Brothers Avatar
The Legend of Two Avatars
Book 1 – Family
Chapter 10 – The Ship
Tanton pulled an all-nighter that night, every town they passed through Tanton whinnied, asking if she could rest, but every time Minege said, "Sorry, baby, we can't stop because Lozulia likes to pull stunts."
"I'm sorry, I run on intuition." Lozulia sat in sadness.
Minege turned back, "And you expect Tanton to run on it too?" Lozulia squirmed in her guilt.
"Can you run through it one more time, why did you send those letters?" Xulo said. Dawn was about to break on day one of their three day time limit, the only ones who weren't able to fall asleep on Tanton were Lozulia—partly because of her body-shaking remorse—and Xulo, because he never could stand the rocking.
"The same reason I sent those letters to set up the Team Avatar press event," Lozulia said, "I really care about this team and I want to make sure we keep moving forward and succeed."
"Couldn't we have succeeded while not on a massive time crunch?"
"I was scared someone else would take her out before we did." Lozulia's eyes welled up. "I'm sorry it's just this thing with my mind and I get so paranoid…"
Xulo laid back and tried to close his eyes, "I won't try to say I understand you or have gotten you in the past, but it'll be alright."
"We can make it to the Eastern Air Temple in three days easy, I just," she swallowed, "I don't want you to be mad at me, or your brother or anyone else on the team."
Xulo exhaled, "The team will moan and complain but I'll tell them to lay off." Xulo opened his eyes and never were they so forceful, "But do not do this again."
"Understood." Lozulia never heard a warning quite so clear.
Hours went by until finally Lozulia could feel the sea breeze blowing through her slightly frizzy hair. "Wake up everyone, we're here." Everyone opened their eyes and saw the wonderful seaside town of Hainan.
Ibera raised first and the most painfully, "Nothing like waking up the alluring scent of fish." The others started to get whiffs of the ocean, "Did I ever tell you guys how much I hate fish?"
"Don't worry, we know you hate everything." Pio groaned at he stretched his back out.
The team walked around the port, eventually stumbling into the fish market. Cods, salmon and all other types of fish flew through the air as people yelled in all directions, Woorq was nearly the victim of getting slapped by fish fluttering behind the group. The team was intent on finding a ship that would take them to the Eastern Air Temple. With each fisherman they asked, however, they were met with rejection and person passionately against the idea of risking Cersiek's wrath. Hopeless as it seemed, they had no time to take a break, it was then they saw Captain Kreffti.
"Boat rides to Mudide!" The full-bodied woman yelled, "Safest ride in all the seas."
Lozulia unfurled her map, she checked rapidly for Mudide, "That's right here." She pointed to the bottom of the peninsula north of the Eastern Air Temple. "This is great, she's experienced with those waters. I bet she could take us to the temple."
"She does look rather brave." Taresc said.
Ibera snickered, "Brave what? The buffet line?" Pio elbowed him in the ribs.
The team approached the hearty woman, "Excuse us, Madam?" Pio opened.
"What can I do you for?" Her voice was raspy, like her lungs ran on smoke.
"You don't happen to be the captain of your own ship, are you?" he asked.
"That'd be right, Captain Kreffti's boat rides, would you kids like to buy a ticket?" She smiled so that the team could see every tooth still in her mouth.
"Well we were wondering if we could rent your boat for ourselves." Pio said.
She closed her mouth, "Why would you need that, if I can ask." She suddenly sprung a face of knowing, "Ahh, I know. Group marriage honeymoon."
The team was mortified; they looked at each other imagining being married to the people beside them, "Not at all, Madam, we want you to take us to the Eastern Air Temple."
Kreffti's carefree demeanor suddenly shifted to panic, "The Eastern Air Temple, where that General girl is?" Kreffti began packing up her signs and other business items, "No way, no how, I'm not risking my hide to go to the Eastern Air Temple, that's Stormbender waters and I'm not ready to pass with my life." She had all of her belongings under her arms, "And what would a bunch of kids want with the Stormbenders…" She dropped her things on the ground with shock painting her face. "Oh no, kids, no. You're all so young, you have your lives ahead of you," She put a hand on Pio's shoulder, "You don't have to sell your lives away to the Stormbenders."
