Ayyyy over 200 reads! Thanks a lot! Y'all are great. Enjoy the story!

Cole POV

The rain is heard softly falling onto the roof above us. It's the middle of the night and my teammates are asleep all around me. Ash and Katie fell asleep in one of the bedrooms, I'm currently sitting at the table with a snoring Jay next to me, Zane is sitting on the floor, powered off, Nya took a pillow and is asleep on the floor, and Haru is passed out on the couch. I, for one, can't sleep. I'm not sure why. I guess not knowing if Kai is okay is getting to me. Lloyd too...

I hear a door quietly open. I look over to see Katie stepping out of the room. She sees me and just stares. "Oh, I didn't know anyone was up." She tells me.

"Me neither." I say back.

"Well, I'm heading upstairs to get something to eat. Want to come with?" She says softly. I nod and I follow her upstairs. She rummages through the fridge in the kitchen. "I don't really have much... just fruit as of now. You can look for anything you want."

"What do you have?" I ask her. She looks in the fridge again and pulls out an apple. She has a guilty look on her face but it subsides when I take the apple.

"Looks like I'll have to go hunting in the morning. Oh, but Lloyd..." she says. She looks very distressed and tired. Lloyd must be very important to her... but to be fair I would be upset too if it were my twin brother. She pulls a necklace out from the inside of her shirt. The necklace has a strong string chain and the pendant is the yang symbol. She fidgets with the pendant in her hands. "What's that?" I ask her.

She looks at me and to the necklace again. "I've had it since I was a baby. Lloyd has the other half;  The yin pendant."

"Where'd you get it from?" I ask her. Her look is unreadable and she stays silent. "I'm sorry, you don't have to answer it if you-"

"No! No, it's fine." She interrupts me. "We have no idea where we got them from." She stays silent another second or two when she continues. "When we were 1 years old, our parents threw us into the ocean. Or at least, that's what we believe. We were found washed up on the shores of this village.  How we survived, only the First Spinjitsu Master knows.  But, when we were taken in, the village was deciding what to do with us.  That's when our caretakers saw the pendants.  They were on us when we washed onto shore."

She flips the pendant over to reveal a name engraved into the back of it with red paint.  The name reads "KATELYN" written in capital letters.  It looks like it was hand carved.  "This is how the village named us.  We have no last name and we have no family.  The whole village pitched in to raise us.  We grew up with Ash and Haru because they are orphans too."

She holds it out to me so I can see it better.  "How did Splenda find you?" I ask her.  "Why did she start training you?"

She drops the pendant to dangle around her neck.  "Since we were orphans, and there were more and more villages being overrun by the Overlord, Splenda decided to give us a purpose, give us something to strive for.  Splenda also is the master of foreseeing destiny, so she kind of just knew we would be the right ones for the job. We've been training to fight any evil that may come.  We've always known that the Overlord would one day overthrow our village, and now that you're here, we may just have a real fighting chance against him.  Splenda also is like a mother figure to us.  She would always be the one to visit us and take us exploring in the jungle." Her heterocromia eyes stare into mine.  "What about you?  How did Wu find you?"

I then go to tell her everything about how Master Wu recruited us, all of our adventures, our other teammates like Pixal.  The whole time, she sits and listens.  "Wow," she finally says.  "Ninjago sounds so different.  It makes me want to see it even more now."

"Well, maybe when this is all over, you can come back and see it?" She laughs. "Yeah, maybe." We eat our apples and talk about anything random. Eventually, we head back downstairs and we say goodnight. I end up falling asleep, despite Jay's snoring, and I wake up to a gloomy and cool morning.

"Rise and shine!" Nya shakes me and Jay awake.  We all wake up and gather around the table where Jay and I were asleep.  "Okay," Katie starts once we're all ready.  "Haru, Ash and I know the village territory like the back of our hand.  But, Lloyd and Kai could be anywhere on the island.  If we are going to do this, we need a plan."

"First, we should head back to the bounty and tell the others what happened.  They'll want to know, and they can help." Zane tells her.  She nods her head.

"After that, we should head back to where they were last seen: the cliff." Nya joins in.

"We can look for clues, and try to pinpoint where they may have landed.  If they landed." Says Haru.

