Chapter Text
“‘Once upon a time, there was a dragon of the o-can-’”
“Ocean,” Jiang Nya Smith corrected. “She was a dragon of the ocean.”
Their parents read this bedtime story to them enough times for the toddler to remember. Now her brother, Jiang Kai, attempted to read it as a way to show off that he now knew how to read. So the five year old claimed.
Kai, seated on the end of his sister’s bed, gave her a ticked expression from her interruption. He kept going anyway.
“‘ She was a gwar-dee-an to the water, and a sister to her brother gwar-dee-an. He was a dragon of land and watched over the pi-oh-pleh-’”
“People,” Nya corrected. She hugged her knees and leaned over to her brother, soft gray eyes lit up. “One dragon of the sea and one of the land. They’re not brother and sister though… not like you and I are.”
“Okay, are you gonna interrupt every time?” Kai asked, slightly annoyed.
“Only when you mess up reading,” Nya smirked.
“I’m a great reader,” Kai stated, a firm face when he said it. “Dad just read you this too many times.”
“What good is a story that’s been told already?” Nya asked, standing up on her bed. “I know the princess gets saved in the end.”
“Well what do you want me to read? We’re already up late.” Kai asked.
“You’re the one who said we could get a cookie.” Nya defended. She jumped on the bed and landed on her back, limbs spread around her bright red bedspread. “Mom and dad are gonna bust you when they get home.”
“I don’t think I should’ve done that…” Kai admitted, tossing the book on the bed.
Nya’s little bedroom is a mess, with all her animal plush toys scattered around the orange rug around the room. Some of those plush toys are hers, such as the squid and the whale, but there’s his lion plushie as well. Their parents weren’t home in the evening, but it wasn’t the first time it had happened. Their mom showed Kai how to make sandwiches whenever something like this occurred and they weren’t home. Then Kai and Nya both stole from the cookie jar when they shouldn’t have, and they were restless enough that they played in Nya’s room until midnight. They played with little samurai action figures that Kai got for the holiday, but Nya liked them a lot more. They’d both pretend to be heroes in the stories about powerful warriors who fought for Ninjago against the evil creatures like the squid and the lions.
Kai got out of bed and walked to the lava lamp on the small blue night stand, flicking it off. Now the only light was the little sea star night lights on the ceiling. He picked up the whale plushie to hand to Nya, ready to tuck her in bed.
However, she didn’t move for him to be able to do that.
“Kai?” She turned her head to him.
“Yeah?” He responded back.
“The dragons… they were lost in the cold…” Nya said. She sat up again, hugging herself in fear. “Where did they go?”
The story didn’t say. The story was about the gods in the dragons of land and sea, whose family dragons vanished before them and transformed into blizzards. The dragons only had each other then, and one freezing night, they climbed an island floating in the sky, and vanished. The blizzard was removed, but they were the gods after that.
Kai was so mad at that ending that he whined the whole night. Mom had to sing him to sleep to get his mind off of it. How could a story end like that? Without the dragons happy?
To that, their dad told them, “Not all stories have the ending you want, or what they want. But that’s how life works sometimes. It’s how you see it that counts.”
Nya questioned it, and was a little more shaken up when reminded of it.
So Kai decided to sit back down, a thought in his mind. “What if the dragons didn’t freeze?”
Nya looked at him in question.
“Change the story. They found warmth on the shore. A… a fire. Like in those camps.”
“A campfire? In the cold?” Nya didn’t know that logic, but it was her brother telling this new story.
“It’s a little fire sitting there waiting for someone to approach it and feel how warm it is-” Kai suddenly jumped on the bed and wrapped his arms around his sister, playfully tackling her on the pillows. “And wrap them up in a nice warm hug.”
“Ah-! Kai- let go! Let go!” She pleaded that, but she’s laughing.
