This was my entry for coolmind’s August 2012’s ‘A Break From the Heat’ contest. Had a lot of fun writing it and won second place with it, too.
This story takes place in the ‘Plan’-universe, though a couple of years before that series begins.
Unplanned
Parking her car, the driver took her surroundings in. You always had to be careful of traps as a supervillain, even when dealing with your fellow criminals. Communications could be intercepted, betrayals happened.
Everything looked normal, though, a typical suburban neighborhood with rows of identical houses and identical gardens. They might look different in the summer, but not on this bleak autumn afternoon. This was the address Mesmeri had given Chill when she’d asked for the favor.
She herself had taken some measure to hide her identity too. This wasn’t her car, and she was wearing a trench coat to hide her costume. But people could still tell Chill was not a normal person. It wasn’t her snow-white hair or her blue lips that made them think that, those could be explained away. But her eyes, pale blue and icy, those could only belong to a super.
Getting out of the car, Chill walked up the path. The wind was cold, but she barely noticed. In Chill’s world, everything was cold. She knocked, then turned a bit so she could keep her eye on her surroundings.
When the door opened, Chill found a surprise. The blonde woman, dressed in a woolly pullover and well-worn jeans, that had answered her knock was not Mesmeri. “Hello, can I help you?” Even as she asked Chill this, the blonde’s eyes refused to quite focus on her.
“Yes, I have an appointment.”
She blinked. “Ah. Your mistress’ guest. Come in.” The blonde waved her in. “Can I take your coat?” she asked after closing the door behind Chill.
“No, thank you,” was her automatic reply. The blonde looked to be in her thirties, average looks, she wasn’t what Chill had thought was Mesmeri’s type. “Just take me to Mesmeri.”
Another blink. The ticking of the pendulum clock hanging in the hallway seemed unusually loud in the silence. “As you wish.”
The woman guided her around further into the house. Chill quickly noticed yet another clock in the hallway, this one standing on a small table. Two more were visible in the living room, standing on a mantle piece. ‘Odd.’
As Chill followed her guide past the living room she considered Mesmeri’s slave. ‘Not a quick thinker, it seems. But is it a result of the process Mesmeri used on her, or was she never all that bright to begin with? And what’s with all the clocks?’ It didn’t escape her notice that the one place where there was no time piece was around the blonde’s wrist.
The blonde led the supervillainess into something that looked like an office. Chill especially appreciated the privacy that its lack of windows provided. There were a few knickknacks scattered about, some candles and crystals. No clocks, though. But most of Chill’s attention was on the woman sitting in one of the comfortable chairs.
Black hair, cut short like Chill’s, framed a face that wasn’t any older than her own yet it was more mature somehow. Perhaps it was the eyes that lend her features that aura. Brown, bordering on black, that seemed to catch everything.
And she wasn’t wearing anything but a silk robe. For a moment Chill thought she was naked underneath, but then she spotted a black-and-white bikini.
That wasn’t what she had expected at all. Chill was only 21 but with 4 years as a supervillain under her belt she considered herself an old hand, and in her experience someone as new on the scene as Mesmeri always wore their costume when meeting other people from their world. “Mesmeri?”
“In the flesh,” she confirmed as she got up to shake Chill’s hand. It looked positively tanned compared to Chill’s pale complexion. “Please, give Catherine your coat and take a seat.”
‘What is this fixation on my coat?’ Chill knew she was being paranoid, but couldn’t help it. Mind controllers gave her the creeps and the fact that it was her that had sought out Mesmeri did nothing to sooth Chill’s suspicions. There was a code amongst supervillains, but it was wholly voluntary and not always honored. But she was here because she had a problem, so she draped her trench coat over one of the chairs and sat down. “She doesn’t have to bother.”
Mesmeri followed suit and gave her a reassuring smile. “That is alright. Catherine, why don’t you check if all the clocks are running.” She turned her attention back to Chill. “I do wonder, why did you approach me for help with your problem?”
Chill shrugged. “Two reasons, really. There are people in our world who have experience as psychiatrists, but all of them started their careers as supervillains with their patients. And your own method of mind control doesn’t work on me, because my body works differently.”
