The light of day woke me from a sleep I didn't remember falling into. Slowly, groaning, I pushed myself up.

...Ow, I internally complained. ...I have no idea why my head hurts so much.

I did not feel good, in any sense of the word. When I'd opened my eyes, my brain had felt something like those animal rights videos of chicks being poured into a giant spinning blade of doom. Right now it was closer to a banana in a blender, which- while still awful- was significantly better than a few seconds ago. It wasn't ideal, but hopefully in a few minutes it would pass.

I did still put a hand to my head, trying to blink away my blurry vision… and then paused. My fingers had caught on something smooth, a headband of some sort, and one I certainly didn't remember putting on in the first place.

I ran my fingers along it again, building up a mental image of its shape. There was a pretty obvious conclusion, but it wasn't one I particularly liked.

Nevertheless... it was still correct. Why am I wearing a psychic suppression band? I thought, as an uneasy feeling began to settle in my stomach.

I lifted two fingers to the suppression band's side. I knew what I was looking for- I designed it, after all. There was a dial on the side, with the ridge expected of a dial to actually make it usable. It was on full power, and more than that, it was locked into place- a safety measure so nobody could just (for example) turn off Ace's future version of the headband and give her an aneurysm. Which meant it wasn't just there by default, it was actively doing suppression.

Fortunately, I'd prepared an autoadjust button, just behind the dial itself. I moved my fingers back an inch and pressed it.

There was a sound of humming in my ears as the microcomputer started up. Then- click click click. The dial rotated around for the briefest of moments, and my vision flickered strangely- but just as quickly, it disappeared. I heard the lock come on and the computer stop- and checked it again.

Still ten, I thought. So it's either buggy as hell or I've actually used the chair.

I paused, and checked my memories.

There was an extremely unnerving gap a little before I'd been scheduled to head onto the plane. That went doubly so considering my supposedly-eidetic memory shouldn't have had gaps in the first place! A bout of forgetfulness being directly before using what was effectively a brain surgery machine to channel interdimensional power directly through your synapses would be bad even if your memory was terrible.

To summarise? This was a situation I very much wanted to check up on.

The only reason I didn't completely freak out was that every other memory I had was perfectly fine. To all appearances, it seemed to be a side effect of using the chair. The timeframes matched up with it being a suppression of short term memory, rather than any loss of it... At least, if I was still in the plane.
I checked my surroundings- and my lips tightened. Yep, I thought, definitely not in a plane right now. Which means the gap is hours-long at least.

It was a bedroom- I had been resting in a pleasantly practical-looking bed, with white sheets. The room also looked significantly nicer than a plane's room should have been- in fact, planes generally didn't have bedrooms, let alone ones with a pleasant warm breeze drifting through great big glass windows on the room's sides. The angle of the light certainly suggested it was the day after.

Good news? I probably wasn't brain damaged. Bad news? I'd sat in the chair at some point during the flight- the very start, if I was correct about it blanking out my short-term memory- and had been out for long enough to get put in this comfy bed here without my knowledge.

The most logical explanation, since I wasn't in a hospital bed, was that I'd simply fallen asleep in the chair and somebody else put the band on after noticing that yes, I had spent far too long in there and that yes, it would be bad if the experiment had been misjudged and I created a planet-wide warp storm the moment I woke up.

Of course, there were issues with that. Like the fact that the failsafe wires should have been easily loud enough to wake me up when they stopped if I wasn't completely knocked out. Waking up in an unsupervised bedroom was enough to drive the worst worries from my mind, but when the worst case scenario is a psionically-induced aneurysm? I could definitely do with access to a lab, I thought. Maybe with a supercomputer so I can find stuff to nick from the CIA again.

Unfortunately, there probably weren't any laboratories around here that would let a small child in. And computers capable of hacking governments were right out. I'd brought a homemade laptop, similarly to my smartphone- it would let me cover the basics- but the facilities I'd been planned to have were more of the 'room with a desk and some boxes' sort than what I was used to.

(Admittedly, what I was used to was one of the finest facilities in the world, or at least one of the priciest for the space it took up. But nobody ever said I couldn't complain about lacking it.)

Getting up with only minor wobbling, I headed to the door and checked it. It's not locked, I noted. That was also comforting- it most likely meant we'd reached our intended destination, rather than my headache being from getting conked in the head and transported to some top-secret facility to cut my brain into conveniently-analysable chunks.

The woman who'd brought the island to Lex's attention, one Ms. D. Stattaco, was (in his words) an 'upstart millionaire that, nevertheless, shows promise'. He'd come here on a business trip, and- between discussions- she'd suggested that a private island here might be useful. He hadn't accepted at the time, of course. When the tower went kaput, though? Well, he'd made the local government (or the bribeable folk that composed it, at least) a rather generous offer, and they'd accepted- as people tended to do when Luthor made an offer. Staying with her in particular was mainly for the extra security, rather than any current business transaction with her, though he did think 'we'd get along famously'.

I didn't quite know what that was supposed to mean- but if she could impress him, and he thought we'd get along, then hopefully it wasn't under assumptions we'd get along with kneecapping a bitch rather than discussing a palaeontological article.

