Enhancegirl 2-1: Spectra's Sleepy Trap

"Come on, hurry it up!" A snub nosed man clad all in black barked at two of his fellows, similarly dressed. Those two men were dragging a heavy, metal object, about six feet across, down a flight of stairs into the dingy basement floor of an old industrial complex. "If you want us to hurry up so bad maybe you should come up and help us, Vinnie!" One of the two labouring men said back. "Hey, I'm standin' guard here," Vinne replied. "Ain't you nimrods ever heard of division of labour?" "I'll be dividing my foot up your ass in a minute if you don't come up and give us a hand with this!" the third man said. "We're the ones who stole the damn thing, so you can help us with the schlepping!" "Fine," Vinnie said. "You want somethin' done..." He took some of the weight of the large object, realising that the others' complaints had been legitimate as he felt the strain on his back.

Eventually, the three managed to get it down the steps, all groaning in pain. "What the hell is that thing anyway?" Vinnie asked, rubbing his arms. Though mostly featureless, the grey box had a computer interface on one side, and a series of black nodules on top of it. "Some kinda new energy source," one of the others said. "Solar powered, but really extreme. Sucks in all the light from the surrounding area." "What does the Boss want with that hippie garbage?" Vinnie said. "I got one of those solar panels on my house, doesn't produce jack squat." "God damn, Vinnie, why you gotta be such a luddite? This is some serious tech! The boss already has a buyer, you know." "They pickin' it up from here?" "Hell no, the heat's way too high right now. We're just stashing it for a while."

Outside, two more men in black guarded the disused old building, nervously fingering sub-machine guns. The night was warm, and humid, and their black body armour was stifling. "What I wouldn't give for a cigarette right now..." one of the guards said, having exhausted his supply already. As he threw his empty box onto the ground, he noticed something move through the harsh, orange streetlights, but only for a moment. "What was that?" A second guard had noticed it too. "Probably nothing, but look sharp." The two raised their weapons, peering into the gloom. The nicotine craving guard looked closely, until his narrow eyes caught sight of a figure, a female figure, silhouetted against the orange light. He couldn't make out any features, but he did see a small cape fluttering behind the mystery woman. "Wait a minute," said the second guard. "Is that a super -" He didn't finish his sentence before both men were blinded by a brilliant flash of light.

"Aaaghh! My eyes!" The guards yelled, rubbing their eyes frantically. The smoker was just beginning to get his vision back, when he was struck in the side of the head by a long, boot-clad leg, sending him careening into a nearby wall. The other heard his grunt, but couldn't see what had happened. He soon suffered the same fate as his ally, however, as a slender arm shot out from the night, punching him hard in the stomach. He went down momentarily.

"This is not going to be difficult," the woman who had defeated them said, before slipping silently inside. Inside, there was more light to reveal her presence. It illuminated a tall, slender young woman of Japanese descent, with her black hair tied in a very short ponytail. She wore a silver leotard, emblazoned with an emblem of a glass prism splitting a beam of white light, its off shoulder straps hugging her upper arms tightly. Her long legs were covered below her knees by her silver boots, with a small sort of half skirt brushing the top of her right leg being the only thing covering her thighs. From the straps under her shoulders trailed the small, white cape that the smoking guard had seen: for these were indeed the garments of a superheroine. The oriental beauty smiled, her eyes upturned behind her white domino mask. The more light there was, the better for her. Her name was Mariko Asakura, but she preferred the name Spectra.

The tall young woman moved swiftly through the until-recently abandoned building, her knee-high boots treading softly upon the ground. She heard a group of men coming towards her from around a corner, and pressed herself tightly against a wall. They turned the corner, chatting to each other about whether or not their boss would reward or punish them for the way the theft had gone. The woman was mere inches from them, directly in their line of sight - but they did not see her. For this woman was not an ordinary human: she had formidable powers over light. She had bent the light around her, making her effectively invisible.

