Aang
My eyes move over the ship; I set a rhythm for them, like tapping. With a pace and pauses, it is easier to concentrate and focus on specific spots. So far, there's not much to see. The Fire Nation ship is big, dark, gives the impression of being evil by itself – (I picture it transforming into some kind of giant and destroying the world all alone) – but there aren't many openings for a grand escape since the guards are taking me through a narrow corridor on the lower deck. A lonely and narrow corridor. Nobody but the two guards and me.
I smirk.
"So…" the word slides slowly from my mouth "I guess you've never fought an airbender before." I touch the cuff's shackles around my wrists, weighing them.
"I bet I could take you both with my hands tied behind my back," I conclude.
The guards don't think the same: "Silence."
Okay.
We get to an end with a metallic door, the man standing in front of me tries to unlock it. My lungs expand with the breath I take and when I exhale, I enlarge it. Enlarge the air.
With a typhoon-like level of intensity, it is easy to push the guard against the door and knock him out with the hit, meanwhile, the discharge sends me flying back, crash against the guard behind my back, and then make us both strike the stairs. The one behind me also faints; he was so nice for softening my crash!
I use airbending to jump straight to the top of the stairs and onto the stern. There's another soldier walking here. I cast a gust of air with my legs that kicks him outboard.
"Sorry!" I yell over the ship's border. "You haven't seen my friends around, have you?"
Katara
The soldiers came to relocate me to another cell at last – (why does it feel so much like a cruel joke?)
I don't know where they took the others, but seeing that they are taking me through an outer pathway instead of the lower deck, I can only imagine they are following Zhao's orders of keeping all of us far, far away from each other. (Another cruel joke, I guess.)
Out here, the sound of the waves brushing the ship is almost drowning. Such loud, strong of strokes of saltwater…
Mmmmm…
It's a long shot, but…
Staring down at the dark blue ocean, I move my hand as much as the cuffs allow me. A small concentration of water, like a really big droplet, rises from the waves.
And I throw it at the face of one of the guards.
"Ah!"
The other one grabs my neck, but when I kick his blinded-by-seawater friend, he throws a swing that flies above my head and smacks the one of the dumb Fire Nation soldier/strangler.
I pull away from them both and rip off a set of keys from the belt of the one I threw the water at. (They're not labeled, there's no way to tell if any of them is for my chains, but just in case.) I could just run now and hope for the best.
But.
I slam and push the two idiots into the water.
Hmph!
Zuko
Zhao wanted to personally witness my incarceration. (Typical.)
"I must say, Prince Zuko, I in actual fact expected you to have an ounce of loyalty left."
My eyes narrow at the back of his head. The sinister chorus of steps the two of us and the soldiers make envelopes us. For some horrible and twisted reason… I realize it doesn't sound much different than it would if I was walking alongside them out of my own free will, without chains or bounds. It makes me sick.
"What is that supposed to mean?" I bite out.
"I know what purpose your father had for you in the War." The sickness increases when I notice how wistful his voice sounds, like he was eager to see me as an all-powerful monster destroying everything on my path. "You were supposed to be the perfect soldier, the embodiment of the most powerful country the world had ever seen. And yet you chose… "
Yeah, that is it. I chose this. I choose to be like this.
I am not like them.
"Keep going," I say, taunting him. Daring him. "At least I chose something. So much for not being a fighter, huh?"
I almost don't notice when he turns around until he yanks me by the front of my clothes and throws me against the wall. By the moment I recover, his forearm is already pressing my throat.
"I also know what flaw revealed you as a mediocre soldier," Zhao taunts back. And he knows I can't argue because he is right. I was a pawn, even I was disposable. "You spoke out of turn."
He yanks me again, ungluing me from the door I hit and then opening it for throwing me in.
"Enjoy your new quarters!"
The door locks at the same time my body clashes and breaks some of the ice inside the closet-length room. Just seconds after, the coldness stings my skin and numbs my muscles and my blood. This is why they called it The Cooler. Nobody would be able to firebend at this temperature.
Nobody that didn't have motivations like mine.
Big puffs of air come out of my mouth in forced panting, some of them already have particles that could form into snow. I keep breathing out, feeling all of my core burn. My veins; my blood heating. My breath becomes heavier but less dense, until I see the flames coming out of my mouth.
Perfect. Now, if what I remember of the design of these ships is correct…
I blow some fire over the conduits. The ice covering them melts at blink-speed, and I hear the unions and pins popping out of their place.
Ha!
