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RonaldM40196867: Koh the Face Stealer maybe?

Zigzagdoublezee: The banner is a bit of a giveaway. But he's been very busy since we last saw him...

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The ostrich-horses trotted down the road one by one, the soldiers carrying their long lances over their shoulders with their helmets hanging off the end. Team Avatar was in the middle of them, in Lu Ten's cart. The cavalrymen had been pretty insistent about taking it, apparently it would be useful to them, so the Yuad had taken advantage by hitching a lift. Gembul was circling overhead, doubling back every so often to check on them.

Rinzen was driving, while Suki and Katara had taken the opportunity to curl up at the bottom of the cart and grab some sleep. Yue sat at the back of the cart, her mind a million miles away. She was thinking about what the traitor had said to her.

She hadn't abandoned her people at the North Pole... had she?

She hadn't had a choice, she told herself. She knew what the Fire Nation had in store for her had she been caught on that night- immediate death, before she had a chance to train and get into a position to threaten their plans. Of course she had to run from that!

But her people had suffered that night too, she knew. And she had left quickly, without even a thought of how to save them. But how could she have saved them? She couldn't even bend water, her native element, let alone any of the others, before she had found out her true identity. There was the Avatar State, she supposed, but she hadn't known that existed until she triggered it during her first encounter with Commodore Zhao.

Even so, was that what the rest of her people thought, wherever they were? That she, Avatar Yue, their Princess Yue, dutiful and devoted heir to their throne, had cut and run? Abandoned them to their fates and run to have adventures across the world while they suffered? The thought saddened her. She hadn't wanted any of this to happen.

"Yue?"

The Avatar was interrupted in her gloom by a voice, and she turned to find Sokka staring at her, a worried expression on his face.

"Are you alright?"

"Of course I'm alright. Why wouldn't I be alright?" Yue told him.

"Do you really want me to answer that?" The Prince of the South raised an eyebrow. "The traitors to your country who just tried to kill us and the fact you haven't said a word to any of us since we got going."

"Oh," Yue tried to act as if these things were only just occuring to her. "That."

She sighed.

"Look, when I was fighting one of those traitors, he said something."

"I'm sure he did," Sokka said. "Trying to justify himself, no doubt. Doesn't make him any less of a traitor."

"No, it wasn't that," she said. "He said I abandoned them that night."

Sokka frowned. There was no need to specify which night Yue meant specifically. It was the night they had met, the night Yue's life had transformed totally, when she had gone from Princess to Avatar.

"That sounds like an attempt to justify himself to me," he said. "He's just trying to guilt trip you. To try to make you feel like you're the one who's done something wrong, when really he is."

"I suppose..." Yue trailed off. "I just can't help but wonder whether he's really wrong."

"Course he is!" Sokka said. "You couldn't bend. What were you meant to do, meekly let yourself get killed?"

"I know that," Yue said quickly. "But I don't know whether my people think I abandoned them."

"Have you abandoned them?" Sokka asked. "I don't think you have."

Yue looked at him, confused.

"We're here because you're trying to learn to bend all four elements so you can defeat the Fire Nation," Sokka explained. "And once you do that, your people will be free!"

"You make it sound so easy," Yue told him, with a weak laugh.

"It's what I do," Sokka replied, grinning. "You can't help what people think of you. All you can do is your best. The only reason you have the chance to save them now is because we ran that night."

Yue nodded.

"I don't know what I would do without you," she told him, and was gratified when he blushed in response.

Then she got serious again as another thought occurred to her.

"He also mentioned dad," she said. "He said he knows what happened to him."

"He's probably lying," Sokka replied. "It was a trick. I'm willing to bet the plan was to get you somewhere private under the pretence of giving you bad news, then jump you, bash you over the head and cart you off back to the Fire Nation."

Yue shuddered. She was glad that hadn't happened.

"Even so, do you think they really do know?"

"Maybe," Sokka shrugged. "But we can't trust a word he says, so there's no point asking him."

"Yeah," Yue sighed. "You're right. But I do want to know."

"I know," Sokka leaned against her reassuringly. "I wanted to know about my father too, when he was a prisoner."

"But he got out," Yue said.

"More like he was busted out," Sokka corrected her. "By you. Did I ever thank you for that?"

"You could stand to mention it more," Yue told him.

"Very well," Sokka said. "Thank you for saving my dad."

He smiled at her, and she smiled back.

"You're welcome," she said. "I guess that's just what I do now."

"Halt!" A voice called from up ahead. Suki and Katara jolted awake with a start.

"What'sgoingon?" Suki asked quickly. Yue stood up to check.

A checkpoint had been set up on the road in front of them, manned by infantrymen wearing the same sorts of white and blue uniforms as the cavalrymen they were with. Above them, a banner bearing the moon and crossed swords symbol fluttered in the breeze.

One of the men, an officer, stepped forwards, but recognised the approaching cavalry and quickly got out of the way. His eyes widened when he saw Yue.

"Is that... her?" He asked, in a hushed tone.

"Yes it is," the lead ostrich-horseman told him.

"Well, I suppose the boss is going to want to see them."

"The boss?" Suki echoed, confused. Yue supposed she would have never met the man who had apparently built all this in a matter of months, ever since he had been a lowly charioteer saved by Team Avatar from a losing battle.

"I think you'd like him," she told the Kyoshi Warrior. "His name is Jet."