Empire: That's News
By Gator




"If you would be so kind..." Siera had the entire cube put in a carry bag by the elderly port clerk.

"Some wants ta smash 'em. Me, I got mine filled wit' water and gold fishes in it. It's real purty." she carefully places the clear plastic in and tapes the flaps of the bag closed. "'Cours, there's care instructions if ya wanna' keep 'em livin' for a while." the woman indicated a brochure put out by a humanitarian group, urging everyone to keep the wildlife in the cubes safe.

"Yes, thank you." Siera put a stray lock of blond hair behind her ear before pulling her sunglasses back down over her eyes. "Have a nice day."

"You too dearie. An' give 'em hell!" the woman shook her fist enthusiastically.

"Oh, it's not mine." Siera said over her shoulder. She went outside and got in the news van with Kevin Milner the camera man for channel 633 news. He lit a cigarette and they were off in the white van with huge letters on the side and a picture of an archaic dish with an actual curve on it.

"You're late." He grumped between puffs

"Sorry, the shuttle didn't arrive on time because of the storm."

"What-ever-I-don't-care" he waved at her like she was the nuisance he thought she was. In actuality she was sorry, it's just that very very few people in the city are cincere.

***

"Becaus I said you were putting Morelle in the steno-pool!" Ilene was arguing with the human resources manager. "Then get a steno-pool and put Pat Morelle in it!" she talked down to the guy like he was a retarded child.

"We're back." Kevin threw his wet jacket down on the floor.

"Use the... never mind. You barbarian." Ilene hissed at Kevin. If it wasn't for the fact that he was the only man on the planet that turned her on, she would have had him fired months ago.

"Whatever. Give it to her" Kevin prodded Sierra forward with his thumb. The blond absolutely hated to be in the same universe with Ilene. But Ilene didn't even look at the thin blonde with straight wet hair.

"Now this is news. Wait. Where's their news building? I specifically ordered one with a news station!" Ilene moved her eyes to Sierra for the first time.

Sierra locked up. She wasn't a brown noser at the start, and being truthfull around her was career ruining.

Fortunately Kevin chipped in.

"They don't do requests. Ya' get one, or ya don't" he propped his feet up on Ilene's desk. Instead of getting the usual insult, Ilene was suddenly mesmerized by the cube. Her mind had alot of moving parts (most of them evil) or she would not have gotten her position. But never in her life had she looked down on an entire city block complete with transportation and people. Nothing had captured her attention this way, and it made her mad at herself for being amazed at something besides herself. After all, to Ilene Andro, nothing in the universe was as amazing as Ilene Andro!

"That's news" she said again and assembled her composure. She'd examine this thing at a later date. "Tell Ted Simms to have some micro equipment ready!" she frowned at her two subordinates. "We're doing the show that's going to win me a Shrannellia Award in an hour. Let's move it people!"

Kevin casually made himself upright again so that he could follow the skinny blonde out. "Wait Keevie." Ilene stopped the younger man. Giving him the eye, she let him know exactly what she wanted. He sighed and locked the door instead.

***

"I don't know what we're going to do Betina, all I know is she's going to try to get a story from the enemy some how." Sierra was in the news building lounge ladie's room changing into a dry uniform. Betina was probably going to be part of the crew called in to make a story out of Ilene's idea.

Betina's dark skinned features and sharp pin striped business suit couldn't hide her beach babe features. When she'd went to college to major in telecommunications, she did it so that she would know the business end when she went into acting and modeling.

Instead she was promoted to such a high position within the business end, that she would have been uncomfortable, and harder working, as an actor. So she stayed behind the scenes where she was happier than 99% of the actors and models she knew.

"Take it from me girl, don't let Ilene wear you down. You're smart and you're just as good as she is, even better. You'll make it as a news castor. You'll see." the beautiful black lady patted the shorter woman on the damp shoulder encouragingly. "Look at me. I had everyone in high school telling me I would never be anything. Now, I make more than they ever dreamed of." she assured Sierra.

"I don't know. Maybe one day." she said half heartedly.

"Okay, okay. You just stick it out girl. I can help you, and so can Bowman. You know he still has the hots for you."

Sierra just blushed. Rob Bowman was the definition of cute and handsome in her book. She didn't think Betina could possibly be right. "Maybe"

***

In room 88 the enemy box was placed on a table in the middle of a large table.



Part 2

Ilene Andro was fixing her face. A slight twitch in her cheek told the entire crew to be on thier toes, or it was the chopping block for their jobs.

