Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or The Last Airbender.

Bodyguard of Azula

Chapter 11: Emotions and Secrets

"Talking"

"Thinking"

"Bijū/spirit talking"

"Bijū/spirit thinking"

(Location: Earth Kingdom)

The sandstorm had blown in, mixing wind with sand. The group stood on the dune next to the tower leading to Wan Shi Tong's Library. Ino had managed to heal Akela. She told Sokka to make sure the wolf got a lot of rest and to take it easy. He was glad Akela was okay.

Aang, however, was another story. "How could you let them take Appa!?" he demanded of Toph. "Why didn't you stop them?" He was enraged and he wanted to blame someone for the loss of his sky bison.

"I couldn't!" she protested, trying to defend herself. "The Library was sinking! You guys were still inside and—"

"You've could've to come to get us! I could've saved him!"

"She was too busy stopping the Library from being buried Aang and you know it," Shikamaru told him. "If she had to come to get us, we would be dead and Appa would still have been taken." But he could already tell that Aang didn't hear him.

"He's right!" Toph said. "I can hardly feel any vibrations out here. The Sandbenders snuck up on me and there wasn't time for—"

"You just didn't care!" Aang cut her off. "You never liked Appa. You wanted him gone!"

"Aang, stop it," Katara told him. She could see that he was angry and tried to keep him calm. "You know Toph did all she could. She saved our lives."

"Our lives won't mean much if we stay here in this storm," Asuma noted. The sand swirled all around them. If it got any worse, the only people he knew who could get out of it would be shinobi from Suna.

"That's all any of you guys care about: yourselves!" the Avatar yelled, lashing out at anyone who was nearby. "You don't care whether Appa is okay or not!"

"Knock it off, Aang!" Sokka barked, not sounding like his usual goofy self. Instead, he sounded like he had authority and knew how to use it. "You're not the only one who's angry here. Or did you forget that Akela tried to fight the Sandbenders off and got hurt in the process?"

"Shut up, Sokka!" he yelled back. "Akela's not the one who got captured. Appa was!"

"Guys calm down," Katara told the two of them, trying to play peacemaker. "We can't afford to be fighting now."

Aang stomped away from the group. "I'm going after Appa!" he declared. He opened up his gilder and flew off.

"Aang, wait!" But he was already gone, flying off into the desert.

"That kind of attitude would have gotten him severely punished if he was a shinobi," Shikamaru stated. He could already imagine the Hokage sending the Air Nomad flying through a wall.

"He's not a shinobi, Shikamaru," Chōji told his friend. He could see the same thing, but he also knew it probably would never happen.

"Still doesn't mean he can go and do something like that. He left us here." If any Konoha shinobi did that without a particularly good reason, they would be treated like scum when they returned.

"In any case, we better start walking," Katara told everyone. "We're the only people who know about the solar eclipse. We have to get that information to Ba Sing Se." They all nodded in agreement and walked off in silence, going back into the desert.

Zuko and Iroh rode on the ostrich horse. Ever since he figured out how to breathe lightning, Zuko had practiced trying to use it. He soon figured out that using it wasn't the problem, generating it was. The normal way to generate lightning was to move your arms in a circular motion, creating the lightning on your fingertips and discharging it from there. Considering that he was breathing the lightning, both he and his uncle agreed that the movements of the hands were not necessary.

Eventually, they figured out that for Zuko to generate the lightning, he had to imagine himself and then break it down into his yin and his yang, then bring them back together. Once that was figured out, Zuko had to practice the imaging. He had made better timing after some practice, but it still took him a little while to do the entire process, which made the breath of lightning a risky move in combat (he also did the imaging practice while moving but it was slower as his mind also had to deal with how the flow of combat went).

And so, they rode on. Feeling that they should stop, Iroh began to make fake sounds of pain while clutching his left shoulder. "Maybe we should make camp," Zuko finally said. It was obvious that's what his uncle wanted him to do

"No please," Iroh told him. "Don't stop just for me." He continued to make the fake sounds of pain until Zuko finally stop the ostrich horse. He hopped down from the saddle and sat down on a nearby rock while his nephew attended to the ostrich horse. The ostrich horse turned its head and gave a low cry of warning, making Zuko move into a Firebending stance.

"What now?" Iroh asked with tried exasperation. His question was soon answered when they surrounded by five komodo rhinos. The thing was the riders weren't all wearing the same uniform. "Colonel Mongke," he said as he stood up from the rock. "What a pleasant surprise."

"If you're surprised that we're here, then the Dragon of the West has lost a few steps," the colonel said. "Though I'm not surprised the Scarred Dragon didn't hear us approaching until it was too late. The brat is still wet behind the ears." His voice was filled with scorn as he said those words. The five riders prepared themselves for a fight.

"You know these guys?" Zuko asked his uncle, ignoring the insult thrown at him.

"Sure," Iroh told him. "Colonel Mongke and the Rough Rhinos are legendary. Each one is a different kind of weapon specialist. They are also a very capable singing group." And frankly, he preferred the singing to the fighting.

"We're not here to give a concert! We're here to apprehend fugitives!" the colonel told them. "Although, I would appreciate it if you two would just surrender. We are feeling generous today, after redeeming ourselves in Kouzan."

Zuko's eyebrows were raised when Colonel Mongke mentioned Kouzan. "What happened there?"

Surprisingly, it was Vachir who spoke first. "If you did not know already, we barely succeeded in defending the colony from an incoming Earth Kingdom army, and the Avatar showed up at the same time."

