A/N: Hey! It didn't take me a month to update this time! It's cause finals week is next week, so I thought I'd update before it started.
I'd like to thank Chocolate Orchids, Envy Her, and readamy64 for reviewing. Your comments meant a lot to me. And for those who are reading, but not reviewing, I do appreciate your support. Perhaps you can take two minutes to leave a comment? I would love it if you did.
After much debating, I decided to keep it one chapter per episode. I just thought it would get weird if I broke an episode up into two or three chunks. Yes, I know they're long, but it's just easier for me this way.
Disclaimer: I do not own A:TLA. I just own Mira.
I'd also like to give a little warning for this chapter. As everyone else experienced a vision in the swamp, so did Mira. Her vision may be a little disturbing (remember, this IS rated T), so I'd like to warn you before you begin reading.
Chapter Four
Seeing Things
That morning dawned in a burst of purples and oranges. Mira, who was already awake, paused her work on her rods to take in the view. Despite her fondness of twilight, there was something about the early morning that was energizing. The growing light filled her with an alertness that could rarely be matched.
The others, however, did not share her enthusiasm. Aang, while a bit more chipper than the others, was still slightly sluggish as he climbed aboard Appa. The others clambered up onto the saddle and sat quietly, waiting to start conversation until a more reasonable hour. Mira took the opportunity to mend her cloak, which had garnered quite a few tears the day before. It wasn't until Mira was knotting the thread on her second-to-last repair that Sokka spoke.
"Okay, first things first," he announced, staring straight at her.
"What?" she asked.
"I want to know how you knew those girls back there," Sokka said, crossing his arms and scowling at her.
She sighed and set down her cloak. "Fine. I met them a long time ago, back when I lived in the Fire Nation."
"You lived in the Fire Nation?" Aang asked incredulously, his eyes wide. "Wow. Where else have you been?"
"An easier question would be where haven't I been." Seeing Sokka open his mouth, she added, "And the answer to that is the Poles. I haven't been to the North or South Poles. But that's about it. Anyway, I was living in the Fire Nation, and I ran across Azula and her friends, Mai and Ty Lee. Azula is Princess of the Fire Nation, and sister to Zuko, who's been chasing you. Mai is excellent with a shuriken, as you well know," she rubbed at her shoulder, "and Ty Lee is an acrobat. Who, it appears, learned how to block someone's chi," she added, giving Katara a meaningful look. "It looks like she'll be chasing after us, which is very, very bad." Sokka snickered at her words, and she glared at him. "I'm serious. Azula is ruthless and evil, and will stop at nothing to get what she wants." She paused, weighing her words. "Which may or may not include killing me."
There was a shocked silence. All eyes were on her. "I stole something from Azula a long time ago," she said carefully. "She knows it was me. I was trying to get away, and she ripped my hood off. She saw my face, and there is no way she forgot what I look like. If she sees me without my hood, I'm as good as dead."
"Is that why you wear it all the time?" asked Katara curiously. "Because of her?"
"Not just because," she answered, shrugging. "I stole from a lot of people. It's easier to escape if no one knows what you look like."
"That's great, but I'm still stuck on the fact that you lived in the Fire Nation," Sokka stressed.
"It's important to know your enemy, isn't it?" Mira asked. When no one responded, she continued. "You're supposed to defeat the Fire Lord, but you barely know anything about his culture," she explained to Aang. "You're supposed to be the bridge between the spirit world and ours, but do you even know about the spirits Agni and Kai?"
Aang shook his head, bewildered.
"As the Water tribe has Tui and La," she nodded to Katara and Sokka, "So the Fire Nation has Agni and Kai. Agni is the spirit of fire. When angered, she can be deadly and devastating. But she is also the spirit of light and warmth for those of the Fire Nation. Kai is the spirit of honor. He represents pride and responsibility, and it is this thinking that is at the heart of the Fire Nation. It is these spirits that come together to form the Agni Kai, or fire duel."
"What's that?" asked Aang, who was totally absorbed in her words.
"When one firebender feels that his honor has been challenged by another, he may declare an Agni Kai. It is a fight dictated by strict rules. It only ends once one opponent is marked by fire."
"That's barbaric!" Katara exclaimed.
"Not to them, it's not," Mira said, shrugging. "Honor means everything to the Fire Nation, and they will do anything to keep it intact. To them, it is their way of thinking and their way of life. To defeat a nation, you must first know how they think."
Aang nodded thoughtfully. "It does make sense. But I think I'll focus on learning earthbending before I focus on the Fire Nation."
Mira returned Aang's nod. "Fair enough." And with that, a comfortable silence fell between them. Mira turned back to finishing her cloak, while Katara examined a scroll and Sokka sharpened his machete. Aang sat at Appa's head and gently guided the bison through the air.
After a few minutes, Mira began to notice a slight change. She stared off to the horizon and noticed that the trees were rising off the ground. She blinked twice and corrected herself. They were losing altitude. She quickly tied off the thread on her last repair and fastened her cloak before nudging Sokka. He yelped and glared at her, but before he could protest, she pointed to the horizon. "We're descending," she murmured. Sokka narrowed his eyes and turned toward Aang.
"Hey, you taking us down for a reason?" he asked. When Aang didn't respond, Sokka tried again. "Aang!" he called. "Why are we going down?"
Aang started at his voice. "What?" he asked, looking around. "I didn't even notice."
"Are you noticing now?" Sokka pressed as they continued to descend, this time at a faster rate.
"Is something wrong?" Katara asked as she crawled up toward the front of the saddle.
"I know this is going to sound weird," Aang began hesitantly, "But…I think the swamp is—calling to me."
Mira peered over the side of the saddle to gaze out at the swamp down below. Tress coated the ground for miles. Moss connected branch after branch, and muddy water glittered in between breaks in the foliage. All in all, not something Mira wanted to experience firsthand.
"I—I think it wants us to land down there," Aang was saying as Mira pulled her head back.
"No offense to the swamp, but I don't see any land down there to land on," Sokka pointed out.
"I don't know," Aang said, unconvinced. "Bumi said to learn earthbending, I would have to wait and listen. And now I'm actually hearing the earth, do you want me to ignore it?"
