A/N: Yay for finals week being over! I just took my last one this morning, and I thought I'd upload the next chapter to celebrate. I have been looking forward to this one ever since I wrote it. This is the chapter that introduces a lot of new, original concepts that I came up with. It was a lot of fun to write, and I hope it's as much fun for you to read. Fair warning, though. It's a long one (but worth it).
At this point, I would like to thank the people who reviewed after my last update. This story had a huge increase in reviews, and I can't describe what that feels like. So thank you to Chocolate Orchids, Matt Guthrie, readamy64, and TearsOnTheRiver for reviewing. And once again, thank you to those of you who follow silently. Your support is also appreciated.
Disclaimer: I do not own A:TLA. I own Mira, and new concepts not included in the show.
And after that long author's note, I present to you:
Chapter 5
Chaos Rising
After a relatively sleepless night in the river people's camp, Mira once again woke with the sun and started preparing for their departure. By the time the others were awake, she had completely packed Appa's saddle and was sitting nearby, grit-paper and rods in hand. She was almost finished smoothing them out, and would be looking for a suitable tree to tap for sap soon. She didn't dare touch any trees in the swamp, for fear of what Hue would do to her once he found out. So she contented herself with sanding her rods completely.
"You're in an awful hurry to leave," Katara remarked, looking over the packed saddle with wide eyes.
"As I've said many times before, I don't like it here," Mira said, stowing away her rods and grit-paper. "And I'm pretty sure those mats we slept on had bed bugs." She squirmed uncomfortably, scratching at a rash on her upper arm.
"Why did you have to mention that?" Sokka whined as he passed by them. He wriggled around and brushed at his arms as if swatting at invisible insects.
"Now can we go?" Mira asked, ignoring Sokka as Aang approached the group. "We're all here, Appa's all ready to go, so can we just…" She waved her arms in the arm in a vague pushing motion, "get out of here?"
Aang shrugged. "If everyone's ready, sure."
Fifteen minutes later, Mira breathed a sigh of relief. They were in the air, above the swamp, and flying away. Not too long after that, however, her relief turned into discomfort. Katara was giving Mira a meaningful look, and Mira knew exactly why. She was just going to pretend that she didn't. So she took out her perfectly smooth rods and continued to sand at them.
Ten minutes after that, Sokka joined Katara in the staring. The siblings just watched her, saying nothing, but unnerving her all the same. She took a deep breath in and centered herself before continuing her work. She would not let them intimidate her.
"Um…why are we all staring at Mira?" Aang asked uncertainly. He'd turned around to check on everyone, and had seen how Katara and Sokka's gazes were fixed on Mira.
"I'm actually not sure why," Sokka said, not breaking his gaze. "I'm just following Katara's lead."
"Katara?" Aang switched his attention to the water tribe girl.
"I want to know exactly what Hue meant when he said Mira was spirit-born," she said, crossing her arms and narrowing her eyes. "I have a feeling you didn't really tell us everything."
Mira set down her rods and crossed her arms in reply. "You really want to have a battle of wills with me?" she asked, arching an eyebrow. "I can tell you right now, I'm a lot more stubborn than you."
The two girls stared at each other in silence as the boys looked on uncomfortably. Finally, Katara softened her gaze. "Please?" she asked. "You don't have to answer anything you don't want to."
Mira relented. "Fine. I told you how it happened. I've got a spirit-mark near my neck."
"Can we see it?" Sokka jumped in, his curiosity getting the better of him.
"Only three people have ever laid eyes on my mark," she said, holding up her fingers and raising them as she counted off. "The first was my father. The second was my nursemaid. And the third was my best friend." She lowered her hand. "So, no, you may not."
"Wait a second," Katara said, realization dawning in her eyes. "That was the thing you covered up on your back when I was healing you in Omashu!"
Mira nodded. "I didn't want you to see it. It's really…personal." She shifted uncomfortably and looked away.
"It's alright," Katara said softly, reaching out to touch her arm. "I understand."
"But what does being spirit-born mean?" Sokka asked, scratching his head. "Will you have to sacrifice yourself, like Yue did?"
"Spirits, I hope not," Mira said shuddering. "I did some research when I was a child, to find out what it meant. Usually it just means that the spirits will have need of you at some point in your life. It could mean sacrificing yourself, or defeating someone who's upsetting the balance of the world, or anything like that. But the spirits will do anything to make sure you stay alive until the point at which they need you. That could mean saving you at birth, or keeping you from harm. You're the spirit's champion. And every single spirit-born was marked. Usually with the symbol of the particular spirit who claimed them."
"Do you know who claimed you?" Aang asked.
Mira nodded, but her expression made it clear that she was not going to reveal who did.
"So, it's like you're working for a spirit?" asked Katara, trying to clarify.
"I may be spirit-born, but that doesn't mean I want to be," Mira said with fire in her eyes. "The spirits have done me no favors, so I don't know why they expect me to fight for them."
"Still, it's a cool story to tell!" Sokka said, trying to ease the tension that had fallen upon the group.
"And yet I can count on two hands the people who know about it. It's not something you go bragging to others."
"Why not?" Aang asked, shrugging.
"Because some people still remember the legends of the old days, when spirit-marking was common. Those champions grew arrogant, and believed that they were above everyone else. If I go around proclaiming I'm spirit-born, people will expect me to have this holier-than-thou attitude. And it draws too much attention. In case you hadn't noticed, I like sticking to the shadows."
"We noticed," Sokka said dryly.
"Thank you for telling us," Katara said.
"Ah ah," she said, holding up her finger. "You don't get to hear that for free. I have a price."
The three looked at each other in apprehension.
"I want to know everything that's happened since you—" she pointed to Aang, "—came back. Don't leave anything out or skim over something. I want to know what's happened to you."
The others looked relieved, something that did not pass Mira by. "What, did you think I was going to ask for your firstborn? Honestly, I'm not that scary."
It took most of the day for the others to recount their adventures up until Mira had met them. They finally finished the story just as night was falling, and they quickly made camp. Since the day had been spent talking, not many words were exchanged around the campfire before sleep claimed the four.
Mira woke at daybreak and quietly went to check on her rods, which she'd left hanging in a crook of a branch the night before. She'd tapped a tree for sap the night before, making sure it was good quality before she smeared the sap on liberally. She made sure to keep turning the rods as she poured, so that the sap coated the wood evenly. She didn't want to have to hack away lumps later. After the rods had been covered, she'd put them over the fire, turning them slowly so every side would have a chance to bake equally. Afterwards, she'd set them aside to harden overnight.
She ran a finger over the rods lovingly, tracing the veins of color that wound through the sap. The lacquer had hardened nicely, with no uneven bumps. She pulled the rods from the tree and swung them around experimentally, getting used to the feel and weight of her newly completed weapons. She felt content now that the rods were done. She could fight well with knives, of course, but with knives, there was always the possibility that your opponent would end up dead. The worst the rods could do was knock someone out (or break a bone, but she'd really have to mean it to do that). The rods were ideally suited for a quick, bloodless fight.
A chittering sound from across the clearing drew Mira's attention. She looked over to see Momo perched over Sokka, peering into his mouth. She pushed herself up and wandered over to see what had the lemur so excited.
A rather industrious spider had set up a web inside Sokka's gaping mouth, and was sitting patiently in the center of it, waiting for a meal. Momo fell silent and watched the spider with wide eyes. A fly wandered through the air, drawing closer and closer until a leg caught upon the sticky thread of the spider's temporary home. The spider picked itself up and crawled over to the fly, which was now wriggling frantically in an attempt to escape.
