Revenge of the Ninja, page 2
Julien smiled appreciatively. “Man, Scarlett, how do I get to be as cool as you?”
“Me? Cool?” Scarlett asked. She’d been called many things over the years. Nerd, geek, teacher’s pet, bothersome, troublemaker, and even “sentimental idealist” (although that last one was just Tommy). But no one had ever called her “cool.”
Stan chimed in. “Um yeah, obviously you, Scarlett. You came up with this whole plan, down to every last detail, which is already pretty amazing. But then when things go wrong, you don’t freak out. You’re just like, ‘Ok, gotcha. We’ll do this instead.’ Like nothing rattles you.”
Scarlett felt her face heating up again, and she stared down at her hands. “W-Well, I mean, it’s best to assume there will be unexpected complications. Then you simply factor allowances into the plan. That’s all it is.”
Zoro-me put his hand on her shoulder.
“That’s cool,” he told her.
“Oh.” She had not realized her face could get any hotter. When it was finally possible to breathe again, she said, “Then, I guess, uh, thanks, guys.”
CHAPTER
3
THIS IS THE BALANCE
Yawarakai had taught Scarlett that the secret to evasion was flexibility, and the secret to flexibility was balance. This was true not just in combat, but in life. People could deny it all they liked, but the world insisted upon balance in all things. For every good, there was bad. For every right, there was wrong. For every moment of happiness, there was suffering. Scarlett understood this. But that did not make it any easier to accept.
Scarlett stood for a moment on the sidewalk and gazed at the house she had lived in her whole life. It was a ranch-style one-level home with faded blue vinyl siding. Some of the shingles needed to be replaced, and one of the front windows had a long crack that had been there nearly five years and was unlikely to be repaired any time soon. The yard was approximately fifty percent grass, forty percent weeds, and ten percent cigarette butts and beer cans. A rust-speckled green Ford Taurus was parked in the driveway, which meant her father had come home from work already.
Scarlett hadn’t paused on the sidewalk simply to gaze at her home, although she supposed Tommy wasn’t entirely wrong in calling her a “sentimental idealist.” No, right now, she was listening for signs of conflict.
And there it was: the faint squawk of shouting voices that filtered out from the house. If she could hear it all the way from the sidewalk, it must be pretty loud. And things inside must be pretty unpleasant.
Zoro-me wanted to ask his uncles if Scarlett could live at the dojo so she wouldn’t have to deal with her chaotic home. And these were the moments she was tempted to let him. But she never did. Partly because she was afraid that—as fond as Hādo and Yawarakai were of her—they’d say no, and she didn’t want to experience that rejection. Even worse, it would be like giving up on her own family, and that was something she couldn’t do.
Like always, Scarlett took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and let herself into the house.
It was about what she’d expected. Her parents were in the kitchen, shouting over one another. Her father, a red-haired, red-faced man, clenched a can of beer in one hand and formed a threatening fist in the other. Her mother—a thin, dishwater blond with perpetual dark circles under her eyes—shook a cigarette in one hand and a pointing, accusatory finger in the other. The subject of their shouting match was the same as usual.
“Who do you think you are, telling me what to do?”
“I’m the one making most of the money around here!”
“You’re also the one spending most of the money!”
Scarlett wondered why they never got tired of saying the same things to each other over and over. It was almost like they were rehearsing a play. She suspected there was not, and would never be, a resolution to their argument.
It took her parents several moments to realize she’d come home.
“What are you staring at?” her father snapped.
Scarlett looked down at her feet. “Nothing.”
“Don’t yell at your daughter!” shouted Scarlett’s mother.
“Don’t tell me what to do!” roared her father. “I come home after working all day, and I get more people bossing me around? You think it’s easy, what I do?”
“I have a job, too, you know,” said her mother. “You think you’re the only one who works hard around here?”
“You just don’t . . .” His face contorted for a moment, as though he was struggling to say something. Then it suddenly went flat. “Forget it!”
Scarlett’s father stomped past her and out of the house, slamming the door behind him so hard that the cracked window shuddered. A moment later she heard his car start. Probably heading to the bar.
She turned to her mother, who stared at the empty space where her father had been standing. Her mother’s face was tense, and she dragged deeply on her cigarette. She kept promising Scarlett she’d quit smoking, but it never lasted more than a week or two.
“Mom . . .” Scarlett said quietly.
“Don’t you start!” snapped her mother. Then she stormed into her bedroom and slammed the door behind her. She was unlikely to emerge for the rest of the night.
Scarlett went into the living room, where her little brother, Paul, sat on the couch, watching something on the DeCobray-brand tablet given to all the students at Springfield Elementary. Whenever their parents fought, he tuned out the real world.
She peeked over his shoulder and saw that he was watching a popular cartoon show about a masked crime fighter called the Crimson Guard. The show was produced by DeCobray, and each episode was basically a thirty-minute commercial for some new gadget they were selling.
“Did you eat dinner yet?” she asked.
“Nope,” he said, his eyes still glued to the tablet.
She sighed. “I’ll make you something.”
He only nodded, completely engrossed in the adventures of the Crimson Guard.
