Son of the Raging Tide

Chapter 9

Destroying the Realm Crystal turned out to be a lot harder than they had thought. Even when Lloyd held it in his hands, he hesitated a moment too long, and the Preeminent was able to successfully make it into the Realm of Ninjago. 

Kai was disappointed to say that he let Lloyd slip out of his reach again, and he was starting to think that even as a water ninja, he was still useless to his friends.

When it was evident that they had no immediate way of stopping the Preeminent, it became a race to get the civilians out of her reach. Then Lloyd momentarily returned, and he had a plan to drown her in the sea. But even as this new strategy started to prove successful, the ghosts began using the village around them to counteract and created legs for her to stand on, and arms for her to fight with. Still, the ninja fought on, even harder as the Preeminent stepped into the sea, hardly fazed by the water, wading toward the boatload of defenseless civilians. 

Kai was blasting as many ghosts as he could with jets of water. It seemed that no matter what they did, the ghosts just kept coming, and the Preeminent didn't slow down at all.He was too distracted to notice Soul Archer sneaking up on them until one of his whistling arrows narrowly missed hitting Kai's head. 

Kai whipped around to see that he was nocking another arrow. 

"Kai, watch out!" his sister yelled.

Kai ducked and the arrow missed, but he lost his footing and slipped off the giant's makeshift limb. He tumbled through the air, the jumbled buildings flying past him.

"I've got you!" Cole was further below, and held his arms up to catch Kai. In the moment, Kai expected it to work. But what they both forgot was that Cole was still a ghost, and as a result, Kai fell right through him.

Thinking fast, Kai spotted part of another building jutting out below him. He reached for it with one hand and finally jerked to a stop just above the sea.

He glanced fearfully at the water below. "I can't swim!" he called. He may be a Water Ninja, but that didn't change the part where he'd never learned how to keep himself afloat.

"I can't get wet!" Cole called back. 

The others were still too far away. As Kai tried to reach up with his other hand, the rotting wood in snapped, and he plummeted into the sea.

The water gripped him in its cold embrace, and panic washed over him as he was submerged, only to bob back up a second later gasping for breath. He reached out blindly and found the wooden shambles of the Preeminent's makeshift leg again, and he clung to it tight, afraid to let go and be lost to the tide.

But as he was blinking the water from his eyes, he looked up to see that Soul Archer was back, drawing his bow again. With no other option, Kai took a deep breath and dived back under.

Still, he could hear Soul Archer's taunting voice say, "You have to come up for air at some time, 'Water Ninja.'" The way he said it, Kai could hear the mocking in his tone.

And he was right. Kai hadn't grown gills when he became a ninja. He felt trapped, knowing that, whether it was Soul Archer's arrow or the water itself, something was about to do him in. And Soul Archer knew it, too. Kai was hardly a Master of Water if he couldn't even keep his own element from killing him.

Get it together! He told himself. The water's your friend. Stop being afraid and use it!

He could feel his lungs straining. No, he'd decided a long time ago that drowning would be the worst way for him to die. It was now or never. 

At the same time that his head broke the surface, Kai pushed his hands forward with all his might, creating a wave that surged and curled over the ghost, leaving no escape. The archer was washed away, and Kai was allowed to catch his breath for a moment.