Southern Air Temple - Reylea
3rd person POV...
Aang quickly approaches another drape and walks through with a smile on his face at trying to find the lemur. Upon entering, however, the smile falls and he draws a sharp breath at the sight before him. Spread out across the entire floor were heaps of skeletons, all covered in armor worn by the Fire Nation.
"Firebenders? They were here?" he murmurs in disbelief.
His eyes moved towards the back of the room where, lit up in the sunlight was the skeleton of an air nomad monk. The monk it seemed had fought against several dozen of these firebenders all on his own, singlehandedly holding them back before inevitably succumbing to death. Aang lowered his gaze to the monk's chest and releases a horrified gasp and despair at the sight of a familiar necklace hanging from the skeleton's neck.
"Gyatso..." he whispers.
Struck with grief, tears start falling from his eyes while he drops to his knees. Behind him, the curtain is pulled open by a determined Sokka, who spots him on the floor.
"Hey Aang, you find my dinner yet?" he asks.
To his confusion, he finds Aang kneeling on the ground with his head in his hands, sobbing. Concerned, and feeling a little guilty, he steps into the room with an apologetic expression on his face.
"Aang, I wasn't really going to eat the lemur, okay?" he starts to say.
He then takes notice of the horrific scene in front of him and widens his eyes in realization.
"Oh, man..." he mutters, seeing the skeleton of Gyatso.
Sokka walks up behind Aang and puts a comforting hand on his shoulder to reassure him.
"Come on, Aang, everything will be all right. Let's get out of here," he gently suggests.
Instead of replying the tattoos on Aang suddenly release a bright glow, and the young airbender lifts his head up to reveal a horrific scowl of rage and fury, looking almost unlike the typically cheery boy. Eyes glowing, with frightening power and fury, he gets to his feet and Sokka steps back with a startled gasp of alarm, frightened by the supernatural activity and sudden change in demeanor.
Katara walks around the room before stopping in front of the statue of Avatar Roku with a curious gaze. To her surprise the statue's eyes begin to glow. She takes a step back, seeing the eyes of every other statue light up in a never-ending circle that travels further up the towering chamber. She gasps in concerned realization.
"Aang!" she exclaims, running from the room.
All across the world, temples dedicated to the Avatar begin to show signs of his return.
In an Earth Kingdom temple, the eyes of an Avatar depicted on a mural start to glow, causing a resident sage to gasp in shock.
At the Northern Water Tribe, the top of the spire on a temple lights up while two sages look on in amazement.
At the Fire Temple on Crescent island, one fire sage was looking into a brightly lit room in shock, and turns to another sage standing nearby.
"Send word to the Fire Lord immediately! The Avatar has returned!" he exclaims.
Jedi Temple - Coruscant
An aging Jedi Master, Xanye, sat peacefully in his quarters at the Jedi Temple, deep in meditation. While probing through the mystical energy of the Force, he suddenly picks up on a tremendous surge of powering, yanking him out of his sense of peace with a quiet gasp of surprise.
Opening his eyes at the feeling, he looked to his right to where an artifact sat on a shelf. He wasn't old enough to have ever experienced the feeling of this power before, but he recognizes it without a doubt in his mind, his thoughts confirmed even more by the glowing artifact on his shelf, which had never done so before in his lifetime. For it was glowing with power that originates only from the Great Spirit, Raava, the Avatar Spirit.
After a hundred years of silence, the Avatar has finally returned.
The Monastery - Mortis
For a countless number of years, the mystical realm of Mortis has been a conduit of the Force, remaining in a delicate balance between light and dark. A sister and a brother. The one who kept balance between the two, the Father, was sat in deep meditation within the monastery, kneeling on his simple pad within the great chamber. As always, his Daughter participated in meditation with him, always faithful to his teachings and willing to obey. His Son, on the other hand, rarely joined them, preferring to not waste away his time delving into something he knows is already there.
Today, however, the Son decided to approach his two family members during their meditation, pausing several feet away from the main platform to stare at the statues behind them, his gaze lingering particularly on the right statue. After a few minutes of silence the Father finally spoke, though he still remained kneeling with his eyes closed.
"What is it, my Son?" he questions.
"Nothing, Father, I was just... thinking," Son murmurs in dismissal.
A frown spreads across the Father's face.
"I know you still wish to leave this place," he deduces.
The Son's expression drops into one of annoyance and he turns around to face him, rolling his eyes.
"Fine then. Yes, I do wish to leave this boring excuse for a planet," he scowls in frustration. "Is that what you wanted to hear?"
The Father finally opens his eyes to give the Son a stern look.
"You must remember why it is that we remain here, in this realm," he reminds him.
"Yes, of course, our sacred responsibility to maintain the 'balance' of the universe," the Son scoffs. "I don't see how our presence here changes anything, when the Jedi are nothing but blind fools. The Sith have hidden right under their noses for a millennia now, and yet still they remain oblivious."
"It is not our place to interfere―" the Father begins to say, only to stop mid-sentence.
A sudden surge in the Force catches the family by complete surprise, and they turn to look towards the statue on the left. A pure white glow emanated from the wavy form of a spirit surrounding the Daughter's statue, thrumming with power.
"The Avatar..." the Father murmurs in surprise.
The Daughter swiftly, but gracefully, gets to her feet with a gaze of wonder and pure joy, a smile on her face at the return of the Avatar Spirit.
"She's returned at last," she says.
The Son quietly rolls his eyes in reply, scoffing dismissively, but it was clear from the gleam in his red eyes that his interest was piqued, as well as his excitement.
"So... Raava's vessel is no longer in hiding?" he muses with a thoughtful gaze. "How interesting..."
"Perhaps balance will soon be restored to Reylea once more," the Father says contentedly.
The Son glances away from his family for a moment before focusing on the Father with an expectant, and hopeful expression.
"Father, as you know, Reylea's presence has always remained... unknown to the galaxy," he begins to say.
The Father raises a hand to silence him with a knowing gaze, shaking his head in disapproval.
"I know what you wish for, my Son," he says firmly. "But I do not need to remind you once more that we are not to interfere!"
The Son glowers at his father, his red eyes glowing brighter with rage and frustration.
"We practically made Reylea into what it is today! It is because of US that the Great Spirits have power!" he cries out, gesturing around for emphasis. "What makes Reylea any different than Mortis!?"
"Brother, please, heed the advice of our Father," the Daughter pleads with him. "We may have helped shape their world, but only at the will of the Force. Hidden they might be, but they are still a part of the galaxy, while we are not."
He shakes his head in contempt.
"Of course you'd take his side. Probably because of how much you favor Raava," he scoffs. "Despite what you believe, Vaatu would do just as well as your Avatar, if not better."
"Vaatu is just as important as Raava in maintaining balance on Reylea, but should he receive power then that balance would be thrown into chaos, as it is his nature," the Father states firmly. "There will be no more talk of this, and that is final!"
The Son growls but opts to not respond. He whirls around and then storms out of the Monastery with a rising storm of anger bubbling inside of him, demanding to be released. Unfortunately, it would seem he is still trapped on Mortis for the time being.
But that will soon change. He can feel it.
One way or another he will find a way to defeat his Father, after which he will finally be free to shape the universe in whatever way he sees fit.