The journey had not taken long, but upon arriving on the island Tadashi realised why his father had chosen such a location. It was completely remote, a small island that one could walk from end to end within an hour, he doubted it even appeared on any maps of the Fire Nation. No settlement, no evictions, nothing. This however did mean that everything built upon it would be new. Fortunately for Tadashi and those that would be living on the island the small mass of land was close to Shu Jing, home of the renowned Master Piando, a man Tadashi had thought of contacted soon after settling into his new home.
Stepping off the boat onto the stone docks, Tadashi quickly realised that there were Earthbenders present on the island, wearing the green and red clothes that symbolised colony uniforms. Before he could even ask someone why they were here Naoko had answered his thoughts.
"Apparently the Fire Lord thought it'd be wise to conscript Earthbenders, these…..colonists were raised to believe that the Fire Nation is the only nation worth being loyal to and that their Earthbending was nothing but a tool to further the Fire Lords goals."
"In other words they won't just suddenly attack me?" Tadashi asked.
"I doubt it, they're as loyal as your average soldier, probably even came here to avoid…..um, discriminative captains."
"I see," Tadashi spoke, grimacing slightly.
As the pair made their way to a set of very large tents Tadashi tried to greet anyone that looked towards him. He was relieved to see that most would give a curt nod, some even doing a small salute as they recognised the royal clothing that he still wore. Before the two could reach the large tents a young man stepped out in front of them, doing a quick bow before looking at Tadashi with displeasure.
"Greetings….um, comm-"
"You can simply call me Tadashi," the boy interrupted, "In the presence of others perhaps Director will work."
Surprised by the quick response the man nodded before continuing.
"Yes sir, thank you. My name is Hideki and I've been assigned as your assistant and operations manager."
Tadashi nodded to indicate he approved of the man's presence. Truth be told he was relieved to have someone else that he could ask for help. He feared that the sudden responsibility that he had been given was too much for someone of his age to handle. But pushing all the negative thoughts aside he put out his hand, surprising the young man in front of him who didn't expect the Prince to act so indifferently.
"I've also been assigned as the official Fire Nation correspondent, relaying information back to the Fire Nation and especially our Fire Lord as a personal messenger."
Tadashi inwardly sighed as he heard that, he was grateful that there would be less chances to face his father again but knew it also meant less chances of seeing Azula.
"That's great," Tadashi said, "I look forward to working with you."
"As do I, Pri- Director." The man bowed, grimacing slightly at his mistake.
Before anyone could move Tadashi glanced towards Naoko and remembered she had been there the whole time shuffling awkwardly in place.
"Ahh, before I forget," Tadashi said, giving Naoko an apologetic look, "This is Naoko."
The girl gave a curt nod, receiving the same gesture from Hideki.
"She'll be my personal assistant, however her rank will sit around the same level as you." He stated flatly, hoping his intentions were understood by the older male.
"I will?" Naoko spoke before blushing slightly.
Hideki also seemed shocked by the statement but quickly understood the meaning behind those words, he nodded to show his approval and smiled slightly, his image of the young prince improving by the second.
"Of course Director," he simply said, "Allow me to give you a quick tour of what we've done in just a few days."
As they walked inside the large tent reminiscent of the big tops of travelling circuses, Tadashi glanced at everyone running about. The majority of those inside were quite young, moving about with boxes of scrolls, maps, tables and chairs. There were a few armed sentries about the place, but they too seemed younger than those Tadashi was used to seeing in the palace. Hideki, noticing the expression that Tadashi and Naoko had looking around stopped in front of a large table in the centre of the room.
"I'm sure you're wondering why everyone here is so young?" he asked, getting the young princes attention.
"You're quite the perceptive one," Tadashi nodded.
"Thank you, well to start off the reason why the Fire Lord chose me was because I was due for a promotion. Believe it or not I've been in the military for 10 years, joined when I was merely 14. I was quickly promoted to Captain within the Navy, spent 5 years on the sea until my ship was one day ambushed and destroyed by a Water Tribe convoy. Luckily we were near earth kingdom territory and I led the survivors into land, we spent the next few weeks chased by those Water Tribe soldiers, running into squads of Earth Kingdom troops before reuniting with the army."
Hideki looked up as he reminisced about the past.
"For my actions I was declared a hero, but instead of returning to the navy the top brass were more interested in my abilities on land and I was quickly transferred to the army corps. After half a year of training I was placed into a squad on the western territories of the Earth Kingdom and went up the ranks till Captain again. I was due for another promotion when you were assigned by the Fire Lord to this division. As you know the Fire Lord has the final say on all promotions and he suggested that my experience of both Navy and Army affairs would be essential for this new division."
Tadashi was surprised. It was merely a week since the day had occurred and so much had happened. It was almost terrifying how quickly the Fire Nation could get something done if it meant winning the war sooner.
