Sokka & Genis - early spring catch-all

[strokeofgenis]

Characters: Sokka or Genis... AND YOU!
Date: Late March, early April
Location: Turtle
Situation: Critical
Warnings/Rating: Much sarcasm. Such boomerang. Many foods. Wow.

[A. Genis Sage - Closed to Bakura - Dojo]

[Genis still had Bakura's note from the last kedan festival. In fact, he'd almost forgotten it after the festival as it had fallen out of his pocket at some point and hadn't quite found its way back to Genis' attention. But find it he eventually did, and that was reason enough to immediately dash off to the Wood Sector. He had a big brother mentor good friend to go see. After all, Bakura was going to be teaching him magic, and what better way than to go to someone who invited him?

[The address that Bakura had given him led him straight to a dojo, and so Genis, being the good kid, will actually knock on the front door of the building, waiting for someone to answer.]

Helloooooooo? Anybody home?

[B. Genis Sage - Open - Midnight Hotel or Keeliai]

[Genis had finally gotten a job. It had taken quite a while to finally get it, but he was finally on the up and up and not completely hating this world. (Because let's face it, Genis isn't going to completely turn a new leaf over for the kedan, even if things are getting better, when there are still kedan bullies on the street. Just a little too raw. And the fact that many kedan wouldn't even give him the chance didn't help either.) But Genis managed to prove himself pretty handily pretty quick. Of course, he's starting out low on the totem pole, nowhere near the most senior of the chefs, but he already has proven capable of being a being both the saucier and the poissonnier, so there's a good chance ordering something from the menu will come from Genis.

[Genis will be experimenting with foods in the kitchen in the Midnight Hotel as he's still getting accustomed to an entirely new range of spices that aren't from his world as well as a host of different meats and vegetables that resemble but aren't quite like the things from back home. So you might smell something tasty coming from the common kitchens... or you might actually be dining in the restaurant Genis is cooking for and want to give him thanks... or you might find him out at the marketplaces buying some fresh ingredients for a new master stroke of genius cooking.]

[C. Genis Sage - Open - Edge of Town]

[When Genis isn't being grumpy about the kedan or cooking, he will be off practising the magic. He hasn't actually gotten to use any magic in a small while, and so he doesn't want to get rusty. One might see him holding a wooden little figure in his hand which actually is a kendama, a Japanese ball-and-stick toy, as he casts his spells. He's not casting of the high-level ones (for the most part), and so as he concentrates, a small glow of light will appear beneath him, and the colours they emit depend upon whatever he's casting. As he's practising, someone watching him might hear some rather... disturbing lines coming from this 12 year old's mouth.]

Come get some! Air Blade!

I call upon thee in the land of the dead to unleash the fury of thunder. Indignation!

Engulf this pathetic soul! Ground dasher!

Drown! Aqua laser!

Pancake time! Stalagmite!

[Hopefully you're not anywhere in front of him as he's casting these or else you'll get caught up in... something: water, ice, wind, fire, thunder, or earth.]

[D. Sokka - Open - Keeliai or Stark Industries]

[Sokka's got a few things on his plate at the moment. Of course, he's helping out finish up the deconstruction of the Palace, and he'll be hanging around there with a clipboard, running in between teams of kedan and foreigners alike, and generally doing his part to plan out the last bits of the reconstruction effort. If he's not there for work, he'll be out helping on the railway lines. His work there is less middle management and more guard duty and occasional gopher. He'll be running supplies between teams as they're needed and making sure that shipments get through from place to place... and of course occasionally collecting the odd report. And then he's occasionally delivering those reports back to headquarters.

[You might just happen happen to catch him while he's on break though. Feel free to interrupt him or have him run into you (possibly literally).]

[E. Sokka - Open - Midnight Hotel or Keeliai]

[The puzzle is annoying the crap out of him. Two months in, and he still doesn't have any solid leads on what in the world they're even supposed to do. It's got to be simpler than he's making it, but at the same time, for the life of him he can't actually make heads or tails of it. He'll either be in the common room staring over his notes or out in Keeliai, perhaps following some random route through the city—especially the Central Sector, trying to track down anything that might resemble a landmark.]

