"Ashley, with all do grooviness, what made you think we can condense ourselves and go out with more power? Isn't there an upperlimit?" An Ashley asked the original.
"One could think that. However, I had a stray memory, a memory from the collective." Ashley told her sitting atop her lavish sofa throne.
"A memory, from one of us?"
"Well not an Ashley, rather an individual before our time. They weren't even a full Whitney, but rather something, and someone else. Cassandra? A Cashier? Well whatever they were, they had a power very similar to Whitney's. When they were merged with her, their powers went up exponentially, their minds became aware of all the others and they became a kind of self^2 version of the others. I figured, if Whitney could do that, why couldn't I? I guess we'll see."
One of the condensed Ashley's had made it onto the highway. Rather than heading towards the mall, people were drawn to her. They began to convert into Ashley's. It was working! Several had already.
And than, she began to shake. The Ashley felt her body ripping and tearing apart from the inside! She held onto her body and tried to hold herself together, to little success. Within moments she'd torn apart, and a 100 Ashley's had dogpiled themselves onto the highway. Elsewhere, the original Ashley sighed in disappointment.
A condensed Ashley had walked into a small neighborhood only a few miles from the mall. Due to the electricity turning off, everything had gone silent. "Hey miss, can you throw us our ball!" A girl had shouted.
The evolved Ashley merely smiled. She'd held up the ball and told told the girl to come get it.
Her mother stood nearby, and told her not to talk to strangers. She tried to grab her daughters hand but she ran off.
Against her best judgement, the little girl did reach her. Ashley leaned down. With an innocent kiss on the forehead, the Ashley stepped back and held her hand. It only took a moment, an instant explosion. The conversion was instantaneous.
The girl had exploded. In her place, was left a smiling new Ashley, fully adult and clothed. She made a duck face and kissed the ball, turning it into a spherical makeup kit.
"My girl, MY GIRL! What have you done to my little Polly!" The mother ran at the powerful Ashley fully. This annoyed her so, she totes wasn't going to let some screaming woman launch herself at her like this. She yawned and put her hand right through the woman's chest. The woman was disintegrated into hose, tops, bras and panties, various clothing Ashley would love. The former daughter, now Ashley picked up a lacy pair of underwear and sniffed it. "That's so hot!"
The victorious Ashley smiled. She could convert this whole town with a few touches singlehandedly, and there was nothing anyone could do to stop her. The original ashley took great pride in this victory. They'd successfully reached the next stage!
Elsewhile, a 3rd condensed Ashley had reached nearby a police station. They'd planned to take them out quickly before they alerted any others or called the national guard.
It wasn't very successful however, because her body had spasm'd and trembled before it even got into the building. She couldn't hold herself together, and promptly exploded into thousands of articles of clothing.
Back in her salon, the ruling original Ashley sighed, but smiled nonetheless.
"Well, 1 out of 3 isn't bad." She now knew there was a great opportunity afforded to them, she just had to be smart about creating her new soldiers. Rather than compressing individuals, it might just be easier to try to convert them directly by seeing one's with adept potential. She ordered a 100 Ashleys to line up, and decided she'd try to transform them again as if they were just regular unconverted people, in order to successfully hatch new Ashley Squareds. Any that couldn't handle the strain would probably just become inanimate clothing. She needed a cuter name for them, later she thought. If even one out of a 100 could be converted, she figured those were pretty good odds.
