Hello all. This is my first Fanfic and it's inspired by The Black Games by Mrs Pettyfer. Other inspiration for this book is my love for the universe in the Hunger Games books (although I despise Katniss and the piss poor love triangle between the equally poor-made characters) and the characters in the Last Airbender, especially Sokka. The light bulb went off in my head and put pen to paper, blending the two universes to the best of my ability. Constructive criticism is absolutely welcome.

Disclaimer: Themes and ideas from the Hunger Games belongs to Suzanne Collins. The character and themes from Avatar: Last Airbender belong to Bryan Konietzko and Mike Dante DiMartino. I wish I had the imagination to create these rich universes.

The cover photo for the story belongs to Mandy Mo from

And without further ado...

Blood is Thicker Than Water

Sokka

District 9 - South Pole

Waking up to a throbbing head and a churning stomach wasn't high up on Sokka's wish-list. Hung-over, most definitely hung-over. He loved the process of getting super drunk but despised the end result.

Opening his eyes, he saw the bright sunlight streaming in the small window which intensified the excruciating pain in his skull, and he quickly shut them again. It was the few months of the year in the Southern Water Tribe, located directly on the South Pole, that the sun shone all day and night, even though it was five o'clock in the morning. After several seconds, he groaned and massaged his temples when his gut willed itself into motion. Hurriedly swinging both legs over the side of the bed, he dashed over clothes strewn over the floor and objects sharp to the bare foot, barely making it to the toilet before he unwillingly heaved his stomach's contents out.

The cycle repeated itself for the next several minutes: nausea, vomit, flush, and repeat. Not trying to break his max limit on whiskey seemed like a better idea in hindsight. Considering he put his name in for the Reaping a record four hundred and thirty-seven times, it was fair to assume it would one of the last times to do heavy drinking before he was possibly shipped off to the Grand Attrition. The Grand Attrition was basically a death-match between teenagers from age twelve to eighteen as punishment for rebelling against the Capitol, which resulted in many casualties on both sides. Two tributes, male and female, where chosen from all twelve districts—Sokka belonging to District 9—and thrown into an arena where one survivor emerged as the Victor and the other twenty-three children were forever torn from their families. This inhumane selection was known as the Reaping, the day all teenagers feared for their lives. The next one was taking place the next day. Sokka was one of the few brave souls that put more than the required amount of ballots into the drawing, as each ballot supplied his family with miniscule amounts of food rations. Sokka couldn't comprehend how in any sense it was justified to sacrifice kids as repayment for an attack against the Capitol forty years in the past, yet grudgingly accepted the Reaping as part of life.

He wiped his foul-smelling lips on the back of his hand and rested his head on the toilet seat, which seemed unsanitary yet he wasn't in the state of mind to seriously care. Surprisingly, a comforting hand caressed his back. His sister, Katara, the ever gentle soul, cooed in his ear, "Just get it all out now. You'll feel hella better afterwards."

He obligingly grunted in response before releasing his bile into the toilet. Katara continually rubbed his back as his stomach clashed with him, lightly chuckling because this was the exact result she predicted when he went against her better judgment to not drink. Even to the most oblivious person, one could see the strong brother-sister bond between them; they held each other up in the toughest moments, such as their father's drunken tantrums or their mother's unexpected disappearance, which their father blamed them for. "I told you no to take so many shots… I told you so, Sokka. I told you so."

Pretty sure his gut was done expelling its contents, he sat back against the wall and let his chin fall to his chest. Eyes clothes, he blindly reached out for his sister and let his hand rest on her knee after feeling nothing but air. She scooted over to his side and wrapped her arm around his head, pulling him towards her and snuggling his head into the crook of his neck. "I know sis. I know…" Sokka said absently.

"Do you promise to slow down next time you go to the bar?"

"Not sure if there will be a next time. I put in a ballot like four hundred-some times." Katara sighed at his stupid idea that he must supply the family food; after all, he fed them better than most families were with the sea animals he illegally hunted. The penalty for hunting animals outside the Boundaries of District 9, or leaving the area all together, was execution. Yet he was selfless enough to risk his safety so that his abusive father and saint-like sister could eat well.

