Fights

Hakoda was in the commanding office of the ship with his son, Bato, and some of the older men, them going over the plans for their invasion on the Fire Nation. The air was rather tense and uncomfortable between Hakoda and Sokka, which absolutely killed Hakoda. He and Sokka had always been close, so Sokka practically avoiding him hurt (even though he knew that he was the one that caused it). So, he was surprised when Sokka had asked to speak to Hakoda privately when their meeting was finished.

Once all the men in the room had left, there was a deafening silence between the father and son. Hakoda cleared his throat and asked in a fatherly tone, "So, what were you wanting to talk about, son?" Hakoda obviously knew what Sokka wanted to talk about, but he was sort of hoping that he was wrong. Sokka scratched the back of his neck and questioned awkwardly, "So Elodie... Do you really love her or have you just been lonely, dad?" Hakoda's face softened and he nodded, "Yes, Sokka. I really do love Elodie and it is my intent to hopefully marry her after the war ends." A shocked, "What," was heard by the men. Katara was standing in the doorway, tears in her eyes and teeth clenched. She gripped her hands into balls as she glared at her father, "Y-You want to marry her?! You can't! Wh-What about mom? And she's not even from here!" He walked over to Katara and placed a hand on her shoulder, "No one will ever replace your mother, Katara. Just because I love Elodie and want to be with her does not mean that I do not love your mother anymore. She will always be special to me and Elodie understands that." Hakoda's voice was filled with emotion as Katara pushed his hand off her shoulder and walked away without saying another word.

Hakoda sighed and flopped into a chair, resting his face in his hand. Sokka's voice made him look up, honestly forgetting he was there for a second, "Is that true? What you said to Katara?" Hakoda nodded, "Yes. All of it was true." Sokka was quiet for a good minute before looking up at his dad, "I'm ok with it." Hakoda, making sure he was hearing correcting, asked, "What do you mean?" Sokka made eye contact with his dad, "I'm ok with you and Elodie... being together. I know she makes you happy and I liked her before, so I guess I give y'all my blessing." Hakoda smiled and gave Sokka a good pat on the shoulder, "Thank you, Sokka. You don't know how much that means to me and Elodie." Sokka smiled weakly at his dad, "I'm just glad that you're happy."

Their touching moment was ruined by loud yelling and a bunch of movement on the deck. The father and son gave each other a panicked look, were they being attacked? They practically sprinted to the deck to find... Elodie fighting with Petak? The crew had formed a circle around an out-of-breath Elodie and calm-looking Petak slowly pacing around each other. Hakoda rushed to the crowd and was about to go knock some sense into Petak when Bato's hand held him back, "Calm down Hakoda. He's been teaching her some self-defense techniques and he's testing them out right now."

For being such a quiet and reserved being, Petak was one of the best fighters in the crew, if not the best in hand-to-hand combat. And he was a tough teacher. Hakoda had been noticing some bruises on Elodie, but she had just told him that she was bumping into things and that she bruised easily. Elodie narrowly dodged a rather fast and hard punch from Petak. He coached her, "Your small and fast Elodie, don't get sluggish because you're getting tired." She scowled as he kept on going after her, but it was true. She was becoming tired from constantly dodging, but she couldn't find the right time to attack. She was caught off guard when Petak kicked one of her legs out from under her and elbowed her hard enough for her to end up onto the metal floor. She winced from the impact and Hakoda clenched his jaw, wanting nothing more than to run out there and pummel Petak for her, but Bato was still holding him back. Petak grinned, "Better luck next time Elodie. But that was bett- Ah!" While he had been busy gloating, Elodie kicked his legs out from under him and got him in a position that he couldn't move in. She smiled widely, "You were saying?" The men cheered loudly as she got up from Petak and raised her arms victoriously.

