counter to see nobody even in the kitchen that extended just beyond that. But then who was making all that racket?

The tall brunette would shake her head, wasting no time stepping behind the counter and peeking down a door that was adjacent to the kitchen.

Gloria peeked her head down and noticed a tall hulking figure of a man, too focused on welding some metal to notice her snooping. Sparks flew from his welding torch as he seemed to be working on an ominous machine that stretched towards the ceiling. Gloria quickly backed out of the threshold before she was spotted. The technology she saw was on par with something she'd see in Dr. Max's lab and one thing was for sure ... it likely wasn't a new kind of convection oven ...

Being the good friend of a well known superheroine had its perks but also its issues. Joshua James took his "job" as Lexi's righthand man very seriously. Maybe a bit TOO seriously. Currently though the more laidback brown haired young man with the eyes of bright enthusiasm had himself locked into a battle of wits, playing a particularly strategic game of Gwent in the Witcher.

From outside, Lexi was strolling along the sidewalk when noticing something she hadn't before in all of her times visiting Josh's residence. There appeared to be a small cubicle of fencing wrapping around the side door by Josh's garage. Lexi, overridden with curiousity peeked around the corner to see that the side door now had a picture with a colorful, comic-like sketch of her in a ShrinkGirl costume that said "The Shrink Grotto"

"...I'm glad he's not taking this too seriously..." Lexi sighed, quickly pulling out her phone as she hoisted her purse onto her shoulder, the bag currently holding quite a bit of extra weight. She'd dial Josh just as he was getting more and more invested in his video game. He'd glance over at the phone noticing an SG logo come up instead of Lexi's name on the caller ID.

"This is ShrinkGirl HQ, Josh speaking ... how may I help?" Josh said, suddenly adopting a strangely serious and professional tone.

Lexi, normally all too much of a dork and willing to play along found herself growing more impatient as she really needed her car sped up the process with a quick sigh, followed by her words, "...Josh... there IS no ShrinkGirl HQ ... and even if there were, you're the only one working there..."

"I mean for now ..." Josh shrugged, pulling up another computer window along with his ongoing video game. "I've got a few applicants coming in next week who are rather promising ... including..."

"Tell me you're joking ..." Lexi said with an exacerbated voice.

"Huh? Oh ... heh yeah, of course..." Josh said, sliding shut a drawer with job applications in it.

"May I get in please?" Lexi said with a slight laugh as she toyed with the side door to notice it was locked. In fact not only was it locked by regular keylock but it seemed to have 2 added layers of security with a deadbolt and a digital lock of some kind keeping the door firmly in place.

"Hmmm ... okay ... but first answer me this ..." Josh said, already stepping up to the door to get a look at his visitor through a security camera he had wired up with some duct tape.

"Josh ... I don't have time for ..." Lexi sighed

"If you're the real ShrinkGirl, you'll know the answer to these questions three..." Josh said, definitely taking his self appointed job as "gate keeper" way too seriously now.

"Josh, you asked ME to come here ..." Lexi said, a bit annoyed, "you said the ShrinkMobile was ready to go ... and I need it for work..."

"Okay, that was the first question" Josh said, a slight bemusement detected beneath his serious demeanor. "Next question ..."

Josh felt a tap on his shoulder.

"Not now, Lexi, I need to ..." Josh yelped, noticing Lexi was now behind him. "What in the -- how did you get in?"

"I shrank under the door..." Lexi shrugged, "You were taking too long ... although I AM going to need my purse..."

Josh sighed, deactivating the security locks and opening the door to scoop up Lexi's heavy purse from the ground.

"Geez, what's in this thing, rocks?" Josh asked, half joking

"Uh sort of..." Lexi replied, pointing to a metal counter where Josh could leave the purse. As soon as he did, it was evident there was more than mere cosmetics and a change of clothes inside from the noise it made when clanging down on the steel surface. "Also I was instructed to tell you to be ... very careful with those..."

Josh peeked into Lexi's purse to see 4 brightly colored stones. He recognized them almost instantly as the Quartzarian power gems but these seemed more vibrant and rich than their prior samples. They glowed in such a stellar way that Josh could only classify them in the most sophsticated and scientific of terms.

"...whoa, shiny..." the wannabe scientist would declare as the warbling glow illuminated his excited face.

"...I feel so safe with these in your hands ..." Lexi sighed, "speaking of which, be careful how you pick them up, they're still fairly warm ... maybe use some aluminum gloves if you have them..."

"Aluminum or titanium?" Josh asked, "I have both..."

"Knock yoursef out ..." Lexi sighed, peeking around the garage, "Now ... I hate to be in a rush but where's the ...?"

"Stop!" Josh warned.

Lexi stopped dead in her tracks to notice her own RC sized ride just below her feet. A few more steps and it might've been totaled.

"You ... shrank it." Lexi said, somehow not surprised so much as confused. "How did you ... fix it then?"

"Teeny tiny instruments ..." Josh said, "Don't ask. I accidentally engaged the shrink drive while working on the inside ... thankfully most of the damage was fixed by then, it should be good to go once you're ready"

"Okay cool and ... thanks again for doing this" Lexi said with a smile and a warm hug, "I really appreciate it"

"Of course Lex" Josh said, "now what's the deal with these crystals?"

"It appears we may have an issue on our hands ... a big one..." Lexi sighed

"Heh, good one" Josh said with a wink and a point

"No ... no, that one wasn't a size pun..." a sheepish Lexi admitted, later realizing that she maybe should've just run with it. "So ... I guess the portal to Quartzaria has been getting opened again ... but only temporarily... best case scenario, it's some kind of a glitch or ... that dimensional doctor guy trying that machine again ... worst case..."

"Mad Max?" Josh said with a dreadful look

"Yeah ..." Lexi said, "which is NOT what I need right now ... things had finally slowed down ... I've got school starting up again, I've got a ob that pays decently ..."

"...well isn't most of that money from the endorsement dollars?" Josh chimed in

"I try not to think about it that way" Lexi shrugged, "It's ... flattering but honestly kind of odd at times ..."

"Well I just think it's great that you still remember the little people..." Josh with a smirk, as if waiting for approval.

"Was that a size pun?" Lexi said, with a raised eyebrow. Josh simply nodded with a sense of pride. "...okay fine, that was good"

_______________________

A single light hummed in the offices of Scott Travis, CEO of CyberTek.

The usually excitable and talkative young man had felt a great heaviness in his heart since the incident with Aeris. He came into his office, not looking at all like his usual self. His tie was barely finished, and disheveled as it hung from his blazer which was also opened, sporting a dress shirt underneath that looked as though it bore a coffee stain.

Even with the recent success his company had been having, it was hard to get too excited given the young woman being kept in containment.

Scott sat at his desk, peered around the dreary office and hit a button which would bring up a monitor.

This monitor served as a direct video feed to a room underneath the manufacturing plant where he could keep tabs on Aeris. The young woman, being propped up like a waterboarding victim had a blank look on her face. She had shown limited signs of consciousness since her accident, but her face remained motionless. Scott was very close to placing a call down to the team working on her condition but he decided against it, instead turning his attention to another set of monitors.

Scott had one of the most advanced surveillance systems in all of the region, if not the country. He had cameras on pretty much everything within the facility as well as a few outside the facility. One was simply a black staticy screen showing nothing at this time, serving as an ominous reminder of Aeris' horrid fate.

Just then Scott's ears perked up at a slight sound, as if listening to a fuzzy two way radio. He'd quickly fetch his headphones and clip them on, hearing a conversation between a man and woman. Their voices sounded ... familiar, to an extent.

"I still can't believe our daughter is going to be part of the Minions game" the woman said

"So you've said ..." the man, seemingly having heard it a million times already replied.

"It's just exciting ... why aren't you excited?" the woman said with a sly chuckle.

"I was excited and still am ... just figure she's got a lot on her plate ... why put more pressure on it?" the man replied

"Lexi really works hard, yknow?" the woman said, "it's just nice to see her get this opportunity..."

Scott frowned as he kept the conversation on at a low volume while also keeping tabs on Aeris. He squinted a bit noticing something odd.

Did he just see one of her fingers move?

_____________________

It was the big day at last ...

Not the day of the ballgame but the day and evening that meant so much to Leah Henderson. The day of her fashion show -- well not HER fashion show but nonetheless she took a lot of pride in the work she had done and the progress she had made. Likewise, her boss was proud of her as well and so was Lexi who took one last chance to text with her before she herself had to return to work.

"You're gonna rock this, gurl" Lexi typed excitedly to Leah while wearing her white and purple pin striped uniform for "The Shrink Shack"

"Thanks Lex, I gotta get going..." Leah typed furiously fast as things were bustling behind her. She had her phone tucked down by her waist in an attempt to hide it as people passed by her in nearly every direction. "but I'll see you tonight, right?"

The last sentence was followed by a "pleading emoticon' -- sort of a smiley face with the tearful looking eyes... much too cute to resist.

"Duh" Lexi responded, "I'm out at 5, I'll see you for 9"

"8!" Leah typed back in a panic, almost dropping her phone, "the show starts at 8 ... maybe even get here a bit early? I could really use the support"

"You got it, Lee" Lexi responded as she slid over to allow one of the Shack's busy chefs the opportunity to get by her and into the crowded main area which was full of happy customers munching on Shrink Burgers, sipping on Shrink Shakes or even just kids playing around with their "Complete the ShrinkGirl Adventure" maze.

Lexi sighed, shaking her head and stepping back into the kitchen with her phone tucked into her pocket before she heard some applause.

"Oh c'mon..." Lexi said with a half joke, stepping out to a rousing applause, she'd throw her arms up in the air as the lights seemed to grow brighter and brighter on her, almost feeling as though she were on stage. People began to stand up and clap, the applause becoming positively thundering.

The smug Lexi decided maybe it was time to give the people what they wanted.

"Excuse me, Lexi..." Will asked, poking her on the shoulder, "Table 3 needs some help"

"You've got it, Will!" Lexi smirked, jumping into action, quite literally, performing a front flip over one of the booth partitions as she shrank athletically and landed on the table square in the center of the amused guests as she held her appropriately tiny order pad.

After showing off and taking the order, Lexi slid off the table, growing back to normal size and offering smiles and high fives to guests as she walked by, hearing chanting and cheers.

"Lexi ... Lexi ... Lexi ..."

"Lexi!" Kim snapped at her from behind.

"Huh?" Lexi eeped, caught in a moment of daydreaming. That was weird ... but the shrinking front flip WAS pretty cool. Too gimmicky perhaps.

But then why did she hear the cheering even still?

It wasn't as grandiose as in her dream but there were some people clapping and crowding around a group of girls who just entered the restaurant.

"Lex... we need you ... like now" Kim said, half joking but all the waiters and waitresses seemed a bit stressed as they picked up the pace.

The reason for such an occurrence was quickly evident as Will, perched at the hosting counter was swarmed by about a dozen ladies, who played for either the Minitropolis Minions or Texas Tumbleweeds teams. They were all in "street clothes" but most were cheering for Molly Anderson, who had become something of a small celebrity for her rise to athletic fame-- although some also cheered for the Minions players, some of whom even had their pictures on the wall from eating there before.

The women were mostly tall, some even topping 6 feet so Lexi was able to easily recognize some of them despite the cluster who ironically obstructed each other, all there to have a meal and chill, but that would be very unlikely as they offered shy waves to the crowd, even Molly who was usually a bit more excitable.

"Oh shi --" Lexi thought to herself. She was happy to see Molly again and the team but this could potentially keep her held up at work if the team stayed a while. The restaurant just went from busy to absolutely bustling. But Lexi still had a couple more hours on her shift. It hopefully wouldn't matter much. Plus it was at least a chance to catch up with --

"Lexi! Holy shit is that you?" Molly asked, emerging from the small group and wrapping her arms around her old childhood friend. Lexi had zero time to respond but blushed bright red upon receiving the hug, embraced by Molly's taller 5'9 build and her pretty chestnut hair which fell to her sides.

"Molly!" Lexi grinned, "I ... yes, heh, it's me ... I'm surprised you remember me, you sportstar!"

"Hah, well it's kinda hard not to know about you, 'little superstar'" Molly giggled, "I remember you used to tease me at times for being the shorter of us both ... seems I've had a bit of a growth spurt since and you? Well you've gone the other way..."

"Yeah yeah ..." Lexi sighed, "May I show you ladies to a table? I somehow don't think you'll have an issue finding one"

"Omigosh..." a shy young lady asked, squeezing between Molly and Lexi to get to a couple of the young ladies who flanked them, "can I get a picture with you?"

"Oh uh ... s-sure..." Lexi stammered, before realizing the young groupie actually DIDN'T want a picture with her but rather the two girls beside them who were players for the Minions. Lexi blushed but stepped closer to Molly as she watched the scene unfold. It was cute to see and a bit of a relief that Lexi herself wasn't the center of attention for a change.

Shortly enough, the hysteria would die down as the ladies sat down and dined. A few customers would occasionally awkwardly ask Molly or others for pictures of autographs but for the most part, the softball players just sat, laughed and dined at the large circular corner booth, ordering plentiful appetizers and entrees as it seemed everybody was eager to be the server to work with them.

Lexi would walk by once and poke Molly on the shoulder

"Hey ... heh ... you all doing okay over here?" Lexi asked shyly, "I notice people are kind of crowding you, wanna make sure you know that comfort is our number one priority here at the ..."

"Omigosh Lex" Molly chuckled, gesturing over to Lexi as a few of the girls leaned over in interest, looking in the direction of the interaction, "...this is my friend Lexi I was telling you about"

A few of the players seemed enthusiastic to meet her, offering hands to shake, while a couple others, the local players seemed less enthused. When one lived in the Minitropolis area, seeing Lexi/ShrinkGirl got less and less intriguing each time. While the softball team hadn't formally met Lexi, they saw plenty of her on team buses or posters throughout the city, not to mention the times they'd order out from the SHRINK SHACK which usually bore her likeness somewhere on the bag or menu. It was a bit of a Lexi overload. But to newcomers, like the visitors from Texas, it was a treat to meet the young lady in person.

"You were talking about me?" Lexi chuckled nervously, quickly feeling the heat of the gaze of all of the players at their seats, "Um... did you need any more water or ...?"

"Lex Lex, calm down" Molly said with a grin, "I told you all, she's super conscientuous ... always was... even as kids growing up"

Lexi blushed, folding her arms neatly and trying to remain professional. She felt as though maybe she should just walk away and let the women continue their meal in peace but Molly simply wouldn't have it, continuing to try and call Lexi back.

"Oh -- oh I'm sorry!" Molly said, scootching over with what limited space she had in the already overflowing booth, "I meant it as a compliment Lexi... it was always super cute how much you cared but ... yeah, you're not our waitress here, hon.... you're my friend, yknow? "

"Yeah?" Lexi said shyly, "even after ... all these years?"

"Uh ... duh" Molly smirked, pulling out her phone and posing it over her shoulder. Some of the remaining softball members watched in anticipation as the two snapped a quick selfie. "Once a friend, always a friend... you said it yourself"

Lexi nodded. It was a philosophy Lexi had kept her entire life but it rarely worked out as such. People move ... they lost touch and even in the age of modern social media, it's unrealistic to think that anybody will be friends forever. Needless to say, hearing these words from Molly Anderson warmed young Lexi's heart.

After a moment of making herself comfortable, Lexi stood up and turned her head a bit.

"W-Well technically I AM your waitress..." Lexi chuckled nervously, looking around at the busy restaurant, "although ... only for another ... half hour or so..."

"Oh yeah? Wanna go check out the park with us after?" Molly asked

"The ... park?" Lexi asked, a bit too caught up in the moment to question it any further.

"Yeah, the Minidome, silly!" Molly said, again gesturing for Lexi to sit down with them but Lexi resisted, not wanting to draw any further ire from her boss or coworkers at that moment.

"We're going to just hang out and take BP, it'll be fun!" one of the other players chimed in.

"B...P?" a confused Lexi asked

"We'll show you" Molly chuckled, "besides, would be fun to catch up, right?"

Lexi gulped and nodded, her heart racing a bit. She knew she had to attend Leah's fashion show. That was an absolute 'must' for her. But she hadn't seen Molly in so long ... plus she had a chance to be on a real baseball field with real baseball players ... something she only just now realized she was kind of interested in. But ... she couldn't ditch Leah on her big night. There was no way ...

"I'm sorry Mol..." Lexi said, "I ... don't know if I can ..."

Molly pouted a bit, "Got plans?"

"Y-Yeah ... I ..." Lexi stuttered, "I'm sorry ... I just ..."

"Can't toss around the ball just for a little while?" one of the girls quipped in, a skinny red head with hazel eyes. She had something of a southern drawl as she spoke, "You're some kind of super girl, right? I bet you can toss a mighty mean fastball!"

"W-Well ...?" Lexi sighed nervously, "M-Maybe? I mean ... I could always just ... for a little bit ..."

Lexi eyed her watch nervously. She HAD done faster turnarounds before ... even if she just missed a LITTLE of Leah's show, she could likely get there on time. Heck, maybe she could even surprise Leah with an appearance from the Minitropolis Minions and Molly. Wait ... was Leah all that familiar or caring about baseball either?

________________________


What Leah did care about was the pit in her stomach that seemed to be mounting as the time drew nearer.

At the Miniborough Auditorium, Leah had been wrapping up with some of the ladies. Thankfully her role wasn't to actually MODEL the dresses and gowns on stage. She'd likely melt from embarassment if she had to do that ... or worse yet, go flailing about in some of the sharply cut high heel shoes. As much as Leah adored heels, she hated walking in them. Her clumsiness rivaled that of Lexi's although she could at least stand on her own two feet if wearing flats.... usually.

"You okay Leah?" Sally asked, taking her fashion consultant and ushering her out into a bigger clearing.

There were still a few hours until the show as the clock had just passed 5 o clock.

Poor Leah had been up all night stressing about this and didn't get much sleep before her long shift began. The hard work was mostly over now and it was just a matter of getting the show coordinated and overseeing it. Sally was about to check on one of her other assistants before pausing and giving Leah something of an unexpected hug.

"Huh?" Leah said, a chuckle briefy crossing her face.

"Your mom would be so proud..." Sally said with a longing, wavering tone to her praise.

"Thank you..." Leah sighed, smiling even as she felt the slightest of tweaks from her pocket, which contained her cell phone.

Leah picked it up as she paced around the backstage area.

"Yeah Lex?" Leah asked, her voice down to a murmur.

"Hey Leah ... uh ... hey ... it's me... Lexi..." the voice on the other end said.

"Heh I know ..." Leah replied, "...that's why I said ... Yeah Lex? You DO know your name shortens to Lex, right?"

"Huh. Right right..." Lexi answered nervously, as a car horn could be heard in the background from a group of rowdy girls in a car behind her.

"See you at the park, Lex!" one of them shouted.

Leah couldn't make out the shouting but she definitely heard the car horn.

"Are you driving?" Leah asked

"Um... n-no ..." Lexi said softly, currently seated in her ShrinkMobile's front seat, her eyes staring down at the ground. Geez, had Josh even vacuumed the floor mats? That was an amazing degree of detail. "...not yet"

"Okay cool..." Leah said, "Because for a second I was afraid you were calling to say ..."

"...I'm ... going to be a little late..." Lexi said, trying to choke the words out. It seemed like time was at a stand still as Lexi let those words sink in, even questioning for just a bit if her cell phone had lost signal. "Leah? You ... you there?"

"Yeah." Leah said, her tone suddenly contrite, while remaining soft. "Did something ... come up? Roxie? Mad Max?"

"Oh uh ... no... nothing like that ..." Lexi said, trying to circle her way back to the answer as she offered a nervous wave to the van of ballplayers who waved as they drove past. "...it's uh ... Molly"

"Oh." Leah said, hearing some racket behind her. She didn't want to stand still any longer than she already had to ... and her growing anxiety was making that even less appealing of an option, "...well, if you can't come..."

"No! No!" Lexi stammered, "I'm totally gonna come! It's just ... Molly ... and some of her friends ... stopped by the Shack and ... they're just going to show me around the ballpark ... it'll take like an hour tops! I'll be there Leah, I promise..."

Leah was about to say something but it was like only air could escape her lips for the next few moments.

"...I've gotta go" Leah said, hanging up hastily rather than say anything she may regret. She paused for a breath, eyes on her phones wallpaper which was a picture of her and Lexi posed off kilter from an old selfie at the winter carnival, taken just a few years prior. She tried not to let her sadness show as she walked over to talk to the gentleman in charge of lighting.

Before she could get over there however, she heard a voice from behind.

"Oh hey Leah... it's okay if I stop back here, right?"

Leah turned in surprise, not expecting in the least to see who she saw.

