Sea of Sand:
"92,898 bottles of tea on the wall! 92,898 bottles of tea!~"
I sat behind Jay atop his walloper, holding to his shoulder with one hand while the other clasped my ear.
When I figured it wasn't going to help, I just flicked my mask back on. I could forget anything having to do with Morro; this was much more annoying.
At least on the Bounty, I could hide out the noise in the girls' quarters with Nya.
Kai seemed to have had his fill with the boys' singing as well, judging by the way he whipped his head back around.
""You take one down, pass it around! 92,897--"
"Enough!" he scolded. "I'm really thirsty! So we don't need to keep singing about tea!"
"Hoho!" Cole taunted, looking over at the ginger and me. "Someone should've had their breakfast!"
"Speaking of which, why did you skip yours, little girl?"
"How am I supposed to be hungry at seven in the morning? And who are you calling little?"
Kai groaned, interrupting the playful bickering between my brother and me.
"We've been following the sun for hours," he complained. "We should've arrived at Stiix already."
"But Stiix is on the eastern coast." Zane informed. "We should be riding away from the sun!"
All of the wallopers ceased moving.
"Whyyy are you just telling us now?!" Ninjago's lightning ninja questioned, in reprimand of the nindroid.
"Because, Kai wanted to lead."
"Great! We're officially lost! We had a leg up, but noooo! Kai wanted to lead!"
I felt like a child listening to their parents argue on a road trip.
"I swear! My gut says we should be following the sun."
"You're arguing with a nindroid! He's a walking computer! Why is it when Lloyd's gone, we look to Kai? We should really be following Zane."
"You know, he is the most logical choice."
"Ladies, you're all pretty," I exhaled, burying my head in the ginger's back. "Can we just go, now? The quicker we get to Stiix, the quicker we find the scroll."
I kept my arms around Jay's waist as the walloper began moving again.
"Well, I still think it's that way, and when I learn Airjitzu first, we'll see who's right!"
I could hear from behind as the brunet tried to fight his respective animal, only to give up with a grunt.
"Fine, we'll follow Zane."
Zane led the way to a set of railroad tracks, and we watched as his beast picked up speed.
"He's already found something!" Cole pointed out (as if it wasn't already obvious). "Let's go!"
We all followed suit.
"Train tracks!"
"They lead straight to Stiix."
"Hey, you hear that, Kai? They lead! To Stiix!"
"Follow the sun, huh?"
"We follow Zane, and look what happens!"
"But, Sensei said the path we seek is never a straight line." the fire ninja argued.
"He also said rely on each other to guide." Zane countered.
"Yeah, Kai! Pfft!" Jay teased.
"Alright, that's enough," I scolded. "Don't overdo it."
***
I'd somehow fallen asleep to the guys' nonharmonic singing; I was shaken awake by my brother.
"Time to get moving."
His words were soft as I rubbed my eyes.
"Can't rest when we still have that scroll to find."
I nodded, taking a moment to stretch before hopping off the walloper, and following the guys up a set of wooden stairs leading to a small train station.
"Uh...did you hear that?" Cole turned to ask us as we stopped atop the boarding platform.
"Yeah, I did," Jay answered. "But...we're in the middle of nowhere!"
A low cackling echoed throughout the station as we ran ahead; I was slow behind the boys, still trying to wake myself up.
Usually, I was on high-alert soon as my eyes opened, but for some reason I just couldn't help but feel...weary? Drowsy?
"I don't know, but be on guard." Kai instructed.
"...Is anyone feeling cold?" I finally spoke up. "They do say you get cold when there's ghosts around."
"Good thinking," Cole responded. "But, I'm not feeling anything, right now."
"Neither am I."
The sound grew louder, until there was a sudden crack in the air; almost out of thin air, a wraith appeared on some sort of...chain? Motorcycle? Chain cycle???
Zane threw a shuriken in its direction as it sped towards us, a large whip in one of its hands as it cackled once more.
It made a beeline for us, and we dodged out of the way as it drove right onto the platform, the vehicle's engine revving.
"Watch out!"
Yup; now I was wide awake.
"My shurikens!" Zane yelled. "They went right through him!"
"BE-CAUSE HE'S A GHOOOST!" Jay screamed.
"Morro must've summoned some friends!" Kai concluded as the vehicle turned around in the sand, charging for us once more. "We're sitting ducks out in the open! We need to take shelter! Watch out!"
Again, the wraith tried to hit us; it missed as we dodged a second time.
"Oh god, he's coming for another pass!" Jay warned.
It knocked over the tollbooth as it turned the chain-cycle back around to face us, before driving into the sand.
"There is no shelter!" Cole piped up.
"Watch out!" I warned as the wraith raised its whip, using the wooden stairs as a ramp to fly towards us.
