Chapter 5 – Laying low is over rated
Now the sun was creeping over the desert horizon. Zane, Kai, and Jay all flew on their respective dragons, Flame, Shard, and Wisp, while Cole rode on his wingless dragon across the earth, Rocky.
"How far do we have to go, and where are we going?" Jay exclaimed loud enough for everyone to hear.
"The dragons know what they're doing, they'll get us to the Under World soon!" Kai yelled back.
As if on cue Cole's dragon, Rocky, roared loudly, and the other dragons above roared with it.
"I guess that means we are close!" yelled Zane. Suddenly Rocky went from running to sprinting at blinding speed, and the three flying dragons flew faster, just like Rocky, and they even began to dive and loose altitude.
"Ahh!" all Jay did was shriek and freak out like a child, the other three held onto their dragon's as best they could.
Suddenly, the dawning sky above began to glitch into a color of pitch black, and things went dark, but the sky would keep coming back again.
"What's going on with the sky?!" Cole exclaimed.
"We're going down!" Kai replied.
"What, you mean we're gonna die?!" Jay said while panicking.
"No, I literally mean down; to the Under World!" Kai yelled back.
As if on cue, the sky went pitch black, and the dawning sky didn't glitch back. And soon, just like the sky, the ground disappeared as well. After the ground disappeared, all was dead silent; there was nothing but a black void.
But in the distance ahead was something very small, almost too small for the naked eye to see. The object was the tiniest orb that looked like a spot of light.
After a few seconds, the orb became bigger in the blink of an eye, and the nothingness went away. After the orb got bigger, the ninja and their dragon's fell through it and appeared in a different world; the Under World.
The one and only world deep under the surface, with rock chambers, lava pools, and with practically a hellish look appeared.
Due to the speed, once the dragons were in the Under World, the ninja were thrown off their dragons.
"Ok, Wisp—Ow!" Jay said as he stood up rubbing his head and glaring at his lightning dragon. Wisp only huffed in response.
"Guys, look," Cole said, getting the other boys' attention.
They all looked ahead of themselves realizing they were on a giant rock ledge that over look the Under World. Nothing really changed much, there were Skullkin here and there, lit torches on the walls, lava pools, all that great stuff. Suddenly there was the sound of rocks tumbling, tiny rocks.
"Ow, my head," a feminine voice complained quietly. Rocky was lying down for a rest when he looked behind himself, and ended looking at his backside. The boys looked at each other and walked over to Rocky, only to find a girl with a bow and quiver full of arrows fall off of rocky. The girl was none other than Kate.
"Kate, why are you here? You said you and Sensei Wu would wait for us back in Ninjago," said Zane.
"Uh, yeah, we lied," Kate confessed a little quickly.
"'We'?" asked Kai.
Just to answer Kai's question, Wu suddenly jumped off of Rocky too with his staff in hand.
"Seems I couldn't keep my word either," said Wu.
"Couldn't or wouldn't?" asked Cole while quirking an eye brow.
"I don't know," Kate cut in, "all I know is that I had my fingers crossed—ain't no way I'm passing up a chance to come here," Kate said with a smirk.
"Speaking of which, we need to find Nya and the sword," said Wu. Kai gasped.
"Oh man, y-you don't think Nya was actually injured do you?" Kai asked with fear.
"I hate to say it, and I'm not going to say 'I told you so' later, but my visions are never wrong, Kai," Kate sighed.
Suddenly Kate fell limp and her eyes went brighter, but Wu caught her and helped her back up. Kate's eyes were droopy again, and when she fully opened her eyes back up, her eyes faded until they stopped sparkling so brightly.
"Kate, what happened? Did you see something again?" asked Cole. Kate nodded her head meekly.
"Yeah—I saw the sword, it's still in one piece."
"Anything else?" asked Jay.
"It's on the other side of this chamber—where Garmadon is—he and Samukai are there looking for it now, but still haven't found it yet," Kate explained softly.
"Awesome, so if we move now, we could beat the baddies to the sword," said Jay.
"Wait, one more thing," Kai said, and looked at Kate, "was Nya there?" asked Kai.