"No! That's hardly what we're doing!" Pio brushed off her meaty hand, "The exact opposite, actually."
Xulo stepped in, "We're going to defeat Cersiek and free the temple."
Kreffti was squatting to pick up her instruments of commerce, "Taking on old Cersiek?" She stopped squatting and started pondering, "What are your chances of winning?"
Xulo sighed and held out his palm, with his fingers he bent a tiny cyclone and with his other he set it on fire, "You're Avatar Xulo, I heard of you."
Pio looked at Lozulia, "News travels fast, huh? I guess that whole affair wasn't useless."
Kreffti was wracking her mind, "If I took you guys and you defeat Cersiek then finally I could get some real business going. I'd also be able to fire those good for nothing waterbenders…" The team looked hopeful, "But there's still the risk of getting caught." Kreffti looked into Lozulia's horrifically rueful eyes and she said, "Alright, I'll take you there. I believe in the children, I really do. I hope one day you'll make it up to me, you're old friend Captain Kreffti."
"Thanks Captain, do we—" Taresc said.
"Ah ah ah." Kreffti waggled her finger, "There's one thing, I need 50 gold coins."
Lozulia searched for words, "But- but what about the children!"
"I believe in children, oh yes I do, but that belief isn't going to pay my workers or fill my belly." She pitifully rubbed her stomach, "50 gold coins are how much I would get for a full boat."
"Well looking at your bucket-o-wealth," Ibera turned everyone's head to Kreffti's pail, holding two gold coins, "It doesn't look like you're expecting a full boat, hm?"
Kreffti laughed, "Okay, okay, so business has been rough lately, with the Stormbenders getting more ferocious in their search for the Avatar, thanks for that by the way." Xulo scratched his head, "There's still the cost of risk and that totals to 50 gold coins."
"We'll do 15," Ibera made unwavering eye contact with Kreffti, "That'll be satisfactory, right, old friend." Ibera gave an insincere wink.
Kreffti held her bulging belly as she laughed, "You drive a hard bargain boy, but 15 will do just fine."
Ibera began reaching into his knapsack and Minege whispered into Ibera's ear, "Ibera, sweetie, we don't have 15 gold coins."
Just then Ibera reached his hand into a coin purse, looked at the currency in his hand and dropped it into the bucket, "I do."
"Wonderful!" Kreffti rattled the coins in the bucket and chuckled to herself, "I'm sorry, I hate to tell you this but I probably still would have done it for 10."
"Good, cuz that's all I gave you." Her face turned pale, "Watch out for the children, Capt'n, they're getting crafty."
Team Avatar's solo voyage to Eastern Air Temple began without a hitch, Kreffti wrangled her crew in as fast as possible so they could part from Hainan immediately. The crew started shoving coal into the engine and soon they were chugging through sea.
Being 'the most safest way to Mudide,' Kreffti came up with a brilliant way of protecting her ship from Stormbenders and pillagers. Kreffti hired a host of waterbenders as shipmates but also they served a second function: fog. As soon as they got a fair distance from land, the waterbenders on the ship would bend a think veil of misty fog to surround the ship. From the outside it was nearly impossible to make out the form of the ship.
Taresc looked over the side of the ship, looking deeply at the shifting shapes of water hitting the boat. Woorq sat beside him on the railing, staring into the mist. Taresc couldn't free his mind from worry. Before today the crusade felt like a dream to him, like some divine joke being played on him. But in a short amount of time, he would be facing off against a General of one of the biggest forces in the world. He could feel the emotions welling in face, but he suppressed them, he didn't want to burden his brother any more than he had to.
"Tare-oorq!" Lozulia popped up from out of nowhere.
Taresc looked up from his sea watching, "Tare-oorq? Is that Woorq's and my combined name?"
