One of Those Days <Ba Sing Se, Earth Kingdom>

[ikeru]

She knew it was going to be another one of Those Days the moment consciousness pried her eyes open in the morning. A headache thumping queasily in her temples, Ikeru awkwardly sat herself up on her sleeping mat, brushing aside a pair of empty sake bottles she had "borrowed" from the Oil Lotus the previous evening (hey, they had a million and one of those things...surely Boss Tanaka wouldn't mind if one or two were missing?) and rubbing the grimy sleep from her eye. By the way the oil-warm sunlight leaked gracefully over her messy thin blanket, she had a faint idea of the time: probably late morning or early afternoon. While still on the floor, she craned her neck upwards and peeked out the window, spotting a small group of filthy children clustered around a patchy ball. Despite the refreshing rains that had sprinkled the massive city only a few days ago, clouds of dust puffed around the children's feet, dirtying them even further and coating their bare shins and ankles in a thick blanket of dusk-brown. Pitiful.

Ikeru heaved a heavy sigh and stretched forward, relishing in the way her joints and back popped, which was an unfortunate thing to relish in; she was only twenty-eight, for the sake of the Spirits. Why did she feel so old? Why was her hair graying? Why did her knees and elbows and fingers sometimes ache and whine and complain? Pooh-poohing such thoughts with a dismissive wave of her hand, Ikeru climbed to her feet, stretched again, and began the process of getting ready for work. There was no point wasting time in dejected thinking; it was going to be one of Those Days, after all.

An hour later and feeling no better than before, Ikki shuffled into the Oil Lotus, her eyes downcast and a frown splitting her face in half. Cheery sunshine had blared down on her for the entire walk to work, forcing her into a testy mood: why did she have to work on such a gorgeous day (the chance of her actually spending one of her gloriously rare days off outside and doing something productive were slim, but, really, it was a good excuse as any to skip work and go back home to sleep)? Curling her bony fingers around the head of her smudged sapphire necklace, she dragged her bare feet across the dirt floor as she positioned herself behind the counter in her usual spot, closest to the door for the shortest escape time.

"Ikeru-san!"

Oh, Spirits.

Boss Tanaka swaggered through the door frame that led to the back rooms, impossibly huge arms crossed over his impossibly huge chest. Ikki could almost feel the ground quake with each footstep her terrifically imposing boss took. His voice boomed through the tiny teahouse like a million rocks crashing against each other. "Ikeru-san! You are late again!" He stomped-walked across the room, slamming his enormous fist upon the cracked counter in anger. No wonder the damn thing is so messed up, she mused.

"Ikeru-san!" Boy, he seemed to like saying her name alot. "I have a job for you!"

"What, besides th'one I got already?"

"I will not tolerate your mouth today, Ikeru-san! Not today!" Rummaging through his pocket, Boss Tanaka slammed a wrinkled scrape of parchment onto the counter. He pointed at the scribbled characters with one meaty index finger. "You are to go to the market today! We are running low on these supplies, and I want you to go out and pick them up." After a moment's pause, he inched the parchment closer to Ikki and produced a pouch seemingly out of thin air. "No funny stuff! Do not spend all of the gold on booze like the last time!"

Huffing, Ikeru snatched both parchment and pouch off the counter, crumpling the paper into a ball in one hand and cradling the pouch with the other. "Look, that was three years ago--"

"Enough! I will hear none of it. Go, now! While the weather is still fortunate!" And with that, her beast of a boss sauntered out of sight and, once she was outside the teahouse, out of mind. A pep in her step spurned by the chance to drink in that warm sun once more, she navigated the crowded, tricky streets of Ba Sing Se like the native she never was, the gold coins jingling noisily. Once or twice, Ikeru had to stop and inspect the list, reminding herself that Boss Tanaka would probably fire her if she were to blow all the money on gambling or sake. Considering the fact she was a woman in a man's city, not to mention her rather unpleasant attitude, she had no doubt it would take her positively forever to find a new job again. Sighing for what felt like the umpteenth time that day, she pushed on through her quest-of-sorts until, lo and behold, she was standing on the fringe of the busy Ba Sing Se Market.

