Broken Bows & Shattered Daggers

A Longerbee Trilogy

Book 1: Moving On

Author's Note: This chapter is dedicated to my very first reviewer! Thank you, Justthisguyyouknow. I want everybody else to stop being lazy. If you had really liked or disliked my story, please review! Twighlightsux, your reviews don't count. Also, I have officially become a grammar freak. *twighlightsux*- You were always a grammar freak. *me* Shut up! So anyways, from now on, if you catch a spelling error or grammar mistake, I would be very grateful if you told me. But first, I would cuss a lot, hit my head against a wall, and then fix it.

DISCLAIMER: I STILL DON'T OWN LAST AIRBENDER! Darn it… my world domination plan didn't go so well… I don't know if it was because of the mutated sharks or the rogue missile launcher. Anyways, story!

Chapter 2: A Broken Promise

"Jet!" Smellerbee screamed. Jet didn't respond.

"JET!"

Smellerbee grabbed Jet by his shoulders and shook.

"Jet, wake up! Wake up! Jet, oh, Jet. Longshot! Longshot, why isn't he—?"

She cut off as Longshot took off his hat, folded his hands, and bowed his head. He was respecting a spirit. A passed spirit…

Jet's spirit.

"No." whispered Smellerbee. Then she wailed.

"No, no, NO! JET!" Smellerbee grabbed fistfuls of her dead leader's clothes, her face drenched in tears. "Jet! Jet, Jet, Jet, JET!"

Smellerbee felt a firm hand on each of her shoulders. Tears continued to stream down her face, smearing her red war paint. She looked up her gaze meeting Longshot's deep, intelligent, brown eyes.

"Bee…" the archer murmured.

Smellerbee turned away and slammed her eyes shut. It wasn't good when Longshot spoke. It was never good when Longshot spoke.

"Bee, he's gone. He's not coming back... Let him go."

Gone?

Not coming back?

Let him go?

"No!"

Smellerbee jerked out of Longshot's grip and buried her face into Jet's still warm tunic. His tunic still smelled. It smelled of home and everything they had endured. It still smelled like Jet, energetic and free. Had they come all the way to Ba Sing Se for this? It was impossible. Jet had always seemed… unyielding, impenetrable like the great city itself. He couldn't be dead…could he?

When she ripped away, Smellerbee's fist had unknowingly collided with the side of Longshot's face. Longshot stumbled away as his nose began to bleed heavily. Smellerbee didn't notice her friend's pain.

He had promised.

He had promised!

"JET!"

The hours trickled past, just like the brook back in the forest. Their forest. Their home. It was their home.

Longshot lifted his head.

Smellerbee's sobs had gradually faded. She lay still, silent. The faint rising and falling of her chest was the only proof that she sleeping. Longshot stood on unsteady legs.

They had to get out of Lake Laogai.

The archer wobbled over to his friend. Smellerbee's face was pale and clammy. Her whole body was shaking. Longshot felt tears coming up and stinging his eyes. He forced them back. He had to be strong.

For Bee, for Jet, for the Freedom Fighters.

Longshot gently reached down and touched Smellerbee's shoulder. She didn't move.

Longshot adjusted his bow and, with tender care, bent down and lifted Smellerbee into his arms. He stood and gazed around the dark stone cavern. He would never forget this place.

How could he not?

His first and closest friend had died down here.

Jet was so much more to Longshot than a 16-year-old rebel that gave the mute archer a home and a purpose.

Jet was a leader,

a mentor,

a liar,

a cheater,

a liberator,

a thief,

a friend,

an enemy,

a speaker,

a swordsman,

a brother,

a terrible cook,

a great storyteller,

a horrible singer,

a testing host,

a misleading guide,

a—

A no good, dirty rotten, over-obsessed, teenage lunatic, who couldn't help but pick a fight every five steps!

He was going to miss him. So much.

Longshot turned away from the cavern, away from the memories, away from Jet's cold, pale body.

Smellerbee shifted in his arms.

Longshot looked down at his now only friend in the whole world. He remembered earlier that day (or was it yesterday?), when Smellerbee was the strong, fierce warrior she had always been. But Longshot knew, oh, he knew, that these past hours had been torture for her. This new life had been torture for her.

And Ba Sing Se…

…the Dai Li…

…Jet…

It had broken her.

His heart clenched, as Longshot realized that he and Smellerbee were the last Freedom Fighters.

They were alone.

They couldn't be, though!