“So I am free to offer you a drink then?”
She gave Mesmeri a small smile. “You can, but I’d decline. I’m not taking chances and this isn’t a social visit anyway.”
“Of course, but for this to work you will have to extend a measure of trust,” Mesmeri pointed out. “Right now, I do not even know what exactly is your problem.”
Chill knew Mesmeri was right, but she couldn’t help but repeat the deal before she’d take the plunge. “A favor for a favor. Right, you might have heard about our fight with Optiman a couple of months ago? It was a big one, totally trashed the mall.”
“I read you gave him quite the run for his money,” Mesmeri commented.
Chill nodded. “Yeah. It... Me and Scorch had bought these power amplifiers from Death Merchant. And I know, half the time what he sells is defective, but they were working; we paid good money for them. And then Optiman came along, moron kept pushing so we pushed right back. Amplifiers went haywire and our powers went wild.”
Her body felt stiff as Chill remembered the ice. The frost crawling up her skin like ivy. Even she had felt the cold on that day. “I’ve been having problems with my power ever since,” she finished.
“Hmmm, just you?”
“Scorch is fine. Or she acts fine anyway. But me, I, my power doesn’t work like it used to. It seems... reluctant.”
“But you do not believe the problem is physical, or you would not have sought me out,” Mesmeri concluded. “I think I will need a demonstration. Please form something on the coffee table.”
The table was only a few feet away. ‘Something,’ Chill considered as she got up and walked over to the table. She focused on that question, and tried not to think of other things. She didn’t want to pay attention to what she was feeling. Placing her right hand flat on its surface she slowly lifted it up, forming a steep cone of ice as she went. Finished, Chill returned to her chair.
“Why did you walk to the table? Why did you not do that from here?” Mesmeri asked. Chill shrugged, but apparently they had been rhetorical. “You had to gather yourself, did you not? It is not your power that is hesitant, it is you. Your power hurt you, and now you fear it just a little.”
She hunched her shoulders, but said nothing. She didn’t like being dissected like this, even as she knew it was necessary. She had a problem and it needed fixing.
“What did you feel as you walked over there. When you knew you were going to freeze something? Did you think back to your fight with Optiman?”
Chill looked away, but Mesmeri’s simply kept quiet. “I’m not having flashbacks,” she finally said. “It’s not that bad. I just feel... nervous whenever I use my power. I have to force it.”
“I see. There are some mental exercises that I can take you through that should help you overcome this hesitation.”
“Hold on, you’re not talking about hypnotizing me?”
“Not at all,” Mesmeri denied. “You will be aware the entire time, it would not be effective if you dozed off. I thought you had agreed to trust me at least a little, it is not like I am proposing to shoot you full of drugs or spend some time in what is not at all a brainwash-machine.”
Feeling a little ridiculous now, Chill apologized. In her head anyway. “You’re right, you’re right. Okay, how do we start.”
“By making yourself comfortable. Comfort is the key here. Are you comfortable?”
Chill had put her arms on the armrests and had laid her head back. She thought she would have to force herself to relax, but it turned out to come on its own. “Yeah.”
“Alright, now look at the, ah, ice sculpture you made.” A wry smile flitted across Chill’s face at that flattering description of her handiwork. “You see it sitting there, completely harmless, safe. Focus on that. Remember how easily you made it, how effortless.”
She tried to, but Chill found her heart starting to speed up as she remembered the spurt of fear again that had run through her at Mesmeri’s request to use her power.
Mesmeri’s voice pulled her away, and Chill found herself eager to follow it. “Clear your mind. Focus on the ice, its clarity, its coldness. Ice does not feel, ice does not fear. Let yourself become cool and clear. Let yourself become ice.”
The fear receded, her heart slowed down.
“Imagine a coldness so deep even the air stills. Let that cold settle deep into your mind, let ice encapsulate your fear. Ice does not fear, ice does not feel.”
Chill’s body stiffened as her fear froze, her thoughts froze.
