The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

It was an easy decision for Cindi, but a tough one for Majestic Woman.

«Too bad for her.» thinks Cindi as she loads up her field pack.

Normally when she goes home, she just flies there. It’s a long trip, but she enjoys the scenery. There was one time when she was too exhausted to fly herself, but then she just took a commercial flight to Athens as Cynthia Royal. That was fine too.

But now she has orders to follow, and she doesn’t want to waste the transit time. So she’s going to teleport through Spyglass for personal use for the second time in a week. «At least this time I’m not transporting a giant rubber dildo!»

Thinking about the dildo though reminds Cindi of Annette’s note today:

I did a little, ahem, shopping early this morning. I hope you enjoy the surprises I left in your underwear drawer.

Of course, you can imagine my surprise at what I found as I was emptying out your old things. Master tells me you call it the BRM: “Big Rubber Monster”. He told me that you tried to deep-throat it. No wonder your throat has been so sore the last couple of days!

Until now I thought your bravest moment was when you fought the Cloud Warriors all by yourself. That was nothing compared to this.

(O-mouthed face)

I know you’re new to all this, Cindi, but please be careful!

H&K!

It was a nice morning laugh. It certainly helped lift her spirits some.

The packing is going slow. Cindy is not sure how well some of her fragile new undergarments will hold up to being stuffed in a military-style ruck sack. So she’s packing them with extreme care.

Besides that, she feels very tired. I had ordered Annette to keep Cindi’s body up the rest of the night. I was hoping that the lack of sleep would help with the ‘jet lag’: 10 hours difference between Arizona and Greece. We would be arriving in Greece in late afternoon if we left right now. I was hoping that Cindi would be tired enough to sleep tonight, even accounting for the time shift.

She is just finishing her packing when her LoH communicator suddenly starts going nuts. Emergency call. «Looks like that leave of absence will have to wait a little while longer. My Lord, what’s the emergency?»

Oh, crap. It’s bad...in a sense. But I can’t tip her off or it will seem too suspicious. «“No time to explain, baby bitch. Just get there. They need you now!“»

She hits the response button and feels the tingle as the teleporter takes her up to Spyglass. The Wraith is at the controls. “Power Man and Greased Lightning are on the ground. They’ll brief you when you get there.”

She has just enough time to think how odd it is that Blake would not even tell her where she’s going, and then she’s there. It’s a open grassy field with no structures in sight but a large concrete post. The other two heroes are standing on either side of the post with grim looks on their faces. Greased Lightning is holding a length of chain and a padlock.

«Oh, shit!» She flies away as fast as she can, but it’s useless; Power Man is much faster. She engages him, bringing to bear her greater combat experience, but that’s useless too; he’s much faster and much stronger. Soon he has her arms pinned behind her back. The last two times that happened...

«“Discipline”» CRAP! She did that to herself. She begins to shiver uncontrollably.

«“Snap out of it, Cindi.” <WWMWD?>» The last part is not a verbal seed; it’s a visual seed image of one of her yellow calligraphed sticky notes.

Immediately she’s back, struggling, snapping her head back to try to break his nose, anything to break free. That’s my girl. But it’s all to no avail. Power Man is forcing her to the ground.

Faster than even she can follow, Greased Lightning threads one end of the chain through the D-ring on her collar, then through the O-ring at the other end of the of the chain. Then in a flash he is back at the concrete post padlocking the chain to one of several iron rings on the post.

Instantly her powers disappear, flight, invulnerability, super-strength, super-eyesight, super-hearing, the works. Majestic Woman has been ready for it since she saw Greased Lightning holding the chain. Unfortunately Power Man wasn’t ready. With a wet snap, bright pain blossoms in her right arm.

«<WWMWD?>» “Claud, you asshole, You broke my fucking arm. LET ME GO!” «This is either one of Blake’s stupid training exercises, or I’m dead.»

Sure enough, Power Man immediately lets go, murmuring his apologies. The Wraith appears from nowhere as his holographic invisibility dissipates, holding a stopwatch. He must have arrived when she was...busy, although, of course it could have been any time really. The “Wraith” that spoke to her at Spyglass could have been one of his hologram projectors. How would she know?

“Ten seconds, Cynthia. I think that’s a record. No one’s ever subdued you that fast before. ‘Trapped in bonds of metal by a man’. That’s what it says in your personnel file under ‘Weaknesses’, right?”

“You damn well know it is, Blake. And you know that it was me who fought for the ‘Weaknesses’ category to be MANDATORY when the Legion was founded. We have to know these things so we can watch each other’s backs.”

“Yes, Cynthia. That’s what I’m trying to do now.”

“Well CONGRATULATIONS, Blake. Nobody ever thought of directly attacking my stated weakness with a Rheonean and a super-speedster before. Enjoy your ‘ten-second record’.”

“Right. And there’s a reason nobody ever thought of that. None of us ever wore our weakness AROUND OUR FREAKING NECK before you did. Claud, break the chain, please. That broken arm is gonna make me lose my lunch.”

“WAIT!” screamed the powerless heroine, “Nobody touches anything before I’m done. Claud, I need you to reach up under my uniform, on my right hip and find the key I have stashed there.”

Power Man’s shy reaction is more reminiscent of Claud Bolling, Cosmopolis City Librarian, than of the mightiest hero on Earth, “Um, Cynthia, I, uh, don’t think I—”

“YOU FUCKING BROKE MY ARM; YOU CAN FUCKING REACH IN AND GET MY KEY. I CAN’T!”

