A/N: Thank you to Angelfly06, things24, Meerkatgirl13, FireChildSlytherin5, Lance Murdock, Aristeia, fifth11, Kimjuni2, ayameko2TTe, JFAPOI, Obscure Stranger, ArrayePL, Avatar of Wurms, and Sirithdiliel for reviewing!

Chapter Twenty-One - Between Enemy Fire

As night fell on the shore of Chameleon Bay, Hakoda sat next to a campfire with Sokka and listened to his stories of the past months. The bits Hakoda had heard from Earth Kingdom messages and from Arnook and others at the North Pole started to get filled in. He heard of Katara's talent as a healer and waterbender, of Avatar Aang's stubborn earthbending teacher Toph, of Aang, even of Appa and Momo, the two animal companions who traveled with the group.

"Katara wanted to come," Sokka said, "but the Earth King needed one of us to stay and help with our invasion plan. I'll tell you all about that, too. You'd be really proud of Katara, Dad."

"I am proud—of both of you." Hakoda clasped Sokka's shoulder, and then his attention was caught as Tamoru came into camp.

Tamoru made his way over to Hakoda and Sokka, and smiled at them before saying, "Everything's fine in town, Hakoda. Mikko was still out of it when I left, but he's stable."

Sokka straightened. "What happened to Mikko?"

"He was stabbed in a battle this morning," Hakoda explained, "but he's going to be all right." He asked Tamoru, "Ursa?"

"Worried," Tamoru replied. "You know how she gets. Hopefully she gets some rest tonight."

Now Sokka just looked confused. "Who's Ursa?"

Tamoru and Hakoda exchanged glances, and Hakoda considered how much to tell Sokka straightaway. He wouldn't lie to him, but he thought it might be better to introduce Sokka to Ursa before dropping "the Fire Nation woman who's sharing my tent" on him.

"She's a woman who joined us a while back. She started out working with us on uncovering Fire Nation spies—she has a talent for that," Hakoda said. "She lost her home and joined us in our fight."

One of Sokka's eyebrows rose and he seemed to consider this information. Then he shrugged and held up his hands. "Hey, if you're expecting me to say something about traveling with a woman, you're looking at the wrong guy. I have women who would hit me with rocks or fans or giant chunks of ice if I made any complaints about girls in battle. Trust me."

As horrible and jarring as the day had started out, it ended on the best note that Hakoda could have hoped for. All of his people were alive, and Sokka's visit put them all in the best spirits. Though Sokka hadn't been to the South Pole since before Winter Solstice, he had still been there far more recently than any of the men, and so he was able to tell them stories of their families and answer a lot of questions about them. Sokka was the one who told Ronook that his wife had given birth to a baby boy nine months after Ronook left.

This brought a lot of whistling and elbowing from the other Water Tribe men, but Ronook just looked stunned. "I have a son?" he stared around, his eyes wide. "I have a son!"

It was very late when Sokka and Hakoda finally said good night. Sokka opted to sleep out under the open sky, and Hakoda retreated to his tent. It felt empty without Ursa there, but for the first night in years, Hakoda fell asleep only aching to see one of his children.

The next morning, Tamoru went back to town to check on Mikko and Ursa, and reported them both to be doing well. "They're playing games. Ursa's winning."

One corner of Hakoda's mouth turned upward. "Of course."

The Water Tribe worked on constructing new mines, since they didn't have enough empty ones to replenish the ones that had detonated. They continued to fish for skunkfish and they gathered seaweed. Sokka jumped in with the gathering both. He knew they were for traps, but it wasn't until early evening when he'd helped gather as much of the skunkfish and seaweed as he could that he joined Hakoda and Bato, who were finishing stuffing one of the mines, and Hakoda explained in detail about the Stink and Sink plan. Sokka was much more enthusiastic about the name than Bato and Ursa had been, and Hakoda couldn't help but grin at Sokka's amusement. How he had missed hearing his son's laughter.

Aside from the tangle mines, they were also creating packets of skunkfish that could be thrown directly at soldiers or onto the boats. The smell was bad enough when the mines detonated, but direct hits would completely incapacitate a soldier, causing a lot of coughing, choking, and burning eyes.

"Hakoda!" Notu came to a stop in front of him. "Our scouts have spotted four Fire Nation ships!"

"Bato, get these mines loaded up," Hakoda said. "The rest of you men, prepare for battle!"

After sending Sokka off to get ready with the other men, Hakoda helped Bato with the mines. There were still some in need of finishing. They had reset the first two rows of mines again, but they needed to get the other mines in place before the Fire Nation ships broached their first lines of defense.

