When Worlds Collide: Book Two, Earth

“A secret passage?” Sokka asked. “Why didn’t we just use this last time?”
“Last time?” I asked.
“Long story,” Aang said, waving his hand, then took off the lid to the sewer pipe. We were splashed with disgusting green water. “Does that answer your question Sokka?”
I chuckled and followed Aang into the pipe.
I was behind Katara, and took her idea of water bending all of the gross water away from me.
I heard Sokka complaining behind me, but I just laughed and ignored him.
When we reached the city, we climbed out of the sewer, and I sighed.
“That wasn’t as bad as I thought,” Katara said.
Sokka came out, covered in slime and goo. Katara water bended all the gunk off of him, and he fell back, soaking wet, so Aang used air bending to dry him off.
I tilted my head, looking at Sokka. “Um... Sokka?”
“What?” he asked.
“You have something on your face,” I told him, hiding my smile. He looked as the two small pink creatures started sucking on his face, and started screaming.
Aang tackled him into a wall to shush him. “Stop making so much noise,” the monk said. “It’s just a purple pentipus.”
Once we had all of the cute little things off, two Fire Nation guys started yelling at us.
“Hey!” one said.
Aang hid behind us and pulled a hat on over his head.
“What are you kids doing out past curfew?” the same guy asked.
“Sorry,” Katara said, “we were just on our way home.”
We all smiled and turned to walk away.
“Wait,” the man called. “What’s the matter with him?”
The others froze, and I rolled my eyes, looking at the back of Sokka’s neck. Huh... it looked like he had the chicken pocks. Do they have those here? “He has Pentipocks, sir,” I said.
They others looked at me, relieved.
The man walked towards us, and started to touch Sokka’s face.
“Um... it’s very contagious,” Katara rushed. The man pulled back his hand, and I sighed.
Sokka started to put on a show, and started to moan. “It’s so horrible, I’m dying!”
“And its very deadly,” I said.
The man backed up to his friends, and started saying how he had heard of it. Wait, was it really real? “We better go wash our hands!” the guy said. “And burn our clothes!” they ran off, and I giggled.
“Wow,” I said. “Those are the most gullible people I have ever met.”
Aang chuckled too, and then we were off, searching for King Bumi.
We were walking when we saw a group of people walking. From behind us, we heard something, and turned to see a giant boulder sliding down the hill, heading right toward the group. Aang, acting quickly, used air bending to knock it out of the way just in time.
“It’s the Resistance!” a woman yelled, and then another girl, about my age, threw something at Aang. He dodged, and we started to run, with the girl hot on our heels.
At one point, I tripped, and when I got up, the girl was right behind me. I took out my fans, and stood to face her.
She had an emotionless look to her. My eyes widened as I recognized who she was.
Mai.
She smirked and threw something sharp at me. I dodged and opened my fans, ready to fight.
She made a move to hit me, and I ducked, then spun to hit her with my fan. She faltered, but was quick to jump back. I used fire bending to make a wall in between us, and when the flames died down, I was already with the others.
Suddenly, the floor dropped, and we were with another group of people, all of whom were from the Earth Kingdom.
A man stepped forward, and I gulped.

“So is King Bumi with you guys?” Aang asked. “Is he leading the resistance?”
“Of course not!” the guy said. “The day of the invasion, we were ready for battle. We were prepared to defend our city. To fight for our lives, and our freedom. But before we even had a chance... King Bumi surrendered.”
We looked at Aang, and I saw his face fall.
“The day of the invasion, I asked King Bumi what he wanted to do,” the man continued. “He looked me in the eye and said ‘We are going to do nothing.’ It doesn’t matter now. Fighting the Fire Nation is the only path to freedom. And freedom is worth dying for.”
“Actually, there’s another path to freedom,” Aang said. “You could leave Omashu. You’re directing all your energy to fighting the Fire Nation, but you’re out numbered. You can’t win. Now’s the time to retreat, to live another day.”
“You don’t understand,” the same man said. “They’ve taken our home, and we have to fight them at any cost!”
“I don’t know Yin,” the guy next to him said. “Living to fight another day is starting to sound pretty good to me.”
Everyone else agreed, and Yin sighed. “Fine. But there’s thousands of citizens that need to leave. How are we going to get them all out?”
Sokka had a thoughtful look in his eye, and he smiled. “Suckers,” he said. “You all are about to come down with a nasty case of Pentipocks.”
I grinned. “Sokka, you’re a genius.”

After we were all covered in dots, and we were acting sick, we started making our way to the gates. In no time, the Fire Nation people opened them, and we were free to go. We walked until we were out of sight of Omashu before we stopped to rest. Everyone set up camp, and we all waited for Aang to return.

