#some skybound Jay because I know that’s what we all think when we hear the word wish associated with ninjago

[splinnters]

ninjatober day nine: wish

A new Prometheus, chained upon the rock Still grasping in his hand the fire of Jove It does not hear the cry, nor heed the shock But hails the mariner with words of love. “Sail on!" it says, "sail on, ye stately ships! And with your floating bridge the ocean span Be mine to guard this light from all eclipse Be yours to bring man nearer unto man!"

The Lighthouse by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

without the electricity because yeah :)

[spinjitsuburst]

ninjago fic recommendations because i have so many Thoughts about them

gonna share some of my favorite ninjago fics bc they're so so so good and i want people to talk about them with me

Land of the Living by @captainbrookeworm - An evil scientist bent on using Lloyd's powers to resurrect his enemies chooses a poor one to start with - with Morro back alive he has to help Lloyd escape the facility, find a way to stop the bad guy, and keep the rest of the ninja from throttling him as everyone learns to adjust (pretty sure this has a sequel that i still need to read)

when you think you're all alone by @mondothebombo - A fic about a deeper look into what things were like for Jay aboard Misfortune's Keep. Lots of hurt, lots of comfort, lots of Jay needing therapy (TW: this fic contains depictions of torture and discussion of sexual assault so please be careful!) (also i've drawn fanart for this fic huehue)

The Ice Emperor and the Earth Dragon by @mcfanely - In the events of Secrets of the Forbidden Spinjitzu, things are changed when Cole gets zapped to the Neverrealm alongside Zane. With two ninja trapped instead of one, we get a different look at how the Ice Emperor comes to be, and just how far Cole is willing to go to protect his brother (this fic broke my brain ngl)

Current Hunger by @thoriffix - After a mission gone wrong, Jay's behavior begins getting more and more unstable. Dangerous. He's hearing whispers in his head, things that aren't there, and the ninja are noticing. Little do they know the danger is much bigger than anything anyone could've imagined (TW: a lot of psychological and body horror)

Play to Win by @sadisthetic - A Skybound one-shot. After getting captured on Misfortune's Keep, Cole didn't expect to be thrown into combat, much less against Jay. A one-shot about Jay and Cole and the worst round of Scrap N' Tap imaginable (tw: violence duh)

Visionary by @k1ngtok1 - A fic about Lloyd, getting an innermost look at the history of the people he cares about most

Would You Like to Enter Prime Empire? by @finn-m-corvex - A fic where Prime Empire carries out somewhat differently, with the ninja separated from Jay and having to work with him from the outside of Prime Empire

There's a Smell of Stale Fear by @spinchip - A one-shot about Jay tending to Zane in the aftermath of a traumatic event. A lot of reflection on Zane and what he's been through. (TW dark themes)

To rise after the fall by @k1ngtok1 - A series of fics centering around Cole and his realization that he has oni heritage. It's so cute and good and yes please read this series i am Begging you

Would You Like to Enter Stardust? by @aureallegories - Something goes wrong when Jay enters Prime Empire. Becoming a corrupted code in the game, Jay forgets the ninja entirely and becomes one of the hardest bosses in all of Prime Empire (i've drawn fanart for this fic too huehue)

Masking and Unmasking by HelloThere3306 - A one-shot set in the movieverse, all the ninjas identities are a secret until Lloyd's gets revealed to the group by accident. The ninja have to set aside their biases to get their green leader back.

[moonlightblueandicegrey]

Unforgettable past part 1

Summary: Jay destroying himself more and more after skybound

!!! WARNINGS !!!

Uhm... We have lots of things here. We have mentions of emotional and physical abuse, self harm, sexual harassment, panic attacks, traumatic moments, self hate thoughts, thoughts of suicide, anger, bad language and curse words, smoking, heavy drinking, mentions of one night stands and abusive sex. I think that's all but tell me if i forgot anything.

You have been warned so don't read this if you are uncomfortable with those things. Now the responsibility is yours.

Writer: So, i wanted to write this thing from winter... It's summer here... I don't even know why it took me so long. Anyway, it's finally ready now. It's the dark fic i was talking about in this poll for anyone who doesn't remember or for people who didn't know about it.

Also it's the story i was referring to in this recent post:

**After Skybound**

As we all know, after Jay's last wish, Nadakhan returned to Tyrahn's tea pot and everything went back to normal. Ninjago citizens forgot everything and they just continued living normally, like nothing ever happened. No one remembered a thing, except Nya and Jay.

Nya had nightmares every night but she decided to ask for help for once. She isn't a person who likes asking for help, she mostly does things alone but she knew that she had no other choice this time. Going to therapy was a healthy thing to do, she didn't want to use other coping mechanisms. She even started talking to Kai. She didn't tell him everything about Skybound but still it was something. Nya was strong enough to realise and finally admit that she needed help. If she learnt something during possession and skybound it's that she doesn't always have to do everything alone and letting someone help her isn't a bad thing. At least she learnt her lesson after all the stuff she'd been through.

With Master Wu, Kai and her therapist's help and support she managed to remain sane. She even did the first small steps into becoming healthy again. It took time, lots of effort and it was very hard for her but success doesn't come for free, it needs hard work and Nya knew that very well.

Jay on the other hand.... He did the opposite thing. Jay found the opportunity to destroy himself completely. Why? No one knew, no one remembered. He didn't want to talk to anyone. Not even to his friends, neither to his... family,

nor to Kai.

Kai, his best friend since forever, had never seem him in such a state before! And he was worried. Nya didn't know what happened to Jay in Nadakhan's ship... No one knew because Jay never told them, no matter how many times they tried to approach him and talk with him. He was becoming distant, building his walls.

His usual happy and cheerful self was gone. He was like a different person! He even asked Nya to give him a break. A break from a relationship that had barely started. A break from a relationship that Jay wanted this whole time. He didn't even want to hear Wu's advices. Cole and Zane had no chance with him. Neither Lloyd could find out what was the problem.

They knew that Jay had been a prisoner in Nadakhan's ship because Nya told them. But no one knew what actually happened there. Only Jay remembered those moments and he could never forget them.

Nadakhan broke Jay completely and took away his happiness. Poor Jay was so close to give up. He didn't actually believe that he could survive in this life for any longer. He lost all hope. That's how his cigarettes became his "friends". He first started smoking after Zane's "death" at s3 but now he started doing it uncontrollably. Kai even found an empty bottle of alcohol under his bed once.

This was the current situation:

Jay doesn't listen to Wu, he avoids and ignores his friends, he pushes everyone away, and Nya? Once she finally decided to give him the love he desperately wanted for so long... He doesn't want it anymore. He doesn't deserve it, no. He knew that he lost himself and this new Jay would hurt everyone around him. Mostly the old Jay who was still somewhere deep inside his heart but too deep for him to reach.

Jay thought that he was stuck in a loop-like situation. He still desperately wanted to feel loved and desirable and special and cared for by someone... But he thought he couldn't...

Someone who doesn't love himself can't be loved by others.

Nobody actually cares about you.

Who would ever love someone as pathetic as you?

You are useless. Only a burden for those who pretend to care about you just because they pity you!

You're not worthy of my pity... You're not worthy of anyone's love...

That's all that Jay knew and all he could think about 24 hours per day. That's what he kept saying to him and what Jay's mind repeats, day and night, since then.

Instead of getting the love and affection he wanted, he got the complete opposite. So, after that, he started having meaningless one night stands with just... Whoever wanted him. He chose this way to feel some temporal "love". This wasn't love... This was just lust. It meant nothing. It was just cold, rough, painful, almost abusive sex. Jay got used to that pain. Even a little addicted. Addicted to this feeling of humiliation, pain and torture.

A part of him wanted to quit and try to become healthy again. But he didn't feel like he could do it. He didn't even know if he had the choice anymore. He just continued falling in the arms of any man who wanted him. And who could say anything since is was his own choice? Jay just kept breaking his own heart more than it was already broken.

During most of those times he was kinda drunk. It felt somewhat good since he wasn't thinking clearly. But the next morning when he was sober again... When he found himself naked, cold and alone? He hated himself! He wanted to rip his own skin! The self-harm scars on his body forced him to use tones of makeup to be able to hide them.

And the same scene was repeating itself over and over again. Jay, laying on a huge empty bed, alone, cold, naked, shivering and crying... He just lost count of all the times he returned home late at night, dizzy, hurt and broken. His already revealing clothes ripped from his own anger and bursting.

What kind of person was he now? He said that he had no idea. Oh, but he knew... He just didn't want to admit it.

He blamed himself for everything. He didn't think that he deserved to be a ninja anymore.

............................................................................

Kai's heart was breaking more and more every single day. He couldn't stand watching his precious best friend like that anymore. He hated all the times he had to hear Jay's footsteps at 3 am. He knew that his friend was going down the wrong path.

He desperately wanted to help Jay get out of this madness. He just didn't know what to do. While he was her "personal therapist at home", Nya told him all that she knew about Jay during skybound but it wasn't enough. Something extremely bad had happened in that ship but he didn't know what. He had no idea what made Jay's heart break like that. His mind though of every possibility. Just not of the one that actually happened. No, it couldn't be... right?

Kai definitely wasn't an idiot. He wasn't naive either. He wasn't delusional. Kai knew how cruel this world could be. He knew how much darkness was out there. He knew how unfair and painful life could become sometimes. He just didn't expect that his beloved Jay had to go through something like that. No, this was too much for him to even think about it.

He promised one thing though. He would find out the truth behind Jay's current behaviour. In a period where everyone was mad at his friend, he would find out what happened in that ship. He wouldn't leave his friend's side no matter what. Never. Especially now that Jay needed him the most.

[finn-m-corvex]

Whumptober 2023 Day 3 - "Make it stop."

Skybound angst time to shine! This is the first time I've ever tried to write Skybound anything so it was a brand-new experience for me! I don't know if I quite did it justice but I gave it a shot. Little disclaimer that all of these may read as a bit disconnected and that's mostly because I've written 30k words in like, less than a week and it's hard to keep things diverse. I'm def reusing phrases and words but oh well!

@splinnters your third tag of the day! Hope you're doing great man!

Words: 2.2k

He cried out as his head collided with the stone behind him, blood splatterings from previous beatings painted across the wall. Ducking his head, it took everything in him to hold in the meager scraps he had been given for lunch, and in his despartation he tried to tuck his legs up, flinching as the one weighed down by the vengestone ball and chain ached in response.

Another fist smashed into his face, and Jay felt his nose break under the force. It was far from the first time. Someone else grabbed his hair, yanking, holding his head up as he was punched again and again and again. The rough hands cradled his chin, fixing it in place and leaving Jay’s bloodied face on full display for the pirates in the room.

Pirates?

Why the fuck was he back here?

Jay tried to plead with them, but one of them drove their boot straight into his injured stomach. The bullet wound Flintlocke had given him screamed in protest, and this time Jay did vomit onto the ground, and his head started swimming when he saw tiny flecks of blood mixed into the bile. He couldn’t make out any of the pirates’ faces, but he didn’t know if that was because of how dark it was in his tiny cell or because of the vision loss in his left eye.

“Look at him, Flintlocke,” one sneered; it was the one pulling his hair. “Ain’t he such a cutie?”

“Quite right,” Flintlocke drawled, and the accent alone almost made Jay want to shit himself, “but I think he’d look a lot better if we roughed him up some more.”

“Would the captain be okay with that?”

“I think Nadakhan would give you extra if you did that,” and Jay could hear the smile playing on the firstmate’s lips. “And we all know how much pirates like extra.”

Everyone else started cackling, and the sound made Jay’s blood run as cold as Zane’s ice. He needed to get out of here; he didn’t know how he was going to do it, but he had to get out of here. Someone must’ve seen him struggling to get away, because his head was quickly slammed back against the wall and someone else’s foot slammed down onto his injured leg. Jay yelled but bit his lip, determined not to let them get another peep out of him.

He wasn’t breaking. He had survived this ship once, he could do it again.

Not again.

“Listen here, boy,” Flintlocke said, and his face was blurred even though he had crouched right in front of Jay’s sight. “We’re not looking for information. The only thing we want is to see that precious face of yours as bloodied up as we can possibly get it. And you know what that means.”

“No,” Jay breathed, panic rising when he saw the firstmate walking away. Flintlocke had never been friendly to him, but he always kept the rest of the crew in line. Without him here…”You can’t leave me here with them! Flintlocke!”

“Have fun, boy!” he hollered, flicking a two wave salute behind him that had Jay’s heart plummeting, “and good luck! We both know you’re going to need it!”

“Wai-” Jay didn’t even have a chance to finish his sentence before another fist was flying into his face at an alarming speed, throwing his head to the side and cracking his jaw. He coughed, spit flying from his mouth as the other pirate kicked him hard in the ribs. Jay felt something crack in his chest, and dark blood tinged the spittle dribbling down his chin.

His head was wrenched upwards again. “Aw look, he’s crying!”

Jay didn’t even realize that teardrops were rolling down his face until it was pointed out, but now that he knew they felt white-hot against his skin, but the shame welling up from inside of him burned more.

“Please,” Jay whispered, trying to dislodge the man’s grip on his hair, “you don’t have to do this.”

“Except I do, little boy,” a wicked grin filled with sharp teeth and breath that could melt acid, “because orders are orders. But I guess you would know that more than anyone, right?”

A metal pipe came flying in from the side that Jay couldn’t dodge in time. The blow sent him to the floor, reeling, gasping as his vision went white from the pain. He thought that it would’ve been the good ol’ one tap two tap system where they would hit him once, ask him a question and then hit him again.

It was not the one tap two tap system.

Again and again, the pipe came down with the force of a thunderclap, bruising and breaking his skin with resounding smacks, and Jay did his best to escape to no avail. Before long he was hauled up by his armpits and forced to sit there and take it as the pirate assailed his ribs, crack after crack as they snapped one by one. Jay was crying out with every blow, yelling when the pirate went after his knee, dislocating his kneecap with ease. He grinded the heel of his boot onto the kneecap, making Jay yell and sob with pain as the other pirate forced him forward.

Now bent in half, Jay tried to push himself back up, only to quickly give up once the man had started raining punishing blows against his spine. It stung against his still fresh lash marks from the most recent whipping, and Jay could feel his breath leaving as his face was pressed farther and farther into the floor. Never before had he been so glad for Wu to give him so much flexibility training.

One of the pirates was chuckling as Jay was finally given a reprieve. “Guess I can see why the captain likes you so much, eh? I don’t know a lot of men who can do the things you can.”

“Make it stop,” Jay gasped, and he was ashamed of himself for begging. Why was he begging already? Hadn’t he taken worse on this goddamn ship? “Please, make it stop.”

