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I am so late to this....but it's finally ready!

For the Ninjago Fic Fest 2024

Finding Balance

After he is retrieved from the lighthouse by his brother and new friends, Echo must adjust to his new life. Even though his new home and family are amazing, it's still so different from what he's used to. Maybe a walk in the city will help clear his mind.

Again, so sorry it's late, the story kinda of spiraled into a longer and longer project. I have more chapters coming soon, I just have to edit them.

@ninjago-fic-fest I don't know if this technically counts as part of your event since I was late, but I figured I'd let you know it's posted now.

Finding Balance

Chapter 1 : Multiple Suprise Visitors

(For @ninjago-fic-fest)

Chapter 1 - Chapter 2

Summary: After he is retrieved from the lighthouse by his brother and new friends, Echo must adjust to his new life. Even though his new home and family are amazing, it's still so different from what he's used to. Maybe a walk in the city will help clear his mind.

Chapter 1

Multiple Suprise Visitors

Zane was scrubbing at a particularly stubborn dark spot on one of the lighthouse windows. He scowled at the mark and pressed with the rag a little harder. The mark still didn’t budge. He decided to give up with the rag and started scraping with his fingernails. After a couple of passes, the mark was gone.

Zane stood back to admire his handy work when there was a loud thumping sound from downstairs.

“Thump, thump!”

He paused; certain his audio receptors were glitching. His only other companion, a small cleaning robot named Ty-Dee, was in the far corner of the room dusting away some cobwebs. What could possibly be making noise downstairs?

The noise sounded again.

“Thump, thump!”

It sounded a bit like someone knocking on a door.

But that wasn’t possible of course.

Nobody else had been on the island for years. Not since the day his father left.

And he had disappeared years ago.

Zane remembered it very vividly.

It was like any other normal day. He had worked on inventions with his dad, had some lunch, gone downstairs to his room to work on his own personal invention, and then went to sleep. But when Zane awoke the next morning, his father had vanished.

He hadn’t left a note behind explaining where he was going or anything.

Just like that, gone.

And from then on it had just been him and Ty-Dee.

The sound came again, louder this time, “THUMP, THUMP, THUMP!”

That was definitely, a knock at the door.

Someone was here, Zane thought. Someone who could finally get him off this rocky island of solitude. Someone was here to rescue him!

Had his father returned? He barely dared to hope.

Zane raced down the stairs, two steps at a time; Ty-Dee rolling along after him, clunking down the stairs one by one. Upon reaching the bottom, Zane bolted toward the front door.

And then he paused, his hand clutching the door knob mid turn.

As excited as he was at the prospect of seeing people again Zane also found he felt a bit nervous. He hadn’t seen a human being in years. His mind started to wander. Who was on the other side of that door? Were they really here to rescue him? Or had they stumbled upon the island by accident? Would they be friendly? He certainly hoped so.

Only one way to find out.

Zane slowly opened the door, just a tiny bit, “Hello?”

“Oh good, Echo you’re here!” an excited voice responded.

Zane jumped a little at the sudden exclamation, but then opened the door a little wider to see who had spoken. A young man dressed in blue, greeted him with a small wave, smiling warmly. There were five other colorfully clad humans standing behind him on the wide stone steps that led up to the lighthouse door.

One of the blue stranger’s companions, a girl with dark wavy hair, must have noticed Zane’s caution and stepped forward.

“It’s okay Echo,” the young woman said gently, “We’ve come to take you home.”

Zane looked back and forth between her and the first stranger. They were both smiling at him. But their eyes were darting back and forth and they both shifted from foot to foot. They almost looked as nervous as he was.

Examining the two closer, he felt a strange sense of Deja Vu.

But then in a blink the feeling was gone. Odd.

No matter, Zane was much more interested in the name the girl had called him. “Echo”? Who was that? He opened the door a bit wider.

“Echo?”, Zane asked, finally stepping out of the lighthouse. “I’m sorry, but no one by that name lives here.” And then, not at all eager to be left behind he added, “But, um, maybe I can help you find who you’re looking for?”

