Jay could barely keep himself aware of where he was going.

He had no trouble seeing his way; that wasn't the problem. The faint blue aura surrounding him had grown into something of his own personal electrical storm, tendrils of power branching several feet from his person. The street he walked lit up in luminous blue. Some of his lightning got sapped into the water and flowed along the path to the drains.

No, light wasn't the problem.

The problem was the buzzing in his head, the buzzing in his hands, the millions of ants crawling over every organ. That awful noise, the mere sensation of it filled Jay's brain until he couldn't even hear himself think. He only grasped vague ideas and images of what his mind tried to tell him.

He stumbled drunkenly along, half-asleep, only partially aware that his feet guided him on his way out of the city, out from underneath the storm.

The wind blew him off his feet and he landed on his back, pain shooting through his shoulder. He had so much energy and yet couldn't find the energy to react. He simply stared up at the sky, blinking slowly despite the heavy raindrops invading his eyes.

Jay lay there for a minute before getting up on instinct and bumbling on.

His brain offered him incomplete images of something warm and safe and wanted, but every semblance of recognition got drowned out in the noise.

He let out an involuntary whine, vaguely cognizant that his mind was trying to direct him toward the source of this welcome, safe feeling, but he could not interpret his mind's instructions. How could he get there? What was his subconscious trying to show him?

It would be so much easier to tell if not for this horrible energy.

Jay roared, allowing the electricity to go wild around him. He blinked white spots out of his eyes.

The buzzing got worse.

Jay stopped.

The buzzing got better.

He quickly became aware that the remission was temporary and fading fast, but expelling some of the energy cleared up a bit of space in his head to think. He rushed to focus on those images of warmth and comfort and make sense of them.

Home, was the first clear word that came to mind.

He was seeing mental images of his childhood home. No doubt a quaint and cramped place, but filled with something ever-present and comforting and safe.

Jay was heading home. That was where his mind was trying to lead him.

Yes. He would go home and be safe, and Mom and Dad would be there, and—

He blinked. Something about that didn't seem quite right. Was he forgetting something? Yes, something he'd been told recently, he thought. Something Kai had told him— right, his Mom and Dad were in the city!

Jay froze.

Suddenly the sounds of rubble being thrown around in the wind phased into the forefront of his mind.

He went pale, skin somehow clammy despite the intense energy surrounding it.

Jay took a moment to really look at his surroundings and clapped a hand over his mouth to muffle a strangled cry.

What had once been the neon lights of the surrounding shops were now scattered across the road, reduced to nothing but a collection of glass shards. Trashcans, chairs, and potted plants tumbled wildly about, threatening to level anything in their path. Trees along the meridian sagged under the weight of all the water collected in their leaves, and some of the heavier limbs had begun to peel off of their trunks entirely. The streetlights offered no light, one leaning this way and the next leaning that. One of the lights had completely toppled over, pulling a mess of concrete and gravel pebbles to the surface at its base. The skyline loomed pitch black, shrouding the tops of the skyscrapers that reached into it. A rumble echoed through the sky, promising so much more destruction to come.

The storm would reduce the buildings to dust, would collapse the highways and all the cars stranded on them, would launch any car uncovered by rubble into the sea. It would pick up anyone light enough and slam them into the ground with no sense of human mercy. It would flood the bay and trap people in their houses so that they drowned. It would send debris launching at anyone who left their houses to flee.

Jay bit down on the sob that wracked his throat.

His mom and dad were in the city.

And then it made sense to him. His team had never betrayed him; he was being so unforgivably selfish for wanting to live and watch everyone else perish at the hands of the storm.

He hadn't thought that far ahead before. He'd just let his survival instincts get the best of him. He'd forgotten his place in favor of listening to the voice in his head telling him to live no matter what. He prided himself in being an inventor, a scientist, and yet he'd let himself go and be so stupid and so greedy as to try and protect himself without fully considering what it would do to everyone else. He was a ninja, for FSM's sake! He should have been well prepared to sacrifice himself for the good of the city!

