15 Luke

It was dark that morning. The hours shifted and now the nights came later and ended later. I suppose that it had been long enough to consider me trustworthy. It was my first night on guard duty. The first time I ever held a spear. It was twice my size, but that wasn't unusual given current company. We were all kids after all. Violent kids. Kids who had a need to defend themselves at night for fear of death. It was me, Danev, and Sunji. Since our rather unpleasant first job together, we had gotten to know each other better. He grew up on a farm, but it was taken over by the Earth Kingdom to provide food for Ba Sign Se. His parents sold him to a small factory owner in Citadel for food when he was 7. That same factory got taken over by the Fire Nation and when the owner was killed for getting in their way, he was once again without home.

It would be a sad story, but when everybody else had just a different variation of a sob story, it got dull.

At least I don't remember mine. It could be just as repetitive as any of those around me. Or it could be unique, I guess. Maybe I'm the reincarnation of the Avatar and I don't even know it.

A tap on my shoulder got me out of my daydreaming, or nightdreaming I guess. I looked up to Danev from the floor where I was sitting, spear across my lap.

"Shift's over. Get some sleep."

A wave of relief came over me, but it must not have been as much as it was for Danev. I'd lie if I said I made it through the entirety of the night without drifting off. I stood up, stretching the aches out of my body before asking "You going too?"

"I'll wait for the changing of the guard. Wake Sunji, get some breakfast and some sleep."

I opened my mouth to reply, but only yawned instead so I nodded in response. I tapped Sunji's shoulder from where he lay outstretched on a table, fast asleep. He was 9, just a year younger than me, but still my height.

He yawned and asked, "It's over?"

I nodded and we walked off, through the currently empty center of the ex-apartment complex. To the right of the entrance was the cells, straight forward was the lobby with the "throne room", and past that as well as to the left was living quarters. In the left-most quarters, there was also a kitchen where "Ladle", an 11-year-old with knowledge in the kitchen, would occasionally prepare meals for the gang. It was calm most of the time. It had been since I joined up around 3 weeks ago.

When Sunji and I walked in, Ladle wasn't present, but 3 bowls of cold soup were in his stead. I grabbed one while Sunji grabbed the other and brought it over to a table to eat it cold. We were too tired to heat it.

Upon the first bite, I couldn't help but notice that there was hardly any meat as opposed to normal. I wouldn't call myself spoiled, but when you have something and you lose it, you tend to notice.

"There's no meat." Sunji said, noticing it too.

"Yeah. That sucks."

"Did we not rob one of the food carriages this week?"

"No. I saw them do it. They got the cart coming through the grain road so I assume so."

"Maybe it was another road?"

"No. Food only comes through on the grain road. Weapons and armor on arsenal, raw materials on the Industrial road, and the rest on the Homeland road."

"The Homeland road?"

"Yeah. The one that leads east to the sea to the docks where the Fire Nation sends stuff from the homeland."

"Oh. That. We call it the Rich people road."

"That works too. Just as accurate."

We had finished our meals and put the empty bowls in the empty washbasin where Ladle would clean it and refill it for future use.

We parted ways considering I slept in the left apartments while Sunji slept at the others.

The apartments were made to fit up to 3 families a piece. It was a slum after all. But considering there were only 28 of us, we all managed to have our own. That in no way means I was in one large ass room. No. It was designed to fit 3 families, but that didn't mean comfortably. My room was straight above the kitchen so I was always one of the first in line for food. It was an arrangement I came to enjoy.

I came to the large wooden door of my room and pushed it open after a struggle. It seemed more like a cell than an apartment which explained why they used them for such on certain occasions. I walked in tossed my spear to the corner where my mattress lay. It rolled perfectly parallel to it stopping only when it hit the edge. I dragged myself to the other corner to quickly urinate before it returned to my mattress where I promptly collapsed and drifted off into the comforting darkness.

But sleep didn't take find me easily. I dreamed. I dream frequently. Similar dreams, too. There was always a storm. A bad one. Lightning racing across the sky, waves rolling as high as the skies engulfing anything in its path. But I dreamed something else this time. Mountains. Mountains reaching past the clouds that you could only see when you penetrated the cloudy layer. There was something special and familiar about these mountains, but I couldn't put my finger on it. There was one mountain in particular. A bit smaller than the others, but far more important, but that evaded me as well. Then, the sweet and dreamless slumber that I so longed for finally embraced me.