AN: I know this is the last day of Zutara Week, but I didn't even realize it was this week until a day or two in and then it took a couple more days for me to decide to actually do it. (I haven't written fic in over three years, and never for ATLA, so this is kind of exciting for me.)

Since I'm late to the party, I decided to do something kind of unconventional with the prompts. I'm starting with the final prompt (so technically I've got the day right for this one at least) and then shuffling the others around to get a multi-chaptered story plot out of them. So this fic will have seven chapters, each one somehow correlating with one of the prompts. I can't promise a chapter a day, since they are going to be longer than your typical prompt drabbles, but I'm going to try to get it out fairly quickly.

Happy Zutara Week 2018, everyone!

"You have to shift your feet as you move to the next form," Katara chided her students gently, demonstrating the footwork for them. "It balances the movement of your arms and keeps the flow of the water steady."

The three girls in front of her nodded somberly. "Sorry, Master Katara."

She smiled at them. "You don't need to be sorry. It was difficult for me at first, too."

"But you're such a good bender!" Aya protested.

"I didn't start out that way," Katara replied. "It took a lot of determination and practice, and I know all of you can do that."

After offering up a few more words of encouragement to her young pupils, Katara dismissed the class. She had held their attention for nearly an hour, and she knew they would start to get distracted if she kept them much longer. She preferred to end on a good note.

"Your tutoring seems to be going well," said a voice from behind her. She turned to see her own waterbending teacher standing in the doorway to the instruction space. "I've been told that your students are all quite taken with you."

Katara smiled. "Thank you. That's good to hear."

"It is," Pakku replied with a nod. "It seems I made a good choice in asking you to be a role model to these young girls. How is your own bending?"

She had been reluctant to mention anything to the older master, especially since he had entrusted her with his students, but in the case of a direct question, she supposed she ought to be honest. Maybe he could help.

"It's actually been kind of strange recently," she said, pulling some water from the nearby fountain and coiling it into a spiral above her hand. The movement of the liquid felt slow, like she was guiding it through mud instead of air. "I haven't had any problems doing anything, but it feels very sluggish. Almost like my bending is tired, even when I'm not."

Pakku frowned. "That is odd. Perhaps it is a problem within your chi? After all, our bending is directly correlated with our spiritual energies."

"That's true," she agreed. She had been feeling restless recently, but she had assumed it was simply a side effect of spending a few months in one place after traveling for so long. "I promise it hasn't affected my teaching, though."

His smile told her that he hadn't thought anything of the sort. "I am sure you are still a perfectly fit instructor, Katara, but it's a shame that Yugoda chose to stay in the north. She is much more knowledgeable of our body's chi patterns than I am."

"I'm sure it's not urgent. I can write to her." She guided the water back into the fountain, encountering the same strain she had when she pulled it out. "I should go get some rest. Thank you for your advice."

"Of course," he replied. "I can only hope Yugoda's is more helpful."

She bowed her head to him briefly before exiting the space, already beginning to draft a letter in her head as she headed home.

Zuko huffed out a frustrated sigh as he glared down at the trade agreement in front of him. It didn't make any sense, no matter how many times he read it.

As he stared at the paper, he realized that he was squinting at the letters. It had begun to get dark while he had been laboring over the agreement, and he had long since told the servants that there was no need to send someone in to light the lamps in his study when he could do it himself without even getting up.

Focusing briefly on the wicks of the lamps in order to ignite them, he felt an uncomfortable twinge in his abdomen. The flames stuttered as they came to life.

He frowned. That wasn't the first time that had happened, but it did seem to be getting worse. The twinge of pain always occurred somewhere in the vicinity of the scar he had received from Azula's lightning, and it always happened while he was bending. He knew he should mention it to someone — his uncle or Aang would both be good candidates, or even the palace physician — but he had been so busy that it kept slipping his mind until it happened again.

It was probably just stress, anyway. His uncle said that stress could cause all kinds of physical side effects.

Returning his focus to the baffling document in front of him, he once again put the pain out of his mind.

The landscape was foggy, shifting in weird ways whenever Katara tried to focus on anything.

Were those trees in the distance? Were they huge flowers?

She looked away, then back. Now she thought they might be ships.

"Katara." The voice was omnipresent and indescribable. "You are not at peace."

What did that mean? That she wasn't dead? She would have thought that was a good thing.

She looked around, trying to get any kind of bearing on her surroundings. All she saw was fog and greenish gray shapes. She couldn't even sense any water.

Then, suddenly, she could see something. Or rather, someone. The red of their clothes stood out starkly against the washed out grays.

Was that Zuko?

Frowning, Katara tried to move toward him, her mouth shaping one of the many questions running through her mind.

Nothing happened. She didn't move. She didn't speak.

"You are both adrift from yourselves," the voice continued. "You have tied yourselves together, but you failed to anchor your own souls. Now you must find balance before you lose yourselves entirely."

Katara felt panic begin to rise in her chest. She had no idea what any of that meant, but it sounded bad. They had tied themselves together? How? And what would it mean to "lose themselves entirely"?

Across the distance, a space that was somehow both insurmountable and insignificant, she met Zuko's gaze. The confusion and concern in his eyes matched her own.

"Fix this," the voice said.

In the Southern Water Tribe, Katara woke up with the sound of her heart pounding in her ears. Staring into the darkness of her small room, she tried to make sense of her dream.

It didn't actually feel like a dream at all. The memory of the shifting landscape and the ominous voice wasn't sliding away or fading, and the dread that had settled in her gut told her that something was deeply wrong.

She got up and slid her boots on, knowing she wasn't going back to sleep for a while. Better to be outside, where she knew the moon would help her find some kind of calm.

Except… it didn't.

The moon had been full only a few days ago, so it still hung large in the sky, but she couldn't feel it. Her innate sense of the water around her wasn't heightened. In fact, instead it seemed to have faded.

The dread grew heavier as she waved her arm toward the ice, becoming a cold rock in her stomach when the ice failed to move at all.

She tried a few more forms, both simple and advanced, but the ice remained stubbornly solid. She moved to a canal and tried to push the water around, hoping maybe her bending fatigue had just gotten worse.

The water remained still, the moon reflecting back at her as she glared down at it.

Frustrated, she huffed out a heavy sigh, and almost fell over in shock as she saw tiny flames come out with the steam of her breath.

Eyes wide, she experimentally punched her fist forward, the way she had seen Zuko do countless times. A burst of fire shot away from her, melting the block of ice that had refused to move for her before.

She stared down at the pile of slush in front of her in horror.

It had definitely not been a normal dream.

In the Fire Nation, Zuko awoke from the bizarre dream in a similar state of panic.

What did it mean to be "adrift from yourself"? Was this related to the weird twinges in his scar?

What did Katara have to do with any of it?

Getting out of bed, he tried to light the lamp that sat on the table near his bed, but nothing happened. The room stayed dark.

That was strange.

Not wanting to squint into the darkness, he moved over to the balcony. The gardens below were brightly illuminated by the nearly full moon above, and he felt a sense of calm wash over him as he stepped into the moonlight.

That was also strange. Moonlight was nice, sure, but he had been building himself toward a panic attack. He shouldn't suddenly feel so at ease.

So his firebending wasn't working and the moon made him feel calm. A very strange thought crept into his mind, and he turned toward the glass of water he had left next to his bed. Moving his hand in his best recreation of Katara's gestures, he pulled the water out of the glass and collected it into a liquidy orb above his hand.

This was going to be a serious problem.