Omashu.... or is it <Omashu, Earth Kingdom>

[blindgirl]

“maybe if you both shut up for a few minutes you’d have heard them” Toph whispered at them horsely. She didn’t know how much they should know about her, her first impulse was to snap at them and tell them to leave her be. But then again, what was the right answer. She was quiet for a few moments letting the various options float through her head. When it came to new people she was lost, it wasn’t as if her parents went around flaunting their blind doll of a daughter. The only new people she met were fighters, generally she didn’t need to talk, a cocky grin a few well placed insults and she was one of the gang.

Not here it seemed.

Casting her face down she sighed a bit. Maybe if they were all breaking into a fire nation infested city it would be in her best interests to toss caution to the wind. “Even though I was born blind, I’ve never had a problem seeing.” From her crouched position she gripped the ground with her open hand. This was a lot harder to explain then she thought it was going to be. Her social skills were never her crowning achievement, anyone who spent a few moments with her would see that much “I see with earth bending. It’s kind of like seeing with my feet. I can feel the vibrations in the earth, and I can see where everything is. You, that building and even the fire nation soldiers”

[airnomad]

Aang retreated fully behind their makeshift barricade the moment that the Fire Nation soldiers came into view past the end of the alley. He had been listening to Toph explain how she was able to 'see' with her earthbending despite her blindness. It was nothing short of astounding, really, and the young Avatar looked toward the girl with a bit of admiration in his eyes.

"That's amazing," Aang said, offering her a smile despite the fact that she couldn't see it. He was sient for a moment and then glanced over the edge of the barrel to see if the soldiers were gone. It was several seconds before a light seemed to go off and he whirled around to face her, his face alit with excitement.

"Hey!" he exclaimed, though quietly enough to avoid alerting any nearby soldiers, "She can see underground!" He glanced back and forth between Katara and Sokka, hoping they would see the use of such an ability in their search for Bumi.

[meatandsarcasm]

Sokka rubbed his chin, moved his mouth a little to the side and raised an eyebrow. It was one of his “I’m thinking now” expressions, and it was focused on the blind earthbender and what she’d said. He didn’t understand bending too much, but it seemed to make sense to him. The girl was positively prodigal to be able to use her bending like that, or so he assumed. After all, it was quite the impressive ability, and those didn’t come by easily, did they? Regardless, it was extremely useful. If she could see people and terrain from that far off, she could get them to the center of the city undetected easily. Not to mention what Aang had pointed out. If she could see underground, then finding Bumi’s prison would be much easier to find.

“In that case, you should lead the way,” Sokka said to the blind girl. “If you can find a way to get us to the center of the city underground, that’s great, but if not, just guide us away from the Fire Nation patrols. We’ll be able to grab Bumi and get out no problem thanks to…uh…”

Sokka resumed his thinking pose and leaned in to stare at the girl, as though he was getting a better look.

“Hmm, I need something to call you…” he continued.

“You’d better tell us your name,” Katara advised with exhaspration. “Or Sokka’s going to come up with one of his stupid nicknames for you.”

Sokka crossed his arms and held his chin at a pompous height “My nicknames are not stupid. They are doused in a creamy sauce of creativity and stuffed with delicious comedy.”

Katara rolled her eyes at Sokka as the boy nodded in agreement with himself, having put off moving forward with the mission in favor of defending his nicknames. Granted, if the blind girl was going to lead, that was on her shoulders, but even if it had been up to Sokka, his nicknames were more important.

[blindgirl]

"your sure stuffed with something..." Toph muttered mostly to herself even though it wasn't that down toned. She was never the type to pull her punches, especially not if he was going to saddle her with some lame nickname. That was demeening and disrespectfull... exactly why she used them herself. Casting her head in the direction of the boy who was seemingly her age she did her best to not sound like a rude brat. " My name is Toph."

