I have a few notes I'd like to include with this before I get started:

1. This has spoilers for Dragons Rising Season 2 Part 2. It's also an AU of something that completely shattered my hopes in this show. (Dragons Rising, specifically, not Ninjago in general. A friend of mine said Dragons Rising is basically an AU of Ninjago, so that's how I'll be viewing the show: something separate and canon in its own way. Like movie-verse stuff.)

2. Jaya drama. And Zane drama. LOTS of it. But also that brother-and-sister spirit I've been missing in NDR.

3. I doubt this will be anything more than a two-shot. Unless I get ideas for more. We'll see. If I do, it won't be just Jaya or just PIXane. These ships contain separate people. Jay and Nya. Zane and Pixal. If I continue this, I'm not limiting these characters to just their ships. The ships will simply play a part in the plot.

4. I hope you enjoy! (Also this takes place...ummm sometime after the beginning of "United We Fall" (episode 15 of Season 2, to know how far in the season we'll be.)

The air was laced with jasmine, which grew in creeping shrubs that climbed the white marble of the grand temple. The scent hitched a ride with the sleepy, cool breeze that blew across the surface of the fountains set in the center of the temple's courtyard, pushing at the jasmine petals that had fallen in the water the way children might try to make their paper boats sail. The city beyond the temple's threshold lay quiet as its current inhabitants slept the night away. The stars twinkled above, partially smudged out from light pollution, but those that managed to poke through that particular barrier danced their nightly ballet. Moonlight fell, darker in its waxing gibbous phase than in its full moon phase, in rays that splashed through the canopy of the trees outside the temple grounds that had grown over the temple, covering its courtyard.

The temple itself towered above several of the temples nearby it, despite it belonging to the section for the smaller cultures of the Merged Realms. Perhaps its size or placement was simply due to its age. Each of its floors were shown by the ledges, underneath which sprouted columns that depicted delicately carved seaweed. Occasionally, there was a small gem animal set into the marble, usually a sea horse made of ruby or emerald. Once or twice, there was a starfish made of yellow topaz and an angelfish of sapphire or amethyst. The gems sparkled when the moving branches of the trees stretching over the courtyard allowed a moonbeam to strike them, giving the temple a special life. Over its yawning mahogany double doors, there was a depiction of the entity to which the temple was dedicated to, the shine of gold forming its lines.

Wojira.

She was sitting on the edge of one of the fountains in the courtyard of Wojira's Temple, the one in the City of Temples.

It wasn't a visit of respect.

Wojira was a raging entity whose fangs and claws left not scratches and bitemarks but devastating storms in their wake. Wojira didn't care if she destroyed a tribe or ripped apart a family. As far as anyone could tell, Wojira was a beast who took the powers of Storm and Wave and used it to the advantage of her predatory behaviors. Had she craved power as she moved across early Ninjago, before the First Spinjitzu Master had arrived and before it had truly been Ninjago? No. She was merely trying to survive, as all animals do when faced with life and death. Yet...somehow, she had gained gargantuan bulk that allowed her rampant run to cause so much ruin.

She was only there because it felt fitting. She was as much of a monster as Wojira had been and the proof was the sparks of lightning she conjured up every so often as she thought.

Nya blamed Wojira more for making her lose an entire year with her family to the primordial serpent. It was ridiculous, she knew that. Wojira had torn through Ninjago City. Several people drowned and countless others were injured from the debris speeding through the capsized streets, the furious winds that knocked people down and made them hit their heads, and the lightning strikes that hit too close and caused horrific burns. Nya was mad at that too. But that year... losing that one precious year, it infuriated her, among other things...

She lost it defeating Wojira. She lost time with Jay, and she had already felt bad enough about it before the Merge! Before he lost his memories and used that disgusting mask and shattered his goodness all because she hadn't tried harder to find him after the Merge.

A sob burst out, followed by more as she struggled to rein them back in. She had already had her cry; she wasn't naturally someone who cried for seemingly hours. She usually lets it all out in one go, wipes her face, calls it good, and sets to work trying to make it better or trying to distract herself. The others called her strong for that and though she doubted it could be called that exactly, it at least didn't reduce her to a complete blubbering mess. This time was different.

Jay had shattered his goodness. He thought she had been lying to him, all because Ras had gotten to him first. He fought her, and she had to fight back because she had seen the damage Shatterspin had done to Wyldfyre's leg, and she was scared. She had to fight back. She had been scared and she fought back, and he thought she was lying when she said she loved him. He told her he hated her.

Jay.

Jay said and did all that.

The man who had loved her since forever.

And what if he actually did remember and was simply mad that she hadn't gone looking for him?

