Looking back on it, Sokka could not tell you what lesson should be taken from that fateful day. On one hand, opening his mouth and being an asshole is what set his sister off on a preachy rage and thus led to enough trouble to last him a life-time just in the span of one year. On the other, if he hadn't had opened his mouth, they would never have won the war. So whether the lesson to be learned was to lay back and keep your mouth shut, or if it was to always say what's on your mind and piss off your sister at any given opportunity, there was no way he could tell you which one it was.

Typically speaking though, assery was usually the way to go.

Of course this time, the story goes a bit differently.

Oh, it started the same for the water siblings. Sokka was an asshole, Katara snapped, and out from the ice tumbled a peculiar little Airbender.

Katara was quick to catch him, despite Sokka's protest. She held him as he came to, and the both of them watched with rapt attention as the boy slowly gathered his senses. There was a moment where concern washed over the boy's features before he leapt out of Katara's hold in a way that was almost a bit too smooth and just a little unnatural.

Katara gasped, and Sokka lowered himself into a defensive position, aiming his spear at the boy, ready to defend both his sister and himself in the event that the stranger attacked.

Sokka watched with suspicion as the boy glanced around his surroundings. When his gaze landed back with the siblings he scratched his head and said,

"I feel like I'm forgetting something."

Sokka scowled, "What--? Who are you, and how did you get in the ice?"

"Sokka, don't be rude," Katara admonished, batting his spear away from the child.

"Sorry about my brother," She said, "He's kind of an asshole--"

"--Hey!"

"I'm Katara, and this is Sokka. We found you in the ice just now."

The child beamed at her, "I'm Aang," he chirped. Then his smile fell away. "Sorry…" He said, "I just really feel like I'm forgetting something… Something important-- Appa!"

"What are you--"

Sokka cut himself off as he had just witnessed the child actually leap fifteen feet in the air and over the wall of ice he had emerged from.

"Huh?!"

He shared and incredulous look with his sister before promptly breaking off into a mostly intelligible, whispered argument, that went something a little like this:

Incoherent whisper shouting "Airbender!"

Blah. blah. "Fire nation spy!"

"Air. Bender."

"It could be a -- incoherent whisper shouting-- We need to-- intelligible gesturing-- Leave, Katara!"

These kinds of arguments were quite frequent with the siblings, and more often than not, they ended with Sokka being doused with Katara's magic water. Sokka supposed he should count himself lucky that he came out of this argument dry, however, the blast of fire and the panicky air bender running from that direction was still a less than ideal end to the discussion.

Aang ran up to the two of them breathless, and said,

"Hey guys, I think I remember what I forgot now."

Sokka's blood ran cold as he caught sight of the figure who emerged next from the wall of ice. Without thinking about it, he stepped protectively in front of his little sister. Ready to protect her at all costs from the approaching threat.

It was a girl, maybe a few years younger than Katara, though she held herself with an unnerving confidence as she stomped towards the three of them.

She was dressed in fire nation red, and her robes were fitting for royalty. It was bad enough that this girl was fire nation, it was worse that she was a fire bender. What sealed the deal and made Sokka genuinely believe they would all be dead that day, was the flame shaped crown placed perfectly in the girl's hair.

He didn't know what a fire princess was doing out there in the ice, but he knew that if she was there, the fire navy would not be far behind. The village would be destroyed and Katara would be taken away from them.

They would be helpless, wiped away like they were nothing. Sokka tightened his grip on the spear anyways.

She stepped up to the three of them and smiled a saccharine sweet smile.

"Peasants," She said to them, "I suggest you step away so I may drown this idiot air bender.

"Woah, woah, woah," Said Aang, "Let's be reasonable here, you wouldn't actually do that."

The fire princess blinked once at the airbender, before Sokka was pulling himself and his sister out of harm's way as the girl lunged.

"Oh won't I?"

Sokka turned around to look at the scene before him and there was the girl at the edge of the ice, holding Aang up by the back of his robes and dangling him over the edge.

"I once pushed my brother off a roof. Do you really believe that I would hesitate to end your pathetic life?"

Katara tugged at Sokka's sleeve frantically.

"We have to do something!" She hissed

Sokka nodded mutely but made no move to intervene. He was not particularly interested in risking his or his little sister's life over a kid they'd just met.

But then,

"She won't actually drown him. He's her only ride home."

Sokka yelped and scrambled to adjust his grip on his spear as he spun to confront the person who had snuck up behind them.

To his dismay, it was another from the fire nation, though he didn't wear a crown and the kid looked half a step away from death.

He had peeling gauze that wrapped around half of his face, covering what appeared to be a burn-- if the singed hair and the angry skin creeping out from underneath the bandages were anything to go by.

He was sickly pale, even by fire nation standards, and despite being in the South Pole, beads of sweat collected at his hairline. If Sokka had to guess, he'd say the kid was fighting an infection from his injury.

The girl turned at the interruption, though still holding Aang out over the edge. She looked the boy up and down once before saying,

"Zuzu, so glad to see you're back with us."

Aang beamed at the other kid.

"Hi, Zuko!" He chirped, "You look terrible."

The girl scowled at the airbender, and promptly dropped him into the water.

Katara gasped and rushed to help the boy out of the freezing ocean.

"How could you do that?" She admonished, "He could freeze to death!"

The girl only rolled her eyes.

"It's okay," Aang said, somehow still cheerful despite having just been dropped into freezing water, "Us airbenders are really good at regulating our temperatures. And besides, watch what I can do."

Sokka, who hadn't ever seen any air bending before, then had to pick his jaw up off the floor as the child spun the air around him into a tornado, and came out completely dry.

Katara cheered at the powerful display of bending.

"That was amazing, Aang!"

The fire nation girl snorted, "What, have you never seen an air bender before?"

Sokka's eyes widened at the girl's incredible show of insensitivity. Her people kill the airbenders and destroy their home's and then she has the audacity to gloat about it? How dare she? Sokka didn't believe in hitting girls, but he was about to make an exception to the rule for this one.

Evidently Katara felt the same way.

"How dare you?" She said, beginning to throw her hands around in the same way as she had before. Sokka gulped, glancing warily at the water that had already begun rippling around them.

"How-how could you be so insensitive?!"

The other fire kid, Zuko, who was already weak from infection, stumbled to the ground as the water grew violent around them and disturbed the ice float.

"Um…" Said Zuko, at the same time that Sokka yelled,

"Katara!"

But Katara's angry tirade continued.

"I knew the fire nation was bad, but you- you're just vile! You're a nasty, nasty ashmaker!"

And then the ice wall behind them cracked, and Sokka turned just in time to see the ice about to crash down on top of them, ready to crush them all.

Only, they were never crushed. At the last second, the ice shattered into harmless little pieces that rained down on them, but brought about no grievous injuries.

Katara stared at her hands, eyes wide and frowning, "I… I didn't do that…"

"No…" Azula said, "You didn't. I think that would have been my brother."

Sokka and Katara both turned to stare at Zuko who was also staring at his hands. Only, he wasn't staring at them as if wondering, 'I know I didn't do that, so where did that come from,' Like Katara had been.

No, instead he looked more like he was thinking, 'What the actual fuck just happened, how did I do that?'

He dropped his hands and looked up, glancing wildly between the four of them, seeking some sort of assurance.

But the Water Tribe siblings could only stare, and his brat sister only quirked an eyebrow.

Sokka thought they were all just going to continue in the oppressive silence like that until they all froze to death, or until the fire navy that he was sure was coming eventually arrived. But then Aang spoke up, and Sokka felt his world fall apart.

"Wow, Zuko, looks like you're gonna be good at this Avatar thing after all!"