Chapter 12: The Big Fight
On the day of the fight, Katara is up absurdly early. Dawn has yet to break, and for a while, Katara watches as the moon dances down slowly. She thinks of the story of Tui and La, told to her by Yugoda a lifetime ago. She wonders if they, too, think of her ever. She touches the side of her ribs, where the upper part of her tattoo should have been, and sighs.
Usually, it is Zuko who is first up, followed by Ocha, and then she drags herself out of bed at the promise of breakfast. But today, she's too nervous to go back to sleep. For a year now she has been hawkishly watching the postings for wrestling matches, hoping against hope to see The Blind Bandit as one of the listed wrestlers, to no avail. Now, there is a tiny sliver of hope, the first names that she actually recognises. The Boulder versus Fire Nation Man. She knows that it was rude to crash Zuko and Jin's date - and as much as Zuko insists that it's not a date, she's sure that Jin would disagree - but the opportunity to ask The Boulder in person about Toph is too tempting to resist. Despite having seen the destruction of the Bei Fong estate herself a year ago, Katara cannot believe that Toph isn't here, somewhere, in the Earth Kingdom. She'd tell Zuko what her obsession is with the wrestling match, but for some reason she feels shy, ashamed. Like she's a child who refuses to give up on old mythology.
Giving up on the pipe dream of falling back asleep, she swings her legs off the cot and leaves her room. She tentatively knocks on Zuko's door, seeking company. A year ago, when they had fled her tribe on that tiny dinghy, she wouldn't dream of interacting with Zuko past the bare minimum. Now, he is the one constant in her life, and she finds her staunch anger towards him thawing. She wouldn't go so far as calling him her friend, but maybe acquaintance. Maybe. She's not harbouring any delusions that he's finished with his hunt for Aang. She's still looking out for signs that he'll flee.
"Zuko?" she whispers. No reply. She cups her mouth against the seam of the door and calls his name again, even louder this time. From another room, Ocha lets out a loud, wet snore, and Katara grimaces.
"Come on, Zuko," she coaxes. "Please!"
The door suddenly swings open, and Katara catches herself from falling face-first into his room. She looks up at Zuko, whose hair is mussed up and shirt is missing. He crosses his arms and scowls sleepily down at her. She stares at the expanse of his chest for a second before blushing and looking away, into his room.
"Can I come in?" she asks.
After a second, he nods, and steps inside the room to begin tidying up his bed.
"No, no," she protests. "Don't tidy up for me."
Zuko shrugs and pulls on a shirt. He looks at her expectantly.
"What's up?" he asks finally. He gestures to a wicker chair in a corner of the room, and she carefully makes her way over before perching herself on the chair. Zuko remains standing, arms still crossed.
This is the first time she has been invited in to his room - granted, she invited herself in - so she takes the opportunity to look around. Just like hers, the room remains bare, filled with only the essentials and nothing that would indicate that this actually belonged to Zuko. What little money they were making, they spent towards helping Ocha buy groceries, and halved the rest. Katara keeps hers under a pile of clothes in her cupboard, for the day she finally decides to split ways with Zuko. She doesn't know where she will go next, but she hopes that one day, she will.
On one corner is a downturned mirror, but she tries not to pry too deeply into that, and instead turns her attention to the view from his window. Whereas the view from her room peers over the sprawling Secret Ba Sing Se, Zuko's stares straight down into the street that customers enter the Jasmine Dragon from. Now, the street is entirely quiet, and merchants have boarded up their small shops for the night. A sole street lamp, which reminds her strongly of the Dai Li's brainwashing lamp she saw through Jet's mind, dots the street below, and puts into relief some traditional Earth Kingdom laundry that swings lazily in the wind from a wire that is strung across a window. She smiles to herself; Zuko has given her the nicer room.
The silence stretches on until Zuko clears his throat, visibly confused and a little uncomfortable.
"Sorry," she says, turning to face him, "I just couldn't sleep."
At this, he rolls his eyes, as he so often does with her.
"So you decided to wake me up, too?"
"Well... who else was I supposed to wake up? Ocha? You try walking in there while she's snoring! It's gross! And she's always in her underwear when she sleeps!"
