One of the biggest risks of putting on a costume when you had powers was that you made yourself a target for the kind of smug, arrogant know-it-alls who so often ended up with the power to twist minds. Vivian rarely ended up needing to face off with them; some unwritten assumption in the way mental manipulators approached things gave them the kind of moral laxity that meant they weren’t often an enemy for someone like Macabre.

Not unless they craved Macabre’s power, of course - and she had made plenty of them despair. Saintly Sadie excepted, most of them now knew not to mess with her - there had been three object lessons in what happened if you did, and afterwards, most of them had learned not to mess with her. Sadie had…

Well, Vivian still wasn’t sure how Sadie had gotten away with it; there had been something going on there which was more than just the effect of the woman’s voice. There were still villains who swore Macabre had to be bi, based on that; this was untrue, but it wasn’t something Vivian was going to deny.

All of this was whirling through her head as soothing, calming, irresistible green energy poured into her head through her eyes, swamping her thoughts and washing conscious opposition asi-

No.

Fuck no.

She was not going to accept this as irresistible. She was not going to go down without a fight.

Macabre forced herself down into a crouch, drove her hand down into the ground, palm open, the floor cracking around her palm and her fingers. She tensed, mustering her strength for flight-

Ms Miracle slammed her knee into the back of Vivian’s thigh, and her focus was lost, the tension that built before she could launch dissipated without converting into lift.

Sometimes she hated how well that woman knew her.

The knowledge was hard won, of course, and she knew the heroine just as well; she was perhaps the only one who knew the hidden, psychological weaknesses of her ‘archfoe’, and it only made sense that Ms Miracle was just as quick a student.

People said they were evenly matched; it was a common assumption that they had gained their powers in the same way, Macabre empowered by the ‘Memphis Miracle’ and simply laying hidden as she developed, fearing the costumed crusader enough to hone her skills before making a clear challenge. She wasn’t entirely sure Miracle didn’t believe it herself.

Vivian knew better. Not just about her origin - though she was pretty sure only two other people on the planet had ever known, and one of those was dead now from trying to duplicate it - but about their power levels.

What gave Vivian the fear about the mental power this manipulator was pouring into her wasn’t how effective he no doubt would be. It was the fact she - and she alone - knew that when Ms Miracle didn’t hold back, she had more power to play with than Macabre.

She was pretty confident the heroine had never worked it out. She could see the hesitation in the way Miracle punched, the carefully bent elbow that gave just a little cushioning to any target she hit. Ms Miracle almost never threw a straight right, and when she did it was only against things like the Earthbreaker.

She held back - just a little - even against Macabre. Vivian had spent days of her life, in total, wondering how she could use a weakness like that without Miracle realising she had it and learning to do better.

Even as Vivian flexed her arms, looking to get out of Ms Miracle’s grip, she knew she was outmatched. That just wasn’t going to stop her fighting.

She’d fight to the last moment. Right up until that irresistible, soothing, balm of a gaze, the energy bubbling through her brain, washed the last dregs of dirty, independent thought down the drain, Macabre would fight.

It would be a last stand worthy of-

Shit!

She was doing it again. Thinking of this controller’s power as unstoppable. Of her surrender as inescapable, inevitable.

Was that how it got people? Was this even Ms Miracle’s plan, or was it his?

Was she going to be brainwashed into a heroine or was he going to try to use her as a criminal tool?

How long could she hold out?

…oh, it was getting very difficult not to think of this as a done deal.

She could close her eyes against this, couldn’t she? Had she left it too late?

She tried, and disappointedly found there was no movement, almost no response at all.

She realised her tensed muscles had relaxed again as she’d been distracted. She tensed again and could genuinely feel them relax once more, against her will, and as they did the calm pleasant spaciness being poured into her head from her eyes washed over her body, waves spreading over her as her defences went down, one by one.

Above her, pinning her down, Ms Miracle giggled.

The sound galvanised her. Rage surged into her, though even that seemed to melt away around the edges of the green energy. She was not prepared to be taken for granted; besides, there was no way Miracle was ready to go to full strength if she was so amused.

Vivian stood, hearing the gasp as Miracle was lifted from contact with the ground to wind up sprawled across Vivian’s shoulders. She reached up fast - there was only so much time - but throw Miracle through a wall, kick this arrogant controller’s head off, and up into the air, figure everything else out later -

“Freeze.”

