Lloyd's eyes popped open, and he sat bolt upright, glancing around wildly.
He'd been kidnapped!
...And put in a comfy bed, next to a nightstand with a lamp softly shining on him, with the wooden walls around the room covered in posters of tea kettles?
That was weird. Well, that seemed weird. Lloyd had never actually been kidnapped before, so he didn't actually know what kidnappers really did with their victims, but he would've guess it wasn't tuck them into a bed in a nicely decorated room. He would've guessed it was more along the lines of "stick them in a cage" or "trap them in a glass case" or something.
Hesitatingly, Lloyd stepped out of bed and wandered over to the door of the room. Surely it would be locked, but it didn't hurt to try.
Lloyd tried.
It wasn't locked.
Marveling at his luck, Lloyd peeked out through the open door to see a long hallway lined with doors. He slipped out and tried the first door, which opened to reveal… A closet. Okay then. Not helpful.
He tried the next door. That one lead to a rather large bathroom.
He tried another door. This one opened to show a room filled with odd objects: a dummy, a punching bag, a rack of weapons, and so on.
Lloyd was closing the door when he heard voices, familiar voices, the voices of his kidnappers. And they were getting closer. Lloyd dashed back to the room he woken up in and closed the door behind, leaning up against it so he could hear as well as possible without being out in the open.
"-Blame you the extra push-ups we had to do," the third voice was saying. "After all, if you'd accounted for the fact that it was the guy's birthday and so he just might be up a little later, we could've snuck in later, got there after he was asleep, and been in and out just like that."
"The servants promised me their info was correct!" The second voice protested.
"Yeah, and you two promise me you'll eat what I cook, and you never do," the first voice laughed, and after a moment so did the third voice.
"Well, I blame extra push-ups on the fact that a certain someone decided to just punch the guy in the head to knock him out and failed," the second voice pouted. They were getting closer, Lloyd realized, so much closer that they might be right outside the door.
Dashing across the room, Lloyd jumped back into the bed and pulled the covers over himself, scrunching his eyes shut. Maybe they'd peek in and see him "still unconscious" and then leave him alone to plan how to get out.
The sound of the door opening made Lloyd tense up. Leave him be, leave him be, leave him be…
"Looks like he's still out," the second voice observed. "Let's go back to playing Sitar Legend and check on him again in ten minutes."
"I don't think he's still out," the first voice noted, coming closer. "When we left him last, he was all floppy and limp because he was unconscious. Now he's all tense. I think he's up. Kid, you up?"
...Oh. Well, his cover was blown.
Slowly, Lloyd cracked his eyes open. "...Yeah."
Sitting up, Lloyd met the eyes of a guy about his age, or actually probably a little older, with thick eyebrows, longish black hair half-up in a bun, and all-black clothes.
"Hey," the black-haired guy said, his voice the first voice from when Lloyd got kidnapped. "You've been out for a while, we were getting worried."
Lloyd blew out a long breath. "Worried. Right. Worried that I wasn't awake yet so you couldn't act out your nefarious plans."
"Our what-now plans?" The second voice wondered.
Lloyd shot a look in the direction the comment had come from and saw a guy the same age as the first one, but this one with very spiky brown hair and an interesting set of scars across his face, not to mention clothes all in red.
"Your nefarious plans. You know, whatever you plan to do with me before you get rid of me for good," Lloyd spat out, glaring at him.
"Bro, we're not getting rid of you or anything like that," the spiky-haired guy said, sounding bewildered.
"This is why our master told us to come get him the moment this guy woke up," the third voice sighed, coming from a girl about the same age as the two guys, but with black hair up in a ponytail and silver clothes.
"Master? Is that what you call the head of the rebels who want Ninjago destroyed?" Lloyd asked suspiciously.
"Head of the rebels, yes. Want Ninjago destroyed, no," the ponytailed girl answered.
