Work Text:
Yeah, yeah. So what if they said that they’d go off on another adventure right after leaving Shintaro. So what if they were in an upbeat mood when they began flying, with the skies bright and the sun beaming down on them.
They unanimously agreed to go home first. Back to the Monastery.
No one admitted it, but after spending so long in the vengestone mines, cages, being chased through a maze of tunnels or falling down the mountain, all anyone wanted was at least one night in the comfort of their own beds. True, their suites in the palace of Shintaro had felt heavenly, but it wasn’t their own rooms, with the familiarity that came with it.
Misako greeted them warmly when they returned. The electric chicken was fine, despite Wu’s poor attempt to use her as an excuse to stay behind. Everyone was pretty exhausted, so they went to bed early.
Cole, for one, was ready for a full night’s sleep in the comfort of his bed, without background clanging from the mines or hard rock pressing into his body. And he’d been exhausted ever since he achieved his spinjitzu burst just yesterday.
But despite his hopes, he still felt heavy and lethargic in the morning.
It was weird. A headache assaulted him the moment his eyes opened. Faint nausea made him uncomfortable, and he was so sore despite the adequate rest.
Cole lay there for a long time, blinking hazily at the ceiling, trying to understand why he felt so off. He could tell that something was wrong, but not what. A sense of dread in the back of his mind was quickly growing.
It spiked to a screeching alarm when he heard something thud against his door.
Cole immediately shrugged out of the blankets tangled around him and stumbled to his feet. The vertigo made his vision swim for a moment and the nausea worsened. But he pushed it aside in favor of making his way to his door and carefully opening it.
On the other side, he was greeted with the sight of his youngest brother offering a sheepish smile and trying to push himself off the door with a clumsiness Cole had rarely seen.
“Lloyd? What’s wrong?” Cole instinctively reached out but stopped just shy of his brother. Lloyd’s face was pale and beaded with sweat, and his eyes looked glassy and unfocused. He looked like he hadn’t slept well.
“Nothin‘,” the young Ninja slurred. “’m fine.”
The dread in Cole’s mind grew.
“You don’t look fine, bud,” he insisted, and Lloyd pouted in a very childish—and so unlike him—way. “No, seriously. You look sick. Did you catch something in Shintaro?”
Lloyd looked at his hands for a long moment. Cole was about to nudge him, thinking he zoned out, when he shook his head. “Don‘ think so,” he replied. He stumbled away from Cole and towards the living room. “Jus‘ gonna…go lie on the couch…”
He listed towards the side—away from the wall—and his arm flailed uselessly for something to grab onto. Cole yelped and dashed forward, a little slower than normal, with barely enough time to catch his brother before he could completely slam into the floor.
His muscles screamed in protest and he couldn’t hold Lloyd upright, so he lowered them both to the ground. He stared in shock at his hands. He…he was stronger than that. He could usually carry any of the Ninja without breaking a sweat.
So…why couldn’t he hold up their smallest member?
He didn’t have time to ponder the question. Lloyd coughed and shivered and his arm spasmed slightly. “F…First Master,” he groaned. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be,” Cole returned immediately. He tried adjusting himself so he wasn’t sitting as awkwardly, and he helped Lloyd lean against the wall. His younger brother’s gaze stared past him, unseeing.
Before Cole could say anything else, another door opened, and Kai, with a blanket wrapped around him, exited his room. The Fire Ninja immediately noticed Lloyd’s situation and wasted no time rushing over. “What happened?” He demanded.
“He just collapsed,” Cole answered, keeping his eyes locked on Lloyd for any signs of change. “He looks sick.” Kai dropped down next to them—a little ungracefully, Cole noticed—and he did a double-take at the Fire Ninja’s blanket. “Are you cold?”
Kai was never cold. Only once, in the Never-Realm, but only because he didn’t have his powers.
Kai nodded but otherwise ignored the question. He gently pressed the back of his hand to Lloyd’s forehead. “He’s got a fever.” Kai’s brow furrowed. “How did it get this bad without us noticing? Where did it come from?”
Cole blinked when he suddenly heard a very distant memory of a doctor asking the same question: “Where did this fever come from? Has she been around anyone sick lately?”
He forced himself from the unpleasant past and focused on his ill brother. “I-I don’t know,” he replied. He bit his lip when his voice shook and Kai sent him a worried glance. Just as Kai was never cold, Cole was always the steady one—his voice rarely trembled. “Let’s get Zane—”
“I am here.” The nindroid suddenly appeared at his side, expression tight with discomfort but studying Lloyd nonetheless. “We should get him back to his room. He needs rest.”
“Jus‘ slept,” Lloyd grumbled in protest.
Cole expected Zane or Kai to offer a snarky reply, but neither spoke. Instead, Zane helped Lloyd to his feet. “I will take him back.” Without another word, he guided Lloyd back towards his room.
Cole and Kai exchanged wide-eyed stares.
They slowly headed out to the living room, where, to their surprise, they found Jay draped dramatically over the armrest of the couch.
