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BANG! BANG! BANG!

The old woman nearly fell out of her rocking chair as the noise reverberated throughout her little rundown house. She would've mistaken it for the raging thunder had it not sounded so urgent. She slowly rose from her seat and trudged over to the half-rotting door.

She reached up to undo the chain when another series of knocks shook the door. "Wait, a second," the woman spoke, shaking her head at the stranger's impatience. Her trembling hands finally managed to pull back the lock and she tugged open the door.

However, she stepped back in alarm when a group of drenched young people huddled together came into view. The light from the room's oil lamp lit up their faces and she could see their chattering teeth and pleading eyes.

"Our c-car broke down and w-we need sh-shelter," stammered the short blonde one at the front who seemed to be dressed entirely in green. "M-may we c-come in?"

"My b-brother's hurt," added the dark-haired girl who had an older red-clad boy leaning on her with his features twisted in pain. "He's b-bleeding."

The blonde one took a light step forward. "Please."

The woman took in the group's pale faces, dripping wet hair, and soaking clothes. Nothing about them seemed odd except for a few cuts and mild bruises that she spotted all over them. Of course, something must've happened that had caused one of them to start bleeding as the girl stated.

Other than these factors, she deduced that they appeared to be harmless. The apprehension on her face disappeared and a kind smile took its place.

"Sure, dearies. Right this way." She stepped aside and almost got pushed over when they all rushed in frantically (save for the girl and her brother who simply limped along while she supported him).

The one in blue gave a grateful sigh, apparently comforted by the warmth of the room. He shook his mop of curly hair and sent droplets flying everywhere. The black one standing near him frowned and slapped the back of his head, hissing, "Stop it."

The old woman shut the door once all six of them were safely inside. They helped their injured friend over to the threadbare ottoman and set him down. Now under proper light, she could see that they looked less like countryside travelers and more like fighters of some sort. From the multicolored gis to the assortment of weapons poking out from here and there, something in her mind clicked.

"You're the Ninja, aren't you?"

The group froze for a second before the one in black cleared his throat and casually swung his right arm back and forth. "Uh, yeah," he nodded, trying not to give it too much importance. "Good guess." He displayed what looked like a nervous grin.

"Well, then why are you out here in the middle of nowhere?" questioned the woman.

The blue one leaned in closer to him and whispered, "Should we tell her?"

"Of course not!" he whispered back.

"What was that, dear?"

"Nothing!" the black one blurted out. He cleared his throat again (and succeeded in raising the woman's suspicion).

"Actually," he continued, "we had something to take care of in a village a good few miles away from here. However, our recently-turned-eighteen driver-" here he glared at the green, blonde one "-saw a cow smack dab in the middle of the road in a storm."

"Oh my." The lady placed a hand over her heart while the girl scoffed and rolled her eyes.

The black one shook his head as if his story was the saddest thing ever. "Yeah, long story short, Lloyd lost control and drove our vehicle straight off the hillside. We crashed and Kai ended up getting stabbed by his own sword."

"Which is why I always tell you all to strap and secure your weapons while we're in any transport system," Lloyd mentioned, clearly trying to steer the conversation away from the topic of his carelessness.

That is when the woman noticed the dark red patch staining the wounded one's (Kai was it?) gi on the left side of his abdomen. Kai kept a hand clutched firmly over the gash and seethed at anyone who came near to examine it.

"Oh, that looks terrible!" the woman exclaimed. "I better go get some gauze and cotton."

"We would require some medications as well if you have those at hand," said the white one who had an authoritative sense of responsibility about him.

"Of course," mumbled the woman and disappeared into an adjoining room.

During this hustle to get Kai the treatment he needed, his eyes landed on Lloyd who, with a pathetic, apologetic look on his face, held his hands together and mouthed "sorry" at him.

Kai only glanced down uncertainly at his bloody laceration before biting his lip and turning away, preventing Lloyd from breathing a sigh of relief

~•~•~•~•~•~•~

The Ninja had been allowed to spend the night and wait out the storm which was still going on with full force. The kind, old lady (who later revealed her name to be Hanya) had given them the upper spare room to bunk in.

The room was bare except for a few crates in the corner. The team had laid down the sheets and blankets provided by Hanya, making six respective piles on the wooden floor. Kai's damage was dealt with and he now lay resting on his sheets.

Hanya had promised the shivering group warm bowls of soup which seemed too tempting an offer to reject. So the Ninja lounged around the room, waiting for "supper" to arrive and discussing their next course of action.

Nya glanced worriedly out the window at the gray haze outside. She could see Jay approach her from behind in the glass's reflection. He placed a hand on her shoulder. "Hey, you okay?"

