Lloyd woke with a start.

He was covered in a cold sweat.

Panicked, he touched his head, then checked his arms and patted his torso, as if to make sure he was still in one piece.

He looked around to orient himself. A sigh of relief escaped his throat when he realised that he was still in his room at the monastery.

Lloyd jumped out of bed and hurried towards the window.

He pushed the sliding pane aside and hungrily sucked in a breath of fresh air.

It was already early morning and a faint shimmer of daylight had appeared on the horizon.

Lloyd rubbed his face with both palms and shook his head, trying to shake off the images still haunting him from his nightmare.

What a horrible scene.

He wondered where it had come from.

Feeling a little better already,

Lloyd closed the window and went to the bathroom to get ready for the day.

In his sleep-deprived state, Lloyd dozed off during their morning meditation session.

He was supposed to focus his gaze on a blank spot on the wall, draining all thought from his mind, but as he sat there, motionless, his eyelids became heavier by the minute.

He tried hard to concentrate, but his head swam.

The off-white plaster on the wall bristled and the sandy molecules started swirling.

The tiny grains danced before his eyes, then formed into a distinct shape.

A hooded head peeled itself off the wall, turning black as it closed in on him.

In the impenetrable mist inside the hood, two red glowing eyes opened, staring at him like two burning laser beams.

Lloyd shivered at the sight.

The room around him dissolved and he found himself back on the barren battlefield of his dream.

The faceless warrior extended an arm from his cloak and raised his sword. He would strike any second…

A sharp pain in his side hauled him back into consciousness.

Lloyd expelled a shaky breath and turned his head to look at Cole, who sat on a cushion beside him.

“Hey, are you okay, buddy?”, Cole asked. “You look pale.”

One corner of his mouth kicked up in a smirk.

“If you must fall asleep during meditation, at least try not to moan in your sleep.”

Lloyd rubbed his side wih his palm.

“Thanks for waking me, Cole,” he whispered back.

“But next time, leave my ribs where they belong, will you?”

Cole merely shrugged, then resumed his pose, before Master Wu would scold them for breaking the meditative silence.

At breakfast, Nya let herself drop into the chair next to Lloyd.

She eyed him critically from the side.

“Are you okay, Lloyd? You look like you’ve been run over by a noodle truck.”

Lloyd arched an eyebrow.

“Thanks, Nya. That’s… truly uplifting.” He sighed. “The truth is, I didn’t sleep so well last night. This nightmare keeps haunting me.”

“Nightmare? What nightmare?”, Kai asked. He had sat down on the chair opposite Lloyd’s and had overheard their conversation. Lloyd recounted his dream about the faceless warrior.

“That sounds horrible, Lloyd,” Nya said compassionately.

“No wonder you haven’t been sleeping,” Cole piped in.

“The human brain is a fascinating and complex structure,” Zane joined their discussion.

“When you sleep, images from the scenes you have witnessed, people you have met or places you have been to resurface and your subconscious combines them and weaves them into a story, which appears completely plausible and realistic while you dream it.

In 90.6 percent of cases, you do not remember your dream when you wake up.

That is, of course, the average,” he added, almost apologetically.

Lloyd shrugged. “But I have never seen those creatures before, nor have I ever been to that plateau where the battle took place.”

“Maybe it’s not an image from your past,” Jay mused. “Maybe it’s a vision from the future.” He wiggled his hand for dramatic effect.

All heads turned in the Blue Ninja’s direction.

Jay froze, his chopsticks hovering in mid-air on the way from his rice bowl to his mouth.

His eyebrows shot up in question.

“What?”

Cole cleared his throat. “We didn’t really think you were paying attention.”

Nya quickly chimed in when she saw Jay’s expression darken.

“But I think you may have a point there, Jay.”

She turned around. “What do you think, Master Wu?”, she asked, addressing their teacher.

A few seconds ticked by, while Wu deliberated his answer.

With a sigh, he asked Lloyd to repeat his description of the enemy he had encountered in his dream.

“Those black warriors, Lloyd, tell me again – exactly – what they looked like.”

When Lloyd had finished his report, Wu briefly closed his eyes, then pushed back his chair and rose.

“Excuse me, students, I need to do some research.”

His hand clasped his bamboo staff a little more tightly than usual.

“I have an idea who we might be dealing with here.”

He turned to leave, but stopped again to look back over his shoulder.

“But I do hope that I am wrong.”

With heavy steps, he left the room and closed the door behind him.

The friends looked at each other.

“Well, that wasn’t worrying at all,” Cole said, sarcasm dripping from every word.

Zane eyed his friend carefully. “Just for my edification, you actually mean you are worried, correct?”

Cole sighed. “Yes, Zane. It’s called irony.”

“Actually, that’s sarcasm,” Zane corrected him.

When Cole rolled his eyes, Zane quickly added, “Never mind, I was just checking.”

“Cole is right,” Kai said, rubbing his chin, deep in thought. “If Master Wu is dreading the answer, it must be really bad.”

“But why am I seeing those things? Why me? Why now?”, Lloyd asked, no one in particular.

“Well, for one, you are the Green Ninja,” Nya said. “Besides, stranger things have happened.”

Jay scoffed. “Don’t get me started.”

He winked at her and she gave him a lopsided smile in return.

Lloyd wondered if they were referring to something specific. He had the impression that an unspoken understanding had passed between them.

“Maybe something triggered it,” Zane suggested.

“Excellent idea, Zane,” Kai lauded.

“Lloyd, has anything unusual happened to you recently?”, Nya asked.

“Aside from the usual unusual,” Jay muttered.

“Sure. Kai managed to hit me and score a point. That was quite out of the ordinary.”

He grinned, then quickly shifted his position to dodge the chopsticks flying towards him from Kai’s direction.

“Told you your aim was off,” Lloyd teased.

“Watch you mouth, you little candy thief,” Kai countered.

That gave Lloyd pause.

Before Nya could give him her told-you-so speech, he lifted his palm to ask for silence.

“Wait a minute. That girl with the candy! What was her name again? The doctor’s daughter?”

“Granddaughter,” Zane corrected him. “Her name is Helen.”

“Right! When Helen was here and checked my ribs…”

“You mean, when she felt you up?”, Kai teased.

“I mean, right after you had your totally random, lucky strike.”

Kai crossed his arms and pouted, but remained silent.

Lloyd continued his train of thought. “She touched the spot above my heart and I felt…”

“Ooooh,” Jay hooted, “you felt something.” Grinning, he shaped his hands to a big heart.

Nya slapped him on the wrist and rolled her eyes. “What are you, twelve? Go on, Lloyd. What happened next?”

“I felt a jolt of energy and it made me feel dizzy for a moment. Like my Elemental Power short-circuited.”

Lloyd visibly struggled to find the right words to properly describe the feeling.

Zane nodded. “I can completely relate to that.”

“And the girl was acting strangely, too,” Lloyd said, ignoring the Nindroid. “Like she had felt something as well.”

“You should go see her and ask her about it,” Nya suggested. “Do you want me to come with you?”

“Hehe, I believe he would rather go alone,” Jay said smugly.

Lloyd narrowed his eyes.

“I can manage this perfectly on my own, thank you.”

He glared at Jay.

“And stop wiggling your eyebrows. It’s annoying.”