Author's Note: Hello again! I haven't expected to update so soon but I'm still so hyper-fixated on this fic and my Ninjago AU that I just had to do it and I wanted to post something Ninja related on International Ninja Day and this just felt right.
I know I could've updated TMNG but Chapter 5 there is taking so much longer to figure out than I anticipated at all. It's a jumbled mess over there in my many drafts of it and I promise I'll figure it out soon and maybe begin posting more of that fic again after I've finished this one.
Well, back to this. I've got reviews now and I'm gonna respond to them here. I missed this part. I used to do this back on my older TMNT fic, Sister's Story (otherwise, I know it as Proto-TMNG).
All of these came from one person and on different chapters. Just bear with me here. I hope it doesn't look confusing.
Anyways, Zenopatra13, thank you for the reviews and here are your answers to them.
Prologue: The cave is in fact the Anacondrai Tomb. How did Sam survive there? Hiding away, most of the time. The tomb is actually much bigger on the inside and does have hidden rooms just like any other tomb in all of fiction. Wouldn't Pythor eat her and why didn't he? Sam's too important to be eaten. Why? That'll be revealed later on. There are a few other reasons she's survived but again, it'll be revealed later.
Chapter 1: Thanks for the tip. While I am used to writing multiple characters, as it would be seen in my other fanfics, I was stuck in a writing slump for a bit and I guess I forgot one of the basic rules of writing. I'll be sure to remember that from now on and hopefully later on when I edit the fic entirely if I ever feel up to it.
Chapter 2: Does Cole have a sister? Well, I wouldn't put it past his family to be bigger than it is in canon, but Sam has no relation to Cole. No blood relation really, but he did know her at some point. That's about it. And only one of Sam's eyes is covered because... well, unless you're my longtime internet friend, that's spoiler related too.
Chapter 3: Hypnobrai cultist has got to be the funniest thing I've heard Vasuki be called. XD Go ahead and think that. That's hilarious. He does have info on my DeviantArt ( gamer-katie/art/Vasuki-the-Hypnobrai-Anacondrai-Hypaspist-971336426 ) too.
And the connection between Cole and Sam isn't blood-related but it is very important. It does involve both of their parents though, in a way, sort of. (Best hint I can give you is the idea that it's definitely a cliche that's been done plenty of times before.)
Chapter 4: This is indeed set in season one. Sam was imprisoned in the Anacondrai tomb, Pythor's evil, and Cole actually lost his memory a different way, but an important way too. If I keep going, I'm going to reveal too much too soon.
Anyways, here is Chapter 5. I've been looking forward to this one and I'm looking forward to making Chapter 6 afterwards. I hope all of you enjoy. R&R.
Chapter 5: Meanings
Despite everything, not even having the slightest clue of knowing the girl's identity or anything like that other than hearing her name that one time, Cole still felt it. No matter what he did or how hard he tried, he couldn't shake her off his mind. Something about her made something ache inside him. It didn't make sense to him and he was certain it wouldn't make sense to the team either if he said anything.
'Yeah, as if I'll say anything,' He thought to himself, letting out a small huff and still trying to shake the sting inside from leaving her to cry.
'I barely knew her for two seconds. Why am I feeling hurt leaving her like that?' Again, no matter how hard he tried to rationalize the whole thing, it still left him aching inside. All he could do now was distract himself and distract himself.
He could feel the weight of the charcoal in his hand and tried so hard not to grip too tight and snap the poor utensil in two. Despite being a natural-born fighter as he calls himself, he had an affinity for art. While his father and his quartet sang and danced and while he did climb mountains and fight, he had an easier time creating art and it was such a nice distraction sometimes.
'Maybe I come from a line of artists too just as much as Dad had a line of performers before him,' Cole thought with a small chuckle.
He was brought back into focus when he finally pulled away from the sketching pad and looked at the picture. Almost immediately, he felt frustrated.
