Chapter 3:
Nightmares Do Come True!
I paced.
And paced.
And then, just for the hell of it, I paced some more.
"Lovers," I repeated, furious. "Lovers."
Aang, to my infuriation, remained calm but understanding. "Look, Toph," he soothed, "I had to feed off Katara, and nothing's changed between us, has it?" To my disgust, a slight blush tinged his cheeks even as he spoke.
"First off, I don't really see how I'd know, seeing as we just met a few hours ago," I retorted angrily. "And maybe nothing's changed on her part, but I'm thinking it has on yours," I muttered under my breath.
"Toph—just calm down," Katara pleaded. "We did what was best. And Aang's right—it doesn't have to mean anything. Besides," she added, "right now, you only have a one-way contract. You have to remain faithful to him, sure, but Sokka's free as a bird—unless he ends up drinking your blood, too."
"Oh, yeah, 'cause that's such a relief—" I broke off from my sarcasm, as a strange and horrifying thought suddenly hit me. "Wait," I said slowly, "you said faithfulness was guaranteed—on my part, at least. So that means that even though Sokka can go around like a total man-slut if he so chooses, I can never—I can never—"
I gulped. "That means I can never kiss another guy! Oh, no," I wailed, beyond the edge of reason and badassery alike. Suddenly it hit me.
"You," I hissed, spinning around and stalking over to Sokka. "You knew about this, didn't you?"
Aang and Katara had suspiciously vanished from the barn, with a bounding leap into the night sky.
"Err...um..." Sokka backed away slowly. "No," he laughed nervously. "What gave you that idea? Silly."
I glared.
"Well...okay...maybe," he amended, caving in the face of my badassery. "But it's happened before," he squeaked at my horrified expression—since I'd actually kinda figured that Sokka was oblivious as I was, "And y'know, it turned out okay."
"This. Happened. Before," I said slowly. "This happened before. Well, then we don't have to worry about you man-slutting about, do we?" I asked, voice dangerously soft. "I mean, you've already done that." Sokka scurried backwards, falling onto his sorry ass.
"It was the heat of the moment! An accident! And it doesn't matter now, anyway!" Sokka cried, throwing his arms up in a vain attempt to block my anger.Badass anger, of couse.
I sneered. "So she's dead now? Good riddance," I spat. "'Cause y'know, it's sucky enough that you actually knew we were gonna hafta start acting like lovers—"
Suddenly, I realized.
She was dead.
Sokka's real, true lover was dead.
I shouldn't have cared a single freaking bit. I mean, really. I'd known him for what, five minutes? Most of those spent in life-threatening anger.
But still.
His lover.
"Oh," I said in a small voice, "oh." Sokka glanced at me, and I could see that he was struggling with the mention of his. Err. Lover. "Well..." I cleared my throat, and squatted down beside Sokka. "I guess...she probably wasn't too bad, right?" I glanced at him. "I mean, you loved her. And stuff."
"Yeah," Sokka admitted, "Pretty much."
I didn't know what to say beyond that, so I just gave him a friendly punch in the arm. "And—about this whole lovers thing," I began, "y'know, it sucks and all, but I really think that we should—"
And then, Sokka's hand was right over my mouth.
"MMFF," I said meaningfully. He ignored me, and gave the air a careful sniff.
"Oh my god," he whispered, obviously horrified, before hissing under his breath, "Shit, shit, shit."
"Glormfp?" I inquired intelligently.
"It's Azula," Sokka murmured back, effectively answering my question of "My god, you dumbass, please tell me what the hell is so shitty about it and why, exactly, you've chosen now to exhibit your disturbing oral fixation."
Slowly, slowly, he removed his hand. "She must've smelled the scent of newborn," he mumbled. "Shit." Sokka turned towards me, and explained quietly, "They'll be here in less than two minutes. We have to get out of here fast."
"Then a fights out of the question?" I furrowed my brow. Azula already sounded like a crazy little psycho bitch. "And why are we whispering?"
"She has really good hearing. Trust me, I know," he muttered. "And you do notwanna fight her," Sokka added, shuddering at the though. "If Aang and Katara hadn't gone flying..." he trailed off wistfully.
"But we're wasting time." Sokka leapt up, glanced at me, and said, "Okay, focus really, really hard. Do you feel any wriggling in your back?"
"Actually..." I shifted uncomfortably. It kinda felt like something was writhing beneath my spine. "Yeah, I do."
"Okay, then your wings are coming soon," Sokka explained, confirming my shrewd suspicion. I squawked as he lifted up the back of my shirt to check. "They're just nubs now, but a few hours from now they'll be completely grown out."
"And now..." Sokka looked around apprehensively. "We really do gotta go. Come on, I'll have to carry you," he instructed, holding his arms out in front of me.
"Ew, no way," I refused, crossing my arms. I mightta come far since...two minutes ago, but not thatfar. "Disgusto."
Immature?
Maybe.
But immature in a very badass way.
"Toph, just hop into my arms," Sokka insisted. "Or do you wanna get blown up by Azula?"
I thought about it.
Then I decided that, no, actually, I didn't. "Fine," I grumbled, as Sokka scooped me up. Lacing my arms around his neck as he stood and prepared for liftoff, I muttered into his shirt, "But that doesn't mean I have to like it."
Sokka sprinted towards the open doors of the barn, leaping into the air as we reached the end of the runway. Soon, my ears were filled with the sound of wingbeats.