The hustle and bustle of mid-afternoon marketplace activity would certainly intimidate a new-comer, but, thankfully, Ikeru was no newbie. As if she had been born and raised in the congested bazaar, she slid into the surging crowds without so much as a second thought. One eye scanning the myriad of colorful carts and loud shopkeepers while the other scouted for the spidery, elusive fingers of potential oncoming pick-pockets, she never even noticed the oncoming force until it hit her dead-on and knocked her down. Dazed and sprawled across the dirt, she watched as the precious bag of gold went flying through the air, unraveling and spilling coins like great big drops of rain. The coins splattered across the ground with muted thumps! She could feel the attention of every peddler, every thief, and every customer in the marketplace spotlighting not the fallen women, not the poor bastard who had knocked her down, but the gold glittering in the balmy sunlight.

She was right: it was just one of Those Days.

[baoli]

Bao Li had spent the first part of his day as he always did. He awoke at the crack of dawn , aided by a thrown slipper to the side of his face, and fought with his grandfather over waking times while his poor beset grandmother intervened with breakfast and hoped that the weak, watery porridge would shut both of them up long enough for her to get Bao Li into a pair of pants and out the door.

Bao Li's grandfather was generally placated by the belief that the young boy was in school of some sort, so the morning railing against authority often ended with him silencing himself in a triumphant grin as Bao Li was unceremoniously shoved out the door at a time befitting the start of a school day. Today was no different.

Bao Li's grandmother kissed him on the head as he left their small house in the city's lower ring, tried to straighen his mussed bangs to no effect, and whispered to him the same things she always did. "Try not to get into too much trouble, Bao Li. Remember, the city's police are nothing against your grandfather's wrath, and if he finds out what you really do during a day, he'll never let you come back to the house."

Bao Li did as he always did - he brushed her words aside and took off at a jog for the market, his empty canvas sack strung over his shoulder and bouncing on his back. Book learning was for other people - Bao Li was getting a real education out in the streets of Ba Sing Se.

He took up his customary spot when he got there, crouched on the ground against a stall just inside the market gates. It afforded him the best view of marks, and the most places to disappear to when the time was right for it. He watched and waited - sooner or later, a real breakfast was likely to waltz into his grubby hands.

When the skinny woman in the oversized green tunic ran headlong into another person on her way into the market proper, Bao Li's eyes lit up. For an instant, it rained gold - her purse had flown, strewing coin all over the street. His stomach knotted in anticipation, his body shifted, and he was off before she'd even recovered - he made a run right at the situation and started scrabbling for all the coin he could carry. He scooped them up one after the other, but only pocketed three - his deft little fingers dropped one to each of his vest pockets.

The rest, he held onto for the lady herself. She looked like her day was bad enough, but if she had this much, three wasn't going to make or break her. He grinned a wide, toothy grin as he approached the woman and held out his hands to her. "These're yours, yeah?"

[jochi]

Jochi was amazed he could get beyond that wall. Ever since it came within his view, miles away from his location in the wilderness, the sandbender found it a great intrigue. It had seemed so short a time since he left the desert, but his excursion to the city itself seemed like forever in comparison. That process of waiting in line was unheard of in the Si Wong, as was such a long wait on the monorail. The cloud of dust that seemed to linger about him drove the other passengers to sit at a conspicuous distance, but Jochi immediately assumed people were rude because of his apparent origins. It was amazing that no one prompted an argument within that time, lest the short and stocky man be taken into custody. But that was all over. He was now in a crowded marketplace, which reminded him somewhat of the bazaars in his homeland, only more civil and less dusty.

With his goggles resting on his bald head, cloth wraps draped somewhat like a scarf around his neck, Jochi meandered through the city market without a clue what to do. He would never admit such a thing, of course. Jochi was without money, food, or shelter. He had only the clothes on his back and the jug full of sand at his hip.

But fortune would soon strike.

Just as he felt the slightest urge to lament his poverty, a single gold coin rolled his way and fell at his feet. Bending down to pluck it from the ground, his gray-green eyes admired the shining beauty. However, his newfound piece of currency was not alone. Peering ahead, he saw the street littered with a few gold coins. There seemed to be a young boy picking them off the ground, but Jochi would make sure to snatch the remainder of money before him. Picking up his pace, the sandbender walked straight up to the young boy and gently pushed him aside with his hand. In his bizarre train of thought, he assumed the emaciated woman on the floor had died of malnourishment - which happened often in the desert - and no one had bothered to dispose of her body. He completely ignored the fact that she was breathing, since he was more concerned with the coins on the street.

