(disclaimer: I do not own Avatar: The Last Airbender. I wish I did, but I don't.)

A/N: The setting is set in modern times (today).

The Light & the Glass - A story about life, adventure, and love.

I
The World We Live In

The government kills children.

Every third-born child, orphan, and stray is disposed of in this sickening world we call home. The government feels that two children for each household is plenty; and that the planet's resources won't be depleted any time soon if that rule is respected. There is a fine line between hallucination and reality, and this world was right in the middle of it. This line is crossed every day by the government, and into hallucination they go. Hallucinations become reality.

For Hakoda, hallucination was no different from reality. The nightmarish fears that accompany him every day and his family almost always come true as the minutes tick by. A child is killed every minute; a third-born is killed every 58 seconds. This was the world that he lived in and that he knew.

Hakoda was a man of construction. He worked in the downtown area, setting up frames and foundations alongside his fellow construction workers. The cars and businessmen whizz past the construction site. And each day, the same group of people that he sees seems to get smaller and smaller. Pretty soon, the entire beat of people will be gone. And construction will be pointless. The pneumatic drills, jackhammers, whirring wrenches, injuries, rope, wires, fences, hammers, and anvils will mean nothing when society dies out due to this fucked up government.

This construction worker had two children: a 15 year-old son named Sokka and a 14 year-old daughter named Katara. But, as fate is at work, he was a widower. Each day, he goes to work, contributes to an unthankful society, brings home the bacon, and spends as much time as he can with the remainder of his family. A family that was nearly consumed and spit out by society.

The government kills children.

Who could do such a thing?

From democracy to dictatorship, climate shift and conservation has turned this world into a skin-tight knee-deep lock down facility; the dictator: Lord Ozai. People know little about Ozai; only that he is the "King of the World." Oh, and that the brilliance and 'sophistication' of today's world comes from: the absolute generous mind of Lord Ozai. This is where the ideas of killing children and babies, genocide, and anarchy came from...

Ozai grew up just like any other dictator would. He had a happy childhood, but didn't succeed in anything in life. If you can't succeed, you teach others to do so. And that was what he did... but, in his own way. Ozai created a socialist group called the Cult of Flames whose ideal was to make the world a better place to live in by reducing the population of the world to prevent the overuse of the planet's supplies and create a balance in supply and demand. Their rituals involved imprinting their bodies in blue arrows that ran along their limbs and backs before finally stopping at their heads.

Each day, the Cult of Flames would go out on a killing spree; firstly, they targeted personal enemies. They made their killings quick and clean by means of poison. A few months into the cult organization, the group ultimately failed, presumably due to the discovery of their operations. Ozai went on, staying strong, and secretly climbed the ranks of government, finally winning the prime role of head governor and electing remnants of the Cult of Flames to his authority, turning the government into a dictatorship. The legal system faded away on its own, under Ozai's command.

The last thing Hakoda wanted to think out was the legal system. In fact, there can be no legal system in this hellish piece. This pre-apocalyptic, indifferent, obscure, macabre, insignificant, insecure, demolished, destroyed, damned, battered, buried, crushed, fucked, and figured out life that is in the hands of the one that cares the least about unity and society.

As far back as Sokka could remember, life wasn't always like this. School would be fun, learning would be fun. But now, the government has changed its ways and is beginning to teach different subjects at school. Theatre became ethics. Pottery became business and law.

'Genocide', 'corrupt', 'renegade'; these three terms were the only three terms that Sokka could think of that could best describe life under dictatorship. When he was six, he believed that dictatorship was when your parents told you to clean your room, quit playing video games, take out the trash, or take a bath. Now, he knows the true meaning of that term. And it only took him a matter of days to figure it out.

Sokka believed that his mom was taken from him.

Katara, on the other hand, is trying to live life to the fullest, even under these conditions. She is doing well at school and encourages her brother to keep his chin up and fight through life's darkest paths. For some reason, Katara got the idea that her brother was suicidal; but, unbeknowngst to her, he wasn't. In fact, the last thing Sokka would ever be is suicidal. He would give anything, do anything, to protect his family.

The government kills children.

This is the world they live in.

After a long day at work, and a few accompanied bruises on his shins from the physical activity endured, Hakoda grabbed a can of cola from the fridge in the kitchen and hopped towards the living room, taking a seat on the couch in front of the television. He switched it on, flipping through various channels before finally arriving at the news station. Real news or not, it was worth watching.

