The Global Protectors –Stalked by Red Jack
By Marcus Lycus
(Marcus_Lycus@hotmail.com)
Hello and welcome to the Global Protectors – Stalked by Red Jack, my answer to cheesy 80s horror films, but with a few twists that even an R rating would not cover.
Legal Horrors – The Global Protectors are copyright, trademark etc. of Doctor Droid (www.superstories.net/droidzone) and are used with his permission. Other characters and text are copyright Marcus Lycus.
What does that legal gibberish mean? It means that if you want to use the Global Protectors in another story you need Doctor Droid’s permission (not mine). It also means that you can’t repost this story or use the characters created in it without my permission.
And since this story is meant for people over the age of 18, please don’t read it if you are younger than that. Any resemblance between characters in this story and any actual persons living or dead is purely coincidental of course.
And finally, please e-mail me with any comments, complaints or suggestions. Remember feedback leads to more stories!
Marcus Lycus
December 2004
Chapter 1 – The Short and
Sad Career of White Crane
White Crane faced her
attacker across the rooftop. The
teenaged Korean heroine was bleeding from a half dozen shallow cuts, including
one across the top of her heaving breasts.
Her torn costume barely covered her nipples any more. Confronted with so much fear, her mind
distracted itself with trivial thoughts like how hard it would be to mend the
costume this time and how many washings it would take to get the bloodstains
out.
Then she realized that might
not be a problem.
Her opponent wasn’t even
breathing hard, he just stared at her from 30 feet away, his baby-faced mask
set in an eternal smirk. He drew his
two butcher knives and ran the edges against each other, they made a
frightening screech.
Dimly White Crane wondered if
the noise would attract someone’s attention.
A bystander, a cop, maybe even another superhero someone had to hear
it! But she knew it was futile. No one had ever come to her aid before, no
matter how much noise she made.
Her stalker smirked and
giggled. He leapt into the air.
White Crane did not need her
powers to know what would happen.
She was going to die.
***
One year ago…
White Crane posed in front of
her mirror. She planted her hands on
her hips, spread her legs, thrust out her chest, flounced her hair and smiled.
“Wulf Pak beware! There’s a new heroine in Hyung’s Town and
she’s coming for you!”
She turned a bit to the side
to admire her brand new costume. When
she started to plan her career as a heroine she’d decided that she would not be
one of those bimbo heroines fighting crime in nothing but a halter top and a
thong. It had taken weeks to find
something that was practical without being too militaristic. Something attractive but without making her look
like a swimsuit model or cheerleader.
Finally she had found it at a dance store.
Her costume was dark blue one
piece leotard that left her arms bare but covered her body and legs ending in
wide bell-bottomed cuffs around her ankles.
The top rose to her slender neck and fastened behind it, leaving much of
her back bare. She’d carefully silk
screened her trademark white crane, an ancient Korean symbol of fortune, across
the front. Another crane decorated the
length of her right leg. The clingy material
of the dance costume showed off her taut concave stomach and round breasts but
without exposing anything. She’d also
added two dark blue gloves that went up to her wrists and had small metal bar
on the inside across the knuckles. She
knew how much it could hurt to hit someone, a bit of protection would spare her
bruised knuckles. On her feet she had a
pair of rock climbing shoes dyed the same color as her costume. Much more practical than the slick boots
most heroines wore. They would give her
the traction and flexibility she needed when climbing or jumping. Around her waist was a thick white belt with
pouches for the police radio and other equipment. Over her face she wore a small domino mask that covered her eyes
and hide her identity but left her puffy pink cheeks and dimples exposed.
She flounced her long black
hair again, practiced a mean look in the mirror and decided it was time.
Megapolis’ newest heroine was
ready to make her debut!
***
Growing up
So-Jung Kim had always been a bit faster and stronger than the other girls in
her Korean-American neighborhood, something she attributed to good genes and
healthy exercise. Her father had been a
marine sergeant back in
But when she
turned 14 she realized there was something more. They’d been playing softball in the school yard and So-Jung
started hitting everything thrown at her.
At first she’d just assumed it was the other girl’s slow underhand
pitches but then some of the boys tried to show off by striking her out.
She hit each one
until Jimmy Woo and his buddies threw down their gloves in disgust and walked
away.
