I have zero explanation for this except that during the rare occasion of me working on my original novel, it occurred to me that out of all the dragon characteristics Lloyd could have, I've been short-changing him on of the coolest ones possible. Also I wanted to write something a little more lighthearted, so here's Lloyd ignoring his one brain cell :D
In his defense, Lloyd most certainly had not been trying to completely eviscerate the inside of his throat. That hadn't been like, anywhere even remotely near the end goal. Was it something he'd wanted? No. Was it something he'd planned? Of course not, his plans aren't that bad. Was it something he probably should have expected?
….well, maybe, but it's too late now.
Way too late, Lloyd thinks to himself, as he finishes hiding the last specks of the incinerated fire alarm in the bathroom trash and immediately retreats to sticking his head beneath the running faucet again.
The thing is, though, smart as he normally is, Lloyd's had it — well, he's had it not so great, lately. It hasn't been the easiest of times in his life, which is saying something, compared to the rest of it. So maybe he'd gotten a little too focused on the barest shred of good news he'd received during the entire thing, sue him.
You try being told you've actually been part-dragon your entire life, what would your first move be? And having grown up with dragons as a normal staple in his life, Lloyd's had a whole lot of inspiration on that front.
In hindsight however, Lloyd thinks, as he tries not to cry over his poor, mutilated throat — he probably should've stuck with like, trying to give himself claws, or something. Or even the flying thing. The flying thing would've been way better.
The worst part is that it actually looked so stupid cool. Kai would lose his mind over how cool this is, and Lloyd can't even show him, because he might lose his mind in an entirely different and much less enthusiastic way.
Lloyd tries for a tentative "hey guys", and immediately doubles over in a bout of wheezing gasps, wishing he'd tried for the sweet bliss of unconsciousness-via-head-bashing instead.
Stuffing a towel in his mouth so the rest of the team doesn't hear him hacking like a chronic smoker, Lloyd wonders 1) how long it's going to take the green power to fix his throat, 2) how long he's going to be able to get away with not speaking, and 3) how much of this he can blame on his great-grandmother before she vaporizes him.
He comes to the conclusion that he's just gonna blame the whole thing on her.
Despite the circumstances they'd met under, Lloyd likes his great-grandmother. She's pretty cool, as far as family members go, and he enjoys talking with her, even if ninety percent of their conversation ends up devoted to lecturing him about what "an absolute scumbag your great-grandfather was, child, truly the spawn of *garbled dragon curses*."
Actually, all their conversations tend to end that way, but Lloyd doesn't mind too much. It's kind of like if his great-grandparents had just divorced like normal people, instead of being otherworldly, immortal god-like beings who went to war with each other.
He hasn't been talking to her for that long — it'd taken a lot of finagling the means of reaching the First Realm from his uncle, for one, and then he'd had to make sure he could get back home, of course. The whole thing ended up being pointless anyways, since his great-grandmother ended up coming to visit him, because he's the only family member she hasn't considered barbecuing at some point, apparently. (Yet.)
"—and you do look just like your father, back when he didn't take after your thrice-cursed *garbled dragon cursing* of a great-grandfather," she had said, inspecting him with her large eyes. "I was quite fond of him, you know. He was a true terror, as I'm sure you are. Or perhaps not, you have a sweeter look in your face. It's the cheeks, I think, you're not nearly as threatening as he ever looked."
"Um, thank you," Lloyd had awkwardly replied, as he'd had little to no reference point of whether or not she genuinely liked him at the time, and was being extra-cautious, because certain recent familial encounters had left him with the mindset that it was best to believe everyone related to him probably wanted to murder him.
Fortunately, his great-grandmother was not one of those types.
"I don't know about the wings, little one," she'd informed him as he'd dangled upside from her tail, eyeing him mournfully. "You seem to take too much after your mother's side."
Lloyd had been less than thrilled with that response, but he'd swallowed his disappointment the best he could.
"Now the teeth, though," she'd said, her eyes gleaming. "Those, we can work with."
That was how the fire-breathing had come to be in the first place — which, as you should note, was entirely his great-grandmother's idea. She'd reasoned that since Lloyd not only appeared to have manifested most of his dragon characteristics in his mouth, but also had a direct connection to the element of fire, he might be able to both successfully breathe fire and survive the attempt.
