Lloyd came to much the same way as last time, screaming in pain. Again, once the pain released him and he regained his senses, he felt a smooth, flat surface against his back. But this time he was upright. Strung up and supported entirely by his chained up arms. Realizing this, he shifted his weight to support himself on his feet, taking some pressure off his aching arms. Especially his right one - it never had been quite the same after being ripped out of joint on the quest for the ultimate ultimate weapon. At least his dad has been able to fix it, but ugh, he tried not to think about that.
"You know, your eyes glow when you're using your power," came Chen's voice, using a completely normal, conversational tone.
A hand reached down and grabbed Lloyd's chin, forcing him to look up to meet the eyes of his captor.
"They also glow when your power is being sucked out of you. It's quite mesmerizing. Pure energy, unable to be held completely within such a small frame. Just exploding out of you. Begging someone to put it to good use."
Lloyd bristled at the touch as well as the words. He wasn't that short! And certainly no one had the right to manhandle him or claim any power he might have as their own!
The Green Ninja closed his eyes and tried to yank his chin away, but Chen's grip was a vise. He must have had martial arts training. Lloyd was determined not to cooperate in any way, but couldn't help a yelp as Chen's free hand went to his strained right shoulder.
"Aw, was this one injured before? Pity for you," said Chen mock tenderly.
Lloyd knew what was coming even before Chen shifted his grip on his right shoulder. This was going to hurt.
Sure enough, Chen wrenched the shoulder and something definitely was pulled out of place.
For nearly a minute, Lloyd couldn't breathe, let alone scream. Could only see black spots as the agony sliced through him. Chen pet his head through it, as if comforting a sick dog or something. Finally Lloyd managed to suck in a deep breath.
"Good little pet," Chen cooed darkly, his sadism obvious in every syllable. Even without seeing his face, Lloyd knew he was smiling at the pain he'd caused. "And my, that is just fascinating!"
Lloyd didn't have to look to see what Chen was talking about. He could feel it now, that strange green energy, sparking and swirling around his dislocated shoulder. Trying to heal him or protect him or something, but helpless with the arm misaligned.
Chen again grabbed his chin, forcing Lloyd's unfocused eyes to latch onto his own.
"Are you ready to grovel yet, pet?" the maniac demanded. "I could put your shoulder back in place. Get you some food and drink. Let you lie down on a real bed."
That sounded amazing. But Lloyd clenched his jaw tight and squeezed his eyes shut.
Chen laughed. "Hah! I knew the son of Garmadon would last longer than that. How about you fill another coil for us, pet?"
And agony exploded through every nerve once again.
~~ ! Go Ninja Go ! ~~
"Lloyd," called an insistent voice. "Lloyd, wake up."
The Green Ninja groaned. He felt a hand on his dislocated shoulder and gasped in sudden pain. His eyes jolted open, darting to the figure in front of him fearfully.
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" whispered Skylor, looking pale. "I didn't know he - I'm sorry. Dislocation sucks."
Lloyd focused on the girl in front of him. The noodle shop girl Kai had been crushing on the last month or so. The Fire Ninja had fallen hard for Skylor and had taken every excuse to eat at her family's restaurant just to stare all goo-goo eyed at her.
When they'd actually had her as a waitress, she'd been pretty cool. Even seemed to reciprocate Kai's crush. Now Lloyd wondered if it had all been a sham.
"Skylor," he managed to say, his voice rough like he had laryngitis or something. Probably from all the screaming.
At first it didn't look like she would reply, like she was trying to paint on a mask of cold indifference. As he watched, her eyes flickered to his bad arm and the mask collapsed.
She smiled awkwardly, but her eyes shown with deep pain and fear. Somehow, seeing her face to face, remembering that scene when her dad ordered her to touch the green energy around that strange coil, Lloyd just couldn't believe she was like her father.
Well, he knew all about that, after all.
"You too?" he asked, nodding towards his ruined shoulder, the chains still stringing him up, everything.
"Yeah," she whispered. "Not for a long time, though. Not since I stopped fighting and just let him use my amber power however he wanted." Her eyes, an unusual brownish orange, looked away for a second. Shame? "My father always gets what he wants in the end. You can't fight him."
Lloyd tried to straighten himself up as best he could. His position was much the same as last time, arms chained above him, glass wall behind him. The glass must be important to their project somehow.
Skylor reached over and pulled a lever that was well outside Lloyd's reach, then caught the exhausted Green Ninja as he collapsed at the sudden slack in the chains. She gently eased him to a sitting position, back against the wall.
"I was instructed to give you food, water, and a bit of a break. He expects me to be manipulating you while I'm at it, though honestly I doubt that would work at this point."
She tugged a tray over to between them, and to Lloyd's humiliation he couldn't raise even his not dislocated arm. Skylor seemed to have anticipated this and held the water cup to his lips without any prompting. Lloyd swallowed greedily. He hasn't realized how thirsty he was until the water touched his dry mouth.
"The-the guys. The other Ninja. What's..."
Skylor chewed her bottom lip, her eyes glancing uncomfortably back to the side and behind Lloyd. Probably the door.
"They're frantic. Searching for you. Your master and parents too."
"But no-one's hurt?"
Skylor gave a very small, very fond smile. "You Ninja are so weird. Yes, everyone is fine. For now, anyway. I have no idea what my father is planning to use your power for. Hopefully they'll surrender."
