A/N: I don't own Avatar. Otherwise Kataang wouldn't ever have even been HINTED at. Because it's ridiculous. So ha. :P
On the night of her Twentieth Birthday…
Katara entered her bedroom for what would probably be the last time in a long one. Exhausted after a lengthy, and filling, birthday banquet, she was looking forward to a good night's sleep. Walking over to the pile of trunks bent for the North Pole, she gave the packing job a thoughtful once over. But as she was going through the list of things that she would need to bring in her head, she noticed a strange rustling noise coming from one of her larger trunks of clothing. Raising an eyebrow, she circled around to the back of the pile and bent down next to a man with his head stuck in an opened trunk.
"Sokka," Katara said calmly, "What are you doing in my clothing?" Yelping in surprise, Sokka whipped himself out of the trunk and faced his sister, looking terrified. And guilty.
"Katara!" He cried, scrambling to find the words to explain himself, "How did you get in here without me knowing?" Katara, her voice venomously nonchalant, said,
"All that fabric in your ears must've muffled my entrance. And shouldn't I be asking that question?"
"I was making sure you had everything! I don't want you to forget something that could be really important! What if it was, like, life-or-death important?" He replied loudly. Katara looked at him, slightly shocked at his honest answer. There was a moment of silence.
"What?" Sokka mumbled abashedly. Katara smiled at him with a warm twinkle in her eyes.
"You were looking out for me." She said finally.
"What? No! I was just-!"
"You WERE!" She insisted, "You're going to MISS me!" At this, Sokka looked taken aback.
"Well of COURSE I am! You're my baby sister!" Katara awed and wrapped him up in a suffocating hug, to which Sokka got a bit embarrassed. But he suddenly pulled away when he remembered something that he had discovered earlier.
"But that's right!" He cried triumphantly, thrusting an accusatory finger into her face. "I DID find something interesting in here!" Katara's face fell; she knew what was coming next. "WHAT," He shouted, pulling something from the bowels of the trunk, "the HELL is THIS!"
Katara looked at the flimsy article of clothing that he had drawn from the trunk and gulped. A sheepish smile grew on her blushing face as she slowly tried to retrieve the white Item.
"Oh, thatttt…." She replied, smoothing out the slightly wrinkled silk. "It's just something I treated myself to recently." Sokka drew back, a disgusted look on his face.
"You mean you don't have an excuse? You were actually gonna USE that thing!" Katara nodded slightly in response. The atrocity in question happened to be a fine specimen of lingerie. It was a ribbed white corset, with matching sheer tights. The whole thing was accented with large pearls.
Sokka, decidedly fed up with the whole ordeal, merely sighed and shrugged his shoulders dejectedly.
"As much as it pains me to think of my little sister in sexy underwear," He said with a shudder, "I guess I just have to face the fact that you're an adult now….and that you're leaving. I can't control you anymore." Katara refrained from correcting him on how he never really HAD. "Just don't let me hear about you actually putting that thing to use." He finished, cringing. Katara smiled sadly in reply; she knew how hard it was going to be to distance herself from her….fairly attached older brother. She was already starting to miss him.
The soon-to-be-crowned princess hugged him again as he got up to leave her. Sokka mumbled good night and rubbed her hair affectionately. She waited until he was at the end of the hallway before telling him that she actually had two more pieces of lingerie; a lacy black one and another constructed entirely from peahawk feathers. She made sure to close the door before he could get back to it.
But as she climbed into bed that night, Katara couldn't help but feel a little hollow in the very pit of her stomach. It was extremely difficult to say goodbye to her childhood home.
Nine months later, in a small village near the Fire Nation capitol…
Han Sue waltzed in through the front door, a large poster clutched under his arm. The rest of us looked up from our game of cards, Han's expression being much more telling than our miserably slow pastime.
"Hello, boys!" Han Sue called cheerily as he leaned up against the kitchen table. We all mumbled our welcome, still looking inquisitively down at the poster in his hand. "Oh, you see I've brought something?" He said in a way that was irritatingly condescending. Suddenly slamming the poster face up on the table, He cried out happily, "Check THIS out!"
We all gazed down at the poster, obviously torn from the notice board in the center of town, and drew in a sharp breath. The poster was an announcement for the arrival of Queen Katara of the northern water tribe.
Jin, one of the younger boys, looked expectantly around at the rest of us.
"Uh, you guys?" He asked, "What's so special about her?" The room got suddenly quiet as we all gaped incredulously at Jin.
"WHAT!" My question began a torrent of passionate responses.
"Only the most famous, POWERFUL waterbender in the WORLD!"
"Yeah! Some say she's an even better than the AVATAR!"
"And she's GORGEOUS."
"And available!" We all nudged each other's sides and smirked at this. Hey, we could dream!
Jin, his blush fading, still looked a bit confused. The rest of the guys obviously knew more about the water-tribe war hero than he did…them being around her age, anyway. Jin was really only 14. Han Sue had noticed his bewilderment, and decided to shed a little more light on the subject.
Waving his arms impatiently to try and quiet the (rather perverted) chatter over the newly crowned queen, He started in on his explanation.
"Jin, and anyone else who might still have some questions, here's a little bit about Queen Katara." We all leaned in closer to listen. "See, the queen has only been on the northern throne for a couple months." Some of us nodded; we knew that much already. But Han Sue still went on.
"She was originally a southern princess. She lived there most of her life. I heard around town that, after the end of the war, she went back home and helped to rebuild…and now the southern water tribe is one of the most prosperous countries in the WORLD. Which proves that, besides being ultra sexy and super powerful, she's pretty smart too. This, as you may suspect, probably means that it won't be long before the northern tribe catches up."
At this we all started muttering to each other, starting to feel uneasy about this new addition to the world's league of royalty. Did the water tribe now pose a threat to OUR nation…? But Han quieted us down again, eager to finish his story.
"Already, the northern tribe is talking fondly of its new leader. I have some *ahem* magazines," He looked away when he said this, like he was obviously hiding something, A/N: Porn….and girly avatarverse equivalents of People.
"And some of them contain some insight as to what's going on up there. Apparently, suitors are already throwing themselves at her feet (although she hasn't really accepted any of them yet), and she's getting invites to meet the royalty of places all over the globe. The country's fish exports are exploding, she's started an impressive school for female waterbending students, she's said to have the largest and most, and I quote, 'fabulous and expensive' closet in the world, and she's practically swimming in her own power. And this is just within a couple of months of being on the throne."
As Han Sue finished his anecdote, we found ourselves sitting in dead silence. We were a little…intimidated. I was actually kind of wondering why Han Sue was looking so happy at the moment.
"What's wrong, you guys?" He asked, obviously warming up to a punch line. We all looked at him like he was stupid. Because, well….we really had no idea what he was getting at. "Don't you understand what I'm saying?" He sighed derisively. "It's her twentieth year. She was recently crowned." We still didn't completely understand. Han shook his head mockingly and smirked.
"She needs to get married within the next three months. And to someone of….wealthy bearing. And she's coming to a nation with an equally recently crowned Fire lord." It suddenly dawned on us.
This new queen might be ever more awesome than we thought.
A/N: Sorry if this makes Katara sound TOO super cool, but I think that it's possible. She has that much drive! :D
Please review, next chapter is back to Katara….and she'll finally see Zuko again! (Oh, and I decided to keep her reason to be crowned a secret for now…maybe to be revealed in the next chapter?)