He’s never heard her swear like this before. Of course, he’s never seen her this angry before either. He reaches inside her uniform. She adds, “And if you grab my buttcheek, I swear I’m gonna visit you one night with a jar of rheanite in one hand and a can of whoop-ass in the other.”

He flinches but finds the key, pulls it out, hands it to her. Key in lock, lock released, then collar released. She feels her powers flow back into her, and, as that happens, the other feature of the Shield of Athena manifests itself: instant healing of any undesired damage that happened when the shield was down.

She flexes her arm a couple of times and then turns to Blake. “There. Damage repaired. Power restored. Hero NOT subdued. How many seconds NOW, Blake?”

Blake doesn’t answer. Instead he turns to the other two and says, “Guys. Thanks for the help. I’ll take it from here.”

“NO!” Cynthia shouts, With a powerful whip-snap motion she breaks the chain off the concrete post and unthreads it from her collar.

“We’re gonna do one more demo, this time without the collar. Claud, you’re gonna subdue me just like before. Try not to break my arm this time. Bill, unlock the padlock and keep the chain and padlock ready. This time thread the chain though the ring on the post and the O-ring at the end of the chain. Wrap the free end of the chain around my neck and use use the padlock there. GO!“

With that she is off in the sky, with Power Man hot on her trail. «So, My Lord, is this what Majestic Woman would do?» Rather than answer I just flood her with a warm feeling. She gets the point.

This time it takes 15 seconds, mostly because Bill and Claud take exaggerated care to ensure that Bill is closing the padlock just as Claud is releasing her.

“So, here I am, powerless, just like before. OH! Except I CAN’T ESCAPE this time, because I don’t have the key to THIS Gods damned lock. So, what did we learn here, fellas? All you really needed to bring Majestic Woman down was that post, this chain, and this padlock. The collar didn’t make a fucking bit of difference. Demonstration fucking complete!”

Blake looks at her coolly. “You’ve made your point. Bill, unlock her please.”

A man of few words, the speedster only says, “You okay, Cynthia?” as he removes the chain from her neck.

“Yeah, fine Bill. Thanks.”

She apologizes to Power Man for snapping at him, “I’m kind of cranky, Claud, I didn’t get any sleep last night.”

Then she turns to Blake again.

Blake holds up his hand. Wait. “Cynthia, I’ll be happy to let you yell at me all day long, but let me speak my piece first. Bill, Claud, please teleport out now.”

The two heroes even seem to teleport away at super-speed. They don’t want any part of the argument they see brewing.

“Did you see the news footage of your heroics last night? It’s the most successful large building fire rescue operation ANY LoH member has ever been involved in. EVEN CLAUD. But all they could talk about was your interesting new choice in neckwear.”

“Blake, I—”

“LET. ME. FINISH. The reason none of us ever thought of exploiting your weakness before, is because until yesterday, NO ONE HAD EVER SEEN YOU WEARING YOUR WEAKNESS AROUND YOUR NECK. I don’t understand it, Cynthia. It’s as if Claud carried a box of rheanite with him everywhere he goes, or as if I carried a huge red “here I am” flag that stuck out from behind my holograms, or as if Sea King carried around a FUCKING GIANT BLOW-DRYER.

“WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON WITH YOU, CYNTHIA? Either spill it or...or convince me that you know what you’re doing.”

«My Lord? Help?»

«“You’ve got to give him something that will satisfy him. Give me a sec.“»

I have been searching Blake’s thoughts since the call came through at her home, but things are...fluid in there. There’s an opening here, something that he’s looking for that he doesn’t even know he’s looking for. What is it? Aaaah. Got it. «“Tell him you’re in love. You don’t have to lie. Try not to; he might catch you. No specifics though.“»

“Blake...that thing that was on my mind last week. I...I’m in love.”

“And the collar?”

“The crazy things we do for each other. I can’t explain it, Blake. But it makes me feel close to him. Don’t read too much into it.”

“He’s a cape?”

“He’s a noncombatant.”

“Jesus...fucking...you’ve fallen for a mortal? I thought you said you had learned your lesson about that during the war.”

“I never said he was a mortal. I said he was a noncombatant. He’s actually older than I am. More powerful, too.”

«“Shit! T-M-I, baby bitch!“»

«Trust me, My Lord.»

“Oh...oh...no. Cynthia, please tell me that you haven’t fallen for Heracles.”

“OH GREAT HER—...NO, Blake, It’s not Heracles. And you can stop guessing now. You’ve never met him. Or heard of him. I’m certain.“

“You’re certain.”

“It’s like his superpower is ‘keeping a low profile’. And I’m not about to break his cover. Not for you, not for anyone.”

If anyone understands the value of hiding—the power of hiding—it’s the Wraith. He softens a bit. “And you met him...how?”

“I think I’ve had enough of the third degree. You wanna lighten up on me some, Blake?”

“Cynthia, I...I just...”

“Yeah, yeah, you’re the white knight, and you think I’m the damsel in distress. I get tired of it, Blake. You do this to me all the freaking time. Look. I’m not ‘in distress’. I’m just a twenty-five hundred year old broad who’s head-over-heels in love for the first time. It’s okay, easy mistake to make. I hear the symptoms look pretty much the same.”

Then she gives her friend a big goofy grin. “I’m HAPPY, Blake. I don’t think I’ve ever been happy, just...happy, ever before. Can you be happy with me?”

He gives her a soft, gentle smile in return. “I...sure, Cynthia, I can be happy, with you, for you. Just, please...be careful.”

“Blake, you never give up, do you. One day you’re going to find that woman who really needs to be rescued, and she’s never gonna know what hit her.”

