"His companions? I've tried that before."
Tanya chuckled. "Shrewd thinking, but no. I'm talking about something bigger than personal attachment. Something grand. Something that appeals to his unshakable duty as The Avatar…"
...
Zuko's hands speared through the water, snapping up the two targets with the speed and precision of a diving bird.
They wriggled and thrashed wildly into his hands as he pulled them out into the warm night air, but Zuko refused to relinquish his grip. Instead each one was stuffed unceremoniously into a waterproof bag, which Zuko then drew tight and dipped into the pond long enough to fill with water.
The spirit of the moon struggled against the bag, trying to push through the leathery material to reach its eternal partner, the spirit of the ocean, that it could feel mere inches away.
Yet they were part of the mortal world now, and their bodies did not have the strength for the task. The eternal push and pull that the two spirits had maintained for thousands of years had been broken.
And up in the sky above, the moon began to bleed a crimson red.
...
The warriors of the water tribe stood stunned, unsure what to think of the strange phenomenon up above.
The moon was more than just a celestial body in the night's sky. More than just the source of their powers. More than the object of their worship. It was an immutable fact of the world: a law of nature that could never be broken. Civilisations rose and fell, wars were waged and forgotten, yet through it all the moon had always been there in the sky at night, illuminating the chaos below it with its silver light.
Yet tonight the moon bled. And without it the waterbenders found themselves absolutely powerless.
Yet while the Water Tribe was paralysed with shock, the Fire Nation was not. High up in the sky Tanya made a hand signal, and war horns bellowed out from behind the ruins of the broken gate. Cries of panic erupted out amidst the Water Tribe ranks as legions of fresh Fire Nation soldiers began to march out from behind the walls.
Yet while those at the front of the water tribe's charge cried out in shock, those at the back cried out in terror.
Armoured hands burst up like flowers from the piles of Fire Nation corpses they'd ran over, clawing for purchase as the bodies attached to them pulled themselves up. Spirit-fearing warriors prayed for salvation as the Fire Nation dead rose up behind them, surrounding them on all sides.
In the sky above Tanya grinned with malice, and barked a single command to her soldiers below.
"Kill them all!"
...
Here we go ladies and gentlemen. Part one of the Siege of the North.
I'm sure a few people are going to write comments about this if I don't, so I'm going to make it clear right now that no, Tanya isn't actually raising the dead. As much as I reckon she'd make a great necromancer, I'm only going to stick to the four forms of bending and other canon supernatural powers.
What she's done is gather an army's worth of corpses from other battle grounds and brought them to the invasion with her, stored within the carriages attached to her tanks. Behind the cover of the shield walls her troops have been unloading these corpses and piling them up on top of the living.
Thus she creates the illusion that her army is sitting there letting itself be massacred, while in reality setting up for an ambush.
I'm planning to finish the siege of the north with an equally sized part two next chapter, and then tidy up the loose threads that aren't so important to this battle with an interlude chapter before we get into the Earth book. I'm busy with work as always, but hopefully part two will be ready in a couple of months or so.
See you then.
...
The Water Tribe was in shambles.
To be fair, anybody else would have been just as terrified as they were in their situation, hardened warriors or not.
Combat training prepared you to handle traps, ambushes and all sorts of nasty tactical manoeuvres. It did not, however, prepare you for the moon turning red, your bending being stolen away, and the dead bodies of your enemies rising back to life behind you.
Through their eyes the world must have seemed as if it had turned into a living nightmare in the span of a few short seconds. Mind-numbing confusion and fear was an understandable reaction given the circumstances.
That didn't mean that Tanya would hesitate to take advantage of it.
"Kill them all!" She shouted, her voice carrying easily over the chaos below. The bloody moon had confused her own soldiers just as much as the enemy, but those who'd been tasked with hiding beneath the piles of the dead weren't just any troops: they were the ones who'd been under her direct command for most of her military career.
They'd had years to associate the sound of her voice with orders that had to be followed on pain of harsh consequences, and her sharp order was enough to snap many of them out of their bewilderment.
The first volley of fire blasts crashed into the Water Tribe's ranks, completely unhindered by the barriers of water and ice that would have usually risen up to stop them.
Within the first few seconds it was obvious that Tanya had them in checkmate. Almost the entire Northern Water Tribe army was trapped out on the open courtyard without so much as a sheet of paper to take cover behind, pincered between Fire Nation forces that outnumbered them three-to-one.
If they had the moon they could have fought back: they could have erected new barriers from the ice beneath their feet, reorganised themselves and pushed back through the relatively thin line of soldiers standing between them and the safety of Agna Qel'a.
But the moon was no longer with them. Their waterbenders were not only completely disarmed, but were randomly mixed around with their armed warriors after their messy, disorganised charge.
They huddled back in helpless fear as the first volley of fireballs set their friends and comrades alight, their panic trapping the non-benders in a crushing mass of bodies that stopped them from forming a decent shield wall.
Whatever orders their commanders tried to issue were drowned out beneath the rising cacophony of pained and fearful screams.
Meanwhile the Fire Nation soldiers quickly realised that they'd just been presented with a shooting gallery. Their enemy was trapped and terrified; cowering away from their fire like mice, and unable to do more than throw the odd spear back at them in retaliation.
Beneath the light of the red moon, bloodlust began to take its hold. The feverish madness that'd been festering since the beginning of the invasion alighted in their eyes: a red mist that made their hands move instinctively, and their mouths stretch into ghoulish grins as they threw fireball after fireball into the quailing ranks of the pathetic waterbenders.
Within the first minute so much fire was being thrown at both sides of the water tribe's army that, from her view up above, Tanya could nearly see two walls of fire squeezing the Water Tribe in on itself.
How long would it take for her troops to burn their way through the entire Water Tribe army? An hour? Perhaps two, if they managed to string together some semblance of organisation.
Her commanders would no doubt say that it was just a countdown to victory at this point, but Tanya wasn't willing to congratulate herself just yet. Not while there was one wildcard still left up the Water Tribe's sleeve.
Her eyes scanned the trembling mass of warriors below, searching for a speck of orange amidst the sea of blue garbs and frowning ever-deeper when she failed to find it.
Where was The Avatar? Even if he was too much of a pacifist to lead the charge himself, he'd expected him to be among the Water Tribe's ranks as they sallied forth to meet her.
She'd even gone and dangled herself up in the sky like this as bait to draw him out. Yet there was no sign of large gusts of wind trying to blow apart her encirclement. Had he actually been wise enough to stay behind in reserve? If so, then he was probably hunting down Zuko right at this very moment, trying to shift the tide of the battle back in the Water Tribe's favour by freeing the ocean and moon spirits.
Sadly there was nothing more she could do to assist Zuko. The exiled prince had played his part perfectly so far; all he had to do now was bring the captured spirits to her before The Avatar caught him.
Not an easy task by any stretch of the imagination, but Zuko was as stubborn as an ox when it came to regaining his honour, and there was nobody else in the Fire Nation more familiar with the way The Avatar thought. If anyone could do it, it was him.
Come to think of it, she'd better get started setting up the finale to her plan. It wasn't like the battle below needed her supervision anymore. With a satisfied smile Tanya flew towards Agna Qel'a, not so much as sparing a glance at the massacre taking place beneath her feet.
...
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