perceiver
. helium lost .

Author’s Notes: The idea for this hit me when I read the definition for this week’s theavatar100 challenge, “twitterpated”. So I guess I’m cheating a little by writing this for two challenges ;) but you guys don’t mind, right?

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Smell.

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They say that dog-bears have a better sense of smell than that of humans—something like nine, ten times better.

Of course, they have never met Toph Bei Fong.

Although Toph Bei Fong’s sense of smell does not surpass her sense of hearing, it is still—so she’s been told—amazingly good. She can smell the butterflies fluttering out after a spring shower; she can smell mud squishing up through her toes after a fresh rain; she can smell the first leaf of autumn falling, carried by a loving wind.

“Smells like four o’clock,” she says one day as she, Sokka, Katara, and Aang are walking through a deep forest.

Sokka turns around from his position at the front of the line. Panting, he sheaths his machete and crosses his arms, beads of sweat dripping down the side of his face.

“It can’t smell like four o’clock,” he says in a snappy tone. “It can feel like four o’clock, but it sure as hell can’t smell like four o’clock.”

Toph crosses her arms and plant both her feet in a reply. “Yes, it can, and I say that it smells like four o’clock. In fact, now, it smells like four o’ one.”

Sokka rolls his eyes as Katara giggles at his expression.

“Yeah, whatever.”

He unsheathes his machete again and begins hacking away anew at the low-hanging vines, trudging through the thick carpet of dead leaves. Aang quickens his step to catch up with Toph.

“That’s amazing!” he says to her, a twinkle in his eye. “How do you know? How can you tell?”

Toph sighs, stops, and points abruptly to her left. “You see that flower there? That’s a four o’clock flower, and it’s just opened. So it smells like four o’clock.”

Aang looks at where Toph is pointing, and sure enough, right in front of her finger is a cluster of flowers, pink and white and red, still slowly but surely opening. Aang watches as the flower irons out the last wrinkles in its velvety dress, then laughs. Sokka, irritated, turns around and glares at Toph and Aang.

“Will you two please hurry up?” he growls. “We have to get to the village by six, remember? And, at this pace, we’ll be lucky to get there by midnight.”

Toph frowns, sighs, and quickens her pace until she’s walking right behind Sokka, every so often stepping on his heels (she is, of course, fully aware of this, and does this just to spite him). She rolls her eyes and inhales deeply. Sokka smells like sweat and muscle, like clothing washed hastily in the sweet waters of a flowing river, like thin strands of hair sticking to skin and poking into eyes. He smells like curses and frustration, like dirt and cuts, like rocks and gravel stuck into the treads of shoes.

He smells nothing like the sweet jasmine ladies of her parents’ court; he smells nothing like the spicy smell of aftershave that so often lingers behind in her father’s bedroom.

She decides that she likes it.

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Author’s Notes: Enjoyed it? Drop a line and let me know ;)