Disclaimer: Own them, I do not. Abuse them with lots of awkward positions and Aangst, I do. Yes…yes I do.

Contrary to what the disclaimer may infer, no I haven't watched Star Wars lately. But I have delved into "deep" conversation over it. Yes, yes I do. And they are supposed to be much older in this, roughly mid-twenties. Maybe earlier, but it's been a while since the final conflict.

Thousand Eyed "Hero"

"What do you want, Aang?!"

He stared into the lake. Stone eyes searched for answers, begging them to be just beneath the water's surface. He didn't care if he could never see them. He just wanted them to be there.

If they were there, then they were real.

"My past…I have too—"

"Forget the damn past! Forget what they want from you! Just for a second, Aang. Just for a damn second!"

His grey eyes were met with green, and blue and gold and even a couple blind pairs staring back at him. That's something he hated about the water. It was never just his reflection.

And, he thought sadly, it'd never be hers again.

"What am I supposed to do Katara?! Throw away centuries of history! Centuries of who I am!"

"If that's what it takes to get Aang back, then yes. Yes, throw them away! They aren't you!"

He wasn't sure what started the fight. It was probably nothing more than a look, the way tensions were. All he remembered was how quickly it escalated, and the anger in her voice.

Oh, that voice she used against him was enough to kill him a thousand times over. He didn't suspect the anger to be the main culprit of his near death, but the pity that voice held for him.

After that, it had all came tumbling down around his ears.

She pitied him. She felt sorry for him; shameful and disappointed. He could sense in her voice that, somewhere deep down, she blamed him for everything.

"I won't! They're a part of me, and I refuse to let some pitiful Water Tribe peasant tell me what to do!"

Thousands of eyes stared back at him. He wouldn't dare count how many glared, or gave sorrowful looks, or refused to even look at all. He wouldn't show his defeat before them; he'd already defeated himself.

"If that's the way you want it, then fine by me! You go ahead and live alone! See if I care what happens to you!"

He bent the water into the shape of her face, and froze it over the eyes of his predecessors. He knew he was a fool.

Here was a girl he'd done everything with. She'd saved him countless times. 'Til the end, before the very gates of Hell, she stood by him and fought with him. She'd crippled Azula, turning the princess' own lightning against her. She'd done it for revenge, for him.

She'd even helped him rebuild their world; standing with him whenever a speech was to be delivered.

How did he repay her?

Well, he'd rather not cement it in words. The memories were bad enough.

"For what it's worth, Aang, all I ever wanted was a hero."

The Avatar, cold an alone, stared into the face of his icy once-upon-a-dream lover. He smirked, the first sign of emotion upon his face in months.

"What a perfect way to describe us," he spoke softly, "our love." A flame flickered to life at the end of his fingers, licking at the water he touched it to. "A candle, burning both ends." With a flick of his wrist, her image melted into the water, steam rising from where it once lay.

Words came to him, from a lifetime ago. A smirk played his lips once more. "Heroes are for children's tales, and adult's Hells."

So completely not what I meant it to be, but satisfying in a darker way.

The quote at the end comes from my OC, Mayu. Whose tentative profile has been put up over at my blog. Which you can see by following the link that says "homepage" on my profile. I'm mulling over a short, multi-chaptered fic surrounding her and Roku, but I'm not sure yet. She is an OC after all….

That's all folks. Er…review!

mcl