Welcome to part 3 of the story, everyone! I'd really appreciate to hear from everyone who has fav'ed or put on alert this little story! As always, my reviewers get special attention when the chapter ends ;)
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Zuko woke, though he had not felt he had been at all asleep. His body had been battling with itself viciously all through his stupor, and there had been no rest. His chest felt heavy and loaded with heavy rocks, his lungs unwilling to use the breath he so painstackingly forced in them through tracts that hurt with every stimulus. He tried stirring. Where am I? Have I been banished again? His tired mind was reeling, and for a moment, he expected to find himself in a ship, his face's left side heavily padded and bandaged, hiding the devastation underneath.
But he couldn't move, and the hands that stopped him from doing it were young and female- not the weathered fatherly touch of his uncle. Nonetheless, the pain lancinated through him and he barely managed to stop himself from crying out- the result was a soft groan.
"Don't move, Zuko," Mai's voice reached his ears, and he realized he hadn't yet opened his eyes. Mai's voice was calm and even as always, but Zuko could still hear a different tone in it that unsettled him. "Katara and the healers are preparing a tea for you, so it won't hurt."
He opened his eyes slowly, thankful that there was low lighting in the room at the back of the tea shop. He realized he was lying in soft bedding on a lush carpet, a much better arrangement than the last time he had been sick in a tea shop. Mai was sitting next to him, a bowl in her hands- but he didn't realize it was for him until she reached over and very gently removed the compress from where it was heavy and dried on his forehead. She dipped it in the water there with slow, careful movements.
Zuko found himself just staring at her while she was doing that, mesmerized and slightly bewildered- he couldn't understand what had landed him in this predicament. His mind reeled, trying in vain to piece together what had gone on, but all he remembered was laughing at Sokka's pictures and adding to the teasing while he was handling tea. After that, everything was a haze of pain and certainty that he was dead.
"Wh…what happened?" Zuko asked, his voice throaty and almost devoid of its resonance. "…I was refilling your tea, wasn't… wasn't I?"
Mai folded the compress again and placed it upon his forehead. Zuko shut his eyes in relief with a smile.
"That's… so good."
"You have a high fever, but I am happy you woke. The healer said you wouldn't, but Katara was sure you would, and you did."
Zuko was speechless for a moment, seeing how Mai's eyes watered- Mai simply didn't cry or show emotion that way. She and he communicated in actions more than words and emotions. Just what had happened? What could possibly have gone wrong now, after everything that went just right?
He raised his hand to touch hers, and tried to ignore how it was shaking slightly, choosing to focus on his fingers closing around hers. He smiled for her.
"Hey," he said softly, and Mai looked at him sorrowfully. "I wouldn't ever leave you, Mai. I'm here, not going anywhere."
But even as he said it, his heart traipsed dangerously, and a radiating pain began to spread radially from there and threatening to quench his breathing. Mai smiled and stroked his hair softly.
"I know," she said simply, her eyes speaking much more than she ever could with her voice. "I've always known, Zuko. But don't tire yourself. You need all your strength to conquer this."
Thankful for her prompting, for even just speaking was making him break a sweat, and tiredness was coming in waves, frowned as he watched Mai change the compress one more time, then excuse herself to call the healers in. Alone in the room now, he didn't need to put up a reassuring face for anyone. He hadn't felt his body so dreadfully heavy and uncooperative ever- not even when he had that fever. It frightened him that Mai hadn't told him what was wrong, it didn't spell anything good. Mai glossed over things when she feared her composure would break.
"Zuko!" it was Katara's voice this time. He turned his head to look at her. She was holding a cup with something steaming, and quickly rushed over to kneel next to him. But she wouldn't meet his eyes. "You're up! That's wonderful!"
"Katara," Zuko gestured tiredly with his hand. "You… don't need to pretend for me."
Katara bit her lip. Zuko glanced at her a little apprehensively. "The truth works best between us… doesn't it?"
Katara swallowed and busied herself for the longest time in helping Zuko sit up just enough to be able to drink the tea. She waited out the panting and the nausea the Fire Lord never admitted to weather, and dabbed the at his sweaty brow before putting the compress away. She secured the cup in his shaking hands.
"Here, drink this, and afterwards, you will need to rest again."
"Katara," Zuko did his best to look stern, but he suspected he only looked flushed and exhausted. "I'm going to drink this, and you'll tell me what's going on. Am I dying?"
"No!" Katara said so viciously he had to blink at her for a moment before he forced himself to raise the- inexplicably heavy- cup to his lips.
