FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

This is a commission for panther1945 (FurAffinity).

Warning: This story contains growth, macro, rampage, vore and micro-torture.

Disclaimer: Quarians and all Mass Effect concepts utilized herein are intellectual property of Bioware and Electronic Arts.

Extermination, by DragonMasterX.

To Quarian Admiral Daro'Xen vas Moreh, admiralty board meetings had lost all practical purpose. With geth technology repurposing as her main focus, Daro'Xen's participation on the meetings had been marginally reduced to courteously yet disdainfully listening to her peers bicker between each other.

It was hard to stay motivated when admirals Zaal'Koris vas Qwib Qwib and Han'Gerrel vas Neema, two males bent on following their own and different interpretations of honor, made purportedly urgent reveries into quarrels between unruly children. Xen had a particular distaste for infants, so this way of seeing it made taking her pairs was difficult.

Without having spoken more than a couple statements and answered questions directed to her person, Xen saw the closed forum dissolve with Koris and Gerrel unable to cede on whether to avoid or confront the synthetic servants who had driven their species from their home planet, Rannoch. The two opposed admirals hastily left the Tonbay, Admiral Shala'Raan's ship, where that day's meeting had been held.

"It's a wonder the Migrant Fleet can manage to remain united with those bumbling fools measuring their genitals every time we summit," Xen folded her arms as the automatic doors closed behind one of the last participants.

"Come now, Xen," Shala'Raan herself, the only Quarian other than Xen remaining, approached from behind the scientist, "We are all under duress. Supplies are at an all-time low. I understand how hard it must be to remain civil."

"The forum is over, Raan. You can stop mediating," Xen quietly remarked, turning to meet her peer mask to mask, "It's hard to remain civil because one of our four Admirals is ready and willing to launch a tactical strike on Rannoch with all of us as part of the explosives. Han'Gerrel fails to understand your ever-present argument that we are not equipped nor do we possess the necessary sustainability for any sort of lasting engagement. Meanwhile, the ever present fossilized voice of Zaal'Koris never fails to impress in his mind-addled fantasy that the geth are anything beyond defective tools."

Raan politely allowed Xen the moment to vent out her frustrations and nodded at the end. "It has been a hard period for us all. On the topic of scarcity, Xen, have you made any progress with this system's composition survey?"

"As a matter of fact, I have," Xen seemed to completely forget her beef with her fellow admirals. "And I'm currently in the process of analyzing a particularly interesting gaseous element which I have yet to finish determining the composition of."

"A new elemental gas?" Raan sounded confused, "I was under the impression the Moreh was conducting a mineral survey. With our fuel situation as it is..." she paused and opened a hand up in inquisitive fashion, "Can it be used?"

"That is yet to be determined," Xen continued, "But don't fret, Raan. The mineral survey for nearby asteroid belts and deserted planets is complete. I shall send you a copy later today. I'm telling you about the element I've been analyzing because it's all I've been paying attention to after my crew showed me the results on the mineral survey."

"If it's all you've been paying attention to, then this means you haven't been as preoccupied with studying the geth artifacts we recovered from that debris field two days ago," Raan said with genuine surprise, "What have you found, Xen? And more importantly, why did you not mention it at the summit?"

Xen uttered only a pair of words, "A planet."

"Go on," Raan encouraged, tapping the side of her helmet while resting a hand on her hips.

"It's outside of every star chart in the citadel database. Most importantly, it's habitable," Xen proceeded, bringing up her left arm. In the next second, orange light began streaming outside, taking the holographic shape of her omni-tool. After quickly tapping away with two of her three fingers, Xen brought up a series of pictures with topographic information, elemental composition and satellite imagery depicting a celestial body with the title: "Xyrah" on it. "There is a high probability that this gas I'm investigating, X-01 as I've categorized it, is largely responsible for the low number of harmful microbes in the biosphere."

If Xen could've seen Raan's eyes behind her mask, she would've seen a sparkle in them. "It's a sterile environment. The Quarian immune system would have to readapt, but other than that it's..."

"The closest to home we've ever come to pass since our ancestors were driven away," Xen finished. Raan couldn't help but stare at her fellow admiral, outstretching her arms in disbelief.

"Keelah," exclaimed Raan, "Xen, Why did you not bring this up in the meeting?"

Xen stood silent, tapping the side of her helmet while staring down into space. "Pointless," she finally sputtered.

"Come again?" Raan begged.

"It happened during my final sweep," Xen explained, letting out a frustrated sigh, "While I was investigating the microbiology of Xyrah, I happened unto an unexpected gathering of life. Intelligent. Diminutive. But sapient. Very close resemblance to humans."

"That's..." Raan seemed deflated all of a sudden, "Unfortunate."

"From my latest findings, these creatures have culture and civilization. All evidence indicates they are incapable of space fare, which led me to conclude they are native to Xyrah," Xen was being very straight to the point in her explications as usual, but even Raan could detect a distinct amount of bitterness in her voice. Raan couldn't say to herself that she wasn't frustrated though.

"I understand your reservations now, Xen. It's best we forget about it," Raan finally said, "The citadel council would never stand for Quarian colonization of this planet."

"However..." Xen slowly paced towards Raan, arms still folded, "The council does not know about these tiny inhabitants. The third quadrant is, after all, a very much open space for exploration."

"That is true," Raan agreed, cocking her head to the side in curiosity. "Xen, what are you suggesting?"

Xen was one of the Migrant Fleet's brightest minds, and she enjoyed research and development as much as she liked being quick and direct. "The council, or anybody else for that matter, does not need to know about this civilization."

Raan gave pause to her response. It wasn't enough that the scientist ahead of her wasn't usually the type to make passes at such ominous statements; but Raan was also concerned about Xen's motives. "What are you planning, Xen?"

"Nothing you haven't already thought of, Raan. I know you," Xen snapped back at her fellow admiral, "And I know you aren't a fool like the two bosh'tets who wasted two hours on military dribble and philosophical tangents. Much as I'd like to sit down to return every last geth in this galaxy to be the tools they were meant to be, this is the absolute best opportunity we've had to finally have a home."

Again, Raan was initially quiet. This time however, there was far less apprehension in her reaction. "If the Migrant Fleet were to settle down there, it would only be a matter of time before these... Xyrahns are discovered."

"But if all trace of the Xyrahns disappeared, then it would be within any species' right to colonize Xyrah." With Xen completing the logical thought, there appeared to be a certain degree of wordless understanding between the two Quarians. "Allow me to be blunt, Raan. I took a risk approaching anybody with this information, but I'm confident that unlike the other two, you can see the big picture." Xen took a deep breath and sighed, never being one to feel exposed. "I require your help."

"I see," Raan nodded, opening the image files of Xyrah that Xen had transmitted to review them. With the information on display once more, the Tonbay's captain looked over the habitable planet again and uttered: "Keelah. It would truly be perfect."

"It is perfect. And it shall be ours," Xen confidently said. "We were not meant to be nomadic. Quarian history has been one failure after the next when it comes to providing a home world. I will rectify that mistake. Will you help me, Shala'Raan?"

"You will probably need someone to write a falsified report on Xyrah's conditions in order to submit to the council for colonization approval," Raan mused as she closed the holographic interface on her omni-tool.

"That is what I was counting on. I also need you to distract the coward and the aging warship while I'm taking care of our pest problem," Xen turned to walk away and briefly stopped, "Raan, I am ninety-five percent sure that some amongst my crew are working for Koris. They have been sabotaging some of my geth research projects for a while now. Seeing as I will need a fraction of the Moreh's crew with me during the descent to Xyrah, they will no doubt be present."

"I can see why you'd think Koris' would be a problem. If he learns you're trying to wipe out a civilization the council isn't aware of..." Raan paused, not even entertaining the thought since she was sure Xen had considered the contingency already. "You need me to find and run interference in their channels during your "visit", correct?"

"Only the second. I have most of their correspondence channels down, so you should be able to finish exposing their network in twenty hours or so," Xen replied. "It'll be enough time for me to complete my research on X-01 and fully prepare for the descent. We will pass by Xyrah on the return trip in eighty two hours. I will contact you once I'm ready for the voyage."

"Hmph. I never expected you to be the type to get your hands dirty on anything non-geth related, Xen," Raan smirked behind her mask. Xen simply resumed her walking.

"For our new world? It will be a personal delight." Xen said before she crossed the automatic doors of the atrium, leaving for the Moreh.

