As they grew closer to the engine room, the structure of the very ship seemed to change with their proximity. In contrast to the spotless features behind and above, the corridors close to the engines…far from the sections passengers usually traverse…were progressively becoming covered in greater amounts of grease and rust, and losing what decorations they had. The rumbling grew louder, and the walls shook to the touch from the mighty forces within.

The light was becoming dimmer, but for Toph the way was actually becoming clearer. The combined vibrations emitted from the hulking behemoth they were approaching was making the clatter of hinges and shifting of bulkheads audible even when she was walking. The wire-frame of the ship had become clearer in her mind, and she could make a reasoned guess about what the decks above and below were shaped like. Then as she stepped over a particularly rusty section of hallway, she stopped to gasp.

Sokka paused as well to look at the blind Earthbender halt in surprise, grin hungrily in pleasure with her fists clenched close to her chest, and finally and most adorably squealing in delight with her bare feet stamping the ground to make foot-shaped indentations in the floor. Momo, startled from his terror-induced hiding, looked down from Toph's shoulder and scrambled down her body to investigate what it was she was stamping. She trembled excitedly "I can feel it!"

"I gathered, yeah…" Sokka observed, scratching his cheek, "so is this what you were searching for?"

"Nah, this is just a really thin coating," Toph poked her toes in the rust and drew little lines and circles in the orange metallic residue, "still feels good…oh man does it feel good…but the really big prize is behind that door."

As Momo tried to draw patterns in the rust himseld, purring mournfully from failure, Toph pointed forward to a door just beyond an intersection in the corridors. The sounds coming from it were alarmingly loud given the size of the walls in this place, and the calligraphic plate bolted to the door left little doubt as to what it was: 'Engine Room: No Unauthorised Persons Allowed'. Sokka, despite his persistent scepticism, was as interested in finding out what powered this thing as Toph was, though for rather more empirically-minded reasons. With his mindset on mechanics, Sokka abruptly realised something and asked, "wait…you know there's a door there?"

"The thing's rattling so much I could probably hear it on deck," Toph pointed our. Her smile very much etched on her face, she paced forward towards the door. Momo scrabbled forward back onto her shoulder in a bid not to be left behind, as Toph felt a tinge of satisfaction at correctly guessing where the handle was.

"Wait…Toph!" Sokka ran forward and appealed, "shouldn't we…sneak around the back or something?"

"What? Scared of facing the future?" Toph asked rhetorically with a mischievous shine in her sightless eye, and pushed down on the handle.

Their senses were flooded with heat and noise as soon as they stepped into the Engine Room. The sound of steam and furnace, clanks and turbines, shouting and grunting, were almost deafening. The sound of the engine beyond was deafening. Vapour, grease and sweat wafted through the red air of the metal room, with various people of hardy musculature running, shoving, throwing things and operating the vast devices with a supreme clarity and purpose. No effort was wasted, no movement extraneous or pointless. The activities of the engineers were as specialised and purposeful as the machines themselves. Toph and Sokka entered unnoticed, so focused was everyone on their jobs. Momo shrank from the activity, entering a world alien to his senses.

There didn't seem to be a clear distinction where the engine ended and the rest of the ship began. To the left and right of them, huge furnaces lay open with coal being constantly shovelled into them ceaselessly. Above the furnaces were catwalks along which a vast myriad of instruments, valves and tubes weaved themselves into a tapestry of iron and steel. Around the room, pipes snaked from the floor, ceiling and walls, converging in the colossal machine that sat before them. A massive sphere with various portholes of various sizes randomly dispersed around it, instruments poking up all over its surface, and pipes ranging from the smallest of copper wiring to enormous chutes converged into it. Parts moved and swivelled in separate, distinct patterns, never staying still, alive. It hissed and whirred, shunted and groaned, roared and shuddered with endless fury. It dominated the centre of the room, like an Emperor on its throne, ruling the ship with an iron fist and demanding the devotion of all its subjects. The blind Earthbending master and the Water Tribe warrior stepped towards the machine and gawped.

The engine seemed to take offence at some minor infraction, and began spouting steam from one of its joints. A bearded man, small and slim but strongly built, by far the oldest man in the room, turned from his repair job on the catwalk and yelled in an impressively loud voice, "redistribute the pressure! The tertiary upper valve's gonna blow!"

The man, wearing sandals, a sleeveless red shirt and short trousers, wielded his spanner like a weapon as he ran to a ladder on the far end of the catwalk and slid down to the floor, skirting across to a ladder at the foot of the engine and climbing up to the steaming valve. The word came back from another of the engineers, "it's no good! The lower valves'll get jammed! We'll have ta increase th' coolant flow!"

"Do it!" the bearded man ordered as he pulled down on the spanner, twisting the screw tighter. The steam flow slowed but didn't stop entirely, no matter how hard he pushed. His muscles strained, and he cursed, "don't you do this to me you damned good-for-nothing LOWER DEITY!"

The man, losing his temper, hit the valve with all the power he could muster. Miraculously, the steam flow stopped, but as he relaxed in relief a loud bang rung out and beneath him, halfway down the side of the ladder, a porthole had blown out, with a small fire establishing itself inside the pipes and cogs. There was a loud ring from the other side of the Engine Room as the man clutched his head in frustration and let out a gurgled scream at the unfairness of it all.

From the left catwalk a slight young girl clambered over the railings and leapt onto the top of the engine, clambering towards a valve sticking out the left side and jumping down onto a pipe to twist it with all her might. The fire billowing out the porthole died down, and the engine seemed to ease its gargantuan effort a little. Far from seeming congratulatory, however, the old man instead clambered quickly up the ladder and yelled across at the young girl, "what are you doing!? We can't get that pressure back! We're gonna haveta crawl along at 15 knots fer the rest of the trip!"

"Word from upon high," the girl leapt up to another pipe to run around the circumference of the engine and jump down onto the nearest chute to the old man, using an inter-connecting pipe to hang down from, "we're gonna haveta crawl along at 15 knots fer the rest of the trip."

"Oh…" the old man replied sheepishly, blinking in embarrassment, "good thinking. Alright everyone, stop slacking! We just got a reprieve here an' we damn well gotta use it! I want her tamed and whipped into shape by noon or ya better get ready ta swim, ya hear me!?"

