Title: "When Wishes Run Dry"
Rating: T (Kataang, violent scene)
Word count: 2970
Writer: ayziks
Summary: This is a bittersweet story that describes the circumstances of Katara's discovery of the start of the deterioration of Aang's health shortly before his passing in his 66th year, and the anguish it causes in knowing their time together on this world is short.
…..
In the middle of the fifth decade since Katara awakened him from the iceberg, things got harder for Aang. He had trouble exercising. He was constantly pulling muscles that Katara kneaded out. His stamina waned. Favorite foods didn't taste the same. His concentration did hold the way he used to, and his keen eyesight and hearing started to fail. His air bending moves were not nearly as powerful and precise. He rarely flew on his glider any more, and when he did, he was exhausted. He wandered off topic in lectures to the Air Acolyte classes, but no one had the nerve to correct him. He forgot things. He tried to hide these things from Katara and Tenzin, but they noticed while holding back expressing their concern.
One day a group of the senior leaders of the Air Acolytes came to Tenzin and Katara in private and told them, "Something is wrong with Sifu Aang, and we are very concerned." They admitted that they shared the concern, promised to do something about it, and the Acolytes bowed and left. Mother and son sat silently contemplating what to do next.
"Father is getting weaker, Mother," Tenzin finally said.
"I know Tenzin. I will talk to him," answered Katara resolutely.
Aang was well aware that he was not himself, and being in his mid-sixties, he was very worried he was experiencing the deterioration of a man much older than he actually was. He needed to meditate on his worries, which were beginning to consume him. One night he rose from his study, with Katara leaning against him on a couch writing in her journal.
"Katara, I need to go meditate."
"Are you going to be all right?" she asked.
"Of course I will be all right. I'm only meditating," he snapped, but realized he was short and terse with her.
"I'm sorry Katara, that tone was uncalled for," he apologized.
"It's OK Aang," she said softly, kissed him lightly, and smiled as she said, "Say a prayer for me and the kids too. I'll stay up if you want to talk afterwards."
So he went off to the most isolated corner of Air Temple Island, and meditated. He fell into a very deep state. A vision flashed to him, and he found himself walking in an ethereal Southern Air Temple as it was over a century and a half ago, when it was teeming with air nomads. But something was very wrong. It was ablaze. Edifices were falling all around and on people. The skies were filled with Fire Nation dragon riders and plumes of fire pummeled the Temple. People were screaming and burning. Bodies were all around. Explosions and white hot fires surrounded him. It was unbearable, and he could hardly breathe through the acrid, billowing smoke and flames.
He felt as if he was really there amidst the destruction of his civilization. This felt like no dream or vision he had ever experienced. He was very frightened and thought, "Is this real? Was everything 'real' in my life actually my imagination?"
He couldn't bear the thought of Katara and the children being only a wishful dream of his youth and this now being reality. But he walked forward, dodging and ducking fire and debris as well as the panicked, fleeing, and dying air nomads all around him.
He arrived at an open square – the place where he and Katara found Gyatso amidst a hundred Fire Nation soldiers' remains. His old mentor stood firm in the midst of the once-tranquil square, directing hurricane-force winds skyward, standing his ground against the onslaught of Fire Nation soldiers, riders, and dragons. Bison and bison riders lay dead around him, burnt or speared…or worse. Air nomads by the hundreds lay still around him. The plaza was also littered with dead or dying Fire Nation soldiers – all by Gyatso's hand. It was unthinkable for this man of peace.
Gyatso noticed Aang's movement behind him and turned in shock, "Aang! You're back!"
"I…I don't know why Monk Gyatso. I ran away," he stated as he felt oddly detached from the devastation going on around him.
"I know Aang. It broke my heart, but it was the only way."
"I'm sorry Monk Gyatso. The only way for what?"
"For you to survive. Look around you. I'm sorry you came back so soon."
"I know. I can see."
This was not possible. This had to be a replay of events so long ago, and yet Gyatso talked like the massacre was happening even as they spoke.
"Was it then – or is it now?" puzzled Aang yet again.
"This is what awaited you if you had stayed, Aang. Destruction and death. Even for you," Gyatso said as he deftly deflected another blast of flame.
Gyatso remained focused on taking out multiple foes as he spoke with lethal air bending moves Aang had never witnessed.
"I'm so sorry. I should have been here, to stand with you as you are now."
"No Aang. Your destiny was to save the world, not be consumed by fire as we were."
"But I'm back now. Here with you."
"You may think so. But do you know why?"
"No. Please explain, Sifu."
"I wish you didn't have to see this. You are surrounded by the spirits of our people in their last moments of terror and pain. You are the last air nomad, Aang. The last of our race."
"But I have a child, Gyatso. He is an air bender. Our race will go on."