The blue stranger looked confused for a second before the girl elbowed him in the ribs and whispered something Zane couldn’t quite catch.

But before he could begin to wonder what she had said, a movement from behind her caught his eye.

One of their companions was coming closer, traversing the last couple of steps. The young outsiders who had first greeted him stepped to either side, creating a space on the last step for the new arrival.

Now, he and this third stranger were standing face to face.

He was clad in white, and a bit taller than the first two strangers. He had short cropped hair and a confused look on his face.

And he wasn’t human.

The stranger was mechanical.

Zane had never thought he would see another human being ever again. Let alone an android like himself.

But this wasn’t just any android…

Zane’s eyes widened even further as he realized that the other android looked just like him.

It was like looking in a mirror. The shape of the face, the cropped pieces of curly wire for his hair, the lines down his cheeks where the sheets of thin metal had been welded together. The only differences being that this android was a shiny silver, instead of the brass and copper of his own rusting metallic skin. He was a bit taller as well, and his eyes were a brilliant blue in contrast to his hazel. But other than that, they were exactly alike.

Zane took a step back in surprise.

After a few more flabbergasted seconds he finally worked up the courage to ask,

“Who are you?”

The other android blinked twice, as if confused as well, before he answered, “I am Zane. I was built to protect those who cannot protect themselves,”

A heavy silence hung in the air.

Until, finally, Zane found his voice again.

“But I am Zane,” he replied.

The silence again, was thick.

And then another thought occurred to him. If this looked like him, then did that mean…

“Do you know Dr.—”

“Julian. Yes,” the stranger finished, “He was the one who made me. He was my father,”

And then the visitor’s eyes were shimmering with oily tears. Zane hadn’t quite expected that.

And then, the stranger leapt forward and wrapped his arms around him.

He jerked back in surprise, but the stranger who looked like him only pulled him closer.

And suddenly, the pieces fell into place.

If father had built this other android…

“A-are you, my brother?”, Zane whispered.

“I think so,” the stranger replied through his tears.

He had a brother?

Why had father never told him?

Zane felt his own eyes wet with tears.

Finally, after all this time. Someone had come for him.

His brother had come for him.

Now both androids were sobbing as they slumped to the ground.

They clung to each other like their lives depended on it.

“I’m so glad I found you,” the taller of the two whispered.

Zane only hugged his brother tighter.

After a minute or so, he pulled away still holding tight to his new brother’s hand, his smile wider than he ever thought it could go. The taller Zane smiled back, wiping away his tears with a baggy, white sleeve.

A large man dressed in black approached the two. The sleeves of his gi looked to have been ripped off, his muscly arms on full display. Zane thought he looked rather intimidating, but his voice was soft when he spoke.

“Are we ready to go Zane?” he asked.

The two androids turned and spoke in unison.

“I think so,”

“Yes please,”

They looked back at each other in surprise and then started to laugh.

“This could get a little confusing,” the stranger in red chuckled. His hair was spiked almost straight up from his head in a way that Zane thought looked rather silly.

“So, what should we do about this brother?”, the silver android asked, ruffling the other’s curly copper hair. “Do you want a nickname?”

Zane thought for a moment.

He wasn’t quite sure what he wanted to do.

He was Zane. He had always been Zane. He had stated that matter a factly not two minutes earlier.

But with the sudden appearance of his brother, he wasn’t so sure if the name was really his anymore.

Nobody had called him “Zane” in years. There hadn’t been anyone around to call him by any name actually. He admittedly had started to feel a bit disconnected from it.

Maybe a nickname would be nice.

Suddenly he remembered the name the stranger in blue had called him earlier.

Echo.

There was the strange feeling of Déjà Vu again. Weird.

He thought he rather liked the sound of that name though.

He wasn’t sure why, but he felt connected to it somehow. He had no memory of it that he could think of, but at the same time it felt familiar. Like when you wake up from a dream and can only remember the feeling of it but not any of the details.

“Oh, but …you don’t have to decide right now or anything. Or we can keep calling you Zane if that’s what you want, or um…” his brother spoke up again, stumbling over his words.

“Actually, a nickname sounds nice,” Zane interjected.

