Author Notes: While the progression of the story roughly follows that of the show, many events are changed, arranged in a different order or omitted. This is fan fiction, after all.
"This is the Great Rock?" Kuei looked at the hulking mass of stone that formed the center of the Song Yi Desert. The Desert Sword was parked nearby with a bored Bosco juggling some balls from his pack while balancing another on his nose. The Sand benders that had helped them earlier had joined up with a larger contingent of their tribe, leaving the Earth King and his companions alone with the rock people said came from the gods.
"None other," Mitsu took out his staff.
"What now?" Kuei looked around, seeing only sand bender sails and the Rock.
"Take us to the top of the Rock," Mitsu pointed. "Use Earthbending to take the Desert Sword with us, I think we'll need it."
Kuei shrugged and got into the vehicle with Bosco. Soon the ATV was riding up the sheer walls of the Great Rock, all three inside excitingly yelling at the great speed. Kuei in particular was really happy; speed was somewhat a guilty pleasure for the King formerly trapped in the mono-rhythmic Ba Sing Se. The ATV thudded onto the flat top of the Rock and screeched to a halt near its center. Mitsu got out and planted his titanium rod in the ground.
"Didn't this place have a door like those houses down there?" Kuei could see the old town at the Rock's rim.
"The Avatar, Toph Bei Fong and me sunk the House of Knowledge to save it. I can't lift it without at least fifty master level Earthbenders and the Avatar to help." Mitsu turned the rod like a key.
"So we're going down?" Kuei looked at the setting sun. "It's getting dark."
"There's enough glow-crystal in there to make sure we don't know the difference," Mitsu raised his staff. "Focus on this spot and we'll be under a roof in no time."
Kuei focused his feet on the small hole left by Mitsu' s staff, spiraling a larger hole in the ground with his arms.
"You're awfully good at Earthbending, Bosco must have been a good teacher," Mitsu rested his staff on his shoulders and smiled at his brother.
"I really had nothing else to do in the palace, everyone else wanted to do everything for me. Including living for me," Kuei widened his arc and Mitsu hopped upwards and hovered as the hole got bigger. "That will never happen again, although I don't think I'll be so bored anymore."
"Being self taught makes you think in ways people don't expect. You should meet Toph, she learned straight from the Badger Moles."
The hole revealed a blue door in the ground with a no handle but an ornate metal latch in the middle. Bosco nervously edged the ATV closer to the hole, where Kuei made a ramp for it.
"The Badger Moles? She must be pretty good if that's the case! I haven't seen one since we were little kids, remember?"
"Of course I remember," Mitsu laughed and patted his brother on the back. "Running with spades in the dirt, falling over the baby badger moles in the nursery. I remember wanting one so bad I almost took one baby home!"
"But not before its mother grabbed you and dragged you both back! They may be blind but they're not stupid." Kuei laughed as Bosco joined them.
"Toph is blind as well, so that makes her even more unique," Mitsu looked westwards.
"Hey, is she your girlfriend?" Kuei elbowed his brother. "You talk about her all the time."
"Girlfriend? I've never asked, let alone asked her out," Mitsu found his cheeks reddening. "Speaking of which, we can't be seen out here. I'll open this and you guys Earthbend the Desert Sword down after you hear my voice."
Mitsu touched the metal latch, letting his bending take care of the gears and mini-locks inside. There was no key here; a Heretic would find their own trademark way in, as with the shrine in Ba Sing Se. Chao Dong of the Northern Water Tribe, for instance picked it with cloth while his Southern tribesman Maki filled it with oil and over-lubricated the mechanism. Mitsu heard the final lock click open as the door swung inwards, leading to a small tube.
"This was the topmost tower of the Library," he gazed down into the hole. "I'll get down there, and you'll see the rod come back up and show you the spot to Earthbend right down."
Mitsu dived head first into the darkness as stars began to appear in the sky behind him, the first signs of night. Buzzards would be coming soon, as night was their feasting time. He landed on the soft floor of the top level, reserved for maps and histories of kingdoms long gone in the Earth Kingdom. Patting the ceiling he sent the titanium rod up, bending it into a drill tip. Soon the Desert Sword was down there with the entire group and the door was closed and covered with Earth. Green crystals covered the walls, shimmering as Kuei touched them.
"So these were your digs for…six years now?"
"Forever," Mitsu put a book back in place after picking it up off the floor. "I could live here forever. We can stay here for a while until we move on."
"Why do we have to move on? This place looks like a safe fortress," Kuei opened a book that was nearly half his size.
"Ba Sing Se was a safe fortress," Mitsu growled. "We have to stop thinking like Earthbenders and a bit more like the Avatar. He's been traveling almost non-stop for the past six months, trying to learn everything he can before the arrival of Sozin's Comet. You're the Earth King, and it's my job to teach you until we find a better teacher."
Kuei shut the massive book with a dust cloud forming. "Better teacher? Ishi, you know a hell of a lot more than me, that' s why I shoved the robes in your face as soon as you came home. I'm not worthy and I know it."
"That's why you have to be king. I can't stay with you, Shin Kuei," Mitsu used the King's seldom used birth name. "The Avatar needs me and the power of the Golden Path if he's going to win. Still, he also needs to know that people have got his back over here. Do you understand?"
"No, I don't understand! Why can't I travel with you and your friends?" Kuei crossed his arms.
