The marble halls of Republic City Hall gleamed with the light of a thousand torches, Sokka of the Water Tribe watched as large crowds filed in through the large bronze doors into the banquet hall to celebrate the one year anniversary of Republic City.
It almost seemed too long ago that they had been traveling the world to bring an end to the tyranny of Fire Lord Ozai; almost seven years had passed Sokka by and here now standing in the shining light of Republic City.
Sitting at the head of the banquet Aang and Katara sat together near the head of the table where Fire Lord Zuko was to sit.
Sokka was standing at the entrance greeting the many guests over half of whom he did not recognize; he resorted to writing a cheat sheet on his arm with everyone's names and their seat numbers which he would know by badges everyone received at the entrance.
Sokka engaged in formal banter with the many dignitaries from the four nations, he greeted Chief Arnook and the Earth King as they came through the door, Sokka shook everyone's hand and made formal addresses to everyone, seeing the most exclusive of guests to their seats.
The gongs sounded in the halls announcing the arrival of Fire Lord Zuko, everyone stood at the table faces to the door as the crimson clad Fire Lord walked in through the door accompanied by Mia, the audience clapped upon seeing the regal leader enter into the grand banquet hall to take his seat.
While the rest of the hall stood transfixed upon the noble Fire Lord Sokka gaze was transfixed at the painted faced warrior guarding his side.
Suki and Ty-Lee both were escorting the Fire Lord and his wife, and Sokka knew the other Kyoshi Warriors were probably outside guarding the celebration, the war may be over by this point but many Deserters of the Fire Nation Military loyal to Ozai and the imperialistic views within the Fire Nation had tried to assassinate Zuko as well as Aang and Katara, Sokka didn't think they would ever truly see the damages of the hundred year war fully heal, hence the need for the Kyoshi Warriors to act as body guards.
The attacks against Zuko's life were in fact becoming more and more frequent; it had been a month since he had last even seen Suki.
As soon as the clapping stopped Sokka moved to intercept them, his hand buried deep in his pocket fingering a newly carved betrothal necklace Sokka had spent many hours carving the stone into a pendent beautiful enough to complement Suki's beauty, he had more than enough scars on his hands to prove it, Katara had been wondering just how he had managed to cut himself so bad lately, he had managed to make up stories about slipping with the kitchen knife and cutting up seal jerky, but after so many times of having Katara heal his hands with water bending he had just about ran out of stories and excuses, thankfully Katara had learned to accept that he was clumsy a long time ago and sighed off his healing sessions every time with little question, which was good he wanted everything to be a surprise.
"Hey Ty-Lee," he said approaching the two Kyoshi Warriors, "hey Suki." He said moving in close to his girlfriend.
"Hello Sokka, It is very nice to see you again" said Ty-Lee flashing one of her customary grins his way.
"What do you want Sokka?" asked Suki smiling at him knowing he wanted to do more than to simply greet her.
"Oh nothing much nothing much," he said in his usual tone of sarcasm, "I'd just like to, oh you know I was thinking since you were in town maybe I could spend time with my girlfriend for a change of scenery, perhaps actually have a date for a change."
"Sokka" said Suki, "you know how important my job is, especially right now."
The younger Water Tribesman held his hands up, "I know, I know it's really important to everyone, but I need to talk to you about a few things Suki."
"What sort of things do we need to talk about?" she said raising her eyebrow.
"Good things" Sokka said reassuringly, "I need to talk to you about good thing I'm not asking you quit your job guarding Zuko I can deal with the distance, just want to know when you get time off of guarding the Fiery Fire Lord."
Suki smiled, "My duties end after the Banquet," she said, "I'll talk about 'good' things with you then ok dear?"
"It's a date" said Sokka triumphantly, "I love you Honey. "
"I love you too Sokka" she said blowing the warrior a kiss and walking off continuing to escort Zuko to his seat.
Sokka seeing that the feast was about to begin scrambled and took his stead next to Aang and Katara, Toph sat opposite them across the table, Sokka though about waving to her but remembered her blindness.
