Standard disclaimers apply.
"Please, Katara! Hawkie Two would be heartbroken if his wing set wrong and he couldn't fly! Just try?"
"I dunno, Snoozles," Toph put in from across the fire. "If you heal it too fast, isn't it just going to fly back to where ever it was really supposed to be going? I'd think you'd want a nice slow recovery process to brainwash it into being your friend."
"Hey!" Sokka cuddled Hawkie Two and covered where he thought its ears might be. "I'm not going to brainwash him! People don't need to be brainwashed to be my friends anyway!" He stomped away before the young girl could make the obvious comments.
Finding Zuko heading for the courtyard with an armful of cups, he immediately tried to gain moral support. "Hey, did I have to brainwash you into being friends with me?"
"Er, well, if you had, I wouldn't remember it, right? That's one of the things about brainwa-"
"Grrrr..."
Zuko laughed lightly, glanced around and gave the irate teen a quick kiss. "You can explain why we're having this conversation later, can you help me with these teacups? I had trouble scrounging up enough unbroken ones for the whole group, I don't want to drop any."
Sokka noticed the prince was holding a teapot as well. "I thought tea was your uncle's thing."
"Well, he taught me how to make a decent cup when we were in Ba Sing Se. I had been planning on breaking him out of prison when I left the palace, so I packed a lot of his favorite teas as part of my groveling for forgiveness strategy." The water tribesman laughed but couldn't help but think that Zuko sounded pretty serious about the groveling idea. "I thought I could make some for the group at dinner."
"That's suspiciously considerate of you." Sokka did his best imitation of his sister's voice, eliciting an impressive scowl. "Seriously, it sounds like a nice idea." He helped the prince wash out the set, listening to his story about the girl who asked him out when he was working in a Lower Ring tea shop. He also warned the prince against repeating the half remembered tea joke in front of the entire group, earning another scowl, which he managed to erase with a well aimed poke to the ribs.
"Listen, what are we gonna do about my dad, I've been feeling guilty enough about leaving behind most of the invasion force, and I can't just ignore it now that I know where he is."
Zuko checked to make sure none of the others were around. "I told you earlier, I understand and I'm willing to help. If the dates are correct, he's in transit right now between prisons - they must have picked him out as a leader of the other prisoners and wanted to separate him. And trust me, trying to get him now would be a lot better than dealing with the Boiling Rock. No one has ever escaped from that place, with or without outside help."
"Okay, so let's tell the group and get with the rescue!"
"That's the part I'm not sure about - as far as we know, I'm the only one who figured out where you guys were heading-"
"Because you have creepy Avatar stalking powers in addition to firebending, yes."
"Hush. The point is, if the whole group shows up on a flying bison there's no way, short of killing everyone there except your father, that we won't get identified, followed and probably attacked here." He gave Sokka a sidelong look. "And you would be in charge of explaining the 'killing everyone' plan to Aang."
"Ugh. Fine, we can't take the whole group, and everyone's going to want to come, I get it."
"So, we hash out a workable plan between the two of us and you present it to the group over breakfast, grab the people we need and go before the people who aren't involved have time to argue. You're supposed to be the Plan Guy, why am I the one arguing for this?"
"Well, lately my plans haven't really been working, so I'm tempted to wing it."
"I promise we won't give this plan to my sister three months before we carry it out..."
"Yeah, I still don't know how that happened... pretty sure I blame the Earth King..."
lineline
Sokka decided that Zuko should make tea every night with dinner. Partly because it was quite good, but mostly because watching him serve it was such a treat. Balancing the tray effortlessly as he moved lightly among the group, kneeling beside each figure to offer a cup then rising gracefully to move on... The water tribesman pondered how he could justify asking the prince to serve tea shirtless.
He had been served first and when Zuko had made his way around the entire circle, they sat together while the firebender sipped his own cup. "This is really good, thanks," Sokka gave his friend a gentle shoulder bump when he was pretty sure it wouldn't cause spilled tea.
A murmur of agreement went around the fire, and Toph added, "The service wasn't bad, either. If you don't have anything to do after the war, you can come be a servant for me." Sokka elbowed the tiny earthbender and got knocked over by a sudden outcropping of rock for his trouble.
"It is funny though," Haru said as he smoothed the outcropping back down. "You imagine a prince being served, not as a good waiter."
