While Wonder Woman concentrated on freeing herself, the bitchbender went about its work. Sweat poured off her body as it responded to vaginal and anal penetration. The vaginal dildo twisted within her, its length reaching deep within her, its width stretching her. But the pain was not, as it was planned according to the computer, entirely unpleasant, as it also penetrated to erogenous insides. The tactile sensations rolled over her in waves, the combined pleasure and pain breaking through her unconscious, feeding her fantasies. A second dildo rubbed her clitoris, alternately gently and severely, the sensations mixing within her, until she was no longer able to tell the difference between the two. Lubricating furiously, the stream flowed between her legs and, since she was upside down, the sweet-smelling fluid rolled over her round, tight buttocks and glistened in the black curls of her bush. Involuntarily, at the same time as she struggled consciously to free her tiara from the strap around her head, her hips convulsed, writhing sensuously back and forth. Concentrating intensely, she strained to avoid rising and falling on the phallus, but her hips rode ‘round and ‘round on the long white tickler.
Making these great circles, at the same time she drove the very wide anal dildo deeper into her. It was the pressure of this object that dragged the moans from her lips as she tried to concentrate. Her battered anal muscles could no longer resist the machine-driven ivory object, and as it twisted within her, and as she herself maneuvered the dildo by circling her hips, it pressed back into her, driving her to heights of sensuality she had not reached before.
When the aphrodisiac-covered phallus entered her mouth, after the tremendous relief of freeing her head had registered, the Amazon Princess realised that she was allowing herself to enjoy this ride. The intense dryness inside her mouth led her to suck harder on the dampness thrust into her, and doing so introduced the chemical into her system in great quantities. Her head was swimming from the effects of the chemical, her body reaching erotic heights from the double penetration, her mind was reacting against the sweat pulled in through her nostrils, and all of these conspired to make her forget what she was about. Once her body began to move upward and the penetrations ended, she would have to force her head as far forward as she could. The chain would then fall above her head, if it didn’t get tangled in her sweaty, matted hair, and fall between the heavy, edged metal plates carrying the dildos into place. When the metal edges crashed together, she hoped, the chain would be broken. If it didn’t happen, the wheel would grind to a halt, as the trapped chain would hold her in place. Then, when the guards investigated the cause of the problem, her effort would be exposed and her chance at escape would be gone.
The wheel began to turn and the hopeful superheroine felt the probes begin to slip from her body. As the dildo pulled out of her mouth, she pressed her head as far forward as it would go. She felt pain at the top of her spine as she struggled for just one more centimeter, the centimeter that might make the difference between success and failure, between life and death. She felt her hips begin to track upward as the pressure she felt at her bare ankles increased. The leather straps securing her there were now carrying more and more of her weight. She still pressed to get her head even further toward her chest.
Her chin was directly against the sweaty top of her chest. She tried to lean forward lifting the top of her back from the surface of the wheel. As her head began its vertical journey, she felt the weight of the chain shift behind her neck. Above her head, she heard the machinery begin to operate. The timing had to be right. If the chain dropped too late to fall between the plates, she was bound to fail. She wiggled her arms and wrists as much as she could, to try to accelerate the movement of the chain. Breathing rapidly, in a panic, she heard the grinding of the gears as the plates began to slide. It seemed that the chain was not moving at all. Were the links caught in her hair? Or on a flaw on the edge of the wheel? WHY WASN’T THE CHAIN FALLING?
The sweat glistened on her muscular body as she strained at her bonds. The effort at rolling her upper torso, pulling her head forward, wringing her arms all added to the excitement she felt. But it was a deadly excitement. If the chain failed to fall soon enough, if the closing of the gate bringing the new dildo into place did not catch and snap the chain, her ruse would be discovered, the moving wheel stopped, and she would remain powerless, in the hands of her enemies.
By this time she had begun to recognise the sequence of cogs and gears, the sounds of the machinery, and she knew that she had only scant seconds for the chain to fall into place. The grinding above her head increased in pitch and volume, and the captive Wonder Woman struggled with desperation and a frenzy born of her fear, seeking to dislodge the chain from behind her neck and allow gravity to drop it into place.
Finally, she felt the weight of the chain shift and drop sharply. The chain lay along the side of the wheel, the center falling loosely into the open jaws of the metal plates moving slowly along the base of the great circle. But only for a few seconds. Just then, the great steel plate slid out from under Wonder Woman’s form, and captured the chain as it ground into place. Then, the second steel plate, the one carrying the next white ivory dildo, slid vertically to meet it. The two sharp edges came together.
Wonder Woman felt her pace slow, as the chain did not break immediately, but rather it was captured and held by the mating pieces of heavy plate steel. Her arms were drawn away from her, and the helpless Amazon felt pain in her already aching shoulders as the grinding sheets of metal pushed inexorably toward one another. The pain increased as her whole naked body was drawn back and the wheel slowed. She felt the leather restraints digging into her ankles. She heard the sound of the metal pieces coming together, but she recognised that the chain had not been broken. Desperately she pulled her arms toward herself, then stopped, fearful that she might simply pull the chain out of the jaws holding it, leaving the chain intact and herself weakened.
There was no great crashing sound when the Amazon’s dream was fulfilled. In fact, the sound of the metal pieces coming together was no different than on any other revolution that Wonder Woman had endured. It was only the surge of Amazon strength returning to her limbs that told the Princess she was now free from her chains.
As she emerged from the floor of the theatre, the guards were waiting to taunt her again. As her head rode the wheel, coming up from floor level, two of her guards were shouting viciously and vilely directly into her face. One, fascinated by her sweaty, firm breasts and erect nipples, plucked her right tit with an increasing animation. She couldn’t see any others.