It looked like any other prop sitting on the table as the crew set up equipment and got ready for this just as any other thousands of stories in their career. To them, the only news was wether or not they got a raise that year.

"Lights." Dan called as the set lit to camera quality.

"NOOO! You fool! Cut off those hot lights!" Ilene's quick attack had the lights dimmed and Dan ready for a coffee break in any other part of the universe except room 88.

"Sorry, phantom illumination!" He called out hoping to smooth out the situation. The four camera men got out filters and programmed offsets they hadn't used in years.

The room appeared as any other flourescent lit room. It gave it a droll dull appearance, not an attention grabbing scene. Ilene finally waved the make-up hand away and stepped to the chair next to the table to get her pin on communicator. It slipped right behind her ear so she could hear everything that anyone said on the set and they could hear her perfectly.

"I want close ups so tight you can smell their armpits. Got it?" she looked as if she were talking to herself as she looked over the setup screen on her computer built into the table.

Every one nodded as if she would look up and notice. (Not)

***

Varisha backed into a corner. She watched the sky with great interest. If no one in the city knew what was going on, Varisha did. She was 100% insane. The only reason she was let walk the streets again, was the fact that everyone in the city quit their jobs in lieu of hiding in the basements and shadows.

From what she could tell, she was in the clear plastic box, on a table, in a room full of cameras. Although Varisha was mad and didn't care, a subtle initiative for mischief (and survival) made her keen to try. At least try. Her long straight main of dark hair shook as she was bombarded by intense white light!

Maybe this was the execution.

Varisha jumped back like a cat, but the glow went away.

She was still alive. She lauged if that was supposed to kill her. She laughed if she was better off dead. She luaghed when she saw an immense mountain of woman sit at the table and start staring at them intently again.

"Mark! Mark! She's looking at us. Come here!" she called over her shoulder. A big burly man with a slow demeanor and appetite like a horse came forward.

"What?" he said wondering what the crazy bitch wanted now.

***

"If she's looking at us, we may get her to let us out!"

"I don't want out. We'd get killed in an instant!"

"They'd grow us stupid! Come on!"

"But my card house is almost done..."

She turned and smashed his card house he'd made out of several several decks of cards with her high heeled boot.

"That's what I think of your card house! Come on!" she urged for the last time and drug him closer to the barrier.

***

"Okay, some one forgot to set this up! Is it miked yet???"

Ilene started looking at faces as if each of them was a moron and had to wait for her to command them.

"We didn't want to break it..." Sierra said from a nearby computer terminal.

"Well I want it set up, yesterday! Kyle! Mike this thing!"

"I've never..."

"I didn't ask!"

It was a total fight from beginning to end.

It was like every last single one of Ilene Andro's stories.

***

The cheerleaders screamed as the saw hit the barrier.

Fifty college girls and some teachers went nuts trying to get away from the noise. But there was no where to hide. Some girls were on their knees clutching thier ears. It was like an AC\DC concert turned up 100%.

Daniella, the head cheer leader wrote in her diary even thought the whole mostly deserted college facility was shaking on it's foundations. "Dear diary, their cutting it open. It looks as if Trish was right. But I hope Bambi was wrong about the giant people killing us. I'm scared..."

***

"No no no. Like this!" Ilene took the cordless drill with the cut off wheel away from the key-grip and did some major destruction herself.

Kevin did a close up with his camera even though they weren't rolling yet. As a matter of fact he could see some of the people in the windows good enough to see if they had hairy arm pits. And he never never in a billion years would admit that he had a stiffy looking at Ilene ripping appart the small clear box full of people and buildings.

***

Varisha pulled Mark to the very edge of a street that dead ended into clear plastic. "You see? They want to open it up and talk to us!" she willed him to have the courage to follow her.

"But, they might just open it up to kill us?" he suggested as his knees shook. The cutting open of the box was rounding the corner and coming nearer to them every moment.

"Then we'll be the first to die! Or! The first to get our chance!" Varisha allowed that the cutting wheel did look dangerous coming their way. She ran with him into a half in tact Shrunk-N-Doughnuts shop.



Part 3

Sierra flicked her screen through some different views of what the camera men were getting. It was a place not too much unlike her own. It wasn't what she expected close up.

No millitary uniforms, no one that looked like they would kill her like an enemy. A part of her wished there was another solution to the senseless slaughter that was happening to every last on of the boxes.

