It's been a couple of years since I last touched this story (my first and probably one and only attempt at a fanfic). And all it took is a nationwide lockdown and quarantine situation and a really kind review that motivated me to re-read my story and start writing again.

I just want to say to anyone reading this that I hope you, your families and your loved ones, are all ok during this difficult time. We live in unprecedented times and it is scary.

I am really sorry to anyone that loved the original chapter 14 but when I was re-reading and trying to get back into writing this, I just couldn't work with the story. I'm sure 2 years ago I knew where I was going with it all but coming back to it after so long, I had to make some adjustment to the chapter to help get back into the overall story.

As always, kind reviews are much appreciated. It really does help motivate me to know that there's anyone out there enjoying this story.


"Aghh!" Aang roared as he finished off a firebending technique. Zuko stood, watching his form with his arms crossed and one hand cupping his chin before nodding slowly.

"Better, but it still needs to be more ferocious. Run through it again," Zuko said. Aang let out a sigh of exhaustion, but reset his stance to begin the form again.

They were training in the courtyard of the Fire Nation's holiday home again. The royal home was fitted adorned by several hills and mountains, providing excellent cover away from prying eyes. The fourth side of the courtyard was backed by a granite hill which meant that it was the perfect spot for the boys to practice their training.

They had been on Ember Island for seven days now, and Zuko still couldn't shake how surreal it was to be staying in his old family home with the Avatar's gang while they waited to face the potential end of the world and, hopefully, end of the Hundred Year War.

It had felt a little weird over the past few days, but he was particularly distracted this afternoon, the conversation with Katara from the previous night constantly popping into his head.

It felt surreal; the people Zuko was with now, and the person Zuko himself was, were so vastly different to when he was a young boy spending his summers in this extravagant villa. It was even weirder because Zuko felt different to how he'd been when he visited the island so recently with Azula, Ty Lee, and Mai; back when he was pretending to himself that his family's side was the right one to be on, and that being the perfect prince was his destiny.

His conversation with Katara about his time after Ba Sing Se meant he couldn't help but think back to an evening on Ember Island that he had spent with his sister and her friends after a terrible house party, when they had sat around the fire and Zuko had tried to confront his irrational deep-seated anger. Zuko could still hear the creepy voices of Lo and Li re-introducing the island to them: "Like footsteps being washed away from the sand, Ember Island gives everyone a clean slate. Ember Island reveals the true you."

Zuko knew that he could never truly have a clean slate for the things that he had done in his life, but he hoped that the person he was now was the true him. For the first time in a long while, he was doing what felt right at least. But that didn't make the experience of staying in the villa and grappling with painful memories of his childhood and family any less difficult.

Aang began to work through his firebending set again, and Zuko was brought out of his reverie by the movement, trying to refocus on the young Avatar. Zuko opted to move their training into a sparring session to force Zuko to engage his brain.

Katara and Toph were sitting on the steps to the left of the courtyard, lazing in the shade of the veranda to avoid the hot sun. They had both spent the morning practising their bending; Katara had gone ice surfing when she first woke up, and moved onto practising her waterbending forms by the sea, whilst Toph perfected her sandbending.

From the shade of the veranda, Katara couldn't help but watch Zuko as he trained with Aang.

Katara used to look at Zuko and would feel irritation spike in her veins. The sound of his voice would make her roll her eyes, and her teeth would involuntarily grit together. But that frustration and dislike had dissipated over time.

Now she felt completely different about Zuko.

Zuko had become someone she could turn to for support, even when she was worried about her friends, about her family, about everyone's future and about the future of the world. When she felt like she was the one who looked after the group, Zuko was the one who looked after her. He had somehow found ways to make her smile and laugh over the past week. He had supported her through hunting her mother's killer, and even helped her with little things like the dishes. He was physical comfort too; there was something soothing about being able to press her face into his shoulder with his arms around her.

Lost in her thoughts, she absentmindedly admired Zuko's muscles and form as he trained with Aang. Katara couldn't help but remember how nice it had felt to wake up curled up against him recently, even though the circumstances had been a dark time for her.

Following her train of thought about being physically close to Zuko, she blushed as she thought that despite the fact neither of them remembered it, she knew they had consummated their marriage from the sore and sticky feeling she had woken up with between her legs.

Katara had initially blamed Zuko, not just for the marriage, but for their intimacy too. Her first assumption had been that he had tricked her, but when it had become apparent that Zuko remembered even less about their night together than she did, she had to acknowledge that she was also responsible for what had happened.

