By the time everyone had dispersed, Dag-Le had dropped Maru to the ground, and had his Dai Li agents bound the young bender's wrists and ankles.
Four more Dai Li came from down the sewer, at the ready to fight. Their Lt. held up a hand to tell them to hold up.
"You disappoint me, Maru," Dag-Le admitted, "You finally find some friends with some fight in them and now you give in?"
"Maybe we could have taken you," Maru said, his face in the pavement, his hair and forehead hanging over the edge near the sewage, "how many of us would have survived? Or killed? Would we be any different from you?"
The Lieutenant grabbed Maru's collar and yanked him up. The older man was sneering. He'd won and he felt no joy in it.
"Your parents fought and killed to the very last." Dag-le said.
"And all they did was die." Maru shot back.
"So will you!" Dag-le snarled, "Just once I'd have thought you'd fight back!"
"Either option ended with me in chains. At least the friends I did make went unscathed."
"Your selflessness is befitting the Dai Li," Dag-le pointed out, "your parents were the selfish ones. Who quit on their country."
"Don't you say a word about them!" Maru warned.
"Or what? You'll surrender again?" The lieutenant growled. Still holding Maru by the collar, he thrust the teen toward the ground, where earth rushed up to meet his midsection.
With the wind knocked from him, Maru felt the lieutenant drop him into the sewage before he passed out.
Coming to, Maru was on the back of a wagon lugged by a couple of ostrich horses. He seemed to be among a rather large prison caravan, though he couldn't account for his clarity due to lack of breathe and what felt to be blood flowing to his head.
They stopped for some time to eat. Prisoners were given meager rations and subjected to watching their Dai Li captors eat a modest but filling meal.
As Maru ate, his hands and feet still bound tight, Dag-le found him through the rest of the temporary camp. The teen looked up at his captor and away again.
"Did you think we hunted you alone?" The lieutenant asked.
"No." Maru replied.
"I apologize for disrespecting your parents'' Dag-le sighed and sat beside Maru, who again turned away, "I was close friends with the both of them, before they left."
Maru threw his food aside and growled, turning to look over his shoulder.
"You're a monster." He said.
"I'm a soldier." Dag-le responded.
"There's no difference," Maru turned away again.
"Maybe not. Like you, everything I did was for me and my family and a dream of survival. I will never atone for killing your parents. But I was with them when they did some truly detestable things as well. We loved each other all the same."
With a sigh, Dag-le stood and walked away, Maru's back still to him. The earthbender sat another few minutes before a Dai Li agent collected him and put him back on the wagon.
For a moment Maru slipped off into sleep, and he dreamed about a campfire that grew taller and hotter, and he woke up sweating.
Then came the screams and the explosion of fire contacting with earth.
"Spread out!" Someone called, "we're under attack!"
The prisoners in the wagon fell into a hush to hear what they could outside. It didn't sound as though the Dai Li were winning.
Maru had his ear pressed to the side when an intense flash of heat hit him in the back. The wagon - and some of its unfortunate occupants - had been blown open in an attack.
The prisoners filed out directly into a battle between the Dai Li and Fire Nation soldiers. Their allegiances split, many found the nearest person and offered to help, no matter the side.
Maru ducked and turned, running through the chaos in search of the last wagon in the caravan, where he thought the Dai Li kept confiscated weapons.
The Fire Nation had taken control of three nearby hills and were reigning fire from above, without care of what got caught in the middle.
The Dai Li, desperate, tried to push forward but could not gain ground without giving up defensive positioning. Even with the prisoners who were bolstering their numbers out of personal desperation did not help make up the deficit.
Separated from most of the rest of his earthbending brothers, Maru broke free from his restraints and found the confiscated weapon caravan tipped over, the ostrich horses carrying it long gone.
He found his tachi and another well-made looking short sword and took cover behind the wagon, wondering what he should do. Any move he made he'd be in the path of a firebender.
"North! North!" The firebenders changed their direction all of a sudden, in one swift motion like a unit that had been bred as one whole. The earthbenders fired probing attacks into their flanks as they turned.
That was when the waterbenders came from that northern position, charging in with liquid whips and icicle shutdown taken from a nearby creek, crashing into the firebenders.
