Author's Note: Yay, my exams are finally over! I flunked miserably but oh well ^^
Here's yet another chapter! Thank you all for reviewing by the way! Keep at it~!
Disclaimer: I don't own Avatar the Last Airbender.
+Avatar World+
The sun had completely risen when the two girls arrived at the palace at last. Ditching the stone platform the minute they skidded to a halt in front of the gates, the two sprinted as quickly as they could across the courtyard. Ignoring the guards who ordered them to hault, the two scrambled up the steps and were just about to open the doors when someone stepped out.
"My, my. What's all the rush?"
It was Iroh. He looked a bit more disheveled than usual but he couldn't have looked worse than the two girls who had raced through the entire night and morning to get back. His eyes looked from a panting Toph to Suki who was clutching a stitch at her side.
"Something's gone terribly wrong!" Suki gasped.
"Yeah, the whole… ground… it just… opened up and…"
Iroh didn't seem to have the faintest glimmer of a clue as to what the girls were saying but opened the door to let them pass which they did gratefully.
Once they were seated in the dining room and had been served their tea which they drank thirstily, the two girls took it in turn to explain the events of the previous night in more detail. Iroh didn't say anything but merely listened carefully, his gaze shifting every time one of the girls ran out of breath and the other took off where they had left off. They had to retell it several more times once they were finished because, in all respects, it was a strange and bizarre account they were recollecting.
"You're saying you heard something shaking before the earthquake hit?" Iroh asked.
"No!" Toph shook her head impatiently. "The ground was shaking. It was totally drumming like mad but it wasn't an earthquake. I know an earthquake when I feel one and this one was… I don't know! Just totally not an earthquake!"
The old firebender across from them looked more bemused than ever and he took no care to hide it from his face.
Sensing that they were losing him, Suki said, "I know this is really strange and unbelievable. But that was no earthquake. The road between us just split apart and it started sucking everything in. Rocks, twigs, whole trees even. It was like a hurricane had formed in the depths of it and it was sucking everything inside! We barely escaped ourselves!"
"But this crevice, as you say," Iroh said, "is it still sucking things in as we speak?"
"Of course not!" Toph said even more exasperatedly. "Then the whole world would've been swallowed up by now! As we were racing away, the vibrations from the creepy crevice thing kind of slowed and then it wasn't there anymore! I'm pretty sure it's stopped now even though the crack might still be there."
Before anyone could say anything more, the double doors to the kitchen opened and Hakoda stepped inside, looking extremely pleased about something.
"I've just spoken with the healer again. He says Sokka is in much better condition now. He'll be up and about in just a few short days. Perhaps sooner."
Hakoda appeared not to have seen the new arrivals and only realized when Suki exclaimed, "Sokka's been hurt? What happened?"
Hakoda looked startled at this. He seemed to pondering what to say to Suki when Toph, sensing an oncoming load of sugarcoated nonsense, pushed her seat back from the table and hurried past Hakoda out of the dining room. Suki followed with Hakoda calling after them.
Iroh drained the last drop of his tea and set his cup down. Curiously, this day, though it had started off gloomy, seemed to be getting even stranger and stranger. And what was even more pressing was the startling news Hakoda had told him in private just after his arrival.
"Ozai did it, Iroh. We saw him. He's declared war on the Fire Nation. He's coming."
The sun outside was a hazy circle of yellow in the pale blue sky. But Iroh, sitting there in his usual chair at the dining table with his empty cup of tea before him, had never felt so cold and gray in all his years. Surprisingly, he was reminded not of the day that his beloved son had died in Ba Sing Se but of the day just before when victory seemed assured.
"We'll have won by this time tomorrow, Father." His son had said confidently.
"Yes, my son." Iroh had answered, patting his son on the shoulder. "Tomorrow it will all be over."
Looking back on this, Iroh suddenly realized why this had floated to the surface of his memories. It was not the consequences of that day which held meaning. Ironically, a calming peace had seemed to surround them and hopeful lies had been exchanged. Similarly, the most recent war which had seemed at long last over, had never been an extinguished flame. It had just been smoldering just below the ashes and was now rising, spiraling out of control from its dormant stage as an ember. How many lives would the fire take this time? How many of his sons would suffer and crumble?
