As Steve reached the mirror maze, he was still debating what to get.
Had he looked behind him, he would have seen the giant, spinning drill missile that had been launched. Had he been a little less excited about hanging out with Darcy, he would have heard the low whistle that it made as it cut through the sky.
He wasn’t. He didn’t.
There was a huge, crackling explosion that knocked Steve off of his feet and left him wondering how he had ended up on the ground.
He propped himself up with his left arm, then his right.
It suddenly smelled like a campfire, and not the kind where s’mores were being made.
“What happened?” Steve asked.
Every single mirror panel that he could see had been cracked or broken.
There was laughter from behind him. Steve whirled around and found a squad of twenty scout mecha-moles standing there on their hind legs. Unlike before, however, these ones were wearing full suits of green metal armor. Their claw hands were equipped with spinning drills and their heavy boots had wheels on them.
“Your prince promised that we’d have five days!” Steve shouted. “Now you’ve broken a promise, ruined our maze, and probably ruined my ice cream date!”
The mecha-mole in front said, “Too bad.”
Steve knew that he had no chance of beating all of them. He was scared, but he was not scared to admit that he was scared.
Steve repeated Sensei Raheem’s maxim: “Admit that you feel fear, then face it.”
He had no shuriken. No katana. Nothing but his fists, his feet, the spell of shadow taming, and the spell of melted time.
Five of the moles jumped Steve at once. He did a back handspring and avoided the initial attack. The moment his feet touched the ground, he did a split, and a diving mecha-mole went right over his head.
He sprang back up and delivered a knuckle-sandwich to the only opening in the mecha-mole’s armor: the face.
His joy was short-lived. Sure enough, one of them grabbed him from behind. Another socked him right in the stomach.
“Oof!” said Steve.
“Hey!” came a shout. “The only one who gets to beat him up is me.”
Nora came jetting down from the sky. She was in her usual black uniform, but this time she was wearing a yellow armband around her right elbow.
The mecha-moles immediately let go of Steve and he did a jumping double back-kick that sent the one behind him tumbling away. The kick catapulted Steve forward and he landed next to his sister.
“You okay, little brother?” she asked.
“I’m better now,” he said.
“I hope these moles are ready to fight two of Ninjastoria’s most notorious criminals,” she said, handing Steve one of her katanas.
Nora unclipped two pairs of nunchakus from her belt. They were made of tan swiftwood, perfectly smooth and perfectly dangerous. Soon, they were nothing but a blur, and Nora started smacking mole after mole.
Steve gripped the katana and relaunched his attack.
“Nora, what are we supposed to do? There are so many of them,” he said, his sword clashing with the drill bit of a scout. “Plus, don’t they eat metal?”
As Steve finished speaking, the mecha-mole ripped the katana out of his hands and devoured the blade in two chomps.
“We have to hold out for one more minute. Then the rest of the squad will arrive,” Nora said.
The moles were zipping around on their wheeled boots, and they dashed at Steve and Nora, forcing them back.
“Fine!” she said. She cracked her knuckles, whistled low, and tugged on her lower lip. One of her nunchaku now looked like a set of oversized baseball bats chained together.
“Batter up!” she shouted and, with a mighty swing, she sent five of the moles soaring at once.
Steve watched as six other ninjas arrived, dropping from the sky on gliders. All of them had a yellow armband around one arm. And all of them were girls or women. Steve recognized his mom among them.
They stepped in unison and then thrust their fists forward. The ground beneath the remaining mecha-moles turned into a geyser of water and lifted the moles into the air. All of the newcomers then pulled out wooden practice swords—bokken—and struck.
The moles fled after that.
“Let’s get moving,” one of women said. She was taller than Nora, older than Nora. Her skin was many shades darker, and she had a sledgehammer slung across her back. Steve immediately recognized Ninja Amari, who was famous for winning the Unlimited Power Tournament more times than any other woman or man. She was a six-time champion.