"Our kingdom is huge, and you have to realize we've already gone further than you've ever been your whole life! We can't help anyone if we're out there traveling like a bunch of lost children!" Mitsu made a fist. "We need to give the Avatar some peace so he can do what he needs."
"He can't launch that invasion of his yet," Kuei looked at a star chart. "Even if he does reach that day, it's not like he's got the army behind him now."
"He's got many friends from all over, plus the Water Tribe warriors are still here I hope. Yet the people here need help. We need to give the Earth Kingdom somewhere to rally to distract the Fire Nation. We are going to get the Big City back," Mitsu cracked his knuckles.
"Omashu?" Kuei blinked, "What good would that do?"
"There's a resistance there led by a Colonel Wong and some of the locals. But for now, we rest. The bedrooms are down that hallway. You two get some rest, we're going into town tomorrow to get news and stuff."
"Fine, fine," the bespectacled ex-King snapped his fingers and Bosco followed him down the hallway.
The aisles were just as Mitsu left them ages ago when he first met Aang, although now that they were underground, it felt damp and dingy. Aang once asked how people got up to the higher shelves without a ladder. To Sokka's annoyance Mitsu stated that any bender worth their salt would find a way up, noting the presence of small water pools, the fire-proof earthen floor while of course, an Airbender could merely spout up. That was why the monks probably read the most in this library, the one for master benders of all arts. Its former keeper was a different sort of Bender of course, but that only made him more suitable to the task. Mitsu threw open a pair of heavy doors into an adjoining chamber, which contained no books but an ornate crystal chair raised on a small platform. Some spider bats cackled as he walked through their webs but Mitsu paid no heed to them.
"It's time, it's destiny," Mitsu dusted off the crystal chair and sat on it. He was soon fast asleep, finally overcome by his trials. The chair seemed to resonate with his breathing, glowing and dimming as he exhaled. The world seemed to fade away as his dreams took him to far away lands, to far away people. They took him to the distant past and the possible futures that could happen. He saw ash and rubble, he saw glory and prosperity, he saw uncertainty for all four nations. The chair vibrated slowly, soothing his nerves and his exhausted limbs as he slept, dreaming of his friends far west and friends he would see in the future, clouded in shadow. He saw the tired old uncle he was forced to abandon in Ba Sing Se, he saw his confused nephew with his facial scars. The Dream Chair would help anyone who desired it, but even it or its occupant couldn't save the Earth Kingdom alone.
"He carries one heavy burden," a spirit stared at the dreaming Heretic as his body ignored all outside stimuli.
"Long Jin, he may be the last of our kind," another stepped out of the shadows.
"As long as there is bending there will be those who adventure into the unknown and seemingly forbidden," the former rogue Earthbender turned to Kari Omoto, former rogue Airbender.
"He now has three paths to choose from. His brother, the Avatar and his Path," the bearded spirit folded his hands into his robe sleeves.
"I am an Airbender, we walk all paths at the same time as all the sky covers all the lands," Kari raised his hands as his eyes and hand tattoos glowed in the part-darkness. "His destiny will not abandon any of those paths," Kari danced through the air. "For he is the Lode Master, the divinely guided herald of the spirit world."
"He is a boy, Kari. Such lofty titles are for people who write books and histories long after their possessors perish. Mitsu Ishihara is a boy, the Avatar is a boy and the Earth King is barely an adult himself. Do not burden any of them with expectations they do not know how to meet." Long Jin turned his back to the snoozing Force Bender.
"They will have to meet them," Kari turned round. "The world depends on all of them, no matter how small the role they think they will play."
"No role is too small, my son," Kari Tsung stepped beside her son, eyes glowing white. "People elevate themselves to greatness from small beginnings, even the Avatars grew from children once. You would do well to remember what you left in this library long ago as almost a triviality."
"How would that trinket help the state of the world?" Omoto looked at his mother in bemusement. "It was but a hairpiece, the only thing I found in Roku's cabin before his entire home was lost."
"Enough, Omoto you are also showing the ignorance of youth," Long Jin held his hand out to Mitsu, who stirred. "He will find that 'trinket' and you will see how valuable it is to the world."
The three faded back into the shadows as Mitsu fell back into his dreams, raising one leg onto the arm of the crystal seat. His mind wandered far and wide across the land as it did the numerous other times he slept in this chair of smoothed crystal, seeing people in his dreams that were almost real.
"Ishi, are you asleep?" Mitsu stirred to his brother's voice.
"What are you wearing?" The Earth King held his arms akimbo to show his newly-found apron while behind him Bosco adjusted a chef hat.
"I'm hungry, aren't you? Come on, I apprenticed to the royal chef for quite some time, and you have a pretty good selection down there in the cellar."
"There's food down there?" Mitsu pulled himself off the Dream Chair.
"Quite well preserved grain, plus there's rock candy and water! There must have been a lot of people in here once," Kuei smoothed out hi apron.
"Once, there were hundreds of us," Mitsu ran his hand over the crystal chair, making it hum. "Their scholars would sit in this chair and commune with the Spirit World. They said this crystal came from the center of the Earth."
"Like the pool of the Northern Water Tribe," Kuei rubbed his chin. "The Generals told me about it once, although they never saw it. Let me have a seat," the King replaced his brother on the glowing chair.
"Careful, Kuei!" Mitsu reached for his brother, who seemed to settle into the crystalline seat quite nicely.
"Ishi, bro…" Kuei took a deep breath. "You won't believe what I'm seeing…"
As he opened his eyes, they began to glow violet.