The teenager went in for a punch, and a 12-year-old Kai winced, thinking of the bruise he'd later have to lie about to his mother and Nya. He wasn't sure how well he could defend himself against someone only a few years short of being twice his age, but he thought he should at least try. He balled his fists and swung them upward, aiming for the guy's face. The older boy screamed and Kai gasped, his mouth a perfect O. His hands were on fire! The young man had taken a few steps back, cursing and covering both his chin and his lip. From what Kai could see through his fingers, his skin was red and already starting to blister.

"How the f*** did you do that?!" he demanded.

"I-I don't know! I didn't mean to, I swear! I'm sorry!"

"You better be, you little-"

"Daniel!" It was Mrs. Anderson, the kid's mother.

"My stars! What have you boys been doing?"

"He did it; he made his hands catch on fire!"

"What have you been doing with those new friends of yours?! I knew they were a bad influence! You expect me to believe -Kyle, is it?"

"Kai."

"Sorry, sweetie, it's nothing personal. I'm bad with names, that's all. Tell me, is he drunk or high?" Mrs. Anderson asked, changing her tone to a much sweeter one.

"Uh..."

"I'm not on drugs, Mom! Kai and I were just playing pretend, isn't that right?"

"But what happened to your face?"

"Er..."

"I saw a lighter on the ground, only I didn't know what it was, and I picked it up. Dan tried to take it from me cause he said it was dangerous and it turned on somehow and..." Kai trailed off, but Mrs. Anderson didn't need to hear anything else. She took her son to a hospital for his burns and called Kai's mom so she could pick him up (and of course to tell her what happened).


His chin was covered in white scars. When Dan approached Kai, his first thought was that Dan wanted revenge.

"Stay away from me or I'll burn you again!" Kai bluffed, even though he had no clue how he had done it the first time and was nowhere near being able to control it.

"Gees, kid, I just wanna say thanks."

"Thanks? For what?"

"For making up that story about the lighter. My mom would've grounded me until I graduated if she thought I was doing drugs."

"I was saving my butt as much as I was yours. What if she'd believed you about what really happened?"

"You don't know my mom at all. She's like, no nonsense and cut the crap."

"Okay..."

"So how badly were you punished?"

"Not that bad, actually. Mom's giving my DS to my sister for who knows how long."

"Why isn't that bad? You play that thing all the time."

"It's kinda a long story. Nya almost took it apart-"

"Why the hell would she do that?"

"I think she wanted the parts for one of her robots."

"Robots?"

"Don't tell me you've never seen Nya's robots! They're awesome, she makes 'em herself out of- Hey, why do you care all of a sudden?"

The screen went black, and the small compartment which Kai was in started to smoke.

"Jay! Do something! Get him out of there!" Nya shouted to him.

The lightning ninja hastily went to open the door, but as soon as he did, a boy with messy brown hair about 10 or 11 years old stumbled forward out of it.

"Why is Kai a kid again?!"

Without his signature spikes, Jay hadn't recognized him at first. Now that Nya had informed him who it was, he could see the resemblance. For one thing, he remembered the scar splitting one of Kai's eyebrows in two.

"What do you mean, again?" The boy was ignored as Jay and Nya started arguing.

"I want an explanation! Where am I, why am I here, and why am I wearing clothes 20 sizes too big?!" he shouted, pushing up the sleeves of his ninja gi, which immediately fell back down again. He tried a few more times before giving up and instead focused on making sure his pants didn't fall down.

"You never told me you were being bullied," Nya said to her suddenly-younger brother now that they had gone silent.

"I'm not being bullied! And if I was, why would I tell a stranger?"

"It's me, Nya."

"What was the name of the stuffed animal you slept with until you were 6?"

"Huh?"

"If you don't know the answer I guess I don't believe you."

"I know this, just let me think for a second... It was a blue rabbit?"

"Named?"

"Mr. Fluffles."

Little Kai burst out laughing. "Sorry, I just wanted to hear you say that. Alright, sis, why are you suddenly way older than me?"

"Chit-chat is not going to help him," Wu said, preventing any explanation Nya would've given. "I suggest you visit Mystake for some Tomorrow's Tea. You should hurry, though, her shop closes at 8."

"Couldn't you go get it for us?" Jay asked.

"I did not cause the problem." And with that, the old man walked out and went to his room.

"Jay, try to fix the machine to give Kai back his memories. I'll tell the others what happened and see if Lloyd still has anything that might fit Kai."

Jay nodded and turned towards his machine.

"Kai, come with me." This whole experience was weird, and if she could help him get it over with, he'd gladly do whatever she said. He followed her down the hallway and waited as Nya went in through one of the doors.

"Something went wrong with Jay's machine!" she told the three ninja inside.

"Big surprise there," Lloyd said sarcastically, not even looking up from his comic book.

"Do you even care about what happened?"

"Does it affect me?"

"I don't know. What do you think?" Nya pushed Kai into the room while he protested.

"Is that Kai?" Cole's eyes went from the boy to the spot where Nya had been standing in the doorway, but she was gone.

"According to my facial recognition software, the answer is yes."

"Facial recognition software? What are you, a computer?"

"You mean you don't remember Zane?" Cole asked incredulously.

Kai shrugged.

"Alright, let's ask Jay about all this."

When the four went back to the main room, they found Jay worriedly looking at something on his laptop. "Oh man oh man oh man oh man!" the lightning ninja muttered, "I screwed up big time!"

"Um... Are you okay?..."

"Of course I'm not okay! Liketenyearsofhismemoriesareonmyflippingcomputerandtheyshouldbeinhisheadanddon'tevenaskmewhyhe'sphysicallyten!"

"Jay, calm down. You're talking so fast we can't understand you. Tell us what happened from the beginning."

"You know how I've been working on a machine to let you look through your old memories?" Cole nodded and gestured for him to continue. "I finished it this morning. Kai tried it out because he couldn't remember where he left the keys to his bike, but we saw a totally unrelated memory from when he was like 9. Then the thingy started smoking and Nya shouted at me to get him out of there, but when I did he was little like he is now. He didn't recognize me or Nya until he quizzed her-"

"I asked her one question! You know, something only the real her would know. Geez, you try waking up in a world where your little sister's years older than you."

Cole rolled his eyes. "Go on."

"Nya planned on telling the rest of you what happened, but only a minute ago she left to get some Tomorrow's Tea. She looked a little mad, now that I think about it. Just now I found a million files on here that I didn't recognize. When I opened some of them I realized they were Kai's memories. Okay, done."

"You've been all over the place with my age. You've said 8, you've said 10, but just for future reference, I'm 12."