"Yes," Mira said, speaking up. "Landing down there won't help you find a teacher. Do you think there are earthbenders down there just waiting for you to show up?" Aang's shoulders sagged.
"There's something ominous about that place," Katara added, sounding unsure.
Appa let out a large grumble as Momo peeked over the saddle once, before chittering anxiously and ducking down to hide. "See?" Sokka said, playing the animal card. "Even Appa and Momo don't like it here."
"Okay," Aang said, giving in. "Since everyone feels so strongly about this—bye, swamp," he said as he pulled up on the reins. "Yip yip."
Mira heard a distant roaring sound behind them, and turned to see a dust-colored tornado bearing down on them. She swore colorfully.
"Mira!" Katara cried, turning to reprimand her. Any scolding she might have done died on her lips as she took in the force of nature.
"You better throw in an extra 'yip'!" Sokka yelled, having also caught sight of the tornado. "We gotta move!"
Mira was thrown against the side of the saddle as Appa began to swerve wildly. The bison was used to being the largest thing in the sky, and the presence of a possibly more powerful force of nature resulted in a twitchy Appa. Aang pulled back on the reins, trying to exert some control on him, but Appa paid him no heed. He dodged left and right, trying to escape from the tornado's path. As Mira continued to watch the funnel behind them, something occurred to her. She'd seen tornadoes before. If you just turned and ran perpendicular to one, you would be safe. Tornadoes couldn't make right turns. This one, apparently, could. There was nothing natural about it.
Her head had unconsciously moved closer toward the tornado as she examined it, but she quickly drew it back as she spotted trees being uprooted from the ground and sucked toward the storm. She remained safely on the saddle. Sokka, however, was not so lucky. With a cry of panic, he began to float up off Appa's back. As Katara grabbed one arm, Mira took hold of the other, and together they dug in their heels and tried to drag him back down. Suddenly, Aang landed in the middle of them, spinning around before thrusting his arms out and projecting a shield of air around them, right as they were sucked into the tornado. Sokka fell to the saddle with a muffled thump as they were spun round and round.
Mira knew it wouldn't last even before Aang started groaning in effort. This tornado was not natural. If it wanted them, it would get them. With a last grunt of effort, Aang's shield collapsed and Mira was sucked violently from Appa's back. She tried in vain to keep hold of her bearings, but the speed at which she was being flung about soon confused all her senses. She didn't know where she was, or even which way was up and which way was down. That is, until she was spat out and started falling to the earth.
She quickly twisted in midair and righted herself as soon as she had a view that wasn't blocked by flying dirt and dust. She looked down to see the swamp rapidly approaching. If she didn't do something soon, she would end up flat as a bug on the swamp floor. As she crashed through the canopy, she cast out her hands frantically, looking for something—anything—to slow her descent. Her hand caught on a (relatively) springy vine, and she clung to it for dear life. She reeled herself in and wrapped herself around the vine, squeezing as hard as she could to slow herself down. To her relief, she felt her momentum slowing. She finally came to a halt mere inches before the swamp floor. As soon as she was sure it was safe, she gingerly unwrapped herself from the vine. At the same time, Sokka and Katara surfaced from the muddy water they'd landed in while Aang performed a rather dainty twirl to slow himself down.
"Everyone alright?" Aang asked, looking around to make sure everyone was present and accounted for. He scrunched up his brow. "Where's Appa and Momo?" he asked, peering through the undergrowth, as if expecting them to magically appear into the clearing. When they didn't, he began to hop up into one of the trees to search for them.
"I'm fine, thanks," Mira called up sardonically, then winced as a hot, throbbing pain finally registered in her mind. She looked down to find her hands were covered in red scratches and welts from the vine.
"Are you hurt again?" Katara asked as she waded over. "Does this happen to you often?"
"More often than I'd like," Mira admitted. "As the scars will testify." Katara opened her mouth to say something, but Mira cut her off. "Don't. What happened, happened. You weren't there. Don't go feeling guilty about it." And yet, Mira felt slightly hypocritical saying it. She brushed the guilt aside as she turned her attention to her hands. Katara pulled some water up from the swamp, and Mira recoiled at the sight of the mud-colored liquid. "You are not healing me with that," she declared.
"Relax," Katara said as she twisted her hands in the air. Pure, clear water began to flow from the water she'd collected, until the mud had plopped back into the swamp, and the water in Katara's hands looked good enough to drink. Only then did Mira extend her hands forward (albeit cautiously). A few seconds and uncomfortable moments later, her hands looked as good as they had before. She thanked Katara and began to examine their surroundings. Like it or not, they were stuck in the swamp. She needed to know what exactly they were up against. Vaguely she heard Katara say, "Sokka, you've got an elbow leech."
After discreetly checking herself for any parasites, she heard Sokka reply in a panic, "Where?" She rolled her eyes. The boy really could be thick sometimes.
She heard Katara echo the exact words she was thinking. "Where do you think?"
A grumble, then, "Why do things keep attaching to me?!"
Mira opened her mouth to reply, but Aang's arrival cut her off. "You couldn't find them?" asked Katara, concerned.
"No. And the tornado," Aang said anxiously. "It just disappeared."
"You really think that was natural?" Mira asked, her eyebrows raised.
"You don't?" asked Katara.
"I've seen real tornadoes. That was not it. Something wanted us down here."
"Now I really want to get out of here," Katara said, shivering.
"Which way should we go?" asked Aang, looking around at the dense undergrowth that surrounded them.
Mira pointed over to the left. "I think we should go that way."
"Hold on," Sokka interrupted. "What makes you so sure?"
"Do you see any other path around here easier to navigate?" she asked, gesturing around them.
Sokka's expression faltered slightly, but he remained stubborn. "I still don't know what makes you the best person to listen to in here," he grumbled.
"Sokka," Katara groaned. "Is this going to turn into another, 'I'm oldest, I should be leader' thing?"
"What? No!" he said, but his blustering tone gave him away.
"Well, if we're going by age, that would make me leader," Mira pointed out.