She wasn't certain, but she had a gut feeling this box would not last the wrath of Ilene Andro any more that the chance they would be grown again and put back on their home planet. She sighed. Ilene raved.

"I can't hear a thing! Is this thing on?" she accused the sound man. Even though a tiny needle-phone was inserted into the box, there wasn't much going on.

"Yes ma'am. We're tuning up the frequencies now." a bodiless voice told her from somewhere off set.

Ilene looked in the sawed open box and was even more infuriated. "Where is everyone??? I need a crowd to interview!"

"Maybe their hiding in the buildings?" Sierra suggested from the off stage area. Ilene didn't bother to locate the annoying blond.

"They can't hide from news! I'm the biggest name in news! Are they so stupid they don't know their having the privalige of being interveiwed by Ilend Andro???!!!"

By now everyone in the room didn't care. They just sat awaiting further orders.

Ilene boiled.

They would sit there untill the universe ended and nothing but nothing would get done.

If it was to get done, she would have to do it herself. She fumed even more. "Allright, allright. Get my portasizer! I'm going in!" she stood and took of her jacket as if getting ready for a fight. The tiny specs were faceless tiny specs, and Ilene Andro wanted to put the news business on it's ear.

Sierra had the dirty job of presenting the portsizer to Ilene.

"Don't hand it to me! Shrink me with it!!" Ilene blared.

The thin blonde had a long loose lock of hair over her face as she just stared at her not knowing what to do. She quickly looked over her shoulder for some sort of sign. Kevin broke the ice.

"About two inches." he said and put his eye back to his camera as if it was case closed.

Sierra gulped a lump in her throat and locked eyes with Ilene. "Are you going to make it your life's work?" Ilene taunted the pretty young woman as if she were retarded.

"Um, oh, universe." she thumbed the Channel 633 unit into action and Ilene bagan to wither away like a projection of an object getting further away. Sharp little pops of static bounced off of Sierra as she held the trigger fast and sweated out the last few inches of the mega-broadcastor become doll.

"Now I can't see the box! Put me in the box!" Ilene stamped her tiny foot as if to get Sierra's attention better. Feeling on the spot, the petite blonde put her hand down so Ilene could ride it up to the box's level. "Some time today please!?" Ilene criticised her carefull slowness.

***

"The time is now!" Varisha went out and didn't care what else was going on. A giant woman had a small woman in her hand headed toward their cube. Varisha ran as quick as her high heeled boots would take her. "She's headed for the Sorority House!" Varisha called out to Mark who had very little in the way of enthusiasm about going to see a woman still taller than the very buildings of the city.

***

Ilene's sudden rush of inferiority complex suddenly turned into a rush of superiority complex as her pumps landed on the road of a very tiny burg and the road crumbled beneath her weight. The retreating hand of 'the blond bimbo' left Ilene in a city scape she could rule at a whim. "That's news" she prodded herself into action. She went straight to the nearest building and poked out some covered windows with her finger. Tiny forms moved about inside the dwelling.

"Ilene Andro, channel 633 news! I'm here to do an interview..."

***

It took several several minutes for her to become more frustrated than ever in her life. She was yelling at people many many times her size, but she was the one on the spot, and she wasn't getting the story. But she WOULD NOT FAIL! She began to beg the tiny beings. It was completely destroying Ilene's track record.





Part 4

Sierra's face stayed close to the shrunken cube as she watched Ilene Andro dominate the enitire city. People were running from her all too successfully as Ilene tried her damndest to get someone to stay still and answer a question.

It looked like a woman trying to interview mice in her kitchen. She'd never talk to any one at this rate.

"Go ahead and film!" Ilene finally yelled at the giant beings outside the clear plastic. "This is how it was! The people of this planet have absolutely no brains like... like... insects!" She roared and stomped her foot causing the sewer beneath the road to cave in and kill fifty people.

"OH! ILENE ANDRO! I'M SAVED!" A single tiny woman caught Ilene's attention.

Everyone in the room heard it, but didn't believe it. It sounded three dollar bill phony to everybody!

Except Ilene.

"You've heard of me?!" the interviewer stooped to get a better look at her one and only interviewee.

***

The Cratz building was a quiet and forboding facility.

No one had entered the building without a pass even as it was being constructed.

No camera or person was ever allowed to let it's internal set up be known. It was a large building. It was a dark building.

It was the Secret Millitary Government Head Quarters.

