Chapter 4: Under the Lake
Rinzen jerked awake and forced herself upright, breathing hard as she did her best to slow her racing heart. She glanced at the window only to find that it was still dark, but the faintest traces of light blue and pink were beginning to make their way across the horizon. Exhaling quietly, she slipped to her feet and headed out of the bedroom to splash water on her face before settling down at the kitchen table with a cup of hot tea, sipping on it as she began to sketch on a large piece of parchment.
"Rin?" Aang yawned as he came out of the bedroom, pouring himself a cup of tea from the pot she had brewed before sitting opposite her. "What're you doing up? The sun isn't even up yet."
"I could ask you the same thing," she answered, glancing up and frowning as she nudged his foot with hers under the table. "What's wrong?"
He bit his lip, dropping his gaze to his cup. "I had a bad dream about Appa. Just this feeling he was in trouble, you know?"
She nodded in agreement. "Yeah. It's why I'm up, too," she confessed. She couldn't quite remember the dream now, the details slipping out of her memory like water through a sieve, but she couldn't shake the feeling that something was very wrong and they didn't have much more time to waste in looking for Appa. She turned the parchment she had been drawing on in his direction. "I was designing a missing poster for him. We could find a printer and get them mass-produced, put these up around town."
He nodded in agreement, studying the flyer for several moments before he finally registered what he was looking at. "You drew this?" he asked, looking up at her with surprise, and she shrugged mildly, feeling suddenly self-conscious.
"I mean, I'm sure we can get a better-designed one, I just wanted the printer to get an idea of-"
"No, no, this is perfect. I just didn't know you could draw. I guess I'm still learning things about you even after all this time." Aang gave her a bright, albeit tired smile, before looking back down at the detailed sketch of Appa she had done. "It looks just like him." He avoided touching the wet spots of ink as he traced his fingers over the image slowly, as if imagining running his fingers through Appa's thick, soft fur, and Rinzen could see the longing and anguish written in every line of his face.
"I miss him, too," she admitted quietly and he glanced back up at her, managing a tiny smile.
"We'll find him soon, Rin," he reassured her.
"I hope so." She got to her feet, heading for the stove to turn it on with some spark rocks so that she could boil some water for some porridge for breakfast. "We'll see if we can find a printer in the middle ring once the shops open for the day," she added over her shoulder.
"Sounds like a plan," he agreed. By the time the porridge was done, the sun had risen and the others had arrived in the kitchen, admiring the drawing Rinzen had done of Appa as she set out bowls on the table along with containers of sugar and cinnamon.
"We're not running out of porridge anytime soon," Katara pointed out as Aang began to shovel spoonfuls of porridge into his mouth quickly the moment he mixed in some sugar.
"I know, but I wanna go find a printer as soon as I can," he insisted before going back to eating as quickly as he could.
"Don't go making yourself sick over it," Rinzen warned as she kicked his ankle gently under the table and he obediently slowed down a little.
Once they had both finished their bowls, they said goodbye to the others and headed out to the train station, which had just opened for the day. Once or twice, Rinzen caught Aang staring at the sketch of Appa she had done, his expression set in grim determination.
"I can't stop feeling like something's wrong," he said quietly when he looked up and caught her eye. "Like he's being hurt somewhere."
"I know." She squeezed his shoulder lightly. "We'll find him, Aang, I promise."
When they reached the middle ring, they found a printer who had just opened his shop for the day and passed on their flyer to him to make copies, which they then picked up and returned to the house to divide into two piles. Katara, Sokka, and Toph took one pile to start pasting the flyers on the walls around the city while Aang and Rinzen took to their gliders, scattering flyers from the air as they flew over the city.
"You guys hear anything from anyone?" Aang asked hopefully as they returned to the house to find Katara, Sokka, and Toph slumped inside on chairs, exhausted from walking all morning.
"We have to give it time," Katara pointed out wearily. "We only just put the flyers up."
With a forlorn sigh, Aang slumped into a chair and Rinzen patted his shoulder gently. "Just be patient," she reassured him. "We'll find something soon."