Sighing, the pirate with the pipe leaned down next to Jay’s ear, making him shudder in disgust. “You know as well as I do, boy, that there is no stopping once we’ve started. Now, care to sing for us a little more?”

Taking a hold of his hair again, Jay sobbed as his face was lifted off of the filthy wooden floor, and he barely had a second to catch his breath before it was being slammed back down into the planks.

But it was different this time.

The pirate kept smushing his face down. Jay could feel the blood coating the bottom of his mouth as blood was forced out of his nose, and he very quickly realized what the pirate was planning to do.

Jay was going to drown.

First Master they were trying to drown him in his own blood.

He thrashed in place, desperation forcing his already chipped nails to claw at anything they could grab until his hands were pinned under someone’s boots, standing painfully on top of his bruised fingers. Jay tried to thrust up with his hips and dislodge their grip on him, but the pipe just came back down with a harsh blow, and nothing he tried was working.

Vision blurring, Jay could feel his chest to constrict and turn in on itself, his awareness starting to fly away in a dreamy haze. He opened his mouth to yell, to cry, to beg for mercy but the only thing that filled it was his own blood. Choking on it, Jay tried to spit it out, but opening his mouth again only made it worse when the pirate pushed harder.

Nothing. There was nothing he could do.

Crying profusely, tears mixing with the blood rolling down his face, Jay let his vision go black, only praying that the ship wouldn’t be the thing to greet him if they ever let him wake up.

“Jay!”

What? Who was that?

Thinking that it was impossible, Jay opened his eyes, seeing the white walls of his room at the Airjitzu Temple greet him as he woke up. There was a hand on his shoulder, rubbing gently, and lips pressed to his hair before giving kisses to the skin behind his ear. Belatedly, Jay realized that the person’s other hand was rubbing soothing circles on his chest, and the flood of panic that had been overwhelming his senses finally subsided.

He knew who this was. “Nya-”

“I’m here, Jay,” she said softly, moving her lips down to his neck and pressing more feather-light kisses to his collarbone. “I’m here, so let’s just take a deep breath and try to relax.”

Inhaling, the breath got caught in the back of Jay’s throat and he started, hand going to his chest and checking for any injuries. Nothing fresh, but the raised bumps of his scars made his fingers tingle with repressed feelings, and Jay curled into himself as he started feeling like he was floating. He needed grounding and he needed it now.

“Do you need your gloves?” Nya asked, watching as his hands started shaking uncontrollably, his element threatening to encompass his fingers and sparking at the tips. Jay nodded wordlessly.

Reaching for the garments on his bedside table, Nya was quick to stuff his hands into them and make sure that they were secure, and relief crashed over his body when the pressure started giving him something to focus on and from the knowledge that his lightning couldn’t hurt Nya. Apparently Nya had been here longer than a few minutes, as she already had his weighted blanket out and ready. She unfolded it and spread it across the both of them, and Jay reached for her wrist when she moved to get out of the bed.

“Wait,” he said, feeling his voice crack with emotion. He didn’t want to be alone, “please, I need you here. I-I’m scared.”

“I know, sweetheart,” Nya said, and Jay sobbed from how gentle her tone was. “Sit up for me, okay? I’m gonna spoil you a bit.”

He did what she asked, sitting up and watching as she laid down against his headboard and boxed him in with her legs, crossing them over his waist and cushioning his head against her shoulder as he laid back down. Pulling the covers up and over both of them, Nya whipped out her phone and set up the kickstand so it would balance on Jay’s bed. Jay had his eyes shut, so he didn’t see whatever she clicked to start playing, but he immediately relaxed upon hearing the sound of his favorite Starfarer movie.

The sounds of Fritz Donnegon and his trusty crew washed over him, drowning out whatever remnant of the nightmare that still clung to his skin. He was flat on his stomach on top of Nya, and he was all too happy to just watch the movie as her hands started doodling random shapes across the skin of his back. At least he thought they were random until one of the lines was unmistakable: she was tracing his scars.

Both of them had spent so much time getting him readjusted to positive touch, and one of those exercises had been tracing the scars littering his back. Jay would sit crisscrossed on the floor with a stress toy or a pillow, doing whatever he needed to do to keep himself calm as Nya would rub her hands across his back from top to bottom. The memories brought back some joy, and Jay wrapped his arms around his girlfriend’s waist, only giving half his attention to the movie; the other hafl was going to the way her hand was carding through his hair.

“I think I wanna start growing my hair out,” Nya murmured, and Jay gave her as much of a surprised look as his sleep-adled brain could conjure.

“Any reason why?”

He was pretty sure he knew why, but Nya only shrugged. “No reason in particular, I just want to try something new.”

“Something new is always good,” Jay said, a large yawn escaping his mouth. The hand on his back drifted further up to his shoulderblades, and Jay knew that he would’ve started purring if he were able to as her short nails scratched the melt spot right below the nape of his neck. “I can do it too.”

“You hate your curls,” Nya chuckled, “even if I think they’re one of the cutest things about you.”

Jay blushed, and Nya giggled as the red stretched from his rosy cheeks to the back of his neck. She was quick to wipe his tear tracks away, kissing his forehead and then his cheekbones.

“Maybe I can learn to like them,” Jay said quietly, “at least, I think I want to start trying to.”

“And that’ll be good for you, dear,” Nya said. “It’ll be good for both of us.”

“Mhm,” Jay agreed, and he craned his head up to press a kiss to Nya’s chin. He kept trailing kisses downwards until he reached her breastbone, where he knew the scar from the poison still lingered under her shirt. He nuzzled against it, hearing Nya’s breath catch and her hand still on his shoulder. Having Starfarer play in the background wasn’t exactly how he envisioned this moment going, but Jay wasn’t particularly picky.

Until Nya had to go on and rain on his parade.

“We’re going back to sleep, Walker, that’s enough action for you.”

“But I didn’t even get to do anything!”

[cboffshore]

No idea if this has been mentioned before , but i reread the OSSAS series and why do i kinda feel like some of the non-prisoner-related stuff nadakhan does to Nya ( not defending his creepy behavior or anything) are things Delara possibly used to enjoy ?

Nadakhan slightly playing with Nya's hair ? Delara liked it when he played with hers. The two playing chess over some mulled wine ? Well there aren't many restaurants aboard the Keep so that could very much have been their favorite way to have a date . Just him reeeeeeeally pushing Delara into Nya before she even knows what's actually going to happen ...

If you were at some point hinting of that in the series , i really apologise for not getting the cue ! #autism

Btw so excited for next chapter of " Witness For The Solitary Host" :D your works are amazing

Good catch - that was definitely intentional. I actually have never rambled about that pattern before, so I've been wondering if I pulled it off well enough for people to catch on. Looks like I did! That's great! (I'm putting the rest under the cut to save dash space!)

It kind of plays into a longer pattern I have in OSSAS about Nadakhan trying to pre-mold Nya into Delara - not even by trying to get her used to those things, but sort of by trying to convince himself that he's got some part of Delara back before he actually does. He knows Nya's not her, but, like.... if the lights are dim enough, or she's asleep or not glaring at him head-on, or she's doing something close enough to what Delara used to do, it's easy enough to pretend he's already won for a few seconds. Just enough to keep him going, really. (Sidenote: there's a song on the playlist with the line "There's nothing wrong with just a taste of what you paid for" - that's on the playlist specifically for this stuff.)

I should admit I wasn't working from the "things Delara used to like" angle - I was more on the "how Delara used to behave" track - but the idea of him intentionally resurrecting these sentimental activities definitely works with the themes of the series, too! On some level, he's absolutely working out of habit (re: the hair touching), so viewing the chess night as something she used to enjoy is a totally valid interpretation.

One thing that's always annoyed me a little about Skybound is this really weird idea that Nadakhan targets Nya because he thinks she's just Delara reincarnate. This is true at the start of the season, but by episode 60 (where he actually refers to Nya by name when speaking to Jay) it's VERY obvious that he's figured out his initial reincarnation idea was off the mark. A lot of fanfiction I've read over the years misses that development, which kind of skews the whole thing and turns it into more of the "I know you're in there and I'm going to break you out and help you get your memories back" stereotype. I didn't want to work with that angle, both because it's just flat out wrong and also because I have seen it SO MUCH and I'm tired. (Which explains most of the motive for writing this series, really - trying to skirt all the trends and seeing what I can wring out.)

Nadakhan's whole thing is taking existing materials and sculpting them into his ideals - which, in my opinion, plays VERY nicely with the "I know Nya's not 100% what I'm looking for but she'll make a good enough starting point" that we get canonically. I really tried to play that up throughout OSSAS, and I'm glad it came through!

Also - glad to hear you enjoyed Witness! The next chapters aren't due til later this year for reasons I can't spoil yet, but I'm very excited to get working on it, because this time I get to examine how Nadakhan behaves when he has what he thinks is 100% Delara. I won't give too much away, but.... it's going to be so fun. He's going to have an awful time. I'm so ready to run this guy over with a Barbie jeep.

Thanks for the ask!!

[writing-hat]

Hi! How are you doing! I really admire how you wrote the character of Delara in your fanfiction. What do you think about her? What do you think about her relationship with Nadakhan. Take care!

Hello !! I'm great, thank you! Overwhelmed by work but I manage lmao I hope you're doing well as well!

First and foremost so sorry for answering this ask so late but I have thought about this ask SO MUCH you have no idea so here we go

Rambles about Delara in my fic (and her relationship with Nadakhan) under the cut!

I'm really glad you like my Delara! :D

I think she is the most wasted potential in Skybound (Doubloon is a close second)

Let's start by the first thing we learn about her. She is Nadakhan's Quarter Master. Basically his second! Above Flintlocke in hierarchy of the Misfortune! This has to mean something, right?

I know I enjoy writing Nadakhan love blinded but O MY GOD she has to be good at what she does for her to reach this post/level/whatever the word is.

Else she would've been cited as like Nadakhan's partner? Or something.

Of course there could be the explanation that she got this place with Nadakhan just being in love with her but nah that's bullshit for me.

She's a pirate! And I do think it would be by choice! Let women make their own choice damn it

I've seen people say that the reason why, when she's brought back, she's excusing Nadakhan's behavior in the original episodes, would be because of the djinn's wish and magic doing the "what he wants to see and hear" once he sees her but nah. I don't think that's the case at all. She would understand his choices, despite not being aware of what's really going on- she must have done her fair share of sacrifices herself (soon to be written about in one of the other fic I'm cooking) and he's the one she loves!

I also love to think that Nadakhan fell in love with her because she was as ruthless as he was.

And because, I repeat, she must've been good at being a pirate and therefore a psychopath of some kind akjzgsg but a strong woman nonetheless, that got whatever she wanted whenever she wanted

(let's ignore how Jay gets rid of her in the original episodes hum)

About their relationship ;

Nadakhan is in love, with her. Madly so. The first thing I couldn't pass or ignore, was him ready to betray his friends to bring her back.

And Delara loves him back just as much. And I know that she could be using his feelings for her own profit- she's a pirate! of course she would- but that's absolutely not how I see them both.

I see them as a couple that works, despite their OBVIOUS flaws. A perfect mirror to Jay and Nya's situation since they're not… in a good situation in skybound lmao.

I feel like there was such a missed opportunity at having the route of Delara/Nadakhan and Nya/Jay parallels (We're definitely entering spoilers for my fic but I need to ramble about it a bit so I'll try to keep it as non-spoilery as possible)

One would be a good and healthy balance in the relationship, but yknow they're villains and pieces of shit, the other would be with a non-healthy almost toxic balance, getting them to where they're going to end up in my fic (i'm cooking with jaya angst ehehe (soon to come don't worry))

That's something they (well more Nya) are going to understand, which will break apart their ship a bit more

ANother thing that is important is the Nya and Delara parallels that I'll also work on in the future (spoilers so I won't delve into it)

thank you SO MUCH for the ask anon! We're definitely not done with Delara in my fic, and I can't wait to write more about her!! Don't hesitate if you have more questions

See you!! (I really hope I answered your ask properly alhfzeg)

[purplerose244]

My thoughts on Seabound!!! 🌊🌊🌊 (3/4)

SPOILERS ALERT!!!

Yep yep yep, I'm liking this season a lot! 😍 Although I hope we'll get into a more frantic situation now, like with more battles and more bonding moments (Nya and Maya hopefully, but with Bentho too 🦈🦈🦈)! We got half a season to go, I'M READY!! 😎😎

Alright, here we go!

GENERAL THOUGHTS

I do like the season a lot, maybe MoM was a little more cohesive? Idk but it's not a big complain, I still love it so far 😍

Also maybe I would've liked more interactions between Nya and Maya about how they've been apart for so long, they had a chit chat but I would've loved even more. Maybe with Nya saying that it was fine and she grew up only to realize she is still hurt by that, even though it wasn't Maya's fault. I still like how they did it, I wished there was more that's it 🤷‍♀️

While I do make sense to Maya's behavior, that while it seems a little different from Hands of Time it had its logic in my opinion, maybe Ray feels a little weird? He seems less courageous than before, and it was established that he is a hothead like his son so that came off as unusual 🤔🤔

But I do love the fact that he's here and he's bonding with his son, for real, I've been waiting for this for so long so I'm happy nonetheless 🤩

Maybe I'm just easy to please and I take all I can get idk 😅

THE STORM AMULET

Oh, are we gonna address the wind element? It feels like we haven't really seen a Morro reference since Hands of Time, that would be cool! 😍 I mean, why even mentioning the wind then 😅😅

Well what do you know, they tracked them, who saw that coming?... me, I saw that coming... we all did probably 🤷‍♀️

Jay took upon himself making a quick recap on how Ninjago will be destroyed this time, thanks Bluebell 👌

Yep nyeheh electricity makes Nya go crazy for sure ❤💙 ... wait it wasn't a Jaya pun?

Jay wear your seatbelt please, you risk you life enough 😅😅 Pff lol "are we there yet" and they are actually there, biggest plot twist I've ever heard of 😂

LEGO HUG 💜💜💜

And with someone who might as well join the League of Jay apparently 💙

I liked The Island yet it was not as exciting as I hoped for, but now understand the meaning of it. The ninja helped the keepers and they are all allies. Without The Island the moment where Mammatus gives Nya the amulet wouldn't be as meaningful

Is it just me or Nya looked even more gorgeous during that moment?... just me huh? Okay then 😂💕

Wait that's a fake? Wait... UNCLE POWERS?!? OMG THAT I ACTUALLY DIDN'T SEE COMING 🤯

Here I thought he was just messing around, he always makes things harder 😅 Or maybe better? I mean, they kinda missed a bullet on this one...

