The Truth: A Ninjago story

Kai & Skylor

Part 3: yin & yang

(Kai)

I could hear her sweet voice through my sleep singing a lullaby from long ago wanting to hear and see, I got but felt the impending slow weight of being hungover from last night, I got up slowly. Smelling one of skylor's recipes I knew she was cooking her orange buttermilk pancakes topped with clove and cinnamon. When I got to the small room in the place of what had been the campfire, it was a full-scale kitchen that looked a bit like the one in the destiny beauty. Walking in I found skylor handing a cup of dark liquid to vaina who seemed half asleep with her head on her shoulder and Harumi perky, upright, and eating skylor's orange buttermilk pancakes. "Good morning" just like her singing skylor's greeting was sweet and beautiful "morning.....how did this...? It wasn't skylor sweet voice that answered my clearly confusing question but Harumi's perky attitude "I do this sometimes...make things" she seemed cheerful about the fact that she couldn't control her powers in her sleep but I decided it was better to not mess with her perky attitude this morning "good morning" oh not nya too with the perkiness, was all I thought when she came into the room greeting us "morning nya would you like some coffee?" "oh yes please" "where is your yang?" "Jay? Oh, he is still asleep" the conversion between Harumi and Nya was interrupted by vaina groggy voice when she said "why don't you just call him, her husband" vaina's head was still on the table but it perked right up when nya answered "because we aren't married" "what?...but you are yin and yang" "so that's like engagement" "Engagement!...wait, so you are telling me that you don't have the blood bonding ritual, or the family gathering with the ceremonial fire lighting" Harumi's hand slowly brought vaina's over-exaggerating hands down to her lap trying to calm her with "vaina, that is only Shintaro tradition" but that didn't really help just made her angrier with her tradition "skylor, answer me this... what are your traditions for yin and yang?" I turned my attention to skylor making a list on the napkin she had given me with breakfast "I don't have any...I think yin and yang are stupid" everyone was shocked by what came out of her mouth especially me because in the five years we had known each other I had never once asked her about the future.

(Skylor)

Knowing the silence I wanted to make a quick recovery "don't get me wrong i think it's perfect for you and jay, Nya. but for me, I would rather not to be forced into something with someone I don't love" I had gone too far with my emotions and knew it so I made for a quick escape only to find myself facing the dark tunnel that we had somehow found with the haft of the team-high or drunk. There I found what always kept me from crashing and burning...my mother.

"Dearie you must go to bed know your father will be returning soon and he would hate to see you up" my mother lied to me when she told me my father loved me but as a good child I went to bed "I love you and I will see you tomorrow morning, remember it's pancake" it was the last smile I saw from my mother that night and morning and year until I was 24 I didn't see it again"

I could hear pixel approach "don't stop on account of me" her calm voice touched my mind and her arms embraced me in a hug "I am sorry for your mother" I was confused about how she knew I was crying for my mother "skylor i have studied humans all my life and i know how some cultures have different versions of the yin and yang and I know your cultures version. I know that is why you don't talk of your mother or of your feelings for kai" "what are you talking about? Me and kai are just good friends" her face went from soft to really you want to play me and her world matched up just the say as she said "you and me both know that isn't not true" we laughed at my stubbornness and her thoughtfulness, but something inside told me to never admit that I have a speck of feeling for hot head ninja, it would be better that way.

"Sky, we have to go" after a few minutes of quiet between pixel and me, I was more than ready to join the group hoping that nun would ask of my hastened departure from breakfast. "Where to next's?" I asked this question because we had come to a fork in the tunnels and that is where we had camped "well, if I am right I do believe we that way" vaina's pale slender finger pointed to the one tunnel that was dark and gloomy as where the rest seem to be light and happier then that one "oh, course it had to be that one" my word made my point as I walk straight into the tunnel that awaited.

(Kai)

It was cold, a cold that not only touched your fingers but your soul. Unlike the tunnels, we journeyed in to retrieve Jay or Zane's bodies the air was tense like the light we followed it stood still as nya moved everyone following her. Vaina was next to her she moved as if she was dancing but dragging her feet I noted how red skylor's hair looked next to vaina's golden hair but at the same time when she moved just so and the light hit it, it was like the fire itself. A fire that pulled me close each time I looked at it and when she glanced back at Harumi and pixel, I could see that same fire in her eyes. "Wait" when vaina's voice called out I was surprised and bummed into Harumi only to have my heart stop when I heard skylor scream.

(Skylor)

Even before I heard vaina's warning I could feel the earth under me give way I could only scream at that moment, a scream that hunted me, a scream that seemed to be not my own. The only pain I felt was the jerk of someone grabbing my hand only to feel another slip through mine and know another scream, not my own. The slippery dirt underfoot was like weels on my feet as I was being pulled from my awkward state. His warm body pushed up against mine and alerted my arousal but the scream I had heard made me forget where exactly he had pulled me into him. Turning to see that cole had an arm grip on a fidgety vaina "let me go" coles face went awry with worry "are you crazy, I just caught you." "Let me go, I have to get Harumi." not negotiating with him, she released her hand, making her slip out of his grasp. Those who were not nindord or reader would think that the rest of her life ended there but those who do would know that vaina being a Shintaro royal she always had something up her sleeve. I can now picture Cole's face as he turned around looking at the gust of wind and landing Harumi who was out of breath once again looking astonished at vania as she too landed but this time with golden wings sprouted on her back, wings that seemed to be from a fairy tale. Ignoring all of our faces, and reaching Harumi who was laughing at the sight, gasps of shock when out of annoyed she slapped Harumi on the shoulder saying thus "you made me grow wings" as vaina didn't seem pleased Harumi was laughing about the whole accent but vaina did not smile as she usually did when Harumi was laughing. no vaina was still pipping mad so made that she turn not to look at the rest of us she said almost to the grave canyon they had fallen into she said "yes, I have wings, go stare at something else" then turning back to Harumi she made a very loud argument that only pixel heard but we could see vaina facial expressions and knew she was infuriated at something that seemed so innocent.