Wandering Prince
Avatar the Last Airbender, Zuko SI
25
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Commissioned by Lord Belly.
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As it turned out, dropping the revelation that I might know where to find the Avatar had required some answers on my part. So, I’d given them the explanation I came up with, and my excuse for not going straight there and breaking him out of the ice, assuming that’s where he was.
“So, he fled around the night of the massacre, but probably not on it. We know what temple he was staying at. There are only a few explanations for why he would have disappeared for all this time and why we haven’t seen another Avatar since. The first being, of course, that he died and somehow it stuck. The second, that he ran away and hid. The third option is that he physically journeyed to the spirit world. The other option is that he was crippled, trapped, or otherwise incapacitated but not killed and he hasn’t reached the end of his life yet. If we assume it’s the fourth option, we need to look at why that was. History tells us that it was typhoon season around the time of Sozin’s Comet, so it stands to reason, he might have been injured in a typhoon. If we knew his starting position and where in the area there was a typhoon at the time, we can reasonably guess his potential course and from there determine where he might have gone down, and set up a search grid. And for that, we need historical records. I know of one place that is almost sure to have those records. The library, hidden somewhere in the Si Wong Desert.”
So it was decided that we would first be doing something to help with the pirate situation, then making our way to the desert to try and dig up information on storms around that time to give me an excuse to move the search grid down south and luck my way into finding Aang… assuming I could. Uncle wanted to visit the library as well, so I promised that after we went to ask the local Earth King for aid, we’d come back and pick him up for that trip.
Unfortunately, as much as I’d like to spend a few days catching up with Uncle, we really did need to get a move on. So, we agreed to come find him again after seeing the Earth King and help more directly with the pirate issue. Yue hadn’t liked the sound of that, but she’d kept quiet as we packed our things and took to the sky, heading for Omashu.
Taking out my map, I planned our route and adjusted course slightly more to the north. “So, Omashu is here,” I tapped the map, “but it’s situated on a mountain in the Kolau mountain range. If we come in during the daytime, they’re going to see us approaching for miles off. Our best bet is to circle around behind it and approach from the north, at night, then set down on a neighboring mountain out of sight. Toph, do you think you can make a cave or something to hide the ship and seal it up so we can leave it and approach on foot?”
The girl studied the map through her blindfold and nodded. “Sure. It shouldn’t be a problem. But it’d be better to just sink it. Land, then I lower it underground, then put up a stone ceiling above it, then cover that with dirt. Easier than trying to move it in and out of a cave, right?”
I chuckled. “Whatever you think is easier. I was going to rely on Yue to use some water to move it. Yue?”
The white haired girl hummed, looking up distractedly. “What? Oh! Sorry. My mind was elsewhere. Um,” she thought back for a moment and nodded. “Toph’s idea sounds better.”
“Are you alright?” I asked, and Yue bit her lip, before shaking her head.
“I can’t help but worry that this is our fault,” she admitted, then sighed. “No. My fault. We attacked the pirates and destroyed their base, but we only scattered them. Could this be their retribution for that? Is it even the same group of pirates? I don’t know.”
Toph and I shared a look before the earthbender shrugged. I turned back to Yue. “It’s possible. We knew there would be consequences of hitting the pirates and not finishing the job.”
Yue winced. “You said there would,” she murmured. “But I still believe I made the right choice. What if it’s just a coincidence?”
“Could be,” I agreed. “Only way we’re going to be able to tell is if we capture and interrogate some pirates. There’s no point to worrying over it right now.”
Studying my face for a while, she finally asked, “You’re going to hunt and kill them, aren’t you?”
“Duh,” Toph rolled her eyes. “Can’t leave guys like that to roam around!” She gestured towards the coast in the distance. “You’ve seen what they’ll do if they’re just left unchecked! The only way to stop it is permanently.”
Quieter, I asked, “What do you want to do about them?”
Sighing, Yue brushed a strand of hair out of her face that the wind had pushed in front of her eyes. “Can’t we just capture them and turn them over to Earth Kingdom forces?”
I opened my mouth, but Toph beat me to it. “Uh, Yue, what do you think the Earth Kingdom is gonna do to them?”
Yue winced. “Execute them?”
“Yup,” Toph confirmed, and Yue made a quiet, distressed sound. “Well, that, or enslave them and make them work off their debt. Either/or. Bumi’s got a few screws loose, but he’s not crazy. He’s gonna do whatever he feels is best for this part of the Earth Kingdom.”
