Luke

Heading down the island's lone mountain, atop which I had been fighting for my life mere moments ago, I could already see the chaos emerging from the beachhead, and the small town that neighbored it.

The Earth Kingdom warship was parked around 50 meters from the shore, still emitting landing craft that were heading towards the defenseless town en masse, raining down boulder after boulder on the wooden and straw huts, leaving nothing to chance, clearly intent on leaving nothing but a heap of rubble in its wake. Something told me this was where I'd find the Captain. Fong was his name. Described as an Earth Kingdom nationalist, a glory hound, a man seeking to do whatever it took to win. Something I knew about all too well.

I was manning the gunner position of the tank while Jadoh was permitted to drive and the messenger took the copilot seat.

I could already see the new clouds of smoke, of soot and ash rising from the town as flaming boulders rained down upon civilians who knew nothing of this war. Nothing of politics, of any of these things, yet who always somehow managed to eb the first victims of war.

I was back in Stone's Edge at that moment, surrounded by the screaming, the suffering that I had caused, the people I had killed. As I watched ahead as the fires burned and spread, consuming little ants of people in their flames, I could almost see myself there as well, the source of all this pain and suffering.

I hadn't worn my helmet that day. I wanted to see it all, the flames, the suffering, the death. It made me feel good, the monster that I am. Today though, as the memories came back, I was glad to have my helmet on. I didn't want them to see my face. I didn't want to see theirs. I was safe in there. They couldn't see me, and I couldn't see them. It was better that way. I knew what I was, and so did they. The less I confused them into thinking I was human like them, the better.

The black sky had now encompassed us, the fog of war now encircling the mass of the island in full. The flames could still be seen in the distance as we drew ever closer like the sunlight at the end of a cave. And in such the same way, that was where we were headed.

We passed the first building, a small hut that had been blown apart by a lucky catapult's boulder. We carried on, a housing complex that had been lit aflame by another boulder that had missed, yet still spread its flames. I could hear the cracking of the wood to my left as we passed the engulfed hobble.

There was no hope of seeing the Earth Kingdom warship anymore. The coast was sealed from our vision by a wall of black soot and rising ash. I looked down to see how Jadoh's view of the road was. Yet when I looked down, all I could see was the fear plastered on their faces. The horror. Jadoh, who had never seen war before, had never seen the suffering it brought, and the unnamed messenger, who was watching his own town be engulfed by flames around him, wondering if his house was still standing.

Another reason I was glad to have a helmet surrounding my head, so they couldn't see how little this meant to me now. How accustomed I had become to this sight, how I myself had been the one to start such fires. How, not long ago, I had been the thing I was now seeking to destroy, the one who started the fires, the one who broke apart families, slaughtered them in front of their loved ones.

Though the dead had been silent for what felt like an eternity now, I could still hear them. Still hear their screams. Their cries. They screamed when they saw me. They screamed when I saw them. They screamed even as they burnt.

And now, they were all dead. And I was alive.

I knelt in front of what remained of Stone's Edge, a killer, a murderer.

What the hell had I done?

We were deeper in the town of Jiaozai now, the flames all around us, families fleeing, running blindly in the smoke, lost, seeking to go anywhere else in the world that wasn't here.

In front of us, a wall of fire rising from the earth itself. I didn't bother getting into the tank. I could take it. We pushed through the flames, the fire cowering around me, not daring to approach, like so many others.

We were in the town proper now, a literal hell surrounding us. A hell I was no stranger to. A hell I'd started more often than not. I made sure my visor was in place on my helmet, the white skull facemask a perfect sign of what I was. Death. Something that would never change.

I unsheathed my sword, and jumped from the tank, landing to the ground and swinging at the first Earth Kingdom soldier I saw, swinging through the small of his back, cutting through, turning to plant a stream of fire into his chest, bringing him to ground in a growing inferno.

Shanzi had come to a stop, seeing I'd dismounted, and I watched the hatch doors opened as the rest of the crew readied themselves to continue the fight. Up ahead, an earthbender had just destroyed the door of a small hut with a sizeable boulder and was making his way in. I grabbed him before he could enter the hobble, pulling him backwards, shoving my sword into his chest, letting his body slide off of the blade. Another flaming boulder came down. I rushed ahead where an earthbender who had noticed me was preparing his own projectile to hurt at me. I ducked, dodging it, rushing forward, throwing a stream of fire into him, igniting the soldier, and pushing him backwards until I brought my sword to his neck, ending his incrementing suffering.

