Ultimate 2

 Drama dictated that Aria describe the changes as being agonizing. Romance suggested that they be pleasurable. But the truth was, if Aria hadn't been watching a holographic display of herself, she might not have noticed the changes. Rather than some extreme sensation, it was a sort of dull numbness, like her nervous system had been temporarily disconnected and told that everything was fine.   

 That was not to say she couldn't see the changes, though. She could see them in the hologram and on herself, and couldn't so much as consider looking away. Her entire body grew. Only a few inches in stature, just enough that she could be called 'statuesque', but so much more in all the other ways. Her biceps swelled to the level of an amateur bodybuilder, and Aria unconsciously gave a sample flex to find that their peak was far rounder and more enticing than a professional.   

 Her stomach hardened, with lines going down it forming the beginnings of a trim, fit stomach. Her pecs, back, neck, all just got a little bit bigger. Her thighs, though, those grew by a lot, becoming massive pillars of muscle that just begged to be crushing watermelons.   

 All in all, she looked like a fitness model, and the changes had only just begun. Aside from size, she grew in strangeness. The hologram displaying a readout of new organs that were growing inside her and old ones she wouldn't need anymore were melting away. Her hair changed color to a faintly luminous, bright purple color that didn't seem like it could be natural anywhere in the universe. Her nerves reconnected... sending a jolt through her brain as everything seemed to slow down, her mind getting faster, her sensory input hitting harder, like her very seat of consciousness was upgrading itself to a supercomputer. 

 As the adrenaline faded, she was able to view the world at what still seemed like normal speed, slowing or accelerating it back at will as she tried to get a handle on her own brain. 

 The computerized voice from before interrupted her. “Good to see you're taking to it, but there are more important things to attend to...” the pod in the back of the room began to slowly open, mist billowing out from the bottom. “My beloved daughter, last of our world... and you, first of yours. I have upgraded you both with the final fruits of our technology, identical to each other, but far above the species you came from. It is my sincerest hope that you will support each other, care for each other, and find happiness away from the grave of this world...” 

 The voice sounded more solemn than Aria had thought him capable of as the pod finished opening, revealing to her... a wolf girl. She didn't seem particularly alien. Her features were slim and pretty, her fur was a pristine white with only some luminous red accents like Aria's own to make her look foreign. Her body was strong, definitely athletic, reminding Aria of a basketball player... but still feminine. 

 Her tits looked to be at least E-cup, but Aria probably shouldn't be looking at that. 

 Besides, her outfit, a thick, flowing robe almost like an ancient priestess', was probably concealing some of her figure. 

 “Hello,” Aria said as her first contact.

“Hey...” the alien responded, her voice more than a little hoarse from the long stasis. 

 “My name is Aria, it's nice to meet you,” Aria continued to treat the situation as plainly as possible. 

 “Mira, and likewise!” the wolfess was already starting to brighten. 

 “You may wonder why you can understand each other,” the machine answered a little more loudly than was appropriate, “The biology you know both possess learns easily, and I have taught Mira your language in the time since we landed here, this is but one of many features you will enjoy, however, as you are simply our planets GREATEST triumph!”   

 As the machine's voice launched into a rant, Aria and Mira took their first long look at each other. Mira was practically a sleeping beauty, still stiff and frozen, while Aria looked like she'd been through a wringer, but neither could pretend the other looked bad.   

 What's more, they wore the same smile. 

 Mira pointed at the hologram tentatively, rolled her eyes, and made a quick pistoning motion with her fingers.   

 Aria smirked in response, put her hands on her hips, and mouthed along to the voice, maw opening and closing as widely as she could, a pantomime of exaggerated pontification. 

 Both girls snickered, any tension the meeting might have had draining away before they stood next to each other and waited for phantasm of Mira's father to finish his spiel. 

 It of course continued unabated “You will grow strong. Stronger without limit. To save you from a world without food, without air, without HOME, this is my gift to you. The fruits of our technology. Electromagnetic Radiation, any wavelength below 100 nanometers, will fuel you and strengthen you, the same force that once destroyed the building blocks of a person making them again, and stronger.” 

 “Look at yourselves now,” the machine slid out a massive screen, popping an old cable out of its socket as it went, before lighting up with a flickering, wan light and passing over the bodies of the two girls present.   