Momo, seeing that the spider was distracted, pounced. He pulled back his hand and shoved it inside Sokka's mouth in an attempt to snatch the spider up. Much to Momo's dismay though, Sokka woke with a start (as anyone would when having a lemur hand thrust inside their mouth). Sokka bucked his head wildly, sending Momo flying. The lemur landed with a thump on the grass nearby, and happily started munching on his prize.
"What are you doing in my mouth?!" Sokka gagged, startled and annoyed at the same time. As Momo continued to consume the bugs, Sokka added, "Momo, you need to be a little more sensitive to my boundaries."
Mira couldn't help it. A snort escaped her, and Sokka looked up to find her watching him, a hand pressed over her mouth. "Erm…how long have you been there?" he asked uncertainly.
"Long enough" she said as she composed herself. "But at least it wasn't me waking you this time."
Sokka looked at Momo for a moment, then turned back to Mira. "You know, I might prefer you waking me up. But—" he added, pointing a finger at her and narrowing his eyes, "—that does not give you the right to wake me up."
She shrugged. "It's not like I'm going to ask your permission." She wandered back to the tree where her rods were hanging, leaving Sokka staring after her apprehensively.
She continued practicing with her new weapons until she was satisfied with them. She slid them into the loops on her belt and made her way to where the others had started packing up camp.
"Has anyone seen my boomerang?" Sokka was asking, digging around in his bag. He finally dumped it upside down and shook it, but the boomerang was nowhere to be found.
"Don't tell me you lost it," Katara said.
"I didn't!" he said stubbornly. "I just…temporarily don't know where it is."
Aang, who had wandered over after hearing the commotion, squatted next to Sokka and poked around in Sokka's things. "It's not in its holster?"
"Oh, I completely forgot to check there," Sokka drawled sarcastically. "Of course I looked there!"
Mira finally took pity on him and pulled the boomerang from a hidden pocket in her cloak. "Looking for this?"
Sokka's mouth dropped open. "Where did you find that?"
"Didn't find it. Nicked it off you before the swamp. I wondered when you'd notice it was gone."
Sokka was up in an instant and snatched it out of her hand. "Not funny," he muttered.
"Why would you steal that from him?" Katara asked, her brow furrowed in irritation.
"Wanted to see how long it'd take him to notice," Mira replied, shrugging.
"Why?" Katara persisted.
"Thought it'd be fun," Mira said, shrugging again.
"It's not fun, it's stealing," Katara said, scowling. "It's unethical."
"What, you thought you would take me in and I'd magically stop stealing?" Mira scoffed. "It's been a little over a week. What did you expect?"
"You don't steal from people you trust," Katara said, her voice softer.
"And that's your problem," Mira said shortly. Katara opened her mouth furiously to reply, but Mira cut her off before she could. "No, listen. From what I've seen, you three are too ready to trust. Not everyone will have your best interests at heart. Even those closest to you may turn on you," she said, punctuating her words by pulling Aang's bison whistle from her pocket.
His hand immediately flew to the inside pocket where he kept it. "But that's—how…" he sputtered as she handed it back to him.
"I'm good," she said simply. "And while it is fun to see how long it'll take you to notice, this also has a purpose. You need to be more observant and more skeptical. You can't expect everyone to like you because you're the Avatar. In fact, that should make you more cautious."
Aang didn't look convinced, but he nodded anyway. "If you say so…"
"Believe it or not, I am here to help. But that also means pointing out the things no one else will or wants to consider. If that makes me a bad person, so be it," she said, directing her gaze to Katara. A heavy silence descended over the clearing.
Sokka, as usual, was the one to break it. "And here I thought you were someone who rarely ever talked," he said, feigning a bright tone.
Mira arched an eyebrow. "You're complaining?"
"No, I—" he broke off. "Criminy. You're not going to talk today, are you?"
Mira gave a mysterious smirk, but said nothing. The attention was taken off her as Momo started chittering frantically. Mira snapped her head around, narrowing her eyes and scanning the area around them. It was her experience that animals had a sixth sense when it came to danger. She was never one to brush off an anxious house pet.
Her sharp ears caught the sounds of rumbling just as a Fire Nation war rhinoceros crested the hill beside them. The rumbling intensified as more rhinos emerged from the brush around their camp. Mira cursed. How could she have missed their approach?
"Give up! You're completely surrounded!" cried the soldier in charge arrogantly. He sneered down at the four, causing Mira's blood to boil. He thought they would instantly give up without a fight?
We'll see about that.
Mira burst into action, sprinting for Appa. She saw the others follow her lead from the corner of her eye before she had to suddenly dive sideways. One of the soldiers was equipped with fire arrows, and seemed to take pleasure in firing as many as he could. Mira ran in an unpredictable zig-zag fashion, trying to draw his arrows away from the others. She was confident in her ability to dodge them, but she couldn't say the same for the others.
She reached Appa last, due to her unusual running patterns. But instead of immediately taking off, Katara hesitated. She peered over her shoulder, her eyes widening as she spotted her waterbending scrolls sitting on an open tree stump. "My scrolls!" she cried, quickly changing course. Mira reached out to grab her arm, to stop her from running back to the soldiers, but the waterbender slipped from her grasp. She ran for the scrolls, leaving Mira with no choice but to wait for her return.
"My staff!" she heard Aang cry, and she saw a blur of orange and yellow from the corner of her eye as he leaped off Appa to retrieve it.
I'm surrounded by idiots.
If they all survived this encounter, she would be having some very serious words with them about priorities. Namely, how to organize them properly.
She watched anxiously as Katara froze a Fire Nation soldier in place before snatching her chest of scrolls out from under him. She ran back to Appa, completely oblivious to the archer who was nocking an arrow, Katara set firmly in his sights.
Mira reacted purely on instinct. She didn't think about which dagger to pull from her belt, how far back her arm needed to go, how much power to put in her throw. Years of experience took over, and she knew as soon as she released the tip of her knife that the throw would be good.
The dagger flew through the air, spinning end over end, glinting in the early morning light. The archer remained oblivious of the weapon flying his way until the knifepoint embedded itself into the palm of the hand holding the bowstring. He let out a shriek of surprise and pain, and Mira grimaced. She didn't like to spill blood. But the injury wasn't fatal. He would heal. He might be kicked out of the Fire Nation army, but Mira didn't see that as a bad thing. At least, that would be what she told herself to avoid the guilt.
A crashing sound turned her attention away from the injured archer. A tree had crashed to the ground right next to Aang, courtesy of a Fire Nation soldier. As she watched, the soldier pulled something from his belt, fiddled with it, and threw it at Aang. The airbender batted it away with the ease of a child playing streetball. Mira wondered what the object had been, but was answered by an explosion from the forest. Aang leaped away towards Appa, and Mira began to prepare for a quick departure.
She said a silent prayer of thanks that Appa was a flying creature. Surrounded as they were, an escape on foot would not have been possible. Mira started to feel a little more at ease as Aang cried, "Yip yip!" and they began to ascend. One last fireball followed them, but everyone (thankfully) had the sense to duck. Mira almost believed they were safe until…
"Wait!" Sokka called, half-leaning out of the saddle. "My boomerang!"
"We are not going back to get it!" Mira said angrily, her temper spiking once more.
"Oh, I see. There's time to get her scrolls and time to get his staff, but no time for my boomerang?" Sokka asked, motioning to Katara and Aang.
"Apparently," Mira growled. She gave the two a fierce glare, but when Katara opened her mouth to explain, Mira cut her off for the second time that morning. "Don't start." She could feel a vein throbbing in her temple, a sure sign that she was about to explode. She crawled to the other side of the saddle and sat cross-legged, forcing herself to relax the tense muscles in her shoulders and neck. She inhaled deeply, keeping a steady rhythm to her breathing. She needed to stay calm. An angry, irrational head never helped her before. She let the wind tug at her curls, whipping them through the air in a frenzy. She focused on the leather saddle beneath her, the wind in her ears, and the gentle taste of rain in the air. She let her emotions float away with the wind, and when she opened her eyes, her composed demeanor was once again in place.