A single figure walked the dimly lit halls between mega amounts of security tracking and technological wonders the outside world may never see. The single mildly dressed woman had the walk of a gymnast turn kick boxer. She squared her soulders and entered a huge onyx door marked only: DIRECTOR.

"Sir, the percentile of people missing in the last 48 hours corresponds directly to names of people purchasing 'a piece of the enemy' campaign."

The single chair surrounded by computers swiveled and a lone man looked at the blond without a glimpse of emotion. In his robes and strange jewelry he looked vaguely a cross between robo cop, a priest, and Mr.T.

"I know." he said flatly and swiveled the chair back.

"Sir, you told me to keep you informed..." she knew her high paid job was always subject to change. Only Collara's cold keen senses and wit kept her making her boss happy all this time.

"You've done well. What else have you to tell me?"

"Nothing." she said with her throat becoming dry.

The chair turned back. A single eye brow raised that was the very opitopmy of evil. "Nothing? Then tell me something trivial." he said leaving his blackened eye sockets aimed in her direction.

Collara wondered if he had eyes at times, other times she wondered if the was anything that he couldn't see!

"I... I bought one for myself." she said wondering what the hell he considered trivial.

"Oh..? I'm delighted to hear it. Let me know exatly everything you do with it. And, it's your job now to find out what everyone else has done with theirs. Take a poll, a personal pole. Make a million dollar prize for the one who shows the most about their creativity. Yes. A million will make even the quietest soul talkative about their desires." He let out a small laugh that reverberated of the very marbled walls. His cheek bent into a half smile.

Even though Collara had seen and done everything, her spine turned to icey worms seeing her boss this way.

"Yes... Milenko"

***

"We have our story! Off worlder trapped in an enemy box! How many other innocent offworlders have perished? NEWS AT ELEVEN!" Ilene had seemed to have snapped. She held a tiny woman in her palm that made her the happiest cold hearted bitch on the face of the planet.

Kevin rolled his eyes as the hammy acting and the cheesy story.

A loaf of bread and they could all eat for free.

"Okay, let's put it together for real. This'll make the nine o'clock slot" Pertina said scrolling off print outs onto paper to ready the shoot.

Cameras went left and right as the production manager directed angle changes and everyone straightened up for the "live broadcast" as Ilene prepped up. "Okay, I need her bigger!" she yelled in Sierra's direction, even though she couldn't see the blonde for the reflection off of the plastic. In a moment she was rewarded with the tiny woman in her hand becoming bigger and bigger and bigger.

"Damn it! You're breaking my arm!" Ilene yelled at Sierra as she put the growing woman down. Soon, she was face to face with a very exotic looking dark haired woman.

But unlike herself, Varisha had a slutty appearance for some reason. Her hips were always moving as Ilene tried to scope out her story.

"On cue, just answer the questions as I ask them, got it? We don't have time for cards."

"Oh, I will. I will. I can't believe I'm being interviewed by Ilene Ando."

"Andro."

"Oh, it's such an honor!" Varisha bubbled adoring the raven haired reporter as if she were super woman.

Ilene just loved herself all the more. "Make up! Make up!" Ilene called and without further warning, a shrunken makeup girl was lowered into the city street next to the two women. Being slightly off on her calculations, Sierra put an 18 year old make up girl in with the two women that appered to be 10 feet tall. Both women felt like little girls as the young high school girl tried her best to make up Varisha's face to look like a battered victim.

***

All eyes were on the clock on the wall.

"Ten seconds!" a voice yelled off set.

The make up girl was hoisted out, the set music began to play and Ilene Andro turned on the volume.

"This is Ilene Andro! Channel 633 news team, and THAT'S NEWS!" She smiled at her camera and kicked off the live news feed.



Part 5

The scene outside the windows of the room was astounding.

Daniella kept scribbling as fast as her hand would move "And then the giant lady grew another woman who lives here! Maybe she really does want to interview us!" some of the other girls were already prepping their hair and getting ready to run out to see the woman who claimed to be a reporter.

Daniella's hopes went up. "I'm going too..." it was the last thing scribbled on the page with a big pink heart in the middle, left behind on a bed in a messy room.

***

"Horrible, horrible..." Varisha panted as Ilene gushed about her broadcast.

"There you have it! I stand in the very ruin of a shrunken enemy cube, and here is where we find and innocent, innocent lady who is misfourtunate enough to be caught between a war... and a hard place." She tried to look sympathetic for a moment. It was almost as phony as Varisha's acting.

