The Enigma -Book 0-

First Part - The Lone Spirit, The Lonely Forest, The Lone Girl

"Quick!"

Yuni tramples all the leaves and vines on the ground in front of him as she moves her legs with lot of tenacity. Rei following behind her with the same thought of getting there as quick as they can.

"Hey, I am the one who heard it first, though"

Rei lower his eyebrows. Why I am the one behind even though it was me who notice the sound? He thinks he should be leading the run.

"Does it matter? We have to hurry."

He knows that. Rei. After all it was him who heard the sounds. The sounds of the rough movement of people. The sounds resembling of someone fighting. And the most distinct sound he heard were the sound of rock beings thrown and smashed. The sound of the earth moving. Soon as he heard that, he assumed there was an earthbending happening somewhere.

If this was the Republic he would have just ignored it. After all, the city is full of bender. One fight or two could happen there. In fact, it happened one day when he lived there. Thankfully, there were authorities who sorted it out.

But this is a forest at the outskirt of the Fire Nation Capital. Any fight would be uncommon here. Not inside a forest where almost nobody goes. At least nobody but him, Rei think.

He goes to this forest almost every day. He spends his afternoon leisure (napping) here where no one from the capital would bother him.

This day he thought he could nap safe and sound like he always do, but the sounds was bugging him and he couldn't rest. Especially when Yuni came found him and bicker him to investigate on the sounds.

Rei don't know why Yuni always successful on bothering him. As if there are no places safe from her, he thinks. He is grateful that he has a good friend like Yuni; a native firebender girl who's the same age as him. But sometimes he thinks for just a little that she is kind of a nuisance. Because she always follow him around. That's why he thought of making this forest his sanctuary. But Rei didn't see it coming, when Yuni tailed on his shadow and found him on his secret haven.

*****

"It's close."

Yuni move her feet faster leaving more distances in front of Rei. Her long socks cover her feet up to her knees so that it protects her from the low grass graze. Her short pant makes her slender legs run easier. And her red upper looks like it was made specifically for her. It's not thick enough to prevent her from moving easily. But it's not also thin enough to make her vulnerable to the coldness of the Fire Nation' high altitudes.

In a sudden an object flying between them from the east to the west, pass right in front of Rei's eyes.

"What was that?!" Rei stops his feet and look to his left side. He sees the flying object that passed his eyes before. The object shaped of 4-pointed diamond. It glows a transparent light blue color.

"Is that a ... spirit?"

Seeing his distances are getting more farther from the running Yuni, he shouts to her with his loudest voice "Yuni. You go ahead. But wait for me there! Don't do anything yet until I come!"

From the north, Yuni look back for an instant at Rei without stopping or slowing down. As he head west, Rei sees Yuni keep running to the north.

Rei now are not following his friend anymore, but a foreign object flying to the west with a considerable speed. The object swing left and right, indifferently, avoiding hitting the numerous trees that stands on its way. Rei does the same thing, only he was on the ground, running. It's almost as if he is chasing a kite.