"As to why all the people here are quite young, well we've been assigned mainly new recruits but also the members of my squad followed me here, which is quite lucky if you ask me."
Tadashi again nodded, knowing that having experienced men would mean the others would be trained quickly and that he didn't need to wait too long before he could start issuing out missions, whatever they may be. Hideki went on to explain that the base would be built with several sections in mind, a detention area for prisoners, the quarters for residents of the island and the main building of operations that included mission central and training facilities. Because there were Earthbenders present and one of the noble families generously donated a huge amount of iron the buildings would be completed in a short amount of time. An advantage to having Earthbenders also meant that redecorating wouldn't be a major issue.
The trio walked outside to the temporary training ground were a batch of recruits were currently going through a basic set of katas. Hideki had intended on explaining how the troops would be initially split but before he knew it Tadashi was walking over to the group with a mischievous look in his eyes.
One of the men, a big and bulky guy for his age turned around and grimaced as he saw the boy, looking him up and down as if he'd insulted his family.
"What's a pipsqueak like you doing here?"
"Me? Oh, I was just watching," Tadashi replied.
"Well stay too close and you'll get hurt," the guy grunted.
"That's not a problem, I'd only get hurt if you were doing it right." Tadashi taunted.
The man went red as the others nearby laughed, his face steaming as he rose his hand to launch a fireball in Tadashi's direction. The boy however did not move, simply watching with a small smile as his opponent got into a stance.
"Hey, isn't that…." One of the female recruits started saying.
"What's he doing?" Someone else said.
Hideki wanted to intervene immediately but Naoko stopped him, understanding Tadashi's intentions. The young prince did intend on antagonising the man, as he had watched him practice he saw great power come from him but all his moves were off slightly or lacked any sense of control. It didn't help that the recruit was quick to get angry, even as he launched his fireball at Tadashi the boy merely had to lean to the side to dodge the blast. The two then started circling each other, the recruit throwing punches every now and then. What he failed to notice was the trail of smoke that Tadashi was creating behind his back, changing the temperature of the heat in the air to create a current for the smoke to stay on. The others who were watching stepped away, wary of such a strange tactic.
Luckily for them, Tadashi was only attacking the angry recruit in front of him.
With a quick gesture from his left hand, Tadashi ignited the smoke directly behind the man and used the momentum from the blast to dance around the stumbling recruit and send a round-kick into the recruit's side. He swore, throwing fire at his sides in an attempt to get rid of the smoke but scowled as it snapped his skin when it combusted.
"You lack control," Tadashi spoke, "Something I'll have to drill into you."
"Who are you to say such a thing?" the recruit growled, throwing another punch.
"That's one of the Princes of the Fire Nation you idiot," the female recruit from earlier shouted.
"Actually its Director now," Hideki corrected.
The man facing Tadashi narrowed his eyes as he suddenly spotted the royal items of clothing that Tadashi still wore. In a second he started quivering. The recruits had been told that a royal would be leading this division but no one had mentioned it would be a young boy, barely into his teen years.
"I'm sorry," he instantly bowed, "I didn't know,"
Instead of reprimanding the recruit for his ignorance Tadashi looked genuinely disappointed at the older male.
"Stand up, I didn't ask you to beg for forgiveness. This is a lesson and today I'll be your teacher. Form up!" he suddenly shouted, surprising the recruits who were looking wearily.
The recruits were hesitant at first but quickly lined up, waiting for further instructions.
"Those who were watching, what was noticeable about my fighting style?" he asked looking all who stood in their eyes.
For a few moments no one spoke, then someone stepped forwards. It was the girl who had spoken out before who was starting to make a good impression on Tadashi.
"Who are you?" he asked the female recruit.
"Private Aki, Director." She saluted.
"Well met Private Aki, now tell me what you noticed." Tadashi tried to be as neutral as possible, but couldn't help smirking at the person he decided would be promoted to senior officer first.
"Yes….sir, well you were in control of the fight the whole time using the smoke to lay a trap before springing it."
"That's right, now what did our recruit do wrong here?" Tadashi asked before wirily adding, "apart from challenging his superior?"
"Well private Yaki was hot tempered and lost his nerve as soon as his strategy didn't work."
"Very good, that's precisely what happened," Tadashi smiled, motioning for Aki to fall back into line.
"Thank you Director," she nodded curtly before falling back into formation with a straight face.
"There's no doubt that the lot of you in front of me possess some skill, otherwise you wouldn't be here. Unlike your instructors and generals I intend on doing things differently, you will be learning skills outside the standard Fire Nation training regime, including how to utilise smoke in your attacks, to see in the dead of the night without fire and more."
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As Tadashi went on, Hideki nodded in approval, surprised by how quickly the young boy was taking to the role. As a firebender himself he was interested in the techniques he spoke of, especially as he started outlining how they would be used for surveillance, sabotage and assassinations.
