The Mystery of Snoozer
Chapter 7: The Rescue
"What!" said Hamtaro after hearing what Jake had said. Hamtaro had to see for himself if what he said was true. Hamtaro climbed out of his cage and quietly ran into the guest room saying "Ticky-Ticky" as he went. Upon entering the room, Hamtaro saw Laura and Jake searching frantically through all of Jake's things and all the furniture looking for Moonbeam.
"Moonbeam, where are you?" said Jake. While their backs were turned, Hamtaro climbed up the dresser and found Moonbeam's cage. The cage was completely empty. Hamtaro sniffed the air saying "Hif-Hif" as he did. He picked up the sent of Moonbeam easily but he also picked up the sent of at least three other ham-hams that Hamtaro had never met. However, the sent was slightly different as if there was some tainted quality of the ham-hams. Hamtaro knew that Moonbeam must have been kidnapped so he ran back into Laura's room and into the hole in the wall where Hamtaro always escaped saying "Badda Badda" as he ran. He slid down the drain pipe and shouted "Oopaa" as he flew out the end. He landed softly on Brandy's head.
"No time to talk, Brandy, I got to run." said Hamtaro. He ran off in search for some help but he didn't need to search for long. Neteru was already just on the side walk carrying his large wooden staff.
"Neteru." shouted Hamtaro.
"Heke?" said Neteru startled. "Hamtaro, what are you doing out here?"
"Moonbeam was kidnapped by those ninja hams." said Hamtaro.
"What?" said Neteru in shock. "I knew I should have stayed by her for protection."
"Do you know where they could have taken her?" asked Hamtaro.
"Yes." said Neteru. "It took me all night but my meditations revealed that Ulzogga is about five miles from here."
"Five miles!" said Hamtaro. "How are we going to get them?"
"I don't know." admitted Neteru. "They had all night to travel there so they have a good lead on us. If only we had some kind of transportation." Hamtaro thought to himself and then an idea came to him.
"I know, we can borrow Jingle's pet pig." said Hamtaro.
"Ya, Herbert can give us a ride." said Neteru. "Follow me, I know where they are." The two hamsters ran into hole in the ground to find Jingle.
Neteru and Hamtaro ran through the tunnels saying "Badda-Badda" as they ran. The tunnel Neteru was running through led to a secluded area in the park. It was some distance away from the Ham-Ham Fun Park and it was covered up by trees and shrubs. Neteru cupped his paws around his mouth and yelled out, "Boss, Jingle, where are you?" When there was no answer, the two hamsters continued to call out for Boss and Jingle as they searched. Soon, they got an answer.
"Guys, we're over here." said Jingle's voice from behind a bush. Neteru and Hamtaro walked through an opening in the bush and discovered Jingle and Boss eating acorns in front of a fire.
"Good morning, Hamtaro." said Jingle.
"My name is Ham-taco, I mean, Ham....Oh never mind." said Hamtaro. Jingle has been mispronouncing Hamtaro's name so much, it was starting to become a force of habit for Hamtaro to correct Jingle.
"Hey guys, what brings you here?" asked Boss before krmping on a sun flower seed.
"Moonbeam has been kidnapped." said Hamtaro. Boss spit out the seed he was eating in shock.
"What? Are you serious?" said Jingle standing up.
"Yes, she was taken by Ulzogga's ninjas." said Neteru. "We need to use Herbert to save her."
"No problem." said Jingle. He put on his guitar and began to play a song on it. As Jingle played the song, Hamtaro noticed that Boss had an ax with him. Hamtaro was a little surprised since he didn't know that Boss owned an ax. After about two minutes of listening to Jingle's guitar, they heard the sound of Herbert rummaging through the bushes. He came out from the pushes and walked over to Jingle.
"I trained Herbert to come to me whenever I play this song." said Jingle as he stopped playing the guitar. "All right, everyone hop aboard." The four ham-hams climbed onto Herbert's back. Jingle pulled out a piece of corn attached to a rod and string. He hung the corn like a fishing line in front of Herbert. Upon seeing the corn, Herbert had an uncontrollable urge to chase the corn. With a startling burst of speed, Herbert ran forwards in an attempt to catch the corn that was in front of him.
"Pig power, the only way to travel." said Jingle.
