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Hysteria

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[POV: Asami]

I found myself sitting in the audience, with no recollection of how I had gotten there or why. I closed my eyes and tried to remember what had just happened. My mind could only summon up the faint memory of having been lead through a red corridor by an Equalist calling me his sister. I had a knot in my stomach, like I knew that I had been wronged. Like I knew that a crime had been committed against me, yet I could not even understand what it was. There was only one certainty, inexplainable, illogical, terrifying: I wanted to be there.

I stood up when the Equalists rose to greet their leader. They had filled the theater, swarmed the streets around it. Amidst the applause, my eyes searched for him. A voice echoed through the venue: "Please welcome your leader, your saviour..."

The curtain was pulled and the mindless euphoria of the crowd began ringing in my ears.

"Amon."

It was a like a virus, it was airborne, it was contagious. I instantly felt it in me when I saw Amon standing there in the middle, his body perfectly still and his arms behind his back. He seemed otherworldly; a proud, mystic figure that had descended into the mortal realm. I could not understand why I felt so elated by the sight of him. Right then I was no different from his followers, who were slowly drifting into hysteria.

He spoke.

"Our cause, that which we are fighting for, is truth itself. Yet this city has spat us in the face. It has shown us contempt for our courage and our will. It has compared us to criminals for daring to defend ourselves against the tyranny of benders. The truth has been trampled, beaten, ostracized. The truth has been buried like a shameful corpse, left to rot under the dirt of denial. But truth is a light that always shines brighter than the lies, and even the most impure of our enemies cannot avoid it forever. There is no escape from truth. It waits so patiently to be recognized, as patiently as we wait for our victory."
Amon held up his arm, fingers stretched out towards the sky. The lighting underneath him cast shadows that made him seem like he was standing high, high above us.
"My brothers and sisters, tonight we show this city how brightly truth really shines. Tonight we show this city its future."
He closed his hand into a fist and lifted the other arm up as well. His movements were sudden and rigid, like the ticking of a clock. And they seemed to multiply as the speech progressed.
"The council of this city, as well as the Avatar, will not hear our grieviances. They believe that we speak only for ourselves. That we are motived solely by vengeance and jealousy. Can you hear what I say? They think that we are jealous of benders, when all we ask for is equality."
The crowd gave a roar of anger. It grew restless.
"Why should we be jealous of their impurity? Of their sickness? The impertinence, the ignorance of their assumptions. They explain everything by providing primitive explanations for questions whose complexity they cannot even fathom. They do not see that we are fighting not only for ourselves, but for them as well. It is the will of spirits. This world must be equalized. This world must be purified. But if we are wrong and our beautiful ideals do not apply to non-benders, then let our enemies struggle to explain with lies what you are about to witness."
Amon pointed to the side of the stage.
"Come here, bender."

A long-haired man walked over to Amon and stood beside him. Insults and curses arose from the crowd.

"Tell me, Cheng, what has fire bending brought to your life?"
"It... It has brought me nothing but disgrace and violence. I have used it only to persecute and intimidate... I have used it to kill."
"Who have you killed?"
"My family, my...my own blood. Bending has made a monster of me. It has given me an insatiable thirst for power. It has made me mad."
"And what have you come to ask of me today, bender?"
The bender sank to his knees before Amon and bowed his head.
"Free me from this sickness, my leader."
There was a collective gasp. Such words, uttered by a bender. My leader.
"Only you can release me. Only you can take away my impurity. Bending is my impurity. I know it now. And I beg of you to equalize me," Cheng continued.
"The light of truth, shining," Amon declared.
The entire crowd stirred, ready to witness the miracle.
"Bend, Cheng. Show them the ugliness of your disease, so that none may question its existence."
"My master, forgive me," Cheng replied.
He then sent a column of flames into the air from his mouth.

I felt the heat of the fire on my face. It was full of spite and ferocity, as if the bending itself objected to being removed. "The evil in him is such, that it even flows out of his throat," Amon said, placing himself behind Cheng. Then, he grabbed the back of his neck with his left hand, put his right thumb on his forehead and promptly rid him of his bending.

The crowd screamed with joy. A long, high-pitched note that never seemed to end.

Cheng fell unconscious and lay there at his leader's feet, his face pressed against the wooden floor of the stage. Further away on the left, I saw Amon's Lieutenant, sobbing, sobbing like the exalted fanatic that we was. It all felt so unreal, like the theater was just presenting another play. But it was not fiction. It was reality.

My eyes were soon drawn back to Amon, who had stretched out both his arms into the air. I suddenly longed to go to him; I felt the absurd need to feel his hand on my neck again.
"Benders of Republic City, benders of the world, it is time for you to wake up from your sleep. It is time for you to open your eyes and to follow Cheng's example. Let the light of truth shine upon you. Accept me as your liberator as I have accepted the spirits as my masters. Your bending has brought only pain and war to this world, and you must let go of this evil or suffer the consequences of your selfishness."

The Lieutenant had pulled himself together and was now escorting Cheng away while Amon took in the applause.
"Kill him!" a man in the crowd suddenly cried. "Kill the bender!"
Amon seemed briefly disturbed. He lowered his arms and urged the Lieutenant to hurry. Then, he left without adding a single word and the curtain fell behind him. The cheering continued until long after the rally had ended.

I felt sickened by what I'd seen. What Amon had done to his followers. He could spread his lies and his hatred into the hearts of others so efficiently, that there seemed to be no limit to his influence. He even possessed the power of making benders hate themselves. He revolted me. He really was a monster, and he disgusted me.

But why was it, then, that I felt so empty once he was gone?





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pheleon's avatar
The speech! :wow: Wouldn't it have been cool if you were able to place that donation thing and have Steve Blum voice it out? ;)

Btw, I'm definitely worried for Asami... she just never gets a break. Poor pretty lady.