"It was also funny when Governor Shun told us that the Avatar had an argument with the Earth Kingdom colonel on how the colony would be taken," Ogedei said, laughing lightly. Zuko and Iroh looked at each other in confusion. Why wouldt the Avatar argue with someone who was supposed to be his ally? "Luckily, Lord Naruto came up with a plan to defeat them."

"That's nice, but enough chitchat." Colonel Mongke turned the rhino back towards the two travelers. "Well? Will you two surrender or not?"

"Would you like some tea first? I'd love some," Iroh asked Colonel Mongke, ignoring his question in the process. He looked to another of the riders. "How about you, Kahchi? I make you as a jasmine man. Am I right?"

"Enough stalling, round them up!" ordered the colonel. The rider twirling the chains threw them at the two. Iroh kicked them away, sending them wrapping around another rhino's legs. Moving forward in a roll to dodge a fire arrow and ball of fire, he smacked the rhino with chains wrapped around its leg on its back, sending it off. That took care of two of the riders, the one on the rhino and the one who threw the chains.

Vachir fired off one arrow at Zuko, which he chopped in half and return fire with a small fireball. It went the wood of the bow and snapped the string, rendering him useless. The colonel stepped in and bent fire at Iroh, who deflected the fire and sent some of his own back at him. Meanwhile, Zuko moved around to the rear of the rhino and jumped onto its back, behind the colonel, who he sent flying from the saddle with a stream of fire.

Iroh went for the ostrich horse and got back on. He rode forward passed Zuko, allowing him to jump on the back. They fled with the fifth rider in pursuit. He threw a bomb in front of them and pulled back as it exploded. Unbeknownst to him, they made it through the explosion intact and kept on riding.

"It's nice to see old friends," Iroh commented as they got away.

"Too bad you don't have any old friends that want to attack you," Zuko said. All they ever seemed to meet was people who wanted to either kill them or capture them.

He contemplated that thought as it made sense to him. "Hmm…Old friends that don't want to attack me." He muttered to himself.

Katara led the group through the desert. They were hot and thirsty. Team Asuma was a little better off but they weren't usually the kind who lived in the desert, that was shinobi who hailed from Suna. Sokka tried to use Momo as a shade but Toph ran into him, knocking Momo off his head. "Can't you watch where you're…?" he began to say, only to remember that she couldn't see well in the desert.

"No," she told him.

"Right, sorry."

"If I wasn't roasting here, I would find that funny," Chōji stated. He had removed the metal plating from his clothes so that it wouldn't roast him anymore then he already was. But he was still sweating like a stuck pig.

"C'mon guys, we've gotta stick together," Katara told them.

Sokka tried to pull himself from Toph. "If I sweat anymore, I don't think sticking together will be a problem."

Toph finally got them separated by pushing him off, making him fall to the ground. "Katara, can I have some water?" she asked.

"Okay, but we've gotta try to conserve it." She looked over at Team Asuma. "Do you guys want some?"

Ino fished out a canteen. "We brought our own water, so we'll be fine."

Katara nodded. She bent the water out of her pouch and then separated it into to four small orbs, one each for Sokka, Toph, Momo, and Akela. They let the water go into their mouths and drank it. "Didn't you use this on the swamp guy?" Sokka asked as the water went down his throat. He was certain that she did.

"It does taste swampy," Toph admitted.

"I'm sorry, it's all we have," Katara told them. If they drank all their water now, they probably wouldn't make it.

"Uh…Ino," Chōji said. "Could I borrow your canteen?" He sounded a little embarrassed when he spoke.

"What happened to yours?" she asked. "Wasn't it full?"

"Yeah…about that…" He lifted his canteen up and held it upside-down. Not a single drop of water came out of it.

"You drank it all already!?"

"C'mon, Ino, an Akimichi doesn't do well in the desert. I was thirsty!" he tried to explain himself.

"Well, you're none getting any of mine!" she retorted, putting her canteen away from his sight.

"Hey, look over there," Sokka said, across from them was a cactus.

"Oh, thank Kami," Chōji said. He rushed over to the cactus and slice off a portion with a kunai.

"Chōji, I wouldn't drink that," Asuma warned him. It was never a good idea to drink something like that. You'd have no idea what would happen.

"What's the harm, Asuma-sensei?" he asked as he drank the water inside the cactus. "Want one, Sokka?" he offered the Tribesman, holding up another piece of the cactus. Sokka took the offered portion and drank it while Chōji and Momo had more than one serving of the cactus water. "You guys should have some," Chōji offered another portion of the cactus to the group.

"It's not that bad, actually," Sokka agreed, having finished one portion.

"I don't know," Katara said as she watched her brother reach for another piece.

Chōji's eyes suddenly dilated. "You know you want the cactus juice," he told them, gesturing to the piece of cactus in his hand. "It's free. Free cactus juice for everyone!"

"Okay, that's it. You're done," Ino told him as she took the piece of cactus away from and spilled it contents onto the desert floor. Maybe she should've let him drink from her canteen.

"Sokka, are you okay?" Katara asked him. He was just standing there, like nothing was happening.

"I think so. I only had one portion," he answered, dropping the full piece in his hand. He looked around, blinking his eyes a lot. His gaze finally settled on Toph. "One question though: why is Toph on fire?"