But they didn’t
forget. When she was heading home from
school that afternoon Jimmy and his friends decided to teach their uppity
classmate a lesson and jumped her as she walked by a dark alley.
It was the
scariest moment of her young life, she was too young to truly know what they
intended but old enough to know it was bad.
But they couldn’t
touch her. Somehow, a second before
they struck she knew what would happen and avoided them. And after a few seconds of dodging their
clumsy grabs her body started to respond with kicks and blows that reduced the
four bullies into pitiful wretches sprawled on the ground begging a 14 year-old
girl for mercy.
So-Jung didn’t
know what that meant. She had never
learned Tae-Kwan-Do or any martial arts but somehow instinctively she’d known
how to defeat four bigger boys. After
that Jimmy Woo and his friends learned to mind their manners (at least around
her) so she never told anyone what had happened.
As they years
went by her instincts grew stronger.
She rarely studied, the night before a test she just flipped through the
textbooks somehow knowing which paragraphs would be important. She even learned to miss a few balls or a
few questions now and then just to prevent people from getting jealous. Of course that was never really a
problem. No one could stay mad at her;
somehow So-Jung always knew what to say.
Life was pretty
good to the attractive 18-year old Korean girl. She always managed to balance the pressures of school, her
parents, her friends and a culture that demanded Asian girls to be demure,
pretty, virginal, geniuses. She even
managed to live up to her family’s expectations, winning scholarships to Harvard,
Yale,
It never occurred
to her that she could use her talents for something more important than scoring
1595 on the SATs or being elected president of her senior class.
Until one night
in May of 2003…
***
She was working
on her valedictorian speech when the phone rang. She heard her mother answer it first in Korean and then in
heavily accented English. Then she
heard her mom cry out and drop the phone.
So-Jung and her
sister Mi-Young ran to the living room of their cramped apartment. Slowly they got the story from her shocked
mother. Her father had been shot. He’d been in the family’s candy store where
he usually worked for 12 hours or more a day.
There had been a robbery, which had happened before but this time the
gang members were not happy with their pickings and had decided to take it out
on her father. They’d shot him twice
and trashed the store. He was alive but
in a coma in the hospital.
The next two
weeks were hell for So-Jung. She spent
every day at the hospital while her mother took over the store. Friends and teachers offered their
condolences and she heard from members of the community how terrible crime in
Megapolis was. Most of the immigrant
store owners in Hyung’s Town had been victims of violence at one time or
another. Crime was the dark side of the
American dream.
Many people
mentioned that someone needed to do something.
The Megapolis police were almost useless. They were more worried about doughnuts and their pensions than
actually fighting crime. Crime fighting
was something they left to Megapolis’ endless supply of superheroes and
heroines. But the spandex patrol
couldn’t be bothered to patrol a Korean ghetto like Hyung’s Town; they were too
busy fighting robots in
Well if the
police were no good, and the American superheroes were no good then…
***
White Crane leapt
from her eighth floor window to the rooftop across the alley. She sprinted across the rooftops, crossing
several blocks in minutes. She’d tried
stunts like this before, just running and letting her supernatural instincts
and toned body take care of her but this was different. It was better. Just wearing her costume made her feel more confident, more
powerful.
This is what her
abilities were given to her for, protecting her community, not passing tests
and hitting baseballs!
She heard someone
yelling in Korean. She leapt off the
rooftop towards the trouble.
***
The next few
months were exhilarating. After her
father had more or less recovered, So-Jung announced to her parents that she
was turning down Harvard, Yale and
As White Crane
So-Jung patrolled the streets and alleys of Hyung’s Town, her instincts always
seemed to tell her what nights she’d be needed and lead her to where she had to
be.
In just her first
week she caught a few muggers, stopped two burglaries and prevented a
rape. The local Korean news ran a
blurry picture of her in costume and she started to hear people talking about
her.
So-Jung did some
research into superhuman biology and history and realized she was probably a
mutant with the instinctive ability to predict or anticipate the future. Her well-toned body could be the result of
the Perez Effect which said that people with superpowers would naturally need
healthier bodies to contain the powerful energies inside them. Mutants tended to either hideous or fashion
model gorgeous and So-Jung was glad she’d gotten the latter.
With her powers
warning her of any danger and instinctively guiding her to the best path she
didn’t worry too much about crime fighting.
