Avatar The Last Airbender Fan Fiction ❯ Sokka: Detective ❯ The Separated Sisters ( Chapter 1 )

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Avatar: The Last Airbender: "The Separated Sisters"
By Gunwild

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Ba Sing Se was all around him, but he might as well have been alone in the wilderness.

Sokka was presently quartered in the second room on the second floor of the first building of the Baking Quarter’s main street. The scratched-in number ‘221’ over the inner door was the only trait that set it apart from the other cheap rooms nearby. At all hours of the day and night it smelled like hot bread, which might have bothered him if he were more aware of his surroundings. Instead, he lay bent in his easy chair, bottle in hand, drinking and trying not to think.

The bottle was full of water, but that wasn’t the point. The crushing disillusionment was. He didn’t eat. He didn’t leave for anything. Sokka merely stared at the ceiling, ignoring his life and wondering if he could ever possibly get over the pain.

They didn’t tell you that heartache was literal. It was as though someone had actually reached into his chest and done damage to him. The regular twinge was similar to bruised ribs, but deeper.

If only there was some kind of armor for this, he thought dolefully, taking a swig of his not-so-adult beverage. He could have worn protection before ever talking to Suki on that unhappy day. He could have been prepared for her frank questions about seriousness and long-term plans and where he wanted them ‘to go.’

He really just wanted them ‘to go’ get some lunch, and had said as much, which was of course the wrong thing to do. She had looked profoundly disappointed in him, and then… and then…

How could she want to be ‘just friends’ now?

Oh, he would never understand, and that was that. Women were not creatures of level logic. They asked clear questions but gave no clear answers. Their idea of romance didn’t obey the laws of reason – action and reaction, transference of energy, inertia. Why did the world have to be full of problems that didn’t have simple answers?

It seemed like forever Since Sokka had been faced with a proper dilemma and arrived upon a solution. But with the shortage of giant drills, city invasions, gas-filled mountains and threatening airship fleets going on there was little to task a young man of his skills. So now he was an ‘idea guy’ with no idea what to do next. That wasn’t ironic. It was just sad.

He didn’t sit up quickly when the knock came at his door. Immediately he began considering it in the form of analysis, just to work out his brain.

*The knock is sharp. The visitor is using their knuckles. This suggests someone with strong hands because people with weaker knuckles will avoid stressing them. I doubt it’s someone of advanced age ‘cause it’s been wet out and their arthritis would be acting up – they’d punish their fingers. Also, the knock is from a low position on the door, as far as I can tell from the echo. It’s definitely a child, and not one shy about making noise on someone else’s door late at night. Yes, that indicates rudeness, familiarity, or both – who do I know who fits the bill, and with access to the people who know I’m here?*

Unable to keep himself from smiling in spite of his melancholy, Sokka raised a finger. “I deduce that my caller is none other than Toph Bei-”

His door fell down as she kicked it in, screws flying out of the hinges, and then stepped on top of it. Toph was wearing nicer clothes than he was accustomed to seeing her in, though the frustrated expression was familiar. “Why didn’t you say that earlier? I must have waited twenty seconds out there!”

The gaping Sokka smacked his forehead. “Why did you think that meant you needed to break my door?!”

“What if you’d been kidnapped? Nobody knew why you disappeared!”

“I didn’t disappear! I told Aang and Katara where I was going, and now I… look, that’s not the point, what are you doing here?”

“My parents took me to a fancy banquet.”

Sokka blinked. “I deduce that you left right away because you hate stuff like that.”

“That’s not deduction; I skip out on that kind of stuff all the time.”

“True.” Sokka swilled his water as though it were of some fine vintage before sipping thoughtfully. “Then, instead, I deduce you left after the soup but before the main course, and used the excuse that you wanted to get some air.” He tapped his teeth, eyes darting around for more indications. “The banquet was on an above-ground floor and you came here by open-top carriage. You sat on the right end of the back row and paid with one of your silver bracelets.”

Toph was given pause. Then she sat down on the floor, rubbing her chin thoughtfully. “You saw me?”

He shook his head, but, remembering that she couldn’t see him, said “No, I’ve been here.”

