Tales of the Avatar As Told by Lady Ryuka and RaeDyn-Rae

by Lady Ryuka

This is a two Author story between me and /u/15203697/RaeDyn-Rae. We are changing some things and adding some things. We hope you all enjoy it. We are following the scripts as well as adding things. We have pairs like Aang and Ty Lee, Katara and Zuko, Suki and Mai, Sokka and Toph.

11. Chapter 10

10

Author's note: We are back to incorporating script with our writings. This is chapter 10, but episode 9 "The Waterbending Scroll" of course with our changes. - We thank you for your support. 3 Lady Ryuka and RaeDyn Rae

Appa is flying through a mostly cloudy sky, broken only by a few shafts of sunlight that pierces the cloud cover dramatically in certain areas. Aang is pacing up and down Appa's back as Sokka 'drives.' "Would you sit down? If we hit a bump you'll go flying off! What's bugging you anyway?" Aang spun around on his heels, "Bugging me? A whole flock of leech-a-piller's could be on me and it wouldn't 'bug me' as much as this terrifies me! It's what Avatar Roku said. I'm supposed to master all four elements before that comet arrives." Sokka shrugs and just states, "Well, let's see, you've pretty much mastered airbending and that only took you 112 years... I'm sure you can master three more elements by next summer." offhandedly. Aang, looking more frightened than he just said he was, almost screamed, "If I had any hair, I'd be pulling it all out right now! I haven't even started waterbending and we're still weeks away from the North Pole! What am I gonna do!?" Aang has put his head in his hands in frustration and hangs his arms loose by his side in sadness. Katara grabs his wrist, and pulls him to where she's kneeling. Aang kneels beside her as she takes his hands in his. "Calm down. It's going to be okay. If you want, I can try and teach you some of the stuff I know." Aang stiffens a small sniffle. "You'd do that?" Katara nods her head and smiles. She and Aang then crawl over to the edge of the saddle to look down. "We'll need to find a good source of water first." Sokka rolled his eyes and snorted out a laugh. "Maybe we can find a puddle for you to splash in."

At a huge waterfall, Katara, Sokka, Aang and Momo are on the left bank. Between Sokka and Katara, he looks a little sour, while she looks up in excitement and happiness at the mighty waterfall. Aang with an expression similar to Katara's. Sokka grunts out, "Nice puddle." Appa swoops in overhead, grunts loudly and drops himself into the water. Momo is on a rock in the catch basin. The sun is blotted by a shadow – the wave of water from Appa's messy swan dive. The wave crashes over him and he is soaked.

Aang has removed everything but his underwear and is ready to join the fun. Katara does not look pleased. "Remember the reason we're here." Aang stopped at the moment he was about to start running to jump into the water, and looked back at Katara, "Oh right, time to practice waterbending." Moments later, Aang is pulling up his pants. Sokka grumbles while tapping his foot, "Great. So, what am I supposed to do?" Aang slid over, "You could," He picks up a leafy branch and holds it out at arms length, "clean the gunk out of Appa's toes?" Sokka folds his arms across his chest. "So, while you guys are playing in the water, I'm supposed to be hard at work picking the mud out of a giant bison's feet?" Aang beams a big 'car dealer smile,' "Mud AND bugs!" Sokka pauses for a second, looks over at Appa, and says, "Okay…" Sokka grabs the branch and walks away, resigned to his task. Appa was blissfully unaware of Sokka's task, and resting low in the water, blowing bubbles.

A Fire Navy ship's prow breaks the water. A jet of fire erupts off the main deck. Prince Zuko fired blast after blast of fire at his sparring opponent. Suddenly the ship tilts to starboard, knocking both combatants off balance. "Someone's changing our course!" He screams up to the helmsman at the wheel, "What's the meaning of this mutiny? No one told you to change course!" Iroh peeps from behind the helmsman, "Actually, someone did. I assure you it is a matter of utmost importance, Prince Zuko." he says as he makes his way down the stairs. "Is it something to do with the Avatar?" Zuko asked, a little more hopeful than he'd like to admit. Iroh made his way back to the deck, "Even more urgent!" He made his way back to his table. "It seems… I've lost my lotus tile." Iroh moves a piece forward on the Pai Sho board sitting on the table.

Zuko looks mystified. "Lotus… tile?"

Iroh straightens up and says, matter-of-factly, "For my Pai Sho game. Most people think the lotus tile is insignificant, but it is essential for the unusual strategy that I employ. Zuko starts shaking with rage, "You've changed our course for a stupid lotus tile?" Iroh looked at Zuko with a mix of patience and annoyance. "See, you, like most people, underestimate its value. Just give me ten minutes to check the merchants at this port of call. Hopefully they'll have the lotus tile in stock and I can get on with my life!"

Zuko works hard to contain his anger, ultimately releasing a gout of flame from his mouth that licks over the ceiling. Iroh, surrounded by smoke, smiles and softly chuckles out, "I'm lucky to have such an understanding nephew." to which Zuko blushed and almost looked as red as his sunburnt neck.

