Barley followed Syndrome, Randall, Dash, and Jack-Jack into the palace. He'd always been curious what the Firelord's house looked like inside. It was by far the biggest building he'd ever been in in his life. The ceilings were extremely high, and the hallways seemed to go on forever.

"You'll be joining the other masters in here," Syndrome said, opening a door.

Stairs led down into a dark and musty cell block. The dungeon. Syndrome herded him down the stairs.

"You'll be fed three times a day. You'll be brought out only for the lessons, and you'll immediately return here when you're done." He shoved Barley into a cell and shut the door. "I want you to start tomorrow. I want him to be a prodigy. I expect him to be metalbending in a few months."

"And then what?" Barley asked.

"And then he'll be able to raze the world!" Syndrome said. "And rebuild it in the Fire Nation's image!"

Syndrome left. Barley sat on the cold metal floor, staring at the wall. His head swam with thoughts of Ian and the others. Had Waternoose kept Syndrome's promise to keep them alive? Would he really give up his chance to kill Violet after chasing her for so long?

Even if he had decided to kill them after all, Ian could handle himself, couldn't he? He was a great earthbender. He had probably escaped. He was probably on his way here right now to get Barley and Jack-Jack.

When he got bored of looking at the wall, he looked over at the woman in the cell across from him. She was wearing the bright orange robes of an airbender.

"Are you his airbending master?" he asked.

"No. I'm a waterbender." Her tone was completely serious, but when he looked at her face, she was cracking a smile. "Yes. Master Edna. It's a pleasure, darling."

A whiny, sniveling voice yelled from the cell next to him. "They can't treat us like this! Does he know who I am?! I'm the son of a councilman!"

Edna rolled her eyes. "Yes, we know."

"My father will hear about this!" His voice rose. "And I didn't get my reward!"

Barley ignored him. He had no sympathy for Ercole. He addressed Edna. "So have you been here a while? I assume you've made a plan to break out of here? You can beat up the guards with some sick airbending moves, and maybe we can steal a ship. I can fly one, maybe—"

She just laughed. "Patience, darling. For now, there's nothing we can do."

"What? Yes, there is! There has to be!"

She closed her eyes in meditation. "Our time will come."

She didn't elaborate further. Barley went back to staring at the wall, trying to think up a plan. It looked like she wasn't going to try to escape, and he didn't think Ercole would be any help, so it was up to him.

~~~~

Randall sidled up to Syndrome. "Sir, I have news. Good news." This would surely cement his place in history as Syndrome's greatest soldier.

"What is it, Boggs? I'm very busy."

"With the help of some earthbender engineers, I have made a machine. One that can help us rule the world." Waternoose had helped but it had been his idea mostly, so he didn't see anything wrong with taking all of the credit.

Syndrome stroked his chin in thought. "Interesting." He saw Dash lingering nearby. "Get out of here, boy. The adults are talking. Go bother your mother."

Dash reluctantly headed toward his mother's room. He wasn't looking forward to her reaction to his burns. There was no way she'd believe Syndrome's story that it was an accident. He didn't want her to confront Syndrome about it. But he knew she'd have to find out eventually. He would just have to make the story convincing.

Mirage was standing at her mirror when Dash walked in. She turned with a pleasant smile. "Dash." Her face froze in horror as she saw his burned eye. "Dash!" She ran to him. "What happened?!"

"It—it was just an accident," Dash stammered. "I was standing too close to a soldier when he was training, and—"

Mirage took his hand, staring at the burns on it. Her mouth was a tight line, and he could feel her shaking with anger. "Dash, tell me the truth. Did your father have anything to do with this?"

He shook his head vehemently. "No!"

"I'll have to talk to your father about this," she said.

"Please don't," Dash pleaded.

The desperation in his voice gave her pause. She pursed her lips as she debated what to do. "Okay, I won't talk to him tonight. I'll give it some time."

He looked up at her with his big blue eyes. "I don't want him to hurt you." The words came out in a low whisper.

She stroked his hair back. "He won't. I promise." She kissed his forehead. "I'll be careful, all right?"

The Day of the Black Sun was coming in a few weeks. The date had been drilled into everyone's minds, along with the location of their secret bunker. That was the perfect time and place to confront Syndrome, when he couldn't firebend. She'd play along until the moment was right. She'd been playing a part, the quiet dutiful wife, for years. She could wait a few more weeks.

She knew he would probably get his revenge in one way or another after the eclipse was over. But right now, she didn't care. All she wanted was answers. She'd decide what to do after that.