She shuddered at the thought. Either scenario was terrible. Pick your poison. She knew she would never be able to choose. She'd be torn, dying of indecisiveness, and the real Jay might be forgotten forever as she stumbled blindly around, trying to help the Jay who had lost everything that made him him.

She hugged her legs to her chest as her mind spun out all the ways everything could go wrong, like her being stuck like that, unable to do anything to help him. Jay breathing his last because he got hurt and she hadn't gotten to him in time. Someone capturing him. The Gong of Shattering sucking every last shred of goodness in Jay's heart, the light of his spirit draining away until the body it left behind wasn't living life as it should. Him never believing her. Him learning the truth and staying away because he was hurt that he hadn't been the priority as soon as she woke up from the Merge, which wasn't true. She had looked for him until she had collapsed those first few weeks that stretched into months. But how was he supposed to know that? Nya brought her legs closer to her chest, adding more and more and more pressure as she tried to turn her mind away from the thoughts.

Jay needing his powers in an attack by bandits, a situation that had been increasing in the Merged Lands, only he couldn't use them because she had his lightning powers since she had won their match in the Tournament of the Sources...

Another villain manipulating and using Jay, discarding him when they thought he had no more use...

Jay thinking he was unwanted when he wasn't, but he wouldn't know that because Lord Ras was a big-time jerk...

Suffering from injuries or illnesses because no one was there to take care of him...

"Get out get out get out get out," she whispered, shaking her head. Hard. Harder. Harder! She needed to stop! It hurt too much, it made her breathing quicken and her heart miss a beat or two, plunging into the dark, deep prisons of anxiety and dread. "Get out!" She clutched her head, not caring if she was tugging at her already tortured hair, not caring that it hurt. Maybe pain would keep everything away.

"Get out," she whispered again.

"Nya?" a voice asked, a hand going with it, placing itself on her shoulder.

She flinched, smacking the hand away, glaring at the owner of the voice.

Zane shrank under her gaze, placing two steaming mugs on the edge of the fountain beside her and moving to fiddle with his gi. His pale skin from the holographic technology almost blended in with the marble around them, blue eyes seeming to glow as he visibly struggled to find his words.

"Go away," Nya told him. Under normal circumstances, she would have winced at how sharp her words cut. It shocked even her. She was always gentle with Zane, not knowing how the Nindroid would take it. Besides, Zane was her brother, the one who sometimes took things the wrong way. Yet, nothing was normal under these circumstances. Nothing. Especially not with Zane siding with Lloyd as he told her to not go after Jay. Zane deserved every last bit of her death glare.

"Nya..." Zane tried, his eyes darting around as though an ancient guide to pleasing Nya in that exact moment had been carved in the centuries-old stone. "I... I am sorry."

"'Sorry' doesn't cut it," she growled. "It doesn't fix anything! Jay still thinks I'm lying, he still doesn't have his memories, and you agreed with Lloyd when he told me to do absolutely nothing to help Jay, and you can never take that back!"

Zane flinched. "I know." He sat down on the edge of the fountain wall beside her, avoiding looking into her eyes. He pushed one of the mugs he had brought toward her and sighed when she pushed it back toward him. "I do not know why I agree with Lloyd." He met her eyes that time.

He was trying to see if she was buying his words.

Which she wasn't.

He ducked his head again. "It is hard to explain."

"So, tell me," she hissed, reminding him that he was still a traitor and needed to earn back her understanding.

He picked up the other mug and held it in his lap, his fingers trailing along its glazed ceramic as he stared at the temple walls.

"I find it hard to accept that I lost my powers. Between Jay declaring that you were a liar and you winning in the tournament against him and receiving his powers, I had forgotten. So, when Lloyd said something I knew to be true — that saving the world is a priority — I agreed because I thought he would still need me here."

"Jay is a priority, too," Nya pointed out. "He was one of us! Heck, he was part of you four back when the Ninja first started out. Why didn't you remember that? Huh? Huh?"

Zane stayed silent, taking a sip from the mug.

How dare he do that?

How could he pretend that he was real, that his actions weren't because his programming had him do it, that he was prone to losing himself in the heat of the moment?

But she felt sick when the spasm of anger passed. She fought Jay, she didn't try hard enough, she took his powers because she had won the battle...

She thought the most terrible, wrong thing to think about Zane, and for a moment she believed it. She had almost said it to his face. Yet she was still furious about how he had sided with Lloyd. She was a monster, he was a traitor, and she had to strike.

So, she did. A low, unfair strike, but something that gave her satisfaction. She'd be horrified in the morning, she was aware of that, but it felt so good right then and there.

"And what about P.I.X.A.L.? Isn't she a priority? Or did that change with the Merge?"