This power alone would be enough to make a respectable superheroic career, but Spectra's version came with a slight downside. As she bent the light around her, it didn't reach her eyes. Becoming invisible made her blind. But she could hear well enough, and it was a simple matter for her to wait for them to pass. Once they had moved on, she decloaked, and continued through the building.

"So how come we ain't, like, reverse engineering this stuff and selling it on ourselves?" Vinnie asked the other two, checking the ammunition count of his pistol. "I don't sweat that kinda stuff," one of them, a square jawed crook named Andreus said. "Yeah, leave the thinkin' to the bosses - hey, what -" The thug noticed a pinprick of light at the top of the stairs, before he found a blast of energy slamming into his chest, throwing him backwards. "Joey!" Vinnie and Andreus whipped out their guns, firing up the stairs without thinking. A shimmering barrier of light appeared, however, blocking their bullets.

"Oh crap!" Vinnie said, realising what was happening. "A super!" The door burst open, and Spectra leapt out, diving down the stairs in one bound. "Good evening, gentlemen," she said, a slight, charming Japanese touch colouring an otherwise thoroughly Californian accent. "I know you!" Vinnie said. "Yeah, I seen your picture in the paper before! You're the one who rescued the Governor's wife from the No-Law Gang!" "I am pleased," Spectra said, "that my reputation precedes me. Perhaps if I am so infamous in your criminal world, you would be wise to surrender Doctor Takagawa's invention to me immediately, rather than risk a battle against me." Vinnie at least, began seriously to consider that course of action. Andreus, however, was not so aware of Mariko's repuation. All he saw was a gorgeous, skimpily dressed oriental girl who, though the same height as Andreus at 5'11", was slender, frail-looking even. "I don't know, superheroine-san," he said, smirking. "Maybe you oughta be the one surrendering to us. Who knows? If you're a really good girl, then maybe we'll be nice to you."

Spectra raised an eyebrow, astonished at Andreus' attitude. "Clearly, the man does not know with whom he is dealing." "Is this guy outta his mind?" Vinnie thought. "This dame can shoot laser beams out of her face, for chrissake! We're just goons!" "Come on, hot stuff," Andreus said, "why don't you start by getting down on your knees?" Vinnie looked at Spectra, shrugging apologetically, aware of the idiocy of his ally. Spectra smirked. At least this one wasn't completely stupid. Still, she would not show mercy to his ignorant friend.

"C'mon, girly, you don't want to make me -" Andreus found himself interrupted by a blast of white light to his stomach, sending him flying back across the room. He landed hard against the grey box at the centre of the room, his hand slapping the control panel as he slumped down. However, as he did so, he inadvertently activated the machine.

"Andreus, you moron!" Vinnie yelled, as the machine whirred into life. He turned back to the powerful, confident heroine. "Look, sister, I'm no dope. I know who you are, and I know what you can do. I ain't gonna make trouble with a super." "For a person in the line of work that you have chosen," Mariko said, preparing to arrest him, "you have a streak of uncharacteristic intelligence." "Yeah, well tell that to the parole board, honey," he said, putting his hands in front of him. At that moment, though, two events of major importance occurred. The first was that a group of about ten men who had heard the commotion barrelled into the basement floor. The second was that the machine that the thugs had stolen suddenly absorbed all light from the room, plunging it into total darkness.

"What?" "Huh?" "Who turned out the lights?" "What's going on?" The thugs were plunged into utter confusion, with not one of them able to see. There might well have been panicked machine-gun fire everywhere, but cooler heads prevailed. After all, a superheroine was in their midst. "Damn!" Mariko thought, blinded as well. But that was not all. She was not just a mistress of light - she was in a sense its servant. She used large amounts of energy with her powers, and needed constant exposure to light, through her eyes, in order to recharge her store. Virtually any source of ambient light was enough, but pitch blackness rendered Spectra powerless. This was why, when using her power of invisibility, she could only do so for one minute at a time, due to it cutting off light from her eyes. However, the criminals were blinded and confused. "For someone of my skill and grace," Mariko thought, "it will be a trifling matter to evade these fools." She began to make her escape, moving her slinky body between the thugs, being careful to listen out for their heavy breathing.

