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Chaos. The random chance of lightning, the entropic rage of fire.
That was Paula’s core, her modus operandi, her very central of being. She thrived off of her own instability. Her PSI worked best when thrown into a frazzle, when things seemed most tense, when an inner odometer was ticking down steadily to her death, her friends' defeat. She acted like a human except she was something far more monstrous except she really was a scared little girl deep down inside.
The nightmare of Giygas’ siren song couldn’t get to her because she was too entrenched in her own inner maelstrom to hear any others.
It was this chaos that fueled her fire. This chaos that allowed her to build shields and draw energy from others with such ease. This chaos that allowed her to split the universe asunder for but a moment when it mattered most.
Sometimes she wondered where it came from.
Other times she knew exactly where.
Sometimes the voices, those that allowed her being to get put into a static-y fever, spoke to her in whispering tones. Lent her their aid in incomprehensible ways.
She prayed for their help. A heaven-rending sound echoed all around them. Everyone got confused and fearful and turned on each other. The discord energized her, even as a stray laser beam seared her shoulder and a baseball bat swung and missed many times more than necessary.
She asked for their support. Rainbow lights filtered down from an invisible source, and suddenly creatures rose back to life, her friends getting back on their feet with a sudden second wind. Nature spat at her in disgust. The disharmony only made her stronger.
She called out to them to show themselves and help. Dazzling light filled the air, and in tears, all combatants backed off, fearful. Heavy air caused everyone to slow, weakened and dizzy. She basked in their presence when all others ran away, so alien and strange that it was incomprehensible.
Her friends begged her to stop, to realize that the collateral she was creating was too much. Like they would ever know just what they were witnessing.
She pleaded to them for fear of her life, screaming to them for aid as her cries were swallowed up by the darkness, as any normal mortal ceased to hear her screams for their hope.
And they came, ripping through dimensions to the aid of four robots faced with an infinite abomination, something truly incomprehensible coming in contact with something whose form cannot be grasped, whose flailing attacks couldn’t be deflected because nobody knew where they were coming from, everywhere at once and nowhere at all.
And when, disintegrating to motes of red, Giygas fell, she did too, into soft oblivion, carried by those that had come to her aid.
“Thank you, thank you, we couldn’t have done it without you, thank you for all that you have done,” she wept, relieved, her own PSI dissolving into tiny sparks of red and black in a microscopic parody of the terror that their enemy previously wielded.
And they were everywhere around her, speaking back in words that she could perceive, but not sense.
We are glad to help. Thank you for making it this far. We wish you safe passage, Paula.
The countless thoughts of others, both from her world and from others, touched her and led her, softly, safely, down into unconsciousness.
And then she woke up in Saturn Valley, tears still in her eyes, the barest whisper of a memory of the dimensions she had brought together in one moment, of the love and pride that the things she prayed to held for her in that single moment.