[ WP ] Titans attack Ba Sing Se

*Leaves from the vine* 
 
 *Falling so slow* 
 
 *Like fragile, tiny shells* 
 
 *Drifting in the foam* 
 
 *Little soldier boy* 
 
 *Come marching home* 
 
 *Brave soldier boy* 
 
 *Comes marching home* 
 
 The Outer Ring has fallen. Blood fills the sewers, great stones are lodged inside houses, and bodies rot in the streets, half eaten. We have hope because the avatar is on her way. 
 
 The old vets always talked about the great, impenetrable walls of Ba Sing Se would yield to no man, bender or not. `` These wars have made the wall STRONGER, sonny boy! You could punch into it all day and it would probably get bigger!'' They would erupt into laughter, clacking and spilling their mugs of Iroh's Spiked Tea together in unison. 
 
 I still laugh to myself when I remember what veterans of the first siege ages ago would say, rocking in their homemade stone chairs: `` General Iroh got through our walls once, and we kicked the Dragon of the West's butt! If a dragon ca n't get through in six hundred days,'' he grumbled proudly, `` then a few baby faced boulder-targets will have to wait longer!'' And wait they did, watching, steaming their mist, staring at us from below the outer wall. 
 
 He did n't know a thing. None of us knew, how could we? Our scouts had told the city about the first sighting, and of course nobody believed them. Or nobody cared. It seemed like our city had heard and seen it all, platinum men standing a hundred slates high, to spirits who changed color and threw benders like bags of pebbles, to rumors of mind control under Lake Laogai during times of war! Now is n't that something? But these were different. Kuvira had a plan for the Earth Kingdom, as did the Dai Li, but these... These are hunger incarnate. Engines fueled by a need to eat and eat, and keep eating. I can still feel their eyes penetrating me with a hungry lust... 
 
 Some argued we should befriend them, like we did the spirits. Hilarious. I trust a Titan as far as I can throw him, because I've seen the worst. When I first saw one of them, I peered into its steamy face with my spyglass on top of the wall. It was staring. Not at the outer wall protecting our poor and our slaves, not at the great stones towers buried into the walls, but at me. It's eyes were fixed on me like a prize. I felt my stomach wretch and my hands shook with fear as I held the glass. I'll tell you though, I hit that thing square in the nose as a warning shot to stay away! He drooled as he walked backwards, curling his bloodstained toothy smile as he disappeared into the tree line. We killed a few after they started to hunger and snatch travelers up, to drive them back. When you try to kill a few Titans, we realized, a hundred more show up for the feast. 
 
 As the great city stands, we did everything we could to keep these monsters contained. Spirits be damned that bending is n't enough to hurt these, earth is the only tactic that will reach them without us getting too close. Earth bending is n't strong enough, as we learned. It took a group of fourteen benders to enclose one in hard enough rock, just to explode in granite and stone and steam a few moments later. We lost our best earth benders when we sent them out to find refugees, and people are starting to disappear faster these days. 
 
 Our only real defense was our metal benders, what little we had. They were art gliding through the air on their wires, launching invisible razors from their sleeves to pierce the titan's necks and erupt in hot blood. Our four metal bender squadrons were demolished when the outer wall was breached, and the bodies of team three were never found. They probably high tailed it to Serpent's Pass to find safety, haha! That serpent will grant you a cleaner death than these will, I promise you that. 
 
 When merchants and traveling families wound up missing, it was investigated. For a bit. Then we started losing officers and military men. First we blamed the spirits. Spirits are so unpredictable you could throw a rocky disc at nothing one second, and have it hit one of those glowing freaks just by appearing in front of it! But spirits do n't dabble in the arts of flesh... Do they? If so, we must have done something wrong in their eyes. 
 
