A/N- Yeah, this is coming behind schedule. Two days ehind schedule, in fact. Why? Because I actually forgot that I promised to update ahead of the regular two week update cycle this week. Just got reminded by one of my patrons, so here I am with it. Next chapter will take the full scheduled two weeks so expect it on Thursday, the 17th October. You could skip the wait and read the next two and continuous updates on Pa-treon right now. For Pa Treon, you can remove the hyphen between Pa and Treon and Google it, then search for my username—Oghenevwogaga. Or you could copy the link in my bio and remove the spaces before pasting it in your address bar.
"Don't do it" were the first words she said as she walked up to him. He stared her down, but she did not even flinch as she met his eyes. He sighed. Reached up to pinch the bridge of his nose. He wanted to ignore her and just do as he wished, but this woman had saved his life. She was more important to his war effort than 99% of his army on an individual level. The only person other than himself who was more mission-critical than Amara was Maki herself. Even Toji would fall to the wayside when compared to the value of the water bender healer. A value she'd shown by saving quite a few of his men from certain death.
"I have no idea what you're talking about" he tried to avoid the entire conversation in the first place.
"Don't play me for a fool, Natsu. I know what exactly happened to Fong's men. I know what you'll allow the men to do to these water benders the second we leave this accursed swamp" She accused, and he shrugged her words off. It was a question he'd been considering already. What to do with the captured benders. This was not as easy as with Fong where they'd all been earth Kingdom army soldiers. It also wasn't as easy as with any other village for the simple reason that they could not leave them here. It would be foolish to leave an enemy to his back, and especially one that was made up of benders as endangered as water benders.
"What happened to Fong's men will not happen to these people. I promise you that, Amara".
"That's not enough. I need to know what you plan to do with them" She probed again, and he buried the urge to send a blast of fire in her direction. So many questions. So many fucking questions. Everyone had a question about every fucking thing, and it was like they did not realise that he was just as they were. Just as human. Just as flawed, and just as fucking clueless. He had no idea what he was going to do to them. But he also couldn't say that. He was the General. In charge. In command. It was his duty to decide what happened here, and he could not fail in that much.
"When we arrive at Gaoling, word will be sent to the Fire Nation command as to what we have discovered here, and they will decide our next steps regarding these people. But if you want them to make it all the way there then you will play your role".
"What role?"
"Divine the water benders among them. Point them out. See to it that the men break both their arms".
"What?" She screamed at his words.
"Amara, this is a battle camp, This is a division of the Fire Nation Army. Every single piece of our camp is mission-critical. Every body we lose to attempted escapes is one less that will be jumping over the walls of Gaoling in two days. Every man we have to dedicate to guarding these folk is one less for absorbing and deflecting fire from earth kingdom catapults. The truth of the matter is that we can not spare the men. If you don't want these people dead, then you will do this. You could heal them in minutes, could you not? See to it that each break is as clean as possible. Just a little bit of pain to keep their lives intact. Worth it, right?" As he spoke, he stepped closer and closer to her until he was moving her hair away from her face and wiping the few drops of tears that had fallen down her cheeks with his thumb.
"This is for their own good" He said to her, making sure to emphasise the words and let them sink in. She nodded at his words. He nodded at her, and then took his hand back before turning towards the tree as it was being searched by his troops for anything of use or value.
"Give that to Toji," He said as one man began walking towards him with a ceremonial bow and a quiver of arrows in his hands. The man nodded and smoothly moved towards his second in command.
When the tree was searched and stripped of everything of value, he and his men opened fire once again. This time, there was no protection for the tree as it caught on fire and began to burn. They stepped past the still burning tree, ignoring the wails from their prisoners at seeing their home so casually put to the torch and moved on to the second half of the swamp. With the giant tree on fire, there was precious little burning that still had to be done, so they covered the distance in only a few hours and then found themselves at the other side.
When he turned around, it was clear that the Foggy Swamp would never exist again. Juxtaposing this sight, and the sight of the once mighty swamp he'd dared enter into almost a day ago, felt like comparing the moon and the sun. They were polar opposites.
"We'll make camp here. Standard scouting procedures. Make sure we don't get ambushed." He ordered Toji and then began working to set up his own tent. For the road, he'd abandoned Sung's practice of having a command tent since it was too much effort to set up and took too long to pack up. He preferred quick starts and stops, so he favoured the same tent he'd used when he'd been a mere Captain. He chuckled at that. It made it seem like his introduction into the army had been a lifetime ago. Every so often, it felt that way, to be honest. Like who he had been at the Academy, and who he was now were thoroughly different people even with less than a year between them.
