The Villain

Resonance took a long look in the mirror. The polymer-fiber-titanium fabric really did look like spandex. It covered her from crew-neck collar to her ankles and wrists. The boots and gloves were a similar material, one that offered just as much protection but didn't cling quite as spectacularly.

The PRA offered it to every agent as part of the standard equipment. Not everyone had the self-confidence to wear the material. As she'd noticed it really did fit like spandex, even if it offered more armor than a dozen tanks. She, however, had the body for it.

Resonance ran her hands down her sides, accentuating her feminine curves with the action. The material was actually quite smooth to the touch. And soft! It really was a remarkable achievement, made even more impressive by the fact that she could actually feel her own hands through the fabric. She would have thought that that much protection would dull her senses but the engineers had somehow managed to allow for the delicate sensations without the aggressive pain that could accompany an impact.

Even more impressive, not to mention important, was the ability to fashion the fabric in whatever colors the hero chose. Or, more precisely, whatever design the hero's handler chose. The administrative overseers had the final say in everything that involved an agent's life. If they decided that large swaths of the material should be invisible then the hero, or more frequently heroine, had no say to overrule them.

Karen was lucky with the handler she'd been given. Every single one of them was a normal; someone without powers. Many resented the lack and took it out on those they were charged to manage. At least she was allowed to go out fully clothed, even consulted in choice of designs. And she'd been given a respectable alias. Although a little trite, "Resonance" was a lot better than some of the hero names out there.

There was a beauty in the way the blue-gray material seemed to ripple and shimmer as she moved. Not only did it draw attention to her body but it would make it more difficult to actually pinpoint her motions. In the dark, it would be nearly as effective as the ability to wrap herself in shadows.

Of course, hiding wasn't one of Resonance's plans. She was absolutely made for the spotlight! She had very unusual, possibly even unique, abilities. The most showy of them might be a bit destructive but even that would ensure that she was sent after the most dangerous criminals.

If only they'd get around to giving me a mission

! Karen lamented.

She'd officially completed her training and registration three weeks before. That should have been plenty of time to find her a suitable criminal to thwart. At that point, she would have been willing to play second fiddle to a more experienced agent just to get out of the compound and

do

something!

Not for the first time, Karen toyed with the idea of going out on her own. PRA agents were permitted to try their own hand at assignment making. Of course, it was generally discouraged and if anything went wrong she could be left high and dry without their support.

Still, support or not, she was on the verge of deciding to go it herself anyway. She hadn't even seen Mary in six days! Although she'd only known her handler for a little over a month, and despite the fact that they had merely been assigned to each other without any more formal bond-building process, it felt like sheer abandonment.

The biggest problem with going it on her own was the certainty whether a criminal would be classified as suitable for a Para to apprehend. By the PRA charter, their agents weren't allowed to apprehend non-powered criminals. That was left to the various police and federal forces across the globe.

If she accidentally went after someone and then discovered herself in error, she could lose her status and be reclassified as a criminal. She'd spent too long, worked too hard, to become classified as an agent. She couldn't imagine her life as anything other than a grand hero, protecting the world from those who sought to use their powers for evil.

Then, there was the not inconsequential lack of information. When sent on assignment, she would have access to the full intel that the PRA had put together on not only her target, but any known or suspected associates. With that kind of information at her disposal, it was difficult to conceive of failure. Without it, she would be hard-pressed to even

find

whatever villain she set her sights on.

Karen's shoulders sagged. She took one last, long, look at herself in the mirror. It was a great costume. Such a shame that the world had to wait to see its splendor until the norms at the PRA decided they were ready to give her a mission.

She could almost imagine the photos that went along with the headlines. It was remarkable how similar a pose the press wanted from supermodels and superheroes alike. She'd be the next pinup doll to come out of the PRA. And why not? She had the body men would lust for and sex sells!

There was something in that thought that tugged at the back of Resonance's mind. It wasn't about publicity, that much she was certain. There were official spokes-men and -women for the PRA. The agents who captured the criminals, stopped the crimes, got their pictures taken but when confronted with the press they were all trained to simply say "no comment" and leave it at that.

If she had wanted to become a PR rep for the PRA, Karen knew she could have. She had the personality and looks for it. She hadn't chosen that life, however. She wanted to do actual good, not just talk up those who had. While she wanted to be seen and known, she didn't really care about the publicity.

What was it then?

Resonance studied herself in the mirror once more as she tried to catch the errant thought. Her eyes lost focus. It was almost as difficult to capture the rippling color of the fabric as it was the wayward notion. Only her form remained constant; average-sized yet exceptionally pert breasts, thin yet not waspish waist, athletic limbs and the pointed juncture of her legs.

That was it! It was something about lust. Now she only had to figure out what it was about the sin that niggled at her mind.

Once more, she allowed her hands to glide suggestively down the sides of her form. She reveled in the splendid sensation of the material but only distantly. The sensation, like the seductive movement of her hands, was nothing more than a subconscious trigger she hoped to provoke a brainstorm.

