The sun burned my eyelids, making me want to lift them, but I wasn't dumb

The sun burned my eyelids, making me want to lift them, but I wasn't dumb. I had played the sun's games for a while now and knew it would blind my eyes. The sun was evil and vile, with fire just like the fire-nation, it could burst any moment. My head was resting on someone's shoulder, who I guessed was Aang. I could still here his calm and quiet snoring, which meant he wasn't awake as well. Sokka's snoring poured over my ears though, making me want to smack him. But I couldn't, I couldn't move from that spot. It felt so good, the light breeze and warmness of dawn. Appa's fur was soft and Aang's shoulder comfortable…

Then Sokka stopped snoring.

He yawned from what I heard, and shuffled to go look at something off the saddle. Then I heard him plop back down again, sighing. "Why am I awake first?" I didn't speak, just got closer to Aang. I heard Sokka mutter something and move again, but now I was getting curious on where he was looking. "One of you two just moved." I didn't even flinch…but Aang did. He was waking up, that was good.

"Sokka…stay quiet…" Aang mumbled, resting his head on top of mine. "The sun's barely rising-" Momentarily he stopped to yawn, but then went back to trying to fall asleep. Sokka didn't say anything again, but I could still hear him shuffling around up there. I wondered how Katara could not wake up by it.

"Come on…wake up Teiko…" When he said my name, I couldn't help but make a small groan. Hearing that made Aang groan, and the next thing you know Sokka's poking us both with a boomerang.

"Yay, you're awake!" I opened one eye and got blinded by the sun…just like I predicted.

"Sokka, go back to sleep." Aang and I spoke in unison making his eye twitch. But, it did make him stay quiet so Aang and I could fall back asleep mostly. And right as I was about to fall asleep…Appa roared. "What is it, Appa?" Aang was now opening his eyes, trying to see what Appa was complaining about. I opened my eyes as well, lightly rubbing them. Then I noticed something…there was nothing around us. "He's probably tired. We should land for a little bit." I nodded and moved my head up straight, away from Aang's shoulder. Sokka went back up to the saddle when Aang landed Appa; apparently he was fearful of falling.

"Afraid?" I asked him as Aang directed Appa towards a big enough area near a river.

"No, I just don't want to fall on you."

I snickered, "Thought so." Those words just made him blush and look away from my direction. Once landed, Aang took over waking up Katara while Sokka and I unpacked a few things. First we unpacked the cooking materials and then the food…then we were stuck. Neither of us knew how to cook. I usually survived on bread and water.

"Good morning guys." Katara said to Sokka and I, who were frustrated over the food. She sighed and sat down next to the food. "I'll make some food."

"With extra meat, please?" Sokka gave her puppy-dog eyes and she just nodded.

"Fine, fine, you two just go and do something to entertain yourselves." I looked at the ground while Sokka looked at me. I kicked a bit of dirt and Sokka kicked it back. Then Aang jumped down and placed a hand on Sokka and I shoulders. Then it was silent except for Katara's water bubbling in the background.

"Um…where are we?" Aang and Sokka shrugged. "Then where are you trying to go?"

"Well, we're trying to go the Northern Water Tribe to find a master." Aang answered, grinning. "We're going to get to learn the elements together, Teiko, including Earth and even Fire!"

"…"

He noticed the silence immediately. Sokka didn't notice though and kept on staring at the food cooking. But still he didn't pursue me to tell him, he would just ask me when we were alone. "So Katara, what kind of food are you making?"

"Aang, what type of meat did you get us yesterday?" Aang pondered on the thought, thinking back.

"Off fish, why?" She sighed and put up the moldy fish meat. "Oh, so that's what the person meant! Well I guess we're going to have to go fishing!" Katara thought on this for a moment then smiled.

"Why don't we all go fishing using water-bending, it'll be practice!" I nodded and Aang grinned. Sokka just looked at all of us and shook his head.

"Oh, sorry Sokka, you can use the fishing-pole!" Looking around on Appa's saddle, Aang searched for the fishing pole.

