Hey y'all! Finally getting close to finishing Part 1 (I'm not sure how many parts there will be because I'm not sure which chapters are part of Part 2 just yet, so...), so I hope you enjoy! Anyway, this chapter has a few references to SoA. If you want to read it in its entirety, please do! If not, well, I'll explain in the other thing below.
Kai POV
"We came back way too early," I tell Zane for the ump-teenth time.
Zane glares at me for a second before turning back to his work. Which is…I have no clue. I honestly would rather keep it that way because it looks science-y and I dropped out of school when I was in the Igncia-equivalent of fourth grade. Mostly because I was tired of relying on others to watch after Nya, and maybe also because I didn't understand a whole lot. But whatever. I think Zane's fixing something. I don't know. I'm tempted to ask, but I'm afraid of the wordy answer. Zane has a big vocabulary, after all.
"We have checked our area; we did not find anything. It is best to prepare for any sample the others may have." What Zane leaves out is that he doubts the others would have thought of what he did.
"OK—" I say, trailing off and pulling out my phone.
"Is there not anything else for you to do?" Zane, if he took off the mechanical effect on his voice, it'd almost sound as if he had sniffed. But he doesn't, so the noise he makes is somewhere in between a scoff and a snort.
"No," I reply, shrugging as I begin to scroll through my Chirp feed. I hear him scoff but I decide it's not worth shooting back some angry retort. No point into getting into a useless fight. That's what I keep telling myself, and while it doesn't help all the time, I've noticed enough changes to see that it's been helping.
It's given me enough time to realize that the others have been tiptoeing around me like a dormant volcano about to burst any second for years. Except for Jay, who honestly couldn't care less about whether I explode or not, must have realized that I needed to get over that (Jay being all philosophical, yikes, the thought is scary. I'm hoping he was just being stubborn or something). Maybe they did stuff occasionally that they knew would tick me off, but they were much more careful around me then say…Zane or Cole. Either way, they act more loosely around me and I wouldn't trade it for anything — even for a little more peace. They shouldn't feel like they're scared of my temper; that's not fair to them.
So I tell myself to stamp down on it a little harder than what I've been doing for the past few years. I can't give them another reason to be scared of me. I can't. Not after what happened with the Overlord a few months ago.
I screw my eyes shut for the briefest of seconds, trying to block the thoughts out. I can't go back. I can't go back. Thinking about me will make me go back, make me relive it, make me feel just as helpless as I had been when it happened. When Shade-Me tried to take over, when Shade-Me did take over.
I know I should probably talk to Lloyd about it — he had experienced something similar with Morro, but I just don't want to bring up an old wound. I know now just how much it hurts, it scares, it feels, when you're being controlled against your will.
But before Zane can notice the sudden tension in me, I open my eyes and continue to scroll down through Chirp posts, pretending nothing happened, pretending that my mind is as blank as he believes it to be.
It's hard, because when I'm not reliving the actual stuff Shade-Me did, there's nightmares, nightmares where Shade-Me takes over again and makes me do horrible things to my friends. I'm not sure what's worse: the actual memories or the possibilities of what I might do if Shade-Me takes over again.
Still, I manage.
I always do. That's the best part of being stubborn — I never give up. I always manage.
Just as I'm about to put my phone away, a sharp crackle causes me to drop my phone, hissing in pain. My hands snap up to my ear, the one with the comm in, as I adjust it and try to deal with the pain. I find that Zane's down the same, eyes narrowed as he attempts to wrestle coherency from the static.
I squint as I try to do the same, but I'm no good at concentrating and whatever's said is lost to me.
Then I realize that Zane's been saying what he hears aloud, and so I try to listen to that.
"Coming…evacuate," he mutters, "Evacuate…now." He looks up, eyes wide. "Evacuate? The city or the Monastery?"
I shrug. "I couldn't make anything out," I say just a second before the transmission comes on in full force, full volume.
"EVACUATE THE CITY!" Jay's voice calls as I wince and hold the thing away from my ear.
"What? Why?" Zane asks as he attempts to figure out what's happening to make Jay so panicked.
"No time to explain, just hit the alarm!" Jay replies.
It's gotta be serious or we'd be in huge trouble. This cannot be a prank. I mean, there's no way Jay would joke about this. So, before I know it, I find myself running over the main computer and punching in the code to initiate the evacuation alarm.
"We have to go to Ninjago City," Zane says, looking up from his translation of the static-y words of Jay and Nya. "They may require our help."
"Good idea," I say, already heading to one of our newer vehicles that's survived over a month being used by us. Thank goodness, because I'm not sure Cyrus Borg appreciates funding us with the way we burn through vehicles; either way, he doesn't go cheap on us and gives us pretty good cars and bikes.
One of these days, I'll ask Nya to help me learn how to fix car-y stuff. I feel really bad for making Borg pay all that money, even though we need good vehicles to get us to wherever and whoever needs help. Like, for example, when you've been told to evacuate the city. It's good to have something that will get you to Ninjago City fast.
Which is something we need, judging by Jay's panic.
We reach Ninjago City in what must be a record. I wouldn't have a hard time believing it if Zane told me that we broke the land speed record — my insides are still catching up to my outside — but Zane doesn't say anything as we split up to search for people who haven't evacuated yet. It's odd to see the city so quiet, so empty, even though cars still crowd the streets. Some people left the engine running, others are pulled off to the side, lining the sidewalks, but most are in the streets.
As I weave my bike through the motionless cars, I notice the most random things: food someone must have dropped because they were in such a rush to get out of the city, a balloon caught on the roof of one building, one of those purple crystals that've become so popular, skid marks littering the sidewalks.
All the while, I don't see anyone or anything that could make Jay ask us to sound the evacuation alarm.