When she was resting directly on top of the wheel’s circumference, she tore herself free, ripping the heavy leather restraints like tissue paper. Leaping from the wheel, she seized the guard nearest her and flung him into the heavy wooden paneling along the wall at the rear of the theatre. He crashed heavily into the wall, and then just dropped into a heap on the floor. She held the second man by the collar and smashed his head into the still-rotating wheel, splattering blood everywhere.
The naked Amazon raced to the third man, the one who had been tweedling her breast, and lifted him bodily from the floor, firmly holding his uniform front as he desperately tried to kick his way free. His kicks were ineffectual against the powerful, but still nude, body of the Champion of All Women. Still holding him up with her left hand, she drew back her strong right arm and drove her fist into his face. He flew backwards as she released her grip on him, landing fifteen feet across the room.
That took care of the men in the room, fewer than the number usually there. If there were any others they had left the room and would return at any moment. This gave the free Amazon only a short time to assess her situation. She saw her uniform lying on the floor next to the door. She dressed herself as quickly as her tired, aching body would allow. She tore the remains of the manacles from her wrists before she slowly entered the hallway.
The hall was dimly lit. The silence of the shadowy passage was unbroken as Wonder Woman stepped carefully into the hall, her eyes and ears searching acutely for a sign of an approaching enemy. There was no other room on this floor, so she moved quickly to the stairwell and made her way up the stairs.
As she neared the top of the stairs, behind the fire doors above her she heard the approach of two sets of boots. She would use surprise effectively here. She hurried to the top of the stairs in time to catch the two men as they were coming through the fire doors. One of them wore the insignia of an officer.
In a moment, the officer was unconscious and lying at the foot of the stairs. The other guard was helpless, held in Wonder Woman’s powerful grasp.
‘Tell me the layout of this place,’ she ordered in her most threatening voice.
Wide-eyed, the guard stopped his struggles. ‘What do you want to know?’ he asked.
‘How many levels below ground are there?’
‘There are four sub-levels below the house. Here, we are on the third level down,’ he said resignedly.
‘Where is the Senator?’
‘I don’t know.’ Wonder Woman shook him like a doll. ‘I don’t know!’ he whined. ‘But he’s probably in the house at this hour. It is well-known that he has to prepare a major speech on the war tomorrow.’
‘How many guards are here?’
‘About twenty.’
‘Sixteen,’ she corrected. ‘Do you have regular rounds?’
‘No. They’re just on call in case of intrusion or if the Senator needs something.’
‘Which level houses their quarters?’
‘The first sub-level. Supplies are on the second sub-level.’
‘You’ve been most co-operative, especially since I don’t have my magic lasso. Speaking of my lasso, where is it?’
‘The Senator had it the last anyone saw. He probably still has it.’
With that, the Amazon carried her prisoner into the hallway. Directly to her right was a door marked ‘Maintenance’. Turning the knob, she discovered it was locked. Forcing the door, inside she found all the paraphernalia of a good janitor’s closet. Using odds and ends, bits and pieces of what she found there, Wonder Woman tied the guard hand and foot, and left him with a nasty-smelling, but relatively harmless, gag in his mouth. Closing the door, she forced the lock back into play, with the unfortunate side effect that the door could no longer be opened from either inside or out.
She continued her way upstairs, still without her magic lasso. Keeping to the stairwell, she secured the fire doors on both floors. While this would not keep the guards out of the game altogether, it would slow them down and limit their access to the house.
As she climbed the last flight of stairs to the ground level of the house, Wonder Woman heard the Senator rehearsing his speech. ‘This is a time of great danger, gentlemen. We look around the world and see growing Communist influence among those nations which we now call the Third World, those new nations which have until now been part of the colonial empires of the European nations. We see increasing Communist influence among our European allies, in the growth of both Socialist parties in the Governments and in the radicalism among students and workers. And we see increased Communist influence here at home. We see greater radicalism on our college campuses, in out cities, and even within the mainstream political venues.
‘It is time to forestall these radicals who threaten our country. We must ferret out the true creators of these “Movements,” so-called, and shine the bight light of publicity on them. Show them for what they are. I call upon my colleagues here to justify those who work with them….’
The Amazon climbed the last few stairs, listening to the Senator, wondering where he was going with this idea. Was he going to invoke a new loyalty oath, like they had in the ‘50s? That seemed to be implied in what he was now saying.
‘…No one who works for the government should be ashamed to declare his support for our form of government. And, if discovered to be undermining our Constitutional system, we should have the instrument to punish any traitor we find hiding under the mantle of our good graces….’
His voice, one of the most famous in Congress, filled the entire floor. It served to explain why he got this house out in the middle of vast acreages. He certainly couldn’t rehearse like this in an apartment, or even in a sedate suburban neighborhood. She quickly and quietly walked down the hall toward the large wooden double doors that opened to the library. How long ago it seemed that she had waited to be greeted by him. The strength had returned to her body, but many parts, particularly her private parts, still ached terribly after her ordeal. Her keen Amazon hearing was wary for any other sounds in the building. She wanted to bring this to an end as soon as possible. She continued to listen as she heard him mention his son.
‘…my son, who was seduced by these Sirens of Sedition, and recently fell in the streets of this capital, the victim of a Communist who planned to attack one of our sacred shrines. Did they seek to destroy the Memorial to Abraham Lincoln, where the march was to end? Or the Capitol Building, which the head of the march was approaching at the moment of the deadly explosions? In any case, they have shown themselves unwilling to conduct this debate in a civilised manner. And, my son, misled by their rhetoric, died when the bomb one of these traitors was carrying detonated prematurely. These enemies of our government have no decent respect for our History, for our traditions. Our President, who is doing all he can to end this war honourably, is confronted with radicals and Communists who will accept nothing less than an outright Communist victory in Vietnam. This proposal will demonstrate our support for the President’s efforts toward peace with honour. It will grant him the powers he needs to conduct a domestic war against these anti-American elements….’
