This is the longest chapter out of the first ten or so even after all the others have their footnotes and stuff. Wow.
I love you all.
Elsie stayed where she was hidden even after the Fire Nation soldiers had walked away with the struggling Katara. The boy who'd led them looked to be only a few years older than Katara. Elsie tried to memorize his face so if she saw him again, she'd…
What would she do? He was obviously a warrior – the scar on his eye (was it his left or right? Did it matter? Would Sokka want to know specifically? Would it help him find her? How many people had scars like that? Would Sokka need to know the color of his eyes or what his hair looked like? Because what if the boy decided to wear a disguise? Would Sokka be able to find the same man if it was a disguise or if he changed into a disguise?)
She wasn't able to hear what Katara said to the boy or what the boy had said to Katara. But something wasn't right here and it wasn't just the fact that Katara got taken away without her consent.
Elsie sat shivering behind the pile of crates for a very long time. She was afraid to get up. Afraid that as soon as she did, the warrior-boy would be standing behind her and would grab her and drag her away like he did Katara.
Prince Zuko thought as he walked back to his ship.
It had been obvious from the remains of a camp on a nearby island in a nearby archipelago that the Avatar had been there. There had been the remains of a fire, rubbed in spots where the children had slept and a large rubbed in spot where the giant, furry thing had most likely lain.
An interesting point that had been made by his uncle, was that while it was obviously difficult to determine exactly where the watertribes people and Avatar had lain because the earth had already been packed in so much from a lack of rains in the area, it had seemed as if there had been a fourth spot.
Prince Zuko would have preferred to think that one of the children had gotten into a tiff with another and decided to sleep so far away (because the spot had been distanced from the rest) but he knew better now than to underestimate the possibility of a fourth person in the group.
Which would mean that there had most likely been another person hiding while he had caught the waterbender.
Which meant that person would likely rush off to find the Avatar to warn him that his friend had been taken.
Which meant that the Avatar would be told her had his friend.
Prince Zuko allowed himself a slight smirk as he walked up the gang plank to the front of his ship. The sounds of the struggling girl and the footsteps of his soldiers were like music to his ears. If somebody had overheard him taking her and reported back to the Avatar, Prince Zuko wouldn't have to write a letter.
And writing ransom letters was such a nuisance.
"Hey! What are you doing back here! No thieves!"
Elsie was kicked in the side by a large man in green as he lifted a crate behind which she hid. She fell to the ground. He'd missed her ribs but had hit her (somewhat) fleshy side.
"Get out of here before I call the Town Watch!"
The man pulled his foot back but Elsie struggled to her feet and ran away. She wasn't about to fight back but at least now she wasn't expected to lay there and take it all without moving until the person beating her was through.
Elsie raced along the streets before she realized that Katara had dropped her basket.
She spent a few minutes wringing her hands and debating whether it was safe enough to go back and search for the basket and vegetables or if she should run ahead and tell Sokka that his sister was kidnapped.
Well, friends were more important than fruit, so Elsie continued running, crouched along walls and streets like a rat running from a cat.
She finally reached the field at the edge of the town and raced through the grass stalks. They whipped her arms and face and when she swung her arms in time with her gait, she noticed scratches along her forearms. They stung, but Katara was more important. She was her friend.
At last, she reached the end of the field and the top of the hill where the trees grew and the forest began. Sokka was sitting on the ground against a tree, whittling a small branch away to nothing with his knife. He looked up as Elsie plowed into him.
"Arragh!" he yelled as Elsie tripped over his ankles crossed in front of him.
Elsie held her arms out to keep her from landing on Sokka. They successfully landed on either side of him but her face smacked into his chest.
Sokka hit his head against the tree and saw stars for a second before he realized that Elsie was scrambling around on top of him, trying to get off in what seemed like a panic.
A panic without any regard to the more sensitive parts of his body.
"Elsie!" Sokka spread his legs a bit to give her less of a target for her knees and grabbed Elsie's upper arms. It was like grabbing a skeleton with skin and a small layer of muscle around it. The girl had no fat at all, and it was beginning to frighten Sokka.
"Elsie, stop! Before you maim me!"
Elsie stilled immediately, not even moving her head as she turned her eyes to look up at him. She seemed as shocked and horrified as he had been.
"Elsie!" Sokka noticed that where his hands grabbed Elsie's arms, there was blood flowing around his fists. "You're bleeding."
Elsie didn't move.
"Where's Katara?" Sokka looked past Elsie as if expecting to see Katara walking up the hill, basket of food resting on her hip, shaking her head in exasperation at Elsie's silliness.
Sokka looked back at Elsie who had still said nothing. Tears were falling down her face quickly and her eyes and nose were turning red so that she looked like a blushing panda.