Kai yanked me behind himself by the arm as the ghost swung its whip at the five of us. It hooked onto Cole's walloper, and the beast went from flesh-and-blood to straight hollow in a matter of seconds.
"He turned my walloper into a ghost!"
Cole glared at the wraith.
"No one turns my walloper into a ghost!"
Jay shooed the animals away before the ghost could get to anymore of them.
"Where'd he go? I can't see him!"
"Stay together!"
"If our weapons do nothing, how are we supposed to fight a ghost?!"
"Good question..."
The ghost suddenly appeared in front of Jay, charging at us again (AGAIN).
"There he is! Watch out!"
Another repeat of us flipping out of the way. The wraith's whip missed Kai's head by a millimeter, crashing instead into his sword.
He groaned, before looking at the blade.
"...Huh?!"
The chain wrapped around his ankle.
"...That's not good!"
And the man went airborne.
He somehow was able to slice the....ghost chain? Freeing himself after being temporarily dragged through the sand.
Serious as the situation was............that was kinda funny.
"I'm okay, everyone!...I'm okay!"
"He's gonna pick us off one-by-one, isn't he? There's nothing we can do!"
"He's underground!"
A scream followed Kai's report.
"Stand back!" Cole directed as the fire ninja went flying again, the vehicle bursting out of the ground and into the air. As the chain wrapped around his sword, the noirette hooked it to a leg of the nearby water tower, as if to stop the car from moving.
The force of the chain pulled the wraith to the ground, and the chain-cycle it drove returned to a normal state, falling to the platform as a regular motorcycle.
...
We slowly approached the ghost, only to yell in terror as it sat up.
The tension quickly died as a train flew by, going right through it.
Jay and Cole laughed, high-fiving.
"Now that's how you stop a ghost!"
Moment over; the damn thing showed up again, cackling at us.
"You think a train can stop a ghost?!" it spoke. "Your world will pay when Morro finds the tomb, and when he does, he will take possession of the--"
The wraith's chain tore the leg of the water tower, and it splashed over him; we watched as the thing began shaking quickly, only to burst from the inside out into a puddle of...goo.
Ew.
"Ah, wh.....What just...happened?" Cole asked as the guys put their swords away.
"He went...ka-blooey."
"Yeah but, he was just gonna tell us what was in the tomb! Couldn't it have waited another second?!"
"We may not know what's in the tomb, but we do know one thing: how to stop a ghost."
"Water?"
"Unusual," Zane spoke. "I guess it's true: the path we seek is never a straight line."
"Uh, speaking of straight lines, if that train's heading to Stiix, wouldn't it be faster if we..."
I groaned aloud.
"Why don't we ever pay attention?!"
"HEY!"
"WAIT FOR US!"
"SLOW DOWN!"
***
Stiix:
I swear, whenever I was around big bodies of water, my inner child would just come right out; it was never heights, never amusement parks. Just water.
I giggled like a schoolgirl as I looked over the docks, trying to see under the 90 feet of murk.
"Welcome to Stiix!" a fisherman greeted us from above. "Watch your step! Ooh, I caught one! It's a big fella!"
The man grunted and groaned as he pulled on his fishing rod. "Wha...WHOA!"
He was pulled in with a sploosh. We stuck our heads out over the dock (with the exception of Kai, for some reason), to see if the fisherman was okay.
"Dangnabbit..."
Suddenly, the four of us could hear...whimpering?
We turned to see the fire ninja sitting down, with a look on his face as if he'd seen something even worse than a ghost.
"I didn't know you were afraid of heights," Jay remarked. "Look Bree, you've got a buddy, now!"
"Can it, ginger."
"I'm fine with heights; it's water I hate."
"Didn't seem to have a problem before." Zane reminded as the boys walked along.
Kai crossed his arms; I followed behind alongside him.
"Before, I could make a fire dragon at will; since Morro's taken over and our power's gone, I haven't felt-- AAH!"
He fell through one of the wooden boards; Cole and I rushed to help pull him back onto his feet.
"Well, now that we know ghosts don't like water either, at least we should feel safe surrounded by it." Cole pointed out.
With that, we continued to walk the rest of the way to Stiix's village entrance.
As we did so, I glanced over every now and then. It was sort of funny, I'd never seen someone I was so close with be so afraid; the guy had no fear of the Overlord, and had even threatened to swim from the Dark Island to Ninjago to fight him.
He...threatened to...
"Wait a sec," I piped up. "Didn't you say at one point that you'd swim an entire island to fight the overlord?"
"Yeah, but that was when I at least had some sort of elemental control," he argued. "Here, we have no powers, no boats, no cars; just a shoddy dock and..."
He shuddered.
"...a will to live."
"Say...if we don't have powers, how are we supposed to learn Airjitzu?"
I couldn't help but throw him a teasing grin.
"Don't you dare try to find a loophole around not drowning."
I laughed aloud.