Almost as soon as she finished her sentence, a knock came on the door and Aang perked up. "Hey, what do you know? Patience really does pay off!" Rinzen shook her head fondly as Aang hopped up and went to answer the door, his smile fading the moment the door swung open to reveal Joo Dee on the other side. "Joo Dee?" he exclaimed, bewildered.
Joo Dee smiled eerily. "Hello, Aang and Katara and Rinzen and Sokka and Toph." Her words were carefully enunciated in a way that made a chill roll down Rinzen's spine as she joined Aang at the door, placing a hand on her brother's shoulder.
"What happened to you?" Sokka demanded behind them. "Did the Dai Li throw you in jail?"
"Jail?" Joo Dee scoffed, but kept smiling stiffly. "Of course not. The Dai Li are the protectors of our cultural heritage. I was simply on vacation at Lake Laogai. It was quite relaxing."
"Lake Laogai? Where the lantern festival was?" Rinzen confirmed, glancing down at Aang as he nodded.
"Yeah, that's where-" He paused, frowning back at Rinzen. "Hang on, I thought you and Lee didn't go to the festival. How'd you know where it was?"
She mentally kicked herself even as she quickly covered up, "Uh, we didn't go, but we heard people talking about where it was."
Aang shrugged, seemingly buying it as he turned back to Joo Dee, but Rinzen caught Toph's narrowed eyes staring in her direction as the earthbender leaned on the wall nearby.
"The Dai Li replaced you with some other woman who also said her name was Joo Dee," Katara pointed out warily and Joo Dee blinked back at her innocently.
"I'm Joo Dee."
"Why are you here?" Aang sighed, clearly realizing they were going in circles, and Joo Dee held up one of the flyers they had been scattering around the city.
"Dropping flyers and putting up posters isn't permitted within the city without proper clearance."
"Are you kidding me?" Rinzen snapped as she snatched the flyer out of Joo Dee's extended hand. "Do we have to wait for permission to do literally anything in this city?"
Joo Dee's eyes widened a little, the corner of her eerily-wide smile twitching slightly. "I...don't know what you mean. We have rules here and we would ask that inhabitants of the city follow them. Y-You are absolutely forbidden to continue putting up-"
"We don't care about your rules!" Aang shouted suddenly, startling even Rinzen. "And we are not asking permission!" He shrugged Rinzen's hand off his shoulder as he began to shove Joo Dee further out of the doorway. "We're going to find Appa on our own and you can just stay out of our way!" He slammed the door shut in Joo Dee's face before turning back to the others, scowling. "I'm done playing by these people's rules. We're going to do whatever it takes to find Appa."
"Yeah!" Toph perked up, grinning broadly. "Let's break some rules!" She stomped on the ground and the wall behind her disintegrated into a pile of rubble.
"Seriously?" Rinzen pointed out wryly as they opened the door to leave, relieved to find Joo Dee gone from the doorstep. "You had to destroy the house to make your point? The house didn't do anything wrong."
"Eh, I'll fix it later," Toph dismissed, waving a hand as they each took a new pile of flyers to begin pasting them around the city again.
"Let's split up," Katara decided as they reached a wall, spreading a little paste on it before putting up a flyer. "Aang and I can stay here in the upper ring and put these flyers up. Sokka and Toph, you should take the middle ring, and Rin, you can take the lower ring. That way, if you see Lee, you can rope him into helping out, too."
Rinzen rolled her eyes even as she nodded, but Toph snapped, "Why do I have to go with somebody? What, you think I can't put up flyers by myself?" She snatched the paintbrush from Katara, smearing paste roughly on the wall before slamming a flyer backwards against it. A long awkward pause followed before she sighed. "It's upside-down, isn't it?" When no one had the heart to correct her that it was backwards instead, she just shook her head. "I'll just go with Sokka."
With that, they split up, Rinzen stuffing her pile of flyers into a large bag as she hopped onto the train to head to the lower ring and begin pasting flyers on the walls. She narrowed her eyes at every Dai Li agent who passed her and raised an eyebrow pointedly in disapproval of what she was doing, making a point to smooth down the flyers as neatly as she could to show that they were there to stay.