BENTHO IS SO SWEET AND COOL OMG HE IS ALREADY OUR FRIEND 💙🦈💙🦈

Jay somehow had his own TV show in the past and yet he's got that horrible acting skills wth 😂😂😂

Kalmaar is a very cool villain, like, deeply evil. Not only he's calculated and merciless, he stops at nothing to get what he wants. And the people that get in the way? He wants them to suffer because they had dared to confront him 😳

And yes the voice does help a lot, I'm sorry I'll keep saying it until the season is over 😂 (or even beyond? Please cast Giles again LEGO 🥺🥺🥺)

Awww Nya no my poor girl 😢 Jay wanted to hug her to comfort her he is so sweet my SHIP ❤💙❤💙

MOM PEP TALK MOM PEP TALK!!! 🤩🤩🤩 How cool was it?

Like, this isn't even Maya asking Nya to believe in herself, this is her saying that she KNOWS her daughter can do anything when she puts her mind into it. FINALLY SHE SEES HOW AMAZING WATER GODDESS IS 💜💜💜

MORE LEGO TEARS OMG THIS SEASON IS FILLED WITH TEARS 😱 Which... kinda makes sense considering it's a water based season 😂

Nice one, and now? NOW WE GO BACK TO KAI COLE AND RAY YAS!!! ❤🖤❤🖤

RIDDLE OF THE SPHINX

That is... surprisingly Egypt theme like? It feels like a title coming from the Fire Chapter of season 11... well we got two fire elementals so 😍😍

SPARRING KAI AND RAY

I REPEAT SPARRING KAI AND RAY!!! SPARRING KAI AND RAY!!! ❤❤❤ Lol Ray got old, but how can someone blame him? He did touch death while aging in Hands of Time, I'm just happy he is alive 😂

Yep, master prankster Wu, that's what I love 👌👌 I always thought Wu had become a father figure for Kai at the beginning, so seeing Ray and Wu in the same picture feels very wholesome to me 😚

Ah, uncle Powers, I both love you and hate you so freaking much 😌😌 But you make cool slides nonetheless 😂

ARE YOU TRYING TO KILL ME WITH BEAUTIFUL SMITH INTERACTIONS??

BECAUSE I LIKE IT KEEP GOING 🤩

Oh no you guys are stranded on an island whatever are you going to do?? It's not like you had already before and managed to survive (Skybound) or you got stranded on a rock in a sea of sand filled with giant monsters (Fire Chapter) or you were on a freaking COMET in SPACE (Rebooted). Yeee, this is the worst yet 🙂

I'm starting to think these ninja are just a bunch of drama queens so no matter what happens, it's always hopeless 😂😂 I feel like I'm kinda right on this one honestly 😛

Whoa whoa WHOA WHO IS NYAD THIS SOUNDS VERY COOL???

Aww I like that, while Ray told his kids stories about dragons and how they traveled through the Underworld, Maya told them about Nya the first water master that could summon whales 💙❤💙❤

Pff imagine if it turned out Nya was the master of fire, carrying a very water based name? Lol

Maya: I would know if it was possible!

Nya: Yeah, like she knows that I can control a bit of ice because it's frozen water

Maya:...

Maya: YOU WHAT

I find both interesting and very annoying that this explorers club thinks so highly of themselves, to the point the deny to aid even the FREAKING SAVIORS OF THEIR FREAKING LAND 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

Misako got good reflexes after all, Kai was probably ready to melt this guy's face 😅

Oh, so a trial by Sphinx is a challenge? A mental one? A cultural one? A physical one? Idk but Misako is actually taking charge and that is cool I guess 🤷‍♀️

Okay this is kind of weird, how is Ray so afraid? Is it because there's fire?... did he... did he grow afraid of fire for some reason? Because it feels a bit off for now, but if there is a deeper meaning that could be interesting 🤔

Wait is that the riddle from Decoded? That's fire right?

IT IS FIRE 🔥🔥🔥

Lol at least in this one Kai wasn't completely ignored 😂 I know my flame babe isn't the most rational person, but I do like that it was an answer connected to his element where he used his head!

Ah Clutch, you really got no backbone 😅 And apparently you're the only explorer who doesn't, dang look at the others go! I'm having a bit more respect for them now 😚

LOOK AT SENSEI GO FINALLY!!! 😍😍 FIGHTING SCENES HECK YES!!!

Kalmaar: I'm your conquerer

Wu: so after skeletons, the serpentine, nindroids, the Stone Army, Chen's army, ghosts, oni, more snakes but on fire and people from a game, that makes you the tenth. Have a free cookie

Kalmaar:...

Wu: you're not special

Is this a little throwback to Possession too? Nya seems to always control better water when she doesn't actually think about it. When her feelings are free, so are her powers 🌊🌊🌊

Also this opens up more possibilities! Creatures connected with other elements might get summoned too! I would love something like that 😍😍

This was NEAT, or maybe I just missed Kai that much ❤ What's next??

PAPERGIRL

ANTONIAAAAAAAA!!!! MY GIRL IS BACK!!! All my girls are back in this season, I'm so happy 😍😍😍 And if she is here, sweet little Nelson has to be around and I cannot wait! Bring in the purple ninja! 💜

Owww Antonia's last day as a papergirl? Nooo why??

She's got a job at the... DAIRY DRAGON??? OMG OMG OMG IT'S THE ICE CREAM PLACE BRAGI TOLD US ABOUT ON TWITTER!!! 🤩🤩🤩 I remember the post, he was asking about names for the place and ice cream flavors. Now I can't wait to see what did he choose 🍦🍦🍦

UNAGAMI BABY HI HONEY!!! 🙋‍♀️ I hope he's doing great 😘😘

This is so cool honestly, Antonia got her own character arc going on! Living in a chaotic city like Ninjago City must be pretty dang exhausting 😅

Was... was that Dareth in the garbage can? Am I wrong? Poor brown ninja 😅🤎😅

SPINJITZU SWIRL, BANANAKHAN, ORANGE SERPENTINE, I'M DYING 😂😂😂

Their friendship is so wholesome, I'm so happy they are still together no matter what happens 💕

I thought Kalmaar wasn't much of a fighter but DANG he's got skills! Also the fact that he uses tentacles makes the fight very cool to watch! 😚😚

RAY RUNNING IN AFTER KAI GOT HURT HECK YES ❤❤❤

Well at least you tried Ray 😅

Ah, little cameo of the original Weekend Whip, always nice to hear it again... AND DO THE WEEKEND WHIP!!! 🌪🌪🌪

EVEN NELSON GOT CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT I'M SO PROUD 💜

I don't even know what is cooler, the kids being mad lads on their bikes, Kalmaar driving a TRUCK or Kai going full parkour on the buildings to follow them 🤯

I'm sorry... am I the only one that during the Kai and Kalmaar talk kinda thought of Jestro and Clay? I miss my boys from NK, they're even more at odds now 😭😭

KAI YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO DIE OR EVEN TRY TO DIE GET BACK HERE AT ONCE 😱😱

Kalmaar just loves to make everyone feel inferior, gotta be his hobby 😶

Oh good Kai is back

OH NOT GOOD KAI IS NOT BREATHING?!? FLAME BABE I TOLD YOU YOU'RE NOT ALLOWED TO DIE 😱😱😱

Antonia, Nelson, you guys are now my heroes. You saved my fave, I'll be forever in dept with you ❤❤❤ Am I being overdramatic? Most likely, but Kai is one of the few that didn't almost die or did die in a dramatic situation and he is also my absolute favorite character so that... kinda keeps my sanity in check in this show 🥴

I wonder... does he still not know how to swim? He saved Lloyd in Possession but I wonder if he was only trying to float on the surface... THAT'S TERRIFYING

This episode was so adorable, I love Antonia and Nelson so much 💜💕💜💕 It's nice to see what the other people of Ninjago do while everything goes mad 🤣

Wait hang on my Ninjajan is a little rusty

"Ninjago City. City that never sleeps" well if that ain't the truth 😂

MASTER OF THE SEA

Like Master of the Mountain? Wait are we going back to Shintaro?? VANYA?? ANOTHER BEST GIRL RETURNS??? 💛

Hey hey hey, we got a full Nyad backstory! I really like when they do these little drawn shots, they feel more like legends! And... the ending sounds terrifying? Like, they wouldn't let Nya sacrifice herself and die... again... right? 😱

Bentho: and the world was in balance, until now because of my brother

Lloyd: and the Overlord before of course

Bentho: the what now?

Lloyd: the evil one my grandpa the first Spinjitzu Master fought?

Bentho: YOUR WHAT NOW

Why do I like this offscreen "hiiiyaaa" that sensei Wu does before actually going into the scene? 😂😂

No matter if they come from the underground or the sea, these are all snake-like creature with the same intellect 😅 Kalmaar and Garmadon would have a lot to talk about, sea king dealing with his minions does remind me of Lord Garmadon in season 2 a lot 😂😂

KAI AND RAY FIGHTING TOGETHER KAI AND RAY FIGHTING TOGETHER ❤🔥❤🔥❤🔥❤🔥❤

OMG Kalmaar is such a brat and petty villain I love him so much 😂😂😂 Yes I didn't even mention his amazing voice!... AH DANG IT 😳😳

*Misako kicks Kalmaar and is actually useful* 🙆‍♀️🙆‍♀️🙆‍♀️

*Misako gets taken as hostage immediately after* 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

KAI LITERALLY JUST GOT SAVED FROM DROWNING WHY MUST YOU DO THIS TO HIM!!!... and Ray and Cole and Wu of course, I care okay 😅

OMG that face 🤣🤣🤣

That some meme material right there

Whoa Vincent that voice just got super up when the Unsinkable showed up, it kinda sounded like Jay's lol

NO NOT BENTHO!!! 😢😢😢

Kai: Nya talks to whales now? (I snorted so hard at this 😂😂)

HECK YES NYA GOT THE AMULET!! 😍😍😍 ... we got, like, four more episodes to go so something needs to happen in between... do I need to be scared? I feel like I need to be scared 😅

Jay starting a fire then blaming Kai?... this is so in character I got chills 😂😂

SHARK BOY IS STAYING TO THE MONASTERY THIS IS SO PRECIOUS!!! 🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩 I want all the shenanigans and we need to write fanfictions about more shenanigans and AAAAHHHHH 🦈🦈🦈

Bless these two fire idiots

They own my heart ❤🔥❤🔥 Also Vincent, this is supposed to be a fun little gag moment, your amazing voice acting is kinda distracting me 😭😭😭

ANOTHER LEGO HUG

YOU GUYS ARE SPOILING ME OVER HERE HECK YES 💙🌊💙🌊

Maya learned that her daughter is capable of everything, I love that. Nya simply understood that she doesn't have to give up when something gets difficult. She is AMAZING and can do anything she puts her mind into. She simply has to hold on until the end 💪💪💪

Omg Benthomaar playing billiard with the guys I already love this 😍😍

YES IT IS SHINTARO!!! THE UPPLY ARE HERE OMG!!! HI VANYA YOU LOOK AMAZING GIRL MISS YOU I HOPE YOU'RE DOING OKAY!!! 💛💛💛 ... I just really like Master of the Mountain okay 😅

I love how Vanya doesn't even question it. It comes from Cole and he said it needs to be protected? Done and done 👌

Wait what, did something fall?

IS THAT THE FAKE?!?!? WHAT HOW WHEN??? UNCLE POWERS??? OR KALMAAR DID SOMETHING??? SOMEONE??? I'M LEGIT CONFUSED AND EXCITED??? 🤯🤯🤯

Well dang, I didn't see that coming, now what Seabound? What do you have for me?

[andawaywego]

Would you mind doing a dani x jamie ficlet about pregnant dani maybe?

i’m finally getting to this! (and hopefully some other prompts that have been sitting very patiently in my inbox). this takes place in a world with no ghosts, where Dani and Jamie have still built themselves a life in Vermont. i hope you like it!

..

Dani sits on the edge of the bathtub, waiting. She is staring at the back of the bathroom door, at Jamie’s towel hung right beside her own; remembering their shower this morning and the way Jamie closed her eyes as she let Dani scrub shampoo into her hair. 

It’s been a long four months. Going into the whole thing, she’d known the chances of a pregnancy sticking right away would be slim. That it could take some time, a few tries, before anything happened. Sometimes it takes couples years to conceive, even if they are doing things the “natural” way. But knowing these things is different than experiencing them, even when she’s been blessed with such a supportive and optimistic partner in Jamie.

Jamie who holds her hand through every procedure; who buys pregnancy tests from the store because Dani felt too embarrassed to do it herself the first few times; who holds Dani in her arms every time the tests come out negative. 

Jamie who is out getting them dinner. Who doesn’t know that Dani is sitting on the edge of the bathtub, waiting. 

Dani checks her watch. It’s been only two minutes. The box says four. 

Distantly, she hears the front door open and then the tell-tale sounds of Jamie arriving home: footsteps to the kitchen; the crinkle of the takeout bag; the fridge opening and then closing. Dani closes her eyes and imagines her in the kitchen, leaned back against the counter and wondering where her wife is. 

When she opens her eyes, it’s been three minutes.

Footsteps again, the creaking of the floorboards underfoot. Jamie is looking for her, Dani knows, but she must see the bathroom door closed. The light peeking out from beneath the gap between it and the floor. The footsteps retreat.

Four minutes.

She imagines a cloud drifting over Jamie’s face like it has every other time and tells herself that, if it’s negative, she’ll wait to tell her. She’ll give it time and then break the news as gently as she can. With a deep breath to steady herself, Dani turns the test over in her hands. Exhales.

It’s positive.

Her heart hesitates, chugging on each pump, while her mind struggles to catch up. It feels like something inside of her is lifting and lifting, skybound and unfettered, and Dani blinks once. Again. 

And then she stumbles to her feet, her legs numb from sitting in that position for so long, and tugs open the top drawer of the bathroom counter, fumbling for another pregnancy test Wants to be positive.

Double-check. Triple-check, maybe.

Just to be sure.

________

Five minutes later, she’s opening the bathroom door and trying to pitch her voice louder without letting it crack with emotion. 

“Jamie,” she calls. “Can you come in here please?”

Something metal drops to the floor in the kitchen. She hears Jamie curse and then pick it up, calling back, “Yeah! Just a sec!”

It feels like it takes years for her to finally reach the bathroom, despite how short of a walk it is. Dani’s heart pounds in her throat and her head, bites at her lungs. She can’t help but picture a litany of different reactions Jamie might have, all of them relieved, excited. Overjoyed.

Like she is.

Jamie appears in the doorway, smiling a little tentatively when she sees Dani standing very still and waiting for her. “You okay?” she asks, coming closer.

