"Fox dung. Why aren't they coming out?" Irritably Eagle Talon paced the sidewalk.
"They've only been gone for fifteen minutes," Cole replied. He sat upon a bench placed by the entrance of the hospital. "Give them some time."
Talon scanned his surroundings. People were walking in and out to and fro the sidewalk, often casting him curious glances. Eagle Talon looked very much out of place wearing his ragged animal skins across his muscular frame. He stood out from the pedestrians in their colorful outfits with their bright, twittering devices. In bustling Ninjago City, he looked as out of place there as weed standing in a patch of orchids.
Cole found himself amused by Eagle Talon's evident anxiety. The werecat paced back and forth relentlessly, too restless to sit down. He kept fingering the jagged dagger he had strapped to his chest, and his eyes kept glancing at the enormous ambulance parked out front and the oblivious humans passing by. His entire body was tense and stiff, and he voiced a quiet, feline growl from his throat once in a while. If he were in one of his cat forms, both tails would most certainly had been twitching rapidly.
When a louder growl sounded from Talon's throat, Cole muttered, "Talon, why don't you just sit down? You're going to freak out someone if you keep pacing and growling like a wild animal."
"Bah," was Talon's only reply.
Cole sighed and glanced up the side of the tall, forbidding-looking building. His gaze wandered over the perfectly lined rows of dark windows and wondered which one had Jay in it. "I sure hope the doctors will be able to help him," he muttered.
Eagle Talon heard him and snorted with disdain. "Ha! Your 'doctors' are useless. There's nothing that can be done for Jay without his Lifesource."
Cole frowned at him. "His what-now?"
"His Lifesource." Talon arched his thick eyebrows at Cole. "What, you don't really think that the Seven Sorcerers have enough energy to keep up the spell by themselves, do you?"
"What are you talking about?"
Talon sighed, as if he had just been asked a stupid question by a little kid. "Look. When you use your powers of earth, do you feel a little tired after a while? Like, it drains your energy?"
Cole frowned as he thought about it. "Kind of... I mean, now that you mention it, but it's like I just did a bunch of pushups. It's not like I'm falling asleep or anything."
"Right, right. So tell me, Son of Earth, how long can you do pushups? Can you do it for an hour? Two hours? An entire day? How about a month?"
Cole opened his mouth, then closed it.
"Could you conjure a mound of earth and keep it hovering in air for weeks and weeks?" Talon shook his head, a slight smirk on his face. "No, I didn't think so. Well, neither can the sorcerers. They have powerful spells and clever tricks, but when it comes to things like the Dark Sleep, in which they slip into the minds of their victims and dig around for their worst memories, their darkest secrets, and their wildest dreams, it takes a lot of mind power and concentration. They could mess around with a human for a few minutes or even a couple of hours, but they're still mortal, and they can't hang around in your brain all day.
"So that's why they created the Lifesource. They figured out how to channel energy into crystal balls and maintain its activity, messing around with the victim under the sorcerer's instructions. It's like they connect a spell between their own minds, the Lifesource, and the victim's mind that can't be broken—unless the sorcerer deliberately breaks the enchantment or the Lifesource is destroyed."
Cole ran this through his head eagerly. "So, if the Lifesource maintains the Dark Sleep spell... then that means if we break it, Jay's free!"
"Either that, or it kills him," Eagle Talon retorted. "Shattering the crystal could very well end him. Of course," he added. "If you want to put him out of his misery, then by all means go ahead and finish him off. I'm sure he'll be glad to finally meet his treacherous ancestors in the Departed Realm."
Cole scowled and took a breath to retort, but a skinny brown tabby suddenly hopped up onto the bench. "And you're sure of that, are you, boy?" Matilda said.
Eagle Talon curled his lip, but didn't reply.
"Why aren't you in the hospital with everyone else?" Cole asked.
"I was going to ask the same of you, kid," the tabby retorted, sitting delicately beside him.
"I wanted to make sure didn't try to eat anyone out here." Cole smirked.
Talon made a face. "Ugh. As if."
"Have you two been talking about our next move, or have you been squabbling like children this whole time?" Matilda inquired.
"What do you mean?" Cole asked.
"Merlin's beard—! How you're going to retrieve a certain disobedient werecat child, that's what!" Matilda's whiskers twitched in annoyance. "Or were you going to let the girl try to defend herself from Dog Bone and his lot? If I recall, you made a deal with Talon that you would help rescue Little Leaf."
"Of course I will!" Cole replied. "I just haven't— we only just got back, you know. We haven't exactly had a lot of time to plan."
"Well, we've got time now." Talon finally stopped pacing and sat down on the bench beside Cole. "So?"
Cole glared at him. "What are you looking at me for? Do you expect me to suddenly pull a stupid-elaborate plan out of the hat in a second? We've got to think about this, man!"
