VELVETEEN vs. The Consequences of Her Actions
The transition between the real world and the Crystal Glitter Unicorn Cloud Castle was usually smooth and easy, accompanied by rainbows, sparkles, and sometimes a thematic musical number.
Not this time. Velveteen tumbled out of the mirror and into a forward roll, barely managing to get her elbows into place to keep herself from landing on her own head.
She heard rather than saw Action Dude come through behind her; from the way his grunt cut off, he hadn’t been as good about recognizing the need for a recovery roll as she had.
Oh, well. He’d probably be fine, and if he wasn’t, the Princess had an excellent in-house medical team.
The fact that they were all rodents was beside the point.
“Oof,” said Action Dude. “Did you get the number of that truck?”
“There was no truck, sugar,” said a sweet Southern voice. There was an edge to it that made Velveteen uncomfortable. The Princess wasn’t supposed to sound like she was inching up on supervillain. The Princess was supposed to be the best of them.
Velveteen raised her head and found herself looking at a pair of polished black leather boots decorated with red filigrees.
The stitching formed roses, not apples. That was a relief.
The apple motif was absolutely a supervillain thing, and if the Princess ever crossed that line, she wasn’t going to be coming back.
Some things couldn’t be forgiven by the children of the world, no matter how much they wanted to.
Slowly, Velveteen tilted her head back, following the boots to a pair of red velvet trousers under a red coat that belled out around the Princess’s legs like the skirt of a ball gown, leaving her with a wider range of motion than her norm, while still keeping her firmly within her fairy tale standards.
Her bodice was sweetheart-cut, trimmed with garnets and diamonds, and her buttery blonde hair was piled on her head like she was getting ready for her own wedding.
The expression on her face was torn between relief and sorrow.
It was such a perfect division that it was painful to look at.
That, too, was part of the fairy tale. Only in a story could someone’s expression be such a flawless summation of their story.
“Vel, honey?” said the Princess. “Is that really you?” She knelt, offering Velveteen her hand. It was gloved in velvet, but that couldn’t stop it from trembling.
“I think so.” Velveteen took the Princess’s hand, letting the other woman pull her to her feet.
“The holidays bounced me around pretty hard, but I think they—oof!” She squeaked as the Princess abruptly jerked her into a hard hug, knocking the wind out of her.
The Princess was always taller than she was, and with the amount of both weight and muscle tone Vel had lost in the Seasonal Lands, there was no contest.
After it became clear that the Princess wasn’t going to let go on her own, she tapped the other woman’s shoulder and wheezed, “Cara. Can’t…breathe…”
“Aw, shit, honey, I’m sorry!” The Princess thrust her out to arm’s-length, keeping hold of her shoulders. “I just never thought I was going to see you again.” There were tears forming at the corners of her eyes, and somehow that was the most alarming thing of all.
“What the hell happened?” Velveteen gripped the Princess’s forearms, trying to take some comfort in the contact. There didn’t seem to be much comfort to be found. “Aaron told me some of it, but he—”
“Villain!” The shriek came from the left. Velveteen turned, but not fast enough to get more than an impression of a swiftly-moving blur heading for the spot where Action Dude had fallen.
Velveteen didn’t think. She just reacted.
The Crystal Glitter Unicorn Cloud Castle was constructed from the dreams and beliefs of children everywhere, and children everywhere apparently thought that any fairy tale princess worth her salt would do a hell of a lot of decorating in marble statues and topiary.
A dragon made out of thorny hedge lurched into motion, grabbing Victory Anna by the collar and hoisting her into the air before she could pull the trigger.
She tried anyway, and her shot went wide, vaporizing a stained glass window.
The Princess sighed. Heavily. “Too damn much, that’s what,” she said, and that was the perfect answer, and it wasn’t an answer at all.
* * *
In the matter of controlling the world’s superhuman population, many things have been tried.
Common power sources have been tracked down, documented, and, when possible, suppressed; civics classes have been expanded to include explanations as to why wishing one’s neighbors into a demonic cornfield is not good citizen behavior; laws have been passed.
