With a heavy thud, Appa half-landed, half-crashed down in a clearing beside a river.
The poor bison was exhausted. Tired and in pain, it had been a small miracle that he'd been able to get them even this far. Despite fighting off his own exhaustion, Katara was too stressed with worry to even think of sleeping. The moment her feet touched the ground she summoned water from the lake over to her to sooth Appa's burn.
"Okay, we've put in a lot of distance between us and them. The plan right now is to follow Appa's lead and get some sleep." Sokka said as he threw his sleeping bag onto the floor and flopped down on top of it like a fish.
Toph didn't even bother with a sleeping bag, and just lay down on the dirt. A flash of irritation surged through Katara. Here she was, just as tired as them and still a little indignant at having to flee from Tanya yet again, yet they got to take it easy while she had to work on healing!
"Of course, we could've gotten some sleep earlier if Toph didn't have such issues." She hissed acidly, barely even registering the words slipping out of her mouth.
"WHAT?!"
There was a literal boom, a shockwave through the earth, as Toph stood up, her youthful face morphed into an angry scowl. Immediately Aang stepped between them, taking on his usual role as the peacemaker, while Blue stood nearby and watched silently.
"All right, all right, everyone's exhausted! Let's just get some rest-…" Aang began.
"No, I want to hear what Katara has to say!" Toph argued childishly. "You think I have issues?!"
Any other day Katara might have de-escalated the situation. She might have apologised, or tried to explain herself in a calm and considerate manner. Not today though. The fatigue and the irritation it caused needed an outlet, and Toph was the perfect target.
...
Team Avatar was a mess.
In a way, Zuko found it quite annoying. They'd been a perfect little team when he was the one chasing after them, but the minute Azula picked up their trail they turned into a bickering mess. The bitter part of him cried out that, if he'd had access to the same resources Azula had, he would surely have thought to use a lack of sleep to turn them against each other too; that this was just another example of how unfairly the world seemed to favour his sister over him.
Truthfully though, Zuko recognised that the real issue wasn't fatigue. Watching the two girls descend into a heated argument, it was clear that Toph wasn't meshing as well into the existing team dynamics as he somehow seemed to be, and that Katara didn't know how to handle that.
His time at sea had taught him that, in such situations, it was the captain's duty to come down hard on the issue and flex their authority a bit to settle the dispute. Sadly Aang was too passive, and the girls both too stubborn, for such an approach to work here.
Should he step in? If things continued like this the Avatar's friends would collapse in on themselves, leaving Aang alone and vulnerable when Azula caught up. But then again how was he supposed to make an impact without speaking? Trying to convey the complicated words needed to show authority through mime would look ridiculous at best, and only frustrate Katara and Toph even more at worst. What would Uncle do in this situation?
Suddenly Aang was screaming too, and to his horror Zuko realised that the usually peaceful monk had reached the end of his tether. This was bad! With Tanya and Azula working together he needed all the fighters he could get protecting Aang until he finally got his opportunity to snatch him away. If Aang said something he'd regret now they might lose Toph's help forever, and at a time when Azula's tank could come rumbling through the trees at any second. No time to think, he had to act! What would Uncle do?!
Aang was halfway through a rant about the unappreciated work Appa did for the group when a flash of silvery steel shot past him and, with a sharp thud, embedded itself in the ground between him, Toph and Katara. All three of them jumped, and quickly looked over at where it had come from.
Blue's grinning mask stared back at the unapologetically.
Before they could demand to know what he'd done that for, Blue strode forwards to his sword and used it to scrape a few quick words into the ground. Then with a flick he cleaned the dirt off the tip of his blade, grabbed Toph's wrist, and began marching off with her.
"Hey! Get off me!" Toph protested. But despite her tough attitude she was still much younger and shorter than Blue, and dragging her along was easy. "Where are we going?"
Aang watched, baffled by the strange turn of events, until they'd both disappeared into the nearby clearing. Then he looked down at the message carved in the ground.
Be back tomorrow. Don't go far.
...
"Hey! Would you quit it with the pulling already?!"
