Chapter 10
Irving Slimovitz had known that going through the school corridor on his own was practically the same as taking the place of his precious station wagon in a monster attack where it would always end up taking the brunt of all the attacks while everything else remained unscathed. Nonetheless, he knew that getting medical supplies to patch up some of the students and most importantly, the ninja, was top priority. It didn't take a principal to figure out that he couldn't do it on his own.
Unfortunately, the rest of the school faculty had decided to run away and save their own skin, or found themselves against the broad side of a Robo-Apes' arm cannon. Abashedly, he had to ask his loving students for volunteers and they had to do it quickly; there was no telling when the Robo-Apes would come back from the city. It was time for him to pull out the big guns, and he took a stand with his megaphone and offered his students the world.
"Whoever helps me get medical supplies, they'll have priority registration!" The offer was met with a resounding silence, apparently no one understood the value of priority registration anymore which reminded him that he needed to discuss with the school board about the quality of their educational approach. Before he could give up however, a hand sharply rose up from the crowd of reluctant students, followed by a voice that yelled out, "I'll do it!"
The principal and Theresa ended up forming an army of two, which in Slimovitz's mind was far better than an army of one, they were lucky that the Robo-Apes still hadn't returned. The only thing that felt remotely threatening to the principal was the odd tension present in the silence which Slimovitz decided to cut through, "You know I never really did apologize for cutting the twirl team's budget," the principal mentally face-palmed himself. Was that really the best way to start a conversation?
To his surprise, the girl reciprocated his apologies, "It's fine, you needed it to patch the school up, I was being a massive shoob. Besides, there are much more important things at hand."
Tears welled up in Slimovitz eyes as the two dashed towards the nurse's office, he was so proud that at least one of his students had some sense of maturity, even if it surprised him that it came from someone like Fowler. She had always been one of those unassuming students, it was very clear that she was passionate about baton twirling, but outside of that she was like anyone else. Perhaps, he should spend some more one-on-one time with his students in life threatening situations.
The principal's questionable line of thought was interrupted by their arrival at the school nurse's office. The two made a beeline towards the medical cabinets and stockpiled on as many meds and bandages as their arms could reasonably carry. They exited the premises quickly but as they neared the inconceivably long staircase towards the Gifted classroom. They spotted a few leftover Robo-Apes patrolling the halls, Slimovitz began to panic, "Oh sweet cheese! How are we going to get past these things? I didn't even bring a hall pass!" Theresa groaned irritated by the sudden turn in events, "We don't have time for this!" The principal turned his attention to her as she dropped some of the supplies she was carrying, and materialized one of her twirling sticks seemingly out of thin air that caused the principal to shoot her a look of confusion, "What? I always carry at least two of these things with me."
A revelation that only served to confuse Slimovitz even more, but before he could ask any follow-up questions the teen took action as she pulled back her arm and readied her aim, "Ninja baton throw!" she yelled out as she threw her baton that missed in a spectacular fashion, as instead of hitting the two Robo-Apes, it hit the lights situated above them causing the lights to spark and ignite the Robo-Apes below setting them on fire.
The principal and teen stared at each other awkwardly, "I…uh…meant to do that?" Theresa said unsurely. The principal merely chuckled at the events that unfolded, "So that's why…" Theresa looked on apprehensively at the principal who waved off her concerns, "It's nothing, never realized that the ninja had such an influence on you. Still though, as principal I'm inclined to tell you that he might be eight hundred years too old for you." Slimovitz's statement caused Theresa to blush, "It's not like that!" The principal merely patted her shoulders and walked with his supplies back to the Gifted Classroom.
The two had finally made the long trek down the stairs to the Gifted Classroom but before they could enter, they could make out the sounds of chanting and a few cries on the side. "Quite the big commotion for us, eh?" The principal nudged at Theresa's direction, "Looks like the other students actually had some appreciation for us!" Theresa doubted it, but she couldn't quite pop their principal's balloon just yet. "Now stand-up straight Ms. Fowler, we need to look presentable," Slimovitz dusted himself off while Theresa merely gave an awkward smile as she straightened herself up.
"Now prepare to be pampered," the principal kicked the doors open and proclaimed, "We're back!"
Only for their presence to be ignored as the crowd continued to chant, "Bash! Bash! Bash!" Disappointed, the principal began to wallow, "Oh who am I kidding?! I'll never be hip with the teens." Theresa merely offered a pat on his shoulder as he curled himself up, "I-It's fine! I think you're…uh…pretty hip?" Theresa complimented hesitantly.
