Supergirl stepped cautiously through the outer door of the deck housing, her hands on either side of the frame as she looked around the inside. The door was wide open, secured back in position by a metal hook outside. Just too easy. She used her X-ray vision to scope out the floor and sure enough beneath an out of place welcome –mat was a pressure pad, its black wires almost invisible in the dimly lit interior, extending to a very small plastic explosive charge smothered in axle grease and black paint. Without her special sight it would have been almost impossible to spot. She switched to her heat vision, melting the contact wires and making the device safe. She stepped into the corridor, her Kryptonian eyes adjusting to the single light at the far end, her irises opening wider than any human eye to allow as much light in as possible. She was faced by a short corridor perhaps ten feet in length, across the width of the ship, with a central T-junction heading off towards the stern.
There were doors on either side of the top of the ‘T’, but they were both empty; one seemed to be an old chart storage room and the other was a small dining room, still housing a stout, thick legged table and 3 chairs, with a small tv remote on the table top, but otherwise empty.
The galley had to be near the dining room then, she surmised, but as she moved to the T junction it was obvious that the room behind, which should have been the kitchen was now one of those sheathed in lead. A further two doors off the upright part of the ‘T’ also had lead lined rooms behind them. She stopped in frustration. She was damned if she was going to walk in blind to a room with a maniac with similar super speed and an unknown amount of Kryptonite, in an unknown form. Yet she knew she had to search the entire ship, for both the bomb and the speed device, as there was no guarantee that the doctor was wearing it. Either or both might be in any of these rooms. The booby traps she had met so far had been using conventional explosives, but she wouldn’t put it passed the doctor to have created a sort of ‘nail bomb’ of Kryptonite. And if such a device was on the other side of one of those lead lined doors… She paused, trying to come up with a plan of attack as to how she could get into these blind spots as safely as possible. It worried her that these traps were designed for her specifically, but as she was here ahead of the deadline, then maybe not all the doctor’s preparations were complete. If she wasn’t expected yet, then maybe the belt and the bomb were just lying around in one of these rooms. It was unlikely, but a possibility that she had to explore.
In the control room, Willoughby was glued to the monitor as she tracked Supergirl’s progress.
“C’mon , bitch…in ya come…” she smiled as Supergirl reached the T –junction. Behind the Doctor, the door opened and Wheeler and Jarvis walked in. She didn’t tear her eyes from the screen as she addressed them.
“Good. Our guest has arrived. You two ready?”
They nodded, which she did not see, so Wheeler added “Sure”.
“When will we get the pardons?” Jarvis, the older one asked.
“What?” said the Doctor still watching her quarry “C’mon, honey keep going”
“You know-the pardons, the Federal pardons for catching her. You said she’d gone nuts and this was a government job to catch her. Shouldn’t there be more agents and stuff besides you?”
“Oh. Yeah, you get the pardons after we get her. I told you this was deliberately low key. She’s an icon, we don’t want news getting out that we’ve killed her.” Willoughby said.
“KILLED her? You said these special rooms and traps were to catch her…I signed up to get clear of a murder wrap not get another one.” Jarvis said with concern.
“I got no problem.” Wheeler said.”Long as we get the money, I can live without the pardon”
“I just wanna go home, miss, when all this is done. Been at sea for 17 years. Different boats, different harbours. Just want to go home now.” Jarvis said wistfully. He was in his late forties, though his weather beaten face made him look much older; grey haired and of modest height, 5’10 or so, but tough and stocky from a life at sea. He was of Nantucket whaling stock, born for the ocean. But there was a difference between being on it on your terms and being forced to be on it because you were wanted for murder. Three murders in fact. Ten years ago he’d hacked three guys to pieces in Metro City. With a large machete. He had then, over the years, pulled a string of minor robberies across the states as he headed for Nantucket before at some stage his crimes had gone federal and he then fled south to Cancun. Since then he’d spent his time as a deckhand for any dubious enterprise that would have him.
Wheeler was 27, six foot tall and heavily built, from ‘Frisco. He was an ex-US Navy weapons expert, discharged on mental health grounds. He too had killed and was wanted for drug running but unlike Jarvis he had used a pistol on his victims. On four occasions. Part of the reason he wasn’t bothered by the whole pardon issue was that he had always intended to kill Jarvis and take his $30 grand when they were done anyway. It was he who had set the explosive traps.
Willoughby had recruited them both in Mexico when she was supposedly on vacation. She didn’t trust either of them. Which was wise. She sighed, tearing her eyes from the screen.
“Look. I’ll double it, to $60 K to help out Uncle Sam with a bit of specialist ‘wet work’, Ok? ‘Why?’ ain’t your concern. I got reasons and that’s all you need to know.”
“$60k each?” said Wheeler.
“Sure.” Willoughby had no intention of paying either of them, so she could afford to be generous.
“I’m in.” said Wheeler as they both turned to Jarvis.
“I ain’t gonna kill her. I’ll take the $30k as you lied about the pardon. I’ll help you catch her, since she’s gone nuts, then that’s me done.” Jarvis said.
