Love in Danger chapter 16: Civil War

In the Royal War Room of Ba Sing Se, the Council of Five was seated around their large map of the world, Earth King Kuei presiding across from them on his palanquin, its curtains drawn, and General How at their center.

"In the past three months several villages in the south and west have refused to pay taxes" explained How to the King. "Many of the residents of these towns, particularly the Earthbenders, have openly and forcefully rebelled against our soldiers, going so far as resorting to violence and murder to achieve their agenda."

"What exactly is their agenda, General?" asked the Earth King.

"The soldiers who have returned from these attacks have informed us that despite these rebellions at first being confined to single villages the people carrying them out have remarkably similar demands. First, they speak out against your rule King Kuei, and with all due respect, they say you are a selfish oppressive tyrant, whose taxes are depriving his people of life. Second, they have spoken more egregiously of this; they are quite upset that our military is cooperating with the Fire Nation army in the reconstruction and demand that they leave the Earth Kingdom immediately."

"These demands are outrageous!" said the King. "Without the Fire Nation's support and without taxation our government cannot possibly hope to be capable of rebuilding the Earth Nation."

"You are right sir" agreed the General. "The war financially drained our economy of any possibility of the government retaining the needed wealth to restore our cities and strongholds, and too many of our soldiers have been killed for us to have enough to oversee the peaceful reconstruction on our own. Though this argument as yet to detour any of the rebels."

"I see" the Earth King said. "What are the costs of this uprising?"

"Hundreds of gold pieces in taxes, nearly thousands for that matter, and our men, as well as the Fire Lord's, have suffered casualties in the attempt to quell the rebellions."

"What are the casualties?"

"Five of the defiant villagers could not be spared by our soldiers, 20 of our own men were killed, and 50 Fire Nation soldiers have fallen."

"50?" the King said incredulously.

"Their main goal is to impose the extradition of the Fire Nation military. They've shown fellow Earth Kingdom citizens quarter but they've taken extra care to kill as many Fire soldiers as possible…and practiced desecration of their bodies."

"Desecration?"

"Outside of every rebel village, the heads of defeated Fire soldiers have been mounted on posts. They have also done things to their other remains that I prefer to not describe."

King Kuei signed and reclined in his seat wearily. He mumbled something that sounded vaguely like 'what a mess'. "Has the Avatar been alerted to these happenings?" he asked. If anyone could help him resolve this it would be the Avatar. If it wasn't for him, he would still be living under the guise that the Earth Kingdom was a peaceful utopia.

"The Avatar has spent the past four months searching for Long Feng and the Dai Li after the attempt on his wife's life. I dispatched men to summon him. When they returned, they claimed that the Avatar has evidence to suggest that the two problems are related" said How. "He has actually been waiting in the outside chamber for me to finish

explaining the situation."

"Very well," said the King. "Bring him in."

The doors of the room swung open and Aang came marching in, the stress of his unsuccessful four-month-long endeavor carved onto his normally carefree face. When he searched Lake Laogai for evidence, he found nothing of value there and every time he had picked up a trace, a whisper of Long Feng's whereabouts, he either arrived too late or found the information to be false.

"Welcome Avatar!" bade the King happily

.

"Hello" was all the Avatar had to say. Without another word he trudged over to the center table of the room and stamped a pierce of parchment onto it.

The Generals and the King stared intently at the paper, reading it over carefully.

"Long live The Liberator" said the King to himself. It was the only thing written on that paper. "Who is The Liberator?" said General Sung, the least prestigious of the generals.

"I think I've found out" said Aang. "I almost got killed in the process. When I was searching for Long Feng, I flew straight into one of the rebelling villages. They kept chanting 'long live The Liberator' as they prepared to attack the soldiers stationed there. I didn't know what was going on at first so I hid in the village to try to find out. I listened in on a lot of their conversations. One of them talked about The Liberator. I didn't catch everything he said but I know he said something about Long Feng and inspiration. The Liberator must have been a nickname Long Feng had his agents use to disguise his identity. Too bad he didn't count on my eavesdropping. Though either way when they started attacking the soldiers I revealed myself, when they found out I was the Avatar they were mad. All of them ran towards me and tried to kill me. If I didn't go into the Avatar State and freeze all of them in a breath of ice I'd be chopped into a million pieces right now."

"That was the only rebellion that was successfully stopped" General How added. "We've interrogated the insurgents and those who cooperated gave us intelligence that confirms Avatar Aang's theories, though the one who instigated, who we believe to be a Dai Li agent it took his own life before we could question him."

"So Long Feng is convincing the commoners to rebel against me for revenge?" said the King as he processed everything he had heard.

"We believe the situation is much more dire than that my liege" said How. "Go on" encouraged the King.

"The insurgents have not simply dispatched once their attacks succeeded" began the veteran General. "Our scouts have reported troubling news that has made us certain of that. The villages that have rebelled seem to now be working together. The Dai Li members who initiated these raids have reunited and assembled their insurgents into their own army."

"An army?" the King said flabbergasted.

"Yes" said How. "They have assembled on the southwestern peninsula here." With a long pole General How traced a circle around a large area on the western coast of the Earth Kingdom. Aang

recognized the spot he indicated.

"That's Haru's village" Aang said. Haru was a friend of Aang and his comrades. In the early days of their involvement in the war they had helped him free his father from imprisonment on a Fire Nation rig which allowed him and other freed Earthbenders to reclaim their town for the Earth Kingdom.

"That is correct; the village controlled by Tyro, or once controlled by Tyro" said General How.

"What!?" asked Aang.

"Tyro, his son, and other Earthbenders who agreed with them were loyalists. When the Dai Li attempted the take control of their village to use its coal and metal mines, they fought against them. They were defeated."

"Defeated? Do you mean they're…dead?"

"We do not know for sure. Only one of the scouts we sent to the peninsula returned. He did not learn what became of Tyro and Haru. The best-case scenario for them is that they escaped and fled to someplace under our control."

Aang was troubled by this news. As well as his friend, Haru was friends with Katara and he knew the news of his probable death would upset her. He did not wish to believe that Haru was dead; he hoped he had escaped, but he figured that if Sokka was here he would say something about how it's unrealistic to assume that he and his father survived, seeing as few people who went against the insurgents survived and it was not in Haru and Tyro's nature to run, as opposed to holding their ground and fighting to their last breath when there was trouble.

"This news is indeed startling General," said the King.

"But there's more."

"More!?"

"Yes. You see theses villages are not simply rebellion against your rule in the hopes you will listen to them. They are, in effect, succeeding from it. The provinces, towns, and bases where these insurgents have surfaced have declared their independence from the Earth Kingdom and the formation of their own; they are calling their conglomerate the Kingdom of Laogai and have named this so-called liberator, whom we believe to be Long Feng, their king."

"Long Feng…has his own kingdom?" the king almost whispered.

"Our scouts have brought us equally disconcerting news" How said. "We have received word that Long Feng's forces are assembling near General Fong's base, armed with the weapons and armor they have stolen from our soldiers and bases. We believe, that with General Fong's base under his control, Long Feng's army will have adequate supplies and soldiers to…"

"Yes General?" the King said impatiently.

"…to attack Ba Sing Se, my liege" How completed.