"I'm not," the blind Earthbender told him. Above their heads, Momo was flying around in circles, going faster and faster until he suddenly did a dive bomb into the sand. "Can I get some of that cactus?"

Katara picked up Momo. "I don't think that's a good idea. C'mon, we need to find again." They all started off before realizing Chōji hadn't moved from where he stood. Asuma quickly grabbed him and started pulling him along.

Sokka kept looking. "Why are we underwater?" he asked, his pupils dilated. All he could see was water everywhere.

"We're not underwater, Sokka," Katara told him. All she could see was a hot desert.

"Yes, we are. I can see fishes," Chōji said, pointing off to the distance. He tried to get loose from Asuma's grip. "Come back, fishes, I'm hungry and you are dinner!"

"Chōji, you need to calm down," Asuma told him, holding him back.

"But I want the fishes!"

Aang flew over the dunes of the desert, looking for his sky bison. He took out the bison whistle and blew. He saw nothing reacting. "Appa!" he called out. He landed on a dune and tried again. "Appa!" Again, nothing reacted. "No," he whispered as a wave of sadness took over him. The sadness quickly turned into rage. "NO!" He slammed his staff into the dune beneath him. He bent the air around as well, causing a huge cloud of sand to fly up.

They crested a sand dune when they saw the giant cloud of sand (which was beginning to look like a mushroom) "What is that?" Katara asked.

"What? What is what?" Toph asked, looking in the other direction. She had felt something blow past her but that was it.

Sokka was also facing the other way. "I don't know, but I'm not going to look at it," he told her. If he looked, he was certain he would say something stupid.

"It's a giant mushroom!" Chōji said, excited. He wanted to go to the mushroom but was held back by his sensei.

"Let's keep moving," Katara told everyone. "I hope Aang's okay," she said, mostly to herself. They hadn't seen the Airbender since he left.

Asuma dragged his student away. "C'mon, Chōji, we have to go."

"No! Come back, mushroom! I love you! You are my one and only!" the Akimichi cried as he grasped the air in the direction of the mushroom-shaped cloud.

"You declared your love to a non-existent shark five minutes ago!" Ino told him, helping her sensei pull him away.

"What a drag," Shikamaru said as he joined in the dragging.

Master Yu and Xin Fu had been hunting Toph for some time now. Her father had promise them an incredibly good reward if they brought her back, so they reluctantly worked together to find her. Their hunt had led them to the Misty Palms Oasis. They started asking the residents if they had seen her. "Yeah, a little barefoot blind girl and her friends passed through here a few days ago," a man told them.

"Did they give you any indication of where they were headed?" Master Yu asked.

"Maybe you could give me a little incentive?" The man rubbed his fingers together, giving the hint that he wanted money for the information.

"Are you suggesting that I break your fingers?" threatened Xin Fu. The man whipped his hand around his back.

"They went into the desert," he told the two of them hurriedly. "Too bad there's almost no chance they survived."

"That's okay, 'cause she's wanted dead or alive."

"No, she's not!" Master Yu argued as the man who gave them the information backed away. "I'm certain her father wants her alive."

"Hey, look." Xin Fu noticed something on a nearby board. "Fire Nation wanted posters."

"So?" He wasn't sure where this was going.

One of the posters was of Zuko and Iroh. Xin Fu turned and saw the same two men walking into the cantina. "So, look who's here." They had been given the opportunity to make some easy cash.

They continued without further incident. By now, the sun was setting, and the temperature was getting cooler. A shadow flew over them. When they looked up, they saw it was Aang. He landed behind them and stayed there. "I'm sorry, Aang," Katara told him as she ran up to meet him. "I know it's hard for you right now, but we need focus on getting out of here." She put a reassuring hand on his shoulder.

He shrugged it off. "What's the difference? We won't survive without Appa. We all know it."

"I could say that I knew this would eventually happen and that I told you so," Sokka said to Aang and Katara, earning him a glare from the Airbender. "But considering the fact that I may not be able to follow the ensuring argument, I won't."

"C'mon Aang," Katara told him. "We can do this if we work together. Right, Toph?" she asked the blind Earthbender.

"As far as I can feel, we're trapped in a giant bowl of sand pudding," she answered. "I got nothing."

"Sokka, any ideas on how to find Ba Sing Se?" asked Katara. If there was anyone who could come up with a plan, it would be her brother.

"I'll let you know when I can think straight again," he told her as he sat next to Akela. He kept shaking his head slightly, like he was trying to get sand out of his ear.

"How about you guys?" she asked Team Asuma.

"Do you think if we ask nicely, the circle birds will let me eat them?" Chōji asked, pointing to the sky.

Shikamaru looked upwards. "Those aren't birds, Chōji," he told his friend. "Those are…it's too troublesome to figure out what those are." Katara looked upwards to see what they were looking at. Circling above them were buzzard wasps, four of them. It was like they were just waiting for the group to throw in the towel, so they could feast.

Then she looked at the group. Aang was sulking, Toph was almost falling asleep, Momo was on his back moving his paw in a circle, Sokka sat next to Akela trying to clear his head and Team Asuma was trying to convince Chōji that there wasn't a giant boar with a banner that said "Please, Chōji, I beg of you. EAT ME!" tied between its tusks on the next dune over. She gave an exasperated sigh. They weren't going to throw the towel in yet. "We're getting out of this desert and we're going do it together," she told them. "Aang, get up, everyone, hold hands!" They did as they were told. "We can do this. We have to." She told them.

