Avatar Rose: Dusk

Ch.50: Nathan

"We're not traveling!" Rose blurts. Her hands reach up to play with her hair. Thank goodness, the Xander guy  has stopped playing with her legs. I can finally regain my cool.

"I don't like people who lie," he says matter-of-factly, getting to his feet. He shifts his balance to his left leg and his arms come up to cross. He gives us this intense look of superiority. "Really, I know you don't want me to get involved and stuff but I'm getting so incredibly bored of this shop anyways."

I shake my head. "It's not like that," I say, looking at my feet. Quickly, I improvise off the top of my head, "It's really nothing much. We're the children of a couple of merchants from southern Earth Kingdom. We were sent to give reports to our suppliers of the success of the franchise." I close my eyes. "Recently, the attack on Ganshan made our suppliers start cutting their crops. We have to make sure our franchise doesn't get put on leave! If we don't..."

Make it believable, Nathan Li!

I shake my head and take a breath. "If we don't-"

"Then my dying mother has no hope of getting treated!" Rose butts in, tears just brimming out of her eyes.

Perfect, Rose.

I turn to her and pull her into an embrace. I gently rub her back until she 'calms down'. "Shhh, Rosemonde, it's going to be okay..."

At the sound of her name, she tenses up, and then she lets it pass. She must realize what I'm doing. My fingers, resting on her back twitch ever so slightly. I find blondie's chi source through his capillaries and quickly hook on to it. He's not a bender, therefore he isn't as closely linked with his chi system. It's gonna be harder to knock this guy out.

Time to do this the manly way. Bringing my hand into a fist, I give the skin around his stomach artery a hard punch.

"Nathan!" Rose hisses.

"What the hell was that?" I hear blondie's voice yelp.

I feel strong hands gather my hands together from behind, and some barrel press against my shoulder. "Hey! Hey! What are you doing..?"

How is he not unconscious? A strong hit to the stomach and he should be out!

In an instant, my body goes stiff. My fingers spiral and lock with the blood in his arms. I pull up, then down and he lets go of my hands and lowers the weapon. As I turn around, I let his hands go into the air. "Whoa, man! Watcha doing?!"

As I catch his hands again and my eyes meet his, my forehead goes red and my eyes crinkle and my jaw drops. Sensing Rose, I can tell she holds the same expression.

What Xander holds is no weapon.

"For the little lady," he says with a smile as he hands the churro over to Rose.

Rose accepts it awkwardly. I can tell she's starving. She polished off her ice cream in a matter of seconds. She nibbles the crispy part and then takes a bite. Although I know this is not the right place, nor time, ringlets of saliva are practically dripping from my mouth. "Thanks?" she says tentatively.

Xander chuckles. "No problem. It's my pleasure to have the Avatar in my little shop."

Before my mind can even process it, the knife I keep strapped to my forearm is centimetres away from his bare neck. "How did you know." I growl, more of a statement then a question.

"Calm down there, hot-shot!" Xander yelps. "Can't you read the atmosphere here? I'm not a threat, I have no weapon."

"Nathan," Rose says quietly, "let go of him."

My eyes flash. "Not until you answer me!" I say more forcefully, my jaw tight and clenched. "Well? What are you waiting for?!?"

"Her pain wires," he finally says, though a little less laid back. "A metallic arm controls chi that way. The wire I replaced had markings of all the bending types: it was singed for fire, spongy for water, crisper metal for earth, yet bendy for air." He's talking rather fast now, it's almost as if he's realizing the situation. Reading the atmosphere, as he calls it. Boy, he's such a hippie.

"Nathan, let him go," Rose spits.

I freeze, then finally relax. "Fine," I say. "Well then- what do we do with him now?"