Yip yip! Chapter four! :D

Enjoy!

Behind an enormous slab of rock, Sokka sat with his father trying to fix up the gash on Hakoda's side.

"Sorry dad," Sokka apologized for the tenth time. "I'm no good at this."

Hakoda managed a slight chuckle. "It's alright son, I'll be just fine."

"I know, dad." Sokka placed another bandage on the wound. "I wonder where Katara is. She just ran off."

"I'm sure your sister knows what she's doing." Hakoda said, attempting to sit up. Sokka snorted.

After Sokka had helped his father into a sitting position against the rock, Sokka busied himself with cleaning up the bloodied rags and cloths that he had used on his father's wound. He was really trying to keep himself occupied. More than anything he wanted to rejoin the fight but the need to protect his father was even greater. He still wanted to though.

Suddenly his vision was obscured by a figure dressed in blue with lots of flowy brown hair.

"Katara!" Sokka exclaimed, and hugged her back tightly. "You're ok!"

Katara pulled away. "Of course I'm ok! Are you?"

Sokka looked over at their dad who was smiling at the pair. "I'm fine but you've got to heal dad."

Katara shot him a panicked glance as she quickly went over to examine her dad. He smiled up at her as she used her bending to fix whatever Sokka couldn't.

"Thank you Katara." Hakoda said gratefully. He sat up a little more easier against the rock.

Katara got to her feet. She looked above her towards the sky. Was that-

"Katara," Hakoda said, noticing her silence. "You seem distracted."

"Is that- is that Aang?" she pointed to the young airbender flying rapidly on his glider right at them.

When he landed, Sokka turned to him. "Please tell me the firelord was a big baby and you didn't even need the eclipse to defeat him." Aang shook his head.

"What happened?" Katara asked.

"No one was home." Aang explained. "The entire palace city is empty."

Sokka's eyes narrowed. "They knew."

…...

Very quickly Zuko made his way through the empty palace and to his chambers. A knapsack from his fugitive days was packed and stowed away under his bed. He tossed it on the bed and turned to the window where he had made a shrine dedicated to his mother.

He knelt before her picture and took in her beautiful features. She was truly the image of royalty to Zuko. She represented everything that his father did not and for that, Zuko loved his mother even more.

"I know I've done some bad things in my past," he spoke to her picture. "But I promise I'm going to make this right."

With those final words, Zuko got to his feet and retrieved his sack from the bed. He didn't look back as he exited the room.

With skill only the Blue Spirit could master, he made his way across the court and into the neighboring palace. Mai's house.

Having been there plenty of times before, he had no trouble finding her room. When he reached it, he wasn't surprised to find that she wasn't there. More than likely she was down in the bunker with everyone else.

Zuko took one look at the portrait of him and Mai drawn by the palace painter. She had hung it on her wall. When that portrait had been drawn, he still had his scar. Unconsciously Zuko reached up and touched the smooth skin on the left side of his face. He sighed heavily and threw himself down into the chair at her writing table.

Using the heavy wooden blocks to spread the paper out, Zuko picked up a brush and began writing his goodbye letter to Mai.

…...

Things were not looking good for the avatar and his companions.

After being led into the firelord's prestigious secret bunker by Toph, tricked into wasting all of their time by Azula, the gaang was not very pleased when they discovered that the fire nation not only had war balloons, but war zeppelins as well. It was these very machines that destroyed their subs at the beaches. As of that moment, they were trapped in the fire nation. What was worse- the eclipse was over.

Seeking refuge on a mountainside, the resistance regrouped.

Katara and Sokka clung to their father. "We'll send the younger ones ahead on Appa. The rest of us will stay behind and be prisoners."

"No dad!" Katara cried. "We won't lose you again."

Haru's dad Tyro stepped forward. "I've had some experience with fire nation prisons. It won't be easy, but we'll all survive this battle."

Sokka shook his head sadly. With an air of depression, the younger members of the resistance, Sokka, Katara, Aang, Toph, The Duke, Teo, and Haru, all hugged loved ones goodbye and climbed aboard Appa.

No was surprised to see tears fall from the avatar's face as he addressed the remaining troops.

"Thank you all for fighting so bravely today. I promise to make it up to you all."

Hakoda gave a sad smile as the great bison groaned and took flight.

