(A/N) Hello everybody! This is it! The chapter I've been waiting to release ever since I first started this fic! Chapter 6 is when we finally find out who Agent I is! I'll warn you though, this will be one sad chapter. No, none of our friends are going to die, but Agent I is going to do something VERY cruel to the Nightprowlers. We'll also see my explanation for why the Garmadon family never gets a break. Read away!
Chapter 6
Travels, Traitors, and Tea
"Here we are."
Violet had led them through the thickest part of the woods until they came to a large clearing. A short distance away was a small, roofed well. There was a cracked stone walkway that led to a small picket fence, the gate of which was wide open. It looked like it would have belonged to a humble little home. But it was far from it.
Inside the fence was a charred frame of what used to be a house. Part of the roof had caved in along with the walls of the room it was over, revealing part of the room inside. There were large holes in the frame, and everything looked as though it might collapse at any moment. Violet felt a lump in her throat. So many fond memories flooded into her mind. The sweet aroma of herbs and teas. The delicious apple pies. Napping under the cherry blossom tree. A trip into the woods to find healing plants with her mother. Learning the names of the different teas and how to make them with her grandmother. Hearing stories of heroic deeds from her father.
This was once her home. Before everything changed. Before the fire.
Violet shook her head. She had to focus on the task at hand. They had to find the captives. "The storehouse is this way," she told her fellow travelers.
They walked a little ways into the woods to the right of the house until they came to what looked like a small shed. "This is it?" Nick asked, unimpressed.
Violet gave a small smile over her shoulder at him. "Don't be fooled," she told him. "This isn't what it looks like." She was about to put the key into the lock when she found that the lock had been broken. Probably the doing of the person who invited us here, she thought with a feeling of dread. She opened the door to the top of a spiral staircase. She flipped the switch to the right of the door, but it wouldn't turn on. She sighed. "I was afraid of this. We'll have to use our flashlights."
Everyone reached into their bags and pulled out their flashlights. They clicked them on, and began the decent. It took a long time to get to the bottom, but they eventually made it.
"This might be a bad time to ask, but is anyone afraid of spiders?" asked Reed.
"Not a bad time at all," Drew responded sarcastically.
"Quit fooling around, you two!" Nick chastised them. "Violet, how big is this place?"
"One square mile. Every tea in the world is here."
The group followed Violet deeper into the gigantic underground storehouse. Sweeping the room with their flashlights, they could see that there were rows upon rows of huge shelving units that reached the high ceiling. Each shelf held bottles of various colored liquids. Whenever they pointed their flashlights down one of the aisles, the beam wouldn't even reach the wall at the end.
"This place is huge. We'll have to split up," Nick concluded.
"No. We'll get lost that way," Violet argued. "This place is a maze and only I know the way through it. We must stick together."
"We'll never find them in time that way. We'll cover more ground if we split up. And if their captor decides to try anything, he can't get us all at once. Use your communication devices to contact each other if anyone finds anything or if something goes wrong`."
"Still, if we're gonna split up, we'd better split into pairs so he can't catch us alone," Violet insisted.
"Good idea. Drew and Violet can check the right side of the place, while Reed and I take the left. If anyone gets captured, we'll alert the rest by our communication devices."
Reed was using the heat vision mode he'd recently installed in his glasses to scan the place for any signs of life. So far though, he hadn't had any luck. "Ugh, why does this have to be so difficult?!" he groaned. "If Agent I wanted us to find him, why is he making it so hard for us to do so?"
"Maybe we're just looking in the wrong place," Nick suggested from behind him.
"You think he's on the other side of the storehouse?" Reed asked, still scanning the place. Nick didn't answer. Reed looked around for his friend, but Nick was gone. "Nick? Nick?"
"To answer your question about Agent I's location, Reed, he's actually much closer than you think." a voice behind him sneered.
"Who was that? Was that you, Nick? Nick?! Where are you?! Nick!" Reed didn't like this...
Suddenly his communication device turned itself off. "What the-" he started. Then his glasses shut down completely, and the lenses turned black. He couldn't see three inches in front of his face without his glasses, so he couldn't take them off to see what was going on; either way he was almost completely blind. Someone twisted his arms behind his back and started tying them together. He would have cried for help if the person hadn't clamped a hand over his mouth.
"Don't worry, Reed," the voice said in his ear. "Everyone will get out in one piece. For now, though, you'll have to sit tight with your other three friends while I find a way to take Drew and Violet, too."
