"Hey, Jet? You okay?" Pipsqueak asked, arms crossed over his wide chest, looking down to the disheveled boy sat at the bottom of the airship floor.

"I'm fine," Jet answered, eyes glued to loose screw that was scraping against metal with every movement. He shifted his weight, scooting the now sleeping infant further into the crook of his arm.

Pipsqueak nodded knowingly, always seeming to be better with telling the emotions of others above much else. He sighed after a moment of silence, ran his fingers through his hair, and looked down the hall. "He'll be okay," he said softly, but confidently, giving a reassuring smile as he did.

Jet returned the smile absentmindedly, something he'd grown used to doing as a comforting gesture to his gang, and normally, it came easy to him. But this time, his chest gave him a sharp pain, and his stomach felt as if someone had sewn it tight together from the inside. "I know," he said, peeling his eyes away from the screw just long enough to glance at Tikka, who was blissfully unaware of the chaotic situation Jet felt he'd put her in. Did put her in.

"Smellerbee wanted me to tell you," Pipsqueak said, shifting his body to sit against the wall beside Jet. "That you forgot your cat-deer."

Jet pressed his eyes shut and breathed in heavily through his nose. "...Shit," he said as he exhaled, as if bad news was just exhausting him at this point. "How do I keep forgetting Rosebud?"

Pipsqueak chuckled a little, presumably trying to lighten the mood. "It'll be okay," he said. "I'm sure she's fine. Everything did happen pretty fast."

Jet stared at the wall across from him, eyes heavy and tired. "I don't know what to do, Pip," he said softly, mostly by accident. "I got too much on my plate, I think."

With a deep hum, Pipsqueak nodded, thinking. "...Well, do you still want to fight in the war?"

Jet's eyes furrowed and shot up to look at him. "Of course, I do," he said, not unkindly. "I can't stop now."

Pipsqueak smiled, a little wistfully, and looked at him back, eyebrows lifting into a hopeful, freed expression. "I don't," he said gently. "I'm tired, Jet. Me and The Duke are going back to Gaipan. Back to the forest. If this war kills me, the last thing I want to see are rolling hills and maple trees. I want to be home."

Jet's eyes softened, images of the treehouses he once called home flooding his mind, how the last time he'd seen them, they'd fallen to pieces. Perhaps, though, with a little elbow grease, they'd be home again in no time. And he wasn't sure if the thought made him happy, or very, very sad.

Pipsqueak laid his hand over Jet's, his hand swallowing Jet's whole, and gave it a gentle squeeze. "You can come, if you want. It'll be safe. A place to hide, at least. And we can watch the world end from the best view in the valley."

Jet smiled a little. He knew Pipsqueak had his moments with words sometimes, and he was glad one of those moments was now. "That's pretty pessimistic - coming from you," he noted jokingly.

"And just like you to avoid a question," Pipsqueak noted back. "The kids have been through enough, Jet. So, if you don't want to go -" he said directly, then looked down to Tikka, then back up to Jet's eyes, his face suddenly serious. "You know I'll take good care."

Jet's mouth gaped a little, soaking in the gravity of what he was implying, and finding himself unable to answer anything at all. Tikka was the one thing keeping him going, the one thing he found most precious on this earth, the one thing he didn't think he could bear to be away from, and the one person who counted on him the most.

But as he sat there and gaped, he realized… that, that wasn't true anymore. Not that he didn't care for her, no nothing like that. But he realized that someone else fit those qualifiers as well. Someone else who needed him , as much as he needed them, with no one else to do the job.

Zuko needed him, and he failed him when the time came. Not to mention he'd completely left Rosebud behind. He'd spread himself too thin, just like Smellerbee said he would. And while Tikka had come out unharmed, the memory of her wails of fright as the ceiling almost crushed them and the memory of Zuko running towards a fleet of airships sent his stomach into a tailspin, and suddenly, he felt very faint.

Never before had he fully felt the weight of his responsibilities and the ties he'd made with others, and the ever so damning realization that he couldn't do it all was near crushing. Never before did he think he'd have to choose between the only two things that meant anything to him. Never before had he felt his heart split in two.

And what painful split it was.

"I'll give you time to think about it," Pipsqueak said softly, patting his shoulder.

Jet nodded, his thoughts faraway and eyes once more glued to the loose screw, and curled a lock of Tikka's hair around his finger.

That night, as he lay in the middle of the bed in one of the few bedrooms of the ship, staring up at a tapestry of a giant red flame, his eyes fluttered shut. He reached one arm out to the side of him, creeping his fingers to the edge of the bed, feeling nothing but the coolness of the thread. His other arm followed suit, until he lay splayed out and comfortable, relatively at least. He sighed, the immensity of the bed bringing him little solace, and longed for the cubby hole with the scratchy red throw blanket that was he and Zuko's bed at the air temple. At least there, only the stone, not the sheets, felt so cold.

Stupid idiot. You should have at least told him where we were going!

Zuko berated himself, over and over, as he looked silently over the side of Appa's saddle. Rosebud had curled beside him, and he absentmindedly ran his fingers through her fur, much to her delight, and a little to his comfort. The sea below went by in a big blue blur, and much like the scenery, his emotions had little change over the next few hours.

