Hakoda didn't trust the Fire Nation.
They spoke of warmth and peace but came with cold steel and greater numbers. There was a plot just beneath the ice, he could smell it in the air and feel it under his skin. They were waiting to spring some unfathomable trap towards some unknown means. But he could be patient enough to let his people drink from the poison they served, better they died with a full belly and a beautiful lie than hungry.
Always better than hungry.
The blockade had been in place all his life. They had been there when he was born, an ever-present omen for all generations after. They had been there when he became a man, always the shadow just beyond the horizon. They had been there when he married the love of his life, an indelible stain on the future they were making. They had been there when his child was born, a promise of death to those that dared dream of better.
The blockades were not just a show of power.
They were practical. The Scourge of the South made it his mission to continue what his father had started—to fully dismantle the Avatar cycle. And Hakoda knew that that was the only reason his people had been kept alive. They were tamed livestock, a trap for the Avatar still lost to the world.
Then, one day, the blockade was just gone.
And for the time in his life, Hakoda looked on towards the midnight sun unobstructed.
Kya held his hand as he watched his children play in the light untouched by smoke.
Scouts later reported after a few days how the ships had withdrawn even further than the ruins of the Southern Air Temples, since they were already beyond observation. Bato and his men sailed as far as the winds and tides took them and turned back after making sure all Fire presence was gone from the South Pole.
They came back with boats full of fish and game, and the tribe had a proper feast.
Any excuse was better than constant fear. Their children deserved better than their parents had.
Six months passed.
Hakoda's fears finally came back. The first column of smoke in six long months appeared, and there were more behind. Black clouds came like a looming blanket, promising death as five ships rose from the horizon. He and his men dressed for battle, full and ready for the first time in so long. They were ready to give it their all for this coming raid. Ready to give a fight to the death should it come to that.
And then, the ships stopped spewing smoke.
And kept moving with the tell-tale smooth push of water bending through ice crusted seas.
His men screamed themselves hoarse at the spectacle, his warriors banging their weapons against their shields with the heat of indignation. They prepared as one to meet the traitors that dared set foot on once hallowed land, bent but not broken.
The first ship stopped just before hitting the ice, it reminded him of when the South still had their benders.
It opened its hatch, aided by columns of ice that reinforced the metal ramp.
His warriors raged.
And an old woman came out and walked by herself towards their fortifications.
Bato and a few more readied their boomerangs, and more readied spears. A water bender surrounded by snow was a fierce opponent. But a water bender on the other side was a monster.
"By the grace of the Moon and Ocean," said the old woman, "Hama of the South returns home."
Silence hung tight against the frigid air.
"We come in peace."
By her words, more came down from the ships. Men and women both. He recognized Karho who was taken some five years ago, and Yekka who was taken as a child and grown up far far from home.
And with that, Hakoda knew he'd lost.
Bato scrambled over the walls of snow and ice and threw himself with abandon at the benders' mercies. And how could he not.
"Yekka!" his brother-in-arms screamed.
"Father?!" the girl cried. And ran towards him
No blood was spilled that day.
It was only by the following morning that he got his explanation.
Hama told them of how the Fire Lord released all their captured benders, only the peasants while any who held positions were kept back, a precaution against further organization. The Fire Nation was condemned by a great spirit for their sins and now they were making amends. Her story matched what he'd read on the official missive carrying the Fire Lord's seal inked in blood.
Hama—his own godmother, he'd learned—was reunited with his mother and had been inseparable the moment they recognized each other. Friends torn apart by the war and time, finally brought together by the grace of a spirit. It was not the Avatar that had laid the Fire Nation low but a different one, and yet the results were all the same.
The War was finally over.
"We were released and given the choice to come back home or stay as citizens of the Fire Nation," Yekka shared. She had come home together with her husband Choma, an earth bender she'd met in the mines where they were forced to work.
"We couldn't do that," Choma added. "Not after what they did to us. But some stayed." There was a bitterness with the way the young man had said it. "It was one thing to be told day in and day out that you would never amount to anything more as a prisoner, but it was another to see the Fire Nation vindicated for their claims."
"They have conquered the air," Karho said gravely, "they have ships that ride the air instead of the sea. They collected us from the scattered prisons all over the Fire Nation in a matter of days what would have taken weeks on our own boats. It didn't matter of they flew over land or water. Nowhere is out of their reach anymore."
"They won," Hama said. "They won and they know it. And now, they are treating the rest of the world as part of their territory—as their fellow people, if you'd believe it."
His godmother shook her head.
"The ships we came on, all of that was manned by our own people. Young men and women were taught by the very soldiers that had taken them—me, away from here to command the same ship back. To keep as a gift along with other things."
The ships' manifests detailed the contents of what was called, humanitarian aid by whatever passed for their council. Five ships, each carrying the same contents of preserved meats, grains, and dried fruits, provisions for their passengers and more, enough for a month's journey and a little longer. There were also metal tools: shovels, hammers, saws, and knives, and then there were spear tips of pure and fine metal, harpoons with flared barbs, and bows and arrows and fine rope. There was also so much coal in the ships that they could run them for a good three or six months.
Enough time to go back and forth from the nearest colony for more.
It was preposterous, but it also wasn't entirely wrong how the Fire Nation believed in their victory. The War had started a hundred or so years ago by their own hand, and so too were they ending it by their will. Their sins against the world notwithstanding, it was clear that there truly was no resistance left or capable of fighting them back.
"With flying ships and a few people who know how to shoot lightning, who else is there left to stop them?" Hama said.
"Are they… treating us as a colony then?" But that didn't make sense, there was barely anything the South could offer them that they didn't already have themselves. Then it clicked. Why they gave the others a choice to leave. "They want our water benders."
"They also have earth benders too," Choma added.
"What… happened to the Fire Nation?" Hakoda found himself without answers or so much as a wild guess.
Hama shrugged.