Archive of Our Own

The sun beat down like a hammer, heat rippling off the sand in waves that made Toph’s feet ache. Every step she took out here was like wading through a giant bowl of pudding. The sand offered nothing. It muffled vibrations and scattered every useful signal.

She hated it. But she hated it even more when Aang turned on her.

"How could you let them take Appa? Why didn't you stop them?"

Toph stiffened. To be honest, she’d expected it. The second the sandbenders hauled Appa away, she knew this would come. She knew it like you know when a storm’s about to break.

Still stung, though.

“I couldn’t! The library was sinking, and you guys were still inside!”

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

A gust swept past her, strong enough to whip her hair into her face. Sand stung her cheeks. She wasn’t sure if it was a sandstorm rolling in or Aang’s bending losing control. Probably both.

“I can hardly feel any vibrations out here!” she shouted back, trying to be heard over the rising wind. “The sandbenders snuck up on me, and there wasn’t time for—”

"You just didn’t care!" he shouted over her. "You never liked Appa! You wanted him gone!"

That one landed low, right in the gut.

She still didn’t flinch. Toph Beifong did not flinch, but her throat tightened. That guilt she’d been trying to smother with heat and anger bubbled back up like lava.

The wind screamed between them, wild and hot and full of fury, like it wanted to drown out every word. Toph braced herself as a stronger gust kicked sand into her face. Tiny grains worked their way under her clothes.

“I did everything I could,” she said. “I saved your lives!”

Then Sokka’s voice chimed in. “Who’s gonna save our lives now? We’ll never make it out of here.”

Toph didn’t answer. The sand, the emptiness, the lack of any living heartbeat for miles around…it said everything. The whole desert felt like it was mocking her: Useless here. Powerless here. Helpless here.

Aang’s voice rose again, like he was barely holding himself together. “That’s all any of you guys care about—yourselves! You don’t care whether Appa is okay or not!”

Toph’s hands clenched into fists.

She wanted to yell back. Wanted to scream that of course she cared, that Appa was loud and smelly and drooled on her once, but she still cared. That she’d been the one standing alone in the sand as his cries faded into the dunes and did nothing because she couldn’t do anything.

“I’m going to go look for Appa.” There was a smaller burst of wind as Aang’s glider unfurled.

She turned instinctively toward the sound, but there was nothing to feel. The ground gave her no answers. Just sand, shifting and useless. Then the gust of his departure blasted across her face. The wind swallowed the space he left behind like it had never held anything at all.

Toph stood there, fists clenched so tight her nails bit into her palms. Her feet sank half an inch into the sand, but it wasn’t solid enough to ground her. She may as well have been floating.

She exhaled hard through her nose and muttered, just loud enough for Sokka to hear, “I hope whatever you found in that library was worth it.”

She heard a rustling sound, like someone digging through a satchel. “We found out about a solar eclipse coming before Sozin’s comet. The firebenders will be powerless during it. If we can get to Ba Sing Se and warn the Earth King, we might be able to plan an invasion—strike while the Fire Nation can’t fight back.”

Toph didn’t respond right away. She ground her heels into the sand, trying to feel something solid beneath it. There was nothing. Just a gritty, shifting emptiness that gave her no answers.

“Great,” she muttered. “Only one problem—we don’t even know which direction Ba Sing Se is.” She paused, then frowned as an idea popped into her head. “Wait…do you still have the map? The one from that professor?”

“Yeah. He gave me everything he had before he…decided to go down with the library.” She could hear the guilt behind that pause, but didn’t poke it.

“Get it out. Now. And tell which areas of the desert he didn’t explore.”

She heard those rustling sounds again, and then a pause. “Okay, he charted most of the desert, but this area here is marked as unexplored. The northeastern part.”

“Then that’s probably where we are,” Toph said simply. “In the middle of nowhere. The part he didn’t map.” She felt him shift beside her. “All right, which direction leads out of this deathtrap the fastest? I want forests, water, rocks—anything solid.”

Sokka made a thoughtful sound. “North. The edge of the desert hits a river and some scattered woods. That’s our best shot.”

Toph stood, brushing sand off her knees. “Then we go north. We can figure out the rest once we’re out of this frying pan.” She turned her head. “Now we just need to figure out where north is.”

There was a pause. Then, surprisingly, Sokka said, “The sun’s starting to set over there. That’s west, which means…” He stepped closer and gently nudged her shoulder, turning her a few degrees to the left. “That way’s north.”

Toph blinked. “You sure?”

“Pretty sure. The sun sets in the west, so it’s easy to figure out which direction is north.”

She tilted her head and smirked. “Color me impressed, Snoozles.”

