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Cole was humming, which made Lloyd very, very afraid. The guy wouldn’t sing for– oh, wait, he wasn’t allowed to say that word anymore. Uncle Wu said it was a sign of weak verbal skills. Ahem. Restart.
Cole never sang unless he was cooking. When he was cooking, all hell was about to break loose. (He was still allowed to say that, right?) Jay was going to start screaming, Kai was going to try to mediate and end up joining in the argument, and then something would catch fire, and–
“Hey, little guy, why you standin’ there?” Lloyd jumped. Cole was staring at him, head tilted a little to the side, headphones popped off one ear. His hair was sticking up kinda crazy too. “You wanna come help?”
“Uh…”
“Sick, get in here.” Cole pulled out a stool and threw Lloyd a spatula, leaving Lloyd no choice but to follow. “This is ridiculous.” Lloyd muttered, hopping up onto the stool–
“What is? Here, stir this for me. I’ve spent the past three days on this and I refuse to let Jay screw with it again.”
Lloyd grimaced, glancing at the pot. Maybe he could stir it for a few minutes. Maybe . “You, uh, you know that was me, right? Not Jay?”
“Oh, no, kid.” Cole pulled his headphones all the way off. “I know Master Wu got you to mess with it, but motor mouth was the one who put a bunch of garlic in. You probably didn’t even screw it up that much.”
Lloyd’s mouth tasted sour. Was that relief or something stupid? Ew. He waited for Cole to say something else so he could move along with his life and stop feeling whatever this was.
And waited.
And waited.
Finally he blurted, “Cole, what do you put in this thing anyway? It looks like diarrhea.” You know, just to fill the silence.
Cole snorted. “Rude, pipsqueak.” He didn’t sound all that offended though. “It’s just tomato sauce, beef, onions, garlic, couple’a spices, and my peeeersonal favorite part…”
He reached up into the cabinet above them, balancing easily on his tiptoes and groaning as he rustled around. He came down with three cans of something that sent a shiver down Lloyd’s spine. “Beans!”
Nope, nope, not happening. He’s messing with me. These are supposed to be the good guys!
Cole was still talking, Lloyd realized. “... you gotta use a variety to get that sweet, sweet texture. I like using…”
How was Cole standing there with three whole cans of that foul stuff in his hands? Wasn’t he scared it was gonna get all over him? What if he couldn’t wash it off? Lloyd didn’t wanna live with that stench for the next… however long he was gonna be there! Why did they even have beans here , in reach of all the good food, like cereal and Pop Tarts?
Oh, oh crap he was opening the lid on the first can–
Lloyd clambered away as soon as he heard the crack of the lid, blindly grabbing at whatever solid hold he could find and hoisting himself away before–
“Lloyd?” Cole glanced up at him, bemused and a little concerned. “Why are you on top of the fridge?”
Lloyd blinked. So he was.
Cole took a step forward, beans in hand, and Lloyd hissed, pressing himself farther back into the space between the fridge and the upper cupboards. “What is your problem ?!”
A shock of hedgehog hair appeared in the doorway. Lloyd groaned internally. There was no chance he was surviving this if Kai got a wind of–
“Are you scared of beans?” Cole laughed, half-disbelieving. He set the can down. “Wh– kid. Why?”
“They’re disgusting .” Lloyd hissed, searching for his next escape route. If he jumped just right, he could probably land on the island without breaking anything, and then he’d be able to slip past Kai and make it to the sweet comfort of his room before either of them had a chance to come after him. Hopefully. With his luck, Kai’d probably catch him immediately, and then it would be like Darkley’s all over again.
He was just starting to get a little too carried away in his brain-mare about being tortured via beans when the only feminine voice on board besides Jay’s piped up and he was saved.
“Would you guys stop bullying Lloyd and get down here? Wu wants all of you on deck for training.”
“But I’m making–”
“No buts. I’ll stir your soup. Get out there.”
Cole shrugged, seemingly at ease. Apparently he trusted Nya more than Jay. That made… a lot of sense, actually. “Come on, hothead.”
Lloyd didn’t hear the rest of the banter as his would-be tormentors ventured up to the training deck, but he was too busy breathing in the sweet smell of relief to care.
Ew. Nevermind. He could still smell the beans.
Nya walked right past him and hopped up on the stool. She was comically tall on top of it– probably taller than Zane, actually. Lloyd was gonna be that tall someday.
She picked up the beans.
“Nya, I trusted you …” Lloyd whined.
She dumped them into the chili.
“You’re a weird kid, Lloyd.” She mumbled, rubbing her eyes and stirring the chili. “They’re literally just beans. They don’t have enough taste for someone to dislike them.”
‘Dislike’ is a nice word for it, Lloyd huffed to himself. “They’re awful.”
“Really?”
“Demonic.” There was a great amount of conviction in his words, which Nya apparently found funny. It wasn’t his fault all of them had stupid taste buds.
It wasn’t until later on, at dinner time, that he got some measure of validation for his hatred of those… those things. They all had just sat down for dinner, and Cole made his usual absurd amount of pomp and fanfare while bringing out his singular massive bowl of demon stew. Then the others dug in. Lloyd busied himself pulling massive piles of rice onto his plate, muttering under his breath about how stupid all of them were. He did look up, however, when Jay covered a laugh behind an ill-placed cough. He was jabbing Cole. Lloyd followed their gaze.
Uncle Wu was sitting ramrod straight in his chair, plate empty, eyes fixed on Cole’s chili. Lloyd had to study him for a minute— oh, that was suppressed fear in his eyes.
Kai let out a dramatic sigh. “You people are weird.”
Lloyd shrugged to himself and took a bite of rice. At least I’m not the only one.
——————-
“Oh my gosh that’s why you hate beans?!”