Quarians were nomadic creatures whose existence was confined to the Migrant Fleet, which meant sharing space with others within their spaceships. The Moreh was no exception, but Xen was the type of woman that relished solace more than the usual Quarian did. She longed for privacy to conduct her experiments away from prying eyes or questioning tongues. The scientist was pragmatic in the sense that she saw no use in sharing her work until it was complete, and therefore did not need unnecessary distractions contributing to detrimental delays.

Over the course of the following two days, Daro'Xen spent more time in her personal laboratory than she ever did. Her assistant drone, a floating orb of holographic energy, went back and forth between Xen's research desk and the various stations that littered the cramped space. It was a small room that doubled as Xen's living quarters. As the captain of their own ships, each admiral was entitled to their individual room, although it was up to them if they shared them with their crew or not. Xen didn't just lack space in her quarters; she also had her bed thrown out to make room for additional storage and processing devices as well as the necessary cooling systems. As a result, she slept wherever was comfortable at the time.

The Quarian scientist's investigation on the newly discovered gaseous element native to Xyrah had proceeded smoothly so far. Xen had concluded that X-01 possessed even more properties than she had initially discovered. On the one hand, it was clearly the reason the Xyrahns had been able to thrive in a mostly sterile environment. Naturally, she had initially been on the clue that the inordinate absence of specifically proliferous airborne microbes and bacteria was due to a certain anti-biotic element to the gas. However, she found exactly the opposite.

Raising her eyes from the main display, Xen tapped on her recorder button. "X-01 is neutral until life form A is within effective radius, remains benign. The gas ignores life form B's tissue, seems to only react to living organisms. Life form C... is extremely reactive to the gas." The Quarian reclined on her chair and brought a couple of fingers to the underside of her mask, where her chin was. She turned and glanced at a tall tube where her assistant drone was monitoring the life signs of an unconscious, captive crew member. "These numbers have been the same on all three successive experiments. There is no mistake. The Xyrahns are..." she paused the recording and got off the chair, approaching the containment tube with her living guinea pig.

The unconscious Quarian was contained within a completely sterile environment being pumped with X-01. Her body was stark naked, and missing every cybernetic augment. Life support was entirely owed to the tube itself. Xen observed with marvel written on her masked expression. Eyes momentarily shifted to the side as her drone projected data for her to read. "Life form C's mass has increased nearly twofold, kept in perfect proportion. The difference between a typical guinea pig and a Quarian one is the absence of a fully functioning immune system. Drone, run diagnostics," she ordered her floating automaton, receiving a confirmation beep in response.

Xen returned to her main computer and began tapping away on the holographic keyboards. Her attention was evenly divided between the three displays staring directly at her as well as the data being streamed into her omni-tool. "With proper administration and controlled doses..." she mumbled to herself as she ran projections on the screens. "Otherwise, prolonged exposure..." she continued murmuring, smiling as she felt an important breakthrough coming.

The admiral quickly tapped on the record button again, resuming her log. "Just as I suspected. The Xyrahns are this world's microbes, exposed to X-01 for an undetermined amount of time, but in concentrated doses. Their systems are fully adapted to the gas, and it's clear from the absence of other microscopic life on this planet that they have taken to predate upon bacteria, as if they were livestock. It's not that the ambient is sterile due to X-01's presence. The Xyrahns, developed by X-01's influence, have effectively sterilized the entire world, making it suitable for Quarian colonization." After a pause, Xen glanced again at life form C in her containment tube. A smirk crept up along the scientist's hidden face. She hit the stop button on her recording and joined the tip of each finger on her hands against each other. "Seems the effects are potentially reversible on non-adapted bio-forms, as well. You have proven very useful, my dear amazon, but that's about as far as you'll take me. It's really too bad you will be unable to leak my findings to Koris. He really should train better subterfuge."

After clicking away on her omni-tool, Xen ordered life form C to be covertly disposed of while she focused on the applications for X-01. "It seems as though with a number of adjustments to our exosuits, the proper amount of exposure and processing can be achieved," she thought, "With the proper administration of omni-gel, the suits should hold through the transformative process as well. I have just enough time to build the necessary implants for myself and my... escorts." The scientist smiled, finishing her train of thought with a final idea: "I do hope you're doing your part, Raan. Disposing of an unruly admiral without causing a stir would be a pain in my behind."

The time for Xyrah's inquisition was closing in.

Standing behind one of the Moreh's pilots, Xen solemnly looked ahead through the ship's window. Xyrah was a planet similar to the human Earth when it came to dimensions, with the major visual difference being the existence of three moons orbiting it instead of one. It was greener than it was blue, owing its hydrosphere to vast underwater reservoirs and a viable network of fluid channels. With X-01 strengthening them, the Quarians could get started on an actual life of their own. It would take time, but the prospect of in the near future freely walking outside of her exosuit made even the usually stoic Xen shiver with anticipation.

Thanks to Shala'Raan's misdirection efforts, Xen and a portion of her crew had taken leave on a number of private smaller scale ships during the Fleet's passage on the way out of the system without arising suspicion. It was an alleged surveyor job, which was technically not a lie, and served as cover for the operation Xen had in mind. She only explained it once to her escorts during a video conference.

"From advance scans and rudimental analysis over the past few days, it's concluded that Xyrahn government is fractioned across the globe, with one central nation appearing at the geographical crux betwixt the other four." Xen showed her operatives a map recovered from satellite recon and highlighted five spots on it. "Conveniently spread to each of the capital nation's relative cardinal directions, there are thousands of billions simply living in a single nation." The statement drew silence in the meeting room. Xen continued. "While their numbers are staggering, do not forget they are less than insects to us. Without Mass Effect field technology protecting them, our weapons will easily decimate them. Disintegration of each city and every artifice found during the inquisition is mandatory once all bio-signs have been terminated. Any queries?"

After a pause, Xen removed the map image from sight and stood straight. With both hands at her back, she ceremoniously declared: "I realize this is not the ideal way to colonize a planet, at least by council standards. However, there is a low probability to ever find a planet as perfect as Xyrah for Quarian taking. Do keep in mind this is a covert operation that not only the council can't ever find out about; but fellow fleet Admirals are also necessarily going to be kept in the dark. For this, I am taking sole responsibility for all the potential repercussions this venture may garner. We are not here to be our people's heroes. Simply actors in the grand scheme to secure the continuity our species deserves. It may come at a price for the Xyrahns, but like the bacteria and lower life forms they consumed to sustain themselves, this is wholly necessary."

After her speech, the admiral patiently waited for the round of applauding hands to stop clapping. Xen silently smiled and proceeded with the briefing: "Squads two through five get in position. Remember to tune the upgraded implants to the supplied frequency before completing descent. I'll lead squad one to the capital. Ladies," she paused to address her all-female crew, "Let us secure ourselves a planet."

Meelo hurried down the streets of the capital city. The young boy regretted his time constraints when he saw vehicular bottlenecking that could put the main driveway to shame stand in his way. He was hard at work running deliveries for his boss, and the man wasn't the very forgiving sort. Knowing that he had to find a way to cross the intersection and finish the job, he opted for a shortcut that involved him to hop along the roof of several cars. Meelo heard the stuck drivers groan and complain, and had to ignore a policeman calling out to him, but he couldn't turn back. The boy wasn't a good liar, and orphans his age were not permitted to work.

Xyrahns had developed a flourishing post-industrial civilization that had seen the rise to many a beautiful metropolis. With the advent of cybernetic technology and mass production factories, population had hit a tremendous boom that had forced them to expand along their relatively gigantic planet. Thanks to nature's boon, it was hard to go wanting for resources for the tiny yet numerous populations.

However, no matter how easily acquirable supplies were, the constant surge in numbers drove fueled the need for more and more land to be taken, plotted in and built upon. Disputes over which organization or group needed or deserved those places the most had been a constant problem among Xyrahns. Castes as well as a highly competitive society with a seemingly unending supply of hands willing to work for food and luxury had wrought a large division among the populous, resulting in entire cities moving as far away from each other as possible to pursue their own goals and value systems. This had given rise to four different nations that now ruled a part of the world each, with a central nation established as an effort to keep trade among people alive.

Meelo lived among billions in the most bustling place in Xyrah. Being an orphan was a rarity, considering how families often consisted of several dozen in a single unit, and were often looked down upon even if they wore a prestigious family name. The organization in charge of his "kind" as they put it only wanted to rid themselves of orphans, put them in any family that would take them. On the flip side, adoption was a rare occurrence, since blood ties were so important that housing a "street rat" would be more troublesome than beneficiary. Meelo had no choice but to work in the streets.

