The Highest Bidder

Chapter Eleven: Nothing Short of Amazing

Let me just say that when the Fire Nation attacks a small village, they make it point to the townspeople that they are they for one reason and one reason only: no negotiations, substitutions, reductions, or anything that would relate to a simple exchange. The Fire Nation is comparative to a high-class military with an overall tyrannical leader who is armed with prodigious skill and quite a heavy ego. Obviously, I'm referring the arrogant flake as Fire Lord Ozai and his sadistic troops of Fire Nation soldiers who believe them to be better than the other three Nations. That isn't the matter today; for Fire Lord Zuko is anything but a self, pampered palace prat and his Firebending soldiers are completely at ease and restful due to Avatar Aang's intervention of the imperial war between the Fire Nation and the three other nations. With that, it should suffice the matter when I explain that when our Fire Navy ship was making course to the small village of the Southern Water Tribe, I questioned Prince Zuko's intention to have two other soldiers (and me) come off the ship and corner the villagers.

Zuko was being prepared for battle; his men were helping him put on the customary armor for soldiers heading into battle. The soldiers who weren't occupied with dressing Zuko accompanied me on either side. Owing to the need that I was more than capable of dressing myself, they simply handed me my items of armor clothing and I put them on regularly.

I approached Zuko when the soldiers were no longer flanking us.

"Prince Zuko, with all due respect"—he glanced at me through his helmet—"why is it necessary to arm the entire fleet if we're confronting a small tribe of Waterbenders? They're mere villagers. They aren't the Waterbenders in the North Pole. They're common folk: regular people."

"Because if they are harboring the Avatar, they could be brave enough to stand up against the Fire Nation."

I stared at him.

"You mean to stand against your father—"

I crossed a line again when he rounded on me furiously,

"Don't talk to me like that!"

I grew accustomed to his angry outbursts, so I was not abashed by his explosion. I simply threw up my hands apologetically and attempted to make a smooth recovery.

"All I'm saying," I said gently, "is that those people down there are a small number, and allowing the entire ship to walk off the ship to flank eight people is overkill."

He considered me shortly then turned to Lt. Jee who was waiting for further commands.

"Keep the men up here. I'll only need her," he said swiftly, followed by his indication of 'her'.

Lt. Jee looked at me briefly, glanced at the awakened Iroh, and then confronted Zuko.

"Why," he asked Prince Zuko patiently, "do you think that she's more adaptable than ten of your best soldiers?"

Zuko's eyes dilated indignantly.

"Are you questioning my orders, Lieutenant?"

"Honestly, Zuko," I said kindly, "I didn't mean that I was better than all of them, just that ten aren't needed against a village of common folk. General," I turned to Iroh for some back-up, "want to intervene on my part?"

Zuko started to look mighty irritated. Iroh shrugged.

"His ship, his crew. I'm just the advisor," he said innocently.

Zuko confronted Lt. Jee and me in finality,

"The captain comes with me, Lieutenant, and if you have an issue with that, I'll send you overboard." He frowned. "That's what I think."

I didn't say much else after that. Prince Zuko beckoned me to follow him as the Fire Navy ship approached the shore. I glanced over the ship's edge to see a boy standing right on the shore, dressed in war make-up, holding a Water Tribe machete in his hands. I clicked my tongue to get Zuko's attention; he nodded his head in confirmation.

The Fire Navy ship went full steam ahead in the shore of the Water Tribe; it stopped when it crashed through the weak border. The warrior that was threatening to fight the huge ship was thrown aside by the power of the halt.

With a noise of metal on metal, the bowsprit of the ship opened and folded down onto the village's floor. The bowsprit is the huge gangplank that is responsible for disembarking Fire Nation troops from ship to shore. The steam that emitted from the metal cleared, and Zuko and I headed down the bowsprit. Behind us, the host of guards that were at first coming with us was ordered to stay back in case the villagers would get out of hand.

I thought this was a bit of an overkill, and the reason was this: as Zuko and I walked down to the shore, I counted fifteen people all together lined up in a row. About six of them were children, prepubescent, and they were cowering behind the older members of the water tribe. One of them was an elder; and two others were teenagers. The teenager Water Tribe warrior boy that had been foolish enough to stand in the way of the ship rose to his feet.