"What? How old are you?" Sokka asked.
"Sixteen," she replied, shrugging.
After a few moments of grumbling, he gestured her forward. "Fine. Go on, oh fearless leader."
"Why, thank you," she said as she passed him. "But just for the record," she called back. "I've always found the best result comes from teamwork."
"Whatever," he mumbled, but she could tell his tone was lighter.
Boys. So easy to please.
Minutes later, she was gritting her teeth and cursing under her breath. She hadn't imagined moving through the swamp would be this slow. She'd picked this way on purpose, for its clearer paths and slightly more navigable undergrowth. But from the speed of those behind her, she could have blindly picked any direction, and their progress would have been the same. She couldn't believe that they couldn't see the pathways her eyes picked out, the holes and gaps that her mind automatically noticed and filed away. She supposed the instinct came from years of needing to know any way out.
Must be nice, to be so trusting. To believe that everyone has your best interest at heart.
She winced as a branch snapped loudly behind her. It didn't help that they were moving so slowly, but now they had to make noise, too? This swamp unnerved her, and providing it with their exact location was not doing her any favors.
As they stopped short in front of a wall of vines, Mira ground her teeth together and sighed in frustration. This would take several long, agonizing minutes to go around.
Sokka seemed to be thinking along the same lines. "We better speed things up," he declared, pulling out his machete and hacking away at the vegetation before them.
"Maybe we should be a little nicer to the swamp," Aang said hesitantly, wincing every time Sokka's blade sliced through the plants.
"They're just plants," Mira said, glad that they finally had a way to up the pace.
"Exactly. Do you want me to say 'please' and 'thank you' as I swing my machete back and forth?" Sokka asked, scowling as he continued to clear the path.
"Maybe you should listen to Aang," Katara cautioned, looking unsure. "Something about this place feels…alive."
"All the more reason to find Appa and get out of here as soon as possible," Mira pointed out. She pulled her dagger from her belt to help Sokka clear the way, but as soon as she neared the plants, she felt a strange tingling sensation in her hand. She pulled back, looking at her skin in confusion. The tingling had stopped as soon as she'd brought her hand away from the plants. Frowning, she tried again. The tingling increased until it felt like someone was gently pressing pins and needles onto her hands. The closer she got, the more intense it felt. Slowly, she pulled back and stowed her dagger back in her belt.
"What? Not you too!" Sokka cried. He'd been watching her attempt to help.
"I don't feel right," she said. "I won't do it. But you seem to have no problem, so go ahead." She gestured for him to continue, which he did. But Mira stayed behind him, allowing him to do all the cutting. If there was something in here that didn't like it, well, it was better that she didn't have any crime on her hands.
Despite her unwillingness to chop any of the vines herself, Mira was glad for Sokka's help. They made much faster progress as a result of the clearer path. Their increase in speed should have started to put Mira at ease, but the loss of daylight coupled with the nocturnal sounds of the forest kept her hackles raised. Normally she loved the forest, but this was not a natural place.
The others seemed to have sensed it as well. Normally the other three were quite chatty when traveling, but not a single word had been exchanged since the debate regarding swamp treatment. Sokka was focused on clearing a path, but Mira knew the others were just as ill at ease as she was. Breaking the relative silence around them seemed…disrespectful.
At least, that's what she thought they were thinking. Suddenly, she heard Katara yell out behind her, "Appa! Momo?" As if calling for them would cause them to appear. Mira clenched her jaw and resisted the urge to slap her hand over Katara's mouth. Making noise was just a guaranteed way to attract attention (especially the unwanted kind).
"There's no way they can hear us, and no way we can see them," Sokka pointed out, sounding irritated. "We'll have to make camp for the night."
Mira, who had come to the same conclusion an hour before, cursed silently. She had been hoping to find Appa and Momo and be out of the swamp before night fell. Nothing good would come of spending hours in the dark here.
A pocket of gas belched up out of the ground, creating a sickening, hissing noise. "What was that?" Katara asked, looking around wildly.
"Swamp gas," Mira replied, pointing to the ground it had come from.
"There's nothing supernatural going on here," Sokka insisted.
A terrifying, ear-shattering scream erupted from behind them. Mira immediately whirled around, a throwing knife already leaving her hand by the time she realized the sound was coming from a small, plump white bird perched on a branch on a tree across from them. Her dagger stuck in the branch right below the bird, handle quivering. The bird gave Mira what seemed to be an insulted look, then flew off, its wings flapping frantically in an attempt to heave its body through the air. She turned back to the others, who were staring at her in shock.
"What?" she asked defensively.
"I just heard a scream behind me, let me throw something at it," Sokka said. "Is that what you were thinking?"
"I didn't exactly have time to think, now did I?" Mira fired back. "I was acting on instinct."
"Remind me not to ever scare you," Aang murmured, staring at her with a mixture of awe and wariness.
Mira rolled her eyes and moved to the base of the tree, preparing to climb and retrieve her dagger. She only had so many, so she tried to collect every one that she threw. She didn't have the money or supplies to buy or make more, and often it was harder to steal weapons then it was basic supplies. She swarmed up the tree quickly, her hands and feet finding nearly non-existent supports to use. She soon reached the branch where her dagger was embedded and with a hard yank, freed it from the wood. Her knife had left behind a small scar on the wood, and for some reason, Mira felt strangely guilty. She ran her hand over the cut and whispered, "My apologies." She immediately felt ridiculous. Why should she be apologizing to a tree? She looked over to the others, hoping that none had been witness to her little display. Fortunately, they seemed to be in an argument over firewood, and were paying her no attention.
She slid down from the tree and stowed her dagger back in her belt before approaching the others. Sokka was trying in vain to light the firewood he'd collected, while Katara and Aang sat around the pile, looking around every so often. Mira knelt beside Sokka and put a hand over his. "May I?"
He grumbled a bit, but relinquished the spark rocks to her. She adjusted them in her hands, and a few strikes later, sparks caught on the kindling and blazed up, dancing merrily in the air despite the gloomy surroundings.
"How'd you do that so fast?" Sokka asked her, amazed.
