I

This place I’m going to tell you about looked like a huge dungeon, walls all rough concrete. But it wasn’t one of those S&M joints. No whips, no chains, no manacles bolted to the walls. They did have a lot of accessories, just not that kind.

It was once a storage area for an underground missile base, and it should have been filled in and covered over under the START treaty. But somebody had influence or put up some money. I never did get the straight of it. Anyway, it was way out in the middle of nowhere. I won’t say exactly, but they didn’t put missile silos near major cities, okay?

They catered to a very exclusive and peculiar clientele. How they were chosen, I had no idea. I sure didn’t know how I was. Sure, I was obsessed with Shi'kara -- the one the rest of the world called Supergirl -- and the rest of the Velorians. Yeah, me and a few hundred million other guys. I figured the Vels could monitor our e-mails; hey if the NSA Echelon program could do it… But why would they bother? And what would they be looking for?

Well, I figured out later what it was all about. I think it had to do with why we’re here today. Maybe with a lot of other things, things that may have led to other meetings like this. Or will. I never saw any of them again, but that doesn’t mean they haven’t invited other people over the years. Could be happening even now. Tonight. I’ve never tried to find out. Somehow it just doesn’t seem like a good idea.

I was working on my B.S. in organic chemistry, but doing a pet project on the side. How they found out about it, I’ll never know. I kept it all on my laptop, never went on line, never networked, never even talked about it with anyone else. But they knew. The whole thing was a setup. I was the only one they wanted -- in that group, on that night. Does that make me sound like an egomaniac?

I was pretty full of myself back then, your archetypal geek. The closest thing I had to friends were my fellow Velophiles and chem majors. Some of those were girls; times had changed. But I was shy around them, except for talking shop. A few study dates, nothing serious, certainly nothing steady. My sex life was strictly fantasy -- an impossible fantasy at that. Well, I thought it was impossible.

When I got the invitation, I took it for a joke. Shi'kara and the other alien superwomen didn’t make public appearances, except when they were honored for really big things like intercepting those rogue missiles or stopping the Big Quake in California, and they sure had better things to do than host private parties for fans. This was before we found out the real reason the Velorians were here in the first place. If I'd known about that, I would have been even more skeptical. Knowing it now…

Anyway, I put it down to some guy who’d seen the pictures on my walls, seen how I’d looked at them… Pretty elaborate for a hoax, though, I had to admit. Came on a really fancy card that had been impregnated with the scent of honey and wildflowers: Velorian pheromones. My reaction was real, but even so I figured the "pheromones" were knockoffs, cooked up in the chem lab. The rest was just power of suggestion, maybe with the aid of a mild hallucinogen. There was an RSVP addressed to some P.O. box in -- never mind. But it could have been the prankster’s home town. Shi'kara herself "fulfill every fantasy?" Forget about it!

About a week later I was sacking out at the dorm when something woke me up. It was a tapping at my second story window. It was dark and I was groggy, besides which I didn’t have my glasses, so at first I couldn’t make out who it was. But whoever it was kept tapping, so I grabbed my glasses, fumbled for the switch, hit the lights.

It was one of them. Right outside my window. Not Shi'kara herself, but she had the unmistakable look of a true Vel. If I’d had any doubts, they were erased when I looked for the ladder under her and there wasn’t any. I still didn’t recognize her, but most of them besides Shi'kara kept a low profile, nobody seemed to have good pictures of all of them.

I raised the window, tried to think of an appropriate greeting, but my tongue was thoroughly tied. I was too busy staring at her breasts. So she was the first to speak.

"Guess you missed our invitation," she said, smiling. Then she chuckled. "I told them not to trust the Post Awful."

"It… it wasn’t that," I stammered. "It was just…"

"You aren’t going to tell me you didn’t want to come, after getting an invitation that was engraved and perfumed?"

I blushed at the double entendre. And something else happened that was as obvious to her as it was to me. You can’t hide anything from tachyon vision.

"I see you do want to come," she purred. But then she became all business.

"I brought another copy," she said, pulling an envelope from her waistband, from inside her panties. Well, she had to keep it somewhere. "All you have to do is sign the RSVP and we’re all set."

In a daze, I reached for a pen from my desk and signed the RSVP. She let me keep the invitation. "Be seeing you," she said, and flew off.

The card smelled of Velorian pheromones, and this time I knew they were real. I knew where they came from. I couldn’t stop thinking of where that card had been, what it had touched. I couldn’t stop thinking of her.

I lost count of how many times I had to beat off before I got any sleep that night. It was only the next morning that I noticed that this version of the invitation had an extra line at the bottom: Bring your device and your formula, ready for use.

II

The people who met me at the airport weren’t Vels. Just a couple of rather grim-faced cut-outs. They said as little as possible, but they seemed to have been briefed in detail.