They both shudder.
"Doesn't really answer my question, but fine. Feel free to stay here; I'm going back to sleep."
Slightly chagrined that he feels comfortable enough to ignore her, she crosses her arms and nestles further into the chair.
"I will stay here," she bites out.
Zuko crawls back into bed and his breathing evens out. Katara turns to look outside the window again.
"Zuko?" she whispers.
"What?" he snaps back sleepily.
"I miss my mom."
A sigh. "Me, too." He sits up and looks at her. Under the pale moonlight, all she sees are the two golden points of his eyes.
"Do you think... there's another lifetime in which both our moms are alive?"
He rubs his scarred eye tiredly. "I don't know. Maybe."
"Wouldn't you want to go to one where everything was great?"
"Sure," he says, a little darkly. "Just tell me how to get to that lifetime. I'm just lucky to be alive in this one."
That's nice, she wants to say, but the mismatch between his message and the dark look on her face halts the words as it forms in her throat. Instead, she thinks of what a perfect lifetime would look like for Zuko. His mom would probably be there. And he'd probably be in the Fire Nation, hanging out with his family, without his scar, probably. And he would have captured Aang.
But although her perfect lifetime also includes having all her family together, it includes having Aang alive and well with her, and his family defeated. Dead, probably, she thinks, envisioning lightning arcing through the air and into Aang. Is there any world where the both of them could coexist happily?
"Do you think," she ventures slowly, her brain tripping over the words as she thinks it, "that in one of those lifetimes we could have been friends?"
There is something in Zuko's eyes that she's too scared to decipher. "Maybe in this one," he offers hesitantly.
"Maybe," she says, but she knows he can't hear the conviction in her voice. She gets up to leave his room. "I'll let you go back to sleep."
But he's out of bed too. "It's alright, the sun is already rising. It's too late."
She watches him leave his room.
The wrestling arena is situated outside of Secret Ba Sing Se, and Katara keeps a close eye out for Dai Li guards, none of whom she has been able to spot so far. The square surrounding the arena is packed, and in the sea of green tunics it is all but impossible to spot Jin. Zuko stands by her, sulking under his hood, looking even more suspicious being the only one in a cloak in this wretched heat.
"How can you stand to wear that thing?" she asks him, wiping the sweat off her forehead.
"You get used to it," he replies. "Besides, I'm from the Fire Nation. This is nothing."
"Well, I'm from the Southern Water Tribe, and it's making me hot to just look at you, so please take off the cloak."
He lifts his head to stare at her for a second, and the beginnings of a smirk begin to pull at his lips, and she blushes furiously.
"I didn't mean it like that!" she snaps hotly. He just raises his eyebrow, still smirking, and she retaliates quickly. "I wouldn't dream of saying that to a man on a date."
The smirk is gone with almost comical efficiency. "We're not on a - "
" - date, yeah," she interrupts smoothly. "But I'd keep my volume down if I were you; Jin could hear you."
He whips around to look at the woman approaching the two of them.
"Lee," Jin beams as she comes to stand by them, and with significantly less enthusiasm, adds, "Sapphire."
"Saph is fine," Katara says by way of greeting, smiling at her pleasantly.
Jin turns to Zuko. "Aren't you too hot with that cloak on? Why don't you take it off?" Jin tries to reach up and push the hood back, but Zuko catches her wrist.
"No," he says shortly, and Jin blushes. They lapse into awkward silence, and Katara spends the time trying to peek over the crowd for a loudmouth earthbender.
Finally, she scowls, frustrated, and turns back to Jin and Zuko, the former of whom is bravely attempting small-talk.
"... I thought of you when I drank that tea; of course, the Jasmine Dragon's tea is much better, but it was a gift..."
Zuko just crosses his arms. Taking pity on the poor girl, Katara interjects: "Why don't we go inside?"
"Oh - oh, alright, then... let me just find my tickets..."
