Chapter Text
If you would have told Jay that he would have been saving a girl today, he would have laughed in your face. He also would have given you a punch if you told him it was another Elemental, after all there was nothing worse than being an Elemental, in this city. They were killed for existing, too powerful and too much of a rival for the Emperor. People who had powers were nothing more than the Elemental monsters that laid waste in the Dark Lands just outside of Ninjago.
Jay had never asked to be an elemental. He never wanted to be one, he never chose to be one. If he was given a choice, he could have been a normal boy, in bed asleep by a dimly lit fire, with no cares in the world – he certainly would not have been hiding crouched behind a marbled quarter wall, in the most dangerous place an Elemental could be. Oh, what Jay would have given to be snuggled close in bed right now, and not have the looming threat of being beheaded, or worst banished to the Dark Lands just outside the cities walls.
Instead, he was trying to hold is breath as he fiddled with some mechanical cogs sizing them up against a board. The board was tattered, dints, scratches and rust burnt into it along with three small holes that had shot through the wiring and cogs, which Jay was dropping to the ground like bullets. He tried to keep the noise to a minimum as he worked his magic. His body buzzed, the hair on his neck, arms and legs all standing on edge, as bolts of electricity whizzed around him from his toes to his fingertips, where small lights of blue fizzled with the reworking of the wires. Once he deemed it done, he held the cogs again, that looked pristine compared to the old ones that now lay on the floor, discarded – except with each one he pulled from the bag now got a nice new addition of a smudged fingerprint.
Jay looked up at the wall which imprisoned him. It was easily over thirty meters tall, and was the only obstacle that stood in his way, other than the tens of thousands of guards that laid waiting. There was a gate, of course, which he could try to pass, if it hadn’t had meant that he would have been thrown straight into a jail cell as soon as he was spotted. Besides, trying to sneak passed the guards was no option either, as for this time of night, the wall had more security, and they were not very friendly. He couldn’t go to the door he had used to get in either, as the staffing had changed and he doubted the only guard willing to help Jay would be there waiting for him. That just gave him more of a reason to use his good old hover board. His plan was simple; he would fly over the wall and be home free. This wouldn’t be the first time he had done it, and it certainly wouldn’t be the last. All Jay had to do was not get shot.
Or captured.
Or shot and captured.
Easy.
He pressed a small cog into the gear and a sudden whooshing sound came from the board, a smirk tugged at his lips as he dared to look over his shoulder. The night was dark, making Jay squint into the shadows trying to watch for any movement of his pursuers. When there wasn’t a sign of them, Jay was thankful the guards always had to be wearing that awful looking golden armour. Not only was it ugly, but it was loud and heavy, three things which would help Jay's escape. The guards hadn’t spotted him, yet there was an overwhelming dread that it wouldn’t stay that way for long, especially now his board was making noises Jay couldn’t conceal. There was some clanging in the background, a clashing of metals that could only means the guards were getting closer and Jay could only turn and tuck himself under the wall again.
He was running out of time.
His hands were getting antsy, fidgeting as he clicked in another cog and the board let out some steam – good it had power. Maybe enough without him having to charge it. Taking a risk, Jay lifted the board into the air, a distance from the ground. Standing up along with it, Jay pulled one foot on before he made hasty work to strapping it. The last thing he needed was to get caught while making his escape. With one secure, he reached for the clothed bag beside him, holding it tight as he placed his other boot on the board.
He bit the top of the bag and held it between his teeth, grunting at the weight as he worked on strapping his other foot in, the boot squeezed tightly around his foot. There was no time for adjustment. Jay sucked a breath in, he could worry about his blood circulation once he was away from here. A shout caught his attention; making his body bristle as he flipped a switch on the board, taking the bag out of his mouth he looked back to see two guards pointing and yelling over to him. It was now or never. He clicked another button, nothing changed. His breath quickened as he scowled. Maybe the board didn’t have enough power after all. Perhaps a little charge couldn’t hurt.
His heart jumped, and Jay found that his body automatically began to vibrate at the sudden thought of finally releasing the tension it had been holding back. The hairs on his body stuck on end as he felt his body pulse. Each thump of his heart creating more of a circuit.
Ba-dum.
His core was set ablaze.
Ba-dum.
His legs bounced.
Ba-dum.
His arms were nothing more than wires getting ready to connect to something.
The goal: his board. An eruption of electricity filled his veins, spouting more and more until there was too much and it needed to release. A spark of blue connected his fingers to the board. Jay felt his body whiz to numbness, his knees almost buckling, but just before they could, the board whirled to life and just as quickly, suddenly he was off. Just in time too, as the sounds of gunshots silenced the wind around him.
Flying had always came naturally to the boy, the feeling of the wind hitting his body, flowing through his hair and his fingertips. It was like how some people are naturally gifted at playing instruments, or dancing, or swimming, he was more attuned to moving around in the sky. Perhaps it was because he was an Elemental. His element being lightning – or electricity, he could never really work that one out – he supposed that he was just the same as a thunderstorm, he soars through the sky like a blue streak. Yet, despite the fact that he was rather good at flying, directions were not something he found easy to follow. The layout was easier to digest when on the ground, now that he was dodging guards left and right while in the air made his anxiety spike up. He, at one point, had to fly straight up, which would have been great for an escape, if only he wasn’t being shot at.
“Whoa!” He heard himself shout as a bullet cut through his already worn out top, adding yet another rip to the light blue polo. Thankfully due to its baggy size, the bullet had flown straight passed his arm and had only taken out part of the sleeve. It had been a close one, though. Biting his bottom lip, Jay dove down, fast, pumping his body more with the electricity and releasing it slowly through his feet which were strapped to the board.
He was gaining speed. Enough speed that if he wasn’t careful he could easily become a pile of mush on the ground. That was if he only crashed into the ground. The pressure was building in his ears, but he couldn’t stop. What he did do, however, was change his direction just at the last second, sweeping up against two guards that had ducked, ready for impact, and soared straight over the very wall that had been keeping him trapped.
Behind him, he heard the guards scrambling to follow him, but it was no use, he was too fast, so fast that the wall he had been trying to overcome was nothing more than a pin in the distance. He had escaped unscathed!
Adrenaline was the only thing keeping him going at this point. He soared in the sky, rising higher and higher as he flew over the city, only just narrowly missing the skylights. He only had to make it home, and then this adventure would be over. He felt his hand sweat, the one holding the bag which now jingled in the wind. His grip tightened.
With the city now behind him, Jay could see the outskirts, two roads laid ahead of him. One which lead to the sandy deserts, or one that led to the farmers fields. He flew over the grassy fields, all until the forth hill of grass did the board start to slow down, just as he descended to the ground. He stopped at a rocky path, one which lead up a grassy hill with more stony staircases. His board jittered and it let out a puff of smoke. Maybe he had worked it too hard again? Jay made quick work of unstrapping himself, almost falling on the ground as he hopped off the board. He flipped switches and the board died down, becoming deadweight in his arms.
“Finally, home,” Jay couldn’t stop the grin that formed. Despite the fact that his body felt extremely heavy, and he was fifty percent sure that the hill was trying to take him out with how steep it was, he reached the top, where a few houses resided.
They had never been as fancy as the ones you would find in the big city, these had overgrown grass littering the walls and roofs, the stone was grey, looking as though it could crumble if the wind was too strong, and the windows looked as though they had been made with sheets of paper with how thin they were. Jay had always hated the cold, for this fact, but if you wanted to lay low, this was the perfect spot. No one ever came to the farming grounds, there were too many, and some were more generous at supplying the city with what it needed, some were nothing but fields of mud, this village was one of them.
Jay lunged himself at the third house, laughing to himself as he made it through the front door.
“Guess who just took out the Palace!” Jay closed the door behind him, walking into the old, dusty, kitchen as he threw the board on the floor and the bag onto the counter. “That’s right, Jay Walker, just did, and I did if without the guards even realising it’s me.”
The sounds of shuffling from the living room could be heard as a figure approached the doorway – which was missing a door completely – rubbing their eye as they did so.
“What are you talking about?” They asked, pulling a cord to turn the light on in the kitchen. Jay didn’t even look up as he inspected the cogs that he was once again pulling from the bag, though now he was lying them down on the counter instead. “I thought the plan was to hit Chen's – or Clouse’s tonight? Why the Palace?”
“The plan changed,” Jay chuckled to himself, again. “I found an opportunity to get into the palace walls and with the intel we got, I was able to get exactly what we needed and more, it was amazing Cole, you should’ve seen it.”
Cole, a teenager that stood at the edge of the kitchen, looking at Jay with concern, crossed his arms. Now, just as his name suggests, Cole's hair was dark as coal, eyes black as night that intensely stared, with thick brows narrowed. His words held a venom, yet Jay didn’t miss the slight crack of his voice, either, as he spoke. “You realise how dangerous that could have been, right?”
“Pfft – of course, but that doesn’t matter – what does matter is the fact that I’ve got this baby,” Jay looked up to his friend with wide eyes, and a smile to match, as he reached into the bag. He brought out three sheets of metal, all different colours. The first one, a golden colour, it warbled the light as it reflected it, the sound it made as Jay pulled it out was one similar to a sword being sheathed. The second was a copper-y colour, not quite as standout as the gold, but it looked to be firmer, like stone it didn’t reflect the light, instead it seemed to be absorbing it. Then, the third sheet was silver in colour and shared a lot of similarities to the gold sheet. Cole looked at each one of them, walking closer to Jay as he took out more cogs from the bag. “You know what we could do with these? You said we needed more finer metals and what’s more finer than royal metal?”
“We could be in so much trouble for this, Jay,” Cole warned, however that didn’t stop him from picking up the sheets of metal and comparing them. Jay rolled his eyes and nodded his head. “It’s amazing.” Cole breathed before both of then locked eyes and moved into the living room, where a small contraption sat on a small coffee table, unfinished and waiting for someone to come finish making it.
“You think this will be enough?” Jay made his way over to the machine, measuring the golden sheet to the pint sized contraption. Cole hummed as he appeared next to him, dark eyes sizing up the sheet before his nose crinkled and he pushed away from Jay.
“Man, you reek,” he shrieked, making an effort to hold his nose as he wafted the air nearby. Now Jay was someone who took his general health very seriously, and usually he would have been offended by Cole's outburst, after all if it was anyone one of them that used more of the water bill, it was most certainly Jay. Though, this time Jay could only grimace as he realised just how bad he did stink. He couldn’t blame Cole for moving away, he really did need a shower. “You’ve got all dust or something all in your hair too, its made it go wild.”
Jay couldn’t stop the sigh that escaped him as he ran a hand through his hair. No, correction, through part of his hair as his hair decided to capture his fingers and hold them in ransom through the knots that had formed. “Yeah, I really need a shower.” Jay stood up and swiped the front of his blue polo, cringing at the dust – or something – which flaked into the air like a small dark cloud.
“Listen dude, I’ll sort all this out,” Cole made a gesture to the bathroom. “You go wash.”
Jay pulled a face but shrugged, he’d told Cole what he was going to do before the mission, and they’ve been partners for so long, Cole could do the simple stuff such as this, while Jay worked on the finicky parts. Jay moved, switching on the light once he reached the bathroom and he gaped.
First Master, he looked awful. Jay stepped closer to the mirror, pulling on his cheeks and ruffling his hair, where more of the cloud of dirt fell from him. “Ugh, gross.” Jay sighed as he ran his hands through his hair again, feeling the natural curls cling to his fingers. With some of the dirt gone, Jay could see some of his ginger hair, though under the light and dirt, it looked more like a dark brown. He was so used to straightening and styling it that it felt alien this way. He never really liked his curls, they made him look too boyish, especially with his freckles. Thankfully due to all the sweat and dirt, they could hardly be seen on his pale skin. He looked a mess.
It took around, ten to twenty minutes for Jay to clean himself, and looking in the mirror now was a totally new person. Low and behold the true Jay, with his wet curls and freckled pale body, tired blue eyes looked back at him. Funny, he thought he had gotten rid of all the dirt, yet still there were two dark spots under his eyes that were too stubborn to wipe away. Some sleep would probably help him. By the time Jay was done, Cole seemed to be finishing up too. “You went with the copper one?”
Cole looked up from his project and shrugged. “Looked less conspicuous with this one.” Jay threw himself onto the sofa as he watched his friend work. After a few moments of silence, Cole asked, “how did you do it?” Jay raised a brow, “how did you get into the wall, the Palace? The last time you tried we almost got arrested."
Jay was quiet, sucking in a breath, he sat up a little more. “I didn’t mean to, it just sort of happened. There was this guy and he mentioned he could get me in, just not out.”
“And you just trusted him?” Cole snapped, Putting down the machine and facing Jay properly. “He could have been bluffing.”
“True, but he wasn’t and I don’t know, I know that Chen's is safer but last time we went there he had moved everything, and all we could get was that stupid fake stuff. This guy got me in and everything was the same as before. I guess I just couldn’t pass it up.”
Cole sighed deeply. “We just have to be careful about this. Its too dangerous to be taking risks.”
Jay could only nod, “yeah, I know.”
“What about your powers? Did any one of them notice that you’re a...”
“An Elemental?”
“Yeah, that. Did they say anything?”
“No,” Jay shrugged, “I only had to use it once or twice on the board, I don’t think they would have thought it was coming from me. I didn’t hear them shout or anything.”
Cole sighed in relief. “That’s good at least.”
“I don’t think it would have mattered either way, they wanted my head for stealing from them.”
“It would have made a huge difference, the fact that they thought you were like me meant they weren’t sending an army after you. If they would have caught whiff that you had the power of electricity-"
“Lightning.”
“Okay, Lightning, they wouldn’t have just left you to leave, there would be a whole battalion out for your head.”
Jay whistled, “yeah, I would not like that.”
“Besides, I need you here. Next time I’ll do the heist, you can stay here,” Jay scowled at that, sitting up once more.
“Oh no,” he growled, “I’ve been sat here along the past eighteen heists, Cole, eighteen! I do more when I’m doing them, and my power only helps me out if there’s ever a chance I get close to being captured, no offense Cole but just because you’re unnaturally strong for someone who’s not an Elemental doesn’t mean that you’re safer out there than me.”
“Yeah but I draw less attention to myself,” Cole argued back.
“Oh yeah, like anyone’s going to believe that there’s a real Rocky Dangerboof, and that he’s totally not going to rob you blind with that awful disguise you put on.”
“Okay so maybe I can’t just hide freckles I don’t have or straighten my hair so it doesn’t look like a birds nest-"
“My hair does not look like a birds nest!”
“Not the point I was making there, Jay, I have to hide my identity somehow!”
“Okay, sure hide your identity, but that’s what you do when we sell this junk, you get to be the face man, if I don’t do the heists then what good am I to this partnership?”
Cole huffed. “You make the damn things!”
“Its not the same,” Jay scratched at his head in frustration. “You can’t just do everything and leave me to just ‘build the stuff’. I’m the one with powers and I’m the one who can get these kinds of results, don’t you want to get more finer materials so we can make better products to sell?”
Cole was quiet for a moment. “Well, yeah, I guess.”
“Then stop fighting with me on this,” Jay snapped. “We split the heists fifty-fifty so that its fair for both of us, like we originally agreed, right?”
Cole looked away from Jay, tinkering with the small contraption, which now resembled some sort of insect. “Right.”
The two boys were quiet the rest of the night, eating only snacks and finishing their latest invention – an insect shocker, a weapon which could move around remotely before a timer for five seconds shows and is able to shock anyone close by. They found building and disputing weapons paid better than just any old invention. Such as Jay’s hover board, he had managed to sell twenty, but it barely did anything for Cole or Jay. It only changed when they upgraded a gun. Then money was being thrown left right and centre. They retired to bed early hours in the morning, promises of going to town the day later and finally selling the contraption, their small argument seemingly forgotten in the meantime.
It was busy in the town. Too busy for Jay's liking as he scaled the rooftop, slipping slightly on a wet drain before pulling himself up to a stop. He never liked the city – it mostly stemmed from being an elemental, but being a thief sure didn’t help. He moved across the rooftops, keeping an eye on Cole as he entered the different shops. He didn’t really need to be here, he just preferred to be there when Cole managed to sell it off to the right person. Or if there were any fights that break out. That happened way more than it should.
Jay watched Cole enter yet a new building and he sighed, sitting on the edge of the rooftop waiting. He scratched his cheek before flinching away. He needed to be careful, he could be scratching away the makeup he put on this morning. For you see, Jay was like an undercover cop – or an undercover thief I guess. The waves of curls were straightened and shaped, and his freckles were covered with a lot of concealer. Not that he wanted to go into it, but he wore some other makeup too, just so that he looked natural and not like he was trying to cover anything specific up. Just a little bronzer and contour. He pretty much looked like a different person, it was all in case someone did recognise him from a heist. At least this way, he could convince them that he was someone else, or they got the wrong person.
Jay sighed as he fiddled with a stray stone, throwing it up into the air, as he counted how many clouds now littered the sky. It was three, just in case you were wondering. Three shapeless clouds too. How long has he been sat there? Too long. He had already started fidgeting with his board, but it could only keep him occupied for so long. Man, he wished he had brought a game along, even if it was one of his more retro styled ones, at least it would keep him occupied.
“This is so boring!” Jay found himself lying at the edge, his eyes focused on the door, waiting for Cole to return. Hopefully it meant things were going well if he hadn’t come out yet. Hopefully it would be sold quickly and the two boys could get their money and leave. Jay felt his eyes drift closed, opening them up he tried to widen them, just as soon as he relaxed, they rolled back again.
He would have fallen to sleep, only if there hadn’t been some commotion going on down below.
“She’s getting away!” A woman shrieked at the top of her lungs, making Jay jump. Another person screamed, this time a man;
“It’s her, she’s the one who made the water explode, an Elemental, a real Elemental!”
Now, a lot of words are used in day to day life. Many words are repeated, and many represents a lot of other stuff. But as there as words we use, there are words that people avoid. Elemental. That was a curse of its own. It damned whoever bore it, and sent them to death whether it be by the Dark Lands or by the Emperor himself.
“Get the Emperor!”
“Where is Clouse?”
“Where’d she go?”
“Here she is!”
“Disgusting Elemental!”
“Get her!”
“For the Emperor!”
Jay was frozen, heartbeat racing in his ears as he watched the group of people surround what looked like a young girl. She was crying, calling out to someone? She had managed to push back anyone who had gotten too close, but everyone knew, anyone could see that she was fighting a losing battle.
If Jay was paying attention to anyone other than the girl, he would have seen Cole racing from the building, he would have noticed his friend shouting and signalling to him. He would have heard the warning to just stay where he was. Stay in the shadows. Stay away from the conflict. Stay alone. Stay safe.
Of course, Jay had always been oblivious. He hadn’t even notice the fact that he had stood up on the roof, hover board in hand as he leaned forward. The girl was trying to push through the people, just as the royal guards were making their way towards her. Jay wanted to act, wanted to stop – after all, if he was in this girls shoes, he would have hoped that someone would help him. His board was laid flat, hovering in the air, waiting for Jay to stand on it. That, he did, just as the guards were getting closer, the girl was pushed onto her knees, and to her credit, when she picked herself up, she raised her fists. She was going to go down fighting. Jay strapped himself and then he was falling.
He didn’t feel real. He felt as though he was somewhere else, his body was numb, tingling like pins and needles. He saw the ground until he didn’t, his board flipping him as he crouched on his knees, electricity buzzing around him as people were pushed back as though there was an electrical barrier between him and others. He pushed though the crowd until he saw her. Wide hazel eyes stared at him before Jay opened up his arms and grasped her. He felt all the air push out of his lungs from the impact as he took the girl into his arms. He held her close, but he was moving fast and from the angle he had caught her from, she couldn’t get proper feeling on the board which meant Jay had to use most of his strength just to keep a hold of her. It didn’t hit what he had just done until the ear ringing scream pierced him. Two arms had a tight grip of him as he maneuvered his way through the city.
“Oh no,” Jay whispered as he held his own grasp on the girl. “Oh crap!”
