The Ghost of Ba Sing Se
The past haunts me every day.
"Honey." The old man said to the pie vendor. "One slice."
The girl took a pair of tongs in her hand. A tasty, sweet scent filled the air as she opened the metal food warmer under a low flame. "You're in luck, Mr. Arkha," she said, handing over a steaming wedge of honey-filled pie on a paper wrap. "It's the last one. Good thing I know you always get this flavor." She chuckled. "But my father always reminded me also."
The old man smiled, making the wrinkles between his cheeks and the tip of his lips more obvious. He gave her ten copper coins. "Thank you, Ling. How is he?"
Her yellow teeth vanished with the closing of her lips. "We hadn't heard of him since the Air Nation attacked the camp he was in…" She looked to the sky. Her eyes shone with the orange light from the dessert sun. "But hopefully, he'll return when the Earth Kingdom gathers more forces. They'd have no use of an old man like him."
"Or me." Arkha jested, putting the girl's charming smile back on her face stained with sand and grease and breadcrumbs. Arkha remembered when she was younger. Her father used to take her to the market where he sells his pies. His wife, a healer was taken to the battlefield to take care of the sick and wounded soldiers. Without someone to look after her at home, he brought Ling and her brother along with him. She helped her with their business and in taking care of her little brother, even though he wouldn't allow her to work. But a year later, he also had to leave his children. Not long ago, the young woman standing before him, pushing the pie cart back and from their house was a light-skinned thin child with dreams and wishful thinking. Her brother helps her out the best he can, but Ling knows that when he's old enough, he'll also be taken away from home. Now, she and her brother have become just like the rest of the people here. Casualties of war. Countless lives lost, for pointless quarrels.
He placed the wrapped pie next to the fruits, vegetables and a bag of rice grains inside his basket. "Well, if Jiao-long finally agrees to the Fire Nation's aid, he'd get as much as many troops as he needs. Your father can come home, then."
"Why hasn't he?" She asked him.
"He's still comfortable in his royal life up in the first rim. While his prime minister handles all negotiations with the Air Nation, his Highness is sitting down in his parties."
"So why won't the Fire Nation face the Air Nation already? They have strong weapons and powerful benders. The Earth Kingdom's forces are too weak to help them, anyway."
He laughed mockingly at the thought. "Those cowards don't fight in wars alone. Not anymore. They've learned to keep away from trouble since they want everyone to forget their warmonger years in the history books. They need a reason to fight and the Air Nation's threat against the Earth Kingdom is their chance to be the hero this time."
The pie store was Arkha's last part in his visits to the market. Afterwards, he headed home.
My grandchildren must be missing their grandpa, he thought.
He went through a village of small, square stone houses stacked like crates on a cargo ship. They were created by earthbenders for war refugees. Some had wooden doors. Others, like the old man's, had a piece of cloth to compensate. He looked at the sky. The sun had hid behind the behemoth wall of the impenetrable city. It was almost sundown.
A small child approached him just before he entered his house. His bones could be seen through his burnt skin. "Mr. Arkha," he said, showing him his palms. "My mother is sick. Can you spare her some food?"
Arkha smiled at him. "You know what?" He reached into his basket. "I just bought something for you and your mother." He gave him the bag of rice. "You know how to cook this?"
The boy wept as he nodded. "Thank you, mister."
The old man pat the boy on his back. "Now run along. Your mother must be worried."
Arkha pushed the cloth aside and went inside his house. It wasn't too small for him, but it would be for five people. He was greeted by his four grandchildren.
The first one, Zhana wore a smooth red dress under a gold belt. She jumped and embraced her grandpa. She was young, but Arkha's old bones and muscles couldn't take on more weight. He lost grip of the basket. Luckily, the twins, Kaano and Kanoa in blue caught it at both sides. Tashi was the last to come, since he was struggling to walk with a stick.
"Hello, Tashi." Their grandpa said.
The boy didn't respond. His face did not even show an emotion, other than not caring. He was waiting for his mother. And Arkha knew she was never coming home. But the boy didn't have to know that. So he kept it a secret.
