Chapter Text
part l: the burning
chapter one
“What is to give light must endure burning.”
- Viktor E. Frankl
It’s the sound of the sea that welcomes Kai back to the world. The crashing of waves on sand, the cry of gulls way up in the sky, the tang of salt on the wind. Kai can feel the sun on his skin, and it feels new. It feels like rebirth. The sun hadn’t been there, in the end. Only darkness. Only the Oni.
He opens his eyes, and the sky is blue. This, more than anything else, convinces him that he’s not where he was. He hasn’t seen the sky in a month, not since the Oni came.
Kai lays there for a few minutes, taking it in. The earth sings, and he hadn’t noticed it before, but he can feel the very essence of it, down down down into the core of their world. Now that he knows what to look for, it’s so obvious that Kai feels a little dumb. How could he not have noticed before? The very air around him vibrates with life, colour practically dancing on the breeze. It’s only now, when he experienced the absence of such vibrancy in the time-that-isn’t-and-will-never-be-again, that he realizes it was there in the first place at all.
Kai sits up, shaking the sand out of his hair. He takes stock of his surroundings finally, almost too scared to do so, but he knows he’s not with the First Spinjitzu Master anymore, and he knows that he’s not back there , so he must be exactly where he’s supposed to be.
Back in time, to the point of no return.
Looking around, Kai finds that he knows exactly where he is, without even having to reach far back in his memory. It’s the place they took their last stand, after all. The place they buried Nya, and Jay, and made markers for Cole and Zane and Wu and Garmadon and Misako, whose bodies they didn’t even have in order to bury.
It’s where he watched Lloyd die.
He takes a deep breath in, and watches the waves lap on the shore near the grave of the First Spinjitzu Master. He attempts to settle into the meditation exercises Master Wu taught them all those years ago in order to straighten his thoughts, to make a plan, to do something, but the memories are pounding into him now, filled with darkness and grief and pain, and before he knows it his knees buckle beneath him, landing hard on the sand. His head drops low, bowed under the weight of a timeline now erased, and his body slumps to the side before he can even try to get up. It’s only his hands digging into the sand that stop him from falling face down onto the rough ground.
He thinks of Cole, broken, bloody on the ground; Zane, sliced through and sparking, Nya, cries petering into silence as the darkness took her; Jay, still and statue by the shore; Lloyd, his last smile he gave to Kai as the staff went right through him-
The tightness in his throat swells and his eyes swim with unshed tears that he refuses to let fall. He can’t. How can he cry when they’re not alive to do so with him? How can he grieve when it’s all his fault? He can’t , not when he remembers his family’s faces as they died, and soon he’s bent double with the force of his grief, a low keen building in his throat.
The wave swells further, and nothing will ever make it better again, his family is gone, they’re never coming back, not even now. They’re as good as dead to Kai, in this world he no longer belongs to (this family who no longer knows him) and he is alone alone alone alone-
The aching intensifies in his chest, heightening his senses and sending his ears ringing, building and building until he can’t stand the weight of it.
Will anything ever be enough? Kai has fought for so long, saving Ninjago over and over and over again, sacrificing his childhood, his friends, his family, everything, for the good of a world that he couldn’t even save in the end. He watched them die, one by one by one, the only people in the world he truly cared for. He’s watched them die before, even, held them as they came back, held them after, when dreams turned dark and screaming in the halls of their home became as normal as birdsong.
When will it be enough?
The grief turns to anger, then, the all-too-familiar tightening of his gut, the shot of adrenaline, the rage that pounds against his skull and eyes and makes his hands spark. When will the world leave them alone?
He stands quickly, staggers only once, and feels the flames burst along his arms. He lets the heat devour him and the world around him, the air turning white-hot as his rage channels into his element and overtakes all other thought.
Kai shouts, carrying all his fury at the injustice of the world with it. He shoots flame and fire without care, lets his inferno burn the world around him. He loses himself to the fire for a long time, flinging flames and rage with all his might, not caring what he hits when all he can see is red. He doesn’t know how long it takes, but eventually his fire begins to slow until the anger and the flames burn low, levelling to a simmer and leaving him weak.
When his fury has been spent, along with his sorrow, he falls to his knees again, tugs at his hair with shaking hands so the pain grounds him, and wishes, with everything in him, that he had died with his family.
It is the only time he lets himself wish that.
Empty and numb, Kai forces himself to calm. The emotions remain, simmering low in his chest and gut like a volcano just waiting to blow, but he’s got a handle on them for now. He can’t stop the grief, or the rage, but he can contain them.
When it comes down to it, Kai is really, truly in mourning. He’s certain he will be for the rest of his life. He forces himself to accept that fact, even as he recoils instinctively against it. He’s grieving all he lost, all he couldn’t stop, and all the people he had to bury and not bury. He’s grieving his world, and he’s grieving his siblings, and he’s grieving the fact that they will not know him here, in this time, in this life. He is alone now, truly and utterly alone, for the first time in his life.
