Dusk in War Time

Day: 120

Old Mining District, Lower Ring, Ba Sing Se

It was Xīnyuè Jié in the Earth Kingdom, their New Year celebration. And if the Fire Nation thought that a little siege would deter the festivities, Ba Sing Se was determined to prove them wrong. The festival started out cautiously as citizens tested the indulgence of the state authorities. Unlike most years, it began in the Upper Ring, the ones most likely to get away with breaking curfew and the blackout law. The next night, when the guards turned a blind eye, the Middle Ring tentatively joined in.

So, things really got going the third night.

Frankly, Lee had never witnessed such flagrant debauchery in his entire life. Public intoxication laws were thrown from the Walls along with the curfew. Men stumbled through the muddy streets in all levels of drunkenness at all hours of the day. Hookers barely bothered with rooms anymore. Women fled to the temples, asking blessings—and forgiveness—for their family.

It was almost enough to forget the Siege. Almost.

Despite their best attempts, and indeed Xīnyuè Jié was a noble attempt, Lee could not forget the black cloud that was the Fire Nation beyond the Wall. Occasionally, they made their presence known, throwing boulders from their massive trebuchets. The Earth Kingdom responded in kind, hurling their own boulders into the Fire Nation camp or sending shock troops to nip their flanks. Lee only heard of the latter through heralds and the state-run newspapers. For the most part though, life went on. They watered their milk and complained about their military assignments, but they made do. The Earth Kingdom endured.

Now though, the cracks were beginning to show.

The crowds pressed in on food vendors. They became more agitated day by day. Before, the people seemed resigned; now, fights were common and Lee heard rumors of looting in the other districts. Grumbling about the military's complacency grew bolder. The greatest mark of change were the Dai Li who frequently prowled the streets. In the past few months, their numbers had grown significantly. People whispered of friends and neighbors who had disappeared, snatched from their homes in the middle of the night.

Cheng thought it was all a bunch of bull, state propaganda to keep everyone inside after curfew. Lee wanted to believe him, but he wasn't so sure.

"Your pops know you're here?" Cheng asked, passing the drink to Lee—a bottle of 64 Lùshuǐ. Lee knew nothing about liquor, but enough that some merchant was pulling his hair out trying to find the missing bottle. Lùshuǐ was expensive. You could buy a bucket of gold for less. They would've sold it if they could convince a merchant that they just happened upon it legally.

"Nope." Lee took a long drink. He was used to drinking whatever the change in his pocket could buy. Honestly, he couldn't tell the difference. His head felt lighter. "He'll probably roast me alive when I get back."

Not that Lee cared. He absolutely did not care.

"What is it with you guys? Every time I see you these days you're storming out of your apartment."

"Trouble with the old man?" asked Fen, reaching for the bottle. Lee let him have it.

"It's nothing."

"Look I don't want to pry…"

"Then don't."

They sat on the roof of the monorail station to watch the parade and fireworks. Fen wore a threadbare coat over his usual sleeveless shirt, the only one he owned. It did almost nothing against the chilling wind. The air held a frosty edge tonight. Even Lee and Cheng were shivering and covered in goose bumps. Down below, buildings held off the worst of the wind and the warmth of so many bodies kept the crowd comfortable.

"You good to keep running jobs?" Fen asked.

Lee watched the sun impassively sink below the Wall. "Don't see why not. Unless he tries to lock me up." He wrinkled his nose at the thought. His legs were going to sleep so he shifted his weight. "Why? Something coming up."

Fen stretched and yawned. "Maybe. Not sure yet."

"Heard there's tons of food in the Upper Rings," said Magpie, formerly known to Lee as Mohawk. His dark irises gleamed. "Heard they're hoarding it all. They're keeping all the good stuff for themselves while they let us starve down here."

"Probably," Deshi yawned.

"And what? You're okay with that?"

Deshi peered at Magpie through heavy lidded eyes. "Yep."

"So let me get this straight…"

"Here we go," Fen sighed.

"…you're okay with a bunch of gold-shitting nobles letting us starve. They're the ones who abandoned the fields. They're the ones who can't get the Fire Nation off our back—"

"And they're also the ones keeping the Fire Nation from killing us all so shove a bun in it," Deshi said.

"It's just a rumor, anyways," Lee said. A rumor that he believed, in part. But he just felt like disagreeing with Magpie. "No one thinks the Upper Ring is actually hoarding food."

Guo nodded. "Where'd you even hear that from?"

Magpie seemed less confident than a moment ago. "Well, my neighbor said his cousin had…"

"Oh for Spirit's sake!" Deshi moaned.

Cheng nudged Fen for a cigarette. The two lit up and excitedly watched the show. Fen tried to look impassive, but never took his eyes off the argument.

"I'm telling you, the Tip-Tops are holding out on us. It ain't right. It ain't right!"

"What ain't right?" Deshi said. "The part where they defend us? Look I want more food as much as you but that don't mean…"

"They defend us? Is that it? These Walls aren't here to defend us. They're here to keep us from all their silk and gold."

"So what? You're gonna storm the Upper Ring? Knock yourself out."

"Brown-nosing, freckled-faced prick! See how you feel when you're starving!"

"No one's starving," Deshi stared pointedly at Magpie's swollen belly. "Especially not you."

Magpie opened his mouth to respond when the sky cracked and the glow of fireworks illuminated the city.

Colors bloomed between the emerging stars—greens and golds that showered the city with good luck. The crowd below them cheered when the first explosions shocked the night. They added their own noise—drums and flutes, songs and firecrackers meant to wake the great guardian spirits sleeping in the earth to chase off mischievous demons and bring good luck for the year.

Magpie tried to make himself heard, but the others drowned him out, cheering at the sky.

"Will you guys shut it!" Magpie complained. "Seriously! Deshi—"

The others booed and swatted the heavy boy until he finally shut up.

"That one goes to Deshi," Guo laughed.

"Who asked you?" Magpie growled.

Guo held up his hands. A lazy, condescending grin spread across his face. "Give it a rest, Mag-eat-a-dozen-pies."

Magpie jumped to his feet but the others pulled him down. Magpie had some stupid rivalry with Guo that Lee couldn't figure out. Probably because Guo, three years younger than Magpie, had replaced him as the muscle of the group. That was a hard blow to anyone's pride, Lee distantly mused.

Lee settled into watching the festival unfold around him. The bottle made its way into his hand a few times, each time the edges of the world blurred more and he grinned with greater abandon. This felt good. He felt good. This gave him a chance to forget everything happening around him. Things had never been great before the Siege. On some level, deep down, he knew that. But he had learned to accept the weevils in his rice, the lice in his pillow, the city stench, and the companionable ache of hunger.

But the Siege changed all of that.

Lee learned the trick to staying well fed: having low standards. That didn't help when there was no food at all. Lee and his band could swipe enough food from careless merchants because they were ahead of the competition. How long before others turned to stealing? How long before that grew into riots and all out looting?

They joked about who they'd rob in the riots, homes of bullies they would vandalize. They joked about anything they could. But Lee couldn't shake the growing sense of desperation. He couldn't go out alone without someone lashing out against him as a zázhong. The suspicious eyes of guards and strangers frightened him. And now, Fu looked at him with the same suspicion.

