Chapter Text
As morbid as it sounded, Zane couldn't curb his excitement at the sight of the seemingly dead body in front of him.
Having been here for so long by himself (well, of course he had Gizmo, too-!), he'd grown to look forward to the next time driftwood or remains of a shipwreck made itself onto the shore. While they insinuated a poor fate for whatever soul had been lost in the disaster, they made a great change of pace for an otherwise unchanging lifestyle of one Zane Julien. The driftwood was great for making repairs to the lighthouse, or, if nothing needed repairing, to make fun trinkets and crafts to pass the time.
But in all the time he'd been checking the beach daily for new toys to play with, he couldn't recall ever encountering an entire body. He knew humans were buoyant from the older times when his father would claim to feel "young again" and implore Zane to come swimming with him in the water, ignoring the imminent danger of the Leviathan. He recalled watching the older man float in the waves with a smile crinkling his face, carefree and matching his claim of youth. And then, shortly after, either his father would grow tired in the truth of his age, or a roar would shake the air and he'd come scrambling onto the shore, ushering Zane inside.
While those memories were far off now, Zane held onto them dearly. After all, his father was a wonderful man.
The robot watched the waves crash against the rocks nearby, the tide slowly rising as the day grew longer. He glanced back down at the body, unmoving, and wondered if he'd actually be able to move it at all. The stranger had a strangely translucent glow about them, face down in the sand that he could only make out a mop of unkempt black hair and just as tattered clothing.
Zane crouched down for a closer look and felt a few droplets of the waves splatter against his face, giggling. Similarly, the water pelted the body, but sizzled out in the way Zane's seen it do on the rocks on a particularly hot day where he'll stay inside else his own systems fail from the heat.
The stranger let out a muffled scream into the sand, body jolting and startling Zane into falling back into the sand and kicking up tiny clouds as he scooted away, eyes wide. Yet, he did not feel entirely afraid-- deep in his mind he felt the prick of hope and excitement at possibly having someone new to talk to. If they survived, of course.
The body pushed itself up on its forearms, and similarly to Zane, crawled on the sand to get itself further away from the water, a bit farther up on the beach towards the lighthouse. They flipped themself over and Zane finally saw a face beneath the mop of hair, pale and faintly translucent as well, stark green eyes a color he'd never seen before. Maybe similar to one of the pens upstairs in the studio, or tea leaves before they're used? Yet, it seemed far more bright.
Zane sat in the sand, repositioning himself slightly as to not be in such an awkward position anymore, now that he felt as though this stranger was less of a threat. And more importantly, his purpose kicked in for a moment-- did this person need assistance? Medical help? While he was not necessarily capable of large medical procedures, he had taken care of his father's declining health for years and there were still first-aid materials inside the lighthouse--
"You," The stranger said, bright eyes looking at him darkly and with an air of suspicion, fear, yet thinly veiled curiosity. He pointed with a hand that shook for but a moment before it stabilized itself out.
"Me...?" Zane replied, unsure but not unfriendly. He had a slight smile on his face, not wanting to alarm the stranger while also showing his willingness and hospitality. But, not too desperate, of course! After all, this stranger probably was in a shipwreck, and likely wanted to get back to the mainland as soon as possible. I'm not sure how he'll do that, but...
The stranger didn't respond for a minute, face switching between several emotions. He studied Zane closely, nose scrunching as though he was trying to decide what to even ask first. Luckily, Zane understood what was likely the main question on the other's mind.
"I am an android, if that is what you were wondering about. My creator is Doctor Julien, I was created to assist and protect those who cannot protect themselves. My name is Zane," He replied matter-of-factly, smiling even wider. Of course, Zane had forgotten that robots were not so common. After all, that was why the original Zane had been designed to look as human as possible. His father often told him that he would have gotten the same treatment, had the doctor had the materials to do so. Perhaps, when they reunite, his father could finally give him that last coat of paint? But that thought would have to wait for now; the stranger still seemed to be confused. If anything, he seemed even more lost than before.
"Would you like to come inside for some tea? I think there's a storm coming in soon..." Zane suggested, still trying to goad some kind of response out of the other. He pointed in the direction of the dark clouds behind the stranger in the distance, and the other swiveled his head hurriedly to confirm there was, in fact, a storm on the horizon. A sour expression settled over the stranger's face.
"Yea, sure... Whatever keeps me out of that rain," He answered sharply, standing up and not waiting for Zane's response. What a go-getter! Zane jogged to get ahead of him in order to show the way to the lighthouse, even though there were no other structures on the island to get it confused with. They quickly ascended the main stairs, and Zane opened the door with a slight flourish.
"Please, make yourself at home," He smiled again, and the stranger continued giving him that weird stare as though he had five heads. Maybe he's a little odd, but that's alright. He ran once more to catch up with the other who was already halfway up the stairs leading to the studio.
"You live here by yourself?" The man asked, back facing Zane as he looked around at the different objects scattered around the room. A couple easels left over from his father, now littered with attempts at learning to draw on Zane's part. A pile in the corner of spare parts for safe keeping, another of driftwood collected over time... It was a lived-in home, one that Zane was determined to keep warm and inviting for the day his father returned.
