The Mad Ophelias: Chapter 6
⧗ Sometime in the future.
Previously on TMO: Wil received a note, presumably from the Mad Ophelias, to meet at a cafe he’s a regular at. It could be a game-changer for the book he’s writing about them. Of course, it could also be a gambit by the Corps, and he’ll wind up behind bars. It’s a chance he’s decided to take.
HIS HEAD IS A WALL OF PAIN. Wil hears faraway sounds. Rustling. Metal dragged on concrete. Indistinct murmurs and snatches of words. Overdose…simple…Tuesday…now.
The air smells subterranean, like his basement bedroom, all dank mildew and earth that’s trying to press through concrete walls. Gradually, he realizes that he’s sitting upright. There’s a dull ache in his shoulders. Hands are zip-tied behind his back—so tight that blood throbs in his fingers. His stomach roils and everything in it wants to make an entrance.
More words. Feminine voices. Live…chaos…the event…
His head sags to his right and he tries to remember what happened but there are only fragments. The cafe. The blond toddler kicking the chair. Lying face down on cool linoleum. A bubble of foamy spit dripping from his mouth. A pair of combat boots standing directly in his field of vision.
Someone presses two cold fingers against his carotid artery, and he smells a soft waft of peppermint.
“It’s slowing down.” A woman’s voice. Finally, a sentence he can understand.
He lifts his head, forces his sluggish eyes open, and wonders if he’s dreaming.
The source of the delicate fingers and minty breath is a thin, young woman who crouches next to him, naked from the waist up. Her hair is a bright, artificial red, and red sniper symbols circle each nipple, two red streaks on her forehead. A black tattoo starts at her upper arm, curls back over her shoulder, and although he can’t see it, he knows what it is.
A Phaya Naga.
It’s the serpent-dragon tattoo adopted by only the most hardcore Mad Ophelia loyalists, the ones who don’t mind the minimum ten years in prison if they’re caught. An homage to the first Ophelia.
From the waist down the Ophelia wears green camo pants, black combat boots, and there’s a large black belt slung around her hips, the bulge of a gun.
A real Mad Ophelia, here, in front of him. He’s giddy. He’s terrified. It’s like stumbling across a Sasquatch in the middle of a dark, isolated forest. Will it eat him? Will it make him famous?
Maybe both?
If he could laugh, he would. Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid. After all, no one knows where he is. His mind feels slightly untethered, like it might bolt into psychosis if he let it—what the fuck did they give him? An odd tingling sensation races down his spine. The note. He should have called the police. The Corps. Lucy, he should have woken Lucy up before going out…but then she would never have let him come, Christ. Lied to her, and now look what happened. He turned his phone off too. The only witnesses a few scattered homeless people and the old man in the cafe.
The Ophelia grabs his chin and pulls out a thin flashlight from a back pocket, clicks it on and flashes the beam in his eyes, blinding him. “Pupils seem normal.” Who’s she talking to? “Might have a concussion and he’s going to have that lump on his forehead for a while.”
“Good. He deserves one.” A different feminine voice—dry and raspy—but the afterglow from the flashlight is blinding and he can’t quite tell where the voice comes from. More rustling, some squeaks as something is wheeled in, or out. He shifts his position in the chair and realizes his feet are bound too. His headache is crushing.
“Anybody got an Advil?” he manages to ask. His tongue is swollen, feels foreign in his mouth. “Or twelve?”
Someone snorts—behind him?—but he hears footsteps, something being unzipped.
Finally, his vision starts to clear. He’s in a room. It feels small somehow, industrial. An abandoned warehouse? Bunker? Sewer space? Another Mad Ophelia stands by a rusting metal door—she too is naked from the waist up, red painted streaks on her forehead, although she’s bigger, thicker, with muscular arms and a short, thick neck. She grips an AR-15 tightly, which seems like a bit of theatrical overkill unless she’s worried a drugged adjunct professor bound to a chair poses a threat. To his right is a rolling stainless-steel table with a laptop, two large flatscreen TVs, and lots of black cables running in all directions. To his left is a camera on a tripod that’s pointed at him. Behind that, a darkened studio light.