"Wait, there's a chance I wouldn't survive?" Lloyd had asked, blinking.
"You're exhaling fire through your little mortal throat, hatchling. Of course there's a chance you wouldn't survive. A very small one, mind you — I happen to like you a good deal, and it'd be a terrible shame if all I was left with in the world was the rest of your *garbled dragon cursing* family."
She had also reasoned that since Lloyd seemed to have an excellent handle on both languages — even if Dragon did sound like butchered yowling in his accent, she bemoaned — perhaps there was a connection with the throat there. At any rate, they had both agreed that Lloyd would be far more likely to breathe fire from his throat than he would be sprouting wings anytime soon.
Lloyd had deliberately mentioned absolutely none of this to his team. If Kai ever learns that he'd been warned dying was an option and continued to try it anyways…
Well, it's breathing fire. Lloyd's staking his hopes on Kai being so impressed with how cool it is that he totally forgets about all about murdering his reckless little brother.
While his great-grandmother gives him all sorts of throat exercises he's supposed to do — apparently the actual fire's supposed to come from his chest, but the throat will take the worst of it — he doesn't get the chance to actually test it out until a week or two later, when he's walking home alone from the grocery late one night.
All he's picked up is an extra-large bag of M&M's and like, four things of cereal, so Lloyd's in good spirits as he crosses one of the older alleyways. He's also relaxed enough for the first time in about three months to let his guard down a bit, so it's a real shame that he immediately gets jumped by thugs the second he does.
"Hands up, kid, nice and easy," the biggest guy says, waving his gun at him. "We don't want any trouble, just your money."
Lloyd bites back a retort. Yeah, sure, they can have all fifty of his cents he's got left. Lloyd's a real billionaire here, in his training shorts and Zane's old sweatshirt, who's even teaching these guys how to pick targets—
"He said hands up, kid!" the second guy barks at him, his own gun leveling out somewhere wildly above Lloyd's shoulder. "And drop the bags, too!"
That has Lloyd scowling. He spent the last of his junk food money on this, he's not leaving it on the city streets, gross. He sighs, shifting his arms and beginning to call up his power, when an idea hits him. Lloyd's mouth curves into a deliberate smirk.
"Hey kid, we said — hey, stop that creepy grinning, we're pointing a gun at you—"
Lloyd just grins wider, opens his mouth, and breathes an explosion of streaming flame toward their faces.
If he were his father, Lloyd would call out something terribly impressive, like "may my hellfire vanquish you back to the eternal pit of misery you crawled out of, foolish scum" — but he's not his father, so he's been figuring he'll end up saying something along the lines of "stop right there, sucker" because he was raised by a bunch of teenagers with the combined schooling level of mid-high school.
Unfortunately, all he ends up actually saying is a bunch of strangled screaming, because he's currently forcing a miniature bonfire through his throat, and wow, he definitely did not calculate how much this was actually going to hurt—
It does the trick, at least. The thugs' faces lose all their color faster than he can blink, and they jump back screaming in terror, dropping all their guns in their haste to escape.
Lloyd would be cackling like he hasn't since he was about nine, but he's too busy trying not die inhaling smoke through his scorched throat.
"Son of — hngh—"
Smoke is billowing out from between his teeth now, and Lloyd sucks in a strangled wheeze, his eyes tearing up as the smoke stings against them. He feels like he's swallowed a blast from Kai, his throat hurts so bad, but it doesn't feel deadly. He can already feel the buzz of green power doing it's job, and the pathetic whining noises he's making reassure him that his vocal chords are still there, even if it feels like he's flambéed them.
"Worth it," Lloyd croaks through his abused, raw throat, before collapsing on the street and nearly passing out.
The next morning is awful. If Lloyd hadn't developed such a high pain tolerance as he has, he'd be in serious trouble right now.
Not that it makes it any better, he thinks to himself, trying not to whine as he accidentally swallows, his throat vengefully reminding him that he tried to charbroil it last night.
"Morning, Lloyd," Cole says cheerfully. Lloyd gives him a weak smile in return, adding a little wave for flair, and hopes it's enough.
"How would you like your eggs?" Zane asks him. Lloyd jerks a shoulder up in a shrug, trying to look as tired as he can. If he can convince them that he's just exhausted, instead of slowly dying inside because he breathed fire through his throat last night—
"I want scrambled," Jay says through a yawn, saving Lloyd from Zane's quizzical gaze. "Make 'em all scrambled, Zane, with that cheese you use."
