Legends of Ninjago: Book 3: The Four Fangs: Chapter 36 — The Choices of Fate

Kai watched as Jay hugged his parents goodbye. Notes of jealousy were brushing up against him inside, and despite his best efforts, he couldn't help but feel his resentment for Jay growing just a little bit more. Sure, he had been hitting on his sister for a while now, and that was an egregious mistake on Jay's part, but at the root of it all... the true root... was this. Not that Kai was altogether very aware of it.

Seeing Jay with his folks, all safe and sound, seeing them sharing memories or telling jokes or hugging... all it did was serve to remind Kai of his own parents. If... if they were even still alive... would they survive today? Would they? Were they safe?

He felt one of his fists starting to shake with rage. His first year had amounted to nothing so far. All he could do now was save Ninjago in the hopes that he and his parents would live to meet another day.

And so, he, Jay, Zane, and Cole took off into the sky, using the bizarre new power the weapons had given them. Usually, Kai wasn't one to complain about free stuff, but this time just might have been an exception. Whenever they flew, it never truly felt like he was the one flying. With his Sword in hand, shining so bright, there were moments when he thought that he couldn't see past the glow. Moments when he blinked and suddenly remembered where he was and what he was doing, even during the fighting. Moments when he... didn't feel like he was the one in control anymore. He didn't like that feeling...

But, there was also nothing he could do about it. It wasn't like he was about to walk across Ninjago City.

Cole brought them to the street where Ann, Keaton, and Lloyd were moving some crashed cars out of the way of oncoming traffic. Kai happened to glance over at a storefront. Past the falling snow and through the window, sitting in a massive display, were several television sets depicting the Great Devourer. A helicopter must have been following her, judging by the aerial shot. She was getting close.

“Won’t we just slow you down?” Keaton asked.

“The outer limits of Ninjago City stretch for miles,” Jay explained. “We’ll need the extra hands.”

“Okay, I’ll go with Cole this time,” Keaton continued, hopping on his back.

Kai reluctantly offered Ann a lift. Zane took Lloyd.

Ninjago City was steadily turning white, from the slush in the streets left behind by previous snowfalls, to the air itself becoming heavy-laden with fog and curtains of weightless ice. More sirens blared in the distance. They were ever-so-slightly muffled by the snow, but that only seemed to make their call sound more lonely and off-putting.

The outskirts of the City weren’t much better. The high-rises had been left far behind, and in their place were suburbs and parks and some farm land here and there, but the snow on the ground was much higher here, the white more expansive, and the sound the sirens far more distant.

Cole instructed everyone to spread out, giving them the best possible chance to spot Anguis and mobilise quickly. Kai dropped off Ann in the middle of some random road, while he flew a little further west, landing by a fishing pond under a dead nut tree.

This was it. Nothing to do now but wait.

He paced along the bank of the pond, carving a groove in the snow that reached up to the middle of his shins. At least, that’s how high it was at first. The heat of the Sword must have been melting it slowly away.

Kai looked down at his hands and swallowed. After that first disastrous attempt to use the weapons, this had happened. This strange type of scarring. The longest streak just barely touched his elbow, and his fingers—still glowing—felt strangely tender, strained, and the slightest bit numb. But that might just be the cold setting in. Was this the result of using too much of the Sword’s power? If they had continued, would his whole body look like this? Would it have eventually destroyed him? Is this what happened to those who did not have the strength to wield the full power of the Golden Weapons, combined?

Of course it was. How could it be anything else? Only a mystical weapon could have caused something like this. The only question Kai truly wanted answered was: will it be permanent?

He found himself wishing he could ask Sensei Wu. He probably knew the answer.

That was right about the time when he stopped pacing and stared blankly out across the little pond, snowflakes falling into the water and vanishing.

…Wu… was gone.

In the hurry of battle and the rush of evacuation, it was easy to ignore, but in the stillness… in the silence… it came to him as forcefully and persistently as the cold air biting at his face.

