Almost an hour of painting walls had actually started to melt my brain. A person can only look at the color gray for so long before they stop being able to place themself in reality.

"Hey boss, where's the food? It's already dark out..."

*BOOM*

A loud explosion came from not too far away outside. "What the…" Before I could even finish my thought, the ninja that had been on the roof ran in, saying that he had heard an explosion, and that there was a fire.

I sighed and grabbed a fire extinguisher and ran out the door. Those ninjas are constantly blowing stuff up around the lair, so I always keep one around the front door.

I could immediately see the smoke, it was right up on the worn down path that served as a road to our lair from the village. I jogged over there, seeing pieces of red metal laying around that looked like it had been blown up. That's when I looked up and saw it.

It was Pucca. Out cold, laying right in the middle of the flames, half of a motor scooter laying across her legs.

I went from a jog to a dead sprint. I ran straight through the fire, pulled the scooter off of her, and picked her up as carefully as I could and ran her far away from the flames.

I sat her on the ground, laying her head in my lap. I looked her over, and other than a couple cuts and relatively minor burns, she looked at least kind of okay. Who knows what happened, or what she hit on the way down though.

I gently laid her head down in the grass, and jogged over to extinguish the fire. It had spread pretty bad, and as much as I wanted to make sure Pucca was alright, I also didn't want to be held responsible for a record breaking forest fire. As soon as I'd gotten the last of it, it started to rain. Could the timing have been any worse?

I ran back over to Pucca and untied my jacket and wrapped her up in it. Didn't need to add her getting sick from the rain to her mile long list of issues she'd probably be having in the next few days.

I picked her up as carefully as I could, trying not to move her around too much. I had no idea what she had managed to damage on the inside of her, not to mention the blood and burns I could see on the outside of her. Luckily, we lived no more than a ten minute walk from the Sooga Hospital, so I yelled out to the ninjas that I'd be back, and I ran off towards the hospital.

I had no idea what my plan really was. I wasn't exactly the most trusted guy in the village, even if I had really laid off the whole "evil" thing. I didn't know how people would react if the evil ninja walked into the hospital with a battered up village favorite. That didn't matter to me though. What would I do after I got her there? I'd have to tell her uncles, right? But how? They don't trust me either. Maybe I'd just leave them an unsigned note, saying where she was…

I managed to get to the hospital in only five minutes. Pucca still seemed alright. Ish. I ran in the door to the ER. The receptionist audibly gasped, and immediately made a phone call, without me even saying anything. It took barely a minute before a whole bunch of people with a gurney ran in and took Pucca away from me. I sighed and turned to leave, realising that they'd taken my jacket too, but a doctor put his hand on my shoulder and told me he had questions.

Sooga was a really small village, they didn't really need security in the small hospital, so I guess this guy was the best that they had to question the big bad ninja man.

"Of course. Anything" I wasn't about to argue with the guy...

"Please, follow me" he said in an incredibly professional tone. Surprisingly not as cold as I was expecting.

He brought us to one of those small, secluded rooms that you never really want to find yourself in. They never mean good things are happening, and I'd spent way more time in them as a kid than most.

"What happened, Tobe?"

"Oh good, he knows my name." I thought to myself. How was I not going to be arrested after this?

"Well… I was at home. Waiting on my delivery order from the Gohrong, when I heard something explode outside. I went out, and I found her. It looked like something went majorly wrong with her scooter. Or maybe she hit something really wrong? I have no idea. But she was in a fire surrounded by bits of her scooter. So, I grabbed her and brought her here. That's all I know. She's been unconscious since I found her."

He jotted down some notes, and thanked me, and told me I was free to go. I was not expecting that. "Hey, doc?" I asked, more nervously than I care to admit. "Can you...make sure she doesn't know I'm the one who brought her here? I don't want her to think she needs to thank me...or something... you know?" He seemed to kind of understand what I was getting at. He nodded at me and walked in the direction they took Pucca. No one wants to be saved by the bad guy. Especially not the nicest, happiest girl in the entire village.