::Whore of Humanity::
I smile as I set down the tea in front of him and he gives me a sad smile back. This is hard on him, of all of us I think he has the most to lose, a wife, a child. I sit down across from him, moving a box off the chair. I haven't had a chance to unpack since I moved. Not that I think I ever will. If by some miracle of fate I survive the final day my apartment will have been destroyed at some point. And if I die, well, they'll have less things to pack up if my apartment survives.
He smiles awkwardly at me and I know he's struggling for something to say, some bit of conversation. I know that smile well. The shy ones that come to the soap houses always give it, unsure what they are supposed to say to me, how much they can say to me.
"Do you ever wonder why the elements choose the avatars and the sides they did?" I ask as I take a sip of my tea. It's something I've long considered and always wanted to voice to someone other than my darling bear Paul. I look at the man across from me with a smile. If he has no thoughts on the matter I might as well voice mine to him. He is an avatar after all.
"No," he says with a slight cocking of his eyebrow. "I don't believe I ever have."
"I do," I reply, setting down my cup. "It makes perfect sense when you think of it. Why earth and water would choose the Dragons of Earth and why wind and fire would choose the Dragons of Heaven."
He looks at me and I can see the curiosity and surprise behind the glasses. Not many people think of me as intelligent. I'm just a pretty face and body. A soap girl. Those who know me, and there are so very few, think of me as witty and caring, but rarely as intelligent. Not that I blame them. I hardly made it through elementary. I'm full of theories, but I lack the basic knowledge to make them facts.
"Why?" he finally asks.
I smile gently as I stand. "Earth is abused everyday. In Tokyo there is only the occasional park where we can even see natural ground. There are the plants and gardens that beautify the city, but those aren't natural. Those were forced there. Forced onto earth, much like the cities and streets, without a care as to whether or not earth wanted to be smothered and polluted."
He looks at me a moment and I can see he has never thought of it this way and for a moment I wonder if I should stop. If I should leave him with the illusion that I am just a simple girl with a sad past and a smile. So many people would wish that, but I thought he was different.
And as if reading my mind he gestures for me to continue.
"If you were smothered, your children cut down or taken to parts of the world where they never naturally should have been, wouldn't you want to fight back? If you had seen creatures die because of pollution or other unnatural causes wouldn't you want vengeance on the creature that did such a thing?"
He looks at me thoughtfully for a moment and I know the answer. No, he would not, but he knows that other people would.
"That is why earth sides against us," I say, pushing my hair behind my ear. I'm so used to being a perfect doll, a coy temptress in front of men that this is strange to me. It has been a long time since anyone listened to my thoughts, not since the priest after my mother's dea… no, I don't want to think of that right now.
"You've thought about this a lot," he says and I nod. For a moment I think he'll ask me to stop. Instead he asks: "what about water?"
"Water," I sigh as I think of the smiling man that fought with me. The man I'm speaking to defended me from him and swore he'd cry for me. I do not believe he will, no one will, but I'm glad he said he would. It gives me a small delusion to believe in. "Water is polluted. Toxic waste, garbage dumping. More of this planet is taken up by water than by earth, but since humans do not live on water they think even less of trying to keep it clean."
He looks at me with a patience I have never known before and I almost laugh. They truly are all either gay or taken.
"Humans use water to drink, to wash, to cool off. Islands use it as a defense against invaders. But it's never thanked. It's taken for granted. Like with earth, water watches as humans over hunt it's children and have accidents that leave crude oil all along the beaches and kill it's children in painful, poisoned deaths. It wants no more of it," I say, pacing slowly around the room. "No more pollution and death."
"Air is polluted," he said quietly as we come to his element and I smile gently behind my hair. He is the perfect avatar for wind. "Why am I not on the side of the earth and the water?"
"Air is polluted," I agree with a nod, "but you are wind. Wind is free. Humans can harness and hold earth and water, but wind can fly away if it no longer wishes to be in a place. It protects, comforts, and destroys of its own will. No one controls the wind. If anything displeases it the wind can simply sweep it away. It has no children that have been destroyed or hurt," I sigh, "I don't believe wind has a reason not to fight on humanity's side."
"What about… fire?" he finally asks.
"Fire is the whore of humanity," I say, neglecting to tell him: much like myself. "It is created by humans and controlled by them. A simple candle is a welcome light, but if it should burn brighter, stronger, and become a blaze, than suddenly it is bad and struck down." Visions come to me of a church and my mother, but I force them away. "Fire dances for man, creating great things. With the heat from fire metal can be manipulated, dead things destroyed, food cooked, and the humans love it, think it a gift. But the second a fire burns a house down or causes a death it is evil. The work of the devil. Fire is a chained dog." I think of all the men that have struck me for not doing specifically what they asked, all the praise I have gotten for my beauty, and I remember I am fire.
He looks at me and his eyes are clear, even through the glass of his spectacles. "Then why would fire fight for humanity?" he asks.
I'm quiet for a moment as I walk over and pick up my small stuffed bear and hug it to my chest. I remember my mother striking my face and calling me a demon and the tears I shed when she died, knowing she was the only one that loved me. When I remember this it always makes sense. "We fight for humanity because we can't help but love those who hurt us so. Because we are the whore of humanity and we can do nothing but what are masters wish."