Aang sat in class, worrying away at the end of a pencil, eyes unfocused as the history teacher rambled on. He thought about last night, and what had happened. Something had changed and it scared him. He wasn't sure what triggered it, b the general unease he'd had since the voice started had now been amplified to an almost skull splitting level. It screamed at him and made the whole world seem on edge. His nerves were frayed and he anxiously tapped his foot as his mind drifted back to last night.

He sat, with his legs crossed and breathed in, and then out. The pills were working less and less lately and today, not at all. Spending the day with Roku critiquing his actions, his choices, and what girls drew his attention was a terrible thing. That night he took a double dosage but even then, nothing had happened except for an upset stomach. So now he was trying the technique that one of the monks had taught him. In, out. Still he could hear Roku humming timelessly to himself.

As the minutes stretched on there suddenly came a silencing, crashing over Aang like a sneaker wave. His breathing hitched, but he pressed through and continued on the measured pace he'd set. Afraid that any change could bring the incessant voice of Roku back.

Yet, as quickly as it left it was back. Only now it wasn't the soft, slightly nasally tinged whining he'd come to associate with the old hippy. It thundered and reverberated around the room, or at least his skull. "Child! you have wasted enough time. Your dawdling can no longer be tolerated! Men seek to go where they are welcome not, and to waken things best left to slumber. They seek power, profit, possibilities! They know not what they try to do, what they are trying to harness or control. They are like toddlers, playing with gasoline and matches because they enjoy the smell and the sparks. Or like children throwing rocks at an old mine." The voice felt like an explosion in Aangs skull. He felt a pressure building, threatening to push everything out. To squish his brain flat and to explode his eyeballs out of his socket. He fell flat against the earth on his back, his hands pressed down to his sides gasping for air. The voice continued. "YOU have been chosen to stop this. To correct their missteps. Too long has the world been without a true guide, a prophet to lead the people. A guardian to protect. A parent to scold and punish. YOU are to take that position. This is not a choice. Come, let me show you what I have seen."

Aang turned his head to the side to see, for the first time, the apparition of a man. His hair long and grey down his back. A goatee growing down over his chin, nearly reaching his chest. Ratty and worn clothing, with a dirty look. And his eyes, his eyes pure white. No pupil, no iris. Simply white

And then Aang was no longer on his floor. He was no longer in his house or town or country even. He was instead floating above an expansive and intense desert. It stretched from horizon to horizon in every direction he looked. Below him there was a massive windstorm, blowing sand around and around in a gargantuan funnel. Through the winds he saw ancient ruins. Ruins that would have been called such when Gilgamesh was first told. Ruins that were old when the spirits stopped dwelling on the physical plain. A thrumming sense of unease entered into Aang as he looked down. Like he was someplace where he wasn't meant to be, where he wasn't wanted. Suddenly he felt a a pulling in his chest and down he was yanked, through the storm into the ancient buildings. The buildings felt wrong somehow. The proportions slightly off for the use of a man. Down through the winding corridors, down through the high roofed cathedral like rooms. Bodies of creatures, from the most twisted and feverish of dreams, lay scattered around. Like they were in a deep slumber.

Finally, into a massive cavern, the scale of which left Aang feeling minuscule. Like a a more of dust floating in a stadium. Like a switch was flipped walls of flame towered up around him, severing him to the bone and he was pulled farther in. Massive walls of stone closed around him, blocking off the flames and he continued to be pulled in. When finally, there, in the center of the room I cased in ice was a beast of proportions so massive Aang was like a mosquito on an elephant, it's features twisted and bent in on itself in ways that made His mind ache if he looked too long at it. He was pulled closer, closer to one of its many eyes. Then he stopped, and floated in the abyss and watched. After an eternity passed its eye flickered, and then snapped open. It SAW Aang, and it was dismissive. He was quickly flung away from the ice, through the stone and fire and twisted uncomfortable corridors. Past the bodies of the vile creatures, who looked almost as if they too had stirred and above the eternal storm of sand.

Aang sat up gasping, drenched in sweat and shivering. The air ached In His lungs, like he hadn't taken a breath in hours. Again, Rokus monstrous voice filled his mind. " You saw the barriers. Know that the wind no longer blows as strong, the fire no longer burns as hot as it aught to, the stone walls have cracks and the ice is melting. The terrible creature stirs. You must stop it, and stop the ones who wish to waken it." And then, finally, there was silence. It pressed against Aang like a stone on the chest.

He cleaned himself up, showered, prepared for bed and then laid there for the rest of the night. His mind playing again and again what he had seen. Unsure if his hallucinations were getting worse, or if what he saw and heard was real. He wasn't sure what worried him more.

"Mr. Aang, are you hungry? Are you finished? Would you like for me to get you another snack? Perhaps a pen or a marker this time." Aang looked up, snapped back to the present by his teachers lilting voice. He looked down and saw that he had worried the pencil in half and slivers of it littered his desk.

"Uh...I'm not sure what I was doing. I guess my mind was just elsewhere today!" A big grin split his face, and his hand sheepishly rubbed the back if his neck. He coughed and spat out another mouthful of wood shavings. They hit the desk with a plop.

"Hrrm. I see. And, since you are such an expert on the invasion by Hannibal, can you explain exactly why Scipio failed in his attack during the Battle of the Upper Baetis?" His smug grin split his face. Taunting a student who wasn't paying attention always made the man feel slightly better about himself.

"I'm, uh...sorry. I don't know."

"Oh! Ooooohhhhh!" A hand shot up, and was waved around with an exaggerated and animated movement. "I know pick me!" The teacher glanced over, sighed, and called on Sokka.

"It was because he was power hungry. He was trying to secure himself politically back home and thought another victory would help that. He rushed in without properly knowing the situation and paid the ultimate price!" His grin beamed out with his answer. Pride evident on his face. The teacher nodded, and the. The bell rang. The students gathered up their this and the teacher dismissed them with a wave of his hand.

AUTHORS NOTES

So, there's another chapter. I'm getting a better idea on where I want to take this, and how I want it to end. The journey in between is still a little hazy, but I'm mapping it out as I go. Feedback is always welcome.

I'm wanting a beta reader, to help catch me on my spelling, grammar and syntax mistakes. If anyone would be willing.

Oh, and would you prefer to get shorter chapters faster, or longer ones but at a slower rate? I'm working fairly rough hours right now and I don't have a lot of energy to spare at the end of a the day. So I don't write a lot. So ,et me know!

Thanks for reading.