The Misfit Princess

The merfolk kingdom bore neither marker, nor flag, for it was the dominant empire if the sea. It needed no symbol to represent its glory. However, if there was such a symbol, it would be the Trident. A powerful tool forged by the great spirits containing the essences of all four elements, earth, wind, fire, and air. Through it, a wielder could channel all the elements within and bend them to their whim.

It was this mighty weapon that was passed among the royalty of the merfolk kingdom. It was their weapon of justice, that if ever passed to the wrong hands could mean the end of all. Queen Kya was the current guardian of this powerful creation, using it wisely. The Trident though, was not hers to bear.

The Trident had belonged to her mate, King Hakoda, long ago, until he had been mysteriously struck down. It was then that Kya would take possession of the Trident until the day she was succeeded by her oldest son, Sokka. Until that day, she would spend her days in the palace attending to royal duties. Today though, was a special day.

Today was the day of a grand celebration. The Starlight Festival was the name. It was the time when the stars shone so bright in the sky that they would create the most wonderful beams in the water. It was a time celebrated by all merfolk, young and old and hailed as the most beautiful thing in existence.

Before the Starlight Festival there was to be a grand concert to start it off. Queen Kya had staged for it to be in the main hall of her coral palace. She had hoped that it would signal great things to come and mark glory to her kingdom. However, something happened that she hadn't expected.

It was in the confines of the palace that conflict was brewing. Screaming could be heard erupting from the rehearsal room where the daughters of Kya were getting some last minute practice for the concert. However, there was a slight problem.

"WHY! WHY! WHY! WHY!", screamed a young darkened merman as he crashed his head to a pillar.

He was very upset right now because things were not going the way he wanted them to. This was understandable, as he was Sokka, son of Kya, and the royal composer. He always loved to create innovation, but what he loved the most was to create music.

He always grabbed at a chance to display his skills, whether it was politics or music. These opportunities came rarely though, despite his desperation. However, the times he did get to perform were very good. The problem though, is they could only be, "very good", this was due to his younger sister Katara.

She almost never showed up to rehearsals, which often left her stuttering during performances. She had an incredible voice though, and Sokka knew that to write her out was folly. To compensate for this forgetfulness he often let her perform vocalized, but that didn't stop her from missing performances which was more frequent than Sokka cared for.

Today was a very big day for him though. This concert was being performed to the entire kingdom, and expectations were high. The problem though, was that Katara wasn't in the palace, and she was the soloist.

"Why am I cursed to have a sister who not only fails to arrives to rehearsals but also fails to arrive on the biggest day of my bloody career? It doesn't help that she's the soloist!"

"Sokka you should try to calm down.", spoke one of his sisters.

"Calm down? How can I calm down? Now we have to cancel the concert! I am going to be considered a laughing stock for being unable to control one girl! Not to mention how mom will react when she finds that Katara is missing!"

A voice came from the doorway. "Katara is missing?"

The voice belonged to Queen Kya. She was a slender mermaid with a very tender but strong complexion. She was the vision of serenity and sternness. Her hair was short, in the normal fashion of many merfolk, so as not to get in the way of her vision.

She ruled with a steady hand, and a compassionate heart. She loved her subjects, and treated them well. Often aiming to balance her policies so as to please everyone. This method was very strenuous on her and had built up mass anxiety. She was prone to over-reacting to many situations, mostly those involving Katara. Recently however, she has done her best to mellow herself out and reason with her daughter. The results of this are a tad varied though.

Beside her was her faithful bodyguard, Match. He was the only one there with a pair of two legs and the ability to breathe without gills. He had short, raven-like hair, and a pair of dark glasses on his face.

He never spoke of where he had come from or why he had come to the kingdom. All he ever told people was that he was not human. This was a little hard to believe at first, because of his pale skin, but when he displayed the inane ability of generating mass amounts of heat and the visage under his glasses, most skepticism died away.

He stood by Kya as a counselor and a friend. No one knew why they were so friendly to one another, but some would say it was because of something that let them relate to one another.

