I don't own Avatar or Miraculous.
Chapter Sixteen. The Chase. Part One.
Katara wasn't sure what to make of Toph Bei Fong. Katara and Rin had hit it off immediately. Somehow, Rin also managed to just as easily get on Toph's good side too. Rin was obviously a very friendly person and only wanted what she thought was best for others. Toph… was not Rin. She discovered that very quickly. It had all started with a simple thing: Appa shedding his winter coat. The team landed in a open clearing in the middle of the woods, safely hidden from any Fire Nation scouts that could try to track them. Immediately, Toph got off of Appa, restless, because apparently she can't 'see' in the air. Everyone else got off and Toph looked genuinely excited.
"Hey! You guys picked a great campsite. The grass is so soft." Rin laughed.
"That's not grass, Toph." She said.
"Yeah, Appa's shedding." Sokka agreed. Katara looked down at the heeps of fur she was apparently standing in and made a face of disgust.
"Oh, gross." She complained.
"That's not gross; it's just a part of spring." Aang said while staring at a yellow butterfly in awe, "You know, rebirth, flowers blooming, and Appa getting a new coat." Rin looked suddenly upset by Aang's words.
"It's spring?" She asked, her voice wavering slightly." Aang nodded happily, not noticing Rin's sudden change in mood. As if on cue, Appa sneezed, scattering fur all over everything.
"Appa! Stop!" Katara cried. Rin's saddened expression faultured a little, but remained. Seriously? What was it about it being Spring upset Rin so much.
"It's not that bad, Katara." Katara focused her attention to her brother, who'd piled a ton of Appa's fur on his head, "It makes a great wig!" Aang stood next to him with fur all over his face.
"And a great beard!" Aang said proudly. Rin smiled a little at the sight. Katara just rolled her eyes.
"I'm glad we finally have more girls on the team, because you two are disgusting." She voiced. That's when Toph put her two sense in.
"Excuse me, does anyone have a razor… because I've got some hairy pits!" Toph lifted her sleeves to reveal a lot of bison fur under her armpits. Rin burst into laughter, doubling over. The boys and Toph joined her, much to Katara's annoyance, until Aang sneezed and landed next to Appa, losing his beard and moustache. They stared at him as he got up, only to find that static electricity had attached a ton of fur on his back. The laughter immediately resumed. Katara managed to smile and joined in… because honestly, that had been funny. Rin sombered up first, wiping the tears of joy from her eyes.
"We should probably start setting up camp. I'll make dinner tonight, okay?" The team agreed, splitting up to set up camp. Aang opted to set up tents. Katara got water for the soup. Sokka went for wood. Tikki flew around her holder collecting various nuts with Momo and getting the herbs from their supplies. Rin herself was preparing to make dinner. That's when Katara noticed Toph. The girl lounged against a rock as if work wasn't in her vocabulary… and being raised the way she was… it probably wasn't. Katara decided to approach Toph and explain the matter gently.
"So, Toph, usually when setting up camp we try to divide up the work." Katara told the blind earthbender. Toph shrugged.
"Hey, don't worry about me, I'm good to go."
"Well, actually, what I'm trying to say is, uh, some of us might fetch the water while someone else might set up the fire or put up the tent. Even Momo and Tikki help out." Katara explained. Toph removed the straw that she been obnoxiously chewing on from her mouth.
"Katara, I'm fine. I can carry my own weight. I don't need fire, I've already collected food, and look!" She bended a tent out of stone, "My tent's all set up."
"Well, that's great for you, but we still need to finish…"
"I don't understand! What's the problem here?" Toph asked in irritation.
"Never mind." Katara huffed. She stalked over to Rin with the water needed for the meal. Rin had been talking quietly to Tikki while getting everything ready.
"I can't believe it's springtime Tikki, that means winter is almost whole year away." Rin muttered.
"Look on the bright side. That's more time to find Cat Noir!" Tikki encouraged.