By this time, Wonder Woman recognised that the plan they had told her of earlier, to begin the process of the destruction of American civil liberties by creating great power in the White House, would start with this bill. She walked to the double doors and turned the handle of the one on the right. As it swung open, she saw the Senator pacing in the empty room. He stopped when he saw her, though he didn’t seem surprised.
‘Welcome again, Wonder Woman. I take it you’ve had a complete tour of the subterranean facilities open to unwanted guests here.’
‘It was not a pleasant experience for me. Your tour guides were a little too eager to enjoy themselves at my expense.’
‘An unfortunate side effect of the quality of help I have been forced to rely upon. Where are the boys now?’
‘About a quarter of this evening’s entourage is out of commission. The others may be struggling with the fire doors.’
‘I figured. Did you kill all of those?’
‘Only those where I had no choice. But enough about me. What are we going to do about you?’
‘About me?’ The Senator looked incredulous.
‘Yes, you. What you’re doing is unconstitutional, not to mention fascistic. From what you told me earlier, I gather you’re planning secret police, harassment of individuals, arbitrary arrests, and anything else your fertile little minds can come up with.’
‘The people of this country want order. They showed that when they elected President Nixon in 1968. They’ll support what we’re doing. And once the bums, the niggers, and the long-haired radicals are quiet and out of sight, and things are as they should be, we’ll take this country down the right path.’
Wonder Woman stared at him for a long moment. ‘And what about the people’s freedom to choose their own paths?’
‘Freedom is too complicated for a lot of people, Wonder Woman. You certainly know that. Your powers give you greater freedom of choice than normal people, and you understand how complex the decisions you face become. What we’re offering is order and security, and the freedom to enjoy the prosperity which will follow.’
Didn’t Benjamin Franklin say something about any people who give up their freedom for security deserve neither freedom nor security?’
‘Things were different in the eighteenth century, Wonder Woman. The amount of wealth and power available to governments now make the kind of thing that they feared not even worth mentioning. What the President and his advisors are planning will change the face of this country. We’ve got something on the books called the Houston Plan to deal with the radicals….’
‘I’m afraid that the details will have to wait, Senator.’ Wonder Woman drew herself up to her full height, despite the lingering pain she felt through her body, placed her feet about shoulder-width apart, and placed her fists on top of her hips. ‘You’re going to come with me. You’re going to explain to the proper authorities about the death of your son. I’m still not too clear about that, except that apparently, you arranged for his death by placing the explosive in his backpack-in something that looked like a thermos and which he believed was very important to hold on to-so that you would have an excuse to begin this increase of government power. I’m not sure whether the bomb went off prematurely or whether you wanted it to go off in the crowd. Somehow, I can’t see you bombing the Lincoln Memorial.’
‘You’re right, of course. It was designed to go off before the march reached the Memorial. But it did go off too soon. We wanted it to go off when there were many people in a position unable to move about, not while they were marching. There was a flaw in all three timing mechanisms.’
‘So, you killed your own son…’ Wonder Woman began, looking aghast.
‘My son was a traitor. Traitors are executed in time of war.’
The Amazon’s arms dropped to her sides when she heard the Senator’s confession, as she tried to grasp the extent of the Senator’s actions. Seeing this opportunity, Senator Carlton reached into the podium near him, whipped out Wonder Woman’s magic lasso, and before the Amazon Princess could react, the Senator had secured her in its mystic coils.
He smiled as he pulled the captive Princess toward him. ‘I don’t think I’ll be going anywhere with you,’ the Senator said. ‘Get down on your knees.’
Powerless to resist, the Princess of Paradise Island slowly dropped to her knees before her captor. The Senator continued to close the distance between them, as he walked slowly toward his helpless prisoner. The rancher-cum-Senator easily looped the golden rope around her bare upper chest and arms. As he did so, Wonder Woman felt the surge of its control roll through her like an electric shock. Below, she felt her sex involuntarily begin to moisten. After he had secured her arms with five coils of the glowing rope, he seated himself before the powerless woman.
‘Everything is about power, you poor naïve heroine,’ he said. ‘The power I have over you, the power the President will be able to exercise, the power of this nation to work our will in the world. There are many kinds of power, many levels of power. That’s something you have not yet learned.’
‘Doesn’t the idea of freedom mean anything to you, Senator? Doesn’t the kind of power you’re seeking mean that there will be limits placed on the freedom of our own citizens?’
‘Freedom should be reserved for those who have the responsibility-and the power-to choose wisely. You see what’s happening out there in the streets. Riots in the cities, on the campuses, here in the capital. Government policies challenged by people who have no idea how difficult it is for a Great Power to operate, the President unable to go into the public arena without fear of a public reaction-you saw what it was like for President Johnson at the end of his term. Well, it’s not going to be like that for President Nixon. We’re already beginning to orchestrate what the great mass of people will think. For example,’ he shifted in his seat and drew himself up as he cleared his throat, ‘do you remember when the President went on television to announce the incursion into Cambodia? Then the next day, the White House announced that public response to the President’s speech was running three-to-one in support of the policy, based upon phone calls to the White House?’
‘Yes. That level of support was almost impossible to believe.’
‘Well, we manufactured it.’
‘Do you mean that the White House lied about the telephone response?’ the Amazon prisoner asked.
‘No, no. We never lied. We just made the phone calls to the White House ourselves, over and over again, so that the people who recorded such things could give a true and accurate report of what came into the White House.’
‘Why did you do this?’
‘Fortified with public approval for our policy, we could then take the next step. The increasing of the President’s power to deal with the small minority who disrupt our lives.’ The Senator was smiling a deeply self-satisfied smile.