Reed continued to struggle until he felt something against his back. Was that... the barrel of a gun?
"You just won't sit still, will you?" the voice asked. "Well, then, I can fix that pretty quickly."
"Grr, when are going to find them?"
Drew and Violet were weaving down every isle, searching for Emma and Lex. So far, the only thing they'd found were a few dead rats. Drew's patience was wearing thin. He wanted to find the captives, but they were obviously doing it wrong if they'd discovered nothing yet. Just then, Violet stopped.
"Did you find something?!" Drew asked hopefully.
"Look at this." She was shining her flashlight at one of the shelves.
Drew scanned the area that she was lighting up, but he didn't see anything significant. "Okay, I give up. What am I supposed to be looking at?"
"A jar of Tomorrow's Tea is gone."
Drew looked closer at the shelf she had indicated. Sure enough, there was an empty spot. "So?" he asked, not seeing why this was so important right now. They were looking for hostages, not missing jars of tea.
"Drew!" Violet face-palmed in frustration. "My family always kept a full stock of every tea in the storehouse! And we left this place with a full stock of Tomorrow's Tea! That means someone else came here and took a jar!"
"You think it's Agent I?" Drew breathed.
"It could be. Maybe he's trying to age the captives!"
"Then we have to find him before that happens."
Suddenly there was a loud bang from somewhere in the warehouse. Drew and Violet looked at each other in panic.
"What was that?" Violet's every word quaked.
"I know what it was," Drew murmured. "I grew up around Emma. I know a gunshot when I hear one."
The pair broke into a run to speed up their search. Their footsteps echoed throughout the dark storehouse. They waved their flashlights around them, hoping to find their friends before it was too late. Suddenly, the flashlights went out, and Drew and Violet were in complete darkness.
"Hey! What's going on?! Why aren't they working?!" Drew asked, about to reach his boiling point. Just then, a dark chuckle echoed in the blackness.
"Why don't you light a fire and find out?" the voice snickered. Drew raised his hand in the air and created a torch out of his fist. The fire bathed the area with light, and an extremely bizzare and frightening sight met his and Violet's eyes.
The fire revealed a towering shadow against the wall. It had the shape of a tall figure in a trenchcoat wearing a fedora hat, and it had red, glowing eyes. "I'll bet you're dying to know what I want with you and your friends. I'll take you to them, and you'll be able to leave with them, but not without paying the exit fee." The shadow then peeled itself off the wall and began to spin around them. The two felt their feet leave the ground. It spun faster and faster until it became a blur.
When it finally stopped, they felt the concrete floor beneath their feet, but they were so dizzy from the trip that they wobbled around, Violet crashing into Drew and knocking them both to the floor. When Drew's vision evened out, he lit his hand on fire again and found that he could not have ended up in a more awkward position: right on top of his girlfriend. Drew grinned sheepishly, but Violet was not amused. "Off, Drew," she grumbled. "Now is not the time for flirting."
Drew, though, just narrowed his eyes and smirked. "Admit it. You like this."
"NO. Get OFF! You're just like your mom said your dad was when they first met." Drew obeyed and scrambled a few feet off, a little disappointed.
"Drew? Violet?" a voice croaked in the darkness.
"Reed!" Violet and Drew both shouted. "Where are you?"
"SHHHHHHHH!" Reed's voice whispered shakily. "You have to... get out of here!"
"Why?" Violet demanded. "We came here for the hostages. We're not leaving without them!"
"Reed, you don't sound so good," Drew pointed out. "What's wrong?"
"You heard that... gunshot, right?"
"Yeah?"
"That was Agent I. He... shot me..."
"What?! Where?!"
"In the back... I think it hit my spine... I... I can't feel my legs," Reed's voice moaned. "You... have to leave."
"We can't!" Violet said again. "The hostages are still here and you need help!"
"But... he's here!"
"Who's here?!" Drew asked, feeling he already knew.
"One, two, three, four, five, six Nightprowlers," boomed the same voice they had heard earlier. "Good, we're all here! Now let's get down to business, shall we?"
Just then the lights flickered on to reveal their surroundings. It looked like they were probably in the place where Violet's family used to make the teas. It was a small, circular room bordered by wooden shelves full of empty jars. There were machines everywhere that looked like they could be for grinding, blending, and other tea making processes. "What?" Violet asked, thoroughly confounded at the sudden lack of darkness. "I thought the lights wouldn't turn on!"
