Okay guys, this is it, the start of the final battle and the last four chapters of the fic. From now on, updates will be every other day.

And I still don't own Avatar


Aang didn't think that Appa had ever flown so fast in his life. He had been flying strait for two days now and Aang could tell that his bison was tired, but they needed to get to the Southern Air Temple before it was too late. They had just entered the Patola Mountain Range so Aang knew they were close to their destination but a small voice inside of him told him that it wouldn't even matter. It was the Winter Solstice, for all he and Katara knew, the Yanari might have already been released. Kuruk's Journal hadn't been specific as to what time of day it had to be. Maybe Tau had already won…

Aang shook his head to clear that thought from his mind. He couldn't be thinking like that, not now. He and Katara had been taking shifts on directing Appa. Right now that was what he was doing and she was lying in the saddle sleeping. However, once Aang saw the Southern Air Temple come into site, he knew he had to wake her up. First though, he just took a moment to look at his old home. Part of him was just happy that he was back here, regardless of the situation.

"Katara!" He finally yelled back to the saddle, "Katara wake up!"

A few moments later, Katara poked her head up from the saddle to look at him, rubbing some sleep from her eye in the process.

"We're here," he told her, and she quickly glanced up and saw the Air Temple looming before them.

It didn't look that much different than how it had looked when they had been here before but the two quickly spotted Tau's airship parked up at the top of the central spire. Aang knew that was where they needed to go to as well and he directed Appa straight to the top.

At first it seemed too easy. They just simply flew to it; however, once they were about a dozen feet away from the top of the spire, Appa was suddenly assaulted with a barrage of icicles. The bison roared in pain as a few of them pierced his skin but he kept on flying upwards. They were above the spire now, and Aang saw that there was a walkway on the outer edge of it. He also saw someone standing on the walkway and Aang assumed it was Tau. His thoughts were confirmed when another wave of icicles seemed to appear out of thin air and shoot straight up towards Appa.

Katara reacted quickly, standing up in the saddle and holding her hands out, turning the icicles back into water before they were able to reach Appa. As the bison began to level off, hovering just a few dozen feet above Tau, she shot the water back down to him. However, he simply just jumped out of the way.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Aang jump off of Appa's head and down to Tau. He did a quick summersault in the air before firing a large blast of fire towards the Waterbender below. Aang though, having never fought Tau before, didn't expect what came next and was unable to block it. Tau had gathered a massive amount of water from the air, and sent it straight into the fire ball, extinguishing it before it even came close to hitting him. He followed up by blasting Aang with the water right before he was able to land on the walkway.

The blast shot Aang off the top of the spire and next thing he knew, he was free falling to the ground below.

Katara paid no attention to Tau and quickly jumped onto Appa's head, directing the bison downwards to chase Aang. Appa had to zigzag as he descended though as Tau had shot more waves of icicles after him. Katara urged Appa to go faster and right before Aang hit the ground below, the bison swooped under the Avatar, who fell softly onto the saddle with a little help from airbendering. Unfortunately, they were too close to the ground and Appa was unable to turn back upwards. Next thing Aang and Katara knew, Appa skidded across the ground as he tried to gain his footing before coming to a complete stop in what appeared to be a large courtyard. Pillars and rubble was scattered throughout it and Aang and Katara hopped off of Appa curiously as they tried to decide if they should simply try to fly straight be up to the top of the central spire again.

"You okay?" Katara asked him, glancing over to him concern.

"Yeah," Aang nodded, "You?"

"Doing great," Katara breathed out.

They cautiously began to walk down the courtyard, not really sure of what they were looking for but knowing that flying straight back up to the top of the spire might not be the best idea. Still though, Katara was beginning to believe that that was the only thing they could do.

"Aang," she started, "I think that maybe we should just…"

She was cut off when a crackling sound filled the air. Aang reacted on instinct, jumping in front of Katara and bringing a wall of earth up in front of them. The wall instantly shattered however as blast of lighting struck it. Aang and Katara both flinched from the resulting explosion, and the dozens of small pebbles that had pelted them, but they didn't have time to recover. Aang heard another lightning strike originate from somewhere and he quickly dove to the side, bringing Katara with him, just as the lightning struck the spot they had been moments ago. The couple had been knocked to the ground by the blast and Appa, who had been walking behind them, let out a loud, distressed groan and began to back away.

