Disclaimer: Avatar: The Last Airbender belongs to Bryke and Nickelodeon, not me. Neither does Aladdin; he belongs to Disney.
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You stroll through the bazaar as evening falls. Most shopkeepers shut their windows and close their doors, preparing for the evening. But one cart remains open. A young lady- redheaded, applecheeked, and petite- busies herself with the ribbons and knickknacks dangling from the racks. She notices you and smiles.
"Good evening," she says. "Is there something I can help you with?"
You shake your head and walk away. She smiles again and steps closer, her hands behind her back. "I can see you are only interested in the exceptionally rare," she said, her eyes twinkling with an impish sort of mirth. "What do you think of this?"
She holds out her hand and unfolds her fingers. A small white whistle in the shape of a bison lays in her palm, glistening in the moonlight. "Don't be fooled," she says. "It may look like a child's plaything, but it's so much more. Like many things, it's not what's on the outside, but on the inside that counts."
You shake your head again. Before you can escape, she sidesteps you, still holding the toy. "This is no ordinary whistle," she said. "It once changed the course of a young man's life. A young man who, like this whistle, was more than what he seemed. A diamond in the rough." She palms the whistle and it reappears in her other hand. "Would you like to hear the tale?"
You shrug. After all, you have nothing better to do this evening.
-----
The young man pulled the hood of his cloak over his head. "I don't like this," he mumbled.
"You don't have to like it, you just have to go along with it," his sharp-eyed companion snapped. "Here he comes. Stand up straight and shut up." She flicked an errant lock of dark hair out of her face. "You are late."
"I'm sorry," he said. "I couldn't get away sooner, not even for a princess."
She handed him a scroll. He unrolled it and squinted at it in the darkness. "I trust you know what to do," she said.
He studied it for a moment more, stroking the small mustache above his lip. "I think so," he said. He handed the scroll back, flexed his fingers and took a broad stance.
"Step back," the young woman said to her companion. He did so.
The mustached young man executed a few smooth moves, and the ground beneath them rumbled to life, splitting open and revealing broad steps that spiraled deep into the earth. "I think I found it," he said.
The girl clutched her companion's arm. "That's it!" she hissed. "That's it."
"Ow, that hurts," he complained, shaking her hand away.
She crept up on the mustached earthbender. "Now, you know what to do, right?" she said.
"Get the whistle," he said.
"That's right," she said. "Take whatever you want, but the whistle is ours."
He strode up to the stairs. "Who approaches?" a deep, rusty voice intoned.
"Just Haru," he said. "An earthbender."
"Only one may enter the cave of the avatar," the voice rumbled, echoing across the darkened desert sands. "The diamond in the rough."
Haru glanced over his shoulder. The young woman shrugged. "Not my problem," she said. "We paid you to get it for us."
He took a step farther into the depths of the cave. Nothing happened. He let out a short little laugh, his shoulders raising, and took another step.
The deserts rose up, swallowing the staircase and the earthbender. In a moment, the sand settled, as smooth as glass. The young man choked.
"What just happened?" he sputtered.
The young woman sighed. "That's why we hired someone else to actually go inside," she said. She crossed her arms. "We'll just have to find this 'diamond in the rough' individual and go from there."
Her companion scowled. "Why do I always go along with your stupid plans?" he said.
"Because they're not stupid, and you couldn't find a good idea if it bit you on the ear," she said. "Come along, Zuzu. We need to be back before anyone notices we left."
"Don't call me that," he mumbled, but he followed her anyways.
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"He was just here a moment ago! Some ponytailed kid with a stupid boomerang."
He paused atop the roof to scowl. "It's a warrior's wolftail," he corrected. "And my boomerang is not stupid."
The shopkeeper glanced up. "There he is, officer!" he said. "There's the thief!"
"We'll get him," the guard snarled.
Sokka scrambled over to the next roof. "Oh, man," he said. "Gotta stay on top of things." The guard hollered, and half a dozen more joined him, all armed to the teeth. Sokka glanced down. "All this for a cabbage?" The guards clambered up the sides of the house. He hastily shoved the cabbage down his tunic and dodged into the first open window he saw.
He landed squarely in a pile of clothing- girl's clothing. "Great," a dry, deadpan voice said. "It's him again."
He pulled a dress off his head. "Morning, Mai," he said. "I'm sure you're looking forward to the new day."
