Autobiography of a Legend

PROLOGUE

Sometimes, I like to think that Morro had a point.

I don't mean that I want to curse all of Ninjago, in fact I want the exact opposite of that. Ninjago is a great place. I love Ninjago and I love the fact I was able to grow up within it. No, what I mean is what those things in Cloud Kingdom said. They said that Morro defied destiny, and wanted to strike back at it. Destiny dealt him a bad hand, and he was turning that hand right back on Destiny.

I thought of that the other day. Kai finally taught me how to play poker so I could join in with the rest of them. I wasn't doing very well at all. I didn't know that my hands were and so I ended up folding nearly every round out of fear that I would lose. Sometimes that was a good idea. Other times it turned out I had a great hand. I was out first, and soon it came down to Cole and Zane. Zane has the best poker face out of all of us... well, he can literally deactivate his facial features if he wanted to, or that's what Jay said. Cole was nearly out and went all in to save himself. He ended up having three in a row, while Zane had nothing. But somehow, Cole kept a straight face the entire time. Not enough to say that he was in trouble, or that he had anything. He managed to trick Zane and get enough to end up staying in the game for almost another ten minutes.

I wonder if that was what Morro did. When he first ended up in the Cursed Realm, how did he manage to get to the point of being the one the Preeminent sent to Ninjago? Did he use the few skills he had to claw his way to the top of the ghost totem pole? I don't know. But seeing Cole remain perfectly straight faced even when he knew he could loose everything, it reminded me of Morro's conviction when we fought atop Ronin's shop. That conviction to stay in the fight as long as possible, even if it meant that he could be out for the count at any point. And somehow, he managed to defy Destiny.

According to Master Wu (who I will have words to say about later), this was because someone in Cloud Kingdom rewrote Morro's destiny for him. But I never believed that. I mean, how would Morro even contact someone there when he was dead? And why would they agree to do that? If I learned anything from people like Nadakhan and Chen, people will only act if they get something in return. So, why would they do that for Morro? Then again the whole back door thing always confused me. I was out of it just enough that I never saw how we got there. It almost felt like we just were there to make my friends' job harder...

I digress. When I watched Cole win that game, I wondered about destiny. Which is weird, I know, it was a game between friends that had nothing to do with that sort of thing. But I began to wonder about my own destiny. About how I became the Green Ninja, forced into fighting my father, then watch him mutate until I had to become the Ultimate Spinjitzu Master, only to have that power taken away from me by force by the very thing that mutated him. I think onto how Chen forced me to banish my father, and then Morro's actions made me sacrifice him. So much of my life revolved around my father, and it wasn't even until the Time Twins that what happened to me wasn't a direct result of something associated with my father's actions (technically he did fight them in the past, but because of my dad's sacrifice the Cursed Realm entered Ninjago and Clouse escaped, which Jay later put together to explain why Nadakhan was released in the first place; what happened with the Time Twins wasn't a result of something my father had done recently, I mean.)

When I think of all of that, I realize that I might have been dealt an even worse destiny than what Morro got.

I don't regret become the Green Ninja. I don't even regret giving away what was left of my Golden Power to help my friends re-awaken their own powers. But when I realize what happened to me in my life that got me to that point, and what happened afterwards, I start to understand that everything that happened to me was in a way tragic. If you gave someone the finer points of my life, without telling them how I got there, I would sound like something out of a movie. In fact, I'll do it now:

Fated by destiny to one day have to destroy his father. Abandoned by his mother at a young age as she tried to find a way to prevent that destiny. Raised to idolize his father even as he was told he would never be like said father. Raised an army that turned on him to try to be like his father, and then told that his actions could completely destroy all of Ninjago. Finds his mother by chance one day only to realize she doesn't feel sorry for what she did to him. Then forced to spend months trying to avoid his father at every given turn, only to be forced to destroy his father when the embodiment of evil mutates him and suppress his father's spirit. Then, after resigning himself to killing his father, is given that father back purified. Then is forced to banish his father to stop an invasion after only getting little more than a year with him. And after that, having to murder his father to stop another invasion that would have corrupted all of Ninjago.

I really begin to wonder what it is my life is. I fought for so long to save my father, then had to banish him. Everyone around me pushed me towards that. They all told me I had to, that if I didn't Ninjago would suffer. And I believed them. In a way I still believe them. But I look back on my destiny, and I start to wonder whether or not Morro saying that destiny was something to be defied, was right. Was I right to do anything that I did? I don't know. And I don't know if putting this all down to page will help me, but I hope that maybe, in some way, it will.

This is the story of Lloyd Montgomery Garmadon, Green Ninja, Ultimate Spinjitzu Master, Golden Ninja, Master of Energy, student of Master Wu, leader of the Ninja, and son of Lord Garmadon.

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Lloyd slowly exhaled, placing his hands into his lap. He adjusted himself in the wooden chair, looking towards Zane sitting down in front of him. Zane's robotic hand stopped scribbling down words at an inhuman pace on the pages of an empty book, leaving the first few pages filled with words. After Lloyd failed to speak for several seconds, Zane looked up.

"I assume that is the end of the prologue?" Zane asked decidedly, "I feel that is an appropriate length for an introduction."

"Yeah, I don't have much more to say," Lloyd shook his head, "Thanks again for helping me out with this, Zane. Saying it all out loud helps me get my thoughts down before they change. We can go through and edit this all later."

"I have no issues assisting a friend in their endeavours," Zane smiled gently, "Though, may I ask a question about this book?"

"Hmm? Sure," Lloyd cocked his head, "What about it?"

"The tone you are currently establishing, will this be what you use for the rest of the book?" Zane tapped the page with his pencil, "Correct me if I am wrong, but did you intend for this to be slightly... combative?"

"Uh... well, maybe..." Lloyd rubbed the back of his head, "I have, a lot of things I want to get off my chest. I have problems with a lot of the things that happened to me. Is there anything wrong with just, you know, talking about those problems?"

"Not at all," Zane shook his head, "Discussion of those topics is often a proven way to reduce stress. What I believe I meant to say, was that this tone you have taken here is not quite what you sound like when talking to me or others."

"Well, isn't that the point of this?" Lloyd waved his hand, "I mean, it's just a book. I'm getting my real thoughts out I can't say to others! Is that a bad thing?"

"Again, I do not wish for my comments to be criticisms," Zane shook his head, "I just would like to know for the future. Shall we move onto Chapter 1?"

"I think we can get another chapter done tonight, yeah!" Lloyd smirked, "Alright, Chapter One, The Boy That Life Forgot."

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Author's Note:

Welcome to Autobiography of a Legend! This fanfiction was originally just this chapter alone, but has grown to become what it is today. I wanted to take this moment to thank you for reading. If you want to stay current on my fics, please follow my tumblr! https://bionicstars.tumblr.com/ You can find updates for my fics there and much, much more! thank you for reading, and NINJA-GO!