Kai flinched at the cold touch of an icepack against his neck. Bruises were already starting to form, and Zane had insisted that Kai take at least some form of action to numb the pain, even it if meant holding an icepack against his neck and having to deal with dribbles of cold condensation trailing down his back.

Right now the four ninja and three knights were gathered in the common room, strewn about on different couches. Macy was sitting against the back of one couch on the floor, Aaron leaning over the back of said couch was trimming the burnt ends of her hair off. On the couch closest to the door that led into the lobby sat Axl and Cole, who were both silent. And Jay was just pacing in anticipation for god knows what. The door next to Cole and Axl's couch slid open and in entered Lance, Clay trailing behind him. Their hands were intertwined tightly, Lance gently leading Clay to sit on either side of Macy.

An awkward silence filled the space, only the occasional snip from Aaron's scissors ringing through the room. Clay twiddled his thumbs, grimaced to himself, then looked up at Kai. Zane was still holding the icepack in place.

"So…" Clay offered, "I want to apologize for what happened in the holochamber."

Kai took the icepack from Zane and leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees.

"No need," He returned, "I kind of deserved it. And these guys already explained what your deal was."

Cole nodded from his own seat.

"Yeah. It wasn't your fault."

Clay tried to nod, but was stopped by a hand grabbing his chin. Suddenly Clay was looking into the fierce gaze of Macy. He swallowed nervously.

"Clay," She huffed, "Why didn't you just let us know when you started hurting so that we could prevent stuff like this? This is the third time that something like this has happened. Once with Jestro, once with me, and now with Kai! You need to start letting us know about these things!"

The ninja shared a look. They'd been told about Clay's past but not about the fact that he had almost killed two other people, one of which being his own teammate. Clay looked at the floor, too ashamed to really meet her gaze. So she released his face, crossed her arms, and grumbled to herself.

"Y'know Clay," Aaron said, hopping off from the back of the couch, "I think this calls for a dogpile."

Clay's eyes suddenly darkened.

"Absolutely not." He said back, "No."

Yet Clay was unable to prepare himself before Aaron suddenly flung himself at his leader, clinging on like a koala. Macy laughed, then piled herself on against Clay's wheeze of protest. Then came Lance, and then Axl got up from his seat to walk over and lay across the other four.

"Get off of me!" Clay sputtered, smothered in his partner's bodies, "We have guests over!"

Aaron's head poked out from under someone's arm, grin plastered on his face.

"You're right!" He chimed, "You guys wanna join in crushing our boyfriend to death until he cheers up?"

The ninja shared a look, and Jay smiled widely. A couple moments later and all four ninja joined in on the pile, laughter rang throughout the room, happiness bouncing off the walls. Somehow a snowball got shoved down someone's shirt, and shrieks of cold split the laughter.

"Zane you ass!" Cole managed to squawk through bouts of laughter, "I know you did that!"

"Maybe I did," Zane giggled from the body pile, "But I think Lance deserved it for elbowing me."

More laughter.

The door that Lance and Clay had come out of only moments before slid open once again, this time revealing young sensei Wu. Wu watched the group play-fight for a but longer before clearing his throat with an amused smile. At once all movement stopped. Cole slowly turned to look at his sensei, horror on his face.

"S-sensei Wu," She sputtered, "We uh- we finished training and-"

Wu held up a hand and chuckled to himself.

"No I get it. Sometimes just having fun is the best training of all. It's good to see that you're all getting along well."

The group scrambled apart, clambering to their feet to stand at attention for Wu. He laughed quietly at the sight of 9 teens untangling like a ball of spaghetti. He took minute notice of Clay's arm turning a soft, pleasant, purple. A color that usually signified love and happiness in magic users. Wu crossed his arms.

"Well, I just wanted to let you know that Merlock has found the spell necessary to send us all back to Ninjago. So whenever you're ready we can-"

"Seriously?!" Jay shouted, "As soon as we're getting comfortable is the time that you decide to make us leave?"

Aaron nodded furiously, and was joined by everyone the 8 others.

"Oh stop that," Wu grumbled, "Merlock says we have a limited amount of time before there's a possibility the spell could retract into his memory banks."

"Can that happen?" Axl whispered to Aaron, who shrugged.

Cole ran a hand through his hair and sighed.

"Well, we've waited long enough. Let's go home, guys."