"Lost him... barely!" Meelo gasped after turning around the corner and peeking out to see the cop who'd been chasing after him lost among the dense wave of pedestrians. A loud gust of wind caught Meelo's attention as he resumed his journey. Discarded pieces of papers, dry leaves and other light items were caught up in a swirling air current. The sky had begun to darken all of a sudden. "Huh, I wonder if a storm's coming...?" A loud ringing snapped Meelo back to attention as he recalled something of importance. "Crap, the train!"

It took all out of him to make the sprint towards the subway station. When he got there the young boy groaned and skidded to a halt as he reached the station just in time to see his ride leaving without him. "Got to catch it quick!" he thought as he doubled back, ran up the stairs and dashed through the lot in the surface level. He reached one of the overhangs just outside the exit tunnel and saw the train coming out, the next tunnel already within visual range. "C'mon, Meelo, you've done this before... aaaand jump!" he hopped off the edge of the overhang, clumsily landing on the roof of the fourth train car. He rolled around before catching on a handle, which enabled him enough leverage to remain on top without being knocked off. "Ahhh! D-damn. That was close. Almost missed it!" he laughed a little to brush off the adrenaline making his heart beat like a drum on the beat. Tapping on his satchel, Meelo made sure the contents were undamaged and breathed a brief sigh of relief, "Thank the trees. Mr. Karool will kill me if I don't deliver this on time."

As Meelo took a seat on the speeding train, he made sure to snuggle down in order to keep himself as warm as possible, as well as protected from the speeding drafts. He gently tipped his hat after seeing an overbearing, looming shade cover his surroundings and looked down in case downpour started. "I can't go down without a ticket. Ugh, please don't rain..." he begged, unaware that his prayers would soon be answered in an unexpected way.

A sudden tremor upset the train's stability, making it violently rattle. Meelo yelped as it was all he could do to not fall off. "Earthquake?!" he exclaimed in a panic, throwing both hands down to hold himself steady. The train inevitably screeched to a halt, no doubt thanks to the driver pulling the emergency brakes. Meelo could only widen his eyes in fear as confusion gripped him. Forceful deceleration ended up with the train halfway through the second tunnel in their route. "It's still going! Why is it so powerful?! Ow!"

Wincing, Meelo looked up after a pebble hit his head. The part of the second tunnel he was under was sustaining damage from the shockwaves below. The young boy was forced to kick into action the second a chunk of ceiling came falling down. After narrowly avoiding being crushed and seeing the rest of the tunnel collapsing, he didn't think about it twice. "I gotta get out of here!"

Sprinting faster than any time in his life until now, Meelo ran across the fourth train car, making his way through to the third. The front car and the second were outside, so he fortunately only needed to cross over two. Meelo could hear panicked shouting and desperate cries from the patrons below as he ran over the car roof, whimpering in his mind about how helpless he was. He didn't know which part of the ceiling was going to come raining down next, so his mad dash included a lot of clumsy rolling and leaps in his effort to avoid falling debris. "What's going to happen to the people in the fourth and rear car if they don't make it in time?! Gosh, I hope they do!" he thought while forcing himself not to look back. The sound of metal bending under the weight of falling rock was making him clench his teeth and tear up, fearing for his life as he made his way through the third car.

Hope renewed in Meelo's heart when his perilous journey to the light at the end of the tunnel came to a close. Catharsis however was short lived. He rolled out from the collapsing tunnel thinking his problems were over, but when the young boy crawled back up to his feet his eyes became paralyzed at the sight before him.

Blazing chaos was the absolute way of defining it. The earthquake Meelo had felt had delivered the capital city into catastrophe. He could see the piles of vehicles on the driveway to the right, and large parts of missing road where the ground had come apart to the left. Though neither the screaming crowds nor the apartments caught that had caught on fire had managed to keep his attention as much as what was directly ahead and above him.

Like a pair of juggernauts sitting at the edge of the capital city, two gargantuan feet leveraged seemingly endless legs that disappeared among the tallest leaves providing the city's shade. Each three-toed foot was easily the size of several city blocks. Dumbstruck, Meelo craned his head back to be able to look up at the insanely huge creature. But even after he fell down on his butt the tree leaves above made it impossible to make out anything above the knees of the strange biped.

"What is that?" Meelo's mind raced, "I've never seen anything like it before! Is there a person above those long legs? Why're they shaped like that?" the questions piled up in the panicked boy's mind as his eyes absorbed information faster than his brain could process it. In a similar fashion, those stuck in the half-collapsed train couldn't believe their eyes either.

A loud sizzling noise alerted Meelo, who saw the leaves guarding their city burn away like paper over a fire, revealing more of the oversized intruder's form. He saw a vastly feminine body, only scaled several hundred sizes up. The giantess' body was fully covered in a black outfit with gold linings the likes of which Meelo had never seen before. Just like the three toes on her feet, he could make out only three digits on each hand; one of which was currently holding what appeared to be a gargantuan pistol of some bizarre design. Aside the peculiarly bent backwards legs and the odd number of digits present in feet and arms, the creature looked very similar to Meelo's people. The only thing the young boy wasn't sure of was the supersized woman's face, since it appeared to be covered by a bubble-like helmet. At this point he wasn't sure if that was the strangely marvelous creature's face. What Meelo was sure about was that she was looking down at them with the gun in her right hand pointed down, with huge puffs of smoke fuming upwards from the weapon's tip.

"She burned the leaves away. They protect us from the rain, but she burned them like they were nothing!" To Meelo, who had lived a life in a planet where the trees were revered as guardians, the sight of a single leaf disintegrating was unbelievable. He had heard rumors of great all-consuming fires and especially wild storms in the far south nation, but he had never once thought anybody would casually do away with an entire city's protective layer like that. "What else is she going to do...?!" the question left Meelo's quivering lips as the next thing he saw was a bright flash and swift air-cutting zap.

He lowered his arms after using them to protect his eyes. Meelo then wished he hadn't reopened them. A quarter of the capital city had suddenly disappeared. The only evidence of there ever being constructions, vehicles or even people were powdery mounds of grey ash compounding indistinguishably from corpses or debris. In the blink of an eye, Meelo had lost sight of several millions he knew lived in those crowded districts that were now dust gathering next to the giantess' feet. "N-no..." his voice was failing, his legs trembling. Whatever commotion was happening underneath at the train with the other people was being drowned out by Meelo's inner voice telling him to get out of there. He couldn't think about the horror he had just witnessed, he couldn't make sense of it. All he wanted was to get out of there. He turned around to see the rest of the rattled city.

Faulty electrical lines as a result of whole power grids going missing and more vehicular accidents had only exacerbated the chaos on the streets. It was pandemonium. Meelo turned to the other side and saw the vanishing point of that part of the capital city. It seemed like it wouldn't matter where he went. But before he knew it, he had hopped off the train, rolled over the jagged road by the tracks and was sprinting as fast as he could from the area. He had to flee. "I got to get somewhere safe. Where is safe now, where do I go?!"

Xen was awfully pensive as she reviewed the invasion's status. All five squads were in place, and things were proceeding smoothly on all four nations while her squad had already overtaken the central portion of the continent housing her pest problem. After burning away shrubbery hiding away what she had identified as the central habitable area, she had determined the ease of which it was to simply pull the trigger on her Arc Pistol and watch the ant colonies burn away. The pragmatic side of her saw it as a boon. They had the element of surprise after all, and a decimating effort was all she could hope for in order to take over Xyrah. Xen could see the rest of squad number one spreading out and tackling the other establishments surrounding the main one she was standing on. They were doing their jobs slowly and steadily. Things were progressing smoothly. Yet something was lacking.

"Magnify," she voiced out, but keeping quiet on comms. The scientist's HUD showed a magnification of her frontal view. "More," he ordered the computer in her suit, and she continued until she could properly make out what was going on under hear. A smile crept up to her lips as she saw the inhabitants of the capital city scurrying away. "There must be millions just in front of me toes; all of them making their best attempt to escape in the other direction after seeing my wondrous weaponry at work." Xen couldn't help but chuckle. She thought it weird at first. It was rare for her to find humor in anything, much less violence. However, this was different.

Everywhere along the ground she looked, Xen could see the chaos she had wrought to the relatively peaceful community of microscopic humanoids. If it wasn't the miniaturized explosions on the various tiny buildings, then it was dense masses of people scrambling away like scattering bugs. A certain part of her relished the sight of their hopelessness; their adorable naiveté at even considering they had a way to successfully escape after she had singlehandedly wiped out a major fraction of their country with a single pull of the trigger.