“Fine. Look, stick to the plan, you’ll get your cash. Now look, she’s in the corridor, she’s about to go into the first room. If that gets the bitch then all well and good. If not, we still got 4 other chances in the other rooms. You get into the corridor and when she goes in one room make sure she doesn’t get out. Ok?”
“You sure them green stones will knock her out?” Jarvis asked uncertainly.
“Trust me, they are like a poison to her. At the very least she’ll get hit by enough of a dose in any one room to put her down and then I’ll finish her off.” She was glassy eyed as she said the last sentence.
Wheeler and Jarvis exchanged looks. “You really hate her, don’t you? What she do to you Doc?”
“My business. Now do your jobs.” Willoughby said.
Jarvis and Wheeler both looked at the small piece of greenish rock they each had dubiously.
“We just wave this at her and she runs away?” Wheeler asked uncertainly, to which the Doctor nodded. “And she’s gonna just open them boxes and look in them?” he added.
“She’s got to, she’s searching for something I got. That means she has to look in them. And when she does…she’s finished. Your part is just to keep her in whichever room she chooses, with the Kryptonite.”
“Er,…I got a question…” said Jarvis.
“WHAT NOW?!!!” shouted Willoughby angrily a she glared at him.
“Er…Where’d she go?” Jarvis asked innocently pointing at the now empty corridor on the screen behind her.
Willoughby finally returned her gaze to the empty screen on the monitor. “SHIT! SHE’S GONE!!!”
Supergirl had weighed her options carefully for a few moments. She didn’t like the thought of blind entry into who-knows-what one little bit. As she pondered, her super-sensitive hearing heard footfalls on the metal ladders at the stern of the ship, as Jarvis and Wheeler headed for the control room in response to the Doctors text. Supergirl guessed that they were likely to be he two crew men she had seen from above and as she scanned down around her at the rooms on the deck below, sure enough, the two make-shift cabins were now empty. That gave her an idea. The lead lined rooms had been shielded to stop her looking down on them …but had they been shielded to stop her looking up?
Whilst the Doctor was addressing Wheeler and Jarvis, Supergirl had withdrawn, disabling any traps she could find with her heat vision before making her way to the bridge. Using the R/T she had contacted the coastguard and given them her position to pass on to Wilson via the Mayor’s office, but told them to hold back and give her an hour or two for her to try and capture the doctor herself. She had no idea how long the search could take. She cleared all the traps from the upper decks and the stern, returning to the bow as the frantic Doctor cycled through all the internal cameras trying to find her.
Willoughby only had the one monitor and each switch took a few seconds as she went from camera to camera. She was becoming more and more frantic as she failed to find her.
“SHIT-SHIT-SHIT-SHIT SHHHHIIIIIITTTTTTT!” she screamed before finally the external deck camera at the bow picked her up. The grainy grey-blue light from the screen gave the Doctor a demonic appearance as it highlighted her features from below.
“There she is!” cried Wheeler needlessly as they all saw her.
“Tricky bitch! What the hell is she doing back out there?” Willoughby asked rhetorically. Even as she watched, Supergirl descended a hatchway to the deck below. “Shit! Now what’s she doing?!” She sighed exasperatedly, switching to the next camera.
“You two – start at the stern on the deck below and sweep her back to the lead rooms – GO!” the Doctor barked, prompting the two to dash out the doorway.
Supergirl looked up into the lead compartments. Sure enough, they hadn’t lead-lined the floors. She could see three of them clearly, before the interference of pipes, wiring and bulkheads became too intense, together with the lead walls obscuring the rooms further back.
The first room was completely empty, except for a small device just by the door which was all too familiar.
She saw her worst fears were confirmed as she could detect the trace of kryptonite inside the bomb casing, but fortunately the various layers of steel between her and it and the small amount of the mineral involved prevented her from feeling any ill effects. The second room, the small former galley, also had a similar device, but in addition there was a small lead lined box on a steel table. The kitchen equipment had been removed when the ship was automated.
The third was similar but with a very thick lead table top that prevented her seeing what exactly was on it. A ship-wide bulkhead hid the rest of the rooms from her current position, as it just built up too many layers of interference- she could see vaguely through it but together with other walls and rooms everything became indistinct.
She felt she could ignore the first room as it only housed the booby trap. She positioned herself under the second room and adopted her flight stance of one fist extended with her other drawn up at her chest. She steeled herself, lowering her head as she composed herself, then looking grimly up at her target before she drew in a sharp breath and shot into the air, punching through the ‘tween deck plates like a knife through butter, splaying the metal back as she entered the former galley from below.
She landed lightly on her toes, quickly turning her head and burning through the traps’ contact wires with her heat vision to first make the bomb safe. The metal bomb casing protected her from the ill effects of the Kryptonite directly, but even just gazing at it with her X-ray vision hurt her eyes.
She turned her attention to the wooden, lead lined box on the steel table.
“That’s it darling, open up your present…” Willoughby said quietly as she eagerly watched events unfold.
