Big Trouble!-5 by Lynceus I missed Lena terribly; I hadn't realized how much I'd come to rely on her support! Going home to an empty bed didn't sound very promising either, so I decided to stay in space and try to figure out what was wrong with my powers. Try as I might, however, I couldn't seem to make any headway. And then I got some help from an unexpected source..

---

I wanted to throw something. Unfortunately, the Starcruiser Jordan isn't the best place to throw a tantrum. Frustrated, I turned away from the monitor. I really needed to talk to Lena, but she would be asleep by now.

It's hard to keep track of time in space; day and night don't really exist as we know them. Not long after Jade left, I curled up on a cot and went to sleep. I woke up taller than I was before, but still a lot shorter than my normal height. I measured myself in the medical bay.

5' 1”. I tried to make myself grow, but all I got for my trouble was a sudden wave of vertigo. I lost my balance and fell to the floor. It didn't really hurt, but for some reason, I started crying anyways. The mature adult I had once been was gone, replaced by a little girl who burst into tears at the drop of a hat!

Was this really all I was without Lena? God, I'm so pathetic! Jade's Power Ring claimed I had the willpower to be a Green Lantern myself, but right now, I sure didn't believe it.

A long, hot shower sounded pretty good about now, but home was pretty far away, and while it was neat, the sonic shower onboard wasn't the same. With a heavy sigh, I picked myself up, wiped away my tears, and tried to get back to work.

-

I'd come to a conclusion about the so-called 'metagene'. Ever since I'd started studying metahumans in earnest, I'd run into several stumbling blocks. Whatever it was that made myself different from a normal human, was no mere mutation!

There was a genetic marker that all the metahumans I'd studied so far seemed to share, but whether or not it was really the 'metagene' itself was debatable. Of course, while the medical bay had some fairly advanced equipment, I lacked the resources to do any kind of full-scale testing.

Heck, I didn't even have blood samples from all the girls yet!

That was understandable, of course, we all had pretty hectic lives; to date, Jade hadn't yet managed to get us all in the same room! But some, I suspected, had their own reasons for not wanting to help me out. Jade herself, for example, hadn't given me any DNA to test. Granted, she claimed to be a normal human, but at this stage in testing, a negative was just as good as a positive, perhaps even more so.

Even Lena had the marker in question, although there were no signs that she had any kind of superhuman abilities, unless you count her staggering I.Q...and that was likely the product of normal genetics in action, given who her father is.

I slam my fist on the counter. Damn it! It's not fair! Lena should be with me, not him! Lex Luthor is a monster; he tried to kill me, and he's experimented on people against their will! How can Lena love him?

“Ow, shit, that smarts!” I suddenly realize I'd done more damage to my hand than any part of the Starcruiser. What the hell is wrong with me?

Luckily, my hand is just bruised, so I sit down and try to get back to work. I need to get my mind off of things, that's all. The equipment in the medical bay can't really detect any changes in myself, so whatever the problem with my powers is, it's not physical. I can't discount the idea of a mental or emotional block; I'd scared myself with how reckless I'd been with my powers!

But I don't think that's it, really. Somehow, my emotional state had interfered with the process that let me juggle my mass and size around. I'd quite literally 'dropped the ball', and shunted my extra mass..somewhere else.

The process had created an explosion, or more accurately, a concussive blast with enough force to level the warehouse. I wasn't sure why, and for the life of me, I didn't know why the explosion hadn't done more damage! I mean, if I converted my mass to energy or something silly like that, well, you get the idea.

So I was left with the theory that I was somehow drawing mass from some other dimension or 'pocket universe'. And that I'd disrupted my connection with the sub-dimension, which was why I couldn't draw extra mass out of it now. At least, not reliably.

But that still left so many questions. Like how I was able to function as a giant woman without collapsing under my own weight! I put my hands to my head. “Argh! I can't think!”

“Wow, uh, is this a bad time?”

I looked up to find an unfamiliar woman standing at the door to the medical lab. She was really tall, close to 6' 6”, and about college-aged. She also had the longest hair I'd ever seen, which fell down past her (rather shapely) buttocks. And she was seriously toned!

I mean, I have a very trim, athletic build, and Lena often calls me an Amazon. But I have nothing on this woman! Despite that, she was far from unattractive, although a lot of people would be intimidated by her.

“Uh...sorry, do I know you?”

She chuckled and crossed her arms over her chest. “Yeah, but the last time we met, you were a lot taller and trying to crush the life out of me.”

