Chapter 29
"Every face is familiar," I thought, looking at the trio of kids I knew.
In front of our group—comprising me, Ty Lee, Azula, and Mai—stood the trio of Aang, Katara, Sokka, and Mai's younger brother in the latter's arms, though we won't count him for now.
We stood on the planks of the construction scaffolding where a statue in honor of Ozai, the current Fire Lord, was being erected. The site was massive, at least one hundred and fifty meters long, with no cover to be found.
Above us, Bumi was being held in a metal coffin suspended by a chain from a metal crane. His laughter, tinged with a hint of madness, echoed around us and was clearly audible to me.
The metal coffin, with only a hole for the face, was lowered and placed right behind us, and for a few seconds, silence spread across the area.
"Where's my brother?" Mai calmly asked the group with Aang.
"He's here," Aang replied. "We're ready for the exchange."
"Excuse me!" Azula interjected, addressing Mai. "An idea just occurred to me. Do you mind?"
"Of course not, Princess Azula," Mai responded indifferently, showing no emotion.
"We're exchanging a two-year-old infant for a king. A powerful king of the earthbenders," Azula said, looking at Bumi, who nodded with a smile, and then Azula turned back to Mai. "It seems to me this is not an equal exchange, is it?"
Mai looked at Azula, then shifted her gaze to her two-year-old brother.
"You're right," she said and walked forward, but stopped after a few steps. "There will be no deal."
With those words, she raised her hand, and the crane began lifting Bumi's coffin back up.
"Oh-ho-ho, see you soon!" Bumi laughed joyfully, his voice carrying to all who could hear.
"Bumi!" Aang shouted and dashed forward with great speed, kicking up a huge cloud of dust behind him.
Princess Azula immediately sent a large fireball at Aang, but he leaped seven meters high, momentarily dumbfounding the princess. However...
A stream of red fire, dense in the air and curving, knocked the Avatar out of his uncontrollable leap, burning part of his clothes in the process.
"Princess Azula, don't just stand there!" I yelled, grinning and watching Aang get up, playing with fire in my hand. Oh, what pleasure I felt at that moment, giving Aang a little fire tap.
"The Avatar!" Azula exclaimed, realizing whom she had encountered. "My luck today!"
Azula charged forward towards Aang, hurling fireballs at him on the run. However, some of them were neutralized by Katara's ice projectiles, deftly managing water on the move. It seems she learned well in the North. Unlike Aang, Katara and Sokka, carrying Tom-Tom, ran in the opposite direction. Ty Lee and Mai followed them, while I, like Azula, ran towards Aang.
The Avatar quickly recovered and leaped to his feet, dodging Azula's fire wave but then had to create a powerful air stream to deflect my flame attacking him.
I rushed at him under the cover of Azula's constant fire attacks and upon catching up, attempted a kick, which was softened by an air cushion and blocked with his staff. But Aang was just a twelve-year-old kid, and I was significantly heavier, so even such a hit sent him sliding across the boards.
I felt Azula leap over me and saw a blue stream of flame hitting Aang, who jumped far to the side, but couldn't land properly because I simply lit the boards beneath him on fire, sending a fireball at him with a second movement.
An air sphere protected Aang from the fireball itself, but when it was a meter away from him, I mentally commanded it to explode.
Aang was blown off the edge of the construction scaffolding, and I immediately made a couple of gestures to extinguish the fire. No point in damaging state property. They might start blaming me for something later.
Azula went after Aang, and I turned my attention to Ty Lee and Mai.
At that moment, Katara simply threw Ty Lee off the scaffolding through one of the holes and protected herself from several of Mai's accurately thrown dart-needles, which hit the planks turned by Katara from the construction.
That's when I decided to get involved. Fireballs hit Katara, then she had to create an ice wall to protect herself from a stream of red fire.
Mai, carefully avoiding my fire, got closer to Katara, but at that moment, Ty Lee appeared behind Katara. I stopped firing to avoid hitting Ty Lee.
Ice obscured the view and didn't allow me to see what was happening, but judging by what I felt, Ty Lee was now using her abilities to block bending. More accurately, it wasn't even abilities, just a good knowledge of acupuncture for both non-benders and benders.
The ice wall melted just two seconds before I reached it. Ty Lee jumped back, and Katara was dazed from the loss of her bending control. Oh yes, I understand those feelings! I myself was in such depression and shock when I learned that my bending could be blocked, even without being a bender. This was one of the reasons I wanted to train with Ty Lee. I was very interested in this. And then I had to try hard to make it so that my bending couldn't be blocked in such a way. I haven't completely succeeded yet, but there are successes in this direction, and that's the main thing. However, my first reaction was no different from Katara's, and there was a chance to use this.
I quickly approached and delivered a maximum strength punch to her solar plexus. Crushing blows are maximally ineffective against benders, but you can hit such weak spots in the body as the solar plexus. Such a hit can even deprive a bender of breath... if hit hard enough. I hit hard enough, hopefully not too much. Katara doubled over and gasped for air, while I grabbed her arm, twisted it behind her back, and held her in a dangerous position. A sharp move and she'd dislocate her own shoulder. And if I try a bit harder, I could even break her arm. Both are terribly painful, something I've come to know in my life. I didn't always come out of fights with the Fire Nation intact. Only water and its healing saved me!
At that moment, I sensed the approach of Sokka and Appa.
"Ty Lee, Mai, quickly to me!" I commanded, and they immediately took cover behind me. In our group, I'm considered a strong bender, and in equal standing, they listen to me in battle.