The Minitropolis Mini Dome -- Home of the Minitropolis Minions -- stood as the biggest (and only) ballpark in the Miniborough/Minitropolis region.

Built in 1998, the stadium housed a capacity of roughly 12,000 people, although rarely sold out, even when the team was in contention.

The stadium was fairly modern for its age, featuring a handful of jumbotrons, all the latest amenities and much more. Styled fittingly enough with the Minions bright purple and gold colors, various monitors, posters and promotional materials all bore the likenesses of Minions players current and former as one walked into the park, along with an overarcing wall mural that surrounded the park with logos and dramatic sport plays immortalized in digital media.

Stepping out onto the freshly cut grass would give anyone, even a seasoned veteran, a calm but chilling feeling as if they were up to bat or fielding a ground ball at that very moment. A glance into the seats would give one the sensation of vibration, as if being assaulted with the energizing screams of fans as they rained down cheers ; each pitch eliciting a starkly different result and reaction.

Of course in reality, Lexi and her all female posse were simply standing on a dimly lit field after hours. Even the hard working ground crews had gone home and the ladies only gained access thanks to a key the star shortstop, Starla Mayberry kept on her key ring.

"You sure we aren't going to get in trouble for this?" Molly asked with a slight smile, already knowing the answer.

"Molls, you're practically FROM here ..." Starla replied. "That said, we're going to kick your butts this weekend!"

"Unlikely," the red head from the restaurant chimed in, a tall right handed pitcher named Amelia Janowski "The weeds are going to roll into town and demolish your tuchuses"

"Did you really just say tuchuses?" a brunette woman by the name of Nicole Smith, an up and coming prospect for the Minions quipped, "You really ARE from Texas, huh?"

"Born and raised!" Amelia said proudly

"And do they really call you guys the 'Weeds' back down South?" Starla asked

"Yeah ... we already get the jokes enough ..." Molly groaned, "...why don't you start your games at 4:20 ... cuz hur de hur ... weed?"

The girls would laugh a bit.... even the one non-player among them named Alexis Cole who seemed to be dragging her feet even as she admired the serene scenery. Due to her own fervent focus on just tracking her steps on the admittedly awesome looking field, she'd completely miss as a group of girls pulled a bag of softballs and some bats onto the field, littering them haphazardly by the home plate area.

"You okay back there, Lexi?" Molly asked, dropping back to come talk to her friend.

"Huh? Yeah um...." Lexi said, stammering a bit as she sported her usual purple tank top and white shorts look, "I thought we were going to ... you know, tour the ball park ... the BP? Ball park?"

"Ha, hon ... I love you, I do..." Molly smirked, purposely putting her arm around the shorter brunette and spinning her around so she wouldn't notice the going ons behind her, "But BP doesn't mean we're going to see the ball park"

"Oh? Heh of course not... I knew that ..." Lexi chuckled nervousy despite being a bit clueless. "...so uh ... what DOES it mean?"

"Heads up!" Starla smirked, smacking a fly ball above the two girls.

"Batting practice! Let's go!" Molly giggled.

Lexi glanced down at her watch. 5:45 PM ... she still had time.

Molly smirked as she traipsed around Lexi on the infield grass

"Whattaya say, shorty? Wanna take a few swings?" Molly teased as she skipped on around her childhood friend.

"Heh, bring it on" Lexi smirked, coming up towards home plate and accepting the bat from Starla as she caught it off a slick bat flip manuever.

Next thing Lexi knew she was facing the prospective pitcher for the Texas Tumbleweeds, none other than Amelia Janowski, who appeared even taller than her natural 5'11 height while perched up on the mound. Lexi winced a bit, not sure what to expect here as she'd be going against a professional softball pitcher.

"Infield in!" Molly said out loud, as the girls giggled softly, "this one can't hit"

Lexi swayed her hips a bit and couldn't help but giggle, even as her focus diverted from the pitcher to the outfield, determined more than ever to make contact now. To her surprise, Amelia went easy on her, lobbing a ball that floated up in the air for an ample amount of time, allowing Lexi to give it her best shot.

The 5'4 brunette would whirl her body around and slam the ball as hard as she could, slamming it into the dirt but with enough speed that it trickled through the infield and past Molly, who was only playing at half speed herself.

"Not bad, short stack" Molly giggled, clapping her hands as she watched the ball whiz by. "Ever think of trying out?"

"Heh, with my schedule?" Lexi sighed, a hand on her hip, "It would never work"

Amelia accepted the toss back in from Nicole as she twiddled her fingers around the seams of the orange sized softball.

"What say we turn up the heat a little?" Amelia teased the batting Lexi.

"Oh? Um ... well, sure ... we could uh ... try it" Lexi said

"Please don't kill my friend, hon" Molly said, pointing to Amelia

"Oh c'mon..." Lexi smirked, "I've fought foes that shoot literal bullets ... how fast could ..."

WHOOSH!!

Lexi's answer was delivered about as fast as a professional softball player COULD hurl a softball, the spherical projectile launching off her fingertips and surpassing her at the plate in a matter of milliseconds, leaving her stunned as she just watched the ball clank off the backstop.

"...she already threw the ball, didn't she?" Lexi asked, very coyly, trying to play off the fact that she was just 'caught looking'

"Steeee-rike!" Nicole remarked, pumping her fist for a moment.

"Honestly?" Lexi smirked, dropping the bat at home plate as Starla returned to take a few pitches, "that's ultra impressive that you can throw that fast ... and even more impressive that you all can SEE it ... let alone HIT it"

"...says the girl who single handedly stopped that bank robbery last month!" Starla said with a smile. "Seriously, what you do is the real amazing stuff"

"W-Well thanks ... but I uh ..." Lexi stammered, standing down by the third base line alongside Molly.

"Hey, we gonna get all sappy or are we going to hit some balls?" Amelia smirked, throwing a medium strength pitch down the plate towards Starla who slammed it into the outfield, sending it careening against the purple padded outfield wall.

Lexi smirked as she watched the ladies having fun, occasionally glancing down at her watch before being interuppted by Molly's voice. The taller orange haired friend approached with a concerned smile.

"You okay, Lex?" she asked

"Huh? Oh uh ... yeah" Lexi said with a shy giggle

"Hey, I realize the sports ball isn't exactly your thing" Molly commented

"Huh? No no ... I LOVE sports ball..." Lexi said with a forced chuckle

"Lex, when we were kids, you used to ask how many touchdowns the goalie scored ... and we were watching TENNIS!" Molly chuckled

"I was just uh ... making sure ... you were paying attention..." Lexi said with a barely convincing poker face. Her concentration was soon snapped back to reality with the yelp of one of the ladies as she yelled "HEADS UP!"

A line drive was heading right for Lexi!

Rather than avoid it however, Lexi did what she did best, momentarily shrinking and then growing back leaving Molly and the other ladies flabbergasted.

"Holy --!" Starla remarked

Lexi looked at the stunned girls with a bit of a dorky smirk and a shrug.

"What? I'm not exactly a gold glober over here" Lexi chuckled

"I think you mean gold glover" Molly said, "but all the same ... holy cripe that was cool!"

"Well it was either that or take a fast moving softball to the head" Lexi said. After all, for her, shrinking was "no big deal"

"Hey Lex!" Nicole called out, to which Lexi turned her head, noticing the group of girls posing for a selfie on the pitcher's mound, "get in the picture with us"

"Oh ... should I?" Lexi chuckled nervously, "I'm not ... part of your ... sportsball team..."

"Neither is she..." Starla shrugged, pointing out the tall right handed pitcher Amelia who also gave a goofy pose into the camera. Lexi giggled and slid towards the mound as if making a diving play, sliding across the shot as if an overzealous father in a SEARS family portrait.

After taking a few awkward angles of the selfie, the girls got up before Amelia singled out Lexi and Molly.

"Did you want a picture with your friend, Lexi?" Amelia asked

"Hell yeah!" Molly giggled, wrapping her arm around Lexi in a strong but loving hug. Lexi gave a silly "bunny ears" pose with her fingers before the picture was snapped as Amelia returned the phone to Molly, leaving the two girls to chat while the others hung around the dugout.

"Huh." Lexi said, pausing and looking down at the grass

"Yes, shorty?" Molly teased

"I just ... I didn't know you still cared so much ..." Lexi said with a dopey grin, "after all these years"

"I mean, we were good friends a while ago and yeah we lost touch ..." Molly said, "but then seeing and hearing the news about you ... becoming ShrinkGirl and all that ... it reminded me of what an awesome person you are ... ask anyone on my team ... they're pretty much sick of hearing me talk about you..."

"Awwww... really?" Lexi said, sounding flattered, "they're sick of hearing about me? That's so sweet!"

"You're a goober ..." Molly said with a roll of her eyes, throwing an arm around her goofy but loyal friend Lexi as she began to walk her away from the baseball field and its silky smooth grass, "C'mon, I wanna show you something..."

_____________________

"Alright you guys ..." the gruff stubbled gentleman who went by the name of Pyro Pete announced during another rousing teleconference call with the Chaos Crew, "I wanna show you something..."

"If these are more pictures of your vacation to the Galopagos... so help me God..." Krazy Karl said, already looking away in anticipated indifference.

"No no ... THIS!" Pyro Pete said, showing a contract on the screen.

Byron Biggs, the current leader of the Chaos Crew looked unamused and shot a derogatory glance in the direction of the monitor displaying the contract.

"Yes ... we know..." Byron said, twiddling with his cigar in his hand as he used his other hand to make a couple of adjustments to his red striped tie.

"That's what we're here to discuss, after all..." the surprisingly reasonable and focused Krazy Karl said.

"Really?" the fourth caller involved said, bored as all hell as she swapped which foot to keep on her coffee table, slapping her thick boots about as she awkwardly tossed silver tipped darts at a dartboard and generally missed horribly since she wasn't paying attention, "I thought this meeting was about expanding the cookie budget"

"Roxie..." Byron growled

"You know for a bunch of criminals, you guys are about as entertaining as a class on lanyard making..." Roxie sneered, taking a swig of Jack Daniels before setting the flask down again, her eyes pretty much everywhere but the screen as she also looked down and began fluffing the fur on her playful and mischevious German Shepherd, Woof.

"This is why we get nothing done..." Krazy Karl chimed in, "there's no focus on this team ..."

"Hey, I'm just trying to get everybody fired up" Pyro Pete said

Suddenly everybody was startled by a loud gunshot as Roxie was off in her own world (and screen) firing off a shot into the already weakened ceiling of her low rise apartment.

"Hey hey!!" Roxie chuckled, "that was a good one, Pyro ... finally someone with a sense of humor!"

"ENOUGH!" the irate Byron Biggs declared, snuffing out his cigar in a haste, "I ... understand a lot of you are upset about the change in plans ..."

"Change in plans is putting it mildly..." Pyro Pete said, "And what? You don't notify any of us about this?"

"He told me ..." Roxie said with a shrug

"Yes ..." Byron said, "And speaking of ... were you able to at least plant the seed of doubt in her head?"

"The what?" Roxie asked, stll not completely all there, "oh right right ... yeah, consider it done, boss"

"...what did I just say, Roxie?" Byron asked, in an attempt to check her listening skills.

"Fuck if I know ... something about gardening?" Roxie said, eliciting a chuckle from most, even the straight laced Krazy Karl.

"This is obviously going to be a waste of breath ..." Byron said, "the fact is, whether you're in on the plan or not ... it's already been put into motion ... I understand why some of you may be against it ..."

"Against it?" Krazy Karl said, "its straight up suicide for any of us who are looking to live a clean life of corrupt crime!"

"Psh, I wouldn't go THAT far!" Pete chimed in, "but it is questionable... then again, since when is anything we've done ever followed logic?"

"Bingo" Karl said

"THIS actually does follow logic ..." Byron said, "...after all, what is it they say? Keep your friends close and ...?"

The line remained silent.

"...never mind"

"Roxie, I'm surprised YOU'RE on board with this plan!" Krazy Karl said

"Yeah, seems you'd be the most against it" Pyro commented with a sneer

"Eh, I'm a big girl" Roxie shrugged, "I can handle myself ... you're all just a bunch of fraidy cats ... besides, could be nice having a new neighbor..."

_________________________

As the sun began to set on a carefree evening, Lexi and Molly hopped their way up the concrete stairs behind the stadium's field of play as Molly herself vaulted over the concession stand and began cooking a corndog.

"You sure you know how to use that thing?" Lexi smirked

"Nope" Molly said, bending down and looking for the switch, playing with a few toggles before finally finding one that caused the less than sterile corndog cooker to hum to life with a crackle and a dimmng of the interior lights for a moment. Lexi and Molly shared a chuckle over that before Molly herself leaned over the counter, masquerading as a concession stand worker. "So ... what'll it be, hon?"

"Um.... I'll take one of those two stale looking corndogs please" Lexi said with a giggle, playing her role as "customer" well as Molly smirked.

"You haven't lost it, that's for sure" Molly giggled

"Whattaya mean?" Lexi asked

"I can just remember as kids how many times you made milk or juice squirt out of my nose from your goofy jokes!" Molly giggled, "you really do have a gift for making people smile ... I mean, we were only close for what, 2... 3 years? And I feel like we still click after all this time... it's hard to forget a friend like you..."

As warmed as Lexi's heart was (although maybe not quite as unevenly warmed as the rotating corndogs), she couldn't help but feel some lament as she slumped down against the wall.

"Wish everyone thought so ..." Lexi said with a frown

"Whattaya mean, hon?" Molly asked, even as her attention was turned towards the rotating corn dog wieners and she noticed one of them plumping up a bit too much on one side. That couldn't be right.

"Eh ... it's just ... ever since I became ShrinkGirl ..." Lexi sighed, "it started as ... well at first it was a horrifying experience but then once I started to get more involved in it ... I genuinely liked it ... I guess I can understand some people thinking I'm just fooling around or I'm some crazy vigilante but ... I feel like Roxie may be right ..."

"Who's Roxie? Your girlfriend?" Molly teased

"Psh, no ..." Lexi answered, although they definitely had a confusing history. "She's uh .. one of my arch enemies ... geez, still sounds weird to say arch enemy ... if Josh were here, he'd be geeking out that I just said it ..."

"Oooh who's Josh? Your BOYfriend?" Molly asked

"Geez girl, is that all you have your mind on?" Lexi giggled "But no ... he's ... he's a good friend ... actually ... a really good friend ... he's set up my website ... he's ..."

"Wait you have a website? I'm totally looking you up!" Molly said with a giggle, making Lexi instantly regret her word as she began quickly tapping away at her phone's touchscreen.

Well... the cautious Lexi thought to herself as she watched Molly's eyes light up with enthusiasm, it's unlikely she'll find the website since I didn't give her the ...

"Here it is!" Molly yelped in glee, "Omigosh, it's so cute! ShrinkGirlShrinks.com? Ohhhh is that suppose to be YOU in the little dancing banner?"

Lexi leaned over and muttered to herself, "...Josh said he wasn't going to use that ..."

"Oh this is AWESOME! Can I show this to the other girls?" Molly asked

"If I say no, it's not going to make a lick of difference, is it?" Lexi replied with her eyebrows dropped.

"Nope!" Molly giggled, scrolling through the website, "Ohhhhh!! There's a place to make superhero requests ... hmmm..."

The excitable Molly began tapping away, shielding her phone from Lexi so she couldn't see it before hitting send.

"Ahhh... c'mon..." Lexi sighed, "Don't give Josh more work to do ..."

"Is this guy your secretary or something?" Molly teased

"No ... well maybe ... I don't know ..." Lexi sighed, "the point is ... none of this was suppose to get to THIS point ... I mean they named a restaurant after me ..."

"How crazy is that?" Molly said, not paying attention to the corndogs as they continued to sizzle unsupervised. "I was telling the team about you and like how cool you always were as kids and I'm like ... of course Lexi Cole turned into a fucking superhero ... like zero surprise"

Lexi turned bright red

"You really mean that?" Lexi asked, "like you're not just ... pumping me up?"

"Lex, I'm a pretty straight shooter" Molly said, having developed a slight southern drawl despite being a native of Minnesota. She HAD spent more than 12 years in Texas after all. "You were fun and kind then and now you're fun and kind on a whole other level ... you have your own website, you have your own COSTUME ... and that car? So badass!"

"Heh I'm glad you think so ..." Lexi sighed

"Hey, there's always going to be haters..." Molly said, "When we play our crosstown rivals, the Dallas Rattlesnakes... I get booed like ..."

"...at least you've never killed anyone." Lexi said somberly, "or ruined their life."

Molly frowned.

"I'm ... I'm sorry hon ... I didn't mean to make it seem like ..." Molly stuttered

"No no ... it's fine" Lexi said, forcing a smile, "I didn't mean to bring down the mood ... it's just .. Roxie said ... and she's not the first to say it ... I'm putting people in danger ... I'm reckless, I'm ...."

"Oh shit!" Molly yelped

"S-Sorry, didn't mean to upset you" Lexi sighed

"No I mean 'shit' ... look at the corndogs!!" Molly yelped, panicking as the smell as burnt corndog filled the air. She frantically searched for an off switch as she fell to her knees before finally just pulling the plug, climbing out from behind the counter as the smoke pooled out and eventually cleared. "...you think they're going to make me pay for that?"

Lexi chuckled.

"Heh, burning the corndogs, eh Molls?" Lexi joked, "that's more MY style ..."

Style. Style. STYLE.

Lexi looked down at her watch. Oh fuck.

___________________________________

The bright lights surrounded a starstruck Leah Henderson as she took one step forward, then another, then another, in her fashionable but functional sleek orange heels with cadmium buckles and shimmering sequins running along the wedge. The crowd was similarly in awe watching the 5'8 (boosted 2 inches by the heels) supermodel strut her stuff as the humble brunette simply blew kisses to the crowd while making her way down the runway, stumbling only a little bit.

While walking, Leah had stars in her eyes as a proud announcer ushered her forward with the news that "Leah Henderson is looking spiffy as always, sporting the latest Summer fashion that will be sweepng Minitropolis ... and soon, the World"

Flashbulbs obscured Leah's eyesight briefly as she modeled the beautiful outfit, naturally of her own design, a backless orange dress to match the heels made of the finest silk available. She'd stop and pose with a hand perched confidently on her curved hip before her face panned out to the crowd and their visible applause and enthusiasm.

Her eyes would stop and hang for a moment though, upon seeing an empty chair. The chair bore no person but only a tent card

"RESERVED FOR MY BEST FRIEND : LEXI COLE"

"Leah! Leah! Leah!" the crowd cheered, "Leah... we have some questions for you! Leah!"

"Leah!"

Leah blinked.

The fantasy was over.

Leah was still very much at the Minitropolis Fashion Show AKA La Mode de Mini. The main gala had wrapped up and now some of the small vendors were answering questions for the local papers. Leah was siting beside her boss Sally who answered most of the questions but still, some press was asking for a statement from her.

Leah, caught up in her own thoughts was quite proud of how the show went but the pit in her stomach had stopped her from quite eeking the words out even as the reporters were kind and professional in their questions and treatment of the young fashionista.

"Leah, how did you decide on this particular style for Sally's store? It seems to have been received quite well..." one reporter asked, as Sally glanced over concerned. Leah appeared like a deer in the headlights, after having had a pretty good showing up to that point.

Leah herself was also stunned... not entirely because Lexi was a no-show (she had an unfortunate premonition of that once she heard Lexi ran into Molly) but also because one of the few people who remained to watch the Q&A was none other than her ex, Justin Wright, who had also stopped by to wish her luck before the show, while visiting his friend Britney.

"Ummm ... well ... the style..." Leah eeped out, "was ... inspired by ... uh ... summer ... summer fun actually..."

"Interesting" the writer replied, noting down her response, "is there any certain ... flow or TYPE of emotion you were trying to evoke with some of your choices?"

"Oh uh ... well ... yes" Leah said, slowly getting more confident as she took a deep breath and recomposed her trembling self "I uh ... when I thin of the calm, warm colors, I think about ... outdoors and sort of a freedom ... I think about ..."

Leah paused. The few people remained outside of the journalists seemed perplexed.

"...s-sorry ... I think about ... friendship and ... togetherness"

The reporter smiled as she wrote down Leah's answer.

"Thank you hon, that was beautiful"

Leah paused and nodded, offering a smile of her own while she held a balled up fist under the table at which she sat.

______________

Lexi exhaled as she took to the streets of Minitropolis in a hurry, the Shrinkmobile revving as fast as it could as she just missed getting a red light by performing some fast thinking accelerating just as the light pulsed from yellow to red. She looked at her car's clock and hoped to God it was running late.

It wasn't.

But Lexi was.

