Sokka the 81st

[markofthewise]

Sokka woke up in the tunnels with a sudden jolt. He was cold, extremely cold, and no matter how much he pulled on his arms, he couldn't seem to get warm. His memory was a blur, but it slowly began to occur to him how he'd just returned from a mission. Then there was the droids... He shuddered as he thought about that. Had he been kidnapped? Maybe it was why he was so cold.

He pulled himself to his feet and instantly regretted it. At first he stumbled into the wall and scraped his elbow along the side. It bled, but he paid no mind to how it hurt. At least until he realized he needed the wall to steady himself, at which point he turned along side his back and waited. When he went to cover the cut with his hand, he decided that made it altogether worse. So he continued to ignore it. Instead he strained his ears for the sound of anything. The tunnels had their usual hollow echo, though it was more thunderous and he realized that meant there was rain falling in from the entrance. Upon finding his strength, Sokka made his way towards the entrance of the tunnel, using his hand to trace the edges of the wall in case he slipped and needed to brace himself. When he reached the entrance, his guess proved to be right. There was a torrent of rain coming through the entrance of the tunnel and much more rain cascading along the edges.

If he'd had any sense, he would have waited in the tunnels. But he made his way up the ladder, keeping his grip tighter than normal due to the slick conditions. It proved to be a wise decision when his foot slipped at one point and he was left dangling by his hands. By the time he made it to the top, he felt more like himself than normal, but he was drenched to the bone and feeling miserable for it. He felt very sorry for himself and realized he was bound to get himself sick like this. He found himself worried about what Katara would think. The last thing he wanted was to see her upset. But even as he plodded on home in the rain, he found himself stuck on that line of thought. It was a bewildering realization that he was more concerned about how his troubles would impact his sister than it would him. The line of thought seemed almost foreign to him. As he stood outside the house, staring at a stony slab with his own face imprinted in it, he began to understand he was worse off than he thought. More than that, he was hesitant to face anyone.

He delayed his trip by taking the long way home, making his way behind the barracks and into a secret entrance to the house. The tunnel leading to the basement was wet and ankle deep as he trekked his way home. Earthbenders may make great tunnels, but Toph hadn't put much thought into water run off when she carved it out of the ground. By the time he made it to the basement, he was back to shivering again. While a warm July rain may not freeze a man, a cold basement did little good for a man in soggy clothes. He took the opportunity to change into some spare clothes, all the while waiting for sounds of activity upstairs. He wasn't alone, so he waited in the basement as he tried to sort out his thoughts. He nearly went to go wait on the spare bed, but found he could not even do that. He remembered the last time he had been in that bed.

Asami. His stomach lurched as he realized the seriousness of what he had done. But that was nothing compared to what had gone on with Katniss. It had been over three months since he and Katniss had begun their relationship. Of course, with a newer clarity, Sokka couldn't quite describe it as that. His memories with her felt hollow and visceral. They lacked meaning or any sense of fondness. He was able to look back at them with the same sort of distance he did with the false memories he had gained from experiments. But he knew these weren't false memories. They weren't echoes of another life. It was all things he did. Things he said. Lies that he told for his own benefit. His fists tightened as he realized the seriousness of what he had done. They were so tight that his fingernails, only slightly overgrown, pierced his palm and made him bleed. He hissed at the pain and used a roll of paper towels to clean them.

But the blood served to be reminders of things far more awful. He remembered the draft. The stinking, burnt bodies of the cultists. The carelessness as his sword split flesh and bone. The utter lack of empathy he felt for any of them. Worse yet, he recalled a great-winged man pleading for mercy. A man who claimed he was no cultist. Sokka had killed him anyway. It was with a great heaviness that Sokka understood so well why he so adamantly told Katara and Aang why he wouldn't want his heart back. It may have been broken before, but now it was so much worse. It ached with shame and guilt. It gnawed at him so hard that his thoughts turned dark and tempted him with the idea of how easy it would be to go back to not feeling again. But he only thought of his death. The horror and cold of being in space. It had only been a moment, but in his memory it felt like an eternity. As his thoughts tempted him further, he lost his temper and threw aside one of the shelves. He snatched a coat and marched back into the tunnel to lose himself in the woods. The loudness of his fit would probably attract his housemates just above him. He wasn't ready to face them.

