#Just a Little Something - Ninjago | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

wyrmswears · 1 month

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"Generator"; 1569 words.

The Administrator has something to show Agent Walker.

...

Sure, he knew it wasn’t the first time he had been called to a one-on-one meeting with The Administrator, but it may as well have been. It wasn’t like he remembered any of their previous interactions; he was going in blind all the same.

When his fax machine first spat out the offending paper, he believed it had been sent to the wrong agent. But there was his name at the top, ‘Agent Walker’. There was the possibility that someone else shared his surname, but as far as he was aware he was the only agent without a first name.

The listed meeting room wasn’t her office, nor was it one of the Administration’s more conventional meeting rooms, complete with tables 30 people long but only one person wide and more fake potted plants than you could ever imagine. No, today he had been called down to the lowest floor of the Administration: the server room. The part of his brain that understood technology bristled at that; it would be much more effective to place the server room on a higher floor. Nonetheless, he wouldn’t say anything about that to The Administrator when he faced her - he would stick to his department, as all good employees did. The networks and communications department could handle that one.

The elevator down required two separate keycards: one was his standard agent ID, and the other digitally recognised him as a department manager. The former granted him permission to move between floors, yes, but only the latter allowed him access to the basement.

The ride down took 2 minutes and 43 seconds. He counted. No one else entered the elevator the entire journey.

When the elevator reached the basement and the doors slid open, The Administrator was standing on the other side of them. He hoped he would forget this meeting like the others, if just so he could become ignorant to the way he jumped at her sudden appearance.

“Agent Walker.”

He swallowed the lump in his throat. “Administrator, ma’am.”

She smiled. This did nothing to soothe his racing heart. “Come, let’s talk.” She beckoned and he followed her into the dark room.

It was large, but so were most rooms in the Administration. The realm reassignment department was tiny relative to the office rooms that the majority of their employees were stationed in. This room was about half the size of block 8E sub-block 185A A3/11√5. He could see three of the walls, dark stretches of concrete, sealing them in. The fourth that should’ve sat opposite to the elevator was obscured by rows upon rows upon rows of computer servers. A blue glow emanated from them and he grimaced at the thought of the voltage it would take to create a light that strong.

As he struggled to keep pace, The Administrator barely spared him a glance. “This may seem beyond your department, but trust me, your role will become clear soon.” She forewarned. She would never have him leave his department, he knew. That was the first rule of the Administration: Stay in your place. “What do you know of Lord Ras of the Wyldness?”

Lord Ras. He had heard that name. Some of the employees that hailed from Imperium had mentioned it in conversations coated with nothing short of hatred. The ‘outlander’ who had gained a position of such power in their otherwise closed society. That sort of talk only ever continued for a couple days before their new job turned their interest towards paperwork and mild office drama.

“Isn’t he the one trying to awaken ancient evils without a permit?”

The Administrator shot him a look, slow and venomous. “He is”, she nodded, “but that’s not important to us right now.” She walked towards him. He averted his gaze to the floor with stiffened shoulders but found that she only continued past him, down the alley of servers. She didn’t need to beckon him this time, he knew what he was meant to do. He followed.

There was little light between the pillars of computers. They were only between two rows of the many, but what he could see was endless. The towers sparked a theory in his mind about why she was mentioning the rogue lord. “We use a lot of power.” He started, testing the waters. The Administrator stopped walking and turned to face him, her silence commanding him to finish his speculation. “Lord Ras allied with Imperium by promising them power; do we need to ally with him too? To have enough power?”

The Administrator smiled and shook her head. Count two for smiles, and a contradiction - she must have expected him to guess wrong. “You’re right that we do plan to ally with him, but it is not out of need for power. We have all the power we could need.” She turned again and continued to weave her way through the computerised nest which was now composed of more than just server towers. Thick cables ran both overhead and underfoot, LEDs glowed from no visible circuitry, and the drone of electric humming and cooling fans only ever got louder the further they went.

Finally, they breached the sea of servers.

