Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

“Hi, can you stop setting things on fire, please and thank you?” Sophia asked Daniela, who was currently exuding a flame from the tip of her pale finger to try and finish cooking Manon’s toast, as she rubbed the sleep from her brown boba eyes.  “It’s,” She paused and picked up her phone to check the time, her nails clicking against her tiger print phone case. “Six-twenty in the morning.”

“Agreed." Lara firmly said with a nod, but then she raised up her brown, henna designed hand, flashing a small smile. “But before you stop, come finish cooking these eggs for me?”

“Girl, you can literally firebend.” Manon said from beside Daniela, covering her mouth with her hand as she started loudly cackling like a dolphin. She bowed her head as she finished her laughing and took a breath, “Girl, heat up your own food. Show us who you are: a proud firebender.”

Lara shook her head with a quiet scoff and pushed her plate of eggs, bacon, and pancakes farther out into the innards of their large cloth-covered glass dining table. “Girl, yes, I am a proud firebender, but I don’t bend before the afternoon.” She laughed as she spoke, “I don’t wake up with the sun, I’m still half gone until the afternoon.”

“A faker.” Megan spoke up decidedly between Yoonchae and Lara, sneakily trying to move her fork to take a bite of Yoonchae’s vanilla greek yogurt that was covered in oatmeal and blueberries. She huffed and dropped her fork on her plate next to her french toast sticks, crossing her arms and speaking in a British accent as she nodded to the Indian girl right beside her, “We’ll have her drawn and quartered.”

“Uhm, no?” Lara’s voice sounded like she was genuinely appalled, her own fake british accent slipping out now. “How dare you. You watch yourself, young lady. I don’t see you running outside on a windy day, all excited to bend some air.” She  gave a dramatic snarl to Megan, turning her attention to Daniela as the Latina grabbed her plate and heated up Lara’s eggs. “A real piece of work, that one.” She mumbled and jabbed a finger towards Megan.

“Yeah,” The other firebender snorted and handed back Lara’s plate.

“Unnie, tell them to stop.” Yoonchae said in annoyance, giving pleading eyes to Sophia who had just fixed herself a plate of leftover Jollibee. “They’ve been up since five in the morning, making breakfast and being loud.”

“Guys.” Sophia said sternly. She didn’t have to say anything more to get four headbows and different variations of apologies.

“Sorry, Ms. Leader.”

“I’m so sorry, my leader.”

Both Manon and Lara spoke in playfully dramatic shaking voices.

Daniela just shrugged and put her hands up in mock surrender. “I didn’t do anything. I was just heating up food!”

“Why don’t we put actual fruit in this bowl instead of decorative fruits?” Megan reached out and put a hand on a fake orange that was sitting in the bowl in the middle of the table with other fruits like bananas, apples, grapes, and pears. She gave the fake orange a small squeeze, careful not to be too hard on the styrofoam. “Like, wouldn’t it be more convenient to have actual fruit? Do you know how many times I’ve accidentally almost taken a bite out of some of this stuff?”

Manon, true to her nature, started loudly cackling again and put her head down on the table, moving her plate out of the way as she did. “Girl..” Her voice was muffled from the  white tablecloth.

“A true airbender to the end, never change, Megs.”

“Uhm?” Megan’s face scrunched up with some tangled mix of confusion, offense, and annoyance. “Hey, you tried to peel one of the fake bananas in here just the other night and were getting mad and saying it was broken.” She defensively said.

Sophia smiled and shook her head, speaking up before Lara could respond to the ginger haired girl. “It’s fake fruit because we’re always out doing missions. You think we have the time to really replace the fruit every week or so? Sometimes we’re out for months, so when we come back the house will smell of rotted fruit if we used actual food.”

“Speaking of the missions, what are we doing today?” Yoonchae piped up after she finished the last of her yogurt-oat-berry mix. “It won’t take too long will it?”

“This one shouldn't take long, why? You have plans, Yoonchip?” Sophia asked gently. She took a bite of her chicken that she’d dipped in left over gravy and sighed contently.

“She’s going out with a boy.” Megan said with a chuckle, although she gave a squeal of pain as Yoonchae earth bended up the ground to hit her in the left knee. “Ow,” She mumbled as she leaned down and to the sigh slightly to rub her knee. “That’s my bad knee too.” She inhaled sharply.

Yoonchae flashed an apologetic look, but before she could explain the table had already reacted.

“Aw, really, Yoonchip?” Sophia tilted her head, her eyes softening. “That’s cute.”

“No,” Yoonchae shook her head and nervously ran a pale hand through her long brown hair. “That’s not it.”

