Disclaimer: I don't own.
|◈|...chapter ten...|◇|
The canopy above them masked most of the dark, orange-toned sky. Through the shadows, they could see enough of the trees and roots to clumsily wade their way forward. "I think we should talk with Koh," Aang said, cutting through the swampy silence as they trudged ankle-deep through the wetland in no particular direction.
Raven grunted noncommittedly, looking at him coolly from the side.
"I mean it," Aang muttered in a childish grumble. Raven walked a little bit faster, ducking under strands of thin, silvery moss, but Aang matched her pace, looking over his shoulder at her with imploring eyes. "He might know about the spirit that pretended to be Zuko."
Raven stopped, and Aang bumped into her side, making her stumble before she could right herself. She glared down at him, but he just glared right back. "All we know right now is that we need to get home. Koh may or may not know about the dark spirit, but does it even matter if we're stuck here?" Aang looked away, unable to take the heat in her tone. Raven immediately felt a splinter of guilt take root. It wasn't his fault they were stuck here. (It was her's.) She sighed, closing her eyes. "Look, I know you wanted to talk to your friend. But right now, we need to get back to the Tower."
There was a moment of silence, and Raven worried the young Avatar had already run off, straight into the devil's mouth, but when she opened her eyes, she saw that Aang was only crouched down. His knees were pulled to his chest as he leaned above the brown-green water. She watched as he frowned at his reflection, the image rippling and warping from a freshly fallen leaf.
"You're right," he finally said after a contemplative moment. "We need to find out how to get back to our friends."
Raven quietly joined him, and her slow, squelching steps through the water turned their reflections into abstract paintings. Gently, she offered, "I can help you look for the real Zuko when we return."
"Thanks," he answered easily, an accepting smile turned up towards her. The younger teenager stood up, throwing a glance around the marshland, dusky and ever-quiet. With a thoughtful hum, he shared, "When I was last here, Hei Bai helped me find my way back to the human world. He's the giant panda I told you about." Aang added before she could ask, "But if we tried that again, I think we might return to my world, not yours."
"And then have no way of getting back to the others," Raven drearily finished the thought.
"Probably," he agreed, and started the directionless trek forward once again. Raven fell into step next to him, feeling hot, sticky, and wretched.
"Y'know," Aang started again after a couple more minutes of quietude. A foggy mist had started to cloak the wetland, beginning to obscure the water beneath them and the cypress trees boxing them in along the periphery. "Koh might know how to get back to your world. He helped me find out about the Ocean and Moon spirits when I asked, though he kinda made it into a riddle too, but it was an easy riddle, so it worked out in the end."
Raven wanted to dismiss the idea out of hand. She did not want to talk with Koh, why did Aang keep—! Raven breathed in sharply through her nose, held it, and then breathed out in a gusty sigh. The silence held a confusing kind of tension as they walked further into the growing fog, until she had the thought to ask, "Why do you want to talk to Koh so badly?"
When Aang didn't immediately start talking about fake or real Zukos, she knew she had asked the right question.
"Koh," he started and then stopped. Raven didn't push him, waiting it out. The fog was up to their shoulders now, thin but wide, covering all that her eyes could see. Aang sighed next to her. "He showed me the stolen face of Avatar Kuruk's fiancé. He was the Water Tribe Avatar after Yangchen, the air nomad in the previous cycle."
"And you want revenge?" Raven guessed when there was nothing more forthcoming.
"No," he answered at once, without any hesitation. His voice was soft and gentle, which she thought was out of place for the harsh and horrifying descriptions he had provided about the malevolent spirit, "Not revenge."
"He took the face of someone an Avatar of the past had loved," Raven summed up, blinking slowly as she followed the thought through to the end, "So do you think he might have...?" She didn't want to finish the thought. Aang was ever cheerful, smiling bright even in the darkest days, and she didn't have it in herself right now to be the raincloud she so often embodied.
Aang shook his head, stating with unending confidence, "No, I don't think so."
"How can you be sure?"
