The White Lotus War
Chapter 10: Imprisoned By Water
Hitomi woke up with her head throbbing from pain. She found herself in a luxurious bedroom and tucked neatly into her surprisingly comfortable bed. When she got up and looked outside the window however, she found that she was on the surface of water! She must have been taken onto a ship after Gao knocked her unconscious! She roared in frustration; she couldn't believe that Gao, the young man that made her act like a complete love struck moron, ambushed her and placed her on a boat, far away from her element!
As the metal door to her room made a "clicking" sound and squeaked opened, she quickly turned around to find an elegantly Fire Nation style dressed man holding a clipboard.
He said, "Captain Gao wishes to invite you and your friend for lunch on the main deck."
Hitomi growled at the man and said, "You tell Gao that the next time I see his face, I'm going to tear out and shred it to pieces!"
The man flinched in fear, seeing that she was not in the mood to be bothered. He stuttered in fear as he said, "B-But the c-captain will n-not allow you t-to leave your room otherwise."
"I don't care!" Hitomi roared. Her roar scared the man into closing the door and running away. Hitomi paced around the room angrily, trying to figure out a way to find Yuko and get off the ship. First, how was she going to get out of her room?
Then she realized, she didn't hear a "click" when he shut the door! That must've meant that he left the door unlocked. She checked, and sure enough, the door creaked open. Hitomi congratulated herself on scaring the guy so much that he forgot to lock the door.
She slowly raced down the steel hallways, trying to find either Yuko or some dirt or coal that she could use to bend with. The halls and rooms were clean of any dirt or earth; Gao must've taken extra precautions before ambushing her. She opened several doors until she accidentally opened the one door that leads her out onto the main deck. On the main deck was a picnic with lots of sandwiches, side dishes, vegetables, and even different types of bread. On the main deck were a bunch of guards, Yuko in handcuffs, and Gao, who was now dressed in a handsome black uniform.
Gao was drinking a glass of some white liquid when Hitomi came through the door. He placed the drink down and said, "Avatar Hitomi, it was nice of you to reconsider my offer. Would you please have a seat?"
Hitomi looked around her. There were way too many guards to fight off. The majority of them looked like fire benders. They were wearing black uniforms similar to Gao's, but she could tell they were fire benders by looking at their golden eyes. Other than Gao, she couldn't tell if there were any water benders surrounding her. Still, without any earth to bend, she wasn't exactly given the choice to fight. She unwillingly forced herself to walk over to the picnic and sit down next to Yuko.
"Did you actually say yes when the guy asked you to attend the picnic?" Hitomi asked Yuko angrily.
Yuko shrugged and answered, "Sorry, I missed breakfast. I got hungry."
A guard was about to place handcuffs on Hitomi, but Gao said, "Please, no handcuffs for the Avatar. She may be our enemy, but she is also an honored guest on my ship. Besides, she is far away from any earth."
"A guest?" Hitomi asked with frustration.
"Despite our current positions, you're still the Avatar. Though we may be approaching different goals in terms of order in the world, I see no reason why I should treat you or your friend like prisoners on my vessel."
Yuko smartly remarked in anger, "Oh what a gentleman! I'm completely flattered! Well if you're such a gentleman, how about taking these handcuffs off of me?"
Gao answered, "I'm no idiot. I witnessed your incredible strength when you kept that getaway car from hitting us."
A question popped into Hitomi's head, "Wait a second; you said you're my enemy right?" Gao nodded and she continued, "Then wouldn't that mean you worked with some guys called the Chief and Fu Lang?"
"I am familiar with Fu Lang and the Chief, yes."
"Then why did you stop Lang's thugs from fleeing the city?"
"Yeah," Yuko added, "You must've known that Fu Lang heard about how Hitomi completely thrashed the Chief and took down his tank operation! He would've wanted to get out of there as quickly as possible!"
"I didn't know about the Chief's defeat or Lang's retreat!" Gao said with shock. He turned to the jumpy Fire Nation guy with the clip board and asked, "Why wasn't I told about this?"
"Please don't look at me sir!" he said fearfully, even though Gao didn't use a scary voice or face when he asked the question, "The Boss has his advisors send me hawks telling of the events that happen within our operation! I didn't receive any news involving the Chief or Mr. Lang!"
That brought up another question to Hitomi, "Who is this Boss? Who are you working for?"
"I can't tell you his name," Gao informed her, "All I can tell you is that he's powerful and he's been preparing to take down the White Lotus for as long as anyone can remember."
Hitomi started to take in what he just said. The man he was working for wanted to destroy the White Lotus? Can anyone even do that? No, the White Lotus was too powerful. They were made up of the greatest masters of their generations.
Hitomi laughed and claimed, "No one can take down the White Lotus. They've been helping the Avatar and the world for centuries!"
Gao looked like he was about to say something, but then a guard came up to him and said, "Captain, our navigators would like to inform you about the possibility of changing our course due to weather conditions up ahead."
