Wow, you guys are super lucky. TWO chapters today! This particular one is a request from Kataang9. Let the evil toward Aang continue! MWAHAHAHAHA! (I still don't own him, though.)

All was calm on a bright, sunny Ba Sing Se afternoon. Aang had just arrived home from a grueling war meeting that really should not have been attended by a thirteen-year-old kid. Sokka was doing yet another mediocre painting at the desk in the front room. Suki and Katara were cooking, and Tooh was pickin her toes on the sofa.

Typical afternoon, right?

Wrong.

Almost as soon as Aang walked through the door, he and Toph immediately felt a disturbance in the ground.

"Uh…guys, something's happening!" Toph shouted in alarm.

Aang's eyes went wide. "I feel it too," he said. "Guys, I think we're having an—"

Suddenly, absolutely everything began to shake violently. A rumbling noise could be heard for hundreds of miles, signaling an—

"EARTHQUAKE!" Sokka screamed at the top of his lungs. He immediately dropped into the fetal position.

Aang dove under the heavy table in the dining room while Toph got under the sofa. Katara and Suki took to the kitchen doorway.

"Aang, what do we do?!" Katara yelled.

"Stay where you are until it's over!" Aang shouted back.

Everything in sight began to topple over and break, including the desk, which fell away from Sokka. All the clay bowls on the table above Aang slid onto the floor and instantly shattered, sending shards of clay—and whatever old, greasy food that was in it—into Aang's left arm. He grunted in pain, but remained frozen as the tremor intensified.

Suddenly, one of the wooden legs of the table snapped. Aang gasped, fearful for his life.

"Aang!" Suki cried. "The table! It's gonna—"

Then, the adjacent leg to the table snapped. Aang could only watch in terror as the tabletop came crashing down on him.

"AANG!" Katara screamed. "No, no, no!"

The earthquake then began to fade, the shaking becoming less and less violent, until it finally faded after about two nightmarish minutes.

Everyone immediately got up and ran to the destroyed table.

Katara had tears running down her face. "Aang!"

The entire group hoisted the tabletop off the floor and moved it aside, revealing the unconscious Avatar. His body was beaten and bloodied, crimson fluid flowing out of what had to have been broken ribs.

"Oh, my goodness…" Suki gasped. "Is he—"

"No!" Katara yelled. "No, he's not! He can't be!" She knelt by Aang's side and hesitated, not knowing what to do when she saw a rib sickeningly poking out of the boy's chest. She put her face close to his and concluded that he was still berating, albeit with great difficulty.

"Aang, I don't know how…" Katara said to him, not knowing if he could hear her or not.' "…But you're going to be okay."

She placed a soft kiss on his cheek. "I promise."