A ripple on the surface had Zuko gripping his gun with a new sense of urgency.
"Aye laddy, Ah don't think that's gonna help." Zhao muttered.
Azula followed his gaze to a particularly murky spot in the water. Either it was naturally ominous like that or something had kicked up the mud and seaweed below. With her gaze never leaving the murk, she fumbled through her bag. At last her fingers brushed over a lens. With a still unwavering stare, she cleaned the lens on her shirt and held the camera out. She messed with it for a moment or two, zooming in and out trying to find an optimal focus.
"Can you put that away!?" Zuko snapped. "We're not here to take pictures this time. We're here to get rid of that thing once and for all!"
"Get rid of it?" Azula asked as she snapped her picture.
"Kill it, lass." Zhao clarified.
"I know what he meant." Azula grumbled. "Killing it was never part of the plan."
"It's what we brought ye here tae do." Zhao shrugged.
Zuko nodded in agreement. "That's what I came to do. I didn't sail all the way to Scotland to gawk at the thing."
Azula rolled her eyes; once again the siblings had two entirely different objectives. For Zuko it was always kill, kill, kill. Hunt and kill, since he couldn't bring their mother back, he would go out of his way to make sure no other family suffered a loss like their own. Of course, sometimes, he went overboard. "Just because it's mysterious and hard to come by doesn't mean that…"
"Yes it does!" He cut in.
She didn't know why she even bothered. She always did have a soft spot for the monsters they pursued. Perhaps it was because, for the better part of her life, she had always been told that she was one of them. Frankly, Azula came along on the hunts mostly for the journey, as corny as that sounded. Zuko adored the fame and glory that came with conquering the town terror and Azula enjoyed the intellectual acclaim that came from studying the remains and the behavioral patterns the cryptids exhibited in life. She enjoyed seeing her photos in the glossy pages of various nature magazines, and sometimes featured on the cover. If she was being honest, it was an odd change of pace; usually she coveted the thrill of the conquer and Zuko reveled in beauty of it all.
Azula glanced at the photo she had just taken, every tiny bubble beneath the surface captured and rendered in perfect HD. She squinted at the photo, noticing for the first time that a shape blotted the murk.
"It were probably a trick of the mist." She heard Zhao mutter.
"Speaking of…why did you insist that we try to find this thing in the fog? Wouldn't it have been better to wait for clearer weather?"
"Nessie doesn't like to show 'erself in the sunlight. Ah only ever see 'er in the mist."
As their argument continued, Azula peered over the deck—if something so small could even be called that. The sandy cloud beneath the water seemed to swirl as though more dust was being kicked up. The same thing that was responsible for the peculiar motion darted deeper into the water, where a visual was even harder to come by. For a long moment the water was still save for the bobbing of their boat. The underwater cloud dispersed revealing a coiled indent in the sand. Azula took another quick picture. "Zuko."
"It ain't too rainy, ye just be a weakling, lad." Zhao declared.
"Alright, you tell me what you see out there." He pointed at an extraordinarily dense patch of fog.
A few feet ahead the water churned and seemed to split. What little light pierced through the mist, glinted off of whatever was emerging. "Zuko." Azula repeated with a hint more urgency, but not enough concern to put the camera down. This could be her one chance to get the perfect snapshot, to provide definitive proof…
"Ah ken see a buncha trees." Zhao replied.
"Those aren't trees they're large rocks."
"They're trees, ye arse."
The creature began to rise, slowly and gracefully. It's motions tantalizing Azula. She took another picture, just in case she somehow managed to miss her shot. From what she could see in the gloomy half-light, the creature was black in color with a green sheen when the light hit it just right. The texture, from what she could perceive…smooth. It could have passed for an eel if it wasn't so massive and didn't have such an impressive maw. "Zuko, this is important." She spoke louder.
Zuko threw his hands into the air, "The sun could be beaming red-hot into my eye sockets, I'd still be have better luck sighting Nessie than I do right now!"
By now, Nessie was well and roused by their dispute. Her slender neck rose completely from the water. She could faintly make out what looked like a dorsal fin. The creature opened its mouth to reveal something akin to a set of shark teeth. The fog curled ominously around her long neck. With a half satisfied and half horrified expression, Azula took her magazine worthy shot.
"You'll have a better chance of sighting her if you turn around and look!" Azula hollered at full volume.
Zhao spared her a backwards glance, "Eh…what's the lass fussin' aboot?"
In one final display of immaturity, Zuko looked right at the sea monster and said pointedly to Zhao, "I don't know I can't see it through the mist."
And the Loch Ness Monster charged. It dove back beneath the waves and charged. Azula found herself thankful that she had come prepared for the worst. She locked her camera away in its waterproof case. "I told you I'd need it eventually." She stated smugly. Zuko had only been complaining that it was a waste of a good hundred bucks since she purchased it. As Nessie slammed into their boat she clutched the case protectively.
"Lassie, get yer priorities taegether." Zhao remarked.
The boat rolled again with the collision of the beast's body. This time a decently large dent was placed put in it's steal haul.
"Still don't want to kill it?" Zuko asked.
"Not if we don't have to." Azula frowned in concentration as she fought to get the boat's engine whirring again. Unlike herself, Zhao didn't seem all that prepared for this endeavor. She looked at the dashboard. "You didn't happen to bring any extra fuel did you?"
