The Fifth Element
No mine this is by Karen at Avatar site.
Water, earth, fire, air… Finally, Fire Lord
Ozai and Sozens Comet are defeated and the century long war between
the Fire Nation and the rest of the world is over. It was all
thanks to my husband, Aang, the long lost Avatar and one of the last
of the Air Nomads. My home, the Southern Water Tribe, is being
rebuilt thanks to the help of our Northern sister tribe, and Aang, my
brother, Sokka, and I have returned there to live peacefully with our
family. But the Fire Nation would strike again, this time in
the form of the banished Princess Azula who was still at war with her
brother, the new Fire Lord Zuko, over the throne. Now, with
my husband passed on due to terrible illness and the Fire Nation
divided in another impending war, we can only hope and pray that the
Avatar will return once again to save the
world…
Prologue
Death
The sun had nearly finished lowering itself into the icy waters of the South Pole… The brilliant colors of the arctic sunset gradually began to fade into an indigo night sky and the first star, nutjuitok,(1) appeared…
"How is he," nineteen-year-old Katara, Cheiftess and co-leader of the Southern Water Tribe, pleaded to the group of village healers coming out of the main medical tent.
It had all happened so fast and she was still in shock. Not even a year after their wedding and Aang had taken horribly ill. Her young seventeen-year-old husband had grown paler and thinner, and his normally large appetite was failing. Often he would collapse in fits of coughing and wheezing.
At first, Katara, Sokka and the others had thought the illness had been due to his exposure to the frozen conditions of the South Pole and the arctic, but now they and the healers were suspecting that it was something far more serious…
Aang had been in the healers tents all day and now Katara was near frantic with worry…
The oldest healer shook her head, a saddened expression on her wizened face.
"I'm sorry," the elderly woman answered, "but he's not getting any better. There's nothing that can be done."
Tears rimmed in the young womans eyes, and she put a hand to her mouth.
"No!."
"I'm afraid not even water-healing can cure this. The tribal priests say it's due to his taking up his Avatar duties so early, far earlier then he was meant to."
Katara's heart sank as she realized what they meant. Her grandmother had told her that all Avatars start learning how to bend all four elements at the age of sixteen, but Aang had told her that the senior monks of the Southern Air Temple had insisted he begin his training at only twelve.
"So… So this means…" the Waterbending masters voice trailed off…
The old womans heart went out to Katara. Poor girl, to lose her young husband so soon!. True, Avatar Aang was technically over one hundred, but most of those years had been spent in suspended animation. He had never gotten the chance to live and grow old with his loved ones!.
"Yes," she answered softly. "Unfortunately, because of the war, the Airbender monks pushed him into early training. He was in the Avatar state so many times before he was the proper age in which his body was ready to handle it."
The young Cheiftess took a deep breath before she trusted herself to speak without sobbing.
"May I see him?. Please?."
"Of course," the elderly healer agreed kindly, and her assistants nodded in sympathy.
How tragic that the world was going to lose yet another Avatar, especially with the growing unrest in the Fire Nation…
Katara quietly entered the tent to see her beloved Aang laying on his bed of felt, furs and skins… Surrounding him were all the medicines, foods and charms the healers were using to try at least to keep him comfortable…
In spite of her grief, the young woman had to smile as she remembered how humorously difficult it had been for her vegetarian husband to get used to the meats, skins and furs of the Water Tribe. "Nothing homier then a roomful of dead animals" he would remark jokingly.
The young Waterbending cheiftess softly knelt by Aang, then she took the nearby cold, damp washcloth and began to gently run it down his forehead, face and neck… Even though he was pale and shivering, his fever was high and his skin burning hot to the touch…
Slowly, the young seventeen year old Avatars eyes flickered open… Seeing his dearly loved wife, he gave her a big warm smile.
"I had a dream about us just now," he said.
Katara forced herself to smile back through her tears as she ran the cloth over his forehead again.
"Really?. What was it about?."
Aang closed his eyes for a moment and gave a contented sigh.
"It was about the day we met," he answered. "Do you remember when you found me in that iceberg?. Your face was the first thing I saw when I woke up."
"I remember…" Katara whispered. Ever since he had asked her to marry him, Aang had told her he had loved her since the first time he saw her when he was a naïve, impetuous child of twelve… She herself had been fourteen, a girl on the verge of womanhood, and had only thought of Aang as a little brother or a son in the beginning… that is, until she realized that the child Avatar, her little Waterbending pupil, was growing into a man before her eyes…
Still smiling, Aang took her hand…
"I'm just glad that I get to see your face one more time before I join the spirits."
This was to much for Katara!. She had already lost her mother, her grandparents, her father!. Why must she lose her beloved husband now too?.
"Aang, no," she cried, throwing her arms around him, her tears soaking his shirt. "Please! Please don't leave!. The world can't afford to lose you and neither can I!."
Her husbands tattooed hand gently caressed her cheek…
"It's okay, Katara," Aang tried to reassure her. "I'm the Avatar. I've had countless past-lives. This is nothing I haven't done a million times already."
As he spoke, his hand grew limp and slowly fell to his side… His eyes began to close for the last time…
"I will always be with you, Katara," Aang murmured before he was taken to join Avatar Roku, Avatar Kyoshi, and all the numerous Avatars of the past. "Always… I promise…"
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Avatar Aang, the last known Airbender, was taken to the remains of the Southern Air Temple where he was born and had spent his earlier years… There he was buried at a secret place in a private ceremony by his wife and Waterbending teacher, Katara, his brother-in-law and Atanerk(2) of the Southern Water Tribe, Sokka, as well as his dear friend and Earthbending teacher, General Toph Bei Fong…
A statue of Avatar Aang was placed next to the one of Avatar Roku in every temple sanctuary within the Four Nations… Not only his friends and loved ones, but the whole world felt the loss of Aang and grieved for him…
It was only a few days, less then a week, after returning from the funeral ceremony that Cheiftess Katara of the Southern Water Tribe discovered that she was pregnant with her late husbands child…