[ikeru]

Still indisposed on her back, the headache she had felt earlier that day pounding a harsh beat all around her head while the air that had been ejected right out of her lungs slowly crawled back in, she gazed, dumbfounded, at the stark blue sky and watched as fat clouds cut lazy paths. Swiveling her eyes to the growing crowds that swarmed around the glinting coins, Ikeru stabbed a bony arm through the air, flapped her hand, and frowned upon realization that no one was going to help her up. Figures.

She climbed to her feet, wheezing and shooting an icy glare at the man who had knocked her over and suddenly left. Brushing the dirt from her clothes, an exercise in futility, she bent over, snatched the leather pouch out of the dust, and began plucking coins off the ground and placing them back into their house with a nasty frown.

It wasn't until the crowds had dissipated, unable to sneak stolen money past Ikki's sharp fox-eagle's gaze and promptly losing interest in the situation, that she realized a few were missing. Oh, crap.

"Oh, crap."

Her mind spinning into a frenzy of images of Boss Tanaka beating her skinny ass into the dirt, Boss Tanaka kicking her skinny ass out of the Oil Lotus, and her skinny ass wandering the streets, homeless and utterly poor, Ikeru let a tiny scream spill from her lips. She was absolutely positive Boss Tanaka wouldn't believe her if she told him someone had knocked her over and stolen some of her money; she was even more absolutely positive, if that was even possible, that the King of Short Tempers himself would definitely lose his mind and--

"These're yours, yeah?"

Spinning on the heels of her feet, she snatched the smudged money out of the grimy little boy's hands without so much as a "thank you", and putting two and two together (dirty young boy + crowded marketplace - money = DUH), she focused her wrath on Bao Li. "Yes," she drawled, eyes narrowed as the coins slipped back into the pouch, "they're mine." She paused, licking her lips and tossing a lock of hair out of her eyes. "You didn't happen t'see anymore coins, did you? I work for a very bad man, you see, and he'd be real upset if I came back t'him and told him I was missin money. Real upset."

And like the Godsend that tiny little man was sure to be in the future, Ikeru watched as what she took to be a little boy shove a slightly little-r boy away, his eyes on the ground in deep concentration. Suspicion etched along the wrinkles in her forehead, she hastily grabbed Bao Li by the elbow and lead him along until she was right behind Jochi. She taped him on the shoulder and prepared to loom like she had never loomed before. "You!" Ikki snapped, irritated deeply, "what've you got in your hand, huh? Is it money, huh?" Frankly, Ikeru didn't give a rat-monkey's ass whether or not these two little thieves were eleven and apparently working together to steal all of her money; if she was going to have to lay the smackdown, then by the Avatar Himself, she was going to lay the smackdown.

[baoli]

Bao Li looked at the woman, agog. First she gave him such a rude treatment for actually trying to help. Then she had the - well, for lack of better wording - she had the stones to call him out for taking money from her when he'd done everything he could to round up the money she'd lost by being careless and running into someone else in the first place. His temper broiled, but she was bigger than him - well, taller anyway, and clearly knew what she was doing. He was about to give back the other three coins he had pocketed when the bald runt shoved him aside and almost knocked him down. He shifted violently, almost pitching into the dirt himself. Before he could, however, there was a hand on him again and he was steadied.

The now angry woman looked to the bald person, then back at Bao Li. She grabbed him by the elbow, spinning him with a worrying ease to face the other person who had pushed him out of the way. He looked from the woman to the short, bald person and sighed. Maybe getting involved wasn't such a good idea after all. This was going to get ugly, and ugly wasn't something he wanted to be a part of. The last thing the grubby boy needed was to be dragged home by the police, or worse - get hauled in by the Dai Li. He heard nothing but scary stories about them, and really didn't want to cross their path any time soon.

Even this 'scary man' boss the woman had alluded to didn't scare him like the thought of the Dai Li scared him. He swallowed deeply and looked right into her eyes, blowing a strand of his bangs from his face before speaking.

"Lady, I don't know this guy. He's just some jerk who pushed me. I've never seen him before, and if you look at those clothes of his, it's pretty obvious he's not even from here in the first place," Bao Li tried to explain, attempting to wriggle his trapped elbow away from the skinny woman. Her grip was like iron, though, and no matter how he tugged and twisted, she held him fast. He sighed and let his shoulders hang down, resigned to the inevitable loss of his prize. "I just wanted to help you. More than I can say for that greedy jerk, anyway," he sneered at the back of the bald guy's head. If it weren't for that guy, he'd have gotten away from this whole mess scot free and he'd be rolling in sugar tarts by now.