"There's a town not far from here," Katara was saying as she examined the map. "We can stop and replace our supplies there."
Sokka perked up. "Maybe they'll have boomerangs!"
"Yeah," Katara agreed unconvincingly. "Maybe."
Mira examined the edge of the dagger in her hand. It was slightly dull, and the craftsmanship was less-than-desirable. The hilt was wrapped in an old, cracked leather that fought against her hand as she gripped it. The balance was completely off, and the blade exposed long-ago stains.
Frowning, she set it back down on the vendor's counter. "I'm sorry," she said. "It's just not what I'm looking for."
"Anything I can do to make you change your mind?" the vendor asked, his face falling at the prospect of losing a sale.
Yeah. Sell something nicer.
"No," she said, giving him a smile. "Maybe next time." As she turned to leave, she made sure to catch her lowered hood on a side display of knives. She took a step, and the display pitched over with a crash. "I'm so sorry!" she cried. "It's this damned hood, always catching on everything."
"Don't worry about it," the vendor said, though his eyes said he felt otherwise.
Mira bent down to help him collect the knives she'd just displaced. As soon as the weapons had been picked up off the ground, she smiled once more at the vendor, then turned and walked away.
She allowed herself a small grin as she pulled the dagger she'd stolen from a hidden fold in her cloak. This was the knife she'd really wanted. She'd noticed its gleam and the supple leather of the hilt without even having to examine it. So she'd asked for the old, dull knife. When the vendor discovered the missing dagger, he'd think back to those who'd asked for it and examined it, but hadn't bought it. He wouldn't think of the cloaked girl who asked about the secondhand knife. She wouldn't be suspected, and that was how she liked it.
She lifted a handful of other supplies on her way back to the others. If she didn't tell Katara how she'd gotten them, she was fairly sure she could convince her they'd been gained legally.
She caught up with the others by the main street. They were looking around in wonder, taking in the festival decorations she'd noticed upon entering the town. She'd assumed they were celebrating a local holiday. She hadn't asked about it, and so far, no one had volunteered a reason for the festivities.
"Mira!" Aang called as he spotted her. He waved her over and said excitedly, "There's a holiday for the Avatar. That's what they're celebrating!"
Mira arched an eyebrow. She'd never actually come across an Avatar festival, but she supposed the concept made sense. If it were true, she could begin to relax. A town celebrating the Avatar would be the safest place for him to be at the moment.
"Look," Katara said, pointing. "They made a giant Kyoshi float." Mira followed her finger to see a towering figure being pulled down the street. A woman with auburn hair, heavy facepaint, and green feminine war robes stared blankly down at the town.
"And here comes Avatar Roku," Sokka said. An old man in traditional Fire Nation clothing was wheeled down the street after Kyoshi. His white hair was tied into a traditional topknot, and his hands were tucked inside his robes. He also had a calm, neutral expression on his carved face.
"Having a huge festival in your honor is great, but frankly, it's just nice to be appreciated," Aang said, grinning from ear to ear. Mira did realize that the young Avatar had faced too many hardships at a young age, and that he was eager for some recognition, but she was beginning to grow skeptical of the festival. As the others stared up at the floats towering above them, Mira examined the crowd around them. Instead of looking happy and cheerful, a majority of the faces in the gathering looked angry, or scornful. Not expressions one expected to see on a holiday.
"Aang, look!" Katara said, pointing to the next float. A giant figure of Aang was wheeled down the street, following the previous Avatars. The clothes matched Aang's exactly, but the face…a garish grin was painted across his face, giving the float a gruesome appearance. Mira slid her eyes sideways to see Aang's reaction, but he was smiling and laughing at the effigy. He hadn't seemed to notice the uneasy tone to the celebration. Neither had Katara and Sokka, by the looks of it. Once again, she wondered where this group would be without her.
Mira's attention was drawn to a man running into the village, a torch in hand. Mira ignored Sokka, who was debating the merits of a torch as a weapon (as he had been unable to find a boomerang in the town), and focused on the man. He was running straight for the floats, showing no sign of stopping.
"Hey, what's that guy doing?" Katara asked, her brow furrowed in concern.
Mira could almost see what was going to happen before it did. The man leaped onto the float of Kyoshi and shoved the torch down, forcing the flame to feed on the wood. As soon as the fire started catching, the man was doing the same to the effigy of Roku. The crowd started chanting and jeering at the floats, shaking their fists in the air and they cried out. The other three looked on in shock, their eyes wide and their mouths hanging open.
What had been the best place for Aang to be was now the worst.
The man had moved on to the Aang float, and threw the torch through the air, where it spun end over end until striking the left eye. The fire quickly caught and started to spread across Aang's face.
Katara snapped out of her shock and ran through the crowd toward the large fountain in the square. She leaped forward and snatched up the water with a gesture, throwing it high into the air until it doused the flames on Aang's face.
Mira's jaw tensed. Revealing themselves in a town that hated the Avatar was only asking for trouble. If only Katara would come back, they could sneak out and fly away, no harm done.
However, as she was learning, that was not how Aang did things.
But it wouldn't stop her from trying. "Aang," she hissed, bending down to whisper in his ear. "I know you want to stay and prove yourself, but it might not be safe. We need to leave."
She thought she might've gotten through to him, but then a crowd member jeered at Katara, and Mira clearly saw the intent on Aang's face. She reached out a hand to stop him, but he leaped past her and glided up to the shoulder of the float. He reached up and pulled the hat from his head, revealing his arrow tattoos.
"Why does no one ever listen to me?" Mira grumbled under her breath. She'd thought this would be a quick in-and-out trip, but it looked like they would be staying a while.
"It's the Avatar himself!" cried one man rather obviously. He was dressed in official-looking robes, and he had an air of one in charge. Mira guessed he was the mayor (or an equivalent leader).
"It's going to kill us with its awesome Avatar powers!" cried one hysterical townsperson. Mira wrinkled her nose in distaste. If they were going to talk about Aang, the least they could do was assign him a gender.
Aang raised his hand in a peaceful gesture. "No, I'm not, I..."
The man who had spoken out before screamed and dived into the crowd. Aang's brow furrowed. Likely, he had never encountered anyone who had been terrified of him and his power.
"I suggest you leave. You're not welcome here, Avatar," the mayor said haughtily, looking down his nose at Aang (It was quite a feat, considering Aang was perched on a float high above the crowd).
"Why not? Aang helps people," Katara said. Mira, sensing that there was no way to make a quick exit, slithered through the crowd until she was standing near the waterbender. Sokka followed her, though based off the grunts and exclamations, he hadn't been nearly as subtle as she. By the time Mira reached the little crowd in front of the fountain, Aang had leaped nimbly down from the float and was standing in front of the mayor. "I'm on your side," he insisted.
But the mayor would not be swayed. "I find that hard to swallow considering what you did to us in your past life. It was Avatar Kyoshi; she murdered our glorious leader, Chin the Great," he proclaimed.
Aang's face crumbled into an expression of shock and anguish. "You think that I... murdered someone..."
Honestly, Mira wouldn't have been surprised if Kyoshi had killed someone. The Avatar was supposed to keep the peace, and sometimes peace required extreme measures. But given the look on Aang's face, she wasn't about to say that.
"Aang would never do something like that. No Avatar would. And it's not fair for you all to question his honor!" Katara was saying, pointing an accusing finger at the crowd.
