XII: Scars

Cole was in his inn getting ready for another search for Wu when he looked up at the mirror. He saw what was looking back and his eyes immediately fell on the scar on the left side of his face and hated it.

"Why do I have to be reminded of the one thing I hate every day?" Cole asked himself.

Suddenly Cole heard a knock on the front door. He opened the door to see Jay all ready to go look for Wu.

"Are you ready to go?" Jay asked.

"I'm not feeling very good today," Cole replied.

"Or yesterday," Jay pointed out, "or last weak."

"I might feel fine tomorrow."

"You said that yesterday and last weak."

"See you tomorrow," Cole said closing the door.

"Here's a movie to break you out of your slump" Jay yelled shoving Cole's favorite movie under the door. It was an adventure about a young boy who's lost on an island without any memories.

Cole went over to the television and put the movie in. After a while of watching the movie the electricity went out.

"How did that happen?" Cole asked himself. He looked outside and saw that one of the power lines on the road! "I'm up!"

Cole went outside and saw that the reason the power line fell over was because Jay was using it to find Wu!

Cole helped Jay up and asked what was going on.

"I was looking for Wu until I started to realize that I was too high and got very scared so I accidentally sent out a electric force which knocked over the power line," Jay replied.

"There's something wrong with you," Cole told him. He picked up the power line, set it back up, and told Jay to fix it.

By the time he got back to his inn the electricity was back on. Cole went over to the television and was about to turn it back to the movie he was watching since it was on the satellite when a commercial caught his eye.

"I've heard that some people have issues with scars from the battles in Ninjago City, Stix, anywhere in Ninjago whatsoever," the man on the tv said, "well I have the perfect solution for you with scar cream. Scar cream is the only cream in the world that can hide your scars! So buy scar cream today!"

Cole turned off the television and immediately went to store to find the cream. He walked into the store and asked the lady who worked at the store if the cream was there.

"I think that we have it in that aisle over there," she replied pointing to a makeup aisle.

"You're kidding right?" Cole asked.

"Sorry, no," she replied.

Cole went to find the cream and found it nearly right away. Right after he found the cream he ran out of the aisle as fast as he could. He bought the cream, left the store and went back to his room.

Once Cole got to his room he went to the bathroom and started to rub the cream on his scar. He then read the directions on the bottle and found out that it said it takes all night to take effect.

The next day Cole went to the bathroom to see if the scar disappeared but when he looked at himself in the mirror he saw that the scar became hot pink!

"What the heck happened!" Cole yelled.

Cole then read the bottle to see if he did anything wrong and it turns out…he did. On the bottle it said to put on only after you take a shower. It also said that it effects last for three days.

"I hate water!" Cole said. He has ever since he was a ghost. It frightened him because touching water before would have killed him.

Cole then heard a knock on his door. He opened the door to see a very startled Jay.

"Were you serious about being sick?" Jay asked.

"I put something called scar cream on my face and it went wrong," Cole replied.

"Can you help look for Wu today?" Jay asked.

"Don't let anyone look at me," Cole said.

Jay replied by handing him a cloak. Cole grabbed the cloak and ran past Jay to start their search for Wu.

Later that day Jay and Cole were looking for Wu when they heard someone in the village yelling out the news.

"A mysterious man was found near the mountains with no memories," the news man said.

The ninja went over to the man who was selling papers and bought one of the papers.

"Why did we buy a news paper?" Jay asked, "we have our phones."

"Just let me read," Cole told him. "An old man was found by monks during a storm. Even though they took a vow of silence they tried to speak to him using a pen and paper, but they only found out that he lost his memories," Cole read.

"What do you think happened?" Jay asked.

"Maybe he fell out of a time vortex, hit his head on the mountain, and now we need to help our master," Cole replied.

A look of realization came across Jay's face when he said, "Should we go get our stuff, then?"

"Sure."

The ninja went back to their inns when Cole found out that his movie was still on. He turned it off and put it back in the case. Then Cole packed up the rest of his stuff, checked out of the inn, and started to head over to the mountains.

"How do you climb the mountain?" Jay asked Cole once they got to the bottom of the mountain.

"You grab a piece of rock and pull yourself up," Cole replied.

"How long is this going to take?"

"Considering how tall this mountain is it should take a couple of days."

"Can't it be quicker?""

"If you want to die of dehydration or sleep deprivation," Cole replied.

"A couple of days it is," Jay said starting to climb the mountain.