Appa is floating on his back, Sokka hard at work on his toes. Appa grunts happily. Sokka grunts, "Yeah. Don't get too happy. You gotta do me next."

Katara and Aang on the river bank. As Katara begins to explain, she starts to waterbend the move she is describing. "This is a pretty basic move, but it still took me months to perfect, so don't be frustrated if you don't get it right away. Just push and pull the water like this…" She begins to bob gracefully back and forth, the water on the river edge moving back and forth with her. "The key is getting the wrist movement right." Aang gets up and imitates Katara. "Like this?" Katara looks over, smiling proudly, "Wow, I can't believe you got that so quickly." Her smile drops some while she continues speaking, "It took me two months to learn that move." Aang smiled and shrugged, "Well, you had to figure it out on your own. I'm lucky enough to have a great teacher." Katara looked flustered, but still said a small, "Thanks."

On top of the waterfall, Aang asks, "So, what's next?" Katara smirks and starts moving her hands in soft gentle motions, "This is a more difficult move. I call it 'streaming the water'." She takes her hand and plunges it into the water, pulling out a stream from the river and begins to loop it around. "It's harder than it looks so don't be disappointed if…" She's cut off by looking over at Aang. He's already mastered this move. He is moving around his stream of water as if it were a toy as Katara stands motionless. After a few minutes of frolicking, she looks sour and drops her water stream. Aang plays with his for a few more seconds and then dumps his back into the river. Katara crossed her arms and stood with her hip jutted out. "Nice work, though the over-the-head flare was unnecessary." Aang rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. "Sorry. Well, don't stop now, keep'em coming!" Katara shuffled from foot to foot, releasing her arms, "Well, I kinda know this one other move." She started, "But it's pretty hard. I haven't even totally figured it out yet. The idea is to create a big, powerful wave…" Katara concentrates, raises a blob of water out of the river, but it falls back upon itself when Katara's concentration collapses. Aang sets up to try. "So… Like this?" He raises his hands and a huge wall of water shoots up into the air.

Sokka, with the wave building visibly behind him, turns and his eyes go wide. He gets soaked as the wave breaks over him and Appa. Aang giggles at the scene in front of him, as Sokka pops his head out of the water. "Looks like I got the hang of that move. What else ya got?" Katara said crossly, while stamping her foot, "That's enough practice for today!" "Yeah, I'll say…" Sokka started, while pointing to a bunch of bags floating down the river. "You just practiced our supplies down the river. "Uhhh… Sorry. I'm sure we can find somewhere to replace all this stuff." Sokka sank back into the water, mottering, "It was hard enough when you were just an airbender." To which Aang shouts out, "Airbender! The necklace!" And started running on the water at breakneck speeds. The bags start to fall over the waterfall. And Aang jumps after them, catching several bags in midair, and creating an air scooter to soften his landing below.

Once back at the waterfall with Appa and his friends, he gives Appa a hug, and then dumps the bags he saved on the ground. Sokka is elated to see that Aang has saved most of the food, even if some of it would need to be re-dried now that it got soaked. And Aang is glad to see the one material thing in this world he cannot part with, the necklace he made for Ty Shi.

While Sokka was looking at what was there, he noticed that their money bag was gone. "Hey, did anyone else notice our money is gone?" "What do you mean we never moved our supplies from next to Appa when we were in Hei-Bei's forest?" Katara said. "The villagers wouldn't have taken it either." Aang said. "Did you notice if it was there when you got the supplies from the water Aang?" Sokka asked. "Nope. I didn't." Aang added. "So our Money had to have gone missing when we were in the village." Sokka replied in detective mode. "Well, we can't go back to the village now. We are too far away." Katara replied. "Besides, They wouldn't want you coming within a whole Nation of them after you flooded half their town, Katara!" Sokka said sassily, with his hands on his hips. "Wait, I missed this. What happened?" Aang asked. "It doesn't matter what happened." Katara all but snapped when she replied. "Well I am just saying we only have what is in our smaller coin purses that we keep on our sides then, which isn't much." Sokka replied with a sigh.

At a port village, the kids are walking down the market street. Various shots of tough looking sailors, merchants and shady types run past each other. In the background a big man is holding up a much smaller one for an unknown reason, as the smaller one yells, "Please, put me down!" Another shopkeeper in blue is addressing a crowd, holding up a sack and asking, "Who's brave enough to look into this bag?" Katara and Aang are sitting in a shop window, waiting for Sokka to exit. "We've got exactly three copper pieces I have shoved in my sock for emergencies, and we've got five silver pieces from our coin purses, the rest of our money is gone. Let's spend it wisely." Aang looks sheepish for a second, "Uhhh… Make that two copper pieces, and five silver. I couldn't say no to this whistle!" Aang produces a white whistle in the shape of a bison from behind his back. Aang draws in a great breath and blows into it. Sokka shoves his fingers in his ears to block the sound he believes is coming. Nothing happens- only the sound of rushing air. "Yeah… I think I will hold on to the silver pieces. You can't possibly get into any trouble with two copper pieces," Sokka said, taking the silver from Aang and putting it in his coin purse. "But these copper pieces smell like buffalo butt!" Aang complained. "Not buffalo butt!" Sokka said so shrill that only certain breeds of dogs could hear, "I kept them in my SOCK!" "Ok, Buffalo butt toes." Katara giggled before taking two silver pieces from Sokka's coin purse, giving him a glare, and heading to a food stand. "I guess she's on food, Aang." "What are you getting?" The boys discuss what they're in charge of getting. Ropes, some flint, and a basket to carry all the food they're going to get. Sokka sighs. "If only we still had some heartseeds. We could solve our problems here too."