'Who...' His mind began racing at a speed that even Jay would be so jealous of while he looked over the bust of that girl. There was no mistaking it. It had to be her with long, wild hair, a soft smile, and gentle eyes.
'Who... who...' At first, there was frustration but then it melted away and warped into something else. Something that made his insides tie in knots and left his mind frazzled.
'Who are you? Who are you?!'
It was almost as freaky as the dreams, or rather the one dream he kept having. It replayed over and over last night and early this morning when he tried to lay back down but ended up staying awake from the crack of dawn since then.
"Oooh, whatcha drawing there?" He jumped when he heard the voice of the annoying bluebird singing in his ear while the shorter man looked over his shoulder. Cole slammed the book shut instinctively, almost catching Jay's fingers before the blue ninja could snatch it away from him.
"It's nothing!" The master of earth insisted, internally wincing at the crack in his voice.
He spun out of his seat and held the sketch pad close to his form. Jay just followed after him and still tried to make a reach for it. Cole held it up, having his fingers still in between the pages but holding it firm and far above him. The blue ninja did try to use the chair but Cole kicked that in and pressed himself against the back of it before he could try to find an advantage in the situation.
"Ohohoho or it's someone you met on the streets of Ninjago City." Jay had that smug grin that looked so much like a cat face whenever someone typed it. Cole gave a huff and shoved him off away and out of his personal space. He swears Jay gets in his personal bubble and sucks the air out of it on purpose. The master of lightning had a quick recovery.
"I gotta admit, Cole. It is quite remarkable how you got her details even if you have only met her for that short moment, even how her hair curls a bit around her nose when over her eye. I wonder.." He had a finger tapping on his chin.
"Is the big mountain man crumbling over the dreamy girl?" He blinked rapidly, fluttering his eyelashes, and tried to look so cutesy.
"Will you quit it, motor mouth?" Cole shut him down before his brother-in-blue could keep on going.
"Alright then. Just wait until Nya hears this." Jay threatened, not in a bad way but definitely in a teasing tone.
"Jay no." Cole, however, felt like he wasn't in the mood for any teasing.
"Why? You're not embarrassed about it, are you?" He shot back at him.
"I'm not, but just don't, please?" He held back from putting too much of a bite into his words.
The blue ninja thankfully, no, hopefully, took the hint and went off. He no doubt was going to hold it over Cole for a long time anyway. The ebony-haired man let out a long breath he didn't know he was holding and flipped the book back open after he brought it down.
'There really is no mistaking it. It's her... but why? Why is she popping up?' He wondered.
He still wondered about his one dream constantly repeating itself. He wasn't the kind to have weird dreams. The only two on the team who do are Sensei and Zane, but Sensei Wu wasn't here to help. He hoped that the elder was alright wherever he was and he'd come back unharmed with whoever could help them.
He let out a hum. 'Maybe Zane can make sense of it better than I can.'
It wasn't too hard to find his Nindroid brother this early in the evening. It was Zane's night to cook, after all. It was always his night after Cole's. The four ninja and the samurai had rotated their cooking duties every night ever since Sensei Wu had brought them together and while Zane didn't like interruptions much like any other culinary experts, there really wasn't any other time he'd be alone.
He peeked into the kitchen and watched Zane tread along the kitchen floor effortlessly.
"I know you are there, Cole." Zane's voice surprised him.
The leader nearly jumped out of his skin.
'Was that his sixth sense or does he have sensors?' Again, only Zane and Jay would probably know the answer to that. He opened the door further and slipped into the kitchen.
"Sorry, Zane, I just-." Cole went ahead to apologize before Zane cut him off.
"Have something on your mind?" Zane interrupted. Cole had an unamused, maybe a little annoyed, face which made Zane dial back, not meaning to be rude. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt."
Cole waved the apology off. "Nah, you're right... There's a lot of," He paused before sighing softly, "something on my mind. I just... I need to talk to you about it."