Kai backed off, laying on the bed next to Nya as he continued his story. “The dragons didn’t freeze, because they had that fire. That’s when they called themselves brother and sister. They felt… a bond when they’re around that fire. Born or not, they’re family, and that campfire kept the family together. No matter the cold, it never went out. Even after the dragons disappeared… it never went out. It stayed there for anyone else who needed it.”
“And it stayed there? By itself?” Nya asked.
Her eyes were heavy now. Kai noticed and crawled out of bed, tucking his sister in the blankets. He lightly moved her smooth black bangs out of her face, and gave a soft smile. He assured her, “If it could, it would fight to get them back. There’s always something.”
There’s always someone out there fighting for you.
That was the last thing Nya could comprehend, as the weights on her eyes became too heavy to hold up. As she drifted into sleep, Kai watched, a warm fuzziness in his heart.
He gave a soft whisper, “Good night, Nya.”
Then he got up and left the room, losing the door behind him. Mom and dad would make them clean up the mess in the morning, when they came back.
Across the little hall was Kai’s room. Unlike Nya’s bed being in the middle of the back wall, his was in a corner, and his bedspread was a seafoam green. Nya had some samurai posters on her walls. He had posters of dragons and warriors on their backs. One in particular had a dragon breathing fire behind the fighter, who held a blue flame sword in might.
Ignacia upheld quite a bit of honor for soldiers like these. They were warriors who upheld honor and power to protect Ninjago from unjust forces. They were heroes.
Kai, gazing at the poster, picked up a toy staff and held it up, trying to replicate the hero. It was a poor imitation, and flimsy. He hit himself in the head with the staff.
He’d have to ask dad if he knew anything about these heroes during prayer. When they would be back. He wondered why they left. It must have been something important for them to leave without warning.
He climbed into his own bed, lighting himself a small night light that’s laid on the nightstand. It was so late at night. He should be able to sleep easily.
And yet he didn’t.
He stared into the blank beige ceiling for a good hour. There was a sense of anxiety bubbling up in him that he couldn’t shake off.
Where were mom and dad?
Maybe he’s overthinking it. This has happened before. They always came back. They’d be back by morning. He’ll see them.
He got about ten minutes of sleep.
He never heard the door open the entire night.
He felt sick. Frozen stiff. Maybe it was the sugar causing fatigue. Somehow, he’s able to hold up eyelids that feel like tons.
The sun is gleaming through the window, lighting up the bedroom. The benefit of having the room at the front was that he got natural lighting, and a view of the hills of rice farms.
Nya would wake up soon, if it wasn’t already far later than what they’re used to waking up at.
Kai laid in bed, waiting to hear the front door of the shop open and for dad to announce, “We’re home!” Then they’d find their kids had slept in, cookies were missing, and they’d be punished with cleaning up their rooms.
Kai hated cleaning, but now he wanted to do it if it meant mom and dad would come back.
So he waited.
He waited until he could safely say another hour passed.
Nothing.
He was getting scared. His heart was racing too fast for comfort. He was definitely getting sick.
“Mom?!” He finally cried out. He didn’t care if he woke up Nya at this point. “Dad?!”
No answer.
“Mom?! Dad?!”
Again, nothing.
Dead silence had never been so terrifying.
Kai climbed out of bed, fast enough that he fell onto the floor. He didn’t care with all the panic he was feeling. He was shaking in his fear. He had to find them. He had to search for them. Maybe he didn’t hear it. Yeah, that’s it, it’s his fault. There’s no reason to panic.
Their entire home was upstairs, with the blacksmith shop on the first floor. The end of the hallway had an open space kitchen and living room, with a slide door in the corner that was their parent’s bedroom.
They’re asleep. They’re here.
Kai, as a kid, could barely slide the heavy wood door open with his weak flimsy arms. He keeps screaming, “Mom! Dad! Wake up! Please wake up!”
After a massive strain, the door flew open, slamming into the wall and shaking the whole building.
The kid’s mahogany eyes shrunk, and his face darkened.