Xen chuckled again, this time louder. "This is foolish," she admitted, suddenly holstering her pistol before daintily placing her fingers on her wide hips. "Yet..." she paused, took a brief step forwards, and let gravity slowly pull her foot down to the ground. Contact with the obliterated side of the Xyrahn capital city didn't accomplish much else than scatter ashen remains. To Xen, however, the action emulated a certain factor of unavoidable euphoria, "...intoxicating. I must interiorize myself with this feeling."

Down below, Meelo still hadn't stopped running. He couldn't believe how no matter how many blocks he crossed over, the giantess was still in plain sight, as if he hadn't made any progress at all. All he knew was that he wanted to be as far away from that fearsome monster as possible. His legs understood the message, but it was difficult to convince himself that there was any possible way for him to outrun that disintegration gun. He only briefly looked behind him to see one of the giantess' feet fall ahead of the other. The resulting stomp that to the giantess was nothing more than light inertia had sent tremors along the streets, making it even harder to stay on the run for Meelo and the other people.

Over the brief glance he had taken, Meelo noticed the giantess had put away her gun for some reason. That gave his heart a bit of hope, but he didn't want to delude himself. "I have to focus on escaping. Maybe the airport...! Gwah!" he didn't have the luxury of even making swift planning, as the encroaching forceful vibrations caused so many upheavals of dirt along the pavement that Meelo ended tripping and tumbling all over. While in mid-air, he saw a speeding car being shot skyward by the violent magnitude causing the earth to surge upwards. The vehicle smashed against the side of a building, exploding with great force. Caught in the ensuing shockwave, Meelo was sent hurtling along the air, slamming into a streetlight. "Oof! Augh..."

The young boy sputtered blood and coughed as he forced himself to his knees and hands. "Puh-please don't be broken, bones..." Meelo begged as he tried his hardest to stand back up. He tried to get his bearings even though his ears were still ringing from the blast and his insides felt like they had been through a blender. The streets were a mess to put it lightly. It was impossible to see beyond some streets thanks to the several upheavals. There were car and motorcycle parts scattered everywhere, and he was positive some of those were covered in blood. Meelo thanked the forest for being more fortunate than those people.

"The airport..." Meelo gasped for air, tears welling up beneath his eyes thanks to the smoke covering the streets. "I gotta make it there or else if the earthquakes don't kill me first, I'll suffocate." The young boy carried himself with effort, but he stopped once something caught his eye. Around the corner in one of the many ruined alleyways, he could make out a struggle happening. A man and a woman were arguing, and it was getting physical. Meelo hid behind a wall to avoid being dragged into the mess. From the sounds of the squabble, the two were arguing about taking a motorcycle. A loud gunshot rang out, making Meelo flinch and cover his ears. When he next tried to look, the woman was sliding down against the alley's wall, holding by her wounded, slit throat. The man was on the ground in a pool of his own blood.

"This is crazy...!" Meelo exclaimed at the grisly sight. He understood the situation didn't look reasonable no matter how one looked at it, but people were murdering each other over a bike! The young boy tried his best to harden his heart, knowing he had no time to dally at the scene, and decided to count himself lucky he hadn't decided to get involved. However, before he continued his mad dash to the airport, the shine on the motorcycle's keys in its slot beckoned him. "There's no way I'm making it in time on foot..." he bit his lower lip, his legs carrying him almost involuntarily towards the abandoned object of discord. "I'm..." Meelo gulped and carefully stepped over the two deceased; the lady having already bled to death; and climbed the motorcycle. It was a bit large for a boy his young age, and Meelo obviously didn't have a license for it, but he had taught himself to drive these things with whatever opportunities life had given him. He only thanked himself for not having waited until he was of age.

Next thing the boy knew, he was speeding over the healthy section of the driveway, figuring that the police would be with their hands too full to check his age or speed limits at this point.

Xen was feeling electrified all of a sudden. Just a single step on virtually empty ground had filled her with such ecstasy. In her eyes, she had accomplished absolutely nothing from a practical standpoint. Yet she knew that the creatures down below were running away from her. They were undeniably afraid of her and her size; her power over them. She could make them all disappear at once if she wished to. The admiral knew her crew was doing precisely that at their own cities. But Xen didn't want to go all out for a gradually incipient reason. A certain amount of stimulus was hitting her brain. She felt it wash over her senses, making her want to drink in this despair she was forcing upon the Xyrahns.

Unable to bear the weight of her desire, the Quarian crouched and shifted on her knees. She leaned over and supported herself with her left hand on the ground while the right stretched out. "There is what appears to be a parking lot over here..." she murmured as her HUD analyzed the situation. She could see no shortage of primitive vehicles haphazardly abandoned over the parking buildings. Making a grabbing motion, Xen swiped her arm and tore the parking lot right off its foundations. "Fascinating," she squinted her eyes at the minuscule architecture, but detained herself for only the briefest of moments. In the next, she slammed the entire thing down like a child disappointed with their toy. "Yet utterly dated. Have these imbeciles done nothing with their thousands of years of evolution?! They truly deserve to be exterminated. And I shall play the role of their exterminator."

The very act of uttering such cruel words was stirring something up in Xen's insides. She wasn't merely feeling elation anymore. It was a swelling sense of all-importance, as if she had taken the mantle of God and her righteous punishment was a decree from the heavens themselves. She lowered a thumb to flatten a tall skyscraper into a mishap heap of concrete, metal and glass. Deep down she really hoped a fool or a dozen had lingered just to picture their horrified expressions when from one instant to the next their lives ended with a crunch.

Experiencing that morbidly sadistic high was driving Xen's every action. Usually calm and demure, she was truly relishing the destruction she was causing. Her hand swept from one side to another as if she was scrubbing sand around on a beach, her fingers razing across the diminutive paved roads that cracked under pressure.

Xen enjoyed herself with precise attacks towards the largest buildings she could find: She knocked them over, snapped them at the middle by using her fingers like a pair of scissors and even ripped them right off their foundations. Tired of speculating whether or not there were victims where she had demolished several blocks, Xen summoned her assistant drone. Thanks to the smoke and dust clouds, it was hard to make out the little people below. The orb-shaped automaton channeled energy to add its processing power to its master's bio scanner, painting living organisms of Xyrahn average size for Xen to find.

Soon, Xen sat up as she looked around her, noticing several painted targets gathering at the stretch of city to her immediate right. It seemed like no less than a few dozen hundred had grouped up in some type of underground shelter. The Quarian was amused. She turned to that side, crawling over to the façade serving as front for the shelter. "Some sort of impressive indoors boulevard. Is it a shopping mall spanning several blocks, perhaps?" she mused, reminding herself of the sheer density of Xyrahn populous. "My movement must've set off some vibrations that they mistook for an earthquake to their level. Pathetic," she found herself giggling as she gently prodded the tip of a finger on the roof of the large edification. "So pathetic!" she shouted, her hand suddenly tearing through the roof and most of the block.

Watching in delight as the relatively enormous building crumbled around her hand, the giantess was even more pleased to see several little green blots suddenly scattering about. Many of them started to disappear, one by one, as they were either crushed under Xen's hand upon crashing into the shelter or killed by debris shower. Xen grabbed and pulled her hand back out, undoing the magnification lenses of her HUD in order to be able to see her opening grabber. Her fingers were covered in dust and crust, with hints of red staining her palm. According to the numbers in her mind, Xen had no doubt she had crushed at least half the sheltered Xyrahns. "Their blood. It's so similar to ours. How unsightly for bosh'tets of this level!"

The very notion of sharing traits with the bugs she was crushing upset Xen like no other thing. "Insignificant worms! Your fleeting existences are only for my amusement. Expiration is all you're good for at this point!" she declared fully aware that even with universal translators, the undocumented dialect belonging to the natives was going to make it impossible to communicate. Xen didn't care to share words with the Xyrahns, but each speech full of grandiose air simply complemented the experience. It aroused her.

Her hand clenched into a fist and returned to the shelter, repeatedly pounding the lengthy complex. If the little ones didn't get crushed under the might of her fist, they would get sepulchered within their beloved safe house. She made sure to collapse it all. At the end of the frantic smashing, Xen brought her scanner back up, smiling after seeing only half a dozen green marks strewn about the collapsed area. She said nothing else and turned to her next target.

