The Forgotten Princess (SokkaxOC)

ii. VIII

A/N; Okay uh this was supposed to be a normal chapter and somehow ended up being 7,272 words long - not including this A/N, by the way.

I need help. (Kinda like Appa does at the end of this chapter.)

...that was in really bad taste, I'm sorry ;-;

Azami P.o.V.

"This is great and all, but don't we have more important things to worry about? We need to make plans!"

Azami crossed her arms in frustration. "We did make plans, ponytail. We're all picking mini-vacations."

With Aang's earthbending well underway, the gaang had decided to take some much needed break time before he started on training on his final element - fire. Truth be told, Azami wasn't entirely sure how she wanted to approach teaching him after how disastrous his previous attempt was, but she'd cross that bridge when they came to it.

"There's no time for vacations," Sokka insisted.

Aang paused in playing his flute, much to Momo's disappointment as the groundhogs stopped popping out of their holes for him to chase. "I'm learning the elements as fast as I can," he complained. "I practice hard every day with Toph and Katara. I've been training my arrow off!"

"Yeah, what's wrong with having a little fun in our downtime?" Katara asked her brother.

Sokka glanced down at the young Avatar, scowling. "Even if you do master all the elements, then what? It's not like we have a map of the Fire Nation. Should we just head west until we reach the Firelord's house? Knock knock, hello mister-"

"Uh, Sokka," Azami interrupted, glaring at him slightly. "Did you forget I spent the first fourteen years of my life living there? I really don't think we need a map."

To her surprise, Sokka didn't back down but instead turned his glare towards her. "Maybe a hundred years ago, but a lot can change in that time. I'm not saying your knowledge is useless, but we need some real intelligence if we're gonna win this war. Besides, it would be helpful to actually have a physical image we can look at."

"Fine," the firebender muttered before turning to address the others. "We'll finish our vacations first, then we can go look for Sokka's intelligence." The water tribe boy glared at her again as the other benders laughed, and she just sent a sly wink back in response. Just because we're friends again doesn't mean I have to stroke his ego the way he does.

Reluctantly, Aang got up and pulled out his map of the central Earth kingdom, which was covered by about five towns and a whole lot of sand. "Where would you like to go on your mini vacation, Katara?" he asked the waterbender.

"Hmm," she wondered. With a smile, she pointed at a town right near the edge of the massive desert. "How about this? The misty palms oasis, that sounds relaxing."

Aang grinned as he looked at what Katara was pointing to. "Oh, yeah, I've been there! It's a pristine natural ice spring, and I usually don't use the word pristine. It's one of nature's wonders."

Yeah... when they got there, it was a whole bunch of sweaty guys wrapped head to toe in bandages and one dried up pond with a small chunk of ice in the middle. Not exactly what Azami would classify as an oasis. Or relaxing.

"Must have... changed ownership since i was here," Aang chuckled nervously as he headed on in. As soon as they crossed the village threshold, the welcome sign behind them crashed into the ground, its support having given out. Lovely.