Chapter Text
Ty Lee had departed from Capital City by ferry a few hours after Zuko and Katara took off. She’d arrived on Numata Island at noon, followed by a two-hour-ride on a komodo rhino. Then she had been guided to Hama’s abandoned inn.
“Boards were indeed torn from the floor on the first investigation, just like you told me,” Ty Lee said to her guide named Goro when they exited the inn. “Seems like I came here for nothing.”
“I wouldn’t say it like that,” Goro retorted, giving her an encouraging look. “I still don’t know the reason why this inn should be investigated again—and I probably never will—but you’re here under the Fire Lord’s orders. And whatever it is that you were supposed to find, now you can report to him that inside there is indeed nothing to be found. Now that you’ve seen it, you can be sure.” He scratched his neck. “You know what I mean?”
Ty Lee giggled. “I do. And, yeah, I guess you’re right.”
Goro was one of the mayor’s six sons and among the investigators the first time this very inn had been searched through. After Zuko’s orders had arrived just before Ty Lee, Goro volunteered to guide her. He’d also asked around if a citizen from Fire Lily Meadow might have traveled to Capital City recently. There weren’t any they could think of.
His shy, slightly crooked smile was contagious. And the way his dark eyes narrowed? Yeah, Goro sure was handsome. Ty Lee would travel back tomorrow without any results, and it frustrated her more than she ever would be ready to express—but maybe she could at least have a little fun with her guide tonight.
“So, is there anything else that might be worth investigating?” she asked, playing with her braid.
Goro nodded toward the mountain beyond the fire lily field, and the forest bordering it. “There is a cave leading under the mountain, where Hama kept her prisoners. I can also guide you there if you want.”
Ty Lee thought about how she should put her words without revealing too much about the reason why she was here. The whole Fire Nation knew about Azula’s escape along with Imiq, and the people had been told to be careful. However, the citizens here didn’t need to know that what had happened could have something to do with what Hama did to them.
“Well, yeah, thank you,” was all she decided to say. Ty Lee swallowed hard as she imagined walking through a dark cave. She shook off the feeling, raised her eyebrows and tilted her head. “Maybe after that, you can show me around town, and we’ll see where the evening leads the two of us…”
Goro frowned in confusion. Then he smiled in understanding. “I’d love to.”
Goro was a firebender, so he summoned a flame above his palm to provide them light as they walked through the narrow path inside the cave.
“You know, I used to be an acrobat at a circus,” Ty Lee revealed. Partly to distract herself from her knotting stomach, partly because she remembered her time on this island with the circus.
“Really? But you stem from one of the most influential noble families.”
At least her family had been prior to the war’s end. “Well, noble women are able to join a circus, if they wish to.”
“Right… sorry!”
Ty Lee waved it off. “It’s alright—a common reaction to a surprising part of my life, I guess. Anyway, we spent a few days on this island as well, right on the other side of the mountain.”
“Oh, I’ve been to this circus with my younger siblings! Wait, were you the girl with the orange skirt and that golden flame hat?”
“Yup, that was me.”
“You are amazing! The circus returned two times since, and we immediately recognized that they replaced you with someone less skilled.”
“Oh, well, I can’t say anything about the new acrobat, since I don’t know her. Thanks, regardless.”
“But working for the Fire Lord is a great honor, isn’t it?”
“It sure is…”
The circus director had been an awful person towards the human and animal members. Other than that, Ty Lee considered her time at the circus as one of the best in her life. Showing off her talents instead of hiding them, like her parents had always told her to, and traveling all over the world… She’d even loved sharing a tent with her female troupe members and sleeping on a straw mattress, instead of having whole quarters of her own with a wide canopy.
“We have arrived.” Goro lit the torches attached to the wall and extinguished the flame above his open palm. “Here is where Hama held our citizens captive. There used to be a metal door, separating the path to the cave chamber, and shackles were hanging from the pillars. We removed everything.”
Ty Lee looked around, rubbing her arms as she imagined people hanging from those pillars with their wrists shackled. So, by using bloodbending, Hama had forced them here and let them rot, just like the waterbender woman herself had been forced into the Fire Nation. Creating a new sub form of bending—or discovering a forgotten one anew—Hama indeed had been a master. Ty Lee couldn’t help but wonder what may have become of her if it wasn’t for the horror the Fire Nation put the rest of the world through back then.
Deeply in thought, Ty Lee walked from the entry to the end of the cave chamber and looked around for any sign, trying to focus on her mission.
“Thank you for showing me this place as well,” Ty Lee finally said to Goro somewhere behind her, still rubbing her arms as she faced the stone wall. “Even though there is no evidence of the reason I was sent out, it was st—” as Ty Lee turned, she recognized three more people suddenly standing with Goro, two men and a woman. “Oh… who are you guys?”
They blocked the exit with their large cabinet-like bodies.
Maybe they are just curious friends of Goro’s who were passing by? Ty Lee didn’t want to jump to conclusions, though her guts told her something very different.