Zane's eyes widened and he scooted back a little. In an instant, his face flashed from shock and hurt to anger. His eyebrows furrowed and he released the mug, letting it fall to the ground. It shattered loudly, the liquid it held splashing everywhere, and if Nya hadn't shared Kai's stubbornness, she would have winced. Instead, she stared Zane down.

"I started looking for P.I.X.A.L. as soon as I found out that she was missing, contrary to popular belief. But instead of galivanting off to some unknown place with zero clue as to what I might expect to find, I was looking for clues from any credible source anywhere. I made use of the time I had when the rest of you went off to find the Dragon Cores." Then, scoffing at the expression on her face, the one she hadn't realized she had made as she opened her mouth to rebuke his words, he said, "Come on...you did not really think I spent all my free time trying to trigger a reaction from the portal gate under the Monastery, did you? Do you genuinely think that I have poor time management skills? That is quite offensive, Nya. Almost as hurtful as you thinking that I had forgotten about her.

"Speaking of that, do you know how long it took any of you to mention her name? A week! And that is not to mention the fact that you did not think to inform me after the Battle of Imperium when I first woke up after the Merge. I expected to come home to P.I.X.A.L., to find some new project she was working on, but she was not there. Then, I spent a few days hoping—thinking—that perhaps she was on some mission and would be home soon enough, so perhaps that was why no one was talking about her. And then you expected me to move on. For the rest of you, she had been missing for years, but for me...I had just woken up."

"Zane, I—"

"No, please just listen. I need you to act like you know full well that I understand what you are feeling." He gave Nya a sharp look, continuing when she nodded, "I did not know what to do! Lloyd made the Mergequakes sound urgent, so I tried to catch up on everything I missed while I started the groundwork for my search for her. I told myself I would go after her as soon as I compiled a list of likely locations P.I.X.A.L. could be at and when you and the others would not need me." He paused, seeming to be drawing up a list of what else to say, and if she didn't get a word in now, it would be a while before she could find time to speak.

So, of course, she settled with a bitter: "After the world is saved."

"The world always needs saving," Zane said. "One thing will always lead to another, and if we do not press the issue, Lloyd will forget that they need to be found."

"How could he? We practically raised him! He's our little brother. He should know better but instead...he's just..." Nya said, punctuating her words with a frustrated scream.

"Ninja never leave another ninja behind," Zane agreed. "And it is more than clear that Lloyd has forgotten that. I, however, remember it clearly."

Protect those who cannot protect themselves. Never leave a family member behind, her mind chimed, oddly sounding a little like Zane's voice.

"So why did you agree with him?" Nya asked. His words were just words. They held little meaning, for Zane had done the opposite of what he claimed he was doing. He had prioritized the Tournament over Jay. He let Lloyd say all those words about how they needed to focus on the quest the Source Dragon of Motion had given them. Words couldn't take back the past. Nothing could. She was still hurt, still a monster who didn't go looking for Jay, a monster who had defeated him in the Tournament when she did find him. He was still a traitor. Still a traitor.

"I told you! I did not think anyone could go after Jay. Serving the greater good hurts people but it remains the greater good. I still stand by what I said, that if the world is destroyed there will be no Jay—or P.I.X.A.L.—to save. That does not mean that I am unable to hate those words. I want to go find Jay, too. I miss him, too," Zane said, standing up before kneeling to sweep the shards of the broken mug into his hands. Glancing down at the stains from the brown liquid that had splashed out of the mug when he had let it drop, he sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. "That is rather unfortunate," he murmured. He stood up and wiped at the stains before giving up and looking up at Nya. "I wish I did not say those things and that I did not have to say them. I was correct when I said it, but that does not mean I was right for hurting you. You do not deserve that." He took a deep breath, then added, "Since I lost in my tournament, I am out of it, which also means that I will not be doing anything of use for the rest of the Tournament unless...I go after Jay in your place."

"What?" She hadn't been expecting that if she was being honest. She would have thought Zane would have been interested in seeing how the Tournament of Sources would proceed, especially given the fact that he had been imprisoned for most of the Tournament of Elements. And Zane admitting he was useless? If anyone had told her that he would say that just a few minutes earlier, she would have laughed in their face. Zane didn't talk about his feelings, not often. Not unless it was serious and he had no idea what to do about it. Though, now she thought about it, how did they know Zane always came to them when something was serious? He could hide that just as well as all the other little times.

Then she remembered his utilization of his holographic technology and how his voice didn't have that robotic effect. It often felt like he used the cloak sporadically, seemingly with no logic. Sometimes he used it for several days in a row, other times he went weeks without touching the ability. Maybe he had been trying to tell them what he was feeling, only he couldn't find the words and resorted to attempting to show them. Maybe it was a sign of insecurity.

And this?

This was definitely insecurity.

He just told her he thought he was basically useless. So, he figured they wouldn't need him if he went after Jay.

