A/N: I don't own Randy Cunningham: 9th Grade Ninja or Deathstroke

Chapter One: Shots Fired

Randy wasn't in the best of moods at the moment.

Not only had he failed his math test, gotten a mega-wedgie from Bash and had his cheeseburger stolen by Howard during lunch, it was also the start of the Mcfist fair week. A fare that as it name suggested, lasted a whole week in dedication to Randy's last remaining, and by far most irritating enemy, Hannibal Mcfist. It had been two months since he had defeated both evil Julian and the Sorcerer, and while the secret hero had first been happy at the thought of being rid of his two most deadly adversaries, he didn't take into account that the billionaire would still want him dead. The freshman had assumed that with the Sorcerer gone Mcfist would give up his crusade to destroy the Ninja since his master had been vanquished, but that simply wasn't the case.

The young hero had to give to give his enemy credit, at least he was persistent. Now instead of wanting to destroy the Ninja so he could be granted a superpower of his choosing, he wanted to destroy the Ninja for cheating him out of getting said superpower. Still, despite now only fighting hordes of robots and mutants that Mcfist and Viceroy sent after him on a daily basis, it was at least stuff he knew could handle. No more would he have to fear that his friends would be turned into monsters he would be forced to do battle with or be hypnotized in his sleep in an attempt to free his arch-nemesis from his prison, now he only feared being late to Greg's Gamehole in time to be the first in line to play his newest addition to his arcade.

Regardless, it still irked Randy that his remaining enemy was well protected due to his status within the city. If only the people of Norrisville could see Mcfist for what he truly was, but he had tried to reveal Mcfist true face to the public before and his attempt to expose the billionaire didn't go quite as he planned. It infuriated the teen to no end that Mcfist could continue get away with trying to kill him while still looked at by the rest of the world as Norrisville's favorite son. Sometimes Randy thought about how easy it would be to just break into his adversary's office, grabbed that arrogant prick by the throat and cuck him out the window and be with done him, but he knew that not only would that lead him to becoming public enemy number one, but would also result in him losing his right to be the Ninja. So, unfortunately, he was forced to deal with Mcfist's constant attacks on his person until his time as the Ninja was over.

"Uh, earth to Cunningham" Howard said, "your zoning out on me, buddy"

His best friend's voice snapped the secret hero back to reality. Currently, the two teens were currently at the Mcfist fair grounds and Howard had already purchased a large funnel cake with Randy's money that he was already halfway finished with. All around the boys were a menagerie of rides, games and shows of circus folk from across the globe. True, Randy hated Mcfist's guts, but he had to admit that whenever the billionaire wanted to do something, he went all out it—even if he left all of his plans to Viceroy to handle of the details.

"Sorry Howard, I was just remembering that everything around us is from the very guy who wants to kill me" Randy replied as they continued to walk through the fairgrounds "what I wouldn't give to show everyone who he really is"

"Yeah, but you tried that before and it blew up in your honk'in face" the heavyset teen causally reminded him as he took another large bite of his funnel cake "besides, if you ousted Mcfist, then this town would literally die without him"

As much as Randy hated to admit, Howard was right. Even if he had a way to expose Hannibal Mcfist for the monster he really was, Norrisville would be lost without his products. From the tallest skyscrapers to the very cereal that Randy ate for breakfast today, Mcfist's company was the very lifeblood that kept Norrisville alive. If Mcfist was taken out of the picture, then everything that his company owed and built, which was pretty much everything, would be lost and the city would fall into chaos in a way that the Ninja could be unable to save it.

"Come on, let's play some games. I need to let this funnel cake digest for a bit before we ride the Mctilt-O-Tron" Howard suggested "I do not a repeat of last year's puke-nami"

The heavyset teen's best friend shuddered as the memories of last year's little fiasco on the carnival ride. After consuming three candy apples, six bags of popcorn and a foot-long chilidog, Howard made the mistake of taking a ride on the Mctilt-O-Tron despite Randy's attempts to convince him to wait a while for his stomach to settle. Sure enough, three minutes into the ride, the ginger's face started to turn green, and unfortunately for Randy, there was no escape. Less than a minute later, Howard unleashed a blast of projectile vomit on not only his best friend, but also on everyone else on the ride. The ordeal resulted in a less than kind title for Howard from the other kids who had dubbed him the 'puke-nami', a title that lasted for the redhead until their freshman year of high school.

