Narrator's P.O.V.:

Ashley was at the playground with her friends Trent and DJ when the school bullies came up to them. Butch, Danny and Gabe, or as they call themselves, the Demon Dragons, started picking a fight.

"So you're the green one's daughter aren't you?" Butch scoffed at Ashley.

"Why do you wanna know Butch?" Ashley scoffed.

"Yeah why does that matter?" Trent asked.

"I bet you fight just like your brother, weak and pathetic." Danny laughed.

"Hey! My brother was trained by my Daddy! He could take you all down with one finger if wasn't going easy on you!" Ashley defended.

"Ooo burn." Trent high-fived her.

"You Tell him Ash!" DJ cheered.

Ryder walked by and he saw his sister talking to the Demon Dragons. He dropped everything and went over to help his sister.

"Hey! Get away from them!" Ryder shouted.

"Well well well, if it isn't Garmadork Jr." Gabe teased. "Still bringing shame to your family as the worst fighter ever?"

"I could fight you if I wanted to." Ryder mumbled to himself.

"What was that Garmadork? You want more punches?" Butch teased.

"Whatever Butch, I'm done with your little games. Just leave my sister and her friends alone and pick on somebody your own size." Ryder demanded.

"Don't mind if we do." Gabe cracked his knuckles and marched towards Ryder.

Gabe pushed him to the ground and the Demon Dragons were punching and kicking him all over. Butch punched him in his eye, Gabe kicked the in the knee, and Danny pulled his hair.

"You're pathetic!" Butch yelled.

"You're a disgrace to your family." Gabe taunted.

"You'll never make it as a ninja." Danny spit in his face.

The Demon Dragons left and Trent, Ashley and DJ went to help Ryder up who was still on the ground.

"Did they hurt you sis?" Ryder asked Ashley.

"Thanks to you they didn't." Ashley said trying to help her brother sit up. "Are you ok?"

"Yeah yeah I'm fine don't worry." Ryder lied.

"Thank you for saving us Ryder." Trent said.

"Even though I could've totally taken them on if I had to." DJ boasted.

"My dad says your a lot like your father DJ." Trent said as DJ smiled.

"Well I'm glad you guys are safe." Ryder smiled.

"Ryd, I think one of them gave you a black eye." Trent pointed out.

"Oh man!" Ryder complained. "Now my mom and dad are gonna get suspicious."

"I really think you should tell them brother." Ashley said. "I don't want you getting hurt anymore."

"Ashley, if you don't say anything to them about this I'll let you have my dessert for a whole week." Ryder bargained.

"Ugh fine but you have to tell them eventually." Ashley agreed.

Then Amber and Allison ran up to them.

"We saw what happened. Are you ok Trent?" Amber said to her brother.

"Yeah I'm fine thanks to Ryder." Trent replied.

"You ok Ryd?" Allison asked lifting him up with her strength.

"Yeah I'm fine thanks." Ryder said as he tried to stand on his knee, but he couldn't. "Ow!"

"You don't look fine." Amber said looking at his eye and his knee. "They roughed you up pretty bad this time hah?"

"I should help you to the nurse." Allison said.

"Thanks Alli but I'm..."

Ryder didn't even get to finish sentence before Allison picked him up bridal style and started to take him to the nurses office against his will.

"Hey! Put me down!" Ryder demanded.

"I'm trying to help you now hold still!" She said.

She carried Ryder to the nurse and he came out an hour later with his injuries barely treated for and he headed back to class. Everyone in the halls were making fun of his eye and his limp and it was like that until he got home.

Lloyd's P.O.V.:

Me, Kira and my mom were waiting on my kids to get home.

"Honey, have you noticed something off about Ryder lately?" My wife said to me.

"Now that you mention it he hasn't been telling us about school a lot lately and he keeps coming home with these bruises all over his face and the strangest excuses why he got them." I realized. "I'm really worried about him."

Just then my son and daughter walked through the door and their backpacks down on the table.