His orders bellowed, everyone set to work on repairs, dousing some flames and stoking others, shouting and shovelling and twisting and throwing things just as before, but a little more relaxed, as one more crisis was over with for now. The old man slung the massive spanner into a holster slung around his back and dropped to the ground, slapping his hands together to get the grime off, looking a little smugly like someone smacking his child for being naughty. He walked forward a few steps back towards the catwalk ladder before both his footsteps and hand-smacking slowed to a halt, having noticed the two new additions to his chamber. He eyed them both with contempt, asking curtly "who let you in here?"

Sokka was lost in the aura of power of the engine and its intricate workings, so upon being snapped back into focus by the chief engineer's attention, he found himself caught looking like an army had snuck up on him and yelled 'boo'. Startled, he spoke quickly, "ah! …sorry, it's just…I mean…I just wanted to see this place! It's incredible!"

"You jus' wanted ta see this place…" the wily engineer growled, "well, ye saw it! So get lost."

"The metal here…" Toph disregarded the engineer's request and wandered forward, hand reaching out towards the face of the engine. As fingers touched, one by one, so the smile on Toph's face grew bigger and bigger. Every turning cog, every twisting gear, every pulsing turbine, was rendered in complete clarity inside the blind girl's mind. The earth was still strong in the metal, the material ground into its fabric, spreading vibrations around and through. It was addictive, and she felt herself drunk on sensuality after such a long famine of unfeeling. She pressed her hand firmly, and sensually absorbed the huge metallic beast before her. Toph giggled in satisfaction, "…it's impure…"

The engineer looked at the girl in puzzlement, wondering exactly what was up with these passengers, "'course it's impure. If she were made out of pure metal she'd break inta chunks after a week. That stuff they make th' decks out of is pretty good fer showing off, but it's useless fer anything practical. It's too brittle an' can't take the elements…if that ain't a pun. That's why th' keel's made outta th' same stuff Our Lady here's made outta." The engineer patted the surface of the engine, "put pure metal inta th' drink an' you wouldn't have a ship left after a month."

"I see…" Sokka scratched his chin, "the pure metal attracts rust more easily than impure metal, since pure metal isn't hardened enough against erosion. So impure metal's sturdier…" Sokka looked around, "that means…wait…how does the outer hull stay clean of rust?"

"'With great difficulty'. Ye should see Shui after she's been scrubbing orange muck off th' ship fer three days straight," the chief engineer smiled, eminently taken by the warrior's scientific mind. A frown quickly follows as he realises he had been showing these people the door, "…why are you still here!?"

"Wan!" the young girl from earlier leapt down from above and landed with bent knees on the plated floor. Standing straight upright, the brown-haired teenage monkey-girl berated Wan the engineer, "stop scaring people off! If they're interested, they're interested. No reason we can't be civil…an' what about me and scrubbing orange muck off fer three days straight? That's not funny!"

"Shui's got a big heart, but no sense 'a humour…" Wan spoke sideways to Sokka, putting hands on hips to address Shui, "kid…there's a system ta these things. We're the crew, an' they're the passengers. Th' crew don't use th' foot massages and cocktail parlour, an' th' passengers don't go poking around th' machinery an' getting their pets clogged in the gearbox!"

The last exclamation was addressed at Toph, as Momo was mimicking her hand movements and padding the metal surface of the machine. Toph turned towards Wan and took offence, "the lemur stays with me, buddy."

"Hey, I'm the one who ends up cleaning th' gunk afterwards," Shui pointed out to Toph, turning back to Wan to appeal, "but c'mon, Wan, you know th' Fire Navy's always lookin' fer good engineers! We gotta advertise a little more!"

"'Advertise'…we open up ta every half-wit that comes along, an' I get stuck with th' last of th' scraps so's you can go traipsing 'round the world, is that it?" Wan dismissed Shui's appeal and wandered up to the engine, unsheathing his spanner and shunting Toph aside with one hand to concentrate on repairing the inside of the blown-out porthole. Despite his distractedness, he continued with the conversation, "face facts, kid. Far as these passengers know anythin' 'bout anythin', this ship runs on voodoo. Try ta tell 'em clear as ye can, they won't get nothin' 'cept she's a 'maaagical' engine that makes 'maaagical' thrust."

Wan made wiggly-quotation-mark motions with his fingers around the word 'maaagical' in-between twists of his spanner, and seemed to ignore them all. Sokka, irritated at the engineer's arrogance, tried to stand up for himself, "it's powered by steam, isn't it? You burn the coal to stoke up a furnace and boil water, so the steam that rises goes through the pipes and passes through sets of turbines. Connect them to gears and cogs and you can turn the propellers, regulate air flows, power all the things Xuan uses up top and other things as well."

"Congratulations, ye passed basic engine theory," Wan quipped sarcastically, never breaking his screw-twisting stride, "easy ta talk smart 'bout 'regulatin' air flows', but I'd like ta see ya try twisting her pipes with yer bare hands while hot vapour's burnin' ye skin off. That's 'regulatin' air flows', sonny."

"Hey! I don't know what kinda bumpkin you take me for, you big creep, but I've seen machines bigger than this entire boat!" Sokka flailed, "just 'cuz you know how to use a spanner don't make you a god!"

Sokka struck a nerve. Wan stopped twisting his spanner and looked up to glare at the machine in front of him, muttering menacingly "you have no idea how right you are…"

As he spoke the words, something seemed to rumble forth from inside the metal sphere more than it was already rumbling. Startled, Wan set to work twisting his screw more rapidly before, drenched even more in sweat than he was before, "c'monnnn…oh, Blessed One, don'tcha dare to this to me…rrrRRAGH!" Something popped from above Wan, and though the rumbling stopped a small joint burst open and emitted a thin plume of vapour. Wan hit the engine in frustration and glared at it evilly, "'and lo, she said, I bring down upon thee mine displeasure…again…'. C'mon people! Clamps! Clamps!"

Wan holstered his spanner once again and clapped repeatedly to get the other engineers moving. By 'clamps' he meant sets of metal rings that could be wrapped around the burst pipe and tightened to keep the steam from escaping, which was exactly what two people handed him. Sokka, having lost the chief engineer's attention, sidled over to Toph and whispered urgently, "I think we better go."

"What!?" Toph reacted angrily, "we can't go now! We just found metal that…" Toph looked around, clamping down a distressed Momo to keep the creature quiet, and leaning in closer, "…metal that I can bend. I just know that if I can get some of this stuff, I can do the same thing I did last time. I'll find out how to use this stuff!"