"I've already done some thinking on my part." Matilda's tail twitched back and forth. "Tell me about that friend of yours who was just kidnapped. Ronin, wasn't he?"
Cole nodded. "What about him?"
"Fellow didn't strike me as the most honest of men. Bit of a shady character you have as a friend, eh?"
Cole sighed. "We didn't exactly hit it off when we first met. He was a huge thief, and he even stole our— well, that's a different story. Point is, he helped us in the end when Morro and his ghosts were attacking Stiix, and we've been sort of mutual allies since then. Now he's trying to make an honest living with his new shop."
"A thief, eh?" Matilda's eyes twinkled with interest. "Was he the type to ever get involved with the likes of Dog Bone?"
Cole blinked. He looked at Matilda, then at Eagle Talon.
Talon raised his eyebrows in a silent question. Cole looked at Matilda again.
She tilted her head up at him. "Well?"
A smile slowly crept up Cole's face. "Matilda... I think you might be onto something."
* * *
"What's that for?" Nya stared at the spindly needle sticking out from the little plastic tube.
Dr. Wesley scrutinized the syringe and replied absentmindedly. "We call this baby orthinilastic whatchamacallit cha-chalookielistenenic hetalmeticalistisim—or, for short, 'OWCH.14'."
Nya eyed the needle warily as the doctor walked over to Jay, who lay quivering on a hospital cot at one end of the room. "Why do you call it that?"
"Because we couldn't think of a more creative title." A nurse with shaggy black hair wearing too much makeup laughed. She batted her eyelashes and grinned, displaying white but crooked teeth. "Actually, it's because it took fourteen tries before we finally managed to get it right. I came up with the formula myself, you know, and I—"
"Yes, very good, Rolanda." Dr. Wesley cleared his throat impatiently. "Now go get the hydrogen peroxide, if you will."
Rolanda huffed and flounced out of the room, the high heels of her shoes clicking against the floor.
Dr. Wesley took Jay's arm and pulled up the sleeve. Jay shuddered at the touch.
Nya's eyebrows furrowed. "What's this... 'OWCH' stuff supposed to do?"
"It's like benzodiazepines, which is used to reduce what may cause hyperventilation syndrome. If this young man keeps hyperventilating like this, the gas in his brain is going to reduce, and that's bad. Hopefully this will make him calm down a bit."
"'Hopefully'?" Nya repeated, arching one eyebrow. "How do you know you won't give him too much and make his lungs stiffen up or something?"
Dr. Wesley frowned impatiently. "Look, when you want to quit your job as a ninja and become a nurse, come talk to me, but in the meantime just let me do my job, all right?"
He looked up when Rolanda flounced in again, carrying a brown bottle. "Ah, good. Here." He took the plastic container and proceeded to pour a few drops on a cotton pad. He swiped it over Jay's bare upper arm, cleaning the skin. Then he picked up the needle, took careful aim, then plunged the tip into the flesh.
Nya jumped when Jay cried out and thrashed his arms in the air, smacking Dr. Wesley in the face. The doctor grunted and readjusted his glasses while Rolanda looked at Jay warily, taking a step back. Jay seemed to be swiping his hands at nothing in particular, as if fending off an invisible enemy. His jaw clenched and face tightened under some sort of strain, then he groaned softly.
Nya's hands rolled into fists, but Wesley held out a hand and said, "Wait."
Everyone in the room watched in anticipation as Jay's struggle slowly lessened, his flailing becoming half-hearted. His cries were silenced, and a few long minutes passed by, during which twitching and abrupt shudders coursed through his body. Finally he fell still in the bed, and his breathing slowed.
Dr. Wesley sighed in satisfaction. "There, you see? It worked."
"Is that all you can do?" Nya asked, her gaze never leaving Jay's pale face.
Wesley ran a hand through his graying hair. "Yes," he replied with a note of annoyance. "We have no idea what's causing him to stay unconscious or for his brain activity to be this unusually, well, active, so the best we can do is try to keep him calm and his blood pressure normal."
Nya was quiet for a moment, chewing her lip thoughtfully. Then, on a sudden whim, she turned to the doctor and asked, "Could you give us a bottle of that OWCH.14 stuff?"
Wesley blinked, looking startled. "Why?"
"For our friends. Jay isn't the only one who's stuck like this," Nya explained. "We're going to rescue them, and I think when we find them, OWCH.14 might come in handy. If we could inject that into our friends when we find them, it could help them calm down."
"Oh. I, uh—" Dr. Wesley stammered. "I'm not sure we can allow you to take a sample of—"
"Dr. Wesley, if we find our friends but can't get them medical treatment in time, they could hurt themselves—or worse. We have a better chance of saving them if we have the formula with us and can inject the medicine before it's too late." She stared pleadingly at him, making certain to keep her voice steady. "Please."
