White Hot Flames (ZukoxOC)

32

"I do like expensive atlases," he murmurs.

Toph plucks the wanted poster from his grip. "Of course you do. That's why this wanted poster is going to stay our little secret. Got that, Lia?"

"What you aren't gonna bribe me?" Rezalia jests. Toph gives the open space near Rezalia an unimpressed look. "Yeah, yeah, I'm just kidding. You're talking to the girl currently making the Fire Lord pay for his own downfall, I'm not gonna flip over a few arrest warrants."

"Don't you and Zuko have a shit ton of them?" Sokka asks.

Rezalia shrugs a bit. "I mean, Zuko probably got pardoned but I do. Luckily, nobody has ever actually tried to act on those things."

At the sound of Aang and Katara approaching, Sokka shoves his money into his shirt. Katara gives a tired sigh at the sight of the hawk perched on Sokka's shoulder. "Sokka, tell me you didn't buy a bird."

"Not just a bird, a messenger bird," Sokka announces proudly. "Now we can send messages all over the world. Even to Gran Gran."

Aang was enthralled. "Wow, how does it work?"

Sokka deflates a bit, as the point that Rezalia had made previously comes back into play. "Uh, I never actually thought about that. Hawky," Sokka instructs, pointing away from himself." Gran Gran, South Pole." The hawk ruffles his feathers but doesn't move from his perch. "I think he gets it."

"That's not south," Rezalia calls out causing Sokka to frown at Hawky.

Before the tan boy can attempt to rectify the mistake, Momo launches himself at the messenger hawk with a mighty screech. Sokka shouts at the bird to play nice, apparently ignoring the fact that Momo had started the fight in the first place. Rezalia does nothing to help, instead electing to sit back and watch the most entertaining thing to happen since Iroh had opened his own tea shop.

The two animals do not play nice and eventually end up being seperated. Katara, who had been cooking all of their meals lately, was using waterbending to stir the hot concoction in the pot when Toph and Sokka return from their latest trip into town, accompanied by even more bags of money.

"Well. Look who decided to join us," Katara remarks, sarcasm coating her tone. "Where have you two been? Off scamming again?"

Toph puts her bags down. "Yes, we were."

"And I suppose you don't think what you're doing is dangerous at all?" the waterbender asks, sliding up beside the blind girl.

Toph huffs. "No, I don't."

"Really?"

"Yes, really."

Katara hums and reaches into her pocket. "Well then. What's this?" She asks holding up the wanted poster that Toph still couldn't see.

"I don't know! I mean, seriously! What is with you people? I'm blind!"

Rezalia snorts a bit, shooting a small flame into the fire under the pot. "It's a wanted poster of you! 'The Runaway'! Is that what you're called now? Are you proud of this?"

Rage colors Toph's face. "Where did you get that!?"

"It doesn't matter where I got it. The fact is-"

The other girl cuts her off. "You went through my stuff! You had no right!"

"Your stuff was messy and I was just straightening up, and I happened to stumble across it!" Katara shouts back defensivly. Rezalia's fingers automatically tap twice against the ground. (Lie)