Toph was strong, full stop, no questions asked.

She never wallowed in self pity. She moved on, taking everything in her stride. When she learned about Suki, and the special relationship she shared with Sokka, she moved on, her heart only slightly fractured. She fell in love with her best friend, and airbender, and she was happy.

They traveled the world, seeing things no one else did, doing things that no one else had done. They were happy.

But fate is a harsh mistress to serve. Is her hand loving, open, or a cold thing, curled into a fist? You could never tell.

Toph had plenty of experience with pain. Whatever doesn't kill us, only makes us stronger, right? But something nearly did kill her.

Fates cruel hand, snatched away her loved. Aang, in the palm of that rapidly closing fist. Tears poured from her sightless eyes. Stupid things. Did nothing but bring tears.

When Katara and Sokka found her once again, slumped and sleeping, over the freshly turned earth of Aangs grave, they could do nothing but look on in despair. Poor, poor Toph. Suffered more then a normal person twice her age has. But then, Toph wasn't normal.

"Can you help her?" Sokka asked, breath misting in the cold air. "Can you do something with your water bending?"

Katara could only shake her head sadly. A tear formed in her eye. It teetered on her eyelash, before spilling down her cheek.

"Time is the only cure for a broken heart."

One night, many years later, Toph was having the most wonderful dream. About a boy, and his friends, traveling all over the world. Her ebony hair was white as the snow she hated so much, and wrinkles adorned her face.

Her mind was as cloudy and fogged as her eyes. Is that what all those wonderful memories simply were? A dream? She couldn't...quite...remember. She pursed her lips until they were white, and squeezed her eyes shut tighter. She was very, very old, so old that her birthdays came by, like any day of the week, uncelebrated. That's all they were, now. Ordinary days.

Her dream changed. There were people, many people. People she knew (did she?) and people she loved (had she ever?). A girl, with brown hair, and a smile that reached her blue eyes. A boy, with a ponytail, trusty boomerang on his belt. And another boy.

A boy unlike any other she had ever met. His eyes were grey and shining, a blue tattoo on his head.

And his footsteps. They were like autumn leaves, brushing along the ground. They seemed so familiar...

He spread his arms wide.

It's time to come home.

And she did. She shed her old, weary body, and her mind became clear. She rushed towards all her friends, smiled until her cheeks hurt, and cried until there were no more tears to shed.

She looked back, to a floating portal. It was like a window, a window back to the place that is all that she had known. She saw herself (for in this place of miricles, she could see), old and grey, lying on a bed, sleeping, a serene smile on her lips. Compared to this new place, that world seemed so fearful, dull, dangerous. Time to leave it all behind.

She turned her back on it, and went to her place. She shed her old life and began a new. A life filled with things to see, adventures to be had, things to do.

After all, there's never any ends. Just new beginnings.