After the Smoke Clears
Zuko and Katara and the end of the world.
Two.
From the get-go I knew this was hard to hold; like a crash, the whole thing spun out of control.
+ So this is Book Two: The Chase.
Disclaimer: I do not own ATLA or "Time Bomb" (All Time Low) nor do I profit from this story.
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Irony was a funny thing.
She had told him that she would take him down with her, but the truth of the matter was that she never truly left.
Spirits, she had felt so alive that night – living second to second, fighting for her life until the dawn broke over the endless, unforgiving landscape.
The adrenaline coursing through her veins and the power humming at her fingertips had been exhilarating – had been pure.
The widening of Zuko's eyes had been gratifying.
To think that, after all of the things he had surely seen, she had taken him by surprise.
She, a humble Water Tribe peasant, as he was so wont to remind her.
She had dismissed him.
She had dismissed him and he had obeyed.
Weeks later, she was still missing that high.
She missed it mostly when she was angry, which was happening more and more frequently now that Toph had joined their team.
Toph was tiny and loud and crass. For a girl from one of the wealthiest families in the Earth Kingdom, she certainly didn't have any manners.
Not that Katara was a snob, but it was common decency to say thank you and to bathe. Seriously, she couldn't remember the last time that girl had taken a bath.
Or offered to help with dinner.
Hell, even Sokka offered to cook if Katara was exhausted.
For all of their sakes, she never took him up on the offer – but still.
And that was how Katara found herself taking out her frustrations while chopping several potatoes while Sokka and Aang set up camp and Toph picked at her feet.
Ew.
She had single handedly defeated the Fire Prince with her words – with her fucking words – and now she had been demoted to personal assistant to a spoiled Earth Kingdom heiress.
She thought not.
But Aang had the weight of the world on his shoulders and Sokka was – well - Sokka, so she dutifully channeled her range into chopping the potatoes for their supper.
As Sokka worked on getting one of the tents to stand, he glanced worriedly at where his sister knelt, mutilating potatoes by the campfire.
Sokka was more observant than he was given credit for.
Sometimes. He liked to think that he was when it counted.
And right now, he felt like it counted.
Sokka knew Katara was different somehow. She was still herself, to a point – still the glue that held their group of misfits together, effortlessly filling the spaces between them with her warmth and her compassion and her cooking. Always her cooking.
But there was something off about her. He could only see it if he looked at her for long enough out of the corner of his eye, but it was there nonetheless.
She seemed harsher, somehow – something about the set of her jaw and the glint in her eyes, which was reminding him more and more of the steel hulls of the fire nation ships Aang had destroyed.
Something had happened in the Spirit Oasis, and Katara had been changed.
And he was the only one who noticed. Aang was too happy with the idea of Katara being safe – the idea of Katara at all - to notice that she was different.
But for once, Sokka had the good sense to keep his observations to himself, and so he worked on securing the tent and ignoring the tension between Katara and Toph.
Before the North Pole, Katara might not have said anything to the tiny earthbender. Now, however, he was afraid of what was going to happen when Katara snapped.
He would do his best to make sure that he was out hunting when that happened.
But for now, he could distract her.
"So," he began, "how about that giant metal death trap?"
He finished fiddling with the tent post and stood back to admire his work. When he turned around to face the group, he found Katara and Aang staring at him incredulously.
Mission accomplished.
"What about it?" asked Toph, cocky and unphased as she picked dirt out from underneath her fingernails.
Katara glared at her.
"What do you mean, 'What about it?'"
"Did I stutter?"
Aang looked from one girl to the other, eyes wide like a moose-bear cub in the firelight.
Katara had finally reached her breaking point. She flung the potatoes and the knife onto the ground as she stood, hands on her hips, rounding on the petite girl.
"Is this a game to you? What the fuck is your problem? You didn't get enough attention at home and now you're happy that the Fire Nation is chasing you around the world because it proves you're just as important as you always thought you were? Your parents cared about you so much that you think it's exciting to go on an adventure?"
"Shut up," said Toph, her voice cracking with fury and something that sounded suspiciously like tears. "You have no idea what you're talking about – "
"No, you're right, I don't. Because the Fire Nation killed our mom and the war took our dad and instead of having people telling me that I can't do things, they tell me that I better fucking start because everyone who used to do them is dead. So no, I don't understand."
Katara's voice had gotten louder and louder until she was screaming shrilly. She would be hoarse tomorrow, no doubt – provided she lived that long – yet it felt oddly satisfying to feel the pain ripping through her throat with every bitter word.
Toph was shaking with tightly wound fury, making the ground around them rumble so forcefully that the pebbles bounced and the trees groaned.
Sokka was looking shell-shocked and Aang was looking at Katara like she was an unagi.
But she didn't have it in her to be sorry.
"I'm leaving," said Toph, turning on her heel and walking out of the clearing.
"What? Toph! Wait, come back, she didn't mean it!" called Aang, sounding slightly panicked as he launched himself across the clearing after her.
