The Adventures of the Jade
Dragon
Episode
6
Chapter
6 The Scorpion Gets a
Makeover
Scorpion moved as silent
as death through the shadows. She
had spent the last month familiarizing herself with
As a result she had agreed to improve her skills by training with the Jade
Dragon. It turned out she needed
the training. Despite the fact
that she had spent most of her life in the Assassins’ Guild, the Jade
Dragon put her to shame in the martial arts
department. However, she was
willing to learn and made steady if not spectacular
improvement.
Master Zhou was impressed.
“You show great promise, Zhen Juan,” he said, using her
Chinese name instead of her English one.
“I have not seen such aptitude since Sun Lin came to my
door.” Melissa bowed,
pleased. Master Zhou did not
hand out praise freely and she valued his
compliment. The Jade Dragon smiled
at the remark, glad that her adoptive father had seen fit to bestow praise
on her newfound companion.
But a month of training left Melissa
restless. She wanted to prove
herself. She knew that the Jade
Dragon and her companions made regular patrols of the city and believed that
it was time for her to do the same.
“You don’t need to do this, Melissa,” cautioned
Natassia. “You showed your
ability when you saved us from Retinoff.
We know that you possess great skill.”
“I was almost beaten to death in that encounter,” replied the girl,
flipping her thick brown hair as she shook her
head. “I want to show that
I can go on a patrol by myself and return alive.”
“What do you think, Jade?” said Natassia
turning to her friend.
“She is very skilled. And
I have never seen anyone hide or move so
well. She is a silent as death
itself. Perhaps she should be
allowed to try. I was the same
age when I began my career.”
“But you were captured and tortured were you
not?”
“As were you,” the Jade Dragon reminded
her. “It is a danger every
superheroine must face. I think
she should be allowed to go.”
Natassia nodded her agreement.
“Tonight then,” she said turning to
Melissa. “We will have to
outfit you with a costume.”
“What’s wrong with this outfit?” the girl inquired, indicating
her somber black pants and shirt.
“Oh, you can’t wear that.
It looks like a pair of black
pajamas. The bad guys will call
you pajama girl or something like that.
A superheroine needs a spectacular
costume. Something that will
impress the villains.”
“It’s a bit late in the day.
Where would I get such a
costume?”
“I’ll bet Suzi will have something,” chimed in Sun Lin. “She
has a ton of clothes and fancy outfits.
I’ll give her a call and if she is at home we can go over and
choose something.”
A half-hour later, Melissa was bravely searching through the closet of Suzi
Kendall, also known as the Scarlet Falcon. Natassia had not come with her,
having decided to train a bit more with Master Zhou, but Sun Lin was with
her. For awhile, Sun Lin and
Suzi helped her search, but finally left her to
it. It was to be Melissa’s
choice after all and the two friends retired to another part of Suzi’s
well-appointed apartment to drink tea and chat.
Suzi had a closet full of clothing and material the size of a living
room. Melissa went through rack
after rack of clothing and fancy cloth without finding anything that struck
her fancy. She had almost decided
to give up and go out in her “pajamas” when something caught her
eye. “Yes, she thought,
“that’s it!”
“My God!” exclaimed Suzi, when Melissa emerged from her
closet. “Are you going to
catch criminals or seduce them?”
Sun Lin’s eyes widened in surprise at the way Melissa was
outfitted. She wore a skin-tight
black dress that left most of her shapely shoulders quite
bare. It was fastened over her
left shoulder by a wide strap of dress material and slit up each thigh so
far that her gorgeous long legs were exposed almost to her
hip. A flap of fabric about a
foot wide hung down in front and behind, allowing her freedom of movement,
but hiding very little of her charms.
The dress fit her so tightly that the outline of her nipples could
easily be seen. Her legs were
bare except for a pair of knee-high soft leather black
boots. Beneath the dress she
wore the tiniest pair of black panties.
