Sarah, Preston, Redbot and Brody arrived in Millport, right outside Brody's old home. She had managed to take them as far as Millport before they got a little lost. Being a farming community, the idea of neighbours was a little subjective, with some farms having the next nearest neighbour being a mile or so away. Brody recognised the odd landmark, but in general there wasn't really much to go on.
They had ended up just patrolling around, looking for anything more familiar, when eventually Brody called out to them.
"This is it!" He yelled excitedly, pointing to one side. Sarah and Preston came up alongside as Redbot and Brody landed by the path up to an old farmhouse. Brody was already running inside.
"What is it?" Preston asked as Sarah kicked up her hoverboard, staring at the mailbox. It was a little rusty, but she could still see a name written on it.
"Romero." She said, furrowing her brows. "That name sounds familiar."
"Well...maybe you're thinking of GEORGE Romero?" Preston asked. Sarah just glared at him.
"Preston, somehow I don't think the Godfather of the modern zombie genre lived here." She said, looking around. "Though...looking at this place..."
The whole place did look like Old Father Time had taken a baseball bat to it. The building looked like it hadn't been painted in years. The equipment out in the yard was rusted and falling apart. Most of the land was overgrown, and looked like it hadn't been worked in years, but according to Brody, his father hadn't actually been much of a farmer anyway. He had said he only came here for the peace and quiet, and it looked like he had got it. Not only had a whole family disappeared ten years ago with virtually no one noticing, it seemed no one had noticed a literal alien invasion on this very spot.
"It doesn't look like anyone's been here in years." Preston commented.
"Matt told me there was an abandoned farm out here, I just never put the pieces together." Sarah stated. Just then, they heard some crashing and banging. It seemed like Brody had gone inside to start searching.
"Probably just as well." Preston answered. "I guess it would be a little difficult to explain Redbot."
"What about me?" Redbot asked. Sarah sucked her teeth.
"The thing is Redbot, we don't really have much of a robotics scene here on Earth yet." She told him. "In fact, robots here, by comparison to you are kind of...primitive?"
"Primitive?" He asked.
"I saw one walk up a set of stairs once." Sarah told him. "Like...that was LITERALLY all it was programmed to do."
"That is primitive." Redbot agreed. "So that makes me the most advanced?"
"On this planet...I...I guess so." Sarah said with a shrug.
"Sizzling circuits, I'm the best!" Redbot said, doing a little dance, before running inside. Preston just looked curious.
"Did he seem happy to you?" Preston asked. "I thought Robots didn't have emotions."
"Oh, believe me that is FAR from the most bizarre thing I've seen!" Sarah commented.
"AIDEN!" Brody called out, running out of the farm and down the path. "AIDEN!"
He collapsed to his knees, cradling his head in his hands. Sarah and Preston both felt badly for him. They always knew it was a long shot that Aiden would still be here. Brody had been kidnapped ten years previously. He had told them his brother was a couple of years older than him, which still meant he was a kid himself. If he had been told by his father to hide, then it was highly likely he'd have to abandon the farm, since it was the first place anyone was likely to start looking for them if the monsters returned. It was more likely that if he was found, he'd have been turned over to the authorities. Either way, the odds against him still being here were pretty steep. Sarah went to Brody's side, putting her hands on his shoulders.
"My scanners show that the only three humans in the area are you three." Redbot confirmed. "There are other life forms, but I'm afraid there's no trace of Aiden."
"He's got to be here, he's GOT to be!" Brody said, looking completely desperate. He had already risked so much in escaping and coming here, but it looked like this was his only real thought on where to find Aiden and the Ninja Steel. Realistically, it was about all he could have thought of, he had been taken before Aiden had left to go...well...wherever it was he went.
"It's been over ten years. Aiden could be anywhere by now." Redbot said, trying to reason with Brody. This only seemed to upset him further and send him into a state of desperation. Sarah started to make soothing sounds to try and ease Brody's mood and get his attention.
"Brody, you said your dad taught Aiden to be a ninja too didn't you?" She asked. "Just like you?"
"Yeah, he did." Brody answered. "Aiden kept saying he wanted to go to the Academy when he was old enough. Dad always just said 'we'll see', which is just parent talk for 'no, but I don't want to talk about it', but Aiden was pretty good, better than me."