The warrior, of course, was Sokka of the Southern Water Tribe, but at this point in time, I had no idea who he was. What I did know was that he wasn't exactly the brightest person that had ever crossed paths with a Fire Nation soldier, for he charged toward Zuko with an adolescent war cry. Zuko casually (and expertly) kicked his weapon out of his hand and then kicked him in the face. The warrior was sent sprawling off the side of the bowsprit.

The villagers drew back in fright and the ease with which their only warrior had been dispatched by Prince Zuko. As we reached the icy shore, Zuko addressed each citizen of the village,

"Where are you hiding him?"

I didn't expect any of them to answer, and what he received in response was fearful silence. He glanced at a female Water Tribe girl with pretty blue eyes and a head of beautiful brunette hair. Of course, the girl was Katara: once more, I didn't know who she was until much later in life. Zuko irritably glanced at her then to the elderly woman who stood beside the girl.

He reached for her and showed the villagers,

"He'd be about this age? Master of all elements!"

A brief pause gave him nothing, and he threw the elderly woman back to Katara.

With a cry of frustration, Prince Zuko launched a gout of flame over the villagers' heads; the response was unanimous as child and woman cowered in fear.

"I know you're hiding him!"

I was about to speak, to convince him that there was nothing here; however from behind us, Sokka rose to his feet, retrieved his weapon, and charged at Zuko with another warrior cry. Zuko turned to him in annoyance. He dodged Sokka's charges, flipped him over his head, and Zuko shot a fire blast at the warrior. Sokka rolled out of the way and threw a boomerang. I honestly have to say that I gave the boy some credit for his ambitious play in fighting for his village, but it was starting to get less amusing.

It also didn't help the cause when a little boy in the crow threw a spear to Sokka crying out in victorious cheer. Sokka charged Zuko again, who, as Sokka reached him, broke off pieces of the spear shaft with his wrist guards. He grabbed the spear, boinked Sokka on the forehead several times with it, broke it in half, and dropped the pieces in the ground.

Sokka rubbed his head. He looked at Zuko angrily; tried going after his machete.

I sighed irritably; although this had been fun from the start, the boy seriously needed to stay down. So I did what I did best, and persuaded the machete to climb out of the snow by itself. The villagers reacted as I had expected, and they gasped when the machete acted on its own. Sokka was flabbergasted as the machete flew to my hand.

"You need to stay down, boy," I drawled, pointing his machete at his chest.

He didn't move.

"Prince Zuko," I said, looking at my superior officer, "this has been fun, but the Avatar isn't—"

The boomerang that Sokka had thrown at Zuko performed its well-known action and rounded back behind Zuko and slammed into his head, which knocked his helmet off kilter. Furious, Zuko's hands spat fire, and he hovered over Sokka menacingly.

I found myself feeling that paranoid sense and apparently my instincts weren't off base. From behind us, before Zuko or I could do anything, I turned just in time (for my benefit) to dodge a kid who skyrocketed on penguin, staff in hand; he flew straight underneath Zuko, swept him off his feet, and he landed in front of me, butt up. His helmet landed on his behind in a suggestive manner.

Zuko pulled his face out of the snow and scurried to his feet.

"What good are your instincts if you don't tell me what's coming?" he said coldly, glaring at me. I frowned at him.

"The boy was coming at 70 miles per hour down a hill on a penguin; I'm a telekinetic, not a motion detector."

Zuko frowned at me for giving him attitude. I glanced behind him and urged him to turn around. Prince Zuko assumed the Firebending stance; I readied myself for an attack. The boy got to his feet, and as Zuko and I started to close in on him, the boy blew a gust of wind at the both us. Zuko shielded his face from the wind; my heart skipped a beat as I was pushed a foot from where I stood before.

And, ladies and gentlemen, that's when I learned that I could make a force field. From behind us, the guards that had stayed on the ship were blasted to the middle of the deck. I apparently had sustained enough power in my meditation to take off most of the damage from the boy's Airbending, hence the one foot slide.

Of course, this was the Avatar, Aang, and at first, even I disbelieved it until Aang said boldly, staff in his hands,

"Looking for me?"

"You're the Airbender?" said Zuko incredulously. "You're the Avatar?"

