Recidivism
The Ordeal of a Rescued Supeheroine
“I can’t believe it,” said Columbia. “I just can’t believe it.”
“Yes, I understand,” said Marvella. “It’s hard to believe. But it’s true. It really happened.”
Columbia and Marvella sat in the latter’s apartment within the headquarters of the Liberty League. Wearing not her trademarked patriotic-themed uniform, but instead only a fleece bathrobe, Columbia sipped from a large mug of steaming tea. She was a tall woman, leanly muscled and very attractive.
Beside her, Marvella reviewed a notepad on which she had written several pages of notes. She wore part of her superheroine outfit: a black PVC jacket over a gray and black unitard. On her face, a pair of normal glasses replaced her adventuring goggles, and her gloves and boots remained stashed in a cubby by the door. Not as tall or athletically built as Columbia, she was equally as pretty as her superheroine comrade.
“What am I going to do?” Columbia asked. “I have to fix this somehow. I have to make it right.”
She put her tea down and folded her legs and bare feet up under herself. Then she shivered. Marvella knew her friend wasn’t cold. She was haunted by memories--memories that Marvella had just helped her uncover.
“The question is, what are we going to do?” Marvella said. “You’re not alone. I’m here to help you. And I have an idea….”
* * * * *
Two hours earlier, Columbia had awoken on Marvella’s couch. She recognized where she was--she’d visited her friend’s apartment many times--but she couldn’t remember how she’d gotten there. Looking down at herself, she saw that she wore her unitard, but not her armor, gloves, or boots. And she felt no cowl on her head.
A moment later, Marvella entered the room. The heroine looked both relieved to see Columbia awake and concerned at the state of her.
“Are you all right?” Marvella asked. “I was worried.”
“I...I don’t know. I feel okay, I guess. But I can’t remember how I got here.”
“I found you while I was out on patrol and brought you here. You were wondering around in a daze. It was kind of scary. I’ve never seen you like that before.”
“I don’t know what happened,” Columbia said. “But thank you for rescuing me.”
“You don’t have to thank me. But we should try to recover your memory.”
“Yeah, sure. But how?”
“Well,” said Marvella, “in my civilian identity, I’m actually a licensed hypnotherapist. I could hypnotize you and help you access those repressed or blocked memories.”
“Hypnotize me?”
“That’s right. You can trust me. I’m your friend.”
“I know. And I do trust you. It’s just...the thought of being hypnotized makes me feel…”
Columbia shuddered and went pale. Marvella sat down next to her and put a consoling hand on her shoulder.
“I think you may feel that way because your memory loss stems from hypnosis. Someone may have hypnotized you and then made you forget everything about it. If that’s true, I can definitely help you by hypnotizing you again.”
“Yeah, maybe.”
“Tell you what,” Marvella said. “Why don’t you take a shower? It’ll refresh you and make you feel better. You can wear one of my robes, until we get your uniform cleaned. I’ll fix you some chamomile tea, which will relax you. And then we’ll go from there.”
“Okay. Yeah, that sounds good. Thanks, Marvella.”
Twenty minutes later, Columbia sat on Marvella’s couch, dressed in her friend’s robe, sipping chamomille tea. Her long hair hung wet upon her shoulders, and her bare feet rested in front of her on an ottoman.
“How do you feel?” Marvella asked, sitting down beside her.
“A little better, thanks.”
“Relaxed?”
“Yeah, pretty relaxed.”
“Good. Then we can begin.”
“So, how will you hypnotize me?” Columbia asked.
“There are many different induction methods. I use whichever one I feel will work best for the patient. For you, knowing that you’re uneasy about being hypnotized and might resist going under--whether or not you mean to--I’ve chosen a more unconventional one.”
“What is it?”
“I drugged your tea.”
“You did what?”
“Drugged your tea. It seemed the easiest solution. Given your heightened constitution, I used a hefty dose. You should drift into a soporific state any minute now.”
“How could you do that to me?”
“Don’t be angry,” Marvella said. “It’s for the best. Besides, I won’t let you remember it anyway.”
“You won’t let me remember it? You’re supposed to help me remember things, not make me forget more!”
“I just needed to ensure you’d cooperate and let me hypnotize you. Now I know that you will, no matter what. And I will help you regain your lost memories. But I can’t have you angry with me. That would be counter-productive, not to mention dangerous. Ah, it’s taking effect.”
Columbia began to sway in her seat. She yawned and blinked several times, with her eyes staying closed longer each time.
“That’s it,” Marvella said. “That’s a good girl. Sleep. Sleeep. Sleeeep….”
Columbia awoke about an hour and a half later, feeling relaxed and refreshed, as per the suggestions she received while she was under hypnosis. She remembered everything that had happened to her up to the point when she found herself on her friend’s couch. She knew that Marvella had hypnotized her and helped her recover her memories, but she didn’t remember being drugged, nor care at all about the induction method Marvella had used to put her into a trance.
“That’s quite a story,” Marvella said, as she finished scribbling on a notepad. “Captured by Ms. Mesmer. Strapped into a chair and subjected to a brainwashing machine. Adoring your captor and willingly being her slave. Then, capturing your fellow League heroines, Raptor and Red Raven, and brainwashing them with the same machine used on you. Making them serve and pleasure you, the way you had to serve and pleasure Ms. Mesmer. And finally being released by Ms. Mesmer when she got bored of you. Then, being told to forget her and to get lost. Both of which you did, literally. Wow.”