Steve followed along as the group bounded through the mirror maze, eventually leaping up onto the top edge of it when they left the damaged section behind. Steve looked back once and saw that the broken glass glittered on the ground like diamonds in the twilight.
In his head, war had been something fought out in the wilderness. It wasn’t something that knocked down your front door and wrecked your hometown.
Now he realized that he had been wrong. That was exactly what war did. All wars.
His stomach gave a twist.
“Everything’s going to be okay,” said his mom, who was right in front of him.
“Weren’t you supposed to be going to Samurai Sam’s? How’d you wind up here?” Nora asked, falling back to Steve’s right and keeping pace with him as they ran.
Steve’s mother said, “Hmmm.”
“I…I was meeting Marcy for ice cream,” he said.
Nora patted him on the back. “I’m sorry that your date got ruined, little bro.”
Despite her reassurance, Steve still didn’t feel well.
“What’s up with the yellow armbands?” Steve asked.
“It’s our symbol,” said Nora. “We are—”
Before Nora could say anything else, something nearby let out a thunderous boom.
The walls of the mirror maze collapsed and Steve was falling, falling, falling.
DARCY
Darcy had armed herself with a bat and a handful of shuriken. She went into the kitchen cabinets and—as requested—she pulled out Gertie’s special backpack that had five slots in order to hold five pies. When she turned around, Morris had silently arrived and had arranged the pies on the table.
Darcy recognized them immediately. They were the extra-creamy vanilla pudding pies that she and Gertie had made yesterday. Gertie had even taught her the proper way to make a pie crust from homemade graham crackers and fresh-churned butter.
Morris fit all five pies into the backpack and gave Darcy a thumbs-up.
“Thank you, Morris. I guess you’re going to stay behind and guard the house?” she asked.
He gave her another thumbs-up.
Gertie was still waiting in the ruined training room. She held out her hands and took the pie backpack from Darcy.
“Since the wall was destroyed, there’s no need to use the door,” said Gertie, and she led the way out of the house.
Even with pies in tow, Gertie was still light on her feet. They dashed through Ninjastoria as the other ninja battle squads were on their ways to different strategic locations.
In her head, Darcy imagined the same thing must have happened when the Bureau of Sneakery realized it was under attack. She wondered where Natalya and Evelyn would have directed their forces. She wondered if Serena and her parents had been fighting or if they fled. She wondered if the Director had been there at all.
Gertie threw a grappling hook onto the roof of the Ninja News Network television station and scaled the wall that way. Darcy climbed the ladder. She told herself that it was okay to come in second place when racing a senior citizen.
“We’ve got allies coming this way,” Gertie said, pointing at a squad of ninjas running across the top of the mirror maze.
Then there was a deafening boom. Everything around them shook.
Darcy watched as a drill bit the size of a truck went screaming across the sky. It struck the wall of the mirror maze
and blasted it into pieces so small that it looked like snow. The ninjas that had been running across it all tumbled down.
“Let’s move!” said Gertie.
Gertie leaped off of the roof. It was at least fifty feet off the ground. Darcy remembered what Steve had taught her about falling.
She fell.
The rush of it made her stomach do backflips. She still felt like she was making a terrible mistake.
The moment her foot grazed the ground she rolled and came up running.
“Not bad,” said Gertie, who was looking back over her shoulder.
They reached the ruined mirror maze. Darcy saw her broken reflection nearly everywhere she looked.
One after another, the ninjas regrouped. They had all fallen in a way that allowed them to land on their feet.
“Steve?” she asked.
He grumbled as he shook his head. When he turned and saw it was Darcy, he smiled. She smiled back, forgetting to talk.
“Uh…Marcy? You okay?” Steve asked.
She quickly snapped back to reality. “Maybe? I just watched a giant drill missile destroy part of your town. I wonder what Head Ninja Philip III would think.”
“He probably would have forced everyone to break all of their mirrors. He was known for doing things that made people hate him, after all,” said Steve.
A hand rested on Darcy’s shoulder. It was Nora.
“Hey, Marcy, how does it feel to be surrounded by criminals?” Nora asked.