“Oh my God...I'm so sorry about that!”

The woman shook her head. “Relax, Flash told me the whole story. You thought I'd kidnapped your friend or something. I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm not happy about what happened, but..” She shrugged. “I don't see the need to be sore about it.”

“I appreciate that. So why are you still here?”

She smirked. “You mean, as opposed to being in a jail cell? Seems your boss, that Jade chick, thinks I could be useful. So if I help out, she can let bygones be bygones.”

I frowned. “I don't like the sound of that. It's almost like blackmail, isn't it?”

She shrugged. “Maybe. It depends on what I have to do, and what I can get out of it. Look, I don't know about the rest of you kids, but getting superpowers hasn't been all fun-and-games for me. Dressing up and playing hero isn't exactly the first thing that came to mind, either.”

I held up a hand. “Hold up, let's start over. I'm Doris, what's your name?”

She walked over to a chair and turned it backwards, sitting in it like a guy would. “Lee. Well, actually, I've been going by Lily ever since...”

“You stopped being a guy?”

She literally growled at me! “What, is it printed on my forehead or something?”

I shook my head. “No, but it's really common. Almost all known metahumans are girls, and only a few of them started that way. We're not really sure why.”

She frowned. “So that means...you're a guy?”

I smiled. “Well, my situation is a little more complicated, but yes. I didn't look like this before I got my powers.”

Something of her aggressiveness seemed to drain out of her. “Oh.”

“Doesn't help, I know. You look at me, and you see a pretty girl. Even worse, I don't seem to be all that upset about not being a guy anymore. And that pisses you off, doesn't it?”

Her brow furrowed slightly. “Yeah, it does. Fuck, are you some kind of psychiatrist?”

“No, just I've dealt with a lot of people like us. You have a lot of mixed feelings about what you've become, I can tell. Because I've seen it. And been there, to an extent”. I slid out of the chair and walked over to her.

“I used to be Damon Zeul. I suffered from a rare medical condition..I was really short and girlish even as a grown man. Maybe if I'd tried to live as a woman, or had an operation, I'd have been happier, but I'd been raised as a boy, so I never really considered it.”

“So..this wasn't really that bad for you.” She spoke slowly, choosing her words with care.

“No, actually, it turned out to be a blessing in disguise. But not at first. I mean, my whole identity had been wiped clean; I wasn't me anymore, but this pretty teenager! I was 27! I had a doctorate! And now?” I shook my head. “I didn't know who I was anymore. Or what to do.”

“Yeah, I can relate to that. I'm an ex-Marine, for fuck's sake. Now I'm some girl. Even looking at girls isn't the same...” She trailed off, her cheeks coloring.

“Lee. It's ok. You can't help how you feel. Your body is pumping all kinds of weird chemicals into your bloodstream, everything about you is changing.”

“I know! I know it! But...fuck. I'm a man! I swear to God, if I start liking guys, I'll blow my brains out!”

I slapped her. “Don't talk like that!”

She blinked at me, even as I sucked in a breath as my hand throbbed in pain. “Fuck...ow...!”

“I hurt you, I'm sorry.” She did look pretty upset, to be honest.

“I tried to slap you silly, and you're apologizing to me?” I winced. Hitting her was like hitting a wall!

“I...I guess it's stupid, but I don't like hurting girls.”

I shook my head. “You were raised to think it was wrong?”

“Hey, if a girl can handle herself, and she starts something, I'll lay her out like a man. But...I don't know. I can bully a guy all day long, but I hate bullying girls. Especially pretty ones.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Was that a compliment?”

She ran her fingers through her hair. “Sorry. Yeah.”

“Don't apologize, I appreciate it. Even though I see this face in the mirror every day, it's still kind of new to me. Being..you know...pretty.”

She nodded. “Yeah. And sorry about saying I'd kill myself. That's the kind of emo bullshit we don't tolerate in the Corps.”

“I can understand why you'd feel that way. I mean, the first time I realized I was flirting with a guy, I was scared half to death!”

Lee licked her lips. “So you...you've been with..?”

“Oh, no. I don't think I'll ever be ready for that. I'm actually with another girl.”

Her eyes widened. “Oh shit, so the girl that was kidnapped, she was your girlfriend?! No wonder you were pissed off!”

I smiled. “You took that better than I thought you would. I guess lesbians don't scare you as much?”

“No, why would...hey! That's not fair!” She attempted to give me an angry glare, but it looked more like a sexy pout than anything.