Yet another crowd member jeered her rather immaturely, and Mira rolled her eyes. If the townspeople were trying to prove that they'd been wronged, they weren't getting off to a good start.
Aang raised his voice to be heard over the crowd. "Give me a chance to clear my name."
"The only way to prove your innocence is to stand trial," the mayor said smugly, a malicious twinkle in his eye. Mira felt dread twist her gut, and a prickle on the back of her neck warned her that this was a very bad idea.
"I'll gladly stand trial," Aang said confidently.
"Aang," Mira hissed. "This is a bad idea. We should just get out of here while we can."
"I'm not going to run away," he hissed. "I need to prove myself."
It's not running away. It's picking your battles, Mira wanted to say, but the mayor was already speaking. "You'll have to follow all our rules. That includes paying bail."
"You're going to spend all our money on paying bail for a crime you personally didn't even commit?" Mira said in disbelief.
"I need to do this," Aang said firmly. "And besides, we have enough money!" He pulled a handful of Water tribe coins from his pocket, and presented them to the mayor. The man looked down at the currency in Aang's hand, and smirked. And with that smirk, Mira's stomach dropped, and she realized that things were quickly becoming very bad.
"We don't accept Water Tribe money," the mayor declared. "You'll have to spend the night in a cell," he continued triumphantly.
Aang's face fell, and he slowly stowed the money back in his pocket. "Isn't there another way?" he asked desperately.
"You said you would follow our traditions," the mayor said. "This is one of them." He looked Aang with a gleeful glint in his eye. He had the Avatar where he wanted him, and he knew it. "Unless you want to break them and further damage your honor?"
Aang lowered his head in defeat. "No," he said quietly. "I'll do it."
Two burly men emerged from the crowd and took hold of Aang's arms. They bull-frog marched him down the road toward the jail, leaving Mira, Katara, and Sokka with no choice but to follow. They locked him in a pair of wooden stocks and shut him inside the prison, which was an open-air courtyard with barred windows cut into the rock. Mira, Katara, and Sokka remained clustered around the cell door as the mayor and his guards left.
Mira was angry, but she knew letting it show wouldn't help. Aang was still reeling with the idea that a previous reincarnation might have murdered someone. He didn't need any guilt her anger would add. So she buried it and focused on forming a plan.
"How was I supposed to know they wouldn't take Water Tribe money?" Aang asked weakly as he sat in the prison cell.
Mira tuned out and set her attention to the jail holding Aang. It was different from the ones she was used to. It was an open-air prison with no roof, and thick walls. Large, round observation windows were cut into the walls at various intervals, thick steel bars crisscrossing them. She couldn't break in through the windows, but perhaps…
She looked up. Aside the sheer height of the walls, and the lack of handholds, there was nothing preventing her from going up. And height wasn't something that dissuaded Mira.
She pulled her darts out and quietly slipped away from the others, who were currently trying to persuade Aang into leaving. They weren't being very successful, so Mira decided to take a more direct approach. She wedged her darts in between the thick stone bricks (where the mortar was crumbling) and pulled herself up. She made quick work of scaling the wall, and as she perched on the narrow ledge, she assessed the wire lining the top in front of her. It was pointed in toward the prison, to deter any prisoner trying to get out. It wasn't very hard to climb over from this angle, but Mira knew getting back out would be slightly more difficult. She decided to cross that bridge when she came to it, and gingerly vaulted over the wire, clinging by her fingertips on the ledge. Still holding her darts, she adjusted her grip and stuck one, then the other in the mortar below her. She climbed down, and when she was close enough to the ground, she paused a moment to stow both darts back in her belt. She clung to the wall, grasping the small indentations where the mortar had crumbled away, preparing to jump down. Before she let go, however, she heard, "Hey…where's Mira?" from Sokka. Mira mouth quirked in a smirk, and she let go to drop down right next to Aang.
It took all her self-control to keep from grinning at their reactions. They all jumped nearly a foot in the air, and Sokka let out another rather feminine scream. After they had all recovered, Sokka asked, "You enjoy doing that to us, don't you?"
"Very much," she confirmed. She turned to Aang. "So, are we leaving?"
He shook his head. "I can't have people thinking I'm a murderer. I need you guys to help prove my innocence."
She stared at him in disbelief. "I can get you out in under five minutes. We can be gone within the hour. And you're choosing to stay here?"
"I have to," he said quietly.
"Besides, how're we gonna do that? The crime happened over three hundred years ago," Sokka pointed out.
A twinkle appeared in Aang's eye. "That's okay, Sokka. For some reason, I thought you were an expert detective."
Sokka puffed out his chest in pride. "Well, I guess I could be classified as such."
By that time, Katara had caught on to Aang's ruse. "Yeah! Back home he was famous for solving the mystery of the missing seal jerky."
"Because that definitely qualifies him," Mira mumbled sarcastically, but she was either unheard or ignored.
"Everyone wanted to blame it on a polar leopard, but I figured out that it was Old Man Jarco wearing polar leopard boots. See, a real eight hundred pound polar leopard would have left much deeper tracks. Okay, I guess I am pretty good," Sokka bragged.
"So you'll help me with my case?" Aang asked eagerly.
Please say no please say no please say no….
"Fine," Sokka relented. "But I'm gonna need some new props."
Mira waved them away. "Hold on a second. I need some help getting out of here."
Sokka did a mock double-take. "You? Need help? Has the world come to an end?"
"Oh ha ha," Mira said sarcastically. "Now catch me."
"What?" he said dumbly as she pulled out her darts and began to scale the wall. "What did she say? Did she mean that?"
His voice faded as she climbed higher. Once she reached the top, she clung to the ledge and put her darts away. Getting over the wire was much trickier coming from the inside. Going over the first time, she could just climb over and use her darts going down. Now, she had to flip over the wire in one smooth motion, with no time to grab the edge or use her darts. She would be free falling to the ground, and as graceful as she was, there was no way she could land safely from that height. She needed Sokka to catch her. "You ready?" she yelled down.
"No!" came the reply.
"Better hurry up!" she warned. She didn't wait for a reply. She flexed her arms, bent her legs, and kicked off the wall. She flew around until she was executing a perfect handstand on the wall. She balanced delicately for a moment, then curled her legs down. She kicked back in a burst of motion, much like a swimmer diving from a handstand. She flipped over the wire, and she was falling. Her cloak billowed around her, and the wind rushed past her ears. She found herself praying fiercely that Sokka was in the right position, and was ready to catch her. She hadn't let herself consider what would happen if he didn't.
She didn't have much time to worry, thankfully. With a soft thump, she landed in Sokka's arms. "Don't do that to me again," he said, looking down at her. "That was terrifying."
"How do you think I felt?" she retorted. "Falling through thin air, depending on you."
"Thank you, for your utter faith in me," he said dryly.
After a few silent moments, Mira said, "Sokka?"
"Yeah?"
"You can put me down now."
"Oh. Right." He set her down quickly, a slight blush coloring his cheeks.
The three stood in silence, staring at each other. Finally, Katara spoke up. "Uh, Sokka? Didn't you say something about needing new props?"
"Hm?" he said distractedly. "Oh, yeah. To the market!" he said, pointing to the main road and leading the way.
Mira followed, rolling her eyes.
Boys.
After Sokka found and purchased his rather silly-looking props, Mayor Tong showed them the scene of Chin's murder. A small temple overlooking the sea rested on the cliff, an amphitheater and a statue sitting behind it. A dirt patch of a petite footprint lay in front of the temple, and the cliff dropped off toward the sea not far from it. Mira wandered around the temple, her eyes scanning for anything that might be useful, while at the same time listening to Mayor Tong's narrative of events.