Right now, Kya was about ready to faint, and Match was ready to catch her. She had not anticipated that such disaster could strike, but in all honesty it should've been a tad obvious.

Katara was nowhere to be found in the kingdom. She had left the borders a few hours back on an expedition of hers that started out as only an exercise until blowing up into a full on treasure hunt. She was not hunting for gold and jewels though; rather, young Katara was searching for human objects.

Katara was a dark skinned mermaid of 18 years of age. Her hair was long and beautiful, and her eyes glimmered like the ocean blue. She was kindhearted to others, and always there to offer a helping hand.

One of her greatest traits however, was her waterbending. She was an adept at the practice, and knew how to work with her skills.

Katara had always been fascinated with humans ever since she was a little girl. Less than humans though, was that Katara loved adventures. She always enjoyed the idea of exploring new things and seeing new places. Humans were another adventure to her, and probably the most mysterious one.

So whenever Katara got the chance, she would search the seas to find human objects, using her waterbending skills to help her, and today happened to be one of her expeditions.

She had just arrived in a ship graveyard bordering her kingdom with her three companions, Toph, Suki, and Lan.

Toph was the youngest of the group, but probably the most rash. Her skin was as pale as the moon, and her fins emerald green. She wore her hair in a bob, that she decorated with a plain headband.

She was very snarky and egotistical of her skills. This was because she was a master earthbender, a task that was not easily accomplished underwater. What's more was that she was born blind, making her ascension to a master earthbender all the more impressive.

Despite being blind, Toph was able to traverse the ocean like any normal merperson. This was because of her ability to ability to listen and feel for ripples in the ocean currents. Recently she had learned how to recognize certain ripples after dedicating herself to practicing.

Toph had been a good friend to Katara, and enjoyed adventuring with her. What she didn't like though, was that Katara sometimes treated her more like a child. Of course, that attitude eventually died with time, but always managed to linger around, much to Toph's chagrin.

Lan never revealed his age, but was a very tall man. He had pale skin and short blond hair. His face sported a ridiculous square nose that led to him being the butt of many jokes, (much to his ire).

He was appointed as Katara's bodyguard by Kya when Katara was in her early teens. Though he appreciated Katara as a friend he often found himself lagging behind, being that he was not a good swimmer. He did his best to keep her under control, but often went along with her on her adventures out of curiosity.

He was Match's brother and a very adept fighter. When underwater, a lot of his skills were lacking though. He could gather around electricity and bend it to his will, but because it was water he had to do extra work so that his electricity didn't spread out and hurt others. Still, he had grown very accomplished with fighting underwater after a few years of practice.

Despite these glaring weaknesses, Katara let Lan tag along, never shrugging him away or avoiding him. He was generally harmless anyways since he never reported anything bad to her mother. Still, he did worry for Katara a lot of times, and worried about the consequences that would befall him if something happened to her.

Suki was a youthful mermaid of 21. She had tanned skin and a very developed body. Her hair was short and brown, with a small bun to the back.

Now Suki has known Katara since she was just a baby. At that time she was still a trainee with the Kyoshi warriors. As time passed, Suki found herself interacting with Katara more and more, taking an older sister role. Now she was the Captain of the Kyoshi warriors.

The Kyoshi were an elite group of fighters dedicated to serving the crown of the merfolk kingdom. This granted them special privileges with whom they could interact with.

Their fighting style mostly dealt with hand to hand combat that utilized their entire bodies to fight. They took advantage of the freedom of water to reach high extents with their movements.

Suki was the captain because of her elite skills and incredible physical prowess. This also made her very ideal when dealing with Katara's adventures as she served as the strong arm of the group. However, that role had fallen when Lan joined and Toph began to develop her earthbending.

Katara had invited them all on this adventure earlier this week, and they all happily accepted. Of course, they had all forgotten that the concert was today, but the memory constantly nagged at them. They disregarded it though, concentrating on the prize.

Katara was holding onto the mast of a ship, looking out to the distance to see if she could spot a point of interest. Suki and Toph followed quickly after.

"Hold it Katara!" They turned around to find Lan struggling to swim over to them.