He couldn't hide forever and he didn't want to. But the thought of apologizing to each and every person he had wronged was a weight on him. Some deserved it more than others. In his mind it was obvious the two he had hurt the most. Suki and Katniss. He had broken Suki's heart and said unbearably cruel things to her. He could never take back those words and he doubted he could ever have her back at all. But he had to try. And to do that, he would have to break Katniss's heart first. They had entered their relationship on a pretense of not feeling anything for one another. But Sokka was no fool. After the three months they had been together, he knew this was going to hurt her. Much as he wanted to spare her, he couldn't simply continue where they had left off like it was fine. She was a friend, but he didn't love her. He couldn't be with someone he didn't love.

There would be others to apologize to as well. He had wronged Edward Elric by turning his teachings to horrors. He'd said cruel things to Winry, Sheena, Korra, and plenty of others. Richard Sharpe deserved a chance to deliver a blow to Sokka's face for the humiliation he'd given him at the birthday party. He mulled it all over, thinking of each encounter he had. At one point, he stopped at a tree in the woods where he emptied the contents of his stomach along its trunk. He felt weaker for it, but he was far from hungry. He wanted to settle one thing first before he found his sister.

---

His first stop was at Katniss's house, where the wet and bedraggled Sokka rapped his fists at the door and hoped she would be the one to answer. Before anything else, he had to resolve their relationship.

His second stop was looking for his sister, Katara. He searched for her at the clinic first, since it was about the time she ought to be working there. By the time he found her, he felt close to falling over. But he needed to be certain he talked to her, regardless of how he felt.

By the time he made his way back home, the rain had let up for a few hours. He didn't feel better, but he'd at least put some food in himself courtesy of the vending machines at the Battle Dome. The first person he went looking for was Asami. She deserved an apology in person.

He ended up staying in his room after that, even though it would have been better to look for the others. The journal would have to do instead.

---

[Voice]

I haven't been myself for awhile now. I really messed things up. I... [There's a long pause as he finds himself at a loss for words.] I should have done better. I will, from now on. I owe apologies to a lot of you. If you'll let me, then tomorrow I'll come find you in person.

[There should be more. But he doesn't know what else to say. It's enough that his voice is weak and miserable without saying much more than that. So he leans back against the wall and keeps his journal open in front of him. Waiting for whatever they have to say in turn.]

Comments

[savedtheworld]

Whenever Sokka's on his way home, Aang is over in the front lawn of the house. He's bending the water from some nearby puddles to do little tricks - just know he made the water into a loop which Momo flew threw. He has a small back of treats on hand as well, that he feeds to the lemur, not yet noticing anyone's approach.

[markofthewise]

Sokka was still trying to figure out what to say to Asami when he spotted Aang in the front yard. This was his second time trekking this way and now the outside wasn't quite so empty as it was before. He felt that same since of panic before. A desire to hide and not face up to what he did. Of anyone, Aang was one of the hardest people to look in the eye of. Aang was their moral compass. He was the only one to never cross the kind of lines that he and his sister had. Aang had been in Luceti a year and managed to stay pure still.

And Sokka had run himself through the mud so many times, but never so much as he had these past few months.

His soggy footsteps gave away his approach long before his voice did. Momo noticed first and flew to Sokka, landing on his shoulder.

"Hey Momo." He looked over to Aang. "Hi Aang."

[voice for now]

[pendantry]

"Are you coming to work?"

Because it was Raven, others might hear it as a callous question. Her tone, however, was the same bland curiosity she usually had about Sokka's this-and-that. It sounded like a different person, using his voice - a familiar person. She thought he might appreciate a little normalcy, and the answer was important.