"I know the perfect place we can go for a while," Aang said to the group from the reins. "The Western Air Temple."

The tired heroes murmured their agreement as the bison flew away from the fire nation.

…..

Several hours later, the sky had begun to darken and it was not long before Appa was full of snoring people. Even Aang had fallen asleep after giving Appa express directions to go directly to the temple.

Only Katara lay awake on the traveling bison. In the small space, she managed to get a nice spot on the saddle where she could look over the edge. Her arm dangled over the edge and her hair blew with the wind as she looked down at the vast body of water below them.

Her thoughts strayed back to the fire nation where Zuko was probably locked away in the library writing more stories about the Painted Lady. It almost made her heart break when she thought about the last words he said to her. I'll follow you anywhere Katara. I promise I won't be far behind you...

The sincerity in both his words and his eyes was real. So why was it so hard for her to believe that maybe, somehow, Zuko was somewhere out there, following her like he promised?

Katara sighed heavily and let her mind drift with the wind.

…..

"This is humiliating." Katara groaned.

"The fact that we thoroughly got our butts whooped by the fire nation or the fact that we have to walk to the Western Air Temple?" Sokka asked down spiritedly.

"Both." Katara answered.

It was the middle of the day and the group found themselves walking in the middle of a desert area.

"I'm sorry you guys," Aang apologized. "Appa isn't so used to carrying so many people on his back."

"This stinks." Toph grumbled. "All this walking is messing with my feet. I can barely see a thing."

Haru, Teo and The Duke all gave audible sighs. Only Momo was silent. He lounged lazily on top of Aang's bald head.

The group walked on and on. A few minutes later, Toph's face lit up as her foot hit the ground. "We're here!" she exclaimed.

The group stopped and looked in front of them. They had reached the edge of a canyon and it dropped down endlessly. The other side of the canyon stretched out emptily across the pit.

"Um Toph," Katara said with a small frown. "I think you need your feet checked."

"No," Aang said, a huge smile appearing on his face. "She's right!"

He told everyone to climb on Appa and in seconds they were flying over the huge crevice. Their eyes went wide as Appa flew downwards.

The Western Air Temple was breathtaking. The temples all hung upside down under the canyon. There were several huge fountains placed over the temples. Huge statues of airbenders and avatars stood at the entrance to each sanctuary. Vines curled around large pillars. Even Sokka was speechless.

"Aang," Katara said breathlessly. "this is amazing!"

"It's the most prestigious and complex temple built by the monks." Aang said as they landed. When he jumped off he began to see the finer details- scorch marks, broken spears and other pieces of armor. "It was supposed to be the only temple the fire nation couldn't find." he finished sadly.

Katara and Sokka looked at each as they each remembered the day when Aang realized the fire nation had invaded the Southern Air Temple. That was a day they would all like to forget.

Absently, they all began to unload whatever items were on Appa and then Sokka began to remove all of the heavy armor he designed for the bison.

Around late afternoon, Haru, Teo and The Duke opted for some exploring. When Aang tried to run after them, Katara grabbed him by the collar of his tunic and stopped him dead in his tracks.

"But I want to go explore too!" he complained.

"We need to have a meeting about what the new plan is," she explained. "and since you're the avatar we thought you should be here as well."

Aang pouted and threw himself down on the stone bench.

"So what's the plan, Plan Guy?" Toph asked Sokka.

"Well," Sokka said scratching his invisible beard. "since the invasion didn't work, the new plan is the old plan! Aang masters all four elements and at the end of the summer he defeats the firelord!"

"Who's going to teach him firebending though?" Toph asked.

Katara thought for a moment. "We could always go back and try to find Jeong Jeong."

"Who's- never mind. I'll find out if he's important." Toph said.

Aang stood up, a huge grin on his face. "Oh, well, looks like the meeting's adjourned so I'm going to go now!"

"Not yet," Toph said with a frown. "I think things are going to get a complicated." she pointed towards Appa who groaned and stood up and walked away revealing a very disheveled prince Zuko. Katara's hand flew to her mouth.

He was here. He kept his promise after all. He followed her.

Zuko moved his mouth but no words came out. He reached a hand out to Katara and Sokka drew his boomerang.

"You make another move and I'll slice your face off!" Sokka said fiercely. Toph and Aang both took defensive stances but Katara stayed motionless. Something wasn't right.

