Chapter One:
Omega, a cesspool of criminals, pirates, mercenaries and the desperate few. In one quiet corner of the station, an old warehouse complex was in the midst of chaos. The home of the Blue Suns was being destroyed from the inside, by one irate young girl. One that had been brought in just hours earlier.
Harkam was going to kill the son of a bitch who took that monster into their base.
"Open fire!"
Harkam did not know who screamed the command, but cursed when his entire squad rose out of their covers to lay fire down the corridor. Damn fucking undisciplined idiots. He was going to lynch each and every one of them for undermining his authority.
He rose up only to see the thrice damned demon tuck and roll, taking with her the very floor in a horrible sound of screeching metal. He did not know how such a thing was possible, but the human girl bent the metal as if it was mere foil, in ways that by no reason should have been possible.
Now encased in the crude makeshift armour she had made for herself she came running at them. Sparks flying off her form as his five-man squad tried in vain to bring the monster down.
In a flash she was on top the far barricades, tearing the metal barrier to pieces as she simply ran through it, rocketing the scraps in every which way in the most absurd display of biotics he had ever seen. Chunks of the barricade was levitated, punched and kicked into his subordinates. He even heard the poor sod who actually got punched go down with a sickening crack. His radio only picking up a brief sob as he laid still.
The girl was tearing through his squad like a Krogan on steroids. But he knew one trick that not even the Krogan could survive.
Gritting his teeth he grabbed a grenade, and prepared his rifle for a concussive shot. Wincing when he heard another of his mercenaries go down, this one got his ankle twisted when the very floor wrangled and ate up the poor man's foot. Twisting it in a very bad angle and forcing him down.
"Grenade!" he shouted out and threw the bomb at the metal form of the girl. And quickly brought his rifle up and shot his prepared concussive charge. It stopped the girl in her tracks, but instead of throwing her to the ground or even off balance, the girl had attempted to dodge and taken the shot over her shoulder. But it was enough to keep her in place for the grenade to sail through the air and stick onto the metal armour.
Bye bye, human. He smiled as he and his entire squad scrambled back into cover.
A mighty crash and hulk of mangled metal crashed into his view. He only managed to catch a glimpse of his lieutenant horrified face when he realized just what this meant.
Fucking who-! His thoughts were cut short when the metal chunk exploded. He was bodily thrown into the wall behind him, his entire side erupted in pain and he lost sight in one of his eyes, his visor a spider web of cracks and broken glass.
Toph stood frozen in place. Her arms shook, extended from her panicked throw, and her heart raced thirty miles a second. That had been closer than she was comfortable with.
She had been confused at first when the weird four eyed things shouted something alien and threw that little palm sized disk at her. Only when it and its comrade had thrown themselves behind cover did she understand just what that thing was.
A bomb.
And what a bomb it had been. She felt just as much as she heard what damage it caused, she had been lucky enough to catch the fist sized fragment, of what had been her metal-bent armour as the explosion shattered it into dozens of small pieces, in the air. She carefully moved her feet, feeling for her surroundings.
Nothing.
She stomped, bringing her down low into a wide horse-stance, this time getting a better, if fuzzy, picture of the hall. It was a whole mess. She felt all the chaos she had wrought on the building, the deep gauges of her armament, the gnarly ditch she had wrought. The twisted and broken ankle of the only human in the hall, the caved in chest plates of the bony ones. The ripped up state of the two four-eyed creatures when the bomb went off. Only three of the five attackers was breathing.
Feeling a bit queasy at the revelation, she stepped past the carnage. The still alive but badly injured four… no now three-eyed one shifted a little as she passed, its head following her. She would have felt bad about it if it had not tried to actually kill her with that bomb in the first place.
Reaching another door, this one leading out… she hoped, she was taken aback when it swished open on its own.