The push through the crowd and Jin directs them to their sits - not quite front row, but close enough for Katara to be able to spot Toph if she does turn up. They sit down, Katara between the two of them, to Jin's deep, and very vocal, dismay. The arena around them is steadily filling up, and Katara's spirits lift to see through the dimming lights a man weaving his way through the crowd, selling cabbages. She remembers him from when Team Avatar was last in Ba Sing Se. Annoyingly, a man comes to sit right in front of her, his height obscuring her view of the stage.
"Lee," Katara says, craning her neck to look past the tall man in front of her, "can you please switch seats with me? I can't see anything."
"No," Zuko snaps, but Katara fixes with him with a glare and he finally relents, standing up. Katara squeezes past him, ignoring his scowl, and settles down in Zuko's old seat. The view from here is much clearer.
Next to Zuko, Jin begins chatting animatedly, undeterred by Zuko's staunch silence. She begins looking around the crowd, trying to spot Toph, but the lights have fully dimmed now, save for a spotlight in the middle of the arena, and a guy walks out into the stage. He's rotund and short, sporting a classic Earth Kingdom moustache she sees everyone growing nowadays.
"He's a biased referee," a man sitting next to her mutters. "He's always siding with Steel Man when he's in the ring; luckily, I think he hates Fire Nation Man more than he hates The Boulder. I mean, who doesn't, right?"
Katara turns to look at the man, who is built like a ton of bricks. He has a wide face and a long beard that curls into a point. Across his right cheek is a scar. He's wearing a white vest and his big, meaty hands are clenched around the seat in front of him, looking out at the ring. A large tattoo of a badger biting another one covers the majority of his left arm.
After a second, Katara manages to stop gaping.
"Who are you rooting for?" the guy asks her.
"The Boulder," Katara replies, tearing her eyes away from his tattoo and towards the ring. The referee is now pacing around the arena, prodding the earth below with one gingerly extended toe.
"Me too," he replies.
After watching the referee prod the soil underneath him for a while, Katara enquires about this to the man sitting next to her.
"Regulation dictates that the ground must be even to give all players an even chance. Are you new to wrestling?"
"Yeah," Katara affirms, smiling sheepishly at the man.
"Well," the man says, puffing out his chest, "you're lucky you're sat next to me, the biggest wrestling fan in all of Ba Sing Se! I'm Sunitchi. The Boulder versus Fire Nation Man is not so much of an interesting match in itself, because we all know who is going to win, but the winner dictates who'll be fighting in the last wrestling match of the season against The Ripper. Oh, and anyway, be quiet, it's starting now!"
The crowd goes silent while they watch the referee hobble up on to a podium.
"Ahem," he says, in a squeaky, high-pitched voice. "Welcome to the Earth Kindgom Wrestling Match Semi-Finals!"
Amidst the screams of the crowd, the poor man has to speak louder: "Our first wrestler can destroy anything in his path, weather the worst of storms, and crush you in your sleep - it's The Boulder!"
Next to her, Sunitchi has clambered on to his feet, roaring and beating his chest. Katara instinctively claps her hands over her ears, and smiles slightly when she notices that Jin and Zuko have done the same. A door to the left side of the arena bursts open, and The Boulder barges through, hands on his hips and his cape flapping behind him. He looks not a day older than he did in his previous lifetime. He comes to stand by the referee, who, even from his vantage point on the podium, has to peer upwards at The Boulder. The Boulder flexes his muscles and the crowd goes wild, and only with a lot of pleading from the referee does The Boulder stop showing off, allowing the referee to continue speaking.
"His contender - his contender - " he ploughs on amidst the booing, "has a love for all things Fire Nation, and pledges his... um... undying allegiance to the Fire Nation... anyway... here's Fire Nation Man!"
On Katara's right, a door creaks open feebly and a shirtless man steps out, belly hanging loose. He brings with him a flag of the Fire Nation and begins to sing, to everyone's undying horror, a song about the Fire Nation.
"My flame burns for thee..." he begins crowing, before a member of the audience flings an empty can at him.
Katara leans imperceptibly closer and murmurs to Zuko, "Have you ever heard that song before?"
"It's the national anthem," he mutters back, entirely red in the face and sinking steadily lower in his chair. Next to him, Jin looks startled, glancing between Zuko and Katara in succession as their heads lean closer.
