A/N: I was feeling inspired for a Zutara. Hope y'all like it. Oh, and I included an allusion to Katara's fight with Zuko at the North Pole. Can you find it? :D Also, I have heard of nothing about self-healing sessions like what I describe. This is only my imagination.
DISCLAIMER: I own a lot of things. Avatar: the Last Airbender doesn't happen to be one of them.
Battles
"Damn waterbender!"
Katara merely laughed and flicked a water whip at her opponent. "Aw, does wikkle Tophie need some helpy-welpy?"
Toph growled and stomped her foot. A crest of dirt rose and fell in the ground, rippling as if a crazed serpent were racing through the earth.
Katara waited until it was nearly at her feet before she leapt gracefully away from the area. A gust of wind caught her and prevented her feet from touching the ground. Toph's head whipped around frantically while Katara floated through the air. "Dammit, Sugarqueen! That's Twinkletoes' move!"
Katara smothered a chuckle. She winked at the Avatar, who was busy maintaining the miniature whirlwind that kept her aloft. Aang blushed, his form faltering. The whirlwind collapsed and Katara fell to the earth with a jarring thump.
Immediately Toph sensed her location. She sent a barrage of melon-sized rocks speeding towards the waterbender, but again, Katara was too fast for her. She spun her arms in a circle and pushed away from her chest, causing the water she'd just drawn from the surrounding trees to leap in front of her in a towering wave. Toph calmly raised a pillar of earth beneath her feet, raising her far above the wave's crest.
Katara sprinted forward to catch up with her creation as it broke around Toph's tower. She spun her hand towards the sky. As Katara's hand twisted, a ribbon of water twisted at the same time, twining about her body like a cat. Abruptly, Katara yanked her hand down. The ribbon boiled and shot her high into the air.
Time seemed to slow while Katara was airborne—this time, without the Avatar's assistance. The water droplets sparkling around her face looked like someone had tossed up a bagful of priceless diamonds as mere confetti. Rainbows sprung from the natural prisms and kissed Katara's dark cheeks.
She smiled fiercely. Her hands rapidly moving, she bent the wave-pool beneath her into a frozen slide and she slid towards Toph, who was standing, utterly bewildered, on her high pillar of rock. Katara collected the water on the slide that she'd already used and shot it into Toph's belly with devastating force. With a shriek of frustration, Toph toppled into the air as Katara delicately landed on the pillar.
"Toph!" Sokka shrieked. He sped forward and held his arms up as if he expected to catch the girl-missile falling to the ground. Aang quickly pushed Sokka out of the way and blew up. Toph's descent slowed and then stopped as she floated on the pillow of air made by the Avatar.
"Toph!" Katara called. She quickly summoned her ice-slide and fairly flew to the ground. "Are you alright?"
Toph landed at the same time as Katara. She brushed sweaty bangs out of her face. "Perfect, Katara." She gave her rival her devil-may-care smile. "Thanks for letting me fly like that!"
Sokka raised an eyebrow. "I thought you didn't like flying."
Toph giggled. "When I'm not expecting it, it's not so bad."
"…That makes no sense whatsoever."
Toph shrugged, her clothes parting slightly at the shoulders where she'd ripped the seams during the battle-practice. "Who cares?"
Sokka eyed Toph's shirt. "C'mon, let's get that mended." He grabbed Toph by the elbow and steered her back to the staircase to take her to the temple below. Aang flitted by them and jumped off of the edge of the canyon. He disappeared below the edge, but it wasn't long until Katara could see the glider dip and sail in the great open space.
Katara waited until she couldn't hear the silly banter of her brother and her friend before relaxing her confident pose with a ragged gasp. She clutched her hip with both hands, trying to breathe through the pain. Aang's distraction earlier had caused her to hit the ground extremely hard; she suspected that she had fractured her hip bone.
She limped to the small pond not far from the lip of the canyon. It was this pool, and the large clear space between it and the edge, that had made it the ideal place for everyone to practice their bending so that they wouldn't go soft while they were waiting for Aang to learn firebending. Carefully, she pulled the long tunic-dress over her head and waded into the water in only leggings and her breast wrap. She hissed when the cool water touched her side, but it soon numbed and dulled the pain.
