Author's note: As those of you who follow my profile may already be aware, this is the third of a number of drafts of this accursed chapter—first was my crappy rough draft, which Kahlan Aisling was kind enough to beta edit; then came my second draft, which was written based on K.A.'s suggestions, and which decided it didn't want to live in my computer anymore and randomly vanished from the face of the earth; and this was the third draft I wrote, which is kind of a second-draft-of-the-second-draft, since I had to write a new second draft after my first second draft disappeared.

:)

Actually, most of you reading this probably don't follow my profile. I wasn't aware of any regulars other than Kahlan Aisling (who is, of course, the stoy's beta) having read HDM and seen ATLA.

Many thanks to Kahlan for helping to make this a more fluid, inclusive, exciting, and all-around tolerable chapter.

Disclaimer: I do not own His Dark Materials or the Avatar* series.

...

"COME ON, TWINKLETOES, PUT SOME BACK INTO IT!"

Beads of sweat traced the tattoo on Aang's forehead as he tried to reassemble the fragments of rock as fast as possible while still remaining calm enough to Bend. "NOT QUICK ENOUGH!" bellowed his trainer, shattering the rock he had nearly just re-formed.

He hated this exercise. Toph would pull an enormous round boulder out of the ground, and then Aang's job was to do his best to keep it intact while Toph smashed it repeatedly. His brow furrowed with concentration and effort.

Katara and Sokka watched, mildly interested. It was still somewhat of a novelty to see Earthbending, since they had seen precious little of it compared to the other three elements on their travels. Then again, Aang's Earthbending wasn't exactly first-rate.

"OFFENSE!" Toph roared, and switched actions seamlessly, starting to reconstitute the rock she had come close to powdering. Aang slammed the side of his fist into it, and it broke into a dozen pieces. Not fine enough; he grimaced, knowing Toph was going to—

"MORE POWER, TWINKLETOES!" She was a short blind girl, yet she could yell like a mad hog-monkey. She had already repaired Aang's feeble damage and was adding on to it rapidly.

He jabbed at the rock, over and over and over again, but the speed of his destructive bending was hopelessly slow compared to the speed of his trainer. He put all his energy into it, but Toph was just too fast. Soon, he was panting defeated in front of a fully formed boulder.

Toph thrust this boulder into the ground and looked at Aang disparagingly. "You can Earthbend," she said, "but you can't Earthbend like a man."

"I'm trying," he said. "Maybe you could go a little easier—"

"Easier? You want me to be all soft and yielding, huh? Soft and yielding like a rock."

"I'm just saying—"

"This isn't Waterbending anymore, Avatar boy," Toph maligned. "Earth doesn't take the shape of its container."

"Maybe Aang needs to take a rest, Toph," suggested Katara.

"He doesn't," said Toph. "He needs to train."

"He trains hard every day. He's worn out," said Katara.

"But we've only been going at it for an hour—"

"That's not what I mean. He hasn't had a moment's peace since Gaoling."

"What's that supposed to mean?" said Toph defensively.

"I'm not talking about you. I mean, first he went about three days with no sleep when those crazy girls were chasing us, and then he immediately started Earthbending training."

"I'm fine, Katara," said Aang. "I can—"

"No you're not," she said. "You need a break."

"He can't exactly take a vacation when Sozin's Comet is months away," said Sokka sarcastically.

"Come to think of it," said Toph, "I'd kind of like a vacation too."

"Didn't you just hear me?" Sokka said. "We can't—"

"Maybe I can't take a full vacation," Aang said, "but we can have a mini-vacation, can't we?"

"Actually," said Katara, looking at their map of the Earth Kingdom, "there are a lot of nice-looking spots around here. What if we all pick minivacations?"

"Are you serious?" said Sokka.

"That sounds pretty good," said Toph, ignoring him. "We can each pick a fun little place for a few hours or a day or so."

Sokka rubbed his face. "You are serious."

"Then it's decided," said Katara.

"Great!" said Aang. "Can I go first?"

"'S alright with me," said Katara. Toph shrugged. Sokka just shook his head incredulously.

Aang grinned. "I know the perfect place."

"Run!" Lyra screamed.

"I'm... trying!" Will panted.

His hand was bleeding again. Already the bandage was soaked, as well as his shirt sleeve and the upper part of his pants. He was white-faced and weak. He couldn't run.

"Come on!" Lyra tugged on his arm and pulled him a few feet more. Her tugging, unfortunately, caused the exerted twelve-year-old boy to collapse on the ground. Lyra bit her tongue to stop from groaning in despair; Pantalaimon, as a goldfinch, fluttered about in agitation.