Maybe “Zane” could be his middle name, he thought with a smile. He wasn’t sure he wanted to let go of the name completely. It was what his father called him after all.

“How about Echo?”

I'd love to hear about your WIP "Finding Balance"!

Of course!

This one is for the Ninjago Fic Fest. I was so happy to find an Echo prompt so I could put my own spin on his story!

It's honesty kinda weird how the story developed. The prompt was just to have Echo explore Ninjago and learn more about himself along the way. But then I realized that to get to Ninjago, he had to get off the island first. So I had to write that bit, and then the middle went in a different direction than I had originally planned.

Like, the complete opposite direction.

The original idea was that Echo wanted some alone time after being rescued by his new family. (Imagine living alone for years, and then all of sudden, you're in a crowded monastery with people around every corner. You might want a break from it after a while.)

But time alone is not at all what I ended up writing for Echo.

I was about to rework the middle bit to better fit the theme I had originally intended when I realized that just because the themes I had going were completely opposite each other, didn't mean they couldn't exist together.

It's awfully interesting that the prompt involved Echo discovering more about himself on his adventures because that's what happened to me while writing.

I love to spend time alone. I feel like I can truly be myself. And a lot of my hobbies are single person activities.

But at the same time, I love spending time with other people! Going to get ice cream with friends, or seeing people at church, or talking and joking with my coworkers, I love it!

I didn't realize how much I loved it until I spent a little too much time alone and ended up feeling really sad and lonely.

And then, on the flipside, if I'm around people for too long, I get mentally drained.

I realized it was all about finding that balance. Hence, the title of the story.

Just like me, Echo is going to have to find that balance in this story.

Luckily, he has his big bro Zane to help him out with that. 😊

Finding Balance

Chapter 2 : Cupcakes and Questions

(For @ninjago-fic-fest)

Chapter 1 - Chapter 3

Summary: After he is retrieved from the lighthouse by his brother and new friends, Echo must adjust to his new life. Even though his new home and family are amazing, it's still so different from what he's used to. Maybe a walk in the city will help clear his mind.

Chapter 2

Cupcakes and Questions

Over the next couple of weeks, Echo was showered with affection from the whole team, as they tried to make him feel at home.

First things first Zane took his brother down to the workshop underneath the monastery. There Echo met P.I.X.A.L.; another android, like him and Zane. She had seemed very confused upon seeing him, but after hearing Zane’s explanation of the situation, she got right to work. She sanded down Echo’s rusty arms and legs until his metal coverings were once again shiny. She carefully applied oil to his joints and even fixed that rouge gear in his chest that always seemed to slip out of place. P.I.X.A.L didn’t say much while she worked, but her smile was warm and kind.

“Let me know if that gear gives you anymore trouble, okay?” she had told him once his repairs were finished.

Jay introduced him to video games, which he picked up pretty easily. It was funny to see Jay’s overly animated fake outburst when Echo won. He also gave him some soda to try, but Echo found it felt funny on his taste sensors.

Nya showed him the art of painting. Echo ended up painting a sunset over an ocean view. It was nice to be off the island, but he found himself missing the sea sometimes. Nya seemed to understand that a bit, and showed him some water tricks she could do with her element. She floated shiny orbs of water in the air and swirling streams all around the room.

He got to help Cole bake his very own “Welcome Home” cake. It turned out a little dry, but Cole didn’t seem to mind. Echo really enjoyed frosting it too. They both ended up on the floor covered in frosting and laughing their heads off by the end of it.

Kai gifted him a pair of sunglasses and then tried to teach him some cool looking Spinjitsu moves. Echo had to reattach his arm multiple times during Kai’s crazy lesson but he had a lot of fun nonetheless. Kai also told him that having siblings was totally awesome, and that Echo was going to love it.

Lloyd showed him the obstacle course and how you could hang upside down from the rings. He also gave him his old Fritz Donnagen comic books. He then proceeded to go on a rant about easter eggs and plot inconsistencies and other stuff that Echo didn’t understand. But seeing Lloyd excited got him excited too. And it felt nice to just listen when he couldn’t think of much to talk about himself.

