-AUTHORS NOTE-

How I love plot twists.

“Get up. C’mon, get up. Get up, get up, get up! I’m not gonna wait long for you to wake up! Up, up, up!”

Someone was poking my head, and I heard a voice I recognized. But who’s voice was it? Not Aang’s, it was not as high. And it was a guy’s voice. Definitely not Zuko.

               “…up! Get-“

               “Sokka, stop it. You’re being annoying. It’s not like you can just annoy her into consciousness!”

               Oh, right. It was Sokka’s. That makes sense.

               “Or can he?” I muttered. I opened my eyes. I was laying down on something hard, and there were trees all around, and a blue sky.

               “Hey, Katara! It worked! I’m a genius!” Sokka was hovering over me, and Katara and Aang soon joined. I tried to sit up, but I felt a terrible pain on my abdomen.

               “And that’s the second time fire almost killed me.” I muttered. Struggling to sit up, I scooched back a bit and was met with Appa’s furry coat. “There,” I said, leaning my back against Appa to sit up.

               “Who are you?” Katara asked, her eyes in a slight glare. She didn’t trust me.

               “I’m Elizabeth.” I stated, and I wasn’t surprised one bit when they gave me a weird look. “Yes, I know. You can say that my name is weird.” I sighed.

               “Well, Aang said you already knew his name. I’m-“

               I interrupted Sokka. “You’re Sokka. And there’s Katara, and Aang. No need to introduce yourselves. And also-“I stopped myself. I was about to say Toph, but she won’t come in for a while. A long while.

               “And who?” Aang asked, suddenly interested.

               “Nothing. Just forget it.” Until the middle of Season Two, I mentally added.

               I knew the question of where I was from was going to pop up eventually. I decided that these people were on my side (or I was on theirs’) so I could tell them. It’s gonna be a nasty surprise for them, though.

               “So, Elizabeth,” Sokka started, “Where are you from?”

               I took a deep breath. “Don’t freak out,” I said, and I noticed they all stiffened, probably thinking I was going to say Fire Nation. “I’m from a different world. A whole different realm.” I told the entire story of how I ended up here, but I left out the details about Zuko and of course I left out how this whole thing was just a TV show. When I finished, they were all shocked, and there was a silence. They’ll either take a while to adjust or think I’m lying, I concluded to myself.

               “…that’s… not the answer I was expecting,” Aang confessed.

               “I know it’s hard to believe, but I want to join you guys on your… uh… wherever you’re going to go.” Nice save, I told myself.”Oh, and I’m a waterbender. I never really knew until later on Zuko’s ship.”

               They were all thinking hard, or at least it looked like it. I bit my lip. Will they let me join them? “So, what’ll it be? Can I come with you guys?”

               After a while of them pondering, Aang spoke up. “Oh, why not? You can come. Right Sokka?” Sokka only nodded, and Katara was still being quiet. “Katara…?”

               “Okay. She can come,” She said uneasily.

               “Thank you.” I smiled. “Uh, sorry to change the topic, but where’s my bag?” I asked.

               “You had a bag, didn’t you? We didn’t get it, though. I think it might still be on Zuko’s ship.” Aang looked at me with an expression that said sorry.

               “Fu-“I started, but remembered that this was a children’s TV show. “Fudge. I was going to say that,” I made a quick save. At least I have my coat. I thought. It was cold all the time here in the South anyway.

               The next day, the gang made me get up early. Well, besides Sokka. He wanted to sleep in as much as I did. But Aang was too excited to go to his home at the Southern Air Temple, so we were forced to climb on Appa in our groggy states. We both were sitting in the back of the saddle grumbling about how we were tired and how Sokka was hungry while Katara and Aang were talking up front.

               “Hey, Liz, what’s it like in your world?” Sokka brought up the topic.

               “It’s insanely different than here. There’s no bending. There’s no Four Nations. Instead of the nations, we have continents that are split into countries, then where I’m from it’s spilt into states. Then there are counties, then towns. But in other countries, there are cities and different things like that. Then there’s more modern technology than there is here. I guess you could say that compared to here, the technology makes up for the lack of bending.” I explained. Aang and Katara had been listening too with a look of interest.

               “Whoa. That’s so complicated!” Aang exclaimed.

