Author's Notes: Written for a challenge on FictionNet. Uh, it's not that great but it's my first time writing Avatar. I'm not too familiar with how to describe all the bending movements yet.
Mist and Rain
One-shot
Bending her knees, she flipped her Water-tribe robe out of her way and took her firm stand. She quickly scanned her environment, hoping to find Aang, Sokka or even that little earthbender Toph. But it wasn't her day. She blew some loose hair from her face and shot a glare to her opponent.
"Pick on someone else next time. This is getting old," she yelled, proud as ever.
She had practiced so long. After teaching Aang waterbending, her skills must have multiplied. After all, you always know something after teaching it to someone.
The moon shone the vast empty lands, the perfect spot for waterbenders and earthbenders. The earth was moist and frogs croaked a strange melody in a nearby pond. The landscape was perfect but something was ruining it. Actually, it was someone.
"Watch your mouth, you water peasant. Do you think that I want to deal with this?" his golden eyes flared. "Where is the Avatar?" His scarred face never seemed to change. He only bore two expressions, one of anger and one of fear. The rest were unknown to everyone except his family, oh his dear family. He had lost them all. His own sister killed her uncle, shame among shame, leaving him with nothing but a curse upon his name. There were no laughs over their stolen food, no arguments about Iroh's favorite flavor of tea, nothing left. "I am not going to lose to you."
She squinted and rolled her eyes. "Have you forgotten? The moon shines bright, meaning you can't even draw power from the sun and my powers are so much stronger. Where is the fire now, Zuko?"
"It's Prince Zuko to you!"
The first shot was fired, aimed straight at her chest. She turned and dodged it.
"This is war."
Her arm swayed and the flow of the water followed. Push and pull. A wave washed to the other side, only greeted by another fireball. The water molecules collided with the sudden heat. There was a sound, like a small explosion and a hollow whistle.
She stepped back in fear, her eyes widening little by little. Even if her powers were augmented with the moon's guidance and with her hours of practicing, his skills matched up to hers. She furrowed. Taking a deep breath, she quickly opened her hands, like she was about to grab something and then felt the water run through her soul. She grabbed on the element, condensed it into ice, clasped her hands together and prepared to attack.
He shot a fireball at her shoulder, burning the blue cloth. With her eyes, she directed some water to cool the fire. An almost sweet sensation rose over her. Fire and water evaporated into a nice cool steam.
She fired the icicles, sharp and deadly at the banished prince. Smirking to herself, she swiftly switched her stance.
The boy countered the ice bullets, one by one. Tiny fire bullets shot back at her, some slashed at her arms.
"Ow!"
He charged at her like a beast, his arms behind him with daggers of fire then pounced. His arms went straight for the pray.
In a spark, he had her trapped with her back against some trees and fireballs centimeters away. She shrieked in fear and beads of sweat rolled down her dark skin. She gulped and immediately used a water-whip to thrash the fire away.
But he was quicker. He snatched her wrists and sent a wave of heat through his palm. She gasped in pain, at the burns on her wrists and glared at him.
"Tell me. Where is the Avatar?"
She shut her eyes immediately and turned her head away.
"Where is he?"
She shook her head in response.
"Answer me!"
She opened her mouth slowly and smiled not-so-innocently. Zuko almost jumped back in surprised. He narrowed his eyes and his grip on her wrists tightened. "Spill, peasant."
"You never change, do you?" she gave a light chuckle.
"What!"
"We have worked together, remember? We fought your sister together. We have a common enemy... doesn't that make us friends?"
"I don't know what you're talking about," he spat, distracted.
"Zuko... you know that you can't change what has happened or even replace it. Why won't you let me help you."
At least she didn't say 'us'.
She caught him off guard as he looked away, searching for an answer in his mind. The water bender used her whip to get away from the fire bender's grasp.
"You are a foolish prince after all," she frowned as she spoke in a low and provoking whisper.
As she flung the pond water at him, she focused it. Frost formed on his fingertips and spread as quick as the wind to his arm and immediately froze his arms all the down to his feet, leaving nothing but his head and neck free to breathe the cool moist air. Flame seemed to come out of his nostrils as he flared, his eyes ready to murder the Watertribe girl.
She took her opportunity to run closer to the pond, readying for another attack. She controlled all the water there and lifted them in midair. A whirlpool formed.
He breathed fire, melting the ice into motionless water.
"Surrender."
"You wish."
He threw his body forward and felt the blaze run through his body and aimed for the poor little vulnerable Katara.
She raised her arms in the air and released all the liquid that she could hold.
Water collided with fire. The fluid pierced through the waves of heat, separating the spark. But at the same time, the fire didn't back down. It weakened the liquid, absorbing the cool energy.
Steam formed between the two. Soon a mist formed, blinding both.
Suddenly, he felt a drip on his bare toes and he looked up. His grass-weaved hat fell from his head and he stared. Rain fell from the sky. Clear drops rained upon them, cleansing the soul. A cool feeling swept across his body. Relaxing, inviting, strange and unfamiliar. But the feeling didn't last long. He stared at her in the blue coat. She had her arms raised and her hands formed like cups. She smiled at the water falling from the sky and onto the green vegetation. It was like the morning dew, fresh and reviving.
She came out of her trance and looked at him, with fear at first but then her heartbeat almost came to a halt. She could see every scar on his face, all the pain that he's been through. She was scared to admit that she almost pitied him. So after all, he was no different from her. She lowered her arm in peace.
She stared into his narrowed eyes and sighed. "You know... I can heal that scar," she started.
"You can't," he looked away. He raised his arm and his fingertip brushed against the burnt skin.
"I can take that burden off of your shoulders," she offered.
"No," he insisted, "this a memory that I would like to keep."
"Why?"
"It's just... a reminder."
"I don't understand you. Why would you—"
"You can't understand me."
She was speechless. Her jaw hung in midair and she looked down. "You have no clue."
"Look. You're a water peasant, I'm a fire prince. Just because we fought against the same person won't unite anyone and least of all, us. Water can't mix with fire. All that remains is the hopeless mist in the air and the soft rain that tickle your skin. There is nothing."
"And for a moment I thought that you weren't so stupid," she muttered. He tried to argue back but she became more dominant. "You are nothing but a spoiled prince, Zuko! You know nothing about me or anyone from the water tribe. We're all human, Zuko. We're all human," she looked down to her feet. "And Aang is human too."
"No, we are different! We... we don't believe in the same virtues and we practice different..."
His voice faltered. His own arguments sounded absurd to him. He backed away, taking a step back. His eyes turned towards her and saw that she was still looking down. He turned around swiftly and escaped. "You're wrong, Katara."
Her eyes widened in surprise. She lifted her head and searched for him but he was nowhere in sight. She sighed inwardly and relaxed her shoulders. Did the spoiled fire prince just show her respect?
"Ugh, what is wrong with that prince!" she yelled to herself.
Some of the last drop of rain fell on her face. They glided down her neck, stomach and touched the ground. She looked up to the cloudy sky and smiled.
"Fire and water make mist and rain."
She kicked some dirt and began to water bend once again. In her mind, she wanted to forget the day's fatigue but it was impossible. Her back ached immensely. As she stretched her muscles a little and returned the water back to the pond, she smiled to herself.
"But I love mist and rain."
Author's Notes: I like my one-shots but I hate them at the same time. I didn't plan this...once again. But I liked the ending of this :) And yes, I'm a Zutara shipper. It wasn't so fluffy and angsty like my HP one-shots, yay! This took me about 2 hours with breaks in between. Aaahh, little plot bunnies.
A review would be greatly appreciated :D