The fun continues. Two chapters since I missed yesterday; puts us about half way through the story.
I still don't own Avatar et al.
~Taidine
Chapter Five : Of Skaters and Spirits
"Objectivity is subjective."
"Let me get this straight. You think Sokka is a skater boy?" asked Toph derisively as we took seats at the bench lining the interior island of the Circle. She kept her feet pressed firmly to the ground, which was thrumming with the rattle and thump of skateboards as the usual group of skaters and stoners showed off their latest tricks. They skidded on the benches and the edge of the fountain, leaped up onto the pedestal of the eagle-and-random-famous-person statue in the center of the Circle, and popped their boards into the air, spinning them and clacking back down upon their tops.
"Sure," I answered. "He's smart, he's sarcastic, he's witty and he's cute. It fits."
"You do know he already has a girlfriend," said Zuko, looking up briefly.
I didn't meet his golden eyes. "Yeah, a girlfriend and a queue," I replied flatly, my own eyes flicking over to where Toph and Ty Lee were sitting, a faint animosity palpable between them. "I don't like him. I'm just making an observation."
We fell silent, skimming the kinetoscopic skateboarders. I couldn't see anyone resembling Sokka, but then, I hadn't seen Aang at first, either.
"Anyone want to play cards?" I asked after a little while. The skaters were interesting for about a minute, after which soul numbing boredom began to creep in.
"No thanks," answered Aang, still studying to skaters intently. He was a monk, he probably had training in stuff like this. Katara shook her head. Zuko muttered "I'll pass," Ty Lee didn't seem to hear me, and Toph declined with a terse, "can't."
"Fine." Just as well, I hadn't actually brought cards.
"I can't see them when they're on the skateboards," Toph complained.
"Would you be able to recognize him right away on the ground?" Asked Katara. Her words were punctuated by the skid of a board and a loud "ow!" from one of the skaters.
"Sure," said Toph. "I could tell with Aang, couldn't I? I guess the way I sense people is harder to fool."
Katara looked around again. The boy who had fallen clambered back up on his board and kicked off, wheels rattling. "I don't know. I don't see anyone like Sokka here."
I wondered if I had been wrong. Maybe Sokka wasn't a skater; and even if he was, no guarantee he'd hang around in Columbus Circle. Another board skidded, and a body thumped. "Wait!" Toph cried, "I think…" She didn't finish, all but springing to her feet and dashing around to the other side of the Circle. We followed.
When we caught up to the earthbender, she was standing in the middle of the pathway, in the shadow of the statue, annoying skaters as they were forced to loop around her. An expression of deep concentration was on her face. "That was him. But he got back on the board. He's here," she asserted, stomping a foot in an annoyed fashion.
Something vast and stony moved out of the corner of my eye, and for a second I thought Toph had done some frustrated but inadvisable bending. I turned, hoping I wouldn't see the statue tear free of the ground or some such. What I did see was much stranger.
As I have mentioned, there is a statue in the middle of Columbus Circle. Atop it is some famous dude, probably the one from whom the circle had taken its name. Perched on the side of the pedestal is a great eagle, feathers delicately carved, wings slightly outstretched and pinned to the stone. Or at least, they had been; but right at that moment, as I turned to look, the eagle was folding its wings.
"What…" Katara murmured, and Ty Lee gave a high-pitched gasp. The rest of the Circle seemed totally oblivious; a skater rattled past us with a vexed expression. But we stared as the great bird ruffled out its feathers, then smoothed them, hopping forward on the pedestal. It was enormous, bigger than any real eagle, and the stone of the pedestal seemed to dimple a little under its weight. It's beak, as long as my forearm, opened; and to my vast surprise, it spoke.
"Avatar," it said.
"That's me," said Aang boldly, stepping forward.
It tilted its head, feathers on its neck standing up, and again a deep voice issued from its massive beak. "Why have you come to this place? This is not your world."
