Wandering Firebender

Ninety Six: Patient

After the tumultuous events that had transpired in front of Alger's home two weeks ago, things finally seemed to be calming down and wrapping up. A large majority of the most serious repair work had been wrapped up and now the inside was being renovated.

Since a lot of the hard work was well out of the way, Elio felt more comfortable taking a backseat and letting Alger and his various crews handle the hard work. In the meantime, he was taking care of his own matters – namely, having another meeting with the Earth King to ensure that their time in Ba Sing Se would not include anymore violent incidents.

Now that Elio had more time to himself after getting a good amount of work done, he was able to take some time to meditate for the first time in what felt like forever. He desperately needed to get his bearings before he was sent on his next mission.

If the last few months had proven anything it was that he was sorely lacking in the experience required to fulfill this role that he had taken on. His knowledge on handling political affairs was limited at best, and those who knew more than him weren't used to establishing peace.

It seemed like the entire world was figuring out how to proceed all at the same time along with him.

"Hey, Elio. Are you busy?" Cindra asked as she knocked on the door.

"Hm? Uh not particularly. Is everything okay?" He asked.

"No! I mean yeah everything's fine. I just wanted to check on you." Cindra answered.

"Oh! Yeah I'm good," Elio answered. He stood up and opened the door for her. "I've just been taking advantage of the time here to catch up on my reports mainly. Alger seems to have the repair work under control now so..." He explained with a nod.

"Yeah...it's actually gotten a little boring the past few days." Cindra admitted with an awkward chuckle.

"Haha I can't say I haven't been bored myself. But it has given me some time to meditate which is good."

"Oh that is good! I know that's a big part of your routine as a firebender. I'm really happy for you." She said with a genuine smile.

"Thank you. I take it you're not up to anything yourself?" Elio presumed.

"Yeahhh I went shopping with Sri and Mila yesterday and got myself some more formal wear for whenever we have out next important party or whatever, but that's about all I've done since things with Alger are slowing down." Cindra explained.

"Gotcha. Well I still owe you a game of Pai Sho if you want to learn how to play." Elio offered.

"Oh yeah! Sure. Why not?" Cindra shrugged and smiled again.

So Elio went back into his room to gather his collection of Pai Sho playing tiles. He then met with Cindra in the commons area where the Pai Sho table had been installed. They sat down across from each other and Elio carefully opened up the bag full of pieces.

"So I'm not gonna lie, I won't be any better at explaining this than last time I tried but I'll do my best to break it down as simply as possible." Elio said with a chuckle.

"Thank you haha I know I'm stupid." Cindra joked.

"No no you're not stupid. Pai Sho is just one of those games that's easy to play but hard to get into, you know? We'll get it to click for you, don't worry." Elio smiled and chuckled under his breath.

As he spoke, he started taking out pieces and placing them on either side of the table, trying to build a starting setup for both himself and Cindra. As he did so, a few pieces spilled out of the bag onto the table. One particular piece caught Cindra's eye immediately.