• Chapter 5

    "Hnn..wha?!" Kristen jolted awake and tried to stand up. The boy clenched his fists and stiffly walked towards her, so I jumped infront of her and growled baring my teeth. He shouted and went to go kick me again. There was a blinding light and a stifled 'oof'. I looked up and saw Kashyyk's wings protecting me from the attack.

    "Damnit Cody, don't attack on impulse! She's a friend!" "Oh." The wings withdrew and Kristen kneeled down next to where I was standing. "You alright Kyrinae?" I nodded. "So, Kristen..where'd you get a leopard from?"

    "I'm not a really a leopard." I chimed in.

    "Ok, my bad, a talking leopard." I rolled my eyes and shifted back to human form. "Whoa!" He yelled in surprise, "Didn't see that comin'!" Kristen cut in, "This is Razsha. She went to school with us, remember?" It clicked. "Oh yeeeaaah!!" Cody and I both yelled at the same time. Aaakward.

    "Razsha?!" Alise burst through the door, "Oh there you are! Did you spend the night at Kristen's?" "Yeah." "Ok,..who's this?" She pointed at Cody with her thumb. Kristen replied, "Oh, this is my boyfriend Cody, he came by to say hi." Yeah, some 'hi'. I snickered, not loud enough for mom to hear. Kristen gave me a look. "Alright, well there's a cancellation for school today, electric problem. Guess ya'll get an extra day for Christmas vacation this year!" She called as she closed the door.

    "Cool! No school!" I cheered and jumped up, immediately cringing in pain. "What's wrong?" I shot an evil glare at Cody. He looked down and shuffled his feet, "Right, sorry..." Kristen was lost. She looked back and forth between us. "What'd I miss??" Cody filled her in on what happened when he got here. "Speaking of which, how did I get here? All i remember is Razsha, I mean Kyrinae, knocking us both out..then waking up to you attacking her." Now I told my story. "You did all that? Thanks Razsha!" I shrugged.

    "That..was...AWESOME!!" All 3 of us spun around to see a small kid standing behind us. I turned to Kristen and whispered, "s**t! How much do you think he saw?!" "I don't know! The freaking mini-ninja just appeared, I had no idea there was anyone here but us!!" She frantically whispered back. I'll find out for myself then. I calmed myself down and played dumb. "What was awesome?" Easy.

    "The wings! And you were a leopard! And that boy totally wooped your butt!"

    "Ok, he totally didn't have to add that.." I muttered to myself. Kristen giggled inspite of herself. "I'm gunna go tell my brother." Kristen tried to scream no, but I clapped my hand over her mouth. "Ok. Go ahead." Cody said nonchalantly. Kristen gave him a WTF are you doin' look, but I just nodded at him. The little boy ran off and Kristen spoke. "Why'd you do that?! Ya'll totally just ratted us out!" She hissed glaring at us. "Nope. He's an 8 year old kid. All we have to do is play dumb." "Yeah, unless anyone happened to see a leopard running around last night or this morning." "I didn't see anyone in the windows." And, of course, then I remembered the boy in the window. 'Just play dumb' I reminded myself and we went inside to get some breakfast.

    The rest of the day and the next day went by with everybody chillin' at my house.

    *Later that night* Me, Kristen, and Cody were sitting in the living room watching some cheezy Disney movie on channel 22. Mom was at a Christmas party at work. I got up to get more popcorn and dropped to the floor, a dull spasm of pain shooting through me. "OMG, what's wrong Razsha?!" "I..don't know.." I stammered. "I think I do," Cody channel flipped and turned up the volume. Some overly hyper guy blabbered, "Unusually high tides tonight due the winter equinox and the Earth's alignment with the full moon." Cody cut the TV off. "We need to get her to the woods, now!"

    We got to the edge of the woods and stopped. "Hi again!" Said a familiar squeeky voice. "What're you doing out this late?" Kristen growled. "Late, it's only 7. And I was looking for my dog." Some barking in the distance was followed by a woman's voice, "Eric, I found him! Come on back!" "Ok mom!" He shouted back. "See you guys later." Kristen blew out a breath, "Whew that was a close one!.." "What was?"

    "Cody didn't say that..did he?" I whispered to Kristen. "Nope.." She whispered back. We turned around. "Wow..," was all we could say.