The Way We Whirr

* * *

In Victor Villanova's lair, the computer that he used for remote communications with his slaves displayed a peculiar message: contact had been lost with slave number 34.

Rufus, slouching right next to his master as the message appeared on the screen, said, "That's the swapped slave, isn't it, master?"

"Yes, Doofus. Yes it is."

Chapter 10—Unexpected Contact and Consequence

Admiral Anticrime was giving instructions to the police backup that had joined him outside Maniacal Meriwether's lair when the phone on his belt rang. He raised his hand to the small crowd that surrounded him and glanced at his preferred communications device. It was the mayor.

"Anticrime here. What can I do for you, Mayor Minor?"

"You'll never believe who just contacted my office."

"Who?"

"Victor Villanova."

"Really?" He raised an eyebrow at this news.

"He says he wants to talk to you."

"Do you have him on the line right now?"

"Yes."

"Tell him that I'll be at his lair in ten minutes. Tell him to wait for me there. If he asks questions, just say that I know better than to let him communicate with me through a phone."

"Thank you, Admiral Anticrime!"

"It's my pleasure."

He closed the phone and returned it to his belt. He raised his hands and the chattering of the policemen and women around him quieted down. "I'm heading off to Victor Villanova's lair for a few minutes. I want you all to stand firm and not make any movement towards Maniacal Meriwether. If you see anyone trying to enter or leave this place, see if you can tell what they're up to, but otherwise let them go."

The police captain stepped forward and saluted.

The hero saluted back to the captain, grabbed his jet pack, and took off into the early morning air.

* * *

Victor Villanova was sitting on the swing on his front porch as the superhero arrived.

"Thank you for coming so quickly, Scott."

The superhero crossed his arms in front of his chest and grunted.

Victor wrung his hands together and bowed his head. "Your distrust of me is completely understandable. I wouldn't trust me if I were in your shoes."

"Then why did you want me so urgently? I was midway through staking out ... a location for possible clues to some recent break-ins."

"You're an awful liar, Scott. You were at Maniacal Meriwether's lair and you and I both know it."

If the villain had been hoping for the hero to be impressed by what he knew, Admiral Anticrime's expressionless face would have surely been a disappointment.

Victor cleared his throat to break the silence. "In fact, that's why I called you."

Admiral Anticrime raised an eyebrow and examined his nemesis closely.

"I, uh, I guess I need to explain a little more." Victor paused to contemplate the correct way of wording what he was thinking. "Meri's manservant sought out my faithful assistant. He had known about the incident at the amusement park and connected me to it."

"So you finally admit your responsibility," hissed Admiral Anticrime, who knew that Victor Villanova and Maniacal Meriwether were the only two supervillians in all of Metroburgh with the resources, cunning, or intellect to even attempt such a scheme. It didn't take much for the villain who didn't do it, to figure that much out.

The supervillain ignored him. "At any rate, it seems that Meri has come up with a process that can enslave people much more efficiently than anything I was able to come up with."

The superhero perked up at this point. "Go on..."

Victor looked down at the ground and mumbled. "He and I, um, you see, we, uh, we, ah. You see, well, we... Last night, Meri and I, we, you know..."

"You traded slaves." Admiral Anticrime grew bored with Victor's hemming and hawing.

"Well, yes."

"And what happened?"

"Well, with the slave that Meri sent to me... Nothing. I couldn't bend her to my will."

"And the slave you sent to him..."

"Has shifted her loyalty to him."

"Looks like he beat you." Admiral Anticrime suppressed the urge to laugh.

"Yes, and I can't let that slip out. My reputation... It's going to be ruined!"

"So why am I here with you? He's obviously the greater threat!"

Victor Villanova winced. "That really hurt, Scott. You know that?"

Admiral Anticrime toyed with apologizing but decided to remain silent.

"You don't know what you're up against. I'm ... I'd be willing to help you to take him out."

Admiral Anticrime scratched his chin as he considered Victor's offer. After a long silence, he said, "Will you confess to the amusement park incident?"

"Yes."

"You'd need to free all of your slaves. And I make no promises of a plea bargain or anything of that nature."

Victor Villanova considered the superhero for a moment. Going to prison would be one way to retain his reputation. Plus, the downtime would give him the chance to plan his next evil scheme.

"It's a deal."

"Great. Now what can you tell me?"

"Let me introduce you to the girl I received in the swap."

"I'll wait here. You bring her to me."

Victor turned and opened the front door to his lair. "Rufus! Bring me the girl!"

His henchman called back, "Yes!"

* * *

With difficulty, Rufus escorted the naked girl to the front porch. Once he stopped pushing her, she stood at attention, gazing blankly forward.