"But Jingle, Moonbeam is that way." said Neteru pointing backwards with his thumb indicating that they were going in the opposite direction.
"Hamgoof." said Jingle. "Not to fear though." Jingle swerved the corn to the left and Herbert made a sharp U-turn. It was so sharp that the Ham-Hams nearly fell off. But they held on as Herbert rocketed forward.
The four travelers rode the rambunctious pig for several miles without slowing down. But Herbert was starting to grow tired near the end and was slowing down.
"I'm afraid Herbert might need a rest." said Jingle. Jingle took the piece of corn off the line and threw it in front of Herbert. Herbert gleefully began eating the corn. The ham-hams jumped off of Herbert's back as he ate.
"How much further until we find Moonbeam?" asked Hamtaro to Neteru.
"My meditations revealed that Moonbeam is some where within a castle in this direction." said Neteru.
"You mean you don't know the exact location of where Moonbeam is?" asked Boss irritated.
"Uh, no." said Neteru creating an anime sweat drop. "All that my divinations revealed was that Moonbeam was in a castle, which direction she was, and that I would know I was there when I see a "Y" shaped branch."
"What can all that do for us?" demanded Boss.
"Never under estimate the power of divination." said Neteru.
"Oh great, just great." said Boss sarcastically. He walked away flinging the ax he was carrying over his shoulder.
Ignoring Boss's attitude, Neteru surveyed the area. He knew that his divinations wanted him to find a branch shaped like a "Y." There appeared to be none up in the trees. Neteru sat down trying to think when he realized he was sitting on a branch. He looked at the branch and to his astonishment, the branch was shaped like a perfect "Y." He looked at the branch wondering how it could show him where to go. He turned his head in the direction the branch was pointing and realized that it was pointing towards a clearing in the bushes which revealed a hidden stone structure up ahead. Excited, he ran over to the branches and pulled them apart. Before Neteru was a steep cliff that would have been small for a human but awfully large for a hamster. But down below and to the distance, Neteru could see a gray castle which must be where Moonbeam is.
"Hey guys, I found the castle where Moonbeam is." said Neteru. Hamtaro, Boss, and Jingle ran over to Neteru and saw the castle down below.
"But how are we going to get to it?" asked Hamtaro.
"Let me handle that one." said Jingle. He played a few notes on his guitar and he began to sing an incantation. "Va yee ollayo dao gedlya." Suddenly, some nearby vines began to grow towards the ground. They stopped growing upon touching the ground acting like a rope that our heroes can climb down. Jingle grabbed onto the vine first and began to shimmy down the vine followed by Hamtaro, Boss, and finally Neteru.
Once everyone was on the ground, Hamtaro asked, "Okay, so what do we do first?"
"First, you will need a weapon." said Neteru. He held up his staff and said, "Bracka ba oonya." There was a flash of green light from the gem on Neteru's staff and suddenly, a belt appeared on Hamtaro and attached to the belt was a sheath with a sword inside.
"That is a temporary sword." explained Neteru. "It will work for you for as long as the spell lasts." Hamtaro pulled out the sword from its sheath and held the blade in his paw. Hamtaro had never handled a real sword before. He had used toy swords before and he was not to bad with them but he wasn't sure of himself with a real one. His thoughts were interrupted when Neteru said another incantation. "Brecka al oonie." A green light appeared from Neteru's staff and suddenly, they were all dressed in brown cloaks. Neteru then said another incantation, "Jif" and suddenly, his staff vanished into thin air.
"Okay, here is the plan." said Neteru. The four Ham-Hams huddled around each other in a circle as Neteru explained the plan.
About thirty minutes later, Jingle, Boss, Hamtaro, and Neteru came out of hiding carrying three inch long packages wrapped in leaves. The plan was to sneak in saying they had brought food for the supplies. Of-course, the packages they carried did not contain food but small pebbles. The hood of the cloaks they wore would disguise their identities.
"Now before we approach, there is something you should know." said Neteru. "In addition to ninjas, there is also samurai. The samurai are worse than the ninjas because they are capable of summoning spells by using Ulzogga's power."
"So that is how the samurai can cast spells." said Jingle.