Sokka
In a perfect world, I'd be able to take down every Fire Nation guard in this ship with the astounding power of my mind and my wicked charisma.
This isn't a perfect world. It's an unfair world where the good guys are caught off guard and that's obviously the only reason why they are knocked down with one punch alone. (That guy will get it the next time we face-off!)
I must say though, it is at times like this when I wish Katara was here with her magic water and her loud mouth, and I wouldn't even care that she yelled at me as long as she was here, and I could see she was safe, and…
Two solid blocks of ice hit the guards square on the head.
"Holy– "
"Sokka!"
"Baby sister!"
Okay, I know it's kinda a punch in the gut to my masculinity that my little sister is saving me from a group of beefy, merciless assassins – not that I was scared or anything – but I won't think about that now. Point is that my little sister is a badass waterbender, and she's perfect!
Katara nearly tackles me down in a hug. For a second there, I could have sworn it was like time had never passed and she was still a little kid I could carry around. (Oh, how I wish we could get back to those times!)
"How did you escape?" I ask her.
"I threw salty water to the eyes of one of my guards and then I pushed the two overboard." (She makes it sound like it was the easiest, clearest thing in the world.) "And look, these keys opened my cuffs, maybe one of them could be for yours."
She fumbles with the keys, they jingle between her fingers and she tries around three of them before my own cuffs open.
With my now free hands, I take her head and give her a kiss on the forehead. "You're the bestest best sister ever!"
"I know, but you'll tell me later, we have to find Aang and Zuko."
Aang
If I was a ship… where would I have some lockups?
Maybe the three guys pointing their swords at me can tell. "You haven't seen my friends around, right?" I ask.
They spring forward. I convoke a blast of air with my legs that makes them bounce and fall to the ground.
"Thanks anyway!" I say, casting an airball to jump over them.
Monkeyfeathers, this is taking forever! I have to do something.
Could I use… No, no, no. Too dangerous.
But…
I sigh. Okay, but I need someplace safe. Somewhere I can hide as long as possible.
The airball rolls me over to one of the intersections in the middle of the hallway. The place is quiet for now, no footsteps, no shouts, no sounds of fire blazing. I know it won't last that way so I need to work fast.
My legs cross in padmasana, my hands lay over my lap as relaxed as they can with the handcuffs still on, my eyes close, and I… see black. There's a rope reaching for me, coming down slowly in the middle of the darkness [1]. It is real, I convince myself that it is real. I discern all of its fibers; when I touch it, I feel its roughness. My palms sweat as I climb it. The more I focus on the rope and on the height I have to reach, the more the rest of the sensations fade. I don't hear or feel anything, not even the air flowing. I am out.
Katara
"Did you see that?"
"See what?" Sokka arches an eyebrow at me, curious and annoyed that we stopped right in the middle of the lower deck where a guard could pass by at any minute.
"I don't know," I admit, "I… I thought I saw Aang."
I did, but I didn't. It wasn't him, it was… a fusion of light that was shaped like him. And it was really hard to see it, because… it was a blink. It disappeared in a blink.
"You must be seeing things because you're worried," Sokka tells me, "Don't panic, we'll find Aang and Zuko."
I'm not seeing things… am I?
Zuko
The machinery hasn't gone awry yet, I have to keep throwing fire at it.
I catch something over the corner of my eye.
Was that… Was that Aang?
Aang
Even before my body regains full consciousness, I feel my own face hurting for how big I'm smiling! It worked! Astral projection worked!
Okay, Aang, but you have to concentrate. Sokka and Katara are free and together, it is Zuko the one that's still locked up. I make my airball appear under my feet again and ride to the place where I found him: a big, thick door embed on the wall several turns away from where I was. There are some growls on the inside, it must be him.
"Zuko!"
"Aang?"
"I found you! I didn't get it wrong!" I cheer. "Stand back, I'm gonna get you out of there."
"No! Aang, you have to stay away!"
"What?"
"I don't have time to explain, but I have a plan; you have to keep your distance. But first, listen: when the room blows up…"
Sokka
Katara and I keep going through every curve, but more than a warship, this place looks like one of those bad labyrinth games where you have to draw a line that gets in and out! (What the hell was this engineer smoking?)
It doesn't help that it is dark and the walls have this odd red glow that seems to come from nowhere. If I was crazy, I would say it is only the reflection of this stupid country's innate evil. Because I am not, I am saying it is the reflection of the light in the copper of the walls. Maybe.
Katara and I sneak our way around what seem to be miles of rectangular hallways, but we haven't found any cages or quarters where Zhao could keep Aang or Zuko.
