...

The train engine burst out of the wall into the vast belt of the Lower Ring and the first thing they noticed was the smell of smoke. Mizumi's initial thought was that something had gone wrong in the train and she was in the process of inspecting all the dials but then Ayika's hand started plucking at her shoulder. Mizumi straightened up and looked outside the cabin. Then she gasped. In every direction across the fifteen kilometer wide belt of roofs and streets there were speckles of flickering orange light and billowing smoke. The ring was on fire.

However, they were now approaching the first station and Xinfei lunged past Mizumi for the breaks leaver because he had no idea how long it took for a hulking machine like this train to stop once it had been told to consider it. As it turned out he'd given the invention too little credit and after accidentally venting most of the steam pressure the machine rumbled and screeched to a near complete halt. When they were finally rolled to a rest Mizumi had no choice but to tell the rest of their passengers that they would be walking along the last fifty meters of track.

They were a strange group which arrived in the station without a vehicle. Xinfei hopped up onto the platform to extend a hand down for Lili and Ayika after him. Muzumi jumped up beside Ma'er in her own despite the pain from her burned leg and Mua very pointedly ignored Ma'er's offered hand. She saw to her own labored ascension but as she clambered up to her feet she gestured her head to the other side of the open station floor.

"We've got company."

A small gaggle of truncheon-armed government station guards were nervously advancing out of their little administrative kiosk. They made slow progress forward as they moved by a circulating convection of each man trying to push the other three in front of him, none of them wanting to be leading a confrontation on this chaotic night.

The guard who lost the battle to avoid the focal location called out. "Hey! You can't be up here on...Um, what even is that?" He pointed off at the stalled, smoking, hulk of the steam train now come to rest on the elevated track like a fat bird on a wash-line.

Mua and Ma'er both sighed and raised their hands preparation for bending. Mizumi saw Xinfei wince at what was about to happen. Then a crisp, high-class voice called out to her side.

"Honored public servants, this is not a party you want to hinder."

Lili strode forward, wielding every stretched centimeter of her already quite noticeable height. "I know that you are doing your jobs but I have here with me two skilled spirit priests and a Public Safety officer who are all hurrying to resolve the crisis which has enveloped our city. I am sure you must have noticed that this ring's gone mad?" Something about Lili's inflection managed to project wealth and power in a way which made even Mizumi feel the rips and soot stains on her dress.

However, the guards still hesitated. As grateful as they were for any mention of a forthcoming supernatural resolution they might have noticed that Lili's explanation didn't extend to Mizumi or Xinfei, or indeed to to Lili herself. Mizumi found her back tensing as she feared that these men might actually attack. Then Xinfei sighed. He walked forward and grabbed Lili's arm, holding out his palm. Lili stared at him for a moment in confusion before starting with sudden realization. She reached into some hidden pocket in her dress and pulled out some well-folded sheets of paper money. Xinfei whipped off two and moved over to the station guards.

"Sorry government boys, just remembered we forgot to pay tax this year. All right, we'll just be heading down then?"

It was not the smoothest delivery ever given, but the nearest guard grabbed the bills and nodded, now all relieved smiles. Bribery was a situation they knew how to deal with. "Right. Civilians aren't allowed to loiter around up here tonight. Get along on your way."

"Much obliged."

Mizumi and her friends made their way down the broad stone stairs from the tram station to street level. Lili was looking at Xinfei with appreciation and Xinfei was looking as if he regretted all his involvement in this mounting fiasco. With that black headband on, the resemblance between him and his brother was even more obvious. He looked strong.

Mizumi had been relieved to see that the open square at the foot of the tram station was empty, though the sound and screams of conflict drifted over from neighboring streets. Ayika and Mama Mua were staring at something else, something invisible in the city around them. If Kuang Harbor was a predictive indicator, then the city guards had pushed outwards from here in their attempt to restore order thus explaining the eerie emptiness. Yet that theory did not match well with the looks of astonishment and fear that both tribal women now wore.

Ayika moved in close beside Mizumi. The shaman-in-training murmured as she stared out at the deserted space walled with tall stacks of shops, restaurants and apartments. "There are so many."

Lili managed to catch ear of what Ayika'd said as she came up behind. "So many what? Spirits?" She looked around anxiously.

Mua broke in, shaking her head. "If it was spirits, by now even you'd see them. No, ghosts. The dead are rising thickly here."

"The Masks must be here as well. That is the only thing which could explain this breakdown of order," Ma'er added. "All the guard stations visible from the tram had their warning lights lit. I suspect Inspector Yang has been very busy here."