"He's rather inspiring for such a young kid," Hideki murmured to Naoko who smiled softly.
"He's been like this since the day I met him, I think he just enjoys having people listen to him."
"I see," Hideki said, "Well it doesn't hurt that the bo-, I mean Director has ingenious ideas to share,"
Naoko chuckled quietly as she nodded in agreement, for her this island was a sign from the spirits that she wasn't condemned to the life of a normal servant. She had already been lucky enough to serve one of the nicer members of the royal family but to also be positioned away from the Fire Lord and his advisors was beyond normal luck.
"Thing's will only get better," she said, her eyes misting slightly.
Only three weeks after his initial arrival in the island and two of the three buildings were finished. Tadashi had to commend the Earthbenders for their ability to speed up construction, however he had quickly learnt that they weren't as skilled as they seemed. Hideki had taught him that the colonists on the island had grown up under the Fire Nation banner and had learnt from 'acquired' Earth Kingdom scrolls, most having been bought from Pirates or taken during the aftermath of raids on villages. Tadashi wasn't sure whether he should feel bad about that but it did help alleviate the feeling that they would suddenly betray him.
But it didn't change the fact that Tadashi was still impressed with what he saw before him.
The entire complex was huge. The main building was built into the shape of a cylinder, split into nine disks; with three floors above ground and six below. The ground floor was the biggest of them all, with space for a training area, offices and facilities to accommodate temporary and semi-permanent guests. The top floor featured several guard rooms built at equal intervals, the number of rooms decidedly built meant that there were no blind spots around the compound. The first floor was entirely office space, where meetings would take place and documents in constant use were stored, there was also a special balcony built to accommodate messenger birds. The floors underneath were mainly used for storage, with a bunker built into the very lowest floor. An area was sectioned off for prisoners, with interrogation rooms placed in appropriate places.
Before the prison could be completed many officials had visited the island, most likely because of the Fire Lords orders, forced to acknowledge Tadashi as a high ranking member of their nation. Of course they had all initially come with that feeling, hating the boy for rising to such heights due to his birth but almost all left the island stunned. Mindful of the Earthbenders, the generals and admirals that visited were impressed with the way that the new recruits and even older veterans were training as a well-knit unit.
Tadashi had made good with the promise he made to himself and promoted Private Aki to a captain, leading the unit of newer recruits. Hideki had been allowed to retain leadership of his old team, even with all the new responsibilities and work he had been given. The first thing Tadashi had taught everyone was how to use smoke to fill a room and ignite it without anyone noticing, proving to be an efficient assassination technique. Due to easy application of smoke, everyone was able to pick it up easily and moral quickly heightened as they added smoke into their strategies. Using heat to see in the dark was much harder, most recruits and veterans weren't able to do it successfully, some felt sick afterwards and one had expended so much of their chi that they couldn't move for a whole day. In fact out of all those who had tried to learn the technique only Captain Aki and Yaki, who had become her deputy, were able to use it without any serious side-effects.
Of course they couldn't simply just train by fighting, all members of the intelligence group were trained to read maps, communicate with steganography and manage intelligence reports with ease. Throughout the time Tadashi had been on the island everyone, Naoko included, had caught up with Fire Nation affairs, and were knowledgeable on all the members of the war councils, important ministers and the ones that were profiting the most from the war. This lead the group to their first major discovery.
Gun Atsui, the Fire Nation's manufacture of weapons had been reportedly dealing with the Earth Kingdom. Of course that information alone was nothing to be wary of, part of the Fire Lord's plan was that Gun would sell weapons that would break with ease to the other nations in disguise. However when looking at battle reports for skirmishes with the Western Earth Kingdom forces one would then start to see that Gun's dealing with the Earth Kingdom were consistently two days before that battle would happen and the Fire Nation would always be on the losing side of those battles, forced to retreat, give up land and vital resources. Tadashi had decided that they would schedule another battle in that region, wait and send a small team to investigate what Gun Atsui would do and act based on that. Tadashi had hoped for good results but never expected the plan to be such a great success. Captain Aki had come back with Gun in custody as well as a Colonel who had been lining his pockets at the expense of the men under his command.
Both men were questioned extensively and sent back to the Fire Nation, Hideki personally seeing to their imprisonment with a report for the Fire Lord as well. It seemed that the top brass who were stationed in the Fire Nation were pleased by the report, word was already starting to spread about an internal investigation into the Fire Nation armies, with extreme punishment lined for any traitorous actions. The next few months were almost systematic, the reports that seemed too perfect were scrutinised, and members of the intelligence group were placed in specific locations, watching those that lead their men into battle with persistence. Whenever enough evidence was collected to pin the treasonous crimes on the Fire Nations traitors, Aki with her team were sent out to collect them and Hideki would see that all information was collected and the offenders were punished properly.
