Author's Note: It does make things easier once they become a bit more fleshed out. I have some pieces of Amelie's backstory that I haven't yet revealed, mostly because every time I've tried it's never been the right time. Let's just say those throwing knives she gave Jack have a past history to them. ;-) And by all means I'm good to post this to DeviantArt, as long as there's proper credit and there's a link to it provided.
Anuli smiled as she observed Jack and Ethan, dressed in their Stealthy Scout and Kickboxing Kid getups were trying to navigate her web maze puzzle that she had spent a good bit of time designing over the last two weeks. She was herself dressed in her Anansewa suit to build the maze and was proud at what she had achieved. Several of the webs were interwoven with spells to sting, blister, heat, freeze, and shock, to provide extra challenge.
Anuli watched as Jack was learning the hard way as he tried slicing one of her webs with his buck knife, only to find that a slight electric shock caused him to screech, drop the knife, causing it to scatter and slide into a deeper part of the maze, out of reach of Jack.
"Remind me, who else among our villains gallery can weave spells into spider webs, again?" asked Jack as he shook his shocked hand.
"That's not the point of this, Stealthy Scout," said Ethan as he examined the web in front of them that had shocked Jack. Ethan tried putting his hand through a particularly decent sized hole in the webbing, with no shock given. Anuli had made it a rule that whenever they were in uniform, they were to refer to each other by their persona's names--so as to not slip up when fighting crime.
"And what other point besides the point of my buck knife is there to this?"
"Well, if the old me in my head's hints are to be trusted... it's to learn to... roll with the punches!" said Ethan as he contorted his lithe body through the hole and deeper into the maze.
"Hey, you should keep the old you quiet for once, it's almost like cheating if I can't have old me in my head whispering the answers to me!" protested Jack as he tried to follow Ethan through the hole, only to brush against a web and get shocked due to the small difference in height there was between them. Jack's lankier height not being very forgiving in this situation, while the shorter Ethan was almost becoming acrobatic in his ducks and slides through the webs.
Anuli took a deep breath and and tried to settle herself at being partly the reason Jack would never have a little Lumberjack whispering hints in his ear.
"If there was a way, Geoff would have done it," added Ethan.
Anuli observed as Ethan maneuvered his way skillfully through the maze, and somersaulted through the last hole, landing on his feet with a flourish like a gymnast might and shouting "ta da!"
"Very good, Kickboxing Kid," complimented Anuli. Jack meanwhile was stuck clutching his blistered knee two-thirds of the way through the maze.
"Did you have to make it hurt, Anansewa?" asked Jack as he made another go and successfully avoided getting more blisters.
"It will all wash off in the showers. I added a "rinses with water" appurtenance to the spell," assured Anuli.
"Great, just what I was looking forward to, another shower."
"Appurtenance? What's that mean?" asked Ethan.
"It means something that can be added to something else but it isn't necessary to what it's being added to."
"Like adding spells to spider webs in the first place. Ow!" complained Jack as he tried to launch his way through the last hole, only to brush his leg against one of the web strands, causing a red sunburned rash to appear wherever the skin had touched the web. Ethan immediately was at Jack's side and was pulling out his water bottle and wetting his leg. Ethan and Jack watched as Anuli's promise was kept as wherever the water touched the burn, it washed away.
"Thank you, Kickboxing Kid..." said Jack with some relief.
But before Ethan had a chance to answer, out of a dark corner a shuriken came whizzing by slicing nearby Ethan and Jack, but with enough space that it was apparent that whoever threw it had tried NOT to hit the boys. Ethan however didn't see it that way.
"Th--that could have really hurt!" stuttered Ethan.
"Only if you'd have moved closer to it," said someone from the shadows.
"Who's there?" demanded Jack, recovering his sense of protectiveness now that his pain was relieved.
"Let's turn up the lights, shall we?" suggested Anuli.
Anuli began casting a web imbuing it with a spell of illumination, but before she was finished casting it, another shuriken sliced the web in half and struck the floor in front of Anuli.
"I'd rather not," said the voice.
"Show yourself, you lily-livered coward!" taunted Jack as he pulled out a throwing knife.
And then suddenly the voice came from behind them.
"Put that away, Stealthy Scout, before someone gets hurt."
Anuli turned to see a ninja donning a deep purple almost black shade of clothes leaning against the side of a punch dummy nonchalantly. He face was obscured by the wrap of his garments, except for his eyes. Ethan and Jack turned around with Jack releasing his throwing knife immediately before Ethan realized who it was and could yell for Jack to stop. Luckily the Ninja deflected the knife's arc by drawing a katana.
"Ken?" asked Ethan.
"When I'm dressed like this, call me the Nightshade Ninja," he replied before taking off the head mask, immediately calming the situation.
"You could have sliced our heads open with that shuriken!" shouted Jack.
"If I had wanted to, I would have. I was only trying to add to Anansewa's lesson of learning to be adaptable to sudden changes to the situation. And besides, with your throwing knife stunt, let's consider it even."
"Why the change from Khaki to Nightshade?" asked Ethan.
"Because, you boys deserve someone more than your former sidekick to work with, and I needed to find what type of hero I am on my own."
"Very nice, though I'm only ever going to call you Nightshade... the constant alliteration you boys go for in naming conventions here in Grit City is just so... juvenile."
"Says the Wonder Witch's protege," countered Ken.
"Touche," admitted Anuli.