Burnt Out - Zuko x OC

Goodbye This Time

Season 2, Episode 12

Kai lay sunbathing on a boulder next to Sokka as he looked over their map. They'd made it to the far edge of the desert after narrowly escaping the buzzard wasps and pulling Aang out of his avatar state with the sand benders.

"Water bending bomb!!" Katara yelled from atop the waterfall before cannonballing down into the oasis, a tsunami of water threatening to drown them all out.

Kai, with one arm shielding her eyes from the sun, used her free hand to wave a balcony of stone over her, Sokka and their precious map. "Careful, Katara!" Sokka yelled from under his new shelter, "This is only a five thousand year old map from the Spirit Library!"

The uprooted earth returned to its home in the ground and Kai rolled over on her stomach, "Did you figure out which route we're going to take?"

Sokka glanced at the marks on her skin before quickly shifting his eyes back to the parchment, "We just got out of the desert, so we must be around here. It looks like the only passage connecting the south to the north is this sliver of land called the Serpent's Pass."

"You sure that's the best way to go?" Toph asked, taking a stand next to the pair.

"It's the only way. I mean, it's not like we have Appa to guide us there." His insensitivity was followed by a jab to the back of his head from his sister as she whispered, "Can't you shut up about Appa?"

"Katara, it's okay." Aang sat away from the others. He'd been withdrawn since losing his bison, understandably so, "I know I was upset about losing Appa before, but I just want to focus on getting to Ba Sing Se and telling the Earth King about the solar eclipse. Besides, we don't know how close Zuko or Azula are, we have to keep moving regardless."

Kai lifted up on her forearms abruptly, pushing her untied hair out of her face as she turned to Aang, "Azula? Zuko??" Toph elbowed her in the ribs and spoke inconspicuously through gritted teeth, "You know, the Fire Nation princess and banished prince. You've heard of them, right Kai?"

"Oh, yeah, I just.." She'd almost forgotten about the boy in the hay loft completely in the past few weeks, almost forgotten about her life's mission when she'd decided on a new one, "Why are they following you?"

"Uh, because of the big, blue arrow on Aang's head, duh." Sokka said before pointing straight ahead, "Now, to Ba Sing Se, no more distractions!"

"Hello there, fellow refugees!" A man's voice spoke from the brush. He emerged with his very pregnant wife and their preteen daughter, "Not to intrude, but we heard you all are traveling to Ba Sing Se. We're trying to get there before my wife Ying has her baby. You should come with us to Full Moon Bay. Ferries take refugees like us across the lake, it's the fastest route!"

"Full Moon Bay?" Aang asked, "We were just going to cross the Serpent's Pass."

They looked at him with both confusion and horror, "The Serpent's Pass?? Only the truly desperate take that path!"

"Hm, peaceful ferry ride or deadly pass?" Kai poked fun at Sokka while pulling her pants back on and tying them around her waist.

The refugee family led them to the ferry port, Kai and Toph falling behind the group.

"You didn't think it was important to tell me that the royal family was following us?" Kai asked with a small amount of irritability in her voice. She'd been trained on maintaining her heart rate, keeping control of her breathing, so Toph had always had a hard time reading her body language.