"Showing off your artwork?" She started at the sound of Zuko's voice, glancing behind her to see him reading the flyer over her shoulder curiously.
"Oh, uh, no. Putting up missing flyers for Appa," she explained.
"That seems awfully sudden." Zuko's nose wrinkled in thought as he examined the poster. "Did you get any new leads on him recently?"
"Not yet, but I can't shake this feeling that something's just...wrong. I don't know. Either way, Aang and I thought it'd be a good idea to start spreading the word and see if anything turns up." She tucked the rest of the flyers into her bag. "Think I could convince Pao to put up a couple flyers in his shop?"
Zuko cracked a wry smile. "You could, but you're better off putting up flyers in Uncle's new tea shop."
It took Rinzen a moment for the words to sink in before she smiled broadly. "That's amazing! He's really getting his own shop?"
"A few men from the upper ring came by this morning and offered it to us. It's just down the street from the Earth King's palace." He didn't look as happy as she thought he would be, which made her frown a little.
"What's wrong with that? It sounds like a pretty sweet deal."
"Nothing, I guess." He shrugged one shoulder. "So you're really okay with us moving to the upper ring? Figured you wouldn't want us so close to where you were living."
"What?" The thought hadn't even crossed her mind, but now that she considered it, something about having Zuko so close to Aang made her heart beat a little faster with panic. "Um, no, it's not a big deal. It's a huge city. We probably wouldn't even run into each other," she reasoned, trying to cover it up.
"Yeah. I guess." Zuko's expression tightened a little and she knew he had noticed the hesitation in her voice.
A sharp intake of breath behind them distracted Rinzen and she turned to see a Dai Li agent who had stopped in his tracks on the street behind them, staring at the poster of Appa on the wall.
"You got a problem?" she snapped at him and he shook himself out of whatever daze he was in.
"Uh, no, ma'am." He hurried away and Rinzen glanced back up at Zuko only to find him studying the Dai Li agent's retreating back consideringly.
"What is it?" she asked, brushing her fingers against his briefly to get his attention, and he jerked back like he had been burned. She didn't know why the knee-jerk reaction made her feel a little hurt.
"Nothing. I should get back to helping Uncle pack our things." Before she could stop him, he turned sharply and headed down the street, disappearing into the crowd. She took a step forward to follow him, but abruptly, a weight landed on her shoulder and she turned to find Momo chittering anxiously at her.
"What is it, Momo?" She stroked his large ears and he took off, soaring ahead before landing on a sign outside of a shop and then turning to stare at her. As she followed him, he took off again, clearly wanting her to follow him. She kept following the lemur down the streets until she found herself outside an apartment building. Momo landed on her shoulder, preening himself happily now that his job was done. Walking up the stairs, she heard Katara's muffled voice through the door and knocked on it tentatively. The door swung open to reveal Aang on the other side and Momo squeaked as he hopped over to Aang's shoulder.
"Good job, buddy, I knew you'd find her," he praised, rubbing Momo's ears gently.
"What are you guys even doing here?" Rinzen asked as she entered the apartment, frowning at the sight in front of her. Katara, Sokka, and Toph were surrounding a teenage boy sitting in a wooden chair with his head in his hands, two other strangers standing behind him.
"Rin, this is Jet, and his friends Smellerbee and Longshot," Aang introduced. "We've met them before. Jet says he knows where Appa is, but the Dai Li brainwashed him into forgetting, so we're trying to get his memories back."
"Brainwashed?" Rinzen echoed, feeling as if her head was spinning as she took a seat on the edge of the bare mattress in the corner of the room. "They can do that now?"
"They took me somewhere," Jet explained, sounding exhausted as he rubbed his forehead. "Underground, there was a bunker of tunnels stretching for miles under the city. They took me to a chamber and kept circling this light around me, constantly repeating that there was no war in Ba Sing Se."
