A/N PLZ RD:
So I've been experiencing some serious writers gizmo with my "NfaN" series and my "Dawn of the Nindroids," and just randomly started writing this to get me back into the swing of writing, aaanndd...I kinda liked it. I think it's only gonna be about 3-4 chapters long, or somethin', but I thought it was really cool. So, it's about Wu and Garmadon.

BTW- Garmadon's first name, in this book, is "Damon." I always thought that it was weird how he never had a first name, so i was playing around with the name Garmadon a bit, and you can spell the name "Damon" with letters out of Garmadon, so, I used that.

Oh, and Lloyd is adopted. ^-^ (read NfaN if you wanna know why!) ENJOY!

...

Nevermore

1: "IT"

Once upon a time, two brothers, ever close, became
divided. The eldest was corrupted by evil and fled their home.
And the youngest- he was left all alone.

It was exactly eight years ago when it began. The change. The sudden twist of events, a whimsical indecision of revolution, a mortifying ache of destiny. It was fate that caused everything, from that moment on, to become as it did, to add to the wrongness that already ate away at their relationship. 'They' meaning the couple that knew they couldn't always be, but would as they had the chance to, more or less adding on the stress it could suffer to their association with each other. It wasn't always that way, where she would sit in the rocking chair in the corner of their son's bedroom, staring out the window in hopes to maybe catch sight of him in the distance, his dark form moving like an endless, deep shadow, to be seen but never touched. At least that way, she would know he was looking out for them. For her. For their son.

But he never came.

Misako Garmadon never knew what to expect with her husband, since Damon was an irrational man, very impulsive. Not one person could predict what his next move would be. Not even his brother, Wu, but, then again, Damon didn't associate much with his brother anymore. Maybe it was his surprising attitude that drew her to him in the beginning. What made her so undeniably crested to follow with his affiliations, to his personality, she'd never know—no two people were more unalike than she and Damon Garmadon. He was one who enjoyed surrounding himself with people, with sound and music and crowds, who wanted to be looked at every time there was someone in the room. Misako, however, liked to stick to the back corner with her books and history texts, never other human beings.

She never understood why he'd chosen her, out of everyone he could've possibly met in his lifetime—it wasn't like she was special, or exciting. Maybe that was what drew her to him: he was exciting. That probably had a larger factor than most other things. Damon was new, fresh, and had a better sense of where the cool people went, where the fish actually swam. Misako was askew, never truly finding her purpose in life—until she met her son, but that was a different story to be told.

Regardless, Misako didn't have to be stupid to know that she was in love with him. She loved him more than she could've loved anything, and she knew that he knew it, too. Long after they began dating (at such a short age of sixteen, not an approved number for Misako's parents,) Damon seemed to finally start growing to love her, too. In the beginning, she could've been cynical of his original intentions, but she assumed she had her ways that even came unknown to herself. Eventually, it was Damon who pulled her down to the sea shore, Damon who knelt to one knee and held out a gleaming diamond, and Damon who practically begged she marry him.

Aside from his reddened eyes, Misako loved everything about him, and maybe eventually did have a soft spot for his gleaming crimson irises. She loved the sickly sweet tilt of his mouth, the soft palmetto of his wavy brown hair, the curve of his perfect eyebrows, the softness of his pale, pale skin, and his rows of flawlessly white teeth, flashing in chagrined grins every once in a while. His nickname used to be 'Cheshire,' until Misako and Damon parted from his usual crowd of friends, which Misako herself didn't mind—but would never say aloud. His friends were obnoxious, and she thought he knew it, too. His right senses settled in. And finally, she could have that storybook happily ever after that she'd only ever read about in novels, the perfect man to bring into her life, and the perfect man to keep at her side forever.

Except…she couldn't.

Snakes. She'd always despised snakes, but it's that exact lizard-creature that eventually took him from her. In the beginning, after he'd told her what had happened to him as a child, it didn't seem so far an issue, only that he had a sharp tongue when he never intended to hate. It was only on that very day that everything began to fall askew, and Misako's perfect storybook world crumbled into tiny fragments of nothing but memories.

