A/N: I do not own Avatar: The Last Airbender.
Avatar: Katara the Last Waterbender of the South 1 – Water
Earth. Fire. Air. Water.
Long ago, my grandmother used to tell me stories about the old days—a time of peace when the Avatar kept balance between the Water Tribes, Earth Kingdom, Fire Nation, and Air Nomads. But that all changed when the Fire Nation attacked.
Only the Avatar mastered all four elements. Only he could stop the ruthless firebenders. But when the world needed him most, he vanished. A hundred years have passed, and the Fire Nation is nearing victory in the war. Due to next element in the cycle is Air, the Fire Nation have wiped out all of the Air Nomads, knowing that the next Avatar would be an airbender. Now, they have targeted our water tribes both in the north and the south. While the Northern Water Tribe holds out, there aren't many waterbenders left among our tribe in the South Pole.
Two years ago, my father and the men of my tribe journeyed to the Earth Kingdom to help fight against the Fire Nation, leaving me and my brother to look after our tribe. Some people believe that the Avatar was never reborn into the Air Nomads, and that the cycle is broken. But I haven't lost hope. I still believe that somehow... the Avatar will return and save the world.
Chapter 1: The Ghost in the Iceberg
Wolf Cove, Southern Water Tribe. 112 AG.
"Katara! Come on!" Sokka, a teenage boy with his hair tied into a ponytail and shaved on sides, yelled. Katara groaned in annoyance as her older brother had just disturbed her concentration. The water that was floating in the air, immediately collapsed onto the icy surface of the Wolf Cove, the camp of the Southern Water Tribe.
Knowing that it was time, Katara put on her gloves. She was a beautiful teenage girl of age 14, with her brown hair styled with hair loopies and blue eyes. Due to the sub-zero temperatures of her home, Katara was wearing a blue-colored fur coat and boots. Running towards Sokka, Katara motioned for Pabu, a husky-fox pup, who became Katara's most trusted companion, to follow her.
"Come on, we need that fish." Sokka complained to her as he already sat on a canoe, proudly holding a harpoon in his hand. The day their father, Chief Hakoda, left, Sokka was tasked with the responsibility of protecting the tribe. Sokka was proud of this, as he had been grooming for becoming a warrior as long as Katara could remember.
"Alright, I'm coming." Katara grumbled as she and Pabu jumped into the canoe. The two siblings began rowing away from their tribe into the cold waters.
Katara didn't know how long she was sitting in the canoe. She watched as Sokka was multiple times trying to catch the same fish with his harpoon.
"It won't get away from me this time," Sokka spoke with pride. "Watch and learn, Katara. This is how you catch a fish."
Katara sighed as she looked away. Looking at the water, she suddenly saw another fish swimming near the boat. Thinking about it, Katara took off one of her gloves and deeply inhaled. Every person within the Southern Water Tribe knew that Katara was a waterbender, the only one left in the tribe. When Katara was younger, there were more than one waterbender in the Southern Water Tribe. But their numbers dwindled when the Fire Nation began their campaign against the Water Tribes, targeting the waterbenders particularly. Many of them were either taken prisoner or killed on sight. The last waterbender that was killed was Kya, Katara's mother.
Katara remembered that day as if it happened just yesterday. A day of fear and pain.
Wolf Cove, 94 AG.
It was initially a peaceful day when 9-year-old Katara and Sokka were playing, throwing snowballs at each other. Their father was busy running the tribe, while their mother, Kya, was in their family igloo. Everything seemed to be peaceful and quiet.
Sokka was about to throw a large snowball at his sister, when suddenly, both he and Katara saw that instead of snow, ash began to rain down on their village. Katara looked around and saw the smoke in the distance, followed by large black ships. They had sea ravens on their flags.
"I'm going to find mom!" Katara told her brother before running off, as the women and children ran hiding into their igloos, while the men gathered their weapons to fight off the invaders.
Katara quickly ducked when a fireball almost hit her. She looked around in horror as the Water Tribe warriors immediately engaged the Fire Nation soldiers, some of them being firebenders, which gave the invaders superiority in the battle. Katara reminded herself that she had to find her mother, and continued to run. Frightened, the 9-year-old girl feared for the worst as she finally reached her igloo.