“Watch the ice, be the ice. Do not feel, do not think, be ice. Cold and clear, no fears, no worries. Are you ice?”
“Yes.”
“And how do you feel?”
She didn’t, so she couldn’t answer. Chill blinked. Her eyelids felt more like blinds, rigid like the rest of her body.
It didn’t seem to put Mesmeri off, because after a few moments she went on as if she’d been expecting Chill’s silence. “Lift your right hand up, and form a snowball.”
Her hand came up, smooth despite how rigid every muscle in her arm felt, and her power pooled in her hand. Moisture in the air gathered and cooled until she held a snowball. It was cold, but not as cold as Chill.
“Did you feel fear?”
“No,” she replied. Chill remembered that it was the reason she’d come to Mesmeri. And it looked like her methods worked. She was sure that she would feel happiness at that, once she could feel again.
It occurred to Chill that Mesmeri had lied, that this was no mere mental exercise. “You hypnotized me.” There was no accusation in that statement. For that, Chill would have to feel betrayed, feel anger, feel fear.
“I am afraid you forgot something, my dear. And you can dismiss the snowball. You forgot that I started out as a researcher, and a researcher is always looking to improve her methods. To try new things. Like how low-level electromagnetic fields can be used to induce trances in unsuspecting subjects. Unfortunately, right now it still requires a person to be present to do the actual hypnotizing.” The supervillainess stayed silent for a moment.
“When I saw you I simply could not help myself. Catherine and her friends have given me so much data,” Mesmeri enthused. “But to add a supervillainess and someone with superpowers to the data-set, it was simply irresistible. So I will make use of that favor you owe me right now, and have you function as my test-subject for a while.”
If Chill could still worry, she would have at Mesmeri’s hungry tone of voice.
“Since consent is a given,” Mesmeri quipped, ”let us move on. Focus on the ice again. Be fearless. Clear your mind of everything. Be thoughtless, be ice.”
Chill sat in the chair, frozen.
“Stand up,” Mesmeri ordered. “Face me.” The supervillain came into view now for the first time since she’d started “helping” Chill. She’d opened her robe and a finger was toying with one of the strings of her bikini-top. Her eyes, however, were firmly fixed on Chill.
“Undress.” There was no embarrassment to give pause to her hands, no defiance that could pass her lips. There was only the order, occupying the crystal clear expanse between her ears.
Her one-piece uniform pooled around her feet, she stepped out of it. Her sports bra sailed to the floor, followed by her panties. Mesmeri’s eyes roamed over every taut muscle, every rigid curve.
“Blue lips, blue nips. How delightful,” Mesmeri remarked. She got up, but paused just before she came into arm’s reach of Chill. “But this will not be fun if you do not enjoy this. So look inward, my Chill, focus on that small corner of your mind that senses pleasure. That sends arousal coursing through your body, and thaw it out.”
The difference was immediate, but subtle. She felt something again, the air whispering against her skin, curling around her rock-hard nipples.
Grinning, Mesmeri approached her again. A finger landed on Chill’s breast, it felt impossibly hot against her icy skin. A moan escaped her. The finger spiraled inward to give her nipple a playful flick. Chill’s moan choked off in a surprised explosion of escaping breath as the pleasure burst into her mind.
The finger trailed down her flat stomach, got lost for a moment in the white patch of fur above her mons before circling around to the target.
Chill’s eyes rolled up as a sun illuminated the glacier that was now her mind. It blinded her as she came all over Mesmeri’s finger without moving a muscle.
“A favor for a favor,” Mesmeri whispered into her ear. Her breath hot against Chill’s skin, yet not melting it even as her pussy continued to. “And don’t worry, I have a catch and release policy. Once our affair is done, you will be on your way again, cured of the problem that led you to my door.”
“I’m not worried,” Chill reminded her.
“Very wise. Now,” Mesmeri went on as distanced herself a little and untied her robe. Her bikini-bottoms fell to the ground. “I think it is time you thank your new mistress for her help. Lick me.”
Chill bent down, all the while keeping her legs and arms straight, until her face was level with mistress’ sex. She extended her tongue and slowly, carefully, Chill licked.