She knew there were really bad villains out there and that her minor
powers wouldn’t mean anything to Bruticus or Dynamo but she wasn’t trying to be
the next Ultra Woman or Stella, she just wanted to protect her little
neighborhood. Usually the tough part
was keeping her identity from her parents and sister Mi-Young. They all lived together in a cramped apartment
and there were only so many times So-Jung could sneak out before they got
suspicious. Her powers made her a more
talented liar than most teenaged girls but stories about ‘study sessions’ and
‘11pm student government meetings’ only worked for so long. Her parents were happy so long as she kept
bringing home good grades but her bratty sister seemed determined to find out
the truth.
Mi-Young knew if
she could prove her golden girl sister was doing drugs, partying, seeing a
white guy or whatever, she’d finally be able to win their game of sibling
rivalry. Ever since Mi-Young had cut
her hair short and dyed it brown her parents had been pretty hard on her
younger sister (and they didn’t even know about her smoking and underage
drinking). Mi-Young coped with it by
trying to bring down her perfect-seeming sister.
But somehow
So-Jung’s powers managed to keep her ahead of the game, she always managed to
slip back through the fire escape window and throw a robe over her costume just
before Mi-Young came in for a ‘surprise inspection’.
***
After six months
of heroics she was happy to find herself listed in the Kirby Guide. It was just a three line entry describing
her as an oriental martial artist with no apparent superpowers but it was a
start.
She met some
other heroines too, at first just some vigilantes like when she teamed with
Night Huntress and Nightbat Girl to bust some peeping toms, but later on she
actually met some A-list heroines.
White Crane tried
not to look too star-struck when La Sola and Aussie Girl from the Global
Protectors flew out of the sky to meet her.
They were in Hyung’s Town trying to track down the villainous Spectral
Samurai and his Necro Ninjas. Apparently
their Japanese member was out of town and they needed someone to help them with
the case. Over a spicy kim-chi dinner
White Crane explained to them that samurai and ninjas are Japanese and that she
was Korean and sent them off to Miyazaki Mura on the east side. They seemed genuinely embarrassed by the
mistake and thanked her.
Eventually even
the lazy cops of Megapolis had to take notice of her. She was called in to Police Headquarters at 1 Kane Plaza and got
a long lecture from Commissioner Mulligan about just what a heroine can and cannot
get away with in ‘his’ city. It was
pretty patronizing but at least he recognized all she’d done and thanked
her. But then Lt. Sharpe the detective
in charge of the Paranormal Crimes Unit took her aside and ‘explained’ that
heroines could expect some ‘extra cooperation’ from the police as long as they
were ‘friendly’. One look in his beady
eyes told her just what he was thinking of.
So she just smacked him and jumped out the window.
***
A few weeks later
she had the best night of her short career.
On that cold November evening Tangun II actually sought her out for a
mission. Tangun II (named after Tangun
the legendary founder of
Except Nightbat
of course.
And Colonel
Liberty.
And Shininja.
And the real
superheroes like Ultra Woman of course.
I mean he’s still just a commando guy with some steroids and
cybernetics, it’s not like he can punch through a mountain.
But still, he was
pretty good.
Together they
captured the group of North Korean spies who were in Megapolis to buy advanced
wardroids from Doctor Droid. After the
authorities dragged the spies off to prison the two found themselves alone on
the roof of the old Manhwa warehouse.
They faced each other about 10’ apart.
She was still breathing hard from the fight with that fat guy who throws
his hat. Her eyes crawled up and down
Tangun II’s black leather uniform and mask.
She caught the discreet um-yang symbol worked into the leather and the
Korean flag patches on each arm. She
couldn’t help but notice the way the dark leather accentuated his muscles and
how big the package between his legs was.
She caught herself wondering what he did off duty.
“Well… that was
exciting.”
“On behalf of the
people of
“WAIT! Wait, uh…”
So-Jung hesitated, it was so strange, she’d never been at a loss for
words before; her instincts had always told her what to say to get what she
wanted. The problem was… she didn’t
know what she wanted. She just looked
down and giggled awkwardly. Inside she
died, “Tangun must think I’m an idiot.”
He walked closer
to her. He pulled off his leather hood
to show off his chiseled features. He
smiled, her heart skipped a beat.