Master Wu was very glad to have another member added to the family. He welcomed Echo with open arms showing him around the monastery and gifting him a large pile of books from the library. When Echo asked if he should put them back when he had finished reading them, Wu smiled and said that they were his to keep.

Zane always seemed to be hovering near him. He followed him around, asking if he wanted anything, and he always seemed to be offering him food for some reason. Being a “nindroid” as Echo now knew he was called, he didn’t necessarily need food to survive, but he supposed the extra energy he got from it was nice. Not that he was complaining. Zane’s food was always delicious, especially since the only thing he had in the lighthouse after Dr. Julien had left was a bit of tea now and then.

It seemed to Echo, that Zane was worried about him. He wasn’t quite sure why though. He was quite happy here. Kai told him it was an older brother thing.

“Older brothers worry about their little siblings. It’s just something that we do,” he had reassured him.

But he didn’t really elaborate beyond that.

After a few weeks, things had settled into kind of a new normal. Everyone went about their daily tasks as usual, and even Zane had started to be a bit less clingy.

But even though everything was calming down, Echo was feeling a little claustrophobic. As big as the monastery was, he always ran into someone. There always seemed to be someone there.

He found himself spending more and more time in his room away from the common areas. He would turn the corner when he saw someone coming down the hall, and he was much quieter during mealtimes.

Sometimes, it felt like he was trapped. Like he was stuck in a new, albeit different, prison. But that didn’t make any sense.

This was all he ever wanted. To have a family, to be around people again. He loved his brother and his new friends. They were all so nice to him. So why did he have the sudden urge to hide away?

Maybe Zane could help him.

Echo found him in the kitchen stirring batter in a bowl.

“Hi Zane. What are you cooking?” Echo asked.

“Oh, hello, brother!”, Zane turned to him, “I’m making cupcakes. Would you like to join me?”

“Maybe not today. But I do have a question.”

“Fire away.”

Echo took a deep breath.

“Do you enjoy living with so many people?”, he said slowly.

Zane looked thoughtful. He set the bowl of batter on the counter and turned to Echo.

“The ninja are my friends, my family. I cannot imagine life without them,” he said.

“Ah, yes. Of course,” Echo turned to look at the bowl of cupcake batter, not wanting to meet his brother’s eyes.

But then he felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked up to see Zane smiling down at him.

“But I know how you feel Echo,”

“Huh?”

“Sometimes they can be a little much for me too,”

Echo stared quizzically at Zane, who winked at him knowingly.

Oh.

Echo felt a mite embarrassed. He thought he had been hiding his feelings pretty well.

“Oh. Um you noticed then huh?”

“Of course I noticed. You’re my little brother!” Zane said in mock exasperation, before pulling Echo into a tight hug. “Now, how can I help,”

“I just don’t understand it,” Echo sighed, as Zane released him. “I didn’t like living alone on the island. So why do I want to be alone now?”

Zane hummed in thought before answering, “Spending time around people is good, but it’s also important to spend time by yourself. It’s a balance. You can’t have too much of one without the other,”

Zane grabbed the spoon out of the bowl of batter and proceeded to balance it lengthwise on his index finger. It wobbled a bit as Zane tried to keep it balanced, stumbling forward to follow the movement of the spoon.

Echo was laughing hard as Zane circled the kitchen, swaying this way and that with the spoon, almost tripping a few times before he finally plopped it back in the bowl, splattering chocolate batter on the kitchen wall.

Zane smiled warmly when he saw that his antics had had their intended effect. “Just like that!” he laughed.

When Echo had let out his last chuckle, his brother slung an arm over his shoulder and pulled him close.

“It’s okay to want some alone time, Echo. Being around a lot of people is new for you. It’s normal for you to feel this way,” Zane said softly.

Echo nodded to show he understood.

“You know what I do when I need some time to myself?”

“What?”

“I go on a walk. Sometimes in the park in Ninjago City, sometimes just around the monastery. It helps clear my mind.”

Echo thought a walk sounded nice. And he would love to explore Ninjago City. Yes. That’s what he’d do, he decided.