"I can start a fire anywhere, at any time, with anything," she said. Sokka gave her a skeptical look, and she elaborated. "You get pretty good at it after years of needing one to survive." She handed the rocks back to Sokka and took a seat in front of a broken tree stump. She didn't want anything to be able to sneak up behind her. Since she wouldn't be looking over her shoulder constantly, this would give her the ability to relax slightly.
But only slightly.
"Does anyone else get the feeling that we're being watched?" Katara asked quietly, looking around uneasily.
"Please," scoffed Sokka, ever the non-believer. "We're all alone out here." He scowled at the swamp gnats that had been plaguing him all day and swung at them with his machete.
Suddenly, a large ball of light seemed to explode into existence above their campfire. Mira threw up her hand to shield her eyes from the pure white light it gave off. It flew off in lazy circles above them, lighting up the clearing they were camping in and revealing several pairs of menacing, nonhuman eyes.
"Except for them," Aang said, shaken.
"Right," said Sokka, finally sounding scared. "Except for them." He swallowed hard.
The light flew off and soon was obscured by the thick undergrowth. The eyes, too, faded from sight, but the image still burned in Mira's mind, and she knew she was to have no sleep that night.
Hours later, something made Mira start from her half-awake, half-asleep state. She sat bolt upright, the fogginess instantly cleared from her mind. Her hand went to her belt as she scanned the swamp with eagle eyes, looking for the slightest disturbance. The other three were propped up with their backs together, having somehow managed to fall asleep. Mira was leaning back against her tree stump, not too far away. She kept still and waited. If something was out there, moving around, she would hear it.
She immediately caught a noise that was not part of the swamp's natural cacophony of nocturnal sounds. This was a low, steady slithering noise, like something moving against the ground. She scanned the area around them, making sure not to keep her gaze in one area for too long.
Suddenly, she noticed long, dark shadows wrapping themselves around the others. She opened her mouth to yell a warning, but a tendril wrapped around her mouth, effectively cutting her off. She cursed her stupidity. While she had been busy looking after the others, the tendrils had snaked their way around her.
She grabbed for her knife before the vines (for that was indeed what they were) cut her off from any movement. She sliced blindly, pushing aside the part of her that had been leery of doing so earlier. But the vines kept coming, wrapping around her and slowing her movements. Suddenly, she was yanked sideways off the little island and dragged through the water. She twisted and struggled, trying to turn around before the vines could drown her in the swamp water. She sliced again and again, leaving countless vines limp on the swamp floor. Finally, her feet hit solid ground, and she had an advantage.
She pushed herself up in an explosion of movement, cutting all the vines around her in one great sweep. And then she turned and ran.
This was the pace she'd wanted to set earlier. Running and ducking and weaving, squeezing through impossibly small spaces, finding paths where there were none. She swarmed up trees and leapt across branches, only concerning herself with putting as much distance between herself and the vines as possible.
A thought occurred to her that made her freeze. The others. They had been wrapped in the vines as well. What had happened to them? What had been done to them while she had been busy running away?
They are capable fighters, a small voice in the back of her head told her. Trust that they escaped.
Because up there in a tree, stranded in the middle of an eerie swamp, that was all she could do.
The swamp had to be miles long. It was a wonder that no one had ever documented it on a map, or mentioned it in a tale. There was no way a swamp of this size had remained hidden for so long (or perhaps, it occurred to Mira, it was known and she had just never heard of it). Mira had been walking all night, but she had still not found the end. Sometimes she wondered if she was wandering in circles, but disregarded the theory. She had an excellent sense of direction. But…the swamp had a way of disorienting you that did nothing to strengthen Mira's conviction.
She pushed aside her doubts and slogged forward. It would do no good to second-guess herself in here. She just had to keep going and hope that she would find the others eventually.
As she continued, she kept an eye out for any of the homicidal vines that had trapped her the night before. She avoided slashing at any vegetation in her way, instead opting to go around it. She knew the damage was already done (for she had hacked and cut away the vines ensnaring her last night), but she still felt wary about making any mark. Besides, she could find easily find a way around.
Hours (or minutes, it was hard to mark the passing of time) later, something in Mira began to unwind. She hadn't seen a single renegade vine since the night before, and hadn't laid eyes on any creature of any kind. The sun was even starting to filter through the canopy, creating little bright, warm spots. Really, it wasn't so bad in here if you stayed long enough. She felt the muscles in her shoulders start to relax, and her breathing came easier.
A sudden realization made her stop in her tracks. She knew what was settling her unease. The swamp, normally filled with a chorus of squawks, hums, and chirps, was deathly silent. Nothing, save for her wading through the water, was making any sound. This fact alone chilled her to the bone and renewed her tension tenfold. Something was not right here.
"You killed me."
Mira started violently and whipped around. There was no one behind her (or anyone near her, for that matter). So who had whispered that menacing thought into her ear?
"It's all your fault," the voice came again, this time in a whispered half-sob.
"Who's there?" Mira called, ashamed to hear her voice crack.
"You're the reason I'm dead." The voice was ahead of her now, just behind a curtain of vines. As Mira approached, a twisted theory as to who it could be formed in her mind. She reached out with a trembling hand and tugged aside the curtain, whispering, "Mom?"
But all she found was a flooded clearing. She waded to the center, looking up to see a few weak rays of sunlight filtering through the canopy.
"My blood is on your hands." Now that voice she did know.
She whirled around to see the thug she'd…encountered so many years ago staring at her. Her eyes were drawn downward to the ragged, open wound in his stomach. The wound she'd caused by sticking her dagger into his flesh. Bile rose up in her throat. "I'm sorry," she said, her voice trembling. "I'm sorry."
He took a step forward, his blank, lifeless eyes boring into her. His arm slowly rose into the air, reaching for her. "No!" she screamed, her voice reaching a shrill pitch. "This isn't happening!" she cried, backing away from the man. "It's all in my head, it's not real, I'm just seeing things," she babbled, squeezing her eyes shut. She stood stock still and held her breath, not daring to move, not daring to make a single sound. She counted in her head, determined not to look until she'd reached twenty. The number came and went, and so she cracked one eyelid open to check the area.
