So there are a few reasons why this chapter came out late, but I won't list them all out lest I sound like a whiner. One thing I will say though, is that I lost motivation to continue writing for a bit. Writing for the sake of plot progression can get pretty boring, but I guess it's unavoidable since I chose to make this a multi-chaptered story. But if there's one thing that gives new writers like me motivation, it's reviews. So I would greatly appreciate it if you take the time to write one. Anyway, Chapter 2 is finally here, hope you enjoy!

"I haven't done this since I was a kid!" Katara shouted in between laughs.

"Me neither!" Aang exclaimed as his penguin overtook Katara's. Katara laughed harder. Aang looked ridiculous on that small penguin. As much as he was acting like a kid, his body was not that of a child. Aang's posture on the penguin was made awkward due to the length of his own legs, but that didn't seem to bother Aang or the penguin in the least, even though anyone else his size would have crushed the penguin if they sat on it.

They zipped through the snow, spiralled through ice tunnels and sailed over small cliffs, with Katara laughing more than she could remember she ever did. For Aang, it felt like an eternity had passed since he had done something like this. It felt so long since he felt as free as a bird. His eyes started to water for reasons other than the wind slapping his face.

When they finally reached the end, they were overshadowed by a giant, metal shipwreck, almost foreboding in its presence.

"Whoa," Aang gasped. "What is that?"

A haunted expression made its way across Katara's face. "It's a Fire Nation shipwreck…and a bad memory for our people."
Still feeling the rush of adrenaline from penguin sledding, and allowing his childish curiosity to reemerge, Aang started to walk towards the ship. "What's a fire nation ship doing down here?"

"It's one of the ships from their navy that attacked our tribe," Katara said darkly.

"Attacked?" Aang spun around. "Why would the fire nation want to attack you?"

"Because they're at war with us," Katara said slowly, unsure of what to make of his apparent surprise.

"At war with you? What? Why? Since when?" Aang asked, bewildered. He thought for a second that she may have been toying with him, but the expression on her face indicated anything but.

"You mean you don't know that the Fire Nation has been at war with the entire world for a hundred years?" Katara asked carefully.

At this, Aang snorted. "Yeah I would have known about that if it was true." He turned around and continued to walk towards the shipwreck.

"But Aang, it is true," Katara's voice came out low. Aang stopped at the concern he heard in her voice, and slowly turned around. Her expression was now even more concerned, which made him a little worried. Yet still, the idea seemed ridiculous to him. How could he not know of a war that had been going on for one hundred years? True, he hadn't left the Southern Air Temple in four years, but he had before that, and there had been no signs of a war. He had even been to the Fire Nation itself. Yet here he was, standing in front of a Fire Nation shipwreck. Surely Katara was just playing one massive joke on him…right?

Still feeling a little sceptical, Aang resumed walking towards the ship. "I'm going in."

"Wait! None of us have ever been inside there. The place is probably filled with booby traps, it's too dangerous." Katara ran up to Aang and stopped him by placing her mitted hand on his shoulder.

As Aang looked into her eyes, there was no longer just concern there, but fear. Aang gulped. Could she really be telling the truth? Was the fire nation really at war with the rest of the world?

"You're serious, aren't you?"

Katara could no longer deny the genuine confusion in Aang's expression. How could he not know about a war that has been devastating the entire world for a century? Unless…

Slowly, realisation dawned on Katara. "Aang, how long were you in that iceberg for?"

Aang blinked, taken aback by the sudden change in subject. "I don't know. Maybe a day, two at the very most."

"I think it was more like a hundred years," Katara breathed.

Aang raised his eyebrows. "Do I really look like I'm 116 years old to you?"

"Well, think about it. This war has been going on for a hundred years, and you don't know about it. The only possible explanation is that you were trapped inside the iceberg that whole time."

Aang considered her words. It seemed too ridiculous, too far-fetched…yet somehow completely plausible. He glanced back at the shipwreck towering over him. If this was really a ship from the Fire Nation navy…

"I have to see for myself if what you're saying is true." He was still not ready to accept what Katara was claiming. Though the rational part of him was telling him that she was right (which was strange, since what she was saying seemed so absurd), he was not yet ready to accept it and all of the implications that came with it.

"But it's too dangerous," Katara protested weakly. When he showed no sign of stopping, she nervously looked around her and hesitantly followed him in.