Supergirl took a long, hard look at the wooden casket. It too might house a booby trap for all she knew. She used her heat vision to burn through a patch of the wood to reveal the lead beneath, then switched to her powerful breath to dowse the smoking wood. She could hear sounds of movement on the deck below her, almost covered by the whirring motor of the revolving light above her; they were still some distance away but she decided to concentrate on the task in hand. She started to melt through the hinges at the back of the box. “God dammit! You devious witch! Why can’t you just follow the rules and open the god damned box?!” Willoughby said with angst.
Oblivious, Supergirl gently lifted the casket to her eye level, her enhanced innate sense of balance keeping the box perfectly level, defying any trembler switches. If this were booby trapped, she reasoned, then it would likely be geared to explode if she opened it from the front. This way she hoped to avoid setting it off. She gently parted the lid and base, just a fraction. She felt the searing pain hit her as the Kryptonite in the booby trap sapped her strength, burning the pad of her thumb where it held the lid just a few millimetres ajar, but an instant later she had reclosed the box. She winced, shaking her hand swiftly until the pain on her thumb subsided. She was panting heavily as she recovered, taking a few seconds even though the splinters of Kryptonite in the bomb had been small. She was glad that she hadn’t set it off.
“NO-NO-NO! GODDAMMIT!!!” Willoughby slammed her fists down in frustration on the desk. She could only watch as Supergirl used her heat vision to melt the lead lid, running her eyes around all four sides, sealing the casket and the Kryptonite inside it for good. Calmly , the Girl of Steel opened the door and stepped back into the corridor.
Supergirl moved to the third room, knowing it too had a booby trap. She stepped off to the side away from the door and found the steel seam of the corridor wall. She located a rivet head and splayed her finger tips around it, the heel of her hand over the rivet itself. She listened a moment but the footsteps below were moving off. She started to apply gentle pressure to the steel, pushing with her hand harder and harder, forcing the steel to buckle and lift, pulling the rivet up away from the second steel sheet beneath it. As soon as enough of a gap had opened, she gripped the open seam with both hands and prised the steel back, as quietly as she could, revealing a metal framework and the inner steel wall beneath it on the other side. This time she used her strength to push rather than pull, forcing the metal to bend back, the inner lead lining bending and buckling with it. As the tortured metal started to groan louder she placed her mouth close to the metal, pursing her lips to whistle a low pitched ultrasound counterbalancing wave that suppressed the noise she was making, not quite fully, but making it much less audible. It took her a few attempts to find just the right pitch, but once she had it was hardly noticeable. Only loosely tacked to the walls, the lead came away easily, allowing her to step into the room. A glance again made the device safe at the door whilst she looked at the lead table that had previously blocked her view. This time there was a larger box sitting at its centre.
As she watched her, Willoughby growled in frustration, snatched a pistol from the table and raced out of the control room.
Supergirl again listened, hearing approaching footsteps over the noise of the lightship’s revolving mechanism. So they were on to her. She moved around the table to face the opening she had made, leaning on her fingers at two corners of the thick table top. As the table was lead, if whoever appeared in the makeshift doorway was armed with Kryptonite, she planned to upend the table, using it as a lead shield to protect her from any threat and any possible blast of Krytonite from the box. To her slight relief, the Doctor appeared in the entrance armed with only a conventional pistol, no Kryptonite in sight. She was wearing a very business –like dark blue skirt and jacket, her hair tied back in a ponytail.
“Doctor Willoughby, I presume?” Supergirl said, for although she recognised her, she couldn’t resist paraphrasing Stanley’s famous greeting.
The Doctor levelled her pistol, much to Supergirl’s amusement as she suppressed a slight smile at the futility of threatening her with a gun. The smirk angered the former geologist. “Oh, you think all this is funny? So if you’re so big and tough why don’t you just open that little box there?” she gestured with the gun barrel. “Because of you, Richard is DEAD, damn you!” she cried tearfully. “If you’re afraid I’ll open it for you!” The Doctor suddenly leaped at the box on the table, but she was never going to be quick enough to beat Supergirl to the draw. The Girl of Steel effortlessly snatched up the lead box with one hand as the doctor’s effort foundered. But even as she did so, she realised something was wrong instantly. The box was clearly empty as she swept it up effortlessly. Yet the moment it was clear of the table she felt a wave of weakness wash over her as her strength was suddenly sapped by exposure to Kryptonite. She frowned, confused, dropping the box to the floor as she grimaced in pain and bewilderment at the Doctor, who was laughing triumphantly. Beneath the spot where the box had sat, in the middle of the table, was a recessed compartment with a large lump of the deadly mineral sitting there, roughly the size of half a baseball. The entire box itself had been a kind of lid for the hidden compartment beneath it and the lead table had prevented her from seeing it.
She staggered back, open mouthed, a frown of agony marking her beautiful brow. She was trapped in the far corner, away from the door and the entrance she had made, the table and its secret contents between her and the doctor, she felt her butt hit the wall, her palms pressed flat against it as she tried to force herself as far away from the devastating meteorite as possible. The pain was building as she felt the life force being drawn from her body.
“Guess you ain’t so smart after all, eh honey?” smiled the Doctor with venom.