The thug was gone. She opened her eyes all the way and took a shaky breath, trying to compose herself. She was just seeing and hearing things. All she had to do was calm down. She'd be out of here before the day was out.
She turned to leave the clearing, but something was in her way. Mere inches from her face was a horrific sight, one that sent her scrambling back.
A corpse burned beyond recognition stood before her. She retched at the smell of burning flesh. Strips of charred skin hung off the corpse's frame, and rotting clothes dragged through the water behind it. Empty eye sockets stared at her. "Why did you leave?" it hissed, jaw creaking and teeth clattering. Its voice caused her to freeze in disbelief. She knew that voice. It was a voice she thought she'd never hear again. When she didn't answer, the corpse continued, raising a skeletal hand rose until a single solitary finger was pointed at her. "You left me to die," it accused.
"No," she choked out. "I didn't. It didn't end like this, I know it didn't—"
"How do you know?" the corpse contradicted. "You left!"
"No!" she screamed. "You're okay, I know you are!"
The corpse cocked its head and shifted to point at her hands. "What's that?"
Mira looked down to find her hands covered in hot, sticky blood. She scrubbed at them, but the stains wouldn't scrub off. "No," she gasped. "No, no, no. This isn't how it happened!" she wailed. She dropped to her knees and submerged her hands in the swamp water. She frantically tried to wash the blood off, but to no avail.
She looked up to find the corpse standing over her. "You didn't care about me."
"I did! I still do!"
"You left. You're nothing but a coward," it spat. "You deserve to die."
The corpse glared down at her, and Mira wondered vaguely who was screaming. Belatedly, she realized that the sound was coming from her own throat. She squeezed her eyes shut, curled up into a ball, and gave in. She screamed. She screamed in fear, in pain, in regret, in guilt, in shame. She screamed until gentle hands took her shoulders and rolled her over.
"Mira!"
Her screams petered out and she cracked one eye open. Katara was leaning over her, concern written across her face. "What happened? Are you alright?"
Mira wanted to snap at her about the obviousness of her question, but managed to bite her tongue. Instead, she deflected. "Have you seen the others?"
She shook her head. "No. I was looking for them and you when I heard a scream. Again, what happened?"
Mira knew she couldn't avoid the question anymore. "I saw something."
She'd expected the water tribe girl's face to cloud over in confusion, but Katara's eyes widened and she said, "So did I."
"What did you see?" Mira asked as she sat up.
"Oh no," Katara said, shaking her head. "You first. I'm not the one lying on the ground screaming my head off."
"Fair enough," Mira admitted shakily. She quickly glanced down at her hands to ensure they were blood free. The action did not go unnoticed by Katara, who raised her eyebrows. Mira cleared her throat and began. "I was walking through the swamp when I heard someone whispering in my ear. I followed the voice and it led me here." She gestured to her surroundings. "It was empty. But then I heard another voice, and I turned around, and…" She trailed off. She took a deep breath to continue. "And then I saw—" She broke off again, not trusting her voice and not sure whether to reveal so much about herself to Katara.
Katara seemed to understand this. "I saw my mother. I called out to her, but she wouldn't stop. I ran into a clearing like this one, and I thought I saw her standing on the other side. But it was just a tree stump." She took a deep breath, then continued. "She died when I was little. The Fire Nation raided our village. I went looking for my mother, but she was cornered by a soldier. She told me to leave, and I never saw her again." Katara was staring past Mira, her eyes fixed on a distant memory.
"I never knew my mother," Mira said softly. "She died minutes after I was born. It was a hard and long labor for her. My father blamed me." She stared vacantly into the surrounding vegetation. "I don't even know what she looked like." After a brief moment of silence, she added, "Someone told me once that I shouldn't miss her because I never met her. I think they were wrong," she said thoughtfully. "I think it makes me miss her more. I don't have any memories of her. I'm not trying to disregard your loss," she added quickly, reaching a hand out to Katara. "I am sorry that you lost your mother."
"I know," Katara said, smiling sadly. "And I understand."
"Thank you for telling me." And with a deep breath, Mira made her decision. "I saw something as well. I saw—someone I used to know. A boy I grew up with. We were extremely close. He was my best friend." A smile tugged at her mouth as she remembered days spent running around outside, games played, and nights spent exchanging terrifying tales. But then reality hit and a tingling in Mira's eyes made her blink quickly. She focused back on the present, and left the past behind. "I left him behind when I left my village. Something happened, and I had to leave." She looked down in her lap as she said the last sentence.
The silence in the clearing was overpowering. Mira finally risked a look at Katara and found the girl looking at her contemplatively. "You've been through a lot, haven't you?" she asked quietly.
More than you could ever know. But all she said was, "Thank you for listening."
"Thank you for telling me," Katara repeated her words from before. "I know it couldn't have been easy."
"I've gone for so long with no one to talk to," Mira said slowly, pushing herself up off the ground. "I'm not used to sharing with others. It feels…" She paused, searching for the right word. "Freeing, in a way. But if you ever tell Sokka I said that," she warned, "I will deny it."
Katara smiled. "I promise. Now how about we find the others?"
"The sooner we get out of here, the better," Mira mumbled, picking a direction and setting off. "If I never see another swamp again, it will be too soon."
Mira had been half-expecting to wander around the swamp aimlessly for the rest of the day, given how their luck was going. But not thirty minutes into their hike, a commotion in the form of Aang interrupted the buzz of the forest.
It was Mira, as usual, who noticed the sound at first. Underneath the animal sounds, there was a quick, rhythmic thumping. She recognized them as footsteps, and quickly turned around, pulling Katara with her to face whomever was coming their way. By the time she realized it was Aang, he was already in midair, diving for them. The two girls were knocked clean off the tree root they were standing and sent flying through the air. Midway through their flight, they knocked into another body before sliding down and coming to a stop in the dip of a different large root.
"What do you guys think you're doing?!" Sokka cried, leaping up. "I've been looking all over for you!"
"Well, we've been wandering around looking for you!" Katara snapped.
"I was chasing some girl," Aang said, drifting up on a gentle breeze.
