Sometimes Morro felt invisible. And not because he was literally hidden from sight.
Sometimes it felt as if he was standing right in front of one of the other Ninja, but no one understood he was there. No one saw him, no one heard him, no one even realized he was standing right there, right in their sights.
Like they were blind and deaf to his mere presence.
He'd try talking to them, but the only replies he'd get were mm-hmms and uh-huhs and okays.
He'd try to help them with various tasks from time to time, but all he ever got was, "Pass me this." or "Help me with that."
He even was rash enough to try reckless feats just to get their attention—but it seemed the only response was, "Here—have a bandage," or, "Dry ice pack's in the freezer."
But no matter what he did, they didn't seem to notice he was there.
It was as if he had become little more than a shadow—always there, but never noticed.
As if he truly was little more than a ghost of what he'd once been.
And he was afraid that soon the others might forget he existed at all.
And he knew what happened to ghosts who are forgotten-how they slowly lost themselves, little by little, until they faded away entirely, unseen and unnoticed.
The mere inkling of meeting that kind of fate was enough to twist knots in his stomach and send flushes of frigid chills rattling through his spine.
Sometimes he was so afraid that the others would forget about him that he'd want to howl and wail and scream and shout, "I'm right here! Guys, it's me! I'm here! I'm right here!"
But somehow the words would not come, and he'd be forced to suffer his isolation alone.
Then one day, things began to look up.
A single comment that he overheard from Jay gave him a new spark of hope.
Little did he realize that he was in for more than he could ever have possibly imagined.
Morro was simply watching Jay working on one of his new inventions and just about jabbering Morro's ear off when the Lightning Ninja just so happened to comment, "You know, I've always wondered to myself, if I could make a wish on the wishing star, what wish would I make?"
"The what?" Morro had been on the verge of being bored to death by Jay's incessant chatter, but what Jay had said just now was way too interesting for him to not be curious. "What did you just say?" he added, scrunching his lips in clear confusion.
Jay just looked at Morro as if the ghost-teen had said that kangaroos were purple and Jay's favorite color was red. Then the lightning-child managed to choke out a squawk of, "You've never heard of the wishing star?!"
"Nuh-uh." Morro answered, shaking his head for emphasis.
"Oh, Morro, my buddy, are you missing out!" Jay exclaimed, a wide grin spreading across his face as he elaborated with great detail and excitement ringing in his voice, "Everyone knows that the first star to appear in the night sky is the wishing star. If you say the star-rune and make a wish on that very star, your wish is bound to come true!"
Morro had never been one for superstition, but he'd seen enough things as a ghost to know that just about anything was possible in Ninjago. He just wasn't sure whether this was one of them. But it didn't hurt to check, and he had to admit that he was fascinated by the idea of a star granting your deepest, most heartfelt wishes—anything precious to your heart becoming yours in an instant. He had to know more about this!
Scooting closer to Jay, he asked, "And what is the star-rune, exactly?"
Jay made a scoffing noise in the back of his throat, as if he couldn't believe that Morro didn't already know about this. "It's so simple, a six-year-old could memorize it. Allow me—" He then cleared his throat rather louder than was necessary and slipped into his best poetry-reciting voice as he exclaimed, "It goes something like this—
Star light, star bright,
First star I see tonight,
Wish I may, wish I might,
Have the wish I wish tonight.
"You say those exact words, not leaving one word out or putting a wrong word in, and the wishing star will grant your wish for you." Stretching his sore muscles, he then sighed in satisfaction and slight tiredness from working so hard and murmured, "Well, I'm going for a nice, tall, cool glass of Zane's world-famous lemonade. I'd ask you if you'd want one, but…"
"It's all right." Morro whisper-spoke. "I'm not thirsty anyway. One benefit of being a ghost—your throat doesn't dry out and you don't need to drink water to survive."
"Right." Jay mumbled contemplatively, before humming happily to himself as he gathered up his toolbox and skipped away from Morro, happy as a lark on a bright sunny summer day.
Morro, on the other hand, just stood in one place for several seconds, thinking deeply about what Jay had said. If he had known about the wishing star beforehand, maybe he would have consulted it first in his quest to become the Green Ninja. But he knew now that he didn't have to be the Green Ninja to prove he was enough—that he was worthy to be a member of Master Wu's wacky family of Ninja. He was enough just as he was, and he knew that now, though it had taken decades to see it.
But having a wish granted wasn't a bad idea—not a bad idea at all. But what wish did he want granted so badly that he'd turn to a star for it to happen? And then he found it. He knew what the deepest yearning and begging and imploring wish of his heart was. And he was going to make it tonight.
Later, as the last of the sun's rays disappeared behind the green hills and rice fields of Ninjago, Morro was sitting out on the rocky ridge near Master Wu's tea shop, Steep Wisdom, watching and waiting in earnest for the first star to appear in the sky. It felt like the wishing star would never appear, but just as Morro was going to give up his notion of finding it, he spotted a tiny sparkle of light in the sky and gasped in wonder. It was the first star! It was the wishing star!
Petrified that he wouldn't make his wish in time, he got right to the rune, not missing a single syllable or adding in just one wrong word.
Star light, star bright,
First star I see tonight,
Wish I may, wish I might,
Have the wish I wish tonight.
Then he fixed his gaze on the star, staring deep into its mesmerizingly shimmering depths of light and power, and whispered faintly under his breath, "I wish…I wish…"
This was it—this was the moment! But he was so scared that he would mess up somehow and bring doom raining down upon his head that his voice kept catching in his throat, and he could barely shape the words he wanted to say. But finally, finally, the wind-wielder found his voice again and breathed, "I wish the other Ninja would take notice of me—that they would see me—that they would know that I am there, that I need them just as much as they need me."
He then closed his eyes and waited for something—anything—to happen.
Nothing happened. Not a sight, not a sound, not a voice. Nothing.
Disappointment knotted in Morro's chest and he felt his eyes welling with specter-tears. This was stupid—thinking that a ball of gas and heat could grant his greatest, most precious wish. Shaking his head in disgust and forlorn sorrow, he slowly clambered to his feet and trudged heavily inside the Bounty landed nearby.
The moment he set foot inside the ship, though, something strange began to happen. He felt an odd, tingling, fuzzy warmth come creeping over him and a cozy sleepiness begin to trickle through his veins, seeping into every one of his weary joints and aching bones and tired nerves. Numbness slowly began to sink into the fibers of his very frame, and he let out a soft yawn as he slowly grew drowsier and drowsier. Nearly about to be drawn into a cocoon of blissful dreams now, he wearily crept down the hall to his room and collapsed headlong into his bed, just managing to pull the covers up to his chin and snuggle his lovies closely to him before the shadows of deep, healing slumber beckoned him away from the waking world.
Little did he realize that he would not wake up the same age as when he fell asleep.
7:00 a.m.
"What in the world?!" Nya breathed in shock as she stared in mixed horror, confusion, and fear at the sight in front of her. Jay was struck speechless. So was Lloyd. Had Cole's jaw not been attached, it would have fallen off his face and onto the floor. Zane was stone-faced. And Kai had successfully managed to turn three shades of ghostly, moonstone-sheen pale.
The Morro they knew was gone. In his place was a ghostly-green kid with shaggy raven-black hair and an emerald-green hair streak that now drooped across his face, all but falling straight into his open mouth. His eyes were closed, his chest rising and falling, his little frame all but still, his mind lost in slumberland. Specter-drool—harmless to ghosts, of course—was dribbling out onto his chin, and his snores were much softer—and the Ninja had to admit, more adorable—than they'd been before.
No one dared move—dared speak—dared even breathe.
It was Lloyd who first ventured to shatter the pervasive silence. "Would someone please tell me what happened here?"
"Someone shrunk Morro—that's what happened!" Jay gasped. "Or-or-or maybe someone took Morro and replaced him with an evil kid-like clone to attack us all in our sleep!"
"Jay, seriously?" Cole moaned, rolling his eyes to the heavens, clearly resisting the urge to facepalm. "When are you ever going to let up with the conspiracy theories?"
