Dark Puck - Soldier's Boy Twenty-Nine B [My FF.net Account] [Ongoing Fic Post] [Wingless Archangel Studios]
June 23rd, 2009
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Soldier's Boy Twenty-Nine B
Continued from here.


Kouji woke in the cave to Sokka yelling at Aang. "Enrolled in WHAT?!"

Kouji sat up, rubbing his eyes.  "What's Sokka having a fit over now…?"

"He's mad at us for going to school," Lee said, quietly, leaning back against Appa with his eyes closed.

The earthbender sighed and addressed Sokka.  "Soldiers stopped us because Aang and I were in the uniforms of the local school.  Would you have preferred we make a big, attention-getting fuss?"

"Yeah, sure fine, but he wants to go back tomorrow," Sokka yelled.

"Also a good idea," Kouji replied coolly.  "The story we gave is that we recently moved to the Fire Nation and are stopping here to rest for a few days before continuing on.  In the meantime, our parents wish for our education to be as uninterrupted as possible."

"But— but— you'll get caught!"

"Not as long as he keeps his headband on," Lee said quietly. "Even the couple kids who pointed out what I look like bought that it was coincidence."

Kouji nodded.  "And I'm here to make sure the story stays bought."  He winced suddenly.  "Which reminds me.  Aang, come outside with me.  We need to talk."

"Fine," he said, and got up.

Once they were outside, Kouji turned to face the Avatar.  "There's… something you need to know about Fire Nation education," he said quietly.

"What is it?" Aang asked, curiously.

The younger boy took a deep breath.  "They don't teach the truth of what happened to the Air Nomads."

"Why not?"

Kouji shrugged.  "Much easier to justify a decimation of an army than the slaughter of innocents.  Children might question such a thing, and we can't have our children questioning authority."  He dropped the dry tone and sighed.  "My brother — Ichiro, I mean — asked some local earth kingdom guys in order to find out what really happened a hundred years ago, and he told me and Yui.  That's how I knew."

"Oh." Aang sighed. "I'll try to remember."

"Hopefully it'll come to nothing," Kouji said, tugging on the phoenix tail he'd gathered his hair into.  No, wait, that girl Aang had been talking to had worn her hair almost identically.  He would change his.  "But I'd rather we be safe than sorry."

Aang nodded. "Yeah, okay."

Inwardly, Kouji was relieved Aang was taking this so well.  "Thanks, Aang."

"No problem."

This done, the colonist led the Avatar back inside.  "Okay."

Lee seemed to have talked Sokka down in the meantime, and was fiddling with the end of his hand-bandage again — when they'd left, the medic had told him, through Katara, to leave it on for another month.

"Niisan," Kouji said, lightly swatting his good hand away.

"What?"

"Stop fiddling with it."

"Oh. Sorry. Nervous habit."

"We're going to be at this all month, aren't we."  Kouji sighed.

"Sorry…" Lee said, quietly. He glanced over at Aang, then back at his hand, then sighed.

"So I guess we go back tomorrow."  The younger boy shook his head, then curled up against his brother.  "I'll get some real  sleep."

"Yeah," Lee replied. "I'll keep watch."

"Get some sleep too, niisan."

"Mmm."

Kouji let himself drift off.

 

*           *           *

 

Lee woke him the next morning when it was time to get ready for school.

"Here goes nothing," said Kouji cheerfully.

"Yeah," Lee muttered, less cheerful.

With Aang, they headed out.  It wasn't until the day officially began that Kouji realised he had forgotten to teach the Avatar something rather vital.

Like the Oath.

Oops.

Predictably, Aang didn't do the smart thing and mouth 'watermelon' and make no noise, but actually tried to guess at it.  Also predictably, the teacher — Ms Kwan — called him on it.  Fortunately, she seemed to think he was doing it deliberately, as an attention-getting move.

So she decided to give the entire class a pop quiz — which did indeed turn out to be on the history of Sozin's Comet.  At least that's taken care of, Kouji thought as he marked down the Official Correct Answers without a word.

Fortunately, Aang seemed to remember his warning from the night before, and kept his mouth shut, too.  Kouji was barely able to keep in a sigh of relief as they passed in their quizzes and headed off to the music lesson.  This went less smoothly, as Aang decided to dance in place.  This, despite many, many quick kicks from Kouji, caught the attention of the music teacher.  "Kuzon!" he snapped.

"I know, I'm a terrible tsungi-hornist," Aang said, sheepishly.

"No, child," was the reply.  "That hullaballoo going on with your feet.  Is that a nervous disorder?"

"I was just dancing," he said, brightly. "You do dances here in the homeland, right?"

"Not really, no," the kid sitting next to him said.

Kouji slumped low in his seat as the teacher explained, "Dancing is not conducive to a proper learning environment.  Young people must have rigid discipline and order."

"But what about expressing yourself?" He wouldn't let the matter drop.

