The next day we all woke up rather early, and quickly began to continue our trek cross the Serpent's Pass. So far it had gone rather smoothly, except for the encounter with the fire nation battleship. However, it wasn't long until we found ourselves face-to-face with another issue. We had begun following the path downhill, but we soon realised that the path lowered to such an extent where a quite a bit of it was covered completely by the ocean. This meant that we couldn't cross the path any further.
"Well, it's a good thing we have waterbenders with us," I muttered under my breath as Katara stood in front of everyone.
"Everyone single file!" she ordered, and the group quickly complied. I stood at the front of the line next to Katara, though, wanting to help. Katara, however, clearly had other plans. "(Y/N), no waterbending, remember," she told me as she gestured to my arm.
"But I can help!" I pleaded, though she gave me one stern glare that told me no. With a groan, I stood single file like everybody else. Katara began to bend the water in front of her so that it was pushed out of all of our way, clearing the path ahead. She continued doing this until we were completely underwater, though she still kept the surrounding water away so that we were in a safe bubble. However, after I minute I could see that Katara was beginning to struggle. I knew she was a good waterbender, and her healing powers were certainly superior to mine, but she didn't have the pure waterbending strength that I possessed, and I knew that I could help. "Katara, let me help," I offered helpfully.
"No, you're supposed to be resting your arm," she strictly enforced as she concentrated on bending the water around of us. "Aang, come and help me," she shouted, and Aang quickly assisted her. Grumpily, I stood towards the back of the underwater bubble, next to Sokka and Suki.
"Why won't she let me help?" I complained to Sokka, who looked at me sympathetically.
"She's just trying to keep us all safe and healthy," Sokka reasoned with a shrug. "Although, you could probably keep up this water bubble with just one hand knowing your waterbending strength," he added, which made me smile. I was about to thank him, but suddenly a huge, looming shadow could be seen through the water, and it looked to be very close by.
"What is that thing?" Katara said worriedly as we all watched the long, intimidating silhouette pass by. Then, in an instant, whatever it was unexpectedly dove at the water bubble! I could see a flash of green scales burst through the bubble, and shrieks could be heard from all of us within it. Our safe bubble, now interrupted by whatever the hell was attacking us, broke down, and water began to flood in. Immediately, I tried bending the surrounding water away to keep us safe, but my efforts were flawed. As soon as I extended my arms to push the water away, my injured left arm filled with pain at the sudden motion. As a result, I wasn't able to do anything. Now I understood why Katara was urging me to rest. Water began to envelope all of us, but luckily Toph must have been thinking quickly, as we all began to rise towards the surface. She had raised the earth of the seabed so that it pushed us up above the water. We were all sopping wet, but safe for the moment.
"What the hell is that thing?" I shouted out, though nobody replied. Everybody was too busy watching the surface of the water. Whatever beast had attacked us began circling around us from under the water, as if it were a vulture circling its prey. Then, it suddenly broke out of the water, making us all jump and shout out loud. It extended itself vertically so we could all see it. It was huge, at least fifty feet tall- and we could only see from its neck upwards- pattern with turquoise scales with purple lines. It's face had two frills and a long tongue, which we could see clearly alongside it's many razor-sharp teeth that it boasted as it screeched at us.
"I think I just figured out why it's called the Serpent's Pass!" Sokka unhelpfully screamed. "Suki, you know about giant see monsters! Make it go away!" he added, clearly terrified as the rest of us.
"Just because I live near the Unagi, doesn't means I'm an expert!" Suki shouted at him menacingly. I didn't know what a Unagi was, but if it was anything like the monster in front of my eyes, I don't think I want to know.
The serpent screeched at us once more, this time more loudly, and abruptly lunged at us. Aang, with some quick thinking, shot some air at it, making it just narrowly miss the platform we stood on. But this didn't deter the serpent, who just screeched at us one more time, before looking like it was going to lunge again. There was little any of us could do; clearly airbending didn't bother it, waterbending seemed futile against an ocean beast that literally lived in water, and there was very limited earth to for Toph to earthbend against it. Clearly, this was the end for all of us. We had chosen to give up our ferry tickets to travel across the dangerous Serpent's Pass, and now we had to suffer the consequences.
