The Gaang flies through the air on Appa's back. Jake Sully is out ahead of them guiding on the back of his banshee. He's leading them to a secret location hopefully out of the range of their enemies. Katara can tell Sokka is in one of his moods so she tries to console him. 

"Hey Sokka, I know you're still shook up about Suki. It's really devastating for the rest of us too." Katara said to her brother. 

"I just can't believe she would do this to us. I mean one minute she's on our side and the next she's trying to kill us. It doesn't make any sense." Sokka frustratingly pines. 

"Yeah, people just don't change their minds like that so suddenly." Said Katara. Sokka absorbs what his sister said and an epiphany washes over him.

"Change their minds. That might be it! What if Long Feng is here on Pandora and he captured Suki. He could have brainwashed her like he did with Jet." Sokka excitedly spits out his idea. Others in the group can't help but hear him and take notice. 

"Yeah that makes sense, he could have hypnotized her and made her fight against us." Said Katara. 

"So to get her back we just have to get her and undo Long Feng's mind control." Said Sokka. brainstorming.

"But how do we do that? We weren't able to break Jet free back home." Said Katara.

"Oh yeah that's right." Said Sokka as the memories come rushing back to him. When Jet was put under Long Feng's mind control the only way he broke free was losing his life. As this realization washes over Sokka he can only pray that he and his friends will find a solution to this unfathomable dilemma. Jake signals for his friends to land and the group descends to the ground. They dismount their respective rides and start scouting. The Gaang wonders why Jake took them here. 

"So what's this place all about Jake?" Aang asked.

"This is the base of operations for our human allies. You see when our war ended some of the sky people stayed behind to live in peace. Groups of scientists who love studying pandora. Trusted friends. Now that the new war has broken out we'll have to make sure these guys are safe. Come on I'll show you around." Jake explained. 

The Gaang approaches the base Jake told them about. It looks just as alien as anything the Na'Vi have shown them but in a completely different direction. It's highly advanced technology instead of highly advanced nature. Steel pod like buildings that must endure the elements. The buildings seem old and weathered. Like they've been their many years without update or innovation. The gaang do see a familiar sight. Humans walk the grounds of this campus. They are friendly faces that aren't giant and blue. The gaang also notice that these people wear plastic see through masks on their faces, the masks have a tube that attaches to a pack on their waist. They wonder what the masks are for.

"Hey Norm there you are!" Jake exclaims as he sees his friend Norm Spellman a scientist who he worked with on his first days on Pandora and fought with him in his war to free Pandora. Another blue Na'Vi but not dressed anything like a Na'Vi. 

"Hey Jake you finally stopped by for a visit." Norm said in a voice that sounded human and not Na'Vi. The two blue men shake hands and greet each other.

"I wish it was under better circumstances. Have the benders given you any trouble?" Jake asked his friend.

"No, we've done a good job of hiding. Who did you bring with you?" Norm asked.

"Benders that have agreed to help us. This is their leader Aang." Jake introduces the air bender.

"Hello I'm the avatar." Said Aang

"Oh and not like an Avatar like us. Avatar means something different to them." Jake subtlety tells Norm. 

"He's a kid." Norm said to Jake looking exasperated.

"Don't let that fool you these guys are bad asses. Lets take 'em inside and show 'em the battle maps." Said Jake.

"Fine, I'll meet you inside." Said Norm as he goes off.

"Follow me I'll show you inside." Said Jake as he leads the gaang to the airlock. To enter their facility they have to go through this airlock first. 

"Everybody squeeze in. It might be a tight fit." Jake said as they all squeeze together in this small room. Jake closes the door behind him as the gaang gets very uncomfortable in the close quarters. When the door seals oxygen is poured in and the room pressurizes. Finally a light turns green and the door on the other side of the room opens. The group goes in and enters the facility. 

"Here we are. Home sweet home for all the humans on pandora." Jake said as the group enters the facility. The place is filled with people in lab coats and scientific contraptions that the gaang can't recognize. Jake grabs a plastic mask connected to a canister from off the wall. He presses a button and takes a toke of air from out of the canister. 