“Yes. Yeah. Perfect,” is the best thing Dani’s brain can come up with.

She’s too busy thinking: I’m pregnant, I’m pregnant, I’m pregnant with our baby.

Jamie reaches out and Dani doesn’t hesitate to fall into them. It’s been only forty minutes or so since they last saw one another, but it feels like it’s been weeks and weeks. It always does, somehow.

Nauseating, is how Owen and their other friends usually describe it, but it’s been nine years and Dani knows:

They’re in love. Terribly, wonderfully in love.

She doesn’t even realize she’s grinning until Jamie makes a face, her lips quirking up in a smile, and says, “What?”

“What?” Dani repeats.

“Something on my face? You’re smiling like a loon.”

Dani laughs and shakes her head, rocking forward to kiss Jamie’s nose. “No, no. You’re perfect. It’s just...there’s…” She stops and swallows thickly, forcing herself to calm down. “I have to tell you something.”

“Okay. Well, you look too happy for it to be something bad,” says Jamie, their child’s other mother. 

Their baby. She can’t get over that.

And she knows they’ll need to go see her doctor again. Get it confirmed. But for now, she says, “Nothing bad, just…”

Another long, steadying breath.

Then, finally: “I’m pregnant.”

There it is.

The silence that follows is deafening. Dani can see the range of emotions Jamie is feeling painted clearly on her face. The way she inhales sharply, the way the shock makes her body shake where it’s pressed to Dani’s.

“You’re…” she starts to say, breaking off to lift her hands, cupping Dani’s face between them. Freezing Dani solid in her awed gaze. “You’re...You’re pregnant? You...We’re having a baby?”

Tears are stinging in Dani’s eyes at the look in Jamie’s. That wonderful disbelief. “We’re having a baby, Jay.”

“We’re having a baby,” Jamie repeats, like she’s trying the phrase out on her tongue. “We’re gonna be moms.”

Dani grins. “Yes,” she says, “we are.”

“I can’t...Holy shit, Poppins.” She laughs breathlessly. Exhilarated. Some great victory won. And then she leans in and kisses Dani until she’s breathless too. “I can’t believe we’re…I’m...”

She trails off, so Dani kisses her again. Says, “I know, I know. Me too.”

“Yeah,” Jamie breathes and Dani laughs again, brushing some of her unruly hair behind her ear. Her eyes land on the three pregnancy tests, lying capped on the counter and they’re close enough to them that, when she reaches out, she can grab one. “Oh my god,” comes her next whisper, staring down at the little screen—the little blue plus sign.

“I know.” Dani kisses the side of Jamie’s head, making her lift her eyes again. “We need to go...confirm it.”

Jamie nods seriously. “Right.”

“But—”

“Yeah,” says Jamie, laughing now, too, but her voice is thick. “Oh my god, Dani.”

That’s the moment when Dani realizes Jamie is crying. Her chin is trembling, looking at Dani like she’s her entire world and then Dani is crying too. She sniffs a little and wipes at her eye with her right hand.

“No,” she says wetly. “Stop crying. You’re making me cry.”

Another laugh. Jamie sets the pregnancy test back on the counter and pulls her closer.

“I’m just happy,” she says. “Really, really happy.” She leans up and kisses Dani’s forehead, then the bridge of her nose, and her lips again. Laughs against Dani’s lips, wet with tears, as Dani wraps her arms around her neck, trying to pull herself as close as she can. Whispers, “I love you so much,” into Dani’s hair after a few silent moments.

Dani draws her head back and looks at her wife for a moment. She kisses her. Her chest feels like it’s only seconds away from collapsing with how much she loves this woman in her arms. “I love you, too,” she says.

Jamie moves one of her hands from Dani’s hips and brings it up to rest it on her stomach. “Our baby is in here.”

The awe in her voice has Dani on the verge of tears again. She covers Jamie’s hand with her own and squeezes. “You’re going to be an amazing mother,” she says and Jamie looks at her again.

The weight of all those worries they’ve both shared in the past—fear of becoming like their own mothers; of letting their child down; not loving them enough—whisper ghosts through the curls of Jamie’s hair, making her shiver just a little. But she doesn’t argue. She just says, “So are you.”

Dani reaches up and wipes away some of Jamie’s tears with her thumbs. Lets herself be led to their bedroom—lets Jamie lie her down and hover above her. Cool air hits her stomach as Jamie lifts up the hem of her sweater, running her fingers up and down Dani’s flat stomach in breathless disbelief.

“Hi,” she says to it, then looks up. “They probably can’t hear us yet.”

Dani shakes her head, smiling. “Not for a while.”

“S’too bad. I’ve got a lot to say.”

Of course she does. Dani doesn’t doubt that one bit.

“There’s time,” she says, because there is, and Jamie’s eyes are shimmering again as she holds back tears.

“Yeah,” she agrees. “Lots of it.”

They lie there for a few long minutes, just resting in the truth of this life they’ve made together. Dani understands how lucky she is to experience this with the love of her life as they lie in their bed, the apartment they share.

“Right, so...if they can’t hear us…” Jamie says, breaking the silence. She has a mischievous look in her eye that Dani knows all too well. She clenches her thighs together as best she can without drawing attention to the act. “Right?”

“Right,” she says and Jamie grins.

“Good.”

Not a second later, Dani finds herself pressed down into the mattress, Jamie resting between her legs as she kisses down her jaw and her throat, tugging Dani’s sweater up again as she goes.

She pulls away for a second, grinning already at her own dumb joke and says, “Wait. D’ya have a condom?”

Dani smacks her lightly on the shoulder and laughs. “I think it’s a little too late for that,” she says.

“I guess it’ll be fine just this once,” Jamie jokes.

Dani wants to say something witty, but then Jamie’s hand skims the bottom of her bra, eager and sure, and she forgets about anything else but them.

All three of them.

..

[vex-posts]

Skybound AU Chapter One

Summary- While being held captive by Nadakhan and his crew, Jay succumbs to a bad case of amnesia, forgetting absolutely everything.

Word Count- 1886

Warnings- Mentions of kidnapping, amnesia, mentions of injuries, I think that’s it, but tell me if i’m missing anything.

A/N- This is a re-post of the one and only (for now) chapter of my Skybound fanfic (due to me accidentally cutting off the last sentence on the original post and me taking months to realize it) I hope you all enjoy, and if you already read this before sorry about that error. It’s fixed now!                                                                                              ~Simon

Jay’s brows furrowed in discontentment as he scrubbed a scrub brush against the deck of the Misfortune's Keep, wishing that he could be anywhere else. “Guess I can check being held captive by pirates off my bucket list… oh wait. It’s not on my bucket list because this is something that never happens to anybody… except me apparently. What are the odds?!” Jay thought. He gazed around the deck. At one point Clancee, the serpentine pirate, showed up. He was besides Jay talking about something the blue ninja had hardly been paying any attention to. “If only I could get a message out to my friends.” Jay pondered in his head, scanning the deck again, he looked over to the far side of the deck to see two other pirates, Flintlock and Doubloon, talking over some blueprints as they had been for the past few minutes. Looking closer, Jay could see an ink and quill set. His eyes widened as his brain hatched a brilliant idea. Only a moment later, Flintlock and Doubloon walked off the deck, leaving everything, ink and quill included, laid out on the deck. “Perfect…” 

“But I never made a wish,” Clancee rambled as he swabbed the deck, happily chatting away to his barely attentive captive. “No, no, no. Not I... heh. Couldn't think of anything to w-wish for, even if I tried. Got everything I need right here. Never fit in with the rest of the Serpentine, so I'm happy enough to have a family.” Jay turned over to Clancee as he set his scrub brush down, and as he began to stand up, clutched his back in pretend agony.

‘Ow! Oh, my back! Ugh!” Jay wailed dramatically. “Oh, that's it. If only I could wish this pain away.”

“Huh? What did you say?” Clancee asked, putting down his mop. 

 “I've finally reached my breaking point!”

“J-Just hold on.” Clancee looked at Jay in shock, but in a split second, took off hastily towards Nadakhan’s quarters. “Captain! Captain! You need to come here! We broke him! We finally broke him!”

Jay let a playful smirk danced across his face for just a second, but quickly exchanged it for a more serious expression as he sped over to the discarded blueprints and quill. He flipped the blueprints over and took the quill out of the ink,  beginning to write his message. "Friends, if you find this, I am doing fine. Please—Ugh, stupid quill. How did anyone ever write with these things?” Jay half shouted at the inanimate object as he dipped the quill in the ink and continued writing. "Don't worry about—me. Worry about stop—stopping Nadakhan. Your friend"—

“I told you not to take your eyes off him!” Jay hears the captain of the Misfortune's Keep bark as he picks up a bottle laying conveniently on the deck and, in a panicky manner, shoved his message in the bottle, taking off across the deck as fast as lightning… or as fast as he can with the vengestone ball and chain around his ankle “You let him escape? Find him!” Nadakhan yells as Jay hears at least half of the pirate Djinn’s crew tailing behind him. As he ran across the ship, he spotted a box of tools, picking them up and throwing them behind him, hearing a grunt and hoping that it would be enough to at least slow his captors down. Unfortunately for him, it wasn't. He stared over the ledge of the ship, then back at his pursuers. He was cornered. Better yet, they were wielding the tools that he threw at them just seconds ago as weapons.”Oh great…” Jay thinks, glancing down at the open skies below him, His eyes widening as an opportunity showed itself to him. Jay spreads his arms out and tips himself backwards, falling off the Misfortune's Keep and into the open air. 

“Oof.” Jay said as he landed on the top part of the Pirate’s Raid Zeppelin, just one ship in their ever growing fleet. “Haha! Bye-bye!” He says cheekily as he waves back at the pirates staring at the blue ninja in befuddlement. However, his victory didn’t last for long as Clancee was pushed off the Keep, Nadakhan yelling at his crew to capture his prisoner before he gets away. Clancee regains his footing, and quickly lunges his mop into Jays face. Jay barely manages to dodge, surprised by the serpentine’s fighting skills. Jay manages to dodge again, but is quickly knocked off balance by the Raid Zeppelin lurching forward with more speed than it had before, then crashing into a nearby piece of floating land. Both Jay and Clancee were knocked off the top of the Zeppelin and would have fallen down into the sea far below if it weren't for Jay hastily grabbing onto one of the thick black ropes that held the islands together. He looked down to see Clancee holding onto the ball and chain around Jay’s ankle for dear life. Looking further down, Jay saw a tiny floating piece of Ninjago. He lets go of the rope, dropping down into it, Clancee barely holding onto the small island as he drops as well.

Looking above, Jay sees another pirate jump down onto the island in hot pursuit. Jay slides down a connecting rope onto yet another small floating island, loosening the rope and severing it from the island completely. He begins a series of sliding down rope after rope, hopping from island to tiny island in hopes of losing his captors.That is until… he comes to a dead end. No more rope left to slide across. No more islands to hop unto. Nowhere else to run. Looking back towards the way he came, he sees the pirate who was chasing him the entire while, Two-Faced was his name, catch up to him. He glanced back to the open skies. Though, they weren’t as open as he thought, as he sees a shape of something breaking through the clouds not far from his tiny island. “Well… here goes nothing.” Jay thinks as he jumps onto the mystery object breaking through the clouds. Whatever it was he was on, it was solid and keeping him out of the pirates reach. He turns back to the pirates, laughing. However, his didn’t expect to see Two-Faced swivel his head around, changing from a peeved look into a face that burst out laughing at Jay. A whirring sound reached Jay’s ears. Next to the island Two-Faced was standing on, the Misfortunes Keep appeared through the clouds. The crew was on the deck, laughing at Jay alongside their friend.

“You seem to have landed on a sky mine,” Nadakhan’s voice cut through the air like a knife. A sharp deadly one at that. “One shot from Flintlocke and… kaboom.” The djinn’s eyes narrowed as he glared at his prisoner. Seeing the look of defeat in his eyes, Nadakhan’s lips curled up in satisfaction.

