Chapter Text
Sokka had been waiting for a morning like this for weeks. A morning where the sun was bright and trusting enough to be above the horizon for longer than a few short hours. As they approached summer in the southern water tribe, their winter reserves ran low, and the sun came out for longer and longer periods during the day, leading his father to finally promise Sokka his first real hunting trip with the other men of the tribe. A promise to become a man.
Things hadn’t been quite the same in the southern water tribe since the last raid. The last raid that took Soka’s mother. And there was nothing he could do. Not then, and not now.
Just remembering it ate away at him, leaving huge holes of helplessness in his heart. And now, with some of the older men talking quietly at the bonfire about ‘the war effort’ and ‘doing their part’, and his father’s increasingly worried looks at Sokka and his sister?
He needed this. He needed something to remind himself that he wasn’t just some helpless twelve-year-old who could only watch as the softest fur skin was wrapped around his mother’s charred body and lowered into the cold waves. Watching as his father’s hands, rough and strong and never appearing to falter in anything, shook and trembled as he tried to hold himself together in front of the tribe. Sokka could remember Katara curled up in bed for days- not her bed, because she couldn’t even bear to set foot back in their family tent for months after the raid. He remembered her small hands curled around their mother’s necklace and remembered how shed quietly asked him through sobs to put it on her for the first time all those months ago.
He had. And she’d hardly taken it off since.
Sokka didn’t need such keepsakes to remember his mother by. He had the reflection in barrels of water and brown rum. He had the reflection in the ocean in the glass wind chimes hanging off the wood sticks that held up their tent back home. He had his face. His dad, gran gran, everyone loved to remind him that he looked like Mom. And Sokka took comfort in the reminder. Whenever he felt like he was forgetting her face, he just had to look in the mirror and fill in the gaps in his memory.
He pushed his gaze forward towards his dad’s feet in front of him crunching through the snow. The sounds of dozens of men he’d known since he was born around him, walking in a pack- in a tribe- filled him with an odd comfort he could never explain, or find anywhere else. Dad had promised him a two-day trip. East, to the hunting grounds a little farther from their tribe. A real hunt. Sokka could hardly fall asleep lying in the hammock in the belly of their tribe’s ships, listening to the waves crash against polished wood as the wind carried them along the coast to their destination.
Sokka walked just behind his dad, feeling the cold wind slicing along his face and the weight of his pack settling against his back. His footsteps slowed as he noticed the small black specs in the pristine snow. He opened his mouth to say something, but he could already feel his dad stopping too, grabbing Sokka’s shoulder.
“Fire nation was here.” Hakoda muttered under his breath, his hand firm on Sokka’s shoulder and his expression cold. A ripple of tension passed through the warriors, and Sokka felt his face harden.
He knelt down, swiping snow and soot between his fingers, rubbing it and letting it fall. “They can’t have been here for long, dad. And I don’t think they’re here anymore”
“Good observation, Sokka.”
His dad gave him an impressed look, and Sokka felt a small swell of pride, but it was overshadowed by a familiar concern, a stress that Sokka could read all too well despite not.
The last time the fire nation had been here, they’d left a wound that wouldn’t heal over.
Natan- a warrior a few years older than Sokka, someone who’d been on a few hunts and thought he could start acting wise with the younger boys- called out from further into the pack of men walking behind. “You think they were scouting us?”
Hakoda inhaled slowly. “Tui and La, I hope not.”
Sanuk crossed his arms, flicking a lock tied with a blue bead out of his wrinkled face. “No. Surely not. What could they possibly even want from us now? “ His statement was met with murmurs of uncertainty, guesses on what the fire nation could possibly be doing back at the south pole. They’d taken their benders (they thought they did, anyway), they’d crushed their tribe. What could they want?
Sokka felt his heart lurch in his chest. What if they were back for Katara? What if they figured out, they hadn’t really decimated the southern waterbenders?
What if their home was under attack right this second and Sokka wasn’t there to keep her safe.
What if he was useless? Again.
As if reading the worry on his face, his dad ruffled his hair a bit, while Bato stepped forward, reassuring as ever.
“If the fire nation had been heading from this way back to the village, they’d have passed us, and we’d have seen it.” Sokka let out the exhale he’d been holding. (As did half the men there.) Everyone had someone back home. Bato continued. “It wouldn’t surprise me if they were dumping again.”
Sokka glanced back towards his father, who looked marginally calmer. “Dumping?”
Santo shouted from the far back, turning heads with his angry yell. The biggest guy among them, Hakoda usually stationed him towards the back of their hunting party to make sure nobody- especially the younger boys on their first hunts.
“You’ve gotta be kidding me! Why do we put up with this, Hakoda!? They turn up all the damn time to give us a scare and dump their shit on our ice!