Of course the constant refinement of the army had more positive actions then negative. The Fire Nation would claim that those traitors were either Hypnotised or born with no honour, no word was said about the people who found these traitors. All that was known was that no one could hide from this group that the top brass seemed proud of. Even Fire Lord Ozai had been kept contempt for the year these raid had been going on, news of Tadashi's brilliance reaching the Fire Lord whenever Hideki came with his reports. The news would eventually reach Azula who had been training non-stop ever since her elder brothers left, by now her blue-fire was more brutal than one could imagine, her persistence for perfection meant that no one dared speak words against her.
Through all the cold hearted viciousness that made up Azula one would think that this was her only trait, the only feeling going through her mind.
But deep down where her real feelings were, she was getting more anxious than ever. The girl had no one to talk to anymore. Mai had been sent away and Ty Lee's family had moved outside of the capital. Ozai was too busy to ever greet her daughter properly, only ever briefly praising her for her work and moving on with the work he had set out for himself. No news came from Zuko, not that she cared about him, but it still niggled at her mind. The only peace she had came from the reports Hideki brought about Tadashi. She allowed the news to motivate her, but it really did make her happy to hear that he was bringing honour to his name and helping out in the war more than Zuko was. Sometimes she'd even go as far as saying he's done more than their Uncle Iroh in the short time he had left.
But even that wasn't enough to drive away the constant feeling of loneliness and anxiousness building up in her mind. A year away from anyone her age had done more damage than anyone realised. If it wasn't for her consistently busy schedule she guessed that she would have snapped already. Neither the servants, her tutors nor even her father seemed to notice, but she knew her older brother would notice, at least the useful one would.
That's when a special report came in some time in the evening.
Before then Tadashi had merely lead his team from home base, anticipating his opponent who wasn't even aware of any threat and dealing with traitors using someone else. It wasn't a bad accomplishment but nothing compared to what he had just done. As Azula read the report she grinned with glee as she went through every detail again and again.
Tadashi had personally lead a team and taken out the leader of a town near Gaipan, allowing the army to convert the town into a support base. What made this so special was that the town had been driven of its civilian population and fully taken over by the Earth Kingdom army. A major general had been there at the time that Tadashi and his team attacked and from what this report said Tadashi had personally taken out the general before setting the whole compound alight. Uncharacteristic for the female firebender she giggled manically as she read how the Earth Kingdom General died.
"Good for you brother, I'll be there soon too…" she murmured, exhaustion setting in as she slipped into bed, "I'll conquer something as well, like an entire city!"
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"I can't believe it's been two years since you left," Naoko spoke, sipping her tea slowly.
"Yes, it's been quite a while," Tadashi agreed.
The two were sitting in one of the empty rooms back on their island, enjoying the rare free time they had between missions. During that time Tadashi had matured greatly, his body toughened by training, his mind by experience and the scars he bore were lessons he'd never forget. The most important thing though was that through hard work and many successful missions the bond between him and the members of the Intelligence unit had exponentially strengthened, you'd be hard pressed to find more loyal Fire Nation citizens.
"Where's the next mission again?" Tadashi asked.
"You had decided to take out King Bumi of Omashu,"
"Ahh," Tadashi murmured, "This will certainly be a challenge, that man is likely to be stronger than any other Earth Kingdom soldier we've faced, not to mention Omashu is built like a fortress."
Before Naoko could agree someone ran into the room, it was Yaki.
"Director, we have an urgent communique from our agent in the southern Earth Kingdom." He passed the scroll to Tadashi and stood back, waiting for orders.
No one spoke as Tadashi read the scroll. His eyes going through the text once, twice and then a third time.
"Sir?" Naoko questioned worriedly.
Expecting a fearful look from the young boy Naoko was surprised when he started laughing. It wasn't a happy laugh either, one that seemed darker than usual, reminding her of the one time she had heard Fire Lord Ozai laugh and the way Azula would often belittle the servants.
"I can't believe it!" Tadashi said, standing up, "He's alive, the Avatar is alive!"
Both Naoko and Yaki stiffened, they knew what this meant for the Fire Nation. The presence of the Avatar could push things back into the Earth Kingdom's favour. If this person was able to rally the remnants of the Southern Water Tribe and convince the Northern Water Tribe to enter the war than the Fire Nation would be at a severe disadvantage.
"Your orders.....Director?" Naoko asked hesitantly.
"Forget Omashu, we're going straight for the top! Have Hideki brought to me, we're restructuring Intelligence to put all resources into the Avatar, we're already behind by at least 2 days."
Naoko quickly got up and left the room, followed by Yaki who had never seen the Director so animated before. Tadashi could only stare outside with glee, he really was excited about this sudden turn of events.
"This will be interesting!"