The Masked Traitors

Hey, guess what, my readers? I. AM. BACK!

Unfortunately…. two of my other stories have been deleted. (sobs) BUT I REFUSE TO GIVE UP! I shall rewrite and repost!

And guess what?

WE HAVE REACHED ONE HUNDRED REVIEWS! (sobbing for joy) I just… I can't… thank you all so much! Thank you, thank you!

Lame chapter title. I know. I'm sorry. It's better than my first version of the title, though. You don't want to know what it was.

Disclaimer: If I did own Avatar, I would have made Korra more like Nausicaa or Ashitaka. (For those of you who don't get the references, it's okay.) And Jet wouldn't die. SO THERE!

And any Studio Ghibli movie I reference belongs to Studio Ghibli and Hayao Miyazaki.

IMPORTANT NOTICE PLEASE READ THIS!

OH! And awesome news.

Today. What's todays date in your country? In Canada, it's the 26th of October. Do you know what that means?

It means it's been exactly one year since I joined .

One year. It went by so fast! I can't believe it! It seems like just yesterday I was just starting Blue! And the 29th is my birthday! Can you all believe this?! I can't believe it… so much has happened in the past year. I started Blue… Prince Mononoke… Love and Lepers… Nobody Knows Your Heart… Glider… Blue and Prince Mononoke and Nobody Knows Your Heart were put on the plagiarized stories list… Blue was taken off the plagiarized stories list…. Prince Mononoke and Nobody Knows Your Heart both got deleted (but I won't give up on Prince Mononoke! I loved writing Nobody Knows Your Heart, but Prince Mononoke means more to me, personally.)... I can't believe it. A whole YEAR.

Just… thank you. Each and every one of you. Thank you all for your support. Sure, Fanfiction has caused me some stress… like when my stories were put on the plagiarized stories list, and when I had to alternate between writing a new chapter and homework, and when I had to change the dialogue of my stories so they wouldn't get deleted, and when two of my stories got deleted… but I wouldn't take it back for anything. Honestly.

You know, unless one of my family members were being held captive until I deleted my account. Sorry, but family beats fanfiction anyday.

And to think it was a complete accident I found this website.

Best mistake I ever made.

Okay, you didn't come here to listen to me ramble. On with the chapter.

My teacup slipped through my fingers and shattered as soon as it hit the ground. My mouth dropped open, and I stared at the messenger (who had just given us the worst news of all time) in horrified shock.

Zuko was on his feet in an instant. "WHAT?!"

The messenger looked startled. I couldn't blame him. "I said, the Avatar has been captured, Prince Zuko. I thought you would be excited by the news." Clearly, this guy didn't know Zuko.

"BY ZHAO?!" Both Zuko and I yelled at the same time.

"Admiral Zhao." The messenger corrected us both.

"AND NOW HE'S AN ADMIRAL TOO?!" I screeched, running my fingers through my hair in frustration. "Spirits, this day just keeps getting better and better!"

Zuko looked even more angry than I did. Not that it was much of a surprise, really. He began muttering things under his breath, so quietly that I couldn't hear him that much. What I could hear, however, involved a series of choice words and stuff like, "Avatar", "Three years", and "Just like that".

"Zuko," Iroh said, sighing. "Even if you had managed to capture the Avatar-"

He never got to finish his sentence, because Zuko stormed out of the room, a figurative smokestack trailing behind him. I just sat there, staring at the ground in shock.

Aang. Captured. By monkeyface - I mean, Zhao. By Zhao. The biggest jerk I had ever had the misfortune to meet - worse than Zuko, Jet, and Jeong-Jeong combined.

I tried to picture it in my head - Aang, the energetic little ball of humor and energy and love, in chains, being presented to Fire Lord Ozai. To prevent myself from breaking down into tears at the picture, I bit down on my lip so hard I tasted blood. I abruptly got to my feet and walked out of the room, clenching my hands into fists to keep them from shaking hard enough to let the soldiers know something was wrong.

