Ivory's Homecoming ► Ninjago

27 ≛ Disturbed Recalling

Nya couldn't sleep well that night.

It had been just a little over a week since Jay tricked Nadakhan and got rid of him for good. Everything was fine in Ninjago, just as it had been before.

None of their previous enemies had ever really bothered her before. Once they were finally defeated, they were pushed into the very back of her brain. The serpentine, the Stone Warriors, the nindroids, Chen's and Morro's armies... none of them had ever truly fazed her. Hell, even the Overlord himself was not something that ever kept her from sleeping.

But Nadakhan. Being constantly sought out by him until the day he finally succeeded in capturing her. She felt weak, incapable of doing anything and being the sole reason he was able to gain those infinite wishes.

Plus, she remembered the feeling of death very well. The initial weak, sluggish wave coursing through her body before feeling nothing but sharp pain. And then nothing.

Nya groaned as she got out of bed. One thing she enjoyed about being the only girl on the team was that the room she slept in was hers and hers alone. She didn't have to worry about burdening anyone else.

Quietly sneaking out the door, she left it ajar before making her way to the kitchen. She needed something to distract her mind from it all.

She had no idea that she would find one of her teammates already sitting at the table in the dark. It took a minute to see his silhouette in the chair. The night sky bursting through the open window helped her see who it was.

Not that she wouldn't have been able to guess, anyway.

He was sort of slouched with his right arm propped on the corner and forehead stuck to his palm. There was a glass of water in front of him.

"Jay," Nya whispered. She held onto the side of the wall.

He flipped around so fast his hand almost knocked the water down. Said ninja had been so lost in his thoughts that he didn't hear her gentle footsteps.

"Hey," he softly greeted once composing himself. "What are you doing up?"

A small smile crossed her face. "I should ask you the same thing."

She walked toward the table and sat in the chair next to him.

A short sigh left his lips. "I don't know. Uh, a lot of things are on my mind right now. This entire thing with Nadakhan was... something, to say the least."

He turned his head to face her, now. "You too, huh?"

Nya frowned. "Yeah... me too." She took a sip of his water.

Jay knew that with her, he didn't need to hold back on anything. "That dick put us through a lot... I can't wrap my head around the fact that if it weren't for him, I wouldn't have known the truth about my family."

She was extremely reluctant to admit it, but despite the erased events, Nadakhan did manage to do one good thing. Through it all, if it weren't for the entire ordeal she wouldn't have wanted to rekindle the romance she previously shared with the ninja in front of her. It made her remember how much she truly cared for him, both as a comrade and much more. She had taken his love for granted, and even then, he continued to stay by her side.

She decided to stay silent on that one.

"Yeah," the water ninja agreed with his statement, "maybe. But he only did that to make you feel closer with him. To make you continue wishing until you wished it all away."

"That's probably true. But at the end of the day, he never lied about any of the granted wishes."

She couldn't argue with that.