"Katara! Can we please get going now? I'd like to spend my birthday ON my birthday." Toph Bei Fong yelled at the top her lungs.

"I'm coming! Just give me one more second." Katara Takahashi's voice came out quieter than she wanted. Why couldn't she be as loud as that earth loving hippie?

Toph groaned her annoyance. Katara laughed to herself. Toph was definitely something else. Katara fluffed her hair once more and looked in her full length mirror. Perfect. She grabbed her purse and walked out the door.

She met her best friends, Toph and Suki Saito, in the hall of their apartment they shared in San Francisco. It wasn't cheap, but it was worth it and they made enough money to live there nicely. She smiled at them and spun around looking for approval her from her fashion critics. They hollered and were throwing cat calls out. Clearly she was looking good tonight. Just the way she liked it.

It was Toph's twenty-first birthday and they were all going out clubbing to celebrate Toph's most exciting birthday she'd ever had. Katara hustled her girls through the door, making sure it locked on her way out. The trio descended the stairs and pushed their way out into the night. Once their stiletto heels, and Toph's flats, made contact with the concrete they crowded around Katara's car. A beautiful light blue GT Mustang.

The girls had all loved Katara's car. Hers was the best amongst the three of them. Suki had a dark green Prius. Since Toph was blind and had been since birth, she didn't drive. But that never stopped her from being a normal person. In fact she didn't even use a cane or dog. Instead she relied on her senses to find her way. And amazing, she walked better than most people.

Though Katara would have been fine with Suki's car, Suki and Toph always preferred going in her car. And Katara didn't mind. She loved her car more, sometimes, than her two permanent passengers. She chuckled softly. Only sometimes.

"WHOO! I am so excited for tonight guys! I get to drink tonight. Legally!" Toph rolled down Suki's window and yelled out the opened passage to the world.

Katara and Suki looked at Toph as though she were immature. Rolling their eyes they turned back to each other, smiled and whooped out their excitement for a special night. There was a buzz in the air and it was intoxicating. Katara couldn't help but feel as though something big would happen tonight. Maybe it was the event, maybe it was the stress finally leaving her body from her job. She didn't know and didn't really care.

They giggled uncontrollably as though they were fifteen, fourteen and twelve again. Katara's smile froze, those were the easy times. The days when everything was clear and no one had to worry about bills, jobs, growing up. Oh how she wished she could go back to the time when she just met the girls and becoming friends was as easy as asking.

A random image flashed in her mind's eye of a boy with golden eyes. Like that of a baby dragon she'd seen on Google. She couldn't remember him fully. Only knew him as the boy she'd wanted to know, but only observed from afar. Where had that vision come from?

It worried her, but she didn't let it consume her. Instead she sent the thought, the memory into the night sky. Now was not the time to dwell on the past and on what could not be changed. It's done and over with. That's the way it meant to be.

Katara was going to have fun tonight. She could feel it in the gorgeous night that was dotted by street lights from the city. Both the moon and stars were hidden from her vision, but she didn't need to see them to feel them or know they were there.

She put her foot to the pedal and sped to their first club destination for the night: The Jasmin Dragon.

ZK ZK ZK

Iroh Miyagi brought tea out to his customers and checked his watch, 9:30 P.M. Half an hour and his café The Jasmine Dragon would be closing and his nephew's club also known as The Jasmin Dragon downstairs. He never understood why his nephew dropped the 'e' in 'jasmine', but that's just how Zuko was. Always coming up with odd ways to do things.

He reached a table with patient customers and set down the tea, when someone across the room yelled out in what seemed like disgust. 'Not possible' he thought to himself. No one had ever said anything bad about the things he served.

Iroh rushed over to the source of the noise, an older man with sideburns that reminded him of a monkey. "Excuse me sir, is there something I can help you with?" he smiled kindly at him.

The man stood up, he towered Iroh by inches, "yes there is. You can tell that snot nosed child over there to shut off that retched noise he calls music!" the monkey man spat at him.

Iroh took deep breaths, calming himself down before he confronted the angry man. "Alright, sir, please sit down and I'll take care of it for you. What's your name?" he plastered a smile on.

The man's face became a deep red and looked as though he would eat Iroh for dinner if he didn't get his way, but he sat down, "The name's Zhao. Zhao Fukazawa. And you better take care of it, Iroh, or I will."

Iroh felt something was wrong, but turned anyway and walked to the child. Well, not really a child. In fact, he looked more like a young adult. "Excuse me, young man, might you please turn down your music on your computer?" Iroh asked in the most sincere of voices.

The man looked up from under his brown beanie, his eyes were bloodshot. "yeah, man, no problemo." he did so. Odd, Iroh thought, why did he have an arrow on his hat?