"Well, we should hope so, else your Public Safety friend let Tailang get killed and the Harbor be torn apart for absolutely no reason." Xinfei's tone made it clear he thought that Public Safety would easily have done just that.

However, Mizumi verbally pushed past him. "That is in the past. Now we must hurry to locate Assistant Gardener Tian and complete the ritual for the ghost mask of Ambassador Naruhama. Ayika, Mama Mua, which direction is the correct way to go?" She knew that if they stopped and gave time to consider the insane magnitude of what they were attempting here they might just freeze. She knew that she would.

Fortunately, after a short argued conversation about things only they could see, Ayika and Mua agreed on a direction towards the middle of the ring, south of the radial tram line and over a wide canal which cut its way down to the city wall. Apparently, the twisted shadows of the hungry ghosts looked denser that way. Unfortunately, in that direction lay what looked like a war-zone of fire, government forces, panicked civilians, and rampaging masks, all their minds twisted towards madness by the encroachment of the spirit world.

Mizumi looked to her side and met Ayika's eyes. They stood together under the roof of dark cloud-cover that glowed orange with the reflected light of scattered flames across the district. No one had given them this task. No one would ever trust them with this task. They could leave and be safe.

But they would not.

Together, that group of unlooked-for people strode forward into the burning city.

...

Xinfei had to assume that Ayika and Mama Mua knew where they were going. As their group of would-be saviors hurried through the dark and smoky streets those two women would stop from time to time to perform whatever dousing or divining allowed them to notice an increasing spiritual disruption. Mostly it looked like arguing. Under the best of conditions the Lower Ring was a confusing tangle of buildings, but if Xinfei could judge from the few glimpses he'd caught of the ring walls high above they were at least moving in a consistent direction. The strategy to find the ghost mask by finding the center of the crisis was a good plan in theory. In practice however, it meant rushing towards the epicenter of fire and chaos.

Nearly everyone in the Lower Ring wanted to be inside tonight, their doors locked and barred against what was going on outside, so the streets were mostly empty. However, disorder had swept though so many quarters and the people living there now had no place to stay that possessed even the illusion of safety. As Xinfei's group advanced through the smoky streets they met more of these fearful refugees.

Then, after turning a corner, they came face to face with a conflict ready to explode. Ahead, at a wide five-way intersection where the buildings dripping with hanging banners in large block characters for shops and services, there was a standoff between a large detachment of city guards and a much larger number of the public. Many of the guards already held their short-swords in their hands, bare blades shining dully in the yellow lantern light. On the other side of the intersection were the local residents, caught in the middle of piling up barricades across the streets. The two crowds had the look of having just pulled back from a brief clash.

The guard captain yelled out, "Return to your homes at once! You are interfering with government forces! Nothing will be solved if the authorities can't get to the source of the trouble!"

"Solve it?! Like you solved Butcher's Quarter an hour back? You Greenies raised the blocks and locked those people inside! Now the whole place is on fire; none of the fire crews could get through to help them!"

"There was arson that-"

"Of course there was arson, because you guard bastards have been pushing people to it! Crashing down like a hammer while the Middle Ring rich folks come down here to tear the place up because they're angry about the Islanders! Well, we've had enough!"

In their side street off the intersection, Ma'er gathered Xinfei and the others closer to him. "We'll go around. Getting involved in this dispute could only burn through time we don't have. Particularly if the hungry ghosts are influencing people's minds as she says." He nodded in Mua's direction.

The others reluctantly shrugged at the sense in this. Lili in particularly nodded so energetically that her head looked ready to fall off. Xinfei knew the smart answer but for some reason he felt a pit in his stomach. One of the citizens up ahead was wearing what looked like a black headband. It was possible that cooler heads could prevail here without bloodshed, but inside Xinfei doubted it. Even discounting whatever Ayika said the ghosts and spirits were doing, people were too crazy to be trusted. He tilted his head back in frustration and then saw something that confirmed his doubt. Little colored shadows flitting across the tiles three stories above them, heading towards the intersection. They looked like glowing animals of pale green.

"Hey Mua, didn't you say that emotion could draw spirits?"

Mua didn't bother answering, she just followed his gaze up to the rooftops and cursed. They were small spirits, looking a little like elongated rabbits made entirely of chopsticks, and they were advancing eagerly towards the two crowds.

Ayika looked equally pained by internal conflict but she reached a decision. She turned away. "He's right, we don't have time. If we can find Naruhama's mask then this all might be over. We have to go now." As always, Mizumi nodded in agreement and they started moving.

