Chapter Text
The first thing Lloyd registered when he was dragged from the quietness of sleep was how warm he felt.
It wasn’t just the lack of cold metal virus throughout his body. It helped a ton, for that to be gone, but it wasn’t the only reason he felt warm. He could feel the sun shining above. He could feel his powers heating him from the inside. He could feel elemental warmth that wasn’t his own. Kai? Was Kai here?
At first, when he realized he was regaining consciousness, Lloyd wanted to protest. Let him sleep for once. Give him more time to not have to be responsible. But when he realized his brother was with him, he put effort into waking up.
The second thing he realized was how relaxed his body was. The warmth made his muscles feel like jelly. But it was also the careful fingers brushing through his hair, one of his favorite sensations that never failed to make him relax. He could immediately tell that it was Kai just from the heat radiating from his brother’s hands.
Then he heard voices above him, ones he thought he’d never hear again, talking quietly. He was still too out of it to tell what they were saying.
It would be nice to just relax in the sun with his siblings around him. But Lloyd needed to make sure. He needed to see for himself that the virus was gone and they were okay.
Plus, he was probably scaring them. He imagined that it wasn’t a pleasant feeling to find him collapsed on the roof and unresponsive.
He scrounged enough energy together to understand what the Ninja were talking about. Their mechs. Rebuilding. Navigating the new normal. Kai never stopped combing through his hair, gently and expertly picking through the many tangles that he’d gathered from all the chaos.
With a bit more effort, Lloyd forced his eyes open.
Sunlight immediately blinded him and they slammed closed again with a weak groan of protest from the young Ninja. His siblings’ voices suddenly rose with excitement and he felt Kai lift him a little higher off the ground. He was leaning back into his brother, totally supported by the other and still too relaxed and tired to move on his own.
A flash of cool fell over him and the light behind his eyelids dimmed. Lloyd took the opportunity to try looking around again. He was rewarded with the sight of an uninfected Nya blocking the sun with her body so it wasn’t blinding him.
“Thanks,” he mumbled.
Nya giggled breathlessly. “Good morning to you too!”
Lloyd smiled softly and turned his gaze to the others. Jay and Cole beamed at him. There was no metal left on either of them. Then he craned his neck up to see Kai and was met with a similar sight.
The virus was gone.
“Hey, buddy,” Kai whispered, smiling brightly like the others. “Good to see you awake. You’ve been out for an hour after we got here.”
Lloyd nodded. More than an hour made sense; he still felt exhausted to the bone. But it was better. So much better. It was like he’d found a part of himself that he never knew he needed. He felt whole in a way he never thought possible.
He could also sense the others. Not just because he could hear them. He felt their elements. Jay’s jumped and sparked with never-ending energy; Cole’s was quiet but steady; Kai’s was fierce and protective. Nya’s element was harder to detect, but he could feel its power and relentlessness.
But there was one very clearly missing. He could almost hear it calling for him from a good distance away.
“Where’s Zane?” Lloyd rasped. He struggled to sit up, his body protesting the movement. Weary muscles screamed in protest as he pushed them to let him sit. Kai helped, and they both knew he did most of the work.
“He’s still at the NGTV building,” Nya replied. “Pixal ran out of battery so he’s staying with her.”
Knowing that filled Lloyd with a sense of urgency. The Ice Ninja was probably fine, but what if the zombots hurt him, or Pixal? Unlike the others, when the infection instantly healed injuries, the nindroids could be damaged. He needed to go check on them.
Relying heavily on Kai, Lloyd managed to stand. He thought that walking (not running, finally!) might help him wake up a bit more, but he was wrong. The fatigue did not go away, nor did it feel like it would any time soon. In fact, it only seemed to get worse as he stood, even though the action took little energy from him.
He supposed that being awake for almost two days straight and spending half the time in a dead sprint would do that to a person.