But then again, Echo thought, he hadn’t really left the monastery since arriving two weeks ago. And he had the distinct feeling that his brother wouldn’t be too comfortable with him exploring a huge city all by himself.

Well, the only thing to do was ask him, he supposed.

“Can I go on a walk in the city?” Echo asked his brother tentatively.

Zane seemed a bit startled by the question and his face suddenly tensed. There was that worried look of his again, Echo noticed.

“Um, well, I mean I figured, just around the monastery would be…”

“Oh! Please don’t worry, brother!” Echo pleaded. He was so tired of being cooped up in the monastery. “I’ll be really careful, I mean it!”

Zane walked over to the kitchen counter, picked up the mixing bowl, and continued to stir the batter. He tapped his foot for a few seconds, apparently trying to make up his mind.

He let out a long sigh, “Ok, you can go,”

“On one condition,” Zane amended with a smile.

“Yes! Thank you, Zane!”, Echo rushed forward to give his brother the biggest hug he could.

Finding Balance

Chapter 3 : New People, New Places

(For @ninjago-fic-fest)

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 - Chapter 4

Summary: After he is retrieved from the lighthouse by his brother and new friends, Echo must adjust to his new life. Even though his new home and family are amazing, it's still so different from what he's used to. Maybe a walk in the city will help clear his mind.

Chapter 3

New People, New Places

Echo felt his pants pocket for about the tenth time since leaving the monastery. Yep, the communicator was still there.

He’d probably forget to check in as much as Zane wanted him to, but he promised himself he’d call his brother at least once on his outing.

At some point.

But not right now, there was too much to see!

And this place was like nothing Echo had ever seen before.

The streets bustled with cars and motorcycles of all shapes and colors. Tantalizing smells wafted from street vendors and out of restaurant doors. Bright signs advertising sales and 2 for 1 specials, sat outside of businesses, trying to bring in as many costumers as possible. People lined the sidewalks, arms full of the wares they had bought at the previous store, headed to the next vendor on their list.

It was so beautiful. The city was filled with more life and color than Echo thought possible.

And the buildings were all so tall! Sure, the lighthouse had been pretty sizable, but these buildings were ginormous!

Echo craned his neck to see the top of a particularly large building that looked to be near the center of the city. It’s shiny glass sides shone in the sun. The walls kept going up and up and up; crowned at the tippy top with a shimmering blue hologram that looked a bit like a stylized letter “C”. The hologram shimmered and warbled with static as a bird flew through the center of the digital image.

There were quite a lot of birds around, actually, Echo noticed. Pigeons strutted through the streets, larger black birds, probably crows or ravens, soared through the spaces between the many buildings. There were even some robins perched on some of the power lines that lined the roads.

Echo was looking at a particularly large black bird perched comic-ly on a rather small streetlight when a kid on a bike almost crashed into him.

“Wwhhhooooaaa!!!!” the kid yelled and swerved at the last second as Echo stumbled in the opposite direction. Both the bike and the kid fell to the pavement with a crash.

When he had recovered his balance, Echo rushed over to the kid sprawled out on his back and offered a hand to help him up.

“Are you okay?”, he asked urgently. He sincerely hoped the boy was alright; it had looked like a pretty nasty crash. But the kid suddenly jumped up from the street unaided, as if nothing had happened.

“Oh, don’t worry, I’m fine!”, he exclaimed, “I’ve crashed my bike hundreds of times!”

The boy looked a little disheveled, but he didn’t seem to be hurt too bad.

“Hundreds of times?” Echo asked, flabbergasted.

“Well, maybe not that many times, but I do crash a lot,” the kid answered, “I’m Nelson by the way, what’s your name?”

“Oh, I’m Echo,” the android replied, and stuck out his hand for a handshake like his brother had taught him to.

Nelson accepted his hand and shook it enthusiastically, “Nice to meet you, Echo! And um, sorry I almost ran you over,”

“It’s okay. I am glad that you are fine as well,”

“Thanks!”, Nelson replied with a smile.

Then his smile broadened, and his eyes widened.

