CH1: The Road
Two figures shared the sun as they walked on a seemingly endless stretch of road that passed through many fields, and between hundreds of trees. It was hot this time of year, but it was slowly cooling down as summer neared its end. Ten years ago, this land was engulfed in a massive war that spanned the world. Since the Great War had ended, everything settled down. Members of the now-shattered Fire Nation were people too, and had taken their forced humility fairly well, and were no longer aiming for world domination. The world seemed pleased with this, but there were exceptions, as always. Someone had to disturb the peace, and often, there were few around who could enforce it.
The two figures on the road were those of a young man clad in blue. His outfit was a very peculiar one; it was almost exactly the same as that of a Kyoshi warrior, with the exception of its color, the armor, and his lack of headgear. The armor was slightly different; hiding between the padding was an expertly crafted steel cuirass, but it was only visible if one looked very closely for it. At his left side, there was another peculiar sight; tied into his belt there was a long, thin sword in a scabbard. A small silk rope dangled from it near where the sword was inserted.
The young man was fairly dark-skinned, and he had fully grown into his body now. He was lean-muscled and strong looking, and his hair was down to his shoulders, where it wasn't pulled back into a ponytail. He was fairly tall now, and strode confidently down the road toward his destination. He was silent, with the exception of a yawn that would escape his lips every now and again. The heat, even though it was dying down, was unbearable.
The young woman who shared the path with him was wearing a rather plain green outfit. She was covered in a healthy layer of dirt, and walked barefoot along the trail. Her hair was short, especially when compared to his. She carried a small pack, but she was completely unarmed. The girl was rather short and stocky. Her muscles were well-defined, and there was no doubt as to her strength. She walked silently alongside the swordsman, with her chin up.
The two travelers reached an unmarked crossroads. Off to one side were hints of a small city, while off in the other direction the road continued on as far as the eye could see. The swordsman looked between the two paths while the woman stood still, impatiently tapping her foot on the ground idly.
"Which way are we going to go from here?" The woman spoke up, not bothering to look up at her companion, who was looking around in the grass at the moment.
"No clue." He pulled a large stick from off of the ground and threw it into the air. It reached its peak before falling from the sky. The swordsman reached out, to point before stopping, "Toph, look out!"
Toph quickly stomped on the ground, causing a hunk of earth to leap from its place in the ground about a half-meter away to dart up above her to deflect the stick. A second later, the stick hit the ground, pointing in the direction of the town off to the right.
"Damnit, Sokka, that's the third time you've almost hit me on the head this trip alone." She scowled, and figured that he knew exactly how to get on her nerves now. He had likely been doing it intentionally two towns ago.
"Sorry. But I do get better results when you hit the stick." Sokka grinned and strolled over to her, "Guess we're going to the town."
"Next time, I'll throw the stick at you, and see what kind of results we get." She slugged him on his right arm, which made him wince. She was still the stronger one; no matter how hard he trained, she was always tougher. He was beginning to suspect that she worked out in her sleep.
"Ow, okay, okay. You get to choose at the next crossroads." They began walking to the town, which didn't appear to be very large, from what they could tell. There were farms around it, and several homes, but there was no sign of any trade coming through. The town was well off of the beaten path, likely a forgotten ink-blot on a hidden ledger within the area's capitol. Not an important location by any means. They walked on in silence for a few moments more.
"Sometimes, I think we should have saved the bulk of our conversations for later in the trip. I preferred them to the sounds of footsteps and nature." Toph spoke up as they were reaching the nearest farmhouse. No one was in the fields today. Toward the front of the home was a small well, and around the back a woman was putting clothes up on a line to dry.
"Maybe; but you can't expect topics of conversation to just spring up out of nowhere, or simply stay fresh. We're just in a dry period right now." Sokka yawned again and looked to his companion. She started walking with him four years ago, two years after he had decided to start walking the land alone. He was grateful for her companionship, but he didn't like the thought that she was with him for his sake. He wanted to get away from everything, but she came along, and he couldn't tell her that he wanted to be alone.
