So I've been reading tons of ATLA fics, and for some reason, I decided I needed to outline the entire history of the world to properly understand the current situation in my story. Needless to say, I stopped when I realized that that would mean going through about 85,000 years of history, assuming a thousand Avatars before Aang, ten thousand years of energybending, and an average Avatar lifespan of 75 years.
Still, I now have a deep and abiding need to write out the entire world history of ATLA, because it would be a good way to add in some other elements that won't fit in the one avatar story I have that I really want to write. So that's what I'm doing. I don't expect to get anywhere, I'll probably quit before I even get to the benders unless I do major time skips, in which case I doubt I'll make it five hundred years in. But it will be fun, so I'm gonna start.
We will skip the very beginning. Depending on what you want to believe, that either involves a lot of matter in a really small space or a lot of spiritual mumbo-jumbo.
Let's just go to the part where humans are spread out everywhere, but savages, still. These people live in caves, wear furs, hunt and gather to stay alive. Primitive.
It was an adventurous young boy, setting out to see what new territories he could find in the still-young world that came across it first.
It looked like an island, if a tiny one. Beautiful grasses and shrubs, and – and this was what the boy cared about – plenty of fruit. There didn't seem to be any animals, but he could swim back to the mainland for that. The island wasn't too far from shore. The boy wondered why no one had come across it before. Perhaps there were predators lurking in the trees? The boy shivered, but he had set out on his own, and he would prove himself. He would spend the night on this island.
When the boy woke up, rising with the sun, something was wrong. He could not tell what. Perhaps it was something in the air. But something was wrong. He left the small clearing he had found himself in and made his way back to the shoreline. He would swim back and grab a few objects of importance that he had left, this island would make a good territory, even without trees...
But the mainland was gone. Panicked, the boy stared at the ocean for a few desperate minutes, but nothing changed. The mainland was still gone. In fact, the island seemed to be...
Moving?
But islands didn't move. The boy knew that. Other things moved. People moved. Animals moved. Plants waved in the breeze. But island were steady, anchored. They shouldn't move. It wasn't supposed to happen.
The boy just stood there in dead confusion for a minute, unsure of what to do. Perhaps he could still try to swim back?
″Hello.″
The boy nearly jumped out of his skin. The... the island itself... it was alive! It was talking to him!
″Sorry.″ The too-huge-to-be-real head ducked back into the water briefly, as if embarrassed. ″I didn't mean to startle you.″
The boy did not respond, too surprised and fearful of being eaten to say anything. He simply stood there blankly, trying to comprehend this twist of fortune. Whether it was a good or bad twist, he couldn't say yet.
″I'm not supposed to be talking to you, but – ″ The creature cut off. There was no visible change in expression, but the boy somehow got the impression that he was sad. ″I don't know where my pride went. And I felt you on my back. Are you lonely?″
The boy blinked cautiously, considering retreat back to the middle of the... island. Or creature. But that would be cowardly, and he was a warrior. He would speak to this creature, and determine if it wanted to eat him.
″No.″ He said. ″Do you eat people?″ He tried to keep his voice strong, but it wavered, just the tiniest bit.
The thing tilted his head. The entire island shook. ″Sorry.″ It apologized. ″I'm not used to having passengers. And no, I don't eat people. That would be barbaric.″ The head looked almost puzzled.
″Take me back to the mainland!″ The boy ordered.
The head seemed sad again and paused before acquiescing. ″Alright.″ It said, relatively softly. ″If... if you ever want to visit again, I'll come back in a hundred years.″
The boy gaped, because a hundred years was a long, long time. He would probably be dead by the time a hundred years had gone by! But the head and turned and started swimming again. The boy quickly grew bored with watching the sea rush by, as interesting as it was to be moving at such speeds. He didn't notice that they had reached land until they were already there. He jumped into the water and turned to perhaps say some farewell to the creature... but it had gone. The boy could see the small island vanishing into the distance already.
~-!-~
The boy returned to tell his wild tale and was met with blatant disbelief. Some had heard of foreign tales of such moving islands, but that one would talk and be a real creature was unheard of. Even the boy himself eventually convinced himself that it had been a bizarre dream. Nonetheless, he told his children about it as merely an old man's fancy.
A hundred years passed, and one of the boy's descendents remembered an old tale his father had told him. He was a young, idealistic thing, and he set out to track down the place. He found the small island just as the sun was about to set.
A huge head lifted itself out of the water. ″You came!″ It said, brightly. ″I found my pride, as well.″
The boy was puzzled. Didn't this creature realize that he was not his father's father? But perhaps for it a hundred years was not so long.
″You are not the boy.″ The thing said abruptly. ″But you are like him, too. How can this be so?″
″He was my father's father. He told me tales of you.″ The boy said.
″But...″ The creature seemed confused. ″Humans are so different from lion-turtles! How can your lives be so short? You do not have the time to do anything!″
The boy shook his head in denial. ″Is that what you are? A lion-turtle?″ He considered. ″Like a turtle-seal, from the south?″
The lion-turtle laughed and the sound seemed to reverberate through the boy's very skull. ″Lion turtles are much bigger, of course. And more learned in the ways of bending. But I suppose, in some ways.″
″What is bending?″ The boy asked.
The lion turtle laughed again. ″Do you not know bending? Here, I will show you!″
The lion turtle reached up to touch the boy with his paw, and there was light. The boy's eyes widened, and then he collapsed.
~-!-~ ~-!-~ ~-!-~
Oh, by the way, since there's no way I have enough inspiration to get anywhere with this, if you have any OCs and situations you want to dump somewhere, feel free to drop them off or PM me. I'd definitely let other people write parts of this, but not if you're a bad writer. I reserve veto power.