We had both fallen asleep pretty fast. Or at least I assume so because I don't remember falling asleep and now I'm awake. I'm not sure what had woken me. The room is pitch black and the only noise is Howard's snoring. Is someone moving around upstairs? I grope around for a phone on the nightstand; it's Howard's and its digital clock reads two a.m. Too honking early. I pull the covers up and readjust myself. Sleeping on my stomach is annoying, but between my sore shoulder and wings it's the only way.

No. That is definitely not coming from upstairs. There are noises that could be described as rustles or maybe swishes. I quickly make sure my feet are under sheets; the irrational fear that something will grab my exposed feet as a child never quite left me. Whatever it is is moving steadily.

"Howard… Howard!" I poke him, but he just rolls over. Scooching closer to him, I squint my eyes. I think… I can see something… HOLY CHEESE IT IS ON THE BED. The sheets are now counterproductive. All I want is to stand on my two feet and fight, but it is too late. The thing is wrapping around my face. I can't breathe. I can't- darkness.


"Time to wake up!" Calls a feminine voice, rapping on the door. Suddenly remembering the thing that had been in the room, I bolt up. I'm alive, I can breathe, it must have been a dream.

"Meeeeeeh. Five mo'e minutes…" Howard mumbles. I stretch, expecting a wince of pain that never comes.

"What the juice?" For some bizarre reason, I am wearing the ninja scarf. Shoes, sash, scarf and all. I tug at the scarf, but not unlike an octopus it clings to my face. Reluctantly (?) it comes off and rests in my hands like a normal, everyday scarf. "What is wrong with you?"

"Cunningham, who are you talking to?" He asks, eyes still shut.

"No one," I reply, angrily balling it up and tossing it back with my stuff. Only then do I realize that something is off. I begin to unwrap the gauze surrounding my chest and just as I suspected, everything had been healed. Only faint pink marks remained. "Yo, Howard. Super-fast ninja healing!"

"I wish I had that," Howard's black eye is a nice shade of purple.

"Ooo, sorry buddy," The wings had also returned to normal. Double bonus.


We get some clothes on and have some cereal at the table. McFistios are possibly the greatest gift ever given to the human race. No joking.

"Boys, isn't this your principal?" Mr. Weinerman turned the newspaper around to the second page (McFist's new resort was on the front page) and there was a picture of P Slim's house and the toilet papered lawn. "It says some local hooligans and some large animals messed up his house last night. They even broke a window."

Heidi, who had been listening in, stared intently at us.

"Absolutely terrible," were Mr. Weinerman's last words on the topic.

"Well, we better get going," Howard grabbed his backpack.

"Have a good day sweetheart!" Mrs. Weinerman called from the other room. We hurried away from Heidi's death glare and out the door.


As we put our stuff in our lockers, I can't help but notice that a lot of people are staring at us. More specifically, they are staring at Howard and his black eye. Doug even comes over and asks him about it and Howard makes up some ridiculous tall tale. I don't pay much attention to the specifics because I'm searching the hallway for a familiar face, Julian. So far he's a no show.

The bell rings and there's still no sign of Julian. I did see Theresa though; when she noticed I was looking at her she waved. Walking into math class, a cursory glance reveals that there is a substitute teacher today. MR. HELVERSON is written on the board in large, white letters.

"Alright class… I'm your substitute for the day. Now, Mr. Slimovitz says you have a test today," the entire class groans. "afterwards you can do whatever you want as long as you do it quietly."

The sub passes out the tests. Howard nudges me with an elbow and I shrug. We tried.

After math, I drift through science and Phys. Ed. PE is a class we share with Julian, but once again he is absent. Lunch comes as a welcome relief to the mind numbing daily routine; however, something is different today. Our usually empty table has somebody at it.

"Hi-ya. Do you mind if I sit here?" Theresa smiles.

"It's cool, right Howard?" I slide my tray next to hers without waiting for an answer.

"Absolutely not. This is our table and…" I give Howard a hopeful look, "fine. Go ahead. I don't care."

"I can go find somewhere else if you really want me to," Theresa moves as if to leave.

"Wait, Howard would love for you to stay," I poke him, "Howard…" He grunts. "See?"

