A/N: Welcome to the first chapter my new story, I think I may have to do one about Mai after this...just to come full circle. I would love to know what any of you think, whether it's positive or negative (as long as it's constructive).

*throws another "ive" up there*

*8/21/10* Thank you to Red Clay for helping me edit this chapter, that's some darn good advice you gave =P.

Gruel Night

Ty Lee raised her eyebrows incredulously as the prison guard plopped a scoop of some kind of watery soup into her bowl. "Blech," she said, looking at the chunks of mystery food floating in it. It was the same thing that they had been eating every night for the two weeks since they were imprisoned.

"I guess its gruel night again." Ty Lee said cheerfully to the guard. She smiled and glanced up at the man's stony countenance and heard Mai groan beside her.

"Come on, Ty Lee," her friend said dryly, "Every night is gruel night."

Ty Lee seemed to have a gift of ignoring her friend, though, and only continued, "Doesn't it get hot wearing all that armor?" She looked at the guard's heavy shoulder pads and iron helmet. "I mean, we are inside a volcano. It doesn't seem very fair of them t—oof," But the guard never found out what wasn't fair of 'them'. The man standing behind Ty Lee bumped her, causing the small girl to nearly topple over and interrupting her ramble.

"You're holding up the line, Sweetheart," he said as he elbowed her out of the way.

The agile young woman swung her arms in a wide circle as she fell forward. She caught herself with her hands and gracefully pushed herself back into a standing position. She looked up with a smile to see Mai covered in her watery dinner, lips pursed in anger.

"Oops," Ty Lee said sheepishly, noticing her empty bowl on the ground beside her friend, so she turned to the prisoner who had bumped her. "Well excuuuse me," she said sarcastically, hands on her hips, with Mai fuming beside her, "I didn't realize that anyone would be sooo eager to eat this stuff." She kicked at her bowl and gestured to Mai's soiled red prison linens. The man chuckled and pushed Mai roughly out of his path as he left the food line, muttering about 'little girls.'

As Ty Lee watched the man walk away her bottom lip poked out in a pout. She thought about kicking the top of his spine, right where it met his skull; it would paralyze him from the neck down, but she looked at the guard who was still emotionlessly serving the soup and thought better of it. He wasn't worth the consequences, but Mai was one step ahead of her.

"It's about time something happened around here," Mai said, starting to smile. Ty Lee quirked an eyebrow and looked at her friend, who pushed up her sleeves.

Then, the acrobat watched in shock as Mai rushed forward and skidded along the dirt ground beside the man, punching him in the back of the leg along the way and causing him to kneel. She let her momentum push her into a standing position and quickly struck him the man in the jaw with a roundhouse kick before he could even figure out what happened, and before the dust settled. The other prisoners in the food line were yelling cheers or threats and the noise was overwhelming.

"MAI!" Ty Lee yelled in a whiny voice as she ran up to her friend, but she was pulled back by a guard and Mai was grabbed by two more. The man who had pushed her was on all fours, looking dazed. He spat blood onto the ground and lifted a hand to hold his jaw. Suddenly, the roaring of the watching crowd stopped and the prisoners parted to make way for one of the senior officers.

"Take him to the healer, take her to her cell and leave her there until she realizes that being the Warden's niece doesn't come with the privilege of being able to attack other inmates at will," he ordered. When Ty Lee realized that Mai was going to be taken away, leaving her all alone, the girl panicked a bit. She imagined pinching the forearm of her captor. She would have felt her finger slide between the bones and right on cue his hold would go limp.

That would be her opportunity to twirl out of his grasp and land a quick jab in between his ribs, which would cause the man to double over in pain. It was a vital pressure point, if she hit too hard she could kill him but if she was careful he would just be incapacitated for a few hours. Next, she would bounce over to Mai in a series of leaps and cartwheels; in her imagination she was wearing a sparkly leotard. Ty Lee would hit one the guards holding Mai with a kick to the inside of his leg. It would cut off blood flow and he would fall then she could jab the other in the solar plexus and she and Mai would make a daring and exciting escape.

All of this happened in a matter of seconds, and just before she was about to execute her plan, Mai noticed the panicked look on her face. "It's alright, Ty Lee! It's just solitary. Spirits, calm down." This was followed by a characteristic eye roll and Ty Lee relaxed at the victorious smirk on her friend's face.

So, Ty Lee abandoned her impossible yet impressive plan and pouted quietly as the crowd was broken up and her friend was taken away. She wrapped her arms around herself as she was led back into her cell for the night along with the other prisoners; it was standard procedure after any kind of fight.

The guard pushed her roughly into her cell. Ty Lee fell, one of her palms caught on a loose rivet in the metal floor, cutting her. The young lady whimpered as the door slammed shut, blocking all sound from the outside. The lock slide into place with a big, hollow sound that made the girl's heart sink even lower, if that was possible. It was when she was in the courtyard with Mai by her side that she could put on her cheerful Ty-Lee-mask, but when she was alone in her cell each night it fell off and all she could feel was despair clutching at her heart; she knew that it made her aura dingy and pasty but she couldn't help it.

The acrobat crawled up onto her cold metal cot and sat legs with her pulled up to her chest and her arms wrapped tightly around them. She looked at her hand, which had started to bleed, and let the tears flow, like they did every night. The cut wasn't deep, but she was afraid that it would get infected. In a panic she wondered if they would have to cut her hand off. She had a ridiculous vision of herself, with a wooden peg in place of her right hand, trying to do a handstand. But she did some of her breathing exercises to calm herself down, and slowly she pulled back from hysteria. Instead of panicking, she pushed her hand next to the cut to make it bleed more and clear out any infection.

We're going to be stuck here forever. Azula is going to leave us here to rot and no one cares. Not my parents, my sisters, not anyone. No one would dare stand up to Azula to plead for her release. Mai's uncle was the warden and even he didn't try to help them. She stared at her injured hand until the scab began to form.

With a sniff, she tried to wipe the tears away, and then fell onto her side. Ty Lee clutched her braid tightly with her one good hand; she left the other laying limp in front of her, afraid that she would open the cut again if she moved it. Stroking her braid was a nervous habit that had developed in her childhood and had now resurfaced in prison.

Ty Lee clutched her eyes shut and curled into a tight ball. She ran her hand along her hair and tried to think of a way that she and Mai would be able to escape. Even if we beat up the guards how will we get out? Two days after the girls were imprisoned on the boiling rock the warden had announced to all of the prisoners that there was now a kill-switch on the gondola. With a flick of a lever, the cable would be released, sending anyone trying to escape to be boiled alive in the water below. Besides, if we try to escape or if we start too much trouble we will probably just be executed instead.

Ty Lee was scared, more than she ever had been in her life as she slowly drifted into a fitful sleep, her braid still clutched tightly in one hand.