The New Kids

  "Bella, it's time to wake up."

  I groaned and rolled over in my bed.

  "Come on, Bella, you've got to get ready for school."

  That woke me up. "School?" I asked sleepily.

  "Yes," my mom replied. "It's the first day of school, and if you don't hurry, you'll miss the bus."

  I almost jumped out of bed and began getting my outfit for the day, while my mom went downstairs.

  I haven't been late for the bus yet, I thought, and I won't be late now!

  I threw on my clothes and hurriedly brushed my teeth before hurrying downstairs to eat breakfast.

  I put down my fork, grabbed my backpack, hugged my mom, and then I was out the door.

  When I got to the bus stop, the school bus was nowhere in sight. I was sure I'd missed it and was about to turn home when, over the hill, appeared the familiar yellow school bus. The bus slowed to a halt and opened its doors, and I climbed on.

  As usual, I was the only one on the bus, and I would have to wait for a few stops before my best friend got on.

  At last, the bus pulled to a stop in front of Anna's house, and Anna joined me at our favorite spot in the back of the bus.

  Then I noticed six other teens get on the bus. They all looked about 15-16 years old, except for a blonde-haired boy, who looked about 14 years old, the same age as me.

  "Who are they?" I asked Anna.

  "I don't know, but they must be pretty new, because I've only seen them once before, and that was yesterday," Anna replied.

  "Let's just ask them." I waved over the six teens. "You can sit with us." I offered. "I'm Bella, and this is Anna."

  "I'm Logan," said the blonde kid.

  A girl with chin-length black hair said, "I'm Nessa, and this is my brother Kevin." Her brother, who had spiky brown hair and was sitting next to her, gave a small nod.

  "I'm Conner," a black-haired teen elbowed a brown-haired teen who was just gazing out the window. "And this scatterbrain is Jonathan."

  "I was just enjoying the view," Jonathan objected.

  "Well, that only leaves me," said the last teen. "I'm Zeke." There wasn't anything remarkable about Zeke, unless you count the fact that his hair stood straight up.

  "It's nice to meet you," I said. "We were wondering where you guys come from."

  "We come from a city called Nin-"

  "-tag," Conner interrupted Jonathan. "We come from Nintag."

  "I've never heard of it," Anna remarked. "Where is it?"

  "Uh, it's kinda by the ocean," Nessa said. "It's so small the mapmakers probably don't bother putting it on their maps."

  "She is right," Zeke inputted. "Nintag isn't on any map I've seen, and I've seen a lot of maps."

  "Why did you guys move here?" I asked.

  "We moved here to help my uncle with a project he's working on," Logan replied.

  Just then, the school bus doors hissed open, and I realized that we had arrived at our school. The eight of us stood up and followed the rest of the students on the bus out onto the pavement in front of the school. Anna and I were walking into the school when I turned back to the six new kids. "Do you guys know where you're going?" I asked.

  "Not really," Conner admitted.

  "Would you mind showing the way to the principal's office?" Logan inquired.

  Anna glanced at me, then said, "Sure! It's this way."

  When we arrived at Mr. Kooney's office, the new kids went in, and Anna and I waited outside for them. I was just thinking that Anna and I would need to leave soon to make it to our class on time when the door to the principal's office opened.

  "Bella and Anna, could you please come in?" said Mr. Kooney. I walked through the door, with Anna right behind me. "Since you two have already met our newest students," Mr. Kooney continued, "I have decided that you two shall be their partners, even though we usually assign boys to boys and girls to girls." Mr. Kooney turned to the new kids. "Bella and Anna will show you around the school until you know your way around. Bella, Anna, here are your hall passes."

  "Nessa, Kevin, Jonathan, Conner, and Zeke will be in 10b, and Logan will be with Bella and Anna in room 9a. You'd better get to your classes. The bell's going to ring soon."

  Sure enough, the bell started to ring as we walked down the almost empty hallways.

  Anna pointed down the hall to a door marked "10b." "That's your classroom," she said. "If you don't have a class schedule, your teacher can give you one."

  The older teens broke off from the group and headed for their classroom, while Anna, Logan, and I went into our own classroom.

  "Ah, look who decided to join us," said the teacher as we walked in. "I hope you have some good excuses for being late."

  "Actually, we do." I handed my hall pass to the teacher. Anna and Logan did the same.

  "Very well. Here's a schedule if you need one, Mr. ..." The teacher checked her attendance sheet. "... Logan."

  As Anna and I picked our seats, the teacher handed Logan a schedule, then softly gripped him by the shoulders and said, "Class, this is Logan. He is new to this school, and I want you to be nice to him. Say hello to Logan."

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  "Hello, Logan," said a very bored-sounding class.

  Logan walked toward me and plopped down in the chair next to me, setting his backpack next to him like everyone else.

  "Now that we've got that done, my name is Ms. Sweeney. Today we will be talking about the Civil War..."

  Lunchtime was a welcome break from the chaos of school.

  Anna, Logan, and I got to lunch before the rest of the new kids. We collected our ham and cheese sandwiches and sat down at a table with lots of chairs.

  It wasn't long before the rest of the new kids arrived.

  "Ugh, why is school so hard?" Kevin complained as he dropped into a chair with his food.

  "I don't think I'll ever get my head around chemistry," Jonathan said.

  "I think we all had a hard time," Logan stated.

  "Actually, school was quite easy for me. I found that I already understood most of the concepts," Zeke said. "One of my teachers even suggested bumping me up a grade."

  "Well, of course they'd bump you up," Jonathan complained. "I wish I could be as smart as you!"

  I changed the subject. "Are any of you thinking of joining any clubs?" I asked.

  "I know I am not doing swimming," Kevin said with a shudder.

