A/N: Again, the response to this has been great. The traffic to this story is really blowing me away, and I absolutely adore every single review, especially the ones that tell me which parts of the story they liked the most. It kind of helps me figure out what's working, and what's not working so well. And also a note: If you go to my profile, I have an estimate of the date the next chapter will be up. So if you want to know when updates are coming, check there.
Warnings: Blood/Violence. Welcome to the thunder dommmeeeee.
Katara's fury comes in the form of violent whips of water and Zuko has no choice but to lash out in response. He tries to limit his firebending to only defensive tactics, but instincts start to push all reasonable thought out of his mind and force him to strike out at her offensively. She takes the burns without more than pained gasps, and as he tosses a solid blast of fire against her, she raises a wall of water from the nearby fountain that suddenly evaporates into steam.
Zuko can barely see through the sudden wall of precipitation, but he continuously throws up flames to try to deflect the jets of water that shoot through it before they can strike him. His fire grows weak, though, and as he struggles to draw in the thickening air, sweat beads along his brow. High humidity was one of a firebender's greatest weaknesses, next to extreme cold, practically killing his flames before they even reached their peaks.
"Katara, will you just let me explain myself?" He calls out, waving out a weak band of flames that cuts through the steam just enough for him to see her form approaching him. He could see the irritated lines of pink, burnt skin on her arms and he did truly feel guilty for hurting her, but she'd taken this further than he'd ever meant it to go.
"What is there to explain? I knew you couldn't change!" She makes a violent motion with her arms, and suddenly he feels the sweat being ripped from his brow along with the steam in the air until Katara has a massive ball of water following her command. He backs away from her cautiously, taking in a deep breath now that the air is more gas than liquid.
"I didn't mean to hurt you, it was—" The ball freezes and shatters, the shards hovering midair.
"An accident? You seem to have a lot of those, Zuko." She spits his name like a curse, and as she pulls her arms back to propel the shards of ice at him, he finds his feet suddenly being yanked out from beneath him by shifting rubble. Any protective fire he could've made flickers out uselessly, the ice coming at him with full force. He feels the sudden chill of the ice shards prickling his skin, quickly joined by the contrasting heat of his blood. The ice numbs the wounds for a moment until his body burns them into steam and he feels the sting of the thin but deep wounds peppering his right side. Zuko pushes himself up onto his hands and knees, wiping blood from his cheek.
"I know." He says, letting out a harsh breath through clenched teeth. He's struggling with his instincts to fight her with everything in him, but he can't risk escalating this any further. He had just started gaining the Avatar's trust; he couldn't lose that progress by hurting her any worse than he already had.
"So what's the chances of them all really being accidents?" He's never heard her so furious in all his time chasing them. She's panting, fists clenched and shaking at her sides. The blood on Zuko's skin moves unnaturally against gravity, sliding back from his ribs and along his back before it's lifted into the air above him. He stares up at her in shock, watching the droplets of his blood that had been gathering on the ground suddenly stop in their descent and instead wind into the air. She was bending his blood as if it were any regular water, and he watches in horror as it hovers around her clenched hands and joins the water already gathering there. "You tried to trick me again, and I almost believed it for a second."
"I wasn't trying to trick y—" The mixture of blood and water splashes to the ground as Zuko tries to get to his feet and speak properly. Suddenly he can't seem to push the air out of his lungs or shift his weight to stand. Every muscle and joint in his body locks up painfully, shuddering as something in him seems to twist and pull. His arms move without his command and crumple beneath him, sending him face first into the rough stone floor. His heart beats wildly in his chest as panic overtakes him, letting out a strained grunt as he tries to move any muscle in his body. His own limbs refuse to listen, his face being pulled from the stone only when his back jerks upright and straightens on its own, the feeling akin to being pulled about by strings attached to his bones. He finds himself sitting up on his knees with his arms pinning themselves behind his back in an unnatural way, the muscles in his arms jerking erratically and forcing his fingers to twitch with the muscle spasms racking the entirety of his captive body. He'd never heard of a waterbender having capabilities like this. He stares up at her in terror, chest heaving, and wonders if she was going to tear him apart from the inside.
"That's worse!" She gestures angrily; seeming to forget her control over his every movement, sends his neck bending at an awkward angle and making him feel lightheaded. A shiver racks through his body as she rights his head with a slow twist of her arm, "Because then you really are just inherently evil, and you manipulate people without even knowing it!" She glares at him like she's expecting an answer, but terror chokes him and he can only manage a few quick grunts of pain and fear.
The only part of his body he can move, his eyes, flick up to meet hers. She seems to be searching him for something, perhaps any sign of hatred or malice, but when she only finds unadulterated terror her features soften. She sees something in his gaze that suddenly extinguishes her rage and her arms fall to her sides limply. There's a sudden rush as his blood is suddenly allowed to flow as it normally does, and he immediately finds himself crumpling into an undignified heap on the floor. His entire body is shaking; his muscles tingling and aching like a komodo rhino had trampled him. He draws in air in short, panicked gasps, finding his fingers stiff and starting to form deep purple bruises where the blood had pooled to hold his arms behind his back.