Sure… Kai had his gripes with Wu. He didn’t always think that he knew what he was doing, some of the tasks, drills, or disciplines he gave them made him want to pull out his hair, but… it was also Wu who saved him from Garmadon’s forces all those months ago. It was Wu who gave him a chance to save Nya, Wu who gave him a place to stay and started training him as a ninja, Wu who had defeated Garmadon the first time and much more. Wu had gotten them this far… and even if Kai still wasn’t particularly close to him… others were. Like Ann and Keaton. So, in a weird way, they had all started to kind of feel like… like… like family.

Kai glared down at the icy edge of the pond. Wu? Family? Just because he found out that Ann and Keaton were his cousins, and Wu was like a father to them?

No… because it had almost started to feel as though, every time Wu called him and the rest of the guys “brothers,” Kai believed him. If he lost Cole… or Jay… or Zane… or Ann… or Keaton…

The idea of it started to make heavy knots curl up in his chest.

No more. No one else. Not today. He promised himself that he would do everything in his power to keep them safe.

That’s when he heard a roar in the distance.

*

It was Keaton who drew the short straw. However, it might have been for the best. She had been standing beside a snow-covered field and listening to the air and the wind, and it carried the first sounds of Anguis to her long before she saw her. There were two helicopters tailing Anguis as well, and there were news ladies inside of each, reporting on the situation.

“SHE’S HERE!!!” she shouted in two directions, trying to get the attention of all her teammates as quickly as she could.

When she turned back, she could already see a towering silhouette emerging from the fog, and within three seconds, it had materialised, followed by the noisy helicopters.

Keaton was forced to jump out of the way of the oncoming behemoth, pushing herself off from the ground with a great gust and landing in the snow. Once she had her senses gathered, she ran.

She was by far the fastest runner in the group, an account of her size and her wind. She caught up to Anguis in no time at all, and jumped onto her back. If her scales had been any smaller, there might not have been room for Keaton to squeeze her fingers around the hard plates that covered the snake, but as it stood they were old and overgrown and perfect for climbing. Keaton went all the way up until she reached Anguis’ head, and then she told the wind to change direction.

Suddenly, a gale picked up, blowing hard into Angui’s eyes. The snowflakes turned hard, like a thousand tiny daggers, blinding the great creature temporarily.

“Blind!” said Keaton to herself. “Now there’s an idea! But not a very pretty one…”

Right as she was thinking this, Cole appeared in the sky, slamming his Scythe into Anguis’ face, and nearly knocking Keaton to the ground. Soon, Jay arrived, and all the rest one by one, each trying desperately to knock the Great Devourer back, or stun her, or do anything at all to her.

They had entered suburbia. There were droves of screaming people in the streets, all running, all dropping their belongings, their televisions, their suitcases, their boxes, just trying to get out of the path of the oncoming monster. Police cars with radios echoed below,

“EVACUATE INTO THE CITY! EVACUATE TO THE SAFE ZONE!”

While the news ladies up above were saying,

“Could these masked vigilantes be the very same from the missing children’s report earlier in the year?”

Keaton found all the noise awfully distracting.

“Take out her soft spots!” she shouted at the others, right as Anguis was bulldozing over a house, reducing it to splinters.

“On it!” said Kai, immediately throwing a fireball into her left eye.

Keaton had to cover her ears from the sound she made in retaliation.

Jay used his lighting on the second eye in rapid succession.

Another ear-scraping scream.

In the heat of that scream, Cole saw the perfect opportunity to further hinder her. Anguis’ mouth was open, and her massive tongue was sticking straight into the sky. He flew by and with one swing, sliced the slimy pink thing in two. She wouldn’t be using it to smell anything anymore.

