The room is cavernous and open to the air. Just as Aang remembers it. A thick layer of dust coats everything, some of it crusted from a century of rain blowing in through the large entryway. The wood on it is slowly rotting away.
Aang breathes in deeply and realizes that the smell is different. It actually smells old in here.
"This is where the Nomads would visit the monks for spiritual guidance. It's for meditating." Aang explains as his friends enter behind him.
"Must have been a lot of Nomads." Sokka says, spinning around, mouth agape. "This place is ginormous!"
"There were. This place was always full too, different people every day. My family wasn't supposed to visit me much, a part of being a monk is seperating yourself from earthly attachments, but once a year, they'd meet me over there." He points across the room to an alcove that looks like it contains the remains of tea tables. There are white and blue ceramic dishes, cracked with age and exposure to the elements. Anyone could see that it was once a cozy place, grand, but simple.
"What are we looking for?" Suki, all business, asks.
"Over here. Toph, we might need your help. These things haven't been opened in a hundred years." Aang walks over to some stone chests at the back of the room. He tries to lift the lid. It had never been partialarly hard before, but it was almost impossible now.
"Outta my way, Twinkle Toes." Toph cracks her knuckles and makes a sweeping motion with her hand. The caked, concrete hard mud around the edge of the lid turned to dry dust that Aang blows away with a brief gust of wind.
"Wow! Aang, what is all this?" Katara exclaims.
"In this room, it's mostly spiritual texts. Some of it is history of the Avatar, but everyone has those. There are others in different parts of the Temple. Some are the letters that travel between the Nations. Since Air Benders and Sky Bison could fly, they were the main mail carriers back in the day. I don't know how the rest of the world got by without air mail! Well... Except for the Fire Nation, of course. They always had their own. And since we were Nomads, the Temples sort of served as rest places and post offices for my people too. Then, they were a few records from other Nations involving ruling ancestry lines. Not super detailed, but enough to keep everyone informed of possible power imbalances and coups going on. I was never allowed to read any of them. Only the Elders were allowed, and I never really wanted to. Do you know how many rooms the Earth Kingdom took up? And that was just the outline!" He laughs.
"So you guys were sort of the police force, and the mail service, back in the day?" Sokka scratches his head. "But you were all about "freedom and peace and love" and all that stuff. You were pacifists. How could you be peacekeepers? There isn't any peace without some fighting."
"Good point. But who said we were actively involved? We were just the passive keepers of information. We gave it to anyone who asked for it. And since the Nomads were always traveling, they could be counted on to always know what was going on in the regions they had passed through. The conversations must have been pretty interesting."
"How often did you get to leave here? Aren't monks Nomads too?" Katara asks uncertainly.
"When you're first starting out as a monk, you don't travel too much. You have to spend time reflecting on who you are, why you want to monk to begin with, and achieve a certain level of inner peace. The older monks don't travel as much, since they're teaching the kids and keeping records, and since we're under their care, we go or stay wherever they do." Why am I talking like it's all still here? Look at this place! It hasn't been uninhabited for a hundred years. He thinks to himself. "Anyway, I got to travel a bit more when they began to suspect that I was the Avatar. I had to learn a bit more about each Nation and it's people. I didn't really think about it much at the time. I just thought it was the way things were."
"I guess we'd better get started. It seems like we have a lot of ground to cover." Suki carefully removes a scroll from the chest and begins reading.
Aang takes one for himself and finds a comfortable place just outside the entryway, overlooking some of the old Sky Bison grazing area.
It feels so empty here. So ancient. Like it's out of a legend. And yet, it still feels like home, like I just left here yesterday.
He glances again to where he'd last met with his parents. A hundred years ago. Only a few months ago. But a hundred years ago.
Did they suffer? Was it quick? Did they think of me? Were they scared?
Aang wishes he knew. Even if it hadn't been quick and painless, he really wants to know how his parents met their end. He doesn't know the purpose or the reason for the knowledge, but he feels he needs it somehow.
Wiping away a few tears, he turns his attention back to the scroll in his hands.
Mom and Dad have been gone for a hundred years. If I want answers, I'll have to start looking for those answers myself.