Chapter Text
The late afternoon sun shone down on the decks of Destiny’s Bounty , reflecting its orange rays off the shining silver of a training dummy’s weapons. Cole bobbed and weaved his way through its attacks, expertly avoiding each hit that came his way. Years of training could only go so far though, as the machine did one of its “random” attacks and sent a blunt-but-still-painful mace into his side. Cole fell rear-first onto the sun-bleached wood. With a short whir, the machine powered down. Groaning, Cole clutched his side.
“About three minutes that time!” Kai called, waving a stopwatch in the air. “You beat your record by five seconds.”
“Great,” Cole grumbled. “That thing got me good though.”
“Take a break, let me have a go at it.” Kai cracked his knuckles and walked over, offering a hand which Cole gladly took.
“Alright. I’m gonna go see what Nya’s up to in the control room.”
“Have fun!” Kai called as Cole walked off. He trekked up the short staircase to enter the Bounty’s control room, greeted by the familiar sound of Nya fiddling with the wires of a new upgrade. It’d become her obsession over the summer, now carrying them into winter. Every time Cole saw her, she was working on some addition to the Bounty’s control room. A new scanner, a new sensor, even a new cappuccino machine. It wasn’t clear why the urge to build had taken her over, but Cole guessed it had to do with her new status as the water ninja and being unable to work on her Samurai X gear anymore. When he asked her about it, though, she just made an offhand comment about “idle hands, idle mind.”
“Whatcha workin’ on, waterlily?”
She looked up, making a point of rolling her eyes at the pet name. Cole knew she didn’t mind, she just liked to give him shit. “I’m getting a new alarm going. It’ll alert us when there’s odd topographical anomalies.”
“Uh… non-smart speak?”
“Topography just means the shape of the ground. Like if there’s a sinkhole, we’ll know immediately and be able to go help.” Nya sighed and pushed away from the mechanical guts of the ship, standing and stretching her arms above her head. “Issue being, I dunno how exactly to test it. I’m worried it won’t be sensitive enough.”
“Well, if there’s a sinkhole, I think we’ll realize pretty quick,” Cole said, offering her a smile. She sighed, moving her arms behind her back and pulling her shoulder blades together.
“Yeah, if the alarm doesn’t go off I’ll just have to reprogram it.”
Cole wandered around, looking at the other various stations in the bounty. Each of the large screens mounted to the walls was covered in displays and data Cole didn’t understand. His eyes wandered, trying to take it all in. How anyone but Nya manned this ship, he would never understand.
She appeared beside him, immediately guessing what he was trying to do. She pointed at a group of graphs in the lower right corner. “Those are measuring current cloud, sea, and wind patterns. Making sure there’s no possible weather events.”
“You really got everything figured out, huh?”
“Yeah, well--” Nya’s response was cut short by the screaming of a siren over the Bounty’s speakers. Cole clapped his hands over his ears as Nya ran back to her wires. Her fingers flew over a group of buttons, but the alarm continued to sound. He could barely hear Nya curse over the noise. Now, she was digging through the wirey guts of her machine, trying anything to make it stop.
The door flew open and the rest of the ninja poured in, all covering their ears.
“Nya? What is that?”
“Alarm system! I must’ve made it too sensitive!” Nya groaned in frustration.
“Turn it off!” Kai whimpered. “First Master, did you have to make it so loud?”
Jay pushed through from the back. His eyes were wild, his curls rising from his scalp and into the air. Electricity buzzed and crackled around him. He raised his arms. Quickly, Nya jumped out of the way as bolts of blue electricity shot out from Jay’s hands, frying the box. Unfortunately, it also fried that entire section. At least, Cole guessed it was fried, since the monitor above it shut off completely and was… smoking?
Jay stared, a look of shock and horror on his face. “I- I’m sorry.” He started to back out of the room.
Nya called out, “Jay, wait-” but he turned tail and ran before she could finish. Silence fell, with the other three staring at Nya. She huffed in frustration. “Unless any of you know how to deal with an entirely short-circuited system, go back to training. I’ve got this.”
Kai shook his head and left, knowing that any attempt he made to help would likely make things worse. Zane followed after him after a moment’s hesitation. However, Cole stayed behind. He turned to Nya, who was already diagnosing the damage done to her system, scowling at the expanse of fried wires. She glanced at him. “Something up?”
Cole drew in a breath, thinking of how best to phrase what he said next. “Has Jay been… more aggressive than normal lately?”
Nya paused. “What do you mean?”
“I mean like right now. Normally, he might try to help you shut it off, or make a snarky remark, or even just… I dunno. But he wouldn't shock the whole system without warning you.” He crossed his arms and sighed. His shoulders slumped as he exhaled. “It's been like this for months. He's changed. You have, too. I know there's something you're not telling the rest of us, and you don't have to, it's just that… I'm worried.”
Nya was silent, tapping her fingers. “Listen, I get it. I know we’ve both been off. I’ve been adjusting to my new role and Jay… just has some stuff on his mind.”
She was a terrible liar. Cole knew damn well there was more to this than that. Still, he did say Nya didn’t have to tell him, he figured he could work with what she gave. “What’s on his mind?”
Another long pause. Nya fiddled with her wires, not doing much apart from nudging them around. “He’s got some worries about you guys. He… I dunno how to put it.” She set the wires down and spun her chair to face Cole. He noticed the bags weighing under her eyes now. Dark, deep-set rings betraying how little she’d slept lately. “To be honest, he barely talks to me about it.” She ran a hand through her dark hair. She’d grown it out over the past few months, so instead of it ending right below her ears it reached her shoulders. It was a nice look for her, though an odd one. Before, she always said short hair was more practical when she was fighting. “… I don’t think he trusts me with whatever he’s thinking about. He won’t really talk to me about it.”
“Do you know why?”
She shrugged. “No clue. I wish… I want him to talk to me, but he won't. Things have been weird since all that stuff… with the magazine and the paparazzi, y'know?”
Wincing, Cole nodded. Yeah, they were never doing a TV show again. The whole thing was more stress than it was worth.
“Maybe you should try.”
The suggestion brought Cole out of his thoughts. “What do you mean?”
“Try talking to him. You guys are close, maybe… maybe he'd trust you more.”
Cole chewed his lip. “Are you sure?”
“You two have been on good terms since the Tournament, right? I know…” She sighed. “I know it got rough again, but it's worth a shot. Out of all of us, I think you're the best at trying to understand what he's going through.”
He shuffled from foot to foot. Deep down, he knew Nya was right. He just didn’t know where to start. What if Jay’s distance extended to him? He was pushing Nya away, why wouldn’t he push Cole away? Still, if this was their best option….
“Alright, I’ll give it a shot and report back.”
“Thank you… hey, Cole?” Nya called just as he reached the door.
“Yeah?”
“I’m glad you’re here.”
He smiled. “Me too, waterlily.”