"This is the footprint of the killer, Kyoshi," Tong was saying, gesturing to the footprint. "It was at sunset three hundred and seventy years ago today that she emerged from the temple and struck down Chin the Great. After that tragic day, we built this statue to immortalize our great leader. Feel free to appreciate it," he said, sniffing haughtily. He looked around, saw he was no longer needed, and promptly left them there.
Mira shuddered as she watched the man leave, then turned back to the temple. Sokka was examining the statue of Chin, nodding and murmuring as he did so. Finally, he said, "This temple and this statue were cut from the same stone. And we know that the statue was built after Chin died."
"So if they were built at the same time, that means..." Katara tried to finished, but Sokka cut her off.
"Shhh! I wanna solve it!" Sokka pouted, waving his arms. Katara rolled her eyes, but waved for him to continue. "That means Kyoshi never set foot in this temple," Sokka said excitedly.
"That's a big hole in the mayor's story, but it's not enough to prove Aang's innocence," Katara said.
"It's not a big hole," Mira said. "It's not even a small hole. So the temple wasn't here. She still could have come from this general direction. We have nothing."
"You're right," Sokka admitted. "We need to go to Kyoshi Island."
"Where'd that come from?" Katara asked, confused.
"Kyoshi was from Kyoshi Island. We'll ask Oyagi if he knows anything about this. If anyone knows about Kyoshi, it's them."
"Are you sure this isn't just some ruse to see Suki again?" Katara asked skeptically, arms crossed and eyebrow arched.
"What? No!" Sokka blustered. "It really is the best place for information on Kyoshi!"
"I agree with Sokka," Mira said, speaking up. "You two go to Kyoshi Island. I'll stay here and see if I can find anything."
Katara nodded. "Alright."
Not an hour later, Mira was watching the two siblings fly away on Appa for the short journey to Kyoshi Island. As they became a speck on the horizon, she turned away. It was time to ask some of the townspeople what they knew of the crime.
She did not have much luck at first. Most people, upon seeing it was a traveling companion of the Avatar, slammed the door in her face. Finally, she had to take down her hood to show that she had no malicious intent, that she was just a normal girl. Well, not normal, per se. But they didn't have to know that, did they?
Finally, she found someone willing to talk to her. Unfortunately, it was a young man who eyed her with entirely too much familiarity. But she needed this information, so she grit her teeth and endured it.
"What do you know about Chin?" she asked.
"Well," he said, tossing his long brown hair out of his face, "He was our village leader three hundred seventy years ago. He turned this place into a center of learning, arts, trading. We went from nothing, to a cultural epicenter. That's why we named the village after him. Would've been nice to see back then, hm?" he said, winking at her.
Mira bit her tongue and swallowed down the words she so desperately wanted to say. Instead, she said, "So what problem would Kyoshi have with him?"
He shrugged. "I dunno. Chin was trying to extend a hand of friendship toward the other nations and lands. He wanted them to experience the success that we had. The other nations agreed to an alliance with Chin, but Kyoshi refused. That would have been that, but Kyoshi thought Chin was enforcing his will over the other nations. Which is ridiculous," he snorted. "I mean, if that were true, the other nations would just have refused an alliance. Simple as that. If you ask me, I think Kyoshi overreacted," he whispered, leaning in close, like he was sharing a secret.
I wish I didn't have to. Mira had to stop herself from leaning away from him. Instead, she batted her eyes and tilted her head curiously. "What did she do?"
"Chin offered a hand in friendship, to talk to Kyoshi. But instead of coming to talk, she killed him," he finished.
"Thank you for telling me," Mira said. "You were very helpful." She turned and walked away, hoping he wouldn't try and follow.
"Hey!" he called after. She heard footsteps behind her, and a muscle twitched in her jaw as he pulled her round. "I thought maybe we could go grab something to eat," he said flirtatiously. "You know, just you and me."
"Thanks," she said, forcing a fake smile. "But I'm not hungry." She turned to leave again, but he stopped her once more.
"Well, we don't have to go eat," he said, leaning much too close for comfort. "We could do something else…" he trailed off suggestively.
Mira was done with pretending. In a flash, she grabbed the boy's wrist and was twisting it around until his arm was pinned behind his back. "Never going to happen," she growled.
"Ow!" he cried. "Spirits, what is wrong with you?!"
"Too much," she muttered, releasing him. He collapsed to the ground, and Mira was gone before he could push himself up.
She ducked behind a nearby building to process what she'd just learned. The boy's story troubled her. To anyone else, it would sound like a normal and rational account of an unjust murder. But Mira wasn't anyone else, and her time in the Fire Nation taught her well. The words she'd just heard reminded her too much of Fire Nation propaganda. "Spreading success" and "cultural epicenter"…it all screamed "lie" to her. Something else was going on here…
Her musings were interrupted by a scream emanating from the building next to her. She rushed around to find a middle-aged woman clutching a child to her chest, staring at the house in horror.
"What's wrong?" Mira asked.
"I can't do this," the woman muttered. "I can't live here anymore. This is just too much."
"What is? What's wrong?"
The woman finally noticed Mira standing next to her. She started suddenly, clutching the child closer to her chest. "Who are you? What do you want?"
"My name is Mira," she said calmly, extending her hands slowly to show she meant no harm. "And I want to help."
The woman squinted at her. "I know you. You travel with the Avatar."
"But I'm not here to do anything but help you," she said. "What's your name?"
The woman was silent for a moment, as if debating whether or not to trust Mira. Finally, she said, "My name is Dima."
"Dima, can you tell me what's wrong?"
Dima took a deep, shuddering breath. "There's something…wrong with this village. Accidents keep happening, but nothing like this has ever happened before. I thought we were just unlucky. I thought they were only accidents," she repeated miserably.
"What kind of accidents?" Mira asked.
"Things break, or burn down mysteriously. Crops die for no reason. People are injured. But…it's never been anything like this. Not like this," she whispered shakily, shaking her head and squeezing her eyes shut.
"Like what?" Mira asked curiously.
Dima inclined her head toward the house. "See for yourself."
Mira took a few apprehensive steps toward the building, making sure to keep one hand on a dagger. She climbed the steps to the house, and gingerly pushed open the door. What she found was horribly familiar.
A small, humanoid figure was perched on the wooden table in the center of the kitchen. It looked to be made of shadows, and small tentacles of darkness whipped around it, snatching up pots and pans and throwing them around the room. It cackled maniacally, and scurried across the table to leap onto the counter, giving it access to even more potential projectiles.
Mira breathed out a particularly foul curse word, which unfortunately caught the attention of the thing in the kitchen. It whirled around, hissing in anger. A disproportionally large slash of a mouth crossed its face. Sharp, stained white fangs filled its mouth, and bright bloodred beady eyes fixed their gaze on Mira. Suddenly, before she could move, a tentacle of shadows shot out and wrapped itself around a kitchen knife. In an instant, the knife was flying through the air, straight toward Mira.
She reacted in a split-second. She yanked her head out of the doorway, slamming the door shut mere moments before the knife embedded itself in the wood. She leaned against the house, taking a few moments to center herself. Then she descended the stairs toward Dima.
"You saw it, didn't you?" the woman said shakily. "That…thing?"
"Good news and bad news," Mira said grimly. "Bad news? You've got a kakodaemon. Also known as a chaos spirit."
"What's the good news?"
Mira looked her straight in the eye. "I know how to get rid of it."