"Zane, can you assess this?" Lloyd asked, turning towards the Ice Ninja with a pleading, sad-puppy look in his eyes.
"Scanning now." Zane affirmed, before activating his built-in medical scanners and letting the whirring wave of ice-blue light thoroughly sweep over Morro (or whoever the kid was) for any clues that could help him and his friends solve this mystery. The scan shut off with a soft click-beep a few seconds later, and he explained professionally, "The DNA and physical characteristics of the wind-wielder are all within this youngling. It seems that Morro has indeed been de-aged in some as-of-yet unknown, mysteriously unnatural way."
"How can a ghost have DNA?" Kai muttered, before letting out a loud yelp when Cole jabbingly elbowed him hard in the ribs.
"Not helping, Kai." Nya mumble-yelled, still in shock over this whole thing.
Suddenly, there was a frantic pitter-patter of footsteps as Master Wu and Misako came barreling down the hallway, skidding to a stop at the doorway and gazing on little Morro in utter shock and horror.
"What in the name of the Sixteen Realms has happened?" Wu cried in dismay, staring dumbfoundedly at his now de-aged first student.
"We're still trying to figure that out, Sensei." Zane answered before anyone else could say a word.
Suddenly, Jay's mouth dropped wide open. He blinked nervously—turned three shades of pale—shuffled his feet—gave a small gulp as he spotted something glistening and shimmering in the wind-child's hair. When he, to everyone's surprise, stepped over to the still-snoozing Morro, he ran a gentle hand through Morro's mop, turned his hand over and squinted at the sparkling dust on his hand, sniffed it and found that its scent was crisp like a waterfall and metallic like a silver dollar, and shook it off into the air to find that it was strangely buoyant.
Stardust. It had to be. There was no other explanation.
But how did stardust get in Morro's hair?
Unless…
"Um, guys," Jay murmured guiltily as he turned back to face his fellow Ninja, Sensei Wu, and Misako, "I think I might know what caused this."
Several minutes and one long explanation later
"You told Morro what?!" Nya shrieked in dismay and shock, horrified by what Jay had just explained to her and the others. "Jay, how could you?!"
"I-I didn't think he'd believe me!" Jay stammered, face flushing bright pink in utter mortification.
"Jay, you know how naïve Morro is!" Cole protested, just as stoked as Nya. "He'll believe just about anything you tell him!"
"Well, I didn't think that he would actually make a wish on the wishing star! Or that it would come true and turn him into…into…this!" the Lightning Ninja shot back, gesturing to Morro frantically.
"What's goin' on?" Morro yawned, stretching his arms over his head and rubbing the sleep out of his eyes as he slowly stirred awake. "Why are you yellin' like that?" As he gradually grew more and more awake, the Ninja realized that his voice had changed to match his new age—which, from what they could gather even without Zane's help, was about eight years old. Then Lloyd just about jumped in surprise when he heard little Morro's stomach rumbling.
"Ith breakfast weady?" the wind-child asked. "I'm hungry."
"Come with me, Morro." Zane replied graciously, holding out a welcoming hand. "I'll fix you some breakfast momentarily."
"Okay, Zane." Morro murmured in a lilting, lisping tone, seeming not to notice the stunned and frightened looks on the other Ninja's faces as he scooted out of his bed, dropped to the floor, and toddled over to grasp Zane's metal hand. His face scrunched in surprise at how cold Zane's hand was, but then he shrugged his shoulders slightly and let Zane guide him to the kitchen for something to eat. As soon as the wind-child and ice-wielder had turned the corner of the hallway, the other Ninja let out a shaky sigh of relief.
"Well, at least we know that he still remembers us." Kai mused aloud in relief.
"You took the words right out of my mouth." Lloyd piped up.
"Did you notice how high-pitched his voice is now?" Cole asked. "It sounds less like a teenager and more like a chipmunk. Kinda adorable when you think about it."
"Adorable voice or not, we have to get him back to normal somehow!" Nya reminded the others, and they nodded their agreement.
"Do you think that his transformation affected his memories somehow?" Misako inquired, speaking for the first time that morning.
"Not that I can see." Master Wu answered, stroking his beard contemplatively. "If anything, I believe his memories are intact, but his mental state has been reduced to that of an eight-year-old to match his younger age."
"Huh?" Jay asked, still trying to get over his guilt and embarrassment over how he was inadvertently the cause for all this.
"Yeah, Master, this isn't really the time to be cryptic!" Cole added, losing his cool for just a second.
"He means that Morro remembers everything from before, but he's responding to things like an eight-year-old would." Lloyd reiterated. "Remember when most of you and Zane were turned into kids through the Megaweapon's power? Jay, you were eating cotton candy and going gaga over comic books. Kai, you tried to do Spinjitzu, but it was too small a tornado because you weren't used to your new body. Cole, you were freaking out because you couldn't drive anymore. And Zane—well, Zane was kinda normal, but I don't really know what he was like at eight mentally."
"Wha—" Nya murmured, "How do you know all this?"
"Zane let me take a look at his memory banks once." Lloyd deadpanned.
"So, this is great and all, but the pressing question still is HOW DO WE GET MORRO BACK TO NORMAL?!" Nya screeched, waving her arms about frantically and looking like she was about to go into a panic attack.
"If everyone can calm down," Misako directed, "Wu and I will go and find some Tomorrow's Tea to use on Morro. It worked on most of you, including Lloyd, so it should work on Morro as well."
"Um, but he's a ghost." Cole observed. "Does Tomorrow's Tea affect ghosts? Or just mortals?"
"There's only one way to find out." Master Wu said, a hint of cheeky mirth in his voice. "In the meantime, it will be your responsibility to care for our little ghost-child until Misako and I return with the tea."
"Wait, WHAT?!" everyone cried at the same time.
"We're Ninja, not babysitters!" Kai argued, and the others murmured their agreement. All except for Lloyd. He was too numbed by the prospect of it to speak. Watch Morro? How could they even do that?
Master Wu must have somehow sensed his thoughts—because the next thing that came out of his mouth was, "Oh, you'll think of something, I'm sure. Do not fret—we shouldn't be gone for longer than a day or two."
"A day or two?" Cole echoed, gulping.
"I've got a bad feeling about this." Nya mumbled, clutching her kimono in her fists so fiercely her knuckles were turning white.
"Come on—we can do this." Jay piped up, his optimism returning to him. "What's the worst that could happen?"
"Oh, let me count the ways." Kai muttered half to himself, but loud enough that Jay heard him.
"What was that?"
"Nothing."
"Hold up—Jay's right." Lloyd exclaimed, reentering the conversation. "You guys all took good care of me before I was aged up. Why can't we do the same for Morro? We just gotta find ways to do fun things with him until Sensei Wu comes back."
"But how do we do that?" Nya asked, though it was clear that her curiosity was piqued by Lloyd's suggestion.
"Well…" Lloyd started. But then his voice trailed off and he let out a heavy sigh. "Okay, I don't really know, but there's gotta be something we can do with him. Besides training, that is."
"We'll figure something out." Cole agreed. "It can't be that difficult to find things that a kid would like to do."
"I just hope Zane's having a better time than we are." Kai moaned, tugging at his sleeve in fearful nervousness.
Meanwhile in the Bounty kitchen
"Do you enjoy eggs, Morro?" Zane asked, pulling on his pink apron (which, thankfully, none of the other Ninja teased him as much for anymore).
"Nuh-uh." the eight-year-old ghost-child exclaimed, sticking out his tongue in disgust. "Too slimy and bland and gross."
"Okay, then. What about potatoes? I could add a little breakfast sausage and bacon to make it savory enough for you."
"Could you add some season' salt too?" Morro asked eagerly, practically bouncing on the kitchen stool he was sitting on.
"Affirmative." Zane complied, already beginning to pull the seasoned salt out of the spice cupboard.
"Mm." Morro hummed excitedly, swaying side to side a little on his stool. His right leg went thunk-thunk-thunk against the stool leg, and he squirmed impatiently for a few minutes before sliding off the stool and standing on tiptoe to see what Zane was up to.