But there was something Spectra, and indeed the criminals, had overlooked. There was not one young woman in their midst, there were two. The second was shorter than the first, with shoulder length, red hair. She too wore a domino mask, but hers was red, and her short, tight dress gold in colour. She too had been made aware of the robbery of Doctor Takagawa's famed invention, and had tracked its thieves to their hideout, using her own particular gifts.

Though the red-haired co-ed, Sophie Scott by name, was two years younger than Mariko, and a few inches shorter, she too was a heroine, with her own set of powers. Hers were not as dramatic or destructive as Mariko's, but they were certainly potent. All of her senses, apart from her hearing, were vastly enhanced. This was the source of her heroic alias: Enhancegirl. And unlike Spectra, being in darkness gave Sophie a decided advantage.

"Oooff!" one of the thugs grunted, dropping to his knees as he caught a sharp elbow in the stomach. "What was that?" Spectra thought, still moving towards the exit. Enhancegirl had felt the tremors from the man's footfalls so perfectly that she'd been able to pinpoint not only his position, but his size, level of fitness, and strength, and had incapacitated him easily. "Damn it!" one of the others shouted. "I think she got Neil!" "Where the hell is she?" Mariko was confused. She hadn't done anything yet, much less 'got' anyone. "Oh, Sophie, you are just too good at this," Enhancegirl thought. Even she found it a little disconcerting being in utter blackness - normally there was a modicum of light in any gloom that Enhancegirl's eyes could use. Nor was her hearing of much use - the one chink in her sensory armour was that her hearing was that of a normal human. But she could feel the change in temperature from the bodies of each of the men, and from that calculated their positions almost perfectly. There was one temperature reading, a little cooler than the others, that didn't quite make sense to Enhancegirl, but she would cross that bridge when she came to it.

"Aaghh!" "Ooogghh!" "Nyyaarrghh!" In three seconds, three men went down, kicked punched or thrown by the stealthy, bare-legged redhead. By this time Spectra knew something was up, and diverted herself away from whatever was happening, seeking refuge against a far wall. One by one, Enhancegirl overpowered each of the thugs - even though she was no stronger than an ordinary eighteen year old girl - knocking them down onto the floor. One of them swung the butt of his rifle (he was not stupid enough to start shooting in the dark), but Enhancegirl was more than prepared to duck - which she did expertly. "Dumbass," she muttered. She used his own weight against him, grabbing his arm and twisting him round. He stumbled, before falling back against the console of the stolen machine. In doing so, he reversed the actions of Andreus, switching the machine off.

There were two men left standing when the machine stopped sucking in the surrounding light. One of them found a blast of light knocking them for six, the other felt an ankle-boot clad foot striking him in the chin. They both fell. The thugs defeated, the two victorious heroines acknowledged each others' presence.

"And who, pray, might you be?" "Just who in the hell are you?" The two heroines spoke simultaneously, their eyes narrowed with suspicion. From the bright outfits the two wore, each could tell the business that the other was in, but they were still wary. "Don't you ever read a newspaper, girl?" Mariko said. "I am Spectra, and I have this situation under control. You may leave." "Yeah, well the name's Enhancegirl," Sophie replied. "And I'm not going anywhere. It didn't look like you had much of anything under control when I got here." "I suppose it might seem that way to the untrained eye of a rookie." Mariko frowned. "Clearly you have not been in this business for very long. I certainly haven't heard of any 'Enhancegirl', and I would be aware of any major new superheroine. So just run along, girl." "Would you stop with the 'girl' thing?" Sophie said, intensely irritated by Mariko's smug attitude. "You're, like, twenty." "That is irrelevant," Mariko replied, annoyed that the gold-clad redhead had managed to guess spot on. "I have no need of your assistance." "Y'know what? Forget this." Sophie began ascending the stairs. "I'm gonna look around upstairs for more goons. You do whatever you want." "Feckless neophyte," Mariko muttered under her breath, as Sophie disappeared from view.

