Harumi wasn't about to let us get away with showing the city I was alive easily. We had barely gotten back to the depot before she'd sent what felt like the entire SOG to come and capture us.

When we got back, we took a moment to celebrate and discuss what was about to come next. Our next step was clear: we had to find someone that could stand up to my father. We needed an army. With Ultraviolet hunting down my friends, though, that was harder to pull off than I thought. We spent hours trying to figure something out, find someone who could help us. With how persistent UV was, though, that was a bit of a problem.

While I'm a bit upset that I was willing to celebrate after that victory we had, it wasn't like we knew something was coming. We were trying to plan our next move, no matter what. Harumi had seen us leave, though, and she'd followed us all the way to the garbage depot, or at least that's what I think had to happen. She must have gone back to Garmadon to try to get everyone together to come and attack us. After how we'd basically humiliated her and UV, we should have expected a bit more of a counterattack. While we did know we'd just started something a lot bigger than just ourselves, we weren't ready for how fast it came.

Now, Dareth was outside when the SOG came to attack. He said it had something to do with Mystake giving him something to make him have brown power… I don't really know why she would do that for him. But I do know that the fact he was outside meant that we weren't ambushed and taken out immediately. Dareth ran in and bought us a few seconds, just enough for us to get ready to fight when they came for us. Even if he did keep talking about having to go to the bathroom. Again, another moment that Dareth saved us. Even if it was weird.

Harumi didn't spare anything when she came for us. She, UV and Killow all showed up. I'm not sure where Mr. E was… and come to think of it, I never did see him again after he came to find us in the first place we were hiding in. And… I never did see him in Kryptarium, either. I'm not sure what happened to him. I… well, I guess… I don't want to think about that. Anyways…

The attack was so fast that we didn't have time to really mount any defense. It was every man for themselves the second that they landed inside the depot. The Masters put up a good fight, and even mom got involved. Pixal got in her mech and defended us. We were able to put up enough of a fight to keep going. When they all came for us, I told everyone we couldn't lose this fight. We had to stand up to him. We couldn't let Harumi take us alive like this. If we couldn't resist just the SOG, we'd have no chance of fighting my father.

That changed when Killow and Harumi showed up, though. As much as I never really dealt with the Oni Mask of Deception, it was strong enough to take down both Turner, Shade and Paleman. UV went right for mom, and Harumi, of course, was there to try to attack me. She ordered them to me alive. I was fighting just to survive. I couldn't let Ninjago fall because we couldn't make our stand here. We had to keep a base if we wanted to help the people.

I probably would have stayed and fought, if Nya hadn't dragged me away. Skylor was the one that saved me from the massive group of people that tried to take me. Without my power, I was just a normal person. I could usually use my power to stop groups of enemies, but now… I really was weak. I was the weakest link on our Resistance. I was weak enough that Nya had to grab me and drag me all the way to the car she built. Skylor bought us enough time to get it started and start fleeing. We picked up Skylor and Dareth, while the others stayed behind to fight. I watched mom get swarmed and captured in front of me, and Pixal was forced to flee at some point as her mech got overwhelmed. Everyone that was fighting for me, was getting captured.

As Nya drove the four of us out, I kept demanding we go back. She, however, said that her priority wasn't them, but me. I'd put myself as the face of the Resistance. If I was caught, it was all over. The further we drove into the city, the more that I knew we'd failed. I hadn't been strong enough, and now I was being made to flee as my punishment.

Skylor and Dareth worked together to get the SOG that were tailing us off our backs. We thought we were in the clear, but Dareth told us we weren't. Garmadon had left the tower and had come to attack us. Nya's car was fast and strong, and it was about the best possible thing we could have used to escape. But that meant nothing when we felt a strange feeling of cold come over us. It was only a moment after that, we heard the Colossus come for us.

I've never felt smaller in my life, than when I was facing that Colossus. That thing was massive, and it was out to crush me. It felt like my father's body, just projected out into this massive thing. It was able to run faster than we could drive. Just feeling it take a step was like sitting in an earthquake. Feeling that thing coming after us was one of the most terrifying moments in a battle for me. That thing wasn't going to stop. Garmadon wanted me dead… and he had the thing to do.

The Colossus managed to get in front of us, and before we could get away, it crushed us under its foot. The second that it did, I knew it was over. That thing was going to crush us, and that would be it. I was going to die, and that was just… it. I thought I would have been scared. I thought maybe I'd have panicked like Dareth did, or tried to fight it like Nya and Skylor. But… instead, as I heard the ceiling start to collapse and the entire car start to bend in… I just felt numb. I felt numb, and I didn't know why. The harder that the thing pushed… the more numb I felt. I wasn't able to focus on what the others were doing. I felt something… something inside me, that I didn't understand. I was feeling what Garmadon was feeling.