"Look, maybe we can sneak in when that crazy guy is asleep or something…" Sokka grabbed Toph's arm and pulled her away from the foot of the engine, "but right now I reeeaaally don't wanna be in the same room as this weirdo."

"Wait! Don't go!" Shui ran quickly in front of the two of them, holding her arms out to stall them, "give it chance, please? We jus' got off to a rocky start, that's all…"

"We never had a start to…start with…" Sokka walked past and looked back condescendingly at Wan, who was climbing up the ladder with the clamps, "your boss put paid to that." Sokka looked ahead and for the first time saw a peculiar alcove embedded into the wall next to the door. A large ceramic bowl and several incense sticks were tucked into it, serving no conceivably useful purpose in the engine room. His mind was distracted only momentarily from the task of skidaddling as soon as possible.

"I'm sorry for his manners. He's a good guy, really, it's jus'…" Shui leant her head in-between Sokka and Toph and held both their shoulders with her arms, looking back in concern, "he's…got a troubled relationship between him and his god…"

"His…god?" Toph voiced aloud. All three of the visitors were utterly confused.

"Well…y'know th' name of th' ship, the Gang Shen?" Shui explained.

Sokka looked blank, while Toph emitted an aura of blankness. They didn't get it.

"…'The God of Steel'?" Shui elaborated.

They got it, after a few seconds. They both breathed in and tipped their heads back as the flash of recognition buzzed through their brains. Sokka realised, "…ooooooooh! …uh…is that normal?"

"You from the Territories, aren'tcha?" Shui asked, "what's yer name?"

"Gameshin…" Sokka nodded, "how did you know?"

"I dunno, somethin' 'boutcha jus' screams 'peasant-boy'. Ain't many o'those left in th' Fire Nation," Shui peered around at Wan, "I dunno how it works where you come from, but people in the Fire Nation think that everything's alive, no matter what. That there're gods all 'round us. Rivers are gods, trees are gods, mountains are gods…I grew up givin' offerings to a god of th' vine crawlin' up the end of the alleyway my folks squatted in."

"Annnd…this guy thinks the engine is a god?" Sokka spoke sceptically.

"Oh, she's a god alright," Shui looked up at the colossus, "she was givin' Wan some trouble all th' way back when, so he thought if he treated her right she'd return th' favour."

"…did it work?" Toph asked in all honesty.

"Heck no. They been locked in battle ever since," Shui seemed heavily amused by it all, "she's got a mind of her own, and no one but no one tells her what ta do."

While Sokka continued staring in disbelief at engineers of all people being so superstitious, Toph seemed strangely taken with this 'God of Steel'. She sounded like Toph's kind of girl. Smile spread up to her cheek bones, Toph advanced her question, "hey…d'you think I can get some of the metal she's made out of? I'm really interested in how she's built."

"Mm…don't see why not," Shui shrugged, leading the two infiltrators and one infiltrating flying creature towards the door of the engine room, "I'll show ya where you can find it. It ain't far from here…"

"Hey!" Wan bellowed from halfway up the engine, forcing everyone to swivel around in alarm, "where d'ya think ye're going!?"

"I…they wanted ta see th' stuff Our Lady's made outta," Shui stepped forward and pointed a thumb towards Sokka and Toph, "I was jus' gonna show 'em th' Shaft Room where th' spare parts 'n scrap are kept…"

"…you ain't going nowhere, missy…" Wan clambered down the ladder and approached the group, "you stay here an' keep up th' repairs. I'll show these amateurs to th' Shaft Room."

"You will?" Sokka felt surprised at this sudden burst of generosity, as well as disappointed that he got stuck with the angry old man instead of the feisty young woman, "…great."

"What!?" Shui retorted angrily, "why can't I show 'em!? You don't even want 'em here!"

"Exactly," Wan explained, "I can't tell ya not to show 'em 'round, 'cuz I know you'll jus' ignore me, an' I can't let ya show 'em 'round 'cuz you can't judge character to save yer life! Better they go where I can keep my eyeballs on 'em."

"So it's not 'bout gettin' away from her, then?" Shui remarked cheekily.

"Ssshhhhh!" Wan drew closer to Shui and pressed a bony finger to his lips, genuinely terrified, "she might hear you…"

"Okay, I got it, I'll get th' tertiary pressure valves back inta shape," Shui nodded disappointedly, "you owe me, mister."

"I owe you nuthin', kid. Not kickin' these idiots out is payment returned, ya hear me?" Wan chastised, walking past the two visitors without once acknowledging them, "c'mon then, I'll show ya th' works. Throw something inta th' shrine an' let's get moving!"

Wan waved a hand at the alcove Sokka saw earlier, and the warrior realised at last what it was, "ooh! …wait, ya mean I gotta pay for being in here?"

Wan stopped and turned around, arms crossed and eyes cross, "if ye wanna stop me reportin' ya fer unauthorised entry, then yeah. No one disrespects the God of Steel an' gets away with it."

Sokka was at his wit's end with all this superstitious nonsense, but his glances for appeal from anyone else fell on disinterested faces. Everyone else was either busy with their work or in-between tasks, even Shui, who had wordlessly picked up where Wan had left off with the repairs. Toph, instead of sympathy, seemed to dig in her heels and demand that Sokka accept the command. A last ditch appeal for Momo fell on dazed and confused ears. The winged lemur was not coping well with all these confined spaces.

Sokka poked through his pockets for something he could give. All he came out with was the 5 Shu copper coin Aang had managed to receive from a Fire Nation patrol 5 days earlier. It was an uncomfortable reminder of the person they had come all this way to help, and the rest of the world that depended upon him recovering from his condition. Helping Toph with her abilities might just help Aang, he knew, even if it wasn't useful straight away. Every help he got was necessary, no matter how small, and if it required flinging good money into a shrine for a god of propeller-turning mechanisms…Sokka sighed and flipped the coin into the bowl inside the shrine, which landed with a sizeable tinkle of copper rebounding against copper. When in the engine, do as the engineers do, Sokka supposed.

Wan smiled and opened the door, expecting the two others to follow. As Sokka grabbed hold of Toph's hand to lead her out, the engineer muttered "not that she ever thanks anyone for givin' her so much cash, though."