"I told you once and I'm going to tell you again, you're not required to get us extra rations. Dad has a job so we can have food and you hunt enough for the three of us already…" Katara scolded, always the filling the mother role in the family without an actual maternal presence.

"Well dad is too busy thinking about when his next drink will be to feed us." Sokka started to absent-mindedly stroke her knee as she smiled back amiably, proud of her older brother no matter how drunk he got or foolish he acted.

"I heard that you worthless little shit!" Hakoda, their father, said as he staggered to the door, one hand holding his beer and the other leaning against the decrepit doorframe. He was a strong-armed man in his forties, aging lines and a thick goatee, tan skin and chocolate colored hair ponytail—or wolf's tail as he and his son referred to it as—that ran in the family and entirety of District 9. "Ironic, considering you're hung-over now."

"Fuck off dad… And you're hung over more than me," Sokka quipped.

"I deserve to be. I support this family."

"The fuck you don't Dad. I have a job and I feed the family. You spend the money on your booze!" Sokka's temper finally flared. He usually considered himself a collected person but his father's selfishness always got under his skin.

"You little shit…" He was interrupted by a blatant middle finger in his direction. In a drunken rage, he dropped his beer and charged at his seventeen year-old son when Katara intercepted his route. She held him back with two fistfuls of his beer-stained shirt, before his open palm came down on her face and she felt the numbing sting on her cheek. "Out of my way you little whore" Hakoda berated through gritted teeth as he tossed his smaller-framed daughter to the side like a ragdoll and continued barreling towards Sokka. Katara slammed hard against the bathroom cabinet, knocking the door off the hinge, and slumped to the floor.

Sokka shot up from his recumbent position and unrestrained fire flared from his outstretched hands. He let loose a guttural roar and bonfire erupted from his mouth and the fear was almost palpable in his father's eyes. Firebending felt so natural to Sokka, like an internal flame or anger that could erupt when aggravated. Yet if left uncontained, it could burn everything down. "How dare you abuse your daughter like that? You're a horrible human being!" Sokka annunciated each word, with flames growing more uncontrollable and scorching the wall.

"How dare you firebend in my house, you freak." It felt like a slap across the face. His dad had always looked down on him for possessing this rare talent. Waterbenders were rare and illegal enough in District 9, but firebending was unheard of and thus he had to keep it under wraps. It was genetics gone wrong because not one person in his family had possessed the same ability. Being called a freak, despite never wanting this skill in the first place, made him feel less than normal and the fact that his father despised him felt like a sword thrust through his heart. "You're mother died keeping your ability a secret. She took the blame for evil little skill and was executed in front of my eyes for something she didn't do."

"You think I chose this dad? Do you honestly think I'm happy hiding this every day? Huh, Dad?" Sokka's shouting brought Katara back to consciousness and she held onto the counter as she tried to stand up. Sokka rushed to help bring her to a stand before turning back on his dad. "Because I don't. I wish I couldn't firebend, life would be so much easier."

"Shout it from the hilltops, why don't you. Let the whole District know you're a firebending demon." In fact, the shouting was worsening Sokka's headache. Hakoda turned on his heels, content after scolding his nuisance of a son, before stopping in the doorway and uttering, "You don't deserve to be alive. Your mother should be here instead of you."

At that statement, Sokka's inner fire erupted and he sprinted at his unaware father. Shoulder clashed against back as Hakoda's son tackled him through the drywall into the next bedroom. Sokka quickly scrambled to his feet, dragging Hakoda up with a tight grip on his collar, and slamming the abusive man against a section of unbroken wall. Sokka's face was a hair's length from Hakoda's. "No Dad, you don't deserve to live. You're a good for nothing drunk that harms his children." Sokka had loathed his father for many years and wanted to finally end his sorry excuse for a life. No, I must show mercy. I must be the bigger man than him.