The Japanese heroine began inspecting Doctor Takagawa's invention for damage. It was a very sturdy machine, and there were nothing more than a few scuffs on it. As she was looking at it, though, she noticed out of the corner of her eye that part of the back wall was jutting out a little. Getting a closer look, she realised that she had found a hidden door. "Perhaps these fools have a little more forethought than I had given them credit for," she said to herself, opening the door and walking through. She found herself walking along a narrow corridor, what had once been a maintenance tunnel. The lights were low, but more than enough for the tall heroine to use her powers.

After a while, Spectra found a door at the end of the long hallway. Suspecting a possible trap, she listened for something on the other side. But the confident young woman was sure that nothing on the other side could possibly pose a threat to her. She opened the door, strode in - and found a blindfold pulled over her eyes. "What?!" Mariko gasped, feeling thick cloth blocking her vision - and her light based abilities. Without light entering her eyes, she was completely powerless. "Sorry, darlin'," came a voice from behind her. "Can't have you messing up our plans." The blindfold tied in place, Mariko felt her slender arms grabbed by a pair of gloved hands. "Unhand me at once!" Mariko yelled as her arms were pulled behind her back. "Not gonna happen," the man holding her said, as she felt a plastic zip-tie being pulled around her wrists. "Aah!" she gasped, as the zip-tie was pulled tight, fixing her thin wrists together. Spectra was, without her powers, a slender young woman, and she did not have anything like the strength to fight off the man who, to her fury, was binding her, the plastic pinching against her skin. Nor did she have the technique: her powers took a great deal of practise to master, and she'd always considered it more valuable to develop her use of them than to learn much unarmed combat.

At this moment, this choice was proving to be a mistake. The man holding her pulled two more zip-ties around Mariko's arms, binding them tightly together, trapping them in place, her tan skin rubbing against the white plastic. Mariko wriggled her bare shoulders, trying to wrestle free, but she couldn't. "C'mon, sweet thing," he said, grabbing Mariko by her shoulders, and pushing her along in front of him. Mariko had no wish to co-operate, but she knew that the man was armed. For now, she was a captive. "How did he know how to rob me of my powers?" Mariko thought, as she was led forward, blindfolded and bound. She had not recognised the man's voice, but the one who had captured the lovely heroine was Vinnie, the canny crook who had been willing to surrender. He'd noticed that, in the gloom, Spectra had not simply illuminated the room herself, which he'd thought she'd be able to do with her abilities. Figuring out that Spectra's powers required light to work, he'd slipped through the secret door while Enhancegirl had dealt with his colleagues, and lain in wait.

Mariko was led over to a chair that sat near the centre of the room, and was shoved into it. She twisted her head round, trying to get the blindfold off, but it had been fitted securely. "Y'know," Vinnie said, "you look kinda familiar. And I don't just mean from the papers' stories about your, ah, exploits." "Whether or not you have a sense of déjà vu is of no interest to me!" Mariko said. She suddenly realised the position she was in, tied up and powerless at the mercy of a criminal, and she crossed her long legs, her right thigh resting against her left. "Very ladylike," Vinnie said, "but I'm not interested in anything like that." Mariko, aware of her considerable attractiveness, did not believe that, but she could do little about it either way.

Meanwhile, Enhancegirl had been having much better luck. Coming upon a group of thugs, she had dispatched them with ease, dancing in-between them gracefully, allowing their own clumsiness to do most of her work for her. Confident that the site was secured, she called in the authorities to sweep up after her. She had recently had a very unpleasant experience at the hands of a villainess named Madam Black, in which she had been drugged and captured, discovering her powers made her very vulnerable to chloroform induced sleep. This night was washing that bad taste out of her mouth, despite the arrogant heroine she had encountered in the basement. "Ugh, I guess I should check on her," she said, stepping over the bodies of the men she'd beaten, and finding her way back down the stairway.