"Careful, Morro." Zane cautioned wisely. "The stove is hot."
Morro marked Zane's words of warning and stepped back a bit, still close enough to watch Zane craft his famous potato-meat skillet, breakfast-style. Then the little ghost-child began to gaze about the kitchen, eyes darting this way and that as he tried to take in everything around him at once. The bubble of coffee brewing, the sizzles and pops of the sausage and bacon grease, the mealy smell of roasting potatoes and frying meat, the tick-tick-tick of Zane's internal clock, the delicate, fluty song of a sparrow outside the window, the ta-ting-ting-ting of the wind-chimes hung from the ceiling and jingling in the breeze…
Before Morro knew it, Zane was finished with his breakfast concoction and was dishing some onto a plate for the little ghost-child to eat from. Then Zane set the plate down, gave Morro a knowing smile, and asked generously, "Would you like a Pop-Tart with that, Morro?"
"Yay!" Morro cheered in delight. He loved Pop-Tarts, especially when Zane toasted them so they were nice and warm and chewy like freshly-baked peanut-butter cookies. Zane grinned back at him and pulled out two kinds of Pop-Tarts from another cupboard.
"Birthday cake or Oreo?" he asked, showing Morro the two options as he did. Morro began sucking on his fist, a clear sign that he was thinking very hard about this. His gaze darted from one box to the other and back to the first. "Both!" he finally exclaimed, looking at Zane pleadingly.
"All right—one of each it is then." Zane concurred, pulling out one package of each flavor and splitting it so that there were two equal helpings of one birthday-cake and one Oreo Pop-Tart apiece. He then took one of the helpings and popped the delicious breakfast treats into the toaster, setting it carefully to "2", the only setting higher than "1" that he trusted to not burn the Pop-Tarts to a blackened crisp after dealing with many of the Ninja's (aka Cole's) less-than-successful attempts with other settings. Morro was occupied using his Wind Powers to cool the hot, steaming skillet dish so that it wouldn't burn his mouth or tongue. Then he plucked up his spoon and began shoveling the skillet dish into his mouth. Zane, recognizing that Morro had never really gotten a good hold on remembering table manners, simply asked, "Do you like it, Morro?"
"Uh-huh." the wind-child mumbled, his voice muffled by a mouthful of sausage, bacon, and breakfast potatoes. The toaster suddenly went sproing and Zane carefully extracted the warm, toasty Pop-Tarts from it, putting them on a separate plate to cool a little before he added them to Morro's big plate. Just then, Cole poked his head into the room and exclaimed, "Something smells really good…"
"There's plenty for everyone. Please, sit." Zane motioned, his voice grand and majestic as if he were the proud host of a fine banquet. With that, Cole came storming in and slid down the bench to sit next to Morro. Morro's face paled at how closely Cole was sitting to him and he scooted a bit farther away, taking his plate with him. The earth-wielder suddenly recalled that Morro—like himself—had autistic tendencies and proceeded to scoot away in return, enough to give Morro his space. When the others came in a few moments later, Zane gladly dished up six more helpings of breakfast skillet and proceeded to toast more Pop-Tarts for everyone.
Morro was happily munching on his own Pop-Tarts, making contented humming noises now and then, swinging his legs back and forth underneath the table. He devoured the Oreo tart and was just sinking his teeth into the birthday cake one when Jay suddenly laughed out loud at a corny joke Nya had been telling. Morro, startled by the noise grating on his hearing, let out a stunned squawk of dismay and covered his ears, letting his head fall on the table just inches from his plate. He then turned invisible and walked out of the room, taking his plate with him.
"Okay." Cole thought to himself with a mental hiss of disappointment. "This is gonna be harder than we thought."
8:00 am.
Morro had finished his breakfast and slipped his plate into the sink when no one else was in the kitchen/dining room. Now he was staring up at a spiderweb on the ceiling, wondering what he should do. He remembered wishing that the Ninja would take notice of him and realize that he needed them as much as they needed him, but so far all the Ninja had done was scare him. And now he was—horror of horrors—bored. Bored, bored, bored, bored, bored, bored, bored. So bored he thought he might die of boredom.
Then he noticed Cole digging through a glass jar full of buttons. Morro smiled. He liked buttons. Correction—he loved buttons. They came in so many sizes and shapes and colors and designs. Sometimes, Morro would just take the buttons in that very jar and let them trickle through his fingers like grains of sand in a sandbox. Without realizing what he was doing, he suddenly clambered to his feet, trotted over to Cole, and tapped him on the shoulder. The Earth Ninja was so startled he let out a startled mouse-like squeak and nearly jumped ten feet into the air. His shallow breaths began to steady and his heart to pound a little less, though, when he saw that it was just Morro.
"What is it, Morro?" the earth-wielder asked the wind-child, cocking his head to one side in confusion and curiosity.
"Buttons." Morro murmured, getting straight to the point as he gestured toward the jar.
"You like buttons?" Cole followed up, his eyebrows furrowing with interest.
"Uh-huh." the wind-child answered, nodding his head for emphasis. Then he made a gesture with his hands as if he were letting sand or water trickle through his fingers. Cole nodded in understanding and patted the spot beside him, inviting him to sit down. Morro gladly complied, scooting closely to the ghostly earth-wielder as Cole handed him a handful of buttons and nodded at him to go ahead.
Plink! Plink! Plink! Plink! Plink! Plink! One by one, Morro let the buttons slip through his fingers and land on the wooden boards—a motion that made a satisfying plink whenever a button landed on the floor. Cole took his own handful of buttons and echoed Morro's mannerism.
Plink! Plink! Plink! Plink! Plink! Plink!
Plink! Plink!
Plink! Plink!
Plink! Plink! Plink!
The sound and sensation of the buttons trickling through the earth-wielder's and wind-child's fingers was mesmerizing, entrancing, almost hypnotizing for the two neurodivergent ghosties. The other Ninja could give all the snickers, giggles, and confused eyerolls they wanted—for Cole and Morro, the repetition and rhythm of it was heavenly.
Sometimes, it seemed as if the two shared a secret silent language that only they—as ghost-brothers and friends—understood. Maybe it was because they were both ghosts, maybe it was their similar ways of thinking, but no matter what it was, it was amazing how easily the two clicked—how effortlessly the two understood each other in ways that the others simply did not.
It could have gone on for hours, but eventually, the buttons ran out, and Cole decided the time had come to clean them up and put them back in the jar. When he started to scoop the spilled buttons off the floor, Morro gave him a disappointed lip-quiver, but he sulkily caved and began helping to gather the buttons into little piles and drop them like grains of rice back into the jar. Then he caught sight of a particular button that piqued his fancy. He picked it up and asked, "Cole, can I keep dis one?"
Cole blinked and took a look at the button Morro was referring to. It was metal, shaped like a green butterfly, and used to have a hook on the back. The hook had broken off months ago, but the Earth Ninja couldn't bring himself to throw it away, no matter how much Zane—the team's fellow neat-freak—begged him to ditch it now that it had no real distinctive use or purpose, except to look pretty.
"Sure, little ghostie." he answered, shrugging his shoulders. "Why not?"
"Thanks, Cole!" Morro crowed in joy before giving him a great big bear hug around his legs and then skipping off with the button in his hands, singing tunelessly to himself in delight and pure bliss.
Cole grinned. This babysitting job was turning out to be better than he'd anticipated!
9:30 a.m.
"Hey, Morro!" Kai called out to the ghost-child standing motionless at the end of the hallway, his eyes fixated on the back-and-forth motion of a grandfather clock's pendulum. Morro turned, blinking in surprise as Kai approached him with an armful of clothes—a green t-shirt, a pair of black shorts, and a black hoodie with a creepy yet slightly intriguing design of skeleton bones painted on it in a ghostly white paint, set off with a mysterious green "5", shakily hand-drawn in lime-green oil pastel.
"Whatcha doin'?" Morro asked, his interest piqued.
