Ninjago - Heart of Stone

Chapter Eleven: Even a Monster

"Where exactly are we going?"

Overlord might have been looking back at Garmadon, but he didn't know for sure. His eye seemed to be fixed ahead, but then again, he might have seen more than just what he was looking at. "You will see," he replied, in his familiar rasping tone. Garmadon bristled slightly at the noise. He doubted he was ever going to get used to it.

"I don't want to sound... impatient," Garmadon said carefully, "but... master... I would like to know--"

"You will see," Overlord snarled, whirling suddenly (in was like watching a purple cyclone turn), "when we arrive. Be silent, Garmadon. Do not test my patience, and give me no reason to despise you so early on."

Garmadon recoiled, his heart thundering. Overlord was turning red, his colours blending and fading accordingly, and that horrible, pulsing eye was bulging, almost escaping his form. It seemed to be looking at him, long and hard, as if searching for something it could not see. He's looking into my mind, Garmadon realized with horror, he's reading my thoughts...

"Very clever," Overlord said, causing Garmadon to look up abruptly. If the eye was a face, it might have been smiling. Gone was the anger from Overlord's tone, replaced with something akin to pride. "You do have the ability to see beyond the superficial. You are exactly what I need, it seems."

Overlord turned again, continuing to lead Garmadon through the thick jungle. Garmadon hesitated for only a moment, trying to decide if he'd liked what just happened. Overlord had become angry, tried to see into his mind... but then he'd stopped. He'd stopped when Garmadon realized what was happening.

Did this mean that Overlord could not peer into his head without his consent? Did he simply choose not to, wanting to test his servant's aptitude? Or had he simply seen what he wanted to see, what he needed to see, and he was playing some cruel, twisted game...

Garmadon shook his head. Overlord was his master, not his tyrant. He was still free; he still had control, still had power. If Overlord had looked into his thoughts, it was because that was a necessary part of his plot to overtake the world, and if that was the case, Garmadon was all for it.

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Nighttime made the water look even more threatening, the great, imposing ocean, a sea of dark foreboding. The knowledge that somewhere beneath the black waves, buried under miles of ocean, lay a great, sleeping beast, did nothing to help with the atmosphere.

Julian had insisted that, if the ninja wanted to battle Leviathan, they would have to wait until morning. "I don't think it likes the light," he explained, "it sleeps most of the time, but whenever it does wake up, it's always at night."

Waiting until morning gave the ninja plenty of time to sleep, which no one but Zane was opposed to. As the others slept soundly on mats laid out across the floor, Zane was kept awake by memories, plagued by the fear that they would fail, and his father would not be saved.

"Zane?" He'd heard the footsteps, the sound of his father coming up behind him. The soft, gentle voice was not sudden. Zane didn't flinch when he felt the soft, wrinkled hand touch his shoulder, squeezing gently.

Zane frowned. Wrinkles? With a sudden sick, sinking feeling, Zane realized that his father was an old man. He'd been old for so long, wrinkled and frail and fading fast, like the remains of twilight...

"Let's go upstairs," Zane said in a hushed tone. Julian nodded, and father and son plodded up the stairs, trying to make as little noise as possible on the ancient, creaking stairs. They sat themselves down on a small, though comfortable couch, which Zane assumed Julian had made himself. Everything in the lighthouse seemed to be made by Julian, Zane mused as he looked at the odds and ends that decorated the place. Julian, seeming to notice his son's curiousity, smiled fondly.