Toph's Best Friend (Avatar The Last Airbender)

Chapter 7.

I made some changes to the OG episode and a couple of pop references. I hope it wasn't too cringey <3

The moon hummed lowly under the blanket of a midnight sky. Her sweet voice mixed with Li's soft melody and danced to the notes of a made up song.

Lì's pipa laid in her lap and the strings bent under her fingers. She plucked the notes quickly, strumming with her fingertips and lightly patting the base of the instrument.

She laid on a tree, her eyes closed and her belongings settled under a concrete tent. Among random collectibles and backpacks set a broken array of musical instruments. They were a pain to carry in between villages, but at night, their soft melodies swallowed the daily tension of survival.

Lì opened her eyes. She looked down at the pipa and her hand slid down its neck. Playing the last high notes of her song, Lì strummed down, and the song finished.

She sighed heavily, looking to the moon and imagining Toph's face.

Cold and betrayed.

"Toph, did you see his face?"

"Priceless, and did you see his friends? The guy with the red beard looked like a baby." Toph gleamed, as she bent down and opened the entry of a quaint cave.

"I swear next time we run into a hunter group like that I'm gonna learn how to metalbend and take their stupid arrows-" Lì walked into the cave and pounded her fist on the carved wall. Pictures of clouds and flowery mountains decorated the gray rock in a scratched mural. A pouch of stolen fruit fell from the ceiling, pumping into Lì's palm.

Throwing one into the air, Lì called out, "Heads up."

Toph opened her grasp, the fruit settling in a nest of pale fingertips.

"-to shove up their butts." Lì finished, gnawing on an apple's crispy skin.

"Well good luck with that." Toph said, falling straight into a soft patch of moss. "You could barley take Baby Beard. You're lucky I was there to save you from that hatchet."

"Oh right like you're so badass." Lì said, approaching Budgey who lay asleep in the corner. Above his head towered strings tied loosely to the ceiling: red, green, and blue banners laid over the webs, coloring the cave in the colors of the three nations.

Lì's small hands grasped Budgey's large head. She grinned as her fingers combed over his soft fur, feathering to her touch. A growl escaped his lips, mellow from sleep.

She laughed, watching his whiskers bounce from his hot breath.

"Well I'm definitely more bad ass than you." Toph said.

"Watch your mouth!" Lì said, covering the tiny ears behind Budgey's large head.

"But you just said it!" Toph exclaimed, her bangs ruffled over her hot face.

Lì laughed. "Yeah, but I'm older. You're still just a kid. That's why I'm the better bender."

Toph sat upright, steel in her eyes. "You are not!"

"Am too!" Lì snapped back.

"Are not!"

"Are too!"

Toph punches the soft dirt of the cave, the ground rumbled as it made its way to Lì.

Lì looks down before the rock erupts from the ground, punching her on the forehead, and knocking her to the ground.

Budgey stirred before settling back.

"Ow!" Lì said. Taking her right palm and extending it from her chest, a rock flew toward Toph, hitting her square in the face.