Lloyd gave a slight laugh, part pride, part fear. "Not a chance."
The water cup was empty and Skylor moved on to spooning up the soup. Lloyd absently took a mouthful, not seeing any point in resisting. Even if it was drugged, it wouldn't make much difference. And he really was starving.
"How long have I been here? Where am I?"
Skylor nodded. "I can tell you that. This is the third day. And you're on my father's island."
Lloyd blinked and tried to sit further upright, only to groan and lean back against the wall again. No wonder he was in such bad shape. It wasn't just the power draining and his bad shoulder after all.
"Three days isn't so bad," he tried to reassure himself. "But an island?"
"Yes. My father was banished to this island nearly thirty years ago by Master Wu and Lord Garmadon."
"Crap," groaned Lloyd. "I suppose my family and friends are still searching the city?"
Skylor nodded and offered him another spoonful. The bowl, like the cup, wasn't very big and they were getting to the end of it.
Lloyd took a deep breath and managed to raise his somewhat functional left hand enough to grasp hers.
"Skylor, you don't have to do this. You know he's planning something terrible. Something that will hurt my friends, our friends. That will hurt Kai."
She actually whimpered, her eyes darting behind him to the door again. "I can't, Lloyd. I can't fight him. I-I tried before and I-I can't do that again."
Lloyd couldn't help the exhausted smirk that came to his face. "Sure you can. Kai wouldn't fall for a weakling. You're a good person. I just know it."
She was on the edge of crying, and Lloyd knew this was as far as he could push without her leaving. At least for now.
"So, tell me about your amber power. You can absorb other powers or something?"
Skylor smiled gratefully at the change in subject. "Yeah, something like that. Amber is the element of replication. I can copy the powers of others by touching them. Like this." She set down the spoon in the empty bowl and held out her uninjured hand. After a few moments a glowing green ball appeared, crackling with the same energy as the coil. But it disappeared after just a second.
She smiled slightly, not used to showing off. "Your power is kind of hard to control. Kai's is actually a lot easier." She snapped and a small fire bloomed into existence above her hand. She stared at the fire fondly. Man, she had it as bad as Kai.
"Do you have all of our powers?" asked Lloyd, thinking back to eating at the restaurant. Skylor casually setting her hand on Kai's, patting Jay's shoulder, slapping Cole on the back, shaking hands with Nya... "Zane?"
"Yep," and she frosted her good hand.
"You should ice that one," said Lloyd, gesturing to her injury.
Her eyes widened, not having even thought of that, and quickly did so. It had hurt so much she'd just been trying to ignore it. She immediately sighed with relief.
Lloyd smiled.
Damn. This was killing her. The Green Ninja wasn't supposed to be nice to her. He wasn't supposed to treat her, well, not much different from how he had before knowing about her evil father. If anything, Lloyd was now even nicer. She doubted Kai and the others would be so understanding.
"I drugged your dinner," she suddenly confessed. "That's how we captured you. We've been planning this for months. Stole you right out of your own bed."
Lloyd nodded. "I figured it was something like that. I forgive you."
This time she really did start crying, pulling her knees up to her chest and burying her face behind them to shield her sobs.
~~ ! Go Ninja Go ! ~~
Clouse casually watched on the security monitor while Chen's daughter tended to the ninja brat.
She was much more emotional than he cared for, ugh, but that's children for you. Like her mother, couldn't be trusted. But any bond between the two could work for emotional blackmail in the future so he didn't interrupt. The Green Ninja needed liquid and nourishment anyway, and in his experience using Skylor was much simpler than IV lines.
He'd almost finished his second jar, which would be much more effective at draining the brat than the wall and chains. Should be more secure and transportable as well.
Clouse was also working on new coils to store the Energy. Once he perfected his design they would really be able to see what the legendary Green Ninja was capable of. Powering an army of Nindroids to supplement their forces was certainly well within the equation, as well as several giant mechs to rival the largest and most dangerous of Garmadon's.
Chen seemed to have another idea, one so sinister he giggled each time he thought of it and refused to say anything more at this time than that he needed six of those coils arranged in a special room of his.
Accounting for the Green Ninja's unexpectedly quick recovery time, six coils shouldn't take long. They already had three, with the brat easily filling them up as soon as they were completed.
Speaking of recovery, the Green Ninja was currently about to attempt another jailbreak. He'd managed to stand up and, making use of the slack in the chains, took up a spinjitzu focus pose. Obviously about to attempt to shatter the chains, and probably would be successful if not for Clouse.
Having been waiting for just such an opportunity, Clouse smiled as we watched Green Energy begin to flicker around his unknowing test subject. He kept one eye on the power readout and one hand on the drainage activation button.
Wonderful. Easy confirmation of his earlier hypothesis - the brat's power was exponentially higher when using spinjitzu.
He slapped the button, ignoring the scream and only paying enough attention to verify that the chains had done their job in quickly dragging the child out of his spinjitzu pose and slamming him against the glass wall. Primed and ready to fill another coil with much more refined Energy than previously.
Hmm, much much more refined. He'd estimate the Energy on this coil easily four times as powerful as the others. Perhaps they should look further into brainwashing or some sort of chemical/mechanical enslavement.
Anyway, that made four coils. Better get back to work on making more.