I just started wandering aimlessly around the ship, thinking hard, trying to remember exactly what the messenger had said.

Aang had been captured.

By Admiral Zhao.

With no mention of Katara.

Or Sokka.

Or Appa.

Or Momo.

Only that "the Avatar" had been caught in a pond by the Yu Yan archers (I vaguely remembered my father mentioning them once or twice) and had been captured quite easily.

"DAMNIT!" I suddenly shrieked out loud, making the soldiers who had heard me jump at least a foot in the air. I didn't care. "Damn, damn, damn, damn, damn!" I punched my fist into my palm with every "damn" to emphasise the word. Should have trained Aang how to fight! Or something! Captured easily! Damn Aang and damn his pacifist ways! They were kind of helpful sometimes, but that was not one of those times! SPIRITS DAMNIT!

"Tora…. You okay?" I heard a scared sounding voice ask. I turned toward the voice, and saw Katsu watching me carefully, looking terrified that he would be on the receiving end of my rage.

"NO I AM MOST CERTAINLY NOT OKAY! THE AVATAR CAN'T DEFEND HIMSELF AGAINST A BUNCH OF PAINT WEARING ARCHERS! THANKS SO MUCH FOR ASKING, KATSU!" I screamed at him. Maybe I was being a little harsh, both on him and on Aang, but I was too mad to care.

~~Water~~

At that moment, the firebending soldier, who was at least two feet taller than the raging female in front of him, felt about three inches tall. As the firebending girl stormed off, muttering profanities under her breath, Katsu looked after her in shock (and slight terror). "What I say?" He muttered to himself, now fearing for his safety.

~~Water~~

Muttering swear words under my breath, I stormed into my room, slamming the door behind me. I flung myself onto the bed and stared at the ceiling above me, thinking hard.

Aang.

Captured.

Katara and Sokka weren't mentioned.

Meaning they're probably safe.

Please let them be safe.

Why wouldn't they be with him?

Spirits, why the hell was Jet even born?! If it hadn't been for him, I wouldn't be on this ship right now, meaning that I would have been with the others, meaning that I would know what was going on right now! Damn you Jet!

I grabbed a pillow and buried my face into it, letting out a muffled scream of frustration. Spirits, this was so frustrating! Agh!

Spirits, tell me what I'm supposed to do!

Then, it hit me.

My pillow fell from my fingers onto my lap, and then onto the floor as I leapt to my feet and began to fumble through the wrappings that Iroh had given me to protect my stuff from Zuko. I kept it "hidden" in the darkest corner of the room. I had hidden my mask over there, along with the sword and knife when I wasn't using them, and the cloak.

My fingers grabbed hold of the piece of parchment that I had found with the sword. The note from the woman - who I'm sort of sure was a Spirit in disguise.

I suspect that you'll put all of these things to good use!

Maybe…

No. It was ridiculous. Impossible.

I picked up the mask and held it up, at arms length in front of my face. The orange colored eye holes stared right at me, and no matter how stupid it sounds, it felt like they were staring into my soul… or something.

I continued staring at the mask. The more I stared, the less ridiculous the plan sounded.

At least, to me it sounded less ridiculous.

The hardest part would be getting in.

Then getting out.

Without getting killed.

Or caught.

But if it worked out… and hopefully it would…

I would be with the others by the next morning.

~~Water~~

Meanwhile, in a different room on the same ship, Zuko held something in his hands.

A single blue and white painted Spirit mask.

He stared at it silently, as if he thought that it would suddenly begin speaking to him and tell him what to do.

Zuko had been walking around the Earth Kingdom village they were docked close to, struggling not to let his rage get the best of him and burn down the village, when a shabbily dressed woman had started calliing to him, waving him over with a wide, toothless grin. She had given him the mask, free of charge completely for whatever reason, and only told him to look out for the mask of the Mononoke. Whatever that was.

