"Guys."
It wasn't the single word that Katara chose to say that got the attention of the small group, but it was how she said it. Her voice was hard, a no-nonsense voice that Sokka could remember his mother using with him when he was little. It had a commanding edge to it; every face in the small camp in the Western Air Temple looked up at her expectantly.
"We ran into some old friends… the Dai Li." She said, her brown eyebrows angling downward in her concentration.
"The whoserwhatsit?" asked the Duke, pushing his helmet up out of his eyes like he frequently did.
Aang now appeared next to Katara, his new glider in his hand. "The Dai Li agents. They're from the Earth Kingdom, but Azula commands them now. They weren't hard to fight, but I think we should start packing up now."
"Aang's right." Katara said, nodding as she started to approach her bag of things.
Sokka, however, shook his head. "No. We need to face them once and for all. They'll just keep trailing us – we'll have to fight them eventually."
"Sokka," Katara began in surprise. "We need – "
"No, we should fight them now," It was Zuko who spoke now. He stood and stretched. "They won't be expecting it. We'll catch them off guard if we go now. We'll have the upper hand."
Toph stood, also stretching. "Sure. I could use a work out. I think we should fight 'em now. I don't want them following us from here to… wherever we're heading."
Katara frowned slightly, but nodded after a moment. "Alright. Everyone get your weapons – we'll need them."
It didn't take long for Katara and Aang to show the small group (though it couldn't really be called small now; their group included Zuko, Toph, Sokka, Katara, Aang, the Duke, Teo, and Haru) the black hole where the Dai Li had disappeared into.
"Here," Katara said, handing torches to a few people. Zuko and Aang lit them as Katara distributed them. "Don't worry if your torch goes out – we have Zuko and Aang to be our own personal torches."
"Glad to know I joined the group for something," Zuko muttered under his breath. "Let's go."
The eight members of the group slowly walked into the sloping black hole. It was dark, but light enough that they didn't trip over anything. The tunnel they were walking in was seemingly endless. After walking for an hour, Sokka spoke up. "How do we even know they're down here?"
"We're following a trail, Sokka," Aang explained, tossing his ball of fire from one hand to another.
Sokka scoffed, his forehead creasing. "What trail? I don't see any trail."
Katara let out a frustrated sigh before pointing in the general direction of the tunnel. "This is the trail! This tunnel didn't just form perfectly naturally."
"Oh. Right…"
It wasn't long before the tunnel widened out. The ceiling grew higher and instead of just one tunnel, three more tunnels could be seen in front of the group.
"Great. Which one do we choose?" Sokka asked flatly.
"We'll have to split up," Katara said, and started handing out more torches. "Everyone needs to have an Earthbender in their group, just in case. Zuko and I will go with Aang in the first tunnel. The Duke and Teo will go with Haru in the second tunnel. Everyone else will go with Toph in the third tunnel."
Sokka squinted, watching everyone shift to form his or her groups. He turned to see Toph standing idly by the third tunnel. "But that just leaves me and Toph."
"Sokka. Toph is the greatest Earthbender. She bends metal. I don't think you'll have to worry about anything." Aang said with a smile, handing Sokka a lit torch.
"Hey! I'm not worried!" the Water Tribe boy said, his voice cracking like it often did. He turned to Toph, grumbling under his breath as he began to trek into the third tunnel. "Thinks I'm scared… not worried… show him…"