Lyra looked up to see real birds flying out of the trees, alarmed by the approaching mob. Their pursuers were getting closer. They could hear the feral cries, feel the vibrations of feet and heavy sticks on the ground, hear the sharp crack! of sticks and rifles beating against one another in the air. Lyra let out an exclamation of fear. They would never make it at this rate!

"Will," said Lyra earnestly, "you've got to pluck up your strength! Come on, just a little further!" she lied, looking anxiously at the distance they still had to go. Pantalaimon transformed into a large eagle, grasped Will's shirt and attempted to pull him upright.

A gunshot—punctuated by savage cries and chanting of "Kill! Kill! Kill!"—split the night, making Will and Lyra jump. Lyra urged and pleaded with Will, and helped him to his feet. They knew where Will and Lyra were; they were running through the woods, gaining rapidly on the frightened children.

Will stood on quaking legs and ran a little ways. Heartened, Lyra began to run too. But before either of them had gone far, Will's knees buckled and he fell to the ground again. Lyra looked behind her, anguished—and in the split second she did, she tripped over something.

She threw out her hands out to break her fall and shut her eyes at the shock of the impact. Spitting dirt out of her mouth, she then looked up to see what on Earth she had tripped over. But there didn't appear to be anything there. She looked all over, but there was nothing. Not a tree root, not a stone, not a fox hole in sight.

Suddenly, Will gasped. He was staring at Lyra's feet. "What are you looking at?" said Lyra, nonplussed.

He pointed. "Your legs… They're not there!"

"What are you talking about?" said Lyra, standing up.

"Look! Come around here."

Lyra walked over to where Will was lying. She peered at the spot where he was pointing. At first she saw nothing, but then she noticed something she hadn't before: a faint outline in the air, something totally invisible and two-dimensional, yet unaccountably there.

Will breathed, "It's a window."

Of course! Lyra had accidentally stepped into another world and tripped on the edge of the portal. To Will, it had appeared that her legs had vanished—because she had been lying behind the window.

They couldn't have asked for a better escape. As Lyra paused for Pantalaimon to become a chipmunk on her shoulder, Will slipped noiselessly through the opening in the air and crouched in the forest on the other side—which was exactly like the woods in which Lyra and Pan were standing except for the absence of the constant, distant shine of streetlamps through the trees. He waited for them to follow.

As Lyra rushed toward the window in the air, she heard a small whoosh behind her. Something shot through the air, narrowly missing her arm, and disappeared into the night. Pan chirped in alarm, his fur rippling. She sped up, lunging for the window as figures holding various weapons came in sight.

Will began to close the window with his free hand, but Lyra suddenly grabbed his arm and pointed at the ground in front of the angry mob, where her shoulder bag—with the alethiometer inside of it—was lying severed from its handle, presumably by the object that had shot under Lyra's arm.

"I have to get it!" she cried, and before Will could stop her she had run back into the world of danger and pursuit. She picked up the shoulder bag with Pan fluttering about over her head and tore back for the window, gunshots striking the grass all around her. She leaped through the window and landed in a heap on the grass in the other world; Will immediately began to seal the rip in the fabric of the two worlds. Their pursuers approached, shouting and threatening, and then the window closed for good and they were gone.

Once the sound of the mob was snuffed out, the sound of crickets and other nocturnal creatures became audible. The two of them sat there, panting.

"It's okay, Pan," said Lyra soothingly, stroking her agitated dæmon. "We're safe now. They can't get us."

"Right," said Will, "well, I'm going to open a window into the café so I can get our supplies."

"Wait," said Lyra. "Give them time to go away."

He shook his head. "If we give them too much time, they could raid our sleeping place and take all our things. I have to do this now. I'll just open a window for a second or two, until I can find a good spot. Do you want to build a fire?"

She nodded. As Will began meticulously opening, looking, closing, moving, opening again, she set to work gathering tinder with Pantalaimon. At last, Will found a position that opened into the café in which they'd been staying until they were driven out of that world. When he returned with the rucksack stuffed with food, water and sleeping bags, Lyra had started the fire and was sitting and hugging her knees, staring into it.

Will set the heavy rucksack down and started to put larger wood pieces on top of the kindling. He sat down beside Lyra. Pan glanced up at him. After a few minutes of silence, Lyra spoke.

"I never seen kids like that before," she said quietly—for the people who'd been after them with guns and sticks had indeed been children.

