Disclaimer: Avatar: The Last Airbender, its characters and universe belong to Michael Dante DiMartino, Bryan Konietzko and Nickelodeon. I'm only a fan, writing this for love of this TV show and personal pleasure.
Summary: Zuko had thought that helping Katara track down and face her mother's killer would solve this situation between them, but when did things ever go right or easy for him? Surprisingly a conversation, or rather, a confrontation when they arrive on Ember Island seems to put them on the right path. Set during The Southern Raiders.
A.N.: I have the biggest girl-crush on Katara, she's one of my all-time favourite female badass characters. Now although I loved the episode, I always felt like The Southern Raiders suddenly deviated from Katara's genuine reasons for hating Zuko with the plot about her mother and somehow her forgiving him at the end of the episode didn't make a whole lot of sense to me. This is me trying to fill in the gaps and also throw in some Kataang in there because I can't help myself.
Letting Out and Letting Go
Katara couldn't believe it. She'd finally confronted the monster who'd killed her mother. After years having nightmares about it and wondering what she'd do if she were ever presented with this opportunity, Zuko─of all people─had led her to the man who had irrevocably changed her life and effectively ended her childhood. And she got to show him just exactly who she was now. She wasn't that helpless, scared little girl anymore. She had the power in her hands. It felt both exhilarating and terrifying that she actually had so much power over him, that in her hands was the decision that would mean life or death.
She'd thought about it. She'd been this close, too. And honestly no one would really fault her for doing it. But then in the back of her mind she'd still heard those words.
'Please don't choose revenge. Let your anger out and then let it go. Forgive him.'
Aang and his damn Air nomad wise words. Katara had trembled with rage, as she wanted so badly to avenge her mother, to rid the world of this killer, this monster, this worthless shell of a man who'd then had the gall to offer his own mother's life in exchange of his own. It was almost laughable, how her mother had sacrificed her own life to save her yet he was all but throwing his mother at her mercy for his own sake. What kind of human being would do something like that?
In the end, she couldn't do it. She'd never know if it was because after confronting him she was able to let it all out and let it go, like Aang had said. Or if she was just too weak to do it. Or if she was strong enough and didn't want to stoop so low as to become the very thing that she hated. Or if it was simply because she didn't want to disappoint Aang, after all.
She'd been lost in her thoughts as she sat on Appa's saddle as they journeyed back when she suddenly realized Zuko was lowering them down as they flew over an island. Internal alarm bells started ringing madly inside of her, as this was not where they had left the others a couple of days before.
"Where are you taking us?" She jumped up and held onto the saddle, turning with a frown to him, even as she tried scouting the area and see if she could recognize where they were.
"I thought of a place we could use to hide out," Zuko said as he replied over his shoulder. "There's an empty house on a remote part of this island. It would beat setting up camps and running from my sister, as she'd never think to look for us here. I just wanted to take a look before going to get the others."
Zuko swiftly led Appa to land down on a beach, and looking up Katara could indeed see a big, isolated house on the hill overlooking the ocean. "Is this a trick?" She questioned him, a hard frown on her face as she flexed her hands, ready to attack him at a moment's notice, already feeling the push and pull of the currents pulsing in her veins.
"Are you kidding me right now?" Zuko turned with wide eyes to her, as he got up from Appa's neck and joined her at the saddle, even as she took a few steps backwards to keep some distance between them. "After all of this, you still won't trust me?" He couldn't hide the hurt in his voice as he gestured wildly with his hands, trying to convey with gestures that he was open and that attacking her wasn't in his plans.
"I'm sorry, but I trusted you before, then you betrayed us and Aang almost died because of that," Katara replied forcefully, staring him down and standing her ground. "As a matter of fact, he did die! The only reason I was able to get him back was because I had the spirit water to heal him. The same spirit water that I almost used on you and your scar, so forgive me if I'm still a little reluctant to accept you as part of our group or that I have unresolved anger and trust issues that this little excursion to avenge my mother's death didn't suddenly clear away!"
She was breathing heavily as she finished saying─really, shouting─all of that and the silence surrounding them then was deafening, only the sound of the waves filling in the void left by her voice. They just stood and stared at each other, as her words seemed to almost physically hang between them and keep them in place. Katara had no idea where all of that had come from, but she'd never been one to hold her tongue when it came to Zuko, really.
"Oh." Zuko said, and Katara narrowed her blue eyes sharply up at him at his tone. "I get it now."
"Get it what?" She countered, crossing her arms defiantly (and a little bit protectively), as she practically spat the words back at him.
Zuko paused for a moment. He didn't want her to start shouting at him again but now that he'd got her talking to him about what was really bothering her he couldn't back down. He didn't quite know how to start though, so he went with neutral and cryptic, to gauge her reaction. "Have you told him?"