Before they left, however, Lloyd suddenly turned towards Kai and threw his shaky arms around his brother as he buried his face in his shoulder. Kai didn’t waste a second returning the gesture, and it was nice to just stay like that for a few moments without worrying about the virus spreading faster. Although Kai had to basically hold him upright because Lloyd’s legs felt seconds away from giving out.
“I’m sorry,” Lloyd whispered.
“For what, green bean?” Kai asked quietly. Lloyd bit his lip at the nickname; it’d been too long since he’d earned it. He forgot how endearing it was.
“For yelling at you,” Lloyd replied, quiet enough for only Kai to hear. He knew his brother would understand what he was talking about. “You saved me.”
Kai was silent for a moment, and Lloyd feared that he wouldn’t be forgiven. After all, the outburst had been uncalled for and pointless. But then his brother squeezed him a little harder. “It’s okay. You were tired and stressed,” Kai murmured. Lloyd swallowed hard. That wasn’t really an excuse, but he didn’t have the energy to argue back. “I’m just glad you’re okay.”
Lloyd nodded in agreement as if the small action alone could express the deep gratefulness he felt that everyone was okay. He felt Kai’s hand move, and then suddenly there was a second set of arms around him, then another and another, until the whole team had piled around him.
Emotion bubbled up through Lloyd but he forced it down. He had to find Zane first, and his mom, then he could afford to let the emotions come through.
Taking the stairs to get down from the building was not an option in this state. The team, flanking close to Lloyd’s side, made a beeline for the elevators. On the inside of the box, Lloyd leaned against the wall and let his eyes close for the minute it would take to get to the bottom. He hoped no one could see how damp his lashes had become in their brief moment before.
“Don’t fall asleep, bud.” Kai gently shook him and Lloyd grimaced in protest. Of course he wasn’t going to, not with the incentive to see Zane. But Kai wouldn’t know that, not after he’d been passed out from exhaustion.
“’m awake,” he mumbled, cracking his eyes open a sliver just to prove he wasn’t asleep.
Jay gave him an odd look. “Why’re you so tired? We were all running a lot but we’re all fine.”
In a more alert state, Lloyd would’ve asked the same question. His siblings had pep to their step even after they suffered the same exertion Lloyd went through. But for him, it took effort to even lift his foot off the ground.
“Mm. Powers,” he guessed.
The confusion on Jay’s face melted away to understanding and he didn’t say anything else.
The Ninja pulled on their masks just as the elevator doors opened to a room full of people. With Lloyd’s hazy and fatigued mind, he saw silver and immediately assumed the worst.
Infected!
Fear shot through Lloyd and he staggered backwards, wrenching free of Kai’s grip with a protest from the older Ninja, and stared in horror at the crowd of people. Shiny faces, claws reaching out, everyone’s gone, one touch and he’s done for—
“Whoa, hey.” Cole slowly reached out for him. “The virus is gone.”
Lloyd blinked slowly and his gaze jumped from Cole to the crowd. The nearest people had turned to watch them with interest, but most hadn’t seen them yet as they hustled around. Any silver or metal he saw was simple jewelry or hair clips.
Okay, fine. They weren’t infected; but he still wasn’t safe. How could he have forgotten? The son of the city’s greatest enemy right inside the mayor’s tower. The one place he should never go. Even as powerful and fully-trained Ninja, the sheer number of people here would overpower them. And he was cornered in the elevator.
A hush fell over the crowd as they noticed the Ninja. Lloyd tried to vanish into the wall of the elevator. This couldn’t be real, it couldn’t be happening—
Cheers erupted.
The crowd swarmed the elevator and Lloyd came very close to panicking, breath gone from his lungs and fear paralyzing him. The other Ninja stepped forward and kept them away, but they weren’t being aggressive. They cheered and applauded and started taking pictures (which, thankfully, Kai stepped in front of him so cameras couldn’t reach him. He was a wreck and would prefer not to have his picture taken).
“What is happening,” he wheezed through the tightness in his chest.
“I think…” Kai seemed equally flabbergasted. “I think you’re a hero.”
What?