They smile. They hug. They teleport back to Spyglass.

Before Blake departs for Carthage City, Cynthia takes the opportunity to present her Leave of Absence notice.

“Going home to mom?”

“Yeah, you just got a good preview of my conversation with her,” she reaches up and touches Blake’s cheek, “except I don’t think she’s going to be nearly as understanding as you were. Thanks.”

“Sure. Stop by when you get back. We’ll...we’ll talk.”

“I’d like that. Bye, Blake.”

Soon she is back in her house, packed and ready to go.

This is gonna be hard. For me. She has called me a God and meant it, so I have to handle this carefully. I have to expose some weakness.

«“Cindi, before you go, there are some things we have to talk about.“»

“Of course, my Lord. Anything you need.”

«“I’ve never been to Themiscyra before.“»

“Well, My Lord, it’s really not that different from any other small city in Greece—”

«“No, baby bitch, you don’t understand. I’ve been observing you for almost your entire time as a superheroine, all 72 years. I’ve followed you everywhere you’ve ever gone, except there. When you cross the boundary of the glamour enchantment, I lose contact with you.“»

“Oh...OH! Please, My Lord! Don’t make me go! I—”

«“Shh, Calm down. Now that you and I are close, intimate, connected, I have every confidence that I will be able to hold onto you across the boundary. But I don’t know that. Since I found out that Themiscyra was there I’ve tried all sorts of ways to get in. All with no success. But, without getting too, um, technical, the various modes of failure give me reason to believe that this attempt will succeed.“»

“My Lord, um, I sense a ‘but’ coming.”

«“Right. If I fail...if I lose contact with you, I want you to leave Themiscyra once a day, if possible, to report in with me, even just an hour or even a half hour will do.“»

“My Lord...I need more than a half hour a day with you. I need it.“

«“I swear, Cindi, if all you can give me is a half hour, I will fill that half hour with a full DAY’S worth of pleasure.“»

Uncertainly she consents, “Yes...My Lord.” She doesn’t really have any other choice.

«“But we won’t worry about it unless we need to. And we are going to cross that boundary with EVERY CONFIDENCE that it will work, that I will still be with you afterward.“»

“My Lord...how...long have you known about Themiscyra?”

«“72 years, baby bitch. Ever since a certain Greek superheroine came to the attention of an RAF Air Marshall in Crete. I was monitoring him to keep track of Nazi expansion. I could have tracked the Nazis directly, but I always felt like I needed a bath after reading Nazi minds.“»

“I see, almost from the beginning then.”

«“Yes.“»

“Why didn’t you take me then, My Lord? Why did you make me wait seven decades to find my real purpose in life?”

«“I had to trap you. I had to tame you. I had to do it all without BREAKING your mind and driving you mad. I’ve done this before. You had to believe it was a dream, until you no longer wanted it to be a dream. To believe the dream, you had to believe that the person bowing to me was really you. That means I needed Annette. I had to do it the way I did it to TEACH you. Had I done it any other way you would be a drooling idiot or a soulless robot. I needed to change you. But I needed you to still be YOU at the end.“»

“So it’s just one more example of my pride, my haughty arrogance, keeping me from being the person I was meant to be.”

«“Yes, little cocksucker. It is.“»

“My life was a waste until I met you, My Lord.”

«“That’s okay, baby. Your life’s not over yet.“»

“So...Annette, My Lord?”

«“Specially bred to be your doppelganger. You had to believe it was you in the dream, so I had to breed your twin. I was prepared for it to take as long as three hundred years, but I got lucky in only the third generation. You’re worried about those seventy wasted years? It could have been much, much longer. Come on, sweet tits, let’s go talk to your mama.“»

She signals for teleport. We depart.

Banshee, the Wraith’s young “associate” (Blake hates the word “sidekick”. He thinks it’s demeaning. He’s probably right.), is duty officer today. All business, she takes Majestic Woman’s desired placement—3,000 feet above the island of Crete—and places her there with nary a stray word exchanged. She picked Crete. I seem to have stirred up some memories. Good.

April 30, 1941: It was going to be the scariest night of Kynthia’s life, but it ended up being the most thrilling instead. Ten days before, she had saved a pilot from the wreckage of his Whitley bomber, over the outcries of her sisters to let him die. She had nursed him back to some semblance of health single-handedly, over the active hindrance of her own mother.

Now their patience, Hippolyta’s, the Amazon Queendom’s, was at an end. He had to go. But outside of the glamour of Themiscyra, in his current state, he would have no hope of evading the Nazis. So Kynthia was going with him.

Her own mother called her a fool, blasphemously sneering at “Aphrodite’s curse of great compassion”. She followed Kynthia and the pilot all the way to the glamour’s edge, ignoring the man and lambasting her daughter. In fact, it seemed like half of Themiscyra had followed them, carrying torches, guns, and rifles, bound and determined that the evil man would leave NOW.

For his part, the pilot was silent. His brief time among the legendary Amazons has taught him better; his opinion was less than nothing. Besides, Kynthia had told him to conserve his energy for her insane plan to get him back to his base in Crete.

In fact if he had piped up, Kynthia was certain he would have added his voice to Hippolyta’s. He had already told Kynthia in no uncertain terms that she was going to get herself killed trying to save him. But in the end there was nothing he could do to stop her.

Then, there at the edge of the Queendom’s glamour, everything changed. An unnatural hum presaged a day-bright glow, which resolved itself into five heavenly, beautiful, dreamlike figures. Kynthia’s five patron Gods appeared to them all, floating in midair.