As if her fears were confirmed, Katara gasped as she saw her mother Kya sitting in the middle of their igloo, with a Fire Nation commander standing tall over her, in his black and crimson armour. The black helmet covered most of his face, but the little girl managed to see his brown eyes and thin moustache.
The invader turned and saw Katara, who shivered in fear. Kya immediately understood what the commander's intentions were.
"Just let her go," Kya told him. "And I'll give you the information you want."
"You heard your mother, get out of here!" the Fire Nation commander yelled.
"Mommy, I'm scared." Katara whimpered, as she shivered in fear. Kya weakly smiled at her little girl.
"Go find you dad, sweetie. I'll handle this." Kya gently assured her daughter. Hesitant, Katara looked at her mother, than at the naval officer, as he looked back at the girl malevolently. Katara finally ran, fast as she could.
'Find dad. Find dad,' she mentally told herself, until she returned to the battlefield. Katara immediately saw her father, taking down two of the regular Fire Nation soldiers.
"Dad! Dad! Please help, I think mom's in trouble!" she yelled for her father. "There's a man in our house."
"Kya!" Hakoda yelled as he ran back to the igloo, with Katara desperately following him. When they arrived to the igloo, it was too late. Katara felt her whole world shattered when she saw her mother lying on the floor of their igloo, unconscious. Hakoda grabbed Kya as he tried to wake her up.
"No, no, no, no. Kya, no." Hakoda cried, tears flowing down his face. "Kya, please. Don't leave me, don't leave us."
"Mommy…" Katara whimpered, as she was crying too. Hakoda checked her pulse, Kya wasn't breathing. Crying softly, Hakoda closed her eyes before embracing his daughter as she broke down.
After they rejoined the rest of their tribe, they saw that the Fire Nation fleet quickly left. Though on that day, the people of the Southern Water Tribe did not celebrate. They mourned. Katara watched as her people gathered up the bodies of not only their warriors, but also of women and children. Sokka cried as they buried their mother. Katara just stood silent, eyes red from crying. To her it was like everything slowed down. She was barely aware of her surroundings. Katara couldn't believe it.
Surprisingly, the Fire Nation didn't return to the village, ever. While some were relieved that the tribe were finally out of the Hundred Years' War, Katara finally understood why they left once they killed her mother. Kya was also a waterbender. For some reason, the Fire Nation were hunting them down.
'They came for me,' Katara thought. 'But she told them that she was the waterbender. She did this to save me'.
Soon, Hakoda and the men of their tribe left in their vessels to assist the Earth Kingdom in the war, leaving Katara and Sokka with their grandmother Kanna.
Katara gently touched the blue necklace she wore. It was her mother's, the only memory of Kya. The necklace consisted of a blue choker with a light blue, hand-crafted jewel bearing the waterbending symbol.
Taking a deep breath, Katara used all of her strength as she motioned with her hand. Though with some struggle, she managed to create a water bubble, with the fish inside it. Katara smiled with excitement.
"Sokka, look!" the 14-year-old girl exclaimed as she held the bubble in the air.
"Shhh, Katara." Sokka whispered. "You're gonna scare the fish away. I can already smell it cooking."
"But Sokka, I caught one."
Sokka continued to ignore his sister, raising his harpoon and accidentally hitting the bubble, bursting it.
"Hey!" Katara yelled as her fish fell back into the ocean, while Sokka cried out in frustration as his fish swam away, while the water from the bubble rained down on him.
"Why is it that every time you play with magic water, I get soaked?" the boy asked frustratingly.
"It's not magic, it's waterbending." Katara argued. "And it's…"
"Yeah, yeah. An ancient art unique to our culture, blah, blah, blah." Sokka interrupted her. "Look, I'm just saying that if I had weird powers, I'd keep my weirdness to myself."
"You're calling me weird?" Katara asked. "I'm not the one who makes muscles at myself every time I see my reflection in the water."
As if on cue, Sokka was looking at his reflection, trying to show off his muscles. Sokka immediately covered his arm before turning to the sneering Katara. Suddenly, the two siblings yelped as the sea currents began to pick up speed. To make matters worse, their canoe was heading towards chunks of floating ice. Grabbing his oar, Sokka tried to steer the canoe, grunting as the currents were too strong.