"Told him what? How you betrayed us? He's well aware of that." She glared angrily at him, uncrossing her arms as her hands balled into fists and she had half a mind of unleashing an attack on him just because he was getting on her nerves.
"No, not that. Have you told Aang that you love him?" Zuko asked her softly, the beginnings of a smile almost tugging at the corner of his mouth. Had the situation not been so tense and if he'd been in better terms with Katara, he might have felt inclined to tease her about this. In a way, he actually was teasing her, as after spending weeks with the group now he was well aware of the fact that Aang and Katara were nothing more than friends━even if he could at times feel this weird tension between the two of them, but then Zuko couldn't really tell if that was because of his own presence in the group or because of something between Aang and Katara completely unrelated to him. Now he had a feeling it wasn't about him after all.
"What?" She drew back, almost physically recoiling with shock at his words. He had to hold himself back from laughing at her reaction, as she definitely wouldn't have appreciated it.
"You obviously do, otherwise you wouldn't feel so strongly about this." Zuko drawled out, crossing his arms almost nonchalantly over his chest.
"Of course, I love him," Katara recovered herself and retorted heatedly, rolling her eyes a little. She started to move away from him then, getting down from Appa's saddle and walking on the beach, drawing closer to the water almost unconsciously. "He knows that, from the very start I told him Sokka and I would be his family." She stared out at the water, the high noon sun shining brightly on the surface and nearly blinding her.
"No, that's not what I meant," Zuko countered firmly, slightly shaking his head as he followed her down and stood beside her, yet she refused to look at him and kept only facing forward.
He had no idea why he was pushing the argument, but it wasn't like Katara could actually hate him any more than she already did. In a way, knowing how she felt about him and how openly hostile she was towards him was sort of liberating. He could simply speak his mind and be done with it, there was no need to tiptoe around what he wanted to say. What she chose to make of that afterwards was her business, so he pressed on, determined to voice his sudden realization. "It's more than that. I get it now, the reason you hate me so much. When I told you about my mother and my scar, you could empathize with me and you wanted to help me. And yes, I did betray you, I don't deny that and that I had my part in how horribly things went that day. But if we hadn't been interrupted back in the cave in Ba Sing Se, you might have wasted the spirit water on me and you wouldn't have been able to save Aang's life. That's why you can't forgive me."
For some reason, hearing Zuko say the actual words and voice out loud what she'd been feeling and thinking for weeks, months now, drained some of her anger and nervous energy away. Katara hadn't talked about this with anyone, other than her very brief conversation with Aang after he'd first woken up at the Fire Nation captured warship. Sure, after fleeing Ba Sing Se she had told the others what had happened, of their confrontation with Azula and the Dai Li in the catacombs, of Zuko's betrayal and Iroh helping her escape with Aang's lifeless body. But she'd merely relayed the facts as they were, she never dwelled on how all of that made her feel. In a way, she hadn't needed to, as Sokka's propensive tendency to overtalk had kicked in then and he'd acted as their spokesperson (so to speak─insert eyeroll here) on their indignation and outrage at the situation. And afterwards… Well, no one seemed to want to revisit the topic, least of all Katara, as it was still too painful to even think about it.
But as Zuko pressed on the issue, acknowledged and actually addressed the situation, it was almost like he was validating her feelings. At least right now he didn't fault her for what she felt, he understood where all this anger and resentment came from. And in a way, it also forced her to face other feelings she'd been burying away, such as guilt and shame.
"You're right," Katara finally said, her frown softening somewhat and her voice quieter, her figure sagging a little as she seemed to deflate as she admitted this to him. "I always come back to that moment, and how it was actually my fault how we almost lost Aang that day."
"What are you talking about?" Now it was Zuko's turn to frown in confusion at her words. "You didn't do anything wrong, it was all my fault. Well, Azula played her part in that as well, obviously." He'd never want to take that credit away from her, he thought derisively.
"I know, and it's not rational, but I've been feeling guilty, thinking that if things had played out differently, just a tiny bit different even, he would have been gone for good. I just…" She paused, inhaling sharply in and letting out a shuddering breath as her eyes suddenly filled with tears. "I can't imagine what I would have done if I hadn't been able to save him that day. Seeing him stricken down by Azula like that, lifelessly falling down… I've never felt angrier and more desperate than in that moment."
"I remember. You water-bent a tsunami at us, it was so powerful that it took me quite a few moments to regain my bearings." Zuko smiled slightly down at her, no attempt to hide his admiration for her in his words. If anything, this little trip of theirs had confirmed something he'd suspected for quite a while now, that Katara was not someone to be messed with.