…

Walking up their newly-installed flagstones towards their two-story home, Misako had no leering premonitions about the afternoon awaiting her. Really, it was more of an abstract day at the fair, reeling in plenty of dollars and endless amounts of useless stuffed animals, gleaming in all its normalness. Not to mention the sorrowful Julyness that came with aching heat, and the startling amounts of body odor reeking off those who were sweaty and showerless. Her hand wrapped around Damon's, her fingers tightening through his, to remind her that he really was there. Two years after their marriage, and Misako sometimes still found herself waking in the middle of the night to make sure that he was still in bed beside her, still real, still not a dream. Damon's hand closed tightly around hers in response. The warmth that spread through her body wasn't induced by the eighty-degree weather, nor the sun beating flushes across her skin.

Their home, white with chocolate brown shingles and a wraparound porch that Misako just loved, welcomed them back with the calla lilies and tulips she'd posted to guard for her. They settled in intricate arrangements around the deck, hanging, sitting on tables, dangling over the porch swing. She could never express how much she loved his place, loved the home that always gave and never took, that reminded her, once again, of the world that she had gained from meeting Damon. It was the home of her dreams. And the russet red cobble path made it all the better. Misako was planning on planting more flowers along the sides of the stones, to help greet her guests—not that she had many—and make her home more acceptable into the community.

But this wasn't the best part of the impeccable life Misako had implemented. The best part was the newest addition to their family.

Lloyd.

The baby was only two at the time. His words came out difficult, even though by then children were supposed to be experienced with language. However, he walked, and pointed, and smiled, and that was all she could've asked for. Carrying in his arms a stuffed bear that Damon had won for him at the fairgrounds, his face sticky with blue cotton candy that Misako procrastinated wiping off because he was too darn cute, the little boy trotted ahead of them, his small legs carrying him forward without hesitation. It had been a few months since Misako and Damon had welcomed their adopted son into their life. By now, Lloyd didn't remember much of his mother—at least, if he did, all was silent. He referred to Misako as "Mommy" now, a trend that he'd only begun a while ago. It was all she needed him to do. No more, no less—just call her "Mom" or "Mama" or even "Ma." She didn't care. But "Mommy" was what made her eyes fall into epic tears every time she heard it.

Misako found out about her inability to pregnancies long before they'd ever come across Lloyd. It had broken her heart—was her storybook world finally destroyed?—to know that she'd never get to have one. She hadn't even considered adopting, because the experience wouldn't be the same. But when they'd found that girl, dying, pleading, begging for them to take him away…she couldn't refuse. Who could've?

Damon had seemed skeptical at first. She knew he wasn't open to the idea of children, mostly because he complained about them all the time. But she knew—call it a woman's intuition—that Lloyd had grown on him the second they'd brought him home. It had been silly of her to worry that Damon wouldn't ultimately come to accept what was. She knew he would. For her. And eventually, for him, too.

The front door was always unlocked. Lloyd shoved it open with his tiny hands and ran inside, dragging his oversized plush behind him at such great speeds, Misako thought his legs would snap and break. He was a skinny baby. She trailed after him with a grin on her face, heart hammering with happiness—the rush of high, the feeling of personality that captured her every time she accepted it. Not once did she let Damon go.

His face was flushed. Not normally did anyone look at Damon and think he could've looked paler than normal, but Misako noticed it. She questioned him about it several times over the course of the day, but he always brushed her off, claiming she was pulling something of nothing. She had a sense something was wrong, but she would forever regret not doing something about it before it got worse. Misako played with the thermostat sitting in the entryway to turn the AC on while listening to the sounds of Lloyd's enthused cooing coming from up the stairs directly in front of her.

He slept in a separate room than they did on the upper floor—it was a quirk she didn't expect to gleam from a two-year-old—but a few nights ago, she'd woken to the sound of their bedroom door opening. Naturally, Misako was a light sleeper, but she'd been startled to roll over and find his tiny, light blue eyes peeking around the crack of their doorway. She'd smiled at him in the scanty rectangle of pale moonlight from the exit doors in their bedroom. (The doors led to a small sundeck off the back of their house.) "Hi, baby," she'd murmured, her voice groggy and light with sleep. He'd only blinked at her. "What is it?"

"Scared," he'd whispered. Misako had smiled, then, and opened her arms.

"Come sleep with Mama," she'd said, and that was all Lloyd had needed as cue; the tiny body had darted into the bedroom and jumped into her arms before one could say the word tenacious. She'd smiled at him, pulled him into the bed, and rolled him into the warm cocoon between Damon and herself, wrapping her arms around him and cradling his head tight to her chest. Later, when Misako asked, she'd learn that he had dreamt about dark, evil spiders with a thousand green eyes, but that was some other event.

