Chapter 7

"And that my apprentice is the origin of the mirror." said Garmadon.

Lucas's eyes were drooping with tiredness. His uncle gave him a long history lesson on The Twilight Mirror and how it can create a portal and bring destruction on Ninjago. He looked at the grandfather clock in his uncle's chamber and it ticked ten o'clock. He just went through a three hour long lesson on the mirror and was both tired from the lesson and the fight he had with his family. If it was a lesson from his father, he wouldn't be tired because his lessons would've taken less time and wouldn't be fighting with his family.

Lucas still hated himself for what he did to them. When he wasn't Garmadon's apprentice, he would always train and fight beside them. But now that he made the choice to leave, it always brought pain to him when he thinks of fighting against them in the future. Lucas also knows that Lloyd is in pain too when they encounter each other for the first time in over a week. He wished his little cousin would realized that he only did it to protect everyone he cared for. It kept bringing pain to Lucas when his cousin told him that he was forced to leave. But Lloyd has never been in a situation to make a choice between choosing your life to save everyone you care for or watch the people you care for die.

"If only he knew what it's like to leave." Lucas says to himself.

Garmadon looked at Lucas and could see something was bothering him. "Lucas, is something bothering you?" he asked.

"Nothing." Lucas lied and looked at the mirror on the small oak table, "With all due respect master, how are we suppose to find all the shards if we only have two before the solstice passes?"

Garmadon sighed a little. "I found this shard when I exiled myself into the Dark Realm." Garmadon explained and picked up the mirror to see part of his reflection and while the rest was empty, "But when my brother and I escaped from the one portal that we managed to escape, I knew that someday the mirror would be found."

"The legend says that if all pieces are found on the stroke of midnight, the wielder of the mirror can open the portal and destroy the mirror, if he wanted to. Now that I hold the mirror, I will create Ninjago in my own image. The legend also says when a piece is found and placed in the mirror, the mirror would show the next location at the stroke of midnight. Seeing that it's only a matter of time before it happens, I want you to get something to eat and some rest."

Lucas bowed, as his stomach rumbled with hunger, and left Garmadon's chamber. As he walked through the marble floor hallways to make his way to the kitchen, Lucas kept thinking about the future, and what's going to lead to if they find all the remaining seven pieces in eight days. He then slowly realized that on the day of the solstice was Lloyd's birthday. Lloyd was going to turn twelve on the day of a possible battle between good and evil and it irritated Lucas that he hasn't thought of anything to give him. He now wished that it doesn't happen or will put harm to his cousin. But he knows at the stroke of midnight the mirror would tell his uncle the next location of a mirror shard.

When he reached the grand marble staircase, Lucas didn't spot any of the skeletons or Serpentine tribes below him training. He figured that they may be in their quarters that his uncle gave them since they're hiding in a abandon mansion. Each footstep he made on the steps of the stairs echoed in the empty grand hall reminded him of a ghost town, like on the Bounty once, and slowly made his way to the kitchen. Just before he reached the door of the kitchen, Lucas felt a hand was pressed over hard on his mouth and his wrists were forced behind his back and was being dragged away.

Lucas tried to call for help as he was being dragged away or kidnapped. But the hand gagging him only muffled his cries. Lucas tried to struggle free from his captor and couldn't do spinjitzu either because his captor had an iron grip on his wrists to prevent him from performing it. Both he and the captor turned a corner and Lucas was now pinned against the wall. Lucas's muscle were now tensed up to face his captor or captors as he was facing the Serpentine generals and Skalidor was the one who kidnapped him and brought him to them. At first thought, Lucas thought it was the ninja doing a stealth mission to kidnap him, but instead faces the generals; which made his muscles relax.

Skales slithered up to the pinned water ninja and hissed at him with his forked tongue in annoyance. "Don't get to comfortable, ninja." he hissed, "Just because you're Garmadon's apprentice doesn't mean we'll take orders from you."

"Be grateful that my uncle doesn't believe me about your side plan to kidnap my cousin." Lucas spat back at them.

"If you mention it to him again, I'll squeeze the life out of you." Skalidor threatened.

"Or make you into one of uss." Fangtom added.

"And we'll go with the same story like from before." Acidicus added and green venom dripped from his fangs.

"And the only way to prevent that from happening to me is this." Lucas said and reached into his pouch to pull out a white pill-shaped capsule.

The generals backed away slowly, while Skalidor released Lucas, at the sight of the pellet. The Serpentine are known to have sensible hearing. That was the only defense the people of Ninjago had and with the help of the sacred flutes, which gave them pain and agony to their hearing and how they got imprisoned in their tombs. Now that Lloyd had released them and when Pythor took the last flute, this was Lucas' only denfese against them. Lucas placed the pellet back in his pouch, fixed his ruffled shaggy hair to make his curved bangs cover his eyebrows and scar and walked away from them. He stopped and turned to face the generals.

"If you ever try to hurt my cousin when the solstice comes, I will make you wish you were back in your tombs." Lucas growled through his teeth and left.

Lucas was furious at the Serpentine as they were still planning to kidnap Lloyd and hold him hostage to make Garmadon follow them. He tried to tell his uncle their plan, but Skales denied it and told him that when he had the Venomari venom in his eyes from the sewers, he had only imagined it. And Garmadon believed the Hypnobrai general. Which made Lucas even more furious towards the Serpentine for making his uncle believe them and not him. Not to mention that the Serpentine burned down his home, The Monestary Dojo. By the time he reached the door, Lucas decided he was no longer hungry and made his way back upstairs and towards his bedroom chamber that his uncle gave him.

When he opened the door of his room, it always brought depression to his heart. Inside the chamber, it held a queen-sized canopy bed, a couch and coffee table with the dust covers still on them. But the reason why it brought him depression to his heart a lot is because he was all alone. Lucas missed sharing a room with the ninja and his cousin. He missed having conversations with them as they were all trying to sleep. He even missed waking up in the middle of the night as he would hear Lloyd having a nightmare and he would take him out onto the deck and play his flute to make him sleep in peace and stay with him on the deck until dawn broke through the sky. But all of that has now changed since he left.

Lucas quickly changed into his grey pajamas and walked over to his bed. As he laid his head on the multiple pillows, Lucas' eyes weren't heavy now and felt something pressed against his back, and felt around to find what it was. When he felt the object with his finger-tips, he grabbed onto it and pulled out to see a silver pocket watch. Lucas was curious why he didn't feel it before and pressed down the button on top of the watch. The metal cover sprung open and showed the actual time ticking on the right side and on the left side had a aged picture of a elderly couple smiling to the camera. Lucas wondered if the previous owners were happier than he was in the mansion and closed the cover and placed it on his bedside table. Feeling more confortable now, Lucas threw the multi-layer blankets on top of himself and closed his eyes into slumber.


A fire blazed in the fireplace of a large bedroom chamber. A figure casted a tall shadow against the orange light and onto the wall behind him as he waited patiently for the clock to tick the time he waited for. The grandfather clock began to chime as the two hands met together at midnight. Garmadon went towards the oak table that rested the Twilight Mirror and picked it up as it gave off a dark golden aura around the flame.

"I, wielder of the Twilight Mirror, commmand you to tell me the location of a shard." he commanded as he looked into it.

Garmadon's reflection began to shift and change as the mirror was doing as it was told. The two welded shards no longer gave off its golden reflection, but instead showed a woodland area in snow. The image began to move to show the dark lord that the forest was surrounded with white trees with black stripes on the bark. Garmadon evily grinned as he knows the next location of a shard and will send his apprentice to retrieve it for him.

"We have our start." he says to himself and lets out his evil laugh.