"Um, hello?" she said, finding the room empty. "Hey...uh...Spectra?" Sophie found no sign of the raven-haired heroine. She did, however, find an open door leading into a gloomy corridor. Suspecting nefarious goings-on, Sophie walked in. She did not call out for Spectra again, unsure whether or not it would be wise to give away her position. She eventually came upon the door at the end, and was about to step through, when she heard voices from the other side. "...sit tight, sister...drop-off..." Enhancegirl sometimes wished that she had super-hearing too. She couldn't hear much. "...fool...indignity...release me!" That had been Spectra's voice. And from the sound of what Sophie could hear, as well as the oriental woman's tone, indicated that she was in trouble.

Enhancegirl pressed her hand against the floor, feeling for vibrations from behind the door. As far as she could tell, she could feel the footfalls of only one man inside. "Right," she said, "let's do this." Kicking the door open, Sophie leapt inside. "Another one?!" In the gloom, Vinnie hadn't seen Enhancegirl enter, and didn't know that a second superheroine was in the building. Finding himself confronting another attractive, leggy crimefightress, he reached for his gun, but found it swatted out of his hand in an instant. "What? What's happening?" Mariko, still blindfolded, couldn't see as Enhancegirl disarmed and disabled the thug, finding the perfect spot to deliver a spinning kick, which sent him barrelling down to the floor, his head smacking painfully against the ground. Dazed and bewildered, he groaned on the floor.

"Hey, you okay?" Sophie said, as she undid the zip-ties binding the taller heroine's arms. "Why did you interfere?" Mariko said, whipping off her blindfold and standing up. "I had this situation under control!" Sophie blinked. "Um...you were tied up and blindfolded. Didn't look like it was very in control to me..." She realised that the light-powered heroine, who did not seem to be drugged, or extravagantly restrained, had had her powers put in check by the blindfold. "That's because you're -" "A rookie, yeah, yeah, I get it," Enhancegirl said, ignoring the fact that Spectra had not even thanked her. "You know most supergals get tied up once or twice. Don't feel too bad." "Have you?" Spectra asked. "Well..." Sophie began, but hesitated. She was not particularly happy about revealing what had happened to the proud light-wielder, but it was always a good idea to have relations in the superheroic community. Perhaps Spectra was merely embarrassed, and Sophie could do something to assuage that. "I'm way, way too nice for my own good...I guess that's what being a do-gooder is all about, though," she thought. "I got captured during my last run. The goons were easy, but their leader had a jar of chloroform, and well..." "She was able to outwit you," Spectra said. "Didn't take much," Sophie remembered with embarrassment. "Just the whiff of the jar ten feet away was enough to make me dizzy." She realised too late that she had just revealed a serious weakness. "Well then," Spectra said, walking out, "it seems we are both aware of the other's vulnerabilities. An even exchange, I suppose. Excuse me." She walked out, her gait putting Sophie in mind of an catwalk model. Little did she know, that was a perfectly apt comparison.

A day later, Mariko was again strutting her stuff in an elaborate outfit, a long, white gown with high slits occasionally flashing her legs. But this was not her superheroic uniform. No, this outfit had been designed for her by an Italian seamstress, as had the outfits of all the women on the catwalk that night. While both Enhancegirl and Spectra spent their nights in the same business, Sophie spent her days as a college student, while Mariko spent hers as a model. The bulbs of the photographers flashed constantly, capturing every step of Mariko's walk. She reached the end of the catwalk, fixing her dark green eyes on the crowd in her signature pose, with one leg slightly bent and the other straight, before turning around, her hips swaying alluringly from side to side.

