Sokka was in the town trying to convince them to leave. But no matter what he said, no one wanted to believe him. If anything, the fire nation soldiers there instead prepared to arrest him for interrogation. He couldn't blame them. He was some random kid, obviously not from around here, spouting what would sound like nonsense to anyone.

"I'm telling you the truth! They plan to blow the dam, and this village will be wiped off the map! You all have to evacuate as quickly as you can, we don't have much time!"

"Save it, kid. We're taking you in—"

"Let's trust him, Officer." Sokka turned to the voice, only to see the old man Jet and his guys mugged before. His gut twisted at the sight of the man's bandages and cane, but his eyes were fierce and kind. "This is the child I told you about."

"The one that kept those rogues from killing you?"

"He's the one." Walking past the once sneering and laughing crowd, the old man leveled his eyes with Sokka's, "Child, you're certain of this? Without a doubt?"

"Yes, sir." The warrior-in-training stopped his voice from shaking, "I don't know how much more time we have. But if you all don't leave now, all of you will die."

"Alright, then." With a solemn and grateful expression, he turned to his family. "Gather what you can in the travel sacks, quickly! Only essentials and keepsakes you can carry in your hand. Let's move!"

"Yes, Father." A young man responded, picking up who had to be his daughter.

"Okay, Grandpa!" The little girl, unaware of the danger they were in, answered enthusiastically.

They left without another word, leaving the crowd of naysayers shocked. That was, until a voice somewhere in that gathering yelled at them. It was a merchant that had come through with a seasonal batch of cabbages. "What are you waiting for?! Get a move on, death is coming!"

Sokka thought the man looked oddly familiar... Had they met before? He didn't muse on the matter long, as the crowd dispersed to their own homes, frantic to get their things to leave. The soldiers helped however they could, gathering heavy loads in travel carts they'd usually used to transport troops and supplies. Within the hour, everyone had their essentials, heading out of the town in a forlorn march for their lives.

Sokka tried to look for that man again, to thank him for his help. But no matter where he looked, he couldn't find him. Instead, lying suspiciously on the ground where he once was, was a talisman. Picking it up, he studied it, finding a familiar symbol: A swirl with three points, the sign of the Asrar.

He didn't know what to think aside from gratitude, resuming his aid of the villagers in their trek to higher ground. There was a hillside not too far from the village, but it was a steep slope that could protect them from the rushing waters. The bend of the slopes would turn the river in the opposite direction, connecting it to the true river just downhill.

All the while, Sokka worried about his family, Ayaan especially.

"Sokka, you need to get to the village to warn them," Ayaan ordered. "They have no idea what's about to happen to them. I need to get to Aang and Katara."

More than likely, they were there right now filling up that dam. If they found out, it would be right when they finished and no sooner. One trait about Katara, when she works, she does so with a single, focused mind. It was an admirable trait in any other circumstance except this one.

They knew this would hurt them. While Ayaan had wanted Katara to learn from this, he didn't want a town full of deaths on her conscience. If he could protect her from that, he would. With everything he had, he'd protect them. And to do that, Jet needed to be out of the picture. For trying to make his little siblings accomplices in a small-scale genocide, the blessed teen was irate.

While the dam was a lost cause, they could still save the people. "Go now, Sokka. We will meet up at the dam once you've succeeded."

"But what if they don't believe me?" Sokka asked, "What if it all goes wrong?"

Ayaan placed a calloused, gentle hand on his head. "I have a good feeling it won't."

With that, the silvery white-haired teen left into the night. Sokka left on the quickest route he knew to the village. But as he looked back, the moonlit sky illuminating his brother's shrinking figure, Sokka felt apprehensive.

His hands had been soft upon his head, but his expression was anything but gentle. Whatever was about to happen, he could only pray to the spirits it wouldn't be too horrifying. An angry Ayaan isn't something one wants to mess with, and this was the angriest Sokka had seen his brother since Omashu.

.

.

Aang continued his relentless chase of Jet through the trees, scaling levels of the forest. After a harrowing pursuit, he finally closed the distance for the nth time, sending a twisting current of violent air towards him.