In other words, you’re fabricating a favourable public response to a policy, and then extending that policy when it is clear that the response, which you’ve manufactured, is what is popular. You’re creating your own reality.’
‘We know what the people want. When the Great Silent Majority realises that their wishes are the policy of this President, they’ll come out and be more overt with their support.’
‘You know, Hitler and the Nazis loved to use plebiscites. They’d rig elections so that there was ninety-nine percent support for whatever it was that Hitler was doing.’
‘But we’re not faking anything. The calls actually came in to the White House operator. The phone records reflect that. We never lied about the results, as the Nazis frequently did.’
Wonder Woman was astounded at the level of deception and self-deception that the White House and some other sympathetic members of the government were engaged in. She had to get free. She had to take steps to prevent this seizure of power, this distortion of the Constitutional system.
‘And, now, dear Wonder Woman, we must remove you as an obstacle. You see, because of your reputation as an ardent defender of the oppressed, when you talk people, will listen. And you know too much about what we have done and what we are intending to do. So, what must be done is to remove you.’
‘You’re planning on killing me? You’ll discover that that is not as easy as you may think. You’re not the first to plan to do so.’
‘No, no, no. Killing you or making you just disappear would raise the wrong questions and convey the wrong message. If they found your body, you would be a martyr and people would want to know what happened. Your ideas would be stronger than ever. We want you discredited, and very much alive to live out your humiliation.’ He pressed a button on the side of his desk.
In a few moments, the elderly butler entered the room. Her was carrying a small black bag. It looked like a doctor’s bag.
Senator Carlton took the bag, placed it on the desk, and opened it. He pulled out a hypodermic needle and a small glass bottle containing a lime-coloured liquid. He pressed the hypodermic through the thin skin on the top of the bottle, then turned the bottle upside down. As he drew back the plunger, the liquid flowed into the capsule. Righting the bottle, he withdrew the needle; then, expertly holding the needle in a vertical position, he flicked the side of the capsule with his index finger, driving small air bubbles to the top. The he gently pushed the plunger forward to drive the bubbles out through the tip of the needle. When all of the air bubbles were cleared from the hypodermic, he sat down next to his prisoner, still holding her enthralled by her own lasso.
‘This is a wonderful age we live in, Wonder Woman. It’s possible to get drugs to do practically anything you want.’ Then, looking coldly at the Amazon Princess on her knees before him, ‘You will do nothing to resist this.’
The command shot through the Amazon’s consciousness. Her powerful body was helpless under its influence. While the Senator approached her with the hypodermic, the butler removed a second needle from the bag. Carlton lightly plunged the needle into the bare upper arm of the prisoner, removed it, and exchanged needles with the old servant. He repeated the process with the second needle.
‘You will begin to feel a bit disoriented in a few moments, Wonder Woman. In light of your Amazon constitution, I believe several doses will be needed with you. You will therefore receive another double dose of the drug before we release you in a few hours, around the morning rush hour. In the meantime, we must prepare you for your debut, so that your public can see the “new” Princess of the Amazons.’ As the Senator spoke, the door opened, and three guards entered the library. He continued, ‘Now I must give you the order to forget everything you have seen, heard, and experienced here, including whatever shall transpire over the next several hours. I further order you to forget that you have come here or that you ever had any intention of coming here. Is that clear, Wonder Woman? You were never here. You never had any plans or intentions of coming here. You will remember nothing of what happened or what will happen.’
‘Already falling under the influence of the drug, the helpless Amazon replied, ‘The magic lasso compels me to obey.’ Her words were slightly slurred and her upper body began to sway slightly. A moment later her head fell forward to her chest, her black hair falling over her bare shoulders.
The Senator smiled. He removed her lasso from her shoulders. The drugged superheroine didn’t move. He coiled the lasso and replaced it at her right hip, securing it to her golden belt. ‘All right,’ he said to the uniformed trio. ‘Take her to your quarters and destroy her reputation.’ As they moved to pick up their charge, he added, ‘There is no reason, at this point, to remove her costume. Leave her body fluids on her legs, and leave your own everywhere else.’ They smiled as they gently lifted the Champion of All Women to her feet and began to drag her from the room. The Senator walked after them, continuing to give orders for the disposal of her body later that morning.
Wonder Woman was carried once again into the heart of enemy country, as she was taken to the guards’ quarters. There, unmoving, almost uncomprehending, she lay on the floor as the men of the watch masturbated over her. They opened bottles of beer and forced some of it down her throat. Because of the effects of the drug, her muscles would not swallow and most of it wound up pouring out of her mouth and down over her body. Finally, marijuana smoke was blown over her as she lay helpless on the floor. Some of the joints were stubbed out on her uniform and boots. The odor remained embedded in her satin costume, her hair, and her body. Throughout it all, the men garbed in black laughed.
William, the Senator’s driver, smoothly moved the car into the driveway in front of the Lincoln Memorial. The sun was barely up and the eastern sky was cloudy so that it was darker than usual on this late spring morning. The men in the back seat, ordered to leave the Princess in a very public place, noted that the only person about was a maintenance person sweeping out the inside of the Memorial. Very shortly he disappeared deep into the main floor of the Memorial, presumably to continue his work. For the moment, there were no visitors anywhere near the steps leading up to the gigantic statue of the Great Emancipator. They injected their Amazon prisoner with yet another dose of the hallucinogenic that was still incapacitating her. ‘Quick. Let’s get out.’ All three men were gathered around one of the doors, pulling their beautiful prisoner from the back seat. One was holding her under her shoulders. He pulled her out of the car and her boots struck the pavement. As he started to drag her toward the steps, the other two grabbed her boots and her hips, and the three strong men quickly carried her about fifteen steps up toward the monument, finally laying her next to the pylon on the viewer’s left. Without looking around, they raced back down the steps, jumped into the waiting car, and sped away.