That jerk was going to pay for this.

[jochi]

His merry harvest of coins from the floor was so rudely interrupted that Jochi could only glare at that skeleton of a woman. No effort was made on his behalf to hide his coins, but he would sooner pull out his own teeth than give up his new wealth. Grumbling, Jochi clinched his jaw and resumed his coin hunt. "Look, babe. Law of the wild. Survival of the fittest. I don't see these coins in your hand, so they're mine now."

The surly little man felt his point was entirely justified, though he felt rather irked at that child's excessive name-calling. Cluching the gold pieces in his hand, he crossed his muscular arms and made his best attempt to look down at the lad intimidatingly - It would be difficult considering the lack of height differences. Almost like a boarcupine, he let out a grumbling snort of anger, then took a baby step toward the kid. But all the while, his words would have a dual meaning that could only be seen by his murky eyes drifting between the two. "Get over it."

[ikeru]

Utterly oblivious to the people in the busy marketplace, who had already drifted back to their respective tents and shops once the interest of fallen money had waned, Ikeru tightened her grip on Bao Li's elbow as he struggled, as if she were his fed-up mother and he was her unbelievably naughty child. However, the fact of Jochi's true age failed to register, and she felt those oh-so-familiar pangs of anger in her belly as he disrespected her and ultimately refused to give back the money he so wrongfully deserved.

"Babe?" she said, cocking her head to the side and switching her weight from one bare foot to the other. She planted her empty hand on her hip and bore her eyes into Jochi's. "Babe?" The indignation of being rudely hit-on by a freaking 12-year-old finally came to a head, and in her extreme agitation (this was seriously one of the worst days ever), she finally disposed of Bao Li by jerking her hand away, but stomping her foot and encasing the poor boy's feet in two mounds of earth, effectively trapping him and the money she insisted he had.

She moved deftly, sliding her filthy feet across the dirt, slamming the ball of her foot, and rocketing a small, thick pillar of earth, about the size of her new-found enemy, right at him. "How old are you? Thirteen?" Her voice inched up several notches, becoming slightly shrill and infuriated. "This ain't the wild! This is a city! Give me back my money or I'll break your ass in half!"

[baoli]

Bao Li tried to restrain a squeak of pain as Ikeru's already considerable grip on his joint tightened even more. Sure, she was skinny, but it was rapidly becoming clear to him that she wasn't one he should be messing with. He had the feeling his arm was going to be throbbing for a week when this whole mess was over. He hated days like this one. It couldn't possibly get any worse than this.

Then, rather suddenly, it did.

The bald guy called the skinny lady 'babe', and everything went downhill like an out of control market stall. Ikeru threw him aside, bristling at the insult. Bao Li barely had time to register the lack of a hand on his elbow before she drove a foot into the ground and the marketplace lane engulfed his leg to the knee, shackling him to the floor. He tugged futiley at his leg, two hands wrapped around it. It wouldn't budge. Bao Li looked at the raging woman and swallowed hard, his face going a barely registered under all the dirt pale.

Oh no. No no no. Not good. A bender. Now he REALLY didn't want to be here. Especially not as her voice rose to an angry pitch beside him, calling out baldy in a manner sure to get a rise. He needed to get out of here fast. To the Hells with the loot, he could get more - as long as he still had a foot left. He decided to plea for mercy, hoping it would get him that at the very least.

Quickly, he fished the two coins out of the side pockets of his vest and threw them at the ground near her feet, hoping they'd be enough to placate the angry bender and not send him home with every bone in his tiny body broken. And leave him with that one coin for food later. He hated to do what he was about to, but it had to be done. He felt it was his last hope.

"Lady, I'm sorry, alright? I'm just hungry, and I wanted some food. There's your coins that I took from the ones on the ground," he yelled at her, purposly cracking his voice like he was going to cry. It was a last ditch effort, but the tears and sob story routine worked on most adults. "I...I.." His lower lip quivered. "I just wanna go home!" Tears rolled down his dirty cheeks, leaving streaks of clean skin in their wake. He covered his face with his hands, faking embarassment. He heaved his shoulders for effect, making it look like he was crying harder. If nothing else, maybe this would at least get the crowd to clamor for his release...and maybe even get him a free leftover bun from some stall for his trouble.