~~~~

The desert was scorching. Violet had never felt such heat in her life. Even with her temperature-regulation, she was soaked with sweat. Her clothes felt like they were suffocating her, and the dry air seemed to burn her lungs.

One look around told her everyone else was feeling it too, probably even worse. They were all dragging their feet, and their skin was shiny with perspiration. Ian looked like he wanted to die. Alberto was begging Luca for water, since he'd refilled his pouch at a fountain in Ba Sing Se.

"Fine, just a little," Luca said. "But we have to ration it."

Violet watched as Alberto took a sip of water. It looked so cool and refreshing. But she didn't want to waste any of it. To keep her mind off her thirst, she tried to think of a plan for their invasion of the Fire Nation, supposing an eclipse was happening soo . But doubts gnawed at her. Even if they got Jack-Jack back, Syndrome could easily kidnap him again. He had an army. Where would they be able to hide until Jack-Jack was old enough to face him? Would they be good enough teachers to help him learn the elements? Who would teach him firebending, if he hadn't learned it already?

The more she thought about it, the more hopeless it all seemed. She started to wonder why they even bothered. She knew that was just the heat talking, so she forced herself to keep walking.

It concerned her that they had no idea where in this desert the library was. They could walk for weeks and never find it.

"This sucks," Alberto complained. "Waterbenders weren't meant for this."

Violet felt a twinge of annoyance. Why did Alberto always have to whine about everything? The rest of them were uncomfortable too, but they weren't complaining about it.

"You can go back to the South Pole, if you want," she said. She didn't mean that, of course. She didn't want him to go. But she hoped it would shame him into shutting up.

"Maybe I will," he snapped.

"Fine."

"Guys," Luca said pleadingly. "Come on. Don't fight."

They walked in silence for a bit. Then Alberto spoke again.

"This sand is too hard to walk in," he whined. "Can't Ian sandbend it or something?"

"Can Violet airbend your voice so we don't have to hear it?" Ian snapped.

Violet laughed, just out of pure shock. She'd never heard Ian be so snarky. Alberto glared at her, and she stopped. "Sorry." She snorted as she tried not to laugh again.

"Guys, stop," Luca said. "We need to focus on looking for the library."

Alberto turned back to Ian. "Shouldn't you be able to find it? Since your brother's the game nerd who knows all of this?"

"He's not a nerd. And I don't know because I'm not him."

"Well, I wish he was here," Alberto said. "Why couldn't you have been taken by Syndrome instead?"

"Alberto!" Luca scolded.

"Well, I wish we'd left you at the South Pole," Ian snapped. "You can't even bend. Luca does all the work. You're just dead weight."

Alberto stopped walking and drew his fist back to punch Ian.

"Stop it! All of you!" Luca shouted. "Or I'll drop all our water! On purpose!" He had his pouch upside-down, ready to open it and let the precious resource spill out onto the sand.

Everyone shut up. Luca glared at them all, making eye contact with each one of them in turn.

"We're not going to get through this if we're at each other's throats," he said. "So be civil, or we might as well just give up."

They begrudgingly nodded. Luca set off again, and the others followed.

They walked for a few more hours, then decided to rest. They would walk more after dark, when it was cooler.

