___________________________________....... |  Lower Ring · Late AfternoonLower Ring · Late Afternoon _
"What do I do?!"
"Nothing stupid."
Nelu pushed forward on the throttle, putting his cruiser into a nosedive, and watched as the dreary world around him began to tilt. Black spires encroached by thick clouds of smoke pitched toward him as the cruiser began to fall, and as his speed increased and the wind picked up and began battering his windshield, Nelu felt the familiar twisting in his gut as gravity left him. The cabin rattled, the engine roared and water in the air became long streaks drawn across glass. Eventually, the thicker upper layer of fog was pulled away like a veil revealing the world of chaos the Lower Ring had fallen into.
Framed in a city of smoke were streets littered in debris and the people of Ba Sing Se running in every direction with no direction. They dove into buildings or under cars and sought shelter where they could. Peppered in with the panicked masses were Benders, true to countless radio reports that were still coming in. But more than that, among the crowds were also those who were not exhibiting bending abilities but were attacking others unprovoked. Reports of individuals who were ignoring warnings and lashing out violently at those around them and in some cases, murdering those they got their hands on. Despite the panic and confusion induced by Benders revealing themselves all at once and in such large numbers, the random attacks were even more unsettling and the idea of a violent Bender drove Nelu to haste. There were few who could handle them, especially in the Lower Ring.
"Allen's location."
A point of light appeared on the windshield highlighting a section of the road a few blocks ahead, close to where Nelu knew the soup kitchen was located. "Officer Gima is here. He is not moving." Came a female voice.
"Status."
"Unconscious. Stable."
"Shit." He hissed, coaxing more power out of the engine. Gravity pushed him against his seat and the cruiser lurched forward, clearing several blocks of chaotic streets in less than a minute and putting Nelu above the entrance to the soup kitchen. There below him he could see a heavily damaged dumpster and the body of Allen slumped against it. Nearby was a man who seemed to have been half buried in the dirt and around the both of them were clear signs of earthbending. There were removed slabs of earth, drag marks and unexplained dirt spires protruding out of the street. His controlled panic and haste turned to anger.
"Get a paramedic unit to this location now."
"Yessir."
"Vanguard?" Nelu half yelled, descending close enough to the ground to dispatch his AI.
"Ready to deploy."
"Deploy it."
The cabin shook again as the undercarriage opened up and a payload was dropped. As soon as it had landed, Nelu moved to land his cruiser. Normal procedure was to wait for a clear landing area, typically provided by the AI, but Nelu wasn't going to wait. He found and made for a small clearing in the debris near the dumpster and put the cruiser down there. He was out before it'd even landed, exiting and dropping a few feet out of the air and into an angry swarm of dust kicked up by thrusters as he moved toward Allen with his weapon drawn. So focused was he on his downed friend that he didn't even notice the AI dispatch another Bender in the area, nor did he give any heed to the half buried, crazed man.
The first thing Nelu noticed as he knelt beside Allen were the heavy injuries he'd sustained to his face. It was as if he'd been beaten repeatedly by a blunt object, or in this case, pummeled by rocks, Nelu assumed. What didn't make sense to him was the fact that Allen's weapon was sitting across his lap as if it'd been neatly placed there. That and it was obvious that effort had been put into subduing the individual in the ground rather than killing him. He obviously wasn't the bender in question and whoever was responsible for what happened was no longer here. Or at least that's what Nelu would have initially believed if he hadn't heard noise coming from the kitchen and noticed the Vanguard focus on the doorway. He looked too and could feel a number of individuals huddled inside.
Perhaps what happened here wasn't an act of unprovoked violence and was instead one of defense. Maybe there had been a misunderstanding. Maybe the man in the ground, who was clearly unhinged, had been one of the crazed individuals running around and murdering people and had attacked Allen and the Earthbender was only trying to help. There was some obvious skill involved in the bending. Most were not capable of such feats, even when their powers were boosted as they were now. Everyone else was bending uncontrollably but this person was clearly making use of techniques they'd learned from somewhere, and that was more telling than anything else. That was dangerous. They needed to come in but Allen had to get out first.
"Hold on, Allen." Nelu gingerly scooped his arm under the unconscious officer's body and carefully picked him up, supporting some of his weight with the man's arm over his shoulder. It was difficult but he managed to guide him to the front seat of his cruiser and place him inside.
"Cancel the paramedic request and get him to the hospital, now." Nelu said once Allen was secure.
"Yessir." There was a mechanical chime as the cabin door swung shut, hissing gas as it sealed. Thrusters under the cruiser flared to life, once again throwing Nelu into a cloud of dust, and steadily lifted the vehicle off the ground and into the air. Once it was high enough, it took off toward the pink haze canopy above where it was quickly swallowed up.
Nelu turned to join the guard at the door but as he approached, the street was suddenly torn open and rolled like a rug. Dirt and rocks and slabs of asphalt spilled over the AI, burying it. But while the robot was rendered temporarily useless, the extreme display of Earthbending was all the sign he needed that his suspect was still here. Inside the room, he froze one of the individuals. A child.
...That can't be right...
Another began bolting toward the back and Nelu immediately raised his gun and started putting rounds through the wall, refusing to release whoever it was he had. If it wasn't a bender, then they were in serious danger and he needed to keep them away from the others. If he could keep them where they were, he could avoid accidentally hurting them in the crossfire and given their position close to the door, getting to them himself wouldn't be a problem. Once removed, he could more easily deal with the Bender without injuring an innocent civilian. However, as he began moving toward the door, a large earthen wall suddenly burst from the ground and pushed into the front wall of the soup kitchen, destroying it but also sealing it completely off.
"Damn it. Door."
A muted jingle from under a pile of dirt answered the command and after some rumbling and shifting of debris, a large slab of concrete was lifted and thrown off the pinned robot. It recovered, found its footing, picked up its rifle, and hit a button on the side before shouldering the weapon again. When it fired next, instead of a bullet, a ball of spirit energy was thrown at the wall, evaporating a chunk of dirt the size of a basketball. It fired again... and then again... and then again, steadily chewing through layers of loose rock and stone and pieces of concrete as Nelu studied the movements of those inside. What surprised him the most was that despite the others retreating, one of them went for the kid. They dove for them, pushing the child out of the way and sacrificing themselves to Nelu's grasp, whether they knew it or not. A selfless act. A good Samaritan not unlike the one who was willing to defend an RSF officer and return their weapon to them.
...There you are...
"aaAAAAHHHH!!"
Nelu turned in time to see a man running toward him, screaming at the top of his lungs. By the time he'd dropped the boy on the other side of the wall and focused his attention on the stranger, he'd been grabbed around the waist and thrown to the ground.
He hit his head rather hard. |
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