“Unless you’re planning to chase after them in a rowboat and settle the score, there’s not much we can do.” Hakoda replied calmly, met with grumbling like usual, but it was a fact. There wasn’t anything they could really do to stop it. Sokka imagined the Firelord wouldn’t be too receptive to a polite letter from the chief of the southern water tribe requesting they stop dumping stuff along the coast of the south pole. At least they weren’t dropping it right on the doorstep of wolf cove.
Sokka looked up as his dad addressed the tribe again. “We keep moving, He said, with the authority that left Sokka swollen with pride at his dad’s leadership. “We’re here to hunt, we’re hunting.”
Natan called back. “They’d probably have scared anything half decent off by now, Hakoda.”
Hakoda shrugged, adjusting his pack on his shoulders. “Won’t know until we check, will we? We keep moving.”
Sokka quickly turned to keep with his dad’s large strides across the snow, willing the bundle of nerves stuck in his chest to go away. They’d be fine. There was nothing that could happen that would ruin Sokka’s first real hunt.
The tribe continued on, walking for a long distance across the ice towards a large glacier, landmarked on their maps and repeated from father to son across generations. This was where the good hunting grounds were. Where the Yak-deer passed through the summer. Where all of the best stories in their tribe came from.
“Sokka.”
Sokka turned his head towards his dad.
“It’s not too heavy?”
“Its fine, Dad, you’ve only asked me four times since we started walking.
Hakoda raised his hands in surrender, a familiar smile on his face. “Alright, just checking.”
Bato laughed from Hakoda’s other side, jabbing the chief in the ribs, only to get swatted away. “Its fine chief. He’s a man. He can carry his own crap.”
Sokak felt a flush rise to his cheeks at the familiar teasing. Bato was like an annoying uncle, never failing to find a way to mess with Sokka. “I am fine, thank you very much! And it’s not crap; I only packed the most necessary.”
Sanuyok grumbled, coming up to join their conversation. The older man squinted at the brightness of the snow in front of them, sweeping greying hair out of his face. “Sokka, you do not need three boomerangs. You can hardly throw one.”
“Can to!” Sokka shouted back indignantly amid the chuckling of the three older men. Bato hit him again with another teasing remark.
“That’s why he’s got three, San, So that when he throws one and it doesn’t come back, he’s got another!”
Sokka groaned, flushing as the three of them laughed again. He swiped at his dad’s hand when it came to ruffle his wolf tail again.
“You guys’ suck... I’ve got three because I’m going to hunt so many moose-bear that they’re all gonna get blunt.”
Bato started cracking up and Hakoda groaned., pinching Sokka’s ear. “Not happening. We are not hunting any moose-bear today.”
“Why not? You said that your first hunt you and Bato got a moose-bear.”
“Yeah, at the expense of Bato’s brain. It’s permanently damaged, you know. That’s why he’s an idiot- “
He was briefly cut off by an offended noise from the second-in-command, inducing a round of back and forth slapping between the two, while Hakoda continued. “You want to end up like Bato!?”
Sokka laughed, and Sanuyok groaned, falling back into step with the men behind the three of them with an exhausted grumble. “I’m going to end up like Bato if I listen to you lot any longer.
Another round of laughter rang out among the men around them, and Sokka felt more rough hands fuzzing up his hair. He’d re tied it so many times since he’d done it on his bedroll in the tent back at wolf cove. But he found himself not caring. Every hand in his hair or slapping his back till it was sore reminded him of where he was. With his tribe, his family. And he couldn’t be mad about that.
____
The walk around the glacier took another few minutes, but as Sokka walked around it, he caught sight of a pile of red against the snow. Red was never good.
He’d learned that long ago.
Red meant blood, and fire, and everything the water tribe blues weren’t. Red meant the fire nation.
He heard a few men sigh in relief behind him, calling back the message that it was just a dump back to the rest of the men making their way around the glacier. It wasn’t good news, exactly. But that pile of what looked to be crates and boxes and scraps of fabric and whatever else the fire nation ship needed to get rid of made a small pit of reassurance that they probably weren’t here for anything else. Probably.
Sokka stared at the pile of red marring his white and blue home, nudging his dad with his elbow to get his attention. “Hey dad, why don’t we ever collect resources from what they leave here?”
His dad looked down at him with an expression so baffled he’d thought that one would think Sokka had suggested that they hop on a boat to the fire nation itself and go worship Aagni.
Hakoda stared at him for a long moment before speaking slowly. “Sokka… why would we do that?”
Sokka shrugged, focusing his eyes forward, regretting saying anything. “I dunno, just a thought. You know? It’s stupid.”
It is stupid, bonehead.” Sanuyok bonked him on the head with the end of his knife, the knobbly bone handle tapping him lightly on the crown of his head. “What do we want fire nation stuff for?”
