Sen

An Avatar: The Last Airbender

Story

.~.

Sen was never one to grovel over the past. But when her path suddenly intertwines with the Avatar, Sen knew she would be dragged into a war she never wanted to be a part of. "And here I am, thinking I can simply glide through in life by stealing from oblivious fire nation soldiers. Goes to show how wrong I was…"

Chapter

One

.~.

If You Can't Take the Heat, Don't Fight a Firebender

.~.

It was extremely hot, hotter than Sen felt comfortable with and that the nighttime should provide. Of course, the reason for this could be due to the whip of fire being frequently directed at her, not to mention the fireballs constantly flying over her head. Sen swiftly wiped out a sai and slashed it across the chest of one of the fire nation soldiers, barley missing contact with his heavy armor. Moving to a safer distance from the enemy, she quickly reassessed her situation.

When Sen came across the camp of fire nation soldiers, she thought she'd hit the jackpot. It would be easy to sneak in and out with a few gold pieces unnoticed. The camp only consisted of twenty soldiers, most of them asleep at the time. Only three were on guard surrounding the fire. If they spotted her, she was sure she could take them out before they alerted the entire camp.

It seems Sen hadn't evaluated the situation to its highest extent though, considering the position she now found herself in. When a group of ten other soldiers showed up after scouting the forest area she knew she'd be spotted, and once she was the entire camp was awakened and ready to fight off the intruder.

Well, everyone has their bad days, she though dryly. Guess this is mine.

Sen glanced around the camp, taking in the position of all thirty fire nation soldiers. This wouldn't be the first time for her to get surrounded by the enemy when "on the job", but this would be the first against thirty soldiers, with more than half of them being fairly experienced firebenders. This might be a little tougher than she had thought.

"Okay, then," Sen said, backing up slowly. "Can't we work this out? It's not like anyone got hurt." One of the soldiers growled and glared at her, holding his hand across his chest. "Well, other than you, but…"

All of them started advancing toward her.

"Oh, come on! You could always just let me walk out of here and pretend nothing happened." She smirked deviously. "That way you won't be considered the laughingstocks of the fire nation when they figure out a measly little girl stole quite a few gold pieces and got away with it." Sen opened her satchel, now full of a dozen bags of gold pieces, and waved one of the pouches back and forth mockingly, her smirk growing bigger. She knew it was a stupid idea to taunt them, but they probably thought she'd never even got a hold of any of their valuables before they noticed her. Sen couldn't just let them be smug about that. She was a lot better at this than most people tended to think. Call her arrogant, but she just had to show it.

In a flash, burst of flames were aimed at her head. Ah, well, I never was really good at talking myself out of tough situations. Sen ducked, pulled out her other sai, and ran towards the closest firebender, prepared to attack. She had a feeling it would be difficult to get out of here without taking down a few of these guys first.

Sen always found it challenging fighting against benders, especially earthbenders, but over the years she has had a lot of experience with firebenders. Luckily, these guys had slow reflexes, so once one of them aimed at her with his fire, she was quick to dodge and swipe her leg out in a wide arc, hitting his ankles and knocking him to the ground. With a blow to the head he was out.

One down.

As she turned around to get focused on another enemy, more fire was launched her way, hitting her leg. Sen dropped down to the dirt to let the flame out before it burned her skin, just narrowly dodging another attack. She quickly got back on her feet and ran for the next soldier, her dark braided hair whipping behind her. The soldier was holding a long broadsword confidentially, ready for her approach. He may carry a weapon, but Sen knew better than to assume he wasn't a firebender. She's made that mistake enough times.

Sen slid down past him on her knees, missing the soldier's horizontal slice with his sword, but in doing so the satchel full of gold pieces received a large rip, dropping three bags by the firebenders feet.

Her focus went directly to the discarded bags.

Do not go for it! The gold is not as precious as your life!

Sen groaned, hating how she had to remind herself of that.

Right as she looked up the enemy's sword came down towards her head. She crossed both of her sai, barely blocking the hit. Pushing the sword away, Sen quickly moved back, trying to gain some distance from the soldiers coming towards her left.

Ten more minutes of fighting and she was getting exhausted fast. If she could just take out a few more she could probably make a run for it, but Sen didn't want to risk an opening to her back. Her lungs and heart seemed to be working double time, she was breathing so hard.

Maybe I could just let them catch me and sneak away when their guard is down? Sen shook her head. No, I get the feeling holding me prisoner isn't what they have in mind. Not after the mess I've made for them.