As she twirled in front of Suzi and Sun Lin, most of her tiny bottom
was exposed to view.
“It’s certainly different,” said Sun
Lin. She was not quite sure what
to say. Her own skintight green
and black outfit was quite revealing, but at least it covered most of her
body.
“What are you going to wear to disguise your face?” she asked at
last. “And what about your
legs and arms? Not much point
in a black costume if those gorgeous white legs and arms are left
bare.”
“I have this,” said Melissa, producing a length of black cloth
that she wound about her head and over her face. It was very much like the
headgear she had worn when she was a member of the Assassins’
Guild. It served as a link to
her past. “And I also have
these. She held up a pair of
black silk nylons and black shoulder length gloves of the same
material.
“I’m not sure Natassia will want you going out in that,” said
Suzi. “It seems a bit too
provocative. You’ll arouse
any villain who sees you in an outfit like that.”
“So much the better,” smiled the
girl. “They’ll be too
busy looking at me to realize that they should be defending
themselves. Anyway, this costume
thing was her idea. If she
didn’t want me to make the choice, she shouldn’t have suggested
it.”
Suzi shook her head. The girl
was certainly determined. And
she was almost the same age Suzi had been when she first went out on her
own. “OK,” she
said. “I’ll leave it
up to you to convince Natassia. If
it’s alright with her, I certainly won’t
object.”
“Where did you get those clothes?” Sun Lin asked
Suzi. “They are certainly
not normal attire.”
Suzi laughed. “I wore it
to a costume party. I was supposed
to be a Ninja warrior. A sexy
Ninja warrior.”
Melissa seemed thrilled with her choice.
She was still pirouetting about the room, waving the stockings and
gloves over her head. Tonight
she would give her new outfit a try.
Thus it was that dressed in her new black costume, she now prowled the alleys
of
She would like to have used the rooftops the way that the Jade Dragon and
Nova did, but she lacked their strength and acrobatic
skills. She would develop those
in time, but for the moment she was confined to the lower levels of the
city. Still, she was almost invisible
as she stole from shadow to shadow.
Even if someone had been looking for her he would have been hard pressed
to spot her.
She was deep in the waterfront district of the
city. Despite the best efforts
of the four heroines this was still an area where crime was
rampant. Everything went on here,
from prostitution, to smuggling, to the white slave
trade. It was the latter that
she was most interested in.
Natassia was almost fanatical in her hatred of those who kidnapped
unsuspecting young girls into slavery, having been kidnapped herself when
still a young girl. She had passed
along her attitude to Melissa who wanted to do something to show her mentor
and guardian that she could make a contribution to ending crime in her new
home.
She was closing in on an area known to be frequented by the worst sort of
criminals; thugs who would just
as soon cut a victim’s throat for a dollar as look at
him. It was also notorious for
being the pickup point for young women who had been lured into the hands
of slave traders or even picked out of their homes by
kidnappers. The trick was to
locate them.
Melissa detected the sound of a muffled
cry. It was almost as if someone
had tried to call for help but had been cut off before she could complete
her shout. Only ears trained
to pick up the slightest sound as were Melissa’s would have heard anything
at all. But to her it was like
an alarm going off. She headed
in the direction of the sound. It
had come from a rundown two-story warehouse right next to the
docks.
Gaining entrance to the building was simple for one with Melissa’s
talents. A downspout from the
roof offered her access to a second floor
window. She climbed it quickly,
and within a couple of minutes had forced the window and entered the
building.
The room inside was dark, which was to her
liking. Silently she crossed
the floor, using the dim light from a single street lamp to find her
way. The door was unlocked, and
she eased herself into a narrow corridor.
From a room about three doors down she could hear the sound of
voices. She stole down the
hallway. In a few more seconds
she would be there. Then
came a sound from behind
her. One of the doors down the
hall was opening. There was no
time to return to the room she had broken
into. Her heart
leapt. In a few seconds she would
be discovered!
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