As always I still do not own Avatar
A New Beginning
Chapter 2: The Return
"Ok," said Aang "so how do we get captured?"
"Um, Aang…" Sokka said reluctantly, "You're not coming"
"Why not?"
"Because you're exactly what they want! If you get captured, they'll take you and kill the rest of the prisoners."
Aang sighed, "Fine…What's the plan though?"
"I'm going to walk into town dressed in my water tribe outfit and just make it blindingly obvious that I'm, well, me! Then all you have to do is follow me at a safe distance."
"Well that shouldn't be too hard," said Aang, "I've gotten pretty good at hiding over the past 5 years; but why do you need me to follow you?"
"In case I can't figure a way to bust everyone out I'm going to need someone to save our asses!"
Aang smiled, "Sounds good! Just like the good old days."
They arrived at the town that Sokka predicted the rebels would pass through that night. They found a tree where you could see the entire town from and looked down from the limbs at the town. Aang peered at the bustling market place and cheerful townspeople with a worried expression on his face, "Will they ransack this town?"
"Nah," Sokka replied, "They pillage and plunder only when they're desperate for supplies, and they just hit one a couple of days ago.
"Good." Said Aang somewhat relieved. So Sokka left Aang and strode into the village; Aang watched his progress from high in the tree; Sokka was dressed in his Water tribe garb and had put his almost grown back hair into the usual wolf's tail. They were counting on the fact that the resistance would send a few people on ahead of the main body to see if there was going to be any trouble when the main body arrived. So Sokka strode through the village, just being generally loud and obnoxious and trying to attract as much attention as he possibly could; he carried his sword and boomerang with him so people could tell who he was. At night he found a room at an inn and pretended to be asleep. As Aang watched, six people dressed all in black detached themselves from the forest and snuck into the inn where Sokka was staying. When they came out, they were carrying a large black bag, and one of the guys was carrying Sokka's Sword and boomerang. Aang now dressed in dark green followed at a distance.
The first thing Sokka felt as he came to was something wet being dragged across his face; he opened his eyes and saw Suki wiping his forehead with a damp cloth, with worry etched on her beautiful but rather dirty face. "Oh Sokka, you're awake! I was so worried!" she exclaimed hugging him.
"Ouch! Watch the head! Watch the head! I've got a lump up there the size of Zuko's ego, thanks to these guys hitting me on the head." Sokka sat up and looked around; he noticed that they were located in what seemed to be a cave; but the weird thing was that there didn't appear to be any way in or out aside from a few air holes the size of a large coin.
"Why did you have to get captured Sokka? I heard the guards talking; they said that you were strutting around town making yourself obvious. I thought you were smarter than that…"
"I am!" replied Sokka, "I just got careless."
"And where have you been for the past two months?"
"Um," he said debating whether to tell her or not, for fear that someone was listening, "Ah, the hell with it, I was looking for Aang."
Suki raised her eyebrows somewhat skeptically "And…did you find him?"
"Nah," Sokka said, "He hid himself too well; but do you remember that Airheaded kid that we met a long time ago? You know, the one that always had me flying off the handle? Well he was following me around before I got captured." He said hoping Suki would get that he was talking about Aang.
She looked at him like he was insane for a second, then she got it, "Oh yeah, that kid was really annoying; too bad you didn't find Aang."
"Yeah," Sokka said.
"So where are we?" he asked.
"We're underground," Suki answered, "That's how they travel, in order to avoid detection."
"That's why we couldn't find any trace of you guys. So how are they treating you?"
"Well, the others often get interrogated, rather roughly, and sometimes they just beat them to amuse themselves. But they aren't too rough with me." She said patting her partially swollen belly. A/N: (She's pregnant if I forgot to mention that)
"That's good; where are the others?"
"Well, they took Zuko away for interrogation a couple hours ago, they keep trying to get us to reveal the Avatar's location even though we don't know; but Toph is right over there," she said pointing towards the center of the room.
Sokka looked and noticed for the first time that there was a wooden structure there; it was a wooden crate raised up off the floor with stilts. He could see Toph lying on the bottom of the crate. "Toph?" he called. She raised a hand in greeting and groaned with the effort and lay still again.
"They beat her almost every chance they get; they're still mad from when they tried to capture her, she and her students killed 10 of their people; so they blame her."
"Spirits, that's awful!" said Sokka "has anyone escaped?"
"A few of Toph's students tried, back when we were first captured, but they were killed to discourage anyone else from trying. They threatened to kill all of Toph's students if she tried to escape, and they threatened me with the deaths of the Kyoshi warriors; so we haven't tried. Not that either of us is in any shape to go anywhere."
"Do you know how many people they have hostage here?"
"No, they keep us separate from the rest of the prisoners. I know they force Toph's students to dig and erase these tunnels when we move but I don't know about the Kyoshi…" she said almost tearing up. Just then a square on one wall of the cave whooshed open and Zuko was thrown through it head first. He looked beaten up and bloody; he groaned as Sokka and Suki helped him over to where they were sitting. Suddenly Zuko noticed who was helping him, "Damn it! They got you too?" Zuko held his head in his hands. "I hope you found him…" he said asking about Aang. Sokka repeated the same thing he had told Suki and Zuko got it almost right away. "Ah, said Zuko, that's too bad.
Suddenly the door swooshed down again and guards entered, grabbed Sokka, and dragged him out of the cell, "Ow! Hey! I can walk you know!" said Sokka indignantly. They took him al the way to the other end of the tunnel and plopped him down in a chair, tied his arms and legs to it and stepped back. Suddenly a wall sprang up in front of them, leaving Sokka in pitch blackness. Suddenly a voice spoke "So… You're the famous Sokka; Chief of the Southern Water Tribe, best friend of the Avatar,"
"Who are you?" Sokka yelled.
"I'm not surprised you don't recognize me; we only met in person once. But I'm still a little insulted... How about now?"
An oil lamp flared to life in front of Sokka, and his jaw almost hit the ground; standing beforehim, with an evil grin on his face, was Ex-admiral Zhao.
Sorry to bring back the dead, but I realized that I had killed off the villain I wanted to use; don't worry I'll have a good explanation for him being alive!
In the meantime please review! I always like input from people who read my stuff.