Lexi sighed, her heart in a knot. She loved getting to see Molly again and had a great time with the girls on the softball field but at what cost? This fashion show meant the world to Leah and Lexi, in a bit of a sentimental stupor got caught up with Molly Anderson, reminiscing and burnt corn dogs. She still had enough time to MAYBE catch the reception and the Q&A panel. After which she would profusely apologize to Leah, buy her free pizza for life from Minima's and maybe subject herself to being a shrunken down fashion model again .... maybe.

Just then, the overly nervous brunette driver found herself startled by a faint distant pulsating red light that whizzed closer to her ... the Mini Troop? No ... this was in the air....

"Oh no ... not now..." Lexi thought to herself as the muscles in her forearms tensed up, fingers clenched around the steering wheel as a pair of sleek drones hovered onto either side of the Shrinkmobile, flanking her.

To her surprise these were different than the usual, clunkier looking models that Mad Max would send after her, and had they been of Enormo Enterprises, they likely would've already begun scorching the pavement with their ballistics. No ... instead, a small screen folded out from one of them, bearing a face unfamiliar to the Cutie Crusader.

"Lexi ..." the voice said, a bit fuzzy as Lexi rolled down the window.

"Could we not do this right now??" Lexi sighed, slowing her car down reluctantly to avoid putting anyone else in danger. She'd eventually pull over and let traffic pass around her as she found a deserted street to park on. "...I'm already late for my friends fashion presentation..."

"...La Mode de Mini?" the voice asked, "...I think that started like over 2 hours ago..."

"....were you sent from Leah to harrass me?" Lexi sighed

"No... I am Dr. Scott Travis..." the man said

"You're the Cybertek guy..." Lexi said, already getting ready to put her foot on the gas. "I'm not interested..."

As she began to accelerate, she could already see the Doctor's ire in her periphery.

"....if he's that concerned, he can use the website like everybody else..." Lexi thought smugly to herself, although the drones weren't content to just let her get away as they also sped up to continue gliding alongside her car.

"Lexi! Please! I'm trying to warn you!" Scott said, although his voice was hard to make out through the gusting wind

Lexi again rolled down her window

"This can't be legal!" Lexi scoffed

"Actually, these drones are 100% FAA licensed and legal ... unlike my competition who just does whatever they ..."

"Okay where are we going with this?" Lexi sighed, "because I'm not about to cause an accident talking to your sorry ass... no offense"

...sorry ass? Even Lexi herself found that to be a bit harsh, but she wasn't in a great frame of mind at the moment.

"I'm trying to ...." Scott began talking before an oncoming truck almost cut him off for good, honking its horn as the drone recklessly swerved out of the way at the last possible second, before readjusting its rudders and hovering back down beside Lexi "...I'm trying to warn you"

"Warn me of what?" Lexi snickered, no longer in the mood to show this guy any manners, "That you can't fly a drone?"

"This is serious, Ms. Cole" Scott said as Lexi took another turn, both trying to shake the drone and reach the auditorium as fast as she could.

"Ms. Cole?" Lexi sighed, just a bit ahead of the drone now as it whizzed closer, "Are you my mom now?"

"Your family could be in danger!!" Scott shouted, finally getting it out but Lexi could barely hear the stern warning as she rolled up her windows and continued to drive away.

Frustrated, even Scott Travis himself called off the pursuit, pulling his drones out of range as he watched her car fade from view on the video screen in his office.

I've already got one tech giant after me ...." Lexi thought to herself, referring to Enormo "now I got the other one? I'll worry about doc what's his face later ... I've got a best friend to make up with ..."

As Lexi rounded the corner however, her warm heart sank.

The parking lot outside of the Auditorium was nearly empty. Just a smattering of cars to be seen and none of them resembled Leah's Toyota. Lexi parked quickly and scooted out of the car, running as fast as she could towards the entrance. The doors were still unlocked but there wasn't anybody there except for event staff and roadies as they carried gear out of the building.

The closest thing Lexi could spot having any association to the fashion show was a very tall girl who may have been a model for the show (or may have just happened to be a very tall girl retreating to her car). Lexi hung her head grimly and sighed.

"...I'm so sorry Leah lovely..."

It was about 10 AM at Sally's Fashion Boutique as a distracted Leah Henderson scrolled through her Instagram to see some photos from last nights show, the sights and sounds, as well as some glowing reviews ; focusing particularly on Sally's Fashion Boutique showing. Leah smiled a bit despite her emotional state which wavered more than the tides at Balthazar's Beach right now.

She was happy the show went so well, disappointed and angry that Lexi missed the show but also more than a little surprised that Justin of all people ended up being one of the few faces she recognized in the crowd. Her dad sadly couldn't make it either due to having to work late at Enormo Enterprises -- something that was becoming more of a habit these days.

Leah would cautiously flip her attention between phone screen and the outside world around her whilst the Boutique remained largely empty, just one middle aged woman persuing a rack of dresses. Just as she was about to stow the phone in her pocket, her Instagram feed refreshed and on came an image that brought more distressed feelings to the young brunettes heart.

It was a post from the Minitropolis Minions official social page and showed a group of girls including Lexi posing on the abandoned Mini Dome ballfield from the prior evening.

Captioning the photo was : Our very own ShrinkGirl hung out with the ladies last night, hitting fly balls and reuniting with Minnesota native Molly Anderson. #GoMinions #ShrinkGirlRules

Leah gritted her teeth for just a moment, interuppted yet again by a call from none other than the "ShrinkGirl" herself.

"Incoming Call from : Lexi"

Leah rolled her eyes and hit ignore, as she had done a few times already that morning. She wasn't in the mood to hear Lexi's excuses. Instead, she turned her attention to the counter where Sally was asking for her.

"Leah, could I have you meet me in the back for a moment?" Sally asked.

Leah nodded agreeably, following her boss between a couple of shelves and further down a small corridor while another girl manned the front counter for the time being.

"Leah ... you did ... I mean WE did fantastically last night!" Sally said, "I've been reading the reviews of the show and while all the fashion on display was great, people are raving about the diversity and style of this Boutique and that is due in large part to you! So I just wanted first of all to say how proud I am of you and to commend you for how poised you were during the reception's Q&A session..."

She thought THAT was poised? a confused Leah asked herself, remembering anything but. She felt like her mouth was being gagged by a snake during that brief interview. But hey, a compliment is a compliment, and Leah gladly accepted it all the same.

"I appreciate that but I don't think I did ... THAT much..." Leah said, "What about the models, and you know the actual ... fashion designers ... like yourself?"

"Well true ... but even in that regard, you did give me some great insight that lent to some of the design choices ... you aren't fashion consultant for nothing" Sally said, more than elated in her praise of the young employee. "And as for being a fashion designer... that was the other thing I wanted to talk to you about"

"Hmm?" Leah asked, a bit confused.

"I think I already know the answer..." Sally said, "but have you ever considered a career in fashion?"

"Omigosh yes yes yes yes!" Leah giggled excitedly, momentarily forgetting her drama with Lexi, "I mean ... that ... sounds nice"

Sally smiled again handing Leah a pamphlet and a packet of papers.

"Wh-What's this?" Leah asked

"Finestein University" Sally said, "Huge fashion school ... where I got my first opportunity and I think you'd do great there"

Leah perused the brochure but almost immediately noticed something that made her face droop.

"It's uh ... pretty far away, no?" Leah asked, "...I couldn't keep working here if I ..."

"I know" Sally said, "just ... think about it ... if you were interested in applying I would gladly put in a recommendation for you but I realize it's a lot to throw at you right now .. just wanted to say thanks again for all your help in the fashion show and I've noticed your passion for style so much ... it reminds me a lot of your mom"

Leah frowned at first but then smiled, her heart just all kinds of shaken at the moment.

_______________

Elsewhere Lexi felt her own heart sinking, having been ignored by Leah for the 8th time. She waited for the phone to go to voicemail before letting her shy voice come through, leaving yet another message.

"Hey Lee..." Lexi said in a sad tone, sitting in her car as she peeked outside the window, looking squarely at the storefront for Aztek Parts and More. Something about the location seemed to be lacking life. The usual illuminated sign was turned off despite it being business hours. The store was open but only a few people were walking in and out, and there seemed to be less computer merch on the shelves.

For now though, Lexi was focused on whatever words she could say in her repeat message to Leah that she hadn't somehow already said in the previous messgages.

"Leah ... look ... I know I let you down ..." Lexi said, a single tear trickling down her eye as her voice wavered, "I know how much this show meant to you and ... I was all ready to go ... you have to believe me... I even made a sign ... in retrospect I don't know that they would've let me IN with the sign ... it had a bad word on it ... actually ... I'm not sure ... is "BADASS" considered like ... offensive? I guess it depends on how it's used ... like if I said one of the models had a BAD ASS... that might be ..."

"You have exceeded the length for a voicemail message. Would you like to try again or send anyway?" an automated voice asked.

Lexi just sighed and said "...just forget it"

"...I'm sorry, I didn't get that"

Lexi hung up the phone in disgust.

Instead of dwelling on her emotional state, Lexi opted to vault out of her car, clicking the sleek silver "SG" button on her keyfob (Josh had more free time than usual these days it seemed) to lock the doors before walking up to the entrance of the shop. As she traipsed into Aztek Parts and More, as she had done so many times before, her heart grew a bit more weary to see her fears confirmed at the sight of bright red and yellow signs reading "GOING OUT OF BUSINESS -- THANK YOU FOR YOUR PATRONAGE"

Lexi frowned as she glanced over at the counter behind which she had always seen the lively Dr. Trevor Hilfmann and there he would be again, but this time featuring a decidedly bleaker look on his face, having already made eye contact with the young brunette before she had spotted him. Without saying another word he simply waved an arm to beckon her deeper into the workshop.

"So uh ... going out of business, huh?" Lexi asked shyly, never quite sure how to lead off unpleasant conversations. While she asked this, Trevor was preparing yet another needle with a metallic looking liquid inside. He'd inspect it with great precision and thought as he always had which reminded Lexi about something else she wasn't so good with -- needles.

"I am" Trevor said finally, "for right now though, let's just focus on running this test"

For months now, Lexi had been seeing Trevor after her exposure to Enormo Enterprises Project Delta. It wasn't exactly easy or ideal to get treatment or even observations after being exposed to a classified and heck, unfinished size altering project -- especially when one of the high ups and main engineer of said company was hellbent on your downfall.

For those kind of checkups and other things, Lexi had come to rely on the elder Doctor Trevor Hilfmann, once known as Hoffnung (his actual name) and come to get to know him as well, as not just some kind of weird family pediatrician but a friend. He was someone who she could go to in a number of crises and while he had quite a wealth of knowledge, being a former employee of the company that changed her life forever, there were certain things that even he was not 100% on.

Lexi sat down, a patch of gauze on her needled arm as she waited for a prognosis. Trevor stared at the sample for some time, as he usually did but this time his body language seemed a bit more encouraging. He no longer had that slowed breathing or long pause before talking that a doctor usually would have before delivering bad news.

"So... you say you're not in pain anymore?" Trevor asked, "As far as ... the size changing and any kind of electrical shocks?"

"I've ... been stable" Lexi said, nodding, "I really have."

Lexi had a slight habit of keeping some symptoms to herself, especially in the past year but that ended up leading to nothing but trouble as her body became so unstable at one point, she almost teetered on the edge of staying micro sized forever. Whatever Project Delta had done to modify her molecular structure seemed permanent but also variable. She could shrink herself under most circumstances although on rare instances, it would be involuntary, with an emotional trigger setting it off. Once, while in the distant dimension of Quartzaria, she had even INCREASED her full height, although that may have been aided by some size enchantment crystals.

While Lexi could shrink herself and at times others, it seemed incredibly inconsistent what she could or couldn't shrink. For example, some machines and objects seemed immune to such a size alteration, yet Lexi could unmistakingly recall the time she put her own life at risk to save an officer in the line of fire from being crushed by a car. In this case, she shrank the car, not the officer and reduced it to toy size in a last ditch rescue attempt that thankfully succeeded.

Stranger still though is that Lexi could be shrunk without a cure even by herself. Once, when tricked by the seductive enchantress, Delia, Lexi became shrunk, not once but twice and couldn't undo either alteration despite having her powers. The witch's black magic seemed to override any ability Lexi had to unshrink herself or Chris (another friend on whom a shrink spell had been cast).

Lexi watched as Trevor, wearing his usual long white lab coat hung up the coat and had a seat across from her. This seemed like more of a "normal talking moment" and less of a sciency size talk moment now.

"So um... I've really appreciated getting to know you, Alexis Cole" Dr. Trevor said, his hands folded neatly in his lap as he spoke. Lexi raised an eyebrow.

"Um... you know we're not breaking up, right?" Lexi said with a half joking smirk.

"Well... no ... but ... I suppose I should've told you sooner ..." Trevor said, "I'm ... going to move"

Lexi nodded slowly

"Yeah ... it seemed that way when I saw the shop..." Lexi sighed

"No, I'm moving ... like back home ... to be with my kids..." Trevor said

"Oh you have kids??" Lexi remarked in a sort of 'how cute' type of way, "Why didn't you ever tell me? I mean you MAY have mentioned it and I did see that picture of the little girl on your desk once ... I didn't wanna like ... ASSUME anything ..."

"Heh ... yeah ... I might've mentioned them..." Trevor said, "but with everything going on, with your health and just ... various situations ... it just never seemed relevant..."

Lexi frowned as she looked at her own hands, twiddling them in her lap. She had known the former Enormo engineer for about a year but hardly knew anything about him outside of his skill set. She had more or less treated him as a doctor and nothing more.

"Mister... Doctor..." Lexi stammered before finally settling on the more colloquial name, "...Trevor. I am ... SO sorry ... I just ..."

"Why are you sorry?" Trevor asked

"It's just ... here you are moving back home and ... I feel like we've barely known each other outside of ..."

"Hey ... hey ... it's okay" Trevor said with a sincere smile, "Like I said, it's been an honor getting to know you... AND your friends ... especially Josh. That kid is beyond his years with scientific knowledge ..."

"Heh, that's for sure" Lexi said with a grin

"But all of your friends too ... Leah, Mara ... the fairies..." Trevor said with a hint of incredulousness in his voice, "...heh never thought I'd be saying that a year ago, that I've met a real life fairy ... but everybody who knows you seems to take an amazing liking to you and they have your back ... and you have theirs."

"Of course" Lexi said, trying to resist the urge to cry as she felt so many mixed emotions at that time rushing over her. It almost felt like the end of an era. Trevor, sensing Lexi's discomfort over the topic simply nodded and gave her some time before speaking again.

"I get this may seem sudden..." Trevor said, "but honestly? I'm surprised I've lasted this long..."

"What do you mean?" Lexi said, a half joking tone returning to her voice, "I haven't annoyed you THAT much, have I?"

"No." Trevor said stoically, "but I knew this was a risk ... to set up business so close to ... well, work. It's been nice being able to start a small business... surprisingly hard too, you ever try Quickbooks? I've rewired an entire automaton from the inside out but this thing..."

"Getting off topic, sir..." Lexi said with a sheepish grin.

"Right." Trevor said, trying to get himself back on track. "Point is... I always suspected this change of occupation would be temporary... and my kids have been worried ... and rightfully so. As I'm sure you know ... Dr. Maxmillian doesn't take anything lightly and losing his assistant engineer hit him hard"

"Oh." Lexi sighed, almost feeling dumb for not figuring this out before. Trevor HAD been the second in command.

She had encountered Trevor first in the very basement where she was exposed to the highly unstable Project Delta. The machine had been destroyed that day and the Doctor may have been destroyed with it had it not been for Lexi's quick acting to warn him. As if on the same train of thought, Trevor brought up the same incident.

"I still remember..." Trevor said, "...you stopped me opening that door ... and I always wondered ... why?"

"What do you mean, why?" Lexi scoffed, finding the question a tad bit absurd. "You would've died..."

"But you could've been caught" Trevor reminded her, "You didn't know me... I might have had security snatch you up ... or used the information I had on you against you ..."

"Well... you didn't" Lexi shrugged, "and yeah I didn't really think about it ... I just knew I wasn't going to let ANYBODY go in there and potentially be exposed to that ... THING ... or worse"

"Don't misunderstand this as me trying to pay back some debt, by the way..." Trevor continued, "That one good deed aside, there was something else about you that seemed pure and that's why I reached out and that's why I've continued to stay ... it's just that currently..."

"...it's too dangerous for you to stay any longer..." Lexi moaned, remembering Roxie's words, as well as the words of others. Lexi's mere existence, in superhero form or not, seemed to threaten those around her.

"It's not your fault, Lexi ... I assure you..." Trevor sighed, "My resume isn't exactly clean ... I WORKED on the Delta Project with Dr. Max despite knowing everything about it ... I tried to be his voice of reason but ..."

"Well, you're not a miracle worker..." Lexi quipped. Even the stoic Doctor Hoffnung had to smirk at that.

"Funny thing is ... it wasn't HIM that got me. It was that informant... Aeris... from Cybertek" Trevor said

"Yeah..." Lexi sighed, "Sorry I wasn't able to stop her ... from getting away with your files..."

"A wise scientist always keeps backups..." Trevor said with a tone of wilyness in his voice, "So she may have gotten away with some classfied information but it isn't lost forever. In addition, that information never made it anywhere. Her car was sabotaged ... she's likely ... deceased..."

Lexi frowned. She didn't particularly LIKE Aeris based on their one dealing, but she didn't wish that on anybody.

"How did she...? I mean ... what happened with that?" Lexi asked.

Admittedly, Lexi's own problems and commitments had prevented her from doing her due research on the whole incident, other than knowing it was foul play and a car accident.

"Her car was blown off the road..." Trevor explained, "but from what I know ... and what I suspect ... it was some kind of surveillance device..."

Lexi then had a flash of remembrance, recalling the time her and her friends cornered the slick blue haired double agent in Trevor's back room.

"It was!" Lexi said startled, "it was like a ... hockey puck..."

"Likely some kind of digital recorder ..." Trevor said, "Enormo was working on something similar as well at one time ... heck they may have had a hand in the design... Aeris probably had that thing implanted in the lab and recorded who knows how much confidential information that I talked about or that WE talked about..."

"But ... why would that...?" Lexi asked, still not following the whole implication.

"The designs ... that Enormo had ..." Trevor sighed, "...although I can't speak for Cybertek but the designs were specifically programmed with a remote detonator ... thaty could be set off at the discretion of somebody in control ..."

"But why would Cybertek want to blow up their own agent?" Lexi asked

"...they wouldn't" Trevor sighed, "they likely thought it was me ... that I had gotten wise to it and removed the device. The trigger can be activated through a number of means ... even something as simple as being outside a designated perimeter, like a shock collar sort of thing..."

Lexi frowned

"So yeah ... I'm unfortunately a target again and no doubt that attack, while unsuccessful, was intended for me ..." Trevor said, "Dr. Max likely is wise to that, if he wasn't somehow behind it himself ... and so ... you understand why I can't stay"

"Of course Doctor Trevor..." Lexi said, throwing her arms around the doctor in a hug. "I'm just ... really gonna miss you..."

"Me too, Lexi... me too..." Trevor sighed, consoling the brunette as a few tears trickled down his lab coats shoulder.

_____________________

Elsewhere in a prominent lab at Enormo Enterprises, another brooding scientist stirred, his eyes reflecting the screen he stared at so judiciously.

"I'll be damned..." the mad scientist said to himself, "He was right about ONE thing ... it PAYS to have backups..."

After sharing a brief chuckle, Dr. Maximillian E Mumford would waste no further time in looking over the saved schematics for Project Delta, applying the modifications he had planned for the controversial successor -- soon to be known simply as Project Epsilon.

The machine had been destroyed by that meddling Alexis Cole -- but it wasn't unsalavageable. The backups on the designs would undoubtedly save the desperate Maximillian some time in not only restoring the machine but improving it in ways partially made possible by his cursed nemesis.

Additionally, Dr. Max HAD one surviving test chamber that had survived and he was even going to attempt using it on the friend of Alexis, Leah Henderson but that plan too had been foiled.

This time, the determined doctor wouldn't be denied. He was smarter, craftier and knew more than ever about not just known physics but entropy and dimensional theory thanks to the help of his recently rediscovered colleague ...

"Dr. Giovanni!" Dr. Max said with a nervous grin, alerted to the Doctor's emergence through a blurry reflection on his screen.

Dr. Giovanni entered the room, his eyes appearing weary and his demeanor not nearly as relaxed as it had been when he first rejoined forces with his old colleague Dr. Maximillian.

"Max..." Dr. Giovanni said, sounding concerned, "I heard about what happened at the meeting and I just want to say ..."