Wonder Woman was left lying face down on the steps. Her arms lay next to her head on either side, with the wrists crossed on the next step up from where her head rested. Her body stretched down the steps across three steps, her red leather boots resting in front of the pylon, which occupied the side of the long row of stairs. She was barely conscious, a result of the huge doses of the drug now coursing through her, dominating her against her will. She could barely move and was totally incapable of either speech or coherent thought. It would take at least an hour for her body to begin to respond, at which point she would be able to stand up. But her mind would still be under the considerable influence of the drug, even at that point.
The tourists began to arrive even before Wonder Woman was capable of movement, so, just as Senator Carlton had planned, the sprawled form the Amazon Avenger would be a figure of curiosity for these people. In addition, for those who ventured too close to the unmoving body, the mixed smells of sweat, fluids, alcohol, and marijuana, all as a result of her three days of torment at the Senator’s house, for it was that long that she was tortured there, all wafted through the air. The first of the tourists to experience this mixture of odors was a group of children, naturally drawn to the inert form of their heroine.
‘It’s Wonder Woman! IT’S WONDER WOMAN!’ several of the small children cried as they and their parents approached the shrine from the mall.
They rushed up to the figure of the Amazon, only to be caught short. ‘OOOOooooohhh! What’s that smell? I don’t like it,’ the child asked, sniffing the air and making a face.
The second child, evidently her brother, was made of sterner stuff and he drew closer to the unmoving body. ‘Aaaahh, that’s just booze and grass,’ he said, looking at his mother and smiling for her approval.
‘Booze!? Alcohol?!? Marijuana??’ the mother asked, and she began to sniff the air as well. As she got closer to the Amazon, she recognised the other odors. Looking down on the unmoving body of the Champion of All Women, she drew her face closer. Her eyes grew very wide, and now her husband was cheerfully approaching his family.
‘Well, what have we here, kids? Is this a surprise? You didn’t expect to find your favourite heroine here. And at this hour?’ he asked, smiling broadly. Then his wife hurried to his side and whispered in his ear, so that the children wouldn’t hear. ‘What? Barry said what?’ He sniffed. ‘It is. That and more!’ Again, his wife whispered to him. ‘What? Oh, nooo.’ He sniffed again, drawing his head closer to the still-paralysed Amazon. Reaching down, he took hold of her shoulder and turned her over, feeling the stickiness all over her body. She now lay on her back. Her left arm lolled down next to her body. Her eyes were open but she could not focus them. To her observers, they appeared to be rolling around in her head, her eyelids fluttering uncontrollably.
‘She’s… stoned!’ the father announced. ‘She smells of alcohol, but it looks like she’s been smoking dope! She must have been mixing them.’
‘Please…. Help…. Me….’ Wonder Woman began to regain some control over herself, and she tried to speak. But her words were slurred and mumbled. She couldn’t control herself so her words came out sounding like nothing very comprehensible. ‘Please…. Help…. Me….’ She said it again, this time with tears forming in her eyes.
‘What did she say?’ Barry asked his mother. His sister ventured closer to the supine superheroine and reached down to touch her bare legs. ‘OOOOoooohh,’ she winced. ‘She’s all sticky.’
Her mother quickly grabbed her shoulder and pulled her away.
More tourists were now gathering around the Amazon lying on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. Word passed from one to another as they arrived, from parent to parent and from child to child as they overheard their parents talking. ‘Wonder Woman is drunk!’ ‘Wonder Woman is stoned out of her mind!!’ ‘Wonder Woman got herself FUCKED!!” WONDER WOMAN IS FUCKED UP!!!’ Soon the reports gathered around them commentaries. ‘Boy, I wish I had been there.’ ‘Can you imagine what she’s like in bed?’ ‘I wonder where she gets her stuff.’ Eventually hostility toward Wonder Woman emerged. ‘That BITCH finally got nailed good!’
It wasn’t long after the crowd had gathered that Wonder Woman found the strength to stand up. Pushing up with her arms, she fumbled as her legs looked for a bit of level ground on the steps. She stumbled twice before she got her feet under her. Then she stood up, lurching first from side to side, bending her body at the waist and swinging her arms for balance. She fell against the pylon, and then pressed her face and chest against the cool marble to refresh herself. ‘Someone…. Please…. Help…. Me….’ She tried to plead again. Again, it sounded like her tongue was swollen and her mouth was filled with cotton. A couple of her viewers laughed.
‘What’d she say?’ ‘It didn’t sound like any language I’ve ever heard.’ ‘Maybe she’s cursing us out in ancient Greek.’
The ungainly Amazon took two steps down toward the street when her balance and her footing gave way, and she tumbled down the stairs, the crowd following. She wound up lying with her head on the sidewalk in front of the Memorial and her body draped over the last three steps. Her arms were splayed outward crucifix-style as she lay on her stomach. There were more laughs this time.
‘Boy, she is really stoned.’ ‘Must have been one hell of a party.’ ‘Hey, Wonder Woman, baby, can you tell us where the party is next time? We don’t want to miss it.’ ‘Didn’t you hear her? She’s in no condition to tell us anything.’ ‘Has anyone called a cop?’ There was silence in answer to that one.
The Princess of Paradise Island struggled to her feet again. This time it took her a long time because she couldn’t figure out how to get her feet and legs below her head from the position she was lying in. She tried rolling over onto her back, but that was too hard to accomplish, so she gave up when she got to her side. From this position, she walked her legs down the steps, like Curly in the old Three Stooges movies. Once her entire body was on sidewalk level, she pushed herself to her hands and knees. Her head hung toward the sidewalk. ‘Please. Some-…. -One…. Help me….’ The laughs came from everyone now.