Sokka groaned, and Toph actually chortled a little. She didn't believe a word of it either, but the thought of a goddess of metal making her own rules and teaching everyone else whose boss filled her with a kind of satisfaction. Someday soon, she was going to be the god of steel, and no one, not even Sokka, could ever doubt that.

A burst of steam and shouts of alarm briefly arrested her attention, and her mind's gaze turned back onto the creature behind her. It loomed large in her senses, rumbling and spitting and groaning, and she couldn't help but feel that the engine was taking offence at her thought processes, at the very idea that the God of Steel could be supplanted. Good, Toph thought, as she turned her back on the metal deity and smiled. It was time she had some competition.

It was unclear who had the last laugh, as the door to the Engine Room slammed shut. The blind Earthbending Master could shape and manipulate the very substance the engine was made out of, but, unnoticed in the overwhelming presence of the machine, Toph had overlooked something more worrying. Into the furnaces, muscled workers shovelled food into the stomach of the God of Steel. The food was the earth itself, Toph's own element, torn from Toph's soil and shipped from Toph's land, disappearing a piece at a time, gobbled up whole and incinerated as a sacrifice to the god in the machine.


Colonel Mongke hadn't been in the Fire Nation more than 24 hours and he already wanted to leave. The sun-less skies, the oppressive hues of red and grey, the confined, claustrophobic spaces…it might have been home but it wasn't where he lived. He lived somewhere else, where fields blazed and forests charred, where men and women fought and died. He was a soldier. He wasn't meant to be wandering around cobble-stone streets politely asking shopkeepers and merchants whether a kindly old man had passed through this way. His business was war…this business was an embarrassment.

Mongke knew the old mantra, back to front, that every citizen of the Fire Nation from factory worker to bartender was a soldier in the war. That every road swept and every screw fixed represented a duty to the Fire Nation. But that still felt like cheating somehow. The war had touched this place in terms of materials produced and men away on duty, but it had never really been touched by the war. That may have been a source of pride for him, leader of the Rough Post-Rhinos, but only in the abstract sense. It was a place untouched by war, so he had made it his mission in life to go where places were touched by war, to aid the Fire Lord not through tightening bolts and checking documents but by physical, martial skill. His mission was to protect this place, not live in it. Living normal, everyday lives was something that happened to other people.

The Firebending Colonel may have sworn to enact the will of the Fire Lord, the divine guiding light of his people, and spread his righteous flame to every corner of the globe, but behind that principled façade he'd long realised it was just an excuse to go out and burn things. Nothing wrong with that, he felt, it was what soldiers were meant to do. He'd been trained in it and specialized in it, unlike the ranks of citizen-soldiers who swelled the ranks every time a generation reached their early twenties. He'd always been a soldier. He just wasn't any good at anything else. Spreading Fire Lord Sozin's vision for a world order under the sun and the children of Agni and safeguarding Fire Nation civilisation against all who would deny them their birthright…stirring words, but they were still words. Mongke held no illusions about that. He'd been a soldier too long to care about such high-minded things. He was a soldier because he was a soldier. Plain and simple.

He really shouldn't have dwelt on these things while Prince Zuko was sniffing the contents of a Herbalist's free samples. It wasn't making Mongke's mood any better. Sometimes he felt like reaching out to his reins and stroking the back of an enormous beast he was sitting on, like they were phantom limbs. It was pathetic.

"Not this one. Too musky," Zuko reported with deadly seriousness, and passed the shop by. Really, really pathetic…

"Maybe I'd like something musky…" Mongke groaned, his brain half-rotten from stultifying boredom. Zuko and the Rough Dismounted were checking the obscure back-alleys of cobble-laned Nagaoka for deliciously aromatic scents. And Mongke was starting to have trouble remembering why after some four hours of walking. On foot. With feet. That moved in a bipedal fashion. He wasn't exhausted by the walking by any means, just thoroughly weirded out. It was Zuko's twelfth rejection of a herbalist's varieties of root and dried grass in a row that was exhausting him. Or was it the fourteenth? "Kachi? How many herbalists have we gone through."

"I don't know…I don't know…" Kachi acted like he was suffering an advanced case of shell-shock, and clutched his head in agony, "make it stop! Can't anyone make it stop!?"

"Calm down, old man," Ogedei was taking this whole trip surprisingly well, "think of it as a kinda torture they didn't have a lesson on in the Academy. Once we're through this, there's nothing the enemy can ever do to us. It's educational."

"Come off it, you're just looking for something to make you smell better," Kachi growled at the pony-tailed show-off.

"It's only shop-browsing, you know," Yeh-Lu reasoned from behind his helmet, "can we stop being so melodramatic? Searching shops for signs of Iroh ain't gonna kill us."

"No…and some sun ain't gonna to kill us neither," Ogedei pointed out, "is there any…real…reason why you gotta wear that armour in the Fire Nation? It just stinks of overcompensating…"

"Mind your own business," Yeh-Lu responded curtly. They half-noticed that another herbalist's had appeared next to them and the squad had unthinkingly come to a halt while Zuko sniffed the rows of dried vegetation in a thorough and comprehensive fashion. Kachi chuckled.

"Well, good thing we are going herb-hunting, then," the gruff guan do-man smirked at the armoured grenadier, "with weather like this, 'overcompensating' ain't gonna be the only thing you'll be stinking of."

"Ladies…" Mongke called the men to order, "we're professional soldiers on a mission from the Fire Lord to track down and kill a wily and dangerous fugitive, not teenagers shopping for clothes. If you gotta gossip, can't you at least gossip about adult, soldierly, male things? This bickering's making my head cave in…"

Mongke rubbed his head, tired beyond reckoning. Ogedei, meanwhile, held a hand to his mouth and chuckled, "…says the soprano…"

"That was an experiment!" Mongke twisted to point accusingly at the ball-and-chain brawler, "mention that one more time and the only thing you'll be squawking will be the backing parrot in 'Pirates of Penshan'…"

"Quiet!" Zuko snapped. Mongke spun round, not entirely used to being on the receiving end of a rebuke, and found himself facing an upright and incredibly serious young boy who brooked no funny business in any way, shape or form. It was an impressive show of authority for a teenager. He commanded, without the slightest trace of irony, "these leaves smell sweet, fruity, but still retain a familiar, woodsy texture to the taste. They have to be the kinds of leaves my Uncle showed to that grocer."

"We wouldn't have had to go through all this if you'd just let us interrogate the grocer," Mongke growled, "she was the last one to see him!"