Lee watched the crowd and tried to forget about his father. The parade was passing below them, a river of dancers and musicians, massive lion-turtle floats that took five men to hoist through the crowd. Adults rubbed its head for luck while children laughed and darted between its legs. Lee saw a group of Air Monks, their yellow robes easy to spot in the crowd, giving out coin and blessing to those in need. Men offered them donations and they would barely walk ten steps before handing it out to the endless line of desperately poor. Lee even spotted the grey vestments of the Tiáojiě Rén. He didn't know much about their order, just that they usually wandered the countryside, looking for dead to bury. Lee suspected the Siege had trapped them. Just like everyone else.

"Will you look at that?" Cheng said. He peered at a group of soldiers. They were probably supposed to be enforcing curfew, but had gone AWOL to join the festival instead. Their armor got the attention of the local girls who sashayed around them with coy, predatorial smiles. One brave girl leaned in and kissed a young soldier with enough passion to make Cheng blush. "I want his position," Cheng sighed.

"That'll be us in a few years," Guo said.

"Can't wait," Cheng said earnestly. "We'll finally get out of this Spirits-forsaken city, see the countryside," he elbowed Fen playfully in the side, "meet some ladies."

"Already got one," Fen said, winking at Wang, who Lee still thought of as Gap-Tooth. From what Lee heard, Wang's sister had fallen for Fen's willy charms. The sneer on Wang's face was enough to know how he felt about the situation. Lee had little sympathy for the boy. He was still sore from their fight several weeks ago.

"Good thing," Cheng said. "Leave enough for the rest of us."

"Please and thank you," Guo said.

"Not you," Deshi teased. "Country girls like city-boys. Not lumbering oxen."

"Don't know," Guo grinned. "Heard ox riding's a sport out in the country."

Lee spat out his mouthful of whiskey, trying to contain his laughter, if not the liquor. He went in for another drink but Wang tried to snatch it from him.

"That counts as a drink. I'm next!"

Lee held him off, still laughing, as he took another long draw from the bottle. He smacked his lips and gave it to the now pouting Wang.

BOOM!

Lee's stomach dropped, falling the distance to the ground below. Something had suddenly changed in the rhythm of the explosions. Instead of cracking the night, they shattered it. The light became harsher—starker.

BOOM!

The rhythm of the festival stuttered, striking a discordant note. The sounds drowned out what Lee could clearly hear from the rooftop, but those on the ground began to realize something had changed. The parade carried on, captivating those closest to it even as the edges of the crowd began to turn their eyes to the south.

Deshi squinted at the horizon. "Are those…are those fireworks…falling?"

Lee followed Deshi's line of sight and saw he was right. Fireworks dipped over the wall, falling into, by Lee's guess, the Southern Slums.

"Roku's balls…" Wang breathed. Horror restricting the curse to a whisper.

Not fireworks, Lee realized—artillery. The Fire Nation was blasting them with artillery. A hellish orange glow began to brighten the southern side of the Wall like an artificial dawn. Screams carried over the sounds of celebration.

Lee watching with horrified fascination as soldiers and guards began to spread the word. The news rippled in from the edges, starting slow. The horns and drum beats, the fireworks still erupting overhead, made the news hard to hear. It was repeated multiple times before each person understood. But fear soon found a foothold. It swelled slowly through the crowd, building momentum like a landslide—knocking stones loose, breaking away ground, until it gathered enough momentum that it swept through the whole crowd. Finally, hysteria overwhelmed the whole mass of them. Most began to flee without even knowing what from. They saw others running for their homes and decided the idea seemed fine enough to follow along.

The parade evaporated in the panicked heat of the mob. Despite the lack of danger so deep within the Ring, performers dropped their costumes, slipping in the mud, pushing each other out the way in their wild run for shelter. The mighty lion-turtles lay trampled in the soggy streets, their bright green and gold now stained with mud. Some musicians clutched their instruments, protective as any mother for her child. Others dropped them on the spot and splashed away.

Lee made out a group of yellow-clad Air Nomads taking to the sky to escape the stampede. With a swell of admiration, Lee realize the monks were flying towards the danger to help in whatever way they could.

Cheng stood. "We gotta get over there."

"Screw that," said Magpie. "What if they send another round over."

Guo was already on his feet too. "Worry about that when we get there."

The others sat, looking uncomfortably between the brothers and each other.

"Are you guys kidding me?" Cheng shouted. "Get off your burning asses!"

"Nothing we can do," said Fen through clenched teeth. He seemed more angry at himself than Cheng. "Someone else will help. Others know what to do."

"Those people need someone!"

Lee knew Cheng was thinking of his brothers the Earth Kingdom had abandoned. It was only a few months ago, but it felt like years to Lee. Of course Cheng and Guo didn't trust their military to help these people. Not after last time.

"If you go," said Wang. "That artillery…it'll spread you across the whole district."

"They have people trained for this," Fen insisted. "We'll just get in the way."

Lee knew the brothers would go. He decided he couldn't stop them and he couldn't let them go alone. He thought of the Earth Kingdom, sitting back to save its own skin. Would these people die the same way as those farmers? Trapped and seared alive as they waited for a rescue that wasn't coming.

Spirits, thought Lee, Fu is going to kill me.

He rose, teetering under the alcohol's influence.

"You wanna be a hero?" Fen said. "Heroes are always the first to die."

Lee held his eyes for a long moment. Then he turned and, together with the brothers, raced across the rooftops.

Fire Nation Camp

Lu Ten watched the artillery disappear behind the Outer Wall and felt his stomach plunging with them.

He had just returned from ghoul watch and was heading for the officer's club—little more than a tent they had designated for drinking—when the first wave let fly. He tried to keep his own feelings in check. Fire Nation doctrine called for intense aggression. The faster the Fire Nation scared the enemy into surrender, the less lives were lost overall. A quick war was the only humane one.

The philosophy was sound, but it didn't stop Lu Ten from thinking of the helpless civilians dying as fireballs crushed them. It didn't ease the thoughts of Dragon Fire burning them alive.

A beefy arm, which could easily belong to a sabre-moose, pulled aside the tent flap of the officer's club. A muscled shoulder and neck followed with a cinder block of a face not far behind.

"Roku's balls. Would you look at that?" Second Lieutenant Chit Sang had come for a better look after he heard the artillery launching. Large as a saber-moose and with a temper to match, Sang loved watching things burn almost as much as he liked burning them. With his enviously high birth (he was Lu Ten's fifth cousin or something) the Fire Nation would love him if not for his second son status and tendency to disagree with his officers. Violently.

Chit grinned at Lu Ten and the prince scowled in return. Chit had a savage love for savage things that Lu Ten found distasteful.

"Come on!" Chit complained when he saw the first lieutenant's expression. "Tell me that's not awesome. I mean, look at those things go! Spirits!"

"Oh, it's amazing!" Lu Ten spat. "The way they smoke all those innocent people. I'd love to watch all the children burning."

"Well, not that part," Chit admitted. "I meant the hurdling boulders part! They're like dragons up there!" He called to the city, "How do you like that you Mud Monkey bastards! Ha ha!"

Lu Ten didn't have the stomach for the spectacle. He pushed past Chit and ducked into the drinking tent.

The inside was spacious by field camp standards. It comfortably fit the tent's half dozen occupants, seated on cushions around a low table, with enough room to accommodate the chest of liquor in the back, which served as a substitute for an actual bar. No such luxury this far from friendly territory, if any territory in the Earth Kingdom could rightly be called friendly. The chest also deterred the junior enlisted, who were much less likely to make off with their booze when it was locked up instead of laying out on shelves. Because their drinking tent wasn't an officially designated officer's club, the senior officers couldn't get a guard posting for it while they were on duty. Lu Ten and his fellow officers had talked about acquisitioning one of the numerous barns, but that required far too much paperwork. All they wanted was a place to drink in peace.