That couldn’t be right. The city hated him. He’d been their enemy before the virus and he’d done little to earn back their trust as it went on. At least, nothing to warrant this complete attitude reversal.
“Let us through!” Cole snapped, using his height to intimidate the nearest citizens into backing away. They slowly parted and made a path to the door. Kai and Nya glued themselves to Lloyd’s side while Cole led the way and Jay followed in the back. Lloyd tried to mask the fear in his expression, but it wasn’t hard. He was too stunned to be scared anymore.
“Thank you, Green Ninja!” Someone cried. Lloyd almost tripped but Kai caught his arm in time.
The cheer brought out more of its kind. They were thanking him. It was like they could tell he’d saved them despite having been zombots. It was like he’d never teamed up with his father or been possessed. Like before the city knew his name.
As the team made their way towards Zane’s location, the cheering continued. Cameras flashed in every direction and citizens ran over to them to express their gratitude. Lloyd could only manage a ghost of a smile. He still wasn’t sure this was real. Was he still unconscious on the tower, conjuring up the most vivid dream of his life?
“Look!” He heard someone cry from the sidewalk. “It’s the Legendary Green Ninja!”
His heart pounded. Legendary? Legendary? What? No—no he wasn’t—not after all his mistakes—
But the word had spread like wildfire, and the crowd screamed out for their Legendary Green Ninja.
“K-Kai,” Lloyd gasped, gripping his brother’s arm with all his remaining strength. Had he even been breathing for the past several minutes?
Kai simply grinned and ruffled his hair. Nya laughed and bumped her shoulder with Lloyd’s. “When you brought us back, we knew it was you,” she explained, confirming his half-fetched theory. “Almost like we could see you doing it. Everyone did.” The corners of her eyes crinkled with a big smile he couldn’t see under her mask.
He…wasn’t hated.
He wasn’t hated.
For the first time since before Morro, Lloyd felt like the Green Ninja again.
He managed to overcome the worst of his shock and started sending tiny waves to the crowd. Their cheers became painfully loud.
It wasn’t hard to find Zane and Pixal. Zane had used his powers to create a dome of ice over the two to keep the crowd—and the zombots, Lloyd guessed—from reaching them. Cole reached them first and raised his fist to knock on the ice so Zane could let them in.
A hole appeared before the knock ever landed. Zane smiled warmly at their arrival and beckoned for them to enter the half-sphere. He closed it behind them and Lloyd relaxed marginally now that there weren’t so many eyes on him.
He was about to ask how the nindroid had fared since he’d run off when he was suddenly engulfed in a tight embrace.
“I knew you could do it,” Zane breathed, and Lloyd laughed a little as he returned the hug. “Well done.”
“Couldn’t have done it without you,” Lloyd replied, his voice shaking. Oh, wonderful. Now he was getting emotional. At least it was out of sight from cameras?
Zane was the one to pull away. His expression turned serious. “Pixal and I are unharmed, but she ran out of battery.”
Jay stepped forward with lightning already dancing around his fingers. “I can—”
“No, I can.” Lloyd suddenly knew it with absolute certainty. He could feel energy humming in his heart where his powers lay. He took a shaky step closer to Pixal, who lay prone on the ground, looking quite peaceful for someone who went down fighting. “I-if that’s okay.”
Zane nodded and knelt next to him as he held shaking hands over Pixal’s body. He wished he could keep them steady, but he was too tired to try.
When he called for his powers, they readily responded. Green energy flowed into his fingers. Now that Lloyd wasn’t on the verge of being infected and the city wasn’t relying on him, he realized how beautiful the color was. Almost like an impossible shade of emerald.
He carefully let the energy spill from his hands into Pixal. He directed them to her power source and commanded them to charge her.
It didn’t take long. As soon as he shut off his powers, Pixal’s green eyes shot open and she surged upright.
Lloyd stood on shaky legs. Nya was there immediately to take some of his weight, which he was grateful for. Zane spoke to Pixal and updated her on the situation. She calmed down and sent a warm smile in Lloyd’s direction. He returned the gesture.
