40 months ASC

"Hurry up, Katara," said Aang standing in the doorway to their home.

"What is this all about anyway?" Katara asked.

"I have no idea. But when Haruko asks the three of us to meet her somewhere, I usually listen," replied Aang.

Aang was now 16 and had been married to Katara for just over two years. Gone was much of his youthful roundness, replaced with the handsome chiseled look of a young man. Likewise, Katara, now 18, was no longer a girl. Having become a mother at the age of 17, her body exhibited the curves normal women have. Though make no mistake about it - Master Katara was still highly athletic, practicing her waterbending at least two hours every day.

The young family rounded the corner to one of the sitting rooms in the lower part of the temple. They were taken aback when all the residents of the Easter Air Temple yelled "SURPRISE" at them.

"Wh-what's this?" asked Katara.

Haruko, the venerable mother of the Eastern Air Temple, stepped forward and said, "This is Aria's surprise party. You know today is her first birthday, don't you?"

"Uh…yeah," said Aang. "I just didn't think anyone else really remembered. We were just going to celebrate alone at home."

"Nonsense," said the gray-eyed temple resident. "Little Aria is our treasure as well. Put her down with Shaila over there and come get something to eat."

Haruko is married to Deshi. She is the direct descendent of two airbenders. Her son, Kochi, is one of the six airbenders Aang is currently training. Her daughter is Fei Yen, Earth Queen and wife to King Kuei.

"Ok, Haruko," said Aang rolling his eyes. He knew better than to think he was going to win any battle that went against Haruko's wishes.

Aria and Shaila were very close in age with Shaila being only months older than her little friend. Shaila is the daughter of Suwan, another of the six airbenders Aang was training. The two toddlers saw each other and smiled before they started to play.

Katara stood next to Suwan and looked at the two girls together. "It looks like they have discovered the game of tag," she noted. Aria crawled to Shaila, touched her with her hand and then crawled off. Shaila did the same for a while until she noted that she was much faster walking than crawling, a skill only she possessed among the two of them. Aria didn't have a chance to win after that.

"When did Shaila start walking?" asked Katara.

"She was about a year old," replied Suwan. "Aria will be walking anytime now. Does she try at all when you're home?"

"Oh yeah," answered Katara. "She stands up next to a chair or something and pulls herself along."

"I bet she's going to be a lot of trouble when she is truly mobile," said Suwan.

"Just think about the both of them if they end up being airbenders," remarked Katara.

OlOlOlOlOlO

Other than taking short trips here and there, Aang and Katara had essentially planted themselves at the Eastern Air Temple after Aria was born. As much as Aang loved to travel, with Aria being so young, he wasn't going anywhere anytime soon. He was very protective of his daughter and wanted to spend as much time with her as possible. Perhaps this was a side-effect of the fact that he never got to know his parents and was raised by monks.

Life was happy and not much occurred in this now-peaceful world. The rebuilding efforts had been concluded a long time ago and life had moved on after the war. Aang received regular updates from around the world, but nothing was ever so critical that he needed to leave his home and family. As much as his reign as Avatar started in chaos, his life now had become routine and fulfilling.

That is, until Aang had a nightmare early one morning.

"Aang!" Katara called out. "Aang, wake up!"

"Huh?" he stopped his violent tossing and turning and became cognizant of his surroundings. He was in his bedroom at the Eastern Air Temple with Katara.

"Are you ok?" she asked.

"Um….yeah," he said, still trying to figure out what was going on. "I must have had a bad dream."

"You haven't had one of those in a long time," said Katara.

"I know. This one was so….real," said Aang. After a brief pause, he said, "Something's not right. I gotta go."

He bolted out of bed, threw on some clothes and ran out the door to their home. Katara was aware that this was something to do with him being the Avatar and was understanding of his erratic behavior. I wonder what this is about, was all she could think.

Aang ran to the sanctuary as fast as he could. He planted himself on the floor and started to meditate. That fact that he was in a very spiritual place helped him to enter the spirit world quickly. His arrows and eyes began to glow. The next thing Aang knew, he was standing in the swamp, his usual entry location to the spirit world.