Mira thought her eyebrows might fly off her head. Aang, chasing some girl? That didn't sound right at all.
"What girl?" Katara asked, her irritation melting away.
"I don't know," he said simply, shrugging. "I heard laughing, and I saw some girl in a fancy dress."
He must have seen something, Mira concluded. She and Katara had experienced a hallucination, why not Aang?"
"Well, there must be a tea party here and we just didn't get our invitations," Sokka quipped sarcastically.
"I thought I saw Mom," Katara said quietly, her eyes slipping closed as she bowed her head.
Sokka's face turned grim before he could compose himself. "Look, we were all just scared—"
"Speak for yourself," Mira muttered. The swamp made her uneasy, but she wasn't scared.
"—And hungry, and our minds were playing tricks on us," Sokka continued, ignoring her. "That's why we all saw things out here."
"You saw something too?" Mira asked. "And you're still trying to rationalize this?"
"I thought I saw Yue," Sokka answered. "But that doesn't prove anything! Look, I think about her all the time. And you saw Mom," he said, looking at Katara, "someone you miss a lot. And—" he looked at Mira. "I have no idea what you saw."
Mira had to admit he had a point. "I saw a lot of things. But there was someone I think of frequently."
"See?" he said, pointing to her. "This can all be explained!"
"What about me?" Aang asked. "I didn't know the girl I saw." Sokka deflated slightly as the wind was taken from his sails. Aang continued, oblivious. "And all our visions led us right here."
"Okay, so where's here?" Katara asked. "The middle of the swamp?"
Honestly, Mira couldn't tell how she determined they were in the middle. There was nothing distinctive about it. It stretched miles in either direction. The middle could have been anywhere, for all they knew.
"Yeah," Aang said, looking over Mira's shoulder. "The center."
Mira turned around to find the largest tree she'd ever laid eyes on towering over her. Yeah. That would be a good indication of the swamp's middle.
"It's the heart of the swamp," Aang said as Mira continued to crane her neck upward. "It's been calling us here," he said confidently. "I knew it!"
"It's a tree," Mira said. "A big tree, but a tree nevertheless."
"Last time I checked, a tree couldn't call anyone," Sokka added, throwing his hands up in the air. "For the last time, there's nothing after us. And there's nothing magical happening here!" he insisted.
As if on cue, a giant wave erupted to their left, revealing a writhing, slithering mass of vines. A wooden mask was perched near the top, giving it a face. Thick arms made of vines protruded from the side, creating an almost human-like appearance. That was all Mira could register before she was on the move, ducking and weaving to avoid it. Sokka, however, was not so lucky.
The vine monster flung an arm forward, and the vines extended, shooting towards Sokka. They wrapped around his foot, causing him to trip and face plant into the muddy swamp water. The vines retreated back to their host, bringing a kicking and screaming Sokka with them. The monster waved its arm around through the air before slamming Sokka back into the ground. Mira narrowed her eyes. If they didn't do anything to stop it, the monster would most likely end up killing Sokka. She couldn't let that happen.
She drew out her knives just as a blade of air whipped past her, slicing the end of the monster's arm off and causing it to drop Sokka. It turned its attention to Aang, throwing its other arm to smack at the airbender. He flew off his feet, landing several yards away.
Mira turned her attention back to the monster, gasping as she did so. The monster's damaged right arm was healing itself as vines crawled up from the swamp water to attach themselves to the broken ends. It didn't matter how long they cut and sliced at the thing, it would keep regenerating. Judging from the look of the swamp, it would have unlimited health.
But…if Mira were to cut at the heart of the monster, it would do a better chance of stopping it. She needed to aim for the center of the beast.
Before she could do so, however, the monster snatched up Sokka and skimmed away across the water. Katara chased after it immediately, waving her arms to waterbend and thus bolster her speed. Mira cursed and ran after it as well, though she was much slower than they had been. She kicked off one tree trunk and landed on a branch in front of her, using it as a stepping stone to reach another branch, and then a vine. She flew across the canopy, her gaze fixed on the monster ahead.
Katara was sending blades of water, waves, anything she could come up with, but the monster was not deterred. Mira took advantage of the monster's distraction and sent one of her thickest blades whistling toward the creature's chest. It slammed into the beast and cut through the vines until only the hilt was visible. The monster reared back in shock, but it did not last long. It punched both Katara and Aang (who had finally caught up) away before pushing Sokka into its chest, where he quickly became embedded in the vines. Mira cursed again. There went her brilliant plan. She knew she was wickedly accurate with the knives, but with the way the monster was moving, she didn't trust herself to not him Sokka. So that left Plan B…if only she knew what Plan B was.
She stealthily followed the monster as it turned and waded away. She was lucky it hadn't spotted her. Little did it know that it was facing not three attackers, but four. She watched as Sokka attempted to saw himself out with his machete. The angle was all wrong for him to work, but if she could get under the monster's reach and hack Sokka away, they could regroup (albeit very quickly) and figure out a plan of attack. But there was a problem. In order to get close enough to free Sokka, she would be in full range of the arms. And she didn't stand a chance against those pillars of vines.
Aang solved that problem for her. He spun in a circle, creating a tornado that twisted the monster up into a spiral of vines. Katara immediately breathed icy frost into a sphere around Sokka, and Mira saw her chance. She dived from the treetops, aimed straight for the block of ice he was encased in. She extended her leg, and with a vicious kick, she punched the ice through the vines and out the other side. She looked up from where she'd landed, triumph in her eyes as she took in the gaping hole left in the monster's middle. The triumph quickly turned into despair as the monster shoved its arms down and then raised them up, drawing vines out of the water to fill the hole. Something about the movement was familiar to Mira. She glanced over to Katara, who was moving in the same fluid way the monster had. And idea began to form in her mind…
"Katara!" she yelled, dodging an arm. "That looked like waterbending! Could there be a waterbender in there?"
Katara looked skeptical, but she said, "Only one way to find out!" She began to pinwheel her arms around and around, creating water blades that shot straight for the monster's arms. The rapid slicing was too much too fast for the monster, who struggled to keep up with the wounds he was receiving. Mira craned her neck to peer in between the gaps, struggling to make out what exactly was in the monster's middle.
