Almecho could hear the wind howling outside. He snuggled deeper into his blanket and pulled his woolen cap down lower on his head to keep warm. He checked his watch; it was nearing midnight. If he fell asleep in the next half an hour, he would get a total of four hours of sleep before they set off again.
The North Pole was near.
He could feel it.
Somewhere deep within his blanket, his satellite phone rang. He silently thanked his friend Adrian, who had suggested and bought him the phone to use during the expedition.
"Hello?" he answered.
"Hey sweetie, how you holding up?" It was Amy, his girlfriend.
"Well, I can't sleep thanks to the biting cold. If the wind outside keeps up, I fear it may blow away the tent I'm in and me with it. Other than that, not bad," he replied. He smiled and wondered if his happy tone would indicate that he had done so to Amy. "How're you?"
"Not bad." There was a pause. "I miss you."
"I miss you too." He took a deep breath. "I'll be with you real soon. We're almost at the pole. After that, I'll be home in three weeks."
"I know; I have marked the calendar. You know, I wish you hadn't gone. I'm lonely."
Almecho said nothing. He wished he hadn't left either. All he wanted at that moment was to be at home with Amy, snuggling on their couch watching a movie together. But he had no choice.
The visions were getting worse.
It tormented him. Visions of people – faces he'd never seen before yet so familiar. He kept seeing them. And it confused him. Scared him.
Who were they? Why was he seeing them?
None of them ever said a word. They just stood there in silence in a never ending queue, staring at him with equally confused faces. And then they would vanish.
"Hello? Almecho?"
"I'm here," he finally spoke. He wondered how long he had stayed quiet.
"Is everything alright?" she said with a worried tone.
"Everything's fine. It's just that the wind is howling so much, I got distracted," he lied.
"Well, you stay safe. And be back in one piece. I love you."
"Love you too."
He put the phone back inside the blanket.
For the last couple of months, he had had a different vision. The people were gone. In their stead he now saw a frozen lake with a light glowing beneath it. He didn't know how but he instinctively knew where it was. At the North Pole. Finally, a clue he could follow. He had left his job and undergone training to hike frigid environments. After about a year, he had finally gathered enough people interested enough to hike to the pole and convinced his parents to sponsor his expedition to the North Pole. And then, he had left.
All those decisions had put a strain on his relationship with Amy. They had broken up a few months after he had left his job. It was only recently that they had gotten back together, after he had reached out to Amy and convinced her things would be the same after this expedition.
Tomorrow. He would locate the frozen lake. He knew where he was.
And it worried him. How could he know that?
Amy lay on her bed with the television remote in hand. She was flipping through the channels searching for something interesting to watch. Anything to take her mind off of Almecho. She needed to stop worrying about him. He could take care of himself. And in three weeks, he would be back and things would be just like how it was a year ago. Before he'd suddenly quit his job.
Feeling an urge to relieve herself, she left her bedroom and headed for the toilet. Relieved, she crawled back underneath the blankets and grabbed the remote to change the channel. She was about to change the channel, a news channel, when a picture of several planets caught her eye. She was a musician but interested in astronomy nonetheless. Any information regarding the celestial bodies caught her eye.
The planets were animated and shown to be aligning. In the background, a news reporter was narrating.
'Tomorrow, early in the morning at nine o'clock, all the planets in the system will be aligned perfectly together. Scientists around the world are excited for this event that occurs once every ten-thousand years. Nearly all the universities in the country are providing a chance to watch the event to the interested…'
Amy had heard about this event from one of her friend. It was big news all over the world.
'Of course, an event of this scale is bound to attract the fanatics. Several groups are calling this event the end of the world. They proclaim this event, dubbed the 'Harmonic Convergence', will release a demon called Waatu from the underworld who will wreak havoc on the world. There have been reports of mass suicide across the globe…'
Amy switched the television off. The last thing she wanted to hear about was suicides. She threw away the remote. In the darkness, she could hear a soft thud as it landed on the carpeted floor. With a tired sigh, she put her head down on the pillow and drifted to sleep.
Almecho woke up to the sound of people screaming. He wasn't sure of what he had heard until he stepped outside his tent rubbing his eyes when something warm splashed his face. It took him only a moment to realize that it was blood. The smell. Thickness. The warmth. The screaming.
Almecho looked up. Atop a small hill, made of ice a few metres away, stood a dark figure. The screams around him faded seemed to fade away as he slowly registered what he was seeing. It was a huge figure, black and … transparent. He could see right through the creature as if it were made of gas. It had several appendages protruding out of its back. One if it held … Almecho's stomach lurched. It held high a severed leg as if proud of it.
Suddenly, the screams came back to his ear. Almecho screamed too. Anyone would have upon seeing such a gruesome and strange sight. And, in the sea of screams, the creature seemed to have heard him.
Almecho knew he had been noticed. Unsure of what to do, he started running. He heard the creature howl and start chasing after him. He ran as fast he could but he knew he could only run so much before the creature caught up with him. The deep snow and his bulky clothes slowed him considerably.