"Exactly so be on your guard." said Neteru. "Don't be skittish about killing any of them because they are merely creations of Ulzogga created through magic. They're not alive." They approached the samurai who guarded the gate. They were dressed in traditional samurai armor that was bright red and orange. On their belts were two sheaths. One sheath contained a sword with a right triangle shaped tip called a katana. In the other, it had a shorter version of the katana called a wakizashi. The two samurai glared at Neteru and the others suspiciously.
"We have come to bring food inside to stock up the supplies." said Neteru trying to disguise his voice. The two samurai did not question Neteru further but instead opened the gate and our heroes stepped in. Inside, they found many samurai and ninjas all around the place either on patrol or performing some other unknown errand. Neteru came over to one of the samurai and asked him, "Excuse me but do you know where the food storage is. We have some sun flower seeds here and we don't know where to put them."
"Go strait down that alley and at the other end, you should see a building marked food storage." said the samurai. Neteru and the others walked through the alley as instructed and at the other end of the alley, they saw Moonbeam.
Moonbeam lay on a table were her arms and legs were bound to it by some rope. She struggled against the rope desperate to free herself. They were about to help her when the same samurai they had asked for direction earlier appeared.
"Hey wait a minute, you don't look like the hamsters who bring our food." said the samurai.
"Oh, really." said Neteru pretending that it was a surprise to him. "I'm sorry, let me show you some ID." Neteru kicked the samurai in the face. He then said, "Juf", and his staff reappeared. He then said another incantation. "Dagmar fuz du." A red bolt of light struck the samurai and he vanished in a puff of smoke. Some nearby samurai had noticed the attack. The four heroes pulled off their cloaks and pulled out their weapons except for Jingle who only had is guitar out.
"Gorma dita luk nuk." said Neteru and from his staff, he fired at least six bolts of purple energy which struck down a few samurai but others had dodged that blast and was still coming towards them.
"Hara ga ma." sang Jingle and from his guitar, a cone of pure sonic energy fired at the samurai. The samurai covered their ears hoping to block out the horrible sound but the sound pierced through their armor causing them to vanish into thin air. One of the samurai had managed to get close so Boss and Hamtaro pulled out their weapons to fight the samurai. The samurai pulled out both his wakizashi and his katana in both hands and used them to block both Boss's and Hamtaro's attacks. With amazing ambidexterity, he easily over powered the unskilled Hamtaro and Boss with his swords. Boss took a good swing with his ax at the samurai's head but the samurai crossed both his wakizashi and katana in an "X" shape catching the ax. Hamtaro took this distraction to his advantage by stabbing the samurai with his sword but the weapon merely bounced off of his armor. The samurai pulled away his weapons and took a swing at Hamtaro. Hamtaro shouted out in pain as the blades of the samurai's swords cut into Hamtaro's arm.
"Hamtaro." said Boss in shock. He took a swing at the samurai with his ax but the samurai blocked the attack with his katana and then stabbed Boss in the abdomen with his wakizashi. Boss fell to his knees in pain. The samurai was about to stab both blades into Boss but before he did, Jingle threw his sword like a spear at the samurai and it went right through the samurai's face. The samurai immediately disappeared in a puff of smoke. Hamtaro walked over to Boss and asked, "Boss, are you all right?" Boss just groaned in pain in response. He was bleeding all over the ground.
As Hamtaro tried to slow down the bleeding, both Neteru and Jingle were holding the samurai and ninjas at bay with their magic. But the samurai was starting to use their own magic making it harder for Jingle and Neteru to fight them off because they must also reflect the spells. The samurai were quickly beginning to close in on our heroes until a voice cried out, "Stop." All at once, the samurai and ninjas stood their ground not moving from their positions. Neteru took this opportunity to cast a healing spell on Boss and Hamtaro.
"So Neteru, you have finally freed yourself from my sleeping spell." said a cold and evil feminine voice. "I should have known that through your power, you would over come that minor obstacle but your persistent resistance is all for nothing. Soon you and your friends shall parish." From the table where Moonbeam was tide up, a dark and evil looking hamster appeared. It was Ulzogga herself.
Author's note: Divination is a type of magic where you gain information or an insight to the future, past, or present by contacting some kind of divine force such as deities or spirits. Sonic means anything that deals with sound.