"Well, you can't go wandering around in PJs all day," Kai explained, holding the bundle out to him as he finished, "so I gathered some of Lloyd's old clothes from when he was little—well, littler, anyway. You're a smidge smaller and skinnier than he was, but they should fit anyway without too much trouble. Here."
"Cool." was what Morro said next as he took the clothes and ducked into the nearest bathroom to change. When he came out a few moments later, he gazed down at his new (er, borrowed) outfit, twisting and turning to admire every stitch of thread and every inch of fabric. The clothes had taken on the sickly-green aura of the rest of his frame, but it was definitely a step above the bedraggled, tattered, threadbare green-and-black robes he'd been wearing when he first revealed himself. He kept the hood of the hoodie down, letting his raven-black locks and emerald-green hair streak show.
"They fit 'ike a glove." Morro murmured to himself, making a happy buzzing sound behind his teeth. Then he turned and looked up at Kai, staring deeply into his amber-hazel eyes. "Thank you." he breathed with emotion, and the fire-wielder knew instantly that he wasn't just talking about the clothes. He was talking about the kindness and forgiveness the Fire Ninja had shown him. Out of all the Ninja, Kai had been the one who'd held the biggest vendetta against Morro for taking control of Lloyd's mind, and Morro knew deep down that this small act of compassion was assuredly undeserved.
Then Morro's gaze fell on the sketchbook Kai now held under his arm. Cocking his head to one side, the wind-child asked, "Whatcha got there, Kai?"
"My sketchbook." Kai explained, holding it out so Morro could see it. "I like to draw sometimes. Helps me calm down and unwind when I'm tired or stressed out."
"Kin I draw with you, Kai? I've got my own sketches. You wanna see?"
"Okay, okay, slow down, little ghostie." Kai exclaimed, grinning widely. Morro was literally hopping from one foot to the other in giddy, unbridled eagerness and excitement—but then he stopped still at the sound of "little ghostie." Kai couldn't tell whether he saw confusion, dismay, curiosity, or a mixture of all three streaking across Morro's face and shining in his emerald-green eyes. But his fears were settled a moment later when the smile appeared back on Morro's face and wiggled from side to side like a squirming, hyperactive fish. Then Kai appeared at his side and offered his hand. Morro took it warmly, and the two headed out to the deck to do some sketching together.
Morro, unlike Kai, didn't keep his sketchbooks, colored pencils, brown paper, and chalk in his room but in a small wooden box in the deck area. He seemed to be more at home in the outdoors and preferred to do his drawing out in the open rather than cooped up in his room, away from the sun and the wind and the clouds and the trees and the meadow critters and the stars that appeared constantly and faithfully every night. It was out on the deck that Morro let go of Kai's hand and went to fetch his supplies before rejoining the fire-wielder at a small line of crates stacked up near the stern deck of the ship. Kai had already settled himself on a crate and was busy shading a rather beautiful sketch of a kitsune kit with one of his own colored pencils. Morro sat down beside him and began to work on a new sketch, rather than returning to an old one as was his usual practice.
For the next several moments, all that could be heard was the swooshing of the breeze, the birds singing in the trees, and the scritch-scratching of pencils as Kai and Morro each worked on their own drawings. Morro quickly fell into a pattern of drawing, then tapping his chin with his pencil, then drawing again. Kai took notice of this with curious interest, studying the little ghost-child like an entomologist studies a caterpillar preparing to morph into a butterfly. It took several seconds, but then the fire-wielder noticed that Morro was involuntarily copying Kai's mannerisms from when he was so engrossed in his drawing that all else seemed to fade away. Kai had to smile at the thought of it, and then he turned back to his own drawing.
Scritch, scratch, scritch.
Tap, tap.
Scritch, scratch.
Tap, tap, tap.
Slowly but surely, Kai managed to finish shading the fur with one pencil and reached for another. But then he had an idea about what color he wanted the eyes to be, and he reached for an emerald-green colored pencil and a jade-colored one. Soon, he had cross-hatched the emerald-green with the jade-green, creating a new blend of green that fell between the two in hue.
When he was done, he coughed to clear his throat. Morro looked up, a little stunned at the sudden sound. It was clear he'd enjoyed himself so much that indeed, the outer world had seemed to fade into a state of bleak nonexistence.
"Hey, Morro." Kai said, holding up the picture. "What do you make of this?"
Morro gasped in sheer delight. "It's beautiful, Kai! You did a great job! How'd you get that green color for the eyes?"
"Come closer and I'll show you." Kai encouraged, beckoning the wind-child over with a welcoming wave of his hand. Morro grinned and earnestly accepted the invitation.
10:30 a.m.
"You've got to be kidding me!" Jay screeched in frustration, biting back the urge to chuck his game controller into the nearest wall. "How could the console overheat so quickly?! I only played for two hours!"
"What's wrong, Jay?" Morro piped up, striding into the room as cool as a cucumber. He knew Jay had autism like he did, and by now he was accustomed to seeing Jay lose his emotional marbles from time to time.
"The console overheated!" Jay groaned, gesturing wildly at the aforementioned game system which he'd been forced to abruptly switch off in the middle of his game. He crashed onto the couch with a steamed, angry look on his face as Morro brushed his fingers along the top of the offending console and pulled back with a pained hiss at the heat emanating from the device.
"You're not kiddin', Jay!" he murmured, sticking his fingers in his mouth and blowing on them to cool his sore, all but fried-and-crispy fingertips.
"Now what am I s'posed to do?!" the lightning-child complained, crossing his arms over his chest. "I'll gonna go bonkers with nothing to do!"
"We could play hide-and-seek." the wind-child suggested, walking over to Jay laying on the couch, a "pity-poor-me" look written all over his face.
"Don't wanna." Jay huffed, "That's a kid's game. I don't wanna play a kiddie game."
"Come on, Jay, pllllllleeeeaaaasssseee." Morro begged, just about shaking the living daylights out of Jay as he did so. "Pwetty-please?" he added, giving a small wolfish whimper.
Jay gave a silent sigh of resignation and started counting, "One…two…three…four…"
Morro grinned at the sound of it and rushed off to find a hiding place, while Jay got up off the couch and buried his face in his hands as he leaned against a wall and kept on counting, not stopping until he finally got to a hundred. "Ready or not, Morro, here I come!" he then shouted, scurrying out of the room to find the little wind-wielder, overheated console completely forgotten.
Turns out finding a ghost is a lot harder than he had thought. Morro was an impressive hider—so impressive that Jay found he had to search high and low through every nook and cranny in the Bounty. Finally, after searching the deck to no avail, he sat down and leaned his head against a coiled rope for a rest. That's when he heard it. It was difficult to pick up over the wind, but if he pricked up his ears and concentrated hard enough, he could hear a faint, childish giggle coming from the top of the mast.
"You little snake." Jay murmured teasingly to himself, before tiptoeing over to the mast and beginning to scale it. He may not have been as skilled a rock climber as Cole, but he'd climbed many a lamppost or lightning rod before. And all those skills were coming in real handy right now. When he'd shimmied his way to the top and silently peeked over the small handrail separating the crow's nest from the rest of the mast, he saw Morro curled up in a ball in the nest, snickering to himself about how Jay would never find him up here.
Oh, you think so, little ghostie, Jay thought to himself as he, quiet as a cat's paws, pulled himself over the side, crept up to the unsuspecting Morro, and shrieked, "SNEAK ATTACK!" Morro looked up just in time to see Jay pounce on him and begin spidering his fingers up and down Morro's ribcage in the biggest tickle attack the Lightning Ninja had ever waged. Morro howled with laughter and rollicking gales of mirth at the attack, barely able to choke out between laughs, "No! No! Stop it! Stop it! Stop it! That tickles!"
"What's that, little ghostie?" Jay exclaimed, "You want more tickles?" Not waiting for an answer, he started tickling Morro under the chin before moving his fingers to the crook of Morro's elbows and the bottoms of his little ghost-feet.
"No! Stop! Cut it out, Jay! Cut it out!" Morro screeched in hilarious, giggling guffaws of laughter, his little legs thudding up and down uncontrollably as he twisted and turned, trying to shake Jay off, roll over, do something to get him to stop. But Jay wouldn't let up the attack until Morro finally battered him with his little fists and cried, "Okay, okay, I give! You win!"