"First Lieutenant," Ryoichi Shiba snapped to attention when he saw Lu Ten. The other officers simply waved. A few chuckled at Ryoichi's formality.

"At ease," Lu Ten said. Ryoichi was a serious and idealistic man, the kind who obeyed orders on principle. This made him a novelty amongst the new breed. The older officers had bets on who could break him first. They obeyed orders too, of course. They just felt entitled to a fair share of complaining beforehand. While they slacked on grooming standards, Ryoichi maintained his impeccably, to the point of scrutiny. It seemed unnatural how well-groomed he managed to keep himself even with supply shortages and the chaos of combat.

Lu Ten liked Ryoichi but the other officers thought of him as a kiss-ass trying for a promotion. Lu Ten couldn't honestly say the thought hadn't crossed his mind. Ryoichi was born in the colonies but had some distant noble relation that might get a career on track. But then, maybe he truly believed in honor and fidelity and all that. You just couldn't tell with Ryoichi.

"Sir, you see where Chit went?" Yuudai asked.

"Just admiring the carnage," Lu Ten said. He couldn't wait to get a drink and get his mind off it all. The distant thunder of artillery echoed.

"Not much to admire, sir," Yuudai noted. "Can't see anything past that muddy Wall."

They had all been admiring the fireworks but those had stopped with the artillery strike. After that, they'd gone inside to find other entertainment—presumably at the bottom of a bottle.

"I wanna see the Dragon Fire go over!" Takeshi said, rushing out with the giddiness of a schoolboy at his first Fire Lord Festival. He loved burning things as much as Sang, but only with the naïve fascination of a child.

Ryoichi rose from his cushion and straightened his uniform before going to their liquor stash. "What do you want, sir?" he asked over his shoulder.

"Rice wine," Lu Ten said. He undid the straps of his shoulder armor, slipping it over his head. He set it by a cushion. "Whatever's strongest."

Ryoichi gave a hint of a smile. He opened the chest and began to rummage around. "Uh…we got some Minoru…some Watatari…"

"Got any Tama?"

"Uh…don't see any. How about Shiying?" he asked, holding a bottle of it up for the lieutenant.

"Shiying is fine." Lu Ten settled on cushion. He took off his helmet and placed it to the side. He stretched his leg, trying to relieve the ache in his right knee. He had a vague memory of injuring it a few years back but couldn't remember how. Lu Ten wished for the hundredth time that firebenders could heal.

Ryoichi brought him the bottle and Lu Ten warmed it with firebending. He pulled off the cork and took a long, satisfied drink. Yuudai passed him a cigarette, which Lu Ten lit with a small flame dancing off his thumb—a trick requiring too much precision to be practical. Lu Ten just liked to show off sometimes.

With a smoke in one hand and a drink in the other, Lu Ten could final relax.

"How was…what did they have you on? Ghoul duty?" asked Yuudai.

"Ghoul duty," Lu Ten confirmed.

Yuudai shuddered and even Ryoichi offered a rare look of sympathy. Ghoul duty was just one of those things you learned to suck up and do without too much grumbling. Everyone hated it. Ghouls bred like flies during times of war. They smelled rancid and looked like a "mole-bat face-fucked a corpse," according to Chit. They roamed the countryside in packs, their numbers swelling because of the war. They rarely bothered armies on the move but were known to attack field camps.

There was also the fact that ghoul duty was an out of the way duty.

Chit wandered back in with Takeshi, chatting excitedly.

"You see that Dragon Fire go over," Chit jabbered to the younger officer. "I bet we're smoking those Mud Monkeys."

Takeshi laughed. "We should have a roast out later."

Lu Ten looked at Yuudai. His square jaw rolled as if chewing something bitter. He squinted at Chit. Too late, Lu Ten realized the man was looking for a fight.

"What do you think we're hitting?" Yuudai asked the question to no one in particular, but somehow managed to aim it at Chit Wang.

"Mud Monkeys. Weren't you listening?" Chit said dismissively.

"Oh right! Mud Monkeys! Say, what were you before this? A royal scholar, right?"

Chit's face went hard. "Funny. A real comedian, you are."

Takeshi looked blankly between the standoff while Ryoichi lit another cigarette. He took a draw and watched Lu Ten, ready to back him up if he decided to get in the middle.

"I meant—I'll try to use small words for you—what structures are we hitting? What do you think? Barracks? A garrison? A school?"

Chit stepped closed to Yuudai, flexing his barreled chest and generally trying to look menacing. Yuudai pushed off the ground and stuck his face right up under Chit's nose, refusing to be intimidated. Lu Ten tensed himself to hold Chit back if he got rough. Right now, they were just blowing smoke. He shook his head at Ryoichi, a slight move to let him know everything was under control.

"You think you're funny? You wanna step outside, you ink-sipping, squint-eyed puddle of piss-mud?"

"You want to know what I want? I want you to answer the question. What do you think we're hitting? Who are we killing out there?"

"If those Mud Monkeys didn't want to get smoked they should've surrendered," Chit said.

"You didn't answer my question," Yuudai said.

"Fact is," Ryoichi broke in, "the General decided that Ba Sing Se needed some encouragement to surrender. If a few burnt homes gets their cooperation, it's better than a whole city starving."

Yuudai didn't look away from Chit. He breathed hard. Then he nodded, a grudging jerk of the head, and backed off. Chit snorted with contempt.

"Took them long enough, if you ask me," Chit said despite no one asking him. "Been here—what? Four—five months now? We've had the artillery up since day one and we're just now smoking them? In what world does that make any muddy sense?"

"Well…" Takeshi scanned the faces of his squad. He fidgeted with uncharacteristic reservation. "You know…the General…"

The men tensed. Even their local psychopath seemed to know when he was toeing the line. And questioning the Dragon placed a foot well over that line. They considered other officers fair game for critiquing and questioning, if they kept it discreet. Everyone knew the General didn't like to get his hands dirty and everyone had their own opinion. Some admired him for it, calling him a man of principle and honor. Others had less charitable thoughts.

All eyes turned to Lu Ten. They all liked the Dragon's son, but no one would say a word against the military staff in front of him.

The prince raised his hands helplessly. His cigarette dangled between his fingers. "Ryoichi's right. The General decided it was time for artillery, so artillery it is. We've had a pretty clean campaign so far. Maybe the staff just decided to step it up." That was the most neutral response he could give. Honor demanded he keep the rest of his thoughts to himself.

"And look where that got us, sir," Chit protested. Obviously. He didn't have the same sense of honor. "We'd be home by now if command was willing to rough up the Mud Monkeys a bit more."

"Fuck that," Takeshi said. "I haven't gotten to kill anything yet."

Yuudai started to argue when the head of Yokota Toki popped through the tent flap.

"Hello, boys." He grinned and poked his hands through the entrance. In each one he carried a dark, ruby-colored bottle. "I come bearing gifts." The men's eyes fixed on the bottle like shirshu on a scent. Yokota gave it a shake and its contents slapped against the glass. "Happy New Year."

The men had christened Yokota as "Joker" for his humor and permanently carefree demeanor. Only the other officers called him that. To his face, at least. He was well liked by the men beneath him and the other officers shared the sentiment. In a military based on fierce discipline and fiercer tactics, Yokota believed what was good for morale was good for the army and thus good for the Fire Nation. And in his experience, alcohol was magnificent for morale.

