Chapter Ten: Some Ninja

Min Min pulled into the nearest parking space. "So did she say where to meet her?"

"Nothing specific." Ribbon GIrl sighed, checking her phone again. "Just at the Ninja College."

"Ugh." Min Min rolled her eyes. "Then how the hell are we supposed to find-" She opened the door to get out and heard some disgruntled shouting from nearby. " Ah. "

The two ran over to the source of the shouting - the college's plaza, where a large statue stood proudly at its center. Before that statue were two people: a very embarrassed looking ninja and a furious mad scientist.

"AND BECAUSE OF YOUR NEGLIGENCE, YOU WOUND UP GIVING HER THE UPPER HAND. DO YOU UNDERSTAND THAT? DO YOU? "

" Yes, already! " Ninjara cringed. "C'mon, I'm sorry, please stop shouting..." The nearby ninja students were all stood in place, eyes firmly on the squabble happening, giving Ninjara an intense feeling of embarrassment.

Ribbon Girl walked up to the two. "Uhhh... Hey?"

Coyle turned to her. Her temple was throbbing beneath her mask. " Ah, Ribbon Girl. Tell Ninjara what a failure he is!"

"I..." She looked at Ninjara. "Why...?"

She sighed. "Explain your story again, carbon-waste."

Ninjara looked away, uncomfortable, and sighed. "She snuck up behind me and-"

"She SNUCK up BEHIND him!" Coyle interrupted, raising her ARMS high into the air and adding emphasis. "He's SUPPOSED to be a NINJA! And she SNUCK UP BEHIND HIM! "

"I wasn't expecting to get jumped out here on the campus!" He insisted.

She glared daggers at him. "I told you to be ON. YOUR. TOES. and you still let your guard down?" She sighed breathily. "Some ninja you are. I should enroll myself here if they're handing out diplomas that easily."

Ninjara seemed to take offence to that. "H-Hey, not just anyone can be a ninja!"

"Oh yeah? Am I not ninja material?" Coyle glared, before shimmering with an electrical blue aura and turning invisible. "Look! I'm totally hidden. Better hidden than you can manage, apparently. "

"Can we focus, please?" Ribbon Girl sighed.

Coyle appeared again, her ARMS folded, right behind Ninjara. "I was three seconds away from giving this nerd a wedgie." She quietly floated back to where she had been before.

"Okay, so, she grabbed you and then...?" Min Min continued.

"Uhh... She grabbed me from behind and stuck her hand over my mouth, like it was a serious hold that came outta nowhere so I was really caught off guard."

"I wanna point out that he was apparently alone when this happened." Coyle grumbled. "Probably because he has no friends."

He glared at her. "I knocked her off eventually but she'd copied me. But I wasn't about to let her get away, so I slipped my mask on and started a fight before she could skip out."

"Remember that he's unmasked when he first gets grabbed. That's all she copied - his unmasked form. At least, at first. "

"Yeahhh... So, uh, I put up a good fight-"

" Doubt it. "

"...But then she was just too tough to beat. She shapeshifted into Kay-Cee, man. I couldn't get a solid hit on her."

"...And so Mimi grabbed him again ." Coyle sighed deeply. "And as a result? Got a form of him without his mask AND one of him with his mask."

"That explains the Ninjara I saw yesterday, then." Min Min groaned. "I thought we were in the clear when he showed up. Damn. "

"At least this tells us Mimi retains all of her copies, and they don't get overwritten by new ones of the same person. I guess she still has that funky-coloured Ribbon Girl in there too. Though I doubt she'd get much use from it." She sighed deeply. "So I guess either Mimi hoped you'd accept any help and not think about it, or she'd bank on Ninjara not telling us he was caught. 'Cause guess what? HE DIDN'T FUCKING TELL US. " Coyle heaved with anger.

"Okay, okay, c'mon!" Ninjara urged her, looking around at the nearby spectators. "I was going to I just... Ugh, I dunno!"

"Don't worry about it..." Ribbon Girl sighed, disappointed.

"See?" Ninjara smiled to Coyle. "Water under the bridge!"

Ribbon Girl glared up at him. "Well I didn't say that... " She muttered.

"Okay, so, she has the two of us from yesterday and apparently Ninjara too." Min Min counted on her fingers. "How many of us are even left for her 'collection'?"

"Myself, Springtron, and..." Coyle bit her lip. " Brass. "

"Okay, well I think the best thing we can do-" Ninjara began.

"Ohhhh, no no no no! " Coyle beamed angrily. "You are not a part of this investigation! Go do some homework, carbon-waste. Try not to get snuck up on again on your way there." She struck her finger out toward the college building, commanding him to leave.

Ninjara took one last look at Ribbon Girl and Min Min, then sighed and walked away in the direction she had pointed, his face down in shame.

Coyle let out another deep sigh, floating over to a nearby campus bench and sitting herself down on it. A student who had been sat there, listening to music, took one look at her and hurriedly ran off.

Ribbon Girl took a seat beside her, with Min Min dropping down on her opposite side too. "So... What do we do about the remaining fighters?"