He didn’t say anything, but she heard a snort of amusement come from him. Toph started walking. No big speech, no rally cry, and no hesitation. Just sand crunching underfoot, the whip of dry wind at her back, and Sokka falling in step behind her.

Every few minutes, he’d give her a light tap on the arm, nudging her back on course when she veered too far. She hated needing it. But out here, with nothing solid to guide her, she let him.

Her feet were already sore and full of sand. The kind that wormed into every fold of skin and refused to leave. She didn’t bother trying to brush it off anymore. What was the point? The whole desert was just one big sandblaster set to maximum annoyance.

The heat was a wall pressing in from every direction. It crawled under her collar, slid down her back, soaked the edges of her tunic and made everything stick where it shouldn’t. Sweat dripped from her temples, slid down her spine, and pooled annoyingly behind her knees. Her hair clung to her neck like a wet scarf.

And the worst part? She had no idea where they were.

Every step was just a maybe. A probably. A “hope this doesn’t kill us.” Sokka’s occasional nudges kept her pointed the right way, but it wouldn’t take much for them to drift off and end up going in circles. Still…she trusted him. More than she’d ever say out loud.

Sokka was breathing hard beside her. Panting, actually. Each breath sounded like it was scraped up from the bottom of his lungs.

Toph tilted her head toward him. “You okay there? Or am I gonna have to carry you?”

He wheezed a little laugh. “I’m fine.”

“Good,” she muttered, stepping over a dune ridge. “Because I’m not dragging your heavy Water Tribe butt through the desert.”

“I could really use some water,” he said.

“Me too,” Toph replied.

Sokka’s voice came a few seconds later, dry and bitter. "We’d have water if Katara was here."

"I miss her," she muttered before she could stop herself. The words felt strange in her mouth. "She’d know what to do right now."

"Yeah," Sokka said, and his tone was heavy in a different way now. "She always knew how to calm down Aang."

Toph didn’t answer, but the wind did. It scraped along the dunes and rustled the fabric of her tunic, the only sound between their shuffling feet and the squeak of her sweat-damp collar every time she turned her head. She wanted to say something else, but her throat felt like it had been filled with powdered chalk.

Then, without warning, Sokka shouted, "Look!"

Toph flinched and jerked her head turned instinctively. "Look at what?! I can't see!"

"It’s a cactus!" Sokka shouted, already moving. She heard the hiss of his blade slicing into the plant, paired with a wet squelch. Then she heard him drinking—no, guzzling. A second later, he let out a long exhale of satisfaction. "There’s water trapped inside these. It’s very thirst-quenching."

A moment later, she felt something cool and damp being pressed into her hands. One of the cactus pieces. She lifted it toward her mouth, but then froze when she heard him giggle.

"Drink cactus juice!" he declared. "It’ll quench ya! Nothing’s quenchier! It’s the quenchiest!"

Toph froze. There was a strange lilt to his voice now, a weird little bounce that didn’t belong. His tone was loose and unmoored. She wrinkled her nose, pulled the cactus piece away from her lips, and tilted her wrist until the juice drained out onto the sand.

"Um…I’ll pass," she muttered, dropping the cactus piece.

Sokka laughed again. "Wow, Toph…you’re on fire!"

Toph let out a sigh and brought her hands to her temples. First Aang took off and now Sokka was drunk on cactus juice. Just great. She stepped forward, her fists clenched and voice sharp.

"Get it together, Sokka. I need your help if you want to get out of here."

He didn’t answer. Just giggled again. "Haha…look at those clouds. They’re dancing."

Toph took a long, steadying breath. Her shoulders ached. Her hands were shaking, and not just from the heat.

"Come on," she said roughly. "We need to keep moving."

He didn’t respond, but she heard the soft sound of him stumbling after her, sand crunching unevenly beneath his boots. Good. At least he was still moving.

Toph didn’t know if she was still heading north. She didn’t even know how much time had passed since they first started walking. It could’ve been minutes, could’ve been hours. All she had was the way the wind shifted across her arms, and the constant, lopsided shuffle of Sokka’s very not-sober footsteps behind her.

And the silence. Spirits, she hated the silence.

Her mind kept drifting back to Katara: her bossy voice, her cool water, the way she always made you think everything was just maybe going to be okay even when the whole world was burning.

Toph had spent so much time thinking about how much Katara annoyed her, with all her plans, lectures, and rules. But now? Now, she’d give just about anything to hear one of those lectures.

She’d never said it aloud, and never would, but Katara had been the heart of their group. The glue. The mom figure. And Toph had rolled her eyes at all of it. At the structure, the bedtime routines, the morning wake-up calls. But walking half-blind through a death desert with a cactus-drunk Water Tribe boy giggling behind her?

Yeah. She got it now.

