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Kai’s room is oppressively quiet without him. The walls, a brown-ish white color, make the space seem so small, cramped. Clothes lay all across the floor where he had dropped them, the sheets of his bed are rumpled from when he last slept here, which must have been weeks ago by now. He often sleeps in Wyldfyre’s room. It helps with her nightmares, they tell her, and she understands, because it used to help hers too.
He’s gone, now, and whenever he does come back, it will not be within her lifetime. The pit in her stomach grows wider every time she thinks about it.
His room is so him, it feels almost like a lifeline. Like he hasn’t gone, like if she just closes her eyes, he’ll be sitting right across from her, writing, or folding clothes, or one of the many other things he used to do while she sat and talked.
But when her eyes close, she still can’t feel him, and her grief is too consuming for her to pretend it isn’t there. She misses him more than anything, more than anyone. Losing Jay had hurt, yes, but losing Kai is worse. Tears sting in her eyes as she sits down against his bed. She needs to clean the room out, at least a little bit. She needs to find something for Wyldfyre, who doesn’t know what to do with herself.
Kai never had many things, though. She’s already given the girl Kai’s old Gi, and his phone. There isn’t much else.
This whole thing feels pointless, it’s not like anyone else is going to take his room as theirs. It’s so silly, taking his things and packing them away. Lloyd tells her she can leave whatever she wants, his room can stay the same, but it’s equally pointless to leave all of these things here to gather dust in a place no one will see them. What a wise boy he’s grown to be. She can’t help but credit Kai with that, he raised her well, too.
She thinks, maybe, the best place to start is under his bed. She can see a few bins stuffed far below, so she drags them out, one by one, setting them in a semicircle around her. The first one is just things he brought from home. Books from the living room bookshelf, all the silverware and dishes, anything he apparently did not want to leave there. The second is full to the top with Nya’s old clothes, seemingly from when she was a baby all the way until she was twelve, when she stopped outgrowing them.
The third and final bin is full of envelopes, a leatherbound book, and nearly two hundred photographs. Pictures that had been framed on the walls, pictures of her as a child, their parents, school photos, one of Lloyd, a couple of him and Wyldfyre, two of Nya and Jay. Photo after photo that apparently Kai deemed important enough to print but not enough to frame or display.
The book turns out to be their mother’s diary. Her handwriting is loopy and pretty, reminding Nya of water. Fitting. The pages start a few days after Kai was born, and stop a few days before Nya was born, right on the final page. They aren’t daily by any means, but the book is rather large. She thinks that this is not meant for her to read, so she closes it and sets it aside. Maybe she will change her mind later, maybe she will return it to her mother.
Now for the envelopes. Every single one has her name scrawled on it. The handwriting is undoubtedly Kai’s, save for one which is very obviously Maya’s. She opens that one first.
~~~
Dear Nya,
I’m writing on behalf of your brother, who can’t really do it himself, yet. He wants to tell you that he is very excited to meet you, and he wants to show you his toy trucks. He thinks you will like them very much. He says that he cannot wait to play with you, whatever you want to play.
He says he’s going to show you all his favorite foods, and he will even share his dessert with you. He will teach you how to run, and how to make cookies. He will braid your hair and walk you to school, and he will even teach you how to play soccer in the yard.
He says he loves you very much already.
Love, your big brother, Kai
~~~
Kai had signed his own name, messy and barely legible. Nya smiles. Why had he never given this to her? Any of these? They’re all addressed to her, and there are ten of them.
She grabs the next one. There are little numbers written on the edges, as if the varying quality of her name was not obvious enough.
~~~
To Nya
This is Kai. Your big brother. Mama says I should right you letters so you can read them later but I dont know how to right good so I do not have anything to say. And also you are just a baby and babys can not read.
Mama still does not let me give you the food we eat but I think you will really like it. She says it will make you sick so I dont give it to you even though I want to. I will someday I promise.
You can not walk yet either. This makes me sad cause I want to play games with you but you only lay on the floor and grab things from me when I try to show you. And sometimes you hit my toys on the ground really hard and I think they will break so I do not want you to have them. I hope you are not bored.
From Kai
~~~
A laugh bubbles up her throat as she reaches the end. He must have been young when he wrote that, four years old at the very most. The handwriting is shaky and hard to read, but it’s adorable nonetheless.
~~~
Nya,
Sorry theres such a big gap between this letter and the last one. I wasnt sure if I was even going to keep doing them becuase I dont have time for things like this anymore. I dont want you to know this but I figure youll be old enough by the time you read these and I just need to say it to someone but I miss mom and dad so much. Its hard to do all these things at once and Im really tired.
I dont know how long I can keep all this up. I work all day and I still have to clean the house and stuff. Your a huge help for sure but its still a lot becuase you have school and stuff. Im sorry to just fill this with me complaining but I dont have anyone to talk to anymore and its hard.
I dont know. I dont really have anything else going on. Sorry.
Kai
~~~
Nya
I have never been more scared in my entire life then when you got kidnapped by those skeletons. Your back now which is why I wanted to right this now. Your sitting right next to me sleeping. I dont want to be a ninja but now Im worried that if we leave itll happen again and I wont be able to do anything about it.