"Yeah, yeah, is the hot chick there, come on tell me, I'm on the edge of my seat here," Jay said quickly.
"But Jay, you are not sitting," Zane said with confusion.
Jay scowled at Zane. "It's an idiom, you idiot," said Jay.
"Oh, don't none of you worry, she's there alright—not faring well, but there," Kate replied.
"Ninja!" a haggish voice came, and the ninja looked down from the rock ledge to find the Skullkin below looking at them.
"Oh fudge," Kate whimpered hysterically. Suddenly, a spear from the Skullkin came flying at them, but luckily they moved only for the spear to pierce the stone walls.
Cole got angry and grabbed out the Scythe of Quakes.
"Oh, no one gets away with nearly impaling me!" Cole shouted angrily. Cole was ready to fight now, and just to show this, he ran and jumped off the ledge and did many flips until he landed in front of the Skullkin.
But when Cole landed, he made a clean landing, feet first, and the earth below him became a big dent right on the spot with the loud sound of a BOOM. But that's not all that happened, the ground began to crack, and just like Shard's ice splinter did in the north, giant razor sharp rocks shot up and destroyed some of the Skullkin warriors.
Suddenly, Cole began to spin, and not like some child, he actually would spin in one spot at blinding speed until the point where he was engulfed in a mini brown and black tornado made of rock clumps here and there. The others gasped at this.
"Sensei, isn't that-?" Kai began, only to be cutoff by Wu.
"Spinjitzu, yes, it is—you three should also be on the brink of learning it," Wu said as he looked at Zane, Kai, and Jay.
"Oh, I bet I could do better than Cole," Jay said while smirking and grabbing out his Nun chucks of Lightning.
Jay began to twirl his nun chucks at great speeds, and they began to glow brightly. Suddenly, every time the nun chucks spun around, strands of electricity and lightning flew from the rock ledge and aimed at the Skullkin, hitting them and causing their skeletal bodies to instantly come apart.
"Nice," Kate complimented.
"Not as good as it's gonna be!" Jay exclaimed happily, and he began to spin like Cole, except he was engulfed in a light blue tornado with small strands of electricity.
"I sense that Spinjitzu is among me," said Zane. Zane pulled out his Shurikans of Ice, and he threw them above the chambers, when the shurikans were flying high above the Skullkin, ice shards were dropping from them and were falling right for the Skullkin.
"Ooh, sparkly," a Skullkin chimed in with too much enthusiasm for someone like him. But right after some ice landed on his claw hand, the ice then expanded all over his hand in an ice coating and began to go up his arm. "Oh," the same Skullkin said with realization.
Suddenly the Skullkin ran around in panic mode with the ice falling on them. Eventually the ice fell on them all and they were stopped in their tracks as the skeletons were caught in an ice imprisonment.
"Too cool," Kate chimed.
"As Jay said, 'not as cool as this'," said Zane, and with that, he did Spinjitzu too, and was engulfed in a white tornado with a few ice shards. Jay and Zane dropped from the rock ledge and down to where Cole was still spinning. The three spinning ninja were able to slow down to a stop. Zane made a clean stop, Cole wobbled a bit, and Jay wobbled to, but he had a sick look and clutched his stomach.
"Ugh, first times a charm," Jay said meekly, and put his hand over his mouth because he threw up a little in his mouth, but he managed to swallow his nearly tossed cookies back down.
Kate, Kai, and Wu hopped off the rock ledge. Kate grabbed out her bow, an arrow from her quiver on her back, and loaded her bow with an arrow head. Kate aimed for an entrance that lead to another chamber at the other end of the room.
"Kate, what are you doing, you're blind—no offense," said Jay.
"Well, you saw that deer, right?" Kate asked, not looking away from her target.
"Uh, yeah," Jay replied.
"Then shut up," Kate said back. With that, Kate shot the arrow, and when it disappeared in the blink of an eye, a horrible cry of pain was heard in the direction the arrow was shot.
"My guess is that you hit someone important," Cole said as he and the others ran to where the arrow went.
