This is basically the first chapter of a probably cringy fanfic i'm writing as of now. Whether you cringe or not is entirely up to you! Uh, well, enjoy I guess?
Hibiki woke up with a start. What...where...oh, right. Sitting up, Hibiki yawned as she rubbed her eyes. Looking around, Hibiki noticed Kirika and Shirabe asleep on the grassy terrain. Wait...that WAS grass...right? Hibiki stood up, seeing Chris inspecting the extremely short grass. Maria and Tsubasa seemed to be looking around the area. "Are you SURE this is grass?" inquired Chris as she tapped the extremely short, greenish looking plant material blanketing the landscape. "Yukine, you've asked that question 3 times now." replied Tsubasa as she crossed her arms and looked at the short, white-haired girl. "Sure, but you haven't given me an answer yet." replied Chris as she looked back down at the grassy terrain. Hibiki approached Tsubasa and asked "Where exactly are we? Elfnein didn't say anything about where we were going to be when we went through the wormhole." Tsubasa turned around and addressed Hibiki. "I'm not sure yet. The grass in this area seems to be incredibly small. That might be a sign of "The destroyer of worlds" like Elfnein said, but the grass seems to be perfectly green and healthy." Maria suddenly walked forwards and squatted to inspect something. "Tsubasa, come check this out." Tsubasa walked over to Maria as Hibiki went to go look at the weird looking grass. "Look at this. The tree, it's incredibly small, just like the grass." Maria gestured towards the small, bush looking tree. Tsubasa contemplated this. "We haven't figured out where we are right now, so maybe this is some kind of anomalous area?" Maria thought about that. "Maybe you're right." After all, many weird and unexpected things had happened in other dimensions. So, were they supposed to think this was out of the ordinary? Well, kind off. To be fair, all of them had woken up, having been sleeping in this new dimension when they were transported here… Maria sighed as she looked down at the tiny tree in front of her. Something was up...but what?
"DEEEEEESSSSS!" exclaimed Kirika in glee as she hopped around the grassy plain the wielders were in. Hibiki, likewise, was having a surprising amount of fun, as was Shirabe. As for Chris, she glared at the three of them, while Tsubasa and Maria led the way. The two women discussed the direction and place they were headed, considering there wasn't a portal to their own dimension when they all had woken up. Tsubasa suddenly pointed. "Over there. There seems to be some sort of city." As the group made their way over to the city they had spotted in the distance, something became VERY apparent. For one, the city was...kind of small. Hibiki noticed the fact that the buildings were….not that much taller than them. Was this...wait...was that… "That's a human, right?" said Shirabe cautiously as she pointed to the rooftop of one of the buildings. The human seemed to be gaping at the sight of, well, six GIGANTIC girls. Tsubasa spoke up. "Something is wrong. This city, it's only a little bit larger than us. Have we…?" "What, you're saying we've become gigantic?" Kirika hopped up right to the human standing on top of the building and waved. Shirabe also went a bit closer to look at the little itty bitty human... "Kirika, Shirabe, be careful-" said Maria, right before Kirika accidentally bumped into another building, the entire structure collapsing. "Huh-DE-DE-DEDDDESSSSSS?!?!?!" cried Kirika as she jumped back. Shirabe stood back as well, surprised. Maria sighed. "I said be careful...and look at what just happened…" "Wait, were there...people...in there?" asked Hibiki as she backed off, slightly terrified at that prospect. Tsubasa stared at the rubble, a little bit horrified. The others wore the same expression of shock on their faces as they looked at the rubble pile. Kirika covered her mouth in absolute horror as Shirabe and Tsubasa went to go dig through the destroyed building to see if there was anything. Breathing a sigh of relief, Tsubasa turned to the others. "No one was in here." Kirika, as did the rest of the girls, relaxed. "If there were people in there, i…" Hibiki shuddered, not wanting to think of that at all. As the gears relaxed near the city, a rather large group of people had come to spectate the extremely unusual sight of six, titan sized girls. News helicopters hovered a safe distance from the girls, with Hibiki, Kirika, or Shirabe occasionally waving. The six girls discussed amongst themselves as to what was going on, and they came to a logical conclusion-they were all giant-sized. How? Perhaps something to do with Gjallarhorn had happened, but they weren't sure. In any case, as the sun began to set, the crowds only seemed to expand, everyone wanting a look at the six girls. Unbeknownst to them, their appearance had broken national headlines, the entire globe speaking about the six titanesses who had appeared in the city of Chicago…