Kai Smith does not exist in this world. Kai Smith means nothing to no one. Kai Smith is as dead as the time he came from.
Once he can get himself to stand, Kai forces his emotions to stay at the low simmer, packing it all away in a neat little bundle and tucking it in the box he has stored in the darkest places in his mind. The pain is still there, following his every move doggedly, but it is less. Enough that he can function.
When he comes to himself again, the sun is nearing the horizon. The waves have settled some, and the wind has died down. Kai tests the air on his tongue and finds no electric tang, so there shouldn’t be any rain for a while. He has a long way to walk to get to the nearest town. He might as well get moving. There are plans to be made, evil to stop, and lives to save. And yet… Kai looks back to the shore and finds that there is one thing he must do before he leaves.
When he leaves the shoreline, there are five graves clearly marked out in stone and sticks on a little hill overlooking the sea, and the moon is rising in the clear sky. There are no names on them, but it doesn’t matter. Kai knows who they’re for. They’re for the people he loves most in the world, the ones who are gone forever because time travel or no, they don’t know him here and they don’t belong to him by any right. He’s a stranger to them now, and he lets himself mourn the ones who were his, back in his time. Because despite all that the First Spinjitzu Master promised, his family is still as dead as they were then.
Kai leaves two graves for two brothers he had to leave behind, two graves for a sister and brother he had to see fade away, and one grave for a brother he watched get slaughtered right before his eyes, and who didn’t get a grave in the time-that-isn’t-and-will-never-be-again.
It’s enough, he tells himself. It has to be.
Kai gets walking, and the stars above him guide his way, shining down to reflect against the beach of pure glass he leaves behind.
~ ~ ~
It’s about sunrise by the time Kai sees the small town in the distance. He only remembers it because he and the others had stopped there once on the way home from a mission and it’d been the closest place to go for a rest. It’s a relief that it even exists at this point in time, since it means Kai’s not too far back in the whole timeline of things. Granted, the First Spinjitzu Master said he wouldn’t be going far back, but Kai hadn’t exactly been sure what the passage of time meant to a literal god.
Kai realizes as he gets near to the town that he looks like an absolute mess, and super sketchy. Being sent back in time hadn’t changed the outfit he was wearing at the end, so he’s still wearing his red gi stained with blood, covered in sand and dust from the road, and his eyes are probably bloodshot, both from crying and from the lack of sleep.
He takes off the outerwear of his gi, leaving him in black leggings and a dark red undershirt, both still relatively clean. He picks up a stick off the side of the road, uses his gi mask as a makeshift bag, and hangs it from the stick like a hitchhiker from a cartoon. He then stuffs the remaining gi inside the mask-bag and deems that enough. He refuses to get rid of the only thing he brought with him from before, so the gi stays. There’s nothing to be done about bloodshot eyes and a sunburnt face. Although, Kai’s always been resistant to the sun’s effects on skin so he might just be saved in that area.
He gets to the town and it’s just as small as he remembers. It could barely even be called a town at all, in fact. A gas station sits off to the left, with a general store beside it. There’s a restaurant right across from them, and beside that what appears to be a car repair shop. A couple other small shops litter the area, and a few houses lie behind the general store, most likely for the people who work in the various places. It’s about as deadbeat as you could ever get, but Kai’s not about to be picky.
He makes his way over to the general store. He doesn’t have any money, but he’s not looking for supplies except maybe some water, which he can probably get for free at the restaurant.
What Kai is really looking for is the date. He needs to know exactly when he is in order to make any plans. He needs to know what has all happened, where everyone is at this point in time, what players are in the game, and what players are out.
The bell rings as Kai enters the store, and a kind looking middle aged man greets him from the cash register.
“Welcome to Riku’s General Store! What can I help you with?”
“You’re Riku?” Kai asks, then coughs to clear his throat when it comes out scratchy and hoarse from his breakdown yesterday. Not to mention the fact that he hasn’t had any water in hours.
“That I am! And you’re not looking too hot, young man, are you alright?” Riku seems middle aged, but his hair is already balding at the top. The rest of it is dark and combed to the sides, leading down to a round, happy face with glasses perched on the tip of his nose. He’s the most grandpa-looking middle aged man Kai’s ever seen, but he looks kind.
Kai shrugs. “I’ve been better. What’s the date?”
“The date?” Riku looks at him funny, but gestures to a worn-looking calendar pinned to the window. The dates are crossed out until what Kai assumes is today. “It’s the 21st of Sonetsu. Why are you asking?”
Kai shakes his head. “No, the year. What’s the year ?”
“The year?” Riku squints his eyes a little, looking Kai up and down like he’s assessing him. Kai bristles. “Don’t you know the year? Listen young man, everyone knows aburi isn’t good for you-”
Kai’s hand slams onto the counter, making Riku jump, and he glares at the man before grinding out, “What. Is. The. Year.”
Riku gulps and glances nervously at the door as if someone is going to come in and save him from the crazy guy he definitely thinks is a lunatic in his store. “Year 4138, New Age.”
