CHAPTER 8
Inhaling deeply, Hachiro focused his energy, and felt it gathering in his chest and flooding through his body with every beat of his heart. His breathing slowed and deepened, and the tension in his shoulders relaxed as his energy absorbed the anxiety. Behind his eyelids, he felt the energy, saw it as swirling colors—like seeing the wind.
The colors twirled, forming shapes and images, an entire unseen world. Hachiro saw his own thoughts mirrored there, the grief of his father's death at the hand of a particularly well-armed Fire Nation soldier. He saw the withering figure of his grandmother, a woman who was Fire Nation, and once had been a guard on the ship that had been transporting some fifty-odd airbenders from their destroyed temples to await execution.
Images flashed in quick succession in Hachiro's mind—memories that were not his, but incredibly vivid and lifelike all the same.
The intense sensation of a stormy sea…the cold, damp, metal walls creaking with every heave of the ship…the frightened squeaks of young boys and girls, clinging to each other as the waves tossed them carelessly, viciously…men and women crowded into a tiny space, the stench of human neglect and suffering mingled with the tangy, pungent scent of terror…
Outside the holding chamber, soldiers swarmed left and right in a flurry of desperate activity…out here the smell of fear was tainted by the dampness of wet clothes and sweat…all hands were at their stations, but no amount of human strength could right the floundering ship…the rain sliced through the air almost horizontally…men and women slid across the deck, shouting as they tied down cargo that had come loose from the tossing and turning of the ship…
Then came the strangled cry, barely audible over the torrent of wind, but a shout caused a wail of horror to go up from every corner of the ship…
"We're sinking!"
A young recruit, sopping wet with the armor of her uniform grating harshly together as she moved, rushed by the abandoned door of the prisoner hold, distress lending energy to her limbs…
As she passed, a hand suddenly darted out from the tiny barred window, grabbing hold of her shoulder plate with such a desperate energy that it stopped her in her tracks…Turning, her amber eyes wild with fear, she stared into the dirty, drawn face of an airbender…His eyes were wide and bright, glittering silver in the dim light…
"Please…help us," his voice was dry and full of despair…
The ship shuddered violently beneath their feet…and several more cries of anguish erupted from within the hold, terrified…
The girl didn't hesitate, but her fingers were numb as she tugged at the lock to the door…she would be executed for this for certain…if she managed to make it out of this alive…
Hachiro inhaled sharply, surfacing back into his own mind, drawn out of the powerful emotions that permeated the memories. It took several moments for him to bring his breathing back to normal and he was able to gather the courage to observe these memories objectively, from the safety of his mind.
Severe storms had punched a hole in the ship's hull, and the entire crew had been in the process of piling onto a limited supply of lifeboats, when Hachiro's grandmother, eighteen years old at the time, who took pity on the prisoners locked in the hold. She released them, in hopes that she and some of them could survive the shipwreck.
The airbenders quickly commandeered two lifeboats, taking with them four Fire Nation soldiers who were willing to depart with them, Hachiro's grandmother included. One lifeboat was capsized and washed away at sea, but the other one, containing about twenty airbenders and two Fire Nation soldiers, were carried by the ocean to the shore of this island, where they had built a home in the dormant volcano and lived ever since. 'Windthrower' had been a playful, teasing name his grandmother had attributed to the airbenders, but it had come to define their new culture, which was so different from the Air Nomad culture of old.
Hachiro's energy flickered, and an image of the beach he had come to know so well since his childhood appeared in his mind's eye, the same beach where his family had washed up so long ago. What had life been like for his grandfather, at the temples he had heard stories about—before the great genocide of his people? An image of this new prisoner burst to life in the colors, the flickering, lapping flames of blue reflecting the boy's sky-colored arrow. Could this really be who his grandfather suspected? The Avatar? How had he not aged? Certainly, if this was a Fire Nation trick—they could have at least sent a withered, skilled old man instead of a child.
A glimmer of red tinged the edges of the swirls, and Hachiro could feel his anxiety bubbling forth again. Then, a streak of green flooded the energy, and the teen's resolve hardened. He would find out. If the boy was lying he would kill him himself. If he was telling the truth—Hachiro winced as a spark of orange fizzled in the flames—it could change everything.
Suddenly, at the sound of earth crumbling, his eyes snapped open.
Aang launched himself out of the hole he had created in the topsoil, taking up a loose defensive stance—just in case. Toph, jumping out of the tunnel just behind him, and aware of the tendencies of airbenders to leap out of her plane of sight, strapped the windthrower boy's legs to the rock he sat on with earthen shackles.
"Good morning!" Aang called, despite the fact that it was afternoon, trying to amend for the restraints with a cheery expression.
"Typical Twinkletoes,"Toph snorted under her breath.
The airbender didn't spare his blind friend an injured glance. Instead, he waved. It was an open-palmed, friendly, non-threatening greeting, and seeing as the boy's arms hadn't been secured by Toph's hold, Aang inwardly prayed that the boy wouldn't respond with an air-blast to their guts.
