Waxing Crescent

Zane was the first to wake up the next day.

He usually was. His charging cycle wasn't nearly as long as a human sleep cycle. He glanced at Cole's bunk- part of him hoped that, for some reason, the transformation may have reversed itself overnight.

There was no logical reason to think such a thing would happen, but he still couldn't help but be saddened when he saw Cole, still facing the wall.

Perhaps if he had been last in line after tying themselves together, or maybe if he had grabbed the scroll instead of Cole, everyone would have been okay.

He heard Pixal's voice in his head. You cannot blame yourself, Zane. What happened to Cole was the fault of Yang, and nobody else

Pixal's voice was always a relief to hear. She too had been quiet the day before, and Zane could feel her sadness weigh against his.

It is difficult not to imagine what could have been done to prevent this. I could have built a new body for myself if I had been the one to become a ghost instead.

You do not know that. Your code has evolved rapidly since your return, but we do not know that it could have survived the temple. You becoming a ghost is the best-case scenario in that situation. The worst case is a much less ambiguous demise

Pixal was right, of course. She usually was. But still, he was built to be human, and humans can't help but entertain "what-if."

Was Cole actually asleep? Zane couldn't tell. Either way, he chose to respect Cole's privacy and avoid disturbing him. His internal clock told him it was five in the morning- plenty of time before sunrise, and he had work to do.

Something in him startled when he saw a figure at the helm of the bounty- it calmed a moment later, when he recognized it as Ronin. Honestly, Zane hadn't- well, he hadn't forgotten about Ronin, but he also had not recently considered his presence on the Bounty, even though he usually took the night shift.

I monitored Ronin overnight. It was uneventful

Thank you, Pixal.

Ronin may have been helping them, but his loyalty was fickle, and their trust did not come cheap after what he had done.

He yawned and gave a bored wave to Zane from the wheel.

"Good morning, Ronin. Anything to report?" He asked. A wave of relief rushed over him when his voice came out quiet thanks to Jay and Nya's repairs the night before.

The mercenary huffed. "I should be asking you that. What the hell happened yesterday? When I go to bed, you're all off to snoop around a temple. When I wake up, there's a ghost talking to himself on the bough."

Had nobody told Ronin? A careless oversight.

He is being melodramatic. I briefed him on the events from yesterday Once again, Zane was eternally grateful for Pixal.

"I nearly took him out, you're lucky I could recognize that moron's voice."

"That was Cole, and he is not a moron."

"Couldn't have been that smart if he got stuck in the temple," he replied with a distinctly callous tone. "I warned you all- that place is bad news."

It was a good thing Kai was still asleep, He had a feeling Ronin would be nursing a black eye for that if he had been here. Zane however, was not so rash. "Perhaps there is a way to restore him to his previous state."

Ronin scoffed, lips pursed into a cold smile. "If there is, that'd be news to me. Cheating death ain't so easy. Not everyone is lucky enough to get a second go."

Zane felt a pang of old guilt like an ancient injury. He had died back there, in that fight with the Overlord. "Cole is not dead, though. He was cursed."

Ronin, who had been watching the Bounty's radar, sighed and turned to face Zane. His prosthetic eye reflected Zane's own blue glow. "Don't get your hopes up on the basis of semantics, kid. People become ghosts when they die." He folded his hands behind his head. "The only difference is that your friend is stuck in this realm, courtesy of that God-forsaken temple. Same way you were stuck in those Borg circuit boards when you got yourself killed."

"You mean when you stole me from the factory on the day of my memorial?" Zane allowed some venom to seep into his tone. His brothers went through such a plight because of Ronin. Because of him getting taken to Chen. Because of Zane dying in the first place.

"That's the time," Ronin said with a coy wink. "'Course, you're a bit different. I don't even know if you can get spirited off to the Departed Realm. But the principle is the same."

Is it now?

"I could be repaired, though. And yet you are saying that Cole cannot."

"You're a bucket of bolts. He is- or was- a squishy sack of meat and bones. It's not a one-to-one comparison." He leaned against the wall and shut his organic eye as he spoke- it had an unnerving effect- he looked wide awake and at rest at the same time. Which of course made him look like he was neither. It reminded him of when half of his own faceplate had been ripped off by the Devourer. "Still, dying sucks for all involved parties."