"Bella, bella!" The seamstress said, overflowing with gratitude at how good Mariko had made her designs look. The tall young woman smiled slightly, before returning to her dressing room. She sat, picking up a newspaper that one of her assistants had left for her. The main article was about her recovery of Doctor Takagawa's invention and she smiled. Mariko needed to be in the light, and not just for her powers. She read with relish

"Spectra Recovers Stolen Energy Reactor: The Lady of Light Saves the Day Again,". What followed was a description of the night's events, painting the Japanese heroine in a very flattering light indeed. That had been the morning edition of the Chronicle. She read through the whole thing, keeping herself abreast of current affairs, before turning to the evening paper. The headline was about a political summit being held that night, but there was one other story on the front page, which made Mariko's fists clench.

"New details about reactor recovery: Spectra rescued by 'Enhancegirl' - An official statement given by one Vincent Maguire, one of the reactor thieves apprehended by police, states that our city's leading light, Spectra, was captured by the criminals during her attempted recovery. Maguire tells how he managed to outwit Spectra, tying her up and holding her at gunpoint, before she was rescued by a second heroine, named Enhancegirl." Mariko seethed. She couldn't believe that the papers had managed to get hold of that tidbit: now it was going to look as if the neophyte was the real hero when, as far as Mariko was concerned, she was the one who had done most of the work. A speculative piece about what Enhancegirl's powers were followed, as well as a picture of the pretty redhead, that had been taken by a freelancer during one of Enhancegirl's first outings.

As Sophie had said, the superheroic community often came to each other's aid in certain situations, and Spectra would have suffered no serious loss of face on account of her brief capture. However, it was a great point of pride for her that she always worked alone, and had until then had a reputation of invincibility. "She must have fed the story to the press," Mariko said, "attempting to make a name for herself." She clenched her fist even tighter, crumpling the newspaper. "She'll pay for this insult."

At that moment, Sophie was enjoying a round of drinks with some of her girlfriends. "So," a friend of hers called Kirsty said to Sophie, "where have you been sneaking off to these past few nights?" "Yeah, Sophe, what's been keeping you so busy? Got a new man, or something?" "Y'know, it might be a total shock to you, but some women do actually have lives outside men." She sipped her drink. "Also, some people actually study from time to time." "Ohmigod, you're such a nerd," Kirsty said. "I swear, you're forgetting how to have fun." "Yeah, well," Sophie said, feeling her phone vibrating in her pocket, "at least I'm not jumping from guy to guy every week." As Kirsty loudly objected to Sophie's insult, she checked the text she'd been sent.

It was from one of Sophie's press contacts, who helped her locate trouble from time to time. "Paper sent anonymous tip. Someone saying there's going to be a robbery at the Acton Heights Bank tomorrow night. Contact police?" "No," Sophie replied. "Leave it to me." Foiling a bank robbery would be just the sort of classic daring-do that had attracted Sophie to the business in the first place. She smiled. "This is going to be fun."

The next night, the red-haired dame found herself standing outside a Acton Heights Bank. It was closed, and nothing seemed out of the ordinary, but these tips, in Sophie's experience, had a way of panning out. Sneaking round to the back of the building, Sophie made sure that no-one was watching. "Enhance!" she said, her body surrounded by a brilliant flash of light. That word was what activated Sophie's powers: she was an ordinary human unless she chose to be otherwise. Her vest-top and knee-length skirt vanished, replaced by the tight, strapless golden mini-dress and ankle hight boots that made up her outfit.

Atop the building, there was someone who noticed Enhancegirl's transformation. Looking down from the roof, someone had been waiting for the redhead to appear. "Spectrum is Green," she said, and a similar transformation occurred as the one she had watched. When it finished, Spectra stood atop the Acton Heights building. She too required a change-word in order to activate her powers, a normal human in her unchanged state. Taking after the criminal who had blindfolded her, Spectra pressed herself against a wall, near to the doorway onto the roof, using her powers to render herself invisible. She had a glass jar in one hand, and a thick cloth rag in the other.