"How odd. You would usually talk to Jay about some things. He is, after all, the first teammate and friend you had when Sensei was recruiting us in the past." Zane gave his observation.
He had always seen Jay and Cole talking, almost always bouncing off one another to the point where it definitely confused onlookers into thinking they were literal brothers, or an 'item' as Jay would put it, and they'd have to correct them. Zane was one of those onlookers once, but after the correction, he understood that Jay and Cole were best friends who just clicked. However this time, it was odd he'd come to him about something.
"No. Not this time. It's... It's something else and I just know Jay would hold this over me for a bit and I don't really want teasing. I want answers." Cole gave an affirmed tone.
Zane gave a soft nod before asking, "What about?"
'Here goes nothing,' The Earth Ninja figured. He might as well get it out before he loses track of his thoughts again. "It's about this dream I've had."
"Would this dream perhaps be the same one that bothered you the other time?" Zane raised an eyebrow.
"Yeah. It's weird because I had it again and I never, not once in my life, had that happen to me." Cole expressed to him.
"And you figured I had that happen?" Zane answered right back with yet another question.
"I mean..." Cole dragged on for a moment before concluding his thought with the ninja in white, "You're the one who gets weird dreams like Sensei's. It made the most sense coming to you."
"Hmm.. I can see why you'd decide that." Zane observed, "Tell me, what was it about?"
"It's kinda a mess. Not gonna lie." He admitted.
"Hmm." The Nindroid gave a thoughtful hum, gently lowering the heat on the stovetop. "Perhaps, it is easier if you tell me the dream and I can break it down into details like I had with my dream of the Green Ninja," Zane suggested, "Maybe we will have a sense of what the bigger picture is and what your dream means after all. Of course, we can consider hypnosis for you to fall asleep and recall the dream if we must."
"Yeah, no. No hypnotizing. Not after the last time." Cole felt a shiver up his spine and shook his head, not wanting to remember how he was still aware of what he was doing despite his body not responding to him. The ebony-haired ninja made a sharp inhale and sighed, pulling pieces of the dream up in his mind. "Every time I fall asleep, I wake up in this field. I have no idea why I'm there or what I'm doing but what I do know is that I'm a little kid. I have to be with how small my hands looked. There was... a yellow butterfly fluttering around and I followed it. I don't know why but I felt a need to."
"A yellow butterfly in this part of the world would more than likely be a swallowtail. Of course, it might not be a species you're looking for but the color it is, yes?" Zane analyzed. "As an artist, you would've studied color theory and the meanings behind them. Yellow would mean joy or happiness and a butterfly would have the meaning of transformation, new beginnings, and hope. A yellow butterfly in your dream would mean that there is a period of calm ahead of you." He started up before a fallen expression was in his eyes. "However, there is a different meaning to a yellow butterfly."
"And what's that?" Cole raised an eyebrow. He could already know the answer to what he meant, but it was much easier having confirmation than running on assumption.
"Like the precious metal that it's closest to, the yellow butterfly may be in danger of being stolen by covetous actors. Stealing the truth is akin to disinformation, lying, or occultism since occult means hidden. No harm comes to those who are touched by the yellow butterfly, but harm may come to those who misuse its omen, just as anyone who disregards the truth runs afoul of reality." Zane's expression remained troubled for a moment before he shook it off.
"So you're saying something could've been taken from me?"
"Hmm.. Maybe so. What else did you see in your dream?"
"I follow the butterfly to someone's backyard. It's warmer in there for some reason and there's a garden. I don't know anyone's gardens and I know for certain dad didn't keep one and my mom, she never had time for one, especially after she..." He almost felt a sting creeping up the back of his throat at the mere mention of his mother. He never really brought her up for more personal reasons than anything and it hurt too much to mention her at all. He stopped, taking a short breath in and calming himself before he could get off track. "Anyways, I walk into this garden and the butterfly from before lands on a flower. It's a scarlet color, much darker than any of Kai's shozoku, and looked like a buttercup except for its coloration and bright lime-green leaves. It looked like an anemone, but also not really."
