Title: Interlude, Part I
Genre: General… I think
Rating: T
Pairings: Wouldn't you like to know…
Warnings: This one's not really all that funny, or all that good for that matter…

Summary: In which the plot moves along in a very unfunny way.

Disclaimer: If I owned Avatar, Jet would be alive. Jet is not alive; therefore I do not own Avatar. Happy now?

Author's Notes: Not very funny, not very long, not at all shippy. Except if you squint. But squinting isn't good for you. This is just a lot of exposition to set the next chapter up, and that too will be a lot of exposition.

Sokka was in a foul mood. Of course, this fact by itself was nothing unusual. Sokka was often in a foul mood, and most of the time, his suffering was entirely his fault. However, to be fair, it would be best to say that at least for today his altered state was only mostly his fault. No one seemed to understand the imperative need to defeat the Fire Nation. He had risked great personal injury (not to mention several blows to the ego) to find the Fire Nation's weakness, only to find that Long Feng's red tape would succeed where Zhao's destructive efforts had failed. Every day brought the Day of Black Sun closer, and yet they were no closer to mounting an invasion of the Fire Nation than they had been on the day the library sank into the sands, and still, Aang was out on his fruitless search for Appa while Toph and Katara were out doing spirits-knew-what useless girly things.

Didn't they understand? Couldn't they understand that there were more important things in life than fun and relaxation, and even more important than loveable flying bison? Aang hadn't even fully mastered Earthbending, and they certainly weren't going to find him a Firebending instructor within the walls; ever the realist, Sokka was sure that Aang was not going to master the four elements in time. They needed to fight the Fire Nation on their own terms, during the solar eclipse, or else, they had no hope. He couldn't understand how Aang and Katara could not understand that the Fire Nation was on the verge of winning, and if the Fire Nation won, everything would be in vain: his mother's death, his father's absence, their travels around the globe, Yue's sacrifice… everything would be for nothing.

That was why, while Aang and Katara and Toph were off enjoying themselves, he was in their upper-ring house trying to come up with a brilliant plan to sidestep Long Feng and his Dai Li. So far, he had come up with absolutely nothing, nada, zilch. His best idea thus far had been to sneak into a banquet disguised as high society. It would have been a perfect plan except for one thing: they had already tried it, and it hadn't worked. Maybe he would have been able to come up with a better plan if it hadn't been for the fact that loud claps of thunder kept on disturbing his thoughts. Sokka cast a worried eye towards the horizon. It was strange, he thought; he couldn't see a single storm cloud in the sky, but sure enough there was a violent storm going on somewhere. The storm was far away, probably outside the outer wall judging by the time between lightning and thunder, but as he glanced toward the horizon, he drew no comfort from the knowledge that the lightning was far away.

Sighing, Sokka realized there was nothing he could do without inspiration. So standing up, he decided to follow Katara's example; after all, no one had ever conceived a worthwhile plan on an empty stomach. Still upset, Sokka headed off to the middle ring in search of amusement, while in the background the storm raged on.

Now, this storm was no natural storm. In fact, it wasn't a storm at all; a storm would have been much less dangerous. No, the source of the lighting and thunder which so upset Sokka was none other than a very pissed Princess Azula.

The night that Zuko had spent drinking, Azula had spent crying. She would have liked very much to drink and drink and drink. But, she considered her mind too valuable an asset to drink herself into the necessary stupor (that and she didn't travel with large quantities of alcohol and there was nowhere where she could discreetly spend the generous allowance her father gave her on the burning drink). So instead Azula cried. While Zuko drank and drank and drank, Azula cried and cried and cried.

She cried with rage, for she had never been more embarrassed. She cried with hatred, for she had had a chance to skewer Zuko and she had missed it. And then, just a bit, Ozai's favorite scion cried with pain, for her first love had been ruined, and she decided then and there that she would ruin Zuko. Somehow, she would capture him in his Blue Spirit garb and present him thus dressed to their lord and sire. And so, for a last time, she took out the Blue Spirit poster from its secret hiding spot by her heart, and for the last time she unfolded the parchment, and then, she set it on fire and watched the fire burn as she imagined what her father would do to Zuko, pathetic little Zuko who had wrecked her dreams and fantasies. When the poster was finished burning, Azula cried some more because she had just destroyed what had that morning been her most prized possession.

Azula had cried herself to sleep, and now she was in a foul mood. Except that unlike Sokka, the Princess could throw about lighting, and so she did. None among her company understood exactly why the Princess was this upset, just that it had something to do with the Blue Spirit. The last time she had thrown about lightning in such a violent manner she had also thrown the captain overboard. This time, there was no ocean into which to be thrown, but no one doubted the Princess' ability to concoct new and interesting punishments, and so everyone who could made his or herself scarce.

Afterwards it was never really clear how it happened. Maybe it was Mai who told the Earth Kingdom blacksmith who told his wife, who told the fish monger, who told the passing strangers who told the bureaucrat, who told her cousin. Or maybe it was Ty Lee who told a passing cat-squirrel and was overheard by a little boy, who told his mother, who told her husband, who told the passing refugees, who told the gatekeeper, who told his son. It might have been anyone really, because everyone was talking about Azula's little tantrum. In any case, it doesn't really matter how it happened, just that by midday, everyone in Ba Sing Se was talking about the Blue Spirit. Of course, certain little details had dropped out of the story (Princess Who of the What Now? War? What war? Don't you know there's no war within the walls?), but by and large, the story was very similar.

The version that the Earth King heard was this:

In the middle of the night, the brave Blue Spirit had emerged from the Spirit World and had saved an entire village from the clutches of an evil madman, who for no discernable reason had taken it upon himself to slay the innocent.

As anyone can clearly see, this is almost exactly what happened. If one were to replace "Azula" for evil madman and ignore the bit about slaying the innocent and saving the village, the story was perfectly accurate. In any event, it was very exciting, and really, that was all that mattered. It was exciting enough that the Dai Li officer didn't immediately arrest the Earth King's cook when she first made an allusion to the fact that the Earth Kingdom might possibly require a masked vigilante in order to keep the peace, but instead this officer actually abandoned his post and listened to the cook's story.

Long Feng had not heard of the misadventures of the Blue Spirit yet, having been in a meeting with the Earth King for the entire morning. He did not know that one of his Dai Li was ignoring his orders and chatting up treason. For these reasons, Long Feng was completely unprepared when he and the Earth King walked past the conversation. He was so unprepared in fact, that it took him a full thirty seconds to evaluate the situation, enough time for the Earth King's interest to be piqued, and far too late for him to divert the King's attention. Thirty minutes later Long Feng was massaging his temples as the Earth King officially decreed it to be Blue Spirit Day, and ordered a massive festival in the Spirit's honor during which he would personally present the Blue Spirit with the keys to the city.

Sometimes Long Feng hated his job and he wondered if it wouldn't be best to simply assassinate the Earth King and take his place on the throne. Then he thought about how much power he would have to relinquish to be Earth King, and contented himself with massaging his temples.

Author's Notes: Ok, so I lied. There's no quest for tea, no larceny, and no Zuko torture. In my defense, this is really only half of the chapter, but it's already fairly long (compared to the other chapters anyway) and I wanted to give you an update. Next up, Interlude, Part II.

In the interim, be a dear and review. It'll make the next part so much better.