In the safety of the ice bubble, the Ninja began discussing what to do. They needed to help families reunite—being a zombot surely separated them—and to recover the remains of their mechs before they could be scrapped by people who should not have their tech. Zane figured that the press would come after them, demanding interviews.
“Let’s get you back to the base,” Nya spoke up suddenly, making Lloyd flinch in surprise, and it was only then that he realized he’d zoned out as fatigue crept back in. He nodded sleepily. “All that can wait until later. You need rest.”
Lloyd hated being coddled, but he couldn’t argue with his sister. He was desperate for a long and uninterrupted sleep.
The moment Zane destroyed the ice bubble, more cheers and cameras appeared from the crowd. Lloyd winced at the noise and flashing lights. How were they supposed to make it back to the warehouse without being followed by the paparazzi?
He didn’t have time to try and think of an answer when someone shoved their way forward and made a beeline for him.
“Mom!” With renewed energy, Lloyd left Nya’s support in favor of stepping closer to his mother. Her hug rivaled Zane’s in strength and she laughed joyously. “You’re okay!”
“Thanks to you,” she replied, still not letting go. “I’m so proud of you!”
Lloyd’s face flushed slightly, suddenly very aware of the many cameras around them. He craned his neck to meet his mother’s warm brown gaze. “I’m glad you’re not a zombie anymore.”
Koko laughed again. “It’s nice to be able to feel my hands again,” she agreed.
Someone in the crowd screeched in alarm. More shouts followed, getting closer, and the sea of people (too many people, too close, he didn’t like how close they were—) parted for the towering four-armed figure that pushed his way though.
“Dad,” Lloyd greeted in surprise. He pulled away from Koko and Nya took up her place again.
“Son,” Garmadon replied awkwardly. A hush had settled over the citizens as they watched, perhaps for the first time, Lloyd and Garmadon stand face-to-face.
Garmadon’s hands fidgeted. Lloyd found it amusing that his father would be the nervous one in this situation. “Good job unlocking your powers, La-Loyd,” he finally admitted.
“So I can use them to turn your mechs to dust?” Lloyd guessed with a wry smile.
Surprise flashed through him when Garmadon shrugged. “Maybe. If I’m bored.”
Lloyd’s eyes widened. Was his father trying to say that he wasn’t going to attack again? Would he finally stop threatening the city and making the Ninja’s lives ten times harder?
Without another word, Garmadon turned on heel and marched away. Lloyd watched him go in stunned silence. If his father was being honest, maybe…they wouldn’t have to fight. Maybe their jobs as Ninja could be a little easier. Maybe they could turn to average city crime rather than massive raids.
A few moments after the Oni disappeared, the paparazzi crowd swarmed the Ninja again.
Cole sighed and rolled his eyes. “I’ve had enough of this.” He stomped on the ground and created a tunnel down. He gestured to the hole before him. “Shall we?”
Kai was the first one to jump down so he could light up the tunnel. Zane and Pixal went next, then Nya helped Lloyd down and followed right behind. Jay hopped down after them and Cole went last, closing the tunnel above them so no one could follow.
It was so much quieter underground. Lloyd sighed in relief. He didn’t prefer the darkness, but with Kai’s fire and his powers resting idly, he knew they’d be safe. The tunnel was big, too, which meant it didn’t feel like he was trapped.
Cole brought them low enough in the ground to avoid any underground infrastructure. They navigated by his feel for the earth around them and walked in a straight line to the warehouse. He closed the tunnel behind them just in case.
“Why didn’t we do this before?” Lloyd suddenly asked in the otherwise-quiet tunnel. “Zombots couldn’t get us down here.”
Cole chuckled in dry amusement. “Would’ve been smart,” he agreed. “We were kinda preoccupied.”
The team shared a moment of humor and settled back into a comfortable silence. Lloyd struggled to stay awake for the latter half of the trip; the darkness and the quiet were soothing, bringing back the exhaustion from before. If anyone said something, he didn’t hear it through the persistent fog in his mind.
