I'M SO BACK!
Didya miss me? Sorry for the long wait...hopefully you like dis chapter!
puts on defensive, anti-whacking spoon armor and arms herself with a penguin
Aang couldn't see much. Everything was hazy, red-tinged, glowing...and the air was of a stifling, nearly unreasonably hot temperature. His gaze was fluttering with shadows of shapeless masses, focusing on different areas of red light, the sweat pouring across his eyelids in salty streams and dripping into his open mouth. He was like a newborn fresh into the world; he sat up with no understanding of where he was, what was happening, what that fur-coated thing was lying on the metal floor a few feet away from him...
Fur coat...a blue fur coat...hadn't he seen that before? He looked away from the blue-coated form, his head thumping steadily in a painful throb. He raised his hand to rub across his face, attempting to smear some vigilance into his dazed state of mind, but let out a gasp of pain when cheek met palm.
It didn't register at the moment; he decided in his mind not to touch his face, though he forgot to interrogate as to why it hurt. The blue-coated thing on the ground was moving again and it sat up, shaking its tan head. A mass of black hair shook in the ponytail behind its head.
A ponytail? A blue coat? It all resembled something...something he knew...
The thing turned and looked at him with droopy, out-of-focus eyes.
Sokka!
Everything rushed so fast into Aang's head he felt like his brain would explode.
The bodies in the pit, Iroh's suspicion, Katara was missing, Zuko ran off, Sokka and him took hours looking for him, vain hours and came back epty-handed, only for Zuko to return with that look in his eyes, with an army behind him, there was no sound, just a flash of red, an unbearable pain...
"Aang?' said Sokka groggily, still not fully awake. The Avatar's gaze was not yet clear so he stared hard at his friend for a few moments. His face, a tan blur, swivelled and came into focus. Aang's eyes widened but he did not allow himself to gasp.
It'll heal, he hissed to himself. Then he flinched when he realized why his own face hurt. Sokka was staring at him, blinking stupidly.
"...Aang? What's on your -"
"Never mind, Sokka," whispered Aang instantly. He rose immediately to his feet and turned his face from his friend's. The blue arrow ran down the back of his bald head as he paced around the room, studying the iron walls carefully. By then the warrior had realized how hot it was and took his coat off, stepping to the other side of the room and examining the bolted door.
"Eight different locks...wow. They really don't want us getting out. And its really hot in here...I feel like a roast chicken."
Aang saw Sokka's eyes light up immediately after he made this comment.
"Mmm...chicken..."
"Sokka! Come one! Focus!" said Aang instantly as he reached the door. Sokka snapped out - not to willingly - from his salivating daydream and pressed his ear to the door. The Avatar glared through the key hole and they both realized that several guards were pacing outside the door. Sokka leaned back and stared at the metal slab. Something clicked faintly in his mind.
"...hey Aang?"
"Yeah Sokka?"
"This...Zuko did this. Didn't he?"
For a long while, no sound escaped from the Avatar's lips. His gaze focused so intently on the keyhole that everything else in the world seemed dim and insignificant. Just as the warrior began to suspect that Aang had no answer to his question, he heard a snarl escape from his friend. His tattoos fluttered a glowing blue and Sokka felt fear rise in his chest. It was the second time he had felt anger flowing from his friend, and it was a terrifying thing to witness. Aang's voice reached his ears as the air began to swirl.
"He's going to pay for this."
The temple was cast in an eerie, omniscient darkness. The pillars were cast in white marble, carven with portraits of giant whales that leapt from raging seas, tearing through white foam to reach the fearsome winds above the waves. Thunderclouds hovered in grey paint on the ceiling, threatening to unleash the purifying rain it represented; blue fires were burning on torches shapes like glaring eels, their eyes glittering with rose-cut sapphires. A great arch formed the shadowed doorway. Up its sides flickered glaciers, pointed pinnacles of ice that loomed over the opening like guardians of the temple's great secrets, throwing hostile messages to anyone who dared disrupt the sanctity of such a place.
When Zuko entered the first thing he heard was the rush of water. The blue fires were lit below the sources so the ice melted to the serene essence; even in the dark it glittered, flickered over stone and tumbled down pillars, scattering over high balconies like channels of cool spirits. The room itself overflowed with soft energy, a gentle power that flowed constantly in the rivers between the floor tiles, the waterfalls that cascaded down several white-washed floors, the deadly still ponds that rested below statues of past water-bending Avatars.