Zuko sat down upon his chair next to his wife and picked up a glass, "To Republic City, To the Future, and may-"
Thunder sounded through the hall as an ear shattering blast rocked the banquet hall, dust and debris began to fly as the ceiling was blasted open above their heads, the banquet was now full of the shouts and screams of the frightened guests.
Sokka, Katara and Aang jumped into motion, along with Suki and Ty-Lee,
Ropes fell from the ceiling along with many armed men equipped with swords, axes and maces, and of course there were fire benders.
Sokka pulled his boomerang from his belt, even after these long years of relative peace he still carried it with him wherever he went.
He tossed the curved missile and knocked out an attacker, the room was alive with the sounds of battle many of Toph's metal benders were battling against the attackers.
"Protect the Earth King and Fire Lord," Suki cried out, trying to rally most of the forces to her side at the end of the hall.
More men shuffled in through the great doors more fire benders bursting their way in through the door, more men wielding spears followed close behind empowering the attack on the banquet hall.
"Aang" cried Sokka, "You and Toph need to prevent those troops from coming into the hall, hold them back out front we can handle everything in here."
"But Zuko and the Earth King" said Aang looking at the two leaders.
"We can protect them Aang," he called, "But we need to you and Toph end this and keep those men out."
They both nodded and begun to move towards the entrance knocking aside attackers with earth and fire bending, it wouldn't be too hard for Aang to end this whole thing on his own no problem as the Avatar, but the overwhelmingly large presence of civilians confined him to basic bending in order to keep the crowd safe from his own abilities.
Sokka swiped his boomerang across the face of a fire bending knocking the man cold as well as a few of his teeth out he made a grab for the man's spear turning with the weapon in one hand and stabbing it straight through another man's heart, Suki along with a dozen other guards keeping the Fire Lord and Earth King safe back up against the corner, Ty-Lee moved through the chaos of the fight with unequaled grace, she expertly targeted the enemy benders applying her Chi blocking techniques to put the ultranationalist fire benders out of commission.
"How you holding up Suki?" he called out moving to the corner to help protect the Earth King and Zuko.
"I'm fine Sokka, but I think we may have to save that date for another night, this one isn't so good."
Suddenly Sokka and Suki were blown off their feet as the ground beneath them almost exploded with fire; Sokka's ears began to ring as if there were bells within them.
His vision blurred as he looked he saw running closer was a young man dressed in fire nation armor, his hand shot forth continuous steams of red fire, the other fire benders and attackers rallied behind the young fire bender.
Sokka watched as more flames shot from the man's hands turning the people in his path to ash, Sokka tried to move but his body wasn't obeying him, it remained frozen as if made of stone.
He lifted his hand and another fiery explosion rocked the floor, seeing more clearly now strange symbols were painted into man's palms as he sent more explosive balls of fire forward.
As he leveled his palm to the wounded people sprawled upon the ground, Sokka could only watch as the ground beneath him was about to become a shouldering crater.
With a flash of gold the man's hand was knocked away as Suki stepped up having tossed her fan into the man's palm drawing a trickle of blood, Suki danced around the man sword in hand ready to slay the fire bender where he stood, she found his flank and rushed him.
Then the unexpected happened, it was as if the man had almost turned into fire and then exploded, the flair of heat was intense and Sokka was forced to close his eyes as the flames brushed over his paralyzed body.
Suki was knocked down by the blow her clothes scorched her makeup melting off her face, but the warrior wasn't out of the fight just yet, again she charged as soon as she had found her footing swinging the sword with expert training.
As if accepting her challenge a rod of crimson fire appeared in the man's grip and he wielding it like a sword moving it to intercept Suki's katana, the blade passed through the flames, but to the warriors amazement it had melted the folded steel away.
And then thunder struck, the bolt of blue lighting had vanished as soon as it had appeared, and Suki collapsed in a heap, Sokka screamed his own voice not even heard by his own deaf ears, he watched as Ty-Lee and Zuko moved to challenge the murderer, Zuko had no one left to protect him but himself, Sokka slowly painfully drifted off into unconsciousness.