House of Rangers
Chapter 9: Sticks and Stones
A/N: Well, here's the next Samurai chapter. What'll happen when a Nighlok come and starts speaking the truth? Will something be said that makes everyone curious as to what it could mean? What does this do for Nina when the truth is spoken about her? Not sure how this chapter will go.
Sorry for not updating this on Thursday, but that was a bit of a hectic day for me.
Disclaimer: I only own things not originally in the shows.
Another new day graced the rangers with its presence as the six found themselves outside in the yard, training as they normally did. Emily and Mike were sparring against each other, using the training swords to do so. Mia and Kevin were doing the same thing in the other area of the yard. Jayden, Ji, and Nina stood side by side near the house, watching. From what they could see, the girls were managing to hold their own against the guys, especially when Emily knocked Mike flat on his ass.
"Emily's usually the one falling over," Ji commented to the two beside him.
"But it's different when she has a sword in her hands," Nina pointed out.
"Maybe she could teach Mike a few things," Jayden shrugged. They turned back to the match, seeing Mike standing up and Emily checking up on him.
It was only seconds later when Emily was chasing Mike into the house, training swords still in hand.
Mike was leaning over a chair in the common room, rubbing his back where it hurt. Emily had knocked him down pretty hard during their training session, but he didn't want to admit it. Kevin, Mia, and Nina were sitting in the room, talking about everything and nothing at all. They saw Emily grab a bag of frozen peas and head over to the green ranger, who looked scared of the vegetables. "Here you go," Emily held the bag out to him, a huge smile on her face.
"Frozen peas?" Mike asked, his eyes widened in a mix of fear and slight disgust.
"It's like an ice pack," the blonde explained. "I was accident prone as a kid, and it always healed me right up. Let me."
"No, thanks," Mike shook his head. He didn't want to hurt her feelings, but he didn't want a bag of food resting on his back. He got up, trying to move away from Emily.
"You really should," she insisted. She began chasing him once more, causing Mia, Kevin, and Nina to smile and share looks. "Come on! It'll make you feel better!" the chase ended when Emily slipped on the other bag of peas, causing her to land face first on the ground and the bag in her hands to spill everywhere.
Mia and Nina were on their feet and heading over to her in an instant. "Emily, are you okay?" the pink ranger asked. Emily lifted her head, her face covered in peas.
"They're everywhere," she whined a bit. "I'm such a disaster."
"No, you're not," Nina assured her, taking the towel in her hands and helping Emily brush the peas off her face. "You were doing a nice thing."
"I'm so sorry," Mike apologized.
"No, it was all my fault," the yellow ranger stated. "I was being silly. I'm always messing things up. I'm sorry. I'll clean it up." She tried standing up, only to slip on the peas and fall down on her butt. "Not again."
Nina found herself in Jayden's room, the two of them practicing their symbols together. They knew the others were off doing their own thing after the accident in the common room, and they wanted a bit of peace to get some of their training done. The two knew the symbols they had to practice and knew what they had to do. Nina, not wanting to sit in complete silence, decided to speak up. "Do you think we should tell the others that we're brother and sister?"
"Why?" Jayden looked at her, a frown present on his face. "I thought they already knew just by the way we act."
"According to Mia and Em, they think otherwise," Nina snorted. "They told me that Mike thinks we're dating, because the only ones we really seem to talk to are each other and how I don't have to do some of the things they do, like train with them, and why we both stayed back on the first day off."
"That's ridiculous," Jayden laughed. "But I guess we can tell them the truth. We should talk to Ji about it first."
"Why?" Nina wondered.
Jayden shrugged. "He would know if we should or not. I get that they're our teammates and they should know, but we've never told anyone because we were protecting each other. There may be a certain time where that has to be revealed. After all, we still can't talk about her to the others."
"Yeah, you got a point," Nina sighed. "I just…"
She was interrupted when the Gap Sensor went off.
Upon arriving in the middle of the city where the Nighlok was spotted, they found it terrorizing people. Jayden made the first move, attacking it when the Nighlok had its back toward them. The Nighlok rolled out of the way and the others ran to stand by Jayden, all of them morphed and ready to fight. "Whoa!" Negatron looked at the six of them. "Samurai rangers? Why are you here? I've been saying all the wrong things right."