Jay reached into the folds of his gi and absently traced his fingers over Zane's power source. His face twisted and his eyes welled with tears.

Zane would have been ashamed of him.

So would Pixal and Nya— they were smart; they had to have known from the very beginning that sacrificing Jay would be the best way through the storm, and he'd had the nerve to doubt them.

Beside Zane's power source, Jay's hand rested on another object.

Maybe he could still make it right.

Jay produced his cell phone and winced at his own reflection in the dark screen.

Jay would die. He would die if he buckled and called them now, and the last memory his entire team would have of him would be of how the coward freaked out and went rogue because he couldn't handle the idea of living out the self-sacrifice that the entire rest of the team had already proven they could take.

But the alternative was so much worse.

Jay turned the phone on and, distantly surprised it still worked despite all the electrical interference, went through his contacts.

He let out a shaky breath. It was so weird to think that he was making the phone call that would lead him to his death.

Jay tapped Cole's contact and tried to swallow on a dry mouth before holding the phone up to his ear.

The line rang once, twice, then he was met with the sound of someone picking up.

For a painfully long moment, the line remained silent.

"...Jay?"

Any semblance of words left Jay's mind, and he responded with a pathetic sob that, unfortunately, gave way to more pathetic sobs.

"Woah! What's going on?"

"Cole, I'm," Jay said through ragged breaths. "I'm so, so, sorry. I get it now. I'm sorry it took me so long. I'm— I'm so stupid." He inhaled sharply and shuddered. "I. I'll do it. I'll power the machine, just— just come get me. Please."

That seemed to do the trick. "Where are you?"

"I'm on Main Street. It's, uh," He glanced around at the bolts of electricity flying everywhere off of him. "It's pretty hard to miss me."

"Hold on. We're on Main, too. We're bound to run into you soon enough, and— woah, is that you?"

"If you're seeing a mess of lightning, then yeah." His mind was filling to the brim with the buzz again, and he was tempted to giggle at the double meaning.

"Hold on, buddy. We're almost there. You'll be able to see us in a minute."

Cole hung up.

Jay looked down the road. He knew they'd be carting him off to his death as soon as they came into view, and yet, now that he'd stopped fighting them, he was oddly excited to see them. Like it would be rewarding to work with them as a team, one last time.

Soon enough, he saw the twin green dots of Pixal's eyes bobbing ever closer— thank heavens. He hadn't done any permanent damage to her after all.

Nya and Cole led the group into the light of his aura at a full sprint, and soon, he could see Kai, Lloyd, and Pixal following close.

They slowed just outside the radius of his wild electricity, gawking at him with their faces donning a whole range of emotions.

"Jay, look out!" Cole rushed forward, past the safe radius and right towards Jay.

The words met Jay's ears but fell flat in his mind.

Then Cole collided with him and they lay sprawled over the ground, safe from the kerosene tank that had just rocketed through where Jay had been standing.

Cole twitched with a garbled cry, lightning pulsing over his form.

Jay yelped and scooted back, bringing Cole away from his energy.

Kai rushed to Cole's side as the earth ninja regained control of himself.

"Oh my— Cole!" Jay reached a hand out towards him, though he dared not come closer. "Are you okay?"

Cole panted, allowing Kai to heave him to his feet. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine."

"I'm sorry! You…" Jay looked at where the kerosene tank had embedded itself in the wall across from them. "You saved me."

"Of course I did, ding-dong! That's what we do!"

Jay stared blankly, a shiver running up his spine.

Nya took a step closer, her eyes begging his to meet them. "Jay, what's been going on with you? We've been worried sick!"

Jay opened and closed his mouth a few times. He lowered his gaze to the ground. "I'm sorry. I should have come back to you all sooner, I never even should have left, I—" Oh, no. No, he wasn't about to cry in front of them right before they killed him off, was he? Apparently he was. "I was so stupid and so selfish and-and-and I know now that I should have prepared for this a long time ago, I just—" His words dissolved into meaningless blubbering, only interrupted to gasp or sniff.