And in front of him sits a woman in a chair.
She’s different.
Narrow chin, wide eyes, her long, black hair streaked with red, but there are no red stripes on her forehead, and at first he thinks she’s wearing a tight red shirt until he realizes that no, she’s half naked too, it’s just that her entire torso is painted red. His heart quickens, because…it can’t be…so he squints, looks to her neck and sees the black barbed wire tattoo that encircles it.
A subversion of Christ’s crown of thorns. Where did that first appear…oh right, the manifesto released shortly after the Patriot Keeper attack. He’d written a whole section about it. Their martyr has been used to oppress us, to choke us into silence, but we will be silent no more. We will make our voices heard, even if we all must become martyrs, like the first Ophelia.
His heart beats faster, an erratic staccato.
It’s an automatic death sentence to be caught with a barbed wire tattoo, because the only Mad Ophelias allowed to mark themselves this way are those who have signed a suicide pact, willing to use their own bodies as weapons for coordinated violence if called upon.
The woman in front of him smiles, although it’s not a smile, not really, there’s a cold and calculating ferocity behind it. She raises her left hand so he can see her palm, another tattoo. It makes him gasp.
MO2.
Each Mad Ophelia was numbered according to the order in which they were sworn in. Which means he’s sitting in front of a co-founder. A woman every law enforcement agency on the planet is searching for. The one who used to go by another name, back before the Mad Ophelias coalesced into something bigger.
MadHatter.
At least, if he’s not being played again. Because no one knows what MadHatter looks like—the few people who do are on the run or underground—and in every photo or video she wore a black gas mask to obscure her face. The authorities occasionally came up with a computerized rendering based on an algorithm of what she could look like, or a sketch from an equally sketchy source, but there was never a report, a break. Some began to wonder if she was real or just a fictional construct, a bogeyman to build a legend.
That serial killer who preyed on hookers and wound up in a dumpster with a bullet lodged in his forehead? MadHatter. The drowned senator who’d been found floating down the Mississippi River after a photo had been leaked of him fondling a naked six-year-old? MadHatter. The Molotov cocktail thrown into the center of an incel rally? MadHatter.
He honestly can’t believe his luck, even though he’s never been in so much physical pain in his life. He’s been right—he’s been right all this time. It’s not a dead end. I told you so Lucy.
If he plays his cards right (and survives), he’ll have his pick of tenured positions. Maybe a six-figure book deal too. But most importantly, he won’t be the idiot boyfriend with a knack for making poor decisions.
He’ll be the man Lucy deserves.
But it’s hard to think clearly when your throat’s on fire.
“Seriously, can I get some water and an Advil?” he asks, his voice cracking.
MadHatter nods assent, and the young Ophelia goes to a dark corner and rummages around in a black duffel bag, retrieving a clear water bottle and a bottle of Tylenol. She quickly uncaps the bottle, then walks back over to Wil and shakes two pills out onto her palm. Wil opens his mouth, and she pops them on his tongue, then she brings the bottle of water to his lips.
He pulls back, hesitates. Consuming a beverage provided by an Ophelia didn’t go so well the last time.
She smirks. Lifts the bottle to her own red lips, takes a sip, and then offers it again, red lipstick staining the bottle’s neck. He takes deep, greedy gulps. Some of the water trickles down his neck.
“Not too much,” says MadHatter tersely.
The Ophelia pulls the bottle away immediately. A grunt following orders. But she’s younger—maybe even a teenager. She’s got to be less jaded, more empathetic.
“Thank you,” he says, making sure to look her directly in the eyes, which are light blue. And, as he suspected, she flicks hers away first. A good sign. Clearly she has medical knowledge, some kind of healthcare experience. No one’s interested in healthcare because they want to hurt people.
