Explanations

Korra sat silently leaning against a rock as she observed her newfound friends. She honestly liked them. They seemed like a nice bunch.

However, as great as their company was, she couldn't ignore her own predicament. The bender was still struggling to process the fact that she was indeed on a completely different planet.

How on Earth was she supposed to get home? She was the Avatar, she had duties to uphold. Being here would not help the matter, not at all.

Shaking her head with a sigh, Korra shoved those thoughts down for later contemplation and instead chose to laugh at the expense of Aragorn, who was struggling with igniting the campfire. Said Ranger cast the bender a weak but playful glare.

"Well, how about you try," the man huffed.

The bender chuckled lightly before getting up and walking over to the ranger, hand hovering slightly over the flint and steel which lay in his open hand.

Should she show them her fire bending? Was it wise to hide her abilities?

'No,' Korra rejected, internally shaking her head.

She needed to gain their trust, and hiding her abilities wouldn't be wise.

Instead of taking the flint and steel-like Aragorn expected her to, she instead patted his shoulder and smiled mysteriously at him.

He stared at her inquisitively.

Why she didn't take it?

"Don't need it," came her short response, making the Ranger jump slightly.

Had he said that out loud?

"Yes, you did. Now shush and watch," Korra chuckled.

With a simple flick of her wrists, a fireball ball shot out of her fist, the sudden appearance of a large fire, making everyone jump back, Aragorn the most. However, Korra didn't so much as flinch at the sudden appearance of flames, much to the shocked Ranger's surprise.

Everyone's gaze settled on the strange girl, who had failed in containing a large grin that spread on her face, and found themselves stunned at her amazing hidden talent.

"H-how, how did you do that? You're a witch?" Boromir managed to choke out first, much to Korra's amusement.

This question caused her to grin even wider.

"No, I'm not a witch. I was fire-bending," the Avatar responded calmly.

"Fire-bending? What's that?" Pippin asked, his large doe eyes lit with excitement.

Everyone knew it was just a matter of time before he would ask a question, but this time they couldn't blame him, they were all curious about what 'fire-bending' was.

"Well, it's as simple as it sounds. Fire-bending is where you can control fire and create it. Only fire-benders can control this element, and as you've seen, I'm a fire-bender," Korra shrugged as if fire bending was the most normal thing in the world.

At that moment, the Fellowship was very glad that Korra had been on their side.

'If this girl can create fire, then what is she truly capable of?' Everyone seemed to think in unison.

"I'll tell you more about my world later, but first you've got to tell me of this world," Korra negotiated, invoking grins all round.

And so the story began, of Sauron, the One Ring, orcs, and everyone put in their own descriptions of their people and where they were from.

Elves and dwarfs, Korra had recently found out, were rivals since the beginning of time, since their ways were so different from each other. This explained a lot about Gimli and Legolas's attitude towards one another.

Korra had found it interesting that there were so many different races in this world, and when she had told them that there was only the race of men in her world, they looked rather taken aback.

Over the hours they had developed quite a strong bond with Korra and even told her that they planned to destroy the One Ring and explained that it was Frodo who volunteered to through into the fires of mount doom, much to her surprise.

Those hobbits were braver then they looked, she had decided.

The bender was told about wizards and the lifespans of the different races. She thought to ask them of their age later.

Even though she looked young, Aragorn, Legolas and Gandalf realised that her eyes looked old and full of knowledge. They wondered how old she was, but as she did, they resolved to ask her age another time.

The Avatar was surprised to find out that there were no animals here that were in her homeworld.

"So, are those common around here? I've never seen one in my life," Korra said, pointing at the thing that looked like an ostrich-horse and raising a sceptical eyebrow.

Sam choked on his food, which he had prepared, and everyone was looking at her in disbelief.

"He's a pony," Sam answered slowly, after recovering from his coughing fit. "Don't you have those in your world?"

"A pony?" the bender let the foreign word roll off of her tongue, shaking her head. "No, I don't have those in my world. But we do have ostrich-horses."

As Korra received blank looks she elaborated further.

"They're like crosses between normal horses and normal ostriches. They have two legs like an ostrich, a horse's body, a horse's face and a beak," the Avatar explained as best she could.

It was everyone else's turn to choke on either their drinks or their food.