She wished she’d listened more and argued less. Maybe even told Katara, just once, that she was doing a good job. She wished she’d appreciated how hard it was to be the responsible one—to carry everyone else and make the right call when there were no good options.

 But instead, here she was. Trying to hold it together with sand in her shoes and rage in her teeth. She missed Katara, and solid ground, and trees, and rocks, for crying out loud. She missed being able to see with her feet instead of playing this endless game of “guess what you just stepped on.”

But she didn’t stop. She couldn’t stop, because if she did then they wouldn’t survive.

So she kept moving.

Toph didn’t know what time it was. Not really. But her body was screaming that it had been too long. Her legs ached like someone had tied boulders to her thighs. Her feet were raw and torn up. Every step across the sand felt like someone was sanding her toes down for fun.

The air had finally cooled, but even that felt like a lie. The wind bit at her sweat-soaked skin, turned every droplet into a freezing sting. Her clothes clung damp and itchy, and her hair was plastered to the back of her neck like seaweed.

And behind her Sokka wouldn’t stop muttering to himself, loudly. And giggling.

“Ha…those clouds look like moose-lions. Or…are they judging me?”

Toph rolled her eyes. “No, Sokka, they’re applauding your decision-making skills.”

He giggled louder. “You get me, Toph.”

She let out a slow, pained groan and dragged her hand down her face. “Oh yeah. I feel so seen.”

He stumbled behind her again, muttering something about his shadow being too loud. Toph tightened her grip on her resolve and kept going. If she could survive years in her parents’ house pretending to be a helpless little doll, she could survive this.

She was just about to call for a break when the air shifted.

A breeze tickled the back of her neck, followed by the faintest vibration overhead. Not enough to feel clearly, but enough to recognize.

Aang.

She stopped walking. “Did you find Appa?”

"What do you think?" He still sounded angry.

Toph’s jaw clenched. Her whole face scrunched like she’d just bitten into something bitter. She bit back the sharp retort she wanted to throw at him, and instead exhaled slowly through her nose. "Then we need to keep walking."

"What’s the point?" Aang’s voice was hopeless. "We won’t survive without Appa. We all know it."

That did it. Toph’s frustration boiled over.

She was sunburned, dehydrated, and blind, yet she had been dragging Sokka and her own temper through this sandpit for what felt like a week. And now their most powerful bender was throwing a self-pity party while she was out here trying to keep them all alive.

She slammed her foot into the sand. The resulting ripple of earth was weak and clumsy, but it kicked up a small wave of sand that sprayed outward.

Aang yelped. "What was that for?!"

She turned toward the sound of his voice, her fists curled. "Maybe you don’t care whether we live or die, but I’m not ready to give up!” She took a step forward, jabbing a finger in his direction. “Sokka’s useless right now, which means I need your help right now, whether you feel like it or not!"

"You think I don’t care? I was the one looking for Appa all day!" Aang snapped back, his voice rising. "What’s anyone else doing? What are you doing?!"

"I’m the one trying to save your ungrateful self!" she barked. "You think you’re having a hard time? I’ve been stumbling through this giant sand pit blind, and I still haven’t given up! So, stop acting like a child and help me."

Aang didn’t stay anything, he just remained silent. Fine.

Toph reached out roughly, found Aang’s wrist, and gripped it with sunburned fingers. “I don’t care if you’re tired, I need you. So quit moping and start helping. Which way is north?”

There was a long pause. She was just about to yell again when she felt his other hand settle lightly on her shoulder, adjusting her slightly.

"That way," he said quietly.

She let go of his wrist, turned, and started walking again. Behind her, she could hear Aang dragging Sokka’s stumbling feet through the sand. The sounds of progress.

Not graceful, but progress.

“I really need some water,” Sokka muttered after a while.

Sokka thought he was thirsty? At least he’d had some cactus juice—Toph hadn’t had a single drop of water since Appa was taken. She was about to say so, too, when Aang spoke up.

“Katara gave me her water pouch before we left.”

Toph froze. “What? You mean you’ve had water on you this whole time and you didn’t tell us?” she snapped. “I’ve been dying of thirst for the past few hours!”

“You didn’t ask!” Aang snapped back, but a moment later she felt the pouch being pressed into her hands. She brought it up to her lips and took a long sip, then she held it out for the others to take. Once everyone had a drink, they set off again.

For a long time after that, no one spoke.

When they stopped again, it was cooler. The wind had shifted again, and the sand didn’t burn as much underfoot. Toph could feel the air chilling against her skin, even through the sweat and grime.

Night.

Toph tilted her head and muttered, “We should rest for a bit. It’s cooler now, but we’ll need the strength if we want to keep moving.”