Sen needed a plan and fast. No matter how many times she tried to gain some distance away from the firebenders to think, it only seemed to give them the advantage. When she's up close in the fight it's easier for her to block all of the attacks with her sai, especially if the attacker is a bender. But from a distance she's useless against benders because she can't fight offense, which leaves her constantly having to dodge and waste even more stamina.

It was with that thought that Sen went after a firebender who kept shooting at her from a distance, near one of the tents. Once the soldier noticed she was advancing on him, his eyes widened in fear, leaving Sen under the impression he wasn't good at close combat. He let off another blast, but it was futile. Sen was already on him, kneeing him in the stomach and knocking the blunt end of her sai on his head.

After that Sen had decided on a simple and probably really insufficient plan. She would fight as close to the tents as she could in hope the firebenders would be stupid enough to hit and light them on fire every time she dodged. With any luck there would be enough fire created so she could make a break for it by hiding in the smoke. Sen didn't like the idea that she was risking setting the forest on fire, but she really could not think of anything else.

Sen yelped in pain as a fireball grazed her forearm. She looked at her arm, afraid her sleeve had caught on fire, when she saw another blast coming for her. In an attempt to get out of the way, she dropped to the ground. Sen must have been more exhausted than she thought because she wasn't fast enough to stand up before a foot slammed down on her back, hard.

The collar of her shirt was tugged to make her stand, causing her to let out a choking cough. Panicking, Sen starting thrashing her arms and legs around, hoping to hit the soldier with one of her weapons. Cold metal touched her throat and she stilled immediately.

"Drop your weapons," one of the soldiers growled. He stood in front her, arms ready to light her on fire if she so much as moved a muscle. Sen guessed the soldier who was holding her still was the one with the broadsword she didn't get the chance to take out.

Sen was about to spit out a "no" when the sword at her throat moved a little closer. She glanced down at her sais and reluctantly let go of them, knowing unless some miracle happens in the next few seconds she's done for.

The soldier smirked. "Any last words?"

She only glared at him, refusing to show any fear. Somewhere in the back of her mind, Sen had known this was the way she would someday die. By the hand of an enemy. And the stupid part is, it wasn't even for a good cause, she wasn't fighting to save someone's life or trying to help put an end to the war going on. Nope, she was fighting and is now going to die because she wanted a few measly gold pieces, something she could have had if she would only go back home to her family. Sen refused to regret any of her decisions, but that didn't mean she wanted for things to end this way.

The soldier saw she wasn't going to speak. Slowly, he moved one of his arms back, ready to let out a blast of fire. She closed her eyes, knowing there was no way out of this. The seconds seemed to pass by slowly and just as the heat of the fire started to reach her face a gust of wind rushed over her, almost knocking her down if it wasn't for the soldier holding her back.

Sen's eyes snapped open, quickly taking in the scene. The firebender that was about to take her life was sprawled out half way across the camp. All of the soldiers stared at him in shock, wondering what had just happened. Wasting no time with the men distracted, Sen used all the strength she had in elbowing the soldier in the stomach and quickly biting his hand, forcing him to drop the sword. She stepped away and prepared to run when someone gave a hard blow to the back of her head, knocking her to the ground.

What the…? Black dots started to blur her vision while another blast of wind passed by, hitting a group of benders. With the arrival of three new voices, Sen could only hope they were on her side as the world turned dark.

.~.

It was hot. Not extremely hot, but enough that Sen was starting to get uncomfortable. And now that she thought about it, Sen suddenly realized she was sick of the heat. There was no explanation she could think of as to why she was annoyed by it. The heat usually gave her a familiar feeling, one that reminded her of home. It typically gave her comfort and a sense of safety when she was feeling lonely.

Sen tried to ease away from the irritation by rolling onto her side. However, doing so only seemed to make things worse when the heat licked at her face and bright colors danced through her eyelids. The dark-haired girl gave up trying to ignore it and with a growl of frustration opened her eyes to the source of her problem.

Red, orange, and yellow appeared through her blurry vision and Sen jumped back in alarm, realizing all at once why the heat bothered her so much. Eyes moving rapidly, she searched for any oncoming fireballs directed at her while simultaneously reaching for a sai that wasn't there.

"It's okay, you're safe!"

Sen turned her head towards the voice, only to come face to face with a pair of concerned blue eyes. She blinked, trying to clear her head, and looked again. A girl, not much younger than Sen, kneeled in front of her and put a comforting hand on her shoulder to try and gently get her to lie back down. The thief refused to budge though, not until she was sure she was safe.

She glanced at the fire and noticed two other figures on the other side of the flames. One was wearing water tribe garments like the girl, and when she looked closer she noticed they had the same colored eyes and hair and shared the same nose. It didn't take much to understand he was the girl's brother.

