Disclaimer: I—I don't own Avatar: The Last Airbender! (breaks into hysterical sobs) There, happy? You got me to say it!
Author's Note: For any of you that just skipped to chapter two…THIS STORY NOW TAKES PLACE IN THE SECOND SEASON. INSTEAD OF GOING TO THE NORTH POLE, THEY ARE GOING TO BA SING SE. THERE WILL BE SPOILERS. TAKE CAUTION!
Please enjoy the story! And forgive me for the long lapse in updates! I'm trying hard not to do it again.
CHAPTER TWO
Shadows and Longings
"Do you want to know what fire feels like, General? It burns will all the passion of one's heart. And right now, mine's breaking."
Something was burning. Its hot, acrid smell tainted the air with its stench—veiled the wind with its ashy aroma. She couldn't breathe in its thick, putrid odor.
Blaring, wicked flames whipped swiftly about her, imprisoning her within a fiery chamber of torture, of hell, mocking in their flickering stance. She could hear their low, hissing voices, sputtering her name, whispering their evil delights. She heard their shrieks pounding in her eardrums—or, perhaps—someone was screaming…
Smoke fell overhead like a looming curtain, wrapping her tight in its dry folds and smothering her. She gasped and strained her ringing ears, listening to the ugly screeches bellowing through the air. She knew she had to reach the victim of this fire's wrath.
But no matter how quick, how lithe her slender body was, the flames only flared and laughed at her in rasping voices. She cried out in anguish, stumbling over something that felt soft and plushy beneath her bare feet.
The towering fire cast a red shadow over the charred remains of a dead man. His beard had been reduced to sizzling whiskers and his tender skin had already been bitten by the flames. His eyes were large, pearly, and empty as glass.
She couldn't feel herself as she looked upon the man.
She was burning with the fire.
She was the fire.
And no one heard her scream.
Sokka heard a scream.
His fatigued body was pulled erect in his sleeping bag, thin circles tracing themselves underneath his eyelids, and fingers keen and swift as they clutched his boomerang's cold handle. His small amount of brown hair had been freed of its ponytail and was now flopping noiselessly in the wind.
Another scream joined the first; it was shrilly and searing in the cold night air, the sound so high-pitched it was sawing at his reluctant eardrums. Grimacing and still clutching his boomerang for protection, Sokka climbed to his stiff feet and padded around the campsite.
His sleepy brain was moving slow and sluggishly. His consciousness seemed hesitant to give in to reality, and he felt like he was lost in a fog of damp shadows, rather then camping in a dark forest clearing.
He could still, however, make out the clear voice cutting through the inky air around him. It sounded gentle and melodious, contorted and maimed only by the rough screeches it was forced to produce.
Sokka knew that voice. He could feel it tugging lightly on the edges of his memories, almost nagging in its attempt to force the warrior's hazed mind to function. But the darkness that fell around him was too thick and comfortable, and Sokka's eyes were glazed and heavy—if only the shadows would thin, his gritty eyes brighten, then perhaps he could decipher who it was he was recalling.
And if only the moon would cast down a harsher glare, rather then sprinkling such silvery ribbons of light. For how gentle was its whitish glow, like a cool hand caressing his face…
Sokka's tired eyes snapped open. He knew that voice. Knew that soft, delicate pitch—the beautiful tinkle of its laugh and the utter wrongness of its scream. His heart was suddenly pounding loud and forcefully against his ribcage. He could barely breathe through such a tight throat.
But he knew who it was. The girl he had been dreaming about ever since her untimely death, her untimely sacrifice—
It was Princess Yue.
Sokka strained his ringing ears, his breath rasping rough in his throat, and followed the echoing screams. He wanted to run but instead his footfalls were slow and tedious against the earthy ground, feigning calmness as his thoughts raced.
Why was Yue screaming? What was wrong? His heart thumped painfully in his throat. He hadn't been able to save her last time, hadn't been able to hold secure enough in his clingy, desperate grip. Instead, he had watched her slip through his insufficient grasp in a wisp of white smoke. He had merely watched while she sacrificed herself for the moon spirit.
But this time, that would not happen. He would save her this time. He would hold on tighter.
But when he finally approached the source the screams, he caught no sight of snowy white hair. There was no pair of crystal blue eyes shimmering with grace or pinkish lips curved in a royal smile. Instead, he found himself staring at a matted mess of thick ruby hair and an ashen face contorted with fear.
He found himself staring at a strange, mute girl from an enemy nation.
Disappointment crashed down upon Sokka—thick, cold, and smothering. It weighed on his chest like a heavy burden, numbing his heart and icing his insides. His eyes felt strangely hot in his cold face, the image of the girl surreal in the dark.
"Wake up."
His voice sounded flat and impassive. He hated it.