Gao nodded and stood up, saying, "Guards, please take Yuko back to her cell. As for you Avatar Hitomi, I would like to personally keep an eye on you." On that note, the guards escorted Yuko back into the ship while Hitomi followed Gao into a door that sent them in a hallway going up toward the navigation room.
They walked down the hallway for a short amount of time until Gao suddenly stopped. Without turning around, he said, "I'm sorry."
"For what?" Hitomi asked with anger and anticipation, knowing that there was nothing he could possibly say to make her forgive him.
Before Gao answered, Hitomi quickly looked down and saw that a keychain with lots of keys was hanging loosely on his belt. While he spoke, Hitomi slowly tried to reach for the keys without him noticing.
"It's not my style to use trickery or backstab tactics. I'm sorry for acting like your friend that night, only to ambush you the following morning. But when I didn't know you were the Avatar, that truly was the real me. I just want you to know that."
"That doesn't change a thing!" Hitomi yelled, "Why are you talking to me like you're my friend? You're not! You kidnapped me and my best friend and you're holding us hostage until we're sent to your Boss! If you really meant anything about what you just said about being respectful towards the Avatar, you'd let us go!"
"I can't let you leave. I do honor you, but I gave an oath to my father that I-" Gao stopped talking, but it was too late. Hitomi had heard him say the key word that she could possibly use later against him.
They returned to walking and didn't say another word until they entered the navigation room. Gao told Hitomi to stay by the wall and he proceeded to talk to a group of people in black uniforms. Meanwhile, she happily and silently played with the keychain in her pocket.
Hitomi listened carefully as they spoke.
A guy next to Gao said, "So the storm that's just two hours ahead will hit us lightly during the first five minutes, but it could rapidly escalate. I propose we proceed on course for three minutes and take this route away from the storm."
Another guy protested, "That might reduce our delay, but there's still a big chance that the storm could catch up. I say we just go the long way and avoid the whole thing."
The guy from before said, "That would take another full day of travel!"
The guy driving the boat said, "I think you're all being babies! This ship can handle any storm that comes our way! I say we drive through!"
Gao said, "We can't risk the storm with the Avatar on board; we can't let her become injured."
"Why not?" asked the guy driving.
Gao glared, "We're not charging at the storm. That's final."
"So what do you suppose we do? Should we go the long way or brave the three minutes and go around this island?"
"We're charging through and that's that!"
"The Captain said no! We're taking the long way!"
"Are you mad? The Boss would be furious with the delay!"
Hitomi stood back and watched them all go at each other. She liked the idea about going by an island during a storm. There could be an opportunity for her to escape. She could break out Yuko and they could make a quick break for the island on a lifeboat. She knew she could make the escape, but she had to make sure they voted on the three minutes storm route. But by the sound of the conversation, they were going to go with the long way. She had to find a way to keep them fighting.
While she played with the keys in her pocket, she felt a small ball there as well. The fire chocolate! It could shoot a small ball of fire from the eater's mouth for an instant! She quickly popped the chocolate in her mouth and began to suck on it. It tasted sweet, but it wasn't shrinking fast enough. She kept on at it, making it shrink, and shrink, and shrink. Finally, she got it to the size that she could swallow. Just like when it happened to Yuko, Hitomi's eyes watered and her throat became volcanic. She quickly spat out a fireball at one of the voters for the three minute delay. His hair quickly ignited and he quickly ran out of the room screaming in pain!
"That was a cruel trick!" one of the other voters for the three minute delay said pointing to the guy next to him, "I was about to side with you too!"
"What are you talking about? I didn't shoot fire at him!"
A little bit more yelling occurred and then everybody in the room started fire bending at each other. Fire was everywhere until Gao bended some water from his water bottle and used the water as a whip to keep everyone in line.
Gao ordered, "That's enough out of you! I will not allow such childish behavior on my ship! We will take the three minute route around the island and that will be it! Is that understood?"
"Sir, yes sir!" everyone saluted.
Gao turned to Hitomi, who tried to hide her pain from swallowing the fire chocolate, and said, "I'll escort you to your room."
"I want to see Yuko." Hitomi protested.
Gao was silent, but he nodded in agreement and lead her down to a cell not too far from her room. She could hear Yuko punching the steel door. Gao stood off far away to the side, respecting the privacy of the conversation, but not allowing Hitomi out of his sight so she could try and break Yuko free from her room. Hitomi smirked when he noticed his gentleman-like behavior, knowing it would come back to bite him.
Hitomi called through the door, "Yuko, its Hitomi. Are you all right?"
Yuko smartly remarked, "As far as being a prisoner goes, I'm doing swell."
Hitomi knew Gao was far enough away so he couldn't hear, but she lowered her voice a little just to be safe, "In two hours, we're getting out of here. Get ready."
All right, it's done! I kind of charged through this one, but I'm pretty cool with how I made it! Please leave a review if you agree or disagree! I hope you love the story so far and I have many more surprises in store for you!