I stepped out of the ring. If it was any other situation, I'd have helped Zuko in fighting an Airbender; however, the Avatar was Zuko's quest, and I wasn't part of that. The Avatar glanced at me suspiciously. I obviously doubted his powers; he couldn't have been over the age of 12.

Zuko and Aang maneuvered for position against the other in the middle of the village that had become an arena.

"I've spent years preparing for this encounter: training, meditating." Zuko said, "You're just a child!"

The Avatar gave Zuko a look,

"Well, you're just a teenager."

I know there are quite a few things that can make a person angry, but I have to say that when Avatar Aang said that little comment, I'm pretty sure it sent Prince Zuko over the edge. Prince Zuko mostly absorbed all my sarcastic comments merely because (1) I made myself useful and (2) he liked me; but still, sardonic attitudes from others spurred his temper like pouring oil on a bonfire.

Zuko erupted with fire blast after fire blast. Avatar Aang cried out in surprised, hard-pressed, and frightened. Aang dissipated each blast by twirling his staff in front of him like a shield; although his efforts were much appreciated by his own safety, the fire didn't extinguish, but merely threw the flames elsewhere. The fires reached the villagers, and they cried out in horror. It was obvious then that the Avatar couldn't protect them all, so he surrendered.

"If I go with you," said Aang defiantly, "will you promise to leave everyone alone?"

Zuko straightened and nodded stiffly. Zuko indicated for me to take the Avatar's staff.

I already felt a little uneasy around the so-called Master of all Elements, merely because he simply was too old to be able to master all the elements. I convinced the Avatar's staff to slide out of his hands and fly to me into mine. Aang gasped slightly as it came to me.

You have no idea how many times it has been assumed that I am an Airbender because I can do these sort of 'illusions'. Airbenders, like Avatar Aang, can swipe things toward them that aren't made of elements, such as mattresses or staffs. It still surprises me how many people think I am the second to last Airbender. Truthfully, it's flattering, but no—I'm not an Airbender. I'm a telekinetic, and that is all.

And apparently, I look older than what I appear. At sixteen, I age the appearance of a twenty-year-old, according to General Iroh and Lieutenant Jee.

At any rate, Aang surrendered and came with Zuko and me on the bowsprit, despite Katara's objections. Aang assured her that he was going to be all right asked her to take care of 'Appa' until he came back.

Of course, when I was on the ship, traveling with Prince Zuko, I had no idea who this Appa was. I assumed it was the penguin upon which he had been riding upon his arrival. Obviously, it was his giant (and friendly) flying bison.

"Head a course to the Fire Nation," Zuko ordered Lt. Jee. "I'm going home."

I held onto Aang's monk hood as we boarded the ship; the bowsprit rose back up, closed, and snapped back into place. Upon the foredeck of the ship, General Iroh joined Zuko, Aang, and me. Aang's hands were bound behind him, facing Zuko and Iroh.

"This staff will make an excellent gift for my father," said Zuko, observing it in his hands. "I suppose you wouldn't know of fathers, being raised by monks. Take the Avatar to the prison hold. And"—he handed the staff to a prison guard—"take this to my quarters."

Zuko glanced my way.

"You, come with me."

I frowned at General Iroh who shrugged.

"I'm in trouble," I moaned and walked away.

The prison guard had placed the staff in the middle of the room. Zuko and I entered simultaneously. He looked at me expectantly.

"You're irritated about the Avatar arriving unexpectedly, aren't you?" I asked, folding my arms over my chest.

"You said you could sense others."

"Sense, as in feel presence around me. The boy came in at very high—and impressive—velocity, Zuko. It's as comparative as being hit with a car: that's how I knew he was there."

"You deliberately dodged."

"It's my instinct to dodge something that's coming straight at me," I said dryly. "And—"

I stopped immediately.

Zuko stared at me.

That feeling of being watched crept through my stomach like an oozing liquid. I stared at him curiously. There was a vibrating in the atmosphere, and as I stood there in front of him, I felt it coming closer. Zuko stared at me. I gestured for him to get behind the door.

A young voice cried out,

"My staff!"

As I had expected, it had been a human who was coming through the corridors at a fast pace. The Avatar apparently had come free of his bonds, and he ran inside the room so fast, aiming for his staff.

Zuko slammed the door shut.

"Looks like I underestimated you," said Zuko.