Anguis was thrashing about now, to the point that no one could really go near her. Keaton landed on the ground next to Ann and Lloyd, watching the horrific sight. Anguis had lost her fangs, her sight, and her smell, leaving her almost incapable of sensing anything. Almost. Unfortunately, a snake’s ears are inside rather than outside, and by sensing the vibrations of the world around her, she could still clumsily find her way. Keaton knew this. She was fond of animal facts.

Anguis rubbed her face in the snow, she threw her head into buildings, she snapped at the debris and swallowed it, she caused the ground to shake and the air to vibrate with more screams; she did not stop moving for even a second.

Beside Keaton, she could feel Ann tensing. It was always easy for her to spot. Ann was tense a lot.

“Zane! Your arms!” she cried, looking up. Keaton followed her line of sight to Zane and saw that the bright “wounds” from the Golden Weapons had gotten worse. Now they reached all the way up past the elbow.

The first thing Keaton did after that was try to catch a glimpse of the other boys to see if they were the same, but Lloyd was suddenly grabbing her by the hand and shouting, “MOVE!”

Anguis was coming through again.

Keaton reacted too late to use her powers for a boost.

She and Lloyd were going to get squashed under the side of her body!

But in the moment when Keaton closed her eyes, she could sense Ann’s body next to hers, as tense as it could possibly be.

She saw her when she opened her eyes, and more than that, Keaton saw her using her powers to create a water-shield above them. The shield was buckled so low that it forced all of them to crouch low on the pavement, and yet, somehow, Ann was still able to hold that shield in place as Anguis slithered over them, her massive body weighing countless tons at least.

Keaton watched her in stunned silence until the very last of Anguis had passed, her face flushed bright red from the strain, but willing to endure it. This was the sister she remembered most fondly. The brave one who always managed to push herself to her limits and protect those most dear to her. The one who was always there for her.

The moment the shield wasn’t needed anymore, Ann let it fall, and she collapsed on her side, exhausted.

“Ann—can you get up?” asked Keaton, glancing from Anguis to her sister and back again.

Ann, of course, was already stubbornly trying to force herself to her feet, but Keaton saw how badly her arms were shaking, and how ragged her breathing had become.

“I’ll catch up—you go,” she told them, while the sounds of the fighting grew steadily more distant with every inch of ground the Great Snake gained.

“Ann…” Keaton choked, springing into a hug. There was no time to explain the hug. No time to explain the water in her eyes. She just gripped her sister as hard as she could, grateful for every second.

When she pulled away, Lloyd was looking at them with a grave expression.

“At this rate, how are we supposed to keep that thing busy long enough for the city to escape, let alone the rest of the country?” he asked.

Even now, Keaton could see the other boys fighting her, and driving her left and right, but never stopping her.

“Use your creation power,” said Ann in an equally grave tone.

Lloyd scrunched up his face in frustration. “I can’t use it, okay?!”

“Did you break it?” Ann snipped sarcastically.

“It’s been broken for years! I can’t use it because this always happens!” He lifted his right hand and it lit up right away, a familiar golden glow encircling it, but all that materialised was a small red ball, and a cry of pain from Lloyd. He doubled over, clutching his arm, seething.

“It hurts?” asked Keaton, trying to figure out why. She had never seen or heard of anything like this before.

“All I’m good at is destruction,” he eventually replied, still bent over. “It’s how I’ve always been.”

Then the answer hit Keaton’s head like a gong. “Is it because you have two kerominie-thingies? Wu said…” She stumbled a bit at his name, but then brushed it off and carried on. “…Wu said you have two, and they’re polar opposites, so they don’t like each other, do they?”

Lloyd frowned, thinking it over. “I guess? Like it matters right now.” As he began to get up, so did Ann. Keaton followed last of all, watching the fighting down the road.

“We’re not going to be useful for much longer, are we?” she asked her sister. They were barely useful as it was, and Ann was at her limit.

“We’ll keep fighting for as long as we can,” said Ann, already sounding steadier. “Right now, it’s all we have.”