"This place is unlike anything we've ever seen." Aang said to Jake.

"Yeah, what's the deal with the air and the masks?" Sokka asked. 

"People from my world can't breathe pandoras air. I can breathe their air but only for like forty minutes and then I'd choke up. Apparently, people from your world don't have any trouble breathing any kind of air." Said Jake.

"Air is kind of my specialty." Said Aang.

"Wait, did you know we could breathe in here before you airlocked us inside?" Katara asked Jake.

"I kind of took a bit of a gamble." Jake said with an embarrassed shrug. Just then they all hear a machine whirring and hissing in the grand spectacle of powering down. It's the sound of Norm getting out of his avatar piloting pod. The pod opens up and then a man jumps out to greet Jake and his new guests. 

"Hey Jake, so are these guys up to speed on everything?" Norm asked as he approached the group. The gaang are shocked by this man's appearance. 

"Okay what's the deal? You were blue a few minutes ago." Said Katara as she is flabbergasted along with the rest of the group. 

"Okay I guess he didn't tell you too much." Said Norm.

"I didn't want to overwhelm them." Said Jake.

"So out there you saw my avatar body. This is my real body." Said Norm as he gestures to himself. "I use this machine right here to transfer my consciousness into my big blue avatar body." He tells his guests as he shows them the machine. "I go in the tube and I wake up all blue and giant. Does anybody have any questions?" He asked his guests. The Gaangs collective mouths drop open and all their hands raise as if they're in a classroom and want to be called on to ask their questions. 

"Dude, explaining all of it to them would take days. We need to get down to business." Jake said butting in. 

"Good point let's get on with it." Said Norm as he guides the Gaang away from the avatar pods and into their main lobby. Most of the gaang moves on but Sokka can't help but think about the avatar program. 

Now the entire group goes into the main lobby. A wide-open room with computers and scientists galore. Norm pulls up the holographic map and the Gaang watches on in awe at something people like Norm take for granted. 

"Okay, since the benders have us out gunned, we're going to have to be very precise and strategic as to how we use the benders we have." Said Norm.

"So we have some specialized missions that utilize you all to your full potential and cause the most damage to the united bending forces." Said Jake as he uses his hands to zoom around on the holographic map. He settles on a hologram of the drill site that the team recently dismantled. 

"You're already familiar with this drilling site. We did a good job of taking that out." Said Jake.

"Yeah, that was fun." Said Toph.

"Anyway, the next couple of missions are going to be a lot tougher." Said Jake as he zips across the holographic map. "We have to reinforce our allies in the western sea. The Metkayina clan are having trouble with united bending ships. They fight a naval battle. Normally those tribes command the waters but the benders are getting the best of them." Said Jake.

"Hold on, did you say that there's a tribe that controls the water? Like a kind of water tribe?" Katara asked Jake with a flair of excitement. 

"I guess that's a way of describing them, yes." Said Jake.

"Well Sokka and I can help them out. I think we'll fit right in with this water tribe." She said confidently. 

"That sounds like the perfect match. So, while they're doing that the rest of us will have to travel south." Said Jake as his swipes the holographic map to a new location. "This right here is the tonrato region. The land of volcanoes and home to the ash people. We know very little about these people. They like to border themselves off from other Na'Vi tribes. All we know is that they're fierce warriors and they don't like outsiders." Jake said. 

"If they don't like outsiders then what can we do for them?" Aang asked. 

"For this mission we're going to have to be very diplomatic. The ash people can be a great ally if we recruit them to our side, or they could be an enemy if they decide to work with the benders. We'll be meeting with their chieftain Yrral to offer mutual aid." Said Jake.

"This will be easy. Diplomacy is what the Avatar does." Said Aang.

"A tribe of fierce warriors who like fire. That sounds like we're back in the fire nation prince Zuko." Iroh said to his nephew. 

"If they're anything like the fire nation then this is going to be difficult." Zuko said.

"Oh come on Zuko. We can talk to these guys." Said Aang.

"With them on our side this fight will be a whole lot easier. But without them it'll be pretty tough." Said Jake.

