XXV: Ozai's Last Battle
Are you ready? I took a lot of time writing this to make an epic battle. Given that I have perhaps 100+ people reading this story, I would love to see this chapter earn upwards of 20 reviews, and then I will promise you a battle between Zuko and Azula of epic proportions!
Aang woke up the next morning to find that his strange island was actually moving! He jumped into the water and discovered that the island was an animal! The biggest animal in the world! He swam around to see its face and found it to be a lion-turtle a great and powerful beast, the lion turtles were the reason why bending even existed, and their power, combined with Raava's, created the first Avatar!
Aang bowed to the lion-turtle and told him: "Maybe you can help me, everyone, including my own past lives, they expect me to take another person's life, and I'm not sure if I can do it. How can I end this war peacefully?"
"The true mind can weather all the lies and illusions without being lost. The true heart can touch the poison of hatred without being harmed. Since beginningless time, darkness thrives in the void, but always yields to purifying light." The lion-turtle spoke and he gently pressed two claws onto Aang and a surge of light went through him: "In the era before the Avatar, we bend not the elements, but the energy within ourselves. To bend another's energy, your own spirit must be unbendable, or you will be corrupted and destroyed. Wait for him, he will come."
The lion-turtle set Aang on a rock and swam away. He looked about and saw that he had plenty of water to bend and a great number of rock pillars at his disposal. With the elements at his command, he was ready to face the Fire Lord.
A light lit up in his chest in a pattern that resembled an owl, and a voice within Aang spoke: "Sozin's comet is coming soon, but you are ready."
"Raava…" Aang spoke.
"I will be here to help you, as I always have."
"How can I enter the Avatar State? I'm going to be facing the Fire Lord when his Firebending is more powerful than ever!"
"You can draw power from the comet too, for you are a Firebender too." Raava replied.
Aang stood at the ready, waiting for the arrival of the Fire Nation airships.
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A surge of power flowed through Aang when Sozin's Comet soared into view… The final battle was on its way.
Seven airships finally arrived, a smaller fleet than the one that Aang had anticipated, but on the Day of Black Sun, the invasion managed to cause plenty of destruction to prevent new ships from being a part of this attack. Aang took note that one of the ships following Ozai's lead ship had broken formation. Somehow, Aang sensed that there were friends on that ship. He took a deep breath and told Momo that it was his time to go. The lemur flew off and Aang kicked things off by Earthbending rocks and knocked out the engine to Ozai's airship after he had started setting fire to the land. Seeing the Avatar, Ozai tossed away his cape and burned it to ash as he propelled himself towards Aang on his fire jets.
"Fire Lord Ozai, you don't have to do this, you have the power to end this!" Aang called out. He truly hoped that Ozai could listen to reason, but with his savage glare, a driving thirst for power, he snarled: "You're right, I do have the power, I have ALL THE POWER IN THE WORLD!"
He roared and he let out a great plume of fire from his mouth as fire jets from his feet held him in the air.
Aang had no choice but to fight now. He evaded Ozai's initial attack by jumping between the rocks and gliding through his Airbending, dodging Ozai's strikes as he blasted great streams of fire! In return to Ozai's attacks, Aang favored pulling rock from the great stone pillars and tossed them for Ozai to dodge, or perhaps knock him out of the sky; but Ozai dodged them all!
Aang threw one large boulder towards Ozai, and with a wave of his arm it split off into three sections and tracked Ozai's flight long enough for Aang to land on one of the stone pillars and catch his breath for a moment while Ozai had to track him down again. Aang remained hidden until he caught his breath and flew up to the top of his pillar and threw a gust of air towards Ozai. He hit him hard enough to the point where Ozai was thrown off his flight trajectory, making him tumble in a spiraling motion, and as he was trying to catch himself, Aang jumped from pillar to pillar to get closer to him and take the offensive, if only for a moment.
He got close enough to Ozai and he jumped just as Ozai took control of his flight again, and Aang turned in a backward spin-kick to let out an arc of flame flying towards Ozai, while Ozai let out a jet of flame from his hands and the two projectiles met in an explosion! Both Ozai and Aang yelped as they were sent flying backwards, although not very far, and Ozai proceeded to fly towards Aang, letting out another jet of fire, aiming for his face! Aang bent the jet to spray around him, and it trickled to the ground looking like lava, and with a stomp and a kick he threw another boulder, which Ozai dodged. He flew in pursuit of Aang, blasting jets of fire one after the other, until Aang reached a pillar formed next to a waterfall. As Ozai lashed out with another great jet of flame, Aang bent the water to quench the flames. The water put out the jet that Ozai threw at him, and the jet propelling his flight had been extinguished for a second. Ozai fell for a brief moment before catching himself and he bent a whip of fire and slashed it through Aang's pillar. The pillar crubled and split, so Aang made a desperate jump as he leapt over to another pillar went back on the defensive by evading Ozai's continuous strikes and often threw rocks at him while he wasn't using Firebending to deflect Ozai's blasts.
