Chapter 9: Planted

                                    

                                          
WORDS: 13,761
ZANE'S POV:
The only way to find the leader of the Sons of Garmadon was for Cole to sing. The other notions had a success rate of less than fifteen percent. On the other hand, Cole singing and messing up had a coup rate of twenty percent. That was the highest-ranking plan I came up with. And I devised up 1,572 stimulations to be able to find the leader of the Sons of Garmadon. Yet Cole's suffering was the only way to go. He just had to trust me. 
As I predicted, Cole would immediately dislike this plan I had formulated. He began to fret about how terrible his singing was— I had to admit; it wasn't pretty. I had to remind him that he came from a famous performing arts school. His father was a Royal Blacksmith; one of the most famous barbershop quartets in Ninjago. I had to plead with him for Cole to go through with this deranged plan of mine. 
Luckily, I convinced him to go along with my plan. As he went up to the stage, he tossed me a coin. I was standing at the jukebox which allowed me to play the song he would choose. For my plan to be successful, I needed to choose the wrong song. A song I knew that would mess with his confidence and facade. As Cole had once told me, with confidence, it can get you anywhere. Lose that confidence, however, and everything will come crashing down right before your eyes. 
Cole went up to the stage with confidence. He believed that I was going to play the song he knew well and would do well in. However, I needed him to lose all that confidence for my plan to succeed. As long as he lost that confidence, everything should work. Phase two of the plan included me knocking Cole semi-unconscious. I knew that Laughy's airs their karaoke nights to people at home. I also knew Nya or Lloyd would have it up and running on the screen in The Bounty. Once they saw Cole getting taken away, my friends would do everything to stop it. 
Before I knocked Cole unconscious I transmitted a message to Pixal, " It is imperative you tell our friends to trust me on this. Out of the 1,572 simulations, this one had the highest percentage of a success rate."
"Affirmative. Letting them know right now," Pixal responded. 
The simulator I was running beeped letting me know it was the right time, "Trust me."
Once I knocked Cole unconscious, Pixal notified me that my friends were on the way. Excellent. Phase three was already in motion. I turned off my communications. No one could contact me now. For the plan to work, it was a matter of trust. As I had no motorcycle, I had to watch my friends race after Mr. E as Ultra Violet sped away with Cole. Like them, I jumped from rooftop to rooftop. What surprised me, however, was that Harumi had tagged along. She was quite agile from what I could see. 
I watched them run into a street with speeding cars. They all managed to jump on the hoods or roofs of the cars. Harumi barely made it. She was very close to falling and landing on her head. Mr. E led them to a dead-end. The only way was to go up. I was trailing them and watching them from a nearby roof. Mr. E snapped both Kai and Jay's wire and together were wrapped up like Christmas presents. Nya went down to free them. Both Harumi and Lloyd hesitated to go after the Mask of Vengence. That hesitation, however, led them to one of their downfalls—literally. 
Mr. E snapped a t-shirt which fell on Harumi and threw her off balance. She wasn't as skilled as us, not having gone through Master Wu's training courses. Therefore, she had no upper-body core strength. Not as tough as we did. She also didn't have a great balance. She was weak in many areas. Although I did think she would make a great ninja and fighter. She was quick and dexterous. She was skilled with a katana and sword, she just needed more technique training. 
I watched as she flung Lloyd up to the roof where Mr. E was. That was my cue. Lloyd and Mr. E began to clash with one another. The clangs of their swords rang through the city. They were both pretty even until Mr. E threw Lloyd to another roof where as a result in retaliation, Lloyd hit Mr. E with a strong blast of his elemental power. The blast was strong enough to knock the Mask of Vengence off of Mr. E's face. He dove straight for it. Lloyd ran to Mr. E but was restrained by shurikens. My shurikens.