"Part of me doesn't even want to ask if you have a plan for Gaoling." Toji said, moving his Ostrich-horse to my side as we rode down the distance that separated us and the Earth Kingdom City.
To be honest, part of me didn't even want to think about it. My plan making so far hadn't been the nest of things after that mess up in the swamp. Losing a fourth of my men to long-term injuries or death while trying to cross a swamp of all things was probably going to kill a lot of the goodwill I'd been building at Central Command. Of course, there was the thought of not reporting casualties until after we had taken Gaoling, and then reporting everything as a lump sum. It was the kind of 'smart accounting' that I would have derided when I was younger. One's failings and successes should be equally regarded as learning opportunities, I'd thought, and while I still agreed with that and even had a bias towards failure for the successes therein, using something as a learning opportunity and allowing it to derail your career were two different things. Two fucking different things.
"Would a direct storming of the wall be unconscionable?" I asked Toji with an assessing look at the City's wall in the distance. We were still two hours or so away, but I was sure that by now word of our presence here had spread thoroughly. After this, I knew the Earth Kingdom military would be able to ignore me no further, and that meant I should probably be trying to minimise casualties. On the other hand, I didn't have the equipment for a long siege against earthbenders with a wall in front of them. If the Kingdom's military met us here in the middle of a siege, then I had little hope of anything other than a quick death for me and my troops.
"Looks strong, but I bet I can go over. So could you. Maybe another two hundred of the soldiers could make it across in time to be useful. How many do you think they have over there?"
"At most? A thousand. It's a big city, but it's no Omashu. We've also never really taken them before and been content to just ignore and march around them so they probably don't have any experience against Fire Nation aggression", I said, beginning to come to terms with what I was about to order. A good portion of those who made it over the wall first would die. I'd be there leading the charge, but even the Dragon of the West lost men when he fought, and I doubted I was as good a fighter as the mythical General Iroh in his prime.
"I think we could do it" Toji agreed, also realising what I was planning.
"Good. We march there. We set up camp like we're going for a siege and strike by noon tomorrow," I said in reply to him.
"Well, let's go get ready to kill ourselves some earthbenders. At least these ones will be able to fight back," He said, and I nodded. Just like me, he wasn't completely comfortable with what we'd done at the Swamp. Those people. They hadn't been fighters. They didn't sign up for this. And yet, I'd killed and captured them all the same.
Of course, the preparations turned out to be moot. They arrived at the walls of Gaoling. They sat down and began to form their camp in preparation for a bloody storming of the walls after a brief night's rest and some hours of strategising. They had no useful maps of the city's interior to speak off, but that was an inconvenience, not the deathblow that it would have been if it had been Omashu they were preparing to storm. Gaoling was not a massive city. Some things would just reveal themselves in time, or with common sense. Like how it didn't take much thinking to sus out that the large tower that stuck out above the walls from the middle of the village was the city's command centre and central administrative building, so it would be one of the places they took first.
It all ended up not mattering one whit as the city's gates opened and a soirée of men poked out before riding towards them. Seventeen men in all, he counted. Toji had already moved to stand next to him in case this was truly a trap or assassination attempt. He shot his friend an annoyed look at that. He could take care of himself. All he received in turn was a shrug of his shoulders as Toji did not really care how he felt on the matter. Maki herself had already taken her position at his other side.
As they got closer, it became clear what they were supposed to be. They stopped at half the considerable distance between the Fire Nation Camp and Gaoling and one of them dismounted his horse to stab a pole into the ground, another moved next to him with a white piece of cloth, and in a matter of seconds, all seventeen of the earth kingdom nationals were stood behind a peace flag that blew in the wind. He looked at Toji, and his friend shrugged, not sure what to do either.
XXXXXXX
"Okay, who are you and what do you want?" he chose to be the one to start the negotiations, seizing power from the beginning.
"I am Kinvara, the Seventhiet Mayor of the City of Gaoling, with me are several of my advisers and councillors. And who are you?"
"Nuh-uh. My question had two parts. What. Do. You. Want?"
"Ideally, we want you out of our city's territory, but we understand that might be a tall ask. Instead, we seek a peaceful resolution to this conflict. Gaoling surrenders" He said, stunning my half of the negotiation group. Even I found myself speechless at his words. Surrender? Just like that? Surrender wasn't new to me, but that only happened in weaker towns that lacked walls and fighting men. Gaoling did not seem to be lacking in either.
"Why?" I asked.
"Why?"
"Surely, you are not a parrot, Mayor. You heard my questions. Now answer them."