Aang sighed in relief as he noticed that his animal guide was getting himself too safely by backing up as far as he could go without leaving his master behind. Instead of worrying about him, he led Katara to run and take cover behind one of the many pillars in the courtyard just as the ground exploded behind them from another lightning strike.

Once they were behind the pillar, with their backs leaning against it, the couple took a moment to catch their breath before Aang cautiously peeked his head out from behind the pillar to see if he could find out where the attacker was. As it turned out, the attacker wasn't hard to find. He saw another flash of lighting appear from a balcony that was looking over the courtyard. He quickly moved back so he was completely behind the pillar as the lightning struck the side of it. A chuck of the pillar exploded, sending stone flying everywhere. Aang hissed as he felt the heat of the blast burn his skin slightly.

Katara looked at him in concern, wanting to help him but knowing that they didn't have any time for a healing session at the moment.

"Okay," Aang told her, "The lightning is coming up from a balcony overlooking us and about a few dozen feet up. Do you see it?"

Katara held up a finger in a silent request for Aang to give her a second before she looked around the side of the pillar, quickly spotting was Aang was talking about. She moved her head back into cover before another lightning strike came.

"Yeah, I see it," she said.

"We need to get up to their somehow," Aang explained.

"Yeah, but how?" Katara asked, "Those lightning blasts aren't exactly leaving us much of an opening to move."

As if on cue, another blast struck the pillar they were hiding behind, shaking the ground around them.

"Well, I don't think we can hide behind this thing much longer," Aang observed, noticing that their pillar was going to collapse on itself if it was hit a few more times.

He looked around to find the next closest pillar to them, seeing one a couple of dozen feet away.

"See that pillar?" Aang pointed to it, and he waited for Katara to nod in acknowledgment before he spoke again, "I'm going to try to get over to it. Once I get there, I'll cover you and you can make you way over to me."

"Okay," Katara told him, giving him a small nod, "I'm ready when you are."

Aang took a few more moments to prepare himself, feeling his heart beating loudly in his chest from nervousness. It was something he felt every time he got into a fight and this one was no exception. From Katara's rapid breathing, and spiraling emotions he was feeling from her, he knew that she was nervous to.

He took one last deep breath before jumping out from behind the pillar as he quickly ran over to the other one he had spotted. He used airbending to help himself run faster and he tried to ignore the sound of the ground erupting behind him from another blast of lightning. He made it to the pillar unhurt, if not a little rattled from the constant lightning blasts, and waited a few moments before motioning Katara to run over to him.

He saw her take a few deep breaths just like he had before she broke off from the pillar and sprinted towards him. Not wanting to risk the chance of lightning hitting her, Aang jumped out from behind his own pillar and punched his arms out, shooting a mixture of fire and airblasts towards the balcony. The balcony was at least a couple hundred feet away so he wasn't expecting to hit anything but to his surprise, one of his fire blasts seemed to be right on target. It flew through the air straight towards the balcony and for a second Aang thought that maybe it might stop whoever was shooting the lightning. However, that hope quickly vanished when a wall of earth rose from all sides of the balcony and the fire hit it harmlessly.

Despite that though, it gave Katara a few extra moments of safety as the lightning was unable to be shot as long as the earth wall was up. She easily made her way behind the pillar Aang had seen and once he was sure she was safe, Aang moved back behind it as well.

"Is it just me or did I see someone earthbend up there?" Katara asked him through deep, heavy breaths.

"It wasn't just you," Aang answered, "There are two benders up there. The firebender shooting the lightning and an earthbender who seems to be blocking anything we send up there. "

Yeah, they both thought to themselves, this is going to be a problem.


Things were actually going better than Sorin expected them to. For all intents and purposes, he and Ryu had the upper hand right now. The just had to make sure they kept an eye on the Avatar and his watertribe girl. They couldn't risk losing sight of them. The sky bison had long retreated to the very back of the courtyard so Sorin wasn't even paying any attention to it. Instead he was focusing on the two benders. He sent a couple lighting blasts towards the pillar he had just seen them run behind before halting his attacks, trying to coax the couple back out of hiding.

"How much longer to you think we have to hold them off?" he asked Ryu. He didn't turn towards the earthbender though for he knew he needed to keep his eyes on the courtyard before them just in case their targets tried to make a run for it again.

