A/N: chu! I got the second chapter, thank youz to the people who read this, and thank youz more to the people who gave me constructive feed back, disclaimer yet again i do not own characters or their likeness or their image, no matter how cute they are! i live off your feedback, and comments, it gives me LIFE! please continue to help me by being constructive toward my horrid writing!
"Hey, Aang. Where's Zuko?" Sokka questioned the young hero, looking around a wide rock hallway of the Western Air Temple that the two had been walking in opposite directions down. The hallway was pretty much bare, just a few doors leading to random rooms, most of which not being used, others not even been looked in. There were no decorations or ornaments in the hall just bare grey stone walls.
The airbender looked up, seeming distant. The tanned boy looked down at the young monk noticing he had just been pulled out of his deep thoughts. "Huh? Oh I don't know I haven't seen him in awhile." The younger teen replied smiling and rubbing the back of his neck.
"How long has it been?" the water tribe boy started his interrogation and leaned in closely raising his eyebrow into a quizzical look.
"Um, I guess a day or two, why?" Aang questioned back with an annoyed glare upon his face, as if daring the taller teen to answer his question.
Sokka stood straight up wide eyed and puzzled, 'I thought they were…' the tan boy started to think to himself, and then answered the tattooed teen in front of him. "Hold up, you mean you guys haven't been training?"
The young hero looked at him flabbergasted. "For two whole days?!" Aang yelled just because of how dumb the statement was.
The taller boy made an awkward motion noticing how stupid the statement sounded but not truly letting it get the best of him, the water tribe teen's tone started out a little high then returned to his normal pitch as he said. "Well you guys do train almost every moment of the day." Sokka then tapped his lower lip with his index finger quizzically looking up toward the ceiling and asking in an accusing manner, "In fact, you guys spend a lot of time alone together, why is that?" the boy then looked down at the airbender leaning in close once more ready to soak up any form of information he could, like a super top secret detective sponge.
The shorter boy's face slightly blushed, almost unnoticeably as he answered defensively, quickly, and moved around uncomfortably as to not let the strategic teen seen his expressional changes too easily, never once looking into the taller boy's eyes. "I don't know what you're talking about. I mean you and Toph spend a lot of time together; you also spend a lot of time with Suki don't you? Are you accusing me of something?" after noticing he had compared himself and Zuko to Sokka and Suki, the tattooed youth lowered his head to not let the tanner boy see his wild raging blush. "I have to go, bye Sokka, good luck finding Zuko!" Aang exclaimed abruptly then hurriedly walked down the hallway taking the left turn at the end, therefore disappearing from the taller boy's line of sight.
'…What was that about?…' the now dumbstruck water tribe boy stood in the hallway alone, staring down the corridor to where the avatar had just run off, thinking to himself. He continued on his original quest to find the firebender, which until recently was one of their most determined enemies. He checked every room down the corridor finding only dusty empty rooms. One room seemed to be an old storage room for art collections, another which smelt heavy of smoke and perfumes the teenage boy assumed was used for cleansing ceremonies, and there were many empty bedrooms. He came upon the former prince's room and peeked inside, no one was there. There was a blanket and the friebender's bag, which held only the essentials to get by. Sokka closed the door quietly, as if the short tempered teenager might be hiding somewhere within his den and if disturbed might try to practice some firebending techniques on him. 'He's almost always in his room if he isn't training with Aang,' the young strategist thought to himself rubbing his chin, a smile spread across his face and he snapped his finger remembering a small fact. "Oh wait, he sometimes goes to the main chamber to look over the balcony!" the determined water tribe boy made his way hurriedly to the large room where the group would eat their meals, congregate and in some rare cases sleep. Upon arriving however he found no one, no trace of anyone being there recently, least of all Zuko. Feeling defeated Sokka returned to the place he started his quest, the training area for the firebender and the avatar. 'Why was Aang so defensive?' he pondered kneeling next to a scorch mark upon the smooth stone flooring. "Ugh! I give up!" he exhaled in a defeated huff.
Sokka bowed his head and closed his eyes trying to regain his cool when the ground beneath him shifted and he fell to the ground butt sticking in the air. He quickly flipped over on his back and saw Toph standing behind him arms crossed over her chest, blank stare, and a wide cocky smile on her face. "What are you doing?" she asked blowing her bang out of her face with a puff of air.
The brown haired boy sat up crossing his legs and placing his palms on his knees. "Well, Zuko is missing and Aang is acting really suspicious." The boy thought for a second as the earthbending girl stood there waiting for him to continue, his eyes widened as he came to a thought. Sokka pondered over it for a moment then gasped as if he just witnessed a deep dark secret. The taller boy leaned in close pulling the shorter girl closer so he could whisper to her. "Do you think that Aang, you know, 'took care' of Zuko?!"
The blind girl hit the taller boy across the back of the head and replied almost not wanting to believe that her close friend had just said that. "Twinkle toes? I think you have a better chance of me being able to bend lightning." She then started to walk off back toward the main temple, Sokka followed closely and queried.
"Don't you want to know what happened?" flailing his arms above his head as if to attract her attention even more, although was pretty much useless considering she was sight impaired. She only saw the most basic movements with her feet and she smirked.
The great earthbender always did love when he tried, almost begged, so she took his bait. "Ok what do you think could be going on?" she asked and the tanned boy opened his mouth taking in a deep breath, the shorter girl cut him off before he started not wanting another ridiculous story. "That doesn't involve murder."
The strategist exhaled his long drawn breath and replied with his honest and almost pathetic sounding answer. "I'm not really sure." He then grabbed Toph by the wrist and sped of dragging her along. "But let's start with some sleuthing!" he excitedly said continuing his quick pace down the large stone hallways of the temple.