Nya hadn't understood it at first.
The ninja had been off dealing with the Serpentine, leaving Nya to watch Lloyd. They'd recently gotten the Bounty back, so Nya had been working on fixing it up and getting the rooms back to how they'd been before. Once Lloyd had finished his chores, he'd retreated to his room. She'd been glad the kid was getting a break. All the green ninja stuff was hard on him.
Later in the day, she'd walked into his room to see him drawing in a sketchbook. She hadn't thought much of it until Lloyd startled and shoved the book under his bedsheets.
"Hey, Lloyd," she greeted, a little confused by the action. Lloyd had already finished his chores and he wasn't supposed to be training right now. He wasn't doing anything wrong if he wanted to use his free time to draw. "The boys just called and said they've wrapped things up and they're on their way back."
"Oh, um, that's good," Lloyd said, shifting in his sheets, seemingly trying to push the book deeper. "Should I go setup my stuff or do you think they'll be tired?"
"Nah," Nya decided. She would be suspicious about why he seemed to be trying to rush out, but she already knew why so suspicion wasn't necessary. "We can figure out what they want to do when they get back." She rocked slightly on her heels. "So what were you drawing?" she asked, both because she was curious and because she wanted Lloyd to know it was okay.
"I wasn't drawing," Lloyd flat out lied.
Nya frowned. "It's okay that you were drawing, Lloyd. If you don't want to show me, that's fine." Maybe he thought it wasn't very good? Or maybe it was something embarrassing?
"I wasn't drawing," Lloyd repeated stubbornly, crossing his arms.
… should she press him on this? It wasn't a big deal, but it was still lying. Lloyd used to lie habitually, even when there was no reason to. But he'd gotten a lot better about it now that he was out of that awful school and was around mostly normal people.
She hesitated, thinking. No, if he'd been playing videogames or something she probably would have called him out on it, but this was different. He was probably just insecure about his art. Nya knew that feeling well. She'd let it go.
"Alright," she shrugged. "Well, the ninja will be back in about forty-five minutes. You can keep not drawing until then."
"Ok," Lloyd nodded, blond hair bouncing with the movement. He looked disproportionately relieved. The kid was so weird sometimes.
Nya forgot about the incident by the next day. Then it happened three more times.
Every time she walked in, Lloyd wouldn't just hide his drawing, he'd hide his pencils too. Like it wasn't just the art, he didn't even want people to know he was doing it. She asked Kai about it, but he'd never seen Lloyd draw. Or he said he hadn't. She didn't super trust his memory on this.
The mystery was really bugging her. She'd come up with all kinds of theories. None of them were satisfying. She didn't have the evidence needed for anything concrete. He never left the sketchbook out in the open and her itch to know wasn't going to get her to invade Lloyd's privacy and search his room for it.
Another thing she noticed on the rare occasions she caught Lloyd sketching was that he only had normal pencils and one blue one. He'd probably found the blue one lying around somewhere. She doubted the lack of color was by choice. Nya had colored pencils, but they were in her room and Lloyd didn't go in there. Other than that, and a few colored pencils Jay had for his blueprints (which was probably where Lloyd had gotten the blue one he had), they didn't have any colored pencils in the Bounty. And Lloyd obviously wasn't going to ask for any, so Nya would take matters into her own hands.
She found Lloyd in the kitchen, reading one of his geography books. He glanced up when she walked in but didn't react to the box set of colored pencils in her hand. Not until she placed it on the table beside him.
"Here you go, Lloyd," she said brightly, pushing the box closer.
Lloyd looked surprised for a moment, then he looked confused. "What are those for?" She couldn't tell if he was playing dumb or if he was legitimately confused.
"For your not-drawing," she explained. "So you can add colors."
Lloyd's eyes narrowed slightly. "I don't draw so I don't need those." He pushed the box away.
"I draw," Nya told him, trying not to feel frustrated and only semi-succeeding. "It's a fun hobby. Pretty relaxing too. I've been doing it since I was younger than you."