He handed the bottle to an awestruck Yuudai. He read the label and whistled through his teeth. "Kyoshi's tits," he swore. He held up the bottle for the other men to see. "Honest-to-Agni Hiroki Firewhiskey. You can't get this stuff anywhere east of the Jǐzhù."

"How in twelve hells did you get us a bottle of Hiroki?" Lu Ten asked and took the bottle.

"You can thank the Captain for that. Had to trade him a month's worth of cigarettes but I'd say it's worth it. I'll just bum some off you lecherous, gold-leafed inbreds."

"Is he talking about us?" Yuudai deadpanned. He asked Ryoichi, "He knows he's a noble too, right?"

"I'm from the colonies," Takeshi said. "We don't have gold leaf."

"No," Yuudai agreed. "You just have a bunch of mud-skinned, snot-eyed, mongrels who leech the wealth of our nation to support their backwater, dirt-humping lifestyle."

Takeshi thought for a moment. "Yeah, I guess we do have some of those."

Yuudai grinned and seized the young officer. "This is what I love about our little Takeshi." He put an arm over the youth's shoulder and presented him to the rest of the men. "You could call his mother, Agni bless her, a monkey-humping harlot and Takeshi here takes it like a man." Yuudai started giving him a nuggie. "We'll make a General out of you yet, you little psychopath."

While Takeshi pushed the older man off, Lu Ten leaned over to Yokota. ""I'll pay you back," he promised.

"No you won't," Yokota said with mock seriousness. He pointed a stern finger at the prince. "I like the future Fire Lord owing me some favors."

"Joker, I could kiss you," Yuudai said, taking the bottle.

"You are ugly. I want Charming."

Ryoichi chuckled. Only Yokota could get one out of him. "Get in line."

"You aren't Charming's type," Lu Ten informed him.

"What's his type?"

"Earth Kingdom country girls," Lu Ten grinned. Ryoichi's smile became more self-conscious and his face might've darkened in the dim light.

"She was…nice," he said simply.

Yokota feigned bewilderment. "Are you saying my sweet, disciplined Ryoichi gave his honor away to some black-nailed Mud Monkey." He put both hands on Ryoichi's shoulders and stared him intently the eyes, struggling to keep a straight face. "Who did this to you?"

"I don't know," Takeshi said. "They don't really do it for me. They're kind of…I don't know…prude. You know?"

"Nah, man" Chit said. "They just wear more clothes cause it's not hotter than a dragon's ass-crack all the time."

The men mumbled in agreement, the previous hostility mostly forgotten, replaced with the usual back and forth of playful insults.

Yokota nudged Lu Ten. "You got a moment?" he whispered.

The prince nodded and the two went outside while the others began filling up glasses. The air was cool and smelled of smoke, which drifted in heavy clouds from the burning city. He could still hear the distant booms of falling artillery.

Lu Ten crossed his arms. "What's up?"

Yokota scrubbed at his face and wouldn't meet Lu Ten's eyes. They had grown up in the Royal Fire Academy together but Yokota never forgot that Lu Ten was royalty. He never knew what might set them off. Say one word wrong and, next thing you know, you're committing ritual suicide with the Dragon of the West breathing down your neck.

"Look, I wouldn't ask if it wasn't so important to the company. But uh…look…I heard some rumors that you and…the General got into it." He saw Lu Ten's fists clench and rushed on. "And everyone's noticed that you've been given shit assignments lately and…just tell me, sir," Yokota never called Lu Ten sir, "are we about to roll the Bloody Dice again?"

Lu Ten immediately understood Yokota's fear. 'Rolling the Bloody Dice' was a soldier's term. In a military that promoted largely on one's nobility, the spectrum of competence for any given position was terrifyingly wide. The higher the birth, the higher a man could—and often, would—rise through the military ranks. That man might be the greatest military commander since Masaaki the Exalted, or a disgraced third-born son who couldn't find his ass if he sat on it.

Lu Ten gave Yokota a sympathetic smile to set him at ease. He understood his friend's concern. The Ninety Fourth hadn't had much luck with their Captains as of late.

Their first company commander after basic was a man named Bando. He had clearly daydreamed his way through officer academy, drifting along on his impressively royal blood (twenty-third in line for the throne). He never stopped talking about the glory of war, the tragedy of the soldier, and shit himself the first time they made contact with the enemy. He talked loudly, as if that made the content of his speech more impressive, and drank a section's worth of whiskey a night, which he stored in his impressively supple belly. He endeared himself to his soldiers by dying quickly in an Earth Kingdom ambush.

Their next commander, they called Gato the Yawner, which summed him up nicely. One soldier even stopped using his mosquito net because he said Gato would catch them all in his mouth anyways. That soldier got malaria. He survived and deemed it worth the joke. Gato seemed profoundly bored with the whole thing until they took the port town of Jeonju. He shit the bed, was relieved of command, and, because he blamed his junior officers and had some connection with the Royal Family, got a promotion rather than death by ritual suicide. Thus, the Ninety Fourth rolled the dice once again.

They thought Agni had decided enough was enough when command made Tatewaki, a grizzled old vet who had lived through the last Southern Offensive, their captain.

"We thought you'd be the one to replace Tatewaki," Yokota said, "and that we might get our asses out of here in one piece. All these shit jobs—we thought the General was testing your honor or—well, you know how the General is." He realized the stupidity of his statement and mentally slapped himself. "I mean. Of course, you do. But then we started hearing the rumors and…well…" He trailed off helplessly, looking to his friend for answers.

"I wish I could tell you some good news," Lu Ten sighed. "I can't say much. The General wants me on another assignment: scouting the mountains when winter ends. I won't be here much longer. I supposed, all these out-of-the-way jobs, the General's trying to get you used to not having me around."

"Shit," Yokota said. Then louder, "Shit!" The young lieutenant composed himself. With a degree of professionalism, he said, "The men are worried, sir. Some say we're cursed. Losing you would be a real hit to the morale."

Lu Ten grinned and swatted Yokota on the shoulder. "That's why they've got you, Joker."

The screech of metal against metal echoed across the camp and another wave of fire flew towards the city. They streaked through the night and disappeared. Yokota watched them fall.

"What're we here for?" he'd asked. He'd said this much without Lu Ten ordering his execution. His eyes flickered restlessly. "What're we here for?"

Lu Ten followed his gaze to the Wall. He couldn't condemn Yokota. A few years ago, he might've. But his time in the army, working his way up from the bottom, had changed him. Maybe teaching him humility had been a mistake on his father's part. Now, he asked himself the same questions. It would be so easy to indulge them.

"We're here to liberate these people," Lu Ten said tightly.

"We aren't liberating them." All humor had gone from Yokota's face. His voice choked in his throat, rough and bitter. He turned to Lu Ten. "We're killing them. Do they even want us here?"

A group of soldiers passed then, joking and shivering. Their laughter faded as the moved on.

Lu Ten had to end this conversation. Personal feelings couldn't get in the way of his duty. Dissent spread like plague; it turned into rebellion and rebellion into chaos. Honorable soldiers turned into bandits and rapists because their officers tolerated insubordination. Lu Ten was duty bound to keep that from happening in his own company.

"They're living under a tyrant, Lieutenant," he said with a harshly. "Their heads are so fucked around they don't know what they want. Once we win the War, things will get better."

Yokota didn't seem able to stop himself. Something had broken or slipped in him. Good humor gave way to the frustration that smoldered inside. "Sir, I don't think they care about that. I think they want to get on with their muddy lives without fire splattering their children across the street. We are marching through here and tearing things apart for these people, sir. What happens when we win?"