"Ostrich-horse, that's revolting. How can you ride such a creature?" Sam asked, looking as though he had lost his appetite, which is quite a feat in it of itself seeing as he's a Hobbit

"It's easy," Korra responded.

She continued to tell them of the creatures that resided in her world, which astounded them, and in turn, they told her of the creature's they thought were quite normal but that is exactly what amazed the young woman.

The creatures here were so normal, that it was weird.

One of the few things that were the same was that both worlds had dragons, but the one's of her world were shy and didn't attack people unless provoked. Their drag, on the other hand,and were ruthless and greedy, much to Korra's surprise.

'Greedy?'

She had told them that the dragons of her world were honourable creatures, which surprised them in turn.

"Honourable? Maybe in your world," came Gimli's angry retort.

Soon the long conversation of the different creatures in their worlds ended and everyone had fallen silent. It was now her turn to tell them of her world. They had been very patient, she owed them a good explanation.

"Well, where do I start?" Korra muttered to herself, rubbing her chin in contemplation.

"How about from the beginning," Gandalf answered for her with a warm smile.

The Avatar felt a slight pang of homesickness. He reminded her so much of Iroh. The thought at least calmed her.

She returned the kind gesture and signalled for everyone to come closer. They did as they were told and all sat around the fire, wide-eyed and eager.

Pippin moved to sit to her right and Aragorn to her left.

"Water, earth, fire and air," she made the different insignias with the flames, making everyone flinch slightly, "These are the four elements. My world is split into four nations. The Southern and Northern Water Tribes, the Earth Kingdom, the Fire Nation, and the Air Temples."

"In each nation, there are people called benders, those who can bend their nation's element. Only the Avatar, master of all four elements, can keep balance in the world. The Avatar is also the great bridge between the spirit world and the material world. Just under two hundred years ago, the fire nation raged war on the other nations."

"The Fire Lord who ruled at the time had grown greedy for power and wanted to extend his empire beyond his own nation. Using the power of a comet that gives a fire bender the strength of one hundred suns, he wiped out the air nomads, in an attempt to kill the new Avatar before he could master the elements."

Gasps of horror were heard all around.

"But the Fire lord didn't succeed," everyone let out a relieved sigh, "The Avatar ran away the night before the invasion. His name was Aang and he was twelve at the time. He didn't know that his people were to be slain the following day. He and his flying bison were in the middle of the ocean when a horrible storm broke down on them. After he lost control, they were both forced under the ocean and Aang created a huge air sphere and froze the water."

"However, by the time he was broken out of the iceberg by a water bender and her brother in the Southern Water Tribe, one hundred years had already passed," everyone looked at her with mute shock, "If I told you the details of his adventures that would take ages. I guess I should stop there?"

She just wanted to tease them, it worked. Everyone frowned at her, silently urging her to continue.

"But I guess I can summarise?" She questioned, earning nods of agreement. "Okay. Aang found out about the century-old war and unfortunately, he went to his home and found the skeletons of his friends and his surrogate family."

Gandalf had shifted uncomfortably at this statement, so had Aragorn.

'That poor boy. Too young to lose so much. He must have blamed himself,' both of them thought.

"He was devastated at first, believing that it was his fault, but he found happiness with his new family."

The entire Fellowship felt for the poor boy. To suffer such a loss and still find joy, was something they all knew that they themselves could never do. He must be a strong boy, they had thought.

"Aang soon contacted his past life..." the bender saw the confused looks that she was getting and quickly explained. "Oh, well, Aang is a reincarnation. When the Avatar dies, they're reincarnated into the next nation in the cycle, water, earth, fire and air. The Avatar before Aang was born in the fire nation, he was Avatar Roku, and before Avatar Roku was Avatar Kyoshi, an earth bender, so on, so on. The Avatar will always be my earth's guardian, no matter how many generations would have passed."

Korra swiftly dodged bringing up the fact that she was, in fact, the Avatar after Aang, she would tell them only when they asked.

"Understand?" the Avatar questioned, getting slightly unsure nods from everyone. "Good. Anyway, Aang contacted his past life, Avatar Roku, and learned that the same comet that was responsible for the death of his people would pass again in under a year's time and that the Fire Lord would use it to wipe out the Earth Kingdom. He needed to master the other elements. Mastering all the elements take years of discipline and practise and yet, he was told that he had to master the last three elements in a year. You can see how he was slightly stressed.