"Well, if he's half as resourceful as you then I'm sure wherever he is he's just fine." Sarah said in as cheerful a way as she could muster under the circumstances. It was true that his training would give him a good chance, from what little she knew of ninjas, she knew that they were taught a variety of skills to accomplish their tasks. She also knew from her friends in Amber Beach that even the most unlikely survival stories could have happy endings. So far, she had a Caveman, a Knight and a man that had been thought to have died over a decade earlier on an expedition born out of a schizophrenic delusion on her speed dial!
Brody couldn't bring himself to smile, but he nodded in agreement. The most well known skills taught to ninjas were stealth and martial arts, but they practiced a great many other skills as well. Wilderness survival was always tools in the ninja's arsenal. It wasn't always clear how long they would be gone or isolated without access to civilisation, so they were often taught to survive in the wilderness for extended periods of time. Their dad took them camping often, and when they were older, even stopped taking food, making them identify what they could forage safely. He had often warned them that when they got old enough, he would stop bringing a tent or any tools as well! If anyone of Aiden's age could survive without any kind of support, it would be Aiden.
"Uh...guys, this is probably the first place Galvanax is going to look, right?" Preston asked. "He could be here at any time! We really need to find the Ninja Steel and get out of here."
"We can look for your brother later, I promise we'll help." Sarah told him. "I have some friends that have some pretty wild survival stories too. Never give up hope! Until you receive absolute proof to the contrary, Aiden could still be alive and well."
"I guess...I guess we have to believe that." Brody answered.
"So, you said he would have hidden the Ninja Steel." Sarah reminded him. "Can you think of where?"
Brody thought about it for a moment, clearing his mind of any other thoughts. He smiled as he looked to them.
"I know exactly where he'd have hidden it!" He told them. "I'll bet it's in my dad's workshop! Follow me!"
Back at the school, Hayley and Calvin were nervously keeping an eye on Mick as he pretended he was a teacher. The more he interacted with the students, the more they started to regret shooting down his original plan of turning into a tyre.
"Mick really doesn't know what it means to lie low does he?" Calvin asked.
"It doesn't appear so." Hayley commented. "I guess being on the run from...whatever those things were would affect someone's sanity."
"On the run..." Calvin said, thinking about something. "You don't think...maybe we're on the wrong side do you?"
"Excuse me?" Hayley asked him.
"What if those things were like...intergalactic versions of cops?" Calvin asked her. "What if he's some kind of criminal and we've just helped him escape?"
"Cal, he's done nothing but try and help us. He fixed Nitro, it's run better this afternoon than it has since you built the damn thing." Hayley told him. "Those things attacked us without any cause! I think I know which side I believe are the bad guys in that story!"
"I guess you have a point." Calvin answered.
"TEACHER!" They heard a voice ring out, just as the doors to the painting room opened. Everyone looked around to see a classic car being rolled out. It was just like Victor that he couldn't just work on his project, he had to make sure everyone knew about it!
"That'll do Monty!" Victor said as Monty pushed their project car out of the paint room. "We're all done with the paint room! You there, you must be the new teacher!"
Mick didn't say anything, remembering what Hayley had told him. It wasn't really lying if he just let people make their own assumptions and then didn't correct them. Victor vaulted out of his car and stood before Mick.
"Well, I've kept things ticking over here for you! Needless to say I am your number one student! Victor Vincent! Six pack abs, impeccable teeth!" He said, giving Mick a toothy smile that made both Calvin and Hayley groan. When he wasn't pushing around weaker kids or aggrandising himself, Victor was generally finding ways to suck up to teachers to help him cruise through school. It looked like he was planning the same thing with his new shop teacher before he even got started in his new job. "Now, how about you admire this perfecto paint job?"
He took Mick around the side of the car, at which he and Monty started to admire their handiwork. Mick just watched on as they lauded their own efforts.
"Look at the sleek lines, look at the sweeping curves, mmmm!" Victor said.
"It's perfect! It should be in a museum!" Monty praised himself. Mick just made a low humming sound as he inspected it.
