Avatar; The Royal Firebender.

Ahead of Schedule

 The northern air temple is now so far away that they can no longer view the giant spires of the temple on the horizon. Part of Aang knew that their encounter with the firenation at the temple wouldn't be the last time the refugees that called it their home would have to deal with them. The Mechanist and the people he took care of would have to leave the place they called home for most of Zeo's life. Though that is a cost of war, displacement is as common as death on the battlefield. As the air begins to get colder and colder the Gaang are getting closer and closer to their destination, the north pole. Any land that they could land on is far to the south since they've been traveling for several days at this point. Appa usually flies at almost 25 miles an hour, so they've traveled over a thousand miles from the last bit of land. Around them are icebergs and endless water in all directions. Thankfully, Zuko had the foresight to actually buy a compass so they wouldn't end up flying aimlessly while looking for a civilization that has alluded to any battle with the firenation for the entire century the war has been going on.

"Well this is boring." Sokka complains, lamenting his boredom to the icy colored sky above them. "It would have been a good idea to get a card game or something to pass the time between places when on Appa."

"It's way too windy for anything like that, if we tried to play anything with them they'd just fly away." Zuko responds, entertaining himself by making a small flame dance between his hands. The fire provides slight entertainment as he tries to change its shape, and some warmth to the firebender.

"It's not our job to entertain you Sokka, you should have brought a book with us then." Katara responds, doing her best to also entertain herself by practicing shifting water between its liquid and solid states.

"Well it'd help if this thing could go faster." Sokka complains, noticing how low Appa is flying to the surface of the water. Appa dips low enough to drag his paw through the water before lifting upwards again.

"He has a name you know." Aang says a bit annoyed at Sokka calling Appa a 'Thing'. "Besides, I'd like to see you fly us thousands of miles through the freezing cold. We haven't had anywhere to land so he's probably getting tired."

"We both know what happened the last time I tried flying, I'll leave that job to you, Appa and ashbreath." Zuko sends Sokka a glare before exhaling hard in his direction. The resulting air current throws the small piece of wood Sokka was carving overboard.

"That's Karma for you." Katara says with a laugh.

Without warning, a sudden wall of ice leaps out of the water freezing itself to one of Appa's legs. With the limb frozen, he can't keep himself stable in flight and begins to spin out of control. The sudden attack startles the four but they're left with no time to process it instead only enough to grab onto the sides of Appa's saddle for dear life. The four scream as Appa continues to spin out of control before slamming into the side of an iceberg then landing in the water. "The hell was that?!" Zuko asks as he shakes the dizziness from his head looking up to see if the others are alright. "Quickly, get up, we're being ambushed!" He yells before drawing his twin swords from behind his back. Sokka draws his whalebone club as they scan the waters for any attackers. As Katara manages to get to her feet she notices something heading towards them. "It's not an ambush, it's the northern watertribe!" She declares seeing the familiar carved kayaks and waterbenders. Hearing this from Katara, Sokka and Zuko lower their weapons slightly before making eye contact with some of the water tribesman noticing the traditional hunter and warrior attire the men wear.

"Not the thing we were expecting to see out on a patrol today." One of the men says as the kayaks get close to the soggy form of Appa. "Apologies for the rude introduction, we can't be too careful out here. We've stayed out of the war for this long and we don't want to be dragged into it now." As the kayaks get closer, the siblings see the man who has been speaking to them, the snow tanned skin and dark black hair of the tribesman are accented with a pair of bright icy blue eyes. "My name is Lon'qu, what are you kids doing out here?"