"Four ships this time," Bato said to Hakoda as they carried a mine onto Bato's boat. "Three yesterday failed, and now they only send one more?"

"Our defenses aren't exactly back up to what they were. They stand a much higher chance of getting through to the bay," Hakoda pointed out. "But you still think something else is wrong."

"It's just an instinct."

"And I've learned not to ignore those."

Still, there wasn't much that they could do except approach the situation with as much caution as they always did. The sun had set by the time they finished preparing their mines and stink packets and loaded them onto ships. Hakoda estimated they didn't have much time to get them set up; at this rate, the Fire Nation had probably already hit the first, maybe the second, row of tangle mines.

Hakoda kept the two lifeboats that were being used for scouting beside the boats, putting one waterbender in each of them, and keeping the last waterbender, Okonu, on his ship.

"The lifeboats can maneuver easily through our tangle mines, and you can stay off to the side and launch these directly into the ships using waterbending," Hakoda told the two waterbenders in the lifeboats, pointing at their packets of skunkfish.

Hakoda was heading onto his boat with Sokka when something stopped them—the arrival of the Avatar's huge sky bison. It was the first time that Hakoda had seen the animal up close, but his attention was focused on the boy riding on Appa's head. He didn't need to know Avatar Aang to see the worry covering his face.

"This can't be good news," Sokka murmured. "Aang! What's going on?"

"Katara's in trouble!" Aang called back.

A cold fist clenched around Hakoda's heart. He wanted to ask how Katara was in trouble, wanted to know what he could do to help, but he had a group of Fire Nation ships incoming, a battle to fight—

Sokka squeezed his arm. "Go, Dad. We'll take care of Katara. I promise." He flung his arms around Hakoda, and Hakoda only had time to give him a quick hug before Sokka raced off, clambering up the sky bison to join Aang.

Hakoda's worry for his daughter didn't vanish, but he had long learned to live with the worry over his children. And he really did believe, as Appa lifted off of the ground with a great gust of air, that Sokka and Aang would take care of Katara. He had to trust that they would. Wasn't that what he had been doing all along? Trusting his children to take care of each other, trusting and hoping that they were equipped to handle everything the world was throwing at them as they fought to help the Avatar achieve peace. Letting go had never been easy, and it was not easy now, but it was necessary. A very, very painful necessity that war had forced upon all of them.

As Hakoda ran on board his boat and the Water Tribe fleet set sail, he turned for one last look of Sokka flying away from him, and a wistful smile settled on his face. Sokka was a true warrior—a protector, a guardian, and Hakoda held onto the belief that Katara would be fine. She had to be.

:-:-:-:-:

Though the wanted poster in Ursa's pocket was a heavy weight that didn't go away, she was in better spirits than she had been the day before. Mikko had not fallen to fever or worsened at all during the night, and the healer had said if he had another good night, she would send him back to the Water Tribe the next day. "Though your people had better make sure that he doesn't do any fighting until he's completely healed," Yumi had told Ursa sternly.

Toward the end of the day, Yumi gave Mikko another draft of herbs to help him sleep, since he was still in pain—even if he didn't complain about it—and had trouble resting. Ursa had nothing to do once he dozed off, and found herself reaching into her pocket to pull out the poster of Zuko and Iroh again. It still took great effort to keep tears from falling when she saw Zuko's face, both because it was her son, right on paper—and then because of a deep heartache and anger at what he had suffered at his father's hands. She knew what it was to be burned and scarred by Ozai, and she knew that the scar was only an outward mark of a far deeper and greater injury within.

Oh, Zuko, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry for what you've suffered. For what you might be suffering now.

She would have expected guilt, the guilt she had worked so hard to accept and overcome, to come back and slap her in the face. It's what she would have once experienced—she would have blamed herself for what happened to Zuko, would have told herself that she should have been able to prevent it, that if only, if only…

And maybe that guilt did tinge the edges of her consciousness, but with eyes that had learned to see the present instead of dwelling on the what-ifs, she was still certain that she had done everything she could. She reminded herself that Zuko would be dead if she had not acted, and that death was worse than a scar. No, it was not guilt that she felt; it was a deep, deep rage. Rage at Ozai.

It's his fault. He did this. He chose to do this. He chose to end Zuko's life all those years ago.