They continued walking, this time by holding hands (Akela walked alongside Sokka). Ino looked back at Shikamaru, who was at the end of the line. "Uh…Shikamaru, what are you doing to Momo?" she asked her teammate.

In his free hand, Shikamaru held Momo by the tail, allowing him to flap his wings without flying away from the group. "Keeping him entertained," he answered with a straight face. Momo looked like he was enjoying himself.

They kept walking until the sun had almost set. They had also stopped holding hands. "I think we should stop for the night," Katara finally said. When she said that, everyone pretty much collapsed.

"Is there any more water?" Toph asked. She was thirsty and she wanted a drink.

"This is the last of it," the Waterbender told her. "Everyone can have a little drink." She bent the water out of her pouch and held it in the air. Momo leapt for the precious liquid, splattering all over the sand.

"Way to go, Momo," Sokka said, looking at the lemur. "You've killed us all."

"No, he hasn't," Katara told her brother. She reached for the soggy sand and bent the remaining water out of it, saving some of it.

"Right, Bending, forgot about that," He was starting to wonder if the cactus juice was really getting to him. Then he saw something that caught his attention.

Katara handed the pouch to Toph so she could take a sip. "Sokka let me see the things you got from the Library," she said, only to find he was staring off at a nearby sand dune. "Sokka, you okay?"

"Katara, I need you to hit me," he told her.

She was caught off guard. "What?"

"I need you to hit me upside the head so I can stop seeing the Kyoshi Warriors doing a group striptease." She didn't even hesitate, whacking him hard across the back of his head. He went face first into the sand. "Thank you," he said as he brought his head out of the sand.

"You're welcome," she replied as she took the bag from his slumped shoulder. She sat down and took out one of the scrolls.

"It doesn't matter," Aang told her dejectedly. "None of those will tell us where Appa is."

He felt a swat on his own head. Looking to see who did it, he saw Sokka, who was having a moment of clarity, standing above him. "Listen up Aang," he said. "I know that you and Appa have been through a lot and I know you hate the fact that you can't find him. But face the facts, Appa is not our primary concern anymore, getting out of here alive is. Stop moping and help us out."

Aang gripped his staff and rose from where he was sitting. "That's enough!" Asuma barked out, standing between them, stopping the fight before it even started. "Aang, Sokka is right, we need to worry about leaving this desert alive first. Sokka, remember that Aang lost his closest friend. You don't need to remind him of it every time you can."

Aang walked away. "Whatever," he grumbled as he sat down a little further away from Sokka.

"Look guys, this way we can find which way Ba Sing Se," Katara told them as she held a constellation map in her hands. "We can use the stars to guide us. That way we can travel at night when it's cool and rest during the day." She looked back and saw everyone was almost asleep. "Just try to get some sleep. We'll start again in a few hours."

Zuko looked around the cantina and wasn't impressed by what he saw. "No one here is going to help us," He told Iroh. "These people just look like filthy wanderers."

"So do we," Iroh pointed out. That was the whole idea. Then he noticed something. "Ahh, this is interesting." Zuko followed his uncle's line of sight until he was looking an old man at a Pai Sho table. "I think I found our friend."

"You brought us here to gamble on Pai Sho?" Zuko demanded in a hushed voice. He couldn't his uncle would do something like that at a time like this.

Iroh stood up from the table. "I don't think this is a gamble." He walked over to the Pai Sho table and Zuko followed.

On the other side of the cantina, Xin Fu and Master Yu were watching their every move. "Let's take them now!" Xin Fu said, rising from his chair. If they caught them, it would be easy cash.

Master Yu put a restraining hand on him. "This place is full of desperate characters. If they find out we're collecting a bounty, we may have to fight them just to keep our prize. Patience," he told Xin Fu. The Earth Rumble host sat back down and continued to watch.

"May I have this game?" Iroh asked the old man as he approached the table.

"The guest has the first move," he answered. Iroh sat down and placed a tile in the middle of the board. "I see you favor the white lotus gambit," his opponent commented. "Not many still cling to the ancient ways." He made a gesture with his hands.

"Those who do can always find a friend," Iroh replied, making the same gesture.

"Then let us play."

The two of them began the game. The only thing Zuko could do at this point was grab a chair and wait. The two players went back and forth, slowly at first but also gradually picking up the pace. As they played the game, Zuko realized that they were placing the tiles so that they made a larger design. The two players placed their last pieces down at the same time, completing the design.

"Welcome brother," the old man said. "The white lotus opens wide to those who know our secrets."

"What are you old gasbags talking about?" Zuko finally asked them. They weren't making any sense (to him, at least).

"I've always tried to tell you that Pai Sho is more than just a game," Iroh told his nephew cryptically, fiddling with a tile between his fingers.

Xin Fu got impatient. "I'm not waiting all night for these geezers to finish yapping!" he declared as he stood up from his seat. Master Yu simply followed. "It's over!" Xin Fu shouted at Zuko and Iroh as he made his towards them. "You two fugitives are coming with me!"

The old man got in his path. "I knew it!" he said loudly. "You two are wanted criminals with a big bounty on your heads!" Thanks to his time in Akawan, Zuko realized what the old man was doing and kept quiet. "You think you're going to capture them and collect all that gold?" the old man asked the two bounty hunters.

"Gold?" asked someone. The attention of everyone in the cantina was now on Xin Fu and Master Yu.

