Forty-seven

Zuko turned from Maya, noticing Aang's return before she did. He stood up, just as Aang looked at him.

"Welcome back," Zuko said.

Aang glared. "Good to be back."

Maya knew what he was about to do, and tried to grab Zuko's wrist to yank him out of the way, but it was too late. Aang released the breath he had been holding, which slammed Zuko into the wall of the cave. At the same time, Aang shot backwards out of the entrance and rolled in the snow.

Maya quickly stood up and helped Zuko to his feet. Then they both chased after Aang, who was trying to wiggle his way through the snow like an inchworm. If it hadn't been such a serious moment, Maya would have found it funny. In another moment, Zuko had Aang by the collar, and picked him up.

"That won't be enough to escape," he said.

Suddenly Aang smiled and shouted, "Appa!"

"Crap," Maya muttered, looking up. Sure enough, there was the Giant Fluff-Monster.

When it landed, Katara jumped down from the saddle and faced Zuko. Zuko promptly threw Aang into the snow and got into a fighting stance. "Here for a rematch?" he asked.

"Trust me, Zuko," she said, contempt clear in her voice. "It's not going to be much of a match."

He shot a single fireball at her, which was quickly nullified by a water shield. And then Katara lifted her hands and Maya watched as the patch of snow that Zuko was standing on lifted into the air and became a column of ice. A second later, she lowered her hands and the ice lowered itself back to the ground at top speed, slamming Zuko into the snow so hard that it knocked him out.

Maya, who had been standing to the side, quickly went over to him and checked that he was still breathing. And then, afraid of what the others might do, she shielded Zuko's body with her own.

Meanwhile, Sokka got down off of Appa's saddle and cut Aang loose from the bindings that Zuko had put him in. "This is some quality rope," he commented, as if that was the most important thing in the world right at that moment.

"We need to get to the oasis," Aang said, completely ignoring him. "The Spirits are in trouble."

That got Maya's attention. "What do you mean?" she asked. But no one answered her.

And then Aang looked back at her, and then at Zuko. He paused. "Wait," he said. "We can't just leave them here."

"Sure we can," Sokka said. "Let's go."

"No. If we leave them, they'll die." He hopped down off of Appa and helped Maya to her feet.

She let him take Zuko onto his back and then allowed him to grab her hand so that he could airbend them all onto Appa.

"Sure," Sokka replied sarcastically. "Let's bring the two people who are constantly trying to kill us."

"I don't think she's ever tried," Aang said, as Appa flew off. He turned to look at Maya. "Have you?"

"No, I haven't," Maya said, feeling awkward. She'd never really spoken to any of these people before.

"Why are you helping Zuko?" Katara demanded. She was very angry.

"Because he needs help," Maya replied, raising an eyebrow at Katara. "But I am not helping him capture you, Aang," she said, looking back at the boy with the arrow on his head. "I'm trying to get him to realize that he shouldn't be chasing after you in the first place, but Zuko is stubborn. Don't worry, though. I'll keep trying."

"How do we know you're telling the truth?" Sokka asked.

Maya sighed. "I suppose you don't. You're just going to have to trust me."

Right at that moment, the sky took on a blood-red hue. Everyone looked up. The moon had turned red. "What the fuck," Maya said.

The girl with the white hair and the fancy clothes put her head in her hands. Maya hadn't noticed she was even there until right then. "I feel faint," she said weakly.

"I feel it, too," Aang said, putting a hand to his head. "The Moon Spirit is in trouble."

"I owe the Moon Spirit my life," the girl said quietly.

"What do you mean?" Sokka asked.

"When I was born," the girl began, "I was very sick and very weak. Most babies cry when they're born, but I was born as if I were asleep, my eyes closed. Our healers did everything they could. They told my mother and father that I was going to die. My father pleaded with the Spirits to save me. That night, beneath the full moon, he brought me to the oasis and placed me in the pond. My dark hair turned white. I opened my eyes and began to cry, and they knew I would live. That's why my mother named me Yuwe, For the Moon."

Everyone was silent after that, absorbing what Yuwe had said. In a few minutes, they had arrived back at the oasis. Quickly, Maya could see that it was Admiral Zhao who had threatened the Moon Spirit. He was holding a wiggling sack and talking about being called the Moon-slayer. Maya wondered for a moment what could possibly be in the sack. That's when she remembered the koi fish in the pond from before, when Zuko had first taken Aang. She looked down into the pond. The black koi fish was alone, and swimming frantically in no discernible pattern.

So the Moon Spirit is a koi fish? Maya thought. Well, shit. Now what?

Obviously, Aang and his friends had an idea. They all hopped off of Appa and got into a ready stance. Maya followed them. She was not about to let Zhao destroy the Moon Spirit.

He laughed. "Don't bother," he said, raising the sack and pointing a fist at it, ready to destroy it with a blast of fire.

"Zhao," Aang said, dropping his staff and putting his hands out in front of him. "Don't."

"It's my destiny," Zhao murmured, as if talking to only himself. "To destroy the Moon. And the Water Tribe."

"Destroying the Moon won't hurt just the Water Tribe," Aang said. "It will hurt everyone, including you. Without the Moon, everything would fall out of balance. You have no idea what kind of chaos that would unleash on the world!"

"He is right, Zhao," said a voice off to the side.

Everyone turned to see who it was. Maya breathed a sigh of relief. Uncle.

"General Iroh," Zhao said, in the most condescending tone he could muster. "Why am I not surprised to discover your treachery?"

"I'm no traitor, Zhao," Uncle said. "The Fire Nation needs the Moon, too. We all depend on the balance." Uncle could see, along with everyone else there, that Zhao was not going to give this up. He tried a different tactic. "Whatever you do to that Spirit," he said angrily, pointing a finger at Zhao, "I'll unleash on you ten-fold! Let it go now!"

And, for a moment, it seemed all would end calmly. Maya watched as the anger slowly drained from Zhao's face. He dropped to his knees and gently released the koi fish back into its pond. She heard everyone there sigh with relief at the same time. The Moon returned to its pale white color. Maya smiled.

And then she looked up in horror as Zhao released a scream of anger, rose to his feet and slashed a line of fire into the pond. Everything was extremely bright for a moment, and then all went utterly dark. Maya could feel tears in her eyes already. She looked up. The moon was gone.