A:TNG One-Shot: Five Years

Author's Note:  I'll tell you right away that I'm not happy with this.  I wrote this over a month ago in August.  As I was looking at the paper and thinking about what to write, the bells went off in school.  That's where the beginning came from, and I just kind of went with it from there.   (As a side note, the bells at my school really aren't that loud.)  I like the sentiment of this story but not so much the actual story.

Five Years

“This place is loud,” Toph complained.  Up and down the street many bells and other noise makers were clanging.

“You can't blame them for celebrating,” Sokka told his fiance as he led the way through the crowd.

“There's celebrating,” Toph grouched, “And then there's making noise.  This level of noise is unnecessary.  They've never been this noisy before.”

“This is the fifth anniversary of the war,” Sokka reminded her.  “It's a big year.  Do you realize that all of the little kids running around today probably have no memories of the war?”

Toph ran that thought over in her mind as she felt the vibrations the excited children around them were causing.  This thought had never occurred to her before.  “Lucky them,” she muttered.  It sounded sarcastic, but Toph's words were true.  None of those kids deserved to go through what Toph and her friends had.

Sokka was also smiling at the kids.  He saw a young Earth Kingdom boy running around with two boys about his age who just happened to be Fire Nation.  It was a sight he never would have seen five years ago.  Sokka marveled over how much could change in five short years.

“Come on,” Sokka tugged on Toph's hand, “We need to find the others.”

“Of course,” Toph began to smirk, “I haven't got to pick on Twinkle Toes and Sugar Queen recently.”