Now that he could see the wall they had been trekking towards all this time, he realised that it wasn’t made out of concrete the same as the other three walls. No, this one was glass. Despite this, nothing was visible from the other side. There was no depth at all, only pure light glowing an almost-white with its brightness (though when Walker inspected the way it lit up its surroundings, he realised it to be tinted pale blue).

In front of the glass wall, the cables reached their largest size before slipping underneath panels in the floor. The servers did not get within 10 metres of the wall. Instead, they stood guard in their rows, watching the tiny humans approach the divine light.

The Administrator hummed, snapping Walker’s attention back to her. She gestured towards the glass. “This is our power source. You can look, if you would like.”

He didn’t know if that was a good idea. Just looking at the glass from this distance was already beginning to hurt his eyes. Nonetheless, unsure if it was because The Administrator had told him to or because he chose to, he stepped forwards.

As he approached, he could feel the electricity in the air. It combed through his hair and bounced around a pit in his chest, dangerously close to the one that ached whenever he thought about the family he might’ve once had, before he forgot everything. He didn’t realise he was shaking with a strange sense of excitement until he was close enough to touch the glass and found himself unable to hold his hand still. He almost did touch the glass, but held back just before his fingers made contact. He still couldn’t see anything on the other side. Pale blue swallowed his vision.

He looked over his shoulder to The Administrator. She raised an eyebrow and jerked her head towards the glass again. He turned back. A bright light stared back at him.

He didn’t scream. This was unusual - Walker knew he was cowardly and anxious and that in any other scenario he would’ve jumped or fallen back or swung a punch - but something was different this time.

If anything, he stood closer than he did originally, watching the sparking lights with complete fascination. His breath fogged the glass.

“What is it?” He asked after what could’ve been anything between a second and a day, even though he couldn’t hear what he was saying over the pounding of his own heart.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” The Administrator was at his side now. When had she moved? “It’s lightning.”

Like realising one’s hunger upon taking a bite of food, the word sparked an ache in the back of his head. “Lightning…” He knew what that was, of course, as well as where it came from. They must have captured it live from a storm. He had never seen a storm before, but he had heard anecdotes of them from newly recruited employees and field agents alike. He was jealous. Did all lightning look like this? Freckles and curls?

She watched as he pressed a hand to the glass. The lightning responded in kind, pressing the palm of its hand opposite to his. “We could let it go of course, but it would run away. Far from here.”

Far from here… No. They couldn’t let it free. Now that he had seen it, felt it, he knew he couldn’t bear to part with it. They had to keep it contained. He told The Administrator such.

She nodded and smiled again. “I knew you’d understand.”

He dropped his gaze to study the hand that would’ve held his if it could.

It was almost the same pale blue that shone through the rest of the glass, but somehow brighter. The similarity in colours made it hard to tell the form of the figure apart from its glow, but blue and yellow markings fanned out across its form like the branches of a pine tree. Lichtenberg figures, his mind supplied.

He looked up at its face, admiring its curls and running a hand through his own. He wondered if he’d at all resemble the figure before him if he looked in a mirror.

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finn-m-corvex · 6 months

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Someone You Loved

Needed a brain break from Whumptober so I wrote this in an hour instead. Haven't listened to Lewis Capaldi for a long time but this song popped up in my playlist and it gave me Jaya vibes so here we are. Kinda similar to Sounding Sea but also not, mostly because I never thought I would write a songfic in my life, but hey, plans change. Literally almost just had a panic attack as I was cleaning this up because I thought I deleted it but nope we're all good. Enjoy everybody!

Words: 2k

TWs: depression, mentions of anxiety, basically all the same stuff as Sounding Sea.

I'm going under and this time I fear there's no one to save me This all or nothing really got a way of driving me crazy

Oh, he was crazy alright. But maybe it was just the hunger talking.

He had never really been one for doing things halfway. Something either got all of his effort or none of his concern and there was very little in-between. Now, he was wishing that he had more gears than forward and reverse; was that why humans created cars with multiple modes? To make up for the fact that they couldn't ever take the stick and pull it back to spare their feelings? Was it all just some sick scheme of taking back control?

No, that was stupid. He let his head thunk against the stone wall behind him, ignoring the bruises littering his skin and the blood welling from the cuts and scratches inflicted across his body. Jay had plenty of stupid ideas already, what was one more?