“I can’t believe it,” said Columbia. “I just can’t believe it.”
“Yes, I understand,” said Marvella. “It’s hard to believe. But it’s true. It really happened.”
“What am I going to do? I have to fix this somehow. I have to make it right.”
“The question is, what are we going to do? You’re not alone. I’m here to help you. And I have an idea.”
“Okay, what’s your idea?”
“I’ll get to that in a minute,” Marvella said. “First, let’s go over what needs to happen. We have to track down Ms. Mesmer and confront her. I don’t think she’s a match for your fighting skills or my gadgets. So we should be able to apprehend her and then rescue Raptor and Red Raven.”
“But how will we protect ourselves from her hypnotic powers?” Columbia asked. “I mean, she used a machine to brainwash me, but that was after she hypnotized me and made me sit in that horrible chair in the first place.”
“I don’t think her powers will affect me. I understand hypnosis and suggestion, and I know how to resist them. In the past, I’ve faced hypno-powered villains before and been immune to their control.”
“Great. But what about me?”
“Yes, you’ll likely be extremely susceptible to her, even more so than you were before,” Marvella said. “If we had time, I’d train you to resist her. But we don’t have time. We need to find her as soon as possible. And that’s where my idea comes into play: I’ll hypnotize you again and implant post-hypnotic suggestions that make you unable to be hypnotized by anyone else.”
Columbia sighed dejectedly.
“What’s the matter?” Marvella asked.
“Look, I know you’re trying to help me. But I don’t want to be hypnotized again. I’m tired of being under other people’s control. I’m a superheorine. If I’m going to help people and fight criminals, then I need to be in control of myself.”
“I‘m sorry, but you really don’t have a choice. You can either let me hypnotize you, or you’ll fall under Ms. Mesmer’s spell again. It’s that simple.”
“Maybe it isn’t that simple. Maybe there’s something else we can do. Let’s strategize and see what all of our options are.”
“No.”
“What do mean, no?” Columbia asked.
“I mean, no, we’re not going to waste time strategizing. And I mean, yes, it is that simple. I’m going to hypnotize you, and that’s that.”
“That most certainly isn’t that. You’re suddenly being very stubborn and, to be blunt, kind of stupid. Of course we need to strategize. In fact, we probably should bring in other heroines to help us out. We shouldn’t be going into this alone. Maybe someone else has faced Ms. Mesmer before. Or maybe they’ll just have a better idea than putting me to sleep and messing with my head more.”
Marvella laughed.
“What’s so funny?” Columbia asked.
“You have no idea.”
“No idea about what?”
“About how much I messed with your head,” Marvella said with a snicker.
“What? How dare you! I trusted you, even though I wasn’t comfortable being hypnotized!”
“Oh, relax.”
“I will not relax!”
“Actually, you will. Slave: Relax.”
Columbia stiffened for an instant and then went limp. She remained awake and stared incredulously at Marvella.
“What...what did you do to me?”
“While you were under, I implanted a trigger word in your mind. It turns out you’re even more suggestible than I thought you’d be, probably because of what Ms. Mesmer did to you. So it was easy to do. Now, every time I address you as ‘slave’ and give you a command, you have to follow it, even if you’re aware of what I’m doing. Like this...Slave: Freeze. See? You can’t move at all. Oh, but you want to say something, don’t you? Very well. Slave: You may speak but otherwise remain frozen.”
“Why, Marvella? Why are you doing this?”
“Because it is absolutely intoxicating to have control over such a gorgeous, sexy, powerful woman!”
Marvella ran her finger slowly up the underside of Columbia’s exposed and immobilized foot. Columbia’s eyes widened. But she could do nothing, except to speak.
“Fiend!” she yelled. “Villain!”
“Oh, no, I’m not either of those things. I’m a superheroine, just like you. I have every intention of rescuing our friends and bringing Ms. Mesmer to justice. It’s just...I’m so attracted to you, and it was so amazing to have you helpless and unaware and following my every instruction. I couldn’t help myself. I had to extend my control over you past that one session.”
“No! What you’re doing is wrong! You have to stop it!”
“Wrong?” Marvella said, after a moment’s thought. “Yes, it is wrong.”
“Yes, yes! It’s wrong! Now let me go.”
“No, of course I won’t let you go. But it is wrong of me to torture you with awareness and memory. If you’re to be happy, then I need to erase your memory of all of this. After that, I can hypnotize and control you whenever I want, without you knowing or being bothered by it. Yes, that’s what I need to do.”
“You’re talking about brainwashing me again!”
“That’s right, I am. Just think of it, my own brainwashed superheroine, who I can control and make do whatever I want...and do whatever I want to her. Mmm!”
Marvella reached out and brushed her fingertips along Columbia’s lithe calf, then down to and around her ankle, under her heel, and up along her instep to her toes. Columbia gasped at the tickling sensation that she could not squirm away from.
“Yes, brainwashing you is the answer,” Marvella said, “and there’s no time to waste.”
“No, please don’t--”
“Slave: Be quiet. That’s better. And don’t worry. You won’t remember any of this. You won’t be angry or feel bad. You’ll feel very good and be very happy. And after I’ve played with you for a little while, I’ll go and take care of Ms. Mesmer. It’ll all work out just fine.”
Columbia glared at her friend, unable to move or speak. Marvella smiled lustfully at her.
“Slave: Sleep. Sleep very deeply. Very, very deeply. Good. Now, let’s have some fun….”
- Not The End -