"Uh…maybe we shouldn't," Master Yu suggested to Xin Fu, who only smirked in answer. Sure enough, a brawl started up. While Xin Fu and Master Yu dominated the others, they didn't notice that the old man, Zuko, and Iroh had left the cantina.

They had slept for some hours before Katara woke them up again. "Come on, get up." She shook Sokka awake. "We need to go."

"I'm up," he told her as he sat up. Akela opened his eyes as he rose from where he slept next to Sokka. The both of them stood up shakily.

Toph also sat up and smacked her lips. "Yesterday my mouth tasted like mud," she said. "Now it just tastes like sand. I never thought I'd miss the taste of mud so much." That was a weird thing all by itself.

"Speaking of mud," Chōji said as Team Asuma woke up. "Have you guys ever wondered what Tonton would taste like?"

"Chōji, if I were you," Asuma began, "I'd never utter that phrase again." Those who try to eat the pig risked Shizune's, Tsunade's, or (Kami forbid), Tonton's displeasure and anger. That was a fate he wished on no one.

Katara walked over to Aang. "I'm awake," he told her as she was about to wake him. "I couldn't sleep." He kept thinking about Appa and where the bison might be.

"Well, we need to get moving if we want to get out of this sand pit," she said to him.

Aang saw something flying past the full moon that looked almost like his sky bison. "Appa!" he cried in joy.

Sokka looked up. "I don't see Appa," he said before he narrowed his eyes at the moon. "But why is Princess Yue trying to fish for stars?"

"The moon…is made of cheese," Chōji declared. "Can I have some?" he asked his teammates, naked longing evident in his voice.

"No," Ino told him firmly.

Everyone (minus Chōji) looked more closely at it. "It's just a cloud," Katara said before dropping her head. She immediately brought back up. "Wait. A cloud," She took the pouch off her back and held out to Aang. "Here, fly up and bend the water from the cloud into my pouch." She told him. He yanked the pouch out of her hands, opened his gilder, and took off. It took him two passes through the cloud to get all the water. He threw the pouch at Katara as he landed back on the dune. She investigated the pouch. "Wow, there's hardly any in here."

At that point, he lost his temper. "I'm sorry, okay!?" he yelled. "It's a desert could, I did all I could! What's anyone else doing? What are you doing!?" He pointed his gilder staff at Katara.

"Trying to keep everyone together," she answered quietly. She opened the constellation map again. "Let's just get moving. We need to head this direction." She knew that he was mad, but they had to get out of the desert first.

They started walking again, until Toph tripped and fell down. "Crud! I am so sick of not feeling where I'm going!" she said as she rubbed foot. "And what idiot buried a boat in the middle of the desert?" That was probably one of the more stupid things someone could've done.

"There's a boat here because someone wanted to fish," Chōji said with excitement. "You see? I knew there were fishes out here! Let's find them!" he told his teammates.

"Calm down, Chōji," Asuma told him.

"A boat?" asked Katara as she went to check what Toph had hit.

"Believe me; I kick it hard enough to feel plenty of vibrations," the blind Earthbender grumbled. Her foot was still stinging from the pain.

Katara backed away so that Aang could step forward. He bent the air to blow away the sand covering the hidden object. When the sand cleared, it revealed a sand-sailor. "It's one of the gilders the Sandbenders used." Katara climbed aboard the helm. "And look, it's got a compass on it! I bet it can point us out of here." She tapped the compass to make sure it was working. "Aang, you can bend a breeze so we can sail it. We're going make it!"

Sokka stared off into the distance. "I could be hallucinating again, but I think Naruto is about two dunes behind us," he announced, getting everyone's attention.

Asuma looked in Sokka's direction. "I don't see anything. I think you're hallucinating."

"Okay, just making sure." They all climbed aboard and started off.

After getting away from the cantina, Zuko and Iroh followed the old man in a building that was apparently a flower store. "It is an honor to welcome such a high-ranking member of the Order of the White Lotus," the old man said, bowing his head before Iroh. "Being a Grand Master, you must know so many secrets."

The old man and Iroh walked to the back of the store with Zuko following them. "Now that you've played Pai Sho, are you gonna do some flower arranging? Or is someone in this club going to offer some real help?" he asked the two men. He was failing to see the point in all this.

"You must forgive my nephew," Iroh told the old man. "He is not an initiate and has little love for the cryptic arts."

The old man knocked on the door leading into the back. The peephole opened halfway, revealing a man's face. "Who knocks at the garden gate?" he asked.

"One who has eaten the fruit and tasted its mysteries," Iroh answered. The door opened, Iroh and the old man walk through. Zuko followed but the door was closed in his face. The peephole opened and Iroh looked at his nephew. "I'm afraid it's members only. Wait out here," he told Zuko.

The peephole closed. Zuko took a step back and waited, taking a sniff at a nearby flower. "Doesn't smell too bad," he thought to himself.

The sand sailor flew on through the desert. Aang was driving it via a continuous air stream at the sail. Katara looked at the compass. "The needle on this compass doesn't seem to be pointing north according to my charts," she said as she double checked the constellation map.

"Don't worry about it," Sokka as he sat behind her, holding Momo against the wind. Akela was sleeping next to him. "Don't fight the journey's path, just go with it."

"…What?"

He shook his head. "Sorry, even I'm not sure what that meant. At least I'm better off than Chōji." He pointed to Team Asuma, who were holding Chōji down and telling him that there was not a barbeque restaurant out in the desert that was having an all-you-can-eat buffet.

