CHAPTER RATING: T (Language)
A/N: It's been a long time. See the Author's Notes at the end of this chapter for the reasons why.
Chapter 41:How Time Flies By
Appa's exhales pushed forth with the force of a gale, pulling the chilling air across Aang's face, an unfamiliar sting cutting into his skin as they flew. He felt an aura surrounding him that was different.
It was despicable.
It was...Evil.
The chill flowed down his blood, and brought a shiver to his bones. The Air Nomads had always known the Wind, the altitude of the mountains, the heights of the limitless sky.
And yet, the breeze was cold?
They headed east, and the clouds built around him, a thick, blinding fog that phased out the Physical World. All sensations were gone from him. He couldn't feel the wind against his skin. He couldn't hear the air whispering at his ear. He couldn't take in the thin breaths that would fill his lungs.
"Wow." A familiar trickster's voice rung. "That was some Ice. Cold. Shit. Right there."
"Yeah." Aang replied, monotone. Apathetic.
"If I'm honest..." The Spirit's steps rang like Fire Nation cannons against an invisible floor. "I really didn't think that you'd do it. I didn't think you had it in you."
Aang said nothing.
"The cold shoulder? Really?" It's voice rang in his ears, as if his thoughts were speaking to him. "Tell me at least...Can you fly?"
Aang turned around, furious, but found that no matter how much he tried to, he couldn't speak.
"Oh thank Me, that's a relief!" It sighed. "I mean seriously!" It floats in the air, taunting him, and circling him. "You do not want to know what our old buddy Zaheer had to go through to attain his ability to 'Let go of his Earthly Tether'" It snaps its fingers, and Aang feels a force strike his chest, his lungs cave in, and he falls to the solid fog floor. "You have questions? Go on then, I'm feeling generous. One question."
Aang looked up, his breathing slowed, and he exhaled his one thought:
"The man I met in the Spirit World, he said that he lost the one person he loved. That she was murdered. He said that's how he mastered the ability of flight."
"That's right." It replied. "And I have a secret to tell you."
"What?"
Aang felt a pair of hands wrap around his shoulders, and heard a voice whisper in his ear.
"...You're going to master the art of flight, too." He turned to face it, but a chilling force pushed him forward, and he fell.
...
"Never before." A voice came into focus. Aang opened his eyes to a familiar cloud-like softness against the bare soles of his feet. "Never before have we had strangers-let alone strangers from every nation on this Earth..." Aang raised his head and looked at his sides. "...stood beside us within our own Sanctuary."
Aang saw to his left, Toph, Sokka, and Katara. To his right, Azula, Zuko, and Iroh.
"Only within the most dire situations have we called upon the aid of others not of our own kind." Mei Shan spoke to them. "Sozin's comet is returning. And I refuse to let the horror that my great-grandfather witnessed...I refuse to let that happen again. With all of you here, I'm confident that we can stop the Firelord."
"We'll do anything we can to stop him." Sokka bowed. "We sent out messenger hawks weeks ago, and we've received their replies."
"That reassures me greatly. We were right to follow the Avatar's instincts. Forgive my people's first impression of you."
"Everything is forgiven." Azula spoke. "Ozai will not take another innocent life."
"Master Sokka, please, share with us your plans."
"Of course." Sokka bowed. "I've coordinated our efforts with The Water-Tribes, Earth Kingdom, and even Princess Azula's own Personal Guard, to launch an assault on four fronts that will overwhelm the Firelord's forces." Everyone stepped forward around a map of the world that sat on a table.
"We're currently at the Western Air Temple." Sokka pointed on the piece of parchment. "The Earth Kingdom forces are approaching by land and the Water-Tribes are traversing the oceans." Sokka flipped the map around to reveal an even larger scale map of the entire Fire Nation.
"Waterbenders will approach by sea. Using their abilities, they will help the Earthbenders tunnel underground. Azula and her soldiers will drop from the skies on their zepplin, and then your airbenders will take to the skies. They'll get hit so fast and hard, they'll never be able to anticipate it!"