He had promised…

An 8-year-old Smellerbee looked up from the picture she was drawing and into the eyes of a 9-year-old Longshot.

She held it up.

"Do you like it?"

The picture was of six stick figures, each recognizable only by certain characteristics. Jet had his twig, Longshot had his hat, Sneers had a frown, Pipsqueak was taller than everybody else, The Duke was shorter than everybody else, and Smellerbee had four short lines, two on either side of her face, to represent her war paint.

Longshot grinned from ear to ear.

He gave her a thumbs up to show that he loved it, but knew it was unnecessary. Even though Smellerbee was young, and they hadn't been friends for long, Longshot knew the girl could read him like a book.

There was a knock on the wooden door of Smellerbee's hut. Before Smellerbee had the chance to ask who was there, the door was flung open. 10-year-old Jet paraded in.

"There's my two favorite Freedom Fighters!" Jet exclaimed.

"Jet!" Smellerbee cried.

She leaped to her feet and ran to him. She then hugged him hard.

"You're back!"

"Sure am." Jet replied, grinning as he hugged Bee back. "And I brought you two something."

He reached for something hidden behind the door.

"For Smellerbee."

Jet withdrew an elegant dagger. The blade was a bright, shiny, silver iron and the hand guard was wrapped with a brilliant amber silk. The blade curved and flowed, like a wave. Like silk in a soft breeze. It was beautiful and frightening at the same time. Smellerbee took the weapon and gazed at it with awe. She looked up.

"Thank you!"

She put it in the sash loop of the back of her tunic.

"I'll never take it off! And when and enemy thinks I'm defenseless…BAM!"

Smellerbee whipped out the dagger and began to fight an imaginary foe. Jet grinned and pulled something else out from behind the door. He kept it behind his back as he walked over to Longshot. The silent boy glanced at his best friend.

Was it safe to give an 8-year-old a weapon, especially when it was Smellerbee?

Jet shrugged. "I don't know." he said.

He pulled a cream colored bow and a quiver of hawk feather fletched arrows out from behind his back. He examined them, before shoving them under Longshot's nose.

"Is it safe to give these to a 9-year-old, especially when it's you?"

Longshot's eyes widened as he took the weapons. He stood in mental shock for a moment, before smiling.

Nope. It was defiantly not safe. Thanks, Jet.

Longshot sank to the floor and began to admire the gifts.

"Hey, Jet!"

Smellerbee ran up with her picture in her hands.

"Did I just hear Smellerbee?"

A huge head poked into the room.

"Pipsqueak!"

The giant came in and gave Bee a big platypus bear hug. The Duke also entered the room. He glanced around.

"Doesn't look like we missed much, does it?"

"Duke!"

Smellerbee went and gave The Duke a hug as well.

"It's 'The Duke'." The Duke muttered, but hugged Smellerbee anyways.

For the third time since Jet's arrival, the head of a Freedom Fighter found its way into Smellerbee's hut. Sneers saw Bee and The Duke hugging and he smirked.

"Ah… you two make such a sweet couple." he sneered.

He dodged the book that was flung at his head. He stalked cautiously into the already crowded room.

"What is that supposed to be?" The Duke asked, pointing to Smellerbee's drawing.

"It's us stupid. Can't you tell?"

"I am not that fat."

"They're stick people, Sneers."

"I'm not that short!"

"Yes, you are, Duke."

"It's 'The Duke'!"

"More like 'The Dunce'."

"Come say that to my face!"

"Why does Longshot have a frying pan on his head?"

"Oh, for crying out loud!"

Smellerbee watched as her friends argued over her drawing. Everybody loved Smellerbee like a little sister. She was the newest and only female Freedom Fighter. She cleared her throat and everybody turned to her just as things began to get violent. The Duke pulled himself out of Sneers' headlock. Jet and Longshot stopped their heated debate over Longshot's hat and Pipsqueak stepped out from in between them.

Smellerbee smiled.

She picked up her picture and placed it on her sleeping mat.

"You know," she turned back to her friends. "A wise man once said that friends will come and go." Everybody watched her as she paused. "But Freedom Fighters are forever."

Everyone howled with laughter. Jet came up, wiping tears of mirth from his eyes. He placed a hand on Bee's shoulder.

"You bet." he said. "The Freedom Fighters are forever and you'll never be alone. I'll—we'll, always be together…I promise."

Longshot bowed his head…

…and let the forgotten tears of the past seven years fall

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