Slowly, her eyes landed on the other boy, obviously the youngest one here based on his height and childlike features. Her eyes focused in on the blue arrows, not quite able to make sense of them due to her hazy mind.

Sen's head whipped back to the girl again as she spoke a second time. "How are you feeling?" The girl's hand left her shoulder, probably noticing she wasn't going to lay back down any time soon.

Sen opened her mouth, but no words seemed to make their way out. She let out a breath, having some sense of mind to stay quiet and attempted to remember what happened to put her in this current position. As the heat of the fire licked at her skin, fragments of images flashed through her head.

The soldiers are gone, she confirmed first, relief flowing through her body as her head started to clear up and she could comprehend what was going on. Her tense muscles loosened up after realizing the only ones with her now were children. But why were these three here and the soldiers weren't?

Sen should be dead.

She saw the fire coming towards her, felt the searing heat burn her skin, and then... She was knocked down?

She shook her head, knowing her memory wouldn't go any further.

The kids looked at her in question and Sen decided she might as well see if they had any answers for her.

"Where am I?"

The brunette sighed in relief as she spoke. "Don't worry; we're far away from the fire nation camp."

Sen blinked. "Oh."

"What where you doing around there?" the girl asked her cautiously. Sen tried to hold down the sudden annoyance at the question, noticing that the water tribe girl was only concerned for her and not suspicious. There was nothing to get defensive about.

"Yeah!" the girl's assumed brother spoke up accusingly, surely not on the same page as his sister. His voice was high and seemed to break at the end with a squeak. Despite her irritation at his accusing tone, Sen almost laughed as it occurred to her the boy must be going through puberty. "And what did you do to make those firebenders so angry? You're lucky we showed up in time for Aang to knock those soldiers away from you!" he scolded, gesturing to the other kid.

Sen glared at him, her annoyance growing as the kid reprimanded her when she was obviously older. He didn't even know her! But then his words finally hit her. She turned to the younger boy, watched as he waved and flashed a sheepish smile.

The sai user balked, wondering how such a little kid could have saved her from her eminent death. There hadn't been a single moment were she believed a miracle might come her way and save her from death by the hands of firebenders. But this boy, this little goofy boy that continued to flash Sen a goofy smile, saved her. She really thought she was going to die. How did he do it? How did he save her?

"How-" her voice broke. She tried again. "H-how did you save me? I was going to die there. I was supposed to die there, there was no possible way-" she stopped, knowing now that she was more affected by what had happened than she had thought. But it went by so fast there was no time to think about it. She just didn't want to die with any regrets.

But Sen realized she did have regrets. Many of them.

She looked back at the boy, knowing she owed him a great deal for what he had done. She would leave the 'how' for later.

"Thank you," she said, her voice solemn but full of immense gratitude.

"You don't have to thank me," he said, looking sheepish again. "I wasn't just going to stand by and let you get hurt."

Hurt.

How naïve he is. Sen wouldn't have been hurt, she would have been killed. That was why she was so grateful towards him.

She shook her head. "No, I do have to thank you. I'm very grateful. I owe you big time, so if there is anything you need, anything at all, just ask."

The boy, Aang, waved his hands at her, mildly flustered. "No- no, you don't owe me anything. I'm just glad you're okay." He paused. "You are okay, right?"

The water tribe girl also looked at Sen intently, having been waiting for the answer to her first question, one Sen didn't give yet. "Yeah, I'm fine. I think. Just a little bruised. And really tired."

The older boy folded his arms, obviously not caring about her answer. "That's great and all, but you still didn't answer my question."

"Sokka!" the girl scolded.

Sen sighed, not caring to give him one either. It was the least she could do however. "I was stealing their gold pieces," she said bluntly.

The three stared at her, not believing her reason. After a moment of unwaveringly staring back, they caved in.

"What?!" the boy, Sokka, exclaimed.

"Are you serious?" the other two shouted, just as bewildered.

"Yes."

The girl looked baffled. "But- but! Don't you know how dangerous that is? You could have died!"

"And for just a few gold pieces!" Sokka pitched in.

Sen grumbled and looked away, folding her arms. "They weren't 'just' a few gold pieces."

"I can't believe anyone would be stupid enough to do that!" the water tribe boy continued.

"Sokka..." Aang started, looking uneasy while the brunette appeared annoyed by her brother. He was interrupted as the older boy spoke up again.

"We barely got out of there ourselves, and we only went into the fire nation camp because we were trying to save you. But you went in and risked your life so you could get some of their gold? I don't get it!" He threw his hands up in the air, exasperated.

