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xxxxxAs the rock monster trudged on, it came to a sudden halt to protect its oh-so-sensitive eyes from the light of the senshi girl transforming. It let out a sort of squealing, strained mix between a roar and a cry. Still though, it kept moving towards the smaller, more vulnerable target. As strange as it sounds, the more the brick moved, the faster they seemed to get, until the combination of bricks was at a sort of running pace, equivalent to maybe a kindergartner dashing down the street towards an ice cream truck. Eager, but slow.

It seemed however, that the senshi girl was going to get in the way. Making her mad seemed to be her one flaw. Though the rock monster wasn't intelligent, it could certainly pick up a few battle tactics. The monster hurled a few bricks at the surrounding cars and bikes, leaving quite a few scratches and dents on their nicely waxed surfaces. The rocks slid back and forth in its strange mouth, and it clapped its hands together, almost laughing and making a spectacle of the most likely irritated senshi. Still, it continued to move closer to the boy. Soon it reached the red truck, only to have its prize snatched away from it. The boy ran off, following an even smaller blur of purple-ish gray fur. Still, the brick being chased after his target with almost stubborn stupidity.

His heart was beating wildly as he ran. Even though the monster was slow, there never seemed to be enough space between him and it; a football field wouldn't have been a larger enough gap. The sheer size of the thing was intimidating to the boy. He had never seen a hippopotamus before, but he was sure it was much bigger than one. Although hippos seemed slow, he heard in class they could be dangerous. This monster was much scarier than a hippo. In comparison to it, Sam was practically flying across the pavement.

They were coming to the edge of the parking lot. The sidewalk making the boundary between it and the road. It was surprisingly empty of traffic, Sam didn't even bother to look both ways before running across to the other side, the safe side that didn't have a monster who wanted to eat him. Or crush him, whatever it was monsters wanted to do with children. Sam hopped over a bench and crouched down beside the cat.

"What're we suppose to do?" Sam couldn't look away from the scene in front of them.

As the boy hopped over the bench, the feline took the opposite path and went under the bench, meeting the boy on the other side.

As his eyes remained glued upon the monster, ********* explained the situation as best as she saw it. "Well... there's no easy way to say this, but... You're a Senshi, Sam!" The manx had been able to sense it ever since she had been stuffed in that backpack. Apparently there was a reason for all of the movement while stuffed away in her denim prison.

With that, she stepped forward about 5 steps, then sprang up almost like a spring-loaded toy into a back flip. The flip itself was unimpressive since it lacked grace of any sort, but as she landed heavily upon her paws again, something clattered to the ground. A rather strange looking rust-orange pen of some sort and a phone both seemed to have appeared out of nowhere. Giving most of her attentions to the overly large pen, she nudged it with her nose towards the boy.

"Take this and shout out 'Ixion Power, Make-up!' ... do it like you mean it, with feeling!" ********* pulled her nose away and looked at the boy expectantly for a split second. After that, the cat hopped up onto the bench, and attempted to hop up onto the tallest portion of the bench, but instead tumbled back down off the other side (letting out a small "ooph" as she landed). There wasn't nearly enough room for her to perch it would seem. Though the feline seemed all smiles, she couldn't help but want to see what was going on with the Senshi of Rainbows. Defeated, she kept that pleasant demeanor of hers as she made her way back to the side where the boy was at.

"Sam... it's time!"

The blonde senshi was making a mental note to herself (that she was prone to forget in the future). When fighting a Rock creature, it would probably be best to avoid throwing yourself at it. Right now, Sailor Iris was realizing how much of a sitting duck she was. She already had several bruises from that teal-haired Nega, and as the bricks began to bombard her, she was already thinking about how many more bruises she was going to get. Instinctively, she protected her head, but sadly the rest of her body was easy pickings for the monster. Bricks pelted her body, hitting her in the stomach, the legs, and many hit her arms as they protected her head. There was enough force to the thrown bricks to cause the girl to stop moving forward and get thrown back. If she had been lucky, she might have been thrown against the hood of a car, where there might have been some give to her landing.

Sailor Iris was apparently not lucky enough for even that much. The asphalt was her landing pad, and as her body seemed to smear across the black surface of the ground, she could feel the skin of her elbows scraping wide open. There was an intense hissing sound escaping her body at the moment, but that was all she'd allow herself in regards to expressing the pain she was experiencing.

"Gotta... gotta get up..." It was simple enough to say, a simple enough philosophy to follow, but many times it was more difficult than one could imagine. Despite how much her elbows complained about how heavily she leaned against them, she straightened her gloved arms (now turning quite red about the torn elbows) and pushed herself up off the ground. If she stayed down, she was already as good as defeated. Sailor Iris wasn't going to let that happen. Using her already wobbling arms to steady herself, she began to push up to her feet.