Ahead, in the house, a shouting match erupted, and a young man dressed in earthy tones stormed out of the home. Following him a second or two later was an older, balding man in similar clothes. Harsh words had obviously been said, and they stopped just short of the well.
"I don't want to be a farmer! I'm going to make something of my life!" The boy shouted at his father. He was red in the face from so much shouting. He turned to walk away more, when his father walked up and grabbed his arm.
"The town's too dangerous! You'll get yourself killed!" The older man was red , as well. They looked very similar, father and son.
"I will not! I'm going to get rich and powerful, you'll see! Let go!" The boy yanked his arm away from his father's hand and ran off toward the town in the distance. The father simply stood in silence for a few moments before turning back to the two travelers. Sokka pulled up the bucket from the well and drank from it using his cup, before offering it to Toph. The man shook his head and continued inside. Once the door closed, he began yelling again.
"Oooh, this place sounds like fun. Maybe your stupid stick trick didn't lead us the wrong way after all." She grinned after drinking the well water from the cup, handing it back to Sokka, who dumped the remaining water into the well and wiped away the sediment with his sleeve.
"Another set of wrongs to right, and all." He sighed. He wished that, one of these days, he would reach a town where there were no corrupt officials, warring factions, or massive, ravenous creatures on the loose.
"It's better than walking miles a day in silence." She turned and began plodding towards town. If Sokka didn't want to do anything, she would. Not that she really cared about the people here, just that they had been away from anything resembling civilization for about two weeks on this past walk. It was time to go into town, whether he wanted to help out or not.
"Right, right." He followed her toward the town, taking his position up on her left side. He didn't want to deal with murderers and thieves today, but Toph was right; they did have to do something. Especially if it was inconvenient. If they didn't, they would probably go nuts. "So, I figure we should do the sister one this time."
"Aww, I prefer the wife one. If we have to lie about who we are, we have to at least go with the one people will believe." She shifted her weight and bumped him with the shoulder. The bump set him off balance for a few steps.
"Why wouldn't anyone believe the sister one? It's worked before." He shifted his weight over to bump her back, with no result. She smiled as he kept pushing, but she just kept walking on, unfazed by his attempts to push her off to the side.
"We don't look related, for one."
"How do you figure?" Sokka dropped his shoulder a little more to try and push her, still with no effect. Toph pushed him back with her hand, tossing him off-balance. He stumbled away a bit before sliding back into his position. A grin formed on his face; that bit always amused him.
"For starters, everyone in the past towns has said that we don't look related at all. Secondly, we don't act like brother and sister, especially considering what I know about how you act around Katara." Toph was counting these out on her fingers, which she was holding up off to her side, pointing at Sokka with them. She held up a third finger, "And, third, what self-respecting brother would dress that fancy, while leaving his poor little blind sister to walk around in the plain stuff I'm wearing?"
"Well, same could be said about the wife thing, mostly. Everyone talks about how we don't look right as a couple when we're in towns." He didn't bother with counting off with his fingers, and simply rattled off his list as they approached the edge of the town. He looked up toward the sky, where the sun was reaching its highest point. He grinned, "I think we act fine like siblings, even if there are creepy incest overtones sometimes when you can't keep character. And, of course, lastly, what self-respecting husband would let his wife dress that plainly?"
"When I can't keep character?" Toph scoffed, "You were the one who kissed me that one time when you got drunk over in that town two days from Omashu and got us kicked out."
"... Well, maybe I shouldn't drink when we're doing the brother-sister thing." He frowned; he didn't remember that city very well. He couldn't recall what happened there, though he remembered something about an angry badgermole, and running into those hippies again. He shook his head to clear his mind of what little he could remember.