"She said he didn't mention where he was going, and I believe her," Zuko countered, eyes fixed on Mongke's face as he placed the bag of herbs back on the rack, "if I think someone is hiding something, I'll let you know. Until then, you do as I say. Understand?"

"…yes sir…" Mongke responded without enthusiasm, "so what are your commands?"

"You'll follow me into the shop, Colonel," Zuko ordered, "the rest of you stay outside and neutralise any escape routes. He could be hiding right in this neighbourhood for all we know."

"You got that?" Mongke addressed the other soldiers, knowing full well that these were not the sort of people who needed things repeated to them.

"Clear as crystal, sir!" Yeh-Lu spoke for the rest of them, pre-empting the predictable grumbling from Kachi or sarcastic remarks from Ogedei. Mongke saw them in the clear light of day and reflected on the absurdity of having them travel on foot. You could spot them in a crowd a li away, the brawler, the bladesman, the grenadier and the archer. They were so conspicuous that the rhinos would only have been the icing on the cake. If Iroh didn't see them coming, then quite frankly he deserved to be caught.

He could see the value in Zuko's tactics, but they just weren't the people for the job. They were soldiers. Nuance would always be a strange and exotic concept to them. Though the Colonel considered…maybe that was a failing in them, not Zuko? He brushed away the possibility. If unsuitable personnel choices led to Zuko's execution, that was the Fire Nation royalty's problem, not his. It was another one of those everyday life things. Something that happened to other people.

"Come," Zuko signalled, pulling aside the sliding door of the shop and entering the shop without once looking at Mongke, expecting the Colonel to enter after him unheeded. He duly did. The door slid shut, and the shoulders of the squad outside sagged collectively.

"Man after your own heart, Vachir," Kachi quipped at the haughty Yu-Yan archer, "you and Zuko…you'd have dan to talk down to us about."

"Silence, infidel," Vachir spoke condescendingly. The rest of the conversation had been too far beneath him for him to consider contributing.

"Ha ha ha! You hear that!?" Kachi slapped Ogedei on the side heartily, "I've been upgraded to 'infidel'! 'parently 'fiend' ain't enough anymore, so I'm moving up in Vachir's 'league table of wretchedness'!"

"Pfft…I got to 'infidel' before you did…" Ogedei belittled Kachi's achievement.

Yeh-Lu sighed heavily, "he's never called me anything 'cept 'barbarian'."

"I'm afraid you're just not cut out for being a 'fiend', Yeh-Lu," Ogedei put a comforting hand on the armoured grenadier's shoulder, "that's your problem! You're just too nice."

"Well let's cover the corners of this place and give armoured-stink-boy a fighting chance to act dirty when Iroh gets flushed out…" Kachi shouldered his guan do and walked a short distance away towards the thin gap between sets of terraced houses, his grin quickly fading, "if he's even here…"

The Rough Walkers spread out to their positions, melting into the street, and in moments not a trace of them could be seen.


The herbalist's turned out to sell things besides herbs. In fact, the shop was filled with all kinds of fascinating knick-knacks. The herbs were there simply to hook customer's noses and drag them inside with their scintillating aromas. The boutique was more of a collection of quaint Fire Nation delights. Scrolls of ancient myths, dragon-shaped ornaments, opera masks, incense sticks and small mechanical devices that played clanky little tunes when someone twisted the key…generally items from a time when it wasn't decreed from upon high that everything had to have the Fire Lord's face on them. It was charming in its own way, if Mongke was remotely capable of appreciating such things.

The boutique was long and thin, with items tagged and scattered in such a way to form three long rows from the entrance to the counter. Behind the counter was a warm-faced old woman, eminently pleased to have customers. She called out to the grim-faced men who marched into the shop, "oh hello there! Come in! Come in! Make yourselves at home! Take as much time as you want! If you need any help, all you need to do is ask."

Despite the warm and folksy tone, Mongke could still detect a hint of desperation in her voice. They must've been the only customers she'd had all day. In Mongke's mind that made her an easier target for intimidation. He wandered up to the counter just behind Zuko and spoke in sinister tones, "yeah…if you value your merchandise, you can start by spilling the beans on…"

Zuko held a hand up to Mongke's chest to ward the soldier off, and stepped forward on his own. The grimly determined young boy sprouted a wide and honest smile on his face, and spoke with friendliness and respect towards the woman, "thank you, that's very kind of you. I noticed the herbs you displayed out front. They're from Mount Pu Tuo in the north, aren't they? I recognised the texture."

"Ooooh…a connoisseur?" the woman complemented the customer, "don't get many of those, these days. You're right, they do come from Pu Tuo. There's a nice young lad who comes down here every day, transporting coal and stuff to the depot and back, and he always brings some herbs from there with him. Good thing, too. It's almost impossible to get stuff these days, what with developments going on."

"Yeah, it's a shame," Zuko concurred, leaning over the counter conversationally, "you don't have some spring bud blossoms do you? I've mostly been making green teas lately, but I'd like to try to make some Pai Mu Tan for once."

"A do-it-yourself tea-maker, huh? Don't get many of those, either," the woman turned her back on Zuko and looked through the cabinet behind her, "it's so encouraging, you know. About the only people who appreciate the delicate and hand-made seem to be my age. But here you are, young boy like yourself going out of your way to find the best tea leaf you can. It warms an old girl's heart."

"I think your heart's pretty warm already, madam," Zuko flattered.

"Oh please, call me Yunnan," the shopkeeper found the shelf she was looking for from the collection and considered a jar carefully, "oh bother…funniest thing. A few days ago someone came in and asked for exactly the same thing. Now I've just gone and sold all my ground stock and forgotten to grind some more. Would you like me to grind this for you?"

"Yes, thank you," Zuko poked around subtly, exuding friendliness out of every pore, while Yunnan emptied the contents of the jar into a mortar and began grinding with a pestle. Zuko prodded, "I'm surprised. I thought white blossom tea would be more popular."

"It is now," Yunnan grinded, "I'd almost given up on finding new customers. That gentleman who came by the other day, I thought he'd be one in a million. But now I'd better get used to being popular again."

"Oh, sorry, I didn't realise it was a sensitive question," Zuko apologised.