Though her brother and father hadn't tried to pursue the topic with her since the news of her marriage, she still couldn't deny that she felt shame over having had sex before marriage. Even more so, she knew she was disappointed with herself that her first time hadn't been with someone she loved. It hadn't been special like she'd secretly hoped it would be.

Instead, it had been the opposite of special; Katara couldn't remember anything about it. In a way, she felt like she still hadn't had sex at all because, aside from the aftermath, she still had no clue what having sex was like. Watching Zuko, Katara briefly wondered what it would have been like if they were intimate but neither of them had been drunk.

Katara's thoughts were thankfully interrupted as Sokka burst into the courtyard with his arms full of groceries, Suki trailing behind him with an amused expression on her face and a piece of parchment in her hands.

"You guys are not going to believe this," Sokka announced excitedly, interrupting the practice. "There's a play about us!"

"We were just in town and we found this poster," Suki explained as Sokka gestured to her to brandish the poster at the group.

"What? How is that possible?" Katara asked in confusion as she and Aang moved towards the poster for a better look. Zuko used the break from training to sit down on the stone edge of a fountain that had not been used in many years, wiping away his sweat with a cloth.

"Listen to this!" Suki turned the poster towards Sokka for him to read it aloud. "The Boy in the Iceberg is a new playwright brought to you by the critically acclaimed Ember Island Players –."

"Ugh!" Zuko interrupted. "My mother used to take us to see them. They butchered 'Dragons in Love' every year."

"Should we go see it?" Aang asked.

"I mean, is it really a good idea for us to go see a play about ourselves?" Katara responded, worry colouring her voice.

"If you want to ruin your evening watching a most likely inaccurately written story about us, which will be wrecked further by terrible actors that will leave you feeling miserable, then you should go watch it," Zuko griped.

"No thanks," Toph grimaced. "I've sat through enough boring, stuck-up theatre performances for an entire lifetime."

Aang kicked at the dirt with his feet. "We never get to have fun anymore," he grumbled quietly. Katara, standing next to him, put her hand on his shoulder.

"You don't have time for fun, Aang. Sozin's comet is less than three days away! You have to be ready!" Zuko barked.

There was an awkward silence and Zuko was suddenly very aware of the fact that everyone else was looking at him with a mixture of pity and embarrassment.

"Yeah…" Aang said slowly, "about that." He took a deep breath. "We decided that it would actually be better if I wait to fight the Fire Lord until after it came."

"After!?" Zuko repeated in shock.

"I'm not ready." Aang admitted. "I need more time to master firebending."

"And, frankly, your earthbending could still use some work too," Toph added.

Silence fell again as the gang waited for Zuko's reaction, which seemed to be staring at them all in shock. For a second, he felt like an outsider from the group again, on the outside of the Avatar's inner circle. He was irritated that, despite being Aang's firebending teacher preparing him to face Zuko's own father, they hadn't thought to tell him such an important detail.

"So you all knew Aang was going to wait?" Zuko looked at each of them, and noted that when his eyes met Katara's, her gaze sheepishly diverted to her feet.

"Honestly, if Aang tries to fight the Fire Lord right now, he's gonna lose," Sokka explained. "No offence," he added in Aang's direction.

"The whole point of fighting the Fire Lord before the comet was to stop the war," Katara said. "But they pretty much won the war when they took Ba Sing Se. Things can't get any worse."

It hit Zuko like a punch in the gut. They just didn't get it. He had thought they understood what they were up against, but Zuko realised they had absolutely no idea what his father was capable of.

"You're wrong," he told them. "It's about to get worse than you can even imagine."

The gang listened to Zuko in horror as he told them about the war meeting that he had attended the day before the eclipse, and of the Fire Lord's plan to use the comet's power, which would fuel Firebenders with the strength of a hundred suns, to wipe out the Earth Kingdom people completely.

"No!" Suki gasped. Although she wasn't an Earthbender, Kyoshi Island was part of the Earth Kingdom, and the Earth Kingdom culture was a part of who Suki was. The thought of that being completely wiped off the face of the earth was horrifying.

"I can't believe this." Katara whispered in response.

Sokka wrapped his arm around Suki. "I always knew the Fire Lord was a bad guy, but his plan is just pure evil!"

Aang started pacing. "What am I gonna do?" he pleaded, throwing his hands up to his head.

"I know you're scared, and I know you're not ready to save the world. But if you don't defeat the Fire Lord before the comet comes, there won't be a world to save anymore," Zuko told him.

"Why didn't you tell me about your dad's crazy plan sooner?" Aang shouted.