"If you want to be a bender, you have to let go of fear," Aang said as they stepped into the dimly lit cabin. The cabin was mostly empty, save for a few empty racks were scattered across the walls. Aang desperately hoped that they were not weapon racks. Light filtered through cracks and holes in the metal walls, and rust covered most of the walls and some of the floor. Behind him, Katara was walking slowly and timidly, her eyes nervously flitting to all corners of the cabin. They walked in silence, until they reached a separate room at the end of the corridor, whose heavy metal door was jammed open. As Aang ducked his head through the door to enter the room, he realised he had entered the engine room. A system of pipes and meters ran across the room, and the faint smell of coal lingered. Aang released a breath he didn't realise he was holding.

"Well, it looks like a pretty normal ship to me. Nothing here to indicate that this is a warship, or that it's dangerous," he said as he walked around the room with his arms raised, as if to showcase his evidence. "It's probably just some old shipwreck that your people built a myth around long ago, and now you never go in because you think it's actually filled with booby traps. It looks completely ordin-".

Suddenly, the pipes beside him started hissing and steaming, and the sound of grinding metal could be heard from the depths of the ship. Aang looked down at the almost invisible wire that he had accidentally tripped, and briefly marvelled at the instantaneity of his karma, before being snapped back to attention when the entrance to the engine room was barricaded shut with a metal cage. Katara's face twisted with panic and before long, their instincts took over their bodies, eventually leading them towards the wheelhouse with no apparent way out.

"Okay, so there are booby traps on this ship, but it still doesn't prove anything," Aang said, more to himself than Katara, though his tone did sound a little panicked. A panting Katara looked at him with a disbelieving glare, as though unable to tell whether he was being sarcastic.

Aang looked around to search for a way out, and when he spotted the beam of faint sunlight near his feet, he followed it to a gaping hole in the roof, wide enough for both of them, but high enough only for an airbender to make the jump.

"Grab hold of me Katara," he said, suddenly grasping her and giving her little time to react. Katara's breath caught in her throat as he leapt through the gap in the roof out into the windy polar weather. Very soon, she didn't feel the need to hold on tight; she felt light as a feather, merely drifting in the wind as Aang subjected it to his will during successive graceful leaps, until they finally made it to the bottom.

Katara let go of Aang, heat slowly creeping up her neck as she realised the position she was just in. Fortunately for her, Aang's mind was elsewhere.

Aang followed the trail of billowing smoke with his eyes, wondering why on earth someone would set a booby trap on their own ship that apparently emits a beacon of some sort. He briefly allowed himself to ponder upon the plausibility of it being an attack ship. It made more sense for traps to be set up on an attack ship than on a simple vessel for voyagers, but he still couldn't see the wisdom behind setting up a trap on one's own ship. What if one of their own had tripped the wire? Or maybe it wasn't a trap at all, maybe it was an alarm of some sort to alert the rest of the crew or a different ship on the water of an emergency. Aang let out an exasperated sigh.

"That doesn't prove anything," he repeated to himself, but it sounded even less confident than it did the last time.

By this point, Katara was almost certain that Aang was in fact trapped in the iceberg since before the war.

"We should probably get back to the village." Aang suspected that they would have seen the smoke and gotten worried. His adrenaline had also run out, and he now felt a little inclined to return to his broody, pensive behaviour that he had grown accustomed to over the past few years.

Katara nodded and followed Aang silently as he made his way back up the hill leading towards the village, fearful of their reaction when they would find out that she had broken one of their taboos.

Sure enough, once they reached the village, everyone was already waiting for them, clearly having seen the beacon sent from the direction of the shipwreck.

Sokka was at the front, and immediately started shouting at Aang, accusing him of being a Fire Nation spy. Before Aang could respond, Katara came to his defence.

"Sokka, you're wrong! He set off the trap by accident. I saw, I was there."

Sokka then turned on her. "You let him in that ship knowing full well that it's prohibited and too dangerous!?"

Aang was still processing the sudden outburst, but couldn't allow the blame to be shifted to Katara. "No no, it was all my fault. She warned me not to go in there, but I didn't listen."

"Well that just about proves it then. You're a spy. Well then it's settled. You're banished from this place."

As soon as those last words came, Aang felt as if he was hit in the head with a brick. Katara on the other hand, instantly flared up.

"What!? You can't just banish him like that!" she cried, stepping in front of Aang.

"Actually, I can," Sokka replied.

"Well if you banish him, then, then…"

Sokka raised an eyebrow in challenge.

"Then I'm banished too!" she declared without thinking. She grabbed Aang's hand and started to storm away. Sokka called out to her but she ignored him.