Scarlett could have been angry or bitter about how bad things were with her family, especially now that she knew how good things could be after spending time with the Arashikage family. She wondered if this was the balance her sensei was always talking about. She doubted this is what he had in mind, but thinking about it like that helped her.
After Scarlett made instant ramen for herself and her brother, she went to her room and booted up her custom-built Linux computer. She started an encrypted virtual private network tunnel, or VPN, that connected to servers run by the Anti-Venom Coalition.
A few months ago, Cobra had tried to brainwash the students of Springfield Academy with their Lyre XR devices, but the JOES had put a stop to it. After that, AVC had contacted Scarlett and invited her team to work with them. They were a secret organization of people who had all been wronged by Cobra and joined together to stop them. Scarlett had heard rumors about them online, so she wasn’t completely surprised. But she hadn’t realized the amount of experience and resources they possessed. AVC was on a different level, and Scarlett wanted to join them. Not just foiling a plot here and there, but putting a stop to Cobra for good.
She sent a message to “Lady Jaye,” her contact at AVC.
Scarlett: Mission complete. Awaiting further orders
Lady Jaye: Well done, Scarlett. Our intelligence suggests that a new principal has been selected for Springfield Academy and could be arriving tomorrow.
Scarlett: So soon?
Lady Jaye: Afraid so.
The previous principal, Zartan, had been a secret Cobra agent. After the JOES foiled his plans, he disappeared. Once he was gone, things got a lot better at Springfield Academy, mostly because Dr. Hauser stepped in as acting principal. Not only was he a nice guy, but he was also an AVC agent—code name Duke—and didn’t let Cobra get away with any sneakiness at school.
Scarlett: Well, it was nice while it lasted. Do you have an ID on the new principal?
Lady Jaye: Not yet, but working on it. Once they arrive, maintain a low profile, but make careful observation, and prepare to give a thorough assessment.
Scarlett: Understood.
Scarlett signed off and closed out her VPN tunnel, then leaned back in her chair as she pondered this new development. With a new principal who was loyal to DeCobray, and probably to Cobra as well, it seemed likely that Springfield Academy was about to become dangerous again. Would they try to restart the Lyre XR experiments on students? Or would it be something even worse this time?
CHAPTER
4
HEADMASTER AND LAIRD
Scarlett was pretty young when DeCobray first came to Springfield, but she remembered how excited everyone had been. The biggest and most important tech company in the world had decided to move its headquarters to their town? They’d felt chosen.
“I bet there’s going to be all kinds of new jobs,” her mother had said one night at dinner. “Good-paying ones.”
But that didn’t happen. Instead of hiring local folks, DeCobray recruited all their employees from elsewhere. Not a single position, from engineer to janitor, was given to an existing Springfield resident. And then they’d gone about completely changing the town. Scarlett’s favorite playground? Gone. The lake where she used to canoe? Also gone. In their place, DeCobray built all sorts of new amenities for their employees, like spas and fancy gyms with expensive memberships that locals couldn’t afford. They tore down older homes and built luxurious new ones. Locals couldn’t afford those either. After a while, it was almost like there were two Springfields side by side that never interacted.
But then Springfield Academy opened. DeCobray said they were “giving back to the community” and built a state-of-the-art school that every kid could attend for free. Or that’s what everyone said. Scarlett wasn’t so sure. Was the school truly “free” if the students were expected to constantly test new DeCobray tech? Or worse, if they were secretly being used as lab rats for Cobra experiments?
Since the Academy was built by a tech company, it didn’t look anything like a regular school. It was much larger, and instead of the no-nonsense aesthetic of the original public school, the Academy was designed like some sort of bizarre Apple-meets-Starbucks modern monstrosity of glass and chrome. The interior was even stranger. All the classroom walls were one-way mirrors, so adults could observe students without them knowing. DeCobray said it was to promote transparency and to make sure students were not distracted. Scarlett thought it was just creepy.
The morning after the JOES planted bugs in the faculty lounge, Scarlett was settling into her desk for homeroom when her Lyre XR projected a school-wide video stream. It showed a dour-looking man with short auburn hair and a beard, both peppered with gray.
Former principal Zartan had always been a real showman. His smile had been almost blinding, and every day he dressed impeccably in a dapper, colorful suit with matching tie and pocket square. His intense, fake cheer had always made Scarlett uneasy. But she decided it was preferable to the man she saw now, who did not smile, was dressed in some sort of black and red military uniform, and looked like he’d never had a cheerful moment in his life.
“Good mornin’, students,” he said in a rolling Scottish brogue. “I am Laird James MacCullen Destro the Twenty-Third. Ye may address me as Headmaster or Laird Destro, and as of today, I am yer new principal.”
Headmaster? Laird?
This, Scarlett decided, did not bode well.
