Road to Ba Sing Se | Zuko

23

❃ The Fight ❃

Jet's hands turned white from the strain with which he gripped his twin hooked swords. Sparks flew between the sharp weapons as he slashed them against one another threateningly. Keya flinched from her spot next to the customers. Jet looked like he had completely lost his mind. His brown eyes squinted suspiciously at everyone in the shop, as if he thought that even the customers were involved in his imagined conspiracy. Keya quickly hurried over to stand between them and the aggressor protectively. She didn't want any innocent bystanders to get hurt.

However, despite his intimidation tactics, Jet's exclamation had not impressed the shop's inhabitants. The Ba Sing Se commoners looked around with confusion written on their bored faces. Clearly, it was simply absurd to imagine that an enemy had entered the impenetrable city without being apprehended. Even then, what enemies did they have? There was no war in Ba Sing Se, after all.

Once Jet realised that nobody was going to help him arrest Lee and Mushi, he grew impatient. He stepped forward and tried to convince his audience of their supposed dangerous tea servers.

"I know they're firebenders!" He pointed one of his swords at Iroh accusingly. "I saw the old man heating his tea!" 

"He works in a tea shop?" A confused customer, who just so happened to be a local guard, commented drily.

"He's a firebender! I'm telling you!" Jet screamed. The fear and stress behind his eyes flashed desperately. Why wouldn't these people listen?! He needed more proof. He noted the girl next to him, trembling with her arms held wide to shield her patrons. Aha!

Jet swung his arm out and grabbed Keya by her shoulder. With a deranged sense of confidence he held her out in front of himself. His other hand held a sword against her throat. She let out a high-pitched squeak and froze in his hold.  "Why do you think that that girl is so afraid, huh? She knows what they are! They've been silencing her!"

"She's scared because you're pointing a sword at her throat!" Someone else replied. Jet's acts against the beloved tea girl genuinely stirred the locals this time.

The guards in particular seemed to have run out of patience. They stood up. "Now, drop your swords, boy. Nice and easy." One of them said as he drew his sword from its sheath.

Jet walked over to Iroh cautiously with one sword still on Keya's neck. He intended to challenge the old man in order to force him to use his bending publicly. In the meantime, Keya was trying desperately to calm her breathing down (imagine looking for firebenders and finding out that there was an airbender in your midst instead -that would be the day). Although her powers thankfully didn't show, her breathing wasn't doing too well. She kept gasping for air, as if she couldn't fill her lungs no matter how hard she tried. It reminded her of when they were attacked by the 'rough rhinos'. Her chest felt heavy and tight. The whole ordeal made her feel lightheaded and dizzy.

Through her panic, Keya managed to make eye contact with Zuko. The grumpy teen had been busy with putting away some dishes when he heard the commotion in the front of the shop. As soon as he had arrived, he saw the cold glint of steel against the Earth Kingdom girl's neck. His heart rate instantly spiked and a surge of instinctual, animalistic rage bubbled up from his gut.

Never before had he wanted to hurt someone more than Jet in that moment. The way Keya tried to keep it together as he held his filthy weapons against her neck... it was enough to drive the banished Prince crazy. How could this happen? He had been keeping an eye out on her all day (only for her safety, of course)! The one moment that he had left to the kitchen, something dangerous had to happen to her.