Nightfall. Illuminated by the crowds below and lights of helicopters, the six wielders all huddled together. None of them were sure what was going on, nor did they want to make a sudden movement to scare or potentially harm any of the people watching them. "Should we try to go somewhere else?" asked Hibiki to the others. "Probably in the morning, it's night time right now." replied Maria as she looked at the crowds several hundred meters away from her, knowing that thousands, maybe tens of thousands, of people were watching her and the others. On the flip-side, whenever one of the titanesses "spoke", it sounded like a sort of strange language, under-toned by femininity. After all, there were six titanesses, and not a single TITAN. That is, until a sudden, resounding BOOM shook the ground. Startled, each of the girls looked around, surprised. "What the hell was that?" said Chris as another boom echoed not too far away. As the crowds below started to get away and dissipate, the booms only got louder. They sounded like..footsteps? As each of the girls stood up and stood back to back, looking for the source of the footfalls, a helicopter flew a little bit too close to Shirabe's arm, the aerial vehicle hitting her elbow and spinning out of control, hitting the ground and sending up a bright flame, causing mass chaos. As each of the girls attention was caught by the downed helicopter, a sudden stomp stopped the screams and cries from the crowds below, dead silence filling the air before the sound of deep, heavy breathing could be heard. Each of the girls looked in absolute shock and terror as an enormous entity stepped into view, charcoal black scales illuminated by the flames. Giant clawed feet. Legs thicker than a blue whale. Broad shoulders set atop a massive bulky body. An enormous whip-like tail that swung behind him like a snake. A gilled neck. A small, boxy head that resembled a dinosaur with small, needle-sharp teeth bared in a snarl. Enormous dorsal plates on the creature's back. And fiery, orange eyes that burned with a primordial fury so intense they could give a lesser being a heart attack. Then, it roared.
"SKREEONK!!!"
The titan towered over even the gears, his gigantic form rising around 20 meters over the tops of the girls heads. The giant stomped forwards again and broke into a sudden dash that belied the creatures bulk, slamming into Maria suddenly like a bulldozer. The sheer weight of the beast was enough to throw Maria away like a ragdoll, the coral-haired woman being launched away like she weighed nothing. "Maria!" cried Tsubasa as she attempted to use her symphogear, but the titan body-slammed Tsubasa next, knocking her into a building so hard the entire structure collapsed on top of her. The remaining gears except Chris were too much in surprise and shock to do anything, but the titan figured out Chris's intent so fast it was almost unreal. The titan grabbed Chris's shoulders with his clawed hands and swung her into another building before tail-whipping both Kirika and Shirabe in one go. In a matter of less than 30 seconds, every gear user was knocked out except for Hibiki. The girl stared at the enormous monster approaching her, too immersed in fear to try and sing. The titan roared before punching Hibiki straight in the chest, the sheer force of the blow enough to send Hibiki reeling. The girl hit a building, the structure crumpling in upon itself as it folded to support Hibiki's weight. The last thing Hibiki saw before losing consciousness was the form of the titan roaring into the night sky, his form reflecting the blazing flames around him.
This was a world of monsters.
Symphogear X Godzilla
Moderator: GodzillavsJason
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GmkGoji
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Symphogear X Godzilla
Heiki, hecchara!
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GmkGoji
- Gotengo Officer
- Posts: 1852
- Joined: Mon Dec 17, 2018 5:10 pm
- Location: Liyue Harbor
Re: Symphogear X Godzilla
Chapter 1 revised and edited.
Chapter 1: World of Monsters
Blinking the sun out of her eyes, Hibiki yawned as she sat up and rubbed her eyes. Immediately, she noticed that she was in her civilian clothes. Strange, she could have sworn she had transformed as usual before passing through Gjallarhorn. Reaching up, she quickly confirmed the comforting presence of Gungnir around her neck. Looking around, Hibiki noticed Kirika and Shirabe asleep nearby on the grassy terrain. Wait… that was grass… right? Hibiki stood up, Maria and Tsubasa seemed to be looking around the area, while Chris was crouching down nearby, her attention solidly fixated on the ground.