The others were not fond of Ronin, and Zane understood that. To an extent, he shared those sentiments. And yet, he could appreciate how candid the mercenary always was. He did not attempt to lie for the sake of sparing their feelings.

Zane didn't remember everything following his death. There were a lot of blank spots in his memory. However, one thing he did remember- the deep loneliness of being trapped in his own mind and the inability to reach out to his brothers, to tell them he was still here.

He remembered how frightening it was to wake up on Chen's island, his new blueprints stolen with his programming shoved into the body.

He hadn't been alone- Pixal had uploaded herself into his code just before they were taken. Even still, that had done little to reduce the confusion and fear of waking up in that cold, dark cell with nightmares and hallucinations plaguing his mind and his memory full of holes.

That was all bad. Zane did not enjoy recalling those times.

Worse though, was the impact his death had on his brothers.

Kai took to venting his anger on whatever foe he could find. Nya buried herself in work. Jay tried desperately to distract himself. Cole had buckled, fleeing far into the forest, surrounding himself with strangers that would believe him okay. Lloyd was left to pick up the pieces.

Zane wished he hadn't caused them such grief.

And now Cole was a ghost- in some sense, he had also died, all to scrounge together some hope of saving Lloyd.

Perhaps the team wouldn't be splitting up- there was no memorial, and Cole was not truly gone. But they were grieving.

The difference was that Cole had to watch them grieve, even as he stood before them and walked alongside them.

"Yes, dying does 'suck,'" he parroted. Ronin snorted. "But you are asserting that we need to move on."

"I'm not asserting nothin'," he replied in a casual drawl. He pulled something from his back pocket. Zane realized with a jolt that it was the scroll of Airjitzu.

Perhaps Ronin saw his expression, because he grinned again. "Aw, don't worry. I was just taking a peek- couldn't read a word. Your omnipresent girlfriend wouldn't even let me touch the damn thing until she had several backups of her own."

Pixal spoke again, this time over the speaker for the Bounty's personal computer system. "You have a habit of stealing that which does not belong to you."

Ronin looked utterly unbothered as he tossed the scroll to Zane. "Can't argue with that. Anyway, you kids went through some shit to get that piece of paper. If I ever die for a diary page and you don't even read the damn thing, rest assured I'm haunting you for all eternity."

For the first time, Zane unfurled the scroll. It was written in old Edo script.

"Do not worry, I seriously doubt you'll ever end up in such a self-sacrificing situation," Pixal said with more than the a hint of condescension.

The mercenary laughed. "Probably not. I think that makes me the smartest one here. You kids just love catching bullets for each other."

"I assure you, it was not a situation I 'loved,'" Zane said in a flat voice; he kept his eyes trained on the scroll. "I'm only sorry that you don't have someone you'd do anything to protect. That is a lonely fate."

Ronin stretched as he yawned again. "Think whatever you want. I'm hitting the hay. Wake me when the fun starts. I have bets with the boat on whether the blue one or the red one will be the first to catapult themself off the deck."

I made no such wager Pixal told Zane. She sounded weary. And I am not the ship

Ignore him, Pixal. Zane thought- he allowed himself to be at least a little amused. The mental image of Jay flying off the ship was entertaining, though it would have been more so if they actually had their elemental dragons to catch them if something went awry.

"Sleep well," Zane told Ronin. "Your insight was helpful."

"Shit, remind me to charge next time."

Pixal sighed within Zane's mind.

Zane checked the time- it was still early.

That was good. He had much to consider. He'd find a way to organize this mess.


Sensei didn't wake Jay up that morning. For a brief, wonderful, half-conscious moment, he wondered why.

Then the previous day's memories hit like a bolt of lightning, burning away the cobwebs of sleep. Right. Cole was a ghost.

He glanced at Cole's bunk- it was perfectly made with no ghost to be seen.

For an awful, paranoid moment, Jay wondered if Cole had disappeared.

With that lovely thought in mind, he groaned and kicked his legs over the bed; he allowed himself to sink off it like the puddle of goo he felt like rather than going through the rigmarole of sitting up. Once he was successfully congealed on the floor, he forced himself into a human shape and sat up. He opened the drawer for his clothes by scooting back, where he had to rifle around for a clean gi. Thankfully, he had an old one balled up in the back of the drawer. Ugh. Laundry. He loved to do it.

