Welcome to the Interim. This fic will follow Kuma through the 16 years between the Avatars, and even a little bit after that. Expect a teensy bit of romance, but this mostly surrounds the realization that not everyone has to follow society or their family's expectations. I've worked really hard on this, so please please enjoy!
Year 1
The young girl let her tongue slip out of her mouth in concentration as she pushed and pulled at the edge of the water, watching the waves slowly forming at her will. It had taken her weeks not bending, but watching the water lap against the icy shore, until she finally was able to stand up, boots planted firmly in the freezing water, and try her hand. There was nobody there to break her will, not on her grandmother's private section of beach.
Her arms were shaking, and the decently sized waves she'd been making were trembling with them. They were beginning to lose interest in the six-year-old's game, and the water was starting to disperse. Sweat freezing against her dark skin, the girl growled at the uncooperative element and tried to keep it under her reigns. The water was growing, seeping deep into her fur boots and making her feet quake in them. Now the waves were unfurling themselves against the shore, increasing in size, rubbing against the girl's thighs through her coat like a stray wet cat-gull that was beginning to accept her as its master.
"Kuma!"
The angry shriek broke the confidence Kuma had been building up, and the cat-gull that had once been purring at her touch was now hissing and fighting feverishly against her until she had to give up control, and the water nonchalantly rolled back into the ocean. She stood at the edge of the water, soaked with anger, her hands clenching inside her thick mittens.
"Kuma!" Grams' sharp tone cut through the morning air. Her granddaughter could hear her heavy steps through the snow, melting everything around her with her fury. She reached out and pulled hard onto Kuma's thick ponytail.
The girl cried out, and the waves near her coiled back apprehensively, as if ready to loyally spring out and protect Kuma.
"What are you doing?" Grams hissed in her ear. She tugged again when her granddaughter made no sign that she heard her. "Look at my when I'm talking to you!" The old woman snarled as the ice puddled around their boots.
Scowling, Kuma snapped her head over to look. Despite her young age, the pulsing anger in her eyes and her words were more than a match for her grandmother. "I was waterbending. You got a problem with that?" She jutted her chin out and narrowed her eyes, daring Grams to satisfy her with a response.
The old woman stuck her neck out and copied Kuma's facial expression spot-on. "Waterbending is not for girls." Despite her age, Grams' quick fingers found a pink-tipped ear and dragged her granddaughter back across the sludge and into the hut. The young girl complained about her ear hurting every chance she got.
"Go change out of your wet clothes." Grams barked when she finally let go of Kuma. When she turned away to stir the pot of sea plums, the young girl stuck out an angry tongue and stalked into her tiny room.
She continued to grumble as she tore the wet clothes from her skin and threw them violently against the seal hide wall. The leggings fell unsatisfyingly into a soggy heap on the floor. Still grousing, Kuma jabbed her short legs into warm pants and scowled at her reflection when she had to fix the ponytail she'd worked so hard on that morning.
Exhausted from all the complaining and no longer able to think of a new one, Kuma flopped herself dramatically onto her small bed, dug her stinging nose into the pillow, and closed her eyes.
Grams had been standing in the doorway throughout her convincing performance. The woman just clucked and crossed her arms.
Kuma lifted her head, eyes heavy with detest. "What did you say?" She made the words sound as threatening as they could.
"I said you should be an actor." Grams gave her a half-smile, and before returning to her cooking she added, "I hear they love Water Tribe kids out in Ba Sing Se."
Kuma didn't have to know where Ba Sing Se was to know Grams was taunting her. She screamed and threw her pillow with all her might. It landed with a thud against the curtain they used as a door and slid to the floor.
…
That night, just before dinner, Kuma's father arrived late, his face lined with grim news. Of course, Kuma hadn't noticed; not yet, anyways.
"Daddy!" She abandoned her stuffed Avatar Kuta dolls and latched onto his snow-covered boot. He smiled at her, but it died as soon as he noticed what she'd been playing with. He cleared his throat, as if to speak, but Kuma began pulling at the edge of his coat. She let out a toothy grin and said, "Come play Avatar with me, Daddy! You can be Won Shi Tong if you want."
Last year, Avatar Kuta had faced the winged spirit in his library and granted the rest of the world access to the owl's endless library. Historians had raved about this act for months, and it was Kuma's favorite story about the Avatar. Kuta had always been her favorite, not because he from the Northern Water Tribe, but because his name was so similar to hers. That, and he was Kuma's first, and children always idolized their first Avatar.