"Are you SURE this is grass?" inquired Chris as she poked the extremely short, greenish looking plant material blanketing the landscape.
"Yukine, you've asked that question 3 times now." Replied Tsubasa as she crossed her arms and looked at the short, white-haired girl.
"Sure, but you haven't given me an answer yet." Chris retorted before she looked back down at the grassy terrain.
Tsubasa shook her head in exasperation, before glancing over towards Hibiki. “Ah, Tachibana… you are awake.”
"Tsubasa-san.” Hibiki greeted her as she stood up. She gave another look at Kirika and Shirabe, debating whether to wake them up before deciding to leave them be. “What happened?”
Tsubasa shrugged. "I know as much as you do. We went through Gjallarhorn, and blacked out. Then we woke up here. Everyone seems to be okay though, just asleep. Yukine’s obsessed with the patterns in the grass.”
“I see…” Hibiki said, glancing down again. Now that she looked closely. The grass did seem a bit strange. It was… simply too small. She couldn’t discern any particular blade of it, it just all seemed to clump together in one, barely there morass.
Maria’s voice tore Hibiki from her inspection. "Tsubasa! Come check this out."
Tsubasa exchanged a look with Hibiki, who smiled, “Go ahead, I’m up now. I’ll keep an eye on Kirika and Shirabe.”
Tsubasa nodded her thanks before she turned and walked over to Maria. Maria was crouching down, running her fingers through a sparse looking bush. No… wait… Tsubasa blinked, the pattern was all wrong. It looked like a… but there was no way it could be…
"Look at this.” Maria said, as she pulled her hand out from between the limbs of the plant. “This tree, it's incredibly small, just like the grass."
Tsubasa stared for a few seconds, her mind trying to process the sight. It certainly did look like a pine tree, but it only came up to her hip. Glancing over, she noted several more clustered next to it. "Are you sure it’s a tree? Not a bush? Or some other kind of shrub?”
“I checked the roots.” Maria gestured at the bush-trees base and Tsubasa noticed how the ground there had been sifted. Not to mention the dirt between the pinkettes fingernails. Maria took a moment to wipe her hand on her skirt before continuing. “There’s only one main stem connecting to them, a shrub would have at least several, even if they would form up into a single main one.”
Tsubasa hmmed her acknowledgement as she continued to stare at the strange bush or tree or tree-bush or… whatever. Finally she shook her head with a sigh. “Elfnein did say the alert was unusual. Maybe this dimension was more abnormal then the previous ones? Different plant forms?”
“Hmm…” Maria murmured, as she put a hand to her chin in thought. “It is surprising how so many alternate dimensions still have identical biological life.” However, her lips thinned as she considered the idea some more. “But does that mean we can’t count on finding human life?”
Tsubasa bit her lip as she looked back towards Hibiki and Chris, the former in her boredom having started to bug the latter by playing with one of her hair strands. The Ichaival wielder snapped back at the gungnir girl, elbowing her in response. Next to them, Kirika and Shirabe stirred at the commotion.
“We can only hope so.” Tsubasa answered. “There is no portal back. We arrived unconscious and woke up in our civilian clothes. These differences… are disconcerting. But they do not leave us with much choice. If not humans, then there must be some sort of sapient life. The mission has not changed, only gained additional parameters.”
Maria glanced between Tsubasa and the other four wielders, then she shook her head. “I guess you’re right. It doesn’t make sense for Gjallarhorn to send us somewhere there is no one to help… or are able to provide help. That’s just not how it operates.” She left unspoken the “as far as we can tell”.
“We should get moving.” Tsubasa answered as she started back towards the others. Maria nodded but shot one last look at the miniature tree before starting after her friend. She just couldn’t shake the feeling that it meant something was off.