"Ok then… it's just that Julian is gone and I don't think he's coming back. Good riddance I say, but Juggo and Dave didn't want to be at the old table," she sighed and morosely took a bite of a fish stick. "Hey, Howard. Your eye looks pretty hardcore."

His mood seemed to lighten up after that. There's an awkward silence. I think we're all remembering last night; personally, I thinking about what Julian said. People knowing that you have a crush on someone is literally the most embarrassing thing in high school. Does she really have a crush on me? And more importantly, do I like her? I mean, she's pretty cute. We both have an affinity for purple hair and we both dislike Julian… that's a lot in common right?

"I can't believe Julian was behind all this… he- it seemed like he actually cared. Do you think everyone will stop turning into monsters? Now that he's gone?"

"I hate to break it to you, but Julian is still out there," Howard countered.

"But that's what the ninja is for right? He's shown up every time a student was turned!"

"Ninja-sminja," his tone mocking, "Where was he last night?"

"I-I'm sorry," Theresa said, a single tear rolling down her cheek. "I'll leave." With that she walked out of the cafeteria.

"Wha'dya do that for?" I wave my hands at where she had been.

"She was asking too many questions," his voice was steady, face unreadable. I growl with frustration and follow her out the caf doors. Howard can be pessimistic, but I didn't know he was that upset. It was an honest mistake leaving the scarf behind…

"Theresa!" I call, there's a pause in her gait. Nevertheless she keeps moving toward the girl's bathroom. "I'm sorry about Howard…" At this she finally turns around.

"It's not Howard, I just feel like a complete shoob. I shouldn't have listened to Julian from the start, I shouldn't have helped him! So many strange things are happening and I just don't know what to do," Theresa's shoulders slumped. What can I say to her? It is the Sorcerer's fault, Julian's fault. Not hers.

"Nobody blames you and last night could have been a lot worse," I grasp at the right words to say. Comforting people is hard. Comforting girls is even harder. When Howard is sad I give him some food and sometimes a bro-hug. Girls…? I don't even know.

"How so?" Theresa's smile is halfhearted.

"P Slimz could have totally busted us." Would that have been worse than a classmate who is working with an evil Japanese half-demon that is trying to kill me?

"That would have been bad too," She shrugged, still bashing herself mentally. For some reason I just want her to be happy. After all that's happened, I need her to be happy. The bells rings, ending lunch. I should be going to Spanish, but I don't care.

"Look, Theresa… I'm not hurt; no one got hurt last night except for Julian. And that wasn't you. You were possessed or something. Don't beat yourself up over it. Julian betrayed all of us and I swear he will get what's coming to him," I clench my fists.

"Thanks Randy, I needed that," her smile is genuine now and she closes the distance between us, wrapping her arms around me. I think she's hugging me, but my brain stops for a few seconds. I she really… is this actually…? I return the gesture hesitantly.

Theresa pulls away after a moment. By now the stream of students has decreased and lunch B has started.

"Well, we better go… fourth hour has already started," she looks at the ground and fiddles with a strand of hair. I nod reluctantly. Hugging her was nice; I swear to cheese that if rainbows had a smell, she'd smell like one. Like rain and sunshine and possibly cinnamon.

My pleasant thoughts are interrupted by screaming from the lunchroom. Not again.

"I wonder who it is this time," I groan.

"C'mon!" Theresa grabs my hand, heading straight for the commotion.

"What are you doing?!" I really do try to free myself from her, but she has a strong grip.

"If there's a monster there's Julian and I owe him a punch in the face!" I chuckle despite myself.

When we open the doors, it's a disaster zone. Food is everywhere and I'm not talking about a food fight. Food is being shot by… am I seeing this right? A vaguely humanoid robot (it has four legs and a single eye made up its entire head) has a McSnack blaster protruding from its arms, aiming the edible projectiles at the screaming students.

"Randy what is that thing," her voice quakes. I might be crazy, but it looks an awful like the new snack machine. What did that guy call it? The Automatic Dispenser of McSnackables?

"It's a robot or something. I'm sure the ninja will take care of it," I try to push her out of the caf. "You should go to class, where it's safe."

"But!"

"No buts!" I yell back to her as I run into the panicking crowd. There is no time to lose; the Ninja has to deal with this. I roll under a table and pull out the scarf. The magical ribbons surround me and then there is no Randy Cunningham. Only the Ninja.

