I'm so sorry I haven't updated since November! I get busy... okay! On to the story.

Zai

Ji pulls the trigger and we run behind a tree to brace for impact. With explosions behind us, we run as fast as we can. I hear a , 'That's them!' behind us, but pay no attention. We don't stop until we make it to our hideout, and empty backyard near and empty house sometimes used to hold soldiers passing by.

"This is our third time this week getting caught! What are we going to do, Zai?" Ji looks at me, furious.

"You heard that too? I don't know! We're going to get caught sometime. You have to do something about your hair, or we might end up in jail, or worse, the Boiling Rock." I gesture to his cranberry-colored bright hair, which he dyed when he was on a rebellious streak (rebelling from what, I don't know, his mother let him do pretty much anything). "Shouldn't it have grown out already?"

"I dyed the roots so it'd last longer. There's no dye, pigment, or even ink to re-dye it in the stores. I've looked everywhere."

"Then how are we going to harm the troops?"

"I don't know! You're the spirit expert. Isn't there a memory-erasing spirit, or something?" I occasionally read about the spirits, but none had this power.

"First of all, I am NOT a spirit expert. Second, there are no brainwashing spirits."

We sat in thought for a few minutes. Suddenly the answer dawned on me.

"The shadow spirit has a cape that allows you to blend in with the shadows!" I exclaim.

"How we are going to get it, that's the problem." He looks at me with questioning eyes. His eyes always speak his mind. There is always love for me mixed in with other emotions when I look at them.

"I have to get into the Spirit World."

"How?"

"I guess I'll... meditate?" I sit in a lotus-style and close my eyes, arms at my shoulders. "I feel like the Avatar." I mumble.

"The Avatar disappeared 100 years ago. It could very well be you." Ji replies.

I smile and mentally say: "O powerful Spirits, please help me to enter your world." After repeating this multiple times, light flashes and when I open my eyes, I'm standing at a gate in an unfamiliar world.

"Hello?" I call. An echo responds: Ello, ello, ello...

But no reply otherwise.

KEEP WALKING.

The thought flashes into my mind like lightning.

"Wh-who's there?"

Silence.

I decide to listen to the message and walk, on and on until I come across darkness.

STOP.

I halt right in front of the darkness. It's as if any and all light is being pulled from the area surrounding it and morphing into a big black shadow.

GO INSIDE.

I take a cautious step inside the black and gasp. There's no light, no anywhere to be seen. I try to turn around but I fell a pulling, calling me to step forward.

"Zai Lin Xiao. I have been expecting you." A voice booms, coming from all around me. It is malicious yet playful.

With more confidence than I feel, I say strongly, "Who are you?"

"I am the Shadow Spirit, and I presume you are looking for this?"

A silvery object appears in front of me

"The Shadow Cloak!" I gasp and reach out for it. An electrical charge runs through my body, and I pull away sharply.

"Not yet. You have a price to pay."

"What is it?"

"When you turn eighteen, the exact minute and second, you will die, and your soul will become mine."

This is completely shocking, but I have no choice.

I nod.

When I open my eyes, I'm back in the exact same position with Ji right next to me. The only difference is that now it's sunset.

"Welcome back, did you get it?" Ji asks me.

"I-I think so..." My voice is shaking. In my hands is the silvery cape. Ji gasps.

"Oh Agni what's on your hand?"

Suddenly I awaken. What happened? I think, rubbing sleep out of my eyes. My hands come away blood red and I feel a trickle drip down my earlobe. My earring! My hands fly up to my ear, where, to my relief, my black hoop earring still hangs. I wince as my hands touch the side of my head, though, where there is a pretty deep gash. Suddenly I take in my surroundings.

"THE FIRE NATION PRISON?!" I can't help but yell as the scene comes back to me.

I had just tripped and fallen and my cape had been ripped from my shoulders. I scrambled to get it, but as soon as my fingers touched the smooth surface, guards yelled,

"There! It's her!" Hurriedly I stuffed it in my old (and slightly small) red windbreaker jacket. The last thing I remember is someone saying,

"We've been searching for this one for two years now" and the sensation of being thrown, before my head hit a wall and I blacked out.

The cape! I unzip my jacket, and sure enough, my cape is still there.

Now to get out of this place. I think, but then I remember Zuko. And remain in my cell.

Zuko

"Now to find out who you really are." A guard says. A different guard is pinning me down by my hands, restricting my bending. The mask is lifted from my face.

"Prince ZUKO?" The one removing my mask says in surprise.

"I figured it was him." The tougher one holding me says indifferently.

"Throw him in a cell. Firelord Ozai will be glad to hear that he's taken care of, along with that rebel girl."

Before I could process what was happening, I found myself in a prison cell.

Suki

With a satisfied look on my face, I walk into camp with a big bucket of fish and another of berries.

A day late, I hope they're not worried. I think. But when I look around, nobody's there.

"Guys? Come on, this isn't funny!"

That's it for now.. Bye ya! REVIEW! -ZFP