It was the first time she’d heard his voice. The first time he’d spoken since this whole thing began - however long that had been. Probably only moments but when she was under siege in her own brain it felt like an eternity.

Vivian had taken her grip on the heroine and was preparing the throw, but the word overrode all that. She felt her body lock into place and realised only then that even the surge of movement hadn’t let her take her eyes off the controller. The conduit remained open, his tempting, irresistible energy still pouring into her. Slow but devious. She could feel it filling her now. Not just her mind, but her body seemed to be filling with the treacle-slow flood of his control.

Which certainly explained why he’d been able to bring her to a halt so fast. Her body trembled slightly as she fought against the instruction, but that was as much movement as she had in her. This man’s compulsion held her firmly in place, against a will undergoing insistent and inevitable erosion.

Ms Miracle slid gracefully from her shoulders and settled on the ground beside her.

“Wow,” she said. “This must be what I looked like, huh?”

“Close,” the man who’d told her to freeze said. “I mean, similar expression.” There was the click of a door closing, and Vivian realised she hadn’t imagined the energy intensifying; he’d made his way into the room and shut the glow of his power away from scrutiny. “You were standing a little straighter, though. And you didn’t seem as much like you wanted to kill me.”

So Miracle was under his control then. Vivian tried to bare her teeth in a grimace, but it wasn’t working for her; her lips didn’t respond properly, and - she was pretty sure - it just looked like they trembled.

Like she was scared.

“This shouldn’t be hot,” Miracle said thoughtfully from off to her side. “She’s not my type.”

The man gave a startled sputter of a laugh. “Are you sure you want to say this in front of her?”

Vivian tried to speak, was surprised when it turned out she could. “It’s not going to matter,” she grated. “You’re both going to regret the hell out of this.”

She could almost make herself believe it, too. But the green, soothing glow lit her mind from within now. It was everywhere. It was all through her. It was unstoppable. Irresistible. It was a part of her now.

…It wasn’t, she reminded herself. It wouldn’t be, either, unless she rolled over and allowed it to.

But it was hard to convince herself of that now. Harder still since she remained rigidly locked in place. Her voice didn’t sound right, either, without free movement for her jaw.

“Oh, you don’t really mean that,” he said easily. “Do you?”

“No,” Vivian said, and her voice was soft, quiet, timid. Which was unnerving - probably for Miracle, too, she thought. What was more disturbing was that she meant what she said. There was no intention in her to make either of them regret this.

And she was pretty sure that was new. “Is this what he did to you?”

“A while ago,” Miracle answered. “We’ve actually fought since then - the whole thing in Belgium?”

Vivian tsked. “I should never have gotten involved with that,” she said. “Stupid plan. Stupid team. But it was quick money.”

“If it helps any, it wore off a little while ago.”

“So what the fuck is this all about?” She wanted to shout it, to spread her arms wide in frustration. To project her power and her authority along with the question. In fact it came out not much louder than her quiet denial a few moments ago, and her body remained frozen.

“I think you can guess,” Miracle said, and Vivian tutted.

“Whatever. Get this guy to, I don’t know, make me suck his cock and let’s be done with this.”

There was a chuckle from the man whose eyes were still pouring power into her, but Miracle spoke first. “But you want to suck his cock already,” she said, and her tone was so innocent that Vivian knew she had to be lying, or joking, or tricking her; the problem was, she couldn’t see what the trick or the joke might be.

She did want to suck his cock. She’d never seen it but she could picture it in her mind, imagine how it would feel, even how it would taste. She imagined a hint of that same calming, blissful energy that filled her now, the power inexorably taking her over, changing her, would fill her mouth, driving her to greater heights of eagerness.

She’d only said the whole thing about cocksucking so they’d fall for her trick and give her what she wanted.

Except… had she wanted it before Miracle spoke? That was somehow less clear. A fuzziness in her thoughts denied her the answer, a fuzziness tinged with that blissful green.

God, she loved this sensation. A groan escaped Vivian’s lips, breaking the short silence.

“That’s not actually why we’re here, though,” he said. “We’re here to discuss your future.”

“That’s for me to decide, not you.”

“Well… morally, maybe. But are you looking into my eyes?”

“Yes,” she allowed grudgingly.

“Can you look away?”

“No…”

“Can you move?”

“…No…”

“Do you think, if I gave you an order right now, you would fail to obey?”