We might find some now that we found Zhao himself.
"You two freed yourselves?" he says, clearly surprised.
Katara throws him a dirty look. She steps ahead like she was already planning on (literally) ice-picking his eyes out. "We put your guards to sleep."
Ooooh! I kinda don't like the way she says that last part – too creepy – but anything that puts Zhao in his place.
Hey, wait a minute! Shouldn't I be the one doing that?
"Looks like I underestimated you two." Zhao gets in his fighting stance. "Too bad your Avatar friend is not here to save you this time."
And that's when something explodes and the alarms go off. (He just had to say it, didn't he?)
The entire boat shakes like the Earth itself was leaning to one side, and we move like pendulums inside. I grab Katara with one arm and keep the two of us from smacking against the wall with the other; Zhao's armor rings when it crashes (repeatedly). Different explosions shoot themselves one right after the other. Some quieter, some bigger, there are valves failing, and the alarms sound like babies waking you up in the middle of the night.
"Man, I sure hope this thing had insurance!" I yell at Zhao.
Smoke creeps into the hallway. What the hell did Zuko do this time? Is he trying to sink the ship from the inside or what?
At first, it is only small clouds, but they grow fast! Soon, they are covering us, choking us. Seriously, what was Zuko thinking?
And now someone is covering my mouth and Katara's and pulling us back. Perfect!
Katara and I struggle to get free while the person shushes us from behind our backs. Don't shush me, you jerk! But then I realize we are… is the smoke… sphering around us? Is Zuko the guy holding us back? Is Aang the one I see airbending the smoke so it serves as our personal giant, breathing bubble?
Katara and I nod when Zuko gives us a heavy look, like explaining. He lets go and points to another junction – or to where I know there's another junction because I saw it before he decided to give a 'Smokescreens 101' class!
Aang and he do some more of his airbenders performance, making round moves with their arms to keep the smoke flowing and following us as we move across the passageways and the commotion – which sounds even louder now that I can hear without coughing my lungs out!
The clang of steps against metal says that the soldiers are rushing to the source of the chaos. But at least they aren't running our way.
We get to a narrower space where the stairs that take to the stern are placed. Once we get up, Zuko closes the entrance to the lower deck and kicks the lock, breaking it.
"What the eff was that about?" is the first thing I say – because damn right I want to know what causes us to almost die of smoke inhalation.
"Zuko made the machinery of the freezer they got him in blow up!" Aang says with his cult-to-everything-that-shines eyes. "And he also used firebending for freeing himself from firebending-proof handcuffs! And he broke my handcuffs!" He takes his own wrists and turns to look at Zuko like the firebending jerk hung the moon! "Seriously, pal, you're my hero!"
"Can we stop being 'Zuko's Personal Fanclub' for once and focus?" I remind them.
Zuko glares at me. "Excuse me?"
"Boys," Katara's voice interrupts us, "it's not that I don't enjoy your delightful conversations, but… where's the pier?"
When I look over my annoyance at Mr. I'm-So-Above-Having-A-Plan… I realize there isn't a pier. Nothing! We are in open sea!
"Zhao must have ordered them to head course!" Zuko states when we race to the border of the ship to confirm we are moving. (Unexpected, but… we are.)
I feel Aang tensing next to me. "Guys, watch out!"
He and Zuko turn and thwart a firebending current directed at the four of us. (Zuko uses firebending, Aang uses airbending.) The guy that shot us is the one we saw with Zhao earlier when he first captured us. "Actually, I was the one that told them to head course."
"Lu Ten," Zuko grits.
Katara puts a hand on Zuko's shoulder. (Pretty bold move to touch a firebender in bending stance.) "We don't have time for this, we have to find a way to get back to the pier."
"You are seriously saying you don't have time to fight a firebender Colonel?" that Lu Ten guy throws back.
"You are seriously a twenty-something arguing with teenagers?" Zuko says.
Oof! (Maybe he's not so bad to have around after all…)
Lu Ten shoots us again, Zuko blocks it. (Forget it what I said. He is a magnet of disaster!)
"Somebody has to drive us back to the pier," Zuko deduces.
"I can do that," I say, pulling out my club from my belt. "And Katara, come with me. Who knows if we'll need some more ice-knock-outing."
She nods. Zuko doesn't react, he keeps his defensive stance waiting for another one of Lu Ten's strikes.
"Aang and I will handle this while you do that," he says, "Be careful."
"Of course, I always am," I grin. "C'mon, sis."