The two of us were connected, and that was the first time I felt him. I could sense the fact I wasn't the one that felt numb, but he was. I was feeling what Harumi meant when she said he wouldn't be the man I recognized. At first, I just felt nothing. He really didn't feel anything. He was just some beast, out to get me. But, the more that the Colossus crushed us, I started feeling something else. I felt him hesitate. I could feel him trying to crush us, but he, for some reason, couldn't.

I don't know how, but I think I reached him. I asked him not to do this. I asked my father not to do this to me. I know I said I don't view him as my father. I don't. But I felt him hesitating trying to kill me. And I realized that I could use that. I could make him stop. I could reach my father, just like he had hurt me. And that, was what bought us enough time for us to get free.

I'm not sure if it was me, or something else that made him stop. But he let us go. My father, the one that had been trying to hunt me down, couldn't strike the final blow. That was a feeling that I didn't understand. I didn't know why he couldn't. But I saw him, before we fully drove away. There was smoke behind him, from something. He was looking down at me. Somehow, I could see him perfectly. Just like I think he could see me. As we fled, we both seemed to understand something. We knew that both of us were far more than just enemies.

I didn't tell NYa about this, not at first. We were too busy trying to flee. Nya drove us all the way to the docks, and told us we had to hide. We ditched the Battle Wagon, as she called it later, and just kept going. Skylor and Dareth split up, and we agreed to meet in the lower areas of the city. The SOG were on full alert looking for us. We learned from the news that they'd managed to get all of the Masters, Pixal, mom… everyone. The only ones of us that were left, were me, Nya, Dareth and Skylor. We'd paid the price for defying my father.

Having our forces go almost right back to the start was about as hard a blow as Harumi could deal to us. I know why she was so quick to make sure everyone saw it. I'd shown my face, now she was showing the people there was a price for showing it. While people were willing to help us, we couldn't count on anyone. We wanted an army, and now we didn't even have our allies. I was back to square one… and it was even more bleak than the last time.

Nya told me I couldn't give up, but I wasn't in the mood to hear it. We had to disguise ourselves and, more importantly, Nya said I had to burn my clothes. Given that we were now fugitives and Harumi was looking for us, showing my colors would get us spotted. She'd gotten rid of the car, now I had to get rid of my robes. I know that I get new robes all the time, so it wasn't really burning those specifically that hurt, but it felt like I was burning away the Green Ninja. It was like having to admit I'd failed, again. I'd had maybe a few hours of victory, and now I was defeated all over again. And the fact I wasn't the one that paid the price made it worse.

Our plan at first was to just keep moving around the city until we could find a new base. I wasn't really into the idea of it. If we did, it would just get found. If we tried to work with the people, we'd get them caught. The fact Skylor was still the CEO of Chen's Noodle House meant we could get food, but not help. As grateful as I was to Dareth and Skylor for staying by my side, I was about ready to give up again. Or at least, not ready to start moving on. And I probably would have, if Mystake hadn't shown back up as a rat.

I have to say it, watching a rat stand up on two legs and talk really was unnerving. Mystake transformed back to her normal self right in front of us, meaning we couldn't deny it was her. She said it was time for us to figure out who she really was, and after seeing that, we couldn't just ignore it anymore. It was time for us to figure out that she was an Oni.

Once I knew what she was, it was pretty easy to put the pieces together. She'd come with the Oni that came after the FSM, and after that she'd turned on them when she fell in love with the realm that he'd created. Because of this, she'd been around to help the FSM ever since the world was created. On top of that, the reason why Wu and Garmadon lived so long was because they were part Oni. Dareth pointed out that the Oni were ones that were destroyed, and Mystake joked we wouldn't want her on our bad side. I know she liked to mess with us, but the way she said it actually sounded like a threat.

While we talked, I asked her if I could transform like she could. She told me that I'd been doing it my whole life. The way she said it was somewhat silly, but it was true. I'd been growing and changing more than anyone I knew. I'd gone from a kid too stupid enough to realize opening the Tombs was a bad idea, to growing into the Green Ninja and stopping threat after threat to Ninjago. Now, I was going to have to become something even more. While having Mystake with us now, fully revealed about who she was, wasn't exactly something that gave us a massive boost in power, it showed me that there was more to us than we knew. We each could do more than we already were doing. And so when Harumi came hunting for us, I knew we could do more than what we were doing. We could do more than just run.

