Work Text:
Kai shouldn’t be up, he knew that, but he couldn’t seem to fall asleep either. Which was, admittedly, a huge problem given he had about four hours left to sleep, and training in the morning. However hard he tried though, he always ended up in the same place. Staring at the ceiling, digging his nails into his palms, listening to the ticking sound coming from… somewhere. He hadn’t been able to figure out where. Did they have a clock like that?
...Zane?
In any case, it was annoying. He tried to focus on the hum of electricity in the walls. The occasional drip of a faucet somewhere. The slight pain on his palms. Literally anything but the ticking noise. As he did that, he heard different noises from another room. Unmistakably, someone getting out of bed. He listened to a bit of the floorboards creaking before he realized how early it was. Who was awake? In theory, it could be Wu, but at the same time, he knew Lloyd was here.
And he trusted Lloyd, he did! Mostly. The kid was impressionable, and he grew up in a pretty bad environment. Obviously, he wasn’t evil, but, to rule out any form of backstabbing would be stupid. So Kai swung his feet over the side of the bed, and got up, making as little noise as possible. Still, the floorboards creaked a little, but what can you do? Not like he was a ninja or anything.
Lloyd’s light wasn’t on, but the noise definitely seemed like it was from there. So he crept towards the room. Knocking was… thought about. For a second. But if the kid was up to something sinister he didn’t want to give him time to cover it up. So just opening the door, rational course of action. He took a deep breath, and turned the doorknob, opening it to what appeared to be Lloyd Garmadon, sitting on the floor with his head buried into his knees. Shit.
Lloyd looked up, clearly he had been about to cry or something. Kai shifted his weight from one foot to another nervously.
“I was just- I heard you get up,” he said, quietly, so as not to wake anyone else. The kid just kind of stared at him. His hair was matted to his forehead, He looked rattled.
“Y’okay dude?” Kai asked. “Should I get sensei or…?”
“...Don’t,” Lloyd finally said. “He’ll just- look it doesn’t-” He took a shaky breath and calmed down a bit. “Just leave me alone.”
Kai furrowed his brow. He distrusted Lloyd a bit, and sure, he didn’t have the greatest attitude, but the kid looked seriously distressed. No way he was gonna feel alright leaving right now. “Hey, whoa, no need for the hostility. I’m not gonna get sensei if you don’t want me to. It’s just that… ” he trailed off. He really didn’t wanna say ‘I’m worried about you’ or anything of the like. Because he wasn’t worried. It would be mean to lie about that. “I’m making sure you don’t run away or something.”
“I can’t even sleep unsupervised?” Lloyd scoffed.
“It’s for your own protection,” Kai answered. “I don’t mistrust you, I’m just a careful person.”
“Cole said you ate a marshmallow that was still on fire once.”
Kai raised his eyebrows. “I’m sorry he said wh-” He lowered his voice, realizing it had gotten way too loud. “He said what?”
Lloyd stayed silent.
“That’s not even true- okay, it’s not relevant. Look. I’m just trying to help. Clearly, I’m not the person to do it, so maybe I should get sensei.” He probably shouldn’t have felt too good about threatening Lloyd with Sensei Wu’s wrath, but, really, that was just a daily occurence with the other ninja so if anything, this was inclusion.
“I’m fine . He’s only gonna make me go back to sleep, and it’s none of your business anyway so can you please just. Go away.” He sounded exhausted more than angry. Which was a little jarring to hear from someone his age. Kai sighed, and tried to relax his tone of voice a little bit.
“Come on. Get a coat or something,” he said.
“What?”
“A coat,” Kai repeated. “Get one. We’re gonna go for a walk.”
“But-” Lloyd tried to protest. Kai cut him off.
“I’m serious. I won’t tell Wu anything, and if you don’t want to go back to bed, a walk is the opposite of that. Clearly you’re restless, let’s go.” he turned around and started to walk away from the room, before turning back to shoot Lloyd a look. “I’m assuming your legs work.”
Wordlessly, Lloyd got up and followed Kai towards an exit, grabbing a sweater from his closet as he passed it. It wasn’t his, but not a lot of the clothes in his room were. They both made their way outside, without saying a word most of the time.
“What’s the point of a walk?” Lloyd asked when they got outdoors.
“Fresh air I guess,” Kai shrugged. “Zane always does it when he’s having some sort of identity crisis. There’s gotta be something to it.”
