2.8 Journey to the Fire Nation

Hell yes, that’s an Avatar reference. My brother has me back in the habit of watching morning cartoons, so I’ve been getting through two episodes on Netflix every day while I eat my dinosaur egg oatmeal.

I’m off to teach kids how to play Quidditch in an hour or so, but we’ll see how much of this I can get through in the meantime.

(My life isn’t always this awesome, I swear.)

Looks like these losers have been living it up pretty good, too. Lots of slacking off and childish games and shit.

Tommy: Dad, we’ve been at this all day. Can I please go to bed now?

Razor: No, son. I must train hard if I wish to be a martial arts master. And, uh, you may have to help me uncrick my neck.

Neck uncricked, Razor abandoned his training regime to go and cuddle his favourite kid.

Razor: Don’t be stupid, I love Katana and Tomahawk just as much.

Lance: Oh Daddy, you so dewusional.

 

Pictured above is Ara’s eighteenth (or something) round of visiting every fishing lot in town, hoping to find that damn unicorn. I was so downhearted by this point that I sat staring at this very frame for a good fifteen seconds before I spotted that glowing miracle in the background. Quick, toss your book in the lake and go feed it carrots!

Myra: I do enjoy a good carrot.

Ara: Excellent. Would you like to be my—

Myra: Nope, just here for the food.

Dang it.

The newly-gigantic age gap between the girls introduced an interesting dynamic to their relationship.

Lance: Wooks wike somebody’s old enough to change my diapers now!

Katana: You can drown in your shit for all I care, brat.

But it was not to last long, because Lance had a birthday the very same night.

Lance: It’s k, I’mma gwow up super gorgeous and steal aaallll da attention from EVWYONE.

Katana’s chicken legs: We’ll see about that.

Orrrrr maybe we won’t? I am slipping on this whole documentation thing. If I were a journalist, I would be fired.

Instead of what you wanted to see, here’s a picture of Tomahawk getting confused over his homework.

Tommy: Just pondering the question — is this thing radioactive and will it give me superpowers?

And another of Arabella leaving the grocery store after investing $7,000 in a partnership!

I like to think we are now super-savvy business investors. Each of you needs to start carrying a briefcase., stat.

Ara: Only if it is pink.

And one last shot of Katana dissolving into a homicidal rage because a glitch was preventing her from microwaving tofu dogs.

Katana: This. Is. An. Outrage.

Here she is, finally! Lance rolled Technophobe upon aging up.

Lance: I don’t understand this advanced futuristic technology!

Katana: It’s a chair, you moron.

Lance: Daddy, why are there so many dirty dishes everywhere?

Razor: You’re quite welcome to clean them up.

Lance: And use the mean, scary dishwasher? I don’t think so!

And so she went out to be comforted by Lionheart, who had finally made it out the other end of Grey Wind. Or, in reality, made it back on camera after I inexplicably ignored him.

Lance: Hey little kitty, do me a favour and take this watch off? I don’t know why the overlord gave it to me when it obviously conflicts with my personality.

(Pffft, a minor mistake.)

Lionheart: Not sure I got the dexterity for that, hon, but I can scratch it until it breaks. I’m real good at that.

I could see these two becoming BFFs.

Sadly, Lance does not get along so well with all the pets.

Larka: HADOUKEN!

Lance: Wha—huh?

(You may have noticed my vain attempt to prettify Larka. Hey, I’m not a big fan of bull terriers. :P)

Back inside, Ara was experiencing some confusion over what she was having for lunch.

Ara: Is it hot dog, or is it pancake batter? Oh how I love shards of plastic in my face.

And Lance decided to brave the dishwasher.

Lance: Just… a bit… farther…

Ara: No wonder you find it scary, child. You don’t have to climb into the blasted thing.

Now for a bit of an update on our exponentially growing population of lawn creatures, since we’ve got them all in one place. Penelop is now an elder and has a son named Denners. The freezer bunnies are Torik, Florik, Baz and Bethany, and our canine pals are Plerp, Gerp, and Berp. All on a quest to retrieve their stolen gold from the dragon Smaug.

Five seconds after taking this photograph, I realized how valuable these guys were and sold Florik so the family could go to China.

And so, here they are on their first-ever family vacation!

Tommy: Mom!

Ara: Tommy?

Razor: Lance!

Lance: Daddy?

Katana: DONKEY!

Only Razor had a distinct purpose for being there, but I wanted a “fun for the whole family” kind of vacation, so I sent everyone off on their own mini-missions.

Lance: Hey Katty, where are you going?

Katana: None of your business, twerps. Have fun on your tricycles.

