Chapter 23: The Great City of Omashu
A swirl of wind, dust, and engine oil greeted Appa's descent. The flying bison's great flaps stirred the air as he coasted in over the jagged gorge surrounding Omashu, its massive stone walls carved into the mountain's side. Zip-line chutes, part of the city's legendary mail-and-transport system glinted beside steep terraces carved into the hill.
Appa landed on a hidden ledge, far from the polished terracotta causeways below, tucked between natural outcroppings of rock. Aang's heart surged at the sight of Omashu's layered houses, green-tiled rooftops stacking like ancient steps up the mountainside. He, Katara, and Sokka dismounted quietly, guiding Appa into dim shadows behind thick stone outcroppings.
"He's too big to sneak in," Sokka whispered. "He's going to need a new address."
Aang nodded and slipped away with Katara. They tucked Appa out of sight, securing a thick chain around a petrified log. With final pats for reassurance, they stepped back toward the city's gate towers.
Walking the stone-paved causeway into Omashu, Aang felt each footfall echo between towers over thirty feet tall. The gates, hewn from solid carved stone, were as wide as a Fire Nation cart, requiring earthbenders to open them by sliding panels that rumbled like tectonic plates.
A pair of guard-benders leaned on their carved pillars. One, a stocky man with a dark grease-braided beard, stepped forward.
"Traveler," he said, voice echoing. "Your business?"
Aang replied quickly, with Katara and Sokka stepping up side-by-side: "We're pilgrims visiting the holy routes, studying the causeways for spring festivals up north."
The guards exchanged a glance. One bent knee, pressed a palm to the gate's rune-carving. The stone slided. The gate opened with a grumble.
"Keep your bows sheathed," the guard cautioned. "The causeways aren't always safe."
They bowed. Aang's small smile belied his excitement.
The gates of Omashu groaned open behind them with the power of embedded earthbending, and the city swallowed them whole.
The sheer scale hit Sokka first.
"Okay… wow," he murmured, craning his neck. "This place looks like someone stacked a hundred towns on top of each other."
The winding stone streets wrapped up the mountain's body in layers of terraces, rooftops, and slopes. Green-tiled towers stabbed the sky like spears. Over a dozen causeway chutes, narrow stone channels that twisted between buildings zigzagged through the air with the grace of serpent coils.
Market stalls lined the lower tier, woven in the earth with tight pathways where kids darted barefoot and vendors barked offers of spiced rice, clay flutes, and melon slushes.
Katara's mouth was open, her eyes wide with wonder. "It's… beautiful."
Aang smiled faintly as he walked between them, hands tucked into his robe sleeves, glancing up at the intricate causeway system laced into the city's spine.
He paused.
For a second, his breath caught in his chest.
"I used to come visit a friend of mine here," he said softly.
Katara blinked. "You mean like a century ago,"
Aang nodded.
"Yes, for my friend. His name was Bumi. He was this wild little earthbender, absolutely nuts," he said, his voice faintly drifting as if carried by the breeze itself. "We used to cause trouble with the guards."
He chuckled quietly to himself, but it was short-lived.
Sokka crossed his arms. "A hundred years ago, right? So he's… probably dead."
Aang froze.
Just like that, the laughter died in his throat.
Sokka's words hadn't been cruel. Just honest.
Aang stared up at the endless stone rooftops, at the highest tower spearing into the fading afternoon light. There had been so much laughter up there once. Wild yells. Reckless leaps into the wind. A friend whose smile could disarm any lecture the monks gave. A boy who could bend the earth like it was water.
Now that boy was probably dust beneath it.
Aang's smile fell away.
His shoulders slumped.
The world had moved on without him.
Again.
Katara noticed the shift in his face and stepped closer. "Hey… what were the causeways like?"
Aang blinked, looking at her.
She smiled. Just enough to soften the silence.
Aang exhaled and motioned to the nearest chute slithering up the street above them.
"Everything in this city moves using those causeways. Packages, food, construction supplies and apparently these days… weapons. Gravity takes things down," he said, pointing downhill, "and earthbenders bring them back up."
Sokka shrugged. "So they get their mail on time."
Aang, missing the sarcasm, nodded. "They do! But my friend… he had better ideas."
He reached out and touched the wall beside him.