"Not right now, little bear." Paku let his daughter down gently, and reluctantly pulled her arms away. Kuma felt her eyes sting as she watched her father get to his feet and greet his mother at the fireplace. He was too distracted to see her quickly wipe away the hot tears, and she was too hurt to bend them away.
Dinner was weighed down by overcooked sea plums and Paku's impending news. Kuma was trying to get rid of the salty taste on her tongue by gurgling it out with tea when her father balanced his chopsticks across the soup bowl. Grams looked up from her dainty sips to lock eyes with her son.
"Avatar Kuta is dead."
Kuma let out an alarmed squeak, but half of it was from burning the roof of her mouth with tea.
"What? Dead?" Grams pressed a palm against her mouth, the teacup suddenly heavy at her fingertips. "No, it couldn't be…" The cup slipped and sent clay shards scattering across the dirt floor. A green-tinted puddle sat there next to her, waiting to be cleaned up by Grams, but she's too shocked to see it. Her hands continue to tremble, and they never stop.
"Word got around this afternoon. By tomorrow, the entire world will know of Kuta's passing." Her father's voice broke, but he continued speaking with a level tone. "He was found in his bed, his throat slit and blood all over the covers."
Kuma let out the gasp she'd been trying to hold in. Her fingers gripped so hard onto the table that splinters lodged beneath her skin. The young girl could feel Grams' shaking hand rubbing calming circles against her back. Her grandmother was repeatedly drawing the Water Tribe insignia into the girl's skin.
"How can this be?" Grams was reduced to hoarse whispers as tears fell, following the grooves in her cheeks down. "He was only twenty-five…he was just a boy…"
"He hadn't become a fully-realized Avatar until last year," Her father added.
"What do you mean Kuta's dead?" Kuma asked and already dreaded the answer. Judging by her grandmother's reaction and the horrible twist in her stomach, it couldn't mean anything good.
Paku looked across at her, something in his eyes that the young girl could not name, even if she wanted to. "It means he's…gone away."
"But Avatar Kuta goes away all the time." Kuma protested. "What do you mean he's dead?"
Grams was tired of beating around the bush. She pulled her hand away from Kuma's back. "It means Kuta has gone to the Spirit World and will never be coming back." She snapped.
Kuma felt her bones chill. She was shivering more now than she had been soaked in the cold water. Her knees felt like jelly as she excused herself from the table. The quiet voices of her family droned on but said nothing of importance; they hadn't yet noticed the beginnings of a wound twisting deep in her chest, one only she could see. She grabbed the toys strewn across her playing rug and carried them into her room, her shoulders drooping like Kuma was carrying a lot more than just a few stuffed dolls.
"Why did you have to tell her like that?" Paku watched as the hide curtain swayed behind her.
Grams had learned that with her granddaughter, she had to be straight, or else the six-year-old didn't understand. But, just like Kuma, her son didn't understand, either. She got shakily to her feet and began picking up the remains of her teacup.
Paku sighed, not knowing where he'd gone wrong. He picked up his chopsticks and finished the meal alone.
…
"Where's Kuma?" Paku stepped out of his daughter's empty room anxiously.
His mother turned from stoking the fire pit. "Shouldn't she be in her room?" She asked lazily. Her skin had a rosy tinge to it, indicating that she'd taken a few shots from her secret stash of imported fire-whiskey.
"I just looked there, and there's no sign of her."
Two identical pairs of eyes met in the lamplight. "The beach," Grams barely whispered before she jumped to get her coat. Spirits knows what she's doing out there… The fury was back her eyes.
And it was extinguished as soon as they found Kuma in her warm fur coat, carefully stringing together a couple piece of driftwood into a makeshift raft, maybe a foot and a half in length.
"Kuma! There you are!" Her father rushed to her side on the snow bank. The waves were sloshing forcefully against his daughter's still-wet boots, but she refused to acknowledge neither the cold nor her father. Once again, her tongue slipped out in concentration. Taking a look around, Grams noticed that in the snow beside her was a small figure. She had stayed a little bit behind, but now stooped forward to pick up the limp doll. As it rolled around and wet her mittens, Grams managed to recognize the face, even beneath the crescent moon. It was Avatar Kuta.
"What are you doing, little bear?" Paku softly asked.
"Making a raft." Kuma grunted as she pulled the seal gut string tight, as if it was painfully obvious.
"I see that." He let a light smile spread over his face. "Do you want to tell me what it's for?"
"Not what; who." Kuma corrected. Finally, she looked up from the driftwood. Her eyes shined in the moonlight, but with tears or an odd sort of determination, Paku couldn't tell.
It was hard for him not to be surprised when his daughter turned away to continue working. "Alright then. Who is it for?"
