[fic post][new year challenge, day three] Sunset

Title: Sunset
Author: Kel
Rating/Summary: PG. Toph waits.

The sun was setting, marking the end of another day. Just another day, another few hours, another confrontation. Never knew what the day would bring.

Never knew this day would bring bandits, benders using their ability to steal, to prey on the unsuspecting.

They usually weren't so unsuspecting, Toph reflected. They were - and she said this without pride or selfishness; it was just fact - the best little group of benders in this time and place. They had all elements, had the Avatar no less!

Bandits were nothing.

So how was it that 'nothing' had Zuko flat on his back, awaiting Katara's healing skills? Was it because he'd gone off alone again? Because... why? Toph didn't get it. What slipped up on Zuko? Paranoid, throw fire on instinct Zuko?

She was glad she'd found him. No one else had felt what she did, heard what she could. She and Sokka had seen him first, when they'd all gone looking.

And Toph hadn't been able to leave, not after feeling the sun's warmth fade.

No one wanted to lay on the cold ground alone.

Sokka had gone for Katara and Toph had knelt beside Zuko. She didn't speak. Why speak? He was unconscious, shivering in the cold air.

Toph was beginning to hate the sunset. The end of the day heralded nothing but an end. She waited, willing the sun to spread its warmth over them again.

But the sun was not the earth.