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The first sound that penetrated Sokka's mind was a mix between a drawn out groan and frustrated sigh. The sound was categorised as 'not human, instead, crazy beast' by his sleep fogged brain.

Forcing an eye open the first thing he noticed was blue sky and clouds. Hmm clouds. He could stare at them all day.

"Urrgh!"

Tearing his one eyed gaze from the clouds, Sokka turned his head ever so slowly so as not to startle the crazy beast that was nearby, to see not a beast, as he had thought, massive and scary in its ferocity, but his sister.

Still scary in her ferocity, mind you, but no beast, unless you count her wild mane of hair as beastly, as Sokka so often did. Just quietly.

"Katara, what are you doing?" He groaned, noticing that she was tearing away at her hair with vigour.

"Well, if you must know, I am trying to get these tangles out of my hair!"

Slothing his way out of his bed roll, Sokka stood up feeling joints creak before languidly stretching hearing his back pop. Letting out a yawn loud enough to wake the dead, he made his way over to his irate younger sister.

Sokka sat down next to her on a rock noticing that she had manipulated a big piece of smooth ice as her mirror.

"Where are Aang, Toph, Appa and Momo?" He asked not overly concerned by the absence. Nope not one bit.

Momentarily giving up on her hair, Katara gave him a look that clearly stated "you're an idiot" before saying, "they went to the village that's not far from here to get some food, like we talked about last night, as you were still sleeping I offered to stay behind so you wouldn't get all worried." And so saying she went back to trying to untangle her hair.

Sokka suspected that Katara didn't elect to stay behind as an act of charity for him, but because she didn't want to be seen in public with her hair looking so wild.

Well, more than normal.

They sat in silence occasionally punctuated by Katara's frustrated growls for around ten minutes until Sokka held out his hand, a demanding look on his face.

Katara looked at his hand then at him, "What?"

"Give me the comb and I'll help you with your hair. You can't reach the back and that's why you can't untangle it."

She smiled giving him a grateful look, "Thanks Sokka."

The ice mirror she was using was starting to melt but Katara didn't mind; she didn't need it now.

After a good fifteen minutes of Sokka playing with her hair, he ruffled her head playfully saying "there all done."

Gratefully smiling at him Katara noticed how light her head felt, reaching up a hand the second thing she noticed was how short her hair was. Frantically bending a large piece of ice from the nearby stream Katara gazed at her reflection taking note of the close cropped hair.

Her eyebrow twitched.

"Sokka," She said in a dangerously low voice.

"I know!" He exclaimed, blatantly ignoring the murderous look from his sister. "Your hair looks so much better this way, and it is completely maintenance free!"

"I'm going to kill you!" She screeched, lunging towards him.

0-0-0-0-0

Appa landed in the clearing where the camp was set up with a loud whump. Jumping from the sky bison's head Aang landed with arms outstretched exclaiming, "we're back! Did you miss me Katara?" Opening his eyes the Avatar noticed the absence of life in the camp. "Katara? Sokka?"

Jumping down next to him, Toph was silent for a moment before saying, "They're not anywhere nearby. Oh, here comes Katara now." She said pointing in a direction near the stream.

Aang called out to the water bender, "Katara, where's Sokka? And what happened to your hair!" He exclaimed in wild panic.

Walking over to them Katara flicked her cropped hair before replying nonchalantly, "Oh, this? I decided to cut it short as it was so difficult to maintain, Sokka helped."

"Where is he?" Toph asked frowning, she couldn't sense him nearby and Katara was acting suspiciously.

"Well he said something about going for a walk and cooling off." Katara said laughing nervously. "I'm sure he won't be too long."

0-0-0-0-0

Further upstream, twelve feet above the ground, suspended between to large rocks was a rather odd sight. For between the two rocks was a massive chunk of ice, shaped suspiciously like a five pointed star. Only the top point of the star was a human head, and if one looked closely they could see the body attached to the head inside the ice, each limb splayed as one of the other four points of the star.

Blearily blinking open his blue eyes, Sokka immediately felt cold, very cold. And he couldn't move. What's going on!

Then his memories came flooding back; an irate Katara, a whooshing sound of water, sudden cold, then, nothing. Oh, yeah that's right. Sokka, in a moment of good deed, had cut his sisters hair short and she had not been happy with the new look.

And now he was completely trapped in the middle of nowhere next to a stream surrounded by trees.

And so Sokka did the only thing he could do in this sort of situation, he called for help.

"Aang? Appa? Momo? Toph?...Katara? HEEEEEEELLLLP!"