Appa landed in front of us with Sokka. He held a boomerang, ready to throw it at any moment. And as I had the opportunity to observe, he does it very professionally!
"Katara!" he yelled.
Katara hadn't yet recovered from the punch and was struggling to breathe, and her arm was in pain.
"Don't move, kid, or I'll break your girlfriend's
arm, and then burn her right here. And she's not feeling too good as it is. So, you better listen to me and hand over the baby Tom-Tom nicely. Believe me, burning is very painful!"
Sokka froze, unsure of what to do, but it only lasted a moment. In the next instant, he took the baby in his arms and showed him to us.
"I'll give him to you, just let Katara go! Don't hurt her!" he said, carefully descending from the flying bison.
He placed the baby on the planks, and the little one, smiling and laughing joyfully, made his way to Mai. I waited until the baby reached us and then looked back at Sokka. He stood tense, but his hands were raised.
"Idiot," I muttered under my breath, looking at him and tossing Katara towards him. Then, creating a fireball in my hand, which I had tested on Aang, I threw it at Sokka and Katara, whom Sokka had caught.
At that moment, I felt the same overpowering force I had experienced on the barge. That overwhelming power that even the bravest consider fleeing from.
"AVATAR!" the thought flashed through my mind along with a tremendous sense of danger, and I, turning around, jumped up and with airbending pushes, sent Ty Lee and Mai further away, to another floor of the construction scaffolding. They're tough and will survive both the fall and the hits, though it will hurt.
Two things happened next.
First, my fireball exploded and threw Sokka and Katara in different directions. If for Katara this might still be somewhat tolerable, though a severe concussion was assured, Sokka's survival was not guaranteed. He's not a bender and doesn't have our physical resilience!
Then... the construction scaffolding I was on, more accurately lying on after throwing the girls away, literally exploded! No, my fire had nothing to do with it. On the contrary, there was no fire. A massive air stream literally demolished a third of the entire construction, scattering all the planks and scaffolding into splinters, and me along with them.
I tuned into my sensations and realized that Azula was nowhere near, while the girls I had thrown were on another floor, and the air wave had carried them even further away.
"So, Aang, round two!?" I yelled at him.
He stopped staring at Katara and Sokka, who now lay motionless on the remaining intact island of planks, and turned his gaze to me, his face twisting in anger.
"Come on, attack me," I whispered to myself.
Aang opened his mouth in a silent scream, and I felt the air masses around me start to move, turning into a terrible hurricane, and then he stretched his hands towards me, and I saw the condensed air masses, now visible even to the naked eye, rushing towards me along with all the planks and dust in their path.
"Screw you!" I yelled and, clapping my hands, spread them apart. A parasitic movement, but I wasn't up for airbending control practice right now, especially since airbending is my weakest element, and I really needed the gestures at this moment.
I couldn't stop or redirect this attack. I simply didn't have enough control over the element, not to mention the strength, but deflecting it just a bit—I could do that. So, I acted as a wedge, splitting the stream of this destructive horror into two parts that diverged slightly. Just a tiny bit, but even that was difficult. Definitely need to work on airbending... if I survive this time.
The deadly stream ceased, and at that moment, I released several explosive fireballs towards where I felt that overwhelming force was coming from, and then, with a powerful air push beneath me, jumped up, performing a front flip and sending the most powerful flame wave I could muster, followed by four dense fire streams attacking from different sides.
However, the fire seemed to be absorbed into a small sphere. When the fire gathered between the hands, I saw that these weren't Aang's hands. More accurately, I felt through bloodbending that it was Aang, but I saw something entirely different!
A tall old man with a thick, now gray from age, mane of long hair and an equally thick and long beard, wearing the Fire Nation crown on his head and ceremonial Fire Nation garments from ancient times. And his eyes glowed just the same.
Avatar Roku.
It was definitely him. After the first fight with the Avatar, I thoroughly researched all the information I could find on avatars. From facts to legends. And I could definitely distinguish the last avatars by their appearance.
The fire collected by Roku was unleashed towards me and simply swept me away. I felt the construction scaffolding break against my back, then hit the statue of Ozai being built. Seems like I broke a couple of ribs. All the higher construction scaffolding began to collapse and fall on me, but I had other concerns.
Water gathered from the air around me was immediately compressed and then transformed into steam. The explosion scattered all the debris around me, and I quickly freed myself, jumping to a more or less open space, and sent even more compressed steam in an icy shell towards the Avatar, followed by very sharp stone spikes, thanks to the stone statue right behind me.
The steam explosion was blocked by an air wall, but it couldn't stop the stone projectiles, which shattered upon impact with what I assume was Roku's earthbending. I gathered the steam back and added even more water from the surroundings. In my left hand, a very dense oxygen orb appeared, surrounded by a red flame shell that, however, didn't burn the oxygen until I allowed it, and in my right hand, a very dense but extremely hot steam orb in an icy shell. Jumping, I stretched my legs towards the Avatar, sending as powerful an oxygen wave as I could with one leg and immediately mixing it with fire from the right leg.
The resulting volumetric explosion engulfed the Avatar and blocked the view, which I used to jump as high as possible with an air push, sending the most dense flame stream I could from my mouth at him and releasing charges not directly at him, but to the sides of him. Let's play with contrasts!
Two simultaneous explosions sounded, and I saw the Avatar simply blown away. He flew out of the smoke cloud and was thrown about fifteen meters away.
At that moment, I sensed danger again, and a shadow covered me. Looking up, I saw a large part of the Ozai statue being built, a huge stone slab hanging over me, beginning to fall towards me.
"Damn Bumi!..."