Presently, Misako waded into the kitchen, an offspring of their entryway by their custom shoji doors. She could hear Lloyd's little feet running around in his room above her. He was probably introducing his new little bear—who, in the car, had decided he'd name "Falafel"—to all the other stuffed animals that Misako spoiled him with. She placed her purse onto the back of the chair, centered at her round table in the middle of their wide kitchen, and turned to see Damon dropping the keys onto the table as well. His chocolate brown hair fell into his eyes as he unclasped the first few buttons of his shirt, which Misako tilted her head, bird-like, to. A glimpse of his pale white skin underneath the cotton showed the tattoo etched across his collarbone. It was Misako's favorite: "I think, therefore I am." It was said by some philosopher that she couldn't name immediately. She knew she'd asked him a million times—believe it or not, Damon was a history major—but never processed who he'd claimed had spoken the wisdom. He glanced up to catch her staring—and blushed.

"What?" he asked, sounding edgy. Misako chuckled. His cluelessness of nothing made her want to laugh harder, only because she was with him, not because of humor. When she was around him, Misako felt like she was weightless, free. That was a feeling she'd never know again after this day was over.

"Oh, you know," she said, just to tease him, and moved closer. Damon's sculpted eyebrows furrowed, and his eyes narrowed in the way they always did when he was observing, listening for something: For your lies. He always had that special talent of knowing when someone was lying or not. She never figured out how, but had grown to not lie around him, which was probably more healthy than not. Her hands slid up his shoulders, across the warm, sun-baked cotton, and to cradle his neck between her palms, her eyes staring into his and smiling. Damon still looked speculative, which, Misako found, was normal. He didn't resist as she used her gentle grip on him to pull his face closer to hers until she could taste him.

Her heart fell into vivacious frenzies. That, too, was normal, as well as her heating cheeks when his hands slowly responded by holding onto her waist. Never would Misako become completely used to the feeling of someone loving her. She pulled his mouth deeper into hers. The fire of her body made the weather outside look puny compared to this. His mouth moved gently across hers, his full, lower lip completely stealing her own, his angle tilting with the slant of his head. The action, so simple, deepened their kiss. Deepened the love that she felt for him. She wrapped her fingers into his silky hair, and gasped when Damon pulled away, ending the intense feeling of flying too soon. She wanted to teasingly scold him for doing so, until she felt him rest his forehead against her shoulder.

Underneath her fingers, Damon's muscles tensed, as if he were preparing for something. She wouldn't have thought twice about it on any other day. But there was already something askew about her husband today, and she was too worried about his paleness, his standoffishness, his un-Damon-ness to brush it off. "Damon?" She whispered, and moved her hands over his shoulder line.

He never moved, but shivered. His arms wrapped around her waist, and from there he pulled her closer, clinging to her with a pounding heart to beat against hers. Tremors wracked his body, but not earthquake-equivalent tremors; just small ripples that reminded Misako of a side effect to the common cold. Was Damon getting a cold in this heat? She wondered if perhaps it was the AC, but pulled him closer, worried.

"Damon? Is everything alright?" she asked again.

Then, he pushed her away. The movement was so abrupt that it sent her stumbling back a few steps, her head reeling viciously from the corrupted movement. Misako stood back, stunned, for a moment. He hadn't ever done that before. She tried to process what had caused him to become so undoubtedly shove-y, but got a good look at him. He kept his head down as he rubbed the heels of his hands into his eyes. All she could see was chocolate hair.

"What's the matter?" she pressed. Damon turned his back on her.

"I'm fine," he said sternly. "Nothing to worry about."

"Damon?" Misako questioned. She stepped forward with a tan arm outstretched.

"I said I'm fine, Misako," he insisted, harshly. He whirled his crimson eyes on her, scolding and malicious. She flinched backwards. He's never looked at me like that before. "What part of that don't you understand?"

