The Raven Takes Wing by Duet Kate saves a friend & learns her special abilities make her a super heroine. Catherine "Kate" Windrunner was tired as she locked the door of the small shop that acted as the classroom for her self defense class. It had been hot lately in Dallas, and that had the gangs acting up, and that, in turn, had made her clients nervous, which in turn led to a very stressful session. She was dressed for the weather, a pink T-shirt, tied under her breasts, that left her belly bare, and a pair of cutoff jeans shorts, with sandals on her feet. She walked down the corridor of the mall, heading for the main doors and the parking lot. It was a "limbo" time; most of the businesses were closed, but the night security and janitors hadn't yet arrived. Kate had nearly reached the exit when she passed a small bookstore. She knew the girl who worked there, a busty redhead named Carol. Kate saw that the back light was on, and the door was ajar, though the "closed" sign was up, and the front lights were off. "Maybe she fell and got hurt," thought Kate, as she went inside. Kate moved through the door, and towards the back of the store. She didn't notice that the door closed all the way behind her, its lock automatically engaging. She moved through the dark aisles to the back room, and looked inside. Kate saw Carol and 5 men. All of the men were white, the smallest 5'10", the largest over 6'4". They were dressed in black, with the colors of a local gang, the Thunderbolts. One of them held Carol's arms behind her, the others were grinning. One, the apparent leader, said "Now you'll find out what happens to girls who fuck around on me ... we're gonna party with you, slut, and when we're through, you'll be lucky if you can walk." Kate gasped as she heard that, and almost as one person, the gang members spun around, and saw her. Everyone became silent for a minute ... and then Kate broke the silence by asking, "Carol, Jimmy the daytime security guard and his friend are waiting for us, outside. Remember? We promised we'd go out for drinks with them after work? Unless you've got a private party . . ." "Gash", the gang leader, smirked and said, "I don't know who you are, bitch, but you've just bought yourself a whole lot of trouble!" Two of the larger gang members, grinning evilly, started moving toward Kate. As she instinctively began backing up (more room to maneuver back in the store), she bumped into something! Something hard! Suddenly, two beefy hands grabbed her arms, the long fat fingers completely encircling her biceps. Effortlessly, her unseen enemy lifted Kate off the floor as the other two approached. "Ain'tcha heard o' lookouts, bitch?" Gash snarled. "Anyone else out there Sonny?" "The mall is empty, Gash," replied the voice behind Kate. As the two gang-bangers got near Kate, she kicked forward with both feet. The momentum launched the sandals off her feet like a pair of cruise missiles flying from the deck of a Navy warship. A sandal hit each thug in the face, causing them to flinch or turn away, giving Kate precious seconds to act. Kate knew that she had to act quickly before the two gang bangers could grab her, but the surprise her kicks had elicited helped. She quickly kicked a heel backward onto Sonny's knee and surprised him, a *whoosh* of air from his lungs resulting, and he released her. She took advantage of that and moved at the two gangers in front of her. The first one grinned, and swung a fist at her. His grin turned to surprise, though, as first she blocked the fist, and then did a quick drop-and-pivot, swinging her leg around behind his, her heel hitting him behind the knee, dropping him. She quickly dropped to one knee and hit him in the side of the head with a precise strike, her fist balled, impacting him above and forward his ear, knocking him out. Kate then did a tight forward somersault, ending on her feet, with a front kick. She wasn't surprised when the second ganger deflected that kick, in fact she was expecting it. She spun off the block, doing a complete circle, then kicked out again. However, she hadn't accounted for Sonny. As her left foot left the floor, he grabbed her from behind. One of his arms encircled her, pinning her right arm to her side. His other arm gabbed her left forearm. She gasped, feeling his massive arms on her, as her left leg was up in the air, the other leg on the floor. Sonny's right arm, wrapped around her right arm and pinning it to her chest, was rapidly squeezing the air from her lungs! His other hand was cruelly twisting her left arm backward, behind them both, into an impossible angle. She grimaced in pain, feeling like he would dislocate her shoulder! Then, as suddenly as the pain had begun, is faded away! In fact, she sensed that she was able to lock her shoulder and prevent Sonny from twisting her arm further. As for the pain in her chest and right arm, that too faded. She felt a 'flush', maybe some kind of adrenaline rush, which seemed to be energizing her for the fight! Just then the other gang banger pulled a switchblade from his hip pocket, 'snicked' out the blade, and stepped forward. For Kate, the next few seconds seemed to drag on for hours. Almost in a detached fashion, she analyzed the situation and decided to stop the 'blade warrior' before dealing with Sonny (she still had not seen Sonny's face!). Still balanced on the tip of her right foot, she deftly kicked toward the hand with the knife. Just as she did this, though, Sonny turned wrenched her left arm violently backward, turning her body slightly to the left. While Kate was amazed that this still did not cause her any pain, she also saw that the kick had missed the knife! Beyond all reason, the 4" long knife blade was raked across Kate's bare midriff by the gang member. Wincing, in anticipation of pain, Kate suddenly realized that SHE FELT NO PAIN!?! Looking first at her knife-wielding attacker, then at her stomach, both realized that though the blade had been dragged across her stomach, it had done no harm! Sonny, meanwhile, was cranking Kate's arm like the handle on an old-fashioned ice cream making machine. Her arm was yanked and twisted to what would have been impossible angles for anyone else; for Kate, the only concern was how to get leverage with the arm to do something. At a loss, she did the only riposte she could - her head slammed backward and up, catching Sonny in the chin. HARD! Her large nemesis grunted and staggered backward a few steps. While his grip had not eased, Kate felt . . . she "sensed" a weakness in him, and thrashed