"Lookin' spritely, Sparky," came Kai's muddled voice from the other side of the room, where he was brushing his teeth, still in pajamas. Between his awful morning voice and mouth full of water, Jay could only recognize the phrase by its familiarity.

"Get your own insults," Jay mumbled as he began the arduous process of removing his comfy pajamas. "It's wrong to rob a dead man," he added. A pang of guilt hit him a moment later.

Kai's eyes went wide- or well, wide compared to the half-lidded exhaustion of a man that had woken up mere moments earlier. He spit water into the sink and rinsed his mouth. "Dead jokes already? Fast turnaround."

"Don't tell Cole." Jay grunted as he fumbled to tie one of the strings on the inside of his suit.

"Mm," was Kai's reply. He stepped away and gestured to the sink. "All yours, princess."

"I'm not a princess, I'm just the only one here with any sense of decency," he protested. Granted, most of the products at the sink were his. But that was beside the point.

Kai sidestepped Jay and made his way to his bunk's drawer to get his own uniform. "Keep telling yourself that."

"I'm sorry an electric toothbrush, mouthwash and flossing is too sophisticated for country boys like you." Seriously, Kai owned like, three hygiene products total, and that included shampoo. In fact, he was pretty sure he and Cole shared their cheap shower products. How their hair wasn't completely dry and dead was-

Cole is dead.

It felt like his brain just rammed into a brick wall and cut off all his thoughts' momentum. He stared at Cole's orange toothbrush in the cup on the sink. Cole couldn't even brush his teeth anymore. Or shower. Or stand in the rain or go swimming or-

Cole is dead, Cole is dead. Cole is dead, dead, dead-

"Right, 'so-phis-to-cated,'" Kai enunciated, giving each syllable a sharp point. "Because all city boys use concealer."

Wait, what was Kai talking about? Jay tried to snap himself back into reality and latched onto the last word he heard. He squeezed way too much toothpaste onto his toothbrush.

"Con… concealer? Well uh, yeah. How else am I supposed to, uh, hide the bags under my eyes that I get from your snoring?" He hoped Kai was still too asleep to catch his hopeless fumbling.

Jay could see in the mirror that Kai had stopped moving, hands hovering over his waist with his untied belt in hand. Damn it.

He ran the water and carefully watched his glob of toothpaste be thoroughly drenched by the water-

Water that Cole can't touch.

He forced the thought away and shoved his toothbrush in his mouth while staring at the bowl of the sink.

The sink that was wet enough to hurt Cole if he touched it.

What was Cole's routine going to be like now? Did he even sleep? Could he change his clothes? Someone else would have to wash them for him- the wet clothes could hurt him. What about rain? Was he going to have to hide under a tarp any time he needed to go outside in gloomy weather?

Maybe I can, I dunno… make something to help with that? he proposed to nobody in particular.

What could he even make to help Cole? How do you help a ghost? Maybe Nya would have an idea. She was usually the idea person.

"-Clean now. I don't think you have to worry about cavities, unless you drill them in your teeth yourself like that."

Jay jumped at Kai's hand on his shoulder. When had he gotten there? "Oh, what?" he asked through a mouthful of sudsy, minty paste.

Kai gave Jay a look. "C'mon. You're good to go, let's just go get breakfast."

Jay winced and spat the toothpaste out and rinsed. "Right. Breakfast."

Two glum, scuffed up faces stared at Jay through the mirror. They really were a mess. Kai looked awake, but no less drained, like he hadn't slept at all. Hell, maybe he hadn't. Jay was pretty sure the previous day was going to haunt (hah hah…) his nightmares for the rest of his life. And afterline. Again, hah hah.

"Right." Kai repeated, somewhat awkwardly. He tugged Jay gently by the shoulder. He really didn't feel like protesting. The rest of his beauty routine could wait.

Cole was in the kitchen. He was the one to greet them as they entered, still green and see-through.

"Morning guys! How'd you sleep?" he greeted from a seat at the table. His strange, echo-y voice sounded almost merry.

"Uh. Fine. You?" Jay replied in a bit of a rush- that left him mentally kicking himself. Probably not a great question to ask.