“I…” she started
to say and stopped. The nineteen-year
old heroine looked down again.
Tangun II slipped
his tahn-bong fighting sticks into a pouch, took off an armored glove and put
his finger over her trembling lips.
So-Jung could feel the warmth of his body through her thin costume. She tried to think of something to say but
he whispered in her ear “hush my delicate little bird; there is no need for
words.”
He hugged her and
started to unzip her costume. His warm
lips met her quivering lips, they kissed.
So-Jung realized
her instincts has steered her correctly once again. She was getting what she wanted…
From a belt pouch
Tangun absently tossed out a small package that instantly inflated itself into
an air mattress, he moved her unresisting body on to it and applied his warm
lips and talented tongue to her neck and collar bone. He undid the clasp behind her neck and pulled her dark blue
costume down lower as he anointed her breasts with kisses. The Korean heroine moaned in undisguised
delight.
Her belt came off
and was discarded; the costume was pulled lower, over her narrow hips. She raised her tight buttocks off the
mattress allowing him to pull it free.
She now lay beneath him dressed only in her mask, gloves, shoes and
black satin panties.
“Please…” she
whispered “be gentle this is my first…” she couldn’t finish the sentence and
just blushed red. None of her friends,
no one at school knew that. They’d
always just assumed. But until now her
instincts had always steered So-Jung away from that sort of thing. More than once she had found herself alone
with a guy and had a flash, a warning of an unpleasant, awkward, painful and
unfulfilling encounter. Even with the
nice guys. Even with the cute
guys. She’d always found a polite way
to get rid of the guy without hurting him, most never even knew they were being
pre-dumped.
But this time,
there was no warning sounding in her head, no instinct telling her to get
away. This was what she had been
waiting for.
Grinning like a
kid a Christmas, Tangun II peeled off the moist panties and knelt between her
legs. Again he applied kisses down her
breasts and belly, feeling the young girl under him squirm and moan, feeling
her temperature rise with each kiss.
Finally he reached her neatly trimmed bush, and licked the
perimeter. So-Jung’s fingers
clenched. Then his talented and
experienced tongue slipped between her legs and the girl let out an excited
cry. She felt a tinge of disappointment
as his tongue migrated upwards again towards her breast and her mouth but that
feeling was forgotten as his hard member slipped between her legs. There was a moment of pain, she bit her lip
and gasped, but then sweet pleasure as his hot dick stroked her sensitive love
canal. He thrust into her slowly at
first milking every long stroke for all the pleasure he could give, and get,
from it. Then he went faster, driving
the squirming girl under him into a frenzy of pants, moans and finally a long
scream that attracted attention from the neighboring crack house.
They paused
quickly to throw Tangun’s reactive camouflage cape over them, the high tech
material immediately adopting the colors of the warehouse roof. Tangun gagged his pretty companion with a
bit of gauze and surgical tape from his med kit and got back to work.
It was a long,
hot night for the both of them.
***
So-Jung awoke
tired and aching but somehow fulfilled.
She was a woman
now.
And she’d lost
her virginity with one of the most wonderful men in all of
Jumping over the
rooftops she tried to decide what story she would tell her parents to cover up
both secrets from that night.
She giggled,
they’d be much more upset about her having sex than being a heroine.
It was the last
truly happy night of her life. Before
things got bad…
***
She was jumping
across
Since she became
a heroine So-Jung’s senses had grown even sharper, she knew when someone was
looking at her and when they intended harm.
During the case with Tangun II she had sensed that North Korean sniper
from 500 meters away. Now she had that
same feeling of threat again but this time she couldn’t tell where it was
coming from. This was different. This was all around her.
She started to
move. Faster and faster she zigzagged among
the rooftops, a growing feeling of dread crawling up her spine. She barely noticed the rising fog until it
grew too thick to see. She was running
along the roof of Uncle Lee’s Korean BBQ and stopped dead at the edge of it,
she couldn’t see more than a few inches ahead of her. She waited for her instincts to tell her which way to run, which
way to jump. Nothing. All her senses said she couldn’t go forward.
So she turned
around to face her fear.
***
“Who’s
there?” White Crane demanded of the fog.
She heard
hysterical giggling more like a small girl than some villain. A name echoed across the roofs:
“Red Jack! RED
Jack! Red JACK! R-R-R-RED J-J-J-Jack!