[jochi]

His heart skipped a beat when he saw that pillar of earth fly at him, but he was quick to counter with his own move. Instead of backing away, the brazen little man thrust his hand straight at the solid piece of ground and shattered it around him. He thought the woman wouldn't be surprised, considering his garb clearly gave away his status as a Si Wong native, a large majority of whom were sandbenders. Scowling, he whipped out a stream of sand from the jug at his hip. Almost like a whip controlled by a waterbender, Jochi flailed the wave of sand straight at the woman.

In the meantime, he assumed a furious expression, face reddened and eyes narrowed. That nearby sniveling kid, the same one he pushed, was only pushing the limits of his anger. The entire time, his greedy hand clutched the coins with a death grip, even as he bended the wisp of abrasive sediment straight toward the frail lady. "What the - Are you blind?I'm thirty-one, bitch! Think before you talk next time, if there is a next time, you scrawny whore!"

[ikeru]

While she would not be the first to admit it, Ikeru was not one of the more intelligent people living among the massive city. She would not be able to point out a native of the Water Tribe easily, and if asked to tell the difference between a Sand Nomad and a regular old Earth Kingdom citizen, well...it was just beyond her. Suffice it to say, once she had hurled the pillar at Jochi, the wailing from behind caught her attention. Expecting an easy victory against the short man, she turned her gaze on Bao Li and swiped the gold coins off the ground once they were thrown at her.

Still bitter as hell at being lied to, Ikeru's cold heart barely even dribbled water as Bao Li began to cry harder. "Oh, jeeze," she groaned, rolling her eyes, "quit crying." There was no way in hell this woman was going to raise children. There was a chance she would have let Bao Li go at that moment, had the hot whisper of sand not pique her interest. She glanced up then paled a little at the sight of a sand whip heading straight for her.

She reacted quickly, coaxing a thick wall of earth up in front of her to act as a shield. It pretty much did its job, save for a few licks of sand sneaking around the edges of her barrier and scratching against her ankles. As soon as Jochi's true age was revealed, along with a few choice insults that would soon be repaid, Ikeru dropped the wall back into the ground, blinked a few times, and suddenly began to laugh.

"You're thirty-one? Thirty-one!" she howled, tipping her head back as great shrieks of laughter burst from her mouth. He was far too tiny to be thirty-one! He looked like a little bald boy who spent way too much time pumping iron. Her shoulders trembling as she calmed down, Ikki rubbed at her eyes with the heel of her hand, smudging the dirt and grime there. All of the good cheer soon evaporated, however, as she slid her foot over the earth once more: an enormous crack split the ground and raced towards Jochi, threatening to plunge him underground if he didn't act.

[baoli]

Bao Li kept up his tearful act even in the midst of his shock - not only was the skinny woman with the vice grip a bender, the little bald dude was too. And bending sand at that - Bao Li had no idea that was possible. Had he not been where he was right now, he'd have been watching the whole fight with interest. As it stood though, he was petrified.He was caught between two benders, his foot cemented to the ground. All he could do was tug, praying the rock prison loosened and keep up his act, really - there wasn't much hope for his release in the cards. Especially now that the angry Ikeru had turned all her attention on Jochi.

Bao Li made a note not to ever say what the little bald guy had to Ikeru. Not if he wanted to make it to his thirteenth birthday. Sniffling for effect, he collapsed in a heap alongside his earthen manacle, making a show of tugging at it with pathetically small amounts of force before giving up entirely and hanging his head and covering his eyes once more. He made small wimpering noises, sounding a bit like a caged animal and adding to his helpless qualities. When that failed to draw someone out to his aid, he considered his options.

Maybe it was time to appeal to the crowd some more, trying to draw out a proper bleeding heart. He removed his hands from his tear-streaked face and put on the most frightened expression he could muster. He looked up to the now gathering crowd of onlookers and wiped a stream of clear snot from under his nose with a sleeve. "Please, someone help me! I don't want to die! I just wanted a proper meal!"

A murmer whispered through the crowd, but Bao Li was unsure if it was for his act or for the obviously oncoming fight between two angry benders. He was sure he'd never hear the end of this one from the gang, but at least he'd get out of this mess. Alive and hopefully way out of the area when the police - or worse, the Dai Li - showed up to clean this fight out of the streets.

[jochi]

"Spirits," he growled angrily, sliding back quickly after his sand attack was blocked. The remainined half of the sand was moved back into the earthen jug at his side, while the rest seemed to scatter into the air. Jochi was rather peeved at that. Sand was so easy for him to bend, though he knew he could move solid earth if required. He had to do such things on his journey from the desert to that hellish city. So harsh and unwelcoming it seemed within those walls.

