It has only been a couple days since we left Omashu. Aang seemed to be in deep thought every single moment none of us were talking. Right now, I was looking over the edge, Sokka was sharpening his blade, and Katara was reading a scroll. Every moment we were resting, I would have Katara teach me the basics of water bending. Once I could get the hang of that, then we would start working on something else. But I wasn't fully to that point, not like her and Aang.

"Hey Sokka, are we flying down?" I asked, glancing up at him. We were pretty quickly flying down towards the trees below us.

Sokka looked over the edge then up at Aang. "Hey, you taking us down for a reason." There was no response. "Aang." Sokka said again and Aang seemed to snap out of whatever he was thinking about. "Why are we going down?"

"What? I didn't even notice." Aang replied.

"Well, we are currently heading towards the treetop, almost to the point of Oppa touching it." There didn't seem to be a response from Aang. Katara scooted forward so she was closer to Aang.

"Is something wrong?"

There was a brief pause before, "I know this is going to sound weird, but I think the swamp is calling to me." Aang answered.

"Is it telling you where we can get something to eat?" Sokka asked, holding his stomach. I could literally hear it growling.

"No I…I think it wants us to land there." Aang replied.

"No offense to the swamp, but I don't see any land there to land on." Sokka looked over the ledge like I was. It was true. All you could see was the tops of the trees, vines intertwining between them.

"I don't know. Bumi said to learn earthbending I would have to wait and listen, and now I'm actually hearing the earth. Do you want me to ignore it?" Aang asked glancing back at all of us.

"Yes." Sokka immediately replied.

"I don't know. There's something ominous about that place." Katara added.

"I think you need to follow your instincts Aang. As the Avatar, your instincts should be the strongest and ones that need to be listened to the most." That is something that I was taught in my training. Your instincts are what tell you someone is about to attack, and how they could attack. Listening to them means a life to save or protect.

Okay, since almost everyone feels so strongly about this, bye swamp." Aang said making Oppa start to fly upwards. "Yip yip."
"Umm.. you better throw in an extra yip! We gotta move!" Sokka yelled. I glanced to where he was looking and saw a tornado quickly catching up to us.

"Aang, move it!" I added with even more urgency. Aang tried to steer us away, but it was getting closer and would not leave us alone. Before I knew it, Sokka was being lifted up and pulled towards the tornado. Katara and I grabbed his hand and tried to hold him in. "Aang!" I called. He jumped over to us and made an air ball around us all. Sokka fell into the saddle, but the ball was sucked into the tornado. I looked at Aang and could see he was struggling to keep the ball up.

Suddenly, the ball disappeared, we were all picked up and sent flying through the tornado and into the swamp. Katara and Sokka fell into the water below, completely covered. I tried to use my momentum and grab a vine or something to slow my descent. I was barely able to grab something, but was still thrown to the ground. Not as hard as Katara and Sokka, but still hard. I could feel my ankle twist slightly from landing on it. Aang just floated down next to me. We all stood up, Sokka groaning with both of them soaked.

"Where's Oppa and Momo?" Aang asked as we looked up. It was dark and gloomy underneath the canopy. "I'm going to climb the tree and see if I can see them." Aang said before taking off up a tree.

"Hey Katara, can you help me wrap my ankle? I think I twisted it in the fall." I asked, trying not to put any pressure on it.

She gave me a nod and I sat on a root. She grabbed a piece of cloth from the bag I had and wrapped it up just as Sokka started walking away. "Sokka, you have an elbow leech." I glanced up as Sokka started freaking out.

"Where!?"

"Where do you think an elbow leech is?" I asked.

He held up his elbow, "why do things keep attaching to me?" He grabbed the leech and threw it away from him. Katara finished wrapping my ankle. I could probably walk on it, just have to be careful with it.

"Couldn't find him?" Katara asked. Aang was swinging down on a vine landing in the water with the rest of us.

"No, and the tornade…it just disappeared." We all glanced at the swamp around us.

"I guess we need to go find them." I offered. Everyone nodded and we started wading through the water and moss. Sokka got his machete out and whacked the vines that were in the way.

"We should probably hurry up." Sokka said, whacking a group of vines.

"Maybe we should be a little nicer to the swamp." Aang yelled immediately after.

