Disclaimer- Avatar is too awesome to be made up by a lame-y like me.

AN: I'm sorry this was late, I was supposed to update yesterday, but my computer was down and my Internet didn't work. I really wanted to type this out, but here it goes. This chapter has a lot of fighting and talking, so if I miss anything, tell me.


Previously, on Avatar...

Suddenly, there was screaming and the sound of fighting.

"TOPH! GET KATARA! NOW! AANG'S IN TROUBLE!"

"No. I'm not leaving you alone to fight all of these.."

"GO!"

-cut to Toph and Katara-

...a loud crash was heard and all that was seen was a falling Avatar. Sokka frantically turned around and began to shout, "AANG!"

Both girls saw this (in Toph's case, felt). Toph's eyes widened with horror. "No."

-cut to the throne room of Ba Sing Se-

"You know well, General Fong, that I am very busy. I have other things to do, but if this a waste of time, I will be rid of your services to me."

"Well?"


The palace was filled with frantic soldiers and Dai Li agents. Azula, Mai and Ty Lee were all in one room planning on their next move.

"How can this be?!" Mai actually looked afraid. "I thought I killed him!"

Ty Lee began to respond hesitantly," We all thought you did too but I guess..."

"DON'T INTERRUPT!"

The green and gold room rustled with fear as the two friends backed up from the rage of Azula.

"If the Avatar was able to survive my attack, then apparently...we'll just need more force, now do we?"

An evil smile began to caress her face. "There's no place left to hide."

-

"We need a plan." Sokka told the others, "We need Ba Sing Se."

"You think, Snoozles? What exactly are we supposed to do; knock on Azula's door and beg for the city? I really don't think so."

Sokka furiously began to point his finger at the blind earthbender but was "happily" greeted by a stub in the toe. "OW! TOPH! WHAT THE HECK WAS THAT FOR?!"

"Gee, I wonder?", she responded in a sarcastic tone. Maybe for being a complete freak of an idiot?

Their surroundings were near Ba Sing Se, although the two kept arguing like an old married couple, Aang and Katara had their own conversation.

As the heat of summer filled the air, green and delicate leaves moved within the sturdy branches of trees. The grounds of the earth became dusty with the season, making every moment feel stale. But almost in the heart of the small forest lay two friends.

"Katara, I'm sorry." The airbender looked over to his side.

"For what?", she responded.

"Everything."

A sense of utter confusion troubled Katara. "Be more specific, Aang."

"Like...I almost let the whole world down! I didn't defeat Azula, I didn't save Ba Sing Se. I wasn't strong enough, I'm a failure."

"No. You're not. Stop telling yourself these things, you know it's not true. Besides, that's why we're here Aang; to give the world a second chance. There is a new beginning for us. We can do this, all of us. I know we can."

"You don't understand! The last time we tried it, I failed! There's no point in turning back now!"

"Aang, this is wrong. This isn't the real you."

He shouted angrily, "Well you weren't exactly yourself after we left Ba Sing Se!"

Katara felt a tight knot in her throat. He was right after all. Who was to blame? She knew that it wasn't him. She knew it and refused to taint the fact. "I..."

Aang sighed. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that."

"No...Aang. You're right. I wasn't myself, but that gives us no reason to loose our hope. It wasn't just your fault. It was mine too. But the world needs us now. You need a firebending teacher."

"Katara, who?"

"I know just the right person.", she replied with a smile.

"C'mon. Let's enter Ba Sing Se."

-

It was the evening and the group was preparing for their plot to ensue for the following day. The Earth King, who was mostly kept out of everything, including the Fire Nation attack of just a few days ago, sat very near the fire pit.

Toph spoke, "And how exactly is that going to work, Twinkle Toes?"

"Well, we just have to make a little drill of our own."

"How many times do I have to tell you?! STOP RESONDING TO THAT! It's not manly!", Sokka began to fling his arms up and down and the rest just turned his way with their eyebrows raised in honor of his random comment of the moment.

"Ugh...Sokka," Katara began to say, "At least Aang doesn't have a necklace, or a ponytail."

The whole group, minus Sokka, bursted out with laughter.

"Snoozles, hitting on the cactus juice?"

There was just more giggles after that.

Aang began to re-tell his idea after their so-called break. "Well, anyways. As I was saying...Toph and I could earthbend a hole through the wall. The only problem is being inconspicuous."

