TOPH
TOPH BEI FONG HAD NEVER READ A BOOK IN HER LIFE. She had never read a book, seen a painting, watched a sunrise, or even really knew what the faces of the people she had just spent the past year-and-change with looked like. Of all those things, though, the only one she didn't mind was the reading of books. All the others, she did her best not to think about. The fact that she had no idea what the painting that once moved her mother to tears looked like? Or that she would never know what it was that made Azula so gaga for sunrises? Or that she would never know what it meant when Sokka said the words, What color are Korra's eyes? Um…like…really, really…blue…? Those were things that made her feel sad, small, lost, adrift in a world that hadn't been built for anyone like her.
And I don't have any fucking time for that. I'm the greatest gods-damn earthbender on the motherfucking planet; I don't have the energy to spare to feel sad over shit I can't do anything about.
But she didn't mind the reading. How could she, when she knew ever word to hundreds of books, scrolls, fables and children's books and even her family's account ledgers? And she knew them, because her parents read them to her, and when she remembered them, she could float away, and drift through the current of their voices.
She was there now. She wasn't in their cabin, the cabin that felt more and more like a barracks or, on bad days, a holding cell. No, she was home, and not just home, but…Home. She was on The Reading Hill, under The Reading Tree. She was snuggled up against her father, who was leaning up against a tree. She could feel his heart beating in his chest, right behind her head. She could feel the relaxation in his bones, the joy in his voice, the tenderness in his smile, the smile she would never see, but she could feel it, and that was way better than seeing.
She was ten-years-old. Her Great Big Adventure, the one her mother always told her about, the one her mother always swore was in her future, was her destiny, was somewhere in the distant horizon, lost to view. It was a cool spring day, the air soft and sweet. Servants hustled and bustled about, the world alive with a cacophony of scents and sounds she couldn't begin to describe. Out in the fields, peasants worked, oxen bellowing, teams of women and men singing a call-and-response, back-and-forth, the sound of their tools swishing through the air and into the ground in time with the rhythm. It was peaceful, it was calm.
The War was so far away…
The theory behind metalbending is a complex one, her father intoned, reciting the stilted official Putonghua that most academic works were written in, at least before what her parents only referred to as The Fall. At its core, any type of metal is merely a form of incredibly refined earth, the degree of refinement varying from implement to implement and metal to metal…
She closed her eyes, the eyes that couldn't see anyways. The faint glow of sunlight that was the most she ever saw turned to complete and total blackness. The world fell away. She couldn't hear, couldn't sense, couldn't feel.
Experiments have been conducted with various forms of refined earth. For example, extremely skilled earthbenders have shown the ability to manipulate coal-
"Dad?" That was her.
"Yes, sweetie?"
"Is that why they only use wood-powered fires on the Fire Nation prison ships?"
He had chuckled. "Where did you hear that, dear?"
She had shrugged, no doubt puffing her bangs off her nose. "The servants were talking about it, I think." She honestly couldn't remember.
"Well, dear, yes, that's true. When the Fire Nation started using steam-powered ships, they used them for the prison ships, too. Then, a few very powerful earthbenders broke into the engine room one day, and bent the coal, turning it into weapons, and took over the ship."
But it wasn't that simple, was it? No, she thought in the present, it wasn't. Coal wasn't refined earth so much as it was compressed earth. The difficulty, she knew, lay not so much in the bending of it, as in the control of it. Any earthbender could be trained to bend boulders and rocks and massive chunks of earth; only advanced earthbenders could bend, say, particles of dirt, or, for example, lumps of coal…
Particles of dirt…
Particles of dirt…
There was an answer there, she knew it. The breakthrough was there, lurking in the back of her mind. She knew she could do it, knew she could figure it out. She had the strength, the power, the will, the determination, the drive…
I am Toph Motherfucking Bei Fong, and I can do anything I damn well please!
She smiled. Gods-damn right I can.
She honed in.
Particles of dirt…why is that important?
Her father's voice came back, reciting from the book, the book that was so good it was illegal. Her father had risked prison, risked losing everything, to get it for her.
Everything…
The problem, at the end of the day, comes down to this: How much can a piece of earth be refined, until it is no longer earth? For example, steel is not one kind of ore. Steel is several different ores, blended and crafted together under high temperatures, through processes we don't fully understand. At the end of the process, is it still earth? Or is it something else? The question is not merely academic. If it is still earth, it can be bent, in the same way that a rock or a pile of dirt can be bent. But if it is no longer earth, it not enough of the earth remains in any real quantity, then it cannot-
Wait.
There…there…there!
She had it. She didn't know how she had it, or even really understand how she'd gotten there, but she had it. She knew it. She knew it with every fiber of her being. Her heart began to race. Her body trembled. Her hand shook. Sweat broke out all over her body, in defiance of the winter chill.