“Oh, who’s the boy, Yoonchae?” Lara asked, already invested. “If this goes wrong, just know it’s his loss.” Lara protectively said already.

Manon and Daniela just raised their brows and shared a look, but stayed silent and continued to eat their food to watch everything play out.

“No, it’s not like that. It’s not a date.” Yoonchae firmly insisted, her face darkening at just the thought. She shrunk in on herself, already looking uncomfortable with the topic.”I don’t like him like that anyway. And plus, some of our friends are gonna be there too. It’s just gonna be,” She took a breath to try to compose herself, managing to sit up straighter. “A friendly hang out session.”

“That’s sweet. Is it today? If it is, you don’t have to come with us on this mission, we can handle it by ourselves. You can go have fun.” Sophia offered with a growing smile. It was nice to see the girl finally getting out there. Every time Yoonchae got invited to things, she’d always said no for one reason or another.

“No,” She quickly said before blinking, “I mean.. I want to go on this mission with you guys.”

Manon’s brows furrowed at her quick reaction before nodding slowly, her warm voice low and confused. “Uh, alright. Do you miss us or something?” She tried to joke. It didn’t land.

“So,” Megan changed the topic. “What’s up with your choice for breakfast? Toast and salad?”

Manon shrugged and bit into her toast with a loud crunch, “I don’t know, but it’s good. This feels like something earthbenders would eat. The earthbender special, right here.” She chuckled and stabbed the few pieces of lettuce that remained in her glace bowl that was now dirtied with ranch, cheese, crouton crumbs, and tiny bits of lettuce sticking to its sides.”If you wanna talk about bad breakfast decisions, talk about Ms. Leader over there, eating Jollibee first thing in the morning.”

Manon shook her head, her knotless braids that were currently styled half-up-half-down bouncing around a little at the movement. She clicked her tongue jokingly, “Tsk, tsk, setting a bad example for the youngins. Look at the three of them,” She nodded her head to Yoonchae, Lara, and Megan respectively. “All three of them are still in school and you're setting a bad example for them. As their legal guardians, we should do better than this.” She jokingly said.

“Uhm, I’m only Yoonchae’s legal guardian.” Sophia corrected her and then looked to Yoonchae, “Don’t ever eat take out for breakfast or else you will be in trouble.”

“You too, Lara.” Daniela added on, although she didn’t exactly sound like she really cared that much. “And if you do, give me a bite or else then you’re in trouble.”

“Gotcha.”

Manon just looked at Megan and shook her head, “Don’t eat takeout in the morning. It’s terrible, you know? I’m you’re elder–”

“Oh, I know–”

“And your guardian, so you kinda have to listen to me.” Manon said.

“You guys act like we're super duper young. We’re only like five or so years younger, chill out.”

“Megan, you’re fifteen,” Daniela deadpanned with an amused smile on her face.

“I will literally turn sixteen next month.”

“Yoonchae’s literally fourteen, and Lara kind of gets a pass since she’s turning seventeen this year.” Daniela rattled off, “You guys kinda are pretty young.”

“Y-uncs, if you will.” Lara added on, unhelpfully.

“Not adding much, Lars, but sure.”

Yoonchae kicked her feet under the table and whistled, “Well, she’s kind of right. We’re not that much younger than you guys. Manon unnie’s turning twenty-two this year,”

“We don’t have to mention it.” Manon shakily piped up, “It’s a sensitive topic.”

Yoonchae glanced at her weirdly, “Right..” She slowly said, side-eyeing her. She stood up to throw away her empty yogurt cup and wash off her spoon. “Anyway, Sophia unnie’s twenty-one for basically the whole year. And Daniela unnie is only turning twenty-one this year.”

“Exactly.” Megan mumbled.

“Anyway, so I just got the text from Son, like an hour ago.” Sophia cut off the whole conversation, bringing it to the main business of the day. “We’re going to the Southern Water Tribe. Which is a pretty long trip just to get there, so Yoonchip, you might wanna stay back if you wanna hang out with your friends.”

Yoonchae, who had quickly finished washing the yogurt covered spoon and was now putting it away, tilted her head. “I want to hang out with Mei and Ua, but I don’t really wanna see him.” She mumbled quietly to herself, musing over the decision for quite a bit before deciding. “I’ll go.”

“Huh? Are you sure? The trip alone will probably take a couple of hours to get there.” Daniela informed her quickly, she stood up and stretched. “I’m gonna start packing, I guess.”

“We, uh, we kinda have to go now.” Sophia sheepishly told them and rubbed the back of her neck.

“You’re kidding.” Lara’s face had completely dropped.

“Ah, I wish.”

