Due to many a request, here is a follow- up for 'One Last Chance'.
Sokka's sister had always been soft and forgiving, and in this the Avatar's spirit was kindred to hers. Therefore it should not have come as a surprise that Aang held the same penchant for collecting trays his sister did.
It also should not have come as a surprise when Aang's habit would cause even more difficulties.
.
In the middle of town they had stumbled on was a stream: Sokka waded in, dumped the prince off his back, and stepped out of the arm-chain encirclement to regard their latest charity-case.
Katara's strays had always caused problems: the sea-bear cub she had found attacked them, a snow-fox that wondered by had bitten, and the foundling snow-elephant had charged through town rampant.
Aang's newest project was all of these combined: the Fire-prince had attacked the group in their sleep! He had bitten and burned the Avatar. As for the charge-attack? It would come soon. Sokka was pretty sure Zuko was up for it, whenever he had recovered enough strength to stand.
Right now however the prince seemed content to sit in the stream, and put his hands together to drink the water.
.
Dehydrated, Sokka drank deeply as well, splashed his face, and finished to resume contemplating the best course if action.
The fire-bender stared back, through narrowed eyes, still seated, hands buried under water.
Sokka was, again, reminded of the icy pole's one truth: there was always a reason when creatures wondered aimlessly and alone.
The sea-bear cub had was disfigured at birth, abandoned; the snow-fox had been starving. As for the snow-elephant? It suffered from a disease that ate its brain, turning it slowly mad.
The water-tribesman would not hazard a guess from which of these afflictions the fire prince suffered. But if he were put on the spot, Sokka would choose: all of the above.
"Stay." he told the man, but considered the fire bender's oppositional nature; not that Sokka cared: "Or run away."
The shrug he countered with his own; and the water-tribesman turned to find his companions. Leaving the Fire prince here and making a run for it sounded just fine, right about now.
Zuko had water. Zuko could get food here. Zuko should ask the villagers to help him out of the cuffs. Zuko might even find his way home from here.
Mission complete.
But when Sokka joined the others where they stood haggling over food, one of the villagers came over to complain:
The Avatar was good. The Avatar have mercy. The Avatar could have all their food for free- if the Avatar would kindly remove their Fire Nation captive from their village's soil.
Mission failed.
Indeed, when they re-located the Fire Prince, he was already surrounded by disgruntled villagers.
A tree was burning. Angry villagers shouted. The fire bender sneered.
Yeah- Sokka shouldhave known it would not be so easy.
Katara put out the tree with an apology. Sokka set out to re-subdue their flammable captive with Toph's assistance. And Aang spent a lot of time apologizing to the people. In the end, they were allowed to stay the night, if future fires would be averted.
When morning came, breakfast was served early, equipment and rations had already been packed. The villagers kindly sent the group away by dawn's light, in an obvious hurry to be rid of them.
Sokka realized another similarity between the prince and Katara's old strays: no sane soul would relieve the gang of this burden.
That evening, Sokka offered to feed their jerk guest. - He had a much better plan than Aang's 'here comes the Fire Nation supply-boat': No, what the water-warrior did was, simply dump the prince's bowl somewhere on his vicinity and stalk off to his sleeping bag.
As expected, the prince yelled at him, complaining that he didn't want this muck they called food.
Sokka then turned back as haughtily as he could, and kindly informed their resident fire bender that the food was not meant for him, but rather for the spirit-goblins. He went on to claim the spirit-goblins were a minor deity water-tribe honored with food and warned the prince not to touch the offering.
Next day, the food was gone, and the mandatory threats Sokka made at the address of said prince-ling were met with jeers: as far as Zuko was concerned, the spirit-goblins could 'bring it on'.
Sokka's ploy went a little too well: his companions promptly put him in charge of anything to do with their angry guest. What was worse, after lunch the prince trailed their little group with a steady, even tread. And yet, the fire bender had stopped spitting and shooting fire-balls at his captor's altogether.
It made Sokka nervous.
That evening, Sokka confessed his worries to Toph. She just laughed at him, and told him that the last time the prince had decided to kill Sokka in his sleep, the preparation had taken over three hours, and his dilly-dallying had left the earth-bender sleep deprived. Sokka thanked the girl for giving him whole new nightmares.
And yet, when the tribal warrior's head hit the pillow that night, he was out like a light.
"I swear on my honor, I will not attack any earth-citizens, unless they attack or threaten me first."
The prince stood planted firmly to the ground, broad legged and chin up. The damn chain thrust downward like some kind of badge of honor.
Aang did a little twirl of glee.
"Well! That's settled then, let's release him and be on our way…"
Not so fast…
It was the man's tone that stopped Sokka short; made him reconsidered. And really look at the man.
The water-tribesman supposed it was a small miracle that prince had had the sense to not wear his full armor into the desert. Still, there was very little chance of any earth-kingdom citizen not attacking the prince on first sight: in those bright red robes and his with that royal swagger.