Katara looked back at where the sand sailor was going and saw a big rock formation. "That's what the compass is pointing to. That giant rock, it must be the magnetic center of the desert."

"A rock?" asked Toph. "Yes! Let's go." She wanted to feel solid earth beneath her feet again.

"Maybe we can find some water there." Katara suggested. They urgently needed more water.

"Maybe we can find some Sandbenders," Aang said to himself.

They rode towards the big rock. By the time they reached it, the sun rising. They climb to the top to get a better view of the desert. "Ah, finally, solid ground," Toph said as she fell to the ground and made a rock-angel out of the ground.

The top of the rock had tunnels leading inward. The group decided to head into one of the tunnels. The tunnel was covered in some form of yellow goo. Sokka took a deep breath. "I think my head is starting to clear out the cactus juice," he said.

"I think so too," Chōji agreed. "And look." He pick up some of the yellow goo, eat it and then immediately spat it back out. "Tastes like beef gone bad," he said before groaning. "Oh, I feel woozy."

"You've hallucinating on cactus juice all day and then you just lick something you find stuck to the wall of a cave!?" Ino demanded angrily.

"I was hungry."

"You're an Akimichi. You're always hungry!"

"Speaking of which, do you have any food I can eat?"

"NO!"

Toph walked down the cave with her hand on the wall. "I don't think this is a normal cave. This was carved by something," she told them.

"Yeah, look at the shape," Aang agreed. He could see that the shape was not natural in design.

"There's something buzzing in here, something that's coming for us!" Toph announced. They all saw what coming for them once she said those words. They all ran back out of the tunnel to avoid the buzzard wasps that were coming out of the tunnels in force. They were soon surrounded by the creatures. One came near Aang and he blew it back with a blast of air. One landed on a rock near Toph, who sent it flying by bending the rock upwards.

Another one flew between Toph and Sokka, so Toph bent a rock up and threw it at where she thought the buzzard wasp was. It landed in front of Sokka, a little too close for comfort. "What are you doing? That rock almost crushed me!" he told her.

"Sorry. I can't tell where they are in the air!" she replied.

Another buzzard wasp flew past them. "I got this one," he told her. He ran forward and swung his machete around wildly.

"Sokka, there's nothing there." Katara told him.

He stopped swinging and looked around. He hadn't hit any buzzard wasps, just air. "I guess my head's not as clear as I thought."

"You said it," Chōji agreed as he rubbed his head.

"Ran into the wall?" the Tribesman asked him. He just nodded.

"We need to get out of here. I'm completely out of water to bend," Katara said. Everyone heard Momo give a surprised screech. They turned to see Momo in the clutch of a buzzard wasp.

"Momo!" cried Aang as the buzzard wasp flew away. "I'm not losing anyone else out here!" He ran to the ledge, opened his gilder staff and took off.

"C'mon, we're going down," Katara told everyone. They began to climb down the rock but the buzzard wasps were following them. "Toph, shoot a rock right there." Katara told her, pointing in the direction she wanted. Toph bent a chuck of rock up in front of her. "Fire!" ordered the Waterbender. She shot the rocks at the incoming buzzard wasp, sending it down to the ground.

"Yeah, you got it!" Sokka cheered. "She got it, right?" he asked Katara, not sure if he was hallucinating or not.

"Yes," she answered. "Now let's move." They kept moving down the rock, still trying to avoid the buzzard wasps.

Meanwhile, Aang flew after the buzzard wasp that held Momo. He flew downwards to get under the buzzard wasp. Once that was done, he flipped over bent a stream of air at the creature, making it lose its grip on Momo. The flying lemur fell through the air but managed to recover. Aang wasn't satisfied by that alone. He landed on the sand and sent an air stream at the fleeing buzzard wasp. It hit the creature, sending crashing down into the sand. Aang glared at the fallen buzzard wasp and then walked away.

Back at the rock, the group had almost made it to the bottom, but the buzzard wasps had been hounding them all the way down.

"On your left," Katara told Toph. She responded by bending a chunk at a buzzard wasp.

A buzzard wasp got close, but Asuma fought it off with his chakra blades. "I don't we'll be able to last much longer here!" he warned. It was then, almost like someone heard him; the surrounding sand was upheaved into the air. It sent the buzzard wasps back into their caves. When the sand cleared, everyone saw that the ones who saved them were the Sandbenders, several of them.

Aang landed in front of the group. He had found who he was looking for.

Zuko had drifted off into sleep. When the door to the back opened, he immediately moved into a Firebending stance. "What's going on? Is the club meeting over?" he asked as he moved out of the stance.

"Everything is taken care of," Iroh told him as he bowed to the old man, who bowed in return. "We're heading to Ba Sing Se."

"Ba Sing Se!?" repeated Zuko. "Why would we go to the Earth Kingdom capital?" That was probably the worst place to be in right now, especially if they weren't from the Earth Kingdom.

'The city is filled with refugees," the old man explained. "No one will notice two more."

"We can hide in plain sight there," Iroh clarified. "And it's the safest place in the world from the Fire Nation. Even I couldn't break through to the city."

The door to the shop opened. "I have the passports for our guests," a young man said. "But there are two men out on the street, looking for them." Zuko and Iroh looked through the front door's peephole. They saw Xin Fu and Master Yu showing their wanted poster and asking people if they had seen them.