Letting out an exasperated sigh she rolled her shoulders back taking a thurough survey of the area trying to see exactly where everything was. She, of course, had her limits as far as distance and clarity but she never took the time to figure out exactly how far that was. Now it was time to figure things out, if she was going to be 'leading' them she had to know a few things. Listening to them she picked up a bit but she felt there was more, something she was missing. She had her suspicions but she wanted to hear it anyway.

"So let me get this straight, the girl Katara is a waterbender." To make her point she pointed her finger towards the girl even though her eyes were still towards Aang slgihtly downcast. " Sokka is the loud one." Her thumb jutted at him a little curtly, he didn't seem to matter much. He talked a lot but honestly she didn't see that he could bend or even fight. Like a small poodle monkey. All bark- no bite.

"Your looking for a guy named Bumi so thats not you" The group kept rambling on about this Bumi person who she didn't know, finding him was their main goal but it's be harder for her. She was the only one to not see, or even hear of this person. So spotting one guy out of an entire town? that was near impossible for her. It wasn't as if they could say, he's the guy with the black hair and the mole on his face. She couldn't see it. Some people just didn't get it. Not that she wanted them to treat her special, like she had a disability. It was very much a double edged blade like that.

Only one other name really came up that she remembered, something that Sokka had said in the tunnel. "... so your Appa? but you don't smell that bad.... your bending is weird"

[airnomad]

"Appa?" Aang repeated Toph's statement of her understanding of their names. His face was screwed up in mild confusion as he tried to figure out just where she got the idea that that was his name. "No, my name's Aang. I'm the Avatar. Appa is my flying bison." In retrospect, Aang might have considered this a little too much for Toph to soak in in such a short time span, but there wasn't much time for longer introductions.

"We're here looking for King Bumi," Aang went on after a moment's pause. "I was going to learn earthbending from him, but now that the Fire Nation is here I just need to make sure he's okay and break him out of here if possible." The young Avatar vast his eyes down toward the staff in his hands as he mentioned his old friend's predicament. In truth, he didn't even know if Bumi was still alive.

No... He pushed those thoughts far away as soon as they cropped up. Bumi would have found a way to survive. He was a mad genius.

During his silence, Katara decided to speak up to fill the void. "We need to start searching somewhere," she pointed out. "Where would the Fire Nation keep him?"

[meatandsarcasm]

Catching Toph’s remark, Sokka’s face quickly fell into his flat browed “we are not amused” expression. This, of course, only turned more sour when he was referred to as “the loud one”. He wasn’t loud, was he? Part of him was tempted to start talking and try to figure out how loud his voice is, but he decided against that course of action considering the firebenders nearby. Toph did redeem herself a little with the “Appa” comment, though, forcing him to stifle a small laugh before receiving the evil eye from his sister. Clearing his throat, he decided to answer Katara’s question.

“They’ll be keeping Bumi in the highest security prison they have, and the only place that makes sense for that is underneath the palace at the center of the city,” Sokka said, getting straight to the point. “Even if its not there, the palace will probably have someone who can tell us where Bumi is living in it, so we’ll start our search there.”

With that, He rose up into a crouch and looked over the crate he’d been hiding behind. The firebender guards were gone for now. If they were patrolling, though, they’d be back soon enough.

“We should probably get moving. If we’re spotted, this will become a whole lot harder.”

With that, he removed his club from his belt and looked expectantly at Toph. She did have the super earthbending vision thing, so it only made sense for her to lead.

[blindgirl]

Toph nodded slipping surely back into seriousness. Something about the tone in their voices made her keep to seriousness.The girl let her hand off of the ground and stood out ready to lead. It seemed the center of the city had something going on, some sort of strange structure, that made the most sense.

Show the people what might happen to them should they speak or act out. The firenation seemed to be rather full of themselves invading such a big city. Surely the earth king would do something about it sooner or later.

Shaking her head her sightless eyes widened and she sat back down, not because someone was coming, not because Sokka proved himself to be more of a simpleton than she'd thought. Or even because she felt sick. Her hands reached out and manhandled Aangs face. Moving the skin on his cheeks this way and that trying to get a good survey of his face.