"You must look beyond what they want you to see," he quoted quietly.
Katara tilted her head. "What does that mean?"
Aang just smiled again. This time, with a little more life.
"It means we're wasting time."
Fifteen minutes later, they stood at the top of Omashu's highest hill, the late-afternoon sun casting golden streaks through the hanging banners above.
A stone cart rattled beneath their feet, smooth, carved directly into the chute, with room enough for three.
Sokka peered over the edge.
"Okay. This is high. Like, 'plummet-to-your-death-if-you-sneeze' high."
Katara's grip on the side tightened. "Aang… are you sure about this?"
"We just need to ride the causeways," Aang said, his voice steady. "Then we're off to the North Pole."
He crouched in the back, his staff braced behind him to steer like a rudder. Katara slid in beside him reluctantly.
Sokka stared one more time over the lip.
Then groaned and climbed in.
Aang tapped the chute wall with the flat of his hand.
The stone groaned, the locks released, and gravity answered the call.
The cart lunged forward.
And they plunged into the heart of Omashu.
The stone cart rocketed off the first drop, sliding and screeching against polished granite.
Wind tore at hair and robes; Katara's braid cracked like a whip behind her.
Aang whooped, pure, reckless joy and leaned his staff to the left.
The cart banked; Sokka's stomach stayed behind.
They whipped past a produce barge on a lower tier.
Watermelons burst into green-pink shrapnel; rind and juice sprayed bystanders.
"Sorry!" Aang shouted, voice trailing as the cart plunged down the next incline.
Rooftop ricochet
A fork in the chute shot them onto a steeper channel… then straight off its broken end.
The cart left the track, sailed in open air, and slammed onto a slanted tile roof.
Tiles shattered; momentum carried them down the slope and through a stone awning, scattering clay cups.
Katara gasped, half laughing, half terrified.
Sokka clutched the rim. "THIS IS WHY WE CAN'T…"
The cart dropped off the roof, re-entered a lower chute, and kept going.
The chase begins
Guards on the terraces spotted the runaway cart.
Two earthbenders stomped; a section of the next track popped up as a makeshift barrier.
Aang jammed his staff under the front axle, vaulted the obstruction, landed on a side spur… and shot into a market tunnel filled with pottery vendors.
Shelves toppled in their wake, teapots and bowls smashing like thunder.
Shards tinkled behind them as the cart burst back into daylight.
Final impact
Near the central plaza the chute curved too sharply; the cart hopped the rim, skidded across open stone, and plowed into a cabbage merchant's stand.
"MY CABBAGES…!"
Greens flew; the cart slumped to a stop, half buried in produce.
Arrest
Dust settled.
Boots surrounded them, eight guards in layered green armor, spears leveled.
"Out of the cart," growled the captain, a burly man with square shoulders.
They obeyed, hands up, smiles weak.
"What in Oma and Shu's name possessed you to use a restricted mail slide?" he barked.
Aang rubbed the back of his neck. "Uh… sightseeing?"
"With the Fire Nation turning thins up to eleven we don't have the time for this!!" One of the guards said.
"What are you talking about?" Katara asked.
The captain's glare could have cracked stone. "With the Fire Nation pressing Nan-Hai and the Crown Prince himself landing troops just two days away, you think we have time for tourist stunts?"
Another guard added, "General Fong nearly pushed them into the sea-port, till that prince showed up and duelled the General to a stand-still. We lost good men. Now every soldier's on edge, and you're breaking city property!"
Sokka's eyes widened. "Prince Zuko fought General Fong?"
"Aye," the guard spat. "Fong had 'em on the ropes, earth catapults wrecked half the harbor, then the prince arrived with his own catapults of flaming boulders, bought just enough time for some Fire-Nation general called Rulo to reinforce." He shook his head. "Could've rid Nan-Hai of firebenders once and for all."
Katara stepped forward, voice gentle. "We're sorry. We didn't realize the situation was so… tense. We only wanted a quick thrill before traveling on."
"Thrill's over," the captain said. "You'll answer to the King for damage and disruption."
Two guards bound the cart with earthbending; others prodded Aang's group toward a ramp that spiraled to the palace level.
As they walked, Aang's shoulders sagged.