The referee picks up the podium and hobbles to one side of the arena. The Boulder and Fire Nation Man stand face-to-face, and the referee finally shouts, "Begin!"
The match is brutal, if the screaming of the crowd is anything to go by, but Katara is once again distracted and looking out for Toph. Jin has clasped her hands over her face and shrieks as bits of debris go flying.
"Foul! Foul!" Sunitchi is yelling.
"Wait, what's happening?" Zuko shouts at her, and Jin peeks out from between her fingers towards Katara.
"I don't know!" Katara shouts back over the commotion. Another roar from the crowd echoes, and Katara notices The Boulder clasping his hands together and swinging it at Fire Nation Man. Even from so far away from the arena, Katara can hear the crunch of teeth as the fists slam into Fire Nation Man's jaw.
"What do you mean? I thought you were a fan of wrestling!" Zuko snaps, ducking to avoid splintered wood. Jin has doubled over, facing her knees, with her hands protecting the back of her head.
"I - I like a wrestler, not wrestling - I don't know what's going on!" More importantly, she didn't care. She was interested in either finding Toph or having the match end so that she could ask The Boulder about Toph. The fact that The Boulder has picked up Fire Nation Man and is now spinning around is of no entertainment to Katara.
Okay, maybe a little.
She watches, dumfounded, as The Boulder heaves Fire Nation Man towards the crowd, who all shriek and scatter. Fire Nation Man crashes into a cart and she hears someone wail, "My cabbages!" and it is in the midst of this chaos that the referee has declared that the match has ended.
"And the winner, by obviously no contest, is The Boulder!"
The clearly partisan crowd is gleeful about the short match, chanting The Boulder's name as he swings up both his and the disgruntled referee's hand. The clamour soon after to reach The Boulder nearly bowls her over.
She turns to Zuko. "I'm going to go talk to him; you're welcome to go back if you want."
Jin looks eager at the offer, but Zuko shakes his head, eyeing the eager crowd surrounding The Boulder disdainfully. "I'll go with you."
"But - " Jin ventures, "I thought we could - "
"No," Zuko cuts her off.
"Well, I'm going back home," Jin huffs. Katara watches Jin leave, trying to push through the gaggle of people also heading towards the exit, feeling slightly guilty about ruining her date.
"You can go with her if you want," Katara offers.
"No," Zuko repeats again, scowling. "We're a team, right?"
Something in her heart skips at that. "Yeah," she smiles, and they try to breach the outer ring of the crowd. After a couple of futile attempts, Sunitchi comes up to them.
"You wanna talk to The Boulder?" he asks her, completely ignoring Zuko.
Katara nods, and Sunitchi cracks his knuckles. "Out of the way!" he bellows, and fans go flying as Sunitchi bulldozes a way for them. Embarrassed and also slightly impressed, Katara and Zuko follow the clearing of disgruntled fans to where The Boulder stands, flexing his biceps and puckering his lips lovingly at them.
Zuko stares at him. "What the actual f - "
"Z - Lee!" she admonishes quickly, elbowing him. She ignores his grunt and turns to The Boulder. "Er..." she says, "big fan."
"Thanks, little lady. The Boulder loves seeing his fans."
"Yeah... anyway, I wanted to ask you about your previous matches."
The Boulder grins at her, flexing his muscles, and Zuko scowls. Taking that as her cue to continue, she beings her list of questions.
"Have you ever wrestled with women?"
The Boulder's expression collapses into a frown. "The Boulder is ashamed," he thunders, "that he lost his winning streak to Owl-Fowl Eye, but her vision was too good for The Boulder to trick..."
That immediately rules out Toph, of course. She switches tactics.
"Have you ever wrestled anyone who's blind?"
The Boulder roars with laughter. "Blind? The Boulder would crush them!"
Katara crosses her arms, unimpressed. "You don't have to have sight to be good at something."
The Boulder quietens his laugh, wiping a stray tear from his eye. He shakes his head, trying to quell his amusement, and then catches sight of Zuko.
"Hey," The Boulder says. "What happened to your face?" The interloping crowd turns to peer at the subject in question.