I've got it.
I've motherfucking got it!
She thought of all the different forms of bending, the sub-groups within the over-arching whole. Earthbending: The bending of the earth. But within that, sandbending, mudbending, a dozen other sub-sets, all different, but all the same…
All parts of the single whole…
The sum of the parts…
The parts of the sum…
Sandbending…
Particles…
Particles of earth…
I'm not bending the earth…
The earth in this piece of scrap iron is no longer whole…
It is broken into pieces…
Tiny pieces, but together…
They form a new whole…
They…
They…
I've got it.
It moved. She could feel nothing but her hand, and the piece of scrap iron in resting in her palm. For days, weeks, months, she had stared at it. Worked with it. Cursed at it. But now…
It moved…
It had been bent. She had found it straight, when they had cut across the Si Wong Desert eight months before, and had come upon the remnants of a Fire Nation column that had not survived the journey. She had felt it upon the ground, picked it up, told Sokka to bend it into a curve. He had asked why. She had scoffed and said, What do you care? Just do it, Snoozles! Azula had laughed and observed, You better hop to it, buddy.
She had only told the real reason to Korra. Korra had come up later that night, leaned in, close, though maybe not as close as Toph would've liked, and asked, What're you gonna do with it?
And Toph had leaned in closer and said, I'm going to bend it back.
Korra had gasped. Will you teach me, when you figure it out?
Toph had scoffed. Gods-damn right I will.
And now…
It was no longer bent.
She clutched it, felt it. Her heart was racing; it felt like, at any minute, it would leap out through her mouth and go running off into the distance, cackling like a loon. She'd let it, too, because she was too busy grabbing Azula by the shirt, hauling the girl up from where she had been comfortably ensconced in a corner, reading her stolen book. Toph was shaking her, and Toph wished for sight then, just for a moment, just to see the look on the girl's face.
"Azula!"
Azula seemed too shocked to resist the shaking. "For Agni's sake, Toph, what?!"
Toph held up her piece of scrap. "What does this look like?!"
"Um…it looks like…uh…wait…what the…holy shit Toph it's not bent anymore."
Toph didn't quite know what to do. Everything stopped. Everything. It was like the world wasn't even there anymore, like she wasn't even there anymore. It felt…it felt…
Her name was Meifeng. She was a daughter of one of the servants. I knew she was pretty, and that made me very excited, even though I wasn't quite sure why. I was showing off for her one day, when I was twelve, again, I didn't know why. I'd never shown off for anyone before, except for my parents. There was a strange rhythm to her heart. I didn't notice when she got close to me. She asked me why I was showing her all of this. I shrugged and felt flustered, which I liked and didn't like, all at the same time. She asked if I liked boys. I made a face and said that I didn't. She said she didn't, either. Then her fingers were in my hair and they were brushing my bangs from my face and…
I'd never felt happier…
I felt like a whole new person…
A complete person…
Because it all made sense…
Toph let go of Azula. She leapt backwards, somersaulting through the air, landing perfectly on her feet. She thrust her fists into the air, the now-straight piece of iron clasped tightly in one of them. She looked up at the heavens she could only imagine and screamed.
"My name is Toph Bei Fong, and I'm the gods-damn best there ever motherfucking was!"
That night, she actually did pray. She got out the little box shrine her mother had packed, and that Toph still refused to discard. She got it out, made Azula light the incense candles, and thanked the gods for parents who would read to her.
Couple of things in here. First, feels, right? Any one else nervous about that?
Second, seriously, if you have kids, read to them. I don't care how tired you are at the end of the day, but there's nothing more important than that. My mother was known as the Unknown Mother at my daycare when I was little. She worked upwards of eighty-hours-a-week to keep the lights on and food on the table, and the one time she got off early, the people at the daycare didn't realize she was my mother until I told them, because my babysitter always picked me up. And despite all of that, no matter how late we got home, or how tired she was, she'd always take twenty-or-thirty minutes before bed to read to me.
That shit matters, guys. *gets off soapbox*
Third, and last, but not least, I dedicate Toph's story of her first kiss to a good friend of mine from college. I basically stole the story of her own first kiss, which was also the day she realized she was gay. I thought it was touching and sweet and waaaay better than my first kiss (which was pathetic and kind of sad, as it so often is), and I swore that, one day, I would put it in a story. Here it is.
Anyways, that's all for today! Lots of errands to run, lots of cuddling to do, and my wife can't grade effectively at home, so we're going out, where I can read and stare at my phone for the notifications of your reviews.
Which reminds me...you guys have been a bit quiet lately...you're still enjoying this, right? *begs for attention*
Moving on! In the next chapter, I use the feels I called forth in this chapter to punch you in the stomach. Stay tuned!