AI-assisted content. (Someone suggested I tag all chapters I've written with assistance from AI. I think it's a fair ask. I'll tag those that I haven't too).
TDBB: Tuff Wars 2.24
Toph pressed her palm against the tunnel wall and the stone flowed shut behind them, sealing the passage with a soft grind of particles settling into place. She moved ahead without checking if Ivy followed, her bare feet reading the floor, each step a small negotiation between her weight and the earth's response. The tunnel narrowed, widened, turned. She sealed each intersection as they passed, the stone knitting together until the way back became indistinguishable from the walls around it.
Ivy limped behind her, one hand pressed against her ribs, her breath coming sharp through her teeth. She did not ask for help. Toph did not offer.
The passage opened into a chamber. Toph stopped. Her legs folded beneath her and she sat hard, her spine curving forward, her hands finding her feet and pulling them into her lap.
Ivy caught herself against the wall. She held herself there, her jaw tight, her eyes finding Toph's shape in the dark.
"Why did you stop?"
Toph's thumbs pressed into her arches, working the muscle until something released. "My feet are in agony." She rolled her ankle and felt the joint pop. "They could use a mud break."
She turned her head toward the sound of Ivy's breathing, the shallow pulls that spoke of ribs bruised or cracked.
"You don't look so good yourself."
Ivy's spine straightened. She pushed off the wall and her legs locked, holding her upright for a moment before her knees buckled. She caught herself on her palms, her body folding, and she hissed as her ribs compressed against her forearms.
Toph bent the earth beneath her, a smooth rise of packed soil that lifted Ivy and settled her into a seated position before she could protest. Ivy's hands found the dirt and she pushed, her arms shaking, her body refusing to rise.
"I'll make you pay for this."
Toph's shoulders shook once, a sound escaping her that was not quite a laugh. "We'll see."
Ivy's teeth ground together. She threw her weight forward, her spine snapping straight, her hands reaching for the wall to pull herself up. The movement tore a sound from her throat, raw and furious, and she hung there for a moment, half-crouched, her legs trembling beneath her.
"I can still take you right here in these tunnels."
Toph had already found her position, her back against the stone, her feet buried in the mud she had drawn up from the water table below. Her fingers worked something from her ear, her head tilted, her body loose in a way that spoke of complete comfort with the floor as mattress.
"Stop embarrassing yourself." She flicked whatever she had found into the dark. "You can't even stand properly right now."
Ivy's legs gave out. She sank back onto the dirt rise, her hands clutching her ribs, her breath coming in shallow bursts that she tried to silence. The chamber settled around them, the stone breathing its slow ancient rhythm, the water moving somewhere below.
Toph's chest rose and fell in the pattern of sleep, her head lolling to one side, a soft sound escaping her mouth that was almost a snore. Ivy watched her, or watched the shape of her in the dark, and she knew the sleep was not complete. Toph's feet twitched against the mud, her toes curling and releasing, reading every vibration that passed through the stone within reach. The snoring was a lie, or a habit, or both.
Ivy settled against the wall and let her body do what it had been designed to do. The chemicals in her blood worked, her cells knitting, the bruises fading from purple to yellow beneath her skin. She conserved what she could, her breath slowing, her heartbeat dropping into a rhythm that matched the stone. She would need strength for the morning, for whatever came next, for the argument that waited.
Sleep took her without permission.
-0-
Ivy woke to smoke and heat and the smell of something burning that reminded her of campfires in Robinson Park. She stirred, her body stiff, her ribs still tender but functional, and she found Toph standing in the center of the chamber with her legs spread wide, her knees bent, her arms loose at her sides. The stance of combat, or meditation, or both. Her eyes were closed, her ears turned toward the ceiling, and her mouth stretched in a grin that seemed to occupy her entire face.
"Oh, hi Ivy." Toph did not turn. "I'm watching the smiling clown blow up your vines."
Ivy pushed herself upright, her hand finding the wall for balance. "What?"
"Your vines. The green covering the city." Toph's head tilted, her grin widening. "You said he was called the Joker? I'm surprised he hasn't blown himself up yet."
She rose from the stance, her spine straightening, her arms reaching overhead until her fingers brushed the stone ceiling. She stretched, her body extending, the adult frame showing its full length.
"This city has always provided the best entertainment." She dropped her arms and turned toward Ivy, her feet finding the mud again. "But it's time to leave now."
She stood with her hands on her hips, her weight shifted to one leg, and she asked the question as if the answer was already certain.
"You coming?"
Ivy had gathered herself, her legs holding, her ribs manageable. She could stand. She could walk. The energy in her veins was low, her body running on reserves, but she was functional. She looked at Toph, at the mud on her feet, the dried blood on her chin, the casual posture that suggested nothing had happened between them.
Toph reached into the shadows and pulled out two shapes, dark and elongated, turning them over a heat she had coaxed from stone striking stone. Roasted rats, their skin blackened, their fat dripping into the dirt.
"You must be hungry." Toph held one out, the larger of the two, her arm extended toward Ivy's position. "Take the bigger one."