"Ugh!" Shot out of the canopies, Jet and Aang freefall with the twister. In the turbulence, the rogue loses his grip on the prized glider. With the nimble swiftness of a master bender of his element, Aang runs with the current to boost his speed. Desperately, he reached for his glider, finally grabbing it before the thief could use his hooks.

Immediately, he prepares to fly off again. There was no more time to waste. Any moment they could blow the dam, and it would be too late by then. His waterbending wouldn't be enough to stop the devastation to come, not as he currently was. Maybe if he knew more, or mastered that Avatar State thing he'd accidently entered before.

But as he was now, it wouldn't be enough. If he didn't get there now, he couldn't fathom the loss.

It would be like his home, completely wiped out. Vacant, quiet. Though this time, he would have helped in that. He would have aided in that genocide. It made Aang sick to his stomach, his arrow lighting up at the anguish just faintly.

Before he can properly blast away, however, Jet manages to knock him back. He'd used his hooks to snag a branch on his way to the ground, using the added momentum in his attack. Aang is slammed into a nearby trunk, the wind completely knocked out of him as he could feel a few of his ribs bruise on the brutal impact.

"Ah!" Aang lands on the ground with a heavy thud, his glider just a few feet beside him. Looking around, they'd gone in one giant circle, back where they'd started on the cliff overlooking the dam. The bombs were almost all in place now, just a few more and all would be lost.

"Gotta... warn them!" Dusk had long become a budding night, the full moon on the rise in the distance. If they didn't have time before, they had little to none now. Even still, hurting and winded, Aang still tries. But he's slow, addled by his bruised torso.

When he finally opens his glider's wings, however, all he finds are ruins. Rips and tears ravage the relic, making it useless to help him fly. While Aang had been chasing him, or maybe the moment he'd gotten into the trees, Jet tore the wings as a last resort. Stuck on the ground in shock, Aang didn't notice the shadow of his foe fall upon him.

"Get away from him!" But Katara did, blasting Jet with a torrent of water. She'd been trying to help him by following them from the ground. She was nowhere near as nimble, however, just barely keeping up until then. It's a good thing her brother drilled them in their stamina every day, or she would have only barely kept close.

"Jet... why?"

"Katara, you would too if you just stopped to think. Think about what the Fire Nation did to your mother. We can't let them do that to anyone else ever again!"

It was so clear to see that he was gaslighting her. So clear, yet she hadn't seen it before now. Why? Why hadn't she seen it? He was trying to use the very information she'd freely given him to try to bring her to his side, and for the past few days, it had been working.

Not anymore.

"No, if I would have stopped to think, I would have believed what my brothers said about you." It would have never gotten this far. She wouldn't have felt this shivering disgust had she just trusted them and listened. Especially Ayaan, who never speaks ill without a reason. "This isn't the answer!"

Her despair was palpable, but it only got worse for her as he continued, "I want you to understand me, Katara. I thought Sokka would understand, but—"

"Where's Sokka?" Tears fall from her eyes, realizing that he'd fully lied when he said Sokka forgave them. He'd done something to him instead, something to keep him out of the way. Her stubbornness did this. They could have been gone if she just listened for once.

Now she made them stay in the den of a madman, with the real possibility that he'd hurt her family. Or worse.

So much worse.

<"You heard your mother. Get out of here!" A stranger was in their house. Katara ran out, spotting Ayaan who was already racing inside. Stealthily and quick, he spoke to his crying sister.>

<"Dad's at the northeast side of the village. Go, Katara. Everything will be okay.">

<But it wasn't. After that day, everything would slowly fall apart.>

"Katara." Jet reaches out and touches her face, the soft caress making her skin crawl.

"Where's my brother you scumbag?!" She shoves him away from her, nauseous and ireful. This was the guy she thought was "cool"? This was the great leader she'd been siding with over her own family? This thing? "What did you do to him?!"

With the steady forms she'd mastered from the Phantom unit and her eldest brother's brutal training meshing in destructive muscle memory, Katara slams a bullet blast of compressed water at her enemy. The hit lands with devastating precision, leaving the unprepared Jet taking the full brunt of the gut punch.