She heard Sokka collapse into the sand with a groan. Momo chirped once and then flopped beside him. Toph sank down more carefully. Her whole body protested, but her feet…her feet screamed. She didn’t even have a name for the pain in her toes anymore. It felt like her feet had been turned inside out and then chewed on by wild animals.

But she didn’t say anything. She didn’t whimper or sigh or ask for help, because someone had to hold it together. And right now, Sokka was giggling at invisible clouds, and the Avatar was one wrong word away from a full emotional shutdown.

So yeah. It was her.

She crossed her arms and folded herself forward, resting her forehead against her knees. Her breath was shallow and sand-scorched. The world around her buzzed with wind and silence and the occasional nonsense Sokka mumbled into the dark. The sand cooled under her, but not enough.

After what felt like a couple hours, or maybe more, she stirred. The heat had bled out of her muscles just enough to let her stand.

"Up," she called softly. "We’ve got to keep moving."

Sokka groaned again. "Do the clouds have arms now?"

Toph didn’t dignify that with a response.

She stood, wincing as her raw feet kissed the cool sand again. “Come on. We’ve got miles to go before we collapse again.”

They resumed walking. The night wind made it slightly less miserable. But her whole body felt like it had been tenderized with a rock mallet. Every step sent lightning up her legs. Every grain of sand between her toes was a new curse word.

And she still couldn’t feel anything through it.

The desert stretched out in every direction—wide, echoing, and blank. Her balance was off. Her internal compass, normally sharp and sure, felt foggy and crooked.

But she kept walking, because that’s what Toph Beifong did. Even when she was alone. Even when she was scared.

Suddenly her foot slammed against something hard and unyielding. She pitched forward and landed face-first into the sand, cursing. Her mouth filled with grit. Her hands burned from impact. And her already-raw foot was now screaming bloody murder.

"Crud!" she shouted, clutching her injured foot. "I am so sick of not feeling where I’m going! And what idiot buried a boat in the middle of the desert?!"

"A boat?" Aang’s voice asked, surprised.

“Believe me, I kicked it hard enough to feel plenty of vibrations,” Toph muttered as she rubbed her screaming toes. She heard the sudden whoosh of a targeted gust of air, and felt the sand shift violently away from her.

"It’s a sandbender sled," Aang said. "I saw them sail off on one back at the Oasis."

Toph blinked, stunned for half a second, then let out a breath that sounded like a mix between a laugh and a sob. "We can use it to get out of here! Aang, you can airbend and sail us out. Help me up."

A moment later, she felt his hand in hers. She gripped it tight as he helped her climb aboard. The deck was smoother than she expected, and best of all, her feet didn’t sink. Sokka flopped in beside her, humming tunelessly.

“Oh thank you, strange, buried boat,” she muttered, nearly falling to her knees in relief. “I missed you, ground that doesn’t move.” Toph gritted her teeth. "Alright, Twinkletoes—take us north."

A whoosh answered her, followed by a sharp jolt as the boat lurched forward. Wind whipped across her face, cooling the sweat on her skin, and pulling strands of hair loose from her bun.

She let the breeze hit her full in the face and grinned. Her ribs ached, her foot still throbbed, and there was probably sand in places sand should never be—but they were getting somewhere. Finally.

They rode in silence for a while. The kind of silence that felt like the end of something, like the burn after a fight, when everything still hurt but the worst was over. Then, Sokka stirred. She heard him inhale sharply, then exhale.

“I think my head is starting to clear out that cactus juice.”

“About time,” Toph muttered. “You were entirely useless the whole day.”

“Sorry,” he mumbled, sounding sheepish.

Toph didn’t say anything for a moment. Then she added, “You drooled on me earlier, by the way.”

Sokka made a strangled noise. “Wait, what?! No I didn’t!”

“You did.”

“I definitely didn’t!”

She smirked. “Prove it.”

Before he could argue more, Aang’s voice cut through the wind. “Up ahead! I see tents. It must be sandbenders!”

Immediately, the air changed. The wind from Aang’s airbending picked up, like he couldn’t get there fast enough. Soon, Toph felt the boat slow beneath her, gliding across packed ridges instead of soft dunes.

Then it stopped with a soft bump. For a moment, none of them moved. Toph stood slowly, her feet still aching, but her spine a little straighter.

The murmur of voices drifted toward them, and then the scents hit her next—dry spices, grilled meat, and sweat-soaked cloth. Civilization, at last. Her stomach growled so loudly even she jumped.

Toph braced herself as she climbed down onto the sand. Her feet were raw, her back ached, and all she wanted was to not be walking anymore.

Before she could open her mouth, a rough voice called out, “Who are you?”

Sokka’s boots crunched down beside her. “My name is Sokka. This is Aang—he’s the Avatar.”

The effect was immediate. Toph could hear the shuffle of feet, and the low murmur spreading from person to person like a spark in dry grass.