“Apologies for the overdose,” says MadHatter. “It was unintentional.”
He can’t tell if she’s being straight or sarcastic. “Well, I came. And if you’d meant to kill me, I’m sure I’d be dead now.”
“Unless you’ve done things you need to be punished for first. Have you?”
All the warning bells start to collectively beep. Careful Wil. He coughs to buy some time.
The Ophelia starts to offer the water bottle again, but MadHatter shakes her head, and she stops. Clearly an answer from him is required.
“A few years ago, I probably would have said no,” he finally says. “But I’m not sure anymore. To be honest I’m not sure of anything anymore.”
There’s dead silence, a long, tense pause, and he’s sure he just said the wrong thing, but then MadHatter leans back in her chair, just a bit. The mood seems to shift.
“Would you mind if I took one more sip of water?” Wil asks, daring to push it.
MadHatter looks at him—eyes such a dark brown that they’re almost black—but she gives the faintest nod to the Ophelia. She lifts the bottle to his lips again, and he takes his one sip.
“So what’s your take, now that you’ve met the object of your research?” MadHatter asks. “Do we live up to your expectations?”
“I’m honored. But...how do I know that I am in the presence of real Mad Ophelias?”
MadHatter smiles. “You think we could be the Corps?”
“They conduct undercover operations. Your tattoos could be painted. Maybe on the other side of the door, agents are recording every word.”
“I don’t think you’re up to anything that would interest the Corps,” says MadHatter. “You’re pretty small fish. Instructor at a community college. Broke. And forgive me, but even your writing feels a bit...pedestrian.”
That one stings. He’s always been proud of his writing. “If that’s true, then why would the Mad Ophelias want to talk to me at all? Let alone…”
“MadHatter?” She grins. “And how do you know we haven’t been talking to you all along? It’s not like this is our daily wear. For all you know, your students are Mad Ophelias. Your colleagues. Your therapist that you stopped seeing.”
Goddamn, how much does she know about me?
“I meant to say…” he continues, but then can’t finish the sentence—whatever they gave him has made his head foggy. “Well, the truth is I don’t know what to say.”
“A man who doesn’t know what to say. Astonishing.” It’s an aside to the others, making him the butt of the joke. They grin.
He decides to remain silent. Let her fill it or not as she chooses. And for a good two minutes, what she chooses to do is stare at him, observing him closely like he’s a curiosity, a rare specimen at a zoo. He can almost hear the voiceover.
In his native habitat, the adjunct professor spends up to four hours staring at a screen each day. His primary source of sustenance is granola bars from the vending machine down the hall. His primary source of water—coffee from the break room. See how his fingers are slightly stained with nicotine? A habit he tries to hide by stealing away to the roof of the sociology building.
He wiggles his fingers to keep the circulation moving.
“We’ve been watching you for a while,” MadHatter finally says. “Your first name is Bryan. Your middle name is William. You could go with Will with two ‘l’s’. Or Bill. Billy. But ‘Wil’ with one ‘l’—that’s either a sign of being nerdy or pretentious. How many times do you get to correct people?”
“Honestly, Bryan with a ‘y’ averaged about the same,” says Wil. “I didn’t want the name I grew up with. When you say you’ve been watching me for a while, how long?”
“Remember that panel?”
There were so many. “Which panel?”
“The one in Los Angeles. A small bookstore, close to Brentwood. You were talking about…something to do with the patriarchal model of agriculture creating the idea of women as chattel. They took a few good shots at you, the women in the audience. Accused you of mansplaining their ‘herstory’ if I recall.”
How could he forget? It was the day he met Lucy. How do they know about that though?
“You kept your cool,” MadHatter continues. “Didn’t even freak when someone said that by not providing birth control pills to all the women, men were using menstruation as a form of oppression. You remember?”
She’s trying to spook me.
Was she in the audience? He tries, and fails, to remember someone who looked like her. But was someone streaming the talk too? Anywhere else it’d have been dangerous, but wealthy women always got more of a pass when it came to those kinds of things.