"There! There's the man! He raped me. He raped me every day." Varisha said pointing at Mark who was still standing under a tree looking up at the giant women.

"Wha??" he backed up a bit. Ilene siezed the opportunity.

"Rape! Of an innocent soul in a town with no protection! This is the enemy!" Ilene stooped and pushed the tree aside as if it were an annoying weed.

"Hey! Leave me the fuck alone!" He yelled as she followed his retreat.

"This is... unacceptible! The enemy deserves justice!"

Ilene yelled after the fleeing man. He made it to a street between two buildings and began to run in earnest. It was still only a few feet from the giantess' toes.

"Oh, he was so awefull." Varisha moved her hips looking down at the tiny man who had saved her bacon on many occasions.

"Plese! For the public and for poetic justice. Would you??" Ilene asked Varisha to come forward against Mark.

The exotic eyes lit up like Christmas.

"Oh, I couldn't! But, I might." she stepped over and quickly stood in front of the tiny fleeing man. He couldn't stop fast enough. He hit the toe of her shoe at a run and fell on his ass.

"This is your very own 'piece of the enemy' to have for revenge."

"Revenge? For me? Oh, I don't know what to say." Varisha was wiggling her hips and smiling like a girl putting her finger on her lower lip. Her wicked insane eyes flashed back and forth from Ilene to Mark. "Oh, I'm so... so..."

She took as step and her toe of her boot came down on mark with a crunch. He flattened with a tiny squeel that made both women wince for a moment.

"Oh! Oh, dear!" Varisha stepped back wiping the gore off of her boot onto the crumbling pavement. "I think I stepped on him!" Varisha gasped phony as a B-movie.

"It serves him right! We cannot stop all injustice! But let this be a lesson to all who think they are above the law!" Ilene smiled into the camera with a gleem in her eye as she preached her very own sermon, news style.

***

The face of Ilene Andro made Milenko want to puke.

The news was an ape with a pistol to him. It had no idea what was going on, but was always shooting at something.

Today.

Today. They hit him. After all these years.

His 'piece of the enemy' campaign was chaos brought to civilization. The very crumbling of time itself. His face grew grimmer. If the idea that merciless killing became popular with his population again, he would be back at square one all over again. Balling his fist he called for his best, and greatest warrior. "Collara! Come!" he said venomously. The scene of Ilene Andro giving tiny autographs to a bunch of college cheer leaders came on the screen. An angry scowl creased his already dark brow.

***

"...and COMERCIAL!" Pertina called as the camera men set all controls to fade.

The rush of voices and hum drum people milling around filled the quiet set. Ilene backed away from the disgusting tiny creatures at her feet. "Okay, we've got to get some more material!" she yelled up at the sky knowing everyone was still listening to her.

Sierra's hand came back in still holding the make up girl that still appeared to be 10 feet tall. Ilene rolled her eyes. "Incompetence!" she huffed as the girl powdered Ilene's face.

On the ground Daniella ran up to see better. They mobbed at the giantess' feet. She was going to interview them! She was going to grow them! All was saved and the girls were suddenly gushing with hope that went beyond all reason.

***

Daniella was panting with excitement as she looked up at the three gigantic women. To think. In a few moments, she would be their size and she would be looking down at the rest of the city. She bubbled with pent up excitement that spilled over. Some of the girls were doing cheers from their squad that cheered on Ilene Andro now.

With a sudden movement, the Nike tennis shoe lifted off of the ground. The tallest, the make-up girl walked around Ilene fixing her face, and she wasn't looking at the ground!

It was slow motion as the shoe started moving. It was big as a van and carried more tons than a freight train.

Daniella had only time to yelp in disbelief for a second. The shoe came down on her and crushed her totally. The other girls screamed as a bloody pulp oozed out from under the sides of the abnormally white shoe.

Up above, a trio of faces looked down, but didn't see what the girls were yelling about. They thought it was another cheer.

***

"Don't dally! You must get Varisha again, and we'll take some of these.. these.. girls and grow them for the next segment!" Ilene directed the ten foot teenager.

"Yes, Ms. Andro." the freckled face tried to smile as she hopelessly tried to make Ilene look better than Varisha.

"Oh... Oh... Ms. Ando! I... I must use the girl's room!" Varisha bit her lip. She actually wasn't lying this time.