The capital city boasted several driveways, some of them level with the asphalt roads and some of them turned highways. It was easy for Xen to see all the poor little citizens attempting their escape via their archaic transportation. She stood up to her feet and stomped her way to the largest highway she could make out, snapping minor and major buildings alike under her feet as they smothered entire city blocks at once with every step. Once there, Xen crouched, watching in delight as an extreme bottleneck had formed on a bridge spiraling along a particularly thick tree root. The highway seemed to be the only promise for escape to the drivers, who Xen could see were attempting to abandon their cars in order to move ahead.

Her very presence had spurred on an outcry of danger in the public. Their rattled senses and urges for self-preservation seemed to overtake the brief moment of unity they had maintained during the escape and were now tuned to the law of the jungle. Xen took a moment to observe simply because the highway of chaos was too delicious of eye candy to ignore. Friends and family turned on each other just to get fractions of an inch of advantage in distance away from the titan looking down on them. Xen could see their cars moving up along the spiraling root, no doubt leading to some sort of hideout or elevated network connecting to a different tree.

"Men, women, children, elderly... it doesn't matter who you are, you value your life. But what would you say if I told you that value is nil?" Xen reached up with a finger, pointing it at the root. The assistant drone responded and after a quick zap, the root highway was severed in two. Those below were immediately knocked backwards as the bridge came undone, plummeting to their dooms whether they were in their cars or not. Looking up, Xen couldn't help but laugh at the sight of so many green dots desperately clinging to what remained of the highway heading up. She amplified the sound output at the bottom of the severed bridge using her omni-tool, soon able to hear the music that was the destitute and loud cries of fear and agony of her prey. A thought then occurred to Xen and she outstretched her open hand right underneath the dangling root.

"You are nothing but prey to me," Xen started as she patiently gathered the falling cars and Xyrahns, momentarily ignoring those that intended escaping her. "Yet I've only thought of this in a metaphorical sense," the Quarian narrowed her eyes, "I do wonder now. What does a pathetic bug taste like?" she deactivated the biological signature overlay on her HUD, able to fully distinguish her victims now that there was a handful of them literally on the palm of her hand. "Pale bluish skin. A set of three short blue-tipped feelers on each head, independent of there being hair or not. Constitution similar to humans. Textbook aliens. Or am I perhaps the alien here in this case? Mhmhmhm..." she chuckled.

Reaching down with a pair of fingers, Xen plucked a squirming bundle of little people from her open hand. She didn't care whether some died or not. With the sheer numbers she had captured some of them were bound to be alive throughout the process. With her sound amplifier gathering up their voices, Xen could hear their panicked noises as those next to them died from the pressure her fingers exerted. The idea of consuming live prey was such a perversion of her initial idea of extermination that Xen very quickly dismissed her crippling Quarian physiology as a problem. Just like in any extra-ship operation, she and her team had applied plenty immuno-boosters, so the only thing Xen had to worry about was a potential upset stomach.

Inevitable anticipation sent shivers along Xen's spine. In any other scenario, the idea of devouring another species would've been unappealing at the very least. Yet she found herself yearning for this particular kind of execution. She didn't just want to eat the Xyrahns. She wanted them to be alive as they were coated in her saliva after being put in her mouth. She wanted them to know they would serve as nothing else than sustenance for another of infinitely greater power than themselves. And she wanted them to squirm all the way down her esophagus.

That was why, after a little amount of hesitation, Xen quickly opened the oral port to her helmet while tilting her head backwards. With her mouth open behind the helmet, the Quarian's fingers dipped into the induction port and released the captured bundle of Xyrahns. Her entire being shuddered as she felt tiny bodies bump onto her tongue and teeth. To avoid risking her health any more than necessary, Xen closed the induction port and her mouth. She could feel some of them attempting to run and jump inside her mouth, making Xen clench both hands as a rush of delight filled her. She could taste their bland flavor without chewing; yet what she perceived was their fear more than anything else; the perfect seasoning. Without any reservations, Xen powerfully swallowed, gulping all of the little people down her throat in one go. "Delicious," she said, feeling the bundled up bodies, living or not, sliding down. "I almost regret making these pathetic things a part of me. They should feel blessed!"

The sensation of preying upon the Xyrahns had awoken something in Xen. It wasn't just hunger. It wasn't just sadism. She truly wanted to become the instrument of these tiny people's demise. Despite her comments, she couldn't deny that eating them felt better than most of the brutish assaults she had so far conducted. Xen was ready for seconds, but she noticed that during the excitement throughout her quick snack, she had closed both hands, crunching whatever people and vehicles left into indistinguishable goop and heaps of junk. She discarded the unseemly bundle, thinking it was best to have at least one living Xyrahn to heighten the flavor.

She stood up with renewed motive and reactivated the bio sign overlay to aid her in her hunt. Xen plucked each bundle of green blots she found and pushed them as close to her helmet's input port as she could before swiftly opening it, dropping the victims in and closing it behind them. Like this, the Quarian hungrily devoured a mighty number of Xyrahns, forcibly ending their lives with a fate crueler than regular death. Before she knew it, Xen had cleaned out the root in front of her, and the bio signs that didn't show ahead and below seemed to be coming from a higher area on the tree. With an unseen smirk, Xen declared, "Patience. This is extermination and I am in no rush. I shall work up my appetite again before I come back for you all," she smiled, patting her full stomach.

Even after spearheading so many atrocities against the Xyrahns, Xen still did not have enough. She loomed over the destroyed, chaotic capital city, enjoying the self-destructive effects of anarchy she had wrought to the once relatively peaceful nation. Before Xen could take a step in the city's direction though, a bright red message appeared on her HUD. "Incoming high-speed projectile?" she murmured, quickly ordering her drone to bolster her shields. There was suddenly a semi-loud crack followed by a tiny blast as smoke rose up to her vision. Xen looked down at a ripple on her pulsating kinetic shields, with less than 0.001% of integrity having been compromised by the attack.

Quick analysis of composition revealed that the projectile had been a low-yield explosive comparable to a fire-cracker. Her shields were quickly repaired, making Xen start laughing as she saw the incoming projectile warning again, which she dismissed. Her magnification tool allowed her to see several airplanes hovering a fair distance away from her. A missile barrage followed, which ended with Xen standing there, covered in tiny tufts of smoke quickly clearing away from her shielded body. Even if she had been unshielded, those explosives would have been insufficient in power even damage her exosuit. "Yet I can tell this is very high yield ordinance to you all," Xen mocked the minuscule air force pelting her with Xyrahn equivalent of a pathetic nuclear strike followed by heavy bombing. "Pesky, bothersome flies!" she swung her palm, swatting the airplanes which exploded in contact.

More weapons, in the form of anti-air turrets and weaponized fortresses, began deploying their own attacks from afar. Yet Xen barely batted an eye at their underperforming efforts. All she had to do was take a few steps ahead and crush the resisting buildings and weapons underfoot. "Still, your ineptitude grossly is exceeded by your insistence," Xen remarked as she saw more and more weapons and vehicles putting her down their crosshairs. It only made sense to the scientist that Xyrahn military, as slow to respond as they were, would come together with some sort of countermeasure.

In all honesty, she didn't know what she had expected from them beyond this paltry fireworks display. Perhaps she now was above anthropomorphizing these intelligent yet clearly and undeniably inferior species. Xen didn't care about their resistance anymore, yet she appreciated the dramatic turn it added to her rampage as she took her time to single and wipe out each effort to stop her.

Meanwhile, down below the situation for the Xyrahns had only worsened. As Meelo sped through mostly deserted streets with his stolen bike, his fearful eyes were overwhelmed by the widespread devastation. He had narrowly escaped more upheavals and another series of dangerous tremors by keeping to the less urbanized areas where plants being uprooted and knocked around by shockwaves were the most hazardous obstacles. Other people had been less fortunate, and Meelo was forced to see the remains of those that had been left behind in the wake of the giantess' fury.

Meelo didn't understand his still being alive. He had no family, and the only poignant person in his life, the employer ensuring he was compensated for his daily efforts, had likely perished when the business district disappeared in that bright flash of light earlier. Wondering about those the giantess had directly or indirectly killed, Meelo thought about his impending death. "Am I going to die?" he pulled the brakes all of a sudden.

Even now the young orphan could look into the distance. It didn't matter he had made it to the other side of the city where it was relatively safer, he could still see that faceless monster tearing into the tree highways, devouring those who had taken to higher vantages. It was like something out of a horror movie, and Meelo couldn't wait to wake up from this nightmare. However, with no such commodity becoming available to him, the fledgling had no choice but to press on.