 “All right... I surrender.” Jay sighs. The bottled massage in his hand slipping from the death grip he had on it this entire time and falling into the sea below. He takes a step forward to jump off the floating death bomb he almost stranded himself on, when one of the chains he had attached to his ankle snagged on one of the bombs spikes.Suddenly, gravity had him. Pulling his weight off on the deathtrap. One second he was surrounded. The next second he was falling. He didn’t even register his wails of protest as he fell through the air, the ocean getting closer. The only sound was the wind ripping through his ears. “Well at least i’m falling into the ocean… and not on land…” He gulped at the thought. There was no way out of this. If he could summon his dragon he would. If he could do airjitzu he would. He cursed the ball and chain around his ankle for not only cutting off his elemental powers, but for also pulling him down with it. He yelped as the bone chilling water pierced his skin like knives. He kept his eyes shut as he flailed in the water, sinking further. The last sensation he registered before blacking out was something hard slamming into the back of his head.

~~~~~

“Is he...alive, captain?” Flintlock asked, peering at the prone figure that lay on the cot in a closed off room in the ship's hull.

“Is he alive?… sadly yes.” Nadakhan grumbles, running his hand through his silky black ponytail. “If I had known that the blue one would have been this much trouble then I wouldn’t have kidnapped him. “Ugh, why do I always get stuck with the most annoying of setbacks,” He sulked.

“What are you planning to do with him? If he doesn't wake up I mean…”

“We could always use him as ransom against his little friends. They don’t have to know of his fate if he doesn't make it.” The Djinn pirate proposed the idea to his first mate, who stroked his mustache pondering the idea.

“Hmm… that is a good idea captain. However, might I suggest that we get rid of the bo-” Flintlocke stopped mid sentence as he heard the rustling of a blanket behind him. Whipping around, he saw as the blue ninja sat up on the cot, grasping at the bandages that were wrapped tightly around his head. “Wait, nevermind. He’s alive.” Flintlocke said. The ninja snapped his head in Flintlocke's direction, startled by his presence. His sparkling blue eyes widened like saucers as he looked frantically around the small room, then turned his attention back at the two pirates who stared back at him expectantly.

“W-who are you?!” Jay yelped, the scared tone in his voice bleeding it’s way into his sentences. “Where am I?!”

 Both pirates stared at each other, then back at Jay, utterly shocked. They both stood there gaping for a moment before Nadakhan cleared his throat, then turned to his number two with an order. “Flintlocke, could you go fetch some spare clothes from the laundry pile, our friend here is quite soaked.” The Djinn ordered smoothly.

“B-but captain-” Flintlocke stuttered.

“That was an order, Flinty. Now go. I need to have a chat with our… friend here.” The djinn ordered once again as Flintlocke took his leave, closing the door behind him. Nadakhan turned to look at Jay. The look of confusion and fear printed clearly across his face. Nadakhan smiled, floating over to the cot, staring down at his injured prisoner. “Tell me… Do you know who I am?” Jay shook his head in response, not making eye contact with Nadakhan. “You have no need to fear, my friend. You are safe here. This is your home.” Nadakhan lied.

“It-it is?” Jay asked cautiously, gazing at the Djinn.

“Do you not remember a single thing? Do you not know who I am? Who you are?”

“Who are you? … who am I?” Jay asked again, his grip on the thin blanket tightening as he struggled to remember.  Nadakhan smiled what looked like a sincere smile, but behind it held an air of wickedness. He wrapped his hooked arm around Jay’s shoulder, chuckling.

“You are Jay. A faithful member of my crew. And I am the Djinn pirate Nadakhan... your captain.”

[that-was-anticlimactic]

Ninjago Be More Chill AU

This is really long whoops guys I have so many Ninjago BMC headcanons y’all have no idea. This won’t leave my head especially since I’ve been seeing some great BMC / Ninjago stuff recently mmm

Who would be who?

Jay as Jeremy:

Okay so like that not original but, Jay gives off such Jeremy vibes! Jay is really self-conscious, as we see in s1 ep8, aka his true potential episode, as we see in season three with the love triangle, and as we can see in season six with the fact that he knowingly makes wishes to “better himself” from Nadakhan. Jeremy also does some things he regrets, some things that come off kind of creepy and not okay, like what he did to get with Christine, luckily, he realizes that, and it’s one reason why most people don’t think they end up staying together. Jay had a few not necessarily okay and kind of creepy actions towards Nya, again specifically in season six, also a little in season three. But, Jeremy is an all around good person, he didn’t intend to hurt anyone and neither did Jay. Jeremy took the SQUIP, which gave some pretty bad advice much like how and why Jay made wishes from Nadakhan. Jeremy is also awkward and fidgety, again, Jay traits. He ditches his best friend for a girl (kind of season three?) but ends up apologizing and trying to make up for it (kind of season four). Not to mention, Loser Geek Whatever is such a Jay song.

Cole as Michael:

Okay so, this is kind of a popular one but? So Michael Mell is the free spirited, I’ll do what I want and if you don’t like it well leave me alone kind of guy. He’s more closed off towards others, but he’s one of the best best friends a guy could have. Cole isn’t as free spirited as Michael, per say, especially with his father, but in the end he can be. Cole doesn’t necessarily care what others think of him all the time (though he does in season 5 after turning into a ghost and kind of in season 3 because of the love triangle and my take on it). Most people in the fandom associate Cole and Jay as best friends, yet another reason why Cole is a good Michael. In the Jay / Jeremy description, I put some blame on Jay / Jeremy for hurting Cole / Michael, but they messed up too. Michael, while being the best friend, knew that Jeremy was unhappy and knew he wanted more, he chose to ignore that. When Michael approached Jeremy at the Halloween party, yeah he had good intentions but he didn’t do it the best way, and heck yeah, not helping Jeremy who was clearly under the control of the SQUIP at the play until he got an apology was a trashy move. Cole’s messed up too. He shouldn’t have tried anything with Nya, and in the way I view the love triangle, it makes more sense as to why, but he knew how much Jay cared about Nya and he knew that “pursuing” her was bad, but he did it anyway. He ignored what he knew about Jay for his own good (Michael ignoring Jeremy wanting more to keep him as his best friend). Cole also did some crappy things in response to what Jay did in Skybound. Sure Skybound is a little ooc and not always the best, but, hey, I’m proving a point haha. Cole and Jay shared unfair words with each other as well, but they made up for it. Michael went to the play and brought the Mountain Dew Red, Cole gave up the jade blade in Tournament and went back for him in Skybound even though he felt hurt. Not to mention, I mean, their love for music (because even though not necessarily show canon, most people believe Cole has a deep love for music). Not to mention, I headcanon both of them as gay also. I also almost made Cole Christine just for Bruise but like... Michael Mell... also most people think it’s canon that Michael has feelings for Jeremy and I think that Michael like tries to kiss Jeremy in the revival during Two-Player Game sooo...

Kai as Rich:

Okay so, another obviousish one. Kai is one of the most self conscious people in the show, but one with more of a self destructive mode that can effect others. Rich, much like Jeremy, was unhappy and ambitious. He wanted more from himself and he genuinely cared about the way people viewed him (much like Jay and Jeremy). Even in the first season with Kai wanting to be the green ninja, we saw Kai trying to prove himself and prove himself but failing sometimes (aka his intense want to be the green ninja). Kai was also the first ninja to wish himself away in Skybound (again, not always the most credible but, still). Rich and Kai share a lot of similarities on that part. They also have a fierce protectiveness for what they care about. Kai is loyal. He is so insanely loyal and one of the best friends anyone could ask for, he is incredibly dependable. Rich is a good friend too. While he didn’t always have control over his actions, he truly cared for Jake and for his other friends. Heck, Rich set a fire to prevent the SQUIPs from spreading because he didn’t want his friends to go through this. Kai would also definitely set a fire to protect Lloyd and his friends. Kai and Rich are / were both insecure, but the both grow and I love them both. So much. Also sometimes they’re both angry boys and I headcanon Kai as bi and Rich is bi in canon just those lovely little things!

Lloyd as Jake:

This is where it began getting harder, but I will FIGHT FOR THIS ONE!! Let’s start with Jake. He’s the most popular boy in school, he does pretty much every activity and runs or plays an integral part in those activities. The school has standards for him that they in a sense expect him, popular boy Jake, to live up to. He mentions to Christine that he feels the need to be perfect to please everyone all the time and it’s so much pressure and it’s clear that he dislikes that. Not only that, but he says in Upgrade that: “my parents wont be home so it’s alright, they laundered money now their on the run. Which means the house is empty so that’s fun”. Jake has absent parents, he lives alone. He most likely absorbs himself in what he does to distract himself from his home life. Okay now, let’s talk about Lloyd. Lloyd is the green ninja. He did not choose this, he did not choose to have all of this happen to him. The world looks up to Lloyd. They depend on Lloyd. Lloyd’s teammates depend on him. The pressure this boy faces is incredible. He’s popular, yeah a lot of people like him, but the pressure and the expectations everyone has for him... well we’ve seen him snap a few times. Not to mention, LLOYD GREW UP WITH NO PARENTS! His dad was evil and his mom left him to try and make his dad not evil, he was alone. So, Lloyd distracted himself by trying to be evil and trying to get revenge on the tribes and people that wronged him and stealing and just he distracted himself with so many things so he wouldn’t have to focus on “my parents left me”. Jake and Lloyd both face absentee parents, both of which aren’t necessarily good (I mean... Jake’s parents are criminals and Lloyd’s dad is Lord Garmadon...), they both have so much pressure to be the best and be amazing and be popular and happy. They both have to be happy because you can’t be popular in school if you’re sad and you can’t save the world if you focus on your problems. You can’t lead after school activities or lead a team of ninja if you get too much in your head. These boys face a lot, a lot is expected of them, and sometimes, the things their parents do do effect them in ways they don’t see. Jake isn’t always the nicest. He knows Rich is a bully, he lets it happen. He called Jeremy a freak at the mall, he’s probably (I headcanon) a sweet guy, but his upbringing causes some problems, much like Lloyd’s (I mean... the first half of season one). Plus, they both have a best friend who would burn their house down to protect them (because let’s be real here, Rich burned it down to protect others by killing himself and Kai would burn the world for Lloyd) pLUS Jake broke his legs saving Rich and they got worse after the SQUIP made him walk on them and Lloyd broke his foot fighting his father and faced the Overlord with a broken foot. *mic drop* I rest my case.

Nya as Brooke:

okay so I feel like this is kind of a weird one, but like, hear me out. So, Nya as Brooke. My first thought when trying to figure out who Nya would be was, obviously, Christine. But when I think about it, I do see some Nya in Christine, I do, but I kind of see her a little more in Brooke. Let’s start with Brooke. Brooke is popular Chloe Valentine’s best friend, she’s, in a sense, a tool, but more than anything she just wants to belong. She wants to be popular, she wants to not only have her status, but to earn her status. She doesn’t just want it because she’s Chloe Valentine’s best friend, she doesn’t just want it because she’s dated a few popular guys, she wants that status because of who she is, which is one thing that makes her different than Jenna (I can say a lot more about that but I won’t get into it because I LOVE JENNA ROLAN). Brooke is sweet, she’s kind, but bruh she is fierce and she could probably destroy you if she wanted, maybe not in the same aggressive way as Chloe, which she grows into in the show. We see Brooke as the second best all of the time, always in Chloe’s shadow and she’s pretty insecure about it, and herself in general. She wishes to be more, she wishes for someone to love her as her and to have the right to speak her mind and to just be herself, which she gets near the end of the show as she begins sticking up for herself, and most people in the fandom believe that she becomes the right amount of assertive after the show. Now onto Nya. Nya is always second best, she’s always in the ninja’s shadow. She literally gave herself a false identity so she could be enough and more than “the girl”, “Kai’s sister”, “Jay’s girlfriend”, and “the smart girl”. Much like Brooke, she wants more. So she does it herself, which isn’t something Brooke has the courage to do until later, but then again Nya hid for awhile too. Nya can be sweet, she can be gentle, and yo this girl is fierce too. She often feels second best as well, second best to Kai, to the team… not to mention how she feels in season five, trying to get an understanding of her identity and her place in the team (as opposed to her place in school). Brooke gets mad too. She gets mad at Chloe when she wrongs her. She gets mad at Jeremy. Nya gets mad as well. She gets mad at Jay, she gets mad at Cole and Kai and honestly Nya’s probably gotten mad at all of the ninja at some point. But she can still defend herself, and it may have taken Nya some time for people to realize that and to be assertive enough to tell everyone that and freaking mean it, but she does it. Brooke gets the nerves to do that too in act two. Plus Brooke dates Jeremy at one point but then they break up and if I had made this Bruise wouldn’t it have fit perfectly?? I know this one is weird and maybe isn’t the best, but Nya and Brooke are both sweet, kind, and freaking fierce girls and I love. Also it just makes complete sense in my head. (Also I know Christine has this thing about discovering herself but... just read the last part...)

Some other ones I’m thinking for right now but won’t type because this is long enough as it is are: Pixal as Jenna Rolan, Skylor (or Harumi but mostly Skylor) as Chloe Valentine, and Nadakhan as SQUIP (though the Overlord was my original idea and does work… I’m liking this Nadakhan as SQUIP thing a whole heck of a lot as I started writing all of these descriptions…) and for the life of me, guys, I just can’t figure out Zane! Like maybe Zane as Christine, especially since Christine has this whole discovering who she is bit and it takes her and Zane awhile to figure out who they are and be comfortable with it, but I didn’t really want to go the Techno route here (nothing against Techno, it just doesn’t seem like a very BMC ship I don’t know… don’t get me wrong though, I LOVE TECHNO!) I mean I suppose Zane would be a rad Christine if we went the Boyf Riends shipping route with this… Anyways that’s all! Do you agree with any of these? If you have different opinions please tell me because I love headcanons so much and I would genuinely love to read them! If anyone wants to hear anymore BMC / Ninjago AU headcanons please lemme know because I honestly might post some more anyways for the heck of it because I want to because I love this okay love y’all bye!

[gwenbrightly]

Ninjago Jaya ~ Blanket Forts

Cross-posted from FF.net, because why not? Just a quick little Jaya oneshot taking place right after Skybound.