They walked in silence for a bit, mostly listening to the sounds of crickets. Eventually, Kai spoke.
“It was nightmares, right?” he pulled at the edge of his sleeves. Telling Lloyd to bring a jacket and not doing so himself might make it into his stupid moments compilation of the week. “That’s why you woke up.”
“Yeah,” Lloyd said softly. “I guess.”
“What were they about?” Kai asked. He was greeted with a loud silence from Lloyd. Alright, kid didn’t wanna talk about it. He really did wonder, though, what Lloyd had nightmares about. He’d definitely had a weird life so far. Snakes? Probably snakes.
There was another pause of pretty awkward silence, save for the whistling of the wind. Kai suddenly became aware he was pressing his nails into his palms again. He consciously uncurled his hand and tried to keep them flat. “Have you been having a lot of them?” he tried.
Lloyd simply nodded.
“Every week, every night…?” Kai asked.
“Every night.” Lloyd said. It seemed like he was trying to shrink in on himself, based on his posture and the way he spoke.
Kai exhaled sharply. He wouldn’t say he was worried. He wasn’t, but he felt bad. As much as he disliked it, Lloyd reminded him a tiny bit of himself sometimes. Mostly a younger version of himself. He’d changed a lot since he first joined the ninja. Still, the sympathy was there. Against his better judgment, he decided to try something.
“I used to have nightmares,” Kai said. Lloyd stopped walking.
“You did?”
“Yeah,” he stopped walking as well. “Uh… mostly when I first got here. Every night, too. Just like yours.” he once again took his nails out of his palms. He really had to kick that habit.
“And they went away?” Lloyd asked. His posture straightened a little.
“Well,” Kai started, “not… entirely. I still have them sometimes, but they’re bearable. You get used to them. And it’s not every night.”
“What were they about?” Lloyd asked.
Kai stopped himself from commenting on Lloyd’s refusing to answer that question earlier. He paused for a second, trying to decide whether he wanted to talk about it. “My sister. Most of them, anyway.” He decided to leave out a good category of the nightmares, the ones about things he definitely wasn’t getting intowith a child. “They’d always just be about her. Missing, or hurt, or… ” He trailed off. “And I couldn’t ever stop it y’know? It was always my fault in some way or another.”
Lloyd looked at the ground. “I’m sorry.”
He probably shouldn’t have said that much. “It’s fine,” he said. “Like I said, they’ve stopped now.”
“How?” Lloyd asked, quietly. Kai almost didn’t hear him.
“Huh?”
“How did you… stop them?” Lloyd dragged his feet through the dirt, making shapes and then erasing them.
“Oh.” Kai breathed. “I don’t know, really. Nya can handle herself, I know that better now. And I guess, I just got used to things being like they are. It stops being scary or dangerous once you’ve been here for a bit.”
“Mine’ll stop, then?” Lloyd asked.
“Yeah. Don’t worry about it. I’m sure they will.” Kai said.
“Promise?” Lloyd kicked a rock.
That took Kai off guard. “Uh, yeah. Yeah. Promise they’ll go away.”
Lloyd gave him a look, one that said he was thoroughly unconvinced. Fair. “No, I mean that. They’ll go away eventually.”
Lloyd was quiet. Eventually, he looked up from the ground. “Okay. It’s cold.”
“Yeah,” Kai agreed. “Tell me about it.”
When they got back, they snuck in as quietly as possible. They tiptoed through the hallway, and back to Lloyd’s room. Kai prayed to several gods Wu hadn’t heard them, because explaining to your sensei why you took the green ninja for a walk at two in the morning, especially when said green ninja is Garmadon’s kid, isn’t easy.
Lloyd hung the sweater back up, and turned back towards Kai. “Uh… Kai?”
“Yep! Yeah?” he said, startled out of his thoughts.
“Thanks.”
“Hm?”
“For- for saying to bring a coat. I didn’t freeze. So-” he looked down at his feet again.
“Right,” Kai said. “Coat. Okay. Well, goodnight.”
“Goodnight!” Lloyd said quickly, shutting the door on Kai.
He took a deep breath in and out, before walking back to where he’d been sleeping. The ticking noise came back into his notice as he sat down on his bed. Everyone else was as asleep as they’d been when he left. He laid down and looked at the ceiling. He dug his nails into his palms, and the ticking noise faded into the sound of electricity humming, crickets, and the occasional dripping of a faucet. Somewhere. He couldn’t tell where.