Blue's grip wasn't painfully tight, but was vice-like in its stubborn refusal to let her slip away. Half of Toph wanted to fight back against it out of pride, but her other half, the side that recognised that she'd been getting worked up enough to do something she knew she'd regret later, was relieved to have an excuse to get away from the others for a bit. She knew that she could be hot-headed, and had been on the verge of doing something rash.
At last Blue seemed satisfied that they were far enough away for them to do… whatever he had in mind. He let go of her wrist, knelt down, and began to pull a couple of items out of his pack. Blue had very little in the way of personal possessions and money, yet had bought something back in Gaoling that he hadn't shown to anyone else yet. Curious as to what it was, Toph focused a few more vibrations through the earth to get a better sense of the shape of each object as he set them down on the ground.
"Is that… a tea set?" She asked. It was far from the delicately crafted bone china sets she'd had gifted to her at home: his was simple and rough, the bare basic cups and kettle used by the poorest of peasants, yet interestingly Blue set out the items in the exact same layout and order that nobles did when holding pompous tea ceremonies.
More importantly there was none of the hesitation to suggest that Blue had to think about what he was doing; instead he moved instinctively, as if he'd seen and mimicked this layout his whole life. Now how would a bandit vigilante be so familiar with court etiquette?
After a good few minutes of silent preparation, Blue had a kettle of tea boiling away. He sat down on the dirty floor and patted the ground: a silent gesture for her to sit as well.
Toph plopped down with a huff, her arms crossed defiantly. The silent waiting while he prepared the tea had taken the edge off her anger, but it still simmered beneath her skin, waiting for any excuse to explode back up again. "So how's this going to work?" She demanded. "'Cause you're mute and I'm blind, so I don't think a heart-to-heart conversation is on the table."
Blue shrugged, then set about pouring the steaming tea into two cups. He offered one to Toph, and she blew on it before taking a sip, then froze.
"This is disgusting." She said bluntly.
Blue sat a little straighter, genuinely surprised by her criticism. How could he be so familiar with the etiquette behind tea ceremonies, yet be so awful at making tea itself? His brew had no delicacy at all: it was strong enough to make her hairs curl up. Whoever he was used to making tea for either had no sense of taste, or had been too polite to tell him that he sucked. He couldn't be from a noble family then: anyone who tried to serve this to guests would have been the laughing stock of the courts for years.
Her feet detected more vibrations as Blue placed something flat and wooden on the floor next to him. It was only when he then brought his cup to his lips and took a deep swig of his own that Toph realised what it was: his mask.
Even in the small time she'd been with the Avatar's group, Toph had already learnt that Blue never took off his mask when anyone else could see. It wasn't such an issue here she supposed, being that she couldn't see his face anyway, but she appreciated that it must be fairly significant for him.
Toph bravely tried another sip again, hoping that it might somehow taste better once she got used to it. It didn't. Somehow it got even worse. With an annoyed growl, Toph tipped the horrid concoction into the ground next to her and leaned over to the kettle. "I can't take another sip of this. Move over, I'll do it properly."
As the young lady of the Bei Fong household, Toph had of course learned the proper way to make tea, even if the lessons had bored her stiff. He chucked Blue's poison away and started again from scratch, putting the water onto a gentle boil and measuring out a more careful heap of leaves. Blue moved to assist her, and at this at least he seemed competent enough. As they worked, Toph's curiosity finally overcame her.
"Are you a noble?" She asked.
Blue stiffened up next to her, confirming her suspicions.
Toph snorted. "No offence, but you must have been a weird one."
Blue hesitated for a moment, then held out a hand out and wiggled it in the gesture for 'sort of.'
"It's complicated?" Toph asked. Blue nodded, and Toph let out a mirthless chuckle. "Everything always is with nobility. Don't tell me, did they treat you like you were made of glass because you're disabled too?"
Blue cocked his head to the side in thought, then shook it.
"Then why did you leave?" Toph questioned.
Blue shook his head again.
"You didn't? Then why are you here? I don't know of any noble father who wouldn't be disappointed by their son running off to play bandit."
...
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