Finding Fate

I knocked on the door hesitantly.

"Come in," a raspy voice called out and I carefully opened the door while balancing the food tray on my other hand. Lightly kicking the door closed, I stepped into the bedroom.

"Hey, how are you feeling?" I asked into the dark room, carefully navigating around Lloyd's bed. I heard movement and a soft click before light flooded throughout the room.

"Exhausted."

I placed the tray on his bedside table and turned to look at him. He was certainly looking better; his eyes had almost returned to their original green and his face held a little more colour. But the bags under his eyes and defined cheekbones said it all.

"Yeah..." I turned away and took a breath. "Get some rest." I took a step, but he grabbed my wrist,

"Wait, don't leave me. Don't leave me alone, please." I could hear the desperation in his voice.

"Lloyd, I..." I turned around and made eye contact with him, his eyes almost boring into my soul. "Alright."

He patted the spot next to him and I moved around the bed so I wouldn't accidentally crush him when I got onto it. I leaned back on the headboard and brought my knees up to my chest.

"I heard your argument with Kai."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

It had been two days since we rescued Lloyd and lost the realm crystal to Morro. The five of us have been trying to locate the whereabouts of Morro while Wu 'sorted out' his tea business. Yesterday, I had gotten into an argument with Kai about how he jumped into the water at the tomb without even considering that I could save Lloyd myself. We eventually made up, but I didn't realise anyone else had heard it.

"You don't have to protect me, you know? I'm the leader of the team, I should be protecting you guys."

"There's a reason we're a team, Lloyd. We protect each other. That's how it works." He opened his mouth and closed it before settling on,

"I guess."

Silence fell between us, and I twiddled with my fingers. All I could think about was what I saw in the maze.

"Tomorrow's New Year's."

"Already?"

"Yeah. It's my first one."

Lloyd sat up suddenly, a bit too quickly for him, causing him to groan, a hand rubbing his temple.

"I shouldn't have done that," he mumbled and turned to me. "You've never had a New Years? Not even with Skylor?"

"Didn't know it existed. There are a lot of holidays and festivals I don't know about. Maybe except for the EoS day. But that's because it was the day Chen got banished."

"Oh."

EoS is the acronym for End of the Serpentine Wars, minus a couple of letters because EotSW doesn't exactly sound very nice.

"Not even Ninjago's birthday?"

"Nope." Lloyd leant back on his pillows,

"I mean, I hated your dad before but now I hate him even more. To not give your children some kind of education?"

"Well, I did get some kind of education. I know some History. Like how the Overlord conquered half of Ninjago-"

"Half?"