AN: Another somewhat gaang focused chapter... But this might be a slight bit espresso depresso with the side bits I've sprinkled in.
Chapter 8 Bad Moon Rising.
Gi had always wanted to become a soldier. On his birthday, the young man, brave and with a fire in his heart for the love of his country, had enlisted himself, begging the recruiter to be in the Cavalry, as his forefathers before had throughout the war.
Granted his wish, Gi was trained to ride his Komodo-rhino steed, and for six short months he'd spent his time in the home army... That was until the horn was sound, and the cannons had begun to roar. After The Avatar's return, and the Fire Nation had begun to change, Gi first thought that he and his mount would no longer be needed, their role replaced with tanks and guns. But still they would fight on.
The call came for a volunteer force to protect the colonies. They would ride at dawn to the north to fight the Snow Savages that had taken land along the coast, with a promise of gallantry for all who'd lead the charge. Glad he was not a foot soldier, slow at march, or sick on a navy ship, Gi was the first in line to ride, with hopes of returning home to see a victory arch in his home town for his efforts. Spurs set on his boots, and lance in hand upon arrival to his new regiment, some seven thousand strong, Gi was surprised to find that the garrison preparing to mobilize were not riding rhinos, nor carrying spears. Instead the men were tending to horse-hounds, an animal native to the Western Earth Kingdom, and rather than pole arms, the men carried around short weapons that Gi had come to learn were called "carbines," and "pistols," each man with a thin curved Dao sword on his side.
Gi was hastily trained in the use of his sword and his gun, before the Fire Lord's volunteers were given the order to set off to the northern coast. The horse-hounds rear hooves beating against the trail, as their front paws dug into the dirt, open mouths full of teeth, panting as they rode. A smile on his face as his first battle was upon him, Gi waited only for a moment to listen to the band play their flutes, before he stirruped his boots, setting off, intent not to return home until he was finished in his hunt...
Over a thousand miles away, The Avatar and his friends sat around the warm glow of a campfire on one of the Fire Nation's interior islands, north of the Black Cliffs where they would soon reunite with the invasion force. In keeping with tradition, Sokka had tried to entertain everyone with a ghost story, but his sister had him beat... Of course, Toph was the one who'd truly frightened everyone.
It was only seconds after Katara had finished her story that the blind girl shuttered in discomfort, having felt the vibrations of what she could only describe as a shreak coming from beneath the mountain the their west. "Did anyone one else hear that?" She asked, getting to her feet, as the others huddled closer to each other.
"Hear what?" Aang asked, as Katara hugged him and her brother.
Toph knelt down and placed her hand to the dirt. "It's like... There's people trapped under the mountain... Screaming."
Sokka pulled away from his sister and scoffed. "Nice try Toph." He said, thinking she was just trying to one up Katara's story.
"No I'm serious... I can feel something..." Toph said, standing up, realizing that there was an old woman with a frail heart walking through the woods towards them as well, though the aforementioned cries of torment from below were more pressing.
"You're probably just jumpy from the ghost stories." Katara said, as momo wriggled in her lap.
Toph felt the vibrations fade out. "It's gone..."
"Ok, now I'm actually a little scared." Aang said, hugging Katara closer as Sokka took a knee.
"Hello children!" Came a voice from behind the three. Aang, Katara and Sokka all screamed as they scrambled to hide behind Toph. "I'm sorry to frighten you, but you kids shouldn't be out in the woods all alone." The four three calmed down significantly when they saw that the voice belonged to a harmless old lady. "My name's Hama..."
"Thanks for letting us stay here tonight." Katara said, as Hama poured each of them tea once the gang was seated at her inn table. "The place is lovely."
"Oh, why aren't you sweet." Hama said before she sat down in her chair at the end of the table. "You know, you should be careful, people disappear in those woods you were camping in."
"What do you mean disappear?" Sokka asked.
"This island is haunted... For years, every time the moon turns full over this valley, people go into the forest, and they don't come out." Hama said, as she set her cup of tea down.
