p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Chapter One/span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"In the Wilds/span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"br /br /p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"The sun had reached its peak by the time the small spirit pushed its nose tentatively out of its burrow and sniffed the air./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Long ears and a small head followed the nose out of the burrow and the spirit hopped nervously into the perpetual gloom that the trees brought to the ground./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"emspan style="font-size: 9pt;"Quick, Heli, quick/span/emspan style="font-size: 9pt;"em thought/em the spirit to itself as it bounded away with a flash, its nose twitching with anticipation as it searched the air for signs of food./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"It bounded out of the grasp of the tangled limbs of something that was once a tree, hopped out of the reach of a snarling spirit and shot up a large pile of rubble in what had once been known as the Middle Ring./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Today there was no Middle Ring; neither was there a Lower or Upper Ring, only the tangled, deformed spirit wilds./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Beyond the wilds, Heli had once heard that the Inner Wall still stood and that it was the only thing keeping the wilds from overrunning the rest of the land./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Beyond the wilds, an overgrown waste land had developed in what had been the thriving agrarian zone and recently the humans were said to have repaired the Outer Wall to keep the waste land, the wilds and the spirits from moving any further outside of the old boundaries./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Heli bounded past the torso of a statue that wore Waterbender furs./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"This was further into the Middle Ring than the little spirit had wanted to go, but food was growing scarcer and concessions had to be made./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"At last it found a rotten apple core and seized it, hurriedly stuffing it into its mouth./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Heli chewed and swallowed hard, tensing when a muffled sound caught its ear. It paused, muscles tensing to flee; the noise had come from the direction of the Upper Ring, an area that no living thing – human or spirit – had set foot in in many years./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"The sound came again and against its better judgement Heli began to follow it./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"This close to the Upper Ring Heli could see the weak light of the spirit portal that had been created during the Royal Palace's destruction./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"This was the closest it had come to the Palace since the day all those years ago when the Avatar had wrought destruction on the city, destroying the entire area and forcing open a new spirit portal./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"That day, Avatar Fagan's actions had echoed between the worlds./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"The other spirit portals had shut down, but before they had closed the spirits had been flung back to the spirit world by the sheer force of the disaster./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"When Heli had awoken, it had found itself in the ruins of Ba Sing Se, unable to use the new portal to get back to the spirit world and trapped far away from its home in Republic City./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"In the generations following Fagan's destruction of the city, Heli had watched the spirits trapped alongside it in Ba Sing Se becoming darker, more twisted and vile than could ever be imagined./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Whispers hinted at the reason behind the change./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"emspan style="font-size: 9pt;"There was no more Avatar. The Bridge has been destroyed. The humans are turning on each other. The benders are dying. The spirits are dying. We are all dying./span/em/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Heli shook its head, its ears flopping around its face irritably./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Fagan had caused the death of millions of people. Perhaps the world was better off without an Avatar./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"It reached the top of a mound of rubble and stepped into remains of the Upper Ring, halting before one of the last buildings that stood: the Avatar Temple./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Twenty years after the destruction of the city the world had braced for the emergence of the new Avatar. But as the years had passed and no one had come forward to claim the title, the people had grown less afraid./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"As a joke, the temple had been erected as a makeshift place for people to pray that the Avatar never did return, that someone born with all that power – with all that power to destroy – never came forward./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Over the years the makeshift temple had been replaced with a small but elaborate stone building, parodied effigies of the Avatars carved on the walls./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Even when the new capital city, The Main, had rebuilt the Outer Wall and shut Ba Sing Se off from the rest of the world, the temple had continued to grow and tribute in the form of food had still appeared on the temple steps./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"There had once been a time when finding food was as easy as walking to the temple, but even then Heli had declined to go there and pilfer food under the twisted glare of the Avatars./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Then, suddenly, the tribute had stopped appearing: a spirit had killed a human. Three more humans would die before the message was finally received: this was no place for humans anymore./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Now, standing before the Avatar Temple, Heli felt the familiar bubble of fear rising in its stomach, but this time the feeling engulfed it from head to toe, leaving it paralyzed in the dust./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Before the temple stood a man with a mop of shaggy blond hair; he studied the temple's façade with a sad smile on his face./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Heli blinked. /spanspan style="font-size: 9pt;"Fagan/spanspan style="font-size: 9pt;"?/span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"It rubbed its eyes and looked again. Yes, Fagan./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Heli's mind raced. This was impossible. The Avatar's spirit could no more manifest in Ba Sing Se then Heli could sprout wings and fly./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Fagan scuffed the toe of his shoe in the dirt and shook his head./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Behind Heli a stone rolled off the top of a mound of rubble and it jumped, its eyes darting off of Fagan and over its shoulder nervously./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"When Heli looked around again Fagan had disappeared and the dust around the Avatar Temple was undisturbed./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"Heli swallowed hard and after a beat turned to dart back towards its burrow./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"emspan style="font-size: 9pt;"Just a dream/span/emspan style="font-size: 9pt;", it thought to itself. /spanemspan style="font-size: 9pt;"Just a dream/span/emspan style="font-size: 9pt;"./span/p
p style="margin-top: .03in; margin-bottom: .03in; line-height: 100%;" align="justify"span style="font-size: 9pt;"As the small spirit scurried out of the Upper Ring and far away from the Royal Palace, the weak light of the spirit portal flickered and flared, burning minutely brighter than it had before./span/p