"No need to apologise, I know how it is," Yunnan ground harder, "only seven years ago, this place was a downright hub. I'd get new people everyday, wanting to know about the old ways, the ancient stories, the mystic heart of the Fire Nation. Then one by one they disappeared. No time for the old ways, they say. We got a bright, gleaming, sparkling new future ahead! Who needs tales, incense and herbs when you got operas, Victory crunchy-sticks and Yantai Institute happy pills!"

Yunnan's anger spilled over into the herbs, which burst into flames. Realizing that she was holding a bowl of fire, the shopkeeper uttered a panicked squeal and began blowing furiously into the mortar, patting out the flames with one hand until the flames eventually died out. Looking sheepishly into the fried remains of her produce, Yunnan looked back and laughed nervously, gingerly placing the mortar to one side, covering her tracks "I'll…whip up another batch. It's no trouble!"

"It's okay," Zuko forgave. Mongke would've chuckled if the banality of the rest of the conversation hadn't dulled his mood. Zuko pushed further, "you're a Firebender?"

"Oh yes! I did my bit for my Nation, too…" Yunnan prepared another mortar and relived past glories, "part of the Navy, once. I was an artillery officer in the Battle of Dong Nai River, don'tcha know?"

"I'm sure you were magnificent," Zuko commended, "I'm glad I'm not the only one who appreciates what you've done for the Fire Nation, at home and abroad."

"If there are more people in the Fire Nation like you and that man, I wouldn't even mind being forgotten," Yunnan paused in her grinding and looked up wistfully, "he was such a nice man…"

"He sounds like a great person," Zuko pounced, "I'd like to meet him."

"Not likely, m'afraid," Yunnan went back to her grinding, "sounded like he was just passing through. He was so courteous and patient…but it still felt like he had a ship to catch, you know what I mean? Didn't say where he was going. I did ask, he just said 'nowhere in particular'. I did wish him a safe trip…"

"Sounds like you think of him as more than just 'nice'," Zuko grinned. Yunnan blushed like she was sixty years younger.

"He was just a really charming man, nothing more," Yunnan teased, finishing with the herbs and pouring the ground remains back into the jar, "here you go. That'd be 10 Shu. I don't suppose you have your eye on anything else, do you?"

"Actually," Zuko picked up the jar of herbs and pocketed it, "I don't suppose you have any White Lotus Pai Sho tiles, do you?"

"Huh…" Yunnan blinked at the odd request, "…not…individually, if that's what you mean. They come as part of the set. Buuut…" Yunnan checked under the counter, rubbing her chin contemplatively, "I do have some in bulk. Leftovers that I picked up one day. 100 tiles to a box. That'll be 50 Shu, though."

"That's okay," Zuko drew a 100 Shu note out the same pocket he'd placed the herbs inside, laying it on the table, "I think I'll be needing more than one."

"Okay, young man," Yunnan shrugged, taking the note from the counter and fiddling with paper and coins inside a compartment beneath the counter, producing a silver piece and three copper pieces, while leaning down and picking up a small brown wooden box with a slider set into the stop. She placed all of these items on the counter, which were duly picked up by Zuko and pocketed. She asked earnestly, "anything else?"

"No, that's everything," Zuko nodded affirmatively, motioning a hideously bored Mongke to begin walking out, "thanks for being so helpful. I hope your business does well."

"Of course! Come back anytime you want! Tell all your friends about us!" Yunnan smiled at the two figures disappearing down the rows towards the shop front, muttering in uncertainty, "even a handful would do…maybe just a couple?"

The customers disappeared, and Yunnan sagged. She picked up a broom and set about clearing up the cobwebs lingering around the place.


The shop door slid shut. Mongke turned and watched as whatever warmness had lingered on Zuko's face evaporated in an instant. Sternly, the Fire Prince called out into the deserted street, "he's not here."

"Aww man!" Ogedei yelled, emerging out of nowhere along with the other Rough Strollers in bitter disappointment, "all that for nothing!"

"My arm's falling off from under-use…" Kachi whined, stretching his swinging arm around to get something resembling exercise out of this day.

"So did we find out anything?" Yeh-Lu asked, ignoring his compatriots' complaints and getting to the heart of the matter.

"He came through Nagaoka to leave for somewhere else," Zuko stood fast against the complaints, "probably by boat. He might be tricking us, sending us off on a wild goose chase, but this is the best lead we've had."

"Agni help us, we're being outfoxed by a senile old nutcase," Ogedei drawled in contempt, "if I could just get my hands on that creep, I'll show him a few tricks he's never used…"

"Watch your mouth, brawler," Zuko marched up to the pony-tailed ball-and-chain fighter and stared at him fiercely, "if you don't respect your opponent, you'll be defeated at every turn."

"I've defeated hundreds of enemies in my time, boy, and I never needed to 'respect' any of them," Ogedei crossed arms and snarked back at the teenager.

Zuko kept staring, and never twitched a muscle, "you didn't defeat me…"

Ogedei looked down at the Fire Prince, fuming quietly at the comeback. Mongke knew the boy was right about Iroh. The Dragon of the West was not an enemy to be underestimated. But right now it was a matter of pride between the brawler and the Prince. Hard as it was for the Colonel, or any of the other Rough Peoples to admit, it was the Prince who held the upper hand in this clash. Ogedei was the last of the recalcitrants, but even he had to admit that when push came to shove Zuko could kick his butt with his eyes closed. The Colonel was, however, finding this cold-hearted, overbearing Zuko hard to reconcile with the warm, compassionate boy he saw inside the shop. But in this circumstance, the brawler didn't have a choice but to say through pursed lips, "…touché."

Zuko nodded, firmly but fairly, recognising a victory when he saw one and never dwelling on it for a second. The Prince marched past Ogedei down the street, ordering "we'll investigate the ferry docks. If no one's seen him go through there, we'll double back and head north."

"Wait…Your Highness!" Mongke interrupted Zuko's step and rushed forward to say his piece, "we've been waltzing up and down these streets all morning, without pause and without breakfast. My men need a break for food and exercise. You'll never hear the end of it, otherwise."

Zuko regarded Mongke, eyes briefly flitting over the rest of his men, with a distant, uncompromising gaze. Showing no sign of sympathy, he nevertheless gave the order "you have ten minutes."

A sigh erupted behind Mongke, and the Rough Legs fell out of formation, stretching arms, legs and other body parts out of inactivity. Mongke nodded to his commander, "thank you, Your Highness."