The girl let out a sputtering gasp and shot upward, her green eyes vivid and penetrating in the dense shadows. Her gaze turned towards Sokka, silhouetted in the faint moonlight, clutching his gleaming boomerang with loose fingers. A neon fork of lighting streaked across the inky sky, marring its perfect smoothness as it framed the warrior's surly features in an eerie halo of static light.
The girl shrunk against a rotten tree trunk and released a piercing wail.
The world, momentarily muted and silent, seemed to flicker abruptly into life. Sokka jumped as his formally deaf ears opened up to sound once more; painfully aware of how shrill the girl's shriek was against the dull rustle of the forest. He had to suck an audible breath of air to ease the irritating throb in his temples.
"Shush! Wait—stop—screaming—"
He dropped his boomerang and held up empty hands, hoping to pacify the girl's fears, but she continued to sob and edge further away from him. At this rate, she would wake up not only Aang and Katara, but every resident in that tiny Earth village, too. The town had refused to give lodging to anyone who spoke out for the lone firebender. Even the one's who had begged Aang for forgiveness were reluctant to be seen in public with them. The angriest civilians of the village had even gone enough to say that if Aang and his friends ever disturbed them again, the consequences would be more than severe. Panicking, Sokka fell to his knees and grabbed the foreigner's wrists in an act to stifle her.
"I'm—not—going—to—hurt you!" Sokka hissed in an urgent voice. She continued to writhe and twist in his grip. "Don't you remember me? I saved you from that crowd today! Remember, with the Avatar?"
Avatar. The word halted her frantic defiance midstream, as if relieving her, so that her thin wrists suddenly hung slack in his hands. She stared up at him through wide, vivid orbs that reflected the moonlight into a silvery-emerald hue. The crumpled bits of leaf and twig that flecked her thick red tresses gave her the appearance of someone wild and uncivilized.
For a moment, Sokka actually believed she was going to say something. Instead, she simply tipped her head forward until her chin thudded against her chest and began to cry.
The action left Sokka stunned. He hadn't expected this. Yet there the girl sat, quivering in a tattered heap, with tears dripping down her dirty face. He let go of her wrists and scratched the back of his head awkwardly, his quizzed mind floundering over what to do.
Finally, he managed to mutter: "Hey…uh…don't cry…"
At the sound of his feeble suggestion, the girl's face snapped upright, wet with tears and pale in the black darkness that surrounded them. Sokka could have sworn he saw her lips twitch into another phantomlike smile, but it seemed fade away before he even knew it was there. Dusting off the earthy ground beneath them, the girl bent low and scribbled something into the slightly hardened soil.
Forgive me for startling you.
The words were scrawled in messy, slanted symbols. Sokka glanced back at her, confused and shocked, as she brushed away a tear somewhat shamefully with her slender finger. Noting her bedraggled appearance, Sokka had assumed that the girl had thrived off the streets all her life and knew nothing of how to write in formal characters. He found himself grateful that they now had some form of communication. But before he could even answer, the girl had wiped away her message and was jotting down something anew.
I was suffering from a nightmare and your image frightened me in the dark. I did not immediately remember you or your kind deed.
The girl paused, looking pensive. Loosing a soft sigh, she continued to scribble into the ground.
I have been running from people a long while. It has almost become instinct.
Sokka blinked as the morbid piece of information sunk in. He could almost picture her voice in his mind, soft yet bitter, heavy with forbidden times she dare not speak of. He gazed into her eyes and knew people had maimed her soul as well as her body.
"It's alright," His voice sounded strangely loud in the silence. "I understand. Is that why you started crying?"
The girl's face twisted into a sour expression. For a moment, Sokka thought he had offended her, but she bent over once more and scripted something with a quick finger.
I cry over many petty things. Though enrolled in no army, war has changed me.
The wind whistled in a low moan. It ruffled through the girl's crimson locks and tugged on the frayed ends of her clothing. Despite her disheveled appearance, Sokka couldn't help but acknowledge how elegant she seemed in the silver moonlight. Flustered, he tried to shove the thought away.
"War changes many people," he replied. "Wait until Aang and Katara wake up, they'll tell you. People die and others get hurt—"
He stopped when he saw her flinch. Her bright eyes seem to dull in an echo of some past torment. Empathy flooded his insides as he looked over her quieted, shadowed face, riddled with despair and misery. He knew what loss and deprivation could do to a person. How it ate away at you until there was a hollow chasm where a shard of your soul should be.
Silence reigned.
"Listen, you've had it rough," Sokka replied slowly, carefully. "Let's go back to sleep for now, we'll get something to eat in the morning…"
But the girl clung onto his hand as if in desperation, quickly jotting another sentence into the earthy floor with her free hand.
Why do you carry a weapon?