She took a deep breath. "I'll worry about myself. I'll try to guide Brass from a distance to watch his back - which would be better for us both, I think. Some distance between us is always best. He'll probably be fine anyway, though. She couldn't beat Spring Man fairly, remember?" She lay her head flat on the palm of her hand with a huff. "And Springtron, well, he's more expendable than the two of us, I'd say. I'll have to think about what I want to do with him. And if he gets grabbed, I dunno, I'll have him self destruct or something."

"What about Misango?" Min Min posed.

"Taken last night." Coyle muttered. "Put up a damn good fight, though. I'll have to buy him lunch. Got some good info on her fighting style non-disguised. Bitch has her own unique gloves, though. That doesn't make things easier."

"Coyle..." Ribbon Girl nervously began. "...It's getting to the point where I think you should really consider telling us what she stole from the Lab. I mean, obviously part of that was Hedlok but..."

She flicked an eye toward Ribbon Girl, then over to Min Min. "When she called in Hedlok, what exactly did he look like...?"

Min Min raised an eyebrow, then shrugged. "It was the golden one."

"Ah." Coyle pouted. "Figured."

An awkward silence persisted for a moment, until Ribbon Girl nervously broke it. "Coyle... Please, we really need to know what she took."

"It's a weapon." She mumbled. "Like Hedlok, just a bit different. It was supposed to stay in the vault, unused, forever. I went a little overboard with it, so..." She shut her eyes, tired. "I'd say it's far too destructive for actual use . Even for the user."

Coyle's answer did not reassure Ribbon Girl. "S-So she has a weapon...? Do you think she's gonna attack some people, or something?"

"I dunno." Coyle groaned, leaning back against the bench. "I'd understand that as the plan if she had only nabbed the first handful of faces up to Mechanica, but why keep going after getting the weapon out of the ARMS Lab...?"

Ribbon Girl shrugged. "Maybe she wants to frame us all for whatever she's gonna do? She seems to have a grudge against the League..."

"It doesn't add up." Coyle grumbled. "All this work... It seems too much for just some run-of-the-mill terrorist attack. I mean, we could explain it all off pretty easily afterwards, right? Hell, we have footage of her transforming in Lola's circus, in the vault, from Kid Cobra's stream..."

"Mm..." Ribbon Girl quietly agreed. None of that really did make for a good plan.

Min Min drummed her fingers on the side of the bench, lost in thought, until a little lightbulb suddenly lit up. "...Oh. OH! " She gasped.

The other two turned to her, confused.

" ARMS League World is opening tomorrow! "

Ribbon Girl sighed. This again, really? "We are not going..."

"No no no, hear me out!" Min Min insisted, her mouth agape. "ARMS League World was built on top of Distant Future Funland - what if Mimi was a huge fan of that place and got pissed it closed down? She'd blame the League and wanna wreck the place up, which is why she nabbed that weapon!" She hopped to her feet suddenly. " AND there was a hall of mirrors slap-bang in the middle of Distant Future Funland, which would explain the mirror ARMS. That's it!"

The two of them simply stared at her, unconvinced. Coyle rolled her eyes. "If you're not going to give serious suggestions, I'd prefer you to keep quiet."

"...Huh? N-No, I am serious!" Min Min insisted.

Coyle glared at her. "You're telling me you think Mimicutie was a die-hard fan of Distant Future Funland? And not only that, but specifically the hall of mirrors? The least interesting attraction in an already awful amusement park?"

"Uhh..."

"And you think she cares enough about all this to warrant a large-scale attack on the place replacing it? You think ALL of this is due to a theme park shutting down? God, what a pathetic motive that'd be."

Min Min pouted. "It sounded good in my head..."

"Perhaps she could be the daughter of Distant Future Funland's owner, or something?" Ribbon Girl suggested. "That'd at least give her some more emotional tie to the park."

Coyle glared at her now. "You're really entertaining this idea? Would you beat up some new singer if they spoilt your music career?" She turned back to Min Min. "Would you destroy a new ramen place if they ran your restaurant out of business?"

The two seemed pretty given up on the idea, suddenly.

"People need actual motives to do the things they do. If she cared that much about a stupid theme park she's a bigger loser than Ninjara." She took a biiiig exhale, trying to calm down a bit after hearing such a stupid idea. "Besides, she'd be cutting it quite close if she wanted to nab all our faces before the opening tomorrow. Three in one night, when we're this aware of her? And those three are the merciless robot, the ex-champion, and me? That's not happening."

Min Min sat back down, a little glum her suggestion was thrown out so effortlessly. "That whole 'collection' bit sure is tricky... Maybe she's not going to do anything once she gets us all? But then why take the weapon...?"

"And why collect League fighters if you hold such a grudge against them?" Ribbon Girl sighed.

Coyle wiped her eyes with the backs of her hands. "Right, well, I think we ought to plan for tomorrow. She wants to duplicate me?"

She hopped to her feet and cracked her neck to one side.

"Let's see her try."