"I can't believe I trusted you!" It was followed by another, and then another, a flurry of punches he could not dodge or block. No matter what he did he was pushed back, the water striking him like a vengeful ram. Katara remembered Ayaan's instruction on where to hit for the most effect, and the most pain. It was taught to her to throw off her opponents, giving her time to escape or attack.

Right now, her blood boiling, escape was not the option she chose. "You lied to me, you're sick and I trusted you!" She blasts him with water again and again. Righteous in her anguish and rage. Yet before she could get another vicious blow in, they all heard something.

A bird call. A very distinct and familiar type of birdcall. Startled, the attacks stopped. The calls came from over the cliff, near the dam. They'd heard the freedom fighters use those calls to communicate often enough to feel dread when Jet replied with another.

"What are you doing?" The energy she had vanished, all but knowing the answer.

Jet, though hurting something fierce, smirks, "You're too late."

"No!" Aang opens his glider and runs for the nearby cliff again, a fraught attempt to get in the air. But just like the last try, he falls flat without any lift. Katara runs over to help him, and he can only hope. "Sokka and Ayaan are still out there, they're our only chance!"

Katara, lamenting her mistakes, pleads to the open air, "Come on, Sokka. Please, Ayaan... I'm sorry I ever doubted you, please!"

Please.

Please...!

But in the distance, they see the lighting of a flaming arrow. As if in slow motion, it tilts and shoots through the air at a silent, perfect angle. It arcs down to the base of the dam, where all of the bombs were placed and waiting.

There was no more time left.

"No..."

-BA-BA-BA-BOOM!

Katara and Aang watch as the dam's center explodes in a cloud of smoke and fire, the massive wall of water that follows promising death to any in its roaring path. In the distance, they see the moment the raging flood rushes through the open gate. A cresting wave dwarfs the town as it's engulfed in mere moments.

There was no way anyone would survive such a cataclysmic disaster. In the seconds that follow, nothing is left. The only evidence that a town with families once stood there was a smiling doll in a purple dress. A toy that could only belong to an innocent child. So many small toys like it floated down the new river, broken, ruined, and purposeless, the fate of their child left in the wake of the unforgiving current.

"They didn't make it in time..." Aang is solemn, not trying to get up anymore. He'd failed. Yet again, he'd failed.

"All those people..." Katara turned back to Jet, who had the nerve to smile at the destruction without a hint of guilt. Wrought with rancor, she was filled with a profound resentment for the man before her. "Jet, you monster!"

"This was a victory, Katara. Remember that." The grin on his face as he believed his plan worked was a crazed, raving stretch of his lips. He paid no mind to the grim expressions of his followers, realizing just what they'd done. He didn't care, only reveling in the fact he'd gotten rid of everything Fire Nation before him. "The fire nation is gone and this valley is safe!"

"The Fire Nation isn't who you should be worrying about."

"Huh? Where did—" Ayaan stood in the shade of the trees, his silent approach unheard until he'd spoken. But the moment Jet looked his way, no one was there. In the bushes, he could have sworn he saw Ayaan standing there. "I know you're there, Ayaan!" The rogue yells, his hook swords at the ready. "Show yourself!"

The river continues to roar and the moon rises, the air chilling enough for breath to be seen. All that answers Jet is silence, paranoia swirling in him. Looking through the woods and trees, he tries to find Ayaan, until a shadow falls over him.

"Brace yourself." Before him stands the visage of a seething Ayaan, silhouetted by the full moon, eyes reflecting the glow. "I'm your opponent now."

"Bring it on! I know I can take yo—"

There was no warning, hardly time for Jet to react. Ayaan's spear came down upon him like a crashing wave, the clang of metal meeting reinforced bone clashing over and over. Just like the river they witnessed erase the town, Ayaan launched his assault on Jet.

It didn't matter what distance Jet got to. Up close, he was met with free-handed, powerful blows. His arms quaked at the weight of them, each purposeful and heavy. At length, he was met with the crippling crashes of the spear. He'd barely avoid the sharpened edge only for the blunted counterweight to slam into him.