"Come on Lan, hurry up." cried Toph.

"Stuff it Toph," gasped Lan as he struggled. "I am not as good a swimmer as you three."

"Well then why did you come?"

"Because I am forced to or else I get a nasty scolding for not doing my job"

"Stop arguing you two and look," said Katara. "There it is!"

She pointed to a ship in the distance. She had been waiting for a new one to fall down in the ship graveyard for some time now. All the others had been explored prior to today and this one had only recently landed down there. This discovery had led Katara to become so enamored that she had completely forgotten that the concert was today.

Katara led the way towards the wreck while the others trailed behind her. They had elected that Toph and Suki would go inside with Katara, while Lan would stay outside to watch for sharks.

They found many open portholes that they could fit through. Each one was large enough for the girls to fit through, except for Suki. She was larger than both Katara and Toph, causing her to be wedged inside. Thanks to the pushing and pulling strength of the others though, she managed to make it inside with little trouble.

Once inside, the girls took to exploring the wreck. It appeared to have been sound internally, with little to no damage on the upper decks. Bodies were littered around the ship, bloated and expressionless. None of these sights disturbed the mermaids though; dead humans were common on their many expeditions.

Katara and Suki were searching feverously for any interesting human objects to collect, while Toph simply floated in place. Though she would help with expeditions, Toph was never fond of the collecting bit considering that she couldn't see the objects. However, Toph would often help in finding places that the girls couldn't normally reach thanks to her Earthbending skills. Since she was also able to bend metal -a task only a blind individual could accomplish- she could open ways that could be blocked.

These skills came in handy when the girls needed to reach the second floor of the ship. With a simple flick of her finger on the wall, Toph managed to cave in a hole in the ceiling.

"Great job Toph!" Katara cheered eagerly.

"Yes, you can shower me in praise later my adoring fans." Toph puffed up her chest with pride.

Suki grunted to herself and looked away from them. Little did those mermaids realize, that danger was not far ahead.

This area was known for its populace of sharks, one shark -Glut was his name- was happening to pass by the area, searching for his quickest meal. Glut had managed to overhear the laughing coming from the inside of one of the ships in the graveyard and had decided to investigate. Once he had gotten close enough to the ship, he was able to determine that there were three people inside the ship. Whether they were merfolk or not was no concern of his, he ate anything he could bite as long as it didn't threaten him.

As Glut maneuvered around the boat for a way inside, he managed to catch glimpse of Lan struggling to keep afloat in his area. Glut intended to eat him, but quickly decided not to. He was getting terrible vibes from Lan and did not feel as if it was worth the risk to challenge him. So he shifted his way past Lan -making sure to be unnoticed- and to the voices from inside the boat, eagerly licking his lips.

Back in the ship, Katara and the others had reached the second floor where the captain's quarters were. It was a room that seemed relatively untouched by damages with only some broken furniture and a cracked window. There Katara saw something that really caught her eye. It was a fork, shining in the midst of a wrecked table.

"Oh wow," said Katara with a gasp as she picked up the fork. "Have you ever seen anything so wonderful in your life?"

Suki swam up and examined the fork with a grin that progressed to a confused frown. "That's great Katara, but what is it?"

"I don't know, but I bet Aang and Jet will." Katara then stuffed the fork into a bag she carried.

"I thought it looked perfect." Toph's little joke had both Suki and Katara giggling at the silliness.

They then took to exploring the rest of the room. Katara had found a pipe hidden under a broken desk and took to examining it with Suki. Toph simply wandered around the room with a bored expression, until she suddenly went straight. She felt as if something was wrong; there were extra ripples in the water coming from the area with the window. She swam over and began to see if she could sense where the ripples were coming from.

A large shape slowly moved upwards from the bottom of the window, but Toph couldn't tell what it was. She concentrated a little more and noticed that the ripples changed again. The shape was now moving one part of its body the same way a mouth would move.

Toph took a very wild guess of what the thing was and proceeded to swim out of the way. "Suki! Katara! Shark! Swim for it!"

