Book: Air

Ch. 49 Tight Walls

Zuko scrunched up his closed eyes as the sunlight penetrated into his tent. He moaned and slammed a pillow on his face to block the light.

Suddenly he felt a pressure on his chest, like someone was sitting on him Quickly he reacted and threw the pillow away. He froze when he realized that the situation was not a threat. Sitting on his chest was his little girl Ursa. She smiled toothlessly back at him with shit bubbles between her lips. She reached her tiny hands out to Zuko's face and squealed.

Beaming with his own light, Zuko sat up and lifted Ursa into his arms, "And just where did you come from?"

"She missed you," came another voice. Hiding in the shadow of the tent was his loving wife Mai, "And so have I." She crawled up to him and kissed him on the lips. They lingered there for a second to capture the moment. They had not seen each other for several long months.

"What are you doing here?" Zuko asked.

"Well you ordered the fire navy here and they needed a high official escort." Mai replied.

"And Ursa was your assistant." Zuko joked and bounced his daughter in his lap. "Why didn't you tell me you were coming? Aren't you worried about her being here?"

Mai's blank face frowned, she took Ursa into her arms, "If you don't want me here, then I'll leave."

"No that's not what I meant. I just don't want a repeat of what happened….that night." Zuko choked on the last two words.

Mai froze, "I was planning on delivering Ursa to Iroh when it came time for the battle. But knowing your uncle, I'm sure he wants to help fight."

Zuko rubbed his head and neck in deep thought. Memories flashed through his mind of the night that Azula came to raid the Fire Nation. Zuko had lost nearly everything that night. He had lost his nation, his honor, and his mother. And he almost lost his daughter. Zuko hoped that Azula could be cured of her insanity and become more human and calm. But that night marked a permanent belief that she would never change but only grow more ruthless and absurd.

"What about Katara? We could leave her in Katara's care." Mai pointed out.

"Not gonna happen. Katara has to fight in that battle, she's the Phoenix Prophet."

Mai's eyes widen in shock for a brief second but then disappeared, "Figures, she's got a brave heart to be fighting with children inside her."

"Its not like she has a choice."

"How's Aang taking it?"

"Well surprisingly. I think it's a risky move and a vitally dangerous one. But if they both believe that they have to do this together, I can't argue against the Avatar and…Katara." Zuko nearly shuttered at the thought of arguing with Katara. To this day, she still frightens him a bit when she used to hate him.

"So why are you napping in the middle of the day?" Mai tried to change the subject.

"We had the battle meeting early this morning, I took a nap afterwards to rest my thoughts. How many do we have left in the fire navy?"

"About 2,000. Its not much, but its enough."

Zuko wrapped his arms around Mai's waist, his chest pressed up against her back. His head nuzzled into the crock of her neck. "That's plenty."

A childish squeal came from outside the tent. Zuko jumped, Mai however didn't react.

"What the hell?" Zuko got up to his feet, pulled a shirt on and exited the tent. The blinding afternoon sun made Zuko see white. He blinked several times before his eyes could adjust. What he saw was confusing.

He say blue, blue uniforms of soldiers had camped out on the left half of the field. These blue uniforms belonged to the Water Tribe and there were hundreds of them. There were men sharpening their clubs and waxing their shields. Some were practicing fighting, some were looking at maps.

Another childish squeal evoked Zuko's attention. He traced his gaze to a small group of people gathered around a fire pit. A man in Water Tribe uniform was racing around with a small girl on his shoulders. She was squealing with excitement.

Mai came up behind him and placed a hand on his shoulder, "Oh I forgot to mention, as we were sailing over here we came across Chief Hakoda's navy ships. He was looking for us."

Zuko recognized the man with the girl on his shoulders as Chief Hakoda himself. The group that was watching him was Aang, Katara, Sokka, Toph, and Mayra's grandfather. Mayra was riding on Hakoda's shoulders.

"I need to stop taking naps." Zuko rubbed his eyes, "I miss too much."

"Relax, the Water Tribe and Fire Navy ships just got here. I needed to wake you so you could go over the plans the Navy Leaders." Mai rubbed his shoulder. She pushed him towards the group at the fire pit.

Everyone smiled as Zuko approached them, Hakoda came to a stop and lifted Mayra off his shoulders. "Time to come down kiddo."

Mayra groaned a bit. She hugged Hakoda and smiled, "Its nice to have two grandfathers now." Then she dashed back over to Katara and Aang.

Hakoda walked over to Zuko shake his hand, "Nice to have you join us. Battle plans are hard to organize, we all deserve 20 winks after those." He smiled.

"Thanks." Zuko tried to smile back.