               “Oh, yeah. It is. But it’s just the way things are. And there are no kings or queens. Well, in my country, at least. But they don’t have a lot of power. They’re just royalty. And then there were laws about school. Everyone has to go to school. Actually, almost everyone. Some people have exceptions, like homeschoolers or people with horrible illnesses. And transportation is different, too. There aren’t any sky bison, and there are ships that can go across the oceans, but then airplanes are faster. Then there are trains and cars and motorcycles. People don’t really go anywhere on foot. And there are stores everywhere so you can get food and lots of other things.” I leaned back, remembering my world and how different it was compared to here.

               “What are ‘airplanes’? And what are those other things that you said?” Sokka asked. Of course they wouldn’t know what the heck these things were.

               “It’s hard to explain everything…” I said, feeling too lazy to explain anything. Whatever I would tell them about would lead to more questions. Pretty much everything had a back story, I realized. It’s like trying to watch Season Two or Three without watching all of Season One. It’s impossible to understand all of it without knowing the back story and seeing every episode.

               “It’s okay. We’re almost at the Southern Air Temple anyway!” Aang said excitedly, turning back around to steer Appa. “Hold on, we’re going up!” He pulled up on the reigns, and we were thrown back a bit. I held on to the edge of the saddle for dear life, for we were flying completely vertical. After those few terrifying moments, Appa went back to flying horizontal.

               “There it is,” Aang said, “the Southern Air Temple.” I widened my eyes at the landscape. There were three main building-like things, and they were ginormous. From the distance, it looked exactly like a painting. I understood how the characters felt when they reached it. In the cartoon, they were so fascinated (well, besides Sokka) at the temple, and since it was only an animation, I wasn’t really that amazed. But here-in real life- I was speechless. It was more amazing than any monument that I’ve ever been to in my entire life.

               “It’s amazing!” Katara whispered with awe.

               “You can say that again,” I said.

               Eventually we landed, and we hopped off Appa. Aang was overflowing with excitement, but you could see he felt a bit sad from how empty it was.

               “So, Aang, where do I get food here?” Sokka asked for the fifth time. Aang ignored the question, but Katara reacted.

               “Sokka, we are the first people from the Southern Water Tribe to see an Air Temple, and all you can think about is food?”

               “Hey, I’m just a simple guy with simple needs.”

               I spoke up. “Well, you better stop talking about your ‘simple needs’ or you’ll make me hungrier than I am. And trust me, you don’t want to mess with me when I’m really hungry.”

               Aang started pointing out different things and places and what was done there and things like that. I was zoned out most of the time, for it felt like I was at a semi-boring museum with a tour guide. Eventually we reached the room with the giant doors, and Aang was opening it. I sighed, already knowing what is going to be in there. When we walked in, the group went observing the statues of the pasts Avatars. Something didn’t feel right, though. There was a weird feeling…

               “Hey, uh, guys? Do you feel like something’s weird in here?” I called out to them.

               “Nope!” Aang said, not really paying attention.

               Katara actually came over to me, eyeing me with a worried look. It reminded me of my mom… “What’s wrong?”

               “There’s this weird feeling… like something’s not right. I don’t know what, though…” I sniffed the air. “And do you smell that? It smells like it was just raining…” Katara gave me a weird look. “Yeah, call me crazy. Do-“I was interrupted by a sucking feeling, like there was air trying to suck me into something. I was suddenly swept off my feet by the air, and I felt all swirly and disfigured.

               “Guys! Help! Something’s happening to Elizabeth!” Katara shouted. Aang and Sokka rushed over, and everything was spinning. Before I knew it everything was dark, but I was still conscious. It was hard to breathe, and I felt like I was surrounded by dirt or sand or something like that. I also heard two very familiar voices from above me, but they were really muffled. It started to get harder and harder to breathe, so I tried to push upward on the ground above me, but it didn’t budge. If only I was an Earthbender! I tried pushing again, and to my surprise, the ground above me was shot upward. I heard a gasp and a scream, and I stood up in the hole I was in. it’s like someone buried me! I looked at the guy and girl who were standing above the hole, and into the red, puffy eyes and immediately recognized them as my two best friends- Clifton and July.

               “No way,” I said. “I had been dead.”