I wrote a really funny Author's Note, but stupid automatic updates deleted it. Grr. So, don't own Avatar. Blah blah cherry popsicles blah blah rubber duck. Blah blah. Read Crookus's story. Review. Blah blah blah. That is all.
Mai threw knife after knife at a wooden post in the palace courtyard, lacking her usual deadly accuracy. With each miss, the desire to cry out in frustration grew stronger and stronger, only to be quelled by the desire to remain stoic and cynical. She was off that day. For once, she desired the ability to express her emotions and scream out in rage. Her senses were dulled by the void of oblivion in her chest, so much so that she was unable to sense the unstealthy Water Tribe warrior sneaking up behind her with a mischievous grin on his face.
"Hey there!" he said loudly once his face was about an inch from her ear. She froze and bristled.
"...Do you have a death wish?" she asked scathingly. "If not, I suggest you walk away slowly. No sudden movements, it frightens animals." She jabbed a knife in his direction.
"Jeez, someone's grumpier than usual. So what's with you?" he asked casually. "Any new... knives? Or whatever it is you do?" He leaned on the post.
"You really have issues with that lump of grey matter between your ears. Did you know that?" A low growl rose in Mai's throat. "Can't you see I'm trying to wallow in my black hole of self-pity and depression?" She turned back to her knives.
"C'mon, tell me what happened!" Sometimes Sokka's obliviousness was a virtue, but in this case, it might cause his death. Mai whirled around and strode up to him, placing a knife at his throat.
"It would be in your own best interest to leave. Now." She said it as plainly as she thought possible for Sokka to understand.
"Not until you tell me what's wrong." He crossed his arms and stared stubbornly.
"Your persistence verges on suicidal," Mai said as she collapsed on the ground in a sitting position. "You're lucky that today I lack the energy and willpower to torture you." She sighed deeply. "If you truly must know, Mister High-and-Mighty Fire Lord Zuko broke up with me this morning. Too good for the spiraling epicenter of hopelessness that is Mai." She snorted sarcastically.
"Oh, well. He wasn't good enough for you, if you ask me." Sokka nodded. "You'd do better with someone a little more faithful than that banished prince."
"Wasn't good enough for me? That indicates that you think something of me, and you think significantly better of me than you do of him. Are my deductions correct, or am I just running off my mouth?" Mai rested her chin in her palm and looked at Sokka.
"Yes, actually, I do. I don't know why, so don't ask me. You just seem like a more interesting person than Zuko. Just please don't tell him, okay?" he pleaded. He looked like a little puppy.
"You know what, I think you're flirting with me." With that, Mai did something she did very rarely.
She smiled.
Sokka stood there. Frozen. Stunned.
"Did you just... smile?" Sokka asked in amazement.
Mai's smile was still there. "Yes. So is it true? Are you flirting with me?" She squinted at him condescendingly. "Or did I just waste a smile on you?"
"Well, if, let's say, I was flirting, would you kill me?"
"No."
"Then I was flirting with you."
"Wonderful." The smile had been slowly fading, and now her face was blank once more. "Now go away. My facial muscles hurt."
Sokka rolled his eyes. "So, any chance of dinner later?"
"It depends. Would you be paying for it?"
"You're the rich one! Why do I have to pay?"
"Because I'm the knife one."
"Well I'm the boomerang one!"
"So?"
"Boomerangs are way better!" Sokka crossed his arms.
"Oh really?" Mai asked.
"Totally! You only ever need one! And it's way harder to throw a boomerang than a knife!"
"Oh really?"
"Yeah!"
Mai walked over to Sokka and yanked the boomerang from his shoulder sheath. She flicked the boomerang out toward the courtyard. Her arm stayed up, fingers spread as if to catch something. After a few moments, she waggled her fingers and looked on expectantly at the boomerang, which was lying idly on the grass. She frowned and let her arm down.
Sokka smiled smugly. "Told you."
Mai glared at him, picked up a knife, and threw it at the post she had been repeatedly missing. It stuck in the knot in the wood that she had been aiming for. She squinted triumphantly, and turned back towards Sokka, hands on her hips. "You try that, then."
Sokka did so. The knife went about three feet to the right of the post. Sokka huffed. "Fine then. It's a tie. So about dinner..."
"How about we blow off dinner and you teach me how to use that boomerang of yours?"
"Well, at least I won't have to pay for anything if we do that."
"So, it's a date?"
"Yeah."
"Good." Mai stalked off, leaving Sokka alone in the courtyard.
I just made a date to teach the deadliest girl in the palace how to use my own weapon, Sokka thought, amazed at his own idiocy. And yet I'm okay with that. Maybe there is something wrong with my grey matter. Sokka shook his head and walked back into the palace.