"Yeah, Zuko's just full of surprises," came a quiet but acidic voice. The only one that hadn't joined the chorus of compliments for the tea. Sokka opened his mouth to speak, to try to take the comment somewhere pleasant or at least harmless, but his sister spoke again too soon. "Who would have thought he'd pick up useful skills while infiltrating Ba Sing Se?"
Sokka was thrown for a moment, not sure what she meant by that, and again missed his chance to turn the conversation.
"Excuse me?" The prince's tone was polite and questioning, but Sokka could feel tension coming over him as they sat close together.
"Well, I assume you picked up all... this," Katara gestured at the cups and abandoned tray as if they were somehow distasteful, "when you were pretending to work at that tea shop in the Upper Ring."
The fire flared slightly, and Zuko sat up so he was crouched on his heels, but his voice stayed steady. "You assume that, do you? How did you know about the Jasmine Dragon?"
"Oh, I guess you didn't know how close you came to getting caught, huh?" Sokka was trying to pay attention everywhere at once. His sister's voice, the prince's posture, the fire which was no longer flaring but seemed to be growing hotter and the others' reactions. "I saw you posing as a waiter there the day before the coup. Unfortunately I ran into your sister and her goons before I could warn the Earth King and ended up in that dungeon you were planted in."
Toph nudged Sokka in the ribs with surprisingly little force, but he didn't need her insight into heartbeats to know how much trouble was brewing. The fire had stopped crackling entirely and had taken on the quiet, intense heat of the forge where he had smelted the space rock for his sword.
"I see." Zuko's form practically vibrated with coiled tension, but his voice remained steady, now almost flat. "You saw me and Uncle serving tea and immediately went to report it to the Earth King." Haru was pulling Teo's chair a little farther back from the campfire in response to the younger boy's comments that he was too warm, and Aang was looking back and forth between Zuko and Katara, apparently unsure if this extended conversation was clearing the air or making things worse.
"Well, I only saw you, but you were calling out tea orders to your uncle."
"But, um, Katara..." Sokka wasn't sure what Aang was planning to say, but he was interrupted by the prince.
"Avatar, I need to speak with you for a moment." Zuko rose with a grace that almost concealed the rage coming off of him in waves, and he looked directly at the young monk as if he had reached his limit for acknowledging the waterbender any further without immolating her.
As the two walked away a distance, the fire cooled until there were barely coals left. In the sudden darkness, Haru said awkwardly, "Well, um, time for bed, I guess," and gathered The Duke so he and Teo could make their escape. Sokka merely concentrated on slowing his breath as he realized with relief that the incident seemed to have ended without bloodshed.
"So, Sugar Queen..." Toph set aside her now cold tea. "You never told us that you saw Sparky before you were in prison together."
The water tribesman began gathering the teacups as he listened to his sister with half an ear. "I don't see how it matters. It was nice to let him know that he almost didn't get away with it, though." The cup in Sokka's hand shattered and he stood quickly.
"There was nothing to get away with, Katara," he said without looking at her. "He and Iroh weren't infiltrating Ba Sing Se, they were living there to avoid the Fire Nation. If you'd confronted them, or waited for me and Aang to get back so we could investigate the situation together or... or anything else, they wouldn't have been part of the fight with Azula." Sokka wanted to say a dozen other things, but he didn't trust himself. He didn't want to take sides against his sister, but he couldn't side with her either, and he left with the remaining cups.
lineline
Zuko and Aang were already finished talking when he had stowed the tea set with their other cooking supplies and headed in the direction they had gone. The monk was sitting on the edge of a fountain in another courtyard, meditating. Maybe he would gain some mystical insight into how to continue his training when two of his bending teachers wanted to kill each other. Sokka headed on towards Zuko's room.
He knocked gently on the door then entered quietly, remembering the night before with a small smile. This time, though, the candles were already lit, and Zuko was still up and (sadly) wearing a shirt.
"What'cha doing?" The water tribesman watched with some concern as the prince gathered a few supplies and packed them in a small bag. "Listen, I know you're angry, but what we're doing here is too important for you to-"
"It's okay, Sokka." His voice was still tight and controlled, and the candles were burning a bit higher than they had last night. "I told Aang that you and I had been thinking of doing something for a couple of days anyway - he probably assumed the fishing you mentioned at lunch - and he needs to explain to Katara while we're gone that she and I aren't going to be interacting anymore." He grabbed his swords in their scabbard and slung it on his back. "When we get back, I'll move into one of the other pagodas, and Aang can come over in the mornings for firebending training."