Jay’s half-lidded gaze locked onto them as soon as they entered. “Hey,” the Lightning Ninja greeted without enthusiasm.
Dull? Jay? Since when?
Cole hesitated near the door while Kai made his way to the armchair and curled up small, bringing the blanket up to his shoulders. He looked miserable.
So did Jay. They all did, actually. They all looked sick.
He only moved when Nya and Zane appeared from behind, both dragging their feet. As Nya plopped down on the couch opposite of Jay, she massaged her temples as if she had a headache. Zane immediately stood next to the open window, where a cool morning breeze wafted through.
For several minutes, no one said anything.
“Is anyone hungry?” Zane finally asked. He didn’t look very enthusiastic about making food.
“No.” Jay was the first to reply, followed by quiet agreements from the others and a few interspersed coughs. Cole also shook his head. The nausea overtook any desire for food. But it was worrisome that no one else was hungry. Maybe they also were suffering from nausea?
“A-alright.” Zane cleared his throat when his voice glitched. Cole and Jay sent him alarmed looks to which he waved away. “If-f no one is hungry, we shou-ould get back to our regular sch-schedule.” His tone lacked excitement.
The more his voice glitched, the more Cole’s sense of dread grew.
He knew by “regular schedule” that Zane meant training. But, looking around the room, he realized that no one was in the mood for it. Even he wasn’t. His body felt shaky and weak and he couldn’t figure out why. Plus, just the thought of the training course sent rolls of nausea tearing through him.
He took another glance around the room. Jay and his lack of energy. Kai being cold. Zane’s glitching and, based on the way he leaned towards the breeze, feeling hot. Nya’s headache. Everyone’s coughing and apparent fatigue.
Cole didn’t like this. Not one bit.
Something deep in his memory was trying to resurface, swirling and weak but filled with pain. Something he’d long buried and tried to forget.
He silently made haste for his room and closed the door with a little too much force.
The Master of Fire, cold.
The Master of Ice, hot.
The Master of Lightning, without energy.
The Master of Water, dehydrated, if he had to guess based on her headache.
The Master of Life, really sick.
The Master of Earth, weak.
Everyone’s coughing and lack of energy and nausea and not eating—
Cole sank to his bed, shuddering.
He remembered her strength sapping away and leaving her bedridden. He remembered the fever that appeared out of nowhere. He remembered how she always felt sick and refused to eat. He remembered the coughs that wracked her body in painful shudders. He remembered the occasional spasms that would briefly take control of her arms.
No, no, no—
The same symptoms that now ravaged his family.
NononoNONO—!
Cole gasped painfully, his lungs refusing to completely fill as terror stole his breath.
He couldn’t—he couldn’t lose anyone else to this—the same sickness that took his mother from him—
He pressed his hand over his mouth to muffle his choking gasps. He could hear his mother’s heart monitor beeping, he could smell the antiseptic and medicine, he could feel her bony fingers in his as she tried to tell him that it would be okay, even though they both knew it wouldn’t be. He could see her take her last breath.
Cole lost his mother to a mysterious illness. His siblings now presented with the same symptoms. The same sickness. The one that killed his mother. His siblings, himself, they somehow caught the disease, they were all going to die slowly and painfully and there was no cure, only ways to drag on their lives—
Tears streamed down his face as Cole all but fell off his bed and collapsed to his knees on the floor.
“Mom?” Cole’s voice shook as he took in his mother’s appearance. She looked worse than the last time he’d seen her—pale, barely moving, skin paper-thin like it would break if he touched it. And yet, she offered her hand with a small smile.
“H-hey…Cole,” she breathed. He immediately took her hand and held it tight as if she’d disappear if he let go. “I…I want you to listen to me, Cole,” she insisted with a sudden rise of energy in her weakened body. “I want you to promise me something.”
Oh. Oh no. Promises came when someone lef…when someone was about to…
His vision became warped as tears flooded his eyes. “A-anything, I promise, but I need you to get better!”
Lilly’s eyes held deep sadness despite the warm smile still somehow etched onto her face. She evaded Cole’s request by continuing with the first topic. “I need you to promise me…that you’ll always stand up to those who…are cruel and unjust.”
“I promise!” Cole cried, clinging to her arm now in the best way that he could hug her, since the doctors told him to not actually hug her since he could accidentally break something—as if he would hurt his own mother! “B-but you—you’ll be okay right? Right?!”
Lilly’s eyes fluttered and she coughed. It sapped away what little energy she had left. “I’ll see you again, Cole, I promise.”
Another promise.
Someone’s hands landed on Cole’s shoulders and, despite how he struggled to pull free, they brought him back and away from his mother. He struggled with all the ferocity he could muster. “No! Stop! Let me go! Mom!”
Lilly sent him one last smile. But then she was still, her eyes closed, a last exhale leaving her body.
Cole was frozen then, eyes wide and unblinking with tears flooding free, unable to move.
He was going to have to see it all again. Five times, unless it took him sooner than them. He would be forced to watch his family slowly lose themselves to the fatal sickness.