“To shove it up their- “
“Hey!” Hakoda called out before that sentence finished leaving Bato’s mouth. Sokka rolled his eyes a little. He was twelve, and nearly a man. He could handle some good cussing. All the men cussed. Hakoda looked back down at him with a sigh. “Sokka. We don’t need their rubbish. We’re our own tribe. We earn our own resources, and we don’t rely on the fire nation for anything. You remember that.”
“Sokka shrugged, glancing back at the pile before focusing his eyes back forward. “Yeah. Forget I said anything.
He paused,his feet stuttering in their step a moment, before he stopped completely, staring at the pile of fire nation reds. Sanuyok bumped into him from behind, apparently not looking forward either.
“Sokka don’t stop, what are you-“
“Dad, look”
Hakoda let out a long-suffering sigh, continuing to walk. “Sokka we aren’t taking anything from the pile.”
“No, dad, look! It looks like a person!”
That got his dad’s attention. And most of the attention of the people around them as their party slowly all came to a stop to focus on the pile, about two hundred metres way.
Sokka squinted hard in the midday sun, he could just make out among the grey of scrap metal and the red of fabric and the brown of wooden crates, a streak of black hair blowing in the icy wind, and an arm limp out against the ice, sticking out from under a large torn flag with the fire nation insignia.
Hakoda stopped. In half a second, he turned from Sokka’s dad, who scolded him with a tired expression and kept offering to hold his pack in case it was too heavy for him, to the chief of the southern water tribe. He raised his hand, signalling for the group to stop. He exchanged a look with Bato, nodding towards the pile.
“Wait here.”
“Dad-!”
“Sokka, wait here.”
The sternness in his dad’s voice made him stop, and he stood still as he watched Bato and his dad drop their packs into the snow and get their weapons ready jogging across the icy plain towards the far away figure.
Tui and La, Sokka hoped he was somehow wrong. Like his eyes were playing tricks on him and it was just the nerves of seeing the sooty snow getting to his head. He hoped, he hoped and prayed it wasn’t a person. Fire nation or not, he really, really hoped it wasn’t a person.
He watched the two leaders of their tribe approach the ‘person’. He watched them walk around the spot for a moment, he could faintly see their mouths moving, as Hakoda moved the person. It was a person.
He felt his heart leap watching both men step back, exchanging a look before Hakoda was shouting for the rest of the warriors to come over. Sokka’s heart jumped in his chest, his legs crying to his brain to stay, or run, or do anything but go over there, but Sokka the warrior was in charge today, not Sokka the kid. He dropped his pack and ran over, along with most of the other warriors, He heard Sanuyok call out for him to stay, that his father didn’t mean for him to go over there, but Sokka’s legs were already moving and courage was roaring in his chest to be like his father, to figure out the situation and help. He had to be helpful. He had to be useful.
A crowd was quickly formed around his dad and Bato, around whoever it was lying on their ice. Sokka’s pushed between legs and wiggled his way to the front, stumbling to kneel next to his father. Hakoda snapped at him- not angry, but Sokka could tell he was stressed, that Sokka probably not meant to be over here like Sanuyok had told him.
“Sokka!? No, go back! Go and stand at the back!”
“No, dad just let me see, what’s going on-!”
His eyes tracked forward to the red silks in front of him, and he felt his courage die a sad and pathetic and quick death in his chest. Red, bubbling. Sick and wet and red against pale skin. Against black hair against a face otherwise scrunched up and young like his own.
“Sokka! Go and stand back!”
Now it was his leg’s turn not to listen to his body. He didn’t move. He couldn’t. he stared. He knew he shouldn’t, but he stared at the boy lying in front of them. He stared at the sick, awful burn searing across his pale face, his black hair sticking to the wetness of it. He stared at red tipped, frostbitten fingers twitching in the cold. He stared at the boy who was absolutely not meant to be here but was. He stared. It was mesmerising. In some sick, horrid way that Sokka hated. It was mesmerising to stare at the voilence inflicted on this boy who was so clearly fire nation. So clearly burned and mutilated by his own tribe. He couldn’t tear his eyes away from the melted skin up his cheek and going around to his ear. He couldn’t look away from the desperate gasping breaths escaping the young man.
He didn’t fight as Santo grabbed his shoulder, yanking him back behind blue clothes and tanned skin, a wall of men crowding around the boy left on their ice. Left to die.
He heard Sanuyok’s voice, his father’s voice, Bato’s voice and they reverberated in their ears, and he was desperate for it all to stop.
He heard shouts for water and blankets and the men in front of him talking loudly about what they thought a fire nation soldier- a fire nation kid, was doing on their ice.
“What happened to his face?!”
“Why did they leave him here?”
“Is the kid alive?”
Over the ruckus, he heard Sanuyok’s announcement.