"I'm—I'm so sorry, Zuko." She says quietly, finally keeping her distance from him. He can't see her, his back still arched in the same position she had left it in and his cheek pressed into the cool ground, but he can hear her sit heavily, "I didn't mean to…to do that to you…it was—"
"An accident?" He asks breathlessly, still trying to pull sufficient air into his lungs. He dares to slowly twist himself into a sitting position, his muscles protesting as he does so. He reaches up to rub his neck sorely, feeling the tendons still twitching sporadically.
She doesn't answer him verbally, the two of them sitting directly across from each other in an eerily still silence. In a strange, twisted way, this is the first time he's really felt like he's on even ground with her. The past, as complicated as it may be, doesn't seem to matter as they sit opposite each other and take stock of the wounds patterning each of them. Burns and bruises made them equals. She'd used all the hate she held for him and his kind in her assault, and now she was truly spent of it. She could only look at the boy across from his as just another person.
Zuko tenses as she suddenly collides with his chest, her cheek resting on his shoulder. It's an unfamiliar embrace, but, surprisingly, not an unwelcome one. He finds his hands settling on her back and holding her against him. Her shoulders shake, a sob ripping through her and her tears dampen the bloodied fabric of his tunic. Distantly, he knows he should be angry with her. He should harbor some kind of resentment for invading him so deeply as to turn his own body against him, but he can only feel sympathy for her.
It seems they were cut from the same cloth, turmoil and conflict between their powers and their hearts being their common factors. He understands her as well as he does himself, holding her long after her shaking stops and her tears dry. He won't push her away, patiently waiting for her to decide when she wants to leave him, but that time doesn't seem to be coming any time soon. She's comforted by the heat rolling off of him in waves and the steady beating of his heart beneath her ear, the rise and fall of his chest with each steady breath bringing her a sense of calm that she never would've thought he could provide her. He tentatively considers that she likes being close to him. Perhaps he was sturdy and warm and something to anchor her when she felt like she was going to be swept away by her own terrifying power and he liked the idea of being that for her.
Zuko shifts one of his hands on her back to settle in the wild locks of her hair, twirling it around his battered fingers. It was as soft as it looked, sliding through his fingers as he strokes the length of it. Her head pulls away from his shoulder and wide, misty eyes stare into his as she braces herself against his chest. He can feel the shallow breaths that leave her against his face, the distance between them frighteningly small as a shaking hand leaves her hair to brush a stray tear from her cheek.
Now that he's this close, he can see there's a tinge of pink, burnt skin across the inside of her cheek under his hand. He can feel the throbbing of forming bruises along his jaw. They were two violent, immovable forces of nature that collided explosively, yet it was addictive and pulled him to her, and she to him, like moth to a flame. His eyes flit down to the curves of her mouth, the hand on her cheek clasping her jaw and pulling her fractionally closer as he sits up to close the distance between them.
"I should go." Katara whispers, and he can practically feel the words on his lips as her hand presses into his chest to halt his shift. His hand leaves her face, hovering near her like he's physically unable to pull away from her completely.
"Yeah." Is all he can choke out, his throat feeling tight. She climbs off of him quickly, walking away from him with shaky steps. As he stands as well, legs feeling like they were weighted down with sand, he sees her glance back at him.
He's finally alone, but now he would give anything not to be.
That night, the full moon taunts Katara, sitting in the sky like a watchful gaze. It had been the middle of the day when she'd used bloodbending against Zuko, but she'd been well aware of the moon even when it wasn't in the sky above them. It had fueled her hurt, rage and fear and turned it into something violent and terrifying. It had made her into a person she despised, and when she'd looked into Zuko's terrified eyes, she'd seen her own twisted reflection in them.
Standing over him, the very blood in his veins at her command, she'd become the monster she'd accused him of being. Yet despite what she'd done to him, he hadn't shied away when she'd sought comfort in his embrace. In fact, he'd done the exact opposite, holding her tightly as if she deserved any kindness from him.
Her heart speeds as she thinks of what had followed the kind embrace, the memory of his lips being just a hairsbreadth from meeting hers. It had taken every modicum of her restraint to push him away and leave before things got even more confusing and terrifying between them. She couldn't be feeling these things for a man like him, and she certainly wasn't supposed to want to be close to him with everything he'd done to all of them.
But hadn't she done worse to him? She'd starved him, accused him, and manipulated him in a way that he had never even come close to doing to her or her friends. Bloodbending was invasive, grabbing hold of every blood cell in a body and twisting it with the motions of her bending. She'd felt his heartbeat pushing the blood with her, speeding in his chest with panic. But it hadn't stopped her from wanting to use him, having quite the opposite effect and spurring her on further. She'd wanted to make his heart beat faster. She'd wanted to stop it entirely.
And she easily could have. She could've frozen his blood, or pulled all of it away from his brain and starved it of oxygen, and that's what had scared her. It was so easy and tangible and only when she'd seen herself reflected in his eyes had she come to her senses. If she hadn't paused to look at him like that, he would be dead. She would have killed him in the most violent way she knew how. And she was accusing him of being the monster?