"So that sounds like a plan. Katara and Sokka will go to the water tribe and the rest of us will go to the ash people." Said Aang. With that, their strategy meeting is over. The holographic map powers down and the crew goes off to find ways of putting their strategy into action. 

"Wow there's just so many cool things to look at here." Said Katara remarking on all the technology that seems futuristic to her. "You're just working on so many interesting things. Like this one what is this thing that you're working on?" She asked pointing to a small hologram of a celestial object hurtling through space. She picked it at random out of the dozens of other holograms. 

"Oh, it's just a comet we're tracking. It's actually fascinating, it should pass by Pandora in about a month. It'll be close enough to see in the sky. The guys around here want to get a better look at it. It's unlike anything they've ever seen before." Norm said. Aang looks closer at the hologram. 

"That's not a normal comet. That's Sozins comet." Aang said with dire seriousness. He's seen it in visions. The rest of the gaang are shocked when they hear it.

"It couldn't possibly be Sozins comet. It's astronomically impossible." Said Zuko.

"It is, I can tell." Said Aang.

"Okay what the heck is Sozins comet and why is everyone afraid of it?" Jake asked the group.

"On our world Sozins comet would pass over the heavens once a century. It would give us fire benders immense power. Oceans of fire flowing from your fingertips as easy as breathing. We named it Sozins comet after the late fire lord Sozin who used the power of the comet to wipe out an entire civilization in a single day." Iroh told Jake and Norm.

"That can't be true. How can all of that happen because of a comet that doesn't even enter the atmosphere?" Said Norm trying to comprehend the horrendous story he just heard. 

"It's true. All of it. If that comet comes here then Ozai will soon find out and it will be the end of everything." Said Iroh Solemnly. 

"Well I guess we have a month to stop him then." Said Jake as the mood in the room turns dire. They all know that they have to speed up their timetable now. Aang spent most of his life preparing to fight the fire lord before the comet arrived. Now he's millions of miles away on another planet and he has to do the same thing. 

Sokka wasn't able to hear much of the plan because he stayed back with the avatar pod. The wheels in his head started turning as an idea was formulating. 

"Yeah, it looks nice doesn't it." Norm said as he walks up to Sokka. "Sorry I kind of skimmed over it but I hot some more time if you want to learn more about it." He said extending a hand of friendship.

"Yeah, I do want to know more about it." Said Sokka. "So to operate a machine like this you guys would have to know a lot about the human brain, right?" He said.

"Yeah, we had to map it out and perfectly duplicate all the neural pathways in real time." Said Norm.

"Yeah, yeah so do you think you could fix the human mind if it wasn't working right?" Said Sokka interrupting the man of science.

"What do you mean by that?" Norm asked.

"You see, something happened when we arrived here. One of our group was captured by the enemy and they brainwashed her. They hypnotized her to make her join their side instead of ours. So with your machine could you go into her brain and undo what the enemy did to her? Make it so she's back to her old self and on our side?" Sokka explains his unique problem to the scientist. Norm takes a minute to digest all that information.

"Well on the one hand what you're proposing could be highly dangerous, borderline unethical, and completely unheard of in all manor of science throughout the known universe. Which leads me to say that your idea has to be one of the craziest things I have ever heard in my life." Josh said. Sokka becomes very discouraged. When he hears that. 

"But on the other hand, I've been running some simulations on how these pods interact with the human brain. I've had a thousand theories as to how these pods can not only scan the human brain but influence and form it's pathways. It's all theory right now but I've been chomping at the bit to test some of this theory. You know how that old saying goes if you want to make an omelet you have to crack a few eggs. So let's give it a whirl." Norm said embracing his inner mad scientist.

"Oh thank you so much." Sokka said relieved even though he didn't like that omelet metaphor. 

"To pull off this experiment we'll just need to get your friend into one of these pods and I'll do the rest." Said Norm.

"That doesn't sound easy but it's the most hope I've had in a while." Said Sokka. "Trust me you're undoing a heinous act and putting things right." He said. Now Sokka has an insurmountable task ahead of him. He needs to find his beloved and capture her unharmed. So much easier said than done.