"Well I can wip-up some cover." Toph smiled.

Katara shook her head, "No. Why can't we just go underground?"

"Because, little sister," Sokka stated wisely, "Going underground would require more handiwork for Aang and Toph. Going straight through is less work for us. Besides, we all need to conserve as much energy as possible just in case we face some...trouble. We covered being unnoticeable, now how about covering up the hole?"

"Easy, Snoozles. All you need are two earthbending masters."

-

Morning finally arrived and all four were ready, well, the Earth King didn't really count. The sun lifted of the rocky horizon and they all knew that it was the beginning of yet another day, that is, to fight for Ba Sing Se.

They decided not to use Appa in order to keep the element of surprise. So, they quietly ran through the branches of the forest until they reached an edge. Sokka turned around. "Okay Toph. How long can you hold the cover?"

She responded in a taunting way, "As long as you can carry that boomerang, Snoozles."

Suddenly, the earth began to rumble with might as the hands of the blind girl shook. She released the force onto the earth and the rumbling sound caused a cloud of dust to rise.

She nodded to her companions, "Let's go."

And so they sprinted across the landscape. "TOPH!", Katara shouted, "The cloud is disintegrating!"

"I'm on it, Sugarqueen!"

Again, the ground shook and more smoke rose off it. "C'mon! We're almost there!"

They just ran even faster, they had a time limit after all and couldn't afford to stay they for more than 24 hours. When they reached the wall, Toph released another dust cloud to give them more cover as it takes time to earthbend on a wall as thick as Ba Sing Se's.

Aang and Toph both pushed their arms forward and the rest just watched as the wall quickly became thinner and thinner.

"There's no way we're going to re-claim this huge city. I mean, we're here for that, right?"

"No Sokka," Aang replied, "We're here to retrieve something we need. Besides, it's practically impossible to get Ba Sing Se back at this time. We need to wait for the right moment, and it's not today."

Toph joined into their conversation, "Twinkle Toes is right. We don't have much time anyways."

Right in her place, she froze.

Katara looked at her curiously, "What's wrong?"

The earthbender reeled back and widened her eyes. "STOP! There's something on the other side!"

The rest of the group looked at each other with fear. Who could it be? Who was on the other side?

"I-I don't know who it is. The vibrations...are...weird."

"What..?"

The wall vibrated and out busted a hole and on the other side...

-

"Well look what we have here? The Avatar. Welcome back."

Standing in front of them, was Azula and the Dai Li. "There's nothing you can do now. You're surrounded Avatar, and frankly, you cannot escape."

Katara looked at Azula angrily.

"Dai Li, eliminate the intruders."

And so the battle began, with the Dai Li prancing forward for attack first. In a straight line, they released their earthy gloves. Toph exploded them with the contact of her fists. Airbending strikes flew from place to place as Aang flipped over five agents and sprang into the air. There was something that needed to be done.

Katara and Azula caught each other's eyes in the midst of the battle. With fury the princess shot her first strike at Katara in the form of a twisting blue flame ball. Katara ducked and brought her waterwip to wrap around her enemy's leg. She pulled and the other fell. As she sat up Katara yelled, "You know what you did!"

"You mean the little lightning I pulled off on your friend?"

The waterbender just looked even more vexed than before. Azula smirked, this is just what she wanted. Sokka stopped in his tracks, he heard the whole thing. He bellowed, "You WHAT?"

Azula looked at him and spoke, "It seems like the watertribe fool has it all figured out."

"Katara, is she telling the truth?!"

She sighed and looked sadly at her brother. "She almost killed Aang." Toph also heard. She widened her eyes. "Oh you're going to get it!", she moved forward with her fists behind her back and the ground began to crumble.

"Er...AH!" Sokka flung out his boomerang.

-

He was enclosed by a hoard of the Dai Li. They attacked him with their rock gloves and two caught his clothing. "AH!" He was pulled back but swiftly destroyed the rest of the flying gages.

"It's time to give these guys a cool down." With that, the pond behind them rose into a giant wave and splashed onto his target.

Once Aang turned around, his eyes caught sight of another fight going on, between Katara, Azula, Sokka and Toph. They needed his help.