"Yes, she did," said Toph, pushing him out of her way and stalking off into the forest.
"Yes, I did," Katara whispered, pulling her arms around herself and holding tight.
"Toph, wait, you could get hurt –"
"I can take care of myself just fine, Twinketoes!"
Katara quietly walked back to the campfire, feeling numb after her outburst.
She never talked about it – never talked about what it had been like to grow up so, so quickly, or how she hadn't really felt warm since the Fire Nation killed her mother.
She had said more about it during the past thirty seconds than during the past five years.
So she picked up the potatoes, rinsed them off, and began chopping again – this time, much slower and decidedly calmer.
Sokka knew better than to interrupt her, but when Aang came back he didn't think anything of it.
"Katara, what was that? You said such awful things to her – how could you talk like that?! – and now Toph's gone! I don't even know if she's going to make it out of the forest alright, or where she's going! She trapped me in some boulders and by the time I got out she was just… just gone! What if she gets hurt?! And where are we going to find an earthbending teacher?"
Katara didn't look up, but she did stop dicing the potatoes.
"Aren't you going to answer me? What happened?"
He was getting angry now, she could tell it from his voice. And that made her feel immensely guilty – he had the weight of the world on his shoulders, and she had to go and make it worse by causing his earthbending teacher to leave. And this forest was not safe for a blind girl to go wandering around in alone, even if she was the Earth Rumble Champion.
Katara felt a sinking feeling in her stomach as she looked up at Aang and his gray eyes. Anger didn't look like an emotion that belonged on his face, but yet there it was.
Things were so much easier in the North Pole. It had been easy to know what the right thing to do was when she was acting purely on reflex.
But this? This was exhausting in a way that the North Pole was not.
"I'm sorry, Aang," she said softly, the fight drained from her voice. "We'll figure it out in the morning."
With that, she walked out of the campsite and headed for the water that she could feel tugging at her sense.
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It was late, but she couldn't sleep. The moon was calling to her and there were still bursts of adrenalin coursing through her veins from her fight with Toph.
She quietly sat on a boulder by the river, first watching the sunset and now looking up at the night sky and taking comfort in her element as it flowed past her.
She had been there for hours, but the river was always brand new.
When the moon was directly overhead, Aang came to sit next to her.
His footsteps were so light, she hadn't heard him, and she jumped as he put his arm around her.
"It's only me," he whispered, breath close to her ear as she jumped up, subconsciously calling the water to envelope her fists.
When she realized who it was, she calmed slightly, but still remained stiff.
She didn't like the way Aang had been looking at her lately. He was under so much pressure that she didn't want to say anything about it and risk pushing him away – La knows the kid knew how to throw a tantrum – but it made her uneasy.
Because he was just that – a kid. Barely seventeen, but perpetually acting like a twelve-year-old.
So she settled for: "Couldn't sleep?"
He shook his head and shrugged.
"I came to check on you," he said, smiling at her. She could still see the hint of something in his eyes and he still hadn't taking his arm off of her back, but she tried to smile back.
It came out all wrong and he looked at her oddly.
With a sigh, she turned her face back to the heavens, closing her eyes as she let the moonlight wash over her dusky skin.
"So," he began again, rubbing his hand against his neck and smiling down at her. "What do you think of the machine?"
"Maybe it's Zuko," she whispered, her voice sounding hopeful.
"…You say that like it's a good thing," he said, right eyebrow raised and confusion coloring his voice.
She turned sharply to look at him. She hadn't meant to say that out loud.
Shit.
"Well," she began, trying to play it off, "better him than his crazy sister and her friends."
She watched as understanding replaced the almost hostile confusion on his features, until he was smiling warmly at her again.
It made her feel sick in the pit of her stomach.
"Yeah, she's pretty bad," he said conspiratorially. He grinned, as if he was saying something terrible and it was their little secret.
What Katara wouldn't give to be terrible again.
But she was never going to get that chance with Aang constantly clinging to her, smiling up at her with his big gray eyes, looking at her like she put the sunshine in his world and she could do no wrong.
She needed something more that being placed on a pedestal.
(I'll save you from the pirates)
La, she needed sleep.
"I think I'm going to head back to camp. It's getting late," she said, standing up and turning to leave.
"Get some rest, I'll keep watch," he said, squeezing her hand before she could walk away.
"Thanks," she said, trying again to smile at him while all of her insides protested at the wrongness of it all.
When had things become so messed up? She was shunning her best friend – the one boy it would be safe to love, because he had a huge smile and an even bigger heart – and fantasizing about a banished prince who had tied her to a tree and tried to kill her so many times she had lost count.
Because she sure didn't have time for love, but an adversary, she could handle.
An adversary, she would welcome. Because it always seemed to Katara that her enemies brought out her strengths in a way that her friends never could.
And there was no denying the fact that just the thought of Zuko and that night in the North Pole got her pulse racing.
Because if there was one thing Katara loved, it was a challenge.
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+ Thank you for following/reviewing!
xo Elle