"Is it... is it really that bad?" Sokka felt the temperature of the room increase and guessed it was.
"I... Sokka, I was happy. I was mostly happy for Uncle because of how much the life we had there seemed to be what he wanted, but I'd also accepted it myself and I was content there. When Azula caught us, I just assumed the Dai Li had figured us out. Just... the universe hating me as usual, nothing that was anyone's fault except maybe Azula's."
The prince set down the clothing he was holding as it started to smolder. "And I've spent all this time trying to get Katara to forgive me, not arguing even when she blames me for things I didn't do, because I wanted to be a part of this group, not just an ally, and she..." Sokka was torn between wanting to comfort his friend and the good chance of suffering serious burns if he did, so he just stood and listened. "There'd been Fire Nation wanted posters of me and Uncle up for months! The last time before that you guys had seen us, Azula called us traitors and almost killed Uncle! But because she won't let anything change her mind, then just like now, she sees me serving tea and assumes I'm part of a plot to destroy Ba Sing Se? I don't want her to forgive me anymore, okay?"
"And that means you have to leave the rest of us, too?" Sokka very much hoped he didn't sound like some love struck girl who had been spurned. "Toph likes you, and Teo is warming up to you and we're supposedly friends, but-"
"We are friends. That's why I need to separate myself. You said yourself that the rest of the group felt forced to take sides, that it was causing tension, and that's when I was willing to accept fault. I came here to help the Avatar, not tear his group of allies apart!"
"You're calling him the Avatar again. I thought we were past that."
Zuko stopped and looked at him with an expression Sokka hadn't seen since the North Pole. "You know, I'm trying to think this through, and be fair, and acknowledge our friendship when all I really want right now is to throw a fire tantrum big enough to destroy a good third of this pagoda, so maybe you could cut me a little slack on how personally I refer to Aang, okay?"
The water tribesman coughed. "Okay, yeah, I'm sorry. Maybe I'm not the right person to be trying to offer comfort right now." He turned to the door but felt an uncomfortably hot hand touch his shoulder for a moment.
"I do appreciate you checking on me, Sokka. Or I will when I'm a little less angry. I... I know this is hard for you, I don't want to ask you to take sides." The prince looked at him for a moment and managed a slight smirk as his voice dropped lower. "I also don't want to throw you on my bed and take my frustrations out on you, mostly because I'm afraid of burning you, so I suppose it might be best if you did leave for now."
Well. Sokka wasn't sure whether he wanted to blush, leer or (rather unmanfully) swoon. He settled for a cough and a grin that was supposed to look cheeky but probably came out a little goofy. "In that case, just for future reference, sentences including the phrase throw you on my bed are not well designed to get me out of the room." He reached for Zuko's arm, only to find it just as burning hot as his hands.
"No seriously." The prince stepped back with a look of apology. "My control isn't great right now, and this isn't something I'm going to just snap out of, even if the distraction is really nice. I'm not going to allow a situation where you could get hurt." He took a deep breath. "Listen, why don't you go and pack up your weapons, any dark clothes you have and your maps. I'll meditate a while until I'm on a more even keel and meet you at my war balloon... let's say midnight?"
"Oooh, a midnight flight?" Sokka found the cheeky grin more natural this time. "And here I thought we weren't aiming for romance with this... guess I might have to start working on that betrothal necklace after all."
"Idiot." But a smile had begun to sneak around the corners of his lips. "Romance in my world is hinting to my parents that your parents would make really good political allies..."
"Well my dad would! He led the invasion force, you know!"
"Go pack... and make sure you bring a thick sleeping bag."
"Of course, it's cold sleeping during flights."
The smirk returned full force. "Actually, I wanted to make sure there was something comfortable to throw you on once I'm feeling a little less combustible."
Sokka found himself blushing while leering and fled to pack before he could embarrass himself with a swoon.
A/N : Since the boys are planning on breaking Hakoda out in transit, and I've altered the dynamic of Zuko and Katara's relationship evolution, the rest of the story will follow the timeline of the series as imposed by the comet and Ozai's genocide plan, but not adhere to any episodes past The Firebending Masters.
A/N2 : Yes, Sokka is obsessed with Shirtless!Zuko. If you're reading this, you probably are, too. ;-p