Disclaimer: Not affiliated, fan work, etc. I can't write, you will be bored by this story, etc character names and backstories subject to immediate retcon at discretion of author

Prologue

The middle of Ru's metal workspace seemed to open up into a large hole, waking him abruptly from his nap. The neat stack of papers Ru was working through before his sleep fell to the ground as the desk started reforming. As soon as he heard angry, earth-shaking footsteps clearing their way across the corridors of his laboratory, he knew it would not be pleasant.

"Didn't I tell you that the Journal of Earthbending threw away papers like this? And why are you sleeping, dunderhead, it's not even noon!" shouted Ru's advisor as she slammed an unfinished work of Ru's onto his now reformed desk.
"Professor Bei Fong, if I may..." Ru stammered, desperately trying keep his composure as he picked up his papers and stacked them back on his desktop.
"You ain't getting any fondness from me with that formal business, you can stick to Toph like the rest of the lab. I told Zhi to stop reading your paper to me after I heard title. "Thermodynamics of the Fire Nation Lineage – An Assessment of EM Generation?"

Ru peered behind his workstation to see Zhi , sporting a snarky thumbs-up and a wide grin. He looked back to Toph, who had lowered herself to Ru's level, giving him a full view of her cloudy eyes and misplaced bangs.

"Ru," she smiled as she spoke in a soft, innocent voice, "since I can't see, would you tell me what the sign outside the door to this lab says?"
Ru muttered the words "Department of Earthbending" and looked at the ground.
"And what am I a professor of?"
"Earthbending..."
Her expression changed to a scowl and her voice took on a much louder sound.
"DARN RIGHT IT IS. Now why are you handing me FIREBENDING research? Get back to work, THE WORK YOU ARE HERE FOR!"

As she left his area, Ru used his own earthbending talent to reform the ground her rant had displaced to its normal position and shape, annoyed, but calm in his proceedings. He stacked the papers again on his desk into a neat pile, and closed his eyes for the second time that day. Zhi, Toph's star student, would probably catch him and report his daydreaming back to Toph, but deep-down he wasn't as frightened by her showy demonstrations of anger as the rest of his lab seemed to be. In fact, her otherwise laid-back and informal attitude towards her work and her students was the reason he applied to her work after his interviews: all of her students called her Toph, not Professor Bei Fong, which was something Ru was only starting to feel comfortable with, and her work in advancing the earthbending field had really flourished since the fall of Ozai. This is why he perhaps felt so bad that he wasn't interested in continuing his earthbending education as much anymore.

It was well known that Fire Lord Zuko in his consultation with Avatar Aang on the upbringing of a new generation had restructured the schooling systems of his nation to allow members of the water tribe and the earth kingdom to attend the prestigious schools of the land. Many families were overjoyed at this prospect as the education within their own lands was the first to go in the struggle against the Fire Nation. Though extremely contented with the opportunity to attend school in the fire nation, Ru always looked on with jealousy to the delicate water benders and aristocratic fire benders, unhappy with the brutish nature and lack of hygiene of most of the other earthbenders, something he felt he couldn't really associate with. Fire Lord Zuko had also done something completely unprecedented; he opened the doors to the science , engineering and liberal arts of the former Fire Nation. With the intelligence and abilities of the two other nations working in unison with the Fire Nation's best, the former banished prince had opened a world of knowledge and jump started what was tantamount to a complete scientific and technological revolution. In what was seen by many as the final reconciliation for the actions his father, Zuko had opened the first joint-institute of higher learning in the city of Ba Sing Sei for the youth to expand their knowledge.

From an early age he had known he was able to bend the earth around him--moving pebbles and stones, trapping his older sister in some mud and running away before she could bend it back at him-- and like many of his bending friends he was placed into the special programs for his skill. When Ru had finished his schooling and compulsory year in the earthbender's division of the Earth Kingdom's forces, he was fortunate enough to be part of the first classes that attended the University of Ba Sing Sei, and above-average performance in the first rwo years granted him placement in an earthbending research area of his choice. After numerous interviews, Ru settled on the coveted work of Toph Bei Fong--the former member of the group which helped Avatar Aang restore balance—who's work involved the complicated applications of earthbending to the ever-increasing technology boom. In securing his spot in her lab, he was not prepared for two things—the inability to learn metalbending, a skill which as of yet, only Toph herself was able to call upon, and a growing disinterest in earthbending studies, as well the whole of academia.

And so, when the news of the rise of insurgencies led by a former princess began to circulate across the world compounded with his growing disinterest, Ru wasn't entirely disappointed to hear news about Toph's sabbatical. She would be on a sabbatical as she joined her former "Team Avatar" to protect what they had helped to build. At the very least, he would have more time to research the other bending disciplines. Maybe without Toph, he could sneak in one or two publications before she returned about the lesser known abilities of the bending talents. But his relief was short lived a few weeks later when a letter arrived.

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Oh yes, more .. ch 2, something about war. Actually my research advisor is now an allegory for Toph so maybe I just wrote this to be therapeutic. Lol, enjoy; or don't