In the East, at dawn, a battalion of the Seventh Fire Nation Komodo Cavalry stood on the bluff overlooking a riverside town. The Major looked around at his men, before issuing his final order. "These backwards people have been harboring rebel agents. We're to disarm them of all weapons, place anyone who is in possession of a gun under arrest, and if they fight, by Agni, I don't care if they're dumb, deft or mute, you will show them no mercy... It's time we teach these uncivilized types what happens to those who resist the will of the Fire Lord. Battalion! Forward march!"
The soldiers set off, and the town had fallen under the royal heel before the hour... There were only three who'd carried guns in the town, and only three who'd resisted at first, before three fell. Through grieving, those closest to the fallen had themselves attempted to take up arms, and so too fell... A single Lieutenant, acting on the unclear instruction of his superior, ordered his men to open fire on a crowd that had gathered to throw insults and stones at the men of his platoon. More soldiers, both fire benders and gunmen alike, from different sections of the unit heard the order, and saw their comrades retaliation, before joining in on what had quickly become a slaughter... The wounded were bayoneted, the village was burned, the bodies piled in a shallow grave. Those who ran away through the fields were treated as resistance fighters amid an escape, only dying tired as the mounted men chased them down.
At the end of the day, the Major wrote in his report, that the suppression of the local rebel cell, had been a resounding success.
Katara more than anyone, was elated to later find that Hama, the elderly woman who'd taken them in, was not only a member of the Water Tribe in hiding, but also a water bender. A water bender willing to teach Katara everything she knew.
The two had to hike east along the hillside the next morning to find a space far away and secluded, keeping any prying eyes of Fire Nation citizens away from their practice.
"In the Southern Water Tribe, water benders are surrounded by snow and ice. The sea, our home, is our element. As you've probably noticed in your travels across dry land, finding a source of water to bend can be difficult at times." Hama said.
"I know." Katara said. "One time, I was stranded in the Si Wong Desert with my friends I felt almost powerless."
Hama smiled at her. "That's why you have to learn to control water wherever it exists."
"I've actually had to use my sweat to bend not that long ago." Katara said with a shrug.
"Very resourceful." Hama said, still smiling. "You think like a master. But there is water to be found in places you would never think to find it..." Hama held up her hand, and twirled her arm over her head, seemingly forming water from nothing.
"Water from thin air!?" Katara asked in surprise. "Of course, it's just like with clouds!"
"You've got to keep an open mind, and let it move like water, to take the shape of the environment you find yourself in." Hama said, before the water pooling on her fingers froze into icicles, and were thrown into the nearest tree.
The two continued their walk, and once in a field empty of all but flowers and rocks, Hama shared her knowledge freely.
"Fire lilies." The elderly woman said, as Katara took in the beauty of the hillside. "They only bloom for a few weeks out of the year, but they're one of my favorite things about living here."
"They're beautiful." Katara commented.
Hama smiled. "They are... And like all plants, they are filled with water."
Katara perked up, as she had something to add. "I met a water bender who was able to control the water in the vines of the swamp he lived in."
Hama smirked. "You can take it further." She said, before spinning in place, pulling the water from the flowers and the grass around her, using the stream created to cut a nearby stone into five separate pieces.
"That was amazing!" Katara beamed, before looking down at Hama's feet, where the ground had turned a shriveled grey, as the plants withered and died. "It's a shame about the flowers though."
"They're just plants. They'll grow back." Hama said, before turning to look at Katara. "When you're a water bender in a strange land, you do what you must to survive..." She placed her hand on Katara's shoulder. "Which is why, I want to teach you the ultimate waterbending technique. It can only be done during the night of a full moon, when water benders are at their peak."
"Don't you think that might be dangerous. You know, with the valley being haunted?" Katara asked.
"Please Katara, two master water benders, with your youth and my experience, I think we'll manage." Hama said.
At dusk, in the occupied Earth Kingdom, the soldiers of the Seventh Komodo Cavalry had made their camp on the high plains as they moved west toward Full Moon Bay to rout what rebels were suspected to be taking refuge there. Just before the sun had set, the thunder of taloned feet could be heard echoing west over the hill where the soldiers had come from. Anticipating their sister battalion, many of the men paid near no mind, and only those on guard grew concerned.
Cresting the hillside, obscured by the bright red sunset, came a company of Earth Kingdom soldiers in exile on the fast and nimble ostrich horses. Sounding the alarm, the soldiers dropped what tasks were at hand seconds before the attack was upon them.