He'd spent years honing his skill with his hook swords. No Fire Nation soldier he'd encountered could stand up to him. He'd been praised and revered by his followers for it, it was something he took pride in.

But his unpolished skills were nothing in the wake of a master. It was an onslaught that didn't allow him to breathe, for taking even a second for a breath meant enduring a savage blow.

"Ugh!" He could hardly predict where the next blow was coming from. He'd prepare for the spear, only for Ayaan to knock it in a different direction with a part of his body. It would spin and twist, too fast to properly see. It didn't help that the spear wasn't the only thing to watch out for.

The ground was muddy, and whenever he thought he'd gained distance, his soles froze. It was only enough to hold him for a second, but a second was all Ayaan needed to get within range again.

Never mind trying to go in the trees, either. Aang, for sure, had been nimble and hard to lose, but Ayaan was a beast. He'd kick off branches and trunks at unthinkable speeds, catching the forest dweller within moments for another clash within the shifting woods.

He was a dexterous hunter, and the longer the fight went on, the more Jet felt like prey before a ravenous wolf.

But just as he was seeing all of Ayaan's overwhelming strengths, there was a weakness. His spear itself. There was wear and tear on it. While well-maintained, a weapon could only last so long under such extensive use. That weapon was on its last even if it could still hit like an elephant mandrill. He needed to find a weak point.

So, taking a big risk, he tanked some nasty blows to get in close with the weapon. With each one, he got a little closer to figuring it out, until finally he found it.

On the neck of the spear where the blade meets the shaft is a jewel he always found odd. Katara had mentioned that he kept that as a memento of their mother after her murder. That place, with how big his blade is, would most definitely be strained after a long time. And it was the same at the bottom of the spear with the counterweight, and the places wrapped in bandage wraps.

He had to get rid of the spear. It was his only way to get the upper hand in this fight. And what better way than doing added mental damage? With luck, he could use that against him to gain an advantage. It was a low blow, but he was more than willing to if that meant winning this fight.

Thinking quickly, he aimed his sharpened, shuang gou swords at the weakest part of the well-used spear. Specifically, he aimed for where the jewel was wrapped and the trinket itself. With a swift swipe of his weapon, everyone watched as the spear Ayaan treasured was cleaved in thirds.

Ayaan's eyes widened as everyone else, the Gaang most of all, let out shocked gasps.

That spear had been his lifeline. It kept him from spiraling when hope was all but lost. He made it with his father, a treasured moment, and it held on to the gift he'd made his mother. It was his most prized possession, something he rarely ever goes without.

On the ground in pieces was the jewel he'd given his mother, and it was like a piece of him shattered. That was the last piece of his mother he had. His, and his alone, it was the piece he'd given her before their lives changed. The symbol of fleeting hope to him.

Broken.

Burning.

He felt like he was burning.

Everything was burning away.

'It hurts it hurts it hurts it hurts ithurtsithurtsithurtsithurts IT HURTS-'

Everything hurts.

He hates it.

He hates this.

He hates him.

But now, it lay upon the ground in pieces. Jet felt triumphant at the look of horror on his face. Thanks to Katara, he knew how much that spear meant to him. In battle, sentimental things being lost can cause one to falter. This was his chance for an advantage.

"Hah! What will you do with your-UGH!" His face had already clocked to the left before he registered he'd been punched. It was followed by more, relentless and agonizing as he tried to block.

Unlike what he thought, Ayaan didn't stop his onslaught on him at all with the loss of his spear. No, it got more violent, more ferocious. He was like a wounded beast, uncaring of restraint anymore.

A growl, primal and daunting, escapes the watertribe warrior. Sharp canines most didn't know Ayaan had revealed themselves in his snarl, bared solely on his target, Jet.

Ice-cold fury blinded him of all else as the moon rose, and that familiar symbol faintly appeared on his head. Eyes vacant, solely focused on destroying what was in front of him, he tuned out the rest of the world. Power seeped into his bones with the moon's rays of soft light, churning through his boiling blood.