"Come now, children," said the old man. "We must have dinner early so we can sleep before the night ripens. The dark is upon us, and with it, the Ghost."
Zhana hastily pulled on his muddy sleeve. "Please tell us more stories about him, grandpa."
He chuckled as he stroked his white beard. "Before you sleep, little one."
The four children gathered around the living area, just a few paces from the kitchen. Kaano and Kanoa guarded the lettuce and tomato slices with beans on a wooden plate. Zhana sat beside quiet Tashi by the warmth of the cooking fire for their tea. Arkha often gets free leftover tea leaves from Ling and his other friends who knew he loved to drink it. He mixes them and drinks whatever taste he made. He took more water from the barrel and poured it into the pot.
Arkha sat on a bench in front of the children. He unwrapped the honey pie and started eating it. "So…" he paused to chew. "The Sand Spirit. His blade of purple fire.
The Ghost of Ba Sing Se."
"Is he really a ghost?" Kaano asked.
"Some say he is," the grandpa answered. "Some say he is the spirit of a young man who was killed along with his people by the war. Others told that he's alive, and is honoring the dead by hunting their murderers. There are countless songs, but one significant word always came out from the mouth of the bards- that he is of vengeful intent."
"Why does he want revenge?" Zhana asked.
Arkha kept a straight face. He tried to hide a heavy emotion under the skin on his face. "Well… Some bad people took this Sand village. It was part of a military operation for the Air Nation army."
"What happened to the village?" Kanoa asked.
The old man closed his eyes. He looked like he was in pain. He pictured a small village getting attacked by a merciless army. "The sandbenders sought to fight them. But the occupiers were too strong. And they had two of the most powerful benders and greatest soldiers the Air Nation will ever produce. Lieutenant Atto alongside his best friend and superior, the First General."
"Why did they attack the village?" Tashi said in the middle of silence. His voice was cold and grim as darkness. Arkha felt a deep emotion strike him as the boy spoke.
Arkha looked down. His eyes disappeared into the shadows of his eyebrows. He then took a piece of the pie and put it in his mouth. "The village was built in the shadow of a mountain. It was a brilliant place to hide their land camps."
The old man looked at the crippled boy wearing ragged dessert clothes, with the white strips of clothes matching his bandages. Tashi looked at him like he was waiting for more words from his storyteller.
"And…" Arkha added. "The Sand village is abundant with honey. They had a huge farm which was only a mile away from them.
The Air Nation army… as they were treading the dessert, they faced the worst sandstorm they ever saw, and their journey took longer than planned. They decreased in numbers. They left a trail of rotting corpses on their way. Those poor lads were buried in the sand, without their families knowing that their heroes had fallen. But fewer heads weren't enough for food to be had by everyone. Soon, their barrels were emptied. There was nothing to eat."
"Why were they in the dessert?" A curious Zhana asked. "Shouldn't they have landed on somewhere without sandstorms?"
Arkha smiled faintly at the little girl. "You are as perceptive as always, young one," he said. "Like the general."
He continued. "The General figured that they'd be detected by the Earth Kingdom if they landed anywhere in clear air above them. It was a usual Air Nation maneuver. While they have the upper-hand, coming from the sky, it's impossible to infiltrate the enemy bases in secret. That's why the dessert is the perfect place to land. But it came with a risk. The sandstorms, which they fell for, and loss of communication to keep them from being detected by the Earth Kingdom. With that, they couldn't contact the Air Nation in the sky to ask for supplies. They were on their own. Fortunately, their march led them to a honey farm. But it belonged to the Sand village."
Arkha noticed the sweet aroma that filled the room. The tea was ready. He stood up and reached for the lone wooden cup, next to a dusty object inside the cabinet. "Though they weren't even fighting in the war," he said. "The First General thought that they were still part of the Earth Kingdom, making them their enemy. And since they were hermits and far behind in technology, it was easy to beat them in battle, even with hungry soldiers."