A deathly worried expression crossed Sen's face, causing the group to stare silently at her in concern. Even Sokka quieted down. "Wait-" she said, looking them all intently in the eye, "are you telling me-" She paused, slowly trying to form her words. "Are you telling me you didn't grab the money?!"

They all deadpanned, wondering if the dark haired girl truly is insane.

Sen immediately got up and started pacing, ignoring the brunette's insistence for her to lie down. "I can't believe this! I went through almost dying and I didn't even get the gold?! That was supposed to get me through my travels to Ba Sing Sae and pay for my living expenses when I got there! Now if I go I'm going to have to get a job and live in the lower quarter. There's no way I'm going to get another chance getting the money back. It's almost pointless to go now..." She sighed, and at that point her knees gave out from all the movement.

"Careful!" Aang caught her before she could hit the ground too hard and helped her back down on the sleeping bag next to the water tribe girl. "We're sorry. There were just too many firebenders. We didn't have time to stop and think about anything other than getting you out of there safely."

Sen quieted down, telling herself once again that at least she was alive. My life is more important than gold. Aang helped her sit down and as soon as he let go Sen laid back with a loud huff. But the money...

"No," Sen started in a mild begrudging tone, "I'm sorry. I don't mean to take what you guys did for granted. My life is more," she stressed out the next word, "important than the gold."

She glanced up at them, noticing Sokka still looking at her like she lost her mind. Eh, oh well.

"So," the water tribe girl drawled out somewhat awkwardly, gaining Sen's attention. "Why don't we introduce ourselves? My name is Katara. This is my brother Sokka and our friend Aang." She gestured to each of them. The group was silent for a moment as they stared at her, waiting. Sen realized it her was her turn to give her name.

"Oh! Ah, yeah. I'm Sen." She flashed them a cheesy grin and waved.

"Well, Sen," she frowned at the way Sokka said her name, "as nice as it is to know you're okay, we're kind of on a tight schedule and got to get going now. So if you don't mind," he said, moving his hands in a shooing gesture to get her off the fur blankets.

"Sokka! Stop that!"

"We have more important things to do than babysit some girl, Katara."

The siblings then began a full out argument, both of them getting louder after every shout. Sen rubbed the back of her neck awkwardly, feeling somewhat bad for being the reason for all the yelling. But either way, she wasn't moving from this spot. Not like she really could. Her head was pounding after getting up and pacing and her legs wouldn't take her very far because of how weak they felt.

After hearing a few particularly rude remarks from the water tribe kids, Sen turned her head to the bald one. Their eyes connected for a brief second, but it was long enough for the dark-haired girl to tell this happened frequently and Aang usually had to solve it.

She watched as the boy sighed and walked over to the siblings.

"Hey, guys."

The siblings didn't seem to have heard him as they continued bickering, even after repeatedly trying to get their attention.

"Hey!"

A small gust of wind blew over the group. Sen held down her long braided hair, preventing it from smacking into her once again confused face. How did that happen?

Whatever happened, it got the siblings' attention instantly.

"It's going to be dark soon anyway so why don't we just camp here for the night?" Aang reasoned. He spoke again, sounding solemn this time. "We had to leave Kiyoshi in a hurry. Appa could use the rest. We all could."

Sen had no idea what Aang was talking about. Either way, the other two suddenly adorned sympathetic expressions, nodding their heads in agreement.

"Fine," grumbled Sokka reluctantly. He turned a pointed finger in Sen's direction. "But we split ways in the morning, got it?"

The outsider threw up her hands in defense, completely okay with the idea. "Okey-dokey."

Yay! New story to get in the way of my other two! ...Yeah. I just couldn't help myself. I think I'm at that point almost every writer reaches. The point where you just have to keep writing something new and different to get your creative juices going.

Putting that aside however, I have been working on this story way before my Twilight one. And when the Legend of Korra came out, I slowly started to get back into it. This is also my first time writing in third person, with snippets of the canon characters perspective, so please bear with me and let me know if anyone seems out of character.

Also, the title picture was created by me. Obviously, it's a picture of Sen. I can't wait to start drawing more of her! You can see the bigger version of it on my deviantart page. I go by the same username or you can find the link in my profile.

I'm really excited about writing this story! And hopefully, if I can ever finish it, I already have plans to write a Legend of Korra fic set in this same universe.

So I hope everyone enjoyed the first chapter. Please review, favorite, alert, etc. As always, it's really appreciated! Feel free to ask me any question too. I'll get back to you through PM or leave a little section for answers in the next chapter, which should be out soon!