After acquiring a basket and enough food to fill it, the kids start walking around the shops to just browse. There's a man near one of the larger ships at the dock where he is soliciting customers. "Earth Nation! Fire Nation! Water Nation! So long as bargains are your inclination, you're welcome here! Don't be shy, come on by!" The kids walk by the ship. The pirate runs right up to them, but they keep walking. "Oh! You there! I can see by your clothing that you're world traveling types. Perhaps I can interest you in some exotic curios?" Aang perks up and pops in, "Sure, what are curios?" The pirate pauses for a moment. "Ya know… I'm not entirely sure, but we got'em!" He said with a dumbfounded childlike grin. The pirate takes Aang by the shoulders and bustles them onto the ship.

The three are looking around the Pirate's hold, gawping at their wares. Katara is momentarily mesmerized by a stone monkey richly jeweled with large, blood red rubies. The pirate captain enters from a dark doorway, "I've never seen such a fine specimen of lemur. That beast would fetch me a hefty sum, if you'd be interested in bartering." He wears a wide brim hat and has a huge green parrot-like creature on his shoulder, which screams several times when the Captain is finished. Aang hugs Momo protectively and declares, "Momo's not for sale."

Katara walks over to a scroll rack. One of them, the thinnest, has the water symbol on its end. She opens it and sees the instructions on how to perform various waterbending moves. Her eyes light up and she draws an intake of breath. "Look at this, Aang! It's a waterbending scroll. Check out these crazy moves!" Aang looks over her shoulder to see the scroll and addresses the Pirate Captain. "Where did you get a waterbending scroll?" The Captain's hand suddenly slams down on the open scroll, "Let's just say I got it up North at a most reasonable price. Free!" He replaces the scroll in the rack, while Katara eyes it hungrily. Sokka is looking at some merchandise, slowly turning around, puzzling something out. "Waaait a minute...sea-loving traders...with suspiciously acquired merchandise...and pet reptile birds...You guys are pirates!" "Wow Sokka, took you long enough. I already figured that out. We used to sell stuff to everyone before, even pirates." Aang said low enough that only Sokka and Katara could hear him.

The pirate that led them on the ship walked up behind them, put an arm around Sokka's shoulder and smiling, said, "We prefer to think of ourselves as high risk traders." Katara looks over at Sokka, knowing he still has two silver pieces left, and looks over at Aang who still has two copper pieces. "So… How much for the, uh, 'traded' scroll?" The Pirate Captain slams a fist on the counter, laughing. "I've already got a buyer, a nobleman in the Earth Kingdom. Unless, of course, you kids have 200 gold pieces on ya right now?"

Aang and Katara spoke privately between one another, Sokka still next to them with the pirate hanging onto his shoulder. Aang told Katara, "I know how to deal with these guys." AHEM! "Did you cough, Katara?" "No." The pirate still holding Sokka said, "That would be me. We're not ALL MEN!" The Pirate said scornfully. "But you're not a woman." Aang said simply. "Are you?" He started looking the pirate up and down and noticed that there wasn't anything different about this one from all the other pirates he's ever seen. "No! I'm neither!" They shouted. "And we're really supportive of your life choices. Now, let the child continue." Aang whispers to Katara, "Pirates LOVE to haggle." as he walks up to the counter. He holds up the two copper pieces in his possession. "What say you, to the price of… two copper pieces." The pirate captain laughed a big hearty laugh. "Hahaha! The price is 200 gold pieces. I don't haggle on items this rare." "Okay, okay." Aang muttered to himself, nodding. "How about two SILVER pieces!" The smile dropped from the pirate captain's face. "It's not as amusing the second time, boy." Katara came to Aang's side, and tapped his shoulder. "Aang, can we get out of here. I feel like we're getting weird looks." "More like DIRTY looks." Aang whispered back to Katara, "When was the last time THEY bathed?" Aang turns to the captain, raises his voice to normal, and says, "Aye! We be castin' off now!" Aang grabs his staff and follows Katara out. "What was that all about, Katara?" Sokka agreed. "Yeah. I was just starting to browse their boomerang collection." Katara hugged herself protectively. "I'll just feel a lot better once we get away from here."