"Yer strong... gotta give ya that... but yer god damned slow... and I ain't talkin' 'bout how fast yer body moves..." Any time was a good time for a taunt.

xxxxxSatisfied, the stupid monster sort of clapped with joy as he hit the girl. Hitting the girl meant he won. That was it. But as the girl continued to stand up, it frowned. It was a fierce frown. A frown that said, "no, I won, you lost, get back down." The monster lost it's happy expression, and its laugh quickly turned into a roar of anger. This wasn't fair. The girl cheated. In an almost toddler-like fashion, it stomped its feet on the ground, sending miniature vibrations through the parking lot. Nothing noticeable, just vibrations. Pounding the ground, it reached up its arm in an attempt to throw more bricks.

xxxxxBut it was haulted when the smaller boy cried out. Turning, the monster looked around for the small boy. But he was no longer there. Now, there was a strange boy who looked quite similar, but had a sort of powerful air to him. The monster's arm flopped to its side. Now there were two of them? This was more work than he wanted. The rock monster simply longed to crush things, was that so hard for them to understand?

xxxxxNow it was go time. Now was its chance. It held its position for a moment, and then hurled a few bricks at the boy. He seemed somehow ... less resilient than the girl, and the rock monster arrogantly assumed it would take less hits. No longer was the monster chortling with each toss though. Now it was mad; enraged even.

His distraction was working, sort of! The boy hadn’t considered that the monster would fling brick at him, maybe just chase him some more. At least Sailor Iris wasn’t in too much danger anymore. Ixion thought he could bare the brunt of the attacks until she could pull herself together.

Bricks were flying at Sailor Chibi Ixion left and right. He was doing his best to dodge them. It was lucky that the monster was somewhat slow, instead of a professional baseball pitcher. Ixion was a much smaller target than the older senshi, and a bendy one at that. The size of the bricks and the speed that they were hurtling towards him made it not too difficult to dodge. Ixion was hopping and skipping around; most bricks whizzed by him. The boy thought to himself, ‘they always said dodge ball didn’t apply to the real world, guess they were wrong!’

"Nice try!" he winced, "my grandma pitches better than you."

Even though he was a good dodge ball player, all his skills at ducking and diving weren’t helping as much as he thought they would. A few bricks hit his shoulder and shins, nearly causing him to buckle. Still he was a trooper, until the cat called out to him.

Looking over his shoulder, back towards the cat, the noob senshi was distracted himself. A brick flew towards him, hitting in squarely in the stomach. “Ufffff,” the boy groaned from the sheer force and impact of the brick. He bent forwards, clutching his stomach.

“Damn it,” he uttered under his breath. The little senshi tired to straighten out. Slightly hunched and still clinging to his stomach, Ixion ran over to a set of cars parked in the metered spaced by the road. He dipped behind one and waved the cat over.

For a brief moment, ********* followed the boy to his new hiding place. She did feel a bit bad about causing him to get hit, but at the same time, he was bound to get hit sooner or later. This weird monster definitely seemed to have a smashing problem.

In a hurried tone, the tailless feline almost commanded "Put me on your shoulder, then get us to higher ground. I'll tell you what you need to do when we get there. Hurry, this isn't a safe place!" If it wasn't obvious before, it was becoming increasingly more obvious as the sound of metal upon metal seemed to draw closer. ********* ears couldn't help but try to flatten themselves against her skull.

The blonde was bleeding pretty good, but her blood kept pumping. However, it was difficult to tell which made her more angry. The fact the cat had once again awakened a senshi that was most likely still in grade school, or how this monster had created all of these ruined vehicles. Either way, this rock monster was getting her attentions and all of her bottled up rage. Rather than leap out at the beast, the blonde charged in by foot. It would be best if she remained grounded for now, so she wouldn't get caught by surprise by more bricks. Letting out what seemed like a war cry, the teen ducked in close to the monster.

That cat better know what the hell she's doing!

With a deep breath, she then called out "Show me what ya got, Rocks-fer-brains!!"

xxxxxRock monster was not a happy rock monster. These stupid, small, lithe beings kept dashing around haphazardly with no direction whatsoever. If only they would just sit still. It was aggravating, having to deal with them both. The rock monster wasn't exactly ... bright ... It didn't have the capability to focus on one at a time. It hit what was moving. It was instinct.

xxxxxSlamming it's fists down, it prepared for it's "last attack" if you will. It picked up two slabs of concrete and threw them at either senshi. It landed just a hair short of the chibi senshi, to which the rock monster responded with a loud roar. It was a wonder the civilians hadn't heard the monster yet. The second slab however, just grazed the older senshi's leg. It wasn't seriously, much to the monsters dismay, but it would certainly leave a scratch.

xxxxxRock monster's beady eyes followed the boy and cat up the hill. Just what were they up to? It didn't matter. What mattered was crushing these things.

xxxxxIt then glared at the older girl. She was becoming quite the pest, wasn't she? Best to eliminate her.

xxxxxSoon.

Ixion followed ********* directions surprisingly well, zig-zaging off to the left just before the concrete came crashing down behind them. Ixion was rattled by his near crushing, but relieved that he wasn’t smashed to pieced by the slab of concrete.

When they reached the top of the hill, Ixion pulled ********* loose from his fuku and set her down on the grass.

An unabashed smirk crossed Ixion’s face as he flexed his right arm. “I’m not bad.” The boy stook a stance, feet spread apart and hand held out; he was all set to call upon his power for the first time. “Ixion Coal Rush.”

When he finished, a large black ball appeared in his hand. The lump was a piece of coal roughly the size of his fist. Looking down at it, Ixion’s cocky grin fell. That was it? His magic power was summoning a ROCK? A lousy small rock against a giant monster made of rocks!?

‘Great, we’re doomed’ he thought.

The dark-haired senshi looked at *********, a bit forlorn. His excitement was dampened by his disappointing magic. “What should I do with this?”