Jet had made a grave mistake.

There are two modes of combat Ayaan is most confident in. The first is his spear, the crutch he leans on for control and balance of both his body and emotions. The second is his fists, which punch holes through trees. And now, his body, already a problem, was getting a boost from the rising full moon.

Using his spear had been mercy. His spear was gone. His tether to calm himself was gone. His mother's jewel had been mercy. Yet there it lay on the ground in pieces.

Mercy was gone.

Jet could see the frozen mist leaving Ayaan's lips as he hissed a breath, the ground freezing over from the lingering water from Katara's previous assault. His footing slipped on the ice, and that split-second lapse gave Ayaan all the opening he needed.

As if time slowed, Jet felt something crack before his body followed, sent flying into one of the many trees lining the forest. The blow bruised his back, making him drop his trusted hook swords. But his punishment didn't end there, the ice crept up from his feet, locking him there as Ayaan, within what seemed to be a blink, was before him.

With both hands free, there was no handicap for the beatdown he was, in moments, to endure.

"RAAHHHHH!" Seconds, minutes, heck, it could have been hours, all Jet could register was that he was a punching bag. A violent left hook jabs his face to the right, followed by the right which flips it to the left again. Blocking only delayed the inevitable, cracking the bones in his arms as the attacks switched.

He was swift enough to dodge some, but a grapple of his hair brought him right back into the cycle of pain. Now, instead of his face, it was his ribs, his legs, his arms, shoulders, knees. With every punch, it felt like something inside him was freezing. A bitter cold deep and unfathomable. Every liquid around him was freezing.

The saliva in his mouth, the drops of blood spilled, his tears and even his snot, frozen before they ever touched the ground.

Then, it finally stopped, when a hand reached up to grab the bloodied fist about to strike him again.

"Ayaan, he's had enough." Katara was the one to call out to Ayaan. Unafraid of her brother, she bravely went to his side, gently placing her hand on his to lower it from its next punch. Jet fell like a doll cut from strings, the freedom fighters that had just arrived looking on in horror.

Katara didn't flinch when his hateful gaze found her. Those vivid hues of blue a beautiful and terrifying tell of his angry mood. She'd contributed to this. And with her mind finally open to the things she was ignoring, she could see it clearly now.

Her brother, just beyond his outrage, was saddened. That was her fault. Nothing but her own fault. His distance and harshness with himself were only to protect them from his own fears. He understood something was wrong with him more than anyone. Of course, he would.

Yet instead of being a support, she'd been an instigator to make that worse.

During all of this, Ayaan says nothing. He was angry at Katara for trusting Jet so much thanks to a crush. He was infuriated Jet used her and Aang for his nefarious plan. He almost made them killers. Aang, with a heart that can fit the world, and Katara, a stubborn pagan of justice, that burden would crush them. He had Sokka kidnapped. He hurt Aang. Katara was heartbroken.

He'd broken the symbol of the only good memory he had left of his mother outside of her dying screams.

A spear could be replaced, no matter how special it was. He could always find a way to rebuild it stronger.

But that jewel. That specific jewel. There was no getting that back.

He hates it.

He hates this.

He hates him.

"I'm sorry, Ayaan." Katara pulls him away from Jet, Ayaan letting her. The faint symbol on his head dissipates, his visceral ire calming if only enough to finally stop. Right now, her apology seemed just as hollow as he felt, even if she meant every word.

His emotions were unstable, anger seeming to bleed through the pores of his skin as an icy mist. A huff of chilled air escaped his lips.

He'd been so patient with her and almost every time it blew up in his face. He'd had enough. Always on edge, always on guard. Even during his sleep. He's always fretting about their well-being enough not to care about his, but when he's alone, that's what he thinks about. She was callous enough to throw that in his face, for a guy she had a crush on.

He loves her; she, Sokka, Gran-Gran, Aang, Momo, Appa, his village, were his world. His small, precious world. If it was for them, he would do almost anything. But even if she'd learned this hard lesson, what got them here wasn't something he was going to forgive with just an apology.