"Hello?" he called out. "Is anyone here?"

"Hello, Aang," said a voice standing ten trees away from him.

"Avatar….Kuruk?" noted Aang. "I didn't expect to see you."

"Aang, I need your help. Come with me," he said.

The two entities walked for a bit. That's when Aang smelled it. Burning.

"Avatar Kuruk, what is that smell?" Aang asked.

"Look for yourself," Kuruk answered and pointed to a tree that was engulfed in flames.

"It's on fire! How do we put it out?" Aang asked knowing full well that a tree on fire in the spirit world was definitely not the same as a tree on fire in the physical world.

"Aang, this tree represents something going on in the physical world. Something very bad…in a very spiritual place. You need to get there and fix things," said Kuruk.

"Where?" Aang asked. But it was too late. Kuruk had faded into nothingness.

"Why can't they ever give me details?" Aang shouted at the swamp. He turned around and headed back to his gateway to the physical world. Before he knew it, he was sitting again in the Eastern Air Temple sanctuary.

He rested with his legs still in lotus position but with his arms now holding his weight up from behind. Think, Aang. The nightmare. You had a bad nightmare which made you come here in the first place. What did you dream? He closed his eyes and thought back to last night trying to retrace his mental steps. He remembered one face from his dream, but couldn't quite place it. He recognized the face.

"Got it," he said aloud to himself and snapped the fingers of his right hand. He bended himself up to his feet again and ran back to his home.

"Katara, no real time to explain, but I've got to go. I shouldn't be gone too long," said Aang in full run-on-sentence mode.

"Where are you going?" she asked.

"The Swamp," he replied.

OlOlOlOlOlO

Aang and Appa spent the better part of a day hurrying to the swamp. As he feared, the saw black smoke billowing out of many different areas of the swamp.

"Appa, don't land," said Aang. "Get to a safe place outside of the swamp until I call for you." He then jumped off his flying bison and, using his glider, made his way towards one of the plumes of smoke. He landed to find many of the surrounding trees on fire.

He got in a ready position and his eyes glowed just for a moment. He then sent a huge stream of water from the swamp floor towards the burning trees, dousing the flames.

Well, that's one down…

Aang jumped from tree to tree until he found another hot spot in the swamp. He used a similar tactic against those flames as well.

This continued for about an hour. After about his 5th or 6th fire, Aang heard voices from behind him. He twisted around to see who was approaching.

"I told you, Tho. It's the Avatar," said Due.

"You were right, Due," said Tho.

"Hey guys, what's going on?" asked Aang. "What's with all these fires?"

"Don' know for sure," said Due.

"Huu told us that there were a bunch of strangers in the swamp a few days ago," said Tho. "Maybe it's them."

"Where's Huu?" asked Aang.

"I imagine he's near the banyan-grove tree," said Tho. "He'd want to protect that above all else."

Aang abruptly jumped high into the trees – high enough so that he could take a flying leap and safely get his glider flying without fear of hitting any vines or branches. The central banyan-grove tree was easy to spot from the air because it was taller than anything else around. To Aang's dismay, it too was on fire.

He landed near the trunk and immediately went to work on the flames. As he was bending the water towards the top of the tree, he heard a distinct hissss coming from the other side of the tree. He continued to bend the water up as he stepped to his side. Finally, he got a look at the source of the sound. It was Huu, also bending water onto the tree.

"Huu!" Aang shouted. "What's going on here?"

"Some people have no shame!" said Huu.

"Who?" asked Aang.

"Firebenders!" answered Huu. "I've been watching them for days now making sure they weren't going to hurt the swamp. I don't even know why they were here. Their ship is over there," he said as he pointed towards the west. "They've been coming into the swamp with their water machines. Then, about a day ago, they started setting fire to the swamp in a bunch of different places. Me and the other swampbenders have been putting out the fires ever since!"

This is ridiculous, thought Aang. His eyes glowed again and he scooped up a great deal of water from the swamp floor and made it encircle him. He steadily rose above the trees. Once he could see the swamp in its entirety, he sent the water in every direction to douse every fire that had been lit. The hissing of fires being put out could be heard across the swamp.

