Hm. I thought I had finished this. But on the contrary, three chapters remain.

Oops.

~Taidine

Chapter Twelve : Of Mosaics and Melee

Needless to say, I leapt out of my bed like the top of a soda bottle someone had added Mentos to. My window, which was fortunately over to one side of the room and not directly above my bed, had a beautiful spiderweb crack spreading across it; an irregular shape in the middle had fallen out. A good-sized chunk of concrete was lying on the floor, among smaller fragments of glass. I walked over the mess – I had gone to sleep without even removing my shoes last night, so the glass merely crunched underfoot – and stuck my head through the opening.

Aang, Katara, Sokka, Zuko, Ty Lee, and Toph, still in an earthbending form with one arm raised as if in a throwing motion, were clustered on the sidewalk. "Sorry," Toph called, relaxing into a more normal stance.

"What are you all doing here?" I drawled. "Don't you have an amulet to quicken or something?"

"We… kind of don't know where to go," Sokka admitted.

"Ty Lee told us you weren't allowed out," Katara called. "But it didn't seem fair to leave you behind."

I looked at Zuko, the original cause of my problems; he had the grace to look embarrassed.

"If you jump, I'm pretty sure I can get you down," Aang offered.

"So?" Ty Lee urged eagerly. "Come on!"

Wow. I felt… happy, I guess, but a different sort of happy then the one that you feel when you're with a group of acquaintances, laughing at bad jokes; a kind of happiness that ran deeper. That they had gone out of their way to invite me on the quest… sure, I had been helpful, but I had never even dared hope to be more than that.

They were all looking at me, and I realized I had let the silence stretch. "Let me get my bag."

It's not fun jumping out of a window on the fifth story. I procrastinated longer then I should have. I wrote my parents a cryptic note, promising them I was all right, I might be away for a while, and when I returned, I was prepared to face grounding for the rest of my natural life, but it was very important I do this now. I checked my bag, tossed in some more pens and a long, sharp fragment of window glass that seemed like it might come in handy. I swept the glass into a pile and opened the window, and looked out at the dizzying drop. Trust me, from the top of it, five stories is dizzying.

"We don't have all day," Zuko growled suddenly, impatiently.

"I'm coming," I replied tersely, swung my legs over the ledge, and dropped.

For a second I was freefalling, then Aang got his act together; a stiff updraft caught me, wind blowing so hard it was almost solid. I tilted nearly horizontal, spreading my arms to increase my surface area, my hair streaming behind me and my eyes tearing. It was probably not very graceful or impressive from without; I landed on the pavement on my stomach, hard enough to knock the wind out of me, but not hard enough to kill me, which, all told, is the fate I should have expected. One point for me not imagining this whole thing – if I had jumped out of this window and airbending were a figment of my imagination, I wouldn't be alive to question my sanity. I picked myself up.

"We want to take the two train into the Bronx," I said, brushing off my pants. "I'm not exactly sure where in the Bronx we want to go, but I do happen to know most of the train stations along that line are decorated with mosaics and similar, as a way to employ artists, so keep an eye out for glass."

"You know, she could have told us that without jumping out the window," Sokka pointed out to Aang.

"I want to come," I assured him.

We trudged up the sidewalk towards the subway station, filling me in on their plan. "We can't leave without everyone who came over," Katara began. "So all of us, Azula, her troops, and Mai have to be there when Aang uses the Amulet to open a portal back to our world."

"We're pretty sure Azula will beat us to the place we have to go to quicken the Amulet," Sokka chimed in. "We don't know if we can beat her in a fair fight, though, so our best bet is to do whatever we need to do with the magical shiny stones and scamper."

"I'll be covering the escape," Toph said. "I'll allow myself to be captured, because there's pretty much no way she can hold me for long. I can let slip that Aang's going to try and open a portal tomorrow in Strawberry Fields, Central Park."

"I liked the name," sighed Ty Lee. "It sounds so… happy."

"That gives us slightly over twenty-four hours to look for Mai," said Zuko. "Everyone else has been either in or around the school, or in or around your apartment building, so we'll split up and cover both areas."

"Yeah, we just need to look for a girl who spends all her time sulking in corners," said Sokka.

We had to make a couple of train transfers to get up to Forty Second Street, Times Square, from which we could catch a two train. The two train actually makes for quite a lovely, scenic ride. It goes uptown through a lot of old Manhattan stations, most decorated with intricate mosaics that relate somehow to the district the station is located in, then passes into the Bronx. Presently, it rises above ground, and you can see the buildings of the borough trucking by on either side. Uptown we traveled, all busily looking out the windows at the scenery.

Pelham Parkway was the station at which I spotted the stained glass – flowers and old photographs set into the stone half-walls to either side of the platform, glowing with the pale light of the slightly cloudy sky that was visible above.

"This has to be it," I said, turning to Aang.

"Gee, what gave that away – the uniforms?" asked Sokka.

I looked out the window again, and this time really looked, adjusting my mind to have no expectations. Clustered at the center of the platform was a squadron of Fire Nation troops, grim faced and outfitted in red.

Well, well. Azula had beaten us here.