"Well, that's nice for you, I guess," Lloyd said, hunching defensively.
Nya sighed. "Is there a reason, you don't want to admit you draw? Is this some weird Darkley's thing?" It was a miracle that Lloyd had been there his whole life and hadn't been turned into a complete psychopath. But his upbringing did still cause him to do a lot of strange things. He just didn't know any better.
"Weird Darkley's thing?" Lloyd repeated, baffled, lowering his schoolbook slightly.
"Yes," Nya said, "Was it, like, not allowed?" She couldn't think of why it wouldn't be, but this behavior had to come from somewhere.
"No," Lloyd answered slowly. "We were allowed to draw. Making a visual of your evil plan was encouraged." Of course it was. How normal of them. "There was even a class for it."
"Why would, ugh, never mind," Nya shook her head. "Just use the pencils if you want. And let it be known there is absolutely nothing wrong with you drawing."
Lloyd huffed, eyeing her suspiciously. "So you've been doing art for a long time? I take it you're pretty good?"
The questions weren't technically off topic, but they did feel out of place. She wasn't sure what he was trying to get at. "Pretty good, yeah. I'm not the best or anything, but I've made some neat stuff. You shouldn't compare your art to mine or anyone else's though."
"Hmm," Lloyd hummed, but his eyes were conflicted. He didn't say anything else though, so Nya gave up for now. She'd achieved the main goal of delivering the pencils, she'd see how things went from there.
She started to draw outside her room more. Maybe if Lloyd saw her doing it, it would freak him out less. It took a bit, but eventually Lloyd approached her. She was doing shading on the coy from the coy pond they used to have at the monastery, using an old photo on her phone as a reference.
The kid stood behind her shoulder, only just tall enough to see over it. He didn't say anything for a couple minutes, silently watching. Not wanting to spook him away, Nya didn't say anything either.
Her focus was drifting back to her drawing when Lloyd suddenly asked, "Are you mad at me for not telling you I'm drawing?" The doubt hit of the admission and the accusation startled her, but she recovered quickly.
"What? No, I'm not mad," she corrected. Why would he think that?
"This is some very passive aggressive drawing," Lloyd said, jutting out his chin.
"Passive aggressive?" She was drawing a fish.
"Yes," Lloyd nodded, crossing his arms. "You weren't drawing this much before you started pestering me about it."
"That's not- I'm drawing as much as I always do," Nya defended. Apparently, Lloyd had completely misread the message she'd been trying to send. "I'm just not doing it all in my room anymore. I thought you'd feel better about your drawing if you saw me doing it."
"Why do you care?" Lloyd groused. "It has nothing to do with you."
How do you explain what caring is to someone who has been neglected and abused his whole life? Nya wasn't sure she could. Actions would teach Lloyd better than words, but she'd try to explain it with words too. "I just don't want you to feel like you have to hide something you enjoy, Lloyd. You should be able to enjoy it without worrying."
Lloyd scowled, but his heart didn't seem in it. "I enjoy it fine. And I don't really worry about it. You guys are- weird." Aka, not sociopaths. "I just- it's private, okay?"
Nya sighed. "That's okay, Lloyd. Like I said, you don't have to show anyone if you don't want to. I just want to make sure you don't feel like you need to hide them for the wrong reasons."
Lloyd raised an eyebrow. He was so short. Well, not short, small. It would hit her out nowhere sometimes what a baby Lloyd was. "Wrong reasons?" he asked skeptically.
"Y'know, like, if the kids at Darkley's bullied you for it or something," Nya explained. He'd said there was a class for it, but that didn't mean the kids were nice about other people's work. "That wouldn't happen here."