Not wanting to have another night of showing off everything that Howard had eaten that day, which was a lot, Randy nodded in agreement with his friend's idea. It was then that the secret hero noticed a booth that had a small shooting gallery with little animals as targets for people to shoot at. Admittedly, Randy was never a big fan of guns, mostly due to his family beliefs in not wanting a firearm in their home, but also because as the Ninja he had access to a vast array of weapons and abilities that made the need to use a gun in the first place seem pointless. But considering that this was merely a game, Randy's beliefs didn't have to factor in his personally beliefs and could instead focus on something more important: kicking Howard's butt at this game!

"Bet you I can take out more targets than you" he mockingly declared

"Please, my family wrote the book on butchering defenseless animals in the wild" Howard defended

"Think you can back that up?" Randy teased with a raised eyebrow"

"Oh, I know I can back that up!" the redhead shot back

The two friends approached the booth to where Randy paid the Roboape for one round for them play. The duo took their dart guns and began to open fire on the targets as they moved about on board. Randy and Howard fired rapidly as they wildly shot at any of the targets they could see pop out for them to shoot, but their rate of fire did little since they weren't aiming their shots. with one final shot from his dart gun, Randy finished the round by missing the duck target he had been trying to hit for the third time. Neither of the two teens were exactly happy with the lack of targets they had failed to hit.

"The score is seven points for player one. Five points for player two" the Roboape said in its basic monotone voice

"What was that about being a great shooter?" Randy asked smugly with a smirk

"Don't give me that look, if I had hit that bunny I'd have won" Howard answered, clearly angry that he had lost

"So, my good Roboape, I'll take one of those tiny stuffed bears if you don't mind" the secret hero said

"Sorry, but you must have a minimal of at least ten points to win a small prize" the robotic gorilla informed him

Randy huffed in annoyance while Howard burst into a fit of laughter at his friend's expense. If there was only thing Randy hated more than getting knocked around by Mcfist's robots, it was getting laughed at by his best friend.

"Well that was pathetic" a voice pointed out

The two friends turned around to see a strange man standing behind them who had apparently been watching them since their game had started. He was a tall man who appeared to be roughly in his late fifties/early sixties and dressed in a long coat that hide the rest of his body, but even under the coat, the teens could tell that the stranger was well-built for his age. He had short cut white hair and a well-trimmed beard, a small sign that the man had spent some time in the military, or was a police officer at one time. But the one thing that stood out to Randy and Howard about the stranger was the eyepatch covering the hole where his left eye once was. Even though neither Randy nor Howard never seen this man before, they both felt a sort of familiarity with him, as if they had seen him from somewhere they couldn't quite place him at the moment.

"No skill. No sense of tracking your targets. Just spray your ammo everywhere and hope you hit something" the stranger continued "and I thought my sons were bad shots"

"Hey this is our first time shooting at anything!" Howard defended sharply

"Clearly" the man replied in a calm voice "If this was a firefight then you'd both be dead right about now"

"Well if you think you can do better, let's see you take a whack at it!" Howard demanded

"Uh, Howard, let's not piss off the dude who looks like he can kill us, ok?" Randy advised

The man narrowed his single eye at the boys for several seconds before walking up to the booth. After paying for a single round, he picked up one of the dart guns and took aim at the board and waited for the targets to pop up. The moment that the first one appeared, the stranger fired a dart dead on before during the exact same to three other targets mere seconds after they popped up. The two teens could only watch in stunned awe at the man put a dart in every single target on the board with ease. It was as if the one-eyed man had done this before, though if he had, Randy had a sense that the targets he had shot at before were of the human variety and he was carrying a gun that fired bullets instead of plastic darts. In no less than thirty seconds, the man had put a dart on all one hundred targets, all of which were dead center of each one. Once the man had proved his point he placed the gun back on the table and turned to face the two friends, who were still in a state of total shock and awe at his prowess.

"Well, that shut me up" Howard said bluntly

"Congratulations sir, you have won the high score" the Roboape said "Please accept this giant plush purple unicorn as a symbol of your greatness with a pop gun"

the stranger took the stuffed unicorn and immediately tossed it in Randy's direction, who nearly fell over backwards from the weight of the stuff animal hitting him. After the boy had managed to steady himself, the one-eyed man began to walk off into the crowd without another word. There was a part of Randy that wanted to rush over to the stranger and apologize for Howard's actions, however, there was another part of him telling him to stay as far away from that man as possible. While it seemed rude of him to do so, the Ninja decided to follow his gut and give the stranger his space.

"Man, what a shoob" Howard commented

"The only shoob was you!" Randy shot back "I mean seriously Howard, that guy looked like he could've beaten us to death without breaking a sweat—and you wanna make him angry?"