"A flower does match that description almost accurately," Zane replied, "That would be an Adonis genus. A pheasant's eye, to be specific. When in flower arrangements, as Jay had learned due to wanting to "woo" Nya with flower language and his skill of poetry combined, a pheasant's eye can symbolize beauty and are a way to offer condolences and shared memories. However, the flower also means sorrowful memories, and with the context of your troubled expression and sleeping schedule becoming more of a mess than it usually is, it would more than likely mean that."
"Huh." Cole felt a slight offense to that sleeping schedule mess comment but pressed on. "After I see the flower and the butterfly, I'm watching it sit there, right? Then I hear a door opening. It sounded like a... A screen door! Yeah, that's the sound it had." Cole felt something click in his head before he paced, "I hear the door open and despite being in a strange place, I don't feel scared or anything like that. I actually almost felt relieved and then... I see someone."
"Who..?" Zane asked, noting that the ebony-haired man paused in between his words.
"A girl. I've seen her in my dream. I can't recall her face cause it's all fuzzy. All I see are these bright turquoise eyes, squinting a bit like there's a smile. Then there's this heat rushing to me so fast, everything's too hard to see and the air looks so cloudy and dark. I hear struggling and some big, I guess, town bell is ringing in the distance. Everything's a blur, the girl looks like she's getting pulled away, I tried to get her but then there's a pain in the back of my head, and then... nothing. Just nothing except the bell ringing." The fact Cole could recall a dream to a T kinda freaked him out a bit, but he did have it repeated a few times, so it made sense that he would, but still. "And then I wake up. The next night it's the same thing right over again."
"Hmm.. It seems colors are very important in your dream." Zane commented, making Cole drop his eyebrows in an unamused face but the Nindroid paid no mind to it and continued, "Turquoise in symbolism would be healing, protection, and serenity. In personality, it is creativity, independence, and calm. In psychology, however, it is balance, self-expression, and emotional clarity. However, since this is in the context of color only, turquoise would often mean calmness, tranquility, and peace."
"So, from what I'm getting, it's all peaceful at the start but then it was stolen away because some bug appears and says so?" Cole almost sounded so condescending over the revelation.
"Most dreams are not to be taken literally, as I have learned," Zane eased him back, "but if this one is constantly repeating to the point of remembering the finer details, perhaps it is important."
"I figured that much..." Cole's face contorted when he responded in turn. His eyebrows raised upward and his eyelids drooped a bit.
"I sense an interjection." Zane could feel one coming alright. There was no mistaking it. He watched his brother's face look troubled and to say it didn't bother him too much would be a lie.
"But then.." For a second time, Cole felt something click in his head. "Hold on."
"To what?" The master of ice raised his eyebrow.
"Zane, I meant "hold on" as in "wait a moment"." Cole deadpanned to the oblivious ninja.
"Ah," Zane noted.
Cole flipped the sketch pad back open where his finger had bookmarked the page. "I'm not sure if this is related or anything, but..." He handed the book over to the Nindroid who set the spoon aside on the counter and carefully took it as if it was made of porcelain that he didn't want to shatter. "You know how we went out to check for any Serpentine sightings and rumors yesterday?" He asked.
"Yes, I distinctly remember you being late to our designated spot, despite you planning us to be there." Zane looked at the page, seeing the head and shoulders of a person, a woman he assumed by the length of her hair and the shape of her face.
"Well, I lied when I said I didn't find any Serpentine, I did. I lost him though. He just vanished. I don't know how since he looked like a Hypnobrai but he did. Then a girl comes running to me and somehow... I don't know, she hasn't left my mind since then," He could hear the gears turning in his own head, watching the Nindroid's light cyan, almost icy, eyes flick around, taking in the details.