Her ability to recognize when someone was lying put Sokka in the clear. “Someone told you how I came?”

“Not at all.”

Toph lifted her chin. “All right then, how’d you do it?”

“Deduction, like I said. You left after the soup arrived because the soup’s the first thing served at one of those fancy meals, and you were hungry because it’s late. I can see the fold in your cuff where you had your arm on the table and dripped on it. But the soup was no good, so you decided to leave and find me to make sure you didn’t eat alone ‘cause you hate that. You’ve got soil on the hem of your dress – not dust like regular walking might put there, but rich brown soil from a garden, the kind overlooked by a balcony in an upscale home. The balcony you jumped from only to soften your landing with earthbending.” Some of these were things he thought might be presumptions on his part, but her reactions bore them out; he grew bolder in his telling, adding hand gestures. “As for the carriage, even you might not enjoy trying to find your way that to an unknown address in the Outer Ring from the Inner one, where the rich people live, so you called one down. You were sitting in the back row because the floor would be the top of the metal wheel well, which you could manipulate to amuse yourself. Your gown’s got no pockets and no catches in the sleeves for coins, and you’re only wearing a single bracelet, the other being what you paid with – your mother would never take you out to a party wearing just one. I know you sat on the right side because you have some down on your left, and the carriage birds are molting this season. It’s only natural that some feathers would waft back and land on you.”

Toph stood, turned around, then violently pointed and opened her mouth as if she was going to accuse him of something, stopping just to look pensive again. Finally she shrugged and conceded the point. “You’re pretty good at that.”

“I know,” Sokka groaned now that he was done analyzing. “It’s awful.”

“What?” Toph waved her hand, trivializing his obvious discomfort. “No, it’s a neat trick. Stop complaining about it to get attention or stop doing it at all.”

“But I can’t!” he whined. “I can’t stop thinking! When I was trying to stop the Fire Nation things were fine, there was stuff to worry about every day. With Suki it was easy because I had to worry about how to keep her happy, but if I haven’t got that…”

“You’ll get over it,” scolded Toph, prodding him in the chest. “Now get up and clean this place.”

“You’re going to help me clean?” This hardly fit with his experience of Toph’s attitudes on cleanliness.

“No, you’re going to clean and I’m going to sit here. At least you’ll be doing something, right? Wasn’t it better when you did stuff just now?”

“I… yes.” In fact it had been helpful to put his brain to a chore or two. He could imagine doing it again – and it would be no small work to think of how he could make these shabby quarters presentable without the proper equipment. “Hm. The door will need its hinges reattached, I can do that with some of the screws from the one to the bathroom. I don’t have any cloth but if I use the label from one of my water bottles the windows will be easy to clean. And the-“

“Sokka?”

“Yeah?”

“I don’t care.”

“Oh.”

As he got to work, Toph drummed her fingers on the wall, thoughts of dinner forgotten in her interest at her friend’s new predicament. So he needed things to do, eh? That was a problem she’d encountered as well – not surprising, for two creatures like them who’d fought a war and were now at a loss for one. He needed mental stimulation, she needed action. Places to go. Things to ‘see.’ Some fights to get into. Around the time he began beating dirt under the rug with his shirt, Toph straightened up and threw her hands in the air. “Sokka!”

“What?”

“I’ve got it! The solution to both our problems! You could be a…”

“Detective?”

She crossed her arms, tilting her head to one side interestedly. “How’d you know?”

He threw his shirt over one shoulder, placing his fists on his hips. “It was a very superficial line of thought, Toph. You might even say it was *elemental*.”

Toph tried not to smile at his awful, awful pun.

---

By the time Toph returned next morning, clad in attire more comfortable, she found herself in a changed room with a changed man. While she couldn’t appreciate the painting, the new furniture and real drapes were nice touches. Sokka himself fairly bounded from his desk, clapping his hands. “Toph old girl! Capital to see you, really top drawer!”

“Why are you talking like that?”

“Well, I have a business now, from time to time I should speak as though an entrepreneur of some sincerity, don’t you know.” He raised something to his mouth and blew into it; it turned out to be one of those soap bubble pipes you could win at a fair. Why he thought that gave an appearance of sincerity was anyone’s guess. “Further, I ought to use verbiage of a gravity befitting my new raiment!”