"DEEEEEESSSSS!" Kirika exclaimed excitedly as she dug her feet into the grassy plain the wielders were in. They had quickly determined that the weird grass wasn’t rooted very well and the topsoil was strangely loose, giving way with just a little additional pressure. Shirabe and Kirika had quickly turned that into a sort of hop-skotch esque game, bounding forward and then checking the prints their shoes left to see how much distance they could cover. They quickly roped Hibiki into it, and after some initial hesitation the Gungnir wielder was now fully absorbed, often breaking into friendly arguments with Kirika over who managed the furthest leaps.
Chris initially grumbled about them getting dirty, but otherwise remained silent with a worried, watchful eye on Hibiki. She figured that her friend needed the distraction. Silently, she congratulated the Zababa duo in coming up with the idea. Anything that would help keep Hibiki’s mind off the fact she was now separated from Miku… that was probably for the best.
Maria and Tsubasa, on the other hand, were all business. The two women led the group, constantly glancing up at the sun to judge the time of day and orientate themselves on their chosen course. Quietly, they also ruminated on future concerns. What if they didn’t find any civilization before sundown? Unlike that one time on that island, they didn’t have any camping provisions on them. The two agreed that if they didn’t find any life in the next few hours, they would call a break and try to figure out how to provision for themselves.
After an hour of travel, the glint of sun off glass caught Tsubasa’s eyes. Her head turned and she breathed a sigh of relief. “Look…” She called out, pointing. “I see something.”
Chris turned and squinted in the direction her senpai indicated before a smile broke out on her face. “Yes! Finally a city!”
“See, Chris-chan!” Hibiki smacked the silver-haired girl on the back. “I told you everything would be alright.”
“Shut up idiot.” Chris retorted, starting forward, let’s get out of the sun. But as the wielders moved off, their initial elation turned to confusion. At first, they thought they were in some hills overlooking the city, but as they approached they realized that was wrong. The structures at once seemed too close and yet too far, with the angles being all wrong. Finally, they drew close enough that it clicked with them.
“What the hell?” Chris muttered as she stared down at the display in front of her. “Did someone leave a model out?”
It indeed looked like a miniature model suburban neighborhood was laid out in front of the six wielders. Neatly networked streets with attached houses and well-maintained lawns fed into an expressway that cut through the land off to their right. And on the other side, an extremely detailed miniature city skyline, the buildings growing increasingly larger and yet… even the largest ones were not that much taller than they were.
And none of the wielders could fail to notice the bugs that were coming to abrupt halts along the streets or climbing out of cars that were pulling to a halt on the side of the roads. Except as more than a second’s glance told them… those weren’t bugs.
“I… I don’t think that’s a model, Chris-chan.” Hibiki muttered, her voice wavering.
“Y-yeah…” Chris answered dumbly, unable to find the wherewithal to really muster a more verbose reply.
As the group made their way over to the city they had spotted in the distance, something became VERY apparent. For one, the city was...kind of small. Hibiki noticed the fact that the buildings were….not that much taller than them. Was this...wait...was that…
"That's a human, right?" said Shirabe cautiously as she pointed to the rooftop of one of the buildings.
The human seemed to be gaping at the sight of, well, six GIGANTIC girls. Tsubasa spoke up. "Something is wrong. This city, it's only a little bit larger than us. Have we…?"
"What, you're saying we've become gigantic?"
“Actually, is this dimension some kind of micro world?”
Kirika hopped up right to the human standing on top of the building and waved. Shirabe also went a bit closer to look at the little itty bitty human.
"Kirika, Shirabe, be careful-" cautioned Maria, right before Kirika accidentally bumped into another building, the entire structure collapsing.
"Huh-DE-DE-DEDDDESSSSSS?!?!?!" cried Kirika as she jumped back. Shirabe jumped back as well, surprised.
Maria sighed. "I said be careful...and look at what just happened…"
"Wait, were there...people...in there?" asked Hibiki as she backed off, terrified at that prospect. Tsubasa stared at the rubble, a little bit horrified.
The others wore the same expression of shock on their faces as they looked at the rubble pile. Kirika covered her mouth in absolute horror as Shirabe and Tsubasa went to go dig through the destroyed building to see if there was anything.
