"I believe the question is: Who are you?" the man called out, looking at ease in his- Bumi's chair.

I gulped and stared at the mysterious man. Who was he?

He didn't look Fire Nation nor Water Tribe. In fact, he looked Earth Kingdom. His features didn't betray any nationality other than the Earth Kingdom. Could it be possible that he was rightfully on the throne?

No, that couldn't be it. Bumi would never leave his throne and he didn't have any children. He didn't even have a wife!

So why was this strange man sitting so nonchalantly in his chair? What had happened since the last time we had visited Bumi? The news we had received had said that Bumi was still king. Or had we been misinformed?

I stared at Zuko with set worry. Perhaps I had a bit of fear within me as well, but I couldn't think about fear right now for I knew that if I turned my attention to it for just a second, I would be completely trapped in it. And I had more important things to think about.

So many things were running through my mind. So many possibilities. So many outcomes. Most of them didn't end quite too well. And I didn't want to think about the most likely- the bad- things that would surely ensue.

I knew that if I kept a level, clear mind I could make the most of the current situation though I couldn't find myself calming down. I couldn't find it within myself to reassure myself that things were alright.

For I knew throughout my entire body that things indeed weren't alright just as I had perceived them to be. There was something going on. Something bad. I could feel it in my bones.

"Zuko," I breathed, hoping he would hear me, but not the strange man. I didn't want to look as if I was plotting or planning something. I wanted to look discreet and as if I wasn't doing anything.

And I also didn't know what I was to do. I had no idea what we were supposed to do next. We hadn't anticipated something like this would occur. We hadn't thought we would ever run into this problem. I was clueless, left in the dark, and I prayed Zuko would take the lead.

The thing I couldn't understand, the thing that made the least sense out of all the confusing things occurring at the moment was: why hadn't we heard of this? Why hadn't we received news that Bumi was no longer king? Zuko and I had both thought, no, believed that Bumi was still king of Omashu.

Or was he still king?

If he truly was still king, then who was this? Who was he? That question kept playing, repeating, ringing in my mind. I couldn't make myself stray away from the question.

Zuko eyed me, nodding his head towards me just the slightest that I would have missed had I not been looking for it.

I gulped. Zuko wasn't going to cover for me, so I guess I would have to take charge. I didn't know if I could, but I knew that if I didn't we could be facing death, so I would have to swallow up my fears and do something.

"I am Katara of the Water Tribes," I said louder than I thought I could.

The man peered down at me with a piercing gaze. "Katara?" he repeated. "It doesn't sound familiar."

"I don't find that shocking. I am not very well known, but I am friends with the Avatar. I am his waterbending teacher," I replied, feeling my chest heave in and out shaky breaths of air.

I knew somewhere inside me there was courage. I knew that it was just swimming around, poking at my fears. But I couldn't find it. I couldn't find the courage I so desperately needed at the moment that I had had in the past when I had been faced with obstacles with the same amount of danger as this.

So why was this any different?

That I could not answer.

"A waterbending teach to the Avatar?" the man questioned, unbelief clear on his face. "Well, that's certainly a new one. Tell me this, Katara: where is the Avatar?"

I felt anger start to boil up inside me. He was mocking me! Pointedly making me sound silly and childish and a liar!

I opened my mouth, ready to prove to him I was the Avatar's waterbending teacher. But… I couldn't prove it. I couldn't at all. I had no idea where he was. No idea other than he had been in Omashu a week ago.

"We…we were hoping you could tell us that," I said quietly.

"Hm…" he said thoughtfully. He didn't believe me, and I knew it. I didn't honestly expect him to believe me though, but it was a nice feeling to have hope rise up within me. Even if it was only to have it crash back down. "And why not?" he asked skeptically.

I looked down, feeling defeated. I had known Bumi would believe us because he had met me before, but this man…? I highly doubted he would believe me though I was telling truth. He wouldn't believe that I had been captured by Prince Zuko, the very man standing exactly to my right.

"Because we were separated six months ago," I explained a bit vaguely.

He studied me. "Six months ago? That's a rather long time. Have you been searching for him this whole time?"

"No, it took time to be allowed to look for him."

The man raised an eyebrow, urging me to continue on and explain myself a little more.

"We- I," I amended, "was kidnapped by the Fire Nation for six months until now."

"And you somehow managed to escape? Did he—" he pointed to Zuko "—help you escape?" he inquired with disbelief.

I shook my head. "I didn't escape," I defended. "I was released."

The man eyed me, squinting his eyes as he tried to get a better look at me from the many meters away he was. He stood up from the chair and languidly, but regally and with authority, he walked down the few steps that held up the throne. He crossed the length of the room to where Zuko and I were standing within seconds. He circled around me, taking me in.