Vivian knew the answer but she was damned if she’d give him the satisfaction. She clamped her lips tight shut; set herself stubbornly against the wonderful, delicious green drug soaking into her system through her eyes, and refused to speak, even as the word seemed to push against her mouth, itching to escape into the outer world.

Miracle started counting quietly by her side. It seemed like the numbers made it harder to keep the answer in, although Vivian knew that wasn’t true; it wasn’t the numbers, it was the question itself, nagging at her brain and demanding to be answered. As if the word really were forcing its way out.

“No,” she said at last. And if it was grudging it was honestly said.

She hadn’t made it to ten by Ms Miracle’s count.

“So it’s for me to decide,” the man said. “Whether that’s right or wrong, well, it’s probably not right. But considering some of the things you’ve done, I’m OK with that.” With barely a pause he continued, “And you are not going to argue that with me.”

Vivian knew instantly that he was correct. It would be pointless. It would also be crass.

And besides, she realised with a sinking feeling, some part of her was starting to relax into this, to accept it. The usual experience had been a compulsion to obey she couldn’t quite overcome, often sluggish reactions as she fought her own inclination to follow commands, until finally the grip the power had on her was broken by sheer perseverance and force of will.

Was this why Miracle had stayed under his control so long? Was the druglike slowness of his takeover more efficient?

Or was all of this like the way her use of language had changed? Was this real, or something imposed on her?

“Okay,” she said simply, and if she was angry about it, she didn’t sound that way.

“Anyway,” the man said, “that’s not what you need to worry about most. What you’re going to need to worry about isn’t being told to do things. It’s being told how to be.”

Vivian definitely heard Miracle whimper at that. Such a weird reaction - but then, Miracle had those. In fact…

An idea formed abruptly in Vivian’s head, made out of countless snatched recollections.

Ms Miracle, standing demurely beside Mentat’s overblown throne, wearing that colour-reversed version of her outfit, the thighs cut even higher, almost everything on display, her expression slack and empty, her body swaying slightly…

…“Yes, sir,” Miracle said perkily, a lazy smile on her lips, as she moved forward to chain the Warrior Queen to be taken to M.A.L.I.G.N. facilities for processing…

…The way she’d known Miracle was under PsyKick’s influence during that big brawl because there was a difference in how she grappled her, pressing her chest against her rather than using her upper arms for most of the pressure…

…seeing her lean forward, just slightly, lips parted and glistening, eyes shining even with the soul inside dulled, when Mindtwister took out the power suppression collar he wanted her in…

…rolling her eyes walking through the headquarters of M.A.L.I.G.N. and overhearing Miracle and Maxine Power squealing while they were used as sluts - the moment she’d decided she would betray the rest of the organisation as soon as she got the opportunity.

“You actually enjoy this shit, don’t you, Miracle?” she asked, wanting to hear a denial but knowing she wouldn’t.

She would have given anything to see the heroine’s face as she was asked the question, but she still couldn’t turn her head, still couldn’t react. She felt like she was barely thinking, ideas just flitting one to the next as and when her brain mustered enough energy to process them.

Still, she heard the heroine draw in a deep breath. Like this was hard to admit, even after all this. Or - maybe - just hard for her to admit to Macabre. Despite their heart-to-heart just a few minutes earlier, they knew each other only so well, but they both respected each other. Miracle had to know this was going to cost her that respect.

“Yes,” Ms Miracle said. “I do. Especially when I know it’s safe.”

Personally, Vivian didn’t think Mentat had been very safe for the woman, but then she had been rescued by the rest of her team. Maybe that was it? It was OK to let go if you were sure your friends would sort it all out for you?

“This isn’t going to be safe for any of us.”

“Ah.” The man was speaking now, and there was a weight to his voice that would have Vivian paying attention even if her green-soaked hindbrain wasn’t desperate to. “Now. That’s what we’re here to talk about. Macabre is the sort of woman who bears grudges. We don’t want that.”

Here it is, then, she thought; here’s where this all starts to come together. What’s the pitch going to be?

“The problem is Macabre. And you’re not Macabre, not really. Not any more than our friend here is Ms Miracle. These are larger than life roles that you both just have the power to assume.”

Vivian wanted to retort that Macabre very much was her. That the woman who trod carefully was the mask, the very real need to hide her true self away. But the green warmth filling her body said she wasn’t really Macabre, and the disagreement died in her throat.