This was a different kind of tenseness for Ann. Keaton didn’t immediately recognise it, because there was something else that the intensity was masking. Something that desperately wanted to break through. Something that made Ann’s voice give the slightest hitch and turned her eyes glassy. Keaton didn’t have the stomach to think about it much right then.

‘The day isn’t over yet,’ she told herself. ‘Anything can happen.’

Anything can happen.

“If this is how you plan on fighting Anguis, then you’re in more danger than I thought.”

All three of them paused at the sound of that voice.

When had he arrived?

When had he snuck up on them without Keaton or Ann noticing?

What was he doing here in the first place?

They all turned around, sure that their ears were playing tricks on them, until their eyes confirmed it. Lord Garmadon was standing there, only a few feet away, four arms and everything, just… glowering.

Thunder thrummed somewhere in the snowstorm.

“D… You… what are you doing here?” asked Lloyd, his dark fist coming to life defensively.

“And here I thought you might actually be happy to see me for once,” said Garmadon with a roll of his eyes.

“What do you want?” Despite her exhaustion, Ann had a water spear at the ready, and Keaton braced herself for a fight. What would the Lord of Darkness try to do?

“My stupid brother is inside of that thing, isn’t he? I’m just making sure he doesn’t die an idiot’s death.”

“You think he could still be saved?” Ann asked in a breathless voice.

“That’s great and all, but you’re no more powerful than Uncle Wu,” said Lloyd bitterly. “What difference can you make?”

It was then that Keaton heard the footsteps over the sound of the wind and the helicopters. There were hundreds—no, thousands—of them. Heavy armour… vehicles… rattling bones?

Emerging from the white wall of fog was a line of Skulkin soldiers, the same ones they had all fought down in the Underworld a year ago. Keaton’s first instinct, naturally, was to prepare to fight, but none of them moved to attack. They just stood there, staring.

“What did you do?” asked Lloyd.

Garmadon was holding himself stiff, as if he was forcing himself to stand still. Forcing himself to look his son in the eye and say, “I had a choice to make. On this day… I… choose… to fight.” It almost looked like he was in pain as he said it, and yet… there was something about the odd sentence… the odd tone… Keaton felt sure that there was some context that she was missing, or that something very important had just gone over her head. One thing she knew for sure, Lloyd didn’t know what to do with this new information. He seemed almost as tense as Ann, if it were possible. His father… had come back to help fight… Had Lloyd ever seen his father do that?

“Aaaagh!” Garmadon suddenly yelled in frustration, stomping on ahead of the three of them. “Are you going to keep gawking all day, or shall we get on with it?! I assume you’re trying to keep that snake from the city?”

“Yes. While everyone else evacuates,” said Ann swiftly.

Garmadon turned one of his cold eyes on them. “Oh, goodie. SKULLTOR! Take the left wing and push her from her Eastern side. IVOR! You and your men push from the North! FEMUS! The guardsmen will cut off her retreat from the south! KRUNCHA! Sweep through the populated areas and keep the people moving! Carry them if you have to, just get them out!”

Several Skulkins nodded or said “yes sir!” and then the enormous army of skeletons started moving in four different directions, all converging on Anguis. Keaton still couldn’t believe her eyes or her ears. Garmadon had gone to the Underworld and wrestled the Skulkins under his command again in order to help them fight off the Great Devourer?

“Alright, what’s the catch?” asked Lloyd just then, staring at the back of his father’s head. “There’s something else you want from all of this, isn’t there?”

“I am perfectly content to fight that monster for the time being, Lloyd,” he replied, lighting up one of his hands with dark energy. “If you’re too tired, then by all means… don’t join me.”

*

Lloyd felt his teeth grinding on one another.

Don’t join?

Too tired?

This guy…

“I’m coming!” he snapped, racing up behind Garmadon and lighting his own fist. “But don’t even think about trying anything!”

Garmadon didn’t reply.