"Anyway, he went to the Northern water tribe where he and his friend Katara could learn water bending. Soon the fire nation arrived with an armada, their whole fleet in fact. Their leading admiral killed the moon spirit, and the moon disappeared. See without the moon, people couldn't water bend. They were defenceless."

No one really understood what she meant by 'moon spirit' and 'ocean spirit' but they guessed it was quite important.

"Aang was furious, so he merged with the ocean spirit and took out the armada single-handedly. The princess gave her life to restore the moon spirit. The moon had returned to the sky and the remainder of the fleet fled. Then, he went to the earth kingdom where he found his earth bending teacher, Toph Beifong."

Korra smiled as she mentioned the old earth bender. She wasn't all that bad once you got past her unbelievably grumpiness and impatience. She definitely knew where Lin got her attitude from.

"Aang and his friends then found the library of the great owl spirit Won She Tong, and found out that a solar eclipse was going to occur in a few months, that would leave the fire nation defenceless, diminishing their ability to fire bend. They then went to the Earth Kingdom capital of Ba Sing Se, where they wanted to tell the Earth King of their plans to attack Fire lord Ozai while he and his troops were most defenceless. After a little convincing, the King agreed to help with their plans. They all split up, oblivious to the fact that there were fire nation spies, disguised as the King's royal guards. The water bender Katara had stayed behind. By the time she found out that there were fire nation spies within the walls of Ba Sing Se, it had been too late. She was captured. Aang and the others went back to Ba Sing Se to save her, but Azula, Fire lord Ozai's daughter, had killed him..."

All of them looked horrified. Pippin looked like he was on the verge of crying. But they hadn't let the bender finish her sentence. Korra raised a half-amused eyebrow.

"He was killed, but was later brought back to life, thanks to Katara's ability to heal with water."

Everyone let out a relieved sigh, and Pippin, now red with embarrassment, rubbed his eyes and placed his face in his knees.

"Anyway, he woke up after being unconscious a few weeks later and found out that the fire nation took over Ba Sing Se and that the world believed that he was dead. They tried to keep it that way so that on the day of the eclipse, they wouldn't expect him to show up. They hid out in the fire nation until the invasion, but when they got to the royal palace, the Ozai had been moved. Their window was gone."

"After that plan failed, they went to the Western Air Temple where Aang found his fire bending teacher. It was quite ironic, seeing as his fire bending teacher was, in fact, Zuko, the son of the Fire Lord, who was banished and sent to capture the Avatar. But he eventually found his way and convinced Aang that he truly wanted to help him destroy his father. Aang now knew that he had to kill the Fire Lord on the day the comet arrived. When it came to the day, Aang was in an all-out battle with the Fire lord. Aang was just about to end his life when he found another way to restore balance to the world, without taking Ozai's life."

Everyone was holding their breaths.

'What? What did he do?' The Fellowship internally screamed.

"He..." Korra trailed off, letting out a large, and genuine, yawn. "You know what, I'll tell you tomorrow, I'm tired. Good night."

She laid down, feeling exhausted, and immediately fell into a deep sleep.

The men were outraged. Aragorn was trying to wake her, Pippin was shaking her violently, while Gimli, Boromir and the other hobbits were shouting at her in unison.

"What happened?! What did he do?! You must tell us!" Most of them were yelling in indignation.

Even Legolas and Gandalf wanted to wake her.

After a few minutes of attempting to wake the woman, everyone now saw there was no way of rousing her from her sleep.

Instead, they talked to one another in hushed whispers. Theorizing what happened to the Fire Lord and wondering what happened after.

Slowly, everyone went to sleep, their imaginations racing. Aragorn and Gandalf were the last one's awake.

"Gandalf. Do you think Korra could help us? From what we've heard, fire benders can be deadly, she'd be a good ally."

"We still don't know much about her," the wizard uttered with a shake of his head, "and we can't just expect her to put her life at risk, but I have a feeling she'll want to join us. We will offer for her to travel with us and find out more about her."

The Ranger looked over to Korra and smiled.

"Yes, that sounds good."