She took a deep breath and began to do a repetitive, meditative series of movements in the shallows that the kind old woman at the North Pole had recommended she do to begin a self-healing session. Self-healing was twice as difficult as a typical healing, for she would have to concentrate and control her bending while also controlling the pain that accompanied any healing. This exercise would help her achieve a peaceful, non-aware state where it would be easier to cure herself because in this state, she was not as aware of the pain. Normally, she wouldn't bother to do this—she preferred to simply grit her teeth and get it done as fast as possible—but if her hip was hurting this much before the healing, she didn't want to know how bad it would be when she was actually bending.
She bent her knees and took a deep breath, ignoring the sharp pain in her hip. She pressed her palms together and, when she breathed out, she pressed down and out until her hands were spread like a bird's wings. The water of the pool followed like a liquid shadow as she took another breath while brought her hands back to her center in the same low arc.
She spread her hands wide and brought her thumbs and forefingers together until she formed a diamond. She breathed out, pushing away from her at the same time. The small water wave behind her back gently fell against her, washing down her shoulders and her head as it continued to move in front of her. Smiling slightly, half-hypnotized, Katara, deliberately breathing in, gracefully raised her hands and had her right hand go straight back and around her head until it was back where it had started, the left making a mirror image. Silently the water complied with her wordless order, encasing her in a swirling bubble of water and filling her ears with the soothing sound of rushing water. Katara breathed out and lowered her hands until they were palm-up in front of her chest once more.
Quickly, with a sharp inhale that was nearly a gasp, Katara flicked her fingers up and made hands that resembled a serpent's head with her fingertips touching the thumbs. Her tutor had told her they were "dragon-hands" but Katara preferred to pretend she was a Fire Nation tax collector: she had just collected the taxes and so she had to snap her hand closed, preventing the poor peasant from even daring to hope their monies might be returned to them. The water vibrated with the motion and collapsed into the center, forming an arc flowing over Katara's head.
Now the tricky part. She exhaled while shifting her stance slightly, looking to her right. She took her dragon-hands and dragged them in a circular motion to the right. Her knuckles would've touched the water's surface had the water not created a trough where her hands traveled. The trough widened, so she had an arc of water above her and a trough of air and earth below. When her hands arrived at the right, she paused and breathed out quickly, opening her hand to show her palm and press against an invisible wall. The water arc above her gurgled and thickened into a stream, flowing towards her hands. She took another breath and shifted to the left. The flow switched directions and drew even more water to itself when she pressed against her left side, breathing out while she did it. The stream became a semi-transparent canopy, casting shifting shadows on Katara's hair and shoulders.
She took a deep breath and circled her hands slowly, deliberately, in much the same motion as Aang had used when they had been tricking Toph earlier. The water arc spun ninety degrees so that the arc started on Katara's left side and ended on her right. When Katara pressed out with all her might, shoving out the air in her lungs in the same fashion, the water shot forward into a coil, vibrating like a plucked string. She breathed in and brought her hands to the right side by passing them through the air over her head, watching the water follow her lead over her head like a ribbon flowing in the wind. She circled on her right side as well, creating another water coil, and gently, she returned to the center position. At this point, Katara was supposed to press her palms back together and quickly shoot them towards the sun, creating a water pillar with her at the center. Technically, it was in this position—surrounded by her element—that she was supposed to cure herself; however, this probably wasn't a wise move, what with her injured hip and all. So Katara allowed the water to slip back below surface with barely a ripple to show the exercises she'd just been doing.
The calming exercise had achieved the desired effect. She was hyper aware of her breathing, of her heartbeats, of the water that ebbed and flowed around her. The pain in her side was much duller: enough to tell her where she was injured, not enough to really hamper her while she healed herself. She dipped her left hand into the pool and drew it back entirely encased in glowing liquid. She pressed her palm to the wound and willed it to sink into her skin and repair the damage that had occurred. A moment's sharp pain, sharper than anything she'd yet felt from the wound, made her bite her lip to keep from shouting and grateful that she'd done the exercise before beginning the healing.