Megan just blinked and took a breath before smiling and clapping with enthusiasm that seemed a little too much for being told they were going on a trip on such short notice. “Road-trip!” She squealed and happily got up to put on her socks and shoes, “Let’s go guys! Road trip on Chanel!”

Manon nodded and clapped, trying to be enthusiastic too, although the doubt and nervousness was clear on her face from her shaking smile.”Woo.. Yeah.. road trip. So much fun–”

It had only been six hours riding on their bison, Chanel, and they were all already going crazy. Sophia’s hands were both gripping the reins as she yawned and glanced around. Her usually more untouched black hair was more ruffled now from the intense wind resistance as they flew through the air.

Daniela was sitting beside Sophia listening to her talk about how beautiful the Earth Kingdom, where she and Yoonchae were from, was during the fall. Her curly black and blonde hair was frazzled from the wind but aside from that she looked like she was doing pretty well.

Yoonchae had already fallen asleep. She was curled on Manon’s lap, her long brown hair partially covering her face due to the way she was laying. Her breathing was peaceful and calming, her chest steadily rising and falling in her blissful sleeping state.

Megan, Manon, and Lara on the other hand weren't doing nearly as well as the others were.

Megan’s ginger hair was flying everywhere, hitting her in the face repeatedly from the speed that they were flying at. She seemed pretty annoyed already and was sighing and shaking her head. Beside her were three board games that they hadn’t yet gotten to play.

Lara’s red hair was floating slightly but seemed to be behaving better than Megan’s at least. She was wearing dark shades covering her eyes and seemed pretty over this whole thing, as they’d all only really been able to grab their bags before they had to leave the house.

Manon seemed to be the least miserable of the three, her braids weren’t hitting her too much and she also had shades on. She was sipping on water as she listened to Megan rant. A smile was playing on her face already and she cut Megan off as she spoke, “To think you were the most excited.”

“Why am I the only one who’s hair is hitting them in the face? I’m literally the only airbender of the group, if anything it should be hitting everyone but me.”

“Actually, technically Sophia’s an airbender too since she’s the avatar and all.”

“Hey. She doesn’t count, and anyway she’s not exactly.. Doing too well with it. Anyway, the air should be leaving me alone the most, I’m literally the air bender.” She threw her hands up in the hair in outrage.

“Exactly.” Lara said, her voice deadpan and, though her eyes were covered, her face seemed to be too.

“What?”

“You’re an airbender, Megs.”

“Yeah?”

“So bend the air, girl!” Lara raised her voice, not rudely, but it did get loudly as she rolled her eyes playfully from behind her sunglasses. “Kinda your whole thing.”

Megan blinked and chuckled, “Oh, duh.” She mumbled to herself and moved her airs, easily forming a bubble of air around them to keep out any air from the outside. “Obvi, I completely forgot.”

Manon yawned and played with Yoonchae’s hair, “I haven’t been to the Southern Water Tribe much.” She mentioned, switching the topic. “It’ll be nice to tour it again. My sister tribe, and all.”

“Oh, yeah, you’re from the Northern Water Tribe, aren’t you?” Megan perked up. “Is everything really down in the south really different from north?” She asked curiously and cocked her head to the side.

“Uhm,” Manon paused to think, “I don’t wanna say the obvious, biggest difference,”

“Oh, the size?” Lara mentioned.

“Well, yeah. And the money difference." Manon laughed, “It’s not funny that they’re poorer than us up in the North, obviously.” She explained and shook her head, “No, no, I wouldn’t laugh about that.. It’s just that,” She took a breath to call herself, “I remember how much of a.. A culture shock it was when I took my first trip down to the South and it seemed so.. So empty. Although I’m pretty sure the Southern Water Tribe is way bigger now or something because of the Southern Reconstruction Project, or whatever.”

Megan chuckled, “Oh, yeah I guess I kind of understand. When I first left the air temples to go explore, I was so confused by how.. Uhm, aggressive,” She chose the word carefully. Delicately, even, glancing at Lara, who was at her side, and then Daniela who was still talking with Sophia. “It was outside of the temples.” She stopped for a moment, debating on adding more before shrugging and saying, “Uh, to elaborate, the first place I went was the Fire Nation.”

Manon cringed, “Oh, yeah. Bad start. It’s like trying to introduce someone to how cute animals can be and immediately starting them off with hog monkeys and eel hounds. Not quite the best start.”

That seemed to even get to the sleeping Yoonchae, as she woke up right there just to mumble, “Eel hounds aren’t even ugly.” And then she went straight back to sleeping.

“Bro woke up to talk about eel hounds.” Megan joked as she leaned on Lara and began to close her eyes. “If I’m still awake when it’s time to go, wake me up.”