The pirate who goes by them runs across the deck shouting, "Hey you! Get back here!" The group turns to look back. A half smile creeps up Aang's face. "Well, well, look who's come to their senses. Told ya the haggling would pay off."

Like angry bees from a beehive the pirates are exiting their ship to come after Aang, Katara and Sokka. Suddenly, the group is faced with a dozen or so well armed and obviously angry pirates. The kids are frightened. The pirates are yelling things like, "There they are!", "Get'em!" and "Nobody's going' nowhere!" Katara stammers out, "I… I don't think these pirates are here to trade with us!" The kids run off with the pirates in pursuit. Pirate They yell out, "Get back here!" The kids run down an alley and the pirates split into two groups. One follows the kids while the other, led by the Pirate They, goes in another direction. "This way! Let's cut em off!"

The three kids turn the corner around a building, pirates in pursuit. As he rounds the corner Sokka skids and yells "whoa!", but they keep going. As she passes the corner, Katara waterbends some water from a nearby stall onto the ground and freezes it. The lead pirate slips and hits the ground.

The cabbage dealer is happily nuzzling a cabbage. He puts the cabbage in his portable stand, which is full of cabbages and begins to wheel it away. As he does so, Sokka and Katara run by, bumping the cart and knocking off cabbages. The shopkeeper saves the cabbages from hitting the ground, but then Aang launches himself between the cart's canopy and the cabbages and emerges out the other side. As he does, he turns and airbends the cart up the street to strike the pursuing pirates. The cart disappears in a cloud of dust as do the pirates. "MY CABBAGES!" the cabbage merchant cries out. "This place is worse than Omashu!"

the pirates who just got knocked out by the cabbage cart groan pitifully. The cabbage merchant just takes his remaining unharmed cabbages and goes to get a new cart and head out of the port town.

The kids run down another alley, but when they turn the next corner they are met by the pirate salesperson and their men. The kids run back the way they came, the pirates again in pursuit. One of the pursuing pirates shouts out, "I hope that lemur of yours has nine lives!" The kids turn into a blind alley. They turn around to face their pursuers. Pirate They duel wields a pair of long knives, "Now. Who gets to taste the steel of my blade first?" Aang takes a deep breath, "No thanks!" Aang airbended a huge gust of wind at the Pirates, who are blinded with dust and disoriented. Aang begins to rush forward while opening his glider. Katara and Sokka run along behind and then latch onto Aang's legs. "Hang on!" He shouts to his passengers. Katara says, "Aang, I thought we were running AWAY from the pirates!" "Just hang on!" They have trouble gaining altitude at first, in fact they bounce off the heads of many of the pirates they are trying to escape. They eventually get airborne, however, and look back to see the pirates and the port receding behind them.

Aang closes his glider once they are all safely back at the waterfall. He then gives Appa and Momo a hug. Happy that none of the mean ol nasty men took his beloved babies, no matter how big they are. "Ya know, I used to kinda look up to pirates. But those guys are the worst." Katara smiles and nods in agreement. "I know. That's why I took… THIS!" She shows the small scroll in her hand. Aang looks disgruntled. Sokka starts pacing, talking crap. "No wonder they were trying to hack us up. You stole their waterbending scroll." Katara looked self satisfied and kind of smug. "I prefer to think of it as 'high-risk trading'. And before anyone tries to lecture me, where do you think THEY got it? They stole it from a waterbender!" Sokka starts bouncing on the balls of his feet in anger. "It doesn't matter. You put all of our lives in danger just so you could learn some stupid, fancy splashes!" Katara facepalms. "You and your stupid fancy magic crap! These are REAL waterbending forms. You know how crucial it is for Aang to learn waterbending." Sokka turned to walk away, muttering "Whatever." while searching the area making sure they weren't followed. As he is searching he sees a camp just a bit away from thiers. Sokka creeps along to get a closer look. As he gets closer he spies their bag of money. Sokka makes sure the person whose camp that was isn't nearby when he is sure they aren't he runs in, takes the bag and runs back to the group. "Well I found our bag of money." Sokka said holding it up. The bag was a tan color with orange ribbon that Aang said he had gotten years ago. "Where did you find it?" Katara asked. "At someone's camp not far from ours." Sokka said. "We should make sure everything is still in it." Aang said. "Right," Sokka said, dumping the contents on a stump. Sokka started to separate the gold, silver, and copper pieces out. Katara took the scroll that was in the bag that had how much they had in the bag on it to make sure they still had that amount once Sokka finished counting. Aang was making sure the smaller pieces of jewelry that Katara wanted to keep were still there too. "You know just thinking Katara instead of having your jewelry you wanted in the money bag you should put it with your stuff." Aang said, holding up a dainty necklace and a bracelet. "Yeah I think I will after this. But the necklace, I think I'd like to wear it until I get my mother's back. I just feel so naked" Katara said. "Umm. Not an image I need right now, OR EVER!" Sokka rubs his hand on his forehead, "Alright we have 320 gold pieces, 50 silver pieces, and 125 copper pieces." he said. Katara opened the scroll and remarked, "That means we are short 80 gold pieces, 150 silver pieces, and 75 copper pieces." "What in Hei-Bei's name was this person even buying? With OUR money!" Sokka yelled and sighed. "You're just upset you couldn't spend it." Katara said. "All that Meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaattt!" "Um we have your jerky though…" Aang said disgustedly. Katara wrote down how much money they had now on the scroll so that they could budget the last of their supplies and not have to worry about money until later again. "Also Aang we have a ton of fruits that Sokka will barely touch so you don't have to worry too much about any meat." Katara replied tossing Aang a Mango. Aang takes it and goes to peel it with Airbending before eating it.

