Consensus, Day 3-1: Headphones

“You need to let men walk all over you, they’ll kill you if they can.”

Once more, the words of Mae’s mother echoed in her head as she braced cruel insult after cruel insult from some coked-up hick who was pissed that his package had been damaged. She could barely register his words over the volume of her latest rock playlist blasting in her ears from her headphones, but she could make out some of the words on his lips and they were not pretty.

She thought back to yesterday and the incident with Howard Grove’s car. How effortlessly she crushed the metal and hard plastics into a beach ball sized clump.

This idiot’s head would’ve provided even less resistance than that.

While her mild aphantasia prevented her from constructing most visual memories, the sight of her hands gripping this dipshit’s head and compacting it into pulp was as vivid as could be. Her thumbprints effortlessly concaving the skin as shades of red erupted from pressure points like precious oil erupting from an arid desert.

The more times that people—especially men—mistreated her, the more she couldn’t wait to extend her destruction to their lives. She had been pushed around all of her life, from elementary school all the way to the mailroom. Too weak to fight back. Whenever one abuser left, a second was quick to take their place. Her mom was replaced with her boss, her father was replaced with her husband.

These cycles of abuse received begrudging acceptance from Mae until just two days ago. Once she saw how beautiful she looked in that mirror, it was as if the clouds in her mind had parted and revealed the truth to her. Now, anger filled her headspace and refused to leave, further exacerbated by a choice encounter with Howard Grove this morning.

She had been called into work by her dipshit boss on account of a complaint that she had received on her route. It should have been a simple reprimand before her shift, but Howard Grove would never allow something to be so simple. While most would have settled for a written complaint, Howard Grove physically called the company several times to let his grievances be heard. He must’ve really liked the sound of his own voice.

Mae and her boss sat through the myriad of insult-laden rambles that essentially boiled down to “she dropped a package on my foot” and “she used superhuman strength to throw my car a mile into the forest”, neither of which the boss seemed to take seriously. To make matters worse, Mae found her clothes becoming increasingly tight with each passing second of the audio playback, especially around her chest area. It wasn’t uncomfortable, but if she had a wardrobe malfunction in her boss’ office she wouldn’t hear the end of it.

Thankfully, she was left off with merely a warning, but it only furthered her growing resentment towards all who wronged her. The rage continued to bubble within her as she completed her daily route, only for it to reach its peak upon seeing that she still had a discarded package within the back of her truck. It was addressed to some company on the other side of town.

“FFFFFUUUUUCK!” Mae seethed. “This fucking company and its fucking inability to fucking organize its packages to the proper fucking mail carriers! Grrruhh! That’s so fucking off-route but I’ll get in trouble if I don’t fucking deliver it.”

She threw her hands up in anger, and the action was so ferocious that her clothing tore in response. Luscious hemispheres of ebony flesh poured from her chest like lava from a volcano, barely contained by the push-up bra within. Had her… holy shit, since when were her tits that big!? The cup size seemed almost incomprehensible to her at this point, in just three days she wasn’t quite sure where on the alphabet her breasts fell anymore.

But one fact was true—they were huge!

“Alright, lets… just get this package delivered so I can go home and change into some actually decent clothing.”

Driving to the location, Mae found her fingernails absent-mindedly digging into the breadth of her breasts, exciting them farther. Even though mail delivery was her daily job and she had learned not to become distracted, she found her eyes drifting downwards, alongside her free hand. Her soft fingertips ran downward over the soft grooves of her abs before tracing the faint lines of her jagged obliques back upward.

Her body was a masterpiece! It was hard not to spend so much time appreciating it when no one else seemed to!

But her entertainment was cut short upon actually arriving at the business in question. She arrived at the presumed entrance, only to find a note that read “P.O. BOX HAS BEEN BRIEFLY MOVED TO BACK ENTRANCE, APOLOGIES FOR INCONVENIENCE.”

Mae just sighed, rolling with the punches. Maybe with this new body and strength, she’d be able to “haggle” her way into some overtime negotiations with her boss. “Heh, yeah, that would be the day,” she spoke to herself as she arrived at what she believed to be the back door of this location.

“Desolate” only began to describe it. This looked like one of those liminal spaces she had heard so much about, with not a soul in sight due to the size of the building leading to relative seclusion. This back door looked more like a mandatory fire escape hatch than anything.

“Helloooooo!?” she shouted, but there was no response.

However, an obscured piece of paper clued her in that this was indeed the correct spot. In the same typeface as the message on the front door read “P.O. BOX INSIDE.”

“Alright, this is the place, no doubt about i—.”

Mae’s out-loud thought process was interrupted when she was suddenly yanked inside of the building by a surprisingly strong yet lithe arm. Before the mailwoman could even begin to wonder about what had happened, she found her body colliding with the cold, hard concrete of a nearby wall.

As if on cue, the chill song of her mixtape was switched out to an intense, bass-thumping one. Her laser-focused eyes looked up at her assailant, only to spot a surreal sight. Instead of a beefy brute, a very pretty and lean woman greeted her. While she still possessed smooth, sexy amounts of luscious feminine muscle on most of her body, it seemed more in tune with a fitness trainer, not someone who could throw Mae around like she was a ragdoll.

Not to mention, she was apparently the head secretary? At least judging by the badge on her sizable lapel that read: Head Secretary, Christina Atelier.

She began to speak, clearly some sort of well-thought-out speech, but Mae wasn’t having any of that. The song from her headphones was pumping her up, not to mention, she couldn’t hear a word this beautiful secretary was saying.

Christina appeared to become increasingly frustrated by Mae’s lack of a response, which only enticed Mae to continue what she was doing. This bitch made her drive all the way across town just to throw her into a wall! If she wanted a fight, she’d get one.