His panic grew and it became increasingly hard to breathe.
Cole knew he needed to ground himself. After all, he was the Master of Earth—“grounding” was part of the job description. But he couldn’t. He couldn’t unsee that fateful night in his mother’s bedroom. He couldn’t unsee the same initial conditions in both his siblings and himself.
He’d promised his mother that he’d stand up to those who were cruel and unjust—and he did. He has. Multiple times. But it didn’t feel like enough. He could do more. He needed to do more. He needed to stand up to more villains, to free more innocents, he had to keep his promise but his life was on a ticking timer now that he had this illness—!
“…ole. Cole. Listen to me, Cole.” He barely heard the voice through the ringing in his ears. But what he did sense were the two calloused hands holding his own. “Breathe, Cole,” the other person instructed calmly. “Breathe.”
“Y-you don’t understand,” he gasped out. “T-they—the sickness—my mom—” His voice broke in another gut-wrenching sob, so unlike the usually-steady Master of Earth. “They’re gonna—”
Master Wu brought his hands together and rubbed his wrist. “Listen, Cole. They have the same symptoms, yes. But it can be cured.”
Cole shook his head, keeping his gaze away from Wu. He felt ridiculous, acting this way when he was an adult, but… “No, it can’t! T-the doctors tried everything, there’s just no cure!”
“No medical cure,” Wu corrected. “It is caused by overexposure to vengestone. You must be around another elemental master to make it go away.”
Cole froze. “W-what?”
“Just as vengestone blocks and suppresses your powers, another elemental wielder can reverse its effects.” Wu’s touch suddenly felt grounding and warm. “Especially Lloyd. Your powers are connected to his, and his to you. Seek comfort and recover in each other’s company.”
Cole finally raised his tear-filled gaze to meet Wu’s soft golden eyes. “R-really?” His voice, broken and weak, held fragile hope.
Wu smiled and it filled Cole with trust and faith. “Yes. I will tell the others before you join them.” Giving him an excuse to be late, too, Cole realized. An out for why he ran off so suddenly. “Bring Lloyd with you. He needs it just as much as you.”
Cole nodded shakily and Wu squeezed his hands before rising and quickly excusing himself from the room. Cole remained on the ground for a few minutes more, collecting himself and drying his eyes.
His siblings…weren’t doomed.
He didn’t need to see the same death befall another person he loved.
Cole pried himself from the ground. He still felt shaky and nauseous and weak. But he didn’t feel the overwhelming despair he did before.
He made his way to Lloyd’s room, taking it slow to give himself a little more time. He entered after a quick knock and found Lloyd fast asleep on his bed.
Despite himself, Cole had to smile a little at the sight. Lloyd getting decent sleep was rare nowadays after everything he’d been through. He looked so peaceful, even feverish, while sleep still clung to him. It made Cole feel bad about waking him up, but he had to. He didn’t have the strength to carry Lloyd to the living room.
“Hey, bud,” Cole whispered, gently shaking Lloyd’s shoulder. “Lloyd.”
The Green Ninja cracked a glassy eye open. “Wha‘ happen‘,” he gasped, stiffening before relaxing again. “Cole…’m tired.”
“I know,” Cole replied guiltily. “I’m sorry. But you’ll feel better if you’re with everyone else, I prom—I promise.”
His voice caught on that dreaded word and he winced, but thanks to the fever ravaging his brother’s body, Lloyd didn’t notice. “Mm, I guess,” Lloyd sighed, rolling towards the edge of his bed. He probably thought Cole meant he’d feel better because he was surrounded by the comfort of his siblings, and not because he needed to be close to their powers. But whatever Lloyd thought of, Cole would take. Anything to get him up and moving.
Lloyd sighed dramatically and swung his legs over the edge of the bed. He swayed slightly and had to close his eyes for a moment. Cole offered a hand, which Lloyd gratefully took, and they slowly made their way to the living room.
By the time they arrived, the others had all stripped the couches and seats of their cushions and blankets and had made a giant nest in the middle with said materials. Zane, the most coherent, helped Lloyd stumble over to the middle of the nest.
The oh-so-mighty Green Ninja fell back asleep almost immediately. Everyone else piled around him, everyone touching at least three others in some way, taking comfort from their presence. Cole’s anxiety spiked every time he heard someone cough or felt them twitch uncontrollably, but he forced himself to relax. He needed to trust Wu’s advice. He needed to have hope.
This could work. It had to.
He was the last to fall asleep, and, despite it still being morning, the team remained mostly asleep until the next day.
When Cole woke up—the first, even though he’d been the last one awake the previous day—he noticed immediately that he felt much better and the weakness clinging to him was gone.
He was further comforted when the others began waking one by one, each feeling pretty much back to normal. The symptoms indicating a deadly illness were practically gone.
They’d fallen ill the same way his mother had: overexposure to vengestone. But because they had each other, and because they had Lloyd—the connector of their elements—everyone healed. They were cured.
They were okay.