Responses to Reviews:

RonaldM40196867: Politics doesn't ruin everything. Poorly handled, ham-fisted, clumsy politics ruins everything. And I do think Avatar needs more films.

TORONTOSUN: I like them too.

Zigzagdoublezee: Maybe. I don't know. The characters who got special spirit powers did that by fusing with spirits didn't they? At least the two I can think of did. Mako just got zapped, which I'm not sure is the same thing.

As Always, Please Review!

Asami

Pushing the control stick forwards, Asami dived down towards the newcomers. The Princess Yue loomed in front of her, painted dark blue to match the colour of the flag flying from her mast. Unusually for Battleships, her twin hulls had been joined together by a fake prow, and on the front of it on the centreline of the ship was a magnificent figurehead of a young woman with a serene smile on her face and haunting white hair. It didn't take much to work out that must be a representation of the ship's namesake, the Princess who, 74 years ago, had sacrificed herself to save the moon, her tribe and the very art of waterbending itself from the Fire Nation armada sent to destroy them.

Waterbenders looked up from their duties as she approached, and eyed her warily. Some waved. Others reflexively moved towards piles of boxes positioned next to the Northern warship's main armament; what looked like large cannons with huge rubber pipes running out of the back of them and into the deck. Asami realised she had seen those before, at defence shows she had been to with Future Industries.

Behind the flagship of the Northern Water Tribe came more battleships. A few years ago, these might have been her enemies. Now she didn't know who they were. Nobody had been expecting the arrival of Northern ships, Raiko had been so unsure of their loyalties after the Dark Avatar incident and the Southern War of Independence that he hadn't even bothered asking them to defend him. But here they were nonetheless.

The Princess Yue was now approaching Air Temple Island and the entrance to Yue Bay. Asami began to swing the aircraft around and craned her neck to see what was going on in the rest of the battle. The air was still thick with flying machines, and the Imperial fleet was desperately twisting and turning to try to dodge them. Her eyes fixed on the Colossus, Kuvira's flagship and the furthest vessel away from her, which was executing a wide turn. Too wide, she saw immediately. If it didn't change course soon it would run aground, right in the middle of the city. That wouldn't quite be the triumphant entry to the city that Kuvira probably had in mind but with that many spirit vines on board the ship could be a giant bomb and Asami did not want it to go off in downtown Republic City. Not least because Korra was still aboard.

One of the Imperial ships finally seemed to realize that the Northern fleet was there. Asami saw signal flags run up its mast even as it desperately tried to dodge a salvo of torpedoes, presumably asking the Princess Yue's intentions.

In response, the forward guns of the Princess Yue swung towards it. Water tribesmen opened a hatch at the rear of the cannons and inserted the shell, pushing it in securely, before closing them up again and making sure they were closed securely. Then one of them pressed a button. Asami knew that water would be flowing into the chamber behind the shell, pumped through the ship from the ocean. Two waterbenders stood just behind the gun, moving their arms in a rhythmic pattern as they steadily increased the water pressure inside it. This was the waterbenders' answer to the air cannons that other nations used, with a shorter range and a longer reload but enough firepower to compete with them.

Finally, when it looked like the chambers might crack open from the pressure of the water straining to get out, a lever was pulled and the pressure was released, propelling the shells towards their target as the liquid escaped the only way it now could. There was a series of splashes travelling sequentially away from the Princess Yue and then explosions on the Imperial ship.

I suppose we know whose side they're on now, she thought, climbing away as the Northerners began their attack. The Imperial fleet, forced to respond to the sudden assault, turned in towards each other in a bid to form a line of battle, and Asami saw air cannons being fired towards the Waterbenders, who responded with more fire as trails of splashes indicated where water guns were being fired.

Every Imperial ship, that is, except one. Colossus was still maintaining the same turn it had the last time she looked, and now it was getting perilously close to the shore. Asami watched smoke rise from the turrets as it seemed to pick up speed, until finally it ran out of sea.

With a deafening scraping noise audible even over the noise of the engine of her flying machine, the Colossus slammed into the beach, the momentum of several thousand tonnes of metal and fuel travelling at speed driving it ever further into the city. The ground cracked and split before it, looking a bit like the wake it generated when sailing, but finally the resistance generated by the earth and rock slowed the Colossus down. It finally came to rest with nearly half of the ship embedded in rock, and the bows of the ship just metres away from smashing through a building. The screeching sound died away, and all Asami could see now was the smoke rising gently off the stranded behemoth. For a moment, everything was quiet, the great shape of the battleship looking like a beached elephant-whale. Even the battle between what remained of the Imperial fleet and the Northerners seemed to pause for a moment, but Asami might have been imagining that. She flew down closer to get a better look, wondering what could possibly be happening on board. Were her friends alright? Was Korra alright? Nothing she could see gave her any indication.

Only then did she see the purple glow coming through every window on the ship, and growing brighter every second. Cold fear gripped her heart at the sight. Colossus was going to blow, with her friends still aboard.