"Well then maybe he shouldn't have made fun of our shooting" the ginger brushed off

Randy let out a frustrated groan at his friend's remark. The freshman should've known by now that trying to talk some form of ethics to Howard was a hopeless cause. He may be his best friend, but sometimes Randy just wanted to throttle the heavyset teen for have the stuff he got them into. Randy then looked back at the stranger as he vanished into the crowd. As he did, the teen felt a sudden chill run up his spine, as if to warn him that he had not seen the last of the one-eyed man. he still felt as though he had seen that man's face from somewhere, but he still couldn't remember as to where exactly. Perhaps he was on TV show or mentioned in the news once, Randy honestly couldn't say at the moment.

"Hey Randy" came another, more familiar voice from behind the boys

The two friends turned around to see their fellow classmates, Theresa Fowler and Debbie Kang, standing before them. As always when he was around the baton twirler, Randy's face became to flush a dark shade of red as his heartrate began to quicken. Theresa always had this effect on him, he could take on an army of robots as the Ninja with no sweat, but when it came to making so much as eye contact with the purple-haired girl, he was petrified with fear. Howard, of course, saw his friend trying to compose himself in front of the girl he had a crush on and rolled eyes at him, knowing that Randy wasn't going to be able to response in his current state, so he would have to make the first move.

"Hey Theresa" he replied in a welcoming voice that quickly changed to one of contempt when look over to her friend "Debbie Kang"

The young reporter shot the heavyset teen a glare in response to that.

"That's a pretty big stuffed unicorn, Randy" Theresa observed "where did you get it?"

"Uh, over by that booth over there" the fellow freshman as he finally began to calm himself down "I won it after I smoked Howard"

"What, no you—gah!" the ginger attempt to correct before he felt Randy stomp on his foot

Randy shot his friend a look to silently tell him to play along. Not wanting the secret hero to look like a total shoob in front of his crush, Howard played along, despite knowing that this would not go well for him in the long run.

"I mean—yeah! Cunningham totally smoked me!" Howard forced himself to say, feigning enthusiasm as he did "yeah…that's totally what happen…"

While Theresa smiled at her crush's victory, Debbie on the other hand, narrowed her eyes at the boys in suspicion, obviously aware that they were lying. But she said nothing of it, knowing that her best friend was head over heels in love with the purple haired freshman—for what reason she'll never understand.

"Wow Randy, you must be a pretty Bruce shot" the baton twirler said with a bright smile

"Uh—thanks, Theresa!" the secret hero managed to choke before handing the plush unicorn to her "Here, you can have it"

Theresa couldn't help but blush as she took the oversized stuffed animal into her arms. Randy quickly back away to give his crush some space after handing the stranger's prize to her.

"Well, it was nice talking to you girls, but we've got a Mctilt-O-Tron to ride" Howard mentioned

"You mean hurl on, puke-nami?" Debbie teased with a mocking smirk that made the heavyset teen grimace back at him

"I wouldn't bother, we just passed by that ride and saw a pretty long line for it" Theresa informed the boys

"Well, great! Now what are we gonna do, Cunningham?" the ginger demanded

"We could all ride the Farris wheel together" Theresa meekly suggested

"I don't know, the Farris wheel's kinda sissy" the ginger pointed before getting the real reason of her suggesting it "but then again, why not? Right, Randy?"

Randy, of course, was a tad nervous at the idea of riding on something that was usually meant for romantic situations. But the moment his eyes met with Theresa's, any worries that he had seemed to fade away. It was as if his heart seemed to tell him that everything would be fine and that he should simply go with the flow.

"Yeah, it's a date" the secret hero confirmed before suddenly realizing what he had just said "Uh—I mean, not's not a date like a date-date—what I meant to say was—"

"Just stop digging and throw the shovel away, Cunningham" Howard advised in a low tone

Theresa again blushed at the thought taking a ride with the boy of her dreams, to which Randy was thinking the same thing of her. meanwhile, neither Howard nor Debbie were exactly thrilled at the idea of being forced to ride together of the Farris wheel, but so long as their respective friends were happy, then they would just have to grin and bear it for their sakes. But before they could leave as a group, Howard felt a rumbling within the bowels of his stomach, a clear indication that his funnel cake was coming back to haunt him.

"Uh, you girls better go on ahead of us and save us a place in line" he suggested "I gotta make a quick stop at the nearest port-a-potty and drop a deuce if y'a know what I mean"

"Ugh, fine" Debbie begrudgingly agreed "But I swear if you so much as burp on me I'm throwing off the Farris wheel!"