She can’t breath – can’t… Something is wrong… she feels like she’s dying. Like someone has thrown acid directly onto her. Her chest burns. In the distance, she can hear someone screaming her name. Sobbing. What’s going on? She’s gone numb… Why can’t she – It’s then that Nya wakes, sitting up, breathing so sporadically that she’s on the verge of hyperventilation. Just a dream. Just a dream… But, oh. Why does this have to be so hard? She's safe. Alive. The poison can’t hurt her anymore, and neither can that djinn. She knows that. But it doesn’t stop her from reliving every last sucky detail of what she faced less than a day ago (in fact, it’s not even midnight yet, so…). She almost… No, it’s best not to think about that… Maybe if she just. Doesn’t sleep? She supposes. But that’s not really a great option, cause then, she’ll be stuck up all night with nothing but her own thoughts to distract her. And she’s not sure she can handle being alone right now. She needs Jay. It’s funny, she thinks slipping from her bed, how she’s gone from actively avoiding the master of lightning, to being desperate to have him near her as much as possible. Love is weird like that. The hallway is dark, quiet. A stark contrast to the locations she’s spent the past few weeks. First, on the run, then stuck in jail, or on an island, then on the run again… Being home is nice. Sort of. Except for the lingering trauma from the past few days. Yeah, the sooner they can recover from that, the better. And for now, the others don’t need to know about how close everything came to being… The master of water quietly slides the door to Jay’s quarters. But… He’s not there. In fact, if his bed still being tidily made means anything, he hasn’t been in the room at all since they finally returned from Styx earlier. So, then… Where is he? Not the kitchen or living room, apparently, Nya discovers upon further searching. Sighing, she makes her way out into the deck – the only other place left to check. And it’s a good thing she does, as it turns out, cause there he is, looking out over the railings, posture tense. A light summer breeze plays with his ridiculously curly hair, making it an even bigger mess that it usually is. Honestly, it’s actually a pretty beautiful night. There are no clouds in sight; she can see millions of stars scattered across the sky.

“Couldn’t sleep?” She asks softly when she reaches him. Jay flinched slightly at the sound, before realizing that it’s her.

“Y-yeah… I couldn’t stop thinking about how…” He says so quietly she almost misses it.

“Me neither. I-even after I scrubbed every last inch of my body, it feels like the venom is still there. Like, I keep forgetting how to breath.. And remembering how much it hurt… And…”

“Oh, Nya…” He breathes, wrapping his arms around her. She bites back a sob as she snuggles into his embrace, reveling in the comfort it brings her. They rock back and forth for a few minutes, trying not to completely break down.

“I'm so sorry we had to go through all of… that. I-you died. It was horrible. And it was all my fault!”

“No. Don’t you dare try to take all of the blame for this. I mean, yes, you definitely made some really stupid choices, but if anyone’s gonna take the responsibility for what happened, it should be me. I started all of this a long, long time ago when I - ” Nya angles herself so that she can see his face.

“Nya, you don’t have to-” He begins to cut her off, but doesn’t get very far. She smiles softly, saying,

“Look. I chose you. I want us to work out, for us to be happy, but in order for that to happen, there are some things that need to be said. First of all, I come with baggage. A lot of it.”

“So do I.” He agrees, still not sure where the conversation is going. She bites back a chuckle.

“I’ve noticed. But… The thing is, before… During the whole fiasco with the perfect match machine? It was never about you. It was about me. For the record, I never stopped having feelings for you… I-I just…” Dragging Jay down beside her, she sinks onto the deck, leaning her back against the railing. It’s going to take awhile to really explain. To lay herself bare like she knows she needs to. Because Jay deserves the truth. They may as well get comfortable.

“I’m not the best at… Being open about my feelings. I’ve always hated feeling vulnerable, and back then? I didn’t really get why… Not until a lot later. When I was forced to become the water ninja, in fact. I was so awful at it, and it made me so uncomfortable – but it also helped me identify some of my self image issues.” She takes a deep breath, reaching for his hand as she continues, “So much of my life, I’ve felt like I had to prove something to someone. In Ignacia, Kai and I both had to prove that we could take care of ourselves. There wasn’t another option, unless we wanted to be saddled with some sketchy babysitter or sent to an orphanage. Then came Kai becoming a ninja, and, suddenly, I got it into my head that you guys wouldn’t take me seriously if you realized that I was samurai x.” She ignores the disgruntled look on the master of lightning’s face – she already knows now that it was a stupid sentiment, “So I didn’t tell you. Even though it probably just made things more dangerous. When Sensei started training me, I felt like I had to prove something there, too. That I was worthy of my mother’s element – even if I hated it and just wanted to go back to being a samurai, something that I was already good at. I got so frustrated that I tried to quite. And that’s when it first started to click. Because maybe some part of me thought that by doing all this impressive stuff, I could prove that it was a mistake for my parents to-to…”

“To leave you behind?” However Jay managed to guess her thoughts, she’s a little grateful she doesn’t have to say it herself.

“Yeah… So, anyway, back when we were still together, you were always so open and sweet about your feelings for me. And somewhere in the back of my head was that part of me that felt like I could never measure up to the person you thought I was and-”

“I'm so sorry! I didn’t realize… I-I only wanted to show you how much I cared. Because I thought that if you realized how special and loved you were… You wouldn't…" Leave me? The words aren’t spoken aloud, but the implication is there.

“I know. I just… I was feeling so overwhelmed, because I did want to be able to tell you how I felt about you – about the whole situation, but I kept talking myself out of it and thinking that if I just added a few boundaries until I reached the point where things felt safe again that… But then that stupid machine came into the picture, and I dunno? It scared me, because what if I was wrong? What if you didn’t really love me and left…”

“I would never.” He assures her, squeezing the hand clasping own. She brings her spare hand up to touch his cheek.

“You wouldn’t. And I was awful to let myself think that. Everything got so out of hand, and I had so many opportunities to fix things, but I didn’t. Even after the fighting calmed down. I didn’t wanna risk hurting you by ruining another relationship attempt. So, I stayed quiet. I came so close to confessing everything on Chen’s Island – but I didn’t have a chance to before we had to run off and save the world.”

“Will it ever not be that way?” Jay ponders. She shrugs.

“The world saving was very distracting. For a long time. Once I finally felt like I was starting to come to terms with what had been going on mentally, having the media get involved dealt me another blow. It was like the world no longer valued me as anything more than a token – an object to be won… But I didn’t want to completely give up on at least being friends with you, so I started trying to talk. But in the end, I just ended up pushing you away even more because I was so concerned about fighting my public image and not letting anyone else decide what I could be or do with my life. And to be honest? It freaked me out how sure you were that we were meant to be. I needed to regain control, and you ended up paying the price. And I can never tell you how sorry I am for being such a jerk! I died! You almost got killed several times because I refused to stop being stubborn and let someone else take the wheel, even for a moment! I-I…” A soft kiss prevents her from saying anything more. How is it that such a simple gesture has always had the power to relieve her pain?

“I forgave you a long time ago… And I never stopped caring about you, either. Even when I was fighting with Cole-which was a pretty dumb move in hindsight. We were both being idiots. And I’m sorry too...”

“I-Okay. Yeah, we kinda were… We’re a hot mess, aren’t we?” Nya exclaims, snuggling against her boyfriend. He smirks slightly.

“Well, we’re definitely hot!” She shoots him a look, which he pretends not to see, instead kissing her forehead.

“And we are a bit of a mess. But we’ve both grown so much. I really think we’ll make it this time…”

“Mm… I love you, Jay Walker.”

“And I love you, Nya Smith. Just don't ever die on me again. I don’t think I could handle that…” They both shudder, moving even closer together, as if afraid that they’ll be torn apart.

“I’m not handling it now…” Nya admits, “I’m sure sleep would help, but… That’s not happening any time soon…”

“Same here. So, what do we do, then?” Jay wonders. She doesn’t answer right away, but then, inspiration strikes her.

“When I was little, Kai used to build these super elaborate blanket forts whenever one of us was upset. Like ones that spanned entire rooms, and had lots of junk food hidden inside. And then, we’d stay up and watch as many movies as it took to calm back down. Do you think, maybe…?”

“Sure. If it’ll help. I’ll grab the cushions and blankets, you get the movies and snacks.” The master of lightning quickly agrees. It doesn’t take long for them to construct their fortress against one side of the deck, using every last spare sheet and pillow they own (and maybe snagging a few from Kai’s stash-that’s what siblings are for) . One and a half movies later, they finally give in to their exhaustion, falling asleep with their hands intertwined. Their joint presence keeps the nightmares at bay until Nya’s brother finds them the next morning. Though concerned about what exactly they’ve been doing all night, he’s honestly just relieved that they’ve finally figured things out. One less source of headaches for him, as long as they don’t go making a habit of public displays of affection like yesterday’s kiss… Which they probably will, but he can yell at them later. They do look awfully cute like that…

[eyeofthewolfe]

Evil Zane Chapter 8

As Zane prepares his new allies, the ninja discover pursue an unlikely friend who has the ability to cure Zane.

Prologue and Chapters 1-5: here

Chapter 6: here

Chapter 7: here

Chapter 8

 Immediately after PIXAL delivered the horrible news, Jay instantly broke into a coughing fit, but he was shooting looks at Nya. The girl instantly caught on. “Oh no, I thought you were getting better!” Nya said quickly and then pulled Jay out of the room. The ninja all glanced at each other, but shrugged and ignored the sudden outburst.

As soon as Nya and Jay moved out of earshot Jay quit his coughing and grabbed Nya. “You don’t think…”

Nya stared back. “She said there was no one else in Ninjago like Zane…” she said. “But she doesn’t know about the other Zane.”

Jay’s mouth lifted into a small smile. “You don’t think that he has the part we need, do you?”

Nya looked back, but Jay could tell that she was thinking. “He did say that he was built to protect others who can’t protect themselves, right? That’s the motive that Zane has, well, had. So that means…”

Both Jay and Nya grinned. “Echo Zane can save Zane!” they said in unison.

Jay turned to go back to the bridge. “We need to go tell the others!” he said excitedly, but Nya grabbed his arm and pulled him back. “Wait, Jay- how are we supposed to explain that we know about Echo Zane?”

Jay froze. He grabbed his forehead. “Aw man, that’s a doozie! We met him during the Skybound timeline!”

Jay and Nya had experienced an alternate timeline in which Ninjago was under attack by sky pirates led by an evil djinn captain named Nadakhan. Each of the ninja were captured in the magical djinn blade, all except Jay and Nya. But after the evil genie had ripped huge chunks out of Ninjago and married Nya to inherit infinite wishes, he was poisoned and weak enough for Jay to say a final wish that would mortalize Nadakhan and therefore destroy his power. But he wasn’t the only one who was poisoned, Nya was accidently effected as well, but fatally. She died in Jay’s arms. That was when Jay made his last and honest wish to go back and prevent all the events that transpired because of the release of Nadakhan. The defeated djinn reluctantly granted the wish and time was reset. Only Jay and Nya remembered the events from this miniature adventure, which they have nicknamed the “skybound timeline”.

But within the skybound storyline, Jay and Nya had fled to the lighthouse prison that Dr. Julien had formally been imprisoned in in order to escape Nadakhan. There, they were surprised to find out that they were not alone. It turned out that Dr. Julien had built a replacement Zane out of scraps to keep him company. He was covered in rust from age, but Nya and Jay had somewhat adopted him as a fellow ninja. He even assisted Jay when he led a party of replacement ninja to rescue Nya and the other ninjas. But when time was reset…Echo Zane was put back in the tower untouched and unknowing that he had ever had friends or been part of an epic battle for Ninjago.

Nya frowned. “How are we going to explain that we know about him without sharing skybound?”

Jay looked up the staircase where the rest of the team resided. They had kept this a secret for so long- none of the other ninja would have ever imagined they had faced a Djinn in their time. Or rewritten time.

Finally, Jay sighed and turned back to Nya. “I guess it’s time they learned the truth.”

Nya paused, then nodded as well. They both returned back to the bridge.

Cole was the first one to notice them walk in because his eyes were already focused on the doorway with a dead stare. He sat up with a confused look. Slowly the team recognized that Jay and Nya had something to say because they were standing in the front. “Yes, you two?” Sensei asked as the room fell quiet.

Nya and Jay exchanged a nervous look.

“You guys are scaring us. What’s wrong?” Kai spoke from his seat.

Nya cleared her throat. “Um, so we haven’t told you the full story of how Jay and I made up.”

“Okay,” Lloyd said, stepping in. “We really don’t have the time to listen-“

“Lloyd, zip it. This is important.” Jay snapped, a bit of electricity sparking from his right hand. Lloyd froze with his mouth open.

“Okay, listen up guys.” Jay started. “I need to tell you all something that you may not want to believe but need to trust.” Nya took his hand. He took a deep breath and said, “I’m going to tell you how Nya died.”

 _____________________________________________________

Zane slammed his fists on the console sending sparks flying. “This is frustrating! The ninja continue to somehow overpower me! This must be what the other villains we have faced felt like after a defeat.”

The Mechanic nodded.

Zane turned to the cyborg with a scowl. “How is Phase 2?” He spat.

The Mechanic directed Zane to the factory line where the machines were busy with five different projects. “It’s moving along, sir. There were some complications with the designs-“

Zane grabbed the Mechanic’s throat and lifted him a few inches off of the ground. “What complications?” Zane growled through clenched teeth.

Spitting and gasping, he said, “They….weren’t…..weaponized….enough….”

Zane dropped the man. “They don’t need to be weaponized! They are fine as they are!”

The Mechanic regained his breath in long gasps. “Sir, all I did was add personalized weapons to fit each design personality to make them even more powerful!” He pushed his shaking body off the ground and hit a button on the unbroken computer console. Five blueprints appeared on the screen.

The Mechanic, still shaking, pointed at the designs. “Now, they are deadly both mentally and physically. I can reverse this if you want-“

Zane shot his hand up and the crook flinched in fear. Zane studied the designs before grinning. He turned to his ally. “Once again, you have exceeded my expectations. You’re excellent additions to my allies will carry through.”

“Thank you sir,” The Mechanic said in relief.

Zane turned to the factory where the machines were busy at work on the current project and the massive metal dragon rested beyond it. “This changes the ball game…” Zane spoke as he saw his new allies form before his eyes. “And it looks like I’ve got home field advantage.”

 _______________________________________________________

They were almost to the lighthouse when Jay finished his story. He closed his mouth and was met with silence.    

“So?” Jay said. “Do you believe me?”

Kai, who actually started silently crying when Jay got to the part about Nya’s death, was the first to speak. “You are expecting us to hear you say that you and Nya lived an alternate timeline with flying pirates and floating land masses and an evil djinn and follow it immediately with asking us if we believed it?!”

Jay nodded. “Yes.”

Kai snorted and was about to speak when someone said, “I believe you.”

The whole team turned to Cole. “You do?” Jay said softly.

Cole stood up from his seat in the corner. “Of all the people in this room, if there’s only one person who could outthink a genie solely based on his love for another, it’s Jay.” Cole started. Jay blinked in surprise. “I know this because when Nya fell for me you fought so hard to get her back. It was enough for me to realize how dedicated you were to loving her and how it was destroying our friendship. If some evil being, genie or not, was after Nya, the only person on this team who would be strong enough to rescue her is Jay. So do I think that timeline is true? It’s not unbelievable. It’s not impossible. But it is imaginable.”

Nya smiled at Cole. Jay looked like he was on the brim of tears. “Thanks, Cole.” He said. Cole nodded before sitting back down.

“So in your…story…” Lloyd began. “You mentioned the other Zane… Emo Zane?”

“Echo Zane.” Nya corrected followed by a giggle from Jay. “He is currently located within the lighthouse prison. We should arrive there momentarily.”

