...

Sano repeatedly banged his head gently on the table of the cafe.

"Ugh," he groaned into the plastic surface, full of frustration and self-pity. "I was so close. I can keep up a welding flame fine on my own, but the circuit cartridge they wanted me to use kept forcing the Chi paths just far enough out of line that I could not manage it. I tell you, this standardization is killing the art."

"Mmhmm," Kadat murmered in dutiful agreement, stirring his milk-tea drink with a waterbending swirl of his hand. He took a sip and admired the contents. "This place is pretty good, how come we didn't come here more last year?"

Sano rolled his head to the side so he could glare up at is friend and was met with an infuriating smile. With a sigh he sat back up and blankly looked around the rest of the cafe. There was only one other person sharing the space with them, an old man in an dirty brown robe and straw hat, who Sano remembered had also been at the ceremony. Frankly the man's clothes looked like he had been sleeping in the woods and Sano was guiltily glad that he was sitting on the far side of the room. Trying to look at something else Sano stared out the windows into the street and was rewarded with something on which to focus his bountiful ire.

"Look, there they go again," he said, pointing at the white uniformed figures walking out of the stadium across the street from the small cafe. "The Lotus Corps marching around on Fire Nation soil, acting like they are the law of the land. It's catering to the Global University exams that makes them not appreciate real firebending nowadays, and our government keeps refusing to stand up to them interfering in the affairs of sovereign nations!"

"Well it's not like the Avatar decides our curriculum herself." Kadat interjected with the futility of someone who knew that this the audience would not be receptive right now but nevertheless felt obligated to correct some facts. "GU is just the best, and everyone in science wants a chance to work in Full Moon Peak City."

"Mrrgerragrrrmm," Sano mumbled indistinctly. "Still, I..."

That was when reality had a seizure and Sano dropped out of awareness in this world. Unnoticed behind him, the old man slid off his chair clutching his face.

...

"Ahh, ahh," Amala found herself trying to pant without any lungs in her phantasmal spirit form and marveled that she had managed to not scream any louder than she had. How had anything managed to hurt her like this while she spirit projecting? Her body was still safely in the closet, far away from this lab and its sinister glass globe. This was very bad, but she could not flee now. She had orders for the eventuality of a successful test.

Out in the room around her the experimenters were celebrating with the careless awkwardness of research scientists everywhere. Even the team leader was smiling under her severe pony tail and frown-lines, despite her trembling and heavy breathing that showed she had been affected by the wave of energy almost as much as Amala had.

"Well done, people. Well done. We are right on schedule for the full implementation with the comet's arrival," the lead scientist said. "How about tonight everyone goes home to celebrate how they like and I will see you at the next phase of testing."

The room slowly filtered empty as Amala impatiently waited with growing anxiety about her body being discovery. But the lead scientist seemed in no hurry to leave and join her celebrating team. When the woman's path of meticulous inspection had left her closely studying rows of data on one of the monitors against the far wall for several minutes Amala decided to make her move. The woman's back was to the central control panel and even if she turned it was partially obscured by an intervening a rolling rack stacked with maintenance parts. Amalacould get at it without being seen.

With single flicker in and out of existence Amala's transparent spirit was floating in front of the bank of switches and control devices. Glancing over at the scientist revealed that the woman had sensed nothing, at the moment she was just swaying back and forth stretching the muscles in her arms. Amala reached out both ghostly hands and placed them around one of the important components on the control board, focusing her energy in careful concentration as she studied the item. Success! Now to simply relax and return to her body. She closed her eyes to dissipate this manifested form.

Nothing happened.

"What, you are going to leave without introducing yourself?"

Amala's spirit spun in the air. The scientist was staring right at her, one hand held out to the side swaying in careful motions. With growing panic Amala saw something else, thin steams of water spiraling out from the woman up in to the dim light, forming a flimsy dome above the two of them. Somehow that was stoping Amala from returning to her body. Panicking, she flew sideways, streaking towards the door like a ray of light desperate to escape, but she smashed against an invisible barrier at the outline of the dome. Those two widely spaced pencil-thin strands of water representing a cage for her spirit more solid than any wall of iron.