“There’s no good answer as to what we should do about them,” I shook my head. “We have the ability to do something, but that doesn’t mean we have the responsibility. We have the fastest ship in the world at the moment. We can fly and do reconnaissance for miles further than anyone else can. We have people here who can handle nearly any group of pirates we come across, at least so long as it’s individual ships. If we do run across something we can’t handle, we have backup in the form of a Fire Nation cruiser, some firebenders, and Uncle. We have two healers who can handle any wounded and an earthbender who can provide temporary shelters to anyone who’s been hit by them, if we want to provide relief instead. Thing is, we’re better suited to hunting down and dealing with the problem before it spreads further and does more damage, than we are to running everywhere they’ve hit and helping. We’d do more good that way. Better to stop the firebug than try to put out all the fires he’s making.”
“I don’t… I don’t think we should be the ones deciding who lives and who dies, or turning people into slaves,” Yue murmured.
“Even when those people are murderers and slavers themselves?” Toph scoffed, and Yue frowned.
“That doesn’t make it right.”
“But you’re okay with turning them over to the authorities, who will?” I asked, and she shook her head. “Then what?”“I don’t know,” she sighed.This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
Toph opened her mouth, but I laid a hand on her arm and cut her off. “Well, there’s no point going through this again. Let’s just focus on getting to Omashu and speaking with Bumi. We’ll decide what to do then.”
Yue blew out an annoyed breath, but nodded. Moving closer, she pressed herself into my side. “I’m sorry. I know I’m being difficult.”
“You’re fine just how you are. Better than deciding every problem is a nail to be hammered down.”
“Yeah, what about me?” Toph asked, pressing into my other side.
I chuckled. “You’re easy. Problems are for smashing,” I sent her a grin and Toph rolled her eyes, sticking her tongue out.
“No but seriously, compliment me too!”
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“So that’s what it looks like from above,” Toph mused as we came in from the north and descended slowly.
The night was thankfully overcast, with only a sliver of moon peeking out. Just in case however, Yue was creating a blanket of fog around us as we descended to a nearby mountain—in sight of Omashu, but it didn’t look traveled. Below and ahead of us, Omashu sat on top of a mountain, carved—or shaped—into the top of it as a series of pyramidal structures surrounded by a large wall, with only a single path leading in. We couldn’t make out many details from here, but that was good because it meant that they probably couldn’t see us at all, especially not obscured by a cloud as we were.
We dipped down, putting the mountain peak between us and Omashu. When we reached ground level, Toph hopped out and the ground rumbled.
“Okay, lower it down slowly,” she called, and I eased open the vent on the balloon. “A little more, little more… Okay!”
The ship thumped, shifting slightly, before it settled. I bled out the rest of the air and Yue and I hopped up on top and began rolling the balloon up and putting it away under the light of a few of my chi orbs. As we did, the ship shook under our feet and we had the sensation of slowly sinking. Soon enough, I looked up and saw we had slipped below ground level. Once we were a bit deeper, Toph hopped down onto the deck to join us.
We finished up securing everything outside and headed into the cabin, grabbing our packs. Looking around, Yue asked, “Do you think we should bring a gift? It’s typically polite when meeting with royalty.”
“Only if you’re trying to suck up,” Toph snorted.
“That depends. If you’re someone’s subject, it’s not out of the ordinary. If you’re a visiting dignitary, then you can, but it would be something culturally appropriate, either to the nation you’re visiting or from your own home. If someone from the Earth Kingdom were to visit the Fire Nation, they might bring a painting of the Fire Islands, for instance, but they might also bring a fine Earth Kingdom steel sword. But we’re not really either of those. We’re just messengers, coming to ask for help. And I doubt King Bumi is the kind of guy who cares about that.”
“Mm. He’s not,” Toph shook her head.
“No gift, then,” Yue nodded.
Once we were sure we had everything, we locked up and I spot welded the hatch just in case. Then, we leapt out of the hole and Toph sealed the top with a slab of stone, before covering the whole thing over with dirt. Then, we made our way quickly down the mountain, into the valley and up a neighboring mountain. We had spotted the road leading to the city from the air, so we pushed through the the night to get there.
The terrain was extremely rocky and dry, with most of the mountain tops being bare, save for a few snow covered peaks on the tallest mountains. The valleys were sparse, but there was vegetation and tree cover, the occasional stream or pond, and game to hunt. It reminded me a bit of the eastern side of the Rocky Mountains back on Earth, in some places.
Finally, after winding around and disguising where we’d come from so as to not lead anyone directly back to the ship, we made it to the road. We set up camp well back from the road itself, but there was really nothing we could do about being exposed other than having Toph create a bit of cover and some alarms for us in the form of a thin layer of ground that would crack loudly when stepped on for a hundred yards around our camp.