Kai registers the date and stills, losing himself to his thoughts. Sonetsu, 4138. What happened then? It’s all a bit foggy in his mind; they’d gone through so many battles and villains, especially in the beginning, that it all blurred together. 4138, 4138, what happened-
“Are you alright, young man?”
Kai startles, then looks back up at Riku. He takes in the obvious concern in the man’s wrinkled brow, the way his hand hovers hesitantly out like he wants to help and Kai immediately feels bad. A few hours into his second chance and he’s already losing his temper, yelling at innocents, and generally making a complete brute of himself.
He takes his hand off the counter with a clearing of his throat and brushes at his shirt. “Uh. Yes. I’m fine, thank you for your concern,” he says, using his ‘civilian voice’ as Cole had once dubbed it. “Sorry for, well, that. I’ve just been under some stress recently. Thank you for your help.” He bows, short and polite, then promptly slips out of the store too fast for Riku to say anything else. Ninja skills always did come in useful during super awkward social interactions, especially when Kai says or does something stupid. Which he usually does.
FSM, he misses his family. They always did tell him to control his temper, and Kai tries, okay? He really tries, but sometimes the heat just builds and builds until he needs to let it out or he’ll explode.
Kai scrubs his face and sighs as he walks across the road to the diner he saw earlier, feet kicking up dust as he goes. Why did the First Spinjitzu Master pick Kai of all people? The hothead, the reckless one, the guy who always messes up and ends up eating his words and tripping over his own feet?
Because you were the only one left.
Kai grimaces, then shakes the thought away even as it sends pain shooting through his chest. Fine, he was the last pick? Then he’ll do the best damn job any of them could have ever done.
He owes it to his family. To Nya, and Lloyd, and Cole, and Zane, and Jay, and Wu and even Garmadon, or what parts of him were left by the end. At the very least, they deserve the chance to have a happy life. To live.
The diner door opens and Kai’s nose is immediately assaulted by the most delicious smells he’s gotten a whiff of in a very long time. He can smell fast foods like teriyaki, onigiri, and fried chicken, but also dumplings and soy sauce-
Kai jerks himself out of his thoughts before he can start drooling. He doesn’t have the money to pay for a meal, he just needs water. That should be enough to last him until he gets to the city, then he can figure something out from there. He’s probably going to have to steal for the foreseeable future, and he’s not… he’s not exactly comfortable with it, but at the same time, he knows he has to. The fate of the world is at stake and if Kai doesn’t eat regularly he’s going to have a hell of a lot less energy to stop evil with. Besides, he used to steal all the time as a child; it was only years of ninja training that beat the morals back into him. Part of Kai hates that he has to regress back to the helpless little beggar he was as a kid, but he reminds himself that he’s not helpless, not anymore. He’s a ninja. And ninja never quit.
So stealing it is. But not from here, and not now. Later, Kai tells himself and breathes deeply. Later.
“Hi there! What can I get you today?” A lovely looking young woman wearing a waitress apron and uniform walks up to him from where he’s been standing awkwardly near the entrance. She’s beautiful; long and shiny black hair pinned in a high ponytail, dark eyes looking at him from behind round glasses and elegant lashes.
There’s an urge to flirt, to call her pretty and gorgeous until she blushes, and in the Before, Kai would do it. In the time-that-once-was-and-will-never-be-again, Kai loved making ladies feel worth something, loved telling them how beautiful they all were. He didn’t mind the extra attention it brought him either if he’s being honest.
But… now?
Kai gives her a small smile. “Sorry, I’m not here for a meal. I just need a cup of water before I hit the road again. Do I have to pay for that or…?”
“Oh!” The girl exclaims. It seems she’s just taking in his bedraggled (that’s putting it lightly) figure now. “Actually, let me talk to my boss. She’s just in the kitchen and it won’t take a second!”
Kai opens his mouth to protest, really he’s not worth the trouble, but she bounces away before he can get in a word. He huffs, blowing hair out of his face, then running a hand through it. He winces as he tugs at several knots. It’s gotten too long.
When he gets somewhere secure, food is first, then finding a way to bathe. He’s still covered in the mud, sweat, and grime he’d steadily accumulated over the last few days in the time-that-once-was. There wasn’t time to bathe, worry about the Oni and Lloyd and Jay and the few survivors ruling Kai’s mind more than things like hygiene.
Blood is still caked to his outer gi too, but Kai pulled that off so no one should see it. He can still feel it though. In his mind he can see it, sticking to his hands and arms, running down his face. Their blood is on his hands, the lives of his family slipping from his fingers in red, shining droplets-
“Sorry for the wait!”
The girl is back, and she gestures for Kai to follow her. “Come with me, boss says she wants you to sit at the bar.”
Kai stumbles to keep up as they weave their way through the tables, his foot catching on the old wooden panelling of the floor. “Hold on, I just want water, did you really have to get your boss? It’s not worth your trouble, really-”
“I’ll decide that boy, now sit down.”