"Y-You really think so?" The principal asked with a shaky tone. Theresa sighed, "Yeah…sure." At the sight of his grateful student, Slimovitz perked up, "You're right! Great men are often overlooked by their peers, don't worry Ms. Fowler, I'll make sure that you get that priority registration this semester…no…for every year that you go through this great institution!"
Theresa scratching the back of her head at the strange sight of their enthusiastic principal, "Uh…Thanks?" The principal nodded and they carried their supplies off to the side. Slimovitz was still curious about one thing though, "I wonder what they're cheering Bash on about."
A box suddenly shook causing the pair to recoil in fear but their fear soon shifted to fury, as the box popped open revealing Doug who after seeing the principal began to complain immediately, "Principal Slimovitz! Bash stuffed me in this box after I told him not to unmask the ninja!" His whiny shrill voice, caused the principal to scream in anger, "Well did it ever occur to you Douglas that maybe you deserved it!" Theresa pushed the principal aside and asked Doug, "What was Bash doing?"
"Unmasking the ninja!" Doug yelled out, and Theresa turned her eyes on the bully as he closed in on the ninja's mask.
She needed to move now.
The entire student body was stunned by the events that unfolded. One moment they were about to witness what should've been the greatest moment in Norrisville history, and the next well…they might have witnessed the second greatest moment in Norrisville history.
Howard Weinerman couldn't believe his eyes as he picked himself off the ground as Bash's lackeys finally got off him. Although, he was having trouble with his jaw that dropped after seeing the brucest takedown he'd ever seen. He was hoping someone got it on camera so that he could show his best friend later on. His open jaw was suddenly shut by his schoolmate, Flute Girl, "Thanks," Howard said as he rubbed his sore jaw. "No problem," the spectacled girl replied nonchalantly.
The rest of the students cheered Theresa on, supporting her actions while the others were conflicted and closed in on the baton twirler, who clutched her baton tightly readying herself though she wasn't quite sure if she could pull it off again, she was sure that she spent all of her adrenaline in that one strike.
Her panic was somewhat calmed when Howard of all people came to her side, "I don't know what the juice got into you, Fowler, but you have got to give me some later," Howard jokingly said as he put on his beaked mask. Theresa offered a coy smile, "Pretty sure all that juice just went out with that one swing." Howard gave her a flustered look, "Well, we're totally shoobed."
A voice cut through their exacerbated worries, "Not yet you're not," Morgan casually remarked. "Morgan?!" The two teens yelled out in surprise, the girl in question blew a bubble from her gum, "That's my name, don't wear it out. That was a ballsy move from you Fowler, anyone willing to go that far for the ninja is pretty bruce." Theresa blushed from the sudden compliment, although she noticed that more and more students were beginning to line themselves up with her and Howard.
One of them was the ghoulish Julian that snuck up on Howard's side causing him to scream as Julian's cold hands grabbed his, "Julian! Knock it off! What are you even doing here?!" Howard slapped the boy's hand away. Julian winced at the sudden attack, "Well, I figured that I owed you and the ninja a lot for putting me back together," he said with a creepy giggle. Howard groaned but reluctantly reached his hand out towards the goth teen, who happily grabbed Howard's hand.
A scarfed teen took to the side of Julian, "Excusez-moi, I could not help but-a notice that you need some assistance!" The accented voice of Jacques made Julian smile while Howard was beginning to fume. "Dang it, ninja! Why don't you get cooler fans!?" He yelled at the still sleeping hero of Norrisville.
"Oh! Did someone say ninja fan?" As Rachel stepped into the line of students defending the ninja. Howard's face creased as the group of teens was slowly becoming lamer and lamer to him, "And what are you going to do? Sing a song?" Howard asked the girl sarcastically. Rachel giggled ignoring the boy's sarcasm, "Well, I did call Bucky over here for a reason." Howard's eyes widened, "Oh no, not Hensletter!"
As if on cue Bucky cut in, "Oh yes, Hensletter!" Howard started to whine, "No! No! No! You better wake up Cunning-'' Howard stopped himself and nervously covered his tracks, as the other students looked at him, "I mean, this shoobin' cunning ninja better wake up now!" The ninja merely stirred in his sleep, still unaware of the crowd that was forming around him. Before Howard could complain, teens began pushing against them as Bash managed to stand himself up, "Get those shoobs!"
Howard bemoaned the situation, as Bash's posse moved towards his direction, "Not this again!" But before they could make contact, they were pushed back by the school rapper, Rhymez, "Yo, yo! Better stay out of this fool's way, otherwise you're gonna get delayed." Howard's lips widened into a smile, "Finally someone honkin' cool!" Rhymez's posse moved to stop Bash's side of students.