A few onlookers mocked her speech, and the crowd laughed again. Wonder Woman was on her knees on the sidewalk in front of the Lincoln Memorial. She was making speaking sounds that sounded like a muffled cry of pain that no one could understand. She head was hanging toward the sidewalk, her long black tresses reaching to the cement. She began to waver unsteadily in her four-point position, and eventually her right elbow gave way and she crashed to the walkway again. ‘Please. Some-one…. Help…. Me.…’ Again, the mocking sounds from the crowd and the laughter.
She pushed herself up to her hands and knees again, and then breathed deeply to gather strength to try to get to her feet. ‘How can you hold yourself up as an example to all women? The Champion of All Women? How can we try to be the equals of men when you allow yourself to appear like this in public?’ The young woman who was speaking was in tears. ‘How can you allow children to see you like this?’ a young mother yelled angrily at her. She too was nearly in tears. The crowd around her was now mostly women and the anger of their disappointment in the woman who had inspired their hopes for greater equality now overflowed. Wonder Woman was grabbed and forced to face each new accuser. ‘Look at yourself! To come out in public smelling like this….’ ‘…and looking like you’ve O.D.’d!’ ‘And your body! How many men fucked you last night, Superheroine?’ One woman spat on the Amazon.
This was a signal to the other members of the crowd who now launched their attack on the powerless Amazon. She was struck from all angles, her hair was pulled, she was spat upon, she was struck with open hands, fists, purses, and any other object that came to hand. The crowd was so closely milling around the now-standing heroine that she fell first this way, then that, but they were too closely packed to allow her to fall down.
The crowd moved toward the small copse of trees in front and to the left of the Memorial. Through it all they continued to beat and jeer the beautiful but now utterly helpless Wonder Woman.
‘Someone…. Please…. Help-me.’
When she spoke, it only served to enrage the crowd further. They reacted as if they thought she was taunting them, speaking a language no one understood, and their fury in their attack became even more violent. Wonder Woman was pushed to the ground on a piece of grass-covered earth on the edge of the small grove of trees. She first sat there, trying to get up, then, under the pressure of the crowd, she fell to her side, and lay there, unmoving.
The entire episode, from Wonder Woman’s first discovery by the family of tourists to when her body was shoved to the ground, took about forty-five minutes. In that time, many of the D.C. radio and television stations began reporting the incident. It also took that long for Penelope, going with little sleep these last three nights, to arrive at the Memorial, where she saw her lover being pummeled by the enraged group of women. Looking up the steps of the Memorial, Penelope saw their male partners looking down on the spectacle, many of them smiling carnally.
Penelope pushed her way into the crowd, and removing her jacket, she kneeled down next to her friend and threw the thin University of Delaware windbreaker over her shoulders. Then she wrapped her arms around the prone body of Wonder Woman. ‘Leave her alone! LEAVE HER ALONE!!’ she screamed at them. ‘Can’t you see that she can’t control what she’s doing?
‘How many of you know someone she’s helped? Or were helped yourselves? How many of you took her as your role model because of her strength and her independence and her goodness?’ The crowd began to draw back, quieter now. ‘You know that a woman can’t do all that and there won’t be some of THEM’-here she pointed to the group of men standing on the stairs-‘that will hate her for it. Leave her alone. Let me take her out of here.’
‘Please. Someone…. Help me.’ This time Wonder Woman was understandable. The effect of the drug was beginning to wear off.
Penelope spoke quietly, ‘Come with me.’ She helped the Amazon Princess to her feet and, with Wonder Woman still wearing the dark blue windbreaker across her shoulders, led her away from the mall. The crowd of women was silent and no one moved as they watched the two women move slowly away. Then they returned to their husbands, children, boyfriends, and friends.
Wonder Woman leaned heavily against her friend, her powerful and shapely legs moving slowly and uncertainly toward where Penelope had parked her Datsun pickup. Wonder Woman’s arms hung uselessly at her sides, her head hanging down, her chin touching her chest. She struggled to keep her eyes open. Her mouth hung loosely open and, as a result of the drug, she occasionally drooled onto her bare upper chest. Penelope’s right arm reached around the body of the Defender from Paradise Island, supporting her and holding her close to the dancer’s athletic body. As they slowly walked out of sight of the steps of the Memorial, Penelope spoke soothingly and calmly to her friend. ‘Just one step at a time, Diana. Rest your weight on me.’ I’ll get you through this. I’ll get you home and cleaned up. Whatever you’ve suffered through is over now.’ But even Penelope noticed the mixture of odors emanating from the Amazon.
The superheroine’s speech was still a bit unclear. Each time she tried to say something Penelope would fail to understand, she responded with a calm voice and a tightened embrace. When they got to the truck, Penelope braced Wonder Woman, still woozy, against the chassis of the truck while she opened the door. ‘Just stand here for two seconds, Diana, just two seconds. All I have to do is open the door. Then I’ll get you home.’
‘Home.’
It was the first completely clear word Wonder Woman had uttered. Penelope heard it come clearly forth just as she opened the door of the cab. Turning to the dazed and helpless warrior, Penelope wrapped her arms around her and squeezed the incoherent woman to her. ‘Oh, dear God. What have they done to you?’ Tears welled up in her eyes and rolled down her cheeks. ‘How could someone do something like this to you?’
Then Penelope leaned and pushed the body of the powerful Avenger into the cab of the Datsun, finishing the job by twisting her in the seat, then pushed her legs into the truck. Upon pulling her hands away, Penelope noticed the stickiness and the odor, which remained, with her hands. ‘I’m never going to let you go out again. Whoever did this… They’re not human.’ She felt sick to her stomach. Pushing the door shut she raced around the front of the truck, then pulled up sharply at the driver’s-side door.