"An' don't you forget it!" Jay replied, giving Morro a playful swat on the back as the little ghost-child clambered shakily to his feet. Morro then shot Jay a mischievous, cheeky grin and then cried out, "Last one down is a wotten egg!" before climbing over the railing and sliding down the mast like it was a fireman's pole before Jay could react.
"Hey! No fair!" the Lightning Ninja cried out as he prepared to follow, but on the inside, he was grinning like a cat in cream. How could video games ever compare to this?
Noon
Zane could be heard scuttling about the kitchen, preparing a delicious lunch, when Morro walked in and murmured, "That smells so good, Zane! Kin I help?"
Zane, to be frank, was rather taken aback by the question. Considering the breakfast disaster earlier that morning, he had assumed that Morro wouldn't want to risk a repeat at all. And he was definitely not prepared for Morro to ask if he could help prepare food for the midday meal. But when he saw the pleading look in the ghost-child's eyes, he finally sighed and caved.
"All right, little ghostie." he exclaimed, using the moniker he'd heard Kai and Jay give him earlier that morning. Morro's face twitched in slight confusion at hearing Zane use the nickname too, but he shrugged his shoulders and rolled up the sleeves of his hoodie, like he'd seen Zane do with his gi before cooking. Zane noticed with great attention that Morro was wearing the same hoodie Lloyd had been very much attached to when he was but ten years of age. And the wind-child seemed to be enjoying wearing it.
"Okay, Morro." Zane began, slipping into his best teaching voice. "Let's be systematic about this, shall we? Let's say that I'll deal with the wet ingredients, and you do the dry?"
"O-tay." Morro answered, grinning the widest grin you ever did see. Zane, choosing not to correct the wind-child's slip-up in pronunciation, then directed Morro, "Okay, I'm going to need two cups of breadcrumbs…two teaspoons of red pepper…one teaspoon of black pepper…a tablespoon of sage…two tablespoons of onion flakes…and one teaspoon of kosher salt."
As Zane gently, patiently explained the steps of making the breading for the chicken tenders he was preparing, Morro carefully followed Zane's instructions to the letter, not missing one teaspoon or adding one tablespoon too much of anything. Zane was impressed—Morro was indeed keen with fulfilling commands thoroughly and willingly. After combining all the ingredients Zane specified, the wind-child quietly took a spoon and began stirring the breadcrumbs and spices together as he had seen Zane do many times before—not too hasty, not too sloppy. Meanwhile, Zane cracked two eggs and beat them before adding a cup of milk and some more salt and pepper. He was about to take Morro's bowl of precisely evenly blended breading mix to use it when Morro grabbed his metal hand and stopped him with a soft, urgent, "Wait!"
"What is the matter, Morro?" Zane asked, his voice on the edge of panic. Had he miscalculated something or misinformed Morro as to the correct ratio of breadcrumbs to spices?
"We need a secret ingwedient." Morro explained, noticing the worried look on Zane's mechanical face.
"What, pray tell, do you mean by a 'secret ingredient'?" the Titanium Ninja asked, curious to understand Morro's line of thought.
"Pa-PREE-ka." Morro clarified.
"Oh, paprika." Zane echoed. "It isn't my normal procedure to use paprika in this blend, but if you insist that this batch needs that as a 'secret ingredient', then by all means, we shall have it be just that."
"Yippee!" Morro cheered, throwing up his hands so that a little of the breadcrumb mixture went flying behind him, drifting through the air like miniscule flakes of snow.
"Oops." the wind-child murmured apologetically. "Sowwy about that."
"It's all right. No harm done." Zane answered mercifully. "Making messes, I have found, seems to be an intricate element of all cooking ventures." Then he took a small can of paprika and told Morro, "Now just a few shakes. Five at most."
Morro once again followed Zane's instructions and gave five shakes, counting each one out loud to maintain his focus. "One, two, three, four, and five!" Then he eagerly stirred the paprika in until he couldn't see clumps of the spice anymore. The Nindroid then gently motioned Morro away so he could add minced garlic to the blend, and then it was time for Zane's favorite part—breading.
The next few minutes were filled with Morro eagerly watching Zane bread the chicken tenders, giving appreciative oohs and ahhs as the ice-wielder expertly dipped each chicken piece in the egg mixture and then roll it in the breadcrumb-spice blend until it was fully covered and ready to place in the nine-by-thirteen Zane had set out for the purpose of baking the tenders. Then it was child's play (no pun intended) to slip the tenders into the oven to bake at 425 degrees.
"Now what?" Morro asked, eagerly wiggling on his stool.
"Now we wait." Zane answered as he finished setting the small handheld kitchen timer the team used in place of a traditional oven timer. Then he sat down at the table and he and Morro waited.
And waited.
And waited.
And waited some more.
Slowly, Morro began to grow bored with all the waiting. His leg bounced up and down. He squirmed and wiggled and fidgeted. He huffed and sighed and chewed on his lip. His gaze darted aimlessly around the room, as the air was filled with a silence pierced only by the repetitive tick-tick-tick of the timer and the sound of the breeze whooshing past the open front of the room.
It began to dawn on Zane that, unlike himself, Morro had always struggled with sitting still and quiet. Zane didn't need to be told twice to stay still. He could just find a good, comfortable spot to sit and wait as quietly as a mouse without any discomfort of any sort. But Morro wasn't like that. Being the Master of Wind, it was natural that he craved movement—that when he felt the wind on his face, not only could he feel calm and free and awake and at rest, but on the other side of the spectrum, he might feel restless and impatient, yearning to climb, to run, to fly, to be in constant motion, whatever that motion might be.
"I sense that you are growing tired and restless with waiting here for the tenders to finish baking." Zane mused aloud. Then he suggested, "Why don't we find some sides to go with it?"
"Yay!" Morro shouted, springing down from his stool and scurrying to the pantry before coming back a few moments later with some bags of honey-BBQ corn chips, packages of mint Oreos, and rice pudding cups, all of which he dumped on the table and began arranging buffet-style.
Zane had to smile. He knew exactly what was needed to complete the array of sides. He dug around in the fridge and extracted a 5 lb. bag of frozen tater tots and some falafel bites. And at the delighted gasp that escaped Morro's lips, the Ice Ninja knew he'd made the right call in letting Morro help him prepare the midday meal for everyone.
2:00 p.m.
"It's all right, Morro. Shh, shh, it's okay. It's only a scratch."
"But it huurrrrtttts!"
"Don't worry." Nya crooned soothingly as she tended lovingly to the ectoplasm-leaking wound on the wind-child's right knee. Morro had attempted to run the mini training course in the hull of the Bounty, but the kickback of the punching bag was too much for his eight-year-old body, and he hadn't phased through the bag in time to keep from being decked by it. He'd hit the floor pretty hard, scraping his knee up something awful. He'd instantly let out a howling wail and Nya—being the sisterly type she was—had come running as soon as she heard the wolfish, sobbing cries ebbing up the stairs like the tide of a stormy wind. She'd taken one look at the distraught, wailing ghost-child and put two and two together in an instant, dashing over and scooping him up in her arms before hiking him up the stairs and into the nearest room with a first-aid kit. Now she was just finishing up cleaning up the wounds as best as she could (without using water) despite the fact that Morro had been so nerve-shattered the specter-tears wouldn't stop flowing.
"Hush, Morro." she now murmured, seeking to soothe away the tears and chase away the sobs wracking his little chest erratically as she plastered a nice big bandage on the crusting scrape and took him into her arms once again, rocking him back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, until his wails began to fade away into small, hiccupping coughs.
"Hush, Morro, hush. It's all right. It's okay. I'm right here. You're all right. It's gonna be all right."
Morro, hearing the comforting words Nya was cooing kindly in his ear, nuzzled his head into her breast, all but melting into her loving, gentle grasp as he snuggled tightly against her, his little tears tricking slowly away as the throbbing ache in his knee began to ease off, enough to take the edge off the pain.