“Say, Ty Lee—” Goro slowly drew closer, his smile turning vicious while his eyes darkened. “Who does your true loyalty lie with? Fire Lord Ozai and his declared successor, Princess Azula? Or the Traitor Prince, who claimed the throne due to the treason he committed?”
They knew Ty Lee believed in Zuko. As much as they knew that claiming something different would be a lie in hopes of getting away with her life.
“So, leading me inside here was a planned ambush,” Ty Lee concluded. “You belong to the Loyalists.”
“Well, look how smart you are,” Goro chuckled, the other three joining him. “We are very aware of the reason why you’re here. It has to do with the princess’ escape. A sign we mustn’t ignore, no, on the contrary: We won’t hide any longer. Our rebellion will spread all over the world until Zuko is gone for good and Fire Lord Ozai has finally reclaimed his rightful throne. I gathered the others in my area as soon as the Traitor’s message arrived. There are more waiting outside. So, I’m asking you one last time: To whom do you owe your loyalty?”
While there were more of the Loyalists waiting outside, at least with the four inside here, she stood a chance. They were all firebenders, as she could tell by their stance, ready to attack.
Ty Lee managed to put on a condescending look. “Well, Goro… looks like the two of us won’t have fun tonight after all.”
Goro snorted and opened his mouth, ready to retort. Before he was even able to make a sound, Ty Lee had already done a backflip toward him and blocked his chi with targeted jabs. Releasing a painful moan, his knees trembled, then he went down.
The others attacked, but she avoided the several flame balls, jumped from one pillar to another, avoided another flame, then landed right in the middle of the triangle attacking her. This was to her advantage. Before they were able to react, Ty Lee chi blocked them all at once and ran out of the cave.
Outside were half a dozen more people waiting, hands ready to bend, as well as weapons targeted at her. One of them yelled something, but Ty Lee was too focused on her next move to understand the words. She leapt high over the group, their mouths falling open in astonishment.
Then she fled across the field of fire lilies, multiple questions racing through her mind, and yet there was no time for her to get them all together. Where should she even head? How many of the Loyalists from Numata Island were gathered in Fire Lily Meadow by now? How many of them had taken Azula’s escape as some kind of sign to escalate their rebellion?
Ty Lee screamed as a hot sensation of pain ran over her bare lower back. She’d got hit by a flame, but didn’t dare to stop running. No, what made her stop and fall on her knees was the fist that slammed into her stomach the moment she looked over her shoulder to get a glimpse of the attacker. She coughed as stomach contents shot up her throat and slid down again, leaving an acidic tingling.
“We got her!” a woman behind Ty Lee shouted.
“Nowhere to run for you. I wouldn’t try it again,” a man said amused, probably the one who’d hit her.
“Turn her around, so I can face that slut!” This was Goro’s growling voice among the multiple steps approaching.
Ty Lee repressed a painful moan as someone kicked her in the ribs, making her turn on her back. The same person grabbed her wrists. Through the veil of unshed tears, she made out around twenty people surrounding her. Goro faced her with narrowed eyes, his knees still slightly trembling from her chi block, as though they were unable to hold his weight. When he knelt down to her, although on purpose, it looked more like his body buckled. “We got you despite your weird talents, circus freak. Too bad the effect of your punches doesn’t last that long, isn’t it?”
Her desperate attempt of kicking him in the chest ended with him grabbing her by the ankles and pressing them in the grass.
Sounds of chuckling reverberated from everywhere.
“The plan was to trap her, but what now?” A woman asked. “According to our sources, she is a good friend of the Traitor Prince. Do we keep her as leverage against him, or do we kill her right away?”
“Leverage!” Goro spit out. “The assassin's guild won’t manage to get into the palace since the guards were doubled. Let’s have our spies deliver him one body part of hers after the other secretly, until he gives in and frees Ozai—or until she is no more.” His eyes took in her body slowly, hungrily. “Too bad that you withdrew your offer of us two having fun tonight. According to rumors, you have gathered a lot of experience.”
There was another round of chuckles, while Ty Lee clenched her jaw.
Her breath increased when he laid his mouth on her ear. “At least let me check if that cunt of yours is blown out from all those men who fucked you.”
As soon as she felt his touch on her waistband, Ty Lee bit into his cheek so hard that she ripped off parts of the skin.
Goro cried out in pain, tugged himself away from her. When she spit onto his face, he slammed his palm across hers. Her left cheek throbbed with pain, and her ear rang. A new veil of tears blurred her view. Pain on her back, her stomach, her cheek.
Goro pulled off both her and his pants and undergarments, then he spread her legs.
Suddenly people started to scream. Goro let go of her, as did the man who’d held her by the wrists. A gust of wind dried her tears—though it was more like a hurricane—and the earth began to shake.
Someone put her undergarments and pants back on, then gently grabbed her shoulders to pull her up into a sitting position. Ty Lee recognized the woman in Kyoshi Warrior make-up and uniform immediately, the shoulder-length brown hair flew in all directions.
“Suki?” she managed to whisper, the sound completely swallowed by the loud hurricane. As was Suki’s only slightly louder, soothing voice.
