We Will Walk in Shadows
Chapter 1: Beginning Anew
In front of the mirror on the Destiny's Bounty, Lloyd inspected his older self. His hair was longer, as were his arms, legs and torso, and his hands and feet were bigger. He turned his face right, then left, then let out a long "aaaahh" to listen to his deepened voice. It was bizarre. He didn't even really know how old he was now- if he was the same age as the other ninja or if he was still younger than them.
But, he supposed, it didn't really matter anyway. All it meant to be older was that he was that much closer to facing his father. His stomach twisted nervously as he thought this, and he watched in the mirror as his mouth turned down involuntarily. He wasn't sure he was ready, physically or mentally, for what was to come. He wasn't even used to his new body yet. In the two weeks since his sudden aging up in the comic book shop, he'd been causing accidents all over the ship doing everyday things. He'd knocked his head on the shorter door frames of the ship countless times. He'd knocked things over as he reached for them, being unused to his longer arm length. And he'd been hurting the other ninja in training whenever he hit or kicked out at them for the same reason, reaching too far with and putting too much of his new strength behind his longer limbs as he struck out.
Not to mention he hadn't been able to successfully do Spinjitsu yet. His balance was off, and his extra strength meant that he usually destroyed something before he fell on his butt out of his unsuccessful Spin. And though he often heard the ninja grumbling about his inadvertent destructiveness, it was only after he'd accidently broken through the wall between the bridge and the deck where they trained that Nya had forbidden him from trying to Spin on the ship, annoyed that he'd also broken some of the ship's equipment, which she herself had to repair.
That was a week ago, and they'd settled down in an open field of sand at the edge of the desert right outside of Ninjago City. Since then he'd just been making dust storms trying unsuccessfully to Spin, winding up on his behind in the middle of a sand tornado that left him and the other ninja coughing the rest of the day. With all these accidents, and the ninja constantly groaning in pain after training him, Sensei Wu had told him to take the rest of the day off, and that tomorrow he would restart his training from square one. And while Lloyd wasn't exactly sure what that meant, he was pretty sure he'd be going back to something like "Learning to Balance 101," which, he had to admit with embarrassment, was probably where he needed to restart training anyway.
Despite his slow adaptation to his new body, he at least took comfort in the fact that he still had his power. As if to prove it to himself, he cupped his hands around the empty air in front of his chest and focused, the green glowing energy beginning to burn between them. He pulled his hands apart too quickly to expand his power, and the energy exploded outwards. Lloyd flinched away from the huge flash of light. He felt his hair sweep backwards and heard the mirror shatter as his power expanded to fill the small room, passing over him like a warm breeze, and then disappeared. He squinted his eyes open and sighed when he noticed the shards of the mirror on the counter and scattered on the ground at his feet. Yet another thing destroyed thanks to him and his new body. He caught a glimpse of his reflection in a mirror shard. His hair stood up as is he'd been electrocuted, and his face was blackened as if he'd been burned.
Sensei had said that his aging up meant that the final battle was drawing nearer, but Lloyd couldn't help but wonder if the balance had been tipped in his father's favor.
Author's Note: Disregard everything after the episode "Child's Play." This story picks up after that episode and does not follow the plot of the rest of Season 2. The first two chapters are rather short, but this is a pretty long story. The chapters will also get longer as the story progresses, so if you like this little bit so far, stick around for the rest! Also, for future reference, the Jay/Nya relationship is not established, but will be included in this story.