"Go left! Go left!" Katara desperately yelled as three ice floes were surrounding them, closing the distance between the canoe and them. The ice floes crushed the canoe, with their force causing both of the teens to fall onto one of them.
"You call that left?" Katara asked disapprovingly.
"You don't like my steering. Well, maybe you should have waterbended us out of the ice." Sokka answered back in a mocking tone.
"So it's my fault?"
"I knew I should have left you home." Sokka grumbled as the floe approached an iceberg. "Leave it to a girl to screw things up."
Katara's blue eyes twitched in anger as this was the last straw for her. As long as she can remember, Sokka mocked her waterbending, and herself on daily schedule. If he mocked her waterbending because he had skeptical views on bending, believing it to be the source of problems, then the reason for mocking her was because she was a female, feeling himself more in charge due to being the only man and warrior left in their village.
"You are the most sexist, immature, nutbrained… I'm embarrassed to be related to you!" Katara finally released her anger, unintentionally bending the water behind her back. She finally released a large wave, strong enough to crack the iceberg near them. Sokka tensed as he saw that, Katara meanwhile, didn't see that.
"Ever since mom died, I've been doing all the work around the camp, while you've been off playing soldier!" the 14-year-old girl continued to rage as the iceberg continued to crack.
"Ah… Katara…" Sokka tried to warn his sister.
"I even wash all the clothes!" she ignored him, yelling.
"Katara! Settle down!" Sokka cried.
"No! That's it, I'm done helping you! From now on, you're on your own!" Katara released another huge wave at the iceberg. Finally hearing the ice cracking behind her back, the girl turned and gasped at the sight. She didn't have time to react as the iceberg fell apart, causing massive waves from the ice falling into the water. The two siblings tried to hold balance as the waves rocked the ice floe on which they stood. The water finally calmed down in ten minutes.
"Okay. You've gone from weird to freakish, Katara." Sokka scolded his younger sister.
"You mean, I did that?" the girl asked shockingly.
"Yep. Congratulations." Sokka answered with sarcasm. Just then, something began glowing from the depths of the ocean. The two siblings gasped as another iceberg emerged from the water, glowing. Looking at it, Katara shivered in shock and fear as she saw a skeleton of what seemed to be a boy frozen inside it. Suddenly, the skeleton's eyeholes began glowing and glowing arrows appeared on its skull and hands. The skeleton then materialized into a bald, transparent boy.
"He's alive!" Katara presumed and quickly grabbed Sokka's club. "We have to get him out of there!"
"Katara, wait!" Sokka yelled as she ran towards the iceberg. "We don't know what that thing is!"
Katara ignored him as she began hitting the iceberg with her brother's club, just as Sokka sprinted to her with the harpoon in his hand. After a few hits with the club, the ice cracked and air blasted out of the iceberg, knocking both the boy and the girl. The ice then fully cracked, releasing a beam of light straight up into the sky. Once he got up, Sokka immediately took his fighting stance, holding his harpoon when the boy appeared from the iceberg.
"Stop! Or I'll fight!" Sokka threatened, but the transparent boy ignored him as he approached Katara. Sokka yelled a war cry as he launched himself at the transparent boy, only to pass through him, falling onto a pile of snow. Katara gasped as she understood what the boy was. It was a ghost, and it was approaching her. The girl desperately tried to waterbend in defense, but to no avail. The ghost touched her hand, causing Katara to scream in fear.
"Katara!" Sokka cried with fear for his sibling as he stood up, only to freeze when he saw something more unnatural. Katara suddenly rose in the air, glowing in a blue light, while the spirit or ghost, slowly began disappearing. Sokka gulped as Katara looked terrifying. To make the whole situation even more terrifying, Sokka felt as if the whole world was going to shatter; the earth was trembling as if an earthquake was beginning, the air was starting to get hot, the wind was whistling with furry and the ocean becoming stormy.
Just then, it seemed to soften on Katara's face, and her body stopped glowing. Sokka quickly popped up to catch his younger sister in time. Shocked by the recent events, the 15-year-old boy carried the unconscious Katara to their ice floe, leaving his harpoon, and began to use both his arms and club to row the floe back to their camp.