The question caught the young warrior off guard. He gazed into her wide, wavering eyes—a firebender's eyes—and only saw innocence. He hardly felt the wistful smile that played across his lips.
"There was a time when my father carried it," he spoke as he hefted the gleaming white boomerang. "Now I carry it to protect the ones I love. I heard a scream and grabbed it, expecting trouble. See? War has changed me too."
Sokka saw the girl's huge eyes shimmer with unshed tears. His insides immediately twisted in guilt, but then he noticed the gentle admiration kindling in her features. A single tear rolled down her pale, dirt-smeared cheek.
You are very brave.
The warrior stared at the words scribbled into the ground. He thought of Yue.
"No, not really…I mean, I try but—it's just—I—" Sokka broke off, shaking his head. He didn't expect this mute stranger to understand his confused emotions, nor did he expect her to appreciate the burden of carrying his scars alongside her own. He watched as she eyed him imploringly, her red lips hanging in a subtle frown.
What is your name? She finally scripted into the ground.
Why was such a simple question suddenly potent with so much emotion? Like it was the carrier of some sort of hidden message too powerful for him to decipher, yet mystifying enough for him to feel. For a moment, he thought his dry throat had closed up against him.
"Sokka," he answered.
The moon bathed the girl in silver light.
I am Sayrea.
"Sing me a song, Sayrea, would you? Just like before, when fire could throw back such cold shadows. Please, sing me a song…before the flame fades and I die."
Sayrea jumped up. Her heart was thumping painfully and her head was roaring in a wild crescendo of intertwining voices. The bright world around her thinned and swam before her eyes in colored dots and wispy strips of light. Everything was blurred, smeared; confused.
"You're finally awake!" A voice cheered jovially. "Great!"
A round, young face poked up inches from her own, a lopsided grin tugging at a corner of his mouth, gray orbs brimming with good-natured excitement. They shimmered like a thick mist.
The Avatar! The word ripped through Sayrea's brain with the force of a thrown dagger. She felt her shallow breath catch in her throat as she stared at him, so small and untainted, as if the brutal touch of war had not yet bruised him. A vague pain pulsated in the very center of her heart; she wanted to embrace him for that reason alone—wanted to cling onto such sweet, pure innocence.
Instead, she merely tensed. What if such pureness was feigned? Her superiors had often spun dark tales of the infamous Avatar—the ancient shadow of a man—gifted with immense power and cursed with ruthless cruelty.
"The Avatar seeks to smite us all,"A soldier had advised her once. "He cares nothing for our Nation."
But the boy situated before her painted such a softer, lighter image. His toothy grin never wavered and his shining eyes refused to dim as they met her teary green ones. No façade had cloaked the valiant words he had uttered yesterday.
"Your Nation's brimming with murders and liars…and that is why I killed him."
Abruptly, Sayrea felt her throat close up. She couldn't breathe.
"…in penance for your Nation's sins, he died…"
The scenes playing out before her suddenly seemed alien and untouchable. The strangers that towered around her were grand, majestic, clean—while she was filthy and pathetic as she groveled at their feet. Her clothes hung on her spindly body in frayed rags, while their spotless garments flowed elegantly to fit their magnificent forms. Her unruly hair fell about her pale face in an untamed tangle of bloody tresses; everything about these strangers was trimmed, perfect; picturesque.
She could not mar such beautiful purity.
"…in penance…your sins…he died…"
"Are you okay?"
Reality flickered back into life. Sayrea snapped her head up in surprise, her brain a whirlwind of confusion, and jolted when she found that Sokka's face had replaced the Avatar's. His brows were knitted together in worry as his eyes panned over her. His piercing cerulean gaze drew her into icy depths.
She heard the haunting whispers in her mind retreat, until her nightmarish memory lay safely dormant once more. As if they were afraid of Sokka's presence.
"…protect me from my nightmares…"
"Sayrea, are you okay?" The warrior repeated once again, delicate yet sterner than before. She felt a strange warmth spread throughout her entire body when he said her name; it seemed to flow, so naturally, off his tongue—as if he were meant to say it. It reminded her of someone she used to know.
He reminded her of someone she used to know. Someone—someone that—
"No!" A hushed voice chided in her mind. "It never happened! Never! You won't think about it! If you think about it, you'll believe it, and then it will come true!"
"…you've always been alone."
Sayrea felt her lips twitch, but she forced them into a restrained smile. Glancing up somewhat wistfully at Sokka's face, she ignored the whispered echoes in her mind and nodded.
Author's Note: Next chapter should have more action. This chapter is sort of getting into Sayrea's personality and setting up things for the future. There were some hints about Sayrea's past—I hope the random quotes weren't too confusing, but they're suppose to be mysterious. If you have any ideas on what they might mean, please don't hesitate to tell me! Read and review, please!