A hundred years gone, a friend likely buried, and now the city he loved sat beneath the shadow of war.
Katara touched his arm, whisper-soft: "We'll make this right."
He managed a grateful nod, though the weight of century-old memories pressed hard against his chest.
The palace gates loomed ahead, carved stone jaws ready to close.
Their fate would wait inside.
Stone columns flanked them as they passed beneath the high arch of the palace's inner sanctum. The floor was a cold, polished jade, reflecting torchlight like dull gold. A long walkway led forward, flanked by silent guards on either side, each armored in layered green plate, spears at their side, helms down low over their brows.
And at the far end of the throne room...
He sat.
Slouched. Crooked. Ancient.
His throne was carved from dark emerald stone, spiraling upward like twisted vines. His robes were layered and wide, shaded deep forest green with lighter moss trim. A long silver beard curled out from his chin like an untamed stream, his eyebrows like gray clouds drifting toward madness.
And on his head…
A delicate, golden crown, curled upward into twin horns, bent like wisps of smoke frozen in time.
Two guards stood at his sides, stone-faced, armored identically, their presence silent but imposing.
The King leaned lazily on one elbow, half-lidded eyes watching the approaching "criminals" with amusement rather than ire.
The captain of the guard stepped forward and bowed. He lifted his hand toward the children.
"Your Majesty. These three are the offenders who disrupted the mail-chute system, destroyed civilian property, and caused general chaos across three levels of the city. Names: Sokka. Katara. And the bald one refuses to give his."
Aang squinted slightly but said nothing.
The King's eyelids flicked upward… just a little as he took in the boy with the arrow on his head.
His posture didn't shift.
But his eyes sharpened.
He leaned forward slightly on his throne.
"Come closer, boy," he said softly, voice dry and creaky with age, but not without strength.
Aang stepped forward hesitantly, flanked by Katara and Sokka.
The King's gaze lingered on the arrow etched into Aang's skin. His hands twitched in his sleeves, fingers curling beneath the cloth. He leaned in a little more.
"Airbender tattoos," the King muttered, as if to himself. "Funny… I thought those were long since extinct."
The room stirred.
A hush swept through the hall like a wind brushing old stone. A ripple of surprise crossed the guards' faces. One even shifted slightly, just a step… as if expecting something more.
"Explain yourself, boy," the King said, louder now. "You bear the markings of a dead nation."
Aang's mouth parted, but the words caught in his throat.
He looked to Katara, then to Sokka.
Before he could answer, Sokka stepped forward, hands raised.
"Your Majesty," he said, stumbling over the title. "We're from the Southern Water Tribe. We're just… traveling north. That's all. We stopped by the old air temples because the bald one over here…" he jabbed a thumb toward Aang, "…thought the airbenders looked cool."
Katara added quickly, "So he shaved his head. And we painted those tattoos on him to match. It was just in good fun, really. Kids being kids."
The King blinked once.
Then burst into laughter.
Wild, raspy laughter that echoed through the hall like cracked bells. He slapped his knee and leaned back in his throne, eyes almost watering from amusement.
"Ohhh, yes, yes! Of course!" the King said, wiping at the corner of his eye. "Because why wouldn't three children from the Southern Water Tribe mock the lost civilization of airbenders for a laugh?"
He giggled again. "I mean, surely the actual airbenders were wiped out a century ago, so it wouldn't make perfect sense to find one alive and well now!"
"Right," Katara said awkwardly. "Because this boy doesn't look a day over fifteen."
The laughter stopped.
The King's eyes locked on Aang again.
Then… without warning, his hand flew from his robe.
A gleam of silver cut through the air.
A knife.
It zipped across the space between them in a blink.
Sokka shouted.
Katara gasped.
But Aang didn't flinch.
Instinct guided him. Without even thinking, he raised his hands, air surged forward in a tight spiral around him, forming a dense sphere of wind.
The knife hit the swirling current and bounced harmlessly to the ground with a clink.
The King leaned forward.
The throne room fell deathly still.
"We have an airbender in our midst, boys," the King declared, his voice now clear and unmistakable.
He stood.
Not slouched now. Not crooked.
Straight. Proud. And powerful.
"Not just any airbender."
He extended a gnarled finger.
"The Avatar."
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