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English
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Part 1 of A Living Nightmare
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Published:
2024-12-06
Completed:
2024-12-07
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3,076
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2/2
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Precursor to a Nightmare

Summary:

Possession AU situation. This is just a short scene in which Morro-possessed Lloyd was threatening Nya's life, successfully inciting Kai to instinctively protect her against him... by stabbing Lloyd with his sword.

Notes:

Russian translation available here!

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Chapter 1: The Most Terrible Thing

Notes:

This is literally just the immediate aftermath of the stabbing, I couldn't really think of a situation where Kai wouldn't have any other option but to use his sword on Lloyd to stop him, so I'm just skipping right to the angst.

CW: stabbing, bleeding

Chapter Text

There was a squelching, crunching sound as Kai felt his sword spear through something. Something made of flesh and bone. Behind him, Nya made a sound that was half-gasp, half scream.

Kai opened his eyes, his heart beating a terribly painful tattoo against his ribcage. More terrified than he’d ever been in his entire life – including the prior few seconds when he’d thought his sister’s life would be brutally snuffed out – Kai relented to the sight he knew would greet him; that of Lloyd, his little brother, the one he'd promised to look after, caught on the blade of his sword like a shish kebab.

Lloyd’s mouth contorted into a devilish, bloody grin. “Atta boy,” taunted Morro.

Then he coughed up more blood, and suddenly Lloyd’s face went slack, the dark shadows around his eyes fading away, quickly replaced by a double stream of tears that spilled silently from their corners. His hair brightened back to its usual blonde in almost the same instant. For a moment that seemed to stretch into eternity, Nya and Kai could see complete awareness in Lloyd’s face as he stared down at them, their first time seeing his own true gaze in weeks. It was him – the way he was looking at them both, the unreserved love underlying the pain and sorrow in his eyes, was in such stark contrast to the leering malice that had plagued them all this time.

 Then his head slumped forward, his body keeled backward, and with a sickeningly slick sound, he slid off Kai’s sword and crumpled to the ground.

“LLOYD!” screamed Nya. She pushed past Kai and fell to her knees beside Lloyd, shoving her hands against the gaping wound in his stomach. “No no no no no!”

Kai, still gripping his sword, staring at the blood staining the blade – Lloyd’s blood, this went through Lloyd, I stabbed LLOYD – broke through his shock enough to reach up to the com in his ear. “Zane!” he shouted – partly out of fear, partly to drown out Nya’s desperate cries for Lloyd to stay with her, stay with her, to keep his eyes open and look at her. “Zane, call an ambulance to our location NOW! Lloyd’s down, he’s-” He swallowed. “He needs help NOW, do you understand?”

“Affirmative,” came Zane’s voice in his ear, and though it was low and composed, Kai could hear the grimness underneath.

He was still holding the sword. He flung it to the floor. Then he stumbled over to Nya and dropped down on all fours beside Lloyd’s head. Lloyd’s eyes were open, albeit dull and heavily lidded, and they found Kai’s face as he bent over him.

“Lloyd, Lloyd please,” Kai muttered frantically, taking Lloyd’s face in his hands. “Please please please hang on… help is coming, okay? You just have to hang on.”

Nya was sobbing beside him, but her hands never slackened in their press against Lloyd’s stomach, her tears spilling onto them and mixing with his blood. “Lloyd, please,” she bawled.

Lloyd’s faraway gaze slid aside, unseeing and fuzzy. His breath wheezed from his bleeding mouth, and his eyelids started to droop closed. Kai shook Lloyd’s head between his hands. “NO Lloyd! Stay awake, stay awake!” His vision blurred as his own tears welled up, obscuring the sight of Lloyd’s eyes shutting completely. He swiped the hair from his face, his hands slicking the blood from Lloyd’s chin across his cheeks. “Lloyd please, please don’t die, don’t die, please, no-”

“Kai! Nya!”

Neither of them looked up as Zane came barreling towards them, followed closely by Cole and Jay. All three stopped short when they saw Lloyd on the floor.

“Lloyd…” choked out Cole.

“Where’s the ambulance, Zane?!” Kai yelled, still holding Lloyd’s head, not taking his eyes off of him. He’s not breathing, he’s stopped breathing, why isn’t he breathing??-

“It’s on its way, Kai,” Zane answered, putting a hand on his shoulder and squeezing it tightly.

