She flew a half-dozen circuits abound the VaVaVidd studio building, slowly spiraling in closer, examining the area with her psychic sensitivity and enhanced physical senses. The grounds were empty and silent.

Finally, she decided upon her entry point: a small window that wasn’t closed quite right, leading into a small room with a few shelves along one wall. Cautiously, she moved in and hovered at the center of the room, looking for any sign of motion. There was nothing.

Taking slow deep breaths, Ethrienne tuned out everything except her psychic senses. It was a calculated risk, but she couldn’t think of any other option. If she was right, the Baroness had discovered and used some new mind-control device that didn’t leave any of the usual traces on its targets. Well, then, she’d approach the problem in the other direction, by finding the traces the targets had left on the device. If Vindiatrix and Shield Lass had been captured and brainwashed, their struggles to escape and resist should have left a clear psychometric imprint behind.

She became aware of the faint psychic footprints left by people in their comings and goings. It seemed like a featureless fog. She continued to search. What she was looking for ought to be unmistakably clear when she found it....

Something caught her attention.

Ethrienne made her way through the hallways. The trace she’d noticed grew closer and more definite. It carried overtones of anger and fear and desperation and resolve—just what she expected from the scenario she was picturing. It was right down this hallway... to her left... behind this locked door. She grinned as she saw the pushbutton combination lock. It was the work of a moment to interpret the psychic traces that told her which buttons to press in which sequence.

Behind the door was a small storeroom. It contained two padded platforms, each with jointed metal support rods at the bottom. She recognized them as the Scissor-Matic units from Vindiatrix’s memories.

She scanned one of the thick padded headrests. It carried strong psychometric traces of sexual arousal. The most recent ones were consistent with Vindiatrix’s recollections. However, there were older impressions that told a very different story. She sensed desperate struggles to escape, even as the physical stimulation became irresistible. She sensed the echo of an overwhelmingly intense orgasm with psychic overtones she’d never encountered before. In the afterglow, she detected a strong current of tranquil submission in addition to the usual relaxed serenity.

It all made sense now. The Baroness had discovered a new mind control method that was triggered by sexual climax. By striking at a moment of maximum vulnerability, the technique made it possible to impose long-term control with minimal side effects or detectable traces.

This was the evidence she’d been looking for. The next step was to present it to someone with the technical skills to study the devices that were hidden in those headrests. That would be the first step in dealing with this new threat. The Palladium Paladin might be able to do it; if not, he’d know who could.

She applied her telekinetic powers to lift one of the platforms. Flying back to ParaPatrol base with that much additional mass would be a bit of a strain, but she’d manage. If necessary, she’d find some hidden spot to set it down and call in Crimson Crag for help.

As the platform rose from the floor, she heard the door slam shut.

She grabbed the doorknob. It came loose in her hand, almost sending her sprawling. She used her psychic senses to locate the keypad and tried to punch in the combination telekinetically. She was sure she’d pressed the right buttons, but the door remained stubbornly locked.

Next, she tried raw force, slamming her body into the door while simultaneously hitting it with a bolt of psychic force. That didn’t work either. She tried pulling it inward with her powers, unable to get a grip that would allow her to add her muscles to the effort. That too had no effect.

She took and held a deep breath as she heard gas venting into the room. Desperately, she battered the door with her body and mind.

Ethrienne muttered curses under her breath as she braced herself for another attempt. The Baroness had outsmarted her. She’d realized that capturing and brainwashing the heroines would leave a clear psychometric signature. She’d also realized that Ethrienne would come looking for it. Rather than destroy the evidence, she’d used it as bait for a trap.

The heroine tried to channel her anger into her struggles. It didn’t help. The room remained firmly sealed as her efforts faded and finally ceased.

-----

She was lying on something, with something holding her legs spread and elevated. She blinked several times before the world came onto focus.

Ethrienne stared at her legs, which were encircled in several thick bands that bound them to jointed metal rods. She couldn’t lift her head far enough to see the rest of her body, but what she could see and feel confirmed that she has been stripped of her costume and bound to a Scissor-Matic platform.

All around her were lights, cameras, and microphones. Clearly, the Baroness intended to turn her into a pornographic spectacle.

She still felt lightheaded from the knockout gas, but she couldn’t wait for it to finish clearing her system. Her psychic senses were even fuzzier for some reason. Her mind tried to reach out, but she didn’t even detect the usual psychic background noise. Either there was nobody within a hundred miles, or her powers weren’t working.

She could worry about that later. Right now, she had to get herself untied.

Just as she started trying to free her right hand, the door opened. The Baroness and two of her Leathergals strode in. “Ethrienne! I’m so glad you decided to join us!” she cooed.

The heroine glared at the villainess as she rethought her plan on the fly. Her bonds were too strong to break all at once—if she started, her captors would be on top of her before she could maneuver. She’d have to deal with them first and complete her escape afterwards.

“I’m only surprised it took you this long,” the Baroness continued. “I knew once you mind-scanned your friends and saw how much they enjoyed performing for me, you’d come running.”

Ethrienne clenched her teeth and focused her gaze on her captors. She threw her full power into a blast of psychokinetic force strong enough to knock the three of them off their feet.

It didn’t even knock the smirk off the Baroness’s face. All it did was cause Ethrienne herself to nearly black out as the projected force backfired on her.

