There was a boy.
He stood on the dock watching the horizon for any sign of the long-awaited ship's arrival. He could hear the bustle of the nearby harbor town with the smell of the morning's catch still lingering in the air, a mixture of fish, salt, and sea. The boy was royalty, but had refused to wear the heavy official robes that day much to the chagrin of his guardsmen. The heat of the summer had not yet relented with the season's impending change, but the boy did not hope for the arrival of autumn simply because it promised a cooler breeze. He waited with eager anticipation because she said she would come back at summer's end.
The end of summer in the Fire Nation meant a lot of things, he remembered. A year ago, he had declared the war was finally over. As the young ruler watched the waves lap at the beach below him, he knew the tides were changing, just like the times were changing, an ebb and flow of progress. The seasons reflected the past year's cycle of peacemaking efforts. Last autumn, the winds changed, and the nations seemed to be chasing different ideas of what peace should look like in their post-war world. The winter brought cold static coexistence where everyone worked to survive, but there was no warmth in their interactions. The most growth had occurred during the spring, and even the boy had felt hopeful when the first seeds of true peace began to take root.
Then the summer heat caused restlessness. Among the people who drew their strength from the sun, a hunger for power began to boil again. The boy of 17 years, forced to rule at such a young age, wondered if he could take the heat. The fire in his blood reminded him that it is his destiny. Yet, the desire in his heart craved the coolness of water to wash over him, for the long summer days to fade into moonlit nights. At summer's end, he stood watching the sea, yearning for the eyes that reflected its beauty, projected its power. At last, the ship appeared on the rippling water within his view, and in that moment, the boy felt at peace.
There was a girl.
She stood at the ship's railing feeling the power of the ocean that surrounded her. She always felt at peace near the water, but the warmth of the air reminded her that she was far from where she once called home. Her three-month visit to the South Pole had been strange. It felt familiar, yet different, and she couldn't decide what had changed more, her idea of home or home itself. And now she sailed back toward what? A position? An occupation? A future? Those were the questions her father asked. But she knew the real answer. It was for a boy.
She decided that she must've been the one who changed. Two years of traveling the world and living away from home would do that. A master of her element now, she could command water out of thin air and sense it in the lifeblood of another being. In her awareness of such power, she felt the burden of responsibility. She wasn't just a teenager who helped win a century-old war. She would be an agent of change in a world that needed rebuilding. People can do better, she believed.
She'd seen it firsthand, after all. The boy, a young leader with a difficult past, had changed. He wanted a better world, too, and maybe that's what drew her to him. She welcomed the sun's warmth on her face, and the iciness of family members who didn't understand her reasoning started to melt away. She still felt suspended between two worlds, though, as if lost at sea. She didn't understand destiny as clearly as the boy did. As the harbor gates came into view, she pushed away her thoughts of an unknown future. When a figure on the dock began to wave to her, she knew that in that moment, she was exactly where she needed to be.