Enhancegirl, though, did not use the stairs. She leapt up the building by a sewage pipe along the side, her powers allowing her easily to find foot and handholds. She'd guessed that the top-down would be the best way to catch the bank's security with their pants down, so had gone up to the top to catch the would-be robbers off guard.

But there was no-one there. Or at least, it seemed that way. Despite her incredible vision, Enhancegirl could not see the cloaked heroine, nor could she detect her in any other way. Normally she would have been able to feel the heat from her body, but Spectra had not placed herself where she had because of its proximity to the door. She had deduced that Sophie's powers were sense-based, and had placed herself right on top of a vent, hot air constantly pouring out. Sophie could not tell the difference between the heat of the vent and the heat of Spectra's body. She had managed to disguise her presence completely.

Enhancegirl looked around, but could see nothing. She was starting to think that the entire thing had been a hoax, until she heard the smashing of glass near her feet. "Huh?" She looked down, but before she could see the spilled contents, she could smell them. "Oh no..." She recognised the heady fumes instantly. Chloroform. Immediately, the red-haired heroine began to feel weak, her supple body losing its strength. She tried to move away, but she was getting groggy so quickly that the dizzy damsel tripped over, falling onto her bare knees. "Ooohh..." she moaned, "this stuff...got me so quickly...my body...so...sleepy...unnhh..." On her knees, Enhancegirl found herself even closer to the pool of narcotising, sweet-smelling liquid. Her arms fell by her sides - she couldn't even try to cover her mouth. Her large, green eyes were fluttering open and shut, as the drowzy girl sunk deeper and deeper into the grip of the narcotising pool. She swayed to and fro as her slinky hips grew weak, before she fell onto her side, her face actually landing in the puddle of chloroform.

"Nnn...oooohhh..." Sophie moaned, immediately overwhelmed. The heroine fell unconscious, her Achilles heel getting the better of her once again. At this point, Spectra revealed herself, taking long strides towards her fallen rival. "A truly pathetic weakness," she said, turning Enhancegirl onto her front. The redhead was completely pliable, her skimpily dressed body soft and narcotised. She offered no resistance when Mariko folded her arms behind her back, crossing her wrists at the point her back met her waist. The silver-clad heroine then produced a roll of duct tape, which - with an ominous tearing - she began to unroll.

She stuck tape to Sophie's left wrist, before rapidly winding it around, fixing both wrists together before continuing to cover Sophie's slim arms in tape, pulling them tighter and tighter, wrapping the tape right up to just under her bare shoulders. "Ooh..." Enhancegirl mewed in her drugged slumber as, now bound, Mariko turned her back over, with some unwound tape still pressed against Sophie's arms. Mariko held onto the length of tape, which began encircling Sophie's torso as she was rolled over, pressing her arms against the back of her gold mini-dress, and plumping up her half shown-off breasts, squeezing them up from underneath.

Mariko then turned to Sophie's uncovered legs, sticking silver tape to her exposed, fair skin. She bound Sophie's ankles first, before wrapping tape just underneath her knees, leaving her soft thighs naked, though the bindings pressed them tightly together. Enhancegirl was now bound hand and foot, her feminine body squeezed in from almost all sides by Spectra's bindings.

"You do have rather a big mouth for a neophyte, don't you?" Mariko said, as she pressed down a single strip of tape over Sophie's lips. The preparations were now complete. Spectra took out her cellphone, but she did not need to make a call. She was interested in its camera. "Two can play at your game," Mariko said, taking the first picture of the bound, drugged redhead, lying vulnerable on the floor in her tight, revealing dress. "Mmmmpphhh..." Sophie whimpered gently, utterly at Spectra's mercy, helpless to stop her bondage being documented. Mariko decided to pose her model, tilting her head to the side, exposing her slender neck to the camera, and making her look that little bit more defenceless. Noting that in addition to rivalling her in heroics, the long-legged, charmingly freckled redhead also rivalled Mariko in attractiveness, Mariko's lip curled. Deciding to humiliate her captive even further, to assure that her reputation as a heroine was a laughable one, she reached down, and was about to lift the hem of her dress - but something halted her. She couldn't quite bring herself to go that far.