Admiral Anticrime pulled a flashlight off of his belt and held it in front of her face. She didn't react to the light being shone on her. "What's that?"

"What's what?"

"Take a look at her neckline. It's like her skin color changes slightly." He ran his finger along the line that effectively marked where the water in the hot tub had reached, on her body.

The girl let out a slight gasp.

The superhero fumbled on his utility belt. Finding a small file, he began to remove whatever chemical it was that covered her skin. The girl flinched.

"Looks like we've got something here..." Victor said.

Admiral Anticrime ran his light over more of her body. "It looks like it covers her entire body. This'll take a while to get off. Do you have a plate or something I can use to catch whatever this is as it comes off of her body? I wonder if there's something we can do to speed this up..."

Victor snapped his fingers and Rufus disappeared into the lair, returning in less than five minutes with a shiny silver bowl.

The supervillain ordered his servant to hold the bowl under Admiral Anticrime's hands. He scraped some more of the chemical off of the girl's skin. He had decided to scrape her between her breasts. As the flecks fell into the bowl, the girl let out a yowl of pain.

"I'm sorry if I hurt you," Admiral Anticrime said.

"Admiral Anticrime?!? What.. why are you here? Where am I?"

"It's a long story, my dear, but we're hoping you can help with something. It seems as though you've been under the control of Maniacal Meriwether, and..."

The girl looked around and noticed the rest of the people around her. "So you enlisted Victor Villanova to help you? Shit! I thought you were a good guy!"

"I am. Please. There's something on your skin and I'm trying to get it off. Can you move?"

She grunted and struggled. "I can't move my body. What..."

"What's the last thing you can remember?"

"I was sitting in the park, talking to a friend of mine," she began. "This guy in a tuxedo came up to me and asked us both to smell a flower. The next thing I know, I'm here."

"A flower, huh?"

"Yes. I vaguely remember a hot tub, but, that part just feels like a dream and I couldn't tell you anything else. Oh, and..." She paused for a moment. Blushing slightly, she whispered, "An orgasm or two."

"I see."

The superhero placed the bowl down on the ground and retrieved a modified microscope from the satchel on his belt. "What is this that's gotten all over your skin?" He added a drop of water to the bowl and saw that the flecks moved towards each other and adhered together, making a larger piece of, well, whatever it was.

"We need to find something that will break this chemical down. Water clearly doesn't do that, at least not on its own." Admiral Anticrime looked at Victor Villanova.

"Did you try whatever you put in the water supply at the amusement park on her?"

"Yes."

"And it ..."

"... had no effect."

"Where did the liquid make contact with her skin?"

He pointed to the spot on her leg where he tried to convert her to his own slave.

Admiral Anticrime dumped the contents of the bowl into the grass and dried it with a rag. He then leaned forward to scrape off some of the chemical from the girl's leg.

The flecks that fell from her leg were no different from the earlier samples.

"What was it that you put in the water that affected all of those girls?"

Victor Villanova's eyes bulged at this question. He paused before sighing and telling the superhero that it was a relatively simple solution that combined alcohol with saline and some pheromones to incite arousal in women.

"Any proteins? There's no DNA-based content?"

"Nope."

"Miss... I'm sorry. I didn't catch your name."

"Sharon Sharalike."

"Well, Sharon. Would you mind please spitting into this bowl?"

She screwed up her eyes, partially because she had taken offense to the request and partially because she didn't understand why he was asking her to do this. But she cleared her throat and gingerly spit the contents of her mouth into the bowl as the hero had asked.

The superhero looked at the contents of the bowl again in his microscope and smiled broadly. "Looks like we've found our antidote."

He licked his hand and ran his hand up and down her arm. "Can you move now, Sharon?"

With some difficulty she was able to bend her elbow.

"Success!"

The superhero called some of the police who were watching this scene to join him, Victor Villanova, and Rufus. After about a half hour, she was able to move her arms and legs well enough that she was, at long last, able to cover herself.

"So now what do we do?" asked the supervillain.

"I've got a plan. I'll need your servant."

"Whatever you need."

* * *

The captain of the police force that had assembled outside Maniacal Meriwether's lair received the order to stand down as Rufus escorted Sharon up to the high gothic entrance.

He pulled a chain near the front door and a low melody could be heard echoing within. After a few minutes, Winston came to the door. "Hello, Rufus. What brings you back here?"

"My master ... admits defeat." He hated the way these words sounded, rolling off of his tongue, but he understood the need to say them. "I am bringing you back your slave."

"Well, Rufus. My employer will be most pleased to hear this news."

Winston placed his hand behind Sharon's back and made a sweeping gesture to guide her into the lair.