The Loyalists attempted to flee, but got pressed to the ground and swept across the field of fire lilies, whose partly dried up blossoms had been torn out and now flew through the air, hundreds of them.
Among the screams of sheer panic, she heard voices yelling.
“Calm the fuck down, man!”
“Stop it, Aang, you’re gonna kill us all!”
Ty Lee made out the source of the sudden shift, about forty to fifty inches away from her: He was wrath itself, soaring with eyes glowing as bright as the arrow tattoos on his body inside a spiral of wind, surrounded by rings of water, fire, and rock chunks. Sokka and Toph perched behind a boulder beneath the Avatar, Appa roared at his side.
Suki helped Ty Lee stand up, although she herself barely managed to do so. “Aang!” Suki shouted, waving with one hand to draw his attention to her, the other one held Ty Lee by the shoulder. “Stop it! They are gone, and Ty Lee needs medical aid!”
Everything ached. The worst pain was the burn on her lower back. She grabbed Suki, to prevent herself from collapsing. She would, nevertheless, if Aang wouldn’t get out of the Avatar State soon, and she could be brought to shelter.
Ty Lee looked up to meet his glowing eyes, directly glaring at her. “Please…” She was still only able to whisper, but made sure to emphasize the word—if her whole appearance wasn’t already desperate enough for him to understand.
All elements surrounding Aang slowed down. Air, water, and fire vanished, the earth chunks fell to the ground. The glowing stopped while Aang sunk down.
“Damn, Aang, one of these days…” Toph approached him with clenched fists.
“You saw what they were about to do to her,” he said, his voice calm yet determined. “I had to stop them.”
“By losing control and putting all of us in danger?” Sokka retorted, pointing at Ty Lee. “Including the person you intended to save?”
“And those people could be anywhere by now,” Toph spoke again as her arms shot up in frustration. “You literally swept them away!”
“How exactly should I have dealt with them all without doing harm?”
“Oh, Twinkle Toes… If it weren’t for your outburst stopping me, I’d have known exactly how to deal with at least that one guy. And, believe me, I would’ve harmed every inch of his body.”
“Not to mention that Aang did harm them with his outburst, called the Avatar State,” Sokka added and turned to Aang. “Will you ever learn to control it?”
Suki steadied Ty Lee as they approached them. “Again: Ty Lee needs medical aid. Now! Let’s get her on Appa.”
Toph raised the ground below to get herself, Sokka, Suki, and Ty Lee on Appa, while Aang leapt between the bison’s horns and grabbed the reins.
Momo was waiting in the saddle, gazing curiously at Ty Lee with his round, green eyes. He squeaked and looked around as if asking something.
“She’ll be fine, Momo,” Sokka said.
Aang commanded the bison to take off, and Suki asked Ty Lee to lie prone. The Kyoshi Warrior pulled a medical kit out of a pouch and opened it.
“C-can’t Aang heal me with waterbending?” Ty Lee dared asking. She didn’t want to come across as ungrateful—they saved her from so much worse than she’d already experienced today—but the healing process with the help of waterbending was usually way quicker. Maybe her injuries would be healed within seconds, which would take days or weeks with conventional ointments.
“There was never the need for me to learn healing,” she heard Aang retort from beyond the saddle’s surrounding side wall. “I’m really sorry, Ty Lee. Although, maybe—yeah! Let’s bring her to Katara. I mean, it’s an emergency, right?”
Ty Lee heard Suki exhale audibly as she massaged the cooling balm into her back. It eased the pain at least a little.
“Katara and Zuko left for Agna Quel'a yesterday,” Ty Lee informed him, trying to ignore the increased throbbing of her left cheek as she spoke this long. “I don’t think they’d have returned yet.”
Toph—whose arms were wrapped around one of the gripping holes of the saddle—looked up with raised brows, and Sokka stopped playing with his boomerang. There was a long moment of silence.
“So, Katara left Ember Island?” Aang finally interjected, somehow composed.
Ember Island? “She and I are part of the investigation to find out what killed the guards; that’s what brought me here. Katara joined us recently. You… didn’t know?”
No one replied, and she couldn’t make out Aang from behind the saddle wall, but his tone before had already been enough of an answer.
Sokka clicked his tongue. “We planned on returning to Capital City anyway, so let’s bring Ty Lee to a healer there. Maybe Zuko will return during our stay. Then we can tell him that our search up until now had been in vain.”
“Right…” Aang agreed.
“Do you have any stuff left here that we should pick up first?” Sokka asked, to which Ty Lee shook her head. She left some of her belongings at an inn as she was supposed to sleep in tonight, but refused to stay in this place any longer.
“The medicine should be enough until we arrive,” Suki spoke to Ty Lee. Ty Lee hissed as she massaged balm into her throbbing cheek. Then she covered her with a blanket. “Try to get some rest for now.”
It was like the blanket around her body brought back the weight of what had almost happened to her, if it wasn’t for the group around the Avatar traveling here by pure accident. Ty Lee curled up and hid half her face under the blanket, so that no one would see her hand pressed to her mouth as an attempt to repress her sobs. After a while, she drifted off to the sound of the rushing wind.