"Hey guys how was school?" I asked.

Ashley and Ryder were acting weird, they wouldn't look at me, my mother or Kira. I noticed Ryder was wearing his hair different and it was covering his left eye.

"Bad day?" Kira asked.

Kira pushed Ryder's hair back and we saw he had a black eye. He was covered in bruises and he was limping a little too. I saw it too and we ran to him.

"Ryder are you ok?" Kira asked as she looked at his eye and scanned him for more injuries. "How did you get that black eye?"

"I'm fine, I'm fine." Ryder replied pushing Kira away.

"Were you in a fight?" I asked.

"Kind of." He answered.

"What do you mean kind of? Either you were or you weren't." I scolded.

"I just... I was just playing rough with some friends a-and I fell off the monkey bars at the playground, that's all." Ryder stuttered.

"Ok, last week you came home with a busted lip, and on Monday it was a bloody nose. Whatever's going on, you need to tell us." I said.

"Dad everything is fine. Now if you excuse me, I-I have a lot of homework to do." My son stuttered again.

As he was about to run to his room, Kira saw him limping and stopped him.

"Ryder sweetheart, you can be honest with us. What's going on?" Kira confronted him.

"It's nothing." He answered as he tried to duck passed Kira.

"Ryder Wu Garmadon, if you don't tell us what happened this instant so help me I will send your baby pictures to all your friends right now!" Kira threatened taking out her phone.

"Fine, fine, I'll tell you." He gave in.

"Come on Ashley, let's go get you a snack." My mom said to her.

"Ok Grandma." Ashley said.

She followed my mom into the kitchen and Kira got an ice pack from the freezer for Ryder's eye.

"Thanks." Ryder said as held the ice pack up to his eye.

"Ok Ryder, spill. What's going on?" I demanded.

"Fine." Ryder sighed. "Some bullies at school have been picking on a couple of my friends and I wanted to help them so I've been taking the hits for them. Today they came after Ashley to get revenge on me. I had to do something, I couldn't let her get hurt."

I didn't know what to say. I didn't want him to come home like this every other day, but I was just glad he wasn't the one picking fights. To be honest that sounds like something I would do. I didn't know if I should be mad at him, or proud of him.

"Ryder sweetie, I appreciate you wanting to help your friends and your sister, but I don't want you to keep coming home beat up like this all the time." Kira said.

"But I wanna help them." He replied.

"There are other ways to do that. Have you told the principal about this?" I asked.

"I already tried but all he said was they don't get involved with problems between students because they wanna encourage 'problem solving' and 'forgiveness' or whatever." Ryder rolled his eyes.

"Well we have to do something." Kira said. "We can't just let this go on."

"Guys, please don't get involved. You'll just make it worse." Ryder frowned.

"I don't get it Ryder, you were trained by me and your mom. You could take down a few bullies if you needed to." I said.

"Lloyd don't encourage him!" Kira yelled at me.

"I'm just saying the boy knows how to defend himself if need be." I reminded them. "I get it if you're fighting at their level to make it fair, but you wouldn't get beat up like this if you were defending yourself like we taught you."

"Well your father does have a point." Kira agreed.

"If I fight back then I'm just as bad as they are. Plus if they knew how strong I could be, they'd stop picking on me and start to pick on the other kids again. It's better to just let them beat me up so no one else gets hurt." He sighed.

"You can't fight everyone's fights son." I said.

"I can try." He snarled.

"Ryder listen, there's more than one way to solve a problem." Kira said. "We'll help you find a way around this."

"How long has this been going on?" I asked.

"A couple months." He frowned.

"Months?!" Kira exclaimed. "Why didn't you tell us son?"

"Because I thought you would be mad."

"Mad? The only thing we're mad about is that you didn't tell us about this sooner." Kira said.

"Yeah, Ryder you're a good kid and we trust you. Your heart was in the right place, but your mom and I just don't want you to get beat up all the time."