Hachiro blinked in disbelief, and before his muscles could twitch into action, the flat stone he sat on seemed to grow arms, curling over his knees and fastening him to the ground. He grunted in surprise and raised his arms, ready to conjure a discharge of wind. But something flashed in his adversary's steel-gray eyes, something eerily remnant of the images in Hachiro's own energy, something that made him pause.
"What do you want?" the windthrower demanded, the tension in his shoulders returning, trying to maintain an intimidating air despite the fact that the odds were clearly against him.
The steel-gray eyes flickered. "Just to talk," Aang winced, "Sorry for the…erm…"
"We had to take precautions," the boy's companion cut in, and Hachiro's eyes flitted to her. The earthbender's voice was stronger than her thin frame suggested.
"So," Aang continued conversationally, cautiously relaxing his stance. "What's your name?"
Hachiro glared reproachfully at him.
The airbender bit his lip, and the wind suddenly picked up, ruffling his short hair and curling over his bare torso with a less than friendly attitude.
"Okay…well," Aang went on, shifting his weight uneasily, "I'm Aang. This is Toph, she's my earthbending teacher."
The glare didn't lessen.
Swallowing, the Avatar went on. "I know you have no good reason to believe me—but, I am the Avatar. My friends and I are trying to end this war."
Hachiro spat contemptuously. "The Avatar is supposed to be over one hundred years old. You are clearly not. If the Fire Nation wanted to trick us, they could've at least put some effort into it."
Toph felt a flicker of irritation. This guy's heartbeat was skipping along like a rabbiroo's pulse, but it wasn't from fear. Anger fizzled from every one of the boy's pores. She could practically smell it. Why was he so angry? What had they done to him?
Aang seemed to sense it too. "What have we done to deserve your hatred? Spent a night on your shores?"
Hachiro was simmering. "Your people killed my father. My father gave mercy to one of you deceitful, lying buckets of cave-scum, just for a brief second, and it cost him his life. I swore to never let another one get off of this island alive."
"We're not Fire Nation," Toph insisted firmly, as if a denial would be of any help. "How many of the people you've killed were children?"
Hachiro set his jaw. "The Fire Nation has been known to stoop to such low places in the past. This is no different."
"Come on," the earthbender was exasperated. "How many firebenders have you met that can earthbend, huh? And waterbend? And airbend?"
Hachiro inhaled, leveling a cold stare at the girl, unaware that behind that shield of bangs, her dead eyes glittered angrily.
"I'll take that as none," Toph quipped, planting her feet more firmly in the earth, reading the boy's vitals.
"Please help us," Aang pleaded, trying a different angle, struggling to open up to this complete stranger, to tell him the truth about how he had escaped Time's clutches. "Our two friends are from the Water Tribe. They found my bison and I trapped in an iceberg—" he inhaled, mentally noting the skeptical expression on the boy's face, "They freed us, and I found out that every airbender I ever knew and loved was gone—killed by the Fire Nation. I found my mentor's…" he swallowed around the lump in his throat, every nerve rebelling against his confession. He continued, leaving the feeling unheeded. "…I found Monk Gyatso's—remains—rotting under the awnings where I used to play with my friends."
There were tears in the kid's eyes, Hachiro realized. Real tears. Not pretend, sorrowful tears, but tears squeezed from the soul and borne from the worst kind of torture—the pain of loss. He blinked. Monk Gyatso. Hadn't he heard that name somewhere before?
Aang sniffled, embarrassed. He hurriedly rubbed the evidence from his eyes, feeling Toph's comforting hand resting on his forearm. He fixed his murky blue eyes back on the windthrower, who held his gaze, wide-eyed.
"Believe me," Aang asserted, trying valiantly to keep his voice from quivering. "I know the feeling."
A spark glittered in Hachiro's eyes. "Let me go," he demanded, "His voice low and quiet. "I—I need to talk to my grandfather."
Aang's first reaction was surprise, then suspicion. He glanced at Toph for confirmation. The earthbender had kneeled, pressing a palm to the ground.
"He's sincere," she said simply, straightening.
Aang's brow wrinkled with uneasiness. "Should we just…let him go?"
"Of course," Toph affirmed. After a pause, she added, "But we're going with him."
Jinju stood beside Appa, applying a knarled old wooden bison-comb to the beast's furry coat. His mind whirled with dark thoughts, memories long buried and freshly reopened wounds.
"They just don't understand, do they, old boy?" the man spoke to the bison like a long-lost friend. "I wish I could have stopped time, like Aang seems to have done. I could've fixed things."
Appa murmured agreeably, full and sleepy from the concoction of fruit and water he had been fed, relishing the feel of the old, familiar comb detangling his fur piece by piece. The beast closed his eyes, imagining that he was lying in one of the Air Nomad temples, dappled sunlight shining down on his coat, surrounded by other bison and airbenders. Appa sighed forlornly, the air whooshing from his nostrils in a gust.
Jinju patted the beast comfortingly. "Don't worry, old boy," he said with a cheerfulness he did not feel, "Hopefully they'll let you out of this cave soon. I know how sky bison hate to not be able to see the sky."
All of a sudden, Appa's huge brown eyes snapped open, and his ears perked up. He grumbled unintelligibly, and stood with a great heave to his feet, ears twitching.