I giggled. “Sorry. But I had to make the point.”

“Ok fine. I'm a hypocrite. Happy now?”

I shook my head. “You misunderstand. I'm not mocking you. I'm trying to point out that a lot of your problems are in your head. You need to stop thinking of everything as gay or straight, male or female. Let's cut to the chase; you think women are weak. Not all women, but most women. You also think gay men are weak, because a lot of them act like women. The problem you're having is, you're not a weak person. You've never let yourself be weak.”

I paused to let my words sink in. “You feel that you have to be strong, tough, and aggressive. Weak people get pushed around, and you don't let anyone push you around.”

“No. I don't.” She glowered at me.

I tried another tack. “Your Dad was a Marine, huh?”

She blinked. “Yeah, how did you guess?”

“So was mine. Mine didn't stop bullying me until I left for college.”

She looked at her hands. “When I was fifteen, he hit Mom. I broke his arm and his jaw with a baseball bat, and told him to get out. That was the last time I ever saw him.” She looked up at me, and I thought she was going to cry. “I turned into him, didn't I? I'm the same!”

“Of course you're not! You'd never hit a woman like that!”

“...I guess I wouldn't. Still..what you're saying is, he pushed people around because he didn't want to be pushed...which made me the same way.”

I shivered slightly as I felt my body grow a few inches taller. I tried to stay relaxed, forcing it didn't seem to work. But I couldn't help but feel a little giddy. I understood Lee's mindset; being small made me feel weak, and being taller empowered me. Except when I was with Lena.

Somehow, being smaller than her felt right in a way I can't quite explain. With her, I don't need to be strong. She makes me feel safe. Loved.

Lee looked up at me as she realized what was going on. Thankfully, adjusting the disguise my ring generates as I change height is second nature for me. I didn't think flashing her would be very conducive to our conversation!

I stopped growing at what I guessed was the 6' mark (my 'default' size has grown a little over the past few weeks) and placed my hand on her shoulder. “You're not alone, Lee.”

She grinned. “Is there anyplace on this tub to get a beer?”

-

Getting the replicator to synthesize alcohol isn't easy; I gather an intoxicated Green Lantern is not a pretty sight! Still, I have enough chemical knowledge that I was able to con it into producing something that tasted like light beer, and could loosen you up a little. I offered a glass to Lee, and she took a sip.

“Say, that's not bad. A little watered-down, but it tastes alright.”

“Glad you approve, the thing isn't really supposed to dispense Miller Genuine Draft. Then again, I've never been a big beer drinker anyways.”

Lee liked her lips. “You don't have to drink the stuff if you don't like it.”

I shrugged. “It's okay. I'll see if I can't get the damn thing to make a Long Island next.”

Lee whistled. “That's a serious drink.”

“Yep. But it tastes better. I never said I couldn't hold my alcohol, I just don't like beer.”

She saluted me with her glass. “Point taken. I appreciate this, by the way. You don't have any reason to be nice to me. I'm a thug and a criminal.”

“Maybe, but that doesn't mean you're a bad person. Believe me, I wasn't planning on using my powers to help people at first either. I had people trying to kill me, and I didn't want to put Lena in any danger.”

“So what changed your mind?”

I sighed. “Lena, of course. She knows me better than I know myself. I always wanted to help people, it's why I went into genetics in the first place. I mean, sure, I wanted to understand why I was different, but it was more about helping other kids not to have to go through the same hell I did.”

Lee shook her head. “I wish I could have done things differently. Maybe I wouldn't have lost Maddie...”

“Maddie?”

She let out a breath. “Short for Madison, which she hated. She thought it sounded like a boy's name.” Lee chuckled ruefully. “She wasn't the most beautiful girl around, but she was tough, and smart. I liked her a lot. I think I loved her...I tried so hard with her. I tried to be the guy I thought she deserved.”

“So what happened?”

“...she betrayed me. Set me up to get shot. I should have died, but...lucky me, I'm bulletproof!” She looked like she was about to say something else, but she quickly took a drink of her not-quite-beer.

“I won't try to slap you again, I promise.”

She frowned. “I feel like you can read my mind, Doris. Ok, fine. When I realized I was still alive...I didn't want to be. Bad enough to die with a broken heart...living with one...it's bad, Doris.”

I stood up and walked behind her, putting my arms around her gently. She stiffened for a moment, then relaxed. “Lee, it's not your fault. You may be a bad boy at heart, but you're not a monster. If she could do that, it means she couldn't have loved you.”

