Hey guys and girls :) new chapter up and as usual I DON'T OWN ANYTHING EXCEPT FOR MY OWN CHARACTER LING, EVERYTHING ELSE IS OWNED BY THE CREATORS OF AVATAR: THE LAST AIRBENDER

I hope you all enjoy it :) and I do welcome constructive criticism as long as you aren't a jerk about it :)

ENJOY

Chapter 3

Ling couldn't believe it. But surely enough the beam of light was a testimony to all that the Avatar was back. She got up, pulled her mask up and flipped over the side of the roof, caught the ladder rungs and slid all the way down. Zuko was at the front, the bow I think it's called, she thought to herself in a distracted moment.

Zuko had changed and was now in his armor looking at the light as well a mixture of shock and triumph on his face. If he caught the Avatar now they would return to the Fire Nation with her on board as well and she would never allow that. She began devising a plan to sneak away. She had made a promise to herself that she would never go back and she intended to keep that promise no matter what it took. Even if she had to leave Iroh and Zuko.

She shook her head from those thoughts. Calm down Ling, that hasn't happened yet and General Iroh would never force you to go back and would make sure that you were taken care of. He had after all, promised he would do just that a few days after she had officially joined.

She walked up to where General Iroh was playing some type of game and Zuko was now facing his uncle.

"Uncle, do you realize what this means?" Zuko exclaimed gesturing to the light with his left hand.

"That I'm not going to be able to finish my game?" General Iroh retorted looking up at his nephew.

"It means my search is about to come to an end." Zuko said facing back towards the light. Ling rolled her eyes, always the dramatic one, she thought but didn't voice it, because if she did they'd just get in another argument and General Iroh would have to step in and she had learned her lesson from the last time…doing hot squats until her legs gave out. She had been sore for days. Her only satisfaction had been that Zuko had had to do them too.

Iroh sighed and went back to his game which aggravated Zuko. "That light came from an incredibly powerful source! It has to be him!" Zuko was indignant now and Ling just sat back to watch the show unfold.

"Or it's just the celestial lights," Iroh gestured to the sky with a game piece in his hand, "we've been down this road before, Prince Zuko. I don't want you to get excited over nothing. Please sit, and why don't you enjoy a cup of calming jasmine tea."

"General Iroh," Ling had walked up to his side mindful to make sure Zuko wasn't watching, "no offense, but we both know that that isn't true. I'm sure you felt the immense power as I did." Iroh didn't say anything to that and just sighed and went back to his game. To Ling it seemed like he was trying to deter his nephew away from the Avatar but why? Does it have something to do with the spirits? She shivered at the thought. She had seen the spirits in action and hoped she would never have to again.

"I don't need any calming tea!" Zuko all but yelled. "I need to capture the Avatar! Helmsman! Head a course for that light!"

Ling walked up to Zuko and began angrily signing, "Must you always yell at your uncle like that? He's the only blood relative that has stayed with you all this time! Through everything! He's just making sense of all the other possibilities!"

"Ling." Zuko said her name without even looking at her and she braced herself for another fight. "I know." And with that he walked away, leaving her there to figure out what had just happened.

General Iroh bid his nephew farewell and walked up to Ling. "My nephew sometimes knows exactly when to exercise restraint but do you?"

"Do you want an honest answer or do you want me to tell you not to worry?" She countered still looking forward.

"From your answer I have my answer. You are an excellent student and most of the time you know when to exercise restraint, but for you, my dear, it is when someone accuses you of something that you have a lack thereof." Iroh seemed proud of himself, having deduced that from her. "Just so you know, my nephew apologized on his way to his room. Whatever you said to him made him tell me that he was sorry for yelling at me and I thank you." He bowed at this and she was so taken aback that she belatedly bowed as well.

"I will forever keep that lecture a secret in case I ever need to use it again which will most likely happen." She smiled, her smile crinkling her eyes and he smiled back.

"You might want to get something to eat, I didn't see you during breakfast and lunch, and you must be starving." With that he left and indeed he was right. She was ravenous.

She made her way to where they held their various meals throughout the day and her stomach grumbled in anticipation. She quickened her steps and rounded the corner and almost plowed over Zuko. She was able to sidestep him and ran the rest of the way to the cafeteria. She could've sworn she heard him chuckle.

Luckily there was only a small line so she wouldn't have to wait long. Zuko brushed past her heading to the front of the line as was his right even though he was banished, he was still royalty. Knowing that she was in the wrong, she knew that she should apologize for reprimanding him but she believed that he had deserved it and resolved to not apologize to him.

Fortunately for her, he never ate with the crew and shortly after he got his food he left for either his room or his uncle's room. She waited patiently until she got her food and left for her room as well. Roasted deer-boar was the soup tonight and her mouth watered more. Roasted deer-boar was one of her favorites and she had been craving it for a few days now.