The combined sensations began to dull, as her sight had moments before, and she slipped partially into a meditative state. Her mind began to hint to her even as her hands wandered farther. Each added caress released a new connection even as it sparked an unnoticed moan.

Just before she thought about herself in the papers she had considered, for probably the hundredth time, going out on her own. After that, she worried over the lack of information. Although that was generally seen as the greatest hurdle, it could be turned around.

There were those criminals who were little more than a shadowy legend among agents of the PRA. Those were often the ones that an agent would go after, only to discover they had hunted someone with no connections to the world of super powers. If she was careful, however, there were a few that she could all but guarantee would qualify.

When the term "legend" was bandied around, there was one name that came first to minds the world over. Resonance didn't favor her chances in the search for Night Strike, however. Even if she thought she had a chance in Hell at finding him, he wasn't actually a villain. Quite the opposite, he was a hero whose legend had only grown when he vanished after his great deeds. Like Arthur of Camelot, it was said he'd return when the world needed him the most.

No. While Karen would love, more than anything in the world, to someday meet the man who had single-handedly restored order to a world rapidly spinning out of control, she wanted her first mission to speak of heroism. She needed to take down a bad guy.

Pressure began to build between her legs as her gliding hands wandered downward. For a moment, her meditative concentration was shattered by a gasp of pleasure. Her fingers had brought her much closer than she realized, as her thoughts slowly began to develop.

Inspiration struck like lightning. Her finger, seemingly of its own accord, drove hard against her enflamed bud in response to the half-formed revelation. Her subconscious mind was trying to work through her rogue body to give her some final clue!

There was one villain who had been confronted by dozens of different agents over the past decade. To the best of her knowledge though, there was very little actual information on him. Even the building in which he lived was owned by a private corporation listed, laughably, only as "Villainy Inc."

Resonance had no clue what charges he was initially wanted for. At this point, however, he was a constant point of contention within the PRA itself. Every single agent who went into the building had failed to apprehend him. Even more important, however, were the rumors that the women were raped, while the men were simply kicked out, beaten and embarrassed.

The truly interesting thing about the unnamed villain was that he apparently had no powers whatsoever. The rumor mill's best guess was that he had dossiers on as many PRA agents as they had on criminals. Either that or he had some means to access the PRA files themselves.

Karen's knees buckled. She collapsed to the floor, her own weight pressing her renegade finger ever harder against her and tripping her over the edge into an explosion. Her body lurched forward, saving her from the trap while at the same time causing another blast of electric delight as her hand slipped free.

She lay on the floor. It took very nearly an act of will to keep her hand out beside her. It seemed desperately to want to sink back between her legs and cause even more exquisite ecstasy. If not for the extensive psychic alert systems in the building, she would have worried that someone had set a compulsion on her.

It was only as the shuddering aftershocks began to subside a little that Resonance suddenly realized she was still in her costume! Without thinking, she reached down to see how badly messed it had gotten. Even the brief contact arched her back and sent a fresh aftershock roaring through her.

She shivered helplessly with desire once more. Karen was impressed, yet again, with the amazing material they'd designed for the costume. There was no question how wet she'd made herself. Her underwear virtually squelched against her skin. Yet the outside of her costume remained as dry as a bone.

Still, even if her costume was fit to wear, she needed to change. Unsteady, she pulled herself to her feet and staggered over to the dresser. With effort, she peeled herself out of the remarkable outfit and inspected the inside. As expected, there were some stains, but at least she suspected it would rinse away cleanly. In an hour or so, maybe even much less, they would be dry and ready to go.

Karen peeled off her sodden underwear and seriously contemplated tossing them straight into the nearest incinerator. In the end she tossed them in the hamper, suddenly aware that whoever did the laundry around there must know the most intimate details of even the highest placed handlers. She turned and headed for the bathroom with her costume in hand. Once she and the outfit were clean, she intended to have a go at the unnamed villain.

* * * * *

The plan was simple. She would ride down on the bike she'd requisitioned and take a look at the building. Everyone knew what to look for. It was a metallic block of an eyesore only fifty miles north of the regional headquarters. The wild took over quite instantly the moment she was out of the city and was broken, eventually, only by the large facility.

The structure itself was drab and industrial looking. If not for the vents, placed seemingly at random across the walls, it would look like nothing more than a gigantic gray, metallic, block. It took Resonance three quarters of an hour to wander around and survey the entire building on foot.

She couldn't fly so the roof remained a mystery to her. Even if there was a way in up there, she wouldn't have trusted it. She didn't trust the handful of vents that were scattered about within any semblance of her reach and she certainly refused to trust the single door she'd discovered on the eastern wall.

Whether or not she trusted any of the entries, she would need to figure out a way in.

Resonance had been named for abilities that all revolved around vibrations. As with quite a number of Paras, she had an offensive, a defensive, and a sensory ability that all worked based on similar properties. It was the nature of those abilities, however, that made her rare.