No sooner had he spoken than they could hear the unmistakable sound of a warbling siren in the distance, rapidly increasing in volume.

“Lloyd… Lloyd.” Kai was a complete mess by this point, his breath uneven, his cheeks damp. Distantly he felt another pair of hands gently but firmly take his wrists, pulling his own hands from Lloyd’s head. Yet a third pair gripped him by his shoulders and dragged him back, away from the boy on the floor, as some figures in white came into view, crouching by Lloyd and speaking to Nya in urgent voices.

Kai was engulfed on all sides by the arms of his brothers, both comforting him and restraining him from reaching back towards the youngest of them. He watched helplessly, through a haze of mist, as the paramedics worked over Lloyd, cutting him open (his clothes, just his clothes, thought Kai dully, it’s too bad about that green gi…), attaching things to him, needles connected to tubes and wires connected to a machine, which made a whirring sound like a camera about to snap a shot, and when the shot came Lloyd’s chest jolted upward and sank back down, his head lolling to the side, his eyes still closed.

“Please, no…” Kai sobbed. Jay hugged his arm even tighter.

The machine whirred again, and Lloyd once more spasmed against the floor as electricity passed through him.

One of the paramedics bent his ear against Lloyd’s mouth. “Still nothing,” he said.

“Oh Lloyd, please,” choked Nya. She’d been pulled back by another paramedic. Her palms were strikingly scarlet in the ambulance’s headlights.

Abruptly, Jay let go of Kai and disappeared from his side. He half ran, half crawled towards Lloyd, and before anyone could stop him, brought both fists down onto Lloyd’s chest. The crackle of electricity bursting from his hands was clearly audible, and Lloyd was even illuminated briefly in the moment of impact.

His eyes flew open as he gasped. Then he sank back down as though dead once more.

The paramedic at his side bent over him again. “He’s breathing.”

“We've got a pulse as well,” said another, crouched by Lloyd's abdomen, where she’d covered his wound and already stuck an IV needle in his wrist. “But he's lost a lot of blood. Any of you a match?” She directed the question at the ninja, all of whom were in various states of shellshock.

Nya recovered first. “Me,” she said. She pulled away from the paramedic that had been holding her. “Take as much as he needs. Please just… save him.” 

“We’ll do our best,” said the woman gently. “You're coming with us. Looks like you might need some medical attention yourself,” she added, gesturing to Nya’s face, which still sported the large bruise that Lloyd – Morro – had given her when he'd knocked her out.

As the other medics loaded Lloyd into the ambulance, Nya ran back to Kai and hugged him tightly, dislodging Cole and Zane. “It's not your fault,” she whispered. “Please don't blame yourself.”

Before Kai could think of what to say or even return the hug, she’d let him go and run back to the ambulance.

“I will ask them which hospital they're taking him to,” said Zane quietly, hurrying after her before the doors closed. As he passed by Jay, who hadn't moved from his place on the floor since he'd shocked Lloyd’s heart back to life, he patted the back of his head. Jay put his face in his hands.

Cole was now the only one left with Kai, holding him around the shoulders, practically keeping him sitting upright, as Kai had entirely lost all energy in his body. He sank into Cole's hold, clasping his hands together to stop them shaking.

Cole rubbed his arms, as though trying to warm him up. “He’ll make it, Kai,” he murmured. “He'll be fine.”

Kai shook his head. “How… How could I…”

“What?”

He couldn't say it out loud. He couldn't put what should've been the impossible into words. He couldn't bear what the others would think if he confessed this most terrible thing.

Zane returned to them, tugging Jay along by the sleeve. “We should go tell Master Wu and Misako, quickly,” he said. “Then we can all go together.”

Cole helped Kai to his feet, then darted to pick up his discarded sword. As he lifted it up to the moonlight his hand slowed, giving him, and Zane and Jay, time to process the fact that it was coated practically to the hilt in dark blood.

Wordlessly he slipped it into its sheath on Kai’s back.

“Come on, Kai,” he said quietly, squeezing his shoulders. “Let’s get out of here.”

No one spoke again the entire way back to the tea shop.

Chapter 2: Safe and Loved

Summary:

Hospital visit scene. Just a lot of stewing, self-blame, and platonic comfort touching because I love physical affection so much.