After a brief pause, Zuko began blasting fire at Aang, who barely dodged any of them. He gasped, terrified, and panted to catch his breath. Aang rolled underneath Zuko to get behind him. By staying behind him, Zuko was unable to blast him. Zuko turned immediately behind him, threw fireballs at him like mad.

I'm actually surprised to let you know that Zuko didn't light the entire room on fire. General Iroh was right about Zuko; that man had little to do with breath control, for he flew his fire blasts madly around them to catch Aang. I was dodging Zuko as often as Aang, who created an air scooters and rode around the on the walls, ceiling, all the time getting licked by the gouts of fire that Zuko unleashed upon him.

"Zuko!" I cried out irritably when one of his uncontrolled flamethrowers almost caught me on the shoulder. "Stop him!"

Zuko grunted in frustration as Aang rode in circles along the perimeter of the room.

"You—catch—him!" Zuko roared at me. "Focus in—on him—!"

I couldn't do what he wanted me to because as light-footed as the Avatar was, the boy was going so fast around the room that I could barely keep track of him. I had to concentrate a little harder on human bodies to fully keep them from moving, and the bugger was going so fast, I couldn't even spot him. Though I did attempt to stop Aang from leaving the room by levitating the pieces of furniture within the walls. Incidentally, Zuko and Aang were dodging the lamps, banners, and decorative objects that flew at them in constant disarray.

Zuko grew furious with the entire fiasco in the room and drew a heavy fire jet from his foot, terminating the Avatar's scooter, which sent him propelling the air and landing hard into the door. He recuperated quickly, grabbed a tapestry off the wall, and wrapped up Zuko as he passed. Zuko struggled against it; Aang grabbed his staff. Zuko broke through his bonds and once more, they squared off against each other.

After a few seconds of maneuvering, Aang Airbended a mattress up off the floor and it slammed into Zuko; it propelled him against the opposite wall—then smashed Zuko up into the ceiling.

The mattress and Zuko fell to the ground. Aang threw open the door and before I could try to stop him, he Airbended me into Zuko's bed side table.

Zuko growled angrily as he rose to his feet.

I pulled myself up and followed him up to the deck hatch of the floor. As we were leveled onto the bridge's observation deck, I saw Aang open his glider, threw it up into the air, and jumped after it. Zuko turned to me immediately.

"Throw me in the air!"

"What?"

"Do it!"

What he wanted me to do—and what I did do—was to concentrate entirely on his body's mass and weight and literally throw him off the observation deck. It's very much in comparison to that of acting like a catapult. This relates to my prior notifications about my ability to move greater masses: the light the object, the easier it is to accommodate its relative levitation.

I threw down my hand as if I was pitching a ball; Zuko went flying into the air as if an invisible foot had kicked him off the side of a cliff. Zuko grabbed Aang's foot in a fierce cry of desperation. They fell to the foredeck with a marvelous crash. They squared off again.

From behind us, I turned to see a flying bison gaining on the ship.

"What is that?" Zuko said loudly.

I jumped down from the observation deck and joined Zuko. The guards came up to help.

Zuko barricaded the Avatar with several fireballs; the staff was knocked out of his hand. And he was pushed off the side of the boat from Zuko's unleashed Firebending.

The boy fell over into the water below. Zuko and I went to the edge.

"Awesome," I said sarcastically. "You managed to throw your ticket home into the water."

"Will you," said Zuko in frustration, "shut up for once?"

From the flying bison, Katara screamed his name, crying out in hysterics.

And this was, I declare, the first time that I had ever seen Avatar Aang—or any other Avatar for that matter—fall into the Avatar State. It was by far the scariest thing imaginable, and—later on—I was told that Aang's becoming into the Avatar State was not too stretched from the description of what I looked like when I was in my all-powerful defense state. Of course, in both stages, the Avatar and I are at our most vulnerable.

From below the Fire Navy ship, the Avatar turned in the water and began to rise toward the surface. Around him, a mighty whirlpool of water formed; he broke through the surface; the Avatar's eyes and tattoos glowed white, and he broke through the surface in front of our ship, towering over us—high above the bridge atop his swirling maelstrom. I had never felt more afraid in my life; I turned to Zuko, who looked up into the swirling column of water and at the Avatar at its pinnacle with dismay and fear.