Hee-hee-hee.”
Across the roof a
patch of fog grew darker, she saw just a silhouette first but gradually it grew
into a man.
Red Jack wasn’t
tall, just an inch or two higher than the oriental girl. He was dressed almost normally, not in any
spandex villain costume, just in a long leather duster and a wide brimmed hat
but as he came closer she could see that under the clothes were a collection of
bloodstained rags and that his face was covered in a smirking ‘comedy’
mask. The stalker giggled and flicked
his wrists; wicked curved blades appeared in his rag-covered hands. There was very little red to be seen on him
but White Crane had visited enough crime scenes to recognize that the red-brown
marks on his coat had once been vivid scarlet blood stains.
White Crane
frowned. Was this it? This was what she had been running from all
night? Some clown with knives? She’d taken on supervillains and gun-toting
mobsters, even a ninja or two. She was
sure she’d take this guy apart in a few minutes.
She’d never been
so wrong before in her life.
He swung the knives
in long lazy arcs that White Crane’s superhuman reflexes easily dodged. She even landed a few blows on his body
noting the strange squishing sound the came each time she hit it. But as they dueled the attacker got faster,
the blows closer. A swipe at her leg
actually cut the bell bottom and almost hit her flesh. She started to be more defensive,
concentrating on evading rather than attacking. She kept one eye on the edge of the roof, looking for a chance to
run but the fog was still too thick.
Things got worse.
Red Jack sped up
slashing faster and faster until his hands became blurs, So-Jung’s instincts
told her to dodge but her body could not move fast enough. One blade made a shallow cut on her left
thigh; the next one was on right cheek, then her abdomen, then across her
breasts. She stumbled a few feet,
almost falling off the edge. Red Jack’s
inhuman burst of speed wore off but by then White Crane was too tired and in
too much pain to obey her own foresight any longer. Her reactions were just too slow.
Red Jack walked
around her cutting at an almost leisurely pace, inflicting shallow but painful
cuts at will. White Crane tried twice
to run, no longer caring that she couldn’t see anything past the edge of the
roof but both times Red Jack blocked her making incredible gymnastic leaps over
her head and inflicting more painful cuts each time. Tears filled her eyes and mocking laughter filled her ears. She could barely fight down the rising panic
inside her. After years of always
knowing what to do she felt helpless and alone. This giggling monster could kill her any time.
She went for
broke, picking a random direction and charging forward heedless of the
consequences. Red Jack jumped in her
way but she barreled through him like an American quarterback. She barely noticed the edge of the roof
before she stepped off it and managed a weak jump. It carried her across the alley but was not high enough. She hit the far wall and fell 20 feet into
bags of trash.
Red Jack landed
smoothly ten feet in front of her and advanced. So-Jung couldn’t move.
She could barely whimper as the cackling villain approached. He put one ragged hand on her jaw, another
on her forehead. The carrion stench
from his body made the young girl gag.
He pulled her mouth open and opened his own. A thick red tube-like tongue emerged from his mask and thrust
itself down her throat.
He took her
breath away.
Literally.
It was like
having a vacuum cleaner stuck down her throat and branching into every cell in
her body. She felt the energy being
sucked from every part of her. Then the
world went black.
***
So-Jung Kim woke
up in a pile of trash feeling nothing but pain and exhaustion. The sun was just starting to come up and
light up the alley. She was alone.
After an eternity
she rose from her painful bed and stumbled towards the street. She noticed a clothes line and swiped an
Insane Clown Posse tee-shirt from it pulling it over her torn costume. She found a token in the compartment on her
belt and got on the cross town bus.
Hardly anyone gave the Korean girl a second look as she settled into the
hard plastic seat, struggling to stay awake.
Two grandmothers on their way to the senior center sneered at her and
muttered darkly in Korean how the kids today just want to party all night. So-Jung tried to laugh but coughed instead.
***
It took two weeks
to find the energy and will power to mend her costume. Another two weeks beyond that to find the
courage to go out again. It was an
article about rising Hyung’s Town crime rate in the Daily Comet that convinced
her she was needed. So-Jung chose to be
a heroine, to risk herself to protect other people, people like her father, she
could not allow one defeat to deter her.