Mira waited anxiously as a black speck appeared on the horizon. She'd spent several hours preparing for the ritual that was about to take place that night, but she was missing one thing: manpower. Sure, she could've used a couple of villagers to help her out (it'd certainly get rid of the little daemon a lot faster), but a banishment ritual was a tricky thing. One shaky hand, one toe over the line, one mistake…she didn't want to think about it. She didn't trust these villagers with her life. Alright, so she wasn't sure she trusted Katara and Sokka with it either, but she trusted them a damn sight more than these strangers. She would only perform the ritual if Katara and Sokka were the ones to assist her. The townspeople hadn't been very happy when she'd insisted that they wait, but seeing as she was the only one who knew how to banish a daemon, they'd had to relent. So she'd gathered the necessary supplies, and she'd waited. Now she stood near the temple, her leg bouncing and her fingers rubbing together. As soon as Appa touched down, she'd accosted them.
"The trial will have to wait until tomorrow," she declared, grabbing Katara's sleeve and dragging her along.
"What?" But we solved it!" Sokka cried.
"More pressing things have come up," she said grimly, not slowing her pace.
"Where are we going?" Katara asked as she unsuccessfully tried to reclaim her sleeve.
"The jail," Mira answered. "I don't want to explain this twice."
As soon as they'd reached the observation window, Mira started talking. "Apparently, ever since anyone can remember, Chin has been plagued by mysterious accidents and bad fortune. Crops die, barns burn down, people get injured…and no one knew why. But when I was asking around about Kyoshi, I saw it. It was in a woman's house, wreaking havoc."
"What was?" Sokka interrupted.
"A kakodaemon," Mira answered gravely.
"A what?" Aang asked, confused.
"You've never heard of a kakodaemon?" Mira asked, astonished. "Alright, so I can understand how the Iceberg Twins are ignorant ("Hey!"), seeing how minor spirits generally hate the cold on principle, but you? The bridge between the spirit world and ours? You don't know?"
Aang attempted to lift his hands defensively, but the stocks prevented him from doing so. "I left before they could teach me anything spiritual!"
"…That's unfortunate," Mira muttered.
"Will you teach me?" Aang asked quietly, after a moment.
"I'll suppose I'll have to, won't I?" Mira sighed.
"You don't have to sound all enthusiastic about it," Aang mumbled, looking dejectedly at his feet.
"I didn't mean it like that," Mira said. "It's just—this all depends on me now."
"What does? What's a kako-whatsit? Could you start explaining instead of making enigmatic remarks that no one understands?" Sokka asked impatiently.
"Fine. A kakodaemon is a minor spirit that feeds off negative energy. They love causing havoc, so a long time ago, the eight element spirits bound them to the spirit world in order to protect the physical world. But sometimes they slip out, and that's just what one of them did. It was only able to do so because of Chin's murder, but I'm not sure how it connects."
"But Kyoshi didn't kill Chin! She couldn't have! That's what we figured out," Sokka said eagerly.
Mira buried her head in her hands. "No. No! Nonono," she moaned.
"What? Isn't that a good thing?" Sokka asked, his brow drawn in confusion.
"Now I don't know what's drawing the chaos spirit! I thought it might be the murder, but now that you mention it, if Kyoshi's killing Chin had been the source, this chaos spirit would be wreaking havoc on Kyoshi Island. But it's here. Why?"
"Why do you have to understand why it's here?" Aang asked. "Can't you just get rid of it?"
Mira shook her head. "I could try, but it would be risky. There's a ritual, but the best thing you can have is identify the negative energy that drew them here. In this case, it would be solving the murder. If I reveal what really happened while I'm doing the ritual, poof. It's gone for good. If you don't have the proper truth, it's a gamble. And I'm not taking risks with this one."
"What's so special about this one?" Sokka asked.
"The greater the injustice (and consequently, the greater the negative energy), the deadlier the chaos spirit. And based off that homicidal little bugger, this is a pretty big injustice. Truth would be best. Dammit!" she yelled suddenly. "We'll have to wait until after the trial. I need the truth. Is there any foolproof way to get it?" she asked Aang desperately.
"I don't know," he said miserably. "I don't know."
"Then we'll just have to wait until morning," she said, trying not to sound too disappointed. "And we'll have to hope for the best."
Mira looked on apprehensively as the mayor approached the observation window. The morning had dawned bright and clear and beautiful, but that didn't keep the dread from filling the pit of her stomach. She didn't have good feeling about this day. Something was going to go wrong. But she swallowed her doubt and tried to look confident in front of Mayor Tong.
"Honorable mayor," Katara said calmly, "we've prepared a solid defense for the Avatar. We did an investigation and found some very strong evidence."
"Evidence? Hmph!" Tong snorted. "That's not how our court system works."
"How else would it work?" Mira asked, wrinkling her nose.
"Simple. I say what happened and then you say what happened and then I decide who's right," Tong said, looking smug.
Mira's stomach clenched and she looked down in defeat. There was no way to get the truth from that system. Chin would be haunted by a chaos spirit for the rest of its days.
By the time she looked back up, the mayor was gone, and they were alone.
"I guess we'll just have to hope for the best," Katara said weakly, trying to force a grin. "Maybe our evidence will make them rethink what happened."
Oh, to be that naïve and optimistic. But she kept her mouth shut and followed the others to the amphitheater, hoping against hope that a miracle would happen. But Mira knew from experience that miracles were few and far between. But there is something in people that keeps them hoping even after the point of giving up. Despite her pessimism, Mira still had a little voice in the back of her mind (albeit way in the back) that kept whispering that maybe, just maybe, she would catch a break. And as much as she tried to stifle it, the voice still persisted in the back of her mind, keeping her from total despair. So as she sat in the front row with Katara and Sokka, a small spark flickered and burned deep inside her.
Tong stood in front of the people of Chin and cleared his throat, preparing to make his case. Mira was expecting a grand speech, or a logically presented case, but what she heard as very different. "Everyone loved Chin the Great because he was so great. Then the Avatar," he pointed to Aang, "showed up and killed him! And that's how it happened," he concluded, before primly taking his seat.
If the people accept his argument, I'll seriously consider just walking away and leaving that chaos spirit.
But, then again, it wasn't up to the people, was it? Tong decided these cases. It didn't matter what the people thought. She grumbled silently. She'd have to confront that spirit, guilty or not guilty. Her conscience wouldn't let her walk away.
Aang took his placed before the crowd, shuffling his feet and swallowing nervously. Mira desperately hoped he remembered the evidence Sokka had tried to drill into him. At Sokka's encouragement, he opened his mouth to begin. "Ladies and gentlemen, I'm about to tell you what really happened. And I will prove it with facts. Fact number one..." Aang's face went blank as he searched his mind for the information. "Uh..."
"The footprints!" Sokka hissed.
Aang's face cleared. "Oh, yeah..." He turned his attention back to the crowd. "You see, I have very large feet." Everyone's eye turned to Aang's petite feet, and a murmur of doubt rippled through the crowd. Aang continued, oblivious to the village's uncertainty. "Furthermore, your... temple matches your statue. But... I was in a painting at sunset. So there you have it! I'm not guilty!" he said, beaming at the unconvinced crowd.
Mira rubbed her temples in defeat. She would have to face a chaos spirit without her best weapon. She was about to resign herself to a life-threatening venture when Katara stood up suddenly. "Mayor Tong, I'd like for the court to hear one last testimony."
He jumped up angrily. "I've already told you! It's just me and the accused. You can't call any witnesses!" he insisted.
"This isn't just any witness. I'm going to call..." she paused for dramatic effect before pointing to Aang, "Avatar Kyoshi herself!"
"What are you doing?" Mira hissed as Aang was dragged away to change into the Kyoshi uniform (which for some strange reason, Sokka had brought back with him).
Katara shrugged. "Well, she is Aang's past life. Maybe wearing her stuff will trigger something."
Sokka cut in. "I do believe in the power of stuff."
Tong protested mightily as Aang was led back into the amphitheater. "This is a mockery of Chin law!"
