CHAPTER 2: The Big 'T'

Continuing from chapter 1….

However, in the end, it didn't take her that long to catch up with the other girl. For Razz had come to a stop at the top of a hill in the distance - and was now staring straight ahead with one eyebrow raised on her face.

And as Kury ran up, coming to a stop beside her - it didn't take more than one glance in front of her to figure out what Razz was staring at.

For stretched out in front of them...standing tall and proud beyond the dusty road that they had come from...was a city. A very large city to be exact.

"...whoa..." Kury murmured to herself, her eyes growing even larger than they were before. She shook her golden head slowly, reaching an awed hand to the back of her tan neck. "...that's a hell of a city, Razz..."

And oh, boy was it. The two girls nearly had to squint from the glare that shone ever so fiercely off most buildings' glass windows in the distance, as they listened silently to the cloud of birds passing overhead toward the sleeping county. The forced wind from flapping wings rustled the friends' hair in their faces briefly as they passed quickly into the rising horizon...what a beautiful horizon...

...wait.

...what was that?

"What is THAT?!" Kury suddenly burst out, her in-space expression abruptly switched to something a bit more frightened. "It's...it's...it's a fricking 'T'!!" She flipped herself rapidly toward the other teen, "RAZZ! WHY IS THERE A FREAKING T OVER THERE!?"

Razz looked in that general direction. This time, an eyebrow went waaayyy up on her face at the sight of the building that Kury happened to be freaking out about.

"Um. That would be a tower." She said, watching as a random bird flew past the giant structure. "And a pretty frickin' sweet one, too. How come all buildings aren't shaped like a frickin' letter?"

Kury stopped. Stared at Razz.

"Well then." The other blonde crossed her bronze arms stiffly, throwing her hip stubbornly to the side, "So much for your reaction to a freaking 'T' out in the middle a' nowhere." Kury looked back at the tower, then at Razz, back to the tower, then back to Razz again. "Razzy? What the hell is wrong with you. I just tried. I just tried to see what was impressive or 'cool' about a random letter on the freaking horizon--nothing. It's just freaky." Her sapphire eyes shifted again out seaward. "Nothing at all."

However, cautiously Kury turned her dusty-haired head over to her friend, one light eyebrow raised in skepticism. "A.k.a. this is NOT something we WALK towards."

"We can. There's a road over there." Razz pointed casually in that direction, before putting her hands in the pockets of her slightly over-sized jeans and beginning to walk down toward the city. "But why should you care? You wanna go over by the big T?" She paused for a moment, looking back. "Oh, and by the way, you call me 'Razzy' again and I'll beat your ass into next year." She continued walking.

Kury blinked. "Ouch..." Rubbing the back of her neck in recognition of the obvious threat, the other teenager followed her friend down the padded-down path.

And so they were off! The twosome continued their tedious trail all the way down to the people-infested city. However, they completely stopped in their tracks at the entrance to the municipality and both turned their sun-lit heads toward the giant welcome sign off to the side.

"'WELCOME TO JUMP CITY'." Kury read off slowly to herself, her eyes locked on the eye-catching billboard. But that was not all that was on the sign that caught the blonde's blue eyes, there was also hand-painted words underneath the welcome. "Whoa...Razz! Look what it says! 'Home of the Titans North'!!" She recited excitedly--before stopping suddenly. She leaned a little closer on her toes for a second, "...ohh...some one spray-painted 'villains beware' on there too...yikes." She turned to Razz, "Who are the Big and Scary Titans North, Razz? Seriously?"

Razz stared. "Um...Big and Scary Titans North, probably." She rubbed a finger under her nose, looking back out at the city. "In other words, a really nasty place for you to do something stupid. Think you can manage to avoid that?" She gave the blonde a pained and perfectly doubtful smile. "...I could just call the police and have you arrested early."

"Or you could NOT." Kury corrected innocently with a nervous smile, knowing perfectly well that that was a likely possibility with Razz. "Let's go...uh..." she gestured towards the people-packed community, "...in there."