Her body quivered again. A fear filled her, a fear tampered by the edge of that wonderful green.

“This is going to take a while,” Miracle said. “Should we get her comfortable?”

“Good thought. OK. I’m going to look away for a moment, but you’re not going to attack. You’re not going to flee. You’re going to stand there like a good girl and wait to be told what to do. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” Vivian answered, but her breaking voice was little more than a whisper.

The green went away, and she felt suddenly cold. Without it filling her she realised her body was aching from holding the pose where she’d frozen, a complaint that had been gone while lost in his eyes.

“Sit down on the bed,” the man told her. Now she could actually see him, he was… fine; not unattractive, but nothing out of the ordinary. You’d walk past him on the street, but if you got to know him, he might well win you over; and in this case, if you met his eyes and he wanted to, he would change your life and the way you thought forever.

As she perched herself on the corner of her disturbed bed and rolled her shoulders, stretching her arms against the aches, she realised that the sense of his inevitable victory was still there.

She wasn’t at all sure she liked that. She glanced across to Miracle, who was leaning against the wall by the shitty TV, and who, despite having her arms folded, gave off the impression for all the world to see that she was fanning herself.

“Enjoying this, are you?” Vivian asked, not quite as bitter as she wanted to be.

“More than I should be,” Miracle agreed. “Look, I don’t know anymore when I got into this. I found out I liked it the second or third time it happened in costume, when I didn’t think I was about to be used to kill people; I sort of just relaxed and let myself go. I buried even that for a long time, though. But looking back on my life before powers… I always had some weird fantasies, you know?”

Vivian didn’t, but she nodded anyway. Maybe it would make them both go easier on her.

With the aches dealt with and out of the way, she remembered that she wanted to suck the guy’s cock. She wasn’t going to be able to do it from this position, but she couldn’t just slide off the bed to her knees to make it easier; he’d told her to sit down.

Meantime he was moving the room’s one chair to face her. He put it against the wall and sat. “Any comfier?” he asked. She nodded. Found herself smiling slightly. Shivered.

“Good. So, like I say, we’re not talking about Macabre anymore. That phase of your life is over.”

His power wasn’t touching her, and she could move again. Her face showed a horrified revulsion, and as Ms Miracle shuffled around to watch, she could see the heroine wince. Sympathy?

She thought back over all the Ms Miracle/Macabre confrontations they’d had. From the first clashes through pitched battles, with quiet moments scattered between the two. Each of them had spent so much time trying to get the other to see things differently, and Vivian felt offended, in a way, that the heroine had been the first to resort to mental manipulation to do it. That was closer to her line of work… except that she hated controllers.

She’d forgotten that hatred somehow.

That wasn’t a comforting thing to realise. And even once remembered, the hatred, the anger, it was all… vague. Blurry. As if it belonged to someone else.

“Before you go any further,” Vivian said carefully, “do you mind telling me what you’re planning?” She crossed her legs and folded her hands demurely over her thigh. Still looking for some way to mute this, reduce this treatment.

When was he going to let her suck his cock?

The man looked to Ms Miracle. “You know her better. What do you think?”

“I think she’s not been pushed enough that she’d be in a good state to hear it yet.” Ms Miracle tilted her head. “Which is probably telling her too much anyway.”

Vivian frowned, but the man just nodded. “It’s a fair point,” he said. He paused for a moment, then turned back to Vivian. “Carefully not asking your name right now,” he said, “and Macabre’s time is done, like I say. So I’m going to start calling you Mercy, and you will answer to it as if it’s your identity. Obey.”

“Yes,” Vivian agreed. Mercy? It wasn’t exactly her look, but she wasn’t being asked to take it as a name, just to answer to it.

Which was enough to let her shout down the voice telling her she would have agreed in any case, once he said that last word and made it a command.

“Are you looking forward to looking into my eyes again, Mercy?”

She didn’t want to be. It had been horrifying at first, but now she remembered the pleasure and the soothing ease of the green energy more than the initial terror. It had become a tempting thing, something she’d want to experience again, even at the risk of being lost in it - and she was pretty sure she was going to be lost in it.

“Aren’t you going to strip her first?” Miracle blurted. Vivian’s jaw dropped and she turned to glare at the heroine, who had a look on her face like she couldn’t believe she’d said that aloud.