"Talking smack about people is not cool," Mike stated. He ran forward, charging the Nighlok.
"I know something about you," Negatron smirked. He caught up to Mike, stopping him in his tracks. "Your bike had training wheels until you were ten!"
"What?" Mike frowned, right before he was shot back into the wall high up behind him. He fell to the ground and Emily ran to check on him.
Mia turned to the Nighlok. "What did you say to him?"
"And you, blue ranger," he ignored her. He went up to Kevin. "You're just boring!" Kevin found himself flying backwards just like Mike had, hitting the roof of the same building. Negatron faced Mia. "Your turn." Mia swung a few times at him. "Lousy cook!" This sent her flying through a different wall.
"I don't get how he's sending everyone flying," Emily frowned, looking to the orange ranger who was getting ready to attack. "All he's doing is saying mean things."
"Keep your guard up," Jayden advised the two standing girls. "This one's tricky."
"Come on," the Nighlok scoffed. "What tricks? I'm just telling the truth. My motto is if the truth hurts, excellent." Before Jayden could even move, the Nighlok was before him. "You're a red faced liar liar pants on fire. You've got a secret." Beneath his helmet, Jayden's eyes widened and he found himself sliding back into the wall behind him.
"Jayden!" Nina cried in shock. Behind the two girls, the Nighlok laughed. Nina growled and faced him, her sword at the ready. "What did you do to him?"
The Nighlok didn't answer as he stepped up to her. "It's not nice to keep secrets either, Chosen One."
Beneath her helmet, Nina's eyes widened in shock and fear. She let out a loud scream as she found herself flying backward and crashing into her brother, who was just trying to get up.
"Looks like we're down to you," the Nighlok looked at Emily.
"Your words won't faze me," Emily swore. "Jayden and Nina have nothing to hide. You're just a mean-mouthed monster spouting nothing but nonsense!" she charged the Nighlok, swinging at him as she lured him away from the others.
As they got back to their feet, the others couldn't help but notice none of the Nighlok's words were affecting Emily. No matter how many negative words Negatron threw at Emily, the yellow ranger wasn't fazed by them. She managed to land a few good hits on the Nighlok. "Why can't he hurt her?" Mike asked, getting nothing in response. After Emily knocked the Nighlok against a wall, Negatron vanished into a gap.
"That Nighlok is a bully," Ji stated as the rangers sat in the common room. All of them were once again in a circle so they could face each other. Nina sat cross legged on her chair, her elbow resting on her leg as her hand supported her head. She was lost in her mind, a million thoughts running through it that prevented her from focusing on the current conversation. "He likes to hurt people's feelings. He channels mental pain and turns it into physical pain."
"He caught me off guard," Mia spoke. "It won't work again."
"Listen, I may have had training wheels," Mike added. "But I didn't need 'em."
"And I'm a good cook, right?" Mia asked, to which those who were paying attention quickly agreed before they could say otherwise.
"Am I boring to you guys?" Kevin wondered.
Jayden answered. "You're extremely disciplined and orderly, Kevin. It's a great quality for a samurai."
"Yeah, you're right," Kevin smiled. "It is."
"Emily was the only one who wasn't affected," Mike pointed out. "That Nighlok knew exactly how to hurt us, but why couldn't he hurt her?"
"Perhaps Emily has some special power," Ji shrugged.
Emily shook her head. "It's nothing great like that. I was teased and called names as a kid. It made me sad. But my sister told me to just pretend like the person teasing me didn't say anything at all, and it really worked. So when the Nighlok said those things to me, it was like he didn't even say them."
"Then why are you always putting yourself down?" Mike questioned. "It makes no sense, unless that's what you really think about yourself."
"Well, no, but…"
"Mike," Kevin glared at the green ranger.
"I'm sorry," Emily muttered before getting up and leaving the room.
Mia glowered at the green ranger. "Mike, the Nighlok can't hurt her feelings, but you can." Mike hung his head in shame, realizing what he had just did.