"We saw him," Aang returned, so sure that the teenaged boy standing outside in the middle of a thunderstorm was his friend. "And he saw me, he recognized me. No, I don't think Koh has Zuko."
"But..." Raven prompted.
"But Koh had said we'll meet again, and at the time, I just kinda ignored him 'cause the Great Spirits were in danger and the Fire Nation was attacking, but... now..."
Now, they were trapped here, where it was looking more and more likely that the spirit's parting threat was less a warning and more a prophecy. But Raven didn't believe in prophecies the way she used to. Not anymore. Her team had shown her that though the Universe might have plans for her, but she didn't have play the role of docile puppet ever again. Her team, her friends, had helped her so much when she had been alone and helpless. Right now, she could be the same comforting reminder for Aang.
A curl of sunny energy settled under skin as she put a hand on his shoulder and smiled wryly, "But I bet Koh didn't say anything about me being here."
Aang's answering grin was lopsided. "You're right."
A few feet away, the trees around them opened up, bowing to the magnificent and leaf-less tree towering above all else. The scraggly limbs looked just as twisted and barren up-close, curling through the air in odd, bent shapes reminiscent of broken, branching veins. The low-lying fog just barely rose above the cypress knees, the knobby, makeshift-stepping-stones nearly as big as the rock towers nearby. The long roots from the old tree extended out like an uninviting pathway. There was no mysterious wolf spirit to greet them this time.
Raven stepped away, motioning idly. She finally gave the apprehension in her gut a voice as she noted warily, "But I think he found us anyway."
"Koh," Aang said, his voice lost in the whisper.
It didn't matter that they had started their walk in the opposite direction, mostly aimless but not entirely. The Spirit World had power thrumming deep in its belly, vast and fathomless. They couldn't escape it no matter where they tried to run.
Koh wanted to greet them.
Aang moved forward before she could say anything, jumping from one knee to another with nimble grace, crossing long distances in a matter of seconds. Raven watched him, her tongue in knots, and then she leapt after him. Her wet shoes left tracks behind her as she joined him at the top of the curved hill made up of one of the tree's enormous roots. A shadowy entrance welcomed them through the light fog, dark and cavernous. Raven had the feeling that she was staring into an open mouth, yawning and hungry. If they went in, they might just be gobbled up and eaten alive.
"You don't want to talk to Koh," Aang reminded her once she turned her attention to him, and there was both a question and a concern imbedded within the words.
Raven sighed. She was used to burying her emotions deep inside, scooping them out and leaving a hollow emptiness in its place. That wasn't what was bothering her. It was— "I heard voices, in the days before you travelled to my world."
"What did they say?" he asked curiously, looking at her without judgement.
She scanned the barren entrance instead of meeting his eyes. Stealing the face of someone you love... Balance.. Good and Evil. "I don't know," she answered, not entirely lying. The memories felt choppy and interrupted, wispy things that she couldn't seem to hold onto for long. She pulled her eyes from a family of five molted cicada shells to look back at Aang with new resolve. "But I'm not letting you go in there by yourself."
"Are you sure?" he asked tentatively, but there was relief in his voice too.
She nodded and held out her hand. The answering smile on his face was excited as he intertwined their hands. She gave them a reassuring squeeze, her fingers warm and calloused, and they both faced the gaping entrance.
Next to her, Aang's face and voice had drained into a wooden quality as he asked tonelessly, "Ready?"
"Always," Raven answered and let go of her apprehension entirely, her expression flat and distant.
Aang squeezed her hand, one last reach for comfort, and then he took the first step towards the darkness, pulling her forward. Together, they walked down the never-ending stairs carved from living wood. The meager light from above was now gone entirely as they blindly headed further down, down, down into the stomach of the beast.
Robin had been standing in front of Aang and Raven, his back to the window and expression shadowed when they had all rushed back to the living room. When he only nodded sharply, a frown pulling his lips down, his team seemed to collectively breathe out. Slower, Katara and Sokka followed after the group, watching as the heroes circled around the teenager with worry-filled stances, the unbending trust on their faces easy to read.