"There. That's better now, isn't it?" Nya asked sweetly.
"Uh-huh." Morro mumbled, his voice muffled by the fabric of the water-wielder's kimono.
"Why don't I get you a snack and a blanket, little ghostie?" the Water Ninja offered.
"O-okay." the wind-child answered. Then he looked up at her and asked, "Kin I wide piggyback?"
"Um, sure." Nya replied, a bit startled by the request, but willing all the same. She set Morro down and then knelt on the floor so that he could clamber onto her back like a monkey. He settled himself rather quickly, wrapping his arms loosely around her neck and his legs around her chest. Nya supported his position by wrapping her arms around his legs and then began piggybacking him down the hallway.
"Wheeeeee!" he squealed all the way to the living room/downtime room, giggling and laughing in joy and childlike excitement. Nya sat down on the couch with him still on her back and then pretended to forget he was there.
"Huh, where did Morro go?" she teased in a singsong voice. "Where is the baby Morro? Where is he?" She stood up—only to be all but tackled as Morro leaped back onto her back and cried, "I'm right here, Nya!" The Water Ninja then whirled around and he dropped off her back, landing on his feet on the floor.
Right before Nya twirled around, grasped his hands, and swung him through the air in a wide semicircle before setting him down again on the couch and darting out of the room. Morro waited there until she came back in with his favorite silver-and-green fuzzy blanket and a bag of soft peppermint sticks. She then handed two to Morro, and he murmured, "Thank 'ou," as he stuffed one stick into his mouth and began nibbling/sucking on it happily.
Nya got her own two peppermint sticks and began chewing on them in like fashion. When the candy sticks were gone, Morro blinked, wrapped his blanket tightly around him, and then asked, "Kin you read me a story?"
"What kind of story, Morro?" Nya asked in return. Morro, still holding his blanket around his shoulders like a cocoon, walked over to a small book cabinet and pulled out—
"The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, huh?" Nya piped up, amused by Morro's choice of reading material.
"What can I say?" the ghost-child shrugged. "I like Edmund. He's a lot like me."
"Now that you mention it, I guess he is." With that, Nya beckoned Morro over to sit on her lap, and he gladly complied, pressing his little back up against her breast, listening fondly and somewhat sleepily to Nya's heartbeat as the Water Ninja took the book from him and began, "'Once there were four children, called Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy…'"
4:00 p.m.
"Higher! Higher!" Morro squealed with delight as Skylor pushed his swing higher and higher into the air. Darreth and Skylor had offered to watch over the little ghost-child while the other Ninja ran some errands, the plan being to meet back up again at Chen's Noodle House for a free dinner for all of them. Morro had taken to Darreth almost immediately, but he'd been oddly shy around Skylor at first and had been reluctant to explain why. So when Darreth had to leave for a martial arts class he was teaching at his Mojo Dojo, the wind-child had been really distraught that the self-proclaimed Brown Ninja was leaving him solely in the care of the Master of Amber.
Until Skylor asked if he wanted to go to Ninjago City's biggest playground, thinking he'd like the swings and slides and such there.
It turned out that he didn't just like the playground—he LOVED it! He loved the merry-go-round, even though it made him a little dizzy. He loved the twisting, turning slides that slithered around each other like snakes coiled together. He didn't like the sandbox (explaining to Skylor that he didn't like sand because it was course and rough and irritating and it got everywhere), but he absolutely loved the climbing structures and the rope wall and the mini-zipline and the rocking animals and the swings. In short, he loved it all!
"Higher! Higher!" he continued to shriek, his face beaming with excitement, his cheeks flushed sapphire-blue with heat and exhilaration, his whole body quivering with happiness and laughter and childlike joy.
Skylor pushed him higher as requested and then took a look at her watch. "Um, sorry, Morro, but we've gotta leave now. The park's closing soon."
"AWW!" Morro whined, reluctantly digging his heels into the dirt to slow himself down and get off the swing without falling and tumbling onto his behind. "Why can't we stay longer?" he asked, his lip quivering in a sulky pout, his whole body seeming to droop like a wilting flower as he stood there, sniffling and trying not to cry.
Skylor didn't know what to say at first, and then a sign for "Candy Kingdom" (a local candy shop) caught her eye. Suddenly, she had an idea.
"Oh, look over there—" she exclaimed, deliberately not looking at Morro. "Is that a candy store I see? I think a certain someone would really enjoy that. But since he's so bent on staying here longer and playing all night, I guess I'll have all the candy to myself." Then she ran purposefully away in the direction of "Candy Kingdom" before skidding to a sudden stop when she heard her charge cry out, "No! Hold up! Wait for meeeeeee!"
Holding back a smile, Skylor turned and kept running, making Morro chase her all the way to the candy shop. They skidded to a stop by the door at almost the same time and Morro tugged on Skylor's sleeve, begging, "Can I have some candy too, please?"
"All right, you can have some. But you'll have to come in with me."
"'Kay." Morro complied, and the two entered together.
After buying enough peach rings, honey sticks, candy corn, licorice, Swedish Fish, jelly beans, M&Ms, and gummy bears to choke a horse, the Master of Amber proceeded to take Morro to a few other stores she thought he'd enjoy as well. First, they went to the local music store. Morro got a real kick out of the drums, maracas, rain instruments, handbells, and kazoos, and he was all smiles when Skylor graciously bought him his very own tambourine and jingle-bell stick.
Next the two visited the toy store. At first, Morro couldn't decide between a jack-in-the-box, a toy airplane, and a Mighty Skye plushie, but then he decided to ask Skylor for the plushie. He hugged the lovie tightly to his chest, snuggling his cheek against her fur all the way to the bookstore. At the bookstore, his eyes lit up when he found a penny on the sidewalk, and he picked it up with a large grin on his face before flipping it and sticking it in his pocket for safekeeping.
When Morro had picked out a pile of books he wanted to buy—including his very own copy of Peter Pan and a boxed set of the first four Magic Tree House books, as well as a book about origami animals and a how-to book for making all sorts of exquisite kites—he piled the books on a neat pile beside the kids' reading area before falling asleep on one of the area's cushy beanbags, clutching his new Mighty Skye plushie friend tightly to his chest.
Skylor made sure to take plenty of pictures along the way. Things like this didn't just happen every day, and she wanted to remember this day for the rest of her life.
And from the gleeful, wonderous look on the sleeping Morro's face, neither did he.
Later, after Skylor managed to rouse the snoozing Morro and purchase his books, she took a look at her watch again and commented, "Well, it looks like we have time to visit one more fun place before we head back to the noodle shop to meet with the other Ninja. So, where do you want to go, Morro?"
The wind-child gazed up at a nearby city map, tapped his knuckles on his chin thoughtfully, and then decided, "Butterfly Gaw-den."
"The Butterfly Garden it is, then." Skylor agreed, and Morro gave her the biggest un-shy smile the power-wielder had seen from him all day.
9:00 p.m.
Lloyd snuggled deeply into the sheets of his bed, cozy and blissfully drowsy from the excitement of the past few hours. After Skylor had brought little Morro to the noodle shop, the whole team had enjoyed a marvelous time of talking and laughing and feasting on spring rolls, fried rice, sweet-and-sour chicken, beef-and-broccoli, sugared rice-flour donuts, fried potatoes, green tea, and a delicious noodle buffet, which easily made out to be Cole's favorite of the whole bunch. Morro especially had enjoyed himself, playing marbles with Jay, folding paper cranes with Kai, making and flying paper airplanes with Cole, playing a glorious game of chase with Zane and his falcon, and chattering incessantly with Lloyd about bugs and birds and butterflies until the wind-child was too tired to talk in full sentences—which the others took as their cue to call it a night and take the little ghostie home.
Now Lloyd too was in bed, reminiscing blissfully on the happenings of this wonderful day, as his eyelids blinked sluggishly and he let out a series of soft, snoozy yawns as he slowly grew sleepier and sleepier. He cuddled his favorite green-and-gold blanket closer around his shoulders and neck and was just about to let himself be beckoned away into a sea of wonderful dreams when he heard a frantic knockity-knock-knock on his door.