"A 'please' would be appreciated once in a while," Zane mutters, but he's already reaching for the fridge again.
Lloyd grits his teeth, trying desperately to ignore how much his mouth tastes like ash. Like, actual ash, which is disgusting. Lloyd's never gonna be able to eat burnt marshmallows again, which is a true tragedy.
The price you pay for being a badass, Lloyd thinks to himself mournfully.
Kai comes in about then, still scrubbing at his eyes, yawning as he sits next to Lloyd. "Sleep alright?" he asks, words mangled through the yawn.
Lloyd nods, then tries to hide the wince that runs through him as his throat twinges. He's apparently unsuccessful, because Kai narrows his eyes at him, suddenly looking much more awake.
"Hey, are you okay?" he says, sounding concerned. "Talk to me, bud."
Lloyd bites his lip. If Kai keeps asking, the others are gonna start looking over, and then that'll be more suspicious. Maybe he can just tell him he's got a cough? Yeah, he can do that. Just one small sentence, a few little words. He can handle that.
"I'm—ngh—"
Lloyd's voices catches on the first word, squeaks like a broken recorder, and then coughs a burst of bright fire across the breakfast table.
A chorus of high-pitched screaming rings out across the breakfast room, Cole and Jay jumping back from the flames as Nya and Zane rush toward him, quickly putting out the fire that's caught the wooden table. Kai's dancing around Lloyd as he doubles over in hacking coughs, sounding two seconds from a panicked breakdown.
"—coughed up fire, that was fire, Lloyd what the FSM was that?!"
"M'a dragon,'member?" Lloyd wheezes, as he's stared down by his family's terrified faces. He coughs again, waving at the tiny puff of smoke that comes out, before giving them a shaky grin. "S'cool, right?"
He's met with five blank stares.
"Oh dear," Zane finally says, looking like he's come to the conclusion that Lloyd is going to kill himself with this. Which is rude, Lloyd can't be cool as heck if he's dead.
"This is worse than the lightbulbs," Cole says, faintly.
"Lloyd, how," Nya breathes into her hands.
"Dude that's sick!" Jay bursts out in excitement, immediately cementing his place as one of Lloyd's favorite people ever. "You can breathe fire, what the heck!"
Kai shakes his head at him in awe, his voice reverent. "That's so cool, that's not eve—ennn oh my god he's dying—!"
Kai's excitement turns to a horrified shriek as Lloyd coughs up a mouthful of blood.
"S'okay," Lloyd croaks, waving everyone off they crowd him, wiping at his mouth. "S'normal too. Throat's just raw. It heals up after a bit."
He's met by five of the most unimpressed stares he's seen all month.
"I'm making you a doctor's appointment," Zane sighs, tapping at his phone. "And you're going over this with Sensei Wu."
"And you're not breathing fire anymore," Cole scolds, eyebrows furrowed in worry.
"Without us," Jay adds. Cole elbows him, and he scowls. "What? C'mon, this is super cool."
"Jay," Nya says, a warning in her voice.
Jay laughs nervously. "I mean, super dangerous, haha! Real, uh, really dangerous. You're coughing up blood, that's bad."
Kai hovers by his shoulder, still looking torn between dreadful concern, overbearing overprotectiveness, and most importantly, an vicious kind of curiosity.
As Lloyd had hoped it would, curiosity wins out. "D'you think it'd work with me?" he finally asks him, a gleam in his eyes. "Since I can control fire, do you think I could breathe it too—"
"No," Zane says, quickly.
"Absolutely not," Nya says flatly. "Not a chance. Neither of you are going to try anything else with fire. If I catch you coughing up smoke, you're both toast."
Lloyd and Kai both nod dutifully.
"Of course," Lloyd assures her, through a creaking rasp.
"Wouldn't dream of it," Kai echoes.
Nya storms out of the monastery at one a.m. that night to find both Kai and Lloyd in the middle of the training field, half the dummies burning down and both sprawled out on the ground. Lloyd is still hacking smoke up, having been responsible for the flames on the right side. Kai is on his hands and knees, his face pale and sweaty, responsible for the fires smoldering on the left. In terms of breathing fire, he's only been able to trigger his gag relax about seven times, but in terms of enthusiasm, he's contributed to the blaze on the whole by boosting Lloyd's flames by eighty percent.