Ann and Keaton were following them now, albeit slowly. The look of pain on Ann’s face as she held back Anguis’ body with nothing but a water shield had actually frightened Lloyd just a little bit, and for a moment he had wondered if it were possible for her to die from over-exerting herself. Luckily, she seemed fine, just tired. He shuddered as he tried to imagine what would be required of him to pull off something like that, and he wasn’t sure if he wanted to keep thinking about it.

“So what exactly were you planning on doing?” Lloyd asked Garmadon as they started running toward Anguis and the other boys.

“Assess the situation… insert myself as needed,” he replied.

“Sounds about right,” Lloyd muttered under his breath.

Flaming firestorms flew across the air occasionally from Kai’s Sword. Shards of ice erupted. More and more earthquakes broke houses down the middle, tore up the roads, and left Anguis tumbling into sinkholes. Lighting coursed through the sky. The blizzard worsened. The wind grew stronger. Thunder rang out. The sky looked as though it were welcoming the apocalypse. Which… it very well might be.

The Skulkin armies were moving into position. The city was flooded with their soldiers, tanks, and so on, and when they were in position, they began herding Anguis away from civilians with artillery fire—large rounds of explosives launched at her in relentless waves. That combined with the ninja’s efforts in the sky proved enough to drive her screaming, wretched self away from town, and toward the ocean.

Soon, Ninjago’s military had arrived as well, completing the ensemble with air reinforcements. Lloyd watched it all unfold from the ground, constantly jumping out of the way of flying debris, Anguis’ massive tail, and weapons fire. The part of suburbia they were in seemed to have been… mostly… evacuated, so there was little to distract them from completing their mission, other than Ann, that is.

Lloyd was still following Garmadon, watching him and waiting to see when he would move in. They had climbed up to the roof of a house to get a better view, and that’s when Lloyd heard Ann huffing and puffing behind him. Keaton was helping her up to the roof, and she wasn’t looking super energised either.

“You two should sit back,” he told them, worried that they might seriously hurt themselves.

“And let you… run off?” Ann puffed.

“You can barely run—you can barely fight. You did your bit, now find somewhere to hide.”

That didn’t seem like the right thing to say.

“I’M FINE!” Ann shouted back at him, already forcing herself to stand up straight. (Though she was unable to keep herself from wobbling.) “As long as I can still move, I can still… where’s Garmadon?”

Lloyd turned around, but didn’t see him on the rooftop anymore. Dang it! He must have left while they were talking!

“That slimy little…” he was grumbling, right when Keaton said,

“There he is!”

He was running up along Anguis’ back, a katana drawn, and when he reached the head, she tried to shake him off. He hung on by the scales, and when he had a moment, he swung around until he was inside her mouth. He took his sword and jammed it up through the roof of her mouth, using some of his destructive power to make sure it pierced her. Unfortunately, it would seem that the sword was too short to reach any vital organs or other such sensitive points. Anguis just screamed again, and then resumed shaking her head and snapping at the ninja, the jets, and the ground troops. Garmadon jumped from her mouth right when she swallowed a tank whole.

Lloyd wasn’t going to be left out of the action, though.

He jumped from the rooftop and he ran for Anguis’ tail, planning to try and destroy just a part of her. He’d never been really good at partial destruction, and there was the risk of hurting Wu (possibly still alive somewhere in her stomach), but he was going to try it anyway. He refused to let his "father" show up out of nowhere and be some sort of "hero." Not after what he had done just hours ago.

Lloyd grabbed hold of the narrowest point in Anguis' tail, (though "narrow" is a relative term. In reality, his fingertips couldn't touch one another, wrapped around it), and he started to climb. Anguis likely hadn't noticed him at all, but with everything going on around her, she barely sat still. Least of all, her tail. Lloyd was instantly sent flying through the air, grazing the sides of buildings and trees, narrowly missing large chunks of shrapnel, all to come crashing back down to the ground every so often. Surprising even himself, he managed to stay on, but he found himself wishing that his powers were more elemental in nature, giving him some kind of advantage like Keaton or Ann had.