Iroh thanked him and walked back to the man. He was about to tell him all was good when Iroh realized that Zhao had addressed him by his name. He'd never met this man before. Iroh never wore a nametag. He grew suspicious then. "Would you be so kindly as to come to the back with me, Zhao?" Iroh motioned with his hands for the man to follow him.

The man smiled as though that was exactly what he wanted all along. "Of course." he stood and Iroh led him to the back. They walked through a door and down some stairs that took them to Zuko's club. Just before entering, the old café owner slammed the monkey like man against the wall, "who are you and what are you doing here?" Zhao tried to push past the old man, but Iroh stood fast. Shoving his forearm along Zhao's throat. "Tell me." his voice was low and deadly.

Zhao sputtered and coughed for several minutes without Iroh showing mercy. Finally he answered, "I know you're the brother of the drug lord, Ozai, and I need something. Now, fast." Zhao looked as though he were dying from a disease. After his anger had dissipated was now a grey color. Like that of a storm, his hair instead of being healthy only looked oily. He was going through withdrawals.

Iroh wasn't sympathetic with the man, he'd done to himself. "I may be the brother of Ozai and he may deal drugs; that does not mean that I am in that business with him. So get your sorry ass out of here before I make you. Now!" Iroh slammed him against the door once more and threw him forward.

Zhao stumbled slightly, but looked behind him at Iroh. "Are you sure you're not taking anything yourself? You've got some strength to you, old man." His words came out in a sneering voice.

Iroh resisted the urge to punch the man in his kidneys, "get out." The café owner growled out the command.

Zhao walked back up the stairs and left with a final look of disgust on his face. Ironic, Iroh thought, that he should be the one disgusted when he is in fact the one doing bodily harm to himself. "It's safe now."

The metal door slid to one side and a man with a scar that covered his left eye and ear came through it. "What did he want, Uncle?"

Iroh looked at his nephew, "drugs, from your father. He thought I could supply him with some. This business of your father's is getting out of hand. How long will it be before they actually do something when I tell them no?" the worry on his uncle's face angered him. The old man had been nothing but kind in all his life.

Zuko clasped his uncle's shoulder, "Don't worry, Uncle, I'll take care of it."

Iroh turned back to his nephew, "No, Zuko, I do not want you in this too. Please stay out." Iroh pleaded with him.

The scarred man just looked back at his uncle. Knowing that he shouldn't lie to him, but he also knew that whatever this was, it wasn't going to stop. Not without being made to. "Alright, Uncle, if you feel that strongly about it. Then I'll mind my own." it wasn't technically a lie. He would mind his own and his own was in fact Iroh. He was all Zuko had in this world. His dad disowned him when Zuko refused to be part of the drug business. He had disowned him the day he'd scarred him. Zuko remembered the day clearly, but shook his head clearing his thoughts. He hated thinking about that. And wasn't going to stop hating it now.

Iroh looked over him, like he didn't believe him. Zuko kept the twinkle from his good eye and put on most sincerest, yet sternest face. Iroh had no choice but to believe him, "Alright, Zuko, alright. Now I am going to go back upstairs and close the café. Don't you have something you should be doing yourself?" Iroh smiled and turned on his heel and trekked up the stairs.

Once his uncle was out of sight, Zuko's face fell back to normal. Whoever was doing this was not going to get away with it, he vowed. The club owner went back through the metal door and slammed it shut. He walked to the D.J.'s turntable, but he wasn't there.

"What the fuck, man? Where did he go?" Zuko mumbled under his breath. He checked around the club. The D.J. could not be found. Zuko was getting impatient. How could he have trusted the stoner? He had known better really he had, but Aang had been one of his closest friends. And he needed the job. He was good at it too, but he was always getting high and forgetting what he needed to do. But he couldn't get mad at him anymore, he just had to find him.

"Hey, Zuko! Man, where have you been? Aang's waiting over here for you!" Zuko looked over his shoulder and saw his other employee and best friend, Sokka. Next to him was Aang sitting on stool and resting his elbows on the bar counter. The bartender and D.J. were quickly joined by the club owner. The three of them had been best friends since Zuko was sixteen. They'd never judged him they way others had. They'd always been there for him and always would be. He knew they would.

Zuko pushed Aang's head forward, waking him from his power nap. His hand was deep within a bag of Cheetos. "Hey, man, I've looking for you all over the place. Where were you?" he licked the cheese off his fingers and said everything slowly. He was on a good one.

Zuko was on the verge of being furious, "no, Aang, where were you? You are supposed to be at the turntables. The club opens in like ten minutes. Get your ass over there!" Aang reluctantly got up and walked to his position. "Sokka, can you get some drinks started?"

Sokka mock saluted him, "right on it, boss." he crouched behind the counter and pulled out bottle upon bottles of alcohol. "tonight, we're getting fucked up and laid."

Zuko smiled broadly, that's exactly what he had in mind.