“...I know. But it still hurts!”

“I think that's why looking at girls doesn't do anything for you. It's not your hormones, although they're not helping. You feel like you're cheating on her.”

She froze again. “...fuck me.”

“Tempting, but I'm a one-woman kind of girl.”

“...ha ha. Very funny. Not.” Still, she giggled, then put a hand to her mouth. “Ugh!”

I laughed. “I felt the same way! Guys don't giggle, right?”

“I guess this guy does. It's not going to be easy, but...you've made your point. I'm a girl now. So I have to change some things. But that doesn't mean I have to change everything, either.”

“Only what will make you happy, Lee.”

She half-turned to face me. “Call me Lil.”

“Lil it is. Say, have you thought about cutting this hair at all? I mean, it's lovely, but it has to be hard to manage!”

“You ain't kidding! I mean, it's heavy, but that's kind of ok; I'm pretty strong. But I keep sitting on it, which hurts, and I've even gotten it caught in a door...which sucks.”

“Ouch. Glad my hair isn't that long.”

“But yeah, uh, I tried to cut it. I can't.”

I blinked. “What, it grows back?”

She shook her head. “No, I mean, I literally can't! Nothing seems to cut it, it's as tough as the rest of me!”

“...really. Hm...” I bugged the computer to replicate a few cutting instruments, and sure enough, nothing seemed to work!

“Well that's damned weird. I wonder if Dream has the same problem?”

“You mean American Dream?”

“Yeah, I'm guessing your powers are similar. She's pretty much impossible to hurt as well.”

“Huh. I guess that means you couldn't, like, take any blood samples or anything either.”

I moved to face her. “Why, is something wrong?”

“Well, it's just...I didn't change overnight. I mean, first I got invulnerable, and then I started getting younger...taller...stronger. Turning into a chick was slow at first.”

I nodded. “Go on, hon.”

“Well, when I first became, you know, 100% girl, I looked maybe 25. Since then, I've gotten even younger looking. And it hasn't stopped. I keep looking younger all the time...and I'm a little worried about it. Is it going to stop? How young will I get?”

“Honestly, I don't know. I mean, American Dream is really 35...”

Lil made a face. “Oh God, she was a guy too? I think I'm going to throw up!”

“I thought the girls didn't do anything for you anymore? And isn't she a bit young-looking for you? Should I be worried?” I grinned.

“Don't joke, please! So...I can get as young as you, then?”

“Well, the youngest I've seen so far is Stefani, she's 18, but looks like, 12 to 13.”

“Jesus. I don't want to be that young!”

“I think you'd be cute at that age, myself. But...I'm inclined to think that won't happen.”

“Why not?”

“Well, the fact that your body bothered growing. I mean, why bother getting taller if you're eventually going to get smaller?”

“Uh...this from the Incredible Shrinking/Growing Woman.”

I laughed. “Yes, but that's actually my power!”

“Well, here's hoping you're right. I could still get kind of young tho', couldn't I? I mean, when do girls stop growing? Eighteen?”

“Sixteen, usually.”

“Oh God.”

I patted her arm. “It'll be alright, Lil, I promise. When Jade gets back, I can ask her to scan you with her ring, plus there's a medical scanner here. Blood sample or no, I'll do my best to help you.”

“...I really don't deserve it, but thank you.”

I flashed her my biggest smile. “That's what friends are for.”

-

Somehow, befriending Lil made me feel a lot better about myself. Maybe my confidence had been messing with my powers, I really couldn't be certain, not without more tests. And once you got her out of her shell, Lil was a blast to hang out with. It's weird; in our former lives, we'd have never gotten along, even if we had met.

But here we are, quickly becoming very good friends. Life sure is strange sometimes.

Hell, she even asked me about clothes, which surprised me. I warned her not to move too fast, but she claimed she was getting bored of the tomboy look. Although, at her size, I think she's kind of stuck for it, poor thing.

Oddly, even though we can't cut her hair (Jade even tried to use her ring like a laser, and she couldn't cut a single strand!), it can be dyed. After a few attempts, she finally settled on this nice henna shade, a little darker than my own hair, and it looks great on her.

Of course, Jade isn't quite ready to hand out another magic ring, but I'm hopeful that Lily will prove to be more than a diamond in the rough.

I'd really love to see her shine.

---

To be continued...

Author's Note: I know I promised to explain Giganta's powers more in this chapter...blame my Muse! Still, I think it turned out better this way. -Lynceus