It really wasn't that attractive.
But Sokka didn't like to see girls cry. Not even strange girls, who didn't talk, almost kneed his sensitive spot, and who he didn't trust as far as he could throw.
Though, determining from when Sokka pulled Elsie against him in a hug in an attempt to comfort her, he could have very possibly thrown her all the way to the South Pole from there. She was so thin!
Sokka patted Elsie's back like he had for Katara before. He knew that it was like trying to comfort his sister but it felt different somehow. It felt awkward because he didn't know this girl. She didn't feel like Katara did; she didn't feel as strong as Katara always seemed and felt.
He knew Katara wasn't the strongest mentally or physically, but she did tend to give off that aura of confidence that made people think, at least, that she was. It was because of that he was so protective of her. Because it was easy for people to believe she was stronger than she actually was.
"Um, Elsie?" Sokka asked after the shudders had stopped and his shirt was as wet as it could possibly get. "Where's Katara?"
Elsie pushed up and sat back, not looking at Sokka as she hugged her knees. Sokka let her go easily.
Elsie rested her chin on her knees.
"She got- taken," she hiccupped. That had been the most satisfying cry of her life. Why was that?
"What?" Sokka jumped to his feet. "Who took her?"
"A man- a boy!" Elsie hurried to correct herself. "He was tall and he had dark hair in a patch on his head and eyes and a scar like a ball of fire on his face." Elsie used her hand to demonstrate around her eyes.
"Zuko," Sokka muttered to himself. He turned around and yelled out to the trees. "Aang!" Silence. "Aang!"
"Yeah, Sokka?" Aang swooped out of the air behind Sokka and landed on his feet as he clicked together his staff. "What's the matter?"
"Katara got kidnapped by the Fire Nation," Sokka explained. "And that Zuko guy."
"What?" asked Aang. "Is he here? How did he take her?"
Sokka turned to Elsie who cringed and huddled into her knees more.
"We were in the market place," she said softly. She could feel tears burning her eyes again. Would they hate her for this? For not stopping them? For not helping Katara? "And these men were heading for us so I ran for cover. I thought Katara would to – it's just instinct for me, so I guess I thought it was for everybody else, too. I guess it's not.
"So I hid behind a pile of crates and when I checked to see where Katara had hidden, the warrior-boy grabbed her and she said something and he said something and then he said some more something and then he threw her to the other guards or soldiers and they walked away with her."
"You didn't hear anything?" Sokka demanded. "You didn't try to get closer or try to fight them off? You just let him TAKE HER?"
"Hey! Sokka!" Aang stepped forward and kneeled on one knee in front of Elsie, his staff tucked under his arm. Momo leapt up on his shoulder and curled his tail around Aang's neck.
"It's all right," Aang assured her. "You were right in coming back for us. There was nothing you could do. If you'd tried to fight, you would have gotten hurt or kidnapped yourself and then we'd never know. You didn't do anything wrong. Right Sokka?"
There was a warning in Aang's voice. Sokka was standing behind them, his arms across his chest. He was about to let it go (because he knew Aang was right. And he knew he should be thankful that Elsie had told them in time) but something made Sokka want to fight. Something kept him from holding back.
"She's my sister, Aang!" He threw his arms up in the air. "What are we going to do?"
"We're going to help her, Sokka," Aang stood up and leaned slightly on his staff. "There's nothing Elsie could have done. She was right in coming to us instead of risking hers and Katara's life by fighting. She's a hero, Sokka."
Elsie looked up at him, surprised. She had expected him to take Sokka's side. After all, they were friends before she was friends with either of them and Sokka was related to Katara.
Sokka huffed.
"Sokka…" Aang warned him.
"All right, all right," he pointed to Elsie. "But she better have told us everything. She better not have left anything out or helped Zuko or something."
"I'm sure she didn't do that!" Aang said cheerfully. "Now let's go try and find Katara!"
Aang hopped up onto Appa's waiting back.
Elsie was glad, then, that she hadn't told them everything. Maybe she had told them everything that had happened today, but at least they didn't know about before. They definitely wouldn't trust her still if they had known that.
Sokka offered a hand to Elsie but Elsie didn't know what it was for.
With a sigh of frustration, Sokka leaned down, took Elsie by the waist and hauled her up to her feet. Elsie gasped in pain and doubled over, clutching her side. She backed into Sokka's shoulder and pushed away from him.
"What is it, Elsie?" Sokka asked worriedly. He forgot that he was angry at her – maybe not her, but at least the fact that Katara had been kidnapped and she hadn't – and rushed forward.