The deep snow?
Almecho looked down at his feet. With every step he took, the snow underneath his foot hardened into ice. He couldn't believe his eyes. Another howl behind him brought his focus back to running. Whatever was happening to the snow, he could study it later. If he escaped the creature. No, he would escape the creature.
He threw away his gloves and started unbuttoning his jacket. Very soon, he was running much faster without the bulk of clothes on him. He could worry about hypothermia later. For now, he had to worry about not being ripped limb from limb by the creature that was still following him.
The wind had stopped blowing and the air was now still. All Almecho could hear was the sound of his own breath, his footsteps and those of the creature following him. How long had he been running? Five minutes? Ten? Thirty? He didn't feel tired at all.
Was it the adrenaline?
It must be the adrenaline, he decided.
The creature behind him suddenly let out a roar. It stopped in its tracks before turning around and running away in the other direction. He saw its figure recede as it made its way back to the camping area where there were plenty of other victims.
Almecho suddenly began to feel cold. He was alone now, standing on ice on a vast desert of snow. Now that the creature was gone, he finally began worrying about the possibility of dying by hypothermia. He was wearing nothing but two layers of woolen vests and a sweater on his upper body. He had thrown his gloves and jacket away.
The thought of being killed by the creature came to his mind. Perhaps, that would be a better way of dying than freezing to death all alone.
Perhaps he should not have run. Sure, he had screamed when he saw the creature holding a severed leg. But in retrospect, he thought, he wasn't exactly frightened of the creature. The only reason he had run was because he knew the creature would kill him and dying wasn't exactly on his mind. He still had to find the lake.
He had to find the lake.
That's why he had run. He had to find the lake. It was calling him. It would explain why he had been seeing those people. He would not die just yet.
He would find the lake.
Amy woke up to the sound of the telephone ringing on her bedside table. She fumbled around in the darkness for a while before finally finding the receiver.
"Hello?" she answered sleepily.
"I have been calling you for the last twenty minutes continuously! Why didn't you pick up?"
"Uh … who is this?"
"It's Adrian. Why weren't you picking up your phone?"
Adrian. He was Almecho's friend. Amy checked the clock on her cellphone which showed fourteen missed calls from Adrian.
"It's four in the morning Adrian. I was asleep and my cellphone was on silent," she answered. She rubbed her eyes and let out a yawn.
"Well wake up and turn on the television. You need to see what's on the news."
"What? About that alignment thingy? The uh … harmonic convergence?"
"No, not that. Just turn it on and go to channel seven."
Amy put the telephone on loudspeaker and sat up with a groan. She had thrown the remote on the ground earlier which meant she'd have to get out of bed and get it. She switched on her bedside lamp and shuffled out of the bed. Grabbing the remote off the carpet, she walked back to her bed and flopped down on it.
"This better be good," Amy said.
"Trust me; it is."
She changed channels to channel seven as Adrian had said.
"They're talking about those weird upside down ancient temples. What's so special about that?" she asked.
"Keep watching. They recently managed to open a door locked by quite a complicated mechanism. What they found inside is quite interesting."
"That's it? Seriously Adrian, you woke up at four in the morning just to tell me that?" She was getting annoyed. "Besides, couldn't they have drilled through the door?"
"It's an ancient sacred temple. They wouldn't do that. And no, I didn't wake you up just to for that. Keep watching. This is a rerun of the news they showed last night at nine. If you'd watched it, you would have called me but you didn't. So, I woke you up. And just in time too. Look, they're entering the room."
The news reporter were now entering a rather large – no – tall room. There was a large statue of a man wearing the traditional dress of the southern country in the middle. In a line that spiraled upwards towards the ceiling were various other statues.
'This finding is a great new discovery. It further adds mystery to the old legend of the so-called 'Avatars' – people of immense power tasked with maintaining peace in the world. The researchers believe the statues in this room are of all the Avatars that have existed since their creation…'
"I know you think it's a fairy tale – we all do," Adrian was saying, "but keep watching."
Amy sighed and continued as Adrian requested.
'There are one hundred and ninety one statues in this room with the latest one built about five thousand years ago. They are dressed in sequence with the latest one dressed in the traditional dress of the Southern Country, the second one with the dress of Northern Country, the third one with the dress of Western Country and the fourth one with the dress of Eastern Country. After that, the pattern repeats. Strangely, none of the statues in this room wear the dress of Republic City even though it is as old as the other four country.
'The pattern is broken only once – the reason all the researchers are excited. Though it is worn down, the sixty-fourth statue is clearly wearing a dress that can only be described as modern…'
When the camera showed the statue in question, Amy let out an audible gasp.
"See, you needed to see this," Adrain said, having heard the gasp. The telephone was still on loudspeaker.
The statue had a face of a person Amy knew too well. A person who was currently on an expedition to the North Pole.
Almecho trudged through – no – walked on the snow that became a solid block of ice underneath his feet every time he stepped on it. If not for that, he would have been miles behind. He still didn't know how it was happening; whether he was somehow doing it subconsciously or if the snow was doing it itself.