"Yes but… papa and mama…" Rin said sadly, "That's so long… they'll worry…"
"But you'll go home eventually, you shouldn't fret. They'll worry, yes, but you'll find your way back to them one day." Tikki reminded the girl. Katara raised an eyebrow. They were talking about Rin's parents? The entire time they'd been travelling with Rin, they would only mention snippets of Rin's home life. Katara honestly knew nothing about where she came from or where she'd gotten Tikki or who her parents where. All she knew was that Rin's old village was some place called Paris and Tikki had somehow chosen Rin to be Ladybug. It wasn't much to go on. Now that Katara thought about it, Rin could have actually been a Fire Nation born girl, hence the colors she wore when they met. Of course, Fire Nation or not, Rin wasn't a bad person and proved that she honestly wanted to help them on multiple occasions, so Katara couldn't care less where Rin actually came from.
Katara interrupted Rin's conversation with the spirit by informing Rin that she had water. RIn invited her with a false cheeriness to help her make supper. As they did that, the boys began to unsaddle Appa. She got some of Rin's stew, once more noticing Toph lazily lying on the rock. She sighed and set her bowl down, walking over to her.
"Hey, Toph, I wanted to apologize for earlier. I think we're all just a little tired and getting on each other's nerves."
"Yeah, you do seem pretty tired." Toph agreed. Katara fummed.
"I meant all of us!" Katara growled. She was kinda getting annoyed. Toph yawned. Crawling into her earth tent sleepily.
"Well, goodnight." Toph said. Katara sighed.
"Goodnight." Katara finished her food before climbing into the water tribe tent her and her brother had to share and dozing off. As she was drifting to sleep Toph began to wake everyone up.
"There's something coming towards us!" She yelled into the camp, waking up everyone. Everyone poked out of their respected sleeping spots, except for Rin, who had completely passed out in her Fire Nation tent. Poor Tikki was trying to wake her holder up.
"Mmm, nine more minutes mama. It's saturday, school is not until later this week." She muttered.
"What is it?" Aang asked, ignoring Rin and Tikki. Toph knelt over, feeling the ground with her hands, as if uncertain what she felt coming.
"It feels like an avalanche… but not an avalanche." Toph replied.
"You're powers of perception are fighting." Sokka deadpanned.
"Should we leave?" Katara asked in concern.
"Better safe than sorry. Someone help Tikki wake up Rin. I'll saddle Appa." Katara sighed and went to Rin's tent, practically dragging the tired teen out of her sleeping bag.
"Come on Rin, we need to move."
"But Alya, it's only saturday. Unless it involves Adrien, I'm not waking up." Rin muttered. Who the heck was Alya? In fact… who was Adrien? Katara had no clue, but she got an idea.
"Rin! Look, it's Adrien, over there." Immediately, Rin was wide awake.
"Eep! Where? Where? I'm not even in my favorite outfit and I… oh…Right…" Rin glanced around in disappointment, upset that the Adrien guy wasn't there.
"What exactly is going on?" Rin asked.
"We are moving, Toph felt something approaching the campsite."
"Oh…" She looked down caust. What was with Rin today? She seemed… not happy to be there for whatever bizarre reason. She hadn't acted upset about traveling with them until today. Rin pulled down her tent and boarded Appa. They flew up and saw what Toph had been sensing.
"What is that thing?" Katara asked.
"It looks like a train that doesn't use tracks." Rin supplied, eyeing it suspiciously, "It is using smoke, likely burning coal. Fire Nation?"
"I hope not." Katara replied. They flew to a new spot, far from the train thing and landed. Toph immediately got off.
"Land! Sweet land!" She said dramatically before earthbending her bag onto her shoulder, "Welp, see you guys in the morning!" Ah, yes… Toph.
"Actually, can you help us unload?" Toph looked back at her with puzzled, yet unfocused eyes.
"Really, you need me to help you unload Sokka's funky-smelling sleeping bag?" She asked. Sokka looked offended before smelling it and fainting.
"Well… yeah. That, and everything else. You're a part of the team now and…"
"Look, I didn't ask you to help unload my stuff. I'm carrying my own weight." Toph growled. Katara's expression fell. That was it.
"That's not the point!" She yelled at the girl, "Ever since joining us, you've been nothing but selfish and unhelpful." Toph spun around to face the waterbender.
"What?!" She pointed at Katara, "Look here, sugar queen, I gave up everything I had so I could teach Aang earthbending, so don't you talk to me about being selfish!" She stormed off, bending another earth tent.
"Sugar Queen?!" Katara marched up to Toph's tent, completely mad now, but Toph cover the opening with a rock slab, "D-Did you just slam the door in my face? How can you be so infuriating!""