What had he done? He had just outed himself to the guards in broad daylight as an Elemental; kidnapped another girl who could have been an Elemental; and now he was on the run with said girl.
Go.
Go!
Gogogogogogo!
That’s all he could do. All he could focus on. He needed to get out of the city and somewhere safe. Then he needed answers. Like for one, who in Ninjago was this girl? And two, why in Ninjago had he just risked being caught just to save her?
Notes:
So there it is! My first fanfic since 2017! I've already started chapter two - chapter two was supposed to be chapter one but I thought this might be a more interesting start to the story, so hopefully it won't take too long for me to post! Please feel free to like, bookmark or comment! Also any constructive criticism is appreciated, though I am a very fragile person so please be kind! Thank you!!! Until next time!
~TooManyFandomsToHandle.
Chapter 2: Kai gets thrown into jail over a water fight.
Notes:
Hey, hey, posting this very late and night when I should be asleep, but its fine, right? Anyhow this was supposed to be the first chapter to this story, and I wont lie I kind of understand why I wanted to start with this, but I also thought it might be a little boring? There's a lot that goes down though too. I mean I got to like 11,000 and something words and I swear I didn't mean for it to be so long. The chapter was going to be so much longer too, but I decided to split half of it into the next chapter, aha!
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
Even before Kai was thrown into the rat infested jail cell, he was having a rough day. It had started just as any other, waking up by his persistent sister, eager to start her day, whilst Kai was content with being curled up in his thick blankets. Her voice rang out more than once and Kai groaned, already feeling the beginnings of a headache. Another call, another groan, then came the whiplash of the cold winter air on Kai's body as the blankets that had been guarding him were thrown off and tossed to the side. A face was in his, dark hazel eyes staring down on him, she called again;
“Hey, wake up,” Kai scowled closing his eyes once more. “Kai, you know its today and people refuse to come in if I open up,” Kai huffed, cracking his eyes open again to see his sister messing with his drawers, who were not cooperating as she strained to pull the left side out which had wedged itself into the wood. “Its the collection ceremony today, and in case you forgot; do you think we need to be on Clouse's list again?”
“I know, Nya,” Kai drawled, voice croaky and unused, “I know, just get out so I can get dressed.” Nya sighed, ragging the drawer out of its wedged place before walking out, probably to get dressed herself as he didn’t miss that she was in her blue pyjamas. The door clicked shut and Kai himself climbed out of bed, stumbling to his neatly folded clothes. He pulled them out and threw them onto the bed. He had known this day was approaching fast, but he didn’t realise that it would be here now. He pulled his shirt off, grabbing a new white one, picking at its buttons and pulling at the collar, he needed to look presentable, customers always judged him when they came into the shop. He presumed it was because of his appearance, unfortunately he had always had a baby face, even with the scar which cut through his left brow. He moved to the mirror in the corner of his room, looking at the mop of hair which laid flat messily on his head. He scrunched his face as he messed with it. It didn’t take long until his hair was spiked the way he liked it. Pulling away from the mirror, he changed his trousers and pulled an apron which hung at the side by his door.
Upon walking from his room, he noticed Nya was tinkering with a small watch – more specifically their fathers watch. It was the only thing left from their parents, well other than the blacksmith shop which the two siblings now currently own. He could already feel the heat from his hands. He noticed that she had gotten dressed, wearing her own uniform, her hair was down still, though looked to have been brushed, dark hair which curled at the bottom hanging loosely over her shoulders. She had put on some makeup too, Kai noted, only by the fact that her eyelashes were a lot more noticeable and her beauty mark – which would usually sit above her right cheekbone – was no where to be seen.
She was sat at their only table, a little landing in the small flat, just in front of their so-called kitchen. She absentmindedly kicked her legs, her socks scuffing the old wooden floor, something which made Kai cringe, he could already feel whatever splinters she was bound to get. Her full attention was on the small device, an old device, watching at it’s gears stood still, old and brown, much like the ones they had in the stove to keep it working – although its gears were a lot bigger than the ones in the watch.
“You’re not helping with the shop then,” Kai clicked his tongue as he moved across the room, purposely stomping. “Its not like we need the coin, right Nya? I’m sure Clouse will be fine if we’re a little short, especially after last time.”
Nya looked up and glared at Kai, stopping her fidgeting with the small gadget, “we both know that I’m going to help, but there’s only so much I can do without your... y'know-"
“Yeah, I know,” he snapped, now turned away from her as he began to walk down their old stairs, the first few steps creaking under his weight. He didn’t need to see her stand up from the table, the screeching of the chair told him so. He was then followed downstairs where he began his routine of opening the shop.
“You act as though its not just us two here,” Nya flicked the curtains open, opening the windows soon after. “I know you don’t like to use *it* but it could help with us raising the coin.”
“That's if we get customers Nya, we can’t guarantee that anyone is going to be wanting to buy anything anyway.” Kai moved to the back of the store, to the forge , switching on the machine, hearing his sister rush in after him.
“No,” she drawled, “but I know that with the heat you can wield the metals faster, and then we’d have more weapons to sell.”
Although Kai wasn’t looking at his sister, he could feel her plastered grin staring a hole into the back of his head. His headache felt worse now. “If you’re wanting me to open up, I can’t be back here *making* them, you’re going to have to be the one to be in here, and last I checked,” Kai smirked and he looked back at Nya, raising his hand into the air, a bright, small flame engulfed it, “you don’t have any fire powers.”
Nya scoffed, “and that’s why I got you up this early dimwit. Now you can do both.”
“Oh the real mastermind appears,” Kai moved to the storage chest, the flame around his fist now gone as he opened it up. “I’m not an idiot Nya, I know for a fact that you can make this stuff way better than me, what’s your edge?”
“Okay, I admit, I just wanted you to speed things up a notch,” Nya was beside him, copying his movement as he moved the different irons and steels. “The more we have in stock, the more people we can try to convince to buy some of this stuff. Besides I’m sure if there’s a ‘Smith Sale’ that would sway some heads.”
Kai stopped for a moment. “You’re not being serious.” He stared at Nya as she held that smug look, passing him a slat of steel, both silently watching the other to see who would crack.
Fortunately, Nya was the first to break it. “C'mon hotshot, get lighting up, we’re on a schedule and those weapons aren’t going to heat themselves up.” Her tone was teasing, but there was a glint of a challenge in her eyes. She wasn’t messing with him, she really wanted him to do this.
“You owe me for this,” Kai threatened, feeling his arms burning up, the heat that coursed through his veins was quick and concentrated, he could already feel the metal warp into his hands as he held it.
“I owe you for not getting us kicked out, or being sent to the Darkley’s? Really?”
At this point he was being petty as he leaned into her space and said, “really.” She groaned, moving away from him as she got to work in the other side of the room.
The silence was deafening, with nothing but the sounds of heavy metal clashing with fire and the sloshing sound which came from the molten on the forger. Kai looked up to see his sister flip up her metallic mask, facing him with a scrunched up face. Why was she making that face for? He scowled right back at her, watching as she moved closer to Kai. It was only when she lifted up something golden towards him that he understood why. “I think this one could be done better.”
“Oh yeah?” Kai drawled, looking lazily over the golden weapon. It didn’t look bad to him. It had everything that it should have. He tugged it from her hold, making her grunt in annoyance. Okay, sure, it looked pretty dull, as though Kai and Nya hadn’t been preparing it for months on end. He twisted it in his hand, feeling the delicate embroidery that was the legacy of the siblings. His thumb traced over every crease and crevice, feeling the smooth, cold metal, and yet as clear as day, Kai could see what his sister meant. It wouldn’t be any use in battle. A dull blade was no more use than a small knife, because it was not shaped into perfection, it would break easily and you would fall prey to its delivery. Kai could only groan as he looked back up to his sister. She hadn’t noticed him staring, but he could tell she was lost in a train of thought. It was always in her eyes, they always became distant, as though she was looking at something far away, as her fingers twiddled, always needing to be doing something as she thought. It was a circular motion, she would tap each finger to whichever was closest and again in a disjointed pattern. When she finally looked back at him, she blinked.
“So?”
“I could make it sharper if you’re asking.” That seemed to be the correct answer as Kai watched a look bloom on Nya's face. She moved away from him, pulling her mask back down as she made hasty work to the other side of the room. Kai looked at the blade again. It had taken them roughly three months to make the small sword. It all stemmed from an old letter the two had found along with some valuable metals that their parents had graciously kept stored under the shop. While Kai and Nya had been apprehensive when they had first seen the blueprints, it was Nya's idea to create them and sell them off for more coin. Though it seemed that they had really made hasty work of this sword if it was so dull. Kai felt his body warm up, his cheeks tingling slightly, and he knew they were going a little red – they always did whenever he was using his power – and soon the heat flooded to his hands where he could feel them boil. It always felt as though his hands should be searing, torn apart by the heat and crumbling to the floor, but they never did. As a matter of fact, at this heat, they looked as normal as hands could. Sure, his knuckles would turn a little redder than usual, but with the slight blush that travelled across his whole body it was easy to mistake it for being nothing but natural. His hands held the hilt tightly, Kai watching the trail of the embroidery – which looked like three thin snakes were undercrossing with each other, weaving in and out, yet still having room that Kai could press his fingers comfortably into the hilt. It was hard to tell where the hilt of the sword ended and where the blade began as the snakes travelled upwards and into the blade. Kai spun it around in his hand and smirked at the whooshing sound it made. On one hand, it was the perfect blade, it was light, easy to manoeuvre and it looked beautiful. Kai would be impressed if he was killed by a weapon so beautiful. Its only downfall was the blade itself. It was a simple job however, simply sharpening. The blade could be heated and sharpened to make the blade a little thicker without Kai having to cut it. The gold shone brightly back at Kai as he looked at himself in the reflection.
For a moment he saw his mothers eyes staring back.
Sighing, he placed it upon the workshop, he would come back to that specific job later, right now he had been in the middle of something before Nya decided that she would graciously interrupt his work. He took both his hands and he brought up the steaming new weapon that had been sat waiting patiently. Just like the sword he had put down, he had decided to make one very similar to it, using the blueprints to make the copy, though now was made with iron. It was weaker but that really didn’t matter if it could sell. The other golden weapons, as their had been two others they had made in the past, had been bought immediately, and that had been the thing to save their hides when Clouse’s men had come looking for coin from them. He hoped that the gold and Iron sword would be enough to save them again. He took it to a slab of rock which stood at the side of the room, and placed it down. He was never the biggest fan of shaping the weapons, he found Nya was less clumsy than him, and was more precise with her hits, but currently she was tinkering with whatever – hopefully not dad’s watch, the two had far more important things than that – and he still wasn’t sure if he was ready to ask her to do something for him yet.
They still hadn’t settled what had happened before, and Kai was nothing if not stubborn. He hit the blade three times, each time feeling the vibrations run up his arms, shivering slightly at the feeling. Still, he did it again, looking out for nicks or kinks which may have stood out. Unconsciously Kai felt his hands become tingly and it was only when the feeling of pins and needles settled into his fingers that he realised that he had been absorbing the scolding heat from the sword. It was a power which he possessed, though was far more complicated than simply heating up his body. Even when he began training how to control his powers since he was eight, this was a power he had not mastered and usually his body naturally called to it whenever he needed to. He would absorb the heat from the object which was closest – if it was a fire – or he was touching. It always left a strange aftermath of his body feeling tingly and numb, though Nya had mentioned beforehand that it could be because it wasn’t his natural body heat so his body was probably overstimulated by the amount of heat. Or something along those lines.
A few more hits and Kai was satisfied. He moved the weapon, which now resembled a machete, to their grinder. “Hey what are you doing?” Kai called out, not turning back to Nya.
“Fixing that tea pot we got yesterday. I’ve cleaned it and got all the rust from it, but there’s something jamming it,” Kai remembered the woman who had brought the tea pot. She looked around eighty years old, or so. She had offered Kai a small sum of coin for asking to fix the tea pot as she said that it had been important to her and she had been holding it for a friend. At first Kai had explained that a blacksmith probably wasn’t the best shop to get a teapot fixed, yet the old woman was very eager that Kai had to be the one to fix it.
“You have fixed things in the past have you not? I need it for a special occasion, you see, and I’m sure my friend would not be impressed if I gave them a teapot that couldn’t make the simplest of teas.”
Now Kai wasn’t always so suspicious of people, but Kai could see the mischievous glint the woman had in her eyes as she stared at him with a smile that seemed much too big for her face. She had begged him, followed him when he had been tending to other customers and while Kai had kept his cool – or as cool as someone as hot headed as he was – the woman would not stop pestering. It was only after Kai had called out to Nya, now at his wits end, that the woman began to explain to Nya what she had said to Kai. He didn’t catch much of their conversation, but instead of Nya pushing the teapot back into the woman’s hands, they worked out a price and Nya bid the lady goodbye and took the teapot into the back.
“This teapot is advanced though,” that got Kai's attention. “I’ve seen teapot machines before, they’re expensive and they’re really hard to create, with something that heats up the water by itself whenever it sensed that it was cold. It runs on steam power too, which is pretty handy when its boiling water.” Nya gave a small laugh to herself, like an inside joke but fiddled with the inside of the teapot. “But this one is different, it still uses steam power, though the layout of the teapot is all different. It has compartments like it can keep things hidden within it, and a latch which can realise them. From the looks of it, its just tea leaves, but I’ve never seen one this advanced before.”
“so can you fix it?” Asked Kai as Nya cleaned the inside. “What’s actually wrong with it?”
“The door to the compartments keeps getting jammed on something, and it was pretty rusty. I’ve replaced a lot of the interior, which is simple in itself but I can’t get this door unjammed.”
“I can do you a swap?” He wasn’t as delicate as his sister, machines were definitely more her thing, but with his powers, he could possible help with getting the compartment unstuck.
“No you’re good,” she replied quickly, “I really don’t want to replace anymore of the inside, I think I’m almost there, its just stubborn.”
The thought of her trying to open his drawers came to mind. Maybe she was trying to shimmy it? Kai shrugged, “well, alright then.”
Kai made quick work of grinding the machete, feeling it bend and shape under his hands. As he lifted it up to take a look at his work, a jingle of a bell stopped the two siblings. Kai turned to Nya, who then looked up at the clock, they had only been down for forty minutes, they still had an hour or so left. Kai took slow deep breaths as he placed the machete on the side of the workshop, and moved towards the front of the shop. He could feel Nya's eyes staring into his back as he moved.
When he opened the door to the main shop, he was greeted with an old man stood in the middle of the shop. Kai shoulders relaxed as he pressed more into the room. The man wasn’t looking towards Kai, he was looking at the display boards with two hands behind his back. He looked like an upper-class man, with his velvet robes, anyone from three miles away could see how soft and thick the clothing looked. It was a far cry from Kai's own thin as paper shirt and apron. The man had short grey hair, slicked back, along with long facial hair which trailed down beyond his chest. He hummed as he looked upon the displays, and when he heard Kai close the door behind him, he gave him a small smile. Kai watched him wearily. “We’re closed.” He said bluntly, looking over to the door, which he was sure they hadn’t unlocked that morning, though nothing like a break in was visible. They hadn’t forgotten to lock up that night had they? No, even if Kai had forgotten, Nya always checked for the both of them. It was their routine before they headed upstairs after cleaning up. Kai couldn’t help but ask, “how did you get in here?”
The man gave a short laugh, his voice deep and rich, much like most upper class men were. They spoke from deep within their chest, demanding authority to be given to them, though with the way that the man was looking at him, he looked gentle, kind, Kai would even say. “By the door, of course,” the man had said, and Kai moved towards the door, pressing his lips together as he cleared his throat awkwardly.
“I’m really sorry about this, old man, but I’m going to have to ask you to leave, we’re not open yet.” Kai opened the door and shrugged at the man. An emotion which Kai couldn’t decipher flashed on the man's face, but it was once again replaced by the small warm smile.
“Of course, my apology for my intrusion, my brother only mentioned some special weapons that you had made, and I couldn’t resist wanting to come see them for myself,” the man nodded at Kai as he walked from the shop. “I think he’ll be back this afternoon, actually, we’ve heard many stories about the Smith's Workshop. You’re parents were great blacksmiths too.”
“What?” Kai tensed as he stared at the old man, who only hummed in response, a small smirk appearing on his face as he gave a wink to Kai and began to walk away. “Hey!” He called out to the man who was taking steady pace now down the street. “You know our parents?”
“Why, of course,” Kai felt his heart drop as he could feel a breath on his neck, his fathers last words ringing in his head as the man looked back at Kai. “You are the spitting image of your mother, that sister of yours too. But that is a story for another day. Have a good day young man.”
Kai felt the need to run after the man, ask him everything that he had known about his parents. He had mentioned their mother too – the very mother who had been banished to the Dark Lands for being an elemental. Blood rushed from his face as Kai slammed the door shut, locking it, then double checking it.
“Who was that?” Nya asked, when he came into the back, where he took a deep breath.
“I don’t know.” Kai answered honestly as the man's words burned deeply into his mind. You are the spitting image of your mother, that sister of yours too. Was someone messing with them? Had they learnt of their heritage and they decided to have some fun with them? But the old man had seemed so nice, why would he want to do that? The change in the old man's face came to mind. Had he not wanted to leave? Perhaps Kai had been too rude, he sometimes got reprimanded by Nya for being too rude and brunt to customers. Something didn’t sit right with Kai as he continued to grind the machete like before.
Nya didn’t question anymore, now more excited that she had managed to wedge the compartment free from the old of a bag of tea leaves. “That woman has to be more careful, I wonder why she decided to put a bag of tealeaves in rather than just the tealeaves?” Kai shrugged, as he got to work on the golden weapon Nya had brought to him beforehand. “Well, I’m going to start setting up outside, we have around half an hour before we open up. I’m gong to leave this here, okay? After I’ve done setting up, I’m going to call for this beauty to be picked up.”
Kai only nodded as he listened to Nya leave the room, leaving Kai by himself. He let himself sigh as he slumped into the chair. They already had the deadline of the coin, Kai really didn’t want to worry about the Emperor being on their back. The only saving grace to all of it was that his parents had never married, Kai and Nya were children out of wedlock, if only to keep them safe. When everything had gone down, Kai had been seven, Nya five, and as his mothers trial came to an end, both his parents had pledged to not know the other, saving both Kai and Nya from facing their own trial.
Kai groaned as he leaned forward placing his head into his hands. A year later after his father disappeared, Kai had learnt that he had been gifted the curse of the Smith family. He was an Elemental, specifically of fire, something his father forgot to mention to the children. The only saving grace was that Nya had shown no signs of being an Elemental, meaning worst comes to worst that Kai was ever found out, denial would save his sisters life.
What were they going to do?
Kai didn’t dwell on the thought long, he had work to do. The half an hour passed rather quickly, with Nya popping her head back around the door, with a smile she spoke, “I think we’re all good to open now.”
Kai looked at the two new additions of the weaponry, picked them up and brought them to the front where Nya took them from his hands and began sorting them. “We heard from the old lady yet?” Kai asked as he switched the label on the door from “closed" to “open".
“Yeah, she’s making her way down, she’s just from near Stiix, she’s just getting the train back up.” Kai gaped at Nya.
“Stiix?” Kai asked, confused, “she’s coming up from Stiix for a teapot? Isn’t that like the other side of Ninjago? Should a woman her age be travelling that far?”
“Well it isn’t pleasant, but I knew that both of you would get it working again,” Kai jumped at the new voice, turning quickly to meet the cold grin of the so-called-lady stood behind him. He hadn’t even heard the bell chime as she came in.
“Oh – well – I just didn’t think you would be here so quickly, is there usually a train at this time?” Kai blubbering as he moved towards the till, smiling awkwardly. He heard Nya snicker at his response as she moved to the back of the shop to retrieve the tea pot.
“Oh, no, no, no,” the old woman responded as she got out her purse moving towards the till with Kai. “Unfortunately there isn’t so I had to make my own means to get here.”
Kai really didn’t want to question how the lady had managed to cross the country so fast. “How much did we agree to have it fixed?”
