Twisted Ninjas Part Two
The Rangers and the Ninjas took their fight to the farmer's market. Max was launched onto the array of tomatoes by the Red Ninja. Armed with a shield, Max lifted it over his face, blocking the Red Ninja's strike with her weapon, a razor-sharp red fan.
"I like your style," she sneered before pulling away from him. "Too bad it won't help you." She said. The Red Ranger growled as he jumped up off the squashed tomatoes and leaped over the ninja. She turned quickly just as Max swung his blade, but she ducked just in time before spinning and using her leg to kick him to the ground. She then stood back up, leaned down, and spoke. "Have a nice trip!" She swung her fan, causing an unbelievable force of wind to hurl Max away. He screamed the entire flight and smashed onto the pumpkin section.
Meanwhile, Maya pulled out her bow gun and fired at the Yellow Ninja, who was jumping from one shelf to another. Maya groaned in frustration and was immediately caught off-guard as the Yellow Ninja lunged from the shelf, charging up his boots. Once he landed on the ground, Maya was stunned by the sudden tremor that elevated her a few feet. The Yellow Ninja took this as an opportunity, pulling out his weapon, which was a yellow mallet, before sprinting over and laying a huge blow to the Yellow Ranger's chest, sending her to the ground, coughing and gasping to catch her breath.
DJ pulled out his ax as he and the Blue Ninja fought near the alley between the shelves and the check-out lanes. With every swing the Blue Ranger tried to inflict on his opponent, the Blue Ninja would dodge by either skidding to the left, right, or ducking.
"Great! Now it is my turn!" She screeched before pulling out two daggers and began striking the Blue Ranger like a scratching post. One final blow and DJ flew backward, his head slamming against a cash register and he fell to the ground, groaning dazedly.
"Where on earth did these ninjas come from?" Ellie asked as she examined the fight from her monitor.
Her father stood behind her, leaning in to view the screen. His eyes widened as he gasped in disbelief. "No..."
Ellie looked back at her father. "Dad...the Ninjitsu Academy has demolished years ago after you lost interest and focused your attention back on karate."
Uni shut his eyes and shook his head. "That is critical information that I fear the Rangers would find out. Now that the ninjas are here, then they must know the truth."
"You know if they find out that-"
"They may never find out unless it is under my permission!" Uni exclaimed.
"Can you just let me-"
"NO!" Ellie was taken aback by the eruption of her father's temper, which was something she rarely saw. He never lashed out like this. At least, not toward his daughter.
Uni realized he had gone too far as he spoke up. "Honey, I don't want anything to happen to you. I do not want to lose you like I lost your mother."
Ellie sighed. "We don't even know if she is dead or not, even after all these years," she said sadly, pain radiating in her chest. She then groaned as she turned back around toward her monitor, trying to busy herself by cracking a few codes. "Never mind, just handle this like you planned."
"AHHHHH!" Max screeched as he was launched again by the Red Ninja's fan attack. His back slammed against the wall that was between the exit and the far left area of the store.
DJ and Maya managed to reach him to help him up, still under stress and pain from their encounters with their respective ninja counterparts.
"You okay?" The Yellow Ranger asked.
"Yeah," Max painfully said as his friends helped him back to his feet. All of them looked up as the evil laughter coming from the ninjas echoed through the entire store.
The Rangers stood their ground as the Ninjas stood side by side, approaching them slowly, laughing maniacally.
"Who are you?!" The Red Ranger yelled.
"Oh, where are our manners?" The Blue Ninja said jokingly. "Perhaps we should introduce ourselves. Right guys?"
The three nodded to one another before a sudden flash emerged from them, blinding the Rangers. They had their arms over their faces to protect their vision, as the visors were just as useful as a pair of cheap sunglasses, and the flash was too strong. Once the light deteriorated, the three ninjas were revealed to be three...teenagers. The Red Ninja turned out to be a pale-skinned girl with freckles, along with long straight red hair that reached her elbows, wearing a red blouse and pink sneakers. The Blue Ninja was an African-American girl with dark brown hair tied in long dreadlocks. She was wearing a blue tank top, jeans, and purple dress boots. The Yellow Ninja was a Hispanic boy with a buzz cut, along with a yellow tee shirt, tan khakis, and green mocassins.
They took tiny steps closer to the Rangers, continuing their echoing laughter.
"I'm Maxine," the red-haired girl introduced herself.