Behind the bar, an elderly lady stands frying something up on a grill with a pair of chopsticks in one hand and a spatula in the other. Her hair is dark black, greying on the edges, and her face is sagged with wrinkles, but they’re not harsh. They’re the type of wrinkles that make it seem like they’ve lived a good, happy life. A no-nonsense scowl rests on her face as she barely looks up at Kai to tell him to sit.
“Um, I’m sorry?” Kai says, before he’s sharply interrupted.
“You better be!” The woman gestures her spatula at him before pointing at the stool in front of her. “If you don’t sit down right now I’ll sure make you sorry in a jiffy!”
Kai gulps and promptly sits down. “Yes ma’am.”
She humphs, then goes back to grilling. “That’s what I thought.”
Kai tries to glance at the waitress for help, but she just gives him a smile and a wink before sauntering off to tend to a few tables across the room who started to call her over. Kai resists the urge to either facepalm, sigh, or sink into the floor. Maybe all three. Alas, he’s still got a job to do, so he turns back to the boss of this place.
“I’m sorry if I’ve done something to offend you, but I really just need a glass of water then I’ll be out of your hair-”
“You’ll leave when I say you can leave, you hear me boy? Now let me do my job in peace!”
“R-right. Sorry.” Kai gives into his urge and sighs deeply, but quietly. If he’s in trouble, it’s best just to wait until she’s decided what to do with him. It can’t be anything that bad anyway, she’s just the owner of a diner. Kai’s faced worse. Much, much worse.
He does not think about the screams his family made as they died. He does not.
It feels like an hour later, but can really only have been a few minutes, before Kai is suddenly blinking down at a steaming plate of teriyaki, a rice dish and a few dumplings on separate side dishes. He stares at them dumbly before looking up at the woman, but she’s already moved to another part of the bar and is resolutely not looking back at him.
Kai’s eyes sting, but he swallows the sudden warmth and picks up his chopsticks.
It’s the best thing he’s tasted in months.
~ ~ ~
“Thank you again,” Kai says to the owner of the diner - Chiyo is her name, as he’d learned after finishing his meal. “There must be some way I can pay you back?”
“Bah! Nonsense, you can’t tell me what to do! I said it was free, now don’t make me regret it!” Chiyo waves chopsticks in his face in her irritation, and Kai backs up a step, holding his hands up in surrender. Honoka - the waitress; she’d told him her name as he was about to leave - waves off Chiyo’s attacks with apparent ease, like this is something they do all the time.
“It’s fine, Red. Never tell my mama what she can or can’t do. If she wants to give you a free meal, then by the First Spinjitzu Master she will.”
“She’s your mom?” Kai asks, glancing between the two. Now that he knows, the similarities are easy to pick out. Their face shape is the same, as well as their dark eyes and the mole that rests on both of their right cheekbones.
“Of course she’s my daughter!” Chiyo says, sniffing. “As if that beauty could come from anyone but me.”
Honoka rolls her eyes but Kai cracks a grin - his first real smile in a long time - and nods his head seriously.
“Of course, Chiyo. However, I need to get going before the sun sets. I have places to be.”
Chiyo huffs, but Honoka gives him a smile that makes her eyes scrunch up at the corners. Cute, Kai thinks distantly.
“We’d never dream of holding you up more than we already have, Red. Isn’t that right okaasan?” Honoka says.
“Yes, yes, off with you boy.” Chiyo starts making her way back into the restaurant. “You better remember our generosity today! I expect great things from you so my food doesn’t go to waste!” She yells that last part over her shoulder before she heads back into her diner.
Kai and Honoka glance at each other, then burst into laughter. It’s fun, and freeing, and while the chuckles aren’t nearly as exuberant as they used to be, Kai feels lighter for it.
When they stop laughing, Kai straightens up, then bows deep to the waist.
“Thank you, Honoka. You don’t know how much this means to me, truly. I won’t forget you or your mother.”
“Red!” Honoka sputters out, face turning red. “Please, it’s alright! Okaasan just likes to help those she thinks are too skinny, it’s in her nature. You don’t need to bow so low!”
“It’s alright,” Kai says, coming up from the bow and giving her a soft smile. “You’re very kind, and so is your mother. You deserve respect for that.” First Spinjitzu Master knows it’s a hard thing to be in this world.
Honoka looks about to protest more, but at Kai’s firm look, she deflates. “Fine. But my mama’s right; you better do some pretty awesome stuff and come back to tell us all about it when you’re done. Those stories you were talking about earlier were really something.”
Kai chuckles. While he’d been eating, Honoka dropped by every few minutes to check on him and she got to asking how he came to be here looking like that. Kai weaved together a story, taking bits and pieces of his life and throwing in some exaggeration to keep it vague and away from events that could take place here too. He left out names, but he told her about the evil sorcerer who tried to resurrect a race of warriors, a man who ran a noodle shop that kidnapped his friend, and a ghost story of revenge and lost dreams.
