A/N: Is this any good? Probably not. But I had a lot of fun writing it so I hope reading it will be a pleasure as well. Enjoy and God bless.
Zuko thought he had learned his lesson about picking fights. Yet here he was, in an underground arena, listening to the cheers of a violence-craving crowd, facing the greatest earthbender who ever lived (at least according to the enthusiastic announcer). How had he ended up in this mess? The same way he always did: he opened his mouth.
Earlier that morning
The chances of finding the Avatar in some random Earth Kingdom town were slim, but there was a chance and that was good enough for Zuko. He told his uncle to stay on the ship, docked out of sight of the town and the actual harbour. He didn't feel like having this trip turned into another sight-seeing tour. His uncle did not seem to grasp that this was a quest not a holiday.
Firstly, he 'bought' some less conspicuous clothes. It counted as buying as long as he left money. Even if a clothesline wasn't a typical shop. He was glad that his uncle had agreed to stay behind. He might have disagreed with Zuko's loose definitions.
He had no idea what he was looking for, but he was sure he would know it when he saw it. What he did not see was the girl who ran into him.
"Watch where you're going, peasant!" he shouted. The girl had come at him from the left, right in his blind spot.
The girl scowled at him. She had dark bangs and wore a fancy dress. So perhaps 'peasant' didn't apply in this case.
"Gee, I'd love to," she said, "only one small problem… I'm blind, you moron!"
For the first time he noticed the milky colour of her eyes. He winced internally; his choice of words was… bad. Zuko hated the way his burn limited his vision. If he had completely blind, completely helpless, he wouldn't want to have to deal with jerks in the street on top of that.
He tried to apologise, but the girl cut him off.
"I suppose you think you're real tough, knocking people over and insulting them. Well, you know what I think? I think you wouldn't last a minute in a real fight."
"Are you… challenging me?" he asked, genuinely confused.
"I would be, if I thought you would be an actual challenge. I bet I could beat you within the first ten seconds."
"You?"
"What's the matter? Scared of getting your butt whipped by a girl?"
"I'm not scared of anyone," Zuko said, temper flaring.
"Good. Come to number seven Argent Street at sundown then if you're so brave."
"I'll be there."
"See ya."
She went off with a spring in her step. He looked after her, flabbergasted. Had he really just agreed to fight a blind girl? It wasn't the stupidest thing he'd ever done, but it was certainly high on the list.
Zuko sighed. Maybe he could just go easy and let her win. It rankled his pride, but he hadn't sunk so low that he was going to start beating up girls.
When he told his uncle, the old man sighed as well, running a hand along his beard.
"Accidents are as common as thistles. Better to pluck them up gently with an apology than to let the winds of rage scatter the seeds to future fields."
"I tried to apologise, Uncle, but she wouldn't let me. Anyways, it's too late. I can't back out now."
"Someday, nephew, you are going to have to learn the art of surrender."
"You're the one who taught me to never give up without a fight."
"I meant that metaphorically. I was trying to teach you to never give up on yourself, not to pick fights with every stranger you meet."
"I didn't do it on purpose. If anything she picked a fight with me."
The address the girl had given him was not some dark alley or secluded square. It was an underground arena with tiered seating around an earth ring. The sign outside proclaimed: "Earth Rumble Six, every Tuesday and Friday."
Uncle Iroh looked at him with concern.
"Nephew, I have a bad feeling about this. Perhaps we should-"
"Ah, you must be the unfortunate challenger."
A thin man with long hair walked over to Zuko.
"I'm Chan, owner, manager, whatever."
"I'm-"
"Dead meat," a familiar girl's voice called.
He saw the blind girl walking towards them, cracking her knuckles with a grin on her face.
"Bandit," the manager said, "are you sure about this? If some random nobody-"
"Relax, Greasy-hair. I can handle some pretentious jerk."
"Pretentious?" Zuko asked, affronted, "you've known me for all of two minutes."
"And yet, I'm spot on."
"Whatever. Are we going to talk or fight?"
"You ready?" She raised her eyebrows at him. Or well, in his general direction.
"Are you?"