His sudden mood swing made her hurt, but she brushed it off. "I-I was worried," she answered, stuttering over her words. He turned away from her. It wasn't right, turning like that; Damon never turned away from her without saying something, or without a smile, or something that revolved around happiness. He was too loving to do so. Yet something prevented him from following tradition this time, and Misako was feeling more dread by the growing seconds. She slipped closer to him, even as Damon stood motionless, doing something with his hands she couldn't see. He never acted this way, not usually. She hadn't seen him ever respond in such vile cruelty. As a matter of fact, witnessing Damon's feral feelings had only ever occurred when something about his younger brother was involved, a subject she chose to avoid for that specific reason. Bothered, she inched forward with her hand out again. "Damon—"

"Don't touch me," he snapped, and Misako jumped away again. She saw him turn with cerise eyes, wretchedly gleaming, malevolent, devouring. Not once had she thought about that snake until today, not once since he'd told her, because initially he'd never told her what exactly a Devourer did. She knew hurt spread across her face, because, well, she was hurt by his words. His face. His actions. Something was wrong with him, something she wanted to heal him with, but didn't know how to provide for.

In his maturity, Damon's features softened from the animalistic snarl they had been. The hate melted away as quickly as it had come, feminized and replaced by undying love and devotion. Never before had Misako seen a look like that on his face—he looked crazed. Angry. Snarling with a ferocious desire to be feared, as jaded conjurers dealt wicked hands into his grasp. He wasn't himself in that precise few moments, all of what time Misako needed to see how this venom really affected him. A spur of the moment, a matched whistle of cries. She attempted to meekly brush off the experience, but for some reason, it was far clingier than a tattoo. She couldn't get the image of his awful face out of her mind. It burned the backs of her eyelids, stained the grace of her perception of him.

"I'm sorry," he apologized earnestly. She believed that he was. He turned back towards her and extended his arms. Damon's gaze bled regret, and she knew that what he'd done made him feel terrible. "I shouldn't have done that."

"No," she agreed. "You shouldn't have."

Misako was hesitant to slip into his arms. Was this the nasty revenge that Wu experienced when faced with his brother? Misako was never allowed to visit the monastery where Damon used to live after…IT had happened, under her own orders, not Damon's. And she got the feeling that, as much as she wanted to visit, to see Wu again, Damon was happier that she didn't go. She'd always had a sense he knew what had happened. Leaving Wu behind had broadened the reason that led to, no matter what road you took, the fact that Misako had made her choice. When it came to talking of his brother, Damon was always angry. His voice made spite. Had she complied to never go again, because of this exact reason, because she subconsciously knew what he was capable of?

"Come," Damon said. He looked pleading when he said so, but Misako heard the dim chip on his voice. Like it was a command. Would she listen to him? Allow herself to be manipulated by his handsome face into forgiving him?

What would I do, hold an eternal grudge over it? She thought, and moved into him.

But she couldn't help but regret it. Just a little.

…

IT. Oh, IT. Why did IT haunt him, like a ghost, constantly yearning at the corner of his peaceful mind, constantly making noises, never settling?

Wu found that he wasn't able to concentrate well. Not today. Something was bothering him, and he fell backwards from the lotus position he'd taken up, barely knocking over one of the eccentric candles he'd set up in a distanced circle around him. The purpose was to capture his inner peace, not repel it. But it seemed like that was all he was doing today: Failing. Failing to find peace was probably the most depressing fail he'd performed all day. Normally, this was the easiest and most-looked-forward-to part of his common day. Now…he was dreading it.

He wasn't a quitter. No. If anything, Wu Garmadon was a fighter. But, he wasn't going to deny the truth anymore. He'd tried fourteen times already to respawn inner peace. It just wasn't happening.

With a sigh, Wu abandoned the candles, still burning and welded by wax pooled at the bases to the floor. He left the room completely, the shoji doors slamming shut behind him. He just couldn't get IT out of his head, and it was hurting to think about, but it was so sickly sweet that he couldn't not think about it, and he was really sore, and he was tired, and he was frustrated and angry and upset and hurt and above all, Wu was heartbroken.

She hadn't come to visit. For two. Stinkin'. Years. There was no fairness in that. At. All.

He should've healed, moved on, gotten better by now. Two years was long enough time to rectify yourself, wasn't it? He'd missed her twentieth birthday, and she'd missed his nineteenth. He'd tried to find a way to contact her—phone, letter, anything—but every time he did, Damon blocked him. Stopped him. He'd claim some lie about her being busy with a guest, with laundry, pet-sitting, whatever lie he could produce at such short notice. With as much as Damon was against lying, he did it more than anyone Wu had ever met. It was just part of who his corrupted brother was.