“We will, Megs.” Manon softly said.

“No, you definitely do have a fawn face.” Sophia softly said. “I don’t see why you deny it so much, it’s cute.” She lifted her tanned hand and poked Daniela in the nose. “You have the eyes of a cougar too, or maybe of a cat. And you have really adorable freckles too.” At the mention of her light freckles, Daniela groaned loudly and covered her face with her tan hands. Sophia shook her head, bewildered at her embarrassment, and quietly whispered, “I don’t see why you hate it so much. It’s really cute.”

“What did you say?”

“Nothing, don’t worry about it..”

Daniela’s eye twitched at the sudden dismissal, she huffed and shuffled beside Sophia, “I hate when you do that. It’s so annoying. You literally know how much that sparks me up.”

“I know, it’s kinda fun though.” Sophia chuckled and tilted her head, “Hopefully you’re not too mad at me though, you and Lara will still be teaching me firebending, right?” She batted her lashes at Daniela and gave a grin when Daniela rolled her eyes.

“Me and Lara aren’t even close to masters. We’re both still learning too. I don’t see why you don’t just go to the fire nation to learn. Isn’t the avatar supposed to travel the world?” Daniela genuinely asked. Her brows eyes seemed to almost shine, although that might’ve been due to the sunlight.

“Well, it’s simple. It feels better and more personal to have my friends teach me. Relationships are also part of being the avatar. Although, I have a feeling that Son is gonna force us to head to the Fire Nation so I can learn to firebend from master.” Sophia casually mentioned before her brows furrowed slightly and her face became subtly dusted with concern. “Although, with how suspiciously the Fire Nation has been moving recently, I’m worried I may not have the time to go there and learn to bend before another war breaks out.”

“No way there’s another war.” Daniela sat up straighter at the thought of it. They both knew how terrible it would be, for the people and for the world in general, if there was another world war. “Avatar Jennie just ended the hundred-year war like, twenty-seven years ago. No way another one pops up after only twenty-seven years.”

Sophia stayed silent, pondering about something before just shaking her head and parting her lips, although nothing came out for a moment. “Hey. Let’s not worry about it, okay? We’re in the Southern Water Tribe now,” She smiled brightly as she pointed down to the icy, snowy landscape below them. “So let’s enjoy ourselves, okay? We won’t be here for long until we have to go up north to the Northern Water Tribe so I can actually fully learn to water bend, so we should savor this.” The bison landed on a flat blanket off open snow, her hooves and furry legs becoming covered with thick, soft snow.

Chanel let out a loud, low groan. The loud noise vibrated everything around it, including all the girls laying on Chanel. Megan sat up quickly and actually propelled herself up in the air from her hands and feet with a loud yelp, “What was that?!” She yelled as she landed in Lara’s arms.

“Chanel just had to.. Let it all out, girl. There, there.” Manon jokingly leaned over to  pat Megan’s back. Yoonchae sat up from on Mamon’s lap and rubbed the sleep from her eyes, yawning quietly and calmly standing up and dusting off her dark green trousers.

The first thing that hit all of them at once was the fact that it was cold. Freezing, freezing cold. Sophia let out a frosted breath and lifted her hand to try and produce a flame. At first, sparks came out and a scarlet flame flickered in for a moment, and then almost immediately flickered out. “Huh?”

“Your flame’s not strong enough, it’s too cold.” Daniela said, furrowing her brows. “Uh oh. Uhm hold on, me and Lars can still try. Huddle next to me, you can just warm up with my hands.” Daniela furrowed her brows in concentration and tried to produce a flame. She was actually able to produce quite a bit of fire.. 

From her shins.

Oh, well this was awkward. Daniela was best at bending with her legs, not so much her arms. But the flame that she did produce was always beautiful, it was scarlet mostly but the ends were edged with azure blue that threatened to take over the rest of the fire. Sophia just awkwardly nodded and allowed her hands to hover over Daniela’s legs. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.” Daniela quietly said, trying (and failing) to look anywhere but Sophia's eyes

Lara however, was better at bending with her arms and not her legs. She produced a bright scarlet blaze out of her palms. Megan and Yoonchae both huddled close. Manon put a hand in but didn’t exactly seem too bothered by the cold, “Just another day for us in the water tribe. Huh, but I am more used to having a parka in this weather.” Manon coolly said.

“Shut up, some of us are from the better, sunny climate.” Lara said with a roll of her eyes.

“Uhm, why’s your flame flickering like that?” Yoonchae asked as the flames in Lara’s hands began to flicker and spluttered out.