"I didn't think I had to! I assumed you were still going to fight him before the comet. No one told me you decided to wait," Zuko said defensively.

Aang continued to pace around in circles. "This is bad." He sank to his knees. "This is really, really bad."

Katara stepped towards him. "Aang, you don't have to do this alone."

"Yeah!" Toph chimed in. "If we all fight the Fire Lord together, we've got a shot at taking him down."

"Alright, team Avatar is back!" Sokka cheered.

Aang stood up and nodded at them. "Thank you, you guys. Fighting the Fire Lord is gonna be the hardest thing we've ever done together." He paused. "But I wouldn't want to do it any other way."

The rest of the day was spent running drills as a team instead of just Zuko and Aang. They practised pairing up to take on the Fire Lord (or, in this instance, the Melon Lord), distracting him so that Aang could swoop in and deliver the final blow. Katara and Zuko practised as the first offensive team, with Suki and Sokka as the second team closely behind them. Katara and Zuko naturally fell into a rhythm of fighting in a circular motion facing away from each other so that they could protect each other's backs.

Toph acted as the Melon Lord for their initial run throughs to make the practise feel more realistic, but after a few close calls, including Sokka nearly being crushed by Toph's flaming rocks, Zuko took the Melon Lord's place.

However, they found that no matter how many times they ran the drills, the issue remained that Aang couldn't bring himself to deliver the final blow, even to an evil melon.

After the umpteenth failed attempt from Aang, Sokka stepped forwards, tired and aggravated.

"What's wrong with you?" Sokka complained . "If this was the real deal, you'd be shot full of lightning right now!"

"I'm sorry." Aang bowed his head in defeat. "But it just didn't feel right. I didn't feel like myself."

"It's the Fire Lord! How can it not feel right to take him out!?"

"Fire Lord Ozai is a horrible person, and the world would probably be better off without him - but there's gotta be another way!" Aang argued.

"Like what?" Zuko asked as he approached the pair.

"I don't know," Aang sighed. "But this goes against everything I learned as a monk."

"Aang, I'm sorry, but this is the only way. You have to stop my father," Zuko said. Even though Zuko had come to terms with the fact his father was a monster who must be stopped in order to save millions of lives, he still felt a little weird about having to persuade the Avatar to kill him.

"This goes against everything I learned from the monks. None of you understand the position I'm in!" He shouted in frustration as he began to storm off towards the villa.

"Aang, we do! It's just -" Katara started to say as Aang brushed past her.

"Just what, Katara?!" Aang shouted, turning back down to face her.

"We're just trying to help," Katara tried to reason with him.

"Well when one of you works out how I can defeat the Fire Lord without taking his life, I'd love to hear it!" Aang bit back at her before turning and stomping back down the hill.

Katara stepped forwards to follow after him but felt a hand from behind her land on her shoulder. She turned to see Zuko.

"Let him go," Zuko said calmly. "He needs time to sort this out by himself."

Katara looked back at Aang's retreating form and frowned. Her whole life she had waited for the Avatar to return and save them all; She had never considered that when the time came to save the world, the Avatar might not want to do it. The thought sat uneasily with her while she imagined what the future might look like if the Fire Lord succeed with his plans for world domination.

Aang continued back to the villa and shut himself away from everyone on the balcony upstairs. He sat cross-legged and tried to meditate on what he should do. When dinner time arrived, Aang declined to eat with the group, instead opting to eat his dinner on the balcony outlooking the ocean view with Momo by his side while he sat in contemplation.

Dinner downstairs was a quiet affair. Everyone was undeniably more solemn since Zuko's revelation; they ate mostly in silence whilst everyone was thinking heavily about the days and challenges that lay ahead. At the end of dinner, Zuko silently collected their dishes and brought them to the kitchen.

Katara joined him and they continued their usual routine of washing and drying in silence.

With their impending fate looming over them, Katara couldn't shake her sense of unease that while she and Zuko were friends, she didn't really know where they stood anymore.

"I know it seems silly to be worried about what to do about our marriage right now given the fact Sozin's comet is only a few days away…" Katara began, breaking the silence that hung over the kitchen.

"Katara, honestly, I'm not sure it's something we need to worry about right now. I mean… we may not even succeed in stopping my father from burning everything to the ground, and even if we do stop him, I may not… or we may not even both survive," Zuko interjected.

He wasn't trying to dismiss her; he just didn't feel very optimistic about their prospects and wanted to save Katara some unnecessary trouble.

"Zuko, I know we're going to give saving the world everything we've got. But you can't go into this expecting to-" Katara hesitated. "-fail." She gently placed her hand on Zuko's bicep, tentatively turning him to face her so they could continue their conversation face to face for once rather than to their dishes.

