Zek

We'd been walking for a little over half an hour, taking the scenic route, it seemed. I wasn't complaining, however. It was a nice night for a stroll. Cool in spite of being in the middle of Summer, the sea breeze tempering what would have otherwise been an uncomfortable muggy evening. The chirping of insects filled the night that would have otherwise been silent save for the footsteps atop the stone walls. The circumstances were made all the more comfortable by my company of course, the occasional sideways glance in her direction giving me the chance to take in the different aspects of her appearance, be it the glistening of the waning moon against her brown hair, the way it blew in the breeze, how her eyes occasionally fluttered to block out the sudden bursts of air.

She's beautiful.

I knew she noticed the looks I was giving her, blushing at first as she avoided my glances, but now welcoming them, returning the favor from time to time.

How did I get this damn lucky?

"Was that part of your master plan, then?" I jokingly asked. "Leaving them alone?"

"Maybe, maybe not," she shrugged with a grin on her face. "Luke could probably use the company."

"Eh, Jadoh would be pissed if Luke beat him to getting a girl on his arm."

"All the more reason to make sure things go well for 'em."

I scoffed, considering it, less entertained by the idea of Luke having female company than by Jadoh being pissed it wasn't him.

"Besides. They look cute together."

"Well, sure, but not nearly as cute as us."

"Aww, you think we're cute? And he I thought we were the dark, edgy, passionate kind of couple."

"Oh, I see. So that's why you brought me up here. We going to make hot steamy love in the midnight fog?"

He guffawed at the comment, amused by it as she retorted, "Ah, you wish."

"Really gonna leave me hanging then, huh?"

"Until the time is right."

"Oh, and when would that happen to be?"

"Play your cards right, and you'll find out," she grinned deviously.

She turned back around before she could notice my own smirk. Play my cards right, huh?

She came to a gradual stop atop the wall, near an abandoned sentry tower—a flaw that by no means would be tolerated in a Fire Nation base, or hell, any competent base for that matter. Where there should have been troops constantly on duty, instead there were mothballed tower while its would-be personnel drank themselves to early graves down below.

"Why'd you stop?" I asked softly, noticing as she, rather than continuing her direct b-line to what I assumed were her quarters, stayed by the edge of the wall, hands on the half-wall, looking out towards the midnight fog. "Thought you were tired."

"Oh, I am," she chuckled. "Just wanted a little more of the view. Then," she yawned, an adorable high-pitch squeak emitting from her, "Then I definitely plan on knocking out."

"Morning's walk really take a toll on you, huh?"

"Not the walk," she laughed.

"Ah," I stated, realizing what should have been obvious considering it'd been what tired me out too, surrounded by people I despised, forced to work alongside them, though I knew her reasons for hating her present company far outweighed my own. "Earth Kingdom, right?" I asked, leaning against the wall fortifications as well alongside her.

"Not even. Just soldiers. They're all fun and games until they're angry, bored, or horny. Then they think themselves mightier than the spirits themselves. Damn soldiers."

"Should I take that personally," I asked as a joke first, but then began wondering if I should. Was she wrong? That same pit in my stomach, it was growing now, that guilt I'd been feeling since that chat with Luke.

"No," she chuckled. "You're different. One of the good ones. You left after all."

Damn it, Ka'li. Why do you have to go and say something like that?

"You're giving me too much credit, Ka'li."

"No," she smiled at me, inadvertently ripping up a hole in my chest, exposing something she was about to wish had remained closed. Please don't. Not right now. "You're one of the good ones," she continued. "I've seen the kind of person you are. You've been nothing but good to me."

"Ka'li," I stopped her. "You don't know everything about me. Things used to be different. I…I used to be different."

"We all have pasts we'd like to leave behind, Zek. But you're different now. I know that."

"You don't get it."

"What don't I get?"

"The things I did. They can't just get written off as 'in the past' that easily. I don't deserve that. You wouldn't forgive it."

"What wouldn't I forgive?"

Please. Just not tonight. It'd been great up until now.

"The things I did, Ka'lira."

"And what did you do? What did you do that's so unforgivable then? What did you do that you forgot the entire purpose of everything Boss said you stand for? To start a new life."