 When I abandoned my lookout post on the outer wall, I did n't feel regretful. I did n't feel. I could n't. I was being marked by hundreds of huge eyes. I was on duty along the wall with eighteen other men on their posts, but the monsters had to be looking at me. They knew they wanted me and I refused to give them the satisfaction. They had been gathering, meeting on the countryside laying in wait for their daddy Titan, that huge sprinting son of a... 
 
 We all patiently awaited for the return of the avatar, knowing that when she showed up, everything would be right as rocks. I was on lookout for any ridiculous flying bison -- or buffalodog or whatever it is -- shedding all over the countryside, but the musky mist that those things give off damn nearly make me blind. 
 
 There it was. A floating dot in the distance. I wipe my glass with my dusty shirt and hold it upright to my eye. I could see her! The avatar, upon her furry shedding chariot, holding her palms away from her and spouting flames behind to the air, almost a glorious liberating comet. I could see her shock and disgust towards these bloodied monsters, and they looked up to watch her in awe. 
 
 I remember to radio this to command. As I'm yelling to the officer through the microphone, the avatar jumps. In her right hand she flips a glider staff open with finesse, flying towards the monsters as a phoenix would. Behind her, thirteen other air benders soar in their aerodynamic jumpsuits. I hear a roar from the shedding beast as it turns and flies in a different direction from the group. The army quickly descends upon a dirt patch, erupting in dust. They stand staring at the Titans lining our countryside, as the Titans turn their head for their next meal. 
 
 The benders did n't meet us at the wall, which worried me. They did n't know these things like we did. I called to command to send a party out immediately. They needed to be warned. I felt a cold sweat slide way down my forehead, my eye growing dry on the glass. I could see the avatar burst into the air with her glider, passing just over the hungry beasts to study them. Her team waited behind. Maybe she ran off to understand them, before sending her team in. I spotted more Titans stumble out of the woods way behind them, picking up their scent. I could tell the thirteen were intimidated by these beasts, they looked as though they lost all ambition without their leader. They were all watching the avatar, not the woods. My heart sank. 
 
 My strained eyes followed the avatar as she playfully swung her way around the Titans, avoiding their swipes and lunges for her. She noticed the fallen Titans had their necks pierced straight through, and glides up towards the sky as she bends a sharp stone from the ground. In a moment I had lost her and found her again, now speeding down towards a Titan with her rock ready to be released. She flies faster towards the ground, almost dangerously, before she veers off and releases the pointed stone deep into the spine of the creature. It rattles and tried to grab at the piece now stuck in its back, before falling with a thud. It's eyes agape, red slime and half eroded bodies seep out of the steaming creature. Arms, legs, clothes were spread out of this creatures mouth as the avatar stares in horror and unbelief. 
 
 I could tell she became enraged. She picked up boulders, deliberately walking towards more targets, as she shaped the huge stones in the air into huge floating spikes. Launching the spikes into the air like a barrage of arrows, she furiously pierces one titan, then four, then seven more, leaving some pinned into the ground, other titans breaking apart and destroying bones from the unstoppable force. 
 
 There was screaming. Titans had ran towards the new feast of the air benders, two benders immediately picked up and gnawed in half like a blood filled cabbage. The rest flew into the air, barely escaping death, fleeing for life. The avatar looked at her lost friends in horror, as she flipped upside down, her leg in the grasp of a Titan with a long stony spike through its eye. It's face was steaming and slick in blood, smiling over it's small snack. The avatar smirks, clasping her hands against each other, palms facing the beast, as an unending cone of flame bursts against its upper breast and skull. Roaring, the giant, veiny hand around the avatars leg squeezes hard. I could hear her screaming from my tower in the middle ring, I swear it. The flames cease. Dark smoke was pouring from the titans face, revealing a half skull under black, searing flesh. 
 
 The air benders seemed too far to help while escaping their killers, and desperately flew towards the captive avatar to get her to safety. Her body was limp as the searing skull opened its jaw and lifted its snack above its head. Before it released its veiny, pale fingers, the titan turned its charred skull and eyes towards mine, and smiled.
