Out of Time // Ninjago Halloween Special 2018

Chapter 4 - 2017

I had a rather stressful last week and didn't get much writing done - so while I am still on schedule with this update, I might not be able to finish and post the other chapters on time... but I'll try my best!

Anyway, here's some Jaya for you 😉.

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Chapter 4 (2017)

"Enjoying the view?"

I wasn't sure how I felt – relieved, elated, nervous, maybe bit of everything – when I finally heard Jay's voice calling through the mist.

This evening I had again been the first one up Haunted Hill. Hoping that I wouldn't stay the only one, I had sat down on a small rock, keeping my eyes fixed at on the path that, tonight only, was leading down into 'old Ignacia' and that was hopefully going to lead my auburn haired friend here.

Under other circumstances I could have said I was looking straight ahead into the distance, but in this foggy night it simply wasn't possible to see very far.

So, the answer to Jay's question was no - although it certainly made me happy to see him finally break through the curtain of mist, carrying the same jute bag that I had given him the year before.

I can't remember who hugged whom first or for how long we stayed like this, silently tightly embracing each other, but it doesn't really matter. In fact, this was the one night of the year where time just didn't matter at all.

"I've been wondering," said Jay, when we broke apart, "up here, are we actually in your timeline, or mine."

I shrugged. "It's impossible to tell; with all the fog you just can't see anything that's happening in the town below us." Whichever Ignacia it was.

"So it's almost as if we're in both timelines at once..." He remarked.

"Which means we're like Schrödinger's cat..." I mumbled, remembering the advanced physics classes from my final year of High School.

"What's that?" Jay asked interestedly. "What does a cat have to do with time travel?"

"Oh, it's something we've talked about at school." I explained. "It is a thought experiment involving a cat inside a box, which is dead and alive at the same time..."

"Hey, that's just like me in our respective times." Jay joked, but I didn't feel like laughing at all.

"Please don't say that." I begged as I desperately clenched his hand.

"Hey." He gently caressed my cheek with his free hand. "I really didn't want to upset you, but-" He shrugged. "-that's just the way it is..."

Yes, of course there was no way he couldn't be dead in my timeline, but I knew that in his own Jay Walker wasn't going to die peacefully of old age... and I simply didn't want to lose him.

In summer, I had successfully graduated from High School. Before starting college – I had indeed decided to do an engineering program – in my hometown just a few weeks ago, I had done a voluntary internship at the Ninjago Museum of History. During that time, I had become good friends with Misako Garmadon.

I had of course told her about my second 'date' with Jay. While she was convinced that it was fate that had made us meet, she also agreed that I couldn't tell him – yet – about what was going to happen in his timeline, especially when I'd mentioned how the people of old Ignacia were making fun of my ancestor and considered him to be crazy, just because he tried to warn them about the ghosts.