Wu tried to find entertainment in the kitchen, but he realized that was as boring as finding peace. He stomped out of the room. The monastery was empty, unoccupied by anything but air, Wu and his carbon dioxide, the Golden Weapons, and memories of IT. Yeah, his father's ghost was in there somewhere, too, but Wu was usually too busy to listen to the falling of something off the shelf or the white whistling in the courtyard. It seemed like everywhere he turned, there was something he could see that would make him think of IT, and his heart would do this young squishy-thing where it twisted until he screamed. It reminded him of when Damon used to twist his arm behind his back until he yelled "Uncle" when they were kids.

Wu cracked his knuckles and threw open his bedroom door. It was…empty. Empty, empty, empty. Except for his bed. But empty nonetheless.

Empty of objects, but full of memory.

"GAHHH." Wu yelled frustratedly into the air. He whirled and slammed the door shut behind him. He hated this. Hated being alone, hated the quiet, hated being bored, hated being young and bored, hated that he couldn't think of anything better to do with his life than sit here and lament over losing the two people he ever loved, hated Da—

Did he hate Damon? Wu stopped in the middle of the hallway. He wasn't usually capable of so much hate, but the Demon of Jealousy was tickling him today. He was jealous because Damon had everything he did not. By eighteen, Damon was already flying out the monastery doors and crook-shanking it into his own home, with his beautiful wife to follow, and…

Maybe that was Wu's problem. He didn't get out much. Maybe he was experiencing a serious case of Cabin Fever.

Or Lovesickness, he thought. Wu grimaced and pinched his hand. "I am not lovesick," he said aloud, and stampeded down the hallway. No. No, no, no, no. Wu wasn't lovesick. He was…just…being…rudimentary.

Was he?

Quit second guessing yourself! He commanded his mind, and threw open the front shoji doors. The sun was hot, boiling the stone ground in the circular courtyard into a bake so hot, an egg could've probably been cooked and served to perfection. Being as bored as he was, Wu decided that it would be fine to go ahead and be stupid and give it a shot anyway. He came back a minute later, found the hottest spot of the gray, tan, and red stones of the inner monastery, and cracked an egg atop it. The yolk and whites pooled outwards. Then, Wu glared at it, then the sun, and flopped onto the ground beside it.

Surrounded by the monastery's great walls, he found himself alone. Alone…

Without her…

Why did he love her so much? Wu rubbed his forehead while staring at the pooling egg. Why was he so in love with his brother's wife? Why? Why? Why?

She just didn't strike him as the person to be with his brother. But then again, it was suspected that women of all great qualities were drawn to Damon like a moth to a flame. He was attractive. Appealing. Found funny things to joke about from absolutely nothing. He made jokes about forks seem hilarious. Wu had tried once, and had humiliated himself, even more mortified when Damon turned his fail into a joke for everyone to laugh at. The two brothers were the best of friends, once upon a time.

But not all stories came with a happy end.

Was Wu not good enough? Was he not good enough for Misako? Oh jeez. Oh, jeez. He'd just thought her name. Oh, GOSH, he'd sworn never to think her name again—Wu felt panicked, sitting upright and looking away from the unboiling egg for a second, swathed in fear. He'd broken the rule he hadn't broken since IT happened two years ago. Oh, jeez, now he was going to be completely and totally cursed for the rest of his—

No. Not cursed. Inspired.

The idea came to Wu, although it was an idea he'd had before and was technically stealing from his past self, but an idea regardless. He sat straighter, taller, and grinned at the oblivious egg; then, standing, dashed back into the monastery. He may not know exactly where his brother lived, but he thought he might know one of his brother's friends who might. It was something Wu normally wouldn't have considered, but…Okay, he had to admit it. It hurt too much to breathe right now. And yeah, he was kind of lovesick. He had to find a way to see her again. Just once. He had to see Misako.

…

Once upon a time, two brothers fell in love with the same girl.

It did not end well.

dun dun duuunnn! ^-^So. Yeah. Dunno if I'll continue this or not, but. I had fun writing it, aaannndd...I think I wanna do at least 1 more chapter. *shrugs* We'll see.

So, thanks for reading it or taking the time to glance at it, and please review, and go have an AWESOME day/night!

~Kairi