It was late at night when Luna lay wide awake in her sleeping area whilst the other prisoners were getting a much-needed night's rest. She could hear the almost nonexistent footsteps of Aang coming near her and sat up so he could lead her to her brother and Appa.
"Your 12 hours are up. Where is Haru? We've got to get out of here." Sokka questioned her as Appa stayed leveled just lower than the bars that prevented prisoners from jumping in the water.
"I can't." Luna tried saying as Aang went through the bars and hopped on Appa.
"We don't have much time. There are guards everywhere. Get on!" Sokka whispered as he glanced around to make sure no guards were coming towards them.
"Luna, what's wrong?" Aang asked her when he saw the look on her face.
"I'm not leaving." she finally said making Aang and Sokka look at each other with worried expressions.
"I can't. You didn't see these people that are now prisoners. Haru told me about his father, the man that he looked up to. The man who fought fearlessly even though he was severely outnumbered. That was not the man that I met today. The fire nation crushed their spirits and their hopes. Do you know what their plan is?" she asked rhetorically.
"What?" Sokka carefully asked.
"It's to wait out until the end of the war!" she whispered in exasperation while throwing her hands up.
"The people that once fought for what they believed in are now waiting for the war to be over. A war that has been going on for 100 years! They have no idea how much longer they will be here but I'm pretty sure that they have made peace with dying here and that is something that I cannot and will not accept." Luna finished with nothing but determination on her face.
"Luna, it was already such a risk for you to be arrested and taken here and now you want to stay here longer?! Who knows what could happen?" Sokka said quietly but his tone got his message across. He was most definitely not happy with the turn of events.
"Sokka, if I'm in any real danger you need to remember that this is a prison made especially for earth benders which means their main concern was getting them away from their element. But I'm not an earth bender, I'm a water bender and all they did was surround me with mine. So if things go too far I have what I need to destroy this entire prison. Hopefully, it won't come to that." Luna reminded her brother knowing how he got when feeling protective over her.
"How would we even help them?" Aang questioned curiously.
"Shh, we need to hide," Sokka said as he saw lights coming closer to them which meant fire nation soldiers were walking towards their hiding spot.
"Go hide," Aang whispered to Appa who immediately flew away out of sight while the three of them ran off to a more secluded hiding spot. But unfortunately, Appa didn't have anywhere to go but up which meant that he would be spotted.
"Look!" one of the soldiers exclaimed as they moved their lanterns higher to get a better look.
~With the Warden~
"Tell me exactly what you saw." the warden commanded the two soldiers.
"Well, sir, it looked like a flying bison." the first soldier explained.
"What?" the warden asked confused.
"It was a giant flying buffalo, sir, with an empty saddle." the second soldier also explained.
"Which was it, a buffalo or a bison?" the warden asked annoyed with their different explanations.
"I-I-I'm not sure what the difference is, but that's not really the point, is it sir?" the first soldier said confused on how to answer.
"I'll decide what the point is, fool!" the warden exclaimed then he grabbed the first soldier and threw him over the railing and into the water.
"Ahhh!" the soldier screamed as he fell and the other soldier watched with wide eyes.
"You! Wake up the Captain! Search the entire rig!" the Warden ordered the soldier in front of him.
"Sir." the soldier said to get his attention.
"What?" he questioned getting more annoyed.
"That was the Captain you just threw overboard, so..." the soldier said cautiously.
"Then wake up someone I haven't thrown overboard and search the rig. There's something going on here, and I don't like it," he commanded.
~With the Gaang~
They hid in the middle of a bunch of crates so that it would cover them up while they devised a plan.
"We don't have much time. What are we gonna do?" Sokka asked them.
"I wish I knew how to make a hurricane. The warden would run away, and we would steal his keys." Aang said with a smile while Luna and Sokka just gave him a 'really?' look.
"Wouldn't he just take his keys with him?" Sokka asked like it was obvious.
"I'm just tossing ideas around." Aang reasoned.
"Aang, I appreciate you trying to come up with ideas, but a hurricane won't help up here. If it could then I would've already made one by now. This isn't our fight to win, we're not the people who've had their spirit stripped away from them. They won't accept the help of others, instead, they need to see that there is a way for them to help themselves." Luna explained.
"For that, they'd need some kind of earth or some rock, something they can bend." Sokka pointed out.
"But this entire place is made of metal," Luna said as she felt the coolness of the hard metal floor.
"No, it's not. Look at the smoke. I bet they're burning coal. In other words... earth." Aang told them as realization hit him when he saw the dark clouds of smoke float up into the sky.
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"It's almost dawn are you sure this is gonna work?" Luna asked her brother as they stood at the top of one of the many vents.
"It should, these vents are all connected. There's a huge deposit of coal at the base of this island and the whole system is ventilated. Aang closed off all the vents except one. When he does his air bending it will lead the coal right back here.