Before the lady could ask, Nya spoke above her as she placed the teapot besides the till. “I think it was two-hundred and fifty coin, right?”
The old lady nodded, as she placed the money in Nya's hand, “I couldn’t thank you enough, young one, without this teapot, I don’t think I would ever see my dear friends and family again.”
Alarm bells rang in Kai's head as the woman picked up the teapot and bid the two farewell. He looked at the coin which Nya had busied herself counting. “She gave us more than two-hundred and fifty, I think its about three-hundred and ten.”
“Three-hundred and ten? Why would she give us so much for a teapot?” Nya shrugged but gave Kai the money anyhow.
“I wouldn’t question it, now if we keep that going we should have enough coin to cover everything.”
That was better said than done. It had been four hours and they only received one customer, who ended up giving them two-hundred and thirty coin. They had raised five-hundred and forty coin, which was pretty good, but not so much when they needed so much more. Not even Nya's little “Smith Sale" bargain was helping turn heads. He supposed everyone was in the same boat, everyone needed to make the coin for today and not to be unfair to the siblings but who actually wanted to buy weapons for everyday use? The teapot had been a special item, but Kai was really considering that they should set up a small side business in which Nya could fix appliances. They would probably make far more money that way.
Nya sighed as she sat on the stairs which lead up to the apartment. “I don’t think we’re making that coin.”
“Maybe they’ll let us off if we tell them our age? We'll just end up losing all our money, possessions and this shop to be send to some boarding school like Darkley's where we can be raised into respectable people.”
“I would like to see you go one day in that place and survive,” Nya rolled her eyes as she stood back up. “Wait, I think someone’s coming.”
Low and behold, someone did indeed come into the shop. It had been a young man, with black hair slicked back, green markings covering his eyes in a variety of shades, with pale skin he looked almost sickly. If it wasn’t for his built, Kai would have thought that the young man was ill, but the way he stood told him otherwise. Or he was very good at hiding it. The man wore similar robes to the old man who had came in before, in fact, looking at him, if he had more wrinkles and more facial hair, Kai could see the resemblance. This must be the brother the old man had spoken about.
Unlike the old man, the brother had a permanent scowl on his face. Kai supposed he would be angry all the time if he also had strange green markings covering his eyes. Had it been from an accident? The brother didn’t seem blind as he looked around the shop, his finger running along many of the displays as he scrunched his face in disgust. Well, if he was going to be like that, why would he come into the workshop in the first place?
His demeanour changed when he spotted the very sword Kai had been working on this morning. More specifically, it had been the golden sword that the siblings had works on for months. His eyes widened and Kai could see Nya's own light up in delight as she made her way over.
“I see you’ve seen one of our most expensive weapons,” so much for her big “Smith Sale", it seemed like Nya was wanting to try and gain as much coin as she could from the young man. Kai couldn’t blame her, he looked wealthy, and well they needed the coin to survive.
“I see,” the man replied, “may I touch it?” He asked, when Nya nodded, he then took the sword into his grasp. “This is good craftsmanship, its exactly what I expected.”
Nya looked back at Kai confused, but all he could do was shrug. “Well, if you’re interested in it so much, perhaps we could strike up a price?”
“How does twenty-thousand coin sound?” The young man sounded uninterested as he examined the sword. Both the Smith siblings gaped, Nya looked back to Kai flabbergasted.
“Are you-"
“That sounds great!” Kai practically shouted from the till, laughing off his loud tone as he cleared his throat and made eye contact with the young man. “Is that all you wanted, because we also have so much more to offer if you’re looking for swords?”
“No, this will do,” the man brought the sword to the till and gave Kai a small plastic card. Okay, so this man was wealthy, wealthy. Kai took the card and swiped it across the till. A chime came from the till and Kai wrote in the amount before another chime went off and Kai gave the young man his card back. The young man smirked almost cruelly as he took the sword into his hands and lifted it into the air. “This is just perfect.” Kai blinked at the man before nodding goodbye as the man left.
“That wasn’t just me, right? He was strange.” Nya nodded, though came to the back of the till to look at the number. “But he gave us more than the amount we needed.”
The two siblings stood there, just staring at the amount as a small receipt began to print itself out. “There’s still four hours to hand it in, do you think we should keep open until then?” Kai nodded before placing the receipt into his pocket.
To say that those four hours passed quickly was an understatement, the two were practically buzzing when they closed up shop. They had six new customers who bought the small things, and Ronin – a local thief – had decided to drop by too, and bought far more things than the two were ever going to let the royal guards know. They had even asked about the old Lady – as Ronin had set up shop down in Stiix – but unfortunately it seemed that he hadn’t ran into any old lady like the one they had described. It really was a big world out there. Nya was bouncing when Kai locked up shop, holding the clothed bag of coin and the receipt in his pocket, they both made they’re way down the street.
“So this will give us three years without pay,” Nya explained as they walked. “Meaning everything else and go onto what we actually need, like food and such.”
“It also means I can sleep in a little more often now.” Nya rolled her eyes at him, but he chuckled anyhow.
The streets were packed, people everywhere, probably to give their offerings to Clouse. Kai and Nya weaved their way through the crowd, knocking and getting knocked into by people as like ants they all tried to scramble over each other. “We just have to make it to the city square and get in line.” He heard Nya shout behind him. He gave her a thumbs up, though now in hindsight, had not been the best idea, as he had raised his hand holding the seven-hundred and so coin, and it seemed as though it had gained the attention of others.
With a crowd so thick, it was hard to make heads of tails, and even harder when Kai suddenly felt someone grab the back of his shirt, pulling sharply back on the collar. His first thought was that Nya had grabbed onto his shirt to stop her from falling behind. He was very mistaken when he was roughly thrown back and dragged through the crowded streets. Kai couldn’t think, it was happening too fast as he brought his hands to his neck to try and stop his shirt from strangling him. He thrashed around, but it was to no avail, his only saving grace was when he was thrown to the ground and released. Kai coughed as he pulled his shirt away from his neck, taking a gasp of air as he looked up to see who had decided to chose him as their target.
He was faced with three men. From one to the other, the three were double the size of Kai, and they were grinning like hungry dogs. The bag Kai was currently holding jingled. So that’s what they wanted. Well if that was the case, Kai could give them a run for his money.
“You look a little young there, with all that money, mommy and daddy let you go out on your own?” One of them – one who had three missing teeth and what looked like could have been once a white tank top though now was looking rather yellow. He looked much older than Kai, by the grey strand in his beard, he’d take a guess at thirty. He sniffed before spitting on the ground. Kai turned his nose at the brown mucus which had landed next to him, standing up he resisted the urge to throw up.
“Manners much?” He responded, wrapping the bag around his hand, he brought them up as fists. If they wanted to play that game then Kai would teach them a lesson. Another laughed, this one was wearing a purple beanie, he was smaller than the others in both height and size. He looked younger than them too, yet shared some resemblance to the Yellow Vest. Maybe brothers?
“Kid's got a mouth on him, hasn’t he?” He continued laughing, almost doubling over as he placed his hands on his knees. “And look at the poor lad, he thinks he can take on all three of us.”
“I don’t think, I know I can, who’s first?” Purple Beanie stopped laughing, if only for a moment, before doubling down in hysterics again.
“Alright, so you want this the hard way,” the third one had a deep voice. One which reverberated through his body, his heart stammering if only for a second as he took a step towards Kai. He was the largest of the three, he looked older than Purple Beanie but younger than Yellow Vest. He was more tanned, and honestly looked well for himself, unlike the other two. Kai steeled himself as he took a step back, raising his hands higher as he tightened his fists. “Just give us the money kid, and we’ll let you leave to run to mommy and daddy.”
“Stupid parents relying on a kid this young, I bet you begged them to take that money, to be a real adult,” Yellow Vest spat on the ground again. “Something you should learn here kid, is that you shouldn’t leave home without a real adult.”
“I really don’t need life lessons from someone like you,” Kai spat. He couldn’t make the first move, he knew that whatever strength he did have wouldn’t be a match for them, all he could hope was that because of their tall stature, he would have the speed to make up for it.
Kai barely got a second to move before a large fist was heading his way. As though his body had reacted by itself, he found himself ducking under and around an arm. Man Bun had gone directly for him. Dark green eyes met deep black ones, as Man Bun recoiled and swung his elbow towards Kai again. Everything felt like slow motion as Kai pushed himself back again. Kai was almost sure that he was going to fall flat on his back, yet a tug from the left stopped his momentum. Pulling at the clothed bag was Yellow Vest, with wide eyes and a crooked smile he tried to rip the bag toward him. Kai grunted as he twisted his body, grasping onto the bag with both hands, he used Yellow Vest's strength to lift himself into the air, and gave him a swift kick to the nose. Now Kai really did fall to the ground with a grunt of pain.
He heard a shout, probably that of Yellow Vest as he was sure he felt his foot made something crack. Scrambling to his feet, Kai panted heavily just as he felt someone grab a fistful of his hair and slam him into the alleyways wall. Kai had shouted himself, bringing his hands to his head he could do nothing but wheeze when a fist uppercut him. He felt saliva drop from his mouth as he fell to his knees.
“Stupid kid,” one of them said, Kai couldn’t tell which one. “Just get the bag and let’s be done with this, its sadly pathetic.”
Kai grit his teeth, and although winded, brought the bag closer to his chest. He looked back up to see the three cornering him again, and with shaking legs he stood back up, rubbing the spit from his chin. Kai was about to move, attack, yet just as he was about to, he watched as a figure leaped onto Purple Beanie's back, wrapping their legs around their chest and one arm across his neck as the other stuck straight. It wasn’t until he heard the familiar shout of his sister calling his name that he realised what was happening. Nya had come running after him.
“Nya!” He heard himself call as Purple Beanie was sent reeling back and away from his friends, gasping in Nya's hold. Kai rushed for Yellow Vest, throwing his full weight on the man as he reached for Nya. They both slid to the floor, though with a cushioned fall, Kai managed to get back up with out scrapes. He used the bag he still had wrapped around his hand and used it to smash into Yellow Vest. There was a lot of shouting, from Yellow Vest, Purple Beanie, Nya, Man Bun and from himself. Kai didn’t know how long it had lasted until he was thrown off a spluttering Yellow Vest – though now was it red and orange vest? Sunset vest? – Man Bun holding him high by the scruff of his top. Kai went with his earlier attack and smashed the bag of coins into Man Bun, he managed three hits until his wrist was stopped and he was in a tug of war with Man Bun.
“Just give me the damn money, you little brat!”
“Get off me!” Kai screamed and kicked, thrashing his body in any way to get out of the older man’s grasp. Suddenly Kai was thrown back into the wall, yet the pull in the clothed bag and his top had stopped. Kai spluttered and fell onto his butt as he looked up to see Man Bun pinned by none other than a stream of water. Kai coughed as he shuffled away on the floor. Man Bun was trying to push against the water, although it was to no avail as it kept him glued to the wall. Kai could see him struggle against it. A hand came onto his shoulder and Kai whipped his head around, ready for yet another fight, but when his eyes met dark hazel ones he froze.
Nya didn’t look down at him, her eyes trained on the man pinned to the wall, a purple bruise already forming on her right cheek. The makeup she had put on was absolutely ruined, her lipstick smudged slightly to the side, as did her mascara. When she did finally look down at him, the water stopped and Man Bun fell to the ground. Nya tugged on Kai's shoulder, and with a little difficulty, Kai stood up, raising an arm in front of Nya as Man Bun also got up. Kai didn’t want to take his eyes away from Man Bun, but he did worry about where Yellow Vest and Purple Beanie were. Were they behind them? Were they still surrounded?
“Kai we’ve got to go,” Nya spoke quietly, still tugging on his top as he felt her stepping back.
“What was that?” Words pierced him like venom, Man Bun looked back up to Kai, throwing daggers at the young boy. “That power, that wasn’t no ordinary burst pipe.”
Another tug and Kai felt himself stepping back along with Nya.
Not an ordinary burst pipe? No that wasn’t. The pressure was so direct that it had barely hit Kai, only splashed him in the face with a couple of droplets. The pressure too, to send someone as strong as Man Bun into the wall, dragging Kai along with him.
Another tug.
“Let’s go,” he whispered to Nya as he turned on his heel and practically ran from the alleyway grasping his sister's wrist as he did so.
“There an Elemental!” He heard Man Bun yell as they ran. “A water Elemental!”
Kai pushed past the crowds which were still swarming the city. Only now there were whispers of the forbidden word, moving just as fast as the siblings were through the crowd. He had to keep moving. The bag of coins had been forgotten in the alleyway as he realised that with one hand he held onto Nya and the other he was using to push passed people. Man Bun had gotten what he had wanted and it was Kai in more trouble.
He could feel himself burning up. “Kai stop!” He heard Nya call out as they came to a less packed area, the market place. Now only people approached them with hopes of selling food; jewellery; among other things. Kai brushed passed all of them. It was hot. He felt hot. “Kai please just wait!” Kai was stopped in his track when Nya suddenly decided to stop walking. He turned to her, agitated.
“We can’t stop, Nya,” he hissed through his gritted teeth, eyes bouncing to every person who seemed to also stop to watch them. “I saw what happened back there.”
“Your hand,” she replied, pulling at his fingers on her wrist. For a moment Kai was confused, what about his fingers? It was only when he let go of her that he saw that he had been burning her.
“Nya, I’m sorry,” he gasped, taking a step closer to inspect her wrist. He had noticed that he had been burning up but he hadn’t even thought about what that could have meant for her. His heart was in his throat when she pulled her wrist to her chest.
“Its okay,” she spoke in a soft voice, though before she could say anything more there was a gasp. Kai snapped his head up towards it to see that a pot of water was now empty, instead there was a bubble of water floating above it, dripping slowly into the bowl. Kai stared at it for a moment before there were more gasps, more water seemingly bubbling into the air as though gravity had decided to very slowly switch places. “Kai?”
Kai bit his lip as he looked around. “Nya, I need you to stop doing this,” his heart hammered in his chest. “I need you to-"
“I can’t,” she sounded panicked, she was scared.
“Okay, okay, okay,” Kai spoke fast looking at her. He himself had to get himself under control. He needed to not be hot, he needed to be cool. “Deep breaths,” he said, though whether it was for himself or her, he didn’t know. “In and out.”
He breathed with her, slowly feeling himself relax. For a moment he thought that they were alright, that they were going to be alright. But it didn’t last very long. A shout was heard over the bumbling conversations of the water;
“There she is, the water witch!” Man Bun's voice rang out as the sounds of the Royal Guards came running towards Kai and Nya.
Kai felt himself pause as he watched them come before he snapped into action, gripping Nya by her shoulders. “I need you to run, run as fast as you can, and I need you to get out of here.”
Nya stared at him, wide eyed. “What about you?”
Kai shook his head, “Nya, run now.”
He then pushed her forward, turning towards the guards, he took a deep breath. He could do this.
“She’s getting away!” shouted Man Bun. Kai gritted his teeth as he felt himself burning up again. Only this time, he let himself boil. He felt sweat stick to his skin, his heart thundering in his chest as Kai felt the heat race through his body. The guards didn’t have eyes on him yet, but they soon would do when suddenly his arms were engulfed in red.
“You’re not looking for water, you idiots!” Kai called towards the guards, now the people were gasping at him. “Its fire that you’re really after!”
Now, Kai was all about attention, even now he felt some satisfaction that he had all the eyes on him. He could help a smug eating grin form on his face as he lifted his arms to the side and raised a brow. He had always dreamt of this moment. Not because he wanted it to come, but seeing the shocked faces of those who could have never imagined Kai could be an Elemental. Especially such a dangerous element such as fire.
“You want me?” He rhetorically asked as the guards made a charge at him. He then whispered, “come get me.” Kai lowered his arms just as the guards came close enough and drew their swords up at Kai's neck.
“Tell us your name Elemental!” They demanded and Kai gulped.
“Kai. Kai Umas,” he replied, putting his hands up into the air as one of them grabbed them roughly and placed them behind his back.
“Umas, you say?” he was pushed forward, “That’s a very specific name, kid.” Kai knew that, of course. He was pushed passed people, as he walked, he realised that he didn’t feel hot anymore. In fact, he felt really cold. His hands twitched in the handcuffs that had placed on him. He wiggled his hands, but to no avail, he still felt really cold. “Its vengestone.” Kai made a confused noise he looked up to the guard walking in front of him. “Vengestone, it stops all of that elemental power that’s going on in your body."
“Vengestone?” Kai asked, but got no more information as they came to a carriage. Of course this would be how they would be travelling to the palace. He was being sent to the Emperor to decide on which way he was going to be killed. Kai pressed his lips tightly together as he was gently shoved by the shoulder. He clambered into the back with one of the guards and sat on the cool, metallic floor. Kai felt the carriage start up, looking through the golden bars, he was able to see the city. As if to mock Kai, it suddenly started to rain. Dark clouds over taking what used to be a sunny blue sky. Kai felt his eyes sting.
“Heroic thing you did back there." Kai turned to the guard who was looking at the city through the bars too. “Sacrificing yourself for that young girl. You should have just left her, she’ll be taken in soon too and you’re both going to be killed for nothing.”
Kai blinked at the guard. He rolled his shoulders back as he leaned against the metal bars. He didn’t respond, if only because he could feel the words cursing his tongue, and unlike usual, Kai was not the one holding the sword. His thoughts drifted to Nya. He had left her, left her to run. The guard could very well be right. At least when his mother had been captured, his father had denied any relation to her, and had hid his powers. He had given both Kai and Nya a chance. But Kai couldn’t have stood there and done nothing. He shifted slightly, his chest now beginning to burn from where he had been winded earlier. He had always hoped that Nya hadn’t inherited the family curse. How stupid could he have been. Even now, he had left her to fend for herself, he couldn’t even try to take down this measly guard as he was sure all it would get him was a quick death.
Perhaps he could appeal to the Emperor? Tell him his sad story? Like heck. The Emperor would probably slice his head off right then and there. He didn’t care for Elementals. He didn’t care for anything.
The ride to the palace was a slow one. Kai spent most of the time fretting that he would hear some news about the capture of Nya. It never came. He took a deep breath when the carriage cell came to a stop. The guard moved before he did, moving out of the cell, then stepping back to allow Kai to jump out. It didn’t take long before Kai was shoved to the ground.
“This him?” A new guard spoke, voice gruff and Kai coughed up dirt that had made its way into his mouth. “Get up Elemental.” Kai was forced to get up without to use of his arms, and as humiliating as it was Kai couldn’t help to spit more and more dirt from his mouth. “Bradley, let the Emperor know that we got one coming straight for him.” Kai looked up to see four more guards were surrounding him. A younger boy – looked younger than Kai honestly – was sent away quickly, as the other guards drew their swords to Kai. He pulled a face to them, even recognising some. “Come on then, we don’t want to leave the Emperor waiting.”
Yeah, they could, Kai thought as he was lead up the stairs to the large wooden door to the dark Palace. Kai gulped when he saw the large corridor. When people had mentioned that the Palace was made out of black marble Kai had thought they had been lying. After all, how could there be enough marble to fill a Palace? Apparently quite a bit as Kai took in the interior. Golden rims stuck to the side and columns, standing out against the deep pools of black. Kai felt the air being sucked out of his lungs like something was forcibly pushing it out. There wasn’t any decorative, only candles which were lit in a purple flame, which rather hung from the walls or stood besides the many columns. More guards stood beside each flame.
Kai continued walking with the swords all aimed for his neck, turning to one corridor to the next until finally they reached a large double black door. Kai looked up at it and felt his blood drain from his face. Just beyond those walls was none other than the so-called Emperor.
Surprisingly, despite the fear, Kai felt relatively calm. His heart wasn’t pounding as such now, and he found that he was slowly catching his breath again. Perhaps it was because he knew that he was fated to die, and there was nothing in his power that he could do to stop that. Is that what his mother felt when she was stood here, waiting for the doors to open? Not knowing if he and Nya would survive even after she had passed? Had she been so calm? A smile came to mind, a small, yet gentle smile of his mother. She had always been calm.