Ryu shrugged beside him, "An hour, maybe a little more. Tau said earlier that from the looks of it, the beam of sunlight coming through that narrow window will hit the sunstone three hours after noon. From the position the sun is in, I'd say it's about two hours after noon right now."

"Great, so another fun hour of hide and go seek," Sorin rolled his eyes, making circular motions with his arms and shooting another blast of lighting when he saw the Avatar peeking out from behind the pillar he was still hiding behind.

"The situation could be a lot worse," Ryu told him, "At least we are keeping the Avatar at bay."

Sorin nodded in agreement before he saw that the Avatar was making another run for a pillar a few dozen feet away from him. He shot another couple lightning strikes down towards him, but each one missed. Just like what happened before, next thing he knew, the Avatar had shot a barrage of air and fire blasts towards him and Ryu had to make another earth wall to block the attacks. Once Ryu brought the earth wall down, they saw the watertribe girl disappear behind the new pillar that the Avatar had hide behind.

Sorin had to admit, it was a nice strategy the couple had worked up. The Avatar would sprint to a new pillar, send a few blasts up towards him and Ryu and then while Ryu's earth wall was in front of them, the girl would run to the pillar the Avatar had ran to earlier. The process repeated, and the couple was inching closer and closer to the balcony. They had started a few hundred feet away from he and Ryu but now Sorin estimated that they were only about one hundred feet away. Sure, he and Ryu were positioned high above them still but if the Avatar was able to get closer then he would just air bend himself up to the balcony and Sorin had no intention of facing him in close combat.

At one point, Ryu decided to not bend an earthwall up when the Avatar shot his usual bending blasts at them. It allowed Sorin to throw in a lighting strike at the watertribe girl when she attempted to run to the Avatar. Unfortunately though, the blast narrowly missed her and she made it too safely. However, because Ryu never put the earth wall up, he and Sorin were hit by several airblasts which had become more accurate as the Avatar got closer to them. The blasts knocked the two men down and by the time they were able to stand back up a few moments later, Sorin barely saw that the couple beneath them had managed to make an extra sprint to another pillar.

"Next time Ryu, just do your earthbending," Sorin told him, glaring at the earthbender irritably.

"Noted," Ryu answered, shrugging off the look that Sorin was giving him.

Sorin was beginning to have enough of this. The next time the Avatar made another run for a pillar, Sorin didn't try to shoot his lightning directly at him. Instead, Sorin shot the lightning in front of the Avatar, hoping that he would simply run into it. It was close to hitting him. The lighting struck the ground a few feet in front of the sprinting airbender and the blast threw him backwards several feet. While the Avatar was still down, Sorin shot another lightning blast directly at him. He saw the Avatar scrambling to his feet, swiftly jumping clear of the lightning and back behind the pillar that he had been hiding in before.

"Come on," Sorin whispered to himself, "Try that again."


Aang leaned up against the pillar while he tried to catch his breath, trying to ignore his throbbing head. That blast had been to close and had rattled his whole body. His vision had actually momentarily blurred when the explosion had occurred and Aang had been amazed that he had been able to retreat back to the pillar that he and Katara had been hiding behind.

"I don't think we should try that again," Katara told him as calmly as she could, "I think they're catching on to what we're doing."

"Agreed," Aang gasped out.

Katara eyed him in concern. Her heart had nearly stopped when he had been almost it by the lightning and it was still aching from that moment. She forced herself to be strong though. She and Aang might not have that much time left to stop Tau.

"Maybe we should split up," She suggested and began to explain when Aang gave her a questioning look, "They can only shoot at one of us at a time. If we split up and go to separate sides of the courtyard than once of us can distract them while the other gets in closer."

Aang thought that plan over for a few moments before nodding, "I guess I'll be the decoy then since I can move faster. You try to sneak up on them and see what you can do."

"I…," Katara looked like she was about to argue, not liking the idea of Aang acting as bait but she quickly conceded, knowing that it was the most sensible thing, "Okay."

Aang took a deep breath, counted to ten, and then shot out from the pillar and took off into a sprint. He wasn't aiming for a specific destination. He just ran around and did his best to avoid the lightning strikes that were being sent down at him. The ground was erupting around him from the attacks and when once strike came dangerously close to him. He leaped high into the air, landing on the top of a pillar. He quickly jumped down though as another blast of lighting struck the pillar and blew the top of it off, narrowly missing him.