Sokka pumped his fist in victory. Everyone nodded their approval, and agreed on the swift and deadly action.
"Avatar Aang."
"Huh…?" His senses came back into focus. Even he could see the blank stare in his own eyes.
"What do you think of Master Sokka's plan?"
"It's uh...It's great, Sokka. I say let's go for it!" He recovered.
"See? Even the Avatar agrees! And then when we all make it into the palace, we all team together, and put an end to Ozai's reign, permanently!" Sokka grinned.
"No." Aang bellowed to shocked expressions. He looked up with an unfamiliar, piercing gaze. "I deal with Ozai, no one else will enter the palace. I have to do it."
"Aang, look. I know you think that it's your destiny to defeat the Firelord, but we all have to do this. Together we can overcome anything, you said yourself that-"
"I SAID NO!" His voice shakes the entire Temple. "I have to do this alone, Sokka! That's all! That's how it has to be! That's how it's always been!" His tattoos glow with the same intensity in his words. The whole room falls silent, and the Avatar walks out of the Inner Sanctuary.
…
A few hours pass like seconds. Aang sat among the clouds on his best friend Appa. The white mist below hung like it always did, covering the infinite chasm behind a silver curtain. He looked out at the horizon, his mind racing about the words spoken to him.
Was it all a trick? Was it all a lie, the Spirit is called The Trickster, of course it would deceive him, just for fun. But then again-
"Hey, Twinkletoes." Toph's voice joked him from his thoughts. "What's bothering you?"
"Toph? How'd you get up-" She tapped the massive pillar of stone she sat on. "Ah. Why am I not surprised?" She leapt up and sat next to him in Appa's saddle.
"So, you blew up on Sokka in there, didn't you?" Toph asked with a casual blow of air at her hair. "What's the matter?"
"Toph, what happened at the Southern Air Temple?" Aang asked.
"You do what you usually do, Twinkletoes." She waved off his concern. "You flew off on Appa and went to go meditate."
…
No. No he didn't. He flew off into the night, and massacred those men. But it couldn't be that only he knew.
…
"That's all?" He asked.
"Yep. You came back in the morning when everyone was awake, we asked you where you were, and you said you were meditating. Simple as that. Don't you remember?"
"Right. That's all I was doing…That's all."
"I know you're feeling bad." Toph whispered. "But I just wanted to say-"
"Thank you, Toph." Aang interrupted. "I don't think that I've come to anyone else for advice more than you. I can always be honest with you." He smiled.
"Do you really believe that?" She asks in a rare, timid voice, blushing behind her hypnotizing opaque emerald eyes.
"Yes. I believe it."
"Then, can I be honest with you?" She whispered. He nods his answer, and turns to face her. "I…" She takes a deep breath. "I lose myself when you take me with you." His eyes widened. "Every time I've held onto you while you flew, I lost all sense of direction, all sense of control. I know this seems strange… "
"No, I'm sorry, Toph, I promise it won't hap-" Aang felt Toph's firm grip take hold of his shoulders, and then the shock of feeling her soft lips push against his.
"..." He licked his lips with a blank stare into her eyes.
"I know how complicated everything is, with the three of you." Toph stood back up, and jumped onto her earthen pillar. "I just had to let you know." A wave of her hand, and the air filled with the sound of cracking earth as she began her descent.
Aang rubbed his lips is disbelief. Then shook his head, cleared his thoughts, and leapt off of Appa. He fell, the air brushing against his face until he turned upwards, and swept Toph off her feet.
The world lost itself in a sudden moment of utter blissful blindness. His arms wrapped around her with comfort, compassion, and confidence. She took hold of him with as much desperation as joy.
"People change, Toph." He whispered. "It's the scariest thing in the world, but it's something we all have to deal with." He landed on the Temple's courtyard, and placed her down. "I don't know what I would have done without you all this time."