Toph was correct with her guess, managing to avoid Glut's incoming mouth. He broke through the window and gave chase. Suki and Katara were shocked and did their best to swim away. Glut chased them around the quarters and made sure to block any of the exits using his incredible bulk.

Katara had attempted to use her Waterbending to swipe Glut away, but his speed deterred her from building up any powerful strikes leaving the girls trapped by the behemoth. Suki then noticed a rusted Ruan on the floor and grabbed it. When Glut made another charge at the girls she quickly threw the Ruan in the way of his incoming bite. This drastic trick worked; Glut bit down on the Ruan too fast and nearly choked on it.

Because of this distraction, the girls were able to make a quick escape from the quarters and back onto the deck. Glut wasn't about to let them get away that easily however. He used his girth to break through the metal floors and catch up to them. He nearly caught Suki in his mouth with this trick, but Katara and Toph pulled her back quickly enough to get her away. The girls then made way for the portholes where they came from, wondering why Lan wasn't helping.

Lan was not unaware of everything going on in the ship; he heard the girls' screams, but was unsure of what to do. He didn't know whether to go in and help the girls or wait for them to come outside. If he went inside the girls could be on their way out, but if he stayed outside it might've been too late for the them.

Thankfully, his procrastination had caused him to catch them trying to escape the ship. Suki had suddenly appeared beside him stuck in the porthole again. Not waiting for a request, Lan quickly helped pull Suki out. Soon Toph and Katara followed while Lan stayed behind to see where the shark would exit the ship.

As it so happened, Glut was powerful enough to break through the walls as well, and easily broke through the porthole only missing Lan because he was moving too fast to see him.

Lan managed to catch Glut by the tail before he could get away, but he soon found himself being dragged by the hulk. Glut didn't notice this though as he was so focused on his prey that he didn't have time to pay attention to anything else. This left Lan pretty much helpless as the speed Glut was moving was too fast for him to concentrate on using his powers.

As the girls swam for their lives, Toph noticed another ripple in the way that caught her attention. It was one similar to that of an underwater cliff, and if she was right then she had an idea.

"Katara, Suki! Do you guys see any cliffs below us?"

They girls looked down, but Suki was the first to answer. "Yes Toph, there'sone just below us!"

"Perfect! Follow me!"

Toph made a quick dive for the area where she was sure the cliff was and Katara and Suki followed after. Glut made a sharp turn to the right and down, with Lan holding on for dear life at this point.

Once at the cliff, Toph moved toward the side and put her hand on the chunk of rock. She then motioned Suki and Katara to come to her.

They were both nervous with Toph's decision, but were willing to trust her. They swam to her and waited for whatever would come next.

Toph then floated perfectly still, waiting for Glut to arrive. It took some effort for Glut to get back upright, but he managed it and made a mad charge towards the girls. He was now at top speed and ready to pounce.

Toph simply waited there motionless while Suki and Katara closed their eyes, waiting for the end. When Glut just a few inches away, Toph quickly moved her arms and fins in strict motions, bending a wall of earth in front of them. Needless to say, this worked, as Glut was moving too fast to stop himself, causing him to crash into the wall face first. He then floated downwards, now unconscious and with a broken set of teeth.

"Toph that was great!" Katara gave her a big hug; feeding her ego.

Even Suki couldn't help but be thankful. "Good job Toph."

Toph smiled as she absorbed the praise. "I know, I know, I am the greatest."

Suddenly, a squeak came from the other side of the wall. "A little help here please..."

The girls slowly moved to the other side to see Lan. He had slammed into the wall as well, getting his nose planted on the inside. The girls couldn't help but laugh at this silly sight but quickly pulled Lan out of the wall. He was very grateful for this and apologized for his carelessness.

Katara, being the kind soul she was, simply said, "It's alright Lan. What's important is that we're now safe. Come on guys, let's go show our treasures to Aang and Jet."

And with that, Katara and the others took to the surface, to have her new treasures indentified by the most knowledgeable people she knew.

Thanks for watching folks; stay tuned next Friday for the second chapter! :)