The Earth Kingdom riders never stopped, as they charged straight through the camp, letting fly arrows, and lead balls from pistols, some swinging gunstocks like clubs, as they passed by their foe. A few riders carried torches to light the path of their cohorts, and fewer still were benders, the ground behind those that rushed through the garrison being left cracked and unusable. A few less experienced soldiers were buried halfway to their necks. Stranger still, among those riding the backs of ostrich-horses, wearing the green of the Earth Kingdom, was a single young man, in the back of the pack, casting fire from his hands, lighting tents ablaze, and scorching the high grass around the camp as he passed through.
The men who'd witnessed the attack, and lived to tell of it, as most had, learned that day, how war made strangers out of their own.
As the full moon shined down on the forest outside of Hama's village, she found a clearing suitable to show Katara the full power that water bending held.
"Can you feel it? The power the moon brings?" Hama asked Katara who was a pace behind the older woman now, age seeming to no longer hinder the speed at which she walked. Hama stopped walking, and took in a deep breath as she straightened her back, the aches and pains of her posture dissipating as the night drew on. "Since Tui first rose in the starry night, it has blessed water benders with its glow. Granting us the ability to do incredible things." Hama's skin tightened, as her heart beat stronger, exposing the veins in her arms for Katara to see. "I've never felt so alive."
Katara nearly stepped back a pace as Hama lowered her arms and continued to speak. "What I'm about to teach you, I discovered in the wretched prison that stole away my youth. Imagine first a life without any water, or shame. Dry air pumped into a room filled only with cages, kept suspended from the ceilings. Constantly chained, and restrained when given what little water we were allowed to drink... But every month I could feel the full moon empowering me... And I learned that where there was life, there was water..." Katara held on to her own forearm as her eyes went wider with each new detail Hama revealed. "The rats that ran along the floor of my cell, were nothing but bags of skin filled with liquid and bones, that's all any of us really are... And that was how I discovered the art of bloodbending."
Katara felt her skin crawl at the word, the idea itself repulsive.
"The ability to control the water in another's body, enforcing your will on them... Over the years as the other water benders died from hunger and disease, I survived, and practiced my bending each full moon on the rats... And when the time came, after three long decades, the guards who were supposed to keep me in, were the very same who freed me." Hama turned to face Katara. "And once you perfect this bending technique, you can control anything, or anyone."
Katara looked away from Hama for a moment. "But the ability to reach inside people, to control them... I don't know if I want that kind of power."
Hama shook her head. "The choice is not yours, the power exists, and can never be taken back. It is your duty to use your gifts to help end this war. Katara, they've tried to wipe us out, our culture, our home. They took away your mother."
"I know." Katara said closing her eyes for a beat.
"Then you should understand. We are the last water benders of the southern tribe. We have to fight these people wherever we can." Hama said holding her hand over her heart. "Wherever they are, by any means necessary..."
Katara's head reeled back for a moment. "You... You're the reason that people disappear from this village every full moon."
"Yes, yes now you understand." Hama said as she nodded her head. "They threw us in prison to die, and they deserve the same fate."
Katara took a step back." No... No I won't learn to blood bend if suffering is all it's going to be used for, and I won't let you keep terrorizing innocent people." She said, pointing at Hama, whose face soured.
Katara felt her arm twist in an unnatural way, as it went numb, and she was nearly dragged by the wrist and elbow, her body turning to follow it before she grabbed herself and pulled against the force imparted on her own limb. Hama stood, arms outstretched and fingers splayed. "You should have learned the technique before you decided to turn against me." Hama raised both hands now, locking Katara's arms and legs out straight, keeping her held in place, causing her entire body to go numb. "It's impossible to fight me Katara. I control every vein, every muscle, every fiber of your being."
Katara grunted in discomfort as her arms were pulled away from her, and she was dragged by her toes across the grass of the forest, before her arms were pulled up, and she was forced to her knees before Hama. Her arms were forced to the ground, forcing Katara to look at Hama's feet. "Please... Stop." Katara begged through tears, completely at Hama's mercy, only for the older woman to laugh, seeming to enjoy the pain she was inflicting.