He took the pot of hot tea and poured it into the cup. "That day, the Air Nation showed the world the extent of their abomination."Arkha heard the sounds of blasters and explosions, amidst a clamor of cries and screams. The tea was shaken with his trembling hands. "They painted the sand with red. They sprinkled the land with the blood of the people who called it home. The First General boasted his augmented airbending by testing it on the sandbenders."
Arkha went back to his bench where he left the honey pie. He tore a bit from the slice and dipped it in the tea before he sent it to his mouth.
Then he went back to his story. "Using their newfound weapons- suits that increase bending by exposing the bender to spirit radiation which is converted by the suits into chi. Funny. It took the Air Nation faster in inventing the technology when they could only study the spirit energy they collected when they first took off in the skies with their grand flying cities than the other nations who built those power plants around them. But the Air Nation did have a Varrick on their side."
One of the children had a hand raised.
"Yes, Zhana?"
"Didn't the Water Nation use their portals to power their underwater cities?" The girl asked. "That's where they went, right?"
"You mean they cowered?" The old man mocked. "They dived into their cozy sunken castles when the Air Nation declared war against the world. Instead of helping the other Nations, they chose to disappear. Where is their honor? I liked them better when they were led by a chief. Democracy weakened them. They didn't learn anything from the Earth Kingdom."
"Finish your story." Tashi said in a hostile tone. "I want to sleep."
"Oh, of course, my child." Arkha wanted to scold him, but he was stopped by the sight of the boy's bandages and stitches. "The First General and Lieutenant Atto laid waste on the Sand village with their augmented bending suits. Their powers increased dramatically as the firebenders are during a comet passage.-"
The fire suddenly went out. The house was darker than the night outside under the light of the moon. Arkha felt a warm wind on his skin. He closed his eyes and rubbed them as sand had entered the room. He opened them slightly. His vision was impaired, but when he looked at the window, he saw something- a dark figure before a greyish landscape. He could see a round shape on its head, like a hood. He wore a robe, wrapped by strips of cloth, fitting it to the shape of his body- which by his estimation was a man in his early twenties. His arms and legs were also covered by the same strips. There was no denying that the person was from the dessert.
The figure looked at him. Its eyes shone with his own reflection lit by the moon. It spoke in a deep, and the most haunting ghastly whispers he heard.
"You're Arkha?"
The old man nodded grievously.
He went inside and picked up the spark rocks and used them to revive the fire. "Sorry about that. But it is windy outside. And dessert winds come with sand."
Sand spirits come with sand. "Would you like some tea?" Arkha offered. "It's on the pot on the cooking fire. But I only have a lone cup- the one I'm having right now."
The Sand Spirit watched the sand that filled the air in the room. "That won't be a problem," he said.
The mysterious young man held his arm and waved his hand through the air around him. All the sand inside drifted to his gestures and encircled him. He summoned more sand from outside to form a ball of sand as big as his head. He pressed the sand in until it became a dense stone twice the size of his fist. The stone spun between his hands and little by little, it emitted a red glow. Arkha could feel the heat radiating from it. Moments passed until the stone turned into a reddish-white ball of lava.
The light emanating from the hot liquid stone reached the stranger's face; enough for Arkha to observe a scar that covered the right half of his face. Arkha had seen countless wounds in his time. So he knew that the scar he saw was of a burn. The small streaks of darker skin looked like a channel of rivers on a map, making it a burn from lightning. Or a firebender.
The bender carefully sculpted the molten rock into the shape of a cylinder with a closed bottom. He brought the cylinder on the barrel of water and dipped it in. Steam came gushing out the barrel. When he lifted the cylinder, it had become metal. The hooded young man bended it into a polished, metal cup.
Arkha chuckled silently. "That's a neat trick. Come in handy?"
"It's an old blacksmith's technique," the young man said, reaching for the pot. He poured tea into his cup. "Applying earthbending to crafting metalware makes the task easier and faster. I made my own armor, among other things…" He emptied the hot cup in one drinking. He flattened it in his palms and turned it into a blade of a dagger. He threw it to the wall; an inch right to the old man's head. "Yes, it comes in handy."
Arkha rubbed his left ear. He saw his reflection in the shiny metal dagger. His face was old and weary, and surprised from the young man's stunt. "Remarkable."
