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Wei was a firebender.
He couldn’t wrap his head around it. The golden eyes, the thick dark hair… Jet had just assumed that he was a war child.
Maybe he was. Maybe he was just unlucky like that.
It would explain the scars. The one that everyone saw and the ones that only he had seen. The ones in the other boy’s eyes and in his heart.
Wei hated the Fire Nation too, but he was fire in the deepest way that someone could be.
He had never hurt Jet or any of the kids.
It didn’t make any sense.
Firbenders were evil. They were the enemy. They needed to be wiped out.
The idea of fighting Wei… of hurting him? It made Jet sick to his stomach.
It was strange to lay in his bed alone. Wei didn’t sleep here, they didn’t want to set a bad example for the younger kids, but they would spend an hour or two laying with one another before the other teen… the firebender would sneak back out and go to his own bedroll.
‘I’m not Fire Nation. …I want to stay with you.’ The words were pained, he could hear Wei’s tears.
It didn’t matter.
It didn’t matter that Wei had cared for him. Or pretended to care for him.
To love him.
It didn’t matter.
Because he was fire in the deepest ways.
He was the enemy.
Jet traced his finger down the cold bone of the club sword he had kept.
Water tribe.
Just like the tattoo.
Just like the slang the other boy used. Just like the hair styles he braided into the little girl’s hair every morning.
But he was fire.
Jet got up. He wasn’t going to be able to sleep like this. He took his tigerhead swords and headed towards the practice ring.
****************************
“Where’s Wei?” Pats asked him.
She was the third girl to come up to him today and he had had enough.
“He’s gone okay? GONE. Not coming back. Go tell all the girls he’s gone and that they need to stop asking me.” Jet snapped at her.
The little girls eyes filled with tears and she ran from him.
Great. Good job. What a wonderful leader he was being.
He rubbed at his tired eyes and sighed. He had been training all night and into the morning. He was tired but still not tired enough to make his mind quiet and sleep. It wouldn’t be the first time he had gone a whole day on no sleep though so he would be fine.
They didn’t need Wei.
“What did you do Jet?” Smellerbee asked from the edge of the sparring circle where he was working through sword forms. “You don’t usually yell at the little ones for no reason.”
Forms he hadn’t known six months ago. Ones that were more designed for a single sword with more weight to it but that he– they- had adapted for two.
He stopped and put his swords away before turning towards her.
There was a braid in her hair, one she had learned to do from him. It made him angry again.
“What’s it matter to you?” He demanded, letting that anger speak instead of his rational mind. Rather than his real feelings about him.
“It matters because we all have to get along Jet. You can’t have all the little ones afraid of you.” ‘Bee said calmly. “What happened?”
Jet didn’t want her to know. She had been close with him. Closer than many of the rest of them. Had opened up about more and let the guy in.
If anyone deserved to know other than Jet, it was Smellerbee.
“He’s a firebender.” The last word nearly chokes him. It comes out thick and growly. He can’t look her in the eyes as he breaks the news.
“Oh.” The girl said sadly but not angrily. She didn’t sound shocked like he had been.
“Oh? That’s all? Just ‘Oh.’?” He snapped. It felt like the anger was filling him out to the edges of his skin today, just waiting to lash at anyone nearby.
“Well… I kind of suspected.” ‘Bee admitted and now she is the one avoiding his gaze. “He had the eyes and he was always warm. Even on the cold mornings.”
Jet was stunned. He was so stupid.
She was completely right. Wei was always warm to the touch.
Hot lips on his, warm hands on his skin, he had just joked around about Wei running a fever.
‘I just run hot. My father… he’s the same way.’ He remembered the words spoken quiet, like it was a shameful admission and now he knew that it had been.
“Why didn’t you say anything?!” He demanded of her. “Why didn’t you tell me we had an enemy in our group?”
“Because we didn’t Jet!” Smellerbee yelled right back. “He was just like the rest of us. Just a kid the world doesn’t fucking want!”
She stormed away but the anger stayed.
He started in on a practice dummy again, wanting to vent the hurt into his aggression but it didn’t help. The pain, the anger, the sadness was all still there. No matter how much he hit the practice dummy it didn’t help at all.
****************************
“Jet?” A young voice asks from behind him. Small and scared.
He doesn’t want to do this. but he has to. So, the leader of the Freedom Fighters turns and faces the boy.
“Yeah, the Duke?” He tries to keep his tone casual.
“Have you seen Wei?” the little boy asks. “I’ve been looking for him all morning, but I can’t find him. Is he on a mission?”
“The others haven’t told you?” He asked but he already knows the answer. The others would leave this to him. It wasn’t their place to tell the kid.
“Tell me what, Jet?” the Duke sounds even more scared now, his eyes wide in his small round face.
“He’s gone. Wei is gone.” Jet wants to keep it vague.
Maybe the kid will think the teen had died on the mission last night. Maybe he wouldn’t ask more questions. Maybe this could keep the peace for a while.
“No. He wouldn’t leave without me. Where is he Jet? Where is Wei? Where’s my brother Jet?” The kid isn’t sad anymore. He’s gone right into angry and demanding, stomping his small foot in the dirt.