“And if he’s not there?” Misako asked.

Jay looked at her confidently. “He will be there.”

Kai raised his eyebrows. He leaned over to Lloyd. “He must have gained his confidence from that timeline.” he whispered to the green ninja. Lloyd cracked a smile, but his eyes were locked on his casts again. He was lost in his head as Jay continued to speak.

“So since he is built by Dr. Julien and has the same motive, he must have the piece we need to save Zane. So we go there and ask him for it.”

Cole looked up. “Without that piece of equipment, wouldn’t it just render Echo Zane purposeless?”

Nya frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Without a purpose it would just be a relic, right?” Cole said.

Jay shifted. “You have a point,” he said. “Removing that piece would…deactivate Echo Zane.”

Nya’s frown tightened. “I’m sure Echo Zane will understand. He’s built to protect others, so that means his brother to.”

“But would he die for his brother?” Kai said.

“I would.” Nya shot back. Kai opened his mouth, but closed it shortly afterwards.

The Bounty began to drop altitude slowly. Nya and Jay looked out the front window and smiled. “We are here!” Jay announced. The team turned and in the brilliance of the sun sat the tall lighthouse gleaming above the waves of the ocean. The Bounty landed on the small beach at the base of the staircase and caused seagulls to flutter to the roof. Leaving Misako to care for the ship, the team exited the Bounty and followed Jay and Nya as they walked up the staircase.

Filled with excitement, Jay bust through the door and yelled, “ZANE!”

Nothing moved. Jay frowned. “Hold on,” Jay said (mainly to himself) and walked towards the wall. Nya walked toward the staircase and looked up. Kai, Lloyd, and Cole walked into the main area followed by Wu, who was checking a golden pocket watch.

“Zane?” Nya called upstairs. She began to walk up the many flights of stairs. Kai followed her.

Jay, on the other hand, was staring at the wall.

Cole approached him. “What are you looking for?” he asked. Jay’s eyes were narrowed as he scanned the brick wall. “The right lever….” He murmured, before his eyes froze on a spot. “There!” he said, pointing at a camouflaged lever. Cole felt his jaw drop a little. Jay chuckled then pushed it down. The brick wall shifted and shape of a door slid to the side, revealing a path to a hidden bunker.

“Zane?” Jay called out as he made his way down the path, followed by Lloyd and Cole.

Sensei Wu looked up from his watch and saw two parties disappear in two different directions. He sighed, walked over to a stool, sat down, and waited.

 _________________________________________________________

After a few flights of climbing, Nya and Kai made it to the top floor. “Zane…” Nya called out as she finished walking up the last few stairs. However, the floor was empty. With a frown, she turned to go back down, but Kai stopped her.

Nya was going to say something, but she saw a spark of fear in Kai’s eyes. “What is it?” She asked.

Kai looked into her eyes and said, “Did you really die?”

Nya felt like Zane had frozen her heart. In that moment, Kai didn’t look like the brother she knew. Instead of his cocky smirk, he wore a confused scowl. His eyes that were once filled with fire were now full of tears. He even looked more pale than usual. Nya sighed and sat down on the top staircase. Kai sat down next to her.

Nya paused. “Yes, I did die.”

Kai looked like he was shot in the gut. “There is an existing timeline where you are dead?” He cried. Nya watched the tears begin to stream down his face. “I don’t want to believe that, I can’t believe that-“

“You don’t have to. You didn’t live that, and you never will.” Nya reassured him.

He tried to wipe away his tears. “But you died. That happened. And a version of me had to live with having my entire family being gone...“

“Oh, Kai….” Now Nya began to form tears. “You know mom and dad are still with us in some way. Besides, we don’t even know they are really gone. They just vanished.”

“It’s not like they are going to come back,” Kai spat. Nya flinched, shocked. “I’m sorry…” he instantly said. “But they’ve been gone for 12 years. I’ve somewhat gotten over losing them…but loosing you…”

Nya wrapped her arms around her brother. “You won’t lose me. I’m right here. I’ll always be there for you.” Kai returned the hug, and the siblings were wrapped in a hug for a few hour-long seconds. Finally, Kai pulled away and attempted to wipe the tears from his cheeks.

Nya lifted her hand, and the water on Kai’s face lifted off of the skin and formed a miniature ball of water. With a flick of her hand, the ball of tears sailed out of the window. Kai watched it go before turning back to his sister. “I’ve seen you do a lot of cool things, but that has got to be my favorite.”

Nya laughed. “I’ve had practice.” She said with a wink. “C’mon, let’s go find Echo Zane.”

 ________________________________________________________

Jay finally made it to the base of the bunker. He paused and looked at his surroundings. “Wow,” he said to himself. “Such good non-existent memories.”

Cole and Lloyd flanked his side. “Whoa,” Lloyd said out loud.

The room was full of boxes with rusted metal packed into them. The ground was littered with orange crusted parts and random sheets of blueprints for skeleton vehicles. A circular window that was half underwater provided the needed light in the room.

“Hello?” Jay called out. “Zane?”

There was silence.

Cole sighed. “Look, Jay…maybe you were wrong about-“

“How do you know my name?”

The three ninja froze. Cole’s eyes widened. “Scratch that, you were right.” He whispered really fast.

Jay stepped farther into the room. “Zane..I know you are in here. This will sound weird, but I know you. My girlfriend and I met you in an alternate timeline, and you helped us. You were built to protect others?”

There was a pause, but then the sound of creaking and rusted metal squeaked in the shadowed corner.

Emerging into the light, Echo Zane said, “I was built to protect others who cannot protect themselves.”

Lloyd and Cole gasped while Jay grinned. “Echo Zane!” he cheered.

Echo Zane looked at his new visitors. “Wait…you three look familiar.”

Lloyd looked at Jay, who was the one now who looked confused. “Does he remember the timeline?”

“Father…” Echo Zane spoke suddenly. The ninja turned back to the robot. “Dr. Julien?” Cole guessed.

“Father.” The rusted replica repeated, this time with more certainty. “You took Father away.”  

[spinjitsuburst]

ramble about ur favs i wanna hear abt ur thoughts -zaptrap

HAN’S INFODUMPING ABOUT JAY... START!!!!

so like sgdkdhdkdhd I say Jay and Lloyd are my “favorites” but honestly it’s so hard to pick favorites out of this skittles squad like I love EVERY character for a variety of different reasons. I was going to also infodump about Lloyd but then I started talking about Prime Empire and then this post got. Long. So. it's just Jay I may infodump about Lloyd another day especially since I'm very Conduit Brained Rn but yea yea!

this is long so i'm putting most of it under the cut so y'all don't kill me for making a huge long post

I considered putting Zane and Sora on here as well since I’d also consider them my “favs” but like this is already gonna be. A lot of. Infodumping (also i typed THIS part before I even started and decided not to yell about Lloyd because this already got long enough). Maybe I’ll make a separate post for those two hmm hmm much to consider but for now MY (technically) FAVORITE NINJAGO CHARACTER: JAY WALKER

THE SPARKPLUG WHO INVADED MY BRAIN LIKE A PARASITE

so hey his name is a pun this makes me laugh ridiculously hard every time I remember he is named. After a misdemeanor HSKSHDKFH

Jay is such an interesting case of a character for me because I started out the show not liking him. Which is. Stares at my entire account I think my feelings have changed somewhat

Jay starts out as an asshole I don’t think anyone can disagree with me there (although honestly they’re all assholes in early ninjago they bullied a ten year old and left him dangling several feet off the ground) but over the course of the show you can see him start developing into a much more interesting character. He goes from being so insecure he's faking everything about himself to someone who knows who he is and is so genuine about it

now yea we could argue about whether his character was too uwu-ified post-season 10 but this is the FUN HAN POST SO WE'RE NOT GONNA TALK ABOUT THAT the point is you can SEE the growth that Jay has gone through and I am going to show you that growth through what I call

✨ The Skybound to Prime Empire Effect ✨

I AM SO PASSIONATE ABOUT THE IDEA THAT PRIME EMPIRE WAS WRITTEN TO BE A DIRECT PARALLEL OF SKYBOUND AND WAS CENTERED ON SHOWING HOW THE NINJA ESPECIALLY JAY HAVE GROWN THROUGHOUT THE SEASON

when season 12 rolls around we are at the point in Jay's development where he is CONFIDENT in who he is. He's a fun-loving jokester with the power of lightning and the drive to help people whenever he can. He uses jokes and humor to help alleviate tension and get people through whatever's happening. And when on his own what does he do?

BECOME AN ENTERTAINER BABEY

i like to think jay's club in prime empire was a safe haven for anyone stuck in the game who figured out hey. we Can't Leave and felt freaked about it. Also Jay would generally try and spread the word that hey something ISN'T RIGHT HERE which would lead people to want to stay with him

(totally plugging my friend's fic but this kind of thing is explored in would you like to enter prime empire by @finn-m-corvex y'all should check it out cool cool)

also the prime empire shorts which i watched all of in the midst of typing this video cuz i love them go watch them please please please jay was publically fighting the red visors which I imagine may have raised some red flags for some players

THIS SOMEHOW TURNED INTO PRIME EMPIRE INFODUMPING LMAO ANYWAYS Jay's confident! He becomes an entertainer because it's who he knows he is! And it's something that will get people hyped and having fun, which is very in-character for Jay to do! He uses those kinds of things to mask the Bad Things going on and get people remembering what's good

I've talked about this sort of thing before but that's Jay's whole philosophy as early as season 9! Which is a DIRECT contrast to how he views it in season 6, as Nadakhan puts it scarily accurately

"You make jokes to mask the fact that you're afraid"

(i was gonna grab a screenshot for that like i did with the hunted scene but netflix has bloCKED THE ABILITY TO TAKE SCREENSHOTS THE WAY I USED TO and i don't have them already and i'm too lazy to grab them from elsewhere so alas trust me he says it)

making jokes to hide your fear and using humor to remind yourself of what's good and coping with the bad are two VERY different outlooks on it

so I think this outlook is what drives him to make this glamrock persona in the first place - this is a bad situation, one he's in with other civilians, and what better way to keep him and themself safe until the others get there than throwing a big performance at a safe place!

also it's just so gender okay I want to look like Superstar Rockin' Jay so badly

it's also interesting to see his outlook on his parents change over time! In season six he finds out Ed and Edna aren't his birth parents and feels upset about it, not understanding why his birth parents would've abandoned him. In season twelve, that outlook changing is EXACTLY why Jay's able to get through to Unagami

"I was abandoned by my parents, too!... I never understood why, and I never had the chance to even ask. But I always hoped there was a good reason. What if there's a reason?"

(again curse you netflix i wanted SCREENSHOTS whatever whatever)

It's this scene that gets Unagami to calm down long enough for Milton Dyer to get there, and presumably is what stops him from just. Flattening him and Jay like a pancake.

to piggyback off of this i absolutely adore how Unagami and Jay consider each other adopted brothers in that one book I still haven't read and I hope he's in Dragons Rising at some point Unagami is my favorite "villain" (no longer a villain) in the whole show he deserves more screentime

like this is where i found out about this and it's plagued my mind ever since. i need to read. this book just for them

SO YEA OKAY Prime Empire is "Who is Jay as a Person Post-Skybound" to me also it opens up so many fascinating things about Jay. I rest my case

so backpedaling a little bit. JAY CARES SO MUCH ABOUT HIS PARENTS GUYS IT'S SO SOFT AND I'M sobs

like yea the first episode with Ed and Edna in it has Jay avoiding them like the plague but this gets explained very easily when you remember he was bullied for his home life before he became a ninja. It makes a lot more sense why he wouldn't want them around his new friends, assuming they'd react the same way. Also how was he supposed to know literally all the rest of the groups parents were either dead, presumed dead, or had a toxic relationship with their kid lmao

(Cole calling his mom kills me. Cole's mom is dead. I know they probably just didn't think that far ahead when writing the dialogue but it's so funny mans pretended to call his dead mom to get on Jay for not appreciating his parents iconic behavior)

anyways literally every episode Ed and Edna are central to (except like the one in skybound) Jay stops at nothing to protect his parents and it means the absolute world to me he's so much like them!! They raised an inventive little nerd and he will stop at nothing to make sure they're safe and it's. It's SO IMPORTANT TO ME OKAY

ALSO this is an excuse to clip my favorite piece of dialogue possibly in the entire show. Except Netflix won't let me now. So you just get the text dialogue

Jay's just fallen from the sky with a messed up eye and is incredibly distraught that all his friends are captured. And his dad just. The woRLD IS FALLING APART AND HE'S EATIN' SOUP-

Ed i love you

anyways

anways anyways this just turned into me rambling about prime empire and then Ed and Edna and a lot of disjointed other stuff but thank you for this opportunity i was going to also ramble about lloyd but i put this post in a word count and

yea i think that's enough for a tumblr post anyways! If anyone wants any like. More logically thought out and direct thoughts about characters feel free to send me asks this was fun thank u @zaptrap for this opportunity to scream about jay

[cboffshore]

You should know that I really appreciate and enjoy reading your analysis on why Jay-torture/sa is such a focus on the Skybound fandom. I haven't read much Skybound fanfiction myself, but it always bugged me how much of the Skybound fanart I saw on tumblr was related to Jay angst and little else.

Reading your essays also helped me word some of the feelings on the Danny Phantom fandom, of all things. If you're unfamiliar, the short version is that there's an enormous chunk of the fandom dedicated to depicting the main character getting dissected in a much detail as possible.

It’s better and worse than the Skybound fanfiction scene for various reasons, but both fandoms have an extreme obsession with torturing the main character, and your canary metaphor really hit the nail on the head. Why do so many people feel the need to be so graphic? Why do I have to walk through a swarm of dead canaries every time I want a muffin? Why do so many people claim this is the “best and most logical” direction to take the story when actual canon states otherwise

AND offers so many other interesting directions you could take the story but don't?

I very much see what you're trying to say with your Skybound essays, and I very much feel it.

Thanks! Speaking as someone who's read a LOT of Skybound fic, it honestly feels like I haven't read a lot because of how similar a LOT of it is. Obviously there are exceptions to the trend (such as your fics and mine), they're just tricky to find sometimes because you have to dig through a pile of dead canaries to get to them. One thing I didn't address in my essays was how it shows up in fanart, but that's also a symptom of it - the gore elements especially show up CONSTANTLY. It's almost like it's not legally a Skybound drawing unless it's Jay with his clothes half torn off and an eye patch crusted in blood. (Again: loads of exceptions there, but it's a HUGE part of fanon imagery.)

The Danny Phantom thing is interesting to hear - I don't personally watch that show, but I know people who do, and I've heard whispers of that dissection trend before. It's fascinating and weird what people fixate on and make into a huge trend, isn't it? Really sucks if you're not into the popular interpretations, though. There are so many other cool questions and angles to work with and we just... consistently end up with the same few ones.

I wonder sometimes if I'm flat out crazy for missing whatever secret sauce makes these fics compelling, but I just can't bring myself to like them. I truly do NOT get it. Ever since publishing that essay, I've learned I'm FAR from the only one who feels this way, but it's not something that's talked about very much at all! What really irks me is when people try to pass these interpretations off as canon and refuse to stop and think about the things they're seeing (case in point, if you didn't watch it go down yourself: a while back we had a liveblogger get to Skybound and be IMMEDIATELY hit with a handful Jay-gets-assaulted-for-sure-so-be-careful warnings, iirc, which... no???).