"Then…?" Toph's voice seemed muffled.
"After all I've been through, all the things I've agreed to. I don't have the right to say no." Her eyes lit up, but sorrow rushed over him as he gave his answer. "It's just not the right time...I'm sorry."
"I was just a little too late." She smirked, and turned away. "I wish I had felt this way sooner." Aang frowned. "But no hard feelings, Twinkletoes…" She began walking. "No hard feelings, okay?"
He shrugged to himself, and recalled the stone pillar back down into the mountain.
Someday, maybe. But not now…Just not now.
…
"Now that we're alone…" Azula spoke to Katara while they stood on an open-air stone balcony, watching Aang return Toph's pillar of rock into the Earth. "I'd like to ask you a question."
"What? Is it about what just happened between Aang and Toph? Because I don't know." Katara replied, looking out towards the same direction.
"Hmm…" Azula raised an eyebrow, but turned to Katara after a few seconds. "No, that's not it, actually. It's about the Avatar."
"Okay." Katara sat down and turned to Azula. "What is it?"
"Do you love him?" Azula asked.
"What kind of question is that? Of course I do! Don't you?" Her voice calmed down.
Azula waited, she waited for a few seconds that seemed like a few years to Katara.
"You're telling me that you don't?" Katara asked.
"Well now, this is an interesting development, isn't it?" Azula replied. "It's more complicated than that." She leaned in closer, Katara could see the fire in her eyes. "I'm different…We're different. And, as expected, our tastes are different. "
"Tastes? Where are you going with this?"
"The bottom line is this: You love him, and I'm pretty sure that you…One day, will want to marry him, have a family, and live happily ever after with the Avatar as your husband? Correct?"
Katara's look of confusion, and the air of silence was all Azula needed to know.
"I'll let you in on a little truth: despite what people wanted to believe...That's not what I want. Not at all." Azula shook her head.
"So what do you want from him?"
"This may sound terrible, but I'll be honest with you. It's the least I can do after all this time." Azula smirked. "I wanted him to see the world the way I see it. I wanted to control him." Katara's jaw nearly dropped, and Azula let out a grim, confident chuckle.
"You were going to brainwash him." Katara's skepticism was tangible.
"I'll just come out and say it. We all know what everyone's thinking. " Azula shrugged. "I was going to make him love me, by making love to him."
"So, what your friends said was true. You wanted to make Aang your sex slave?"
"I know what you're thinking. Go on, ask me." Azula's smug grin are away at Katara.
Katara paused before speaking.
"Did he...enjoy it…?" Azula gave Katara her evil smirk, and walked towards the door.
"He loved it." She let her words hang, "But unfortunately...not as much as he loves you."
Katara watched Azula leave the room, and even with the visage of Azula's cocky smile in her mind, she couldn't help but hear a hint of sadness in the Fire Nation Princess' voice.
PUBLISHED ON: 12/27/2015
A/N:
Okay, I'm not going to lie. A big reason why this chapter took so long was because of Fallout 4. Fortunately, I just finished my first playthrough. And I don't have any urge or plans to start again so soon.
But another big part is a writer's dilemma. I started this story in July of 2014. That's crazy. It seems like I just wrote chapter 10 a few days ago, and yet, here we are. 31 chapters later. Working on something for so long can cause burnout. It's happened before, and it'll happen again, but even that is just a part of the issue.
The last reason can be summed up like this: "I'm not sure how I should proceed."
16 months, and A Change of Heart is reaching its final chapters. And the hardest thing to think of is the ending. After so many events, twists, plotlines, and plot holes, how do I come up with a satisfying ending? I've got no more "filler arcs" to write, but have no concrete idea in how to wrap everything up.
That is the hardest part of all.
I like writing cliffhangers that make you hate me.
But I really just want an ending that will make us all happy.
A few more chapters, and we'll see if it does.
Thank you...for reading.