Startled, Zuko pulls his hood down further, and then stalks up to him. "Mind your own business, unless you want to fight," he growls.
The Boulder looks eager to offer, so Katara yanks a seething Zuko away.
"Useless, overblown, good-for-nothing, son of a - "
"Let's just go home," Katara interrupts, dejected.
Zuko pulls his arm away, stalking out of the arena. "Why did you wanna come here anyway?" he snarls at her.
Her own anger flares up. "Don't shout at me! And I was looking for someone."
"Yeah? Who?" Zuko retorts, clearly not caring.
"The Blind Bandit," she shrugs, in a sour mood herself and ill-inclined to pacify Zuko.
"W-Wait!" someone behind her says, and Katara spins around to face Sunitchi. Zuko keeps walking, and Katara lets him.
"The Blind Bandit?" Sunitchi replies, and Katara is more desperate for information than she is worried that The Blind Bandit title may not exist in this universe, nods.
Sunitchi swallows, lowering his voice. "I have information on the Blind Bandit."
Her heart jerks up from her feet up to her throat. "You do?" she asks, not daring to believe it.
"I - " Sunitchi looks around, nervous. He rubs his arm. "You have to come with me. It's not safe to talk here."
Katara nods, making to fall into step with Sunitchi, when she walks straight into an outstretched arm.
"She's not going anywhere with you," Zuko growls.
Sunitchi shrugs, looking skittish and glancing around rapidly, so Katara intervenes quickly. "I'll go," she says, but the offer falls on dead ears.
"No," Sunitchi shakes his head, "not now." But the protest dies in her throat when he says, "Tonight. By the Qiang He river - it leads out of the city. You can bring your boyfriend if you want."
"He's not my boyfriend," she protests, just as Zuko echoes the same thing, but Sunitchi has already turned to leave. Katara and Zuko turn to face each other, scowling.
"Thanks a lot," Katara snaps, and Zuko gapes at her.
"I saved your life! You were going to walk off with a total stranger!"
"Oh, and I suppose that your being there would save me?"
"Yes," he replies arrogantly.
"How? You can't even bend! What would you do?"
"Enough," Zuko says secretively; darkly. Once again, her lack of knowledge about Zuko yawns open and Katara marvels at it, at how long she can live with someone and know nothing about them. There have been surreptitious mentions about Zuko's uncle, but past that, Zuko keeps his secrets close.
Allowing his silence to remain taciturn, they walk towards the Jasmine Dragon in uninterrupted silence, one anticipating the meeting with Sunitchi and the other dreading it.
The Qiang He river glistens invitingly in the twilight, and Katara allows herself a few baser moments of dipping her feet in her element before heading deeper into the forest, propelled forwards only slightly by Zuko's incessant grumbling. They find Sunitchi at the base of a thick tree, leaning against it with his arms crossed.
"Hi," Katara says.
Sunitchi doesn't return the greeting. "We need to go this way." He points towards the thicket of trees, and Katara can see two broadswords strapped to his back. She swallows against the rising premonition in her belly and follows his heavy footsteps.
Zuko is right next to her. "I don't trust this guy," he whispers.
"You don't trust anyone."
"With good reason," he retorts. "I met this one guy in Ba Sing Se who was convinced that my Uncle and I were firebenders and tried ratting us out."
She rolls her eyes, rushing to keep up with Sunitchi's brutal pace. "Imagine that."
"I think you trust people too easily," he counters. "But I guess it makes sense given that you've only ever seen your little iceberg before I came along."
Katara nearly trips over the root of a tree. "Yeah, my life really is better now," she mutters sarcastically.
Sunitchi's voice cuts through their conversation abruptly. "Here," he says. "This is where you can find information about The Blind Bandit." He gestures towards the trunk of a tree, and Katara steps forward to peer at it. It has the phrase, "From the bottom, up" etched on it.
"What does it mean?" Katara asks Sunitchi.
"It's... uh... a slogan," he says slowly, "by a rebel group that The Blind Bandit might be associated with, and their whereabouts might be somewhere here."
"Which rebel group?" she asks, but he doesn't answer. She turns around to face him, but he's glancing up at the trees. Suspicion rises in her and she turns to look at Zuko, and it morphs into panic when Zuko is nowhere to be seen.