“I’m sorry kid, he’s gone.” Jet says and he turns away.
He can’t keep his own anger from his eyes and the Duke doesn’t deserve it. What’s more, it would show the lie to his words, it would keep the boy from having closure.
“No! No, he’s not gone! He can’t be! Where is Wei?” The boy is practically wailing now, and Jet sees Pipsqueak step forward. The larger boy scoops the Duke up into a tight bear hug and carries him away from the others.
His high voice can still be heard for a long time, questioning, denying, demanding and finally sobbing.
It was better this way.
Smellerbee’s eyes held an accusation.
Clearly, she didn’t agree but she didn’t say anything. She was the only one he had told the truth to, but the look Longshot sent him told him that the other boy had his suspicions as well.
****************************
Later, when they are fighting the fire nation soldiers, he forgets for a moment that Wei is even gone. He forgets everything but the fight and the mission.
It’s the first time his mind is at peace all day and he smiles predatorially.
He can do this. Just keep fighting. Throw himself into the cause and free this valley from the enemy.
He doesn’t need Wei. He doesn’t need some Fire Nation scum pretending to care about him. He didn’t need some liar telling him he was being too harsh, risking too much, pushing the kids too hard.
Jet just needed to fight the Fire Nation. To kill firebenders.
This was what he needed, and it was what he would do.
****************************
Jet couldn’t sleep. It took utterly exhausting himself to finally find any rest and he was awake not long after falling into his bed.
It started to effect his decisions. Not enough for the younger kids or the slower ones to notice but he felt longshot’s sharp eyes on him often.
Smellerbee suspected something was wrong and stuck close but she never argued or countered his decisions.
No one stepped in to tell him he was doing too much, fighting too hard, working the kids more than they could take.
No one put a steadying hand on his shoulder and no one was there to share the burden of keeping these kids safe and happy.
He hadn’t realized how much he had learned to lean on Wei in their short time together, but he was feeling the absence now.
It made him angrier. Angrier at the lying boy who betrayed him and angrier at the fire nation for ruining everything that was ever good in his life.
They would wipe out the forces in this valley, no matter what it took.
He started to look for ways to do it. Some way that a small band of children in the woods could really dislodge forces full of trained adults from the surrounding towns and villages.
They just needed something big. Something destructive. Something to take out the enemy in one fell swoop.
Jet looked and he planned and he waited and he stewed in his fury.
He would have revenge on the Fire Nation if it was the last thing he did.
****************************
When Sokka stumbled into the camp they were watching he knew it was too good of a distraction to waste and signaled the attack.
After the fighting was all done he saw the dark skin, blue eyes, and blue clothing of the water tribe on two of the new children.
He looked but did not see the tattoos that would mark this boy as a warrior of the tribe. Marks like those on the pale wrist of a boy who had been gone for months.
He didn’t want to think about Wei.
Jet focused his attention on Katara instead.
Beautiful, sweet, innocent and a waterbender.
Everything he should want in someone else. Everything right and good.
Kissing her that night wasn’t the same.
He didn’t let her see but he was sad and disappointed and angry.
Always angry.
He should want the soft sweet girl in his arms.
He shouldn’t be thinking of larger hands that always felt warm. Jet shouldn’t be remembered the feels of hot pink lips against his own, or of them trailing down the familiar path of his jaw and neck.
That had been the enemy. That boy had been fire.
He should want the water girl.
But he doesn’t.
So, he pretends, and he lies, and he woos her, and she does what he needs her to do.
She helps him to prepare the final task that would wipe out the enemy.
****************************
Longshot and Smellerbee find him frozen to the tree after he has been there for a while.
After his shouting and rage had abated.
They find him quietly weeping.
His anger has been spent. His task had been failed.
He couldn’t stop thinking about Wei. Couldn’t get away from the thoughts. Being trapped like this had trapped him in his mind and made it impossible to keep moving away from what he didn’t want to admit.
He wished he hadn’t sent him away. He wanted the boy here so badly.
Jet had been wrong. He had been wrong about so many things and he was sorry for them all.
Most of the freedom fighters left. The little ones were scared and the older ones angry at Jet for tricking them into almost doing something horrible.
Longshot and ‘Bee stayed. They understood and they stayed.
But they couldn’t stay in the forest. The Fire Nation would come and they would seek their revenge. It wasn’t safe.
As they walked away, Jet couldn’t help wondering if they were walking the same path that he had made the firebending boy walk months ago. Leaving the valley he had called home was the hardest thing he had ever done but the quiet support of the two fighters who had stayed by his side helped.
“Where are we going now, Jet?” Smellerbee asked quietly as they looked down over the forest from the path they walked into the mountains.
“Ba Sing Se is the last true Earth Kingdom stronghold. Maybe there’s something for us there.” He answered her.
It was worth a shot.
It could be a new beginning.
In his pack there were things to take the memories of his past forward with him. A map of the valley they had used for planning missions. A dagger he had taken from the ashes of his first home.
A bone club sword that made his heart ache when he trailed his fingers down it’s smooth surface.
Maybe things could get better now.