I need somebody to heal Somebody to know Somebody to have Somebody to hold

And of course, like a goddamn fool he had fumbled it. Fucked it up most likely beyond repair, just because he didn't come with a gearshift to dial his love back. She had known better than any of the others, always picked up on his mood shifts and his anxiety and his everything before he even knew what was going on; sometimes she was even faster than Cole. Before then Jay had never met someone with that ability, because most people would turn a blind eye to him at best and try to hurt him at worst. Kinda like what was happening right now, actually.

She wasn't like most people.

First Master, how stupid was he?

It's easy to say But it's never the same I guess I kinda liked the way you numbed all the pain

He did. Fuck, he missed her so much. He missed the way she made him feel like he was on top of the world, like he could do anything and be anyone. Anxiety couldn't touch him, his insecurities powerless against the encouraging words she would feed him whenever he started to doubt himself. What was he now?

Stuck in a shitty pirate ship with no friends and no way of calling for help after possibly fucking all of them over for what might be the last time.

Well, at least he wouldn't be able to damn them anymore, right?

The ball and chain was heavy on his ankle, and he had to drag it up by hand so he could tuck his knees against his chest, looking up at the bright sky through the grate. His hands were blistered from how much he had been mopping the deck, but it was still much more preferable to Scrap n' Tap.

He tried to imagine how it would sound for her to say 'I love you.'

Now the day bleeds Into nightfall And you're not here To get me through it all I let my guard down And then you pulled the rug I was getting kinda used to being someone you loved

Jay was still trying to imagine it when night finally fell, a dark blanket smothering out his one light source and casting the rest of his cell into darkness. He couldn't say that he ever had a problem with the dark before now, but the shadows were stretching just a little too much, the corners just a little too obscured and his vision was too fuzzy as it was adjusting to the new level of light. He supposed one of his eyes being basically out of commission wasn't helping.

Tears tried to leave his eyes but he blinked them back, determined not to cry. Nya wasn't here, and Cole wasn't here, and crying wasn't going to change that. He could do this, he could get through it.

Being left to his own devices left too much time for him to start going down memory lane, and he was thrust into the memory of the day when his world shattered apart, the shards gouging holes in his heart to leave gaping wounds that he didn't know how they would heal at the time. His head had been hurting like he had smashed it into the wooden floor of the Bounty, winded as if he just recovered from a bad fall.

He wanted it back. Why couldn't he just have it back?

I'm going under and this time I fear there's no one to turn to This all or nothing way of loving got me sleeping without you

He loved her too much to try and push her away again, and yet here he was, keeping her at arms-length when all she wanted to do was get closer and try to help.

Younger him would've rejoiced, reveled in the knowledge that Nya wanted him out of all people, but Jay knew better now. Knew how easy it was to get swept up in the current, to lose yourself in the tide that never quite receded.

To drown in it, because eventually you would forget that you had to keep swimming.

Sleeping was something that didn't come easily to him anyway, but now it was impossible to find. Apparently he had pissed off Mr. Sandman too, as he would spend night after night springing awake from some bad dream or another, only to find some sort of project in this damn lighthouse to keep him occupied. He needed distractions; distractions from how he had left Kai behind, how he didn't protect Zane, how he had damned Cole and Lloyd and Wu and Misako and everyone else in fucking Ninjago-

But mostly? He couldn't stop thinking about he had damned her too.

Now, I need somebody to know Somebody to heal Somebody to have Just to know how it feels It's easy to say but it's never the same I guess I kinda liked the way you helped me escape

She was right there. Nya was right there and he failed her, again.

Jay shivered in his chair, looking around his parents' trailer to try and find any trace of her. The only thing he could find was a framed photo that he had given his parents forever ago, from before their messy breakup and the fights and the Djinn. From when they were still happy. Sure, they were both smiling, Jay's arm wrapped around her shoulders and her arm around his waist, but...

Were they ever really happy? Or was Jay just too scared to admit that something wasn't right?

He clutched the photograph in his hands, watching as the wooden frame started to crack under the pressure. Maybe it was just because he grew up poor, but the cost of his escape had been too steep; it should've never been her.