Teardrops fell into the grass, as Hama spoke. "The foolishness of youth. Do you think that The Fire Nation would stop? Did they stop with me, or my sister? Did they stop with your mother?"
At the mention of Kya, Katara closed her eyes, and it was as if she could feel a hand holding her by the chin, the moonglow reaching out to her. "The Fire Nation did stop with her..." Katara said, as she regained feeling through her body, and Hama's grip over her vanished. Katara's fingers grabbed at the grass, and the water left the blades and roots, turning the ground grey. "You're not the only one who draws strength from the moon... I know the spirit well." As she spoke, Katara got to her feet, and the water in her hands became a thin stream in the air. "And she would hate what you've done with her gifts."
Leading with a swift attack, Katara pulled more water from the grass, and threw the concentrated stream at Hama from the side, only for the elder woman to capture the flow of liquid in her hands, and throw it back. Spinning as she caught the returned wave of water, Katara once again sent it at Hama, preparing for the next blow sure to come.
The old woman turned taking the water and looping it around herself before sucking the water from the two nearest trees, adding more force to her next attack. Katara, expecting something similar to what Hama had done, planted her right foot behind her, and thrust out her right palm towards the blast of water, standing her ground and breaking the blast apart, the water flying off into the early summer air in a bubble away from her, separating into more manageable pieces.
Surprised by the move she'd never seen, Hama wasn't prepared for Katara to scissor her hands across one another, and sideswipe Hama's legs and shoulder check her with the water in the air from two seperate directions, causing the woman to pinwheel off the ground for a moment before she fell on her face.
As Hama got back to her feet, nose slightly bleeding from her fall, Aang and Sokka came running down from the mountain towards the two. "Get away from Katara!" Aang ordered the woman 30 years his junior, (In a purely chronological sort of way,) as he held out his fists, prepared to launch a rock fizure through the ground towards the elder witch.
"We know it's you that's been kidnapping those people." Sokka said, as he held his short musket low.
"Give up, you're outnumbered." Aang said.
"And out-matched." Sokka added, only for Hama to smile unseen by the boys, as she raised her hand. With his arms moving against his will, Sokka slowly raised his musket toward's Katara, as he tried resisting the control exerted over him. "KATARA!" Sokka shouted in warning to his sister.
"You have out matched yourselves!" Hama said, as she forced Sokka to pull the trigger of his gun. Katara jumped and rolled out of the way, as the spread of pellet's from Sokka's scatter gun stripped the bark off the tree she stood in front of a second ago. Hama laughed to herself, throwing the two boys'bodies at her younger opponent. Springing to her feet, Katara jumped sideways through the gap that existed between them, and landed, pulling the water from the grass, and sending it upwards at Hama.
The old woman ripped a tree behind her apart as she stole away its water, creating a circular shield that deflected the attack away and into the forest. With her free hand Hama pulled Sokka to his feet. "I do enjoy playing with your brother, he has so many new toys."
Katara turned to look at Sokka as he was forced to pull his spare pistol off of his belt. "It's like my brain has a mind of its own!" Sokka said, in horror as his arm pointed the gun at his sister. Katara took the water from the nearest bush, and created a barrier of ice with it as Hamma made Sokka pull the trigger, the low velocity lead ball shattering apart as the ice itself vaporized.
Aang was pulled up by his back by Hama's bending. "This is so weird!" Aang said, as he was thrown at Katara, who used the water vapor around her to catch and carry Aang, freezing him upside down to a tree.
"Sorry!" Katara said to her friend.
"I'm alright!" Aang replied.
"Katara I still have weapons!" Sokka shouted, as his arm pulled his gun-sword from his back. He slashed at his sister, who backed away from the clumsy disorganized attack, as the pistol within the sword was fired off into the dirt, narrowly missing her left foot. Finding her opening, Katara pulled back a tree branch by the water inside, and released into Sokka's gut, causing him to fly backwards away from her. As Sokka fell against a tree, Katara pulled water from it, and froze his arm in place.
Hama cackled, as she unfroze the water keeping the two in place. "Don't hurt your friends now, Katara. And don't let them hurt each other!" She said, before crossing her hands over one another pulling Sokka and Aang towards each other, Sokka's sword aiming right for Aang's gut. The two boys screamed bloody murder, as Hama laughed to herself in sadistic enjoyment.