For a long minute, Lloyd was quiet, then his shoulders slumped. "It was… a few different things," he admitted, gaze on the ground. "You were only allowed to draw certain types of stuff. If you drew something that fell into an 'evil' theme, they'd leave you alone. Might even compliment you, especially if they wanted something from you. Anything else was freely mocked. And a lot of stuff just wasn't allowed. You couldn't draw anything nice or cute or heroic. The only reason I was allowed to have comic books was because I said I was studying the villains." He shivered, an edge of horror in his voice. "They would have burned my whole collection if they thought I was routing for the heroes."
Huh, that had never occurred to her. A lot of boys liked comics, so it hadn't seemed weird that Lloyd liked them. But an evil school would ban anything that glorified heroes and showed villains always losing. Were comics where Lloyd had gotten the skeleton of morality he'd come to them with? "You had to say you were studying the villains?" she asked, trying to process this new information. "They bought that?"
"I had to pretend to be a fan of Borlog the Eliminator," Lloyd pouted. "He's the worst. His villain outfit isn't even that cool."
Nya had no idea who that was, but she got the picture. "Is that a Starfarer villain?" She'd definitely heard Lloyd and Jay talking about that one.
"No," Lloyd shook his head. "He's from Thunder Flash. I used to have comics from all the big series." He started counting on his fingers. "Violet Vengeance, Hazard Knights, League of Destiny, Starfarer, Pheonix Wars, Blue Lightning, Shadow Boy." The light that had entered his eyes when he began listing the comics dimmed and he lowered his hands. "They got stolen when I was kicked out though."
Nya's stomach twisted. They'd taken what stuff of his was left at Darkley's when they were there. It hadn't been much. She'd assumed some stuff had been missing, thrown out when Lloyd was expelled, but maybe it had been more than she'd thought.
"Oh, Lloyd," she said gently. "I'm sorry."
Lloyd shrugged. "I was surprised they let me keep them that long anyways. It's whatever." His flippant words didn't match his upset expression.
They'd all underestimated how much comics meant to Lloyd. They could afford to get him a few more. She'd ask Jay about it later. This comic things was an entirely new problem though. One issue at a time.
"So do you like drawing comics?" she asked, returning to the original topic.
Lloyd shrugged again. "Sometimes." He didn't elaborate.
"I'd love to see them sometimes," Nya told him, smiling. "Only if you want to though, no pressure. But remember, we aren't Darkley's, you don't have to worry about that kind of stuff with us."
"Yeah, okay," Lloyd affirmed quietly, then padded away. Well, she'd learned even more disturbing information about Darkley's they'd have to address, but this felt like good progress on the drawing side of things.
She and Jay got Lloyd some new comics the next day. Nya didn't tell the lightning ninja all the details, it felt like Lloyd had told her that stuff in confidence even if he'd never outright said it. Jay hadn't needed a deeper reason though; he'd been happy to pick out comics for the kid. He'd been geeking out in the store. It had been cute to watch.
A week later, when she and Kai walked into the kitchen, Lloyd didn't hide away his work. And he was using the pencils she'd given him. The blond glanced up at them when they entered but kept drawing.
Kai strode up, blissfully unaware of what Lloyd drawing out in the open like this meant. And it was too late to explain so all she could do was brace herself and hope for the best as Kai opened his mouth.
"Hiya, kiddo," Kai greeted, peering down at Lloyd's paper. "Oh, hey, that's really good! What is it? Some kind of monster? A dinosaur?" That could have been so much worse. That was fine actually.
Relieved, Nya moved closer to look herself since Lloyd wasn't objecting. Her brother was right, it was good. Really good. For his age, crazy good. The linework, the shading, the framing, the pose. If someone had shown it to her and said it had been done by a professional artist, she would have believed it.
"It's a grundle," she told Kai, recognizing the red scale covered body and barbeled face with cloudy white eyes and massive teeth. Lloyd had positioned it so it looked like it was looming over the viewer, green drool dripping down its huge teeth. She was so glad they were extinct. Ninjago had enough danger as it was, thank you very much.
"What's a grundle?" Kai asked, squinting down at the image like that would help him remember.
"It was one of the deadliest predators of ancient Ninjago," Nya informed him. "They're extinct now."