"Hey you!" I jump on top of a table. "Yeah you. With the one eye there." Its eye slowly rotated until it fixated on me. "I was just wondering… how hard would it be for you to buy glasses? Or do you just wear contacts?" That did the trick; now its fire is completely focused on me. It is very tempting to grab the packet of McSquiddles as they whiz by my head, but I restrain myself.

For the next few minutes as the kids rush out, I dive, flip and dodge the ammunition in every way possible. I thought it wouldn't be so bad if it hit me, but with the speeds they are being fired at it feels like rocks are colliding with my flesh. Once the cafeteria is fully empty, I pull out the sword. The ninja sword isn't the coolest weapon I have, however it is the most reliable.

Launching myself into the air, I plunge down aiming the blade at the point where the eye connects to the robots body. At the last minute, it backhands me to the floor. I can hear the metallic clang of the sword from somewhere behind me when it falls. We circle each other, looking for an opening.

There's something very wrong about this. If I could just remember… the tattoos. Don't they usually say something helpful about now? I panic. A quick rewind tells me they've been gone since last night. Heidi definitely would have said something if they had been there. The ninja symbol over my heart, the one that never moves or changes, wasn't there. What did Julian do to me?

"Ninja tripping balls!" I yell and with a flick of the wrist a ball flew out and broke apart at the feet of the robot. As planned, it slipped, leaving itself vulnerable for precious seconds. "Ninja rings!" Two rings whizzed by the snack machine, only one fulfilling its intended purpose.

"One down, one to go," I say. Now that the machine only had one food cannon it would be much easier to destroy. I get in a ready position, muscles tense, waiting to jump. ADoM lies still.

"You're a sad honking excuse for a robot! That was barely even a scratch!" Still cautious, I inch up to the metal bulk. The light in its eye had gone out. Maybe I had hit the off switch? Without warning, the eye lit up and a metal cable shot out from the socket of the missing arm, tangling around my feet.

"Whoa!" I scream, the world shifts upside down. ADoM stands up, letting me dangle in the air uselessly. My heart drops. There, on the far side of the cafeteria, is Theresa. She uses a chair to ward off the wayward flying snacks, but I can see her tiring.

"Let. Me. Go!" With a might beat of my wings, I'm able to right myself and without my weight tightening the cable, it falls free. I land on the shoulders of the former snack machine and pull out the sai; not bothering to announce my next move, I stab the blade straight through the eye. When it falls to the ground, it stays there for real this time.

I kick it for good measure. The McFist Industries logo mocks me. The green smoke that went to McFist during installation was just a coincidence right? I've been paranoid lately. McFist manufactures pure awesome; there's no way he could be working with the Sorcerer. Are they both out to get the Ninja? I kick it again and again and again. JUST LEAVE ME ALONE. STOP SENDING PAWNS AND SHOW YOURSELF SORCERER. ADoM's body is dented beyond repair. I feel so helpless, all I know is that I'm a ninja and an evil Sorcerer is after me. The future is filled with scary unknowns and I want my friends to stop getting hurt.

The back of my neck prickles and I turn to see Theresa staring at me with undisguised horror. I fold my wings, attempting to look non-threatening as possible.

"Theresa, I-" She runs away before I can tell her that I'm sorry. I'm sorry that she saw me lose control like that.

I had just replaced my sword when Debbie Kang, reporter and editor of the Norrisville High Gazette Times Tribune Weekly Daily Press Chronicle, rushes in.

"Hello, I'm Debbie Kang and I'd like to interview you for the NHGTTWDPC," she grins. "Are you the protector of the school or are you doing it for show? Why do all pictures of you come out blurry? Why can't anyone remember what you look like? The people want to know!"

I back away. If the Sorcerer doesn't already know who I am, then he certainly will after an interview with Kang. She is notorious for uncovering secrets.

"Smoke bomb!"

I show up late to Spanish half way through the class. Howard asks me what happened, but I can't bring myself to answer him.

What will the Sorcerer's (or McFist's) next move be?


a/n

There was a lovely fanart done for the last chapter! bit. ly /1CyaHdh

I also estimate maybe... three more chapters? Thank you for all the reviews!

Here's randy's schedule in case u were wondering:

Math

Science

PE

Lunch

Spanish

History

English