My first story, so comments appreciated. I may or may not decide to continue it.

A not on the title, it's a metaphor. The hope of the world is like an hourglass. I'll leave you to figure out what it means.

Disclaimer: I do not own Avatar: The Last Airbender or any of it's characters.

I think I did that disclaimer right. Not sure if you really need those or not. And I don't know if this chapter would be considered chapter one, or a prologue, so I'm just calling it chapter one. Deal with it.

"We need to ensue his rage," Azula whispered, glancing at the tightly closed door. She wanted to other being to hear this conversation. Her gazed slowly returned to Long Feng, who looked ragged and tired from sitting in his cell for so long. Despite taking over the Dai Li, Azula realized Long Feng's intelligence, and knew she could use it to help her finish the war once and for all. Even though he was at her mercy, he was still offered something in return for his cooperation: His freedom.

"And how do you suppose we go about that?" Long Feng replied, equally as quiet. He was desperate to regain his freedom. He figured as soon as he was free, he could join the ranks of Azula's army, and work his way to her advisor. His intelligence alone was enough to do so, but he was also a brilliant strategist. Once he finally gains Azula's trust, he will slowly begin to mislead her, and eventually retake the Dai Li. He cared not what happened after that point, mostly because he knew it would be years before it ever happened.

"You tell me. You're the genius in the room," she said confidently. He couldn't help but reveal a small smile at the compliment. It seemed she had already forgotten, or at least was pretending to, his betrayal.

"You're flattering me," he said, turning his head to the door. He thought he heard a noise outside it, but after a few minutes of silence, he figured it was nothing. "But explain to me, why can't we just kill him?" He already knew the answer. He wanted to make sure she did as well.

"You know as well as I do why not," she said bitterly. "If we simply kill him, he will be reincarnated. Sure, he would be the child of a water tribe, but with the new alliances the water tribes have made, it would take too long to reach defeat them." She paused, though she wasn't really sure why. "No, we have to kill him while he is in the avatar state. This will break the cycle, and the war will be ours. And to do so, we need to anger him. We need to get him so mad at us, that even the smallest incident will send him raging in to the avatar state."

"I see." Long Feng folded his hands in front of his face, and thought. He thought about how to anger the avatar, but also what he would do after he once again controlled the Dai Li. After what seemed to be 30 minutes, he finally broke his concentration. "We need the one thing that affects human emotions more than anything else." After moments of dramatic pause, he finished his thoughts with a single word. "Death."

"I told you, we can't kill him," she began to shout, though more of a shout-whisper.

"Not him," he interrupted. "Someone close to him. Not too close, however. This could cause more depression than rage. No, we need someone that's only somewhat close to him. Do you know of any such person?"

Now it was her turn to think. She began listing all the people she knew who had been close, but not too close with the avatar. Most of the people she could think of were more his enemies than his friends. Then it came to her. "I might know of someone. She's not all that close to the avatar himself, but she's very close to his dorky friend."

"I assume you mean Suki," Long Feng interjected. He had done a little research on the avatar before his arrival to Ba Sing Se. He learned of the head of the Kyoshi warriors, who was romantically linked to the avatars friend. "Yes, yes that's perfect," he said, his smile returning to his face. "Not only would the death anger the avatar, but it would depress his friend so bad, that the avatar would be angry over that as well."

"Then it's settled," Azula stood, standing up. "We shall capture this, Suki, and eliminate her. But we must make sure the avatar knows about it."

Long Feng stood as well. "What if the avatar happened to watch her death? That would be even more traumatizing, and it would give us a shot at destroying him in the avatar state right there."

Azula's hand grabbed the door, readying to slide it open. "That would be nice. I could use ideas like that around me," she said, sliding the door open to see the one guard permitted to come within 10 feet of the conference room. Her hand at her side, she lit a small flame in her hand, and in a single blow she took out the guard.

"What on earth was that for?" Long Feng said, trying not to shout.

"I can't let anyone know that you are working for me," she said, removing the soldier's helmet and handing it to Long Feng. "You will follow me as my personal body guard, not that I need one. When the others discover this one's body, and see the door open, they will simply assume you have escaped." She finished removing the guard's clothes, and handing them to Long Feng. "I can put on an angry face, punish a few soldiers, and send out a search party. Nobody will suspect a thing."

Long Feng finished putting on his new uniform, and slid on the helmet. "Oh, and one more thing," Azula said.

"Yes?" Long Feng asked.

"Don't think this means you can mislead me in to losing the Dai Li. If I so much as pretend to suspect you doing such a thing, the search party will find your lifeless corpse in the woods nearby." She said, walking away and signaling for him to follow. "Do I make myself clear?"

Long Feng let out a sigh, and replied, "Yes, my master."