After a lovely snack of fruit and jerky, the boys could smell the vegetable stew that Katara was making. "We must be training later. Katara usually makes stews when we have to be busy,"Aang says. Sokka takes a big whiff of the stew, "I do not envy you right now."

After a wonderful meal of vegetable stew, and a side of roast duck for Sokka, and the bowls are picked up, Sokka's doing dishes and drying the leftover duck for jerky while Aang and Katara are on the river banks again.

Zuko's ship is docked at the village the kids have just left. Zuko and Iroh are in the market area, with Zuko's arms folded across his chest, he stares at Iroh, clearly unhappy. "I've checked all the shops on this pier. Not a lotus tile in the entire marketplace." Zuko turns to shout at his uncle. "It's good to know this trip was a complete waste of time for everyone!" Iroh calmly looks up at Zuko. "Quite the contrary. I always say the only thing better than finding something you were looking for, is finding something you weren't looking for at a great bargain!" In the middle of Iroh's saying, a parade of Fire Nation soldiers walks by carrying armloads of merchandise that Iroh has just bought. One of them is some kind of brass musical instrument. Zuko looked dumbfounded. "You bought a sumki horn?" Iroh patted his tummy. "Aaahhh. Yes. For music night on the ship. Now, if we only had some woodwinds." They begin to walk down the dock, and see a large pirate ship. "This place looks promising!" "Not as promising as TenZou." Zuko muttered with a half smirk under his breath, and left it at that.

Zuko and Iroh entered the ship while the Captain and Pirate They talked of the escapees. "We lost the Water Tribe girl and the little bald monk she was traveling with." Zuko walked over to address the pirates. "This monk, did he have an arrow on his head?"

Katara has Aang hold the waterbending scroll. "I just want to try this one move first and then it's all yours." She leans backward, assuming the waterbending stance prescribed in the scroll. "The 'single water whip'... looks doable." She raises a stream of water and whips it around, but it hits her in the forehead, leaving a bruise. Sokka, visible over her shoulder sitting cross legged on a rock, laughs. "What's so funny?" She asked, fuming so much that she could almost turn the water touching her to steam. "I'm sorry. But you deserve that." Sokka said, now leaning to yell at Aang. "You've been duped. She's only interested in teaching herself." Katara looks down sheepishly, and says, "Aang will get his turn once I figure out the water whip!" She yelled with a little anger and a little guilt. She tries again, but the whip behaves erratically and unintentionally zaps Momo, who screams at her in protest. "UGH! Why can't I get this stupid move?" Aang walks up to the river, beaming positivity as he smiles at her encouragingly. "You'll get it." Katara looks displeased at this pronouncement, undoubtedly expecting Aang to show her up once again. Which he does. He makes a perfect water whip on the first try. "You just gotta shift your weight through the stances…" He gracefully manipulates the whip for a few seconds and then drops it back into the river. "There. See, the key to bending is…" Katara angrily shakes her fists in front of her, "Will you PLEASE shut your air hole! Believe it or not, your infinite wisdom gets a little old sometimes. Why don't we just throw the scroll away since you're so naturally gifted!" She looks over at Sokka, who is not impressed. "What?" She looks at Aang, who is frightened and looks on the verge of tears. "Omigosh, Aang, I'm so sorry. I don't know what came over me. But, you know what, it won't happen again." She rolls up the scroll and hands it to Aang. "Here, this is yours. I don't want to have anything to do with it anymore." Aang just smiles up at Katara and says, "It's okay, Katara." Momo sits on a rock next to Sokka, rubbing his behind where the whip struck him. Sokka belts out, "What about Momo? He's the real victim here!" Katara kneels down to stroke Momo's ears as he chitters. "I'm sorry, Momo." Sokka wriggled a little, ready to milk as much as he could out of the situation. "And… What about me? There was the time that yo-" Katara angrily cut him off. "No more apologies!" Sokka whispers to Momo, "Well, it was worth a shot, little buddy."

Zuko's ship. The prow opens and deploys a small cutter craft that steams away. on the river where the cutter craft and the pirate ship are moving up the river in parallel, Zuko and the Pirate Captain, green parrot still on his shoulder, are in conversation. "Shouldn't we search the woods?" The pirate captain asked. Zuko scoffed. "We don't need to stop. They stole a waterbending scroll right?" the pirate captain simply nodded. "Then they'll be on the water."