“Rude,” Vivian said, and was surprised to find herself smiling at the blush that spread across Miracle’s cheeks. “Oh, shit, Miracle, have you been into me this whole time?” She laughed. Not that she’d reciprocate the feeling. But here, in this weirdest situation, with the soothing power of the controller washing through her, she was enjoying the chance to tease her nemesis rather than taunt her.

“No,” the heroine said, and the defensiveness in her tone sent Vivian into a surprisingly sympathetic mood. To her surprise, though, Miracle continued. “I’m into this. That’s all. And he stripped me when he took me over.”

“Well, mostly,” the man said with a slight grin. “You kept your boots. If you wore a mask you’d have kept that too.”

Vivian rolled her eyes, but not before she saw the grin Miracle broke out with. All of a sudden she didn’t think Miracle was under the guy’s spell. Which made her a willing participant - but it also meant the dynamic she was up against wasn’t the one she’d thought it was.

The man continued. “Anyway. Mercy?”

“Yes?” Vivian blurted, and realised only from that how deeply the instruction to answer to it had taken root.

“Look into my eyes.”

She obeyed, and as her focus settled in she saw the green fire kindling in his eyes. Felt it pour out of him and into her again. She whimpered, caught between pleasure and fear, but unable in either case to stop it from happening, to stop his power from reaching so deeply into her that she could be changed.

“Your career as Macabre is over,” he began. The news was like a spike of ice through her heart, and she wanted so much to protest, but somehow she couldn’t. “Your career as Mercy is going to begin soon.”

So that was why Mercy was so comfortable as a name, she thought, before remembering feeling the change when it had been made a name not long earlier. She wasn’t having things she’d already felt, believed, or hoped revealed to her. She was being changed. And not only that, she was accepting those changes. Not fighting them at all.

She remembered, not long earlier, fighting that idea, fighting the little voice in her head that presented these changes as inevitable, unstoppable, matters of fact. That reaction was gone, buried, lost in the warm green peace. She was so full of his power that her scalp tingled with it.

“Mercy is a heroine,” the man continued. “She fights for the safety and well-being of others. She believes in their right to that safety. She’s,” and Vivian could hear a certain amusement enter his voice, “very like Ms Miracle that way. She understands how important it is for people to be able to live safe, happy lives and to benefit by them.

“She feels that way because you feel that way.” A pause. “You understand.”

It wasn’t a question. She was sure it wasn’t a question. But all the same, Vivian found herself saying “I understand.” She wondered at the breathy lightness of her speech. Was it weight lifting from her shoulders? Or was it her impression of Ms Miracle, down at a deeper level than she was consciously aware of?

“This is your second chance, Mercy,” he said. “Whatever your real name is - this is your second chance.” She heard him swallow. “And it’s mine, too. That’s important to you, both those facts are. You don’t want to mess this up for either of us.”

“Is that cheating?” Ms Miracle asked. There was a teasing tone to her voice, and Vivian again wondered what exactly the dynamic was between those two.

“I’m OK with it,” he said. “And so is Mercy. Aren’t you, Mercy?”

“Yes, sir,” she responded, her voice definitely perkier and more eager than before. Vivian wondered at herself; she was definitely finding this more fun than she’d expected. Being changed like this, being bound to a set of ideas she’d not had before, that was delicious - and it really shouldn’t have been. Vivian didn’t like giving up control, and this was certainly not enough to change that.

It was more as if-

“Oh,” she said dreamily, “fuck.”

“What’s wrong?” It was Ms Miracle who asked, not the man in charge, not the source of her green rebirth. She didn’t have to respond to Ms Miracle. But she felt closer to her now. And combined with the respect she’d long had for her, it was easy.

“I think I’m starting to like this like you do.”

The green went away as the man looked across to Miracle and Vivian gasped to lose it. It was like coming up for air after a long dive in the ocean; a relief and a loss at the same time.

“Shit,” Miracle said. “Right. Because you said she was like me.”

“I meant just how you think about heroics!” There was a note of actual worry in his voice. Vivian smiled.

“It’s OK,” she said gently. “I didn’t expect this. But I’m OK with it.”

“Because… you think I would be?” the heroine asked. Although Vivian supposed she should stop thinking about Miracle that way if she was to be Mercy.

She nodded.

“So what do we do?” the guy asked.

“Well, if I get a vote,” she said, “I’d quite like to suck your cock now, please.”