"Or, maybe we should do the married thing. It also cuts down on sleeping costs, since we can just share the same bed. We are pretty broke, remember?" She didn't want to seem too impassioned about it, but she couldn't do much else. Sokka hadn't been interested in a relationship with anyone in years, but that didn't change the fact that she still wanted to be with him. He didn't seem to realize it, which bothered her.
"I suppose so. Married it is." Sokka himself had no opinion on the matter. He would start dating again when he was good and ready. Though he was bothered by her constant insistence, he couldn't tell her 'no.' It was nice that he had someone interested in him, but at the moment, he didn't feel right about it. After two loves died, and a third disappeared into thin air, he simply didn't feel like he was meant to be with anyone, and followed with that.
"Good thing we decided before we reached town." Toph snatched his hand up in hers and smiled. Sokka paused when she squeezed his hand hard enough to nearly crush it. He smirked a bit as he walked while he shook his head and laughed a little.
They continued on into the edge of town. Instead of the bustling daily life that one normally expected from a town this close to the road, there was nothing at all going on. The streets were deserted, even the main street. There were no shops. A dog trotted down the street towards the pair with a severed hand in its mouth. It walked as if nothing was wrong, and crossed their path as it headed to some unknown destination. Sokka watched it idly as it passed by, before stopping to take a look around the town.
"Hey, hey!" A man darted out of a building that was in the center of the town. Sokka's left hand went up to his sword's scabbard for a moment before he saw that the man wasn't coming at him with a weapon. He relaxed, and the man walked up to them, raising an eyebrow, "Oh! Another swordsman! I see, I see."
"Is this guy as stupid looking as he sounds?" Toph whispered to Sokka quickly as the man approached. He simply chuckled in response, and squeezed her hand once.
"So nice to see new blood in town. You're in luck, if you're for hire, sir. A nice place for work this season." The man had a near-toothless grin; he had lost a lot of teeth in his time, apparently. The man circled around the two, and whistled, "You two look strong, too. I'm Wei, this town's sheriff, by the way. Lots of work for a rough fellow like yourself here."
"What kind of work?" Sokka raised an eyebrow in response to the man's peculiar behavior. The man was mentally weighing him and categorizing him. A sound of wood being hammered together came from a shop off to the side. Judging by the sign, it was the cooper's shop, which occupied the space behind a nice, clean looking tea shop. The tea shop looked very out of place in this city; it was clean and looked inviting, while the rest of the buildings were dingy and forbidding, with the exception of two large houses that capped the ends of the main street; one on the east side, and the other on the west side.
"Why, the kind of work an enterprising young swordsman like yourself would be interested in. These two large groups of gamblers are feuding at the moment; they're always looking for the upper hand against one another. If you need money, they would pay a good price for someone who looks as skilled as you..." Wei trailed off as he finished looking over Sokka and Toph.
The door of the tea house opened, and an elderly man stepped out to look at the newcomers. Wei glared at him, but he stood unmoved. The old man simply stood silently and watched, until Wei backed away from the pair, toward his station.
"... Hey, Toph, is that who I think it is?" Sokka nudged Toph, who frowned.
"Sokka, is that some kind of stupi- Oh. Oh!" She released his hand and walked over to the old man, smiling. Sokka followed behind her closely.
"Good afternoon, you two. How have you been?" The elderly man smiled; it had been years since he last saw these two troublemakers. At the end of the war, he had worked closely with them and the Avatar, instead of his nephew. He wondered when he would see them again, and supposed that his question was now answered.
A/N: This is meant to be a companion to my primary work, entitled "The Wake of the Avatar." Really, this idea struck me as hilarious and awesome one day, and fits where I want Sokka to be when it comes down to the story. I didn't want to take space out of the main story for this side-story, so, here it is. It will seem familiar to those of you who have seen the movie "Yojimbo", or its western counterpart "A Fistful of Dollars," because, well, that's what it is, only redone within my vision of the Avatar world, ten years after the end of the war with the Fire Nation. While this story will mostly stand alone, I intend for it to be tied in with the other story on a larger scale. Thanks for reading.