"Greedy wench!" Pulling back, he soon saw the fissure headed to him. He was swift to move aside, sidling his small and stocky body away from the attack just before it struck. At the same time, he lunged forward, falling the small distance it took for him to hit the ground, and slammed his fist into the earth.

"You'd sell your own kid to the butcher just for some quick gold!" His knee having fallen to the earth as well, he bounced back to his feet and divided the earth all the way toward that bony woman. It was a move similar to hers, except for the menacing shards of earth jutting from the edges. The attack would probably break a few things, but Jochi wasn't concerned in the slightest. Coincidentally, the heavy shaking seemed to break the young boy free of his earthen shackle.

[ikeru]

Oh, it was on. Not like it hadn't been on the moment that sorry excuse for a man stole her money, but this time it was on-on. At Jochi's (probably true) taunt, Ikeru scoffed, twitched her head to the side, and spat into the dust, missing the still-trapped Bao Li by half an inch. "And you'd buy him right up, you scuzzy kid fuc--" Her not-so-pleasant words were severed, thankfully, by the oncoming attack of split earth and jagged rocks.

Balancing herself on one foot, she swung her leg down on the closer shards of earth, pummeling it into a million little pieces. To counter the fissure, she leapt to the right and yanked the earth beneath her feet skywards, giving her an extra five feet on Jochi, combined already with her natural advantage.

Ikeru literally towered over the man, and damn, did she love it. Most bystanders and innocent shoppers alike had already scattered at the first display of trembling rocks, but the few remaining fools crowded behind the abandoned markets, desperate to catch the action and eventually wander home with tales of fight that they never participated in.
People are dumb.

Alas! Bao Li's shackles had been broken, all thanks to Jochi. Ikeru, however, failed to notice the freedom delivered upon that little rat, and was instead more preoccupied with slamming her feet upon her earth pedestal and forcing thick chunks of earth to go sailing towards Jochi.

[baoli]

Bao Li was forced to watch somewhat helplessly as the fight began in earnest mere feet from his face - not a single one of the huge rooster-pigs that called themselves adults at the market that morning would make a move towards the brewing conflict, not even to help him out. See if he ever let up on them again. They were all fair game if he made it out of this in one piece, and he'd make sure they'd all pay heavily for it. He managed to skootch to one side just fast enough to be missed by a glob of spit from Ikeru's mouth.

His heart was thudding in his ears, so he wasn't picking up the speech of the two benders properly. He thought he heard Jochi say something about selling kids, then the earth under Bao Li was shaking furiously as he fell into stance and started manifesting effects. The rest of the crowd watched as the short, bald man split the earth between himself and Ikeru, nasty spiked rocks jutting out from either side of the gash. Bao Li was on the verge of screaming as the hole grew nearer to him, pulling furiously at his leg and hoping for the miracle he felt he deserved.

And he got it.

The earth splitting effect Jochi sent towards Ikeru did the trick. His earthen bonds tore open and crumbled as fast as they had been put on. Never one to waste time - or a decent opportunity to get the hell out of the way - Bao Li scrambled off between two carts and ducked down an alleyway in the market. He dodged around some stalls and other patrons, making his way to the far end of the area and hiding his lithe form in a crowd of children who were watching the bending battle. He sat down beside the nearest cart, unslung his loot sack from his back, and fished out a single rice candy. He popped it in his mouth and watched from a safe distance - after all, it wasn't every day one got to see two benders fight in the middle of Ba Sing Se.

[jochi]

Though the woman effectively resisted the attack and soon towered over him on an earthen pillar, Jochi was not the slightest bit intimidated. Never willing to give up, he sprinted toward the earthen pillar. Perhaps it would seem like a show of masculinity, but for Jochi, his next move served no other purpose than to vent momentary frustration. During the brief bolting movement, he shouted; "Shut the fu-graaah!"

His own anger had interrupted his taunt with a loud cry, sparing onlookers from his foul language. Stopping on cue, he sent a crack in the earth at the column by sliding his foot in an arch across the ground, while his hands swung from his side to his front. Doing so, he heaved a slab of the earthen street where the woman's feet met the pedastal. She was almost like a trophy, maybe even something like a statue atop a column like that, but Jochi was bent on taking her down.