"You don't scare me, Kang!" the heavyset ginger fired back

In order to keep between the two pairs, Randy smacked his best friend in the back of the head as a way to get him to settle down. Likewise, Theresa shot Debbie a glower as a way to tell her to stand down, to which the young reporter relented.

"So, I'll—I mean we'll—see you girls at the Farris wheel then" Randy said with a nervous laugh

"Absolutely! We'll see you guys there!" the baton twirler said with a smile

With that, the two girls headed off to secure a line for the ride. Before they vanished into the crowd, Theresa took one last look back at Randy and gave him a small, timid wave goodbye that he in turn returned with his own meek wave. Howard, who saw the gesture rolled his eyes and groaned at his friend's actions.

"Jeez, you have got it bad, Cunningham" he pointed out

"Got what?" Randy questioned, trying his best to hide his nervousness as he did

"Oh, for crying out loud—you have a crush on Theresa!" his friend exclaimed "I mean seriously Cunningham, you can see it from honk'in space at this point!"

"What? No, I don't!" Randy denied in a sheepish tone "Your cray-cray, why you acting cray-cray Howard?"

"I'm not acting cray-cray because it's true!" the redhead persisted "and newsflash: she likes you to!"

"Ok, I like her, happy?" the secret hero admitted

"Very much so" Howard answered with a smug look on his face "Why do turn into a total shoob whenever your around her? you know she likes you to"

"I know, but I'm just scared of wonking it up between us" Randy replied, "I mean she smells like rainbows for crying out loud—rainbows, Howard, rainbows!"

"Yeah, I'm sure that's not a real thing" the heavyset teen shrugged off before adding on "Look all I'm saying is if you don't act on this soon, then some other shoob like Julian or Stevens is gonna come in and snatch her away from you!"

Randy hated to admit it, but Howard had a valid point. For the longest time it seemed that both Randy and Theresa had been trying their best to hide their feelings toward one another in an attempt to not make things awkward between them, but it was becoming painfully clear to everyone around them that they had a major crush on one another but were too scared to act on their feelings to do anything about it. it wasn't just that Randy didn't want to possibly ruin things between him and the baton twirler, but he also feared what could happen to her due to his double life as the Ninja. Howard was the only person in the world aside from Smith who knew that he was the Ninja, and on more than one occasion that put his best friend at risk. He simply couldn't stand the idea of putting the girl he loved through that sort of danger.

It wasn't just the thought of putting her life at risk that frightened the freshman, but also putting her through all the other tribulations that being in a relationship with a superhero brought with it. If he chose not to tell her, he would have to constantly lie to her about where he had been sneaking off to for hours at a time, and considering that he was terrible at lying, she wouldn't buy it for a second. On the other hand, if he instead chose to tell her that he was in fact the defender of Norrisville, then she would dread that every time he left to do battle with the forces of evil that it would be her last time seeing him alive. It was something Randy could never let Theresa suffer through.

But as Howard had stated earlier, if he let Theresa slip away, then someone else could swoop in and take her away from him. He cared for Theresa deeply, and he knew that she in turn felt the same way about him. so, perhaps he could find a way to make this work out for the both of them. Perhaps this was a sign from the universe that he was destined to ride with her on the Farris wheel. He wouldn't know unless he laid everything on the line and finally told her how he felt on the ride.

"Your right, Howard!" Randy declared "I'm going on that Farris wheel to tell Theresa how I feel and no force on earth is going to stop me!"

But as fate would have it, the Ninjanomicon began to glow from within the confines of his jacket, instantly making Randy grimace at the sight of it.

"I knew that would happen" Howard commented dryly

"Ugh, let's just get this over with quick" Randy berated the book in an annoyed voice as the two friends began to make their way to the port-a-potty's

As Slade entered his hotel room that he had been staying in for two days now, he couldn't help but let his mind wander back to those two boys and how bad they were at shooting a dart gun. He had no doubt that if they'd probably shoot themselves if they had real guns. The whole ordeal reminded him of the first time he tried to teach his sons, Grant and Joseph, to shoot and how badly that ordeal turned out. yet despite them being unhappy memories, they were the only ones he had of his children. Grant had long been dead after his first mission for H.I.V.E ended in failure and Joseph had joined the team Slade had sworn to kill in Grant's name, the Teen Titans. His daughter Rose, who held much promise, also joined the Titans after Nightwing took her in, leaving the assassin alone. Honestly though, Slade preferred it that way, there was one left to hold him back from doing his job.

