118 Chapter-118

"Appa!" Despair overwhelmed the monk as he scanned the endless desert, hoping to find his best friend, but only endless sand met his gaze.

Other members of Team Avatar joined in the search, with Naruto creating clones that sprinted into the desert.

After almost half an hour, they regrouped, and the situation looked grim.

"How could you let them take Appa!?" Aang's anger found a target in Toph.

"The library was sinking! I had to choose between you and Appa!" The blind bandit defended herself, guilt evident in her voice.

"We would have made it without your help! You should have helped Appa! But you didn't care about him! He never did!" The furious monk confronted Toph, who lowered her head in silence.

"That's enough." Naruto stepped in between them, facing the Avatar. "You're angry, I understand."

"No! You don't understand!" Aang, frustrated and anxious about Appa's fate, was on the verge of tears. "He's all I have left of my home. And you say you understand me?!"

"Blaming Toph won't bring Appa back."

"…"

"…"

The intense gaze between the Avatar and the shinobi created a heavy atmosphere. The water tribe brothers and the blind bandit stood by, unsure how to intervene.

One, a master of the four elements and the best bender in the Avatar state.

The other, a one-man army with the strength to break rocks barehanded.

Getting between them wouldn't be wise.

"He's my best friend. I can't just calm down and pretend like nothing happened!"

"If you keep acting like this, you won't be the only friend you've lost today."

Silence lingered until Aang flew into the sky, leaving his team behind.

"I didn't ask you to defend me."

"...?" Naruto raised an eyebrow at the blind bandit's expression.

"I don't need you to defend me," she repeated angrily, the scorching sun and hot sand bothering her less than feeling small and vulnerable.

She hated that he got involved and defended her.

"True, you don't need it." Naruto approached Toph, who was even more annoyed by the soft tone of his voice. "But that doesn't stop me from wanting to do it."

"..." She fell silent when she felt something over her head, shielding her from the strong sun. Her hands brushed the surface of the orange jacket that covered her – he had given her his jacket to shield her from the scorching sun.

"Ahhh~"

"...?" Katara gave a strange look to her brother, who sighed in a strange and very feminine manner, witnessing the shinobi's tender gesture with the blind bandit.

"Ahem! I say we have to go." Trying to protect his manhood after that moment of tenderness, Sokka advanced in the desert. "We flew for almost two full days with Appa to get here, in the middle of the desert, yes. My calculations do not fail me; this desert measures 9,065,253 km²."

"Where did you get that number?" Katara asked curiously, thinking her brother might have calculated Appa's regular flight speed and the time they traveled. She didn't think he could be so intelligent.

"About a book."

All respect for his brother's intelligence waned when he pulled out a scroll from one of his shoes, revealing what looked like a small map of the desert.

"Do you want me to take you?" Naruto swiftly created two shadow clones, planning to carry one friend himself and have his clones transport the other two. It sounded like a good plan.

"Sorcerer, we are at 45°, and you don't know how far we are. If you overexert yourself, you could suffer from sunstroke or heat stroke. It would be dangerous to have to take care of yourself and move forward, and you don't know if there could be any monster or enemy outside."

"Hey?"

"Don't move unless I say so."

"Oh." Following the waterbender's order, Naruto looked around, realizing he didn't remember which direction they had come from; he had to pay more attention.

All the teenagers started walking, and in just a couple of hours, they were already feeling very bad.

The brothers of the water tribe were accustomed to a lifetime at the South Pole.

Toph was accustomed to the temperate mountain weather of her home.

And Naruto, for the first time, cursed his body. Yes, it could heal faster, be stronger, and better in many ways than the average human, but that meant it needed more 'fuel' so to speak.

Food was no problem; as a child, he had gotten used to putting up with it, but water was another issue.

"What are you doing?" Katara stopped short when she realized that the shinobi of the group stopped walking to take out a bottle.

"Something I didn't think I would do. Please don't look."

"What's going on?" Toph only heard a zipper open and the sound of water being poured into a bottle. "Find water?"

"Something like that."

"Pull up your pants, Naruto!" scolded Katara, who had to watch the boy pee in a bottle.

"I'm almost done." With a sigh of relief, the blonde looked at the bottle, having saved a lot. "From the little I remember from survival classes, is that you can always drink your urine in case of emergency."

"Are you seriously going to take that?" Sokka asked incredulously at Uzumaki's idea.

"I hope not." Giving a sigh of resignation, he put the bottle in his pocket. "If you guys can do it, you should. Do you want a bottle, Sokka?"

"Yeah."

"At times like this, I wish I were deaf too." Toph growled as she had to listen to Boomerang boy also pee in a bottle.

"Excuse me, be quiet, I'm trying to concentrate."

"Sokka, you're going to urinate in a bottle, not pass a test."

"Shut your mouth, sorcerer."

"What does it matter, give me a bottle, little girl."

"Toph!" Katara squealed in disbelief as she saw how the blind bandit took a bottle from the shinobi and was ready to drop his pants. "No one has to drink anyone's urine!" She screamed, stopping the girl before she did anything wrong.

Katara took water from her bag and divided it into four parts to share with the others, although Naruto shook his head silently.

Sometimes the waterbender hated Uzumaki's kindness.

"This tastes funny, it's swamp water!" Sokka shouted in disgust at the muddy and bitter taste of the water.

The teenager's disappointment turned into joy when he saw in the distance what seemed to be a plant – a cactus.

But he did not have time to run towards it, as he was knocked down by an unstoppable Naruto who left a trail of sand as he ran to the plant.

"Come with Dad!" Using a kunai, he cut the cactus, and his eyes lit up when he saw water.

"Naruto wait!" Katara had to run, bringing Toph with her, and stopped the blonde before he could drink from the stuff. "Are you going to drink from a silver with red flowers? What if it's poisonous?"

Apparently Sokka and Naruto were in the same boat. What was life without risks?

The first to drink was the teenager from the water tribe, who drank until the bottom was white and remained silent for a few seconds.

"Baby Cactus Juice! It's so refreshing!"

"I see it fine." Naruto ignored the hallucinogenic state of his friend, who shared his drink with Momo. The lemur reacted strangely, flying in circles and falling with a thud against the sand. "See? Everything is fine."

Without thinking twice, the shinobi drank the cactus juice. For a few seconds, he felt excellent, and his thirst was quenched.

Only to stop a second later, falling against the ground with a thud.

"It's my turn." Toph didn't care that one was amazed at being able to fly and that another fell unconscious; she was very thirsty.

But before she could take a single sip, the waterbender of the group had used the same cactus juice to destroy the plant and prevent anyone else from drinking it.

"I can't be taking care of all of you all the time!" Katara shouted angrily, who had to grab Momo and pull her head out of the sand, then grab her brother's jacket and stop him from trying to drink the cactus game.

"Wake up." Toph was less kind to the ninja boy and gave him a hard kick in the stomach to wake him up.

And he achieved it.