Chapter Text
Wu nearly slammed the sliding screen door from its tracks as he threw it shut against the glare of the light off the lake where their father remained in their canoe. The orange sunset began to seep into the sky and brought a chill to the children of the First Spinjitzu Master.
“Yin! Garmadon! You have to see what I found,” gasped Wu. He kicked off his shoes in the corner of the genkan and ran loudly down the corridor in search of his brothers.
“What? Is it trouble?” Garmadon asked. He leapt to his feet as Wu panted in the doorway to their shared bedroom.
“No,” declared Wu. He sat himself in the centre of the tatami floor and revealed the scroll he had run home holding.
“Where did you get that?” Xiyin asked as he eyed the thing sceptically. He took it upon himself to close the door behind his brother.
“I went into town,” Wu declared proudly.
“Does Father know?” asked Garmadon with a wide-eyed whisper. He grasped his brother’s arm before he could open the scroll. Wu grinned mischievously and placed a finger over his lips. Garmadon’s eyebrows knit in a panic. “We were supposed to come straight back here from the lake!”
“What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him,” Wu said with a shrug that cast off his brother’s hand. Xiyin stood to peer out their window.
“It’s almost sunset. He’ll probably come back soon,” he warned.
“Ew!” Garmadon shouted. He shoved his brother and covered his face with his hands. Xiyin watched him ball his fists and swing for Wu with his eyes closed. “Why would- where did- I don’t wanna know!”
“Gross,” Xiyin called from his place near the window. Wu’s attention was absorbed as he rolled the scroll to the next set of pictures. He yelped as one of Garmadon’s flailing punches struck his arm and Garmadon focused his blind attacks.
“Ow! Ow! I’m telling Father!”
“Oh, yeah? Then tell Father why you got punched!” Garmadon shouted to punctuate a particularly strong blow that Wu barely managed to duck beneath.
“What is that?” Xiyin asked. Garmadon felt along the floor with his hands until he had crawled over to his neatly-made bed. He pulled his blanket over his head and groaned loudly, as if sound would wash away the images scarred into his mind’s eye. Wu grinned.
“It’s how babies are made,” whispered Wu delightedly.
“Gross!” Garmadon’s thick blanket muffled his voice.
“Why the heck do you even want to know that?” Xiyin wrinkled his nose. He glared at Wu where he sat cross-legged on the floor. He shrugged. Xiyin did his best not to have his attention distracted by the black and white ink drawings of a lady with her legs spread wide and a man beneath her who inserted his penis into a gash between her legs. “What is that?”
“I don’t know,” Wu admitted.
“It looks painful,” Xiyin muttered.
“I’m never having children!” declared Garmadon. “I’m never doing that. No way.”
“You need to get rid of that before Father comes back.”
The front door of the lake house opened and closed calmly.
“I’m home,” called their father. Garmadon bolted upright and threw off his blanket.
“Crap!” He shouted. Garmadon immediately pressed his hand over his mouth as his voice attracted footsteps in the corridor.
“Wu!” Xiyin hissed. His brother fumbled with the ends of the scroll. Garmadon scrambled to his feet and lunged across the floor to tear the scroll from Wu’s hands and crush it between his hands with a surge of violet flames. It disintegrated between the hands of the fledgling elemental master of destruction as the door opened slowly.
“Is everything alright?” Their father asked. All three boys froze: Wu sitting cross-legged on the floor with one hand reaching for Garmadon, Garmadon himself laid on his stomach with his hands still pressed together as if in prayer, and Xiyin standing between them and the window watching it all with both hands clasped over his mouth. Their father chuckled. “You three look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“Yeah. It’s… we’ve got it under control,” Xiyin spoke up. “It’s nothing.”
“Dinner will be ready in half an hour, if one of you will set the table.” Their father closed the door and let them be. None of the boys moved until they heard the door to the kitchen close and their father moved the heavy metal kettle to start a cooking fire beneath it.
“What the heck was that, Garmadon?” Wu hissed. Garmadon’s hands shook as they parted. He yelped and covered his head as Wu sat up to his knees and punched down at his back. Xiyin grabbed Wu by the arm and dragged him off of Garmadon as he curled into the foetal position.
“I panicked!”
“Yeah, obviously!” Wu struggled within the grasp of Xiyin’s armlock. “I was going to close it!”
“No, you weren’t!”
“Well, it’s gone now,” Xiyin said firmly. “And if we keep fighting, Father is going to know something’s really wrong. So stop it.”
“I’m telling Father anyways,” Garmadon declared.
“No, you won’t!” Wu shouted and broke free from Xiyin’s hold. Garmadon scrambled to the door and threw it open. He ran down the corridor with Wu hot on his heels. Garmadon shoved open the kitchen door dove behind their father, who looked up from the vegetables he had been slicing.
“Is something wrong, boys?” asked the First Spinjitzu Master calmly as he set the knife back against the cutting board. Water bubbled away in the kettle.
“He’s hitting me,” Garmadon muttered.