"Well you better get used to it because I don't know how to get out of this." My son sighed.

"Well I'm gonna start by calling the school to tell them about this." Kira said. "It's not your fault they wouldn't get involved."

"Fine, but just don't embarrass me ok? And by that I mean don't do anything crazy Mom." Ryder looked at Kira.

"I'll do what I have to son, this isn't right." She said.

"Fine whatever." Ryder rolled his eyes. "Can I go take a nap now please? I'm tired."

"Sure you can." Kira said. "Thank you for letting us know what was going on."

"Yeah yeah." He said.

He got up and started limping towards his bedroom. It looked like he had hurt his left knee. He was leaning on the walls and whatever else he could to keep his balance. Kira and I noticed his limp and stopped him.

"Ryder wait." I looked at him. "Why are you limping? Are you hurt?"

"This time one of the guys kicked me in the knee and it hurt really bad." He sighed.

"Let me take a look ok?" Kira said.

"No Mom, it's ok it's just a little sore." Ryder said. "Trust me I'll be fine."

I could tell Ryder was more hurt then he was letting on. Kira took him into the living room and put him on the couch and looked at his knee anyway just to be safe, and lucky for us it was just a bad bruise and he would be ok. Ryder was also slightly bleeding in a few places and his black eye was still throbbing. Lucky for Ryder, Kira knew first aid and was able to treat him for his injuries.

"Ok that should do it." Kira said wrapping up the last of his wounds and placing another ice pack on his knee. "You're gonna be fine son."

"Thanks mom." Ryder sighed.

"Now listen to me, I don't want you to take beatings like this anymore." I said firmly. "You are lucky we didn't have to take you to the emergency room this time. Next time it could be a lot worse."

"You think I wanna get beat up all the time?!" He screamed.

"Of course not!" Kira said. "You getting beat up solves nothing and the only one who gets hurt is you."

"Exactly, nobody else is getting hurt, and that's a good thing right?" Ryder shrugged.

"Yes but at what cost?" Kira sighed. "Ryder you're a good kid, and we're proud of you for trying to do something about this, but you need to find another way to help other than letting those bullies pick on you."

"I want to, but I don't know how." Ryder sighed.

"You'll find a way. You always do." I told him.

"No Dad that's you." He sniped. "I'm not like you, I'm not a ninja!"

"I didn't say you had to be." I said. "Look, if you can't change your situation, change yourself."

"I don't have time for another one of your lame riddles dad." Ryder rolled his eyes.

"Just think about it." I winked.

"Whatever." He sighed.

He got up and limped to his room. Me and Kira stayed there to discuss this.

"Well what do about this?" I asked. "We can't just let him get beat up like that."

"Well first I'm gonna call that school and let em know what I think about their dumb policy." Kira said furiously.

"Woah easy girl." I tried to calm her down. "This is the only school that accepts elemental masters. If he doesn't go here, then he'll have to homeschooled again."

"I know, I'm just saying they could at least give us a phone call when he gets hurt like that." Kira crossed her arms.

"I agree, but that probably wouldn't solve anything anyway." I sighed. "We gotta think of something else."

"Daddy? Mommy?" We heard our daughter come into the living room.

"Hey sunshine, what's up?" Kira said.

"Are you mad at Ryder?" Ashley asked.

"No Ashley, of course not." I said as I put her in my lap.

"Good, because Ryder saved me and I don't want you to be mad at him." Ashley said.

"He did? How did he save you?" I asked.

"We were on the playground and I was playing with Trent and these guys came up and tried to pick on us."

"They tried to pick on Trent too?" Kira asked.

"And DJ." Ashley nodded.

Trent was Kai and Skylor's youngest son, he was born on the exact same day Ashley was, just a couple hours after. They had been best friends since birth. Sometimes they would even throw their birthday parties together, which me and Kai were fine with because they had most of the same friends anyway.