"We don't have the fighting men to oppose you. We have seen what remains of the Foggy Swamp and shudder at the thought of a similar fate befalling our homes and our peoples. So we have decided to submit ourselves to your mercy with a quick surrender and hope that you will leave us in peace," he said, and I nodded at his words, feeling the honesty within them.
"Well if that is so, then kneel." I commanded, noting with pleasure that it only took the Mayor and those with him a few seconds to accede to my command.
"I, Major General Natsu of the First Battalion of the Fire Nation Army, do hereby accept your surrender and pledge to protect your peoples and properties as if they were my own, as you yourselves now are. Welcome to the Fire Nation, Kinvara" I said with a serious tone that bellied the smile on my face. The reminder of the Foggy Swamp was not the best of things, but taking city this big without any men lost would be one hell of a coupe. The kind of coupe that got promotions.
I'd never forgotten my basic goal of becoming a general in time to prevent the Fire Nation from losing the 100-year war. And now the only thing standing in the way of that was the grandest jewel of the Earth Kingdom, Ba Sing Se herself. I'd take her. I knew I would. Now I just had to write Command of this victory and request further reinforcements if I were to be marching on the Three walled city. Sure, there were a few settlements between me and her, but
"I will be taking over your administrative quarters" I told the mayor. "Ready the city for my entrance," I said, feeling a million thoughts run through my head at the same time.
The camp took the news that we would not have to assault the city very well. Almost too well, in fact. I stared at all of them in suspicion for a while, wondering if I'd been given an army of cowards without ever noticing. Of course, my thoughts were turned to more useful endeavours in no time. The gates of the city would be opened for us by noon, and we were to ride into the city. It was an opportunity for a trap to her pulled, Toji had pointed out and I agreed. It would give them a chance to betray us, but I judged the risk to be worth it. It was worth it because even if we were betrayed, then it just meant we'd have to do what we came here to do and even then, with the advantages of already being within their walls and not having to worry about taking said walls. If the fools were daft enough to invite firebenders into their home with intention to betray, then we'd show them why the Fire Nation Army was the greatest singular military force on the planet.
I made sure my soldiers were ready in case it did happen, and I myself rode at the tip of the spear, ready to cut down any earth bender who tried to betray my trust at this moment. Toji and Maki rode side by side behind me. And behind them were Shin, Amara, and Tal. We rode into the city like that, and noted the way the civilians all got on to their knees as we passed. Good. A truly subjugated force.
XXXXXXXX
"You could be out there with them, you know? No one would begrudge you a night of pleasure" Amara was the one who said this as she strolled into my office. Even though she said the words with a casual tone, there was recrimination in her voice. I sat in the central office of the Mayor's building, writing letter after letter, requesting this or that from the High Command while updating the other battalions of my progress and movements. The Hawks would fly in the cover of the dark, so I had to be sure to complete the letters before I went to bed. Outside, there raged a party. Someone had started a bonfire. There was wine aplenty as I forbade drinking during the march, and they'd somehow convinced the locals to join in on the partying.
"My duties do not permit me such opportunities. And my personal moralities mean I abstain from such pleasures" I said in reply to her testing words.
"Personal morality? I never knew you had such."
"What do you want, Amara?"
"So you know what they're doing is wrong?" She asked, voice beginning to rise.
"No one is being raped" I pointed out tersely, feeling my irritation rise to match her own.
"But your mind wasted no time in going there, did it? It might not be rape, but it certainly does smell like it" She replied.
"And what do you expect me to do about it? I made my rules. None of them are being broken. The women there, they're not being forced to stay. If any man raises a hand at any of them, I'd be the first to cut that hand, but that isn't what's happening".
"No, instead the women are being asked out of their homes by armed soldiers who make no threats beyond the threat that is unspoken in their very presence"
"That is enough, Amara. I have greater problems to deal with."
"But-"
"Get out" I said finally, and she humphed before twirling around and slamming the door behind her. I sighed, feeling as much disappointment in myself as I did anger in her. I was finally a popular leader with the troops. I could not risk it by outlawing something that most in my position would have never even had a problem with. It was the curse of leadership. There was a time to take a stand and a time to stand aside. This was the latter.
I sighed and signed off the last letter before placing it on the out tray for the orderlies to deal with while I retreated to the bedroom I had set aside for my own use.
A/N; Breathe. Like I said earlier, you can either wait till Thursday, the 17th of October, for the next chapter or skip the waiting and read the next two, as well as continuous updates as I write on pa-treon (same username as up here- link in bio). Both are equally valid actions, so no rush. For Pa Treon, you can remove the hyphen between Pa and Treon and Google it, then search for my username—Oghenevwogaga. Or you could copy the link in my bio and remove the spaces before pasting it in your address bar.