The sound of the doors being opened made Kai jump as he was pushed forward again. Now the swords were put away, pulling away from his neck as someone grabbed the cuffs he still had on and pushed him forward. Kai took in his surroundings, seeing a room full of people – he had not expected an audience – people he had never seen before. There were a few Kai knew, Clouse, who must have been pulled from the city centre as soon as it was announced there was an Elemental; Chen, the Emperor’s right hand man, he came into the shops now and again to buy weapons from the Smith’s; and lastly stood the old man and the younger brother from this morning. Kai blinked at them both, confused of how or why the two brothers were on the council of the Emperor. Who were they? He hadn’t even gotten a name from either of them.
Kai's steps faltered as he tripped. “You are the spitting image of your mother, that sister of yours too.” That old man knew. He had known about him and Nya. Had he known that Nya was an Elemental too? No surely not. Kai stared at the old man, who looked back with no emotion. Kai tried to search his face for anything, any give away that the old man had known anything about the Smith siblings. Being pulled to a stop Kai realised that he hadn’t even looked up to his executioner once. Breath caught in his throat as he was pushed to his knees. He couldn’t look up. Should he look up? Kai felt like he was choking, suddenly the air in the room had become denser. Or had it always been this dense? No, surely not. Kai tried to focus on his breathing. In and out. He felt so cold. He was still calm. No, that was stupid, he wasn’t acting calm, he was numb. He was paralysed with so much fear that he was mistaking it for being calm. He was terrified. He wanted to cry. He couldn’t cry. He had to remain strong. He had to escape. He had to find Nya.
“What is this?” Kai stopped breathing. The Emperor had finally decided to speak. A shuffling sound was heard and then loud footsteps echoed throughout the chamber. One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. He was getting closer to Kai. Eight. Nine. Ten. A pair of black boots came into Kai's view, which was now becoming more and more fuzzy under the water filling them. “What could be so important that you delay my meeting with my council members?”
“He is a Fire Elemental, mi'Lord.” A guard responded. The black boots left Kai's vision as he circled him. “We saw it with o’ own eyes, his arms blew up ‘to flames, he didn’t flinch or nuthin’!”
“A Fire Elemental, you say,” the Emperor hummed in what Kai could only describe as delight. “Name?”
“Kai Umas.”
“Umas?” The Emperor sounded shocked, “tell me boy, do you know what that name means when you gave it to them?”
Something golden flashed in Kai's vision as he felt something sharp on his chin. His view was pulled up by the sword, which Kai stared at for it was none other than the sword he had recreated this morning. The golden sword that he and Nya had worked so hard on was now pointed directly at his chest, though now a black coated hand was holding it at the hilt. Kai's eyes drifted from the sword, to the arm, where he realised that the rumours of the Emperor were true. There stood in all his glory, the Emperor had four different arms. Three of his hands laid at the side of his body, yet one still held onto the golden sword. Maybe that coin had not been worth it. Kai looked up to his face, where white marks were patterned onto a face which Kai could only describe as unreal. It looked unnatural. Terrifying. With deep, red blood eyes, Kai could swear that he could see Hell Fire reigning in those eyes. Those who had said that the Emperor was scary was wrong. This Emperor was more than just simply terrifying. He had the face of any nightmare Kai had ever had, and the dark aura which almost concealed him made it felt as though there was a thick fog of darkness and the unknown ready to capture you in its grasp and take every piece of you until you were nothing but dust to the wind. Even then Kai was sure that you would still be trapped within its essence. Still, Kai found his voice, “It was the name of my mother.”
Now Kai would have loved for his voice to sound strong, determined. For him to sound at the very least angry. But instead it sounded quiet, broken, as he looked up at the Emperor. His mouth was dry and he could still feel the pools of water filling his eyes. “Maya.” Kai may have been delusional but the Emperor had almost sounded like he spoke with fondness. “She was the Elemental Master of Water, how does a Fire Elemental become her son?” The Emperor stared at Kai as though he was waiting for an answer, yet all he did was bring the golden sword up to his face, looking deep into the reflection of himself. Kai tried to breathe, but still he struggled. At this point, he should have passed out, he could feel that horrible headache coming for him. He wished he had passed out, then he would have missed the look of disgust from the Emperor as he looked down at Kai. “Send him to the dungeons, he takes a journey to the Dark Lands tomorrow.” Kai didn’t have the strength to stand up, even when he was tugged up by the guards, he still ended up being dragged. Just before he was pulled from the room, he heard the dark chuckle of the Emperor, “say hello to your mother, will you, Kai?” The doors slam shut.
Kai groaned as he was thrown into the cell, scraping his already hurting body across the uneven rocks. He felt a sting on his cheek, and even though he couldn’t reach up to feel it, he was sure he had scratched it on a rock when being thrown in. There were squeaks behind him and he swore he felt fur brush against his fingers as he pushed himself up. He grunted as he leaned against the stone wall. Even with the rocks jabbing into his back, Kai couldn’t help but visibly relax. His head fell down as he took three deep breaths. It was funny, Kai would give any money to be back at home under his thick covers with Nya probing him to get out of his bed. “Please be okay.” He wished as he lifted his head to finally let the tears flow, the ones that he had refused to let go of today. They felt hot against his cool skin.
“Just be okay.”
Kai didn’t know when he had fallen to sleep, only that after the forth time, something cold and slimy was thrown on his face, he took a rather loud gasp of air as his body jumped up. His shoulder cracked from the awkward position it had been lied under, as he blinked multiple times in the now darkness. What time was it? Had he fallen to sleep crying? He wasn’t able to ponder on the thoughts for long when he heard a quiet whisper of the person who had been throwing the cold, slimy things. Kai looked down to see that they had been ice cubes. Ice cubes?
“Good, you’re awake,” the voice said, Kai tried to make up who was talking to him, but all he could see was ice, cold blue eyes staring back at him in the darkness. There was a jingle and a creak as the locked door to his cell opened. “I was afraid that you had passed before I had been able to aid you.” Kai flinched when the blue eyed boy knelt beside him. The blue eyed boy hesitated. “I intend no harm, I promise.”
“Who are you?” Kai asked as he watched the boy look through some keys. Now closer, Kai was able to see that the boy had spiked up white blonde hair, with pale skin and high cheekbones.
“A fellow friend.” Was his reply as the boy showed him a specific key and motioned for his hands. Kai moved to allow the other to unlock the cuffs. Instantly Kai felt hot again. It was sort of strange to feel come it flooding in so quickly. It was nice. Kai turned back to the boy, who was quickly moving back to the cell door. “We do not have much time, I can lead you through these tunnels but once you are out you must find your own way out.”
Blondie moved quickly from the cell and Kai didn’t waste much time to follow. “So friend,” Kai scowled as he followed Blondie down the corridor, sticking close to the walls as they walked. “Why exactly are you helping me?”
“That is an easy question,” he replied before he raised his hand to the candle where like a breath of cold wind put it out, engulfing the two boys in darkness, looking over his shoulders down at the corridor. He smirked at Kai, a smug looking face as he winked. He put a hand on Kai's chest, pressing him to the wall as a pair of guards walking down the corridor to their right, laughing to each other. None of the guards looked at the two boys, instead they continued walking and it wasn’t until Blondie deemed it was safe to talk did he continue, “because I am like you.”
“You’re an Elemental?” Kai accused, “and you’re here, in the Palace, just doing what?”
“That is for another time, what matters now is that your out of this maze.”
Kai opened his mouth to retort but a cold – and we are talking freezing here – hand was placed upon it. He looked at Blondie, who had placed a finger to his lips to shush Kai. Voices could be distantly heard.
“Can you believe that they were able to steal all that metal again?”
“Do you think that they’re creating an army?”
“Well we all know the prophecy, right? It was the last information we had before the Dark Lands appeared.”
“Yeah, but have you heard that there were two spotted in town today, and they said there were nothing but kids.”
“Kids? Well let’s be honest here, all the adults were probably killed, so it makes sense that they are some kid Elementals.”
“Yeah but kids against the Emperor, I’m glad I’m on the winning side.”
“You and me both, brother.”
The voices died down as Blondie took his hand away from Kai's mouth. “There is a left turn and we are out, from there I can distract the guards long enough that you to find a way out, but please be as quick as you can.”
Kai could only nod as he followed Blondie down the corridor, and there he was able to see what Blondie was talking about. Wooden stairs led to a small wooden door. Checking the outside, the two boys crawled outside, onto the grassy field that surrounded the palace. “What will happen to you?”
“Nothing I cannot handle.”
“Thank you,” Kai nodded to the blonde male, who in return gave him a small smile and nodded back to Kai. Before Blondie could walk away, Kai gripped onto his arm, “say, you haven’t seen a girl be taken to the cells, have you?”
“A girl Elemental? No,” that same smirk appeared on Blondie's face as he shrugged at Kai, “though I did hear that the Master of Lightning had saved her during your little show in the town square.”
“Master of Lightning?” Kai questioned.
“Why, yes, the same one who keeps stealing all of my cogs, please when you find him, would you be able to ask him that he can take anything he wants, but please leave some resources for the rest of us.”
With that Blondie was off, leaving Kai to stare at the open space beside him. Nya had been saved. That would have meant that she had almost been captured, but another Elemental had saved her. Another Elemental had just saved him. Just how many Elementals were there? Kai gave a sigh as he looked up at the large wall. All he had to do was get over that wall. Or find his way under it. Or just any way around the wall. He just needed to get out of here so he could begin his search for his sister and this so-called Master of Lightning.
There was a rustle in the bushes and Kai moved, flinging his body towards a small wall, cradling to his knees as much as he could.
“Oh man, oh man, oh man,” he heard someone pant before suddenly someone was falling on top of him.
Green eyes met green.
Notes:
Please leave any comments, constrictive critism or anything, i love reading those things and it really gives me motivation to right! The same for any kudos or bookmarks, but hey please also don't feel pressured to do so, I'm still going to write this story anyhow! Thank you!
Also fun fact, I went with the name Umas for Kai and Nya's mum because I think technically Smith isn't their Canon name and Germany once used the surname Umas, so that's cool!
~ TooManyFandomsToHandle.
Chapter 3: The sixth time Lloyd tries to run away.
Notes:
I just want to say thank you to everyone who is reading this! I wont lie, I was expecting absolutely no one to like it, but it always makes me smile when I see that someone has left kudos or a comment or a bookmark! Honestly just thanks to anyone who has read or interacted with this story!!!
Also this chapter changed like 5 different times, because j couldn't make me mind up, and it was supposed to be so much longer, but I decided to cut it shorter as I didn't want to make it too much of a read, just know that these two (you'll know which two) are my favourite characters in Ninjago and I absolutely love them and will write far too much for both of them, aha!
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
First came the pain of the fall, then the hot burning sensation of the stinging of his scraped hands. He gasped before he groaned, his body aching from having just ran and then fallen.
“Ow,” was the first thing Lloyd said as he opened his eyes. Instantly he saw another pair of eyes watching him wide as he laid on the cobbled flooring. Knelt against a wall was a boy, with smeared blood across his cheek, a red nose and what looked like a large raised bruise on the right side of his forehead. His brown hair was spiked in all different directions, much like the rest of his dishevelled appearance. Clothes were rather stained red, or ripped and Lloyd could see where buttons had been ragged off. His breath caught in his throat when the other simply just stared.
There was a long pause, the world seemingly stopping for the few seconds that the two stared at each other, that was all until Lloyd couldn’t help himself from yelling. The other boy was a blur as strong hands found themselves pressed upon his lips, fingers digging into his cheeks as he tried to scream louder, only now it was a lot more muffled.
“Stop it! Stop it!” The other whispered harshly, eyes darting around, before landing back to Lloyd, glaring deeply as Lloyd pushed against his arms. He wasn’t moving. Lloyd breathed deeply through his nose.
In. Out. In. Out. In. Out.
“You’re going to get the attention of the guards,” the brunette let one hand come away from his mouth to grip his wrist instead, pulling it from the remaining hand. “Do you want that?”
Lloyd blinked at the stranger. Did he want to get the attention of the guards? Well, yeah of course he did! A stranger, most likely an escaped prisoner was holding him hostage! He wanted the guards to come and put him back into the cell he had escaped from! Why wouldn’t he want that?
Lloyd gulped.
Oh, yeah, he himself had been trying to escape. He, much like the prisoner, was also hiding from the guards. If Lloyd was to alert them, they would have known that he managed to escape his chambers and would investigate his room where they would eventually find the secret tunnel that Lloyd had accidently found and his chance of escape would be no more. Lloyd only had one choice.
He shook his head; no. The stranger seemed to look deeply into his eyes, though still tense, he removed his hand from his mouth, keeping his hand tightly against his wrist as he pulled the young blonde forward as he pressed his back to the wall again. “Who are you?”
Lloyd should have prepared for this. He had prepared for all other outcomes. If he was to be found by the guards, then it was a simple “I got lost, sir,”; if he was found by his father then he could always make the excuse of “I’m training” because a Warlord – no emperor – could never be too careful; or if he was to be found by any of the servants then he could simply tell them to mind their own business. They were always too cowardly to say or approach the eleven year old. But a prisoner? Lloyd had always thought that their cells were unbreakable. No one had ever escaped before – besides her - so how this particular prisoner had escaped was beyond Lloyd. That didn’t change the situation he found himself in. His wrist was starting to hurt, though when he tried to pull it back, the grip on it tightened and Lloyd saw the flash of anger on the strangers face bloom.
“Cat got your tongue, kid? I asked, who are you?” Lloyd looked down at the ground as he bit the inside of his cheek. His father always said that if he was ever taken hostage that all he had to do was remain silent until he came and found him. That didn’t seem like the smartest idea against the stranger. He looked like he was running out of patience with Lloyd’s silence, he would have to reply. But what could he say? Oh, I’m the Prince of Ninjago, I’m trying to escape too, can I come with you? Lloyd looked back up to the stranger. Honesty was always the best policy, right?
“I – uhm, I’m – “
“It came from this way!”
Lloyd's eyes widened, just as the strangers did as a heavy atmosphere fell quickly upon them both. Lloyd saw a bunch of different emotions flow through the strangers face, almost like a silent conversation with himself before coming to a decision. In a matter of seconds, the stranger had let go of Lloyd's wrist and was already running towards the royal gardens.
Lloyd was too stunned to comprehend what had just happened, it was only after another shout from the guards that he realised that everything he had within his grasp was going to quickly be thwarted, if he didn’t move.
So move he did, jumbled and incoherent running as he scrambled after the stranger. Why was he following the stranger, you may ask yourself? Well, he may have planned for how he was going to get out of his chambers, but under this amount of pressure, Lloyd really didn’t want to be alone. He was going to be caught and if the stranger had escaped the prison and made his way out to the outside then he must have some semblance of where or what to do, right?
The stranger was no more of a shadow, as Lloyd willed his limbs to keep moving, running faster and faster until he ran straight into something soft, and falling back onto the not-so-soft cobble. A bristle of leaves had him look up, to see the flash of angry green eyes once again.
“You – you’re – you’re – “
The stranger gaped at Lloyd, taking a deep breath in and he began to grit his teeth. Hands came up to his already spiked hair, and pulled as he huffed a breath out, making a quiet noise from the back of his throat. Lloyd took the time to look at their surroundings, seeing that they had ran into the entrance of the gardens. That was good, there would be less guards around here, though more guards at the top of the wall near here. That wasn’t to say that the maze wouldn’t have one or two, but they could easily be spotted by someone on the wall, that was, if they weren’t careful. Lloyd had been hoping that he wouldn’t have to go through the maze as it was nothing but trouble.
He was snapped from his thoughts as he was pulled up by the front of his black cloak. He blinked at the stranger, who must have gotten over himself rather quickly, and was now scrunching his nose down at Lloyd. “What are you doing? Why are you following me? Did that old man tell you to? Are you a spy or something?”
“N – no, I’m not a spy, I’m a – uhh,” Lloyd paled. He couldn’t say he was a prince. He couldn’t tell him who he was. He had vowed that after he escaped the Palace that he would throw Prince Lloyd down the drain. His destiny was not to follow his father’s footsteps, his mother made sure of that. The stranger raised a scarred brow. “I’m just like you, I’m trying to get out of here!”
Lloyd held his breath as he waited for the response. The stranger had looked him up and down and was now looking at him with uncertainty. He was going red in the face, he could feel it heating up, his cheeks becoming hotter and hotter until the stranger let go of him. “Then find another way out of here. Why are you following me?”
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know? What do you mean, you don’t know?” they were talking in hushed whispers, but every moment or so, one of them would whip a look around just in case the guards had caught onto the two of them. “You’ve just decided to follow a stranger?”
“Yes! No! Uhm – “ Lloyd sucked his lips in as the other rolled his eyes and placed a hand against his face. He mumbled something Lloyd couldn’t understand before he turned from Lloyd to start walking across the hedge. Into the maze.
“Listen, I don’t know who you think you are kid, but don’t follow me.”
“You don’t know where your going, do you?”
“I’m not talking about where I’m going, I’m telling you to stop following me. If you want to escape then there’s more of a chance for you if we’re separate.”
“You’re walking into a dead end.”
The stranger didn’t listen as Lloyd stopped walking, watching as his form disappeared. He thought about leaving, he knew this maze, he could go without the stranger. Though now he couldn’t help his curiosity get the best of him. He turned his hands into his pockets as he casually leaned back and looked at the ground again. So, maybe the stranger had no idea where he was going. Perhaps he had gotten out of the cells by pure luck. Even if that was the case, he had felt the strong grip the stranger had – his cheeks still hurt – and Lloyd could use that strength. If he was caught by the guards, maybe the stranger could take them on by strength alone. Sounds of scuffing feet caused Lloyd to look up to a stranger, stomping angrily towards Lloyd. “Did you find it?”
“Find what?”
“The dead end?”
The stranger didn’t appreciate the humour as he whipped towards the blonde. “Didn’t I tell you to get lost?” Lloyd shrugged as he couldn’t stop the smirk which tugged on his lips. Still, as the stranger began to walk away, Lloyd found himself walking the same direction.
“Kid,” the stranger growled.
“What? It’s not following you if I know how to get out of this maze and you happen to be going the right way.”
Another uncertain glance was shot his way as Lloyd continued to walk beside the stomping teenager. He took a deep breath as his eyes glanced up to the wall. It was too dark to see if there were any guards, not even silhouettes or shadows could be seen as an outline for Lloyd to take a guess at. Instead, he was just looking at the darkness looming over the shadows of the light the lanterns were working so hard to give. He wouldn’t know if they were spotted until it was too late. Lloyd’s brows creased as he looked back down.
The next turn was a crossroads, as just as Lloyd turned right, he realised that the stranger had chosen to go left. He blinked as he watched him confidently stride down yet the wrong way again.
“Wrong way,” Lloyd warned, only to get a snap of a response:
“This is the right way, this is the way I’m going so I can finally lose you, since you don’t want to get lost yourself.”
Mature.
Lloyd gambled the thought of continuing down the maze. He knew it like the back of his hand, he knew that Stanley would be on the route the stranger had chosen to go. He was always the one to do the night time shift in the maze. Lloyd was sure he’d hear it too, just at the other side of the leaves. He wondered if Bradley could have set up camp near by. If the stranger kept it up, he’d be thrown back into the cell. Lloyd wasn’t doing too good either, having followed the stranger into the maze, he should be trying to scale the wall right now. Lloyd would probably be caught soon, too. After a while of thinking, he found that the decision was chosen for him as a now grumbling stranger was once more making his way towards him. Now Lloyd didnt fight the smirk as the stranger glared. “So pipsqueak, since you seem to know where your going in this overgrown Bush, why don’t you lead the way?”
Lloyd grinned, “I thought you told me to ‘get lost’?” Again, the stranger did not find his humour.
“Unbelievable,” the strangers hands were in his hair again. “We both want out of here, right?”
“Yes.”
“Then maybe we should work together, you seem to know where you’re going and I – “ Lloyd waited for him to continue. He cleared his throat. “I can fight the guards... or something.”
