Chapter Three: Clarity of Action

Green… Tranquil… The smell of fresh grass… The sound of leaves swaying with the wind… The skies are cloudy, yet the sun shines brightly. The feeling of peace and serenity entirely surrounds me. I want it to last forever, but it doesn't…

The sun started to dim and darkness started to envelop everything. I try to move away, to escape somehow, but I was paralyzed and soon the darkness enveloped me as well.

I wake up on the floor panting and covered with sweat. It had been weeks since my encounter with Shen, and I've been having dreams like that ever since. I could only guess what it means, but I'm certain it's not something good.

I wash myself off and head down. After I had breakfast, my mother hands me a list and sends me off to go shopping. I grab one of our baskets and step outside. The nearest village is about an hour away on foot, but luckily I have my trusty pet tiger-dog to ride on.

Nekko loves it when I ride her. Personally, I wouldn't like people climbing on my back telling me to take them somewhere, but Nekko couldn't be more excited. Even putting on the saddle gets her tail wagging. It's one of our many bonding activities.

We reach the village and head straight for the market. Bringing a tiger-dog into a place filled with food isn't exactly the best idea so I leave Nekko beside an alley and tell her to stay put. No one's really going to try and steal her here, the people in this place have better things to do, plus a seven hundred pound tiger-dog isn't something you would want to take on.

I look at the list and the first one there was "Cabbages". I take a quick scan of the market and I spot a man with a wagon full of it. I usually buy vegetables from Old Hem's but those cabbages look so nice I might just make an exception.

As I begin to walk towards the merchant a young Earthbender boy jumps over his wagon and Earthbends the ground under it causing the wagon to fly into a group of people who appear to be chasing him.

"MY CABBAGES!" The man yells out loud.

Poor guy, he must have lost a lot of money with that. But I'm sure he'll be fine, that kind of stuff only happens once or twice.

I'm betting the boy from earlier stole something from those other guys and thought he could get away with it since he's a bender. He was right though, non-benders are definitely handicapped in a fight against benders, and the odds of catching one are very slim even if it's just a kid. I find it extremely unfair. Benders should never use their powers to exploit others. It's like what the Fire Nation does only in a smaller scale. With power comes responsibility, and if one cannot handle that responsibility, then they don't deserve the power.

While the merchant picks up what's left of his cabbages I head to Old Hem's, my usual supplier. I see a young woman setting up some vegetables on one of the stands, but it's obviously not Old Hem. Her daughter Takai sometimes tends to the shop whenever she's not around. Takai's one of my "sort of" friends. We get to talk once and a while every time I go into town but whenever we do, she usually avoids eye contact, purses her lips and blushes when I look at her and smiles awkwardly when I try to lighten the mood with a joke or two. I don't think she likes me very much, or she's afraid of me or something.

"Hey, Takai. How's it going?" I greet her with a smile.

She turns around and gets startled, dropping all the vegetables she was arranging. "H-Hey Tenkuu. N-Nice to see you again!" she says while making that awkward smile she does.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you." I say with a puzzled look on my face.

I buy off some cabbages, and since it's on the list, some carrots and onions too. The whole time Takai's hands were shaking, and she still had that awkward smile on her face. I ask if she was alright and she just smiles and says she's fine with no eye contact what so ever.

"Thanks Takai, see you soon." I say to her as I place the last cabbage in my basket. She says "You're welcome" and brushes her hair back again, without as much of a glimpse at me. I have had enough, I put my hand on her cheek and look into her eyes and ask "Is something wrong?"

Her eyes widen and her face turns red like an apple. Her mouth opens but no words come out. She breaks away and hurries inside and closes the door behind her. By doing that, I think I may have made it worse.

What could I possibly have done? I'm always nice to her, I compliment her at times, I even gave her a homemade bracelet that one time, yet she acts like I'm going to set her on fire or something. I just don't get it.

Then again, I've always been confused by people, opposite reactions to situations, complex social norms and crazy outdated traditions. I would rather deal with animals than people. With them it's simple, no need for fancy words and "saying what's appropriate", just honest communication.

I shop for the rest of the items on the list and finally got to the last one, "Fan". I found this peculiar. No one in my family uses fans; it's always breezy up there. Maybe it's for fanning out the coal while roasting something; I did buy some meat and coal earlier.

After walking for a while I stumble onto a small fan shop near the alley I left Nekko in. I take a quick peek just to be sure she was still there. And she was, along with a few kids playing with her. I don't really mind, despite Nekko's size and appearance she's the friendliest tiger-dog you will ever meet. She plays with everyone, mostly children who aren't scared off by her ferocious look.

I ask the kids playing not to jump on her so much or pull on her tail. Nekko hates it when people do that and might hurt one of them if they keep doing it. I tell Nekko to be nice and that it won't be long before we head home. She licks me in the face and I head for the fan shop.