"Aang, these are just plants. Do you want me to say 'please' and 'thank you' as I swing my machete back and forth?"

"Maybe you should listen to Aang. Something about this place feels…alive." Katara glanced around the swamp just as I glanced around. I was using whatever root near me to help me move.

"I'm sure there are lots of things that are alive here and if we don't wanna wind up getting eaten by them, we need to find Appa as fast as we can." Sokka continued to whack through the vines. Aang shook his head before jumping down from the root and landing next to me.

I realized it was going to be harder to get through the swamp than I thought. With the water covering everything, I wasn't able to see the vines and greenery below the surface. Multiple times throughout our trek through the swamp, my foot would get caught in something, making me strain my ankle that was already hurting.

By the time we made it to a large tree root and up it, my ankle was throbbing. Somewhere along the way, I was able to find a larger stick that I was using for a walking stick. "There's no way they can hear us and no way we can see them." Sokka said as we climbed the large root. "We'll have to make camp for the night."
"Yes please, I really need to sit." I spoke up. Everyone looked back at me, who was leaning on a stick and definitely struggling.

"Maybe I can try to heal your ankle a little bit." Katara offered.

"Yes please."

Suddenly there was a large gurgle off to the side of us. "What was that?" Katara asked as we all looked out to the water below us.

"Nothing, just swamp gas. Look, there's nothing supernatural going on here." Sokka explained just as a horrible, disgusting smell reached our noses. I quickly covered mine with one of my hands along with Katara.

Before I could fully hide the scent an ear piercing scream appeared from nowhere. We hugged each other, with a start and looked up to see a white bird. Was the bird the source of the scream? Just as I thought that, it screamed again then flew away.

"I think we should build a fire." Sokka exclaimed before running to find some wood or something to build a fire. He went over to a tree root that looked a little dead and started chopping at it.

"Sokka the longer we are here the more I think you shouldn't be doing that." Aang tried to reason.

"I asked the swamp and it said this was fine." He then grabbed a root and started shaking it like it was talking. "Right, swamp? 'No problem, Sokka!" We all looked at each other as Sokk continued to chop down wood.

Eventually, we were able to get a fire going and Katara was able to heal my ankle up a little bit. While we were waiting for Sokka to get a fire going, she instructed me and what to feel when trying to heal something using water. I didn't quite get the feeling I was supposed to, to heal something. I tried a couple times, and was barely able to feel anything healing on my ankle.

"Don't worry. Master Pakku said it takes some of the women a couple tries to get the hang of healing." She gave me an encouraging smile before glancing up at the trees around us. "Does anyone else get the feeling that we're being watched?"

"Please, we're all alone out here." Sokka replied, using his machete to swat away a fly moving around him.

Eventually, we were all able to go to sleep. I wasn't fully asleep because my ankle was throbbing. We all had our backs to each other, each facing a different direction. I felt a tug and was bing yanked away. My eyes flung open and saw each of us being pulled in a different direction. I let out a yell of both pain and fear as I was pulled into the swamp. I lost sight of everyone else as I was pulled through the forest. I had to get out of whatever was holding me. I reached my hand down and grabbed one of the fans on my thigh. Opening it up, I was able to slice through whatever was holding me. Once I sliced through, I flipped over and landed on my feet. I grabbed my other fan just as more….vines…came at me. Blocking, slicing, and dodging, I was able to get free of the vines. I tried to run from them as well, but I didn't get far before my ankle was hurting again. I found a tree root and hid underneath it. I stayed there for a good minute or two before stepping out. Cautiously, I glanced around the area I was in, ready for any vines to shoot out at me.

"Hello! Anyone?" I yelled into the swamp around me. There was no response. I wasn't truly surprised because we were all pulled in different directions and easily could have been pulled far away.

Slightly in the distance, I saw the back of someone. "Hello?" I called as I slowly walked towards the person. A little bit of light slipped through the canopy so I could see the person. It was a woman, with brown hair and blue clothing. Her hair was down with braids in the back. I recognized who it was. "Mom?" I started limping towards her, tears filling my eyes. "Mom!" I called as I got closer. I went to touch her, but instead of touching clothing I touched…wood.