"I'm good to go. Zane's had Pixal translating the scroll, Nya's in the control room copying 'em down for us."

Jay could feel his brain go haywire. Kai's expression was blank, probably matching Jay's own. "Oh, that's good!" he said, trying to force some enthusiasm into his voice.

Cole smirked and crossed both arms over the table. (They didn't phase through.) "What's wrong? You look like you've seen a ghost."

Kai nearly broke into a coughing fit. "You too? Everyone is making damn ghost jokes this morning."

Zane was at the stove cooking breakfast. It smelled like pancakes. He turned to them, his expression difficult to read, as it usually was when he was in an enigmatic mood. "Come, take a seat. It's almost ready."

Jay obeyed, in a bit of a trance. It wasn't like he wanted Cole to be all doom and gloom about being a ghost, but this was just jarring. Yesterday, he had screamed for help as he lost his mortality in front of them. He had lapsed into that awful silence as they walked back. Looked humiliated after falling down the ladder.

Now he was making jokes.

Kai sat next to Jay, eyes darting between all three of them, almost frantically. Jay saw him clench and unclench his fists on the table and bounce his leg.

To be fair, Jay probably didn't look much more relaxed, because Cole's smile waned. His expression shifted, fell a bit. "Hey, don't worry about me, I'll be okay," he said. "I'm fine."

"Are you sure?" Jay asked. He fiddled with his fingers. "I mean, yesterday was… it was a lot, it wouldn't be weird if you needed some time. We'd understand."

Kai jerked his head to Jay. "Yeah, what he said."

Glad to see we're both at a loss.

Cole smiled in that way of his- that kind and disarming way that he was so good at, equal parts carefree and comforting. "Look, I'm sorry I worried you guys, but don't worry. Lloyd needs us, and I'm not going to let him down, alright? Yesterday was hard, I'm not gonna lie, but it can only go up from here, right?"

Jay didn't have a response to that- aside from "Don't jinx it," perhaps- his mind was still reeling, trying to decide what to do. It's not like he wanted to push Cole to have a breakdown, but if he was just pretending to be okay, surely that wasn't good.

"Besides," Cole said, rubbing his (transparent) hands together with an eager grin, "I tried earlier, turns out I can eat food, so I'll live." A beat passed. "Relatively speaking."

"He's been helping himself to the batter all morning," Zane helpfully supplied as he used a knife to swipe some pancakes onto a few plates. "Straight from the pan."

"Hey, you'd do the same thing if you were impervious to burns!"

"No I wouldn't," Kai and Zane said in unison, voices deadpan. Jay couldn't help but snicker as he was passed a plate of pancakes loaded with enough syrup to drown someone, just the way he liked it. Kai wrinkled his nose at Cole and Jay's plates.

"You two are disgusting."

"What's the point of eating pancakes if you're not going to put any syrup on them?" Cole asked. Jay could see him struggle with the fork- his hand seemed to phase through it a few times before he actually managed to grab the thing. Cole didn't react with anything more than what appeared to be annoyance and frustration.

Which… made sense. It wasn't like Cole was repressing everything. He still acted like Cole, and Cole was an emotional and expressive doofus.

Maybe he was faking it. Maybe this was all just some facade he was putting up to trick them into thinking he was okay. Jay was pretty sure that's what was happening at least a little bit.

He watched Cole take a bite. Strangely, as the food passed into his mouth, it seemed to disappear- they could still see through Cole's form, but not the food he had just eaten.

But at the same time, the fact that he was smiling at all was probably good. Maybe it meant he wasn't completely devoid of hope. Jay took a deep breath.

The least he could do was return the smile, right?

"I'm with Cole. Kai, you're the weird one here. Even Zane and Nya put syrup on their pancakes."

Kai groaned. "It's way too sweet! I can feel my teeth rotting just smelling the stuff."

Zane was eating his food silently, watching their exchange with an expression somewhere between neutral and warm as he ate.

"You just have no taste," Cole retorted with a pointed glare followed by some wand-waving incantation movement of his fork.

Kai rolled his eyes, then picked up his dry pancake with his hand like a heathen and ate it like a cookie. "Whatever. Why can ghosts eat, anyway? Most food has water in it, doesn't it?"

Cole shrugged. "Dunno, but I'm definitely not complaining."