"Okay, please hurry. If you don't make it back in time, we'll shoot the next segment without you!" she warned.

Varisha was all bubbles.

The hand of a blonde woman came out of the sky and lifted Varisha free of the box. She was set on the carpet, and grown, and grown, and grown. Undoing the shrinking that had put her at the mercy of her enemy. Now she was their scale. She looked in the box. She could just minutely make out Ilene Andro's features. The rest of the girls were mere specs at her feet.

The mousy haired woman with the portasizer waved at her.

"The ladie's room is through that door way..."

With one motion. Varisha had the portasizer, and ran thrugh the door marked exit into the alley behind the news station.

Sierra's eye brows went sky high. "Hey! That's the station's property!" she took off after the escapee.

No one else on the set even flinched or cared. They merely set up for the next segment. Pertina came up with another portasizer to fix the girls Ilene had selected to be interviewed.



Part 6

Collara had never seen her boss this way. Pissed? Perhaps all this time she WAS seeing his lighter side. And now he was becoming darker. Even to her. She could hear him breathing in her ear piece. It made her wince when he began to speak again.

"You have the van?" He asked as if he were having phone sex. But Collara's brain could not fathom Milenko beside a pool lusting after women, so she couln't concieve him being excited about anything.

Her voice was terse and mechanical. "The van is on the road." she reported back. For the thousandth time she dreaded the ear piece linking her to her boss. She felt like he was intruding on her thoughts.

"Is Number One there?"

"We're picking her up now." Collara could see the woman in a trench coat walking up the city street. Her head was above the crowd. Number One was for the most part a beautifull tall woman. But her legs had been mutilated in a portasizer accident a long time ago, and her cybernetic limbs made her crazy. Made her less than human. Made her Milenko's Number One (besides Collara)

Number One was only brought in for special things. Collara was glad she didn't have to work with the six foot five inch amamzon every day.

The van's shocks snugged as the cyborg got in. One of Number One's eyes had been shot out in her last fire fight, and now part of her face was covered with chrome. Collara had nothing to say. Neither did Number One. Wiggie was twitching as he drove the van.

"I don't like it... I don't. Milenko's not right." he said man handling the van through traffic.

"Are you declining the mission?" Collara asked their driver. Of all the pick up's and drop offs Collara had done with the skinny crack head freak, she would have guessed he knew Milenko wasn't right by now.

"Yea. Yea! I'm quittin'. I quit. This shit is too much! Shrink a whole building full of people?! No. I don't like it!" he looked for a place to park the van so he could get out and run.

Of course, Milenko heard every word over Collara's head phone. He gave only one instruction.

"No one quits" he whispered to Collara.

Collara looked over her shoulder at Number One in the back. With a single nod of her head, Number One gladly took him out before he could stop the van.

Wiggie was shrunk and grabbed by Number One. Collara slid into the driver's seat like a cat. The car behind them never would have guessed the drivers just swapped.

"Not far now." Collara noticed they were already on J street and they were headed to M street.

Collara looked over her shoulder to witness a three inch screaming man go into Number One's mouth. Just like that, he was being crunched up like corn chips. Collara put her eyes back on the road.

***

Varisha could not believe how stupid her adversaries were! They were total morons! She ran two alleys up and found herself on an ordinary city street. A man was waiting for his wife to come out of a hair dressing shop on the curb. She walked toward him shaking her hips as he took notice and rolled down the window.

"Yes?"

"I need directions to the nearest Grand Galactic Hotel. Do you know where it is?" she opened the passenger door and got in his car with him. He was more than happy to oblige her question.

"Yea, see that tall tower? That's it." He pointed up the city street.

"Oh, you're a darling!" she gushed opening her top to reveal the orange caps of her nipples. Suddenly she caught a glimpse of that stubborn dumb blonde chasing her. "No time for fun." She took the portasizer from behind her and zapped him with it. She slid on top of the tiny man and the last thing he saw was a perfect athletic ass, larger than a zippy mart, coming down on him. He screamed and scrambled on all fours on the leather seat of his car, but the perfect ass was just too huge and too fast. He compacted and exploded under her immense butt cheek.

The dark haired woman still had her nipples out as she felt the little man crunch under her and she fought the slightly alien car into traffic.

***

"... and she just stepped on Daniella and... and... killed her!" one of the cheerleaders sobbed.

