Hello. This is my submission for round six of the pro bending circuit. Shout out to perhaps-this-is-prussia (tumblr) for helping me edit. I chose the first scene of book 1 episode 2 and the prompts I chose were:

Object: bookshelves

The quote

Character: Aang.

Word count: 1,048

Katara and I walk back to the village together. On the way we talk about all sorts of random things like bending, life in the Water Tribes, a cloud that looks like an armadillo bear, what armadillo bears look like, life in the Air Temples and Sokka's meat dance. The conversation never stopped! I just started telling her a story that involves a squirrel pig, five cakes, an earth bender traveller and an air ball, we came over the last hill.

I could see the entire village gathered at the entrance, as we got closer all the kids ran to us shouting my name happily, which made me happy. But that feeling was soon terminated. All the women and Sokka however eyed us angrily. Actually, they were eyeing me angrily.

"I knew it!" Sokka accused as he stepped closer to us. "You signaled the Fire Navy with that flare! Your leading them straight to us aren't you?!"

"Aang didn't do anything. It was an accident." Katara said, it almost seemed like she was defending me.

"Yeah, we were on the ship and there was this booby trap and well, we boobied right into it." I explain trying to help the situation. I probably just made it worse. Considering the fact that Gran Gran's face goes from angry to furious. Her eyebrows frowned even more and she pursed her lips.

"Katara." She started while shaking her head with disapproval. You shouldn't have gone on that ship! Now we could all be in danger!"

This is bad. I have to do something.

"Don't blame Katara!" I say putting my hands up in the air. " I brought her there, its my fault." I put my head down. Hopefully this changes things.

"Aha! The traitor confesses!" Uh oh. "Warriors, away from the enemy! The foreigner is banned from our village!" Sokka declares. I thought Sokka was always grumpy looking, so this must be a whole new level of rage. The tip of his nose was pointed upwards and his lips are pursed so tightly it doesn't look like he's breathing. His eyes are bulged wide and his face (despite the temperature) is red. The kids look up at me sadly before obeying his orders. I can hear Katara's breathing pick up as she gets angry.

"Sokka, your making a mistake." She argues. Sokka's facial expression doesn't change.

"No. I'm keeping my promise to Dad. I'm protecting you from threats like him." He retorts while pointing at Aang.

"No!" Katara yells. "Aang is not our enemy!" I'm guessing this happens a lot between the two of them. Katara seems to have a lot of experience with fighting back.

"Don't you see? Aang's brought us something we haven't had in a long time. Fun" She finished.

"Fun?" Sokka questions as if it was a joke. "We can't fight fire benders with fun!"

This is getting heavy.

"You should try it sometime!" I joke hoping to lighten up the mood a little.

"Get out of our village!" He yells. Great. I should have kept my mouth shut. "Now!"

Katara's face softens a little. "Grandmother please, don't let Sokka do this" she begs.

"Katara, you knew going on that ship was forbidden. Sokka is right. I think it best of the Airbender leaves." Gran Gran replies.

Katara's posture stiffens. "Fine! Then I'm banished too!" she yells. Katara grabs my wrist tight but not too tight and drags me away from the village towards Appa.

"Where do you think your going?" Sokka demands, still furious.

"To find a Water Bender! Aang is taking me to the North Pole!" She replied. Wait what?

"I am? Great!" I reply still kind of surprised.

"Katara!" Sokka shouts after her "Would you really choose him over your tribe? Your own family?" He asks softly. I can tell that she is second guessing herself, she's never been away from her tribe before, now that she's not as angry her mind is clear and the decision isn't as easy. This isn't right.

"Katara, I don't want to come between you and your family." I tell her. I walk past her and get ready to jump on Appa. I don't want to leave the South Pole. I don't want to leave her, but I will to make things easier.

"So your leaving the South Pole? This is goodbye?" She asks me sadly. I turn around and smile at her.

"Thanks for penguin sledding with me." I tell her, trying to cheer her up.

"Where will you go?" She asks, I can just see the making of a tear in her eyes.

"I guess I'll go look for the Airbenders." I reply. Oh, when I get back Gyatso is going to make me clean my room. "Wow, I haven't cleaned my room in one hundred years, not looking forward to that."

I jump on Appa and take the reins. It's probably best to end this nicely even if I am banished.

"It was nice meeting everyone." I tell everybody. Sokka rolls his eyes.

"Let's see your bison fly now air boy." He says.

"Come on Appa! You can do it! Yip Yip!" I encourage. He just stands up and lazily yawns.

"Yeah I thought so." Sokka snorts. One of the little girls cries and runs next to Katara. Miki, I think.

"Aang, don't go I'll miss you." Miki whimpers with tears in her eyes.

"I'll miss you too." I tell her. I steal one more look at Katara. She looks heartbroken, you can see the sadness in her eyes.

"Come on boy." I tell Appa halfheartedly. He walks away slowly. As we go on I can faintly hear Katara shouting behind us. It's not loud enough to understand, but I can tell she's upset.

I'm upset too.

As we get further and further away from the village I remember stacking the bookshelves while Gyatso told me about something that an old friend told him once.

"Happiness can be found in the darkest of times, if one simply remembers to turn on the light.

"Even though I was banished and happened to get on the bad side of almost the entire village, I still got to meet Katara." I tell Appa.

I'll never forget her smile, her laugh, her beautiful eyes.

I will never forget her.