"I'm Dejahnay," the African-American girl spoke, giggling to herself.
"And I'm Marco," the boy said with a sadistic grin on his face.
"We are the Twisted Ninjas," Maxine said. "We are faster than you."
"Smarter than you," Dejahnay added.
"Stronger than you," Marco stated.
"But we are TWISTED!" Maxine declared as the three morphed back into their ninja outfits with the power of smoke bombs.
"B-b-but I thought they were destroyed!" Ellie exclaimed after witnessing the three mysterious ninjas reveal themselves.
Uni could not believe his own eyes. The only three ninjas he instructed were now...evil? The fact that they were alive alone was too much to comprehend, but...how?
"Po..." he muttered. So this was his way of getting back at me.
"Why would Po use them?" His daughter asked.
Uni thought for a moment before realizing a very important artifact that he had in his possession. Something he and Po had studied when they were young, way before Po turned himself to evil. Then it all made sense.
He shook his head. This was going to be difficult to explain to the Rangers.
The fight with the Ninjas was perhaps the toughest battle the Rangers had to endure. Sure, they defeated Buck, who nearly decimated them. However, the twins were present, and they were only saved by the Sacred Box.
Here, the Rangers decided to play fair for the time being, though they didn't stand a chance. From Marco slamming Maya against the wall over and over, to Dejahnay doing flips to avoid DJ's attack before striking him once again with a burst of aquatic energy from her dagger, to Maxine using little effort of either slashing Max with the sharp ends of her fan or blasting him away with a huge gush of wind from her weapon.
It was perhaps child's play for the ninjas.
The Rangers managed to huddle together near the entrance of the store, struggling to move forward as they were still affected by their opponents' attacks.
"Let's power up our blades!" Max ordered.
"Right!" Maya and DJ affirmed. In queue, they turned toward where the ninjas were menacingly approaching them. They pulled out their blades and charged them up.
"Air Gush!"
"Hydro-slash!"
"Seismic Swing!"
They all swung their blades, allowing the energy from the blades to spring out and travel across toward the Ninjas. They reacted by pulling out their katanas and attempting to block the attack their respective ranger counterpart threw at them, but it seemed the blast was a bit too much, and their blades could only hold back so much. Their feet skidded backward on the ground as they ground their teeth, grunting before finally the blast was too much to bear and they were sent to the ground by an implosion of energy.
"Alright, we got them!" DJ cheered.
Dejanay grunted and she quickly got up to her feet, clutching her abdomen with her left arm. "These guys may be a match, after all."
"I think that is enough for the day. Let's give Po a sitrep." Marco suggested.
"Sure," Maxine replied before pulling out her fan. "But first..." she suddenly separated from her team, sprinting toward the Rangers.
"Watch out!" Max exclaimed, but it was too late. Once she was merely 3 feet from the Rangers, she swung her fan, blowing them away.
The Rangers wailed before they torpedoed through the glass automatic doors of the market, landing outside on the concrete curved sidewalk leading to the entrance. They demorphed, moaning in pain.
"Sensei," Max coughed out, trying to reach his teacher through the communicator on his wrist.
"Very impressive, my fellow students," Po acknowledged, sitting on his throne. The three ninjas knelt down in front of him, their heads bowed downwards showing submissiveness toward their leader.
"We thank you, Sensei Po," Maxine spoke. The three were without their masks but were still in their suits.
"I may have to take into account the fact that those pests really were a match against us," Marco pointed out, looking up at his master. "That triple slash did affect us. They may not stand a chance when it comes to regular combat, but their powers may be a saving grace for them."
"Interesting observation," Po complimented. "However, I may have the perfect strategy to take those Power Rangers down for good."
Maxine and Dejanay looked up. "What is it, Sensei Po?" The former asked.
Po leaned forward and spoke, his voice menacingly low. "You take them out one by one. Observe their moves, and figure out their weaknesses. We'll start with the Blue Ranger. Dejahnay, you will lead the team on this particular mission."
Dejahnay jumped to her feet, grinning. "It will be my pleasure! However, I may need a weapon."
Po raised an eyebrow. "And what would that be?"
"Do you still have the crystal of nightmares?" Dejahnay requested. Po raised his eyebrows, stunned by the Blue Ninja's request, wondering what she would need an old weapon for, especially since he had used it once, and the mission failed.
"Sky!" He called out for his sister. Sky approached him from his right. "Give this girl what she needs."