There! A flash of arm, a glimpse of a face. "There's someone inside!" Mira yelled.
Katara's eyes narrowed, and she whirled around, flinging her arms out and sending a huge water blade toward the monster. It cut right through the wooden face, and the top section of vines slid to the swamp floor with a crash.
There was a momentary pause, and Mira started to wonder if they'd won. But suddenly, a column of vines shot up from the swamp floor, encasing Katara and shooting her up into the air. Mira began hacking away at the trunk of vines, her hands stinging in protest as her knives bit through vegetation. She felt a blast of air pass behind her, and suddenly, the vines went limp. Katara began to fall a bit unsteadily, so Mira reached up a hand and guided her to the swamp floor. Once she was safely on the ground, Mira turned to look at the remains of the monster.
Aang stood before a pile of vines, hands extended in a fighting stance and eyebrows drawn in anger. "Why did you call me here if you just wanted to kill us?" he asked furiously.
"Wait!" The vines spun away to reveal an older man with wild gray hair clad only in a leafy loincloth. "I didn't call you here."
They all exchanged surprised looks, but didn't back down from their defensive stances.
"We were flying over and I heard something calling to me, telling me to land," Aang insisted.
"He's the Avatar," Sokka explained. "Stuff like that happens to us a lot."
The man's eyes widened. "The Avatar! Come with me!" he said, turning and beckoning to them. The others started to relax, but Mira held still.
"Are you insane?" she cried, stopping them in their tracks. "This man just tried to kill us all, and now you're willing to follow him? If this is how you normally think, how are you still alive after all this time?"
"If he really wanted to kill us, he wouldn't have given up," Aang said, choosing to ignore her last statement.
"Oh yeah, that was him giving up," Mira retorted. "I seem to remember us defeating him! What makes you so sure he's not leading us away so he can try again?"
"I promise I will do nothing to harm you," the man said. When she didn't move, he said, "You must hurry; it's important!"
"Mira, if it has to do with being the Avatar, I need to hear it!" Aang insisted.
After a few moments, she relented. "Fine," she said, grumbling. "But I still don't trust him."
"Fair enough," Aang said cheerfully, following after the swamp man.
"Seriously," she muttered as she followed the others. "How is he still alive?"
It was a long, arduous hike that the swamp man led them on. They began to ascend the massive tree that stood in the middle of the swamp, sometimes having to resort to using vines and tree roots to pull themselves up the steep incline. Everyone was too out of breath to talk, but as the roots leveled out, the conversation began.
"So, who're you then?" Katara asked.
"I protect the swamp from folks that want to hurt it," the man explained, bending a large vine up and out of the way. He stood aside and let the others pass him. "Like this fella, with his big knife," he added as Sokka neared him.
"See? Completely reasonable. Not a monster, just a regular guy defending his home!" Sokka said, ever the rationalist. "Nothing mystical about it!"
"Oh, the swamp is a mystical place, all right," the man corrected as he led them farther up the tree. "It's sacred. I reached enlightenment right here, under the banyan grove tree," he said, fondly patting the bark of the tree they were climbing. He took a seat on a large, flat area between two massive roots. "I heard it callin' me, just like you did."
"Sure you did," Sokka drawled. "It seems real chatty," he said, glaring at the swamp man.
The swamp man continued, ignoring Sokka's sarcasm. "You see, this whole swamp is actually just one tree, spread out over miles," he said, gesturing outward. "Branches spread and sink and take root, and spread some more. One big living organism, just like the entire world."
Mira thought her eyebrows might fly off her face. One huge tree? Spread out over miles? She found it hard to believe.
"I get how the tree is one big thing, but the whole world?" Aang asked, confused.
Mira's lips twitched. Aang could accept the idea that she could not, and yet, she had no trouble facing a concept that was crucial for the Avatar. The irony was not lost on her.
They sat down in front of the man, sensing that he was starting a long monologue.
"Sure," the swamp man said, answering Aang. "You think you're any different from me? Or your friends? Or this tree? If you listen hard enough, you can hear every living thing breathin' together," he said earnestly. "You can feel everythin' growing. We are all livin' together, even if most folks don't act like it. We all have the same roots, and we are all branches of the same tree. Your friend here seems to understand that," he said, nodding to Mira.
She shrugged. "Poverty looks the same in all four nations. You learn not to make judgments after a while."
"But it's more than that, ain't it?" he asked, tilting his head and squinting at her.
"What do you mean?" she asked, squirming under his gaze.
"You're spirit-born," he said, his eyes widening.
"What's that?" she asked, feigning ignorance.
"You know," he said shrewdly. "A spirit saved you at birth."
"Like with Yue," Sokka said, looking at Mira as if seeing her in a new light.
She sighed. There was no way she could hide it without looking suspicious now. "My mother died in childbirth," she began. "It was a long and difficult labor, for both of us. When I was born, I was very pale and listless. The midwife didn't think I would last the night. She was just about to call for my father when the doors slammed shut and the locks closed. I was left alone in the birthing room with my dead mother and the midwife. A woman appeared suddenly, out of thin air. The midwife was too scared to move, so she could only watch as the woman picked me up and nursed me back to health. When she was done, she set me down and laid a single finger on the back of my neck, marking me. And then she vanished."
"That woman was a spirit," the swamp man explained unnecessarily. "They have a plan for you. That's why they saved you."
"If this plan is anything like what they planned with Yue, I want nothing to do with it!" she cried. "The spirits have done me no favors in the past. Why should I help them?"
"Sometimes we can't see the path we're on. We just have to trust the spirits that it'll lead us where we need to go."
The hair on the back of Mira's neck stood up as her instincts screamed at her. Her hand shot out and closed around Sokka's wrist, which had presumably been creeping toward her neck to find the mark. "Touch it and die," she hissed.
"But what did our visions mean?" Katara cut in quickly, trying to change the subject.
"In the swamp, we see visions of people we've lost, people we loved. Folks we think are gone. But the swamp tells us they're not. We're still connected to 'em. Time is an illusion, and so is death."