The conversation all felt so normal, except they were talking about Cole as a ghost.

"Maybe for the same reason you can still wear clothes," Jay posited with a mouthful of syrup, batter, and chocolate chips.

Cole hummed, which sounded weird in his ghost-y voice. "Guess so."

Talking about it all so casually felt weird. Jay glanced at Kai, who was hanging a leg off the side of his chair with his other leg propped on the seat. He met Jay's stare and just shrugged and shook his head.

It was awkward, still. Cole was a ghost, and every second Jay spent thinking about that felt like he was sinking further and further into a muck. Yet here they were discussing clothes and food like it was nothing.

On the other hand, it's not really that weird for us, is it?

The thought gave Jay pause. Because when he really thought about it, it wasn't that weird. If Cole were his usual self, they'd still be eating breakfast together even though one of them was currently who-knows-where going through who-knows-what at the hands of a vengeful spirit.

Jay had to chew on that one for a while. All he knew for sure was that they were all a mess.


"Hey Sis. Brought you some pancakes."

Nya didn't seem to hear him at first. She had her head buried under the Bounty's console, fiddling with the electronics underneath.

"Sis? Fire to Nya? Anyone home?"

A brief exclamation of surprise and a head bump against the console countertop later, she was staring at him with a perplexed expression.

"Fire to Nya?" she repeated, a smile tugging at her lips.

Kai passed her the plate and sat on the floor across from her- he leaned against the central support column with his legs folded as if he were meditating. His sister spent a moment scooting around and situating into a more comfortable position from which to eat, then set the plate on her lap.

"Well, it can't be earth to Nya. That's Cole," he explained in deadpan. She rolled her eyes.

"You're spending too much time around Jay."

"No kidding," he agreed with a sagely nod.

It was silent for several seconds. Nya stared at the plate as she took a bite. Her brow was thoroughly furrowed.

I feel ya, Sis.

"Cole is… well, he's acting like his usual self," he finally said. He tipped his head back and pushed himself forward, craning his neck just enough to see some of the photos pinned to the beam, albeit thoroughly warped from his perspective.

Nya sighed in between bites. "But how he's actually doing is anybody's guess."

"Yep."

"How are you doing, though?"

Kai blinked once, twice, and folded his arms. "I wasn't the one turned into a ghost."

His sister watched him with those annoyingly sharp eyes of hers. She always was the shrewd one. "No, but you are the one that chronically seethes over anything you can possibly find a way to blame yourself for. And if I'm this frustrated, I can't imagine you are any better. Especially since you saw it happen."

Really not pulling punches, huh?

He may as well not hide it- not from Nya. That was an exercise in futility at this point.

"I dunno. I'm mad, I guess," he settled on.

Make no mistake, it was true- Kai still wanted nothing more than to march back to that temple to force Yang to fix Cole. But it felt like a suffocating fog had settled over his thoughts. Like his anger was some omnipresent thing boiling under the surface, but the nerves were too damaged for him to actually hurt from it.

Nya didn't say anything. The silence wasn't quite comfortable, but it wasn't awkward either. It just…was.

It was silent, save the thrum of the ship's engines.

Until finally, although not until after she finished her plate, she asked just about the last thing he expected.

"Do you ever get mad at Master Wu?"

"What does the sensei have to do with this?"

"I don't know. I'm just… I'm annoyed, is all."

"Because of the water ninja thing?" he asked- he still didn't like the idea of Nya being a ninja, but once she put her mind to something, there was no stopping her. If she wanted to join the team as a ninja instead of as the Samurai, Kai would suck it up.

The problem was that she didn't sound like she wanted that at all.

"It's just… Every time things finally start to feel normal- it's like he's waiting to drop bombshell after bombshell." She started fiddling with her empty plate as she spoke, tracing shapes along the rim with her fork. "He knew our parents, and he didn't say anything. And now that it's convenient, he wants me to suddenly learn to use elemental powers I didn't know I had."

Kai felt his heart constrict as Nya drew attention to the open wound. Compared to everything else, it was practically a footnote in this entire mess. What did that even say about him? That revelations about his missing parents were like, not even top five in his current list of things to worry about?