"Duh, it's so tiring having to say both of your names." Taresc chuckled tenderly, "Whatcha doing?"
"Looking out at the sea."
Lozulia looked out and saw a blanket of fog. "Beautiful, I see the appeal."
"Well, all I have is down here." Taresc directed her attention to the sliver of sea crashing against the ship.
"Now that's just not going to do." Lozulia cracked her knuckles, she took a step back and launched a barrage of fire out against the fog. "Look, quick!" Lozulia's fire cut a window through the fog and they were able to see a beautiful visage of the sunny sea for a moment until the fog reformed and blocked the way once again, "Nice, right?"
"Yeah." Taresc smiled but Lozulia detected something wrong.
"What's going on in your mind?"
Taresc bit his lip, "It reminds me of Dayue. Xulo and I had a little boat we'd take out on the water sometimes. We'd go out so far and we could see the Western Air Temple, as soon as Xulo saw it, he would want to go further, all the way and visit the air nomads but I never let him because I was scared we wouldn't be able to come back." Taresc opened his eyes, "I feel like I'm coming full circle." Lozulia stared empathetically into his eyes, "Xulo wants to go to the Air Temple but I don't want to because," Taresc cleared his throat, "I'm scared we won't be able to come back."
Lozulia couldn't possibly come up with the words to ease his heart but she tried, "Tare, There's no chance of us not coming back, Xulo will make certain of that." Taresc heard those words in his head already but they did nothing to calm, "And me too. I swear I won't let anything happen to you, or your brother or anyone for that matter!" Lozulia had no clue if it'd mean anything to him, but she needed to make it known. "Plus Woorq! That thing will destroy anything that tries to come near you. I can see it in his eyes." Lozulia backed away from Woorq in fear.
"Thank you, Zuli." He weakly grinned.
Suddenly the sheet of fog dropped all at once, they were able to see the blinding sunlight and the whole sea once again. "What's happening?" Lozulia said.
"Cut the engine!" They heard Kreffti yell.
Lozulia and Taresc ran to what seemed like mutiny on the front deck, "We're not bending anymore!" a waterbender yelled.
"Come on, boys, why do you all have to break up this perfect harmony we have going?" Kreffti pleaded.
"The perfect harmony where you get most of the money and we get zilch? I'll happily break that up." Another waterbender snapped.
"Hey now, that is hardly fair. I let you all sleep on my ship for free!" Kreffti scoffed, "You benders are so entitled, you think just cus you have these special powers you deserve more." Kreffti muttered under her breath, "striking in the middle of a voyage? Shows how thankful you are."
"You let us stay on the boat because it's free security! You said so one night while we were drinking."
"I did?" Kreffti rubbed her neck, "Huh, imagine that."
Taresc and Lozulia looked around and saw Xulo beckoning them along with the rest of Team Avatar. They met on the backside of the boat, "I'm assuming you all heard that?"
"No mist without gold," Ibera said, "Really a fair trade if you think about it." He said sarcastically.
"I seems like Captain Kreffti is unwilling to move the boat until the fog is back up." Pio said.
"Is this your first time seeing fog, Pio?" Ibera said.
"No, thank you for asking!" Pio sulked, "Although, seeing a ship… it's a little new…" he said quietly, "And before you ask, I could produce fog around the boat but it'd be significantly far from the opaque class Kreffti is looking for."
"Not even with both of us," Xulo chimed in, "we can't bend with the power of ten waterbenders."
"So we need to convince the waterbenders to continue working under tyranny." Ibera said, "Easy enough."
"What's our plan?" Taresc asked.
Xulo pushed Taresc and Lozulia off to the side, "You two are going to go down below and relax."
"This seems hardly fair," Ibera whined, "Do I smell favoritism," Ibera took an exaggerated whiff and nearly gagged, "Nope, still just fish. Did I mention I hate fish?"
"Taresc said he wanted a day off and I'm not going to break that promise, Lozulia didn't get any sleep on our way here and needs to rest." Minege began raising her hand, "Lozulia is necessary for tomorrow's mission, you can sleep while we're taking on Cersiek." Minege testily lowered her hand.
