Relax, I'm A Ninja (21 page)

“Are you Mrs. Ito?” a policewoman said.

“Yes, yes. What happen?” She put on her Japanese accent, brewing up some serious tears.

“It appears to be a break-in. We don’t know intent at this moment.”

“My husband? He okay?” She dropped the fast food bags and grabbed me around the waist. We didn’t technically know if he was okay, but I wasn’t sure if she was truly scared or faking.

The policewoman looked down. Not good. The oxygen in the air disappeared, and all I could think was that the paramedics didn’t make it in time. I was too young to assume his Clan responsibilities, to live without his quiet yet strong influence.

Finally the officer said, “He’s alive; he’s been taken to the hospital. The intruder stabbed him, but it seems your husband managed to kill the man.”

My mom broke down. If it was an act, it was flawless. I let out a huge sigh of relief. He was alive.

“I’m sorry, ma’am.” The officer put a hand on my mother’s shoulder. “I understand this is hard, but we have to ask you to find alternative lodging. The intruder’s body is still inside, and we’ll need to investigate the crime scene. Do you have a place to stay?”

“Yes. Can we get things?”

“Not until we’ve done a full sweep and questioned the victim. We’ll need a contact number for you,” the officer said. Mom gave her cell phone number. “All right, I think that’s all the information we need from you now. We’ll be in touch.”

“Thank you.” My mom bowed several times, wiping her tears with her shawl. You’d never guess she was torturing someone an hour ago.

When we got to the bus stop, her tears dried up. She pulled out her phone. “Courtney, I need a pick-up at the bus stop nearest the Wado Karate Dojo. We have an emergency. You must be silent about this matter, understand?”

After that, Mom made several more calls. The way she gave out commands formed a pit in my stomach—it reminded me of what Amy and I did to that Akuma. The screaming. I shuddered, worried kissing her would never be the same. I couldn’t even do more than hold her hand at the moment.

Courtney took us to the hospital. That place was too familiar. First Todd, and then I’d spent days listening to the beeping monitors and staring at Amy’s weakened body. Now my dad was in that bed with four stab wounds. He looked old, way older than he was. His wiry eyebrows furrowed even in his sleep.

Mom sat on his bed, her strong features crumbling into real panic. She put her hand on his arm. “Toshiro, do you sense any
kami
?”

“What? No!” I didn’t even think of that. He could have easily taken
kami
from that Akuma, but he didn’t. No matter what he’d done in his past, my dad was an incredible man.

She sighed in relief and shook his arm. “Ken, Ken.”

“Uhnn.” He moved his head back and forth, fighting his way out of sleep. Then he opened his eyes. “Hisako, I didn’t …”

“Shh, I know.” She kissed him on the forehead. “We took care of it, but our cover’s been breeched. Even if the other four Akuma in the city didn’t know about the dojo, they will now. Cops are everywhere.”

He heaved a sigh. “Disaster.”

“What do we do?” My mom seemed to have all the answers. It surprised me that she asked Dad for help.

“I’m not sure they’re on Clan business. I knew them—Taro and Satsuki. They trained with me in Japan. We joined about the same time. Most Akuma work in packs, fight for rights over areas. They’ve probably contracted with the city’s Akuma to leave once I’m gone.”

“Do you think they’ve alerted others?”

“If there are still four in the city, doubtful. They’ll want the
kami
for themselves. If we could kill them all at once, it would buy us time before the Akuma realize who we have now.” He flinched, grabbing his side.

Mom nodded methodically. “Okay, we’ll stay there, pretend we don’t know what’s going on. I’ll have the Saburau rotate watching the dojo and guarding the city. We can’t have them getting stronger by stuffing themselves with
kami
.”

“They’ll tread lightly until the press dies down, but they won’t give up.” He closed his eyes, overcome with fatigue.

“The one we caught implied there’s a spy,” Mom said. The thought of having an Akuma
close enough to gather information chilled my blood. “Toshiro would sense that, wouldn’t he?”

Dad shook his head. “Not if the spy is suppressing his urge to consume
kami
like I am. They wouldn’t eat. They would appear as a normal human. It could be anyone, possibly someone very close to us if they were able to point out the dojo.”

