Speed Queen flattened herself against the wall and moved slowly down the hallway, she hated this kind of thing, but sometimes just running headlong into danger wasn't the smartest thing to do.
She'd been running at super speed all over the city looking for this place, the secret lair of Return to Sender, but had only found it when she'd literally stumbled across it. At her super speed, she'd gone careening through the air for almost a whole city block before she came to rest. As always she quickly recovered and came running back, if a little bit slower, to where she'd tripped.
It looked like any other manhole in the city, but when she reached out to it, it became fuzzy as the hologram distorted just slightly. For anyone else, the little-used alley would appear like so many others in the city, but for her, the minor discrepancy between the hologram and the edge of what it concealed was something that at super speed was glaringly obvious.
She had vibrated at just the right frequency to "see" between the frames of the hologram and found the control panel to one side. A large section of the alleyway tilted down into a ramp, leading her to where she now found herself.
She finally reached the end of the hallway, shuffling around Return to Senders modified truck and opened the single door that was there. Peaking inside she saw a pretty ordinary looking room that contained a coat rack, several pairs of boots as well as a table with several of his weapons laying on it. At the far side of the room was another door, sticking her head in slightly further she looked for camera's or other monitoring devices but found none.
Satisfied that there was no obvious danger, she opened the door the rest of the way and stepped inside. She let go of the door and it slowly closed behind her, it was only when she heard the "thunk" of several heavy sounding bars locking in to place that she realized she'd made a mistake.
With a burst of speed she ran to the door and pulled on it to no avail, then she speed to the other side of the room to do the same with the door there. She pulled as hard as she could on the handle but nothing happened.
That was when she heard the hiss of gas coming from the ceiling. She dashed to the door she had come in, lowering her shoulder to give it a good hard hit, but even as she did the gas had already started to take a toll on her. By the time she reached the other side of the room, her speed had dropped and all she accomplished was to hurt her shoulder.
"Damit... I hate gaaaassss..." she managed to mumble out as she used the door to keep herself upright, only to slide down it as the gas finished its work.
* * *
Abby Barron, better known as Speed Queen, blinked as the bright light of the room penetrated her eyelids and the effects of the gas began to wear off. She tried to lift her hand to protect her eyes but found it bound to the metal framework of the contraption she was in.
Her first instinct was, of course, to vibrate her way out of it, but she still felt sluggish and found it impossible to focus enough to do so. Instead, she looked around the room, as best she could, to see what kind of predicament she was in.
The first thing she noticed was that she couldn't move her head very much, there was something under her chin holding it upright and some kind of strap around her forehead. She could also feel her arms pulled back behind her, stretched almost straight out from her shoulders. In addition, her legs were bound and stretched apart so that she was almost doing the splits. Her entire body was tilted forwards so that she was almost laying on top of the contraption.
That was also when she realized she was naked. Even her face was fully exposed, robbing her of the protection of her mask. Strands of her red hair fell over her eyes and she tried to blow them away from her face.
In front of her was a monitor and just at the edge of her vision was a man standing by a door.
"Welcome Speed Queen." he said as he walked over to her and stood just to the side of the monitor.
"Let me go now and I'll go easy on you." she said with confidence.
"Why you've only just arrived... I'd hate to see you go so soon... Abby." he said with a smirk and the knot in her stomach tightened even more.
She didn't recognize the man, he was dressed in a tailored suit and she guessed was in his forties, but beyond that, he could have been anyone.
"Oh don't try and place me, we've never been formally introduced. I'm a specialist of sorts and don't get involved in the little games you and your counterparts play. Though I do enjoy the fruits of their labours." he said with a grin that stood the hairs on the back of her neck to attention.
"What do you mean? I'll be out of this thing any minute and then you'll be sorry!"
"Why yes you will be, but I see you haven't quite come all the way around. What is the last thing you remember?"
She scrunched her forehead thinking back, "I was at Return to Sender's secret lair... where is he?" she started but something seemed off. For starters, where was he, villains usually wanted to gloat in person.
"Oh, he sent you to me to make sure you didn't get in his way again..."
Something nagged at the back of her mind, there was something she couldn't quite remember, but it seemed important. Her eyes opened wide as suddenly it all flooded back into her mind, like a giant damn had broken.
"Ah yes, there it is..." the man said.
"Oh god no... what have you done..." Abby let out in almost a panicked cry under her breath.
It wasn't the first time she'd been here. It wasn't just a few hours after Return to Sender had gassed her. Instead, it was exactly one year since the first time she'd been strapped into the contraption.
She thrashed at her bonds as the memories came back.
Much like this time she'd come around, groggily trying to figure out what was going on. Unlike this time though she had still had her costume on. But as soon as she'd opened her eyes the monitor in front of her had come to life.
Strange patterns and colours had played on it with sounds that seemed to penetrate deep into her mind. She'd fought it as hard as she could, for what seemed liked days but had in hindsight only been hours.
Her body had gone limp as the machine funnelled its message directly into her mind. Then the monitor had shut off and she'd stood up from the machine.
At some point, her bonds had been removed as she laid there soaking up the messages the monitor was sending her. She'd stretched out and left the place, running as fast as she could across the city and back to her apartment.
At first, nothing seemed different, but soon little things started to change. Going on patrol became a chore that she would put off doing. Work became something that was to be avoided at all costs. Friends became burdens that she stopped responding too.