He didn’t mention Nadakhan since that wasn’t his story to tell. He didn’t even know all the events of that one, as Jay and Nya left out more than Kai thinks they were telling when they sat everyone down to explain why Jay was flinching at their every touch and Nya woke up screaming.
He didn’t talk about the Sons of Garmadon or the Oni either. Too fresh, and too real. Too… too much, really.
“I’m glad you liked them,” Kai replies. “And again, thank you for everything. Maybe I’ll come back and tell you more one day.”
“I’d like that,” Honoka says. She backs up a few steps, then turns when she hears Chiyo yell for her from inside the diner. “I’d best be going.”
“Me too.”
“See you later, Red.”
Kai smiles. “See you, Honoka.”
Then he turns, and leaves the first people who showed him kindness in this world behind to forge ahead, no matter what the future (past?) may hold. It’s… comforting, to know that even with the weight of the world on his shoulders, even with all that will happen (has happened), there are still good people in the world.
Kai clings to that hope. It might be the only hope he’s got left.
~ ~ ~
It’s easy to find someone heading to Ninjago City. Lots of farmers, workers, or folks just plying their trade come and go in the hustle and bustle of that city. Many of them go for the farmer’s markets and trade festivals that happen all over the city, stay for a few days, maybe a week or two, then head home with their profits.
Kai hitches a ride with two gentlemen in their truck - they don’t have room in the cabin of the vehicle, but they tell Kai that he’s welcome to sit in the open trunk if he can handle the bumps. Kai laughs and replies that he’s been on much bumpier rides in his life. He doesn’t say it of course, but dragons are not the smoothest of sailors.
They’re on the road in no time, and Kai sinks into the blanket one of the men had generously offered him. The sky quickly sinks into a blaze of red and orange, the sun kissing the horizon as night approaches. The truck drivers said it would be a three day trip to Ninjago City, and Kai sighs as he stares up at the stars beginning to blink awake.
His mind wanders back to his time in the town, and the information he’d learned. He’d been interrupted so many times that he’d completely forgotten about the date he’d been given.
The 21st of Sonestsu, Year 4138. New Age.
Kai’s memory is blurry, not because he doesn’t remember what all happened in his time as a ninja, but because so much had happened that dates and years had all but slipped his mind. What he knows for certain is his own age during each major event, and he works backwards from there.
Kai was born on the 22nd of Seisuru, Year 4122. That means in the old timeline (this timeline?), he would’ve been sixteen in 4138. Kai frowns. What happened at sixteen? He’d become a ninja just before his fifteenth birthday, then they’d trained and gotten the golden weapons from Garmadon, met Lloyd…
Lloyd.
Kai sits up, realization dawning on him. He’d been fifteen when Lloyd had been struck by the Tomorrow’s Tea and aged up to around thirteen (as far as anyone could guess). That means Lloyd has already been aged up, already sailed to the Dark Island, and whatever version of the ninjas exist in this world now that Kai doesn’t exist have probably already fought the Overlord or are about to.
Kai runs a hand over his face and sighs deeply. Okay, so he’s got a rough estimate of where he is in the timeline. It would be better if he knew what exactly is happening in Ninjago City at the current moment, but he doesn’t. All he knows is that the Overlord battles, which lasted a few months if Kai is remembering correctly, are either in progress or have just ended with the big, final confrontation. If it’s the former, Kai isn’t sure what to do, considering none of the ninja (his family) know who he is, and engaging in the fight with them would just make him suspicious. He can’t afford to be suspicious right now, and he can’t afford for them to know anything.
On his hike to the town, Kai had made up in his mind that being a hero like before would never cut it. Too much publicity, too much scrutiny, and too many people would get to know his face. He doesn’t have any sort of identity here, no family, no name, no records of existence. People would look , and if they couldn’t find what should be there, Kai would be screwed.
And as much as Kai doesn’t want to admit it, he’s… damaged. He’s got scars, stories, and, as Nya would say, traumas that he can’t afford anyone looking too closely at. His story wouldn’t line up, and if people go poking around, the wrong people might start taking notice too.
No, the best way to play this is to go underground. And not just underground, but to the Underground. The underbelly of the city, the places that Kai knows the others didn’t really go, but where he dipped his hand in a few too many times back in the old timeline. Muddled with moral grey, even if it got real close to black, the Underground was always a place Kai could go and just be . He wasn’t anyone there, just a guy in a dark hoodie beating up people who got a little too close to the shadows for his liking. No fame, no reputation, and no gi. Just Kai.
Here, now, Kai can use the Underground to disappear. He can remain a ghost, hard to find and easier to forget. He can work in the shadows, pull strings from places no one will even know they exist.
If he’s going to fix this (and by this , he means everything), he can’t play by the good guy rules. He needs to be faster, smarter, and better than every single opponent they’ve ever faced. He needs to get the upper hand, and to do so, he can’t be soft. It entails a certain kind of… proactiveness. The kind that he knows would get him either kicked off the team or locked in Kryptarium Prison.
Maybe both.
Kai grimaces, then lays down. There’s not much he can do from the back of a truck in the middle of the desert. Once he knows exactly what’s going on in Ninjago City, he can make a more detailed plan.
