I do not own Avatar: The Last Airbender
Moon Priest
Leverage
"Quiet!"
It was the first sound Sokka had made since they saw what had happened to Omashu.
Aang thanked every spirit he could name for Sokka's timely whisper. Not even a second after all three of them had stopped moving, even stopped breathing, did a Fire Nation patrol move past the alley.
He could see that they glanced inwards, but luckily a cloud passed in front of the moon. They were hidden in the night. Safe.
Even if Sokka did whisper something under his breath as they passed. Quite contrary to his order, but it did seem to work out for them.
But they still had to find Bumi. That was certainly not going to be easy.
Katara was extremely confused.
Not that anyone could blame her.
Everything happened so fast.
They had been looking for some metal place where King Bumi might have been imprisoned, when Aang had suddenly knocked a couple of runaway rocks away from the tracks. And then they'd been attacked by Fire Nation guards and one hell of a creepy girl. Did her face even move during the fight?
A running retreat later and the earth swallowed them up.
And now her brother was trying to let the Earth Benders see the most logical escape plan ever.
"Guys, think for a moment, would you? Omashu is built on a tower of EARTH. How hard would it be for you people to just tunnel away to the bottom of the valley? Spirits, if you do it right, you'd end up in the Badger Mole tunnels and you'd be literally free. It's a maze. Any pursuers would be hopelessly lost."
Katara had to admit, it was pretty damn logical. Why no one had thought of it before?
She blamed Earth Kingdom stubbornness.
But they had the Avatar on their side. If nothing else, that should sway the fence-sitters and the majority of the civilians.
And it did.
Each time Sokka did something like that, he reminded Katara more and more of the way their father would guide their tribe.
Logic, not hopes. Facts, not promises. Debate, not propaganda.
It was beautiful. More importantly, it was effective.
Things had suddenly taken a turn for the not-boring.
Something, or someone, had galvanized the resistance into new action.
It started with the attempt on their lives.
But even that was surprisingly normal. How better way to destroy an army than by beheading its leadership? At least, that's what the Kingdomers thought. Nationals didn't operate in the same way. Kill the leader, he gets replaced and you end up with an army raging at the bit for revenge. It was just the way things were.
But then, something changed.
The hordes of rebels their spies had been keeping an eye on disappeared, literally overnight.
And then the attacks began.
Omashu's railways started collapsing at night. While normally this could be fixed by a quick application of Earth Bending, the normally complacent Earth Benders refused. Nothing helped. Bribes, threats, outright torture. All of them refused. It was maddening.
And it was just about the same time when the real attacks began. Whole barracks were undermined and left to fall on any sleeping soldiers. Aqueducts were broken. Wells plugged with mud. Roads wrenched open.
And it got worse, day by day.
Attacks on commanders. Sergeants on patrol swallowed by the earth. Warmachines catapulted by vigorous Earth Bending. Mounts let loose in the middle of the night. Politicians disappearing without a trace. Storehouses ransacked. Granaries emptied. Tax-offices plundered.
It was terrible. There were no more rebels. Only terrorists.
And while this made for a more interesting day-to-day life, it was certainly lacking as dinner-conversation.
That suited Mai just fine.
Her family spoke too much and said too little.
AN: Okay, the first time I'm doing something like this.
Previous chapters were roughly aligned in such a way that one chapter equated one episode. I'm changing that now. Omashu will probably end up as a two or three chapter arc.
As for explanations… first things first. The canon escape-plan. That was just stupid. They had earthbenders. They were on a plateau. So freakin' obvious.
I've done away with the Pentapus and 'Pentapox'. It was something that irked me in canon, so that's gone.
Anyway, I'm taking my first real deviation from canon here. Tomtom isn't captured, so the rebels have no leverage. Hence their attacks, an attempt to gain that leverage. All these attacks are orchestrated by Sokka, who (as I think I've said) is not nice. At all.
Also, Azula's trip from where Ty-Lee was (somewhere in the Fire Nation proper, I'd imagine) to Omashu isn't going to be as short as it was in canon. Thus, we get time to muck about in Omashu.
And yes, Katara and Aang did argue against the plan, but they ultimately decided to allow it, as long as they could search for Bumi on their own as well.
Also, there wasn't a cloud.
Read, enjoy and review.
~GrinGrin
PS- two things…
Firstly, I'm killing the poll regarding my ANs by tomorrow at the latest. It hasn't got a lot to do with Moon Priest (not yet, at least), but I'm putting it here anyway.
Secondly, I've been mucking about in my profile page. I've put requests, general info, milestones or targets and generally cleaned it up a bit. Pay it a visit and see if it can either help you or me, yeah?
Written: 07/01/2014
Posted: 07/01/2014