Steve’s mother was right behind her and she didn’t seem to find Nora’s joke to be funny. Both Nora and Nora’s mother were wearing yellow armbands tied around one arm. She thought, perhaps, that it was some kind of soldier uniform.
“Stevie, are you cut at all?” asked Ninja Steve’s mom.
“Mom, please don’t call me that,” said Steve, and then added, “I’m injury-free.”
“Yeah, Mom, don’t embarrass him in front of his girlfriend like that,” said Nora, who was clearly intent on making things worse.
Darcy stood there. Years of spy training, weeks of ninja training…yet nothing had taught her how to deal with this. Her hands were clammy, her face was flushed. She had nothing to say. She didn’t even know if she should say anything about their cancelled ice cream...hangout? Evening? Date?
It was supposed to be a date, wasn’t it?
Thankfully, someone else spoke first.
“Let’s go take out that drill cannon,” said the woman with the sledgehammer.
Soon, they were all bolting away from the wreckage of the mirror maze and through the main street of downtown Ninjastoria. All of the businesses were closed: Kickin’ Cake, Kara-Tea. Even the 24-hour coffee spot, Throwing Star Buck’s (named after Ninja Buck, who was really good with shuriken) was shuttered. Darcy assumed that most of the owners were out fighting mecha-moles somewhere.
They found the drill cannon in front of a blocky concrete building that must have been a factory. The hulking cannon had a long, rectangular base that was propped up on three mechanical legs that could each raise and lower, changing the angle at which it would fire the giant drill bits. It made sharp hissing sounds and steam shot out of its sides.
One scout mecha-mole sat in a cockpit that was off to one side. Ten brute mecha-moles were there, too, hustling to reload it.
There was no battle cry. The ninjas silently dashed toward their targets. Darcy stayed close to Nora and Steve’s mother.
Ninja Gertie unzipped her pie backpack. Her hands became a blur and she threw all five of the vanilla pudding pies. Each one struck a mecha-mole in the face.
Then, Gertie performed a technique that summoned a cloud of rumble-bees. Ninjastoria’s rumble-bees were far worse than regular bumblebees, because they could shoot their stingers like missiles. And, as Darcy had learned in her biology classes, rumble-bees absolutely hated the smell of vanilla.
Like all of the agents, Darcy had been trained to resist common fears, so she wasn’t scared of bees. The mecha-moles, however, didn’t seem to have that training.
The cloud of bees attacked the pudding-covered moles and sent them in a panicked run. When one of the brute mecha-moles broke free of the bee cloud, Nora kicked it in the shin. Then, Steve’s mom slammed her elbow into its stomach. It went flying toward the metal front doors of the factory and broke right through them.
Darcy ran after it, Nora by her side. The factory was full of clear, teardrop-shaped tanks that were thirty feet high. The tanks were all connected by spiraling silver tubes. Some of them were swirling with dark red liquid, some blue, some golden. All of them had ladders running up the sides.
The mecha-mole had gotten back onto its feet and Darcy drew back for a punch. The mole blocked it with its forearm and swiped at her with its other claw. She felt the claw breeze by her face, barely missing.
“Duck!” shouted Nora.
Darcy ducked just in time for Nora to roundhouse kick the brute mecha-mole. It went flying through the air and struck the tank full of red liquid. There was a crunch and a crackle. The tank burst open and a river of red swept the mecha-mole off of its feet.
A sweet smell filled the factory, but Darcy couldn’t quite place it. She shot Nora a quizzical look.
“This is the Juice-Jitsu factory. We’re looking at gallons of Choppin’ Cherry,” Nora said.
The mole approached them once again.
Before Darcy or Nora could strike, a torrent of blue fruit juice shot over their shoulders and blasted the mecha-mole into the wall. Still dripping with juice, it got up, used its claws to dig straight through the wall, and was gone.
Darcy looked behind her and saw Ninja Steve standing on top of one of the tanks. He was holding a fire hose that was connected to the juice tank.
“That was a big dose of vitamin see-you-later!” he shouted.