The Gods spoke! Kynthia had been chosen by them to carry out the Gods’ mission in the world of Men. She would be given new gifts of great power, to use in the service of the Gods. Kynthia is awestruck. She really WAS the “child of destiny” all along.

Seeing the scene now in Cindi’s mind, I can see that it’s just so much bullshit. The most obvious reason for them to intervene is to prevent “Kynthia” from being captured and tortured by some of the world’s foremost experts in the art, eroding that strong will until she eagerly led them straight into downtown Themiscyra.

It’s all so clear to me. “Why didn’t these ‘Gods’ just kill her then?” you ask. Two reasons. First, the Amazons believe they are a “chosen people” and that among them Kynthia herself is a “child of destiny”. You can’t just go around killing people that YOU YOURSELF set up with such expectations.

Second, fights, insults, and abuse aside, Hippolyta loves her daughter more than life itself. If they wanted to turn the Queen of the Amazons from a devoted thrall into a lifelong enemy, killing Kynthia would be the surest way. Of course, they absolutely DON’T want that. So instead they made a virtue of necessity, and made Kynthia a demigod.

That’s what a demigod is, after all. Just a normal human that the sick bastards have tinkered with. Ares, Hestia, Hades, Heracles, Circe, they were all as human as you once. All were changed on the down low and given some “child of the Gods” backstory. I can read their minds. I know what I’m talking about.

And on that fateful day they were doing it to Kynthia, but they were not doing it “on the down low”. They were going to make Kynthia a demigoddess in front of Hippolyta and half the Queendom. This was gonna require all the pomp and circumstance of an imperial coronation.

Hera approached and solemnly bestowed upon Kynthia the strength of the Gods.

Hermes gifted her with the Gods’ own ability to ascend into the heavens, to fly.

Artemis gave her the senses of the Gods: eyesight keener than any eagle’s, hearing more acute than any wolf’s.

Athena gave her the shield of invulnerability that protects the Gods from harm.

And Aphrodite? Well, Aphrodite gave Kynthia her uniform....

It’s okay, have your laugh; I can wait until you’re done...Ready?...I see...No, no. Take your time...There. Done? Alright. The uniform—or I should say uniforms, for Aphrodite presented her with 5 sets of them—had the most subtle and complex power of them all.

Aside from providing top-notch eye candy, the uniform casts a glamour over her that identifies her uniquely. When she is not wearing the uniform, no one who does not already know her identity can tell that she is the Gods’ chosen hero. Because of this she has never had to expend any effort at all maintaining a secret identity. The uniform does it for her.

The “goddess” called it “the Gods’ own gift of revealed concealment”. These guys are good at “concealment”. They’ve been hiding a whole city for over 3,000 years.

The ceremony went on for several hours. The Gods had to explain to Kynthia the ins and outs, the intricacies of each gift, including her loss of power under male enslavement, which always confused me. I can only imagine they threw it into the mix to keep her from getting too cocky. Then they made her demonstrate for the assembled crowd. The demo, not so incidentally, gave her some valuable practice time.

Of course, there was no longer any hurry. Now there was plenty of time to get the injured pilot back to Crete. When it was finally time to go, the newly minted heroine easily lifted the awestruck man and carried him away, holding him close and tight.

Somewhere over Greece west of Athens the flight lieutenant found he could no longer restrain nor hide his gallant reflex. To both of their surprise, his brave little soldier standing at attention was not an unwelcome companion. Passing over the Isthmus of Corinth she lowered the Shield of Athena, and other more conventional barriers to entry, both for the first time ever. Somewhere over Peloponnesia between Isthmia and Sparta, she lost that which can never be recovered but nonetheless was of no value to her. Somewhere over the Mediterranean Sea north of Crete, after more than 2,400 years of life, she finally experienced la petite mort.

After she set down her charge, her lover, in front of an astonished guard, she saw him for the last time, being carried away in the back of a small truck. Soon another truck took her in a different direction.

Three weeks later, while government scientists in Arizona were still endlessly poking her, prodding her, testing her, her RAF pilot lover died in the first wave of paratrooper assaults when the Nazis attacked Crete.

But meanwhile back in the present, we are now approaching Themiscyra. Cindi is done with her melancholy memories. Cindi is focused on the present. Cindi is nervous. She knows she must obey me, but she desperately needs to stay connected to me. The risk of losing me is driving her nuts. I reassure her as best I can; I really am confident that I can stay with her this time.

Looking through her eyes I see the city laid out before me. This is no different than the other times. I am seeing what she sees, and her eyes are unaffected by the concealing glamour. She’s decided to come in from the east to avoid “Stinky Pond”, a hot sulfur spring on the southwest side of the city. Even from here we can see the shimmery column of hot moist stench that rises from the spring. Yes, I’m glad we went the other way.

Now we are at the boundary, and I feel it trying to rip me from her. She feels it too; she holds her head and screams. But continues. Her Lord demands it of her. Soon the tension ebbs. I’m still connected. I’m inside one of my enemy’s most guarded secrets, for the first time since I found out about it.

«Are...are you there, My Lord?»

«“Yes, baby bitch, it was a rough ride, but we made it. We hung onto each other. We FUCKING made it. I couldn’t have done it without you. Good girl!“»

She shivers with joy at my praise. «Good girl. Reward!» Suddenly she can’t wait until bedtime.

We left before 9am Arizona time, which puts us in Themiscyra just before 7pm. We fly low over the city quietly, but Amazons are nothing if not preternaturally alert. Many of her sisters look up, and seeing their unofficial ambassador to “Man’s World”, the Chosen One of the Gods, they smile and wave.