The kids camps, fire still blazing. The boys are asleep, but Katara is awake. She gets up and silently removes the scroll from Aang's bag. She backs guiltily away from the camp, turning around only to be confronted by Momo's luminescent green eyes. He is sitting on some sort of tree trunk as he chitters at her. "Shh! Momo, go back to sleep." He doesn't. Instead he watches at the side of the riverbank as Katara practices, and fails, to produce a water whip. Katara, frustrated, almost forgets what time it is, as she raises her voice, frustrated. "Shoot! Come on, water. Work with me here!" She lifts a globe of water out of the river and tries to manipulate it, each of her mistakes being punctuated by a verbal exclamation of "okay", "stupid!" or something else.

Zuko and the Pirate Captain on the deck of one of their ships, who are clearly now close enough to hear this noise. They look at each other, then to Katara wielding a stream of water. "Okay, Katara, shift your weight through the stances…" she mutters to herself, unaware of her peeping Toms. The stream collapses. "Uggh!" Suddenly she hears the noise of grinding metal. She runs over to a row of bushes on her left and parts them to reveal Zuko's cutter craft now beached on the river bank. She turns to run, but there stands a pirate, who grabs her. She bends a water whip around and smacks the pirate in the face. He lets her go, but she runs right into Zuko's arms, who holds her fast. "I'll save you from the pirates."

Katara is bound to the trunk of a small tree, her hands behind the trunk. She is surrounded by the pirates and Zuko. Zuko stands in front of Katara, smugly, threateningly, "Tell me where he is and I won't hurt you or your brother." Katara spit, concentrated and waterbent it to hit Zuko in the back of the head. "Go jump in the river!" Zuko gets up close, wipes off his head, and wipes it on Katara when he puts a hand on her shoulder, trying to reason. "Try to understand, I need to capture to restore something I've lost. My honor. Perhaps in exchange I can restore something you've lost." Katara hears Zuko as he paces around her, then she feels a familiar weight on her neck. Zuko is holding her necklace up to her neck. Shock is moving across Katara's features. Zuko walks away with the necklace. Katara croaks out with a sob, "My mother's necklace? How did you get that?" Zuko scrunched his face and shrugged. "I didn't steal it, if that's what you're wondering. Now, tell me where he is." Katara screeched out with more vigor this time. "NO!" The Pirate Captain walked forward. "Enough of this necklace garbage. You promised the scroll!"

Zuko produced the scroll and made fire in his hand beneath it. "I wonder how much money this is worth?" The pirates gasp and some cry, "NO!" "A lot, apparently. Now you help me find what I want, you'll get this back and everyone goes home happy. Search the woods for the boy and meet back here." The Pirate Captain sullenly shuffled his feet and responded with a "Fine," in almost a sigh.

A shot of the waterfall is replaced by Aang and Sokka still sleeping. Sokka rolls over, starting to wake. He notices Katara's empty sleeping bag in the foreground. "Huh? Where did she go?" He said half groggily. He then shot straight up and started searching Aang's bag. Aang was waking up by the sound of his bag being rummaged through. "What's wrong?" Sokka dropped Aang's bag, and if Aang didn't squirm over a few inches, it would have hit him in the gut. "She took the scroll! She's obsessed with that thing. It's just a matter of time before she gets us all in deep-" He is cut off when his hands get wrapped in a sling. He is pulled right off his sleeping bag screaming. He lands on the ground and is faced by a pirate who throws another sling at him. He rolls out of the way, picks up his spear and charges the intruder. Aang, in the background, turns to see a huge beefy pirate hefting two crossbows with a net tied between them. He aims and fires. Aang fires an air ball at the approaching net, but the air passes right through it. The net rolls him up into a nice neat bundle and he is thrown backwards onto the ground, where another pirate begins dragging him away. They instantly leave Sokka alone, who gets up, his pride hurt. "Oh, what? I'm not good enough to kidnap?" He is answered by another net which scoops him up. He screams as they drag him off.

The pirate ship is beached on the river bank, the pirates, Zuko and his men lined up facing each other. Katara is still bound to the tree, Iroh standing next to her. The pirates have Sokka and Aang tied up. Zuko holds the scroll. "Nice work!"

Katara looks to be on the verge of tears. "Aang, this is all my fault." "No, Katara. It isn't." Iroh saw this display, kind of shook his head and said, "Yeah… It kind of is."

Zuko stood in the middle of the company, saying, "Give me the boy." And the Pirate Captain, at the same time, said, "Give us the scroll."