Kouji kicked him again, but, like Toph, he had removed the soles from his shoes and thus the kick wasn't much good.  And the teacher was going on.  "I know that sometimes we are so moved by the love for our Nation," here the colonist had to roll his eyes, "we can't control our own bodies."  He sighed mournfully.  "If you must, you may march in place quietly the next time the urge hits you."

The class started playing again, and Aang slumped miserably, missing most of his notes.

"And now you know why I hate school," Kouji said to Aang later, when they were let out for recess.

"Yeah, I guess…"

Lee's class was let out at the same time, and he was sitting on a bench with his eyes closed, waiting for them.  Kouji started to pull Aang over when the girl from yesterday joined them.

"Hi, Kuzon," she said, ignoring Kouji. "I really liked that crazy dance you did earlier."

The younger boy blushed slightly, due to proximity.  He was grateful that it was Aang she was focusing on.

"Thanks, On Ji," the older boy said, grinning. "I could show it to you again, if you like."

Before she could reply, Hide shot fire at Aang's other side from behind them. "What'd you say, colony trash?"

And then Lee was on him. He was taller than the other boy, but much less massive, and it wasn't long before he stupidly tried to punch the other boy with his left hand. Hide took the opportunity this presented, while Lee was slightly frozen from pain, and quickly had him pinned and was helpfully redecorating his face.

Nobody expected Kouji to strike from the side, throwing himself into Hide with enough force to knock the bigger boy off of his brother.  As soon as they hit the ground, Kouji rolled off of and away from Hide, coming to his feet and backing out of wrestling range.  "You want to watch your mouth about us colonists," the younger boy said,  his grey eyes bright with rage.  "And leave my brothers the hell alone."

Unfortunately for Kouji, this was the exact moment the Headmaster chose to come out of the school, with the eleven-year-old standing over the still-prone Hide. "Picking fights on your second day?" he asked, glaring at Aang and Kouji and blatantly ignoring where Lee still hadn't picked himself up. "We need to have a conference to discuss your punishment. Bring your parents to my office after school."

"He started it!" Kouji shouted, his blood pounding.  "He firebent at Kuzon!"

"Don't be late," was all the man said in response, taking Hide and leaving the schoolyard.

It took Aang and his friend from yesterday to hold Kouji back after the bully smirked smugly at them.

"Where are — I-I m-m-mean wh-what are we gonna tell…?"

"He started it," Kouji said again.  "Okay, let go, I won't go after him…"

Aang let go.

Across the yard, Lee was starting to sit up, and Kouji ran to him instead.  "Lee…"

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah, fine, he didn't even have time to touch me… how's your hand…?"

"That's not what I meant," he replied, dodging the question.

Kouji blinked.  "Not what…?"

"Are you okay?"  Lee repeated, unable to go into more detail here.

"I already told you, I'm fine."

"Jiro, Hide…" He trailed off again, trying to communicate what he was trying to ask.

"Firebent at Kuzon, I kn… oh…"  Kouji blinked.  "Oh."

"Are you okay?"

The younger boy considered this.  "…actually… yeah.  Yeah, I am."

Lee relaxed visibly. "Good. Good." He hugged the younger boy.

Kouji clung back, and whispered, "What do we do about the conference…?"

"You and Aang go with Sokka and Katara dressed up. If he asks about me, you say I ate something funny and have been throwing up."

"Okay," the boy agreed.  "Let's get out of here."

"Yeah, okay." Lee started up, again stupidly putting weight on his bad hand. He yelped and fell back again.

Kouji helped him up the second time.  "Kuzon!" he called.  "Come on!"

"Yeah, okay," Aang said, coming to join them. "Lee, you okay?"

The older boy nodded. His nose was bleeding and his left eye was rapidly swelling shut, but his face didn't look actually broken, just swelling up and already turning pretty colors.

"We can get Sokka and Katara in on this," Kouji said softly to the Avatar.  "They can be our parents."

"Lee's taller'n both of them, though."

"He's not coming," the other boy replied.

"What do we say if the Headmaster asks about him?"

"That he ate something funny and is throwing up.  You could ask him, Kuzon, he's right here."

It's okay, Jiro," Lee said a little thickly, having torn off a non-obvious piece of his shirt to try and slow the bleeding from his nose.

Kouji sighed.  "Let's just go back."

"Yeah," Aang said.

 

*           *           *

 

The conference went as well as could be expected, though where 'Wang Fire' had gotten that ridiculous beard Kouji had no idea.  He then proceeded to get carried away once they got back to the cave, telling both boys that they would not be returning to school again.

"I'm not ready to leave," Aang insisted. "I'm having fun for once, just being a normal kid. You don't know what it's like, Sokka! You get to be normal all the time!"

"There is no such thing as normal," grumbled Kouji where he was curled up against his brother.