But before anyone else could speak, Aang cut in. “Some sandbenders stole my sky bison. Do you know where we can find them?”

There was a long silence. Then, the same man spoke again, but this time his voice was hesitant. “A sky bison? Why, yes…they sold him to us.”

“You have Appa?”

“We did,” the man replied slowly. “But we sold him.”

Toph couldn’t see Aang’s face, but she could hear the sharp pull of his breath, then the tremble in the air around him. “You sold Appa?” Aang’s voice darkened. “To who? Where are they now?”

“W-we didn’t know he was yours. He was brought to us by another sandbender clan. If we’d known he belonged to the Avatar, we wouldn’t have bought him. We wouldn’t have sold him. Please understand.”

“Where. Is. He?” Aang ground out, his fury barely contained.

“Some of our people took him west, to find a buyer,” the man said quickly. Toph could hear the fear now. Their footsteps shifted across the sand as people backed away.

Aang’s breathing turned sharp. It came in gusts, like every inhale scraped against the inside of his chest. Toph could feel it in the ground—little ripples of air pressure and tension, pressing against her feet and buzzing beneath her heels like a warning tremor.

He was about this close to exploding. Again.

“You’ll take me to whoever you sold him to,” Aang said darkly. It wasn’t a question.

“Yes—yes, of course!” the merchant stammered. “They should be returning soon. Once they do, we’ll have them take you to him.” The merchant hurried on, the words tumbling out now, quick and desperate. “In the meantime, we can help you. Please, stay and rest. We’ll provide food, shelter, and water. We’ll help you find your bison.”

Toph tilted her head slightly, focusing on the man’s tone and the way the sand shifted under him. He was scared of Aang, and she didn’t blame him one bit.

“Fine,” Aang finally said, and Toph let out a long breath. The fire hadn’t left his voice, but he seemed at least to be calmer than before.

The merchant practically tripped over himself backing away, barking orders in every direction. She heard the sudden uptick in activity. Feet scrambled, crates shifted, plates clattered, and water jugs sloshed. Someone dropped a pan and cursed in hushed tones.

Toph almost laughed. Fear was one heck of a motivator.

They were quickly led to what Toph assumed was a large tent. The fabric brushed against her arm as she ducked inside, warm and scratchy like everything else in this cursed corner of the world.

The air inside was still stifling, but there was shade, and the faint, blessed sound of water being poured. She rolled her ankles, flexing her toes against the rug beneath them. Solid ground. Not perfect, but better than open dunes.

Someone shoved a water jug into her hands, and she almost kissed them.

Toph raised the water jug to her lips and drank deeply. The liquid was lukewarm and tasted faintly of dust, but it was the best thing she’d ever had. Her hands trembled just slightly as she lowered it and passed it to Sokka, who drained half of it in one go.

They ate something flat and chewy. Toph didn’t ask what it was—she didn’t care. She chewed through it like a half-starved beast. After she was done, she leaned back, letting her muscles unwind.

For a minute, she just sat in the quiet. Then she shifted, tilted her head toward the flap where Aang still stood silently. She could feel the tension radiating off him like heat off sand dunes. He hadn’t moved since they’d entered.

Toph turned her face away. Katara would’ve known what to say right now. She would’ve coaxed him into eating, and calmed him with that low, steady voice of hers and that never-ending kindness.

Toph…she didn’t have that in her toolbox. All she had was grit and stubbornness.

She leaned back, letting her sore body melt into the thin padding under her. For now, the fight was over. Her stomach had stopped growling, and her skin wasn’t crisping in the sun anymore.

But the knot under her ribs stayed. They’d crossed the worst part of the desert, but Appa was still missing. Katara wasn’t here, and Aang was still a walking thundercloud. And even though she’d shouted and bossed and kept their group from collapsing, Toph couldn’t help but feel like she was still winging it. Still pretending she wasn’t scared. Still hoping someone stronger would walk in and take the reins.

But no one did. So she tucked that fear down deep into her chest and let her breathing slow. They were safe, for now. And tomorrow, they'd find Appa, then they’d go back to the Oasis and find Katara.

But tonight…they’d sleep. And no one had to know she’d cried a little bit into her elbow before drifting off.

They left the market three days later, after the merchants finally came back. The man they’d met that first day had explained the situation to the merchants who had returned, and then they’d quickly loaded the sled with more provisions, strapped it to a giant beetle, and set off. Toph was glad to finally leave behind the desert encampment. Not just because she hated not being able to see due to the sand, but because  Aang had been tense and restless the entire time. Knowing they were making some progress towards finding Appa had been the only thing that kept him from exploding. 