Currently, his job consisted of coming to Norrisville to take out one of the town's most beloved figures: Hannibal Mcfist. When Slade was contacted for the assignment by his employer for the job, he was a bit surprise as to who he was being contracted to kill. Slade had never met Mcfist before, but from what he understood about him, he was like an idiotic version of Luthor—and that was saying something. However, Slade was well aware that the man was a well-respected billionaire and was the man who kept Norrisville up and running, so in other words, it be his basic rate for killing a billionaire. The assassin demanded ten million up front and another twenty-five million after the job was done. Of course, this employer agreed, considering that it would be pointless to argue with the world's top killer. And so, the contract was made and Slade took the first flight to Norrisville out of San Francisco to carry out his task.

Deathstroke had been spending to two days doing recon in his civilian attire in order to properly scope out the perfect place to take out his target. Thankfully, this little festival meant to bolster Mcfist's ego was the perfect place to draw him out in the open without no effort on Slade's part to draw him out. There was still the matter of the Ninja to deal with, but the assassin had studied enough of this potential obstacle on his flight here to know that he'd be a minor annoyance at best. The Ninja was reckless, arrogant and obviously didn't do much planning during his fights, all the clear indications of an amateur. If the Ninja did interfere with his job, which he no doubt would, Slade would deal with him as he did with anything else that got in his way: by putting it down for good.

Having that mind, Slade picked up his suitcase and placed on the bed before opening it to reveal his costume and a vast array of weaponry he needed to carry out his task.

"Time to go to work…" he said to himself as he picked his mask

After the two boys had managed to find a port-a-potty, Randy took out the ancient tome of Ninja knowledge and opened it up to allow his mind to travel deep within its inner world. Upon arriving within the Nomicon, Randy found himself looking at an image of a Ninja dueling with a samurai in a forest. The two warriors matched one another blow for blow with their blades as they clashed again and again, neither one giving an inch to the other. As the two warriors continued their battle, Randy noticed something moving through the underbrush. Before he could figure out what it was, it leapt out of the bushes to reveal itself as giant cobra, making him let out a startled yelp upon seeing it. The serpent let out a hiss at the two warriors, thus making them stop their battle and look upon the snake in horror. The cobra then lunged at the samurai, who quickly raised his katanna to do battle with the serpent.

But just before the cobra could sink its fangs into the samurai, the ninja leapt forward and decapitated the snake with a single blow from his sword. The samurai appeared awestruck by what his enemy had do for him, as did Randy, who was also confused by this gesture. The samurai then sheathed his blade before bowing in respect to the ninja, who in turn put away his sword and returned the bow with one of his own. Randy was still confused by what he had just witnessed, but he knew the lesson the book wanted to teach him would reveal itself soon. Sure enough, the slain cobra's body began to fly upwards over the two new allies as its body began to twist and morph itself into a series of words for Randy to read.

"Sometimes when you defend an enemy, you gain an ally" the freshman read aloud before breathing a sigh of relief "whew! And here I thought you going to something wonk like 'the Ninja cannot know love' or some other thing to keep me from asking out Theresa. But good talk though, I look forward to figuring out however this going to help me with today's problem"

The two warriors facepalmed in unison at the boy's response. Moments later, the ground underneath Randy's feet started to give way until finally it broke apart and caused the hero of Norrisville to fall back into his body. As per usual with their little meetings, Randy didn't quite understand the meaning of the words quite yet, but he would no doubt learn the lesson soon enough before the day was done. He then stepped out of the port-a-potty just as Howard had done so, looking quite relieved as he did.

"So, what did the Nomicon have to vaguely tell you this time?" the ginger asked

"Something about protecting an enemy or whatever" Randy replied offhandedly "I guess it's cool with me dating Theresa"

"Or its trying to tell you that you have to protect me from Debbie Kang while you're trying to get your groove on" Howard theorized "man, I am so not looking forward to riding next to little miss killjoy"

"You're going to just have to deal with it, Howard" Randy informed him "Besides, don't you have like a crush on her or something?"

"What? No, I don't!" Howard snapped back a bit to quickly

Randy gave his friend a smug smirk at that. He knew that the heavyset teen was attracted to the young reporter even if he didn't want to admit to himself or anyone else. The secret hero always suspected that Howard had a thing for the girl when he wrote that story for when he was the hero and had her fawning over him throughout it, but it was certainly confirmed for Randy when he saw how the two acted around one another when Howard had taken on the mantle of Le Beret and how they somewhat flirted with one another. While it was adorable at the thought of those to hooking up, Randy was uncertain as to how long it would last considering that Debbie was a well-organized person and a stickler for rules while Howard was…well, Howard.