Sunitchi turns to face her, and licks his lips slowly. "The Freedom Fighters. In Ba Sing Se, they've been rebelling against the Fire Nation ever since the siege." He takes a step towards her, and Katara instinctively steps back. "In the beginning, the rebellion was successful, and they were able to create strongholds in Ba Sing Se. But now, the D-Dai Li are after anyone who might support the rebel group, which includes The Blind Bandit... I'm the biggest wrestling fan in Ba Sing Se. And I've never seen The Blind Bandit, and nobody mentions her, except for you. You know her. And any leads on where the Blind Bandit is gives me huge money... and if I don't tell them... they'll kill me."
He turns towards the sky, and bellows, "They're over here!"
Before Katara can react, a hand is clapped over her mouth and she's yanked into the trees. She bites at the hand, but it does not move, and she begins to scream, but a voice hisses in her ear, "be quiet."
Her heart speeds up, and she hardly dares to recognise the voice. The hand is removed from her mouth and wraps around her waist instead. A hook latches onto a branch above them and she's hoisted further up.
"Where's Lee?" she whispers back to the familiar voice.
"We don't know; we don't have him."
She closes her eyes, just as three bodies drop down and surround Sunitchi. Even in the darkness, Katara can see their broad hats and their signature insignia of a glowing, green circle on their chests.
"Where are they?" one of the Dai Li members hisses.
"They were here! I swear!" Sunitchi whimpers. "They're up in the trees!"
One of them nods to the other, who all but flies up to the top of the trees. Katara is yanked further up, beyond the eyesight of even the Dai Li. The man drops back down and shakes his head.
"No sign of either of them."
Zuko, where are you?
The Dai Li turns back to Sunitchi, and bends a pillar rock at him. Sunitchi goes flying and hits a tree, slumping down.
"We don't take too kindly to liars," a member of the Dai Li hisses. A pair of shackles morphs from the ground and wraps itself around Sunitchi's wrists before, who is pulled upright and dangles mid-air as the pair of shackles wrap themselves around a tree branch.
"No, no, I swear! They're somewhere here!" Sunitchi sobs.
A member of the Dai Li steps up to him, and whispers, "Do you know what the penalty for lying to the Dai Li is?"
"No, please," Sunitchi pleads, and Katara wrestles out of the grip that is still tight around her wrist. Even if he was about to give her up to the Dai Li, it's no reason to let him die.
"Let me go or I'll scream," Katara whispers to the person next to her, who releases her for the millisecond needed for her to jump down.
"Hey," she shouts, unnecessarily loudly, but the Dai Li has already turned to face her, and before they can move, she tears off into the forest, and the Dai Li pursue her, away from Sunitchi. She stumbles along, narrowly avoiding fists made of earth flying towards her, and stops abruptly when se notices the Dai Li triangulating her. She glances around wildly, looking upwards to see if she could scale a tree, but the Dai Li steadily approaches, their hands reaching out.
A noise of a sword being unsheathed rings through the air and suddenly Zuko is there, moving through the Dai Li effortlessly, swinging Sunitchi's twin blades with a smooth grace. She catches the gleam in his eye and her breath hitches at the feral way in which he attacks them. Soon, all three of the Dai Li slump to the ground and Zuko lands in front of her, sweat beading his forehead and arms.
Relieved and a little overwhelmed, she flings her arms around him, and he returns the hug briefly.
"Where the hell were you?" she asks him.
"Where was I? I step into the bushes for one second and I turn to get you and you're just gone - "
"Someone else came to get me."
"Someone else? Who?"
"I did." Multiple pairs of of footsteps thud on the ground and someone lights a lamp, bringing into sharp relief a pair of hooks, and a straw sticking out of a handsome, smirking mouth.
She smiles, her heart beating rapidly. "Jet."
Disclaimer: I do not own A:TLA.
A/N: Wow, that took a LONG time to write! I've been on holiday (within the country) so I've been pretty distracted, but I hope the longer chapter and the cameo at the end makes up for it. What do you think? Please leave a review!