Elsie held up the hand that wasn't holding her side and tried to wave him away but Sokka would have known of it. He reached around Elsie using his super-fast warrior skills (phff!) and pulled up her shirt.
Forming right underneath her rib bones (each of which Sokka could see despite the fact that Elsie was leaning towards that side) was a gigantic purple-blue bruise that went well with Elsie's watertribe clothes.
"Did someone kick you?" Sokka asked.
Elsie nodded and tried to pull away but Sokka grabbed her wrist with his other hand, unable to tear his eyes away from the poor girl's side. Elsie felt mesmerized by Sokka's concentration. Her breath hitched in her throat and chest as he took his hand from her wrist and drew a finger along one of her old scars.
"What's this…" he trailed off as he pulled Elsie's shirt up more, forgetting about everything else except the marks on her body. Elsie reached up instinctively to keep her shirt from being pulled off her chest, but Sokka didn't seem to notice.
He spun Elsie around and pulled the back of her shirt up until he bared her shoulders and back. Elsie clutched her arms in front of her chest tighter.
"Aang!" yelled Sokka. "Aang, come here!"
Aang jumped down from Appa's back and walked towards them. "Sokka." He asked. "What are you do…"
Aang stopped talking as he walked around Elsie and saw her back.
There were crisscrosses of scars and scratches from what looked like many old beatings and attacks. There were even some lumps where it looked like the bones had been broken but no attention was given to them in a medical sense. Long, thick lines drew in diagonal patterns and crisscrossed many smaller and closer together scratch-marks where Elsie had been beaten with both, either poles and sticks, or many small branches or twigs tied together.
None of them were fresh; all of them were old.
"Elsie," Sokka breathed. "What happened?"
Elsie stepped forward and pulled down her shirt. Her cheeks were burning crimson. Aang and Sokka didn't move; they just stared at her.
"I used to get beaten," she would look at them.
"By your family?" Aang asked.
"No," Elsie stared at the ground, her arms lightly hugging her stomach. "I don't have a family. At least, my father's gone and my mother's dead."
"Who beat you, then?" asked Sokka.
"My grandmother – or at least, that's what I was supposed to call her. She wasn't really my grandmother, just the mother of the man my mother was supposed to marry before-" Elsie took a deep breath and plunged ahead. Tell them now or tell them never. "-before my mother decided she preferred a firebender."
"What?" Sokka demanded. "But your mom was a member of the Water Tribe, right? I mean, you look like you're a watertribe person."
"I am – she was," Elsie shrugged. "But, I don't know. I guess she fell in love. I like to think she fell in love. Nobody would call it love, though. They said it was like loving an animal and I was half an animal because of it. They said there wasn't any reason they should treat me like a human being so they didn't."
"But who treats animals like this?" demanded Sokka, indignant. "I'd never treat a dog like this!"
Elsie shrugged.
"Why'd your mom's water-boyfriend or whatever take you in?" asked Aang.
Elsie shrugged again. "To spite my mother, I guess. To be able to mistreat the spawn of fire and ice the way she thought it should be. My mother dishonored her tribe and her fiancé when she fell in love with the firebender and had me. I'm a freak, and she didn't think anybody else would be able to convey that better than her."
"But what happened to your mom?" Aang asked.
"She died giving birth to me. Everybody said she was consumed in fire and when the fire died down, they found me in her ashes." Elsie shuddered and hugged her shoulders tightly.
"Why would they say that? Women die in childbirth all the time."
"I don't know. I guess they were lying. They just didn't want me to get it into my head that I was better than anyone." Elsie snorted ruefully. "It took me a while, but I figured it out. I realized what they were doing to me when a child from the tribe was taunting me with a burning stick, teasing me to use it to burn the village."
"I got angry and the flames kind of exploded," Elsie whispered and waved her hands to show the exploding fire. "They burned up the stick and burned up his arm and he had to jump in the snow bank. Fourteen years and I didn't get it. I mean, of course I knew why, I just didn't really know."
"What?" asked Sokka, beginning to become suspicious.
"I'm a firebender," Elsie said, glancing up at Sokka standing there stunned. "And that means I'm a freak of nature."
"Well, that's it!"
Sokka hurried over to Appa and jumped up.
"Are you coming Aang?"
"But Sokka," Aang protested, resting a hand on Appa's side. Elsie was still standing in the background of the hill, her arms hugging her shoulders. "Sokka, you can't just leave her here."
"As far as I'm concerned, Aang, she's a part of this," Sokka picked up the reins to Appa and held them in one hand. Appa groaned.
"But Sokka, that's not fair."
"She could have been helping them, Aang!" Sokka screamed at him. "She could be lying, or hoping you'll follow what she says and get captured! She could be trying to get you killed!"