"But… he keeps secrets. Maybe he wanted to preserve our feelings. Maybe he wanted to wait until my powers manifested more gradually. I don't know," Nya mused. She set the plate down and pulled her knees to her chest. "I don't like it, but I get that, you know?"

She clenched her fist and released it. "But what about Morro? Kai, he was our age at most. And he died."

Oh. Honestly, Kai hadn't thought much about Morro. At least, not as more than a nebulous, villainous force that they were fighting. The current thing that Kai needed to hit to make everything okay again. But yeah, he had been the sensei's last student before Cole, then the rest of them.

"He still chose to possess Lloyd. I wouldn't feel too bad for him," Kai decided. "It… it's awful, but it's not like anyone could guess that he'd come back from the dead."

Nya had an expression on her face that Kai did not like. It was twisted and sad, her eyes misty. "He possessed Lloyd because… Kai, he wanted to be the Green Ninja. Then he was told no. And got so angry that he became… that. It's happened before, and sensei didn't say anything."

"Before? What do you…" Kai trailed off.

Oh.

Oh. Yeah.

It felt like the wind had been knocked out of his lungs, like everything had just gone dark. A dizzying vertigo slammed into him, and he leaned forward with his knees supporting his elbows.

"I'm… I wish I hadn't done that. I- shit…"

It hit him all at once. His own words echoed in his head, as though they had come from a stranger.

"I should have been the green ninja!"

And he had all that power at his fingertips, and it only took seconds for him to get dangerously close to doing something awful. What if, instead of a staff, it had been the power to possess people?

He really wasn't that much better than Morro.

Nya looked away. "It's… it's not entirely your fault, though. In the tournament, I mean… and you did the right thing in the end, when you destroyed the staff. You didn't actually do anything wrong, didn't act on those feelings, and I'm so glad that's the case."

Nya was talking faster now, her words blending together a bit.

"But Kai, you were way too close."

"...I'm sorry."

"You're not the one that should apologize, though!"

But he was sorry. He was so sorry. That tournament- he nearly made the worst decision of his life. Nearly ruined everything he loved all over some stupid power.

"But Sensei Wu… he's seen it happen before! Morro died because of his anger. And he still let you get so close to- to…" she trailed off. "I almost lost you that day, Kai. That was the day that the Kai I love almost died. And Wu has seen that happen before, but he didn't do anything!"

Kai pushed himself from where he was sitting and pivoted around to sit next to Nya. He leaned against her, and she put her head on his shoulder.

"Sis, the sensei wasn't even on the island. And I hadn't talked about it for a long time. Not to mention, it was my own stupid grudge."

His sister sniffled. "Wu still knew you were mad, though. At least a little bit. We all did. We never held it against you because you're an amazing person, and it's not evil to feel a certain way as long as you do what's right, but in all that time Wu never made sure you were okay, when he's already lost a student to that jealousy."

Kai put his hand to his chest and squeezed, feeling the fabric of his gi bunch up in his hand. "He's told me all the time, though. That I need to let my anger go, be a better person and stuff. I was always the idiot that couldn't do that."

Nya's head snapped up. "Kai! You're not an idiot! You're a teenager! We all are!" She gestured wildly in some vague direction. "We're just kids, Kai! We're kids that are putting our lives on the line! We do stuff that most people twice our age wouldn't be willing to do!"

That was… definitely a thought that had occurred to Kai before, although not like this.

"Sis, I'm proud of what we are. I love doing it. You know that. All of us love it. We don't… we never fit in with normal kids. You know that."

Their parents disappeared when Kai was six. If it weren't for the kindness of the neighbors, they would have starved. Other kids were playing with toys while they were learning to run a blacksmith shop just to make ends meet. Being told by the sensei that he wanted Kai, not Ray or not some piece of metal- but Kai- was the best thing to ever happen to him.

I mattered. I could make a difference.

"I do too!" she said in a rush. "Don't get me wrong! I love this too! I couldn't imagine doing stuff like going to school or playing sports or whatever. I love this family, and I wouldn't trade it for anything…"

"...but?" Kai prompted, hearing the silent qualifier.

"But Wu should have been more careful. You were grieving, and Wu never once checked on you. He left that to Lloyd. He expected us to process losing Zane all on our own, when we're just kids! He expected you to get over your green ninja obsession and to grow as a person on your own. To let you find your own path."