Zuko
I cast a fire screen to cover Sokka and Katara's way as they head to the deck. Lu Ten pushes it away and shoves another blast at me. Aang and I have to split in order to keep it from hitting either of us. The fire makes it difficult to not tire oneself too fast, the heat is already making me pant and sweat.
Lu Ten attacks me again and I roll over to skip it; he is targeting me in specific, Aang is not a priority for him. That diminishing might serve our side.
I nod at Aang to go further to the side – out of Lu Ten's line of sight – and when Lu Ten himself comes at me yet again, I push myself up pirouetting back, luring him away from Aang.
"Trying to kill me already?" I jeer at Lu Ten. "Afraid Zhao might steal your thunder?"
I skip another blow. "It is not personal," he says, and it does sound professional, like all of this was mere protocol, like everything was just a means to an end. "Not all of us can make big names for ourselves just by being born."
Another blast. I block it, watching him come closer through the flames fading. "Some of us lose what is rightfully ours," he continues, "and we have to get it back."
"You think I don't know what loss feels like?" I say.
My country, my throne, my family; sound familiar?
He hesitates for a moment, his stance remains, but his eyes glisten with doubt. Or consideration. Either of them makes him pause for a mere shift of my eyes.
Aang follows them – my eyes, my signal – and pushes Lu Ten forward with an airbending move. I catch and immobilize him, bowing his knees down and pinning his arms on his back. His eyes grow in pain and shock until they zero in me with plain disdain. He looks at me like I was no better. Than who, I don't know; but I know Lu Ten thinks I am not excessively above whatever level he set me in.
"My, what an effective ambush, Prince Zuko," he says, his expression is one of a repressed smile with no humor, "You really are a member of the royal family."
Oh.
So it was that.
Acid resentment runs through my veins – (really? He is going to throw that on my face?) – but my hands shake with… unwillingness. (What am I supposed to do now? Kill him?) He wouldn't be a threat anymore if I did it, nor to our group, nor to the rest of the world as part of an enemy army. He wouldn't chase us, wouldn't cause damage to anyone else ever again, and yet… he kind of looks like me.
A little, only the shape of our faces. His face reddens when his blood goes up for the angle his head is inclined.
Blood.
He is only human.
When my hand hits the center of his neck, I feel his throat sink, I feel him choking. Non-fatally so. He will recover sooner rather than later.
"Aang, we have to– " the of several fire blades cutting through the hatchway I locked interrupt my sentence. "Okay, new plan: stay close to me." Things are about to go bump.
Sokka
Katara and I tip-run to the deck of the ship till we stand on the starboard.
"So what now?" she asks.
"Well, at the risk of seeming obvious…" I take out my bolases and throw them to one of the clear view screens above us. We can't see much from here, but there's the sound of glass breaking, a scream, and a thud, so… it's fair to assume we are good.
"Fine, but how are gonna go up?" Katara wonders again.
"Can't you make one of those ice chains of yours?"
"You know my waterbending is never good unless I am angry." She pauses. "Quick, say something that makes me angry!"
Perfect task for me!
"Uh… One of those new Air Nomad girlfriends of yours asked me out on a date."
"What?" my sister shrieks, outraged.
"Yeah. I might even take a shot with her, she's kinda cute– "
Right before I can finish, she moves her arm like she was throwing something and it is nothing other than a long water tentacle from the very ocean that becomes a thick ice string over the deck.
"Awesome!" I exclaim.
"Right when I think I've done something without you sticking your nose in it," Katara says, so obviously not letting go of her Girl Code stuff.
"Maybe you should be grateful that you have friends with taste," I grin. "But congratulate yourself later, we have things to do in here."
She growls. I think I could do so, too. (Sisters, huh?) (They get angry over the most ridiculous stuff.)
We use the ice to climb to the helm cabin, the one which's window we broke and the helmsman is unconscious on the floor next to the bolases. I consider throwing him through the hole on the window, but Katara thinks then he could use that to get back in when he wakes up, so we open the door and drag him outside before locking ourselves inside the cabin.
"What now?"
The compass on the control panel says the ship is heading to the northwest. We were captured for how long? A couple of hours? More? I know that if it had been enough time to get out of Southern waters we would be heading straight to the North – in our way to have our heads served in a Fire Nation banquet. So…
"Assuming this is what Zuko did back at the South Pole," I whirl the helm to the right. The ship nearly drops in the same direction, Katara slips and screams when her whole body follows the inclination.
"What is it that boys have against giving warnings?" she complains.
