The man brings them into the city.
Along the way, Toph catalogues every sound, texture, and smell that she can. There are many people, but they overall seem to be a largely militant group. Too many people hold themselves and walk around with practised steps. Toph can tell that the civilians are dreadful gossips too. It's not hard to pick up on their interested whispers.
'Refugees, obviously. Definitely from Wave, I've heard that there's been an increase in kidnappings there, typical, right?'
'No way, their clothes look nothing like Wave Country, maybe Kusa. Iwa is definitely still messing with them by the way, there's no way Iwa has been innocent all this time-"
So there are country tensions going on. Not too surprising but Toph does not recognize the 'countries' at all. She keeps herself as put-together as she can but inside she's already going through millions of theories.
Time Travel. But that would be proving all her studies wrong. She was grown up on culture lessons and history books. There's no way she wouldn't have heard of any of these countries.
Coma? Toph has always been attuned to her senses. There's no way she wouldn't be able to tell whether or not the ground- grassy with smooth pebbles littered across and pressed into the compacted dirt- is real. Her dreams have never matched reality.
Spirit World. Definitely Not. She feels too real.
Alternate World? Probable enough. And she has yet to feel an example of bending-
Her heart stops as she feels the rhythm of footsteps. The rhythm of footsteps against and up a wall. The thumping feet leap and land again onto the roof of a building. It wasn't a fast enough pace to attribute the action to sheer will and velocity, and the wall was too steep! Toph doesn't understand how.
There was no fire crackling or rushing to propel the person up.
There was no change in vibrations from earth shifting and grabbing onto feet to prevent fall.
There was no puffing or whispering of air lifting the man's steps and carrying him, and there was no noisy rippling of water and crunching ice aiding movement.
What is going on? Maybe she is in the spirit world. She hears the man that had first approached them trying to get her attention.
"Kid? We're almost at the hospital, I-" the man awkwardly pats her shoulder, "-I can carry you if you need to? The village is overwhelming, isn't it?"
Toph's mind stutters a bit, and she realizes she had stopped walking. Her hand blindly moves and reaches out to touch Zuko's still form limp against the stranger and his arm thrown over a shoulder. Similar to how her troops would carry the injured.
"I'm fine, thank you," Toph says softly. They continue their walk to the hospital.
Zuko wakes up on a bed. He immediately sits up, slightly surprised at the clean-smelling, light blue clothes someone had changed him into. He doesn't feel any injuries. He does scowl a bit at the metal bracelet formed over his left wrist. Obviously made by Toph.
At a closer look around him, he recognizes the clinical equipment around the room. On the other side of the room, there's another bed. It's ruffled a bit, but empty. Zuko looks back down at his lap and takes a deep breath. Disinfectant. Another deep breath. Blood.
He's in a hospital, obviously.
Zuko turns and looks back at the other bed across the room. He wonders where Toph might be.
Suddenly, the door is opening and three nurses are gently leading Toph into the room. One of them sighs and looks up, spotting Zuko.
"Oh! Your brother is awake now, sweetheart," The nurse says kindly. A nurse behind her quietly scoffs.
Zuko grimaces when Toph subtly turns toward where he's sitting and smiles innocently.
The hospital is familiar enough.
Toph recognizes the vibrations in the types of metal used as frames and stands around the building. Over the years, she's been able to differentiate the rates of vibrations in different metals. She had gotten a friend of hers to tell her the names of the metals as she refamiliarized herself with them.
Even without the vibrations, the smell is terribly hospital-like. (She's always been a bit sensitive to the scent of ammonium)
Zuko was left to rest in their shared hospital room, and Toph had let one of the nurses lead her to a bathroom.
Everything here was making her anxious. Too many patients and strangers had the walking gait of an Airbender. Some (only, like, four she's counted as of yet, but still) of the nurses weren't treating her like the little, weak blind girl she's presenting herself as! And more so, most of them were keeping an eye on her as if she were some threat!