"I can't think like that. Something will happen, someone will..." Meelo paused as he heard a sharp buzz cut through the air. Out of nowhere the armed forces had made an appearance, giving the boy a glimpse of hope as he witnessed jets and later tanks making beelines towards the gigantic threat. Meelo drove to a hill to better witness the battle and couldn't believe his eyes when even the attempt at a nuclear strike failed to even inconvenience their destroyer. "No..." he sobbed as he was forced to see the most skilled men and women they had and their best equipment being shredded out of the sky and stamped into the ground like mere pests. "I can't stay here. I have to go... I have to get away from here!"

There was no hope driving him anymore. It was pure fear that had gripped Meelo's heart, directing his survival instinct, making him abandon every last thought of potential salvation. Before he could make conscious decision of it, he was already making his way to the airport again. His entire plan hinged on being able to hitch a ride on whichever flight went as far away from this living hell.

Unfortunately for Meelo, a half-full tank could only bring him so far after he had gunned it for all the engine had. He hadn't grown attached to the stolen vehicle, but he regretted not having a readily available way to continue on in case his plan failed. On the bright side, by now the pain in his midsection was mostly gone, so he could walk on his own two feet without feeling agony. "Please let there be a plane left..." he begged as he turned a corner, hurrying down the last few stretches of road until he could start making out control towers. The closer Meelo got to the airport however, the less likely his chances seemed.

The perimeter encircling the airport had been closed off. Seemingly tens of thousands of survivors who had the same idea as Meelo were gathered in a violent riot, hurling rocks, empty guns, bottles, anything they had on hand in order to break windows in order to get inside. The sight of desperate people burned into Meelo's frightened eyes as he watched citizens turn on each other, using the writhing bodies of others as stepping stones to climb over spiked fences, some of them getting carelessly impaled on the way. Even if they got through, armed forces gunned them down on the spot.

"Why...?" Meelo trembled as he witnessed the senseless violence. "There are planes leaving now; I can see them. They're boarding others. Why are they not letting people through?!" he cried, although deep down Meelo knew he did not want an answer to that. It wasn't rare for their elitist society to abandon those with no names, riches or fame to speak of; but now it was being taken to its literal extreme. Just like the angry rioters, Meelo had had enough. "But what can I do? I'm just a kid who's gotten lucky so far. Those guys over there are armed to the teeth and they don't care who they're shooting down. They just want to let the rich board in peace... maybe if I snuck in? Is there even a way in that won't end up with me dead?"

Meelo focused on his surroundings, trying his hardest to find a way in. He made sure to stay as far away from the angry mob as he could so nobody would see him poking around; he didn't want his infiltration to be made even harder. He followed the chain fences, remaining behind cover to ensure none of the armed guards saw him marauding. "It's impossible. I thought I'd find a hole or something, but this place's sealed up tight. What am I going to do...?" he sighed as he slid down with his back against a wall.

"LOOK OUT!" the sharp cry of a voice nearby made Meelo flinch and reel away, prompting him to instantly scatter away from the wall and hide behind the nearest plant out of fear. Before Meelo could see what was going on, there was a bright flash followed by thunderous roar. A vast expanding wave of kinetic energy blasted the poor kid away, who could only hang onto an oversized leaf for dear life. The leaf was torn off its stem and he was sent flying into a nearby lake.

Struggling not to drown, Meelo flapped his arms and kicked his legs hard. He pushed against the tattered leaf on his way out, afraid he would get knocked further down by the sinking object. In the heat of the moment, Meelo had missed the chance take a deep breath before submerging, so he could now feel the burning in his chest as his oxygen-deprived lungs demanded precious air. His desperate ascending swim paid off and eventually his head made it to the surface: "BWAAAH!" he loudly gasped, desperately gulping air while intermittently coughing up water. Despite his ordeal, Meelo quickly dove down as his eyes saw another flash followed by another explosion. Even as he ducked underwater he could see a sequence of blasts and only wanted to poke his head out to breathe, paddling nearer to the edge of the lake in case the water became dangerous to stay in.

When the series of explosions ended, Meelo carefully climbed out. He shook his wet body and lamented the loss of his hat, but found himself mostly unscathed. "What... ack... What happened?" he hacked and coughed some more water, pounding his chest once for relief. When he walked over the little hill overlooking the lake though, he got the dreadful answer he immediately regretted asking for.

The airport lay in waste, an inferno of legendary proportions raging where the airplanes were being loaded earlier. Meelo couldn't see the rioters or the military personnel, and wondered if they had been vaporized in the attack. Then he finally took notice among the airplane remains that some of them looked vastly different. Unlike the commercial and private lines, these black jets looked awfully similar to those Meelo had briefly caught a glimpse of when the military took the fight back to the giantess. "They crashed here...!" the orphan fell to his knees, the endless fire ahead of him burning in his hopeless eyes. "Had I joined the rioters... or found a way inside like I wanted to then... then I'd be dead alongside everybody else!" tears were rolling down his cheeks as he grabbed his head to make a feeble attempt to remain sane. Meelo couldn't take it anymore. "Everywhere I go, no matter what I do...! People die... everyone's dying... everyone's dead!" he sobbed uncontrollably while pounding the ground. "There's no point!" he screamed out loud, "GAAAAHHHHHH!"

Rampant destruction had become a mere game in Xen's design. The Quarian couldn't help herself any longer. What had begun as a straightforward genocidal conquest had turned into a pleasure cruise for the awakened sadist. The stepping on hapless crowds, the demolition of buildings with the simple flick of a finger; the decimation of an entire culture of miniature people was making Xen's loins burn. She couldn't help herself any longer.

Once she stopped getting shot at, Xen acknowledged the bugs had either run out of capable hands and weaponry or come to terms with their situation. Whichever the case, she was bored of them already. The experience had enveloped her whole being, and Xen wanted nothing more than to complete her mission, but she needed a better stimulant than this half-destroyed capital city.

Xen leaned against a tree while panting, feeling her rarely utilized muscles pulse with the exertion of physical activity. She relished the light exhaustion, knowing she could've erased this city with four thermal clips, yet she had taken the time to personally get her hands dirty. She licked her teeth, savoring the after-taste of all the Xyrahns she had devoured, and realized she wanted more.

"I want more of that sweet, fear-coated meat," Xen panted with arousal as she brought up her omni-tool menu. "It's time," she took a deep-breath in order to collect her thoughts. She couldn't make a mistake here. Her hand glided over her holographic input console, quickly tapping away command after command, entering, deleting and modifying variables in the program she had written to harness the vast quantities of X-01 gas floating everywhere in the planet.

With the implants and exosuit mods Xen had rushed to develop for the past few weeks and perfected during the last three, the scientist had found a way to use the weak Quarian immune systems as a perfect receptacle for the symbiotic qualities of the X-01. "Absorbed by our exosuits and processed by my special cybernetic augmentation, the gas will be able to accelerate our metabolism and strengthen our bodies. With repurposed medigel administration and hyper-efficient nutrient-paste supplying energy to the overcharged cells... ah!" Xen's mental review of her newly developed technology was cut short by an electrical jolt running through her. She heard similar Quarian moaning nearby, indicating that the integrated system had worked.

Panting, the admiral felt a significant amount of heat building up within her very core. Xen buckled over, holding by her stomach as it tingled, like a tickling sensation spreading from her mid-section to every last corner of her body. She grunted, her body spasming as it creaked and swelled. "Activate... regulating omni-gel administration..." she managed to speak out as the feeling of growth took over.

At first protesting at the additional mass it had to contain, Xen's exosuit managed a proverbial breath of relief as its elasticity and components were automatically refitted to its enlarging user's proportions. Xen felt suffocating pressure become replaced by bliss she hardly knew possible as she and her suit grew larger. The Quarian looked at her hand and held it down against one of the tree's roots she had been leaning against. Gradually, the root appeared smaller and smaller to Xen. Looking past that growing difference, she could see the city's smoldering and flattened ruins appear farther and farther away.

Xen was overcome by the wild sensation. She had never put much stock on one's size, which was why Krogan and Turians appeared less intimidating to her than to other Quarians. Xen was an advocate of using brain power as opposed to brute force, but she had come to understand the allure of physical strength in her brutal rampage against the Xyrahns. Now Daro'Xen was completely convinced she was going to have no equal.