"Int it much left, but Ah goat some." Zhao rummaged through his belongings.
"Hurry up and find it!" Zuko grimaced as Nessie landed a third strike. He took hold of his gun again and cocked it. He ignored, Azula's word of protest and took aim. He fired a shot, where he'd last spotted the creature.
"You're just going to make her angry." Azula cautioned. "We won't stand a chance then."
"If I hit the right spot…" Zuko started.
"We're not killing it!" Azula took hold of his arm. The girl couldn't fathom taking such a one of a kind animal out of the world.
"It'll kill us."
The worst thing was that she couldn't refute that line of reasoning. Other than pointing out that they had picked a fight in Nessie's territory, but she very much wanted to escape with her life and her camera. Reluctantly she released her hold.
Zuko steadied his gun once more only to have his nearly perfect alignment stolen by another blow. This time the boat overturned. The option to right it once more was stolen by Nessie's stubby but powerful tale coming down on it with a vengeance.
"Ah shite." Zhao yelled as he found himself dipping beneath the waves.
"Shut up and swim." Azula instructed. For her it was easier said than done with the extra weight of her camera. But she'd be dammed if she let their efforts go completely to waste. She scanned the water for a chunk of the boat or any large sea debris. Some distance down the lake she spotted a fairly large log. All she had to do was make it there.
Apparently, this was a case of every man to himself, for Zuko and Zhao were a good many strokes ahead of her. Neither paying attention to each other. With nothing else to do, and a sea monster hot on her trail, she took a deep breath and pushed herself through the water as fast as she could muster.
Which she was distressed to find, wasn't fast at all between the camera and the bagginess of her clothing.
She gauged the distance between herself and the shoreline.
It was so far…
.oOo.
Zuko was panting like an animal by the time he reached land. His limbs were completely spent and his energy wasted. He'd put so much time into this trip and would gain nothing from it. The world was just as infested as it was before, the famous Loch Ness still has hazardous as before. He slammed his fist into the sand.
"Laddy, Ah don't see yer sister anywhere."
Zuko bolted upright and scanned the beach himself. "She's here, she has to be." He scrambled to his feet and screamed her name, only to have it echoed back it him. "Azula!" He shouted again. The world around him was terribly quiet. Even Zhao had nothing to say.
Zuko balled his hands. He had already lost their mom to the Wendigo, he couldn't lose his sister to the supernatural as well. He just couldn't.
But the loneliness of the beach told him otherwise.
The mist grew into a soft drizzle, taking away any chance of spotting Azula.
"Ah think we should gather a search party, aye?"
"That's not going to do any good." Zuko mumbled. "Not in this weather."
This time Zhao didn't argue. "If ye wanna stand 'ere n wait then ye do that. Ah am gaun tae get some help."
Zuko stared blackly at the water. A way off, he could swear that he was able to make out the silhouette of his foe. The dark shape was drawing closer and this time he didn't have his gun. Like Azula, that seemed to be lost to the sea. Yet he held his ground—somehow, he'd avenge his sister. Even still, he could hear her making an argument against doing so.
Time crawled slowly. Nessie lazily coasted along with no sense of urgency, none the wiser to the fury she was heading towards.
He could see her more clearly now, the creature that haunted the lake for so long. She was every bit horrifying as the locals had warned. Those eyes, large and glassy, bore into him. Fully aware of the folly it was, he took a rock in his hand. Before he could throw his rudimentary weapon, Nessie bowed her head.
As if it were some mundane, every day occurrence, Azula leapt off of the beast with a semi-cheerful greeting. "See Zu-Zu, I told you that you didn't need to shoot her. She was afraid, that's all." She turned back to see her new companion off, but her mount had already disappeared back into the fog. "I have the pictures too."
"And?"
"I don't think I will release them."
"What?" Zuko roared. "You went through all of that trouble and you're not going to release them?"
"I'm glad you're okay too, Zu-Zu." Azula waved him off. "No I won't. Not the super clear ones anyhow. She doesn't need more people like you going after her. If they see real proof, they'll go after her."
"So this trip was pointless?" Zuko asked, grateful to be having this argument with her rather than crying over her lifeless body.
"Our hunts don't always have to have a point. Not everything has a point, sometimes things just are." Azula shrugged. "But if it makes you feel better, no, not completely pointless. I have a few decent shots, they're of better quality than most of shots of Nessie. I'll sell those."
Zuko sighed. "I guess it doesn't matter right? As long as you're okay…and I never have to see Zhao again."
Azula made a successful attempt to evade Zuko's fluff and relived hugs, "I don't know about that last thing, Zu-Zu. He told me that he'd be interested in joining our duo."
"He what? That's not the truth. Please tell me that, that's not the truth."
"I don't know, I think it would be interesting to have him tagging along with us. I'd love to hear what he'd say if he came face to face with a…" she thought for a moment, trying to recall what was next on their list of things to investigate. "With a Stick Indian."
Zuko for one, could do without the visual. "I supposed we should catch up to him before he gets everyone and their long dead ancestors to go looking for you."
"I don't know, I think I might be fine with the attention." Azula smirked. She slung her camera case over her shoulder and followed Zuko up the beach. Her camera had seen a lot of things, but none of it came close to what it captured that morning.