Breathing a sigh of relief, Tsubasa turned to the others. "No one was in there." Kirika, as did the rest of the girls, relaxed, though none of them could deny that they all were feeling on edge.
"If there were people in there, I…" Hibiki shuddered, not wanting to think of that at all. As the gears relaxed near the city, a rather large group of people had come to spectate the extremely unusual sight of six, titan sized girls.
News helicopters hovered a safe distance from the girls, with Hibiki, Kirika, or Shirabe occasionally waving. The six girls discussed amongst themselves as to what was going on, and they came to a logical conclusion, or rather, somewhat illogical conclusion-they were all giant-sized.
How? Perhaps something to do with Gjallarhorn had happened, but they weren't sure. In any case, as the sun began to set, the crowds only seemed to expand, everyone wanting a look at the six girls. Unbeknownst to them, their appearance had broken national headlines, the entire globe speaking about the six titanesses who had appeared in the city of Chicago…
Nightfall. Illuminated by the crowds below and lights of helicopters, the six wielders all huddled together. None of them were sure what was going on, nor did they want to make a sudden movement to scare or potentially harm any of the people watching them.
"Should we try to go somewhere else?" asked Hibiki to the others.
"Probably in the morning, it's night time right now." replied Maria as she looked at the crowds several hundred meters away from her, knowing that thousands, maybe tens of thousands, of people were watching her and the others.
On the flip-side, whenever one of the titanesses "spoke", it sounded like a sort of strange language, under-toned by femininity. After all, there were six titanesses, and not a single TITAN. That is, until a sudden, resounding BOOM shook the ground. Startled, each of the girls looked around, surprised.
"What the hell was that?" said Chris as another boom echoed not too far away.
As the crowds below started to get away and dissipate, the booms only got louder. They sounded like..footsteps? As each of the girls stood up and stood back to back, looking for the source of the footfalls, a helicopter flew a little bit too close to Shirabe's arm, the aerial vehicle hitting her elbow and spinning out of control, hitting the ground and sending up a bright flame, causing mass chaos. As each of the girls attention was caught by the downed helicopter, a sudden stomp stopped the screams and cries from the crowds below, dead silence filling the air before the sound of deep, heavy breathing could be heard.
Each of the girls looked in absolute shock and terror as an enormous entity stepped into view, charcoal black scales illuminated by the flames. Giant clawed feet. Legs thicker than a blue whale. Broad shoulders set atop a massive bulky body. An enormous whip-like tail that swung behind him like a snake. A gilled neck. A small, boxy head that resembled a dinosaur with small, needle-sharp teeth bared in a snarl. Enormous dorsal plates on the creature's back. And fiery, orange eyes that burned with a primordial fury so intense they could give a lesser being a heart attack. Then, it roared.
"SKREEONK!!!"
The titan towered over even the gears, his gigantic form rising around 20 meters over the tops of the girls heads. The giant stomped forwards again and broke into a sudden dash that belied the creatures bulk, slamming into Maria suddenly like a bulldozer. The sheer weight of the beast was enough to throw Maria away like a ragdoll, the coral-haired woman being launched away like she weighed nothing. "Maria!" cried Tsubasa as she attempted to use her symphogear, but the titan body-slammed Tsubasa next, knocking her into a building so hard the entire structure collapsed on top of her. The remaining gears except Chris were too much in surprise and shock to do anything, but the titan figured out Chris's intent so fast it was almost unreal. The titan grabbed Chris's shoulders with his clawed hands and swung her into another building before tail-whipping both Kirika and Shirabe in one go. In a matter of less than 30 seconds, every gear user was knocked out except for Hibiki. The girl stared at the enormous monster approaching her, too immersed in fear to try and sing. The titan roared before punching Hibiki straight in the chest, the sheer force of the blow enough to send Hibiki reeling. The girl hit a building, the structure crumpling in upon itself as it folded to support Hibiki's weight. The last thing Hibiki saw before losing consciousness was the form of the titan roaring into the night sky, his form reflecting the blazing flames around him.
This was a world of monsters.
