Book II: Earth
The Nature of Balance
It was dark. It was more than dark, it was…really dark. So dark in fact, the boy who tried to use the darkness to his advantage fumbled around aimlessly, doing his best to keep his footing on the sand and random bursts of hills. Fed up of needing to spit sand out of his mouth, the boy decided on simply crawling around. That way, he would stop falling down, and also keep low enough out of sight should anyone else see him this late in the night, or was it "this early in the morning?"
Nevertheless, after what seemed to be twenty minutes of crawling in the sand, the boy felt comfortable that he was far enough to start a small fire. He took out the sticks out of the pelt backpack, but found that he forgot the fire rocks back at the camp. Sighing, he began his slow crawl back to fetch the missing rocks. He continued his crawl mumbling in frustration when he bumped into something soft.
"Sokka…what are you doing?" Toph yelled out in a hushed voice.
"Huh? Toph, is that you? I can't see you!" Sokka exclaimed in frustration
"Oh no…how awful." She responded in her classic style. Realizing her sarcasm, Sokka continued to figure out where exactly he was in relation to where Toph was. Other than the grainey feeling between his fingers, he wasn't aware that sand could be soft.
"Where are you then?" Sokka asked again in a hushed voice.
"Closer than you think…" While Sokka was trying to figure out what to do, Toph's situation was far from pleasant. Uncomfortable would be a better word; after almost dying of a migraine from Sokka's idea of a wake up call, she had to fumble around in the sand only to be knocked down onto her back. Now here she was, the "Blind Bandit"; the five time champion of Earth Rumble, being straddled by a water tribe boy confused by the dark. It's not like she asked for this to happen. But Toph wasn't stupid either. Under normal circumstances, she would simply knock him off her with a simple push. Of course, this would cause Sokka to yelp in pain, wake up the others, and draw attention to the reason of why they were up so late at night….or was it early in the morning?
Sokka, still not aware of the precariousness of the situation, moved his hands around to find the missing Toph. What's this? Sokka asked himself…Oh no… "Toph! I didn't mean to!" Giving up on playing it safe, an exasperated Toph growled in anger when Sokka poked her eye and got sand in her mouth. Bending some sand into his mouth before punching him off her, Toph managed to kill two birds with a handful of sand. While Sokka rolled around the ground in pain and coughing and spitting out sand, Toph spat out her share and rubbed her irritated eyes. If it wasn't for the darkness, you could've sworn that there was a blush on her face, but of course that could have been because of the intense coughing…who knows?
It took a while, but after a few minutes of calming down and a massive amount of water from the oasis pond, things settled for a bit and the two were now sitting near a fire. They weren't able to retrieve the fire rocks, but Toph was able to provide the next best thing from hardened sand.
"And so, that's my plan. What do you think?" Sokka concluded.
"All right, hearing this I just have some things I'd like to point out." Toph started off. Not hearing anything from Sokka, she continued on, "First off, what does scaring off Chiang have to do with finding out who he really is?"
"It's simple really." Sokka started to explain, "First, we get Momo to dress up in a white sheet and have him fly around. I'll then speak in a spooky voice and interrogate him. He'll be so scared that he'll tell us anything!" Giving a blank expression in Sokka's general direction, Toph sighed in despair.
"Yeah, he's blind. Remember?"
"Oh yea…"
"Secondly, that plan's stupid. Knowing you, I bet that's how you'd plan to get into a Fire nation fort. "
'The plan's not stupid. It's homage to one of my father's greatest pranks."
"I'd bet it is…" Toph muttered under her breath.
"Fine, what idea do you have then?"
"Just follow Chiang and find out what he's up to. We'll play it normal during the day and at night we'll share notes on whatever we found out about him. It's how my parents kept a tab on me during the day. Of course, I could feel the guards from a mile away." Agreeing on the plan, Sokka put his "plan scroll" into his backpack and Toph covered the fire in sand. They started their way back to camp; unaware of a pair of glowing eyes disappearing into the sand with a grin on its face.
"Finally, the sun's up. Let's get going everyone." Aang said in a sleepy tone. Still worried about her Airbending friend, Katara continued to keep a careful and motherly watch. Of course she still kept up with taking care of their blind guide, Chiang. Late to wake up were Sokka and Toph, for obvious reasons. With red eyes and bags under them, the two sleuths dragged themselves from their sleeping bags constantly mumbling along the way.
The day was uneventful, filled with trekking through the vast desert expanse, fighting off hunger induced annoyances from everyone's favorite lemur. "Hey….I think I see something over there!" Sokka called out. Beads of sweat ran down his face as the party walked past a group of cacti. Are they waving at me?
"Wait...I think I see it too!" Katara hesitantly said. In the distance, there surely seemed to be an oasis.
"It's probably just a mirage. Let's keep going to Ba Sing Se." Aang said calmly.
"Hold on young man. Katara, what direction have we been going in?" Chiang politely asked. Katara quickly took out the compass that Sha-Mo had given from one of the ruined Sandbender skiffs and glanced at it. It's pointing away from us… "We've been moving Northeast, Chiang."
"Ah! Yes. If that's correct then that is another oasis in the distance." Chiang pointed out happily. "You see, there's a whole chain of them on the way to the desert border. It's how us Sandbenders have lived and traveled...at least, back in my day."
"Heh…yeah right." Grumbled Sokka
"Oh yes….right indeed Sokka!" Both the watertribe boy and lady earthbender looked towards the other's direction and nodded at this new discovery about Chiang. When the group finally reached the oasis, everyone was happy to take a break.
"Water!" Both Aang and Katara screamed in joy as they ran towards the small pool.
"C'mon guys, we've got to get to Ba Sing Se!" Sokka scolded the pair like his father would.
"Yeah, didn't you dweebs already get some swim time at the last oasis?" Toph added in a motherly way.
"Oh come now you two…let them be, we shan't be more than a few minutes." Chiang defended Katara and Aang. At first, Sokka and Toph were just annoyed by how their friends were suddenly acting until Aang asked for them to join in…and was suddenly attacked by Katara from behind.
"Didn't that happen last time as well?" Toph asked the watertribe boy.
"Yeah, now that I'm thinking about it, this oasis looks really familiar as well…" Sokka looked down to Toph for approval to his claim, but she only looked up shrugging her shoulders and moving her foot in the sand for a demonstration. The two looked back towards their friends playing in the water with uneasiness, their gazes directed towards the stranger who walked towards the pool with Aang and Katara's clothes as they strode back onto the shore.
Well, that's the end of the first episode this is. Tune in for the second part of the non-existent movie in the future! Also, please check out my other story, "The Avatar Returns" and review its OCness!
Thanks for reading!