Mamoritai 3 - A Llorumi story

4. The training starts

Notes: As a proud European (and a huge Eurovision fan) I HAVE to ask ya'll, which is your fave song? Mine is Cha Cha Cha from Finland :) But yeah, here's also the new chapter xD

Words: 1604

Me and Val talked for 5 hours, then Lloyd came to interrupt us with my dinner. Val also realized the time and left. Lloyd said that their "emergency meeting" was just Wu lecturing them about letting loose and "being out of shape". I decided to read my book from the beginning again, so I could really understand the whole plot of the book. Lloyd asked if he could sleep on the floor again and I approved it, but only for tonight. Then I fell asleep again. I woke up in the morning, no weird dreams. No dreams at all in fact. Today my physiotherapy started! I was excited to get out of this bed. A monk named Ishani was my therapist. She had taken care of me in my coma as well. We started out "easy". Just me walking and moving my hands. It felt so much more difficult than it should have been, but I tried to remind myself that I haven't used my muscles in six months. I tried lifting a small piece of bread and it felt like a big rock! I was exhausted in the evening. Tonight I commanded Lloyd to go sleep in his own bed. He agreed, hesitantly. In the morning, he was sitting beside me though, sleeping. He explained that he just came to check up on me and fell asleep there. He also said it wasn't going to happen again and that he was sorry. I don't know if that's sweet or creepy. I guess it's both. The rest of the week was just me training every single day. Every night I collapsed into my bed, completely defeated. But everyday I got stronger. I was also getting use to having a prosthetic arm. The ninja on the other hand, complained that Wu was pulling pranks on them. And like hardcore ones.

"Repeat that for 30 times, then have a minute long break and do another 30." Ishani instructed me. I nodded and started to squeeze the stress ball in my hand. We were in the monastery's living room. All the ninja were sitting around, annoyed from Wu's pranks. Ishani got up to get some tea. As she walked up to the shoji, Nya slammed it open, covered in green goo. Ishani flinched and sprinted out fast. "This has to end!" Nya yelled out. "We have to do something, Lloyd!" Nya continued, cleaning herself from the goo. "Okay, okay! Let me think!" Lloyd answered and stayed quiet for a while. "This is ridiculous! Let's just go talk to him. Like reasonable ninja!" Jay proposed. Everyone nodded in agreement and they exited the living room. I was focusing on my stress ball exercise when I heard someone clear their throat next to me. I lifted my head to see Lloyd. He looked nervous. I raised my brow. "I-i was wondering... My birthday is next week, so I was wondering... if you would like to..." He hesitated. "Would I like to?" I repeated. "Would you like to... go to dinner with me?" He said quietly. Is he? Is he asking me on a date? I was taken aback, but tried to answer quickly. "Oh, yes! I would... really much like to!" I responded. Really much like to. REALLY MUCH LIKE TO. My gosh, why was I so awkward? "Oh great! I thought we could go on Tuesday, if that's fine? And we don't have to go anywhere fancy if you don't want to. Or anywhere far if you don't want to! And if you change your decision, you can always cancel. It's fine by me. B-but of course I would love i-" He started to ramble. "Anything's fine! Or preferably we could go somewhere that doesn't have a lot of stairs. I'm probably still in a wheelchair on Tuesday. But it's your birthday, so you decide." I answered him with a smile. "Okay! I'll come by... your door on tuesday... to... pick you up!" He explained as he backed away. "Okay! Watch where you're going!" I said to him. "Of course I-" Lloyd started as he turned around and bumped into Ishani, spilling her tea all over her clothes. "Oh jeez! I'm so sorry Ishani! I didn-" Lloyd started to apologize. Ishani looked annoyed. "It's okay, chosen one. I'll go change." She interrupted, holding back her anger.