Yokota's words made Lu Ten more afraid than angry. Yokota had spoken treason. Or close to it. Any more, and Lu Ten would be bound by duty to see his friend strung from the watchtower. This needed to end. Now.

The prince lunged for Yokota. His hand burned as it struck his friend across the face, tearing across the cheek and catching his nose. He filled his first with the collar of Yokota's uniform, yanking him to his feet as he began to stumble. Lu Ten jerked him forward so their noses nearly touched. "Lieutenant Yokota, I'm going to say this once: shut the fuck up and keep your muddy thoughts to yourself." Yokota looked like a child, shocked by Lu Ten's sudden fury. His mouth worked helplessly to apologize. Lu Ten didn't care. "We are here to do a fucking job. General Miyamoto wants this city, so we will take this city." Yokota tried to pull away but Lu Ten held him fast. "Their reasons are none of your business."

Then he strode away before he could see the betrayal in Yokota's eyes. He was too sick for a drink now. In the distance, the artillery shrieked.

The Southern Slums, Lower Ring, Ba Sing Se

As a young girl, the elders taught Akanna that Naninnak was a place of torment and fire. As she came of age, she heard other, older stories of a frozen waste where souls wandered, seeking purification before passing on to the Lap of Twi. Akanna was no scholar and, in the North, the elders barred women from certain knowledge anyways. She suspected it was easier for the elders to cast the Fire Nation as the villain if they embodied of hell itself.

Her mother steeped her childhood in stories of Naninnak, told with a barely concealed smile to an obstinate child. The old fear returned whenever she saw the work of the War. Watching the Southern Slums, she was suddenly a child again, counting her good deeds and hoping they were enough to save her.

Naninnak wasn't a story anymore.

It was in the Slums looming before her, terrifying and more real than the breath in her lungs—breath that burned with smoke and ash. Akanna thought that years of smoking would condition her lungs. She was wrong. A brown haze obscured everything more than several feet ahead of her; it burned her lungs and clogged her nose. Hot ash stung her skin like splashes of cooking fat popping from a fire pan. The smoke left a dark, oily coat on her skin.

Akanna knew all about Fire Nation siege tactics from personal experience. First, came the flaming boulders of coal, designed to destroy structures and drive people into the streets. Then came the Dragon Fire—an oily, flammable substance that water couldn't extinguish. Dragon Fire was too dangerous to light in advance, but when it landed and caught on the flame of the artillery, the two-part attack could reduce whole cities to ash.

Stone made up most of the Slums, exactly to prevent such fires. But enough refugees threw together shelters of wood scraps and oiled cloth—anything that kept the mud from their beds and the rain off their backs—that they burned now with the fury of a dragon.

Akanna moved quickly with her response team: herself, several soldiers, and an earthbender who carried a massive stone jar filled with water.

"Here," said Akanna. She could not guess what the structure might have been. It lay in skeletal ruins now, spewing black smoke and the bright red flames of Dragon Fire.

"Here?" asked Corporal Lok. The earthbender looked at the blaze. "This place is torched."

"Only the front," she insisted.

"The sowán is near the entrance," a soldier said, pointing to the boulder lying a few yards beyond the door frame. "The Dragon Piss overshot. Might be survivors in the back."

Lok grumbled, but immediately worked to move the sowán from the building. Akanna knew he was a good soldier, he just sulked whenever his pride was wounded. He hated looking foolish in front of others. Almost as much as he hated the Fire Nation.

With the boulder gone, Akanna dipped her mind into Tagiuk Uuman, the Ocean's Heart. As her consciousness grew, it touched the water around her, feeling its swirling energy—an extension of the energy within herself. She moved her body with the flow, entering into and guiding it. She lifted it into the air, matching its rhythm, then sent it to douse whatever flames she could.

Lok worked to bury the Dragon Fire that, thank the Spirits, had mostly fallen in the streets. Without air, the fire hissed and died, leaving behind smoking piles of dirt. All the while, he called profanity at the Fire Nation.

Akanna worked her way into the building, the soldiers close behind. She looked around and realized it was a living space. Few such places existed formally in the Slums. Mostly, the refugees piled upon each other and shoved themselves into any habitable space. What some might call apartments or a townhouse could stretch for blocks, interspersed with common rooms, vending stalls, and play yards.

By Akanna's best guess, the sowán had struck a common room. Fire ate the furniture, chewing the cloth and stuffing. A few pictures burned, too blackened to tell what they might've been. A shrine to Kyoshi lay toppled, incense spilled over the floor. Most of the damage came from the impact. Akanna avoided looking at the body the fireball had struck when it plowed through the ceiling. Even if they had survived the blow, they'd been burning for some time. A few bodies lay against the walls, clearly thrown by the force of the impact. Akanna continued dousing fires as the soldiers checked them.

"Look at her side. She's been dead for a while."

"The two males?"

"No good."

"What a mess."

"Piss-eyed bastards."

She moved deeper into the structure and found she was right. The blast had left the interior mostly intact. She heard baby crying. Leaving the flames behind, the building became dark. Sickly orange light pierced the cracks of the cobbled-together dwelling. Smoke hung from the air but didn't threaten to suffocate anyone. She moved cautiously through the dark, following the baby's sound. She drew a ghost-light from her pack and the room filled with the crystal's strange, green glow. She imagined the people inside were terrified. And fear made fools.

"Is anyone here?" she called. Perhaps they would trust that the Fire Nation didn't know Qinese. "You're safe now. I'm a healer. Is anyone injured? I can help."

Something muffled the sound of crying.

"You don't need to worry…" Akanna stepped into a room and saw several families huddling against the edges. Even in the pale, green light, they could see Akanna was of the Tribes and visibly relaxed. A mother had a child pressed against her breast, trying to nurse it into silence. Her arms shook.

"Please," said a boy. "Please. My mother. She isn't here. Please…"

He spoke a southern dialect but Akanna could not place the region. He had traveled far. Akanna thought of the bodies she had seen coming in.

"Where's your father?" she asked.

"Please," a man said. He had a long face and thin mustache. "We can talk when we're safe. Are we safe?"

Akanna assured them they were. She wanted to move this group along so she could check the rest of the complex, but decided it was best to give her team time to clear the bodies. She decided they would all be better off if they didn't see that mess.

"A group of us were traveling up through the Si Wong trying to get here," the mustached man informed her. "A swarm of buzzard-wasps attacked. Peng's father got stung."

The boy, Peng, ducked his eyes and returned to the ground. He didn't look older than fifteen.

"Why were you traveling through the Si Wong?" she asked the man.

"No choice. We're from Swi Kong. We thought Omashu would take us in. But their burning king kicked us out…"

"Qigang," said a woman reproachfully. Akanna assumed she was his wife. She had the air of authority about her and even the dim could not hide Qigang's blush. She seemed remarkably calm given the situation. "The King gave us food and a few days rest," she told Akanna, "but there was no room. Anyone could see that," she gave her husband a pointed look, "King Bumi (Spirits smile on him) sent a soldier to help us on our way. The king is a kind man. A good man."

"He could have given us a ship," Qigang grumbled.

"Hush," the woman said. "We made through the Jade but had to turn east when we ran into the Fire Nation. That's when the buzzard-wasps attacked. Peng's father…we all know a sting is fatal. He volunteered to stay behind. Give us time while they…Pang was a good man. A good man."

Peng had begun to cry softly.