His strut and confident way he studied me made me nervous. As if he could find a reason to condemn me to death just by my apparel. I shook a little, a chill running down my spine as he came in front of me, facing me.

Zuko glanced at me and then at the man, his protective side starting to kick in for me. His fingers curled, and I could tell it took a lot of his discipline to keep himself from roasting the man to a crisp.

I almost chuckled to myself, but I caught myself. There were more important things at hand than how Zuko was protective over me.

"Why were you released? You must not mean to say that the Fire Nation is now so merciful that they will let their prisoners go?" he questioned, raising an eyebrow up. A smirk, almost too small to see if one hadn't been looking for, was playing across his lips.

"No, the situation was different," I answered.

"Oh? Who was your captor?"

And that's where I really panicked. How could I tell him that Zuko had captured me and yet he was standing right beside me? Surely he knew that Prince Zuko had a scar covering his left eye. Could I risk telling him Zuko was my captor?

I looked down, feeling somehow a bit ashamed. I can't explain it, but I was a bit ashamed. Defeated as well. As if he had me, and he pretty much did have me. I knew I couldn't lie and say someone else because no one in the Fire Nation would release a waterbending captive besides Zuko. "Prince Zuko," I answered quietly, keeping my eyes on the ground. I gazed tentatively at him.

The man's hard face softened as sympathy started to wash over him. But then it quickly changed. His eyes flickered right to Zuko.

I gasped in my mind. He had realized it! Figured it out! He knew that the man standing beside me was none other than Prince Zuko! We were surely doomed!

"And who is this?" he asked.

I froze, not sure what to say at all. I wasn't sure I was to lie or simply tell him the truth. I was a bad liar, but still…

The small bit of hope I had disappeared like the fleeting last rays of a setting sun. I struggled to restrain my quivering form from shaking relentlessly from fear. I felt small tears start to prick my eyes. I gulped, fighting back my raging emotions. I stared the man right in the face and said, "Prince Zuko."

I didn't say it proudly nor arrogantly. But I said it bluntly and without shame. There was no point in trying to cover up what was. And whether I was imprisoned or let go it didn't really matter. We would still have no information on where Aang and Sokka were.

The man looked at me stunned.

Zuko had turned his head away in shame, knowing he had doomed us. His eyes were squeezed shut, not wanting to bear to look at me.

"But you have to understand!" I pleaded, getting ready to explain everything to him.

But I was cut off, silenced, deadened. There was no way out of this. I had no way to back out, take back my words, and the man was not willing to listen to my explanation. But there wasn't really any hope of him to understand Zuko changing because he'd fallen in love with me. That would make me look more like a traitor than Zuko a threat.

The man had his hand raised up, his eyes drawn away from me.

I felt my heart sink and swell all at the same time from fear and discouragement, a bitter poison that made me want to retch and vomit. I didn't know what to do or say or think. There was no way of explaining things because the man refused to hear it.

"I'm sure you're a nice girl, Katara," he said. "But we just cannot take a chance and quite frankly your story is very hard to believe."

"No, it's not!" I protested though I knew that it was hard to believe.

"Katara, I would like to believe you, but…" he trailed off.

"But what?" I asked him, feeling anger bubble its way to the top.

"But it is not unlikely for a bender to switch sides, for whatever reasons."

I felt anger and fury rush through me. He thought I would betray my country! How dare he! He believed I was with the Fire Nation! This man that didn't even know me nor did I know him!

My hands balled into tiny fists of violence and destruction. "Are you calling me a traitor? That I would betray my people? Merely because I am traveling with Prince Zuko?"

"Katara—" he started, but his tone and how he used my name so casually made me even angrier.

"No! You don't even know why I am with him!" I yelled, thankful I wasn't a firebender for if I was the whole palace would be burning right above our heads.

"I am sure you have a good reason, but your story is hard to believe. And if you are, in fact, allied with the Fire Nation, I cannot take that chance," he replied. He motioned to the guards to step forward.

I gulped, choking down my anger, hoping that if I was calmer thing would work out a little better. I looked at him deadpanned. I couldn't believe what was happening. Things had taken such a bad turn.

I had been wrong. We hadn't hit rock bottom from where we had started from. This was rock bottom. We were to be imprisoned.

There was nothing we could do. I highly doubted Zuko would be willing to fight back. I wondered why he hadn't said anything at all. I assumed it was because whatever he had to say would have probably made the situation only worse due to the fact that he was Prince Zuko.

I was scared, worried, but most of all, angered. I was angry that they could just take us away without even allowing us to explain ourselves. It wasn't fair!

The two guards that had been standing by the doors walked up behind us. They tied our hands together, and as they were doing so I stared the man right in the eyes. I didn't have an expression on my face, but my eyes could tell him I was angry with him.

And scared.