"Your the avatar?! your a legend!" She caught herself bringing her voice back down to a lower level, honestly she was more skeptical than amazed. Somehow that seemed like a more important detail than looking for some stinky old king.

She didn't hear anything about the avatar being alive before this, well except for bedtime stories. This was strange the strangest day she'd possibly lived through, if she managed to survive it then she'd probly turn out as warped as the rest of their small crew.

[airnomad]

Aang was about to stand and follow Toph, but he took a crouched step back the moment she whipped herself back around and loomed uncomfortably close to him.

"Your the avatar?! your a legend!" she exclaimed. Aang was about to make some kind of modest remark about not being that legendary, but he wasn't prepared for her suddenly groping his face. With his back against the wall he couldn't really pull away, and sheer confusion was overtaking his reflex to swat her hands away. Instead he merely squinted his eyes and wrinkled his nose as she poked and prodded his face, elciting a few muffled grunts.

After a few seconds, though, Aang finally reached up with his hands and gently pushed aside her fingers. "What was that for?" he blurted out, still more confused than offended. But the moment the words left his mouth and his eyes refocused on the pale, pupil-less orbs behind Toph's curtain of black hair the reason dawned on him. "Oh...." he mumbled, "Sorry... But a little warning would be nice next time." He smiled reflexively even though the expression would likely be lost on the girl, and then started to stand.

[meatandsarcasm]

While it was impressive that Toph could tell who Aang was just by taking a…”look” at his face, Sokka decided the negatives were as weighty as the positives. Aang was getting to be really well known. They couldn’t just walk around anywhere like normal civilians anymore. They’d have to start being more cautious. There was that, and the fact that Toph was announcing who it was so loudly. Was he the only one that knew what enemy territory was? Geeze. This was why he was the leader. Putting a finger up to his mouth, he made a perhaps overemphasized shushing noise.

“Yes, Aang’s the Avatar. Balance bringer, spirit bridger, yada, yada, yada,” he said in a loud whisper. “But when we’re in a city full of firebenders, we like to keep that hush-hush, okay? You know, so people don’t start trying to burn us.”

Katara gave Sokka a small warning glare, but Sokka ignored it. The city had two exits that they knew of, not counting whistling in Appa. Forget if they were just spotted. If the Fire Nation troops found out the Avatar was here, they’d seal the city eight different ways and turn absolutely every ounce of their strength on them. They had been through a lot of tough fights, but that would be unlike any battle they’d ever faced, and if they could avoid it, they should.

“Don’t pay attention to Sokka, he’s just paranoid,” Katara said to Toph in a nice, somewhat comforting tone. “But we should get moving.”

[blindgirl]

" I just wanted to be sure it was real..." Her eyes narrowed a bit in consentration, it wasn't as if she could see him and read his expressions. All she had to go on was her touch and feel. When she had inspected his face she'd found that his head was bald, that ws weird. She couldn't reall feel too much of peoples hair though, balding was common but not bald.

It didn't matter too much though, it wasn't as if she could tell if he was attractive, ugly or somewhere inbetween. Still she was sceptical of the would-be avatar. But thinking about it, a bit made sence. Looking for a strong earth bender, not to mention the boys own strange bending, coupled with the water benders, she could have sworn the boy water bended. " Well it doesn't feel like you were lying. "

Deciding to let it go Toph pressed her hand to the ground helping herself to her feet. Well no need to wait around, it they wanted to find some old as dirt king that was none of her business really. She'd help for now. It was much better than going back to her parents and trying to face that insanity head on. They'd have a lot of questions, a lot of questions she couldn't answer and keep the same freedoms she had before.

Maybe she could runaway, it wasn't as if she couldn't make a living for herself beating idiots to a pulp. Her head turned back toward the group as she navigated herself out of the ally. The dress was making it hard for her to walk, she really wished she'd been wearing something less constricting. " You comming?"