But the pain was only for a moment, and soon Katara was wading out of the pool and drawing out the water from her hair and clothes by pinching her fingers together in the air and slowly dragging them away from her body. The water followed her hand, and as she pushed a little farther, she allowed them to flow the small distance back into the pool.
Katara was pulling on her tunic-dress when someone coughed. She spun around, feeling no pain from her newly-healed hip, ready to deal with the intruder.
Zuko rose carefully from his cross-legged position on the ground, making no sudden moves. Katara still didn't relax.
"What are you doing here?" she growled.
Zuko smirked. "I came up to keep an eye on Aang while you all practiced bending. I never left."
That meant he'd seen her in her underwear! Katara flushed (in anger, of course) and turned her head. "You should've said something!" she hissed to the pool.
"The show was very educational."
Katara growled. She snapped her hand towards Zuko's voice, and was rewarded when her water whip made him yelp. She looked at him again, and saw with satisfaction that he was rubbing a nasty-looking red welt on his cheek. "What did I do?!" he demanded.
"Gentlemen get slapped in situations like this. Since you're no gentleman, I thought that was more appropriate," she explained icily.
"How was I rude?" Zuko protested. Katara merely glared at him. They stood staring at each other for a full minute—Zuko confused, Katara livid—before understanding washed over Zuko's face and he relaxed his defensive posture. "I meant your bending! Not the…the…" He gulped. Obviously he recognized he was in all kind of hot water with Katara now and didn't want to say something that might make her mad again.
"The strip show?" Katara suggested sarcastically. She drew the last beads of water out of her leggings and flicked them carelessly towards the pool. Some of the water splattered on Zuko, but he didn't move and she didn't care. "I suppose I'd rather have you bothering me than Aang, but I'm still well within my rights to tell Sokka about this."
Zuko had opened his mouth once Katara had made her 'diplomatic' suggestion, but a sly gleam lit his eyes while he listened to Katara continue. "So," he drawled when she was done. "You'd have your brother fight your battles for you."
She hissed like an angry lioncub. "How dare you! I fight my own fights!"
"Prove it," Zuko suggested casually. When she didn't move, made completely by her rage, Zuko shrugged and ambled towards the steep staircase. He was suddenly dangling by his ankle ten feet in the air.
Katara's eyes flashed as she flung her hand to the side. Her large water lasso obeyed, tossing Zuko into the shallows of the pool where she had been moments before. "You would pick a fight," she seethed, waiting for him to stagger upright, "with a woman, and one who was just recently injured at that!"
Zuko had been trying to find a way to surrender that didn't involved him receiving a concussion, but his smart-ass tongue slipped before he could control it. "I don't see a woman here, just a little girl!"
Katara growled and blew towards her enemy. The water froze and rose around Zuko's middle, cementing him up to his neck in ice. At a different time, Katara might've laughed at the sight of the hapless Zuko—the sight was remarkably similar to her memory of when Sokka met Mr. FooFooCuddlyPoops. But all Katara could see was her red rage.
Her ears were similarly ringing, preventing Zuko's shouts of "I'm sorry, that was dumb, stop it, Katara, you'll hurt yourself again!" from registering. She started to bend an ice dagger for herself, but found that her water wasn't water anymore—it was steam. She tried to bend it back to her, but it was too hot for it to stay solid or even liquid anymore. The cloud of steam was thick and extremely stifling. She coughed and started feeling around, making the white air swirl and stick to her arms. Zuko was nearby, and she had to teach him a lesson.
And suddenly Zuko was there. He grabbed her arms and threw himself onto her, pinning her to the hot mud with brute force. Zuko's lips were moving, but Katara still couldn't hear anything, see anything beyond her own blind anger. She watched Zuko's lips press together in frustration before they abruptly smashed into hers.