Chapter Text

There was a blanket folded over the back of one of the visitor’s chairs. Kai took it and draped it around Nya’s shoulders. She hardly stirred, merely burying her nose further into her folded arms.

Kai pulled up the chair as quietly as he could to the other side of the bed and sat down with a sigh. He could hardly bear to look at Lloyd, but he forced himself to.

The boy looked so small, almost malnourished – Zane had noted that Morro likely hadn't felt the need to eat in the time he'd been possessing Lloyd – having been stripped of his armor and gi and put in a flimsy hospital gown. A needle and IV drip was taped to his wrist, a small oxygen mask was strapped over his mouth and nose, and wires hooked up to a steadily beeping heart monitor twisted through his sleeves. There were dark shadows under his eyes, though thankfully not the unnatural kind that had been present while Morro had taken over.

Kai had no idea if Morro had truly gone for good, if he was just biding his time inside Lloyd before resurfacing, or if he too were simply unconscious from the injury. And at the moment, Kai truly didn't care. The only thought that consumed him was the same ever since he'd first felt his sword run through Morro – Lloyd’s – body. He didn't think he would ever be able to forget that sensation. Even now it sent pain shooting through the nerves of his hands to think about it, and goosebumps crawled up his arms. He clasped his hands together, squeezing the feeling from his fingers until they went numb.

Raising his bunched hands, Kai leaned his elbows on the edge of Lloyd's bed and pressed his forehead to his fists. Had someone entered the room at that moment, they might have thought he was praying.

“Lloyd…” he finally said, his voice low. “I’m so sorry. I promised I’d look after you. I should have been able to stop Morro without hurting you. If you…” His voice caught in his throat. He took a shuddering breath. “If you’d died I would never, ever forgive myself. Neither would Nya.” He looked sadly across the bed at her. “In fact I’m pretty sure she doesn’t forgive me now.”

Giving blood had exhausted Nya, but she'd refused to leave Lloyd's room after he'd come out of surgery. Aside from some quick, tired assurances that Lloyd's condition was stable according to the doctors, she hadn't said a word to Kai the whole time he'd been at the hospital. Granted her attention had been mostly kept by Misako (someone else whom Kai knew definitely wouldn't forgive him), who of course had wanted to know exactly what happened. Regardless, Kai couldn't imagine that Nya wasn't mad at him for stepping in the way he'd done, needlessly hurting Lloyd the way he'd done, for her sake, when she probably could've protected herself without him. Hadn't she proved, time and time again, that she wasn't the helpless little sister who needed him to save her from every danger? Was she not now a ninja, an elemental master even, of just the same caliber as he and the others were? Why had he allowed Morro to taunt him like that, to use his stupid older brother pride so easily?’

And this was not even to speak of what Lloyd would have to say about the whole thing when… if he woke up.

“And it’s okay if you don’t either,” Kai continued, his voice becoming thick as he fought to keep control of himself. “No matter what the circumstances, I never should have hurt you… If I were stronger I would’ve been able to save you that first day Morro showed up, without getting anyone else in danger.” He bent his head over Lloyd's limp hand lying on top of the blankets, succumbing to the tears. “But I’m not. I’m just a weak, stupid kid. And I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”

He was crying freely now, holding Lloyd's hand in both of his. It wasn't because he was scared of Lloyd not waking up, though there was a small fear of that buried in him that he refused to entertain. What he mourned, what he knew had been broken beyond repair, was the trust Lloyd had placed in him, and the trust he'd had in himself, that he would protect the green ninja, that he wouldn't let anything happen to him. How would Lloyd ever count on him again after this?

And could he ever look at Kai again and not immediately remember what he'd done to him?

Just then, Kai felt the hand he was holding twitch. He held his breath and stared at it.

Very deliberately, Lloyd's pale fingers curled around Kai’s slightly darker ones. Kai looked up at Lloyd's face.

“Lloyd? Buddy?”

Lloyd's eyes slowly blinked open.

“Kai…” came his muffled voice under the mask.

Kai gave a short, involuntary laugh. He practically climbed onto the bed beside Lloyd, mindful of the tubes and wires as he reached over to brush his hair aside and cup his cheek. “Hey!” he said. “Welcome back, big shot.”