  "Aw, you should try it! You might learn something!" Nessa said encouragingly.

  "Like how to swim," Jonathan said with a snicker.

  Kevin rolled his eyes but didn't say anything.

  "I'm thinking of joining the debate club," I said.

  "What's that?" Conner asked.

  "It's where you go to debate people," Jonathan stated.

  "Jonathan's right," I added.

  "He is?!" exclaimed Conner.

  "Yup. You basically debate people in competitions for prizes."

  Suddenly, Anna said, "Uh oh..."

  "What is it?" Nessa asked.

  "Brutus the Bully is coming our way." Anna tilted her head to indicate a tall, stocky jock, who was striding arrogantly towards our little group, followed closely by a few other jocks.

  "Well, well, well. What do we have here?" said Brutus. "Looks like you two finally found some people as nerdy as you, because only nerdy nerds would want to hang out with you."

  I rolled my eyes. "Ignore him," I said.

  Brutus turned his attention to Kevin. "You probably got your wimpiness from your weak parents."

  "That's it." Kevin stood up in a flash. "Don't you dare insult my parents!" He stood there, glaring at Brutus. I was shocked to notice that there was a flame flickering in the palm of Kevin's right hand.

  "Kai," Nessa hissed quietly, "snap out of it!" She said it so quietly that I could barely hear it, but Kevin was close enough to get the message. Reluctantly, he sat back down in his chair, and the flame extinguished.

  "Morons," said Brutus as he walked away with his buddies.

  Kevin glanced at Logan, who gave a subtle head shake. I thought it was strange that Kevin would take orders from the youngest in the group.

  After Brutus and his buddies were out of earshot, I asked, "Why did Nessa call Kevin Kai?"

  There was an awkward pause, then Kevin said, "Kai is my middle name, and it's way cooler than Kevin, so that's what most people call me."

  "Should Anna and I call you Kai or Kevin?" I inquired.

  "You can just stick with Kevin for now," Kevin replied.

  "Oh, and while we're on the topic of secret nicknames, does anyone else have a nickname I should know about?"

  Jonathan opened his mouth to reply to me, but suddenly closed it, as if someone had quickly stepped on his foot.

  The bell rang, signaling the end of both lunch and the awkward conversation.

  When I got home, I asked my mom to take me to the library.

  "Of course!" my mom replied. "We can leave right now if you want." I said that I would like to leave as soon as possible, and we quickly hopped into our car and set off.

  The drive to the library seemed longer than usual, but it wasn't very long until we had parked in the library's parking lot.

  I jumped out of the car and started walking as fast as I could toward the library, and my mom had to tell me to slow down so she could catch up to me.

  Finally, we entered the library, and I headed straight for the computers, while my mom went towards the crafting section. I quickly logged into a computer and clicked into the search browser. I searched two words, "Kai", and "Fire".

  The first result that came up was titled, "Lego Ninjago: Kai, the elemental master of fire".

  The next day, I managed to catch the six friends alone on the bus.

  "I know your secret," I said.

  "Oh yeah?" Jonathan said, skeptical. "And what's that?"

  "First of all, your name is not Jonathan. It's Jay."

  "It is?" said Jay, trying to act like he didn't know that, and failing miserably.

  "Yeah. And Conner's name is Cole, Kevin's name is Kai, Nessa's name is Nya, Zeke's name is Zane, and Logan's name is Lloyd." I added.

  "What's the point of telling us you know our names?" Nya asked. "Our names aren't very dangerous information."

  "I also know that you six are the elemental masters of lightning, earth, fire, water, ice, and Lloyd is the Green Ninja," I said.

  "Okay, so that might be slightly dangerous information," Nya admitted.

  "Slightly dangerous? She could expose us at any moment!" Jay exclaimed.

  "Jay, stop exaggerating, and calm down." Lloyd ordered. "Is there something you want from us?" he asked me.

  "Yes." I replied. "I want you to scare Brutus so that he stops bullying people."

  "But to do that, we'd probably have to show off our elemental powers," Zane stated. "How do we do that without blowing our cover?"

  "You could wear your uniforms," I suggested.

  "Hmm..." Lloyd thought for a moment or two, then said, "Alright. Here's the plan..."

  Brutus walked down the school hallways. School was out for the day, and he had just bullied a little kid into buying him a piece of candy.

  Brutus had just exited the school and was rounding a corner to meet his buddies when something stopped him short.

  In front of him was me, standing in front of six figures dressed up like the characters from Lego Ninjago. Brutus had watched Lego Ninjago: Spinjitsu Masters as a kid, so he knew how powerful the Ninjas were.

  "That's right," I said. "I gave the elemental masters a call."

  Brutus smirked. "It's obviously just costumes. The elemental masters are just a story."

  "Does this look like a story?" said the one dressed up as the master of fire as he held up a hand wrapped in flames.

  Something about the master of fire's voice sounded familiar, but Brutus was too terrified to think about that. "What do you want with me?" Brutus asked.

  "We want you to stop bullying kids - forever," replied the figure dressed up as the Green Ninja. "If you bully anyone ever again, we will find you."

  "Okay." Brutus' voice was a bit higher than usual. "I promise to never bully anyone ever again. Just please leave me alone!"

  "You can go now." said the Green Ninja, and Brutus stumbled away in relief. He knew that after this day, he would never be the same.

  "Thank you, thank you, thank you!" I practically squealed as soon as we were alone in the back of the school bus. "That was so awesome! How can I repay you?"

  "That look on his face is a good enough payment for me," Kai said.

  "I recorded the whole thing," Zane replied.

  After we were done celebrating our victory, I asked, "How long are you guys going to stay here?"

  "Until my uncle finishes his project. We've been helping him with it after school," said Lloyd.

  “Well, I hope you stay a while.”