“Garmadon started it!” Wu exclaimed. He pointed his finger at his brother, who ducked behind their father’s back. Garmadon poked his head out to give his brother a death glare. Xiyin turned his body to slip through the doorway behind Wu. Their father watched him as he went to the cabinet.
“Care to tell me what is happening, Xiyin?” The First Spinjitzu Master asked as Wu fumed in the doorway.
“I’m setting the table,” he replied dully.
Lloyd closed his eyes against the warm kiss of sunlight as he laid his head back on the soft grass of the hill. Small birds twittered in the trees that gave some shade to the shrine. The footsteps of two children tramped through the tall grass as they passed by where he lay next to his younger uncle, Kai, and Nya. One child pushed the other and they yelled as they fell.
“Yuzhen! Play nice!” Kai scolded.
“Maiya started it!”
“I did not!”
“She did, too!”
“He pushed me first!”
“She called me a monkey!”
“No, I didn’t! I said you looked like a monkey!”
“Maiya, why did you say Yuzhen looked like a monkey?” Nya asked her daughter disapprovingly. Lloyd sat himself back up and squinted against the glare of the sun as Yuzhen crossed his arms and glared back uphill, away from them.
“Because he does,” pouted Maiya as she stood up and brushed grass from the knees of her trousers. Kai choked on a sip of his water and laughed out loud. Yuzhen whipped around at the sound of his father’s laughter and slammed his balled fists by his sides.
“I do not look like a monkey!” He shrieked before crossing his arms and glaring uphill again, as if he were asking the gods to strike Maiya down.
“You do, too!” Maiya exclaimed. Nya sighed and stood up to scoop up her daughter. Maiya stuck out her tongue mockingly as Yuzhen scowled. Lloyd couldn’t help but chuckle.
“Oh, yeah? Because you look like a frog!” Yuzhen called.
“Blah, blah, blah! I can’t hear you!” Maiya exclaimed.
“Nyeh!” Yuzhen stuck out his tongue back at her.
“Now you look like a frog!” Maiya shouted.
“Cut it out,” ordered Kai. “Get along.”
“I’m never going to talk to Maiya again. She’s mean,” declared Yuzhen.
“Yes, you will,” Kai said. “Don’t make me get over there and tickle you.”
“No, I won’t. Never, ever,” Yuzhen swore. Kai sighed dramatically and smacked his hands on his knees. He got to his feet and wiggled his fingers in the air and Yuzhen stumbled backwards as he stuttered: “Ok. I’ll talk to Maiya again, but not for a million gazillion years.”
“Fine with me. I didn’t know monkeys could talk!”
“Maiya. Be nice,” Nya scolded. Maiya huffed. Nya’s voice edged on frustration. “What in the world am I going to do with you?”
“Kids will be kids,” Xiyin called. “They’ll grow out of it. Trust me.”
“Nuh-uh! I’m serious! I’m never talking to Maiya for a million gazillion years!” Yuzhen shouted over his shoulder. He screamed as his father got off their picnic blanket and lumbered comically after him.
“I’m gonna getcha!”
“No! No!” Yuzhen scrambled as his feet caught on uneven lumps of dirt. Kai pursued his son in slow-motion as Yuzhen screamed and clawed at the dirt. He kicked his feet wildly as Kai tickled his ribs and Maiya laughed. Kai grasped his son firmly and scooped him up to hold him under his arm as Yuzhen continued to kick and claw.
“Oh, man. Was I ever like this?” Lloyd cringed.
“I think everyone was,” Xiyin mused.
“I wasn’t,” called Kai proudly. He adjusted his position to hold Yuzhen more properly, like how Nya held Maiya.
“Nope. You, too,” said Xiyin. “You were just too young to remember.”
“I can’t imagine Uncle Wu ever being a little kid,” chuckled Lloyd. “I can see him being in ancient Ninjago primary school, still all stoic and wise and talking in proverbs.”
“I don’t think Master Wu was ever a little kid at all,” Nya frowned.
“Well, there was that time we had to raise him,” Kai said with a shudder, “in the Land of Oni and Dragon. Now that was weird.”
“You all better believe it. He was indeed a child once,” Xiyin said. “There was a time we all swore off having children. Garmadon, especially.”
Xiyin pointed up at Yuzhen and Kai turned so that his son faced his teacher.
“So, if even the great Master and Lord Garmadon couldn’t keep his promise, I predict you’ll end up getting along just fine with Maiya.”
“No,” Yuzhen pouted.
“Alright, are we done here? Do you wanna go home?” Kai asked. Yuzhen nodded. “Alright. Down you go. Help me pack up the picnic and then we’ll go home.”
Kai set Yuzhen back down on his own two little feet. He dutifully gathered the bags of candies and crisps and clipped them all closed, one by one, as Kai folded up their picnic blanket.
“So that means you were a little kid, too,” Lloyd teased his uncle. Nya set Maiya down and shook out her arms. She guided Maiya away from tormenting Yuzhen any further with her foot.
“Yep.”
“Can’t believe you were ever like this, either.”
“Because I wasn’t,” Xiyin replied coolly.