Long Way From Here
By
Ian Gainsborough
Author's Note: Scott Solomon is my character. To explain this story would be a hindrance at most. Long story short, Scott's traveled around the world for so long, he crossed dimensions. This is not the beginning of that. I've warned you for now.
Chapter 1: Reunion
Suki's vision swam. For a moment, she thought she heard the voice of a boy calling for her.
"Come on, Suki, give me a sign." Suki's head throbbed. Light poured in and ruddy twilight greeted her eyes flickering open. Sitting over her, with the glow of a fire against his face, she welcomed the sight with a smirk. Thoughts filled her mind and the throbbing subsided. Memories of meeting this red-haired stranger surfaced into her mind. She reflected on meeting him and other refugees en route to Ba Sing Se.
"Xin," she said gently, groaning to sit up. Xin stopped her, and laid her down again.
"Take it easy, Suki," he said, "From what's gone on here, I'd say you were in a hell of a fight. How do you feel?"
"Like I was hit with some really nasty Fire Bending," she replied, bringing a hand to her forehead. Her next thoughts were on the cool brass headdress she had worn, now apparently missing. In fact, she was missing a lot of things. She didn't feel the constriction of her well-known form-fitting armor.
"Where's my armor?" she asked, thinking aloud.
"Not sure," said Xin, turning back to face her. "When I found you, you were stripped; as were two other of your fighters. I cleaned your wounds best I could without peeking." In his hands as he said this was a mortar and pestle, grinding up leaves and herbs. He set it aside and helped Suki into a sitting position.
Suki had a better look at her newfound friend. He was a strange one; with unusual red hair slowly growing long, and sparkling eyes that held a fire, yet he didn't have the ambitions, the integrity of any Fire Bender. He was well muscled, and proved his skills when she first met him as a strange wanderer.
"How've you been since Full Moon Bay?" he asked, continuing to grind the herb leaves.
"Alright," she answered. "I finally saw that boy I was talking about again."
"You mean Sokka?"
"I helped him and the Avatar through the Serpent's Pass."
Xin stopped grinding again, checking the herbs to see if they were a fine paste. He took a breath, long and careful, as if a memory had overtaken him suddenly.
"Serpent's Pass, huh?" he said, bringing the mortar over to Suki's side, and applying a finger-full of the paste to a wound. Suki hissed and cringed. It stung like there was no end to the sharp stabbing pain. Xin reapplied the bandage and set the mortar aside.
"You know, a few days after I left on the boat, I couldn't help but feel I needed to tell you something," said Xin. "So I stayed aboard to head back to Full Moon Bay. I asked around only to learn from a couple of refugees that you and the Avatar and some others had headed off to the Serpent's Pass together two days earlier."
"Wait, you followed us?" asked Suki. Xin nodded and poked the fire to keep it going.
"Well I had to wait for a few days; you know, pick up supplies, rest up, all that good stuff. I went after you three days after I got back to Full Moon Bay, so you had a head start.
"I found your tracks, and followed them along the Pass. I stopped and rested, oddly enough, in the very same place you had camped."
"What about the gap of water in between?" asked Suki. "How'd you get across?"
Xin chuckled to himself. "I gathered you had some Benders in your party," he said, "I had no choice but to swim across. Well actually, I held my breath and jumped in, swam as far as I could and walked what ground I managed to get a foothold of. There's nothing scarier than the thought of drowning." Xin shuddered at the memory, but took deep breaths to calm down again. It was silent, as the moon had slid into the star-pecked sky; Broad strokes of dark blue chalk filled the night sky, bringing only the red glow of the fire as light to the faces of Suki and Xin. Suki looked with an admiration at Xin; his bravery to do something so stupid. He reminded her of Sokka in many aspects, and missed that idiot from the Water Tribe deeply. The fire crackled as Xin placed more wood, and he sat back and stared at it.
The pause broke finally with Xin continuing. "I found your tracks a day or so ago. They broke off from another party, obviously the Avatar and his group. They were headed toward Ba Sing Se it looked like. But I followed your tracks, instead. After a few days, the smoke of the battlefield drew me and I found you left for dead."
"How long was I out?" Suki asked, stared at her bandaged torso.
"A day at least."
"And the others?"
"They're fine. I tended to them as well. Hell of a fight. There were tracks I didn't recognize. Three sets heading off toward Ba Sing Se."
Silence continued into the night, Xin and Suki staring at the fire. Finally, in an attempt to break the accursed serenity, Xin stood.
"It's late," he said. "I think we're going to need some rest for tomorrow."
"Tomorrow?" asked Suki. "Why?" Xin was halfway across the circle before he looked over his shoulder, the campfire illuminating his face.
"We're heading to Ba Sing Se."
Author's Note: Originally, the story was about Scott somehow finding his way into Kyoshi Island, but I coudln't quite figure out how he would meet up with Iroh and Zuko. So I settled on the idea, 'What if Scott met with Suki instead?' and I found this concept was easier to work with. But for a change, I wanted to try something different, you know, something that not many other writers have tried. And of course it ended up Scott and Suki meeting again instead of for the first time to establish this takes place after Scott had come to this new world. I went ahead and did my homework, having watched several key episodes to finalize this story's tie-in to canon events during Ba Sing Se. Not all of it is true (I refuse to give my point on this until later chapters) but makes for an interesting concept.