My Immortal- Grieving Katara
A songfic set three years ahead of the show. I am testing out my writing, so reveiws are loved, constructive critiscism doubly so.
I'm so tired of being here
Suppressed by all my childish fears
She'd traveled around the world at least twice with Aang, preparing him and herself for the day he would face the fire lord. Why couldn't she bring herself to leave Sokka and help him? Her brother was deathly ill, and Katara had chosen to stay behind with him. Aang and the rebel army would travel to where they knew the fire nation would be, including the Fire Lord Ozai. A voice at the back of her head kept hissing coward until she'd gone practically mad.
And if you have to leave
I wish that you would just leave
'Cause your presence still lingers here
And it won't leave me alone
"Katara…" She could still hear the sadness in his voice hours after he'd left. She could see him everywhere: looking at a map, playing with some boys, helping carry pails of water. Her feet carried her to the pier Aang had stood at the night before in much too deep of thought for his age.
These wounds won't seem to heal
This pain is just too real
There's just too much that time cannot erase
She was needed here. There were far too many wounded to be cared for by the few woman they had. Sokka needed her here. Why did she feel like she was slime? The logic was all there, so why was she sobbing like she'd killed a man? Was it that she couldn't, or wouldn't stop her tears from tracing rivers down her cheeks?
When you cried I'd wipe away all of your tears
When you'd scream I'd fight away all of your fears
And I held your hand through all of these years
Her mind was flooded with memories of hugging a shaking figure close to stop his sobs, and all the nights she'd held his hand and whispered his nightmares away until Aang was claimed by a dreamless sleep. She helped him, no…watched him grow the past three years.
But you still have
All of me
But now that he'd gone on without her, that she'd let him leave when he needed her most, she wasn't Katara anymore. She was the shell of her former self, working long days and sleepless nights with no life in her eyes, emotions bottled deep inside her chest.
You used to captivate me
By your resonating light
Now I'm bound by the life you left behind
They had been so care-free, all the days spent on Appa's back racing among the clouds. Aang was so blissfully unaware, so peacefully ignorant that it absolutely broke Katara's heart. She'd done everything she could to preserve that part of Aang. But when the army had assembled, everyone looked to her for guidance. 'She knew the Avatar, she knows what to do.' And in the months after that still hadn't changed, everyone expecting, practically pleading her to have answers she would never know.
Your face it haunts
My once pleasant dreams
Your voice it chased away
All the sanity in me
What little time she had too sleep was consumed by dreams of him that left her gasping for breath and shaken to her core. These weren't the dreams of him she'd had in the past, not the ones where Aang brought peace to the world and her mother held them both in a warm embrace. Her decision to stay behind was slowly eating her alive.
These wounds won't seem to heal
This pain is just too real
There's just too much that time cannot erase
Kataratook every spare second to look for someone with news of the battle. When the news came back grim she would work herself to exhaustion, trying to let the dull ache in her muscles drown out her own bleak thoughts. But it never worked; however much time she spent trying to ignore those thoughts only brought them back stronger.
I've tried so hard to tell myself that you're gone
But though you're still with me
I've been alone all along
"He's the avatar! This day had to come!" She yelled to the still waters of the lake, trying to come to grips with herself; she would tackle reality later. Aang was in her every thought, dream, and breath; but she felt the ever-present distance between them, the one that had always been there. She'd asked people about it; about how there was a gap in-between her and her closest friend. The best answer had come from her grandmother, and just thinking about it racked her body with fresh sobs. "A deep part of you knew this would happen, Katara, it kept that distance to save what little shreds of sanity it could. It was an unwilling act of self-preservation."
But you still have
All of me
But no matter the gap, no matter his age, no matter how far apart they could ever be, which wasn't tied to the confines of this world, Katara knew she would heal, and she would continue her life. But the Katara she had been only a short time before would only ever return with Aang.