I don't see anyone or anything, but I sure feel them. Sometimes it's whispers, other times, it's that feeling you get when someone's watching you, but there's always this ticking. Not like the one a clock makes, but like a more metallic sounding version of a heart beating. It's creepy, but what can I do? People may need help and I'm not one to leave someone if I don't have to.
Plus, this is the best way to figure out what is going on.
Zane finds me after about ten minutes, asking me if I had better luck than he did. Which means he found nothing and no one. The no one part is good. The nothing part? Not so much. We're just as clueless as we were in we first arrived, and Jay hasn't been responding the past few minutes. Neither has Nya, but Cole and Lloyd have. No surprise they don't know anything, too.
"Maybe we should go find them," I suggest after another minute or two.
Zane nods and leads the way as he heads for where Nya and Jay were supposed to be searching when they sounded the alarm.
Cole and Lloyd had the same idea, judging by the way they were waiting for us when Zane and I drive across a street around where Nya and Jay were when we went to go look for those crystals.
"I'm guessing you didn't find them either?" Lloyd calls.
"Nope," I reply, bringing my bike to a stop next to his.
"They couldn't be playing a prank, could they?" Cole asks, looking like he couldn't quite believe they'd do something like that.
"I find that unlikely," Zane mutters, turning his head and looking around. He hasn't stopped looking, even if he's stopped moving. Personally, I'm fine with it, since it means he might catch something we don't.
"Yeah. Not even Jay's going to risk ticking off the entire city or adding any more community time to his sentence," Lloyd says. Then he points out, "And there's no way Nya would let him do something like that if it weren't serious."
"So the question is what is it? What's going to happen?" I ask unhelpfully, though maybe it is. Maybe it'll get the juices flowing and we'll exchange theories.
"I don't know, but is it just me or is there this tick?" Cole replies, shrugging. He looks over his shoulder uneasily, adding, "It's been following me everywhere, and boy is it creepy!"
I frown, nodding. "Yeah, it is." But really, "creepy" is an understatement. Ominous, chilling, grating are other words for it, but none of them seem like a perfect fit.
"Yeah, I've heard it," Lloyd says, looking at his lap and playing with his sleeve.
My frown deepens as I wonder why he isn't looking at us. Normally, he'd shrug it off or say something off-topic to keep everyone from focusing on it. I think this is affecting him more than us, but why? I wish he would stop trying to hide things from us. I wish none of us felt like we had to hide whatever we're feeling; we're siblings after all (how weird is it that Jay, my "brother" is dating my sister? Extremely weird, if I'm being fully honest). But, of course, we don't like talking about what we feel because we feel like the others experience even worse and it makes us feel bad enough to keep us from talking. Thinking differently seems simple enough, but "seems simple" rarely is.
If I say something, Lloyd will get mad. He always does. It's bad enough that he thinks we're treating him like a piece of glass on the verge of being broken. This would probably set him off.
So, I pretend that I don't know anything and blurt, "It sounds like something's about to explode or something."
Wrong thing to say.
Lloyd looks up, his already pretty pale face paling even more. "You're right," he whispers, casting paranoid looks all around the street, twitching as if it would explode right that second. "We should get out," he says in a louder voice.
"Lloyd…" I start.
"I think it is more than likely," Zane cuts in. I throw him a glare, which he, as he always does, ignores and continues, "Perhaps it would be wise to put as much distance as possible from the device that is set to explode."
"And possibly leave someone in it? I don't think so," Cole says.
"I'm staying," I add on, knowing that Cole will say the same. He nods, agreeing.
Lloyd sighs, running a hand through his hair, and nods. "Let's do this, then."
"Should we split up?" I suggest.
Lloyd shakes his head. "Bad idea. Things always go bad when people split up."
"C'mon, stop being paranoid. This isn't like some TV show," Cole says, before agreeing with Lloyd, "Let's stick together, though."
I shrug. At least we'll be doing something. I open my mouth to say something, but it's lost as something explodes.
A powerful bang that shatters the windows in every building in the city. Glass rains down as we scramble to cover our faces, our necks, our bodies, though it's useless. It's so hard to focus on anything in the chaos, to focus on anything besides yourself and your safety. And it's made worse as trails of fire make their way across my body as the glass shards pound against me.
The only thing I hear is the bangs as explosions ring throughout the city, a constant beat, continuing way too long. I can't even hear myself breathe. It's just bang bang bang b a n g. It's all that exists. The bangs. Forever and ever, in an endless cycle that consumes everything else.
Black gathers at the edges of my visions, before they take it away.
Before they take it all away.
I wake to Lloyd shaking me, frantically calling my name.
Sitting up, I push him away, gently, and try to force myself to stop shaking.
I can't.
"We need to leave. Now," Lloyd says.
"Why? There could be people who need us!" I argue, climbing to my feet.
Cole doesn't agree. Instead, he stares at a fixed point, mouth set in a line of grim determination.
"Because we are not ready for this," Zane answers, pointing behind me.
I turn around.
He's right.
We really aren't.
But I don't think we'll have a choice in being able to get away.
Yeah, yeah, another cliffhanger. I don't think the next chapter is super cliff-hangy? Maybe. Why the heck are y'all gonna trust a maniac fan girl to keep her word?
In all seriousness, this was perhaps one of the hardest chapters for me to write, and I'm super tempted to re-write Chapter 6. BUT Ninja never quit so I'm going to keep on going.
(also for those of you who felt like there was another story that you missed out on, it's in Shadows of Amethyst. I think it explains it in "Reign" one of the SoA chapters but I don't remember. I haven't touched that in so long...)
Anyway, cya! I promise I'll be back with chapter 6 soon!