Katara's train of thought immediately comes to a screeching halt when she realizes where she'd wandered in the daze of her own thoughts. She's face to face with the wall of stone blocking Zuko's doorway, her heart pounding hurriedly as she feels Zuko's presence in the room. She can feel the way the blood flows in his veins, and how his heart beats steadily and calmly, but not slowly enough for him to be asleep. She frowns, realizing he must still be awake.
"Zuko?" She asks before she can stop herself, her voice carrying through the thin walls. She hears footfalls inside the room as he approaches the wall.
"Couldn't sleep?" Zuko asks so softly that she strains to hear him, her ear pressing to the wall.
"I just…wanted to make sure you were okay." She can't be sure, but she thinks she might hear a bitter chuckle resonate from the wall.
"I could ask you the same thing." Her fingers trace the nearly healed burns patterning her skin from his attacks unknowingly.
"I'm fine. I just need to know you're okay." A short sound, like something rubbing against the wall, followed by a thump, indicates Zuko sitting.
"A few aches and bruises, and I had a pretty bad nosebleed, but thankfully my fashion sense is pretty good at hiding bloodstains." He says dryly, "Guilty conscience?"
"What?" She asks, settling on her knees.
"You feel bad about what happened." It's not phrased like a question, and she rubs her neck awkwardly, glad he can't see the flush on her cheeks.
"I always feel bad when I do that. The person I am when I bloodbend—it's not me. I'm sorry you had to see that." Silence follows for long enough that she wonders if Zuko has fallen asleep. Feeling for his heartbeat, she finds that his blood is still flowing too quickly to indicate unconsciousness.
"It's only fair. You've seen me at my worst. Multiple times." She can hear the pained smile in his voice, "And now I've seen yours. Would I be overstepping my boundaries by saying we're even?" She pouts, picking at the stone beneath her and pulling back with dust coating her fingers.
"I'm not so sure about that. I didn't chase you around the world and try to capture your best friend." It's meant as somewhat of a joke, but the atmosphere suddenly turns tense.
"You can't capture someone who doesn't exist." Again, his words are quiet, but now it's less fatigue and more his unwillingness to share a part of himself.
"You don't have a best friend?"
"No. I don't really have friends at all."
"Stop being dramatic." He shifts, the sound of his head thumping back against the wall in frustration clear for her to interpret.
"I'm not being dramatic, I'm being honest. I don't have friends. I've never been very good at making friends." He pauses, thinking, "Azula had Mai and Ty Lee, and I would play with them sometimes, but they were always her friends. I was content to spend all my time with my mother. Which sounds kind of pathetic now that I say it out loud." She finds herself giggling—giggling, of all things—and shaking her head as if he could see the movement.
"It's not pathetic. It's kind of cute." He scoffs at her response, and she can hear him turning to face the wall like he can look at her.
"I am not cute."
"I never said you were cute. I said the thought was cute." He trips over his words a bit before he can respond.
"W-Well good. Because I'm not." She smiles at the floor, tucking an unruly strand of hair behind her ear. Something about the stillness of the night and the banality of the conversation made this all seem so normal, as if she'd known Zuko for as long as she'd known any of her friends back home. Some strong part of her still wants to hate him, tearing open old wounds and demanding her attention, but the more she learned about him, the quieter that part of herself got.
Now that voice was slowly being replaced with a different one. This one mused about the softness of his unscarred skin, and the way his eyes gleamed in the sunlight like they'd caught some of the energy itself and locked it in those golden depths. It wondered what it would have felt like to kiss him, and how different it would've been than kissing Aang. Would he be gentle with her? Would he be strong and forceful like his brash nature?
"Katara? Are you still there?" He asks, and she realizes she hasn't said anything in quite some time. She wonders why she's still sitting here at all, when she hadn't even meant to come here in the first place.
"Yeah. I shouldn't be, though. It's pretty late." She's giving herself an out, a way to leave before the butterflies in her gut get any more obnoxious, but she can't seem to get to her feet.
"It is." He responds simply. She wishes she could see his face so she could decode the emotions buried behind those two short syllables. He's feeling something as complicated as she is, and that thought makes warmth blossom deep within her.
"I'm going to go back to bed." She says to the wall, fingers idly toying with her skirts now.
"Goodnight." Zuko murmurs and she hears him stand slowly, his movements stiffer and slower than they normally were, before crossing the room and settling on his cot. She still doesn't move though, staring into the grains of the wood before her and feeling the flow of Zuko's blood slow incrementally as he falls asleep. Something about the regularity of it soothes her as she follows it through his heart and around his body; having the effect of white noise and making her eyelids feel heavy.
She braces herself against the wall and lets sleep finally take her.
A/N: BAM. Okay so I've been wanting to involve bloodbending since I first thought up this AU. It kind of connects with the chi-combined healing earlier as in Katara reaching inside him spiritually before reaching inside of him physically y'dig? Smarm smarm symbolism symbolism.
And I know some of you are getting impatient for the adult rated stuff but give it time. It's coming, I promise. ~ Jiggle