"What in the…" she cautiously slid closer, her feet never leaving the ground ready for anything. Her caution was quickly changed to curiosity as she felt how the door had folded into itself to part way for her. She could feel the pieces and she see it before her how they all fit together to form the door, tough many of the smaller pieces and gears went well over and past her head. She could just not fathom how something so intricate could work so flawlessly.
She shrugged her awe off her shoulders and continued on trough the doorway, it was yet another notch in new and weird experiences she had that day.
What is this place? Toph thought as she felt the world around her. The maze of metal corridors went on endlessly in all directions. She could feel many hundreds of thousands of people and things all around her. Above her, bellow her to her left and right, everywhere were people, things and stuff she could scarcely imagine in her head. Not only that the odd purified metal beneath her feet just made the task of 'looking' hard.
Her prison was well behind her now as she made her way down the larger hallway, she could feel the dirt and grime on the floor, the trash and paper scattered everywhere. It was actually impressive as even the layer of dirt had layers of dirt, it was refreshing if she had to be honest as it gave the floor a more homely feel to her. The air carried a rancid odour of fresh piss and oil as well of being very dry and stale. Dust hanged thickly in the air. Wherever she was the place really needed to open a few windows to freshen the place up.
More of the weird creatures infested the place, the few humans she could pick out was clearly outnumbered. She kneaded her soles against the cold floor knitting her face in concentration as she tried to expand her range.
Nothing, her sight were still limited and she could not see further than a few hundred meters in any directions. The whole place was so hollow it made it hard to visualise. If she had to describe it all in one word she would say chaos, it felt like chaos.
She wandered aimlessly, hoping to find her way out of whatever this place was.
It did not take long when she heard something that brought her to a stop. It was… was; growling? It was a quiet guttural growl not just from one but many things. Her sensitive ears and touch managed to pick up the near silent scrapes of clawed feet.
"Come out now, I know you are there," she said to the ambush she was more than sure was coming.
The response she got was less than promising for all she got was wet hisses and growls. Answering her challenge something stalked out of their alley. Her muscles tensed as she prepared herself for any sudden moves. On each foot, thin and padded like a dog's, two thick claws protruded and feebly tried to dig groves into the floor. How many weird things are there in this place? What more was hiding in the dark?
It was thin but the way it moved bellied a developed physique. The way it twitched and moved and growled it felt… feral. Like a rabid animal.
She turned up to face it, making a show of looking at it, keeping her ears open and alert. She searched for something to bend, something easier than the metal beneath her. She found nothing but a thin layer of sandy dust.
It growled spitting out unintelligible words that sounded warped and too throaty to be its real language. It gesticulated wildly, its body tense and its heart beating in powerful fast strokes. It was angry, afraid? How it moved was erratic and trying to be imposing. It brought back memories of Earth Rumble, half of the fun was the posturing and the crowd pleasing. And this… thing reminded her of that. Was it trying to impress on its peers or her? She did not know and it made her cautious.
She took a tentative step away from it, readying her fists for any sudden moves. She did her best to sense and see if she could feel for any guns.
Alarmingly she found more than a few. At least that was what she assumed from the blocky shapes she picked up through her senses. Made from the same earth clean metal that surrounded her.
She gritted her teeth. What was wrong with this damn place?! She swore, for what felt like the thousandth time since waking up in that room.
She was tired of it all!
"Fuck off," she spit at the thing's feet and walked off. She did not care anymore. She would beat them up as surely as she had beaten up the others. Annoying weaklings all of them, not a solid bone in any of them!
Unsurprising the thing took offense to her action and roared its challenge and drew its gun. She had been prepared for it and twisted around and jabbed her fingers through the seam between the floor sheets. And with a mighty heave wrenched it up between herself and the alien.
She heard three barks, but only two impacts on her makeshift shield. A jolt of surprise shot through her when she felt the vibrations of the alien collapsing on the floor. The rest of its pack yelped and screeched a hasty retreat back into their alley and soon disappeared beyond her senses.