It hit her hard as she stared at Zuko's picture. Ozai's fault. Even if she had done something differently, even if she had gotten her children out of the Fire Nation before Ozai's fateful decision—Ozai was the one who had chosen power over his family. Ozai had done it all. And she…she was not responsible for the choices Ozai made. She had been his wife; she had tried to talk to him. She had tried to persuade him. It was all she had been able to do; but his decisions were his. He had decided to burn Zuko, and never had she hated the man her once-husband had become more than she did at that moment.

She was so lost in staring at her son's face that she jumped when the front door to the healing hut opened. She shoved the poster into her pocket as two men hurried inside, one of them half-supporting, half-leading the other. Both were clad in brown cloaks, and in the fading light of the sun, Ursa could see that the man being supported had a swollen face; his eyes were completely shut because they were so puffy. He was also sucking in sharp gasps of breath and clutching at his throat.

The man who was helping him shouted, "I need a healer!" He looked around and spotted Ursa. His eyes widened and he stared at her, surprise on his face, before cautiously asking, "You're not the healer, are you?"

"No, she's—" Ursa stopped as Yumi came out of her room in the back of the healing hut.

"My, my. What do we have here? Let's get your friend sitting down." Yumi helped get the blinded, swollen-faced man sitting.

"He ate some berries," the first man explained, "and then his face just swelled right up, and he said his throat was getting tight—"

Yumi swiftly grabbed herbs off of her work table, pouring them into water still hot from fixing Mikko's drink, but Ursa's attention was no longer on the healer. She stared at the first man as he paced back and forth while his companion struggled for breath. Her heart was suddenly thumping loudly in her ears. She barely heard Yumi say, "We must get him to drink this quickly. He may have a hard time swallowing it."

She barely paid attention as Yumi and the first man forced whatever concoction Yumi had made down the throat of the second man. Firebender. He's a firebender—what is a firebender doing here? Are they both firebenders?

"There. He's breathing a little easier now," Yumi said. "We'll give him a few minutes and get him to drink some more. The swelling will start to go down. You must have eaten okala berries—the bright purple ones?"

The second man could only nod as he took slow, deep breaths.

"You must not be from around here. The locals would have known better. And I don't recognize you," Yumi said.

Ursa stayed quiet and tried to decide what she should do. It felt like that last night in her inn all over again, when she knew there was a firebender and decided to confront him. But this was different, she told herself firmly. She didn't have to confront them, and if confrontation did come, she was better equipped to handle it.

But what would she do if they suddenly attacked? Mikko was heavily in a drugged sleep; normally all the noise would have already awakened him.

"We were camping nearby," the first man said. His voice and body language screamed lying to Ursa, and it was all she could do to sit calmly and not reach for her boomerang. "We're on our way to Ba Sing Se. Our village was overrun by the Fire Nation."

"Oh, dear." Yumi shook her head. "How fortunate that you were close enough to come get help here! Any longer and your friend would have died. Here, young man, drink another cup of that and you will be just fine." She handed the swollen man another dose of the drink, which he swallowed without any trouble this time.

"We really need to be going now. Our…families are waiting for us." The second man stopped his pacing and motioned to his companion to get up.

"You should stay for a bit. It's going to be a while before the swelling around his eyes goes down enough for him to see," Yumi said.

"We'll be fine," the first man said abruptly. "Let's go," he said to his friend, and tugged on his arm.

Ursa bit her lip and her eyes narrowed as she studied the men's movements on their way to the door.

Yes. They're both firebenders. I'm sure of it.

The first man caught her eyes, and she stared at him without speaking until he turned and pulled his friend out the door. Did he recognize me? Or does he just think I'm part of the Water Tribe?

"Well!" Yumi exclaimed as soon as they were gone. "Wasn't that strange? They seemed to be in a dreadful hurry."

Ursa stood up and went to the window, peering out and watching the two men walk hurriedly down the street. Do I follow them? What if there are more? What if they're on the Earth Kingdom's side? What if they're not? The last time she had asked herself these questions, her inn had burned. "I didn't realize you had refugees pass through here," Ursa said, keeping her eyes fixed on the men. "This village is very secluded."

"We get the occasional refugee, though we miss most of them because of the tunnels."

"Tunnels?" Ursa watched the two men vanish around a corner of town. If she was going to follow them, she would need to go now. She glanced at Mikko, still sound asleep, and then nodded to herself. She would follow, but do her best to remain unseen. She had to know what the firebenders were doing. She moved toward the door, but Yumi's words stopped Ursa in her tracks.