"There's the intruder!" A soldier called Luna and Sokka were now surrounded by guards and the prisoners watched.
"Luna, stop. You can't win this fight." Tyro tried reasoning with her while all the other prisoners looked at her with sadness as they remembered the way they believed they could escape here.
"Listen to him well child. You're one mistake away from dying where you stand." the Warden said as he made his way to stand in front of them at a distance while watching his soldiers move in closer to trap the two siblings.
Just then the vent began rattling and a fountain of coal spouted out of it with Aang and Momo following once it stopped.
"Tyro you're wrong. If I wanted to win this fight, then I would've already done it. But this isn't my fight to win, I am not the one who was taken from my family and put into a prison where my spirit was broken. Earth represents the strength to stand your ground and not move when hardships are thrown at you. That's what earth benders learn when they start their training. Face things head on or it won't work. Is that still who you are? Are you still strong people who will stand their ground in the face of danger? Or are you what they want you to be, scared, helpless, victim? You can stand here and wait for the war to end or you can do your part by helping end it yourselves." Luna spoke with defiance in her tone. She meant every word that she said and she could see how the people were looking at her.
They were shocked that she would speak like that to them. They were shocked that she would speak like that in front of not only the Warden but a dozen of his soldiers who were just waiting to attack her.
"Foolish little girl. Don't you see? Their spirits were broken long ago. Do you think you can spout some inspirational words and they would suddenly regain what they lost? Pathetic, just like them." the Warden spat out in disgust as he turned to walk away deeming there to be no problem here that his soldiers couldn't handle.
Only when he turned away did a rock hit him straight on the back of his head making him whip his head around to see who threw it so that he could make sure they were punished properly.
There stood Haru with a stubborn look on his face as he twirled three rocks above his hand. So the Warden did what he saw fit for his rudeness.
He thrust both fists out for a double punch sending a wave of fire towards Haru who turned away to not be hit by it only for the fire to be blocked by a thick wall of coal when he turned to see who made it he saw his father in an earth bending stance with both arms up letting him know that his father just saved his life.
"Show no mercy!" the Warden ordered his men as they all got into position ready to fire bend against them.
They shot their fire directly at Tyro and the other prisoners but luckily Luna's speech along with Tyro and Haru's actions proved to be enough to raise the spirits of the other earthbenders as they stood with Tyro using their earth-bending to put up an even bigger wall in front of them to protect them from the fire.
"Ahh! For the Earth Kingdom, attack!" Tyro grunted out as he and the other earthbenders raised the coal wall in front of them and then pushed it forward to attack the soldiers in front of them like a big wave.
The other benders took that as their cue to fight back and that's exactly what they started doing. All of them attacked the soldiers and this time it was the soldiers who were outnumbered.
Sokka was going around breaking the soldier's spears and throwing the top half up in the air where Momo caught it to prevent the fire nation soldiers from having their weapons.
Tyro and Haru stood side by side and worked together to start moving a big portion of the pile of coal they lifted it in the air and then pushed all the coal closer together to form a boulder.
They launched the boulder at the wall of their prison successfully creating a large hole in the wall and the force of the boulder hitting the wall was enough to knock the soldiers that were standing at the top of the wall off their feet and over the edge falling to where the prisoners and soldiers were fighting.
"Get to the ship! We'll hold them off!" Tyro ordered the other prisoners so that he could make sure that the others were safe before going to safety himself. This caused Luna to smile.
Ever since the fight had started she stood near the fence that kept them in, ready to help if needed but so far nobody needed any help. Watching Tyro take charge and fight back made her smile because she knew that this was the person that Haru talked so highly about. The man that he looked up to and she was glad that she could help him become that man again.
"Do not let them escape!" the Warden yelled at his men. So he and two other soldiers shot fire at the prisoners that were running to the newly created entrance but Luna used the water from the ocean and blocked their water before it had a chance of touching any of the earthbenders.
Aang and Sokka ran to her and Aang bended the air around him to where he was now controlling a little tornado and pointing the end of it towards the soldiers and the Warden.
"Guys, throw me some coal!" Aang called out to Luna and Sokka.
The two siblings gathered a bunch of the coal in their arms and loaded it into the tornado which proved to be effective by the way that it launched at the soldiers knocking them down.
"Ooh, that's gotta hurt," Luna said with a grimace as she imagined how it felt.
Tyro, Haru, and another earth bender used the coal that was now lying on the floor with the remaining fire navy soldiers and then used it to pick them up and move them onto a big pile of coal and then they lifted it higher and higher. They made sure to focus as they carried it over the fence and above the water then they let it go sending the soldiers and the warden falling into the water below.
"No, please. I can't swim." the Warden pleaded just before they were dropped.
"Don't worry. I hear cowards float." Tyro told him without a care in the world.
After that, they joined the others on the ships and made sure that nobody was left behind. Appa was floating in the water next to the ships with Aang and Sokka sitting on his back waiting for Luna to join them.