Destro continued, “I have reviewed the school records, analyzed the way ’twas previously run, and found it lacking on all counts. So, on my first day I want to make it clear that I will not show the same tolerance for idle behavior an’ disorderly conduct as my predecessor. Your time will no longer be wasted on frivolous Lyre XR feature release assemblies or other such nonsense. You are here to learn and prepare yourselves for the harsh world that awaits you, and that’s precisely what ye will do. ’Tis a noble’s responsibility to look after his people, and I promise ye that under my command, you will gain the vital skills needed to not merely survive but excel in the cruel future that awaits. In return, I expect that none of you will shirk your duties as students of this academy. That is all. Good day.”
The video feed cut off abruptly, and it felt like the entire school had gone silent.
Mr. Ogot, Scarlett’s homeroom teacher, cleared his throat awkwardly. “That was . . . new . . .”
Scarlett was fond of Mr. Ogot. He was originally from Kenya, spoke in a soothing tone, and always approached his lessons with warmth and humor. Scarlett thought it was important to learn from a Biology teacher who actually enjoyed life, and she was certain he had no clue his employer was secretly an evil terrorist organization.
“Students, I know change can be a little frightening,” he said brightly. “But I’m sure the . . . uh, headmaster has only your best interests at heart.”
Or the best interests of Cobra? Scarlett wondered.
Back when Zartan ran the school, he used one of the students, Michel, to bully anyone who didn’t fall in line. That was actually how the Average Joes got started. Michel had cornered Julien in an alley and beat him up as punishment for hacking the Lyres. Stan tried to stop him, but back then he’d been no match for Michel. If Scarlett and Zoro-me hadn’t stepped in, things could have gotten really ugly.
That sort of thing used to happen a lot at Springfield Academy. Having a bully like Michel roaming the halls with total freedom made all the regular students anxious. But when Zartan disappeared, so did Michel. After that, the school became a lot more relaxed and upbeat.
But now, as Scarlett went about her day, she noticed everyone had the same grim demeanor as Destro. It was like his grumpiness was infectious. She even began to wonder if it was some subtle new manipulation caused by the Lyre XR. Zartan had used the device many times to control his students’ emotions. Once, he’d even turned a bunch of them into a rage mob and sicced them on the JOES. Zartan might be gone, but maybe Destro was using the same tech?
Except when she met her friends at the clubhouse after school, Julien shot down that theory immediately.
“Nope, the school pushed a huge update to our devices this morning, but all it did was remove stuff. All the emotional-controlling code is gone. So is the entire filter function.”
Along with everything else, the Lyre XR devices had a feature called filters that allowed you to make the world around you look different in a way only you could see. There were several options, from brightly cartoonish to dark and gritty noir. For some students, class was a lot more fun if the numbers bounced around with smiley faces, or if the teacher looked like a caped crime-fighter.
“Wait, the filters are gone?” asked Stan. “Like, no more Toon Town in class?”
“’Fraid so, dude,” said Julien.
Stan groaned. “Algebra just got so much harder . . .”
Zoro-me gave him a comforting pat on the shoulder.
“I guess Destro was serious about going in a different direction from Zartan,” said Scarlett. “But the question is, what direction?”
“The unfun direction?” suggested Julien.
By the end of their first week under Destro’s leadership, Scarlett decided that Julien’s guess was unfortunately spot on. The headmaster began each day with dire warnings about the horrible things that lay outside Springfield, and reprimands that the students weren’t working hard enough to prepare for them. That invariably cast a gloom over the school that lasted the entire day.
The gloom only deepened when Destro announced students would “henceforth” be required to wear military-looking uniforms provided by the school: gray short sleeve dress shirts with red epaulets, black dress pants with a red stripe down the side, and a belt with the Destro clan coat of arms imprinted on the buckle.
The next day, Destro announced that instead of homeroom, students would begin each day out on the soccer field, where the headmaster himself would lead them in a regiment of push-ups, sit-ups, and “star jumps” (which was apparently what he called jumping jacks).
Lesson plans changed as well. Mr. Yang’s World History class, which had always focused on the cultures of countries they studied, now seemed focused entirely on war. Sometimes they studied a single battle for the entire class period. Stan reported that in Algebra class, the word problems had gone from realistic topics that students might encounter—like buying something at a store—to calculating the weapons and munitions needed by dictators seizing power. If Country A is X square miles in size, and a Leopard tank’s operational range is Y miles, how many tanks will be needed to reliably occupy the entire country?
Scarlett wasn’t surprised when her AVC contact informed her that Destro owned the Military Armament Research Syndicate, or MARS—one of the leading weapons suppliers in the world. It was also notorious for selling weapons to anyone, even the most repressive regimes, so long as they paid.
Lady Jaye: Obviously, an alliance between MARS and Cobra would be a huge problem, both for Springfield and the world at large.
Scarlett: My team is ready for deployment
It would have been more accurate to say that her team was eager for deployment, or any action that might roll back the draconian rules Destro had brought to Springfield Academy. Just that morning, he had announced pizza was banned from the cafeteria because it had “too many empty calories.”
Lady Jaye: Glad to know we can still count on you. It is unlikely that a billionaire and known warmonger like Destro would become the principal because he suddenly developed a passion for education. To determine Destro’s true objective we need you and your team to plant bugs in his office, just like you did in the faculty lounge.
Scarlett: Understood. I’ll put a plan together at once.
CHAPTER