I couldn’t think of anyone that stood out as a spy. Dad never went anywhere, which made sense now. Mom was fairly solitary as well and probably only had Saburau connections. Maybe a dojo student or one of their parents? Unlikely. My stomach turned. The spy could have come through me. I’d been too reckless these past months. Simon was at school. What if someone else saw?

“Even if we can’t see the spy, we should be able to preempt the killers.” Mom smiled at Amy and me.  

I cringed. Maybe I didn’t mind pointing them out, but what might happen after we found them made me sick. I had to tell her we wouldn’t torture people, and it scared me that she might not listen.

“Courtney, take Amy and Toshiro to Amy’s house. Guard them until someone comes to replace you,” my mom said after a while.

Amy was almost passed out on my shoulder from all that fighting. She wasn’t fully healed and occasionally winced in pain, though she tried to hide it.

Courtney headed for the door. We followed her, but could barely keep up since she was on the verge of running. We got in her car and she barreled down the road. “You don’t know anything about Saburau, huh?”

I let go of Amy, leaning toward the front seat. “Hey, I wasn’t lying. If you asked me a month ago what my mother did for a living, I’d have told you she was an amateur game show critic. I swear.”

“Bullshit. You lied about how you found Simon, too. Hisako asked you if you sensed
kami
in your dad. I know what that means—you have high spiritual energy, and your dear daddy is ex-Akuma.”

I didn’t know what to say. I did lie about Simon, and I wasn’t excited about her knowing everything. Sitting back, I sighed. Hopefully she hadn’t picked up on the fact that Amy could see them as well. Mom didn’t want the
Inyo
thing getting out.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.” Courtney straightened in her seat, smug as ever. It didn’t matter what she thought. My dad was in the hospital, the Akuma were on our trail, and it was looking like I’d be the resident torture master. Courtney’s feelings were at the bottom of the totem pole. No, more like smashed underneath.

She pulled in front of Amy’s house. “I’m dropping off my car at home and coming back. Try not to die.”

Amy glared at her. “We won’t beat any Akuma while you’re powdering your nose.”

If looks could kill, Courtney would have taken Amy out right then.

I opened the car door before a catfight broke out. Not that I wouldn’t have enjoyed seeing that, but I just wanted to make sure Amy was nice and healed before they fought. Almost before Amy shut the car door, the wheels screeched as Courtney floored it.

“Ugh! Why does she think she’s so superior?” Amy said as she plopped down on her couch.

I was ready to crash, but it was my turn to be the calm one. “I guess pretending to be a bratty cheerleader leeches into everything.”

She laughed. “Do you think she’s really like that?”

“I don’t know.” I sat down and pulled her close. She hugged me tight but didn’t even try to kiss me. I had a feeling we wouldn’t kiss for days, maybe weeks.

“I feel like I can’t trust anyone.”

People kept changing left and right. Mom had gone from a crazy game show lady to a ruthless
kunoichi
Master. My dad had gone from a quiet sensei to a tortured ex-Akuma. Even Marty, who was always a goofy ladies’ man, wasn’t what he seemed. I thought I was on the inside of the ninja world, but there was no such thing.

The only person I could trust was sitting right next to me, so I squeezed her tight. “At least we have each other.” I took a deep breath, wishing we didn’t have to think anymore. “So, a spy.”

Amy’s nails dug into my back. “I bet it’s Courtney. She’s all rage.”

“But we’ve seen her fight them. And she’s had plenty of openings to sense the
Inyo
thing like the other Akuma seem to. Wouldn’t she have captured or killed us?”

She frowned. “I hate that you’re right.”

We went over several people we knew—even her own parents—but nobody seemed right. Everyone sounded like a ninja if you thought hard enough. And we were thinking way too hard.

“Do you think the spy could be Eddie?” Amy asked.

I busted up laughing. “Are you kidding? No way.”

“I know it sounds crazy, but think about it. He tried to keep us apart like your dad said they would. And he’s so pissed off at you. Like, disproportionally pissed off.”

I shook my head, hating to think about it. Eddie couldn’t be the Akuma spy. I’d known him forever, but things had changed so much recently. My breathing quickened as I thought through everything that had happened—the questions, the intervention, even the Scrabble incident. He wasn’t stupid. He could have figured it out.