Little did he know that he and Katara weren't the only ones who witnessed the beam. A teenage boy stood onboard of a Fire Nation battleship, with his yellow eyes gazing at the beam of light in the distance. The boy, wearing the robes of his people and having a large burnt scar on the left side of his face, watched in amazement.
"Finally." The boy finally spoke. "Uncle, do you realize what this means?"
The boy was addressing an old man with grey hair, sitting cross-legged at a small table with playing cards and a tea pot. He also wore the reddish robes and armour of the Fire Nation.
"I won't get to finish my game?" the old man asked in response as he sat, deep in thought as the steam came out from his hot tea.
"It means my search is about to come to an end." The boy answered. The elder man sighed, rolling his eyes. "That light came from an incredibly powerful source. It has to be him."
"Or it's just the celestial lights." The elder suggested. "We've been down this route before, Prince Zuko. I don't want you to get excited over nothing."
"Please sit," the prince's uncle continued. "Why don't you enjoy a cup of hot, calming jasmine tea?"
"I don't need any calming tea!" Zuko yelled at his uncle. "I need to capture the Avatar!"
"Helmsman, head a course for that light!" he then ordered. After hours of sailing, they arrived to the site of the iceberg and found nothing but a boy's skeleton. With so much energy, Zuko ran down the gangplank of his vessel towards the iceberg and began desperately searching. His elder uncle meanwhile descended down the plank with patience and a calm expression on his face.
"Where is he?" Zuko desperately asked. "Where is he?"
"Even if you're right," the elder told him as he stood there. "and the Avatar is alive, you won't find him. Your father, grandfather, and even your great-grandfather all tried and failed."
"Because their honour didn't twinge on the Avatar's fate." Zuko answered, as he finally stopped searching around and approached his uncle. "Mine is. This coward's hundred years in hiding are over."
Just then, one of the Fire Navy sailors called for the prince and the two approached him. Zuko was shocked, then angry as he saw why the sailor called him. He was holding a harpoon. Zuko immediately guessed that someone found the Avatar before them. His uncle, an elder named Iroh, took the harpoon and began expecting it. What Iroh said next caught the teenager's attention.
"It's a harpoon," Iroh spoke thoughtfully. "Brilliantly crafted. Obviously from the Water Tribe."
"Water Tribe?"
"Well yes, we are near the South Pole." Iroh explained to his nephew. "The only tribe that inhabits this place is the Southern Water Tribe."
"Everyone all aboard!" Zuko yelled, before addressing to a naval commander. "Boatswain, find the map leading to the Southern Water Tribe and set course for it!"
As they returned to their battleship, Iroh looked at his teenage nephew with deep concern.
The first thing Katara did when she slowly woke up, was that she groaned as her head was pounding. She desperately tried to remember what happened. The 14-year-old girl remembered the iceberg, the skeleton, the spirit and that was it. Her eyes opened up and Katara saw that she was inside her home igloo, lying on her bed. As she remained in this position for two minutes, Sokka and Gran-Gran entered the igloo. Katara wanted to stand up, but felt woozy and had no other choice but to lie back.
"Easy there, Katara." Gran-Gran gently told the teenage girl as she and Sokka approached her. Gran-Gran touched her forehead, inspecting her temperature.
"What happened?" Katara asked with confusion. "I can't remember anything."
"You can't remember?" Sokka asked in exasperation. Katara shrugged her head slowly, still experiencing a slight headache. She wanted to tell what she last recalled, but stopped and looked at her grandmother.
"Don't worry," Kanna calmed her granddaughter. "Sokka told me everything."
"Still, what happened?" Katara asked. Gran-Gran sighed heavily as she finished inspecting the girl's condition. She sat cross-legged beside Katara's bed.
"Yeah, who the heck was that bald weirdo, and what was with you floating in air?" Sokka exclaimed. Katara ignored her brother as she looked at her grandmother, desperate for an answer, while Kanna held an expression full of sadness and wariness. The three remained in silence for a minute.
"Avatar." Kanna finally answered. "Katara is the Avatar."
Sokka immediately began rejecting this, stating that he couldn't believe it. Katara, meanwhile, sat in silence, her face full of shock, disbelief and fear.