Chapter 3: News-

Months passed for Toph, each day seemed like years. After two months she had convinced her father to let her join the army. With her mother's pleas he finally agreed. Now everyday Toph would leave the mansion in the morning to go train the other soldiers, and return home after sundown. Her mother would prepare her food to be ready when she came home, because her father said to have her starve if she was not home for dinner when her father called everyone to the table. Toph would spend all day training new troops, then come back home to her prison cell for the night. She cherished the time she spent away from the walls of her parents estate. Takeo had left a week after the first night he had appeared in her room. What he had told her parents is that he had some important business to attend to, what he told Toph was that he was looking for Aang, so he could kill him. Every time he was home he would constantly ask Toph if she knew where the young Avatar was. Each and every time Toph denied that she knew anything. Takeo knew that this was not the truth and that she was obviously hiding something, but Toph took his beating instead of telling him that Aang was at the south pole with Katara. She would not betray her friends, even at her own expense. She wished more than anything that she could send a letter to them, to beg for help, to be rescued. But she had yet to find a way.

Now there was another cause for pain in her life. Toph was returning home from the doctor that the army provided. She had went then in search for an answer to why she had been sick every morning for the past two months. The doctor had done several simple tests on her, from asking questions about diet to blood tests. Only one test gave the answer, an answer that Toph had not expected at all. She was almost four months pregnant, and in five months she would be a mother. A mother? This was something she was definitely not ready for. She had no clue how to be a mother, and now she only had five months to learn everything about raising a baby? And Takeo would be the father? That thought haunted her, what kind of father would Takeo be to a child. He already proved to be a terrible husband, how would he treat a child? He was only home for a few days every month, and those days were torture for Toph, being beat and raped every night and having to put on a strong act for her parents during the day. He had yet to come this month, but the month would end in the next week, so he would come soon if he kept to his usual pattern. She would have to tell him the news soon.

It wasn't long before she was back at her house, but instead of going inside to confront her parents right away, Toph quietly walked around the large yard to the bridge that only a few months ago Aang had convinced her to come with them on their journey. The journey that changed her life, that ended the war. She didn't feel like going to work that day, which was a shocker, usually she would do anything to get out of her house, and the easiest way was work. But not today, she just didn't feel like it. She would have to go inside and tell her parents the news. Spirits, how would they take this? She was only twelve years old and now she was pregnant. Her father would be infuriated. She said and rubbed her head and seat down on the railing of the bridge, swinging her feet a little. She would tell her parents and then go into her room and sleep the day away. If Takeo came that night then she would tell him as well. Hopefully, his heart would change hearing that he would be a father, and the beatings would stop. Part of her knew that the chances of this were near impossible, but there could always be hope. That was one of the things that Katara had taught her. If he beat her it might hurt her baby, their baby. It was his child after all. All her ever talked about when he was home was finding his brother and having kids. He wanted all his children to be airbenders, he wanted to single-handedly rebuild the air nomads. This is why he raped her every time he was home. She always closed her eyes and tried to block everything out when that happened. Finally what he wanted was a reality and she was pregnant. If she did not get away from him she was afraid she would be forced to have a child every chance Takeo had. It wasn't like her parents didn't have enough money to help raise a lot of grandchildren.

After all those thoughts Toph sighed and looked around the yard. It was early fall and the leaves were beginning to change color and fall to the ground. A soft breeze rustled the leaved, bringing the soft sound to the blind girl's ears. She had always loved the sound of the wind blowing through the trees, it was like music to her. The sound made her feel like everything was alright and that there was peace in the world. But there was no peace in here for her. After a few minutes she opened her eyes and sighed, then got off the bridge and headed to her parent's parlor. They would be in there for sure. It was wear they always sat day in and day out. Once she got to the room she took a deep breath and slowly walked in. As soon as her parents heard the door open their eyes fixed upon their daughter as she walked in. Toph didn't look up, just kept her head hung low knowing that there would be yelling within the next few minutes.

"Toph, is everything okay? You're home early." Her mother asked, standing up from her seat. Her father just watched his daughter, waiting for her to answer her mother. Toph took a deep breath, not looking up from her feet. "I went to the doctor today," She said before she paused. Her mother swooped in and went over to her daughter, checking her over for broken bones or cuts. "The doctor? Are you alright?" Her mother asked. Toph turned her head slightly at her mother, then shook her head slightly. "There's some news, I don't know how to say this to you." Toph mumbled. Her mother looked at her worried, her father's look was more intrigued. Toph lifted her head to look towards her father, her hand almost instinctively moving to her stomach. She could feel the bulge where the baby was growing inside of her.

