Lava | Ninjago

🜂 | where we left off

[posting this from twitter bc I just found it and thought it's too good to be lost there so... inspired by my moot reacting to a tweet about a lava screenshot]

•••

When they got back from the lighthouse, the sky was already dark, filled with white twinkling dots. No one seemed interested in getting to work immediately, instead, they all went their own way, getting used to life at the monastery again. After all, most of them haven't been there in a long time.

So long, that it seemed almost like a labyrinth at times. It wasn't an enormous building but somehow Kai ended up in different places than he wanted to go. And somehow he was suddenly faced with the door of Cole's room. Surely they must've messed with the building's layout, it wasn't that easy to get lost here, right? After all, they spent so much time here, how could they forget anything?

Kai flinched the moment the door he was so intensely staring at opened. And Cole seemed to get startled too, flinching when he realised there was someone standing in his way. He got out and just stood in front of Kai, both ninja looking at each other as if they were frozen to their spots.

"Hey, Kai... what are you doing here?" said Cole, breaking the eerie silence.

"Oh. Uh..." Kai looked around, suddenly nervous from being caught... staring at Cole's door. "I guess I got a bit lost," he confessed.

Cole smirked and crosses his arms. "Oh yeah, you and your sense of orientation," he teased.

"It got better over the years."

"Sure."

Kai watched him as he leaned against the door frame. As much as he tried, he couldn't ignore the tension between them. Although he couldn't really say what it meant, what it was. Anger? Awkwardness? Longing? Of course Kai felt bad for leaving but in his defence, was there any other way? He needed to get out. At least for a little while. Not like it helped much though. He couldn't get his mind off her. Everything reminded him. Everything screamed 'Nya'.

And still, there were times when he was lying in bed, thinking that maybe everything was better had he not left. Had he not said goodbye to Cole.

So of course the moment he saw the master of earth at the doorstep he felt ecstatic. Kai wasn't the type to admit his mistake or defeat easily and if it was on him, their reunion would be far in the future, if at all.

There was just this huge, blinding cloud of uncertainty: Was he allowed to hug him? Hold his hand? Call him Pebble and love? Was he allowed to spend a night in his bed when he couldn't sleep? Kiss him anytime he felt like it? Whisper him sweet words people call nothings? Was he still allowed to consider him in his future visions? Or was it all just the past? Were they just other pictures he could only look at and ache for them to come back?

It didn't feel like a break-up to him. But people can drift apart. Especially when they're not together. Like badly anchored boats. This isn't what happened to them though, right? Because the last thing Kai would need was losing Cole. He already lost Nya and almost lost Lloyd, but losing Cole would be his last straw. And it all would be his fault.

All of a sudden he stepped up, his body moving on its own. "Cole–" He paused. What was he gonna say?

Cole perked up and waited for something. He waited for Kai to say something.

Kai, say something.

His hands dropped, perhaps under all the tension he felt. "Um... I..."

Cole left his spot at the door frame and instead moved closer to Kai, the two ninja standing just a step apart from each other. Kai looked up, his eyes meeting the ones he had missed so, so much over the months. Finally he got a clear view of them once again.

It wasn't just a photo nor a hazy memory anymore.

They were real and staring back into his own.

"I missed you so much, Cole," Kai managed to say at last. He reached out with his hand but quickly retreated back.

"Yeah, well... you're the one who left."

"I'm sorry." Cole shook his head, lowering his gaze to the floor, much to Kai's dismay.

"I just wish I could've been there for you," he sighed. "But I didn't want to tell you what to do. I got it. I got it when Jay left. I got it when Lloyd left. And I totally understood when you did. It hurt, but I got it."

"Why didn't you visit?"

"I wasn't sure if you even wanted to see me. I wouldn't be surprised... I don't know, I guess we all needed a break."

The silence was filled with thousands of unspoken words. Words Kai wished to say but wasn't sure whether or not he was allowed to.

"I'm sorry I left."

And then he was staring into his eyes again, as Cole smiled. "It's fine, as I said, I get it."

Now it was Kai's turn to shake his head. "No, I could've found a better solution than..." a sigh, "leaving you like that when you also needed support. Than getting myself a pack of extremely hyperactive kids."

"Birds of a feather flock together," sang Cole.

"Ha-ha. I'm not that hyperactive."

"Sometimes." Kai scoffed, although he liked the way the atmosphere was becoming more comfortable. It took another several seconds of standing in silence for Cole to back up from the conversation.

"Well, I guess we should get some sleep..."

"Yeah."

"Night, Kai." Cole made a step back and giving Kai one last tiny smile, he turned back to his room. Wherever he intended to go, whatever he meant to do, it was long forgotten.

"Cole," Kai called out, making the black ninja stop in his tracks and turn back. He wasn't sure about his next words but god, would he hate himself if he didn't at least give it a try. "Can I hug you?"

Cole raised an eyebrow. "Since when do you ask?"

Kai shrugged, not tearing his gaze away from the rather interesting wooden floor.

"I don't know..." He didn't want to get his hopes up when he heard footsteps but he certainly could the moment he saw Cole's foot. Right after that, there were arms being wrapped around his body and the calming aura of the earth ninja surrounded him. Kai quickly hugged him back without any hesitation and breathed in his scent that was absent for so long.

Oh, how he missed this. How many nights he was kept away from sleeping thinking about it. Why has he never come back?

"I missed you."

"I missed you too, Blaze."