Aang slowly descended back to the swamp floor where he found Huu just watching him. "You've gotten stronger since the last time I saw you," Huu noted.

Aang simply nodded back, still irritated that this situation was no accident.

"Huu, I think I got all the fires put out," said Aang. "I need to go find the firebenders who did this." With that, Aang jumped to the top of the trees once again so he could get on his glider. He immediately flew towards the west. At the speed he was going, it only took a few minutes to get to the edge of the vast swamp.

Aang could see a ship docked in a small river that ran to the nearby ocean. Aang pointed his glider towards the ship and flew there as fast as he could.

He landed on the deck of the ship, which was mostly vacant. Over to one side, he saw six water machines similar to the ones he saw years ago in Jang Hui, the water village. Each one could only hold one or two people, but if all six were deployed, Aang could see how significant damage could be done.

No one moved towards the Avatar, who still stood where he landed. What is going on? Aang thought. Aang finally had enough waiting for some sort of a greeting and began walking towards the command center of the ship. Just as he reached the door, it swung open revealing the officer in charge.

"Can I help you, Avatar Aang?" asked the high-ranking man in uniform.

"Good, so you know who I am. Who are you?" Aang asked.

"My name is Commander Kenichi and I am in charge of this ship," said the man.

"What are you doing here?" asked Aang bluntly. "You are causing a lot of problems in this swamp."

"What problems? It's just a swamp!" answered Kenichi.

"I don't really care what you think. Again, what are you doing here?" asked an angry Aang, pressing for more answers.

Kenichi tried to act high and mighty, but in truth he was relatively new at this command and bit of uncertainty started to show through his confident front. He exhaled. "Well, if you really must know, we are…kind of on leave."

"Leave?" asked Aang. "I want to know the entire story, NOW!"

"Come with me," said Kenichi, who ushered Aang into a private room that was connected to his quarters. He had him sit at a table and poured him some tea.

"Now, I'm not going to ask you again. What is going on?" asked Aang.

"I can see that you are angry and I want to begin by saying that we intended no harm to anyone or anything," said Kenichi. "I report to Admiral Cho. We were recently performing some naval exercises with the rest of the western fleet not too far from here. The Admiral got angry with us. He said we were a bunch of incompetent buffoons and ordered the ship away from the rest of the fleet for a period of one week so they could continue their exercises without us. He gave us no other direction than that. So we sailed southeast until we ran across this inlet. We've been here about four days now."

"And….," said Aang.

"And what?" asked Kenichi.

"Uh, what are you doing to rectify the situation? An Admiral called your ship and your men buffoons and you simply sail away and play?" asked Aang.

"We weren't….playing. I merely told the firebenders to go practice off the ship," said Kenichi.

"THEY SET FIRE TO THE SWAMP!" yelled Aang who banged both fists on the table.

Kenichi leaned back as if to subconsciously get away from the ire that was being aimed at him.

Aang gathered himself. "You are in command of this ship and thus, you are responsible for your men. They were setting fire to the swamp, not by accident, but definitely on purpose. They set fires in many locations as if to see how fast they could burn the place to the ground. It took years for the swamp to grow to its current size. There are many creatures that call the swamp home….and unbeknownst to you, there is a small village in that swamp. You easily could have killed the people that live there."

Kenichi's eyes got a little wide at hearing that there were people living in the swamp. "Avatar Aang, I had no idea….."

"Of course you didn't. You were just acting in your own selfish, entitled way. I wonder if that is one reason you were asked to leave the naval exercises," said Aang. "I highly recommend that you pack up your things and leave here immediately. And in case you didn't catch it, it's not really a recommendation if you get my drift."

Kenichi nodded.

Aang stormed out of the room and took flight once again once he reached the deck. He took roost in a nearby tree to watch the next steps taken by the captain and crew of the ship. As he expected, they did raise their anchor and left the river that flowed into the swamp and went back out to sea. Aang had become a much more intimidating figure how that he was older. Although he was very powerful even before he had reached his teen years, he now looked and sounded like he could do great damage if he needed to.

Upon seeing the last smoke trail from the ship as went over the horizon, Aang opened his glider and made his way to Huu once again to explain what he had seen.