Sky nodded her head, looking over at Dejahnay, motioning the Blue Ninja to follow her.
"Sensei!" Max called out as the three heroes stormed into Karate Operations through a portal.
Sensei sitting at the table, with his back turned against the three teens, but his demeanor toward them did not stop the swarm of questions thrown at him by the team.
"Who are those guys?" Maya spat out.
"How are they human?" DJ inquired, his hands against his head.
"Are they working for Po?" Max inquired, jumping in front of his teacher, and glaring down at him. "You always told me a true karate competitor faces his teammates in the eye during a conversation. Do NOT give us the silent treatment! We want answers!"
Uni was stunned for a moment, looking up at the fuming Red Ranger. He knew he had to come clean, even if it was difficult. He stood up with his cane in his hand, before speaking up, pacing around the table. "I have practically raised those three until about a few years ago, rangers. Ninjitsu is a different field of martial arts compared to karate, and while I wanted to carry on my family legacy, my younger and more imaginative self wanted to try something new. So I opened up a separate school, which taught ninjutsu. I picked up three orphans, who were all raised by karate masters from schools across the world. They were young, around 6 years of age, when I started teaching them."
"Those three were the ones we just had a run-in with, right?" Maya asked, crossing her arms.
Uni nodded his head. "Yes, Marco, Dejahnay, and Maxine were all interested in my program. However, they were cold and conniving. They had zero respect for anyone but themselves, and for four years, I dedicated my life to trying to shape them into valuable fighters...but around the age of 10, following the twins' parents' deaths at the hands of Po, he rushed to my school and kidnapped them. Following that, I decided to cancel the ninjutsu program."
The Rangers all looked at one another before DJ spoke up. "How the hell did they get their powers?"
"It is obviously dark powers," Ellie spoke up, walking into the conversation. "There is no way Po could obtain Ranger powers, however, there isn't much effort into giving experienced ninjas a boost."
"A HUGE boost," DJ emphasized the previous statement, scratching his chest, which still stung a bit from the Blue Ninja's dagger attack.
"Well, there is no way Po could convince these three to work for him," Ellie said, groaning. "Marco, Dejahnay, and Maxine have been completely been driven to instantly over the past several years. Po have been able to break them apart, erasing whatever made them human, and build them back up as the relentless soldiers you guys just fought. Their minds have been twisted, hence their name TWISTED Ninjas. If my theory is true, these three will stop at nothing to destroy you guys.
"Well, Donnie and Bonnie were his allies once," Maya stated.
"Yeah, but they were manipulated and lied to into doing so," Ellie replied, rolling her eyes.
"That is correct, and besides that particular situation, I know Po doesn't keep many secrets, so there is no assumption we can conclude except that these three WILLINGLY gave themselves up to evil."
"So...you think they are humaitors."
Uni sighed. "I do not know, Maxwell. A human can decide how much of their humanity they can trade for humanitory powers."
"It doesn't matter at this point," Max exclaimed. "We need to decide a strategy to take these three out, and pronto." The other two rangers nodded their heads. The Twisted Ninjas managed to obtain a one-up against the Power Rangers. They needed to think outside the box in order to beat them.
"Well, we need to brainstorm another time," Maya suggested. "My mom is calling me and is wondering where I am."
"Yeah, my dad is probably home from work. We talk tomorrow during school." DJ added.
"Very well. Be mindful of your surroundings, rangers. You never know when those three are going to strike." Uni warned.
All three teens nodded before heading out through a portal. Once the portal shut, Ellie grunted as eh turned and slumped over to her computer desk.
Uni glanced at his daughter and raised an eyebrow. "A penny of your thoughts, Ellie?"
"Dad, I am bored!" Ellie complained, waving her arms in the air. "This whole station is perhaps the only thing I am good for, am I right? It is not like I was surrounded by hundreds of karate students and even challenged a few in matches. Those three guys, along with Bonnie and Donnie are all rookies compared to me."
Uni sighed and used his index finger and thumb to rub his eyebrows. "I will tell you what, Ellie. I can assure you when your time comes, you will be fighting amongst those three, but for now, you are not ready."
"'You are not ready. You are not ready,'" Ellie mocked her father. "How can I BE ready?"
"Time will tell, my dear daughter...time will tell."
I know I know, this introduction to the ninjas could have been stronger, but this is still build-up for what is to come. And no, there won't be a sixth gem for Ellie.