"My name is Lee," Zuko lied swiftly, his mind working furiously, "we're aboard a Fire Nation ship, I'm a deck hand."

Sokka snorted in disbelief. "If you're a deck hand, why on earth are you talking to me? Isn't your job to like, swab the decks or whatever?" He made a mopping gesture with his hands.

Zuko scowled, "Yes, but I also have to talk to some of the prisoners who aren't high priority." He winced at his lame excuse, but Sokka seemed to buy it, flopping back down on his wooden seat and complaining about it was too hard as per usual.

He looked down at the smaller boy with interest, once again admiring their differences. Sokka was more slender, less bulky. His hair was chocolate brown and was obviously naturally straight, unlike Zuko's which tended to curl a little at the ends when wet. Sokka's eyes were a piercing sky blue that contrasted against his dark skin. Zuko's eyes were a hot molten gold, and his skin was creamy pale. Sokka's hands were fairly scarred, probably from accidents, not battles. Zuko had the hands of a prince, soft and without calluses.

"Well, Lee. How are my chances of getting out of here?" Sokka asked without a trace of humour in his voice. He stared steadily up in the direction of Zuko's voice.

Zuko paused. "Slim." He said, something unknown slipping into his voice as he stared at his captive friend. Sokka frowned slightly and opened his mouth. He was interrupted by the metal clang of the door opening, and the heavy tread of a soldier.

"Uh, has the prisoner eaten today?" The armoured man asked, standing awkwardly, wanting to salute but knowing it wasn't appropriate.

Zuko had always found talking to the soldiers a little unnerving; as their armour was designed to intimidate all that saw it. "I don't know. Why don't you ask him? He's right there." Zuko pointed at Sokka, slightly irritated. Such useless questions.

"Yeah, I have." Sokka mumbled distractedly, once again moving his hands in front of his eyes, testing his vision.

"I have to go." Zuko stood up, brushing off his armour, impatiently pushing his chair away and walking over to Sokka. He tapped the table to get his attention without startling him, "I'll bring more food later if you get hungry."

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Blackness. Empty, never-ending, stretching out towards infinity blackness. At first, Sokka had been overwhelmed by a claustrophobic terror, horrified at his sudden lack of sight. Then Lee had turned up, with his dignified, refined voice and no-nonsense way of speaking that Sokka had found strangely reassuring. The few other people who ventured down to where Sokka was being held spoke to him hesitantly, or even rudely sometimes.

The only thing that had kept Sokka sane was his daily battle of wits with Lee, who seemed to enjoy his visits too. The food certainly wasn't very good, hardly any meat, mostly soup. His sort of friendship with Lee came with a healthy dose of guilt as well, whenever the older boy came down to talk, Sokka was plagued with thoughts of Aang's current location, and if Katara was alright, and sometimes even if Momo was getting enough food. Sokka and Katara had formed a motherly team, with Katara being the bossy, nagging side and Sokka being the indulgent, worrying side.

Occasionally Lee would come in, reeking of burnt leather and antiseptic cream, and Sokka would demand to know what happened, how he was hurt ect. This always seemed to amuse Lee, but he would duly hold out the injured limb and allow Sokka to fuss and prod with wild abandon.

Sokka had a routine. Every morning he would be tossed from his bed by a particularly violent wave, then he would fumble about and curse a bit, then he would desperately search for his clothes before Lee came to visit. He never seemed to manage it in time and Lee would kindly hand him his clothes (which never seemed to stay in the same place) and turn around to wait until the other got changed. They would chat for a while; Lee would 'subtly' attempt to pry into Sokka's private life and Sokka would 'subtly' rebuke him. Then Lee would be sent for and he would rush off, leaving Sokka alone for about five hours, in which he passed the hours by imagining what Lee looked like. Tall, obviously. Probably one of those girly, posh guys, judging by his voice. Maybe tanned from working up on the deck in the sun all day? He would have to be handsome. Guys like Lee don't come with attitude and an ugly face.

Then he would attempt to sleep on the creaky rust bucket Lee liked to pretend was a ship.

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Zuko examined what he had learnt from Sokka so far. He had written notes after every visit. 'Quiet, but occasionally sarcastic. Enjoys meat greatly. Has a girlfriend – won't tell me her name. Blackmail with meat? No mention of the Avatar as of yet. Father's name: Momo. Mother's: Appa. Must be a water tribe thing. Scrawny, lack of proper training but holds himself with the posture of a warrior (engineer some kind of scenario?) Fusses like a mother hen. Kind.'

He sat back in his chair, scowling furiously, eyebrows furrowed. His eyes continued to skim over the notes until he groaned in exasperation. One little water tribe warrior shouldn't have such a hold over him. He'd surmised a while ago that if Sokka had any useful information, Zuko's soft approach wasn't going to get him to reveal it. It irritated him that he knew he wasn't going to turn this prisoner over to Zhao, much less his father. His crew had no idea Sokka was a friend of the Avatar's. They'd been told that he was just a water tribe boy, and was being kept to be released at a suitable location. A poor excuse, but Prince Zuko was known to be irrational, so the crew accepted it.

Iroh was humming to himself contentedly at his own desk, papers spilled messily so that the wood could hardly be seen. His fingers were covered in ink and he was smearing little blobs all over the surface of the desk but he didn't seem to mind. Any member of the crew would assume that he was hard at work, but Zuko knew enough to assume he was writing a song or a poem. Funny how such a feared General needed a creative outlet to control his frustrations.

"How is that amusing boy downstairs, Zuko?" Iroh asked suddenly, shrewd eyes flicking over to meet Zuko's. He grinned knowingly and Zuko flushed. Iroh always referred to Sokka as 'that amusing boy' ever since the old man had ventured down to where Sokka was held and the young boy had spent an hour cracking jokes and amusing the old general with a surprising knowledge of old war songs.

"He's fine." Zuko stated without emotion, breaking their eye contact. The embarrassed pale pink flush remained on his face, and he turned away from his uncle, self-conscious. The old man's intelligence discomfited Zuko; he was vaguely worried that he knew more than he was letting on.

Zuko froze. What on earth was he worried about? What was it that he was concerned Iroh knew? Sokka, a little voice whispered in his head gleefully. Some dark corner of his mind knew that he was terrified that Iroh had discovered Zuko and Sokka's bizarre sort-of friendship.

Iroh met his eyes with a wide smile.

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Katara brutally cut through the tree's bark with a particularly violent strike of water, arms shaking with exertion, panting. Aang watched silently, sitting cross-legged on the damp grass. Katara thrust her arms forward with one last cry of rage and sliced the wood through completely, and fell to her knees, sobbing, body shaking with wild convulsions.

They were in a dark forest, surrounded by moss-covered trees, the sunlight filtering through the leaves and covering them in patches of light. There was a fine rain falling over both of them, from Katara's fierce strikes of water.

Aang wordlessly knelt by her side and put his arms around her, both of them now thoroughly soaked in Katara's rain. She cried, great choking gasps, and grabbed onto Aang's shirt, pulling the material till it stretched almost to breaking point.

"He'll be fine," Aang said kindly, a serene smile on his face, totally confident in the truth of his words. Katara nodded, face buried in Aang's chest.

A fog began to raise, droplets of water clinging to Katara's eyelashes.

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OK, sorry for not updating for forever – I bet no one will even read this, but I wanted to finish it. Katara isn't going to let Zuko get away with taking Sokka away. There will definitely be a confrontation between those two, and since this is set after Katara became a master waterbender, I'll bet that she'll win

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