"What do you mean if?" Jay inquires.

"Well, Lloyd has his dragon form.  He could have flown away and waited out the storm." Haru says.

"That may be true," Ash says.  "But we don't know that for sure.  He probably would have been back by now if that were the case.  I say we check the bottom of the cliff first."

"We'll do that.  Now, let's get going." Katie tells us.

"Woah woah, lets hold on a minute.  None of us have eaten for a while." I tell everyone.  She sighs.  "Okay, yeah, you're right.  Let's head upstairs to see what we can find."  We walk up the staircase and into the kitchen, only to find and almost empty fridge just like last night.  Katie grumbles and grabs her retractable bow and a quiver of arrows.  "Right, I'm going hunting.  Anyone want to come with?" Haru and Ash volunteer and they all head out.

"Hunting?  They have to hunt for their own food?" Nya asks.

"Yeah," I answer.  "They do."

After an hour or so, the three return with a couple of dead animals.  They skin the meat, with Zane's help, and cook it.  After another hour, the sun is fully above the horizon outside and the plates of food is presented in front of us.  "Breakfast is served." Zane says as he places the plates down in front of us.  We all dig in.

"Wow, this is better than my brothers cooking!  But to be honest, he's not exactly the best at cooking." Katie says to Zane.

"Well at least he can cook." Haru teases Katie. 

"HEY!" She says back to him.  We all laugh at the two and finish eating.

"Okay," Zane asks us as we're about to head out the door.  "Do we have everything?  Weapons and such?"  We nod.

"Let's do it!" Jay says.

We make our way back to the bounty, careful to steer clear and out of sight from the villagers.  When we eventually make it back, we see Wu, Garmadon, Misako, and Splenda on the lookout, no doubt for us.  Wu sees us and signals the others.  "Where have you been?  Do you know how worried we were?" Wu asks us angrily, but we can tell he's more relieved than angry.

"We're sorry master." I say to him.

"We were attacked by the shadow assassins!" Jay cuts in.

"The shadow assassins?!" Garmadon says as he comes up behind Wu.  "What happened? Are you okay?"

"And where are Kai and Lloyd?" Splenda asks us.  We all look at each other.

"Um," Jay says.

"Well, you see..." Zane starts.

"During the fight, there was an explosion." Nya talks to the four. "Lloyd and Kai were caught up in the middle of it, and they were... blown off of a cliff...?" she says quietly and nervously.  A wave of worry washes over the four. 

"Are... are they okay?" Misako asks Nya.

"We don't know." She answers.

"When the storm hit, we weren't able to go looking for them.  We had to regroup and spend the night at Katelyn's." Zane tells Misako.

"We are planning on going out to look for them as soon as we can.  But we wanted to come to you first."  Ashley says.

Wu strokes his beard and the group stays silent.  "We must look for them immediately." Garmadon tells us.

"Yes." Splenda agrees.

"Then it is settled." Wu says.  "We shall look for them immediately."

"How does now sound?" Katie asks them.

Lloyd POV

I open my eyes to see pitch black.  Surrounding me is nothing but a black abyss of nothingness.  I look around and find out that I'm in a suit that looks like the one the ninja wear, except green. 

"Hello?" I call into the abyss.  My voice echoes like crazy and it takes a while for my voice to fade out.

"Hello, Lloyd." I hear a cold and raspy voice say behind me.  I spin around to find nothing. 

"Who are you?" I ask into the abyss again.

"Your worst nightmare."  The ground, beneath me starts to shake and it breaks into a million shards.  I start falling, deeper and deeper into the abyss.  I can't tell how far I'm falling or how close the ground is, if there even is ground, but I feel the wind whipping through my hair.  I pull out my wings and attempt to fly but I can't.  I then look to see both my wings have huge rips and tears all over them.  I start to freak out.  I then feel the ground hit me as hard as cement, and I wimpier and groan out of pain with the wind knocked out of me.

I hear raspy laughter echo throughout the darkness.  I cover my ears.  The sound is so loud and coming from everywhere it hurts my ears.  Once the laughter stops, I remove my ears to hear ringing and the voice once more.