"I know. He is wonderful Aang. But he is not an air nomad, Aang. You have a family. He has a wife now – a beautiful young woman who has the heart of an air nomad. The new ways are different, and are good. He is the first of a new race of air benders that they will have together."
He was relieved with that prophesy, "Then why am I here, Gyatso?"
"It will soon be time to join us in passing from this world, Aang. Your spirit and ours will be together again, and we will be at rest, because of the good you have done. Your time grows short, my dear pupil. It is nearly time to come home, Aang."
"I know, Gyatso, I can tell. Things are not 'right' about me," Aang admitted.
"You always were a smart student," Gyatso managed to smile despite fighting the onslaught.
"How much time do I have Gyatso?" Aang asked.
He was fairly sure he was only a ghostly witness to this bloody end of his kinsmen, but was disturbed by seeing what Gyatso had seen, and was consumed by. For the rest of his life, however long that might be, he knew he would be unable to shake the terrible images of the carnage that befell the air nomads.
"It is not for me to say. An instant for us may be months to you. I am only a messenger. You will have enough time to say goodbye to those you love."
"I…I understand. But please Sifu Gyatso, I have to know when. When will it happen?" he questioned.
"You will know when, Aang. You have blessed our memory Aang, and brought peace again to the world. Only you could to that. Do not weep for us, or for me, or worry that you have not done enough. You have been a wonderful Avatar. What's to be done next must be done by another. That is the way of the Avatar Spirit."
Aang was about to say something, but a brilliant bolt of lightning and blast of thunder arced from a dragon rider overhead directly at Gyatso, hitting him and electrocuting him. Aang was instantly blinded and knocked unconscious by a terrible white light that consumed everything.
….
Aang awoke with a start. He was relieved that he was back in the Air Temple shrine garden, and his reality returned, but was shivering from the grim vision of the last moments of the air nomads, and what had been revealed to him by his Mentor. He was staggered that it was the spirit of Gyatso who gave him the terrible news of the end of his own life, not one of his past Avatar lives. The spirits must have meant it to make an impression.
He shuddered again. "It did," his innermost thoughts concluded.
He was startled by a touch on his shoulder. It was that familiar tender touch. But it had such uncertainty this time.
"….Aang? Aang?" Katara had been calling his name fearfully numerous times. He heard her as a faint echo at first, but his name got steadier and louder each time.
He snapped out of his deep trance, and looked into her tearful but sparkling eyes. Her beautiful, wavy steel-gray hair was as beautiful as the brown hair of her youth, and her 'laugh lines' and still thin physique was as beautiful as the day they met. She knelt beside him and put her arms on his shoulders.
Katara stuttered, "Are…are you all right? You were gone so deeply into your vision. I've never seen you go that far away. I was afraid you weren't coming back."
"Yes I will be all right," Aang said tentatively.
Katara gave him a look of disbelief, "No Aang. I don't think so. Not this time. Not from the vision you were in. This time it was different, wasn't it?"
She could always tell what was going on his head and heart. She was so close to him as his spiritual partner as well as his wife that she could feel the impact of his visions a little, just like that first time at the battle at the North Pole. She knew this one had been very troubling.
She let it all out and confessed, "You've been holding back something Aang. People are noticing things 'wrong' with you, sweetie. You drift off. You forget things. I don't see that 'zing' in your workouts. We haven't been 'together' in bed in days. You're hiding something Aang. I can read you like a scroll."
Aang cast his eyes downward and admitted, "I know, Katara. You always had the knack of knowing what was wrong with me, even when I didn't know."
They had a nervous laugh together.
He sighed, looked with total seriousness into her eyes, took her into his arms, and stated shakily, "Katara. I wish I could grow old with you."
"Of course you will Aang. Besides. You're already old," she snickered and tried to be positive, but knew there was something more to what he said than what he was saying.
"No, Katara. I mean grow really old. Ancient," he corrected her.
"What are you saying?"
"Check me out," he asked and closed his eyes for her healer's examination.
Nervously, Katara held her palms in front of him. Part of her did not want to know the answer to this exam. Her hands glowed as she moved from his head to his toes. Tears rolled from her eyes as she drew the terrible conclusions from her examination of his body, "Aang. Your insides. They are aging too fast. If they keep getting older that fast, it means…"
She couldn't finish her sentence, so she just blurted out through her tears, "What does this mean, Aang?"
Aang stated calmly, "The spirits are calling me home, Katara. I was just there. I was connected to my time, with Gyatso, at the temple on the day of the attack. In the place we found him."
She held him tighter, and streams of tears cascaded from her eyes.
"You can't go, Aang. Not now. The children are all grown and married. It's just you and me again. And I need you more than ever now. The grand kids need you."
Aang said sadly to try to soothe her hurt, "Sweetie, it's going to happen, and soon."
"How soon?" she pleaded desperately, looking into his gray eyes in near total panic.
"I don't know Katara. But I can feel it won't be long," Aang said sadly.