"I'm here to find the Amulet of the Four Elements, so I can defeat the Firelord and restore balance to the world," answered the boy, sounding very brave and noble. A second later, though, he spoiled it with a meek: "Uh, my world, that is. I didn't think I'd end up here. I don't even know where here is!"
"This is a realm beyond the spirit world," said the eagle ponderously. "It is a reflection. It contains your world, and is contained by it. It is a world far more real, and far less. It is dangerous for you to be here. More dangerous than you can imagine."
"But I have to find the Amulet," Aang maintained.
"You must, to return home," the eagle agreed, shuffling yet a little farther forward on the pedestal, until its claws clutched at the edge. "But be warned, Avatar. There are vagrant spirits here who will have no love for you. They will sense you have the power to bring them home, and they will seek you out."
"I think we've met some of them already," Aang agreed. I remembered the snakebats and had to agree. "But they must know something I don't. How can I get home?"
"The Amulet," said the eagle. "It will allow you to return, but only when quickened by the bending of all four elements."
Aang nodded decisively. "Then how can I find it?"
"To remember who you are is the first riddle. The Sphinx will give you your second."
"The Sphinx? Who's that?"
"The Guardian of the Temple," said the eagle.
"The temple? That's where Azula wanted to go!" Ty Lee exclaimed. We all turned to her.
"The Sphinx and I were two of those who bore the Amulet here long ago," said the eagle, shuffling backwards. "Now, none of us can give it to you in its entirety. But the Sphinx will set you on the road to find the artifact, and to return home. And you must return home, Avatar. You do not belong here…" The final word faded as the eagle regained its original position and spread its wings slightly. An unfelt wind seemed to ruffle its feathers; then they faded and stilled, returning to lifeless stone.
Ty Lee broke the silence, entirely unawed by what we had just witnessed. "Well, I totally got a look at Azula's information. I can find the temple no problem."
"What about Sokka?" asked Katara.
"What about Mai?" demanded Zuko, suddenly and impatiently. "She's here, and she's just as much on our side as Ty Lee is."
"We don't even know where to start looking for your girlfriend," said Toph, sounding bored. "But we do know Sokka's here somewhere. He touched the ground in the Circle for a minute. I felt it."
"Maybe we should split up," said Aang regretfully. "Ty Lee, Liz, and I can go out to the Temple and talk to the Sphinx. Katara, you and Toph stay here and look for Sokka. Zuko can stay-"
"I'll go with you," Zuko disagreed, scowling. "Toph's right about Mai. We don't even know where to start looking for her, so I'm just as likely to find her out there as here. And you might need me if you run into my sister. Or any spirits looking to eat you."
I waited to see if there were any further arguments, then pulled out my city map and spoke. "If that's settled… Ty Lee, do you think you can figure out where Azula was headed?"
We bent over the map, Ty Lee turning it every which way, tongue between her teeth, making 'hmm' noises. "Ah-hah!" she said finally, extending a hand for a pen. I handed her one, twirling it absently between my fingers before slapping it down in her palm. She brought it down firmly somewhere on the coastline of Queens. "There."
I eyed the map. The location she had marked was rather far away, even by subway. "Are you sure?"
"Yep. It's by the place where the edge of the island is shaped like an elephant-rabbit, see?"
I did not see, but she seemed rather certain of herself, so I unfolded a subway map to chart our route. "Let's get to Forty-Second Street. We can transfer there and head uptown," I told the rest of the group who had determined to seek the Temple – Ty Lee, Zuko, and Aang. They were all bent over me; Zuko's hair was tickling my ear. "We might need to take a bus over to the coast, but we'll worry about that when we get there." Folding the maps, I stood, forcing them all to straighten rather quickly to avoid skull-chin collisions. "Katara, do you have a cell phone?"
She opened the tote bag she had brought with her and pulled one out. "I can use it, don't worry," she assured me.
"We'll stay in touch," Aang promised. "Tell us right away if you find Sokka."
And we set off.