They sat under a group of dead trees. The dry, thin branches didn't provide much shade, but it was better than nothing. Alberto was sitting next to Violet. She hesitated, then said, "Hey. I'm sorry about what I said." It felt insignificant compared to what Ian had said, but she still felt bad.

He grunted and wiped sweat off his forehead. "Whatever."

"I…want you to stay," she said, putting her hand on his arm.

His expression softened. He leaned his head on her shoulder. She rested her head on his, enjoying the feel of his soft curly hair. It was like a puppy.

She must have fallen asleep. The next thing she knew, Luca was shaking her awake. The first thing she noticed was that her mouth was extremely dry, as if she'd eaten several mouthfuls of the desert sand. She grimaced.

The next thing she noticed was that it was dark out. A breeze was blowing. It was warm, but again, better than nothing.

Luca gave everyone a small sip of water before they started walking again. Violet had never tasted anything so good. She had to force herself to stop before she took too much.

The walk was a little easier now. To everyone's relief, Alberto didn't say a word, which also made the journey more bearable.

Violet was afraid that they would search all night and then have to spend another day in the heat. But finally, Luca pointed at something in the distance. "I think I see it!"

There it was. A tower of pale brown bricks, the same color as the sand. It was almost invisible unless you were looking for it.

"Let's go!" Luca ran toward the building, slipping a little in his excitement. There must be so many books in there. An environment that encouraged curiosity and learning, unlike his home at the South Pole.

He gasped as he entered the library. There were shelves as far as he could see, filled with books and scrolls. All the way up to the ceiling. He could sit in here for a hundred years and only scratch the surface.

"This place is huge," Ian said. "How are we going to find anything?"

"Can I help you?" a nasally voice behind them droned. They jumped and looked around, but there was no one there.

"Uh, hello?" Violet said uneasily.

One of the books moved. A small green worm emerged.

Alberto burst out laughing. "What is that?"

The worm glared at him, exhaling in annoyance. "I'm the Bookworm, the builder and owner of this great library. What do you want?"

"We're looking for knowledge about—"

"Everything!" Luca exclaimed. "Tell us everything you know!" He was on his tiptoes, basically dancing with excitement.

"Don't get distracted, Luca," Violet said. "We're looking for the date of the next solar eclipse."

"Why?"

"To stop the Fire Nation," Alberto said.

"With violence?" the Bookworm asked.

"I mean, yeah."

"No," Violet said quickly, sensing the Bookworm's distaste for violence. "I'm an airbender. A pacifist."

The Bookworm eyed them suspiciously. "Okay…Well, you can take a look. But don't take too long. Or abuse any of the knowledge you find. And don't take anything!"

"Thank you!" Luca dashed off to look at some of the books.

Ian raised a finger timidly to speak. "So, um, is there a classification system, or—?"

The Bookworm sighed. "No. My assistants aren't the most organized." He pointed to one of the shelves, where a caterpillar, a stick insect, and a spider were haphazardly shelving and reshelving books.

"Oh. Okay." That wasn't ideal. How would they ever find anything in this place?

They split up. Ian's chest felt heavy as he looked around at all the shelves. Barley would love this place. He could have gotten lost for hours in all these books.

He read the spines of the books. There was no rhyme or reason to the way they were organized. He sighed. "This is gonna take forever."

A high voice spoke. "Need some help?"

He looked around. A purple ant was standing on a shelf, speaking to him.

"Do you know when the next solar eclipse is?" Ian asked.

The ant hopped off the shelf. "Come with me." Ian followed him.

Meanwhile, Violet was reading a book about airbending. There was probably a lot she hadn't learned about airbending that she never could now that all the masters were dead.

She stopped when she got to a page about deadly moves. An image showed an airbender drawing air out of someone's lungs. Waternoose's face flashed through her mind again. She dropped the book.

Alberto wandered up and down the shelves, bored out of his mind, not even reading the titles on the books. Somebody had better find the answer soon so they could get out of here.