And when he had returned to the ship, feeling slightly relieved of the rage he had felt earlier, he had found a note on his bed, sitting on his bed on top of a pair of dual dao swords. Just like his old ones, but new. Not a scratch to be seen on the metal. The note only said, Just in case.

Just in case.

The Avatar was in captivity. Captured by Zhao.

It was a stupid plan. Simply ridiculous.

Incredibly ridiculous.

But, then again, who better to carry out an incredibly ridiculous plan than a boy who had nothing else to lose?

Just in case.

~~Water~~

So far, Aang was not having a very good day.

First, he and Katara had to deal with a sneezing and coughing Sokka keeping them up all night. Then, when Sokka's cold had turned into a fever, he had been forced by Katara to go out and find some stuff that Katara could use to help Sokka heal. When he had returned, without any herbs but with a map (that he had gotten from some lady selling trinkets by the side of the road), he had discovered a delirious Sokka and a waterbending who was beginning to show symptoms of having the same fever as Sokka. Of course, because Katara was his friend, he had gone out immediately to find the healing place the map showed the way to. And then, when he had found the healing place and the crazy cat lady healer who lived there, he had been forced to wait a whole hour while the healer searched for plum blossom - which had turned out not to be for him and his friends, but for the healer's cat.

And then he had been forced to run away from some crazy archer guys with red face paint, dive into a freezing cold pond (it was still winter, for Spirit's sakes!) and grab at some frozen frogs that the healer had promised would heal Katara and Sokka.

Then he had ended up pinned against a log with several arrows (curse his comfortable, brightly coloured, flappy airbenders clothing!), the frozen frogs stuffed down his shirt and against his still freezing body, with a net flung over his body.

Then he had been forced to walk (how did people walk long distances without getting bored?!) in the freezing cold, while those stupid archers mocked him with their warm fur clothing that was much more suitable for cold weather than his airbending clothes, which were more suitable for gentle spring breezes and warm spring air than the freezing winter (how did he survive in the South Pole for an entire day? Who knows? Maybe we'll never find out). They had reached a prison, heavily guarded with possibly hundreds of firebenders who could kill him with one fire blast if they had the chance.

And, of course, he had been chained up, making him incapable of bending in any way other than taking a deep breath and blasting the door in front of him with a tornado of air.

Commander, Admiral, whatever he was, Zhao had come in and started taunting him about the death of his people, and how he wouldn't be killed like they were, and how Zhao would just barely keep him alive. Aang had retaliated in the only way he currently could - by blowing a wind storm at the monkey-faced jerk (he had Tora to thank for that insult - she had used a stronger word than jerk, though). Zhao had stormed out of their, his hair all ruffled, but smug about the fact that he had captured the Avatar so easily.

Aang threw his head back and stared at the metal ceiling high above him. Worst. Day. Ever.

~~Water~~

A flash of silver suddenly flew through the air, nearly decapitating the masked figure. The figure, for her part (and it was obvious that the figure was a female, seeing as she was wearing a skirt, an almost feminine looking fur cloak, and had two small bumps on her chest), did not scream when the dual dao sword nearly hit her, but instead, jumped about a foot in the air and spun around, causing the bright white fur on the figure's mask and cloak to whip around through the air. The figure instantly held out a gleaming silver knife, pointing it at the place where the sword had come from. The figure didn't make a noise, but she was clearly challenging whoever had thrown the sword, and silently ordering them to come out.

After a moment, another masked figure slowly emerged from behind the shadows of a large bush. This figure was clearly a man, as there were no noticeable bumps on the figure's chest, and had a more male physique. The male figure was dressed completely differently from the female figure. The male was wearing a completely black outfit, complete with long sleeves, long pants, black boots, and gloves. There wasn't an inch of skin that was revealed. His mask was blue and white, with a blue face and white "eyebrows", slit eyeholes, square-shaped pointed ears, along with a long line that covered the nose and curved under the eyes and down the sides of the mask. Strapped to the male's back was a scabbard that currently only held one sword, due to the fact that the other was laying on the ground a foot away from the female figure.

