Ninjago: The Flash in the Rain

Chapter Two

10 Years Later, Bird's POV

"Yes! High score!" I shouted, as I beat Cole's record in Candy Crush. Whoops, too loud. Now Sensei Zane would come in and revoke my BorgPad until I had finished training.

"Bird? Shouldn't you be training?" Yep, guessed it. "Please, no more Candy Crush until after you've finished your training. Aryssi's been waiting for you."

"But Zane, I trained yesterday. I think I'm in peak physical condition, I've even been able to do Spinjitzu a couple times!"

"The first time, you crashed into the training dummy. The second time, you fell off the island. Do I need to continue?" Drat, he had a point.

"Yes, Sensei Zane." I walked into the training yard, where I saw Aryssi waiting, just as Zane had said. She was wearing an orange ninja gi, and her bright red hair was tied up in a ponytail, with just a few strands falling out. Her face was covered in freckles, and her brown eyes shone.

"Bird, you're late again. Do you know how boring it is to train by yourself?"

"Everyone's gone, again? Why wasn't Zane training with you?"

"That's not the point, Bird. You can't just skip training because Cole beat your Candy Crush record, again. Also, Zane was making soup."

I was about to reply, but she turned away from me and picked up her spear. I looked up, and saw my nunchucks right where I had left them, in the tree. Crap. Aryssi giggled. "Three, two -"

"Wait!" I shouted. "No fair, let me get those down!"

"One!" Aryssi said, and ran at me. I jumped out of the way, and ran over to the tree. I quickly scaled the tree, and inched along the branch until it was too unstable to balance without the branch snapping. "Look, a little Bird in a tree, it's your natural habitat!" Aryssi laughed. She stood under me, looking up at me with laughing eyes. "Oh come on, can't I tease my cousin?" She asked me. I held onto the branch, and crawled along it like a sloth. I was within arms reach when a sudden breeze knocked me out of the tree. My nunchucks remained in the tree, and I was flat on the ground.

"Sorry, little dude." Cole winked at me. I saw Kai's dragon vanish, and I realized the ninja's dragons must have caused the wind gust. Great. I got up just in time to see Jay vanish into the temple. Cole must have my sad expression, because he came over to me. "Don't worry, Bird. He'll get over it." He reached up and got my nunchucks out of the tree. He smiled, and walked inside.

"He's been saying that as long as I can remember." Aryssi said. "Rematch?"

After three rounds of sparring, the score was two for Aryssi, one for me. We were both tired, and she wanted to play Sims. We walked into the temple, and saw Skylor and Jay arguing. "You can't just ignore him!" Skylor shouted. "He is your son!" Jay was about to snap back, but he saw me and held his tongue. I hated it when adults did that, yet around here it happened so much. "Hey, Bird, Aryssi." Skylor sighed, and walked away. Jay didn't even acknowledge me and walked after her.

"He'll come around." Aryssi said. Everyone really needs to stop saying that, it's been the same way for my entire life as I remember it. "What do you say to a few rounds of Mario Kart?"

Later that night, I overheard Cole and Kai talking in their bunk room. "I think we should bring him next time. He would be a big help." Kai said.

"But what if he gets hurt?" Cole asked. "He's only fourteen."

"Jay was fourteen when he first joined the team, and we weren't that much older than him. Nya was thirteen as Samurai X, and we were all in plenty of dangerous situations at such a young age. Don't forget, we'll be there as well and we can help if anything gets out of control."

"If he goes, Rissy goes too."

"Not a chance." I laughed to myself. Kai was way too over protective of his daughter.

"She's just as capable as Bird. I could give the same argument as you just did."

"Fine, but only if everyone goes. I want everyone able to watch those two just in case anything should happen to go wrong."

Someone tapped my shoulder, and I jumped out of my skin. I turned and saw Lloyd's bright green eyes staring down at me, a smirk on his lips. "Eavesdropping, are we? Don't worry, I won't tell. I did plenty of that myself when I was small. I'll put in a good word for you, but you best be off to bed." I nodded, and he smiled at me before dissapearing into the bunk room with Cole and Kai.

Needless to say, I got little sleep that night. I was far too excited at going to look for the Octopus woman in the morning. Probably wasn't my best idea, as I was exhausted that morning. There was a knock on my door, and Cole came in. "Hey, big shot. Guess what? Kai and Lloyd agreed to let you come with us to look for the Octopus woman today-." She really needs a better name. "But only if you swear to us you will do everything and anything we tell you at the drop of a hat. Oh, and Rissy is coming too. It wouldn't be fair for us to take you but not her."

I ran over to Cole and hugged him. "Thank you so much, Cole." He hugged me back, and I smiled.

After eating some of Zane's left over soup, we were all ready to go. Aryssi and I were both clearly very excited. Aryssi rode with Kai and I rode with Cole. This time, we were searching the Sea of Sand, and this meant there was a large chance that we would stop at Ed and Edna's junkyard.

I had guessed it. "Jay, we're passing your parent's place, think we should stop by?" Kai asked. Before Jay had time to respond, we heard shouting from the junkyard.

"Jay? Is that you? And your friends! Edna dear, Jay has come to visit us!" For a guy that old, he sure had quite the voice.

I saw Jay slap his face with his hand. "I guess we're going in." He said. This was certainly going to be interesting.

"Jay!" Edna cooed, squeezing her son in a hug so tight his face turned purple. I took a step back, but she caught me too. "And Bird! My, you have grown since I last saw you!" She cast a side glance at Jay. "Why haven't you visited more often?"

"We've been, uh, pretty busy recently. Sorry, Mum."

"It's alright, dear. Why don't you all come in? I have some Kabloo Berry pie in the fridge, I'll go get it."

The pie was delicious, and Edna kept talking the whole time. "Aryssi dear, has my grandson been behaving himself?" She asked at one point.

"Of course, Mrs. Walker. Although he keeps leaving his nunchucks places he shouldn't-"

"Hear that dear?" Ed said. "He's taking after our son. Aren't you proud of him, Jay?"

"Of course. He's even done Spinjitzu a couple times." He noticed that? I thought he couldn't care less.

"He fell off the cliff the second time he did it," Aryssi piped up. "Good thing Cole was with us, he managed to save him just in time." Everyone started laughing, and I wished I could turn invisible.

The visit was over a short time after that, as we had to continue searching for the Octopus. I still need to give her a better name with pizzazz. I wasn't entirely sure what we were supposed to be looking for, especially if this woman can look like any other being. "Blekksprut!" That should be her name.

"Pardon?" Kai asked.

"'Blekksprut' means 'Octopus' in Norwegian." Jay said. I nodded.

"Not very creative, but I like it." Kai replied. Ouch, I thought it was more creative than 'Octopus'.

"What are we supposed to be looking for?" Aryssi asked. "If she can shape shift, can't she literally be anything?"

"We're looking for anything that could potentially be used as a hideout, or a secret base of sorts." Lloyd said. No wonder they've been searching for so long, a secret base could be someone's basement. This was much more boring than I thought it would be. We were flying around on dragons over nothing but sand for the next two hours before we all gave up. I was definitely ready to play Candy Crush until my eyes bled.