The distraction that created allowed the Dai Li to regather and push up the closest hill, the fighting continuing until each of the three participants were gathered upon a hill of their own.
Where the fighting died so was born the anticipation of its renewal. Maru, his tachi sheathed at his side and his new short sword gripped tight in his hand. His path was less than clear. Fire lined the road north and south, and the road itself was littered with bodies dead and near-dead, supine and still.
As Maru began to move south, back toward Gaoling, he heard the combatants cry out once more, and the elements clashed in a cacophony of battle.
Walking slow, unsure if he was being watched by scouts, Maru felt a hand grab at his calf and grip tight. Turning and holding his sword our defensively, Maru looked down and saw Dag-le, half-scorched and barely breathing.
"H-help," he begged, gripping tighter, "h-help."
His hand dropped from Maru's calf and the earthbender paused, conflicted. Gritting his teeth, Maru pulled the still breathing Lieutenant off the road and under a cedar tree. Dai Li agents just up the hill, defending their rear, took notice.
"Ah, s-shade," Dag-le sputtered, the left half of his face was as scorched as his clothing. He must have been at the epicenter of quite the large blast, "it's s-so hot today."
"Lieutenant!" One of his men rushed down the hill and to his side. Looking to Maru, the agent scowled, "If it hadn't been for you we'd have been in Ba Sing Se already!"
Maru reached for his sword but Dag-le stopped the both of them.
"My f-fault," he said to the man, brushing a hand against his burned face, "my punishment."
Dag-le sighed, but after a moment smiled, even as his men faced off against the forces of two other armies, beyond outnumbered.
"Let us r-rest in t-the shade and s-sing songs with the spirits." Dag-le muttered, holding his Dai Li agents hand firm until his eyes closed and his hand went limp.
Fuming, agent stood, and turned to look up the hill his fellow earthbenders were defending. He paused to look back at Maru, who sat still on his knees, hovering over Dag-le. Without a word, the agent moved back up the hill and rejoined the battle.
Yet Maru couldn't find it in himself to move just yet as he begged the spirits and the badger moles to look over the man who had killed his parents.
Four more Dai Li came from down the sewer, at the ready to fight. Their Lt. held up a hand to tell them to hold up.
"You disappoint me, Maru," Dag-Le admitted, "You finally find some friends with some fight in them and now you give in?"
"Maybe we could have taken you," Maru said, his face in the pavement, his hair and forehead hanging over the edge near the sewage, "how many of us would have survived? Or killed? Would we be any different from you?"
The Lieutenant grabbed Maru's collar and yanked him up. The older man was sneering. He'd won and he felt no joy in it.
"Your parents fought and killed to the very last." Dag-le said.
"And all they did was die." Maru shot back.
"So will you!" Dag-le snarled, "Just once I'd have thought you'd fight back!"
"Either option ended with me in chains. At least the friends I did make went unscathed."
"Your selflessness is befitting the Dai Li," Dag-le pointed out, "your parents were the selfish ones. Who quit on their country."
"Don't you say a word about them!" Maru warned.
"Or what? You'll surrender again?" The lieutenant growled. Still holding Maru by the collar, he thrust the teen toward the ground, where earth rushed up to meet his midsection.
With the wind knocked from him, Maru felt the lieutenant drop him into the sewage before he passed out.
Coming to, Maru was on the back of a wagon lugged by a couple of ostrich horses. He seemed to be among a rather large prison caravan, though he couldn't account for his clarity due to lack of breathe and what felt to be blood flowing to his head.
They stopped for some time to eat. Prisoners were given meager rations and subjected to watching their Dai Li captors eat a modest but filling meal.
As Maru ate, his hands and feet still bound tight, Dag-le found him through the rest of the temporary camp. The teen looked up at his captor and away again.
"Did you think we hunted you alone?" The lieutenant asked.
"No." Maru replied.
"I apologize for disrespecting your parents'' Dag-le sighed and sat beside Maru, who again turned away, "I was close friends with the both of them, before they left."
Maru threw his food aside and growled, turning to look over his shoulder.
"You're a monster." He said.