The Baroness shook her head. “I’m not stupid, darling. This room is shielded by a dissipator field generator.”

That explained it. Whenever she tried to use her power, the suppression device drained most of it away and scrambled her control over what remained.

Desperately, Ethrienne tried to pull her right arm free while applying her telekinesis in tandem with her muscles. Maybe at point-blank range she’d be able to apply some of her power. All she got out of it was muscle strain from the exertion and a moment of dizziness from the power backlash.

Her captor looked very pleased with herself. “I hadn’t planned on recruiting any superpowered performers just yet, but I made sure to be prepared in case an opportunity happened to drop into my lap!”

“‘Happened’ to drop into your lap? You knew I was coming!” Ethrienne snapped.

“I rather suspected you might after Vindiatrix and Shield Lass described your response to scanning their memories.”

“They told you about that?”

“Of course they told me. The whole point of the exercise was to rebut scurrilous rumors that I had somehow inappropriately manipulated them.”

“Brainwashed them, you mean!”

“Whatever you choose to call it, you’ve helped convince the public that nothing of the sort happened. Thank you for your assistance.”

Ethrienne glared at her captor. “You knew I wouldn’t let it go, so you were expecting me to come here looking for clues. You knew I’d find the psychic imprints on the platforms, so you used them as bait for a trap.”

“And they call Vindiatrix the supreme detective,” the Baroness deadpanned.

“So you admit you brainwashed them!”

The Baroness shrugged. “Here behind closed doors, there’s no point in denying it, especially since you’re about to experience it firsthand.”

She was running out of time. If she didn’t find some way of getting out of this, fast, she would soon be joining the other heroines in the Baroness’s next lewd video....

Her eyes went wide as a thought clicked into place.

She burst out laughing.

After taking a deep breath, she was able to speak. “I don’t know how you figured out how to warp minds without leaving obvious traces,” she said. “What I do know is that it won’t work twice in a row. If people see me suddenly start acting like those two, they’ll know something’s wrong. They’ll know you did it.”

Ethrienne’s expression became downright smug. “You just ruined your whole scheme by getting too greedy. You might as well let me go and run for it while you still can.”

Baroness Blackleather didn’t look worried. “You’re right. Having you suddenly join your friends onstage would raise suspicions. It would also undercut your assurances that Vindiatrix and Shield Lass are acting of their own free will—thank you again for that, by the way.” She paused, obviously enjoying the heroine’s annoyance at that last comment.

“No, you can’t go onscreen... not as Ethrienne.” The Baroness looked her up and down. “Ah, but as long as you wear a different mask, you could be anyone. You have a remarkable body, but no one is going to recognize you by your breasts or buttocks or labia no matter how many close-ups they see.”

One of the Leathergals held up a ballgag. The other held up a shiny ice blue ski mask with white eye lens inserts.

Ethrienne stared at them for a moment, then tried to lunge forward and tear her way out of her restraints by sheer determination. Her captors watched indulgently until she slumped in defeat.

“Do you really think you can keep something like that secret?” Ethrienne snapped as she Leathergals moved in.

“With your assistance, yes.”

“What makes you think I’ll—?” Her comment was cut short as one of the Leathergals popped the ballgag into her mouth.

The Baroness raised her voice slightly but gave no other sign of noticing the heroine’s struggles as the gag was buckled into place. “Because, unlike your friends, you will maintain a public attitude of prim propriety.”

Ethrienne shouted protests into her gag as the ski mask was pulled over her head.

“Your erotic performances will be a closely guarded secret. You will insist on protecting that secret, which means protecting my studio from interference.”

She paused a moment to let that sink in, then took a small remote control unit from her belt. She pressed a button, and a monitor screen swung down from the ceiling. “Before we begin, I have something to show you.”

She pressed another button, and the screen lit up to show Vindiatrix and Shield Lass striking cheesecake poses. Across the screen was the title “Warming Up Frigidelle”. At the bottom was a bit of descriptive text: “In their second erotic adventure, Vindiatrix and Shield Lass race against the clock to thwart the aptly named Frigidelle before she releases a libido-killing virus. They ultimately capture the villainess and cure her of the neurotic repression that drove her to evil.”

Another click of the remote control. “This is our concept art for Frigidelle.”

The screen now showed a drawing of a woman wearing light blue thigh boots, a high-cut ice blue bikini bottom, a low-cut ice blue corset, and an ice blue ski mask with white eye lenses.

The Baroness grinned at Ethrienne. “As you’ve no doubt surmised, you’ve been cast in the role of Frigidelle. You’ll start by filming the scene where you set aside your old inhibitions and learn to enjoy being a shameless lesbian sex kitten.”

A sultry saxophone riff sounded. The Baroness answered her phone. “Yes? Excellent! Send them to Stage Four.”

She hung up. “Your friends are ready to start filming.”

Etrienne stared wide-eyed. The brainwashed heroines were about to have their way with her, thinking that she was one of the Baroness’s minions. They would never know that they were condemning one of their fellow heroines to share their sexual slavery.

She made a last desperate attempt to break free from her bonds and shouted into her gag.

“I appreciate your enthusiasm for getting into character,” the Baroness said in a mock-encouraging tone.

The stage door swung open. Vindiatrix and Shield Lass walked in.

“Hello, ladies! It’s showtime!”