This is my first fanfic I've posted on the site. It's still kinda hazey to me (I write as I go along, with very little plot to go on, so if you have suggestions, there's always the review box) Sorry that this chapter is so painfully short and focuses mainly on the Caribouhorses themselves. I'll legthen it later by telling you who is who and such. Maybe even some clips of the event of the burning or something. hope you somewhat enjoy and KEEP READING. Disclaimer: I do not own the concept of Pro-bending, Bending, the Avatar, the Equalists, Amon, or any of the other Avatarverse stuff. Just Caribouhorses, and the 5 main characters here. Maybe some more critters and characters later on ;).

The distant sounds of liondogs barking and caribouhorses whinnying...still in sleep's relaxing embrace, the sounds were only dim lulabys for my dreams...Heat...It was a cold night, so it only acted as an extera blanket to sleep's soothing cradle...An electric buzz and a scream...Those sere what forced me out of my Dreamland, like rising out of deep water all too quickly. I looked around, still in a sleep-induced haze, confused and scared. I swung my legs off the bed, and put them flat on the floor, feeling a familiar and reassuring connection with the earth. (our floors were terricotta tiles) I tried to take a deep breath, only find it too choked with smoke to do so, and coughed a bit before calling out, "Mom! Dad! Where are you?" No respense ever came. Not ever again.

Panicked, and not knowing what else to do, I ran outside. Just as I did, Sora, my buckskinpaint Caribouhorse came trotting up to me, nickering and whinnying frantically. The red haze of the sky immediately told me why. Fire. Our entire village was set ablaze.

Sora had on his halter and a lead rope (I figured someone else tried to run off with him), so I tied the lead rope to the other side of his halter to fation a pair of reigns. Grasping hold of his dark mane, I hauled myself up onto his back, ducking to avoid a velvety antler from whacking me in the face. to prevent that from happening, I collected his face, which made the antlers point in a safer direction. I gave him a good kick, and he went foreward, on to Umi's house.

"Umi!" I cried out. I could hear little Kaeru screaming from inside their burning home. I could faintly hear Umi shouting orders at her little sister, Nokoribi. I went ahead and ran inside.

When Umi saw me, releif crossed her face. "Mori, thank the Spirits!"

"Yeah," I agreed. Umi handed me Kaeru, her three-year-old brother, and I swiftly carried him in my arms safely outside, where I set him on Sora's back. I knew Kaeru wouldn't try to climb down from there. I was about to run back inside to help Umi and Nokoribi, but they were already at the door, walking out. Umi and I looked at eachother and we had a silent agreement that we should go let out the Caribouhorses.

"Nokoribi, stay here and look after Kaeru," Umi commanded.

"And Sora," I added. Instead of the usual arguement that would have insued, Nokoribi took the orders with an obidient nod.

"Where are your parents?" I asked Umi as we were headed to the stables.

"Holding off the Equalists," was her respose.

"Eqalsists?" I inquired.

"Anti-benders," she clarified.

"Oh Spirits!" that didn't sound very good. I was releived when Umi didn't return the questoin.

We ran inside the stables, Caribouhorses whinnying and wailing, all rearing frantically. We went around and unlocked every stall, letting the horses go so that they wouldn't get cooked in their own stalls. When Umi unlocked her own Caribouhorse's, Kawa, a blue roan, she pointed in the direction of her own house. Kawa understood, and bolted out the door towards her owners burning home with Sora. I went over and unlocked the stall of Nokoribi's own horse, Kasai, a firey sorrel. I did the same as Umi, and she, too, obayed. Then I walked over to another freind's horse's stall. Karasu was this ones owner, and this Caribouhorse was nearly black with a flaxen mane and tail. Again, I gave the command to run to Umi's house.

We let the rest of the horses free, then ran back home to our horses. As soon as wwe got there, Nokoribi mounted her own mare, I mounted Sora, Umi mounted Kawa, with Kaeru in front of her, and I took hold of Karasu's Caribouhorse, whose name was Yoru, by the halter. I rode out to Karasu's house, which had only just caught aflame. I saw her and her parents flee from their front door, and I managed to carefully Pull up parallel to Karasu. This was good timing, you see, for she had just been pleading with her parents so that she could go grab Yoru and bring him back. She immediately mounted him and took off with me, her parents seeming, with good reason, incredibly worried about the situation at hand.

As we took off, Umi, Kaeru and Nokoribi met up with us. As we began to ride out, i cought glimpse of a dark figure. He wore large, red striped shoulder pads. He was also hooded. As he turned to them, a slump figure fell to the ground. When he turned, a nearby house that had caught fire lit up a pale, expressionless face, and there seemed to be a red circle on the forehead. Then it occured to me that it had to be a mask, for it heald the same, cold expression the whold time we were charging forward. That was when i realized that the next people in line were Umi's parents.

"NO!" she cried, seeng the same thing as I. Kawa pulled ahead of the rest of us, Umi raging on her back. I charged ahead of her, for I realized that she still had Kaeru on board, and if these guys were as bad as this one looked, then I couldn't let either of them get hurt. I let loose a loud battle cry, and before the masked man could turn back around to us, I ran up to the group of people with the glowing green goggles. I hit a very certain button on Sora that said, "REAR!" and so he did. His cloven hooves struck two Equalists on the head. They fell to the ground with a pair of yelps. Before annyone could do anything else, I breathed in, bringing my hands up, horizontally, palms up, then growled and shoved them back down, face down, creating a deep, not-to-mention steep bank, with a large amount of Equalists inside. I knew that they could eventually get out, but it was enough to keep them occupied for a while. I pushed Sora forward, and he jumped over the ditch. I landed next to Umi's parents, who were hand cuffed with metal shackles.

"Come on! We can still all get away!" I cried out.

"No, not now!" said Umi's father. "Now's not the time!"

"Then when is the time!" I retorted.

"Later!" answered Umi's mother. "Flee to Republic City! You'll be safer there!"

"But-"

"Jsut go! Never let Umi, Kaeru or Nokoribi behind!"

I could see that they were dead serious. If anything happened to any of them, i was dead meat. "I won't!" I promised to them, and myself. I loved them too much to let anything happed. I scoured the line for my own parents, but not a single face even closely resembled them. Fighting back the tears, I jumped back over the ditch. I galloped up to the others, saying, "Your parents told me that we have to go to Republic City!"

"W-why?" Nokoribi obviously didn't want to go.

"They said we'd be safer there." I didn't want to go either (I hated cities) but we had no choice.

And so, with several more protests, and reluctance and nostalgia tugging sharply into my heart, we rode away, away from the smoke, away from the flames, away from hatred, for now, and into the cool, moist night...

Our home had been burned down. There was nothing left for the five of us in the little rual village of Tai-Gen. We had to move on. We had to be strong if we were going to survive now. We had to survive, if not only to see the end of the Anti-bending campaign.