Then screams rose up from the intersection. Xiaobao whipped around to see a guard scrabbling at his back where a pale green spirit now gripped on. More were hopping down and darting among the crowd. The guard shouted as he tried to rip the glowing stick rabbit off but either the spirit dodged every attempt or the panicked man's hands passed right through it. Then the guard suddenly went limp and then drew his sword, seemingly terrified and not recognizing his fellow guards around him.

The man's commander yelled out, "Zhang! Drop your weapon!" However, Zhang was swinging his sword wildly at the other guards and everyone around him. The captain swore and gestured at his men to circle around. "We'll get that thing off you!"

Zhang just screamed in reply. He dashed into the middle of his intersection, is trembling sword-point alternately pointing at the civilians and the guards while on his back the bundle of green glowing sticks poked phasing etherial limbs through his body. He was starting to move like the possessed Masks. Members of both crowds were screaming and many of those shouts called for killing the guard before he could kill them. Accusations and superstitions were flying.

Xinfei groaned. "They're all going to die."

Then he felt Lili press against his back in fear and the sinking feeling got worse. Because he realized what he was was about to do.

The maddened guard lunged forward, slashing wildly with his sword as the little spirit played with his head and the suddenly Xinfei was on him. He honestly didn't know when he'd started running, he'd seen the bloodshed that was about to come, he'd heard Lili gasp, and then he was tackling the man. Fortunately, the little spirit seemed to be just as startled and it leaped off the man's head to skitter down into the street's drainage channel. That left Xinfei wrestling with a very confused but no longer violent city guard in the space between two large and fearsome groups of people.

Someone called out from the citizen barricades, "Hey! That guy's wearing the black headband! I've seen them out in Kuang Harbor! They're the working men!"

Another man joined in. "Yeah! He's standing up to the guards and their spirits!"

Both factions were moving closer together now. Xinfei stood in the middle and knew that he was same idiot he always yelled at his brother for being. It seemed heroism was a fatal defect in the Bao family line. At least the others could keep on with the actual mission. Maybe that would be enough.

Then a sharp, high pitched voice rang out. "Everybody stop!"

Xinfei turned with exasperated disbelief to see Lili Gaoli skidding to a halt next to him in her smoke-stained green dress. She stamped her foot on the paving stones like this entire riot around her was a disagreement over seats at an afternoon lunch. "This is ridiculous! Everyone calm down right now and be sensible! This is Ba Sing Se; spirits and ghosts cannot be allowed to make us act like animals!"

A frozen hush descended over the entire intersection. However, as much as Xinfei admired Lili's ill-considered zeal, he couldn't exactly give her credit for that.

The Masks had arrived.

From the first screams it took a while for most of the gathered mob to notice. Then they too saw the four human shaped silhouettes crouched up on the tile roof of an apartment building. Then the light of the lamps below washed up the facade and tiles to reveal the shadows of wings and tentacles and spikes rising off their backs.

The city guards screamed just as much as the civilians and the Masks joined in the cacophony with a metallic cough that may have been laughter. Then one of them seemed to grow bored and with a single careless gesture ripped loose an entire cross-beam from the roof on which it stood. The Mask twirled the massive beam in one hand for a moment before it turned and hurled the trunk down into the crowd. Five people vanished under the impact and then the Masks dropped down among them, ready to find their own amusement in these fragile humans.

The intersection exploded into chaos. People screamed and ran in every direction, succeeding only in colliding. There were some stalwart souls from the barricades who rushed forward to muster a defense and there were uniformed guards who sprinted off to flee over those barriers they'd been ordered to tear down. Xinfei tried to plant himself against the buffeting human turmoil.

"Lili! We've got to get-!

He was interrupted by a man in a mask falling from the sky, wrapped in shadows of yellow leaves and a transparent crown of branches. The thing introduced itself by grabbing a guard who'd turned to run and lifting him carelessly into the air. The Mask tilted its head as it looked curiously at the screaming human it held. It grabbed his arm in glowing claws. Then came the snap.

The Mask stamped its foot and screeched with pleasure like the groan of a forest tree slowly falling. It tossed the screaming man away and spread its hands like fangs. Those burning yellow eyes were looking at Xinfei and Lili. Then a jet of water smashed into its head as a another stream slammed into its feet, sending it flipping and spinning.

Xinfei spun to see Mua preparing for her next strike.

"Boy," she growled. "You and her are the stupidest thing I've ever run into. But then again, second place is me so I'm stuck here too. Let's smash these damn things."

She gathered up her floating whips of water for another attack against the recovering Mask but a brick went flying by over her shoulder to smack the possessed man in the head, followed by another flurry of projectiles thrown by both earthbending and simple human arms. The people were fighting back. They hadn't yet seen what Xinfei knew in his stomach. It wasn't enough.

...