"Mom?" I called looking around the small clearing I was in. Tears were freely falling from my eyes. I still remember when she was taken. Katara and I were holding each other as the Fire Nation soldier pulled her away from us. She was taken for being a water bender, but she wasn't. She was protecting the both of us. After that, I knew that I was going to have to take care of Katara, because she was much younger than I was. I knew she remembered mom, but she didn't have as much time as I did with her.

My mom was my best friend growing up. She taught me all the small things I needed to survive. Once she was taken, my father went off to war to fight the Fire Nation. Sokka and I had to take care of the tribe, because we were the oldest children of the Chief.

Katara. My head shot up and as I realized where I was at. I was in the swamp, all of us sent away from each other and alone. I wiped my eyes, freeing them from the tears falling. I couldn't think about the past. My family was out there and I needed to find them. I reached down into the water surrounding my ankle. I needed to heal my ankle, I needed to be strong enough to move forward and take care of my family. I felt a cooling sensation around my ankle, the same sensation Katara had done earlier. I looked down and saw the area around my ankle glowing a light blue color. Immediately, my ankle felt better. I stood up, rolling my ankle to test how it was doing. It wasn't completely healed, but it was stronger and I would be able to do more on it.

I got my fans in my hands and headed back in the direction I came from. If anyone else was able to think, they should be going that way too. I heard the sound of hacking just ahead of me, "Sokka!" I yelled.

"Sene!" Sokka yelled back. We continued to yell each others name until we could see each other.

"Thank goodness you are ok." I said as I pulled him into a tight hug.

"Have you found anyone else?" Sokka asked as we pulled away from each other.

"Not yet, I was hoping I would be to find them by heading back this way. But I have only seen you."

"I was thinking the same thing. Maybe…" He stopped as we both heard a yelp. We glanced at each other, we both heard it. Before we could go anywhere, we were shoved down the tree root. Once we hit the bottom, I held my head and groaned as I sat up.

"Katara, Aang!" I yelled as I saw them both sitting across from me. I pulled them into a hug, glad we were able to find each other again.

"What do you guys think you're doing?" Sokka asked, standing up exasperated. "I've been looking all over for you."

"Well, I was wandering around looking for you too. Katara countered glaring at Sokka.

"I was chasing some girl." Aang looked down at the ground then used air bending to stand up.

"What girl?" Katara asked as Aang helped her stand up. Sokka came over to me and helped me stand, wrapping his arm around my shoulder.

"I heard laughing, and I saw some girl in a fancy dress." He rubbed the back of his neck.

"Well, there must be a tea party here, and we just didn't get our invitations." Sokka sarcastically put his hands together. I elbowed him in the gut, making him double over slightly. "What was that for?"

"I thought I saw mom." I glanced over and saw the sad face of Katara.

"I thought I saw her too." I stepped to her and gave her a hug. She held onto me tightly before we pulled apart.

"Look, we were all just scared and hungry, and our minds were playing tricks on us. That's why we all saw things out here." Sokka was trying to make reason where there wasn't any.

"You saw something too?" Katara asked him.

"I thought I saw Yue. Sokka replied, looking away. "But that doesn't prove anything. Look, I think about her all the time, and you saw mom, someone you both miss a lot." He motioned to the both of us.

"What about me? I didn't know the girl I saw. And all our visions led us right here." Aang added. Aang stepped forward and glanced at the area where we were standing.

"Ok…so where's here? The middle of the swamp?" Katara asked. We all glanced around at the area, trying to see why here.

"Yeah, the center…it's the heart of the swamp." I looked back at him and saw him looking up. I followed his gaze and saw a huge tree right next to us. "It's been calling us here. I knew it." Aang smiled and looked at us.

"It's just a tree. It can't call anyone." I punched Sokka in the arm for that comment.

"Nature can do a lot of things we can't even imagine. Calling us could easily be one of them." I spoke up.

"For the last time, there is no one after us and there's nothing magical happening here." Suddenly a giant creature erupted from the water next to us. We all screamed and held each other with the suddenness of the creature. We quickly let go of each other and ran in different directions as the creature tried to attack us.

