a/n: I'm so mean.

-x-

When everything was said and done, the world would end in flames.

Koh locked this knowledge in a grin that was never his own, while watching a war that hadn't stopped since the beginning of man. Because the humans, they were no where near as intelligent as they made themselves out to be (with their books and inventions and their ignorant lives). If they were, maybe they would learn. Maybe the treaties and the blood spattered uniforms would actually mean something.

But Koh saw every dirty little secret that the world had to hide, and knew that the 'maybes' were only fantasy. And the face-stealer's laugh echoed off of the cavern walls, breaking off into pieces that shattered like glass on the dirt floor.

It was funny. After 900 years, he was finally going to get his revenge, but not in a way he'd imagined. It would be simply in the act of not saying anything. No warning for his enemy's past lives, no cryptic message for the little boy with eyes that had seen too much, too soon. No, this time Koh would relish his moments of silence, letting shadows coil around his wall of expressions as he watched the young Avatar flicker dangerously like a candle caught in the rain.

The blind earthbender felt it in each hurried heartbeat of the citizens too young to die.

(Time is running out)

The warrior saw it in each inked line on the page clenched in his hand, the page no one listened to.

(Time is running out)

The healer heard it in each agonized cry of grown men carrying battle wounds, of women receiving news they shouldn't know.

(Time is running out)

The young boy with the earth on his shoulders said it as he stood at the threshold of the palace, trying to steady his trembling hand.

"Time is running out."

It was slipping through the cracks of almost everything, dripping from the pores on their faces in the form of anxiety. Time was something that they didn't have, something Koh had owned forever.

So the spirit watched, the spirit waited.

And the spirit smiled an awful smile as the vision of a tear-stained and battle-worn man (child) stepped cautiously into the cave, failure dragging behind him.

"I told you we'd meet again, young Avatar."