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lloydskywalkers · 3 months ago

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escape pod

dragons rising s2 part 2 is out that means PAIN TIME (cannot believe i got this to post with 2% service but please beware there are major major spoilers in this! if you haven't finished the latest dragons rising release steer clear)

Lloyd’s learned, a long time ago, how to ignore pain.

It never quite works — pain doesn’t care for being shoved aside and silenced, and he’s also learned, on the steps of Borg Tower, the depths of his grandfather’s tomb, strewn among the shattered remains of Kryptarium Prison’s walls — it’s sure to remind you it exists with a vengeance.

It’s taking that vengeance now. Now that he can’t distract himself with tournaments and battles and the exhausting adrenaline that beats out a steady alarm of go go go.

The alarm’s still going off in his head, but there’s nothing left to do.

Well, that’s a lie.

Lloyd buries his face in his hands, obscuring the blurring portraits in front of him. There’s so much to do — so many promises to answer and so many failures to make up for.

Jay.

Arin.

The Source Dragons, the Forbidden Five, his uncle, Pixal, Skylor, and on and on and—

Nausea overtakes him, and Lloyd gasps raggedly. The smell of the monastery courtyard was comforting, once. It’s the smell of home, the smell of familiar incense and earth and smoke and seawater and ozone and Kai’s terrible hair gel.

The smell of everyone lost and missing and gone.

When he’d first woken up after the merge, alone with only the empty silence, he’d thought — that was the worst it could get. It was everything he’d ever feared, and he’d thought, after he found Kai and Arin and Sora and his family one by one, that maybe that was the worst it would get. That things would get better.

“Stupid,” Lloyd curses again.

His fingers clench over the hilt that’s tucked beneath his gi, close to his chest. The Source Dragon’s blade feels impossibly heavy, but it hasn’t left his side — he’s too terrified of losing it, of breaking it, of shattering the trust someone else has put in him.

Why in the world people keep trusting him, Lloyd still can’t understand. It’s not even Lloyd they’re looking to, is it?

Son of Garmadon, with countless eyes turned toward him in anger and suspicion.

Green Ninja, with countless hands outstretched to him, for him to save.

Conduit, another vessel for another power and another responsibility.

Master, the stupidest title he’s ever thought he could take—

Failure. Failing and falling and failing all over again.

Is that all you know how to do, Lloyd Garmadon?

He’s lost his mom and his father and uncle. Lost Jay, lost Arin, and he can only hope no one else is next.

Lloyd’s fingers clench in his hair, pulling hard enough to hurt. It’s a pitiful distraction from everything else.

Fever still burns hot and familiar beneath his skin, leaving an aching weariness that makes standing feel nightmarish. It’s outweighed by the jagged line of fiery agony that cuts from hip to shoulder, every movement sending firecracker bursts of pain that leaves him shivering and dizzy.

Stupid. Lloyd’s getting sloppy. How many times has someone backstabbed him before? How many near-misses has he dodged, instincts born from years of training just saving him?

Stupid. Lloyd doesn’t need saving. He shouldn’t need saving. Lloyd is the one who needs to save others and all he’s done on that front is fail.

“What do I do,” he whispers, to absolutely no one. “What do I do, what do I do, what do I do—”

Does he go after Jay, with Kai and Nya? That’s the strongest pull — Jay is his family, his brother, Jay is a missing piece that’s been gaping in his chest for years, now bleeding and raw and how, how can he just leave him—

But then there’s Arin, Arin with his kindness and enthusiasm and incredible potential and pain, Arin who Lloyd’s failed and how he can leave him with Ras, knowing what could happen—

But then there’s Sora, who he can’t possibly abandon either, and the rest of his family, who he’s just gotten back, and the growing threat of the Forbidden Five and the Source Dragons’ thundering instructions and the crimson-edged blade burning a hole in his gi and—

Okay. Okay.

Lloyd lets out a long, shaky breath, biting back a whine at the spike of pain that flares across his chest.

He can do this. He has to do this. He’s pushed his body to breaking before. Again and again, this time isn’t any different. All he needs to do is—

Stars explode in his vision.

He barely manages to avoid keeling over as something pulls hard, as if to yank him from his own body.

No, no no—

There’s a thundering ache pulsing through his head, like the strike of Ras’ gong over and over again. Lloyd fights back a strangled mix between a sob and a curse.

He hasn’t managed it yet, overcoming a vision and staying calm. It’s too disorienting, too awful — the world blurring away into violent reds, horrible flashes of future failures like a demented strobe effect. The terrifying sensation of losing his mind and losing his body and losing the ability to move, knowing the world’s moving on without him while he’s stuck somewhere in some half-formed future.

It’s like Morro, forcing into his head and tearing his sense of self from him.

Another searing flash of pain, another aching pull—

A sharp scream tears through the monastery, haunted and familiar.

The visions scatter like dust, and Lloyd is on his feet before he can think.

One turn, a room down from his own — Lloyd slams the door to Kai’s bedroom open with an aching shoulder and staggers toward his brother.

He’s already cut himself off, strangling the cry in his hands as he gasps for breath, but it’s unmistakably Kai who was screaming.

Lloyd steps forward, hands held open, careful to make his presence known. His heart wrenches as he catches full view.