“A firebender. This boy is a firebender- he couldn’t have survived out here long if he wasn’t.
The entire tribe of men silenced for a second, before bursting into uproar. A firebender’s life held in all their hands, the same tribe who took their own benders, crippled their tribe and treated them like animals.
The same tribe that took Sokka’s mother.
Sokka couldn’t think. He tuned out the angry shouts of “a firebender?!” and “leave it here!” and the other shouts of “he’s hardly a teenager; we can’t let him die!” and “what do we do?!”
What did they do? What did a person do with a child of the enemy wounded and probably dying in their home?
It hurt Sokka’s head just to think about.
“Enough!” Hakoda’s voice rang out over the shouting, powerful in a way Sokka would usually be listening with pride and admiration,
“This is a child. We are not savages. We are not leaving him here to die and continuing on without a second thought.”
Men argued and shouted back.
“Chief, you can’t be serious!”
“He’s a firebender! You know as well as any of us do what they’re like!”
“It doesn’t matter what firebenders are like. He is a child more than he is a firebender. We are bringing him home and we are keeping him alive.”
Sokka watched as the men relented, seeing dirty looks towards his father. Many didn’t agree with this decision. But that was what being chief was about, Sokka realised in that moment. It wasn’t all just walking at the front of the hunting party and telling who should go fishing, who should sharpen the weapons and who should repair tents. It was about making the hard decisions that could turn every man standing in front of you detest you, and it was about accepting that and doing what was right anyway.
Nothing could ruin this day, he’d thought.
Tui and La, he was so, so wrong.
Sokka felt numb. Not from the cold. He felt an odd numbness that he’d only felt after the raids, after discovering who they’d lost. He felt numb as he walked beside Santo, hardly hearing the man’s gruff voice trying to reassure him, carrying both their packs of stuff while Sokka remained focused a few men ahead. Where his father was. Where Bato was. Bato hiking through the snow carrying both his and Hakoda’s packs, while his own father walked as fast as he could through the snow, carrying a person that didn’t belong here on his back. Sokka couldn’t tear his gaze away from tangled black hair and the pale skin he could see peeking around the blankets and wraps the men had scavenge d together to try and keep him warm enough to get back to the boat. He couldn’t tear his gaze away from the spot now covered in soaked bandages, hiding his mutilated face. He couldn’t tear his gaze away from the struggling boy.
He’d heard the men talking.
“can’t be much older than Sokka.”
“He’s not any bigger than Sokka”
Sokka Sokka Sokka. His own name. This boy was like him.
He didn’t like that. He didn’t want to have anything in common with someone from the fire nation.
He didn’t want this boy to be similar in age to him. He didn’t want this boy to be similar in size to him. He didn’t want to be anything like an ashmaker.
He didn’t like that his dad was going out of his way to help this boy. This boy, an ashmaker. A fire nationer. Someone who wasn’t from their tribe.
How could his dad save someone like that?
~
The walk to the boat was long. It didn’t help that they’d all been walking for hours towards their next campsite and now had to walk all the way back. But there was a sense of determination only Bato could recognise in Hakoda’s eyes. One that screamed that he was doing something brave, reckless and something that screamed ‘Hakoda’. Bato walked silently beside him, carrying both their stuff while Hakoda kept his eyes forward, walking with this strange boy on his back.
“Hakoda- “
“Bato. Don’t you think that burn looks like a handprint?”
Bato’s words died in his throat, and he looked at his friend. He’d known Hakoda since they were toddlers. They’d seen everything together. He didn’t see Hakoda get this determined look unless he was doing something he really knew that he had no other option but to do.
“I didn’t- I didn’t look at it that hard, I suppose- “
“It was a handprint, Bato. It wasn’t some kind of accident.
Bato resumed his gaze forward, following their fading tracks from where they’d headed west this way not an hour before. He knew what Hakoda was like. He knew what kind of chief he was, and that meant he could see where Hakoda was going with this situation.
“Someone did that to him, Bato. Someone mutilated his face and dumped him here to die. His own nation.”
Bato sighed. “Hakoda, you can’t just… adopt some kid that’s got it rough.”
“This kid hasn’t got it rough, Bato, he’ll die out here if we don’t help him.”
“You know what I mean, Hakoda. This isn’t- what are you going to do with him? He’s a firebender in the southern water tribe. He doesn’t belong here, the tribe won’t want him here- “
“Then the tribe will have to learn to accept him.”
Bato sighed, adjusting the two heavy packs over his shoulders.
“Hakoda. What happens when he wakes up? What if he’s hostile? What if he burns our tribe? What happens when he doesn’t want to be here?”
Hakoda didn’t give him an answer, and Bato knew then he’d made up his mind. He sighed again, warm air rushing from his lungs to form a cloud in front of him.
Bato didn’t get an answer.