"No worries, Doctor..." Dr. Max said, his emotions having had time to settle down since the initial ultimatum. "The board was right to be angry with me ... this project has taken MUCH too long..."

Doctor Giovanni glanced up at a larger monitor over Doctor Max's head that said "PROJECT EPSILON" with a progress bar that appeared just over half full and growing as the red flickering bar continued its journey from the left to the right of the screen.

"Doctor ... I do understand..." Giovanni said, "they mocked me everywhere I went ... I took my research to over a dozen colleges and institutes of science and was laughed out of the room every time..."

"How did you do it...??" Dr. Max asked, a rare sense of humility in his voice, "How did you ... get the funding? How were you able to ...?"

"I ... pleaded my case" Dr. Giovanni said, "and based on how things have gone here, I'd say you've done even more than I could have ever dreamed... but ... I stuck to my guns and found one college who would give me a shot, on the grounds that they see close to immediate results... and that's why I fear my experiment failed..."

"So they ALSO treated you unfairly..." Max scowled.

"It's not about that necessarily..." Giovanni said, "But I will admit fault on my own end ... I rushed the project ... I had a working prototype but ... you already know the rest. Had I maybe been more PATIENT with my project... things could've gone differently"

"Nein" Max said, "they would've pulled the plug... your research would have been cancelled ... I am not ... in no way am I HAPPY about what happened to you but at least..."

"No." Giovanni said, sounding surprisingly stern for now, "Cancelled research is better than dangerous research. I regret pulling that lever every day ... I regret that people could've been hurt or killed due to my recklessness..."

Dr. Max nodded and attempted to show sympathy despite one fundamental difference between the two men. The crazy doctor had no such sympathy. Not anymore. Maybe not ever.

"I'm just ... telling you this because ... I know how much this project means to you..." Dr. Giovanni said, referring to the Project Epsilon which Max worked on, "but maybe it's worth taking some extra time to make sure it's done right"

"I don't HAVE the time!!" Max snapped before realizing he may have gone too harshly on his well meaning colleague. "I mean ... yes. Yes, you are right. Anyways ... shifting gears... is there any news on the portal inducer? In some ways it's a good thing I'm going through this mess... its taken attention off the REAL revolution..."

"As flattering as that is..." Dr. Giovanni said, "Yes. I will say, the portal inducer is ... functional but the results aren't as stable as I'd like ... we'll hopefully be able to improve on that in future trials. Speaking of which, I could always reallocate some of our staff to YOUR project..."

"No! Nein!!" Dr. Max said suddenly, a suspicious look on his face, "I mean ... no, that's okay. I am ... preferring to work alone"

"Always the lone wolf, yes" Dr. Giovanni said, "Well regardless, the help is much appreciated... because of it, we should be able to fire off another test run soon ... although I am concerned about the power drain the machine is taking ... it seems everytime we fire it up, there's a near blackout level of energy drawn..."

Dr. Max at that moment peered over towards a very specific fragment of his computer monitor -- it was one that displayed an overhead map of Fenster Forest, with small diamonds denoting the location of Quartzarian Crystals that peppered the landscape.

"We'll just have to get more creative then..." Dr. Max said with a grin, "Don't worry Giovanni... you will soon have all the power you are needing..."

_________________________

Lexi exhaled, having felt like the wind was taken out of her already stretched out sails after being delivered the news that her longtime friend Trevor would soon be out of the picture. Even though he HAD said he would only be moving a few hours away, he also mentioned something about it being in everybody's best interests if he kept distance with the impending threat of Max and his drones. With that on her mind now, and the also existant threat of CyberTek, Lexi finally found a moment to meaningfully consider her odd encounter with CyberTek's chief of engineering, Scott Travis from the night before.

Why were HIS drones also after her and what was HE trying to warn her about?

Before diving into it too deeply, she heard the automated voice from her ShrinkMobile alert her to a call from a somewhat surprising caller.

"INCOMING CALL FROM ... MOLLY ANDERSON"

Lexi pressed a button on her car's radio to send the call through her speakers as she drove to Leah's job at the fashion boutique.

"Molly?" Lexi asked, her eyes still a bit puffy from crying but her voice had mostly returned to normal.

"Heya Lex" Molly said cheerfully, picking up where the duo had left off the night before at the ballpark. Lexi found herself smiling again for the time being. "Hope I didn't catch you at a bad time?"

"Huh? Uhhh no no" Lexi said, wiping a tear from her eye as if she could be visually seen. All the while she was drawing closer to the Fashion Boutique which was a convenient distance from Trevor's Aztek Parts and More.

"Okay well ... hope you don't mind the call..." Molly said

"I gave you my number!" Lexi said with a shrug, "just figured you'd be busy with your PB&J or whatever..."

"BP...." Molly smirked, "and nah ... I was actually just driving through the local neighborhood... considered stopping by your parents but didn't see your car there and thought it might be weird"

"Awwww, they would've loved to hear from you" Lexi said

"Really? Think they still even remember me?" Molly asked

"Psh, if nothing else, my dad would've asked for your autograph" Lexi said

"Really? Is he that big of a fan of professional softball?" Molly asked

"Nah, he just really likes getting people's autographs" Lexi said with a shrug.

"Well as I was driving by, I went down by the rural side of town and saw ol' Fenster Forest..." Molly said with a swoon of nostalgia in her voice, "remember some of the nights we spent there?"

"Heh of course, Molls" Lexi said, "they were fun ... they were ... really fun"

"Yeah! And well, the only thing that kinda sucks now is that eyesore factory blocking some of the view!" Molly scoffed, "was that always there?"

"Added that beauty in the past year..." Lexi groaned, "it's funny how fast this city can move on projects when it WANTS to ... or when they're bribed enough"

"Bummer" Molly said, "I mean the forest is still intact so that's what matters ... I was actually wondering if maybe you'd wanna ... take a little walk down there tonight?"

Lexi smiled a bit as she parked her car pretty close to the front parking space at Sally's Fashion Boutique. This time she saw Leah's car there, so she knew she wasn't too late.

Inside the building, Leah was wrapping up for the day, having worked a short shift, she was on the phone with someone, just texting them as she grinned a little bit, throwing the phone back in her pocket as she checked in with Sally just to make sure everything was okay for her to leave.

As Leah made her way towards the back though, it was hard not to spot a giant purple car perched out front and parked next to her silver Toyota no less.

"Oh shoot..." Leah thought to herself, but kept on walking, dreading the inevitable chat that would be had.

In the Shrinkmobile meanwhile, Lexi continued to share laughs with Molly as they remembered their handful of times in the Forest.

"And then you tripped you on that frog!!" Molly giggled

"That was not a frog!!" Lexi laughed, shaking her head "It was a rock!"

"Really? A ribbitting rock that hopped away when you fell on it?" Molly laughed

"Psh, I guess we can always ask the frog tonight if we see it again" Lexi commented

"Ha! So that's a yes? You wanna go?" Molly asked.

It was at around this time, both Lexi and Leah made eyecontact through the glass windowed door of the storefront. Leah looked a bit perturbed, while Lexi attempted to lighten the mood with a smile and wave. It didn't exactly land. Leah was more just confused as to why Lexi had been spending so much time in her car rather than just walking in.

"I'd love to..." Lexi said with a nod, watching as Leah finally took her first steps outside of the building, "but hey, I gotta go for now... I'll see you tonight, okay? And hey... maybe I'll invite an old friend"

Molly paused a bit but then put it together.

"Oh! Leah? Shit yeah, I'd love to see her again!" Molly said with the kind of excitable giggle that could only rival Lexi herself in its bubbliness.

"Okay cool! See you then!" Lexi said, before ending the call.

Just as fast as her anxiety had calmed down however, Lexi found herself nervous again to see Leah drawing closer and closer. Heck at one point it almost seemed like Leah was going to honestly try just turning for her own car without saying hello to the obvious as hell appearance of the ShrinkMobile in the moderately crowded parking lot.

"H-Hi Leah..." Lexi said, slipping out of her car door and waving to the long haired Leah who seemed to only want to keep walking but she ultimately couldn't ignore her best friend, despite the anger still in her heart.

"Hello Lexi." Leah said, although it had to have been one of the coldest 'hello's she had ever given Lexi.

"Leah I am SO sorry!" Lexi said, almost magnetically drawn towards a hug with Leah but Leah simply took a couple of steps back to show Lexi it wasn't okay. "...I'm sorry I just ,.... I didn't MEAN to... I ..."

"I know..." Leah said, her arms now crossed, "Trust me... I know you didn't MEAN to ... nobody MEANS to ... but I mean, your sense of time has ALWAYS been terrible! I kept you on time for class most of last semester! I knew once you said you ran into MOLLY..."

"This isn't about Molly!" Lexi frowned, "I wanted to go to your show!"

"Then why DIDN'T you?" Leah sighed, looking pouty and upset as she stomped her foot.

Lexi frowned as she fiddled with her fingers.

"...I have no way to answer that ..." Lexi mumbled weakly, "...in a way that won't involve the name ... Molly..."

"Yeah." Leah said, "and I mean I get it ... you haven't seen her in years ... I even thought about this today ... and like ... I get it meant a lot for you to see her, I'm not saying you shouldn't have other friends, of course you should..."

"But this was important to you!" Lexi said

"Can I just finish my fucking sentence?" Leah said. Lexi instantly frowned. "S-Sorry ... it's just ... I love that you get so energetic about stuff but it's like sometimes you just... you don't think!"

"I WAS thinking, I swear I was..." Lexi sighed, "I was watching my watch the whole time, I wanted to get to the auditorium and ..."

"Yeah ... well where WERE you?" Leah sighed, sounding more sad than angry now.

"...I got there at like ... 10:15..." Lexi said shamefully.

"10:15..." Leah said, "The show started at 8, Lexi"

"You said yourself I was terrible with time..." Lexi frowned, hanging her head.

"And I mean, even if you wanted us ALL to hang out..." Leah sighed, "You could've brought Molly and whoever to the show, you know I wouldn't have minded..."

Lexi frowned, not even having thought of that.

"I know, it's just that ..." Lexi frowned, "there's no excuse... I got caught up in the moment..."

"Look, I don't wanna keep coming down hard on you ..." Leah sighed, "It's just... Lexi? What are you doing?"

Lexi frowned and hung her head, giving her best friend Leah Henderson the ol' puppy dog pout. It was perhaps the oldest trick in the book to beg forgiveness but Lexi was additionally adding her own twist, shrinking smaller and smaller in the process as she looked up with a pitiful smile.

"Lexi..." Leah said sternly, "You will NOT shrink yourself to look cuter..."

"I'm really sowwy I couldn't make it..." Lexi said in a purposely sad voice, now about the height of Leah's waist.

"Lexi..." Leah said, again her anger starting to fade.

"I'm so so sowwy Leah..." Lexi said, her voice sounding more and more like a squeak

"Lexi...." Leah said, but now she was closer to laughing. "For fucks sake, you really are a goober..."

"I couldn't drive there because my tiny feet wouldn't reach the pedals!" Lexi squeaked, looking WAY up at Leah now. Her little 'pity party' had left her no more than 3 inches tall as she nodded contritely.

Leah finally shook her head and surerendered the grin Lexi was searching for.

"Okay okay ... let's just ... move on..." Leah said, "You really are adorable ... besides the shrinking ... but sometimes I do worry you're just making a joke of things"

Lexi shook her head and slowly regained her former height, opening her arms for a hug but waiting for Leah's approval which she slowly gave, leaning in to hug her sorry best friend.

"I do take it seriously" Lexi said, "I promise I do"

"I know you do..." Leah said, "guess I'm just more pissed than anything that you now have a NEW way to endear yourself to me..."

"Oh yeah?" Lexi smirked, "the whole tiny Lexi your weak spot?"

"Psh, tiny ... anything has been my weak spot" Leah sighed, "but you knew that"

"I do..." Lexi said, "I also know it's a beautiful day out and looks to be a beautiful night..."

"Where are you going with this?" Leah asked with a smirk, "because I only agreed to be FRIENDS"

Lexi playfully slapped Leah on the arm.

"I was thinking we could go for a walk!" Lexi said excitedly, "a walk in the forest!"

"Oh!" Leah said, "Yeah, that could be neat ... maybe we could even meet with the fairy siblings"

"Oh." Lexi said, a bit more worried about that part.

"What?" Leah asked "Are they okay?"

"Huh? Yeah! Yeah, they're fine ... it's just ..." Lexi sighed, "I kind of ... invited someone else..."

"Molly?" Leah said, crossing her arms, a lot of her newfound joy beginning to evaporate.

"Heh..." Lexi sighed, feeling the familiar anxious warmth overtake her head, "...it was actually ... HER idea..."

Lexi expected another potential fight to break out but to her surprise Leah simply nodded.

"Okay" Leah said

"Okay?"

"Yeah. I mean ... it's been a while and ... I don't dislike her ... I don't want you to think that ..." Leah said, "could use some time out anyhow ... been run ragged between classes starting back up and this whole fashion show thing ... yeah ..."

Lexi paused, "Okay great, I'll uh ... we'll see you there then? You want me to pick you up in a couple hours or so?"

"Actually..." Leah said, "I think I'll drive myself"

"You sure?" Lexi asked, "You're on the way ... it's not a problem"

"No no... it's no problem for ME" Leah said, "besides, was thinking I'd invite a friend since we're ... yknow... doing that"

"Oh yeah?" Lexi said with a grin, "A boy perhaps?"

"...I shouldn't say" Leah said as she began to climb into her Toyota, already typing a text to the person in question.

"That's a yes!" Lexi said with a smirk. "Sure, bring him along! I'm just glad we're cool. We ARE cool, right?"

"Yeah ... we're cool" Leah said softly as she shut the door to her car and gave Lexi a friendly wave. Lexi jumped in the ShrinkMobile and drove off, feeling like the emotional rollercoaster was maybe starting to even out a bit.

On her phone meanwhile, Leah typed

"So Justin ... you doing anything tonight?"

The crisp azure skies would give way to the twilight as a serene calm descended over the scene of Fenster Forest.

Despite the threat of Quartzarian Power Crystals raining down from mystical portals like meteor showers, all appeared calm for the moment and not a noise could be perceived, save for the pitter patter of grass as it was displaced by the footsteps of two young ladies as they caught up on each others escapades after a decade plus long absence.

"Really?" Molly gasped in shock, "Fairies?"

"It's true..." Lexi said with a guilty smirk as if revealing something she wasn't supposed to, "I mean ... if you care to believe it, of course"

"Hah, I remember you always had a thing for Tinkerbell..." Molly said

"I told you that?" Lexi said with a blush, falling off the pace a bit as she buried her hands in her pockets.

"Oh c'mon now, it's nothing to be embarassed about ..." Molly shrugged, "Kinda cute, really. It's not like you talked about her ALL the time or anything..."

After an awkward pause, Lexi finally spoke up again.

"...I talked about her all the time, didn't I?" the blushing brunette queried.

"Okay so it was quite often, but no more often than I talked about Jenny Finch" Molly chuckled, "oh, in a different world, I could've been a pitcher"

"You wanted to be a pitcher?" Lexi said, "...that's the one who ... throws the ball, right?"

Molly raised an eyebrow

"Kidding! Kidding! I actually did some research on softball" Lexi said, "gotta be sharp for that first pitch business... still deciding if I want to throw a circle changeup or a knuckle curve"

"Heh, Lex... just throw the ball down the plate and you'll be fine" Molly said, "nothing worse than when an amateur tries to show off ... heh, no offense"

"None taken..." Lexi said, stepping on a stick and hearing a crack. She backed away nervously, causing Molly to stop in her tracks "Did you hear that?"

"Lexi hon, it was a twig..." Molly said, pointing to the protruding snapped stick beneath Lexi's white sneaker. "You sure you're okay? You seem a bit ... jumpy"

"Heh sorry ... just ... when you're in ... well ... my business..." Lexi said nervously, finding it hard to believe she even uttered the phrase, "you never know if you just stepped on a twig or ... well... a person..."

Molly frowned, but then tried to bring it around to a positive vibe again

"That's my Lex..." Molly said, "I always said you'd never hurt a fly"

"Well, that phrase takes on a whole different meaning when you've been the size of one!" Lexi said, a nervous grin on her face.

"What's that like, anyway?" Molly asked curiously, finding herself now conscious of ther surroundings as she also made sure to be careful, just in case any sticks or stones she stepped over housed some kind of ant sized creatures or people. One could never be too cautious, after all. "You know ... the shrinking thing?"

"It's ... it's interesting..." Lexi said, recalling her earliest days of shrinking... the loss of control, the fear, the fright. But after that had all worn off there almost came a certain calm to it, even a freedom. She could change her size at will, for the most part. Yes, her powers seemed to be limited to downsizing but at times when she'd feel really stressed, it wouldn't be uncommon for her to seek refuge under her bed or just cuddle up with her ironically named cat "Tiny" -- at times she had even considered building herself a little dollhouse to dwell in. "It's ... it's scary..."

"I can imagine" Molly said with a sympathetic nod

"But ... it's kinda neat too..." Lexi said, surveying the sprawling landscape in front of them. She could spy the large clearing of green and see all the grass as various blades drooped from rain, although some seemed to have an extra twinkle. It was a bit too early for the moonlight to be shining off the radiant dew so it was more than likely those crystals again ... another situation the overclocked ShrinkGirl would have to monitor. For now however she was content to just spend some time with an old friend as they waited on Leah to show up and join them. Lexi would find herself spacing out a bit as she yearned for those good old days.

"Lex?" Molly asked, noticing Lexi's stupified state, "Earth to Lexi?"

Lexi grinned a bit and shook her head.

"S-Sorry, just ... got to thinking..." Lexi said with a deep sigh, hands back in her pockets, a telltale sign that she was preoccupied despite her best efforts.

"Superhero stuff?" Molly asked

"Yeah..." Lexi sighed, "and Leah and I got into a kind of fight ... so ... I wanna just ... I don't know ... I'm hoping tonight will be just a fun night out"

"I'm sure of it" Molly said, trying to reassure her old friend.

As the two girls continued walking, Lexi could swear she spied what appeared to be a shoddy looking black and white car tucked away off the beaten path. It didn't LOOK like a police car but it didn't look like any car she knew of either. It certainly wasn't Leah's car and if it had belonged to Sonia Sanders or anyone she knew, she likely would've heard about it by then. She ignored the sight in favor of continuing to catch up with Molly despite the aroused suspicions.

Inside the shady car sat a shady man known as Oliver Skaggs. The Chaos Crew operative, who was also former Mini Troop had been deployed to the forest for both fact finding and crystal retrieving but he was none too pleased to see Alexis and ... the other girl whom he did not know. He glanced down at his phone, anxious to call his short tempered boss but he had no choice, about to do so before noticing another duo entering the scene. He set the phone down for a second.

"This is getting interesting..." Skaggs muttered.

Molly and Lexi would take a few more steps in the grass before hearing a set of footsteps trailing closely behind. They could also hear muttered chatter. Lexi obviously recognized Leah's voice but it was the male voice she found familiar and yet ... unknown at that point.

"Told you we should've just come in my car ..." Leah said, the other voice sounding a bit further behind her and a bit winded for that matter.

"Yeah ... well ... I got here, didn't I?" he said

"Heh yeah, you got lucky" Leah said

"I still don't know why we had to race from the car!" the exhausted male remarked before finally joining up with the rest of the group as the four people now converged in a grassy clearing.

"Leah!" Lexi said, spinning around but to her shock, she laid eyes on the boy behind her. "...Justin?"

"Heh ... hi Lexi..." Justin said, awkwardly offering his hand to shake. Lexi simply folded her arms and refused. Justin didn't take long to take the hint and retract the handshake, shoving both of his hands into his jean pockets now as Leah gave Lexi a disapproving frown. Lexi had no facial response to this but Molly could tell the tension was palpable.


"I'm Molly..." Molly said in a friendly tone, hoping to break the ice with Justin as she offered a handshake this time.

While Molly and Justin chatted a little, Lexi wasted no time pulling Leah away from the social circle.

"Leah are you nuts?" Lexi said in a persistently loud whisper, "Justin WRIGHT?! Have you learned nothing?"

Leah lowered her brow in anger.

"Hey, at least he showed up to my fashion show!" Leah said, "and we've been talking more lately ..."

"Apparently..." Lexi cut in. Molly and Justin had gone more or less silent but were trying to stay out of the quarrel developing between the two best friends. "You two dating again or something?"

"No! It's not like that! We're just friends!" Leah said, "not that I have to explain everything I do to you, y'know..."

"Of course not!" Lexi sputtered, "I'm not saying that ... it's just that ..."

"So ... nice night out..." Molly said, smiling nervously as she tried to calm tempers down, swaying on her feet a bit as the group vacated the grassy field, leaving a spying Oliver Skaggs to his work.