Nya sighed. "I wonder if the Land Bounty will be okay out there."

"I'm sure it'll be alright," Jay smiled, "whatever Pixal builds never seems to give up on us." He paused to think it over and frowned. "Unless there are problems involved like the mech getting blasted to another realm or the Destiny's Bounty getting its wooden butt whooped everytime we take it out for a ride."

"Well, the Land Bounty is stranded out in an unknown field in the middle of a thunderstorm," Nya pointed out, gesturing out the window.

Jay shrugged. "Yeah, then that poses a threat to the mechanics."

"Maybe we should try to avoid further circumstances in which Lloyd has to drive," Zane suggested, getting nods from the others and an indignant exclamation from Lloyd.

"Hey, I did give the cow a full blow of the horn," the blonde argued. "It's not my fault it couldn't get a clue. It just stared stupidly at the Bounty straight on and moo-ed!"

"And you thought throwing us off the hill was the better option?" Kai spoke, sounding aggravated and glaring at Lloyd for nearly killing him.

"I wasn't gonna deliberately run a cow over like that," Lloyd shot back. "Isn't there a law against such things?"

"Not that I'm aware of," Cole muttered, raising an eyebrow at the Green Ninja.

"You also don't deliberately endanger the lives of your friends for a dumb, unimportant animal," Jay threw in, wincing at the memory of them tumbling down the rocky slope in the pouring rain and Kai's cry of pure agony making his blood curdle.

Kai slowly sat up. "Yeah, dude! I got stabbed by my own sword. That's, like, betrayal."

"Okay, stop it," Nya cut in, noticing Lloyd tense up at the mention of that day's accident. "It was a moment of confusion. It could've happened to anybody. What matters is that we're all safe. We're alive, the cow's alive, everyone's alive."

Jay scratched the back of his neck. "I mean, what if the cow belongs to a farmer and he decides to have beef chops for breakfast tomorrow morning?"

"Jay, you're really not helping."

"I'm just sayin' . . ."

"What worries me is that Ishwari's army of Parinaams were right on our tail when we fled off track," Zane acquainted, "They may catch up to the wreck of the Land Bounty and calculate our whereabouts."

"'Disobey me and Karma will defy you; obey me and Karma will favour you,'" Lloyd recited Ishwari's words, leaving an uneasy silence afterwards.

Jay wrung his gloved hands nervously. "Her karma may be in the works as we speak."

No one said a word for a few minutes, wanting to let the anxiety die down a bit. They couldn't blame themselves for not being hopeful. For all they knew, the Parinaams may as well be right outside Hanya's door.

"All we can do now is sleep and hope for the best," Nya concluded the night's discussion, moving away from the window. "We'll patch up the Bounty in the morning and head over to Nom, provided we get through the night safely."

There was a light knock at the door and the tinkle of ceramics. Nya immediately walked over and opened it, smiling when the old woman stood there with the streaming bowls of soup.

"Fresh off the stove," Hanya declared happily, pushing the tray towards the girl. "Chicken corn soup with soy sauce and vinegar already mixed."

"Thank you so much for everything, Hanya," said the Master of Water, carefully taking the tray from her feeble hands.

"Aw, it's nothing, dear," the woman chuckled, flapping her hand. "You all do so much for us. This is the least I can do." She waited at the door till Nya had distributed the bowls amongst her and the others. Taking the empty tray, she smiled, "I'll come back for the dishes in the morning."

"Very well," Zane said, handing Kai one of the bowls. "We really appreciate your hospitality. I hope you have a nice night."

"Good night, all of you," Hanya chirruped.

They all chorused their respective good nights before the woman went away, closing the door behind her.

Kai sniffed the warm contents of his bowl. "This smells awesome. And boy, am I starving."

Everyone laughed as Kai tossed the spoon away and drank the soup directly from the dish, spitting half of it out when it proved to be too hot for his self proclaimed "fire proof" tongue to handle.

Lloyd could only give a weary smile, still deprived of the brunet's pending forgiveness.

~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~•~

Right, so this little piece of writing is, you can say, an extract of a book I may be working on. Of course the original scene will be a bit different from this since I only wrote this to test it out.

Since the theme basically revolves around Karma which is originally a part of the Hindu culture, I've decided to give the villain a Hindu name and personality. And her respective followers are known as Parinaams which means "consequences" in Hindi.

I don't even know if I'll ever get round to work on this book but I have a pretty cool idea and backstory for it so who knows.

There may be a second part to this.

(Prays I don't start this book and never make an effort to finish it. I do that a lot!)