"What are you doing in our land with a Sandbender sailor?" the leader of the Sandbenders demanded of the group. "From the looks of it, you stole it from the Hami tribe."

Sokka felt Akela tense up by his side. "What's the matter, Akela?" he asked in a whisper. The wolf looked at him, looked back at the Sandbenders and then pawed his nose while his tail drooped. The Tribesman got the message immediately. "You mean it was one of them?" Akela nodded in acknowledgement.

"We found the sailor abandoned in the desert. We're traveling with the Avatar," Katara explained as she gestured towards Aang. The leader's eyes widened slightly. He knew who that was. "Our bison was stolen, and we have to get to Ba Sing Se."

"You dare accused our people of theft while you ride in on a stolen sand sailor?" a younger Sandbender demanded. Toph paid closer attention. She had heard that voice before somewhere.

"Quiet, Ghashiun!" barked the Sandbender leader. "No one accused our people of anything. If what they say is true, we must give them hospitality." That was the law that every Sandbender tribe held to. No one ever broke the law of hospitality.

"Sorry, Father," Ghashiun apologized. He knew the law as well.

Toph's eyes widened at the voice. "I recognize the son's voice," she whispered to Katara. "He's the one that stole Appa."

"Are you sure?" Katara asked. They had to be careful and not accuse the wrong person.

"I never forget a voice."

However, the two of them had forgotten that Aang was right behind them and could hear every bit of the hushed conversation. He marched forward with angry steps. "You stole Appa!" he accused the son, pointing his staff at him. "Where is he? What did you do to him?"

"They're lying! They're the thieves!" Ghashiun protested, trying to deflect the blame.

Aang responded by swinging his staff at one of the sand sailors, bending an air stream at it and destroying it. "Where is my bison!?" he demanded.

The door to the flower store opened and the young man walked out, pulling a cart with two big pots of flowers. As he walked away, Xin Fu and Master Yu walked towards the store. Xin Fu opened the door loudly, slamming it against the wall and making a pot of flowers hanging from the ceiling crashed to the floor. "Hey, you! where are these men?" he demanded of a man who was tending to the flowers. "I got a tip that they're in your shop."

"As you can see, no one is here but us," The man replied, spreading his arms to emphasize the point.

"We know all about your secret back room," Master Yu told him. "Kick it down," he ordered Xin Fu.

"Hey! That room is for flowers only," the man protested as Xin Fu ran past him and kicked down the door, revealing an empty room.

The only thing that was in the room was a Pai Sho tile, specifically the white lotus tile. "Some unlucky soul has an incomplete Pai Sho set," Master Yu stated as he picked up the tile, missing the actual point of the tile.

Xin Fu angrily knocked the tile out of his hands. "Let's go back to finding the girl," he told Master Yu.

Outside the village, the young man was still pulling the cart with the two large flowerpots. The flowers were lifted to reveal both Iroh and Zuko hiding in the pots. They shared a look and then went back down, placing the flowers back over their heads.

"You tell me where he is now!" Aang told Ghashiun and destroyed another sand sailor via Airbending to emphasize his point. He was mad and he wanted his bison back.

"What did you do?" the Sandbender leader asked his son.

"It-it wasn't me!" he protested.

"You said to put a muzzle on him," Toph announced, killing any defense he had.

"YOU MUZZLED APPA!?" Aang roared. At this point, his anger grew too much, and he went into the Avatar State. He destroyed another sand sailor, and it was more violent this time.

"I'm sorry!" Ghashiun apologized. "I didn't know it belong to the Avatar."

"How many sky bison are left, you baka!?" shouted Ino. There was only one left, it wasn't hard.

"TELL ME WHERE APPA IS!" Aang demanded, his voice mixing with those of the previous Avatars, making it sound almost demonic.

"I traded him, to some merchants. He's probably in Ba Sing Se by now. They were going to sell him there." Aang said nothing. He just stared at them, making them nervous. "Please, we'll escort you out of the desert. We'll help however we can!" Ghashiun promised. If he didn't try to appease the angry Avatar, he and his tribe might end up dead.

But this only seemed to make Aang even angrier, as the sand around him began to get swept up by the wind forming around him. "You need to move, now!" Asuma ordered. They all started running away from Aang, who was enveloped in a dome of air and lifted off his feet. He was also causing a sandstorm.

Katara tried to reach for Aang but was pulled away from him by Sokka. "Get out of here, Katara," he told her in a calm voice.

"What do you think you're doing!?" she demanded.

"I'm doing the job I was given. Now run!" he ordered. As she moved away, he reached for Aang's arm. "Aang, stop it!" he told his friend, trying to get through to him. Aang simply moved a hand, and he was pushed back. The Avatar was about to lash out against the Sandbenders when Sokka grabbed his arm, yanked him down, and punched him in the face. "I said STOP IT!" he yelled, his eyes turning pitch black as he cut the link between Aang and the Avatar State.

Aang returned to normal as he fell to the ground. As he did, tears welled up in his eyes. Seeing the tears, Katara ran over to him and hugged him. "I'm sorry, Aang. I'm so sorry," she whispered.

He opened his eyes. "It's not your fault, Katara," he told her. They broke the hug and stood back up. Aang turned to face the Sandbender leader. "Sorry about breaking the sand sailors."

"You have nothing to apologize for, Avatar," the leader said, looking at his son with a disapproving look. "There are additional sand sailors nearby. We will be fine. We shall head towards them and then escort you out of the desert."

