(The Day Before the Wedding)

"Hey, Mai?"

"Yes?"

"How do you spell your name?"

"M-a-i."

"Oh."

"Why do you ask?"

"Because we just received the wedding pamphlets and the banners, and printing company totally misspelled your name on everything."

"WHAT?"

Mai spun on her heel to see Ty Lee sifting through the several boxes of pamphlets. The acrobat had a worried expression, her brows knitted together in concern. Azula, who had been going over the guest list one more time in the corner, widened her eyes. The three girls were going over the last-minute details for the wedding — such as making sure the wedding venue was perfect, and the guest list included everyone it needed to, and that everything was spelled right.

"They spelled my name wrong?" demanded Mai as she took large strides towards where Ty Lee was seated.

Ty Lee nodded, brandishing a pamphlet whose title read:

~ Welcome, dearly beloved, to the wedding of Fire Lord Zuko and Lady Mei ~

"You can't be serious," Mai murmured as she yanked another pamphlet from the box. Sure enough, it read the same as the one in Ty Lee's hand. "My name has three letters. Three! How did they manage to spell A-z-u-la and T-y-L-e-e right for your wedding two months ago, but somehow misspell M-a-i for mine?"

Ty Lee frowned as she moved to unfurl the wedding banner. "The wedding banner is also misspelled the same way."

"Utterly shameful," said Azula with a tut-tut, who was already on her feet and on her way to the Royal Hawkery. "I'll write a letter to the printing company and have them reprint the pamphlets and remake the banner."

"Make sure you red-ribbon it, love," called Ty Lee over her shoulder.

"Will do, love," was Azula's response.

Had it not been for the stressful situation at hand, Mai was sure that she'd have made a comment about the "honey-moon" behavior that Azula and Ty Lee were doing again. But Mai could only let out a shaky exhale, to which her friend place a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"I—" Ty Lee started

"Ty Lee, if you say I told you so about that kooky Fire Sage, I swear I'm going to lose it."

The acrobat frowned. "That's not what I was going to say. I just wanted to say that I think everything will go fine, even with this little mishap," said Ty Lee, "The morning Azula and I got married, I woke up with a giant zit on my chin, remember?"

Mai frowned. "Yes," she sighed in exasperation. The 'giant zit' was actually the smallest, most minuscule, and insignificant lump Mai had ever seen. And no matter how many times Mai tried convincing her friend that nobody would notice it, as Mai herself had needed a magnifying glass before she spotted it, Ty Lee could not be solaced. "I remember, Ty Lee."

"But luckily, Katara's waterbending turned out to be really good at getting rid of acne, remember?" continued Ty Lee, oblivious to Mai's snark, "So, I'm sure that everything will work out in the end. And besides, even if the pamphlets are misspelled — nobody even looks at those anyways."

Mai still felt disheartened. "But everyone looks at the banner, though," Mai moaned. "And they're all going to see in big, fat letters: welcome toM-E-I's wedding."

"Well, then it's a good thing Azula's already sending a messenger hawk to get it reprinted."

Mai, despite the situation, allowed herself to feel a little more optimistic. "Yeah, I guess you're right. Thanks—"

Before she could even fix her sentence, the door suddenly slammed open, revealing a ruffled-looking Avatar.

"Mai! Ty Lee!" Aang gasped, looking around the room. "Is Zuko here?"

Mai's eyes narrowed as she noticed the feathers sticking to Avatar's clothes. "No," she said slowly — as if trying to elongate the moment of calm before the storm. "He and his mother left to go shopping for the flower girls' crowns. Why?"

"You remember the eel-swans and turtle-ducks that Zuko wanted for the fountains to 'encourage a more serene environment' or whatever he said?"

"I do."

"Yeah, well the eel-swans and turtle-ducks just arrived, but they were all fighting, so Katara and I tried breaking it up, but then we accidentally let them all escape and now they're running around everywhere, and Toph is wrangling the eel-swans and Suki's wrangling the turtle-ducks, but they both have surprisingly sharp teeth, and Sokka is actually scared of turtle-ducks so he's no help — by the way, how can someone be scared of turtle-ducks? — EITHER WAY, WE REALLY NEED ZUKO!"

The optimism that Mai had allowed herself to feel a moment ago was now withering away like a flower in the middle of the desert. She winced. Once. Then twice. Then her bottom lip trembled dangerously, and it looked like she was one step away from an emotional breakdown.

Ty Lee, who had been friends with Mai long enough to know that nothing good ever happened after her bottom lip starts trembling, quickly stood up and being ushering Aang away from the room. She did not want to be around for the inevitable tipping-point Mai was soon to experience. The last time Mai had one of her "tipping-points", the day had ended with a portion of the Royal Garden's flowers brutally beheaded with shurikens.

"Here, Mai, you stay here — I'll go help Aang wrangled the turtle-ducks and eel-swans," said Ty Lee hurriedly as she began swiftly walking to the exit. In a low voice, she hissed at Aang: "Run while you still can!"