“Oh, c’mon.” Megan mumbled as she desperately reached for the hot air, as that was all that was left of the fire. “Not fair. So not fair.”

”I should’ve stayed home.” Yoonchae mumbled somberly as she stared blankly at where the now dissipated flame had been in Lara’s palm.

“My heat regulation is off because of how damn moist and cold it is.” Lara grumpily blew away some of the snowflakes that were rapidly falling in a flurry around them. “Water tribes..”

Sophia cleared her throat and stood, “Ok, Dani’s flame is out too. We’re just on the outskirts of the tribe, right? We should go over there, tell them our business–”

“What even is our business here? You never told us.” Megan quipped.

“We need some scrolls or something. Anyway, we tell them our business, maybe stay a few days, and then we head up north to the Northern Water Tribe. For my actual training.” Sophia’s commanding but kind voice boomed loudly. “So let’s all hat out so we can escape this cold.”

Lara and Daniela were the first to begin walking, “Yes, please.” Daniela mumbled as she stepped through the deep snow. “Oh my god. I’m, like, sinking into it, ugh.” Daniela groaned and tilted her head back with annoyance.

“Watch out.” Megan called out. Just as Daniela and Lara stepped to the side, a big, sharp gust of wind shot past them both and shredded through the snow, causing it to blow off to the sides and pile up.

Daniela lit up at the sight, “oh yeah, lead the way!” She cheered and gestured in front of her, “Go on, go on, keep it up.”

“Manon, Sophia, can’t you two waterbend the snow out of the way too?” Megan suggested as she stepped up to the front of the snow, her feet leaving imprints that were almost too quickly covered by falling snow.

“Yeah, sure, why not?” Manon shrugged as she began to, in sync with Sophia, bend snow out of their path while Megan blew the rest of the snow to their sides. Yoonchae was walking in the back with Lara and Daniela and was staring at the snow before lifting up a pale hand and grabbing a fist full of snow and stuffing it in her mouth.

Lara, who had been the only witness as Daniela was more focused on attempting to ignite her legs again, started laughing at the sight. “Yoonchae, don’t do that. That’s, like, not hygienic, I think.”

Yoonchae blinked and her face twisted with mock outrage, “No, it is! It’s just snow, it’s not dirty!”

“Y’know what? Have fun, you do you, champ. Soph’s your guardian, not me. If you get sick, have fun.” Lara pat Yoonchae’s back as she watched the younger girl take another large bite of snow, shaking her head. “Tsk, tsk.” She joked.

Chapter Text

“It’s so itchy in this thing.” Daniela quietly complained as she adjusted the furry light-navy blue parka she was fitted in. “At least it’s helping me warm up though.” She could slowly feel her heat regulation coming back and she began to slowly heat up her hands and feet.”This is what they have to wear everyday?” She glanced down to the dark blue trousers she was in that had fur-lining on the inside for warmth.

“I miss the beach.” Lara pulled the fluffy hood of her own parka over her head as she spoke. Her hands had already heated and she was currently in the process of warming her legs too, although the pants were doing a damn good job.

“I like the fit,” Megan said, nodding in approval as she watched the watertriber who was currently housing them prepare some type of soup for them. “Just not a fan of the boots. They’re so heavy, I feel so grounded.”

Manon raised a brow as she helped prepare the soup. It was a cultural staple that she’d tried when she first came down to visit her sister-tribe, Five-flavor Soup. The water was muddy, as it’d soaked up the excess juices and flavors that had leaked out from the ingredients. Speaking of the ingredients, inside the soup there were long ropes of wheat, along with thinly cut seaweed and algae. Although some of the ingredients seemed to even surprise Manon, “Oh.. Uhm, wheat and algae are in it too? When I last had it..” She trailed off, not sure if she could continue without causing disrespect.

“Yes, well,” The older, seemingly middle aged woman, Kyaa, began to speak. She had darker skin, like Manon’s, and long brown hair that she’d tied back into a bun. “The Earth Kingdom has been trading with us recently, people have been trying new recipes by taking stuff out of the soup and replacing it. I think we should just try adding it in and keeping everything else.” As she spoke, Yoonchae and Sophia perked up from where they were sitting on the rug next to the fire at the mention of the Earth Kingdom.

“Yeah. I see.” Manon said. She placed bowls with spoons inside in everyone’s hands and helped Kyaa waterbend the soup into their bowls. “Enjoy, it’s a delicacy here so be respectful.”

Sophia picked up her spoon and took a sip of the brown soup, getting a mouthful of seaweed, her eyes seemed to light up at the taste hitting her tongue and she quickly swallowed, “Amazing.” She murmured.

