"The Ship of Dreams, they called it. And it was. It really was…" Over five days, the lives of Kai Wen and Jinora Gyatso became irreversibly entwined. But their adventure was not the typical love story, for the ship they met on was the RMS Titanic. From the moment the ship set sail from the Earth Kingdom in 177 AG, it was destined for disaster. [Kai/Jinora] Titanic!AU.

Disclaimer: I do not own The Legend of Korra, or any of its trademarked characters. I also do not own the plot of the movie Titanic: that belongs to James Cameron and his associates. I only own the story that you see written, and hope that you enjoy my spin on things.

Those in Peril on the Sea by boasamishipper

Chapter Nine

177 AG

After Jinora slipped back into Varrick and Zhu Li's tour group, the shipbuilder informed her that Pema and a few others had already gone down to the private veranda for midday tea. The two didn't specify who would be there, but she had a pretty good guess—the Beifong sisters, Buttercup Raiko, Asami Sato, possibly Korra if Pema was feeling particularly generous. Jinora hoped Korra would be there as she really needed someone friendly to talk to.

You had someone more than friendly, she reminded herself as she walked down the corridor. A few men (steerage and upper class) tipped their hats in greeting as she walked by, and the corners of her mouth quirked upwards in a barely noticeable smile in response. You had Kai. You had someone amazing, Kai Wen, and you gave him up. He'll never want to talk to you now.

How long would she be able to convince herself that her actions had been for the better? She hadn't felt enlightened for giving Kai up. Instead, she'd felt rather guilty for giving up the one person that had made this trip bearable.

Jinora quickly schooled her features and squashed her thoughts as they were veering onto dangerous territory. There was no time for this. She was late.

After a moment of hesitation, she entered the veranda and made her way to the table reserved for them. Like Varrick and Zhu Li had said, her mother was indeed waiting for her with an expression on her face that showed Pema was not happy that Jinora was late. And was that—yes, Korra was, along with Asami, Buttercup Raiko (who gave her a onceover like the woman was measuring her size for a pair of lingerie), a smiling Suyin, Lin (who as usual looked like she'd rather be elsewhere), and a cup of tea already prepared with two scones on a plate where she was designated to sit. With nothing else to do, she sat down next to Korra, greeted, "Hello, Mother," and unfolded her napkin over her lap. She picked up her teacup, took a sip from it, and then glanced up at the other two women and said, "Good afternoon, ladies."

"Hey, Jinora," Korra said, leaning towards her while the others discussed something or other that Jinora didn't care about. "Sooo…" She waggled her eyebrows, shooting Jinora a wide grin that reminded her of the owl-cat that ate the canary-mouse. "How did things go below decks with you and my protégé?"

It took a miracle for Jinora to swallow her tea and not react outwardly to Korra's brash statement. Thank the Spirits that no one else had heard. "Nice," she hissed under her breath. "Say that a bit louder, Korra, I don't think they heard you over in Omashu!"

Korra didn't even blink. "Come, my dear Miss Gyatso," her voice became pompous, taking on a near-perfect impersonation of Buttercup Raiko, "would you humble an old lady?"

"You're not old," Jinora muttered, taking a bite of her scone. Blueberry, her favorite. "It went—well, it went…well." She remembered dancing and singing and cheap beer and arm-wrestling strange brutish men and meeting Skoochy and Tahno and Jaya and little Qin and how wonderful Kai had looked in his dress shirt and their near-kiss on the deck last night… "It went really well."

Korra raised a single eyebrow, looking unimpressed. "Really? It went well? After all the work I put into setting you two up it just went well? I'm disappointed, Miss Gyatso, I expected more gossip from you." Before Jinora could retort, the tan-skinned woman's expression softened. "Never mind me. Did you have fun?"

Jinora was about to reply when she caught what Pema and Suyin were discussing. "Of course the search for bridesmaids' dresses was such an odyssey," her mother sighed. If nothing else could be said of Pema Gyatso, she was a wonderful storyteller. Jinora suddenly remembered when she and Ikki and Meelo were children how her mother had used to sing to them old Air Nomad songs. Where had those times gone? "And let me tell you what happened with the invitations—Raava, it was a disaster. I told Jinora to mail them and do you know what she does?" At Suyin and Buttercup's head shakes, Pema continued. "She—and you won't believe this—she actually took half of them and threw them out because she didn't like the people they were being sent to."

"Come on," Lin reasoned, rolling her eyes. "It's her wedding, Pema, as you know. She shouldn't have people she doesn't like there."

If Lin were forty years younger, Jinora would've kissed her. Asami and Korra nodded as well, looking as though they agreed but didn't want to say anything. Pema's eyes narrowed and she pressed her lips together, giving Lin a thin smile that looked positively sinister. "You couldn't know, Ms. Beifong, but it's obvious that my daughter could not care less about this wedding and she just did it to make me angry."

"If she doesn't want the wedding to happen then maybe it's not meant to be." Jinora held her breath, watching the conversation like it was an award-winning match of kuai ball. Lin looked like she could rip a block of metal in half. "Maybe that means that you shouldn't control Jinora's life like she's your puppet—"

"And you'd know all about not wanting weddings to happen, wouldn't you?" Pema's smile was sickly sweet, and although Jinora hated to admit it, her mother had gained the upper hand. She didn't say anymore, but from Lin's flushed cheeks it was obvious. Everyone on the ship (those up to date with high society, at any rate) all knew about the affair between Lin and Jinora's father, Tenzin. Everyone knew that Lin hadn't wanted the wedding to happen.