"Jarhalt?!" someone shouted above her. It was that odd yarbel she likened to that of a weird bony alien. Where was it? She could not feel the alien, nor could she sense where ever it stood. Not to mention what it said.
"What?" she asked dumbly. She got a crowed response from the thing, but it was no more intelligible than any other time. It repeated the word 'jarhalt' though, whatever that meant. But it did seem friendlier than the other bunch. "Yeah, I don't understand you at all."
She heard the thing sigh, and how its feet clamped against the metal flooring of what she assumed to be some kind of gangway. The place was somewhat similar to how the fire nation liked to build their machines, so she could easily imagine it. It at least made more sense than nothing else.
"Suit yourself," Toph shrugged and continued walking. She did not know where she was going, but she figured that sooner or later after a few trials and errors, and a bit of luck, she would find herself the way out of this complex. It couldn't be that hard now could it? Eventually she'd run out of building to wander through and find herself the way out. At least that was what she hoped.
She did not get far when she heard a familiar set of feet coming closer. Tensing up she stopped and listened for the alien. What did it want now?
It quickly came into the 'sight' of her earth sense. It was tall, and gangly. Why were there so many of these… things around all of a sudden. Toph had never heard of creatures such as them before.
"What do you want now?" She asked feeling how the thing petered to a stop just a couple of steps from her. Toph turned her head to hear better. Maybe if she listened hard enough she might come to understand what it said?
It spoke with this double tone. But while it did gesticulate and flick at its arm it remained as unintelligible as ever.
She was ready to just ignore the thing and continue on her way, when another voice of a woman spoke from the things arm;
"How a human gets on Omega without a translator is beyond me. But you really need to be more careful," the arm lady said. Toph took note how the alien spoke, and then the lady voice started to speak.
Toph now intrigued turned fully towards the thing, cocking her head curiously. What kind of spirit bullshit was going on now? She could only assume it had something to do with spirits. Aang always heard voices or saw things that no one else could. Being able to talk with his past selves and such. Though having a voice coming out of a person's arm was however new to her. She had never heard of it before.
"So you speak for this guy?" She asked the arm lady. She was unsure how it worked, was she supposed to address the spirit or the thing it spoke for? She got her answer almost immediately.
"It is not a VI," the thing sighed. So… not to the spirit it was. "Are you lost?"
Toph scowled.
"And who's asking?" She ignored the question asking instead her own.
"Captain Preitor Gavorn." The thing asked and made a show of looking her up and down. "It is a bad idea to wander around unarmed around here, the alleys are infested with Vorcha, especially for a small human girl."
Toph grit her teeth. Why was it that where ever she went everyone just assumed she could not take care of herself. The thing would fare as well as those that had imprisoned her. That is badly against her.
"I am a bender and can take care of myself, mr. Nosy."
"Yes, tell that to the pests as they rip you open. Follow me, I will lead you to a safer district," the thing waved her to follow and started to walk briskly. "I can't have you dying while I am tasked of cleaning the place of Vorcha, I have a reputation to uphold."
Scowling now, Toph followed the taller alien. It grated on her how quick and easy the thing dismissed her. But she settled on being led. For maybe it would lead her out of the building and onto proper earth. Then she would not need to be lead around like a helpless blind girl.
A/N: Here you have chapter two.
To answer some of the questions posed in the reviews:
Toph is about 14-15 so about 2-3 years from the show. She's been running her metal-bending school for a bit.
This chapter was pretty much already written when I posted this story, I wrote about 1600 words since I posted. That should give you a rough estimate how quick I write. But if you take a look at my profile you will see I have more than one or two stories which I juggle on a when I feel like writing basis. I post every few months on one or two of my stories.
And I answered where she is at the top of this chapter...
that should cover all the questions.
So please tell me what you think of this chapter or the story as a whole, if you have questions please feel free to pose them, I usually answer any PM or review.