Ember Island, that's all you had to say! Just two words, and we could have met up there. Now, neither of us have any idea where the other could even be!

He knew he was being hard on himself, he knew he was. But it was hard not to be. Jet didn't even have Rosebud to get around now. They were sitting ducks in that airship! And spirits know, Jet was just about as good at getting through the Fire Nation wilderness as Zuko was at not running towards imminent danger without a second thought. Stupid, stupid, stupid .

The rest of the gang had been rather quiet, which was a tremendous relief. He feared conversation may be out of the realm of possibility for him at the moment. Though, eventually, someone did speak up. Katara, he thought, but he didn't quite catch what she said. Something about needing supplies.

"We could always eat venison," Sokka said humorously as he looked over to Rosebud, obviously trying to lighten the mood, but miserably failing.

"That's not funny," Zuko snapped, immediately and undeservedly harsh. He cut his eyes up, pinning Sokka where he leaned against the saddle, until Sokka, with a nervous pull of the collar of his shirt, looked away from the murderous look.

"You're right. Uh, sorry."

Zuko made a derisive sound, not really meaning to, before inhaling deeply to calm himself before this escalated into something he didn't want. His fingers had forgotten their occupation of stroking Rosebud's cheek, and she quickly reminded them by brushing her head against his hand. Zuko closed his eyes and welcomed the blackness behind his eyelids and began to scratch under her chin once more. She let out a soothing rumble, something like a purr, and he couldn't help but to compare the pushiness of the animal with the likeness of her owner. His mind went to Jet gesturing with his eyes that Zuko allow him to curl under his arm, or how he forced his lips onto Zuko's at nearly every waking moment, ...or shoving him into a bath because he didn't want him to leave, and it made the edges of his lips twitch towards a reluctant smile.

At least, if he couldn't have Jet next to him, he could have a part of him, for now.

He allowed his mind to stop berating, and start thinking, as they made camp on an unnamed spot of land a little South of Ember Island. He could find Jet. He just had to think things through, for once.

As it turned out, finding Smellerbee's group of fighters was much harder than anticipated. Not only were the trees so dense that looking down from the airship was near useless, but it didn't help that the fighters were immensely camouflaged and actively avoiding anything vaguely resembling Fire Nation troops. And as Jet peered over the railing at the rather obnoxious fire logo on the side of the airship, he knew that this strategy was never going to work.

"You didn't set up a rendezvous point?" he asked as he slipped back inside the ship, watching as Smellerbee and Longshot shoved whatever supplies they could into their bags.

"There wouldn't have been a point," she answered, cutting her eyes up at him before pulling the strings of her bag together with a swift yank. "Anyone who got left behind got left behind. That was the agreement. The deal was to keep moving forward."

Jet pondered as Tikka pulled at the collar of his shirt and patted his cheek. Smellerbee stopped what she was doing for a moment to raise a brow at him, obviously amused at the sight. He supposed it was rather hard to be taken seriously as a military strategist with an infant pawing at his face.

"...Well, who took over after you left? You had to have a backup, right?" he asked.

"Tiguaak," she answered. "I believe you two have met before. He's… he's actually the one that told me you weren't dead, and that you were looking for the avatar."

Jet's brow raised. "Yeah? Small world…" he said, suddenly feeling awkward, for some reason.

Smellerbee sighed. "What's wrong?" she asked, setting her supply bag down to cross her arms over her chest.

Jet peeled his eyes from the floor, ran his fingers through his hair, and tried to look her in the eyes. "It's just… you were right, about running myself thin."

Her eyebrow perked, and Longshot looked up from his shuffling to give him a sympathetic look. "Well, have you thought about what I said? About dropping you guys off in town?"

"Actually," Jet said, then sighed, looking off at nothing again. "Pipsqueak offered to take Tikka back to Gaipan so I can stay and fight, but I… I don't know."

"You mean," Smellerbee said, taking a step towards him to better see his face. "...without you?"

"Yeah," he answered, thumb rubbing calming circles on Tikka's back, more for himself than for her. But it was almost no use. His breath caught in his throat drastically, and suddenly, and he found himself unable to breathe. When he spoke again, it came out all wrong, cracked around all the wrong edges, and he felt pitiful. But he didn't stop. "I… I don't know what to do, Bee. I spent my whole life fighting! My whole life I've been trying to stop this war, and now I want to stop it even more because of her and… Now I have to pick between that, and her, and I… I fucking can't. "

Smellerbee's face softened, and before Jet knew it, Longshot was up and beside him, placing his hand on his shoulder. He looked into the archer's eyes, soft but aged beyond his years.

"I know," Jet said, feeling like there was a fist clogging his throat. "I have to do what's right for her."

Longshot's brow raised, and he nodded, then looked down and up again.

"But… I also have to do what's right for me… right?" Jet asked, and the archer nodded once more.

Jet sighed. "What if I don't know what that is?"

Longshot looked away for a moment, and Jet studied his thinking face, and after a moment, Longshot looked back up again to meet Jet's eyes, and much to Jet's dismay, he shrugged, for once unsure how to answer.