"But there's levels of not-normal. And Aang has a point about his level being much higher than Sokka's," Lee said. By now, his face and hand had swollen enough to be barely recognizable.

"Yeah, I guess…"  Katara couldn't heal him yet, not until they'd left this town.  Kouji had put up a fuss, though he knew it to be futile.

"I'm gonna throw them a secret dance party!" Aang was saying.

That was such an Ichiro thing to do that Kouji whirled around to stare at the young Avatar.

"Go to your room!" Sokka said in his 'Wang Fire' voice.

"…actually, it's a good idea," Kouji said after a moment's thought.  "Dancing is forbidden here.  We'd be teaching them to defy authority, to think for themselves."

"Exactly!" Aang said, eagerly.

"It's too risky," Sokka shot back. "You two are already in trouble."

"We'll leave right after," Kouji replied.  "Besides — you have me and Toph.  We can detect any trouble coming before it gets to us."

"We don't have a band. And how are we gonna explain a cave that just happens to be perfectly set up?" Toph objected.

"People will believe something 'cause they want it to be true or 'cause they're afraid it's true," Lee said quietly from his corner. "You can stretch coincidence pretty far. How do you think I got away with being here with those pictures all over the place and the giant statue in the schoolyard?"

Kouji nodded.  "Exactly.  And the band's easy enough; we can get the better players in the school band to do it."

"This is such a bad idea," Sokka complained, but he knew when he was beat.

 

Word was spread and a band obtained; the cave was set up and the party was ready to go.

Except for one problem: nobody was dancing.  One student said that he didn't think his parents wanted him dancing in a secret cave; another worried that someone would find out.

"Oh, boy," Aang said, then, for lack of any better way to persuade them, started demonstrating.

Kouji grinned.  "And then there's a trick that a friend of mine in New Sozin liked to do.  He called it firedancing, though you don't need to be a bender to do it."  He joined Aang and did the simpler of Ichiro's fireforms, something the older boy had termed a flare.

"…wow," he heard someone whisper.  "I guess Huān wasn't a freak after all."

Now that was interesting.  Why was that name familiar? 

Lee quietly joined in as well, doing movements that were more formal and elaborate.  Kouji grinned at that, and copied him.  Before long, more kids had spilled into the dancing space. After a while, Aang dragged Katara out, too, for a little showing off.  By then, Kouji slipped over to where the drinks were, settling in by Toph.  "Cheaters," he said with a grin.

Lee had been cornered by what had to be half the girls in his age group.

"Poor niisan," he added.  "Should I rescue him, do you think?"

"You're afraid of girls," she reminded him.

"Only most girls."  He looked over at her.  "…want to dance?"

"No. I wanna pay attention and make sure no grownups come to yell at us. But… thanks for asking." She punched his shoulder affectionately.

Kouji flushed and rubbed at his shoulder before taking another drink.

While everyone was applauding as Katara and Aang finished their showing off, Toph sat up straight. "Someone's coming," she told Kouji.

"Balls."  Kouji slunk off to warn the others quickly.

Lee was dancing with one of the girls in his class, who, despite the unsightly swollen discolorations on his face, was watching him with an expression that could only be described as 'worshipful.'  Kouji caught his brother's arm.  "Trouble coming," he said, then darted off to catch Sokka and Katara.

No sooner had he done that than the Headmaster, accompanied by guards and Hide, appeared at the entrance of the cave.

"He's the one we want!" the man called. "The one with the headband!"

"Uh-oh!"

But then first one kid, and then another and another until the whole group was involved, put their belts on as headbands in imitation of Aang. Thanks to this deception, the group was able to escape free and clear.

"The guards are dancing," Kouji said to Toph with a little laugh as they fled to Appa.

Toph giggled as well, then the six of them piled onto the bison and took off.

"We're safe now, Sokka," Katara said, settling in to fix the bruises on Lee's face. "You can take off that beard now."

"Oh, no I can't," he replied, stroking it. "It's permanently glued to my skin."

Kouji crawled over to him and yanked it off.  "Nope, only temporary!" he crowed.

"Ow!" Sokka yelled repeatedly, covering up whatever Toph was saying to Aang.

"Oh, you big baby, you'll get over it," Kouji taunted him, then clutched his throat, eyes wide.

Lee looked over and grinned. Katara thwapped him lightly. "Don't do that until I unsplit your lips, stupid."

"Your voice cracked!" Sokka crowed delightedly.

"Shut up!" Kouji squeaked.

Sokka just laughed harder.

Sulking, the younger boy kept the beard as a hostage — or perhaps a trophy — and crawled over to his brother.

"Don't worry, it's normal," Lee said softly, squeezing his shoulder. "It'll stop eventually."

Kouji sighed.  "I guess it was inevitable."  There, that was steady.  He wasn't going to push his luck.

"Yeah," Lee said quietly. Katara thwapped him again.

"Stop talking."


Current Location: my bed
Current Mood: drunk
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