“Right,” Lloyd grinned, raising a brow. “I’m sure you can fight pretty well,” he wiped his nose and watched as the stranger did the same. The stranger felt the dried blood and bristled.
“Just tell us where we’re going.”
Lloyd snickered, “c’mon, uhm – errr – its this way, sir.”
Lloyd couldn’t describe the expression the stranger was pulling when they started walking again, only that he would say it was like a look of surprise. They walked in silence for a while, with only Lloyd nodding or pointing the direction they needed to go. They hadn’t been spotted, which was rather lucky. Maybe the stranger just had a pot of luck he was secretly hiding from Lloyd.
After the forth turn, Lloyd was confident that they had passed the two guards that kept watch, and they should be in the safe zone of not being caught on the ground. Now they only needed to resist being spotted from the wall. Just as Lloyd went to point to the right, the stranger spoke:
“Kai.”
Lloyd jumped, scowling up at the stranger. Where had that come from? Lloyd imitated, “Kai?”
“You called me sir, I don’t like it, my name is Kai.”
Oh. That made more sense. Lloyd pondered over the name. He looked like a Kai. Did that make sense? He looked back up to the stranger, now that he knew his name, did Lloyd have to tell him his own name? Probably.
“My name is – “ don’t say Lloyd. Don’t say Lloyd. Not Lloyd. Not Lloyd. Think of a name, a random name. Not Lloyd Montgomery Garmadon. Don’t tell him you’re the Prince.
A memory of his mother looking down at him came to mind:
She wore her hair into a plat, which trailed down her shoulder as she bent down on one knee to come eye to eye to Lloyd. “My little man,” she would coo. “How you got to have such green eyes, I will never know. My beautiful green eyed boy.”
Green. Green eyes.
“My name is Greenie.” A voice rung in his head as he spoke the old nickname.
“Your name is Greenie, really kid?” Lloyd couldn’t help but nod, and as Kai raised his brows in question, he had seemingly taken the name. “wow, some parents, huh.”
“My parents,” Lloyd shrugged, not really understanding what Kai had meant, but still wanting to join in anyhow.
“Why?” Kai had asked, and with a raised eyebrow, he elaborated, “why Greenie?”
Lloyd made a gesture to his eyes, with a small smile. “Green eyes are rare, and with eyes as prominent as mine, I guess it just stuck.”
“So its a nickname?”
Lloyd panicked, “no, its my name.”
“So they named you after the colour of your eyes. Weird.” Lloyd usually would agree, but all he could do was shrug. The name would work, for now, he only needed to know Kai until they both made it passed the wall. He didn’t need a proper fake name until then. “Where now pipsqueak?”
Okay, maybe the name wouldn’t work, as he glared up at Kai. “This way.”
The two walked in silence once more, only the sounds of their breaths in the wind to keep them company, it wasn’t until they came to the edge of the maze that Kai pulled Lloyd back by the scruff of his cloak. He held in a garbled noise until he heard it.
“He’s gone sir.” Kai had grabbed onto Lloyd, pulling him close to his chest as they both stepped back into the bushes. His hand was not holding his mouth as tightly anymore, but Lloyd could feel the heat which was pouring from it. He tried to see if the guards were any close, but with the darkness surrounding them, he couldn’t make heads or tails where the voices were coming from.
“What do you mean gone? How could he have just disappeared, we had only put him there for three hours, that’s barely any time to escape.” He could feel Kai's breathing still. They were talking about him, weren’t they? He had been the escaped prisoner. If the guards knew then why wasn’t the castle going into a lockdown? Did they not want to panic everyone? Why were they talking so casually about it too?
“Perhaps he had planned on getting captured, they said that he came in very quietly.” Kai began to move, pushing Lloyd to step forward once or twice as he peaked around the corner of the hedge. Lloyd looked up to him to gage his reaction, but only found him looking sternly into nothing.
“To save the skin of that girl, I doubt she would be able to help him from here.” Kai looked back down to Lloyd and he pressed his lips into a thin line. He was having another conversation with himself, only now Lloyd was able to see the indecision in his eyes as they both looked at each other. Was Kai wanting them to move? To run? Or stay and hide? Is that why he was unsure?
“No, not here, but he is an Elemental, could he have used his powers?” Lloyd's eyes widened at the guards words. An Elemental? A real Elemental? He felt Kai stiffen, brows creasing as he looked away from Lloyd. Had he made his decision? Lloyd moved, pulling at his arm to move Kai's hand from his mouth. It didn’t work and Kai stayed still.
“Surely not. Surely he would have made a ruckus if that was the case.” Why wasn’t there a ruckus? Why wasn’t there shouting of the guards to go searching? Did his dad not know that there was an Elemental on the loose?
Oh. They hadn’t let him know. They didn’t want the wrath of his father so the generals were keeping it to themselves. He’s seen this before, back when they had found the other Elemental. He had escaped and while Lloyd had found the trust by Bradley, he had sworn never to let his father know for the sake of all the guards heads be strung up outside the castle walls. They were hoping to capture Kai before his father got a whiff that he had escaped. If they couldn’t capture him then they tell a lie about sending him to the Dark Lands early because he was making a scene.
“Is this the end of the maze?” Lloyd heard Kai whisper into his ear. He looked back up and nodded. “When I say run, I want you to run in any direction away from the maze, okay?”
Run in any direction other than the maze. Yeah he could do that. Lloyd nodded again, and he felt Kai take a deep breath in, letting the blonde go. Lloyd took a step back away from Kai.
Then something incredible happened.
Just like the torches that would be strung up in the Palace, or the lanterns outside, Kai's hands lit up widely in flames. Lloyd felt his breath become caught in his chest as he heard one of the guards shout:
“Hey, what is that?”
Lloyd looked into Kai's eyes as he nodded. “Run.”
Lloyd did as he was told, almost tripping on his left foot as he sprinted forward. Now that he was out of the maze, he was able to see three guards stood post, just at the entrance of the staff's kitchen. Why they had been there, he wasn’t sure, but still, he flung his hood on his cloak up, masking his blonde hair, as a powerful wave of heat hit his back. He dared to look over his shoulder.
“Fire!” the guards all yelled at once, and Lloyd could only stare wide eyed at the blazing maze. The fire was spreading fast. Not paying attention, Lloyd tripped and fell onto the floor, yet some more scrapes to add to his earlier ones. He paid no mind to it as he watched the green shrubbery turn orange then black to ash. “Quick grab some water!”
“Look over there, its the Elemental, grab him!” Lloyd felt someone grab onto his cloak. He screamed as he thrashed his limbs, pulling at the sleeve of whoever had got him, only stopping when he quickly realised how warm the hand was, and dark green eyes peered down at him telling him to stop. Lloyd did as they said and allowed himself to be pulled to his feet before they were running again. Kai still had a hold on his cloak, guiding Lloyd to wherever they were going.
They came to a stop, just behind some wooden boxes and barrels. It was storage for food. They must have been close to the kitchens still. They both held their breath as more guards ran passed, a lot spilling water from buckets, and shouting for others to bring more. Lloyd jumped when he felt a tap on the shoulders, and saw Kai pointing up to the wall. There he could see that there was one of four staircases to the tip of the wall, which now had a lot of guards running down from it. He looked at Kai with a brow raised in confusion. Kai made a gesture of up. He wanted to go up the wall? Was that a safe idea? Was that a good idea? Lloyd couldn’t help the sense of dread when he looked back at the staircase, which was empty. The guards have all but rushed to the gardens, leaving the two boys alone with nothing but lanterns. Kai moved before Lloyd did, and although wanting to protest, Lloyd did nothing but follow in Kai's footsteps towards the staircase, keeping his form crouched and as small as possible.
They made it up the staircase with no problems, and once there were at the top, Lloyd felt the wind whip his breath away. He blinked at his surroundings.
Sometimes if you were high enough in the Palace, you could see the mountains which laid far away from the city of Ninjago. Sometimes Lloyd could make out the large wall which kept them isolated from the Dark Lands. But never in his life had he ever seen the city this close from way up high before. Because of the darkness of night, the lights from below were eliminating in bright oranges, yellows, blues and whites. It looked like the stars in the sky had decided to have a party down below and Lloyd was able to witness it all. “Whoa.” He couldn’t help himself breathe, only glancing away when he realised that Kai had no desire in looking at the view like Lloyd. Instead he was around five paces away, walking quickly through the pathway of the wall. Lloyd quickly ran to catch up to him. “How are we going to get down from here?”
Kai cleared his throat. “I’m not too sure.”
Lloyd blinked, leaning down to see the bottom of the wall. “Do you think we would survive a jump?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, of course not.”
Lloyd stopped when they reached a post. There Kai also stopped, if nothing to look around. The two searched the storage boxes for anything. All Lloyd could find was a rather thin blanket. “Could we use this for a soft landing?”
Kai eyed the blanket wearily, and thought that he was going to agree, all until Kai snatched the blanket from Lloyd’s hands and felt the texture of the blanket. “How about a parachute?”
Lloyd shrugged. Maybe it could work, it was probably large enough for it. Though Lloyd wasn’t sure how parachutes actually work. He watched Kai as he grabbed a hold of all four corners of the blanket and gave it a shake. Then lighting up his hand, he tried to put his arm in the middle of the blankets.
The blanket caught on fire immediately.
“No, no, no, no!”
“Its on fire! What do we do?”
“I don’t know! I don’t know! Don’t touch it!”
Lloyd felt Kai grab onto his cloak as Lloyd threw the blanket from the side of the wall. The two watched it fall onto the roses bushes of the gardens, them quickly setting fire along with the blanket. The two watched it for a short while before Kai finally spoke:
“C’mon, we’ve got to move, they be back.” Lloyd nodded as he was led away. So far the two had managed to set the whole garden aflame, and still had been able to elude the guards. It was only a matter of time before they were caught. They came to another set of stairs, which once again only led back down to the Palace. “Is there not a way passed this damned wall?”
“Not without being able to pass over it.” Lloyd responded, listing as Kai mumbled something under his breath as he let go of Lloyd to walk down the stairs. Lloyd followed quietly. The sounds of shouting from the others idea could be heard faintly. From what he could tell, the fire was spreading rapidly. His father would soon hear about this.
“Shh,” Kai suddenly said as he crouched down against the wall, pulling Lloyd with him.
“Nice try kid, but I saw you hide, come out, we only want to talk.” As much as Lloyd was appreciating the company of Kai, when he was dragged for the umpteenth time, he was beginning to grow bored and tired of it. They ran, though not the direction which Lloyd would have expected. Instead, there were heading towards the fire. Why? He didn’t know, but it was clear that the guards were paying less attention to them as they ran with the fire still spreading faster like a plague that couldn’t be stopped.
Chaos was the only way to describe the way things were going. There were guards everywhere, but where there were guards, now there was a heck of a lot of fire. Lloyd felt his eyes sting from all the ash, and his lungs burned with the running and smoke he was breathing in.
Lloyd didn’t even know where they were at this point, only that the fire had spread to the point that they were null and void as they ran through the palace. It was only until Kai had stopped running that Lloyd finally got the chance to look around. They were in the front courtyard. A wall of soldiers all stood at the ready facing both Lloyd and Kai. Lloyd heard Kai swear under his breath as he let go of Lloyd’s cloak and stepped in front of him.
“So he did have an accomplice.” One of the guards laughed, patting another on the shoulder. “I told you one of those sneaky Elementals had made it passed our walls, its not that lightning one either, they’re like cockroaches, multiplying and really annoying to kill.”
Kai rolled his shoulders back and Lloyd stepped a few back. He was going to try to burn them down. He was going to try and fight his way out of this one. Lloyd looked around. He knew that the courtyard had the doors to the cellar somewhere nearby. If they could get there, he could make his way to the inventory and perhaps there might be something in there to help lure the guards away or a weapon which would mean he could convince the guards to let them through the main entrance.
The sounds of swords being unsheathed made Lloyd look back up to see every guard with their swords pointed to the both of them. Lloyd desperately looked around as Kai's arms lit aflame once more.
There was a shout and Lloyd was running again, this time towards the pair of grey doors. It didn’t have a lock, usually just a guard stood post next to it, but the guards were all concentrating on Kai right now, he didn’t need to worry about any of that. There was a cry of pain and Lloyd could tell that it was Kai. He didn’t look back. He couldn’t waste this time, this opportunity.
A hand slamming into his chest caught him off guard as he fell backwards. He grunted as his back fell onto the uneven cold stone ground. He coughed as he looked up to see a guard jeering down at him, sword withdrawn and raised to Lloyd’s neck. He glared up. He didn’t recognise this guard.
“Thought you could get away without your old partner there, ha, serves you right,” Lloyd felt tears prickle the corner of his eyes as he gasped to gain his breath back. “Pathetic try, but a try nonetheless. Your friends putting up quite a good fight over there. Let’s give him some motivation, eh?” Lloyd was roughly dragged up as an arm was placed around his shoulders and the sword was drawn to his neck. “Oi kid!” the guard shouted and Lloyd watched as Kai – who had at some point gained one of the shoulders swords, it now on fire – turn his gaze to the guard and Lloyd. Lloyd tried to kick his legs, but the sword was pressed closer to his neck. “Let’s stop all this fight and fire, come back with me and we can take you where you both truly belong.”
Lloyd huffed a breathy laugh at that. If his father knew that Lloyd had been thrown into a cell with an Elemental, there would be no telling what his father would do. And that’s not even getting into the fact that he currently had a sword against his throat. The guard would never see the light of day again.
“Come on now, that’s it, step away.” Kai raised his hands in surrender as Lloyd still attempted to wiggle from the man’s grip. “You’re both pretty good for a couple of children, but children aren’t going to cut it, you’re both being sent to the Dark Lands at first light.”
Lloyd should have given up. Called it quits, and simply returned to his cursed tower and give into the temptation of being his fathers son. He could have easily done so. But that fire which had started the day he had met his uncle. The day he had lost his mother and the day that he had found out what really lurked out in the Dark Lands, he knew that destiny was not for him to become the next Emperor. He knew that it was not to give into the evil which coursed through his veins. No, destiny had a bigger plan for him, and it was times like these that Lloyd was reminded of it. When he felt as thought that he had lost, that all hope was gone, destiny would intervene.
This time it came as ice.
The courtyard which had once been stone was now frozen over like a lake in winter. Not only that, but the guards which surrounded both Kai and Lloyd had become ensnared. Raising to their shoulders, the guards were stuck.
“What are you doing?” The man holding Lloyd shouted. The ice was travelling up his body too. “Stop it!” he screeched as Lloyd pushed his arm away where it then became encased in ice, freeing the blonde boy from his grasp. Unbuttoning his cloak – which had also been caught in the ice – he jumped down, sliding across the ice to where a shocked Kai stood.
He was looking around, searching for something, or someone. Another Elemental? “We’ve got to go!” Lloyd pulled at Kai's sleeve. Kai began to follow Lloyd, though was a lot less stable on the ice, tripping and slipping at any opportunity that he could. He looked back.
“There’s a ramp.” He observed, gaining Lloyd’s attention to see that there was indeed a ramp up towards the wall. It looked too steep and slippery to climb or run up, but the thought of the inventory caused Lloyd to grin.
“Kai, do you know how to drive?”
Kai tripped again and slammed into a wall as he fell. Lloyd cringed as he opened the doors to the cellar. The ice had thankfully stayed on the ground and guards. They both scrambled inside. Lloyd stopped, causing Kai to knock gently into him, “what’s wrong?”
“Just a trap.” He remembered this one, a trip wire at the bottom of the stairs. This was quite an old one, before he got locked in the east wing of the tower, he had loved setting up these kinds of things. Lloyd was curious, how had no one tripped it yet? “Watch your step at the bottom.”
“A trip wire? Who’s setting up traps in the Palace?”
Lloyd could only shrug, though when he stepped over the trip wire, he saw that Kai had a thoughtful expression, before scowling at the wire as he stepped over it. “So driving?” Kai looked at him from the side, suspiciously.
“Why?”
“Do you think we could drive over the ramp? To get to the other side of the wall?” A door slammed and in came three guards, all pointing their guns at them.
“Arms up,” one screamed, Lloyd’s arms raised immediately, the guard looked at them each. They must have come from the inventory. Lloyd jumped when a church bell began to ring, a loud chime three times, one after the other. Danger. Was it the fire? The escaped prisoner? Lloyd disappearing? He watched dread fall upon the guards faces as they stood silently with their arms up. Lloyd looked up to Kai, as he felt him shift backwards. They looked at each other as Lloyd shook his head. Not yet. They weren’t in the correct position for the trip wire to work. Kai seemed to take the warning as he looked back up to the guards.
Lloyd glanced down behind them, looking at the trip wire as he followed it up to the corner of the walls, all the way to the two sacks on flour which lay at the opposite sides of the room. The guards took two more steps into the room. Almost.
“Who are you?” Lloyd watched one of them train his gun directly on Lloyd. “Pull your hood down.” Lloyd glared from under the hood, he lowered his hands to grip it. “S-slowly now.” Slowly Lloyd pulled his hood down, and he watched as the guards eyes widened. “What? Pri – “
Lloyd had never moved so fast, turning to Kai, he pushed with all his might so that the brunette fell straight into the stairs, tripping the wire as he did. He couldn’t stop the squeak which crawled up his throat when Kai had shouted and buckled onto the stairs. He hadn’t meant to push him that hard. Other shouts from behind him had him gripping onto Kai's fore arm, pulling with all his strength as Kai slowly followed the lead, clutching the right side of his stomach. The guards were fighting off six large and heavy bags of flour, with their guns discarded as they pushed. Lloyd took the opportunity to run passed them, Kai behind him as he made more concerning noises. Once they made it from the room, Lloyd let go of Kai, who was now leaning against the wall, rasping, as he locked the door with the bolt lock, grasping the pad lock as he clicked it into place. Just in time as Lloyd felt the door shudder. A moment earlier and the guards would have burst their way from the pantry. Lloyd looked over to Kai, who had his head low, his breathing still uneven.
“Hey, are you okay?” Lloyd didn’t get a response as Kai hissed a breath through his teeth. Maybe pushing Kai hadn’t been the best idea. Lloyd stood awkwardly as he watched Kai groan and curl inwards as he slid down the wall.
“Give me a minute,” His voice was gruff, and he had said it so quietly that Lloyd had almost missed him saying anything at all. He took a deep, shuddering breath in, then out. Kai leaned his head down against the wall, and Lloyd noticed that his cheek seemed to be swollen. Right, he had been fighting the guards before Lloyd had pushed him into the stairs. He cringed as he stepped closer to Kai. Kai's eyes were closed, and Lloyd could see that his swollen cheek was spreading to the left eye.
“I’m sorry,” Lloyd mumbled as Kai opened his eyes to look at him. He could see the tears that were failing to fall as he looked at him. He raised his hood again as he stared at the ground. A shuffle and Kai was stood up again, still clutching his side but he was stood up.
“Let’s get out of here.” Lloyd followed silently behind Kai, who was also walking with a slight limp. He must have really been hurt. He had been hurt before Lloyd had ran into him. Now he didn’t just look rough, he was worse for wear. They both walked down the large storage room, with various machinery laid across the rooms, Lloyd watched as Kai struggled to try and manoeuvre his way around the pipes and wires which hung dangerously.
“If we get a car,” Kai began Lloyd’s head instantly raising, “there’s no guarantee that we are going to be able to make it across the other side of the wall.” He was talking about the ramp, Lloyd’s previous idea. No, they didn’t know what would happen if they were able to drive over the wall. “We could just drive and crash on the other side.”
Kai was right, even if they were able to get passed the guards to get to the ramp, how were they going to make a safe landing on the other side? “Where did that ice come from anyway?”
“I don’t know.” Lloyd looked up at Kai and sucked in a breath. “It had saved us, maybe all we need is to trust it? Whoever made it had wanted us to escape.”
“We’ll die anyway if we stay here,” Kai mumbled to himself, though Lloyd had clearly heard what he had said. His chest hurt. Kai would die either way, Lloyd would get a slap on the wrist and more security. “Where to now?”