Taresc and Lozulia agreed and started walking down the stairs to the sleeping quarters when they heard Xulo saying, "Okay, team, I have some fun ideas for getting the crew back to work."
Walking into the dark sleeping quarters wasn't an immediately comforting. It was a rectangular room with a couple tables with playing cards strewn about. The duo found two comfortable looking hammocks and jumped in vertically to each other. "This isn't so bad." The area had a good deal of character to it, cut into the walls of the ship were pictures of family, friends, pet or whatever the crew needed remembrance of. Amongst the pictures were crass carvings of the Captain in various scenes of her destruction: Kreffti getting torn apart by buzzard-sharks, Kreffti drowning while the crew laughs or Kreffti choking on her daily mutton, their love for their captain was apparent on the wall.
The two talked for a bit, they discussed what their favorite food was, favorite book they've ever read. They talked a little bit about how attractive Ibera was to Lozulia's dismay and how Pio probably memorized a dictionary and how he proud probably felt about it. They laughed their drowsy laughter as the boat creaked and sway in place.
"What's going on in your mind, Lozulia?" Taresc asked from above.
Lozulia sat in silence for a second, "Thoughts."
"You can do better than that."
"I honestly can't." Lozulia pulled back.
"Try for me?"
"I'm nervous." Lozulia carefully considered how she continued forward, "I'm nervous about so many things right now that they don't even have forms anymore. I'm just worried about this blob called, 'everything.'" Lozulia could only make out one figure in that blob, Taresc. In the beginning, Taresc wasn't even on her radar; he was just the awkward brother along for the ride. Then she learned about his secret and how vulnerable he truly was. Something about him pulled her in, perhaps it was how different they were. Lozulia was wild and rarely wanted to give anything a thought more than it needed, Taresc was controlled and collected and you could tell when he was thinking about something, sometimes more than needed. Lozulia holds her secrets tight, she'll never let a person know her real thoughts; Taresc was open, if you wanted to know how he was feeling you just had to ask. With the more she learned the more she fell in love and the more the thought of losing him scared her. There was still one thing that bugged her, "Who's Lido?" She asked.
The question sent a shock through his system, "Lido?"
"Xulo was yelling about him in the swamp, I was wondering if you could tell me who he is."
"Lido was Xulo's and my little brother." Taresc tone was somber.
"Can you tell me happened?" Lozulia pried a little further.
Taresc inhaled a painful breath, "Why not. Xulo and I weren't the best of friends growing up." Lozulia remembered Minege saying as such. "Xulo was a real jerk to me and we fought just about every day with him winning most of the time. Poor Lido was always in the middle of it, he would come between us and tell us to stop when our tempers flared up. He was the peacekeeper; we both loved him dearly and honestly didn't want him to see his brothers fighting with each other. In fact, we would always bring him along on those boat trips I was talking about earlier."
"Is that why you look so fondly on those trips, because Lido was there?" Lozulia asked.
"I think so, it was the only time Xulo and I got along, for Lido," Taresc smiled, "Funny thing was he also really wanted to go to the Western Air Temple, there was this thing with him and that damn temple, he looked at that temple like he thought all of our problems would disappear if we just went there one time. Maybe it's because he looked up to Xulo so much," Taresc smile faded, "he was the stronger and cooler brother. One day, Xulo and I got into this giant fight about… something, I honestly can't remember and neither can he. It was rainy that day and like always our argument ended with us getting into a fight. This time was different though, I was winning for once, maybe it was mud that Xulo wasn't used to bending. Lido came to try and stop us, he screamed through the rain for us to end but neither of us was willing this time. I could finally win this time and Xulo was not going to lose for the first time, so we ignored him. We thought Lido was just going to stay and watch, but after a while, we looked over and he wasn't there."
"Where did he go?" Lozulia said in suspense.