"But what about my vision? It was someone I had never met," Aang said.
"You're the Avatar. You tell me."
Aang looked down, his brow furrowed as he thought. "Time is an illusion," he muttered. "So…it's someone I will meet."
The swamp man winked in reply.
"Sorry to interrupt the lesson, but we still need to find Appa and Momo," Sokka cut in, standing up abruptly.
"I think I know how to find them," Aang said, reaching down to place a hand on the tree. "Everything is connected," he said quietly, squeezing his eyes shut in concentration. The arrow tattoo on the back of his hand suddenly lit up, and a bolt of light raced from his fingers down the trunk of the tree and into the forest. After a few silent minutes, he bolted upright and said urgently, "Come on! We've got to hurry!"
The others raced after Aang, but a hand on Mira's shoulder kept her back. She turned to find the swamp man looking at her gravely. "You may not like to hear it, but the spirits chose you for a reason. Remember that."
Mira swallowed a lump in her throat. "Maybe they made a mistake," she said roughly. She pulled away and ran after the others.
"Don't be afraid of your destiny!" she heard him call to her.
Crazy old man. It's not me they want.
Though, she wasn't sure what scared her more: the idea that the spirits had made a mistake…or that they hadn't.
It took them very little time to find Appa and Momo. Aang led them in a beeline toward their location, and even if they hadn't had his guidance, the drawling, off-tune folk sings would have clued them in.
As they neared, Aang thrust his hands behind him and took off, sending up a cloud of dust behind him. Mira and the others hurried after him, increasing their pace as they heard the crunching of wood and a handful of screams.
They burst onto the riverbank and gasped in horror as they took in the sight of Appa bound by ropes attached to long, wooden canoes. Gawky, leaf-clad river people gaped up at them in shock. Clearly, they hadn't been expecting any trouble.
Aang punched his hands out and blew one of the river people off a canoe, freeing Momo, who had been trapped in a cloth bag the man had been holding.
"We're under attack!" one of them yelled, bending a wave toward Katara and Aang, who were standing on a tree root that arched over the river. They both blocked it, pushing against the bender in a game of tug-of-war.
"Hey," Katara said in awe, "you guys are waterbenders!"
"You too?" he said, a grin forming on his face. "That means we're kin!"
Katara made a face, and Mira leaned over to whisper, "Think about it. He's like your cousin!"
"Very funny," she muttered, still eyeing the man warily as he let the wave drop. Sokka and the swamp man ran onto the riverbank and up the root, drawing the river man's attention.
"Hey, Hue," he called cheerfully. "How you been?"
"You know," he said, shrugging. "Scared some folks, swung some vines. The usual."
"Hue?" Sokka asked. "That probably gets confusing."
"Not a lot of folks come 'round here, so no."
"Big surprise," Mira muttered. "Who would have thought?"
They were invited back to the river people's camp, and though Mira desperately wanted to leave the swamp as soon as possible, she knew leaving just before twilight was unwise. It would be better to wait and leave in the morning, when they were fully rested. So she reluctantly joined the others around the campfire for dinner.
Or, what passed for dinner in the swamp. Several items of meat were lined up on a kabob and roasted before they were handed out to the guests. Normally, Mira wasn't picky with what she ate, but she drew the line at bugs. Some of the things on her kabob had too many legs and looked a little too crunchy for her taste.
"How you like that possum-chicken?" one of the river people asked Sokka. Mira took note of what he was eating and identified it on her own kabob. She began to nibble at it as Sokka answered.
"Tastes just like arctic hen," he said thoughtfully, looking at the meat in his hand as she chewed. "So, why were you guys so interested in eating Appa?" he asked, curiously, gesturing to the sky bison. "You've got plenty of big things wandering around," he added, pointing to the catfish-gator lying behind the river people.
"You want me to eat ol' Slim?" the river man asked, sounding scandalized. "He's like a member of the family," he said, tossing Slim a fish to eat.
"Nice Slim," Sokka said nervously, throwing him something from his kabob. It bounced off Slim's snout, and the creature turned to hiss menacingly at him. Sokka whimpered and flinched away.
The river people laughed. "Oh, he don't eat no bugs! That's people food!"
Mira knew some of the things on her kabob looked a little too spindly.
"Where'd you say you was from?" another river man asked.
"The South Pole," Katara answered.
"Didn't know there was waterbenders anywhere but here. They got a nice swamp down there, do they?"
Mira swallowed down a snicker. The thought of these loincloth-clad men in the South Pole was just too funny.
"No, it's all ice and snow," Katara answered, biting back a grin.
"No wonder you left," the river man said, looking put off.
"Well, I hope you realize now that nothing strange was going on here," Sokka said, switching topics to the swamp. "Just a bunch of greasy people living in a swamp."
"What about the visions?" Katara insisted.
"I told you," Sokka said slowly in the tone one would use when explaining something to a small child, "We were hungry! I'm eating a giant bug!"
Mira lost her appetite very quickly as Sokka shoved the wasp in his mouth and bit down. She tossed her kabob to the side. She could go without dinner tonight. She'd gone longer on much less.
"But what about when the tree showed me where Appa and Momo were?" Aang pressed.
"That's Avatar stuff, that doesn't count," Sokka said, waving his had in the air. "The only thing I can't figure out is how you made the tornado that sucked us down," he said, looking at Hue.
"I can't do anything like that," he said, looking slightly disturbed. "I just bend the water in the plants."
"Well, no accounting for weather," Sokka said, shrugging. "Still, there's absolutely nothing mysterious about the swamp."
"Whatever you say, Sokka," Mira said. "The sooner I get out of here, the better."
"I knew you were scared of caves, but I didn't know you were scared of swamps, too," Sokka couldn't resist saying.
She fixed him with an icy stare. "You really want to mess with me?"
He gulped. "No. Not really."
"I thought so."
A/N: Next up will be an episode I heavily debated omitting. It was filler in the show, and didn't advance the plot at all. So, I decided to make it non-filler. Next chapter introduces several original concepts, and ventures a tad into AU territory. I'm very excited for it!
Please review and let me know what you think!