But Eddie wouldn’t do that…or would he? He’d always wanted to be strong like the characters in our games. I thought back to his cold face, how he’d told me to break up with Amy. Did he know what we were? Maybe he could sense it like my dad.

I put my head in my hands. How could I trust myself after I’d been wrong about so many people? Eddie could have fooled me like everyone else. “Maybe.”

Amy rubbed my back and was quiet for a while. “Should we follow him? See if things seem suspicious?”

“I guess so, but we can’t bring it up to my mom without knowing for sure. Who knows what the Saburau would do to him.” I couldn’t bear the thought of torturing Eddie for my mom.

She nodded. “Tosh, what happened tonight—”

“Will
never
happen again.” I looked into her eyes. “We’re not going to be Saburau. I won’t take orders like that.”

Her whole face relaxed. “I’m so glad you feel that way, because I was worried you’d think I was weak.”

“No way! They’re not using our relationship like that. We can help in other ways.” I managed a smile, pushing her hair from her face. Her pink lips were still inviting, but I couldn’t bring myself to kiss them. It was like there was a wall of glass between us. I didn’t know why, but it wasn’t the same.

Her face turned playful. “What?”

“Oh, nothing, you’re just so beautiful.”

“Duh.” Amy rolled her eyes and laughed.

She grabbed the remote and turned on the TV while I got some snacks from the kitchen. Then we snuggled under a blanket. It felt so normal and nice—as long as I didn’t think about the fact that Courtney was outside guarding us.

“We should probably think about homework,” Amy said as the show ended.  

“True. Let’s work on chemistry.” I had to keep my mind busy, distracted, otherwise I’d be sick over everything happening.

Amy grabbed her book and we spent the next couple of hours catching up. Homework was supposed to be boring, but I enjoyed it. As we worked through the assignments, my mind pushed out all the crap. For a second, we were a normal high school couple working and flirting up a storm.

If only it was that easy all the time.

27

Spying on Eddie was about as exhilarating as sleeping. Wait, no, most of my dreams were more entertaining. Amy and I had watched him for the past few days and had barely anything to show for it. Most of the time he guzzled Mountain Dew while playing computer games, but every night at nine he’d slip on a long black trench coat and head to a comic book store I’d never been to—entering the back room through the alley door. I hated to admit that could be something.

As I stared at him across the cafeteria, he was still Eddie. I may have been biased, but it was hard to believe he was the Akuma spy. We’d snuck into his room to check his computer when I knew he was hanging out with Stu and Todd. Nothing. There were no hidden weapons, unless a replica of Frodo’s sword counted. Of course, that didn’t mean he didn’t have them.

“Tosh, you want the rest of my fries?” Sarah asked. I’d been eating lunch with the girls since the Winter Ball, and I’d become their personal garbage disposal.

“Oh, sure.”

“Enjoy.” She slid her fries over. Eva didn’t even ask if I wanted her remaining carrot sticks; they came along with the fries. I was still starving, so I didn’t mind. Amy grabbed half of what I got. Hard-core training with my mom had that effect. She’d been putting us through what I’m sure bordered on torture.

Life had gotten strangely normal since the attack on the dojo. The Akuma appeared to have dropped off the map. Dad had just gotten home from the hospital that day. He was a local hero now. The police decided the guy he killed was The Ninja. The state prosecutors claimed they wouldn’t pursue Dad’s case, but we were still waiting on official news. There hadn’t been a murder since.

But we knew better. The Akuma were still around, spy included. They were waiting for the right opening like my dad said. The extra Saburau in the city just stopped them from taking
kami
, and they couldn’t attack the dojo head-on without eating some to make them stronger.

“Oh my gosh, Maddie, look who’s coming over here!” Eva squealed.

Maddie looked up from her book, her hazel eyes going wide. Then she sank into her chair and raised the book to cover her rosy cheeks. Stu was coming straight for the table in all his tall, lanky glory. I looked to where Todd and Eddie sat. Eddie didn’t look up from his food, but Todd had a goofy grin on his face as he watched.

“Hi, Stu,” Amy said. “What brings you all the way over here? Isn’t this like a code breech?”

“I just…um …” He started to hyperventilate. I covered the ketchup on my plate in case the sight of it sent him over the edge.