‘Oh, shit!’ There was a ticket on the windshield. ‘You can never get a cop in this city. But I leave a car here for ten minutes and they’re all over your ass.’ She tore the ticket from the windscreen and tossed it behind her seat. She got in and started the engine.
‘Please. Someone. Help me.’ Wonder Woman’s delirium was almost painful to listen to for someone who would not have had an emotional stake in her well-being. For Penelope to hear her lover cry out so piteously was more than she could stand.
‘Diana, we’re going home. Please try to stay calm. I’ll take care of you. We’re going home,’ Penelope told her. By the time she had finished just this short statement, she was crying. ‘Oh, God. What did they do to you?’
As Penelope drove through the congested streets of the rush-hour capital, Wonder Woman’s body rolled back and forth on the seat. Each time the truck stopped, her head fell heavily against the dashboard, and each time the truck made a turn, her body lolled in that direction. Never once did Penelope even consider taking Wonder Woman to a hospital. She seemed to sense that the Amazon’s remarkable recuperative powers would eventually restore her to health. She also knew a fear, born of the nature of her relationship, that Wonder Woman’s public humiliation would pale in comparison with the revelation of a lesbian partnership. For the time necessary for the powerful Amazon to recover, Penelope resolved to treat her lover herself.
The trip to Georgetown took longer than Penelope wanted it to. Every time she came to a stop, she reminded herself to reach over and restrain the free-falling body of Wonder Woman. The occasional verbalisations, cries for help that issued from the lips of the delirious Princess, nearly drove her into a frenzy. When they reached the apartment complex, there was still only little evidence that Wonder Woman was recovering.
Penelope jumped from the cab and ran to the front door. The living room of the apartment opened directly onto the parking lot. She unlocked the door and pushed it open slightly. Then she hastened back to the passenger-side door, opened it, and struggled to lift the Amazon out of the truck. ‘Come on, Diana. Just walk with me. Please. Just a few steps. I need your strength now. Please.’
Wonder Woman’s legs took timorous and ungainly steps across the lawn and up the walkway. Before she reached the door, the blue Delaware windbreaker slid from her shoulders and fell to the ground, revealing the slumped and devastated body of the Champion of All Women. Penelope urged her, cajoled her, pleaded with her to take just one more step, then another. Finally, the two women entered the apartment, where Penelope let herself fall to the shag carpeting, with Wonder Woman falling on top of her. Once in this position, she kicked the door shut.
Long moments passed. For three days, Penelope had wondered and worried about the fate of her roommate. Now that she was back home, Penelope was fearful of the consequences of the Princess’ escapade which had gone so disastrously, so terrifyingly, wrong. Finally, she embraced her lover again, the tears running freely from her.
She pushed the heroine from her as gently as she could. Wonder Woman now lay on the floor, on her back, her eyes open but unfocussed, the pupils dilated, the eyelids fluttering wildly. As Penelope looked down on her, again she felt a rush of emotion. ‘Who could do this to you? To you? Of all the people in the world, why would someone want to hurt you like this?’
Penelope took up Diana in a fireman’s carry, the dancer’s strong right arm securing the Princess’ left arm and left leg as Penelope carried her roommate across her shoulders. She moved carefully across the living room to the stairs that went up to the loft. The first thing to do is to get her into bed. The wide wooden stairs were negotiated easily, but the bookcases on the balcony required a bit of careful navigation to avoid a collision between the pinewood side of the case and the Princess’ head. Penelope then moved to the bedroom.
Bending her body at the waist, Penelope dropped Wonder Woman’s body onto the bed, and then rolled her onto her back. Reaching under her unresisting body, the lover removed the Amazon’s golden girdle and dropped it beside the bed. Before doing so, she saw how scuffed it was. Was all of this the result of whatever torment her friend had endured?
Then she removed the satin red-and-gold eagle breastplate. As she did so, Wonder Woman flailed at her, struggling against the action, as if trying to resist her. Was this a general instinct from her years of crimefighting? Certainly any male criminal who may have even briefly had the upper hand over so beautiful an antagonist would have attempted to remove this. Or was this reaction the result of only the last few nights? Penelope wasn’t sure which answer she would have preferred. The breastplate, too, was scuffed and showed evidence of being used to snuff out joints. Further, it contained residue of semen, sweat, water, urine, and beer. Her breasts, once revealed, showed signs of discolouration and bruising.
Penelope next reached down to Wonder Woman’s legs, and pulled the zipper down on the inside of her red leather boots, first the left, then the right. These boots really would need a polishing before she could wear them again. That is, if I let her wear them again. Like the other parts of her costume, they carried deposits from her mistreatment. But it was what Penelope saw after getting them off that caused a catch in her throat. There were bruises around her lover’s ankles, as though Wonder Woman had been placed in heavy restraints, and that she had rubbed her ankles against these bindings as part of her efforts to escape. Small cuts showed clotted blood in a neat line around each ankle. Seeing these, Penelope quickly rose to examine the Amazon’s wrists. Sure enough, similar cuts revealed that her Amazon bracelets had been bound.
She removed the Princess’ tiara and noticed the debris, the sweat and even semen residue in her hair. Wonder Woman must have gone through another torture like she has undergone in Delaware. Why did men act like forcing sex on a woman was the only way to demonstrate their superiority over her? True, Wonder Woman’s strength, power, reputation, and symbolism made her a prime target for this animalistic reaction, and certainly the costume she wore invited it, but did they have to gang-bang her, did they have to cum all over her face and hair?
Crying openly now, Penelope had to leave the room to compose herself. She used the opportunity to go to the bathroom, where she turned on a bath for the brutalised Avenger. A few moments later, she returned to the bedroom. She dreaded what she would find when she removed the heroine’s tights.
