Zuko stares at Mai through half-hidden eyes; peeking through the folds of darkest brown hair which had grown through in the last few months. She stands on her tiptoes, removes her outer robe and hangs it up on the highest nail; before falling back down onto her heels and shooting Zuko a death glare.

"What?"

"Nothing!" Zuko scowls, folding his arms and pointedly looking away. "I didn't say anything."

"Quit staring, or I'll give you something to stare at." There's a brief and tangible silence between the two of them as Mai approaches the bed with a little caution. "Got that?"

Zuko pretends not to watch her from his periphery as she sits down on the side of the bed. "That depends. What will you give me to stare at?" he asks, partly out of genuine curiosity. "Because if it's good, then…"

Mai scoffs and slaps him lightly on the arm. "Stop it," she hisses, but she's not scowling quite as much as usual. "Be serious."

Zuko's eyesight shifts back over to the girl on his bed and he sighs. "You looked pretty, today. On the beach," he tells her, his eyes darting all around. He's nervous, obviously. Mai's eyebrow twitches upward, but she smiles back at her boyfriend.

"Thanks."

"You're welcome," he wrings his hands and leans backward; his shoulder blades pressing against the headboard of her four-poster bed.

"Why are you so twitchy today?" Mai asks, shuffling a little closer to him. "Is it because we're all alone and my parents aren't in?" she teases, just a hint of a smile being dragged up from the side of her mouth.

"No!" he snaps back, defensive. "It's not!"

"Relax." She fiddles with the bedsheets. "We don't have to do-"

"Stop it!" Zuko crosses his arms again, a blush spreading across one side of his face. "Stop talking about it."

"Why does that bother you?" Mai wonders, trying to conceal the hurt in her voice. "I didn't realise that the thought was so off-putting for you," she says curtly, her voice turning a little sour.

"It's not, I just…" Zuko struggles, seemingly annoyed. "I want to, but I…"

"Then what?" she persists, noting the scowl deepen on Zuko's features. "You haven't done it before?" she seems surprised, when he nods; a little abashed. "Well, neither have I. We're only seventeen. It's understandable. What, did you think I was going around being easy like Ty Lee?" she tosses the name out with a frown. "Please."

Zuko visibly tries to relax himself and sits up a little. "I was banished when I was thirteen. I spent three years on a boat and one year holed in Ba Sing Se with my uncle. I don't… I'm not good at-"

"Have you done anything at all?" Mai asks, sceptical- but if she's embarrassed, she hides it well.

"I, uh. I only ever kissed one other girl. In the Earth Kingdom, her name was Jin." Zuko remembers, and then wishes that he hadn't. It felt… odd, somehow. Mentioning Jin's name to Mai. "That's it."

Mai's brows shoot up. "God," she says under her breath. "You weren't kidding."

This sets Zuko off again and his nose wrinkles up in anger. "Fine. Be like that," he yells, throwing his hands up in the air. "Why don't you just go and find yourself someone who-"

She cuts him off with a well-timed kiss on the lips; her preferred method of Zuko-damage-control. He resists at first, like a brick wall; but melts into her in no time. Easy, she thinks; feeling his hands land gently onto his back. When they part, she smiles at him. "We'll take it slow."

"YOU DID WHAT?!" Zuko hears Katara screech from his prisoner's room in the air temple.

So, Sokka told Katara, huh.

"He could have KILLED you?! Ever think of that? He could have teamed up with the fire nation at boiling rock and you'd be a prisoner now!" Katara continues, disappointment rife in her voice. I can't do this without you!"

Sokka lowers his. "Listen, sis, I know, I know. But… he was an outcast, there. He left his friends, his family and his title behind to come and help us – hell, they even arrested him!" Sokka shakes his head. "I trust him."

"I don't." Katara scowls. "And that's not going to change," she says with an air of finality on the subject, crossing her arms over her chest.

Sokka blinks twice, taken aback by his sister's explosive anger. It wasn't in their blood to get so angry, as descendents of the water tribe. "Do you think maybe you're overreacting, Katara? I mean, why don't we let him start afresh? He could really prove himself, don't you think?"

Katara shakes her head, wordless. Without anything further to say on the matter, she swiftly turns on her heel and leaves the room.