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While the fight between the Avatar and the Fire Lord continued on. One airship, the one that was flying out of formation, took to higher skies and then turned its course to collide into the remaining five airships. Metal met metal and released a loud and gut-wrenching sound as the airships' hulls banged together, scraped, and creaked! Parts rattled off and plunged to the ground, and as for those boarded on the ships, if there were any that had survived then it would have been by some miracle.
Luckily, the final ship to've been struck wasn't totally destroyed. Those who steered the traitorous ship were Suki, Sokka, and Toph, and they managed to catch the last ship, by climbing out to the top of their ship and then making a series of daring jumps onto the last ship, and snuck inside. They worked their way towards the main controls and took control of it thanks to Suki and Sokka's fighting styles and Toph's Metalbending. Toph would often choose to bind the ship's crew to the walls inside by bending metal straps around their chests. Sokka and Suki would distract the crewmembers leaving way for Toph to trap them.
They reached the main controls of the final ship, where they encountered the Firebending captain. Although he was careful not to use any big moves inside his ship, he wasn't shy to throw a series of fireballs at them. Sokka advanced with his sword to face him and try to put him on the defensive, but as they dueled Sokka suffered a bad burn on his leg during the ruckus as he and Suki were trying to subdue the captain of the airship, but soon enough, the downing ship was under their control.
They managed to land the craft while fighting the damage it had taken, and once it was down, and the crew taken care of they situated themselves so they could watch the rest of Aang's battle.
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Ozai decided that not was the time to switch over to bending lightning. He kept Aang on the run following up with one strike after another as Aang leapt from pillar to pillar, dodging Ozai's lightning. Aang took a stance on one pillar as Ozai rested on another, and aimed yet another bolt of lightning at Aang. This time, Aang caught it and started the technique to redirect it, the power of Ozai's strike was incredible and only barely possible to control as the power surged through Aang's body and he struggled to aim his redirected strike. At first he pointed towards Ozai, and saw the shocked, almost frightened, face of the Fire Lord, the last time he saw this technique was when Zuko told him that he was going to betray him and teach Aang Firebending, and now he knew that his son was speaking the truth, and now Aang was prepared to use Zuko's special technique to end him; but Aang wasn't a killer, instead he pointed his other arm towards the sky and released the lightning without anyone getting hurt, and it crackled and boomed among the clouds.
When Ozai took flight again, Aang leapt over two more pillars, but at the third, Ozai threw the fiercest lightning bolt he could muster! The bolt struck the pillar Aang was about to land on, and it exploded! Aang flew up with the shockwave and he fell limp with the force. As he plummeted towards the surface of the sea, he bent the water to catch himself before he busted himself up by crashing through the water's surface tension. As Aang rode the resulting wave towards the shore, Ozai threw a powerful fireball that broke through Aang's wave! The Avatar flew into the air once again, his body twisted, and then he landed on the shore his back hitting first, and not only that, but on top of some sort of miracle pebble that applied pressure onto the wound on his back, the wound he'd gotten when Azula struck him with lightning. Ozai struck a nearby cliff and caused a rockslide to fall over Aang, but when Aang landed on that miracle pebble, in just the right spot, he felt a surge of light power course through his body and spirit! He regained his connection to his past lives, receiving visions of each and every one of his past lives demonstrating their greatest defenses and attacks as their Avatar eyes glowed, lending Aang their talents. At the end he caught a vision of Avatar Wan and Raava with an aura of bright white light surrounding them, Aang had reconnected himself with the Avatar Spirit; and as the rockslide fell over him, he put his arms up to shield himself just in time!
Ozai approached the rock pile and began laughing manically, but though the earth, Aang felt his approaching footsteps vibrating; Ozai was almost on top of the rock pile, and conjured up a great fireball to smash down upon the Avatar, when a burst of fire exploded from within it! Ozai moved an arm in front of his face to shield himself from the flying rocks! Within an orb of air, Aang flew out of his rocky trap and glared down at Ozai his eyes and tattoos were glowing white! Ozai conjured up a smaller fireball, and as he was about to throw it, Aang stuck out a hand and a fierce gust of air hit Ozai! The Fire Lord flew backwards and skipped across the water like a flat stone, he rolled and tumbled when he hit the shore, end over end, until he ended up with his back against a cliff!
Aang flew into the air within his orb of air, his head then tilted back, and he let out a roar spouting from his mouth, both of his arms, and both of his legs. The tendrils of flames curled to form a ring around Aang and his orb of air, followed by a ring of earth and then water. For the first time ever, Aang was bending all four elements at once!