So if the purple star is the Metal Sector, and that represents five... then what in the world am I supposed to do when I get there?

[F. Sokka - Closed to Milyn - Milyn's Apothecary]

[It's amazing how just a few seeds can germinate into a full-fledged idea. And it's amazing how far those apple seeds can fall from the tree. An idle conversation with Gene and Tony a while back mixed with conversations from Enjolras and Akito formed a plan. It was time to break out of his small circle of friends and start finding out more about these strange kedan that they lived amongst. And to do that, he needed to go see Milyn.

[He had heard her name cropping up more and more over the past few weeks, though the reasons were still unbeknownst to Sokka. Still, she seemed to be the one kedan that was more on their side than anyone else, and Sokka knew she knew the kedan leaders perhaps more than any of them, so it made sense to go and find out more of what he was dealing with before going directly to them. Besides, he didn't even know what he was going to talk to them about. He barely even knew Milyn, but at least he had an idea of who she was and where to start from. And so, in true fashion, Sokka is planning on just improvising as he gets there. All of his plans never seemed to work out as written anyway, right?

[He approaches the apothecary and heads on in, looking for the Cherrywood Healer.]

Hello?

[G. Sokka - Closed to Toph - Keeliai]

[Sokka is actually kind of out of practice when it comes to swinging Space Sword around.  Truth be told, there hasn't been much need for all that much fighting around the Shell in the past months, and that had made him just a little bit restless.  He definitely wanted to get out and get swinging and make sure he was keeping his sword skills up to snuff.  The one problem is that he didn't have a training partner.  Granted, not that he needed a training partner per se, but it was more enjoyable if there was someone else there doing kata with him, even if it was a completely different kata than him.

[Which is why he had fetched Toph.  First, she would be eager as anything else to go with him to go punch some rocks around... and perhaps even punch some rocks towards Sokka, though Sokka would ask them to not be massive boulders, please thank you very much.  Second, well, he enjoyed Toph's company, and now that she was here, he was going to take advantage of it.

[And also, it gave him a good excuse for him to figure out what exactly Toph knows of this place.  She'd been here before apparently, but not... recently by the sound of it.]

Okay, so... tell me what you know of the Creep Lord, [he says whilst they're walking to their training house.]

[H. Sokka - Closed to Gene - Midnight Hotel]

[And if he didn't have enough appointments already on his docket, he's certainly come up with one more.  After all, if Sokka was remembering rightly, it was Gene that had actually gone to Zanru and Yunxu and Heojin to find out about their opinions as to the demolition of the Palace of the Landed Sky, and that would prove interesting.  Sokka still didn't exactly have a solid direction as to where to proceed with his long-term plans of being involved with the three gangs, but he knows for certain that figuring out these three reclusive characters was going to be a good first step.  It's at least better than showing up completely unprepared, not knowing what in the world he was going to go talk to them about.

[And besides, he really ought to get to know Gene better anyway.  Oddly enough, at their last encounter, he seemed less surprised by Sokka's world than Tony.  In fact, he seemed less surprised than Sokka was to about half of those events!

[So Sokka heads upstairs to pay Gene a visit.  He doesn't exactly know when he's going to be there as he doesn't have a solid timetable for him yet, but he'll periodically go knocking on Gene's door or look for him in the common room to have that nice little chat.]

[Z. ??? - Choose Your Own Adventure]

[Welcome to The Missing Link's Tu Shanshu Customer Support Centre. Please listen closely as our menu options might have changed.

[For all inquiries involving Sokka, please press 1 now.
[For all inquiries involving Genis, please press 2 now.
[To organise a plot with this mun, please press 0 now or contact our Plotting Help Line at themissinglink.
[For all other inquiries, you'll need to need to speak to a customer service agent to organise a PSL because this department doesn't handle that. Seriously what are you doing calling this line?]