"I-I" I wanted to stop right now. Just reverse the last 5 minutes, prevented myself from saying anything, but I was here now, in too deep. I can lie. I can always lie.

No, idiot, don't. You need to say it eventually.

Just not tonight.

Just fucking do it and get it over with.

"When I first enlisted…," There was no going back. It was here. "When I first enlisted, I guess it was some sort of initiation, my squad…" I paused. Why did I have to see her face again? Why did I need to remember that now of all times? I could still see her, her face, terrified, no. Why now? "I raped a girl," I just finished, beating around the bush too slow, too painful, to the point I just wanted to let it go, get it out, be done with it as blunt as it may be.

And then there was silence.

"What?"

It was only a whisper, and somehow that hurt far more than if she'd yelled at me with everything her lungs could muster. This, however, this was a million times worse.

I didn't know what to say. All I could manage was "I'm sorry," in a whisper barely louder than her own.

"Why?"

Why? There was no reason 'why'? I was terrified to say 'no.'

"I-"

"Why you?" Still whispering her voice cracking, face staring dead at me as though I was no longer Zek, the person she'd proclaimed she was in love with, but some stranger all of a sudden. And I supposed, in a way, I must have seemed that way.

"I thought-why you? But-but you aren't like the others…"

"Ka'lira," I barely let out, reaching forward to put a hand on her shoulder. "I'm sor-"

"Don't touch me!"

And that time, it had been a yell, and I'd been wrong. It hurt. It hurt even worse, and a part of me knew it wasn't going to end there.

"Ka'lira."

"Don't talk to me! I-I thought. Damnit! Why!?"

"I was scared," I could hardly manage to say.

"YOU were scared? How the fuck do you think she felt?! Who was she anyway?!"

"She was nobody. She was just a girl that my squad had and-"

"And you decided to have your way with!"

"I didn't-I didn't decide to do anything. I j-"

"You did! You fucking did!" And she put her hands against my chest, shoving me backwards, not enough to knock me over, but enough to push me further away from her. The look in her eyes, she didn't recognize me. She had no idea who I was at that. "You-you were supposed to be different. I thought you were different.

I am. Please. You told me I am. And you're right.

"Ka'lira," I pleaded, but there was nothing I could say.

"Stay the hell away from me."

And like that, she was gone, down the steps of the wall, away from me, and not just for tonight, no, I had the distinct feeling that she would be gone for much longer than that, the consequences of what I'd said, and of what I'd done years ago now making themselves clear to me in ways I'd prayed I'd avoid. Actions, however, had consequences, and years later, I was now just starting to realize what they were.

"Damnit, Zek," I mumbled to myself. "What did I do?"

There was no point questioning it. She was gone from my sight, and from much more than that I was beginning to see.

The night was completely quiet. There was no chirping of insects, no birds heading off to sleep, there was nothing to accompany me as I just sat there. The earth itself was still. And I sat there for a few minutes longer, nothing to keep me company, just me and the mistakes I'd made years past now come back to haunt me.

I thought it was behind me. I thought I was free. I should have known better.

And so it was only me and the mistakes of a past life that refused to unlatch itself from me. Nothing in the world but silence.

The wind was still, I noticed. It was eerily silent, as though the movement of the Earth itself had ceased. There was nothing but a whistle in the distance, above me. What?

It was a whistle I knew, growing louder, closer.

No.

The explosion sounded off soon after, the castle around suddenly lit by a new light source not far behind me, brilliant in stark contrast with the shrouded nature of the rest of the world. That sunburst was not unaccompanied, however. A second explosion sounded following the whistling of its shell as I ducked to the stone floor of the wall.

No no no. This can't be happening.

Two more whistles sounded by accompanying explosions. I had no way of knowing what was even being hit, down on the ground as I was, staying low, terrified of the debris that might fly my way should I remain standing up, instincts of years in the field having hard-coded these reflexes into my memory, no evading them, simply abiding.

A scattered 3 more artillery landings sounded, and there was a pause, only momentary, but all I would get I presumed, and I raised myself, just enough to see over the fortifications and there was the fog, shrouding the Nip, but beyond it, slowly emerging into my line of sight, 3 hulking behemoths of steel floating atop the sea, the formation of the ships telling me that another bombardment was coming soon, this was destined to be far worse than the last.

The Fire Nation has attacked.