And yet, something inside of me felt like this wasn't going to result in our deaths. In fact, I didn't feel like my normal self at all. I felt confident, and stronger than ever before. Additionally, I suddenly felt absolutely no pain from my left arm, as if it had suddenly healed in a matter of seconds. I had only felt like this once before: at the Northern Water Tribe during the siege, right after my battle with Zhao. This allowed me to reach a conclusion about what had just happened. La and Tui must have gifted me their power, just like they did during the siege. That's why I felt so powerful and confident.
"Everyone, stand back," I ordered, though it wasn't just my voice that barked the instruction. La's deep voice echoed alongside it, as did Tui's gentler voice. That's when I knew with confidence that the water spirits had gifted me their power in order to save my life. The gang followed my order with haste, standing behind me. I glared up at the giant serpent, and stared it in its huge beady eyes, as if trying to intimidate it. The serpent didn't seem scared in the slightest, though I didn't expect it to, and seemed to ready itself to fatally lunge at us once more. It then dawned on me once more that perhaps waterbending wouldn't be very useful on the huge beast, considering it was an aquatic creature itself. I would have to show it something that it hadn't seen before, but that meant taking a risk. Instantly I started to form a plan, though I wasn't convinced it would work. Even with the power of the ocean spirits flowing through me, if the move I was planning didn't work, there was going to be little I could do to stop the creature's devastating lunge.
I inhaled deeply as I stood in a strong waterbending stance with my knees bent. I quickly glanced to the sky, and spotted a large cloud floating over the serpent's head. I closed my eyes, and focussed on feeling the water vapour from within that specific cloud. Luckily for me, the cloud was dense with water vapour, meaning I could easily manipulate it. I then switched my focus onto my breathing, all the while concentrating on feeling the heat from the sun and from within the body. Just as Wan Shi Tong had hypothesised, I bent the water in the cloud so that I felt both ice crystals and hail form within it. According to the hypothesis, this would create an electrical imbalance. It did feel as if the cloud were becoming unstable, which filled me with hope. I looked back at the menacing serpent as I built up the imbalance, and saw that it was getting ready to strike. Just as it lunged it's long, lethal body towards us with its mouth open, I exhaled sharply and suddenly released the energy that I had built up inside the cloud. In an instant, a long, pure beam of white shot out of the cloud and, in the blink of an eye, made contact with the attacking beast. There was a flash of blinding light as the bolt of lightning hit the serpent, but I didn't look away. I couldn't look away, I was too amazed. I had just generated lightning, albeit in an unconventional way.
The beast shrieked in pain as the lightning made contact with its scaly body, and immediately cancelled out attack on us. It screamed once more, and then dove back into the ocean in fear. I couldn't believe what had just happened; I had just created lightning, and saved everyone's life from the serpent. Abruptly, there was a sudden rumble of thunder that rippled through the sky due to what I had done. Now that we were all safe, I felt the spirits withdrawing their power from me. The sudden reduction in strength made me feel weak and faint, just as it had done after the siege when I unexpectedly passed out. This time I stayed conscious, but my legs gave way, so that I collapsed with my back to the floor. There was a moment of silence amongst all the gang, likely due to shock, as they processed what had just happened.
"Am I on the cactus juice again, or did that boy just bend lightning?" I heard Sokka drearily ask the rest of the gang.
"(Y/N) bent lightning??" Toph queried the rest of the team.
"Were you not watching?!" Sokka shouted at her in disbelief.
"No, as a matter of fact, I wasn't watching," Toph sarcastically stated.
"Oh right, sorry..." Sokka then trailed off as the realisation that Toph was blind set in. Luckily Suki jumped in before it could get any more awkward
"Okay, I don't know what the hell just happened, but I do know that we should probably get back on the pathway," Suki wisely informed us.
"Suki's right," Katara quickly sided with her. "Sokka and Suki, can you help (Y/N)? He doesn't seem to be in any condition to walk," she commanded, and I felt my body being hoisted up by the two lovebirds. I watched as Katara bent a pathway of ice for us so that we could rejoin the rest of the pathway. Both of my arms sprawled across Sokka and Suki's shoulders, they helped me walk across the ice.