Still reeling from everything that had happened within that short exchange, Aang snapped back to reality to find Katara declaring that she would also be banished along with Aang. Aang stopped and tugged himself free from Katara's grasp, putting his hand on her shoulder to stop her from marching off.

"Katara, what are you doing?"

"What does it look like?"

"Katara," Aang said as softly as he could manage, "It's okay. I'll go, you don't have to come."

"But you can't just-"

"It's okay," Aang stopped her from finishing. "I wasn't going to stay here for much longer anyway. This just means I'll have to leave slightly earlier."

"But…" she managed, her anger draining away.

"Katara, I don't want to come between you and your family."

Katara slowly dropped her gaze and conceded, and Aang nodded towards her.

"Goodbye."

Katara only gazed back sadly in response as he walked away toward the shelter where he had kept Appa.

"Come on boy," Aang tugged Appa onward in a tired tone. Appa groaned and dropped down, too tired to walk any further. After nudging Appa to get up and failing, Aang sighed and dropped on Appa's leg, defeated. Appa had already made a scene when Aang told him they were leaving earlier. The beast didn't budge. When Aang didn't either, Appa finally relented, but he was still too tired to fly, so they set off on foot.

Aang looked behind at the village which was still visible in the distance. Appa groaned again, but as Aang made himself comfortable against Appa's leg, he was too busy thinking about other things to respond to Appa.

He had initially entertained the very slight possibility that Katara was joking about the one hundred year war, but he could no longer. The evidence was overwhelming. Sokka had accused him of being a Fire Nation spy, and the rest of the village looked like they had seen a ghost after Aang had set off the trap inside the shipwreck. Which meant that there must have been some truth to what Katara was claiming. Only, the idea of one hundred years having passed was very…scary. Did that mean that most of the people he knew had already passed away or were now very old? Did that mean Gyatso was…

No. He didn't want to consider that. He shut his eyes and willed it away.

A distant, deep rumbling woke Aang up from his brief sleep. Aang got up and rubbed his eyes. As he reoriented himself and remembered the events which had just taken place, he figured that he must've fallen asleep on Appa's leg. It seemed Appa too had drifted to sleep, and the noise which had woken him was now making him grumpy.

Aang turned to the source of the sound (which was towards the village) and nearly stumbled. Approaching the village was a fire nation ship, much like the one which had gotten him banished, only this one was intact and on the water.

His mind reeled with the possibilities. He couldn't see what any of the villagers were doing in response from where he was, but if their earlier reactions were genuine, then this was not good.

Promptly, he grabbed his staff.

"I'm afraid you're gonna slow me down if I take you buddy, but you'll know where to find me."

Appa huffed in response as if he was offended.

Shaking the drowsiness from his eyes, he snapped open his glider. At first he tripped from the dizziness he got from the sudden movement after just waking up, but he quickly got back on his feet and was gliding in no time.

As he approached the village, a figure in the Fire Nation uniform came into view, and in front of him, with his weapon raised, was Sokka. The rest of the village was cowering and hiding at the back. When Sokka's assailant raised his fist to strike him, Aang's eyes widened, and in one, fluid motion, he snapped his glider shut and brought his staff in a downward swinging motion as he landed, sending an arc of wind at the person and knocking him off his feet.

At once, everyone turned to Aang and noticed him. The young warrior rose to his feet, slightly disoriented, and then noticed Aang. The first thing Aang noticed about the boy (he seemed to be in his teenage years) was his angry red, puckered scar enveloping his left eye. Another thing he noticed was that his uniform looked more regal than the other soldiers standing behind him, so he assumed that this young warrior was the leader of the crew, possibly royalty.

"Finally, the Avatar."

Aang pointed his staff at him and narrowed his eyes.

"What do you want?" he asked dangerously.

But instead of giving him an answer, he started firing blasts of fire at him.

Reflexively, Aang started dodging the blasts and manoeuvring himself around the firebender, occasionally sending his own blasts of wind at him. As the fight progressed, and as he saw the fear on the faces of the civilians, it became clear to Aang that the Fire Nation was indeed at war with them. His mouth dried as he realised that this might be another attack on their village. Eventually realising that this fight was going nowhere, Aang sent one powerful blast of wind that knocked the teenager off of his feet and sent him to the ground with an audible thud.

Aang then asked the firebender in a voice he hoped did not show any trepidation, "Did you come here to attack these people?"

The boy stood up, rubbing the pain off the back of his head. For a moment, he seemed to consider what he should respond with. Then he spoke.

"I won't do it if you come with me."

