1. Thunder

…

In less than three seconds the night sky burst into a confetti of blinding blue light, thunder roaring inside the restless black clouds like a furious caged beast. The sharp breeze cautioned those indoors to remain there, and ushered creatures outdoors to return to their dens.

Another echo of thunder, and Aang was certain the world had literally quivered from the tremendous noise. His skin was trembling, but the wool blanket was snug around him and he lay against Appa's warm, rippling form. His body was quickly registering the fear that had settled over him, skin blossoming with small goosebumps and heart pounding so hard he was sure it was louder than the thunder roaring outside the comforts of the Western Air Temple.

He could recall it so clearly it was almost painful, the memory as fresh as a gaping wound. Thunder and lightening all around him, preying over him, ensnaring him and crushing him and then finally consuming him whole. He was falling down, down, and Appa's jaws were gaping, wailing, but the thunder drowned all other noise and he could sense nothing else but his overwhelming fear of dying. The regret. The guilt. The shame.

His head touched the water and it felt like thousands of needles picking at his flesh, the pain was everywhere and all at once. Appa had stopped wailing. There was no more sound, just the distant sloshing of the water rushing into his ears and nostrils and mouth. He felt the cold needles, and the tingling numbness, and then he felt nothing. He was dead.

For a 100 years, he was dead. He had no dreams, he could not move, he could not feel.

And then he was alive again, young again. A new life, to repent for my transgression. In desperation he threw his feelings at a young Watertribe girl because she had found him, revived him, and saw no fault in him. He was the dawning of hope and peace in her eyes, the end to war, the answer to the world's problems to which he had helped create. He did not dare let her think otherwise. Because he was ashamed of what he really was, a coward and a helpless little boy that ran away from responsibilities and growing up. In some ways, it was often why Katara treated him like a child. She was grooming him to be the Avatar.

Aang closed his eyes, hoping that would regress the memories, but that only proved to have him relive the events of the last few months inside his head. Waking up to blue eyes, fighting a scarred Prince, Waterbending, hiding, running away, Omashu, the Swamp, a blind girl – a new friend, Sandbenders, Ba Sing Se, the Avatar State, Guru Patik—let her go.

Aang opened his eyes and gasped. He looked at his hands, his arms, but the light that had emitted from the blue arrows snaked around his forearms regressed like dying embers. A film of sweat smoothed over his bald head, small pebbles of perspiration dripping down his temple. He was sweating but the temple was cold. He felt like he had no control over himself anymore…

He peeled off the blanket around him and held his head in his hands, shoulders trembling. He thought of waking up Katara, asking her to comfort him from his nightmare. But he hadn't even slept, and he was ashamed of looking like a coward to her. And then he thought of Zuko, but immediately decided against it. The dour Firebending Master was not the type to listen, and Zuko had his own demons to haunt him. He considered Sokka, but the older warrior was not as good with advice like his sister, and Aang wasn't quite sure he wanted to see Sokka use Appa's fur as facial hair ever again.

"She waited, and listened…"

Suddenly Aang knew exactly who to talk to.

"Toph?" He called, whispering. Her bedroom was the closest to where he slept. Toph knew he was a coward, she teased him relentlessly that he was too soft and docile to be a bender, much less the Avatar, but Aang never took offense to them. She would always tease him with a smile, and there was a tone in her voice that made Aang unreasonably happy despite her taunts. In some ways, teasing and punching him on the shoulder was her way of expressing her affection. And she expressed it often to him. He rather liked it, because she treated him as a friend and not as a child.

For a long stretch of time, there was silence. Aang frowned and lay his head back down on Appa's belly.

"I was wondering when you'd say something."

Aang bolted upright, tried to stand but his foot got caught on his blanket, and he toppled forward. "Huaaah!" A pillar of earth shot forth and when his chest hit it, it fell away into fine powdery sand. He landed on the soft earthen particles as if it were a pillow.

He heard twinkling laughter, and firm footfalls coming towards him. The footfalls stopped before him. When Aang peered up at the figure standing over him, Toph Bei Fong was frowning meditatively.

"I…" Aang's mouth couldn't seem to work properly. A streak of lightning exploded the room with brightness in one fleeting instant, and the sound of thunder followed with a tremendous echoing boom. Aang flinched. "I can't…sleep." He admitted, feeling defeated for some reason.

"Me either," Toph told him, sounding so flippant and nonchalant that it took Aang aback. He blinked owlishly. She sat with her legs folded in front of her, directly across from him. Aang was aware that he was still lying on his stomach, and quickly bent the air around him so that he could right himself. The rush of displaced air pushed Toph's hair back, but other than that she was as still as a rock. Aang sat in a lotus position similar to hers, and yet not as rigid.