Nya spends about forty-five minutes alternating between yelling at them and dousing them with twin jets of water from her hands. Neither Kai or Lloyd mind getting sprayed by that point, but the yelling definitely doesn't do wonders for the headaches they've both got from smoke inhalation.
After that fiasco, Lloyd is officially banned from breathing fire, influencing anyone else to try and breathe fire, or even mention breathing fire.
Lloyd declares that this is a prejudiced offense against him being half-dragon.
"You are a prejudiced offense against the entire health world on the whole," Zane glares at him, tying off the last of the bandages he's been wrapping around his throat. Lloyd makes a face at him. The bandages are overkill, and Zane knows it — all the damage is on the inside, anyways.
Next to them Nya is still chewing out Kai, who's steadily chugging at the glass of water Cole forced on him. "I don't care if you think you're fireproof, and I don't care if you—" she stabs an accusatory finger at Lloyd. "Have special elemental powers that'll heal you eventually. If I so much as see a spark of fire from either of you, anywhere near your mouth, I'm going to super-soak you with the illegal water gun Jay built last summer."
Kai and Lloyd pale in unison. Kai speaks up hesitantly, "Wouldn't it just be easier if you hit us with your powers—"
"No," Nya hisses, her eyes flashing murder. "Because it's making a point. It's the water gun of shame."
Kai and Lloyd exchange commiseratory glances.
Cole and Jay don't say much until Nya and Zane have wandered from the room, at which point they surge forward, eyes gleaming.
"Tell me you got video of it," Jay whispers.
Kai grins. "Duh. Wait 'til you see what he did to the balance beams."
After that, unfortunately, Lloyd really does have to stop breathing fire. Mostly because he'd like to be able to speak again without doubling over in wheezing coughs, but also because Nya's legitimately terrifying with her water gun.
Also because Kai's too scared of Nya as well, so Lloyd's lost his claim to a bad influence.
Ah well, Lloyd mopes to himself. It's a nice card to have up his sleeve in a pinch, he guesses, but clearly it was never meant to be a natural thing. He's just too human. (Or too Oni — maybe that's influencing it? He'll have to ask his great-grandmother, next time she goes off on another rant about them.)
The important point is, he has every intention of not doing it again. Every intention.
But then he visits his father in prison again, because his dad's chatty like that now, apparently. Which isn't a terribly bad thing on its own, because Mr. Self-Proclaimed (or was it Harumi-proclaimed?) Emperor Garmadon has at least mellowed out a bit since the whole "wreck half the city in a rage" thing. And Lloyd's been called here in person to check out the new security measures they put up, so he does have a good reason.
No, the breaking point comes when Lloyd's trying to leave in peace, and his terrible dad of a father decides to make some snarky comment about how "boringly quiet you are today", like Lloyd's supposed to be his entertainment, or something.
Normally Lloyd would just ignore it and storm off, but his throat's been killing him this whole time, and the vein in the upper right corner of his forehead is throbbing just a little too much. So instead of leaving, he whirls on his father, eyes flashing as he growls. Garmadon's teeth bare, prepared to snap at him, and Lloyd opens his mouth to snap right back—
And promptly breathes a campfire's worth of bright flames at him instead.
Lloyd claps a hand over his mouth in horror as the flames blossom out against the glass barrier, before doubling over in ragged coughs, smoke streaming through his fingers. A clamoring of alarms goes off, and that's the only warning Lloyd gets before the emergency sprinklers come on, soaking both him and his father. At least they'll hide the brimming tears from the smoke in his eyes, Lloyd thinks miserably, watching as his gi soaks through.
Garmadon is dead silent. He stares at him with wide eyes, his mouth hanging slightly open. He closes his mouth, blinking twice, his jaw working. Then, finally— "That is undeniably unfair," he growls. "She taught you how to do that? I've been begging her since I was six."
Despite the intense agony his throat is in, Lloyd beams. "It's so cool, right?" he says, his voice sounding like a malfunctioning blender. "Totally awesome. No idea why she wouldn't teach you. Must suck to be—"
Lloyd doesn't get to gloat much more than that, because he starts wheezing again and the security guards come drag him out "for his own safety", but for the look on his dad's face?
So worth it.