"Well...it's GOOD, but you forgot one thing that makes it...more of a C than an A+." Mick stated.
"Oh?" Victor asked him. "What's that?"
Mick closed over one of the doors to the paint room and grabbed both Victor and Monty together.
"Well, when you pushed the car out of the paint room, you parked it on the hose." Mick told them. "Which means any time now..."
There was a huge bang and the whole room shook, knocking several items off the shelves as the students shrieked. Mick held the door closed as parts flew into it. Fortunately the door, and Victor's car took the brunt of it, meaning very little debris flew into the room. Victor and Monty meanwhile were splattered in green paint, but Mick had moved them to ensure it would miss him.
"The compressor will explode." He concluded, grabbing a fire-extinguisher as smoke billowed out of the paint room. "No need to worry class! I've got this covered!"
As Victor and Monty left to get cleaned up, Calvin and Hayley followed Mick into the paint room where he was dousing what was left of the air compressor in foam to ensure it wouldn't catch fire.
"Um...Mick...little bit of constructive criticism." Calvin stated. "Most teachers would tell a student that BEFORE they blew up the classroom."
"Oh...I'll remember that in future." Mick answered as he went back to dousing the compressor in foam. Hayley just face-palmed.
"We are SO getting expelled if we don't get him out of here soon." She grumbled.
Back on the Romero farm, Aiden was digging up the floor while Sarah and Preston had a look around. Even if they didn't know that he was a ninja, Mr Romero seemed like a pretty interesting guy looking around. There was a variety of tools all around the workshop, tools that he presumably used to forge his weapons. There was a furnace, which they assumed he had been using to melt the Ninja Steel for forging, and nearby there was a shelf full of pictures and momentos.
"This was always our secret spot. Dad would always bury this box as part of our ninja training." Brody explained as he dug up the floor. "Dad would make Aiden and I find this spot blindfolded."
"Blindfolded?" Sarah asked. "Your dad sounds like a pretty...um...strange guy."
"I thought my dad could be harsh." Preston muttered. Brody just laughed.
"I guess out of context it does sound pretty harsh." Brody commented. "It was all part of our training. It was more of a game than anything else."
"Whoa!" Preston exclaimed as he pulled back a sheet, revealing a red truck. It was covered in dust and cobwebs, and clearly hadn't moved in years, but for all intents and purposes, it looked like it should still work, given a little bit of attention.
"That was my dad's truck." Brody said with a smile. "He didn't go into town often, so when he did we made a day of it, stocked that thing up to the gills and that would be us for another few months."
"So this is where your dad trained you and Aiden?" Sarah asked, seeing some trophies and some training equipment lying around.
"Sometimes, when it was too cold or the weather turned." Brody told her. "Most of the time we'd train outside though. You know, people say that my dad was the greatest ninja that ever lived."
"What people?" Preston asked.
"I don't know...people." Brody answered with a shrug. Sarah just shot Preston a withering look to tell him not to pursue this. It was natural for kids to want to believe their parents were the best at whatever it was they did, and without any evidence to the contrary, the potential was there that Brody was exactly right about that. Of course saying someone was the world's greatest ninja was somewhat like saying someone was the world's greatest spy. Strictly speaking if they WERE, then no one would know since their whole raison d'être was concealment and subterfuge. Not to mention the fact that if they did hardly ever leave the farm as Brody had said, then people weren't likely to talk about them much at all. Of course since Brody had in the last 24 hours escaped Galvanax's ship and found his brother had disappeared, the last thing he really needed was anyone challenging his childhood fantasy version of his father.
Back at the school, the students had finally gotten the last bell and had gone home. This meant the workshop was now empty and allowed Mick the opportunity to work on the Datacomm. Hayley and Calvin were grateful that the compressor explosion hadn't caused more of an incident than it already had. It looked like none of the students had made a complaint about it, probably because Victor had pressured them into staying quiet about his involvement. It was strictly speaking his fault, since he had caused the buildup in the air hose, but that didn't mean there wouldn't be a few uncomfortable questions about why the teacher on duty hadn't warned them sooner the compressor could explode, or hadn't seemed to do anything about it, which would inevitably lead to the question who he was and why he was there in the first place!