"Do you suppose this person could be the same as the girl you've seen?" Zane asked, still not taking his eyes off the page for a moment before he handed the sketch pad back to its owner before Cole could feel antsy over the idea of the pages turning without permission. He had seen Jay try to do so but of course, his fingers had nearly broken once before between the pages due to Cole snapping it close so hard. Cole spent that time apologizing to Jay that day and while Jay had forgiven him, he still tries to push Cole's buttons.
"If that's the case, then why is she so important? Why's she popping up in my head now?"
"Perhaps after you faced your greatest obstacle in the form of your dad and achieved your true potential, you've opened up more doors in your mind and now you're subconsciously looking through them whether you were aware of it before or not." Zane revealed, "The question remains though. Why is this person, a stranger you've never met before in your life until that moment yesterday, constantly reappearing?"
"Thing is... Again, I don't know. I really don't know and I don't like that I don't know." Cole spat "What's weird is that I feel like I've seen her long ago before this happened, before I saw her on the street or became a Ninja, but that's not possible. It doesn't make sense. It's not like I have any gaps in my memories or anything."
"Are you certain that's true?" The question almost made Cole halt entirely. "I've had my own experience with memory gaps and only recently did I discover my past. Is it possible that you did lose something too?"
"Well, even if I did lose something, I still have this feeling. It feels like something's gnawing at me in the back of my head or something's trying to squeeze in just to fit, and the feeling just won't go away."
"Perhaps if it bothers you so much, then we should look for her again. For answers, if not anything else. She might have some." The master of ice suggested, turning back to his cooking tasks. A gasp rang in the air and Cole swore he felt something pop in his neck when he snapped his head around, looking over to the sliding door to the dining room. He reached his arm out and pulled it open. There, he watched his two ninja brothers in red and blue fall over.
"How long have you been there?" Cole asked with frustration in his voice.
"So we're finding this dream girl of yours, Cole?" Kai had a cheeky smile.
"Jay already told you?" Cole glared over to the bluebird.
Jay had a guilty smile on his face. "Can't deny it's good gossip, Cole... Seriously though, are we finding this mysterious, dreamy lady for the big, mountain man?" He chirped.
"Jay, I've literally only seen her once." Cole deadpanned to the blue ninja who gave an even cheekier grin that rivaled Kai's at the moment.
He shook his head and stepped over them, or at least stepped over Kai and pressed his foot down enough to Jay's side who yelped. He screamed that he did it on purpose but Cole denied it as he was walking away while Kai shoved Jay off him and got up from the floor. The Earth ninja paid no mind to them while he flipped the book back open, looking between the pages. One of them with bright turquoise eyes and the other of the girl.
'Could it really be the same person as Zane said?' He wondered.
'If so, who is she? Why's my brain thinking she's important now?' Cole could ask himself all the questions he'd like but there wouldn't be any answers to come. Not unless he looked for them.
'She has to have the answers.' He concluded, finally reaching their shared room and lodging his sketchbook into hiding after he checked if the bluebird was snooping around. He sighed in relief when he didn't see him.
'She must have the answers.'
EDIT: Sometimes chapter names will be literal, but that's fine. It explains enough.
Author's Note: This chapter was much longer than I anticipated but I'm happy for it! Mostly because it means I can grasp the characters a bit more much like I had years ago when I first started writing fanfic.
Also to note, I know it seems off to have Zane study dreams and their meanings at first, but when you consider the idea that he's always had weird dreams and even have prophetic ones, he'd definitely would try to find any subtle meaning that could help the bigger picture if it did apply to the dream at all.
Anyways, I can't wait for the next chapter. It's definitely bound to have more action and I'm so excited for Sam and Cole to meet again! Wooo!
If you guys did enjoy this chapter, please leave a review/comment down below and I'll do my best to answer them.
Other than that, see you guys later and happy international ninja day!