"When will we get there?" I asked, already listless. "And won't she follow us?"
"Only about half an hour—we're not that far," he answered my first question, to my relief. "And.." A hesitant pause. "I don't think she will." Sokka was alarmingly uncertain. "With Azula, it's always about watch and wait."
"You seem to know a lot about her," I commented. Sokka shrugged.
"Well, she's pretty much our arch nemesis. Her Dad's trying to unite the vampires and take over the world, so it's kinda serious," he explained.
I paled slightly. Take over the world? And I thought that was only in the movies. "You never mentioned that!" I objected, flicking him on the forehead.
Sokka winced in return. "Yeah, well, the whole 'saving the world' deal was kinda gonna come afterthe fact that you were a vampire," he admitted. "Katara wanted to introduce the concept to you...slowly."
"Well, you sure did a great job of that," I grumbled. Snuggling myself up against Sokka's chest—hey! it was cold up there—I closed my eyes. In fact, I was surprisingly tired—it wasn't like I could go all night without blinking, but I prided myself on my ability to stay awake. With the help of a little caffeine, of course.
Caffeine.
Surprisingly, Starbucks had not yet lost its appeal. "Hey, Snoozles," I murmured, eyes still closed, "When we get back to New York, remind me to stop at Starbucks, will ya?"
I could feel the surprise radiating from him. Apparently, caffeine-dependence was an abnormality among vampires. "Sure, Toph," he agreed. "If you let me have the next cup of blood we run into."
I groaned in defeat. "Fine." Without another word, I sank deeper into Sokka's warm, cozy sweatshirt and drifted into sleep.
The next thing I know, Sokka was urging me, "Toph! Wake up, wake up!'
"Okay, okay," I groaned, but clutched the warm entity I could feel hugging me to its chest closer.
"We're in New York," Sokka said desperately. I guess his arms had started aching already.
Oh, now I remember: I'd fallen asleep in his arms. Ho hum...he was warm, and I was cold. It wasn't much of a decision.
"Don't you wanna get up, see the city?" he prodded further.
"New York," I considered, barely mangaging to get the words out. "Place of my death." I snuggled still deeper. "Let me think about that..." I mumbled sleepily. "...Nope, no chance.
I could hear Sokka gnash his teeth. "You know," he sighed, resigned to his fate, "If you don't get up now, I'm gonna drop you onto the sidewalk, gum and all. And also...we're outside of Starbucks."
"What?!" I shrieked, giving Sokka a good shove as I leapt out of his arms. "Why didn't you say so?!" I demanded.
"Well...it's been kinda hard," he defended, rising from the ground and brushing himself off. "Everyone seems to think that I'm going to rape you."
We both shuddered.
"Okay then," I muttered. "Let's just go inside." With that, I waltzed into dreamland.
Ah, coffee.
How I'd missed it.
Though what I wouldn't give for a steamy hot mug of blood...
Ugh, I forced myself to think, stepping in line with Sokka behind me. I could deal with all of this vampire stuff, but I had to admit, a 'steaming hot mug of blood' was going just a little to far. So for my duration in line, waiting for the wonderous substance that was coffee, I forced myself to think...coffee-ish thoughts. Lots of them.
And also, I pretended I didn't know Sokka. Mostly because by the time I was paying, he'd been forced to run to the WalMart next door and buy a Hannah Montana sweatshirt.
Partly because his was blood-spattered from our earlier encounter.
But mostly because I convinced him that he absolutely had to wear clothes that he normally wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole.
Fortunetly for me, tween sensations and their apparel definetely fell into that category.
"Mm, caffeine." I inhaled the sweet scent of my latte fifteen minutes later, walking out of Starbucks. Sokka had resorted to painfully cramping his wings inside his brand new jacket, his normal sweatshirt having ready made holes in the back.
"What should we do next?" I asked a moment later, squinting as the early morning, yet painfully bright sunshine beamed down through the skyscrapers.
"Probably change out of these," Sokka answered after a moment, picking at his Hannah Montana wear with unconcealed digust. "And then move into a crowd of humans—Azula won't be able to attack us there."
"I sure hope so...though the were-thing sure didn't have any objections." I wrinkled my nose and took a sip of latte at the thought of my attacker.
"I smell a lotta humans...this way," Sokka decided, following his nose as we turned a corner. "Now if only for the clothes..."
"I know!" I snapped my fingers, and raced into a nearly deserted part of the street with Sokka behind me. "Hey, you!" I called after two teenagers, about our size, and wearing school uniforms. They turned to face me, fear flickering across their faces almost simaltaneously.
"C'mere," I beckoned. "Watch and learn, my friend," I whispered to Sokka. "Sometimes, felonies are just too fun not to commit."
The rather stupid kids stood in front of us a moment later, the girl nervously straightening her skirt and the boy glaring as he clutched his books to his chest.
For a moment, I almost pitied them.
Ah, well. I knew it would all be worth it for the expressions on their faces.
"I'm sorry," I said quite seriously, "but we're going to have to steal you're clothes.
A/N: Lol, loved that! I chose this to post tonight instead of I'd Lie, but that'll go up tomorrow. Also, I edited/reposted the chapter...Do you guys like it better now?
Also...do any of you have a DA/lj? So I can friend you :) I'm miss-silverwing both places, by the way (keep the hyphen).
Edit: Added some stuff between the time Toph woke up and Starbucks, at the request of a reviewer. So...hope you guys appreciate it!