[airnomad]

"Coming," Aang replied to Toph and started after her. However, he felt a slight tap on his sleeve and turned to regard Katara, who had reached out to get his attention. "Hm?" he murmured in a general questioning tone.

"Your arrow," the waterbender girl pointed out, aiming a finger at his head. "If the guards see it they'll know you're the Avatar." Aang's eyes swiveled in to try and look up at his own forhead while simultaneously running a hand over his bald pate. He was reluctant to cover up his tattoos. They were a great honor to the Air Nomads, and he felt somewhat guilty for hiding his heritage. But given the circumstances, this might be an exception.

"Good idea," Aang said after a moment of thought. He leaned his staff against the wall and reached for the back of his sash, pulling the knot loose. He snapped it out straight at arm's length and then swiftly began tying it around his head like a headcloth. "They might not have gotten a good look at us as we entered the city. If we get caught, we can just pretend we're regular kids." Aang gave a final pull on the freshly tied knot behind his head and then pulled his staff back into his hand with a bending-induced vacuum of air.

"Let's go," he said, nodding to Katara in one more gesture of thanks.

[meatandsarcasm]

Before long, the group had advanced deep into the city. With Toph guiding them, they had easily managed to avoid trouble. The girl had a mouth, but she was extremely useful. Sokka had never seen an Earthbender with this kind of ability before. Granted, he hadn’t seen many, but King Bumi was one of them. Come to think of it…did even Bumi have this ability? An idea formed in Sokka’s mind, but he shook it off. For now, their priority was rescuing Bumi. They could work the rest out later. The group was now walking down a back alley, surrounded by high buildings. Sokka looked up to get a better look at them. He had been impressed with Omashu the first time he saw it, and even on his second trip, the structure of the city was pretty amazing. The buildings ascending the side of the mountain, the mail system weaved throughout it, the Fire Nation hawks…

Wait, Fire Nation hawks? Sokka peered more closely into the sky, where a pair of bird like shapes appeared to be getting closer and closer. They weren’t messengers. Those would be flying directly to and from a destination, not flying around like this. But what else could they be used for? His eyes went wide. They were scouts. The cries of a hawk could be heard far and wide, and if they patrolled the city when people weren’t supposed to be in the street, all they had to do was let out a screech when they saw someone not in a Fire Nation uniform running around. With each moment, the hawks got closer, and Sokka began to panic.

He looked at Toph, then back up at the hawks. The girl couldn’t see them. It made sense. She would only be able to see things attached to the earth. No wonder they weren’t avoiding them. Briefly, he thought about telling her, but decided that would take too. Instead, he reached out, grabbed her by the collar, and darted to the side.

“Out of the street!” he said, darting through a thankfully unlocked back door. “Hawks!”

Katara gave a puzzled look for a moment, but looked up at the mention of hawks. Quickly comprehending what Sokka was saying, she grabbed Aang by the shirt and made to follow Sokka. Meanwhile, inside, Sokka found himself face to face with a family of five enjoying what looked like dinner. For a moment, he just stared dumbfounded, but finally scratched the back of his head and tried to speak normally.

“So, um, hi,” he said. “Just dropping by. How are you doing? Good? That’s great...”

[blindgirl]

Toph felt she was doing a rather good job, as of yet they hadn't run into a single soldier, in fact they hadn't run into any people in some time either. It took a moment to ponder why that would be but her feet didn't halt with her thoughts.

Stretching her vision out beyond the immediate street she could feel people... They were all just inside, that was a little weird. It was still a little warm so the sun had to be out, maybe they had really hot heat lamps? No, she defiantly felt the sun on her skin when they were out of the shadows. So then what was going on?

Surveying the group behind her she grinned about to tell them they were only a block or two away when Sokka's nervousness seemed to surprise her, was her about to go on another little jaunt int crazy land?