+Ethan Jones+
After pocketing the keys, Yumi stood up and disappeared inside a closet for a few minutes before emerging with a small plastic tank of gasoline. Unscrewing the cap, she promptly started pouring the entire contents over the body of her former gang leader boss.
"What the hell are you doing?" Jones asked in amazement.
"Destroying evidence." Yumi replied curtly, tossing the empty container aside.
"You're going to burn him? Katara gasped in horror.
Yumi didn't say anything but glanced toward the broken window where the fatal bullet had entered. The pounding on the door was relentless but it wouldn't last long. Sooner or later, they would get in.
"You two stay here." Yumi said abruptly before starting down the stairs.
"Wait, what're you trying to-"
But Jones never got to finish his sentence. At that moment, a horrible grinding booming and grinding sound signaled the downfall of the front door. A tinkling noise could be heard which Jones guessed was the doorknob flying across the hall. There was shouting from the doorway and then-
Gunshots. The intruders, whoever they were, must've ransacked a military weapons warehouse before stopping here because it never ceased. Everything that hadn't been shattered before surely must be turned to dust and rubble by now. Ethan tried crawling but Katara stopped him.
"Hold still! I'm gonna heal you!" she whispered. She made circular movements with one hand, rotating her wrists until, miraculously, a ring of flowing water was swirling around her fingers.
"How the hell did you-"
"Not now!" Katara hissed and she placed the shapeless blob of water onto his bleeding wound. It felt extremely hot one moment as water glowed white and then rapidly cooled. Jones watched in amazement as Katara cleared the water. It was as if his ankle had never been penetrated before.
But they had more pressing problems. Whatever Yumi was doing down there was stopping the intruders from coming up the stairs or they would have been dead by now but there was no telling when her defenses would fail. Jones looked frantically around the second floor landing, finding nothing of use. He had no arms, no knife, no nothi-
And then his eyes fell on the fuel soaked body of Raul and remembered the clicking noise he had heard earlier before Raul had opened the door.
Kneeling beside his dead host, he flipped the bloody body over. No gun. Then what had the noise been?
"ETHAN!"
He turned just in time to see a man suited in black stepping onto the landing with a semi-automatic gripped in both hands. He was just about to pull the trigger when his left arm flew up in the air and snapped backwards at a painful angle.
"Argghhh!!" the man buckled, the arm still bent backward, fingers brushing his shoulder blade. He looked in excruciating pain and it was only after a second that Jones finally realized that it was Katara's doing. Her hands were stuck out in front of her, one directly above the other. When she bent her wrist downward, the man's entire body sagged to the floor like an extremely crude puppet.
There was no time to contemplate this however as a chaotic battle raged on the first floor. Jones could not see what was going on but there were plenty of gunshots, shouts, curses and shattering noises. All too soon, the noise died down like someone unplugging a deafening stereo. No sounds could be heard except the groans of Katara's hostage who was pinned to the floor.
And then came footsteps. Glass crunched underneath the feet of whoever was now ascending the stairs. They seemed heavy and slow yet steady at the same time. Jones motioned Katara to get back along the wall and stood up. His eyes darted to the body of Raul and finally saw it. His left sock had a rectangular shape rising just above his shoes. Jones quickly pulled it out, revealing a foldable machete.
The person was now at just a few stairs away from revealing himself as the sole survivor. Jones held the machete in front of him, a sharp 10-inch long blade which would be completely useless against a pistol.
"Wait, Ethan!" Katara hissed suddenly. "It's-"
But she didn't need to finsh. The person had finally reached the landing. Disheveled with powdered wall plaster coating her hair, Yumi looked wearily from Katara to Jones and then to the machete which he quickly lowered sheepishly.
"The police will be here soon" was the first thing she said. Her calm voice suggested they had done nothing more exciting than chase off a couple of annoying flies. She carelessly gestured for them to follow her downstairs and, after a quick glance at each another, Jones and Katara followed.
A/N: Ooh, you guy's are gonna love the next chapter. A revealing interrogation about Yumi's past life. And I don't mean reincarnation!