A soldier arrived and informed Akanna, with a significant look at the refugees, that the entrance was cleared of all debris. Akanna and her team searched the rest of the complex. In all, they found another three hundred refugees. She tried to find the families of the dead but, after asking around, she learned that twenty-four people were missing, not half a dozen. The few from the entrance could have belonged to any of them.

"Back to work, then," said Akanna. A soldier offered her a cigarette. Spirits, she wanted it but Lok looked like he might be sick. "Give it to the corporal. He looks like he needs it."

"What's that supposed to mean?" the earthbender asked.

"It means you're sulking."

"Lok's always sulking," someone chimed in.

"Burn you all!" Lok said, but took the cigarette. He leaned over a sowán, dangling it from his lips, trying to light it over the smoldering boulder. Successful, he took a deep breath.

They set to the grimy work of rescuing civilians and the hours slipped away monotonously. They found only two other structures that night with survivors. The Dragon Fire saw to the rest. Akanna could not imagine that Naninnak was worse than this. She found some comfort in that.

Most of the fire had come under control by the time dawn greyed the sky. Mostly, because anything that could burn had. Dragon Fire hit hard and fast and usually burned itself out in a few hours. Akanna blinked the sting from her eyes. The smog had turned her smoker's cough into a hack that she knew would dog her for days. Her body ached and her head felt like someone had stuffed it with live coals. Too much bending in a short time always left her with a migraine. The pain of a hundred previously unnoticed burns began to complain. All in all, Akanna had little to complain about. The Slums had fared worse.

The assault left it devastated, turned it into miles of waste. Blackened heaps of rubble and cinders lay where buildings once stood. Beds and portraits, personal shrines and broken pottery, jutted from the smoldering hills. The morning fog was dirty with smoke. Crumbled walls rose like tombstones. The skeletal hands of steel supports stretched from the earth. Some of the litter looked disturbingly like the charred remains of bodies.

Refugees wandered through the rubble, shadows against the smog. Most picked through the hot ashes hoping to salvage something – anything. Some shuffled around, listless and unseeing. A man sat and wept. A brother rocked his crying sister in the hollow remains of their home. A mother dug through the ashes calling a name. When Akanna pulled her away, her hands were burned almost to the bone. She handed her off to a healer.

Several elders already worked to clear away the dǎogào huāyuán, patches of raw earth where prayers were buried. Refugees began to congregate on the small gardens. Akanna watched as they dug small holes to place their offerings. A musician played a solemn tune on his pipa. He still wore a green and gold costume. Akanna nearly forgot the city had been in the throws of a festival only hours before.

"We need to make sure someone's watching those," Akanna pointed at the smoke that drifted from the broken homes. "Those can flare up again. I saw a whole village go like that once."

"I can inform Lieutenant Deshi, my lady," said a soldier. Akanna nodded and he ran off. Lieutenant Deshi had a million other problems to sort out, but she trusted him to get someone on the job.

"What now?" Lok asked. An unlit cigarette hung from his lips.

"Let's get back to command. They'll know." She glanced at the corporal. "You going to light that?"

"I'd rather chew it." He fidgeted a bit then said, "I've had enough smoke for the night, ma'am."

"What's going on there?" a soldier asked. He nodded at a crowd forming outside a large building that stuck out from the smaller structures surrounding it. Akanna heard sounds of a fight, but couldn't see any.

Her team made their way to the crowd. Akanna began to make out the building through the haze. It had partially collapsed. From the damage, it looked like the sowán had hit it from an angle. The roof had caved, along with the left and front walls of the second story. It looked like the first story roof might have as well. Oily smoke leaked from every opening in the building. Someone had put out the worst fire—or the fire had simply exhausted its fuel—but now a brawl had started in the street before the building. Most of the crowd stood watching but some men were wrestling on the—no, they weren't wrestling. Several men struggled wildly to run back into the building while others, sometimes three or four, held them back.

"What's going on?" she asked a man. He shrugged and went back to watching the fight. She pushed past him and found someone else. He didn't know anything either. She got lucky the third time.

"Children in there," the man said. "Lots of them. Some kind of shelter? I don't know."

In the Tagiuk Uuman, fear and pity could not touch Akanna. Her mind was clean and focused as a blade. If not, the dread that loomed in the deep of the Ocean's Heart might have overwhelmed her—sent her diving into the ruined building like the others.

In that moment, she decided, when this was all done, to get plastered.

"What's the problem?" She ignored the leviathan lurking in the depths. She needed to act quickly, but rashness could mean disaster. The first thing she learned as a healer was that thoughtless action was usually worse than no action. She needed to stay calm and fucking breath.

"Whole thing's unstable. Could come down any minute."

That didn't help Akanna with the issue of breathing.

"Why hasn't it been put out yet?"

"Children in there. Lots of 'em. We had a team handling it but they said the building would come down if they tried anything. Worse than doing nothing, they said. Then they moved on."

"Can we put it out?"

"Full of Dragon's Piss. The sowán just grazed the building," he grimaced at the damage a 'grazing' had caused, "but it got nailed by a pot of the bad stuff. Course it had to be an orphan shelter. Burning piss-eyed whoresons." He spat.

Cold dread threatened Akanna's calm. She knew the answer but she asked anyway. "Couldn't earthbenders create supports, keep it from collapsing?"

The man shook his head. "You ever seen earthbending?" He glanced at Lok and noticed for the first time the belt that marked the corporal as a bender. "No offense," he said quickly, "but the tremors would bring the whole thing down. A Master might have enough precision but…"

Akanna's thought quickly as she dared. Ice could support the structure enough for Lok to bend safely, but the Dragon Fire burned too hot. It would burn away the ice the moment it formed. Honestly, it was a spirits-given miracle the children hadn't burned to death yet.

Suddenly, with a terrible groan, the building caved in on itself. A mass of sparks rushed from the ceiling. Flame and oily smoke spewed from the windows. The crowd reeled back, screaming. As the building fell, a group of men lost their grip on their buddy who ran into the heaving structure. They reached for him, caught his sleeve, but he tore free from their grip and disappeared beyond the entrance. He had run three paces when the ceiling came down and Akanna lost sight of him in the black smoke the belched out.

The roar of flames smothered the children's screams. A small mercy.

Akanna knew no one had survived. She knew it was hopeless

But she took a step forward.

Then another.

"Get me barrels of water," she commanded to anyone who could hear. "As many as you can get." No one moved or said anything. She reeled on them, "Now!"

A few men took off.

"Lok. With me."

The young corporal appeared at her side. His lips pulled back from snarling teeth. His eyes never wavered from the blaze.

"Can you do it?"

He nodded tightly.

"Are there any more earthbenders?"

Two men raised their hands.

"With me. Put out the Dragon's Fire."

"How do we know which is which?"

"If it's still burning in ten seconds, it's Dragon's Fire."

"We were ordered not to go in," the other said.

"Yeah? And I was ordered not to freeze your balls off, but I guess we're all a little insubordinate today."

She turned once again to the blaze.

And began to bend.

She became a monsoon; she struck the fire with the precision of a healer. That's what this was. Healing. The building was a patient wracked with disease and she would scrape off every speck of decay. She doused the flame that hadn't caught on Dragon Fire. She could feel Lok behind her and didn't check to see if the others had followed, but the oily flames hissed and popped as earth starved them of air.