Aang looked back at the villagers, who were huddled together in fear. He couldn't shake the image of the terrified children's face when a fire blast came dangerously close to them just earlier. For a second he wondered why the firebender wanted to take him on their ship, and where they wanted to take them. He was about to ask the firebender but decided against it when he realised that it didn't matter. This was his first test as the Avatar, and he wasn't going to sacrifice the safety of an already scarred village for his own curiosity. He would at least have to take the danger away from them.

Dropping his defensive stance, Aang surrendered. "Alright."

Katara gazed over Appa's saddle with a worried expression on her face. After his surprise and excitement over finding out that Appa actually could fly had settled down, Sokka noticed her expression.

"Don't worry, your boyfriend is probably safe. He is the Avatar after all." For some reason, it took the firebender saying that Aang is the Avatar to convince Sokka that he actually was.

Katara whipped around to face him.

"He's not my boyfriend!" she exclaimed, perhaps a little too vehemently.

Sokka just rolled his eyes.

Soon enough, the ship came into view, and as Appa approached closer they were just in time to see Aang fall off the ship into the frigid ocean water. Katara's heart leapt into her mouth. Frantically, she started screaming.

"Aang! Aang!"

As Sokka looked on with disbelief, a bright glow started to emanate out of the water. Seconds later, Aang emerged on a swirling pillar of water, his eyes and tattoos glowing a blinding white. He gracefully bent the water around him to land on the deck, and then sent a powerful, whirling mass of water at the soldiers on board, sending most of them hurtling off the deck, including their leader.

Sokka gasped in disbelief.

"Now that is some waterbending."

Appa, sensing that his master was in trouble, bellowed and landed with a flick of his tail, toppling a few more off the deck.

Gradually, the glow on Aang reduced, and Aang stumbled a little, trying to catch himself from falling.

Katara, who had already unboarded from Appa, ran up to him to catch him.

Weakly, Aang looked up at her and smiled.

"Hey, you came anyway."

She smiled back.

A few soldiers who were still on board started to stir and get back up on their feet.

"My staff," Aang pointed towards it weakly.

"On it." Sokka ran up to where the staff was lying to grab it. As soon as he did, another hand grasped the other end of the staff, and Sokka let out a surprised cry when he saw the scarred boy holding onto it, dangling from the side of the ship.

He then repeatedly jabbed the staff into the boy's forehead, causing him to release his grip and fall into the water.

As Aang tried to get up and board Appa, Katara attempted to freeze the remaining soldiers on board with the water that Aang had brought on deck from his recent waterbending feat.

After accidentally freezing Sokka first, she managed to freeze the remaining few soldiers.

Hurriedly, the three boarded Appa while soldiers who were thrown overboard were already climbing back onto the ship.

As Appa took off, the young leader (who had apparently already climbed back up), along with an old, paunchy man, simultaneously sent massive fire blasts aimed at Appa.

In response, Aang manoeuvred Appa to dodge the blasts, and sent a powerful blast of air towards a nearby mountain. A massive heap of snow and ice broke loose from the mountain, falling onto the back of the ship and causing enough damage to ensure that they wouldn't be followed.

Aang slumped back down in his seat at Appa's head.

Katara spoke first.

"Where'd you learn to bend water like that? That was amazing!"

"I don't really know how, I just did it. I guess it's just one of the perks of the Avatar state."

"Avatar state?" Sokka questioned.

"I'm pretty sure that's what it was."

Sokka was about to ask him what that meant but decided that he wasn't interested.

Aang remembered learning about the Avatar state with Gyatso. Since he had pretty much already mastered airbending by the time he was revealed to be the Avatar, he spent a lot of time learning more about the Avatar rather than training. Sometimes, instead of training, they would spend entire sessions just chatting. Gyatso would often share some wisdom with Aang during these sessions.

The memory of Gyatso suddenly hit Aang with a wave of nausea. Recent events proved that Katara could not have been lying about the one-hundred year war. And if Aang really was frozen for that long…

Just as suddenly, Aang realised that he was flying away from the South Pole with the two water tribe siblings.

"Wait, why are you two here? Don't you have to go back home?"

"Our gran let us leave to go with you," Katara replied. "I can finally learn waterbending at the North Pole," she said with a hint of excitement.

Aang just stared at her blankly. Just a few hours ago, he had been banished from their village, and now the village's head allowed her grandchildren to travel with him.

Katara regarded his confused expression.

"We are going to the North Pole, right?"

Suddenly, the memory of Gyatso came back.

"We have to make a stop first," Aang whispered.

"Where?" asked Sokka.

Aang gazed out towards the horizon.

"Home."