"Whoa…sorry - this is - I just have to say – I can’t believe I’m meeting a real life nindroid!”, Nelson stuttered out, “This is so cool! I’ve seen some nindroids around town, but I’ve never actually met one before,”

Echo smiled wide.

He didn’t think anyone had ever called him “cool” before. It felt good. And from the sounds of it there were other nindroids in the city as well. That was an encouraging thought.

Pausing their conversation, Nelson crouched down by his bike to examine it.

“Oh no…” he groaned, “my mom’s gonna kill me...”

Echo gave Nelson a concerned look.

“Oh! Not really. It’s just an expression,” Nelson added with a laugh, seeming to understand Echo’s confusion. “She keeps telling me to be more careful when I bike in the city. So, she’s not going to be happy when she sees this,” he gestured to the overturned bike.

Echo took a closer look at the bike and saw the reason for Nelson’s distress. Not only had the chain come off the gears, which in and of itself would have been an easy fix, but the gears themselves were missing entirely!

He looked around for the missing gears, and finally spotted them scattered on the sidewalk a few feet away. He quickly retrieved the bike gears and went to hand them to Nelson.

“Are these what you’re looking for?” he asked.

“Oh, you found them! Thanks Echo!” Nelson exclaimed excitedly. And then he paused, seemingly deep in thought, “Now, how do I reattach these…”

Echo squatted down next to Nelson to get a closer look at the problem.

If there was one thing he knew, it was mechanics. He had reattached his own arm multiple times and had kept Ty-Dee in tip top shape over the years in the lighthouse. Echo figured he could reattach the gears easily.

With the right tools.

Which he didn’t have on hand.

“Hmmm. I think I can fix it, but I don’t have the tools right now…”

“You’ll help me fix it? Aw man you’re a life saver Echo!”

Echo stood up and considered their options.

“If you would like, we can take your bike back to my house and I can fix it there,”

“That sounds great! But I’ll have to ask my mom first,” Nelson rolled his eyes, “She doesn’t like me going to other people’s houses without her permission,”

“Hm. That seems like a good rule for her to have” Echo replied.

“Yeah, I guess,” Nelson admitted, “I’ll ask her and maybe I can come over with the bike tomorrow,”

“Sounds like a plan,” Echo nodded his head in agreement, “I suppose I shall see you tomorrow. It was very nice meeting you Nelson.”

“It was nice to meet you too,” Nelson replied with a smile.

Echo waved a quick goodbye and was just turning to leave when Nelson interrupted.

“Hey, I was headed to the Dairy Dragon for some ice cream. Y’know, before I almost crashed into you and all. But it’s kinda boring eating ice-cream all by yourself. Do you want to come?”

Echo considered the offer. The whole reason he had wanted to explore the city was, ironically in a city this size, to get away from people. But honestly, after talking with him for a bit, Echo kinda wanted to hang out with Nelson some more. Who knows? It could be the start of a new adventure.

“I would love to accompany you. But, um, what is ice cream?”

“You’ve never had ice cream before?!”, Nelson blurted, flabbergasted.

Echo thought back to all the different meals he had tried with his new family. Ice cream. Like the cream cheese frosting on his welcome home cake?

“Um. Is it like cake?”, Echo offered in response to Nelson’s bewilderment.

“If you like cake, you’re going to love ice-cream!”, Nelson replied, “Be prepared for deliciousness my friend! It’s this way!”

Nelson gestured for Echo to follow him as he wheeled his bike down the sidewalk towards a row of small shops.

Echo didn’t move from his place on the concrete.

Friend. He had made a new friend.

Echo stood smiling for a moment longer before Nelson shouted back to him.

“Are you coming, Echo?!”

“Coming!”, Echo shouted back and ran to catch up with his new friend.

It wasn’t exactly the alone time he had planned for the day, but that was okay.

He was glad to have met someone as nice as Nelson.

Broke through a little writers block on "The Lighthouse" via mentioning a spider web. I was like, yeah, there's a spider web in the corner, and then the transition from one scene to the next became clear. What even is writing? 🕷🕸🤷‍♀️