Akanna slipped into the Abyss of La, the deepest state of consciousness a waterbender could master. It came with difficulty, the new moon seemed to hold it from her, but she finally settled into the quiet crystalline depths. The world became quiet, not an emptiness but a depth so heavy with purpose that it drew the outside world into itself and silenced it. Her waking mind pooled around her, filled the room with an awareness that touched every drop of water, every vapor, every speck. They sang to her in the ebbing voice of a still sea on a cloudless night. Her body moved in a symphony with it, the harmony then melody of their great song, composing and conducting it. She pulled as they pulled her, gathered every drop to her, no matter how scattered by flame, and their song became pillars of ice that pushed back against the fallen ceiling. The flames screamed discordance but she matched them, conducted them, added their own notes to hers and soothed them until they grew silent.

She sang for the better part of an hour, each turn of her waist and arch of her wrist building it note by note. She sang as the fire fled from the building. She sang as the sun crested the Wall.

Her song came to an end. The final note hummed in the air. Akanna collapsed and her mind rose from the Abyss of La, gasping for breath.

Ice webbed through the building, stitching it together. Despite the heat, the ice would hold for an hour at least. Her work wasn't perfect, but they were no longer in danger of the building crushing them. She became aware of the earthbenders adding pillars of stone to hers of ice. Lok directed them, showing them the safest way. The building trembled but held and became stronger with each additional support.

Rescuers and soldiers streamed into the building. They searched the rooms for survivors. They found nearly a hundred bodies, including the man who had run in when the building collapsed. Only six children still drew breath. One died shortly after they found her.

A field clinic in the Straights, Lower Ring, Ba Sing Se

The cots were placed in rows but the sheer number of people that rushed through the clinic, that were heaped on beds or the ground when no beds remained caused the chaos to overflow the neat arrangement as a river of healers and assistants rushed through the long rows. Their uniforms—blue and white—reminded Jin of paintings she'd seen of the the Huān River during the spring thaw, all crashing water and frothing rapids. She watched from the clinic's entrance and feared she would drown if she went in.

Torches filled the room with suffocating heat. The luminous crystals that abounded throughout the city didn't give enough light for the delicate task of healing. The healers just had to put up with the nuisance—a nuisance that compounded the already claustrophobic air of the clinic.

"We have to go in there?" Lee said from her side.

Lee. This was his fault. A few hours ago, she was at home, asleep. Then Lee had pulled her from bed and, with less than a minute to dress herself, dragged her across the entire city while the world burned around her. Her mother wasn't particularly pleased with the situation, but Jin had a duty and the clinic was far enough from the Wall that the artillery couldn't touch them. No sense in a clinic if one fireball would kill them all. Jin had to lie about a possible fine for dereliction of duty before her mother let her go. She wasn't even sure Fu knew that Lee had gone, but that was his business.

"Jin? Are we seriously going in there?"

"Yep."

Lee looked uncertain and pale—paler than usual. If she knew the golden-eyed boy, he probably imagined they would arrive at the Slums and dash into the fray to pull victims from the ruin. Lee was no fantastic hero—he always hated the idea of them. But something had left him restless and aching lately, something beside the siege. He wouldn't tell her what it was. She knew he would eventually, but she also knew that when his feelings festered long enough, he acted like a brain-burned moron and ran into situations without thinking.

Like now.

When Jin arrived at the Slums, following Lee's warpath with Cheng and Guo, they were immediately turned away. Letting kids run into collapsing building could only make the situation worse, the soldier had said. He had changed his tune a bit when he learned that Guo could earthbend and assigned him to moving massive stone vats of water for the teams of waterbenders. Cheng startled the young private, raising diyu about he and Guo being a package deal and neither went anywhere without the other and if he didn't like it they could just deal with having one less earthbender and…the helpless soldier finally decided it wasn't worth the trouble of keeping Cheng from the action. It's on your head if you die, the soldier said, but the little girl and zázhong absolutely weren't allowed into the red zone. Lee almost tore the man's head off and Jin almost helped.

Which was how they found themselves at the clinic. Lee seemed ready to risk his life in a collapsing city, but didn't know what to do about a clinic.

"I'm no healer," Lee protested.

"Neither am I."

"You're an assistant!"

"We all have to start somewhere."

"I'll find something else to do maybe I can…"

"We're staying together."

"I'm useless here!"

"And I'm saying you're not!"

"You have training! Practice! I've never…"

Jin didn't have time for this. She rounded on him with the fury of a saber-hawk. "Can you hold a bandage in place? Can you hand me shit when I tell you? Can you prove for once that you have some Spirits-given common sense?"

Lee was startled into a vigorous nod.

Jin felt a twinge of sympathy. Lee was doing well, given the circumstances. He hadn't even retched, after all. But the whole situation was stressful and she was terrified and furious. So she only felt a little guilty when she told Lee, "Are you gonna grow a pair and come with me or stand here in everyone's way?"

Jin knew she'd gotten to him when his nostrils flared. They always did when he was angry; and right now, angry was better than scared.

He stood a little taller and squared his shoulders. His feet unconsciously shifted to a fighting stance. "I'm with you."

"Good. Just stay with me." She took his hand and his face grew more heated. "Everyone will need help. They'll pull us in a hundred different directions. Don't let them." Impulsively, she wanted to brush the hair from his eyes, but the moment passed. "Stay with me."

Lee swallowed and squeezed her hand. "I will," he managed to say.

She returned the squeeze and held on tight. Setting her jaw and soothing her wild hair, she waded into the dying and frantic mass.

Immediately, bodies began to press against her. The heat of so many people packed together began to choke her. In a minute, sweat had soaked her clothes. She tried to wipe the streams that stung her eyes, but only managed to spread more sweat across her face. She gave up and began to blink rapidly to clear her eyes. She still felt Lee's hand in her own. She turned to check on him when a foreign hand reached through the mob, grabbed her wrist, and roughly pulled her clear of the crowd. Lee held on, but barely.

Jin looked at the healer whose hand still held her wrist. She didn't recognize the woman. She was a healer, by the pale blue uniform she wore. The woman seemed young, maybe a decade older than Jin. No older than thirty. Maybe twenty-five.

She spoke something to Jin in the nasally, pitched language that Jin recognized as Artok. When the woman saw that Jin didn't understand, she switched to the Quinese. "Will you help?"

She spoke excellent common tongue.

When Jin didn't respond, the woman yanked Jin's hands to a red bandage that covered a man's belly.

"Hold" the woman commanded.

Jin moved mechanically, forgetting for a moment about Lee. Without him to focus on, she felt like she'd drifted out to sea. Her was drowning in sleep. If she just swam the right way, she could surface from this nightmare. But one direction blurred into another. After a moment her mind slid into the well-worn grooves left by hours working under Akanna. That helped. Without really thinking, she put pressure on the field dressing. Something soaked her hands.

Oh—right. Blood. That was bad. She pressed harder and the man groaned. She hadn't realized he was conscious. She turned to Lee who stood there like an idiot. She couldn't decide between rolling her eyes and screaming at him.

"Hold this!" she shouted at him. Screaming it was.

Lee jumped like she'd poked him with a hot iron. He rushed to her side and held the bandages that stuffed the bleeding chasm in the man's side. With her hands free, Jin began to look for something to mop up the blood that soaked the exposed torso. She found what she assumed was the man's shirt, cut away for a clear look at the wound, and used it wipe away the blood with little success. The bandage that Lee held was already soaking through and blood seeped out around the edges.

"Artery?" she asked the healer.

The woman looked at her with mild surprise.

"Yes," she said. "Iliac. External."

Jin gritted her teeth and began using her hands to wipe away blood. "How long has he been bleeding?" She scrubbed her hands on her dress (oh well, she needed a new one anyways) and tried to clear away more of the sharply metallic muck. Her hands were stained and sticky.