__________________________

Meanwhile, in the back room of Aztek Parts and More, a busy Trevor Hilfmann could be seen packing up some transistors and other small machine parts. Notably, certain things still remained on the walls and around the room, such as some of the blood samples he had taken from Lexi and his desktop computer which contained a lot of secret information, especially since he restored the files Aeris had snatched off of it.

An eager but also weary Joshua James knocked lightly on the outside threshold of the workshop since there wasn't actually an official door.

"Josh, you can come in..." a very curt Trevor answered, taking a break from packing to sit down on one of two remaining office chairs, "I'm the one who invited you here"

"Right... right..." Josh said nervously, "I just.... wanted to ... heh yeah ..."

"So ... I assume Lexi aready told you the news..." Trevor said, wanting to get right down to business.

Josh simply nodded

"Yeah... I'm really sorry you have to leave..." Josh said, then peering around the room at some of the gadgets the doctor still had laying about despite his hard work packing. His curiosity could be hidden no longer "Um... so what are you going to do with all this stuff anyway?"

"Well..." Trevor said, a certain hesitance in his voice that broke over time, "I can't take ALL of it ... and I'd hate to just dismantle it ... so I was hoping to maybe pass the business along to ... a younger scientific mind?"

Josh looked at Trevor flabbergasted.

"M-Me." Josh said, shocked as he pointed to himself, "You meant me?"

"I meant my SON" Trevor said, only to see Josh's embarassed reaction before nodding, "Yes I meant you. I know you've built some pretty impressive gadgets for Lexi already ... and well, the lease on this building isn't up for a few more months... you don't have to keep the shop open but you're welcome to whatever's here that you can use and maybe..."

Before Trevor could even finish, the enthusiastic brown haired guy thrust himself at the surprised scientist with a hug.

"Oh thank you thank you thank you!" Josh said, "Do I need to know anything? The password to the back door's triple encrypted padlock? Does your clientele depend more on Windows or have they finally made the shift over to Linux before I keep telling people but they never believe me, you're far better off with a Lin --"

"Okay okay..." Trevor said with a bit of a fatherly chuckle, "It's obvious you've thought about this for a while ... and I'm flattered you're so eager ... but just also know this is a lot of responsibility ... plus once the lease is up..."

"Right. Right." Josh said with a nod, "I can't exactly pony up the fundage for that ... heck, utilities on this place must run a fortune..."

"You have no idea..." the dejected Trevor bemoaned, "by the time I deduct overhead I'm barely turning a profit"

"Hmm, but maybe it doesn't have to be a store anymore..." Josh said, thinking out loud. Trevor was maybe a TAD worried about what Josh had on his mind but he was also a bit too occupied with his own next moves to get too involved.

It was pretty apparent however that Josh was already envisioning a new use for the space... a very "Josh-like" one.

"Anyways..." Trevor said, trying to steer the topic away from profit margins and storefront ownership, "At the very least, you deserve to know the truth about Project Delta and ... some other things I know about from my days of working at Enormo Enterprises"

"Hmm, no offense Doctor..." Josh said, "but I thought we knew everything about that Project ... or as much as we could know about an unfinished project... I even snatched some of the files on it ... y'know ... between you and me..."

"Yes yes, I'm quite aware..." Trevor said, trying to mask a chuckle, "Dr. Max was none too pleased at that..."

"Oh I bet" Josh said, "did he say anything like ... I'll get that kid! or ... I would've gotten away with it too if it weren't for that meddling..."

"He's not a Scooby Doo villain..." Trevor said with a bit of a smirk.

Josh stood, stunned in silence once more as he gazed around the lab, populated with a myriad of interesting gadgets. Some of them he was famliar with ... others looked like something he could probably figure out with time, while others still? Well, he wasn't even sure they were of this PLANET.

"I realize I kind of threw a lot on you here..." Trevor said with a hesitant look. "Maybe you wanna think it over and ..."

"Yes! Yes! Yes!" Josh exclaimed, throwing his arms around the surprised scientist in the white lab coat.

"Yes?"

"I accept! I shall take up the mantel as the new Dr. Joshua James ... the third!" Josh said with a flourish.

"...are you even a third?" Trevor asked

"...eh"

_______________________

"Wow so real life fairies, huh?" Justin said, as the awkward quartet of Lexi, Leah, Justin and Molly continued a brisk walk through the woods. "You and Lexi must've been freaking out"

"Heh it was no big... literally..." Leah said, trying to crack a joke to lighten the mood. Even Molly and Lexi struggled to laugh, as Molly whispered over to Lexi. Leah was curious but tried to pay attention to Justin instead so as not to show any signs of jealousy or worry.

"So what's the deal with them?" Molly asked quietly, "and why do you seem like you wanna strangle the guy?"

"They dated..." Lexi said in a whisper, "...which on its own would be fine but ..."

"You talking about us or something?" Leah said in a half joking way but Lexi instantly picked up on the underlying hostility of the question.

"No.... I mean, no more than you're telling Justin about fairyville" Lexi said with a disapproving gaze. She didn't think even Justin would be dumb or immoral enough to do anything to the fairies dwelling in the woods but she didn't exactly love Leah casually giving out the information, even if it did sound absurd to most average people that there could be a fairy colony in the woods. After all, they're called "fairy tales" for a reason.

"Is it really called Fairyville?" Molly asked with a smirk, "I think that was the name of a small town I played in the minor leagues for at one time"

"Nah, it's called ... some weird latin name..." Lexi said, genuinely forgetting for a moment. "and... wait really?"

"Yeah, the Fairyville Pixies" Molly said with a chuckle

Leah rolled her eyes a bit, keeping her distance from Lexi and Molly as they walked apart from her and Justin, who also sensed the tension.

"I'm not sure why you're so protective of secrets anyway, Lex" Leah said, causing Lexi to slow down a bit, "Pretty much everyone knows you're ShrinkGirl!"

"Yeah but it wasn't always that way..." Lexi sighed, as she missed those days at times.

"Who was the first to find out?" Molly asked curiously, causing Leah to almost instantly pounce.

"That would be me" Leah said proudly, "I found out ... when she ... well, had to save me"

"I think technically we found out at the same time..." Justin commented, since he was there that night as well.

"Heh oh yeah, I suppose we did..." Leah responded.

"How fucking romantic..." Lexi muttered under her breath, taking some aggressive stomps forward, even surpassing Molly and going off on her own for a moment.

Molly looked back concerned and then tried to follow up with Lexi. Leah hung her brow for a moment but tried to retain her cool. If she didn't know any better, Lexi looked so mad, it almost looked like a red spark arose from under her sneaker when she stepped on some kind of rock. Of course that would be no ordinary rock but just one of several lightly buried Quartzarian crystals that peppered the area. In fact the entire forest had become sort of a minefield for the foreign rocks ... a fact that was of more importance to Maximillian E Mumford than maybe anyone else involved.

Unbeknownst to the drama laden youngsters, Oliver Skaggs continued to spy on the group from his car as he'd creep up at a very slow pace, keeping his binoculars honed in on the action, before being startled by the appearance of Max himself on a small video screen contained within the dashboard.

"SKAGGS!" the impatient scientist said, in a static veiled voice.

"Gah!" the startled thug for hire yelped out, "stop doing that, would ya?"

"What is the status report on Fenster Forest?" Max asked impatiently, "and why are you still in your car? I asked you to get me those crystals, or did you finish already?"

"N-No sir..." the shaky Skaggs responded, "I was going to get them and then ... I saw ... her"

"Who?" Max said, before a brief pause brought the anger noticably boiling back to the surface, "...the ShrinkGirl?"

"Her and some of her friends..." Skaggs said

"Okay so?" Max asked, "It is a big woods! My scanners are showing crystals all around a 5 mile containment radius!"

"I don't know sir..." Skaggs said, before having a closer look at the young man with Lexi, Leah and Molly "Holy shit -- I know who that is"

"What? Who? Who are you knowing?" Max asked in his usual demanding tone.

"The guy with the girls ... that's that kid from the cafe..." Skaggs muttered

"The one who saw you disposing of evidence? Justin? You're absolutely sure?" Max said, "Hmmmm perhaps we can be doing the killing of two birds with one projectile..."

Skaggs looked notably confused by the sentiment.

"...never mind. Look, if you're too cowardly for this task, I have other ways of getting what I need..." Max said, "just keep an eye on them and don't let that Wright kid out of your sight ..."

"You're suggesting I try to go up against ShrinkGirl while she has help?" Skaggs said

"I'm suggested you MAN up and do the job you were hired to do, yes!" Max said, "I'll worry about securing the crystals, you wait them out ... I'm sure at some point they'll be seperated and then you'll have your chance... geez, I gotta do EVERYTHING around here ... oh, is this thing still on? Damn it ... I can never quite find the -- there we go -- pzt!"

With that Skaggs let out a heavy sigh.

"..wonder if it's still too late to take that job at Best Buy..." Skaggs muttered to himself.

In a locaton not too far and yet off the grid existed a council of fairies, men and women, warriors and civilians who were in the citadel of Fensteria AKA "FairyVille" -- the golden dome housed the Fensterian Flummox, which was at the core of Fensteria's power and in many ways dictated the flow of dimesional stability as well as the colony's ability to stay hidden from human view.

At the center of the meeting was Esmerelda, the Queen of Fensteria who looked around the gathered assembly with a dire look.

Daniella, the blonde haired and blue eyed leader of the Fensterian guard stood up to report her latest findings.

"Ms. Esmerelda, the gems found in the forest have indeed been confirmed to be of Quartzarian origin ... and the ramifications of that are disastrous alone but what's worse..." Dani spoke, before being interuppted by one of those same dimensional rifts as the members of the council watched with bated breath as the flummox itself sparked and glitched.

"Yes ... I too am aware and afraid of what could happen next..." Esmeralda said

"But what's more is ... we have reason to believe these portals aren't the work of Quartzaria but rather some other source ... and that other dimensions could be in danger of rupturing..." Dani said, before pausing, "...including ... Fensteria Prime"

With this, the fairy council was notably worried.

"Are you absolutely sure about that?" Esmerelda said, even as she herself had the same fears if Max's radical interdimensional experiments went off. Dani just gave a subtle nod, trying not to further panic the others. "...God help us all..."

_______________

Lexi herself was still fuming at so many things while she paced through the woods, so much so that she found herself unaware of the colorful gems that were buried just under her feet. Some were more obvious than others while some were only evident if one looked closely at the colorful sparking under the dirt.

At that particular point though, Lexi was trying to bring herself to a calmer state, finally slowing down as Molly, Leah and Justin caught up.

"Lex ... look..." Leah sighed, "Can we just ... all chill out? This is suppose to be a fun night out and ..."

Lexi was listening to her best friends words but found herself distracted by the appearance of a very small drone floating across the night sky with a single blinking red light. Leah looked at Lexi curiously.

"Maybe it's one of Josh's?" Leah asked hopefully.

"Don't think so" Lexi said, noticing more drones joining the swarm like robotic fireflies.

These drones were smaller than Max's usual but they seemed just as intent on creating a perimeter although they were ignoring Lexi and her friends entirely, instead scattering throughout the woods.

"Shit" Lexi muttered

"What is it?" Leah asked

"This place is full of those ... magic crystal things!" Lexi said, finally poking her foot down by some grass to expose a piece of a yellow gem as it remained sizzling in the ground. Just the quick tap of her foot would scorch her sneaker a bit. "Yowch, these things do get hot!"

"So this is ... superhero business?" Molly asked, to which Leah nodded.

"I mean ... I could CALL Josh..." Lexi said, sliding out her cell phone, "see if he can follow up"

Lexi stood apart from the others for a moment, an arm leaning against a tree while she anxiously made the call.

"So like ... are you Lexi's sidekick or something?" Molly asked Leah to which the already miffed brunette got angrier, "I ... I didn't mean it in a bad way ... I just meant like ... do you go on adventures with her?"

"Yeah I go on adventures with her!" Leah snapped, "But I am not her sidekick!"

"Hey hey, chill..." Molly sighed, trying to quickly deflect the topic, "I thought it was COOL that's all ... I'd love to be Lex's sidekick ... give her tips and all that"

"She already has Josh for that!" Leah said defensively.

Lexi let out an exhausted sigh, hearing the strife.

"Can we PLEASE get along?" Lexi sighed, hanging up the phone, "Josh isn't answering ... I don't know ... maybe I should go after the drones?"

Lexi seemed disappointed that yet another fun night out would be ruined by some kind of superhero business ... let alone the arguing between her two good friends and the sudden re-emergence of Leah's exboyfriend.

Molly walked up to her and gave Lexi a reassuring hug

"Maybe... just for one night..." Molly suggested, "you just ... be a normal girl? Not to say you're not normal but ..."

"I get it..." Lexi said with a bit of a warm smile, "Yeah ... yeah, let's just ... go for our hike... not like I can catch all those drones anyway ..."

Still, Lexi had to frown as she watched the flock of robotic birds swoop into the forest in all different directions. Max likely stood to acquire several dozens of those valuable Quartzarian gems...

________________


Despite the momentary drama and some extra tension (particularly between Lexi and Justin) the night was a decent one. The group parted ways as dusk hit, with Leah and Molly sharing an overextended hug that felt to be just overexageratted for "appearances" more than anything. Lexi gave Justin a sort of an acknowledging "nod" (a slight step up from ignoring him most of the night) as she slipped into the Shrinkmobile and began the drive home.

Next was Molly to leave, followed by Leah and then finally Justin who backed out slowly and decided not to make the same mistake he made on the way to the Forest, instead taking a left instead of a right, even as he watched his cohorts go the other way. He was following the instructions of his phones GPS which seemed to be taking him a shorter route back home.

Justin sighed, reflecting on the whirlwind of a week (or heck, year) he had just had. School was going well enough despite being fired from the cookie shop and it was kinda nice to have made up with Leah again even as he drew the ire of Alexis Cole, somebody who was mostly known for "loving" people. Maybe in time he could become friends with both of them. Truth be told, the conscientious young man still felt a tremendous amount of guilt for the events of the prior year, where he met Leah in an attempt to gain more intel on Lexi. Him and his father Joseph barely talked for the past year, and their relationship suffered just a bit more when Joseph was able to get his son a job at KEKSE, a place Justin was already suspicious of because of its little known association to a certain tech conglomerate.

"Shit, I don't know why my dad even still works for those clowns ... especially that Max guy..." Justin thought to himself.

As if on cue, a strange growling was heard from behind. Justin consulted his rearview mirror to notice the emergence of headlights from behind but it was as if the car had come out of nowhere, having been sitting idled for the past hour as if stalking the young man's eventual appearance on his route.

"The hell?" Justin thought, not needing the stress as the aggressive driver began tailgating him.

Justin, feeling even more anxious as his hand tightened around the wheel. He then began to slow down more and put on his hazard lights, hoping the pursuing driver would get the hint and drive around.

No such luck.

Instead Justin's car would get a rather rude and invasive slam from behind. This only caused Justin to speed up but on the dimly lit road this was a dangerous endeavor, especially as the road narrowed.

It all seemed to happen so fast ... the distance between Justin's car and the one behind him tightened up considerably until another slam rocked Justin's car producing the sound of crunching metal as the reckless stalker seemed to not mind damaging their own vehicle in favor of running Justin off the road. It was as though he were being targeted.

Justin looked around for any kind of escape but there were only clusters of large stones off the side of the road as well as telephone poles. The low visibility didn't help either. Justin tried to pull off the road, or what little of it there was, narrowly avoiding slamming head first into a telephone pole as he slammed on the brakes.

The car behind him remained running but stopped a short distance behind as Justin remained paralyzed in fear within the drivers seat.

Justin's hand shook as he dialed "9 ... 1 ...."

SMASH!!

"Fuck!!" Justin screamed, scooting to the side as a jagged metal crowbar smashed his drivers side window in.

"Get the fuck out of the car!" the angry man shouted with a hoarse voice. Justin dropped his phone in fear between the seats as the angry man clicked a gun, holding it awkwardly as he dropped his crowbar to the ground with a clang. "NOW!!"

Justin got out slow, thinking he recognized the man...

"Wait..." Justin muttered, "I know --!"

The man, known as Oliver Skaggs would forcefully restrain Justin with a pair of handcuffs, slamming into the backside of his own black and white car before poor Justin could finish his sentence or his call to the police. Oliver would slide Justin into the backseat of the car as if he were making an arrest, pointing the gun into the backseat for a moment before he began to drive away in a haste.

"You seem like a smart enough kid where I don't have to tell you not to try anything stupid!" Skaggs said, keeping the gun nearby while he made a phone call.

The brutish but not always bright Oliver Skaggs accidentally talked into the side of his gun's barrel before making the proper adjustment, talking into the phone now.

"Yeah, Doc... I got him"

Justin Wright awoke in perhaps the worst possible way -- in a state of total shock and panic as he saw his own clouded face appearing through the curviture of a triple reinforced glass containment chamber, each hastened breath he took only served to remind him of how claustrophobic his current situation was as he could see a thin fog forming on the clear surface in front of him.

The last thing Justin remembered was stumbling out of Oliver Skaggs' car once it parked at the loading dock of Enormo Enterprises' massive warehouse. He tried desperately to make a getaway but Skaggs was quick enough to track him down, clubbing him in the back of the head which explained the massive sore Justin still felt in that area.

Peering around the room, Justin made out what appeared to be massive servers, and lots of them, along with twisting and spindling bundles of cabling that connected each machine to the other. If he looked to his immediate left or right he could see 3 other chambers, although they were empty -- for now.

Just when the captured young man didn't think things could get any worse a door slid open with a sci-fi like whoosh and in stepped Dr. Maximillian E Mumford, a confident smirk on his face as he raised his brow, content to see how his plan had progressed in such a short time. A light beeping emanating from a machine in the corner accentuated the doctors slow methodic footsteps as he stepped up closer to Justin, getting very close to the outside of the glass chamber.

"Well, Mr. Wright we meet again!" Dr. Max cackled

Justin would roll his eyes had he not been so frightened. What kind of secret agent villain non-sense was this?

Instead, Justin would struggle in vain and utter the words that would be considered a cliche for anybody in this situation

"Let me out of here!" Justin shouted

"Hah! You would be liking that ... but no!" Max said, pacing around the room a bit and ignoring his hostage's pleas as he sat down at a computer and typed furiously on a keyboard, bringing up a window that read "PROJECT EPSILON -- INITIATION SEQUENCE"

"My dad works here, just so you know!" Justin said, trying to come up with any leverage he could

"Oh I'm well aware..." Max said with a sneer as he continued to face himself away from the struggling Justin Wright, "but perhaps you didn't notice this ... your father is a massive pushover ... look what happened with you last time ...not to mention your sister..."

Justin hung his head.

"Yes, I know a lot about your family, Mr. Wright" Max touted proudly, "and with any luck you inherited some of your familys resilience and prowess because ... well ... heh, let's just say you're going to need it...."

The Doctor continued to monitor a few parameters on his machine as he prepped it for testing.

With his tight deadline set by the board, he couldn't afford to wait much longer.

Worst case scenario, the test would fail on Justin but the Doctor would have at least a few future attempts ... although Max was typically confident that the test would succeed. After all, he was always sure to be the smartest person in the room. There was only one whom he considered even close to an equal on the intellectual scale and as it happened, that person was just about to enter the room, causing the startled Doctor to seal off Justin with a steel enclosure so he couldn't be seen.

"Dr. Max!" Giovanni said as he entered the room, appearing worried, "Is everything alrght? I thought I heard someone screaming in here!"

Justin meanwhile, now enclosed in darkness and a coffin sized glass chamber began banging and screaming for help. His efforts would be to no avail however as the glass and steel were basically sound proof when combined in such a manner.

Dr. Max was arrogant but not quite cocky enough to fire off his unconventional machine in the presence of Dr. Giovanni. After all, he had bigger purposes for his partnership with the interdimensional studier and there was no need to mess that up over the progressing Project Epsilon.

"No no, Doctor..." Dr. Max said in a reassuring tone, proving that his moods really could flip on a dime. "Everything is fine in here, just continuing to work on my new project"

"I must say I'm impressed..." Dr. Giovanni said, not quite understanding the scope of Dr. Max's "other" project but marveling at its ambition all the same, "You're juggling quite a bit between the interdimensional portal inducer and this Epsilon Project of yours... I just worry you're spreading yourself too thin ..."

"Nein nein... this is the way of a scientist..." Dr. Max said, masking the fact that he was indeed very stressed but mainly from the pressure of the Enormo Board Members who threatened to shut him down if Project E. didn't show significant progress soon. "But I have some good news as well... which you may have noticed..."