The first moment that presented itself--the first moment where Lloyd could think and the world slowed down ever so slightly--he lifted his left hand and prepared to strike.

His palm, oozing with energy, made contact with the cold of her scales, and he waited for something to happen. He felt a hole opening inside of him when nothing did. He even lifted his hand to be sure, but the scales were entirely unaffected by his power. So he tried again (barely, as the tail started flying upward again), and still, the scales refused to dissolve. He was forced to quickly conclude that they were mystical in their own right, and as a result were immune to these types of attacks. He probably should have guessed as much, since his own father didn't try it... but he wasn't about to admit it right then.

"Oh--jeez!" he suddenly cried when Anguis' tail shot up again, much more forcefully than before! Something had hit her, and she was thrashing again!

This time, he was caught off guard, and his fingers were tired. It barely took any force to knock his grip loose and send him hurtling into the sky, flailing his arms and legs about uselessly.

Someone on the ground yelled, "LLOYD!!!!" but he didn't have time to see who.

The wind and snow were raging all around him, his sense of direction was completely shot, and he had no way of slowing his fall. That didn't mean that he wasn't going to try, though. Already, his fist was primed to destroy the ground beneath him if need be, (not knowing how much it would really help), and he set his jaw, determined to prove--in front of everyone--that he could save himself. That he had this under control.

Right as he turned over in the air, however, and could see the ground fast approaching... his heart gave a sudden jump and he wasn't so sure about his plan anymore.

That's when something came whizzing by that nearly tore his arm off.

Heat. Terrible, smothering heat. It wouldn't have been so bad in the snowstorm if it weren't for the fact that Lloyd had already been working up a sweat, but that wasn't the only reason Lloyd was uncomfortable. When his eyes finally made sense of what they were seeing, he realised that Kai had saved him, and was currently holding on to him by the arm.

Lloyd growled to himself and yelled, "I could have saved myself!" while kicking at the air as they flew.

Kai looked back at him and...

Lloyd froze. Kai's eyes, peeking from his mask, were glowing. Glowing red.

"Next time, I'll let you fall to your death if you'd prefer," he quipped, snapping Lloyd out of his thoughts momentarily.

What was the Sword of Fire doing to him?

Then, something happened. Something so quiet and so small that everyone else missed, except for Kai and Lloyd. It was the Sword. It was pulsing. Kai was drawn to it at once, and Lloyd followed, alarmed by it for some reason. They stopped moving and hovered in the sky for a moment, just staring, and the longer Lloyd did so, the wider he felt his eyes becoming. Like they needed to take in more of the light of that Sword. And then he heard it speak...

"Korregodd..."

"LOOK OUT!!!"

Jay's voice was so shrill that it broke the trance immediately, though not in time to spare them. Anguis' head was swinging around like a massive baseball bat, about to collide with them! Jay zoomed in front of them to try and slow her down, but his lightning only served to disorient them all more upon impact. Kai, Lloyd, and Jay were sent crashing into the ground, bouncing a little like deflated basketballs, and rolling until they were too dizzy to stand up right away.

Almost immediately, Cole and Zane were knocked together by Anguis' tail, and they landed a few yards away, in a snowbank. Anguis finished this performance by eating three more Skulkin tanks, and screaming.

"She's breaking the line!"

"FIRE!!!"

"RETREAT!!!"

Sounds of glass shattering.

Buildings crumbling.

Lloyd held his head and grimaced. Everything was fuzzy and white and cold. The storm was so bad now that he could barely see his own hand in front of his face. It helped when there was lightning from the sky, flashing every few seconds now.

"There you are!" Kai called, and Lloyd felt a hand grabbing him by the shirt collar and pulling him up. "Jay?"

