Actually...he didn't know where to start, so he stopped. He stopped and lowered his head and carefully went through everything, wanting to find a nice starting point, one good enough to kick-start everything that he was about to tell them, but he couldn't. It all...blended together, like a colour palette, scenes and images mixing with each other, creating one incoherent memory after another, as if his own mind refused to give life to them.
"Are you okay?" Aang's voice would ring out, but he wouldn't answer.
He was. He was...okay, but...it was difficult to share his past with others. On other days, he'd refuse to share his past even with himself, refusing to acknowledge that it happened, that he was forced to leave it as perfect as it was, and escape to a foreign land where he was hated.
"Just...wait." He relaxed his shoulders, perched his palms atop his knees and breathed in.
To him, his life began in a single fleeting scene, a fading memory of when he was so, so small, with his tiny hands wrapped around large fingers. Golden eyes stared down at him, the warmth in them meltingly soft, as if honey was about to drip right out of them and down the man's pale, pale cheeks, yet translucent tears went down instead. To think that his first and last memory of that man would be so similar...
So he started there, right at the beginning.
"I...was born in the Fire Nation to a soldier father and a...hiding mother," He didn't stop to take a look at their reactions. He wouldn't stop until he was done, and he was far from done. "For eight years, we lived in a small cottage on the outskirts of the city, far away from the main palace and it's inhabitants. There weren't many other soldiers near us, for our neighbourhood was a fairly poor one, housing hiding refugees and the sick. There was no need for the soldiers to stick around these areas, so we were off the radar. As I've told you before, my mother was from the Northern Water Tribe, but she originated for the Southern Water Tribe."
At that, Katara interrupted him, "Southern...?"
Guren nodded. "She left many years ago, before the two of you were even born, I reckon. She arrived a young girl, perhaps around your age, and she was taken in by Pakku, who, over time, began seeing her as his own daughter," He gave her a strained smile. "Your grandmother wasn't the only woman who ran away from him. I once asked her how she and my father met, and she told me that it was a fated day, that all the forces in the world worked together to make them meet. That was all she ever told me, and I left it at that."
"A Fire Nation soldier and a Waterbender, huh?" Sokka's tone was low, "I can...only imagine how it ended."
So Guren continued, "For reasons that are still unknown to me, we were forced to move after that. The friends I'd had made over the years were all left behind." He lowered his head once again, breaking eye-contact with Katara. "I...made more friends, ones that made my days brighter, ones that warded off my loneliness, yet I was forced to leave them behind as well when my parents' relationship was revealed. General Fong...he told me my father burned my mother through the bone," A poorly restrained laugh slipped past his lips, one that even he couldn't understand. "It was an odd thing to hear."
"Wait...by 'burned through the bone' you mean...?" Sokka trailed off, not daring to finish the question.
Guren tilted his head. "What do you think I mean?"
Sokka averted his eyes.
"But that doesn't explain the flames you can make." Aang made a fair point.
"I can't explain it," So Guren told him the truth. "I don't have a realistic explanation to how it happened. All I know is that my Waterbending was...overwritten by something else, somehow."
Katara inched forward. "How did you end up at the Northern Water Tribe?"
That...
"Noran. He was my mother's Waterbending student. I can only guess and say that my parents suspected their relationship would be discovered soon so they made contact with him. He came and he took me away."
"Where is Noran now?" Aang asked.
Now...? "That's not something I know. He left soon after we arrived at the Northern Water Tribe, saying that he was going to search for my mother. He said he'd come back with her, but he never did. I don't know if he's alive, and frankly? I don't care."
"You don't?" Katara's voice was soft.
"Why should I? He picked me up and threw me to the wolves. I am a son of a Fire Nation soldier, what other reason would they need to hate me? Noran knew this. He knew and still he left in search of my mother."
"And then you met Yue."
He glanced at Sokka. "And then I met Yue."
"You loved her." Again, Katara's words were softly spoken.
"I did. She was all I had, but I figure it wasn't meant to be after all." He leaned back, resting his chin on the palm of his hand. "Yue was...special to me."
"Was...?"
Guren peered at Aang. "Was. That's my life story you all wanted to know so much. I'm not that interesting, don't you think?"
"Azula."
The moment that name left Katara's lips, Guren turned in her direction. "What...?"
"You called out her name, you...fought her. You knew her."
Shit...! That was a miscalculation on his part. He...couldn't resist calling out to her, especially not after all those years. "That...Zuko you talked about. He's the banished prince of the Fire Nation. Azula is his younger sister. Of course I'd know who they were."
Still, Katara wouldn't give it up. "But you knew her. Were you...friends back while you were still in the Fire Nation?"
Questions, questions, questions. "No. No, I wasn't."