Ozai retreated back to the stone pillars with Aang on his tail, and with every blast Ozai threw Aang had some way to keep it from hitting him. With three tendrils of fire being thrown his way, Aang sent three tendrils of water into them, with the water in them, the fire expanded and burst, but not quite like an explosion, it was as if they simply dissipated with a flash of light! In his pursuit of the Fire Lord, Aang used his Earthbending to take off the top third of two pillars in Ozai's path and brought them together, as if in an attempt to crush Ozai. The two pillars came together with a boom and a cloud of dust erupted. Ozai narrowly escaped, and chanced a look behind him, and from the dust cloud, Aang blasted his way through! With his orb of elements, he pursued Ozai, crashing through the pillars, and splitting rocks off into tiny pellets, like bullets, and shot them at Ozai and he weaved frantically about the pillars using his fire jets.
The Fire Lord kept flying through the pillars in attempt to avoid the wrath that was the Avatar in his full power! Aang threw five fireballs that followed Ozai as if they were tracking him; he was lucky that the pillars took all of them as he evaded them one at a time. Ozai tried to retaliate by sending over another torrent of fire Aang's way, but with Aang in his flying orb of all the elements, the fire didn't even faze him.
As Ozai rocketed to the sky, Aang was ready to end things. He extended and rotated an arm, sending out a tendril of water Ozai's way. It reached out and coiled around him. Now in his grip, Aang threw Ozai down on one of the stone pillars, locked his limbs down by encasing them in stone, and with his legion of voices in the Avatar State, he announced: "Fire Lord Ozai, you and your forefathers have upset the balance of this world, and for that you must pay the ultimate price!"
Ozai struggled within his bonds and snapped his eyes shut, as Aang wound up all four elements to pierce through his body. He anticipated an agonizing end, with his entrails having been drilled through with the elements. Just as he was expecting the strike, all he felt was a splash of water!
Ozai looked up and the Avatar descended, having regained his senses, and came out of the Avatar State. He landed on Ozai's pillar and undid his bonds with his back towards the Fire Lord.
"No, I'm not going to end it like this." Aang stated.
The Fire Lord caught his breath and then snarled: "Even with all the power in the world, you're still weak!"
Aang felt the vibrations as Ozai moved towards him in a desperate attempt to attack, but Aang kicked a foot up, and without even looking at Ozai, he managed to catch his arm; the Fire Lord tried to strike again with his other arm, and Aang brought up more stone to entrap him, Ozai tried to breathe fire at Aang, but he deflected the flames with his Airbending, and finally Aang touched one hand on the center of Ozai's forehead, and the other hand was placed on his sternum.
This was his moment; he took the lion-turtle's lesson and began bending Ozai's energy. The two of them looked to the sky, Aang's eyes and maw let out a blue light while Ozai's let out an orange light. A moment later their bodies began glowing those respective colors. Ozai's orange glow slowly took over Aang's body, it kept creeping over him, ready to corrupt and consume him, but just as his blue light was about to fade completely, Aang's head snapped forward, and his blue light powered through his body and quickly overtook Ozai's, the intense light took over the world around them for a moment, but soon the light faded away. Aang staggered back a bit but then stood up, proudly and straight; Ozai on the other hand, collapsed onto his back as his earthen shackles crumbled away. He was weak, but he still made an attempt to strike at Aang by punching into the air a couple of times before collapsing again.
"What, what did you do to me?" Ozai asked weakly.
"I took away your Firebending, you can't use it to hurt anyone ever again." Aang replied. He turned towards the sea and bent the water to extinguish the flames of their battle. Then Aang located the airship he knew his friends were on, and bent the pillars to form a bridge between himself and the airship.
Sokka, Suki, and Toph emerged, praising Aang for his awesome battle, but as Suki asked Aang if he resorted to killing Ozai, the Fire Lord looked up to her and snarled: "I'm still alive."
He then succumbed to Sokka and Toph's childish taunts, and Suki's terrible attempt at one.
"I am the Phoenix King!" Ozai snarled.
"Oh, I'm sorry, Poenix King of losers!" Toph retorted. With Ozai under Suki and Sokka's guard Aang and Toph teamed up with some surprisingly cooperative Fire Nation airship crewmembers to salvage parts from the other ships to repair the one that was left in the best state. The airship crewmembers cooperated because they not only feared the Avatar's power and Toph's Metalbending, which came in very handy, but they also seemed to come to accept that Ozai was no longer the one in command.
So with an airship repaired, they all loaded up, they threw Ozai in a cell made with Toph bending metal to form a cage. Then Sokka took the controls and flew them back to the Fire Nation.
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