"Forget the lights, look!" Drew cried, pointing ahead of them. Tied up to a pole and looking pretty bruised were Nick and Reed, along with Emma and Lex. Standing over them with his back turned was none other than Xavier, alongside a figure in a brown trenchcoat and black fedora hat. When he turned around to face them and took off his hat, Violet screamed.
It was Ivan.
"TRAITOR!" Drew yelled angrily.
Ivan chuckled darkly again. "Actually, I'm not a traitor. In order for me to be a traitor, I would have had to be on your side at one point and would have to be on the opposite side now. That is not the case. I am actually on nobody's side. That is, nobody's but my own. You see, I'm a double agent."
"And you, Xavier?" Violet asked, turning to the bully. "What made you turn against us?"
Xavier shrugged. "Ivan has more power. I'd rather be on a team that can win, even if I can't be the leader. And besides, Ivan promised no rules if I joined him."
"He's my right hand, now," Ivan told them, smirking.
Drew and Violet took fighting stances, the former with his katana and the latter with her war fans. Their foes laughed. "You think you can defeat me?" Ivan scoffed. "I can control shadows!" He thrust his hands out in front of him and clenched his fists. Drew and Violet were lifted off their feet by dark shapes behind them. Ivan had turned their own shadows against them. Violet kicked her feet, but her shadow kept a firm grip on her. "Sorry, but you can't hurt something that has no form," Ivan sneered.
"We aren't scared of you!" Drew raged.
"Fine then," Ivan shrugged, "Perhaps this will be scarier?" There was a flash in Violet's vision, and suddenly she was back at the old monastery. Her mother was making lemon tea in the kitchen, and the aroma carried into the hallway where Violet was standing. She followed the scent, and there was her mother, arms outstretched to her. Violet ran at her, but just as she was about to leap into the hug, a hole opened up at her mother's feet, and she vanished down it, her shrill scream ringing in Violet's ears. Then in another flash, she was back in the processing room, still being held by her shadow. She looked over at her boyfriend. His forehead was shining with sweat, and he was breathing heavily. It looked like he had seen something awful, too.
"If you're still not scared, how about this?" Ivan asked. He spun around once, and the most hideous sight met their eyes. It was a monster, the likes of which they had never seen. It was all black, and had long, pointy spines all along its back, a scaly body, three thick claws which could rip through the skin on each of its four feet, and wings and a tail like a dragon. It turned its head around to meet them, revealing a face like a wolf, with a mouth bearing sharp teeth dripping with saliva. It flashed its red, cat-like eyes at them, stood up on its hind legs, and cackled like a hyena. Then it spun around, and it was Ivan once more.
"You have the same power set as the Dragon Queen!" Violet gasped.
"The who?" Drew asked, not recognizing the name.
"The Dragon Queen was a powerful evil sorceress who was known for being able to control shadows, create illusions, and turn into a monster," Violet explained.
"Yes," Ivan continued, "and she was also capable of casting nasty curses and jinxes upon her enemies. She was eventually taken down by the First Spinjitzu Master at the time that his two sons were small children. Tell me, sweetheart-"
"STOP CALLING HER THAT, IVAN!" Drew yelled protectively.
"Drew, now is not the time for that!" Violet argued.
"As I was saying, Violet," Ivan continued, "have you ever wondered why your family has always had to deal with hardship? It's not a coincidence that destiny never seems to show mercy on your line. You see, the First Spinjitzu Master had defeated the Dragon Queen, but she made her dying breath a curse upon the First Spinjitzu Master and all of his descendants after him. From that moment forward, the line of the First Spinjitzu Master would never find happiness. I have the same powers because I am a descendent of hers. For years, I have been working behind the scenes to fulfill her goal: to take over Ninjago. I will do it in her name!"
"You're evil!" Violet shouted at him angrily. "I bet you could kill us all and not even blink an eye!"
Ivan motioned for her shadow to bring her over. He leaned in close. "Sweetheart, I'm not here to kill anyone, especially not you."
"Ivan, I'm warning you!" Drew cautioned.
"Drew, I can take care of myself-"
Ivan cut her off. "I'd love to kill you, Drew, but not today. I have other plans." He then reached into his pocket and pulled out a jar of purple liquid. "Violet, my dear-"
"IVA-" Drew began, but didn't finish due to the fact that his shadow had put its hand over his mouth.
"As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, Violet, would you be so kind as to explain to everyone what this is?"
Violet gasped. "That's the Tomorrow's Tea! The one that was missing from the shelves! You stole it!"
"Correct! And what exactly does it do?"
"It causes you to be older."
"Right again! How much older?"