Azula wasn't Little Vixen.
"I think that's enough questions for today. My head is going to split open at this point, so I'd appreciate a little peace and quiet." Not waiting for their reply, he turned to the side and watched the clouds pass them by.
The sun was setting. Night will befall them soon.
_
As it turned out, they ended up flying over a swamp after some time. And Aang was flying them suspiciously close to it. Sokka questioned his actions, and Aang told them that he swamp was calling to him. After receiving disagreeing answers as if to land down, he began pulling them away, only for them to end up caught in an whirlpool...somehow.
It was their unlucky day, it seemed.
.
.
.
That was how they found themselves crashing head first down into the swamp.
"Where are Appa and Momo?" Aang asked as they looked around, before he climbed up the nearest tree.
Guren flexed his arm, wondering if his shoulder sustained any injuries. Seeing that it hadn't, he breathed out a sigh of relief and dried off his clothes, leaving him dry from the waist up. He couldn't go around vaporising every drop of water he saw...could he? He doubted he had the strength to keep doing it.
"Sokka, you've got a leech on your elbow." Guren pointed out as he looked at the other boy.
Within a second, Sokka began jumping around. "Why do things keep attaching to me?!" He grabbed the leech and threw it away.
"I heard that flies are attracted to shit."
Sokka whipped back around towards Guren. "Are you saying I'm shit?"
"I don't know, are you?"
Cue intense glaring.
.
.
.
Aang couldn't find Appa nor Momo, so that was how they all ended up making their way through the swamp, with Sokka cutting everything down in their path.
"Maybe we should be a little nicer to the swamp."
Nicer...to the swamp? Guren glanced at Aang. "Does the swamp have feelings?"
"Yeah! Does the swamp have feelings?!" Sokka chimed in.
Katara addressed them both. "Maybe you should listen to Aang. Something about this place feels...alive."
Guren furrowed his brows. "Plants are alive, but I doubt they feel pain as we do. We do need to get out of here, don't we?"
"You're right, but still...Something feels off."
Guren bit back a shiver.
.
.
.
Until night feel, they were searching for Appa and Momo.
And then flies started annoying Sokka.
"Oh, look, flies!" Guren exclaimed, not bothering to hide his amusement.
"Ha, ha, very funny!" Sokka swung his machete around, trying to get rid of them, but he did absolutely nothing about that matter.
Something burst on the side, drawing their attention. "What was that?" Katara asked, drawing nearer to them.
"Nothing, just swamp gas. Look, there's nothing supernatural going on around here." Sokka gestured at the swamp.
The...swamp gas neared them and Guren, once again, turned away as nausea made a nest out of his insides. Curse his weakness for disgusting smells. He couldn't stop himself from gagging.
But then a scream came from near them and the three of them huddled towards Guren, clinging to him. What was he, a babysitter? Oh. He was the oldest...It turned out that the scream came from a small bird, who, for whatever reason, could mimic screaming sounds.
"I think we should build a fire."
For once, Guren agreed with Sokka.
The boy instantly began chopping at some tree roots, despite Aang's warnings to stop.
.
.
.
"Does anyone else get the feeling that we're being watched?" Katara asked after briefly looking around.
Guren turned to the side from his place on the ground. "The more you keep saying it, the worse will it get. I'm starting to agree with you about the swamp feeling...off."
"Please!" Sokka brushed them off. "I don't know what you two are talking about. We're all alone out here!" He continued swinging his machete at the flies and mosquitos.
Then the insect burst into light and multiple lights lit up around them.
"All alone, huh?" Guren sat up, wanting to rather be on guard just in case something happened.
"Except for them."
He just wanted to get the hell out of this forsaken swamp...
.
.
.
They were fucking cursed, weren't they?!
That was all Guren could think of as he ran full speed forward. Multiple cracks came from behind him, but he wouldn't look back. But then something tripped him, and he flew forward at full speed, coming to a rolling and painful stop once he slammed head-first into the water. He resurfaced and came face-to-face with...vines.
They whipped towards him, instantly wrapping and curling around his body, squeezing him tight and rendering him close to breathless. He shifted his arm out through a crack and gripped onto the vines, feeling them harden and dry out beneath his palm. As if sensing the danger he posed, the vines released him and pulled away, leaving him in the water.
He breathed in, only for the air to catch in his throat and send him into a full-blown coughing and choking session. He turned to the side and spat out the swamp water that had ended up in his mouth, before he swirled his tongue over his teeth, trying to get rid of the nasty aftertaste. It didn't work.