It's so weird.
She's gotten used to the sounds of feet walking up the walls and she's gotten used to the surprising amount of tension around her, but she has yet to fully figure out the fuck the nurses had first asked her. It's a miracle that they actually let her be alone in the bathroom. She goes over the questions in her head. And really, their little interrogation wasn't subtle at all.
"Where are you two from? Do you know how you got here?" A nurse asked gently.
"We are from the Earth Nation, I don't know how we got here, " Toph had answered faux-shyly, curious as to whether they would recognize the term.
She felt them tense almost immediately at the word 'earth' and Toph mentally winced at their heightened suspicion. One of them had the gall to mutter "What a strange accent" under their breath. Amateurs.
"Well, you are now in Fire Country- what village are you from?" One of them asked next, a bit sharper and a bit ruder.
"No village, we are… refugees, "
The nurse didn't even hesitate when going onto the next question.
"Are you and your brother a nin?"
Toph had answered that with a confused head tilt and the nurse sighed before asking if she would like something to eat or to go to the bathroom.
If she could just figure out what the hell a 'nin' is!
"Miss? Are you alright in there?" Toph hears from outside the bathroom door. She sighs before answering.
"I'll be done in a moment, ma'am!"
She washes her hands without having to grope her way around the room, and the nurses lead her back to Zuko.
Toph grins at her 'brother' and stumbles slightly into the room.
"Zuko? Where?" she asks, her voice young and her movements pathetic.
"...I'm over here?" Zuko responds slowly, then he glances at the smiling nurses and his eyes subtly become more understanding. He starts lightly clapping his hands.
Toph pretends to follow the sound and makes her way to Zuko's bed.
She climbs onto the bed with fake difficulty and launches herself into a hug at Zuko. Zuko quickly wraps his own arms around her, and shifts so her mouth is closer to his ear.
"Act, alright idiot?"
Toph leans back and sits on Zuko's legs. She smiles at him brightly and Zuko is momentarily distracted by how young she looks. It's been a while since he's seen her blind eyes at full blast. He feels a shift on his bracelet and looks down to see newly raised dots littering the surface of the metal. Braille. Alright then Toph, let's see if he can remember the codes.
He carefully brings his hands to his lap. With his right hand, he thumbs over the bumps on the metal bracelet and carefully reads through them. Brother-sister. From Earth Kingdom. Refugees. Slavery.
Zuko would raise his eyebrows at how quick Toph is with setting up a story. She's lucky that they've probably confused Earth Kingdom with their own version of the nation. Druk gave him a basic rundown of geography at least.
Zuko turns back towards one of the nurses and sharply asks,
"Where are our things?"
One of them flinches while the other two regard him with unimpressed stares.
"They're being analyzed. You're suspicious." One of them says bluntly. Toph scowls, her back turned towards the nurses. Zuko feels his fingers twitch slightly at the loss of his twin swords.
"When can I get them back?" He asks, softly this time.
"That's not for us to decide, "
And suddenly, Zuko can feel Toph tensing on top of him. Two heavy sets of footsteps approach the room, and a man and woman in intimidating grey get-ups walk in. There's a strip of cloth over their head heads, and a metal plate attached to each. Zuko tries not to think of the things Toph could do with that.
"You will refer to me as Risu and my companion as Kekira, We are elite chuunin and we will be conducting some questioning of you two, " The man says, not even pretending to act the way people are supposed to when talking to kids. The woman smiles sharply at Zuko.
'Ahh, interrogation, how fun' Zuko thinks. And he turns back to Toph and her grey eyes, but then he does a double-take and looks back up at the man.
He has bandages over his eyes, blind and respected. Risu's back is straightened but not stiff, ready for attack. And did he just say "Chuunin?" Zuko wishes Druk could have given him more information based on culture rather than spiritual powers.
Well, he and Toph have always liked challenges.