“Raiment?”

“*Clothes.* I’m wearing new clothes.” He could be heard to brush his own sleeves in pride. “Checked pattern, reminds people of how exact and organized I’ll be on their cases. And I’ve got my lens-holding earpiece. The hat it came with was a bit too large to wear all the time, so I designed a whole new style of cap – one with two bills! The one in the back will keep the sun off my neck.”

Toph sat in the easy chair off to the side of the desk. “I didn’t know you had such a sensitive neck.” She then coughed in a way that sounded considerably like the word ‘wuss’ before continuing. “Still, you can’t get too excited. Being a detective isn’t something you walk into right away. It’s going to take time and work before we get clients.”

“We?” He sat himself back down.

“Sure. I’m your assistant.”

“Right, of course. I do suppose I need a plucky assistant.”

“What? I’ve never plucked anything in my life! Except my toes, I guess.” She went to work on these as she talked.

“It means ‘brave,’ Toph. But that’s not what we need to concern ourselves with. The fact is, after running around putting homemade posters on every wall in town last night…”

“Did you draw them yourself?”

“Yes.”

“That might not be the best idea, from what I’ve heard.”

“Shows what you know. This morning a messenger came telling me to expect a client just a few minutes from now.”

Toph’s attention turned fully away from cleaning her feet, for once. “A messenger?”

“Yes. Evidently our first customer has money to spend on that kind of… extravagance.” He nonchalantly blew some more bubbles towards the window. “Speaking of extravagance, I think I hear them coming now.”

“I don’t hear anything,” put in Toph, who was a talented listener.

“Oh, but I think you do. You’re just not *deducing* from it. That tinkling in the road is the sound of a metal harness on an ostrich-horse-drawn carriage, and all the local ones tend to use regular ropes. That one is our rich guest.”

Sure enough, a minute later there was a knock at the door. Sokka grinned. “Enter, young lady!”

The young lady – for indeed, she was such – was quite pretty, if rounder than most, and dressed in the finest of clothes. She wore bone white from head to toe, the color of mourning among the people of the Earth Kingdom, and her eyes shone with sadness to match. Sokka immediately dropped his smile in the face of a damsel in distress, but still had the happy thought that this boded to be something interesting.

“Hello, sir,” she said with perfect politeness and a small bow. “My name is Kin. I’m seeking the help of a detective.”

“Yes! Please, take a seat.” As she did so, he said immediately, “I’m sorry about the loss of your mother. I can only hope the generous inheritance she’s left you can make the transition easier; it can’t help that your father isn’t with you.”

The heiress appeared startled. “Sir, how did you know all that?”

“Your clothing explains that you’re deeply saddened by this loss; it’s typical for only close family members to wear funeral garb outside of the actual funeral. I would have thought that you were young enough that one of your grandparents had died, but your fresh tears seem to say that the death was unexpected and you still haven’t had time to get over it. Your haircut is, without disrespect, inexpensive, while your clothes are superior, suggesting that you’ve only recently come into wealth.

“It doesn’t take much to guess that this was probably though the inheritance from your dead relative, and that you spent some of it right away on the funeral. I knew it was your mother and that you have no father because, as I’m aware, when a mother dies a father typically becomes overprotective of his female children, not allowing them to go without a guard to strange rooms in the poorer part of town. But you had a thrifty mother, and only recently came to realize that she had money stored away. That’s why you wouldn’t think of it as dangerous.”

“It seems simpler when you say it that way,” she admitted, “But still, you’ve missed one thing – the inheritance isn’t as helpful as I’d like it to be. In fact, it’s what’s brought me here today.”

“Go on,” Sokka said with an encouraging half-smile. “I’ll do whatever I can to help.”

“Well,” she began, “It was only a week ago that my mother, who was the hostess at the Third Tree restaurant, fell seriously ill. She had been rather sick for some time and hidden it from me – that was her way, to be very proper, to keep calm and carry on. But it became so bad that she couldn’t complete her duties, and I saw to her during her final days. Just before she died, her breathing was awful, but she decided to make a last declaration to me. I thought it would be simple sentiments, but it was more – she told me a story. I’ll never forget how she put it.