In the dark, Kai’s almost a shadow of himself. He’s too-thin and gaunt, dark circles etched beneath his eyes, almost ravaged from his time in the Netherspace. He’d come back so strong, burning and fierce and everything they’d needed, that at the moment, Lloyd hadn’t realized. He’d completely missed the toll it took on Kai, and hey! There’s another failure to add to the list.

Not about you, Lloyd scolds himself fiercely. Enough.

“Kai?” he says, reaching a hand out for his shoulder.

Kai shakes his head, face still buried in his hands. He’s muttering furiously, sweat shining on his forehead.

“Can’t — sleep, can’t, gotta — gotta move—”

“Kai,” Lloyd’s voice breaks. He knows the panicked fear in his brother’s voice too-well. Knows the live-wire adrenaline that forces you to push through exhaustion and pain and abandon sleep, the feeling of failure on your heels.

“Kai,” he rasps again. “Kai, it’s okay. It’s me, it’s—” He blinks back tears. As if that’s going to be a comfort. Kai’s got the world’s greatest expert in failing people here, lucky him.

Kai’s hand seizes around his wrist.

“Lloyd,” he croaks. The panic is his voice is ebbing, the tremors in his hands growing just a bit less violent. “Lloyd?”

Carefully moving his hand atop Kai’s own, he nods. “It’s me,” he says, trying to sound perfectly put together.

Kai makes a shaking, broken sound.

“Oh,” he says. “Oh, I thought—” His hand tightens around his wrist. “You’re here?”

“Yeah.” Lloyd gingerly slides next to Kai on the bed, taking both his hands in his own. “I’m here. For real.”

Kai holds his hands so tightly it almost hurts, as if letting go of Lloyd will land him back in the Netherspace. He stares at their hands, expression easing into something that’s a lot less frightened and a lot more Kai.

“You’re safe,” Lloyd says. “You’re safe, okay? I promise—”

Kai gives a wet snort, pulling a hand free to scrub at his eyes. “‘Course I am,” he says, voice ragged but sincere. “I got you here.”

Lloyd stares at him. It feels, just a little, like he’s driven the Source Dragon’s blade right through his chest.

He opens his mouth, ready to assure Kai of — something — and—

Promptly bursts into tears.

“Wha- Lloyd, what’s wrong?!”

“I’m sorry,” Lloyd swipes angrily at his eyes. “I’m so sorry. I’m fine, I’m fine, I just—”

He feels like his chest is crumbling. He sucks in a breath desperately, and tries to find a smile.

“I’m just really glad,” he says. “I’m really glad you’re back.”

Kai stares at him, brow furrowed in worry. Something flickers across his face, the gentleness Lloyd remembers from when he was small, and then Kai’s arms are wrapped around him and he’s being held tight.

“Thanks,” Kai laughs wetly. “I am too. Really, really glad.”

Lloyd tries to reply, but it gets lost in the lump that’s formed in his throat, his eyes burning hot. Zeatrix’s wound sings in pain as he presses tight against Kai, but it’s easier to ignore this time. Instead, Lloyd buries his face in Kai’s shoulder, and tries desperately to force back any more tears.

The wet warmth against his own shoulder is the only thing that makes him feel a bit better.

It takes a moment, for the wracking shudders to subside, but Lloyd finally finds his voice again. If he was a better leader, he’d know exactly what to say. If he was a better brother, he’d find the perfect, comforting words for Kai, he’d know just what to say to make him feel better.

But Lloyd is neither of those things, and at his core, he’s still only pretending to be older than he is.

“D’you remember,” he asks, voice a whisper. “What you said, back before we faced the Overlord the first time?”

Kai’s hold tightens. “That we’d look back on this, one day,” he rasps. “And laugh.”

Lloyd nods. “‘Cause it would be over. It would just be — a bad memory.” He bites his lip, hard enough to bleed.

There’s a ragged, shaky sound as Kai exhales.

“Kai,” he whispers. “When’s it gonna be enough? When’s it gonna — when are we—”

Their poor, broken family, fighting for so long. Jay, who’s bruised and bled and put everything on the line again and again for others, lost and alone and shattered.

What did they do, to deserve — why are they still —

Kai suddenly pulls back. His hands seize around Lloyd’s shoulders, his eyes pinning Lloyd in place. Dark and burning, Lloyd knows them better than he does his own.

“Don’t leave,” Kai says. “You can’t — you can’t leave. Don’t ever leave.”

Lloyd remembers — the breath knocked from his lungs at Kai’s first hug when they found each other, the only ones left after the merge. Relief so strong he’d cried himself to sleep that night, crammed into his brother’s bed as they convinced themselves to hope the others were out there, too.

“Promise me, Lloyd.”

Another promise. The Source Dragon’s blade burns hot against his chest. This one, Lloyd hopes, he’ll find easier to keep.

“I promise,” Lloyd whispers. “I promise.”

#dragons rising #ninjago #dragons rising s2 spoilers #dr s2 spoilers #lloyd garmadon #kai smith #am sad!! also wrote this with no power so if there are mistakes #shhh you dont see them #title credits go to my fave lloyd song at the moment <3 #my fic

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