ASTRA'S BODY SEEMED to freeze in place as the Library shook again. Not happening, her brain insisted. Safe, it said desperately. Ninjago was safe. That was what her parents had said. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Lloyd reshelve all the books quickly, his green eyes flashing in fear and adrenaline.

"Astra, we have to go!" Lloyd yelled, and then he was tugging her out of the library when the protective doors shut on all of the precious information, and she sprinted up the stairs with him numbly.

Safe. Safe. Safe. Safe—someone screamed loudly from above them and Astra's brain finally registered that it was not safe, it was very much dangerous, and when the twins burst out of the spiralling staircase and onto the ground floor, Astra saw the first real lightsabers of her life in action.

Her father's blade was blue; the first thing she realised. Zaven's was blue as well, darker than Pa's, but different to Uncle Wu's green. Adeinne had an azure blue lightsaber in her hands as she moved fluidly through the battlefield. What the school grounds had become. Astra bit down on a shriek as a blaster shot ricocheted over her head, folding to the ground on instinct. Nothing from Zaven's class would help her here, why couldn't I get the Armed Combat professor, THREE ISKAVAS.

"Astra!" Lloyd had squished himself behind a large potted planet like she had, clutching his satchel to his chest in short breaths.

"We need to warn the students in the lower floors," Astra realised in horror. "They don't know what's happening, their teachers are up here—"

"We need to organise all the students. Get the firsts on the upper floors to come down to the lecture halls and I'll get everyone on the underground ones." Lloyd gave Astra a short nod, touching his right hand, which was in a two fingered salute to his chest. Astra did the same, and the twins split off in different directions with separate missions.

Astra's head was clear now that she had a goal, a plan already forming in her head. The youngest first. Get the most experienced surrounding them, should we send out scouts, oh why didn't I listen to Pa's lecture on battle strategy closer? She decided to start at the top and work her way doing, her suspicions confirmed that all the teachers had left their students loose in their classrooms.

On the top floor, in one of the Science classes, Astra corralled a small group of kids her age around the level to grab the rest of the kids, working their way down to the sixth, to the fifth, fourth, third, second, first and finally ground in her plan. The only ones who squabbled with her plans were the ones her age, squawking about;

"Why should the assistant tell us what to do?"

"Do you have a better plan, Chad? Shut the hell up and scout out passages, carefully, with Andrea." Astra had instructed. Now the large group of five hundred were attempting stealth sneaking down the stairs. She pushed everyone into groups of fifteen, with two older students amongst the youngest armed with stun blasters they'd raided from a locked classroom (the Internet, thank you for lock picking classes).

When the last group had disappeared down the stairs, Astra debated trying to help out the adults on the ground floor - blaster bolts and lightsaber battles were still raging across the courtyards and open grounds. She saw her mother let off two confident shots that stunned grey and black cloaked people, and decided the adults would have to cope until the students were calm and collected.

Descending into the biggest lecture hall (the seven to eight hundred odd kids were stuffed to the absolute brim in here, honestly, how had Wu and Morro scouted this many out?), Astra began helping Lloyd section everyone into age groups and catalogue inventory of weapons. A team of the oldest students a couple years older than Astra and Lloyd had shaken out of their shock and were building barricades on the doors.

They knew so little about the battle, but Astra was absolutely exploding on the inside with the information she and Lloyd had learnt in the Library.

"What have we got?" she managed to gasp out at a random kid - Cole? He was all muscle and a bit clumsy with the practice tools in Zaven's class, but he'd immediately protected all the younger kids on the way down.

"Three full Jedi kits, twenty five blasters, three training sabers and food and water from lunch." Cole summarised, pointing to a pile of resources that Jay and a boy with white hair were guarding.

"Okay...okay," Astra massaged her temples and pointed to the boy next to Jay. "Who's that?"

"That's Zane Julien," Cole said, frowning at Astra. "Why are you doing this?"

"Huh?"

"Helping us. The others treat you like crap, let's be honest. They treat me like crap too."

"They have no leadership skills, my parents are up there and possibly dead, and no one else really seems to care or understand what's happening." Astra hissed. "We have defensive shields up all around the planet, and a blockade around us. That means someone let these guys in."

"And the only person..." Cole realised, wide eyed, "The only person who's come through recently is Princess Skylor."

Astra nodded solemnly. "Well, not specifically her. It could be her guard, one of her friends that she brought with her, her servants, even her pilot could have helped them."

There was a loud bang from upstairs and a scream Astra thought might have belonged to one of the teachers.

"LET ME GO," she heard Lloyd yell from a scuffle by the wooden doors. "Get off me, Kai!"

"No, Lloyd, don't be an idiot, your parents will be fine!" Kai fought back against the shorter boy. "Stop it!"