I’d brought the parts for the mechanism in my luggage. Nothing suspicious about them. Nothing that looked like it was for a weapon. Could have been parts for a vacuum cleaner, as far as the security people were concerned.

The ingredients were something else. But the cut-outs knew what to do; took me straight to a chemical supply warehouse. They’d already made the arrangements, even put everything on their credit card. Nobody at the warehouse seemed suspicious. But some years earlier, nobody would have raised an eyebrow over fertilizer and fuel oil.

They loaded the stuff into the back of a van, and we were on our way. It was a long drive, and the cut-outs weren’t much for conversation.

"So how many people are coming to this party?" I asked.

"A sufficient number," was all I could get out of them.

"Are you picking up any of the rest of them?"

"Arrangements have been made."

Seeing that I wasn’t getting anywhere, I was reduced to staring out the window. The scenery was boring. Semi-desert with scrubby vegetation to each side, low mountains in the distance. Nothing ahead but the two-lane blacktop, with an occasional gas station or bar. It was getting towards dusk and, after a while, there was nothing to see but the center line and the highway signs and billboards in the headlights.

There wasn’t any sign marking the turnoff, but the cut-outs knew where it was. We headed down a side road that led to a chain link fence with a gate and a faded sign that referred to the area’s former status and warned unauthorized people to keep out. No sign of a guard; the cut-outs used an electronic device to open the gate without even getting out of the van.

Eventually, we reached a blocky concrete building lit by floodlights and surrounded by a dozen or so other vans and cars. There were people outside, standing around or milling around. Some looked like cut-outs, the rest had to be the other guests. At a quick glance, most of the latter were young and geeky looking, like me. A few were older. There was even one woman among them.

They didn’t seem to be making much conversation, for people sharing an obsession. But that didn’t really surprise me, it was one thing to chat on the Internet, under the cover of screen names. But in person….

I didn’t think I knew any of these people, but then one of them stepped out of the shadows. Max Cleland. He’d had the nerve to post a picture with his Internet profile, something few of us did. I certainly never had. But somehow I got up the nerve to break the ice.

"Mr. Cleland, I presume," I said, extending my hand. "Benedikt Spinoza."

Not my real name, as you well know. But then, neither was his.

"Oh, right," he said. "The fire guy."

Meaning, of course, that my favorite fantasy was imagining Shi'kara bathing in fire, climaxing again and again as the flames licked her intimate parts. And after she cooled down, of course, inviting me to….

My revery was interrupted as my two cut-outs unloaded my bags of chemicals and the parts for the mechanism. Cleland looked at them quizically.

"You’ll see," I told him. "It’s something entirely new. I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you."

Cleland didn’t know how to take that, so instead of responding, he gestured to his own bags, kicked at one of them. I heard a clattering noise.

"I came loaded for bear," he told me, then snickered. "Well, loaded for Vel."

I knew, of course, that he was into mechanical devices. I just hoped he wouldn’t take all night with them. Would there be a time limit for each of us? Nobody had said anything about the details, at least to me.

One of the cut-outs gave us a heads-up. The doors of the building opened. We were instructed to pick up our gear and head inside. I was able to carry my own stuff; so were most of the others, but Cleland needed help. He tried gamely with his bags, but managed to drop one on his foot. A yelp of pain, and more clattering. After that, he left it to the cut-outs and hobbled along behind.

Inside, there was an elevator. It wasn’t big enough to accommodate all of us at once, so the cut-outs had to split us up into groups. I ended up with Cleland and his cut-out baggage handlers and the one woman in the group, who said her name was Beverly. She wasn’t carrying anything.

"I just came to watch," she said.

I was disappointed by my first impression of the Downdeep Downdeep. Nothing but a corridor with bare metal doors, painted olive drab, on each side. It led to an equally drab, cavernous space that had been fitted out with the bare minimum of amenities to serve as a theater.

There were folding metal chains for the audience and floodlights to give a good view of the space that was going to serve as a stage. That space was separated from the rest of the cavern by a barrier of glass or plastic, with a door to far left and what appeared to be a couple of apertures near the center.

The barrier couldn’t have been part of the original design from when this was a storage room at a missile base. When I looked more closely, I could see that the material had been melted around the edges to seal it to the concrete. Glass then, for sure. Plastic would have discolored, even caught fire. Had to be Velorian work.

Nothing behind the stage but the concrete wall. On the floor, several huge plywood containers. Props of some sort, no doubt. TV cameras were mounted on the ceiling, angled towards center stage. Out front of the barrier, monitors were positioned to each side. I wasn’t sure what this setup was for, although I had my suspicions.