Nya's next statement was barely above a whisper. "Kai, I nearly lost you because of that. We… we're not normal teenagers, but we're not adults either. You needed Sensei Wu, and he wasn't there for you when you were angry and sad and hurt, even though he knew for a fact just how badly it could end up."

The sensei… wasn't there?

Well, in a literal sense, that was true. He wasn't on the island, but Kai hadn't told Wu he was going.

"But Sis, it was really stupid for me to be mad about the green ninja. That wasn't Wu's problem."

Kai went stiff as a board when Nya flung herself into his arms. "Yes, it is! He's the closest we have to a guardian, Kai! He's supposed to keep us safe."

"It's… not always safe to do this, though." It wasn't ever safe. Their lives were always at risk. That wasn't the sensei's fault. They chose to risk their lives.

"Maybe not, but when he's already lost a student to your exact anger, he should at least make sure it doesn't happen again. And he didn't. You're only okay because you were stronger than Morro, but what if you weren't? You don't deserve a ruined life because you didn't know how to handle your anger! Wu would have let you ruin your life just like him."

Kai wanted to refute the claim, but something about the words stuck- wormed their way into his mind. He wasn't angry at the sensei, but…

"Wu had a deceased student that was like you, and not only did he hide it, but he didn't learn from it, either." Nya was crying now, and held Kai so tight that it hurt, and she was shaking in his arms.

"If he had just… if he had warned us… if he had learned his lesson, maybe you wouldn't have gotten so close to destroying yourself! Lloyd wouldn't have been captured! Cole wouldn't be cursed! And now you're all blaming yourselves for the temple and he's just going to let you!"

Kai's mind was spinning. He really wasn't good at these kinds of talks. "Nya, we went behind his back to go to the temple."

"He knew what you were doing. He's not an idiot. But he didn't stop you guys!"

"We… we had to go, though! We have no chance of stopping Morro otherwise." He hated to admit it, but like, it was true. The ghosts- they were just too strong.

"If he really cared, he still wouldn't have let you go! Or at least would have given you some kind of guidance! Maybe support you guys going instead of forcing you to go behind his back, even if it was just with some advice! Maybe then it would have played out differently! Maybe he could have stopped whatever mistake led to Cole- ugh, I don't know!" She threw herself back against the console, pressing her palms over her eyes.

Kai thought of that rope. At the time, it had made sense- to make sure they didn't get separated in the spooky haunted temple. In practice, it had only slowed them down and cost them a few invaluable seconds. Cole was so close to being home free. If it weren't for that rope

If Sensei were there, would they have made that stupid mistake?

"I dunno, Sis. I don't know that I can blame Sensei for that."

She huffed, wet and snotty with a face full of tears. "Of course you don't; I bet you're busy blaming yourself."

Kai forced out some kind of laugh, because it wasn't like this was about him. "Well, when you lose your friend- another friend, that is- even though they're right there, and you still can't do anything, y'know..."

He cut that wonderfully coherent thought off before his breath could catch. First Zane, Then Lloyd, Now Cole.

Nya sniffled and wiped her face with her sleeve. Some oil smeared across her nose. "Wow, we really are a mess, huh?"

"Guess so."


"Try not to blame yourself too much, Bro. And also, if you tell anyone what I said, I'll kill you."

Cole heard Kai chuckle. "Right back atcha, Sis."

That was when Cole took his cue to leave- he rushed across the deck and into their barracks before they could see him, hopefully. He felt phantom heartbeats pounding in his chest.

He hadn't… well… he hadn't meant to eavesdrop, but at first they were talking about him, and because of him, it dragged up all this nasty stuff.

First Spinjitzu Master, how did everything turn into such a disaster so quickly? He felt like he was running through a maze just to navigate his own thoughts.

"Come on, Cole… Pull yourself together; you need to calm down." He took a deep (fake) breath. "Ugh, you're losing your mind."

He was trying, he was really trying. But it didn't make a difference, because everyone was still looking at him like he had six arms and three heads.

Granted, it had only been a day. And he wasn't proud of how he had acted yesterday- it made sense that they were worried, but also, it's not like they had time for him to brood.

