Ninja Stars

Chapter 5

So Mayumi and Ling walked on, still in silence, with no scenery change or any sign of danger until evening, when it got so dark that they couldn’t see.

“Stop poking me with your ninja star, Mayumi!” Ling snapped.

“I’m ten feet away from you, Ling,” said Mayumi’s voice from somewhere nearby. “Oh, and kindly stop hitting me on the head before I get a concussion!”

“I’m not hitting you, Mayumi,” Ling replied, “you must’ve finally gone mad.”

Then they heard something snap somewhere ahead. There was a strange growl, and the rustling of some leaves.

“If I’m not poking you, and you’re not—ouch! — hitting me, then what is?” Mayumi wondered.

“Quick, Mayumi, hand me my flashlight!” Ling yelled, for Mayumi had previously confiscated it because Ling kept shining the light in his eyes.

“I don’t know, Ling, you’re probably just going to—oaf! — shine it in my eyes again, aren’t you?”

“This is no time for arguing, Mayumi! Just trust me! We can’t keep on walking in the dark like this; we must see what keeps hurting us! If it’s a real threat, we can fight it off together… whatever it is. Hurry, Mayumi!” Ling shouted.

Mayumi quickly tossed the flashlight toward where Ling’s voice was coming from, and got out his own flashlight.

“Ouch!” Ling cried as the flashlight hit him in the head with a loud thump. “Watch it!”

“Sorry,” Mayumi called.

“Ok, let’s turn our flashlights on on the count of three,” Ling said, “one… two… three!”

Both ninjas shined their flashlights toward the direction of the rustling leaves, and to their horror, they saw none other than a large, black ape, about six feet tall, in one of the tree branches, ripping down fruit and chucking it at Mayumi. But fruit wasn’t the only thing the ape had. He had also inexplicably managed to steal both Ling and Mayumi’s ninja stars without them noticing.

Suddenly, the ape grabbed two of the ninja stars and flung them at Ling with all his might. Ling stumbled backwards as the stars hit him in the arm, creating deep cuts. Mayumi panicked, for he did not know how he was ever going to get past the ape, or how he was supposed to get Ling to safety before he lost too much blood.

“Mayumi…” Ling groaned, “Mayumi… you can do this… Mayumi… hurry…”

“Don’t worry, Ling,” responded Mayumi, “I’ll get you out of this safely. Don’t worry!”

All of a sudden, an idea washed over him like a wave of power, and Mayumi knew what he had to do.

He picked a rock from the ground, and threw it at the ape. It hit him hard on his cheek, and the ape immediately turned its focus off of Ling.

“Hey ugly!” Mayumi shouted. The ape just looked at Mayumi like he was wondering if Mayumi was talking to him or not. “Yeah, you!” Mayumi continued fiercely. “Get your ugly face down here and fight like a man!” At this, the ape got really angry. He growled menacingly and began grabbing everything he could possibly use as a weapon, including rocks, the remaining ninja stars, twigs, branches, and more fruit. The ape then started flinging the objects at Mayumi at an alarming rate, but Mayumi wasn’t scared. He started karate-kicking things out of the way, splitting the fruit and most of the branches in half. He ducked as a ninja star narrowly missed his head, and did some flips over to where Ling lay, rapidly losing blood.

“Ling!” Mayumi said. “Speak to me, Ling! Tell me you are okay!” For Ling had passed out cold, in the middle of the forest, with an ape threatening to put him in a full body cast.

Mayumi grabbed Ling and flung him onto his back with all his might, and started running: map in one hand, flashlight in the other. The ape did not follow, which was fine by Mayumi, since he really didn’t need one more thing to do at the moment.