Ch 2 on the lam
Wash woke up and put his armor on, then checked his weapons. So far, they were still working. He wanted to leave the hotel and keep moving. But his instincts from being in project Freelancer and the marines told him to get intel whenever the opportunity presented itself. He left his two rifles inside the room and carried his pistol and knife.
"Here's hoping she has good intel." Wash muttered.
Ursa put some food on a table and waited for Wash. As she waited, she looked at the customers and took a deep breath. If they knew she was once the wife of Ozai, mother of Zuko and Azula… she put the thoughts out of her mind, knowing what the retribution would be. And it wouldn't be pleasant.
And her thoughts drifted to the newest person to come in. She briefly wondered what kind of a name was Washington.
"Morning." Wash said.
Speak of the devil…
"Morning." Ursa said.
"So, name's Washington. Yours?" Wash asked.
Ursa raised an eyebrow at Washington's apparent lack of socialization skills.
"Ursa." She said.
"Nice to meet you, Ursa. You said you had some intel." Wash said.
"Straight to the point." Ursa said, drinking a cup of tea.
"It's who I am." Wash said.
"One question. You plan on staying for long?" Ursa asked.
"No. It's a rather long story, but I'm not from here." Wash said.
"Yeah. I figured that out when I saw your armor. Not even the fire nation has that stuff." Ursa said.
"Fire nation?" Wash asked.
"One of the three nations in the world. There was once peace, but the fire nation attacked. The war's been going on for 100 years." Ursa said.
Wash let the information settle in. He crashed on a planet at war, for a full century. He knew all about the horrors of war. And Ursa was hiding plenty of information. He could tell by the way she was darting her eyes.
Before Wash or Ursa could speak, a man came in. Ursa stood and walked towards him.
"Can I help you?" Ursa asked.
"Who knocks at the door?" the man asked.
What kind of a question is that? Wash thought, as he headed to his room to grab his weapons. His instincts told him it was going to get ugly real fast.
"One who has eaten the fruit, and tasted its mysteries." Ursa said, and headed to the counter to grab something, but then she stopped. She ran the recent memory thru her mind over and over, going thru the man's body movements.
"You're a firebender. Aren't you?" Ursa asked, as her hand went past a parchment and towards a sharp knife.
The man didn't respond, but grabbed Ursa and pinned her against the counter.
"How'd you know?" he asked.
"How'd you infiltrate the white lotus?" Ursa shouted back, and stabbed the firebender in the stomach.
He fell to his stomach, clutching the stomach wound. Ursa ran upstairs, with the parchment in her hand. The firebender fired a jet of flame out of his hand, trying to kill Ursa.
"What the hell is going on?!" Wash asked, as Ursa barged into his room.
"We need to leave, right now." Ursa said, putting the paper in her shirt.
Wash kicked the window open and grabbed Ursa.
"Hold on." He said, jumping out and landing on the hard ground. Wash ran as fast as he could, Ursa running behind him.
Shouting was heard as fire nation troops approached them. He ran out of the town, and heard fireballs go right past him.
"Holy shit." Wash shouted.
"Follow me!" Ursa said, running towards the hills. Looking back, she sees the Inn slowly, but surely catch fire, doomed to be a patch of charcoal in the near future.
"We can't outrun them." Wash warned.
As they ran up the hill, Wash stopped running. He turned around, DMR in his hand and started to fire at them.
Exhaling his breath, Wash carefully put the crosshairs between the eyes of the firebenders and pulled the trigger. 7 shots rang out, and 7 firebenders lay dead.
Ursa stood up and removed her hands from her ears, trying to drown out the gunshots.
"I stalled them for now. Keep walking." Wash said, slinging his DMR, and unslinging his sniper rifle.
"That thing's huge." Ursa said, her eyes glued to the sniper rifle.
It's not the only thing that's huge. Wash thought.
"Yep. SRS-99 sniper rifle. Fires bullets 6 inches long." Wash said.
"Why would you need a weapon of that size?" Ursa asked.
"If you saw what I had to kill, you wouldn't ask." Wash said.
"We need to find the avatar." Ursa said, knowing he was alive.
"The what?" Wash asked.
"He's a person who can end the war." Ursa said.
"You know what he looks like?" Wash asked.
"I've heard he's a 12-year-old child, bald with blue arrow tattoos." Ursa said.
"But you haven't seen him personally." Wash said.
"No. I haven't." Ursa said.
"Ursa, stop." Wash said, stopping behind her.
"What happened back there? Some man came in, both you two said some cryptic shit, then all hell breaks loose. And now, I killed 7 firebenders to defend ourselves. What's going on?" Wash asked.
"Look, it's very complicated." Ursa said, not wanting to tell her past.
"Gee, I've been thru complicated shit as well. You tell me what happened back there, and I tell you a bit of myself." Wash said, hoping the compromise would work.
Ursa waited before choosing her words.
"I was raised among nobility and trained to recognize subtle body movements. That's how I could tell he was a firebender." Ursa said.
"And the fire nation has been waging war for the past century. But why would he suddenly attack you, and burn down the Inn?" Wash asked.
"Promise not to tell anyone what I'll tell you." Ursa said.
"Promise." Wash said.
"I'm with… I'm with the resistance." Ursa said, not mentioning the white lotus.
"That makes plenty of sense. You're with the resistance, firebender infiltrates the resistance, or so the theory fits, and all hell breaks loose." Wash said.
"That's correct. You make it sound simple." Ursa said.
"You'd be surprised how simple things can be." Wash said.
"Okay. I told you what happened, now you tell me about yourself." Ursa said.
"Okay. I'm a special ops soldier. Trained in just about everything you can think of." Wash said.
"Seen a lot?" Ursa asked.
"Yeah." Wash said, his voice suddenly tired.
A loud roar is heard, and a flying bison lands in front of them.
"You guys okay?" a young kid asks.
Washington looks at the boy, and quickly puts the pieces together.
"Are you the avatar?" Wash asks.
"Yeah. I'm Aang."
"Washington. And this is Ursa."