"I'm pregnant." She whispered, her mother's eyes widened. Her father had not heard, and he cupped a hand over his ear. "What was that Toph?" He asked. Toph took a shaky breath and spoke at her normal tone, her voice shaking with a small fear of what her father's next words would be. "I'm pregnant." Her father smirked hearing the words and stood up. "Well, that's good news, very good news." He said, leaving Toph flabbergasted. Her father wasn't yelling at her? He thought this was a good thing? Who was this man and what had he done with her real father? "You think this is good news?" She asked weakly. Her father nodded and chuckled some as he settled back into his seat.

"You don't think that I let you take that job of yours because I wanted to. I wanted you to be happy for a few months. Of course this is good news. I wanted this to happen. I saw your mother in you, your wanting to be free, it's just like your mother was. But pregnancy and motherhood changes a woman like nothing else." He explained. Poppi gave her husband a sharp look before he continued. "The next year or so you'll change in a way that in the end, you won't believe how you act now. You'll be raising a child. You won't be able to just leave, because you'll have to find a way to keep the baby as well as yourself alive out there. You won't be able to leave it alone to go off to your job, and we both know that Takeo won't be around to watch his child. It will be all your responsibility. And you'll learn how to be a proper mother.

Toph stared at her father in astonishment. Her father had planned all of this just to get her to be a good daughter? He had planned for this to happen to her? To force her into a marriage, to let her husband run off whenever he wanted to on his stupid quest then come home and abuse and rape her constantly? How could any person be that evil? He was her father he was supposed to help her grow up to be a good woman but this was not the right way at all! "You set this all up! How could you?" She raged, her fathers expression never changed.

"Because it was the only way to get a terrible child like you to learn." He smirked, knowing he had won. Toph glared at him, wanting to knock him down and beat him like Takeo had done to her. But she couldn't. She knew that the guards would stop her. She felt disconnected from the earth with the carpeted floor. She felt some vibrations, but it was like sand, fuzzy and harder to bend. With ten guards standing around the room she would have no chance to get at her father before she was stopped. She just turned and ran running out of the room, heading outside to the courtyard to get away from him. Once she was back outside the earth cracked with each step as her bending exploded her frustration into the earth.

Meanwhile, Takeo sat in Toph's room, sitting on the bed in a traditional air nomad meditation position, calming his anger at another month of failure on his quest to find his brother. His body may have been sitting in the present, in a time of reconstruction, but his mind was in the past. He remembered when he was a young boy.

Takeo had gone to the Eastern Air Temple on his eighth birthday. It was tradition for a young air nomad to choose a sky bison at the age of eight. So the night before his guardian, Monk Yochang had him pack for the journey from the Northern temple to the Eastern. The next morning they had left before sunrise and made it to the eastern temple just before high noon. This was Takeo's first time out of his home temple, and he was excited to see the differences of the new temple, and seeing all the new faces. Yochang quickly recognized an old friend of his, Monk Gyatzo, and he smiled and walked over beside him. Takeo walked through the large crowd of young monks who were waiting to get an apple to feed to the young bison. He stopped beside another young monk that looked exactly like him. The boy looked at Takeo and mirrored his expression of confusion. "Who are you?" The boy asked Takeo, his voice the same as his. Takeo looked over the boy again. "I'm Takeo, who are you?" The boy smiled wide. "I'm Aang." Takeo smiled weakly to be polite, but he was still confused as to why this monk he had never seen before looked just like him. Takeo glanced back at his mentor, to see that he was happily talking to another monk and a female who was wearing air nomad clothing, but did not bear the air nomad tattoos.

After Takeo and Aang had both gotten a bison they were playing happily when Monk Yochang and the woman Takeo had seen with him earlier came over. "Takeo, Aang, can we talk to you?" Monk Yochang asked. Takeo and Aang looked at each other confused but then nodded at Monk Yochang and followed him as he went into one of the empty rooms of the temple. As soon as the door to the room had been closed the woman ran over and hugged the two boys. "My sons!" She exclaimed. Both of the boys were confused, looking at Yochang for an answer. Yochang smiled and looked at the two. "Takeo, Aang. This is your mother." He smiled and looked at the woman. Both of the boys were greatly confused, but they smiled wide and hugged their mother tight. Yochang and Kyana then proceeded to tell them how they were both their children. That Yochang and Kyana's love was forbidden, because Kyana was from the Northern Water Tribe and Yochang was a head air nomad. The boys listened intently, Takeo standing by his guardian and father, as Aang clung to his mother. But when Yochang told them that they would have to go back into their normal lives and act like nothing had happened in the room, both of them protested. "I want to stay with mom!" Aang whined, tightening his hold on his mother's shirt. Yochang explained that the boys had to stay where they were, because one of them would have a very important job to do in the future.

