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Synopsis: Jezz- along with her sensei Edge- are recruited to locate a missing girl believed to be kidnapped and mind-controlled.
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The sun was just beginning to rise.
The surf broke and washed over the stretch of Chrystal Heights shore as seagulls sounded overhead. The cries of the hovering birds underscored the quietness of the morning beach rather than disrupting it.
Two figures- an old man and a brown-haired woman who appeared to be in her late twenties or early thirties- stood along the shoreline. They did not disturb the silence in any way. To the casual observer, they appeared to wear their environment like camouflage, as opposed to existing within it. A more attentive observer might have noticed there were few footprints in the surrounding sand, despite the fact that the woman appeared to be doing a series of martial arts katas.
The old man was Asian in appearance, perhaps 80 years of age. His white hair was surprisingly full and long, reaching past his shoulders, and his goatee extended several inches from his chin. He was 3 or 4 inches over five feet and thin in a way that suggested he would need to walk through a thunderstorm before standing on a scale if he wished to see three digits. He seemingly held himself erect only by supporting himself with a staff that was as tall as he was. His name was Edge.
"Breathe," said Edge. "Breath is fuel. It creates structure within. Unless one is breathing like an injured cow, such as you are doing now."
The recipient of Edge's verbal taunting was an athletic-looking woman with brown hair and brown eyes. At 5'7", she was several inches taller than the slight old man who berated her. Her name was Jezz, short for Jezabel.
"Oh, c'mon, Edge," said Jezz. She began a series of strikes and kicks, speaking as she did so. "My breathing isn't that bad."
"That is true only if you are comparing yourself to buffalo," said Edge. "I could fling a blade at you in the dark without fear of missing, using only your snorts to track you."
Jezz continued her motions, hands and feet moving effortlessly through moves practiced countless times before. Then she stopped and dropped into a horse stance, her legs slightly bent at the knees, ankles shoulder-width apart, fists at her sides just above her hips. "I was poetry in motion, Edge."
The old man's hands twitched. Less than a heartbeat later his staff struck Jezz in her exposed mid-section.
The thwack of the wood striking her belly echoed briefly. Jezz maintained her stance, showing no sign that she had even noticed.
Edge circled around, then whirled and struck Jezz on her rounded buttocks. Again she showed no reaction.
Edge hmphed. "It is fortunate we practice in the open. The vibrations created by the ripples in your blubbery rear-end could shatter our furniture."
Then a voice said, "Hey, old man, why don't you pick on someone your own size?" Another voice answered, "Because, Dave, all the kids are in school today, so there's no one his size around!" A round of raucous laughter sounded.
The voices belonged to three guys. Each had a beer in his hand and none of them appeared to be a ball of fire in the brains department.
Edge ignored them, continuing to circle around and strike Jezz with his staff. Jezz gave no indication that she had even heard them.
The dark-haired guy said, "Hey, babe, if you want to get hit with a staff, I got a better staff for you right here."
The blond guy next to him said, "Yeah, we can give you more wood than that old guy any day."
The brown-haired guy said, "There's three of us and you have three holes. Coincidence? I think not."
Edge turned to them. "You think you can defeat my student?"
The three guys laughed. "Of course we could take her," said dark hair. "Any one of us could take her."
Edge nodded. "I see. Why do you think that is so?"
Jezz sighed. "C'mon, Edge. This isn't necessary."
Dark hair looked baffled. He replied, "We're bigger than she is. Stronger. Faster. And yeah, we can see she does karate, but so do we."
Edge's eyebrows went up. "You are trained?"
Dark hair nodded, his chest puffing up as he said, "Damn right. We've been taking lessons at the YMCA for over a year now."
Edge said, "The YMCA, you say? Your skills must indeed be formidable."
Dark hair nodded. "Damn straight. We kick asses and take names."
Edge nodded and stroked his beard in a thoughtful manner. "Then you should do so."
Dark hair blinked. "We should do what? Kick her ass or take her name?"
Edge nodded. "Both. She has been a poor student. You should strike her bottom and take her name. She is in need of a lesson. You should defeat her and then give her all your staffs."
Blond hair said, "Are you serious? You want us to beat her down and then, what, do her?"
"Of course I am serious," said Edge. "I would not have instructed you to do so otherwise."
"And you're fine with us doing this and then doing her...?"