That wasn't enough.

This situation was bullshit.

So he wasn't going to take this apology. Not right now. Right now, he could barely bear it. She was old enough to understand certain things even if she was still just a kid. But... she was a kid. A very naive one. A very brave one. And a sometimes very, very dumb one. All children had their moments of being idiots. Even he had them, and he was considered an adult.

The heart is sometimes wrong. The mind is sometimes wrong. Impulses are sometimes wrong. No matter how good of a deed they seem in that moment, it can lead to something worse if not thought through. Katara was young, inexperienced, and sheltered. Ayaan held responsibilities she wouldn't understand, and understood things she was too young to understand. Wisdom takes time. That's why patience is a virtue.

But Ayaan was young, too, and his patience had limits she'd clearly exceeded.

He silently went to pick up every piece of his broken spear. The blade and counterweight of his spear were still intact. able to be used again. He'd already known that one day his spear would break. He was already prepared for that. His spear could be fixed with the tools he made sure to get back in Omashu.

He put every bit of his mother's ruined jewel in a small bag. There was no hope for the jewel, it was broken beyond repair. But he would keep every piece of it he could close, every sliver. No matter how futile it seemed, until not a piece remained, he'd hold on.

All of them board Appa, their things long-since on board. But before they take off, Ayaan looks back. The Freedom Fighters had gathered to nurse their struggling leader. The beaten and bruised rouge lifted his head. His eye was swollen shut, lips busted, and cheeks bruised, it was a surprise that he didn't have missing teeth.

"You're a... traitor...!" He said, voice shaking in pain. Even then, he still felt he was in the right. "We could have... freed this... valley!"

"Who would be free if everyone was dead?" Sokka looks down on him, disappointed, disgusted, and disillusioned. Any sliver of hope he may have had for Jet vanished in smoke, "No one, Jet. You became the traitor when you stopped protecting innocent people."

Looking at Katara, he speaks again, "Katara... please..."

"Speak her name again and I'll leave you with more than just broken bones," Ayaan practically hissed. Jet was wise enough to cringe at the sound.

The Gaang secured themselves on Appa without another word, Katara taking one last glance at the group below. By then, the other freedom fighters had gotten there, and rightfully looked away to tend to their leader. The guy she'd fallen for, the guy she wrongly trusted, the guy she believed over her brothers.

Katara had learned a lot through this horrible ordeal. A lesson she didn't realize she had to learn. While she may fight with her brothers all the time for the simplest of things, they would never try to hurt or use her.

This... This was the result of her foolishness. No, her immaturity. Ayaan was older and wiser than her, and while he may not know everything, who did? He knows more than her when it comes to people. He sees things differently. And while Sokka was younger, he was way more observant. They did things to keep her safe.

<"You're thinking about the small picture." Sokka explained, "It would make sense that you wouldn't get it." To her scowl, he continued, "Ayaan isn't thinking about whether we can take on those soldiers, he was thinking about the village's wellbeing after that fact.">

<"If there are no fire nation soldiers, wouldn't everything be alright then?">

<"Katara, it's not that simple.">

She may not always agree with them, but Ayaan never did or said things without reason.

<"I've looked up to him all my life. Ayaan, the way he thinks about things is different from you and me." Sokka said, trying to word it in a way she'd understand.>

<Katara sighed, "I wish he'd just explain that then! I look up to him too, Sokka." She said, frustration clear, "But I can't read his mind!">

Her heart sank into her stomach, and the reason for that was painfully obvious. It wasn't that she couldn't. It was because she wasn't trying to. It only got worse as time went on, until now, as she willfully ignored every sign. To anyone else, it was so clear.

Her brother's word is more than just an opinion when it comes to her safety. It wasn't like Sokka's "instincts" at all, it was an entirely different thing. Something much more accurate, something she didn't entirely understand yet. But it was something that she should have, and from now on, would trust. A lesson was finally learned.

Looking down at Jet one last time, her aggrieved thoughts made themselves known, "I can't believe I had my first kiss with him."