"No, no... I have a roommate," Zane replied, waving his hand. He made his way to the far side of the room where the dining table was, currently only set for one, and tapped on the small box nearby. "Gizmo, we have a guest!"
Zane delighted in the stranger's surprised gaze as he watched the small robot pop out from within the box, chittering and beeping in excitement to be of use to a new face. Quickly, it hopped up onto the table and set down a second cup of tea to join the first, skittering over to the kitchenette to prepare a pot of tea as fast as possible. Zane motioned towards the seats at the table and the guest was knocked out of his stupor, hesitantly sitting down.
"So it's just you and... that thing? What about that Julien guy you mentioned?" The stranger seemed to be carefully deliberating over each of his questions, a million more displayed on his face as he stared directly at Zane, a stern expression.
"Oh, my father... He left some time ago, maybe two or so years now? I wasn't really keeping track, if I'm being honest, hehe..." Zane laughed, rubbing the back of his head sheepishly. He had considered it, a long time ago, picking up on keeping the tally marks his father kept so diligently on the walls of the studio, but eventually he ran out of room to use. It seemed a pointless endeavor. "But I've been keeping the hearth warm for his return, so to speak."
The stranger went quiet, then, "My name is Morro."
Zane's grin grew, and he clapped his hands together, "Oh! I was just about to ask! It's nice to meet you, Morro. Where do you come from?"
"Not relevant- anyway, I'm curious about something," Morro had a blunt way of speaking, Zane had noticed. He would curtly redirect or even ignore entire lines of conversation, redirecting in a way that left the android slightly lost. After all, he'd always been taught to respond to any question someone asked of him with utmost honesty and politeness. Was Morro not taught the same by his own father? I suppose it's rude of me to wonder...
"Ah... yes, what is it?"
"You said your name is Zane-- you're not the same as the other one though, right?"
Other one.
The original.
"You've... met my brother?" Zane's smile suddenly felt harder to put on, hands clutching his cup ever so tighter, gears shifting just a little less fluidly, heartbeat speeding up just a smidge faster--
"Blue eyes, silver, looks exactly like you? Also named Zane? Yeah, I'd guess so. Never bothered knowing the guy's surname," Morro trailed off, glancing around. He said something else, but the words didn't process through Zane's head.
Once, he remembered joining his father for one of his impulsive swims. While his body was not fully water-proof, his father insisted that it would survive for just a few minutes in the water without issue. Of course, he trusted his own father and heeded his words, excitedly sprinting into the waves himself and joining in the fun.
He remembered the sun that day, glinting so brightly it nearly blinded him. He remembered his father's crinkled smile. And he remembered how strong the waves were, pulling him under as he felt the weight of the water entering his body.
The surface of the water, glittering and wonderful, the bright sun and beautiful sky sank further away as he was pulled from it. All too fast, all too fast.
He didn't remember much else about that day, vague images of his father grabbing his arm and being thumped onto the sand, spinning and finally understanding the feelings his father described to him when he one day asked what it was like to die.
This feeling, though Zane was not drowning under an ocean now, was so similar, it nearly made him reel back in pure shock.
Morro eyed him and he only now realized the other's mouth was no longer moving, drawn into a thin line as his bright green irises scanned him as though perhaps, like Zane, he had an internal monitor inside his eyelids (though he knew non-robots did not possess this).
Zane honed in on those eyes, the sharp color unlike anything he'd ever known grounding him for a moment, and he let out a long, stunted breath as he looked down at his hand, dripping with tea from a cup Gizmo had filled while he wasn't looking, not long for this world as he seemingly destroyed it in his stupor.
"Oh, messy me... I'm sorry Gizmo, could I ask you to help clean up the shards? I wouldn't want Morro to step on them," He beckoned the little bot over from where it was setting the kettle back onto the stove, and it quickly chirped in response as it gathered supplies in its hands.
Morro laughed lightly, giving him another one of his strange looks. "I wouldn't worry about me stepping on that. You think I'm worried about getting a cut, or something?"
"Huh?" Zane turned his head to face the other, puzzled.
Morro's face tightened for a moment, but then he laughed again. "You... realize I'm a ghost, right?" He held out his hand across the table, splayed for Zane to see. And see he did--right through it, beneath faintly calloused fingers and bandaged wrists and chips of paint left on nails he saw the table right there.
Zane gaped at the hand, then up at Morro's face, then back down at the hand, as though he wasn't sure what to be impressed at.
Morro continued his uproarious laughter, but it was not malicious-- he seemed genuinely entertained. It was a nice laugh to contrast with his otherwise terse personality, which Zane appreciated, if he wasn't the butt of the joke right now!
"I.. I see! I didn't know ghosts were a real thing, only from the stories... My father never described having such an experience to me," Zane explained, joining in on the laughter with a slight hesitance, but seeing no bad intention from Morro, felt his shoulders relax.
"I get it now, don't worry," Morro didn't quite smile, but his mouth was upturned enough that Zane could make out the unique dimple decorating only one side of his face. Humans were always fascinating like that... Their small imperfections fascinated Zane. After all, he was created to be... perfect. Or something along those lines, at least.