[voice]

[markofthewise]

It's strange when he thinks back to the last few months with Raven. Of anyone, she was loyal the entire time. He realized he said a lot of things, some with veiled cruelty that she never reacted to. She was steadfast and took it all in. And she stayed by his side the entire time. While he can't fault Winry or Hiccup or anyone else getting fed up with him, it certainly means something to him that Raven stayed there.

But he doesn't really have an adequate answer.

"I don't know." He didn't plan to today. Or tomorrow. He wasn't sure when he would. "I don't know if I should."

[Filtered Voice]

[godbent]

[More to Haruhi's surprise than anything, her first thought to this is "it isn't February." She wonders, briefly, why she had this thought. After all, Sokka had really done nothing to her (well, other than the spirit possession encounter but that's a while other thing) and hell, she hadn't noticed anything wrong - just had some talks with Winry which proved that something was. And perhaps because of that, this post isn't for her and really ought not to relate to her.

But she's also not dumb. She heard that ninja guy say that Sokka had a death penalty back on that post about the spirits and she heard everyone's reactions to that. This thing reeks of regret, and it's in thinking about that she realizes "Oh." Of course, this is similar (arguably more mature, but similar) in feel to the reaction she had that one February. After she made that astronomically stupid, hurtful choice which still haunts her. Sure, the situation is different--

Okay no, it's completely different. Plus she's making some big leaps of logic here in a self-indulgent way. And this isn't for her. She should let it be and let Sokka apologize to who he needs to apologize to because she's not involved. And she does let it be, for the better part of an hour before she decides... you know what, at worst, it'll be useless. She can live with a useless thing. So she pens up a filter and-]

Hey. Down the line, if you want to [talk? no, that's dumb] do something with someone you don't need to apologize to, I'm free. Just for future reference.

[...That was so dumb. She tries to be sympathetic. But she's probably not very good at it. But they share another hurtful secret so... why not.]

[Filtered Voice]

[markofthewise]

[Haruhi's voice is not one he expected to hear in reaction. Normally when she did talk to him, he always had a knee jerk reaction of being mildly annoyed. It was silly, but they tended to annoy one another a lot and it was a bit of a natural development. He didn't have it this time, though. He was too focused on all the things he had done that he found himself suddenly wondering if he had hurt Haruhi in some way he couldn't remember. They'd had their fight in the woods, but that was frankly not that unusual for one of their own confrontations.

It takes him repeating it in his head to realize just what it is she's offering. Coming from her, it's a surprise. He's hesitant to accept.]

Oh. [He realizes he isn't even sure if he's going to agree or not. But now that he's already said something, there's less time to think about it now.] Like what?

[tokennonbender]

[Asami had been avoiding Sokka for weeks. It wasn't so hard, honestly, there was always an excuse to slip away, to have dinner at the far end of the table, to be out when he was home. And then he was on missions, and that made everything easier. It was just so...awkward.]

[At the moment though, she was reading in her bedroom, sitting at her desk, oblivious to the impending terribly unpleasant conversation...]

[markofthewise]

[In fact, Sokka had been gone for about a month now, with only one brief return home. With people growing increasingly angry at him, it had been preferable to be away. But now he was back. And he felt awful. But Asami deserved to know things if she hadn't put the pieces together yet.

He sighed and knocked on her door.]

[greenjacketed]

In so very many ways, today was not Sokka's lucky day. Not by a long shot. And to heap insult upon injury, Katniss's door was indeed answered by someone who wasn't Katniss. Richard Sharpe loomed in the doorway -- tall, vaguely dishevelled, and with a towel tossed over his bare shoulders. The faint aroma of soap suggested that he'd recently showered and had heard the knock just after hauling on a pair of trousers but just before he could locate a shirt that didn't stink of dirt and sweat. Although his flogging scars weren't visible, many others were -- an ugly dark splotch on his abdomen, raised cuts along his chest, and possible old burns on his arms. But even uglier than all those scars was the one ever-visible on his cheek: the one that turned his simple resting expression into something sardonic and cruel.