The doorhandle was smooth and brassy- I opened the door to check the corridor. And it was... actually quite nice, I had to say. The sort of place I'd actually be willing to stay of my own accord, rather than just staying there because I lived in the place. If anything, it reminded me of Wayne Manor- except where the Manor was a big, warm, cozy, noble place, this was relaxed and open. The walls were white and smooth, and the floors were marble tile. Decorative images hung from the wall, and a smooth, tan carpet covered the floor.

But as much as I would have liked to stand there in awe over a rich person with good taste, I had more important things to do. Such as finding somebody who could confirm precisely what had happened while I was out. Feeling the stress starting to get to me, I began to hum as I stepped into the corridor- "Lonely girl, alone inside her head…"

The building seemed pretty empty, for the most part- a few glances outside revealed that there were in fact some guards, but their attention was directed outwards, not inwards. Nothing out of the ordinary there, either.

I perked my head up at the sound of laughter, down the stairs- I followed it, still humming along, into the lobby. I headed through the wide open space and down the pristine staircases, then turned a corner towards the door of what I deemed to be the kitchen. I could hear male voices talking, plus one with a strong greek accent I presumed would be Ms Stattaco herself.

I passed the threshold, and took a look. Yup, I thought. Those are our bodyguards. Four of them, to be precise- I'd never learned their names, since Lex tended to prefer the 'faceless goon' variety of bodyguard (with Mercy being the notable exception). They'd noticed already, as any good bodyguard did, though they would have been better if they'd remained near my room to explain the situation to me.

The fifth person there- a stocky woman in a fine black dress that neither meshed with the house nor the climate- only saw me when I coughed politely. She looked tall, and strong of build. Her features were equally strong, and I couldn't tell if she was muscular, overweight, or just big-boned.

All in all, she looked much like how I imagined one Mrs Trunchbull- except for her expression, because upon meeting my eyes, she gasped happily. When I met her eyes, they were giddy and wide like saucers, and I gulped at my impending doom.

So that's what he meant. Damn you, Lex, and damn your sense of humour as well. "Umm... Hello, Ms Stattaco," I said.

I had only a moment to react as she charged- and alas, I did not escape in time.

I was suddenly being physically picked up and snuggled to death, and I flailed in dissatisfaction at my predicament. "Oh, you're adorable!" she cried, and for a moment I knew precisely how Lenny's puppy had felt immediately before that one spoiler before that one other spoiler that all high school children know- then she dumped me on my feet, dazed and disoriented, and just as helpless against her subsequent vigorous head-patting as I'd been to the alleged cuddles.

And Lex thinks she's 'promising'! I thought incredulously. At this rate, I wasnever going to get a chance to discuss the events of the flight with my guards- but I sincerely doubted they'd be sniggering as much at the blunt force trauma to the cranium I was currently recieving if they thought anything had gone wrong themselves. "It's a-" I started with gritted teeth, before she bodily picked me up and hefted me onto her shoulder for more of what could debatably be considered hugs. "-a pleasure to meet you, Ms Stattaco."

"Please!" she chortled, in a manner I could only describe as 'mirthy'. "Only my uncles call me that. Just call me Deva, it's what everybody calls me!"

Deva Stattaco. That has to be a villain name, I thought, doing my best to spontaneously manifest heat vision in my snickering, distinctly unprofessional guards' direction. She'll be trying to conquer Themiscyra the first time we go there, I know it.

Right now, though, she was dictating her plans to me- and I hadn't even had the chance to get changed. Honestly, this was the first time that being this small had gone badly for me, crazed lobster-men notwithstanding.

So she was probably a supervillain, and if she wasn't... well, in my mind? She was the foulest of villains already. Being manhandled and- as she'd just started to do- being hauled out of a nice, cool house to go and have a walk (or be carried) down a beach I'd already confirmed as absent of fossils could, to some degree, be considered 'a bad first impression'.

Oh well, I thought glumly, resigned to my predicament already. At least she's apparently competent.

As I was hefted bodily out of the house, my bodyguards followed me- or, more accurately, followed Ms Stattaco- out to the gate. She waved two more bodyguards over. "Queen, Sanchez?" the big woman said. "Could you escort me and this adorable little lady to the beach?"

"Miss Luthor?" asked one of my own- presumably checking to see if he, or any of the others, were actually needed if we were guarded.

Well, the only reason I needed them normally was to keep it from people that I was, in fact, just as bulletproof as that alien who looks exactly like me. So that made it a decision between 'let them follow you down and presumably take pictures for Father to laugh at' or 'keep it as secret as possible and hope the crazy lady doesn't have a camera'.

"Go enjoy yourselves," I grumbled. Because I sure as hell won't. They headed back inside, still somewhat amused at my situation, while I wondered exactly how long this woman could heft me around before her arms got tired.

It was probably going to be quite a while, since the universe- and Ms Stattaco herself, of course- seemed unwilling to let me get back to some nice, calm, sensible mad science and brain surgery. Hopefully my brain wouldn't explode in a font of psionic power while she gushed on about the wonders of revani cake- I really, really wanted to know precisely what had happened in the journey that got here in the first place.