Still, Sophie was photographed many times in her captive sleep. Tricked and trapped, Enhancegirl could do nothing to prevent this, the occasional muffled moan coming from behind her silver gag. "Spectrum is Red," Mariko said, changing back into her civilian attire. She had enough photographs to ensure Sophie's public humiliation, so she left, descending the stairwell that Sophie had neglected to use, leaving the bare-legged redhead bound and alone on the bank's roof.

As Mariko left, she halted suddenly, covering her hand with her mouth. She found her heart thumping hard in her chest, her stomach tightening. She put her hand against a wall, and had to steady herself. "What...what on Earth have I just done?" she thought. She felt disgusted with herself - why had she felt the need to go so far? She had never been so pointlessly cruel to someone before. Why her? Why now? "Is it because father -?" In her shame at her actions, she couldn't even bring herself to reverse what she'd done. She just left, as quickly as she possibly could.

With the puddle of chloroform lying next to her face, Enhancegirl was kept unconscious well into the night, lying helpless where Mariko had left her. Eventually, as the chloroform began to dry in the night air, it started losing its potency. "Mmmpphhh...nnmmmppphhh..." Sophie moaned, at last beginning to come round. Her vision swam, and the trussed up damsel was very drowzy, but she remembered what had happened. "Hmmmmmmppphhh..." she bleated, as she shifted her lithe body, feeling duct tape pressing against her curves. As she'd feared, she had awoken to find herself tied up. "No way..." she thought to herself, "I got tied up again...I can't believe it..." She saw, and felt, that her mask had been pulled off as well. "No! Whoever captured me...they might know who I am now...how could I have been so...so stupid..." Smelling the chloroform near her face, Sophie was in danger of passing out again, but she managed to get some strength in her body, and started wriggling away from the narcotising pool, the nubile damsel gradually edging away. As she did, her vigour started to return.

"Mmmpphhh...mmppphhh..." she mewed as she moved slowly across the concrete. She was still groggy and weak, to be sure, but she was not as overwhelmed by the sweet scent as she had been. Reaching the edge of the roof, she was clear headed enough for her enhanced senses to be useful again. She felt the sticky bonds again, but now with purpose. She could feel every pore and strand of the tape that pressed against her soft, smooth skin, and she was able to deduce its weaknesses. She pulled at a strange angle, one arm one way, the other pulling in the opposite angle. But she was proved right. It took ten minutes of solid pulling, her lovely body writhing around on the cold floor as she struggled, but eventually she managed to pull her forearms apart.

Once that was done, it was a simple matter to unwind the rest of the tape from her arms, before freeing her legs. "Downgrade!" she said, turning back into her normal self. She lost the use of her powers, but also her particular vulnerability to chloroform, so she didn't have to worry about being overcome again. Nervous that she might encounter her captor, she crept carefully down the stairwell, not wanting to risk the pipe in her civilian guise. She kept on guard the whole way down, and out of the building. But she needn't have done. Spectra was long gone.

Welcome readers, to the second outing of Enhancegirl, otherwise known as Sophie Scott, the red-haired superheroine with an unfortunate weakness to chloroform. In this story, she tangles with another heroine, the tall, beautiful Spectra, real name Mariko Asakura. Will Sophie prove herself a worthy heroine? Or will she find herself tied up before she even gets the chance? Read on, and discover!

This is a sort of two-part episode, the second part of which can be found here: https://damselbinder.deviantart.com/art/Perils-of-Enhancegirl-2-2-Lissom-Lasses-Kidnapped-449448111

EDIT: I've applied a small retcon to the beginning of this story, to bring Mariko's character a little more in line with how it develops in later chapters.