Avatar: Reborn in Ice and Blood

Also, while it might have been information Azula would have liked to have that pertained her, it was not essential to her survival, so long as she was kept in a safe environment. Really, this is all my fault, and I can't begin to say how funny that is.

...

"Ah," I say, allowing a smirk to surface, "Perhaps I should leave you to it."

"Not before handing over my brother, you're not," Mai says, focus once again on me.

So this is her decision. Good for her, I suppose. As for Circus Girl…

"Ooooh…" she brawls, "Noooohooo – hic – Azu-zulaaaa"

"Shut up!" The princess snaps. Circus Girl disobeys. "I said SHUT UP!"

Her shout is accompanied by a fist of fire. Circus Girl will not move. Mai can only watch with wide eyes as she tracks the path of the attack.

A scream tears itself from her throat.

I don't have the time to note all of it. I don't have the time to cancel out the attack. I'm not standing at the right angle, and Circus Girl is too far from the river.

The only thing left…

With adrenaline pumping through my veins, my heartbeat thumping loudly in my ears, cutting off the guttural noise coming from Mai, I shift my stance. One hand moves upwards from my side, my feet shift as though for a dance, and I take control of Circus Girl's body.

I make her throw herself out of the path of the attack.

It's a heady feeling, knowing the utter control I have over her limbs. And with it comes the realisation of why Katara found it such a horrendous technique. With the power I have over Circus Girl, I have taken her freedom. Her body is no longer hers. She is my tool.

I relinquish my hold over her, and feel the beads of sweat trickling down the side of my neck.

Ah.

Exhausting.

I don't think I'll be doing that very often.

"Ty Lee!" Mai rushes to her side, "Are you alright?"

Circus Girl's breaths are coming in short gasps and she doesn't look like she's with us at the moment. Good job there, self. You traumatised another person today. Does that fulfil the monthly quota?

Azula herself looks… very much like she did when she burnt two people to lovely charcoal sculptures.

But this time, I'm not taking her and running. I very much doubt I could. The only thing I would be capable of now is to form a platform of ice that can carry me downstream.

I have the urge to run a hand down my face. This is nothing short of a clusterfuck. Maybe I should just… leave this be. I'm not all-powerful. Far from it, when I think of how much damage I've caused only this one girl so far.

"What a mess," I murmur, checking on the location of the firebenders in the forest. They've moved closer. A bit more, and I'd feel threatened.

Actually, I already do. I'm not in a condition to fight them and win.

"You!" Azula rounds on me, pointing her finger accusingly, "This is all your fault!"

I chuckle. Which infuriates her further. "Of course it is," I agree, and my tone is so dry that she takes it as sarcasm.

Even though I did not refute her words, she takes them as though I did, and makes to launch some more fire at my face.

Surprisingly, I don't even need to move to dodge, as a stiletto cuts through the air, making Azula yank her arm back, for fear of it being sliced to a bloody mess. Mai.

"That's my brother you're attacking," her voice is cold, yet full of fury. First her friend, her precious friend, then her brother, her infant brother. Azula picked the wrong day to attack her allies, temporary as they may be.

Dear me. Azula will have learned an important lesson today. Never expect compliance from someone when attacking their family member and they are in a position to prevent it.

I tend to live in the front of my head. It allows me a margin of peace. Distraction, nothing more, from what I have lost, what I have missed and who I used to be. Now though, it is time that I made use of my literal emotional maelstrom. It is time that I allow the disgust I have for this place and its people, much like I harboured it for my own, to surface. Self-flaggelation does nothing but stall for the inevitable realisation that guilt is not carried out in silence, and that it must be placed with awareness.

I am not at fault here. Not entirely. To say that would be to treat the other parties as children, slaves, or idiots, and to take a burden I have no desire for: a scapegoat. I have no guilt to carry but my own, and it is no heavier than the weight of my own existence.

It's time for me to take the moral high ground and stay on it. Freedom is my goal, though what is it worth, if it is only I who is free to enjoy it?

"We're done," I murmur. It doesn't shatter the tension.

But it does give them a way out of this situation that doesn't involve a corpse or two.