Darcy grinned. Nora groaned.
“What flavor was that?” Darcy asked.
“Berry Bash!” said Steve. “It’s the best one. Want to try it while it’s fresh?”
“I’d prefer to wait until I can drink it through a straw, thank you,” she said.
They all left the factory and saw that the other ninjas had gained control over the drill cannon. They were tying up unconscious mecha-moles and carrying them off.
“Amari, should we destroy the cannon?” asked Ninja Steve’s mom.
The woman with the sledgehammer hefted it high above her head. “I think that’s a fabulous idea.”
With a shout, she took three big swings with the hammer. The first side-swing completely destroyed the cockpit. The second side-swing knocked the loaded drill bit off of the front. Finally, Amari’s downward swing crushed the steam engine that ran the whole thing.
The ninjas all gave a cheer.
Gertie cleared her throat. “Marcy, I’m sure you’ve noticed the ladies with the yellow armbands. I would like to introduce you to the Sisterhood of Butt-Kicking.”
Darcy made eye contact with all of them. It was clear that Ninja Amari was the one in charge.
Steve leaned in close and whispered, “Ninja Amari is Sensei Raheem’s ex-wife. It’s been a few years.”
Darcy nodded. She didn’t know much about Sensei Raheem’s personal life. She hadn’t even considered if he was married or not.
“Sisterhood, let’s get to headquarters and plan our next strike,” said Amari. “Ninja Steve, you can come with us, but you can’t walk into our base. The sisterhood doesn’t allow men to hang out.”
Darcy watched Steve deflate. He opened his mouth to say something, then stopped himself.
He turned to Darcy. “It’s like the saying from Sensei Raheem’s book: never argue with a powerful woman wielding a sledgehammer.”
She was impressed. Nora looked stunned. The Steve they had always known would have found it impossible to walk away without a protest. On top of that, he was quoting a book.
“I’ll see you soon, Steve,” said Darcy. “Be careful, okay?”
“Sure!” said Steve, “I
’ll—”
There was a crackle of static. Then, it sounded like someone was tapping their fingers against a microphone. Darcy couldn’t see any speakers anywhere, but the sound was booming from everywhere at once.
“EVERYONE, SHUT UP! THIS IS IMPORTANT!”
STEVE
The sheer volume of President Ninja’s message was enough to make Steve dizzy. He clamped his hands over his ears and braced for the next announcement.
“Ninja squadrons Cheddar, Rapunzel, Thirteen, and Triskaidekaphobia report to station five, immediately,” he said. “All ninja students seventeen and under should report to the school grounds immediately. That includes you, Nora!”
“I’m part of the sisterhood,” said Nora, to her mother. “I should be with you all, not with the children!”
Steve’s mother kept an even tone. “Nora, that was a direct order from President Ninja. He let you out of jail early, in case you forgot. I’m sure that he’ll have an important leadership task for you once you get there. Besides, I know that Steve and Marcy will be safe if they travel with you.”
Then Steve’s mom looked at Steve. “You are doing great, honey. I’m proud of you and I’ll tell your dad all about it. He’s manning the tennis-ball launchers on top of the house at this very moment.”
She gave him a big kiss on the cheek and left in a blur with the rest of the sisterhood. Now it was just him, Darcy, Nora, and a ruined drill cannon. He leaned against the frame of the machine. Darcy walked over and stood across from him.
“This is surreal,” Darcy said.
“This is inexcusable!” Nora yelled. “I should be there with the sisterhood. President Ninja keeps treating me like a child.”
He thought about telling Nora that she was throwing a temper tantrum, just like a child would. He decided to hold his tongue. Steve watched his sister punch the side of the cannon and leave a deep dent in the side. Nora stormed off, leaving Steve and Darcy alone.
“I know what you mean about it feeling surreal,” said Steve. “I had to fight with a juice cannon. I should feel excited about that, but I’m not. I wish I never had to do that.”
Agent Darcy and Ninja Steve in...Mecha-Mole Mayhem! Page 4
