Special Delivery

A small group of Jack-bots floated out of a delicatessen, swigging back huge cups of motor oil and chatting about robot things. They made their way down the street and turned into a wide alley. If they had been more alert, they would have heard the sound of breathing coming from somewhere above. If they had been more alert, they would have noticed the cowboy hat lying discarded on the ground next to a trashcan. If they had been alert, they would have seen the girl crouched on the other side of the trashcan and the three boys hanging from the low-lying rooftops around them.

"Danger! I sense danger!" squealed one Jack-bot when its sensors finally detected something.

Four shapes leapt out of nowhere. The Jack-bots armed their weapons and flew back into a close-knit cluster, back to back as they prepared to open fire. They didn't get a chance to fire a single shot, however. A series of swift karate chops and kicks from their opponents knocked their heads straight off. The robots went careening into the ground.

"Nice work, you guys." Raimundo said, standing over their fallen opponents.

"Look! There are—were four of them." Kimiko said. She carefully pulled open one of the robot's chest plate. Inside was a small ID card with a long barcode on the bottom. "We should each take one of these. I did some research on the 'net earlier and it turns out that these are security clearance cards. If we carry them around, the Jack-bots will think we belong here."

The other three monks all took security clearance cards from one of the broken Jack-bots.

"We shall need a disguise." Omi said.

"Got it." Clay had the Moby Morpher strapped to his arm. "Moby Morpher!" In a brilliant flash of light, the four warriors were disguised as pizza deliverymen from Pickford Pizzeria. "I thought that maybe we should try to stick to a theme, see."

"Great." Raimundo said. "But now we need to actually find out where Jack is."

The monks walked briskly down the alley. Raimundo looked up. "Well, that was easy."

An enormous fortress was located on the other side of town. Attached to the top of its highest tower was a huge neon sign with the words 'JACK SPICER'S EVIL LAIR' flashing over and over in multi-colored lights.

"C'mon, let's go." Kimiko said.

Four pizza deliverymen strode down the main street of the city with a sense of purpose in every step. No one, neither Jack-bot nor black knight, even attempted to bother them. For the first time, they actually managed to approach their destination without being accosted by the forces of evil. Of course, this didn't last long. For even as they advanced towards the gate, a familiar foe could be seen standing in front of it.

"Mayun," muttered Clay under his breath.

"Who?" Omi asked.

"Annoying bad guy." Raimundo said quietly. "You wouldn't know him."

Mayun was standing guard in front of the castle. He bore the telltale signs of their battle a few days ago but was otherwise hale and put together. The monks stopped about twenty feet away and had quick conference. They decided that it would be better if Omi went first, since Mayun had never met them. While the littlest monk approached the shadowy demon, the other three pushed down their caps over their faces and tried to look as unobtrusive as possible.

"Hello, my friend!" Omi said boisterously as he walked up to Mayun. "I am O…. Ollie the… pizza delivery mon—er, man."

Mayun glowered at him. "Are you expected?"

"Certainly!" Omi said, beaming. "I have a pizza here for Jack Spicer."

"For my liege?" Mayun demanded. "King Jack?"

"Yes." Omi replied.

The shadow waved back and forth as Mayun peered closely at him. "Where is the pizza?"

"My fellow apprentices—er, pizza delivering persons have them." Omi explained. He pointed to the three Xiaolin monks loitering about several feet away.

"Very well." Mayun said. "I shall inform my Master of this. Wait here." The shadow flickered weakly and split into two separate entities. The first Mayun remained on guard while the second slipped between the bars of the gate and trotted up towards Jack's lair.

Omi leaned against the gate alongside the guard, whistling nonchalantly.

Jack Spicer had beaten every game in the arcade twenty times over and was starting to get bored. He decided that it would be best if he could check up on his advisors now. He had transported them from the Slurpee to a large indoor swimming pool in the middle of his throne room to give them more room to work and think. Hopefully, they had come up with his battle strategy.

"Hey, guys!" Jack called as he entered the throne room. "How's the planning going?"

A rumbling sound came from pool. 'Your Majesty!' The voice boomed. 'We have devised a cunning strategy that will allow you to seize control of the world in less than a week.'

"Sounds great!" Jack said. "What is it?"

'You shall need but two Shen Gong Wu.' The voice continued. 'First, the Golden Tiger Claws, which has the power to transport its user to any point on Earth.'

"And?" Jack asked.

'And you will also need the Diyu Prism, which amplifies the power of other Shen Gong Wu. It will reveal itself soon. I promise that if you retrieve this Shen Gong Wu, you will rule undisputed.'

"That's what you said about the Crown." Jack pointed out, but he raised no further objections.

Mayun turned up then, padding into the room in the shape of a gigantic dog. "Master!" He panted.

"What is it?" Jack asked.

'Speak.' The voice from the pool rumbled.

"Yes, Master." Mayun said, inclining his head. "A man has come to the gate for you. He claims to have something for you. Something called 'pit-zah'. I do not know what this thing is, but he says that you desire to possess it."

"pit-zah?" Jack asked. "Pit-zah? What's that?"

'He speaks nonsense.' The voice said. 'Chastise him.'

"No!" Mayun howled. "It is true! He stands at the gate now! Follow me and I will take you to him!"

'I should advise against that. Command Mayun to remove whoever is out there. You have no time.'

"Hey, I don't take orders from you." Jack said. "I give the orders. You know why?" He pointed to his Crown. "This is why. I'm the King, remember. I do whatever I want; you obey me. Okay?"