“Girl, be honest. You’re dads a chef, you know this isn’t ‘Amazing.’” Lara deadpanned as she hesitantly took a sip, although she seemed to remember her manners and laughed lightheartedly, “I was joking, it is good though.”

Megan took a sip of the soup, gave a small scrunch of her nose, and then immediately put it down gently and put her spoon in. Kyaa seemed to take just the slightest amount of offense to it and turned to Megan, trying to give an understanding look to her. “Not to your usual temperature, airbender?” She asked, her eyes darting to the blue arrow tattoos that were hidden on her forehead by her hair and the separate arrow tattoos going down each of her arms.

“Huh? Oh, n-no, it’s an okay temperature!” She gave a forced, tight-lipped smile.

Yoonchae gave an amused snort and leaned close to her to whisper, “You have seaweed stuck on the front of your teeth.” And watched in endearment as Megan quickly stopped smiling to try and fix it with her tongue, “You got it.” Yoonchae whispered again and went back to just quietly drinking the soup and trying not to show her reaction.

Megan’s response to Kyaa’s question seemed to amuse the lady, who just smiled and shook her head. “I have dessert waiting, perhaps you’ll like that more.”

They watched the lady take a seat and begin to work on knitting a partially finished blanket. It was long and was a dark blue pattern that had each next line in a lighter shade of blue until it got to white. Then it had each next line in a darker blue until it got back to the original shade, and the process seemed to repeat the process. Sophia smiled at watching the lady knit and called out from where they were all sitting, “That’s a very pretty blanket, ma’am.”

“Thank you, aren’t you a bright young lady?” She spoke kindly, although her head was down in concentration as she focused on her blanket.

Megan glanced back down at her soup and then looked back up at the others. “She laughed when I mentioned the temperature, is that temperature thing like some type of watertribe slang?”

“Kinda,” Manon said, her own warm smile blooming on her face. She gave a small chuckle and lifted the bowl to her mouth, sipping from the edge of the wooden bowl. “What she said is basically like if someone said ‘not to your liking?’ or if someone said, ‘not my cup of tea,’ or like.. Like ‘not my air to bend.’” She explained softly. Megan nodded slowly, the idea slowly clicking in her head.

“Ohh. That’s cool.”

“Yeah. The more you know.”

Yoonchae shuffled where she was seated to grab her phone from her pocket and blinked, furrowing her brows. “Ah,” she mumbled as turned it off.

“What? Did it break or something” Daniela asked. She hadn’t touched her soup.

“Bad service.”

A collective groan overcame the group. Sophia shook her head but didn’t seem too bothered. Manon began grumbling under her breath while Daniela and Lara had both pulled annoyed faces and Lara started fake choking herself. Megan put her hands in her face and shook her head slowly, “Ughh, bad service is the worst. I’d rather have no service than bad service, seriously. Not even being, like, hyperbolic or anything there.”

“Real,” Lara mumbled, her sulking session already beginning.

“The youth these days, so obsessed with their phones. Ah, it’s like an addiction, it is.” Kyaa mumbled to herself, or she tried to mumble anyway. She spoke loud enough for all six of them to hear. It was silent for a moment but Manon spoke first.

“Right.” She nodded her head and agreed, she shook her head in mock disappointment. “The kids nowadays, can’t handle a little bit of the real world.”

That caused Lara to break first and start laughing, “Girl, don’t pretend that you weren’t part of the little sighing ceremony that just commenced too, Ms. Sighed-And-Started-Instantly-Grumbling.”

That caused everyone else to give small giggles and Manon burst out laughing. Sophia blinked after giggling and then narrowed her eyes funnily, “Hey, you don’t even use your phone that much!” She called the older girl out, beginning to laugh as she spoke, “I just realized!”

“Alright, avatar, what’s the first order of business,” Daniela asked, tailing behind her dark haired leader as they stepped out into the snowy wonderland that was the inner of the large Southern Water Tribe. There were large homes everywhere, all of which were various different looking igloos, all made of thick, tightly packed snow. Looking around was a big change for both of them, especially Daniela. “It feels weird.” She started to speak, stuffing her hands in the pockets of her parka. “In the fire nation, there’s never snow. Like, ever. Seeing it now, it’s actually kind of exciting.”

That seemed to catch Sophia’s attention, she craned her head to look behind her at the firebender. “You’ve never seen snow?”

“Uh, no, not really.”

“Ever?”

Daniela snorted, “Ever.” She confirmed, a smile plastered on her face.

“Oh, after this we’re definitely gonna go look around together! And we’re gonna play in the snow too, you can’t say no!”