He knew he was close to the lake.
He could feel it.
It felt as if someone invisible was pushing him from behind, guiding his path. And now, the push was getting stronger.
He was very close.
His hands had gone numb from the cold. His ears felt as if someone had twisted it and clipped it. He was shivering to the bone from the cold. He had to find the lake fast.
He walked slowly through the uneven landscape full of small hills made of ice. It was getting misty and windy and Almecho had a hard time keeping his eyes open because of the cold air. But still, he pressed on.
He had been walking for over an hour when something hard hit his back. The force launched him into the air and he landed on hard ice a few feet away. Clutching his right arm, on which he had landed, he stood up and turned to face the assailant.
It was the creature. Because of the howling wind, it had managed to sneak up on Almecho. And now, it looked ready to kill. It hunched, ready to pounce on him. But before it could do so, a huge golden snake-like creature materialized out of the mist and knocked the creature away. The snake turned to look at Almecho; he could tell by its expression that it was an intelligent creature.
"Run Raava!" it exclaimed before turning back to attack the black creature.
Almecho wasted no time. He turned heel and ran as fast as he could, leaving the snake to fight the black creature.
He could hear roars and hiss behind him as the two strange creatures fought each other. Loud cracks and thuds echoed and pierced his ears through the noisy wind as the two smashed each other into ice and snow.
It wasn't much further now. He could feel it. He could see it.
In the distance, the ground glowed where it should not. He knew it was the lake. He had found it.
And why wouldn't he find it? He had been here before after all. No, he had never been here. Or had he? He couldn't tell. He felt as if he'd come to this place a hundred of times yet he was sure that he had never set foot on the arctic before this expedition. Yet somehow, he remembered the place in a way only someone who had been to it would.
Soon, he was no longer running on snow that turned to ice but on ice itself. He was on the lake. And buried underneath it, in the center, was what he had been looking for. Something that would answer all his questions.
The ice underneath him suddenly cracked, giving away to his weight and plunging him in freezing water. He screamed in pain internally as the coldness bit his entire body, driving it numb instantaneously. He forced his eyes to open; in the darkness, all he could see was the globe of light glowing a few metres away.
He forced his arms and legs to move, to swim to that globe of light. His entire body ached with every movement but he knew he could not stop. He was so close.
He extended his arms.
He was almost there.
Just a touch.
Prince Rahul of the fire nation sat meditating in his room. This was his only moment of peace before he left for war tomorrow. A war with the Earth Kingdom led by the one who was supposed to bring balance to the world but instead had chosen to spread chaos.
His meditation was interrupted by the arrival of one of his servants.
"Sire! I have important news!" His servant paused for breath. "They have him! They have captured the Avatar!"
Prince Rahul, escorted by a team of elite fire-benders, entered the village of Hirahara. The report had come from General Anita, one of his most trusted personnel. If she said the Avatar had been captured, it meant the Avatar had been captured. How that was possible, he did not know. But he was about to find out.
"Prince Rahul, thank you for coming," General Anita greeted him in front of a large makeshift fortress in the middle of the village. It had been built by earth-benders loyal to the order of the White Lotus.
"General Anita," Rahul said with a nod. "So, you captured the Avatar?"
"About that; we do have the Avatar but it is complicated," she answered.
"How so?"
"Let me show you."
She led the Prince into the fortress. Once inside, earth-benders opened up a secret passage that led underground, beneath the fortress above.
"We found him on the beach off the coast dressed in strange clothing. He was completely drenched in icy water."
"Icy water?"
"Yes. His body was cold and his heart was barely breathing. If not for the water-bender healers with us, he would have died in a few hours."
"Wait a minute Anita. Why would you save the Avatar? You know we are at a war with him."
"Because he's not the Avatar leading the Earth Kingdom."
"What do you mean?"
They stopped in front of a prison cell. General Anita motioned for Prince Rahul to look inside.
The cell was lit with four torches in each corner. Bound by chains to the back wall was a figure in clothes the Prince had never seen before.
"The reason we know he's an Avatar is because he sent the healers treating him to the infirmary despite being on the brink of death. His eyes were glowing - tell me who else can do that besides the Avatar."
Prince Rahul peered inside the cell. "But how can there be a second Avatar?"
"I don't know my Prince. But with one Avatar gone bad, I wonder if the Avatar spirit chose another one."
"There's only one way to know for sure. The test of the Avatar relics."
"I'll have the Nation Elders bring it here tomorrow morning."
"Have them bring it here by tonight. I ride to war tomorrow. I want to be here. I want to make sure."
Prince Rahul stared at the unconscious figure of Almecho inside the cell wondering if he really was an Avatar. If he was, then he could help turn the tide in the war against Avatar Jung of the Earth Kingdom.
Only time would tell.
Hello, I hope you liked this story. I've always toyed with the idea of two Avatars meeting face to face in flesh. I don't actually have a continuation planned out; this is all there is for now.
If you liked this, have suggestions and/or criticisms, please feel free to leave a review. Thanks.
:)