"You'll need a disguise, jerk-bender; something in earthen greens. And the top-knot's got to go."
If possible, their fiery guest puffed up even further, answering as if he had expected his: "Unacceptable."
When Aang's face fell, and he started to complain he would never understand any of them, both the water-tribe and the fire-nation warriors rolled their eyes.
Things got no better as got closer to Ba Sing Se: the city where they hoped to find Appa.
At one of the bigger towns, they tried to ask the sheriff to hold on to their fire bender until they were safely away, and then let him go. The man agreed easily enough, and Aang had as usual been pleased by another's helpfulness. But then, Sokka's conscience had made him ask if the sheriff perhaps meant to release the prince off over a cliff.
After an awkward pause, the sheriff had denied that, but not even Aang had been convinced.
Then, only days from Ba Sing Se, they ran into a small earth-army patrol.
The Commander had been thrilled to meet the Avatar in person, and assured them that if flying bison indeed existed, they would be found on Ba Sing Se's bazaar markets. After that, he had suggested his army could relieve them of their prisoner.
Aang had again explained they did not mean to keep their guest detained, but the commander had assured them he was their best bet: His patrol could work wonders with its personal fire-bender at their disposal.
This time Sokka tried to explain that this fire bender was not likely to cooperate with Earth Kingdom armies, but again their objections were met as irrelevant:
The commander would take extra care of their prince; the commander had his own pair of Dai Li at his command: skillful, careful men. Not like those butchers down under the city. They liked to say Fire-Nation soldiers were like tempered metal: hard, and if broken, shattered beyond use. But the commander was a caring man, and this fire-bender was young yet…
In the end, the group had resorted to sulky silence, while Aang alternatively smiled politely or nodded worriedly.
No one complained when Sokka woke their group in the middle of the night to make themselves scares. Not even when they had to knock out the two guards the commander had set on the jerk-bender, and not when they needed to free him from a fresh set of chains.
Even the prince seemed relieved to be taken out of there; at least he took extra care to be far, far away, before he turned to Toph and insulted her nation in a colorful language.
The girl just shrugged: "Hey, don't lug me with those losers. I have my own standards."
The endeavor did serve to turn them away from the city for now; for no one believed it would be fair to take the fire bender into the city after this. In hindsight, Sokka realized they might have discussed their new direction with Prince Ponytail first though.
Still, four days later the prince was still trailing on their little group. Though, in the mornings the prince looked like he was miserably caught doing something obscene. - Which, in a way, Sokka thought he was. Perhaps it had also occurred to their hot-headed guest that he would not live long if he ventured away from the Avatar's company this deep within enemy country.
This was why the gang had taken this detour; to at least give the fire bender a chance at survival. Yet, when Sokka took a step to the side to gesture at the village beyond, the prince took up a decidedly defensive stance. It was odd, but Sokka kept his voice neutral as he explained:
"That there is a fire-nation colony. I'm sure they'll find you a way home. Keep walking, jerk-bender; this is goodbye."
He got a sneer for answer: "If you wanted to take me home, you should have taken me back to Uncle and my ship."
None of the gang understood that, not even Sokka. The reaction had him worried though. "Well, none of us are looking forward to walking through that desert again, so you'll just have to find some other means of transportation."
When the prince still didn't move, he tried: "do we need to borrow you some money or something?"
"That's Fire Nation soil."
"Yes…?" that had been the main reason for coming here.
"I can't go there."
Sokka arched a tired eyebrow. "Care to elaborate on that?"
But it was clear from the prince's stance that he did not: the low crouch suggested he'd fight them sooner. It was the first time in days Sokka thought it might have been a bad idea to release him from the manacles.
Toph saved the situation, in her usual way. "Bored now." she uttered with a yawn. "Let's try slides instead."
The firebender uttered a growl when the ground under him started carrying him towards town. Instead of giving in however, he turned and started to running back to them. There were flames in his fists, and one worried moment Sokka thought the man would shoot their blind earth-bender down.
Then Sokka understood why Toph provided such an easy, unworried target; standing there picking at her ear at complete ease. There was no honorable way of attacking her. She had not, after all, even initiated an attack; she was only moving the ground.
It still took several minutes and an increase of ground to near break-neck speed before the jerk-bender relented:
"Stop." Their trouble-making guest huffed. "They'll –stone me."
The ground slowed, but did not quite stop it. "Excuse me?"
"I'm banished. From Fire Nation soil. I go in there, they'll stone me."
Toph paled, and her slide disappeared. The prince stood panting a while, hands on knees.
As disgusting as the concept was, Sokka could not help but ask: "So, your lordship, is there any place where we can take you where they won't just be happy to kill you?"
The man gave a half-hearted growl: "I told you, my Uncle. And my ship."
"Terrific."
And Sokka was, again, reminded of the biggest problem he'd always had with strays: nobody wanted them.
Nobody at all. – they would never be rid of this man.
Yeah; this time I tried something else: keeping with a rhythm. The first part I kept pretty rigidly to it, later on I let it go.
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