See-More snarled through his bonds, held captive in an electric-blue net curtesy of Cyborg and mouth taped by a grey-silver strip that honestly had no right being as sturdy as it was.
Their leader was here and he was preparing; he was ready.
He told them about Slade, carelessly dismissive of their enemy's presence. "He wants an army," Robin said. "Of benders." And he told them about what he had learned from Jinx, leaving nothing out about the fight at the bank, describing his realization about the sword and the identity of the other H.I.V.E. villain.
"Zuko?" Katara exclaimed, taking a step forward, unconsciously planting herself in front of Aang. Her braid was loose around her face, and the water from the fight was staining her kimono with dark patches of blue.
"Their conversation must not have gone well," Robin answered. "He aligned himself with Jinx, which means he also must be helping Slade."
Sokka looked at See-More and the one-eyed boy blinked slowly, the tape over his mouth pinching. Sokka wondered what that meant. It was hard to tell with the helmet covering the top half of his face, leaving only the single (fake?) eye to read.
"So what do we do?" Beast Boy asked, shooting an unsure look at their home intruder. "Wykkyd got away with the other half of the sword."
"Hm," Robin said, crossing his arms, his gaze skirting over Raven and Aang before landing on Katara's steely expression. He mirrored her, mouth curving upward in a dangerous, somewhat gleeful smirk. "We get it back, of course."
"How?" Cyborg demanded, but not without respect.
"Raven and Avatar Aang."
Sokka followed the rest as they looked at their white-haloed friends. He heard Katara ask something else in the background, Starfire's warm voice layering on top, but Sokka's mind was too busy chewing on the army of benders thing, piercing through the meaning. If Slade wanted to use the sword to gather an army, which world did he actually intent to rule?
"So now we wait," Robin declared, and he took three decisive steps to stand in front of Aang. Katara didn't flinch. Giving her an assessing look, Robin crouched down, staring into the blank void of the Avatar's gaze. "For them to return to us."
When he looked back up, Cyborg had tied See-More to a kitchen chair, his arms crossed as he stared the smaller teenager down. Katara's hands were fisted, a tundra storm in her blue eyes. Sokka watched as Starfire and Beast Boy drifted away, staying close — still in the living room — but finding projects in other corners of the room in order to not crowd their teammates. Beast Boy still seemed to find a spot on the couch nearest to Raven.
"Katara," Cyborg said, gently, pulling his gaze from their captive to look at the fierce waterbender. Sokka approached from her left side. The hero nodded to him and added, "And Sokka. I think I met Toph today."
Katara couldn't stifle her gasp quick enough. Sokka found his voice first, and it fortunately didn't crack, "Is she okay?"
Cyborg nodded without hesitation. "Yes."
"What happened?" Katara wondered, her expression suddenly glassy and hopeful. She reached out, resting a hand on the smooth, cybernetic surface of Cyborg's arm. He frowned in thought at the touch, but she didn't pull away, expression beseeching.
"We fought," he reported, and added after a moment, with obvious chagrin, "She won. And then challenged me to another fight and said we could go best two out of three."
Katara snorted a laugh, and Sokka felt the tension in his jaw unwind a little at that. "That sounds like her," she agreed.
"Had quite the group of cheerleaders on her side," he said wryly, amused, and explained before they could ask, "A crowd of Billys, the H.I.V.E. Five villain who clones himself."
They quieted. Then, in that moment of calm, all three turned at the same time to look at See-More. His eye narrowed, as much of a dirty look as he could manage without any eyebrows to complete the image.
Katara snarled.
Sokka got there first, crossing his arms and raising his chin. "So do you only have one eye under the helmet or is it like, a stylist choice? Your villain persona?"
The teenager gave him a slow, green blink, the tape twisting. Confused. Surprised.
He rolled with it, ignoring Katara's angry, annoyed squawk, "I gotta say, your outfit is super ugly, man. The eye just doesn't do it for me."
This time, the villain made a low growl through the tape, the green-filled glare sliced into a narrow slit. Anger.