Katara looked to the side, biting her lips.
"No," she repeated. "You're not dying. We won't allow it."
Zuko just sipped. Katara sighed.
"Your uncle with Aang have gone to get what is needed to complete your healing. See, what happened- nobody could really predict it would happen, but your artery- right above your heart- it… it ruptured. It filled your chest with blood, that's why you feel all the pain when you breathe and move… the… the tea will make this better."
Zuko was feeling like there was no more room for fluids in his body, but he forced himself to drink the medicinal tea to the end.
Katara took the cup and helped him lie down again, then she wrung her hands once before she said quietly:
"Be still now, for a moment, okay?"
Zuko nodded- the most he could do with all the nausea of moving around. Katara parted his night shirt to expose his scarred chest. She coated her hands with water from her flask and very gently, the water glowing upon the inflamed skin, she applied her healing power. Almost instantly, the constricting he hadn't even realized he had been feeling let up, and some of the rocks in his chest seemed to disappear.
Zuko sighed and smiled at her, but Katara turned away.
"Please, don't thank me. That was what you were going to do, wasn't it? You have nothing to thank me for."
Zuko would have just shrugged that off were it not for the saturated guilt he heard in his voice. Zuko was an expert in guilt- he had lived with it for so long that he could tell in an instant if anyone else was sporting it. And what he heard in Katara's voice was the acidic kind of guilt, that eats you from inside without even knowing about it. And though he was already feeling sleepy, the exhaustion pawing at the edges of his awareness, something tugged at his soul about Katara, that he shouldn't leave her with her thoughts like that.
"Of course I do," he pressed shifting slightly in the futon. "Why not thank you? You saved my-"
"No, Zuko- I didn't save your life. I put it in jeopardy," Katara said harshly. "If not for me, this condition in you would never have developed."
"You can't know that," Zuko tried to sound non-chalant, but it came out pathetically weak.
"Stop it," Katara huffed and wiped her eyes, then, looking for something to do, she began fumbling with the compress although with the tea Zuko didn't need it any more. "We both know that's a lie. If you hadn't taken Azula's lightning for me, this would never have happened. It was my own damn fault! I shouldn't have been in the plaza, or damn it, anywhere where she could see me. I should have thought she would try to play dirty and use me."
Zuko tried to breathe in better, but chose against it. It was hard work to keep himself focused, to watch Katara beat herself up over him. Ironic, really- once I'd have liked to see her feel this way about me, and wallow in guilt.
"Listen," he tried to make his voice strong. Katara stopped, but still didn't gaze at him. "Look at me, Katara."
And please do it now, before I pass out.
It only took a breath's time for her to raise her deep, vibrant eyes to meet his own, but to Zuko's rapidly depleting energy it felt like a century. He breathed in.
"I'd do it anytime, all over again. We're friends, Katara. Wouldn't you do it for me, too? For Toph, or Suki, let…" he breathed in, "let alone Aang or Sokka?"
"Yes, I would. I would, of course," Katara said so earnestly it nearly made Zuko grin- but he knew that he shouldn't laugh at her right now, no matter how amused or cute he found she sounded.
"Then… would you want me hating myself if you saved me? It was war Katara. That's all… all there is to it."
Zuko's voice had become weaker and weaker, and Katara realized he had been pushing himself to talk to her. Idiot! You are supposed to be helping him, not the other way around.
"You're right, Zuko," she said as steadily as she could make it, and straightened the covers over him. "Rest now."
But Zuko had already lost consciousness, and aside the slight wheeze of his breath, rapid and shallow, he was quiet.
Katara's eyes watered again as she got up to leave him to rest. He looked terribly tired, and his complexion pale and flushed with fever again in the same time. She dipped the compress in water she bended to become cool again, and gently placed it upon his forehead.
I'll do the same for you, Zuko, if it's the last thing I do.
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Okay so there will be one more part to this story. Zuko wanted to talk and show off he has the mettle to be a good leader. XD I hope you like it, though it is more chatty and emotion/angst/guilt filled than anything… Between Katara and Zuko, one can't expect anything else since one of them can't bend at the moment. XD
Laytonsuperfan: You're welcome :)
Insanely Irish: Thank you! I hope you like this one, too!
Omega19x: No, you are definitely not. Thank you! I hope you like this installment, too.
Ayame of the Azuma: Thanks! I hope you won't mind canon though.
Things24: Thanks! He still lives.
Dragonwitch250: Well, he's working on it. He's a fighter, even when bedridden.