Theresa looked upon the chaotic sea of students, as she remained by the ninja's side. But before she could take it all in, a hand grabbed her collar, "What in the cheese, are you doing Theresa?!" Debbie asked in a loud whisper. Theresa waved her friend's hands away, "I don't have any clue, okay?! I just acted on impulse!" Debbie groaned expecting that sort of answer from her friend, "Fine, but you'll have to tell me everything later. By the way, did you at least find your boyfriend in the rubble?"
Theresa was taken aback by the sudden question, "He's not my boyfriend, and besides he's right over- "Theresa immediately shut her mouth, almost outing her crush to the nosy reporter. Debbie remained oblivious however, "So you didn't see him, you want the ninja's help to get him back from those Robo-Apes, right? Howard told us that he was taken." Theresa turned to Howard, who merely shrugged his shoulders while chuckling nervously. Theresa decided to play along with the excuse, "Yeah, I really need the ninja's help."
Debbie sighed in resignation, "Okay," the journalist grabbed ahold of her best friend's hand startling her in the process. "What? Did you really think I'd leave you in the dust now? Not when I'm going to need an exclusive from you later." Theresa let out a soft laugh at her friend's attempt at extorting her.
Their conversation was cut short as Bash managed to break through the front lines of their circle of students. "Yeah Bash! I'm going to take that mask- "His rapid dash was stopped abruptly as Theresa swung her baton at his stomach, "Not again! That's Bash's second no-no place!"
As the other students quickly moved to get rid of Bash, Debbie looked on at her best friend in both fear and admiration, "And here I thought you wouldn't be able to do it twice." Theresa who was now panting from her second burst of adrenaline, "I'm going to be sick." Debbie rolled her eyes, "You're going to be fine, the ninja's going to owe you a lot for this though." Theresa shook her head, "We owe him a lot too, this is the least we can do," the girl turned her attention to the ninja who stirred in his sleep. Debbie noticed the longing look in her best friend's eyes, and hummed deep in thought.
It seemed that her best friend might have a crush on two people, how controversial.
Heidi Weinerman was conflicted, on the one hand, the ninja was their hero and this was a total violation of his privacy but on the other hand, this was probably going to get her to the very top of the school news' ranking. Decisions, decisions, what would be the right move for this?
"Move out of the way!" The voice of her brother interrupted her thoughts as he pushed her aside before a wet calculus book could hit her. "T-Thanks," Heidi said as she picked herself off the floor, Howard however was furious, "What in the cheese, are you doing?!" His outburst evidently shocked his sister who was dumbfounded, "What do you mean?" Howard sighed, "You're so obsessed with getting the next scoop that you don't even want to be a part of a story. There is a ton of stuff going on, and you can either do something, or just go home." Heidi tried to formulate a response, but a voice from the crowd yelled out, "Howard! We need some help here!"
Howard growled, "That better be an actual problem, Hensletter, or else I'm shoving your dinger where the sun doesn't shine!" The stout boy left her sister on the side who was left with her own thoughts again. Her brother was right…a statement that she never would've thought she actually thought of. The Sorceress was still a problem, and if the students managed to hurt the ninja, then their hope may be lost.
An opposing group of students stealthily flanked Howard's group, but before they could barrage them with another pack of wet calculus books, Heidi cried out to Howard, "Watch out!" Howard turned and aimed his Clamp Gun at the students, firing at their hands and legs, stopping them in their tracks. Howard proudly looked towards his sister, "Thanks!" To his shock, Heidi only held a look of contempt and disgust, "Don't make it weird, shoob."
Howard was glad to see that his sister was still fine.
Slimovitz swam through the sea of students which was something he'd never thought was actually possible but he made it work, though some of his bones were definitely not supposed to bend in the manner that they did. Oh well, that was for his health insurance to figure out and for future him to panic over. He had been searching for something in the past few minutes, he needed it to stop his students from getting their school a potential lawsuit. It sent a shiver up his spine; this was almost as bad as the year of '85…
Nope, he didn't have time to dwell on it. He needed to find the answer, and he also needed to stop the buzzing sound in his ears…Wait, buzzing? He turned his head to the right and saw his beloved megaphone, "Oh sweet cheese! What did they do to you? That's it, I am going to decrease the school's football budget this year!" Speaking of decreasing budgets, Slimovitz surveyed the area looking for a particular student.
And there she was, Theresa Fowler, who was currently batting away students who were several times her size. That girl was going to go places, Slimovitz thought fondly. Still, he knew that she had to get out in one piece so that he could give her priority registration.
