Before I begin this, let me just say that I still have no idea how I ended up in the Avatar universe... Avatarverse. That sounds better. Anyway, all I remember is that I was walking home (in the dark, accursed train schedule) when all of the sudden there... wasn't.

Anything.

At all.

At least I'm pretty sure that's what I remember.

I should probably also mention I keep pencils, colored pencils, a pencil sharpener, erasers of various kinds, sketchpads, sketch paper, a broken umbrella, a wirebendy man, a psychology textbook, and a book of mythical creatures on me at most times. All carried in an old lego bin. I would have had lunch too, but... well you know, walking home at night, not in the morning. Also I have my cell phone charger, and a cell phone that isn't a smartphone-yes, those things still exist.

Oh, and my coat, hat and gloves. But that goes without saying. Also they're black.

So yes, I was transported randomly to the Avatarverse, and that was all I had. Now that the prologue's done...

Of course, I didn't realize at first I'd been teleported specifically to the Avatarverse. I just thought I'd randomly ended up on an iceberg. Now, finding yourself randomly standing on an iceberg is an unusual experience no matter where you started out, unless you started out on an iceberg. In my case, I started out in Texas. Yes, I'm Texan, no I do not have a cowboy hat, moving on. So naturally, I did what I always do.

I observed the world around me.

"Water, water, ice, water, water, ice ice ice... yep, no human life whatsoever. I'm screwed."

Setting down my ridiculously heavy lego bin, I shrugged and looked up at the sky. Pretty sky, pretty sky... to be honest, I wasn't exactly panicked, exactly. I knew I should have been, but there wasn't any observable danger. Flicking open my phone, I glanced at the time. Then I shut it and pocketed it again.

You know what, this is a story, so I'm going to skip over the boring fifteen minutes where nothing happened except me pondering the nature of the universe.

After fifteen minutes, I was just sitting and thinking, as I usually do, when I heard this CRRRRNCH. Of course my gaze shot to where the noise came from, but there was this HUGE ICEBERG in the way, so I couldn't tell what was going on. And then there were two voices yelling at each other in some language I didn't know, although it sounded like a mixture of japanese and something else.

Voice one was a guy, clearly very angry. Voice two was a girl, clearly very pissed off.

Nope, I didn't make the connection then. To be fair, I was more happy there was somebody else HERE then worried about who they were.

"Now how am I going to get over there?" I mused to myself as the female voice screamed foreign obscenities. "I mean I could swim, but in this water that's dangerous... hey, umbrella paddle, there's an ide-"

CRRRRK.

Yep. You all know what that is.

Just to confirm it though, I glanced at the iceberg. Yes, it was cracking. And no, I STILL did not connect the dots. All I knew was that the iceberg was cracking and that could be very dangerous. So I threw myself down on the ice floe, hands over my head, cringing in anticipation of being speared by chunks the size of minivans, and that crazy lady was STILL yakking her head off.

Well, until the whole SHWISHOOM sound of the thing falling apart.

Fortunately for me, no huge chunks rained down on my little platform when the ice finally fell apart. Still, I was very cautious when I looked up to confirm that it was over. The iceberg had completely shattered, now only existing as random bits floating in the water, and I got a very brief glimpse of the two voices-before it bobbed up out of the water.

And that, that is when I realized where I was. Because, magical as they are, icebergs usually do not glow. And the giant six-legged form silhouetted in the frozen sphere was a really big clue, too.

"...what."

Oh have I mentioned I talk to myself? Because I do. And make random observations. You know, just because.

Anyway, there I was, watching this thing, when suddenly it just shattered in a beam of light. I'm going to assume you've seen the show and I don't need to explain why. I stood up, rolling my eyes as the now three voices began to have their conversation about how evil Aang was (for the record he's very evil, he just hides it well) and pondering what to do with this newfound knowledge. Obviously, I had to ask them for help or just sit here and die... but I couldn't speak their language. And I was STILL on the other side of the iceberg, which presented its own problems.

"Logic problem: Attract attention. Logic solution... Oh, duh. Loud noises. KRILILILILILIIIIIIIIIII!"

That certainly got their attention. Male voice wandered around the back of the iceberg and pointed his spear at me, yelling something in Avatarese.

I waved back cheerily. "Nope, still can't understand you dude! Can I get a lift?"

Female voice joined her brother, looking at me with raised eyebrows. Ambiguously Gendered Voice (snarkity snark snark) joined them, using his staff to balance his leaning. Male voice blinked, then yelled at me in Avatarese.

"You know, if the random guy can't answer you the first time, what makes you think he can answer you the second time?"

Female voice said something to male voice, which got him waving his arms and whining, and then female voice said something deadpan which I assume was basically 'You're a jerk you know that right.' Ambiguously gendered voice made a comment, which female voice supported. Male voice groaned.

(Yes, I am referring to them by voice. I will continue to do so until they introduce themselves to me.)

Ambiguously gendered voice shook his head and flew over to the small patch of ice I stood on, explaining something to me in a language I couldn't understand.

"Thank you for that excellent explanation, and yes I'd love a lift." I smiled and grabbed my BOX'O'THINGS. "You mind flying me over there?"

Ambiguously gendered voice raised an eyebrow in confusion, but he shrugged it off and turned to the other two, shouting something in a friendly tone. Female voice shouted back. Male voice just sighed and threw up his hands, leaning against the iceberg.