"Sorry, little dudette! Better buckle up!" I spin the wheel again for stabilizing us (don't know how well that works) and establishing a steadier course of return.
The sound of attacks and voices outside tells us someone is battling close to us. That can't be good.
"What was that?"
"I don't know," Katara says, "I'm gonna take a look." She comes to fit herself through the glass we broke, twisting herself away from the dagger-like (or worse) pieces of shattered glass!
"Katara!" I call. "Katara, are you crazy?"
"It's for stopping anyone we don't want any close from coming closer." She slithers out, holding herself from the roof.
Oh, Spirits! (Sisters, huh?)
Zuko
Zhao and his crew cut the iron of the hatch, the smoke from the failed machinery is the first one to come out in one big, dense cloud. (Don't know why, but all the trouble it is going to take them repair the ship after the damage I caused makes me feel strangely proud…)
"Suffocating us to death, Prince Zuko," Zhao sneers at me once he pushes his men out of the way to get himself out, "I knew you had it in you."
My smirk drops. "I am not a killer," I affirm. "Ask Lu Ten over there if you don't believe me."
He is contorting on the floor fighting to not swallow his own larynx, but he is alive and awake.
"Well done, you spared the life of a rich daddy's boy," Zhao bores, "You must have felt kinship."
I think I could copy his characteristic animal grimace if it allowed me to bite his head off. "What did you just said to me?"
Aang tries to ease me, but he doesn't get to before Zhao launches a shot at the two of us. (At least we know he set the two of us as targets.)
He yells at his men to come get me. Telling Aang to step back, I block all of their firebending attacks using airbending to make an air whirl, trapping the blazes with it, and concentrating them to turn it into a firebending defense. I shoot them their own fire multiplied.
"You learned airbending already?" Zhao inquires after dodging it. (This has to be the first time that I see him genuinely surprised instead of angry or sadistically pleased.)
"A lot has changed," I say.
He throws another blast at me, but Aang slices his fire into pieces with cutting blows of air.
"Don't let him get to you, Zuko," Aang warns me, standing in a defensive pose for another assault, "Remember that airbending requires contact with one's spirit. It's a wild guess but if your Avatar Spirit awakens out of rage… you could get into the Avatar State again."
And sink the ship, provoke an earthquake, making us explode; the works. Yeah, I remember.
Zhao comes for another hit. This time I am the one to shelter Aang.
"The Avatar State…" Zhao muses as if tasting the words "That is how that strange condition you got in last time is called?"
I step forward, shooting fire from my fist. "That is none of your business."
Suddenly the ship sinks – or very nearly sinks – to the right side, changing course.
"Whoa!" Aang says once we slide to the side. "You think Sokka and Katara had something to do with that?"
The ship swifts course another time, we slide to the opposite side.
"Nah, must be a coincidence," I say, dryly.
While the rest of the Fire Nation soldiers try not to fall into the open sea, Zhao clutches to the starboard and grits something under his breath. I don't manage to catch what it is, but it can't be anything good judging by how he speeds in direction to the ship's superstructure.
"Aang, stay here and fight the soldiers, I am getting Zhao!"
I follow him through a set of stairs and halt him before he can open a door to the accommodation bridge. My fingers shoot a current that welds the door close.
"Don't even think about it," I tell him.
I am not afraid of Zhao. Ever since we met, I have never been afraid of him. Never, not even once. But now, today, at this moment, when he turns around… I realize I also had never seen him.
Not the real him. Not without the different masks he puts up to make himself seem… human. The ones I continuously see peeling off from his face.
When he looks at me, it isn't a man the one I see anymore. It isn't an animal either. Even animals communicate feelings; they have energy, auras. Zhao is… plain dead. It is hatred the one that keeps him going, and since we are alone now, all he needs is the pure, unadulterated hatred he directs towards me to nourish himself. I can feel it as though it was sucking the vitality out of me, like he was… trying to take out what makes me human to keep it for himself.
"What, worried about your girlfriend?" he bites out. "She is the one that's inside, right? Otherwise, it wouldn't matter."
I glare at him. "That is not true."
"Isn't it? You saved her excuse of a village in the South Pole for her. What other reasons would you have to care about them?"
My fists clench. "That is not true," I grit, spitting fury.
"Mere facts, Prince Zuko. What is a man without his country? Look at you. You go around pretending you have left the Fire Nation behind and that you accept the few crumbs the other nations throw your way, but you wear our colors and our clothes nevertheless. Feeling homesick?"