I quickly discovered that there is very little for two children to do in Shang Simla. But they can, apparently, make sandcastles out of limestone paving.

Tommy: More like cakes than castles. I could just gobble it up, couldn’t you?

Lance: No. But you go ahead and try.

Tommy: Nah, screw that. HULK SMASH!

Lance: Gosh, Tommy, you are such a desk sometimes.

Meanwhile, it was straight to the Academy for Razor. A few matches against some mighty blue belts and he was already climbing up the ranks again.

Razor: Smell my putrid purple socks, foe!

Maia: Eek! Get it away!

Razor: Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think this is proper post-match protocol.

Maia: No really, I’m feeling lightheaded from the fumes.

Well, he has worn those socks (which I didn’t put on him, for the record) through every match and training session since he started. It’s possible they might be a little rancid by now.

 

But it hasn’t stopped him from getting requests like these from his sparring opponents.

Not that he would ever accept them when he’s happily married to this.

Ara: (typing) “You… will find yourself… in the midst of a very large… pie.” Oh, how his amuses me.

Besides creating incredibly insightful fortune cookies, Ara had a pretty unfulfilling China adventure. She spent most of it hunting for those stupid bugs that like to hide in the hills and only emerge for like a millisecond every hour. I did have her try out some excavation for the first time ever, which amused me mainly because she was so inaptly dressed for it.

Ara: Please, our clothes can’t even get dirty in this game.

Let’s get you electrocuted and test that one out. >:)

Dun dun dun, mystery time! There’s somebody standing at the top of the tower… who ever could it be?

If you guessed “a surly Lance who’s all irked because I won’t let her play with her IF,” you’re right!

On to our other resident grump now. Like her mother, Katana spent a few days running errands for random townspeople. She was slightly more successful on that front.

Katana: So I brought you the rocks you wanted, Mr. Lu. Could I get those simoleons now?

Jiang: Ah, yes… soon, my dear.

Jiang: First you must marry my son, Jimminy-Bob!

Katana: You gotta be kidding me.

She got out of there as fast as she could.

Meanwhile, back at base camp…

Tommy: So about this new look of yours, sis. It’s, uh, not working too well for ya.

Lance: Like I’d take fashion advice from you, Mr. Two Earrings and a Rashguard.

Despite the way I’ve written them so far, these two actually do get along. They’re often partners in crime, getting up to shenanigans like this while the adults are out sparring/adventuring.

Tommy: Isn’t this great, Lance? We could never do this at home!

Lance: Actually, yeah, we could.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the next trait Katana rolled was “Dislikes Children.” I mean, clashing with your little brother and sister is one thing, but then there’s this…

Katana: Boo, lady! Your daughter sucks! You should never have procreated!

Lady: Step away from the crazy woman, Gertrude. These Legacy Tourists are extremely unpredictable.

You can say that again.

Lance: If I stick my thumbs in far enough, do you think I could pop out my eyeballs?

Let’s not find out, please.

After that, I gathered that the kids were probably bored to death and sent them out again in search of activities.

Lance: This sucks. I’m cold. I wanna go back to the mirror.

Fine, just make sure to extinguish the torch and say “the tribe has spoken” on your way out. 😉

Once she got sick of chasing bugs and rocks, Katana decided to take her adventures to the next level. Well, the next level down, that is. Because she was exploring tombs and all that.

Katana: Shut up and let me do my thing.

“Do her thing” she did. And I certainly am not complaining.

But eventually the gold piles became sparser and all she had to look upon were these.

Katara Katana: The previous incarnations of the Avatar!

(Is it just me, or is this legacy becoming a big game of “guess what pop culture kick Sam is currently on”?)

Katana was so enchanted with her little expedition that she rolled “Seasoned Traveller” (max visa for every location) as her LTW. I accepted it. Yeah, it’s gonna be a pain in the butt to fulfill but I am overly ambitious sometimes. She’ll probably go to France like once and then I’ll give up. 😛

Katana: Lion turtles?

Okay, I’m done.

After that life-changing mission, she returned home to begin learning the sacred art that courses strong in her veins.

Katana: Whoop-dee-doo.

Just so Tommy could fulfill a wish he’d had locked in since the beginning of the trip. Man, I love this kid.

Tommy: Prime view of the porcelain throne! Sweet!

While Lance was being stalked by a troupe of Australian tourists vying to read her a bedtime story.

Tourist: No worries, darl, we just wanna follow you to bed is all.

Mother and daughter had some quality time at the kitchen table.

Katana: Mom, why does everyone like Tommy and Lance better than me?

Ara: I am not sure, honey. Perhaps because they don’t put poison in sweets and pull hearts out of dogs.