Daniela chuckled and nodded, her light brown and blonde hair swaying. It was practically white, as it was covered in a fresh coat of fluffy white powdered snow. “First though, you mentioned getting some scroll from here? Where, the library?” She pointed to a large snow building that was lit up dimly and had a plethora of books and people inside of it.

“Ah, no. From,” Sophia hesitated for a moment, pulled out her phone, checked the message Son had sent her, and then confidently responded. “From the village chieftain.”

“Ohh, right, right.” Daniela nodded as she continued to walk. For a while, they walked together in silence, the only noise being from the many people walking and the kids playing around them. Then, finally, Dani blinked incredulously, “Wait, sorry, what? The chieftain?” She raised a brow, “And where’s that?

“I was just gonna try the biggest building.” Sophia said with a nonchalant shrug and pointed to the long, rectangular snow building that was far off in the distance. It had this serious aura about it and standing in front were four guards on each side of the large open spot where the door would be. They were each holding spears and wearing serious dark blue armor with helmets that were grey with white fur, it looked like wolf head armor. Their knee, shoulder, and elbow pads were also that same grey-brown with white wolf fur.

“Oh, yeah, that might do.”

“Yeah,” Sophia instinctively responded, chuckling a bit.

They somehow sped up their pace by quite a bit, as they made it there in what felt like only a few minutes despite their distance and the amount of people they had to sway through. The guards took a look at them trying to enter and immediately moved to stand in their path. One of them immediately asked, “Who are you?” He asked Daniela, although Sophia took it upon herself to also do an introduction.

“I’m the avatar, my name is Sophia Laforteza.” She bowed her head in respect and awkwardly swayed on her feet when they didn’t move. “Uhm, I need to see your chef.”

The guards didn’t even seem phased and just stared at them, turning their attention to Daniela. “Yes, we’re aware. And you?” The guard asked.

Daniela blinked and pointed a finger to herself, as if to make sure. “Me?” She looked around only to see they were indeed speaking to her. “I’m her friend, Daniela.”

“Sophia and Daniela, foreign names. Where are you from, ‘Avatar’ and ‘Avatar’s friend.’”

“Ba Sing Se,” Sophia proudly said.

“Uhm,” Daniela hesitated. It had only been, how long, twenty seven or so years since the latest world war. Hopefully the Southern Water Tribe didn’t hate people from the Fire Nation despite how recent the war was. She shuffled a bit beside Sophia.

The avatar poked her friend's shoulder, “Tell them.”

“They might not like it..”

“What?”

“Fine.” Daniela cleared her throat and spoke up, “I’m from Fire Fountain City.” She firmly said, her eyes trained on the eight guards in front of them. The guards were just silent, standing there with unchanging faces as the snow fluttered down around them.

“Do you both have proof to enter?” The guard asked in a carefully monotone voice.

Daniela straightened and glanced at Sophia, who had taken a sharp breath and began to grasp for her phone. Her hands were shaking as she tried to text on it and she sighed, “Uhm, we can just come back later or tomorrow, I don’t have it yet, sorry.” Sophia said with an embarrassed laugh.

With that said, Daniela willed her feet to move and began to pull Sophia away with her, wafting through the thick snow that had begun to pile up even more than it already had. Behind them, Daniela could hear one of the guards speaking to the others, “Fire Fountain City,” He said it like it was amusing somehow, “She didn’t look too Fire Nation, freckles and stuff. Seemed more like an earthbender, or some weird waterbender to me.” Daniela tried to ignore how heavy her heart felt and the sinking feeling in her stomach at the words.

“Time to eat,” Sophia said, her mind already off of what had happened back there. “I wanna go find some good restaurants or something around here. The food tastes so different here.”

“You have money?”

“Uh, yeah,” Sophia said and flashed a cheeky smile, “Don’t worry about it, I got this.”

“Yeah, uhm.. Can we eat like, outside of the restaurants? I don’t really wanna stay inside right now.”

“Yeah, sure,” Sophia tucked her hair behind her ears, which were usually pale but were turning a pinkish red from the extreme cold around them. “We can walk around together or something, eat, play some games, go sightseeing. It’ll be fun.”

“Go sightseeing?

“Yeah? Why, you don’t wanna?” Sophia tilted her head at the girl, her dark sage green, almost brown looking, eyes boring a hole into her. Although the large snowflakes were obscuring Daniela’s vision, she could still see the way that Sophia’s eyes seemed to shine in the bright sunlight that bore down on them, the way the light caught on Sophia’s dark black looking hair and exposed the extremely brown strands.