Lloyd thought for a moment. The inventory was on the right side of the storage. He took the lead, tripping over a bunch of wires before standing up straight, face burning. He cleared his throat, “do you have any friends that are helping?”
Kai shook his head, “the one with ice, he helped me out of the cell, but I don’t know who he was.”
In a small voice Lloyd asked, “what did he look like?”
Kai eyed him sceptically, “I don’t know kid, it was dark and I wasn’t really paying attention. I think he had blonde hair.”
Lloyd huffed, that didn’t narrow down who had helped them. There were hundreds of blondes in the Palace, and no one had ever shown to be an Elemental, after all, they would have been killed by his father. “It was a boy though?”
“I think so?” Kai was staring straight forward, but Lloyd saw him tense his jaw. He wasn’t telling him something. Lloyd dropped it. If they were there to help, they would help again, if not then that was that. They had done something and that was always better than nothing. Lloyd brought a hand to his neck, expecting to feel a cut or graze from the sword, but thankfully there was nothing from before. His head was still attached.
They continued walking, avoiding the wires and pipes, all until Lloyd pulled back a bunch of cords to reveal a door, which was the height of his shoulders, and he twisted the lock to pull it open. They had to crouch to enter the inventory, but they made it as a warm golden light surrounded Lloyd.
It was always peaceful in the inventory. Though it was always busy too. There were papers, drawings, notes and a variety of objects that were in the progress of being made. A couple were things that had been discarded, yet not thrown away because as Lloyd was always told, nothing is useless, it could be useful in different ways, they just had to find out how. Although, Lloyd knew that it probably helped that the scientist was a kind man. He had been the one to tell Lloyd about the story of his father and Uncle, having lived through that time. He had also been the one to explain to him what an Elemental was, even though his father had explicitly asked Lloyd not to ask questions about it. It was also where he found out that it was his great grandfather was the one to create Elementals.
Lloyd quickly grabbed Kai's ripped sleeve, halting him as he heard a clash of metals. Kai seemed to have froze too at the sound. There was a mumble, and although Lloyd recognised it, he still felt on edge, as though if they were caught he would call the guards to them.
Or perhaps he was afraid that he would reveal Lloyd's identity.
Lloyd wasn’t sure how he had done it, but Kai now held onto a small letter opener, it must have came from the cabinet just beside Kai. He started to press forward, Lloyd following slowly, reluctantly.
The shuffling from the other side of the room became louder before there were footsteps, ones that were coming closer. They were going to get caught, Lloyd knew that. His eyes flashed to the letter opener. But the scientist was a nice man – he had never caught his name – and surely he would hear them out before calling the guards. Maybe.
Lloyd gripped Kai harder, digging his nails into the skin of his arm now, shaking his head when Kai hissed at him. He tried to shake out of Lloyd's hold, but Lloyd held on still shaking his head. There was a noise, something falling, Lloyd noticed the clatter of an object hitting the floor before he realised that there was another hand on his shoulder. Both the boys stopped, holding their breath. If someone was in the room with them, there was no way that they hadn’t heard that. If they did they would have been deaf. Lloyd had never thought that the scientist was deaf before.
“Oh, its you.” Lloyd looked up to Kai, who was looking somewhere behind him, brows creased as the grip around Lloyd tightened. “Now how on Earth did you manage to get all the way over here when making your escape?”
Lloyd instantly turned around, yet Kai's hands stayed on him, now he had an arm across his chest, holding onto his shoulder, just as the other one did. With his hood up, he hoped the scientist wouldn’t recognise him.
The scientist hummed, “I’m sure there was only one of you, who may the little one be?” He didn’t know it was Lloyd. He felt Kai twitch. He was thinking about how to answer him. Say nothing, Lloyd hoped, let’s just grab what we need and get out before he calls the guards.
“You knew I was escaping,” Lloyd couldn’t see his face, but he knew Kai was scowling. The scientist store at Lloyd, before he grinned at him. Kai wasn’t the only one that felt unsettled. “How?”
“Well, I couldn’t come help you myself, so I sent my apprentice.” The scientist sighed. “Now, there’s a problem with you being here, you are getting deeper and deeper into the Palace, you will be caught sooner than later.” The scientist turned around and Kai seemed to relax. “Here, take these, they should get you over the wall.”
Lloyd was handed some rope and some metal objects. He was unsure what they were, but Kai seemed to raise a brow. “You want us to rope climb down that huge wall, with no protection?”
“Well your little friend there would be able to secure your fall,” the scientist smirked. “Isn’t that right, Ll-"
“I can’t control that!” Lloyd gasped, shouting louder than he had meant to. “It just happens at random!”
“It happens when you think you have no option left, if you fall, it will catch you.”
Lloyd leaned closer to Kai, who was now looking uncertain, taking the rope and metal objects from Lloyd, wrapping them around his shoulders. “Why are you helping us?”
“Do you know anything about the Prophecy of the six? I think all its scriptures were destroyed, but there used to be an island which you could only find in the sky. The cloud Kingdom.”
“They had the power to choose the future, to reveal destinies,” Lloyd knew this story, he had asked his mother about it. That was where she had gone, right? He remembered her telling him that she had to visit the Cloud Kingdom to understand what was going to happen in the future. His father said that it didn’t exist. “Its a fairy-tale for young children.”
The scientist laughed, “I suppose it is a little far fetched, but the people of the kingdom do not choose what happens, only peer into the future and write about it.”
“And this prophecy of Six – or whatever – has something to do with why your helping us?”
“Not just you, there are others, but yes. Though you must hurry, the bell has chimed and that means the Emperor will be on your throat in no time. Take the rope and climb down, don’t let anyone find you, then run to wherever is safest for you in Ninjago, somewhere other than home and wait, we will find you and the others.” Lloyd had a bad feeling. Still the scientist pushed them towards the door. “You know the way?” Lloyd nodded, “good, go to the West Wing and use that part of the wall, the guards will be wanting to protect the Prince, meaning there will be less of them in the West. We will create a distraction for you so that you may be able to avoid the guards completely but I will not promise anything. Good luck.”
With that, the two were thrown from the room. “So much for driving out of here.”
“This is better, more discrete.”
Lloyd didn’t reply as the two walked by the corridor. The West wing? Lloyd could get there. Stopping, he turned to Kai and smirked as he started to push a bookshelf. He groaned quietly as he put all his weight into the bookshelf. It moved an inch. Lloyd grit his teeth as he tried again, scraping his shoes on the ground to try and move it.
“Alright Greenie, move,” Lloyd did as he was told as Kai sucked in a deep breath and pushed the bookshelf. It took a few moments before it started to judge, revealing another corridor, though much darker than the one there were currently in. “Of course the Palace would have secret corridors.”
“It was blocked off because when – “ Lloyd stopped himself before he said father. “ – the emperor is not in a good mood, there servants would survive more if they didn’t run into him.”
“And you know this?” they both ducked into the corridor and before Kai began to push the shelf back, Lloyd pulled down a lever and the bookshelf began to move back into place.
“The guards talk, and I’ve tried escaping before.”
“Didn’t go to plan?”
“Nope.”
The two walked down the corridor, Kai lighting his hand in flame as they walked down.
“When did you realise you could do that?”
“A long time ago.”
“Could you control it?”
Kai looked down to Lloyd with a strange expression. Was it sympathy? Pity? Lloyd wasn’t sure.
“At first it was a small thing, like my hands getting hotter and hotter, and they would set other things on fire, it wasn’t until I was around your age that they did this.”
They stopped at a crossroads. Lloyd nodded to the left and Kai followed. They two walking with anticipated breath. There was another chime of the bell. Had the fire been extinguished? Then another. No they had realised something else.
”The guards will be wanting to protect the Prince.”
The third chime. Lloyd felt his blood run cold as they continue walking. Kai seemed to ignore the chiming of the bells, but Lloyd knew what they meant. The forth chime came and Lloyd grabbed onto Kai's arm and began to run.
“H – Hey what are you doing?”
“We’ve got to go now!”
They knew Lloyd wasn’t in his chambers. That meant that they were no longer looking for an escaped prisoner, but also the kidnapped Prince.
“I know that but your stomping is going to get their attention more than anything we’ve been doing!”
Kai didn’t know, Lloyd couldn’t tell him. He couldn’t tell him that the bells meant that the Prince was missing because then he’d have to reveal that he was said missing Prince.
He would leave him. He would leave him in the castle and run without him. Lloyd didn’t want that. He also didn’t want to be caught and Kai be killed for not only being an Elemental but for also kidnapping a Prince. They finally came to the end of the corridor and Lloyd pulled another lever. The two squeezed passed before the bookshelf was fully open and Lloyd instantly ran to the window, opening it up with Kai's help before leaping out onto a roof.
“Stop going so fast, you’re going to fall!” Kai followed after, Lloyd scrambled to the next rooftop, where he slid down the plates, some of them sliding with him and falling to the ground. “Greenie, stop!”
“Its this way!”
Lloyd jumped as he landed on a crate, he sat at the edge and jumped off onto a smaller one until he was finally on the ground. He looked up to see Kai doing the same. “You’re being dangerous, stop it.”
He grabbed Lloyd by the arm before he could run off again and glared down at him. “I’m trying to escape.”
“You’re trying to get yourself killed, kid,” Kai let go of his arm before looking around them. “where are we?”
“We need to go up there, Lloyd pointed to the wall,” Lloyd sighed. “But I don’t know where the steps are.”
“Right,” Kai sighed as he took the lead, Lloyd following behind. They walked slowly, sticking to the walls. It seemed no one was at the top of his wall. They were all probably in the East Wing. Still, they took the precaution. They walked for not as long as Lloyd would have expected until they reached the stairs. “Come on.”
Lloyd followed him, and the two reached the top. Again, Lloyd was hit with Ninjago, except this time it was the other side of the city. The lights were still illuminated, yet this side seemed a lot more busier, as though it was still day time and they were all still buzzing with life, rather than being asleep at this time of night. Kai got his attention.
“Okay, I don’t trust you enough to let you go on your own,” the metal objects were now hammered into the ground and were clipped onto the rope. No, they weren’t clipped on. They were melded. He had used his Elemental powers to secure the metal. “So you’re going to have to climb onto my back.”
Lloyd looked at Kai. “You’re hurt.”
“I’ll be fine, I’ve been hurt worse than this and had to carry my sister home.” He had a sister?
“What if you cant?”
“I can.”
“But what – “
“Look, do you want to get out of here or not? Because I will leave without you.”
Lloyd considered it. Staying with his father. Letting Kai go. It would mean that they wouldn’t want to go after Kai if Lloyd showed up. He could tell them he heard the rose bushes were on fire and wanted to check them. He would get a slap on the wrist. His father would be more overjoyed of finding his son that the lost Elemental would have been forgotten about. Though when Lloyd looked at Kai he knew that this was a one time offer. He wouldn’t escape if he went back. He wouldn’t be able to face Kai if he ever came back.
Lloyd climbed onto Kai's back.
“I need you to hold on tight, because I’m not going to be able to hold onto you, okay?”
“Okay.”
Slowly, with Kai gripping the rope, the two began to descend.
If Lloyd was to describe the feeling. He would have used the words; light-headedness, nauseating, terrifying, and feeling like gravity was gripping onto his body and was trying to drag him down just to watch him fall. He didn’t feel safe.
It also didn’t help when Kai had stopped, around twenty steps in – he wasn’t counting – letting out a shuddering breathe. He was shaking too. Lloyd didn’t feel any safer. After a moment or two, Kai began again, though Lloyd could feel that the brunette was loosing his strength. “Kid,” he rasped, “hold onto the rope.”
Lloyd had never followed an order so quickly, grabbing a hold of the rope as Kai breathed, hard.
They were going to fall.
They should have risked driving the car over the ramp.
Lloyd thought that would have been a better way to die.
“I’m sorry.”
What?
Lloyd didn’t stand a chance. When Kai's body weight fell onto him, his fingers slipped and it wasn’t even a second before the two boys were falling. Lloyd tried to scramble, to scream, to do anything, but all he felt was a warm hand over his as the wind whipped around him, squeezing all the air out of his lungs and throwing his body left and right. They were falling. They were falling and they were going to die.
Lloyd felt the pressure in his stomach, like a knot and he felt like at any moment he was going to throw up.
Nothing happened, they just continued falling. His throat hurt, no burned. He was probably screaming. He should scream. He hoped someone was out there to help them.
Then he felt something pop inside of him. Like the relief of cracking a bone in the right way. He felt something rip open and surge across his body, as though it was coursing through his brain. It was nice, safe, warm. It felt like his mother hugging him. His father whenever he looked proud of Lloyd. It felt like he understood everything, though none of it all at once. It felt right.
It was welcoming Lloyd, crashing into him like he had dived into the sea. It caught him like soft waves, or like the cushion on his bed. Wrapping him up and keeping him safe from the hard, cold ground.
It was green.
Then it was black.
Notes:
I actually love little Lloyd and Kai so much! Like I love them even when Lloyd is older but boy does it hit differently when Lloyd was young and smol and Kai was like his protector. Also I know it sort of sucks of a name for Lloyd as Greenie but it was more of a pun of him being the Green Ninja and I don't know if anyone has noticed but I like Kai giving people nicknames because remembering real names is harder to remember than random bits of their appearance, so Greenie does both. Even though Kai rarely even calls him it!
Thank you all to everyone who has read this and please leave any comments down below, I absolutely love reading and replying to them all! Also if they're is any constructive criticism, please let me know, I am fragile but very open to it! And if you don't want to comment, it still warms my heart to see anyone who interacts by kudos, subscriptions or bookmarks! Just thank you guys!
~ TooManyFandomsToHandlr
Chapter 4: Cole's problems multiply.
Notes:
Hey guys, I'm back with a branch new chap! Christmas this year was h e c t i c so I wont lie, I didn't have much time to write, and then the shower blew up (sort of, it blew up on the inside and only a little on the outside) so that's been fun! Happy New Year! I hope everyone is having a love January!
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
Cole was angry. No, Cole was furious. Cole could feel his blood boil as he stared into the blue eyes of his best friend. He wanted to shout, scream, pull his hair out. His mouth just hung open silently instead. His heart was pounding in his ears, like it was protecting him from the words which Jay was saying to him. His fist tightened as he hung his head low. It was bad enough that he was trying to live with one Elemental, now there were two. It wasn’t the same as before either, as now there would be guards actively looking for said other Elemental. He heard the nervous tone in his friends words, he thought the same. Then came the apologies, except they weren’t really apologies, because right after he would say he was sorry, he would then go into a tangent of how he needed to do this and to Cole that really felt like the partner he has had for so long wasn’t considering him at all. Not considering that Cole was not apart of this band of Elementals. He didn’t have s Sort of innate power inside of him that could give him the advantage. Heck, Cole wasn’t even an engineer like Jay – he wasn’t taught how to build to survive. The only thing he had going for him is that he was moderately stronger than the average man, but even so, it wasn’t as though it was impossible strength either. Jay knew that, and even when Cole raised to look at his friend again, he saw the lines etched into his brow. He still wasn’t considering Cole. Only the other Elemental and himself.
“Do you have any idea how dangerous this is?” Cole spoke in hushed whispers, leaning closer to Jay as he gripped a hold on the sofa's back. His nails digging into it. “How do we know we can trust her? How do we know she’s not a lure for the Emperor to find you?”
“She’s not,” Jay spoke through gritted teeth as he moved away from Cole. “She’s scared.”
“She’s acting scared. We don’t know the first thing with this girl and now,” he raised a pointed finger to Jay's chest, “she knows where we live, who you are and who I am. If she goes running off to the Emperor, we’re both finished.”
“I couldn’t just leave her there, to be killed, Cole. If that was me, I know that you would have done the same for me.” He moved Cole's finger from his chest before his hands were ruffling his own hair. His leg was bouncing too.
Cole persisted. “Yeah, my stupid best friend that I’ve known for years. I would save him. Not some girl from the side of the road just because she’s an Elemental. You never think about these things, you just do it and hope that the consequences won’t catch us up later.”
“I couldn’t leave her,” Jay slumped as he pulled on his hair. “I couldn’t just turn a blind eye when I know that we could have swapped places. I would want someone to rescue me too.”
Cole sighed as he placed a hand on his friends shoulder. “But it wasn’t you, and now we’re stuck. She can’t stay here. We can’t trust her.”
“She has no where else to go, you saw the guards,” Jay argued, keeping his voice low in hushed whispers.
“Jay,” Cole said slowly rubbing his right temple in slow circular motions. “You know how dangerous it is for you to be living here, can’t you see that with two of you there’ll be more?”
“We’ve lived here fine for almost a decade, they wouldn’t know.”
“Wouldn’t know? They know her face, they’ll be looking for her right now, we don’t know if she’s working for them, its only a matter of time before they come and knock on our door and then we’re on the run.”
“We can’t just kick her out – “
“Jay,” Cole lowered his voice but leaned closer to Jay. “I can’t do that. I can’t risk both of us for a stranger who happens to also be an Elemental.”
“She didn’t even know she was one until this afternoon, Cole.”
“That’s not our problem. What is our problem is that we’re going to have to move, so start packing your things.”
Cole began to stand up, but a hand held him down, Jay staring intensely up at him. “You’re being too brash.”
“I’m being cautious,” Cole scoffed, “I’m actually thinking. I’m always the one who thinks Jay, you used to be cautious too, you used to think before you act, and lately its like you have a death wish.”
“You’re jumping to conclusions about stories you’ve just made up. You’re right, we don’t know who this girl is, we don’t know if she’s working for the Emperor and all we know is that she’s in help and she’s an Elemental. You haven’t said two words to her since you’ve got back.”
Cole’s jaw tightened, Jay still wasn’t listening. He pulled his arm from Jay's grasp, which he gained a lovely glare from Jay for. “Because we can’t trust her Jay.”
“Won’t you just try to talk to her? Then you can make whatever judgement call you want.”
Cole was scared. No, Cole was terrified. He couldn’t look at Jay as the other placed a hand onto his shoulder. He wasn’t listening. He would rather all three of them be killed. For what? For the sake that someone would save Jay? Cole would always save Jay, that’s how its always been. The day Cole walked out of his family home was the day he dedicated to protecting Jay. Jay and his death wishes. How long will they survive with them?
He heard his voice but stopped listening, his chest hurt, his body felt numb however. Like he was underwater, drowning in a pool of anxiety. He needed some air quick.
He suddenly turned away and began to walk to the door, even when Jay called him back, even when he could hear his best friend reaching out to him, Cole ignored it and continued walking. He couldn’t stay here. He felt sick. Jay didn’t follow. As he walked into the kitchen his eyes caught the cause of the problems curled up against the refrigerator and if he had stared enough, he would have been able to notice that she was crying. He sucked in a breath. His heart was still pounding. He felt sick and dizzy and strange. He wanted some air. But despite that, he found himself creeping towards the curled up girl. He had barely said anything to her when he had rushed home.
After the debacle at town, he had pressed that Jay and this girl would be behind jail bars now. Even when he managed to get home – through a lift since Jay wasn’t there to get them home – Jay must have realised his shock, his anger, his petrified expression that he was instantly pulled into the living room to discuss things.
“You can’t stay here,” his voice didn’t shake as much as Cole thought it would. “It’s not safe for you, me or Jay. Hoarding one Elemental is hard enough, you will get us all killed.”
The girl was silent as Cole talked, and for a moment he thought he wasn’t going to get a response until he heard a quiet:
“I’m sorry.”
Cole sucked in his lips as he watched the girl take a deep breath then sigh. He was about to continue, to tell her how long she had until they needed her to leave before she lifted her face. He would have been expecting the girl to have been still crying, by the way she was curled up, but it seemed those tears had dried up long before as he watched her stare at nothing in particular. The look on her face screamed determination, she didn’t look like she was going to argue back with Cole.
“I’ll go,” she began to stand up and Cole took a step back. “I need to go back anyway. I can’t leave – “ her voice broke.
Cole's throat seized up, but he nodded anyway. She needed to go. This was what he wanted, what Jay needed and she was already accepting it.
So why wasn’t Cole able to look her in the eyes?