I don't know. It's weird. I'll stop blathering on about it now, but again, it's good to know the essay helped someone else. Thanks!

[cboffshore]

daily anon asks because anon likes hearing you ramble about your fics and i encourage them like the little analysis rambling - gremlin that i am.

regarding your new fic, which was beautifully written by the way! to what extent would you say the skybound events still affect jay & nya even after crystallised? are they small little triggers, nightmares after all the years passed? what’s your insight with that?

Hey there! Looks like I might have to start calling you the Enabler or something if this keeps up ;)

Anyway: yes, I'll take you up on the ramble chance offer, and I'm doing it in a single shot so I don't forget. And it's going to get long, so. You know.

Under the cut we go!

Post-Crystalized, I do think the events of Skybound still affect Jay and Nya, but realistically not much more than any other character-specific events affect any of their teammates. It's not a timeline that gets explored a lot, either - most Skybound angst that I see either happens during the season, immediately after, or within the context of very specific events, like the pirate genie joke from season eight. Granted, that's about as much as the show is willing to acknowledge it, so it's sort of tricky to figure out how strongly it would affect them.

Ultimately, I settled on a little bit of projection - I have some specific emotional trauma from a few years ago that I like to think I've gotten over, but sometimes I find myself thinking about it after the smallest little thing. For instance, I discovered a while ago that when I put my retainer in for the night and then smile at myself in the mirror, the retainer moves my lips and exposes my teeth just enough that my smile looks pretty close to the perpetrator's.

Weird, right?

It's been years since I've seen or spoken to that particular person. I can barely remember their face, so I have no idea what really set THAT memory off. And yet: there I was in my bathroom thinking of them. I didn't have any kind of major reaction beyond some discomfort and feeling kind of weird about myself in the moment, but, you know.. still happened. Anyway, that's the angle I go for when writing post-Skybound Jaya, because it's the one that makes the most sense to me and that I find easiest to write. The common trope of huge, overblown speeches about self worth and guilt and everything being okay that crop up in so many Skybound fix it fics has never sat right with me, because that's not how I approached my own recovery. I think I'm pretty healed and that I've processed it pretty well, but every so often, something minor just takes me back.

When I was first outlining this fic, I set it right after the Dark Island Trilogy, because that's something that I've NEVER seen addressed. If you haven't read it yet, I won't spoil anything for you, but the important bits are that it is canon and that it actually involves the Sky Pirates (minus Nadakhan). While they don't remember any of the timeline, Jay and Nya sure do, and they mention it a few times in the trilogy in that classic secretive way people have headcanoned for years now. Had I gone this route, it would have made the wound a bit more raw, which would've been nice. However, Jay having that flashback THEN would have been too obvious. (Also: they didn't have the Monastery. I wanted them to be seriously stable for this.) I then tried pushing it back to right after MOTO to be a companion piece for Small Cuts, but ultimately, I decided that loading Jay and Nya up with all the events of the Wildbrain era would give me the most ammunition to choose from. So: Post-Crystalized. They're still getting used to each other. Chapter two of A Little Annihilation will basically just be them on their own, bonding more as they embark on the world's most sentimental Home Depot run.

We don't have any decent information on how Jay and Nya process Skybound now. We ALMOST did, believe it or not, but the creators chickened out of putting Nadakhan on the Council of the Crystal King. Beyond the teapot gag, we haven't had any solid acknowledgement since SOG.

However! We did get a scrap of it in Dragons Rising season one, but only from Nya's angle, and it's VERY minor. I drew from e14 of DRs1 for both IICT and Annihilation, because that episode gives us two tiny, telling moments: the tinge of bitterness in Nya's voice when she tells Sora about the djinn and their showmanship, and the way she steps in front of Sora when all she sees of Arrakore is his silhouette and can't rule out that he's not dangerous. I've seen a lot of criticism towards this episode for not giving her a more dramatic or emotional reaction, which I find WILDLY unfair, because let's be real: at this point, Skybound is no longer the worst or craziest thing she's seen.

Whether or not those tiny reactions were intentional on the writer's part (and the writers' room for DR id so thorough that I believe it was intentional), they're IMPORTANT. It's been years! The Merge has happened, she's been the ocean, Jay's gone MIA, she's helping mentor the next generation and stop reality from caving in on itself. Dying in a wedding gown Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge style (and all its associated trauma) isn't necessarily top of mind, but having to use a djinn spell and tell Sora who they were would probably remind her of all that. To say NOTHING of the absolute curveball of meeting Arrakore! I stand at my mirror, put my retainer in, and see my bully's face; Nya steps into a cave and sees a four-armed, ponytailed silhouette rising and threatening her. Of COURSE that's startling, but enough has changed that she wouldn't collapse into a sniveling mess in front of Sora. For Jay, we know nothing, so I'm making him up as I go and taking a similar approach.

I got a little carried away there, but the point is: yes, it probably still affects them; no, it's not as drastic as people probably expect, and I can't bring myself to write it that way, because Nya's reaction matches my own so closely that I can't imagine writing anything else. Obviously I'm not working from the knowledge Nya has in Dragons Rising, but I'm letting her reaction there retroactively color her post-Crystalized experience (as well as Jay's, because I think they're similar like that).

Anyway, thanks for the ask! I'm hoping that that "daily" there isn't just hyperbole - you know I'm always down for this.

[purplerose244]

My thoughts on Ninjago the Island!!! 🏝🏝🏝

So, gotta be honest... this is not a Blind reaction thing, I actually watched it in French first so I know most of the stuff already 😅 It's entertaining, it got great animation, but nothing more than that in my opinion 🤷‍♀️

Still there is stuff I liked or I want to point out, and finally I'm seeing the English version so I can actually understand what the HECK they are saying 🤩

Alright, nothing else to say, here we go!

UNCHARTED

I haven't actually seen anything Clutch Powers related before Ninjago, is he always like this? I love that he is a jerk honestly, just wondering 😂

Press F for respect for intern Dwaine (at least he seems to like being... used?)

Clutch: It's just a bunch of rocks! It's not alive!

Totem: I'm about to end this man's whole career

Wait, Misako is part of the explorers club? ... that would have come in handy in season 11 to get the scroll of Forbitten Spinjitzu from the club instead of begging uncle Powers for it... *sighs* I don't mind plot holes in Ninjago like most fans I think, but if you wanna make Misako relevant again at least pay attention to the details 😅

Wow, after the end of season 13 I would've thought Wu was going to go through a midlife crisis, not Misako 😂😂

Oww, everytime I hear I get 😢 Bless your soul Kirby, always in our hearts 🖤🖤🖤

Well hello Brian

Always nice to see you 😊

Twitchy Tim must have been pretty interesting to voice 🤔 I like him enough, he's fun and all, maybe not at the level of the characters we got last season

Okay, the place is called the STORM belt, there are LIGHTNINGS, and the sand of the beach is BLUE. Are we gonna address any of these similarities to our Bluebell here or not? 😅

Wait, Tim was giving a hot air balloon tour, does that mean other people where with him? What of them? Are they dead? Did he let them die on the island?... am I reading too much into this? Probably 🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️

Alright, the part of the boats? SO COOL 🤩🤩 I literally can't say anything bad about the animation at this point

Why did they think leaving Kai, Jay and Cole on one boat was going to be a good idea 😂 Also Zane just randomly doing sick tricks on his vehicle, love that nindroid

I'm guessing Nya is keeping her water abilities for her season 🤷‍♀️

Yep, yep, this is why the creators try to keep Pixal out of the adventures, with her everything is way too cool and easy to access to 😎😎

Twitchy Tim: There are statues that become alive!!

Lloyd:... so it's a season 2 stone army ripoff, we've seen worse

It's a cute episode overall 👍

THE KEEPERS OF THE AMULET

OKAY THE INTRO IS SO FREAKING COOL 🤩🤩🤩🤩

So Twitchy Tim has temporarily taken over Jay's role of spazzing out and complain about worse case scenarios... in another occasion they might have bonded over this, maybe 😂

Okay, survival position? MOOD

Nya: DRAGOOON 😱

Me: DRAGOOOOOOON 😍😍😍

Why am I not surprised that Jay was the one that named him Zippy? 💙 Also HE'S SO CUTE 💕💕💕 Love how in every adventure, we always get very different types of dragon in this show 👌 I'm a simple person, I see a dragon... 🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩

Oh-oh, it's the "Lloyd's done with this crap"'s face

This means serious business... am I that used to LEGO characters that this way of crossing arms on the chest looks almost normal to me? 😅

Soooo, Master of the Mountain clearly gave Cole too much development... because now he got demoted to "the one who is always hungry" 🤦‍♀️ I'm all for Cole's endearing love for cakes, which is super relatable, but if you're gonna push it on his fun side, at least be coherent 🙃

Is it just me or it feels like the writing of this special was made by someone different from the one of season 13? Like, it's not bad, just less engaging and witty. For now. Maybe I'm being premature 🤷‍♀️

New way of nerfing powers, we got... weird, sucking power totem thingies... OKAY

My gosh I really can't say anything about the animation, look at that! It's all cinematic with such a light! YES!! 🤩

I'M SORRY

WHY ARE WE LOOKING OVER THIS??? IT LOOKS LIKE COLE'S LAVA PUNCHES BUT THEY ARE JAY LIGHTNING FEET??? IT'S A GREAT IDEA AND I WOULD LOVE TO SEE IT AGAIN??? WHY ARE WE IGNORING THIS??? 💙💙💙💙

So they at least addressed that lightning isn't a Jay's thing only anymore 😅

Alright, Jay having a mental breakdown because of a bridge because it always breaks, that's the Bluebell I know and love 😂😂 Nya telling him to keep moving was cute too 💙❤💙❤

Okay, I'm sorry but this really bothers me, what kind of lightning can instantly knock out the MASTER OF LIGHTNING??? Like, my gosh, really??? I hope they give us an explanation, like it's some sort of special lightning, because this really doesn't sit right with me. Jay is lightning proof, we've seen it in Skybound, we've seen it in Sons of Garmadon, I DON'T BELIEVE HE WOULD JUST BE KNOCKED OUT LIKE THAT 😡😡😡

Soooooo, storm amulet? Being one with the lightning? Is that the reason why Jay got to be the sacrifice? 😅

THE GIFT OF JAY

Alright, I am kinda looking forward for this one, what did Bluebell actually say or do to get him into trouble this time 😂😂

Oh, he just... introduced himself... well that was underwhelming

SENSEI👏YOU👏ARE👏A👏FREAKING👏GOD👏STOP👏GETTING👏KIDNAPPED👏BY👏RANDOM👏VILLAINS👏

Bring ooooon Lloyd Grills 💪

Okay I did like the little speech, definitely resonates with how Lloyd survived this long even though everything wanted him to give up, even his father... I'M NOT CRYING YOU'RE CRYING 😭

Jay out there making the real questions 😂

Awwww Edna used to call him gift of Jay? I can totally see it, so cute 💙💙 Makes even more sense if Libber actually left Jay at the Walkers' door...

Pff, Jay made the connection I would've done honestly 🤷‍♀️ Like, him being the master of lightning really didn't give these dudes any impression or inspiration? Any cool idea, full Road of El Dorado style? 🙃🙃

Lloyd out there abusing of the animation budget 💚💚💚

Somehow these ninja never actual sneak in, it's always a huge mess everyone knows about beforehand 😂 It's familiar though, I'm used to it and happy with it 👍

I might not be the biggest Misako fan, but you know what I am a fan of?

LEGO HUGS 😍😍😍😍😍

Dang it uncle Powers, you just got here to make a mess did you 😅

Not the first person of the fandom to say this, but Jay looks absolutely lovely with that flower crown 🌺🌺🌺

Oh poor greenie

Lloyd just has the worst luck 😓

Jay: Why would I be the gift?

Kai: Yeah who would want Jay?

Nya: Huh, me?? 😡

Got some very good Jaya for this little special, can't complain 💙❤💙❤

I mean, not matter how big of a snake Wojira might turn out to be, we've already seen the biggest and the second biggest snake of all so 🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️

Whoa, at last... IT WAS THE FIRST SPINJITZU MASTER THAT HAD SOMETHING HE SHOULD'VE TOLD WU A LONG TIME AGO!! 😱 Wu, you got pulled a Wu, how does it feel? 😂

Again, Jay freaking out, kinda my jam it's too funny 💙💙

Wow Kai way to be hominous offscreen 👏👏 I miss talking about my flame babe, this really isn't his time 🤷‍♀️

THE TOOTH OF WOJIRA

So when I first watched this I was genuinely, really excited about knowing the truth behind all this. It turned out very different from what I first thought, but at least in this case it's okay (besides I was pushing with the lightning meaning just to see Libber again 😅😅😅)

I feel like the guys get their powers stolen or blocked so much it takes them a minute to remember "Oh wait I can literally burn my way out" 🤷‍♀️

SPINJITZU YAY 🤩

I... forgot that Misako knows how to fight 😅 She knows how to do spinjitzu too if I remember correctly...

NYA BEING LIKE "OUT OF THE WAY IMMA SAVE MY BOYFRIEND AGAIN" ❤💙❤💙

Gotta love how they were all crazy worried about Jay, like, this is something that never changes through the show. They really care so so much for each other 💕💕💕

Ooohhhh, okay, so Wojira does seem to be the main villain of next season according to the story. I remember Tommy saying that we needed to have faith and this is probably why. The special was okay, nothing too much, and hopefully that too much we will see in Nya's season 😍😍😍

What the- pff, I didn't notice this the first time 😂

At this point I can't tell if that one short with the chicken of the movie carried a hate or a love for chickens in the actual show 😂😂

Nice to see Jay standing up for himself at least for a little while 💪 Also Lloyd being "He's our trouble", aww family 💜

THERE IT IS

MY BRUISE HEART IS SOARING 🖤💙🖤💙

Gotta give props to the voice actors, voicing an explanation while fighting must be pretty hard! WE ARE BLESSED WITH AN AMAZING CAST!!! 🤩🤩🤩

And there he is, our favorite jerk... shaved Ronin 😂 He does look a little weird, but it's fair, new animation and all. Not the weirdest until now 🤷‍♀️

I genuinely had to make a mental check to see where we are with Ronin now, like, he started as a villain, then a partner, he betrayed us, became an ally, he hunted the ninja, then joined them, that timeline was erased, he was around in SoG and... wow this man is chaotic 😂😂

Yaaaay, Twitchy's last minute redemption act! Lloyd is too good at motivational speeches 👏👏

A bit of Lava OTP/BrOTP

Cause it's good for the heart ❤🖤❤🖤

Okay, Scooby doo reference, why not? Also honestly, I'm confident Ronin has seen A LOT of jails and prisons... probably won't stay behind bars for long 😅

Mammatus: sorry for imprisoning you and almost killing your friend

Kai: no biggie, that's how we make friends in this show

Alright the "And Clutch Powers" gag made me chuckle 😂 ... wait where is he- DANG IT UNCLE POWERS

Okay, this is the last time I say it I promise, but I mean. I MEAN

THE ANIMATION GUYS 😍😍😍

Aaaaand sensei you jinxed it 😅 But you apparently awakened Nya's season so I'm gonna forgive you on this one 😉

FINAL THOUGHTS

There are a few little details that bothered me a little, and it wasn't as exciting as I maybe hoped it was going to be, but it was fine. Enjoyable still. These characters make me like the show, even when it got nothing too impactful 🤷‍♀️

But I got triggered about that lightning thing with Jay 😅 I guess I'll just fanfic whatever I had in mind...

Don't have to repeat myself about the animation *chef's kiss*

The writing was really less engaging, a little normal in a way? Idk just a feeling. Nice to see Ronin again though, I really like him. And nice to see Jay freaking out, I really like that too 😂

To be honest I wanted to put down my thoughts on this one because I REALLY wanna do the same with Nya's season 🤩🤩 I already know that Maya is gonna be there and I am so HAPPY already!!! 💙💙💙

So that's it from me! Thank you for reading me ranting, see you next season! 😊