They're calling me again. To feed the animal that I am I suppose. Perhaps not though…They like to come every now and then, beat me, torture me. They beat me but I don't swell. Perhaps they don't beat me. I don't know. Do I know?
Did I mention I had a brother? He's not here, he likes to stay away from home. He avoids me. It's alright. I'm used to it by now. He sent me here. He sent me home. Ha!
Home is for the weak. The strong have no home, they have no earthly attachments. Perhaps I am weak? My brother is weak, do they think I am weak? Maybe that is why they're calling me. I think they want to feed me. Do they want to feed me or do I want to be fed.
I always was weak I guess…or not. I'm positive I was not weak. I merely miscalculated. I heard that before, but I can't remember where. I feel my pulse…
Do I have a home now or…my brother sent me here.
Here.
Home?
No.
Just another place. I will be freed at some point when I change. I am capable of change, I tell myself. Here is your food, a figure in red says.
I do not respond. I merely gaze at the figure, wondering why I am receiving such kindness. The figure lifts their hood, a red hood, a hood I do not recognize, did the figure have a hood…Mother never wore a hood.
Mother was always close to my brother…she was weak, my father would say. I have trouble believing it. She is innocent, so they say, but I wonder when my mind was once sharp – not the dull drab of slop I am now, or perhaps I am so sharp I cut myself – I loll my head. New aromas try to invade my senses – I feel my pulse again.
I wonder if my brother has a pulse. I nearly killed him after all.
Even though I never want to see her again, I wonder where mother is, why she left, but then I forget, a passing in the wind. Summer heat in the Fire Nation does that to people.
The heat makes you slow, you become your own burden, having to trudge to the market, get cabbages for the family – always from the same merchant, I sometimes think he is not human, am I human?
I remember breathing fire from my face, oh pretty blue fire – you don't like to talk to me anymore. You were my only friend. I had friends once…
Friendship is dead. It's an illusion. The Avatar, my brother, the Water girl, they have no friends I tell myself. They are powerful and defeated my father and I through raw power. They are strong because they have no home…
They are…I look around my cell. I'm trapped in white walls so unlike my heritage. The walls should be red, bloodied, I can see it why does no one else. Perhaps I am hallucinating; mother seemed real.
I can't move in these red walls, white to others but truly red because only the people in the right see red…my arms are trapped, my legs trapped. The box likes to close in on me. It's a nice feeling simply because I can feel it.
I get up and walk twelve steps to my right. I admire my accommodations. Spacious white walls in an ornate room. Bars stand guard in front of me…and I see figures interrupt their jobs. The bars are protecting me, they tell me so. I believe them.
Other than the food they give me I don't trust any figures. Figures brought me to this state of consciousness in the first place. I had a mathematic percentage, probability, of going insane in my last hours before my coronation. I didn't go bonkers, I came back from the fishing trip intact.
They led me astray, they convinced me to take a cruise. Fishing was bad enough, I almost lost it, I wanted to invite the Dai Li with me, it would have been fun watching the traitors drown by my own hands.
No, sadly not. The Water tribe girl took me on a cruise. She wanted to show me the way of balance, peace, love, and kindness. Nice, peace-loving people don't freeze others and chain them to grating.
But I don't blame her either. I forgive them. I've got nothing else better to do. I listen for heartbeats other than my own. Nothing? I shrug. It's getting late, I thought. There are no windows here, but I have attuned to the sun even when I cannot see it. I listen for my own heartbeat…
The sun, shining bright on my face…did I mention I had a brother? Maybe my brother putting me here is the best for me, the most opportunity for me to change. He said that to my father…a father who lied to me, I think.
Monsters are incapable of discerning the truth one of the Fire Priests said once. Was I there when he said it. Probably not. Do I care.
Yes.
No.
The bloodied white walls are…Mother liked white walls. I've never known why.
The guards…excuse me the others think I scream and shout and make animal noises like I lost my humanity or never had it in the first place. What they don't see is that I'm very much sane. I check my pulse to be sure, and my interests have been confirmed.
I am sane. I may talk in rambles and I may see things that others do not, or so they, the others, not the others but they, say, but I'm okay with it just as they are okay with it.
It is only a matter of time before I am released, free. I check the pulse on my neck, a tingly sensation in my calf, I'll be free soon.
Maybe then I'll see my family again…