"Guys, it's okay, I can walk," I weakly groaned, and I tried to push myself off of their support. Unfortunately for me, the pain had now returned back to my left arm as I was no longer under the influence of the spirits. This, coupled with the weakness that the encounter had momentarily riddled me with, meant that I was in no condition to be walking.
"Easy, thunder boy," Sokka told me strictly. Great, first Toph with the nicknames, and now Sokka as well. Still, I had little choice but to let them both carry me back onto the pathway.
By the time we had rejoined the pathway, I had managed to regain some of my strength, though I still couldn't walk unassisted. We were almost at the end of the Serpent's Pass, though, so we didn't want to stop yet. So, with the help of Sokka, I hobbled alongside everyone else as we continued across the pathway.
"So when did you learn how to bend lightning?" Sokka asked me curiously as we walked down a steep decline, getting closer to the end of the deadly route.
"I discovered it at the library. When Wan Shi Tong took me away from the group he showed me some firebender moves to incorporate into my waterbending," I explained truthfully to him. "It's not lightningbending, though. I can generate it, but not totally control it," I clarified.
"Either way, it's super cool," Sokka told me, and I smiled at his words. I must admit, after I had defeated the serpent beast with lightning, I had expected Sokka to make some unfunny jokes about my origins in the fire nation. However, he hadn't mentioned anything of the sort. In fact, he kept talking about how cool it was that I could bend lightning. It's funny how relationships can change in such a small amount of time. A few days ago there was some serious tension between myself and Sokka, but now we seemed to be good friends.
"Thanks for helping me walk, by the way," I graciously thanked my friend.
"No problem at all, buddy," he responded with a smile. "You deserve it,".
We now knew that we were approaching the end of the Serpent's Pass, and were excited to finally reach Ba Sing Se so that we could search for Appa. After a few more minutes, our final destination could be seen in the distance. Between the brown cliffs and green bushes, a long sandy-grey wall could be seen, stretched as far as the eye could see, with many watchtowers on top. I didn't know much about Ba Sing Se, but I knew that it was made up of two walls: the inner and the outer wall. This was to make it impenetrable, and keep the fire nation out. Years ago, when I was just a young boy, I remember reading about General Iroh's siege of Ba Sing Se. It was the closest that the earth kingdom capital has ever been to falling. But that was ages ago, and Iroh seemed like a much different person now.
"There's the wall!" Sokka shouted, pointing at the looming structure in the distance. We had now officially survived the Serpent's Pass. The dangerous cliffs of the pathway had now been replaced by regular, brown earth, for which I was glad. "Now it's nothing but smooth sailing to Ba Sing Se," Sokka added as he helped me complete the final steps off of the pathway. All of a sudden, there was a shout from within our group. The wife of the family who we had been escorting fell into the arms of her husband with a scream of pain.
"The baby's coming!" the wife shouted at us.
"What?? Now?! Can't you hold it in or something" Sokka desperately shouted at her, and, despite the situation, I couldn't help but secretly laugh at his words.
"Sokka, calm down," Katara eased him. "I helped Gran Gran deliver lots of babies back home," she explained, though Sokka continued to argue.
"This isn't the same as delivering an arctic seal!" he shouted. "This is a real human... thing!"
"It's called a baby," Katara stated obviously to her brother. "And I helped her deliver plenty of those, too. Aang, get some rags. Sokka, water. Toph, I need you to make an earth tent- a big one," she ordered as Toph bent a huge pyramid of earth around the family of three, with an entrance in front of us. "Suki, come with me," Katara instructed as the two girls walked into the tent. With Sokka and Aang having ran off to get rags and water, that left me outside by myself. I wanted to make myself useful so that I could help, but clearly Katara didn't want me to risk hurting myself. I already had an injured left arm and was incredibly weak from the spirits giving me their power earlier. So, I found a spot a few metres away from the earth tent, and sat down with my back against a wall of earth. I let out a deep exhale as I relaxed. Sure, there was probably chaos ensuing inside of the earth tent, and I should probably be finding a way to help. But I was tired, and, at the end of the day, we all would have died earlier to the serpent if it weren't for me, so I had earnt some rest. I closed my eyes as I relaxed, and the next thing I knew I had fallen asleep without even realising.
