Now, I’m not sure what ZAM! is, but it slashed a nasty-looking gash right through the side of the speaker, the smell only minimally better than that of the company that surrounded me. “Too much POW! not enough ZIP!” I told myself as I started in on attempt number two. This time I willed the radiation to a lower level, the mental setting switched from ten to five. Again I felt the familiar sensation, but this time all I got for my troubles was a crackling noise, like static. Again, it was better than the sound the current company was making, but not what I was going for.
Attempt number three was a mixture of POW!, ZAP!, and ZAM!, but this go around I managed to modulate the three, forming, it felt like, a wave of some sort instead of a constant beam. I stared at the speaker, bombarding it with this new sort of ray that shot forth from my eyes.
“Whoa!” I yipped, with a grin. “Look at that!” Suffice it to say, the zombies around me ignored my outbreak, but me, I was looking. Boy howdy was I looking. In fact, I was looking at, in and through, could see every circuit and wire and nut and screw. “Superqueen has fucking X-ray vision!” Gaga was singing my praises overhead. It was a few hundred years too late, but I’d take what I could get.
I rubbed my hands together, happy as a, well, an undead clam as I walked to the door that I’d recently found locked. I probably could’ve blasted it with my max-ten ray, perhaps exploding the lock off altogether, but that would have, of course, called attention to myself. And so I went with option number two, my X-ray vision—take that Charles Atlas!—looking into the door rather than blasting through it. It took a few tries, but soon enough I could actually see inside, the contents of the room instantly revealed.
What I beheld were two sets of items. One side of the smallish room had stacks of boxes all filled with canisters of salt. That made sense. I mean, our enemy had minions, and they all needed salt to remain cognizant. As to the other side of the room, well, that gave me pause. I couldn’t tell for certain I was seeing what I was seeing, basically because none of the boxes had markings, but, based on what was held inside them, which was some sort of powder, it looked like explosive devices.
“Is this what she has planned for Liberty Island?” I asked myself. “Is this what she was doing on the island before she was discovered, before her troops were annihilated?” That explained what she was doing there in the first place, apart from ensuring my inevitable arrival. I mean, it did seem to me like a fool’s mission. And Blondella was lots of things (seriously, lots), but foolish wasn’t one of them. Still, judging by what remained in the coat room, it appeared she hadn’t finished with her mission before she’d been thwarted. Best guess, though, during the melee, the traitor Libetians managed to get a hold of some of this stuff, perhaps had even rigged the island with them already or perhaps had been rigging it all along, on the sly. “Not good,” I lamented. “Not good at all.”
I turned my head-beams off and looked back to the disco. Gaga had given way to Katy Perry—yawn—and my first foray, namely the coat room, had given way to my second, namely my search for Dara and Ricky. After all, I no longer required the elevator to take me to where I needed to be in order to look for them.
And so once again I shot my radioactive load, so to speak, this time up instead of out. It was difficult at first, because I had to adjust for distance and depth, to shoot through the ceiling and up to the next level, but with a few tries I was able to adequately see into the rooms above. The images weren’t as clear as when I was looking a few feet ahead, but Superqueen being, well, super, I could still see what and, more importantly, who was in each of the rooms.
On the catwalk itself there were perhaps fifteen milling zombies, presumably cognizant minions, each waiting for their next command. I shifted my gaze. In one of the rooms, Blondella stood talking to Lola. Too bad I only had video and not audio, but beggars couldn’t be choosers. And, at least, Lola appeared safe and in one piece.
I then shifted my head, the beam slicing through the wall and into the adjoining room, and there, thank God (really, THANK YOU, GOD!), were Dara and Ricky, both tied together and tethered to a table. They were alive—to use the word loosely—and apparently well. That is to say, their heads were still attached to their bodies and their mouths were moving in what seemed like a conversation.
I breathed—again, to use the word loosely—a sigh of relief. We weren’t too late. Not yet. There was still a chance to rescue them, to thwart Blondella’s plans, to return to Utah and save my minions. It was odd to think that, to desire to return to Utah, but we’ll go with that whole beggars/choosers rationale again.
Sad to say, however, there was little time to celebrate my X-ray achievements. I saw their shadows a moment later as they reemerged onto the catwalk. Lola and Blondella were returning. And so I hot-footed it—rather coldly, of course—back to the elevator, staring blankly into space, waiting for their arrival.
Two minutes later, the elevator door parted and out they walked. “Follow me!” shouted Lola, our initial group springing to, um, life. She led and we followed, all of us pouring inside the DJ Booth, Blondella, thankfully, not joining us.