For now, he needs to sleep. It’s been a long day (month, year, timeline), and he can feel his thoughts growing sluggish, turning around and around in his brain as the fog of exhaustion creeps in. He closes his eyes, and is asleep in the next few moments.
~ ~ ~
It’s not until the final day of travelling that Kai finally figures out the state of affairs in the city. They’ve stopped at their last pit stop for breakfast, a dingy gas station with a small diner attached to it, and while he’s waiting for their food, the TV hitched to the wall catches his attention.
‘Breaking News!’ It reads in the red, scrolling banner at the bottom. ‘After the defeat of the Overlord by the ninja, Borg Industries announces plans to build headquarters at the battle site!’
Kai stares at the screen, mind blank, until the server calls his order number. He snaps out of it, hurries to grab the food for him and the drivers, then quickly asks, “Hey, can you turn on the TV volume?”
The worker shrugs. “Sure.” They grab a remote from the counter and dial up the volume to a comfortably low level. Kai strains his ears to hear over the chatter in the diner.
The screen changes to show a news reporter and Cyrus Borg standing in the city, workers buzzing around them in the background clearing debris and making way for trucks.
“As cleanup efforts continue in the areas affected by the battle between the ninjas and the Overlord, CEO of Borg Industries, Cyrus Borg himself, has bought the land at the site of the Overlord’s defeat! We have an exclusive interview with the man himself right now! Mr. Borg, why did you buy the land? Many people believe it to be cursed now!”
Cyrus Borg smiles kindly at the reporter, then turns to the camera. “Well, that’s exactly why I bought it! I thought to myself, what does Ninjago City need now more than ever? Hope! Our heroes gave us the chance to rebuild from the damage, and to let the stigma of this area continue would be a waste of land and a detriment to the people! I have a dream to give Ninjago City new tech, far more advanced than anything we’ve ever seen. It’s the dawn of a new age for this city, and I plan to use this site as a springboard for that vision!”
“Well you heard it here first, folks!” The reporter turns back to the camera. “Cyrus Borg is bringing a whole new Ninjago to the city, so stay tuned as construction continues!”
The program switches, and Kai turns away from the TV. As he walks out of the diner back to the truck, his mind whirls with all the information now available to him. He’s so preoccupied, he barely notices as he gives his drivers their food and they thank him.
He climbs back into the trunk, and off they go. The man in the passenger seat informs Kai that they should arrive in the city in a few hours, so Kai hunkers down with his meal and gets to thinking.
It’s only been a couple weeks at most since the battle, from what Kai can gather. He knows what cleanup work looks like intimately, considering how many times he’s helped in the process, and the background of that interview looked to be in the final stages of initial cleanup, which usually takes two or three weeks.
So that means the Overlord is “defeated”, or at least, everyone thinks he is. Really, he’s just biding his time until the Borg Industries headquarters is finished, then he can take over slowly and infiltrate Cyrus’ mind and take over the nindroids and the city while no one knows and no one is on the case and his family is far away for now, safe for now, but they won’t be soon and-
Slow down. A voice like Master Wu’s filters through the low buzz of panic in Kai’s mind, and he takes a deep breath, shaking hands running through his hair.
Right, slow. There’s a lot to do, but he needs to make sure his head is on straight, and panicking will do no one any good.
So. First things first, what has already happened that Kai can’t change? Well, the whole beginning of their training with the Skullkin and Nya getting captured. He wonders how that went down since he’s not here anymore. The release of the Serpentine. Lloyd. The Great Devourer was loosed on the city, which means Harumi’s parents have already been killed, setting her down a very dark path. Kai frowns and makes a mental note of that for later.
What else? Garmadon made the ultimate weapon, sailed to the Dark Island, and woke the Overlord. The golden weapons were sent to space in the time travel shenanigans (Kai scoffs; what he wouldn’t give to be done with time travel shenanigans). The stone warriors. The Temple of Light. The fusion of Garmadon and the Overlord. The battle, and subsequent “defeat” of the Overlord. Sensei Garmadon’s return.
Kai smiles at the thought. It’s been so long since he’s seen his sensei, years even. Lloyd was the only one who was able to say a proper goodbye before the Preeminent died and took all her prisoners with her, and the Garmadon that came back after Harumi resurrected him was never their Sensei. Just some twisted, evil version of him that only existed because of the Devourer’s venom.
Lloyd’s age is something Kai can’t fix. He sighs, feels the disappointment, then lets the bitter feeling of failure seep out of him. Obviously, if this is the time he came to, then this is the “point of no return” that the First Spinjitzu Master was talking about. If that’s true, then Lloyd needs to be thirteen. He needs to have his childhood stripped from him, no matter how much that makes Kai’s blood boil. At least it’s not Kai’s fault this time.
And at least, he muses, he doesn’t have to worry about finding a way to bring Sensei G back without unleashing the Overlord on the world. That is a moral decision he knows would’ve nearly killed him.