Shanzi's screw were continuing the fight on their own. I didn't concern myself with them. I continued forward, towards one place, slowly but surely, the sea, fully intent on ending this blight at its source. And that was until I heard the screams. The screams I hadn't stopped hearing since all those months ago. The screams I hadn't been able to silence then but had the chance to silence now. I took the detour, heading deeper into the streets, slicing through the leg of un unwary Earth Kingdom soldier who was lighting a straw hut aflame with a torch, dropping him to the ground, serving him his own medicine as I turned and threw a small bolt of fire towards him, igniting the man where he lay on the ground writhing in pain.

An earthbender found me amidst my rampage, raising a pillar from the ground to send towards me that broke into a thousand tiny shards mid-motion as my own flames overpowered the structure, breaking through and striking the man where he fell to his knees until I brought my blade to his neck, ending his connection to the world. I could still hear the screams. The screams of the people I'd killed. They were dead. Why? Why did they still scream?!

Ahead, I saw them. A mother and child. I killed a mother and child before. An earthbender stood above them, a hammer in hand. I stalked forward, brought my sword up to shove it through his back. Just another foe. I didn't move to kill him because of what nationality he represented, because he was a threat to the innocent, but because he existed to kill me in this moment, and I to kill him.

The man turned before I could plant my sword through his back to erupt from his chest. He brought his hammer around, and the next moment I was on the ground. The girl screamed. No. Why would you scream? You should be cheering. The monster is about to die. I'm the monster.

I could feel something trickling down the side of my head. It was warm. I was on the ground. I could only see the dirt in front of me. No. I could hardly even see that. The helmet. It didn't fit right. It was bent. It was blocking my sight. I can't see anything. I reached up to remove the damn thing, and so I did, and could see and hear again, finally. And I heard the girl scream. She was screaming for me. I heard the man behind me. I heard his feet shift; I heard his roar.

I rolled, the hammer fell to the ground, crushing the ground beneath where my head had been moments ago, and I shot my fire into the sky, into the man, no number of armored protective layers able to save him. I recovered my sword on the ground, reached up to plunge it into his heart, and he fell, dead, and I rose.

The mother and child were still huddled there, fresh tears running down their faces. I looked at them. And they looked at me, but this time, it wouldn't be the last thing they would see. This time, it wouldn't be the face of the man who would kill them. Not anymore. Never again.

"Thank you"

And they ran. And the screaming continued. It wasn't in my head anymore. It wasn't the constant voice banging around my helmet, echoing back into my ears time and time again. It was the man who had been shoved to the ground as a spearman readied to pierce her throat, the girl who was being yanked out of their home, the boy crying as his home fell to pieces around him.

I flexed my grip on my sword. And for the first time in months since that day had occurred, I knew what I had to do. I knew why I was here.

I walked to the spearman and girl, slicing through his spear, rendering him unarmed, shoving him to the ground with my left hand as I brought my sword down into his neck as the woman ran off. I found the home that the girl was being pulled out of as the earthbender readied himself to have his way with her in the center of the burning town square. I reached them, planting my hand around his neck, shoving him away as I planted my sword into his stomach, driving him further off away, shoving him to the ground, before yelling at the girl to run. I found the burning house, the hovel collapsing in on itself. I dropped my sword, reaching both hands out to control the flames, to let them die out, redirect them away while nearing the house, bending the flames away from where the screaming boy was. I entered the burning structure, rising a collapsed beam with my right arm while warding off the flames with my left, pausing for a single second to offer my left arm to the boy, who took it, allowing me to pull him out from beneath his collapsing home, returning him to safety, to anywhere that wasn't there. I recovered my sword and carried on.

Further ahead, I could see where the tavern had been. A burning boulder had fallen through the roof. The flames were spreading. I ran there, bending the flames away from the straw as I burst into the door. An earthbender and a standard soldier were lining up the folk gathered there for the slaughter. I reached for my sword, slicing through the back of the soldier as the bender turned towards me, bending a boulder out from beneath the tavern's wooden floors, splintering the foundation beneath us, hurling it towards me as I destroyed the projectile mid-air, ducking beneath the rubble, slicing a clean cut through his chest as he fell to the ground, and I yelled at the people to leave the place.