Cindi takes little notice until she sees a cop directing traffic. It’s a busy intersection, and the traffic light is out. But with Cynthia’s Artemis-sharpened vision the identity of the cop is unmistakable. Cindi swoops down behind her, grabs her across her ample midsection, and spins her around like a rag doll.

“What the f—", the cop starts, and then realizes who it must be, “KYNTHIA! Put me down, you whelp!” Of course, the actual words they speak are no doubt Greek to you. But your humble translator lives only to serve. You can pay me later.

“Not until you say ‘Please’, Kalliope!”

“Alright, alright. PLEASE put me down, guttersnipe!”

There are only ten years’ difference in their ages out of literal thousands, but Kalliope still holds it over her. She and Kalliope have been friends since they were both junior officers together. Kalliope was “Porthos” to Cindi’s “d’Artagnan”, an apt metaphor that has only been possible for her since she read Dumas’ first edition of his iconic classic 150 years or so ago. Alas, poor “Athos” and “Aramis” have both long since passed away, centuries before Alexandre Dumas was a gleam in his mother’s eye.

Traffic is snarled. Horns are honking. Cindi puts her down. Kalliope straightens her tunic and tries to untangle the mess that has built up in only a few seconds. Greek drivers are not exactly the most courteous in the world. Amazons even less so. Over the roar of the traffic. Kalliope shouts, “So what brings you to town, Oh Chosen One?”

Raising her own voice to be heard, Cindi says, “You know, the usual. It’s been a while since I checked in. Thought I should. Why are you directing traffic? Surely you have enough seniority to be a senior detective at the very least.”

“I just got back a little over a year ago. I was up for city service again, and I intentionally picked something I could sleepwalk through. I was tired.”

“I bet! You’ll have to tell me about the Antarctic trip.”

“We pulled up a core almost four kilometers long, Kynthia. FOUR FREAKING KILOMETERS. We hit liquid water that hasn’t touched atmosphere since the before hominids came down out of the trees. It was amazing.”

“Clearly this story needs more time to age if you can tell me the whole thing in one breath.”

“Meet me at Nike’s Wings, and I’ll SHOW you how well this story has aged. First round on you.”

“I don’t know. I may not be able to make it tonight. You know how it is.”

“Yeah. I guess you better check in with the Mom-ster. The sooner the better. It’s the only hope I’ll have of seeing your adorable little mug at all while you’re here.”

Cindi’s face becomes a stoic mask. She takes a fighting stance. “Foul varlet, Koala-pe! How dareth thou besmirch the name of thine own fair Queen. En Garde!”

“What, ho! Doth thou assault this officer of the law? I shall clap thee in irons, trollop!”

“Yeah. That’ll have to wait until later. I’ll bet she already knows I’m here.”

“Scoot. Scoot. You know where to find me.”

And then she is in the air again, heading straight for “city hall”.

There are three tiers of gatekeepers in front of the “Mayor’s Office”, but Cindi is ushered through each without delay.

Well, at the first desk she had stopped herself, dropping off her rucksack. The functionary assured Cindi that she would see that it got to her room.

So after being waved through two more doors she finally enters her mother’s office. Her mother, Queen Hippolyta, is attired in a smart business suit that would have received an approving nod from Hillary Clinton or Condi Rice. She is already standing, smiling, walking around the desk to offer her daughter a hug.

“Well, it’s about TIME. Did you disrupt the whole city before coming to see me? Or just the one intersection?“

“I love you too, Mamá. I see the place is still standing. ‘You lead your people with wisdom and courage.’”

“Sometimes I wonder...Oh, you look wonderful. How could such beauty have come from me?”

“Well, according to you—”

“Shh. Just let me look at you for a bit.” Holding her at arms length, she does just that with a beaming smile.

«“Well, this seems to be going pretty well.“»

«It always STARTS OUT like this, My Lord.»

Against my better judgment, I loosen my deathgrip on Cindi’s mind and risk a probe of Hippolyta. Ooooooo. Storm clouds on the horizon.

“So, Kynthia, what tears my daughter away from the mission of the Gods?” That was a slap, believe it or not.

Cindi is already on the defensive, but tries to ignore it. Hippolyta thinks her daughter never should have left the Queendom. Having her nose rubbed in it by the Gods themselves didn’t make Hippolyta any more happy about it either.

“Mamá, I...I wish to return the tiara,” Cindi cuts to the chase, removing the symbolic crown from her head. «Let’s get it over with.»

“I never gave you that tiara.“

“Yes, Mamá, I know. But the Gods don’t exactly visit me whenever I want. So I am turning it over to the next authority figure in that chain of command.“

Looking at Cindi’s collar, Hippolyta is suddenly boiling with rage. Through clenched teeth she asks, “You wish to exchange a symbol of leadership...for a symbol of-of SLAVERY?”

“Yes, Mamá.”

“WHATEVER FOR?”

“I’m on love, Mamá.”

“OH, GODS! NOT ANOTHER MAN LIKE THAT...THAT...” She begins waving her arm dismissively, “SIDNEY!“

Now Cindi goes off track. “His name was SIMON, Mother, SIMON TREMAINE. And he was a hero. A brave ‘MAN’.”

“He didn’t seem so brave when he knocked down half of Themiscyra.”

“His plane crashed into ONE EMPTY BUILDING, not half of town, and the only reason it did that was because the glamour made it look like he was coming down into an open field. WE killed his whole crew; he did nothing to hurt US.”

“Even so, you should have left him to his fate. HE WAS A MAN.”

“He was a warrior and a hero on the side of the ANGELS, Mother.”