Instantly, the air chilled several degrees, to the point the ground was covered in a layer of flash frost. Katara realized belatedly what she'd just revealed, and to her horror, her eldest brother's gaze couldn't be more rigid.

"Your first what with who?" Eyes the clearest, brightest hue of blue they'd ever seen, Ayaan's voice was a disturbing calm before an obvious storm. Veins popped about his neck and face, a show of the amount of restraint he was currently exerting. Despite how cold it had gotten, sweat built up on the three Gaang's brows.

"I-um..."

Sokka was terrified. "Sis, why?!"

"It was a spur-of-the-moment thing, okay!"

"But him?! Of all people, him?"

"I know, I know. I've made a whole host of terrible decisions lately!"

"Terrible is an understatement!"

"Aw, man..." Aang just looked hurt, almost to tears. "Wait, where did Ayaan go?"

"Oh. No." The siblings said in unison, looking over the saddle to the ground they'd just barely left.

As they thought, Ayaan was already back on the ground. Like a demon from hell, he descends upon the freedom fighters. Bulldozing through the unlucky few trying to stop him, he found Jet in a heap, picking him up by the roots of his unkempt hair.

"How dare you lay your filthy, no-good, piece of shit lips on my sister?!" Fist met face in a flurry rush of punches. Left, right, up, down, there was no telling where the next punch was coming from. All of them were fueled with an unbridled rage. His hands coated themselves in hardened ice, leaving a bite of frost with each blow.

The younger freedom fighters pleaded for the incensed behemoth to stop, but Ayaan couldn't hear them over his fury. A wave of his arm was all it took to shake off their added weight. He could care less about them right now. Weak, insignificant. They were not the prey he sought to maim, bursting through them to resume his beat down of Jet.

"Fight back!" Multiple people, including Sokka and Katara, try to get him off of Jet to barely any avail. "You said you can take me on, right?! Then fight back, bitch!"

At this point, Jet had long since passed out cold. Just barely, Sokka, Katara, and Aang—Who waited for a little to come down, not that they noticed—were able to pull him away from the fallen rogue.

"Ayaan, language!"

"There are kids present!"

"It was a mistake! I'll never make it again!"

"This bastard put his dusty, crusty lips on you! Fuck language! I should knock out every one of his yellow ass teeth! Let me go!"

"No, Ayaan!"

"Don't kill him!"

"LET. ME. GO!"

"Appa, help!" Hearing the call, the giant bison gently flew over from where he was. With an easy grab, he had a feral Ayaan in his hold. Cuddling the fuming teen in his fluff, he waited for the others to quickly get on his saddle before flying away into the night sky.

Hours went by before Appa landed again. The whole time, he kept his human cub close. It took that long for Ayaan to calm down, and when Appa got the gist that he did, he took that time to land. and put him back on his saddle. The bison grabbed the then-quiet boy by his collar and deposited him on his back with a practiced toss.

The other kids sat in silence, a very, very uncomfortable silence. They waited for Ayaan to speak, Katara most of all. She waited for him to yell at her, scold her for how she'd behaved.

But what found her instead was her brother's warm embrace.

"Huh? But, Ayaan—"

"I'm sorry you had to go through that. I'm sorry you all had to see me like that." One by one, Ayaan pulled them all in. Sokka, Katara, and Aang were cradled in his hold. They all latched on one by one, hugging him back with all their might. Seconds became minutes, Ayaan only holding them tighter.

Katara couldn't help but hiccup, "Aren't you upset with me? Mom's jewel, it got broken! I trusted a madman! I—"

"Oh, I am furious. But your Chief isn't who you need right now." He answered, calm returning as he listened to their hearts beating. "I'm the eldest. No matter what, I have to be strong."

No matter how much he was hurting, he had to endure.

"But today was hard, wasn't it? It's okay now."

It would take time for things to return to how they were, if ever.

But this was a first step.

Hiccups turned to sobs, and he held the three even closer. Flying on Appa through the night, Ayaan listened to the silent lullaby, humming the tune as his siblings cried themselves to sleep in the comfort of his arms.

If he ever came across Jet again, it would be on sight.