While Yochang was still explaining, a group of monks came in and yelled at him, throwing back the warnings they had given him when the twin boys were separated from their mother and each other in the first place. "You were only given guardianship of Takeo because you gave up your right to be married and swore that you would never see this woman again!" One of the monks shouted at Yochang. Yochang knew he was trapped. He had broken his vow and now he was going to loose the only piece of his family he had left, he was going to loose Takeo. Three of the other monks had already dragged Aang out of the room, and started to tell him that he could never speak about what happened in that room and never see any of those people again. Yochang stood protectively in front of his other son and wife, knowing that they were trapped. Takeo could not just go to another monk, he like his brother that was destined to be the Avatar, was special, and needed to be in the care of someone that would let him be special. Quickly he turned and wrapped his arms around Takeo and Kyana, turning their bodies to air vapors and transporting them all out of the temple into the Northern Water Tribe. Takeo looked at his father as he let go and disappeared, going back at the temple to face his punishment. Takeo was left to live with his mother until 5 years later, when he would disappear from the world for another 97 years.

Takeo didn't mind growing up in the north pole. His mother was a very nice woman as he found out. She had even taken him to a place where air nomads in hiding went to test and receive his arrows when he was 12. There was another reason Takeo liked his mother so much. She was the moon spirit, so every month on the new moon she was too weak to get out of bed. So each new moon after Takeo met his girlfriend when he was ten, he would take his sky bison Visaya to the tip of the earth kingdom to meet his girlfriend Yang. Yang was an air nomad from the Eastern temple that Takeo had met when he was traveling with his mother to the earth kingdom. They had been dating secretly for two years when something happened that changed Takeo's life forever. When they were at the earth kingdom one night during the summer, a group of bandits attacked them. Both Takeo and Yang fought and drove the bandits away, but Yang had taken a knife to her stomach, and she died in Takeo's arms while he was helpless to save her. Takeo took his blanket from the saddle bag and wrapped his love in it, hate running deep through his veins, corrupting every inch of him. He flew back to the Northern Water Tribe and buried Yang in the spirit oasis, so her body would never be disturbed. Then news came from his father, that they had announced that Aang was the Avatar early. Takeo was furious. Why did his younger brother get all the power in the universe? If he had gotten that power then he would have been able to save Yang. Now his mind was locked on one thing, killing his brother. Takeo left the Water Tribe the next night, leaving a note to his mother saying that he would never return. He traveled down south through the earth kingdom for a few days before stopping to rest. That night when he was meditating he found himself in the spirit world, and he could not find a way out. He spent the next 97 years there, while the war waged and his brother was frozen in the ice.

Takeo stopped his meditating, the memories too hard to bare. It was only three years ago that he had escaped from the spirit world, and he was no closer to killing his brother than he was then. He clenched his hands tight in anger. But he was stronger than he was a hundred years ago. Now he could bend all four elements just like his brother. Even without the power of the Avatar State surely he could beat his brother in a battle to the death. He would not give up his search. Not when he was this close to getting the power his brother possessed. Hearing the door to the room open Takeo looked up to see Toph walk in quietly. She was just like the air nomad he had loved all those years ago. Strong willed, a rebel, and Toph looked exactly like Yang had. Smiling Takeo got up and went over to her putting his hands on her shoulders. Instinctively Toph's body tensed up at his touch, but she just looked at him. "I have something to tell you Takeo." She said. Takeo nodded and motioned to bed for her to sit down.

"Sit down and tell me then. It'll take the weight off your feet." He said. Toph took a deep breath and moved to her bed and sat down on the clean sheets looking up at him. "You got what you wished for. You're always talking about that you want to have as many kids as we can so you can rebuild the air nomads. Well..." She paused, afraid of his reaction. "I'm pregnant. You;re going to get your child like you wanted." Takeo smiled wide and rested a hand on her shoulder and bent down kissing her cheek before whispering in her ear. "Well, that's very good news Toph. Very good."