Im scared and I dont know what to do. I dont know what the right choice is.
I think well stay here because your safer here then with me. Im sorry I failed to keep you safe Nya I hope maybe you can forgive me but I understand if you cant.
Kai
~~~
Nya sifts through the letters, setting them around her in order. They’re going to make her cry, she thinks. She’d forgotten how haggard her brother used to look. Kai’s under eyes were damn near purple at all times. He was pale, and dangerously thin. It took months for him to start looking better, for him to fill out enough.
He never told her what was wrong with him. He never told her anything was wrong at all. She’d only noticed when she found an old photo of them in her room. He got thin again sometime after she turned into the sea, she thinks. He looked paler when she returned, gaunt and exhausted. He wouldn’t say why, wouldn’t tell her how he felt, so she didn’t think about it much. She never really looked below Kai’s surface. No one ever does.
The next letter has much better handwriting, so it must have been written long after they became ninja. Kai had allowed Nya, and sometimes Cole, to tutor him in reading whenever they had the time. He’d picked up writing after a while, pouring his soul into the pages of his little notebooks. She hasn’t read them, because he hasn’t let her, so she doesn’t know exactly what he writes about.
Maybe she’ll read them.
~~~
Dear Nya,
You and Cole have been helping me with reading. It’s hard, and Zane says that’s because it’s harder to learn things like this later in life than when you are a child. That’s ok though because I think anything is better than nothing. I’m very grateful for both of your help.
I haven’t written in a very long time. We’ve been Ninja for a few months now. I hate to admit that this group is kinda nice to be around. I forgot how much I loved other people. I love you, but it was always a little lonely, just the two of us.
I like being here too because it’s not so uncertain. Well, it is, but the uncertainty is different. Like, there’s always food to eat and I don’t have to worry about paying the bills and stuff. It’s nice. I don’t know how I feel about you being a ninja yet but I believe in you. I just don’t want you to get hurt, you know?
It’s ok, it doesn’t matter. I’m here to keep you safe so it’s alright. And I don’t like him very much, but I think Jay will help me protect you. I can tell you two care a lot about each other. It bothered me at first, but I see now that it doesn’t matter what I think as long as you’re happy. I just hope you’ll let me walk you down the aisle when you get married. If not that’s fine too. Whatever you want.
I think I was always just meant to care for others. It’s not the same, but Lloyd reminds me of you sometimes. Not personality wise, because he reminds me more of me there, but in terms of like being a little kid that needs help. I don’t know how to explain. It’s nice having someone to look after again.
Love, Kai
~~~
Nya,
We found mom and dad. I don’t know if I’ve ever been so happy in my whole entire life. They’re alive and they didn’t leave me us back then. They didn’t want to leave, they were taken away. I know it’s wrong to be happy they were like imprisoned but I always thought they left us because they didn’t want us.
I want them to stay. I want them to stay here and be my mom and dad but they said they want to go home and not be ninja anymore. That’s ok I guess. I understand. I don’t want to be a ninja either really. I asked if I could go back with them and they said no because the city needs me. They’re right I guess but I need them. Why does what I need never matter? It’s ok, I don’t need them the way people need me. I like to be needed anyway. People don’t leave the people they need.
I think I’m tired. I’m saying things I wouldn’t usually say, even in letters like these. I still haven’t decided if I’m gonna give them to you or not. I think I say too much stuff that I don’t want people to know. We’ll see.
Kai
~~~
Nya remembers when they found their parents. She had been happy at first, too, but it was different with Kai. She never missed Ray and Maya, at least, not the way he always did. She never had to wish she had them, because she had him, and sure, it would’ve been nice to have a mom, she never really thought to mourn a life she didn’t ever have in the first place.
Kai had been over the moon. He was like a completely different person around their parents. Happier, louder, and much more immature. He spoke like a child, acted like he didn’t know things he did know. He would only call them ‘mommy’ and ‘daddy’. The responsible pillar she knew her brother to be was gone, replaced by a child.
Looking back, she understands. He had never gotten to be the baby. He was only about five years old when Ray and Maya disappeared, saddled with a whole house to uphold and a baby to care for. He’d always kept strong through it, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t exhausting. With their parents back, there was no need for him to be the adult. He could be the one being taken care of, for once. Maybe that’s fair.
~~~
Nya
I don’t like being cold. I don’t like it at all. I always wanted to touch the snow without melting it in my hand, but now I understand that it’s not worth it. I didn’t really understand what you meant when you said that I run hotter than normal, but I do now. It’s so cold without my powers. I understand why you always clung to me during the winter now, I must’ve been so warm.
It feels empty without my powers. Like something in my chest isn’t right. I hate it. I’m missing something and I don’t know what to do. Like, hopefully I’ll be able to get them back eventually, but that isn’t guaranteed. I don’t know. I managed to light a fire earlier, but it was just a little spark that had to be fed wood, and it almost knocked me out afterward.