Although she wasn't the only one who surprised him, as Howard Weinerman clumsily rolled himself up against more students that were breaking past their lines, he recovered quickly and began to order the other students around. Slimovitz had never seen the boy exert this much effort into…well anything. The two were going above and beyond for a person whose face had never been seen by anyone.
Perhaps the whole 'put students into life threatening situations' plan may not have been such a far-fetched idea. This was far from the time to consider that he had to speak up now before they destroyed the entire classroom. Also, why was the classroom this big anyways? Slimovitz swore that the number of gifted students in the entire history of Norrisville High could only be counted in one hand.
The principal tapped the megaphone that was still staticy and spoke out, "Alright that's enough!" All the students paused, as he continued to speak, "If even tries to lay a finger on the ninja's mask, they will get a single but large demerit!" The students on the ninja's side let out a collective groan at the miniscule threat, while the other students merely laughed.
Slimovitz face-palmed at the sight, "I mean, the students that try to lay a finger on the ninja's mask will get expelled!" The students merely laughed even harder, "Ha-Ha Bash ain't going to get expelled, I'll expel you!" Bash threatened with a haughty laugh. Although, Slimovitz was less than amused, given the fact that the bully failed to take into account that after all this was over, his step-father would lose a ton of credibility, to say the least.
"Alright, Irving, it's time to pull out the big guns," the principal mumbled to himself, and took a deep breath before speaking into the megaphone once more, "Those that don't follow the rules will have to pay more than twice for their pudding tots!" The laughter of the students abruptly stopped as silence filled the classroom.
"What?!" Howard cried at the prospect of more expensive pudding tots, Debbie smacked the back of his head, "Ow! What was that for?"
Debbie rolled her eyes, "We're on the good team for once." Howard's eyes widened in realization, "Oh yeah…"
The opposing students began to mumble amongst themselves.
"Yeah…"
"This isn't worth it…"
"…Nope, was never part of this…"
The sight of students dispersing made the principal let out a sigh of relief, "Glad that, that's over, now for anyone that's able to move, let's cover the ninja's sleeping spot with some of these cloths," the students quickly set up a makeshift medical station, and started to patch up some of the students and the ninja.
"I cannot believe that we're getting guard duty," Howard complained as he chewed on a candy bar. Theresa gave him a stern look, "What? All that fighting made me hungry." Theresa could only sigh at the sight of his crush's best friend, "Whatever," she paused briefly, "Thanks by the way."
Howard stopped chewing his candy bar as the sudden show of gratitude from the girl surprised him, "For what?"
"For helping me out, I wouldn't have been able to fend off that many students on my own." Theresa explained as she put a gauze on one of the ninja's exposed wounds. Howard shrugged it off, "It's what friends do."
"Are we friends though?" Theresa asked bluntly, before correcting herself, "I-I mean it's not that I don't want to, it's just that we've never…you know?"
"Yeah…" Howard awkwardly affirmed. The silence of the room was killing the two, as they found it difficult to continue their conversation. Howard needed to find a way out of the conversation, and in his desperation, he threw his own candy bar into the floor. "Oops, I'm just going to pick up my candy bar ever so gently," he kneeled down as slowly as he could as Theresa sighed exasperatedly, "You know if you didn't want to talk, you could've just left the room!"
Howard quickly picked his candy bar up and crossed his arms angrily, "Well you shouldn't have thanked me!"
"I was being nice!" Theresa argued, causing Howard to moan in frustration, "No, you weren't, you were being a- "As tensions rose, a groggy voice interrupted their argument, "Howard, are you playing Grave Puncher again?"
"Shut up, ninja!" Howard yelled, ignoring his now conscious best friend, before his eyes widened, "Ninja?" Theresa also looked towards the bed and saw that the ninja was sitting up as he blinked his eyes open.
Tears welled up on her face, as she dashed towards him enveloping the hero in a tight hug, "Thank cheese! You're finally awake!"
The ninja could only look down on the girl that was hugging him, while his best friend was awkwardly whistling with an innocent tune.
What in the cheese happened while he was asleep?
A/N: Hey everyone, Somi here! And I'm feeling much better though it's a bit of a touch and go situation. Like, I've been feeling fine but some things have happened this week. I broke both my controller and my mouse, I have a spare mouse but like sheesh.
This chapter was a ton of fun to write as I actually got to delve into some of the other side characters of the main show. It's a shame that some of the RC9GN background characters never quite got their chance to shine after their brief appearances in their focus episodes save for some characters.
The next chapter will return to our normal schedule (probably). Anyways, thanks for all of your support and kind comments! They've been a huge help.