"They were just idiots, Huu," said Aang. "There was no reason for them to burn down the swamp. They were just practicing and thought it would be entertaining to start a bunch of fires. And their commander wasn't much better – he's the one who sent them out here to practice in the first place. They're gone now and I doubt they'll return anytime soon."

"Thank you, Avatar," replied Huu.

With that, Aang jumped to the top of a large tree and whistled for Appa to come get him. He climbed aboard. "Yip! Yip!" he yelled. "Let's go home, buddy."

OlOlOlOlOlO

Upon his return home, Aang told Katara the entire story. She advised him that Zuko should be made aware, not only of the issue with the fires in the swamp, but that these men were so incompetent that they were asked to leave regular naval exercises.

He began to draft a scroll:

Zuko,

Unlike most of the messages I send you, this one is of an official nature. I have been made aware of several issues affecting the Fire Nation Navy and I wanted to be sure you were aware of the situation. I know that sometimes subordinates have a way of keeping things hidden...

I was called to a sacred place – a swamp - in the Earth Kingdom to find that it was being destroyed and burned by members of your navy. Upon talking with the captain of the ship, I discovered two things. First, that they were purposely asked to leave the fleet exercises due to incompetence. Reading between the lines, I think that the Admiral probably had enough with the screw-ups and thought it easier to just send the problem away rather than to deal with it. Second, they then went to this sacred place and thought it would be fun to just set fires with no regard for the harm they might do. There is a village located in the swamp and those people could have been injured or killed, not to mention the damage that could have been done to their home.

I hope you will look into this matter. The ship in question was being led by Commander Kenichi. He reports to Admiral Cho.

Aang

Aang had just finished sending the scroll to Zuko when he was approached by Deshi out on one of the balconies of the temple.

"Aang, do you mind if I have a word with you?" asked Deshi.

"Of course. You have me concerned….you are not usually so serious," said Aang.

"Oh, it's nothing. It's just something I think you should be aware of," answered Deshi.

"I'm all ears," said Aang.

"First, come with me," said Deshi. He led Aang towards the airbending practice area, the location where Aang usually taught his students. As they approached, they saw two figures there practicing their skills. Deshi put out his arm so that Aang did not walk into full view.

"What's going on Deshi?" Aang whispered, having gotten the idea that they weren't supposed to make their presence known. "It's just Meifeng and Kochi practicing…I'm sure Meifeng is just helping your son."

"Just wait," said Deshi.

The two friends hung back and watched as the two airbenders practiced some of the more difficult moves Aang had showed them. Meifeng even showed Kochi a few of the forms that only she and her Dad had been taught since Kochi was still a few levels behind them. The banter was lighthearted and Meifeng giggled whenever Kochi messed up. One time he retaliated and hit her with a blast of air that knocked her to the ground.

"Kochi, I can't believe you did that!" she exclaimed, still laughing at her training partner.

"I thought an expert airbender like you could have handled a little air blast," replied Kochi.

"I wasn't expecting it," said Meifeng. "You caught me by surprise."

"Is that right?" said a smiling Kochi, who outwardly prepared to send yet another air blast at his friend. But this time she was ready. She caught his air blast and redirected it right back at him, knocking him off his feet. He air bended a cushion underneath himself so he wouldn't hit the ground too hard.

Both teens laughed at the game they were now playing, and obviously enjoying.

"Deshi, I - ," Aang started, but was quickly cut off by an index finger to Deshi's mouth to shush him. Deshi nodded back to the young airbenders.

Kochi stuck his arm in the air so that Meifeng could help him up. But when she grabbed his hand, he pulled her down on top of him instead. That's when it happened. The two giggled a little bit, which was followed by a little bit of staring into each other's eyes, and finally, an embrace and a kiss.

Aang was taken aback. His eyebrows raised and his face showed a bit of shock.

"I just thought you should know," said Deshi.

"I didn't see that one coming," Aang admitted.

"You may have no seen it coming, but is it really so hard to believe? They spend a lot of time together because of their airbending training. And they are virtually the same age as you and Katara. Is it really so hard to believe that they may want to date?" asked Deshi.

