HAPPY ZUTARA WEEK ZUTARIANS! :D

Boredom. That was the only thing Katara felt. Here she was dressed as the Painted Lady at a costume party at her friend Ty Lee's house and she wasn't exactly in a partying mood. Maybe she was half an hour ago when she was actually with her friends but now? When she first came to the party she was with her brother Sokka (dressed as a soldier), and her friends Aang (dressed as a hippy) and Toph (dressed as a wrestler). An hour ago Sokka met up with his girlfriend Suki (dressed as a Kyoshi Warrior). The two of them had then gone upstairs and didn't come down since. Half an hour later Aang had to take Toph home, leaving Katara on her own at the party with a bunch of other people she didn't really know. She would have left already but Sokka was her ride home and she didn't have a drivers license.

"Hey Kat!"

Katara looked up to see the peppy Ty Lee standing in front of her. She was dressed in a cute circus acrobat costume.

"What are you doing here sitting by your lonesome?" she demanded with her head cocked to the side and a cute look of curiousity on her face. "Why aren't you hanging out with other people? I mean even Mai is actually mingling."

It was true. A short distance away dressed as a vampire princess was the gloomy but popular Mai. And she was talking to a guy. Of course this wasn't just any guy. This guy was Ruon Jian, one of the most popular guys in their school.

"Seriously, get up and go mingle!" Ty Lee grabbed Katara's hand and dragged her off the couch she was sitting in.

Katara tried to pull her hand out of the bubbly girl's surprisingly strong grip.

"Ty Lee, no. I hardly know anybody here!"

"Exactly! That's the point of mingling!"

The two girls were now standing at the refreshment table where one other person was standing. This person was dressed from head to toe in black and hanging off their back was a scabbard holding a pair of fake duel dao swords. Judging by how the body looked Katara guessed that this person was a somewhat muscular guy.

Ty Lee let go of Katara's hand and placed it over her upper back.

"Now go talk to some people and flirt with some cute guys!" she said before pushing her friend toward the guy in black. Katara stumbled forward and bumped in him from behind. She took a couple steps bacl, fixing her hat and veil and mumbling some quick apologies.

"What are you supposed to be?

Katara stopped fiddling with her costume. That voice...it sounded familiar. She looked up to get a look at his face (he was a head taller than her) and
stumbled backwards when she saw a demonic blue mask instead of a face.

"I could ask you the same question." she answered.

"The Blue Spirit? You know, the masked thief?"

Katara didn't react. She never heard of the Blue Spirit. Though she couldn't see it, she knew the masked boy was rolling his eyes.

"He's a comic book hero?"

That explained why Katara had never heard of him. She wasn't much of a comic book reader.

"I don't read comics." she said

"Then what are you supposed to be?"

Wow, this guy is pretty rude. Katara grumbled mentally.

"I'm dressed as the Painted Lady. She's an ancient spirit who watches over the villages by the river. It's old ancient folklore. You know...something
real."

"Well at least other people have heard of me."

Katara growled softly. She could not believe how rude this guy was.

No wonder he was by himself she thought.

"Well what did you have to do for that?" she asked. "Black clothes and a mask? It took me hours to get all this make-up right."

Katara could hear a faint chuckle behind that demon mask.

"So let me get this straight;" he said, "You spent as much time getting ready for a party as the length of the party it's self? I will never understand women."

Okay that did it. She was sick and tired of hearing sexist comments. She got enough of them from her brother, she didn't need them from some stranger!

"Well you're a guy we don't expect you too."

"Well I'm not trying to impress anyone. I'm just here to have fun."

Katara raised an eyebrow.

"Uh huh. And that's why you're here by yourself."

"You're one to talk."

"Well you know, I'm not trying to impress anyone either. " She turned away from him and began to walk away "You can go have your fun."

"Fine!"

Katara went back to her couch and sat down in it again, totally annoyed. First she had to deal with complete boredom because her brother decided to get lucky and now she was feeling complete annoyance from that guy. His voice and his attitude seemed very familiar to Katara but she couldn't think of who he was.

"You wanna dance?"

Katara looked up to see a boy Sokka's age in a Navy uniform with his hand held out for her to take. Boredom and annoyance forgotten, she accepted the boy's offer. The boy took her hand and led her to the bigger part of the livingroom where the other guests were dancing. As the two of them danced the boy pulled Katara closer and closer to him by the minute. She was slightly uncomfortable at this but didn't say anything to stop him. It wasn't until the boy started grinding on her roughly that she just wanted to stop. She tried to pull herself away from him but he pulled her back in

"Let me go!" she told him.

Katara didn't know if he could even hear her because of the music or he was ignoring her. All she knew was that she was feeling sore from all the grinding. She put her hands on his chest and tried to push away but he refused to let her go. She was about to tell him to let her go again when she felt herself pulled out of the grinding boy's grip. Next thing she knew the Blue Spirit guy was standing in front of her.

"What's your problem?" the Navy guy asked angrily

"She doesn't want to dance with you anymore."

The grinder scoffed and reached out for Katara's arm but then her rescuer punched him in the face. The nearby guests stopped what they were doing and watched the scene with wide eyes. The Blue Spirit ignored them, he just took Katara's hand and led hear outside to the backyard. There was nobody else out there. Just a picnic table, some lounge chairs, and a fire pit. From outside the two of them could hear the loud music playing.

"You okay?" The Blue Spirit asked

Katara straightened out her dress, mostly to keep herself from looking up at him.

"Yeah." she muttered. "Why did you do that anyway?"

"It's just something any other person would've done. I saw a guy harassing a girl, and I got angry."

An uncomfortable silence.

"Well thanks for that."

The Blue Spirit nodded and the two of them looked away from each other. Another uncomfortable silence.

"Listen, you should probably be getting out of here. That guy might want to try something on you again."

Katara then remembered why she had to go through what she did on the dance floor and groaned.

"I can't. I'm here with my brother and I don't know where he is and I can't drive!"

The Blue Spirit scratched the back of his neck and looked around.

"Well you know there's nobody here and it's a pretty nice night...Let's just hang out out here until you're able to go home."

It did seem like a good idea. Out there Katara would be away from all the noise and she would be safe as long as she was with this guy.

The rest of the night Katara and the Blue Spirit laid on the lounge chairs staring up at the stars and talking. They talked about a lot of things; school, home life, family, and dreams. Katara told him about her favorite classes, about her father, brother, friends, and grandmother, and about how she hoped to be a doctor after she finished high school. The Blue Spirit told her about how he learned tae kwon do, about his father and sister and how he lived with his uncle. While they talked Katara soon knew who her rescuer in the blue mask was. She was surprised that he would actually come to this kind of party, save her, and tell her about his life. After two hours Katara got a text from Sokka.

"Time for me to go." she said sadly. She was enjoying her time with the Blue Spirit and hated to see it end. She got up from her chair and looked at her companion.

"Thank you again." she said.

"No problem."

Katara went to the sliding doors with reluctance. Before she opened it she turned back to the Blue Spirit.

"See you at school Zuko."

wow, reading this over now this was a really dumb one XD. Thanks to ZStar2010 for all the help