"I'm here," he said, coming over. Neither of them seemed too concerned about what just happened, and Lloyd couldn't tell if that was a good or bad sign.

"This storm is getting too wild!" yelled Kai, just trying to speak over it. "Zane!"

Within a few seconds, Zane and Cole were flying over, their eyes glowing just like Kai's and Jay's.

"You need to thin out this storm!" Kai continued.

"I can't!" said Zane. "Everything I try only makes it worse!"

After a dangerously loud bought of lightning cracked jut then, Cole yelled, "Jay!"

"I didn't do that! The storm's getting too powerful!"

"Lloyd!"

Oh great. Garmadon found them. Lloyd had to resist the urge to turn and run when he came over, followed closely by Ann and Keaton, who both looked like they were ready for this fight to be over.

"Don't you ever do something so stupid again!!!" Garmadon yelled, grabbing Lloyd by the shoulders and shaking him. Lloyd was ready to punch him. "Do you hear me?! You could have died!!!"

"We're all gonna die!!!" Lloyd fired back.

"We're driving her away--"

"Look around!!! If she doesn't eat everything we throw at her, then this storm is going to kill us!!!"

"Why don't you boys stop it?!" Ann asked, holding a hand over her eyes to block the snow.

"We can't!" they said in unison.

"Oh, for the love of--it's the Weapons!" Garmadon barked. "You have no idea how to control them do you?!"

"I can beat you up just fine with mine!" said Cole, raising his Scythe, only for an earthquake to come along and destabilise them.

"Give them to me! I'll calm the storm!" said Garmadon, marching forward and reaching out one of his pitch black hands.

"No way!" half of them yelled.

"We travelled up and down this island trying to keep the Weapons out of your grubby paws!" said Jay, clutching his nunchucks like they were a string of pearls.

"I am the only who knows how to control them! At this rate you'll kill us all before Anguis does! Let me use them! I can disperse the storm and destroy her at once!" Garmadon tried again, only this time for Ann and Keaton to step in between them as well.

"You think we're that incompetent?!" asked Ann.

"By the looks of things, yes!" he shot back. "Can't you see?! Those marks on their arms?! The Weapons are eating away at them! If this continues, not only will the storm reach a level of destruction of world-ending proportions, but they will be absorbed into the Weapons!"

"We can't trust you!" Kai said plainly. "You'll just run off with them the first chance you get!"

Lloyd wanted to chime in somewhere during all of this, but he was caught between both points. On one hand, yes, it was clear that the boys were causing damage as much as they were helping, and the weapons needed to be set aside or left in someone else's hands. But those hands could not be his father's. Not in a million years. Kai was right, Garmadon would try to steal them, the man could not be trusted.

He was ready to be done with the whole conversation. He was ready to throw the Weapons into the ocean and then get back to fighting Anguis, just be done with them. He wanted to...

"...teogg..."

The wind seemed quieter somehow.

"...Goread ug niivahiim..."

The argument was distant.

"Fugichurn dim und ga... one of noble birth..."

"The blood union of the ancients..."

Lloyd had his hands over his ears, sensing flashbacks to the voices he had heard during his travels with the Serpentine, only this time, the voices seemed far more real, and they were coming from...

The Golden Weapons.

They were pulsing again, and soon the ninja were able to tear themselves away from the argument to notice. Each and every one of them glanced down to their respective Weapon for a moment, and then they looked at Lloyd, eyes still glowing from under the shadow of their masks.

"What are you...?" Garmadon started, whipping his head around, only to stop in horror. "...looking at..."

All eyes were on Lloyd now, still covering his ears. He didn't like this, not one bit. He could tell that something big was happening, and he knew that he wasn't going to like the outcome.

"Do you hear it?" asked Cole. "The voice of the Scythe?"

"Voice?" Ann repeated quietly.

When Lloyd looked at the Scythe, the deepest voice became clear. It was speaking in an old language that he had heard his father and uncle speaking in from time to time.