Something stings me from the inside. I don't know what it is, but I know I don't it to be acknowledgement. I don't want it to be nostalgia. I don't want Zhao to be right.
"In your own way, you know this little fight you are putting up is wrong," he continues, "because you know you are not fighting for your own people. Your motives are weak, and before you start a war, you better to know what – and who – you're fighting for, Crown Prince of the Fire Nation Zuko."
'Crown Prince.'
I bite my lip, so hard that it reopens the cut from Zhao's slap; it was what I wanted, I soak in the blood and the pain. Instead of distracting me, it accentuates what Zhao is saying. Crown Prince of Fire Nation blood. I was supposed to bleed for my country and make others bleed in its name. There wasn't a need for me to swear my loyalty, the latter was implicit. Inherited. Ingrained.
Zhao looks at me intently and triumphantly, like my sudden lack of reaction was what he wanted. (Perhaps it was. It is when I stop fighting that I feel the less like myself.) But he is interrupted by a big chunk of ice falling on top of his head. I barely blink while I watch it knocking him out.
Katara was the one who threw the ice, she is standing on the structure's rooftop. (Perfect!)(Just perfect!)
Did she hear us? How much, exactly, did she hear? She didn't hear the part where Zhao called her 'my girlfriend', did she?
Her expression gives nothing away; I can't even see her eyes glowing although I can distinguish their color. A few strands of her hair blow with the wind. She is beautiful.
We stare down at each other from the height difference.
Sokka's voice cuts us off. "Katara, what's going on in there?"
"Nothing!" she answers – as innocently as she can after knocking out an adult man.
"Can you come here? I need ya to do something for me now that you're outside!"
She goes towards her brother's voice without glancing back at me. (Guess she did hear us.)
I use my stunts to push myself onto the rooftop and follow the two of them. Katara looks into one of the cabin's upside-down while kneeling at the edge. "What is it?"
"I think I have a plan to ensure Zhao won't bother us for a while," Sokka's voice replies.
I mimic Katara's posture to see him at the helm of the ship. (Why am I not surprised?) "No good can come out from that," I say.
"Zuko!" he greets me. "Buddy, so happy to see you!"
Yeah, right.
"Listen, I did some math, and I think I can drive us back to the pier," he indicates, "but it's gonna takes ages to get there, so I thought: 'Hey, we could go faster!' And then I thought: 'We could go faster than faster!' And then I thought: 'We could do a lot of damage by going faster than faster'."
"Do you mind explaining?"
"I want to crash this ship against the others parked at the pier," he finally settles.
"What?" I shout.
"Nobody would follow us!"
"Nobody would survive!"
"It doesn't have to be like that, we'll get everyone out before the grand explosion. And I still don't hear anyone else brainstorming how to get Zhao off our case."
Good point.
"So what do we gotta do?" Katara asks.
"Go to the machinery room and accelerate the engine," he says. "It's a steam engine, fire and water. It's the perfect work for you two!"
Right.
"We could get to the machinery room through the hatch the soldiers broke," I point out. But looking back, I notice… "Aang has company there."
"Don't call anyone's attention," Sokka advises, "get in here and use the door. I'll activate the alarms to tells you when you have to come up again."
Katara and I get inside the cabin through a broken window. (I don't want to ask.) When we pass the door, we find the helmsman unconscious on the floor on the other side of it. (I don't want to ask.) It takes us a while to remark…
"Shouldn't we have asked Sokka if he knew where the machinery room is?" Katara says.
I facepalm myself.
"I can help you with that," another voice startles us from our side. It is General Iroh, Lu Ten's father. My other descendant. He chuckles, "Sorry. Didn't mean to scare you."
Katara
General Iroh seems… approachable at first glance. Even friendly, smiley. His posture is regal, but his energy is greeting. He doesn't resemble Zuko either.
Maybe a little on the shape of his eyes, their outline is definitely smoother than the one of Firelord Ozai's despite Iroh's deeper wrinkles. He reminds me of Gran-Gran. It is something in the way the two of them stand; perhaps all elderly people give off that air of compassion and openness.
It feels bizarre to say 'compassion and openness' for describing someone part of the Fire Army, especially after tonight. My hand goes to the pendant of my necklace, the tips of my fingers dig into its carved lines. Adding new anger to an old grudge is a horrible sensation, but that's what tonight managed. After everything Zhao did to me and my friends, my brother, after what he said to Zuko…
Zuko.
He hasn't talked to me yet. And, being honest, I haven't done much to talk to him either… or acknowledge what happened with Zhao.