So what’s left? The answer is daunting, and Kai swallows as the list of names grows in his mind.
The Digital Overlord. Chen and Clouse. The golden weapons. Morro, his ghosts, and the Preeminent. Nadakhan and his crew, the Hands of Time, Harumi, the Realm Crystal , the list goes on and on, and the more Kai thinks, the more his breaths come up short.
Oh, and Pythor. Kai grits his teeth, his fingers involuntarily curling into fists. This is one of the things that Kai has no qualms about getting morally grey for. Pythor caused so many problems in the time-that-once-was, caused so much grief and pain that Kai knows , with startling clarity (and perhaps less surprise than it should), that Pythor’s time in this version of the world is limited, oh so limited. Kai will make sure of it.
And then there’s also the Oni and all that can of worms entails. So much to do, Kai sighs shakily. People and places that will almost certainly bring back old traumas, ghosts, and pains that he’d taken great pains to bury in the previous timeline.
But thinking big picture might just kill him, so Kai takes a step back. At the moment, the Digital Overlord is his most pressing issue, followed by Pythor and possibly Harumi. Pythor is an easy fix, but Harumi is more complicated. She’s still young and growing into her dark mindset, but Kai knows that left alone, she’ll grow into the worst villain of them all. She won’t be allowed to hurt Lloyd like she did the last time around, not if Kai can do anything about it. It’s only been a few months since the Great Devourer’s attack anyway, Kai doubts she’s had time to really solidify her resolve just yet.
At the end of the day, she’s just a kid. Just a hurting, lonely kid who lacks the support system to make the right decision. In another life, Lloyd might’ve been her. Heck, Kai might’ve been her. He can’t fault her for trauma or questionable moral choices, especially not with all the things he knows he’s about to do in the name of saving the world as everyone knows it.
This time, he’ll give her better options. And if she still chooses wrong, well.
Kai, for the first time in his life, feels like he has time. He’ll cross that bridge when he comes to it.
The last few hours of his ride to the city is filled with thinking, planning, and dare he say it, scheming. He has a lot to do, and while he has almost a whole year yet before the Digital Overlord thing really kicks into gear, he wants to get the jump on it. Plus, he has many other things to attend to, including his plan to establish presence in the Underground.
In moments like these, when the weight of the world is literally pressing down on his shoulders, Kai wants to be mad at the First Spinjitzu Master. He wants to cry, or scream, or beg him to reverse this decision.
But in the end, Kai remembers the end. Remembers dead eyes, blood splattered bodies, darkness reaching, reaching, reaching. Remembers the sounds they all made as they fell. Remembers being the last one standing.
He won’t fail again. He can’t fail again. This second chance is a gift, even if Kai has a sinking suspicion it might kill him in the end.
It’ll be worth it, for them. If he can help it, they’ll never know who he is. His family will live on in peaceful bliss as he protects them from what they cannot yet see. They’ll be safe, and okay, and not dead, and that’s the only thing Kai can ask for from all of this.
His own life is of no consequence. He’d gladly give it all for them, and even now, when they no longer know him, when he’s no longer even a part of their world, he’ll still do so.
They’re his, in any world. In every world . And Kai protects his own.
~ ~ ~
The city is smaller than he remembers, but then again, Kai is more than four years in the past. For a city that gets attacked and destroyed so often, Ninjago City’s city limits expanded so rapidly in four years that entire districts aren’t here. Kai isn’t sure how much is here and isn’t, but he knows for sure that at least half of the Southern district is absent as well as the South Slums. Those will be around in the next couple of years though; they were built first, then the Upper and Outer districts were built just before the Hands of Time incident.
The drivers drop him off just inside the city when he makes it clear he’s not heading to Downtown, which is where they’re going. They bid him farewell and Kai wishes he had something to give them in exchange for their kindness. They did drive him halfway across the continent for three days, but all Kai has is the clothes on his back and he doesn’t think they quite want bloody, dusty gi in payment. And it’s not like he could bear to part with it anyway.
They’ll just have to settle for the saving of the world as their payment. Kai grimaces as he realizes that that’s going to be his mindset for the foreseeable future. It’s not like he has money for rent, food, and clothes, especially with Ninjago City’s prices. It’s not as bad as he knows it will be in the future, but it’s enough that finding anywhere to live requires a steady, decent-paying job. Which Kai does not have. Nor will he get, considering the activities he’s planning out in his head.
Kai heads further into the city, the paths different and yet familiar. From his perspective, it’s been almost a month since he’s set foot in the city, and as he takes it all in, a nostalgic ache presses against his lungs.
Towering apartment buildings and company complexes leer down at Kai as he travels the streets. Car horns carry across the wind, intermixed with the chatter of the crowds as people pass him by, taking no notice of his disheveled appearance. Here, he is just another face in the crowd. Construction can be seen just about everywhere, the jackhammers and trucks repairing the damage from the recent battle, even though it’s not as bad as Kai knows it is in Downtown where the Overlord battle was focused on. As he walks, he can hear vendors shouting from their stalls; even in the modern age, Ninjago City has never stopped being a market city.
