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Chapter 34

We all sat around a fire as Zuko poured tea into some cups. "No one can make tea like Uncle. But hopefully I learned a thing or two. Would you like to hear Uncle's favorite tea joke?"

"Sure."

"I like jokes," Aang said.

"Bring it." Zuko stood up and began passing the tea around.

"Okay. Well, I can't remember how it starts but the punchline is, 'Leaf me alone, I'm bushed'." We stared at him, deadpanned. "Well, it's funnier when Uncle tells it."

"Right. Maybe that's because he remembers the whole thing." Katara grabbed a cup.

Zuko walked over to us. I grabbed two cups for Toph and I. They laughed. "It's nice to get a chance to relax a little. It hardly ever happens," Toph said. Zuko handed Teo their drink.

Sokka and him walked off to the side, away from everyone else as we all talked. The next morning the two were gone, and a note was left with Momo.

"What does it say?" Toph asked.

Katara read the paper. "Need meat. Gone fishing. Back in a few days. Sokka and Zuko." Aang walked back over to his sleeping bag. "One more thing. Aang, practice your firebending while I'm gone. Do twenty sets of fire fists and ten hot squats every time you hear a badger frog croak. Zuko."

Aang proceeded to fall back asleep. A badger frog croaked, making him stand up. "Nobody else has homework." He began doing the squats. "One hot squat. Two hot squat. Three hot squat. Four hot..." I walked away with Toph over to the fire.

We sat talking as Katara started it up, refusing to let me bend still. I didn't want to either way, stupid wound still hurt, stupid uncle. 

I laughed at something Toph said, making her look over at us. "You know you two have been hanging out a lot," she said. "Are you two dating or something?"

"Yeah," Toph said. I blushed, awkwardly looking away..

"Wait really? Since when!?"

"Sometime after I met up with you guys." I fiddled with the edge of my sleeve. "We kissed during the night... although we never really said we were actually dating, just kind of silently agreed on it."

"How have I never noticed, why didn't you tell me either?"

"Well, I don't really care about telling people, they find out when they find out." Toph shrugged.

"Yeah I don't know how you didn't notice, almost everyone else did." I thought back to the times we had kissed while here, which was only like two, but each time someone caught us. The first time being after Combustion Man was defeated, and The Duke, and Teo caught us then. And the second time Haru caught us just last night.

"And I told Sokka that we had some sort of a relationship at the beginning. He helped me cook," Toph said.

"I can't believe I never knew..." Katara said, dejectedly.

"Zuko probably doesn't know," I suggested. I gave her an awkward smile.

"Well at least I have that."

The second day of their trip, the two of them still didn't return. I laid on the ground, bored, watching Aang continue to train. Katara and Toph were with him. I yawned, watching Katara move her water around. Slowly I fell asleep.

"Wake up." I shot up, seeing nothing but black. I tensed up, expecting my usual nightmare. Expecting for hands to shoot out of the darkness at me.

But this time it was different. This time I could move around.

"Hello?" I called out. 

"Hello, child." I heard someone say. I spun around looking for the voice, but couldn't find anything. 

"Who's there?"

"This is a familiar sight for you? This blackness."

"How saddening." Another voice joined in. I looked around, still seeing nothing.

"Who are you?"

"Who do you think we are?"

"There's only one other thing inside of you."

"Uh... the... dragon blood...?"

"Quite right." One of them passed by me, making me jump back, startled. It was a bright blue dragon.

"What are you doing here?" I asked, watching it.

"You're weak right now," said another one. This one was red. They circled around each other.

"Your defenses are down."

"You're relaxed."

"Giving us a chance to talk with you."

"What about?"

Suddenly I felt myself being shaken, waking me up. "Hey, you okay? You feel like you had another nightmare," Toph said. She and Katara were standing over me.

"No, no I just had a really weird dream." I sat up. "I didn't even realize I fell asleep, how long was I out?"

"Only an hour or so."

"Feels a lot shorter."

"Wait hold on a second." Toph lifted up the top of my dress, unclipping it from the skirt it's attached to in the process. She began feeling my stomach. I blushed, surprised. "Your wound, it's completely healed!"

Katara examined it. The wound was gone, there wasn't even a scar. "That doesn't make any sense. It was still there and red yesterday."

"Maybe it has something to do with my dream?" I pushed my shirt back down, clipping the skirt to it again. Although the shirt didn't really cover that much, Toph didn't need to do that. "Now can we please leave my stomach alone."

I walked back over to the fire with Toph. "You liked it," she said quietly. My face turned a dark red, making her grin.

"What, no, I..." I sighed. "Yeah okay, maybe just a little."

"Your heartbeat says otherwise." She shrugged.

"Yeah well, you probably did that on purpose."

"You can't prove anything."

"No, but I can do this." I gave her a peck on the cheek. A light blush spread across her face and she smiled. "Anyway I'm gonna finish my nap."

I headed over to my room and continued sleeping.

"You're back."

I found myself back in the void. The two dragons were still circling around me.

"Now there is something important to tell you."

"You are going to die."