Rising Shards

When Laenie was in her full beast form, she generally had one focus. Since the Exa form was brought on by intense emotions, when her mind was in a simpler, more feral state, it matched whatever had brought it on. Frightened by a fang cleaning machine? Exa Laenie gets big to hide up at the ceiling. Sad about missing the last pink cupcake? Exa Laenie shows up to dig a big hole to wallow in. This time, Laenie had gone into Exa form in a rage filled but protective mood. Aira had been taken by jet drones flying high above, and only Laenie’s larger form could help here. She had to rescue Aira. Nothing else mattered.

Laenie tried leaping as high as she could. She could get somewhat close to the drones, close enough to hear Aira screaming, but not enough to reach her.

* * *

Aira could always sense it, at least she told herself that, when Laenie changed into her beast form. So even though she was being gripped by robots that were zipping around at ridiculous speeds, she could still almost feel it when Laenie turned. She could really tell Laenie had transformed when she felt a gust of wind from beneath and heard a guttural growl.

Laenie wasn’t the best planner in her beast form. She generally just broke things or ran away, so Aira had to think fast. If she timed it right, she could teleport right to her. But if she missed, she risked just getting caught again and burning out her powers in a pointless back and forth game. Then she’d be in danger of falling all the way to the ground, which would be really bad. Aira didn’t have her bloodsaber either, and the force of the drones was starting to make her dizzy. Things were piling up and if she didn’t act fast, this was going to get a lot worse.

* * *

Jumping wasn’t working. Even in beast form Laenie could tell that much. But how could she save Aira? The drones were zipping around in patterns too confusing for Laenie to follow.

Something light and kind of slimy landed on Laenie’s face. It took a few seconds after she’d already tasted it to see that it was a slice of ham from one of the lunches Aira made. She howled in joy when another plopped a few feet next to her. She rushed to it, but stopped before eating, looking up to the sky. She could smell more food up there. Aira was holding more sandwiches, waving as best she could in Laenie’s direction.

* * *

One of the best ways Aira had found to communicate with Laenie in her Exa form was food. Sometimes when she’d beast up, it was the only way she could get through to her, especially when Laenie hadn’t had lemonade before turning. Generally, lunch meat worked the best, which was one of the reasons Aira had made so many sandwiches. Luckily, she’d pocketed a few after the group’s lunch (more in case Aira herself got hungry again but this worked out for Laenie.

It was incredibly difficult to get her bearings enough to tell, but once she did, she saw the drones weren’t particularly bringing her anywhere. They were looping in paths that were somewhat like eights, over and over. After she spotted this, she got out the sandwiches and timed it for Laenie, bringing her into position in the center of the flight path, where the drones dipped a little.

Now that she’d gotten Laenie’s attention, she had to be more precise than she’d ever been, and in a way that a giant, less intelligent monster version of Laenie could understand all the way on the ground. With some frantic points and a few more ham slices, she had to hope Laenie understood, especially as she readied her last bait: the last full sandwich. With the other slices of bread mushed into it a bit leftover from the lunch meat she’d already thrown.

Aira mentally counted down until she was in the proper spot to throw again, hoping that Laenie would understand that this would be the last shot.

* * *

Laenie’s eyes were locked onto the secondary prize dangling above her. Rescuing Aira was still priority, but Aira was also offering a sandwich. Sometimes when void fighting, Laenie would end up in her monster form. One of those times, Aira had thrown some food at a void monster to see if Laenie would go after it, somewhat as a joke, and somewhat as a test. The first time Aira had done it, Laenie said it felt pretty demeaning afterwards once she was back to normal, but here it could help her save Aira.

Aira readied the sandwich, and Laenie felt herself drooling as she prepared to jump for it.

A lot happened in the brief moments of Laenie’s jump. First, she got the sandwich almost to the second Aira dropped it and devoured it immediately, and it was delicious. As the arc of her jump reached its highest point, she saw that the drones were much closer, this time in reaching distance. She reached out immediately for their throats, grabbing two in her hands. The drone holding Aira let her go, and she teleported instantly to Laenie’s side, clinging tightly to her. A horrible split second of wobbling as the jets tried to keep everyone flying ended quickly when Laenie started smashing them together. One was destroyed immediately, and the other was rendered pretty useless, and started a slow, gentle descent for Laenie and Aira both like a paraglider. Laenie dropped the destroyed drone and held onto Aira as they safely returned to the ground.

“Thanks buddy,” Aira said, nuzzling into the warmth of Exa Laenie’s fur.