Razz looked over at her. "May I inquire as to why you think that's a good idea?" She asked, raising an eyebrow. "The last time you suggested we just venture randomly into a city you were hit by a car crossing the first street."

Kury blinked, her mouth shrinking in embarrassment. Only a second later she straightened up, her face now BEET-red, before she chuckled nervously with a guilty hand rubbing the back of her sun-tan neck, "Uh...yeah...about that..." she shrugged her shoulders in a change-of-subject approach, "...SO, anyway. Where ELSE do you think we'd go BUT in there, might I inquire?"

"The opposite direction." Razz replied blandly, beginning to walk toward the city. "But, hey, you're the one who makes the mistakes. I just roll right along."

Kury shook her sun-lit head. "Oh, my god, Razz..." She jogged after her friend with a chuckle.

And with that, the two girls now headed into the next place of their next current choice of dwelling--Jump City. The largest city next to New York. The most foreboding yet welcoming place in the world. The most actively covered in villains city on earth. And, apparently, the home of the Titans.

The city, starting from where the twosome had entered, seemed much larger than they had previously assumed. From what they could see, they were a colony of tiny red-ants scurrying about amongst the rest of their fellow workers, all the while above them there towered gigantic blades of grass and unimaginably tall trees.

Everyone was rushing and constantly moving, even this early in the morning. The streets were packed with multicolor cars, taxis, motorcycles and other varieties of automobiles either stuck in traffic, or cheating they ways around it. From restaurants and cafes to shopping malls and grocery stores, the sidewalks were entirely lined with the such. People going in and out, around and on top, there seemed to be someone everywhere doing something or other in and on the excessive amount of edifices.

"Holy crudinfishies..." Kury murmured quietly to herself, slowing to a stop in awe of the metropolis before her. "So this is Jump City..." She gazed with intrigued, deprived eyes around at the looming structures in front of her. "Razz...isn't this amazing...?"

"Simply fantabulous." Razz intoned, her expression perfectly sarcastic as she pulled her headphones up from around her neck, sticking them on her ears and continuing to stroll into the bustle. "I had no idea you lacked city exposure, Kury. Or should that surprise me...?"

"You want a cup of java? I'll GIVE you a cup of FRICKIN' JAVA!!"

An infuriated voice from somewhere ahead of them caused both girls to look up - just in time to see a random guy get BOOTED right out of what seemed to be the door of a cafe, followed by the form of an emo-looking boy who stuck his upper body out the door, jabbing a threatening figure at the groaning man on the floor. "YEAH, how does THAT taste, ASSHOLE?!"

SLAM!! The cafe door was shut in another moment, and the pained main continued to lay on the sidewalk, moaning in agony.

Razz slooowwwlllyy raised an eyebrow. "Wow. Didn't see that coming."

No reply.

Kury was LONG GONE...

...but not far. Currently, the blonde-haired girl was looking through the glass of a window on the wall of the very same cafe.

Razz looked at her, frowned and jogged over to her. "Kury, what the hell are you doing?" She ran up by her, giving her a scolding look. "Don't peek in there like that! You look like you're gonna steal something!"

Kury slowly turned back to Razz--a suggestive grin plastered on her face. "...Razz..." With a shimmer of sunlight flickering briefly off her golden hair, she turned back to look in the window. "...that dude's really hot..."

Razz gave her an odd look. "You mean the emo kid?" She peered in the window, watching as that very guy was walking back behind the counter, starting to prepare a drink by the beverages. "He looks really crabby. Totally not your type."

"Oh, whoops." Kury rolled her eyes. "Sorry. Forgot he's your type."

"Shut up." Razz gave her a disgusted look, turning her eyes back into the cafe. She surveyed the look of the place consideringly. "Doesn't look that bad in there. You hungry?"

The other teenager's eyes grew ten times their normal size as her hair whipped around her back sharply with her head's turn. "STARVED!"

"I figured." Razz rolled her eyes and stepped over to the door, opening it up. "Come on."