Katara gasped—or tried to. Her mouth was otherwise occupied as his lips pressed and pushed against hers. They were hot and moist and firm, and Katara felt herself melting like her ice had under his burning heat. Not him! her head screamed. Not the enemy!
But her body was saying something else entirely. Zuko felt her body relax and fall limp into the mud, and took advantage of her apparent inability to protest to raise his hands to frame her face. He gently took her chin and lifted it slightly so he could press even more firmly against her mouth. Katara's nerves were completely frazzled; her awareness jumped between his hands and his mouth and his belly on hers and back to his mouth and oh his mouth…!
And then, without warning, he slapped her. Hard.
That brought Katara around. With a feral shriek, she shoved him off of her. Zuko acquiesced, rolling easily into a fighting stance. "What was that for?!"
"You weren't listening to me," he said as if it was obvious. "I had to get your attention. You couldn't hear me while we were fighting; I had to try something."
"And so kissing me was your solution?" she all but shrieked, shaking with frustration and anger.
"It worked, didn't it?"
Katara fumed, but had no real response to that. "Oh! You're impossible!" She stomped away, the mud squishing between her bare toes. She started to step over the small ledge that had been the edge of the pool before Zuko had boiled all the water into steam, but a pain in her side made her gasp and stagger slightly.
Zuko was immediately at her side, his hands close but not touching, as if afraid to make it worse by contact. "What's wrong?"
"My hip. It must've been aggravated when you pushed me to the ground." Katara glared at Zuko.
"When you fell," he argued even while helping her to sit down.
"When you assaulted me!"
"Which I wouldn't have done if you could've heard me earlier!" When Katara said nothing in return and merely winced, Zuko nodded as if she'd agreed out loud. "Besides, assault requires for one party to protest."
"Excuse me!" Katara gasped her outrage, and then really gasped as she felt her hip twinge.
"Never mind." Zuko quickly scooped up a handful of mud and plastered it on Katara's side. "Does that feel better?"
Katara was fully prepared to blast him for his idiocy—"What in the world is dirt supposed to do?"—but then the soothing heat from the warm mud soaked into her side and she sighed instead.
"Why don't you use the water from the mud to heal yourself?" Zuko suggested quietly.
Katara glared at Zuko again. "I was going to do that!" Actually, it hadn't even occurred to her. She bent the water into her side, but as soon as the first bit of liquid left the mud, the heat left as well. She doubled over, gasping, and the little moisture she'd pulled was sucked back into the dirt.
"Try again," Zuko urged. Katara gathered her strength and, gritting her teeth, tried again. She braced herself for the heat loss and immediate pain, but it didn't happen. She quickly finished healing the small crack that had reopened during her, ah, encounter with Zuko, and opened her eyes. Small flames crackled out of existence around his fingertips when he saw that she was finished.
"I figured," he explained with a crooked smile, "it might help if I kept the mud warm for you."
Katara's scathing response stuck and died in her throat as butterflies invaded her stomach at the sight of Zuko's grin. What a magical mouth. First that mind-blowing kiss, and now an actual smile…
Would wonders never cease!
Zuko caught Katara's look and cocked his head curiously. "Katara?"
She snapped back to normal. "C'mon, Zuko, led's head back. They'll be worried by now."
Zuko nodded his head slowly. "Yes, you're probably right."
"I'm always right!" she snapped, her energy returning as she stood up and away from Zuko's personal area.
Zuko's grin widened but quickly smoothed away. "Of course you are," he replied neutrally.
"Are you making fun of me?" Katara squawked while they climbed over the ledge. "You are, aren't you? Why would you do that?"
"It's so easy to do, I just can't resist."
"You're just asking to get your butt whooped again."
"Yes, I'm a glutton for punishment. Why do you think I talk to you?"
"Oh! Of all the nerve! I'll have you know that…"
As the pair walked away down the steps, squabbling like normal, the steam cooled enough to condense and fall back to the earth as water. It hit the warm, firm earth with a hiss, and some of it reheated to become steam. A never-ending cycle of fire and water—completely incompatible, but for a brief moment when the droplet would barely touch the ground, it could exist in harmony.