Chapter Two: A Shallow Grave
Darkness pressed at him from all sides and then there was pain, deep pain as he felt his heart beat again, thudding to life, pain that surged through him as his thick, cold blood coursed once more through his veins. His lungs ached for air, forcing him to breathe but earth filled his mouth and his nose, choking him. Panic took over, he was buried! His heavy limbs stung with pins and needles as the blood rushed through them but he forced them to move against the soil with a strength that only terror can provide. He thrust up his arms, and felt them break through the surface. He clawed at the earth until his head was free, and he drew great gasps of breath. At last, he pulled himself up and out and laid back beside his grave panting.
It was night. Through the silver branches of the trees he watched an infinity of stars turn above him as he rested. A great stillness possessed him as it slowly began to sink in. He was back. Just as Hei Bei said he would, he had been brought back. The cool wind shook the long grasses that grew around him and scattered feathery seed-heads that trickled off into the inky dark. All things seemed brighter and sharper. He had never known the starlight to fall so thickly nor had he ever noticed the textures of the shadows in between the blades of grass, in the roughness of the bark, in the folds of his clothing. Jet found himself plucking idly at his shirt, marvelling at the way the shadows changed with the movement of the cloth.
Jet suddenly wondered how long he had laid been lying there, time, it seemed, was moving strangely for him. Jet attempted to get up but his body was still stiff and cumbersome, his efforts only resulted in shaking more loose earth from his clothes as he tried to move. At last, he stood, though he had to clutch at the trunk of a tree while he steadied himself. Jet looked down at the mess of his grave and then toward the lake that spread out gleaming in the pearly light toward the dark horizon.
Longshot and Smellerbee, where were they now? What were they doing? His most faithful freedom fighters had buried him in this place, in this small copse of trees on a hill that looked over Lake Laogai. He didn't know how they had managed to get him out of those underwater caverns but somehow they had evaded the Dai Li long enough to bury him in this makeshift grave. They had buried him under trees. They knew how he had hated the city. This was just the kind of place he would want to be buried. Jet smiled grimly at his macabre thoughts even while his heart swelled with emotion when he saw their memorial, the marker of his grave; his hook swords buried in the branches above where they had interred him.
Jet reached out toward the branch painfully, his hands closing around the familiar handles of his blades. He pulled the weapons free from the wood that they were half buried in and their weight in his hands made him feel complete once more. They were as much a part of him as any of his limbs were and beneath the stars, they gleamed, reminding him of old times. Old times; should he seek his freedom fighters out again? He ached to see them again; they were the closest thing he had to a family. But would it be fair on them? They had come to Ba Sing Se to start new lives but Jet had only held them back, unable to let go of the past. If he reappeared in their lives again they would feel obliged to follow him on whatever mad quest it was that he had agreed to. Once again he would be leading them away from the lives they truly wanted to lead; the lives that they had a chance of finding, now that he was dead to them. He would remain dead to them. He had only been brought back to this world for one purpose anyway.