Channeling confidence, Sokka reached out and pulled the tape off, wincing sympathetically at the surprised-pained snarl. He leaned into the teen's personal space, ignoring Cyborg's warnings and Katara's confused questions. "You know Toph. So then you must know Zuko too?"
"Sokka."
It wasn't Katara or even Cyborg. Robin was suddenly next to him, a green glove resting with some weight on his shoulder. See-More's pupil tracked the motion, unblinkingly. Robin was looking at See-More, his own masked eyes narrowed.
"Zuko?" he prompted, shrugging off the hero's hold. Or, well, trying to. Robin's fingers tightened, almost bruising now.
"Leave it," the Titan ordered coolly, reaching for the tape with his free hand. "He doesn't have any information we don't already have, and he'll just lie to you for the rest of it."
Sokka felt something inside him snap, and he jerked himself free with a shove. He ended up standing next to the villain, who had attacked Katara, staring back at the three shocked faces of his new friends and sister. "Then it won't do any harm to let him talk."
"You're being unreasonable, Sokka," Robin argued stonily. "Why are choosing this hill to die on?"
In the back of his mind, he noticed that the rest of the room had gone silent.
"No one is going to do any dying," Katara said with a put-upon sigh, rolling her eyes at the seriousness in the other boy's voice. Yet she still cautioned, "Sokka," reaching out towards him.
"The H.I.V.E. were friends with Toph, so maybe they were friends with Zuko too."
See-More made a small, breathy noise.
"You did say Zuko sided with Jinx," Beast Boy told Robin, who hadn't looked away from the two in front of him, unblinkingly intense. Starfire hovered nearby, her concerned eyes on only Robin. "Maybe that's why?"
"And Slade," Robin started to say.
"He knows something that you don't want us to know," Sokka cut in and moved to block See-More from the leader's view, standing in front of the other boy and leaving his back undefended. He didn't let it bother him. "What is it?"
Robin didn't have any scratches on his face. He had said he'd fallen through a window, like the recordings had shown, but he was standing here, unharmed.
"I'm not—"
"Someone was pretending to be Zuko when there was that fight at the mall," suddenly the boy behind him hurried to say, his voice coming out rapid-fire and in one single breath. "I don't know why or who but—"
Robin's face was like thunder, cracked like the furious tempest of lightening outside. He could be lying, Sokka thought passively, but he wasn't. Robin's (Fake-Robin) expression was the only answer he needed. He wished he had been wrong.
Lightening struck, and glass shattered. Someone was shouting, voices overlapping, and then the Tower went dark all at once, plummeting them all into nothingness.
Again.
Sokka was getting really sick of this.
Their world was entirely pitch-black.
Faintly, they could hear click-click-clacks of something inhuman crawling around above them, shrouded in a cloak of obscurity. Raven felt herself take another step, her foot finding the drop of another step. Aang was right behind her, and their joined hands pulled them down together, before she abruptly pulled him back as she took a step backwards, her feet re-finding purchase on the landing zone about three steps wide behind her.
"Wha— What is it? Is it Koh?"
"No, but he can come to us," was the flat answer, but there was an unhesitating sense of power in her voice. She didn't budge at Aang's gentle tug. "We're doing this on our own terms."
Aang didn't need to answer her, and she wouldn't have been able to see his silent acceptance in the darkness anyway. Instead, she let him link their arms together, pressing their backs against each other so they were facing opposite directions. It was both grounding and terrifying, standing entirely in the blackness as they waited for something to happen.
It didn't take long.
Without warning, a sudden gust of motion and air shot around her— and then Raven was face-to-face with a red-faced demon, two horns made of spindly, twisted twigs. Trigon? her mind trilled with illogical panic, a stabbing shock shooting upward from the base of her spine as her breath snagged in her throat, her face freezing.
"Koh," Aang the Avatar greeted blankly, and she felt his hand tighten in hers, hot and sweaty. The dark spirit curled around her in order to be before the younger boy, the scales on his snake-like body shimmering slightly in the dimness as he trapped them in the middle like prey in a spider's web. As Aang talked with him, all she could feel, all the way to her bones, was a deep relief that those cold eyes were no longer on her.