As she passed seven feet tall and continued on to grow bigger and bigger, Xen finally took notice of the rest of her squad, which had spread out to destroy the other cities surrounding the capital, all writhing in bliss with their own expansion. The scientist frowned upon them, initially believing she would use this technology to expedite the extermination by powering them up. "These parasitic wretches don't deserve to be on my plateau," Xen quickly accessed her computer, replacing variables to set her rate of growth to different scalability when it came to her. "They may taste a fraction of my genius. But only I... ahhhh!"

In contrast to her arrogance, Xen couldn't help but join the chorus of. It just felt too delicious. The sensation of her skin tight suit closing down on her before it released as it also grew was like experiencing suffocating confinement prior to heavenly release. As she grew bigger and bigger, the 20ft. tall tree she was leaning against started to look increasingly less impressive. She wasn't destroying and she wasn't devouring, yet Xen felt just as turned on if not more stimulated by this newly discovered form of pleasure. She quickly passed ten feet tall and dug her fingers against the tree trunk behind her as her rump pushed into it.

It turned out that the expansion process made their bodies extremely receptive of touch even through their outfits. As a result, Xen and her crew members around the Xyrah had suddenly become unable to pursue their conscious intentions in favor of clumsy walking, tripping and rolling like supersized drunkards. Xen watched her crewmates being overwhelmed by the growth she had instated in them all, glad for her bloated ego that she had support against the tree.

What the Xyrahns were forced to witness was their destroyers growing stronger and larger still, further disparaging the situation in the favor of the merciless invaders. Many of the tiny inhabitants didn't even get a chance to witness as they were immediately wiped out by enlarged feet, legs, knees, buttocks or outright entire gigantic female bodies grinding along the ground to derive more stimuli from their intense growth. The grim reality that had covered the streets of every major city and the capital had become the truest definition of demonic wrath. And all the despair-ridden citizens could do at this point was watch the masked demons bask and get drunk on their power while awaiting their inevitable deaths.

With the Quarians growing beyond the height of some of the tallest trees, whole Xyrahn cities and millions of the microscopic dwellers at a time fell victim to careless steps or gargantuan hands using the ground as support to get back up. Xen's euphoria only grew with her body, exacerbated by the sight of the sunlight as her head grew through the canopy. She looked down at her crew members who had stopped expanding. The others had remained at various sizes just under or over 20ft. tall, while Xen herself continued to rise higher and higher without any clear sign of slowing down.

"This is our true strength," Xen grinned as she opened the comms channel to address her invasion force, "Those of you that followed my orders and equipped yourselves have been blessed, reborn into bodies that our ancestors could only dream about. It's time we show the worms we've come to purge this planet of what our power is. Don't disappoint me!" her voice commanded. Like pleasure-driven puppets, the newly grown giantesses that Xen could immediately see completely stopped using their weaponry, instead beginning to stomp cities and their populations with great efficiency. "Yes! Enjoy yourselves!" the scientist boomed with laughter as her shadow cast over the forest at 40ft. tall, "You don't know when your next chance will be. I certainly will not be holding back."

Xen turned to the now smaller tree behind her. She crouched, amused by how the tree's crown only came up to her knees right now. Her left hand gripped the trunk for support while the right closed around the top. With her perfectly functional HUD painting over large quantities of bio-signs convening at a single spot, Xen licked her lips behind her mask in anticipation. With only slight effort she extracted the entire treetop, holding it in her growing hand with gleeful eyes. "You thought getting to higher ground would save you, did you not?" she mocked the panicked tiny green blots on her display. "You vastly overestimate yourselves, my insignificantly little morsels. Now feed me!" she commanded, opening her induction port to quite simply cram the entire treetop against the expanding hole. Xen didn't seem to care about getting an upset stomach in the future any longer. Tree bark, branches, leaves, curling roots and of course, vehicles and Xyrahns; she devoured the treetop like a particularly messy salad.

The giantess munched and gulped, closing and opening the port on her helmet to use it as an improvised slicer so she could get chunks easily inside her mouth. The ravenous sadist couldn't help herself any longer; she wanted her victims churning away inside her belly. With additional size came increasingly overpowering hunger, which only made the 50ft. tall and growing Xen impatient. "I wish for more..."

With her gigantic size that dwarfed even the other enlarged Quarians, Xen had an excellent vantage point from where she could survey the devastation her team had caused. Hundreds and hundreds of cities had been vaporized by Quarian weaponry, others crushed in a surprisingly similar bout of physical violence Xen herself had exerted upon the capital. Yet many more remained. "If there's anything to commend these bugs for is their multiplicative instincts. Hahaha! What a delectably remediable conundrum!"

Guided by her life form scanner, Xen first stomped in the direction where she saw the least fellow Quarians. Enormous footfalls made the ground shake even for the smaller crew members, some which got out of the way of their massive yet nonchalant captain while less fortunate ones got kicked or even mercilessly walked on. Xen had to bend over to collect populated tree crowns, laughing to herself in amusement whenever she caused unrest on the populations so foolishly attempting to remain still while in hiding until it was too late.

Down Xen's gullet they went, tree and everything around them. The Xyrahns had become no more than indivisible food toppings for Xen's strange new diet. She went from populated tree to populated tree, crushing new cities and old in the way, further diminishing the population count while ensuring the other destroyed settlements were pancaked for good.

Taller and taller Xen grew, moaning with every surge of energy that continued to put her higher and higher above her once so-called peers. Her crew members became harder and harder to detect with every trip to a new edible hiding place, and as a result by the 100ft. tall mark, Xen wasn't just wiping out entire cities by unwittingly walking over them, but also ironically inviting her crew to join those she had crushed at the bottom of her soles. The utterly massive Quarian did not care. Her lust for growth and her insatiable hunger had combined to give birth to a monstrous titan with narcissism equalized to her sheer disregard for any life other than her own.

Xen's tour of indulgence brought her all around the central nation. In as little as thirty minutes of catering to her twisted desires, Xen had brought more hapless and intentional destruction to Xyrah than the entirety of squad one put together. To the now 200ft. tall Xen, it brought her no end of satisfaction to see the now extremely small Quarians who understandably had to abandon their destruction duties simply to save their own skin. "What's the matter, little ones? Have you not enjoyed yourselves as I said?" she mocked, having to crouch down to be able to properly see the much crew members she had so decisively outsized. Xen seized the first one she could get her massive fingers around and brought the squirming mini-giantess up to her eyes.

"Cuh-captain!" the crewmate struggled in her captive's grip; many Quarians belonging to a ship had the habit of addressing the Fleet's admirals as captains of their own vessel. "Please be careful! Keelah, if you dropped me from this distance...!"

"Did I not say you didn't know when there would be another chance like this?" Xen casually addressed the squirming Quarian in her hold. At that moment, the admiral swelled another twenty feet taller in a near-instant, further making the captive squeal and squirm. "I told every single one of you that I would not hold back. And my newfound appetite for destruction appears to be as boundless as the universe."

"Captain, please!" the crew member pathetically cried, "I've done all you asked! I've been loyal to you...! If this is a joke, it's not funny at all!"

"Oh." Xen appeared genuinely surprised for a moment. She closed her eyes and deeply breathed, surging an additional thirty feet taller, making the crewmate scream out loud as the monstrous Xen became even huger. "You should know I'm not the type to joke, little one. As for scrutinizing your loyalty, however, you're absolutely right..."

The hyperventilating mini-giantess held dearly to Xen's fingers as the much larger giant opened her hand to allow her to stand on the growing palm. With Xen expanding taller and taller, the crew member did not dare open her mouth, but she allowed her poor heart a breath of relief. That was until the crewmate saw a looming shadow above her and looked up to see Xen's other hand pending above. "No!"

With a single clap of the hands, that annoying, begging voice disappeared from the air and Xen, smiling behind her mask, finished her sentence: "...except you decided to spy for Koris. A terrible career change, really." Separating her hands, Xen shook gooey remains off her fingers and rubbed her messy palms over her suit to clean her grip. She turned around and proceeded to add a filter to her HUD bio sign overlay, this time to find the 20ft. tall Quarians. "Hmm, very few of you left. I do wonder why?" the admiral chuckled as she intentionally scraped her feet along the cracked ground before starting her hunt.

"Help! The captain... she's gone mad!" one of the crew members in hiding behind a tall tree was making her attempt to contact the other squads, but it was clear the communications had been segmented off by Xen.

"I assure you," Xen's voice rang out like omnipotent booming as the tree behind the hiding crewmate was effortlessly uprooted and hurled back like a mere stick. Xen's mask was all encompassing now that the scientist had passed the 300ft. tall mark. "I haven't been this lucid in years."