"It's not like you'd be alone if you fell," I pointed out. "Pretty sure we all know how to swim."
"...Right."
"Well...all except you."
"Bree."
I feigned innocence his way, only to be met with a playful shove.
"You'll be fine, Kai," I reassured, faking a punch to his shoulder. "We've got your back."
His lips formed a grim line; he nodded nonetheless.
"Yeah..." he trailed off. "...Yeah..."
"Besides," I continued. "I love the water; I could use an excuse to go swimming."
He smiled.
"I wouldn't trust Stiix's lakes -- who knows what's in those depths? Bleh."
"I must be a mermaid, for I have no fear of depths, and a great fear of shallow living."
"Okay, Socrates."
"Pfft."
***
The Main Village:
"Ugh, what a dump." Jay remarked, covering his nose with his hand. "You'd think the thief who stole the scroll of Airjitzu would have better taste."
"Ah, this is Ronin we're talking about? He'd steal the sea if it were worth anything; we just have to figure out which rock he's under, and get to the scroll before Morro does."
"Let's split up and start looking." Zane suggested.
I followed them inside a small pawn shop full of old knick-knacks; antiques, artifacts, the usual.
"So...tell me more about this Ronin." I requested of my fellow ninja as I looked through a shelf of dust-ridden items.
"Where do we start?" Jay asked. "The usual type of thief: cocky--"
"Overconfident!"
"Highly arrogant."
I hummed.
"What I'm hearing is I'll have fun with this guy."
My ginger brother chuckled.
"You'll learn to hate him real quick," he assured. "Don't worry."
"Duly noted."
"Wait a minute," Cole spoke, lifting something out from a pile. "This is my dad's Blade-Cup Trophy! What's it doing in a pawn shop?"
"Selling stolen goods?" Kai asked. "Ha, sounds like we might've stumbled on the right place."
We heard someone whistling, and quickly moved to hide.
Stepping inside the building was a man about Cole's height; his shaggy brown hair was short, hidden by the large red bamboo hat on his head. A noticeable feat that I was quick to study was the device covering his right eye; it was definitely not an eyepatch, rather a scanner of some sort.
A green chest-plate covered the sand-green clothing on his back; an orange armpiece covered the left side of his chest. I'd also noticed the shuriken buckle on the fabric of his red belt.
We jumped down behind him to block the shop's exit.
"Ronin!" Cole scolded the man, who turned to face us with a, "Huh?"
I took note of the vase he was carrying.
"Going so soon?" Jay asked, as the five of us approached.
"If this is about our last encounter," the thief began. "i-it was only business."
"You left us in the mouth of a--"
"So you're still upset." Ronin interrupted, shoving past us to put down the vase. "Let me make it up to you."
Quickly, he hit a button below his desk, and a net fell from the ceiling.
"AHA!"
...
The net didn't even reach us.
"Uh...that was mistake, I can explain that."
Cole scoffed.
"Nothing here is legit, including you!"
"Yeah, I bet your airship's not far, either!" Jay concluded, sticking his head beneath the net to come face-to-face with the thief. "What do you call it again? Rilo? Ruby?"
I crossed my arms, standing near Zane.
"Rex!" Ronin corrected, turning away from the guys. "And could you have a little sympathy? Sold her so I could buy this place."
He turned back to face Jay.
"As you can see, I'm trying to make an honest living."
"Honest enough to steal the Scroll of Airjitzu?" Kai pointed out.
"The Scroll of Air-whatzu?"
"Airjitzu! It can make a Spinjitzu Master fly!"
Cole lifted an abacus into the air.
"Yeah! So hand it over, or we can make you fly!"
He threw the abacus into the wall, and it broke on impact.
"Whoa, cool down, fellas!" the thief scolded. "Even if I had such a thing, it sounds pretty old and important. Definitely not something I'd keep on-site, and definitely too much for you to afford; maybe I can interest you in some weaponry?"
"Ronin, get your fingers out from behind your back." I finally piped up.
All eyes turned to face me.
"...Who's this?" Ronin continued. "Are you guys on babysitting duty?"
"She's one of us," Cole scolded.
"Yeah, back off!" Jay added.
"Sheesh, talk about your knickers being twisted!"
I rolled my eyes.
"It was a long trip, and I don't feel like playing mind games with beggars who pretend to be choosers," I continued, approaching the man and prodding him in the chest. "So, you can either hand over the scroll, or--"
"Or what?" he cut off with a smirk. "You'll Spinjitzu me into next year? Bet you can't even throw a good punch."
Ronin chuckled.
I smiled.
"Oh, so you admit you have it."
"..."
He was frozen. I looked back at the guys.
They were beaming.
"Way to play devil's advocate." Cole joked.
"Ha! Talk about reverse psychology!"
"Meh, this guy was child's play." I remarked, patting the thief's shoulder.
"It was a good try, though."