She saw Hakoda in the crowd and smiled sheepishly at him. As the crowd broke up, she walked over to her boyfriend, Sokka, Zokkik, and Bato. She could tell by the look on Hakoda's face that he was not very happy with her. He opened his mouth to say something, but a just as unhappy-looking Zokkik beat him to it, "What the hell were you doing out there, Elodie? He could have really hurt you! Look at all the bruises on you!" He took her hands and eyed the bruises littering her arms and Elodie sighed, "I'm fine Zokkik. And besides, did you see me kick Petak's butt?!" Zokkik relaxed a little bit before letting go of her, but his place was instantly taken by Hakoda, "Why didn't you tell me you wanted to be trained to fight? I could have done it." Elodie gave him a look, "Would you really train me like you would train someone else? You would totally go easy on me?" Hakoda gently ran his thumb over a forming bruise on her forearm, "Go easy on you? Of course I wouldn't... maybe." Elodie pursed her lips, "That's what I thought." Hakoda's hand slid down to hold Elodie's, "Can you blame me for not wanting to beat up my girlfriend." She smiled and rolled her eyes playfully, "I guess that's a good thing." He started looking at her bruises again and sighed, "Will you let Zokkik check to make sure you don't have any big injuries?" Elodie gave him the same look as before and said with a warning tone, "Hakoda." He let go of her hands, "Ok, ok."

Elodie shook her head at the overprotective men before finally noticing that Sokka was standing with them, obviously slightly uncomfortable. She glanced up at Hakoda, wondering if she should talk to his son, and he gave her a slight nod. Elodie smiled and tried not to sound awkward, "Hi, Sokka." He cleared his throat, "Hi... I just wanted to tell you that I'm sorry for how I reacted to the news about you and dad, I was just very shocked and wasn't thinking logically. And, I want to give y'all my blessing." Elodie smiled at the teenager softly, "Thank you, Sokka. That really means so much to me." To lighten the mood, she grinned, "And I can understand why you're shocked. I can only imagine that you were thinking "Why does this young, beautiful woman like my old father?"" Sokka laughed and nodded, "A little bit, yes." Hakoda clutched his chest in pretend pain, "That one hurt."

Hakoda sighed when he heard someone call out for him, "I have to go." He pats Sokka's shoulder and pressed an insanely quick peck to Elodie's cheek before heading over to where the problem was. There was awkward silence yet again. Elodie was about to make some excuse to leave the awkwardness, but Sokka started, "My sister... She's still not happy about you and dad, but she'll come around. She just needs some time to think about it. She was very close with my mother, so..." Elodie smiled a bit and nodded, "I understand, Sokka. I really do. Y'all both take all the time you need." He smiled back at her shyly before saying, "I should probably go check on Katara and Aang." Elodie nodded and waved goodbye to him before he left.

Elodie was heading towards her room to get cleaned up when she heard Toph's voice, "That was pretty cool. Have you ever fought before?" Elodie shook her head, "I haven't. Was it obvious?" Toph cracked a grin, "Yeah." The older female laughed at the bluntness, "I hope I didn't look too dumb." Toph shrugged, "From what I can tell, you didn't. You just felt inexperienced." Elodie could tell that Toph was feeling a little embarrassed by her choice of words, hoping that Elodie didn't take offense to her brashness. So, the older girl just laughed softly, "You're probably right. I'll just have to practice more so I don't look like an amateur." The two talked for a little longer before separating ways.

It was nighttime and Elodie had just hunted down Konoye. He had the bad habit of stealing her hairbrush, claiming that it was way better than the one he had (which was totally true, but Elodie hated chasing down the dang brush). She was grumbling as she cleaned out said brush while heading to her room. Hakoda was in the room and had been taking off his boots, obviously getting ready for bed, but he was distracted by his girlfriend stomping into the room. He grinned at her, "Konoye took your brush again?" Elodie huffed and nodded while stopping in front of the mirror and brushing her hair. Hakoda pushed himself out of the chair and took the brush out of Elodie's hand before gently taking over the task.

Elodie immediately relaxed at the soft brushing and found herself subconsciously leaning into Hakoda as he brushed away. Once he was done, he gently moved Elodie's hair to the side and pressed a gentle kiss to the side of her neck. She smiled and turned around so she was facing him. He leaned down to kiss her again and she said softly, "I love you, Hakoda." He smiled and rested his forehead against hers, "I love you too, Elodie."

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