As she paced the building a second time, she allowed herself to fall into a meditative trance. The technique was simple for her. When she'd hit puberty, and her powers began to erupt, she had quickly mastered the art of finding the calm center of her mind. It was something of a shock to have discovered that other states, such as arousal and masturbation, could bring about similar results but she felt most confident with the age old form of deep breathing exercises.

The world seemed to expand around her. In her calm state, she began to feel the very vibrations in the air. Not just the light tug of the wind, or the subtle beat of a bird's wing in the distance. Sound, air, even her footsteps caused ripples that bounced back and fed her information about her environment.

That was how she discovered the first passage that ran beneath the earth in a line straight towards the building. After another complete circuit of the place there were four total, one for each wall. One for each cardinal direction. All were roughly twenty feet below the surface and five feet wide but beyond that she couldn't tell much about them.

Resonance toyed with the idea of following one until it reached the building but immediately rejected it. She might be able to learn a bit more about where, precisely it entered but that was about it. The passages themselves were too deep for her to get much more than a general shape and the air within acted as the best insulation to prevent her any more knowledge of them.

Instead she decided to follow one back, away from the complex. It suddenly began to rise and she could slowly make out more details of the hidden passageway. She knew, for example, that the sharp incline was made manageable by stairs, rather than a slope. She also thought she sensed a motion in the walls that suggested there was nothing to block the bottom of the flight.

The entrance to the tunnel was simplicity in itself to find. Although very cleverly crafted, the faux rock stood out to Resonance's super human senses. It wasn't that it was hollow, simply that the density inconsistencies within it were all too geometric to be natural.

If she had to guess, the actual mechanism that operated the door was housed within the cover itself. Not only did that help to hide the mechanics but it also lent the forgery some additional believability as it added a tremendous weight to the supposed boulder. Now, all she had to do was figure out how it operated.

Resonance could, of course, simply destroy the false rock. That was the most blatant manifestation of her abilities. To most people, even other Paras, it would look as if she held her hands out, focused on an object, and it simply shattered. The truth was her concentration brought it into a destructive resonance that caused it to shake itself apart.

The thing was, she wanted to try to do this as subtly as possible. Much more experienced agents had tried to go after this man. He'd found a way to take each one down in turn. While it was possible that he already would know everything about her the moment she caught his attention, it was also possible that he'd need to study her abilities and take steps to counteract them.

Either way, it paid not to blow up his back door. The longer she went unnoticed the better. It was quite possible that simply opening the door would trigger an alarm but at least if it did it gave him no display of her abilities.

Unless she was mistaken, there were no cameras in the tunnel. Not only had she failed to sense any but the subterranean structure lacked even the necessities for them such as conduit to pass the image back to the building. Even if he had full access to PRA records, he wouldn't have a picture of her to compare with until she was much closer.

The lever was just as laughably simple to discover as the fake rock had been. She had to admit, without her abilities she might never have found it. As it was, the angle of the crack in which it was hidden made it difficult to operate. After no little squirming, she finally managed to reach half her arm down the rock's throat and twist the handle just enough to get the great beast moving. It was more luck than skill that allowed her to pull her hand back out before the mechanism yanked her off her feet.

The passageway down was as bland as the building to which it ran. The metal steps were covered with soft rubber mats to deaden the sound of her footsteps and ensure a better tread. The walls were a bear gray metal and looked about as inviting as the entry to a prison.

Fitting!

She thought, considering what he did to those he caught within his domain.

As Resonance slowly descended the stairs, she fought to keep her senses attuned to all of the minute vibrations around her. The narrow confines of the hallway actually helped to focus her sense of the air like a pneumatic tube. She would know instantly if anything approached from a much longer distance than she normally could.

The only downside to the effect was that the compression changed her sense of depth. Until she became accustomed to this specific hallway, the best she could do would be to guess how far away anything was that moved. Still, it was better than nothing, even if it did leave her a little jumpy.

Of course, the added tension didn't help her concentration any. It took effort to filter every subtle shift that occurred. She was loath to ignore the sense she gained from the walls and floor around her. While she knew exactly where and how far the corridor ran, she didn't know what might be hidden within.

As it turned out, there was nothing within the walls. It began to seem as if the passage was exactly what it seemed to be; a direct exit from the lair intended for a discreet and safe escape. Of course, if that was true, even if she managed to overcome the villain, he would very easily be able to flee through one of the other three tunnels, if not that very one.

The next obstacle was relatively simple, if incredibly frustrating. The corridor ended in a door at approximately where Resonance expected the building began above ground. She slapped her gloved hand against the corridor, near the door and her enhanced senses confirmed her suspicion.

The good news was that she could feel the mechanisms within the wall that opened the door. The relatively simple system pulled the metal barrier up into the ceiling. The bad news was that, closed, it formed a completely airtight seal. Worse still, the only activation panel seemed to be on the other side of the door.

As far as she could tell, there was only one option. Resonance had to destroy the door if she hoped to get in this way. It was possible that he had some form of remote to open the doors from outside, since she hadn't seen a handle or panel on the only door on the building either. It was also possible he simply never left the building. Rumor certainly suggested the possibility.