"Piece of cake!" Mick said as he finished with his repairs. "It just got a little shaken up. It only needed a few adjustments."
"Good, then call your friend, we're going to need to get out of here." Hayley told him. "If the janitor finds us in here, he'll start asking questions."
"Hold on." Mick told them. "I just need to find the frequency."
The spade hit something solid, and Brody immediately got down on his knees and started scrambling to dig it out with his hands. Sarah and Preston both closed in as he opened the box.
"Empty?" Brody said, sounding like his frustration was starting to get the better of him.
"Brody..."
"Where's the ninja steel?" He demanded, grabbing the box and throwing it across the room, where it scattered tools and hit the wall. Brody started to pace as he tried to think of what the next move was. Now he had no idea where Aiden OR the Ninja Steel was. Was it possible Aiden took it with him when he left? If so, where was it now?
"Brody, try to calm down." Preston told him. "This isn't doing any good..."
"Well, neither is this!" He snapped. Sarah had gone to retrieve the box, but as she did so, she noticed there was something in the box. The small amount of dirt that had gotten into the box through the gap between the sides and the lid must have concealed it. At first it looked like it was a piece of paper, but as she shook it off, she realised it was a Polaroid. It was pretty retro to hear of anyone using a Polaroid, but between the fact the picture looked like it was taken when Brody was a kid, and the age group of Brody's dad, it was entirely possible it was taken by his dad.
"Brody, what's this?" Sarah asked. She showed Brody the picture at which he inspected it, confirming what she suspected.
"It's a picture my dad took. That's me and my brother Aiden." He told her. "He took us to a tournament he attended. He won that trophy."
"Trophy?" Sarah asked, taking another look at the picture. She was starting to think of something. "I've...I've seen this trophy before..."
She thought to the entrance to the farm, and the name on the mailbox. She thought it sounded familiar!
"Brody, what was your dad's name?" She asked him.
"Dane Romero." Brody told her. She just squealed in delight.
"I KNEW that name was familiar!" She shrieked. "I saw that trophy earlier today! It's in the school trophy cabinet!"
"What's it doing there?" Preston asked. "Brody's dad never went to the school...neither did Brody or Aiden."
"Exactly, so why would the trophy be there now?" Sarah asked him. "And why would Aiden leave THIS picture behind where Brody would look for the Ninja Steel?"
"Because he hid the Ninja Steel in the trophy!" Brody said excitedly as he came to the same conclusion. Just then, his Datacomm bleeped. He answered it excitedly.
"Mick? He asked. "MICK! You're alive!"
"Yeah, I'm alive...though I don't think I'll be trying that again anytime soon." He responded. "Where are you?"
"Mick, I want you to listen to me really carefully, this is important." Brody told him. "I want you to meet me at the High School. Aiden hid the Ninja Steel in a trophy in the trophy cabinet."
"Right, I'll meet you right..." His words tailed off. "Um...Brody, I'm AT the High School."
"What?" Brody asked. "What are you doing...? Never mind, just...get the trophy, I'll meet you there!"
Sarah grabbed Brody's wrist and pulled it across.
"It's in the centre of the middle shelf, it's a martial arts trophy with a gold figure of a man doing a side-kick on the top. The name on the plaque is Dane Romero." Sarah told him.
"Um...who's that?" Mick asked.
"She's helping, I'll explain later." Brody told him. "Just get that trophy, and whatever you do, do NOT let anyone get their hands on it!"
They all snapped around as Redbot slammed a hand down on a counter, causing them to jump.
"Redbot, you gave us a heart attack!" Sarah gasped. "What was that about?"
"Master Brody, we may have a problem." Redbot stated, showing him some mechanical wreckage. Brody gulped.
"What is that?" Preston asked. "Some kind of...robot insect?"
"It's called a Buzz-cam." Brody told them. "It's what Cosmo Royale uses to film Galaxy Warriors."
"So he just heard and saw everything we just said." Preston surmised.
"Which means that Mick is in a whole world of trouble!" Brody answered. Sarah went to the truck and found the keys in the ignition. She turned it over, thanking her lucky stars that the engine seemed to still be running.
"OK, we need to get there fast." Sarah told them. "Let's just hope the engine holds up after all this time!"