I was sick of running. After being pursued to the ends of Ninjago, taken down by Harumi, humiliated, beaten and likely putting the city in fear again after hearing about what happened to the Resistance, I wasn't ready to just let Harumi get away with this again. When I saw her and Killow coming after us, I knew that if we ran, we'd just end up where we started. But if we did something to fight, we'd gain the upper hand. I had a plan. A plan I would never have guessed would turn out the way that it did.

With Mystake's power to shapeshift, I had her turn into a version of me and go to distract Harumi. Meanwhile, Skylor and Nya went and split up HArumi's forces. Nya managed to take Killow down a canal, and being the Master of Water, he didn't stand a chance. Skylor's copied powers let her take the rest of them down. The fact they were willing to come after me, and me alone, was our advantage. An enemy that looks only for one outcome, will often miss the obvious. So when Harumi found herself without anyone to help her, we had an opportunity on our hands.

When we cornered Harumi, I knew that this was it. This was my chance. I hid until Harumi came around the corner and revealed myself. I told her those that don't change often fail to move forward. Or, something like that, it was a heat of the moment sort of line. She called me a beggar in rags, someone that had changed for the worse. Just seeing her like that again, made me angry. I felt that same anger that I'd felt when she'd first betrayed me. But, more than that, I didn't feel crippled. I was upset, angry… but I wasn't letting those feelings get to me. I was stronger than Harumi. I was going to be stronger than her. I'd told her that she couldn't break me like she let herself be broken. Now was my chance to show it to her.

Without her friends, and with all five of us together, we captured her. Holding her down so we could tie her up was like trying to grab onto a wild animal. I'd never heard someone scream and snap like she did. It was like the act of us touching her disgusted her. We had to gag her because she was shouting so much, it could alert someone. We had Harumi in our hands, the one person in the city that Garmadon was closest to. We had our shot at getting back at them.

We'd paid the price for defiance, but now we were making Garmadon pay as well. We had the person that would be the key to us finally hatching a plan to take down my father. We had the key to actually, finally, showing my father what I could do. The chance… to truly put up a Resistance.

...I just wish I knew what that plan was going to cost me… and Harumi.


"I wanna stop there," Lloyd frowned, "...I need to get myself ready to talk about what comes next."

"Alright," Nya leaned forward, planting her chin on one of her hands, "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," Lloyd nodded, "I… just don't want to talk about all of that yet. I need to save all that for… for the next chapter."

"Right, next time is when we tried to take the Colossus," Nya frowned, "...Lloyd, are you sure you can talk about that?"

"I'm sure I can," Lloyd nodded, "I have to. And… I've already spent, too long being angry at Harumi with everything I've talked about. I need to… I need to actually talk about this. It's the last thing that really makes it so talking about her is… hard."

"Alright, well," Nya stretched, "Look, if you need to take some time to think about it, just let me know. You've been doing a lot of these lately."

"I wanna get through everything," Lloyd insisted, "I want to make sure I finish this. I've spent a long time making this. I want to finish it out. And, I think if I stop now, I won't finish it. It's a hurdle I have to overcome… and, thanks, for doing this."

"You don't even have to say it," Nya popped her neck, "But I'll make sure I remember you owe me a favor for this."

"Wait, really?" Lloyd blinked. Nya smirked, then chuckled.

"Of course not, Lloyd," Nya shook her head, "You know I'd do this for you no matter what. You sure this is all you want to say about this, though? I'd thought you'd have more to say about how Harumi took the Masters away from us."

"It all happened so fast… it felt really bad in the moment but, now that I'm actually talking about it… well," Lloyd shook her head, "I don't think I have more to say. It's… not this part that's important. I mean, it was but, not in that way. You know?"

"Yeah, I get ya," Nya shook her head, "I just heard from the guys you could go on long rants. I haven't heard you go on one yet, though. Maybe you'd gotten past those?"

"Maybe," Lloyd shook his head, standing up from the chair, "I'm gonna go get ready for training. I promised Kai I'd help him with a new Spinjitzu trick."

"Good luck," Nya rolled her yes, "My brother may know how to fight, but he isn't really good at coming up with, 'new moves,'" She held up her hands in air quotes, "The last one he tried nearly burned down the Bounty."

"I'll make sure to have Zane nearby then," Lloyd smiled. He made his way out of the room. Nya gave a long look towards the chair he'd sat in, then slowly looked down and stood up. She gave a small sigh, then left along with him. The next chapter was going to be a lot… and not just for him.


Author's Note:

Apologies for this chapter going up so late tonight, I was having a 503 error for almost 5 hours before I finally got through to posting this.