As Penelope removed the blue and white-starred tights, she gasped. The Amazon’s muff was, as expected, covered with lubricant and cum. But she wasn’t prepared for the bruises about her vagina. Raising the Amazon’s left leg, she saw similar bruises at her anus as well. ‘What did they do to you?’
Penelope returned to the bathroom, and, keeping an eye on the filling tub, she found a sponge under the sink. Turning off the water, she dipped the sponge, and then carried it to the bedroom to begin the process of cleaning and washing Wonder Woman. It was going to take much of the day.
‘It’s THURSDAY!!??!’ Diana exclaimed.
‘’You’ve been gone three full days,’ Penelope explained. ‘I haven’t seen you since you went to work on Monday. I had no idea where you were, nor what had happened to you. I was worried to death.’
The Amazon Princess sighed deeply. Sitting in the tub, she took a double handful of water from in front of her and dipped her face into it. She had been home for three hours, but she was only now regaining her faculties. After sponging her down, Penelope had carried her to the tub. Getting Diana into the bath wasn’t as hard as Penelope had thought it would be, but she was right in her worries about the barely conscious body slipping beneath the water level. Twice Penelope had to reach in and pull her roommate back above the surface.
‘The thing is, I have no idea where I was or what happened to me.’ She shook her head, the water spraying. ‘I can’t remember a thing.’
‘Kane made you forget what happened in Newark with your magic lasso. Do you think--?’
‘Probably.’ She paused, biting her upper lip. ‘There’s no way I can get those memories back. The only way I know what happened to me while I was under Kane’s control is from the movies you showed me. I remember those events as if they were movies, not as if they actually happened.’
‘Who did it? What were you investigating? Where did you go?’
‘I have no idea. I mean, I don’t even remember what case I was investigating, if that’s what it was. That’s going to make it tough when I go to the Pentagon tomorrow. I’ve been gone, presumably since Monday, but I have nothing to show for the time, and I can’t remember what I was looking into. Do you have the newspapers from this week?’
‘Yes. I kept them. What’s the last thing you remember?’
‘I went to work on Monday. I watched the march against the war and saw the explosion. General Ripper called a meeting in his office. I don’t remember what the meeting was about and I don’t remember what my assignment was.’
‘Could it have had something to do with the march and explosion?’
‘That’s my guess. But what trail I was following, what specific bit of information I was examining, who I report to, I have just a blank.’
Penelope, now stripped to the waist except for her bra, walked over to her soaking roommate. She knelt behind the fixtures and put her hands on Diana’s shoulders. Her strong fingers kneaded the tired muscles there, then moved to Diana’s upper arms. ‘I want you to stop.’
‘What?’
‘Please. When I saw you this morning…. When I saw those people laughing at you… in your uniform…. Americans, who are so proud of what you represent, laughing at you, making fun of you. And the way you smelled, the way you looked. I couldn’t stand it. You were so helpless. Can’t you just be a military intelligence operative without being Wonder Woman? Or, maybe, you could go and do something else. Wonder Woman could just disappear.’
‘Penelope, my darling, you know that is who I am.’
‘No. No, you’re not. You’re not Wonder Woman. You’re Princess Diana of the Amazons. Can’t you just live your life for yourself?’
‘I came here with a responsibility. The responsibility to carry the Amazons’ message of peace and love to Man’s world. That’s the link between Princess Diana and Wonder Woman. Wonder Woman is the messenger for Princess Diana.’
‘Peace and love? You are abused sexually, violently, for three days, you’re left in a stupor on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial with the obvious intention of public humiliation, and who has done this? Men! How can you get a message of peace and love through to people like this?’
‘I have to keep trying. It’s what I do?’
Tears welled up in Penelope’s eyes. ‘When I saw you, so helpless, I was so frightened. You didn’t see those women. They were ready to kill you because you had disappointed them. And how can you expect to bring your message now? Every paper and every TV and radio station is probably telling the world about your-what, your fall?’
‘Then I’ll have to start all over and win them back.’
Penelope realised that she was not going to convince the superheroine to give up her quest. When she stood up, she was still crying. I seemed that she had been in tears all day. ‘I’ll wash your uniform.’ It would give her something to do.
‘All right,’ Diana said, and she allowed her body to slide down into the tub. Then, suddenly, she shot upward, ‘NO!!’
Penelope turned in the doorway. ‘What?’
‘Maybe there’s some information about where I went there? I don’t know what I’m looking for, but maybe there’s something there. Let me look at it closer first. Why don’t you check out the bad news? Channel Five has an eleven AM newscast. See what they’re saying about me. Tell me how bad it is.’
The Senator was in a horrid mood. The morning news shows had started off promising. Wonder Woman was found in a dissolute state on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. Incoherent. Smelling of alcohol and showing signs of drug use. TV News never mentioned sex, but it was implied in some of the code words and phrases they were using. Then, an hour later, everything changed. Wonder Woman had been the victim of an elaborate effort by her enemies. Criminal elements had captured her, apparently, and had left her there in an effort to discredit her. There weren’t even any pictures to get into the public mind. Wonder Woman had been led away by an unknown woman before any TV cameras could get there. And, apparently, no one had taken any photos of her. Or at least no one admitted to having taken any. The woman who had taken the superheroine with her had inspired this interpretation of events. It was accepted by the people at the scene. Now it was the only interpretation offered by any of the television channels.
Who was this ‘unknown woman’? What had she said? Man, if I were that eloquent I’d have the Senate eating out of my hand.
‘Diana! You’re not going to believe this! Guess who has saved your ripe round ass from the insinuations of the world’s press?’
‘William. Get the car out. Take Langer into town and bring back Olga. We have need of her services.’
End of Chapter 4