DJ, or Dareth Jr., was Dareth and Gail's son. I still have no idea how that happened, but he was friends with Ashley and Trent too because they were all the same age. They all got along pretty well together.

"Did you get hurt sunshine?" Kira asked.

"I didn't, but only because Ryder saved me."

"What are these boys' names?" I asked.

"Butch, Danny and Gabe. They call themselves the Demon Dragons." Ashley told us.

"Ok, thanks sweetheart. Now go get your homework done ok?" Kira said.

"Ok." She sighed and ran out of the room.

"Well if they're picking on Trent too, I better see if Kai or Skylor know anything about this." I said to Kira.

"Ok, you do that. I'm gonna call the school and give them a piece of my mind." Kira smirked.

"That's my girl." I kissed her on the cheek.

Kira went into the other room and then I took out my phone and texted Kai:

————{{{Lloyd's phone}}}————

Lloyd: Hey Kai.

Kai : Oh hey Lloyd. Are
Ryder and Ashley ok?
Amber told me what
happened at recess today.

L: Ashley's fine but Ryder
came home with a black eye
and bruises all over him. He's
limping too because some
jerk kicked him in the knee
pretty bad. I was wondering
if you knew anything about
the ones who beat up my son?

K: I'm sorry to hear that.
I've been asking Amber
and Trent what happened
since they got home, but
the only thing Amber told
me was that Ryder got hurt.

L: Ashley said the boys that
keep picking on him call
themselves the Demon
Dragons. That's all she
told me.

K: They must be pretty
strong to take down
your son Lloyd.

L: Yeah I thought so too
at first, but Ryder says
he won't fight back or
the other kids would
get hurt.

K: So he's letting himself
get beat up so the bullies
will pick on him instead
of everyone else?

L: Exactly. His heart's in the
place, but I don't want him
to get hurt all the time. 😔

K: Then tell him to defend himself. He's your son,
surely you taught him how.

L: Of course we did. But He
thinks fighting will make the
bullies go back to picking on
the other kids. Why does he
have to be so noble?! 😓

K: Um maybe because he's
a miniature version of you?

L: Oh right.

K: Look I don't like them
picking on my kids either.

L: That's the thing. They
won't pick on your kids
because they are too busy
beating up my son and
now it's putting Ashley
in danger too.

K: I get it. Look at it
this way, your son's
a hero. He saved my
kid today.

L: Yeah, he is a hero but he
needs to act like one before
the other kids start thinking
he's a wimp. We both know
he's not.

K: I don't think he cares
about what the other kids
say. I think he just doesn't
want any other kids to get
hurt.

L: And I'm proud of him for
that, but he's going about it
the wrong way. What am I
supposed to do? I love my
son, I can't let him get hurt.

K: You'll figure it out.
I know you will.

L: Thanks. I'll think of
something. I better go
check on Ryder. Thank
you Kai.

K: No problem, I hope
Ryder gets better.

L: Thanks me too. 😔

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

I hung up the phone and peaked into Ryder's bedroom. Ryder had fallen asleep, so I just continued with my day until I went to bed.

The next day...

I was getting the kids ready for School and I went to get Ryder up.

"Come on Ryd, it's time for school." I said peaking into his room.

"Dad I-I don't feel too good." He said coughing.

"Oh sorry, let me see." I felt his forehead. "Well you don't have a fever."

He started to cough again and I couldn't tell if it was just a cold or if he was trying to fake it. So I called in an expert.

"Kira, can you come here please?" I shouted.

She came into the room and looked at us.

"What's the matter boys?" Kira asked.

"Ryder says he isn't feeling well." I told her.

"Well I'm n-not." He stuttered. That was always a tell when he was lying.

"Let me see." Kira felt his forehead. "Well you feel fine to me. Ryder honey, if you don't wanna go to school, you can just say so."

"Really? You'll let me stay home?" Ryder asked.