"Should… we do something?" Aang asked.
"Hey, I'm just enjoying the show." Sokka said with a shrug.
"I've got it." Rin muttered, still not quite awake, "Katara!"
"What!?" Katara snapped at her.
"Could I talk to you… please?" Rin asked.
"What, are you my mom?"
"Nope. Just the oldest on here and most experienced." Rin replied nonchalantly. Katara faultured. Rin motioned for Katara to come to her, hiestantly, and still fuming, she went to Rin.
"What?"
"You need to lighten up." Rin said simply, "Your stressing yourself out about a matter that could be addressed calmly in the morning."
"But she-"
"Yeah, I get that she's bothering you by not working, but like I said, it seriously should wait until morning. You're too upset about this. You need to walk away and calm down, and insulting her isn't going to do you any good. She's a stubborn girl. Besides, put yourself in her point of view. She isn't used to being on a team. She's alway fought solo… in arenas. When she wasn't fighting, she was stuck in her house alone. She isn't quite used to the whole team idea yet. You've grown up with a brother and are used to sharing everything, even work. Aang is a monk who shared everything with his fellow monks. She needs to get used to us. We literally just met her." Rin scolded.
Katara faultured. Rin had a point.
"Now, please, go to sleep. I hate pulling all nighters, and I was not prepared to pull one tonight." Rin grumbled. The girl lumbered off and fell back asleep next to Appa, not even bothering to set up her tent or sleeping bag. Everyone went to bed in silence. Once more Katara started to drift off before Toph came out of her Earth tent and yelled, "That thing is back!" Everyone immediately sat up, well, except for Rin. They were seriously going to have to solve that girl's sleeping problem if they wanted to survive surprise Fire Nation attacks.
"Well how far away is it? Maybe we can close our eyes for a few more minutes." Sokka asked. Katara and Aang both noticed the smoke from the train thing.
"I don't think so Sokka." Waking Rin up was much easier the second time around now that Katara knew her key word was Adrien for whatever bizarre reason. They got on Appa and took off.
"Seriously, what is that thing?"
"And how does it keep finding us?" Toph complained.
"I don't know, but this time, I'm gonna make sure we lose them." Aang promised. They flew for a very long time before landing in one of the most secluded places he could find. Rin fell asleep on the ride. No one blamed her. They got off.
"Okay, forget about setting up camp. I'm finding the softest pile of dirt and going to sleep." Sokka announced.
"Who is this guy chasing us anyways?" Toph asked.
"It could be Zuko, we haven't seen him since the North Pole."
"Who's Zuko?" Tikki questioned, still perched on her holder's shoulder.
"Oh, just some angry freak with a ponytail who's tracked us all over the world." Sokka replied.
"What's wrong with ponytails, ponytail." Katara teased.
"This is a warrior's wolf tail." Sokka mumbled.
"Well, it certainly tells the other warriors that you're fun and perky!" Sokka sighed.
"Anyway, whoever's chasing us, they couldn't have followed us here… now would everyone please shh!" Momo jumped on Sokka's head, chirping nervously.
"No, Momo. Shh!" Sokka said. Toph sat up at that instant.
"No… don't tell me…" Sokka groaned.
"That's impossible, there's no way they could have tracked us."
"I can feel it with my own two feet!" Toph said standing.
"Let's get outta here." Katara suggested.
"Maybe we should face them, find out who they are. Who knows, maybe the are friendly." Aang suggested.
"Always the optimist." Sokka said, "Just leave Rin though, no use in waking her if we wind up leaving again, besides, at least one of us should get sleep tonight." They waited. The train thing came to a stop. Three figures on giant lizard creatures. Katara recognized them as the three girls from Omashu. Katara was suddenly glad they didn't wake Rin up. The last time, the girl with braids had completely forced Rin out of her transformation. It had kinda freaked both Tikki and Rin out.
"We can take them. Three on three." Toph said.
"Actually, there's four of us." Sokka objected.
"Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't count you. You know, no bending and all." Oh, the ignorance in Toph that statement… and she hadn't even been told about Rin's Ladybug persona.
"I can still fight!" Sokka cried.
"Okay. Three on three, plus Sokka." Sokka growled at that. Katara's annoyance with Toph slowly began to return with that statement. She really wasn't that ignorant of non benders, was she?