After a little while of climbing it was starting to get dark so Cole found a group of trees all huddled up together on the mountain. Jay managed to get up to the trees a few minutes later. He started a fire using his lightning and Cole went over to the nearby trees and found some leaves to make a bed.

After looking at the dark, starry, night sky for a while Jay asked Cole, "How did Wu find you anyway?"

"I already told you," Cole replied.

"You said that you were testing your strength," Jay said.

"What else do you need to know?"

"I want to know why you went to the mountain."

Cole thought about everything he went through before to lead him to the mountain that he met Wu on. He thought about the very words he told Jay and Zane and Wu when he first met them all.

"I don't know if I'm ready to tell you all of that," Cole replied.

"Please," Jay begged.

"No," Cole turned his back to Jay and tried to get some rest.

Hours later Cole was staring at the night sky. He looked at the different constellations and took special attention to the little dipper, his favorite constellation.

"Wake up for me, honey," he remembered the raven haired women who cared for him all of her life until the day he went in the emergency room to see his mother for the last time. He remembered the huge smile on her face when she saw her tired son. Cole was thirteen at the time. He had small braids in his recently cut hair and he was wearing a grey sweatshirt and blue jeans. Cole remembered how upset he felt. His mother was sick and he was afraid he was going to lose her.

"I didn't come to say goodbye," Cole informed her.

"Good," his mother replied, "because there's something I wanted to ask you."

Cole came closer to the bed and sat next to his mom.

"If I get out of here..." she started.

"I didn't come to say goodbye for a reason," Cole interrupted.

"As I was saying," she continued, "if I get out of here I won't be strong enough to go hiking or be able to climb so I want you to climb the mountain I take you to the bottom of every year and climb to the very top of it."

"But no one has ever done that before," Cole told her.

"I know that you have the strength to climb that mountain and when you're done come back to me and tell me all about how you got to the top of that mountain."

After the conversation Cole woke up at five in the morning every day to build up his strength. Every day he tried harder during dance lessons with his father to become more flexible. One day while Cole was doing his morning stretches he heard a sad depressed knock on his door. Cole remembered very clearly and vividly all of the emotions he felt during that conversation with his father. The day his father told him that his mother didn't make it. The day Cole thought that his entire world was going to end. He refused to leave his room for three weeks after that. His dad even had to postpone the funeral until Cole finally decided to come out.

The day after the funeral Cole was doing the dishes when his father came down stairs with a piece of paper.

"What's this?" Cole asked.

"It's a letter from your dance teacher," Lou replied.

Cole was horrified. He hadn't seen his dance teacher in five years! What if his dad found out that he ran away?

"What does it say?" Cole asked.

"Did you forget how to read?" Lou asked.

Cole took the letter from his dad and started to read.

"Hence!

I understand that you have been going through some stuff, but I would appreciate it if you joined my classes again. Please report back to Marty Oppenheimer's School of Performing Arts (MOSPA) as soon as possible.

Thank you.

Mr. Gremble."

"It's time that you go back to school," Lou told him.

"After everything we've been through in the last month? You want me to leave?" Cole asked tears brimming in his eyes.

"I want you to get on with your dance studies and focus on something else other than your odd emotions."

"Me being sad when my mother passed is odd?" Cole's sadness was replaced with anger. His voice started to raise and anyone could see just from looking at his eyes that he was down right furious with his father.

"It's been a month," Lou replied. "You need to move on."

"Fine!" Cole yelled. He walked over to the door where his dad already packed his suitcase and picked it up.

"I hate you," Cole said not even looking at his father. He walked out the door and ran over to the woods.

One month later Cole was standing at the foot of the tallest mountain in Ninjago. He had scrapes and bruises and scars all over his body. He has been trying to fulfill the promise he made to his mother for an entire month. Cole kept trying to climb the mountain but he kept failing and falling. Cole decided to try again and when he was half-way up he almost fell off again, but he refused to give up. Cole put more power into the climbing then he did with anything else in his entire life! Cole was determined to fulfill his promise. Once Cole saw the top he was so relieved. He fulfilled his promise. Then he saw the strange old man sipping tea on that mountain peak.

Suddenly Cole's train of thought was interrupted by someone snoring right next to him. He looked over and saw Jay lying down on his leaf looking like he was going to be full of energy the next morning.

"The reason I went up to that mountain," Cole told himself as he was finally getting some rest.

Author's note: Sorry if anything was confusing in this chapter, but I'm going to try and explain this in my other story I Wish I Knew You.