"You can stay home only today on one condition." Kira bargained. "You have to get all your homework done, promise to stop lying to me and your father, and you have to stop bribing your sister. Deal?"

"I thought you said one condition." Ryder mumbled.

"That's the deal, take it or leave
it." Kira crossed her arms.

"Ok fine deal." He gave in. "I'm so sorry I lied to you. Thank you."

Ryder hugged us both and I could see tears of relief coming from his eyes. He was a straight A and B student, so it wasn't gonna hurt his grades for him to miss one day of school. Plus he was still limping a bit and he needed to calm down after what happened.

So the both of us got Ashley up, dressed, fed and out the door to catch the bus. We told her to ask Ryder's teachers for his homework so she could bring it to him. I just hope we made the right decision.

I let Ryder rest for a few hours and then I went to check on him. He was laying on his bed staring up at the ceiling throwing and catching a ball up and down.

"Hey son." I said walking into the room. "How are you feeling?"

"I'll be ok Dad." He sighed.

"You wanna talk?" I asked.

"I thought we just did talk." Ryder said.

"I know, but is there something else you wanna tell me?"

"No." He answered quickly. "Ok maybe."

"What is it?" I asked as I set down next to him on the bed.

"Are you disappointed in me?" He frowned.

"Of course not, what gave you that idea?"

"It's just that I've been acting like a hero, but everyone thinks I'm just a pushover." He sighed. "I've been trying to do the right thing but no one realizes that that's what I've been trying to do. They think I'm a disgrace to our family because they think I can't fight."

"Ryder, you are not a disgrace to our family." I assured him. "I'm proud of you for taking action and standing up for your friends. That's what this family does, it's what you were born to do."

"You're proud of me?" Ryder sounded surprised.

"Of course I am. I'll always be proud of you."

"Thanks Dad." He hugged me and we both smiled.

"Of course." I replied.

"I have an idea. Can you drive me to school?" Ryder said bolting up from the bed.

"I have a better idea." I smiled.

I told my mom and Kira what was going on and I took Ryder to school on my dragon. It was during recess. I flew in and I saw three older boys trying to pick on Ashley, Trent and DJ. They weren't throwing punches yet, but they looked like they were about to. I was about to go over there but Ryder stopped me and we ducked behind a bush.

"Are those the bullies Ashley told me about?" I whispered to Ryder.

"Yeah, I got this. Stay here." He said.

"Ryder wait." I said as he turned to me. "Don't be afraid to defend yourself. Ok?"

"Ok dad." He hugged me. "Thanks."

Then Ryder ran up to the bullies and I stayed and watched. I don't like to spy on my kids, but I had to find out what was going on. Ryder told me all about the bullies and their names on the way over here.

"Back for more Garmadork?" One of the boys taunted, I think his name was Butch.

"I don't want to fight you, but I will if I have to." Ryder said firmly.

"No you won't, you're weak and pathetic." Another boy said.

"Ryder? What are you doing here?" Ashley asked.

"What I should've done a long time ago." Ryder pulled up his sleeves.

"Take him boys." Butch demanded.

The bullies had Ryder surrounded in seconds. I was about to jump out and help but Ryder didn't need any. He did spinjitsu and the boys fell flat on their backs. I was so proud of him.

"Now listen here, I don't want you picking on my friends or anyone ever again." Ryder demanded.

"Or what?" Butch barked.

The boys stood up and one of them threw a punch at Ryder, but he blocked it. Then he used his powers and it hit a tree behind them. The boys were scared silly until one them said.

"Haha you missed!"

"I know, that was a warning. Next one won't be." Ryder smirked.

The boys ran away from him and the whole playground started clapping and cheering for Ryder. My boy has always been a hero, and now the whole school recognized him for being one. I was so proud of him.

He looked over at me and gave me a thumbs up and that was my cue to leave. I left because I didn't wanna embarrass him, so I flew back home.

Later that day the kids came home from school and Ryder had a big smile on his face. He looked happier than he's been in a long time.