"Yes, I was going to talk to you about that ..." Dr. Giovanni said, "I checked in on the dimensional project and saw you had collected a lot more of those ... crystals? Are we sure they're a viable power source?"

"Only one way to find out..." Dr. Max said with a chuckle as he put an arm around his colleague's shoulder -- a gesture that produced a hint of discomfort even from the long time partner. "Shall we fire off another test run?"

"This early? Are you sure?" a worried Dr. Guillardo said as Max would begin leading him down the corridor for the portal inducer room. "The last few tests haven't been extremely stable..."

"Ah but the last few tests have been relying on traditonal power ..." Max said with a nod, "admittedly we underestimated just how much energy this project requires but ... I ran some tests on these ... quartz crystal things ... they are incredibly powerful! One or two of them could sustain the machine for as long as an hour ... and with even more ... well who knows?"

"You seem confident..." Giovanni said with a half chuckle, "which I'm not sure how to feel about that"

"Why not look a challenge in the face and let it know you aren't afraid?" Max asserted as the duo entered the dark metallic room holding the portal inducer -- except this time the machine was much more menacing, bigger than the two men combined, it was about the size of a small tunnel and barely fit in the larger room which was just a tad smaller than an airplane hangar.

Max would go over towards the machine, noticing a few items on the control panel first. A mug of tea (a favorite of Dr. Guillardo's), some notes, various pens scattered about but also a copy of a recent newspaper. Max would move the items aside but not before taking a better look at the front page of the Minitropolis Press

"...what is this?" Max asked, showing Dr Giovanni the front page image

"Oh, that's just yesterday's newspaper... I like to keep up on current events while I wait for the machine to run through its cycles" Dr. Giovanni said, about as calm as an old man in a porch swing sipping on lemonade.

"I see the newspaper but .. who is she??" Dr. Max asked

The image featured Lexi and Molly, a picture from their batting practice exploits that had been published in the morning edition.

It read "ShrinkGirl to throw first pitch at Minions game in anticipated sell out event -- seen here, reunited with old friend Molly Anderson"

"Oh ... well... that's ... Alexis ... with ... I guess a player on the team?" Giovanni said, finding the doctor's question a bit strange.

Dr. Max continued to fire up the machine even as his curiosity sparked along with it.

"And... this girl... she is a ... friend of Alexis?" Dr. Max asked, already surmising as much from the headline.

"I ... guess so?" Dr. Giovanni said, growing more and more concerned anytime Dr. Max started to talk about Lexi "I believe she used to live here and now she's this big softball star"

Dr. Max stopped for a moment, the gears in his head turning faster than the ones on the dimensional portal inducer.

Deciding to keep his thoughts to himself for now, Max continued with the test, plugging the new crystals in carefully by sliding them into some slots on the portal inducer. The machine would fire up and crackle immensely, except this time without causing the lights or machinery in the room to flicker. Could it be the mad scientist had truly found a perpetual power source?

"I did mean to ask you ..." Giovanni queried, over the noise of the machine as it fired up, "...have you been working on ... OTHER portal inducers?"

"Oh ... oh yes" Dr. Max admitted with a bit of a guilty grin, "it was meant to be a surprise but I've constructed some smaller versions of your machine ... I've been doing a little research myself and I'm trying to create a ..."

"A self contained vortex grid..." Dr. Giovanni said, naturally being the expert on the subject for many years, "...are you sure that's wise?"

"I figure the way we have it configured..." Max said, as the machine remained in a standby phase, "...this machine will act as the central hub but to truly achieve our goals, we need satellite machines ...which is why I have them strategically placed ... one in our sister location by the forest ..."

"And the others?" Giovanni asked, a bit worriedly.

"It's best not to get into specifics..." Dr. Max said with a shrug, "Besides, this test shouldn't have any effect on THOSE machines ..."

As Max continued his reckless test, he hadn't dropped the thought in his mind about Molly Anderson.

He could only let his imagination run wild with the possibilities....

A friend of Alexis ... an athlete at that ... somebody young ... who was likely fast, possessed above average strength ... she would be the perfect candidate for Project Epsilon ... OR ... the perfect guinea pig.

___________________

Officer Sonia Sanders continued her patrol around the perimeter of Fenster Forest.

She was actually assigned to be patrolling on the east side of town but she found herself more and more suspicous of the forest area, especially once Enormo Enterprise successfully opened their sattelite location.

The phrase "quiet but too quiet" came to mind when she thought about them and that second lab had indeed been "too quiet"

Since it's construction, they had only brought on maybe 1/4 of the employees despite being close to the same size as the main complex.

Sonia had reason to believe that they were working on something big, despite having no proof for certain.

On this particular round through the woods though, the Officer would find a very concerning sign. A car run off the narrow bumpy road that ran parallel to the forest. She slowed her car down cautiously and stepped out, taking very small and deliberate steps as she approached, not sure if she'd find a person -- alive or dead, within the car. Sweeping the perimeter quickly the focused Officer would find nothing, leaning over the driver seat as the car lay tilted on its side a bit. She reached down between the seats and felt a cell phone, its battery now dead.

She let out a sigh, her heart and mind more troubled.

She was about to call in the situation when something even more urgent arises.

The ground beneath the Officer shook and tremored, sending her backwards a bit. The minor quake, while short lived, also came with another side effect. Sonia looked way up into the sky to see a streak of red lightning fire off into the air before arcing and eventually vanishing from sight. The location of the blast was pretty far away but the fact that she could still make it out would mean it was fairly significant.

Sonia would hop into her car and chart a course towards the direction from which she saw the blast which would put her on a collision course with the Miniborough University Campus.... why did it seem like so much trouble arose there? Could Lexi somehow be involved?

As the suddenly rushed Sonia Sanders took her drive towards the source of the BOOM, she placed a call to fellow Officer Carl Scolex, who was once again holed up in his office, no doubt going through case files on ShrinkGirl or anything Alexis based. He had something of a fixation himself.

He'd answer the ringing phone on his desk, a bit surprised that it was a call from Sonia Sanders.

"Yes Officer Sanders?" Carl asked, his voice sounding a bit rushed and hurried

"I think we need to investigate more into the Kekse case..." Sonia said, "also I found a wrecked car off the side of the road in the Fenster Forest District..."

"Officer... you were assigned to District 3 today ... what were you even doing down that way?" Carl asked as his hand gripping the mouse hovered around on a webpage.

"Does that really matter right now?" an agitated Sonia asked, "We have a downed car, a possible lost person and a major disturbance on or near a college campus? Shouldn't that alone warrant more manpower to investigate?"

Carl Scolex had bigger fish to fry ... plus he wasn't exactly thrilled with how 'investigative' Sonia was becoming.

"Sonia ... you're following up on dead leads..." Carl warned, "we've checked out Kekse... their building permits are in order ... there's nothing else to see or know ... Miniborough Campus has been under extra security ever since the bombing ... if anything else came up, one of our officers would check it out ..."

"And the wrecked car in the forest?" Sonia asked

"I'll have somebody investigate that..." Carl said, although it was more of a poor attempt to appease his angry colleague.

"No need" Sonia said, "I have a cell phone that I'll bring back to the office as soon as I'm done here..."

"As soon as you're done doing what?" Carl asked, again with annoyance in his voice.

"Well your ... extra officers on Miniborough Campus may need some backup and its only a 20 minute drive from here..." Sonia said in a bit of a flippant tone of voice.

"Officer Sanders!" Carl said in a gruff tone, "You are WASTING time ... we can investigate the missing person but you are NOT to go anywhere near the campus ... let it go...!"

Sonia said not another word. Instead she clicked off her intercom and simply continued to drive.

Something about that cookie place rubbed her the wrong way. Its sudden appearance in the wake of the bombings, the rushed process to get the building permits up ... not to mention she knew the truth, as did many of the Mini Troop and City Hall itself. The name of the cafe was registered as Kekse but its larger holding company was none other than Enormo Enterprises....

Back at the station, Carl Scolex began to feel his anxiety rising, not needing an awol officer to further complicate matters while he continued to try and build a case against Alexis Cole. He reluctantly dug into a drawer under his desktop, making extra sure that nobody was watching as he placed a call, keeping his voice low.

"...we may have a problem ..." Carl said, "...just keep an eye on the cookie place... that's all"

_________________________

A determined young brunette by the name of Alexis Cole winds and throws a pitch. It's the bottom of the 9th with 2 outs and 2 strikes on the other teams best hitter and she lobs a fastball with all of her might ... only to watch it clatter somewhere 10 feet or so in front of the plate.

"Awwww man ..." Lexi thought to herself, watching yet another pitching attempt fall short.

Sure it was an odd thing to be doing but Lexi wanted to be prepared for her "big moment" ... and sure she was getting a few odd looks from the neighborhood kids as she remained alone on a pitcher's mound at a nearby little league park, but hey, they just didn't understand, this was serious business.

After all, it's not everyday a local superheroine gets a chance to throw out the first pitch at a certain softball league's final series of the year with (presumably) her friends and family in attendance, as well as her friend Molly who's come all the way from Texas just to see her throw this pitch.

"Okay Lex, maybe slow down a little bit..." the overly anxious girl urged herself before pausing, feeling her phone vibrate. She'd quickly glance at the caller ID, seeing it's Leah, and picked up as she went to go retrieve her last pitch attempt.

"Heya Lee..." Lexi said non-chalantly, practicing different methods to grip the spherical softball in her fingers as if she were about to unleash a devastating knucklecurve. Leah didn't seem so well in the meantime. Lexi always had a sixth sense about these things, even before her best friend could speak, "...is everything okay?"

"Lexi, I'm worried..." Leah said with a noticeable melancoly in her voice

"About what, hon??"

"Justin didn't call me when he got home and I haven't been able to reach him all day today either..." Leah said

Lexi's concern suddenly dropped, if only a bit.

"Oh." Lexi said, setting the softball aside and sitting down on a bench, "Well I mean, what's he, your boyfriend? He doesn't have to tell you when he gets home or whatever..."

Leah let that comment go because she was a bit upset even as she felt a bit miffed.

"Well ... I'm just worried ..." Leah said, "I mean, you saw those drones last night ... what if Max got him or something?"

"Psh again?" Lexi shrugged, "I'm pretty sure that whole scheme is so last season..."

"Lexi..." Leah said, a hint of anger in her voice now

"Look... I'm sure he's fine" Lexi said, "If you're really concerned, call Officer Sanders or something..."

"I don't exactly have her on speed dial, Lex..." Leah said, "or any of the Mini Troop for that matter ... besides, why go to the police when I know THE ShrinkGirl? Couldn't you just like ... check to see if he's okay? Or ..."

"Gosh Leah ... I just..." Lexi said, a frown on her face as she tapped her feet on the grass, "I've got a lot I'm working on now and ..."

"Lex, you're practicing throwing fastballs..." Leah said, matter of factly, "you told me last night that's what you'd be doing..."

"I just ... think you may be worrying a bit too much, that's all..." Lexi said, "Besides... I really shouldn't be using my powers anymore than I have to ..."

Leah sighed

"What?" Lexi said, "If he's really in trouble I'll go help but ..."

"That's not what this is about!" Leah said, sounding a bit more angry now "You were practically ready to strangle Justin all night last night ..."

"Do you blame me?" Lexi scoffed, "he played you like a fool and for some reason you two are just best buds again!"

"We're not ... ugh ... look..." Leah sighed, "I just ... he was around ... yknow?"

"What's that suppose to mean?" Lexi asked

"It's just ... you haven't been ... not a lot anyway..." Leah said dejected, "I get that you're busy and all and ... it sucks we couldn't dorm together but ... anyway... getting off on a tangent ..."

"There's more, isn't there?" Lexi asked, sensing something else bubbling under the surface.

"Well honestly, I'm calling bull..." Leah said, "...you claim you don't wanna use your powers or whatever which would be understandable except you've had no problem using your powers to investigate Fenster Forest stuff or whatever ... you did that whole stealth mission to get your car back --"

"That was different --" a hasty Lexi responded, "I was also trying to save Sugar Rush..."

"I just feel like ... ugh!!" Leah said

"What? Say it"

"I feel like if it was MOLLY who was in trouble, you'd be off to the races trying to save her!" Leah eeked out, instantly regretting it.

"...is that what this is about?" Lexi sighed, "Look, I didn't exactly see YOU making an effort to be friends with Molly last night but that doesn't mean I'd ..."

"Okay okay ... I know..." Leah sighed, "I didn't mean anything by it... it's just ..."

"What?" Lexi asked

"...I've been kinda lonely, Lex..." Leah frowned with a shrug, "I get what Justin did was wrong..."

"He almost got us both killed, Leah!" Lexi reminded her

"Yeah, well at least he showed up to my --"

"For fucks sake, we're still on this?" Lexi sighed angrily, "I'm sorry I didn't come, okay?? I mean, is it really that big a deal?? It's not like you were IN the fashion show! You just picked out some damn outfits for it -- and ..."

Lexi paused, feeling a tightness in her chest. It was she who possessed all the regrets now.

"...Leah I'm sorry ... I ... I didn't mean that ..." Lexi sighed, catching her breath. It was too late. The damage was done.

"Yes you did..." Leah said, and with that, the conversation was ended with just a click.

Lexi let out a grunt, both upset with herself and upset in general, setting her phone on a bench while she took the softball and pounded it as hard as she could against the backstop with a mighty hurl.

While Lexi was off venting her anger however, she was missing another incoming call ... from Officer Sonia Sanders ...

______________

The cantankerous and determined Carl Scolex sat at his desk, hammering away on a keyboard while placing a small cell phone to his mouth.

"Any improvement on her condition?" Scolex asked the man on the other line.

"Nothing besides a momentary spike in brain activity..." Scott said dejectedly, keeping tabs on all of his projects from the sanctity of his office, while viewing things on a cluster of video monitors. "...I was advised this treatment may take some time though ... if it's to be effective at all..."

"I'm terribly sorry again for what happened..." Carl groaned, continuing his search and note taking efforts while trying to strategically pivot the conversation to why he had really called the tech mogul.

"Anything else?" Scott asked

"Well ... perhaps it isn't the right time ... but ... you said Aeris was ... doing research on Dr. Hilfmann..., right?" Carl asked.

His question of course was not aimless as he himself was looking up all the information he could on Enormo Enterprises' former assistant engineer to Maximillian. Dr. Trevor Hoffnung had a tenure of over 20 years with the tech giant and was involved on several projects from the Enormite to other smaller scale ones. His last known employment with the company just happened to coincide with around the time ShrinkGirl was first sighted -- sometime around that previous winter, when Roxanne Wright made her presence felt at that years Winter Carnival.

It could be reasoned then, that whetever technology made "ShrinkGirl" the way she was would have been fired off sometime prior to then, whether recent or even further back.

"Trevor ... yes" Scott said, finding his mind in a thousand different places at once. "I'm sorry ... Officer ... Scolex? Don't you think we should be a bit more concerned with the matter of ... well, Alexis' family?"

Carl paused for a moment.

"Um... how so?" the officer asked

"...Don't play naive with me, sir" Scott said, "or perhaps your superiors are in the room wit you right now?"

A long pause would suggest not.

"...okay then" Scott said. "Don't you think we should at least in some way come clean to Alexis or her parents about ...?"

"Hey" Carl Scolex said, in a gruff and aggressive tone, "You yourself said you tried to warn her... you sent your drones to deliver the message and she wouldn't listen..."

"Maybe in retrospect, sending the drones wasn't the best ..."

"No" Carl said, his mind made up as he furrowed his brow. "Alexis can deal with whatever that madman Max decides to do ... "

Scott again paused.

"...So you DO agree he's a mad man?" Scott asked, the regret continuing to amplify in his head.

"He has a few screws loose, yes" Carl said

"Then why exactly were you ... were WE so okay with taking those surveillance devices from him?" Scott said

"I knew the man was a nut ..." Carl said, "even I didn't think he'd be in the explosive business ... especially when we told him they were for tracking intel on ShrinkGirl ... talk about shooting yourself in the foot ... both figurarively and literally..."

"I suppose ..." Scott sighed, "...and you think there's REALLY no way to trace those bombs back to him? I feel like as an officer of the law, you have more than probable cause to make an arrest ..."

"...not without implicating us" Carl said with a sigh, "Look. We're in too deep now. I'm sorry about Aeris, I truly am. But we're so close ..."

"I'm just ... not sure if the ends justify the means..." Scott sighed

"Look. We're close, I promise you" Carl said, "I've tried to get Max in on other charges, he always evades them ... it's like ... he's got some guy on the inside who either tampers with the evidence or ... I don't know... he finds a way around it. I've asked him to even come in for interviews in person and he refuses... it's always just over the phone"

"And he's allowed to do that?" Scott asked

"Technically, as long as he isn't found guilty of any crime ... we have no probable cause to search his property or summons him" Carl said. "To that end, I've even reached out to our guy Trevor a few times ... figured as Lexi's ... gadget builder or whatever, he'd have some juicy information but again, he declined all my requests..."

"Sounds like you'd have to find HIM guilty of something then..." Scott said, although he was half joking. He had only met Trevor but a couple times and found him to be a rather nice man. Then again, that wasn't hard to do when one works in the shadow of Maximillian E. Mumford.

Carl heard this and his mind instantly began to kick into overdrive.

"I've... gotta go..." Carl said.

____________________

It was dingy and dark in the basement where two men toiled on a sophisticated piece of machinery, looking at a series of wires and fuses that all interconnected. One was a well known scientist in the community, known as Dr. Joseph Wright ... one of the finest (remaining) engineers at Enormo Enterprises. The other? Well he wasn't exactly the brains of the outfit.

"Can you back up please?" Joseph asked, a bit miffed as the muscular and hulking younger man seemed to be encroaching on his personal space while he had to make extra careful not to incur even the slightest slip of the hand.

"Sorry ... sorry..." Carl Townsend said in a barely apologetic tone as he gave way, pacing around the basement impatiently, "You understand all this ... stuff?"

Joseph gently closed the hatch on the small machine and nodded, although his face bore sweat from the time he had put in working on the sensitive piece of hardware.

"It's ... tricky" Joseph said, "I only know what it is because it's modeled after a bigger one we have back at the lab..."

"Hey, the less I know the better..." Carl said, taking a larger step back.

"On that end..." Joseph said, taking a look around the perimeter. "...you sure there's nobody ... y'know, upstairs or anything?"

"We're good" Carl said.

"And how can you be so sure?" Joseph Wright asked.

Carl Townsend could be "sure" their efforts would go unmonitored because the basement they dwelled in was none other than that of the green and black building known as Kekse -- a cookie cafe on the Miniborough Campus known for their exceptional snickerdoodles. While heavy foot traffic floated past the area, nobody was paying the place any mind thanks to an "expertly" constructed wooden sign boarding up the main window.

"CLOSED DUE TO TERMITES"

This sign may have turned away young paying customers not giving it a second thought but it didn't stop one officer by the name of Sonia Sanders who found herself on campus, surveying the area. There was something about the place she never had trusted and her gut told her to take a closer look -- her gut, as well as the fact that just a bit earlier she had seen some kind of spark emit from the place.

"How about a break?" Joseph said, shaking his head while the two gingerly hobbled up the creaky wooden steps back to the more extravagantly decorated kitchen, "I want to try some of these snickerdoodles that Dr. Max won't shut up about..."

While the two left the mysterious machine and its surroundings unguarded, Sonia slunk her way around the side of the building, kneeling down so she was now level with the cellar window which let in very little light.

Sonia leaned in, pulling out a penlight from her belt and shining it inside.

With even the narrow beam of light she was able to tell that something major was up -- seeing a piece of machinery that looked as dangerous as it did illegal. It almost resembled a silver claw coming out of the ground, with jagged arching sheetmetals acting as talons.

Sonia gave the window a bit of a harsh tap with her nightstick to notice it seemed pretty fragile. She'd peek left and right really quick before smashing the window in with her shoulder, hitting the concrete pretty hard.

The noise would of course alert the scientist and the thug upstairs.

Sonia lay on the ground in pain for a moment, as shattered glass lay around her. She got up to her feet finally and took a couple of cautious steps towards the machine which appeared to be inactive ... for now.

"What in the fuck is this --" Sonia began to say --

THUD!!

A quick whack in the back of the head is all it would to render Sonia immobilized as the stealhy Carl Townsend dropped the pipe with which he had whacked her, breathing tensely over her fallen person.

About halfway up the stairs stood Dr. Joseph Wright, mouth agape in shock at what he had just witnessed.

"Hey... you knew the rules..." Carl warned.

Gloria Graff was hard at work in a quiet lab. Something about watching the liquids flow through the test tubes while she jotted down results brought her some calm. She could use it too ... ever since the new semester started, she felt swamped -- not even to mention her continuing internship at Enormo Enterprises.