"I don't care for more squabbles today. I will hand over the brat," I say, carefully positioning myself between Azula and Mai, "And I will move on. Know that whoever comes with me lives with simple rules: do your own laundry, you eat what I find, or find something yourself, and any complaining will be thoroughly ignored."

With that, I remove the brat from my chest, rather unsuccessfully, for he has his small fists curled tightly into my shirt.

"Don't be a brat", I tell him, ignoring my own feelings on the matter, when he refuses to let go of my collar.

"Ba!", he says.

I pry his strong little fingers away. "Hey, hey", I soothe, "You're safe. You're with your family."

"Nnnn- nuh!"

I hope that first part wasn't the precursor to any messes in the kid's diaper.

"This won't be the last we see of each other", I wink at him.

His bottom lip quivers and the tears he didn't shed until now begin to gather in his eyes. "Ka!"

It's bizarre, this scene we're making, and everyone around us is watching with open mouths how he won't stop clinging to my hair. That really hurts. I am seriously considering cutting it short, even though I will look grotesque with hair like a hedgehog. This is the desperation a baby drives me to.

An extraordinary baby.

But a baby all the same.

"Tom-Tom! Cease this nonsense at once!", Mai shouts from behind him, so directly at me, really.

He screams.

That's hurting my ears. I don't think a slight case of tinnitus would be out of place after this. Lovely. Exhausted, attempting to do the right thing and grant everyone their autonomy without actually granting it, because that never should have been my power to begin with, and partly deaf.

"God, you baby", I mutter in a language I haven't made use of since my second set of parents told me that it was creepy to talk to myself and settle in to endure until he tires. I hear babies do that sometimes.

But, miracle of miracles, he ceases the noise-making and instead sniffles at me pathetically.

"That's right. This screaming is rather childish, don't you think? You're what, two now? Time to get a grip. What do you think you'll accomplish like this, huh? Kick up a goddamn fuss like that if you know you'll get somewhere with it, brat", I lecture and… I cannot believe this is working.

How is this working?

This kid isn't a kid at all.

I wasn't just projecting unreasonably. This little guy must be from my world. He's even from an English-speaking country. The chances… are probably marginally slimmer than there being another rebirth into Avatar. Can he speak yet?

Probably not. Speaking was a challenge and a half. He just hasn't had anyone to motivate him to talk in two years. And, damn it all, it's been close to eighteen for me. Even as I hand him over to his stunned sister, I say, "I'm around until the princess is back to her right old self. But after that, I'm going to see if I can't change the world. Tell me why I should bother with a baby while I do that. Give me any reason at all."

In another world, I had a large family. With two older siblings I had become an uncle thrice over by the time I was twenty-five. Both my parents were younger siblings as well, so I had cousins en masse. All of them needed looking after at some point. That way, I got to experience of being the caretaker and of being the one taken care of.

Which might be the reason for my reluctance to get rid of the brat now. But I can't take him with me where I'm going and he's safest where he is now. Perhaps one day when all this is over, I can kidnap him for real. He knows all this.

Could I… Mai owes me a favour. I could keep in contact with him through her? But she would have the power to skew any messages of mine and also wouldn't always be there to read any of it to him. Maybe someone permanent in his household? Someone who could be trustworthy with the right motivation?

However, this discovery hoes not make for an instant family-like connection. It doesn't guarantee anything at all. The only way for me to achieve my desired understanding is through honesty. But depending on the brat's personality, with the disadvantage of not being able to speak yet, if I shared everything now, before we have achieved equal footing, our dynamic might be screwed from the very beginning.

Damn, this is complicated.

He needs to speak first. Then, and only then, can we figure something out.

"So this is what you wanted all along," Azula accuses. And, she's got me there.

She doesn't mention the strange language I spoke in, that the brat seemed to understand. Mai cradles her brother carefully, with a mistrustful air. She perhaps thinks I've done something to him, then? Well, no matter.

Nothing could make the situation any weirder at this point, I think.

Except for maybe the parrot sitting on Ty Lee's shocked head.

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Don't forget to throw some power stones :)

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