He turned a corner and saw Ian in front of a large panel of dials and giant cranks. The domed ceiling was covered in metal gears and models of the Sun, Moon, and stars. Ian saw Alberto and waved him over.

"Alberto! This machine will show us what the sky will look like on a given date," Ian said. "Help me turn it."

The calendar was on today's date. Ian used some of the dials to turn it to the next day's date. Then together, Ian and Alberto turned the crank. The Sun and Moon moved, sliding past each other.

"Not it." Ian went to the next day.

"Do we have to try every single day?"

"Well, we can't risk missing anything. Now get turning! We have a lot of days to get through."

They cranked for what felt like hours. Finally, the Moon landed in front of the Sun.

"Got it!" Ian said. He wrote down the date. "It's in a few weeks!"

"Yes!" Alberto hollered. "Then that's when we'll invade the Fire Nation!"

"I knew it!"

They jumped. The Bookworm was perching on a shelf, glaring at them.

"You lied! You are going to abuse this knowledge for violence. I should have known."

"Why does it matter?" Alberto said. "We're just doing it to the Fire Nation. They're evil."

"Yeah, they're the violent ones," Ian said. "They've killed countless people—"

"Including our parents!" Alberto raged.

"—and destroyed so many villages and communities…"

The Bookworm scoffed. "You humans are all the same. You all think you're justified in your hatred and violence and wars."

Ian dropped his head, ashamed. Alberto was unperturbed.

"Well, I think it's perfectly fair. And you can't stop us anyway, so I don't care what you think."

The Bookworm waved his fist at them. "You lied to me! So now you must be punished!"

Alberto laughed. "And what are you gonna do to us, little guy?"

Right before their eyes, the Bookworm began to grow. Ian and Alberto stared in horror as his body stretched and oozed, rising to the ceiling and spreading across the floor.

Ian ripped up part of the floor and threw it at the Bookworm. It sank into his flesh. He didn't even flinch. Ian's stomach dropped.

"Run!" he shouted.

They ran. The Bookworm chased them, knocking down shelves and throwing books at them. For a giant blob, he was extremely fast.

Violet was talking to Luca about a book he'd found. It had nothing to do with the eclipse, but she didn't want to be rude. So she just nodded politely as he babbled on about something. He was talking too fast for her to understand.

"Guys!" Ian yelled. "We have to get out of here!"

Violet looked up. "What?"

Alberto pointed behind them. Violet and Luca screamed when they saw the Bookworm.

"Violet! Airbend him!" Ian yelled.

Violet sent a tornado at the Bookworm. It didn't move him an inch.

"No! Do the thing!" Alberto yelled.

The thing? Did he mean…

She shook her head wildly. "I can't!"

"You humans don't deserve knowledge!" the Bookworm screeched. "All you do is lie and steal and hurt people!" He grabbed a torch out of a sconce on the wall and swung it around, lighting several shelves on fire.

"No!" Luca cried.

The fire spread across the books and scrolls, the flames licking at the pages. The pages shriveled and blackened.

Luca leapt forward and splashed water on the flames as they grew. He desperately splashed more water and ice at the fire. He had to save the books.

"There's no time!" Ian shouted. "Let's just get out of here!"

Alberto grabbed Luca's arm and pulled him toward the door. Luca helplessly stared at the shelves as the fire consumed them. The bug assistants ran for the door, screaming. The Bookworm didn't try to run. He just sat there as the fire consumed him too.

Alberto pulled on the door. "It's stuck!"

Ian brought up stone walls to protect them from the flames that were racing toward them. It didn't stop the searing heat or the smoke.

"Hurry!" Violet said, coughing.

Alberto managed to yank the door open. They all ran outside and collapsed in the sand. They crawled away and stopped a few yards from the library.

Luca stared at the burning building. Embers flickered through the air, along with burnt scraps of paper. Flaming bricks hit the sand as the library caved in.

"All that knowledge," Luca said. "Gone. Forever."