“’Kin,’ she told me, ‘I’ve always said that your father died, but that isn’t true. He was actually just an awful man, and when you were still a baby he walked out on both of us. But he took more than himself away; he also took your sister.’”

Toph raised her eyebrows. Sokka had already folded his hands and begun contemplating. “Please, go on.”

Though choked up, Kin pressed through. “She had to stop to gather her breath, but I knew she was going to finish the story. She wouldn’t let herself die until she had. ‘You were lucky that you were the one who was fussing, because I slept with you in my arms that night; he stole your sister away from the crib and left without a word. No guard I asked for weeks and weeks told me he’d left the city, but I don’t think he would. I was almost sure that he stayed, but it’s such a big place I didn’t expect to ever find him. And I was afraid. Even after he was out of my life and I was able to make my fortune I’ve never spent it in case he were to come back and try to hurt me, to take it from us. And so I have no idea where your sister could be – I can never hope to reunite the pair of you, who were separated when you were just a year old, but when I’m gone please put on my grave that I was mother of two, Kin and Jin, and loved two until I died.’”

They allowed her a pause to cry at the end of her obviously emotional story, with Sokka shutting his eyes in thought. “And you’re sure those were close to her exact words?”

“Very sure,” sniffled poor Kin, “They were the last I heard of my mother’s voice.”

“I see. Well, I take it you want us to aid you in finding your sister?”

“Yes. I want to split the inheritance with her, to let her know how much her mother loved her, even though she didn’t raise her.”

He sat up straight. “That’s inspiring stuff, and I’ve already devised a plan to find your sister that unless I’m really wrong, will work like a charm.”

Miss Kin appeared apprehensive but pleased. “You have?”

“Yeah,” Sokka replied, raising his bubble pipe cheerily. “I’ll ask you to go back to your home and send your messenger to each of the news pamphlets in the Outer Ring. Ask them to print for the evening edition a call for all young ladies named Jin around your age to come to your house tonight at five bells. Say it’s so that we can determine which’ll claim the large inheritance. Be sure to mention that point. Large inheritance.”

Toph’s lip immediately twisted in a frown. “Sokka, if we do that every Jin in town is going to show up. Plus women not named Jin who just want the cash. It’ll be a huge lineup of every local teenage girl there is.”

“Precisely,” chuckled Sokka. “You might say I’m counting on it.”

A silence followed. “You’re not just becoming a detective to find a new girlfriend, are you?” Toph probed cautiously.

“No! Look, just trust me – if this plan doesn’t work, I’ll be very surprised.”

---

But the only one who was surprised was Kin’s unfortunate housekeeper. The old woman very nearly tried to invite the dozen girls who showed up to the sitting room for tea, and it was only through the protestations of the recently-arrived Toph and Sokka that the door remained shut.

As a half-hour passed yet more young ladies arrived, and a few thereafter, until the entire street outside was full of talking, milling ‘Jins.’

“Sokka,” said Toph, “Don’t you think that’s enough? There are almost a hundred of them out there.”

Still dictatorially puffing his bubble pipe while staring out the window, the newly-minted sleuth shrugged. “I guess, but I want to allow enough time for the ones from across town to arrive. It stands to reason that a runaway husband would try to put some distance between himself and his wife.”

“Whatever your plan is,” Kin whispered, “I hope you don’t wait too long. The police might have a problem with such a large gathering.”

Hoping not to lose his livelihood to the officials on his first day in practice, Sokka nodded. “Okay, I guess we can start.”

“So what’s the plan?”

“I’m going to find the one that looks like Kin.”

Toph shook her head. Kin looked terrified. “But sir, even if she is my sister, she might not resemble me enough to-”

“Don’t worry about that,” Sokka said with a pat of her shoulder. “I’ve considered that angle. Now, if you’d excuse me…” And with that, he threw open the door and shouted to the assemblage, “Everyone! Single file in front of the door, please! No pushing, and we’ll be able to get this thing going.”