Will said nothing, but took his knife out of its leather sheath and stuck it in the ground angrily. He had earned the knife in a fight which cost him two of his fingers—this mutilation was the so-called "badge of the bearer"—and which had taken place in the otherworldly city of Cittàgazze, a place devoid of adults that had become a sort of gigantic playground for children. Ci'gazze had been overrun with beings the children called Specters, who fed upon the souls of adults but were not interested in—could not even be seen by—children. Will's fight was with a young man named Tullio, who was the older brother of two of these children. After the fight, Tullio was attacked by a Specter and his soul devoured. Tullio's younger siblings feared Will and Lyra, and blamed them for Tullio's worse-than-death fate. As a result, Tullio's siblings gathered a horde of children, armed with sticks and guns, to attack Will and Lyra. He had seen children in such a state before—but never had guns been involved.

Bitterly he took his sleeping bag out of the rucksack and smoothed it out on the grass. He then removed the subtle knife from his person, laying it carefully beside him. He lied down fully clothed.

Lyra shuddered, still looking at the fire. "I thought... When I was at Bolvangar, I thought that no matter how terrible adults could be, no matter how evil and vile and wicked... I thought kids were different."

"You were wrong." Will turned away from her and closed his eyes, trying—in vain, despite his exhaustion—to fall asleep.

Pantalaimon suddenly became a wolf, ears perked, staring intently into the trees. He had sensed something—or someone—nearby.

"What is it, Pan?" said Lyra anxiously, peering into the darkness but seeing nothing.

A split second later, she had her answer. With a rustle and a snarl, a pack of strange creatures suddenly leapt out of the brush. The things were plump and had fluffy striped tails, but they were far from cute; they had fierce red eyes and sharp tusks, and they were all growling.

Lyra screamed and backed away frantically. The movement agitated the beasts: the nearest one let out a sound like an angry tiger and bounded ferociously at her. Will whipped the knife out of its sheath, but Pantalaimon beat him to it. He pounced on the horrible creature and, as the two animals tore at each other's throats, became a massive lion. He roared deafeningly and the entire pack of creatures whimpered and ran off.

Lyra's eyes were wide. "What were those things?" she said, her voice an octave higher than it normally was.

"I don't know," said Will, shaken. "But whatever they were, they were dangerous. This world isn't safe. We should go—"

"Wait, Will," Lyra said pacingly. "We're tired. Shouldn't we at least get a night's sleep before we go into more danger?"

"We're already in more danger, if those animals were anything to go by."

Pantalaimon transformed into a lemur with wide, disconcerting eyes and looked at Will. "There are dangerous animals in the woods in our world, too," he said reasonably. "And in yours, and in Ci'gazze. I don't know if we'd be better off in any of those places; at least nothing intelligent is hunting us in this world."

"Yeah," said Lyra, "like my mother and Lord Boreal."

Will couldn't argue with this. "Are you sure you want to stay here?"

"Yes," said Lyra. "Come on, Will—we've already built a fire and everything!"

"Why are you so keen on this world?"

"I don't know," Lyra said. "Here—let's ask the alethiometer if it's alright to stay here."

She opened the heavy gold instrument's lid and pointed to three symbols around the face: the globe, for world; the knight's helmet, for protection; and the baby, for future.

The answer came instantly: chameleon, followed by moon, followed by anchor, followed by tree. Well, that was easy enough to interpret.

"It says this world is deserted of our enemies, and we'll be safe from the animals if we keep the fire going," Lyra reported.

Will's tenseness subsided at this good news. "All right," he said. "I guess we can stay here—at least until we get some sleep and work out what to do next."

Lyra smiled. Will carefully replaced the knife in its sheath, and they both settled in to their sleeping bags. Pan curled up as a ferret in Lyra's arms, and the pair of them started breathing with slow steadiness almost instantly. The orange glow of their small campfire flickered over the little girl and her dæmon as their human and animal breasts rose and fell in sync. Will closed his eyes and relaxed, feeling secure in a way he had not felt since his first night in Cittàgazze. Try as he might, however, he could not shake his thoughts of wild animals and unknown predators.

He moved the knife a tiny bit closer.

...

* The new sequel series coming out this year has been redubbed "The Last Airbender: The Legend of Korra," I see. I find this wrong on a number of levels; not only does it make little sense compared to "Avatar: the Legend of Korra," considering that there is clearly no longer a single last airbender, but it also recalls the M. Night Shyamalan adaptation, which is too horrible to think about. James Cameron's movie came out years after ATLA—was it really necessary to do that? I do know that Cameron had apparently been writing the movie for decades. If Cameron has his knickers in a twist about copyright infringement, why didn't he speak up when the first series came out?