The woman scientist watched Amala without concern. "It's embarrassing, but I will admit I did not notice your presence until after the test was complete. I suppose that's what happens when you get too caught up in your work. But I have time for you now."

The woman held up her other hand in a clutching motion and Amala's world wrenched. She was across the room now, the scientist's fingers somehow clutching all too physically at her throat. Amala screamed and struggled but the fingers which should have passed through her spirit form like mist stayed as immovable as platinum. And all the while that shrewd, faintly lined face regarded her calmly.

The woman inspected her like a specimen, even as Amala's spirit writhed and choked in her grasp. "Airbending projection. Limit one to two kilometers but lends to under half a kilometer due to her likely unfamiliarity with this room. Late teens means student, confirmed by the unwisely manifested university lab-coat, which means intern in the labs granting access to the low security areas of this facility. Interesting. Having reached the ends of reasonable deduction, I now ask WHO SENT YOU."

The words were spoken in the same calm, confidant manner but they crashed into Amala's phantom existence like bolts of lightning. Now she recognized the woman. There was no gold in her hair or makeup on her face, but this was Avatar Meili, and Amala was doomed.

Amala brought her trembling astral hands together in front of her and closed her eyes in concentration. Now Avatar Meili saw what Amala was holding clasped tight in that fist and for the first time shock crept into the Avatar's eyes.

"The command key? But to interact with physical matter though a spirit projection is impos..."

Amala silently screamed in concentration until there was a mighty wrench at her soul and she thought she would tear in two but then she was gone and the Avatar was clutching empty air. The web of water vanished into dissipating mist as the Avatar reached out to tap her cheekbone, still regarding her outstretched hand and the empty floor beneath it with curiosity.

"Intrusion in prototype hall, prepare for lockdown. Jinpa, to me."

In seconds there was the sound of armored feet pounding echoing down the halls but the Avatar was now spinning delicate webs of air towards the hand that had lately held Amala. Something just above the surface of her skin began to take on a blue glisten.

The laboratory doors burst open as the soldiers arrived, heavy in their suits of powered armor that glowed with the lines of activated chi-circuits. "Avatar Meili!" The lead clanking figure began "Is the..."

The Avatar interrupted, brushing past them out the door into the hallway. "Begin lockdown of the campus grounds but leave facility security as is. I want to see who flees."

"Yes, Avatar." The soldier replied, tapping his gauntlet as he switched communication channels while falling into step behind her.

Meili swept through another tall door and the corridors were grander as they neared the Avatar's main operational building. More people rushed forward to fall in line behind her as part the ad hoc ambulatory command center that was forming around their mistress, receiving their orders from an Avatar who assumed they would be there before she spoke.

She continued her commands, "...backsearching for any packets referencing the test timeframe. And she has been in the spirit world recently, likely communicating with someone. Increase our presence there until further notice. Agent Jinpa!"

"Yes, Avatar."

There was a burst of air and on the empty marble of this crossway in towering corridors a new figure kneeled where before there had been nothing. She was dressed in a skintight suit plated with light pads of carbon armor and with bulges along the spine that echoed some strange reptilian. The dark grey with highlights of orange and black was only interrupted for the goggles and the exposed mouth with now grinned in anticipation.

The Avatar snatched a metal clipboard from one of the aids beside her and threw it at the newly appeared woman's feet. "The cameras saw nothing, of course." The Avatar said, and with a stamp and a twist of the fist the clipboard was crushed into a ball and began to glow. "You are patched into the network. Follow for the chance that her contact is also on the school grounds. However, apprehend her when she tries to flee."

The agent stood and bowed, picking up what had now cooled into a small metal bust of a frightened young face. The grin beneath those goggles was wide and ruthless.

"Of course, Avatar Meili." She stepped back and with a slight hint of breeze her form faded out of sight like a vanishing mirage, leaving only a shimmer in the air and empty marble walls. The keenest eyes might barely pick out a wavering streak of the hidden form that raced up and out of the hall on its mission.

...

