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[/cell][cell][color=white][center][sub][sub][sub][sub][sub][img]https://i.imgur.com/DHKvx27.png[/img][/sub][/sub][/sub][/sub][center][color=2e2c2c]Ba Sing Se University   ·   Late Afternoon   ·   [&.Exit][/color]Ba Sing Se University   ·   Late Afternoon   ·   [@Exit][/center][/sub][/center][/color][quote][color=2e2c2c]_[/color]
[color=9f9f9f]Zhen was in a classroom in one of the old buildings of Ba Sing Se University, holding a question and answer session for one of her seminars. Natural light was pouring in through the massive windows, built in an era before electric lamps, and she was seated at one end of the table, while the nine students who had bothered to show up were at the other end. Most professors liked to have their assistants handle these sessions, but in the times when Zhen’s busy schedule allowed she preferred to run them. She had expected attendance to be sparse, on a holiday such as this only the most dedicated or the most desperate bothered to come. The first question was asked by Siku, who was not very bright but tried hard. He seemed genuinely worried about the low marks he got, perhaps unaware of how the university could “adjust” the grades of students who came from families as wealthy as his. Zhen never interfered with this, but liked to make her initial grades honest, giving them a glimpse of the truth. He asked 

“Could you explain Emotivism? You said something about it when covering ethical philosophy but I didn’t understand.”

She smiled, then said.

“Of course. Emotivism is the school of thought that ethical statements have no true or false value, no logical content, and the only thing they convey is the speaker’s own emotions regarding something. This takes some unpacking. Let’s take given an example of a statement with a clear truth-value: I am a 400-foot tall purple platypus bear with pink horns and silver wings. Obviously, that’s false. How do you know it is false?” 

Siku said

“Well, uhhh, duh I can just look at you. You aren’t any of that. Did I need philosophy for that?”
Then Huanyan spoke up. She was one of the most dedicated students, earning excellent marks and showing the type of enthusiasm Zhen liked to see. Perhaps Zhen could persuade her to join her handpicked seminar on Bender Spirituality next semester. Huanyan said 
“A better way of stating it would be that we can falsify it using empirical evidence, it contradicts our sensory experiences."

Zhen said

“Correct. Now, two more example statements, one of which is has truth-value, the other doesn’t: Chu Hua Yuan is a good stickball player, Chu Hua Yuan is good. Can you identify the one with a truth-value?”

Several of them spoke at the same time 

“The first one”

“Correct, the description ‘good stickball player’ is something that we can ground in other concepts, it relates to the game of stickball, and we can link it to physical characteristics such as her stamina, the accuracy of her shots, etcetera. But once we remove the second part and reduce it from ‘good stickball player’ to merely ‘good’, we are adrift. Without the ability to tie it to reality, the only thing we can glean from it is that the speaker has positive emotions attached to Chu Hua Yuan, it’s semantically identical to shouting ‘Chu Hua Yuan! Chu Hua Yuan!’ like a rabid fan in the stadium crowd.
The problem is that all ethical statements are like the second type. Stating ‘killing is wrong’ or ‘making people happy is good’ is the same as our example from earlier, devoid of any content except for emotions. Even if we try to ground them by saying something like ‘Killing makes people feel bad’, we have merely sidestepped the problem, that is a practical statement, but we would still need to eventually make an ethical statement, such as ‘making people feel bad is bad’.”

	As she was speaking her last words there was a pink flash outside the window, and everyone stared to see what happened. A beam of light had shot up into to the sky, disappearing after a few seconds. Then the window rattled from a pressure wave, luckily it was not enough to cause any serious damage. All of them were silent, then Huanyan started to say “I think that was by the…”

As she spoke Huanyan pointed at the window and summoned a burst of air strong enough scatter all of the papers in the room. After that the room was as silent as graveyard. Then she pulled her hand away and tried to gesture that she meant no harm, but that too summon a gust of wind that blew everyone’s hair back. When she tried to speak her words produced smaller blasts of air, like a light breeze, but enough for everyone to feel. Huanyan started shaking, trembling, fearful of what was happening, trying to avoid any large motions. There was no mistaking it, Huanyan was airbending. Zhen felt the power too but retained her composure, like the tightly wound spring of a mechanical watch. All of the students let out a scream in unison but then Zhen spoke with a commanding tone. “Quiet. There is no reason for anyone to panic, including Huanyan. I will find her the assistance she needs. Everyone else is to remain here, and call the proper authorities if anything else comes up while I am away.” They did as they were told.

	She held Huanyan’s hand tight in her grip, pulling her along down the hallway. The trail of papers blown by gusts of wind followed them as they went, heads turned, and people screamed. Bending was happening elsewhere in the building, Zhen was sure of it, but she had to deal with the problem closest to her first. Eventually they made it to Zhen’s office, Huanyan shaking so much that she merely slumped down after the door closed. She looked around the spacious room, seeing the well organized shelves stocked with books, the awards on the shelf, and the array of photos displayed above her desk. There were many of them, every one related to some occasion where Zhen’s work with the Doing What We Can foundation brought her into the spotlight. So many of them were of Zhen smiling, reacting with awe as she accepted a donation from one the most illustrious families of Ba Sing Se. The Sorans, the Varricks, the Satos, the Moons, all of them had contributed, as though they had turned a charitable venture into a way of one-upping the rest of the elite, but among all of the photos one was front and center: the time that King Wu had made Zhen among the fortunate few to receive the Order of Republic Excellence during the New Year Honors. 

	Huanyan sat there in the center of the floor as Zhen rushed about the room. Zhen was closing the blinds, dragging a large trunk out of the closet, checking that it was empty, a lot of actions that didn’t make sense to Huanyan, but she was tired and scared, not asking any questions as she saw that her breath was still causing a small breeze that rattled the papers. Zhen stopped her work and crouched down beside her, making strange hand motions that Huanyan didn’t recognize. She asked Zhen 

“What are you doing?”. 

Zhen said 

“An act of mercy”

Huanyan said 

“What? I don’t understand. Is there something I should be doing?” her voice growing weak as she spoke. 

Zhen said 

“No. Nothing at all. Just sleep. There’s nothing you need to do anymore, nowhere you need to be, nothing you need to be. It’s coming on now, best thing is to embrace it, join in the emptiness. No use in fighting because there’s nothing after this.”
 
Zhen could see the air current’s swirl around Huanyan’s face, forcing her lungs full of pure nitrogen, her eyes closed slowly and her muscles relaxed, dropping her to the floor as she fell into a painless and final sleep. Zhen was by her side, holding her hand the whole time. When she felt the pulse stop she cracked a small smile before she began to compose a message for the corpse disposal division. 
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