"Not as remarkable as your feats in battle." He said. "First General Arkha."
He scoffed. "That's a name from a distant past." Arkha looked into the cup of tea in his hands. "It's Retired First General Arkha now. Atto has succeeded me a long time ago. He was always the greater soldier."
"He's next," the Spirit said. "He was with you that day. He stood by you when you attacked my village."
"That day."
"Do you remember?"
"Clear as yesterday."
Arkha closed his eyes and saw himself back in a different day. An earlier time. He felt the youth he had lost to the years. He felt the fire inside him that day. The excitement. The rage. The hunger for power and destruction. The honor of fighting for the glory of the Air Nation. How he missed that sensation. But his grief and regret had replaced all these feelings the moment he tried to forget them.
First General Arkha ordered his men to wait as he and Atto dealt with the first strike. They were a storm that sent the villagers' tents soaring to the sandy sky. Using their heightened bending, they slaughtered the sandbenders. The men were blown up from the inside. The women and children were killed by the debris and lack of air when the other Air Nation troops finally attacked and deprived them of breathing. They did all those horrid things for a few barrels of food and honey. They were a peaceful village, unknowing of the war. And now, their home is a pile of trash and bones buried in red-painted sand. All because some soldiers were hungry.
An airbender soldier was about to suffocate a young boy, the last of the village, as others watched, when the First General stopped him.
"Leave that one." First General Arkha said. He saw an old man at the feet of the boy. He was wearing different clothes than those of the sandbenders. He was protecting the boy. But he failed. "Let him tell the others what we did. I think he'll be much more convincing with some blood on his clothes."
The soldier let the boy off his airbending grasp. He knelt down and cried on the old man's dead body. Then the soldier pulled him off the body and showed him to the First General.
The young sand villager met eyes with the First General. The face of a murderer. He would not forget it.
"Take him," Arkha said with a grin. "I'm still short of an earthbender in my collection."
The sand villager was entrapped in a metal casing and suspended it in the air.
Arkha opened his eyes in bewilderment. His heartbeat started to race.
"Do you remember me?" The Ghost whispered.
"You're… you're that boy." Arkha realized. "How did you escape?"
The Ghost hit the old man with the back of his hand. Arkha fell from his bench; his face touching the ground. He coughed with the cold of the ground, chilling his chest.
"I adapted. Or the spirits were kind enough to grant me strength. Did you really think I wasn't going to find you?"
"I never thought that you survived. We always thought that you died from the fall."
"I never fell. I flied." He took something out of a pouch on his belt. It was a metallic rod connected to a wire that went somewhere to his back. His hand was trembling with haste. "Last words? You could try for an apology, but it won't change what I've anticipated to do for twenty years."
The old man forced a smile. "How was the tea?" He asked, whimpering.
The Ghost spat on the murky ground. "Didn't like it. I like my tea with a drop of honey."
The old man wept. "I know why you're here," he muttered. Tears came out of his eyes. "I took your village. Your family. I ruined your life. And I'm ready for what's to come.
But please, not in front of the children."
The Ghost looked around. "What children?"
Arkha found himself in an empty house. No Kaano and Kanoa- because they ran away from the war. Zhana was fighting in it, but she still needs help from Tashi, whose stubbornness cost him a long beating from the Air Nation's whiplashes, crippling him. Tashi… he was the boy he left to tell the tale of the sand village ambush. He was the ghost of the sand people; the ghost of his past, who came back to haunt their murderer. To pay what was owed. To take back what was taken from him.
A monotonic buzzing sound came from the metallic rod the Ghost was holding. A beam of purple light emerged from the tip. The tubular streak was as long as a longsword. The ray of light ended in a significant fading. Arkha has seen this light before. The beam reminded him of the shots from spirit blasters and cannons; warfare designed after a dark spirit which launched similar blasts from his eye.
And the old man closed his once more. He braced himself for the end.
"I knew this day would come."
The Ghost of Ba Sing Se raised the spirit blade.
"So did I."
Next Chapter- "Gathering Strength"