-

Currently, Sokka just took out his machete and was blocking some of Azula's assaults. Toph was creating an earthquake and shooting up boulders from the ground. The firebender was just dodging everything, from jumping over stones and redirecting fireballs. There was no stopping her. With one flip at a time, Katara did an aerial over the wooden bridge and gathered the water below into her fists. She surrounded herself with a circle of water and started to use the octopus form. But Azula deflected every move she made, that is, until one of the tentacles grabbed her arms. She attempted to firebend but the flames were drowned out by the water around her hands. But Azula struck back, using the only weapons she had left, her legs. A white hot flame cut through her watery chains. As she prepared to attack Katara, an air blast caught her flying to the other side of the bridge.

"Aang!", Katara hollered over her shoulder.

"Katara! Don't move!" She stood still and he covered both of themselves with a rocky tent, for on the other side, Azula was getting ready to strike. He started to punch at the protective wall, causing stones to burst out toward her face. Not one hit her, so Aang created a wave of the rocks and forced it to her.

"Uh!", the assault was successful.

"Yes!"

Meanwhile, Sokka and Toph fought side by side against Dai Li agents.

"SOKKA! What the heck are you doing?" Well, she was right to be on the alert, for Sokka was doing something stupid, at least that's what she believed. He ran for every single giant boulder there was and destroyed them all with his machete, even the boulders created by Toph.

"...Making sludge juice of our own."

"What?"

"Toph, can you make a ledge underneath all the agents? Then I want you to make it slanted, pointed outside of the city!"

"You can't boss me around, Snoozles!"

"Wait for it...NOW!"

At that moment, Katara and Aang were working together to make a tidal wave and slashed it onto the stray stones. Toph did what she was told and all the Dai Li slipped out of Ba Sing Se, leaving Azula on her own. The Avatar flew Katara up to the top of the wall while she got the leftover water from the pond and blew it over the enemy earthbenders, making them frozen in their place; literally. Kuei (the Earth King), was hiding in

one corner and the rest of the group turned to her angrily.

Azula grinned. "That was a mistake."

"No, it wasn't." Aang got into an earthbending stance and lifted from the floor, a thick wall. Her eyes broadened and Toph quickly made a smoke screen.

Aang and Katara flew off the ledge and began to run to the palace with the others. Knowing that Zuko, Mai and Ty Lee were probably waiting for them at the entrance, all of them got ready (with the exception of Kuei).

Almost suddenly, an electric sound was heard and the wall Aang forged was crumbling.

"Look's like she fell for our plan." Sokka spoke between breaths while they ran faster.

"Yea. Let's just hope she doesn't figure us out.."

They looked behind and saw a shadow. "Aang, call Appa now!"

"I'm on it Sokka." He took out his bison whistle and blew as hard as he could. It only took about a couple of seconds for them to hear a soft roar coming toward them. And into the smoke flew Appa and the gang quickly jumped aboard.

"This will keep her off guard."

"Yea, Aang," stated Katara, "We ran west instead of east into the area of the palace. Good plan! Now let's do this."

-

The kids and Kuei soared through the sky when an orange fireball came straight for them.

"Zuko." Katara said. "We better hurry."

Aang glided the bison toward the ground and they were all greeted by furious minions. They jumped off, leaving the Earth King on the back of Appa and came to defend themselves from their foes. Fire blasted from Zuko's finger tips toward Toph but Katara defended her by forming an ice shield.

Of course, that was the distraction as Sokka and Aang quietly escaped to where they made the hole for the crystal catacombs. Aang started to earthbend another hole through the ground, as the previous one was sealed shut.

Toph enslaved Mai to one of the palace pillars with bands around her arms, legs and forehead. Ty Lee was taken care of my Katara, who froze her in the nearby moat, while Zuko mysteriously escaped.

"C'mon Toph! Let's find the others!"

When the whole group reunited, they were in the crystal prison, but what the saw was devastating. No one was there. Scorch marks were across the walls and a hole was formed.

"He escaped!" Sokka threw his machete on the floor. "This can't be for nothing."

Toph stepped forward. "It isn't Snoozles. He escaped, that means our job just got easier."

"We're too late."


AN: Yup. Another day, another chapter. I hope you enjoyed it! Next chapter is...

Chapter Three: The Firebending Master

If you have any theories on what's going to happen next, feel free to express yourself.