I didn’t like it, given just how many people were around. The road was packed with bedraggled refugees clustered in little groups, huddled around campfires here and there, along with the occasional trader. Yue took them in in the dark and I could see her heart breaking as she wanted to go help them, but forced herself to stay with us.
I let the girls get some sleep while I kept watch most of the night. Just before sunup, only four or so hours after turning in, Yue woke up and relieved me, and I was able to get a few hours of sleep. The next morning, we broke camp and took to the road, just another small group of travelers starting to move on their way to Omashu.
We had joined the trail about half a day’s walk from the city, coming in behind a supply caravan bearing the familiar winged boar of Toph’s family. For the most part, we kept silent as we approached—now that we could see the state of the people around us, the mood was a bit too somber for conversation. Yue looked like she wanted to cry and Toph just looked angry—and I couldn’t blame them. The pirates had not been kind to these people, and the trek from the coast to Omashu wasn’t an easy one.
Listening in to the conversations around us, it became apparent that the local bandits had learned what was going on and deciding to pile on more shit, they had gone around taking what little many of these people had managed to save, then when they didn’t have enough to satisfy them, took their anger out on the women for the most part. Between whatever wounds they had taken during the pirate raids, the march, the bandits, the rapes, and the fact that these people just hadn’t been prepared to survive in the wild so most of them hadn’t been able to hunt and provide for themselves, many of them had died along the way and those that didn’t were looking pretty starved.
As we approached the gates, Yue finally broke the silence. “I want to hurry to the palace and see King Bumi.”
“Nunuh. It doesn’t work like that,” Toph shook her head. “Maybe where you’re from any stranger off the street can demand an audience with your leaders, but not here.”
Yue let out a frustrated noise. “It doesn’t,” she murmured. “How does it work, then?”
“Heh heh! Just leave it to me! You have no idea how much you lucked out, that I decide to come with, you know?” the earthbender grinned.
“Realistically, how long do you think it’ll take?” I asked Toph, and her smug grin dropped off as she turned considering.
“A day or two, probably. We always get high priority when we visit. It’s not that King Bumi is being a jerk about it or anything, just that the guy’s busy. Also, uh… don’t piss him off. This whole city is his domain.”
Yue sent Toph a confused look. “He rules the city. Of course it’s his domain.”
Toph shook her head. “No, I mean, he’s made the city his. He’s an earthbender. He’s old and really strong. The ground below us, the stone making up the buildings and structures, all of it is full of decades worth of his chi. The whole mountain is a weapon he could bring down on someone’s head if they threatened it. I did the same thing back home, with our family estate. He’s just had a lot longer to do it. He may act like a kooky old man, but he’s the most dangerous thing in this city.”
“Well then it’s a good thing we don’t intend to start trouble,” I shook my head as we advanced in line.
After a few more minutes, the caravan ahead of us passed through and the guards to either side of the gates waved us forward. Looking us over, it only took a moment for the one who appeared to be in charge to say, “You don’t look like refugees.”
“We’re not. We’re—” Yue began, only for Toph to cut her off, holding out her family seal.
“Oh! Ms. Beifong! The caravan ahead of you didn’t tell us you were traveling with them!” the man’s attitude changed immediately as he realized he was dealing with someone important, not just another traveler.
“That’s cause we’re not,” she grinned, tucking the document away in her robe’s belt. Leaning in, she lowered her voice, forcing the guard to lean in. “I’m traveling on vacation with my friends, but I want to do a surprise inspection of our holdings here in Omashu. If those guys knew, they’d just tell them we were coming, then the surprise inspection wouldn’t be a surprise anymore, would it?”
The guard chuckled, nodding. “I see. Very well. I suggest sticking to the upper quarters. The lower quarter is where we’re housing the refugees and while we’re patrolling heavily, we weren’t expecting this many people.”
“Yeah? What’s King Bumi doing about it?” Toph asked, and the man shrugged.
“What he can, I imagine. We’ve set up temporary housing and have begun distributing food. I’m sure that if the Beifong family would like to contribute, our king would be grateful.”
Toph nodded. “I’ll arrange a meeting to speak with him about it and see what we can do.”
“That would be most appreciated. Please enjoy your stay in Omashu, Ms. Beifong and friends,” the guard bowed, then waved us through.
We passed through the gate and into the city proper. Toph turned an expectant look on us, looking particularly smug as she waited.
Reaching out, I patted her head and the girl lit up with a blush. “I’m impressed. Good job.”
“Yes, you handled it well,” Yue chuckled, taking Toph’s arm in hers and pulling her along. “Which way to the castle?”
“Uh,” Toph had to take a moment to get her bearings, and fight down the blush. “It’s this way!”
Shaking my head, I followed after the pair. Hopefully, getting in to see Bumi would be just as easy, but somehow, I doubted it.