Zuko began to walk away without acknowledgement, but Mongke remained where he stood, and in recognising the Colonel's continued presence the Prince had to stop his walk down the long cobbled street and turn back to ask, "something else bothering you, Colonel?"

"Well…Prince Zuko…" Mongke wandered over and dropped his voice, "it's about what happened in the shop. How did you…do that? With the being nice and everything?"

Zuko's eyes drifted off to the other side of the street. What he asked seemed to be an uncomfortable question, which just made it more important to Mongke that he got a straight answer. The Prince answered, "I've found out recently…I'm a much better actor than I thought I was."

This proclamation sounded more like an admission of guilt than a royal's bragging. It seemed to be something he was deeply ashamed of. Whatever the reasons for it, Mongke could never hope to understand, but this entire episode had shown that Zuko was a far better commander than the Colonel had been willing to give him credit for. And far more difficult to understand. He wasn't sure what he was expecting the Fire Lord's scion, exile, enemy and hanger-on to be like, but it wasn't anything like this.

"Go on…get some rest," Zuko commanded, wandering away from the Colonel to be by himself. Earlier he might have interpreted that urgent need to get away from the rest of them as arrogance and haughtiness, but up close it seemed like an honest admission that he just didn't belong amongst others. He didn't know how to interpret it. It was something that happened to other people, as usual.

"Hey! Colonel!" Kachi called out from down the street. Mongke seemed distracted enough that it took a short moment for him to recognise his soldiers were calling his attention. He turned sideways and looked at the soldiers. Kachi was pointing his thumb down-street while the other soldiers were wandering away, "we're gonna do some sparring in that scrap-yard down the road. Get some blood pumping, y'know? Wanna come?"

"Uh…" Mongke didn't feel like sparring at the moment. He leaned back onto the nearest wall and voiced his thoughts, "you know that thing that commanders do sometimes? That whole 'gotta be alone for a while to watch the world go by and contemplate things and stuff' schtick? I dunno why, but I'm feeling an itch to do that."

"Ah, the old 'leaning 'gainst a wall looking deep' routine," Kachi understood perfectly, making a thumbs up as he walked back to the rest of the soldiers, "gotcha in one. We'll be back in ten! Good luck, sir!"

"You too," Mongke saluted, and duly got down to work contemplating things. He wasn't much good with that, so he quickly gave up. Mostly he just wanted quiet. The world around him broadly obliged. The shuddering and fuming of the factories was muffled by the lines of terraced houses, and these back-streets were mostly deserted as most people were either working, on the waterfront or in bars. A bar sounded like a good idea too, but ten minutes wasn't enough to get a good drinking round started. Consequently he settled down against the grey wall, watching the grey, smoky clouds above and listening to the clatter of wheels on faraway cobbles, the calls of crow-gulls, the distant thunder of the factories, the even more distant sound of the winds, ships and seas, and the tiny flutter of a piece of scrunched-up paper landing at his face.

That last sound had his head snapping away from the sky in puzzlement, and he looked down at the stonework to see, motionless without the wind in these enclosed streets, a small pink paper origami of a swan. Still leaning against the wall, he looked around to see who could have dropped it, but while there were a few other people wandering past at irregular intervals, none were anywhere near close enough to drop a piece of paper right in front of him without him noticing. Feeling unnerved, Mongke hesitated before leaning down to pick up the origami, looking it over from every angle to make sure it didn't come alive and bite him or something. Through this, he saw a small sliver of ink drawn onto the paper and realised that inside the folds lay a message.

Leaning back up against the wall, Mongke clumsily unfolded the origami, tearing it in a couple of places, but ultimately revealing the calligraphy written on the pink folded paper within: The Dajie Den. 3 'o clock. Don't be stupid. Mongke eyed both ends of the street with suspicion, and crumpled the paper into his pocket. Now he had something to lean against the wall and think about.


Aang wandered deeper. He'd been wandering deeper ever since he entered the ocean. It didn't seem like he was in water anymore, but he still drifted down deeper into the darkness. It wasn't complete darkness, though. Below his feet, something emerged from the gloom, a path. It was blue, dry and reassuringly solid. It curled around and down, each side of the path a precipitous drop, but these cliffs disappeared into nothing a short distance down, making room for the next rung of the spiral. Aang peered to the side, and saw the spiral form a tunnel, funnelling into darkness. As Aang wandered down, he looked up in wonderment at the underside of these paths. The cliffs became mere shadows, and the interiors were flickering messes. Stray shards of rock from above splintered into the path, but Aang passed through them as if they were mist.

Down and down he walked. Either for eternity or for an instant he couldn't say. He could walk backwards and still be moving down the path towards whatever it was below. He didn't know why, but whatever it was didn't seem threatening at all. It was comfortable, inviting, joyous. He could begin to hear the laughter. The honest, open laughter of knowing the way of the universe and being free of the tyranny of separation. Aang came to the end of the path and found a cave, suspended in the void. Inside, the path kept going.

For days…could it have been days? It must've been, it was so long a way…Aang walked through the cave, down twisting, turning, vast and narrow tunnels. Past endless drops and through narrow holes in the blue, dry, frictionless rock. Despite the challenges he faced, he never once felt challenged. It seemed to come to him naturally. He didn't feel any weight clambering over obstacles, or any sense of gravity running over thin bridges over endless chasms. The rocks didn't even feel like rocks. They left no dust, no mark, and they had no texture. They could have been solid clouds or unmoving foam for all Aang knew. He never really stopped to think. So much beyond held so much promise.

Past another cliff, through another tunnel, Aang came across a solid wall of liquid. It was a waterfall that didn't fall, a river that flowed from floor to ceiling, a pool that reflected without anything to reflect. Beyond it, Aang could hear that laughter. That laughter that promised to show him so much, to tell him so many things. He hadn't much to show them, but it didn't matter. It just seemed so welcoming. The wall of water lay in a chasm going left to right, and disappeared into a similar chasm in the ceiling. No part of it touched the rock except for a small bridge that crossed the divide and disappeared inside.

Aang stepped onto the bridge and came closer. The water before had merely been a step on the way. This was the real thing. The real ocean of life. He had only to step through and he'd no longer have to worry about being himself anymore. It was getting so tiring. He looked into the water and saw his reflection, a relic of himself, just to remind him of the corporeal thing he could leave behind. Just another step and it would become irrelevant. He smiled at himself. His reflection didn't smile back. Aang saw himself still in Airbender clothes, without hair and sporting his arrow, staring down at him in disappointment. Aang paused. Who was this?