"Jeez." Rinzen suppressed a shiver. "I wonder how many other people they've brainwashed like that in the city. No wonder this place is so weird."
"You said it," Toph agreed with a grimace.
"What else can you remember?" Katara prompted Jet, who grimaced.
"The place they took me to, it was underwater, I think. Under a lake."
"Wait, a lake?" Sokka perked up from where he was leaning on the wall. "Do you guys remember what Joo Dee said? She said she went on a vacation to Lake Laogai."
"That's it!" Jet agreed, nodding fervently as he looked up. "Lake Laogai. That's where they took me."
"Well, you guys know where that is, right? It's where the lantern festival was," Rinzen pointed out as she glanced at Aang, who nodded in agreement.
"That has to be where they're holding Appa." His expression was set in determination as he made his way to the door. "We have to get there as soon as we can." Jet got to his feet shakily from his chair, nodding as he followed Aang out. Rinzen glanced at the others, who looked just as uneasy as she felt, before reluctantly heading for the door as well.
As they headed down the street towards the path that lead to the lake, Rinzen bit her lip when she noticed they were passing by Zuko and Iroh's apartment building. She debated for a moment whether to tell them about the new lead on Appa's location before coming to a decision. She needed to trust Zuko more that he wanted to change, and that meant letting him in a little.
"You guys go ahead," she blurted out, causing everyone to turn and look back at her. She flushed a little under the sudden weight of everyone's eyes on her. "I'll meet you at the lake, I just need to talk to Lee. I'll join you in a minute, promise." It took a moment, but Aang nodded and continued on as the others followed him. Only Toph narrowed her eyes at Rinzen pointedly before turning and heading after the rest of the group. Exhaling a little in relief, Rinzen turned and hurried into the apartment building, nearly colliding with Iroh halfway up the stairs.
"Oh!" He peered at her around the box of belongings he was carrying. "Rinzen, if I knew you were coming, I would have put on some tea for you."
"I'm not staying," she reassured him. "I just needed to talk to Zuko for a minute, is he here?"
"He's looking around the place to make sure we haven't left anything behind," Iroh reassured her. "We'll be moving into an apartment above the new shop today, so you can come visit us there anytime you like. Just look for The Jasmine Dragon."
"I'd like that," she answered honestly. "And really, congratulations on the shop, you deserve it."
Iroh blinked for a moment, clearly stunned, before giving her a warm smile. "Thank you." She hugged him briefly, mindful of the box he was holding, before hurrying up the rest of the stairs to knock on the half-open door.
"Hey, are you guys done packing?" she called, but no answer came. She pushed the door open, frowning as she glanced around the empty single-room apartment. "Zuko?" she called again, but there was only silence in response, not even a shuffle to indicate another presence in the apartment. She bit her lip before returning down the staircase, finding Iroh just at the foot of the steps.
"You're back awfully quickly," he pointed out with a wry chuckle. "I'd hoped you'd spend a little more time speaking with my nephew."
"Zuko's not in the apartment," she answered and his smile slid off his face, his expression turning grim as he set the box at his feet.
"I see." He forced a small smile, placing his hand on Rinzen's shoulder. "I'm sure he'll be along soon, or he might have gone ahead to catch the train to the upper ring. We can go to the new apartment together, if you'd like."
"I can't," she said apologetically. "We've got a lead on Appa, we think he's underneath Lake Laogai. I have to meet the others there."
Something in Iroh's expression cleared as he nodded, picking up the box again. "It's all right. Come by when you can and let me know if you find your bison. Be safe."
"I will." Rinzen gave him a quick hug again before hurrying out the door and down the path to the lake.
"You took your time," Toph deadpanned as she rounded the corner, finding them all standing on an outcropping of land culminating in a large round metal manhole cover.
"Sorry, I just-" Rinzen began to explain apologetically, scrambling to think of some way to explain why she had gone to see Lee, but Toph just waved her hand dismissively.