The heat was worse than it had been a few days prior. It was heavier, like they were moving through a furnace instead of air. But as miserable as it was, Toph didn’t complain. Not when she had wind in her face, water she didn’t have to fight for, and solid planks beneath her feet, even if those planks were strapped to a glorified sand canoe and a giant beetle.

She’d take what she could get.

The merchants said it would only be a short journey to reach the circus, but even a short journey in the desert dragged like molasses through a sieve. They stopped at sundown to rest, and when they set off again at dawn, Toph was more than ready to feel solid earth beneath her. She could still remember how she felt before she learned earthbending from the badgermoles, and standing in sand felt like that all over again. She was blind, and she hated feeling helpless.

All throughout the ride, Aang didn’t complain. He didn’t speak at all.

He sat beside her the whole ride, close enough that she could feel the tension vibrating off him in waves. He didn’t ask questions, didn’t bend the air like a restless fidget. He just…sat there, like a string pulled so tight it might snap without warning.

Toph didn’t like that kind of quiet. Not from him.

By midday, they arrived. Toph knew it before anyone said a word. She could feel the earth around her, and the air had cooled slightly. When she hopped down from the sled, she breathed a sigh of relief at the sensation of seeing the world once more.

Finally.

Through her feet, she felt wooden posts sunk into the dirt, ropes pulling against canvas, and the heartbeat of animals locked in cages. There were sounds, too—tinny, unnatural music and a whip crack in the distance.

They were at the circus.

“Aang, we’re near Fire Nation colonies, you should probably cover your head,” Sokka suggested as he jumped to the ground. Toph felt him the moment his feet touched the earth.

She felt Aang hop down next, light as always. The kid had a knack for never fully landing when he moved. Even now, furious and dead silent, he still hit the earth like a whisper.

“Here,” one of the merchants said, and Toph sensed him moving over to Aang, holding out what she assumed was a head covering. “Wear this. Then I’ll take you to the trainer we sold him to.”

She watched through the vibrations as Aang put on the hat and then gripped his glider tighter.

They were led forward, and a few moments later, Toph felt a thick, layered canvas brush her arm as they entered what she could only assume was a large tent. Inside, the air smelled of smoke and sweat and something burnt. The floor changed beneath her too, from dry earth to a springy kind of padding.

Carpet. Great. Even more muffling.

The merchant who’d brought them here stepped lightly across the carpeted floor, his shoes brushing over it with nervous haste. She fell in behind the merchant, her ears tuned for every shift. She could hear Sokka just behind her, his breathing shallow, like he was bracing for a punch. Aang was beside her, and still too quiet. And with Aang, quiet meant dangerous. It meant pressure was building. She could feel it like air thickening before a summer storm.

Toph hated this floor. It swallowed vibrations like a sponge. Everything was dampened—distant. The only thing she was sure of was that they weren’t surrounded. No crowd. Just a few tense heartbeats. That was either good or very bad.

The merchant cleared his throat. “Trainer Yuan! We’ve returned about the creature—”

“You!” The voice that exploded across the space made Toph flinch. It was rough and filled with fury. “You’ve got some nerve showing up after you sold me that defective wind buffalo! I’ve been training animals for over thirty years, and he’s the most stubborn, willful beast I’ve ever had the misfortune of training!”

Toph heard the merchant stammer slightly, trying to recover. “We warned you he was untrained—”

“Untrained?” Yuan shouted. “He was feral! You owe me compensation.”

Toph could practically hear Aang locking up beside her. The pressure in the air spiked. Aang wasn’t bending yet, but on the edge. Like standing next to a lightning rod and feeling the hairs on your arms rise.

The merchant scrambled, voice higher now. “If you still have the bison, we’d be happy to take him back and issue you a full refund.”

“I don’t have him!” Yuan snapped. “He escaped last night. Took down half the main tent with him, and nearly killed me!”

Toph’s fists clenched. She hoped he had been flattened. Maybe stomped on once or twice, for good measure.

The merchant asked, “Do you have any idea where he went?”

“No,” Yuan said, spitting the word. “And frankly—I don’t care. He’s a liability to the entire circus. I should’ve whipped him harder and beat the rebellion out of him before letting him near the other performers.”

The air went still. Dead still. No sound, no breath, not even a twitch from Aang. But underneath the silence, the floor shivered. It was faint, nearly buried beneath the carpet, but Toph felt the shift in Aang’s stance. The tension in his jaw. The kind of silence that wasn’t calm at all…it was fury.

Toph exhaled slowly through her nose.

Here we go.

“What did you do to him?” Aang yelled.

The air pressure shifted hard. It sucked in—like the whole tent had just inhaled and forgot how to exhale. He was coming apart, Toph could feel it. Every breath he took pushed the air further off balance.

Yuan huffed. “He was an animal, I handled him the way any trainer would. You break animals. That’s how it works.”