Sokka pondered what was going on for a second, but not a moment sooner, nor a moment later. Then he spoke. "You're really gonna hand over the Avatar for a stupid piece of parchment!?" Zuko points at Sokka, screaming to the pirates. "Don't listen to him! He's trying to turn us against each other." The pirate captain leaned forward, inspincting Aang. "Your friend is the Avatar?" Sokka popped up by the pirate Captain's side and stated, "Sure is, and I'll bet he'll fetch a lot more on the black market then that fancy scroll." with a wink and a nudge. Zuko was so angry, the grass beneath his feet was starting to smoke, "Shut your mouth, you filthy water tribe peasant!" Aang looked concerned, a little afraid for his life, "Yeh, Sokka, you really should shut your mouth…" Sokka looked sweetly at the obviously very interested pirates. "I'm just sayin', it's bad business sense. Just imagine how much the Fire Lord would pay for the Avatar. You guys would be set for life!"

The Pirate Captain points to Zuko. "What do you take us for? Keep the scroll! We can buy a hundred with the reward we will get for the kid." The pirates begin to walk away with the kids. Zuko calls after thm. "You'll regret breaking a deal with me!" Zuko and the guards on either side of him unleash a torrent of flame, which bathes the ground underneath the pirates who jump out the way. General melee begins. The Pirate They jumped into the midst of the firebenders with a cry. Zuko and his men bear down on the still bound Aang and Sokka. As they get near, four pirates jump into the frame to defend their captives. They drop smoke bombs and the battlefield instantly becomes a foggy mess. The remaining Fire Nation soldiers approach the edge of the crowd and are instantly pulled in by the arms of pirates emerging from the smoke. Katara is still bound to the tree. Momo climbs down the trunk and chews open her bonds. "Thanks, Momo. I owe you a bushel of apples."

Aang ran through the smoke, coughing, his hands still bound. Near misses with a throwing star and a spear cut Aang's bonds.

The exterior of the smoke cloud is where Zuko emerges. He puts the waterbending scroll through his waistband on his back. He turns around to just avoid a sword stroke. Zuko assumes a firebending stance, Pirate Captain points a sword at him. They struggle, but no one gains advantage.

A sling removes the scroll from Zuko's waistband. Momo intercepts the sling as it returns to the pirate and takes the scroll, and flies off. Momo in turn is pursued by the Pirate Captain's green parrot, which tackles Momo in mid-air. The lemur drops the scroll and it falls back down into the smoke filled battlefield, jets of flame erupting from it at various points.

Sokka crawls on the ground, the sound of steel on steel all around him. Out of the smoke a machete buries itself in the ground in front Sokka, scaring him. He uses its blade to cut his arm bonds. "Aang? Aang, are you there?" Aang airbends himself up over the smoke cloud, then drops back down. "I'm over here. Follow my voice!" Sokka can't see a thing in the smoke. "Where? I can't find you!" "I'm right here!" Aang replies as he assumes an airbending stance and blows away the smoke from the immediate area to reveal a mix of Fire Nation soldiers and pirates in combat. They freeze and look at him. He closes the smoke back up around them. "Uhh… Nevermind. I'll find you!"

Sokka crawled out of the smoke and got up. As he does, Aang jumps out of the smoke over Sokka's head. "RUN!" They run towards the pirate ship, which Katara is trying to push off the beach. "Help me get this boat back in the water so we can get out of here!" All three begin to push on the boat, but nothing happens. They stop and look up at the prow. Sokka got wide eyed and looked like a small child next to the large ship. "We need to get a team of rhinos to budge this ship." He all but whined. Aang perked up and smirked. "A team of rhinos… OR two waterbenders!"

Katara looks at Aang and smiles. Aang and Katara pulled the river back and forth up the beach, slowly raising the water level around the prow. The ship floats.

On the shoreline, the duel between Zuko and the Pirate Captain raged on. Iroh tries to break it up. He calmly observes, "Are you so busy fighting you cannot see your own ship has set sail?" Zuko dodges a blow. "We have no time for your proverbs, Uncle!" Irohh points to the pirate ship sailing downriver, "It's no proverb."

"Bleeding hog-monkies!" The Pirate Captain swore.

On the pirate ship, now far away, the kids see Zuko's ship following in the distance, loaded with pirates. The Pirate Captain shouts out, "Hey, that's my boat!" Iroh stands next to Zuko, scratching his chin, pondering, "Maybe it SHOULD be a proverb." Zuko grabbed Iroh's wrist and tugged, "Come on, Uncle!"

Aang looks astern at the pirates as they close in. He turns to yell forward. "Can't you make this thing go any faster?" Sokka is standing at the control center, scratching his head. "I don't know how. This thing wasn't made by the water tribe." He starts pressing random buttons and pulling random levers.

The smokestack of the cutter ship is visible in the background. The pirates are passing them. When they draw parallel, pirates begin jumping onto the kid's ship. On the aft deck, Katara faces two pirates advancing on her. As she backs up, Aang, who is visible on top of the cabin, waterbends a huge wave onto the deck that washes one of the pirates overboard. Katara, afraid at first, but then gaining confidence and determination in her continence, creates a water whip and smacks the other one overboard. Aang beams at Katara, "Hey. You did the water whip!" And Katara returns the smile with one of her own, "I couldn't have done it without your help."