"So why can't you sleep?" Toph deadpanned, looking directly at him with unseeing eyes.

It unnerved Aang a little, and he gulped. "Uh…nightmare…"

"Liar," Toph stated, unnervingly calm. "I didn't even have to listen to your pulse. You were awake the whole time, your breathing was so loud I could've sensed you a mile off."

Aang huffed. "What's the point of asking, then?" Something occurred to him suddenly, and then, "You were awake for that long, too?"

"Thunder storms. They're too loud." She grumbled, grimacing.

"That's all?" Aang raised his eyebrow at her. He wished he could read Toph's expressions, but Toph rarely ever had looks that revealed anything beyond what was already obvious.

Toph smiled wickedly. "Why so curious?"

Aang decided to be brave. It was just the two of them, after all. "I'll tell you why I can't sleep, if you tell me yours."

"You're…not lying," Toph commented, brows raised. And then she smiled. "All right. Ladies first." She was looking at him expectantly, and Aang knew all too well that she was teasing him again.

He chuckled, and it made him happy to hear the sound come out of his mouth. It meant he was relaxing. But he frowned a little when he realized he didn't know where to start. "I don't know where to start," he admitted sheepishly.

Toph rolled her eyes. "Well, I might as well. You're probably just scared of thunder." She grinned like a devious cat.

Aang pouted.

Toph began, "When I was little, I didn't know how to Earthbend all that well before the Badgermoles. Every time a thunder storm would come along, I'd get really disoriented and dizzy. It was really loud and my senses were keener because of my blindness. I hate thunder."

Aang giggled. "So in other words you're scared of thunder?" Toph flexed her fingers, and a small rock hit Aang in the shoulder. "Ow! Hey!"

"Maybe a little," Toph conceded, "but… my parent's were never very comforting anyway. I was too young to be of any use to them, so I was raised most of the time by housemaids and butlers."

Aang felt ashamed for teasing her. "Sorry." Another rock was flung at him, this time hitting his head.

"Don't be, Twinkletoes," She ordered flippantly. "So what's your story? Why can't you sleep?"

Aang's demeanor chilled. He frowned.

"Don't take back your word, Aang," Toph warned, several rocks suspended in mid-air and ready to lunge toward the sole Airbender.

Aang smiled, but he felt miserable inside. "Remember when Katara and Sokka told you they found me in an Iceberg?" They were alone, and he had wanted to talk to her in the first place. It was all or nothing.

Toph replied uncaringly, "Yeah."

Aang's face fell a little at the memory. He didn't know how to retell it without paining him.

"Aang?" Toph spoke, snapping him out of his own self-pity. Unexpectedly, he felt her pale fingers close around his own hand. And that's when he suddenly remembered that whatever trouble that was inside him emotionally was effecting his body: his heart, his nerves, his chest, his stomach, and his very fingertips. And Toph had been awake the whole time, most likely capable of sensing every ounce of his distress. It was as if he'd been pouring his heart out to her with his feelings, instead of his words.

Aang probably should have felt a number of things. Shame. Embarrassment. A sense of violation. Surprisingly, it wasn't any of those feelings. He felt lighter, almost completely empty, as if all the poison that contaminated his feelings was being squeezed out of him. He felt ready.

Aang squeezed her hand. "One hundred years ago, I ran away from my responsibilities…"

He told her everything. His woes, his fears, what he was feeling at that moment amidst that terrible fateful storm, when he was plunging into the ocean that would be his and Appa's grave, thunder and lightning all around him. He told her about Monk Gyatso, and finding his corpse in the ruined sanctuary of the Southern Air Temple thinking it was all his fault—that everything that happened to Katara, Sokka, Zuko and even her was all his fault. He could've prevented it, but he was too much of a coward and an irresponsible child.

"..so I ran away. I left Monk Gyatso and the other monks to die, I left a whole world to rot for a hundred years in tyranny. In the span of one hundred years, how many people do you think have died because I wasn't there to protect them?" He couldn't remember when the tears started falling during his monologue, but he was aware of them now as he spoke, "I regret it so much, Toph. Every day, every time it rains or when I hear thunder and see lightning. Every time I look at Katara and Zuko, what the war's made them… Every time I see people fight—it just hurts."

He placed his head in his free hand, not letting go of Toph's hand with his other, and cried quietly.