The logical part of her understood that the old spirit's mask had revealed only one set of ice-blue eyes instead of the four blood-red she knew, so she forcibly steadied her breathing. She heard Aang say something, asking if he'd seen someone who looked like the Fire Nation prince, and Raven ordered herself to get it together. She had faced terrors worse than some caterpillar-snake-demon-thing that liked to play with masks and scare children.
"I did not expect to see you so soon," Koh said, his voice layered with many different tones that echoed off the wooden walls, the deep baritone rising above them all, "And it seems you brought a... friend..." The insect-like body tightened its loose circle, the spirit now wearing the face of a young woman with wavy flowing hair, her eyes curved with gentleness as she looked thoughtfully at Raven.
Like every nerve was on fire, Raven stiffly pulled her hands free to press them together as she bowed lowly, hiding her face for a split-second before she finished rising, "Hello, Koh the Face Stealer."
"Welcome, Raven the Teen Titan," she answered, and then in one big blink, Raven was facing a blue-faced animal, the mouth open in a fanged smile. Raven stared back with an air of boredom, and the spirit continued slowly, "You do not belong here." The inhuman being wrapped around them again, facing Aang to add, "Just as they do not belong there."
The spirit circled around them again, adding another layer. It was larger and longer than Raven had expected.
"That's what we're hoping you can help us with," Aang admitted woodenly. She found his hand again and gave him a comforting squeeze.
The ancient spirit droned, "Five friends without a home."
"Yes—"
"And five faces without a heart."
...What? What horrifying riddle did that mean?
Raven inquired with forced lightness, "Without a heart?"
"Mhh," the Face Stealer said, "You want to find a way back, do you not?"
Before she could answer, the centuries old spirit cut between them, pushing them apart as it wove itself in a figure-eight around them. Instead of the solid warmth of Aang at her back, now all she could feel was the cold, smooth surface of Koh's hard-shelled back. A Noh-like mask stared down at her, the red lips stretched in a gleeful smile.
"One needed to learn to let go," the spirit murmured, the long, insectoid body snaking between them and pulling them farther and farther apart. Aang, Raven thought piercingly, not-yet in a panic. Then, suddenly, instead of continuing to form a wide figure-eight symbol, Koh circled around them in full. The empty space was abruptly pulled tight, throwing the two teenagers together as the spirit coiled around them, now nearly suffocating them in its closeness. "And one needed to learn to hold on."
She heard Aang gasping in the hot air, his breath short and fast as the dark spirit trapped them closer. Her own breath was short and clipped, beads of sweat dripping down her face as she struggled to say in monotone, "How? How do we hold on?"
"You tell me," Koh said and the weight encircling her chest loosened and then disappeared. The pale face with sunken eyes and red lips stared at her from the shadows. "The Spirit World is a reality outside of the physical realm."
"Yes, that's why I can't bend," Aang explained, blinking slowly as he caught his breath, some part of his brain picking up on the hint and trying to puzzle through it. "Because I need my body's chi."
"But I don't necessarily need my body to use my powers," Raven realized, remembering just in time to numb her surprise as red lips puckered into a semi-smile from the shadows. "I just have to,"—hold on, Koh had said. She knew what she had to do now—
The dark spirit faded fully into the darkness, shadows like liquid-ink spilling into the now-empty space. His parting words echoed off the walls, "Until next time, lost ones."
"Hold on," Raven repeated like a mantra, and Aang gripped her hand tighter like it had been a command. Her friends, old and new, flashed behind her eyes, and a sunny heat burst free from the depths of her nonphysical spirit, her internal compass spinning towards home-family-friends. Her soul-self projection shined bright, illuminated everything around them.
And then—
Whiteness.
|◈|...|◇|
Author's Note: Please Read and Review – I'm hoping to get to 50 reviews? Can you guys try and get there? Maybe? Possibly? No? Oh, well, it's just a goal.
UPDATE: this was re-written 12/16/23. Also, thanks for the reviews y'all. My gratitude is a decade late, but still. :)