The girl made her way up, taking a shuddering breath before she wiped a few tears that were threatening to fall. Maybe he was too quick to judge, maybe he should trust Jay's instincts. His gut wasn’t telling him she was a threat, at least he didn’t think it was.
“No wait,” Cole stepped closer to her, still looking anywhere else. “I can’t send you out there, they’d take you in a heartbeat. Jay would never forgive me for that."
The girl sniffed, “I can take care of myself.”
“Not like this you can't,” Cole sighed, slapping a hand to his face. “None of us can stay here, not when there’s probably guards that are going to be heading their way here, and I’m sure that we would be ratted out eventually. I can’t believe I'm saying this, but if we all need to leave, you might as well come with us.”
“I can’t go, my brothers been captured – “
Jay spoke up from the doorframe of the kitchen, “that’s okay, me and Cole should be able to get him out of the Palace.”
Cole wanted to curse, “what are you talking about Jay?”
“We know how to get in and out, we should be able to help her brother,” Cole couldn’t believe what Jay was suggesting now. First its just helping this girl, but now he wanted to save her brother?
“That’s a suicide mission and you know it, we can’t get anywhere near the cells.”
“Its fine, honestly,” the girl hiccupped. “I’ll just have to try and do it on my own, I don’t want to drag anyone else onto the mess I made.”
“Nya, listen, we know someone who can help, he should be able to get us in and out of the Palace to get your brother and back out, and we should be safe in Stiix.” Stiix? Was he talking about Ronin?
“He won’t help us without a price, and right now we have nothing to offer him,” Jay shrugged.
“How much would he need?” Nya asked quietly.
Cole shrugged, “honestly, there’s no limit, whatever he wants for the job, I guess, but I bet it would be a lot since its breaking in and out of the Palace and rescuing a prisoner.”
“I might have something back at the shop, my parents left us a lot. We’ve been keeping it stored, didn’t want to give away the memories our parents had given us, but if... if it saves my brother, then I guess they don’t matter that much.”
“What kind of things?” asked Jay, who looked pretty hopefully at Cole. Cole wasn’t so sure.
“Just trust me, they’re valuable.”
“See, Cole, we need to go to Stiix anyway, its the only place where we can get identities, why not get two birds with one stone.” Cole knew Jay knew why they couldn’t do this. He still wasn’t sure if he could trust this girl. “We can help more Elementals, Nya and her brother, uhm...”
“Kai.”
“Kai, and probably so many more if they’re out there.” Cole gaped at Jay.
“What are you saying?”
“I just meant we can help Nya get her brother back, that’s all.” Cole stared at Jay, he knew he had meant something more, but Jay wasn’t willing to share. Was he really hinting that they would be the start of a revolution? Yeah, no, he wasn’t doing any of that.
“If we get this person – “
“Ronin.”
“Ronin? I know him, he owes us a lot of money,” Nya – was that her name? – blinked, “does he really know how to get in and out of the Palace?”
“He’s the only one who can get in without any detection, he’s got a lot of friends on his side. You say he owes you?”
“Yeah he does, if we made it to Stiix, would he be able to get me in and out?”
“Well yeah, but we’re not going to let you go alone.”
“I can’t believe we’re discussing this.”
“Exactly, see, even Cole agrees, okay so we’re going to Stiix and then we’re getting your brother out and then we can lay low until this all blows over.”
“Jay you think this is all going to blow over? We’re going to be laying low the rest of our lives.”
“Well, at least we’ll be heroes.”
“That’s if we survive, Jay.”
“Listen, I’m helping Nya and her brothers, so are you coming or not?”
“Please don’t fight, I’ll go, I’ll find Ronin and my brother and you won’t have to see me again – “
“No, because we’ve done more dangerous things – “
“More dangerous than this! No we haven’t!”
“I’m going to get my things, and then we’ll be off Nya, Cole are you coming or not?”
Cole groaned rubbing his hand over his face before following Jay back into the living room where the ginger was playing with his hover board – it seemed it had broken when he had flew himself and Nya back to the house.
“You’re crazy, no you’re insane, you want to be a hero or do you just want a death sentence?”
Jay continued to ignore him, moving around as he grabbed a bag and started placing things into it. “Give this to Nya,” was the only thing he said to Cole as he handed him a cloak. A stupid cloak, not even a proper jacket. Probably because everything else looked like it would drown the poor girl. Cole a took deep breath before returning to Nya, passing her the cloak.
“You should wear this, with the hood up so no one can see your face.” Nya thanked him, putting it on.
“You really don’t need to do this,” she tried but Cole raised his hands.
“Its too late now, Jay's convinced that we need to help, and as stupid as he is, I can’t let him do this on his own, so you’re welcome.”
Nya only nodded.
“Right, think I got everything, is your shop in the city centre?” Nya nodded. “My hoverboard is broken, but do you reckon we could get a ride?”
“The old man next door should be awake still he might give us a lift,” Jay nodded, walking out of the kitchen as Cole presumed he was going to ask the neighbour for a ride.
“If we’re doing this though, you have to swear to me that you’re not just some spy send by the Emperor to get to Jay.”
Nya looked bewildered before shaking her head, “what, no! I didn’t even know I was an Elemental until today, besides I would never when my brothers an Elemental.” Cole nodded, looking up when Jay came to the door panting.
“He said he could take us to the town.”
The ride to the city was a long one, thankfully the old man didn’t care for speed limits as he made a rush to the city. There was small talk but neither Cole nor Nya entertained it, only Jay – who sat at the front with the old man – talked to him. Cole wasn’t really sure if he did trust the girl, but looking at her, with her leg bouncing and her hood up as she looked out of the window, Cole couldn’t help but feel like she was telling the truth. She seemed concerned and if she really was a spy, then why was she letting Jay and Cole do the planning? Was she still crying too? Cole wasn’t sure.
When thanking the old man, Cole was thankful when Nya had told the two that they were pretty much outside near her shop. “Its just down this way.”
Nya had stopped on the walk there, patting herself. Cole turned to her, “You okay?”
“I don’t have the key.” She replied, putting where her pockets her, “Kai must have them, we can’t get in.”
“Does the shop have any windows?” Jay questioned.
“Y – yeah it does,” Jay nodded at Cole.
“Then it’s fine,” Cole shivered from the cold. “We can get in through that.”
“How?”
“We’ll just smash our way though.”
“Oh... okay.”
Shivers rolled up his arms as Cole saw the shop closing in. It was official, they were doing this and against his better judgement, they found themselves just outside. Cole stared at the large window. He knew people who lived in the main city weren’t afraid of vandalism, well if they were small stores at least, but having such a large window looking into the shop was brave to say the least. Fingers rose and planted themselves on the glass. It was freezing, even under his gloves Cole could feel the bite the cold threatened. This would make it much easier.
“The alarm shouldn’t trigger.” Nya had been pretty quiet the walk there that Cole had almost forgot she was there. He scowled.
“And why wouldn’t it?” Nya let out a puff of breath before pressing her lips together. Cole waited.
“We couldn’t afford a proper system, so we just got a broken one from a dumpster and while I tried to fix it, the circuit board was fried. In the end we just made it look new and hope it would deter anyone who thought they could steal from us.”
Jay whistled, “its that one there, right? You did a good job, even I wouldn’t have thought it was a broken one.”
“Not that it would have mattered to you Jay, you would have fried the alarm as soon as you saw it.” He didn’t need to look back to see the smirk on Jay's face.
“I, uhm, I wouldn’t have fried yours.” Cole tried his best not to roll his eyes as he tapped on the glass, listening, tapping specific places multiple times, from one corner to the other before stepping back and swinging his elbow into the glass. Immediately it shattered, making the three jump back despite knowing what was going to happen. There was silence for a while as the three waiting for any indication that anyone had heard the glass fall, but after around three minutes, the street was quiet, it seemed no one was interested or they hadn’t heard them. “Does it count as breaking and entering if the owner is with you?”
“What? I don’t know. Be careful when stepping in, there’s glass everywhere.”
“How did you do that?”
“Its his thing, we have Elemental powers, Cole is very strong.”
“You’re not an Elemental?” Nya asked, sounded almost astonished.
“Nope, I’m just a normal person who has very bad luck for finding and befriending Elementals.”
“Don’t let him fool you, he’s just jealous that he doesn’t get to have cool powers like me and you.”
The store wasn’t very big, probably somewhere which Jay and Cole would have walked straight passed, but looking at the merchandise they could have made a couple of penny’s from Nya and her brother if they had decided to go here. He walked to a shelf which held a lot of different weapons, mainly swords. They must have liked making swords.
Turning back Cole realised that Nya must have gone upstairs – to get her things, of course. They didn’t have time to mess around and explore, they were on the run and it was only a matter of time that any guards or just about anyone walked by and found the three. Cole walked up to Jay who was playing with some nun chucks. “Do you even know how to use them?”
“I could learn, they don’t look too hard to learn,” Cole grabbed the nun chucks and placed them back where they should have stayed, watching as Jay walked away, keeping his eyes on the weapon. “What’s this room?”
“You’re asking me?” Cole followed Jay as he opened a door to another room, and stopped in the doorway. “This is where they make the stuff?” Jay was instantly looking through blueprints and whipping around the room like a child in a candy store. Eyes widened as he muttered to himself, leaving Cole to lean against the doorframe, waiting until Jay decided he wanted to explain to Cole whats got him so excited. Or leave Cole wondering, Jay has done that one too many times. “There’s no way them two made blue prints like this, this isn’t just how to create the stuff out there, you could build machines with these schematics, like... like war machines.”
“You’re saying Nya and her brother were planning a war anyway?” That didn’t sound right, Nya and her brother couldn’t even fight the guards that caught them.
“What? No, just found them crumpled up on the ground, saw a corner of one of them and thought I'd check them out. Why they were put there, I don’t know, I’m going to ask now.”
“Wait, Jay –“ Too late, the ginger had already pushed passed him and was bounding up the stairs. Cole took another look around the room. Unlike the rest of the shop it was much more disorganised. In fact Cole knew for a fact that this room was practically a health hazard. The equipment was placed randomly, most were on the floor, but a few had just been put on a random surface, the hooks which they could hang from dissuaded. No broken, a nice small crack was noticeable when you got close. Scrunched up paper was all over the floor, probably thrown with no trash can to throw into. He kicked a ball of paper before it topped on a hook. A random hook which was partially hidden by a rug – why they had a rug near fire Cole didn’t know, but he approached the hook anyhow. Throwing up the rug he found that it had been a latch to hatch of a basement. Moving the rug completely, gagging at the amount of ash and dust which came flying into the air as he did so. The hatch was small, probably half the size of Cole. He looked up the open door. If they had blue prints for machines, what else could they be hiding? It didn’t seem like Nya and Jay were coming down the stairs anytime soon. He unlocked the latch and opened the hatch which what he would have thought would have led down to a basement.
He was surprised to see that it wasn’t anything of the sort, instead it was more like a box has been dug under the house and was hidden by the small door. The box was filled to the brim with small spheres, which in the dark glowered a light blue. He reached down and before he could touch one of them, it made a whirring noise and let out two puffs of smoke before it started to vibrate. Cole's eyes widened as he slammed the latch shut. He had set off a bomb. His hearts pounded as he raced to stand up, tripping over everything on the floor, not caring about the noises of the metal clashing and falling, just trying to reach to the corner. Even when he fell and slid his back into the nook of the wall, he waiting for his impending doom, which would happen any second now.
Or now.
Or anytime.
He could still hear the vibrations so it must have been counting down. He needed to warn Jay or Nya, and get out while they still had time!
Cole didn’t have the chance to stand up as a light knock came from the latch, lifting it slightly. He blinked at it and waiting once more as another small knock and bounce came. Now, he’s seen small explosions, heard them, and has cleaned up after them whenever Jay's invention would decide to implode on him. The small ball had not exploded. It sounded like it was trying to get out though. Despite his better judgement Cole crept his way back over to the latch where he swung the door open, covering his face in case the sphere decided that now was the perfect time to explode.
It seemed it wasn’t as he listened to the whirring of electricity that sounded oddly familiar. A wave of a soft heat wafted over his fingers as he lowered his hand to look at the small sphere floating at eye level with him. He watched it silently as it whirled, fell silent, dropped slightly before whirring back to life again floating back to its place as some steam was pushed from it. It was glowing a light blue, but you could see the copper metal moving and twisting over the glow as it tried to stay up. This was similar design to the hover board which Jay had created, except instead of using his electricity, it was using steam. Like Jay’s prior inventions.
Placing his hand under the sphere, it seemed to stabilise itself and float a little higher away from his hand. Looking down he could see the other spheres, but they stayed dim and still. This seemed to be the last one clinging to life.
Smiling at the sphere, he grabbed it with his free hand and felt it shiver in his hand before dimming and becoming still like the others. Instead of throwing it back into the box, he placed it into his pocket. As fun as it had been, they needed to go now, they had stayed here longer than they needed to. Cole stood up and made his way up the stairs, where he found Nya and Jay both crouched over a table. “What are you doing?”
“I said to Nya that I would try and fix this watch,” Jay replied quickly, fingers moving just as fast.
Cole scoffed, “now? Like right now Jay? When we’re on the run, you decide to do this now?”
“He’s right Jay, we can try later, but we can’t stay here.”
“Yeah, I know, but I’m close to doing it all, it won’t take a miminu – “
“Jay we have no more time left, the sun is already rising and people are going to start coming out, we stay any longer and it’ll be left while we run.” Jay groaned but Cole watched as he began to place the bits into a bag which Nya had over her shoulder. “You ready to go now?” Nya nodded, Jay remained silent as the three began to make their way out of the shop, back onto the street. “Do you think FugiDove would be open by now?”
“The motor shop? The one filled with just bikes?” Asked Nya.
“Yeah, that one.” Cole quickly replied before focusing back onto Jay.
“I hate that guy,” Jay muttered under his breath before shrugging, “he should be, I’m sure when he hears we want to rent one of his stupid bikes he’ll be ecstatic.”
“We’ll make our way over there then, Nya put your hood up, we don’t want anyone noticing you.” Nya did as she was asked as they walked through the streets. The sky now turning a beautiful red, the sun really was making its journey, just as the streets began to fill up with a couple more people, all running to where Cole would presume would be their jobs. “We could go through Dareth’s.”
“Dareth’s? You sure, I’ve heard more and more of those Sons of Garmadon have been going there, one look from them and the guards will be on our tail.”
“Yeah, but Dareth will cover for us, he always has.”
“He’s come into the shop before, he teaches how to fight, right?” asked Nya, walking between Cole and Jay. Cole nodded,
“Yeah, he owns a Dojo downtown, but he had a bar up near here, which is connected to an abandoned warehouse which we can use for cover until we get to Dove’s bikes. Then we can use to get to Stiix –“
“I have to get my brother,” Nya interjected, “they’ll kill him if I don’t get him out.”
“Nya, we know that, but we can’t go into the Palace guns blazing, they’re capture all of us and we’ll all be in the same boat,” Jay's tone was soft, he had even reached out to place a hand on her shoulder, “I promise I’ll get your brother out, but we need to ensure you’re safe first.” Nya turned to him and Cole shook his head. They were on a suicide mission with all of this, all of them knew that Nya's brother was dead no matter what happened, what they had to do now was try to get somewhere safe so that they didn’t suffer the same consequences.
“What is it that you want from Ronin, you said that you had been able to get in and out of the Palace before?” Nya turned back to Cole and he couldn’t stop his brows narrowing.
“Yeah to steal some metal, not a whole person, Jay can’t use his hover board for two people,” Nya looked taken back, but he saw the flash of anger run across her face.
“He used it for me and him.”
“Yeah and now he can’t use it at all, just because it happened once doesn’t mean it can just always do that. Ronin can get us safely in and out of the Palace for the right price, that’s how we can get your brother out.”
“And you’re sure about that?”
“Yes,” Cole hissed. “I’m sure.”
“Right, okay.” Nya fell into silence again, though Cole could see the stomp in every step. She wasn’t it making it easier to save her. He understands that she wants to save her brother, but to Cole, himself and Jay came first and everyone else could wait. She should have been left to wait. Yet, here they were, walking down the street as though they weren’t currently fugitives.
“We’re almost there,” Jay's voice was coaxed in anxiety. “Cole they’re everywhere.” He wasn’t wrong, just down around the corner, huddled near the entrance of Laugh's were around five guards all chatting to each other. The three stopped in their tracks. “What are we supposed to do?”
There wasn’t any other way to get into the bar – well the back but Cole knew that Dareth kept that locked and that even when you bang on the door, he never goes to it. Swallowing, Cole took a deep breath and pressed his lips together. It was a stupid idea and he was sure that he would regret the decision, but Cole placed his arm around Nya's shoulders, tugging the hood down even more. “What are you talking about Jay, we’re going in.”
He heard Jay's shocked face more than saw it, as the ginger made a strangled noise when Cole and Nya started to walk towards the bar. Cole could feel the tension in Nya's shoulders, and he could do nothing but squeeze her shoulders tighter. If she were to appear too rigid then it might draw eyes.
When they got close enough two of the guards stared them up and down, and Cole tried to give them a toothy grin, although he was sure that he probably looked guilty even if he wasn’t holding Nya so close to him. The guards lost interest though and turned back to their conversation and Cole had never moved so fast in his life into the bar. Which for the time in ten morning should have been dead, yet here there were a room full of rather sleeping drunks, or people who were still drinking. He spotted Dareth off to the side of the bar where he was drying a glass, eyes slowly drooping. He made a beeline to him, pushing and pulling on Nya to try and follow him as he wafted through the crowd. Had the bar been open all night?
“Dareth!” Jay beat him to it as he slammed his hand on the bar top. The noise woke Dareth as he jumped, dropping the glass on the floor. Cursing Dareth looked at them with wide bloodshot eyes.
“Oh sorry, I was just about to get your drink, sir, I must have zoned out – “
“No, Dareth, its us, Rocky Dangerboof?” Dareth blinked at him, tilting his head before the words seemed to click into his brain like a puzzle piece.
Dareth leaned over the counter, whipping his head around the three before looking much more awake than before, “Oh no, oh no, you can’t be here right now,” Dareth spoke through a whisper. “They’re here, they won’t leave, I can’t help you right now.”
The Sons of Garmadon. Cole let Nya go and leaned closer to Dareth, “there’s no way you could help? Not even a little? They all look too drunk or are asleep.”
“Yeah, they look like that right now, but you haven’t seen it, Rocky, I’ve seen people be torn apart just saying one bad thing about the Emperor, they wake up quick and sober up even faster.” Cole looked around the room, he wasn’t too sure how much he trusted Dareth's word, the man did tend to over exaggerate a lot of the time. “Just leave while you still can, I’ve heard they’re going to be more coming soon, there’s something big that happened, something last night.”
Yeah, they captured an Elemental and found that there are two more out on the streets, Cole knew the news already. “So there’s no way for you to help?” Dareth shook his head before standing up straight, looking passed Cole. He went to follow the gaze when Cole felt a large grip hold onto his left shoulder, seeing Jay with the same panicked expression.
“You seem to have dropped some glass there Dareth,” came a booming voice above the three. Nya, who had been quiet this entire time, dipped her head more down. “Don’t you want to clean it up?”
“Oh, uh, yeah, I just need to,” Dareth never continued the sentence as he flounded left and right before making his way to the other side of the bar to get the brush and pan. Cole watched him before glaring up at the newcomer.
“So you guys are in need of some help,” he had been listening in on their conversation. Maybe there weren’t all drunk or sleeping. Though the man did reek of alcohol. “Since Dareth can’t help and I’m feeling very generous, is there anything I can do to help?” Dareth fell onto his knees as he recklessly swept up the pieces of glass.
“You know, we actually find that we don’t need any help,” Jay replied with a fake smile. “We hoped Dareth could help and since he’s too busy, I think me and my friends can see ourselves out.”
“Yeah, thanks for the offer,” Cole tried to shove the hand from his shoulder as the man leered down at them.
“Oh come on, we’re all brothers here, we have to help the will of the Emperor, c’mon let me help you,” he squeezed his hand tighter, pushing Cole and Jay closer to Nya, feeling her elbow jabbing him in his stomach.