Toph could hear the pain in his heart, burdened and far too tired to be the heart of the wonderful 13-year-old boy that had seen her for who she was, who had promised her freedom and happiness and understanding. She caught her bottom lip between her teeth, unfamiliar with how to deal with such a saddened person. So she let him cry, for as long as it would take him to run out of tears. She held his hand tightly, gripping it.

Aang leaped towards her in a unceremonious embrace and buried his face into her shoulder. Toph was far too stunned to do anything.

There was a long moment, and then Aang sniffled.

"Better yet?" Toph grated.

Suddenly aware that he was holding her so closely, he leaped away, shielding himself with his arms as if expecting some sort of attack. "I'm sorry! I…I'm stupid!" He blurted dumbly.

Toph sighed. "The situation I'm in isn't you're fault, Aang," she explained, looking at him. Aang felt as if she could truly see him, and this comforted him somehow. "My parent's aren't annoyingly smug aristocrats just because you were gone for a 100 years, and neither is the fact that I'm blind your fault. You were 12, and you felt caged in. They were going to send you away, where you'd never see Gyatso for a long time."

"That's no excuse to leave!" Aang argued miserably.

"It was a good enough excuse for me to leave my family, my home," Toph conceded, her voice soft. "I felt trapped and alone with no one… and you, you're the Avatar. They treated you differently, made you feel alone. That was their mistake, you were only 12. And I was only 12, too."

"Your decision didn't kill thousands of people…"

Suddenly, Toph punched him square in the jaw. Aang toppled back from the force of the blow, the sound of her hard knuckles against his jaw making it all the more painful. He landed on his back on Appa's furry stomach. The mammoth creature stirred, yawned, but remained asleep.

"If it wasn't for you I'd have been stuck in that stupid Earth Kingdom province alone and out of place for the rest of my life!" She yelled at him, not caring if she'd wake up everyone in the Western Air Temple. "You showed me that I could be myself, to follow my heart. And I followed you! But I'm beginning to think that you don't even know who you are anymore." She pointed her finger down at him accusingly. "I know who I am. I'm Toph! Never forget who you are, Aang!"

He looked at her with furrowed brows and frowning lips, his jaw aching almost to the point where it was hard to ignore. He winced, cupped his jaw with his hand, and looked away. He wasn't sure if it was her piercing glare that made him balk, or the pain in his jaw.

Who was he? He was a murderer. He was a coward. He was the Avatar. He was the last Airbender.

He was a child. He was human. He'd made a mistake, and he was here to fix it. And, recalling it now, he suddenly couldn't imagine himself without the friends he'd made along the way. Katara, Sokka, Zuko, and Toph. They were all there for him, they were his family now. They defined him, and he defined them.

He was Aang. A friend. A brother. A hero. And he was Toph's student. He was also Katara's and Zuko's as well. They counted on him, and yet he was living in the past.

"Don't feel sorry for yourself, Aang," Toph said quietly, sounding almost affectionate, "Despite whatever happened one hundred years ago and everything in between, you're here now. You've saved a lot of people and brought hope to the nations—to me, and to everyone who's fortunate enough to have met you. You didn't know that you'd be gone for one hundred years, you had no way of knowing that storm would hit you! And…" She looked away, looking almost ashamed of herself, "I know that this may seem selfish and bad, but I'm glad you ran away. I'm glad you were stuck in that iceberg for a hundred years, I'm glad you needed an Earthbending teacher, I'm glad you chose me. I would have never met you otherwise, and I wouldn't change that for the world. "

They were both children in this war. They both needed each other, as selfish as that seemed. But it made complete sense for the both of them. And in a way, the events that happened from the moment he was freed from that iceberg shaped him in ways that the monks would never have fathomed. They could not have done better. And because of him Toph was free to shape herself into her own person as well, instead of remain the delicate porcelain doll imprisoned by her overprotective overbearing parents…

There was a sound of thunder piercing the air.

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The END.

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NOTE: I usually write for the Sailor Moon X-over section, but this is a special occasion. A little something for Acrostic Taang Week back at DeviantART. :D Some of you may recognize me from my DA account also known as Moony92. This is for day 1's theme, Thunder. Which I am totally late for. XD

I think Aang made a selfish and stupid decision by running away from his responsibilities, but he was only 12 years old. He was a kid under pressure, and we all tend to do rather drastic things under pressure. A lot of teens run away when they're upset and think they're misunderstood. He didn't know that there would be a storm and he would be imprisoned in an iceberg for 100 years while a genocide of his people took place and the Fire Nation probably killed loads of other innocents while he was gone. ; So…yeah. Go Taang!

If there are any mistakes at all, sorry. This story is not Beta'd (none of my fics ever are).

Peace out,

- Moony92