"Ecstatic," Mai said.
"Good morning, Sokka," Ty Lee giggled. She tossed him a veil; he draped it over his head. "You're getting in trouble awfully early."
"You know me," he shrugged. "Trouble never sleeps."
"Coming to haiku class tonight?" she asked, dropping cross-legged on her bed and staring up at him under her lashes.
"Crashing haiku class is more like it," Mai grumbled.
"Maybe, maybe not," he said. "Depends where the wind takes me."
The front door crashed to the floor. "Where's the ponytail?" the guard demanded.
"And I believe the wind is taking me away," Sokka said. He tore off the veil and dashed to the opposite window. "Ladies…" He dropped out the window, landing on the awning above a shop. A lemur scrabbled up the ropes and leaped onto his stomach. "Oh, there you are, Momo. Good timing."
Three guards crammed in the window above them. "There he is! Get him!" one of them hollered.
"Good timing's not good enough," he said. He grabbed Momo around his fuzzy middle and bolted.
The guards may have been armed and dangerous, but they hadn't grown up on the narrow streets of the city since their baby days. Sokka dodged through the alleys and byways until at last the city guards were lost far behind them.
He slumped down against the wall, plunking Momo down beside him, and wriggled the cabbage out of his shirt. "And now, your Momoness, we feast!" he declared. He pulled a handful of leaves off the round vegetable and handed them to the lemur.
He had just torn a huge bite of the slightly bitter cabbage when two small children crept around the corner of the alley, peering at him while he ate. Sokka slunk down. Momo looked at his cabbage, then padded lightly over to the two children. He held the leaves he held to the little girl.
"Aw, Momo, don't do that," he whined. "If you feed them, then I'll feel guilty, and then I'll be hungry again."
The little girl took the cabbage and tore it in two pieces. She handed the larger of the two to her younger brother, who devoured it eagerly. Sokka sighed and pushed himself to his feet. "Here you go," he said.
"Thanks, mister," she said shyly. He flashed her a lopsided smile and scratched the back of his neck.
Noisy cheers echoed from the nearby marketplace. The two children looked up and darted down the alley. "What's going on?" he said. Momo chittered a response. "Well, if you didn't know, you didn't have to answer, now, did you?"
Sokka followed the children and blended into the crowd. The citizens cheered as a young man astride a gray horse strutted down the busy street. He tossed his shaggy dark hair away from his tanned face and flashed a broad, white-toothed smile at the people below. The young girls sighed.
"On his way to the palace, I suppose," an old man said. "Probably another suitor for the princess."
"Princess? What princess?" his equally old friend snorted. "There's not a princess. It's only a rumor."
"Then why do rich young men keep riding into the city to visit the palace?" the old man shot back.
"I don't know. Stop asking me questions, I'm old and I don't feel like answering them," he retorted.
Sokka rolled his eyes. Of course someone would bring up the princess. It was the biggest urban legend in the history of the earth kingdom- well, besides the myth about the avatar. He'd heard about them all his life. Neither of them could possibly be true.
"Out of my way, you filthy brat!"
Sokka snapped to attention to see the little boy frozen in the path of the gray stallion. His sister darted out to grab him, but she wasn't fast enough. The well-dressed young man raised his riding whip.
Before he knew precisely what he was doing, Sokka dashed into the path and caught the crop. "You know, if I was as rich as you, I could afford some manners," he snapped. He twisted the whip out of the young man's hand. The two children ran away and vanished into the crowd.
"Oh, I could teach you some manners," the young man seethed. He lunged from his saddle and yanked the whip back. Sokka lost his balance and fell backwards into the muddy street. The crowd roared.
Sokka sat up, wiping mud from his forehead with the back of his equally muddy arm. The young man smirked at the crowd, waving as he rode down the street. Momo trotted out of the crowd and hopped nimbly onto his shoulder. "Look at that, Momo," he said loudly. "It's not every day you see a horse with two rear ends."
The young man pulled the reins of the gray stallion, stopping him short. "You are a worthless street rat," he said, his every word chosen carefully. "You were born a street rat, and you will die a street rat, and only your fleas will mourn you."
He turned his horse sharply and trotted briskly down the street. Sokka scowled. "I'm not a street rat," he said, scratching the back of his neck. "Come on, Momo."