They're actually taken to a real interrogation room. Zuko knows the value of not underestimating children but, fuck, he wishes these 'chuunin' were a bit less fantastic at their jobs.
'Risu' and 'Kekira' temporarily separate them, they didn't even flinch at Toph's scarily good silent crying. Well, Zuko can tell that the man was a bit awkward with the fumbling 'child'.
"How, when, and why did you come into our village?" Risu starts off with. Risu and Kekira watch him carefully from their side of the table, all of them sitting in chairs.
Zuko answers their questions as definitely as he can. Some things are technically true, of course-lies weaved with truth are the best, and Zuko has spent years practising lies to Toph so he's confident.
"I don't know how we got here. Toph and I were ambushed and knocked out, and we woke up in this village. We were escaping traffickers, "
The two chuunin nod and Zuko lets his eyes wander over the man's bandaged eyes. Kekira asks the next question.
"Are you trained?"
Zuko cocks his head and inwardly rolls his eyes at how quick his interrogators were to reach for their weapons.
"Are you shinobi?" She asks, clarifying.
"I know how to use swords, but not chakra,"
They relax and Zuko slumps slightly in his chair.
"Where are you from?"
"Land of Earth. No village, "
Risu openly scowls and Kekira's eyes sharpen.
"Not Iwagakure? Who was trafficking you?"
Zuko performs a flinch and raises a hand to feel at his scarred eye.
"I don't know who. We were not allowed to look."
Kekira glances at Risu from the corner of her eyes. Zuko mentally clocks in the tiny amount of sympathy in her expression towards Risu. Similar background then? Risu seems to sense her gaze and silently dismisses it.
"The girl calls you 'brother' yet you act nothing alike. She has a different posture, and a slightly different accent," Risu says. Zuko wonders if Risu can see like Toph does.
"We are siblings of trauma. Family without blood, surely you understand?" Zuko says back, easily, with just the right amount of defensiveness.
"Do you intend to stay here in Konoha?" The woman asks finally.
Zuko hesitates for a moment.
"If you will let us. We don't have any money though, "
Kekira nods. She and Risu stand up, gesturing for him to do so too.
It's Toph's turn then.
Toph sits quietly on the chair, swinging her legs forward and back.
"-can you tell us what your ambushers sounded like?" The man, Risu, asks. Toph shrugs.
"He sounded old. And mean. Like Zuko when he's really upset, " Toph answers childishly. She nods and raises a hand to tap lightly on the table. Kekira huffs out impatiently and taps on Risu.
"Y'know, Risu's blind too, he lost his sight saving a family. Were you born blind?" Kekira asks her, albeit insensitively. Risu grumbles slightly and Toph is actually surprised.
"Really? And he's a chuunin? I was born blind. Can I be a chuunin?" Toph asks excitedly, hoping they'll explain a bit about what chuunin even is.
"Well, being a shinobi is very dangerous, but if you're-" Kekira begins to explain. Risu cuts her off. Shinobi? Like a ninja?
"Do you or your older brother have any ill will directed towards Konoha? Are you a threat?" Risu questions calmly, he begins to tap the table too, but out of beat with Toph's. The off-beat thumping almost makes Toph sneer.
Toph grins small and makes a show of listening to Risu's tapping.
"We just want to be safe. I don't want to hurt nobody, " Toph says. Her heartbeat is normal.
"That should be it then, thank you for your compliance. I'm sure you can become a shinobi if you put your mind to it, sweetheart, " Kekira says. She's more relaxed than she was at the start of Toph's interrogation.
"You'll have to do a bit more minor questioning, and there are some legal things your older brother will have to do, but things should be fine for you. I hope you enjoy your time here in Konoha, " Risu says. He's already standing to leave.
"Thank you!" Toph says happily. She keeps her head from turning directly towards either of them. She hears Risu's steps hesitate for a moment before he leaves. Kekira has half the mind to stay with Toph, to help her find her way to the door.