Toph bends at the girls, but they easily dodged.
"Yeah, well, we wanted to find out who they were. We found out. Now let's get out of here." Sokka decided. They all agreed, quickly climbing on Appa and leaving the girls behind, just barely dodging the princess girl's blue fire.
"I can't believe those girls followed us all the way from Omashu." Katara said. Suddenly Rin stirred.
"Papa?" She yawned, "What's going on?"
"Huh, I guess it's close to when she normally patrol's with Cat Noir. That's literally the only time she'll wake up on her own. She's trained herself to. Weird, considering she also had school… which was kinda a priority too…" Tikki said.
"Uh, she and Cat Noir patrolled her old village?" Katara asked.
"Almost every night, at four. It was part of the job." Tikki said, "They'd go until five before going back home. It was always still dark, but the sun would usually rise a little later. The problem is, she'd always fall right back asleep after getting home and was almost late for school everytime."
"Well, that explain the sun rising over there, oh no! We've been up all night with no sleep!"
"Sokka, we will be okay."
"Are you sure?! I've never not slept before! What if I fall asleep now and something happens? And something always happens!"
"Everytime we land, those girls are there, so we'll just have to keep flying." Katara pointed out. Admittedly, Katara was more than tired herself… if only a certain earthbender had helped… no… she had to wait until she was more awake like Rin said.
"We can't keep flying forever." Aang pointed out, "So what is the plan?"
"Don't know… too tired to think." Toph muttered.
"I'm sure we will come up with something after a short nap." Katara agreed.
"Yes! Sleep!" Sokka cheered. They all began to drift off as Rin slowly stirred. Suddenly Appa began to fall. Rin was fully awake at that moment.
"Guys! What the heck! Wake up!"
"What's going on!?" Toph asked.
"Appa fell asleep!" Aang explained he climbed to the front and attempted to wake the bison, "Wake up!" They nearly crash landed before Appa woke up and stopped their decent, landing in the woods.
"Apa's exhausted." Aang announced.
"Well, we put a lot of distance between us and them. The plan now is to follow Appa's lead and get some sleep."
"Of course, we could have gotten a lot of sleep earlier if Toph hadn't had such issues." Katara heard herself say. Oh, no.
"What!?"
"Hey! Is this really the ti-" Rin started.
"No! I want to hear what Katara has to say. You think I've got issues?"
"Yes! With the comment you made about non benders and you refusing to help out earlier and simply adjust to the fact that we are a team now?Maybe if you'd helped, we'd have gotten some sleep and we wouldn't be in this situation.
"Guys! Stop!" Aang cried.
"You're blaming me for this?!"
"No, no. She's not blaming you!" Aang said. What was he talking about? Of course Katara blamed her! It was her fault! It all made sense now!
"No, I'm blaming her!"
"Hey! I never asked you for diddly doo da. I carry my own weight, and I was totally joking about Sokka! Besides, if there's anyone to blame, it's sheddy over there!"
"What? You're blaming Appa?!"
"Yeah! You know how they keep following us?" She scooped up some of his fur, "He's leaving a trail everywhere we go!" Huh.
"How dare you blame Appa! He saved your life three times today! You're talking about how you carry your own weight, but your not! Appa is! He never had problems flying with only four of us!" Toph scowled, visibly angry.
"Humph. I'm outta here." Sokka tried to stop her, be she earthbended him out of the way. What had Katara just done?!
So... I wanted to make the ages of the characters in this story a little clearer. I accidentally called Adrien sixteen last chapter... so yeah. I biased how old Adrien and Mari are in season one of Miraculous. Since this is supposed to take place two years after they first become superheros, I had to add that into consideration.
Adrien turns fifteen in season one, so two years later he would be seventeen.
Mari is fourteen all of season one, but I assume she's only a few months younger than Adrien. She's sixteen in this.
Sokka is a few months younger than Mari, but is also sixteen.
Zuko is a little older than Mari, but younger than Adrien. He is sixteen too.
Katara is thirteen.
Suki is sixteen.
Aang is twelve.
Toph is twelve.
Gabriel is forty.
The entire story takes place where Heroes day doesn't happen, but Frozer and everything before has happened. The other superheroes are cannon in this, they simply aren't mentioned much due to still being in the Miraculous world. I hope that helps clear things up. Remember to review and give constructive criticism.