Before Randy could further tease his best friend about his feelings toward the young reporter. The two teens began to notice that the flow of the crowd had begun to speed up around them. Curious about this, they both decided to follow the flow of the crowd and see where everyone was headed to. The freshmen soon found themselves at the center of the fairgrounds where they joined the crowd as they gathered around a small stage. However, what upset Randy was who was on the stage: Hannibal Mcfist. Standing with his arch enemy was of course his right man and chef scientist, Viceroy, his wife, Marci and his stepson, Bash along with a pair of Roboapes flanking each side of the billionaire. The very sight of Mcfist's smiling face made Randy's blood boil with rage, knowing full well that he could nothing to stop him.

"Welcome one and all to the Mcfist fair week!" Hainnbal said to the crowd, to which they cheered "This makes the tenth anniversary of the festival. And to honor this glorious occasion I'm here to give you lovely people a surprise—free Mcsquiddles!"

With that, the two Roboapes chest's opened and reveled cannon that fired plums of the candy that started the Mcfist's family business into the air that then rained down upon the crowd of people, most of whom already had their mouths open to eat the candy as it fell down upon them—one of those being of course Howard. Randy, however, did not partake in eating the candy as it rained down from the sky. Instead, he only glared daggers at Mcfist as he smiled and waved to the crowd as they cheered him on. The anger inside the teen's being was starting to reach its tipping point, but before he could say or do anything about it, a horrifyingly loud bang cut through the joyous cacophony around him and instant turned the crowd's happy cries into cries of fear and panic: the sound of a gunshot.

As the people around Randy and Howard began to scatter around in all direction as another shot went off, the two friends were equally confused by what was going on. All around them people were either running for cover in case the shooter started picking them off next. It was still unclear who had been first been hit by the first bullet—if it hit anyone at all. Then among all the chaos, Randy saw it. There, laying on the stage in a pool of his own blood was Hannibal Mcfist. His wife was crouched over him, crying hysterically as she put her hands over the where the bullet and hit her husband in the chest while Viceroy and the other Roboape who hadn't had its head blown off by the second bullet trying to move their boss while Bash had already run off for cover.

Acting on instincts alone, Randy and Howard ran and hid behind a nearby bench as a third shot dropped the other Roboape. It all seemed impossible to the two boys. One moment everyone was celebrating then the next moment it became a scene of utter panic as the man who spent so long trying to kill Randy and been struck by a weapon that had been banned from being sold in Norrisville. Despite the horrifying scene around him, there was a small part of the protector of Norrisville was felt a strange sense of satisfaction watching his enemy being laid low. But that feeling gave way as he watched his wife continue to weep at the sight before him. Randy couldn't let either her nor the rest of the town suffer any longer, he had to find the shooter and stop him before someone else was shot.

"The shooter's up there!" someone cried out as he pointed to a nearby building

Randy squinted his eyes and saw the faint outline of a man holding a sniper rifle in his hands. Throwing cation to the whim, he reached into his jacket and pulled out his mask, but just before he could throw it over his face, Howard suddenly stopped him.

"Are you nuts!" he demanded "that dude is shooting people! Shooting people Cunningham!"

"I can't let this whacko harm anyone else!" Randy shot back "I have to do something!"

Howard knew it was pointless to try and argue with Randy. He knew that this was his job to protect the innocent from events such as these, but he couldn't bear the thought of losing someone he thought of as a brother. But as the ginger looked at the chaos around him, he knew that he couldn't hold his friend back.

"You better come back alive, or else I'm gonna be pretty mad if your dead" he warned the hero

Randy nodded in understanding before throwing the mask over his face and transform into the Ninja. He then dropped a smoke bomb and vanished in a cloud of orange foul smelling smoke, leaving Howard alone to say a small prayer that his best friend would return from this ordeal alive.

In all honesty, Randy had no idea what to expect when he appeared on the rooftop of the building that the shooter had been spotted on. The Ninja had never faced anyone who carried firearms before, and thought that he never would. Guns were a far cry from what randy normally had to face, but the thought of facing someone with a gun seemed to make this situation all the more dangerous than facing a giant robot or a monster who was one a classmate. Regardless of his inner fears, Randy steeled his resolve and swore to bring whoever this madman was to justice. As he stepped out of the orange cloud of smoke, the Ninja found the shooter just as he was dissembling his sniper rifle and putting it away in a metal suitcase.

