"Are we close to Mount. Atzel yet?" Toph whined, her arms sprawled over the edge of Appa's saddle, her expression bored. "I miss dirt."
Katara rolled her eyes. "Appa's getting us there as fast as he can. You'll be back in your mud before you know it."
The trip had been long, Appa had been flying low and slow all day due to large amount of passengers he carried. It was hot and boring and the group was restless.
From the top of Appa's head, Aang reached down and rubbed between his big, gentle eyes. "What do you think, buddy? Should we turn in and rest for the night?" The sun was just about to set, it's strong, yellow rays touching the ground in front of them.
"Guys..." Zuko stood up quickly and clenched his fists. "We have company."
Everyone turned around to look and saw a massive, looming mass of a warship close behind and a little higher than them. It's shadow would cover them in a few seconds.
Percy's stomach flipped. He didn't know what was in that ship but it could not be good, considering the reactions from everybody else on Appa's back.
"Yip yip, Appa!" Aang grabbed the reigns and steered his friend up. "Sorry buddy, your rest is going to have to wait."
"Azula." Zuko spat, his mouth was pressed even more tightly than usual. His calm, dark demeanor changed and his eyes flashed dangerously. Azula's face appeared in the large front window, her crooked smile sent shivers down Percy's spine. She looked so young but there was something about her. Something crazy.
"Who is that?" Percy asked. "Do we have to fight them?"
"That..." Zuko's hair whipped around his face as he trained his eyes on the retreating back of Azula. "Is my sister."
"She's pure evil." Sokka added. "There's no way we can outrun her with Appa as tired as he is. I think we might have to fight."
Percy felt guilty. She looked so young, maybe fourteen or fifteen and these people were acting like she just crawled out of Tartarus. She did look a little unstable, but that didn't seem like a good enough reason to pull a sword on her.
A small trap door opened at the top of the ship and Azula climbed out and stood, her back straight and her fists clenched, like she was going to punch them from all the way up there. The wind ripped at her hair and clothes but she just looked down on them, it seemed like everyone in this world was immune to fear of falling to their deaths. To Percy, who always preferred the ground to air, it was unnerving.
"Good evening, brother!" She yelled over the wind, her harsh voice carrying to them.
Aang stood up and held his staff behind him in a defensive position. "Azula, we don't want to fight you!" He yelled back.
"Well, too bad." Azula barred her teeth. "I do!" She caught sight of Percy. "And who is this? Another pathetic friend to hide behind, Avatar? Shame, he does look like quite the warrior. But I supposed he will have to die like the rest of you."
The airship was right on top of Appa now, he couldn't go any faster and Percy didn't see how they could win this fight in the air.
Aang spun and flipped his staff down, sending a massive gust of wind directly at Azula. She saw it coming and flattened herself on her back until it had passed. She jumped up laughing.
"You think you can just blow me down, Avatar?"
She jumped. Time seemed to slow down, and Percy noticed everything that happened, a bonus to having ADHD. Zuko grabbed Toph's shoulder and shoved her behind him, Katara and Sokka both took a step back too. Azula threw her fist at them like a punch, only instead of her hitting air, blue flames appeared from her hands and shot at them with such a force Percy could feel their heat as Zuko and Aang met the flames with open arms and dissipated it.
Percy only had time to yell something intelligent like "Blue fire?!" Before Azula herself landed on the edge of Appa's saddle. He barely had time to register her amazing balance before she swept another blast of the blue fire from her feet.
Sokka swung his sword at her head and she ducked as Zuko and Aang got rid of the fire and shot some of their regular coloured flames right back in her face.
She was too fast, though. She almost reminded Percy of an evil version of a Hunter of Artemis.
"Sokka! You have to get Appa on the ground!" Aang yelled as he ducked another blast from Azula. "OW! Toph!" He clutched the side of his head where Toph had just punched him. "What was that for?"
"Sorry! I can't see up here!"
"TOPH! Get down!" Katara shrieked and tackled her to the bottom of the saddle just as a blast of fire passed right where her head had been. "Get to Sokka!" She yelled and pushed Toph towards her brother, who lifted her up and held her in his lap so that she would be safe until they hit the ground and the young earthbender could start kicking some butt.
Appa started going down just as a snake of water wrapped itself around Azula's ankle and pulled her off balance. She teetered on the edge of the saddle for a moment before flipping backwards off.
Percy's breath hitched in his throat before he realized that they had descended a lot quicker than he had realized and she had landed on the ground perfectly unharmed.
He hadn't joined the fight up to this point. There had been so limbs and flames and sharp objects in such a small space he was surprised only one of them had been pushed off. Plus, he wasn't sure he could kill this young girl, no matter how much freaky blue fire she shot at him.