The female figure was dressed more in a traditional fashion, rather than in "ninja" fashion like the male. She wore a dark dress that barely showed up in the darkness of the night. Over her dress she wore a tattered off-white sleeveless shirt, along with a long necklace made of sharp looking wolf fangs and dark purple wooden beads. Hanging from her shoulders was a knee-length white fur cloak. Covering the female's face was a dark red, orange, and white mask, with circular orange eye and mouth holes, a red face, and white lines going over the eyeholes and separating the eyeholes from the mouth holes. Connected to the mask was a long sheet of white fur, blending in perfectly with her cloak. Almost hidden, but not entirely, by the fur of her mask were white disk-shaped earrings. Covering her feet, and not going with the outfit at all, were a pair of black boots that hardly made a sound when she made a step. There was a pouch at her waist, attached to her body by a string running over the shoulder opposite of the pouch.

Acting instantly, the female lashed out at the male, slashing her knife back and forth as she lunged forward. The male instantly held up his sword, blocking her hits one by one. The female wasn't put off by this, and instead continued to wildly attempt to slit the masked males throat or decapitate him. The male suddenly lunged out, catching the females right wrist before she could make another blow. Then when she tried to punch him, he caught her left fist in his hand, trapping her from doing anything to him - at least, with her hands.

"You." The male figure hissed, sounding furious. "What in Agni's name are you doing here?!"

The female stopped struggling. If her mask had been off, I'm sure we would have been able to see a shocked expression. "Zuko? Is that you?" She sounded incredulous.

"I'm asking the questions! What are you doing here? You're supposed to be back on the ship!" The male snapped, glaring at the female from behind his mask.

"I could say the same about you! How'd you know it was me?!" The female fired back, finally managing to yank her hands back. She rubbed her wrist. "You know, you're stronger than you realize."

The male scoffed. "I saw your knife. And your clothes are exactly the same. What are you, stupid?"

The female sighed, bringing a hand up to her face and pulling her mask off. As the mask came off into the female's hand, it revealed the face of a fifteen year old girl with dark gold eyes and messy brown hair pulled back into a braid, hidden underneath both the mask and the fur of her cloak. "I guess I should have changed. But I didn't have anything else to wear other than the clothes I was wearing when I first got captured, and those would have been too obvious! It was a Fire Nation tunic - I'm not planning on broadcasting to the world that I'm a traitor to my Nation!" Tora flinched slightly at the word "traitor", before regaining her composure. "At least with these," She gestured to her dress, shirt, and cloak. "It wouldn't be totally obvious what Nation I was from."

"What are you doing here?" The male demanded furiously.

Tora glared, crossing her arms. "The same that you're doing. I'm freeing Aang."

Suddenly, the male reached up and yanked off his mask, revealing the face of a sixteen year old boy with golden eyes and an angry, dark red scar covering his left eye and spreading across his ear and some of his lower jawbone. His hair and scalp was hidden by a tight black hood that connected to his shirt. And he looked furious. "What?! And how do you plan to do that?"

"How were you planning on doing it? Aang is my friend - I'm not going to let some jerk Admiral take him to the Fire Lord when I could do something about it! Even if I don't escape, as long as I free Aang, I don't care if I die!"

"What if neither of you escaped? What if you both got caught? There's more of a likelihood of that happening than you both escaping!"

"Then at least I tried. And at least I have a good reason - You just want to free Aang so you can capture him for yourself!"

"At least I won't be starving the Avatar to death and torturing him like Zhao is probably doing right now while we stand here and argue!"