Outside, the slaughter was carrying on. Untrained town security, local militia in all but name, were trying as hard as they might to ward off their town's invaders, despite how little use it was. I could see Jadoh now, and the messenger, joining the fight, and so I rushed forward too, throwing a ball of fire at a man who stood poised to hurtle a sizeable disk at Jadoh, downing the man, and I finished him off with a clean slice through the nape of his neck.

Jadoh continued forward, saving a town militiaman, planting a shortsword through an Earth Kingdom bowman's back as the messenger fired an arrow at an earthbender standing atop an aflame home, raining down shards of earth upon us. The battle was approaching ever closer to the sea now as the town was cleared slowly but surely of the invading threat. By the docks, where soldiers were continuously landing, more and more people were being continuously slaughtered by the invading earthbenders. I threw a bolt of fire at an earthbender a-ways away who was in the process of drowning a fisherman in the sea by the face down. His grip died all at once as the fire took him over, and he fell over the docks, into the water. I sprinted forward, slicing through the entire body of an accompanying soldier, splitting him in two as I pulled the fisherman from the water, stabbing into the water to finish off the Earth Kingdom soldier before the sea took him, shoving the fisherman away from the sea further into the town where it had already been cleared.

Jadoh, on a different dock, alongside the messenger and a number of other militiamen, were clearing their side, enabling me to have cover as I proceeded down the wooden gangway to clear as much of the way as I could, to do whatever I could to defend the people who had never asked for this war to be delivered to their doorstep.

So I continued forth, a spearman charging towards me. As I showered him in fire, the spear splintered and broke into a million pieces in his arm as he writhed and pain, falling off of the dock into the water, already dead. Behind him, an archer took aim and loosed his arrow, missing as I dodged right, and fired a bolt that penetrated straight through his armor, burning a hole so deep that light could be seen emitting through him from the other side.

A swordsman, rising from his landing craft that had just docked was kicked back into his craft by me, into the men behind them, stumbling backwards, as I stood above them, lighting the lot of them in the same put, carrying on as I reached the end of my dock, and as I turned over to see to my left, Jadoh and the militia had done with theirs.

And so, all that was ahead of us, was the final Earth Kingdom vessel, still emitting its landing craft, still raining down fire upon us. I had no idea at that moment of how this would come to an end with a favorable outcome. I had no idea either what was happening to Boss, to Zek, Gordez, any of them. They could be dead for all I knew. When I'd left, that castle had been on the verge of falling. For all I knew, it was gone. It changes nothing. Either way, I'd hold my ground, and from what I saw with the militiamen around me, they would do the same. These were their people. This was their home, and they were all ready to die for it.

And that was then, along the horizon, a gray steel vessel, a Fire Nation destroyer, but not just any, The Patriot, came into view, and from it, an explosion erupted, and moments later, aboard the Earth Kingdom vessel. It shook, and so did the waves. Seconds later, another blast fired, missing the vessel. The Earth Kingdom warship attempted to return fire to no avail. The Patriot was out of range. What the hell were we firing. The Patriot fired once more, hitting the vessel's hull, and it had now begun to list, turning away from the fight, readying its retreat.

The Earth Kingdom transports were dead in the water, not knowing whether to turn back and try to catch up with their mothership, or risk landing. After a moment of consideration, they continued forward, possessing the advantage of numbers, at least, they did until the clamor of hundreds of feet were heard behind us, and Yilie's forces had come to reinforce this front, and at their head, Boss, Ka'lira, and Zek, while Gordez, as I could imagine, was aboard The Patriot, bringing hell to the Earth Kingdom vessel that, after sustaining one last blast, was retreating to the setting sun, defeated.

The transports had no other choice now, a new reinforced front blocking their advance, and The Patriot, their retreat. The flag of surrender was raised from one transport, then another, and another, and their weapons were dropped into the sea below, both as a show of surrender, and a way of not giving them to us, a double edged sword, but one we could live with. The battle had ended, and the island of Jianghe, had survived, and its people along with it.