 Wherever the machine passed, they grew. Muscle tightened, veins popped, bones hardened. As it passed over their rears, the machine let out a snap as its power briefly surged, enlarging their hips massively and giving an exaggerated feminine figure to the pair, the perfect counterbalance for what could have been a brutish level of muscle.   

 It barely counted as a side effect. Aria could FEEL her strength shooting up, and she could tell that the device was meant to be scanning her. Tentatively, she gave it a tap, only for her finger to push into the steel a bit as the computerized voice sounded again. 

 “Error! X-Ray Failure. Sorry girls, I wanted to show you how your organs have changed, how you're the same on the inside, and possibly establish a sense of rapport, but something has gone wrong. Running diagnostics...” The voice went silent for a moment, leaving Aria to look at her new friend. 

 “So... welcome to Earth,” the foxgirl said politely. 

 “Thanks. It doesn't look like I can just... stay in the spaceship,” the alien wolf responded. 

 “Yeah. Sorry about... all this. I'm a trained therapist if it will help, if you reach the point where you're ready to talk about home...” 

 “Honestly? I'm not sure how sad I feel. A lot of us probably deserved it, and my family was some of the worst. We sank TRILLIONS into this project; and by all rights nobody should even have that much.” 

 “So... what have you determined, then?” Aria asked as passively as possible. 

 “I think I just need to be better,” Mira responded with finality. 

 “That sounds like a healthy way to handle it!” Aria smiled genuinely, “Let me introduce you to something called 'comics' when we get home...” 

 “Home?” Mira asked. 

 “Well of course!” Aria offered, “if you can't stay here, you have to stay somewhere, and my apartment isn't that small. Whaddya say, roomie?” 

 Aria dropped her professional demeanor a moment, going up to the alien girl and initiating 'first contact'... grabbing her hand after running a finger across her bicep, feeling how it seemed iron-hard to even her own preternatural strength before grasping her still soft, feminine hands, long claws briefly clicking together. 

 “Heh, well I guess I'd better,” Mira answered weakly before gripping Aria's hand tight, the fox girl refusing to wince under the shooting pain. 

 The romantic moment didn't last long, however, as the machine voice came back on with siren-like urgency. 

 “ERROR! Flesh density exceeds X-ray penetration. ERROR! Active changes detected during measurement. ERROR! Project Lilith enhancement exceed projected improvements by a factor of...” a console exploded, “ERROR! Existential threat detected! Activating hyperspace implosion! Playing may-god-forgive-us.midi!”   

 “Oops, hold on!” Mira exclaimed to a baffled Aria as the alarm petered out, pulling the fox close and cramming her against the wolf girl's rather... hefty... chest before taking off in FLIGHT. The wolf alien shot off like a bullet, shattering the walls of the ship one after another, exotic material folding like paper walls as she rushed to the outside. 

 As they left, a final message played, “Sorry, honey...” 

 The air – no, the very space it occupied – began to distort as they made it to the surface and away from the mountain peak, the tails of Mira's dress only barely making it before a deep, bass-filled sound played and the mountaintop disappeared. A spherical hole was carved into the mountain, the peak leaving behind a crescent bowl where once countless tons of stone had been. 

 The spaceship's implosion took out everything, an entire mountain just gone; the impossible disappearance of a landmark the only sign it had ever been... that, and the pair floating against open sky. As the vacuum left behind by the implosion pulled in a cubic kilometer of air, tornado force winds whipped past the pair in the sky.   

 Their clothes were shredded, leaving them both naked in an awkward embrace, but it felt like little more than a breeze, their hair blowing dramatically back in the wind. Mira actually blushed, looking down at the fox girl clinging to her for dear life. 

 Aria, though. 

 Aria was working hard to suppress her drool. 

 She wanted to maintain her good impression, after all. She'd gotten quite a prize and it wouldn't do to seem ungracious. A beautiful – really beautiful – new roommate and future girlfriend was already impressive and an easy situation to ruin, but it wasn't the primary concern. As the sun began to rise and the sunlight brushed across her new six pack abs, that feeling of strength already inside her once again, Aria felt like she had to become quite perfect at handling power. 

 After all, she was going to be a goddess.