She reached her room and hurriedly opened the door. She set her food on the small square table and searched the room for any uninvited guests. Checking under her bed, behind a Fire Nation flag that she had and every now and then wanted to burn, even in her bathroom. She refused to let anyone see her face and made sure that if anyone were to be in her room without her permission, they would surely suffer.

Being satisfied that she was truly alone she sat down at her table and began to remove her mask but stopped short. She had almost forgotten to check the air ducts. She hastily got up and used the wall to give herself a push up she grabbed onto the air duct grating and maneuvered it over the lip of the hole. Pulling herself up she looked left and then right and being satisfied that no one was there, she lowered herself down and maneuvered the grating back into place. A healthy dose of paranoia never hurt anybody, right? She mused to herself.

She took her place back at her table, removed her mask and began to eat. There was more in the bowl than she had previously thought and when she was finished she felt like she could hibernate for a hundred years. She sluggishly dragged herself up and went to her bathroom and began getting ready for a shower. Tomorrow was going to be a long day and knowing that they were most likely going to go on land to try to capture the avatar she wasn't going to let wet hair make her sick and unable to do her job.

Her room was a normal sized room that could fit about three and a half beds the size of her bed which sat in the left corner of the door. She had a desk right in front of the door and her little table a few feet behind it. The bathroom was attached to her room on the left side and it was small but big enough to fit a stand-in shower, a toilet, and a small sink, and she was perfectly fine with it. She didn't have any decorations since this was more of a temporary living situation and that she might have to leave at a moment's notice, if something were to happen and she would never be able to carry much.

She stepped out of the shower changed into her sleeping clothes and made sure that her door was locked and that if someone were to try to come in she set up a trap that would jingle a cluster of cans and wake her up in a heartbeat. She snuffed out all the candles and fell into a peaceful sleep.


Today was the day that they were going aground. She couldn't wait any longer! She couldn't even focus on her morning routine of meditation, she was so excited to be off the ship even if it was for five minutes or five hours, she would take it.

She watched as the sleeping ship awakened and decided to go down for breakfast this time, wanting to keep up her strength and stamina just in case they actually had to fight the Avatar. She dreaded that encounter and would do anything to not fight him.

She was one of the first in the cafeteria along with a certain banished prince and a creeping feeling that she should really apologize but she shook her head. No, she was strong in her resolve to not apologize and wouldn't let a little guilt get the best of her!

He went ahead of everyone else as usual and left. She got her food and headed back to her room but as she came to an intersection she could hear someone pacing up and down the hall.

It was Zuko, or the back of Zuko at the moment and she contemplated whether or not she should leave and act as if she never saw him so worried or nervous or actually talk to him and see what was wrong. The latter won out and she approached him as he turned around. She cocked her head to the side as if to ask him what was wrong and catching the hint he sighed.

"He's had a hundred years to learn the elements," He said and she gestured with her free hand as if to say go on. "What I mean is, what if he's too powerful for us? I just want to go home. I'm sick of the sea!"

She handed him her bowl clinking it with his and began signing. "The dude's gotta be over a hundred years old. Now we both know that people over that age are most likely to be frail no matter how powerful they may be. Besides, home or family, whichever you want to go with, isn't in the blood or the place you were born, it's in where those who love you most are and in here." She laid her hand on his chest right over his heart and retracted it a few seconds later.

He stood there stunned then shook his head as if to make sense of what she had just told him. "How do you know so much? What about your family and home? Where are those for you?"

Even though she knew he couldn't see she gave a small sad smile and for this she was thankful then replied, "I don't have a family or a home and I like it that way."She had stunned him again and she took advantage of that and grabbed her bowl out of his hand did a hasty bow and left, practically sprinting to her room.

She didn't want to be questioned by him because then he would be persistent about it and find out everything and it would ultimately blow her cover and she wouldn't allow it at the moment. Probably never.


She came out of her room a while later and found General Iroh instructing Zuko on the deck as Zuko dueled against two firebenders and Iroh told him to do it again. She had to laugh at him somewhat because she wasn't the one under the general's scrutiny. Iroh was a great teacher but he was strict on his students.

Zuko ran through it again. He shot fire from both his fists at his opponents and his opponents retaliated by shooting out fireballs from their fists and Zuko dodging them by jumping and twisting through the air making his body parallel to the ground and landing like a leopard-cat on his feet. He held two of his fists out at his opponents and the match was concluded. Had this been a real situation they wouldn't have given up so easily and it would have gone on longer. Ling was bored.

General Iroh sighed and stood up, "No! Power in firebending comes from the breath," he gestured to his stomach, "not the muscles." He explained and moved his arm in front of himself like he was going to throw a punch. "The breath becomes energy of the body. The energy extends past your limbs and becomes fire!" He shot a small and non-menacing fireball at Zuko that dissipated before it ever touched him. To the prince's credit, he never flinched and Ling was surprised. "Get it right this time!"