"You can't defeat me." It says.  "You can't even protect yourself or one of your friends from a small explosion.  Pathetic."  I feel a force kick me in the ribcage.  "Weak." Another force stomps on my back very painfully.  "Failure." The force kicks me in the face causing me to be pushed back several feet.  "To think you were chosen to defeat me." The voice whispers in my ear.

A sudden spotlight appears and shines onto a group of people.  I stare at it and see Splenda, Katie, Ash, and Haru.  They all look at me with disgust and hatred.  "Guys?" I ask.

"Who do you think you are?" Haru asks me. 

"What?" I ask in return.

"You think you're so cool?  With your stupid powers and dragonkin form.  You're always trying to outshine the rest of us.  Trying to impress everyone when in reality, you're only making a fool out of yourself." Ash tells me coldly.

"W-What do you mean?  What's a dragonkin?" I ask her.

"Who are you trying to impress?!  Face it, Lloyd, you will never be great.  You're nothing but a piece of shit we have to deal with every day." Katie says to me.

"I can't believe I took you in as my student.  You're such a disappointment." Splenda tells me.  Tears form in my eyes.  "I wish the villagers had just taken in Katelyn off of the beach, and not you.  I wish they threw you back into the ocean to drown.  It would have saved us a lot of trouble."  She pulls out a sword.  Tears form in my eyes.

"Guys, why are you doing this?" I ask desperately.

"God, you're such a crybaby.  Why don't you do us all a favor, and get out of our lives!" Haru tells me.

"Destiny should have chosen someone else to be the green ninja!" Ash says to me.

"G-green ninja?"  They all begin to walk towards me. 

Lloyd... I hear someone call my name.  They come closer and closer to me, weapons drawn out.

Lloyd?  The voice sounds stronger and a little familiar.  The four of them close in on me and surround me.  They are about to strike me when...

"LLOYD!"  I wake up in a panic, tears rolling down my face.  I look around while breathing heavily.  My eyes dart around the room until they land on Kai.  His face is struck with worry.  "Hey, hey!  It's okay!  You're okay!  It was just a nightmare!" He reassures me.  His hands grip my shoulders as my breathing slows and becomes less rapid.  He continues to sooth me until I've fully calmed down.  He brushes the hair out of my face with his hand and he looks me in the eyes.  "You're safe." He tells me in a calming voice.

Kai POV

I wake up to hear birds singing.  The light from the window shines in my eyes and I roll over to avoid it.  I then see the sleeping figure in the other bed across from me, sleeping soundly.  His hair is all messy and in his face but he looks like an angel nonetheless.  I smile to myself. Every time I see him, I can feel butterflies fluttering in my chest. I have no idea why it happens around him, and ONLY around him. Maybe I just enjoy his company a lot, which it's true, I do. We may not talk much, but I always get excited to be paired up with him or when it's my turn to teach him the fire element. Part of me just wants to be with Lloyd all the time. He IS a great friend after all...

I continue to stare at the boy with platinum blonde hair.  As weird as I might look to other people out of context right now, I wish this moment could last forever.  I then see the boy wince in his sleep.  I assume he's just having an odd dream but then the winces turn into actual whimpers.

He shivers and grits his teeth.  I sit up in bed and look over at him.  "Lloyd?"  His whimpers become more and more rapid until he's sending out cries in his sleep.  I rip the blanket off of me and, forgetting I have a sprained ankle, rush over to Lloyd so I'm sitting on his bed and gripping his shoulders.  "Lloyd!  Wake up!  Come on buddy, it's just a dream!"

Tears roll down his cheeks and he whimpers more.  "LLOYD!" I call out to him desperately.  He wakes up in a panic and starts to look around rapidly.  "Hey, hey!  It's okay!  You're okay!  It was just a nightmare!" I try to reassure him. He continues to panic but after catching sight of me his breathing slows and his panic attack stops.  I move my hand to brush the hair from his face and look him in the eyes.  "You're safe." I tell him.

He sits up in bed and wipes the tears from his face.  "Are you okay?" I ask him. 

"Yeah..." he says slowly. 

"Do you want to talk about it?  It looked like a really bad dream." I tell him.  No duh, idiot he just had a panic attack in his sleep!  Why would you say that!  I mentally scold myself.