Then there was a silence between the two of them. The only source of noise was the owl in one of the trees above them, hooting softly. Zuko held his mask in one hand at his side, while Tora had already placed her mask back over her head, so her hair was covered by the fur and the mask was resting on her head. She casually placed one hand over the hilt of her sword, and Zuko remembered her saying that she had been trained by Piandao of the Fire Nation - one of the most formidable nonbending warriors in Fire Nation history. He remembered hearing some news after he had been banished, how Piandao had single-handedly taken down a hundred Fire Nation soldiers that had come to force him into joining the army. If he was Tora's father - Zuko didn't want to think of what she could do to him when he was wearing only thin black clothing, with only a thin layer of padding underneath, both for warmth and for protection. But something told him that she wouldn't hurt him - even if he attacked first. She would only knock him unconscious if she managed to gain the upperhand.

Judging from the fight they had only the day before, he doubted that either of them would gain the upper hand.

Finally, Zuko sighed. "A truce." He said, pinching the bridge of his nose.

Tora looked startled. "What?"

"A truce." He repeated, his voice becoming slightly more edged than it had been a moment before. "We work together to get the Avat- to get Aang," He interrupted himself and said the Avatar's name upon seeing the look on Tora's face. "Out of the prison and out of Zhao's hold. Once he's free and he's with us, we can fight - bending, sword, knife, whatever you can use. If you win, I let you go with him, and I won't follow after you two. If I win, the Avatar is brought back to my ship, and both of you are to be kept in the brig until we reach the Fire Nation. If either of us lets the other be captured, or breaks the truce or our promise to each other, then let Agni burn us down where we stand."

"That's kind of intense, don't you think?"

"Do you agree to the terms or not?!"

Tora sighed, before holding out her hand. Zuko took it, and the two of them seized the other person's other arms bicep. Then they nodded, showing each other that they were in a truce. Once they had let go, Tora reached up and pulled her mask down over her face, before tossing the fur over her shoulder. Zuko placed his mask over his face and tied up the strings.

Once Zuko had grabbed his dual dao sword and returned it to its sheath, the two of them were off, disappearing into the darkness of the forest.

A whole year…. I'm sorry, still focused on that. One whole year.

Sorry… but actually attacking the prison comes into the story in next chapter. I just thought that you guys had waited long enough for an update. This isn't a filler chapter, it's important to the plot, it's just showing you what happens before they hit the prison. Because they don't show that in the episode. At least, I think they don't.

But I'll be working on next chapter, so hopefully I'll be update faster for that chapter than I did for this one. :)

/

Stay Tuned For More Words

/

Oh, somewhat, not really, important note: There's a person on Tumblr who has been reviewing this story. If said person happens to be reading this right now, guess what? I don't really care what you have to say about my story. I can take criticism, but you are not giving me constructive criticism. You're just flaming my story, so your opinion doesn't matter to me. I'm sure you have seen a vast majority of the reviews are positive (which I know simply astounds you), so the fact that you, one person, has been writing a snarky review on it doesn't really bother me too much.

How did you even come across Blue, anyway?

Oh, and after reading your most recent blog: you said you'd "show them all". I suppose by "them" you mean my readers. If by "show them all", you meant "show the author my blog that mocks her and try to get her to stop writing", then you've failed.

Really, the only thing that bothers me is the fact that people insist on writing blogs or whatever, on tumblr or wherever, that make fun of people's writing. Author's should be able to write what they want to write without being afraid of people mocking them. Stuff like that could destroy a persons self-confidence in their writing. I've read quite a few terrible fanfictions, but I would never, on my worst day, write something to mock the authors "terrible writing skills" and "terribly developed characters", no matter how terrible the writing or characters were. I hate it when people do that.

FANFICTION IS ABOUT LETTING AUTHOR'S WRITING SKILLS GROW. HOW IS TEARING THEM DOWN HELPING THEM OUT?

Oh, and about "Lili" (one of the little girl's in the tribe) and "Fat" (Piandao's butler - the one Sokka fought when he was practicing). In Fat's case, that's his actual name. I'm not kidding, look it up. And Lili - I just gave the kid a name. Is that so wrong? I can't refer to characters (who Tora is supposed to have known for two years) as "the little girl".