"Heir to mine power... you have been found."

He didn't like what the Scythe had to say.

"And the Nunchucks, too?" asked Jay.

"I sense the blood of he whose light shines brightest in the dark."

"And the daggers?" asked Zane.

"The time that was foretold has come."

"Stop!" Lloyd cried, clutching his head tighter and backing away from them. "Leave me alone!"

"The prophesy..." Keaton gasped.

"THAT prophesy?!" Ann shrieked.

"It can't be..." Garmadon breathed.

Even as he spoke, the Golden Weapons were shining brighter, and their wielders were coming closer to Lloyd, as if commanded to.

"It's you..." said Kai, looking at Lloyd with a strange sombreness. "You're the Green Ninja."

"The what?" said Lloyd.

"I've had enough of this!" Garmadon was coming over, shoving the ninja aside. "We have much larger problems to deal with right now! And that boy is no foretold messiah!"

That familiar twist in Lloyd's heart came back in full force.

"Why do you always feel the need to decide what I am?!"

The group paused to look at him, then Garmadon glared and replied, "I will not have you running off and risking your life over some foolish prophesy! You've done enough of that already!"

"AND I'M SICK OF YOU TRYING TO CONTROL ME ONE SECOND, AND THEN ABANDONING ME THE NEXT!!!" Lloyd felt hot, and he knew his eyes were red. "YOU WERE NEVER THERE WHEN WE NEEDED YOU--ONLY THERE TO HURT BOTH OF US!!! NONE OF THIS WOULD HAVE HAPPENED IF YOU WERE EVEN A HALF DECENT HUMAN BEING!!! I'M SICK OF YOU!!!"

Silence.

Heavy breathing.

Clenched fists.

Lloyd had to tune out the whispers from the Weapons as he stared his father down. He still had no idea what was really going on, but if Garmadon was trying to keep him from it...

"I am never going to be your son," he finally finished, edging closer to the ninja, who instinctively drew closer to him. "You've lost the right to tell me what to do."

Garmadon made no reply for an uncomfortable amount of time. Any number of terrible thoughts were likely running through that twisted head, and Lloyd didn't even want to start guessing as to what they were.

Finally, after another distant scream from Anguis, now far off in the blizzard, Garmadon spoke.

"Give me the Weapons... so that I may destroy Anguis... and myself along with her."

"What?" Keaton said in quiet astonishment.

"The Weapons must be fully unleashed in order to kill a being as ancient as her, and thus I doubt anyone would be able to survive the event. Give them to me... let me end this..." Another pause following, in which one question could still be heard coming from all who were present. Why? Garmadon seemed to answer them. "I cannot be in a war where I must fight my own... where I must fight Lloyd..."

Was he telling the truth? Surely not.

Then again... Lloyd had only ever heard Garmadon use that tender tone of voice when he seemed the most clear-minded...

In the end, Lloyd couldn't decide what he truly felt. All he knew was that he didn't like the idea of giving him the Weapons under any circumstances.

All the ninja were glancing around at one another.

"The armies will run out of ammunitions sooner or later," said Ann.

"And we're... running out of us," said Jay, looking down at his own arms, now bright blue up to the shoulders.

Cole was the figure whom everyone gravitated toward for an answer.

"I don't like it," Ann said to him, "but at this point, it seems like our best chance for a clean victory."

Cole thought it over.

"I still don't trust him," said Lloyd, still glaring. "But if he wants to go..." For some reason, he felt his bitter temper softening as he turned away and finished, "...let him." For some reason, it hurt just a little bit to say. It hurt to think that he might be okay with his father... with Garmadon dying. He hated how much it hurt. It shouldn't hurt. He should be glad... shouldn't he?

Ultimately, Cole was left to make the decision, and that decision was, "Alright. I can't believe I'm saying this, but... Garmadon... the fate of Ninjago is in your hands."