For the first few moments they spent in the air, Haruko held her breath. The sensation of flight was new to her, but then again, almost everything she had experienced in the last hour had been new to her. She had been flying blind from the get go.

The city looked more like a spiderweb from this high up, the illumined streets like a net, all the strings converging into one point in center of the city, the downtown district. At least to Haruko, it seemed like the entire world was right there, so small she could fit it in the palm of her hand.

As Koto took them higher into the sky and the air got thinner, she turned to the other people in the saddle. Aazir had lost his hat during the fight, his shoulder-legth hair was blowing in the cool wind as he looked over the edge of the saddle, entranced in the view from above just like she had been. Next to her, Hang didn’t look at the city, she seemed to gaze into the vastness of the sky above as she reclined on the side of the saddle. Either she had expirennced something like this before or she was extremely good at masking her emotion. All of them showed scars from the battle, torn clothes and bruises and bloodstains.

“What now?” Haruko asked. They couldn’t stay adrift in the wind forever.

Koto, who was in the driver’s seat near Cloud’s head, turned around the face her companions. She looked just as disheveled as the rest of them- the wings of her wingsuit had yet to be reattached to her chest and had a long tear across the wing. “I- I don’t know.” Koto stammered. “This was a rash decision- I’m sorry-”

“We can’t go back, they saw our faces, and we aren’t exactly inconspicuous.” Hang said. She wasn’t looking at them- her eyes were closed and her head was tilted towards the sky. The realization dawned on Haruko that she was right- they couldn’t go back, there was no way things could be normal again. She had blatantly attacked law enforcemnt and caused mass property damage, and while she never cared much about being an upstanding citizen or following the arbitrary rules a corrupt police force put in place, this would put a target on her back, it would put one on all of them. Haruko exchanged a glance with Aazir, he seemed to understand it as well as she could.

“Are we gonna get arrested?” Aazir whispered, his voice cracked with anxiety. Koto didn’t respond verbally, but turned to Hang.

“Trust me, you don’t want to go to UDES prisons.” Hang said. “I say we run, get out of the UDES or at least the desert until this whole schitck blows over, in a few years they’ll forget it ever happened.”

“Alright,” Koto nodded. “Where to? The air-”

“Not the air temples.” Hang cut her off. “We very clearly have an airbender with us, they’ll check them all to every extent they can, we can’t risk that. I’ve heard there’s a safe house for criminals down in the Coral Isles, they can help get us to some safe place until it’s ok to comeback. Maybe the Fire Nation, or Republic City. I don’t know, but it’s our best bet.

Haruko tried to remember everything she had heard of about the Coral Isles, an archipelago off the south-eastern coast of the UDES, closeby to both the Southern Water Tribe and the Shanhu reef. She knew about as much about the region as she did anywhere else, but she did know it was far. If Hang was right about the situation blowing over, they’d only be there few years at best, and then they could all return to normalcy. A brief speck in time once one considered the grand scheme of things. Haruko nodded. “Alright.”

Koto nodded. “It’ll be easier for them to find us if we travel on Cloud, I’ll get Tashi to take her back to the temple. We’ll travel by train, I have enough money and rations to last about a week.” She looked Hang dead in the eyes. “This safehouse better be legit.”

“We’re gonna leave home…” Aazir whispered. Haruko moved over to where he was sitting and put her arm around him. “Don’t worry, we’ll be ok.” She whispered, trying and failing to sound reassuring.

It was around midnight when they returned to the shop and landed in the same scrapyard Haruko had cleared out that morning-that event seemed like forever ago despite happening within twelve hour’s time. Tashi was sitting on the steps with Pasha on her shoulders, and seemed excited to see them at first, but changed to worry when shesaw how battle-worn they all were.

“Tashi, I need to go to the Coral Isles, and I can’t tell you why right now.” Koto said as she dismounted Cloud with a small bag in hand. “I need you to take Cloud and go back to Air Temple Island, tell my mom that I’ll be gone for a few months, at most.”

“Oh-ok.” Tashi stammered as she handed Pasha over to Haruko. “Should I tell your mom?”

“You can tell her where we are, but don’t tell anyone else.” She turned to Haruko. “I’m going to get changed, civilian clothes will make me less recognizable. You and Aazir should gather up anything you will need with you.”

Haruko nodded and entered the house.

The house was quiet and dark as Haruko and Aazir entered it, Liling and Quan had gone to sleep a while ago. She didn’t say anything to Aazir as she ran up the stairs as quietly as she could, taking every measure to be both as stealthy and efficient as possible.

Haruko didn’t bother to pack her schoolbooks, the heavy tomes wouldn’t be practical to bring on the run. She packed clothes, work pants and tank tops and a spare jacket for cooler weather, socks and underwear and anything essential. She made sure to pack the treats she brought for Pasha, and the first-aid-kit she kept on her bathroom counter. Haruko hesitated over the photo of her family she kept on her bedside table- the four of them photographed before her mother had died, Aazir barely three years old. She settled on taking it, removing the photograph from its frame and folding it before stuffing it into her satchel bag. Haruko did one last scan of her room before leaving it, unsure when she would come back.

She reunited with Aazir, Koto and Hang outside. Tashi was busy preparing Cloud for yet another departure, and everyone else seemed as on-edge as Haruko did. Aazir had packed a bag like she had, Hang had gathered what belongings she had brought from the shop (which, surprisingly, included a banjo) and Koto had donned an outfit of off-gray pants and a crimson sweater over a yellow button-up. Her arrow tattoos were still visible, but she looked less distinctive without the uniform.

“All packed and ready?” Hang asked as Haruko locked the door behind her.

“I guess so.” Haruko replied. She exchanged a nervous glance with her brother.

“Alright.” Koto put her fist over her hand for emphasis, she spoke in a grave, serious tone. “We’ll head off to the train station, we should be in the Coral Isles in a few day’s time.”

If there was one thing Haruko was grateful for, it was that the train station, and the train itself, were relatively empty at this time of night. They had boarded a southbound train without any trouble, save for a few strange glances. Haruko didn’t mind them, it would take alot to offend her now.

They found seats quickly, two pairs of seats facing each other, each with one seat next to a window. Haruko took the frontwards-facing window seat, Aazir sat next to her and almost instantly fell asleep against her shoulder. Across from her, Hang took the opposite window seat, put her bags infront of her by her legs, and looked out the window. Koto followed but pulled out a book, the title read ‘The Complete Collection of Laghima’s Poetry’. It seemed too boring to strike conversation about, so Haruko looked out the window, following Hang’s example.

It wan’t long before the train started and the train station- then the Jing Zi skyline- started to disappear from view. The landscape became less urban by the second, eventually spreading out into desert scrubland. Haruko barely had time to register what has happening as she left the home she had known for years, running away with strangers to a part of the world she had only seen on the vidset. In the past twelve hours, her world had expanded incredibly and flipped itself upside down, and she couldn’t help but feel a sinking guilt as her home gradually disappeared from view.