Comments

[seismometrics]

Well, yeah. [Her tone spoke of complete obviousness in this, dismissing the possibility.] Just wasn't what you asked.

[Sokka had the tendency to wander and be tangential in conversation. Fortunately she was around to keep him sorted out.]

[She lifted a finger to scratch at the side of her nose.] I was collecting information at one point. We don--didn't really know a lot about him, except that no one would say his name except in the Palace, and everyone got twitchy every time someone got close. Then some guy actually came through and did it, and there he was on the network, all smug that someone set him free. We knew basically that he'd come before, that he was the reason Eshai pulled in the kedan from another world.

Not really a lot more than that. No one wanted to talk about him, and he didn't exactly do a lot of talking about himself.

[A shadow flickered over her features, and the lightness in her voice quiets.] Someone told me he was inside Asti. That he killed some of the turtles.

[theideaguy]

[Sokka nods a bit as Toph tells her part of the story. And it's interesting. Like, really interesting.]

Huh. I've never heard any of that first bit before. Like how he came here. Everyone when I got here was just like, blah blah blah don't say his name ever.

[He pauses for a bit before addressing the next part.]

Yeah, I got here like the week before the Creep Lord killed five of the fifteen little turtles. [He's a little quiet about that, honestly.] I got adopted by one of them after that happened, parenting Taraja alongside Enj. So I can kind of figure out now just how bad that was.

But yeah, apparently the Creep Lord burrowed into Asti and did all sorts of stuff down there. Started raising up a bunch of cultists that tried assassinating a lot of us, and just taunting all of us on the consoles.

To get him out, we had to go into the Dreaming to go kill him.

Or, it.... He's really an it.

[seismometrics]

[Her voice remains that tempered thread. Somber. Slightly distant.]

Yeah, when I came, no one really told me much of anything, either. No one really collected information, or wrote stuff down, and it could be like pulling teeth to get anything out of people -- never really was sure why. But whenever people got information -- from the Emperor or wherever else -- they guarded it like it gave them some kind of advantage.

[A finger rubs under her nose, briefly.]

Pretty stupid, really.

[At the mention of the little turtles, though, her tone again takes on that even quieter, stiller note.] Yin was mine. I found her as an egg. And named her.

[And a small, quiet part of her wonders if the turtle would know her now, even recognize her . . . but that's not something she can say aloud. There are still some things that are too hard to say aloud, which expose her like the white wick of a plant root pulled up from soil and into sunlight.]

[So she pushes on.]

What's that mean, anyway -- that he was inside Asti?

[theideaguy]

At least you guys had an emperor to ask things from. The last one died just after I got here, right alongside the baby turtles. Course, that's also when the Creep Lord decided to leave the Palace of the Landed Sky.

But yeah, pretty stupid to keep all that information away from those they brought to fix things.

[Yeah, Sokka's definitely been annoyed by that as well. Information sharing would have benefited everyone really.]

Taraja is still out there somewhere. [He stops walking and pauses for a few moments, closing his eyes to concentrate.] Way way way far away. Too far away to talk to of course, but at least she's alive.

[He barely remembers the names of which of the turtles had died. He doesn't even know if Yin is out there or was one of the five. But really, knowing that Toph had named one of them? That somehow connected the two of them in a weird way, even if it was not the same turtle.

[But he picks up and continues walking.]

Well, just what it means. It was inside Asti. Underneath the Shell, somewhere.

Look, I know it's weird, and I don't even know how to even explain what all happened down there, but we sunk the Hotel deep within the Shell and then found all of these tunnels leading everywhere underneath. I don't even know if that was the Dreaming or if the Dreaming came after but...

The Creep Lord was this weird... stone thing we found.

[seismometrics]

[Toph snorts at his first comment.] Oh, yeah, lucky. Lucky to have an Emperor that doled out information -- and then only pieces of it -- in response to direct questions . . . and then only if she wasn't annoyed with you and throwing you out of the room. Lucky by only giving someone access to the library for like an hour at a time -- again, when she was in a good mood. She probably did just as much to keep us in the dark as anyone else, just giving out bits to people who didn't share, like she hadn't yanked us out of our worlds and expected us to do something in the first place. She wasn't help, and she wasn't answers.