In her room Amala was hyperventilating as she tried to pack. Everything, absolutely everything had gone wrong. The only good thing is that she was so terrified by her imminent capture that she could not think about what her parents would say about her leaving the school. With a twinge of regret she shoved her computer in a crudely assembled box of electronics that with a press of a button twitched and smoked to herald the death of her digital friend and the incriminating records it held. Shoving some clothes into a backpack, she at the same time fumbled with removing the authentication chip from her glasses. Finally and with a grimace she looked at the four foot long object made of cloth and telescoping metal tubes that had been wasting her limited closet space at her mother's insistence. A reminder of the only school project she had ever really hated. Well, if it ever had a use it would be now.

Amala then lifted up her thin dorm mattress to reveal the flat box hidden on top of the box-springs. She pulled it out to reveal the long adhesive strips and dots of the bending circuit pathways, and beside them the small bundle of circuit chip cartridges she had personally etched. She was not supposed to have these. She had her airbending license of course, all kids of the True Air Nation ended up getting theirs as early as legally allowed. However, since that test she had almost never used these devices. She didn't even test her own programs herself, an attitude that befuddled the other benders in her chi physics program who delighted at rare opportunity to suit up for bending. But her handler from the Movement had insisted she have this box and now she did, so she hurriedly stripped down and applied the pathways to her prickling skin.

Once redressed she was ready to flee. Amala was reaching for the knob of her door when she abruptly stopped herself. Years of watching bad crime drama shows had instilled some instincts, such as not escaping out the front entrance if you thought there might be people coming after you. Then with dread Amala turned to look at her small cramped window that was just big enough for her to fit through. As she reluctantly slid a program cartridge into the circuit she felt ready to cry.

It was only a fifteen foot drop and her well-programed airbending circuit brought her to a gentle stop but it still took Amala a moment to open her eyes and stop softly screaming over plummeting to her death. She was an airbender who was afraid of heights and now she was on the run from the Avatar. Then she hurried off across the campus into the settling evening without looking back, even at the black and orange form crouched on the roof of her building that slowly rippled back into the gloom.

...

Amala could not stop touching her arm where she felt the circuit pathways rubbing against her sleeves as she made her way down and across the campus. The lab coat hid all trace of her unpermitted equipment and there were enough Air Nation about that no one questioned the colors but she still felt eyes pressing on her. She was repeating a mantra to her self. "I've got cash. Have to make it to the airport and buy a ticket. Make it to the airport and buy a ticket." But she knew in her heart that her rehearsed backup plan was shot. She still had the one thing other thing they had given her for her mission, but she did not think she could bring herself to use it. People had to be closing in on her. Even if no camera could have seen her spirit form, even if the Avatar had never seen her before to put a name to her face, even if...

Ahead of her, making their way through the unconcerned after-dinner milling of the campus crowd, were three Lotus soldiers. Amala could not stop herself, she froze when she saw them and when one of them chanced to meet her eye, she ran. And relying on the core instincts of security everywhere; once she ran, they chased.

...

On the rooftop above, airbender agent Jinpa cursed from her invisible vantage. They hadn't made the girl's face public yet, so those guards had no idea who they were chasing yet the fool had still gotten spooked. The little fugitive was running fast enough to confirm her guilt of something and the overstuffed backpack hinted to someone planning to flee even to campus security. The bundle of rods and cloth awkwardly held in one hand as it pumped to frantic steps was difficult to identify but interrogation would solve all those mysteries.

"Well," Jinpa thought to herself as she saw one of the Lotus below raise an earthen barricade. The girl in the orange coat summoned a gust to hop over it, almost falling on the far side. "She is not going to be meeting with any conspirators now with half the campus chasing her. I guess that means I get to have some fun". With a blast of wind the hunting airbender agent burst out of her cloaking invisibility as she rocketed forward from her rooftop perch and hit the ground running; running with the force of a hurricane at her back.

...

"Oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no."

Amala caught herself with a small swirl of air as she skidded around a sharp corner and took off running down the walkway. She couldn't keep this up. She was a thinker, not a fighter and had admittedly for the last few years been focusing more on the meditation aspects of her bending training rather than the running and jumping and general cardio. She was just lucky her bending equipment held three circuit slots or she would have dropped all her programs trying to change them. How did the Lotus find her so quickly?

Suddenly she realized; her phone! She whipped the rectangle out of her pocket and franticly spinning around for an idea she settled on throwing it down over the railing of the walkway to smash on the rocks where the ground sloped down to a lower level of the mountainside campus.