Momo hopped onto his shoulder and tugged on his ear. "So maybe I am a street rat," he said. "But I wasn't always. I used to live at the south pole, with the rest of the water tribe." He sighed heavily. "But then the war…and I ended up here, without the rest of my family." Sokka twirled Momo's long soft tail around his finger. "But I guess things will eventually work out."
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The conversation dragged on. The handsome young man bragged about himself, while the king and queen sat patiently and listened to his lists of exploits and accomplishments.
A young woman in a plain dress strolled into the throne room. She leaned over and whispered something in the pretty queen's ear; Queen Poppy nodded and sat up straighter. "Prince Han, it has been lovely to talk to you," she said. "But something has come up. If you'll excuse us…"
Han cleared his throat. "If you don't mind, I have a question," he said. "I've heard about the princess-"
"That's only a rumor," the king said.
Han turned red. "But I heard-"
"One hears many things," the king said. He waved his hand. Han dragged himself to his feet and slunk away. The young woman crossed her arms and watched him exit out of the corner of her eye.
As soon as the doors to the throne room swung shut, King Lao leaned over and rubbed his forehead. "Toph," he called. "Toph, where are you?"
"She's in her usual spot," the servant girl said. She crossed to a large tapestry and drew it back, revealing a petite girl in a white embroidered dress.
The girl waved. "Hiya," she said.
"Where are your shoes?" her mother asked.
Toph pulled up the hem of her white dress and wiggled her bare toes. "Somewhere," she said. "I forget." The queen shook her head. "Well, I couldn't get a good look at the guy you wanted to marry me off to."
"Did you get a good look?" the servant girl asked.
"Horse-faced and sneering?"
"You win."
"Enough," the king said. "Toph, we have to pick a suitor for you to marry. Why do you persist on interrupting with your personal opinions?"
Toph shrugged. "It's fun," she said.
"Toph," the queen sighed.
"Well, it's fun for me," she said. She stepped past the curtain and walked into the throne room. "If you still feel the need to keep me hidden from the outside world, then the only source of excitement I get is eavesdropping on whatever suitors you drag in here. And I did not like that one."
"We have to keep you hidden, darling, it's for your own good," the queen said. Toph walked towards her mother; Poppy wrapped her arm around her daughter's tiny waist. "If it was known that you were blind, no one would want to marry you."
"Why should anyone have to marry me?" the princess shrugged.
"You know it's the law," Lao said patiently. "A queen cannot rule alone. And if you're going to be queen someday, you must follow your own laws."
Toph pulled away from her mother's arm. "If I'm being forced to marry, shouldn't it be for love?" she pointed out. "Can't we…I don't know, let me meet people?"
"Toph!" her mother exclaimed.
"They don't have to know I'm the princess," she explained eagerly. "They'll think I'm just some party guest."
"It's too dangerous," her father said, shaking his head. "You're blind. It'll be too much to you."
"You think everything is too much for me," she said, scowling. "I'm sixteen years old, and I've never even left the palace before. I don't even have a real friend."
The servant girl jammed her hands on her hips. "So what am I, stewed sea prunes?" she said.
Toph rolled her foggy green eyes. "You don't count, Katara, my parents pay you," she said.
"I like you, though," Katara said, unperturbed. "Well, most of the time."
"Thank you for your honesty."
"Toph, you must marry before your seventeenth birthday, and you must marry someone of noble birth," Lao said. "Those are the laws."
"There's too many laws," Toph said.
"You're a princess, and you must follow them," Lao said.
Toph scowled. "Then maybe I don't want to be a princess anymore," she said. She pulled the delicate golden tiara off her head and chucked it across the throne room. Katara ducked just in time; the band flew out an open window. Toph stormed away.
"I don't know where she gets it from," Lao said. "You weren't nearly this picky." Poppy looked down at her hands.
"I'll go find her," Katara sighed. "And the tiara. Again."
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Author's Notes:
I recently watched Avatar all the way through. Then I watched Aladdin. I haven't had enough sleep in weeks. This seemed like such a good idea at the time.
I hope you like this! I haven't written a comedy in a while, and I felt my funniness was getting rusty. So this is a lot of fun to write.
Also, I wrote myself in as the storyteller. I couldn't think of anyone else in the Avatarverse who might've worked (a lot more people will be cropping up later...)
Next chapter will be up soon!