Toph gritted her teeth. Wrong answer, buddy.

Toph didn’t need to see Aang’s face to feel what was coming. The pressure rose like heat. Static filled the space around him.

“Aang,” she hissed under her breath, “not here, not now—”

But it was too late.

A sudden, violent gust slammed into her from the left from an air current sharp enough to scrape. Toph stumbled two steps back, feet sliding uselessly on the cushioned carpet.

The world screamed.

It wasn’t a sound so much as a sensation. Like every grain of sand outside had been picked up and hurled against the tent at once. A raw, howling wind tore through the space, and Toph barely managed to stay upright.

The tent vibrated. Fabric ripped, and a support beam somewhere behind her snapped with a groan. One of the animal cages rattled so hard it sounded like it flipped. The animal inside screeched in panic. The floor beneath her shifted again, and she couldn’t tell if it was wind or earth tremors. Probably both.

Trainer Yuan shrieked. “What—what are you—?” Then his voice broke. “You—you’re the Avatar!”

Toph’s jaw clenched. Gee, took you long enough.

“Aang!” Sokka’s voice was panicked. “Stop!”

But Aang didn’t stop.

Another burst of air hit her in the chest, hot and pulsing, like a blast from a forge. Her hair whipped into her mouth, her ears rang with the shriek of wind.

“How dare you hurt Appa!”

The words weren’t just being spoken in Aang’s voice, there were other voices there. That wasn’t just bending, that was the Avatar State. And for the first time in a while, Toph was genuinely scared.

She forced herself forward, feeling her way toward him. The floor offered nothing, it was all rumble and chaos and shifting fury.

“Aang!” she shouted, arms raised, hoping he could feel her presence. “Aang! Snap out of it!”

No response.

In the distance, outside, there was a crash—something big and wooden coming apart, followed by screams. She gritted her teeth, bracing against the force, and kept shouting, because Katara wasn’t here to pull him back. And if he didn’t stop soon, he was going to destroy the circus—and all the people in it.

She gritted her teeth and charged blindly toward the swirling mass of pressure that surrounded him. Every instinct screamed at her to back away, but she didn’t. She reached forward, and her fingers closed around something warm.

His wrist.

“Stop it!” she yelled, pulling herself toward him. “Aang, stop! You’re not going to find Appa by tearing everything down!”

The wind resisted her, buffeting her from all sides. She could barely stand. But she pushed closer, clinging to his robe, and wrapping her arms around his middle before she could be flung back. His heart was pounding so fast she could feel it through her chest.

“I know you’re upset,” she gasped, holding on as the ground trembled again. “I know this feels like everything’s falling apart. But this isn’t the way to fix it!”

The air around them roared louder, nearly deafening. She ducked her head and pressed closer. Something above them creaked, and she really hoped it wasn’t the tent about to cave in.

“I’m not Katara,” she said, voice cracking. “I’m not good with words or feelings. I’m not warm and soft, but I’m here. And I care, okay? I care about you.”

The wind slowed.

She felt it first in her ears, then in the weight of the air. The storm didn’t stop, not all at once, but it eased. Like someone had turned the volume. He slowly came down from where he had been hovering, and then his knees buckled.

Toph gasped and stumbled, but she managed to catch him, even when they both collapsed onto rug mess like a sack of potatoes. He was shaking now, but not with rage. He was sobbing. They were silent, awful shudders wracked his chest.

His arms wrapped around her like he was afraid he might fall through the ground if he let go. Toph froze. Physical affection was not her thing. She’d hugged maybe three people in her entire life, and two of them had been her parents when she was five. But he clung to her like the world had split in half, and he needed something solid. And somehow, she was the solid thing.

Toph swallowed hard. Her hands hovered awkwardly in the air before she finally settled one against his back. She rubbed small circles. It felt strange…not bad, just strange.

A small warmth settled deep in her chest and pressed against her heart. Toph sucked in a breath at the suddenness and shoved it back down. Nope, not thinking about that right now.

Her ears rang faintly with the echo of screaming and shattered wood. A moment later, Sokka ran over and helped them stand, and then they quickly fled the tent. The merchants who had taken them there were already scrambling onto the sled. They hopped on board, and with a snap of the reigns, they set off for the desert again.

They’d left behind a circus torn to pieces, a trainer who wouldn’t be sleeping well for weeks, and a part of Aang that had snapped under the pressure. But at least he wasn’t flying away. He sat beside her, slumped like a broken umbrella. His fists hung loose, his spine bowed, and even his breathing sounded tired. Things were silent until they finally hit the sand.

Then Sokka broke the silence. “We should head back to the Oasis, and then Ba Sing Se.”

Aang didn’t answer.