Zuko's heart threatened to soften at this peaceful reminder of Katara. The darkness of the temple - disrupted only by flickers of blue flame - was like some shield of ghosts that made it safe for his heart to drop, for his shell to weaken, for his grief to be unleashed. But such things of comfort were not real. It would cause him more pain later, more loss, more fruitless hope. The fire of his soul roared and encased him again in his horrible armor of apathy.
The priestess saw him before he saw her, but she did not acknowledge it. Her mind had to focus on the task at hand, the water that flowed about her shoulders as she meditated, the glowing symbols in the ancient book she recited mentally, the prayers she may have to repeat later for this strange fire bender of noble blood...
She was impressed when Zuko did not speak. Normally a visitor would wake her from her meditation and disrupt all her prayer, forcing her to repeat it at a later time. This strange man though, this man that bred pain with each movement of his hardened body, this man with the great fires in his soul, seemed to respect her own custom. The prayers were long and tedious, but through each one the fire bender stood, motionless and silent as stone.
When she had finished her gaze fell, finally, upon his face. The scar she had seen before in visions; the Avatar's great journey, the war, the death of the Fire Lord. Yet other than glimpses, the Prince's face had hardly ever surfaced when she talked with the Avatars past. Her gaze watched him, blue as the water that draped over her shoulder and soaked her dark hair, fearless in the face of his desperation. The fire was never ending in his heart; it fed like a fat parasite off of a pain she could not yet uncover.
The silence lengthened and she felt the man grow tense. The water lowered and sank back into the pool beside her.
"The Prince of Fire Nation should not be in the presence of a Water Tribe Priestess," she said softly. Her voice was like flutes, and it reminded Zuko of the soft way Katara used to say his name. His inside flared in rage, the flame flickering gently between his fingers, and then died again.
" I must ask you what the Water Tribe custom is for burial," he hissed. The priestess didn't blink, but watched him steadily.
"The customs are different than yours. In the heart of each fire bender runs powerful, honorable flame; for this reason the sons of Fire Nations are cremated when they pass, to release the unbound strength of their souls. Our ceremony would not suit you."
"I am not here to bury a man of Fire Nation. I want you to bless a woman of a Water Tribe."
Her eyes fluttered but still refused to blink. She was searching for the source of his anguish, a source he hid beneath the ferocity of his eyes, the deep red flame that glided slowly around his wrists. Her eyes squinted slightly and her shoulders lowered.
"Why do you carry so much pain, Prince? Why is there so much anger in your heart?"
Zuko ground his teeth at these words. How he hated her, how he hated this - this stupid, useless fraud! All he had wanted was her to bless one stupid body, now she had to go on stupid lies about his heart, his nonexistent heart - he decided, pointedly, that he would kill her after she performed her ceremonies.
"I feel nothing, you old liar. I'm not angry. All I want you to do is bless a body for me, do you understand?"
The woman stared at him and took one step towards his flaming figure.
"Apathy grows from pain, dear Prince. It is a leech. The more you subdue your grief, the more it will consume you."
Zuko roared and his right arm burst into blinding flame. His left hand clenched angrily around the priestess' arm and he brought his fiery rage dangerously close to the calm complexion os her face. She stared at him withouth fear, even when the edges of her hair began to singe. The fire in his eyes was of a maddening, terrifying brilliance. When he spoke, his white teeth glittered in a constant snarling of unequaled fury.
"YOU WILL TALK NO MORE OF INSIGNIFICANT THINGS, WENCH," he roared, releasing her with a rough shove that caused her pain she did not show. He panted heavily, trying to control the furious fires about his shoulders. "You will follow me, and you will bless a body. Fail, and I will call you witch and burn you in the center square. Walk."
He pointed to the door and the priestess, still unmoved by his fearsome display of brutality, walked swiftly to the arch and passed him, clutching her right arm.
Her face was rent with wrinkles of her age and Zuko cursed himself. He had nearly attacked an old woman...why? For what?
She is a water bender. She is the enemy. They are the brutal ones, not you. Beneath her serenity she is nothing but a devil. She could've killed Katara just as easily as that earth bender.
A hellish, red glow lit up his arms and he followed the woman beneath the arch with newly-fueled fury. The pain in his heart twisted to betrayal; betrayal turned to wrath; wrath drowned into hatred. The woman felt the fires devour his tortured soul and she made one more silent prayer to the gentle comfort of the darkness.