Astra flinched at yet another explosion and a cacophony of screams and shouts that followed. But it was the next yell that launched her into action. Her father had only been injured badly a few times because of farm equipment, yet this shout sounded ten times worse and more painful. How she singled out his voice and her mother's reassuring, choked one out of the mayhem above remained unknown.

"Let us out of here, Kai," Astra snatched two blasters from the pile of weapons and tossed one to her brother. "I will stun you, so don't give me crap about my parents being fine."

Lloyd nodded, charging up his blaster with a grimace. "Keep everyone here safe. You, Cole, Nya, Jay, and Zane should be able to keep everything in order."

"Get Kade or Rema to help you if you need more hands. Don't let Chad or Morro open their stupid mouths to say some bullshit." Astra added, sticking her head out of the door. "Clear."

"Oh, and keep the princess safe!" Lloyd whispered shouted unsubtly, following Astra out the door.

"Hey, no, I still didn't say you could go—" Kai stuttered at a loss for words. "Don't die!"

"We'll try!" Lloyd called back cheekily. Astra ran up the stairs, listening carefully for her parents amidst the battle. Lloyd was doing the same, his blaster charged to stun.

"We can just," Astra mimed shooting an invisible crowd of enemies with her blaster, "And then look for them?"

"Sounds stupid," Lloyd considered carefully. "Sure, let's do it."

Astra quickly checked the stairwell and found it empty, all the noises were coming from the open grounds now. The twins moved fast and steadily towards the battle, blasters in their shaking hands as they entered the blood-bathed stage. The teachers were using more of their abilities than Astra had ever seen before - launching rebels into the air, slashing and spinning their lightsabers, destroying the front gardens and fields for cover.

Her eyes scoured the grounds for her parents, until finally, finally, she caught sight of them. Misako's blaster was firing every second in a new direction, the blue bolts hitting their mark every time. She moved strangely though, limping every time she had to shift her whole body. Astra's father wielded his lightsaber with practiced expertise, her mind running through all the parts anxiously. The only thing she'd learnt would be put to use, and nothing looked out of order.

They finally noticed Lloyd and Astra amidst the chaos, Misako's eyes widening in shock.

"No!" she shrieked, blasting a black-cloaked attacker. She leapt over slumped bodies that Astra prayed to the moons weren't people she knew, and then Misako's trembling hands were cupping her face, her mother was pressing a kiss to her brow and Lloyd's.

"What are you doing here?"

"Saving you," Astra tried to say confidentently. "What happened? Who are these people?"

Misako blasted another person and pulled the twins behind a column. Astra bit down on her tongue as she saw her father stumble back but then lunge forwards in attack. Be safe, don't die, she chanted to herself. Be safe, don't die. Be safe, don't die. Be safe, don't—

"You need to go."

"I want to help," Lloyd blurted out, waving his hand towards the battle. "Let us help!"

"You are my students. You are under my care, but most importantly you are my children. I will not let you be in harm's way."

"It goes both ways," Astra protested, "If you won't let us be in danger, then you can't either. Not fair."

Misako spluttered in exasperation, then set their stunners to maximum with deadly calm. "Stay in protected areas with high ground. You're shooting to stun now. Practice on Varenna will kick in like riding a bike. Stay safe."

Astra weighed the blaster with a much more confident grin, "Got it. You better stay safe too Ma."

Lloyd fired off a practice shot at the wall and squawked when the dangerous bolt rebounded. Misako ran back out into the battlefield and Lloyd tugged Astra towards one of the spindly towers that was overlooking the front gardens.

The curved, cream-coloured walls were interrupted by a small balcony that jutted over the greenery, providing them with a perfect spot to overlook the people. Astra checked all the settings and switches - what they had in their hands were small, compact blasters, but they were deadly.

And even if they were shooting to stun, the right placement would kill someone.

She took the first shot, the blaster not even reverberating in her hands at the bolt connected with someone's body. They crumpled to the ground in a swathe of black cloth, umoving. Astra and Lloyd exchanged confident, silent glances, and began shooting like their lives depended on it.

Because they kind of did.

Vareena, Two Years Ago

"Astra, binir, aim less for your brother and more for the targets." her father sighed, shooting one of the metal plates himself. The red bolt ricocheted off harmlessly, sending up a storm of sand where it landed. "Try again."

At thirteen years of age, Astra wasn't exactly torn up about being a bad shot - that was, until Lloyd suddenly could do trickshots and land perfect bolts on the targets without even breaking a sweat. That left her two options: shoot her brother or get better than him. The first was funnier right now, but it was getting kind of boring.