Sokka poked the ashes of the dead fire pit, "Sit down so we can discuss this battle with my dad so he knows what's going on."

Zuko took a seat, "Right, it nice to have you with us. Having your numbers will give us an advantage. We are striking tomorrow. Now tomorrow is the last day of the summer, and its also the day which my father wishes to take control of an ancient firebending source. If he succeeds to obtain this power, our chances of victory are slim, very slim. Which is why we are attacking at first light tomorrow." Zuko pulled a world map from his pocket, "We are attacking here," He pointed to the same small island he had been pointing out during the battle meeting. "This is the Four Spirits Isle. Ozai will be here with this army protecting him. We need to stop him before he gains this Ancient Firebending. So we're going to attack hard and from many different directions. Now we are stationed here on the shoreline of the Earth Kingdom, right across the island. It takes about 2 hour to reach it by ship. We'll send about 2/3 of our army by sea and hit the land. The other part of the army will go by air and attack Ozai's army around him. The land army is attacking on the outside, the air army will damage the inside. The goal is to cut a path through his army to allow a small group through to reach Ozai."

Sokka interrupted, "The group is gonna be me, Zuko, Toph, Aang, and Katara. We'll sneaky come in when Ozai's forces are weak and then we'll crush him before he'll move a finger to start that ceremony." Sokka slammed his fist into his other hand.

"Katara will be apart of this?" Hakoda questioned. He stared at his pregnant daughter. "Aren't you due soon?"

"Yes, but I need to do this. I'm one of the only people who can stop Ozai." Katara answered.

Mayra's grandfather spoke up, "She is the Phoenix Prophet and the Avatar is the Dragon Prophet. They were both chosen by the great Fire Spirits to end this madness before its starts. If they are not present to stop Ozai, then we can never win. Not even if we had an army of 1,000,000 men, it would be impossible. If Ozai were to gain control of the Fire Spirits and then activate their power with the ceremony, it would mean doom to us all."

"You seem to know a lot about the Ceremony." Hakoda pointed out.

"I am a member of the Phoenix Temple, of course I know about it. There is a lot of history on the Four Spirits Isle. I've never been there before, but I know a lot about it. The Isle is one island that looks like the four nation squished together. All the four elements symbolize together in unity, it is said to be the most peaceful place in the world. In each corner of the island, there is a temple for each Element Spirit. The Air Spirit's Temple is in the mountains, the Water Spirit is under the lake, the Earth Spirit is woven in a tree and the Fire Spirit's Temple lays in the depths of a volcano. In the Fire Temple there is a great cauldron. It is said that the great Spirits of Creation whispered their secrets and poured their souls into it, and from it spawn the ashes of the First Phoenix and First Dragon. The source of fire came from that cauldron, it was the first light of the world. I heard its truly a sight to see." The old man awed.

Sokka waved him off, "Yea yea, so we need to focus our attention on the volcano of the island. If we find a cauldron we find Ozai."

Hakoda scratched his chin in thought, "It sounds like you kids have been planning carefully."

Mai huffed, "What about me? Where do I fit into your little plan?"

Sokka panicked, he hadn't thought of that. Zuko shared the same expression, he opened his mouth to speak but another voice overpowered his.

"Red Alert, ships coming off the western horizon!" shouted someone from outside. Everyone frozen. The men hoped their feet (including Toph) and frantically looked around for the watchmen. The Duke was stationed as the watchmen at that time, he was sitting high up into a tree with an eyeglass. He was waving his arms trying to attention down below.

"The ships are igniting!" He shouted. Everyone's eyes widened.

Sokka began to yell again, "Everyone grab your armor and weapons, huddled under the trees for protection! Expect an attack!"

"Are we under attack?" Toph asked. Her feet were shifting across the earth, she couldn't see any other attackers approaching them by land.

The Duke continued staring through the spyglass, he gasped in horror, "Hit the deck, they opened fire!" he quickly climbed down the tree and hit the ground hard running for shelter. He took hold of Toph's hand for her to follow close behind him since she wouldn't be able to see the flying balls of fire.

Sokka continued barking orders as he ran with Mai (holding Ursa) and Zuko to shelter. Aang, Mayra and Hakoda aided Katara to stand and then sprinted after the others. The canon fire hit the base hard just as the three of them got under the bomb shelter. It was cramped of some many soldiers, weapons, supplies and Appa.

The ground shook. The air had piercing sounds of splintering wood. Smoke began to consume the pure air. Everyone held tight on to each other, trying not to breath in the smoke or lose their balance from the trembling earth.

"Crap! The Loyalists must have found us!" Sokka cursed.

"How is that possible?" Zuko yelled over to him.