Biting back a less-than-pleasant remark, he slowly dragged himself out from under his covers and subconsciously staggered over to the door, rubbing the mistiness of oncoming sleep out of his eyes as he slowly turned the doorknob and opened the door with a squeaky creak.
There in front of the door, with a blanket wrapped around his shoulders and a cockapoo plushie with a super suit and pink mask tucked under his arm, was a bleary-eyed, shakily shivering Morro.
"Wazgoinon?" Lloyd slurred, struggling to stay awake on his feet. "What are you doing here, Morro?"
"It-it-it's so cold." Morro moaned, shuddering from the poignant chills washing over his body in waves of frigid agony. "And it's so dark, and I just feel so scared…" His voice trailed off and he moaned in lingering fear as he stepped further into the room, eyes darting around frantically as if searching for some nightmarish monster.
Lloyd, sleepy and yawning his head off as he was, wasn't too slow-witted in putting two and two together and making four. "The Cursed Realm." he replied, his voice quivering as Morro's shivering began to grow fiercer and stronger by the second.
"It was so cold, just so cold…and it was dark and scary and eerie and so, so creepy it made my skin crawl with goosebumps all the time." Morro explained, his voice getting smaller and smaller as he stepped closer and closer to Lloyd. Finally, he smushed his little body into Lloyd's legs and began to cry in fear and pain and anguish at the mere memories of that horrible, haunting place.
"Come here, little buddy." Lloyd crooned kindly. "You can sleep with me tonight."
"Weally?" Morro asked uncertainly.
"Really." Lloyd repeated assuredly. Morro's face lit up immediately, and he scurried out of the room as fast as he could to fetch his blankets and lovies. When he came back a few moments later, his arms full of his comfort blanket, pillow, and family of plushies, Lloyd had already cleared a place for him in his own bed and patted the spot beside him invitingly. Morro took the invitation and just about lunged into the bed. He then laid his blankets down in a small pile at his feet and began arranging his lovies the way he wanted them. There was a brown-blond catamount, a well-loved mint-green snake, a clouded leopard cub, a tiger cub, a selkie-silver wolf pup, and his brand-new Mighty Skye plushie, who got the prominent place closest to where Morro laid his pillow to sleep.
"Mighty Skye, huh?" Lloyd commented, his voice laced with full interest. "You like The Mighty Movie?"
"Eh, it's okay." Morro murmured. "I like the TV movie better, though. The original Mighty Pups were so cool."
"I agree with you. I think Rocky's more of an energy-tools-pup myself. And Rubble's super strength always reminds me of Cole's Earth Power, which I think is cool because they both like food and they both enjoy some DJ. At least they kept most of the powers intact in the Mighty Movie."
"Including Skye's." Morro added. "She has Wind Power just like me."
"Is that why you like her so much?"
"Uh-huh. If I ever got the chance to meet the Mighty Pups, I'd want to meet Skye most of all." With that, Morro sighed, laid down on the bed, and pulled the covers Lloyd was sharing with him up to his chin. Then he, in turn, let Lloyd share his own fuzzy fleece blankets as the two snuggled together for warmth. Morro seemed to decide that he liked cuddling with Lloyd, and Lloyd for his part decided being a ghost's safety blanket for one night wouldn't hurt.
Soon, Morro was curled up in a ball against Lloyd's chest, his stuffies tucked under his arms, his own little chest rising and falling with "baby snores" not unlike Lloyd's own. Lloyd sighed deeply, amazed at how much the tension between him and Morro had diminished in the past several days since the fall of the Cursed Realm.
In a way, it was as if Morro wasn't just a redeemed enemy and his adopted cousin, but Lloyd's little brother.
And it was that thought that comforted Lloyd the most as he let himself fall headlong into the welcoming shadows of deep, healing, restful slumber underneath the canopy of glow-in-the dark star stickers dotting his ceiling in myriads of shining beacons of light.
The next morning
Morro and the others were happily chomping down on waffles with peanut butter, bananas, and strawberries when there came a steady tap-tap-tapping sound from the deck. The Ninja gasped in wonder, and Nya and Kai were quick to scurry down to the deck to see who was there. It only took a few minutes for the others to realize that the one standing there was none other than—
"Master Wu!" all the Ninja except Morro cried out at once, pausing their meal and rushing to meet him. The six all started talking at once and would have continued this way if Misako hadn't shown up and commanded, "Whoa! Slow down! It's been a long journey for both of us. One at a time, please."
"You got the Tomorrow's Tea, right?" Jay asked eagerly.
"Yes, enough to change Morro back to his proper age."
"Oh, that's good." Kai breathed. "For a second, I was worried that we might end up having to raise an eight-year-old ghost-kid, but now things can go back to the way they were before."
No one noticed Morro standing there, invisible literally and figuratively, listening to every word with fear beginning to coil into his heart, sending daggers of chilly coldness spiraling deeply into his core and twisting taut. His heart was pounding, his breathing shallow, his hands trembling convulsively as he just listened to the others speaking about how good it would be to have Morro back to his normal self again.
Morro's stomach seemed to twist into knots within him. His legs were burning with adrenaline, and all his focus was pointed towards one singular thought.
Run.
Turning on his heel, he scrambled away as fast as he could. He didn't care where he went as long as he was running away—away from the tea that would make things go back to the way they were before, away from the one thing that would take away his wish.
Away from the rejection, the pain, the ghostly invisibility that had been forced on him when the others stopped regarding him as little more than another member of the team.
Holding back his tears, he scrabbled for a hiding place, somewhere the others would never think to look for him. Then he curled himself into the smallest ball possible and began to cry.
"Morro, come here!" Lloyd called out, followed closely behind by the others as he reentered the dining room. "We've got something to get you back to—" His voice suddenly trailed off as he saw that Morro's plate was only half-empty and Morro was nowhere to be found.
"Morro?" he asked, looking frantically under the table to see if the ghost-child was hiding under there. "Morro?" he called out again, gaze darting around in case the ghost was hiding in plain sight. "Morro!" Lloyd screamed in desperation. But the wind-wielder was gone.
"What happened?!" Kai cried out.
"Where'd he go?!" Cole screamed, distress leeching into his voice as he realized Morro's absence for the first time.
"We've gotta find him!" Jay shrieked.
"And we will!" Master Wu answered. "Everyone, spread out and search for him."
"And hurry! The Tomorrow's Tea will only take effect if Morro has it within a day." Misako warned them.
"Let's find that little ghostie—and fast!" Nya agreed before the others cried out their typical call-out: "Ninja-GO!"
"Morro?" Lloyd called out frantically, searching for the little ghost left and right, high and low. He knew that Morro had many bizarre abilities up his little ghostly sleeves. Invisibility, anti-gravity, tethering—lots of tricks to stump pursuers and also let him always land on his feet. And if Morro was hiding because he was scared, he could be employing any of those sneaky strategies to get out of using the tea.
As much as Lloyd didn't like Tomorrow's Tea, he knew that it could be the only way to turn Morro back to his normal age. And knowing that it had a time limit only caused the pressure to spike for him. Then he thought of something. Morro had been very excited about his Mighty Skye plushie last night. And it was clear that he loved Skye as a character as well. Perhaps it was because she and Morro were sorta alike in personality—minus the checkered past of the latter.
And that's when Lloyd hit upon where Morro might be hiding. And how to approach him without scaring him even worse and letting him hurt himself even more than he might be already.
Slowly and carefully, Lloyd made a beeline for the wind-wielder's room and ducked in without making a single sound. Using his Ninja skills, he tuned out all outer distractions and focused on the sensations he could pick up from the room itself. The twirling of Morro's leaf mobile, the rumpled sheets on the bed, a small collection of doohickeys and thingamabobs sitting on the nightstand, the closed closet doors—and the soft sound of someone's strangled, stifled sobs.
