Disclaimer: Avatar is not mine.
A/N: I wrote this fast, although I've had the idea for some time. Any mistakes should be reported.
Summary: Aang finds that being the Avatar means duty is before happiness, and as always that means Katara.
Aang has known since he opened his eyes
(100 years, in the blink of an eye, awake from a century long dream)
and saw the endless blue of Katara's eyes, that he will never forget this girl.
(This will haunt him later, because Guru Pathik says letgoletgolego and he finds he won'tcan'trefusesto)
For now though, her eyes are full of wonder and sadness (for it has been a century long nightmare for everyone else), and the combination of the two emotions make her beautiful in a way he hasn't seen before.
(He remembers happiness and peace, the beauty before everything fell apart.)
He thinks that he fell in love with her just a little right there.
He knows he loves her, when he finds that the fate of the world briefly takes a backseat to Katara.
But he is the Avatar, and duty has always come first.
Katara has loved Aang since she learned he was their savior.
He is only twelve (such an old twelve), but she believes he will save them all. She just wants this war to end, before it takes away her father or brother.
She truly loved him later, when she started to care less for the world, for the Avatar, and more for just Aang.
He told her once that he is as much her savior as she is his.
She catches his broken body, the picture of a guardian angel, and saves him from death.
She realizes in that split terrible second that this goes beyond the love of a friend, but then again she supposes she's always been more of a mother to them all anyways.
A mother's love is powerful, so she pushes back the idea of romance.
(She's too young to be a mother, but she ignores this.)
She realizes she has fallen in love when she threatens the Fire Prince with death should he harm Aang.
Later, when she cannot bring herself to kill her mother's killer, she realizes just how deep her love ran.
She meant every word when she threatened Zuko, and would still follow through if Aang were harmed.
She will commit the unspeakable for Aang, and it isn't until later that she realizes why.
With Aang dead, she thinks a part of her would too. The good part, the part that hesitated to kill the man who had killed her childhood.
Somehow the idea that Aang holds the best part of her in his breath doesn't scare her.
The fact, that Aang can die and will do so willingly for her and everyone else, does.
Malu hears whispers of the Avatar when she is twelve, and her city of Omashu has been captured by the Fire Nation.
She yearns to meet him, to ask questions, and learn everything about who she is and where she belongs.
But she takes little to no initiative in her goal. She is just a bit too cynical for her age. Being in a war, and the last of your kind does that to a person.
Her mother was an airbender that lived in isolation. She doesn't know who her father is. Her mother dies when she is six, and she is found as an orphan and somehow finds herself in Omashu. She felt safe here, but that was before the kingdom was taken by siege.
When the Avatar saves them all, she is surprised to find he is her age.
But he is really more than 100 years old, and he holds the knowledge of the Air Nomads.
She wants to talk to him and show him she can fly.
(Just barely, but then again she's had to teach herself.)
She doesn't get the chance, because they leave as easily as they came.
The only thing they leave behind is hope, and she is nothing but thankful.
(For a second, he catches her eyes and his own widen because she has gray eyes like his own, and that is the sign of...)
But destiny and the fate of the world call, and he leaves on a bison, and she promises herself she will find him later.
Life remains difficult after the war. There is rebuilding taking place everywhere, and the Avatar is important in that process, because duty always falls upon him.
It is also the happiest period of his life, because Katara is his in a way he could not have imagined when he was younger. She loves him the way he loves her and that is all that matters.
So, he doesn't think that this girl, who has been watching him in the dim light, will change anything. It is a party in Ba Sing Se, and he is a little surprised that she is being so forward, when she comes up to him.
"I'm an Airbender," the brunette tells him bluntly. Closer, he can see stormy gray eyes, that he hasn't seen on anyone else in such a long time.
He is seventeen, and he is thrilled to find someone like him.
It is obvious she is one of his people. She has the features of a Nomad although she looks nothing like the calm, stoic people from his childhood.
She is a violent tempest, demanding attention just by her presence. Her gray eyes challenging his, and her smile teasing, deceptive. Her face shows a determination he finds reassuring.
"I've been searching for you for five years," she continues, when he says nothing else. "You're unsurprisingly difficult to get a hold of."
He laughs nervously, but then the questions come. How? And why? When?
In the end almost sheepishly, he asks who.
"Malu," she says quietly. "After my mother."
Katara realizes what will happen before anyone else, except perhaps Zuko (who knows about blood and duty, more than she does).
Aang has gotten a new lifelong friend, in the way only he is capable of. Malu is his age and cynical and has characteristics that usually upset Aang.
Besides the ruins of the Air temples, Malu is the only thing left of the people who could fly the heavens.