Three people came running into the shelter after another fireball hit the shelter. It was Raichen and Yuo-Gin carrying some warrior. They were being rather aggressive with the warrior.

"Chief Sokka!" Raichen yelled, "We have been tricked! There is a traitor in our ranks, he is a Loyalist. He says this was his mission to reveal our location! We should kill this son of…" Raichen lit her hands close to the traitor's face, he didn't flinch.

"No stop," Sokka pushed her aside and pulled on the traitor's collar, "You Loyalist scum, how the hell did you find us?"

The traitor started to giggle, "Ozai sent me to deliver this message to you, all of you." His eyes danced from Zuko, to Mai, to Toph, Aang, Katara and then back at Sokka. "He knows everything, he will always be ten steps ahead of you. You can never win. You're all going to die." He laughed out loud.

Sokka slapped him across the face. "Where is he keeping my wife? Where is my son?" Sokka shook him roughly.

Hakoda placed a hand on Sokka's shoulder. "Son stop. Its useless, we need to get everyone out of here before more damaged can be caused."

Sokka looked at everyone and sighed. He shoved the traitor to the ground. "We need to stick with the plan for tomorrow. They'll keep heading towards us, so we need to split. First we'll run into the forest to throw them off, then we'll split up and then circle back to the island, far from Ozai's ships. It will take longer, but it will be less dangerous. Dad you take the Water Tribe and come in on the island from the south. Zuko take your navy and come in from the north. I'll take the blimps and come in through the air straight on. Aang, you need to come in from behind with Katara. Avoid the fight at all cost, save your strength until the right time."

Everyone nodded. However Aang frowned at the plan, things were looking bad now. What if more surprises occurred during this fight? What would be the consequences? Aang didn't want any more lives to be taken this way.

"Wait, what about Mayra?" Katara yelled.

Sokka blinked.

"And Ursa?" Zuko added.

More canon fire hit the shelter. The Duke rushed back after surveying the shelter, "Sokka the shelter isn't gonna hold out much longer! We have to get out of here!"

"Toph, Duke, take the kids and run out as far as you can with them! Get them somewhere safe!" Sokka yelled back.

"WHAT?" Toph howled, "Do I look like some babysitting service?"

"TOPH DON'T ARGUE WITH ME!" Sokka blasted at the top of his lungs. Toph was studded, but didn't say another word. She ran up to Aang and Katara, took Mayra's hand and ran out of the shelter. Mai and Zuko ran with her, with Duke coming up behind them.

"Go! RUN!" Sokka yelled to everyone in the shelter.

Everyone shattered from the shelter towards the forest. Soldiers grabbed everything around camp, weapons, tents, logs, pieces of ships, sails and anything that could still be used. The firing seemed to increase, more fire balls bombarded the camp, sending everyone sprinting towards the forest.

Katara ran as fast as she could beside Aang, but she couldn't take much more of it. The smoke was suffocating, the trembling ground was irritating the children. She felt like she couldn't run or breathe. But suddenly her womb prickled her, this time in sere pain. Katara cursed to herself and realized that she was having another contraction. Without realizing it, she was falling forward.

Aang caught her just in time and hoist her into his arms. Katara choked on the smoke as she tried to breathe through the pain of the contraction. She gripped her stomach tightly, scrunching her eyes, trying to concentration on other things. But the pain was excruciating, she couldn't not think about it.

Aang panicked and used the wind to blow the smoke out of the area, the smoke engulfed around the fast approaching ships. They were covered in a smoke screen.

"Good thinking Aang!" Sokka yelled to him.

"Sokka we need to stop!" Aang yelled back.

"Why?"

"Katara's having another contraction!"

"Shit!"

"I can make it." Katara pushed her words through her teeth, "Get…everyone to safety."

"Aang run ahead of the group and head up north!" Sokka ordered.

"No I'm not leaving anyone behind!" Aang defied.

"STOP!" Toph shouted. She was several yards away from everyone. She had stopped dead in her tracks. "There is an army coming from us in the front!"

"WHAT?" Sokka screamed. He looked deep into the forest, he could see smoke from fireball being ready to launch. He could see hints of red and yellow peeking through the darkness of the forest. He continued to curse to himself. "This can't be! Everyone split up head north or south NOW!"

But before anyone could move, the army inside the forest began to open fire on them. Being bombarded on both sides, front and back. Each fireball on both sides getting closer to each other. The ships were near boarding the shore, the army from the forest was advancing.

Sokka felt sere bloody panic course through his veins, it was like he was stuck in a room whose walls were closing in, and the door was too far out of his reach. He felt like he wouldn't be able to make it in time before those walls would close in on the entire army. Their hopes of winning were now dashed.