"Sweetheart, I was born ready."
Two minutes into the fight and he was starting to realise the girl's words weren't just simple boasting. She was good at this. Like Azula-prodigy-bender good.
No matter how quietly he tried to move, how quickly he dodged, she was ready for him. He had given up trying to sneak behind her. Despite being blind she seemed to have some sense, something beyond even hearing, that let her know exactly where he was.
It was almost like… like the way his bending allowed him to feel nearby flames. She was an earthbender, could she use that to 'see'?
Well, only one way to find out. Zuko jumped over her next attack. He couldn't stay in the air for more than a few seconds; he wasn't an airbender. But maybe he could use those few seconds to his advantage. He twisted in midair, using the momentum from his earlier leap to change his trajectory.
He landed just to the left of where she expected him to be. The moment his foot touched the ground she turned to face him though. The earth began to roil in concert with her movements and before he knew it, he had sunk to midcalf.
"Gotcha," she said with fierce satisfaction.
'Oh, no.' He didn't have time to think anything else because at that moment the earth spat him out as though he tasted very bitter. He shot through the air in an arc that must have looked spectacular to the audience. To him it was purely terrifying.
He didn't think, he simply acted, bending fire to slow his fall so the he landed on his feet.
The ampitheatre was silent. Then some bright spark yelled, "Firebender!"
Pandemonium ensued. Most tried to flee while others moved towards Zuko and his uncle with evident hostility.
For the second time that day the earth opened up beneath him. This time it swallowed him whole. It was pitch black and due to his rising panic it took him a few moments to realise that he could breathe.
He saw it then, a light - a fire - in the darkness. His uncle stood a few metres away, flame held in his cupped palm, looking far calmer than anyone who had suddenly fallen into a pit had any right to.
"Uncle?"
"Who else would I be?" the old man joked.
"Where are we?"
"In a tunnel. I thought the Fire Nation was supposed to be smart, but maybe you're just the exception."
The girl stood behind and he whirled to face her.
"What do you want?" he demanded.
"A proper thank you. It seems that instead of whipping your butt I'm going to be saving it."
"We are, of course, most grateful for your assisstance," his uncle said in his diplomatic way, "what my nephew was trying to express was his confusion as to your helping two complete strangers from an enemy nation."
The girl shrugged, "Honestly, I'm not sure myself. Maybe it's because those people seemed ready to murder you on the spot and I didn't want to let that happen. You seem like a very nice old man. And maybe, if you can stand to be around him, your nephew isn't really as much of a jerk as he seems."
"Hey!"
"You get offended pretty easily, don't you, Sparky?"
His uncle chuckled - the traitor.
"That he does."
Zuko glared at his uncle.
"But he is getting better," Iroh added.
"Come on," the girl said, smirking, "I'll show you the way out. This tunnel opens a long way from the town. You'll be safe there."
"Won't the other earthbenders try to follow us?" he asked.
"Listen, Sparky," he was quickly coming to hate that nickname, "there are earthbenders and then there are earthbenders. Those dunderheads might be able to chuck a few rocks around, but they don't even know that these tunnels exist. We're a long way down, far beyond their limited reach."
Zuko didn't like it, the idea of tonnes of earth between him and the sun, having to rely on a cocky - albeit capable - eleven year old girl to get them out.
"Lead the way, Blind Bandit."
Her smirk slit into a full grin.
"You can call me Toph."
The girl - Toph - led them to the surface just as she had promised. She and Uncle Iroh had chatted the whole way, about the badgermoles and the value of learning bending from the original masters.
Meanwhile something had been bugging him. When they reached the surface he finally blurted it out.
"You can use earthbending to see, right?"
"In a way, yes. I can feel the vibrations in the earth which lets me sense what's around me."
"Then how come you bumped into me?"
Toph smiled mischieviously.
"You're a bit slow on the uptake, Sparky, but you do catch on eventually. I was just trying to pick a fight. Every other wrestler was too lilly-livered to challenge me."
He looked at his Uncle.
"I told you."
She laughed, waving over her shoulder as she re-entered the tunnel.
"See you later, Sparky."