"Jay," Nya cooed, voice carefully soft. "Why did you leave?"

Jay grabbed his hair in fistfuls. "I didn't want to die."

A look of shock swept the group, save Kai.

"I-I know I should have expected it, but—"

"Expected what?" interrupted Cole. "No one's dying!"

"But that was the plan!" He met Nya's gaze again. "I heard you talking in the Bounty, I heard you saying that you needed me to power the machine but that much strain would kill me!"

She went ghostly pale, eyes wide. "Which is why we amended the plan to divide the load between you, Zane, and Pixal! That way no one would get hurt!"

The remaining cognizant part of Jay's brain went silent. "What?"

A horrified expression swept through the group like a virus.

Lloyd shook his head. "Do you really think we would sacrifice you? Do you really think Nya and Pixal would plan that for you, or that I would approve it, or that Cole and Kai would go along with it?"

"After what I did to Zane?"

"Zane can still be saved," Lloyd said. "Let's put that aside for now. Do you think any of us would be willing to sacrifice you?"

"No, after what I did to Zane on the rooftops! I gave that soldier the electricity to shock him!"

Cole furrowed his brow. "Is that what this is about? Sure, that wasn't ideal, but it was an honest mistake; everyone makes those!"

"Then afterwards, why did you want me to die?"

Cole gawked at him.

When no one offered to answer him, Jay continued, "It's just like you guys always joke about. I'm whiny and useless and expendable— except those were never really jokes, were they?"

Nya took another step closer, and Jay stepped back. "No one ever wanted you dead."

"Then why did you leave me?"

"What?"

"I called for you— you and Cole! That Serpenteel, he stabbed me and pinned me to the wall and he had a knife over me. He was going to kill me and you and Cole were free, so I called out to both of you and you just ran right past me! You left me for dead!"

Cole gasped, and Nya held a hand over her mouth, tears streaming down her cheeks.

"The Serpenteels hit us with a flash-bang!" Cole cried. "We couldn't hear a thing!"

The buzzing clouded Jay's mind. He turned the words over in his head a couple times before they hit him.

"Y-you didn't hear me?"

"No!" Nya and Cole chorused.

"You would have saved me if you—" he stumbled back.

"Of course. Of course we would have," Cole confirmed.

"Jay," Nya said. "We love you."

"Oh," he said simply. He nodded at nothing in particular, then wailed, "Ohhh, noooo, I really have been an idiot!"

He lost himself to sobs that pushed him to his knees and wracked his whole body.

Outside his electric field, five people offered him soothing muttered phrases and words of encouragement.

Jay lost himself in the storm, and yet there they were, sticking with him. Always there. Always by his side.

His tears mingled with the streams of water pouring down his hair and onto his face. He was so heavy and so light all at once, and the buzzing was there and everything was too much, but at the same time, it was just enough.

He focused on reigning his breathing back under control and, at long last, wiped his face with a sniffle before facing the team— his team.

"I do believe we have a city to save."

Kai and Cole cheered, Nya laughed, Pixal smiled, and Lloyd nodded at him with a proud "Way to go, Jay."

Jay held his hands out placatingly when Nya jabbed a finger in his direction with a promise of, "We will be having a talk about this later."

Kai slung an arm around Lloyd's shoulders. "What's the plan, chief?"

"Now that Jay has the entire city's power as well as his own, he should be able to power the machine without putting himself in danger. Pixal can help, too, if there are any complications on his end. The matter of it is getting Jay to the machine. That rooftop is still swarming with Serpenteels."

Jay gasped and pointed at Lloyd. "It caught on! My name for them caught on!"

Pixal hummed and scratched her chin. "So how do the six of us get past the fifty of them?"

"I think you meant the seven of us," Jay corrected, producing a certain power cell from his gi. "I think we might have someone else on our side who'd like to join the party."