They came to the spot, but looked around and didn't see the arrow or anyone else, but they heard wheezing.
"Does any one else hear that?" asked Kai. Kai asked as he walked further and closer to a wall, only to notice the wheezing getting louder.
When Kai turned around to look where he was going, he suddenly saw Samukai with Kate's arrow driven straight through his chest plate armor and through him as well as it pinned Samukai onto the wall and his feet weren't touching the ground.
Everyone gasped when they noticed Samukai.
"Looks like I was right about the important part," Cole simply said.
"I may be going down, ACK...but Garmadon won't...you will all pay…" Samukai said between wheezes and his voice trailed off before he took one last breath, and he was gone.
Kate reluctantly walked up to the skeleton body and reached for the arrow before she yanked it out of Samukai's torso, and his body clattered to the ground.
"Shouldn't do this but," Kate said as she looked down at Samukai's dead body, "rest in peace Samukai," Kate sighed.
"Come on we got to move," said Kai. They all went through the entrance to the other chamber and they soon came into one that was smaller and with lava falls at the bottom and lava pits slowly flowing. Where the lava falls met the bottom was a stone large enough for them to walk on, and impaling the stone was the Sword of Fire.
"There it is, we're home free, woo-hoo!" Jay cheered as Kai made his way to the sword. As Kai stared at his golden weapon, it glowed, and that's when Kai smirked because he decided to finally do Spinjitzu, and he was engulfed in a tiny red and orange fire tornado. Kai spun his way to the sword, only for the whole place to suddenly rumble, causing Kai to loose his balance and his Spinjitzu stopped and he nearly fell over and into the lava but he caught himself.
"Oh no, you were so close," Garmadon's dark voice said, and soon his shadow form appeared again, but this time he looked different.
This time, Garmadon was about the same sized as they others, just a little taller, his skin was as black as night and his irises were glowing red, and he wore a metal Mongolian hat atop his head with a bone crest. He wore no shirt, leaving his torso exposed, but his torso took a skeletal expression as if his rib cage was visible, but he wore baggy black pants and a purple sash across his waist, and his teeth weren't normal, he had a razor sharp set of jaws.
"Garmadon, please, don't make anymore mistakes," Wu pleaded to his evil big brother.
"It's too late for that!" Garmadon snapped, and he ran over to the sword and grabbed it from its place, "besides—you still need to save Nya," Garmadon said darkly as he stepped aside for them to see, only for the ninja, especially Kai, to gasp when they see Nya's limp body hanging from her wrist with shackles, and blood was trickling down the arm that Garmadon injured earlier with the metal bar.
"What did you do to her?!" Kai exclaimed with tears threatening to spill.
"It's called leaving a mark," Garmadon replied. Kai couldn't take it, so he ran over to Nya, and no one, even Garmadon, stopped him. Kai was able to slip Nya's lithe hands from her wrist shackles and catch her from falling.
"Huh, Kai?" Nya said meekly as her eyes began to open.
"Shush, Nya, don't move, we're getting out of here," Kai said softly to Nya.
"Hmm, yes, I suppose you are—lucky for all of you, for what I am about to do, I only needed one of the golden weapons for—and there may be no battle today, but we will meet again soon," Garmadon spat, and with that he took the sword and flung it through the air while not letting go in an intimidating style, until he suddenly drove the sword into the ground again, and just like that, his entire body disappeared in he blink of an eye. Everyone was quiet while taking this in.
"Well, that was beyond trippy," said Jay. Nya was able to stand while she leant on Kai's shoulder, and they both walked slowly towards the Sword of Fire. Kai took his free hand and took the sword from the earth.
"Sensei, where did Garmadon go?" asked Zane.
"I don't know, and I'm afraid that will remain unknown for a while," Wu sighed.
"Oh, my gosh!" Kate exclaimed as she looked at Nya's arm. Everyone followed Kate's gaze and noticed the x shaped flesh wound on Nya's bicep.
"I'm so sorry I couldn't protect you, Nya," Kai said as he hugged Nya and finally let a tear shed down his face, "even if there are more adventures to come—I'm laying low for a long time before I do anything else this dangerous again," Kai said after he stopped hugging Nya.