"Please! If you could just wait one more second, I'm sure Kyoshi will be here," Katara pleaded, her eyes flicking to Aang (who still very much resembled his current self).
Aang fluttered his eyes girlishly and adopted a mock falsetto. "Hey, everybody. Avatar Kyoshi here."
"We are doomed," Mira muttered as Tong blustered about. But just as the words escaped her lips, a whirlwind kicked up, surrounding Aang. A cloud passed over the sun, and the temperature dropped. As quick as the storm appeared, it vanished, leaving Avatar Kyoshi standing in the place of Aang. She towered over the crowd, staring down at them in a neutral expression. "I killed Chin the Conqueror," she began calmly. She ignored the gasps of the crowd and continued. "A horrible tyrant, Chin was expanding his army to all corners of the continent. When they came to the neck of the peninsula where we lived, he demanded our immediate surrender. I warned him that I would not sit passively and while he took our home, but he did not back down. On that day, we split from the mainland. I created Kyoshi Island so my people could be safe from invaders." She finished her monologue with the same calm she had started with. She lowered her head, the whirlwind reappeared, and Kyoshi was replaced by Aang.
"So... what just happened?" Aang asked uncertainly, looking around.
"Uhh... you kind of confessed. Sorry," Katara said weakly.
Seeing an opportunity, Tong pounced. "And I find you guilty! Bring out the wheel of punishment!"
As the bailiff brought out a giant wheel separated into various sentences, Mira sighed. "They would hand down punishment like this." She wasn't particularly worried about the wheel. This time, she would grab Aang and yank him out of Chin, willing or not.
Despite this, she still found herself wishing that the wheel would stop on community service. Aang could help her banish the chaos spirit, and then they'd be on their way. Two buzz-birds killed with one stone.
But, of course, the universe did not look favorably upon Mira. The wheel landed on boiling oil, and she sighed irritably. She'd have to rescue Aang from certain death, and she wouldn't be able to banish the kakodaemon. It wasn't how she liked to end things.
But fortune comes in strangest forms, the strangest of all being Fire Nation soldiers. The group from that morning had returned. The rhinos crashed through the town, throwing fire and invading the amphitheater.
"We've come to claim this village for the Fire Lord!" yelled the colonel of the battalion. "Now show me your leader so I may..." he smirked as another solider toppled the statue of Chin, "...dethrone him."
"That's him over there!" someone yelled, pointing a finger to Tong, who was hiding behind the wheel of punishment.
" You! Avatar! Do something!" he cried desperately.
"Gee, I'd love to help, but I'm supposed to be boiled in oil," Aang said calmly.
Tong hurriedly moved the wheel to community service. "There! 'Community service.' Now serve our community and get rid of those rhinos!"
Aang smiled and exploded into action. Mira followed his lead, leaping to her feet and running up the amphitheater steps, dodging villagers as she did so and pulling her rods from her belt loops. She pushed off the final step, flying through the air toward the nearest rhino. She swung her rod with all her strength, and the wood met the soldier's forehead with an almighty crack. He slumped sideways, sliding out of the saddle. Mira landed on the ground in a crouch, tucked away her rods, and quickly vaulted up to land on the rhino's back. "C'mon buddy," she murmured, tapping his hide, "Let's go find your friends."
The rhino snorted and lumbered away from the amphitheater, toward the center of the town. She rounded a corner to find another rhino blocking the road. The solider rising it squinted at her, asking, "Chuan? Is that you?"
"Guess again," she said, before hurling herself off her rhino. She spun through the air to deliver a swift roundhouse kick to the jaw. A second solider slid to the ground, and Mira's mouth quirked in a half-smile. It didn't last long, though, as a fireball sailed past her, just brushing her cloak. With a curse, she smothered the flames and whirled around. Another solider was at the end of the road, his smoking fist extended in front of him. Before Mira could do anything, he sent another fireball sailing toward her. She dived sideways, into a back alley. Quick as a flash, she scurried up the side of a house and onto the roof. She crouched down, watching intently as the soldier urged his rhino closer to where she'd disappeared. She slowly slipped a dagger out of her belt, pulled her hand back, and let it fly.
The dagger spun end over end in the air, until with a ringing clang the hilt struck the soldier's helmet. The noise spooked the rhino, who took off in a panic, his rider still slumped over the saddle. Mira let herself down off the roof, her eyes scanning for any more soldiers coming her way.
A quiet, maniacal giggle tore her attention away from the road. She looked to where it was coming from, and saw the kakodaemon standing in the middle of the road, staring up at her, its beady little eyes fixed on hers.
"Don't you dare," Mira said quietly, yet intensely. "Don't—you—dare," she said louder. "Not now. I'll deal with you later," she promised. The kakodaemon only laughed and melted into the ground, the shadow flying away in between a pair of buildings across the street. Mira was torn whether to follow it or find more soldiers. She was saved from the decision by a soldier who found her.
Mira whipped the rods from her belt and sank into a defensive position. The firebender gave a wicked smile and did the same. But before he could move, Mira sprang forward, sprinting toward the man. She knew that sudden, unexpected movement tended to catch people off guard, especially soldiers, who favored precise forms. The sight of her running for him would rattle him.
But it wouldn't unnerve him enough that he wouldn't get a shot off. A fireball raced through the air toward Mira, but it didn't faze her. She bent backwards and dropped to her knees, her momentum carrying her underneath the flames. She drew her rod back as she neared the man. As she drew level with him, she brought the rod forward to meet his kneecap, and a sickening crunch echoed in the morning air.
He gave a howl of pain and collapsed, clutching his knee. Mira pulled herself up, brushing the dust from her clothing. The soldier continued to groan loudly, rolling around on the dirt road. She took pity on him and gave him a none-too-gentle rap on the head with her rod. He fell to the ground, unconscious. Mira walked away without looking back, searching for her next opponent. He wasn't too hard to find.
And so it went. Mira kicked, punched, and swung until time blended together and all that mattered was the next solider, the next rhino. Her muscles grew weary with the effort, but she pressed on, knowing that her enemy would take no pity on a tired opponent.
Finally, she came across Aang standing over the unconscious body of the colonel. "Does this mean…?" she asked.
He nodded. "Yes. It's over."
"Good," she said. "I need a nap before I take on that daemon."
"You're still going to do that?" Aang asked in disbelief. "After all that fighting? Is that a good idea?"
She shrugged. "Probably not." And leaving him with that, she turned and walked toward the woods to find a comfortable clearing where she could steal a few hours' sleep.
After a brief nap, Mira woke feeling at least somewhat refreshed and alert. Any residual sleepiness was washed away with the water of a nearby icy river. She calmly made her way to center of Chin, burying any doubt and uncertainty with every step she took. She needed to be perfectly composed when banishing the daemon.
Katara eyed her anxiously as she approached. "Are you sure you want to do this now?" she asked. "No one would blame you if you walked away."
"Wouldn't they?" Mira asked, cocking her head. "I can do this. I need to."
"What about the trial?" Sokka asked. "Wouldn't that have helped get rid of it? We heard the truth from Kyoshi herself."
"But the daemon probably wasn't there to hear it. Plus, there's a specific ritual I need to do to truly banish it."
"That's another thing," Aang said suddenly. "How do you know how to get rid of it?"
"Like I told you before, I studied spirits a lot growing up." After a second's hesitation, she added, "And I stumbled across a tiny little Earth village around a year ago. There was a shaman who lived there. He recognized me as spirit-born, and taught me all he knew. I spent a couple months there, learning different rituals and thing like that. Speaking of which, did you collect the things I asked you to?"
Katara held out a few cloth pouches she'd been holding. "Why do you need this much salt again?"
