Chapter 21: Two Years (2)

The cold earth pressed against his cheek, damp and unyielding. The scent of blood, sweat, and rot clung to him like a second skin. Two years. Two years of torment, of chains digging into his flesh, of darkness so deep he had begun to forget what the sun looked like.

Shoji had not been a high-ranking officer, not recently enough at least. He had not known state secrets, nor had he stood in the war rooms of generals. Yet that had not mattered to the earthbenders.

They had dragged him through their stone halls and demanded answers he did not have.

Where was the Fire Nation's next invasion? How did their supply routes work? What was the final plan of the fire nation?

And when he could not answer; when he could only wheeze out, "I don't know," through bloodied lips, they had made him suffer. The whips had not been the worst. The worst was the precision.

They had used thin blades to cut just deep enough that the wounds would never quite heal. Just enough to scar. They had crushed his fingers one by one between stones, forcing him to hear the bones splinter. They had buried him alive, only to pull him out at the last moment, gasping, choking, his mind fraying at the edges. They had deprived him of food, of water, of sleep.

And still, they had demanded answers. Answers he could never give. For a time, he had truly believed he would die in that cell, forgotten, nameless. A footnote in a war report, a corpse lost in the dirt.

Then… the fire appeared. Not the kind he had been trained to bend. Not flames pulled from an existing source, but something raw, something deep. He had been left alone in the darkness too long, left to rot in that damp cell where no fire existed.

And in his desperation, his body had changed. He had stopped reaching for fire outside of himself and instead turned inward. The first time it happened, he thought he was hallucinating.

A faint ember, flickering to life between his fingers. A flame that should not have existed. A flame he had created.

And with that discovery came something else. The pain had made him aware; acutely, excruciatingly aware of his body. The beat of his heart, the tensing of his muscles, the shudder of his breath. And then, deeper still, something more subtle, something humming beneath his skin.

Electricity.

He had first felt it in his own nerves, the way his body twitched involuntarily, the way pain surged like a current. Then he had learned to sense it; the faint pulses in the guards beyond his cell, the life coursing through them.

And finally, he had learned to use it.

At first, it was weak. A spark, a shudder. But then it grew. Became something more. One night, when a guard had leaned in too close, Shoji had reached out; just for a moment. A whisper of current. The guard collapsed, twitching.

Shoji stared in shock and a silent hint of excitement through the electrical sense he had developed.

This attack method… it was invisible, silent, deadly… it was perfect! It had taken weeks, maybe months, before he could use it properly. Before he could reach out and kill without so much as a flicker of light.

When he finally made his move, the escape had been swift. One guard. Then another. They had fallen without a sound, their bodies left cooling in the dim corridors of the prison.

And then he had run. For the first time in two years, he had felt the night air on his face. The scent of trees, of damp soil, of freedom. Now, here he was, still running, still surviving.

And then he saw it. A small fire, flickering through the trees. Shoji froze, muscles coiled like a spring. His instincts screamed at him, but exhaustion dulled the urgency.

There, beside the fire, sat a child. Draped in a red cloak, the figure poked at the flames with a stick. A small pot bubbled over the fire, sending wisps of steam into the cool air. Shoji's breath hitched.

'A child? Alone? Here?' He crouched lower, pressing himself against the earth, barely breathing.

But then, the child spoke, "You shouldn't be sneaking around like that, mister."

Shoji's blood turned to ice. The child; without even looking up, knew he was there.