Lin must've known that half of intimidation was the beauty of a well-timed exit, so she shot Pema a glare that could've made the Si Wong Desert freeze over as she stood up and left the room. Suyin immediately began stammering apologies for her sister's behavior. Asami's and Korra's mouths eyes were wide in shock. Buttercup Raiko was interrogating Pema about Lin and Tenzin's affair.

Jinora sat, dumbstruck, at the corner of the table. Had that really happened?

"If she doesn't want the wedding to happen then maybe it's not meant to be. Maybe that means that you shouldn't control Jinora's life like she's your puppet."

Like she was Pema's puppet.

And then Jinora realized just how fruitless her situation really was. Spirits, she would be a puppet, but not just to her mother, to LingShi. There would be no way to fix it. There would be no one to help her, only those that pitied her and never did anything. Her life would be a waking nightmare. She would be la mindless minion forced to do everything LingShi Zhang told her to do, from cooking and cleaning to unsafe sex. She would be a slave to his demands.

Raava, she was trapped with no way out and she couldn't do anything about it.

She calmly and deliberately turned her teacup over, spilling lukewarm tea all over her dress. "Oh, look what I've done," she said, no hints of regret in her voice. She didn't wait for any more excuses to flee the room after that.

"Your newspaper is upside down."

Kai's head shot up so fast he nearly got whiplash as he saw Jinora standing before him, her hands at her sides. Her cheeks were red with the chill wind, her brown eyes sparkled and her hair blew wildly around her face. He drank in the sight of her, having thought that he would never see her again.

"I know," he said hoarsely. He could feel his heart doing a really weird dance inside of him, not unlike the one he'd done with Jinora. It was ridiculous, but at this moment, however, his heart was not in any condition to follow its boss's order, and it should be frightening, but Kai, sitting in plain sight in first class in someone else's suit with only a stolen newspaper shielding him from everyone else, was far from scared. "I—Jin, what are you doing here?"

Jinora looked a bit nervous, nothing compared to how he felt. Then she sat next to him, and he wondered if she could hear his heart threatening to beat out of his chest. "I went below decks. Skoochy—he was busy with J-Jaya, so I asked Tahno and he said you were still up here. And I found you. And I just—I wanted to say that your newspaper was upside down."

Kai tried to ignore the flips his stomach did every time his newfound, his true, love spoke. It was a hard mission and he felt proud when he managed to say "So?" without his voice cracking.

"I just thought I should point that out." Jinora sighed and played with the ends of her hair aimlessly. Kai found the gesture unbelievably endearing. "Because people might wonder, you know."

"What about?"

Jinora flashed him a quick smile, but it didn't quite meet her eyes. "About the newspaper being upside down."

Kai let out a quick breath and looked at the girl sitting across from him, really looked at her. She looked worn, as though she'd run a hundred miles without any water, and looked almost as despondent as when he'd first officially met her. "Why did you come back, Jinora?" Looking back a little later, he could've rephrased that differently.

"I changed my mind." She didn't explain. He wasn't sure if he wanted an explanation. "I'm here now, if you'll take me."

The boy in Kai wanted to say that he'd take Jinora in any way, shape or form but didn't want to make a euphemism out of everything like Tahno liked to do. "I'll always want you, Jin," he whispered. "No matter what. I—" The words died in his mouth, and Spirits, he wanted to say something but wasn't sure if he was supposed to. If the time was right. If she reciprocated his feelings.

"People might talk if we're together." If they weren't sitting so close, Kai would've missed Jinora's hesitant whisper. "I don't—they might hurt us, Kai."

They might hurt us. He was surprised to find how little he cared. He took a deep breath, looking long and hard at Jinora's sparkling eyes and the slight smile covering her face. "I don't care, Jin," he said, pulling Jinora closer to him so that they're both hidden by the newspaper. "Do you?"

"No."

The answer was simple and it was all it took. Kai leaned forward gingerly until the few inches of space between them was gone. Jinora closed her eyes and waited, and Kai wasn't about to let her wait for long. Their lips connected, and he could've sworn a spark like lightning had formed between them at that very second. He wouldn't have expected it but Jinora really knew how to kiss. Spirits, she was doing things with her tongue that he hadn't known were possible. He responded in kind, more grateful than ever for the presence of the newspaper to shield them from passerby who didn't appreciate seeing public displays of affections.

It wasn't his first kiss. Far from it. But his heart and stomach were acting like it was—flipping and jumping and dancing like they were going to explode from the passion. He let them do their thing because he was too happy to care. This kiss, their first, was so much more than storybooks had promised. Dear Spirits, it was so much better.

The world could've ended then and there and he would've died happy, because maybe he hadn't gone to every country in the Four Nations or climbed a mountain or learned to read, but he had kissed Jinora Gyatso and that was what really mattered to him now.

Kai opened his eyes as the dinner announcement bell broke them apart. Jinora's eyes were still shut, like she was trying to make time last for just one minute. Like she was replaying their kiss in her head over and over and over again. (Or maybe that was just him.) But then her brown eyes locked on his green ones, and a bright smile blossomed on her lips.

He moved to bring the newspaper down, but Jinora grabbed his shirtsleeve before he could do anything. Her mouth was less than an inch away from his ear, and it took every vestige of Kai's willpower not to turn around and kiss her then and there.

"Come to my quarters after dinner," she whispered, barely heard over the din on the decks. "Room twenty-eight. And," she leaned forward, her lips skimming his skin, "bring your sketchbook."

A shiver ran down Kai's spine as he swallowed thickly and nodded. It took him several minutes after she left before he was able to walk comfortably.

Thanks for all of your reviews, favorites and follows, you guys, and I'm really sorry for the hiatus. When it's summer and school's over, rest assured I will update more often. I definitely hope to finish this fic before the end of the year, though.

Yours in Fanfiction,

-Boa :)