"We checked back at our house to see if he was there, he wasn't. Then one of us, I can't remember," Trauma clearly took its toll on Taresc, "One of us came up with the idea that maybe he was at the shore, so we raced there. When we got there, Lido wasn't waiting at the shore like we thought; he was in the boat, trying to get to the Western Air Temple. The storm was rough on the sea; his boat was rocking really violently. We yelled at the top of our lungs for him to get back, but that boy kept rowing. It was just as the lightning flashed," Taresc was chocked by his tears and couldn't speak, "his boat turned over and we never saw Lido come up. Xulo ran into that water like he himself was drowning, he swam for Lido at desperate speeds."
"You didn't go too?"
"I couldn't swim at the time, it tore me up. It felt like days waiting at the shoreline, praying that I'd see Xulo swim back with a little head on his shoulder." Taresc clutched his clothing.
"He didn't find him? That means he could still be alive, Taresc." Lozulia was full of hope.
Taresc let the tears stream, "He found Lido. He found Lido after the fifth try. He found Lido at the bottom of the ocean." Lozulia began to cry too, "Lido wasn't breathing, but Xulo tried so hard to change that. Once it was apparent what had happened, we just hugged each other and sobbed in the pouring rain, with Lido lying cold on the sand."
Lozulia remembered Minege saying something about a tragedy, it was apparent what that tragedy was, "What happened afterwards?"
Taresc caught his breath, "We didn't talk to a single other person other than each other for weeks afterwards. Xulo doesn't like this part, but he would cry for days straight, and I held him tight. We both felt so guilty, it was the worst feeling I've ever felt."
"Were you crying?"
"No, I didn't, not after that night. It wasn't that I was over it, it was just that Xulo needed me and I couldn't be there for him and myself." Lozulia was surprised at his amount of compassion and subsequently fell for him a little further, "We were inseparable after Lido passed, Xulo became very protective of me since I was his only family at that point."
"He was strong and you were emotionally strong." Lozulia declared.
"I wouldn't consider myself emotionally strong, I cry rather often as you know, but if Xulo needs me, I'll suck it up." Taresc remembered something, "Oh yeah, promise not to tell Xulo? We promised that we wouldn't talk about it with anyone, especially the part about him being weak."
"Promise." Lozulia said drowsily.
"Are you falling asleep?" Taresc looked over.
Lozulia smacked her lips, "Yeah, the crying really tired me out." She turned over in her hammock. "Thanks for telling me, Taresc."
"It must've been soo hard." He voice was getting softer and softer.
"It's okay, I'm better now," Taresc looked over his hammock, "Alright, I'll stop bothering you."
"Taresc?" Her voice was nearly inaudible.
"Yeah?"
She was falling deep into sleep, "I think I love you." She trailed off and suddenly she off in the land of nod. Taresc was stunned, the thought of Lozulia having feelings for a low-rent-Avatar like himself never wandered into his mind. He couldn't think too much as he himself began to slip into sleep; the last thought in his mind was how he loved her too.
"Taresc!" Ibera whispered loudly into Taresc's ear.
He awoke with a start, "Ibera." Taresc had to catch his breath, "What is it?"
"We need your help." It was obvious that Ibera was panicked, "Badly."
Ibera and Taresc arose to the surface where it seemed to heading into dusk. Xulo was pacing hysterically on the fogless deck, "Ibera! I told you not to wake Taresc."
"We need him, Xulo." Ibera gripped Taresc by the shoulders, "Kreffti is threatening to turn the ship around and head back to port." Then Ibera got wilder, "And she's not going to give me a refund."
Xulo was ashamed but realized the gravity of the situation, "Taresc, can you help?"
Taresc was borderline uncomfortable from the desperation in their eyes, "What have you guys tried?"
"Well, I started by sending Pio in as a secret operative. Since he was a waterbender, I thought he'd be able to fit in and use that swampbender charm of his to persuade them to get back to work." Xulo said.
"Pio was immediately overwhelmed by the slang and lingo they used and he didn't know." Ibera scowled, "He had to take a breather to collect himself. That plan was over."
"Then I thought that Ibera would be able to convince them that:" Xulo motioned for Ibera to finish the sentence.