Zuko tried to talk again but all that came out was a choked sound.

Then Katara saw the blood.

It was seeping through the front of his shirt and slowly pooling in the fabric. Being a healer, instinct took over and Katara ran to Zuko.

"Katara what are you doing?" Aang shouted at her. She paid him no mind as she rushed to Zuko. He took one step forward and fell forward. Katara caught him and gently lowered him to the ground.

"He's hurt!" she called back to Aang.

"So?" Sokka exclaimed.

She ignored him as she hastily ripped Zuko's shirt open to reveal a deep gash that was steadily leaking blood and turning a nasty shade of green. She gave him a quick once over and determined that this was the only wound on him.

"I need some water!" she called to her friends.

"Don't tell me you're actually going to try and heal him!" Sokka yelled.

"He's hurt and I'm going to fix him!" Katara shouted back. "I'm a healer and I'm not just going to let him die like this!"

Aang and Sokka looked at each other once and turned back to Katara. "So?" they both said.

"Oh for the love of Oma," Toph rolled her eyes and pushed the two boys out of her way. She broke off a chunk of the stone bench and used her bending to fashion the rock into a decent sized bowl. With her feet as her guide, Toph made her way over to the fountain a few yards away and carefully dipped the bowl in the water. While she was doing this, Katara busied herself by trying to make Zuko as comfortable as possible for the time being. She used his shirt as a pillow and used part of her own shirt to wipe the sweat that was beading on his forehead away.

"Katara," he said weakly. He looked up in her eyes and Katara saw something flicker in his.

"Shh," she shushed him. "Don't talk, you'll make yourself weaker."

Of course he didn't listen. "I followed you," he struggled to say. "I kept my promise." Katara nodded but didn't say anything else. When Toph brought the water over, she quickly got to work. With her healing abilities, she was able to see that the damage went a lot deeper than she thought. Broken ribs, internal bleeding. Katara couldn't help but wonder how he even managed to get as far as he did.

Before she knew it, Zuko had passed out. She continued to heal him as long as she could but eventually, she got tired as well. She sat back on her legs as she watched him sleep. She could still see the bruising and knew she still had a lot more work to do.

She got to her feet and gathered up the bowl and torn pieces of shirt that lay around him. She turned to go to the fountain but found Aang standing right there in front of her.

She jumped and nearly dropped the bowl. "Aang, you scared me."

His expression could have made Gran-gran cower. "Katara, what are you doing?" he asked.

"I'm healing him, Aang. What does it look like?"

"It looks like you're helping an enemy who's been trying to kill us for over a year!"

"Enemy or not, it wouldn't have been right for me to just leave him!"

"I can't believe you right now, Katara." Aang threw his hands up in frustration.

"No I can't believe you, Aang." she countered. "You're supposed to be the avatar. You keep going on about how you want peace and whatnot but that's all talk right? In the end you'd kill anyway right?"

"I am trying to keep peace!" he yelled. "But I can't do that if I have some crazed banished prince who could murder me in my sleep!"

"He's not going to kill you in your sleep Aang!" Katara dropped the bowl and placed her hands on her hips.

"Whatever Katara!" Aang exclaimed. "Fine, fix him up, heal him and when he tries to kill us, don't come crying to me!"

Katara snorted. "Even if he does, what makes you think I'll come crying to you? I'm your teacher remember? But fine, I'll heal him and I'll find out why he came here, and if he does turn out to be bad again, you won't have to worry about my bad decision making anymore!"

"Oh yeah? And why's that?" he asked.

Katara steeled herself for a moment. "Because- because I'll leave. Then you can go and be Mr. Avatar and keep peace with Sokka and Toph but I'm leaving."

Aang's expression softened. "Katara, I-"

But she cut him off. "I'm done talking to you Aang." with that she pushed past him and went to find blankets for her and Zuko.

Aang slapped himself on the forehead and took a few steps towards Zuko's sleeping form. Aang's eyes went wide as he realized for the first time that he was looking at a scar-less Prince Zuko.

A/N

Sooooooooooooo,

what'd you all think?

Please leave reviews and

let me hear your thoughts

on this story so far.

Just a question I want to ask: Between this story and Shadow of the Day, which one do you like better and how do the two compare?

I just want to know :)

-kye.