"NO!" Katara shouted, holding both hands out toward her friends. Both of them stopped moving towards each other, though they remained suspended in the air. Sokka made sure the grip on his sword was tight so it didn't go flying into Aang, and the air nomad looked up to see that his body remained unpenetrated. All eyes fell on Katara, and Hama grinned to herself, lowering her arms. For she was not the one holding Aang and Sokka in the air. As Katara realized what she was doing she retracted her hands inwards, holding them close to her chest, dropping both of the boys.
Sokka pulled his sword away from his friend, as he was granted control over his body, and Aang landed in a handstand, before falling to his feet. Katara meanwhile was silently crying to herself. "I... I..." She muttered.
Hama turned and looked up to the moon. "My work in this world is done... Congratulations Katara, you're a blood bender." The old woman closed her eyes, before she laughed, the sound growing louder into the night, before, as if by the will of the moon itself, Hama's nose bleed began to flow faster, and then, with a groan, the old woman seized up, and collapsed on the forest floor, as the people she'd unjustly imprisoned approached from the mountain, Toph leading them. In all reality, intervened by the spirits or not, Hama had died the moment she'd first been knocked to the ground by Katara's side sweeping attack. The brain bleed she'd suffered during the fall, shortening her life to only the few precise minutes she needed to pass on what she knew.
In the north, the grasslands had turned to snow, and Gi's volunteer unit had reached their enemy at the north coast by dawn, the perfect time for an attack. They were courageous at first, taking on what they thought was the worst of the water tribe fighters after their march had been ambushed. They'd charged up the hill, and once they'd taken the positions of their enemy on the other side, in the valley to the west, they held stout to repel an expected counter attack from across the creek that they couldn't cross while mounted, only for the fight to become one of attrition, as the unit took fire from a hidden earthwork fortification with upturned wooden boats acting as roofs to shelters dug into a hillside opposite the creek to them.
The volunteers clung to the belief they could claim victory as their trusted leaders attempted to guide them around the creek and thus out of the line of fire to what looked to be a shallow section to the north, but the odds become overwhelming when the water tribe reserves, with their home made muskets had flanked them from the nearby woods to the north. The fight was not yet hopeless though, until the path that they'd come from was cut off by a third section of tribesman hauling cannons with them over the hill, taken out of since captured Fire Navy ships.
Badly led and now outgunned, Gi and his volunteers lost count of the mounts that they'd lost, and the men having fallen from them. Gi's own mare had a cannon ball go through her gut, ripping her in half from under him, which sent him falling to the ground. The only route left available was retreat to the south into more favorable ground.
Once out of the fight, the light cavalry began work making a field fortification in the snowy forests south of the coastal plains, getting a count of the dead and wounded. Awaiting orders by dispatch rider, the unit had to hold for nearly two weeks. Gi slept in a tent with a man who'd lost his arm that entire time, and by the end of the sixth day of having to listen to his tentmate's pained moaning, Gi just wished to make it home unharmed. He just wanted to go home, be congratulated for his campaign by his father, be patted on the back by his mother, and kiss his girlfriend. Gi didn't care now for the band, or the parade, or the shouts of jubilation from his countryman anymore. They faded from his mind faster than he'd worn out his uniform. Faded... Like ink left in the sun. Like dreams to the waking, and thoughts to the dying.
Though it wasn't winter, the subarctic north was cold and bleak. Men suffered chills, pneumonia, and those without spare socks found their feet frozen. Then finally, when the dispatch had returned, they were ordered to retreat to the nearest division fort. The long march, further slowed by those who needed to now travel on foot, saw an outbreak of typhoid, that by the end had killed more men than they'd lost in their sole battle against the savage. Hunger set in as they'd gone through their rations three quarters of the way home, and some men fed on horse-hound to survive.
As the volunteer regiment reached the fort they would for a while call home, morale was in doubt, the unit's pride was wounded, and Gi found none of the honor or glory he'd sought when he'd enlisted... For he'd never ride home, nor into battle with the cavalry again, as Gi Park of Shi Jing Island, had died of exposure on the seventh night after his first and only battle...