I miss you. I think you’re probably scared, wondering where all of us got off to. We’ll be back, I promise. I’m scared, that’s for sure. I feel so vulnerable. Helpless. If something bad happens, what am I supposed to do about it??? I feel useless. I don’t know, that’s stupid probably. It’ll turn out ok, and I’ll see you again.
Kai
~~~
I hate you. I hate you. I really hate you. I hate you so much it hurts. I hate you for not listening when I told you being ninja was dangerous. I hate you for not listening when I said I didn’t want to be one. I hate you so much. I hate you more than anyone. I hate you for leaving me. Why did you leave me? Why does everyone always leave me? What’s wrong with me that no one wants to stay???? What did I do? I don’t mean to be angry all the time, I just am. Is that what did it? Why did you leave???
I hate you and I hate mom and I hate dad and I hate being a ninja. I don’t know what to do anymore. I can’t stay here. I hate this stupid monastery. Why are you written on every surface? Why are you still here if you’re gone??? No matter what I look at I see you and YOU AREN’T HERE. You’ve stained the whole place, ruined it. It hurts to look at anything. I hate you. I hate you for taking away everything I love because now I have nothing and I don’t even have you this time. I always had you. I always needed you. You didn’t even say goodbye to me. I hate you.
~~~
Nya,
I don’t hate you. I wrote the last letter the day after you turned into the sea. I was angry. Even then I understood why you did what you did, I just didn’t want to admit it. I’d rather be angry than sad, and pretend I don’t know that what you did was harder for you than I understand. I’m sorry for what I wrote, it isn’t true, I was just sad.
I want mom and dad to go away. I was so excited to have them back, so excited to see them and stuff because I missed them and I love them and it’s hard to stay the adult all the time when I just want to cry and be the baby, but I need them to go away. I miss you more than I ever missed them, I miss you so much it’s killing me, but no one seems to care. No one has asked if I’m ok, and that’s fine, because I can handle myself, but it kind of hurts. Mom and dad only ask me about you. I can tell they regret that they didn’t get to know you and so they want me to tell them everything about you. That’s fair, but it really, really hurts. It almost feels like they miss you more than they love me. I get it, though, because there’s still time for me, and there isn’t for you, but I just can’t keep talking about you and how amazing you are every day. It makes me miss you more, which makes it hurt, which makes it worse when no one asks.
I can’t help but cling to the hope that you will come back. I know it’s unlikely, but I feel like there’s a chance since you aren’t actually dead. I don’t blame you if you don’t but I think I will always hope you do.
I love you so much, Nya. I will see you again someday.
Kai
~~~
Tears pour freely down Nya’s face, now, barely avoiding hitting the letters. She holds them a safe distance away, to keep them dry. She can see, through the shaky handwriting, the scope of Kai’s grief. She knows it as well as she knows him, because the same grief curls through her own chest, settling like a vice around her heart. She hates him for leaving, but she understands. No matter where she looks, she sees him. They’re the same, in so many ways.
She understands how awful it must have been, being asked for every detail of her life, because she is experiencing the same thing. Wyldfyre asks her about Kai almost daily. The difference is, Wyldfyre is a child who doesn’t know better, and Nya has Lloyd to lean on. Kai had no one, and their parents should have known not to pester him with questions while he was so clearly grieving.
He’s always been good at hiding his feelings, but not so much that you couldn’t see them if you looked hard enough. Someone should have looked. She would have looked.
She opens the last letter with shaking hands, swiping at tears with the back of her wrist, breath jumping through her chest. This is officially the last she has, and for some reason that hurts more than before she found the letters at all.
~~~
Nya,
I can’t decide who Wyldfyre reminds me more of, me or you, or Lloyd. I think that if I weren’t being stupid it would be me, but because she’s so young and stuff I can’t help but look at her and see you two. I know that she’s basically a carbon copy of me, but she’s also a little girl who needs my help, just like you were. And Lloyd was, except Lloyd is a boy.
I love her so so much. It’s like she’s my kid, but she isn’t. I’ve never had a kid, though, so it might feel different. Sometimes I want to say she’s my daughter, but I don’t think she would like that, which is totally fair. I don’t want to push her. We just get along so well. I’ve never met someone that clicked with me the way she does. She doesn’t compare to you, no one does, but she comes so close. I love her so much.
I wish times were not so rocky so I could show her more. I teach her to harness her powers as best I can, and she seems to enjoy the lessons, but there’s so much I wish we could do. She’s never been to an arcade. I know she would love it. I think there’s a lot of things she would like. Things we used to take advantage of. She’ll see them one day. I swear it.
Kai
~~~
It feels very much like something she should let Wyldfyre read. Even Nya herself hadn’t known just how much Kai loved the girl. Sure, there were signs, but she didn’t know it ran so deep. She thinks that Wyldfyre should read it, so she can know that she was loved. But she kind of wants this to be something for her. Maybe that’s unfair, but she has shared so much of her beloved brother, she would like to keep something.
She slips the letters back into their envelopes, then settles them in the box she’d found them in.
“Thank you, Kai,” she sniffles, lifting the box into her arms to take to her room. “I’ll see you again one day.”