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At the Garibah tree, something unusual was happening. For one thing, Marco had decided to visit, and he never bothered with the tree unless he needed to talk to Ax or Tobias. For another thing, Marco had a rather odd object with him.

Somehow, Marco had managed to find a birdie perch. And not just any birdie perch. It was quite possibly the most ridiculous birdie perch in the history of the multiverse. And Marco was currently dragging it over to a spot near the tree that had relatively less grass, and setting it up.

Standing the birdie perch up straight, Marco then took out a hammer and four very, very long nails which he had also managed to find, and sat down next to the perch and began hammering each nail around the base of the perch. Which should at least keep it from moving around or getting knocked over. Sure, it wasn't so study that it couldn't be dislodged with some actual effort, like say, Tobias morphing polar bear and running over it in an angry rampage. But really, Tobias should realise that not removing the birdie perch was in his best interests. Because if that happened, Marco would then be forced to go and find one that was even uglier.

When he was finished, Marco stood up and surveyed his handiwork with a smirk on his face.

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Marco, Zuko likes the Garibah tree. It's naturey and comforting and reminds him more of home than anyplace else in this crazy joint, so he is watching your actions darn closely.

"What are you doing."

Marco wasn't touching the Garibah tree. See, look - there's a whole metre inbetween the birdie perch and said tree.

"Redecorating," Marco said.

Hence why no fire is being thrown. Yet.

"Why."

"Because the tree needs something to look at. Duh."

Well. Really it was for Tobias. But no way was Marco going to say that. That might give out the completely wrong impression that Marco was being nice.

"That doesn't even make any sense."

Zuko demands that you start making sense right now!

"Does that thing even have a purpose?"

"Shh, the tree might hear you. And then if it realises that it doesn't have eyes and can't see anything it'll feel sad."

Sorry, you probably won't get much sense out of Marco. Especially since he's beginning to twig that you might be a really fun person to needle.

"Course it does," Marco said, not explaining anything at all.

Zuko frowns. On some level, he's beginning to suspect that Marco might suspect that he is a fun person to irritate, and the worst part is, nothing he does from here on out will do anything to refute that idea. He's doomed.

"What is it?"

In a city of concrete and glass, and on a living ship where the walls were part of their host, Rhiow was discovering regrettably few places to groom her claws - they sorely needed sharpening.

So when the young ehhif boy near the strangely living tree (the one that she had been told very emphatically she was not to sharpen her claws on) started nailing a large wooden stick into the ground, one with amazingly colorful and fun dangling toys on it, she trotted right up to him, pleased.

"How incredibly thoughtful of you," she said absently, not paying attention at all to the kind of reaction she could elicit, and began sharpening her claws on it.

Yes. Yes you are.

"What, can't you tell?" Marco said with a needling grin. Why yes, he was going to be annoying and avoid actually explain what the thing was.

Marco's first thought was that Tobias must have decided to morph a cat just to pull some kind of epic reverse-joke on him - except that didn't sound anything like Tobias (unless Tobias has suddenly turned into a girl. Which technically was possible...). And come to think of it, that didn't sound anything like thought-speak either.

He blinked. Okay. There was a cat. It was talking. It was apparently not someone who had morphed a cat. Yup. Just another day in the insanity that was now Marco's life.

"So," he said, eying the cat. "You must be a dirty bird then."

What? Just because it was a can didn't mean Marco couldn't make fun of it.

Rhiow's ears flicked as she glanced down at the English around the base of the perch and put her whiskers forward in amusement. "Young man, you should probably get your eyes checked. This is clearly a scratching post."

Sharpen, sharpen, sharpen. She's proving it, see.

Meanwhile, Marco was wondering how the hell he had gotten himself into a conversation with a cat. Really, it was even sillier than Cassie and her whole "talking whales" thing.

"Well. Don't blame be when you get eaten by a territorial hawk," Marco said. Not that Tobias would try to eat a cat. Still, the idea of Tobias and some cat battling it out for ownership of a really ugly birdie perch was rather amusing.

< A talking cat...intersting. At least, a talking cat that isn't using thought-speech. > It wasn't someone in morph, that was for sure. Animal morphs, aside from parrots, didn't speak.

He only noticed the perch afterward. < And what exactly is that thing? > He turned his attention to Marco.

Rhiow sniffed, flipping her tail at Marco. She finished sharpening her claws and began to groom herself in his general direction. "The Princes of the Air don't bother with the People - we give them too much fight for us to be worth it."

Marco snorted at the cat's 'Princes of the Air' thing. "Hear that Tobias? Apparently, you're a 'Prince'. You must have forgotten your tiara."

With an amused glance back at the cat, he decided to explain 'that thing'. "Well. I had thought it was a birdie perch. But apparently it is actually a cat scratching post that's just pretending to be a birdie perch."

Zuko narrows his eyes. Further.

"Skip the theatrics." He points at the tree. "I meditate there. A lot of people meditate there. A lot of people who aren't you. What is that thing, and why are you putting it there?"

He's no fun. No fun at all.

Marco rolled his eyes. "It's a birdie perch. Birds sit on it. Duh."

"For Tobias? Why didn't you just say so?"

"Because that wouldn't have been nearly so fun," Marco said with a smirk.

A fireball scorches the grass to cinders next to the bird perch before flaring out.

Yes, Marco, it did just come out of Zuko's fist.

"Consider that next time you feel like being funny."

And with that, Marco's on red alert, preparing to morph in a hurry if need be. But he keeps a unaffected exterior, and doesn't move.

"For someone who likes meditation, you're doing a pretty good job of destroying the place," he said coolly, watching Zuko closely to see what he'll do next.

"Ha ha. You think fire is easy to control? If I wasn't good at it, I'd set the whole tree on fire if I sneezed."

He's exaggerating, a little. Zuko would start a small fire that would spread. Azula's the one who would envelope the tree with one exhalation, but he's not admitting that to Marco.

"I didn't say you don't have control," Marco said calmly. "I said you're destroying the place. I'm sure everyone else who meditates here will be really happy to see that patch of burnt grass. So I guess you just deliberately and purposefully wanted to make some random destruction. Nice, real nice."

"It'll grow back."

He's gone through his katas here before.

"The only reason it was the grass and not your bird perch is because it's for Tobias. Who I have no problem with."

Though why he can't just sit in the tree, Zuko's not sure.

"Must be working real well then, that meditation thing," Marco said brightly. "Since you were so good about resisting the urge to destroy that for no good reason. Cause you know, me making fun of people is obviously so much worse than setting stuff on fire all the time."

"Your face is still in one piece, isn't it?"

And in point of fact, Zuko did come here to meditate, so down he sits at the Garibah tree's base. It loves him, even though he causes rampant destruction. Which he's not apologizing for.

By this point, Marco had concluded that this guy was just talking himself up. The kinda gut who thinks they're so tough, just because they were born with more muscles than everyone else. But upstairs, they got nothing.

So as far as Marco was concerned, this guy was clearly not worth his time. Well, other than for making fun of, of course. So Marco just snorted, and decided to ignore him.

It's funny that the opposite is true - if by "muscles" you mean "natural firebending talent" - but Zuko is content to ignore Marco right back, especially if Marco isn't making any more attempts at irking him.

That was kind of his intention, after all, so he meditates, satisfied for the time.

< Shall I be like Jake and tell her not to call me 'prince'? > he asked privately with a laugh. < It's...scary. Just...bad. > He was trying not to laugh as he said it. < And extremely funny. >

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