Chapter 1: World of Monsters
Blinking the sun out of her eyes, Hibiki yawned as she sat up and rubbed her eyes. Immediately, she noticed that she was in her civilian clothes. Strange, she could have sworn she had transformed as usual before passing through Gjallarhorn. Reaching up, she quickly confirmed the comforting presence of Gungnir around her neck. Looking around, Hibiki noticed Kirika and Shirabe asleep nearby on the grassy terrain. Wait… that was grass… right? Hibiki stood up, Maria and Tsubasa seemed to be looking around the area, while Chris was crouching down nearby, her attention solidly fixated on the ground.
"Are you SURE this is grass?" inquired Chris as she poked the extremely short, greenish looking plant material blanketing the landscape.
"Yukine, you've asked that question 3 times now." Replied Tsubasa as she crossed her arms and looked at the short, white-haired girl.
"Sure, but you haven't given me an answer yet." Chris retorted before she looked back down at the grassy terrain.
Tsubasa shook her head in exasperation, before glancing over towards Hibiki. “Ah, Tachibana… you are awake.”
"Tsubasa-san.” Hibiki greeted her as she stood up. She gave another look at Kirika and Shirabe, debating whether to wake them up before deciding to leave them be. “What happened?”
Tsubasa shrugged. "I know as much as you do. We went through Gjallarhorn, and blacked out. Then we woke up here. Everyone seems to be okay though, just asleep. Yukine’s obsessed with the patterns in the grass.”
“I see…” Hibiki said, glancing down again. Now that she looked closely. The grass did seem a bit strange. It was… simply too small. She couldn’t discern any particular blade of it, it just all seemed to clump together in one, barely there morass.
Maria’s voice tore Hibiki from her inspection. "Tsubasa! Come check this out."
Tsubasa exchanged a look with Hibiki, who smiled, “Go ahead, I’m up now. I’ll keep an eye on Kirika and Shirabe.”
Tsubasa nodded her thanks before she turned and walked over to Maria. Maria was crouching down, running her fingers through a sparse looking bush. No… wait… Tsubasa blinked, the pattern was all wrong. It looked like a… but there was no way it could be…
"Look at this.” Maria said, as she pulled her hand out from between the limbs of the plant. “This tree, it's incredibly small, just like the grass."
Tsubasa stared for a few seconds, her mind trying to process the sight. It certainly did look like a pine tree, but it only came up to her hip. Glancing over, she noted several more clustered next to it. "Are you sure it’s a tree? Not a bush? Or some other kind of shrub?”
“I checked the roots.” Maria gestured at the bush-trees base and Tsubasa noticed how the ground there had been sifted. Not to mention the dirt between the pinkettes fingernails. Maria took a moment to wipe her hand on her skirt before continuing. “There’s only one main stem connecting to them, a shrub would have at least several, even if they would form up into a single main one.”
Tsubasa hmmed her acknowledgement as she continued to stare at the strange bush or tree or tree-bush or… whatever. Finally she shook her head with a sigh. “Elfnein did say the alert was unusual. Maybe this dimension was more abnormal then the previous ones? Different plant forms?”
“Hmm…” Maria murmured, as she put a hand to her chin in thought. “It is surprising how so many alternate dimensions still have identical biological life.” However, her lips thinned as she considered the idea some more. “But does that mean we can’t count on finding human life?”
Tsubasa bit her lip as she looked back towards Hibiki and Chris, the former in her boredom having started to bug the latter by playing with one of her hair strands. The Ichaival wielder snapped back at the gungnir girl, elbowing her in response. Next to them, Kirika and Shirabe stirred at the commotion.
“We can only hope so.” Tsubasa answered. “There is no portal back. We arrived unconscious and woke up in our civilian clothes. These differences… are disconcerting. But they do not leave us with much choice. If not humans, then there must be some sort of sapient life. The mission has not changed, only gained additional parameters.”
Maria glanced between Tsubasa and the other four wielders, then she shook her head. “I guess you’re right. It doesn’t make sense for Gjallarhorn to send us somewhere there is no one to help… or are able to provide help. That’s just not how it operates.” She left unspoken the “as far as we can tell”.
“We should get moving.” Tsubasa answered as she started back towards the others. Maria nodded but shot one last look at the miniature tree before starting after her friend. She just couldn’t shake the feeling that it meant something was off.