He felt his mother's shaking hand squeeze his shoulder. She was looking out at the water, thick streams of tears creating indents in the snow. "Avatar Kuta." She whispered across the waves, barely heard by her family. She stared down at Paku and revealed the doll in her hand. "The raft is for Avatar Kuta."
Guilt struck him like poison had swept through his system.
"Mm-hmm." Kuma confirmed, and cut the string with a knife. She peered into her father's eyes, innocence ringing her pupils. "Because that's what you do, right? When someone goes to the Spirit World, you have to send their body somewhere so that they're with their element. Right?"
It took Paku a second to force a smile on his face. "Yeah, that's right."
Kuma nodded, as if she knew that'd be his answer all along, and diligently when back to her work. Grams settled down on the other side of her granddaughter, and watched as the moon continued her ascent, Avatar Kuta cradled in her lap. Paku had offered his help, but his daughter refused to take it, insisting that this was something she had to do by herself.
It was almost midnight by the time Kuma was satisfied with her work. She got up and stood with the water at her knees, her skin already producing goose bumps. The raft bumped against her legs as the young girl looked over and outstretched her hands to Grams.
"Is it time?" Her grandmother was still viewing the endless water, one hand propping her old body up and the other supplying the doll with comforting touches, despite the fact that it was dead and at the same time, never even alive.
"Yeah." Kuma turned to her father. "Daddy?"
"Mm?"
"Did you get the candle?"
He produced a candle from his coat, along with a pair of spark rocks. Paku ceremoniously lit the flame, and gave his daughter a glance before setting it at the head of the raft.
Avatar Kuta was set upon his final vessel not long after that. When Kuma was satisfied with his final resting position, she pulled a knife from her coat shoulder and with one swift movement, cut open the doll's neck.
Grams felt the cold shock ripple through her old bones at how easy it had been for her granddaughter to end the doll's life, even if he was only a toy. She exchanged a wary glance with her son before asking tentatively, "Why did you slit Avatar Kuta's throat?"
"Well, that was how he was found, right? I thought that it would only be natural if he went the same way." Kuma's eyes were now rimmed with a black sort of innocence, but Grams insisted it must have been the lighting. She turned to her father. "Can I say goodbye?"
He could barely nod.
Standing in the icy water, Kuma watched the rafter bounce against her for a moment and the long candle dripping wax that froze midair into solid droplets, and mused on what she could say. When she finally spoke, her voice was low and both her grandmother and father had to lean forward to catch her words before they fell into the water and disappeared.
"Everyone tells me that you always fall in love with your first Avatar, and, if you're lucky to get that far, hate the second. I don't think love is a good word, because it is too important to use on someone I've never met. But I love you anyways, like an older brother or an uncle or something, because you have always been there. I am so sad and sorry that you are gone. You were young, or so I'm told, and you didn't deserve to leave like you did. But as long as you know that you were a really, really good Avatar, I think everything's gonna be okay. So…
"…until next time, Avatar."
Kuma, waited for the wind that was not there to pick up Avatar Kuta and push him across the water and out of sight. When she realized the raft hadn't moved and her heart began to sink, she heard her grandmother let out a little cough.
Their eyes met. "Just this one time," Grams instructed, only appearing stern.
Breathing out slowly, the young girl carefully pushed and pulled the water clutching at her legs. Not long after, the raft was pulled along with the retreating waves, and became nothing more than a glowing yellow light in the distance.
Six-year-old Kuma had never felt abandoned until she stood there, shivering in the arctic sea, and watched the candle bob along the current; to her, it felt as if there was a gaping wound in her chest beginning to grow that could never be healed.
"And thus, the Interim begins." Grams spoke as if it was a final blessing, and headed back inside.
…
Fire. Air. Water. Earth. Yesterday, Avatar Kuta, master of all four elements, was found dead in his home, his throat slit by an unhappy diplomat from the Fire Nation. The whole world is left in shock, guideless, and unable to sleep soundly in our beds until the next Avatar is found in the Earth Kingdom, in 16 years. My grandmother likes to call the age between Avatars the interim, and says that rest of the world will just have to sit tight and wait for him to come forward and solve everyone's problems. Personally, I don't know why we have to rely on a person who disappears for 16 years and then comes back and expects us to worship him. But I guess…that's just how the world works.
Hope you enjoyed it! Leave me some comments, tell me what you think! I appreciate any kind of feed back, as long as it's polite. Please note that the tone of this fic will mature as Kuma grows older, which is why it might seem childish here in this first chapter. Alright, until the next chapter, dears!
The Agent