So she went out
again, a bit more subdued, a bit more cautious, but determined to do her
duty. She took extra precautions this
time. With some money she’d shrewdly
invested on e*trade she was able to buy an armored leather jacket and painted a
white crane on the back and a small one on the sleeve so she looked less
militaristic with it. She added a pair
of tahn-bong fighting sticks like Tangun’s to her equipment. If Red Jack showed up again she’d have
something ready to counter his knives.
She’d tried to
learn more about her attacker but the Kirby Guide had nothing on anyone
named Red Jack or matching the description.
She even paid $19.99 to subscribe to Kirby Guide On-Line Premium
Service and found nothing.
Considering the Kirby Guide listed every martial artist,
vigilante and alien warlord who’d appeared since the Great Depression that
meant that no one had ever recorded anything about him before. Even web searches and Lexis/Nexis just told
her that Red Jack was another name for Jack the Ripper, nothing about a
contemporary supervillain using the name.
Fortunately the
next few months were quiet. She stopped
some normal robberies and helped shut down a Microsoft center before it went on
line.
At school she
started seeing an American boy named Jeff.
She didn’t dare tell her parents about him but he was actually very nice
and sweet. They made love for the first
time on Valentine’s Day. He was no
Tangun II but he was OK.
By March So-Jung
had practically forgotten the attack.
***
She’d just beaten
up some Wulf Pak gangers who were trying to mark Hyung’s Town with their gang
signs when it happened again. The three
black punks were running down the alley back to their ghetto when White Crane
felt a stab of fear shoot up her back.
Someone was watching her. He was
watching her.
She felt an
impulse to run but fought it down. She
already knew he was faster. She had to
face him fresh and alert not exhausted and afraid.
She jumped on a
dumpster then to a fire escape and then scrambled up to a rooftop. She looked around; thick fog was already
appearing, isolating her from the world.
She took out the fighting sticks.
Red Jack’s cackle
brought back all the fear, all the helplessness but she stood her ground. She was ready this time.
He came out and
charged, she raised the sticks to parry.
His yellow eyes
met hers, she saw the future and she froze.
It was all useless. She would
never have a chance. She just knew it.
She tried of
course, but this time he was ahead of her from the beginning. None of her blocks stopped his cuts, none of
her strikes connected. The armored
jacket protected her upper body from his knives but soon there were shallow
cuts criss-crossing her face and legs.
Then the fight
was over.
Red Jack jumped
over, moving too fast to see. He landed
lightly and wrapped his arms around her.
A quick tug left her jacket half unzipped and a strong yank on the
shoulders turned it into a straight-jacket pinning her arms helplessly.
White Crane could
smell his carrion stench, hear him giggling in her ear, feel him pressing his
crotch into her ass. She looked down in
despair and dropped the useless fighting sticks. He shoved her over onto her belly, she heard him run his knives
along each other making a horrid screech.
“L-listen…” she
started, her last hope was to somehow talk him out of… this. “You don’t have to… We could…” she couldn’t
even say it.
Not that it
mattered, Red Jack’s knives flashed and the crotch of her costume fell open.
He pried her legs
apart and put the flats of his blades along her collarbone, the points just
under her chin.
She screamed as
he entered her, screamed until her lungs ran out of air but no one
noticed. No one heard. She could hear people on the street below,
see them through cracks in the fog, from a tenement window one man seemed to
look right at her but no one moved to help.
In the middle of a city of millions she was alone.
When Red Jack
began to pump into her dry pussy the pain took her breath away, it was like
having sandpaper rammed through her private parts. Then it got worse.
She could feel
him pulling at her, sucking energy and life from her body, she couldn’t breath,
couldn’t move, just feel the cold numbness creeping into her fingers toes and
breasts.
Mercifully White
Crane blacked out.
***
She did not stir
until dawn and did not really move for an hour after that.
She was alone on
the roof, weak and in pain but alive.
With some effort
she freed herself from the armored jacket that had become a trap. She peeled off the rest of her filthy torn
costume as well. Someone whistled from
a housing project across the way but she was past caring, she just wanted to be
free of these clothes. She left them on
the roof to rot and climbed down a ladder to the alley. She found a busboy uniform handing out to
dry and snatched it. Slowly, painfully
she made her way home.