The moment Randy's mentally registered who the shooter was, a cold chill of fear ran up his spine. The gunman was dressed head to toe in a black and tan suit body armor that was adorned with a vast array of weapons that ranged from pistols, submachine guns, grenades and even a broadsword strapped to it. even underneath the armor, Randy could tell that this was a well-built and muscular man who obviously knew how to fight without the use of his weapons. The biggest draw to Randy was the mask that covered the man's face. It was black on one side and tan on the other side with a single eye hole on it. even though the Ninja had never met this man until this very moment, he knew of him by his name and reputation alone: Slade Wilson, A.K.A, Deathstroke.

The very mention of the trained gunman's name could make even the bravest man quiver in fear. Deathstroke was known as the world's greatest assassin, and with good reason. The assassin had left hundreds, if not thousands, of bodies during his time as a hired killer. From what Randy knew of Slade from what he had seen and heard of him from newsreels in the past, he was a soldier who was injected with a formula that gave him enhanced strength, speed and agility as well as a healing factor and unlocked his mental capacity so that he could use up to ninety-percent of his brain functions. After going AWOL, he became a mercenary, and during that time, he had faced off with major superhero teams such as the Teen Titans and even the entire Justice League and had nearly killed them all in every clash they had with him. If Randy was to stand any chance against the assassin, he would have to fight with everything he had, and even then, Randy feared that it still wouldn't be enough.

"Holy cheese what did I just get myself into!" the young hero thought to himself in a mental panic

Despite the absolute terror Randy felt, he knew he couldn't just let Deathstroke escape after what he had done. So, he drew his sword and took a battle stance to show that he meant business. However, the mercenary merely ingored him and continued with putting his gun away.

"I knew you'd show up soon enough" Deathstroke mention casually as he finished putting away the gun he used to shoot Mcfist "but don't worry, I was just leaving"

"I'm not letting you walk out here!" Randy declared in a defiant tone "You're going to answer for what you've done!"

"Look, I don't know if your aware of this, but I'm not here for you" the hired killer replied "but if you get in my way, we're going to have a problem. And trust me, you don't want that"

"I'm not letting you get away, Deathstroke!" the Ninja told him "yeah, I know who you are, and I'm not scared of you!"

"Then you clearly don't know me that well" Deathstroke answered as turned to face him "allow me to fix that"

Before Randy could even mentally register the fact that he was about to fight the world's greatest killer, Deathstroke suddenly reached for one of his hosteled pistols and opened fire on the Ninja. Randy barely had time to leap out of the way before the bullets managed to strike him. As Randy had managed to evade the bullets, the defender of Norrisville failed to realize that his opponent was already charging toward with his sword drawn. Thankfully Randy was able to block the blade at the last second, but it was difficult to do so since Deathstroke's enhanced strength put more weight the force of his strike. Slade then pressed his attack by delivering a strong kick to the Ninja's torso that knocked the wind out of him as he was sent flying from the blow as well.

"Ninja rings!" Randy shouted as he flung his bladed rings at his opponent

Slade drew his pistol once more and shot each ring into pieces with pin-point accuracy before lunging at the Ninja once more, this time firing his pistol at him as he did. Randy leapt and spun as he continued to dodge the oncoming gunfire, but as he did, Slade managed to close the gap between them and locked blades with his enemy once more. The two began their dual, every thrust and slash Randy attempted to make was blocked and parried every time, whereas Deathstroke's sword nearly cut into Randy's skin on every swipe of his broadsword. Randy knew that if he was going to stand any chance against Slade, he'd have to switch of his tactics and fast. He leapt backwards from Deathstroke and reached into his pocket to pull out an electroball just as the mercenary came at him again.

"Ninja electroball!" he cried as he flung the ball Slade

Deathtroke ducked his head down and let the ball fly right over his head before drawing his submachine gun and opening fire with it. again, Randy was put on the defensive as he did his best to once more evade the onslaught of bullets. The Ninja managed to get close enough to Slade to do a backflip over him and pull out another ball to use.