Zuko is the one who responds to Iroh's offer. "Why would you do that?"
Iroh shrugs. "Family sticks together."
"Lu Ten doesn't seem to share that philosophy."
Iroh looks down. "My son has acquired wrong beliefs. Mayhap for my fault, but that is for another talk. His heart is… mostly in the right place though."
"Is it?"
They stare at each other surrounded by charged silence. The atmosphere is the one of a reverse mirror, those that showed them their opposite. In appearance, at least. The two of them do have some of the same aura as well. It is… I don't know, strong and bustling. It feels a bit… like fire.
"Where is the machinery room then?" Zuko presses.
"Down the hallway, to the left, you can follow the signs."
Zuko has been poker-faced ever since what Zhao told him. He still is, without thanking or even looking back at Iroh when he leaves to where the direction the latter is pointing.
"Thanks, General Iroh," I say.
"My pleasure, young lady!"
"You should find someplace safe," I tell him, "Things are about to go down."
I run after Zuko to the room; when he opens the door, the hot steam nearly burns my skin through my clothes. Zuko reaches the main mechanism, using one of his fire daggers to open a compartment that reveals the coal and the fire inside. The flames create intense yellow and red lighting across the walls, the added temperature turns this place more into an oven than anything else. Though, it also seems more somber…
"Katara, throw some more coal in here," Zuko tells me.
I do, and he starts growing the flames using his firebending. From here, the ship appears immovable, there's not the smallest indication that we are moving. Not waving, not shaking, not even one of Sokka's crazy turns... till the alarms go off.
In a blink, I feel Zuko tensing, his anxiety is so sharp that the hairs on my own arms stand, and he pushes the two of us out of the way of a firebending blast from the door. Lu Ten was the one who threw it at us.
He looks so different from the person that captured us. He was much more in-control than Zhao then – (not that that's very difficult) – but he looked more serious, more worthy. Now he is disoriented, inelegant, and angry. Not Zuko-angry though, Lu Ten's rage is much darker.
"Way to leave me for dead, kid," he chews out in Zuko's way, holding on to his own throat.
Zuko remains impassive. "I knew you were going to live."
"Sure, live humiliated by the fact that the Avatar defeated me and felt enough pity to leave me alive. I just cannot thank you enough."
What is it with everyone's need to prove who is the toughest one?
The alarms continue screeching and clanking, the lights are a burning red color. Knowing what Sokka is about to do, they are a sign of absolute danger – death – and they are spurring us to get out. Zuko seems to think the same, amidst the heat of the room, his skin feels cold for dread.
"Katara, you have to get out of here," he tells me.
My fingers cling to his sleeve while the rest of my body freezes, refusing to move.
"You have to leave," he presses, murmuring. "He is coming only after me. And you heard Sokka's plan, you have to get somewhere safe."
My nails claw deeper into his sleeve, I feel them piercing my own palm. No, he can't do this. He can't expect me to leave again. He can't tell me to leave and don't look back. He can't tell me to leave!
You said you would be here, I think at him, remembering our conversation. You said it like you promised it.
He takes my hand, his skin isn't cold anymore, nor is it warm. It is ghostly, I wouldn't feel anything if I didn't know he was touching me. It is different. We have to be different. We can't be our usual selves. We can't be…
I let go of him.
He shoots Lu Ten another blast and I use the chance to escape, remembering the path where we found the hatch the first time. When I get to the stern, Aang stops some soldiers from cutting my head off.
"Katara!" he smiles.
Sokka is with him. "And the grumpy one?"
Something is taking over my body from the inside. It is cold, it dulls me. "He stayed behind."
Zuko
Lu Ten obviously doesn't think this is protocol anymore, I turned it personal.
His attacks are stiff and straightforward, but he is so blinded by rage he keeps missing, and he is turning this into more of a physical fight than a bending one. His rage is reminiscing of… me. (Great moment to notice the family resemblance!)
I keep dodging, but he is fast, and I am tired, and I have thousands of things to worry about! Like the fact that we could be about to detonate!
Do I really look like him when I get… like that? So brutish?
He throws me off balance and I fall dangerously close to the breach in the engine with the coal and the fire. The right side of my face burns, it burns so much…
Lu Ten presses his arm on my throat. An eye for an eye, I guess.
I try to kick him off, but with the lack of air and the fire disorienting me… I can't. I feel like I am inside of one of my flashback nightmares, someone is fighting me without mercy and the worst part is that he is a member of my own family. The fire stings and prickles the skin on my face, and it downs me that this is so much worse than a nightmare; this is real, it is irreversible! If he kills me, it is over. If he burns the other side of my face, it is over as well. And I can't fight it – I can't fight that awareness, and the fire, and him at the same time! I am losing!
