heart2heart | Ninjago Bruise

Chapter 8

"Man, I hate having to do pointless missions like these," Cole huffed, resting his arm on the kitchen counter.

"Does this even count as a mission?" Jay questioned, sitting down on the stool beside his friend.

Just over a week had passed since the defeat of Chen and his army of anacondrai. It was long and painful, and most definitely one of their more stressful missions to date. In the following days of the fight at the corridor of elders, the team spent much time resting and getting used to being at the Destiny's Bounty again. It had been a very long time since the entire team had been together again, and especially with nobody arguing. It felt nice.

Wu, Lloyd and Misako spent most of their time together, reminiscing the days where Garmadon was still with the team. Since sacrificing himself to the departed realm to save Ninjago, the green ninja had been significantly quieter, even around his teammates. It's not like any of them could blame him. Garmadon hadn't been back long and he and his son were only just getting to really know each other. They were like two peas in a pod; inseparable. It sucked for the ninja to see their friend in such despair. For now, all Lloyd needed was time.

Kai and Zane were spending a lot of time together too. Zane had been attempting to show Kai how to fix simple things in the team's vehicles. The fire ninja had never been that great at mechanics, even though he'd spent most of his life around and working with metals (although he'd still never been good at it before). The team rarely saw those two unless it was at meal times.

Nya pottered around too. She often helped her brother and the nindroid, but mostly stuck to doing her own thing. Nobody really minded as she'd always seemed to do that. Kai would state that it was because she didn't truly feel like she belonged on the team - with her being the only one who couldn't do the same things as the boys could - yet they always tried to reassure her she was always welcome.

That just left Jay and Cole.

It'd been weird between them. Not the sort of awkwardness you'd expect, but rather the 'what are we supposed to do now?' kind. The lightning ninja spent time visiting his parents in the past week - they'd helped at the battle against Chen - so was helping them clean up the scrap yard in return. Cole hadn't seen him much as he preferred to stay in his bedroom sleeping or snacking while watching movies he often called cringe. Whenever Jay wasn't with his parents, he was often playing video games.

It's not like the two had been avoiding each other. They didn't really have a reason to, right? Although Jay had been questioning whether he had gotten the wrong idea on the island. Since they got home, Cole had seemed a lot more distant, and it was only starting to worry Jay. Their closeness during the tournament had seemed so sincere but it was barely there now.

Luckily, Wu had assigned everyone to small tasks around the city, mostly just unclosed cases that the police department hadn't picked up on yet. It kept the ninja on their toes, as well as still providing them enough time to rest. Besides, it's not like they were doing it alone, and it offered more alone time between the masters of lightning and earth so overall they were grateful.

Now, the pair were just questioning about when to start.

"I thought a 'rest period' was supposed to mean that we sit back and do nothing for weeks? Why is it that not even a week later we're being forced back into action?" Jay sighed, picking up the police case laid on the kitchen counter before them.

Cole shrugged, "typical Wu, I guess. At least it's a sort of laid back one compared to everyone else's."

The kitchen counter was cluttered and the room light wasn't even switched on. They sat in the warm glow of the candles Zane had likely lit earlier while cooking but forgot to put out. Neither of them were complaining, however, it was sort of relaxing.