“Angels? Are you a Christian now?”

“It’s just a metaphor, Mother, and you damn well know it.”

“Watch your tone with me, ‘Chosen One’.”

“AAARRRRRGH. WHY DO WE DO THIS? EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. I don’t want to fight with you, Mamá!“

“Then don’t tell me you’re in love with a mortal. Show me that you have some brains, Kynthia.”

“I’m NOT in love with a mortal.“

“But you said—”

“I’m in love with a GOD.”

That stops Hippolyta cold. This is serious business. These people are personally acquainted with Gods. They don’t bandy the term around lightly. Hippolyta pauses and considers her next words...carefully, “Not one of our Gods, I take it?“

“No, Mother. Not one of ours.”

More silence. “And this...God...loves you?”

Cindi puts a thumb under her collar and thrusts it forward.

“He owns me. I love Him and worship Him, and He owns me and guides me.”

Hippolyta, possibly the fiercest woman in all of history, slumps back against her desk and hides the tears welling in her eyes. She despairs. She knows that look in her daughter’s eye. Hippolyta is defeated. All of her hopes and dreams for her daughter lie in ashes. Her daughter has found her true calling, her purpose in life. And it is not in Themiscyra.

“I’ve waited so long. And now...now it will never be.”

“Waited? Waited for WHAT, Mother?”

“FOR YOU TO TAKE OVER, DAMMIT! You’ve been ready for fifteen hundred years. Do you hate your own people so much?”

Cindi is in shock. She honestly had no idea that this is what they’ve really been fighting about all those years. “Mother, I would never...You are the Queen of the Amazons. You are the only leader we’ve ever had. Why would I...How would I ever challenge your leadership? Mother, you’re my queen too. I’m loyal to you. I always have been.“

“Nonetheless, you are a better leader than I am. You have been since...since before the fall of Rome. You could have come to me. You could have demanded your birthright. You could have, should have, been the one behind this desk.“

“And you would have, what, just retired?“

“Oh, my lovely daughter, my Kynthia. I would have given you anything you needed. I would have supported you in every way that I could.” But in her mind I do see her retiring. Leaving the Queendom. Seeking out...Heracles? Revenge after more than three thousand years?

Oh, wait. In her mind she sees Heracles: the madman, the slave master, the rapist, the...the WHAT?

«“Baby bitch, MAKE her tell you about the slave years. Make her tell you about Heracles. Right now. You won’t regret it.“»

“Mamá, tell me about the slave years. Tell me about Heracles. Tell me everything.“

“What? Have the Gods given you the gift of clairvoyance now? I was just thinking about him.”

“Just tell me, Mamá.”

To tell you about Heracles (says Hippolyta), I have to tell you about me. About us. About the Amazons. I have to tell you the story that we older ones have never told you younger ones. The story of our shame.

Themiscyra was not always a friendly place for women. My birth name was not “Hippolyta”, it was “Semele”. It means “from the dirt” or “from hell” depending on the context. It wasn’t a very flattering name in either context, but all the girl children were given names like that.

And that wasn’t all. As soon as any girl child was old enough to toddle, she was...I was, forced to wear a burden on my back. If there was actually something to be carried from one place to another, that was the burden. But if not, it was a bag of rocks. Always your burden was big enough that you could barely stand up under it, no matter how weak or how strong you were.

The burden worked like shackles, like fetters. Kynthia, you’ve been in the field for long marches, you know what it’s like to stand up in the morning with a heavy rucksack and not take it off until you lie down to sleep at night. After several days’ long march, what happens the first time you try to walk without your burden?...That’s right. You fall flat on your face. You can’t find your balance, at least for a while.

Now imagine that you were NEVER without your burden. That you wore it from waking to sleeping, from birth to death. You’d never be able to stand, much less walk, much less run away, without it. And with it you could barely walk at all.

Escape was out of the question. None of us ever even dared dream of it. With no hope of escape for us, the men could be as cruel as they liked. They treated us like animals. They even called us “pack horses”. Women were only good for endless labor until we were old enough to fuck, and then we were only good for two things. As soon as a child was weened, boy or girl, it was taken from it’s mother and raised either to be a slave master or a slave.

As I was set to enter my eighteenth year, I could see that I would soon be put on the auction block to be bred like a prize cow. I prayed to the Gods night after night to deliver me from my fate, although I had no idea what other life a woman might lead.

And then, one night, the Gods visited me to answer my prayer. Hermes himself wrapped a glowing belt around my waist. He told me to take off my burden and stand. I knew that it was impossible, but I could not refuse a God. I stood without my burden. I walked without my burden. And then...and then I ran. I ran to the forest. I was free.

Every day the men came looking for me, but the Gods hid me. Every day the Gods provided for me. Wild vegetables. Berries. Game that fell dead at my feet. Every day I tried to teach myself to fight. Remembering the lessons I had seen the men giving the boys as I bore my burdens from place to place.

I dreamed of freeing my sisters. I began to sneak back into the town at night. I would come to a woman, any woman. I would tell her that the Gods had taught me to stand, and that she could do the same too. She would rise holding my hands, first leaning on them, then touching them, then letting go and crying with joy, then holding my hand again as we ran off to the woods.

Within a month there were 50 of us living in the woods, sheltered from the eyes of men. That was when we went on the offensive, attacking with only stout sticks, freeing our sisters in broad daylight. They had better weapons. They had horses, real horses. They had generations of training. But they could not stand against us.