"N-no.  I-I don't really want to talk about it." He says very quietly. 

"Are you sure?" I ask him, wanting to help him.  He nods.  "Okay, I'll leave you alone about it." I tell him.  "But if you ever want to talk, I'm here for you." He nods once again.

Then, Doctor Aaron suddenly opens the door and we look at him.  "Is everything okay in here?  I heard yelling." He says in Dark Islander.

Lloyd clears his throat.  "Yes, we're fine.  Thank you for asking."  Doctor Aaron nods.  "Well, would you like breakfast?  Doctor James and I were just preparing some in the other room."

Lloyd turns to me.  "Hungry?" He asks me.  I nod.  "Yes, we would like some breakfast.  Thank you."

"Well, once you're ready just call for us and we'll bring some to you.  There are clean clothes on that stool right there for you." He says.

"Thank you." Lloyd says as Doctor Aaron leaves the room. 

"What did he say?" I ask Lloyd.

"He gave us clothes and will bring us breakfast when we're dine getting ready.  And I'd take the clothes if I were you." He recommends to me.  I laugh. 

"Wait, why were you asleep?  I thought you weren't suppose to?"

"Doctor James said I was okay to sleep a few hours ago.  I've been up most of the night." I nod.

"Aren't you tired?" I ask him.

"I've gone through days with only a few hours of sleep before, I'll be fine." He reassures me.  We then get up and grab the clothes.  We change facing opposite sides of the room.  The clothes they gave us are basically extra nurse uniforms.  Still comfy though.  We now wear a long sleeve white shirt with a blue button up short sleeve shirt that goes over it.  We also wear longe blue pants and slippers. 

I look at Lloyd to see him looking around for something.  He walks over to his old pile of clothes and pulls out a yin pendant.  He puts it on him so it's hanging around his neck.  I wonder where he got that from.  Once we've dressed there is a knock at the door and Doctor James comes in with two trays of food.

"You two shouldn't be out of bed." He says.  "Sorry Doctor James.  We were just getting dressed." Lloyd says in return.

"It's alright.  Anyway, I've brought you food." He says as he places down two trays of food.  He leaves us to eat.  We sit on our beds and eat our food.  Delicious scrambled eggs, bacon, and potatoes.  I'm halfway through eating my food when I notice Lloyd hasn't touched his food. 

"Lloyd..."  He turns to me.  "What's wrong?"

"Nothing is wrong." He says.  I set aside my food and look at him.  He avoids my gaze.  "Lloyd..." I say again.

"I'm serious!  I'm fine!" He insists. 

"Lloyd look at me." I ask him.  He finally looks up from the floor and into my eyes.  "You have to eat if you're going to get your strength back." I tell him.  He scoffs.

"What are you?  My mother?  This seems very out of character for you." He tells me.

"Oh?" I answer.  "And what exactly is in character for me?"

"Hotheadedness, being stubborn, must I go on?" He answers.  Dang.

"Well, you seem to be out of character yourself." I say back to him.  "Far more out of character than me."  He looks at me. 

"What do you mean?  I'm not out of character!" He tells me.  I roll my eyes.

"Not eating, being too quiet, having panic attacks in your dreams?" I ask him.  He continues to stare at me.  "I mean, I'm no expert, but I'm pretty sure having panic attacks in your sleep is not normal."  He looks to the ground again.  I decide to push a little deeper.  "What was so horrible to cause you to have that reaction?" I ask calmly.

There is silence in the room for a few moments when Lloyd speaks up in a voice that sounds more childish and innocent.  "Can we talk about this later?"  I can hear the desperation to drop the subject in his voice so I back off the subject for now.  I resume eating my breakfast when I see Lloyd move onto the ground in front of the beds.  He turns into his dragonkin form and stretches out one of his wings to reveal the large tear from before. 

He looks at it in frustration and sadness.  He transforms out of his dragonkin form and returns to his bed, finally taking a bite out of his breakfast.  It's not much, but it's a start. I consider talking to him again, about his wing this time, but I decide against it. He seems to be in a fragile state and I don't want to cause any reactions that could take a turn for the worst. After he's had more rest, I'll confront him about it. But for now, I'll leave him to heal and give us time to figure out how the heck we're going to get home.