"I'm a soldier." Dag-le responded.
"There's no difference," Maru turned away again.
"Maybe not. Like you, everything I did was for me and my family and a dream of survival. I will never atone for killing your parents. But I was with them when they did some truly detestable things as well. We loved each other all the same."
With a sigh, Dag-le stood and walked away, Maru's back still to him. The earthbender sat another few minutes before a Dai Li agent collected him and put him back on the wagon.
For a moment Maru slipped off into sleep, and he dreamed about a campfire that grew taller and hotter, and he woke up sweating.
Then came the screams and the explosion of fire contacting with earth.
"Spread out!" Someone called, "we're under attack!"
The prisoners in the wagon fell into a hush to hear what they could outside. It didn't sound as though the Dai Li were winning.
Maru had his ear pressed to the side when an intense flash of heat hit him in the back. The wagon - and some of its unfortunate occupants - had been blown open in an attack.
The prisoners filed out directly into a battle between the Dai Li and Fire Nation soldiers. Their allegiances split, many found the nearest person and offered to help, no matter the side.
Maru ducked and turned, running through the chaos in search of the last wagon in the caravan, where he thought the Dai Li kept confiscated weapons.
The Fire Nation had taken control of three nearby hills and were reigning fire from above, without care of what got caught in the middle.
The Dai Li, desperate, tried to push forward but could not gain ground without giving up defensive positioning. Even with the prisoners who were bolstering their numbers out of personal desperation did not help make up the deficit.
Separated from most of the rest of his earthbending brothers, Maru broke free from his restraints and found the confiscated weapon caravan tipped over, the ostrich horses carrying it long gone.
He found his tachi and another well-made looking short sword and took cover behind the wagon, wondering what he should do. Any move he made he'd be in the path of a firebender.
"North! North!" The firebenders changed their direction all of a sudden, in one swift motion like a unit that had been bred as one whole. The earthbenders fired probing attacks into their flanks as they turned.
That was when the waterbenders came from that northern position, charging in with liquid whips and icicle shutdown taken from a nearby creek, crashing into the firebenders.
The distraction that created allowed the Dai Li to regather and push up the closest hill, the fighting continuing until each of the three participants were gathered upon a hill of their own.
Where the fighting died so was born the anticipation of its renewal. Maru, his tachi sheathed at his side and his new short sword gripped tight in his hand. His path was less than clear. Fire lined the road north and south, and the road itself was littered with bodies dead and near-dead, supine and still.
As Maru began to move south, back toward Gaoling, he heard the combatants cry out once more, and the elements clashed in a cacophony of battle.
Walking slow, unsure if he was being watched by scouts, Maru felt a hand grab at his calf and grip tight. Turning and holding his sword our defensively, Maru looked down and saw Dag-le, half-scorched and barely breathing.
"H-help," he begged, gripping tighter, "h-help."
His hand dropped from Maru's calf and the earthbender paused, conflicted. Gritting his teeth, Maru pulled the still breathing Lieutenant off the road and under a cedar tree. Dai Li agents just up the hill, defending their rear, took notice.
"Ah, s-shade," Dag-le sputtered, the left half of his face was as scorched as his clothing. He must have been at the epicenter of quite the large blast, "it's s-so hot today."
"Lieutenant!" One of his men rushed down the hill and to his side. Looking to Maru, the agent scowled, "If it hadn't been for you we'd have been in Ba Sing Se already!"
Maru reached for his sword but Dag-le stopped the both of them.
"My f-fault," he said to the man, brushing a hand against his burned face, "my punishment."
Dag-le sighed, but after a moment smiled, even as his men faced off against the forces of two other armies, beyond outnumbered.
"Let us r-rest in t-the shade and s-sing songs with the spirits." Dag-le muttered, holding his Dai Li agents hand firm until his eyes closed and his hand went limp.
Fuming, agent stood, and turned to look up the hill his fellow earthbenders were defending. He paused to look back at Maru, who sat still on his knees, hovering over Dag-le. Without a word, the agent moved back up the hill and rejoined the battle.
Yet Maru couldn't find it in himself to move just yet as he begged the spirits and the badger moles to look over the man who had killed his parents.