“But then you sold out for the money, although under somewhat altruistic purposes. When that crashed and burned though, you went dark…until you started poking around on some of our mantrap forums. So, what are you Bryan, William, Wil. A closet ally? A patriarchal voyeur? A fanboy with pretensions?”
Wil has wondered about that himself on more than one occasion. In the beginning, he’d seen himself as a role model for a new masculinity—more inclusive, vulnerable. He’d even written a paper about it. And then he’d gone and done what his own paper argued against by accepting the job in Seattle without talking to Lucy first. Resented her for minding. Wil had begun to think it was biological, an issue of hard-wired neurons forged in the days of caves, and spears, and life spans that topped out at 30.
Or maybe that was just another excuse. Something to think about another time.
“I don’t know what you’d call me,” says Wil. “It seems to me…that men have really fucked things up. And we should be a part of unfucking things up.”
“Really?” MadHatter narrows her eyes, almost coquettishly. “Or are you just saying that so you can draw me out? Deconstruct our conversation for…what’s the title of that thing again?”
“Mapping the Mad Ophelias,” says the young Ophelia. “Though he’s been playing around with a subtitle. Feminist Misandry and Violence in the Collective.”
“I don’t know if you can unfuck things up and consider us misandrists,” says MadHatter lightly. “Seems a bit contradictory, dontcha think?”
Wil tries to swallow, but his throat has gone dry again, and he doesn’t dare ask for more water. Feels a trickle of sweat drip down his forehead. “I want to understand. There’s been talk of, well, a division within the movement. Or that there was. Some truly battling for the rights of all women, and some…who thought men were unredeemable.”
“Ah,” says MadHatter. “We’ve heard that too. I guess you’re wondering which side of the fence we fall on. And what a scoop it would be for you, to finally sort that out. Probably get you out of that rinky-dink dive you call an apartment and give you some credibility among the liberal mucky mucks who still think it can all be fixed with some good old-fashioned democracy. But that shit never worked out all that well for women now, did it?”
“True, but—”
“There is no ‘true, but.’ Self-defense isn’t misandry. And violence, well, it’s not our first choice, but it’s the only choice men have left us with. It’s time for us to drive a stake into the heart of the vampire once and for all.”
Is that what the camera is for, the lighting? Are they going to drive a stake through my heart? Stream it live for all the world to see? The truth is, he doesn’t know who’d applaud more—the feminists he’s pissed off over the years or the Patriot Keepers who still use his face for their ‘World’s Biggest Cuck’ meme.
He shifts in his chair. “Killing me on camera probably isn’t going to spark a whole lot of outrage. Like you said, I’m pretty small fish. Although my partner will be worried if she doesn’t hear from me soon.”
MadHatter says lightly, “Who, Lucy? Oh don’t worry about that. She has. We texted her from your phone. As far as she’s concerned, you’re grading papers on campus.”
Wil tries to hold his face still. But his right eye twitches.
“Since your phone is on campus, with one of our members, she’s pretty convinced,” MadHatter continues. “People think apps never lie. And it’s not like she’d ever leave the apartment to check, right? But she is a little irritated. You should be kinder.”
This does make him flinch. She’s right about that.
MadHatter leans forward. “I agree, though. Killing you would be useless. We’re actually granting you the privilege of participating in a defining moment of human history, streamed live for the whole world to see. You’re about to become famous. Don’t lie—isn’t that what you’ve always really wanted?”
It’s true, but not like this.
MadHatter smiles. “Because let’s face it, the only thing better than a martyr…is a resurrection.”
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© 2026 J. Lincoln Fenn. All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction published as a serialized novel on Substack. No part of this work may be reproduced, reposted, or distributed in any form without the author’s prior written permission. First publication rights reserved by the author.
Have you been to an indoor firing range for target practice?
Lol. I was just curious. I think it's cool. That an author does the thing their character also does. For the writing experience.