"I feel your pain, Male Voice!" I shouted as Ambiguously gendered voice flew back, presumably to get Monstrous Roar.

After a few moments, Monstrous Roar came swimming around the iceberg, Ambiguously Gendered Voice sitting on his head. He stopped briefly to let Male Voice and Female Voice clamber on board, then headed over so I could clamber on. While still holding onto all my things. That was an athletic challenge, but I managed.

"(Gibbering that sounded interrogative and rude)," Male Voice demanded, pointing his spear at me.

"Yes. It is very sharp."

"(Gibbering that sounded exasperated)," Female voice pointed out, moving the spear aside. "(Gibbering that I have no idea what it sounded like)." She put a hand on her chest. "Katara."

"Is that what we're doing...? Oh all right." Curling my hand into a fist, I thumped my ribcage. "Reid."

"Reed." Katara raised an eyebrow, but smiled; obviously my name was odd but she could roll with it. She gestured toward her companions, one by one. "Sokka. Aang." Then she leaned over and patted the fur of our shared mount. "Appa."

Sokka pointed at a random iceberg. "(I'm guessing what he said is Ice or something sarcastic like that)," he intoned instruct fully. Katara sighed.

"No, no, I got it. Sokka, Katara, Appa, Aang, and (Here I tried to mimic Sokka)."

From the looks I received, I clearly mangled whatever it was Sokka had said.

"...By the way I'm from another world!"

Nope, no reaction. Well, this was going to be a fun trip through the world, not even being able to communicate. Illiterate and effectively mute. Woooo.

When we arrived at the village, I was shivering. What? I'm FREAKING TEXAN. We get ONE MINUTE OF SNOW A YEAR. One minute. And before you point at Aang, he was airbending hot air around him the whole time, oblivious to my plight. I'd call him a jerk, but somehow I think he legitimately didn't notice. Kids...

Anyway, Katara and Sokka got off Appa, waving us down. Aang jumped off into the deep, soft snow. I... looked at the snow with a sigh. "I wish I had boots..."

A few seconds later, I was waist deep in snow. While sir and ma'am Eskimo were standing in their nice broad snowshoes and captain hurricane was just gliding across the ice. They gave me a strange look.

"Hey, what did you expect? That I was prepared to come out here?"

"...(Gibberish of a somewhat accepting sort)?"

Sokka glared at Katara, somewhat critical of whatever she had suggested. "(What really, waste time on this incredibly handsome individual)? (He's changing my words in the fanfic to be solely worshiping him)."

"(Do you want him to die in the snow, and also I'm going to shoehorn in random pony references from now on)?"

With a sigh, Sokka walked off, mumbling about my most excellent moral character. Soon enough he returned with, in his transliterated words, the best pair of snowshoes the village had to offer. This fanfic may not be entirely accurate.

And then, after I'd clambered back onto Appa and pulled on the boots, we walked over to the village. Katara introduced us to them, them to us, and told me she liked cupcakes which really actually kind of explains a lot about her character. I smiled, waved, and allowed myself to be pulled by the children into a random tent... where I curled up and just stared at the wall.

I mean, think about it. If I could, you know, speak the language, this would be so much easier. I could get everyone to do everything they need to to make the world better, single handedly solve Zuko's daddy issues, all those fun things that the fans just want to do. And really, I'm not a martial artist or a swordsman or... anything without my voice. Just an artist. ((A really good artist, don't get me wrong, and an excellent actor... I did use charades later on, I'm not completely useless.)) Heck I couldn't even follow orders, because I couldn't understand them.

So I sat in that tent, staring at the wall, and thinking about my situation. I came to the logical conclusion.

"I am depressed about my lack of effectiveness."

Totally logical. Have I mentioned I'm insane?

So, how could I become useful. Well... really, nothing came up in my mind. Actually, that's not right, nothing useful came up in my mind, though numerous images of suddenly discovering I was an xbender did zoom through. But... in the end, I settled on the plan of just waiting until Zuko attacked and then following the group around until something came up.

Because, really, what else could I do?

Quite a lot, actually. Laundry, helping move heavy loads, skinning some fish... it was only five minutes before I got bored and started inexpertly helping out around the tribe, for which Sokka begrudgingly gave me approving-sounding grunts. Hey, if you can only do mundane things, then do mundane things. And break out in song randomly, people LOVE that.

What I had failed to remember in my eagerness to assist and be useful was the simple matter of timing. I spent the whole day learning fun facts about water tribe society from observation, as well as need tricks like how to scrape ice properly off of tents, and was completely surprised that the events of episode one didn't happen in one day. That would have been much more convenient for me, to be honest; I'm not one for mindless repetition, although mindful repetition is intriguing. Alas, Aang was not slated to head on his ill-fated penguin sledding trip until the next day; he spent the whole time the sun was out playing with the kids and/or checking on Appa.

So, the next day, there I was, singing that most grandiose tune ("I'm making a note here, huge suc-sess...") and, well, scrubbing the toilet (a horizon-widening experience) when everybody started shouting. SHOUTING! Shouting of the shouting kind and, as I looked outside, yes, people POINTING! At... a flare! Oh my goodness!

"Finally. I was getting bored..."