The elevator kept bringing more fans. Nobody I recognized, but I recognized some of the screen names: Yossarian, Adam Stone, Ultraman. Tetrite, Shadow. All fans; none of the fan fiction writers. Was that a coincidence? Some were really vocal about what they hoped to see that night. Especially Cleland.

Cleland had brought all kinds of hardware: knives, swords, railroad spikes, hammers, bolt cutters, vises, power drills, even a jackhammer, all of which he showed off proudly. After using them to demonstrate the invulnerability of her Most Sensitive Areas, he was hoping that Shi'kara would compress them into tiny balls and take them into herself for keeps. But he wasn’t entirely satisfied.

"I wish they had a tank," he complained. "They said they couldn’t get one in here, even if I paid for it. But she could have a dug a tunnel, and the military could have found a surplus tank somewhere. They must have thousands of them. Hell, a burned-out Iraqi T-54 from the war would have been fine."

Other fans were talking about the usual sort of thing—Glocks versus Magnums, Uzis versus Kalashnikovs.

After about 20 minutes of this sort of thing, I was getting bored. I turned to Beverly, who’d been pretty quiet so far. She was about my age, dark-haired rather than blonde; an athletic type, nice looking but hardly a stunner. Like one of the soccer players in Bend It Like Beckham.

"I haven’t met any female Velophiles before," I ventured. "I was wondering, ah…" I was trying to find words that wouldn’t give me away as a complete asshole. "I mean, the appeal to… a woman."

"Do you mean, am I a lesbian?" she responded bluntly.

"Well…"

"Not really. Although there are some. Maybe her, in the front row."

She pointed out a woman in a military fatigues with a boonie hat. She was flanked on each side by several other soldiers. I hadn’t noticed them arrive. Some sort of guard detail, I guessed, but what were they here for? Not to protect the star attraction, obviously. Maybe to keep the fans from getting out of hand with each other.

"As for myself, I don’t want to be with Shi'kara, sexually," Beverly continued. "I just love the idea of being Shi'kara. Being superior to men instead of dependent on them. To have them look at me with stunned awe. And as for all the fantasies you guys like, well I like them too. Bullets and breasts... if you use your imagination, the bullets feel like your lover’s kisses on your breasts. And then there’s the awe of being watched as you effortlessly brush aside harm that would kill a normal human. Watching your lover watch you as you show him that you’re beautiful, stunning, free and totally invulnerable. And knowing that he loves you for it."

She was so forthright I didn’t know how to react. She was simultaneously justifying my own private fantasies and somehow trespassing on them. Frustrating them, at least. I thought it might be nice to get together and share the fantasy. But if I even hinted at that, she’d probably kick me in the balls. And it might turn out worse if she didn’t. So I ended up just quoting Spock.

"Interesting," I said.

We’d been here an hour, the seats were filled, and still no sign of Shi'kara. Could this whole thing be a colossal practical joke, after all?

There was a sudden flurry of activity as the soldiers left their seats and entered the stage. Securing the door behind them, they began attacking the crates with crowbars. The largest revealed a glass bathtub; another what looked like some sort of air purification device. A smaller crate was filled with jerrycans, and others held sundry military and civilian weapons.

The woman solder had kept her back to the crowd. But suddenly she turned about, whipped off her floppy headgear and shook her golden tresses free. The star attraction, and we hadn’t even noticed. Talk about embarrassment. But we got over it pretty quick, and broke into cheers and applause.

III

"Hi guys!" she beamed, with a smile that could light up the Galaxy. "Are you ready to have some fun tonight? Because we’re going to have some fun tonight."

It was a little disconcerting. Sure we wanted to have fun, but it still seemed strange to hear Shi'kara talking like the headliner at some Las Vegas show.

"Now I know you all have some fun ideas," she said. "But I thought we’d start with a fun idea of my own."

She paused, Nobody had expected this.

"Ever see La Femme Nikita?" she asked. "Nikita was one tough lady, Not as tough as me, but then… who is, right?"

More applause.

"Well, you all remember Nikita, from the American remake with Bridget Fonda even if you missed the original with Anne Parillaud, or maybe you saw TV series with Peta Wilson—I think she was the best. But how many of you remember Victor the Cleaner?"

Only a few hands went up.

"Gee, and he was in both movie versions. Don’t you remember, the guy who came around with the acid to get rid of the bodies the other agents had left behind? Only one of them was still alive? That was funny, I guess, if you’re into black comedy. But I always thought it was funny that Victor had the idea he could dissolve all those bodies with just a few gallons of acid."

The stagehands dressed as soldiers took that as their cue. Donning protective masks, they started emptying the jerry cans into the tub. When they were through, they came outside and sealed the door behind them. Shi'kara paid no attention to them.