"I can go after Jay in your place," Zane repeated, looking at his hands. "I... have experienced memory loss before. Multiple times." He let out a soft laugh before seeming to wilt, meeting Nya's gaze. "I have been manipulated in one of those periods and was told lies about my past. I have fought and hurt you and the others."

"And you might be able to use that to reach out to Jay?" Nya asked, almost scared to ask, thinking illogically that maybe Zane would turn around and tell her that it wasn't possible because Jay shattered his goodness and wasn't a Nindroid like Zane was.

"I may be more intuitive in figuring out what to say to reach out to him," Zane replied. "However, if you wish to go after him yourself, presumably if you lose in the Tournament or when the Tournament concludes, I will abide by that wish."

"I want to go after him now, " Nya said. "Who knows what might happen while he's out there? He might get hurt." She closed her eyes, raising her face to the stars. She wanted to be the one to bring Jay back, back from losing his memories and using the Gong of Shattering and back home. Where he belonged. With her. She was his Yang. But Zane was right. If the world was destroyed, Jay would be destroyed along with it, and her place in the Tournament of the Sources might be able to prevent that outcome. Zane, however, could go after Jay. He was right. They could do the Tournament of Sources, and he could find Jay. Time might be running out for her Yin. They couldn't know for sure. So, sending Zane after Jay would be a good idea. Right?

Taking a deep breath, she opened her eyes and said, "Can you? Go after Jay, I mean?"

"If I leave in an hour, I can catch him by nightfall tomorrow," Zane answered.

"Thank you," she breathed, hugging him and ignoring the surprised noise he made from the force of the impact. "Thank you thank you thank you thank you."

Zane pulled away, appearing to be uncomfortable. But Nya caught a hint of a smile as he said, "I will go get ready then."

"Do you need me to distract Lloyd?" Nya asked. She doubted Lloyd would allow Zane to pull the "I would be doing nothing if I don't do this" card, and he might tell the Nindroid to remain at the City of Temples. That must have been why Zane had waited to approach Nya with his proposal until then.

"If you can keep him out of our quarters while I prepare, that would be beneficial." Zane picked up the pile of shards from the broken mug—Nya almost told him not to before remembering that the shards couldn't cut his Titanium skin—and started to walk out of the temple's courtyard, turning back to make sure she was following him. She picked up the other mug, the one she had ignored, the one still intact, and joined him as they walked back to the quarters assigned to them for the Tournament of Sources.

Right as they were about to part, Nya going to distract Lloyd and Zane slipping into the rooms to pack, Nya stopped Zane from walking away.

"Hey, why don't I look through those possible sightings of P.I.X.A.L. while you're tracking Jay down? And then, when you bring him back, we can compare theories," she offered.

Zane's eyes lit up, figuratively and literally, upon hearing those words. A grin stretched across his face as he asked, "Really?"

"Yeah, really. You were right — about everything," Nya said. "It's time we got everyone in the family back."

"Good," Zane replied, motioning for her to go lure Lloyd away from the Ninja's quarters, slipping away when she went to satisfy the request.

Ten minutes later, the elevator that brought people to and from the mountain ledge the City of Temples was situated on sped down to the mountain's base. Inside it stood a Nindroid, though you couldn't tell because he was using cloaking technology to appear human. Slung over one shoulder was a backpack filled with essential supplies, the other hand fingering a shuriken as he prepared for the worst of conditions on any roads he might take. He had changed into the mountain climbing gi Kai had designed for them before he...before he was trapped in the Nether-Space, watching the outside rush by as the elevator went down to ignore the memories. The breeze had kicked up in power, whispering as it blew past, carrying old leaves that rustled when they hit each other. Cool, pleasant, smelling faintly of jasmine, though it was barely detectable. Not like it had been at Wojira's Temple in the City.

The stars twinkled above, some still blotted out from the light of the glowing streets of the City of Temples. The few he could spot without any special features on his vision seemed to be tiring, getting ready to set. The trees swayed in the breeze, their trunks groaning slightly, becoming the mountain's rhythm. Joining it was the crashing of the water from the towering falls and the song of a nightingale. If he weren't in such a rush, he'd sit and listen to it. Master Wu would have enjoyed meditating to it.

P.I.X.A.L., Jay, and Master Wu...

All of them were still missing, and Zane would do whatever it took to get them back.

First things first, however, he scanned the area around the base of the mountain, looking for anything that would point him in Jay's direction. The light from the waxing gibbous moon would barely have been sufficient for human eyes, but despite his current appearance, Zane wasn't human. He picked up on the trail easily. All the better to find and bring Jay back.

All the better to save Jay from the shattered goodness of his soul.

Welp...I hope y'all enjoyed this!

Let me know what you think! Thanks for reading!