"Came in a few minutes ago. Don't know how long before that. Okay. Step back."

Lee stumbled away and Jin had to step in to pull the bandages from the cavity. The healer bent water from a nearby basin and plunged it into the wound. Then, before the blood could dilute the water, she froze it. The man convulsed as the water expanded and ice filled the cavity.

"Watch him," the woman said. "We'll need iodine on that or he'll rot. You children ever work an artery wound before?" The woman aimed her skeptical gaze at Lee. Jin responded for both of them with a shake of her head.

"When the ice begins to thaw, put pressure on the wound. If the bleeding stops, I can Heal him." She turned to go then said, "Don't let him fall asleep."

She moved on to another patient and the children were left to tend the man. Children. Jin hated that word but had never felt more out of her depth than that moment. Sometimes she forgot she was thirteen and that most adults considered her young. Most of the time she didn't feel young. Even now she felt something of both—not in between, but both—horribly out of her depth in a world too old for her and somehow apart of that world and its ugliness. She felt like she'd missed something, like she'd fallen asleep in class and woken up lost and confused. She didn't know what she'd missed, only that its loss filled her with a hollow ache.

Though Lee focused all his attention on the patient, Jin could see it in him too—a kind of hardness around the eyes. He weighed the world with a weary cynicism that hadn't existed a year ago. His smile was a little less easy, the light in his eyes a little more dim. Lee had undergone some imperceptible shift that she'd missed day by day, but could see so clearly when she looked back.

In that moment, she wanted very badly to hug him.

He looked at her. For a moment, she thought he'd caught her staring, but he just looked concerned.

"We're not supposed to let him sleep, right?"

"Right."

"Well…" He nodded to man whose eyes sank as he relaxed into sleep.

"Spirits, Lee! Do something!"

Lee began to shake the wounded man harshly. He groaned.

"Not that, you idiot!"

"Well it worked, didn't it?"

"Move! Out of the way! You're gonna kill him if you try to help more." Spirits! Boys were useless!

Jin wondered why the woman didn't just bend the man's blood. She remembered reading that blood was mostly water anyways. Nine parts of ten. Maybe it was too diluted? But she'd seen Akanna bend mud before when they walked through the Lower Ring. She would have to ask.

"Hey. Hey, you've got to stay with me. You can't fall asleep."

"Five minutes." The man's voice came out a thick whisper.

"What's your name? Hey. Come on. What's your name?"

"Chen. Chen Jian."

"Lucky. You have a nice name."

"You…you have…what's yours?"

"Jin."

"Jin. Jin…that's a nice name. Jin."

She laughed. "I don't think so."

"No. No it's a good name."

"I always hated it."

"No. No…it's good."

"Stay with me. You have to stay with me."

"Yeah. Yeah. I know."

"Tell me where you're from. Tell me about your family."

"My family?"

"Yes. Tell me about them."

"My wife. We're going to have a child."

"That's wonderful. What will you name him?"

"Her."

"Sorry?"

"You said him. It's a girl. We haven't decided."

"What about…Chun?"

"Too plain."

"Jia?"

"Everyone and their mother is named Jia." He laughed and winced. "Don't make me laugh."

"Promise to stay awake and I might not," she winked at him.

He laughed again and groaned against the pain. "Not fair, Jin. Jin. I'd like to name her Jin."

Jin felt his side. The ice had begun to thaw and blood was seeping through the dressing. She found some more under the table.

"Where are they? Your family."

"They…they got them rescued…couple hours ago…couldn't…they couldn't…"

"It's okay. I'm here. Will you stay with me?"

"I don't want to die."

"You're not going to die. You're going to live."

"I want to…I never had any sisters, so I always wanted a girl. I wanted her to bring a nice boy home that I could threaten…"

"Your daughter's very lucky," she said. "How do you feel?"

"It doesn't hurt much."

That concerned Jin. The wound in his side was—well, she'd seen worse, but not by much. And she'd seen men die of less severe wounds. If he couldn't feel any pain, that meant shock. She remembered Akanna say that could happen when someone lost too much blood. She scrounged her brain for the solution. She'd only ever worked on burn wounds before. Fluids! He needed fluids. She turned to the chaos around her. A man passed and she grabbed his wrist.

"Water! Do you have water? Any fluids? Do you know where any are?"

The man stared back with bloodshot eyes and shook his head. He pulled his wrist free and disappeared into the throng.

"You have to stay with me. That's it." She turned to Lee who stared at Jian, at the gaping, flowing wound. "Lee!" She wasn't sure if he heard her. "Lee! I have to get him water." She knew there would be a store of water somewhere for the healers, but Jian would bleed out before she found it. "You need to stop the bleeding. Find the artery and put pressure on it."

"You mean..."

"You have to feel around. Inside him."

Lee went pale as Jian at the thought.

"You can do it. You have to."

Lee nodded, quick as a rabbit-cat. He breathed, trying to calm himself like Fu had taught him. His breath rattled through him. Don't think about it, he told himself. Just don't think about it. Lee braced a hand on Jian's chest and plunged his other hand into the wound. He gagged but kept his composure.

"What am I feeling for?"

Jian said, "Sorry. I'm just…"

"Jian. Keep your eyes open." To Lee, "Feel for something—uh—squishy…about the size of your thumb. You'll feel a lot of blood pumping out of it."

He groped around, wrangling his own stomach that lurched at the wet warmth of the man's insides. Jin was pointing to where the artery should be but he couldn't tell one bleeding mass of tissue from another. Everything was hot and gushing and pouring the man's life all over his forearm. He continued to fumble. Blood roared through his ears. He thought he found it. He couldn't get a firm grip. His mind felt far away, like he was looking at the man through a tunnel. The warmth clogged his mouth, his nose, his lungs. The heat suffocated him.

All he could feel was the heat.

The man began to scream.

A long moment of moping blood passed before Jin realized the bleeding had stopped.

"Lee…"

He continued feeling around the man's wound.

"Lee…stop. Lee. He's not bleeding anymore." At first she thought that Chen had died, but his chest rose and fell with heaving breaths. He had lost consciousness, but otherwise had steadied. It looked that way, at least. "Lee… What did you do?"

He pulled away from the man, his arm red to the elbow, his eyes wide and terrified.

Jin checked the wound. It had gone black and tough around the edges, charred like a well-done steak. It still felt hot, hotter than a body should feel. Cauterized.

Jin began to tremble. She looked at Lee and saw him, really saw him for what felt like the first time in her life. She saw his lanky, black hair that fell over ashen skin and golden eyes.

"Lee. What did you do?"

"I don't know." His eyes were wide and haunted. He looked between Jin and the wound. "I don't know."

A/N: So this chapter took forever. I had 90% of it done, then my hard drive crashed so that was fun. Then, when I rewrote it, something didn't save right and I lost most of it again. Always use google docs, kids. They'll save your life. Besides that, I'm juggling a story for my fiction class and a job. But who needs free time, right?

I really wanted this chapter to start showing the full consequences of war without demonizing the Fire Nation. Most of them are just doing their job and want to go home.

Terms and Translations:

Xīnyuè Jié: literally means "new-moon festival" as their New Year is based on the lunar calendar.

Tiáojiě Rén: mediator/bridge builder. They're an important faction in this AU and have a large role to play later in the story.

sowán: Slang for the flaming boulders of coal the Fire Nation use for artillery. A merging of Sozin and gāowán, the Chinese for testicle. They are literally calling the boulders Sozin's balls.