It turned out it wasn't too hard to find the Temple. A couple of train transfers got us into the general vicinity by a little past noon; I stopped at a deli to buy lunch when Aang reminded me and determined walking cross-town would be our best bet. We were approaching the water when Aang lifted one arm and said, "There."
I followed his extended finger; he was pointing to a low, cheap-looking warehouse. "You sure?" I asked.
"Look at it," Aang instructed. I did that mental trick I was getting rather good at, clearing out my preconceptions and expecting something different. Sure enough, the building flickered, as briefly as though illuminated by summer lightning; for an instant, instead of corrugated metal, I saw an elegant, tapering structure of pillars and stone.
"I see," I acknowledged. We set off at a brisk walk.
The doors were padlocked, but Zuko made short work of that, heating the metal of the chain that bound them together until it melted like ice cream on a summer day. Aang gestured the doors open, and we went in, cautiously.
The interior of the warehouse was full of stacked cardboard boxes. I did my best to unfocus my thoughts and not expect anything in particular, but the whole place would do little more than that irritating flickering trick. It would have to suffice; I glimpsed high ceilings, stone pillars, and intricately carved walls as the lights within the place went from fluorescent to – something else – and back again.
Zuko paused by the entrance and ran his hand along the wall. Stone. Flicker. Cheap metal. "Look," he said, and I did. Whichever substance the wall was, it was scorched, blackened in a patch near the door.
We walked farther in, between pillared halls or stacks of boxes, and there were more signs of a battle, more scorch marks on cardboard, metal, or stone. "What happened here?" asked Aang, although he really shouldn't have needed to.
"Azula happened," said Zuko darkly.
A whimper caught our attention; almost in unison, we turned. Huddled against one wall was a dark, pathetic bundle; a scrawny, underfed man and his cat, both burned and bruised. The light flickered, momentarily revealing their true nature – a beast part feline, part human, sagging against the wall, fur scorched and matted with blood. The Sphinx.
"Yes…" the Sphinx hissed. "Your sister follows the path…"
Aang bent to the man, or the creature, that changed with the light. "Can we help you? You're hurt."
"I will recover…" the Sphinx sighed, then drew a deep, laborious breath. "You are the Avatar?"
Aang nodded, and settled on his knees. Zuko, Ty Lee, and I withdrew slightly, giving the illusion of privacy, but we could still here every word that passed between them. The Sphinx breathed again, scratchily. "Listen. The Amulet is in four parts. Each has a spirit to guard it. They must be… joined and united… with all four elements. The Fire Princess cannot quicken the Amulet. I have told her the next step, but also… that she will need you… and I did not give her the fragment entrusted to me."
"What is the next step?" asked Aang, brow furrowed.
"You must return to the center… you must speak with the bones… the bones of the terrible lizards. You must meet with the Pheonix."
Aang nodded again. "Center, terrible lizard bones, Pheonix. Got it."
"The fragment I was entrusted with. It is in the center of the temple. Take it and go… quickly…" The Sphinx let out a long, rattling breath, then turned over on its side. Flicker. The man pulled blankets up to his chin and closed his eyes.
"Is he…" Zuko began.
"Alive," said Aang. "Probably needs sleep to recover. Come on, let's get the magic amulet thing."
He led the way unerringly to the tallest sack of boxes there was. I waited for a flicker and looked up; it was a tall stone pillar, but it didn't quite meet the ceiling, and there seemed to be something luminescent in the gap. Aang put his tongue between his teeth and raised his hands, sighting carefully; then spun, bending air. A nearly visible curl of wind looped between pillar and ceiling like a lasso and constricted; something dropped free, and he caught it neatly.
It was a gemstone of flawless green, no larger than my thumb, and it seemed to shed a faint light. "Well, there's one," said Aang, and tucked it in the pocket of his jeans. "Let's check in with Katara and figure out where we're going next."
"A terrible lizard is a dinosaur," I said flatly. "And there's only one place in the city you find dinosaur bones. I know where we're going next."