She completely devastated now, and clung to her husband. They cried together for a long time.
Finally, her crying subsided, wiped her tears, and had a look of defiance, "This is not fair Aang. What about Yangchen? She was in her nineties. And Kyoshi was 240. You are only 65, Aang. Even Roku was in his seventies before he was killed. That's not old at all."
"Remember I'm really 165, Katara," he reminded her with a weak grin.
"You haven't done enough good in this world, sweetie," she said frantically, "And you haven't been with me long enough. Fifty three years isn't enough for me. I'm that selfish."
Aang spoke in a peaceful, accepting tone, "Maybe I have, Katara. I 'saved the world' as you like to say in your journals. I helped create the United Republic with you and your brother and our friends, designed the Air Temple and Republic City. I stopped Yakone and countless other bad guys. And due to our love we brought another air bender into this world, as well as two other fine children. Isn't that enough in just fifty years? Most people don't even get that long. I don't understand all this new fangled technology and my place in the world of spiritualism and science. Maybe a new Avatar that does understand all this should come along. We had five decades of happiness."
She caressed his sad face and pleaded, "Don't say that Aang. You've done so much. There's so many things you can do still. Please don't leave me. I can't live without you."
"You will, katara. I just wish I didn't have to tell the kids," Aang stated with true sadness, "Especially Tenzin and Pema. They are just newlyweds."
"They were excited about making you a grandpa," Katara barely whispered.
"I'm already a grandpa," he tried to cheer her.
"But not a grandpa of air benders."
That caused a shudder and a tear in Aang.
Katara saw the hurt, "Oh sweetie, I am so sorry," and they hugged and sobbed for what seemed an eternity.
Finally, Katara had the courage to speak again, "Come back and visit me as a spirit. Keep me from being lonely. I…I don't know what I will do without you. I never have thought about living a day without you ever since you came out of the ice."
Aang eyes had that old twinkle for a moment as he laughed, "And I've been trouble to you ever since. I don't know if the spirits will let me see you."
Katara tweaked his nose like old times, and shook her head in mock anger, as she smiled weakly, "What am I gonna do, Aang?"
"Take care of our grand kids. Especially the ones we don't have yet," his voice cracked.
"But that can only be once and awhile. Tenzin and Pema won't want me to interfere even though this is home to them. The others live so far away."
"They will always want you in their lives."
"I…I'll try. What else Aang? What can do to keep our love and your memory alive?"
"Be a Sifu to the new Avatar."
Her eyes and shoulders fell with the crushing weight of that last wish, "Oh dear. I don't think I have the heart and strength to do that, Aang."
Aang smiled, and wiped a tear from Katara's bloodshot eyes, "The new Avatar will be a water bender. Who's better qualified than you to teach them? Maybe they'll be Southern Water Tribe. Maybe even a relative."
"Well. Maybe. I will have to pray on these things."
"Remember what I taught you."
She shrugged like a schoolgirl remembering a verse, "Yeah I know. 'Friendship so strong it lasts more than a lifetime'. Easier said than done, Aang. You're not on the receiving end of that."
"I'm sorry. I can't change this. I really truly wish I could."
Realizing that she hurt him, she hugged and kissed him.
"OK. I promise. But I can't teach them Avatar things."
"You spent a lifetime with an Avatar. You studied everything about Avatars. You interviewed every one of my former incarnations through me. That book is still a best seller and in every library in the world," he mused.
"Not a long enough lifetime yet, Aang," she observed and put a tender hand on his neck and shoulder.
"I can't change what will happen," admitted Aang.
"But you are the spirit of the World Aang. You are more powerful than any human being on the planet."
Aang explained the unexplainable, "But no one lives forever. That immortal Spirit lives within a human body that's been chosen. This body lived through things that a human has never been asked to do ever before. That Spirit knows what's best for the world and what is to come. It's clear I can't be the one to deal with what's next. I've been blessed for so long and like no other Avatar before me."
Katara promised, "I will make what is left of your days, Aang, as peaceful and loving as I can."
"You did that once before when you weren't sure I would even live another day."
She cried, and hugged him as she choked through the words, "But it's so much harder now Aang than then. I have loved you more every day since then – that time when I finally realized I loved you. We've had every day of our lives together since. We were just getting started then."
She added, "Aang, I wish I could go with you when your time comes."
"That wish will come true someday, Katara. But the spirits need you more than me now."
They hugged and kissed tenderly.
"I love you, old man," she finally smiled without tears.
He grinned, and said, "Since you stopped counting birthdays years ago, I guess I can't say 'I love you old woman'."
They had a bittersweet laugh over that.
There was nothing more to say. They rose walked slowly together with their arms around each other's waists. She could feel his growing weakness. But they concentrated on the still strong bond of love and lifetime friendship as they strolled slowly back to the residence. Every minute counted between them now. That wish they got.