"A free spirit is a demonic spirit." He said wryly, "So I was telling them that by being free from Kreffti they were risking losing their freedom, cue pregnant Minege."
Taresc cringed, "You did not…"
"We stuffed Minege's shirt with some feathers we found and pretended that Ibera got her pregnant in his wild endeavors. And it was very effective…" Xulo paused, "Until all the feathers fell out."
"What else?" Taresc was scared to ask.
"Well we sent Pio in again." Xulo said.
"Did not work. Again." Ibera said.
Taresc looked around, "Where is he now, also Minege?"
"Our current plan." Xulo looked down in absolute shame.
Ibera looked like he was on the verge of tears, "We sent Tanton and Woorq in to just start biting people."
Taresc barely had a response, "Why?"
"WE DON'T KNOW!" Ibera then began to cry screamingly.
Taresc looked at the broken men in front of him, unsure of how they could be so ignorant to the easy solution. "Come with me."
He led them to the bow of the ship where the horrific scene of Tanton nipping at people and Woorq slapping waterbenders with his tongue. Taresc got onto a higher platform and whistled for people's attention, "Hello?" Everyone looked at him, "Hi, my name is Taresc. I'm Xulo's brother; I know that it's been a real difficult day. Well, we really need you guys to start bending the fog again."
"Why should we do that?" A waterbender yelled.
"We really need to get to the Eastern Air Temple, I know it's not something to brag about, but we want revenge. A couple weeks ago, a group of Stormbenders came to our village and killed everyone." The waterbenders immediately lowered their guard, "Everyone we had ever known died that day, we don't want anyone to ever have to face something like we did." People began talking amongst themselves, "I understand that Captain Kreffti is awful and I would be lying if I said that she treated you guys was right." Everyone stared at Kreffti, "But I just ask that you do your job one more time. Just once and you can leave to do whatever you want."
All the waterbenders looked at each other and nodded; they headed back to their stations and began bending the fog back, "Fire up the engine again!" Kreffti yelled with glee.
Taresc stepped down from the platform and saw the shocked and impressed Ibera and Xulo, "You just need a little sincerity." Taresc shrugged.
After hours of traveling, night had fallen and Kreffti yelled out, "We're nearly there, be ready to get off."
"Everyone, get ready," He gave directions for everyone, "Ibera, go grab Lozulia." He turned to Minege and Taresc, "You two, go grab your pets." Everyone went their separate ways, getting ready for the fight of their lives.
Xulo shook with the anticipation of taking out a General, when suddenly he felt droplets of water fall onto his skin; he looked around and noticed the fog fell, "I didn't say release the fog!" Kreffti yelled. The waterbenders looked at each other perplexedly, it seemed clear to them that none of them brought the fog down. "If it wasn't you, who was it?"
Xulo looked in the distance and he saw on the mountainside of the Eastern Air Temple there were various figures illuminated by torchlight. He immediately recognized them as Stormbenders, but there was one at the top, dressed differently than the rest.
The girl stood there with a kooky smile and two buns in her hair. "Caught ya." She said, there was no doubt in Xulo's mind that this was Cersiek. Suddenly the Stormbenders on the mountain began to move their arms in unison.
"What are they doing?" Pio said. No one else on the boat seemed to notice the figures on the mountain.
Xulo then started to feel the boat rock more than usual, he knew exactly what they were doing, "Everyone hold onto something!"
From the Eastern Air Temple a giant wave emerged from the shore, thrice, if not quadruple the height of the boat. It raced right for them and pushed the boat a considerable length until the wave collapsed on itself with the boat inside. The boat splintered into tiny pieces under the might of the tsunami. People on the boat screamed, especially Kreffti, everyone was tossed into the sloshing sea. Xulo yelled for his team, but could barely stay afloat in the turbulent currents to see anyone. He could feel his consciousness waning as he got dragged down and air left his lungs. The last thought he had before he blacked out was wondering if the moon was as pretty the day Lido drowned as it was now.