"You tire me, young man. If you can defeat her, then she is yours by right of victory. The fault would lie with her for losing, not you for winning. And although she is a poor student, there is no doubt that her soft body can provide for you a vessel of pleasure."
Still in horse stance, Jezz spoke through gritted teeth. "Edge, knock it off. You're going to get them hurt."
Dark hair said, "We couldn't hear her. What did she say?"
Edge let out a high-pitched laugh. "She said she does not fear losing, as she thinks she would scarce notice your child-like appendages attempting entry. In fact, she fears she would be bored."
Brown hair said, "She said what...?"
Dark hair snapped to Brown hair, "She said we have small dicks."
Blond hair said, "Enough of this shit. Let's beat her down and get a piece of that ass already."
Jezz said, "Edge, you're a dick."
Edge gave a shrill laugh and stepped back, as if to give them room. Jezz remained in her horse stance.
The three guys looked at each other. Then dark hair shrugged and stepped forward. When Jezz didn't react, he reached out and pushed her shoulder.
"Well?" he said. "C'mon. At least put up a fight or something."
Jezz said, "Turn around and walk away now. Save yourself the embarrassment."
"Fuck that," said dark hair. "Besides, you have nice tits." He reached out and placed both his hands on Jezz's breasts.
Jezz's left hand immediately arched over dark hair's right wrist and locked on to his left wrist. She dropped her forearm into the crook of dark hair's right arm and pressed down, trapping his forearms against her torso. As she did so, she drove the stiffened fingers of her right hand between his wrists directly into his throat. Then she released his left wrist and brought both her arms around, driving her elbows just inside his forearms and knocking both his hands from her body. She drove her right elbow into his jaw, then spun and back-fisted him in the groin.
Still moving, Jezz back-kicked him in the mid-section, crossed her legs briefly as she stepped back and repositioned herself in a battle stance. Then she looked at the other two and said, "Next?"
There was stunned silence as blond hair and brown hair stared at their comrade, who was on the ground simultaneously clutching his throat and testicles. Then they looked at each other.
"What a bitch!" said blond hair.
"Yeah!" said brown hair. "What the fuck? Dave was just trying to be friendly!"
"Get her!" said blond hair.
Both guys moved in quickly, hands low to protect against groin shots. Too low. Jezz shifted her hips and suddenly kicked blond hair in the jaw, then held the kick high as she brought her heel sideways to strike brown hair in the jaw. Both men stumbled away from each other.
Blond hair had been struck harder than his comrade and he stayed back for a moment, trying to clear his head. Brown hair shook off his blow and charged at Jezz.
Jezz ducked under his reaching hands and shifted sideways, then lifted her knee to strike him in his mid-section. She drove her elbow into his exposed ribs then and when he arched in suddenly pain from the blow, she back-fisted him in the jaw.
Brown hair stumbled back a step, blinking. Jezz leaped up and snap-kicked him in the jaw. Brown hair fell backwards, arms wide, and didn't move.
Blond hair was back on his feet now. He glared at Jezz and screamed, "That's it, bitch! You're going down now!"
He leaped forward, screaming, "Kiiiiiiii! Yah! Hah! Ho! Wah!" He slashed at her with flat hands, threw punches and thrust kicks, all equally ineffective.
Jezz finally took pity on him and directed a straight punch that sailed through his whirling arms, striking him squarely on the nose. He whummppfffed and fell backward onto the sand, blood flowing freely from his nose.
"We're done here," said Jezz. "Get your friends up and get out of here."
Dark hair and brown hair were just getting to their feet. Blond hair got to his feet as well. The three of them looked at each other. Jezz took a step forward and the three of them turned tail and fled.
Jezz watched them flee, then turned to Edge. "Jeez, sensei. Was that really necessary?"
Edge gave Jezz an aloof look, then said, "Before the start of your exercise, I would not have believed so. I would have been terribly mistaken. You were barely adequate to defeat those three children."
Jezz said, "What do you mean? I took them out in under twenty seconds without actually hurting them and I wasn't even trying very hard."
Edge said, "That is precisely my point. What if one of them had even the rudiments of training? He could have struck you and caused me embarrassment as your teacher. That is unacceptable."
Jezz said, "There's no way any of them could have-"
Edge cut in. "You did not perform the Aggressive Cutlass in the correct manner."
"I did too!"