Sokka turns to Zuko and makes a face of apology. "Look. I gotta do this, I'm sorry dude," he says with what sounds like genuine regret, before pulling a pair of handcuffs from his pocket and approaching Zuko with them.

If Zuko had been drinking something, it would have been the perfect time for a spit-take. "What the hell are you doing with those?!" he splutters, eyeing up the handcuffs more closely.

"I stole them from boiling rock! Aren't they neat?"

Zuko frowns. "You stole those just to use on me when we got back?" he asks, a little disheartened. Sokka was annoying, sure, but he had felt that they had really bonded.

"Well," Sokka seems a little sheepish and he glances in the general direction of where Suki was now staying. "Other things too," he waggles his eyebrows and Zuko's face turns a furious and unprecedented shade of red. He backs away from Sokka, panic in his eyes. "What was the other reason!?" he asks, mortified, not sure he wants to know.

Sokka glances down at the cuffs and sighs. "Look, Zuko. I know you're older than me by a year, but there's something I have to explain to you about the birds and the bees-"

"Get away!" he yells, backing into a corner. "HELP!" he cries out, concerned for his own wellbeing.

"Don't struggle," Sokka says, inching closer to his target. "It'll only make it worse for you."

"Jesus, do you even realise how creepy you sound?" an unfamiliar voice comes from the doorway. Both men gasp and turn to look.

It's Toph, leaning on one of the doorframes and picking at her nails. "Couldn't help but overhear," she says, drily. "It comes with the territory of being blind, you see. I have to hear all of the stupid conversations you guys have when I'm not around," she roasts them with a little giggle. She briefly assesses the situation with her feet, and then groans. "Sokka – you do realise that Zuko can melt away metal, right?" she points out.

Sokka turns to look at Zuko, a betrayed and angry expression on his face – and Zuko just shrugs, as if to say – well, what did you expect?

Toph continues her beratement. "And we all know that Zuko can melt away Katara's ice restraints. Even if Katara is choosing to be… blissfully ignorant of that fact, right now," she pauses to roll her eyes intentionally.

Zuko and Sokka share a glance. "So, uh, what's your point?" Sokka asks.

"Have either of you considered that I actually want to be here, and that you don't need to imprison me?" Zuko tries, his voice terse, but both of them ignore him totally.

Toph gets to her point, gracefully as ever, with a superior smirk on her face. "This is where I come in. Stone can't be melted."

Sokka's eyes adopt an expression of understanding and he stuffs the handcuffs back into his pockets with a cough. "Ahem," he looks at Zuko, conspiratorially as if the two now share a sacred secret. "You can just forget that you saw those."

Zuko shudders heavily. "I wish I could."

He grumbles but doesn't outwardly struggle against Toph when she creates a stone seal for his hands and clamps it around his wrists. As she's bending, Zuko can't help but notice that she seems a little hesitant.

"I'm sorry, Zuko," she admits. "If it were up to me, I probably wouldn't lock you up." There's a tone of regret, there. Not for the first time, Zuko's forced to confront the fact that Toph is far more mature than her years.

"But it's not up to you, is it?" he narrows his eyes, sounding defeated.

"'Fraid not," she replies curtly.

"So how do I get Katara to trust me? How can I get her to believe that I'm not going to hurt any of you, or run away? I came here willingly – I even sacrificed-" he begins to get frustrated, feeling the dampening effect of the stone on his warm hands. She cuts him off.

"I just said it's not up to me. Save your arguments for her," she advises, shrugging as she steps back to admire her handiwork and touches two fingers to her forehead in a mocking salute motion. "Catch ya later, Zukes," she cavalierly employs a fun nickname which she just made up before sauntering out of the room.

"I would, if she would ever listen to me!" he's left yelling after her. His words reverberate around him, bouncing off the walls in the giant stone cavern of the Western Air Temple. They mock him; reminding unpleasantly him of his former self, complete with the feelings of regret and failure that followed him around.

He slumps down on his makeshift bed, which is nothing but a stone slab, and chastises himself for shouting at her.

Between Azula, Mai, Katara, and now apparently Toph... it would seem that women, in general, had a serious way of getting under his skin.

The format of this is basically a snippet from the past, and then the current storyline. They won't always be related, just used for slow character growth