A/N: So. I appear to have written angst, and Toko angst at that. Huh.
Disclaimer: I don't own Avatar. Neither do I own the idea of Toph on Zuko's shoulders...that came from a pic on Deviantart. Sadly, I don't remember who drew it...
Oh, something else: there's something in here about Zuko having a mission with Katara. I don't really know anything about this, except that it's in the newest trailer. Have fun. ;)
He came to them with a sudden plea for forgiveness, an awkward countenance and a fractured smile. His heart was pounding like a wild beast's, and she admired how well he held himself together under that strain. Still, her comrades were mistrustful and reasonably so. What they saw was the darkened man who had pursued them, who had captured them, who had appeared in their dreams enshrouded by flames. To them, he was the man with the temper of a monsoon and the obsession of a demon. Flashes of a battle in a sacred oasis, betrayal among the crystals, and a figure in an ironic, laughing blue mask hardened their thoughts.
Was it wrong that her first thought was of the boy whose heart had frozen as his uncle's had almost stopped permanently, in a ghost town far away?
Nevertheless, she took a defensive position with her friends, prepared as always to lay her life on the line for the ones who had rescued her from her pretty dresses and unreachable stars. This wasn't her battle, not really, but she would do whatever was needed of her. She would hate him, she would fight him, she would even –
It did no good to think that far. She hadn't killed anyone before…but if she was needed to, there was no doubt that she could. She could forget her momentary thoughts of mercy, and they'd never know.
But after he'd been driven away, when the lips of her friends had just barely begun to abandon their thin forms, she recalled that heart. Not the telltale march of a liar – even a killer's heart seemed to beat differently in her mind – but the erratic beat of the fearful. Yet even through her anger, that was something she could never bring herself to tell them. Maybe she sympathized with the injury it would bring to his pride, but for whatever reason it was another thing they'd never know.
It all worked out in the end – she and Aang were the first to accept the forgotten prince into their group. He went on adventures, he bonded, he slowly grew out of his awkward, reflective shell. He had to pay her back for burning her feet, of course. She was certain that the view from his shoulders, both of her surroundings and his humiliated face, would have been exquisite if she could see it. Still, no one besides the two of them knew just how panicked he had sounded when he burned her, perhaps his final chance of redemption. The panic part applied to her as well, but that wasn't important. It was just something else they'd never know.
But she began to keep another secret of his – honestly, hadn't she done enough already? – after he went on his mission with Katara. The events of the day had caused the waterbender to forgive her declared enemy, but it had done a little more for Zuko. When she was too near him, his heart rate sped up. When her arm brushed his during daily chores, his body shivered ever so slightly. She supposed he couldn't help it, even if he felt guilty about his girlfriend at home. Katara was a force of nature in battle, and probably beautiful to boot. But she knew for a fact that Katara didn't think about him in any way except as a trusted companion, and she was already halfway with another. Her heart sped up almost as much as Aang's did when they were together, even if neither were brave enough to admit it. Sokka, being her brother, might have noticed Zuko's slightly gentler tone when speaking to her, or the furtive glances she was certain he indulged in every now and then. But he was busy with his own object of affection, the recently recovered Suki. They were head-over-heals.
It wasn't fair, really. She knew them all literally inside and out. She knew, and they never would.
She kept smiling, of course. She kept hoping that things would work out for the better, that somehow this tension could be released harmlessly, or that Zuko would get over his sudden affections. They all got to know him, and eventually she found that he was even easier to talk to than the others. It had to do with her way of getting under his skin, maybe, her way of teasing him about all of the things he was most sensitive about and still getting away with it. She could take anything he dished out as well, without any offense. But it went deeper than that, on quiet nights around the campfire or trips to the fountain to soothe her burnt feet. She had a particular way of talking to him that got to the root of the matter. They seemed to share so much – their pride, their anger, their familial troubles – and she knew just the way to cajole him, prod him, to frustrate him and then reassure him, to get past the sullen defenses remaining.
But nothing was ever perfect. To her dismay, his infatuation grew. When Katara was being too friendly with Aang, she could practically feel him burn. She laughed it off, even teasing him about it secretly – because the others would never, could never know. He was angry with her at first, even furious, but she was so blatantly right that there really wasn't anything he could blame her for, as she reminded him. Not that he didn't try. Yet by now she knew him better than any of the others did, and she cajoled and prodded him again until he relented. She became his confidant, and that made her proud.
They'd never know.
Life was just fine as she pretended that things would work themselves out. But the issue would not just go away because she wished it would; it fought to gain her attention. She grew more uncomfortable day after day, like she was sitting on some sort of pent-up energy without any idea what it was for or how to release it. She felt sick to the stomach sometimes when they talked together, even as his quietly powerful voice vibrated pleasantly on her ears. The disorienting sensation grew more and more, until she felt as though she wanted to scream from the sheer pressure of it.
One night they sat, legs dangling off the edge of a temple ridge as he looked over the cliffhanging at the night sky and she mentally examined the delicate carvings in the stone above their heads. His voice contained that smooth, gentle quality that could only mean that he was talking about Her, and although she couldn't see it she could definitely feel the ill-disguised smile he wore. As usual, the pressure mounted and she felt the unexplainable desire to leave, leave and never imagine that face again, hear that voice, feel that heart, unless…unless what?
Unless it was for her.
Her mind was numb as she listened to embarrassed but beautiful – so beautiful – words, completely wrong in this man's mouth. Zuko should be fire and strength and strong, sure vibrations, not soft and gentle and…wrong. She wanted to slap him, to push him off, to-
No, no she couldn't do that…but…oh, she wanted to. It was sudden and just as wrong for her as this was for him, but she knew there was a raw force behind it that Katara could never have, there was a fire…
And then her lips were smashing against his, clumsy and rough and so very, very not Katara. Not Katara, not Mai, not any other girl who had ever captured his attentions. It was kind of funny, in a sad way. She knew how to read his every emotion, but he had no idea what she was thinking. Ever. And she knew that he had never seen this coming, never even thought twice about her.
Because she really was the only one who saw.
Then she was running, running as far away as she could, to anywhere but here. The others' laughter from the distant campfire echoed in her ears, mixing with the sound of his call.
They'd never know.
A/N: I really don't know where this came from; I usually don't like killing hopes and dreams. D: I was vacuuming at the time. Eh, the ending's still open. Sorta. I'm worried about OOC-ness in this one for obvious reasons, but I, at least, can see her acting this way in this situation.
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