"Victor dumped the bodies in a bathtub," she continued. "Of course, it wasn’t a transparent tub. I got that idea from reading about a stripper you’ve never heard of. Lily St. Cyr. More than 50 years ago, she’d take a bath on stage. Not in methanoyl chloride, of course; that’d have been murder on her G-string."

She paused, teasing her audience.

"Among other things," she continued. "She wasn’t a Vel. If she had been, she’d only be in her 80’s now, not even middle-aged for us. She could have stood in for me tonight."

She paused again.

"Not that I’m complaining."

She winked, and glanced behind her to confirm that her assistants had finished filling the tub.

"Right on the mark, two thirds full," she explained. "Wouldn’t want it to overflow."

Shi'kara took off her boots, but left on her fatigues.

"That leather and rubber can make a real mess," she complained. "I tried it once. Spent the rest of the night cleaning up."

She dipped one foot in the acid.

"Mmm, not too hot, not too cold," she cooed. "Just right."

She looked back at the fans, and winked again.

"Well, here goes nothing," she said.

She stepped into the tub, lay back as if she were relaxing in a beauty and let the acid do its work. We didn’t have long to wait, because methanoyl chloride is strong stuff. But she helped it out, inhaling deeply so that her magnificent breasts popped out even before the fabric covering them went completely to pieces, wriggling around so that fragments of her fatigues would detach themselves from her heavenly body and float away until they vanished.

The TV monitors offered closeups, and even instant replays of Shi'kara’s supremis flesh being revealed inch by glorious inch. I’d thought she might have been wearing one of her uniforms, hopefully the one without a skirt. But she didn’t have a stitch on, not even a G-string -- did they even make G-strings out of vitaninium? As she turned towards us, her perfect bush came into view, and the cameras zoomed in as she began to finger herself.

Knowing about Velorian invulnerability was one thing. Seeing it first hand was quite another. Knowing that Velorians were sexual beings was one thing. Seeing one show just how sexual was quite another. Here was one of the Protectors of Earth, honored by the world for her service to mankind, flaunting herself shamelessly. The acid sloshed in the tub as she masturbated furiously, her hand moving too fast for the human eye to follow – but we were treated to slow-motion replays that showed every stroke.

I was squirming in my seat, desperately wanting to come and trying to hold myself back, eyes darting from Shi'kara herself to the slow motion monitor and back. I was totally oblivious to the other fans, and they were doubtless oblivious to each other. As the gasps and moans of the Velorian goddess reached a crescendo, I zeroed in on her: the monitor could never catch up. Shi'kara arched herself, thrashed up and down and about in the tub in the tub, splashing acid into the concrete, until she screamed in ecstasy.

As Shi'kara came, as I came with her, I felt a hand on my crotch. I knew who it was, of course, she was sitting right next to me. But I’d never expected this. She was moaning as she felt me come; no doubt about where her other hand was, had been. But I didn’t turn to look; my eyes were still fixed on the stage as the golden goddess there recovered herself and basked in the afterglow even as she had luxuriated in the acid. Her face took on a look of utter contentment.

There probably wasn’t a dry fly in the house. Shi'kara had reached out and touched us, one and all.

But only Beverly had literally reached out and touched me. It was the first time I’d ever been touched intimately by a woman. Not that I’d have dared admit it.

After a few moments, the star attraction stood up in the tub, then floated out of it. It was the first time we’d seen her fly. She revolved slowly in midair, making sure that our eyes could drink their fill, before landing next to the air purifier that had been parked in the corner and switching it on. Then she looked back at the small puddles of acid next to the tub.

"Victor!" she called out.

"Yo," responded one of the stagehands in fatigues.

"See, we do have a cleaner," she said, turning towards the audience. "Only our Victor knows what he’s doing, unlike the one in the movie. Right, Victor?"

"Fuckin’ A."

"So as soon as we get the place cleared of hydrochloric acid fumes, he’ll come in and finish the decontamination. Meanwhile…."

A pause. A really long pause. Then she looked down at herself, as if only realizing just then that she was stark naked.

"Oh, that," she said. "I’m only supposed to wear the uniform when I’m on duty. And I’m not on duty tonight. So look all you want."

She struck a series of provocative poses. There was a stirring in the audience, at least among those with quick refraction times, and most of them were young enough, including me. I felt Beverly’s hand on my crotch again, then inching into my pocket.

Apparently the air purifier had done its job by now.

"Got to make a quick change now," Shi'kara said. "Back in a few."

She came out, headed for the corridor. They’d improvised a green room behind one of those olive-drab doors, no doubt. Everyone looked at her, but nobody actually tried to touch her. We seemed to know the rules of the game instinctively.

Chances are that nobody noticed Victor entering the stage area with his chemical tank. He was already there by the time we took our last glimpse of Shi'kara wafting out the door.