Katara, in her bedroom, wrote in her journal as she studied for a law test that was due for next week. Her walls were painted a dark blue and a single low-watt lamp lit the room, leaving the unlighted corners dark and cold. She chewed on the end of her pencil. Her legs were propped up on the wall behind the bed she rested on. She was thinking of things that were very much not homework. The faint volume of the radio that sat on the top of her desk was enough to fill the entire space of her room, much like the lamp. They seldom play any music, even classical. Only news, top stories, the things going on in the world.

Sokka, in his bedroom, which was right across the hallway from Katara's, sat in his desk, having the same lighting as Katara's place, but up to a more elevated point so he could read. He didn't care much for homework. The same exercises were displayed on every single worksheet, research assignment, and book page that was spread across the space of his desk. he was absorbed neither in his schoolwork or his reading, much like his sister. The sagging sports posters that hung on the darkly shaded walls of his room covered up a color that he hated the most: red.

These news stories that Hakoda heard on the television were always about violence. "An officer at Memorial Park was killed today," "Domestic disturbance proves to be the worst as a family's father shoots his son and his wife before finally committing suicide," "A deranged robber stabs a local clerk working at a late night shift at a small grocery store," "An 11 year-old girl drowns at Crow Lake after thin ice collapses," "Sad news breaks out from the hospital as a war veteran who had been in a coma for nearly a year forces the doctors to pull the plug," "A bloody shootout at central downtown-"

A weak knock was heard at the door.

Hakoda cut his sip of cola short and stood up violently, crashing into the couches as he made his way towards his children, who were already standing at the doorways of their bedrooms. At the door, it could be anybody, besides door-to-door businessmen. It was a very dark night, and rough rain plummeted into the grass and sidewalks outside, making the occasional mild floods and puddles of mud.

"Children," he said. "Get ready. This may be them."

The tax collectors carried guns.

Many of the 'collectees' revolted; paychecks were obviously cut low to minimum wage. The envelope Hakoda had in his hands was rippled on the edges and wrinkled on its sides, after much grip and frustration he had put out on it. These tax collectors can easily abuse their power.

Katara and Sokka stood in front of the facades of the hallway that ran parallel to the door, staying near the living room. Hakoda took a deep breath. Relax, he told himself. The father walked towards the front door, unlocked the hinges, and turned the knob, finally opening the door.

The things that night can bring are amazing.

There, on his doorsteps, stood a boy, injured and wet. The rain drizzled on his tattered clothes, dripping down on the "Welcome" doormat that the father had intended to toss out months ago. The boy leaned against a support pillar that held up the roof above the porch. Hakoda could notice the boy's bloodstained hands. He was speechless. The children behind the father were speechless.

"Please," the boy managed to say. "I need some..." Hakoda quickly helped the boy in, closing the door behind him from preventing the drizzles from getting inside.

"Sokka! Get some towels!" Hakoda commanded. Ripping his glance away from the scene, the son ran to the bathroom and searched for the fresh whites, leaving the sister standing there, eyes wide open, hand over mouth. She studied the boy. He looked young, possibly Katara's age, but with the wetness and tattered clothes, it was hard to tell. She did notice, however, that a blue arrow was tattooed to his forehead. It was faded away, as well as the other arrows which were on his hands and arms.

Leaving the boy to lean against the couch, drenching it in rain, Hakoda ran to the dining room and received a chair, then rushed back to the living room, bumping and tackling into walls and corridors. After placing the chair in the room, he rushed back to the kitchen, rummaged through the medicine cabinet, and pulled out the first aid kit, retrieving a white bandage from inside and a bottle of hydrogen peroxide, along with a few cotton balls. He ran back to the living room.

Kneeling down near the boy, who was now weakly slouching on the chair, the father lifted up the boy's hands from his torso. His palms were imprinted with his own blood. Hakoda poured hydrogen peroxide onto a cotton ball.

"It's just a flesh wound," the father announced, to which the boy didn't reply in any way. He applied the medicine to the boy's wound, making him flinch and wince in pain. After covering the wound in medicine, Hakoda patched the bandage on the boy, wrapping it around his ribs.

By the time the son returned with the towels, Hakoda had managed to sit the boy down on a chair and place a cloth on the wounded bleeding torso. Sokka tossed his father the towels all at the same time, with numerous dropping to the now wet floor. Hakoda wrapped the boy in a fresh white, as he continued sway and swagger. With a hand on each shoulder, Hakoda crouched down and looked at the boy, examining his face for any head injuries.

"What happened to you, child?" he finally asked as the event's tension lowered a bit.

Dizzy circles of lights and colors spun around the boy's head as he could barely keep his eyes open. The only sound he could hear was the powerful ticking of a clock, which overpowered the sounds boasting out of the TV set.

And before the boy could answer, he fainted, falling into the arms of the father.