Such an expression intensified when he saw the young man on the front step. He muttered a few very choice words -- oaths and swears by any measure of language -- and crossed his arms. His shoulders drew up stiffly. He was glad his bruises had seen fit to fade.


"Bugger. What the hell do you want, eh?"

[markofthewise]

Sokka winced as he found himself staring up at Sharpe. The man was even more imposingly taller thanks to standing on the door step. It made Sokka feel small. As if he didn't feel three inches tall already. His will to see this through nearly went away and he nearly excused himself.

Instead, he swallowed and found his courage to stay.

"I need to talk to Katniss."

[precipitous]

She heard Sokka's message on the journal while she was at the convenience store, a sudden surprise in an otherwise muted day. She had no idea how to respond to it, so she didn't.

...Was this him? The real Sokka? The one she had never met? She swallowed, shut her journal, and tried to distract herself during the rest of her shift by stacking cans in the shape of animals. Even still, she ended up leaving early. Her mind kept drifting back to his message.

She wouldn't wait for him to find her, even if she didn't have even the slightest idea what she was going to say to him. She wasn't even sure she wanted to, she just knew she needed to.

Korra wanted to turn back. She really did. But she was already in front of his door, and a moment later, she knocked.

[markofthewise]

He'd spent some lonely hours in his room because he wasn't interested in spending too much time with people. Misery kept him better company than other people, because then he had only his own thoughts to make him feel guilty. The presence of other people gave him more than he cared to have for thinking about.

He was startled when he heard a knock on the door. He'd been sitting beside his bed on the floor, staring up at an open window at the rustling tree behind it. A moment passed as he considered pretending to not be there, but then he worried it may be important. Or maybe it was Suki. She could have came back.

He stood up and after a few moments and opened the door. Korra.

"Hey."

[voice]

[corrinesbell]

I'll be at the shop, tomorrow.

[So for one reason or another, she intends to be found. Even if it means she has to clear out her other customers before he gets there.]

[voice]

[markofthewise]

[.... Sheena. Well, he does need to talk to her.]

I'll be there. [A pause.] ... have you heard anything from Suki?

[voice]

[not_a_troll]

Do not fret, Sock-a, removing barnacles from your boat was actually quite a refreshing task. I have learned a lot about myself that day, et cetera and so forth.

You are forgiven.

[Maybe he should give him that stone after all... Just because he sounds really sad.]

[voice]

[markofthewise]

[It occurs to him he forgot completely about Loki. He'd been a right jerk to him, even if he hadn't been particularly awful.]

Did you ever get to go out on the ocean?

[voice]

[twodragons]

I guess you were more of a jerk than usual.

[They might share a house, but this is easier for now. Zuko is in the kitchen, discovering the wonders of a toaster.]

But if it helps, I don't think you owe me an apology for anything. So... things are still okay between us, right?

[voice]

[markofthewise]

[Zuko. It's funny how many times he's had a fresh start with him. This latest one hasn't been as good. All the same...]

Yeah. I guess they are.

[ voice ]

[herotypical]

[ buffy had only tangentially knew of the problem -- from suki's stories and the way shikamaru had talked about sokka's death in that one fatally public moment. she hadn't pressed for details, she'd remained firmly on the outside of the situation.

but now things sound...different. almost like the calm coolness that comes after the rain -- the kind that breaks the heat and bring relief, however soggy and grey and dreary. ]

You should come over. Let me make you dinner, sometime. Maybe watch a movie. [ a soft offer for an escape. house seven, after all, is practically empty and those who remain are hardly judgemental.

or. well. sparrow isn't, at least. buffy just likes sokka too much. ]

[ voice ]

[markofthewise]

[To her it may be an offer to escape, but it sounds like a reward. Like a child receiving ice cream for a scraped knee. Stubbornly, he won't say yes. Not when he doesn't deserve it.]

I can't.

[filtered]

[endgames]

[Shikamaru's not one of the people Sokka owes an apology too. If anything, as much as he made some of their mutual friends suffer, it's Shikamaru who owes the apology.

That's what he thinks after he sees the message, at least. It's not until after Korra ducks out of her shift early, when he takes a look at the journals and quickly figures out her reasoning.