"Okay ... so 2.7..." Gloria muttered to herself, holding up a clipboard as she blew a tuft of her own dark curly hair from her eyesight. She paused for just a moment, glancing down to see a small ripple in the beaker of green liquid she had.

She was about to continue her studies when a loud THOOM filled the room.

"What in the --"

Then came another ... and another. Each one shook not just the lab equipment but her as well.

"Heya Gloria!" she heard a gleeful voice boom from above.

She knew that voice ...

"LEXI!!" Gloria gasped, shocked to hear her own voice was nothing more than a squeak. She grasped her own throat in shock, incredulous at the sound. "Wh-What's going on? What have you done to me?!"

"Heheheheh, silly Gloria" the delightful Lexi boomed, several sizes bigger now than the shrunken Gloria, "I shrank you -- same thing I do to everyone else ... and now we can play together and be friends forever!"

"Fuck you!" Gloria squeaked frantically, trying to run as the bubbly brunette's hand snatched her up with ease, her fingers gripping the frightened woman as if she were wielding a pair of tweezers. "Put me down!! Put me the fuck down!!"

"Awwww...somebody's grumpy..." Lexi said in a teasing voice. Gloria looked in shock to see the Giantess Lexi was now in a purple and gold cheerleading outfit, a drastic change from her previous attire of a black t-shirt. "You need a timeout, huh?"

"Lexi! This isn't a fucking joke!!" Gloria squeaked, thrashing uselessly against the powerful grip. "Let me go!! Change me back!! You can't fucking do this to me!"

"Oh I'd say I already have..." Lexi giggled, carrying the tiny Gloria over to what happened to be a dollhouse. "You're just so CUTE! I couldn't help myself!"

"I am NOT cute!" Gloria pouted, still wearing her white lab coat but she was pretty much just a doll now ... the clothes feeling more and more like Barbie clothes than the ones she started with. "I am a ..."

"Tiny little toy..." Lexi giggled, finishing the sentence for her. "Now here... you need to chill out"

"Lexi!!" Gloria snapped, then noticing that she was being hovered over the chimney of the dollhouse, "LEXI!! Don't you dare --!!"

"Whoopsie doodles!" Lexi said in a very sing songing voice, watching her tiny victim plummet down the chute of the chimney as if it were a straw.

Gloria would let out a shrill scream as her environment grew narrower and narrower until she blinked a few times, trapped inside one of her own science beakers.

"No!! No!!" Gloria screamed, her frightened reflection staring back at her, although she felt something against her back, as if she weren't alone, "This can't be happening!! Let me go!! Let me out!!"

"It's not so bad..." Gloria heard another voice say.

She turned in shock to see Rachel Rutchmann -- the "old" Rachel before her transformation, although she was also stuck tiny and in the beaker with Gloria, her back facing the fellow tinyt woman.

"You get used to it..." Rachel said with a shrug.

"FUCK!!" Gloria screamed, finding herself dripping in sweat back in her own bed, the sheets disheveled as she had almost fallen off the slanting mattress.

She looked around her room and noticed something most alarming.

"Shit, I'm late for work!" she yelped, getting up and hurrying to her closet to get ready.

She was so tired of the nightmares ... she was never going to let Alexis Cole belittle her again...

_________

It was the day of the big game and while Lexi was excited, she was also a bit nervous and saddened by her latest argument with Leah ... So many things had her heart in knots, much like the garlic knots she saw placed at an adjacent table while she sat in her stiff red booth at Minima's Pizza awaiting the arrival of her friend Molly Anderson.

Lexi glanced down at her phone before placing one more call to Sonia, only to receive another concerning non-answer. It wasn't until much later that Lexi noticed she had missed a call from the reliable police officer. Since then she tried to call her a few more times but with no answer. She hoped it was nothing super concerning. Right when Lexi was about to put the phone away, she saw a call from Josh incoming.

"Yeah Josh?" Lexi asked, "How's our newest science whiz doing? Hopefully not feeling too nervous about filling Trevor's shoes?"

"Heh, I'm something of a scientist myself...." Josh bragged, "it's no big deal ... although I did wanna tell you about something interesting I found while digging through the files on the Delta Project..."

"Oh lord..." Lexi groaned, leaning her face on her hand. How she rued the name of that dreaded project. She'd much rather call it something fun like the Shrinky Project or Smolsville ... "What's the bad news?"

"Well technically in your case ... nothing" Josh said, "but the intended Project Delta, when it was completed was to have a component to it that ... well, just kind of skeeves me out, personally"

"Moreso than size manipulaton on human beings?" Lexi asked

"Yeah ..." Josh said, "well at least you seem to be able to change your size at will"

"Meaning...?" Lexi asked, scanning the crowded restaurant for any appearance from Molly.

"The original designs had prototypes for a remote control ..." Josh said, "they were basically attempting to sell this technology to the military and create some kind of super soldier ..."

"Ugh, sounds so comic booky..." Lexi scoffed

"...nothing wrong with comic books ..." Josh said defensively, "but in this case, I suppose ... the full extent of the experiment would see candidates receive extra strength and even speed depending on their size change ..."

"and the remote was...?" Lexi asked

"Basically, the operator, or the one who held the remote could also override the parameters of the project..." Josh said, reading over a part of the project description that was littered with yellow caution markers.

"Meaning?"

"In other words, if somebody got too ... unruly... perhaps started growing out of control ... the remote would shrink them back to normal ..." Josh said

"Yeah I see what you mean now ..." Lexi said, "that would kind of skeeve me out too ... so basically the operator or whoever had the remote could change the other persons size without their consent?"

"Yeah ... but I mean, you'd assume anybody holding that much power would be ethical about it..." Josh postulated

"We're talking about Mad Max here" Lexi said with a groan. Of course he would design such a ridiculous countermeasure.

"Well, I guess it's a good thing the project never got finished then..." Josh said

"Hey! That's not technically true!" Lexi said with a smirk, noticing Molly waving to her from the entrance of the restaurant as she strolled up from the area with the retro looking jukeboxes on the wall, "Anyway ... I gotta let you go ... you sure you can't come to the game tonight?"

"I'm sorry Lex ..." Josh said, "I'll have it on TV though ... just have to finish transporting some of this gear from Aztek back to my house..."

"Okay science nerd... nerd on" Lexi said with a grin as Molly took her seat.

"So..." Molly said, "you excited about tonight?"

"Mondo" Lexi said, grinning as she plucked a menu free from behind a napkin dispenser, handing Molly one as well, "Glad you were able to come out here and chill with me one more time before, well..."

"I'll still be here for the weekend..." Molly said with a shrug as she perused the menu, "although yeah ... probably going to be busy with team drills and stuff ... after the series, we go back to Texas"

"You ever think about ... moving back here?" Lexi asked curiously, giving her friend one of her sappy (even if unintentionally) smiles

"Once in a while, yeah..." Molly admitted, "But I like Texas ... the food's cool, the people are cool ... plus the boys"

"Heh, you must be quite the hit down there" Lexi winked

"Eh, I .. uh ... I do okay" Molly said with a blush, "But honestly? I just want to enjoy this moment a bit longer ... it's been really nice seeing you again, Lex... sorry about the other night though"

"What about it?" Lexi asked as a waitress came over to take their order. "Ummm... could we have a large extra cheesy pizza for the table to share...?"

"Hey! You didn't even let me order!" Molly teased, slamming her hand on the table in mock anger.

"Omigosh, I know you!" the waitress chuckled a bit, gesturing towards Molly, "you're Molly Anderson! We went to elementary school together!"

"Heather!" Molly said, instantly remembering, "Yes! Yes! How you been?"

"I've been well, thanks ... how are you?" Heather asked with a chuckle

"Can't complain..." Molly said, "I'm glad to see Miniborough has stayed true to its roots ... so many great people are still in the area and they've all been super nice"

"Heh, glad to hear the town's been treating you well ... hey good luck in the game tonight" Heather said before pausing, "...I'm ... I'm sorry Miss... the order was for...?"

"We'll stick with that cheesy pizza" Molly said with a grin, "and she'll have a cherry coke ... I'll have a strawberry smoothie please"

"Hey, I never said I wanted a --" Lexi started before shrugging. Cherry Coke WAS one of her favorite drinks. She simply nodded to confirm the order as familiar face from the past, Heather took the menus and stepped away. After enough time had passed, Lexi decided to shift the conversation back to its prior state. "...now what did you mean by ... sorry about the other night?"

"Just seemed like I ... I don't know ... interfered with something?" Molly said in a guilty tone as her usually cheerful eyes peered downwards at her lap. "You and Leah seemed a bit ... eh... and same with that new guy ... Jason, was it?"

"Justin" Lexi said, not particularly liking the mere fact of saying his name. Lexi could be very loving but also tough when it came to forgiving.

"Yeah ... just felt some like ... I don't know ... bad vibes...' Molly said with a bit of a shiver, "...sorry if I'm reading too much into it"

"No... no, you're right" Lexi sighed, her cell phone trembling in her hand as she had it perched on her lap in the event she decided to change her mind. She didn't want to be the first to text or reach out to Leah after the fight but a part of would be very sad if Leah didn't show up to the softball game tonight for the first pitch... then again, Lexi felt she probably deserved it after missing her best friend's fashion show night. "Leah and I are just ... having a sort of fight"

"I'm sorry to hear that ..." Molly frowned, "I also got the impression that Leah doesn't like me very much..."

Lexi tsked and thought for a moment, trying to tactfully approach the subject.

"If she's mad at me, you can tell me" Molly said finally, "I'd rather there not be any bad blood between any of us, especially when I'm leaving in just a couple of days"

"Ther's ... no ... you're fine. She doesn't know you that well is all... it's been a while and she can be a bit shy" Lexi said, "besides I'm the one who let her down..."

Molly shook her head

"I refuse to believe you could let ANYONE down... your Lexi programming wouldn't allow it" Molly joked. Lexi forced a smile, deciding to keep her mood as light as possible. "But hey if you really believe you did anything THAT bad ... it couldn't hurt to apologize ... clear the air... you two have been best buds for what?"

"Basically our whole lives..." Lexi said with a sheepish shrug.

"Yeah ... so just ... tell her how it is and ... I'm sure you two will be tight again in no time, yknow?" Molly said with a grin as their drinks arrived.

"Thanks Molls..." Lexi said, smiling for a moment before another regretful look crossed her face, "I'm gonna miss you when you leave..."

"I know ... I'll miss you too Lex" Molly said offering her glass for a momentary clink. "But hey, I'm like a tumbleweed... I'm sure I'll be blowing by again sometime..."

Lexi couldn't help but grin at the comment. It was something right up Lexi and Leah's alley, after all.

_______________________

Sonia Sanders let out a long winded wheeze as she came to, in total shock, just as Justin had been. In fact, a quick glance to the right would show Justin just beside her in a matching glass tube. She looked around, feelng as though contained in a fish tank, her arms barely able to move, along with her legs. She gave the young man, Justin Wright a concerned look as if to check on his well being non-verbally.

Before she had much more time to surmise her whereabouts, in walked the hulking mad scientist, wearing a blue pullover and casting a menacing silhoutte. None other than Dr. Maximillian E Mumford. Sonia tried to keep her breath as steady as possible, trying to remember her stress training. This was not a situation that any amount of training could adaquately prepare anyone for.

"What ... the actual ... fuck were you thinking?" Max said, looking at his associate Oliver Skaggs.

Sonia vaguely recognized the man, thinking he might have had a brief stint with the Mini Troop before being booted off the force.

"What? Carl gave her to me... he caught her at the cookie place..." Skaggs started to explain but it was obvious Max wanted to hear nothing more of it, a dog sized Maximite clomping in behind him. In short order, Max had turned a couple of extra robotic creations into a small army, and the extent to which his machinery had evolved was simply astounding if not extra frightening. Quickly Sonia was snapped out of her current trance by the continuing bickering of the middle aged scientist with his thug like accomplice.

"I do not need the whole story!" Max snapped, "You brought my a cop!! A police officer!! Do you realize how RECKLESS that is?!"

"Sh-Should I have killed her?" Skaggs asked, honestly not sure how to respond.

"I don't know ... killed her ... buried her... SOMETHING!! Yes!!" Max answered in his prototypical loud panic of a voice, "Don't BRING HER HERE ON MY FRONT DOOR!!"

"...actually I went in through the back..." Oliver said dumbfounded

"...you really ARE only hired for your brute strength, huh?" Max quipped

"Thank you, sir" Oliver replied

"...that was not a compliment!!" Max shrieked, slamming his hands down on a panel.

At this point, the escalating volume of the interaction was sure to garner anybody's attention, even in the closed lab on the lower levels of the large facility.

One thing was clear as Max reared his head to stare in on his pair of unwilling test subjects, Sonia and Justin -- the Mad Doctor was becoming ever more unhinged. He pressed a button on his console which set off a series of red lights just outside the room containing the chambers and the wired servers. It was an added layer of security in the form of wandering Maximechs -- larger human sentry style robots that patrolled the adjacent hallways, although the Doctor was willing to bet nobody would be foolish enough to even enter anywhere near the forbidden lab.

After all, he hadn't chosen this room on accident ... this was the same room ShrinkGirl had gotten her shocking start.

While he wasn't too worried about bystanders, he did have one concern remaining as he sneered at Sonia Sanders through the cold hard glass.

"Eventually they will come looking for you ..." Max snarled, "that pesky MINI TROOP!! I'm sure it's only a matter of time before they discover you're missing and then all my plans will be KAPUTT -- but NOT if I start the experiment soon ... I would've preferred more test subjects but there's nothing wrong with starting here with ze two..."

Max took a seat and swung that seat towards a monitor showing biometric data on both of his subjects as well as the two tubes next to them that remained unoccupied. He was but a moment away from initalizing a test run when he could swear he heard something. A sort of clattering. He took a peek around the corner, not seeing anybody but it seemed that one of his patrol bots was occupied, as if having seen something. This gave the mad doctor a bit of pause as he stepped out of the room, taking his cell phone with him.

__________________

Back at the Mini Troop, there weren't too many Officers currently in their offices. Some had gone on patrol or even taken off for the day, invigorated by the excitement of the upcoming softball game and the live appearance by ShrinkGirl.

One Officer remained glued to his seat, going through steadfast research on everything he could dig up on Trevor Hoffnung ... or Hilfmann.

"What ... are you hiding?" Carl muttered to himself, scrolling through files on the Doctor from his time with Enormo Enterprises.

Before he could get too much further however, a frantic Officer walked into his office, startling him as he peeked up to see Officer Chas, a blonde haired rookie who had had his own dealings with ShrinkGirl at one time, having his life saved by her in a drone attack that took place over that past summer.

"Officer Scolex, sir!" Chas said, appearing frantic and out of breath

"Yes, Officer?" Carl asked, sounding more annoyed than anything.

"It's Officer Sanders, sir..." Chas said, "she had called me about some kind of weird occurence on the Miniborough University campus ... said she might need back up..."

"Ugh for fucks sake..." Carl sighed, "I told her that was a dead end..."

"I was inclined to agree, sir..." Chas replied, "But I did owe her a favor and I was heading that way anyway..."

"Did you find anything?" Carl asked, a strange suspiciousness in his tone.

"Well ... yes actually" Chas said, "Sonia's car was in the parking lot but not her ... and I went to that KEKSE place ... it was closed ... had a strange sign saying "CLOSED DUE TO TERMITES" but it was ... completely dark on the inside ... no sign of anyone..."

"So what do you think happened?" Carl asked

"I'm afraid she could've been kidnapped or something, sir" Chas said, "I've tried calling her comm for the past couple hours but nothing ..."

Carl sighed, rubbing his aching head in worry before he heard a loud rattling coming from his drawer. He looked down at it, trying to ignore it even as it persisted. He also tried his best to retain eye contact with the worried Officer Chas.

"Well sir? Should we send a search party?" Chas asked, "I'm ... not sure where she could have gotten off to but she had mentioned something about Enormo Enterprises being the reason for her suspicion and if I may suggest ... I've been a bit on edge about them too ... ever since they opened that new Fenster Forest location, there's been a lot of strange things happening..."

Carl paused -- the phone pulsating in his drawer like some kind of tell tale heart.

"I'm afraid I can't justify a search party for a missing officer because of some ... strange things..." Carl said

"But sir --"

"I'm going to need something with more substance..." Carl said sternly, hoping to dissuade the rookie Officer as much as possible with his lingo. "But keep my posted ... if you don't hear back from her soon, I'll come with you on a manhunt..."

"Sir, it may be too late by then!" Chas urged

"Those are your ORDERS, Officer!" Officer Carl Scolex barked, "Do you understand?"

"...yes sir..." the annoyed Officer groaned, leaving the room but giving the tense Carl Scolex a sour stare as he left.

Already struggling to think, Scolex was further agitated by the return of the phones vibration as it rumbled yet again within his sealed drawer. This time, he picked it up, thinking nothing of yelling at the caller on the other line.

"What?!"

"Officer Scolex!!"

"....Maximillian..." Carl sighed. "This is really not a great time..."

"This is not a great time for me either..." Max said as a he paced the halls of his facility, looking each way upon reaching a junction. "One of my men was STUPID enough to apprehend one of YOUR officers..."

"...Sonia Sanders..." Carl groaned

"Yes." Max said, "Just tell me ... how long do I have? Surely you can throw some of your Officers on some kind of petty patrol or something to keep them off my back just long enough to --"

"Look" Carl said in a stern voice, "whatever you're thinking of doing, do it now ... or soon. I've put my career at risk for you trying to track down this Alexis girl ... and I agree she's a menace but eventually this is going to fall back on me ..."

Max thought for a moment, pausing as he heard the rate of his robots steps increasing. They were getting closer to whatever or whoever they were trying to detain. At this point Maximillian was reaching the point where his plans were nearing a point of no return. It truly was now or never. Not just for Project Epsilon. For all of it.

"So you're saying ... if your Officers were to encounter ... ANOTHER disturbance ... they'd be a lot less likely to waste time and energy searching for Sonia whatsherface?" Max asked, having just cooked up another wrinkle in his plan. This one wouldn't even involve too much since he aready had something on the way for the next phase.

"I'm.... not sure how you reached that conclusion, Doctor..." Carl said, "But I suppose so, yes"

"In THAT case... you may want to divert some of your workforce to the Mini Dome then" Max smirked, "I heard the pregame show will be something rather ... spectactular!"

Carl was about to raise his voice but it would soon be to no avail as he was left stunned, muttering to dial tone.

Carl resumed his search on Trevor while simulataneously picking up his Office Phone, calling into Officer Chas who was still on duty.

"Yes sir?" Chas asked, still sounding annoyed from before.

"Officer! Send out an APB ... tell all available Officers to be on the ready at the Mini Dome!" Carl Scolex said, "We have reason to believe there may be an attack there before the big game"

"Shit. Should we start evacuating civilians?" Chas asked

"Not just yet" Carl said, "This is all still heresay ... but better safe than sorry. Especially after what happened last year with Sugar ..."

There was a pause on the line -- the tension growing palpable.

"Sir?" Chas asked

"Please, Officer ... divert whatever manpower you need to the Mini Dome" Carl said, "I'll be there as well to lend a hand ... I just need to ... follow up on something..."

Without another word, Carl Scolex slammed down the phone, his mind racing a million miles a minute as his mind made a connection based on the OTHER attack the Mini Troop had to stop. That one ended up being the doing of well known criminal Roxie Wright and her "little assistant" who had been found guilty of placing a mini explosive underneath the floorboards at the Krazy Kookie.

Carl feverishly studied notes and photos of the case, involving Rachel Rutschmann, permanently miniaturized by ShrinkGirl. She was able to evade arrest for a while using a high powered jet engine and small artillery. The real question had always lingered over the case ... where would she have been able to GET such technology? It was assumed Enormo Enterprises or maybe Roxie was more resourceful than originally thought and built her the gear.

But no.

Carl zoomed in one of the wings from Sugar Rush's tiny metallic jetpack. Whatever it is, it had been designed specifically for a tiny woman to pilot. That same technology had proved integral in committing a crime. The designer of such a technology could therefore be indicted on charges of being an accomplice. A super high-res magnification showed a barcode on the jagged edge of Sugar's gear.

"...gotcha" Carl sneered.

__________________

Back at Enormo Enerprises, the pandemonium had officially begun.

Held in the basement currently were Officer Sonia Sanders and Justin Wright -- 2 individuals whose biggest "offense" was knowing too much.

On the run was a potential third -- an elderly man who had been chased a time or two before but never by mechanical monstrosities like the ones who pursued him now. He scrambled quickly towards an elevator in the distance, the hallway appearing to grow longer and longer as he was starting to get winded.

Just ... a little ... further...