Aang landed on the deck, eyes aglow, and Bended the water from the column around him in a circle. It released and expanded outward into a shockwave that blasted Zuko, his men, and me overboard.

When I fell, I was shocked and horrified by what I had seen, so it shouldn't be much of a shock when I tell you that I had to sit in the moving waters for a few minutes to understand what had happened.

With full physical contact—because I was completely submerged up to my neck in the endless ocean with a possibility that I was going to be eaten by a shark or an octopus—or whatever floated in international waters—my defenses kicked in.

Water pulled around me obediently, and I rose with the waves up to the hilt of the deck's edge. I pulled myself onto the deck of the ship. Sokka looked at me nervously.

"Aang, we might have a problem…"

In my stage, my telekinetic powers grabbed hold of the flying bison that prepared to take flight.

Aang became furious, and he powerfully Airbended in my direction; I threw the weapons rack at him, and he dodged successfully.

"This is not normal," Sokka sighed exasperatedly. He threw his boomerang at me; it deflected from me in an invisible shield.

Katara gasped in terror as she turned to look at me.

"Aang, we have to go!"

I turned around, and concentrated on the bodies that floated in the water below. Zuko and several of his soldiers were rescued and pulled on board.

My mind seared with agony as I relented when I saw Zuko safely back on the boat. Appa was released from my control. Problems on board continued to increase as Katara froze the water on the deck, and the soldiers that tried to capture them were mere realistic statues.

Aang flung another blast of air in my general direction. I barely held onto the boat as I was nearly thrown overboard. An apparently woken Iroh and a very annoyed Zuko came to assist me. We three looked up into the sky at the flying bison with utter irritation.

"Shoot—them—down!" Zuko yelled furiously.

Zuko and Iroh, in unison, launched a massive bolt of fire at Appa. The Avatar jumped off the back of the saddle and Airbended the fireball with an impressive gale with his staff. The fireball took a right angle away from the bison and clashed into the ice cliff nearby.

The fireball exploded and released a huge amount of ice from the cliff wall which fell into the narrow channel that the ship was navigating. Zuko gasped in horror—I am pretty sure that I screamed—das the entire channel (and the boat) was blocked (and crushed) under the avalanche of ice.

Iroh and Zuko rose to their feet, both irritated. I pulled myself out of the large pile of white.

"Good news for the Fire Lord," breathed Iroh as he observed the foredeck of the heavily damaged ship. "The nation's greatest threw is just a little kid."

"That kid, Uncle, just did this. I won't underestimate him again."

He turned to the soldiers,

"Did this ship out and follow them!"

Some of the soldiers were using controlled Firebending to thaw out their compatriots whom had been frozen by Katara.

"As soon as you're done with that…" Zuko muttered.

He sighed, obviously frustrated, and turned to me.

I declined quietly.

"Prince Zuko, I truly admire your ambition," I said wearily, "but I can't do this"—I indicated the large amount of ice—"when I'm feeling like my brain is going to burst."

Zuko sighed.

Iroh approached me with a congratulatory smile.

"You did very well, Captain. It's quite astonishing what you can do when you're at your most vulnerable. Isn't it, Prince Zuko?"

Zuko didn't show the same amount of praise as General Iroh; however, his simple nod was sufficient enough. With that sense of recognition, I painfully turned to the heap of ice on the deck, asked my body to forgive me, and stepped onto the large pile.

My limbs were numb with the cold.

Zuko set a hand on my shoulder,

"Let the soldiers do it. You've done enough."

I looked at him.

"It will take hours to shovel this snow out by hand, and a couple for Firebenders to melt it." I reasoned to him softly.

He looked more appreciative as he stepped back.

With what I was about to do, I can explain the amount of pain as this: during a terrible migraine, it's like screaming at somebody while trying to do house work. If nobody has ever had to do this then the lives that you have led, ladies and gentlemen, can't have been all that bad.

When I Bended the water when I was in the ocean, it was out of the necessities to survive, along with the safety to whom I was loyal. When I move the patches of ice, it took all the concentration within my relative circle of infinite power to hoist the huge avalanche of ice off the deck of the ship and to throw it back into the ocean.

I was met with gasps of awe from the soldiers who were unfrozen; Iroh cheered for me from the background. When I turned, Zuko's eyes had widened.

When I had done my duty, I fell to the deck in a collapsed faint, exhausted and in pain.