I do not own any of the Avatar characters. Sagira is mine.
A swing of her fist, a stomp of her foot, and a huge slab of stone, which stood as tall as her, popped out of the ground. She began punching it, and on the other side pieces sharp as knives flew across the small yard and impaled the wall. Two Dai Li soldiers came skidding down the wall, and landed in front of her. They began running at her. She backed against the wall. Huge stones and flat pieces came flying in every direction, all headed for one target: her. She waited....waited...waited. The scene seemed to almost move in slow motion as she clenched her fists and felt the wall behind her losen, and seep over her arms and legs. She stepped forward and held her stone hands in front of her face and began to punch and kick, shattering every rock that came her way. The two Dai Li were now on either side of her. They were lost in a cloud of dust for a moment, and all that could be heard was the sound of rock hitting rock, things shattering, some grunting, and when the cloud disappeared, she was standing over them. They were trapped. They each had a pair of rock hands pinning them to the ground, and a huge spike that sprang up and curved down, threatening to pierce their hearts if they dared move. She remained in a stance, ready to strike at any moment. Someone snapped their fingers. Out of the corner of her eye she saw her trainer raise his hand as if to say "enough". She took a breath, relaxed her muscles, and with a single downward thrust, sent the stone spikes back into the earth. The rock hands shattered, allowing her victims to get up. She stood before them, and bowed. They returned it.
He had been watching from off to the side, and now he began clapping as he approached her.
"Very good, Sagira," he said as he placed a hand on her shoulder," You have improved much since the last time."
"Thank you, master Long-Feng," she replied, keeping her eyes forward.
"You have worked very hard this week," he said to her," I think you have earned the weekend off from training. Starting now."
Sagira relaxed completely for the first time all day," Thank you master."
"But I want to see you keeping up with your breathing exercises. Breathing is the key. It is important that you at least master that. Only when you have mastered that will you master everything else."
"Yes, master," she replied almost distantly.
"You may go," he said.
She bowed to him and walked from the yard to go clean herself up. He stared after her as the two Dai Li came and stood behind him.
"Almost time," he muttered.
He had taken her from her home when she was just a child. Everyone knew what she was. He had taken her from her family with a promise to them that his duty was to train her to master earthbending and prepare her to assist the Avatar. But his intentions were quite the opposite. He had brought her back to the Dai Li headquarters where she was immediately brain-washed. She didn't remember her family, or anything from her past. She was still aware of her duty to the world. But when Long-feng had finished training her, he planned to hand her over to the fire nation, where she would be brain-washed again to destroy the Avatar rather than help him.
Sagira sat in her room at the Dai Li headquarters thinking to herself. She was so tired and bored. So she gets a couple of days off. Big deal. Long-Feng won't even let her go outside unless she is training. So what if she is some important prophecy or whatever. She hated being cooped up in that prison cell for so long, but according to her master, she was in danger in the outside world. She had a destiny and people would try to destroy her because of it. She looked at herself in the mirror. She stared at the white vine-like markings on her face. She had been born with them. That's how the Dai Li knew it was her they were looking for. She wished it were only paint.
She sighed and pushed herself up. The Dai Li had upped her training when they found out the Avatar had returned. Her destiny was linked with his. She was supposed to help him on his journey. If he was back, why was she still in this place? Shouldn't she be out there looking for him? Thinking about it was only making her mad. She walked to a space in the wall. She used her earthbending to open it, and she exited the room.
They watched as she walked serenely down the hall. In the dark, she could not see them. He waited at the end of the hall. She was coming towards him. A wave of his hand signaled a dozen fire nation soldiers to jump from their hiding places and surround her.
Sagira lost her composure for a moment as she automatically went into a stance to attack. The fire nation soldiers began to close in around her. She kicked up slabs of earth and manipulated them in all different directions. People were flying all over the place. They kept coming out of no where. Where were the other Dai Li agents? She was forgetting her breathing exercises. All her focus was on warding off her attackers. But something happened that she wasn't prepared for. One of the soldiers had manuvered around her, and jabbed her in the neck, back, hamstrings, arms. She couldn't bend. Anything the Dai Li had taught her to do she couldn't do. Her chi was blocked. She was lost in the sea of fire nation soldiers. She screamed and struggled even after she was gagged, and her hands pulled behind her-palms together-and chained tightly.
"Get her back to the ship," a voice growled," Quickly!"
She struggled, but it was no use. There were too many, and she was powerless without her bending.
Admiral Zhao watched the soldiers force her away. He looked around him at the seemingly empty hall. Before leaving he dropped a large sack of money on the ground.
"The Fire Lord thanks you," he said and walked out.
There was silence for a moment. Dai Li agents began jumping down from their hiding spaces. Long-Feng was among them. He stared after the Admiral, smiling.
Half way across the world, the avatar awoke from his sleep with a start. It was the third time that week that he had dreamt about a girl being kidnapped by the fire nation.