Lloyd closed his eyes at his touch, leaning into the hand. He swallowed, then looked at Kai with a pained expression. His voice wobbled as he spoke.

“Kai. Did I… hurt Nya?”

“Shhhh, hey, hey.” Kai stroked his thumb against the corner of Lloyd's eye, catching a stray tear in the process. “Don't worry about it, Lloyd. It's not your fault, it wasn't you. Nya’s alright, she's right here.” He gestured with his chin at his still dozing sister, not wanting to let go of Lloyd. “She was worried sick about you. She donated some blood.”

“You saved her…” There was unmistakable relief in Lloyd's voice now as he gazed at Nya. He reached towards her, just managing to brush his fingers against her arm. “You stopped me.”

Kai’s heart sank. He pulled his hand away from Lloyd's cheek.

“I'm so, so sorry, Lloyd.”

Lloyd turned his head back to him. “You stopped me… from doing something I would've… never been able to take back.” His other hand was still in Kai’s, and he squeezed it gently. “You drove out Morro. You saved me, Kai. Thank you.”

“Saved you?” Kai shook his head in disbelief. “Look at you. I did this to you, Lloyd. I couldn’t-”

“Kai.” Lloyd weakly lifted Kai’s hand to his chest, hugging it to his heart. “If what I did to Nya wasn’t my fault… then what you did to me wasn’t your fault. It was Morro’s. He’s the one I won’t forgive for this,” he said in a hard voice, “not you.”

Before Kai could respond, Nya mumbled something and stirred. As she woke up and stretched her arms, her eyes rove blearily from Kai to Lloyd. Seeing Lloyd awake she immediately mimicked Kai and leaned further onto the bed. “Oh!” she cried, clasping Lloyd’s face in both hands before burying her face in his chest, gripping the front of his gown. “Lloyd!”

“Nya!” Lloyd laughed through a fall of tears, wrapping his arms around her. “Nya… I’m-”

“Don’t say you’re sorry!” she said without lifting her head. “You’re back, you’re alive, and that’s all that matters.”

Lloyd looked as though he wanted to respond, but when he opened his mouth his lips trembled and he seemed to give up. He let his chin rest against Nya’s hair, sinking back into his pillow so that she was lying almost on top of him. “Then… thank you, Nya,” he whispered.

He reached a hand towards Kai, inviting him.

Almost as though she could sense his hesitation and the reason for it, Nya too lifted a beckoning hand to him across the bed, giving him a watery smile. “Come on, big brother.”

Kai took both their hands in one of his. “Hey,” he said. “You two… I…” He looked at them both, watching him expectantly.

I love you.

I love you.

So much.

He couldn’t say it. Not while Lloyd was lying in a hospital bed recovering from a stab wound he’d given him. Not while Nya was looking at him through a bruise covering nearly half her face that he’d failed to prevent.

But they merely pulled him onto the bed on Lloyd’s other side. There was hardly enough room, but Kai managed to lay himself down and wrap his arm over them both, pressing his forehead to Lloyd’s. Gingerly, he hugged them both to him, his little siblings, his family, the most important people in the world, and closed his eyes, pretending for the moment that this was enough, that he was enough, to keep them safe forever.

 

 

"You think he's awake?"

"It's hard to say. But surely Kai and Nya would have alerted us if he was."

Zane opened the door wide to allow Jay, Cole, Wu and Misako to enter the room, but they all paused in the doorway at the sight of Kai, Nya and Lloyd lying fast asleep against each other on Lloyd's bed.

Misako covered her mouth with her hands in glee. "Oh my. Isn't that precious?"

"G'awww," Jay concurred in a whisper.

"Lloyd's hugging them back," said Zane with a smile. "That means he was awake."

"Probably still very tired though," said Cole, also smiling fondly at the trio. "Let's let them stay this way for a bit."

"As long as they're alright," said Wu, patting Kai's shoulder before turning to leave. "Let's go everyone."

The door closed softly behind them.

In the darkening gloom, Morro opened his eyes. He grinned at the sleeping boy and girl in his borrowed arms.

Heh. Interesting...

 

 

Notes:

I know it's been weeks since I updated my other Ninjago fic, so sorry for anyone who was waiting for that! I will get back to it, I just hit a bit of writer's block and ended up doing this instead. >_<

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