"It depends on the percent concentration. Every ten percent equals one year. That jar has a yellow label, which means the concentration is fifty percent, equal to five years."
"Right once more, my sweet, and I plan to use it."
"You wouldn't dare! It would affect you too!"
"Of that I am aware. It seems you are all in quite the predicament. But your Senseis don't know that you're in trouble. Well, that will need to change. After all, the main reason I'm doing this is to spread fear of me."
Drew was trying to say something, but the shadow was still preventing him from speaking. Out of curiosity of what the fire wielder had to say, Ivan removed the hand from his mouth. "We won't let you get away with this, Ivan!" Drew yelled.
"You want to stop me from using this?" Ivan sneered, grinning evilly. "Then come and get it!"
Immediately their shadows dropped them. This was it. Ivan was fighting them for the Tomorrow's Tea. Ivan rose up in the air perched on a dark mass of smoke. Drew tried to hit him with a fireball, but he dodged it easily.
"He's too fast!" Drew shouted.
"Then we'll slow him down!" Violet answered.
"How?"
"We're surrounded by magical teas! I say we use them!" With that, Violet charged down the main isle, Drew following close behind. Suddenly Violet made a sharp right turn down one of the isles, and Drew had to skid to a quick halt before he made the turn too. Violet was grabbing jars of tea left and right, stuffing them in her bag.
"What do those do?" Drew panted.
"You'll see," Violet answered quickly, and dashed off in the direction they had come. The two gasped when they saw their enemy. He had now conjured a dragon made of black clouds, and was riding on its back.
"You wanted a fight!" Ivan shouted down at them. "I'll give you one! But I won't make it easy!"
"Neither will we!" Violet yelled back. She reached into her bag and pulled out a jar full of clear liquid. "Darkness feeds your power, so eat this!" She shook the container vigorously until it began to glow a brilliant white. She threw the jar at the dragon, and it shattered at its feet. Immediately light engulfed the beast until it shriveled up. Ivan fell to the ground, but quickly got back up again.
"You think a little light can stop me? Let me show you true power!" He raised his arm up in the air, and as he did so, a huge shadow of a hand rose up from the ground in front of them. Before Drew and Violet could react, it slammed down on them, knocking them to the floor. While Drew groaned on the ground, Violet scrambled back to her feet and reached into the bag again, this time retrieving a jar of red liquid.
"Try this!" she shot back, and hurled the jar in Ivan's direction. It smashed against the floor, and red vines sprouted from the floor. They wrapped themselves tightly around the double agent, but he simply summoned the shadows to cut them loose. Violet was reaching into her bag for another jar when it was suddenly yanked off her shoulder by another shadow. She looked up at Ivan. He was seething.
"Enough of this!" he screeched. Drew finally sat up and looked angrily at the double agent. Then, suddenly, they were once again up in the air held by their shadows. "I've lost interest in this fight. It's time for the chessmaster to make his final few moves!" Ivan removed the bottle of Tomorrow's Tea from his coat pocket. He then took out a cell phone and dialed a number. "We'll call your dad, Violet. I'm dying to know what his reaction to all this will be, you know, since he was forced to grow up too fast, too. I can't wait to hear what he has to say about his kids having to go through what he had to. I'll put it on speaker, so we can all hear it."
Lloyd was in his office, trying not to worry too much about the rescue team - or Ivan for that matter. A few days ago it was discovered that he was missing, too. Suddenly his cell phone began to ring. The sensei looked at the number. It wasn't one he recognized. Should he answer it? Was it safe? He hesitated for a moment, then decided that it may be news about the mission, so he went ahead and pressed the button to answer it. "Hello?" he asked tentatively. The voice that answered was one he never expected to hear again.
"Sensei! Glad you picked up. I was afraid you would miss the call."
"Ivan?!" Lloyd gasped. "Where have you been? You disappeared without a trace!"
"Never mind that. I'm calling about your kids and their friends."
"What about them?" Lloyd didn't like the tone of voice he was using...
"I'm the one who's holding them captive."
"WHAT?!"
"Yes, Sensei. I am Agent I. I'm the chessmaster behind all of this. I have been playing on both sides of the chessboard, manipulating all of the pieces, both good and bad, and now I've maneuvered my way through this game and have finally cornered your king."
Lloyd was speechless. A person they had trusted was really a double agent.
"Anyway," Ivan spoke casually, "I'm here with all the hostages and the people in your rescue team, who are now my captives as well."