The stand has an incredible variety of fans, but only one gets my attention. A plain gold fan, made out of thin sheets of metal. It's tough and a little heavy yet is still a decent fan, I wouldn't be surprised if this was used as a weapon. I ask the shopkeeper where it came from. He says he got it from Kyoshi Island when it was attacked a few weeks ago.

"By the Fire Nation?" I ask him, even though I already knew the answer. He nods yes. Apparently one ship suddenly came and started to raid the town, but it wasn't for the usual reasons, they were looking for something, someone…

"The Avatar…" The shopkeeper whispers.

I suddenly remembered what I'm supposed to be doing. I should be training, becoming stronger. The Lightbender is The Avatar's guardian, his "shield and guiding light" at least that's what the sphere told me. I haven't been honing my skills at all. All the combat training my father taught me is all I have, and I'm certain that's not going to be enough. If I am to protect The Avatar I need to master the only edge I have against his enemies. Lightbending.

"You gonna buy that?" The shopkeeper asks me with the most puzzled face. I must have drifted off again. I have to stop doing that around people. I buy the Kyoshi fan and another simpler fan. The other fan is for my mother, but the one from Kyoshi is mine, I have a feeling I'll need it someday.

A loud crash catches my attention. The kids from earlier come rushing out of the alley where I left Nekko in. I bolt towards the alley and find three Earth Kingdom soldiers hassling Nekko, one of them swinging around a chain.

"You must be the owner. Don't you know that it is… illegal to bring a wild animal into town. I'm afraid we're going to have to take him" said the one holding a mace.

He's lying of course, wild animals roam around this village all the time. What's rare are tiger-dogs. Their pelt and fangs can be sold for a very hefty price. Nekko's not as big as the usual tiger-dog, and these bastards think they can take her down easily. They did not however, take into factor her owner. But even though they're obviously bad people using their status as "soldiers" to do whatever they want, I have to at least try and resolve this peacefully.

"I'm sorry, can't you just give us a warning? I swear I won't bring her into town anymore." I say to them.

"Sorry kid, we have to enforce the law. If we make exceptions, that just wouldn't be fair to others, now would it?" said the man with the mace.

I knew it. They think we're easy prey and they're not going to back off. We're going to have to run. I know they won't chase us all the way because they have no legitimate reason to take Nekko. We have to be subtle though, simply hightailing it out of there won't work in our advantage.

"Alright" I say "I'll just get my stuff off the saddle." I put my basket aside and climb on Nekko then I slap her on the side, our code for "Run". She jumps out of the alley onto the street. I thought we would be home-free but these "soldiers" were a little smarter than I anticipated. Three other guys were waiting for us outside, blocking our way. A chain whips out from the alley and tangles Nekko's legs. She roars out and manages to knock one of the guys out with a swing of her arm. I jump out and take the other two down with a few jabs to some pressure points. I'm really glad dad taught me how to do that or that would have gone a different way.

The three with the chain aren't strong enough to pull Nekko away. I take one of the soldiers' swords and try to smash it but it doesn't work. I have no choice then. I drop the sword and dash toward the other three. One of them lunges his spear at me and misses. I push it down, step on it and break it off with my foot. Then using the spear's shaft I knock him unconscious. The mace guy charges at me and breaks the shaft, but I manage to sweep his leg and he goes down. I grab a piece of the shaft and bludgeon the chain guy with it. He didn't put out much of a fight.

I was ready to take Nekko and get the hell out of there when I hear a footstep behind me. When I turned around, Nekko had already tackled the mace guy.

"Nekko stop!" I yell out.

Just in time too. She was ready to tear the guy's head off.

"It didn't have to go this way. I really hate having to resort to violence." I say as I kneel beside him. "Now how about we just forget about all this, okay?" With Nekko's legs still bearing down on him and her face right up in his ready to bite it off on my command, he didn't really have much of a choice but to agree.

"Good. But be warned. If I ever see you morons trying to take advantage of anyone ever again, I'm going to let her decide your fate." with that I gesture Nekko to let go. I grab my basket and we head home.

As we ride back, I can't help but wonder if I had done the right thing. Was it right to beat up "soldiers" who are "protecting" the village because they were trying to take Nekko away?

Of course it was! They're bullies, and they needed to be put in their place! They were going to kill Nekko for her fangs and pelt. You didn't do anything wrong, in fact, you were protecting your pet, your companion, your bestfriend…

I struggle to rationalize my actions but then I realize that there's no point to it. It already happened, there is no point in dwelling on the reasons, I just need to be prepared for the repercussions. Then it hits me.

What's going to happen when I meet with The Avatar? What repercussions will that bring? To my family… to me…

Tomorrow's the solstice. Tomorrow I'll have some more clarity about this, about all of this.

I hope…