Katara is slightly jealous that Malu is something that Aang needs and wants, but the girl is likable in her own way, and Katara counts her as a friend after some time.
Aang has already proven that he loves her above the others.
It isn't until later, when Aang is kissing her, and whispering of the future that she understands.
She has always imagined herself being a part of Aang's future, of having little Airbenders and somehow repopulating a nation. She knows that it is one of Aang's dreams.
"The Avatar has all four element in his being," Zuko explains calmly, when she asks him fearfully. He knows more than he lets on about the Avatars. His great-grandfather was one, apparently and so he has studied what he left behind.
"Although he is born into one nation, he holds all the elements. If the Avatar should have children with a non-bender, the child has an equal chance of being the bender of one of the elements. If the Avatar has children with another bender, though, the children will only be able to bend that element, because the scale has been tipped in that element's favor."
"So, if Aang and I," she stops, biting her lip and feeling a faint blush appear, but she has to know.
"They will all be Waterbenders," he tells her softly, looking away from her sudden display of sadness, as she begins to sob quietly. He awkwardly pats her back, and she falls against him. He has never been comfortable around emotional females. It is part of the reason he knows Mai was made for him.
"Aang has always wanted...to revive the Air Nomads," she confesses, although there's no need to. Everyone in their immediate group of friends knows this.
"I'm sorry, Katara," he tells her honestly. "You and Aang are made for one another."
"No, apparently we're not."
Katara tells her the intricacies of Avatar genetics, and Malu doesn't understand what she can do, until Katara tells her that Aang want to have the Air Nomads back.
Malu glares and refuses such an idea. She has not fallen in love yet, but already knows Aang is not the one for her.
He has taught her about her people and how to airbend. He proudly declared her a master after two years of training. She is grateful, beyond belief, but she does not love him.
"Malu, you must understand. You've been searching for your history. Perhaps, you can help..."
"I won't. Besides, aren't you the one that loves him?"
"There are things more important than how I feel."
"No wonder he loves you," Malu says softly. "You're all about duty and morals and stuff."
Katara has thought through this a hundred and plus times. Toph urges her to screw duty and be happy. Toph wouldn't understand though. She has always fought for what she wanted. Katara admires her for it, but knows she could not live with herself if she held her own happiness before the greater good.
Katara nods sadly, and Malu wonders if she has said something wrong.
"Exactly."
Aang has never hated being the Avatar more than when he realizes that duty come before anything else, and that has usually meant Katara.
He understands in the way that a boy (man) that has always followed his duty does.
He knows in the back of his mind, that it is the right decision. What is the price of his happiness, if the restoration of the balance of elements can be accomplished.
There must be an Air Nation, for the Avatar to continue to exist.
(He wonders if perhaps it is better for an Avatar to not exist, but pushes the traitorous thought away from his mind.)
He thinks he might be bitter, but he also thinks he has every right to be.
Malu is his friend, and although he does not love her, he cares for her. She does too, in her own way, and their marriage will be a comfortable one. Never happy, never beautiful, never epic, but he gave that up when he gave up Katara.
On their wedding day, Malu cries, for the first time since he has known her. She understands why she must do this, but she doesn't accept it. She is too challenging, but after a year of Katara and he asking and begging she has grudgingly accepted.
They had always been a good team.
"I still love you more than anything," he tells Katara after the reception.
She smiles sadly, and kisses him. For the last time, because duty has come before happiness for her, as well.
She has not cried this day (he admires her strength), and instead it is he who begins to weep.
She holds him, and he remembers that she has always been his savior, and he wishes he could save her, as well.
300 years later, the Air Nomads have become a small nation that is steadily growing. They are a unified, slightly isolationist nation that can all trace their family history back to at least one of the many children of Avatar Aang, and his wife Malu.
However, they all have traces of other nations, for the children of their most famous Avatar married non-benders from the other nations, to keep the Airbending trait strong.
They have had another Avatar since then, descended from the eldest of Avatar Aang's children.
(Aang meets his great-granddaughter as a spirit, and guiltily knows that he has passed down the burden on his descendant.)
They are due to have another as soon, as the Fire Nation's Avatar dies. They are awaiting the event with excitement.
They celebrate their two ancestors, every year on the day of their marriage. It is both a happy celebration, that becomes solemn as they understand how close they were to complete extinction. Fate intervened on their behalf.
They are flourishing and know they have to thank their ancestors. Avatar Aang and Malu have become almost Gods in their society.
Malu is seen as their savior in a different way than Aang was. She was the last of the Airbenders, and they know it was fate that made her and Aang fall in love.
(At least, that is how the stories go)
The story of Aang's true savior is forever forgotten.
Would love to hear your thoughts.