Sharon had to suppress the urge not to shudder in fear at the recognition of the man who had shown her the flower.

Rufus stayed back as he watched her disappear into the darkness before the door closed in front of him.

He slowly turned around and walked back towards the street, where he was quickly placed in the back of a waiting squad car.

"Do you think he suspected anything?" asked Admiral Anticrime, who was sitting behind the steering wheel.

"I... I don't think so."

"You did a great job, Rufus. Didn't he, Victor?"

Through clenched teeth, Victor, who was also in the backseat of the car, said, "Yesss."

"Now we just need to pray the girl doesn't lose her nerve."

* * *

Winston escorted Sharon back to the library, where Maniacal Meriwether sat in a tall, high-backed chair with its back to the door. He was thumbing through a biography of Franz Mesmer.

Upon hearing his manservant enter the room, the villain said, without looking up, "Did you know that Franz Mesmer was basically considered a charlatan and a thief in his lifetime? Most people felt that his cures of people afflicted with various ailments had more to do with the subjects' wishful thinking than any actual treatment he gave them."

"Sir!" Winston spoke, sharply. "Victor Villanova has returned his subject. Apparently he was unable to break her."

Maniacal Meriwether placed the book on an end table, stood up, and turned to face Winston and the girl who was quite adept at pretending to be a robot.

"Should I bring her to the hot tub for a restoration just to be on the safe side?"

"Yes, but first I want to know what Vicky tried. Would you please tell us, my dear?"

She spoke carefully, doing her best to maintain a low, monotonous tone. "He removed my clothes, sat me down, and dripped some fluid on my leg."

"Where?"

"In his lair, master."

The supervillain rolled his eyes. "I meant, where on your leg?"

She moved her arm mechanically. "Right here, master."

As the villain knelt down to examine her leg, she quickly pulled a small object out of her cleavage and squeezed it tightly in her hands.

In an instant a net rose above the three of them and came down, hard, trapping herself and the two men underneath. As she realized that the gadget provided by the superhero had done its job, she whispered, "Thank you, Admiral Anticrime."

Both Winston and Meriwether took a moment to realize what had just happened. Meriwether let out a cry of shock at this unexpected turn of events. He looked at his manservant and spoke with the slow sarcasm his servant hated. "So you didn't check her for anything concealed..."

Giggling slightly, she pressed on a small communications device in her ear. "I did it! Admiral Anticrime, I did it!"

"Great job, Sharon," echoed throughout the room as the two men stopped struggling against the trap. "We'll be in there in a minute to free you and bring Meriwether to justice. Just hang tight."

* * *

Following the successful apprehension of Maniacal Meriwether, Victor Villanova had a single request of Admiral Anticrime, the police force, and the mayor. "All I ask is that you not let it be known that I helped."

The hero, on hearing this, scowled, but agreed. "You don't want anyone to know the good in you, do you?"

"I've got ... a bit of a reputation to maintain."

The mayor laughed. "We can do that." He looked down at his desk and signed an order calling for the incarceration of Victor Villanova and Rufus for the next eighteen months.

As the police captain escorted Victor off to jail, the supervillain made a point of creating a public spectacle for the benefit of the TV cameras, calling for the overthrow of Metroburgh's city hall and the destruction of Admiral Anticrime.

It took the superhero no time whatsoever to find a chemical combination that neutralized the effects of the contamination to the water supply at Metroburgh Adventure Land. All of his slaves were released and ordered by the court to undergo a psychiatric evaluation and a series of medical examinations to ensure that they had suffered no permanent damage resulting from their enslavement or their subsequent awareness of it.

During Maniacal Meriwether's trial, the prosecution intentionally omitted the details of the agreement between Meriwether and Victor Villanova. Maniacal Meriwether's defense also made no mention of this agreement, as it would have had the implication that Victor had emerged the more devious supervillain.

Maniacal Meriwether and Winston were sentenced to five years in prison. The other prisoners, especially Victor Villanova and Rufus, left them alone as often as possible. The wardens reported that this form of solitude was generally what both men seemed to prefer.

* * *

A news special, which aired a few months after the incident, featured intrepid investigative journalist Nikki Gnocchi. She gave a thorough report on what both Victor Villanova and Maniacal Meriwether had done, and the lives they were now leading as prisoners in the Metroburgh Prison. She admitted to being one of the people ensnared by Victor's deeds but could only report on what other people told her she had done.

"One can only speculate," she concluded her report, "What might happen if these two dastardly supervillains were to try to join forces and try to take over the peace-loving city of Metroburgh."

"Thank you, Admiral Anticrime, for all you do for this city."