Katara rushed in through the hole in the wall and tore Sokka from the older man, effectively ending the scuffle. "Stop it stop it stop it!" Katara reprimanded both family members for their willingness to harm each other. Katara placed her hand on her father's back and guided him to the door, evidently getting him as far away from his son as possible. "Dad, how about you go make some breakfast? I'm personally famished," Katara suggesting eagerly, hoping Hakoda took the hint. "I need to have a talk with Sokka."

Sokka mumbled back a response along the lines that she wasn't his mother, though they both knew she sure filled the role spectacularly. Katara puffed out her lower lip, pleading for her dad to be mature and leave the vicinity. As if on cue, he trudged out of the room, drywall dust on his back with several small cuts and disheveled hair.

A brief awkward silence took place before Katara scolded her older brother, both fully expecting the figurative shit-storm to hit hard. Katara massaged the spot where her head collided with the wooden cabinet as both waited for Hakoda to be out of earshot. When their father's grumbling and verbally pained steps disappeared into the kitchen, she turned on Sokka.

"Sokka, why must you aggravate him like that? You could have been the bigger man and walked away." Gentle words, not those of high-toned shouting or scolding. Yet, the disappointment she expressed was nearly palpable, which hurt him more than being angrily chewed out ever would. "Why must you start a fight you're perfectly capable of avoiding in the first place? It hurts me… It truly hurts me to see you two divided and at each other's throats constantly." Sokka's head was bowed in shame yet raised it when he heard his sister sniffle. Hands still hot from summoning flames, reached up and wiped the running tears away. "Have you stopped to think how it affects me that my only family despises each other and I'm left here trying to keep it t-together..." Katara's rant was reduced to unintelligible sentences as she sobbed into her brother's shoulder; he was forever Katara's rock, her shoulder to lean on. Sokka glance up to the wall, seeing patches of pulverized wall where his father had thrown him up against or slash marks from drunkenly swinging his boomerang at his only son. That is why 'Tara… The fact that he tries to fatally harm his children is why.

The nausea and the pounding in his head had slowly ebbed away as a need to comfort his sister kicked away. Back sliding down the unmarred section of the wall, Sokka slowly lowered his sister to the floor along with himself and hugged her tightly to his chest. "I know 'Tara… I know…" Sokka trailed off as he soothingly shushed her and planted light, brotherly kisses atop her head. "Mom's death should have brought the family closer." He bit his bottom lip, holding back tears of his own. He had to be strong for his sister's sake. "Instead it tore us farther apart." He was met with only a slight nod. "Y'know, sometimes I lay awake at night seeing mom lashed in front of the town, made a mockery of, over and over again and know I'm the reason she's dead. She was a saint, and absolute saint. I deserved it, not her. But you might have been too young to remember." He laughed embarrassedly after confessing. It was nothing to be ashamed of, especially around the one person he could spill all secrets to, yet he felt odd remembering the gory events twelve years in the past while sleep evaded him. Most people blocked those moments out. Oh Spirts, how he wished the memory could be erased. But alas, it haunted him. "You remind me of her 'Tara. So kind-hearted and out-going, so selfless and motherly… she and you are the closest things to a pure soul on this Earth."

"Sokka, I don't remember mom…" She lifted her head from his chest, uncovering tearstains on his sweater, leaning her bruised head against the wall. She hand instinctively embraced his. They had gotten through life's hardships together and they would continue to do so. "All I know of her is her beauty through the pictures. All I know is dad and you loved her so very much… but I'll never have a mother to love."

"I did love her. She was the greatest person I've known and she paid the ultimate sacrifice for me." Sokka languidly raked fingers through his saddened sister's hair, comforting her in a time of sorrow. "I'm sorry you never met her 'Tara. I truly am. But the one thing I've learned is that you only need a single loved one to make this brutal life all worth it. You've done that for me when Dad didn't and I can only hope I do the same for you."

"You have Sokka. You've been the greatest person you possibly could to me. Dad may not see it, or respect us, but we only need each other."