Don't tell me it was good to have any kind of information in the first place. Information isn't any good if you never have it all together to figure out what you're supposed to know in the first place.

And the rest . . .

You mean I could have just bent the guy and had done with it?

[theideaguy]

[Sigh.]

You make the Emperor seem a lot like Long Feng. Never mind. I stand by what I told someone else, that world leaders are all terrible. If I ever get into a position of political power, I am never going to institute a monarchy.

[About the only good one was the Chieftain of the Water Tribe, and he still had issues with him over Yue. At least it could be worse.]

But hey, no, I get you. Being given half of the answer without the more important half still sucks. That seems to be about the only half we ever get here.

As for the Creep Lord, well, it wasn't that simple. We all had to bend the guy. [Er.]

... kill the stone.

Best you could have done is just killed a piece of him. Don't ask me. Some crazy voodoo spiritual symbolic thing.

[seismometrics]

Only differences are Long Feng pretended to be polite about it and grabbed for power he didn't have. Eshai didn't pretend at all and lorded what she did have over everyone else.

And for all that, she wasn't bad, she was just . . . an adult. You know? And we were really little kids -- and not especially smart ones, by her thoughts.

[And a significant snort, temporarily amused.]

I don't know; I could see it: Prince Sokka of the Wet Kelp Kingdom. King Sokka of Stinky Fish Land. Hey, your sleeping bag alone might have enough stuff growing in it for a whole starter city.

[She affects a dramatic voice to go with the pronouncements, her hands spreading widely . . . then dissolves into snickers.]

Best. Friend. Ever.

[theideaguy]

Hey, we go on to defeat the Fire Lord. Shows what a bunch of not especially smart kids can do. And for the lot of good that did Eshai, lording it over everyone.

[He still hasn't gotten the exact story of how Eshai met her demise, but you know, so it goes.]

[Not that he'll get a chance to really muse on that more because, ah, Toph is such a good friend.]

You should smell yourself sometime, Queen Toph of the Swampy Mud Puddle!

[Perhaps there's a marginal amount of offence, but if there's real offence there, it's lost pretty quickly after he starts to laugh along with her.]

Gotta keep him humble. ;)

[seismometrics]

[Full-out cackling then, until-- (still snickering)]

Hey, I bathe. [Raising an arm, she shoves an armpit toward him -- probably to the consternation of the nearby kedan. See? Smell.]

[Her loose sleeve does slip downward with the movement, baring part of her arm. The space rock that he gave her is still twined in bracelet form around her arm, the dark rock stark against her pale skin. There's a new addition, though, as it curls protectively around a set gem, the stone a deep, verdant green.]

That's so PITiful. Literally. Full of pit.

[theideaguy]

[Yeah, Sokka isn't even going to fall for that one. He practically blanches at the thought of it.]

No thanks. Besides, I bathe too!

[He just doesn't like doing the washing. That's what Katara is for, right?

[But out of the corner of his eye, he sees something else, both familiar and strange all the same. He blinks before his eyes drift up to the space metal armband on her arm. That's not surprising in and of itself. But what is surprising is the gem set into it.]

Hey, when did you put a jewel inside your space earth armband?

Don't make her pull out the other one.

[seismometrics]

[She smirks and is about to retort, but his question cuts her off.]

Huh?

[Her fingers move to it, feeling the familiar curve of the band, and its unfamiliar stone, arm lowering.]

I didn't. It was there when I came back.

[She's still getting used to that -- "came back" rather than "woke up."]

Wasn't there before. But I end up feeling weird when I take it off, so. I pretty much left it that way.

[She's meant to ask someone about it. But in light of everything else she's had to adjust to, it's never seemed like a big deal.]