Their “pack horses” were disappearing in droves, and they knew that I was to blame. They called me “Hippolyta”, “she who frees the horses”. It was a curse on their lips, but it was a song on mine. Soon we all adopted new names, but my name, the new name that they gave me, was the one that struck fear in the hearts of the men of Themiscyra.

By the time we were 300 strong, we were stealing their weapons and horses too. By the time we were 400 strong we had driven them out of town altogether and reclaimed our homes, our lives.

The diaspora of the men of Themiscyra spread our fame far and wide. They not only gave me my name, they gave us all our collective name: “Amazon”, meaning “without a breast”.

You see, by the time we were ready to attack them force-against-force, we were all fully-armed and well-drilled in the use of all our weapons: broadsword, short sword, axe, short pike, and bow-and-arrows, all either on foot or on horse-back.

It was our finest marks-woman, Xena (Gods. You know, Kynthia, how she hates that TV show. She’s short, fair-haired, and pale-skinned, with a kind and sweet disposition. Deadly aim, though, at any distance, with anything shot, thrown, or launched.)...Anyway it was Xena who came up with the idea of strapping down one breast so that we could hold the bow closer for better aim.

The foolish men thought we had cut off the offending organ and named us as such. When we saw the fear that the idea engendered in our enemies though, we embraced it fully. Some even dribbled animal blood on the strapped-down side of their tunics before battle, just to unnerve the fools.

But what man (Hippolyta spits the word) can resist the opportunity to tame an uppity woman? The original men of the town had departed, but others came. First they came singly, then they came in pairs, then they came in raiding parties, then they came in armies.

We never lost a single woman in battle. Not one. And we held Themiscyra for over twenty years. None of us ever seemed to age, except the children. And they stopped aging when they reached their full adult stature. By the time we faced our ultimate test, we were just over 500 strong. All adults. All strong and whole and able-bodied. All battle-tested warriors.

And that is when the news reached us. Some man, some king, had commanded the great hero Heracles to bring him the belt of Hippolyta. Well, of course, many long years before, I had stopped wearing it except on ceremonial occasions. I certainly no longer needed it to stand.

But...HERACLES. His exploits were the stuff of legend. It would be our greatest test yet. We doubled our sentries and our night watch. Sure enough, after only a week, one of our advance scouts found Heracles encamped on the other side of the forest, with only twenty men!

We were overjoyed! It was simply not possible that such a small contingent could defeat us, even if the twenty-first was the “Destroyer of the Hydra”. But they never came any closer. After two weeks we began to wonder what their game was. We soon found out.

I was reading alone in my private chamber one afternoon, when I heard a noise. I turned to find Heracles standing in my doorway. His eyes were mad. He was tall and fierce and powerful. I have no idea how he made it past our sentries in broad daylight, but he was certainly not going to take me without a fight!

He never struck, never even threatened me. Instead he knelt before me, he begged me to hear him out, to listen his sad tale, to feel his tortured soul. Ignoring the belt hanging on the wall altogether, he begged me to accompany him back to his camp. There was something about him. I agreed. Somehow we slipped past the sentries undetected, he for the second time. I still don’t know how he did it.

In his tent he fed me a fabulous dinner that he prepared himself. We shared his finest wine. He told me his story. How in his madness he had killed his own family. How in his grief the Gods had punished him, demanding that he perform mighty heroic labors for an unworthy king.

He begged me not to let this come to a fight. He begged me to give him the belt, the symbol of my authority. I was moved. He was a tortured soul, a man of peace forced to fight over and over again. I was ready to assent, to give him my precious God-gifted belt, just to help ease his suffering.

Then suddenly the sound of hoof-beats, hundreds of hoof-beats, could be heard approaching the camp. You see, someone had somehow noticed my absence that day. They had come to the conclusion that Heracles had kidnapped me. Some say Hera herself spread that rumor, but no Amazon ever said that.

Soon the whole Amazon nation was surrounding the encampment. 500 surrounding 21, 22 including myself. Heracles’ madness suddenly possessed him. He accused me of orchestrating an ambush, of attacking under a flag of truce.

I protested my innocence, but he didn’t listen. He grabbed me by the hair and dragged me out of the tent. His mad eyes seemed to glow. Somehow I couldn’t fight back. That scared me even more than Heracles’s sudden violence.

And then...and then it was all over. All 500 of my warriors, my Amazons, dismounted from their horses. Then they disarmed themselves, placing all their weapons on the ground in front of them. Then each one fell to the ground and curled up, each in a shivering, sobbing, and wailing ball. Heracles’ men unpacked huge cases of manacles, fetters, and chains.

They moved among my warriors, taking their proffered weapons, shackling and chaining their unresisting forms. They staked the entire Amazon Queendom to the ground, and then...then they went to bed. Why not? They certainly no longer had anything to fear.

Heracles made sure that I had seen the whole thing. Then he ripped off all my clothes and threw them into the camp fire. He dragged me back to his tent, screaming my horror at the nightmare defeat of my unbeatable army. That night he used my virgin body, over and over, my most bitter defeat, my greatest shame...I liked it.

Make no mistake! I feared for my life the whole time. I demanded he release me, but still I came. I pleaded for him to stop, but still I came. I shouted my rage and horror at the continued betrayal of my own body, but still I came. By morning I was riding on top of his prone form; I was fucking him, and still I came.

In the morning they lined up all of my warriors on their knees, fettered, manacled, and chained. Heracles did not even bother to bind me. I knew there was no escape. I was glued to his side, hugging his leg as I sunk to the ground naked and crying.

I watched aghast as the men began divvying up their spoils by rank. Heracles’ lieutenant first, then the next in command, and so on. Each one walking up and down the line, and choosing a woman. Then after the last man had chosen they began again, each choosing a second, then at third, then....