"So..." Zane trailed off, trying to figure out how the least awkward way to prop this question would be. "You died in a shipwreck, and your ghost washed up here...? I'm really sorry to hear that, if so."
Morro looked ready to laugh again, but something else appeared to be weighing on him at Zane's words. "No, I've been a ghost for a long time. I have no idea how I ended up here. Water is supposed to destroy ghosts, and I..." He looked lost in thought, brows furrowing as his body language tensed. "Where are we, exactly?"
"Ninjago...?" Zane answered slowly, not quite sure what the other was looking for as an answer. "This island is off the western coast. I don't know any more than that though, I'm sorry..."
"Western coast!?" Morro shouted, hands slamming on the table. Zane jumped in his seat at the sound, and Morro sat his own self back down, hand on his chin. "There's no way I could have drifted from Stiix to the west coast without getting destroyed a minute in..."
Zane had no idea what he was talking about. He didn't know what Stiix was, or where it was, or how far it was from here. It made him upset that he couldn't help the other in his seeming predicament, but what was he to do? I wish I could be more useful...
"Pardon me, but I'm a bit lost... If you didn't come from a shipwreck, where did you come from?" The droid asked, trying to not be intrusive but still he was curious, and he wanted to know what all these things meant so he could help.
"The details aren't really important, if I'm being honest," Morro waved his hand dismissively, "It's not relevant to you, anyhow." He looked out the window at the rain, grimacing. "But, you don't suppose I could stay here for the night? Again, ghosts don't do water. I don't wanna know what happens if I get destroyed a second time."
Zane perked up, trying not to be too disappointed at his questions being redirected once again. "Oh, of course! There's a bed you could use, my father's, I don't mind sleeping on the floor since that's what I used to do! Please, make yourself comfortable," He said cheerily, standing up to show the way as Gizmo finished cleaning up the bits of shattered cup from before, moving on to clear the table as well.
He led Morro to a corner of the room secluded by a curtain attached to the ceiling, giving the image of a private area, though the curtain swayed from the wind coming through the windows nearby. Luckily, this corner had no windows, and Morro would be safe from the rain. As Zane moved to grab the blankets to make the bed a bit more organized (he had slept in it the night before, and in his morning laziness had not bothered to make it yet...), but Morro grasped his wrist and he paused.
"I really don't need to sleep in the bed, I can just float. I can't even feel the blankets or anything, so... it's kind of pointless for me," The ghost explained a bit flatly, and Zane watched him lift his feet off the floor and stay there, as though to prove his point.
Zane made a small "o" with his mouth, but still... "Are you sure? I want to make sure you're comfortable while you're here," He said, a lopsided smile. At Morro's blank, bored stare, he got his answer. "Okay, okay, if you insist. Umm... You should probably still stay in this corner though, it's the only one without windows..."
"Very well," is all Morro gives him in response, tossing himself up in the air as though there were an invisible bed beneath him. It left Zane awestruck for a moment. His father had told him many stories of the mainland, a place with beings who could control magical abilities, or supernatural ones, even... But he'd never actually seen anything like it, besides the leviathan outside, of course (though he hadn't seen that fellow in awhile, and briefly wondered if it was doing alright). Seeing a supernatural being work their magic in person was something else, for sure. He wondered what it was like to walk on air as though it were earth.
"Goodnight, Morro!" Zane chirped, leaving the corner and pulling the curtain to leave the ghost to his privacy as the android began to clean up for the night.
Gizmo was discarding the broken cup pieces in the trash, and Zane picked up the cup that Morro had used, almost starting to turn it over in his hands before he realized it still had tea in it-- he poured it down the drain. A waste, but he supposed there was nothing else to do about it.
He's so strange... Zane washed the cup under the water, disliking the feeling of the liquid on his metal. Suffocating. He quickly dried off with a towel and set the cup back down on the counter to be used later, scanning the rest of the studio for anything that needed to be fixed.
The rain pattered lightly on the roof, and Zane was thankful it wasn't any heavier, else he have to get out the tarps. Really, who would design a lighthouse with only holes where glass windows should be...? His father was always vague about his reason for living in such a place, buried deep in his mind like a locked box alongside other topics he tended to be vague about.
The android's mind went back to the conversation with Morro before, about... that person. As though second nature, Zane's feet took him to the one workbench rarely touched by his own hands, covered in a thin coat of dust from having not been tended to in a day or so. Zane brushed aside some of it, making a mental note to dust again this week, and gingerly opened one of the drawers, shifting through the contents.
He fished out a photograph, old and worn and dented at the corners where Zane had held it in his hands a million times in this same way.
In the photo itself was his father, a bit younger looking than some of Zane's earliest memories of him, his face twisted into his usual crinkled smile, bringing a smile to Zane's own face. He was arm in arm with someone else, a bird held between them. The other person was...
Zane's grip tightened, causing yet further damage to the photograph, and he set it back into the drawer carefully, slamming it shut afterwards.
It was time for bed.