"We haven't really talked about our marriage since I accepted it's real and we agreed to be friends. Maybe we should talk about what our marriage might mean in the new world once this is all over. In case we do succeed and both survive this," she emphasised.

Zuko sighed. He had been trying to give Katara some space and not to pressure her into talking about it. Yet here she was, trying to pressure him into to talking about it when none of it could even matter in a few days' time.

"Well, if we somehow do pull this all off, then my Uncle Iroh should become the next Fire Lord. He was originally heir to the throne before his son, my cousin, Lu Ten died in battle, and my father convinced our grandfather to make him the next Fire Lord instead," Zuko said.

"I didn't know that," Katara admitted quietly.

"Uncle would be the best person to become the Fire Lord. He's so wise, and would know exactly how to help our nation to start making amends for the horrors it's caused," Zuko murmured. "And if he was Fire Lord, then we wouldn't even have to worry about whether you'd be Fire Lady or not."

"But what if, for whatever reason, your Uncle doesn't become Fire Lord, and you do - then what? Are we just gonna wait and hope that the Fire Court refuse to accept our marriage as binding because I'm from the WaterTribe?"

"I guess so. If they did, it would certainly help take the decision out of our hands," Zuko answered.

Katara nodded. She was silent for a moment, before she spoke again.

"Zuko, do you think if we asked the Fire Court, they would agree to annul our marriage or divorce us? I mean, if you were the Fire Lord, surely they can't say no, right?" she asked quietly.

Zuko couldn't help but feel a sting that despite the improvement they had made in terms of trusting each other and becoming friends, Katara was still trying to get out of being married to him. But Zuko quickly reprimanded and reminded himself that they had gotten married by accident, and staying married would undoubtedly affect Katara's whole life. While Katara had stopped pretending that their marriage didn't exist, that didn't mean she had agreed to act out being married to him for her whole life. Zuko reminded himself it wasn't fair to expect Katara to do that, because if he did become the Fire Lord, then as his wife Katara would be expected to live in the Fire Nation with him. By being married to him, she'd lose all of her freedom to make her own independent choices about her life. Zuko acknowledged that she had become bound to his fate, and her only options to have a way out of that life were to try to dissolve the marriage or to dishonour it.

"Um, well in terms of an annulment, I don't think we'd be able to get one of those… because we, uh, you know," Zuko answered awkwardly.

Both Zuko and Katara flushed bright red at his mention of their first night together.

"As for a divorce, I have no idea whether they'd agree or not. As far as I'm aware, it's never been done before. But if that's what you want, and if that's what it comes to, then I promise you I'll try."

"Thanks, Zuko." Katara gave him a bittersweet smile, her lips curling up at the corners as her eyes filled with tears.

"If they said no, what would you do then? Would you agree to staying with me in the Fire Nation, or would you leave?" Zuko asked tentatively. "I won't judge you for whatever you decide. I just wondered," he added hastily.

"I don't know." Katara admitted as the tears that had been welling up in her eyes brimmed over the edge and slowly began to slip down the side of her cheeks. "I'm sorry."

Zuko raised a hand to cup her cheek and gently wipe away at the tears falling. "It's okay," Zuko promised her. "Like I said, this may not even be a problem in a few days."

Katara nodded shakily against the palm of his hand. "Because Iroh could be the next Fire Lord," Katara said.

That wasn't exactly what he meant, but he nodded back at her and wiped away some more of her tears.

"We'd still be married though - would I still have to live in the Fire Nation?" she asked.

Zuko considered their potential future path. "No, you wouldn't. I would want to help Uncle stabilise the nation, but after that you and I could live anywhere in the world. We could even go back to your home in the South Pole if that's what you would want." For someone who had said the matter wasn't worth giving much thought, it certainly sounded like he had already spent some time considering their future.

Katara had to admit, the thought of them moving back to the South Pole didn't sound bad at all. She would love to see Zuko try to adapt to living in the middle of an icy wilderness, and was grateful that he had even considered it and grateful if he wasn't trying to force her to make a decision.

Katara reached up to press her palm softly against his scarred cheek, mirroring Zuko's hand cupping her own face. Katara was briefly reminded of when they had been stuck in an emerald cave under Ba Sing Se and Zuko had allowed her to touch his scar. Except this time, when Katara cupped her hand to his cheek, Zuko kept his eyes open as he carefully watched Katara's movements.