"Salt wards off evil spirits," she explained as she fastened two pouches to her belt. "They can't stand it."
"And what about the dual dao swords? Planning on chopping it up?" Sokka asked as he handed her a leather scabbard.
"If you'd just wait and watch, you'll see," Mira answered impatiently.
"What do you need us to do?" Katara asked.
"Listen very closely to what I'm about to tell you," Mira said seriously. "Everything needs to be done just right, or things could go very wrong."
"No pressure, or anything," Sokka muttered.
"Now, I need you three to each take a bag of salt…"
Mira stood in the center of the town, scabbard and salt pouches hanging on her belt. She flexed her hands, trying to keep her fingers relaxed. She bounced lightly on the balls of her feet, shaking her arms to loosen up. When she felt ready, she took one step forward and bent her fingers into a claw-like shape facing her chest. In one swift movement, she flipped her hand around and pushed up and out, until her hand was pointed to the sky. It was a gesture to summon daemons.
A pool of shadows bubbled up in the middle of the road, boiling and writhing furiously. Mira grasped the handle of her dao swords, ready to move in an instant. Summoning daemons was always tricky. Daemons didn't take too kindly to being called for, and usually had to be dragged kicking and screaming. And angry daemons were not something to be trifled with.
The shadows finally settled into the humanoid shape Mira had seen in that kitchen the day before. Its tentacles whipped through the air, plucking at imaginary objects. Its red eyes bored a hole through Mira's, and it hissed menacingly.
Mira didn't back down. "I know why you're here," she said, her voice echoing through the empty street. "I have the truth."
The daemon froze. If it could have facial expressions, Mira imagined it would look terrified.
"You can leave right now, and I won't tell it to you," Mira offered neutrally. "Or you can remain, and I will have to choice but to banish you."
It unfroze at her words. A malevolent cackle issued from its gaping mouth, filling the town and seeping under Mira's skin. It grinned at her, its white fangs gleaming dully in the afternoon light.
She tried again. "Will you go peacefully?"
It burst into action, leaping across the fifteen feet that separated them. Mira whipped her dao swords out as she twisted to the side, narrowly avoiding the daemon. It landed in a crouch behind her, its little hands digging into the ground in anger.
"You were warned," Mira said darkly, pulling apart the sword into two blades. "No second chances." Before the spirit could move again, Mira twirled her blades and began the intricate series of movements that was a sword dance.
She whirled the blades around in the air, end over end, a constant blur of motion. The daemon's eyes widened, and it started backing away from her.
"Aang, Sokka, Katara! NOW!" Mira yelled, sweat pouring from her brow. She moved faster, closing the distance between her and the daemon. She sensed rather than saw the three emerging from alleyways to circle them, salt pouches in hand. She knew they would be laying out a clean, unbroken circle of salt to contain the spirit. Unfortunately, it would also contain her.
She saw the spirit tense, as if to bolt away. She couldn't let it escape, or she wouldn't be able to call it back again. But she was wielding a pair of dao swords. The daemon never really stood a chance. She flicked one sword out, and it sliced the air right behind the daemon, fencing it in and preventing it from diving away from her. She kept the swords in constant motion, swiping across each side of the daemon, keeping it boxed it. The daemon hissed in panic and turned this way and that, trying to find a hole in her technique.
"Circle's done!" she heard Katara call.
Mira gradually began to slow her sword work until the blades fell to her side. She kept a steady grip on them, in case the daemon went for her again. "Chin was a tyrant," she said clearly. "He enslaved his people to his will, and forced other nations to do the same." The daemon who had frozen once more when she had begun talking, began to writhe in agony, its pained screams piercing the air. "He was not a great leader. He was not a kind man. He was a cruel dictator, and that is why you're here," she said, raising her voice to be heard over the shrieks of the daemon. "The people here believe Chin was good. He was not. That is the lie you feed on. But now you hear the truth, and you must go." She pulled the larger pouch from her belt and opened it, gathering a handful of salt. She lifted her hand until it was placed right over the daemon. "And now, chaos spirit, with a power of a spirit-born, I banish you to the spirit world." She let the salt trickle from her fist. The spirit's skin sizzled and boiled as the mineral touched it, renewing its screams. It glared up at her, its bright eyes filled with hate. It was slowly fading, but it was not yet broken. Right before it vanished, a tentacle of shadows whipped at her leg, slicing her leggings and cutting her flesh.
Mira cried out in shock and pain. Her skin burned, hot blood trickling down her leg. But she didn't look away from the kakodaemon until it was truly gone. Then she allowed herself to collapse. "Katara!" she groaned.
"Is it gone? Can we come through?"
"Yes!" Mira cried. "Get over here!"
Katara rushed forward, pulling out her waterskin. She pulled the stopper, but Mira grunted, "Wait." She pulled the smaller pouch from her belt, opened it, and upended the contents into her mouth. She grimaced at the bitter taste of the salt, but forced herself to swallow it. Then she pulled the larger pouch from her belt, and poured more salt onto the wound.
It felt like someone was stabbing her in the calf with a white-hot poker. She grit her teeth, but couldn't stop the strangled moan that escaped from her lips.
"Why are you doing that?" Aang asked in shock.
"Trying to get the spirit essence out," Mira replied tersely. "Look."
Black goo was oozing from the cut on her leg. It hissed and bubbled, the salt forcing it from Mira's body. "Now you need to pull the rest out. And be sure to get it all." Mira then let herself lay back on the ground. She squeezed her eyes shut and clenched her jaw, trying not to focus on the throbbing pain. She could feel Katara's waterbending probing at the wound on her leg, and squirmed at the feeling. She felt a small hand slip into hers, and cracked an eye open to see Aang kneeling by her side and holding her hand. A small warmth grew inside her chest and refused to be pushed out.
"Why is it you're always getting hurt?" Katara asked, trying to keep Mira's mind from the injury.
"You ask me like I know these things. It's not like I wake up and decide, 'Gee, I think I'll go fight a chaos spirit today'. It just happens."
"Well, technically you did wake up and decide to fight the spirit," Sokka pointed out unhelpfully.
Mira opened her eyes and gave him her fiercest glare, causing him to shrink back. Even wounded, she could be terrifying.
"Alright, I got it all," Katara said confidently.
Mira pushed herself up and saw Katara pulling the water from Mira's leg. Instead of the clear liquid that had gone in, it was now a thick, viscous, black sludge. Katara made a face. "Where do you want me to put it?"
"Just set it on the ground over there," Mira pointed. She picked the salt pouch back up and scattered a handful on the spirit essence. It hissed and bubbled before evaporating into gray smoke.
A heavy silence filled the air around them. Mira poked at her leg and was pleased to find that there was no excruciating pain. The shaman had warned her about spirit injuries. She was satisfied enough with the appearance to be confident that Katara had in fact removed it all.
"But the cut…it's still black," Aang said, concerned.
"It'll always look like that," Mira said, examining the black line traced across her leg. "It's a consequence of being cut by a spirit."
"Worst town ever," Sokka concluded.
Mira nodded without hesitation.
"Wanna skip the celebration?" he asked.
"There is nothing I would like more."
A/N: Yes, I did slip in a Lion King reference for those of you who caught it.
And I can promise you, we will see more spirits and more of the spirit world in this story. What did you think of it? Funny story, actually, I was trying to come up with a name for the chaos spirits, and I managed to cobble together kakodaemon (from the Greek kako, meaning bad, and daemon, meaning spirit). I thought I was being rather clever and original, but lo and behold, I'm reading Henry IV part 1, and there it is. Cacodemon. You think you're being clever, folks, but the Bard's always there to show you up.
But I digress. Please, review and tell me what you think. It takes mere moments, and feedback is always appreciated!