Disclaimer: I do not own Avatar, its characters, designs etc. Those are © Mike and Bryan, and Nickelodeon. Li Feng, Ikkuma, Kaya (the younger) and other original characters are © me, Lady Asvin.
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"Kaya! It's time for dinner. Do you want to go get daddy and Ikkuma?" The little girl smiled toothily, bright hazel eyes gleaming.
"Ok, mama!" Suki helped the wriggling almost-two-year-old into a parka that was much too big for her, stuffing the girl's glossy chestnut curls into the fur-lined hood.
"Now, go get daddy!" She waddled quickly out the door of the hut, looking for all the world like a possessed parka. Suki stifled a giggle, turning instead to stoke the fire heating up the rack where the fish dumplings were warming. A cool stone bumped against her collarbone when she righted herself; putting a hand to the stone, a worn smile played around her lips.
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Two years earlier.
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"Suki… you should have told me something. Anything," he began, interlacing his fingers with hers. Sighing, he pressed her captive hand to his cheek. "I would have gone back to kill the man that did this to you!" He pulled apart from her and shifted nearer to the coal bucket. "Why didn't you tell me?" The Kyoshi girl pressed her eyes closed and wet her lips nervously.
"I… I didn't know," she said faintly. "I didn't know how you would react." Sokka turned to look at her, his face a mask of disbelief.
"Suki – I asked you to marry me," stressed the boy. He recaptured her hand and kissed it. "Maybe it would have been different if you had fallen in love with someone else-" his voice went very quiet – "but that isn't what happened." He let go of her hand to put his warm one on her slightly protruding belly. Suki tentatively imitated the gesture, putting her hand over his, delighted when a sound kick responded to the warmth. Sokka squared his shoulders and looked at her.
"These children deserve to grow up feeling loved and wanted," he said. Usually the one with the jokes, Sokka was now painfully sober. "I know what it's like to grow up without having parents around too much," he explained. "I wouldn't wish that on anyone." His blue eyes bored into hers; all of the pain, the secrecy, the tears – it all came down to this. The Kyoshi warrior squeaked in surprise as Sokka abruptly drew her into a tight embrace.
"If you'll still have me," he whispered hoarsely, "I'd like the chance to be a good father to your children." Suki began to cry, sobbing silently into Sokka's shoulders. Maybe, she thought, maybe everything will come out all right.
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Present.
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She snapped out of it as the door to the hut crunched shut. Sokka walked in, Kaya in his arms and Ikkuma clinging to his boot; the sight made Suki grin.
"Ikkuma got a fish! Show your mother, Kuma." The little boy disengaged himself from Sokka's leg and ran to Suki, pulling from his parka something wrapped in sheets of seaweed. He ripped off one of the sheets to reveal a tiny, twitching grouper-salmon. Suki fought the urge to pinch her nose against the smell of the dying fish, and leaned down to kiss her son on the forehead.
"All right everyone. Clean hands and faces, then food!" Sokka groaned, but threw off his parka and helped the children out of theirs. Ikkuma's ponytail got stuck in his hood, and for a hilarious moment he waddled around frantically, blinded by the fur lining. Sokka led the way to the well in the back lean-to of the hut, and broke the ice covering the opening to ladle out water.
"D- daddy, it's c-c-cold," said Kaya, scrubbing her hands quickly and rushing to dry them on a strip of homespun. She began to walk out of the room, only to be pelted by a soggy washcloth.
"Mommy said faces, too!" cried Ikkuma, and Kaya grumblingly scrubbed her cheeks, turning them bright red. The trio trooped back into the main room, sniffing the steaming bowls of seaweed soup.
"Aw, yes!" whooped Sokka, noticing a fish dumpling in the broth. "You outdid yourself this time, Suki." The girl smiled, ladling out a last bowl for herself.
"Dig in, guys." The hut was filled with the sounds of chewing and slurping, and the occasional satisfied sigh from one of the happy munchers. Suki got up when Kaya yawned.
"Help me put them to bed?" she asked Sokka quietly, and he nodded and picked up Ikkuma from the pelt where he had dozed off. They took the children into another room, separated from the main room by a hanging curtain of animal skins. Covering them with quilts, Suki and Sokka made sure that not a single draft could enter their warm cocoon. He put his arm around Suki's waist; it was thicker than it had been when he'd met her, but other than that and a few under-eye shadows between them, nothing had changed.
"They're beautiful," he said to her, serious for once in his life. He met her gaze. "Just like their mother." Tears collected in the corners of Suki's eyes, and she leaned her head against his shoulder. In another life, Suki would still have been a child; at eighteen, she should have been a child. Even through the painful and unexpected, however, she had found a friend and a rock, someone she could depend on. She had found someone that would love her unconditionally... and love them unconditionally, like they deserve. She looked up to him.
"Thank you," she whispered, wiping her unshed tears with a sleeve. Sokka smiled, and poked her shoulder.
"Let's clean up. I have fish to salt." And together, the youngest parents in the Water Tribe turned around and prepared for another day of life in the aftermath of war.