He doesn't have much idea where to go from this point, if he should in fact do anything at all. Any anger he had was on his friends' behalf, anyways, and Katara told him she wanted to handle this herself. Now's probably not a good time to ask anything of them, but it's not in his nature either to sit around and assume things are fine. And so he ends up shooting a filtered message off later in the evening.]

How's it going?

[Not a casual it, but a purposeful one. If it wouldn't look silly to do so, it would be capitalized.]

[filtered]

[markofthewise]

[Sokka isn't sure how to feel when he hears Shikamaru's voice. He knows what the ninja did, after all. He exposed his secret for all to see. A week ago, Sokka hated him. He relished the idea of giving Shikamaru a taste of his own medicine and finding some way to ruin things for him as well.

Now... well. Now Sokka was in misery. He couldn't help but feel a bit of resentment that Shikamaru played a part in it. But he knew better, of course. It was better to be this way. He couldn't hurt anyone else like this, now. But that dark part of his soul taunted him with how much easier it would be if he didn't have to feel. If he didn't have to bear the guilt he now did.]

Do you even need to task?

[markofthebrave]

Katara was in the clinic. She was researching delivery methods of knock-out drugs. She'd read these things before, but she didn't mind. It was easier to focus on something that was about getting Sokka back than worrying about Sokka.

It felt like if she wasn't busy then that was all that she did. It was tearing her apart that she hadn't seen him since their talk, that he'd gone on a mission. She could only hope it wasn't a combat one. Not only was she worried about his safety, but after what she'd seen on the draft, after what they had spoken about, she was worried about what he'd do.

When she glanced up at the noise of the door opening, there was a pause before she reacted. She almost didn't believe it. But that looked like real blood.

"...Sokka?" she stood up slowly as if she was afraid she was going to frighten him away.

[markofthewise]

Blood covered his shoulder. His hands were bloody. He'd managed to smear some along the wall, which he still used to support himself. He was ragged looking and completely soaked from the rain. His legs threatened to buckle under him at any moment, but yet he kept standing anyway. Sokka wanted to smile. He wanted to give her some sign that everything was okay. He wanted some kind of sign that would make him think that.

But he knew better. And it was obvious in his eyes. There was nothing but sadness there.

"I'm back."

In every way possible.

[july 10th]

[automailed]

[Edward has barely been paying any attention to the journal since his parents arrived in Luceti, so he doesn't notice that Sokka's back until he's practically at Ed's doorstep. He's out on the lawn today, stretched out in the grass and staring at the sky. He used to do it with Al a lot, so he figured it would help him think.

Instead he just feels like his mind is even more of a mess than ever before.]

[july 10th]

[markofthewise]

[Sokka stands at the road, trapped in hesitation as he watched Ed on the law. He knows he hasn't been noticed yet and, if he wanted to, he could just keep going. He has no idea what part Ed played in everything, but he does know that Ed is among one of the people he wronged the most.

So he steps out onto the grass, making no effort to conceal his steps.]

Ed.

voice;

[breezing]

Uncle Sokka! You're home? [ Yes, that is the main thing she got from that talk. ]

Are you coming home-home? For real?

voice;

[markofthewise]

[... Ikki.]

I'm already home. In my room.

[Voice]

[thisismylife]

[She'd known he'd been gone. She'd gone looking for him after the whole Shard debacle, but he hasn't been back to the smithy since and she's checked like clockwork every day, worried the longer his absence spanned out. She owed him an apology, a big one, and it ate at her the longer she waited, and the sound of his voice over the journal now was both a relief and a splash of icy dread of what his reaction might be.

Also, for a return announcement? That didn't sound promising.]

Sokka? You alright?

[Voice]

[markofthewise]

[By now, Sokka had forgotten all about their conversation in the smithy. Now it was coming back to him. It wasn't his worst crime, but he remembered how upset she was at getting caught. No, not just that. She was ashamed of the theft. He'd only made it worse.

But for her question...]

No. Not really.