Zuko was aware that they were both still young, but it felt like they had matured beyond their years. The sights and experiences that weighed on their shoulders were more than any person should ever have to bear, let alone two teenagers.

When they had first woken up in that Fire Nation inn as newlyweds, Zuko knew that he would accept their marriage and honour it out of duty and respect. But in truth, ever since Zuko had woken with Katara snuggled against his chest, Zuko knew that he would follow through with their marriage out of more than just honour. Zuko could admit to himself that if they somehow lived through this, then he wouldn't mind being married to Katara and spending their future together.

With their faces only inches apart, Zuko wanted to close the gap and kiss Katara. He wanted to tell her that he thought she was incredible., that he was jealous of how quickly and gracefully she had mastered her bending, and that he admired how fierce she was (even if he had often been on the receiving end of said fierceness). She was beautiful, caring, and kind. She challenged him, and not just as a sparring opponent; she pushed him to a better version of himself, and helped him hold himself to a higher standard.

If Zuko was really being honest with himself, not only did he want to be married to Katara, he wanted her to feel the same. He didn't want her to feel stuck with him, but Zuko knew that that was asking far too much of her.

Katara's hand travelled from Zuko's scar down and across to his shoulder. The movement stretched the fabric of his shirt by his collar and, for the first time, Katara noticed a thin strand of metal hidden underneath his shirt. Zuko dropped his hand from her face as she tugged at the metal chain around his neck, bringing it up over Zuko's collar so that she could look at it.

From the chain hung two plastic rings, one of them charred; their wedding rings.

"You saved them?" Katara whispered, stunned.

"I didn't want to lose them. Suki helped me find this chain in the villa so that I could wear them while I was firebending," Zuko quietly explained.

Katara's hand remained outstretched to the chain and continued to stare at the rings in her hand.

Katara had to admit that a significant part of her was touched that he had saved their rings. Even if they were tacky, plastic, and partially charred, she was still touched by the gesture. She was even more touched by the fact that he hadn't told her that he had saved them, hadn't been brandishing them at her as a physical reminder of what she had been afraid to accept.

Katara knew that they would stay married unless the Fire Court refused her as their Fire Lady or agreed to divorce them; she had learned to accept that. As she looked at the rings, she considered reaching up to unclasp the chain from behind Zuko's neck and slide hers onto the ring finger of her left hand. She could wear it until the Fire Court made their decision, she reasoned with herself.

Rationally, she knew wearing the ring wouldn't make her anymore married than she was, just as not wearing the ring would not make her any less married to Zuko. But putting the ring on would still feel like accepting a potential fate as the Fire Lady if Zuko became the Fire Lord and the Fire Court didn't divorce them…

Katara still hadn't made up her mind as to what she would do if faced with becoming the Fire Lady. Would she run from it? She knew it would be shameful to not honour the vows they had made, but it was one thing to be married to Zuko, and an entirely different matter to find herself married to the Fire Nation - the nation she had hated for her whole life.

"Katara.," Zuko brought both of his hands up to rub gently at the top of her shoulders while he tried to get her to look him in the eye. "Whatever the Fire Court says, or whatever happens, I'll support whatever decision you make. You know I'll honour our marriage if that's what you decide to do. That's why I kept the rings. But if want your own life… I'll understand and I'll fight the Fire Court for our divorce. I'll help you leave the Fire Nation if need be."

Zuko gently pulled her into a hug, and Katara willingly wrapped her arms around his waist and rested her head against his shoulder, craving his support. Zuko bent his head down to whisper in her ear. "You don't need to decide now. Let's wait until we know what we're even deciding on." Katara nodded against his shoulder.

Katara was scared of the future. She was scared of having to decide about the marriage, but was even more scared by the thought that they wouldn't even have a future to decide on. Fear curling within her, she allowed herself a few moments of comfort in Zuko's protective embrace. She knew things were confusing enough, what with them having become friends who were married, and she knew the longer she stayed in Zuko's arms the blurrier the line of their friendship was becoming. Reluctantly, she pulled herself out of his embrace.

"Thanks Zuko." She reached up to neatly tuck the chain back under his shirt. "I'll leave these with you for safe keeping," she whispered as she took a step back. "I need some time to myself, if that's okay?" Zuko nodded in response as she walked out of the kitchen.

Alone in the kitchen, Zuko looked back at the sink where the remainder of the dirty dishes still sat waiting to be finished.

"Cool, guess I'll just do the rest of these by myself then," Zuko said to himself quietly, before chuckling slightly. Zuko admitted to himself that with the end of the world looming, this could be one of the last times he cleaned dishes; he decided to try to savour it.