And with that, they were gone and the door slammed shut, leaving a reeling Mai standing in the center of the room.

A second later, the door opened once more. This time, however, it revealed neither Ty Lee nor Aang. Instead, a servant woman was standing at the entrance of the door. The servant woman bowed briefly before rising once more with wide, startled-looking eyes,

"Lady Mai, forgive me for my interruption," she said hurriedly, " I-I'm not sure how it happened, but your brother and Lady Kiyi have fallen through the roof of the wedding venue! They're still dazed from the fall, but I think they're alright." A beat of silence ensued wherein the servant woman stared expectantly at Mai, and Mai stared at the ground stoically. "Lady Mai? Can you hear me, Lady Mai?"

Once again, Mai winced. Once. Then twice. Then her bottom lip began trembling.

And the serving woman, who couldn't have known about the "warning signs" (as Ty Lee liked to call them), stared on in utter bewilderment when she saw Mai took her face into her hands and let out a scream of frustration.

. . .

(Five Minutes Ago...)

"I'm bored," intoned the voice of a fifteen-year-old Tom-Tom.

"I know," replied the voice of the same-aged Kiyi.

"I'm hungry," said Tom-Tom.

"Still? Even after all those Fire Flakes?"

The two were laying down parallel to each other, head-to-head, on top of the sloping roof of Kiyi's bedroom. From their position, there was nothing but blue-skies above them and the frightening threat of falling to their deaths below them.

Each had a bag of Fire Flakes in hand (though Tom-Tom's was now empty), and Kiyi was throwing the last few flakes up in the air and catching it with her mouth. Her mother would be absolutely livid if she found out about Kiyi's habit of sneaking out through her window and climbing the sloping roofs, but Kiyi found herself too bored to care. She had thought that her best friend's arrival to Caldera City would inflict more excitement into the oft-bored boy, but she was clearly wrong.

Once their bags of Fire Flakes were over, and the teenagers were left with only the red powder on their hands, they both let out a sigh of boredom.

Turning to her side, he glanced at her tiredly. "You're no fun," he said simply.

Kiyi had not taken her eyes off the cloudless blue sky above. "I can be plenty fun," she protested, twisting to her side to shoot him a glare. "You just don't know nothing."

"It's: you just don't know anything," he corrected dryly. "'You don't know nothing' is a double negative, which means that the person you're referring to does, in fact, know something."

Kiyi snorted. "You sound like my grammar teacher."

"Was that the one whose pants you lit on fire? Or the one whose glasses you snapped?"

"The one whose pants I lit on fire," Kiyi answered with a self-satisfied grin tugging at her lips. "I snapped my mathematics teacher's glasses in half."

"Oh, my mistake," retorted Tom-Tom. "I have a hard time keeping up with just how bad of a pupil you are."

Kiyi turned her nose up at him. "Whatever," she scoffed, "At least I'm not as much of a stickler as you. You're the most boring person I know. I, on the other hand, enjoy living life on the edge."

"On the edge of what?" said Tom-Tom, "You're the sister of the Fire Lord, not some wild, reckless female bandit who steals from rich men before running into the Si Wong Desert. You may live a more entertaining life than I do, but not by much."

Kiyi frowned as she realized that Tom-Tom was right, not that she was ever going to admit it to him. "That's your opinion," she snapped.

Straightening up from her position so that she was standing, Kiyi began tight-roping the very thin and precarious edge of the roof, her arms extended to help keep her balance. Tom-Tom lifted his head just enough to watch her.

"You're going to fall," he stated.

"Please," she snorted with a huff, "I grew up around Ty Lee. You seriously think I'm going to fall?"

"I know it."

"Okay, well, why don't you try it then and show me how it's done?"

Tom-Tom scowled at her for a moment, as if trying to decide between accepting her challenge or choosing the safe route. Eventually, however, it seemed like his disdain towards being showed up by a girl won out, and Tom-Tom stood up sharply and began walking to the edge of the roof.

"Anything you can do, I can do better," he snarked.

"Then by all means, please," she gestured with her arms, "show me how it's done."

Scowling even harsher, Tom-Tom began teetering on the edge of the roof. Every time he looked down and saw the several yards that separated them from the very hard cement floor, his stomach did a very unpleasant jolt and he felt very sick. But hearing Kiyi's I knew ya couldn't do it was somehow exponentially worse than the threat of falling to his probably very painful death.

He reached halfway across when suddenly, the roof dipped underneath him.

"Kiyi," he whisper-shouted — as if he was scared that being too loud would cause the roof to collapse, "The roof — it's going to collapse."

Kiyi, who had been smugly grinning at him, soon adopted a very anxious face. "Did I forget to tell you about the soft-spot?" she asked, though they both very well knew that she had in fact forgotten about it.

"A soft spot?!" Tom-Tom hissed incredulously, standing very, very still. "Your brother is the Fire Lord! He can't afford to get his roof fixed?"