Ilene was doing the best job she knew how. She regretted ever being born. "Ah, that's horrible! I'm so, so sorry our make up girl stepped on your friend, but, how is it knowing your whole world has been shrunk and made into toys for another people?" Ilene tried to steer them back on track. The live feed made her wish she'd pre-interviewed these morons.

"It's bad." one of the other girls piped up. "My boyfriend Carl isn't in the thingie we were in so I haven't seen him, and my mom was supposed to take my car away because I let my sister use it to run away, but my mom isn't here either..."

"And that's all the time we have! It's obvious our enemy is victimized just like anyone else. The soldiers of this planet are no where to be seen, it is only chaos for the innocent civilians who haven't a clue to what's going on. Is it senseless slaughter? Is it justice to rape a world? I'm Ilene Andro, and that's....."

bbbbbbbbbbzzzzzzzzzzzzsssssssseeeeeeeeewwwwwwwwwwwweeeeeeeetttttttteeeeeeppppppp****************

***

Milenko's eyes closed as the transmission faded to snow. Permanently. He sighed as his hands clutched the sides of his chair. "Well done." Unlike Collara's ear piece, Milenko had her voice coming over speakers all around him so her voice was a booming presence.

"There may be an incident." she said looking at the industrial sized portasizer in the back of the van shrinking the entire city block.

"Then make and incident. Terrorism is rampant these days." he said smugly quoting Ilene Andro. (hopefully for the last time). "And bring them here to me." he ordered Collara.

"Yes boss."

She was instanly rewarded with the link being broke. Now Collara could breathe again. She didn't have his ever present breathing in her ear. She motioned for Number One to help her go out into the newly cleared off dirt and retrieve the small package in the center of it.



Part 7

"Thomson here." the mayor of Doolington answered his red phone.

"Your advisors are on the line." his secretary Hilda Griffith chirped in her cheerie tone.

"I'll take them here." Donald Thomson hated when the advisors had to call. "Thomson here."

"Be advised that a major terrorist act has just taken place! Action must me taken!" Jack Smitherman was his chief security advisor. Jack was on top of anything and everything at once. Donald Thomson grinned appreciation.

"Keep me updated." Donald took the next advisor's call.

"This is Terra Goldstien! One of our city blocks had been diminished, repeat, diminished. A terrorist activity is taking place!" Her voice was hard with hate already.

"Keep me updated." Donald took the next advisor's call.

"I advise you to back off."

"M.. m.. Milenko. Ah, Thomson here."

"You can't seem to keep the news source to yourself. I'm taking it. Any complaints?"

"N-n-----no. No complaints."

"Good. And, I watched your golf game yesterday. Congratulations on your hole in one." Milenko sat in total darkness as he talked over his secure link to the mayor.

The man was so apparently scared of Milenko, that it was a useless gesture to let him know that even his most secure play area, his golf course, was never out of Milenko's sight. But it made him happy that Donald Thomson knew his entire game was entirely known by the dark overlord of the government.

"I'll handle it." is all Donald said.

"Sweet dreams." Milenko severed the line with a digital harmonic scream that made Donald jump up from his desk chair like a rocket. It made him piss his pants! He hated that.

The next phone call was the chief of police advising him that a swat team should be called out to back up the police.

"Have the swat team go through a hostage drill before going out." Donald told his chief.

"But... a drill sir? By then they might be..."

"Understand my political standpoint. If any one of those people is hurt by accident, I'm held accountable. A drill." he slammed the phone down and took no more phone calls. "Hilda, if anyone calls, I'm not in, I'm at the golf course." He walked sternly past his secretary, she began pumping the emergency calls to everyone's answering machine in the building.

***

"Two cop cars. This is a cake walk." Number One said. Her cybernetic eye had a cross hair monical over it. Collara just drove normally as rescue vehicles were dispersed to go to a scene that was completely devoid of any wreckage. As they drove, the van went from a black shiny appearance, to a yellow delivery van with a popular rental company name on the side.

"Keep your eyes open." Collara hissed at the monster sitting beside her.

Number one just looked at her closer with her one human eye. It made Collara wince. "Then keep your eye open!"

All the way back to the Cratz Building, there were no other incidents.

***

"WE HAVE AN INCIDENT!" Pertina screamed as the power to the building was cut and emergency lights came on.

"What the fuck?!" Kevin reverted back to his back alley personality and went through the blackness to the back alley exit that that weird woman had used. He found a deserted alley, a spike of static electricity bounced off of the wall and hit him in the arm. "FUCK!" He could see the building across the street getting