He zigzagged over to another pillar as more lighting strikes shot after him and he hide behind it to catch his breath for a couple of seconds. He looked around to try to find Katara but she was nowhere to be seen. She wasn't where he had seen her last so he knew she had to be making some progress. He just hoped that the two men on the balcony wouldn't spot her. He was close enough to them now that he could easily spot them. Wanting to keep their attention, he jumped out from behind the pillar again and sent air blasts up to them. As always, a wall of earth rose up to deflect the blasts followed by more lightning strikes when the wall disappeared.

Aang kept on evading though and every now and then he would send more blasts of air up to allow him to rest for just a few seconds. He didn't know how long he had been evading the blasts but those few seconds of time he got when the earth wall would come up were starting to become very precious to him. His movements were starting to slow as he grew more tired and his body ached from what he was doing. Aang knew that if he had taken more time to recover from the desert he wouldn't have gotten tired so quickly but there was nothing he could do about it now.

Unfortunately, Aang's slowing movements made him easier to hit. One blast of lighting came straight at him and he did the only thing he could do. Using the technique that Zuko had taught him years ago, Aang caught the lightning in once hand and used the other to direct it through his body. He could feel the power run through him but unfortunately, he was to weak to hold it any longer. He didn't have time to redirect it towards the balcony and the lighting just shot harmlessly out of his fingertips and into the skies. Aang instantly collapsed from exhaustion and he barely noticed that another streak of lightning was heading towards him.

Using what little strength he had, he raised his own earth wall to block it. The wall exploded in front of him and the blast threw him back roughly against a pillar. He collapsed to the ground and his whole vision became blurry. His ears were buzzing from how loud the explosion had been and he could barely make out anything. He stood up shaking his head in an attempt to clear his vision and looked up at the balcony, seeing one of the men getting ready to shoot another blast of lighting at him. Aang knew that he wouldn't have the strength to dodge it and he also knew this was the blast that might be the end for him.

However, an icicle suddenly shot up to the balcony seemingly from nowhere and impaled the firebender right in the shoulder. Aang heard the man let out a quick yell as the man's arms shifted downwards from the pain so that they were aimed at the floor of the balcony just as the lighting discharged from the man's fingertips.

The entire balcony was suddenly engulfed in flames and Aang was unable to see anything through the smoke that rose from it. He just stared to where the balcony had been, shocked by what he had just seen. The smoke finally dissipated after a few moments and the balcony wasn't even there anymore. It was just gone and Aang didn't even need to guess what had happened to the two men. He let out a shaky breath and fell to his knees on the ground, partly from exhaustion and partly from surprise.

He looked around, seeing Katara emerge from a pile of rubble way off to the side of the courtyard. So that was where she had been, he realized. She had moved away from all the pillars and instead chose to use the rubble for cover. Aang knew that the ice shard that had resulted from the two men's death came from her and he could tell that she was shaken up about it. After all, she had never really been responsible for anyone's death before.

"Aang I…I" she stuttered once she stood over him, looking down at him regretfully and pulling at one of her strands of hair, "I'm sorry…"

Aang's eyes widened, knowing why she was saying sorry to him. He hated the idea of taking a life, she was probably terrified of what he thought of her now.

"I…I just," she continued, not seeming to know what to say, "I just saw you go down and I didn't think there was anything else I could do and…"

Aang quickly stood up and placed a finger over her lips to silence her, "Shh, you don't have to explain anything, I understand."

Katara face suddenly turned to a look of relief but she still seemed to be questioning him, "But…"

"Look," he interrupted, trying to reassure her, leaning against the pillar as he tried to regain his strength "I know that I would never be able to take a life but I'm not going to hate anyone for doing that if they had a good reason to…especially you. It's okay Katara"

"O-okay Aang," she sighed and hung her arms to her sides. She could tell that Aang was shaken up about it, she was a little to, but as long as he didn't hate her for it she felt okay. While she didn't believe in killing people, she wasn't completely against doing it if circumstances called for it. She had threatened Zuko at the Western Air Temple and she had meant it at the time. As far as she was concerned the situation here hadn't been that different. Those men had been about to kill Aang and she did what she needed to keep him alive. Despite her confidence though that she had done the right thing, she knew in the back of her mind that she would be questioning it later. For now, they still needed to get up to the top of the temple and stop Tau.