“We told you, were okay,” Jay tried again, but the strangers smile dropped. “We just needed Dareth.”
“Of course you do. Say brothers, do you know why we love coming here? Dareth always seem to attract those rebels.” The man was now looking at Dareth who had stopped sweeping. “They always just want help from him too, don’t they Dareth?”
Dareth stumbled, stuttering over his words as he gave him a nervous laugh. Cole knew where this conversation was heading, too bad that the stranger already had them cornered, and he had a tight grip on both Jay and himself. They needed a way out, and quick, he saw Jay's mouth open to say something, but before anything could be said, much to Cole's fears, Nya turned around to face the stranger, and while Cole had no idea what she was about to do, he was not expecting her to brace herself on the counter, lifting herself up slightly, curling her legs towards herself before slamming them into the stranger. The unexpected force made the stranger topple, taking Jay and Cole with him. The stranger stumbled into a couple of tables, trying to hold onto them for stability, though found himself not only falling but taking a couple of his so-called-brothers with him to the floor. The crash made the bar rumble, a lot of others lifting their heads, confused, while some only looked in their direction. The stranger groaned on the ground, and what Cole could see, he must have smashed his head on a couple of drinks. He would have the worst headache later. Cole quickly scrambled back up and vaulted himself over the bar to Dareth. Nya and Jay had the same idea as the three stood by Dareth.
“What do you think you’re doing?” asked a different voice, but Cole just shoved Nya – who’s hood had fallen down in the disruption – towards the door to the back of the bar. “Wake up! Get the guards, now!” The three were running through the back. Cole took the handle, using his own body weight to stop it from being opened from the outside. It only took a few moments before Cole was being barrelled into.
He grunted as his shoes scraped the floor, Cole was continuously bracing himself, pushing back on the force. At one moment he wasn’t sure he was still breathing, only that a breath had been knocked out of him as he kept the door closed as much as he can. Jay took the lead as he grabbed the keys from under the kitchen sink, before racing to a large cupboard, which at first glance looked the same as all the others, except it had a lock on it.
Once unlocked, opening it up instead of being met with a usual cupboard, there was the frame of a cupboard but with a broken down wall at the back, the wall which led to the warehouse.
“Go,” Jay told Nya as she tried to push a barrel of beer towards Cole. “We'll catch up.” He gently pushed her to the cupboard before coming towards Cole, using his own strength to keep it closed. “We need something to keep it closed.”
“Gee, thanks Jay, I didn’t think of that, thank you for – ugh – that wonderf – wonderful suggestion.” Cole gritted his teeth, they weren’t going to be able to hold this door for long. Cole braced his shoulder against the door, putting more of his weight into keeping it closed. “Maybe we could – out – outrun t – them?”
“You willing to risk it?” A screech caught there attention as they watched Nya try to drag a fridge from one side of the room to them. “What are you doing?”
“They’re going to be waiting for us through the warehouse,” Nya responded, pushing the fridge slowly towards them. It wobbled before toppling on its side. “For the sake – come on, please work with me here!”
“You don’t know that! Go now because they get through!”
“C – Cole, I have – argh – an idea, but I need you to help Nya with that fridge.”
“What and leave you holding the door, Jay we can barely keep it shut with the two of us,” Cole looked between Jay and Nya, unsure with what he should do. Jay grinned at him as he lifted his hand, watching as blue volts erupted through his fingers like guitars strings. “You’re crazy.” Cole pushed against the door as he moved to Nya, helping her push the fridge towards Jay as the other placed his hand onto the door handle. Even from across the room, Cole could hear the fizzing of the metal, as well as the screams from the other side of the door. “Don’t set the door on fire!” One quick shove and Jay and the fridge swapped places, Jay shaking the extra electricity from his hand. “Going the long way around?” Jay nodded just as Cole turned from the cupboard and towards the silver door. Three kicks and the door came loose from its hinges, another three kicks and the door snapped in half giving them enough room to climb over the door. Just in time, as the fridge was pushed away from wedging the door shut.
“Over there!” came a shout and the three were running down the street. Cole felt his muscles burn, but he persisted to run, only coming short of Nya, who ran just behind Jay. They turned left, where a street was now busier than it was fifteen minutes ago. Cole shoved passed people, and jumped over lazy pedestrians who didn’t know how to sit on a bench without stretching their legs out.
Taking a glance behind him, he swore his heart skipped a beat. Behind him was not only the five guards – which he could only really see three – but there chasing him was the ragtag mob which were once asleep on Laugh's floor. Dareth hadn’t lied, they really were quick to sober up. Taking a left turn, he realised where Jay was going as the ginger began to climb onto a dumpster, reaching up to take a hold on the building artiest design, a swirl of rock rose petals disguising a ventilation shaft. Up Jay rose to an open window, reaching down to grab Nya's hand and lift her up, then Cole's turn, just as it seemed the mob had caught up with them.
Cole then took the lead in the home, ignoring a woman scream as a door slammed shut, and only focusing on finding the way out. They found themselves in a long corridor, filled with various doors, but Cole didn’t pay attention to them, racing right through the corridor to find the stairwell. Instead of running down back to the street, Cole ran up, up to the next level of corridors which he also ran down to find another window. This window was closed, but easy to open as Cole forced the glass to slide. He then crouched onto the ledge, not daring to look down to spoil his confidence. Leaning back slightly, he took a deep breath and then leaped from the window to the edge of another building. His flapping arms had barely caught the side of the building, but his feet slammed into it and despite the burn of lethargy he pushed himself up, to roll onto his side and wait for the others.
He rook deep, shallow breaths, coughing once or twice as he tried to regain his breath. He wasn’t sure how Nya and Jay managed to get onto the building – Cole was stronger than anyone he knew, and he knew that in situations like this, Jay would use his hover board, but with it being broken, he was surprised to see them both doubling down and trying to regain their own breath.
“Do you think we lost them?” Cole had a feeling that they hadn’t, yet no one had followed them to a window, so for now they were safe.
“I don’t know, we should probably keep moving though, I don’t think they’d give up that easily.” Jay nodded, helping Cole up from the ground, the two then making their way to the patch of ivy which had over grown the side of the building. Taking a hold of the vines, they began to climb down, jumping from the wall to the ground when close enough.
“Do you think Dareth will be okay?” Nya asked, looking back up at the wall of ivy. He honestly hadn’t considered the man while they were running.
“Yeah, he will be, they said he likes to attract Rebels, they’d want him to stay as he is otherwise people would know not to go to him.”
“Even though they are there?”
“Well we went, didn’t we?”
“Are we close to FugiDove's?” Nya grunted as changing the subject. Cole gave her a half shrug.
“We’re closer than we were,” he heard her sarcastic laugh behind him, but ignored her as he walked through the alleyway, back to the street. Now, to say he was sick of the cat and mouse chase would have been an understatement yet as he peeked onto the street, there they were, the stupid mob. It looked smaller than before, but Cole noticed the three guards still leading the patrol. Cole backed up, looking around for anything they could use. “Get under,” he ordered, shoving Jay into a pile of trash bags, throwing some on top of him, too.
“What are you doing? These stink!” Jay protested, throwing one bag from him, but Cole only replaced it.
“I’m saving our butt’s, now hold your breath and stick it out.” He then eyed Nya, who looked quite mortified as he gestured her to follow Jay into the trash. She seemed hesitant but she sat among the trash, Cole moving a few more – honestly he didn’t know if it was more disgusting by the amount of trash bags, or the fact that they did really reek, had they not been cleaned up after months? Cole then slipped under too, holding his breath as he revisited the urge to gag. He grabbed Nya's hood, pulling it over her head as the sound of the mob got closer.
Cole sucked in another breath, a hand was still pulling the cloak down on Nya. His other arm gripped her shoulder, his body pushing into the rocky wall beside them, the smell of rotting was sickening, his eyes were beginning to sting, yet still they stayed there. Jay shuffled, Cole locking eyes onto blue ones which darted away quickly to the left.
Seconds passed by, and finally the dreaded sound of a guard entering the alleyway hit the three. Cole tensed, closing his eyes as though it would help with disguising them into the blur of black. A sudden boom made Cole jump, followed by another one as someone kicked the dumpster beside them. They opened them, checking to see if anyone was hiding within them. Cole could feel his anxiety peaking, if they looked in the trash bags beside them then it was inevitable that they would be found. He wasn’t even sure they could escape this, unless they used brute force.
Thankfully it seemed that checking the dumpster were enough as the shout of, “nothings here! They must have gone a different way!”
“Well they can’t just disappear! We need information from them quick, they might know about – “ The voice disappeared down the street. Cole quickly pushed the bags away from him, kicking them as he stood up.
“That should give us some time,” Cole wiped down his clothes as he heard Jay gag.
“What is the plan when he get these bikes?” Nya was also swiping her clothes down.
“Then it’s free reign, were driving straight to Stiix.”
“I heard that bad things happen there, its called the city of the Ghosts.”
“Not quite, its the City on the water, its a town near the end of the wall, its only called the City of Ghosts because its so close to the wall and people think that it brings bad luck. Come on,” Cole led them back to the street, searching for any sign of the mob coming back. “We can cut through that alley over there and we should practically be there.” Both Jay and Nya nodded.
“Is it true there’s a hole down there?”
“Do you honestly believe that? I think if there was a hole then we would be swarmed, you’ve seen what its like when they open the gates,” Jay shuddered, “I don’t think Stiix would be a town left standing. It would be the city of skeletons if there was.”
“Yeah,” Nya spoke as though she was no longer listening, not catching up on Jay's awful attempt at a joke. Cole rolled his eyes.
“There, its just down there.”
The building was tall, metallic, and looked very out of place against the marbled walls of the other buildings beside it. You could see the rust build up from any rain that poured down, a make shift shop which honestly shouldn’t have been able to stand if it wasn’t for the large bolts which kept the thing stable. Numerous bikes lined the front, ranging from broken down ones, to ones which looked like had already gone through multiple crashes, to newer looking ones, then ones that were so shiny that Cole was almost blinded by it when the sun hit it right. “Good thing its open, that would have been awful if the shop was closed after all of that.”
Cole glared, “yeah, I would have broken into it if that was the case.” Jay laughed as he walked through the door – a cut out of the metal. Inside there were even more bikes, all ranging by colour order to create a rainbow pattern across the store.
“Hey Fugidove!” Jay shouted, his voice bouncing from the walls. At first there wasn’t any indication that anyone was with the three, but then there was a coo, and then a crash and then a bang and suddenly a figure was in front of them. No, more like in front of Jay.
“Jaybird, is that you? Oh it is you, hello my friend, what is it you would like today?” Jay scampered back from Fugidove – a man hidden by a mechanical mask shaped like – could you guess? – a Dove. The cloak he wore over his shoulders were ripped and repaired so poorly that it looked a lot like wings – an awful pair of wings which a bird would not be able to fly with – but it added to his overall look of a bird. He cooed again, stepping into Jay's face once more, gripping his friend by the shoulders. “I’ve been taking so many bikes apart that I could give you any spare parts that you need. I can show you how to use them all too, we can make a night of it – “
“Okay, okay Fugidove, stop for a moment – “
“Or are you after something else? Are you wanting to hang out with your best friend, I can make us some coffee and we can have a catch up – oh yes of course that’s why you came!” Fugidove had that grin on his face, the grin which meant that he was feeding his delusion that he and Jay were the best of friends. Jay had once come to him for some spare parts, ended up in a fight and had won, after that Fugidove had been obsessed with his friend, making up stories that they had grown up together, or that his and Jay's parents were best friends, or he had once even made the lie that they were long lost brothers. No matter how many times Jay had told him that they were not friends, or brothers, or anything, Fugidove would ignore it. It was annoying, but in the end, it usually meant that Cole and Jay got exactly what they wanted if they played him right.
“Hey Fugidove,” Nya began to say, but was shush by Fugidove, who wafted one of his wings towards Nya. “Hey you don’t have to – “ Cole grabbed her arm before she could do something stupid, shaking his head at her.
“No, seriously Fugidove, listen, we need a favour,” Jay continued, stepping even further away from Fugidove than he was. “We need to rent a couple bikes, could we do that?”
“Rent a couple bikes? From me?” Cole blinked, looking at Jay as Jay shrugged.
“Yes?” Jay said with some uncertainty, but Fugidove could only coo and squeal in delight before racing off to the side of the store which he had come from.
“I’ve been waiting for you to come and ask me Jaybird,” The sound of keys jingling echoes, as well as a door opening up. The three stood in wait, all until, “come on then, I want to show you this baby!”
Jay and Cole looked at each other, and it was Nya who took the lead this time, following where Fugidove had disappeared to. Cole and Jay followed shortly after.
The room which Fugidove had opened up was a small office, three bikes were held within the room, leaning against the wall, a wooden and shabby desk on the opposite side, with piles of paper stacked upon themselves shamelessly. There were some other office equipment but Cole didn’t give them much thought as he watched Fugidove show off one of the bikes mounted on the wall. In all honesty, it was a beautiful bike, with bright blue streaks against a black base made it look polished, and new. Unlike the copper metal which most machines had, this one had a silver, not as fancy as the golden bike beside it, but it still looked pretty impressive.
“So, do you like her? I named her after you, Blue Jay!” Cole was pleasantly surprised by how willing Fugidove was being. The man loved his bikes, he would have thought that he would have put up more of a fight, but apparently not.
“Its amazing,” Nya came closer to the bike, Fugidove looking at her with wary eyes. “Did you build this yourself, this isn’t the usual procedure for how to make bikes, if so its beautiful craftsmanship, who taught you?” Her hands reached up to touch the bike but were quickly slapped away by Fugidove.
“This bike isn’t for you, girly,” he hissed, swatting Nya back again with a coo. Nya swatted him back, but stepped away from bike glaring at Fugidove. “This bike is for Jaybird only. Seriously Jay, now could you associate with such uncivilised people.”
Nya gasped, “how dare you – “ Cole grabbed her again, holding a hand to her mouth, even when she struggled and jabbed him in the ribs.
“How s – sweet Fugidove, Jay would love to accept it.” Cole said, still holding a grumbling Nya before whispering into her ear, “We need him, wait until we’ve got the bikes.” Nya seemed to calm down enough that Cole let her go. “Is there by any chance that you have one more bike we could rent?”
Fugidove hummed, “do you really need two bikes, Jay?”
Jay nodded, clearing his throat, “yeah we do, all of us are going,” Jay gestured to Cole and Nya. Fugidove seemed to look at Nya and Cole up and down before sighing.
“Sure, they can take that one,” he pointed to another bike, which unlike the silver and the gold plated ones, it was a copper based one, but still looked in pretty good condition.
“How much do you want for them?” Jay asked, but Fugidove shook his head.
“You get them for three days, and if they come back unscathed then its free, if they get damaged, I'll assess how much you’ll owe me.” Jay nodded, their deals usually went this way with Cole and Jay having to pay anyway as usually the things borrowed would be broken or damaged in some way.
“Thank you Fugidove,” Jay and Cole said in union, helping Fugidove get the bikes unmounted.
“Just remember that you can have them for three days, I want them back as soon as possible.” Jay nodded.
Nya had pushed the bikes to the main entrance once they were unmounted, Fugidove following her with every move. “Come back soon, Jaybird, we need to have a big long catch up.” Was all he said as the three said their goodbyes, making their way onto the street.
“Well I guess this bike is mine,” Jay grinned wiggling his eyebrows as sat on the black and blue bike. “She’s light too, she’s probably fast.”
“Well try not to crash into anything as we get out of this city,” Cole stopped when he noticed Nya climbing onto the second bike. “What are you doing?”
She narrowed her brows at Cole, “driving, why?”
“Do you even know the way to Stiix?”
“Well, no, but I can just follow you and Jay, right?”
Cole huffed, “off, you can sit at the back.”
“I know how to drive a bike, I used to race my brother – “
“I’m not saying you don’t know how to drive, I’m saying you’re going to get yourself lost and we’re not turning around to come get you, so off.”
Nya clenched her jaw but with a huff of her own, she climbed from the bike and Cole took her place.
“You can get on the back of mine, if you want?” Jay offered with a smile. Nya looked at him, pressing her lips together before giving him a small smile.
“I appreciate it Jay, but I...” she trailed off, gesturing at his bike, “you’re bike was made for you so..”
“Yeah, yeah, I get it, I’m not the best driver,” Jay's face flushed but he smiled nonetheless. Nya gave him a smile before sitting behind Cole, who started his engine.
“Try not to get shot,” he grinned at Jay.
“They have to catch me first.”
Notes:
Thank you so much for reading!! Please if you can - no pressure though! - please leave any kudos, comments or anything with this story! I appreciate kind criticism about anything in my writing (I'm just a sensitive soul!) And again I'm just so thankful that you guys are reading this and I hope you're all having a good time, aha! Thank you!
~ TooManyFandomsToHandle
Next Chapter:
Chapter title: Nya becomes a boy.
Word count: 405.
Chapter percentage: 3%
Date posting: Between end of Feb/Early March!
Hijabiwriter on Chapter 1 Sun 22 Oct 2023 09:53PM UTC
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TooManyFandomsToHandlr on Chapter 1 Mon 23 Oct 2023 05:48PM UTC
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Hijabiwriter on Chapter 1 Mon 23 Oct 2023 06:09PM UTC
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22Ginja_Ninja22 on Chapter 1 Sun 22 Oct 2023 10:10PM UTC
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TooManyFandomsToHandlr on Chapter 1 Mon 23 Oct 2023 05:50PM UTC
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22Ginja_Ninja22 on Chapter 2 Mon 30 Oct 2023 10:40AM UTC
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TooManyFandomsToHandlr on Chapter 2 Sat 04 Nov 2023 07:18PM UTC
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Just_Fiction on Chapter 2 Sat 04 Nov 2023 03:22PM UTC
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TooManyFandomsToHandlr on Chapter 2 Sat 04 Nov 2023 07:26PM UTC
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Just_Fiction on Chapter 2 Sun 05 Nov 2023 01:10AM UTC
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Lydiastarology on Chapter 2 Mon 06 Nov 2023 07:33PM UTC
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TooManyFandomsToHandlr on Chapter 2 Wed 22 Nov 2023 07:24PM UTC
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Saron6 on Chapter 2 Tue 21 Nov 2023 08:39PM UTC
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TooManyFandomsToHandlr on Chapter 2 Wed 22 Nov 2023 07:26PM UTC
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Saron6 on Chapter 2 Wed 22 Nov 2023 07:32PM UTC
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Lydiastarology on Chapter 3 Wed 22 Nov 2023 08:03PM UTC
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TooManyFandomsToHandlr on Chapter 3 Sun 26 Nov 2023 02:54PM UTC
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pendejosinombr367 on Chapter 3 Wed 22 Nov 2023 08:51PM UTC
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TooManyFandomsToHandlr on Chapter 3 Sun 26 Nov 2023 02:56PM UTC
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Just_Fiction on Chapter 3 Thu 23 Nov 2023 06:27PM UTC
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TooManyFandomsToHandlr on Chapter 3 Sun 26 Nov 2023 02:58PM UTC
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Just_Fiction on Chapter 3 Sun 26 Nov 2023 03:32PM UTC
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22Ginja_Ninja22 on Chapter 3 Fri 24 Nov 2023 04:15PM UTC
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TooManyFandomsToHandlr on Chapter 3 Sun 26 Nov 2023 03:01PM UTC
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ninjago_prinzlloyd on Chapter 3 Sat 08 Jun 2024 07:15PM UTC
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snow0sky on Chapter 4 Mon 22 Jan 2024 11:00AM UTC
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TooManyFandomsToHandlr on Chapter 4 Tue 23 Jan 2024 04:43AM UTC
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luty (Guest) on Chapter 4 Tue 23 Jan 2024 02:53PM UTC
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charcolate on Chapter 4 Sun 04 Feb 2024 02:23AM UTC
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TooManyFandomsToHandlr on Chapter 4 Fri 09 Feb 2024 06:17AM UTC
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