"There's one thing I don't get," Kevin spoke up, turning everyone but Nina's attention to him. "When the Nighlok spoke to Nina, he mentioned something about her being the Chosen One. What does that mean?" They all turned to Nina, only to find her spacing out and not paying attention.
"That is something I don't know about," Ji frowned, curious as well.
Noticing Nina wasn't responding, Jayden reached out and poked her in the shoulder, only for her to fall off her chair and snap back into reality. She sat up on the floor and looked around, seeing confused looks from her teammates.
Do they know about everything? Nina asked herself in her mind, still thinking about the earlier attack and what the Nighlok had said. Clearly he knows I'm the Chosen One, but to what extent? Do they know about the cup, the mask, the elixir? What about Sibuna? Or do they just know I'm known as the Chosen One? The thoughts repeatedly ran through her head as she tried to figure them out. As she sat at the table in the kitchen, Jayden entered. Mike had gone to find Emily, and Mia and Kevin had gone off to do something else. Jayden wanted to talk to his sister, so he found her in here.
"Nina, is everything all right?" he asked, sitting across from.
"Define all right," she looked up at him, breaking from her thoughts. "And then I'll tell you if it is or not."
"The Nighlok know we have a secret," Jayden sighed. "I take it that's something that's not all right."
"Yes, but all they could know is that we have one," Nina pointed out. "They more than likely don't know what the secret is."
Jayden nodded. "True. What about what he said to you about keeping secrets and calling you the Chosen One?"
"Well," Nina bit her lip, clutching her locket without realizing it. This did not go unnoticed by Jayden, who had been wondering what the deal was with it. "The secrets part was probably about me keeping secrets from my friends at school and…maybe about some things I've been keeping from everyone here."
"Like what?" Jayden frowned.
"Like a few things that happened at the boarding school that may or may not effect this depending on how much the Nighlok know about it," Nina rushed out, but the red ranger caught every word. "If the Nighlok know more than the fact that I'm the Chosen One, then we've got a huge problem on our hands. If they only know that I'm the Chosen One, then we should be good for now. However, I can't talk about what happened at the school until necessary because it dealt with a club I was in there, and the first rule in it is not to speak about what we do in it."
"Why do I get the feeling that this club did things you shouldn't have been doing?" Jayden narrowed his eyes.
Nina rolled hers. "We didn't do anything you're probably thinking we did. But if you mean doing things we shouldn't have done as in doing things behind people's backs to save people, then yes."
"Now I'm confused," Jayden shook his head.
"It's going to be confusing until I explain it all when the time is right," Nina chuckled. "Right now, I'm living in two worlds with two different families. I hope that once this is all over, I'll be living in two worlds with only one family, which would include you all and my friends from school."
"You're right," Jayden smiled. "That is very confusing."
Another day another Nighlok gone. The rangers had defeated Negatron for good, using Emily's idea to help them. Everything the Nighlok had said was forgotten after the fight was over. Now, the rangers were walking through the park, Emily asleep on Mike's back as he carried her. They all thought the fight must've taken quite a bit out of her, since she had been the one to stand against the Nighlok the most.
"Emily said she was fine," Mia commented. "But I guess the Nighlok's words hurt her after all."
"She hid it well," Jayden agreed. "Everyone has something they don't want to hear."
"She was incredible," Mike added. "The way she fought off that Nighlok rocked. Girl's got guts."
"Her sister would be proud," Nina nodded. None of them noticed the small smile that crept up on Emily's face. They all stopped in their tracks when they heard a joyful tune, one that none of them would forget no matter how old they got. "That's a sound I can never forget!"
"Ice cream trucks are my favorite," Mia grinned.
"Sounds better than the Gap Sensor," Mike huffed.
Emily bounced awake, a huge smile on her face. "Did someone say ice cream?"
"You're awake?" Mike asked, looking up at her since she was still on his back.
"We got to catch up with that truck," Kevin realized as it started passing by. "Come on, guys."
The six rangers began running toward it, Emily still being carried by Mike.
A/N: I'm not always going to include the fight scenes where they take down the Nighlok for good, but I will for the episodes where it's most important or something major happens.