"Just shut up and stay still," snapped Kiyi as she began waddling towards him very slowly. "Okay... on three, you jump towards me, and I'll move us away from the soft-spot."

Tom-Tom nodded. "Okay," he whispered.

"On three," Kiyi repeated, inching closer to him. "One..."

"Two..."

"Thr—"

Tom-Tom leaped forward towards a very unprepared Kiyi. She squealed as he collided with her. The force of their collision caused them to go rolling down the sloped edge of the roof, their figures blurring so that they looking like a blur of flesh-colored blobs.

"YOU DUNDERHEAD — I TOLD YOU TO JUMP ON THREE, NOT WHILE THREE!" shouted Kiyi as she tried slowing their fall with her firebending.

"You should've been more specific!" wailed Tom-Tom, whose sleeve was momentarily on fire after Kiyi misdirected her flame.

Kiyi grunted her head collided very painfully with a loose shingle. She looked down and saw the very quickly approaching floor. There was no way she was dying the day before her brother got married. Twisting herself so that she could flame-propel herself, she grabbed Tom-Tom around his middle.

"Stop whining, and hold on tight!" she snapped angrily.

With another grunt, she used firebending to jet-propel them before they hit the floor. She hadn't yet mastered feet-only jet-propulsion like her brother, but she could do just fine while using her hands and feet. Unfortunately for her, she had Tom-Tom to worry about. And with her hands wrapped around his middle, she was unintentionally burning his stomach while trying to fly them to safety.

"Owch," he squeaked, wriggling away from her hands.

His wriggling was causing Kiyi to begin wobbling about. "Stop squirming!" she hissed, "We'll get Katara to heal you after! You're going to make us—EEEK!"

Distracted as she was, Kiyi hadn't noticed that they were flying straight towards a messenger hawk. With a loud bird screech and two synchronous human shrieks, the two teenagers and the hawk collided with a loud thunk, resulting in all three mid-flight beings going hurtling towards a nearby roof. As Kiyi and Tom-Tom fell towards a sloping roof, Kiyi caught sight of a rolled-up letter falling out of the messenger hawk's pouch.

She didn't have time to consider the run-away letter because, a moment later, all three collided with the shingles of the roof and fell right through.

. . .

Outside the kitchen of the Royal Palace, two kitchen-staff workers slipped out of the kitchen — both taking furtive glances over their shoulders to make sure they weren't caught slipping out.

"I feel like we're going to be caught," bemoaned the taller, brown-haired girl. "I really need this job - I can't get fired."

"Stop worrying so much," said the shorter, black-haired girl, twisting her dark hair back and out of her face, "We're just taking a five-minute break, Nari."

Nari, the taller girl, sighed. "I'm so excited about the wedding tomorrow, but I'm so tired of cooking for it!"

"Right? I mean, surprisingly, Lady Mai and Fire Lord Zuko make such a good couple but—"

Nari looked taken aback. "Surprisingly?" she echoed in disbelief. "Lyra, their names are even spelled compatibly according to this week's edition of The Sage!"

"How can a couple's names be spelled compatibly?" Lyra asked, dubious.

"Well, Z-u-k-o and M-a-y, right? If you look on the couple name compatibility chart from this week's edition of The Sage, and you spell out Z-u-k-o and M-a-y on the chart, then you get a 96% compatibility," explained Nari.

Lyra snorted. "First of all, that sounds ridiculous. Second of all, Lady Mai's name is spelled: M-a-e."

Nari had opened her mouth to argue, but she suddenly heard a loud messenger hawk screech. A second later, a letter was falling out of the sky and towards them, conking the taller girl in the side of her head - coaxing a yelp out of her.

After a stunned moment, she reached down to retrieve the letter.

"It's a red-ribbon letter!" gasped the Lyra.

Unfurling it with her trembling, flour-covered fingers, the Nari read aloud the content of the letter.

Greetings,

Somehow, you fools managed to commit such a glaringly obvious blunder the day before my brother is to be wed.
I am not sure how all of you managed to misspell one of the biggest names in the Fire Nation,
but if you lack the brain capacity to know better, take this as a reminder on how to spell the future Fire Lady's name: M-a-i.
Normally, your incompetence in such a manner would be grounds for serious consequence, however, I have decided to take mercy upon you.
Kindly remedy this error ASAP, and I shall pardon you.

Sincerely,

Princess Azula, second-in-line to the Fire Throne and former Princess Regent of the Fire Nation

Both girls emitted a terrified squeak at the letter. The taller girl wasted no time in shoving the letter into her robes, and they both rushed back to the kitchens.

"How did she know?" whispered Nari, who went very pale. "Princess Azula always knows..."

"Let's just sneak back into the kitchens," whispered Lyra.

A/N: Okay, I know it's not supperrr realistic for Azula's letter to the printing company to be so vague, but nothing about this crack-fic was supposed to be realistic lmao