There was a small fear within me that I would never see Sokka or Aang again. That I would be forever stuck in the city of Omashu thanks to the strange man. I was afraid that today would be the last day I would have my freedom for if Zuko couldn't get to Aang then the world would surely crumbled for what firebender would teach the Avatar?

No one other than Zuko. And that's what I was scared of. Terrified of.

But I had to keep a brave face even if I was quivering and shivering within my armor. I needed to keep my head up and try to find a way out of this with Zuko. I couldn't give up hope, though with fate's sense of humor constantly jumping in to improvise, it seemed nearly impossible.

But I would try.

The guards took us away, leading us out of the throne room. They steered us down long and veering hallways. We reached a hallway barely lit, the flicker of the flame on the torches licking and nipping at my heels on the floor, playing tag.

We arrived at a small cell probably no wider than three meters. It had been carved into the wall, being entirely made up of earth. It was probably very musky-smelling and chilly in there.

One guard heaved open the large, metal door while the other held us in place. They untied our hands, and I rubbed the mildly chaffed skin. They both pushed us into the cell and slammed the door shut, bolting it in place.

"Ugh!" I yelled in frustration. I spun to the door and kicked it once. Relief rushed through me, venting my frustration. I kicked the door again, hoping to regain that same reaction. And again. And again. And again. And again.

"Katara," Zuko called out. He placed his warm hands on my heaving shoulders.

I flinched from the sudden surge of warmth going through me. I gulped; that was all I could do as I fell into Zuko's touch. I looked at the floor, defeated.

What this what was to happen? Were we always supposed to be in this cell, imprisoned, barred in? It seemed that I was always being captured, hostage, prisoner. And it drove me insane! I never seemed to be able to do what I needed to! I was always held back, restrained! My hands were always tied behind my back!

Was I always to be like this? Was I always supposed to be a prisoner to whatever force was superior to me? And at this moment it was some strange man that I didn't know the name or rank of.

I don't know if I would have been angry if he was just some servant playing pretend for the day or some high ranking general. If he wasn't anyone important I would be relieved that we hadn't been condemned to a life in a cell, but also angry that he had wasted our time. And if he was a high ranking general, well, I don't think that I could find any relief out of that situation.

And I assumed that he was a high ranking general or something of the sort. It made sense if he was. The guards obeyed him just as they would with Bumi.

I turned to Zuko. "What are we going to do?" I rested my head against his chest, and he wrapped his arms around me.

"I don't know," he said firmly. "But getting frustrated and angry isn't going to solve anything. We have to think this through."

I sighed and nodded. He was right. There was no point in getting angry. It wouldn't do anything besides make things worse.

But what could we do? We were trapped in a cell, our cover having been blown.

Thanks to me.

I had told the man who we were. Who we both were. I had messed things up terribly. If I had only lied and pretended that Zuko was someone else, then maybe we wouldn't be in this mess. Maybe we would have been told where Aang and Sokka were. Maybe then things would be alright.

"I'm sorry," I quietly apologized.

"Don't apologize. This was going to happen whether it is your fault or mine. If this hadn't have happened because of you, then it surely would have happened because of me," Zuko replied. "So do not beat yourself up for this. Whatever we are going through, it meant to happen. We have been placed here for a reason."

I nodded my head once weakly. "Ok," I murmured though I wasn't completely convinced. I still felt as if it was my fault, like I had messed this up. But I wouldn't continue to utter of my feelings. We had to focus on getting out of here instead of me.

And as if Zuko had read my mind, he declared, "We have to find a way to escape."

"But where are we to go?" I questioned. "We don't know where Aang and Sokka are. This was the only place we could look. And they're not here," I said as I squatted on the floor against the wall. The bitter cold seared into my skin, but I didn't care really. There were things worse than being cold.

Zuko set his lips into a thin, firm line. "I don't know. We just need to find a way out of this cell." He placed a hand on the cold, earth wall confining us in. "Perhaps if I heated the rock..." he fumed, thinking out loud.

I stood up, hope slowly rising. Perhaps he had found a way out. Could he be onto something? "What?" I asked.

He shook his head. "No, that would never work."

"What wouldn't work?"

"I thought I could heat the rocks, melting them, but I would sooner set the entire cell into a blazing inferno than give us the possibility of escaping," he answered sourly.

"Oh." I gazed at the rock walls, taking them in. There wasn't any openings of any sort...Except for the vents. There were small vents no bigger than my fist lining the bottom of the walls. There were a total of five of them. There were also cracks flowing all along the walls, delicately waving up into the ceiling.

Could they be the pathway to escaping?

We'll have to see...I thought to myself.

A/N: Hey! Ok, here's the new chapter! I like it. I mean, it's alright. WHat do you think?

I really don't have a lot to say about this chapter. Umm...Yeah...

Thanks! Please review!