"Cool," Kai said. "Why are you drawing it?" he asked Lloyd. Nya winced a little internally, hoping Lloyd wouldn't take offense at the question. It was a bit of a random thing to draw, but she was sure plenty of people thought an apex predator like the grundle was cool. In fact, she'd seen one on one of the comic covers in the comic shop. Maybe he was drawing the grundle from that.
"I had a dream about it last night," Lloyd told them, idly adding highlights to the drool. "It was trying to eat us." He paused, frowning. "Actually, It might not have been trying to eat me. I was there though. It's kinda blurry. I forgot most of it when I woke up."
"Psh, I could take a grundle," Kai declared confidently, puffing out his chest. "I've faced dragons before, that thing doesn't even have wings."
"You have not beat a dragon," Nya scoffed. "You glared at one for, like, twenty seconds then made friends with it."
Her brother glared at her huffily. "I was ready to fight a dragon," he reluctantly updated. "And there was a little more to it than that." He ruffled Lloyd's hair. "The important thing is, I wouldn't let you get eaten by a grundle, squirt."
"They're all dead anyways," Nya pointed out wryly, smiling as Lloyd grumpily tried to fix his hair.
Kai shrugged. "I stand by my words. Anyways, Lloyd, that is really good. You're giving Nya a run for her money, she's really good at artsy stuff too." Despite having heard her brother compliment her work many times before, she still felt a burst of warmth at his praise.
"Thanks," Lloyd mumbled, uncharacteristically shy.
The two then started discussing what Lloyd's training for the day would be. Nya already knew the day's schedule, so she paid more attention to Lloyd's continued drawing. He really was good, and he clearly enjoyed it. She was glad he didn't feel the need to hide it anymore.
Now that Lloyd was sure it was okay, he could be seen drawing fairly often. He drew all kinds of things. Animals, objects, buildings, comic characters, and he drew them in many different styles. Realistic, cartoony, comic, he had quite a range. He would still, on rare occasions, hide his work, maybe because he was drawing something more private, but that was fine. She just hadn't wanted to be afraid to draw.
One day, Lloyd approached her with a request.
"You want to learn how to paint?" she asked, caught off guard. There had been no lead up to this, he'd just walked in the door and asked.
The kid nodded. "I've seen you do it sometimes." She actually did it more than sometimes, she just usually did it in her room. Painting required hauling around more stuff than drawing.
"Sure, I'll teach you," Nya agreed, excited and a little nervous. She'd never tried to teach someone else how to paint before. Well, she'd tried with Kai a long time ago, but he'd given up very quickly. He didn't have an artist's mind and didn't like doing things he wasn't good at. "Have you painted before?" She needed to know where to start.
"I've used spray paint for graffiti," Lloyd answered. "Does that count?"
… sigh. At least this one wasn't inherently bad. Definitely one of the better ones. "That is a type of painting, but I assume you mean the paintbrush on canvas kind, right?"
Lloyd nodded eagerly and good grief was the kid cute sometimes. She'd never expected to get a younger brother, but it was turning out to be… something really special. She couldn't put the right word to it. Kai often acted immature, but it wasn't the same thing.
"Alright, I'll get some supplies together," she promised. "We can start during your free time tonight if you want." Lloyd still had his afternoon training with Cole today.
"Okay!" Lloyd agreed, bouncing on his feet then fleeing the room. Nya shook her head in fond exasperation. Alright, she had roughly six hours to come up with a lesson. She could do that.
That night, she showed Lloyd how to paint an ocean scene. She taught him about layers, brush types, blending, all the basics. He got a bit frustrated at the start, feeling like paint was harder to control than pencils, but once he got the flow of it, he improved quickly. His end product was much better than Kai's first attempt. It had been fun, painting with someone else. So when Lloyd asked for another lesson, she didn't hesitate.
This was looking like it was going to be a thing. Their thing.
A new way to bond with her little brother.