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Flicker

This part had no ships in it, this part is simply for entertainment and a little bit of angst but not really angst, it just shows how Kai and the others interact, and each part will be from different parts of the seasons in ninjago!

Kai's always liked fire. He likes the way it dances, flickering back and forth and lighting up the dark. He likes the different colors it burns, how warm it feels when you get close. Fire's a source of destruction, of course, he knows that — but it's never been that way for him. Heat like that can be useful, he thinks. Heat like that can be used to heal, not to burn, people just have trouble seeing it that way, sometimes.

A lot of this is just a metaphor for himself, and yeah, Kai's aware of that.

Kai runs hot — always has, always will.

It's not a normal kind of hot, either, the kind of hot where he's always moving too much, like the woman down the street claims. Kai runs unusually hot, and that's not just him being dramatic, either. Kai runs hot enough to fool thermometers and doctors and Nya's hand when she runs it over his forehead. He runs hot enough to radiate heat, enough that Nya's calling him a furnace as soon as she learns what that is.

It's not something he, personally, notices much. Kai lives in the forge — if he was always overheated, he'd be dead by now. Kai just runs at a temperate different than anyone else does, that's all. It doesn't bother him.

He has, of course, worried about it bothering Nya, but fortunately that doesn't seem to be the case.

Quite the opposite, in fact.

"Kai?"

Kai drags sleep-heavy eyelids open, blinking in the dim light that filters from the half-patched holes in the roof of their tiny home. At first, he's confused to why Nya's tiny voice is waking him this early in the morning. The shop doesn't open for another couple hours, and he's pretty sure the forge isn't burning down — he did remember to extinguish everything before he closed up, right?

Nya interrupts his flow of thought, tip-toeing across the creaking floor of their home. Her hair falls oddly, the fringe from the cut he'd wrangled it into sticking up all over her forehead. She stops at his bed, barely coming up to his eye-level as she stares at him with wide, dark eyes.

"Kai," she hisses, this time more insistent.

Kai blinks again, runs a hand over his face, and sighs. "Wha'issit, Nya?"

Nya leans closer, bringing the threadbare edge of her blanket tighter across her shoulders. "I'm cold," she whispers, sounding very much upset with the fact.

"Oh," Kai says, awareness filtering back in as his heart sinks. Winter is coming on faster this year, and for all that Kai's been good about saving up, they really can'tafford to have the heat on just yet. He'd been hoping that the forge alone would keep them warm until then, but apparently not.

He bites his lip, a familiar ache settling in his chest. Nya deserves better — way better, and Kai can't give her it, and he's trying his best but ever since their parents—

Nya seems to have finally lost patience with him, as she's pushing at his arm.

"Move," she grunts, shoving at his arm with tiny fingers. "C'mon, you big lug—"

"Nya, what—?" Kai moves his arm for her, confused — and she promptly crawls up into the space it was occupying, hauling herself into his bed as she clambers over his legs and—

"Oof, Nya, that's my stomach—"

Nya ignores him, finally shoving him over enough that there's a small space for her in his bed. She quickly burrows beneath the blankets, pressing herself up against him and shoving her freezing toes against his leg. Kai flinches back with a high-pitched yelp, fully awake now.