“We still have to get that information about the eclipse to the Earth King,” Sokka continued. “That’s what this was all for.”

A soft wind rustled past them, and Aang muttered, “We should be looking for Appa.”

Sokka let out a long sigh. “He could be anywhere by now. We don’t even know which direction he went. But if we go to Ba Sing Se, we can regroup. Maybe he’ll make his way there, too.”

Toph shifted on the sled, grounding herself. Her legs still shook slightly from grabbing onto Aang back in the tent, but she wasn’t about to admit it.

“He’s not wrong. Appa’s smart, and Ba Sing Se’s one of the only safe places left,” she said. “Besides, if there’s a giant, walled city full of people and snacks, that’s where he’s headed.”

Aang didn’t respond.

Sokka tried again. “We need to go back for Katara anyway. She’s probably losing her mind wondering where we are.”

That landed. Toph felt Aang twitch. It wasn’t relief, just…something less brittle. She wasn’t sure whether she felt better or worse about that.

They didn’t speak again after that.

The merchants that brought them there agreed to take them back to the Misty Palms Oasis. They didn’t ask questions. After witnessing what Aang was capable of, they were probably too afraid to refuse.

Toph could feel their unease in every interaction: the skittish steps, the careful silences, the subtle way they never quite walked close to Aang, like he might go into Avatar mode again and send them sailing straight into the stratosphere.

Toph didn’t blame them.

He’d scared her too, a little. Not that she’d ever say it out loud. Not in a thousand years.

Three days of hot wind and grit passed in a blur of sand, stale food, and Sokka snoring way too close for comfort. At least the sled meant no more dragging her feet across a burning wasteland.

Still, by the time they rolled into Misty Palms, Toph could’ve kissed the packed ground beneath them. She could smell the damp clay, the dripping ice water, and the sweet, fruity scent of that beverage she liked.

The moment they stopped, Sokka jumped down and said he’d check the rooms. Aang wandered off to ask around. Toph stayed near the door of the inn, arms crossed, one foot tapping lightly as she tried to feel something useful through the crowd noise and hard-packed floor.

Nothing.

The place was a vibrating mess of footsteps, conversations, stomping boots, creaking floorboards, and the occasional flop of some drunk collapsing onto the floor of the cantina.

Minutes ticked by. Then she heard Sokka’s footsteps return, fast and uncertain.

“She’s not in her room,” he said, and she could hear the tension in his voice.

“She’s not anywhere,” Aang added. “I asked around. No one’s seen her for days.”

Toph’s gut clenched.

No. No, no, no. She tightened her fists, trying not to let the spike of panic show in her voice. “What if something happened?”

Sokka was silent. Toph tried to feel the ground again, scanning for familiar patterns, but there was nothing she could trust. What if she’d been captured? What if she was hurt?

“She wouldn’t just leave,” Sokka muttered, more to himself than anyone else. “She knows better.”

Or maybe…maybe she left because she knew better. Maybe she went out looking for them, because none of them listened when she said they shouldn’t go looking for that Spirit-forsaken library in the first place.

Then, there were footsteps, and they were approaching fast.

“Excuse me,” a man’s voice called out. “You’re the Avatar and his companions, right?”

Toph turned toward him. She could feel his calm, steady heartbeat calm. He didn’t feel threatening.

“Who’s asking?” Sokka said warily.

“My name is Xiang. I was told to keep an eye out for you.”

“By who?” Aang asked, voice rough with suspicion.

“By Katara.”

Toph’s knees buckled slightly, and she caught herself against the wall.

Xiang continued, “She left a message for you, days ago. She said if you returned, I should tell you she went to Ba Sing Se.”

Toph blew out a breath. “Smart,” she muttered. “Sugar Queen always did have the brains in this group.”

Sokka made a quiet, relieved noise beside her. “She’s okay. She just went on ahead.”

“She’s okay,” Aang said, and Toph couldn’t help but notice how unmistakably hopeful and relieved he sounded. It felt like someone had pinched her chest.

She was glad Katara was safe. Of course she was. But the way Aang’s voice changed, the way it brightened…she knew it wasn’t for her. It never would be.

She shoved the feeling down and crushed it under a scowl. Feelings were for other people. Softer people. People who didn’t throw rocks for fun.

“See?” Sokka said. “Another reason to head to Ba Sing Se. Katara will be there.”

They stayed the night.

The beds weren’t great, but it was the first time in days Toph felt anything close to comfort. She didn’t sleep much. Her body was still too tense, her thoughts too loud. And every time she drifted off, she kept hearing that sound Aang made. That quiet little hopeful sound. And worse, she kept feeling it. Like it had hooked itself under her ribs and made itself at home.

But when morning came, they packed up and set off toward Ba Sing Se.