And then he heard it. A sound that made his insides freeze over. The plucking of strings echoed around him, coming from multiple directions, before all the notes started coming from behind him. They were quiet, the sounds recognisable to him from a mile away, and he knew...he just knew which instrument it was. Slowly, he turned around, and the coldness switched over to scalding heat in a moment's time. There sat, long, flowing red garbs cascading down the tree, barely brushing against the waters below. In his lap sat a guqin, crimson-black marred with golden swirls that twisted and turned along its entire length. There was...an ethereal glow surrounding him, just further proving how unreal he was.
Yet he looked more alive than the last time Guren saw him.
Softly, tenderly, the notes followed after one another, never overlapping, never...interrupting. He watched his fingers glide over the sleek, polished surface of the wooden instrument, watched them flick over the strings, gently pulling at them. The man's eyes were closed, the concentration evident in the way his thin brows lightly furrowed. To think that the last time Guren saw him like this was...over eight years ago, while the man oversaw him as he practiced his own given instrument. He was calm, focused, not a single thing catching his attention nor breaking the thick concentration.
Guren envied him as he sat there, without a care in mind. He envied him...
"Father..." he muttered, staring up at the man.
There was no answer.
"Father, is it true?"
One string after another, he plucked.
"Did you...kill mother?"
It only got louder, the waves of symphonies carrying over to him, making his heart tremble.
"Father...can you look at me?"
But he didn't. No matter how many times Guren repeated himself. The man didn't raise his head, for all he could see were the seven strings on his guqin, and all he did was brush the pads of his fingers over them, over and over and over again.
First, the itch made his fingers convulse. Then it tapped up his arm, through his shoulder, up his neck, until it settled there, burrowing it's way through it. Biting back the urge to sink his nails into the side of his neck, he instead reached for the nearest stick and broke it off, before he pulled his arm back and threw it in the man's direction.
He should've expected it to sail right through him, because he wasn't really there. He was never really there. He was gone. He was gone and Guren was wasting his time on a fake. He turned around, squeezing his fists tight, digging blunt nails into rough palms, and walked away.
And then the music stopped, and so did he. He didn't know why, but...an overwhelming kind of terror overcame him, not allowing him to turn around. So he dug his nails straight into his palms, letting them rip through the rough skin and the terror was no more, only pain. He turned back around, finally saw those golden eyes of his, and immediately regretted having looked, for he could only see the tears leaving them. It was history repeating itself all over again, just like that night, just like that blazing night.
"Father..." he called out to him, a knot tying itself at the pit of his throat.
Again, his heart trembled once he saw a smile curl his lips. It was just like before. Only kindness seeped out of his lips, and only fondness curled them, yet no words left them. He stood up, leaving the guqin behind, and his robes fluttered as he descended towards the water. Guren stood there, waiting for him, and once he was close enough, Guren took a step back, not allowing him to approach him. Yet, despite his actions, his father's smile didn't fade. It was still there, as small as it was.
How unfair. He didn't like this. He didn't want this, and he certainly didn't need this. Another step back, his father didn't follow. He stood a way away from him, the sleeves of his robes covering his hands, dipping into the greenish water, yet as he raised his hand, it only revealed that they were dry. An apparition, that was all he was.
He wasn't real.
"You killed her, didn't you?"
No answer. But the way his lips trembled gave Guren enough of an answer.
"I hate you...!" he forced out, staring the man down, "I hate you so, so much...!" He did not approach him, he couldn't, he wouldn't. "You don't understand how much I fucking hate you...!" The more he spoke, the more did his anger give life to his words.
Slowly, the smile disappeared, until only a thinly pressed line remained.
"You promised me it would get better!" Deeper and deeper, his nails dug into his skin, spilling blood that ceaselessly dripped into the water below. "You promised!"
How could he...make a promise he couldn't keep? How could he look him in the eye and...and-!
"Liar!" He lowered his head, forcing himself to look at the water instead. "Liar, liar, liar, liar, liar!"
He knew that this...apparition in front of him wasn't really his father, that it was something this swamp gave life to, that it would disappear and never appear again, but he couldn't...help it. It wore his father's face, looked at him with the same eyes, showed him the same kind smile and even played the same songs to him as his father did. It was...too similar, too...alike, yet it was a fake, an intruder, and impostor.
That was all it was, but he couldn't...
Through the blurriness of his eyes, he saw it get closer, red robes fluttering near, and he clenched his eyes shut as he saw it reach out a hand. But he felt nothing except light warmth at the top of his head. The familiarity of that one, single action snapped him back to reality, but as he opened his eyes again, there was nothing in front of him.
He was alone, and the guqin still sang songs inside his head.
•
"Everyone can be dangerous. Under the right circumstances and when push comes to shove, we take the path that we think leads to the best destination. No matter the destruction left in our wake...or the people we leave hurting."