The Little Dragon

||50

Saturday, July 25th

Kaida

•• ━━━━━ ••●•• ━━━━━ ••

I told them about the Jet situation, and how Zuko is on a date. We continued to talk before I stood up. "I have to go home, Iroh will be worried about me." I smiled sadly. "I will stay in touch though." I helped every one of them up.

"When will we see you again?" Sokka started, speaking his mind upfront. I bit my lip.

"I will get in contact with you when I get a trail on Appa," I looked at all of them. "Hyo will help you find him." I looked at Hyo who let out a sad "mii" in reply. I didn't want to be away from him, but the gAang needs his protection over myself, especially when they don't have Appa.

I gave them all hugs before they boarded Hyo and took off towards the sunrise. I sighed to myself, before hopping down from the building. I followed my heat all the way back to our apartment. To my surprise, the lights were still on.

I opened the door to see Zuko fast asleep in front of the door. Did he try to stay awake waiting for me? I bent down and stroked his cheek. In an instant he reached up and snatched my hand, his eyes now wide open.

"Where have you been?" He growled at me with a glare.

"I was watching the stars and fell asleep." I lied through my teeth, this was becoming a really bad habit of mine. Zuko would go crazy if he heard that the Avatar was in town.

"Do you know how worried I was?" He stood so he was looking down at me. I frowned at his anger.

"I'm sorry." I looked away from him, my eyes meeting the floor. He grasped my hand tighter before letting it go completely.

"I'm going to bed." He turned and stormed towards his bed. This was about to be a very awkward moment due to the fact we share the same cot. I followed after him just to see him grumpily crawl into bed and turning his back to me.

I didn't like him mad at me, sulkily I walked up to him and poked his shoulder. "Zuko." I poked his shoulder again due to me not getting another response. "Zuko." I was about to poke him again, when he snagged my hand for a second time. This time his glare froze my heart.

"What do you want Kaida." He snapped and I drew my hand away, fear flooding my eyes, he really was mad at me.

"I just wanted to say I'm sorry again." I didn't know what else to say, I just didn't want him to be mad at me anymore. "It was my fault, I shouldn't have fallen asleep, I'm sorry." He grumbled something and turned his back to me.

Did he not forgive me? I felt all my hope drain out of me, I slumped my shoulders with a sigh. I walked towards the closet and drew out a spare blanket and pillow. I laid it down next to the bed and crawled into it.

I looked up at the ceiling for a while thinking about Zuko being mad at me. "Kaida." I heard Zuko say my name.

"Yeah?" I said back to him.

"Why are you sleeping on the floor?" I heard the shuffling of blankets above me, and all of a sudden Zuko was peering down at me from the cot.

"You are mad at me," I said, a little bit of pout in my words.

"I'm not mad." He let out a sigh.

"But you snapped at me." I looked up at him.

"I was worried Kaida. I was scared that something happened to you." He reached down a hand to me. "If you weren't back by morning, I would have gone hunting for you." He stroked my cheek.

"Sorry for making you scared." I apologized again. I understood where he was coming from. I really did, I would have been just as mad if I were in his shoes.

"Come up to the bed, you don't need to sleep on the floor." Zuko made room for me.

"You aren't mad at me?" I rose from the floor before crawling in next to him.

"No." He closed his eyes, still facing me. "Now sleep." I smiled to myself as I closed my eyes as well.

•• ━━━━━ ••●•• ━━━━━ ••

"Kaida!" Iroh ran up to me as I was putting my shoes on to leave and hunt for Appa. I stood my shoes now on, I was about to speak but Iroh cut me off. "You're leaving? Could you go to the store? We just ran out of milk." He still had his apron on from running the store.

"Where is she going?" Zuko rounded the corner, his arms crossed, he wasn't mad at me anymore, just more worried about anything I do.

"I'm going to take a walk." I smiled weakly, he was not going to be happy with that answer. I saw him sigh through his nose.

"Okay," He turned and walked away, before looking back at me, "make sure you are home by a reasonable hour." What is he? My father? I looked to Iroh who had a soft smile on his face as he looked at Zuko, before turning back to me.

"You can just grab it on your way back." He put a soft hand on my arm. I nodded my head and turned to the door, I pulled it open and stepped out into the street.

"Good luck on your shift today, I'll come by to see if you need help!" I waved and shut the door behind me. I got the day off to myself after asking for it. I had worked every day for the last three weeks. I was tired and needed time to myself. But, I guess I'm doing this for myself and for my friends. I looked up at the sky. Now, where is this massive bison being held?

I started on my run and I ran for hours until there was sweat in places I didn't even know could sweat. I must have run through half of the city, yet there was no trail. Where in the world would this bison be?

I started to run again, and ran for another few hours until the sun was setting over me. I stopped, out of breath. "Where are you Appa?" I said to myself between breaths. At this rate, he wouldn't be in the city at all. "I can't give up, this is Appa we are talking about!" I clenched my fists. Whenever I find the people who took Appa, my fists started to shake in anger, I would cook them like a steak.

Running again with another fire of motivation fueling me, then all of a sudden a flyer fell on my shoulder. It stopped me and I picked up the poster to see Appa's big face on it. I smiled, the gAang is doing their part in finding this bison as well.

Then at that moment, I picked up a trail.

    I looked around me, I must have been so far away from home now. I was in the middle of a loading area. Appa was here, I pumped my legs faster, sliding around corners. I ran into a wall on a tight turn but I bounced off and started running again. My legs were screaming in protest and my lungs weren't far behind. Then I got to a large warehouse. I snuck up to one of the walls and looked inside.

No Appa. Then I looked at the ground there was a man sweeping up chunks of white fur. My eyes widen, that was Appa's fur, I remembered it well. I need to tell Aang, Appa was in the city!

But... Where was the gAng staying?
•• ━━━━━ ••●•• ━━━━━ ••