Rolanda, standing idly at the other side of the room, spoke up. "I think that's fine, wouldn't you say so, Dr. Wesley?"
Wesley glared at the nurse with annoyance. Rolanda, unperturbed, pressed, "We wouldn't want to be responsible for one of the victims suffering hyperventilation syndrome just because we wouldn't give the formula to the people who could treat them, would we?" She smiled innocently.
Wesley scowled and stayed silent for a moment. Then he said with some acquiesce, "All right. Fine." He sighed. "Let me show you how to inject the medicine properly."
* * *
"No, he's fine now. Well, I mean, not fine-fine, but he should be better now that the doctors are taking care of him." Lloyd paused, holding his phone to his ear. "Yeah, I'm sure you and Mr. Walker could drive over to see him... Yes, yes, we're OK, Mrs. Walker. It's just part of the job."
He listened a bit more, then replied, "Ah... no, I can't say that anything like this has ever happened before. No, it's nothing for you to be worried about—yes, I'm sure." Another brief silence followed, then he said, "Thanks... You too, Mrs. Walker. All right. Bye."
Lloyd tapped the 'End Call' button on his phone and slipped it into the pocket of his gi. "Jay's parents are coming over to see him. His mom sounded really worried."
Liana shifted in her seat in the waiting room, sitting beside Wu and Zane. A few other people were in the room, along with a couple of small children watching the TV playing some Starfarers movie. "Do they want us to meet them here?"
Lloyd shook his head. "No. I mean, I guess they'll want more of an explanation as to why their son's in a coma that's making him scream in his sleep, but honestly, I'm too tired to go over it. I'm ready to get back to the Bounty and rest from that trip."
"What did you tell Mrs. Walker?" Wu shifted his gaze from the magazine he was idly reading.
"I told her that Jay was in the Ninjago City Hospital right now because he had been hurt during one of our missions and that he was stuck in a coma that was messing with his head. I didn't bother trying to explain the Dark Sleep and the Moon Tribe to her."
Wu nodded, then his gaze shifted from his nephew to the corridor. "There's Nya."
Wu, Zane, and Liana stood up alongside Lloyd when Nya walked in, carrying a plastic vial and a syringe in one hand. Zane saw the objects and inquired, "What are the vial and the syringe for, Nya?"
In response Nya held up the vial to the others so that they could see. "This is OWCH.14. This is what they used for Jay to make him calm down, and I think it kind of worked. I asked Dr. Wesley for a sample so we could give it to whoever we find next—Kai, Skylor, Misako, Ronin, the cops, or even extra prisoners the werecats might have abducted."
"Smart," Liana said.
"Hold on," Lloyd interjected. "I thought we were going to rescue Little Leaf first... Weren't we?"
Nya nodded. "Oh, we are, but you never know when we'll run into those cats again. After Little Leaf's saved and Eagle Talon's gone, we'll work on getting back our friends."
"Wouldn't it be better if we tried to get the other moonstones first?" Liana asked.
Everyone looked at her. "What?" Lloyd asked.
"The moonstones. The ones the Moon Tribe are so desperate to find. Remember?" Liana frowned. "If their leader—Black Blood—is willing to kidnap and torture us to get those stones, they have to be valuable, and he has to have some kind of dark purpose for them. Nothing's happened yet, so he must be—"
"Black Blood's a girl, actually," Lloyd interrupted. "She's Little Leaf's half-sister."
"Really?" Nya stared at Lloyd in surprise. "Wow. Then... that means Eagle Talon is her brother, right?"
"I guess so."
"Whoa, then she must be only, like, nineteen or something if she's around Talon's age—"
"What I believe Liana was trying to say," Zane interjected before the conversation could run on a tangent. "Is that Black Blood may still be looking for the broken moonstone pieces, which means we have a chance at stopping her."
There was moment of silence as the group allowed this to sink in. Then Lloyd said, "Maybe if we can stop Black Blood, we can save our friends."
Another brief silence followed before Nya said, "We can't let Talon know. He'll betray us once he has Little Leaf back."
"Not to mention the moonstone you promised him," Zane added.
Nya groaned. "Ugh, I still need to figure out what to do about that! I don't want to know what he'll do if he finds out I lied."
"Maybe it couldn't hurt to give him one of the moonstones we find," Liana suggested.
"How many moonstone pieces are there?" Wu inquired.
"Perhaps we could ask Eagle Talon how many pieces were lost when the Elemental Masters destroyed the moonstone. He might know, seeing that he is Black Blood's brother," Zane said.
"Won't he get suspicious?" Lloyd asked.
"We may have to risk that. I don't see how else we'll find out," Nya responded grimly.
"Let us step outside," Wu said, turning toward the exit door. "We can discuss all this with Cole and Matilda later on the Bounty, and in any case, they and Eagle Talon are probably waiting for us to come out."