Tuesday rolled around and Val promised to help me with clothes and makeup. Lloyd and I decided that he would come pick me up around 6 pm. "Stay still!" Val ordered as she tried to put mascara on my lashes. "I am!" I protested. "Close your eyes, it's easier that way." She ordered again and I obeyed. I could feel the mascara brush against my lashes. "There! Open." She said. I opened my eyes. "Ohh, you look so pretty! It's perfect!" Val celebrated. "Can I see too?" I asked and Val handed me a mirror. Val gathered all of our shared makeup products off my bed and got up to my wardrobe. To my horror, or surprise, I had big and dramatic eyeliners and dark red lipstick. It was very different from what I did normally. Brown eyeliner and very natural makeup. "Is something wrong?" Val asked. "No... it's just way different from what I usually do." I explained. "I have alway argued you would totally slay some dramatic liners. And I was right." Val said as she went through my clothes. "I guess..." I said as I turned my head around to see the makeup from each angle. "You can stand right?" Val asked. I nodded. She turned back to my closet and went through my clothes. "Soo, do you have any ideas for your outfit?" Val asked. "Well the problem is, that I don't know where we're going so I don't know how fancy I need to dress. So I thought I'd just put on something dressy, but casual. Like that green shirt with some dress pants?" I wondered out loud. "Yeah, that could work. We can fancy it up with some jewelry and a cute hairstyle." Val said as she got the clothes out of the closet and laid them next to me. Then she offered me her hand and helped me put the pants on. The shirt I got on myself and Val searched my jewelry drawer. "Okay how about this?" Val asked and showed a silver necklace that had a small sun and a moon. "You gave that to me." I responded with an amused smile on my face. "Yeah, I know! That's why I think it's good!" She chuckled. She finished my look up with the necklace and some simple earrings. Then she just did a simple half-up-half-down hairstyle on my hair. It felt kind of weird that someone had to do these normal tasks for me. "You're done my love!" Val exclaimed happily. She took my wheelchair and helped me get onto it. It was borrowed from the hospital. "You're perfect!" She said as she looked me up and down. "If we ignore the fact that I have to sit in a wheelchair, yeah I look pretty good." I said as I looked at my outfit.

As Val and I were having a picture-moment, there was a knock on my shoji. "Can I come in?" Lloyd's voice asked. "Yeah you can!" I answered. He opened the shoji and my jaw dropped, figuratively. He was wearing his shoulder length blonde hair in a top knot, with a few strands framing his face. He had a green dress shirt and black khaki pants. After I scanned his outfit from top to bottom I realized to look him in the eyes. His jaw, on the other hand, was literally open. "Wow..." He said quietly. "You look... good!" I complimented him. "Y-you look... beautiful..." He said with real sincerity in his voice. You could tell it was a genuine compliment. I blushed a little. "Ookay, I am way too single for this. Why don't you love birds go now." Val broke our amazement-silence. "Oh yes! Right!" Lloyd answered, as if he broke out of a spell. He walked behind me and grabbed the wheelchair's handels. "May I?" He asked. Goddamnit he is such a gentleman. "Yes, you may. I'll see you tomorrow Val." I chuckled and smiled at Val. "See you. Have fun!" She yelled after us as we left my room.

As Lloyd pushed me through the monastery's corridors, I decided to ask. "So where are we going, birthday boy?" I asked inquisitively. "You'll see." He answered. Of course... I scoffed and Lloyd pushed me outside. I saw that the bounty was floating above the monastery. Lloyd pushed me under it. "What is-" I asked, but was interrupted by a wooden elevator that came out of the bottom of the ship. It lowered to right in front of us. Lloyd pushed me on it and got on himself. The elevator got up slowly and we came into Nya's workshop. Lloyd stepped off the elevator and pushed me off as well. "Is it okay if I carry you?" He asked. "I can walk small distan- WHAT ARE YOU DOING!" I was interrupted by Lloyd as he just grabbed me off the wheelchair and was holding me now bridal style. "Don't worry. It's not a long distance." He carried me through the ship and onto the main deck. And what I saw was absolutely... beautiful.