"Forget it. You're here, so we can go now." She stomped on the ground to force a rock to jut out of the ground and prop up the manhole cover, revealing a ladder descending into a dark tunnel. Grimacing at the sight of the inky blackness below, Aang and Sokka slid down first, Katara following and then Jet, Smellerbee, and Longshot descending after her. Rinzen dropped down with a burst of air at her feet to cushion her landing as Toph climbed down shakily, gripping the metal rungs of the ladder like a lifeline.
"I'll catch you if you fall," Rinzen offered, causing Toph to glare down at her.
"I'll be fine, taller Twinkletoes, don't you dare." She slipped on the last rung and toppled backwards with a yelp, causing Rinzen to quickly catch her shoulders to steady her. Toph exhaled a little shakily as she straightened again, her toes digging into the dirt floor instinctively for purchase. "Okay. Maybe I should stick closer to you guys just in case," she agreed, shuffling a little closer to Rinzen's side nervously.
"It's starting to come back to me," Jet said as he led the way down the dark, damp tunnel and the others slowly followed. "This is the way they took me."
As they proceeded, the walls of the tunnel steadily became dotted with more and more dim green lanterns, casting a sickly glow over them. Shadows seemed to dance with each step they took, making Rinzen feel just a little more unnerved. Water dripped around them and echoed along the expanse of the tunnel and she nearly shrieked as a cold drop fell down the back of her neck. The next moment, Katara let out a startled noise instead as a drop of water hit the back of her neck as well.
"Shh!" Sokka hissed in response, pointing at a set of doors ahead. One door was cracked ajar and as they passed it, each of them peered inside before grimacing and carrying on. Curious, Rinzen peeked into the room only to find a Dai Li agent standing at the front of the room. Several women dressed in identical Earth Kingdom robes stood in rows in front of him.
"I am Joo Dee. Welcome to Ba Sing Se," the agent said calmly.
"I am Joo Dee. Welcome to Ba Sing Se," the women parroted in eerie unison, their voices echoing against the damp tunnel walls discordantly.
"We are so lucky to have our walls to create order," the Dai Li agent added.
"We are so lucky to have our walls to create order," the Joo Dees repeated, their intonations identical, and Rinzen felt goosebumps rising on her skin as she hurried past the room to catch up to the rest of the group. She found herself inching a little closer to Aang as he glanced back at her questioningly, his expression tense and worried.
"You really think Appa's here?" she pointed out quietly. "He hates tunnels."
"I know." He bit his lip hard before glancing back down the long corridor of doors in front of them, his jaw clenching a little as his fingers tightened on his staff. "Which is exactly why I think he's here. I can feel it, how scared he is."
"Well, I'll trust your Avatar instincts," she offered as she nudged her shoulder lightly against his, trying to cheer him up, and it seemed to work as he cracked a tiny smile.
"Any of these cells are big enough to hold Appa," Jet said, nodding to the hallway in front of them, and Aang glanced between the doors and then decisively headed for one of them.
"My instincts are giving me a good feeling about this one." He tried the door, which was blessedly unlocked, before throwing it open to reveal a large empty chamber.
"A good feeling, huh?" Sokka deadpanned as they followed Aang inside, looking around for any sign that Appa had been there. Rinzen heard a quiet shuffling noise and instinctively looked up toward the source only to find several Dai Li agents suspended over them on small hanging platforms. Even as she opened her mouth to warn the others, the door slid shut behind them and she spun around to see Long Feng standing with a group of agents behind him, his arms folded behind his back.
"You have made yourselves enemies of the state," he said coldly and Rinzen felt her grip on her staff tighten reflexively. Around her, she could practically feel the rest of the group tensing into defensive stances as she did the same. "Take them into custody," Long Feng ordered the agents around him, who immediately closed in around the group.
Instinctively, Rinzen found herself spinning out her staff, sending a blast of air at the agents closest to her. A strong breeze at her back made her look over her shoulder to see that Aang had done the same behind her so that all of the agents around them had been blown away. Toph lashed out next, sending out a large boulder from the ground at the nearest group of Dai Li agents that descended from the ceiling to knock them away and leaving a large crater in the ground. Jet yanked out the hooked swords from their sheath on his back, charging at an agent to take him on along with Smellerbee as Sokka drew out his boomerang to throw it at one of the agents sliding down from the ceiling.