"You mean you don't know?" Yumi asked in surprise. "I would have expected that if your tribe was defending the bay, you would know about the tunnels! As you said, our town is secluded, as is the neighboring town. There's not really any good way out of here over land if the Fire Nation were to take the area, but our earthbenders had the foresight to create escape tunnels months ago in the event any of us needed to get out quickly."

"What?" Ursa was going to lose the firebenders, but this new bit of information suddenly seemed very important in light of the firebenders' unexpected appearance.

"Oh, I have a map of them. I'll give it to you to take back to your tribe. There's one tunnel that comes out right at the bay, which would be a handy escape route for you and your people if you need it." Yumi continued to explain about entrances and exits, and Ursa vaguely heard her talking about how there was one tunnel that connected this town to the next one in the area, but she wasn't really listening anymore.

Tunnels. There's a tunnel that goes out by the bay. An exit point that we didn't know about—and what if the firebenders do know about it? Could they use it to sneak up on us without warning?

Oh, spirits…

"Can you find the map? As quickly as possible, please," Ursa said urgently.

Yumi was already walking into her living area in the healing hut, and she came back with a scroll. She handed it to Ursa, who hastily unrolled it and looked at the map. It showed the bay, the towns, the familiar landscape, and there were green lines that represented the tunnels that crisscrossed under the land.

And one of them did come out right at the bay. Right near their tents, right there and they hadn't known it at all. There was another tunnel just outside of town, in the middle of a place that was supposed to be very hilly and rocky, according to the map. It was right in the direction the firebenders had headed.

Ursa rolled up the scroll and stuffed it into her pocket with the poster of Zuko and Iroh. "I have to go. If Mikko wakes up, tell him I went to the bay and I'll be back soon." A dreadful sense of foreboding had taken hold of Ursa. She might not have known where the firebenders went, but if there was any chance they were using—or planning to use—any of these tunnels, she had to warn the rest of the Water Tribe.

Ursa ran out the door and took off toward Chameleon Bay, her heart hammering in her chest. What if the Fire Nation is about to ambush the Water Tribe? What if they're using the tunnel to get to the bay?

No, that wouldn't make sense…they would have to come out of the tunnel and the Water Tribe is camped right there on the beach; surely the Fire Nation would be seen before too many of them could come out of the tunnel.

Still, her sense of urgency and apprehension did not lessen as she fled toward the bay; if anything, it increased. The sun had set and she stumbled several times in the darkness, particularly since there was no road to the bay and she was racing through rocky landscape. Twice, she fell flat on her face, bloodying her hands, but she picked herself up and kept going.

It seemed to take ages to get to the bay, but when she got close, she noticed two things: the Avatar's sky bison flying away from the direction of the bay and a familiar voice calling her name. She turned to see Ornu jogging toward her. He must have been on lookout.

"What's wrong?" he asked as soon as he saw her.

Ursa spoke in between great gulps of air. "There were two firebenders in town. There are tunnels, Ornu, made by earthbenders. One of them comes out right at the bay. I don't know what the firebenders are up to, if they're up to anything, but we need to warn the others that there's a tunnel—"

"Wait, slow down. A tunnel?"

"I have a map. It comes out right near our tents. We have to warn—"

"There's no one on the beach right now," Ornu interrupted. "Four Fire Nation ships were incoming; the fleet just set out to meet them. We're already stretched thin on traps from our encounter with the Fire Nation ships yesterday."

It crashed over her then, and from the expression on Ornu's face, she knew the same thought had occurred to him. She hoped they were wrong, prayed that it was all just speculation, but the possibility was enough to send both of them running the rest of the way toward the bay, down the rocky embankment to the empty tents. Ursa could see the Water Tribe ships sailing across the bay.

Is it a trap? Have the Fire Nation ships been testing our defenses, pushing our defenses, so that they could lure the boats out to fight and take over the beach in the meantime? Could we hold out against four Fire Nation ships and then a beach full of soldiers?

Maybe she was wrong. Maybe she was blowing this way out of proportion. Maybe there had only been two firebenders and there weren't anymore, maybe, maybe, maybe…

But better to be overcautious and suspicious—better to be safe.

"Where's the tunnel?" Ornu asked urgently.

"It's supposed to be over here."

Ornu followed her to one of the rocky areas along the cliff face that sheltered the cove. "How does it open?"

"I don't know. It's supposed to be something non-earthbenders can use—a stone that moves?" Ursa suggested.

"Like this one?" Ornu eyed a large slab of rock and pushed it. It budged a little. "It looks the right size for hiding a tunnel."