How to get out of here? Here on the inner reaches of the campus, the ground dropped off sharply beneath the walkways to the point that you could enter a building on the ground floor and find yourself descending five floors to exit the other side. Now as Amala ran along the side of what had suddenly become a five story building she realized that there was only sky before her. At this particular dead end there was no staircase down, only an open vista, and the door inside the building beside the walkway was locked from this side. Could she backtrack and go another way? Amala turned around.

Silhouetted in the lamplight at the other end of the building was a figure in black armor highlighted with slashes of orange. That figure did not look friendly. Well, that decided that. At this time Amala wished she had been more studious with one particular school project, she wished she had tested more of her bending programs herself, and frankly that she wished had made a great number of different decisions in her life. She began to unfold her craft project.

...

Jinpa dropped down in front of the covered walkway she had seen her prey disappear into. There was the girl in the labcoat, seemingly trapped at the end of a dead end path. At least until she unfurled something that looked like a pupating deck chair which Jinpa belatedly realized was supposed to be a glider staff. This girl really was the worst airbender. Jinpa ran forward, confidant in her ability to make the capture and assuming she should at least prevent this girl from accidentally killing herself. Amazingly, after a moment where it looked like the girl would faint just from standing on the railing she leapt off and actually managed to summon the wind to fly into the new night on her homemade abomination. Jinpa grinned, thinking that this might actually be some fun. As she bounded up onto the railing, Jinpa flexed her arms and along their inside edge orange knife-like wings snapped into position. It was always nice when they tried to run.

Amala was barely managing to keep above the rooftops, making several unintentionally sharp turns to avoid smashing into trees. Behind her, the pursuer darted and swooped like an orange winged falcon. Amala tried to put on more speed as they flew out over the city on the slopes below but it was as hopeless as a balloon trying to outrun a fighter jet. Jinpa moved in for the capture and her first airblast put Amala into a falling spin that she nearly did not recover from. Jinpa was scanning for somewhere on the streets below to bring her quarry down for the cuffing when she noticed the girl pulling something out of her jacket pocket. Amala brought her hand to her mouth and tossed something tiny towards the agent.

The thrown object looked like a small seed or nut but training was training so Jinpa went into a spin to capture the projectile in a projected ball of air that she then pushed to the side. This was a very reasonable and well executed action that led to Jinpa being very surprised when she was suddenly enveloped by a rapidly expanding jungle that had spontaneously relocated into mid air.

What?

Massive green trunks and vines exploded outwards in every direction in an expanding maelstrom. The black sky had vanished somewhere in this chaos. Jinpa swooped left, then right; absorbed a hit on the shoulder, burst up and spun into a leftward dive. All she could see was vines. Something wrapped around her leg sending alarms flashing in her vision as suit supports were crushed and she jerked into an uncontrolled spin, the horizon lost in a tangle of green. It took two razor-concentrated airblasts to cut herself free and she just managed to escape to open air as the whole verdant tangle crashed down into the buildings below.

Jinpa sent herself into a gentle soaring circle, panting and trying to discern what had just happened. The scene below her was chaos as the huge mass of vines that had smashed into the upper floor was still disjointedly shooting out crushing strings of vegetable matter the size of sewer pipes. The mass burped up a few more hundred pounds of vegetation before finally falling still and inactive. Spirit vines?

The girl was gone, Jinpa knew before she even looked, yet she still put on an extra burst of speed and shot through the air down street after street, finding nothing in the glittering web of streetlights. This attack, whatever it had been, had provided enough of a head start for even the most incompetent spy to go to ground. Whoever was behind this break-in at the labs was more dangerous and inventive than Jinpa had given credit. Gritting her teeth in frustration, she radioed in her failure, advising command of possible casualties outside the university where the vine mass had crashed.

Landing back on the walkway where the chase had began, Jinpa ripped off her helmet and threw it down in anger. But as she did something occurred to her. Jumping over the railing without a thought she fell gently down to the earth, careful to not disturb the dirt too much. And there it was amongst the rocks of the hillside, the shards of the girl's phone. The screen was broken near to dust but the memory appeared to be physically intact. The agent smiled, maybe this pursuit was not a complete failure.

...