"Get down, Rin!" Katara called and Rinzen ducked just in time for Katara to whip out a stream of water from the waterskin at her hip, knocking down an agent who had been descending practically over Rinzen's head. As she straightened again, she gave Katara a thumbs-up before blasting another Dai Li agent away from Aang's back as he focused on covering Longshot, the archer carefully firing arrow after arrow with precision.
The scraping of stone caught Rinzen's attention just as Aang shouted, "Long Feng is escaping!" He and Jet ran after Long Feng as the older man slipped through the stone door that had opened behind him. It shut just before Aang and Jet could reach there and before Rinzen knew it, Aang threw his fist out to destroy the door entirely, leaping through the rubble and vanishing out of sight as Jet followed. She hurried after them, but her path was blocked by a Dai Li agent who dropped from the ceiling to land in front of her.
She raised an eyebrow at him, raising her staff threateningly. "Buddy, standing between me and my little brother is definitely not a good idea." The Dai Li agent didn't respond, but one of his gloves made of rock shot out at her, which she batted away easily with a sharp blast of air. She ducked to avoid the second glove he threw at her, but then both gloves circled around to grab her wrists, yanking them behind her back roughly as her staff clattered to the floor.
The tight grip on her wrists shattered abruptly and she looked around to find Sokka catching the boomerang he had thrown to break the rock gloves, which lay in pieces on the floor. She nodded to him gratefully as she snatched up her staff again and leapt over the Dai Li agent's head to clamber over the stone rubble after Aang and Jet just as Katara knocked out the agent with a well-timed water whip. The others joined Rinzen in running down the hall as they reached a large stone door. Toph slammed her fist into it to slide it open only to find Jet lying prone on the floor, Aang sitting by his side and looking distressed.
"What happened?" Rinzen asked as they hurried to the two, dropping to her knees beside Aang to place a hand against his shoulder.
"Long Feng attacked him," he explained, his voice cracking slightly. She ushered him to his feet and aside so that Katara could kneel beside Jet and draw out some water to try and heal him.
"This isn't good," the waterbender said quietly, glancing up at them worriedly.
"Just go," Jet insisted weakly, grimacing a little in pain before forcing a smile at Katara. "I'll be fine."
"We can't just leave you behind," Katara insisted, suddenly sounding devastated in a way Rinzen had never heard her sound before.
"There's no time," Longshot suddenly spoke, the first time he had ever said anything in front of them, lifting his head. "You have to go. We'll take care of him." Smellerbee settled on the ground beside Jet's head.
"I'll be okay," Jet repeated and Katara bit her lip hard, shutting her eyes tightly before getting to her feet. They turned for the door leading back out into the hallway, Rinzen feeling more and more like they should have stayed behind with Jet with each step away from him.
"He's lying," Toph whispered bleakly as they reached the door and, without giving anyone a chance to respond, she kicked open the stone door so that they could return to the hallway. Katara hesitated, turning back to glance at Jet, but Sokka placed a hand on her shoulder to guide her forward instead.
Rinzen took a deep breath, squeezing Aang's shoulder gently. "We should keep looking for Appa," she said quietly and he glanced back up at her before nodding, scrubbing a hand over his face quickly to compose himself.
"Yeah." He took a deep breath of his own before setting off down the hallway, tapping on each door lightly and then listening for the echo. Catching Rinzen's frown, he clarified, "Trying to figure out how big the room is based on the echo."
"Smart," she noted, impressed, and he managed a small smile back at her before stopping in his tracks when he tapped on one door and listened to its echo. He pushed open the door only to find the room empty with a tiny pile of hay in the corner and six large manacles abandoned on the floor.
"He was here," Rinzen realized as she stepped inside, relieved.
"But he's gone now," Aang confirmed, sounding dejected. "We're too late, they've moved him."