"Wait," Ursa hissed. She held up a finger to her lips and then heard it more clearly. Voices coming from inside the hill.

"Get Hakoda back here now," Ornu whispered the order, and Ursa didn't hesitate. She ran for the shore.

"Hakoda!" Ursa cupped her hands and shouted Hakoda's name across the water. On his boat, his familiar figure turned her way, and she waved and motioned to him. She knew that if this ended up being just a few soldiers, if it was something else, then they were wasting precious minutes that could be spent getting to the incoming Fire Nation ships, but she was almost positive that this was some sort of trap.

Ursa turned back to Ornu only to find that they were too late. The large rock had been moved aside and she could see the tunnel that went into the cliff face, could see the Fire Nation soldiers that were coming out. She could not, however, see how many were in the tunnel. It could have been ten or a hundred. Ornu fought to keep them from coming out. The one advantage that he had was that only a couple of soldiers could emerge at once.

Ursa yanked out her boomerang and threw it at the head of the nearest soldier. The soldier fell and she caught the boomerang when it came back to her. Some of the soldiers, she could see as she got closer, were wearing the red Fire Nation uniforms; others wore nondescript brown clothes like the two men at the healing hut in town.

She found herself in close combat as some of the soldiers who had made it out of the tunnel turned their attention to her, and she silently thanked each of the Water Tribe men who had spent so much time teaching her combat. It was easier to fight on the beach than it had been on a crowded ship the day before—she had more room to maneuver—but it was still all she could do to keep herself on her feet.

Then Hakoda and the other men on his ship arrived, rushing past Ursa to meet the soldiers. No one had time to question what a tunnel was doing there; they just acted to handle the problem. Ursa heard Hakoda shouting at Okonu to try to block the tunnel.

Okonu bended a huge stream of water from the ocean over to the tunnel and froze it, along with several soldiers trying to get out, creating a barrier of ice and trapping whatever soldiers remained inside. It wouldn't last long—the firebenders would just melt it, but they would have to be careful of their people frozen in ice and it would give the Water Tribe a moment to overpower the people who had already made it out of the tunnel.

By the time the ice barrier finally melted away enough to permit more soldiers to come through, leaving two men still half-frozen and shivering in ice, the Water Tribe warriors were standing at ready in front of the tunnel and the Fire Nation was at a disadvantage because they were bottlenecked inside. Soon they realized they had no chance to win and retreated back the way they had come.

But this time, this battle, the Water Tribe had not been so fortunate. Ornu was lying facedown on the ground near the tunnel, unmoving, and Ursa watched in horror as Hakoda and Tamoru turned him over. She smelled burned flesh before she saw the charred skin that seared his chest and neck. He wasn't breathing and his eyes stared glassily into nothingness.

There was no time to grieve, no time for anything. There were still ships incoming, still a gaping hole in the cliff side. Once Hakoda heard, very quickly, the story of the tunnels, he took the map from Ursa and looked at it.

"This was the only tunnel this close, but this other one here could be a threat." Hakoda's voice was hard and the grief was evident in his eyes as he quickly began to issue orders. He had Okonu waterbend a very thick ice barrier back inside the tunnel. The other men tied up the Fire Nation soldiers who had been knocked unconscious and hadn't managed to escape. Two of them were dead. Notu went to town to get the locals to come take charge of the prisoners, since the Water Tribe didn't have the capacity to hold half a dozen of them. Notu was also supposed to find an earthbender to come permanently close the tunnel, and to see if they would close the other tunnel that could potentially be a danger to them.

The air was thick with anguish and anger, and Ursa's heart hurt so fiercely she could hardly breathe. Tears blurred her vision as her eyes passed over Ornu's body.

"Ursa."

Ursa turned at Hakoda's voice. He handed her the boomerang she hadn't realized she had dropped as she stood there, frozen. "I need you and Tamoru to stay here and guard the prisoners until the locals come to take charge of them. The rest of us have to go assist the fleet now."

She nodded numbly and gripped her boomerang as all the men but Tamoru ran back to Hakoda's boat. She watched as it set off across the bay, sped along with the aid of waterbending. She dropped to the ground near two of the tied, unconscious prisoners.

Tamoru was the only person left moving around the beach. He grabbed a blanket from a tent, took it over to Ornu, and spread it carefully over his body. A fresh wave of grief struck Ursa so hard that she almost threw up. She blinked and watched Hakoda's ship disappear from sight as it went to fight the other half of the battle.

Dear spirits, please…please don't let anyone else die tonight.