It was still early in the morning as one hooded person made one last sweep over the bustling street in front of him.

Like many trading cities, the streets of Danyuan were busy from the moment the sun peeked over the horizon and they rarely calmed down until it set. The shuffling crowds made it a near requirement to move to a destination quickly or get swept along by the swarm of people.

It also allowed for people to discreetly slip away into side alleys so they could gather in nondescript buildings without being noticed.

Seeing no obvious signs of being followed or any observers, the hooded figure slipped through a door and pulled it closed behind him.

“We weren’t followed, and no sign of Fire Nation guards outside the normal patrol.” the figure whispered to a comrade already inside the building.

“It’s nearly 10. Everyone who could make it has gathered inside.”

Inside, a group of around twenty people were talking to each other. Every once in a while they would glance to the side at a rough stage, waiting for someone to begin. In the distance, great bronze bells could be heard announcing the change of the hour.

As soon as the ringing faded to nothing, two figures stepped out from the gathered crowd. Even dressed in lower quality clothes to fit in with the rest of the people Chi Song and Zhu Wuneng were easily identifiable.

The muted conversations that filled the room died off as the two of them made their way to the stage.

“So this is all that could make it?” Zhu Wuneng mused.

“Tch, that or the rest decided to join up with that group from the Water Tribe.” Chi Song said.

Both of them tried not to think about what that meant and decided to get things started as the crowd started to get a little restless.

“Hello everyone!” Zhu Wuneng greeted the crowd, “Thanks for coming here, I…”

“Save the speeches for selling things, kid.” a middle-aged man near the front. “You called us here for a reason. Get on with it.”

Eye twitching in irritation, Zhu Wuneng did his best to ignore the interruption. “Right… well, everyone knows how the Fire Nation Princess has been recruiting?”

“You mean tricking nearly the whole city into giving her a loyal guard force? As expected from one of those nobles.”

“Still she seems alright so far.”

“We’ll see.”

More conversations broke out among the crowd. When people realised that the port guard would be trained locally and not sent to a training camp there were a mix of reactions from the citizens. Most were happy that their friends and family were not being sent away to join a war no one who hadn’t joined the army by now had wanted to be a part of. That those same people would be trained to make sure the city was protected had earned Azura a lot of good will.

Even if most of the Fire Nation soldiers were decent people, they were still considered outsiders by the people in the city. That was why Zhu Wuneng and Chi Song had joined with a resistance group even though they both lived in the higher society of Danyuan, they didn’t want strangers ruining things for their city.

“Alright people, we get it,” Chi Song called out, trying to stop things from running off on a tangent. “The princess isn’t the greedy noble sort we expected. That’s nice. But we have a problem.”

She took a deep breath because she knew this was going to cause a panic.

“Azura knows me and Zhu Wuneng are Earthbenders.”

“She was also the one who made me call this meeting.” Zhu Wuneng added in, figuring it was best just to get everything out in the open.

There was dead silence as the crowd absorbed those two statements.

Then there was pandemonium as everyone began to shout over themselves, demanding an explanation for what was going on.

The two on the stage tried to calm things down to explain but no one was listening to them. More demands, questions, and angry words were hurled at them without the chance to address a single one.

It might have continued to escalate until a white haired old man raised a foot and slammed it into the ground, causing not only the group to quiet in favor of staying on their feet but also set the entire building shaking.

“Now then,” the old man said gently. “If we are done acting like children, why don’t we let those two explain why they called a meeting with every Earthbender in the city they could.”

“Master Dan! You can’t…!” one of the angrier members of the crowd started before being silenced by a glare.

“It’s been a while since I taught you Molin, but I would have hoped you would remember manners by now.” Master Dan swept his gaze over everyone gathered before stopping on the two teenagers on the stage. “Now go ahead, young ones. What message do you have for us?”

Said ‘young ones’ nervously exchanged glances before Chi Song took a step forward.

“Well she gave us this nice big speech, but apparently people don’t like those around here,” she started off a little shakily, the joke helped though and some of the tension bled out of the room. “But the whole thing boils down to two points. One; if any Earthbender causes trouble for the city, she will spare no expense to see them hunted down.”

That got a lot of frowns from the group. For the most part everyone here already kept an extremely tight lid on their Earthbending for fear of being arrested. It didn’t make sense for a princess to tell them to not cause trouble to a group that already hid themselves.

“Two,” Chi Song continued. “Is that any Earthbender who wants to openly practice can do so if they join the her household.”

…

“You’re kidding right?” came the question.

“Is this some kind of joke?”

“Is that open to anyone or just us?”

They spoke hesitantly but it was, after all, such an outrageous offer.

“What about the rebels trying to kick out the Fire Nation? Do they get the offer too?”

Zhu Wuneng stepped forward to support Chi Song with the weight of all the questions.

“It will be open to anyone in good standing starting tomorrow morning.” He said. “As for the rebels...they are currently being arrested by Princess Azura and her forces as we speak.”