I looked back and saw the creature holding Sokka and throwing him down into the water. I went to step, just as a wind blade sliced through the vines of the creature making it drop Sokka. It then turned ar threw its vines at Aang. I took the moment of distraction to run over to Sokka. Grabbing his arm, I pulled him up and we ran to hide behind a tree root. Before we could get there however, Sokka was picked up again by the creature. With amazing speed, it took off into the swamp. I used some of the bending Katara taught me to go after it, moving with the water. The creature stopped ahead of me and I saw Katara in front of it, slicing it with water. The slice she made in the creature immediately started closing with vines.

Katara used the water and shoved the creature back into a tree with a huge wave, just as I got up to her. "Tag team?" I asked. She gave me a nod and we got into a stance to fight this creature. Katara parted the water and started running at it, but vines shot out and shoved her backwards. She flew past Aang who was running towards us. Aang stopped to watch Katara and the creature took the opportunity to fling Aang backwards with Katara.

I sliced the creature a couple times as it started sucking Sokka into its stomach. Each cut I made, it healed itself. I slid to the side every time it shot out vines. I dodged most of them, anticipating the vines shooting out. One of the times it shot a vine out, it shot two. The second one hit me and flung backwards.

Aang flew towards it and landed on its head. Once he was on its head, he wrapped himself and the creature in a tornado of air. Once the air disappeared, the creature was in the form of a large twisted root.

I stood up and ran up with Katara, standing on the opposite side as her. I couldn't see what she was doing, but quickly Sokka was shot through the other side. I pulled water up, grabbing Sokka and setting him down softer than if he was just shot through. The creature healed the hole shot through its center with vines then started coming towards Sokka and I.

Aang jumped down and shoved its head into the water and landed between us and the creature. But the creature slapped him and he went flying away. I watched him sore through the air and deeper into the swamp. Katara and I both had the same idea. We used the water and started slicing the creature, over and over and over. We were slicing it faster than it could heal itself.

"There's someone in there. He's bending the vines." Sokka yelled to us over the sound of the water slicing. Katara made a large motion using water to slice the whole top of the creature off. Immediately, it stopped moving but then vines quickly slithered through the water wrapping Katara up so she couldn't move. I immediately started slicing the vines holding her as Aang jumped down and blew air at the creature.

The strength of the wind Aang blew unraveled the creature quickly. "Why did you call me here if you just wanted to kill us?" Aang yelled.

"Wait." A voice came from the vines that were disappearing. Once the vines were gone, there was an older, heavier man standing in front of us. He had gray hair and was covered by a leaf and a belt. "I didn't call you here."

"We were flying over, and I heard something calling to me, telling me to land." Aang explained as we all glanced at each other.

"He's the Avatar. Stuff like that happens to us a lot." Sokka explained.

"The Avatar? Come with me." The man said, turning around and walking into the swamp. We all glanced at each other.

"Should we follow him?" Katara asked.

"I don't think he means any harm." Aang replied. "Let's follow." So we did. He led us to the top of the giant tree in the middle of the swamp.

"So who are you then?" Katara asked as we came to a stop at the top of the tree. We could see almost the entire swamp down below us.

"I protect the swamp from folks that want to hurt it, like this fella with his big knife." The man replied, moving a vine out of the way of the path we were on.

"See, completely reasonable." Sokka put his machete away. "Not a monster, just a regular guy defending his home. Nothing mystical about it."

"Oh the swamp is a mystical place all right. It's sacred. I reached enlightenment right here under the banyan-grove tree." He sat down on the root and crossed his legs. "I heard it calling me, just like you did."

"Sure you did. It seems real chatty." Sokka basically scoffed. I punched Sokka in the arm as he frowned at the man.

"See, this whole swamp is actually just one tree spread out over miles." He held his hands up motioning to the whole swamp around us. "Branches spread then sink and take root, and spread some more. One big, living organism. Just like the entire world."

"I get how the tree is one big thing, but the whole world?" Aang questioned.

"Sure. You think you're any different from me or your friends and this tree? If you listen hard enough, you can hear every living thing breathing together. You can feel everything growing. We're all living together, even if most folks don't act like it. We all have the same roots and we are all branches of the same tree." The man explained some more.

"But what did our visions mean?" Katara asked as we all sat down in a circle with the man.

"In the swamp, we see visions of people we've lost, people we loved, folks we think are gone. But the swamp tells us they're not. We're still connected to them. Time is an illusion and so is death." The guy has definitely had a lot of time to think and a lot of time to ponder.