"I hadn't even planned on doing that," she admitted, shaking her head a little, her eyes far away as she seemed to revisit that moment in her mind. "I don't remember actually thinking about it, I just reacted. When I realized what I had done, I was already with Aang in my arms."
They paused for a moment, thinking about everything they'd said. It was weird yet somehow fitting that Zuko was the first person Katara was able to admit to having such thoughts and feelings. She was so used to being the steady, soothing one of their group, acting all motherly as Toph would now teasingly nag her all the time. Most of the time she tried to be calm and mature about things, as someone needed to be the voice of reason among Sokka's shenanigans, Aang's silliness and Toph's carelessness. It wasn't until Zuko joined them and threw her off-balance that she'd realized just how much she'd kept bottled up inside.
"So now every time you look at me you're reminded of that day and how you almost lost him because of my betrayal," Zuko recapitulated their situation with a slight sigh as he nodded at her, rubbing a hand on the back of his neck.
"It makes me so angry all the time. I hate feeling like this." Katara admitted, as she kept frowning thoughtfully up at him. "And it also scares me." She finished in a whisper.
"I understand," he nodded, not really looking at her but at the sand beneath his feet, as he crouched down and balanced his weight on his heels, holding his arms akimbo over his bent knees as he looked up at her. "But I had hoped that by now, especially after this trip, you'd understand that I am sorry, that I have nothing but good intentions and that I'd never do anything to betray your trust ever again." Zuko smiled tentatively up at her.
"I do. Sort of." Katara nodded seriously down at him, before rolling her eyes slightly to herself. "I guess I've been focusing on my anger at you, as it's easier to deal with that than everything else I'm feeling. I was used to hating you for so long, it's hard to change that."
"Okay, I can take that. Bring it on." Zuko said and she was surprised to look down at him and find him grinning at her. "As long as you know that I am on your side and I'll do anything I can to help you, Aang and the others."
"I appreciate it. But I need to let go of this, it's not fair to you." Or to all the others, she thought to herself, as they were forced to be in the crossfire of her bad mood and sharp comments and all the tension she'd been creating in the group lately. "I can't promise it will all magically go away, but talking to you about this has actually really helped, more than anything else." Katara offered him a small but genuine smile then.
Zuko nodded back at her, his grin fading to a calm smile of his own. "We can keep talking about it, anytime you want. I may not be as good with advices as Uncle, but I'll do what I can."
"Thank you." Katara appreciated the sentiment behind his words.
"And I know you didn't ask, but speaking of advice, you really should think about telling Aang about your feelings." Zuko said almost nonchalantly, standing up straight once more in one fluid motion and gazing out at the ocean.
"I can't think about that right now," Katara replied, blushing a little at his words and the candid way he was talking about her feelings for Aang, as if he already knew something that she didn't. She hadn't really stopped to think about all of this, she hadn't let herself do so. To her, everything was still too messy and confusing. If anything, she'd learned that each time she let her feelings cloud her judgement had come with near-fatal consequences: Jet's manipulation and Zuko's betrayal. She couldn't allow herself or Aang to loose sight of what was most important right now. "We're in the middle of a war and we need to prepare for the comet."
"The war and the comet are not going to change how you feel, believe me." Zuko said it with such conviction, his voice heavy with a cross of bitterness and regret that Katara couldn't help but tilt her head slightly in curiosity. The banished Prince noticed it and elaborated; it was only fair to open up to her after everything she'd told him. "I left Mai behind because I didn't want her to get involved in all of this, but I regret not talking to her and giving her a chance to understand me when she'd done nothing but support me. I should have trusted her instead of just leaving like that. I've hurt her deeply, yet she still saved my life, even going up against Azula. So my one hard-earned piece of wisdom and advice on this is that talking and knowing is better than wondering and regretting."
"I just…" Katara blinked up at his words, for a moment just opening and closing her mouth as no sounds came out. "I can't, not right now. If I do, and then I have to see him battle the Fire Lord and if…" She shook her head and closed her eyes tightly, unable to bring herself to say the unthinkable. "I just can't."
Zuko glanced down at her from the corner of his eye. Sometimes he forgot they were all still teenagers. Navigating this newfound world of feelings and relationships was already complicated enough, yet here they were going through all of this while also dealing with life and death consequences and thinking of the freedom of the world. It really didn't seem fair.
He decided to give her some space and quickly checked out that the summer house was as empty and untouched as when he'd come over all those weeks before. As he went down to the beach once more and found Katara still staring out at the water, Zuko realized he'd inadvertently caused more turmoil inside her. She then asked if he would mind going alone to pick up the others, as she wanted to be alone for a while and think about everything. Obviously, he agreed and she was right: It had been a couple of harrowing days for her. He only hoped that as they'd cleared the air between the two of them moving forward they'd be able to work together and get along so they could do their parts to end this war.