"Ninja cold balls!" he shouted as he hurled the balls

Deathstroke shot the balls in mid-air, causing them to explode in a cloud of snow. While Randy was in awe of what he had just witnessed, Deathstroke tossed a grenade through the now fading cloud that landed at the teen's feet. before randy could jump away, the grenade exploded in a flash of blinding light that was accompanied by an ear-splitting boom, a flash-bang grenade. As Randy stumbled backwards while he was disoriented from the blast, Deathstroke ambushed him with a flurry of kicks and punches that struck with a force no robot or monster had ever hit him with before. Randy could feel blood filling up in his mouth as Slade's fist collided with his jaw. A strong kick to his side shattered the Ninja hip while a powerful jab to his chest cracked a rib. Randy had been hurt before from his past battles, but this was different, this was agony in its very definition, this was proof that Randy was not even on the same level as Deathstroke the Terminator.

With a roundhouse kick across his face that sent him flying across the rooftop, Randy knew that this could be his last battle if he didn't think of something soon. He struggled back to his feet as his vision returned to him, allowing him to see Slade slowly advancing toward him with a metal Bo-staff clutched in his hands. Seeing that his sword was doing him no good, Randy put it away and instead drew his sais. Mustering up every ounce of strength that he had left within him he charged at the assassin and began to swipe his sais furiously at him, but sadly, Deathstroke easily dodged every attempted attack on his person before seeing the opening he was waiting for and basked his staff across Randy's skull, knocking his sais out of his hands. Slade them caught one of the sais and stabbed into the Ninja's scarf, holding him down so that he could pummel his opponent senseless with his staff. The pain Randy was in was indescribable, nothing he had ever fought before could even top the beating he was currently getting.

There was no other option: he had to either escape and live to fight another day, or die here and now. As much as he hated the idea of running away, he knew that this was one fight he couldn't win. So, he used his foot to pick up the other fallen sai and toss it up to his hand and used to cut himself free from the scarf he then ducked from the bo-staff and backflipped away from the assassin before taking out a smokebomb to use for his escape.

BANG!

The smoking barrel from Slade's staff indicated that he had fired a bullet from it, but the Ninja didn't know where the bullet had gone, that was, until he looked down and saw a dark red patch on his torso that was slowly spreading. Maybe it was the adrenaline or that he was in so much pain as it was that kept him from feeling the pain from the bullet, but regardless, he had been shot. He looked back up at Slade with a stunned expression in his eyes just as the mercenary fire another shot from his staff that cut across the side of Randy's head. The force from the second bullet and the blood loss from the first gunshot cuased the protector of Norrisville to stumble backwards until he tripped over the edge of the building and fell toward the ground below. He had failed. For the first time as the Ninja, he had truly and honestly failed both the people of Norrisville and himself, and this time, it looked as though there would be no way of him redeeming himself now. now the whole city was at Deathstroke's mercy and when the people of Norrisville would look for who to blame, they would look at him as the one who caused this.

The last thing he saw was a pile of garbage bags before his vision left him…

Theresa had been hiding behind the alleyway dumpster for a half-hour since the first shot had gone off. She remained hidden as she heard shot after shot go off from the building just across from her on the alleyway. She had been walking through her as a shortcut to get to her home and now she was in fear of getting shot by whoever was laying siege on the fairgrounds. The reason she had left early was one out of anger, for she felt as though she had been betrayed by the boy she loved. When Randy said and Howard would join the girls on the Farris wheel, she thought that this could be her big chance to finally tell Randy how she truly felt about him, but when neither of the boys arrived, she felt truly jilted by her crush.

Debbie tried to calm her friend and suggested that they stay and have a good time without the guys around, but Theresa was too distraught to feel any joy. So, she threw Randy's gift in the trash and left the fairgrounds to head back home. But as she did, that's when she heard the gunshots go off. Even from where she was, she could still hear the screams of terror from the fairgrounds. As she took cover behind the dumpster, all the baton twirler could think off was if weather or not her friends were still alive. with every bullet fired all Theresa could think of was someone like Debbie or Julian or even Randy lying dead on the ground. She wanted to go back, but her fear kept her right where she was.

Then she heard the Ninja's voice which was soon followed by the sounds of a brutal battle. She didn't know who or what the town's hero was fighting up there, but it certainly wasn't a robot or a monster. Then her fears reached new heights when she saw the ninja fall from the rooftop and down the ground below. Throwing cation to the wind, she rushed over to the protector of Norrisville's side to see if he was still alive. When she first saw him, she feared the worst, there was so much blood pouring out of him that she was scared that may already be too late to save him. she then heard a soft moan escape his lips and breathed out a sigh of relief, he was still breathing, but barely. There was no time to call for help or try to find someone, if the Ninja was to survive, then it would be up to her to save him.

So with the defender's life now in her hands, she carefully picked him up and carried him out of the alleyway and back to her home, all the praying that he'd live long enough to get there.