Lloyd started a mental list: The Wrong First Reactions to Finding Out Your Little Brother is Quarter Ancient Demon.
Although I really should expect this from them by now.
“No, Cole, I’m actually deathly allergic to anything that grows on a bush.”
Cole blinked. “You really need to work on your sarcasm.”
“I grew up around Jay, cut me a break.”
“Fair.” Cole slouched back against his bean bag, throwing his journal to one side. “Actually, though, is that why you hate beans? ‘Cause you’re half Oni?”
“Is that a thing?” Lloyd screwed his face up.
“I thought Kai taught you better than this.” Cole groaned as he stood, flexing his calf and staring at it with a thoroughly disappointed expression for a moment before shrugging and heading for the door. Lloyd couldn’t help but snort as he followed him. They entered Master Wu’s study, and he pulled a book down from the top shelf. It wasn’t one of Wu’s, Lloyd realized. It was torn up, covered in soot and dust, the covers bound and re-bound with crudely-cut leather strips. Inside the front cover Lloyd discovered sloppy handwriting, jagged and harsh, smudged enough that it was probably charcoal. Property of the Smith family.
Kai’s handwriting.
“This was his dad’s,” Cole explained. “It’s got a bunch of old legends from the people who founded Jamanakai village. There's some stuff about Oni in here.”
They spent the rest of the afternoon reading that book, taking notes and copying down drawings. It was nice, Lloyd decided, to have a third opinion. The authors didn’t seem to mind Oni all that much. They were more like fascinated observers than anything else— sorta like those people on nature documentaries. They didn’t paint Oni as evil. Maybe destructive, definitely dangerous, but… normal.
By the end of it something inside Lloyd had settled.
“You did this on purpose, Cole. Had me read this.” Not a question.
Cole chucked his empty Gatorade bottle into the trash can in the corner of the room. “Of course not.”
“Lies.”
Lloyd just got a smile in return.
——-
One in the morning dawned on a sniffling lump of ninja all huddled up in the bunk room. Kai had woken up first, and lo and behold, there was Lloyd, sitting curled up on the couch with his head buried in his arms. The process of dragging him back to their shared room had woken up the others, and five minutes and a ridiculous amount of blankets later, here they were.
“You finally ready to admit you’re not fine, genius?” Kai mumbled, curling tighter around Lloyd.
“Shuddup.” Came the muffled reply.
“You’re allowed to cry,” Cole interjected, “You’ve been through way more than enough.”
“It’s j’s late.” Lloyd insisted, burrowing deeper into his mound of blankets and brothers. “ ‘m fine.”
Several moments passed.
“I hate him.”
“Your dad?”
“M-mmph.” Lloyd sat up, pulling Kai with him. There was a moment of rustling. “I hate Garmadon.”
“You mean you hate the creature Harumi brought back from the departed realm?” Zane clarified.
“Yeah.” Lloyd huffed, eyes shining. “I hate that— I hate that he looks like him, but he feels so different. He— ugh.”
“He’s evil.” Kai muttered.
“But he’s all I have left.” Lloyd whispered.
There was a heavy moment. No one could respond. He had them, of course, but it wasn’t the same. They weren’t his parents. Wu wasn’t, either. They knew they couldn’t ease their aching brother’s pain, and it hurt.
The fact that this kind of pain was familiar didn’t make it better, either.
“I don’t ever wanna see that thing again.” Lloyd decided. “I… it’s not him and it never will be, so— so there’s nothing I can do about it. He’s hurt—“ a moment. “He’s hurt all of us enough.”
“Good.” Kai mumbled. “ ‘f he ever shows his ugly face around here I’ll jus’ throw a can of beans at ‘im. That’ll send him running.”
A tense moment.
Jay snorted.
And then it was like a dam had broken loose. All this heavy, awful weight, absolutely demolished in light of the mental image of a pajama-clad Kai, hedgehog hair in all his glory, sending the Lord of Darkness running for the hills armed with a can of off-brand kidney beans.
“Wait,” Kai cackled, “I should’ve made the Bean Weapons instead of the Golden Weapons.”
“Bean-juice-infused force field would’a come in handy.” Cole deadpanned, fighting back the grin shining through his voice.
“This logic is… confusing.” Zane whispered, which to some reason made them laugh all the harder.
“Flip off, dad! Lloyd snorted. “I have the power of beans and friendship on my side!”
“Oh great First— “
“We should start a company. ‘Protect yourself from the dark evils with our new patent-pending bean spray!”
“The Bean Ninja.”
“Lightning, ice, fire, earth, and bean. ”
“Hey, ‘bean’ makes more sense than ‘energy’ or whatever.”
“ Pfft- how ?!”
“Oh, man.” Lloyd gasped. “It’s too late for this.”
“Indeed. We should attempt to rest for tomorrow.”
“Zane?”
“Yes, Jay?”
“Could we put bean guns on our mechs tomorrow?”
“…we’ll see.”
“Yes.”
“ Go. To. Sleep.” Kai groaned.
“As soon as Nya gets her foot out of my kidney.”
“Wait, when’d Nya get here?”
“You mean your bean?”
“Jay, that wasn’t even funny.”
“Oh my gosh Nya you are here!”
“I’ve been braiding your hair for the past twenty minutes, dork.”
“I thought you were Cole!”
“I’m over here!” Cole piped up from the other side of the room.
“ SLEEP.” Kai groaned.
Silence, for a long while.
“Let them come back and try to mess with us.” Zane spoke into the darkness. “All we need are Cole’s chili farts to save us.”
Someone wheezed. Cole gasped. Nya’s voice groaned: “Dude, I was falling asleep… ”
And Lloyd fell asleep feeling a million times safer.