Act and Feel
For #21 - violence; pillage/plunder; extortion
Violence always made Aang's skin crawl, but he had long since learned to push the feeling away. It had been years – almost five of them – since he had felt scared or nervous going into a battle: since he had allowed himself the luxury of humanity when he was carrying out the deed they held as the highest sin. It was still murder, whatever his supporters said, and no matter what Katara did to ease his mind, it was still wrong.
There was no emotion now: just the turbulence of adrenaline that had no outlet once the battle was through.
He'd come seriously close to death, this time. That shot – arrows: always arrows! – had come dangerously close to pinning him to the ground. By sheer luck, he had tripped over a rock, and the arrow had grazed his left arm just above the elbow. Warm, sticky blood was seeping slowly onto his bright yellow tunic, but he didn't even bother to bandage his arm. Something primal was beginning to rise up with the energy still pumping through his veins.
Aang contemplated his mortality on the way back to the tiny camp he and Katara had made earlier that day. Sweat dripped into his eyes, but he did not raise a hand to wipe it away. So he was the Avatar; when the life he knew finally ended another would begin, and he would lose all the memories he had now; all the people he loved now.
He would lose Katara.
When he got back to camp, bloody and sweating and dirty, to find her sitting quietly by the fire, running a comb through her unbound hair while watching a spitted eggplant roasting over the flames, the same thing that had risen in him earlier – the need to act and feel – began to gnash it's teeth and claw at the cage that confined it.
So he let it out.
His staff fell from his hands to make a muffled thump against the loosely packed dirt. Katara started, and looked up with wide eyes that began to worry the moment they took in his injured arm and his dark countenance. She stood, sweeping her hair back over her shoulder, and opened her mouth to speak, but whatever she had been planning to say was warped into a muffled squeal when Aang grabbed her roughly and kissed her.
There were fingers in her hair, and a calloused hand grasping her chin, holding her still. She wouldn't have moved anyways. He only ever kissed her like this when he was scared for her: for what one of them would feel if the other should pass.
Katara's arms worked of their own volition and wrapped themselves tightly around his shoulders. She kissed him back, hard, standing on tiptoe to press herself closer.
The eggplant began to burn.
AN: I love being kissed, don't you? It's niiiiiiiice...