And now, my latest attempt to paste in an excerpt from another chapter of long-defunct prose experiment I Am Empowered, a Year-One-ish first-person account from Emp in 140-character Twitter format detailing her earliest days as a superheroine.

DISTRESSING DAMSELHOOD, OR DAMSELING DISTRESSHOOD (part 2)

Same thing with superheroines. If some of the degrading crap I've endured had happened to an A-list "capette", there would be hell to pay.

If bad guys ever treated a popular heroine like WetNurse or Angelfish like they treat me, they'd be perceived as Unwritten-Rule violators.

But because I'm a nobody, because I'm a "joke cape", supervillains—and superheroes, too!—feel free to demean me in some VERY dubious ways.

Like the time that jackass Kelp King bound and gagged me with his stupid magic seaweed, leaving me strapped up on tiptoe beside his throne.

You remember the famous—well, infamous—YouTube clip, don’t you? God knows, I fervently wish that I didn't remember it.

I'm struggling futilely as the douchecape blares, "Ha! Guess THIS little superchica won't dare defy the Sargasso Sovereign again, will she?"

Then he leans over, flashes a hugely cheesy grin, and slaps me on the butt, HARD. Cue my humiliating, sheep-like bleat of gagged protest.

The real damage is done, howeva, by the HD camera Kelp King had trained on me, and the tragically memorable post-slap footage it recorded.

How do I put this delicately? There's a lot of me back there, and what's back there isn't as firm or toned—or non-blubbery—as I might like.

Captured on crisp, HD-quality video, the King's slap sends a wave of flesh rippling across my big, soft behind, then rippling right on back.

The 8-second clip that douchecape uploads to YouTube 10 minutes later—speech, slap, "Mmph!", jiggle, jiggle, jiggle—gets 1.2 million views.

(Later on, I make the rookie mistake of glancing at the clip's YouTube comments. Afterward, I'm unable to get out of bed for two full days.)

Barely a few minutes after the video's uploaded, some moron's already made a strangely hypnotic GIF of my poor, slapped behind's jiggling.

For months thereafter, seemingly every idiot male in the caped community, hero or villain, will say to me, "Hey, I saw that GIF of yours…"

Not helping matters? The tragic reality that my supersuit's molecule-thin hypermembrane displays my bottom with cruelly merciless clarity.

Not a single superheroine in my field wears a more rear-end-revealing costume than my crappy suit's sparkly, body-paint-like embarrassment.

Everyone remembers my stupid, undulating backside, but no one remembers the Emp-positive aftermath of that mortifying incident, of course.

I rather badassedly chewed through the seaweed stuffed in my mouth, gnawed my way free of the kelp binding me, and suckerpunched Kelp King.

I clubbed that doofus douchecape unconscious with his own big, heavy, goofily ornate crown. (Come to think of it, I literally crowned him.)

The King's camera was lost in the ensuing lair collapse, so all footage of my badassery is gone forever. Footage of my ass? Online, forever.

Note: After being muzzled for hours by a mouthful of salty kelp, I lost my taste for sushi's seaweed wrapping. I'm a sashimi-only girl, now.

Here's the deal: I guarantee you that Kelp King would never have buttslapped an A-List superheroine, for fear of Unwritten Rule retaliation.

Oh, but when a C-List—or D-List, to be truly honest—superheroine like dumb ol' me gets humiliated in a semi-sexualized manner? No Biggeh.

Worst part about that video? I suspect that, unofficially, it's turned slapping my particular behind into, well, a "gluteonormative" act.

Ever since the Kelp King clip, a distressing number of bad guys now seem to feel rather free to give me a quick buttslap after capturing me.

"She's tied up good, boss." SMAK "Better luck next time, huh?" SMAK "Sucks to be you, superchica." SMAK "That GIF was awesome, girl." SMAK.

And since I'm invariably trussed up and gagged when they slap me, I can only writhe and wriggle and sheep-bleat "Mmph!" in impotent protest.

No doubt supervillains always wanted to buttslap an uppity superheroine—or ANY uppity girl, maybe—and now they see me as fair game.

They're never dumb enough to cross the line by, say, giving my vulnerable bottom a firm squeeze, which would put 'em in verboten territory.

Instead, a quick swat on the butt gives the bad guys plausible deniability. Why, they'd do that to ANY cape! (Except they only do it to me.)

Every doofus villain probably watches closely to see if my backside still jiggles post-slap, just like in that stupid GIF. (Yes, it does.)

Nowadays, even my fellow superheroes seem to be maddeningly, make-me-grind-my-teeth-ily casual about inappropriately touching my behind.

One of the senior—and more imposing—SuperHomeys, the legendary hero Phallik, has become fond of slapping my backside with his magic spear.

He claims "spearslapping" is merely a sign of comradely enthusiasm and teamsmanship, an innocent gesture "just like pro athletes always do."

He declared—a little too heartily—that I could slap HIS behind in companionable reciprocation, an offer which I respectfully declined.

The truth is, I'm too intimidated by Phallik's power and status to protest his buttslapping bonhomie with the proper degree of forcefulness.

As a founding member of the team, he can easily have my (lowly) Associate Membership suspended at any time, which he's kinda hinted at.

"You DO wanna fit in around here, don't you, rookie? We don't need any new recruits with poor team spirit on the Superhomeys, you know."

TRANSLATION: "You WILL let me smack your big, superheroic booty with my scary ol' spear whenever I want, or you're off the team, honey."

I'm know that I'm barely clinging to a minor role, here. If I screw this up, I'm certain I'll never get another chance to join a superteam.

I don't really want to rock the superboat by accusing him of sexual harassment, or claiming the HomeyCrib constitutes a hostile workplace.

I'm painfully aware that A Real Superheroine—which, obvsly, I am not—would tell this hulking dumbass to keep his fucking spear to himself.

I can't discuss this with the other superheroines on the team, given that Sistah Spooky's organized them into the We Srsly Hate Emp Club.

The testosterone-drunk boys' club of male Superhomeys wouldn't be any more sympathetic to my bitching and moaning, I think it's safe to say.

Capitan Rivet, but I don't want to disappoint him I should be able to handle by myself.

Adding another level of creepiness: Supposedly, Phallik's famous Phallospear is somehow a part of him, thanks to icky magical shenanigans.

In effect, that means that he might as well be slapping me with his dick. (Then again, his supranym's "Phallik", so maybe he really is.)

<END OF EXCERPT >

Wellp, if this actually worked, webcomic readers, I’ll try again shortly with another excerpt from I Am Empowered, which will move on to serialize one final (if lengthy) chapter from the incomplete project.

Today’s Patreon update: Originally done as a means of scratching out more worktime to complete the long-gestating Empowered vol. 12, I've switched over to a Monday/ Wednesday/ Friday Patreon posting schedule that won't feature the fixed content format I previously used. However, my vast archive of years of Patreon posts—extensive Empowered previews, vintage con sketches, work stages on covers, "damsel in distress" commissions, life drawings & much, much more—remains available for Patrons' perusal.

-Adam Warren