 

Funny thing is, people don’t actually like Lance. This screencap was taken after two days of her hanging out at base camp.

Her grandfather would be proud.

But this girl’s wouldn’t. You know those chicks who go to the gym purely to show off? Yeah… ‘nuff said.

Before you read any further, make sure you put this music on. It is completely essential to the remaining quarter of the chapter because it is fucking epic and my writing is not.

After several days of sparring, Razor emerged from his tent (still entirely asleep) to face what could potentially be his last day of matches.

Razor: Unnggghh.

He had only one rank to go, and his opponents were getting tougher and tougher.

Guy: Dude, what happened to your face?

Razor: Funny, I could ask you the same thing.

Guy: What? Nothing happened to my—

*BASH*

Between matches, he continued to charm his female peers without really trying.

Mr. Stink: Hey now, what’s he got that I don’t?

Look at yourself, man. You want to go home and rethink your life.

Mr. Stink: I want to go home and rethink my life.

But Razor was a fair warrior and showed no mercy to any opponent, gooey-eyed or otherwise.

(Yeah, I made a gif. No big deal.)

Until he was faced with an unusual adversary: an old, frail woman named Abi Yat Sen. This posed a particular challenge to his sparring ethics.

Razor: I will try not to make your defeat too painful.

Abi: Please, do not hold back on my account.

Razor: Okay then, I w—

Abi: Foolish boy. I would break your face, but it appears somebody has done that already.

Razor: Well shit.

I will spare you the graphic details, but Razor got his ass handed to him several times before finally snagging a victory.

Abi: You seem surprised.

I am kind of starting to worship you right now.

And so our heir retreated into a (hungry?) tent for the night.

He emerged, refreshed and melty-faced, and stepped into the Academy for another shot at his “last day.” Inside, Abi Yat Sen was whipping some young stud into shape.

Abi: Move those legs, fatty! Feel the burn!

Razor: Dear lord, the woman’s an army sergeant.

Guy: You don’t know the legend of the great Abitar? (Hurr hurr.) You mustn’t be from around here.

Razor: Damn straight, you mudsplatter. My hits are out of this world.

Guy: Ugh, I hate when they open with lame puns.

With this guy out of the way, it was on to his final opponent…

And really, who else could it be?

Razor: Come on, my limbs are flailing in every possible direction and I’m still not hitting you!

Abitar: Your method is sloppy, young greenhorn. A warrior must keep his energy focused.

Abitar: This is what I call the Majestic Ape.

Razor: Yeah? Well this is what I call the FOOT IN THE FACE.

Abitar: Oh dear, so predictable.

They sparred and sparred until Razor reeked of humiliation and failure. Abi Yat Sen was certainly a woman to be reckoned with, to say the least.

Razor: I will get you this time, old woman. Here in the library, I shall end this once and for all.

Abi: We shall see.

And so…

Wait, what?

RAZOR WTF WHY ARE YOU STANDING IN A HILL ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE COUNTRY OMFG YOU IMBECILE.

Yeah, so uh, the Langurds kind of got stuck in China. I’d heard WA could be buggy, but I’d never really seen it until now. Apparently I lost track of time during the epic showdown and forgot that the vacation was running out, and then there were some funky teleportations and disappearances and stuff because Razor’s tent was still set up at the Academy, preventing the family from going home. I was completely terrified for a good ten minutes before I figured out that that was the cause.

The good news is, everybody survived! The tent had to be permanently deleted, but I have no doubt that some money-giving glitch will make up for it in the near future.

The bad news is, Razor never finished his duel with the Abitar. Which means he’ll have to return one final time to complete his LTW, probably as an old man. But hey, at least they’ll be on an even playing field then.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Aaaaaand cut. I didn’t make it through this whole thing in the hour before the Quidditch demo… I actually have been working on it for a couple of days now. But shhh, you didn’t hear that. I am obviously an utter speed demon when it comes to churning out legacy chapters.

As always, it’s a pleasure to see your lovely faces (you know, figuratively). Good luck to those of you heading back to school and such, and Happy Simming to all!

-Sam

P.S. Will I ever come up with a more creative sign-off phrase? Probably not.

P.P.S. I actually didn’t upload this when I intended to, so now it’s the eve of back-to-school day and I am totally in denial. I feel like my writing skills are in shape because I’ve been doing these updates all summer, but wait until it’s critical theory essays and French compositions. I’ll probably come cowering back every week to console myself with this inconsequential, low-effort writing. But hey, I don’t have a problem with that if it means I get more chapters out! 😀 (And neglect my grades in the process…)

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