#this is why ive been golden master posting btw lol

[21st-century-ninja]

🎵 Constant by House of Heroes

hiiiiiiii nutmeg u definitely did not put this ask in my inbox on June 25th of last year!!!!! :D :D :D

sdfkdghlsjf i finally made myself sit down and write the last part of this and i think it turned out pretty fun so I hope you enjoy!

Constant

setting: ns1, ns8, ns16 characters: Lloyd, Gamadon wc: 999 words other tags: angst, h/c (maybe???), golden master!lloyd on ao3 here

"You're leaving."

It's not a question or an accusation.  It's just a statement, as true and as obvious as the bunk beds around them and the Fangblades a floor above and the shuddering wood beneath their feet.

Garmadon turns.  Lloyd stands a step away, hands balled into fists, eyes fixed somewhere near Garmadon's chest.

Heavily, Garmadon sets his bag on the bed.  Completely, he turns to face Lloyd, even as every instinct tells him to go.   "You're safe," he says.  "That's all I ever cared about.  That's only why I came back -- for you, son."

"So stick around for me too!" Lloyd blurts.  "What good is coming back just if you abandon me again?"

Garmadon's heart sinks.  Lloyd's expression changes.  His shoulders slump and his white-knuckled fists relax almost like they're letting go.  "There's no stopping you, huh."

"The evil in my blood demands it," Garmadon says.  It's an excuse.  It's not.  Even now, it churns within him, demanding him to hurt and harm and destroy.

A hand covers one of his.  Garmadon blinks back into focus.  Lloyd's fingers squeeze tight around his.  

"You came back for me," he says, suddenly fierce.  "That means there's got to be light in you, too, right?"  He drops Garmadon's hand and steps back, resolute.  "And if that means we've got to fight --"  He exhales harshly.  "If that means we've got to fight, then I'm gonna do everything in my power to defeat you."

Garmadon sinks to the ground.  Like this, his son's head is nearly equal in height to his own.  When did he grow so big? he wonders.  When was the last time I carried him?

When will I not be able to?

Lloyd meets his eyes squarely.  Despite it, tears mar the corners of his.  Gently, Garmadon lifts one clawed fingertip and catches them on the tip.  

"I know," he says, hushed.  "I know.  I wouldn't have it any other way."

Slowly, Lloyd grins a watery grin.  

"Promise?" he whispers.

And:

"Promise," Garmadon says.

---

There is strength in the boy.  Garmadon will give him that.

He takes another blast of energy to his shoulder, a wince that quickly turns into a grin as his power feeds on the fight.  The green ninja springs out of the way of his counterattack.  Fire shines in his eyes as he pulls away, as bright and burning as the golden power that was his demise the first time around.  He smears the back of his hand against his mouth; it comes away bloody from the cut on his lip.

He looks wild.  Feral, with the blood staining his teeth and jaw.

But the words that come tumbling from his mouth, the platitudes and pleas and whines- whatever strength the boy might have is rendered useless by his heart.

A pitiful thing, human hearts are.  Garmadon is glad to have been purified of his by his resurrection.  

Destruction boils at his fingertips.  He focuses it into another blast that sends the boy into the wall.  When he tries to stand, Garmadon punches down with a destruction-strengthened hand.  The boy collapses back to the ground with a choking cry.

Garmadon strides over to where he lies.  Bending one knee, he kneels beside him.  One green eye slips open and follows his movement.  The boy tries to say something.  It comes out in broken wheezes.  

"You," he gasps, eye trembling, searching Garmadon's face.  "Father -- light -- you--"

Garmadon's hand snaps out.  The boy gurgles as fingers close around his neck.  He thrashes weakly, but Garmadon lifts him as easily as one might a particularly pesky rodent.  His claws catch on sensitive skin; blood beads and slides down his neck like a stain.

Good.  Garmadon tilts the boy's chin up, up into the spotlight beam of the prison security and the eyes of the world.  

"There is no light in me," he hisses.  "The man you are searching for is dead."

When he pours power into his arm this time, the world erupts in purple fire.

---

There had been a legend once.  There had been a legend of one who would hold the powers of the First Spinjitzu Master, who would unite them with the element of destruction, who would bring about the end of the world as it was known.

Once, he'd assumed with everyone else that the legend was fulfilled in the Overlord's short-lived reign over New Ninjago City.

Now, burning in the rage of the supernova before him, Garmadon wonders how they ever thought that weakling could have been this.

His arm, broken and mangled, straightens itself.  Another one sprouts from his elbow, and another from his ribcage.  The sphere around Lloyd warps, concrete buildings bursting into flowers before melting like lava and flying back together in shards of glass.  

Creation and destruction, harnessed in one body.  The total ability to destroy and reshape the world at his will.  

Garmadon struggles to his feet.  Lloyd's eyes raise like empty floodlights.  They lock onto Garmadon, and energy deluges upon him like a hurricane.  His skin flakes.  Forms rise from the darkness around him: wisps of gray hair, visages of pale skin, sense memories of creaking joints and aching bones.  

Garmadon screams.  He takes a step.  Another.  Feeling disappears from his legs.  He pulls his arms close to his chest and runs.  

His body connects.  

He throws Lloyd to the ground, and the light around them bursts like a lightbulb.  

Garmadon blinks bright spots away.  Feeling, pain, rushes back into his body as Lloyd snarls beneath him.  He digs his claws in and shifts, planting one knee on Lloyd's chest and bracing his other foot on the ground.  

"Once," he snaps, "you made me promise to hold onto whatever light might still be inside me.  And damn it, Lloyd, but now you have to too!"

Lloyd screams.  Garmadon flies back, smashing into a wall.  Through spinning eyes, he sees as Lloyd stalks closer.  

Garmadon musters a grin.  "Everything in my power," he says.

Shouting, he charges forward again.