"Ahhh! Please no!" the crewmate threw her arms up in defense before a giant fist pounded her down into a bloody pulp dirtied with mud and grass.

Xen gave the dead target under her fist a warm smile as blood seeped through her hand. "I feel like I've awakened to a whole new truth about our race. There are few of us, and every contributing life is precious. That has always been our main philosophy. However, I disagree." The overwhelmingly tall giantess turned to crawl along the forest, her knees and legs leaving a razed path under all that weight. She seized another hiding crewmember from an especially large boulder in her grip. "With this planet's beneficial ecosystem and my newly discovered process of enhancement, the frail and witless Quarian will die off and a new, all-powerful, dominating species will replace them."

"You're crazy! Xen, you're a demented bitch! Stop this nonsense!" the crewmate demanded out of anger more than self-preservation, "This is hubris! Quarians represent unity and you're murdering us!"

"You call me crazy. Wouldn't any worthless pig also spew insults to the culler?" Xen chuckled, "A worthless, yet possibly delicious pig, now that I put more thought into your miserable existence."

"Whu-what do you mean...?" this crewmate hadn't seen Xen eat the Xyrahns, so it came at a full surprise once that enlarging female colossus' induction port opened on her mask. It was then that the full gravity of the situation became clear to the mini-giantess. "N-no! You can't...! Stop! Stop it! Don't you eat meeeee...!" her long shrill was gradually silenced as Xen slipped her captive into her oral slot, opening her mouth to receive the snack.

"Quarian meat..." Xen mused as she closed her mouth and the induction port after it. The titaness sat down to rub a hand over her stomach as she knocked the crew member around in her mouth, savoring the taste of her exosuit before swallowing her. "That was too bland. I should've undressed her first," she thought, turning to the rest of the forest. "More opportunities lay before me! Excellent."

Like that, Xen transformed herself into the largest predator on Xyrah. There was nowhere to hide from her hunger. With every other Quarian's size having been limited, all of the reserves to keep just her growing were being funneled into her, enabling her to maintain connectivity to all of her scaled-up omni-tool services. She could follow the movements of every one of her few remaining crew members in the same way she had the Xyrahns before them.

At first, Xen thought to only rid herself of those she knew were traitors, which she had mostly rounded up in her own squad, while others had been given the order of silent execution by her lieutenants in the other squads. But at this point, she was consumed with the idea of culling the weak. If they couldn't outrun her or escape their fates, they then did not prove to be resourceful enough to live in her planet. Xen had no intention to let any in her squad live.

One by one, Xen hunted them down. With her over 400ft. tall body and scaled up gear, the smaller Quarians stood no chance against her. They did their best to fight back with their own weapons, but Xen was simply too powerful. It didn't matter if they used to support the deranged admiral or if they were covertly against her anymore. They had all joined forces out of sheer determination to live. But that wasn't enough.

Like the cattle Xen envisioned them as, they all ended up sliding down her throat, disintegrated by her oversized Arc Pistol, or outright stomped to an unrecognizable heap of blood and guts. At the end of the hunt, Xen's body stretched all the way up to 500ft. worth of skin-tight outfitted giantess. The only reason Xen did not continue pushing her size further was due to a warning that the omni-gel reserves to keep her gear and equipment on proportion was running dangerously low. She was disappointed, but at the same time pleased with the results.

"Mmm, this is fantastic," Xen finally concluded as she rubbed her bloody hands together as if dusting them off after cleaning. "My planet is going to be the perfect grounds to raise a new, powerful generation of Quarians. Under my guidance..." she paused as a new alert popped up on her HUD. The message prompt told Xen that unauthorized outgoing transmissions were attempting to make contact with the Migrant Fleet. "Hmph," Xen grunted in annoyance. Within a couple of strides, she returned to the landing site where the drop ship she and her squad had arrived in was. To Xen, the ship was barely the size of a toy that could neatly fit in her hand, which she raised to her mask.

The only remaining squad one member that wasn't Xen was currently screaming her head off being rattled inside the ship like a candy ball inside its tiny plastic box. Her effort to circumvent Shala'Raan's interference in order to contact her ship's admiral had been interrupted.

"Ah, now I understand. I erroneously enabled my filter for approximately 20ft. tall Quarians. I was under the impression everybody had equipped the implants like I ordered," Xen mockingly snickered down at the ship. "What were you trying to do? Alert that coward that Daro'Xen vas Moreh, demure and introvert geth specialist, has grown a hundred times bigger and has murdered no less than thirty crew members in cold blood?" the giantess laughed out loud, "If the old man heard your outrageous tale, he would downright doubt your sanity. And even if he believed you, I think his heart would stop at seeing me this big!"

"Y-you..." the crewmember was the only squad one who hadn't grown, so she was less than insignificant to Xen. All the miniature Quarian could do was hold onto whatever piece of machinery she could in order to not fall off the drop ship's doors which had been torn open, "You're a monster!"

"Perhaps," Xen agreed, bringing her free hand up to thoughtfully tap at the side of her mask, "But you are less than a bug to me. And when, pray tell, have you asked a mosquito for its opinion before casually swatting it?"

"D-don't think you'll get very far with that attitude, Daro'Xen! Do you think you'll be able to cover this all up?! Keelah! You're 500ft. tall, there's no way..."

"This? It's entirely reversible, my dear," Xen spoke with her usual air of superiority, but now magnified to the tenth power thanks to her immense size. "I can think no less than six different scenarios that could've ended the lives of this many "brave explorers". There isn't a lot left for autopsies either, unless the investigators cared to get inside my stomach themselves," Xen paused, smacked her lips and narrowed her eyes at the ship in her grip.

"Wh-why...? Why did it turn out this way, dammit! We were going to expose you as a cruel genocidal maniac...! How did you know we were spying on you?!" the crying small Quarian demanded, having no found it entirely useless to argue logic or empathy out of the giantess any longer.

"You vastly overestimated yourselves," Xen sighed rather nonchalantly. "And now, you'll die like the rest of the traitors... and those I didn't like!" Tracing her final obstacle in the central nation, Xen began shaking the drop ship until she saw the green blot separate from it and begin falling down. All Xen had to do next was crouch and elevate the sound reception just to be able to listen to that deathly scream right until the moment the regular sized Quarian made contact with the ground after falling for hundreds of feet, "Splat."

"What happened to this one?" a male, elderly voice asked as a stretcher brought in a child paralyzed with fear.

"Found him at the park in front of the airport; after the jets crashed down, too. It's a miracle he's still alive but... he won't say a word." A middle-aged female voice responded.

"It's a miracle any of us survived this heavenly wrath," the old man remarked, "We were punished for our vain and shallow ways. There's no way around it."

"Some say it was aliens. There's nothing to prove it was any act of God..." another male chirped in.

"Then how do you explain them getting even larger?! They wiped out every major city in seconds!"

Among the stirring arguments, Meelo finally came to after spending an hour staring blankly ahead. He had become so struck with grief and despair that he had shut down. While the giantesses obliterated their nation by zapping or trampling underfoot or eating their safe havens, only the smallest fraction of citizens from different castes and social stratums had gathered into one big group of survivors.

"Where am I?" were Meelo's first words, though the familiar albeit decimated surroundings told him he never left the capital city, and that somehow, the least likely of potential outcomes had allowed him alongside a handful of other citizens survive the inquisition. Meelo was being talked to, but with his mind still in a haze, he couldn't respond. There was an incessant ringing in his ears. Images of that horrible day's events flashed in front of his mind's eye.

The tunnel collapsing after he had hiked a ride in the train; the business district disappearing before his eyes; people murdering each other; the explosions; all of it vivid and as unpleasant as standing there when it happened. Yet he had survived through it all.

Meelo would have thanked whichever deity had been looking out for him, but one look up told him the misery was not over. Through a crack in the ceiling he saw the light filtering in suddenly disappear and show only black. His luck had run out.

There was no time to alert the adults around him. All Meelo could do was brace for the inevitable.

Daro'Xen's scanner was still at work, after all. And it took only the tip of one finger to rid herself of the central nation's final bundle of survivors in a single snap.

"Thank you for making my job so easy, insects. I promise swift death to all the others in your pathetic planet as well," Xen stood up, stretching her outrageously tall body with a sigh of contentment. "After all, a goddess must also be benevolent."

Xyrah would soon be conquered and rid of all its natives. Daro'Xen vas Moreh had won.

The End.