"What-HEY!" The girl felt herself being shoves pulled and lifted out of the way, in her attempt to keep up with him her foot slipped on the end of her skirt knocking her lightly into Sokka's chest. Disheveled and confused she was about to give him a peace of her mind when her attention caught again on the family eating dinner.

She quickly jabbed Sokka in the arm once he shut up. " Next time you want to spaz out tell me and I can find a less populated area" The young girl fumed but more over it was because she'd been surprised, she hated that. Hawks, who would have guessed there were freaking hawks in the city?

How was she supposed to know that there were silly rats with wings in the air. Her hands worked to straighten her dress ignoring the rip in the bottom and most of the dirt stains that now covered it since she walked through a sewer tromped through a city. Not like she could see if she looked like a mess anyone.

[airnomad]

Sokka's sudden alarm caused Aang to tense up. Until the following mention of hawks came, he was ready to do battle. But as he realized there was no immediate danger, he simply took a moment to observe the birds circling overhead before slinking into the nearest building behind the others.

"Who are you?" was the first thing he heard upon entering the home. Aang side-stepped around Sokka and Toph in order to get a view of the room's layout, and he realized that they'd barged in on a family. The father of the household had stood from his table and was staring at the four of them with confusion and annoyance. "And what is that smell?" he asked a few moments later sniffing the air. "Is that..." his upper lip curled with disgust, "sewage?"

The young Avatar self-consciously tilted his head to sniff his clothing for a moment. Maybe he'd just grown accustomed to the smell and didn't notice it any more? "Actually, it is..." Aang gave a somewhat embarassed laugh in an attempt to lighten the mood.

"We're sorry to barge in like this," Katara said suddenly, drawing the attention away from Aang. "But we needed to get off the street. Those hawks might have spotted us."

"What are you doing out on the street? And you should know you're not allowed to meet in groups larger than three people." Aang looked at the man curiously for a few moments. He found something disturbing how the citizens of Omashu had already come to adapt to life under the Fire Nation's rule. It was a big change from their last visit.

"We're looking for King Bumi," Aang told the man, suddenly finding his resolve again. The Omashu citizen visibly looked shocked by that news. "Do you know where the Fire Nation is keeping him?" the Avatar asked, hoping to extract any knowledge from him. However, the man didn't seem to hear the last question and quickly went about the task of shutting tight any window that wasn't already closed. He even peaked out the door before shutting and locking that as well.

"Looking for Bumi?" the man eventually repeated Aang's statement. "Who are you?" he demanded, "Are you working for the Resistance?"

[meatandsarcasm]

Sokka winced rather harshly and let out a small yelp as Toph punched his arm. He quickly nursed it with his other hand, rubbing it tenderly. He heard stifled laughter from across the room, coming from Katara, of course, and he quickly shot a glare in her direction.

“She’s surprisingly strong!” he said defensively, still rubbing his shoulder.

A small cough brought his attention back to family that occupied the household. Clearing his through, he gave his wounded arm one last comfort rub before putting his hand up to his chin in an attempt to look thoughtful. Truthfully, there was something to think about. They could, on the one hand, tell them that Aang was the Avatar. That, however, was a high risk, high reward situation. If thee people kept their mouths shut, then finding Bumi would get easier, along with this “resistance” that was mentioned. On the other hand, if they alerted the Fire Nation troops, they may as well have stayed out in the street and let the hawks find them.

“We’re not with the resistance, but we are friends of Bumi,” Sokka said. “Do you know where he is?”

The man paused for a moment and shared a glance with his wife, “How do we know that you’re telling the truth?”

“He has a giant pet goat-rabbit named Flopsy,” replied the Water Tribe boy without missing a beat. “And really, do we look like spies to you?”

The man looked over the smelly and dischevled pre-teen foursome for a moment before shaking his head slowly. Sokka smirked. For once, it seemed that sticking out was going to work to their advantage. Maybe this man would even take them to the Resistance…