Alberto shrugged. "Oh well."

Luca turned on him angrily. "Alberto! There were millions of books in there! There was so much knowledge that can never be replaced!"

"And history," Ian added. He didn't personally care that much, but he knew Barley would be mourning it if he were here.

"Why did he do that, anyway?" Violet asked.

"He found out we were going to attack the Fire Nation," Alberto admitted.

"Did you at least get what we came for?" Violet asked, ready to freak out if they said no.

"Yup!" Alberto said proudly. "The eclipse is in a few weeks!"

"We need to leave for the Fire Nation now, if we want to make it in time," Ian said.

Violet wasn't looking forward to walking through the desert again. But she supposed they would have to.

"The Fire Nation is across the ocean," Luca said suddenly as they walked. "We're gonna need another airship or a ship ship to get there."

"Maybe Buzz has one," Ian said. Knowing Woody, he'd probably gone straight to their old home as soon as they left Ba Sing Se. "Let's stop by and see if he can help us."

"None of us can fly an airship," Luca pointed out.

"We'll…cross that bridge when we get there," Ian said. "Maybe Buzz can fly us or something."

Violet stared at her hands as she walked, not hearing any of the words being said by anyone else. She couldn't stop shaking. Maybe if she had been able to stop the Bookworm, the library wouldn't have burned down. But the thought of doing it again made her want to throw up. She couldn't.

Alberto's voice cut through her spiral. "Hey, are you okay?"

He was staring at her with his ridiculously green eyes. They were like emeralds. She'd never seen eyes like that. Why had the spirits given him such gorgeous eyes, and how come everyone didn't get lost in them all the time?

"Vi?"

She blinked at him. "Sorry. What?"

"Are you okay? You seemed…off in the library."

She sighed. "I just…I can't believe I almost killed him." She covered her face.

"I mean, he was evil, so it's not that bad," Alberto said.

She looked up at him. "Don't lie! It scared you too."

"I wasn't scared," Alberto said defensively.

"Well, you looked it." Her voice dropped. "You were looking at me like…like I was a monster." Tears stung her eyes. She closed her eyes, feeling stupid for crying over this.

"I don't think you're a monster," Alberto said. The gentleness in his voice surprised her, and she opened her eyes. He was looking at her with a tenderness she hadn't expected. "It just didn't feel like you, which is why it freaked me out a little. But it doesn't change how I see you."

She smiled upon hearing this. "Thanks, Alberto." He smiled back, seeming relieved.

When they reached the countryside, they went to Woody's house first. To their horror, it had been completely leveled by the Fire Nation.

Buzz's house was still standing. It was burnt and ransacked, but there. Ian knocked on the door, and Buzz and Woody opened it.

"Buzz, we need another ship," Ian said.

"You're in luck!" Buzz said. "I just finished fixing up the Fire Nation airship. Luckily, the looters didn't touch that one."

"A Fire Nation airship?" Luca gasped. That sounded terrifying.

"Yeah! Let me show you."

They followed Buzz to his shop. Luca looked around in awe. He stared at all the engines and mechanical parts around him. He wanted to touch them and know how it all worked.

He shrank back when he saw the Fire Nation ship. It was the biggest airship he'd ever seen.

"So where are you going?" Buzz asked.

"The Fire Nation," Ian said. "We have a plan to stop them."

"Whoa, really?" Woody said.

Albert nodded. "There's gonna be an eclipse! They'll lose their firebending and we'll get to just walk in and take Jack-Jack!"

"And Barley," Ian said. "We're probably going to hide in the Fire Nation until the eclipse. Can you fly us there, Buzz?"

"To the Fire Nation?" Woody exclaimed. "That's so dangerous."

"Please," Ian said. "Barley needs your help. The world needs your help."

Buzz looked at Woody. "I mean, you did say you wanted a trip."

Woody sighed, then nodded. "All right. Let's do it."