People pass him by, oblivious to the ninja and time traveller in their midst. It’s easy, here, to blend in and disappear into the crowds. Kai’s known from a young age how to make his presence small, nigh undetectable. It came with the territory of having to essentially raise his three year old sister at the age of five. He learned stealing, sneaking, and stealth under the hand of desperation and deep hunger pangs, learned how to hide through the guidance of fear as shadows ran after him, yelling at him to get back here brat! It’s easy to settle back into the mindset that never truly left. There’s a reason he was always the best on their team at stealth missions.
It takes a little over an hour, or at least that’s what Kai thinks it takes (he doesn’t have a watch, and even though his sun-sense is intact, it doesn’t exactly give him a human-made numerical count for the time of day) before he reaches his destination.
The beginnings of the South Slums greet him, the dark alleys and shadowy roads snaking together into one large, grey maze. Right now no one knows it as the South Slums, it’s just ‘the south part of town.’ It’ll take a year or two before the slums themselves really expand out; currently it’s a mix of run-down buildings, convenience stores, and shitty apartment complexes slapped together in the city’s last attempt at controlling the poverty line. (Spoiler alert: it doesn’t work).
As it is, however, it’s exactly the place Kai is looking for. Just north of here is Underground territory, the most dangerous and volatile part of Ninjago City. Filled with criminals, gangs, and people society generally deems as ‘other’, the Underground territory is the place no sane citizen wants to be. Good thing Kai is no ordinary citizen.
He ducks into the alleys, navigating with no real purpose or direction. He’s really only scoping out the territory, trying to find a good place to take over for a base and getting a lay of the land. His plans require him to act like he belongs here, like he’s always been here even though he’s just arriving. He doesn’t have a hood to use to hide his face, so he settles for keeping his head down, walking at a nondescript pace, and flattening his matty hair down so it covers at least some of his face.
Kai passes shadowy figures in alleys, groups of people that size him up (that he lets size him up) then deem him unworthy of their time, grimy stores and even a few motorcycle gangs that remind him of the Sons of Garmadon for a brief moment. Even a brief moment is enough to make him shudder, if only internally.
He walks until the sun begins to set, and as he goes past the same store for the third time in as many hours he realizes it’s about time to pick somewhere and settle down before all the gangs come out to play. He wants to get involved, but not yet. Not until he’s ready, on his terms.
Ten minutes later finds Kai staring up at an abandoned apartment building, dusk fast consuming the streets and making long shadows stretch longer. It might just be Kai’s imagination, but he swears he can see glowing eyes follow him as he walks past the last alley to stop in front of the building.
A peek in through the bottom window shows a few homeless people hanging about or sleeping. Kai frowns. Higher up then, to a level that’s stable, but unreachable to anyone not a highly skilled ninja trained in at least five different acrobatic arts.
He goes around the building, through an alley he makes sure is empty, then scales the side when no one is looking. It takes him a bit, but once he’s inside he finds a cracked and crumbling staircase that he’s sure most people wouldn’t be able to get past. He goes up a couple floors from there, which places him at about the sixth floor of nine, then takes the nicest looking apartment he can find.
It’s got a bedroom, a kitchen, and a bathroom, with a small open space beyond the kitchen probably meant for a living room. For once, Kai’s luck is good, and he finds a dusty, slightly dirty mattress in the bedroom, and some dishware left in the cupboards even though the doors are hanging off the hinges. Everything else is bare, however, and Kai drags the mattress out of the bedroom, just for simplicity’s sake, so he can have all his belongings in one place.
Kai stands back once he’s pushed the mattress into the corner, surveying his new home. It’s… cold. And dark, now that the sun has almost fully set. He’s abruptly reminded of the place they’d all bought together during Lloyd’s training, the cramped, one-room apartment that they’d all crammed into together for the sake of one little boy. It had been small, smaller than this one, and yet it’d been so much warmer. So full of life and love.
Here, Kai is alone. He’s been pushing the thoughts away, but standing in an abandoned apartment building, surrounded by nothing but shadow and empty space, it’s unavoidable.
His family is gone. He is alone. No one is coming for him, they don’t even know him to look. It’s enough to make hot tears well in his eyes, but he fights them down. He already had his breakdown, no more emotions. He needs to get to work.
He jumps when gunshots ring out from the streets, not close, but not far enough for comfort. Kai risks a peek out of the window, the shutters still hanging and intact, but he can’t make out anything even in the light of the streetlamps. Whatever fight is going on isn’t near him, and even though a part of him itches to go out and stop the violence, the rest of him droops with exhaustion, begging for sleep and a break from this reality.
He gives in and lays down on the mattress. He’ll have to scrounge around for some blankets tomorrow, but lucky for him, the Sonetsu month heat permeates the apartment and it’s not cold. He tells himself the shivering is from a draft.
It takes some tossing and turning, and Kai hears more gunshots, but eventually he finally drifts into a restless, uneasy sleep.