Sokka, on the bridge with a beefy pirate and the pirate They on him, shot a quick, "Will you two quit congratulating each other and help me out?" As he smacked the pirates back duel wielding his boomerangs.

Momo flies across him and his pursuers at this point, closely pursued by the Captain's parrot. The pursuit ends when Momo traps the parrot by wrapping him in the pirate vessel's black flag. Sokka screams as the pirate throws him into the sail in front of him. Sokka falls with a thud to the deck below. Sokka starts to cut himself out of his bindings with his boomerangs.

Aang drops in and throws Pirate They through the guard rail with a huge blast of air. He twirls the beefy pirate around on a whirlwind of air for a few minutes before ejecting him high into the air. He comes back down in the background, landing with a splash in the river. On the floor of the foredeck, Sokka's supine forms in the foreground, Katara and Aang visible on the bridge deck above. Aang jumps down to Sokka. Only to see that they're headed for a large waterfall. "OH NO!" As he says this, Pirate They draws their blade, making a distinctive sound. Aang turns to face him and draws his bison whistle in response. He blows the whistle furiously to no seeming effect. The unimpressed Pirate They is promptly round-kicked overboard by Sokka, who finally cut himself free. Looking at Aang, and tapping his forehead as if to say 'think, darnit, think' Sokka asked, "Have you lost your mind? This is no time for flute practice!"

Katara and Aang look over the starboard railing at the rapidly approaching waterfall. The prow is almost at the lip of the fall. Katara turns to Aang with determination and confidence in her eyes, "WE can stop the boat! Together! Push and pull the water!" Katara and Aang. On the foredeck. start waterbending in unison, making pushing and pulling motions. The boat is now turning around right at the lip of the fall. It's now at a 90 degree angle to the lip of the fall and motionless. Beyond Sokka, the smokestack of the cutter can be seen growing larger.

"We're doing it!" Katara beamed. Sokka pointed to the cutter. "Yea, but now we have another problem!" The cutter is bearing down on the pirate ship. The cutter catches up to the pirate ship and tams it amidships. The kids yell "whoa!" at the impact, which lifts the starboard side of the pirate ship out of the water and, consequently, makes the ship list badly to port. The list rapidly becomes so bad that the three fall off the ship and over the falls, the pirate ship falling behind them.

Appa swoops in and they land on his backs. He exits just in time to avoid the falling pirate ship. The pirate ship disintegrates when it hits the bottom in a cloud of water and debris. Appa and the kids swoop out. Momo lands on Sokka's shoulder in the back. Aang looks at his whistle around his neck, smiling. "I knew this whistle would come in handy. Thanks, Appa." "Yeah. We owe you one." Sokka said while hanging his arm over the side of the saddle to pet Appa's side. He grunts back to them.

Zuko runs up to the river bank near the waterfall, Iroh huffing and puffing behind him. "My boat!" Iroh finally caught up with Zuko, regaining his breath. "Hehe, Prince Zuko, you're really going to get a kick out of this. The missing lotus tile was in my sleeve the whole time!" He produces the missing lotus tile with a huge smile on his face, which disappears fast as lightning when Zuko snatches it from him.

After Zuko seemed to throw the lotus tile that he hid in his fist, he turned to talk to Iroh. "We need to return to the ship." Zuko turns and heads back to the port town, annoyed. Iroh followed behind him pouting over the thought of the now newly lost lotus tile. They are walking for a while before Zuko decides to speak again. "We have a new chef." He said. "Wait what?" Iroh said, confused. "While I was waiting for you to finish shopping, I stopped at a food stall and got lunch. This person makes really good food and said his passion is making food so I offered him a job and he took it in a heartbeat." Zuko said. "So, I am no longer cooking?" Iroh said. "You will help him for two weeks until he gets the hang of cooking for the whole ship. His name is TenZou." Zuko said. "Alright," Iroh said with a small smile. Once back at the ship Iroh goes to the kitchen to meet TenZou. Zuko goes to Iroh's room and places the lotus tile on his desk, leaving with a small yet satisfied smile.

Appa is breaking through clouds, with Aang helping direct him. Katara looks over at him for a moment, clutches the necklace that isn't her moms, and thinks to herself sadly. After a few moments, she looks up at Aang again, and says, "Aang, I still owe you an apology." Katara is kneeling and looking down at nothing. "You were just so good at waterbending without really trying. I got so competitive that I put us all in danger. I'm sorry. Besides, who needs that stupid scroll anyway?" Sokka pulls the scroll out of his tunic and holds it on display. "Is that how you really feel?" Katara reaches for the scroll, but Sokka pulls it away and gives her a 'hold up' hand. "First, what did you learn?" Katara smiles. "That stealing is wrong." She takes the scroll from Sokka, "Unless it's from pirates!" The kids laugh as Appa flies off into the soft cloudy daytime sky.