Someone hits him in the head, knocking him out. It is Sokka.
He helps me stand up. "We have to go!" he says.
"Can you help me get him out?" I point to Lu Ten on the floor.
"Seriously?"
"Can you?"
He rolls his eyes. We carry Lu Ten's unconscious body to the stern.
"Boys!" Katara and Aang run towards us, the pier is coming closer behind them. We are the ones that are approaching. To one of the other warships. At high speed.
Sokka repeats that we have to get out of here – (because that wasn't clear enough, boy genius!) – but we can't leave behind the rest of the unconscious soldiers on the floor.
"Don't worry, I'll take care of them!" Iroh walks in our direction. Cheery, careless.
"You will?"
"Like I said, family sticks together… Uncle."
Uncle. That is our parentage. He is Azulon's son.
Sokka grabs me by the back of my collar; he, Aang, Katara, and I jump into the ocean. It takes us a mere second to reemerge to the surface and witness the massive, continuous explosions we caused. The warships fall one by one in a domino effect.
"Well," Sokka says, wringing the water out of his hair, "that went well."
Katara
I am soooo glad I insisted Sokka packed some medicine in Appa's bag; you can never be too cautious.
After… the fireworks show… we swam to the coast where we left Druk, Appa, and Hawky. I think all of them took a moment to recognize us, I think they noticed we had changed. In some way. I know something changed, I'm just not sure what is it. And I can't seem to figure out while helping Zuko disinfect his broken lip.
He hisses and pulls away once more when I put the disinfectant over it.
"Sorry," I apologize.
"I don't even know if it is the medicine or the saltwater the one that is making it burn."
"It is because it caught seawater that you need the disinfectant," I remind him, a little amused by the fact that he can spend the entire night battling commanders, and colonels, and soldiers, but he hisses at disinfectant.
The corner of his mouth goes up, his lips look impossibly pale against the red cut.
"Shouldn't you be taking care of your scratch, too?" he says once I try to put the medicine over it.
"Nah, it's just a scab already."
"You have dry blood on your neck." His thumb comes close to the rough mark on my throat and wipes away the crusty trail scattered around the cut.
It is nice, the way he always worries. About what I feel, what I think, whatever happens to me… And yet… in this situation…
"So… um…" he starts, looking down; his face looks kind of pink "when you threw that ice at Zhao earlier…"
I stare at him. "Yes?"
"Um… he was saying some stuff to me and I was… wondering… how much of it did you hear."
From the part where he said you only saved the Southern Water Tribe because of me.
From where he said you only cared about the world because of me.
"Enough, I guess."
He hums and nods, rubbing the back of his head.
"You didn't…" I try to choose my words carefully "You didn't listen to anything he said, right? You didn't believe it."
He stays quiet. It makes me worry.
"Zuko, when that guard took me hostage… what did you think?"
His eyes are made of liquid gold when he gazes up to meet mine. "I thought I was going to lose you."
"And what did you do?"
He looks puzzled. "I surrendered."
"That means he was wrong about you. About your… motivations… to fight."
It is his turn to stare at me; I watch the emotions flow in his eyes as though they indeed were golden rivers. Each gleam is a new feeling, but I can't identify them all. They are too many, too confusing.
"When Zhao caught you, he cornered me," he says, "I was desperate. It was terrifying. It still is. To realize there is nothing I wouldn't do for you."
Silence falls upon us.
I don't know where we are anymore. I don't know who we are; I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. I don't want to know. I don't want to start deciphering things tonight: how I feel, how he feels, what does everything mean. But there is one thing I do know:
"I can't be… that… for you, Zuko," I whisper.
I realize I am sad. I never thought I wouldn't want to be someone's reason. I don't want that responsibility, I don't want the world to depend on me like that. All my life, I've been responsible for everyone, older and younger than me. I don't want to carry more people around, I want to rest.
As if reading my thoughts, Zuko nods. "I know." He pauses. "You don't have to worry, this is something I have to solve by myself. Thanks for being here though. I appreciate it."
He bows to me. When he straightens and I see his eyes, more of those emotions are swimming. So many more, his eyes could be made of diamonds and gold.
Aang calls for us: "Guys, are you done yet? We have to return before the sun comes up."
Zuko is the first one to go.
Trivia:
[1] Aang is applying a meditation technique used to self-induce Out-of-body experiences.
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