"Okay, plan stands," said Sokka. "We're on one of the first cars, so they shouldn't notice us right away. Aang and Katara will study the windows. The rest of us can create a distraction."

The subway doors opened, and there was no more time for planning. There ware three sets of doors in each subway car; Aang and Katara shoved their way through the commuters to go out through the front one in our car, while the rest of us exited through the more rearward pair. We moved over to the platform wall, all keeping a wary eye on Azula's troops.

I peered at the closest window, a stained glass of a curling purple flower. Not helpful at all. I sidled down the wall to investigate the next one. Orange flowers, with many petals. Very pretty, I'm sure. I glanced at the Fire Nation squadron. They hadn't noticed us yet.

The wind blew away a cloud as I was studying the third window, a stained glass image of small white flowers tucked among spade-shaped leaves, and a sudden beam of sunlight made the image explode with color and light; I had to look away from the brilliance. Several windows down the platform, I heard someone cry out, and turned to see Aang staring into the illuminated window; then he turned slowly, to where the light filtering through the glass made a colored puddle on the floor.

Myself, Zuko, Ty Lee, and Sokka moved as a group towards the Avatar and Katara; Toph followed us slowly, dragging her feet. "What is it?" Zuko demanded as we drew close.

"The windows…" said Aang. "Look at the way the colors wind up on the floor. It's telling you how to put together the Amulet. Look, they're bending patterns…" He gestured with one hand, following the curves and swirls of purple and blue that the iris cast on the floor.

Toph, who was kind of staring out at the railroad tracks – stained glass held no attractions for her – went "Um," as if she were trying to get someone's attention.

"Come on, we have to start over there," said Aang, pointing to the very front of the platform.

"Um," said Toph again. "Guys, Azula kind of isn't with the rest of the Fire Nation grunts."

Aang was already moving for the frontmost window, Katara following in his wake.

"So where is she?" Sokka asked in cockeyed confusion.

"I can't feel her…" said Toph, looking down at her feet.

Compelled by some instinct, I looked up.

She dropped from the roof, a spiky silhouette in a Fire Nation uniform, bare-headed except for her topknot where her troops wore helmets, and landed in front of us, spiderlike. "Hello," she smirked.

Zuko was already in motion, throwing fire; red flame met blue, and he was tossed back. She shot out her other hand, an arc of flame carving towards us; Toph moved swiftly, and a slab of concrete tore free, meeting the fire. Blue flickers curled around the edges of the concrete, then died. I reached into my bag, hand closing around the jagged glass; Sokka cast about for a weapon. Problem was, we were mostly not benders, and although Sokka and Ty Lee could usually hold their own in a fight, I think this is a case where fighting fire with fire would be really effective.

I looked over my shoulder; Zuko was picking himself up, but more depressingly, the entire Fire Nation squad was racing down the platform towards us. Toph let her concrete block drop, lifted one arm and extended the other, taking a step forward: the slab split into a pair of oblongs, and she flung the first towards Azula.

Blue fire met concrete in a blaze of heat and light, and Azula jumped, landing neatly on the square, then again, this time meeting ground directly in front of Toph. The earthbender directed the stone around and ducked; Azula caught on just in time and dropped into a crouch as the block of concrete whizzed by over her head.

The rest of the Fire Nation squad was right behind us now. Ty Lee faced them in a martial arts stance and charged forward, fingers a blur, but she couldn't take them all; Sokka, although he did his best to improvise with his backpack, was not much of an unarmed fighter. Zuko was back on his feet, bending great whips of flame; two of the soldiers closed on him in a great cloud of red and gold, fire meeting fire.

I took a page from Sokka's book and began laying about with my bag, futilely, getting momentarily caught up in my own battle. The soldier I was taking on dodged around the tote, then reached out one hand and caught it (I guess, now that I thought of it, it wasn't even very heavy, holding only maps, money, etc). With the other hand he caught my wrist, and soon I was quite firmly restrained.

I looked around. Zuko and Toph had their arms pinned behind their backs, and Sokka and Ty Lee were being held equally helpless. More than a few Fire Nation troops were prone on the floor, but there had been more of them then I had first thought; and Azula was standing in front of us, utterly unharmed, gloating. "My goodness, that was even easier then I had anticipated. This world does weaken benders, doesn't it?"

That was when a fierce gust of wind sliced through the air behind her and sent her sprawling to her knees, revealing Aang and Katara in bending stances. "You're not going to stop me from putting the Amulet together, Azula!" Aang declared.

The Princess of the Fire Nation rose to her feet, her hair slightly disarrayed, still grinning. "I never intended to," she said. "I know it's the only way home, and although this world has certain… advantages… I certainly don't want to stay. Actually, I'm going to help you by removing certain…" Her eyes, several shades darker then Zuko's but still frighteningly similar, skimmed over us. "Distractions."

I heard the rumble of an approaching train.

"Meet us at the Winter Garden in Battery Park City, ready to open a portal, and no one will get hurt," said Azula, as the train pulled up beside her. The doors opened and commuters streamed out. "Much," she added, her smile broadening, and stepped inside. Her squad followed, pulling us and their fallen comrades along with them, and the train pulled out. I glimpsed Aang and Katara standing dumbly on the platform we passed, picking up speed.