She heard a groan beside her and saw that Appa had walked up to them after seeing that the coast was clear. The couple boarded the bison in silence before he took off towards the top of the central spire. He flew in circles, outlining the sides of the spire and staying close to the walls of it so that Tau wouldn't be able to see them coming up if he was still standing on the walkway waiting for them. Luckily for them though, he wasn't and Katara figured that he had gone inside, thinking that his companions would be able to handle her and Aang.

Appa landed on the outer walkway at the top of the spire and Katara and Aang quickly jumped off and cautiously began to walk to the doorway leading inside…


Tau stood over the podium, looking down at the sunstone anxiously. He wasn't just looking at that though, he was looking at a small beam of sunlight that was slowly making its way across the podium and towards the sunstone.

Thirty minutes, he thought to himself, Thirty minutes and the Yanari will be released.

Suddenly he heard the doors open behind him. He turned around expecting Ryu and Sorin to walk in a say that they had taken out the Avatar but instead, he saw the Avatar and Katara walking towards him, each looking slightly tired but ready for a fight.

"Where are Ryu and Sorin?" Tau asked, blue eyes gazing at Aang intently.

Aang and Katara exchanged glances before Aang turned his head back to address Tau, "It's over okay, stop this right now."

Aang might have imagined it but he saw a brief look of sorrow flash across Tau's face.

Tau closed his eyes and breathed in a deep breath, knowing full well what happened to his two friends. He pushed back the sadness he felt, knowing it wouldn't do him any good. He could mourn their deaths later, this wasn't over yet. He opened his eyes again and glared at Aang angrily.

"If I stop now then their deaths would mean nothing," Tau said, pulling a steam of water from the air and gathering it around him, "Do you really want to fight me?"

"You can't win Tau," Katara spat at him sharply, suddenly feeling the anger she had towards him coming back full force, "You're going to pay for everything you've done!"

"You really think you have an edge on me don't you?" Tau raised his eyebrows.

"Tau, we don't have to fight," Aang spoke up again pleadingly, "You're outnumbered, and this will only end badly for you."

"I'm outnumbered?" Tau smiled wickedly, "What makes you think that?"

Aang and Katara exchanged confused glances before looking back at Tau curiously.

"More specifically," Tau continued, "Do you really think your precious Waterbender is on your side?"

Aang suddenly felt a change in his connection with Katara. It was something he didn't recognize and he had no idea what it meant. He looked at her, seeing her shift her gaze between him and Tau confusedly before her eyes fell somewhere in between. She seemed lost…

"After all," Tau continued once again, "When it comes to love…." he paused, gaze turning towards Katara confidently, "everything may not be quite what it seems. Katara…kill him."

"What?" Aang spurted out in shock and looked over to his soul mate only to see her blast him backwards with a stream of water that she had pulled out of the air.

Aang was knocked onto his back and he grunted from the impact. He slowly stood up, not sure what was going on and gazed at Katara in shock.

"Katara what are you doing?" he asked pleadingly.

She didn't seem to hear him though. She walked slowly to him, her eyes not seeming to recognize him, and Aang started to slowly back up. There was something else wrong with those eyes to. Aang looked closer and gasped…her pupils were dilated, there was hardly any blue left in them. Aang suddenly felt his heart nearly break. The only time he had seen someone act the way Katara was acting now was Jet…under Lake Laogai…when Long Feng had brainwashed him.

"Having a Dai Li agent as a companion has its advantages," Tau said, slowly walking down the stairs leading up to the podium and standing slightly behind Katara, who was gazing at Aang menacingly.

Aang gasped, realizing that the earthbender that was with Tau was an older Dai Li agent. He also realized that she must have been brainwashed between the time of her capture and his own arrival on the airship days ago. Tau had planned this. Just in case they made it out of the desert, Tau had made sure that he had one more card to play. To Aang, it was sick that Tau had decided to use Katara against him…that he was trying to force him to fight her.

"Now, I do believe the odds are fair," Tau said, tilting his head towards Katara and smiling slightly, "Right Katara?"

She didn't answer him. Instead, she kept facing Aang as she brought her water up in front of her and charged forwards.


For those of you that think Katara's brainwash thing just came out of nowhere...it didn't. It was hinted at. For those of you that don't believe me, read chapter 19 again.

Anyways, review and the next chapter will be up Saturday.