In the end, however, public opinion has proven to be the best mechanism for exacting this control.
Despite the “super,” people with powers are still only human, and like all humans, they seek social contact and approval.
Their desire to be liked is their greatest weakness.
Comic books, graphic novels, and popular television shows have been deployed with great success to keep the superhuman population on the effectively “straight and narrow.” No one likes the villain, after all.
When the world is rooting for the heroes, who would voluntarily choose the other side?
But more insidious, and more effective, is rumor.
Gossip and hearsay are slippery weapons, best deployed by the experts—and those with reason to attempt control of the superhuman population have had more than enough time to perfect their craft.
Take, for example, Velveteen. A relatively low-ambition superhuman, she seemed content to disappear from the public consciousness, becoming a footnote in the history of The Super Patriots, Inc.
The narrative supported by the corporation, however, did not allow for this quiet exit; if she was not a hero, she needed to be a villain.
Years of careful propaganda resulted in her public approval rating entering the negative numbers during a time when no one should even have remembered that she existed.
As a consequence, when she did return, the general populace was primed to view her as a threat—something which made it easier for the superhuman registration and recruitment laws to pass.
Had Velveteen been left alone, had The Super Patriots, Inc.
been willing to admit that she was a lost cause, would the animus regulation laws have been able to pass?
The world had been prepared to see her as the bad guy in any situation she happened to become involved with…
and when that situation included publicly defeating the only other person known to have her specific power set, it became easy to see that power set as somehow innately corrupt.
It is possible that, in their handling of the Velveteen matter, The Super Patriots, Inc.
sowed the seeds of their own eventual downfall.
Rather than entering a period of rebuilding after Supermodel’s defeat, they were thrown straight onto the defensive, and were unable to recover.
And then there is the matter of the magical heroes, of the seasonal heroes, of the ones who manifest ideas, ideals, and most of all, opinions.
Jolly Roger, the living human manifestation of the concept of heroic piracy, was very different in our time than he would have been during the time of the East India Company.
Fewer throats were slit; more baths were taken.
So what, then, happens when the great machine of gossip and public opinion is turned against someone whose powers stem from such a well?
How much can a hero change without “hero” ceasing to be the operative word?
* * *
The sound of shouting attracted Yelena to the arrival garden.
She stepped through the space between two decorative hedges, wearing a black ball gown trimmed with rainbows, and stopped, blinking at the edifying sight of her lover locked in unceasing battle with two topiary dragons and a large plush unicorn.
The Princess was standing nearby, arms crossed, looking at the fight in disgust. Action Dude was off to one side, looking baffled. And Velveteen—
Velveteen was there, half-crouched behind the Princess, face screwed up in concentration.
Yelena frowned, assessing the fight again.
Torrey wasn’t being hurt by the topiary; they were doing their best to restrain her, and she was shooting them over and over again, sending leaves and twigs raining down around her.
If they’d wanted to, they could have gripped her arms tight enough to make her bleed; they could have stomped on her and broken her bones.
All they were doing was keeping her away from Velveteen.
Vel was playing a defensive game, which was why she was going to lose.
Yelena heaved a sigh that seemed to come all the way up from her toes before walking over to stand next to the Princess, her back to Velveteen. “So,” she said. “You’re back.”
“Uh, yeah,” said Velveteen. “I am.” She paused before asking, “Why is Torrey trying to kill me?”
“She’s not trying to kill you.”
“Oh.”
“First off, she’s probably after Aaron. Secondly, that’s one of her wounding lasers.
It’s set up to cauterize flesh as it cuts.
She’s probably just trying to cut off one of his arms. Maybe both of them.
I mean, technically, she could use it to cut off his head, but she always says that’s not nice, and I try not to discourage her when she finds a point of morality she actually likes. ”
There was an extremely long pause, during which Torrey fired six more times and one of the dragon topiary lost a wing. Finally, Velveteen said, “That’s fucking great, but I still don’t understand.”