"What is it boy…?" Jinju had scarcely gotten the question out when a rumble shook the floor and three dusty figures emerged from beneath the ground.
The old man stumbled back with shock, dropping the comb with a clatter.
Aang used his airbending to remove the dust from their clothing, and was greeted by a joyful roar from his bison. A large pink tongue promptly slathered him with saliva.
"Appa! Ha-ha!" the airbender wrapped his arms over the bison's nose. "You all right, buddy? Is Jinju taking good care of you?"
Recovering himself, the old airbender in question tucked his hands into the folds of his dusty robe, eyeing his childhood friend peculiarly.
"I suppose I shouldn't be surprised," Jinju said after a moment of silence, his tone inflecting merrily, "You always were a wily one, Aang."
"Actually," the young Avatar piped, "This one was Toph's idea." He motioned to the earthbender standing partially behind him. She was covered in volcanic ash, and seemed perfectly fine with it.
"Grandfather!" Hachiro quipped, irritated that his mother's father was being chummy with these imposters. Something flared in the back of the young windthrower's mind. A tendril of white. Uncertainty.
"My dear boy," Jinju's rheumy old eyes focused on his grandson for the first time. "You weren't in on this escape, were you?"
"No," Hachiro replied bitingly, shooting a glare toward the escapees as he brushed a bit of ash from his shoulder. "No, I certainly wasn't! They compelled me to talk to them. I need to talk to you grandfather. How is it even possible that this…this kid," –he spat the word out contemptuously— "Can be the Avatar of old?"
Jinju regarded his grandson wistfully. "Do you remember, Hachiro," he began, drawing a steady breath, "When you accompanied your father in raiding that Fire Nation vessel that dropped anchor near our coast?"
Hachiro's eyebrows twitched, and Toph shifted her feet in the soil as she felt his heartbeat skyrocket.
"What does that have to do with anything?"
The boy's voice was full of anguish, and Aang flinched sympathetically. He knew how horrible it was to lose a father-figure.
Jinju didn't wince. "That girl didn't deserve to die, Hachiro," he stated, his voice quiet but firm. "Your father knew it was the right thing to defend her, even though logic told everyone else it was fruitless."
There were crystals of fury in the boy's eyes now. "My father died for nothing."
"She is Water Tribe, Hachiro," Jinju replied, his tone reprimanding.
"What difference does that make?"
"The Water Tribes have always been peaceful people," Jinju responded, his voice adopting that 'in my day' lilt to it.
Something flickered to the surface of Aang's mind. Is. Jinju said 'is'. The airbender raised his hand, waving it urgently. "Uh, excuse me, can I ask a question?"
Jinju's blue eyes flashed towards him, curiosity piqued. He dipped his head. "Of course."
"When was this? I'd like to have a frame of reference."
Hachiro glared venomously, but Toph blinked, tilting her chin knowingly—she had a vague idea of what Aang was talking about.
Jinju obliged willingly, biting his lip as he thought back. "About…nine years ago now? It was Hachiro's first mission. The girl seemed to be the only prisoner on board, and our scouts (who had been monitoring their hawk communications) told us that the captain had been ordered by the Fire Lord himself to execute her. Our raiding party was sent to sink the ship and loot any materials—namely food—we could use. That was back during the year-long blight that had hit many of the food sources on the island, and we were forced to look elsewhere. An ignoble necessity, but unfortunately there was no way around it…"
Aang's excitement was growing visibly. "Is that lady still here now?"
Jinju blinked. "Oh yes, one of the families adopted her. She had a bad bump on the head, she did, forgot who she was and all that."
The young Avatar could barely contain his enthusiasm, but he bit his tongue and waved Jinju on. "Thank you. Sorry to interrupt. Please continue."
Hachiro's glare had become a puzzled stare.
Jinju, blissfully unaware of what Aang was hinting at, smiled and leveled his eyes toward his grandson once more. "The point is, my boy, that your father did what he believed is right, he knew the consequences and still decided that it was worth it. He did not die for just anything, he died in defense of a woman who would have been destroyed by the Fire Nation, just as we were so long ago. I have the same feeling about these children. My heart tells me they are at risk for being destroyed, and my memory serves me well if my senses don't—Aang here is most certainly the Avatar."
Hachiro's gaze flitted from his grandfather to Aang, and then back to Jinju. Pain glimmered in his eyes, and he swallowed.
"I believe you," he murmured, his voice quiet.
Jinju closed the distance between them, placing a comforting hand on his grandson's shoulder. "Thank you," the old man's voice was low, quivering, and resonating with relief.
Suddenly, Appa's low growl boomed through the cavern, and all heads turned toward its source. The bison's teeth were bared toward the entrance to the cave.
"Father," Akiko stood there, flanked by two guards—one of them was Akira, wearing a frightful scowl that was aimed at Aang. The airbender tensed.
"What is the meaning of this?"
A/N: Ressurection! I know...*shamefaced*...it's been incredibly long. Thank you for those of you who have sent me reviews and messages with encouragement! You guys are more responsible for keeping this fic going than I am!