In the end, Heracles’ top five men each had twenty-six slaves. The rest each had twenty-five. Heracles claimed only me, but in truth he used any woman he wanted. No one would deny the “Destroyer of the Amazons”.

He went away to take my magic belt to his king. In his absence, I became the twenty-sixth bitch of his number six man. When Heracles came back, which was often during his remaining labors, he would reclaim me from his underling.

It was the hell of old Themiscyra all over again. Even worse! The women, myself included, became servile cowards, each willing to do anything to curry favor with her master, each betraying her sisters to become “most favored” of her group of 25 or 26 slaves.

Each of us soon learned that by being a willing and eager fuck she could earn some respite from endless back-breaking labor. Some of us even fell in love with our captors.

I despaired daily. I cursed the Gods. I suppose it was a small mercy that none of us ever became pregnant, although our masters berated us as worthless, barren whores.

And then, just as suddenly as it began, it ended. Five years to the day after our capture. Heracles and his men brought us all to the edge of Themiscyra, released us from our chains, and walked out of town. We could see them, in a daze, trying to figure out where they were, trying to find the city of slaves that should have been right in their plain sight. Eventually, all of them, even the great Heracles, gave up and left.

The last to leave was actually Heracles’ right-hand man, Theseus. Over time he had come to love his number-one slave, my sister Antiope, the very first woman chosen in that ill-fated lineup years before.

As it so happened, she returned his love. He stood at the edge of the city, unable to see it, and wailed for his Antiope, his lost love. We tried to restrain her, fearing that if she went to him that the magic bubble would pop and he would see us, and enslave us, again. But eventually she escaped us. Or we took pity on her and let her go; I can’t remember.

She ran to him. Our fears were unfounded. From his perspective Antiope just appeared out of thin air. They fell into each others arms. They smiled. They kissed. They departed together.

Years later I learned that they had married. However, she never aged. She never bore him a child. She watched him grow to hate her as he grew bald and fat and she stayed young and beautiful. Eventually he cast her out and she returned to her home, to her real home, to her sisters.

After Heracles and his men were forced to leave, the Gods continued to bless us. From time to time they would bring us young abused girls, girls who had been beaten and battered, but who nonetheless had not been broken by their abuse. The Gods had us raise them as Amazons.

They also saw to our needs. If we needed quarried stone or wood for building, someone brought it. If we needed fabrics, someone brought them. If our crops failed, someone brought food. They didn’t know they were in Themiscyra. They didn’t even realize they were dealing with women, often calling one or another of us “Sir”. If we tried to pay they insisted that we already had, and refused to take a “double payment”. We were hidden in plain sight, and blessed by the magic of the Gods.

It took us a long time to learn to trust each other again, but eventually we did. We regained our battle prowess, although it was not really needed. No one could find us to attack us.

Eventually, out of boredom some of us began to volunteer in other armies, especially if we believed their cause to be just. That is how your Aunt Penthesilea and many others came to die in the Trojan War. She wanted to defend the fair Helen from being forced to return to that loveless marriage with Menelaus, King of Sparta.

But anyway, that’s another story, and I am at the end of mine. We never age. Our numbers grow as the Gods augment them. And here we are today.

“And what happened to Heracles, Mamá?”

“Kynthia, I told you. He left.”

“And you never saw him again?”

“Um...”

“MOTHER!”

“Okay. You must keep what I am about to say in the strictest confidence. You must!...Many, many years later, centuries later, long after everyone thought Heracles was dead, the Gods helped him find his way back into the city. In the dead of night he sneaked into my private chambers yet again.

“He bowed at my feet, crying, begging me to forgive him for the madness that caused him to enslave the Amazons, to enslave me. It had taken him years but he had finally reined in that madness, leaving him with regret after regret. However, so much time had passed. There was no way to make amends for so many of his wrongs.

“But he knew that the Amazons still existed, as young and strong as the day he enslaved them. No one could find them though. Night after night he prayed to the Gods, until finally Aphrodite had mercy on him, and guided his steps to Themiscyra. Kynthia...He pleaded, he cried, he prostrated himself to me, begging me to forgive him.”

“And did you? Did you forgive him, Mother.”

Suddenly in Hippolyta’s eyes the love for her daughter shines like never before. “Oh, my darling, darling Kynthia. I did so much, much more than forgive him. As I recall it was some 2,483 years ago. About nine months before your birthday.”

Cindi is stunned. Cindi is aghast. Cindi is speechless. ALL the Amazons believed Hippolyta’s story that the Gods had impregnated her. What would they do if they found out that their most hated enemy, the man who had enslaved them, was the father of the beloved Princess, the Chosen of the Gods?

She knew that this was a secret that she would have to carry to her grave, a secret that could unravel the whole Queendom. But that was not the foremost thought in her mind.

“I have a father.”

“Yes. You have a father, and your name has a meaning. Heracles was praying on holy Mount Kynthos when Aphrodite answered him and brought him to me. But, Kynthia, NO ONE can ever know but the two of us. Not your friends. Not your ‘God’. Not Heracles himself.“

“Yes, Mamá. I understand. I do. No one will ever know.”

Well, of course, I do know. But it’s okay. I’m pretty good at keeping secrets.

“But Mamá...He didn’t stay?”

Hippolyta’s shoulders shiver. She is crying openly now. She shakes her head sadly. “In the morning, h-he was gone. He never came back.”

They fall into each other’s arms. They cry. After almost 2500 years, they finally understand each other.