[theideaguy]

[Sokka tilts his head a little bit when Toph answers, mainly because he wasn't entirely expecting that answer. And it doesn't take him all that long to figure out the truth behind it all.

[And in that moment, he can't help but be a little touched by it. Her soul gem, the embodiment of her presence here, is locked inside the armband that he gave her. Huh. Huh.]

Oh right... right...

So, when you were here before, did you have soul lanterns? I guess it's supposed to be something that anchors us here or something?

Well... we don't really have those any more. We have these soul gems to replace them. These are now the things that have us anchored in place. And... that's your soul gem.

[seismometrics]

Soul lanterns?

[Without even thinking about it, she adjusts her steps to avoid a kedan who's decided to cut it a little too close.]

Didn't have anything like that. No "soul" anything. Eshai would bring us here and we'd be in some kind of room on the floor or fished out of a pool, and we were just there. I think there was something about clone bodies at one point. I'm not sure.

[Her fingers go back to the gem again, sliding over it.]

What do you mean, "anchored?"

And where's yours?

[theideaguy]

[Wow. Things sure have changed since Toph was here and when he came.]

Okay, let me go back and start at the beginning. Not the beginning beginning, but at least earlier.

[Self-deprecating joke, haha.]

So... Aang or someone else probably has a better understanding of all this since it involves all this spirit and soul stuff. But when we first got here, we all got special lanterns called soul lanterns. Apparently they used to be in the Palace, but when I got here the Creep Lord had invaded the Palace, so they were all in our apartment rooms instead. And we couldn't move them elsewhere; they were stuck there.

And they're something like... what keeps us here? Otherwise if we didn't have it, we might just whisk off back to the world we came from. Or something. [Shrug.] But now that we have it, if you're separated from it for too long of a time, you... kinda... kick the bucket. And you just feel worse and worse as time goes on.

[Yes, it's kind of a wordy explanation, but... it's still important.]

Anyway, now instead of lanterns, we all have some piece of jewellery that keeps our soul. Or whatever it does.

Mine's here on this ring that I got when I finally woke up from the Dreaming.

[Sokka puts his hand in hers and wraps her fingers so that they can feel his ring.]

[seismometrics]

[The suddenness of his fingers in hers startles her. She's used to touching -- slugging a shoulder, joining in on a hug with the Gaang as a whole -- but not necessarily being touched, and it brings her steps to a jerked pause.]

[His fingers are warm, ridged with calluses, slightly rough . . . but also deft, the sinews firm and strong around bone and muscle. Metal and stone bands one finger, smooth and warmed by his skin. Her fingertips trace the curve of it without thought, taking in the pattern and design of the metal, her own fingers small and short and roughened with years of stone and dust.]

[She likes his hand in hers. Likes the weight and the warmth and reassuring grain of his skin. The smallest of flushes emerges -- quiet, unrestrained pleasure, the flutter of it flickering through her chest.]

[And then realizes exactly how she's responding and breaks the connection, dropping the hand from hers -- though the flush is slower to dissipate.]

Kind of stupid. And risky. For something that important.

[theideaguy]

[Sokka knows Toph is sensitive to the whole touch thing and that, without the sight, she needs to be able to get a sense for the intricacies of things via the other senses like touch. Though he's not exactly prepared for the reactions that result from it.

[Because first Toph's touch isn't simply one that's entirely businesslike, merely seeking to ascertain the shape of the ring and the soul gem. It's one that lingers. For someone who has expressed solidarity in the past by punching someone in the shoulder and group hugs, it's actually a surprise. Especially considering it's Toph. That wasn't exactly her modus operandi. Even if she had put it there, she was practically holding his hand for more than that brief moment.

[And second is that Sokka doesn't go away from it entirely unaffected. That sudden realisation that maybe... maybe she could possibly sort of maybe like him... he wasn't prepared for that. He doesn't even know if it's true; truth be told, he's actually kind of bad at that until it hits him straight in the face. But that someone else—well, other than Ty Lee—liked him? It's not entirely something easily dismissed. And it makes him miss Suki... and at the same just ache inside from not having someone there at his side.