"You don't know that, Sokka! She never gave any indication that she wasn't on our side!"
Sokka pointed an angry finger towards Elsie. "Look at her, Aang! She's a firebender! She's our enemy! We don't know what she'll do because she's unpredictable, unknown and our enemy!"
Elsie felt a wave roll up in her. It felt like the fire when she had burned the boy's arm.
"She was probably laughing it up with Zuko while they tied up Katara! She could have been the one to kidnap her, herself!"
Ah yes. This is what rage felt like.
"You stupid, lying, awful boy!"
Aang spun around and Sokka's mouth dropped open.
Elsie felt all the tension leave her shoulders and tense up her throat. She felt so open, so free, so angry. The world could bow down to her now, because she was upset and feeling it. There was no reason for her to listen to this anymore! She'd left the Water Tribe, she'd left her home – these were more people she could just leave and never look back to.
In fact, the only reason she was staying was to make sure Katara got safe. This was all for Katara who had never doubted her like Sokka, or basically not paid much attention to her like Aang.
"You think that just because I have something I can't help, I'm responsible for other people like me!"
Sokka tried to work his voice but all he could do was move his jaw up and down.
"I came running up to you – terrified – and crying and so scared you'd be angry with me for not trying to fight those Fire Nation people. Then I told you and you believed me and were about to help your sister when you just up and hate me because I tell you I can bend fire! You're just like those stupid village people! They couldn't stand me because I could do something they couldn't. Is that why you aren't more thankful for my information, you ugly, stupid boy? Because you're jealous of your sister? Maybe some deep, down part of you just wants her to be gone! Forever! And you're too jealous to admit it!"
Elsie stopped. Her breath was heaving and her heart felt like it was about to bump its way out of her chest.
Oh god. She'd done it. She'd really stood up for herself. She didn't just run away – she defended herself. Against mean, stupid, ignorant people.
"Is this some sort of Water Tribe thing?" she asked when the silence continued. "Like, whatever doesn't fit in a perfect little igloo should be thrown to the seals? I mean, I know I've lived there my whole life but I was never included in anything. I don't know what parents really teach their children. Maybe they all just teach you to hate other Nations. And you know what? I'm not even really another Nation – I'm Water Tribe. That's who I grew up with and as little as I know them, I know Fire Nation even less."
"Yeah, but…" Sokka trailed off.
"You were really angry," Aang commented.
"Yeah, well," Elsie shrugged. Now the fire was leaving her and she didn't have the uncontrollable urge to destroy everything she saw. "I kind of lost it."
Actually, now she was feeling kind of lost again. It was even worse than before because now she'd alienated herself from the only two people who cared about her and weren't captured by Fire Nation soldiers.
"It's okay," Aang nodded. "Katara and Sokka have lost it before too. Like right before you – that was Sokka losing it."
Elsie raised her eyebrows.
"Not me, though," Aang laughed and thumped himself on his small bony chest. "Ow." He rubbed his chest. "I never get angry or upset! I'm the Avatar – I have perfect control!"
And with that, Aang airbended into the air and back-flipped onto Appa's head.
Which would have been very impressive had Sokka not been sitting there.
"Aang!"
Aang laughed. "Sorry, Sokka." He rolled off of Sokka who looked very scandalized and smiled broadly at the giggling Elsie. "Are you coming? We've got to save Katara!"
Elsie glanced at Sokka.
Sokka sighed and gestured for her to climb up. "I'm sorry," he said. "And I promise not to accuse you of things you can't help. I didn't mean what I said; I was just upset about Katara."
He looked at Elsie and suddenly what had seemed like a slightly sarcastic apology became a bit more sincere.
"I mean it, Elsie," he looked at the ground and back up to her face. "I really am sorry."
Elsie nodded. She climbed back up on the bison's back.
"All right!" Aang declared. "We're going to save Katara! Won't this be an adventure!"
Sokka rolled his eyes. As Appa took to the air with Aang's yip yips, Sokka turned back and grinned ruefully at Elsie sitting in the saddle. "Don't think I'm going to apologize all the time," he said. "I'm a man, and a warrior, and we have things called pride."
Elsie rolled her eyes but only once his back was turned again.
Anita: Again, I worry this chapter is too stupidly angsty, and so much time is given to Elsie's background that she's a little MarySue-ish, but I feel like I need it in here.
I really don't think Elsie is a MarySue, especially after the revamping. She doesn't play such a big part because she generally doesn't speak, until we get closer to the end, and even then it's not like she defeats Ozai or Azula or something. She just helps the story get to the part where Aang and company defeat Ozai, Azula, etc.
And she does fall in love, but with another OC of mine, who I think is pretty hot. I like 'im!