"No, they haven't," Sokka said as he nudged past Rinzen to kneel down beside one of the chains. "They'd've had keys to open these cuffs, right?" He pointed at a chain that seemed to have been sliced cleanly through. "But these are cut through, not unlocked. And from these scuff marks, I'd say they're from some kind of broadsword."
"Broadsword?" Rinzen echoed, recalling the kind of swords Zuko had had mounted on the wall of his quarters back on his old ship and feeling a sudden spark of hope that maybe, just maybe...
"Yeah, why?" Sokka looked up at her and she quickly forced herself back to reality.
"Nothing. Just wondering who'd have a broadsword in this place," she said quickly and he shrugged, getting to his feet and dusting his knees off.
"In any case, Appa can't have been taken far. The ground is still warm where he was laying here." He nodded to the large empty space between the chains. "We should hurry and try to catch up to him." He glanced at Toph. "Can you push us up to the surface?"
"Can do." Toph cracked her knuckles before stomping on the ground hard. Before Rinzen knew it, the earth under her feet was being jolted upwards rapidly and they sped up towards the ceiling. Toph punched upwards and icy lakewater cascaded toward them, but Katara and Aang quickly parted the water around them so that they could ascend unhindered. They burst through the surface of the lake and hurried along the rocky path Toph created to the shore. A sudden rush of footsteps behind them made Rinzen glance over her shoulder to see several Dai Li agents climbing out of the hole they had made to chase after them.
"Do you think we can outrun them?" Sokka called up to Aang, who looked over his shoulder as well and grimaced.
"I don't think it's gonna matter." They skidded to a halt when they noticed more agents ahead of them, Long Feng standing in front of them with his arms crossed behind his back again. The agents stamped on the ground to raise a large wall of earth in front of them and Rinzen turned just to see another wall rise behind them, boxing them in.
"So what's the plan to get out of this one?" she asked, glancing at Aang, who looked just as uncertain as she did. Suddenly, a warm weight landed on her shoulder and she turned to see Momo perched there, chattering rapidly.
"What is it, buddy?" Aang prompted and Momo took off just as quickly, soaring past Long Feng and up into the sky. Rinzen squinted up at the sun only to see a large shape soaring down towards them. Just as she registered what she was looking at, Aang shouted happily, "Appa!"
Appa smashed through the wall as he landed in front of them, his teeth bared as he growled and approached Long Feng angrily. Emboldened by his appearance, Aang and Toph slammed their fists into the other wall to knock the Dai Li agents standing on it into the water.
"I can handle you myself," Long Feng snarled at Appa, kicking out, but Appa caught his leg with his teeth, easily tossing him across the water. Grimacing, Appa spit out one of Long Feng's shoes before turning to face the group warily. Before Rinzen could stop herself, her feet were carrying her to the bison at a run and she pushed herself up with a burst of air to cling to Appa's soft fur, burying her face into it as tears stung her eyes.
"You're really here," she whispered. A soft breeze beside her made her look up to see Aang clutching Appa just as tightly as she was, the others crowded around Appa as well.
"We missed you, buddy," Aang murmured, his voice breaking as tears streamed down his face, and Appa closed his eyes with a soft rumble of contentment, clearly the first time he had felt so happy in a long time. Rinzen wanted to hold onto Appa's fur forever, but found herself reluctantly sliding down to the ground again, rubbing his nose gently.
"But how'd you get free?" she asked, but Appa was soaking in the affection too much to even acknowledge her question, not that she expected an answer.
"Does it matter?" Aang slid down as well, wiping his eyes with a broad smile. "He's here. That's enough for me."
"Yeah. Me, too." Still, the suspicion of who had freed Appa still lingered at the back of Rinzen's mind as she continued to stroke the sky bison's soft fur, reassuring herself that he was really safe after so many weeks apart.
Yeah, I have no one to blame but myself and my writer's block after so much time off. Writing fight scenes are the bane of my existence, and finals were a pain and then the holidays happened and then some job interviews for after my graduation this May, but I finally managed to finish this chapter! Happy New Year and happy belated holidays!
I hope you enjoy this chapter and I'll aim to get another one out before my final semester starts on the 16th!