So Astra actually listened to her father, began aiming for the targets properly, checking all the settings and the power capsule, holding the blaster so much that it became second instinct. Lloyd's skill improved as hers did - his aim was never off, he clearly enjoyed being good at another thing, so slowly, Astra stopped the competition with herself.

Her parents let her take her training blaster with her wherever she went because they knew for all the good there was on Vareena, there was bad. The first time she'd used it was on the way home from school. Lloyd had gone to gang out with Brad and Gene (unwisely, as she'd warned him), so Astra was heading towards Nya's house. Instead of wasting time and going the long, safer, way, Astra took many shortcuts and somehow found herself in an alley.

Three guys cornering a thirteen year old hardly seemed fair. Then again, they were armed with crooked teeth and ugly smiles, and Astra had a blaster, training or not. The force from the weakened stun was enough to send them backwards and give her time to get the hell out of there. She never stopped practicing, but the time she spent on it dropped when she began getting into podracing. An hour or so a week kept her skills above rusty, but there was no way she'd ever imagined what would happen in two years' time.

"Duck!" Astra's breath caught in her chest as Lloyd pulled her down.

"They know we're here," Lloyd's green eyes widened in fear as the thundering of footsteps began to reach them.

"Up," Astra decided quickly. They didn't have time. "Go up."

She swung herself up onto the balcony railing first at Lloyd's older sibling protection excuse, her sneakers slipping and sliding as she dug her feet into the stone cracks in the wall of the tower. This tower, she was pretty sure, served no purpose and was simply there for the architecture. The green vines spread across the tower face, helping Astra pull herself up onto the out-jutting roof of the overhang.

The footsteps stopped and shuffled around below them, soft voices muttering.

"Not here, Captain."

"Move on. Kids can't do much in battle anyways." ordered the gruffest voice, and the footsteps retreated. Astra went to tug her brother back down, but he shook his head frantically, pointing at the balcony. A black hand rested on the railing, half covered with vines and leaves. Someone had remained behind. Lloyd held a single finger up to his lips, then fell off the balcony.

The person below had somehow predicted Lloyd's terrible decision, moving swiftly to counter the surprise attack. Lloyd managed to tackle them across the balcony to a bit of open space that Astra could peer down in. Their head was right below her, so it was only natural that Astra grabbed the nearest clay flower pot and dropped it.

"Hey, you almost got me!" Lloyd complained. Astra rolled her eyes and dropped from the roof, checking to make sure the guy was properly knocked out. "We have to go. Looks like we're winning but they're ganging up on Master Adeinne."

Astra ran down the stairs with Lloyd on her heels, recharging her blaster with quick reflexes whenever she shot out a stunner. They reached Adeinne in a nick of time, stunning the four out of eight men who were trying to swarm her. The experienced professor took the rest over, launching into a quick fire attack with her lightsaber.

"We're rounding up the rest, now. Where are the other students?" Adeinne asked urgently, crouching down to rifle through one of the attacker's robes. Her eyes widened and she stepped away holding her lightsaber tightly in one hand, the other taking something out of the robe pocket.

"Down in the lecture halls," Astra said, frowning at the teacher's strange behaviour. "I think we've got all the students there. What should we do?"

"Find the oldest, and most experienced. I assume you've found blasters and training sabers? Yes, take those with you and sweep the Academy floor by floor. I'll go ahead right now so you'll just be double checking. Stay safe, twins." Adeinne said softly, and then the teacher was running away, making a seemingly-impossible jump up onto a balcony.

"That was weird, wasn't it?" Astra said.

"Why'd she want to go ahead? We could have done it ourselves — not like there's anymore bad guys to whack on the head." Lloyd stared at the stunned man's body and shook his head. "Let's go."

"Yeah, yeah," she muttered, "Lead the way."

The Masters of Energy and Death walked away from a pair of sharp eyes, not once turning back.

If they had, maybe they could have stopped what chaos was to follow.

A/N: hope you enjoyed! I really thought i'd spend more time writing in the holidays but i've got so much work ahhh—

- dommie out

𝙖𝙣𝙣𝙤𝙪𝙣𝙘𝙚𝙢𝙚𝙣𝙩

man, guys, I'm really sorry to do this (ah those fateful words come), but I am officially putting the ninjago academy of jedi on hiatus. i realised that I haven't written this fic in ages, and I'm about to go through two of the hardest, suckiest years of schooling in my life. i want to finish up rtw as soon as I can, and maybe focus on some original works.

i will still be doing oneshots, though, and might have a new fic coming out soon? idk just yet, so that's up in the air. i might come back, but if I don't, you'll know when I release a chapter with the plot and what was supposed to happen if I carried on writing. I'm really sorry to do this but I've been thinking over this for a while and I just want to lighten to the loads for myself. that's the reason why I've uploaded like five chapters in half an hour, otherwise,

-dommie out :)