Avatar The Last Airbender Fan Fiction ❯ Metamorphosis ❯ How Do You Make An Avatar? ( Chapter 5 )

"Metamorphosis: How Do You Make An Avatar?" by Abraxas (2009-12-19)

 

I walk with hesitation.

 

Sokka is brave by contrast.

 

I explain my angst is typical - a man without destiny is a stranger everywhere.

 

"Zuko," he whispers as if the key to a spell.

 

A captive meditates. Toph, a tiny, blind girl, sits. Barefoot. She is strong with the spirits of the earth.

 

"Spirits exist everywhere, forever. Of man. Only a few are acute enough to know them. And of those - the number could be one - are strong enough to control them."

 

I recall a story my uncle related of a journey with a spirit.

 

I thought it was a tale imagined at bedtime. I did not consider that people believed it. Confronted with my friend, now, I wanted to accept it. Just as I wanted a place to be. That part of me ruined by my father refused to yield.

 

There are air, earth, water, fire spirits. There are people able to manipulate them. Except air - that was denied. The element was the medium of life thus too important to trust with man.

 

"But one will be born of the air and restore the world."

 

I remember - yes, it was part of their argument - that prophesy. My uncle called it the Avatar. My father mocked it. The Avenger of the Indian.

 

"Can you commune with the spirits?"

 

"No - but my sister is strong with the water spirits."

 

We walk through that village of strangers hand-in-hand. He leads. I follow. He smiles saying it is OK. I squeeze wishing it to be true. Is it that I fear my own freedom?

 

The stigma of my deviance is not easily forgotten.

 

 

"And you are, too, with the fire spirits. Paku was certain about it. It's why my father accepted you." He strokes my scar around my eye. "It consumes you."

 

END