Daniela must’ve taken a moment to respond, as Sophia had waved a hand in front of her face. Daniela’s face flushed red and she quickly looked away, “Uh, right, no I want to, it sounds fun.” She scrambled to say, “Just us?”

“Mhm, just us.”

“So like..?” Daniela trailed off and looked up to meet Sophia’s confused gaze. Daniela shook her head slowly, “Nevermind. Do you think they have scarves here? And gloves?” She rubbed her hands together.

“Oh, yeah probably. We should probably stop for that stuff first, right? C’mon,” Sophia ended up walking ahead and Daniela couldn’t help but stare. Sophia didn’t know where she was going and yet she still had confidence. Daniela had learned to never say that she was lost, yes, but even when she tried her very hardest you could still tell that she was unfamiliar. But with Sophia, you couldn’t, she moved like she had already walked these paths for years. “Y’know, I feel like this was Son’s way of getting us out of his hair. He had the time to arrange for her to stay with Kyaa but not the time to tell the chieftain that we would be coming today to get the guards off of our backs? Really?”

“Yeah,” Daniela dryly replied. The walk was comfortably quiet. They looked around as they walked until they found a place. Peering inside, there were clothes hanging around everywhere on hangers and Daniela’s eyes locked onto a section filled with thick parkas, gloves, and scarves along with what looked like ear muffs. “Oh, in there!” Daniela dragged Sophia in, stepping in front of her and lacing their fingers.

“Why do you like to always get in front of me?” Sophia asked, amused.

“Do you not like it?”

“I prefer I be in front,” Sophia started, her eyes dimming with some untold emotion. “I prefer to protect people in my life, y’know?”

Daniela paused just as they went past the doorway of the shop, ignoring the lady welcoming them. “Well maybe I should protect you sometimes, Ms. Leader.” She saw Sophia’s eye twitch at being called that and began to move towards the gloves. “C’mere, Soph, these would look cute on you. Are they your size?” She held up a pair of light purple knitted gloves.

Sophia raised her brows but stepped over to her, lifting up her hand so Daniela could put it on her. “Yeah, it fits.” She picked up a pair of light blue gloves and put them on one of Daniela’s hands.”Yeah, this fits you too.” She grabbed both pairs, then picked up two scarves. One scarf was black and the other was green.

“You’re taking the green, I assume?”

“Yeah? I’m an earthbender at heart, y’know.”

Daniela nodded and put down the black scarf, picking up a sapphire blue one instead. “Like my fire,” Daniela stated when Sophia raised a brow. They awkwardly stood for a moment and then Daniela cleared her already clear throat in an attempt to fill the silence, “We should grab some for the others, you know they’ll cry favoritism if we don’t.”

“Oh, yeah.” Sophia said and quickly looked around to start picking up gloves for the other girls, “You grab the scarves.” She said and then continued, “Sorry it’s so awkward, I don’t know why it’s so weird today. It’s like we just met or something, which is dumb cause we’ve been friends a bit now.”

“Yay to two years and a half years,” Daniela said as she picked up scarves. One green, one red, one white, and one aqua blue.

Sophia had grabbed pairs of gloves.

One pair was light green.

One pair was light pink.

One pair was a light orange.

And one pair was a light yellow.

“Who’s is whose?" Daniela tilted her head, glancing at something off to the side of the cozy shop.

Sophia shrugged and began to walk up to the counter to pay, “They’ll probably just randomly grab a pair and assign it to themself. It’s easier that way.” She placed the items on the counter and turned to pay when Daniela suddenly paused.

“Ah, hold on.” She quickly moved back to where the glovers were sitting on the rack and turned to the rack below it, crouching down and grabbing something. She scurried back to the counter and placed six necklaces items down. They all looked identical but were obviously meant to be worn differently. Each thing was simple, a simple shark tooth piece of jewelry. Two were in the form of a necklace, the next were two bracelets, a ring, then a pair of earrings.

Sophia tilted her head but placed down the water tribe coins, which were thick and a blue silver that almost looked like dense rings at first. “Where did you get this money from?” Daniela asked.

“Uh.. I begged Manon.” Sophia took the purple knitted gloves out of the bag and put them on, wrapping her green scarf around her neck. “I’m actually not too sure where she got it from though.”

“No, that checks out. She carries foreign money on her a lot,”

“What?”

“Since she used to be a trader of something like that when she came to Hybe City, she would get foreign money a lot and now she just carries a lot around just in case.”

Sophia blinked, thinking back to the interaction she had when she’d begged the waterbender for money. She suddenly blinked and smiled, as if everything was starting to make sense now. “Oh, so that’s why she ended up pulling out those Earth Kingdom coins?”

“Yeah.” Daniela, “That’s probably why.”