"What do you want, Ivan?" Lloyd asked desperately. "I'll give you anything you ask for. Just don't hurt them!"
Suddenly a voice in the background came through. "Dad! Don't show weakness! It's what he wants!"
"Violet! You let her go, Ivan!"
"Lloyd?" The office door opened to reveal the six other Senseis. It was Nya who had spoken. "What's going on? Why are you yelling?"
"Ivan is Agent I and he's holding the hostages and our rescue team captive!"
"What?!" Jay screeched. "Is he on the phone? Put him on speaker!"
Lloyd did as he was told, and the double agent's voice was able to come through loud and clear.
"What do you want with my kid, Ivan?" Kai raged.
"Sensei Kai? And did I hear Sensei Jay as well? Everyone is there? Good! I prefer for you all to hear this!"
"Dad!" Drew's voice called. "He wants to get a reaction! Don't let him get one from you!"
"Let's get back on topic, shall we?" Ivan suggested curtly. "You see, I have a bottle of Tomorrow's Tea in my hand. According to the label, it should age everyone in this room five years. Wouldn't that be a shame, missing out on the rest of their childhood?"
"No! Don't!" Lloyd pleaded. Ivan couldn't be evil enough to make six children go through the same thing he had to endure when he was forced to use Tomorrow's Tea. A dark chuckle was the only response.
"Unfortunately, Sensei Lloyd, I'm on a schedule. I've already planned out my takeover of Ninjago. Getting the Black Dragons to burn down the monastery was phase one. Aging these kids up causing you an immense amount of emotional pain will wrap up phase two. Phase three is when I actually take action. Ninjago will be mine in the next forty-eight hours."
The mood amongst the Senseis in Lloyd's office was in the negatives now. Their kids were about to be stripped of their childhood, Ninjago was about to be plunged into greater chaos, and they were miles away, incapable of doing anything to stop it. Kai and Jay were fuming, Skylor was in shock, Nya was on the verge of tears, Zane was closing his eyes sadly, Cole was starting to disappear, and Lloyd could feel the wall hiding his emotions cracking, ready to crumble at any moment. He hadn't felt this vulnerable since the night Heather was taken away from him. That was his last explosion. He could feel it was about to happen again.
"Ivan, don't do this!" Violet's voice begged.
"Sorry sweetheart, but as I said before, I'm on a schedule. With that, I think I'll just go ahead and drop this thing. So long, Sensei! Hope this hurts!"
There was a sound of breaking glass, screams and shouts, a howling wind, and an evil laugh. Then, suddenly, it all stopped. There was not a single sound on the other end. Everyone looked at Lloyd. He was frozen in his chair.
"Lloyd?" Kai asked quietly. "Are you alright?"
The green ninja tried and failed to swallow the lump in his throat. "Leave me," Lloyd managed to choke out. Everyone exited the room, leaving the head sensei alone. Only when the door was shut did he finally feel free to let out the agony that had built up inside of him. A long, sad cry rang out into the halls of the palace - a sound that could only come from a broken - no, a shattered heart.
(A/N) Yes, he did. He aged them up. Just to cause everyone a heck of a lot of pain. So, were you right? Did you guess the right person for Agent I? Tell me in the reviews!
So, my explanation for the series of unfortunate events (geddit?) that befall the line of the First Spinjitzu Master is that Lloyd's family is cursed. It all began when the Dragon Queen cursed the FSM and all his descendants. Not long afterward, Garmadon was bitten by the Great Devourerer, and, well, you all know the rest.
I was going to kill off Xavier, but I realized I had promised you all that I wouldn't kill anyone. Besides, Agent I had no reason to do that. He might as well use Xavier as an ally rather than throwing him away. I think Xavier will show a little more potential in the third part as Ivan's right hand man, kind of like Pythor was to the Overlord. Even though Pythor's potential only seemed to decay as the show went on. Maybe that wasn't such a good comparison after all. Oh well.
Welp, we've reached the climax! Next chapter the falling action begins as the Nightprowlers wake up and find themselves five years older! What will they look like? What will their reactions be? What will their parents' reactions be? Stay tuned to find out!
Thanks to ebony umbreon, Kairocksrainbow, DragonWhisperer762, and The Mayor of Ninjago City for your reviews last chapter! And a big congratulations to AveXCninja11 for guessing Agent I's identity! I'm impressed! You guessed correctly all the way back in Chapter 1!
So, tomorrow I'm heading out west on a vacation, and I won't be able to update next weekend. See you the weekend after that, I guess!
Review please!