* * *
"Finally!" Eagle Talon exclaimed irritably as Wu, Nya, Zane, Lloyd, and Liana filed out of the glass doors. "You sure took your time in there. My butt's asleep!" He stood and stretched.
"We had to call Jay's parents to tell him what happened," Lloyd explained as he and the others joined Cole, Talon, and Matilda. "We're ready to head back to the Bounty now."
"Actually, I think we should stop by Ronin's shop first," Cole said, standing up.
"Why?" Liana questioned.
"Matilda figured that he might have worked with Dog Bone sometime before he decided to go straight," He explained. "If we could find something—like an receipt for stuff they smuggled or an address—we might be able to figure out where his new hideout is—"
"Hence find Little Leaf," Matilda finished with a flick of her tail.
The group shared glances. "Couldn't hurt to try," Nya said. "But Ronin doesn't really seem like the type to be involved with mountain robbers."
"Dog Bone isn't just a robber," Cole said, arching his eyebrows at Nya. "He's a crime lord. Last we saw him, he had this big underground organization that was involved with smuggling, robbery—and maybe slave trading. He had this huge palace hidden in some mountains and had hundreds of people working for him. It was like they had their own secret community. I think anyone like Ronin could have gotten involved with him at one time or another."
"How do you know all this?" Nya quirked an eyebrow. "Does it have something to do with how Dog Bone knows you?"
Cole and Matilda shared a glance, and Liana quirked her lips in a small grimace.
"I can tell you later," Cole said. "It's kind of a long story."
Nya gave a small frown. She wasn't sure she liked the idea of Cole having secrets he wasn't sharing with his friends. Matilda and Liana obviously knew what he was talking about, and she supposed what happened really didn't really relate too much to what was going on now, but she still didn't like these references. It made her feel like Cole was cutting himself off from the team, and in Nya's opinion, he was making a bad habit out of it.
"Well, what are we waiting for?" Eagle Talon interrupted with an impatient snort. "The sooner we find Dog Bone, the sooner we can rescue my little sister."
* * *
"Right this way, Mr. and Mrs. Walker." A young, ginger-haired nurse led the anxious couple down the hall. "Your son's in here."
She pushed the door open and showed them into a small hospital room. Ed and Edna stopped and stiffened when they saw Jay's wane, listless body lying in the cot. His blue gi had been switched with an ugly patient's robe and a plastic band wrapped around his wrist.
"Good gosh!" Ed muttered, eyes widening.
"Oh, dear!" Edna fussed, wringing the strap of her purse with her hands. She swept to her son's side. "Oh, poor dear! Our little boy!" she murmured, gently swiping a strand of auburn hair out of Jay's pasty face.
"Say, ah," Ed cleared his throat, running an oil-stained hand through his wispy gray hair as he turned to the nurse. "Now, how did this happen?"
The young lady shrugged ruefully. "I'm sorry, I have no idea, Mr. Walker. All Dr. Wesley said was that your son was in a coma and was suffering from something like sleep paralysis."
"Sleep what-now?" Ed frowned.
"Sleep paralysis. It's when the patient suffers from nightmarish hallucinations that seem very life-like, and even if they're aware they're only dreaming, they can't wake up." The red-haired lass cast an anxious glance towards Jay's cot. "But I've never heard of anyone in conditions like this." She said, "We've given him some medicine that's making him calm down a bit, and we think it's helping."
Jay stirred and slurred something along the lines of, "mmmnnngthbtDarethPuffs."
"Though it is making him ramble," she nurse added.
"Didn't his friends tell ya what happened? Was it in a battle against some crooks or a training accident—or—or something like that?" Ed kept glancing at the bed where his wife stood over.
"No. We only had enough time to get him to the emergency room and do what we could for him, and by the time he was finally settled in here, they had left. His fiancé insisted on being here with him, but she left before anyone could ask how it happened."
Ed blinked. Edna looked up from Jay and stared at the nurse.
For a moment nobody spoke.
Until Jay mumbled, "I will make it rain meatballs on your face."
Ed cleared his throat. "Miss, did you, ah— did you say... his... fiancé?"
Miss Drew arched her eyebrows. "Yes. She was adamant about coming in here with him and persuaded Dr. Wesley to let her in when she announced their engagement. The Water Ninja, right?"
The Walker couple exchanged astonished looks with each other. Edna stood up and clasped her hands together. A broad smile spread across her face, and a bit of emotion made her eyes glisten. "Well, I'll be..."
"Oh, boy. Oh, gosh. Oh, gee," Ed croaked, eyes gleaming.
"My milkshake is still better," Jay rambled in his sleep.
"Oh, you, ah—" The nurse searched their smiling faces. "You didn't know? Whoops!" She giggled sheepishly. "Oh, I'm so sorry! I hope the happy couple won't mind too much they couldn't surprise you themselves!"