"I guess not," answered Aang. "I guess I just never thought much about it."

"My advice is to just let them be," said Deshi. "There is no reason to interfere."

"I disagree," said Aang. "Airbending training has to come first. I need to ensure they are aware of the risks of a personal relationship and are willing to deal with any consequences that may arise as a result of their being together."

OlOlOlOlOlO

Aang decided to wait a few days until he broached the subject with Meifeng and Kochi. He wanted to make sure that he had spent plenty of time thinking about the situation and weighed all the risks and rewards of having two of his airbending students dating.

When it felt it was the right time, he sent for both of them to meet him at his home.

They arrived one at a time, looking a little confused. As friendly as their whole community was, they had never been summoned to talk with their Master one-on-one before. Little did they know that it really was a two-on-one.

When Kochi entered the living room of the small flat, he saw Meifeng already sitting on the couch. The two teens had a pretty good idea what they were there for. Meifeng started glowing red when she realized what was going on.

"Master - ," began Kochi.

"Kochi, relax. I only needed to talk with you two. You haven't done anything wrong," said Aang.

Both of the students visibly exhaled.

"I have been made aware that you two are an item. Is this true?" asked Aang.

"Yes, Master," said both Meifeng and Kochi.

"Are you happy together?" asked Aang.

Both heads nodded.

"There is nothing wrong with dating or any other…uh…physical expressions of your love that you may want to engage in," said Aang.

"You mean, sex?" asked Kochi.

"Well, let's not jump to the most extreme situation quite yet," said Aang. "I was talking about holding hands and kissing….things like that. I wouldn't recommend sex until marriage."

"But Master, Min taught us that Air Nomads don't get married. They find their bonded mate around their sixteenth birthday," said Kochi.

"Just don't forget that you two are not completely Air Nomad. The traditions of your Earth Kingdom upbringing need to be taken into consideration as well. There is no longer a Winter Festival each year. And now parents are around their children much, much longer than they used to be," said Aang.

"Yeah, you never knew your parents, did you Master?" asked Meifeng.

"That's correct, Meifeng," replied Aang. "So my point is, you need to consider both sides of your heritage before making any hasty decisions. Ok?"

"Yes, Master," said the teens.

"My one and only concern is what would happen if something happened between you two," said Aang.

"What do you mean?" asked Meifeng.

"Have you considered the fact that you will both need to continue your training side-by-side even if things don't work out romantically?" asked Aang.

"I don't think we've ever thought about it," said Kochi.

"I sincerely hope you two eventually get married – I really do - but if it doesn't work out, well, depending on why the break-up occurred, it could lead to hurt feelings, anger, sadness, and most of all, not wanting to be anywhere near each other. And that's just not a possibility. Do you understand?" asked Aang.

"I think so," said Meifeng. "We need to go into this knowing that we will need to continue our training no matter what."

"Exactly," said Aang. "Else I will need to create new rules to forbid students in the same class from dating one another. You two are the trial run. Try not to ruin it for the airbenders who will train in the future. I can't afford to have either one of you not continue your training simply because you don't want to talk to or touch the other person."

Both students got the point. They stood up and bowed to their Master before exiting Aang's home.

"So, do you think you made yourself clear?" asked Katara as she rounded the corner from the bedroom.

"I hope so," said Aang. "I can't have airbenders quit their training for something so trivial as someone got their feelings hurt."

"I'm sure it will be fine," said Katara leaning down over her husband's shoulder and pecking him on the cheek.

OlOlOlOlOlO

Aang,

Thank you for telling me about Commander Kenichi, Admiral Cho and the incident at the swamp. I called them before me and they were very surprised that I was aware of everything that had happened. As you said in your message, subordinates have a way of hiding things if they want to.

I have come across a potentially bigger issue that may need your intervention. At a minimum, I may need your advice. I know you are due for a visit to the Southern Water Tribe shortly for Hakoda's wedding. Would it be possible for you to come to the Fire Nation capital afterwards? We have much to discuss.

Zuko

Aang sent an immediate reply telling Zuko that he would see him in approximately 1 month's time at his palace.