Once again there was pandemonium. This time it took far more to quiet them down.

-o-

Across the city, a few minutes before the bells tolled 10, I was standing with a group of Fire Nation guards, experienced ones not the fresh group we had barely started to train, waiting for the report from our watcher groups.

The signal was due any moment and we needed to ensure there were no rebel supporters hanging around our target to give early warning. While it probably wouldn’t matter in the end, chasing them down would be put far too many of my plans behind schedule. It was better to sweep them up in one go.

To that end, I had several groups of soldiers ready to raid specific targets at the chime of the bells. With all the leaders of the rebel groups captured, anyone with anti-Fire Nation motives would be either too small or too weak to actually affect us.

A man dressed in normal commoner clothes rounded the corner and approached one of the guards. After a short exchange the man left and the soldier made his way to me.

“No signs of observation, your highness. They don’t know we are here.”

I smiled contentedly as the bells started to toll in the background.

It was always nice when there were no last minute complications to a plan. No sudden variable to account for. With that in mind the three groups surrounding the building moved towards a seperate entrance and with three great gouts of flame blasted the doors clean off.

I calmly walked through the resulting dust cloud and waved a hand in front of my face to help clear it away. “Good morning everyone. For your crimes against the Fire Nation you are all under arrest. Please resist, since otherwise this is going to be a frightfully boring day for me.”

“It’s the Fire Nation!” Some incredibly bright soul shouted from inside.

A discrete signal from me had the rest of the guards step through the doors and fan out.

“There’s more of them!” Truly a genius, that one.

“Calm yourselves men!” the man I assumed was the leader of this group boomed. It was actually impressive how large the man was. Easily a head taller and a bit wider than anyone else in the room the earthbender made for an impressive figure. Especially considering he seemed to be all muscle. “The foul Fire Nation strikes at us from the shadows, but that is because they fear us! We shall overcome this trial and then purge our fair city of their corrupt influence!”

Spirits, he was loud. And slightly annoying since his declaration seemed to put some spine back into the rebels. That just wouldn’t do, I had beaten them. I had taken their whole insurgency and today was the day I crushed it. No last minute speech was going to undermine my accomplishment. I had won and they would recognize that.

“That would be impressive.” I sarcastically complimented. “Seeing as how my guards are in the process of arresting not only the people here, but also the other nine hideouts you have hidden across the city.” Shock filled the faces of everyone there. “So there will not be another rebellion to trouble the fine people of this city. You either give up without a fight or give one final struggle to mark the end of the insurgents. Either way, the city won’t have to deal with the likes of you any longer.”

The leader obviously didn’t like that going by his expression. “Liar! We are the strength of the Earth Kingdom! We won’t be defeated by the likes of you!” He roared and stomped on the ground. A boulder rose and was punched at me before I shattered it with a blast of fire.

Strength of the Earth Kingdom, huh? I suppose the Water Tribe wasn’t the only one poking around the city… or he could just be delusional. Danyuan has only been under Fire Nation control for fifteen years or so, the leader could have been an Earth Kingdom nationalist and just never left in that time.

A rock flew through the space I had been in before subconsciously dodging. I should pay attention to the fight in front of me, I could have him interrogated later if I wanted to know how the Earth Kingdom fit into this.

Five rocks hovered in front of the leader and were launched with a ferocity I hadn’t seen from either Chi Song or Zhu Wuneng. I danced back and forth through four of them before ducking under the last. As I did, my leg kicked out and sent a low cone of flames over the ground.

In response an earth wall rose in between us blocking the flames. Undeterred, I pivoted from my low stance into a back kick, sending a much stronger fireball that shattered the Earthbender’s defenses and sent him stumbling backwards.

I took a moment to survey the rest of the building. The rebels had followed their leader’s example and attacked but they were a poor match for the professionally armed guards. Most of them lacked a proper weapon and the few earth benders were struggling when faced against several fire benders at once.

The ground in front of me cracked and buckled as the leader recovered and launched another attack. Since I couldn’t see exactly how he was planning to attack, I jumped into the air just as the cracking earth reached me. Just in time too, a lance of rock burst from the ground right where I had been standing.

Taking advantage of the near miss I used the protruding rock as a foothold to launch myself further into the air over the leader and rain fire down on him. He responded well by using a wall of rubble as a shield, but he made the mistake of taking his eyes off me.

Landing next to the earthbender I feinted towards his face with a weak spurt of fire. When he reflexively drew back I lashed out and kicked at his ankle while pulling him further off balance using a hold on his arm.

Taken completely off guard the leader fell heavily to the ground where I casually twisted his arm until he was forced to roll onto his stomach and stepped on his shoulder to prevent him from moving further.

“She beat the boss!” that same individual shouted over the din of combat, causing everyone to see that I had indeed beaten their leader. One by one, the rest of the rebels discarded their weapons and surrendered.

“He certainly enjoys shouting out the obvious doesn’t he.” I mused out loud, a smile on my face. Today was going great so far.

The leader under me just let out a pained groan in response.