Lloyd blinked. Then he blinked again. What? "The rebels don't want Ninjago destroyed?"
"Nope," the spiky-haired guy stated, popping the "p" exaggeratedly.
"Actually, the rebels want to save Ninjago," the black-haired guy added.
Lloyd's jaw dropped. As soon as he got control over his shock, he stammered, "That's- that's great! That means all we have to do is get the rebels to talk to my parents and they'll find out they both want to help Ninjago and keep it safe and stuff, and then everybody'll be okay!"
"It won't be that easy, I'm afraid," the ponytailed girl said slowly. "You see, the rebels are trying to save Ninjago… From your parents."
"From my parents? But my parents are the best! They saved Ninjago from the beast Meowthra, and they stopped my evil Uncle Wu, and everybody loves them!" Lloyd protested, standing in his confusion and growing anger.
"Wow, he really doesn't know. I mean, we were told he was oblivious, but man, he doesn't know," the black-haired guy marveled.
"I'm not oblivious," Lloyd argued. "And what don't I know?"
"So much," the ponytailed girl said fervently.
"So tell me!" Lloyd burst out. "Tell what I don't know about my parents. Tell me where I am. Tell who the 'Master' is that people keep talking about. Tell me why there are teapot posters on the walls. Tell me everything!"
Someone laughed rustily.
Lloyd peered around the three people standing in front of him to see an old man with a long beard on his face and a conical hat on his head. Lloyd's eyes widened and his jaw dropped for the second time. He knew that man. He'd seen him in pictures in history books and on TV documentaries and even in some very old family photos.
"Uncle Wu?" Lloyd breathed.
The old man grinned. "Hello, nephew. I haven't seen you since you were a baby. Well, I haven't seen you in person, that is."
"But- but you were banished years ago," Lloyd stammered, sitting back down on the bed. "How are you here? ...Wait, where is here? Did I get taken to another realm? Oh. Oh, that's not good, that's not good at all, I-"
"Calm down, nephew," Wu ordered. "You're not in another realm. Everything is fine. Well, everything's not fine, actually, but that's why you're here."
"And here is…" Lloyd's voice trailed off.
Wu smiled at him. "Come with me."
That said, the old man turned and walked out the door.
"That's not an answer," Lloyd muttered. "Or if it is, it's a needlessly cryptic one."
"You'll get used to it," the spiky-haired guy said with a laugh.
"Go on, follow him," the ponytailed girl advised.
"Otherwise he'll make you do chores and disguise them as training exercises," the black-haired guy stated, chuckling a little.
Slowly, Lloyd stood and went out the door. Looking left and right, he caught sight of Wu entering a doorway. Lloyd rushed to keep up with him and found that the doorway led to a flight of stairs, which in turn led up to an opening through which the sun was shining.
Lloyd sprinted past Wu and up the stairs into the sunlight, looking around wildly for a way to escape. For the third time in as many minutes, his jaw dropped.
He was on the deck of a boat, but the boat wasn't floating in a harbor, oh no.
It was flying through the air.
"I'm dreaming," Lloyd declared faintly. "I'm dreaming I got kidnapped by people working for the rebels and got put on a flying boat."
"You're not dreaming, and it's actually the rebels who work for the us, not the other way around," Wu said helpfully, coming up behind and beside him. The sound of more footsteps suggested the three kidnapper teens were also coming up behind him, but Lloyd was mostly focused on his uncle, who continued, "The rebels take care of most of the tasks, leaving us free to spread the word and plan for the endgame. The flying boat and the kidnapping parts are accurate, though I prefer to think of 'kidnapping' as 'involuntary transportation.'"
Lloyd sat down hard, right then and there on the deck of the flying boat, focusing on the first thing his uncle had said. "I'm not dreaming?"
"You're not dreaming," Wu repeated.
"Okay," Lloyd said weakly. "...I think I want an explanation now.
Wu nodded. "And you will have one. Follow me."