The weary scientist was in fear for his life. It had appeared Max's robots had gone haywire.

The elevator doors in front of him would open but strangely before the wayward doctor could press the button to summon the elevator.

Inside stood Dr. Max flanked on either side by two armed mechs. He tsked and shook his head as two of the mechs already chasing the man in the basement placed their gun barrels to his head. The two on Max's sides turned their gun barrels towards the guilty party. Max hung his head for just a moment before his more callous side took control again.

"...Sorry it had to be this way, Dr. Giovanni"

The work day was winding to a close at Enormo Enterprises. The once busy hallways of the large conglomerate were nearly devoid of people. Only a few people hard workers remained to wrap up on projects or perhaps they had their own reasons for being there. While very few "human" sounds could be heard, the large complex showed some signs of life with sporadic thuds and clangs that brought an unsettled feeling to the few who remained, one of them being Enormo's senior accountant, Mr. Dave Henderson who was trying to drone the sounds out of his mind by speaking with his daughter via his office phone.

"Well.... I was thinking..." the weary kindhearted man said to his daughter, "we could stop off at Del Taco Hut on the way to the game but the way things are going today I'm going to be lucky to just MAKE it to the Mini Dome in time ... anyway Leah, I hope you're doing better than ..."

"I ... don't think I'm going to the game, dad" Leah said, sounding a bit downtrodden as she sat on the bed of her dorm room, also peeking over at the brochure for Finestein University her boss had handed to her.

"What? Why not?" Mr. Henderson asked, getting ready to close out his many applications for the day and start heading home hopefully.

"Lexi and I are in a bit of a ... fight" Leah said, feeling the words hang on her tongue a bit longer than usual. Neither Leah nor her father could even remember the last time the two girls had a fight or rift of any sort. No friendship is perfect of course.

"I'm sorry to hear that dear..." Dave answered his troubled daughter while occasionally glancing down the hallway that descended around a corner just past his office. Something eerie was going on at the lab, that much was for sure, but for now Mr. Henderson was more focused on trying to cheer up his daughter and maybe even play peacekeeper.

"Yeah..." Leah sighed, now clutching the college brochure in her hand. She hadn't even told her Dad about the opportunity yet. Then again, she pretty much never saw him ... between her busy school and work schedule and his insane hours at Enormo Enterprises, they only talked on the phone briefly. If nothing else, the ballgame would be a chance for them to spend some father/daughter time together.... but Leah wasn't sure she could handle any awkwardness that might ensue from seeing Lexi so soon after their fight.

"I don't want to pry..." Dave said, "I just know ... you two have been friends since like ... forever..."

"I know, Dad!" Leah said, an almost dismissive scoff in her voice, "You don't have to tell me ... Lexi is ..."

Leah paused in that moment as so many emotions tugged at her heartstrings. It was as if she couldn't come up with the words to describe Lexi.

"...I love her" Leah said, failing to come up with anything else.

"Then... you should go" Dave said warmly, "WE should go. As soon as I get out of here, I can meet you down at the stadium, okay?"

Still, Leah paused ... something she prefaced with a long drawn out breath.

"It's ... not that simple Dad" Leah said

"Maybe it CAN be" Dave said, trying her best to give his daughter a pep talk over the phone, "I'm not saying you just ... don't talk about it ... but sometimes being friends means ... well ... being there for each other.... and after the game, you two can sit down and talk about what's bothering you and ... sort it out"

Again, Leah paused.

"I'm not going to make you go, sweetie" Mr. Henderson said, "I'm just saying ..."

"I get it" Leah said, this time with a more relaxed tone, having set the college materials down on her desk as she got up now, cell phone perched on her shoulder as she made a run for her keys, "and ... I'll be there. But you better not be late, Mister!"

"Heh, I'll be there as soon as I can, sweetie" Mr. Henderson said, only momentarily distracted by a loud clang coming from down the hall. "...get us some good seats, okay?"

"You got it, Dad" Leah said with a grin, "Love you, bye"

Dave Henderson should've felt a bit happier but he too was bogged down with stress. He set the phone down and while he was glad to have had a positive impact on his daughter, he felt regretful that he couldn't be there for her more. He was so proud of Leah though, how she had made a name for herself, pursuing a career in fashion just like her mom had. Hopefully once all this "Project Epsilon" business blew over, he could take some more time off, spend time with the family. With any luck, that maniac "slave driver" Dr. Maxmillian would be out of the fold and maybe the company would get a much needed reorganization.

For now though, Dave was perturbed by the sound of a heavy metal weight as it made contact with the tiled floors of the hallway.

"Okay..." the uneasy accountant thought to himself as he wrapped up his briefcase and things and took a cautious peek outside of his door. "...what IS that noise?"

Right on cue, the noise seemed to have stopped.

Dave took a few more steps forward, about to make a beeline for the closest stairwell that would get him to his car and eventually to his car when he heard a scream. It was a young woman who's voice he didn't recognize but that didn't matter to him, he had to see what was up despite his overwhelming instincts to run.

He'd turn the corner and peek around nervously watching as a hulking silver robot with red blade-like shoulders intimidated a young secretary who screamed before finally making her escape. But the robot wasn't alone.... and now that its only human target for the moment had fled, the menacing Maximech turned its attention to the only OTHER human in the vicinity.

"Shit" Dave muttered, scampering back towards his office but he was now flanked by another Maximech.

The machines were clearly quite strong, with each step causing minor tremors. They were also fortunately slow but that didn't matter as the observant Dave Henderson could make out small gun turrets on their shoulders and arms. He'd scramble for his phone to dial 911, as if that would even help.

"9...1...."

SLAP!

Dave's phone slid to the floor, having been slapped by one of the robots extendable arms. Dave futilely fell to his knees to try and reach for it only to watch helplessly as one of the Maximechs lifted its thick metallic foot and slammed down on the phone, reducing it to microchips. Dave stood back up and yelped, seeing not only the robots but now the menacing scientist in control of them.

"Hello there, Mr. Henderson...." Max smirked, his eyes cold but his face showing elation at his latest catch. "Care to work some overtime??"

______________________


MINITROPOLIS MINIONS V. TEXAS TUMBLEWEEDS
FIRST PITCH 6:35 PM
SPECIAL GUEST SHRINKGIRL
FIRST 5000 FANS GET A FREE SHRINKGIRL BOBBLEHEAD

_____________________________________________________

The scene at the Minitropolis Minidome was perhaps more electric than it had ever been as the big game was getting ready to start. It was perhaps the most attended game since the Minidome had opened, with people crowding the turnstiles and exuberant children eager to snatch up their ShrinkGirl bobbleheads if they had been so lucky to arrive early.

Lexi meanwhile was absolutely overwhelmed despite her attempts to the contrary. She realized the crowd wasn't there to see HER, and instead the athletes on the field but she felt such a pressure to perform and do well. She currenty resided in the home dugout sitting alongside the players for the Minitropolis Minions.

"Lexi...." Nicole said, wearing her purple pinstriped jersey bearing the MINIONS logo in bold sporty font, "The girls and I are honored to give you this"

Lexi looked down a bit but then quickly back up to flash a smile to the excitable softball team as Nicole presented a large poster signed by the whole team, including Molly Anderson, who wasn't even on the team. The picture was taken directly from the girls impromptu batting practice and featured the team and Lexi laying on the grass smiling.

Lexi read the message on the top to herself before finally reading it out loud, her voice breaking just a bit.

"To our smallest fan ... Lexi AKA ShrinkGirl ... signed your local Minitropolis Minions...." Lexi said, choking up, "Oh ... this is so beautiful, ladies, you didn't have to do this..."

"Psh, now you're going to throw her off for her big moment" one of the players snickered.

Lexi blushed bright red, also wearing a Minions jersey, although only the top part which was buttoned up over her purple tank top. She wore regular jeans besides that and a Minions hat on her head bearing the goldenrod "M" on it. This was all happening so fast. The girls were so enthusiastic. She had had a wonderful week seeing her old friend Molly and the crowd cheering which seemed to grow more and more thunderous by the moment only helped fuel her already hyperactive energy....

So then why wasn't Lexi happier?

The answer was obvious... and it rhymed with Leah Schmendersons....

"Tonight we welcome not only Molly Anderson ...." the announcer said with a booming voice as Molly stepped out onto the field. Even wearing an opposing jersey she got a whole cascade of cheers. As soon as the cheering died down, the excitable announcer continued as Lexi took a couple of cautious steps up and out of the dugout, facing the crisp green field which was illuminated by some of the brightest flood lights she had ever seen. Sure the games looked brightly lit on TV but being there in person only made her feel even more anxious as she gripped a softball tightly.

"...we also welcome our 'small town hero' ... our smallest savior ... our CUTIE CRUSADER...." the announcer quipped " .... SHRINKGIRL!!"

Lexi let out a sigh and jumped out onto the field receiving a line of high fives from players on both teams as she nervously made her way out onto the mound.

Back at his house, a busy Joshua James was unloading some computer parts he had snagged from Aztek while having the game on TV and the volume up. He took a break from his work to watch the game as the camera showed a close up of Lexi looking around the crowd with an astounded smile. It was hard not to be swept up in the wholesomeness of such a moment. Lexi looked so happy she could cry ... although a more keen observer may have noticed at least the slightest bit of heartache in the excitable brunette's heart.

Lexi took a few hesitant steps out onto the mound, pacing about as if she were a pitcher herself. Her eyes would blink in response to nearly every flashbulb that went off from the surrounding area as it curved around her. It seemed like everywhere she looked she'd see people cheering for her, leaping out of their seats (most were already ON their feet) and she'd hear the chants of the name "SHRINKGIRL" or "LEXI"

Heck, she could somehow distinguish her mother's voice out of the thousands screaming "YEAH LEXI!! GO!! GO!! GO!!"

She smiled sheepishly and waved, finally deciding to give the people what they wanted.

A quick glance down the 60 foot distance proved almost dizzying to Lexi as she stared down the catcher, one of the players of the Minions. She offered Lexi a consoling smile. Nobody expected the young rookie lady to be Sandy Koufax after all. All she had to do was lob a softball up towards the plate. She gulped down her nerves, focused on the glove that seemed to be miles away from her and wound up to throw.

Her form appeared sound but a last minute distraction threw the wannabe pitcher off her game.

However brief, Lexi glimpsed one friendly face in the crowd she couldn't be more overyjoyed to see as she made that final followthrough on her pitch.

"...Leah?"

While this all happened in "real time" Lexi felt the slow motion pull of the moment as her sudden surprise forced her to change up her pitching motion, resulting in a pretty laughable wide right toss that missed the catcher entirely. This would cause Lexi to blush bright red but the crowd would take it in stride, most refraining from laughing and the majority offering a sort of sympathy applause.

Lexi would feel "okay" about the incident -- definitely cheered up to see Leah in the crowd, and sitting close enough that she could practically jump the wall and hug her but she couldn't help feeling this low rumbling in her chest.... actually ... that wasn't her chest.

Up in a sky box, one of the promotional managers of the event was perplexed as he watched a large orange blimp flying just overhead -- so low to the stadium that it was causing a disruptive rumble to everybody down on the field level. He'd place a quick call to another of his staff.

"Hey ... why's the blimp so low?" he'd ask

"I have another question..." the panicked staffer would answer, "why IS there a blimp at all?"

The answer for that would soon become crystal clear ... and it wasn't a good one.

Josh, meanwhile, still having the game on, felt for Lexi for missing the pitch but then quickly shifted his focus upon seeing the blimp shrowd the stadium in darkness.

"...this isn't good"

Almost simultaneously, Trevor Hoffnung was watching the game activities unfold while he sat in the nearly empty store room of Aztek Parts & More and saw the same thing, having nearly the exact same reaction.

The large scale blimp cast a dark shadow over the entire park and to make matters worse, it seemed suspended in midair instead of simply passing by the stadium. Lexi looked up with a scowl. Something wasn't right. She squinted to get a better look at the assailant blimp, only to read something disturbing scrolling across a digital marquee on the side of the blimp.

"TODAY'S GAME BROUGHT TO YOU BY ENORMO ENTERPRISES...."

"Hello everyone!" a cackling voice came ringing out from overhead. Almost instantly the players began to scatter, except for Lexi and Molly who was standing beside Lexi, also concerned and frozen in fear, "Hope you're enjoying the game! You don't want to go anywhere and miss the pregame show!!"

From outside the stadium, the Mini Troop was already on the move, flashing red and blue lights erupting as some officers left their cars to go inside and hopefully stop the developing chaos.

"Hello there, Fraulein Alexis!!" a cocky Dr. Max quipped, his image appearing on a jumbotron on the side of the blimp, "Nice pitch ... NOT! Looks like someone needs to work on their curveball ... well here comes a curveball for YOU!!"

"Who IS this clown?" Molly quipped, looking over at Lexi

"He's a doofus ... but extremely dangerous ... you need to go..." Lexi said

"What? I'm not gonna ditch you Lex" Molly said, bearing her fists. Lexi looked over and shook her head.

A loud clanking sound gave way to a hydraulic WHOOSH as about a dozen of Max's upgraded Maximechs fell to the field with a commanding slam, shaking the ground and the bystanders around, including Molly who fell back in shock. Maybe she WASN'T prepared for what was to come.

"Molly, my dear..." Dr. Max said in his staticky tone of voice, "I understand you're a Minitropolis native .. welcome back to the city .... may I give you the TOUR?!"

Lexi yelped, jumping in front of Molly to prevent her from being wrapped up in a thick metallic lasso that came snapping her way. Unfortunately this left Lexi worse for wear as the lasso device came with an added punch in the form of an electrical shock that surged from her body, sending her writhing to the floor in pain.

"Lexi!!" Lexi's mom screamed from the stands while Molly watched on in horror as well.

"We've gotta do something!" Lexi's dad said but was quickly seized by the arm by an officer.

"Sir ... Miss? We need to get you out of here..." the Officer said, forcefully escorting Lexi's parents from the pandemonium before things got worse. Other cops were getting involved in getting the remaining spectators towards the exits, although there were so many, it would likely take too long to evacuate them all as many flooded the gates to try and get out.

"That's our daughter down there!!" Mrs. Cole screamed.

Down on the field, Lexi grunted, trying to get up before feeling a forceful yank on her arm. Another robot had her restrained just enough to keep her from getting up, and so she tried to drag herself towards Molly, despite suffering from blurry vision and a bit of wooziness from the brief zap. That's all she needed now was her powers acting up again.

Molly backed away as much as she could, only to clank into another Maximech that had her pinned from behind. The merciless robot wrapped its arms around Molly in a bear hug, proving inescapable as Molly struggled and groaned.

"MOLLY!!" Lexi screamed, trying to pull herself free from the robot but it seemed the more she tugged, the tighter the tension got, as if she were on a choker leash.

"Worry not, Fraulein!" Dr. Max teased, as some of the robots even began to rescind into the large blimp. "She'll be perfectly fine with me ... HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!"

"You bastard!!" Lexi yelped, shrinking herself to about a half of her full height in an attempt to break free from the robots grasp. She slipped her now smaller arm free only to be bumped over by another robot. She shook herself off, growing back to full height but helpless to watch as the robot grasping Molly was beginning to ascend into the blimp.

"No!!" Lexi screamed, trying desperately to fire her grappling hook onto the talon like leg of the robot as it crept closer. Before she could line up the shot, she'd be struck by one of the attacking Maximechs, clanked squarely in the jaw.

In the stands, Leah Henderson could watch no more of this. Despite her better judgement, the lanky brunette climbed out of her seat and vaulted over the wall onto the field to try and help her best friend, soon realizing just how outmatched she was as 3 Maximechs froze her in her place by turning guns on her.

"Lexi!!" Leah screamed

Lexi turned around, ducking another punch from the lumbering android and dashing over to Leah, standing in front of her.

"Leah! What are you doing down here? This is dangerous!" Lexi sighed, watching Molly get taken aboard Max's blimp. "...and I've gotta save Molly"

Leah nodded, before looking even more worried. Lexi took note of this even as they were slowly getting surrounded by robots.

"Everything okay, Lee?" Lexi asked

"...I haven't heard from my dad since I got here ..." Leah said with a quiver in her voice, "he said he'd meet me here but since we talked, nothing ... and if Max is on the loose..."

Lexi nodded

"I'll take care of it ... or ... at least I'll try" Lexi sighed, before noticing a flashing light behind Leah. It was no flashing light though but rather the glowing arm cannon of a Maximech as it prepared to take its shot. "Shit! Look out!"

Lexi dove onto Leah to prevent her from being shot, and the laser struck one of the other bots instead. Leah groaned but nodded.

Lexi got off Leah and began unbuttoning her jersey, revealing the purple ShrinkGirl tights underneath. She then unbuttoned her jeans a bit to reveal the SG belt buckle just underneath.

"You .... had your costume on under the jersey?" Leah asked, a bit perplexed as Lexi helped her up.

"You never know when ..." Lexi started, then turned quickly to notice another bot about to fire. She hugged Leah, shrinking them both so that they avoided the blast. "...this could happen"

"Where are your ... bullet blocky things?" Leah squeaked, looking around at the now giant robots.

"They're in my purse ... back in the dugout ..." Lexi sighed. "Hold on ..."

"Hmm?" Leah asked confused, before watching Lexi grow back, leaving Leah tiny on the grass. Lexi would scoop her tiny best friend up into her hand and begin to sprint, trying to be as careful as possible with Leah's tiny body. Lexi came to a cold stop as a couple of Max's robots leapt ahead of her, cutting off her path to the dugout.

"Leah ... uh ... you trust me, right?" Lexi asked sheepishly, looking down at her tiny best friend and then glancing up at the robots with their glowing red eyes as they took aim.

"I guess I don't have much of a choice..." Leah squeaked with a shrug, turning bright red.

Without much warning Lexi took a deep breath and swept Leah into her cleavage, causing the tiny brunette to squeak a bit frustrated.

"Really??" Leah squeaked, struggling a bit between her best friend's breasts.

"There's no pockets in the costume!" Lexi sighed, diving forward and going into a sprint.

Leah squeaked and groaned, feeling a bit woozy from all the action. Lexi finally found her purse and dug into it, fetching out her wrist gauntlets and more importantly the miniaturized ShrinkMobile which was currently about the size of a Hot Wheels car. Lexi involuntarily giggled just a bit from the motion of Leah thrashing about in her bra.

"Hehehehehe, Leah stop...." Lexi smirked, "that tickles"

Leah gave Lexi a bit of an annoyed glare. She was not amused.

Lexi carefully plucked Leah out and sighed, looking at her with very sorry eyes.

"Leah ... I'm really sorry about everything..." Lexi sighed deeply, "I should've looked into Justin ... and I should've just paid more attention in general ... I'm really sorry I missed your show ... I know how much it meant to you and ..."

"Lexi..." Leah squeaked, "It's okay ... I promise"

Lexi gave her tiny best friend a half smile but still appeared sad.

"Lex ... I ..." Leah squeaked before hearing more crashing and screaming from the bleachers just above them. Lexi let out a gulp. "Th-This may not be the right time..."

"Right..." Lexi sighed, setting Leah down and shrinking herself now as the duo hopped aboard the ShrinkMobile.

Lexi started the car, backing up and performing a K-Turn before flooring it out of there.

"So THAT'S how it felt that time you were in Mara's bra?" Leah asked curiously, "...super weird"

"We ... don't have to talk about that ever again if you don't wanna..." Lexi blushed as she continued driving, now entering the pavilion.

"Eh, we're best friends, Lex" Leah said, "theres nothing we don't do together ... not sure we NEEDED to do that but ... LOOK OUT!!"

Lexi yelped, swerving to avoid a foot as people were on the run, frantically clearing out of the Mini Dome.

"Ugh I need to get us somewhere clear of these people before I grow the car back" Lexi sighed, flooring it and weaving methodically between the shoes of the scared citizens as they all fled to their vehicles. Leah almost couldn't bear to watch, keeping her head down on the dashboard as the reckless driving unfolded.

"You can open your eyes now, hon" Lexi said, having grown the car back now that they were in the parking lot. She slowly drifted up on Leah's Toyota, causing her best friend to give her a confused look. "You need to go Leah ... please... it's not safe"

Leah sighed, climbing out of the Shrinkmobile now to see the horrid scene as it unfolded all around her. Police cars had the place surrounded but it was futile to stop Mad Max, even as his blimp drifted out of sight at an incredibly slow pace, clearly on a collision course with the biggest building in the city -- Enormo Enterprises monolithic main facility.

"Lexi..." Leah said, before climbing into her own car, "Please be careful"

"I'll do my best..." Lexi sighed, taking a deep breath, adjusting her mirrors and slamming on the accelerator. "....next stop, Enormo Enterprises!"