It’s a small room, with two tower drawers on each side of the master bed that had a cherry blossom patterned blanket.
It’s empty.
All the boy could do was scream at the top of his lungs.
“Kai?”
He didn’t hear Nya’s voice calling out in question. He’s storming out of the room, down the hall and down the stairs. His heart was too fast for him to slow down, his blood felt like it was sparking a painful rise in temperature, and from there, his vision was blurred. He kept screaming, “MOM!! DAD!!! STOP HIDING!!!! DAD!!! DADDY COME HERE!!!”
He tripped on the last step down to the shop. The scrape on his knee didn’t cross his mind.
The shop was empty.
He kept screaming.
Nya waddled towards the top of the steps, seeing for herself just how panicked her brother was. What was sparking this? Why was he screaming for mom and dad? Why was it scaring her?
“Kai?!” She tried to call out to him to get him to stop. He didn’t stop. He ran out to the front yard. “Kai, are you ok-?” Nya’s now stumbling down the stairs, well, climbing down them with the stumps she called legs.
Kai kept screaming, no more words at this point. He kept running around the front yard, desperate to find someone, anyone.
He tripped down the hill again, tumbling to a lantern post.
He stayed there, scratched up. He couldn’t move at this point. Everything felt dizzy. A blur. All he could hear was his own heart.
“Kai?! Kai! What’s wrong? Are you hurt?” A few minutes later, Nya was in front of him, trying to talk to him. “Say something!”
He didn’t. He couldn’t notice her.
The panic on her brother’s face was all too much for the three year old. It was rubbing off on her, as large tears started falling off her eyes. “Kai, stop… talk to me…”
She hugged her brother’s chest, holding onto him. She could feel how hard his body was thumping in place. She cried on him, clinging to her brother.
It took a long time, but the soothing hug began to rub on Kai, slowing down his thoughts and calming down his body.
He could see his sister, a small child, clinging onto him, tugging at his teal pajama shirt, crying.
It all became a core memory from there.
He could remember every cloud in the sky to this day. Every fleck of jade green grass on the hill. Every bed hair on his sister’s head. Every tear she shed. Every wrinkle on her maroon pajama shirt. The chill of the morning air made them both shiver.
Suddenly, all the panic became numb for Kai. Nothing else mattered at that moment besides his cold, crying sister.
What used to be a panicking heart felt… warm. Warmer than usual.
He couldn’t see, but there was a small tint of orange in his eyes. What he could see was the orange glow coming from his palms. His whole body felt warm, like a campfire.
He placed his glowing hand on Nya’s back. She jolted up a little in shock, but after a second she started to hug him tighter. Whatever this was, she liked it.
He held her close, rocking her in his lap, letting her be embraced in a sense of warm comfort.
Nya was too young to remember a lot of things back then, unless Kai told her about it. But she distinctly remembered this moment, the first time she was embraced by the warmth of a young elemental.
She also remembered when she asked, “Kai… where’s mommy and daddy?”
She wished she never said that. It made all of that heat vanish at once, the tint in her brother’s eyes vanishing.
Then he started crying, being the one clinging onto her now.
He didn’t know where they were. No one knew. They just… vanished.
Did they leave?
Did they leave them?
Did they do something wrong?
Most of Kai’s cries weren’t words, but she swore she heard him ask, mid sob, “Why did they leave us…?”
They stayed like that for a good while. The store was closed, so nobody would come up to their house today. It was just them, until hunger took over their minds.
Nya didn’t get to say a word, as Kai suddenly stood up, picking her up to carry her back to the shop.
It was a stoic, lifeless, “Come on. There’s cereal in the kitchen. Let’s get something to eat.”
There wasn’t a child with big emotions in that face. It was an expression from someone much older.
Maybe it was then Nya realized that not only were her parents gone, but so was the youth of her brother.
For Kai, it was one look at the shop. One straight, narrowed, determined look.