"DEEEEEESSSSS!" Kirika exclaimed excitedly as she dug her feet into the grassy plain the wielders were in. They had quickly determined that the weird grass wasn’t rooted very well and the topsoil was strangely loose, giving way with just a little additional pressure. Shirabe and Kirika had quickly turned that into a sort of hop-skotch esque game, bounding forward and then checking the prints their shoes left to see how much distance they could cover. They quickly roped Hibiki into it, and after some initial hesitation the Gungnir wielder was now fully absorbed, often breaking into friendly arguments with Kirika over who managed the furthest leaps.
Chris initially grumbled about them getting dirty, but otherwise remained silent with a worried, watchful eye on Hibiki. She figured that her friend needed the distraction. Silently, she congratulated the Zababa duo in coming up with the idea. Anything that would help keep Hibiki’s mind off the fact she was now separated from Miku… that was probably for the best.
Maria and Tsubasa, on the other hand, were all business. The two women led the group, constantly glancing up at the sun to judge the time of day and orientate themselves on their chosen course. Quietly, they also ruminated on future concerns. What if they didn’t find any civilization before sundown? Unlike that one time on that island, they didn’t have any camping provisions on them. The two agreed that if they didn’t find any life in the next few hours, they would call a break and try to figure out how to provision for themselves.
After an hour of travel, the glint of sun off glass caught Tsubasa’s eyes. Her head turned and she breathed a sigh of relief. “Look…” She called out, pointing. “I see something.”
Chris turned and squinted in the direction her senpai indicated before a smile broke out on her face. “Yes! Finally a city!”
“See, Chris-chan!” Hibiki smacked the silver-haired girl on the back. “I told you everything would be alright.”
“Shut up idiot.” Chris retorted, starting forward, let’s get out of the sun. But as the wielders moved off, their initial elation turned to confusion. At first, they thought they were in some hills overlooking the city, but as they approached they realized that was wrong. The structures at once seemed too close and yet too far, with the angles being all wrong. Finally, they drew close enough that it clicked with them.
“What the hell?” Chris muttered as she stared down at the display in front of her. “Did someone leave a model out?”
It indeed looked like a miniature model suburban neighborhood was laid out in front of the six wielders. Neatly networked streets with attached houses and well-maintained lawns fed into an expressway that cut through the land off to their right. And on the other side, an extremely detailed miniature city skyline, the buildings growing increasingly larger and yet… even the largest ones were not that much taller than they were.
And none of the wielders could fail to notice the bugs that were coming to abrupt halts along the streets or climbing out of cars that were pulling to a halt on the side of the roads. Except as more than a second’s glance told them… those weren’t bugs.
“I… I don’t think that’s a model, Chris-chan.” Hibiki muttered, her voice wavering.
“Y-yeah…” Chris answered dumbly, unable to find the wherewithal to really muster a more verbose reply.
As the group made their way over to the city they had spotted in the distance, something became VERY apparent. For one, the city was...kind of small. Hibiki noticed the fact that the buildings were….not that much taller than them. Was this...wait...was that…
"That's a human, right?" said Shirabe cautiously as she pointed to the rooftop of one of the buildings.
The human seemed to be gaping at the sight of, well, six GIGANTIC girls. Tsubasa spoke up. "Something is wrong. This city, it's only a little bit larger than us. Have we…?"
"What, you're saying we've become gigantic?"
“Actually, is this dimension some kind of micro world?”
Kirika hopped up right to the human standing on top of the building and waved. Shirabe also went a bit closer to look at the little itty bitty human.
"Kirika, Shirabe, be careful-" cautioned Maria, right before Kirika accidentally bumped into another building, the entire structure collapsing.
"Huh-DE-DE-DEDDDESSSSSS?!?!?!" cried Kirika as she jumped back. Shirabe jumped back as well, surprised.
Maria sighed. "I said be careful...and look at what just happened…"
"Wait, were there...people...in there?" asked Hibiki as she backed off, terrified at that prospect. Tsubasa stared at the rubble, a little bit horrified.
The others wore the same expression of shock on their faces as they looked at the rubble pile. Kirika covered her mouth in absolute horror as Shirabe and Tsubasa went to go dig through the destroyed building to see if there was anything.