“There he is,” I said, standing up, and racing over to Aang and a giant creature.
“We looked everywhere,” Aang said, “no Bumi.”
Katara hugged him, and Sokka hugged the giant beast. My eyes widened as I took it in.
“What is that?” I asked.
“This is Flopsy, Bumi’s pet,” Aang told me with a small smile.
I raised my eyebrows but nodded.
“We’ve got a problem,” Yin said, coming up to us. “We just did a head count.”
“Oh no,” Katara said. “Who’s missing?”
“No. We have an extra,” Yin said, and turned, showing us a little baby that was playing with Momo.
“Awe!” I said, and rushed over to the little boy. “He’s so adorable!”
I looked up and saw Katara, Sokka and Aang’s jaws dropped. The baby giggled, and I smiled, giving him a big hug.
After a while, we were all sitting around one of the fires. I was playing with the little baby, and everyone was watching us.
I set the boy down, and watched as he went over to Sokka, and picked up his boomerang.
“No!” Sokka said, taking his weapon back. “Bad Fire Nation baby!”
The boy started to cry, and Katara hit Sokka on the arm. Sokka sighed. “Fine,” he said, and gave it back to the child.
Immediately, the kid stopped crying and started giggling. “Oh you’re so cute,” Katara cooed, and kissed him on the cheek.
“Sure he’s cute now. But when he’s older, he’ll join the Fire Nation. You won’t think he’s so cute then,” Yin said. “He’ll be a killer.”
“Does that look like the face of a killer to you?” Katara asked, picking the babe up into the air.
“Of course not,” I said, pinching the little guys cheeks. “He’s just too cute.”
For once, Katara wasn’t glaring at me, instead, she was smiling while we played with the baby. It seemed as if this was the only thing we could agree on.
We looked up as a elegant bird landed on some rocks nearby.
“A messenger hawk,” Yin said, and walked over to grab the paper it was holding. He handed it to Aang, and the monk opened it up and read it.
“Its from the governor,” he said. “He thinks we kidnaped his son. So he wants to make a trade... his son... for King Bumi.” His eyes widened, and he looked shocked and excited.
I frowned. “You mean we can’t keep him?” I asked, pouting.
Katara rolled his eyes. “We weren’t going to keep him in the first place. We can’t raise a child.”
I huffed. “I could! I have a little brother that I take care of all the time.”
“He’s not ours. And I’m sure his family is worried sick about him,” Aang said. “Imagine how you would feel if you lost...,” he trailed off, looking at me. “Never mind.”
I sighed, wiping away a tear that I didn’t know was there. “I understand, when you put it that way,” I said softly. “I guess I just missed having Danny around.”
Yin looked at us before excusing himself. “I can see you have matters to discuss. I’ll go plan with the other men.” And he walked away.
“I’m sorry Sam,” Aang said, looking at me. “I didn’t realize that-“
“It’s fine,” I said, interrupting him. “I just... I’m really tired. I’m going to bed.”
They all nodded, and I walked away.

The next morning, we were going to take the little boy back to his family.
“You do realize that probably walking into a trap right?” Sokka asked Aang, who was walking down to meet us.
He handed the baby to me while he climbed up on Appa and I shook my head. “I don’t think it’s a trap,” I said. “Any sane person would give anything for the safe return of their child.”
“And it’s a new day,” Aang said, smiling, “I have a good feeling about this.”
In no time we were at the meeting place were we were going to make the trade.
The baby for Bumi.
We were their for a few minutes when we noticed three figures walking towards us, all of whom were female.
Bumi appeared to be in a coffin made of metal, covering everything but his face.
“You brought my brother?” the girl in front asked.
It was Mai, the one who had attacked us the first day we arrived.
“We’re ready to trade,” Aang called.
The girl on the right turned and spoke. “I’m sorry, but a thought just occurred to me,” she said. “Do you mind?”
“Of course not Princess Azula,” Mai said.
I gasped and stepped back. Sokka gave me an odd looked, but I just shook my head, and handed the baby to him. I could hardly support my own weight, how could I stand and hold the baby at the same time?
“We’re trading a two year old for a king,” Azula said. “A powerful earth bending king? It just doesn’t seem like a fair trade, does it?”
“You’re right,” Mai said, and motioned for Bumi to be brought back up away from us. “The deals off.”
“Bumi!” Aang yelled, and raced up to get him.
Azula shot blue fire out of her fist, but he avoided it and raced up to get his friend. The Fire Nation princess started to chase him, but I got in front of her.
“I don’t think so,” I scowled.
She glared, but then blinked, and looked at me. “You... who are you?” she asked.
I glared. “None of your business,” I spat and threw fire at her head.
She dodged and studied me. She then looked up in time to see Aang loose his hat, and his tattoos were easy to see.
“The Avatar,” she said, “and and a lost legend? My lucky day.”
I cocked my head. Lost legend? What?” before I could say anything, she threw me to the ground and chased after Aang. “Don’t let this girl get away!” she shouted at her friends, pointing at me.
I stood up shakily and glared. I looked over and saw that the girl dressed in pink was chasing Sokka, and Mai was fighting Katara. I watched as Sokka managed to get the baby away, and he disappeared.
The girl in pink then started to charge at me. My eyes widened as she got closer, and shot a fire ball at her. She easily dodged, and I growled. She jumped and landed in front of me. I flinched when she got in my face, and saw her eyes widen as she looked at me.
“You...,” she trailed off and shook her head.
Without hesitating, I took out my fans and aimed to attack. She dodged, and I missed her completely. We continued fighting for another minute or two before she knocked me off my feet.
I landed on the ground with a thud, and I was out of breath. She held me down, and held down a pressure point on my back. I struggled before everything went black.
Great.