"You're right, Longshot," Jet murmured, exhausted and heavy with emotion. "I have to figure that one out on my own."

That night, as the sun dipped below the sea, Zuko looked out over the ocean and contemplated his options. The more he thought each option through, the less viable it became. He couldn't take Appa. That would surely land him on Aang's less favorable side. He couldn't ask someone to go with him on Appa. They were all much too busy training. Besides, the only one seeming to care enough to actually look for Jet would be Katara, and after her outburst at him at the campfire, that was definitely not happening.

So, what was he to do? Sit and wait? It seemed unbearable.

The more he sat, the more irritated he became. He picked up a rock from the beach and launched it into the ocean, the splash doing little to stifle his emotions. He picked another and repeated the motion until his arm had grown tired of it. Then, he sat on the beach and placed his face in his hands, the moonlight dancing on the water and the waves lapping the shore being his only company.

He knew this feeling wasn't anger. There was no one to be angry at. It seemed hard to even feel angry at himself, for once. No, this was something else, and he knew it. But still, an unfamiliar feeling it was. When he left Mai behind, he'd felt guilty. He'd felt he'd let her down. All the things he felt a million times before.

This was different from that. This was like a pit of loneliness, a helpless need to be near someone, yet unable to do so, and unable to be quelled by anyone else. Like a part of him had been stripped away and replaced with nothing but air.

He even missed the kid. Strange how someone just being around can make a person grow attached. And though surrounded by others, well, nearby at least, he'd never felt farther away from anyone.

He looked through his fingers at the grains of sand below, wondered if Jet was feeling the same way, like a grain of sand at the whim of a vast ocean, helpless to forces beyond their control. With a sigh, he raised his head to gaze at the moon, full and round and beautiful in the sky, and contemplated what it'd be like to be the one watching over it all. It seemed like a better existence in some ways, to be detached from the happenings of the world, merely a bystander to it all.

But it also seemed lonely. Very, very lonely.

And he was sick of feeling lonely.

He had to do something, thought through or not.

With a determined grit of his teeth, he stood and left the beach behind him, choosing instead to head to the cliff where an angry waterbender stood, observing the ocean from her own little pit of despair.

She turned to scoff at him over her shoulder, and at that point, he was much too exhausted to deal with this any longer.

"What is it with you?"

Jet lay awake again that night, staring at the tapestry on the ceiling, contemplating the meaning of life, and why, oh why, it had to be so damn complicated.

What was right for him?

Everything seemed so simple before, when he was still angry at the world. Perhaps that was why he clung to it for so long. He knew what he wanted, and how to get it. Things made sense. But now…

What did he want?

What kind of man did he want to be?

He wanted to fight, to make a better world. Seemed simple enough. But how? His wants and his needs were spread so thin, it seemed impossible to appease them all. In order to fight, he'd have to leave Tikka behind, which he didn't want. But in order to have a better world for her, he had to.

He wanted to be held. To not sleep alone in a giant bed fit for kings, alone. He wanted modesty, and the forest, and the valley. A home for him and Tikka. His family. His friends and his gang.

...and Zuko.

All his life, he knew his place in the world. He was a fighter. He never had to concern himself with frivolous feelings like attachment or inner conflict. There were always two separate options: lover or fighter.

No one ever told him it was possible to be both. He was never taught how to balance the two.

Was this what it was to be a man? To have to be both?

What would his father do?

His chest grew tight at the question as it appeared in his mind, seemingly out of nowhere. It was a question that hadn't occurred to him in a good, long while.

He knew a lot of the things he'd done in his past would be things his father wouldn't have done, at least as far as he knew. But unknowing what his father would have done, with no one there to tell him otherwise, he did them anyway. And he hated that he'd never know. Hated that his father would never be here to tell him.

Nor his mother.

But perhaps…

He shot up from the bed, the movement jiggling the mattress on which Tikka slept peacefully at the other end of. His hand snatched his bag from the floor and shot inside, and out he pulled a little pocket sized diary. Tikka's mother's diary.

He flipped through page after page, hoping to find an answer waiting for him. One that wasn't shrouded in metaphor, anyway. But besides a few entries about her day, a lot about how darling little Tikka was, and how much she missed her husband, there wasn't much to offer in terms of life advice. He supposed that parents didn't always have all the answers either, unfortunately.

But one page caught his eye, a lover's poem towards the end.

I've got two swords that are cast in bronze

They pierce all the way to the soul

They draw you in with the promise of sin

Like the moth to the flame to the coal

I've got hair like the starless night

It sticks to my lips when I smile

I'll wind it with yours and we'll drift off course

In a ship touching hearts all the while

For the way I walk is lantern lit

That leads you into the night

I'll hold you close and love you the most

Until our end is in sight

Perhaps, Mrs. Martha could give him some direction after all. He read it over a few times more, then shut the diary shut and laid it on his chest. Though touching, and only a slight reminder of Zuko, he wasn't one for metaphor.

Direct answers, that's what he needed. He needed to talk to someone who'd been through this before, or at least, something similar.

Sokka be damned, but his father was the only one.