"I wanna thank you, Luna. For saving me, for saving us." Haru said gratefully as he looked at her like she hung the stars and moon up in the sky.
"I didn't save anybody, We just reminded you of what you lost and gave you a little coal. The rest was all you." Luna told him with a blush on her cheeks from how intensely he was gazing at her.
"Thank you for helping me and the others find our courage, Luna of the water tribe. My family and everyone here owes you much." Tyro said in a sincere tone.
"So, I guess you're going home now?" Luna asked in a hopeful tone. She knew how much Haru's mother missed her son and her husband and hoped that they would show her that they were now alright.
"Yes, to take back my village. To take back all of our villages! The Fire Nation will regret the day that they set foot on our land!" Tyro called out loudly for all the earthbenders to hear making them all cheer loudly too.
"Come with us?" Haru asked hopefully causing her to turn towards him and look at the pleading eyes he was giving her.
However, Luna wasn't the only one who heard his hopeful question. Both Aang and Sokka heard him as well and they were both ready to get up and voice the multiple reasons that she couldn't and shouldn't go with them but Luna beat them to it.
"I'm sorry, but I can't. Your mission is to take back your home. Ours is to get Aang to the North Pole. Besides I can't leave my family." Luna explained as she turned to look at Aang and Sokka who pretended like they weren't listening. But just like when they were at the village, the two of them weren't exactly acting non-chalant very well causing her to chuckle.
"That's him, isn't it? The Avatar." Haru asked her curiously even though he didn't need her to answer to confirm his suspicion.
"Luna, thank you for bringing my father back to me. I never thought I'd see him again." Haru said giving her a hug to show his happiness.
"It's what I would want done for me if I was in the same situation. Family means everything to me," she said pulling back from the hug to reach up to her necklace. Touching it was always like she was back in the South Pole with her family.
But when she reached her neck, instead of touching her necklace it was just her skin that she felt making her let out a gasp.
"What's wrong?" Aang asked her concerned as he jumped from Aapa's back to the ship so that he was now standing next to her glaring at Haru like he did something wrong.
"My necklace, it's gone," she said sadly as she looked up at him with the saddest eyes he'd ever seen.
"Luna, were you burned?" Sokka gasped when he saw her back. Her clothes looked like they had been at least singed with fire. He could only see that because her back was facing him while she faced Aang.
"Not that I know of," she said turning to him confused about how this question was brought about.
"Oh my, the clothes on your back look like someone burned you. Are you sure you're not in pain?" Haru questioned coming closer as he and Aang now saw the burned clothes that Sokka was talking about.
"I don't feel anything. Wait, that must've been how my necklace fell off. The ribbon got burned and it fell off my neck." she said in realization.
"But if the fire burned your necklace then how would it not burn your skin?" Sokka asked her confused and concerned.
Just then the tattoo that appeared on her skin the day that she found Harmony glowed and Harmony flew out of her hair.
"Of course, it's your bond with Harmony. That's the only explanation. Dragons are fireproof and being bonded with you must've made you fireproof as well which explains why your clothes got burnt but you didn't." Aang said with wide eyes as he stared at her bond tattoo. He too had a bond tattoo because he and Appa were bonded ever since he met him when he was younger.
"Is that even possible?" Sokka questioned while Haru just looked at the dragon with fascination.
"Yeah, I read about bonds when the monks found out that Appa and I were bonded. They gave me a book about it and everything. It is said that when a person is bonded with their animal in rare occasions they might inherit some of the characteristics their animal has." Aang recited as he remembered what the book said.
"Since Harmony is a dragon and she's fireproof then she must've passed that onto you," Aang said looking down into Luna's eyes and he smiled when he saw that they weren't sad like they were earlier. Instead, they were looking at him with interest with the words that he was saying.
She was truly fascinated with his knowledge about bonds and hoped that they could talk more about it.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~With Zuko on the Earth Bending Prison~
Zuko arrived at the prison a few hours after they had all vacated it. He had his men search around for any sign of the Avatar while he went out to the prison yard to look there.
And much to his surprise, a shining color of blue caught his eye and drew his attention to it. It stood out like a diamond in a pile of coal.
Walking closer to it Zuko felt that he had seen that necklace before.
"It's hers," he muttered to himself as he picked it up from the ground carefully.
Inspecting it closer he saw that the ribbon that holds it in place was torn and scorched with fire. It seems the fire touched the necklace and burned the fabric causing it to fall off Luna's neck.
"Please be safe," Zuko muttered as he closed his eyes and clutched the necklace closer to his chest as he silently said a prayer to the spirits to keep the young woman that captured his eye safe.
Zuko wasn't a fool, he knew that if fire was close enough to burn the necklace off of her neck it meant that she most likely got burned and he could only hope that she was alright and that she didn't end up with a scar like his. Not that it would make her any less beautiful to him but he didn't want her to also have a constant reminder of how awful his element could be.