Lloyd then bent down, taking it slow, as if he were approaching a frightened, timid rabbit caught and cornered in a trap, and looked under the bed. There, curled in a tight ball against the far wall, Mighty Skye plushie scrunched up tightly in his arms, was none other than a sobbing, shaking Morro, face flushed with fear, eyes blue and puffy from crying, his emerald-green hair streak drooping down sadly in front of his face and his pupils glassy and empty, a deep well of great imploring and haunting sorrow.
"Morro." Lloyd breathed in relief, then asked in a confused tone, "Why are you hiding? What's the matter?"
"I don't wanna change back, Lloyd. I don't wanna go back to the way I was!"
"What do you mean? This could be your only chance to be your real age again!"
"But I don't want to, Lloyd! I don't want things to change! I want them to stay the same!"
"What are you talking about?!" Lloyd pressed, even more confused and bewildered than before.
"I don't want to be just another Ninja!" As Morro's voice grew more choked up by tears and hiccupping sobs, he wailed, "I w-w-want to cook with Zane, a-a-and play hide-an'-seek with Jay, and r-r-read with Nya, and spend time w-w-with Cole, and draw pictures with Kai, and snuggle with you!" He burst into a fresh round of sobs before he finally managed to explain, "I just want to spend time—with all of you! I want to spend time with my family!"
At first, Lloyd didn't get what Morro was saying. And then he took a closer look at the baubles and trinkets sitting on Morro's nightstand. A butterfly button, a shiny copper penny, a bluejay feather, an old spoon from the kitchen, a candy wrapper, an unused Band-Aid, a scrap of green fabric, a shooter marble, and many others.
That's when everything sank into Lloyd. That's when it clicked. It wasn't that Morro was trying to be selfish and not give up his newfound childhood. It was that he wanted to spend time with Lloyd and the others. He wanted to have fun with his family.
His family. That's what Morro called the Ninja. His family. And now, he was afraid that if he used the Tomorrow's Tea, he'd lose that.
That he'd lose his only chance at having a real family.
The Ninja's family.
Quickly, Lloyd scooted under the bed, just close enough to look Morro in the eyes. "And you will, Morro. No matter what age you're at, you're part of us now—part of our wacky family. Nothing can change that—not now, not ever." Then confusion flooded into Lloyd's mind again as he asked, "What made you think that you weren't part of our family?"
Morro sucked in a shaky breath and whispered, "I'm invisible to you."
Invisible? Lloyd couldn't even begin to describe the shock he felt right at that very moment. Morro feels invisible? No WONDER he didn't want to take the Tomorrow's Tea.
"You're wrong." the Green Ninja said finally. "You're not invisible. Not to me, not to any of us. And I'm sorry if I or any of the rest of us have made you feel that way. But you are not invisible. You never were and you never will be." As if to prove his point, he held out his arms, inviting Morro in for a hug—which Morro gladly accepted.
"Morro…" Lloyd murmured after a few minutes.
"Yes?"
"Um, no rush, but the Tomorrow's Tea does have a time limit."
"Kin—sniffle—kin I have till this afternoon to take it? I wanna get a fam'ly photo first."
"I'm sure that can be arranged." And with that, the two hugged even more fiercely, and Lloyd couldn't help but feel a bittersweet sadness filling his heart when he and Morro finally pulled away and the two crawled out from under the bed.
He had just realized that he might never be able to hug kid-Morro ever again.
"Lloyd?" Morro asked, looking back at him meaningfully, still clutching Mighty Skye in his arms.
"Yes?"
"Thank you. I needed that."
Lloyd couldn't help but grin at that. Truly, Morro didn't feel invisible anymore.
"I love you, Lloyd." Morro then exclaimed, so sweetly and innocently that Lloyd did a double-take. Once he was sure that the affectionate exclamation meant what he hoped it meant, he answered back, "I love you too…little ghostie."
"Not you too!" Morro moaned, tossing a pillow at Lloyd playfully, a mischievous grin written all over his face before Lloyd hit him back with a different pillow. The pillow fight had begun.
Later that night
Lloyd sighed blissfully as he gazed up at the stars dotting the night sky in pinpricks of gold and silver light. It had been a good day today. The family photo had turned out even better than expected. Everyone was in it—Lloyd, Kai, Cole, Zane, Jay, Nya, Darreth, Skylor, Sensei Garmadon, Misako, Master Wu—and Morro.
Little eight-year-old Morro.
Who would never be an eight-year-old again.
He'd taken the Tomorrow's Tea shortly after the photo was taken and framed in a special place in the Bounty, where the Ninja could look on it and remember the wondrous day that they all had relished, when Jay's slip-up comment had led to a beautiful time of spending time with the one love-starved Ninja who needed attention the most. But Lloyd hadn't seen hide nor hair of Morro since then, and he was beginning to get a little worried about him.
Make that a lot worried about him.
The Green Ninja knew from experience that coming to terms with a rapid aging-up was a long, difficult, even painful process. Especially for someone like Morro, who'd cheated death multiple times and sorta lived to tell about it. He'd been stuck at fifteen years old for decades before the wish happened, and Lloyd wasn't quite sure how Morro would take something like this.
He could only hope that he hadn't made a huge mistake in convincing Morro to take the tea. If he did, he just knew he'd never forgive himself for it. Not in a million, trillion—
"Whatcha doin', Lloyd?" Morro's voice, strong and low, rang out from behind him. "Stargazing?"
"Yeah, pretty much." Lloyd murmured, craning his neck to see the ghost-teen standing still behind him. As he watched, Morro came over to him and lay down on his back just a few inches away from Lloyd. He then stirred around slightly to get comfortable and let out a long, wistful sigh.
"You know, sometimes, back when Sylph and I were still together, we'd go out to this one tree and gaze up at the stars together, try to find our favorite constellations, remembering the legends behind their names…" His voice trailed off and he let his eyes fall shut for a second, murmuring, "Those sure were the days."
"And you can have days like that again—with us, with your family." Lloyd added, hoping that he had guessed Morro's thoughts correctly.
"Yeah, I guess I can." Morro agreed.
Then Lloyd asked the one question that had been rolling around in his mind for hours. "What exactly did you think of the nickname we gave you?"
"Um…it was a little awkward at first, but then I guess I got used to it."
"The way you responded when I called you that, I thought you hated it." Lloyd exclaimed with a laugh.
"Well, I didn't exactly expect that you would ever call me that. I guess we are brothers after all."
"And you're my favorite cousin, don't forget that."
"Lloyd, I'm your only cousin."
"My point exactly!"
The two couldn't help but share a laugh at that. Then Lloyd sighed fondly to himself and asked softly and slowly, "If you could go back and change your wish, would you?"
Morro seemed distant, lost in thought for a few moments. Then he turned his head and grinned cheekily at Lloyd. "Nah." he answered. "I wouldn't change it for Ninjago itself."
"I gotta admit—you were pretty adorable as an eight-year-old."
"Lllllooooyyydddd!" Morro moaned, burying his face in his hands, trying to hide how crimson-hot his cheeks were flushing.
"Sorry." Lloyd muttered, realizing that he'd accidentally mortified his favorite and only cousin with that statement.
"It's okay." Morro murmured in reply after he finally managed to stop blushing from sheer humiliation. "Did I really look that adorable? In a little-kid way, I mean?"
"Aren't all eight-year-olds that way?" his green-clad cousin asked, a good-natured teasing note in his voice.
"Fair point." the wind-wielder replied, and he and the energy-child shared a laugh. Then Morro sighed again and gazed back up at the stars. "You know something, Lloyd?" he said after a moment.
"What?"
"I just realized—stars are invisible during the day, but they're also always constant, always there, even when you don't see them. And they're all part of a big celestial family—like us. Like the Ninja."
"When you put it like that, it makes me wonder why I ever hated you." Lloyd replied, just a smidge of cheeky mirth in his voice.
"Why, you take that back, Green Ninja!"
"Not on your death, ghostie!"
As Wu watched from the door of the tea shop, he sighed in wonder. Truly, a single act of forgiveness—and familial love—could change everything.
It had changed everything.
No longer was Morro invisible or unseen or forgotten.
He was home—home where he belonged.
With the Ninja.
With his family—his family that saw him.
Seeing him through the eyes of love.