Ivy's hand shot out and knocked the rat from Toph's grip. It hit the wall with a wet sound and fell into the mud.
Toph's face contorted, her mouth opening, her brows drawing down. "Hey. That was big meat."
"You're blind, not stupid."
Toph's head tilted, her expression shifting from offense to something closer to puzzlement. "Why are you still grumpy?"
Ivy's breath caught in her chest. She felt her lungs seize, her throat tighten, and the sound that came out was not words but air forced through a too-small opening, a sharp exhale that carried everything she could not yet say.
"Why am I?" She found her voice, or something close to it, the pitch rising, cracking. "Why--" Another exhale, sharper, her hand rising to press against her ribs as if holding herself together. "Have you forgotten what you did to me?"
She stepped toward Toph, her legs unsteady but carrying her, her finger pointing though Toph could not see it.
"Turning on me. Locking me up in a cone. The repeated assault." Each word landed like a thrown stone. "It all happened yesterday, Toph. And now, now you want us to go back to playing house and eating rats like none of it ever happened?"
Toph had bent to retrieve the rat from the mud. She held it in both hands, brushing dirt from the charred skin, and she spoke without looking up.
"Stop being a delicate flower, Ivy." She bit into the meat, tearing a strip free, her jaw working. "You're tough enough to strangle Gotham with vines. You can take a few hits and move on like it never happened."
Ivy's tongue pressed against the roof of her mouth. Her anger sat in her chest, heavy and familiar, but something else moved beneath it, something she could not name, a confusion that made her hands shake. She had known Toph for a month. A month of tunnels and rats and stances and silence. Why did the betrayal still ache like a rib that would not heal?
Toph had already moved on, her teeth pulling meat from bone, her other hand reaching for the second rat. She spoke around the mouthful, her voice muffled.
"No meat for the picky princess."
Ivy felt her stomach twitch, a contraction that traveled up into her throat. She stopped it, her hand pressing against her abdomen, her teeth closing on the sound that wanted to escape. She would not. She would not want this.
A sound came out of her anyway, hollow, almost breathless, rising from her chest without her permission. She felt her face shift, her mouth pulling at corners she could not control, and she heard herself ask the question as if from outside her own body.
"What have I become?"
Toph's grin returned, meat juice running down her chin. "I turned you into a monster that destroys a city." The sound that followed was not a laugh but something lighter, a hihihi that escaped around the bone in her hands. She pulled the last of the meat free and crushed the skeleton in her fist, the bones snapping with a sound like dry twigs.
"I don't know where this crybaby version is coming from." She turned the crushed bones over in her palm. "I'll hammer it out of you is I have to."
Ivy went still. The chamber held its breath, or she held hers, and when she spoke her voice was low, measured, each word placed with care.
"Apologize."
Toph's hands stopped moving. The bones sat in her palm, forgotten. "What?"
"Say sorry." Ivy's voice rose, not much, but enough to carry. "For stabbing me in the back. And promise to never do it again."
Toph was quiet. The bones in her hand shifted, settling. She folded her fingers over them and turned her face away, toward the wall, her shoulders drawing in.
"No." The word came flat, final. "I didn't do anything wrong."
"I know it was the Parliament's doing but--"
"Then if you know that, stop asking me to--"
Toph's hands spread, palms open, the gesture one of offering and refusal at once. Ivy watched the shape of it in the dark.
"Stop asking you what?"
Toph's arms dropped to her sides. "To apologize for something I didn't do."
Ivy felt something shift in her chest, a loosening she had not expected. She pressed her lips together, holding it back, and then she let it go.
"Aha." The sound was small, almost private. "There. You said it."
Toph's head turned, her brows drawing down. "No I did not."
"You did." Ivy's voice carried something that was not quite triumph, not quite warmth. "I heard it. And I forgive you, Toph." She paused, letting the words settle. "Just don't do it ever again."
"I did not apologize."
"You can't stop yourself, can you?" Ivy's shoulders shook, a sound escaping her that was closer to the hollow laugh from before, but softer. "I've already forgiven you. Stop saying sorry."
Toph's body went rigid. Her hands found the bones in her lap and crushed them further, the fragments grinding against each other. She threw them into the dark and they scattered against stone.
"I don't say sorry to anyone."
"You just can't help it, can you," Ivy pulled her knees toward her chest, her body folding into a shape that was almost comfortable. "Every time you open your mouth, there it is."
Toph's arm rose, her finger pointing toward Ivy's voice, and she opened her mouth to speak.
"I did not--"
"You did." Ivy's head fell back against the wall, her eyes closing, her body loose. "Keep talking. I'll have a full confession by noon."
Toph's mouth worked, her lips pressing together, her teeth grinding.
"I-- grhh!"
"You're sorry," Ivy finished for her, her voice carrying the word like a gift. "I know."
Toph sat with,her shoulders hunched, and buried her feet in the mud.
Ivy's breathing slowed, her body settling into the dirt rise, her cells still working, her strength returning. She kept her eyes closed.
Thanks for reading. I also have advance chapters if you want to read ahead. I've also scheduled all posts for this week, to Friday, don't miss a day!