The Birth of the Silver Specter (part 2) Out of gratitude for saving their lives and in no small part to gain revenge on the people who nearly killed them, the Li’s helped Barbara learn to make the most of her newfound ability. Cho Li took it upon himself to add to Barbara’s knowledge of martial arts, expanding on her already considerable self defense skills. At first, Amy did not appear to have much to offer (beyond her enthusiasm) at least not until Barbara got a message to meet Amy at the research center where she did most of her work. Barbara was suitably impressed when she was escorted into Amy’s lab. The enormous room looked more like the engine room from a starship than a lab of a lowly graduate researcher. “For some reason, I thought I’d see a work bench, a microscope, and a bunch of test tubes,” Barbara admitted to Amy. “Pretty impressive, isn’t it?” Amy explained, gesturing at the futuristic looking equipment. “I’m no slouch when it comes to coming up with the ideas, but I need outside funding to get these things built. They get a percentage of whatever I come up with and I get more money to build these toys. But now for the reason I asked you here. Get undressed and get into that chamber so I can get your measurements.” Barbara was dumbfounded. “What, just like that? I mean, I could probably tell you my measurements and then I could keep my clothes on.” “Not for this,” Amy replied. “I need measurements that are accurate to the fraction of an inch. And besides, there’s no standard of measurement for people’s faces. Not to mention that I need to find out what your body mass is – and I don’t mean your weight.” Barbara was still reluctant. “Come on,” Amy insisted, pushing Barbara towards the indicated chamber. “It’s not as if I haven’t already seen you naked. Trust me, once I get this data, I’ll be able to give you your surprise.” “You make it sound like I’m a kid getting a haircut,” Barbara responded. But in the end, Amy won out and Barbara disrobed and stepped into the chamber. Inside, crisscrossing laser beams danced over Barbara’s body, and in spite of her invulnerability, Barbara was beginning to have misgivings. “How much longer?” Barbara asked. “Almost done,” Amy replied. “I just have to punch this data into the suit’s matrix. There, you can come out now.” As Barbara stepped out, she stooped to recover her clothes. “Oh no,” Amy said. “Don’t get dressed yet. Your new suit’s just about ready.” “What, not even my underwear?” Barbara whined. “Nope,” Amy responded. “It would only confuse the matrix. Got to be bare skin. Here,” she said, tossing what looked liked a silver ball to Barbara. “It’s ready. Try it on.” Barbara looked at the gelatinous silver ball in her hand dubiously. “Try it on? How?” Amy grinned. “Just slap it with your hands and it will do the rest.” Barbara thought Amy had flipped, but decided to give it a try. Holding the ball in one hand, she brought the other hand down on it hard. Immediately, the ball collapsed and silver fluid began crawling up her arms. Barbara looked at herself in horror. “What is happening to me?” she cried. “Don’t worry, that’s how the suit is activated.” Amy told her. “Beats getting dressed the ordinary way, doesn’t it?” Amy pulled out a full length mirror so Barbara could see her new appearance. Barbara was now covered from head to foot in a silvery, form fitting suit. The only opening in the suit was for her eyes and mouth. There were no other openings. Hard soles gave her feet the appearance of wearing boots while a long, white pony tail emerged from a top knot at the top of her head. Barbara examined herself. “This certainly is impressive, but why go through all of this trouble. I mean, I look like some sort of masked avenger.” “Hey, if the shoe fits,” Amy told her. “Besides, I figured you wouldn’t want anybody to recognize you when you go busting up the mob. But the real reason I made this suit was because I figured you wanted something a little more durable than clothes off the rack. I mean, even if your skin is tough, most clothes aren’t. After a good day of fighting crime, you’d probably wouldn’t look much better than that day you rescued us.” Amy continued. “At first, I tried to make something that was just as tough, but the results just weren’t flexible enough. And then I realized that your skin would be tough enough, so I just had to come up with something that would be able to cover up any holes that might be made. And that’s just what this suit does. Watch.” Amy took a knitting needle and pulled a piece of the suit off of Barbara’s arm. Other than the feeling that she was peeling rubber or plastic off her arm, the suit behaved just like fabric would. Amy then punctured the area she had pulled up with the needle and let it drop. The needle left a big hole in the suit, but then the hole closed up, just like water filling up the void. “Wow,” Barbara said. “But what about big stuff?” “Way ahead of you,” Amy replied. Amy pulled out a knife and slit the front of the suit open. Barbara gasped. Amy sure had a casual attitude toward Barbara’s modesty! But before she could complain, the gap in the suit sealed itself up again, leaving no trace of the gash. “As long as the suit’s in one piece, the matrix will close up any opening. However, if you split it into two pieces, the sections won’t be able to join up. What’s more, the suit’s matrix can only take a certain amount of abuse before it becomes inert and you wind up wearing a very ordinary skintight body suit.” “How much abuse?” Barbara asked. Amy shrugged. “I really don’t know what the limits of this stuff is. It’s been fairly durable in the lab but I haven’t really had a chance to test it in the field. But it certainly doesn’t last forever. That reminds me, slap your thigh twice and hold your hand out like this.” Amy gestured as if she were holding a club. Barbara did as she was told and was amazed as a silver night stick grew from her palm to fill her out stretched hand. “Wow,” Barbara said, taking a few practice swings with the club. “Any other secrets in this suit?” Amy shook her head. “That’s it for now. This is just version 1.0, after all. I should be able to get it to do other things later. I’ve been experimenting with adding some colors to the suit, but everything pretty much gets mixed together right now. By the way,” she said, noticing Barbara trying to drop the club, “just push the ends of the stick together in your hands to get it reabsorbed into the suit.” After disposing of the stick, Barbara turned her attention to the suit again. “How does it come off?” “Just clap your hands three times and hold them cupped in front of you like this.” Amy gestured again. “I wanted to make it easy enough to remember, but not so easy that you would trigger it accidentally.” Barbara dutifully clapped her hands and was pleased to see the suit flow off her body and into her cupped hands, once again resembling a silver ball. “This is truly amazing, Amy!” “Hey, what are sidekicks for?” Amy said with a grin. “Oh, and here are a few more, just in case.” She said, handing her some more balls. Barbara put the balls into her purse. “I can’t wait to try this out.” Then she straightened up as if to leave. “Whoa, partner,” Amy said to Barbara as she turned to go. “Don’t forget your clothes!” Barbara blushed as she noticed her nakedness for the first time. The suit felt so much like a second skin that she was going to have to make a special note of times when she didn’t have it on. Still, she was excited by these new developments. Soon, organized crime would be getting a taste of it’s own medicine!