Zuko sneered at his uncle, "Enough. I've been drilling the sequence all day." He walked up to his uncle menacingly and got right in his face. "You will teach me the next set. I'm more than ready."

"No, you are impatient." His uncle growled back. "You have yet to master your basics. Drill it again!" He practically yelled the last part.

Zuko wasn't having any of it. He barred his teeth and it seemed to Ling that he was going to try to intimidate his uncle into teaching him and she briefly wondered what a duel between him and his uncle would be like. General Iroh would probably win in about five seconds flat. No one would really be able to call it a duel. She sighed. She really needed some action because this place was starting to bore her to death.

Zuko shot a fireball out of his foot into one of the soldiers he had been dueling and Ling felt slightly bad for the man but not bad enough to go help him up and make sure he was alright. "The sages tell us that the Avatar is the last airbender, he must be over a hundred years old by now, he's had a century to master the four elements," that got her attention. He was using her words to get his uncle to teach him more sets! The little smart devious jerk! She was impressed and mad that he had actually been listening. "I'll need more than basic firebending to defeat him, even if he is old and frail he's still a master. You will teach me the advance set!" He yelled in his uncle's face.

"Very well, but first I must finish my roast duck." Iroh reached over to his left side and grabbed a bowl of roast duck and rice and began shoveling it in his mouth. Ling laughed to herself at the disgusted look on Zuko's face and walked to sit down next to Iroh.

Zuko seemed to take this as way out and said, "Why doesn't she have to learn this stuff?" Iroh with his mouth stuffed with food was unable to answer so Ling took it upon herself to. "Because I am technically considered a master." He was not happy to hear that and stomped off to repeat the set with the soldiers. She turned back to Iroh. "Are we actually docking today? Please tell me that we are." She made a begging gesture and he sighed. "I do not actually know my dear. I believe we are but I am going to go get some sleep as soon as I can sneak away from my nephew. You won't tell him, will you?" She shook her head and "zipped" her lips and he smiled.

General Iroh was one of the few people that she could ever trust with her life and just being around him brought a kind of warmth to just about everyone's life that he came into contact with. She could see why he had been the favorite between him and his wretched brother with Fire Lord Azulon.

Iroh snuck away and Zuko continued for a few more minutes with her scrutinizing him and giving a few pointers here and there. He wore himself out and claimed that he was going to go get lunch and relax a bit. She decided that lunch was needed for her too and reluctantly got up and followed him inside.


After lunch, she went back outside to meditate on top of what she now knew as the bridge/helm overhearing some of the crew talking about how weird and dangerous it was for her to be up there. She still wasn't sure what it was called however, and she didn't really care. She made her way up there and when she came out of the door she found Zuko staring through a telescope scanning the horizon searching for any sign of the Avatar.

Upon hearing the door open and shut he turned around and didn't show any sign of shock upon seeing her. Before he got the chance to turn back however, she began signing fiercely, "You little jerk! You used my words against your uncle, your teacher, so that you could learn what you were not ready for! You know how awesomely devious that is? Very!"She finished with clapping her hands slowly three times and he smirked. "I don't know whether to be proud or mad."

"Why not be both?" He replied without any hesitation. She sighed as a sign of defeat and he chuckled to himself and went back to looking through the telescope, all signs of their joking were gone, replaced by a harsh seriousness. He just does not know when to relax. She thought to herself and climbed up to the roof and meditated.

A few minutes later however Zuko exclaimed that he saw the Avatar. She climbed down and politely shoved Zuko out of the way. He didn't complain or anything and she saw him as he leaped down from the last bit of a Fire Nation ship. She straightened her posture and looked back at Zuko and nodded. It was him. It was the Avatar!

"Wake my uncle," Zuko ordered one of the soldiers on the right side of the door. "Tell him, I found the Avatar." The soldier ran to do his bidding lest he get a fireball to the butt. Ling had to stifle a laugh as the mental image of the guy running around with his butt on fire trampled through her mind. "As well as his hiding place." He said more to himself. "Ling," he turned towards her and she nodded showing that she was listening, "you are going to accompany my group down there in case things get out of hand." "Understood." She shot back and darted to her room to get ready.

She couldn't believe it! The Avatar was truly alive and well despite his old age. She wonder if he would be short or tall and the like, as she shoved her blades into secret compartments in her loose but tight clothing and her boots. Her clothing was all black and fitted her body nearly perfectly except that it had to be loose enough for her to be able to slide her blades and whip and smoke bombs into. Feeling satisfied she returned to the deck and awaited General Iroh and Prince Zuko to join her.

She couldn't help but be afraid knowing how powerful all the other Avatars had been and that this guy was over a hundred and with that much power she wondered if they would even make it out alive.