He barely had to say the words before all of the eager, apprehensive or greedy looking women lined up perfectly, with only a little jockeying for position. Some were much younger or much older than the client; some even appeared to be from different nations. From the door Kin could only see a few, and Sokka walking past them, barely glancing at each in turn. After less than a minute he halted and exchanged words with one. Toph could be observed straining to hear them, and then while clasping her arm, Sokka walked his chosen girl directly back up the street towards them.

Kin gasped. Toph’s guard went up. “What? What is it?!”

“She’s my exact double!” exclaimed the first separated sister, eyes agog. The second, a copy in every way but for her green dress and pigtails, was also stunned.

Slyly, Sokka made his introduction. “Miss Kin, I’d like to present you with your twin sister, Jin of Fountain Street. She says she was raised by only her father, now deceased, and likes tea very much. Isn’t that nice? Your housekeeper should get her some.”

When they had all sat down and the twin girls had caught their breaths, Kin related her story to her newfound sibling in hurried, shaky tones. By the time she was done Sokka was raring to go over his work.

“It was all a matter of listening, really,” he crowed. “Or, to be more exact, deducing from what I’d listened to. In the first place, Miss Kin’s late mother said that she was treated badly by her husband, and was unable to make her fortune. It stood to reason that he wasn’t the best worker, and wouldn’t move up in life. So I knew we should use the pamphlets to find the daughter *in the Outer Ring*. Surely she’d show up. But the real question was how to know which Jin she was – which would take care of itself. I knew you’d turn out to be twins.”

“How’d you figure that?” asked Jin, enthralled, though not enthralled enough not to drain her teacup while she talked.

“Easy. Your mother also said a few things that gave it away, and in fact Kin might have realized herself with a few weeks more consideration, when her grief passed.

“For one, the separation happened when you were one year old, Kin, and your sister was still in a crib. That puts it in the realm of probability – both being babies at the same time, both young enough to be ‘fussy’ and have to sleep with your mother. But what clinched it was when she called you a ‘pair,’ and of course your names.”

“’Kin’ and ‘Jin’” muttered Toph, hitting herself in the head. “’Silver’ and ‘gold.’ I should have picked up on that one.”

“It’s normal,” Sokka reminded them all, “For identical twins to have rhyming or themed names. That made me sure, and so I asked for this big turnout of Ba Sing Se’s Jins without worrying.”

“But, and begging your pardon if the question is foolish,” gushed Kin, “What if her father had changed her name to keep from being caught?”

“Oh I didn’t feel concerned,” he answered, shrugging. “It’s a common enough name, and besides, when most fathers leave their families, they don’t take a child. No, he had a lot affection for Jin, and wanted her to himself. He kept the name just like he kept the baby.” With a toast and then a triumphant chugging of his entire hot cup of tea (his face turned red, but he smiled just the same) Sokka stood. “It’s time we left you two to catch up with each other, I think. No payment’s necessary for now.”

“But we can barely thank you enough!” Kin protested. “I’ve found my sister, and I can share what I got from my mother with her.”

“And I can help my sister when she’s just lost her mom.” Jin bowed. “It’s great work you did here, really great.”

“I know,” he allowed, looking smug. “And be sure to tell plenty of people about it. Word of mouth would be a good way to get new cases. I just might drop in for tea sometimes, since I stink at making it – but other than that, the diversion was its own reward to me. And Toph’s rich, so don’t pay her either.”

“Hey!”

“Oh save it, you are. Anyway, come on, Toph, there’s always more thinking to be done for more people. And ladies, I’ll take this opportunity to bid you good day.”

Toph followed him out, sighing. “So that’s it? You’re not going to watch them reunite tearfully for a while, at least?”

“Eh, not my place. Besides, I don’t think they’re going to cry. They’re gonna smile. A good sister – even if you think you don’t know her that well – can really help you out.”

This he said, and this he meant. There was no way for him to know that just a few hours later, a girl named Katara would be throwing her late edition news pamphlet down in disgust and vowing to right what she saw as a great wrong that her brother was doing the city.

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Written by Gunwild
Created by Bryan Konietzko & Michael Dante DiMartino
This fanfiction not produced for profit
Avatar: The Last Airbender and related indicia are the property of Nickelodeon