"Hold on," Sokka said, getting everyone's attention. "There's one more issue we have with your tribe."

"And what is that?"

He looked to the wolf standing next to him. "Who was it, Akela?" he asked.

Akela paced slowly towards the Sandbenders. He began to sniff each one of them, checking their scent. "What is the meaning of this?" the leader asked.

"Sokka, what are you doing?" Aang asked as well. Both he and the leader had no idea what was going on.

"You'll see," he answered shortly, keeping his gaze on the wolf. Akela kept sniffing, going to each Sandbender. Finally, he found the scent of the one who wounded him. He looked up, bared his teeth, and growled at the Sandbender leader's son, Ghashiun.

He looked down at the growling wolf. "What are you growling at me for, you stupid cur?" he asked. Hearing movement on the sand, he looked up just in time for Sokka to slug him in the face, breaking his nose in the process. He fell to the ground and the Tribesman kicked him repeatedly, his foot hitting harder and harder. Ghashiun tried to curl into a ball to avoid more of the pain, and it only worked marginally. "P-please…st-stop," he croaked out.

"You want me to stop, is that?" Sokka asked. He stopped the kicking and grabbed Ghashiun by the collar. "If you ever harm Akela again, your father won't have enough pieces of you to bury," he growled to the Sandbender's face. To prove his point, he drew his machete and cut Ghashiun's chest, making it bleed badly.

He threw the Sandbender back to the ground and looked at his father. "You might as well take care of him," he said. He and Akela walked back to their own group. No one said a word after what they had seen. That was whole other side of Sokka they never would've thought existed.

"Alright, I'm done here," Naruto said as he put the last book in place. He had to admit, the whole process went a lot faster when he had help.

"But we're not done," Professor Zei said as he looked at the rest of the empty shelves. "There are still so many books that need to be replaced." It was saddening to see so many empty shelves.

"You don't think I know that?" he asked the professor. "Trust me, I've been doing this whenever I can for the past three years and I know for a fact it will be a long time until this section will be completely restored." He just hoped that it would be finished before he died.

"How did you find the Library in the first place?" Zei asked him as they walked back to the center of the Library.

"By accident," the blonde admitted. "I got caught in a sandstorm three years ago. I found the tower and climbed inside. That's when I met the owl. He was generous to allow me to wait out the storm in the Library. I walked around the place, looking at all the books and eventually saw the destroyed Fire Nation section. When the sandstorm eventually died and I could leave, I made the owl a deal: I could come back as many times as I can to restore the Fire Nation section of the Library. He took the deal on the spot."

"That's incredible." He never would've thought to do that.

He shrugged. "Not really, the bird was moping around before I made him the offer. That is something I never really want to see again. It's too weird."

"Why is that?" the professor asked as they walked down the halls, the sound of their feet echoing all around them.

"When he gets depressed or mopes around, he goes to the baby section of the Library and reads nursery rhymes. If he's really depressed, he starts singing them out loud," Naruto told him, silently suppressing a shudder at the memory. That had been a long three hours.

"…You're right, that is weird," Zei agreed. He made a silent note to stay out of Wan Shi Tong's way when he got like that.

They reached the bridge directly below the tower. "Time for me to go," Naruto said, looked over at Zei. "Now do you remember what I told you about living here?" He asked the professor.

He nodded. "Make sure that Wan Shi Tong doesn't mistake me for food. Always keep treats on hand for the Knowledge Seekers. And make sure that Wan Shi Tong eats occasionally," he recited, counting the things on his hands. "Did I miss anything?"

"That's pretty much it. I'll see ya when I come back, Zei," he said before literally jumping all the way up to the inside of the tower and then ran up it, leaving behind a stunned Zei. He soon leapt out of the window and landed in the Si Wong desert. Information went through his head almost as soon as he landed. "It seems that the Avatar's group has received help from the Sandbenders," he mused.

"Indeed," the Kyūbi agreed as he looked through the information as well. "Sokka managed to see your clone. It's a good thing he was hallucinating beforehand. Otherwise, the rest might have seen it."

"That's true." Right now, the second clone was tracking them. They appear to be heading for Ba Sing Se. That made sense. They had been in the Library and found information for the war. There was no doubt that they would try to get to the center of the Earth Kingdom.

The fox grinned. "Kit, do you remember Lesson number 5?"

"Of course, I do. When you hear opportunity knocking, open the door," he recited. That was an important lesson and it always paid to pay attention to it.

"They just gave you a very good opportunity."

He caught the fox's drift and grinned as well. "Yes, they did. It also gives me a chance to refine an old jutsu of mine." He was beginning to look forward to this idea. It also helped that he had been in Ba Sing Se before and knew exactly what to do.

The Kyūbi look through his Jinchūriki's mind and saw what he was planning. "You are evil, kit. I approve. They won't see this coming until it's too late!" he declared with an evil grin.

"Then it's best to get started, isn't it?" He quickly created another clone. "Go find the princess and tell her what's going to happen." The clone nodded in acknowledgement. The two of them ran at top speed through the desert, inadvertently causing a sandstorm between them.

End

Author's note: Thank you for all the reviews you've sent me.

Now, I know I changed Sokka up but I needed him to be serious when I needed him to be. Plus, I thought it would funnier if he was lightly intoxicated. A heavily intoxicated Chōji was much more fun to me.

What Naruto has planned for Team Avatar will eventually be revealed.

I'll see you all next chapter!