"That's okay Aang, I'll just watch." Sokka chose to sit down on a rock nearby, not wanting to get wet early in the morning. Aang took off Appa's saddle as Katara took off her clothes and wore what looked like a white bandage swimsuit but was really her undergarments. I just took off my top shoes and wore a burnt orange swim-suit looking top, which was really my bra. As Katara and I stepped into the cold river-water, Aang took off his shirt and shoes. From the moment I stepped into the water and faced Katara, I felt a pair of eyes on me. Cautiously, I turned around and saw Sokka picking his teeth, looking at the sky. When he saw me looking at him he just shrugged his shoulders.

"Okay, I'm ready!" Aang walked into the water, ignoring what Sokka had just done. "I think some of us should go lower in the river, to see if it leads into a pond."

"I'll go, I wouldn't mind. I've water-bended some before." Aang nodded at me with a smile, glad that I had apparently.

"I'll go with her, just incase she catches one." Sokka grabbed a bag and put it over one of his shoulders. Nodding, Aang looked me off. As I walked in the water, Sokka walked on the land, eyes never leaving me. "So when'd you learn some water-bending?"

"When I found a scroll on it…I accidentally burned it though."

"So you practice fire-bending?"

"It's more exciting than water is." I stopped walking when we reached a pond; there I kicked the water lightly.

"Hey, water is pretty exciting sometimes."

"Like you'd know being a non-bender."

"Hey, I've seen people water-bend before!" I didn't reply. I was looking for a fish. With no luck I stepped out of the pond. Even on the way there, there were no fish. "Giving up so quickly?"

"Do you see a fish in there?" Sokka snickered and removed his shoes, took off his shirt, and stepped into the water. Then he started looking for a fish…no avail.

"Okay, so this pond is stupid. We can find another on our own." I didn't comment when he left his stuff and dragged me by the wrist. It's not like we couldn't find our way back, it was a pretty big pond. After a few minutes we found another pond, this one fish swimming around in it. "See, Sokka always knows where to go.

"Right, Sokka knows everything." He frowned at my words as him and I stepped into the pond. Concentrating in a semi-peaceful way, I lifted one of the fishes out of the water with water-bending. Sokka stared at me, making me feel uncomfortable. "Sokka, stop staring and open up the bag."

"It's with my shirt." Flinching, I turned to face his lazy expression. Not letting go of the fish was hard, but I kept it going.

"Then grab the fish." I moved the water bubble with the fish in front of him. At first he looked for the angle, and then he went for it. He grabbed, it but it slipped out of his hand making him fall backwards in the pond. Thinking quickly, I water-bended water out of the pond and caught the fish. Then I made the water fly onto the land, into an open area not close to the water.

"Help me up!" Sokka let out his hands in front of him as he sat in the water. Rolling my eyes, I grasped both of his hands and tried to pull him up. When I did that, not one of us tripped, thank god. "Now, time to grab the fish!"

But when he tried to run in the pond, he pushed me over, making my legs go up and hit his legs. Gosh, I was hoping this wouldn't happen. For some reason, Sokka had to get situated on top of me before we could even react. When Sokka looked down at my rosy cheeks, I snapped back to normal. Once I was back, I quickly blew him off me with air-bending. Breathless, I stood in the water and got out. Sokka fell out of the tree I had blown him in, muttering to him. I grasped the fish as the boy with the pony-tail walked over to me. Luckily, the fish was already dead. But seeing him dead made me sad, so I threw the sea-creature at Sokka. "So you don't like dead animals."

I snapped at him, "I'm still an air-nomad!"

"Yeah I know, it's just you don't act like Aang…" Since I knew he would say something like that, I continued walking with him without saying anything. I knew we shouldn't leave our time alone in a half-argument, but it was the only thing I would let myself do. When we found our original pond and river Sokka got dressed in his clothes, and we continued on with the fish in the bag.

Sokka got out the fish and gave it to Katara once we got back to camp, still not speaking. "Looks like you guys had the better idea of a place." Katara said when we got back to camp. She was fully dressed along with Aang.

"I guess so." Sokka said as I put my shirt back on, back to everyone.

"Well that's good, we all need some protein." I snickered at her comment, now putting on my shoes.

"Teiko and I would prefer it if we just had the soup please!" Aang said joyfully, most likely grinning to her. It was easy to tell he wasn't too excited as well for killing the fish.