They all hit the ground and started attacking again. Azula was amazing, dodging, throwing punches and fire and jumping and rolling around. Like an evil ninja or something.
There was a crack and the already fading sunlight flickered as Azula started summoning lightning. Sokka dropped his sword and tackled her to the ground, rugby style.
"She can control lightning now too?!" Percy yelled. "That just isn't fair."
Azula kicked Sokka off of her, successfully burning his arm. Her own warship had landed now and fire nation soldiers were filing out, spears ready to aid their mistress, but she waved them to hold-off.
Azula jumped and stood nose to nose with Percy, staring wickedly into his eyes. "Hello, I don't believe we've met." She said with a proud politeness.
"Yeah, I don't really think we're going to be friends." Percy said, and he focused his energy on the ground. When he controlled the water back home, he always felt such a strong pull in his gut. This was different. Every muscle in his body felt like it had been slammed into a solid stone wall, but it was worth it.
A jagged crack form in the ground behind Azula and would have dragged her down if she hadn't been so quick.
"Another earthbender." Azula mused. "Funny, I didn't have you pegged as such." She flicked her bangs out of her face and inspected her perfect nails.
That made Percy angry. She was so nonchalant about killing them, like the emprosia demons back home. He wasn't going to hold back anymore.
"I supposed you'll have to die with the rest." She said and started attacking again.
"You know... people keeping telling me to die and it never really works out. I've never been good at taking orders, I guess." Percy focused his energy and the familiar tug of his gut wrenched his stomach.
A burst of salt water sprouted from the crack he had just opened. The waves flew around, knocking out the whole legion of soldiers watching.
"A waterbender? But you just earthbended!" Azula gasped, momentarily shocked out of her cool, calm demeanor. She took a step back and stared at Percy before snarling at everyone and turning around to run.
Katara threw two strands of water after her that wrapped around her legs and tripped her. She stumbled and turned to throw fire at Katara but was knocked back by another blast of fire from Zuko.
"Enough, Azula." He demanded. "You've lost."
The ground under her rose and fell suddenly, slamming her now limp body against the rock.
"Is... is she dead?" Aang asked, slightly horrified.
"She's still breathing." Toph confirmed, she raised a large boulder and hung it over Azula's body. "Want me to finish her off?"
"Highness!" The soldiers had regrouped without anyone noticing and we standing, spears aimed at the group, firebenders ready.
"Let them take her." Zuko decided.
Aang touched Toph's arm gently and she threw the rock at the airship, smashing one of the propellers.
"Let's get out of here while we can." Aang said, as the firebenders scrambled to put out the flames and stop their ship from completely being destroyed. Three of them ran and picked their princess up and carried her to their own.
The gang and Percy quickly scrambled up Appa's side and hung on as the bison roared and started rising. Percy wasn't sure what had happened, but he knew that he felt sick as soon as they were in the air again. He hated flying, it was the most unnatural thing in the world.
Zuko frowned. "Something was different."
"Different?" Sokka asked."Different how? She tried to kill us!"
"You've got a great family." Percy told Zuko feelingly.
"We could have killed her." Zuko said, emotionless. "We really could have ended it."
Percy's stomach felt weak. This guy, not much older than him was just casually talking about his own sisters murder. It wasn't like Percy didn't understand, she seemed really crazy and evil, but to actually kill her?
"No." Aang said, His voice was low and soft but firm. "I'm an air nomad and the Avatar, okay? I don't kill things, I protect all forms of life."
That seemed like a reasonable idea, Percy thought. His mind also flashed to Grover. The Lord of The Wild would like this tattooed kid.
He almost missed the pointed look Zuko and Sokka shared before Katara pulled the water out of her hip flask and started healing Sokka's arm.
Sokka sighed and he was healed. "It's times like this I'm really glad you're my sister."
Katara smiled. "When you tackled Azula, I was really proud that you were my brother... Also... I don't think we were wrong to leave Azula alone."
She looked at Zuko and steadily met his eyes. "Her soldiers were just about to start attacking again and we would have been overwhelmed. Plus, it wouldn't have been very honourable to attack an unconscious opponent."
Aang laughed softly and Zuko looked away from Katara's steady eyes.
Percy wondered what had happened. He felt left out in such a tight group. They all had their history that he didn't know. It felt so intrusive for him to be there but at the same time, they were all so friendly, even after suffering obvious betrayal and hurt in their lives.
"We should be at Mount. Atzel by tomorrow around midday." Zuko said, breaking the silence. "If we survive any more surprises, that is."
Okay! This is my first chapter back! I am so excited. I hope there are still readers here after being left alone for a couple years? Haha, I truly am sorry.
-Randomly, does anyone listen to Jon Bellion? I've been discovering him this past week and I am honestly am SO interested and in love.