They began climbing upwards and soon reached the surface. Half-asleep and almost completely zoned out, Lloyd didn’t protest when Nya led him to the couch and helped him lay down without collapsing. She ruffled his hair and went to fetch a blanket.
Lloyd was on the verge of drifting off when a familiar face entered his vision.
He propped himself up and his mind cleared a little. “Uncle Wu!” He gasped. “You’re okay!”
Wu pushed him back down with a smile. “Yes, nephew, your powers reached quite far. Everywhere I went was cured.”
Lloyd’s brief energy faded again and he blinked sleepily. “’s good,” he mumbled, content.
His uncle squeezed his shoulder. “Rest. You have earned it.”
Lloyd didn’t need to be told twice. He sank into the void of sleep before Wu had pulled away.
Recovery took a few days of spending far more time asleep than awake. In his brief moments of clarity—awake and without a foggy mind, which were few and far between—Wu explained that unlocking his powers in such a run-down state had completely drained his body of energy, and he needed sleep to recover. Lloyd didn’t protest. He didn’t mind relaxing for a while, peaceful for the first time in a long time.
While he was resting, the Ninja were quick to clear up their broken mechs and drag the parts back to the warehouse. Some parts were mysteriously missing, but nothing too important, so they tried to not worry too much. Maybe it was just excited fans and not an underground criminal organization. Until a threat arose, they weren’t going to stress over it.
Pixal left to visit her father, but a day later, returned to the base, much to Zane’s excitement. She claimed that she would help with clean-up and recovery, then rejoin Borg in his office, but she didn’t specify how long that would be. She seemed content with them—specifically Zane—and Lloyd couldn’t blame her. He guessed it was nice for the nindroids to find someone similar to them when they’d previously thought they were one-of-a-kind. Interestingly, her battery seemed to drain much, much slower than before, as if Lloyd’s powers were a longer-lasting source of energy, or something in her had changed.
Once Lloyd had recovered most of his energy, he helped families recover and begin to process what had happened. He explained the situation to them in more detail than they’d known previously.
He also answered the press’s call for an interview, just as Zane had predicted. He only agreed to one, though, meaning they had all gathered when he arrived. He kept it as short as possible because the crowd still scared something deep inside him. No doubt a hidden scar he’d carry for a while because of the masses of zombots that had tried to kill him.
Days grew into weeks, and weeks stretched into months. The Ninja rebuilt their mechs and stayed mostly out of the cameras. Zane and Pixal set up an energy barrier surrounding the warehouse to keep the paparazzi out; it was only a matter of time before they really tried to find their secret base. Despite what she said originally, Pixal never left for more than a few days at a time.
The city entered an unprecedented time of peace.
With Garmadon silent since the virus, the Ninja were able to spread out over the city and stop or prevent regular crimes. But even those were rare. Lloyd was honestly grateful for the quiet. It gave him more time with his friends and his mother. He went back to school so he could at least finish his high school education, and that was a nightmare on its own. He wasn’t bullied anymore, but what faced him was almost worse.
So much attention.
His schoolmates turned out to be huge fans of the Legendary Green Ninja. They all wanted signatures. They wanted to see his powers (which he flat-out refused to do, those were too personal to just flaunt around). Worst of all, they wanted to be his friends, as if they were actually genuine and not seeking fame.
The other Ninja, who somehow, through all the chaos, had kept their identities secret, made it bearable. They surrounded him and kept the worst of the crowd away. He hadn’t liked touching people before, and after the virus it was worse, so they acted as a human shield around him.
Lloyd was barely sixteen, but he still had a couple of years to finish in school; he’d fallen behind after Morro and his brief villain stint. He hoped that the initial craze over his return would die down as the honeymoon phase wore off.
But he was happy. He was content. For the first time in his life, he felt like he belonged.
If only he knew just how far his powers had swept over the land. If only he knew that humans weren’t the only ones to sense him.
If only he knew about the restlessness brewing.