Silence ensued, where Katara tried to relive any memories pertaining to her deceased mother and Sokka reflected on his last moments with her. "Y'know, she told me I was destined for greatness as those evil people ripped her from her family and home. She didn't beg for her life or tell them the truth. No, she paid with her life to ensure my safety. What have I done to repay her? Poach animals and do practically any illegal thing that come to mind. Do you think she watches happily from the Spirit World?" No answer. "She doesn't."

"Sokka you're too hard on yourself. You do everything for this family. You feed this family, illegally or not. It's done with good intentions because you're no criminal. And you act the father when ours is too immature." She lifted Sokka's downcast chin, her thumb nestled in his sprouting goatee, catching his eyes with those of her own. "Don't beat yourself up. No one is perfect, but you're damn near it." In the rare times Katara did cuss, her brother knew she was being completely serious.

"Good intentions or not, it's still illegal." Sokka didn't appreciate praise from others because only his own judgment wasn't biased. People like Katara deluded his mind with false accolades while people like Zhen, a cruel girl who he all but assumed her life goal was to make his living hell, endeavored to bash his esteem. "You're closer to perfect than I am." He lazily twiddled strands of Katara's hair with his fingers, still holding her close with the other arm. "I'm truly proud of you 'Tara. You could've turned out a mess with the lack of decent parenting in your life yet you're a greater person than all I know."

"It's only because I've had the greatest brother to guide me every step of the way…" Yet again, she exalted him. He was her role model I life and best friend.

"And you'll always have me there…"

"I love you so much Sokka."

"And I love you. You deserve to live in a better and less cruel world. Rumor has it that people lived free of the Capitol's rule and weren't holed up in these shitty 'Districts' before the Pyrrhic War." The War was a nuclear showdown between the former Earth Kingdom, Air Temple Empire, and Water Tribes against the Fire Nation that left much of the uninhabitable. The Capitol taught their citizens that they are truly lucky to live in the Districts, safe from the contaminated lands. "How I would love to live free of this prison camp they call District 9… I practically do it half the time anyway. I wish we could burn the Capitol and its rule to the ground and instead live in freedom. The 'safe haven we live in while surrounded by radioactive wasteland' is probably straight up bullshit. I mean, who really knows what's outside their District from what the eye can see?" Sokka peeked over to see Katara, eyes glued shut and breathing lightly, asleep on his shoulder. She had apparently drifted off during his anti-Capitol rant.

He had been so hung-over and preoccupied with his sickness and furtherly drunk father that it had slipped his mind that his sister had stayed up most of the night babysitting the drunk males and practicing her waterbending, which she also kept from public knowledge, when it was at its strongest during the moonlight. She was sleep deprived and he didn't blame her for dozing off at an inconvenient time.

Following a light chuckle, he wriggled free of the weight from Katara's head and gently slung her over his shoulder. Pushing of with his legs, he carried her to the door, where he had to support his sister with one hand and pull the doorknob with the other. "Damn, you're heavier than you look 'Tara," Sokka groaned, majorly encumbered by sister clinging on to him in deep sleep.

He led himself into her bedroom, caringly laid her down on the bed, and threw a blue quilt that was knit by their Gran-Gran over her napping body. He strolled over to the door, giving one last glance inside the room, before shutting the door and going into the kitchen. He passed his father, who slept face down and snoring gruffly on the animal-skin couch.

He scribbled a quick note informing his sister on his whereabouts, threw on a wool parka, and slipped out the door only to be blasted in the face by the blisteringly cold South Pole wind. Flurries obscured the vast ocean that lay in front the city and mostly hid the Snowcap Mountains that pinned District 9 against the coast. Sokka leisurely strolled into the heavy blizzard, unready for the hectic day that was unknowingly shaping up before him.

I hate making Hakoda the mean father because he's a cool guy in the cartoons. Unfortunately, this personality serves to help the plot and express Sokka's emotions. Please, hit me with all your criticism.

Signing out,

ChronicChamp