When I finally awoke, thing seemed much more peaceful. I could see everyone gathered outside of the big earth tent, talking amongst themselves. Well, everybody but Aang, who was nowhere to be seen. I got up from against the wall, and I felt much stronger now compared to before. I wasn't sure how long I had been asleep for, but I almost felt normal again now. I paced over to where everyone else was.
"Well, look who decided to wake up," I heard Toph say, her back to me.
"Sorry, how long was I out for?" I asked apologetically as Sokka and Suki turned around to look at me.
"The birth took three hours, so about that long," Suki informed me.
"And where's Aang?" I questioned them curiously, having noticed that the Avatar was nowhere to be found.
"He's gone ahead to Ba Sing Se to look for Appa," Sokka answered. That made sense, but I wasn't sure what the plan was for the rest of us. At the moment, it looked as if we were splitting up from the family of three so that they could get to Ba Sing Se and start their new life. Well, they were a family of three, but now the wife held a newborn baby, bundled in a blanket, in her arms. I walked over to the family to offer them a congratulations.
"Congratulations on the baby," I told them with a smile. "Sorry that I wasn't there to help with the birth," I added as I scratched the back of my head awkwardly.
"Thank you, and don't worry about it," the mother smiled at me, and the father shook my hand.
"Your name is (Y/N), right?" the father asked me, to which I nodded.
"That's right," I told him.
"You're the Prodigy of the North, aren't you?" he questioned, and I was very taken aback that he knew of me. "I've read about you before, but always thought it was just a myth," he explained to me. I had no idea that people of the earth kingdom knew of the Prodigy of the North. Of course, the 'Prodigy of the North' had been a myth for centuries amongst the water tribes, but I didn't know that it was somewhat common knowledge outside of the tribes. "Without you we wouldn't have even made it this far. Thank you," the father then added, and I beamed at him happily. I bid them a quick farewell before they announced their departure to everyone and started walking towards the city. I watched them walk into the distance with a smile, yet I couldn't help but feel a tiny bit of sadness. I wish that I had a family like that. No expectations, just unconditional love and care. That's not to say that my parents didn't love me, but they had always been addicted to the idea of their son becoming the Prodigy of the North- the one who would defend his tribe against the fire nation. Well, I wasn't there to defend the tribe anymore.
Eventually I turned back around from watching the family walking into the distance. I saw Sokka and Suki talking together, while Katara packed up some things that I assume had been taken out during the birth. In a surprising move, I watched Sokka kiss Suki. Not a kiss on the cheek like she had done when they reunited a day ago- a proper romantic, loving kiss. Maybe Sokka was right; he was an expert on women. Maybe I should ask him for advice when we get into Ba Sing Se, just like he had jokingly offered. I would certainly need the help, as I was clueless when it came to love. I had never had time for dating between training, plus I was engaged to Kyana, so I never had the chance to truly fall in love with someone. Maybe someday, but for now I was focussed on doing my best to end the war.
A few minutes later Suki left. She said goodbye to me, claiming that she was going back to the other Kyoshi Warriors at Full Moon Bay. That left just me, Sokka, Katara and Toph by ourselves.
"So what's the plan now?" Sokka asked us when the four of us finally regrouped. To be honest, none of us really knew what we were going to do next. I guess find a way into Ba Sing Se? But then Aang would never be able to find us. However, as everyone else discussed what we were going to do, I was distracted on something that I could see in the air. It was a small speck in the distance at first, but after a few second it got closer. It was Aang using his glider! And he was coming towards us.
"Why is Aang back already?" I asked, and everyone, excluding Toph of course, looked into the air where Aang could be seen travelling back towards us. A moment later the young Avatar landed next to us, with a look of anxiety on his face. "Please tell me that Appa is so huge you found him immediately?" I asked enquired with false hope, and Aang shook his head.
"No. Something stopped me. Something big,".
Word Count: 3627
(A/N: Hey everyone, first of all, sorry for my brief absence from uploading this story. Writer's block has been tough, and I've had stuff going on in my personal life, so my motivation to write got destroyed for a little while. Back I'm back now, and I'm super excited to keep sharing this story with you guys! The next chapter should be published at some point next week, so keep an eye out! I hope to see you guys then! Have a good one! -JetDragon09)