Breathing a sigh of relief, Tsubasa turned to the others. "No one was in there." Kirika, as did the rest of the girls, relaxed, though none of them could deny that they all were feeling on edge.
"If there were people in there, I…" Hibiki shuddered, not wanting to think of that at all. As the gears relaxed near the city, a rather large group of people had come to spectate the extremely unusual sight of six, titan sized girls.
News helicopters hovered a safe distance from the girls, with Hibiki, Kirika, or Shirabe occasionally waving. The six girls discussed amongst themselves as to what was going on, and they came to a logical conclusion, or rather, somewhat illogical conclusion-they were all giant-sized.
How? Perhaps something to do with Gjallarhorn had happened, but they weren't sure. In any case, as the sun began to set, the crowds only seemed to expand, everyone wanting a look at the six girls. Unbeknownst to them, their appearance had broken national headlines, the entire globe speaking about the six titanesses who had appeared in the city of Chicago…
Nightfall. Illuminated by the crowds below and lights of helicopters, the six wielders all huddled together. None of them were sure what was going on, nor did they want to make a sudden movement to scare or potentially harm any of the people watching them.
"Should we try to go somewhere else?" asked Hibiki to the others.
"Probably in the morning, it's night time right now." replied Maria as she looked at the crowds several hundred meters away from her, knowing that thousands, maybe tens of thousands, of people were watching her and the others.
On the flip-side, whenever one of the titanesses "spoke", it sounded like a sort of strange language, under-toned by femininity. After all, there were six titanesses, and not a single TITAN. That is, until a sudden, resounding BOOM shook the ground. Startled, each of the girls looked around, surprised.
"What the hell was that?" said Chris as another boom echoed not too far away.
As the crowds below started to get away and dissipate, the booms only got louder. They sounded like..footsteps? As each of the girls stood up and stood back to back, looking for the source of the footfalls, a helicopter flew a little bit too close to Shirabe's arm, the aerial vehicle hitting her elbow and spinning out of control, hitting the ground and sending up a bright flame, causing mass chaos. As each of the girls attention was caught by the downed helicopter, a sudden stomp stopped the screams and cries from the crowds below, dead silence filling the air before the sound of deep, heavy breathing could be heard.
Each of the girls looked in absolute shock and terror as an enormous entity stepped into view, charcoal black scales illuminated by the flames. Giant clawed feet. Legs thicker than a blue whale. Broad shoulders set atop a massive bulky body. An enormous whip-like tail that swung behind him like a snake. A gilled neck. A small, boxy head that resembled a dinosaur with small, needle-sharp teeth bared in a snarl. Enormous dorsal plates on the creature's back. And fiery, orange eyes that burned with a primordial fury so intense they could give a lesser being a heart attack. Then, it roared.
"SKREEONK!!!"
The titan towered over even the gears, his gigantic form rising around 20 meters over the tops of the girls heads. The giant stomped forwards again and broke into a sudden dash that belied the creatures bulk, slamming into Maria suddenly like a bulldozer. The sheer weight of the beast was enough to throw Maria away like a ragdoll, the coral-haired woman being launched away like she weighed nothing. "Maria!" cried Tsubasa as she attempted to use her symphogear, but the titan body-slammed Tsubasa next, knocking her into a building so hard the entire structure collapsed on top of her. The remaining gears except Chris were too much in surprise and shock to do anything, but the titan figured out Chris's intent so fast it was almost unreal. The titan grabbed Chris's shoulders with his clawed hands and swung her into another building before tail-whipping both Kirika and Shirabe in one go. In a matter of less than 30 seconds, every gear user was knocked out except for Hibiki. The girl stared at the enormous monster approaching her, too immersed in fear to try and sing. The titan roared before punching Hibiki straight in the chest, the sheer force of the blow enough to send Hibiki reeling. The girl hit a building, the structure crumpling in upon itself as it folded to support Hibiki's weight. The last thing Hibiki saw before losing consciousness was the form of the titan roaring into the night sky, his form reflecting the blazing flames around him.
This was a world of monsters.
Heiki, hecchara!