"This isn't like when Zane died… I'm still here and one of us is still in trouble!" He turned to the mirror and felt a jolt go down his spine when a sullen ghost stared back at him. Every instinct in him screamed "enemy." He drew close to the mirror and used a finger to tug at the skin below his eyes, which were sunken-in and dark, with deep shadows below them. He looked like he hadn't slept in a century.

Slowly, he untied and tugged down the top of his gi, now that he had the room to himself. He pulled his arms out of the sleeves and craned his neck to view his back through the mirror.

His body was covered in scars- it had been even before Sensei Wu found him. He was never a careful kid. All of them had their fair share of marks from this fight or that scuffle, and Cole had never really minded. Because he had survived the fight with the skeletons and serpentine and the Great Devourer and the tournament and Chen's Anacondrai. He might have been damaged, but the skin over those scars was tough and sturdy. He had come back stronger.

"You survive all that, just to get killed by a temple," his reflection mocked. His scars were lighter on his body before- just a bit off-color. Now, they were so white that the glow from his aura painted them an almost neon green. Well, maybe not neon, but they were definitely brighter and uglier now. More vivid.

He had a large build- he was easily the most muscular of the group, with Kai as a distant second. And that hadn't changed, his physique was the same, but was it just him, or were those his ribs casting a shadow across his torso? Surely he wasn't actually seeing his skeleton beneath his skin.

It was really hard to tell, honestly. The fact that he was transparent made it so hard to judge. Made him look sickly and gaunt even though he hadn't lost any weight- well, visibly, at least. Weightless ghost and whatnot.

"You look like one of the bad guys, you know that right?" his reflection taunted.

He didn't respond. Cole sighed and pulled his gi back on as a million unlikely scenarios forced their way into his head: from mobs attacking him with hoses and spray guns to the other ghosts controlling him somehow to him withering away completely, since it didn't seem like food did anything when he was like this.

"Ugh, you're paranoid, Cole."

He thought about going to see the sensei, but…

Even disregarding that conversation between Nya and Kai, and all the baggage that came with that, the thought of talking to Master Wu about it all just…

"You'll do it, Cole. You'll do it as soon as things calm down. For now, just get a hold of yourself!"

He forced some enthusiasm into his step as he threw himself onto his bed, where he sat in a meditation pose- he had always been better at meditating than the others- well, all of them except Zane.

He took a deep breath, trying his best to imagine the feeling of air going in and out of his lungs, to shove away the nagging voice in his head that told him he'd forget what it felt like to breathe at all. He felt his body settle, like the mist that made him up was calming- he felt himself solidify, if only a little bit.

Okay. Think. How is this most likely to go? Actually go, that is. Not all that paranoid witch hunt crap.

First, they'd pick up Misako from the tea shop. She'd tell them where they had to go next. She was easy to be around, Cole found. She probably wouldn't try to get into things with him. Whatever they had to find, they'd go find it.

Would Cole be helpful on a mission? As things were, he could barely hold himself together. Breakfast alone felt like it had sapped him of all his energy, all to eat some food he couldn't even taste. He needed to practice.

Not to mention Airjitzu. He died for that scroll, so he may as well use it. They were probably going to start training today. There wasn't a lot of time. Come to think of it, could he even still do regular Spinjitzu? Ugh, another thing to worry about.

It was easier when he put it in a list.

Refresh on Spinjitzu.

Learn Airjitzu.

Learn to be a ghost.

Save Lloyd.

Tell Lloyd what happened and hope he also doesn't blame himself for what happened.

Stop whatever Morro was doing and hope it doesn't rain while doing it.

Get everyone else to get over what happened to him.

Easy.

… And then what?

Because surely there had to be an after to all this. Even if everything worked out perfectly well, and they fixed everything, and sent the ghosts back to the Cursed Realm, what about him? Were they just supposed to go back to working at the tea shop? What would his dad think?

Cole shook his head, as if that could jostle off the thought.

He'd cross that bridge when he got to it. Everything would be okay.

"Everything's going to be okay, it'll all work out, Cole!"

Sure, it was a pretty similar pep talk to the one from last night, but now he had a plan, and his team was on the deck, ready to help him with the plan.

That would have to be enough for now. He flopped back on the bed- he was pretty sure the top of his head half-phased through the wall.

"It's just another evil thing you gotta beat. Just not one that's shooting arrows or pointing swords at you."

What a complete and utter mess.