72 hours later…
The day time sky was clear over Sensei Wu's monastery on a large mountain in the middle of nowhere. But suddenly a giant red fire dragon came out of nowhere and was flying very fast next to another elongated blue lightning dragon, and they raced each other as they both flew around the monastery. The dragons were Flame and Wisp as their riders Kai and Jay, and they rode them with much excitement.
"Woo, yeah baby!" Jay exclaimed.
There were four very large stables specially made for the ninjas' dragons. The stable was located a bit father below the monastery and were inside the mountain. A separate flight of stairs lead from the monastery to the stables. Rocky and Shard were the two dragons to lay down and relax in their stables.
But back with the monastery building, Kate was in the middle of the training course with her bow and arrows out, and her bow was loaded. The sack dummies flew around her with paper bulls eyes tapped onto their torsos', and Kate shot a perfect bull's eye at each shot.
"Hey Kate," Cole said with a smile as he and Zane came out of the monastery, but because she was in the middle of training, Kate thought the boys were dummies and shot an arrow at them, but luckily they dodged the arrow head and the arrow impaled a window.
"Hey, watch it, kid!" Cole snapped angrily.
"Sorry—and I bet I did you a favor, you guys could probably use some practice on agility," Kate said as she left the training course and walked up to Zane and Cole.
"Oh, well, Cole and I thought you looked a little bored," said Zane.
"Naw, I never get bored firing arrows...but it can be pretty tiring."
"Well, when you're done, Cole was wondering if you'd like to play his favorite video game, Face to Fist 2, with him—and I was wondering if you'd simply help me take care of Nya—her wound is getting better, but Kai doesn't want to take any chances," Zane explained.
"Yeah, I can understand that—ok, how about this, Zane, I'll help you with whatever you need first, and when I'm done helping, I'll come play video games, ok Cole?" said Kate.
"Sure, I guess that'll work, I'll get started on playing, just come in and play when you can," Cole said as he began to walk back into the monastery, until he was stopped by Nya, who had fresh white bandages wrapped around her wound.
"Oh, hey Nya, felling any better?" asked Cole.
"Yeah, a little, who knew ice had so much healing properties?" Nya asked with a light small.
"Nya, did you need something, you shouldn't quite be up and about yet," Zane said softly.
"Yes, I'm aware of that, but I got up because I needed to tell you something, where's Kai and Jay?" asked Nya, and as if on cue, two loud roars were heard. The roaring came from Flame and Wisp as they flew so close to the monastery that Kai and Jay just jumped off, afterwards, the two dragons flew down and into their stables.
"Why I'm right here, were you thinking about me?" Jay asked Nya with a smirk, only to get a whack upside the head by Kai.
"Uh, no, not really, there's trouble in Jamanakai Village, shouldn't be too far from here, and-," Nya began, only to be cut off by Kai.
"What kind of trouble?" Kai cut in.
"I was getting to that—it's Garmadon, and I don't know how or when, but I think he's back," Nya said with worry.
"Awesome, now I get to kick butt again," Kai said with a smile.
"Wait, what happened to Mr. Lay Low?" asked Cole.
"On vacation—now let's go men," Kai replied as he and the other three boys went with him down to the dragon stables.
"What confuses me is how did you know there was trouble in that village?" Kate asked Nya after all was quiet.
"A friend tweeted," Nya said simply as she grabbed out an old fashion flip phone.
"Ah," Kate said as she nodded her head in realization. "Wait, you have a flip phone?" asked Kate.
"Give me a break, I worked at a black smith shop and I lived with my brother," said Nya.
"Fair point," Kate simply said.
Meanwhile, the ninja were all mounting their dragons, and the dragons were about to exit the stables. Zane's dragon was first to spread its giant ice wings and fly out at great speed, and then Kai and Jay. Cole and Rocky were last to leave, but even though Rocky didn't fly out, he jumped out of the stables and was actually able to cling to the steep mountain side and run very fast down the mountain and onto flat land, and the others flew low to stay close to Cole while he and Rocky traveled by land.