her head backward again. Unbeknownst to her, Sonny had backed to the door jamb for support. When Kate's second head-butt landed, his head was smashed backward into the jamb with incredible force. Her head, this time, had connected not with his hard chin, but with his large pulpy nose. Blood surged from broken vessels, out the nose, and down Sonny's throat, gagging him. The lad with the knife, having recovered from the shock of seeing his blade do no damage to the girl's stomach, shifted the grip to a stabbing one and charged Kate. The full force of his overhand strike brought the point of the blade to the girl's chest, between her breasts, in a loud "smack". Now, if he had hit a wooden plank with as much force as he used against this girl's chest, the knife blade would have penetrated at least 3" into the wood. No doubt about the power behind his swing. Yet, again, the fighters were astounded as the steel blade SNAPPED, a segment at least 2" broke off the blade and fell to the ground between her legs. The remnants of the knife twisted in junior's hand, and managed to slash his own arm "on the rebound"! Wasting not a second, Kate kicked out again, this time with her right foot, and nailed the dude's cojones. The impact seemed to lift him several inches off the ground, and he landed back a foot or so, on his butt. Hard. He was now "officially" out of THIS fight, his family jewels feeling to him like they'd been smashed flat. All this had happened in maybe 10 intense seconds. "Gash", the gang leader, and his two remaining cronies, who until now had been observing this fight, decided to "get off the sidelines". One loser turned and streaked out the rear door of the shop, into a service corridor in the mall. Gash and Jonesy, the other gang member, rushed toward Kate and Sonny. Carol had been pushed to one side, ignored for the moment by Gash and Jonesy. By now, Sonny was clearly out of the fight, gagging loudly on the blood pouring down his throat. Although he still held the girl's arm, still had one massive arm which reached around her right side, across her front (below her breasts), and gripped her on the left side of her rib cage, there was no strength left in his grip. Well, there was enough grip left to provide Kate with a firm base from which to continue using her legs. She quickly jammed both of her heels downward, with all her strength, into the tops of Sonny's boots. His grip weakened still more, giving her enough freedom to drop downward, turning toward her left. She held onto his right arm as she did so, and effected a successful shoulder throw. As she lowered herself, she turned to the left and "rolled" Sonny over her back toward Gash and Jonesy. At the top of the arc, across her back, Kate stood upright and yanked harder on Sonny's right arm. His butt and legs were now flying toward the others, and before either could react, the man-mountain crashed into them, sending them sprawling. Kate, still bent from her shoulder toss, was panting, trying to catch her breath, as she watched her "toss" scatter the gang members like ten pins. Just as she started to rise and face Gash and Jonesy (who, by now, were lying on the ground with the other gang members), Gash pulled a 'Saturday Night Special' from a holster under his arm pit. Before Kate could do anything, Gash "popped" two quick shots at the girl's chest. Carol screamed when the gun went off, Jonesy began laughing, and all Kate could think was "Oh, SHIT!!!" The first .38 caliber round hit Kate right between her breasts; the second landed above her left breast, and the impact shoved her back into the wall. While everyone waited a second or two for the sound to stop reverberating in the small room, and for the smoke to clear, Kate, astounded, realized that though she had taken two shots to her chest, was UNHURT! "Un-fucking-BELIEVABLE!" she thought. Well, Jonesy may have been a street gang thug, but he wasn't exactly stupid. Close, but not EXACTLY stupid. When he saw the girl was had taken two slugs to her chest and yet was still on her feet, and not bleeding, he said "I'm outta here!" and literally crawled past her, out the door. Amazed at what had happened, Kate only watched Jonesy's hasty retreat; she was so fazed she could not react against the boy as he passed her. Gash, on the other hand, shrugged off this turn of events. "Shit happens", he thought. He also thought that he didn't want any part of some chick who could take a knife to the stomach, and TWO bullets (well, okay, they WERE just lead rounds - not hollow points, not even metal-jacketed). Looking sheepishly at Carol and Kate, Gash dropped the gun and fled out the back door of the store. Three gang members still lay on the floor, victims of Kate's martial arts skills. Grabbing Carol's hand, Kate YANKED the girl to her feet and dragged her out through the store into the mall. Without pausing, the women fled the mall, and raced to Carol's car. Kate pushed her friend inside, grabbed Carol's keys from her shaking hands, and drove her home. Carol was in shock, it seemed and Kate got her home without incident. She never mentioned what had happened in the back room of the bookstore. After leaving Carol at her home, Kate took a city bus back to the mall to collect her motorcycle. Unlatching the helmet from the helmet lock, and removing the "Kryptonite" bike lock, she hopped on her small Honda 450cc "Rebel" and drove home, and went inside, locking her door. On the ride home, and after her arrival there, she had gone over the events of the evening in her mind, not knowing how it (or WHAT) had happened, but realized that she wasn't "normal". Normal people don't stop knife and bullet attacks with bare skin, leaving no marks. She should be dead ... yet wasn't .. and that amazed her. Kate stayed home the next couple days, thinking, and trying to figure out why she had not been harmed, but she couldn't. During her second night at home, she saw a story, on CNN, about Wonder Woman. "I could do that too" she thought. She decided to give it a try, and over the next couple weeks she worked on a costume. Finally, she had one ... a tight black lycra top, and a matching mini skirt, with skimpy little black ankle boots, and black lace panties. Then, she got up enough courage one muggy night to go out on her first patrol. She slid the panties on, then the top, and skirt. After donning her boots, helmet, and gloves, and she slid out of her efficiency apartment, into the night, and hopped onto her "Rebel" to begin stalking the back alleys of Dallas, looking for wrongs to right.