It never should have been her.

But it was, and there was nothing he could about it now. The best he could do was hope and pray that his plan to rescue her wouldn't fall through, because he was running out of prayers.

It worked, and the price for that had been steep too. Would the heavy costs and the sacrifices ever end?

Years passed, and against his better judgement Jay thought that maybe it would.

Now the day bleeds Into nightfall

Was it night? He couldn't tell anymore. Slipping in and out of sleep was confusing, to say the least, and he had no idea how long he had spent laying down on this uncomfortable couch before someone would be lulling him back to sleep. Mr. Sandman must be taking pity on him.

And you're not here To get me through it all

But Nya was here; he could hear her voice, whispering to him in soft tones with gentle words, kissing his cheek and then his lips and playing with his hair and trying everything she knew to try and get him back to sleep.

Was he going crazy? Again?

First Master, it really was just like the ship all over again. He didn't remember the voices being able to touch him, though. That part was new. Oh well.

Gotta enjoy a nice dream while it lasts, right?

Why did someone start sobbing when he said that out loud?

I let my guard down And then you pulled the rug I was getting kinda used to being someone you loved

Jay loved that she loved him, cared for him, trusted him, and he trusted her with his life and his soul. Knowing that she was there at his side always helped him get through the days; he was sure that he wouldn't still be here if something had ever happened to her. They were two halves of the same piece; maybe they didn't quite fit together all the way, but there was nothing they wouldn't do to make it work, that Jay wouldn't do to make it work.

So really, she had to stop doing stupid self-sacrificing shit. But he guessed that he wasn't really one to talk.

But becoming the sea?

And I tend to close my eyes when it hurts sometimes I fall into your arms I'll be safe in your sound 'til I come back around

She was never coming back around. Jay stood outside of the lighthouse, looking out across the ocean and watching as the tides flowed in and out, taking in the rocks just off-shore and the small rip-currents jaggedly cutting through the calm surface of the water.

Jay turned around, feeling the breeze start to blow his jacket into his back. Shutting his eyes, he let his element buzz around him, crackling and fizzing and popping The darkness was something familiar; he knew what to expect when he shut his eyes for too long, and he needed the familiarity no matter how traumatic the origins were. Without hesitating he let himself fall backwards into the surf, the cold water making him freeze up instantly as it washed over his face and into his nose.

He suppressed the natural urge to fight and get his face out of the water.

What was the point when she wouldn't be there to tell him how stupid he was being? To say that he should've worn a thicker jacket, to dry his clothes, to snuggle with him in the bed until he could finally feel his fingers and play with her hair?

For now the day bleeds Into nightfall And you're not here To get me through it all I let my guard down And then you pulled the rug I was getting kinda used to being someone you loved

Jay wrote the same words over and over at least once a night. He didn't know why he was fixating so hard on them but he couldn't stop, and even now as his hands were trembling and his hair was dripping seawater onto the pages he was writing the same seven lines again. There was no one there to kiss his cheek and offer him tea and to laugh at how his hair looked like he had been dunked in a mop bucket.

He should've just stayed in the goddamn ocean.

But now the day bleeds Into nightfall And you're not here To get me through it all I let my guard down And then you pulled the rug I was getting kinda used to being someone you loved

For some reason, Jay cut out the first two lines eventually. After a while, it just got a little redundant to keep saying that the day would go away and be replaced by the night; at least, that was his best guess for why one day he started writing three lines instead of seven. He read them over and over, again and again, feeling the bitterness and the anger and the sadness consume him from the inside out, and Jay knew that Nya would not recognize the man standing on the beach if she ever decided to walk back onto land one day.

But she never would, and Jay would never get used to the loss that spread through his chest like a disease, a cancer that there was no way to treat.

I let my guard down And then you pulled the rug I was getting kinda used to being someone you loved

#finn's writing #ninjago #ninjago jay #ninjago fanfiction #ninjago songfic #jaya #ninjago jaya #shockwave #shockwaveshipping #anyways. should probably get back to work on whumptober tomorrow #but just wanted to write a little something something for you guys!

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