"But what about my vision? It was someone I had never met." Aang asked.

"You're the Avatar, you tell me."

"Time is an illusion." Aang started glancing down at the tree beneath us. "So, it's someone I will meet."

"If it is someone that you will meet, she must be important if she was to be the first thing to show up now. Maybe the next person we need to look for." I tried to reason.

"Sorry to interrupt the lesson, but we still need to find Appa and Momo." Sokka shot into the intelligent conversation we were trying to have. I glared at him and he just shrugged his shoulders.

"I think I know how to find them." Aang moved to a kneeling position and placed his hands on the ground beneath us. "Everything is connected." He closed his eyes and the tattoo on his hand started glowing. We all watched as he seemed to be connecting with the earth below him. He stood up suddenly, "come on, we've got to hurry!"

"Where are we going?" I asked as we all ran.

"Appa is being held in a net by people." Aang explained. "They are just through that group of trees right there." Aang jumped up and sent a sliver of water hurling towards one of the boats. Two of the men were sent into the water. "Appa!" Aang yelled, sending air towards another boat.

Katara and I ran up next to him on a tree branch. The man Aang hit dropped a bag letting Momo fly away. "We're under attack!" one of the men on the boats yelled. He then sent water to us, and we sent it back.

"Hey, you guys are waterbenders." Katara exclaimed.

"You too, that means we're kin." The man replied, stopping the water. We stopped holding it as well, making it fall back into the swamp. Sokka and the other man finally made it up to us. "Hey, Huu. How you been?" The boat man asked.

"You know, scared some folks, swung some vines-the usual." The older man with us replied. So now I had a name to go with him.

"Huu?" Sokka asked. Huu just smiled at us.

"Well, now that we are all friends, do you think we could start over?" I asked.

The Swamp clan let us go with them to a camp that they all had. We were sitting around a fire and they had made food for us all. "How do you like that possum-chicken?"
"Tastes just like arctic hen." Sokka replied, taking a bite of the food we had. "So why were you guys so interested in eating Appa? You've got plenty of those big things wandering around." Sokka motioned to the catgator they had behind them.

"You want me to eat Slim, he's like a member of the family." Due asked, throwing some food at the catgater.

"Nice gater." Sokka tossed a bug at him, keeping his own hand closer to himself. The bug however hit Slim in the nose and bounced off. He then turned and growled at Sokka, who cowered away.

"Oh, he don't eat no bugs! That's people food." Due replied with a goofy smile.

"Where'd you say you was from?" Tho asked after Due.

"We are from the South pole." I replied after swallowing my bite of food.

"Didn't know there was waterbenders anywhere but here. They got a nice swamp there do they?" He replied back with a second question.

"They aren't any waterbenders, not anymore that we have left." I spoke first.

"No, it's all ice and snow." Katara added.

Both of the men's faces dropped, their mouths almost touching the ground. "No wonder you left." Tho finally spoke after a few moments.

"Well, I hope you realize now that nothing strange was going on here." Sokka spoke u after another brief pause. He motioned to the trees around us. "Just a bunch of greasy people living in a swamp."

"What about the visions?" Katara asked.

"I told you we were hungry, I'm eating a giant bug." Sokka held the bug up before taking another bite.

"But what about when the tree showed me where Appa and Momo were?" I looked over and saw Aang giving something to Momo who was sitting on his lap.

"That's Avatar stuff. That doesn't count." I raised my eyebrow at Sokka.

"What about the tornado that made us land here?" I asked him.

"Easy, that was Huu." Sokka pointed to him, who shrugged his shoulders.

"I can't do anything like that. I just bend the water in the plants." Bending that water in the plants. I guess that does make sense. Water is in everything and if you really try, you can easily connect to the water in everything.

"Well… not accounting for weather. Still, there's absolutely nothing mysterious about the swamp." Sokka was trying really hard to make everything make sense. As soon as he finished that sentence, there was a scream. It sounded like that same one from earlier, so hopefully it was the same bird.

I hope you guys are enjoying this. Sorry it's been a week since I last posted. If you guys would like to see a basic picture of what Sene looks like or what she is wearing, please leave me a comment.