The reflection changed. Now it was an aged Firebender staring down at him, twice his height. He had his arms in his sleeves and spoke compassionately, but urgently, "Aang, you cannot come here. This place is forbidden for us."

Out of a dim fragment of memory, something awoke. Aang spoke with deep tiredness "…us?"

"The Avatar Spirit is forbidden from this place," Roku stated. Aang knew the reflection's name…it was his name, after all. Roku continued, "I swore to dedicate my life to preserving the balance, just as you did. We all did, as one, back when the elements were first used by man. It is an oath that we can never rescind, never break, no matter how many lifetimes we pass through. The Avatar Cycle must never end."

"The Avatar Spirit…" Aang repeated monotonously, trying to remember, "I am the Avatar…"

"As am I…" Roku spoke gravely. His eyes glowed, and his reflection became fuzzy, unclear, as a thousand people became as one.

AS ARE ALL OF US.

Aang's confusion seemed to clear. Everything became acute, noticeable. The rock became solid under his feet. Gravity became heavy. The ground shook.

THE BALANCE IS IN DANGER. WE MUST RETURN. THE AVATAR MUST RETURN.

The ground shook violently, and Aang lost his footing. He fell, passing between the rock and the wall of water. The fall seemed endless, without bottom, and Aang could sense with greater ferocity that his heart was almost beating its way out of his chest in anxiety and terror. He screamed.

The rock disappeared from sight, and the water wall continued to frame his vision. Far beneath was the planet itself, clouds and continents visible through the purple texture of upon high. Aang flailed furiously and futilely, as the water wall became noticeably the surface of a sphere, and he fell away from it. Below him, a tendril leading from the surface merged with the base of the enormous sphere. It looked like a root. But the root was damaged, with holes poking through. With enormous, impossible speed, Aang cleared the distance between himself and the root, and flung his arms around his eyes as he fell through one of the holes.

Not feeling any kind of impact, Aang pulled his arms away and looked around. There were fleeting, flickering visions all around him, rushing past him like wind. There was the land, rocky but fertile. They became rice paddies. Then towns. Then cities. The land became greyer and greyer, the air murkier and more suffocating. And then it was dead, yellowed out, lifeless. He saw ships slamming into shores, soldiers marching. Fields of fire stretching from horizon to horizon. Thousands of people rattling in cages from unmentionable terror. A massive metal tower, rising blackly and menacingly from a bay of clear, silvery water. A comet passing overhead, turning the entire sky red. The seas black. The earth into a scorched desert. Trenches dug into the soil and mountains driven through. Two pillars standing proud, only to be assaulted by steel and gunpowder. Silvery caverns turned orange by the fierce sun. The screams of young things screeching unbearably, buried under black earth. Dozens of children, their hearts unbeating, giggling as water poured ceaselessly from their bodies. Pieces of fractured metal drifting through the water. His friends drifting through water. The white masks appearing in the water, amidst the wreckage of bulkheads and bodies.

You promised, Avatar.

And now a white mask appeared inches from his face, its black eyes piercing him with their stare. No longer a vision, it felt real enough to touch, textured and alive and filled with incurable rage beyond reason or sense. Its anguished cry, screeching with the pain of centuries betrayed, drilled into Aang's skull like claws.

GIVE US BACK OUR CHILDREN.


Aang gasped violently as he was catapulted out of his slumber. The physical world thwacked him like a train and he breathed so harshly he felt his lungs might just explode. His eyes bulged and fingers turned white from gripping the bed sheets, sweating streams into his red clothes and trembling so much he may as well have lost all his hair all over again and drilled through the floor. Katara was shocked awake at his rising, and took a moment to collect herself before smiling with relief.

"Aang! You're alright!" Katara leapt off of her stool and grasped Aang by the hand and the shoulder. The cold sweat and ceaseless vibrating caused her relief to be tempered with a realisation that all was not well in Avatar-land, "and…terrified out of your mind…"

Aang looked around fitfully, seeing only Katara in the room. He looked into her eyes fearfully, demanding to know, "where is everyone!?"

"I…" Katara looked around herself, having woken up at the same time as Aang, and never seeing them leave, "…I don't know. I didn't see them leave…"

"They're in danger!" Aang threw the covers to one side and leapt out of Katara's grasp onto the floor, "I have to warn them!"

"Aang!" Katara cried in alarm, "you can't…!"

"I know what you're gonna say! But…" Aang rushed towards the door a few frantic steps before his knees gave way. As he began staggering across the floor, all the fight seemed to drain from his voice, "…but…y'know what? You'd probably be right…"

Katara rushed over to Aang to stop him hitting the floor as he fell, suffering from disorientation. The Waterbender propped the Avatar up and managed to free hand to swing a circle around herself and flow some water out of her slung pouch, twisting her hand and spreading her weight to let the water move over Aang, trying some extremely rudimentary healing with one hand, "you're running a fever Aang. You need rest…"

"Don't worry about me…" Aang gasped, clutching at Katara through a misty haze of vision, "if you don't stop them…we'll all drown…"

"What do you mean!?" Katara swung her arm back to bend the water back into her pouch and free her other hand, "why are we in danger!?"

"Go!" Aang thrust an arm out at the door and looked angrily at Katara. Wracked with indecision, Katara looked at the door and back at Aang several times before finally getting up to rush across the room, flinging the door open and running through.

She paused to look back at the stricken Airbender, muttering worryingly "…Aang…" With no more time to waste, she shut the door and ran as fast as she could, stopping at the first corridor to ask aloud, "where did they go, anyway!?"

Aang picked himself up and crawled over onto the bed with as much strength as he could muster. His body convulsed as he coughed, and he collapsed onto the bottom end of the bed, without the strength to so much as pull the sheets over himself. He breathed harshly, and loudly, and he gulped as he considered…at least this meant he was alive. If his body wasn't a boiling, aching collection of limp, useless tubes, that may have just been a reason to smile.

To Be Continued…

Avatar: The Last Airbender Concept and Characters © Nickelodeon 2005-06


Author's Note: Not much word count left, but I just want to say this has been my favourite chapter to write so far, especially the Rough Rhinos and Aang. Also...I'm writing fan fiction primarily to improve my writing style, so if it seems 'wordy' or overblown...please pointit out. I loves me some feedback.