Mae assumed a fighting stance, but Christina didn’t wait around to play. She lunged at the mailwoman, catching her off-guard and tackling her to the floor. The strange beaut reached for her headphones, Mae’s mind immediately recognized this and desired for them not to be removed from her ears. This crazy bitch was probably trying to steal them from her!

Sure enough, even though she yanked and tugged, Christina was unable to make the cheap plastic budge, much less break. Mae rewarded her sisyphean effort with a punch to the face, sending her flying off and into a nearby pillar, which shattered on impact.

The impact did little to phase Christina, who still somehow managed to land on her feet and get right back into action. Based on the bruise around her forehead, Mae’s initial punch seemed to be the only blow to do any sort of damage.

Brushing the debris off of her pantsuit, Christina briefly paused only to resolve a crick in her neck. Mae was fast on the attack, but Christina was faster, zipping around her fists and countering with a surprisingly gymnastic scorpion kick, knocking Mae onto her curvaceous rear. She then gave the defenseless Mae another kick to the face for good measure.

Resorting to plan B, the secretary outstretched her hand and used some sort of telekinesis on the package Mae had delivered. Mae was closer to it, however, and managed to secure a grip on it around the same time. The two wrestled over the package, but Mae’s mass manipulation won out. Christina found herself being yanked towards Mae via her own mind grip, only to receive a clothesline lariat to the face from the mailwoman’s powerful left bicep.

Seizing the opportunity, Mae tore open the package. What she saw raised a sculpted eyebrow. It was some sort of strange syringe-like device, no larger than a cigarette lighter. While it had no immediate practical use to her, judging by how defensive Christina’s posture became at the sight of it, it clearly possessed some sort of dangerous power.

Pointing it at Christina as if it were a loaded gun, Mae began to back away towards the nearest exit. Her song was nearing an end, as was her desire to continue this fight. Christina walked closer, but still kept her distance. She must’ve suspected that Mae was totally bluffing, but never quite closed the gap between the two of them. A smile grew on her face, she knew something Mae didn’t.

Sure enough, three office workers entered from the preferred exit, leaping onto Mae like ravenous zombies, clawing at her clothes and hair as they attempted to grab the syringe in her hand. These three sudden additions alongside Christina’s telekinesis overwhelmed Mae to the point where she had to ditch the device if she wanted to escape with her life.

And escape with her life she did.

Throwing the attempted pile-up of people off her, she made a mad dash for the exit, running straight through the door without stopping. Hopping in her mail truck, she didn’t even look back as she drove away from that accursed office, fist pumping and hyping herself up as her heart pounded with rejuvenated resolve.

Once more, someone tried to walk all over her. This time, she didn’t let them.

~

Christina gripped her head and groaned. Even with the equivalent of five Howard boosts under her belt, that bitch of a mailwoman managed to elude her grasp. With the only one of the two known remaining supergirls that she had the element of surprise over, she thought it would be a surefire win. Slip an extra package pertinent to her business into Mae’s truck undetected, wait for her to arrive at the specific location, hypnotize her with Carrie’s former ability and acquire her strength manipulation.

But no. She just had to be wearing headphones.

All of Christina’s careful planning—undone by a single variable she had failed to consider. Sure, her brain was powerful and capable enough to manage her ascension plan alongside an entire company from the shadows, but not without a few hiccups along the way. Such was the scientific process if one were to achieve meaningful progress, Christina knew that all too well.

Then again… She deserved better. The scientific method’s snail-pace was growing inefficient for a powerful being of her stature. Christina deserved the world bowing to her by day three!

She needed to strike quickly and efficiently, while accounting for any and all potential hiccups along the way. A few more stops by Howard Grove’s cubicle should solve that for sure! With a bit more brain food, she’d have contingency plans atop contingency plans!

Bringing her endless leg up to her crotch with the elegance and grace of a machinated crane, her toe flicked Mr. Carob away from the depths of her netherregions.

“Time for you to be a good little boy and man the office while your real boss attends to some… personal business matters,” Christina explained to the man who was 20 years older than her as if he were a child.

Mr. Carob merely nodded, his good behavior rewarded with a flirtatious wink from one of Christina’s long, thick lashes.

She slipped into a new slinky red dress, as if she were attending a banquet hall of sorts. The chosen garment fit perfectly, hugging Christina’s sensual curves like a second skin, putting her succulent body on a drool-inducing display. The thin fabric clung tightly to her chiseled abs, hints of definition showing right through the smolderingly sexy outfit and leaving very little to the imagination.

Stepping from her office, her high heels trotted down the recently buffered floor, the metronomic click, clack alerting all to her commanding presence. If they didn’t love her, they feared her—both of which were quite delectable positions to have within a subordinate’s headspace.

But when she arrived at his desk, another wrench had fallen into her plans. Howard was not at his desk for the first time in 25 years.

Where the hell had Howard Grove gone?

~

“Babe, I think we’re going to need to order some more workshirts, this one’s all cut-up from claw marks and breast-related expansions.”

“Yeah, yeah, that’s great honey.” Darius replied, not even looking up from his computer as he typed message after message on some online bidding sight, hyping up the sale of his mediocre goods. There were at least two questionable phrases in that sentence and yet Darius didn’t so much as raise an eyebrow at any of it. “But trust me, whatever boring mailman day you had wouldn’t even compare to the day I had!”

Mae closed her eyes tightly, trying desperately to imagine some sort of calming, happy place. Nothing materialized.

Instead, she thought back once more to yesterday and the incident with Howard Grove’s car. How effortlessly she crushed the metal and hard plastics into a beach ball sized clump.

Darius’ head would’ve provided even less resistance than that.