'As you wish... Your Majesty.'

Jack straightened his Crown and smoothed out his purple cape. He ran along the length of the pool and jumped into the throne chair on the other side of the room. He picked up the Sword of Tartarus and gestured at Mayun imperiously from his high seat. "Dog! Bring this 'pit-zah' man to me!"

Mayun nodded and groveled shamefully before turning around and leaving. As he bounded off, he transformed twice, first into a giant preying mantis and then into something that looked like an extremely skinny centaur with arms like curved spears.

The second shadow merged with its originator as it left the lair. Mayun stood in place for moment. Then he looked down at Omi and said:

"My Master has approved of your presence. You may enter."

Omi waved over at his fellow Xiaolin warriors, inviting them to follow him in. When they came over, however, Mayun stopped them.

"You may not enter." Mayun said. "Only the dwarf has permission."

"Dwarf?" Omi demanded, losing composure.

"Shh!" Raimundo urged. "Just follow him, okay?"

Omi took several deep breaths. Mayun turned his back on them and opened the gate for Omi. During that time, the monks came up with a whispered plan.

"I reckon we can't just walk in through the front door." Raimundo remarked.

"We're gonna have to sneak into the lair another way." Clay said.

"You know, I'll bet we could get through by going around to the side and jumping the fence." Kimiko said. "There'll probably a few Jack-bots milling around but they won't bother us. We have clearance."

"We'll need a secret codeword." Raimundo suggested. "Something that Omi can use to signal to the rest of us when to drop in on Jack."

"Chinchilla." Clay said without skipping a beat. The other monks turned to look at him. "What?"

"Chinchilla it is." Omi agreed.

Mayun grabbed Omi brusquely by his shoulder. It felt as if his entire arm had been frozen solid. The monks stepped away from them as Mayun split in half once again, with one side remaining on guard while the other taking Omi up into the lair.

The lair, which was a mess of chrome from the outside, was surprisingly elegant from within. The ground was neatly covered in rows of a special reflective tile that resembled smoky glass. Pillars of marble and busts of horned demons decorated the walls. The ceiling was made of glass and the sky was clearly visible from the inside.

More bizarrely, the fort was littered with staircases. Some of them led into actual rooms while others seemed to wind upwards forever or end in midair. Mayun navigated their way around all of these and took Omi up a particularly long stairway. These stairs led somewhere; more specifically, Jack's throne room.

The throne room surprised Omi even more than the rest of the lair. It was taken up in its entirety by an enormous indoor swimming pool. The walls were covered in posters of Jack in various poses and statues of the evil boy genius stood on the edges of the pool. And, on the opposite side of the pool, sitting on an ornate golden throne, was Jack Spicer himself.

"Welcome to my lair!" Jack called. "What the heck do you want?"

"I have pizza!" Omi said, still a bit winded after climbing all those stairs. He felt like he had spent an hour there, even though it had been no more than 15 minutes.

"What kind?" Jack demanded, leaning forward.

"Er… your favorite?" Omi responded nervously.

Jack narrowed his eyes. For a second, Omi feared that he would see through the deception. Then he remembered who he was dealing with and lost some anxiety.

"Awesome." Jack said. "I don't remember ordering out but hey, free pizza! Who'd turn that down?"

'You are always wise, Your Majesty,' said an unnaturally loud voice that seemed to come from the pool.

"What was that?" Omi questioned.

"Nunya!" Jack snapped.

"Nunya what?" Omi said, feeling foolish.

"Nunya business!" Jack finished, and he burst into spasms of laughter at his lame joke. Omi watched him giggle to himself. He heard a tapping noise coming from the ceiling, and while Jack was preoccupied he looked up and saw his friends on the glass roof, looking down at them.

Omi held up five fingers, motioning for them to wait.

"Hand over the pit-zah—pizza," Jack said after he finished laughing.

It was then that Omi remembered that they hadn't actually made a fake pizza box to present to Jack. Whistling nervously, he made a show of turning around and fumbling with the air. He could hear Jack rapping his fingers on the arm of his chair impatiently. This is a gooey situation. Omi thought. There was only one thing to do now.

"CHINCHILLA!" He bellowed at the top of his tiny lungs.

There was a loud crash from above as Kimiko, Raimundo, and Clay smashed through the glass, sending shards raining down in the pool. The water frothed and hissed in response but no one was paying attention to it. Jack was watching the three monks drop down into the room, his eyes wide with alarm.

"No! You can't do this!" Jack cried out.

'You are correct again, Your Majesty. They cannot do this.' The voice said.

Trapdoors suddenly swung open underneath the four warriors.

"What the…" One of them murmured, looking at the empty spaces below them.

They dropped down into them without as much as a sound.

"That was… fast." Jack Spicer remarked as the monks disappeared. "Wait, does this mean that I won?"

'Yes. You defeated your opponents quite handily.'

"Man, I rock so hard!" Jack called out. The pale boy jumped down from his throne. "Where did they go?"

'To the dungeon'. The voice revealed.

"Great. It's taunting time!" Jack said, cackling evilly.

The being in the water made a loud humming noise, almost like it was about to say something, but evidently decided against it. 'As you wish, Your Majesty. Mayun will escort you.'

The shadowy hound reappeared at Jack's feet with a leash around its neck. Jack Spicer took the leash and together, boy and dog made their way to the lair's dungeons.