to rule the world | a ninjago au

[30] chat it's not looking good you hear me?

nya

How do you react when your brother returns from a mission and tells you his Golden Weapon, the one that was stashed for secrecy to keep it out of Wu's wrinkly old hands, is now in said wrinkled old hands? Do you scream, shout, punch, or hold onto your mother's cold hand and try not to cry?

Do you watch your not-quite boyfriend's anxiety rise and fall as the Lord collapses in his chair and the room behind the door explodes, or turn a blind eye?

Or do you do what Nya has done for the past three months - suck it up, push it down, and keep moving?

The last one, obviously. Pick a new problem to solve, a new puzzle to reverse-engineer, train harder, fight faster.

Nya was still trying to wrap her mind around what had happened at the Pyramid of Povau. Not the Serpentine using Svanna like a guinea pig, or the Pyramid collapsing in on them, but what Lloyd had done. That weird burst of energy from him - like the shocks the Sons had given them in the fight for the city all those months ago - but not painful. It had felt invigorating. Like a shot of pure, clean energy that could have kept her fighting for three days, but the feeling had faded as soon as they'd left the crumbled remains of the Pyramid. When she asked Skylor about the feeling, because her best friend had held up the entire structure to keep them from being buried alive with an element she'd used maybe a handful of times, the redhead bit her lip and motioned for Nya to sit down next to her in their dorm.

"I don't," Skylor faltered, for a moment so pale she was almost translucent. Then she was back to normal, like that odd stumble had never happened. Nya knew Skylor and Pixal so well sometimes it hurt when these flashes took them over. But they never talked about it. She knew they should talk about it, but in between the fighting and the killing and the training and the planning, where would you fit in a therapy session? "The feeling was so weird. I haven't felt like that in ages. Energised, you know. Like you could throw me into any situation and I would have been able to fight my way out of it. It felt great, but..."

"But?" Nya echoed softly.

"I don't want to have to rely on Astra falling in holes and Lloyd freaking out and his powers going haywire to have that feeling back again. I liked having control over my powers. I just," Skylor heaved a frustrated breathe. "I shouldn't be so weak with them."

"You're not."

"I—"

Nya look Skylor directly in her eyes, so tired and worn she felt like she was looking into her own reflection. "Sky, you are not weak. We have been thrown into the worst situation possible. Jay talks a lot about multiverses and alternate timelines and I can't think that any other you would say that you're weak. We've been through hell, I mean, I think we're still in it sometimes. It's a miracle we're still alive. And miracles aren't weak."

Her friend let out the most genuine laugh she'd heard in weeks. "You should go into the equivalent of stand-up for pep-talk."

"I could make it big. I've had a ton of practice kicking my brother out of bed and getting Jay to leave Titanium's bunker for a meal."

"Hey now, you spend almost as much time holed up in there making us fancy new things." Sky gave her a small smile. "I still think go-go-gadget bunker is a stupid name for a workshop."

"It is, but it makes him laugh." Nya and Skylor's watches beeped in unison. A reminder for a meeting to solve the Golden Weapon situation. She swiped a few protein bars from her bedside table and paused, watching Skylor as she tied her hair back. "Hey, want one?"

Sky's face froze again. Then it relaxed, properly, and she stretched out her hand. "Just in case."

The two girls made their way to the meeting room, picking Pixal up from Valley's office on the way. The samurai was going on about something way too tech-based for Nya's engineering brain to keep up with, and by the vaguely nonplussed look on Skylor's face she wasn't catching anything about machine model integration. Pixal's green eyes flashed with excitement as she projected a visual mock-up that Nya figured out just before they entered the meeting room.