Percy Jackson and that kid in the iceberg

When heartfelt speeches fail, threaten murder

They practiced most of the day, fighting back most of their anxiety. The fact that they were still just going to grab Haru and get out of there bothered Annabeth the more she thought about it. Every earthbender, not just Haru deserved to be free. This whole town deserved to be free. And even if they did save Haru from prison, then what? He would have to live the life of a fugitive.

Finally, the twelve hours were up. The four of them boarded Appa and rode to the prison rig. Aang rushed to get Katara while Percy, Annabeth, and Sokka waited for her. They all breathed a sigh of relief as she came into view, and then stiffened again when they realized she didn't have Haru with her.

"Your twelve hours are up; where's Haru? We've gotta get outta here." Sokka hissed.

Katara shook her head. "I can't."

"We don't have much time. There are guards everywhere. Get on!" Sokka said.

Katara didn't move.

"Katara, what's wrong?" Aang asked.

"I'm not leaving," in the moonlight, her eyes shone with determination. "And I'm not giving up on these people."

"What do you mean you're not leaving?" Sokka said.

"We can't abandon these people! There has to be a way to help them."

"She's right," Annabeth said. "We need to fight back, and get them to fight back. The Fire Nation thinks that they've gotten them pinned without anything to bend, but we have two waterbenders and this rig is in the middle of the ocean."

"But we aren't that good yet," Percy said.

"It doesn't matter. You're both good enough, and you don't need bending to have courage."

"I tried telling them that," Katara said, "but they wouldn't listen."

"Well, we need a decent plan," Sokka said.

"I wish I knew how to make a hurricane!" Aang said.

We all turned to look at him.

"The warden would run away and we'd steal his keys."

"Wouldn't he just have his keys on him?" Percy pointed out.

"I'm just tossing around ideas."

"If there was just a way to help them help themselves." Katara said.

"For that they'd need some kind of earth, or some rock. Something they can bend," Sokka mused.

"But this entire place is made of metal."

Annabeth looked at up the smoke curling into the night air. "Not all of it. You can't burn metal. Coal on the other hand..."

—————

Dawn had arrived by the time they had their plan in place. Annabeth would have loved to take credit for it, but surprisingly enough it was Sokka who came up with how to get the coal to the earthbenders.

"These vents reminded me of our little trick back at the village. We're gonna do the same thing, but on a much bigger scale," Sokka explained. "There's a huge deposit of coal at the base of the silo. And the whole system is ventilated. Aang closed off all the vents except one. When he does his airbending the coal only has one place to go, right back here."

"It should work," Annabeth agreed. "But just in case we should have a back up plan."

Before she could continue, a shout rang in the air. "There's the intruder!"

They all got too their feet, but it was too late. She, Sokka, and Katara were surrounded. Luckily enough Percy had gone with Aang to coal chutes watch his back.