[Beautiful confusion. Entirely surreal contradiction.

[Only Toph's words break Sokka out of that mental labyrinth.]

Hey, we're living in a city on the back of a giant turtle. I can't think of anything more stupid than that. Blame the Emperor for casting a spell that does stupid things?

[seismometrics]

Way ahead of you on that.

[Her fingertips are still tingling -- which is an embarrassing, way-too-girly feeling. She balls her fingers inward towards her palm, then flexes, trying to detach from the sensation she can't afford. Twisting her face away, the weight of her dark hair shifts across her face, making the heat in her cheeks all the less visible.]

So are we there yet, or not?

[theideaguy]

[If Toph hadn't broken contact with Sokka's hand, there would still be a very pronounced distraction that kept him from even realising she'd replied. But there was still the camelephant in the room that he just couldn't bring himself to talk about. He's brought up Suki every once in a while in casual conversation, but just thinking of her now made everything all the more awkward, and he didn't want to particularly reminisce in those feelings right now. Especially because doing so just was... awkward. So awkward.

[Thankfully, Toph excels at cutting through awkward like a knife and redirecting things.]

Eh? Oh... oh yeah, just over here. [There's a dojo that he's heard about where the two of them can train.] It'll feel good to once again start swinging a sword around.

[seismometrics]

[It's a talent. Or at least a very effective coping mechanism. Toph keeps nudging the conversation back to safer, familiar ground.]

You're going to have to define "over here."

[Still blind. Not going to let him forget this.]

[theideaguy]

[Once again, facepalm.]

He physically puts his hands on her shoulders and turns her to face the right direction. Sixty paces thataway.

[Ahem.]

Nice and inside. You won't have to have your shoes on so your feet won't freeze. You'll probably have to bring your own earth though...

[seismometrics]

[Yep, definitely back to familiar ground. Give and take, bantering back and forth like a tennis ball. She lets him turn her, obediently heading forward . . . but there's that grin again -- an echo of the one she gave when he suggested this whole thing.]

Not freezing is good.

And don't worry about the earth. It's all covered.

[In retrospect, he's probably going to make some kind of bad joke out of that, and she gave him the ammunition.]

[theideaguy]

[Oh he is. Even if he hadn't been given the idea for it either.]

That's why I mentioned it. Because the earth is covered by wooden boards.

[Yeah, he's so clever. Look at that smug smile. Look at it, Toph. With your blind eyes.]

[seismometrics]

[She knew it was coming, and it still earns him a shove sideways. Which she won't miss because of her blind eyes.]

[Casually. So casually:]

So I'll take you on.

[theideaguy]

[Yeah, he knew it was coming. It's half of why he did it. He couldn't help it! But still... it was go time nonetheless.]

Oh you are so getting taken on.

[And so when they finally reach the dojo, Sokka open the door for her and allow her through first.

[Inside is a particularly open space. The dojo used to be Korra's own space, but since had changed ownership to Bakura after Malicant's defeat. Not that Sokka really had interacted with Bakura much (ever), but he'd known Korra, and presumably it was still a good space to train.

[The room is fairly large, and perhaps thankfully empty. No kedan are around right this moment, which is perhaps thankful for the two of them since their practice sparring might be slightly more disruptive to any kedan that might be attempting to practice katas in the meantime. Otherwise, the style of the room is fairly simple; the floor is wooden beams, and only minimal decoration is on the walls.]

[seismometrics]

[Toph steps into the space, up and onto the wooden floor, her step nearly soundless. She kicks off her shoes nearly immediately, leaving them at the corner, head tilting to try to catch the sound of anyone else in the room. Satisfied that they're the only two, she pads forward, strangely assured in the space -- considering the fact that the wooden floor would have cut off her seismic sense the moment her weight met the floorboards.]

[No clinging to anyone's arm today . . . just that strange self-assurance, and that small smirk that says that she's pleased with herself.]