* * * * *
General Blankenship and Major Steve Trevor watched through the one-way mirror as Wonder Woman used her Lasso of Truth on the man who--they reluctantly had to admit-- greatly resembled "Omaha" Mackelroy.
"You say the Black Obelisk transported you over twenty years into the future?"
"Yes."
"So, where is it now?"
"For the umpteenth time; I don't know! Some weird cat-lady came along and stole it from that spider-woman. But, she did mention selling it to someone named...Spellcraft."
"Spellcraft; Spellcraft," muttered General Blankenship: "Why does that name sound so familiar?"
"I believe Dr. Savage had a couple of run-ins with him, before the war, sir," Trevor replied: "Something to do with fragments from an eighteenth-century meteor strike in Yorkshire, England."
"Hmmmmmm! And, this Black Obelisk was supposed to have been sculpted out of an ancient Egyptian meteorite. Correct?"
"Yes, sir."
"Makes me wonder if scientifiction authors like Wells and Verne might be more right than most people like to think?"
Watching this on their 3-D imaging screen, in 1968, Doug Phillips and Ann McGregor looked at each other and smiled.
"If only they knew," said the former: "Right, Ann?"
The latter smiled and nodded: "I couldn't have said it better, myself."
She then gently removed him from where he was perched (on her right shoulder), and gently cupped both her hands around him. Whereupon, she gave him a cautious-but-tender kiss. One that he returned as best he could, by embracing her lower lip with both his arms, and passionately kissing her back.
The other staff members in the Project Tic-Toc control room smiled at each other. Although, they were polite enough not to pay too-close attention to this public display of affection!
General Kirk was just as discrete in his televisual surveillance of the kissing from the staff meeting room. His own wistful smile disappeared, however, when his scrambler phone call was finally patched through.
"Carter? It's Woody. How are things over at the CMDF? He pulled through with flying colors? Excellent! Then, maybe you could do me a little favor. No pun intended, of course!"
* * * * *
SMALLVILLE, KANSAS (1876)
Count Manzeppi finally regained consciousness. The last thing he remembered, he had been about to unleash the pent-up fury of that Persian djinn on those meddlers, West and Gordon, when he was suddenly overcome by a strange case of vertigo.
Now, he found himself in a torch-lit basement of some kind. Tied down, with massive amounts of rope, to a large square platform.
"Ah! Count Manzeppi. Welcome back to the Land of the Living. However brief that visit might prove to be."
The corpulent count struggled to move his head about, so he could get a better look at whoever was talking to him.
"Who's there? Where am I? Why am I bound like some...poor man's version of Gulliver?"
"All good questions, my friend. To answer them, in reverse order? I'm anxious to discover how you (self-confessed leader of the Eccentrics) infiltrated my newly-inherited residence. To wit: the opulent cattle ranch of the late Senator Buckley. Father of my current host body; Egan Buckley. Alias...Voltaire!"
Manzeppi gasped at the eight foot-tall being who suddenly emerged from the flickering shadows, and leaned downward over him. Until they were literally nose to nose.
* * * * *
GOTHAM CITY
(JUNE 1968)
Batgirl turned off the Batcycle's engine, one block up from the dancing school, and used residual momentum to coast the rest of the way. Therby insuring that Florence of Arabia would not hear them coming. For there was no question of her _not_ being inside.
The Batmobile was parked at the back door for all the world to see!
Robin hopped out of the sidecar without a moment's hesitation. But, just as he was about to grasp at the back door's handle, Batgirl stepped in front of him.
"Not so fast, Boy Wonder. Florence might have activated one of King Tut's booby traps after returning here."
"Holy Haste-makes-waste! You're right again, Batgirl. Let me get out my Bat-imager and scan the immediate interior of this building."
"Bat-imager?" echoed the Diva of Derring-do.
Robin nodded: "It's a new device that Batman recently developed. A kind of...electronic stereopticon that uses sonar to get a virtual picture of what's ahead of us. For those areas of Gotham City (including hidden criminal lairs) that might have poor lighting!"
"Similar to the echolocation of real bats," observed Batgirl.
"Exactly!"
Whereupon, he took out from his utility belt, what anyone else might have thought was a pair of opera glasses. He then pressed them against the gray exterior of the back door, and peered through them. A minute later, he saw it. A pair of greenish-colored silhouettes. One considerably larger than the other (and, decidely too curvaceous to be Batman).
In fact, the only thing remotely resembling Batman was what he initially took to be one of those action figures for pre-adolescent boys.
That is; until he saw it move...of its own accord!
tbc
Giantess World
Author's Chapter Notes:
WASHINGTON, D.C. (1943)