***
So-Jung spent the
next few weeks trying to forget White Crane ever existed. She stayed away from newspapers and TV
reports about rising crime. She spent
more time with her friends and with Jeff.
She avoided rough neighborhoods and dark alleys, returning to life as a
normal, above average Korean girl.
She hid her
diaries and souvenirs from her short career in a box deep in her closet. She kept meaning to throw them out but never
got around to it.
Once, walking to
the new Amazing Arachnid movie with her friends she thought she caught a
glimpse of Red Jack watching her from a rooftop. She excused herself and ran home.
***
Three months
later So-Jung awoke in her room in a cold sweat.
He was here.
She knew it. She knew with more certainty than she had
ever known anything, she knew he was here.
And this was it.
Her eyes adjusted
to the dark, she saw a flash of silver blades and a silhouette by her
window. She closed her eyes and counted
to ten. She’d always known what to
do. Twice now she had been too afraid
to do it but this time… she was finished with White Crane, whatever happened,
this villain would not lure her into become his prey again.
“N-no. No.
If you’re going to kill me, do it.
But I won’t be afraid of you.”
She heard
giggling, it became an evil cackle.
“Go AWAY! I’m done with you!”
The monster fell
silent.
Then he started
to giggle again and slipped gracefully out her door into the rest of the
apartment.
So-Jung’s eyes
went wide. She jumped out of bed after
him. She caught a glimpse of his filthy
ragged cloak entering her sister’s room.
She was screaming
then, but no one heard.
She saw him standing
on Mi-Young’s bed, his legs straddling her 16 year old body, his knives
scraping against each other once again.
He looked at So-Jung and giggled again.
Then he leapt out the open window into the night.
Her heart
pounding So-Jung stood motionless for 10 minutes. She’d done it. She’d
mastered her fear of him, her fear for herself. And it had only taken seconds for the monster to trap her
again. Once again she knew what she had
to do. And it terrified her.
She stumbled back
to her room. It was waiting for
her. Meticulously repaired her costume
was draped over her computer chair. The
armored jacket and fighting sticks were gone; it was her original costume,
restored for one last battle.
She closed her
eyes and took a deep breath. She reached
for it.
***
“Hey sis, I had a
bad dream… OHMYGAWD!”
Mi-Young had
walked in just as So-Jung fastened her costume behind her neck.
“Uh…” So-Jung started to put together an excuse
about a costume party.
“You’re White
Crane? You? OHMYGAWD! That’s so
awesome! Wait till I tell Toni!”
So-Jung closed
her eyes again and took another deep breath.
Knowing what would happen did not make it any easier but at least… Well
at least she could say goodbye. She
hugged her sister and kissed her on the forehead.
“Mi-Young,
listen… you’re right, I am White Crane and… listen… I have a mission
tonight. It’s really important, really,
really, important. And if anything
happens to me…”
“Hey did you ever
meet Ultra Woman or Star? Wow I bet you
met Tangun! That’s why you got his
poster right? What was he like?”
An idea hit
So-Jung like a freight train. Maybe
somehow there was still something she could do…
“Listen, listen,
if anything does happen, there’s a Nike box in my closet OK, just get it to the
Global Protectors or someone OK?
They’ll know what to do.”
“Huh? What are you saying? I mean you’re a
heroine! Nothing bad happens to them!”
“I-I know… but if
anything does… just remember OK? And
remember… I love you sis OK?”
“So-Jung stop
that you’re scaring me! You’re gonna be
OK right? Right?”
Tears in her eyes
So-Jung just nodded and climbed out the window giving her sister one last wave
goodbye before she jumped to the next rooftop.
“So-Jung! Where are you going?”
But her sister
was already gone.
Mi-Young turned
white as a sheet and sank to her knees.
Something terrible was going to happen.
She just knew it.
***
Fifteen minutes later…
White Crane faced her
attacker across the rooftop. She was
bleeding from a half dozen shallow cuts, including one across the top of her
heaving breasts. Her torn costume
barely covered her nipples. Confronted
with so much fear, her mind distracted itself with trivial thoughts like how
hard it would be to mend the costume this time and how many washings it would take
to get the bloodstains out.
Then she realized that might
not be a problem.
Her stalker smirked and
giggled. He leapt into the air.
White Crane did not need her
powers to know what would happen.
She was going to die.
WIZARD'S LAIR MAIN
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