I almost had my typing caught up with the writing, but yesterday I finished a chapter and started another one, well, so much for catching up. I had to split chapter 13 into three chapters, so I'm working on chapter 15 now.

I'm so thrilled by the support I've been getting…Thank you!

As always, characters by Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko, Story by Me.

Completed

It took about two months for Kya to stop having nightmares about being burned in the face or hit by lightning. She'd also taken to following her father wherever he went as much as possible. At first she would cry whenever he went somewhere she could not go, but he'd always assured her that he'd be back in time for meditation the next day, and he always was.

He had taught them about meditation for as long as they could remember. Aang would have an hour in the morning where he and the children would meditate together because, although they looked fully Water Tribe, they were also Air Nomad children. He couldn't teach them air bending, but he could still teach them the way of life.

Not only would Kya do the hour in the morning, she would stay with her father until he was done, which was sometimes for hours on end. At first he thought that she would get tired and go back to the house, but every time he opened his eyes she would still be there, watching him intently. On one particular day he opened his eyes to see that she was sitting across from him, meditating.

At first he thought that she was just mimicking him, but then he realized that she really was meditating all on her own. He sat perfectly still and quiet, just watching her. As the minutes ticked into a half hour he'd become so proud that tears began to well up in his eyes. He still didn't move or make a sound, he just watched.

After another fifteen minutes the little water bender took a deep breath and opened her eyes. She saw Aang sitting there with tears in his eyes and a huge grin on his face. Her eight year old mind couldn't figure out why he was doing those two things at the same time, so she focused on the tears, "Daddy:? Why are you about to cry?", she asked, jumping to her feet and running into his arms.

He hadn't realize he had become so full and ran his hand across his eyes, "I'm happy Kya, I'm so proud of you."

Crying because you're happy?, she thought, Adults are so weird.

When they went home they found Katara and the boys in the back yard. Tenzin had just started walking and was toddling around, and Kya joined Bumi in playing with his boomerang and practice swords. Aang, still beaming with pride, sat down on the grass next to Katara. "You took an unusually long time today.", she said.

"I was done almost an hour ago," he looked at his wife and smiled, "I was waiting for Kya."

"Waiting for Kya to what?", she asked nonchalantly

"Finish meditating."

She finally looked away from the children and at him, "You're serious.", she said, surprised that the little girl who used to hate getting up in the morning to go to the pavilion had meditated on her own.

"Yep", he leaned back on his elbows.

"You seem extremely proud."

"I am. I think maybe this is how you felt when she started water bending. I can't explain it. It's like I'm finally seeing me."

Katara gave the Avatar a strange look, "I see you in them everyday. In their eyes, in the way Bumi acts and the way Kya moves. Look at her," she pointed to Kya dodging and flipping around her little brother, "you two are the only ones who move like that. She even water bends like you."

"Is that how I move?", he asked. He had never really paid attention to how he moved, but he had always noticed how graceful his little girl was, "That's pretty cool.", he smile even bigger.

After that day Kya's dreams began to get better. Some would end in her defending herself , others would end in the same way, but she would handle it by having a quick meditation session. After a full week passed that she didn't wake up screaming or come running into their room, her parents knew she would be alright; that is until the day came that Aang said that he had to go away for a few weeks.

It started out like a typical conversation, about work, over dinner. "It shouldn't take any more than two or three weeks," Aang said between mouthfuls of noodles, "I was thinking it was only going to be two, but I got a letter from the foreman at the Eastern Air Temple that said that he found something I may be interested in, so after I leave Ba Sing Se, I'll be going there."

Kya stopped eating and looked at her father, "No.", she said stiffly, "You can't go to that place.", tears started to fill her eyes.

The disciplinarian in Katara puffed up, "Excuse me? What did you just say? Did you forget your manners?"

Kya turned to her mother and cried, "Mommy, he can't go to that place."

Katara reached over to Kya's chair and pulled her into her arms, "Oh Kya, it's okay. We've been to Ba Sing Se lots of times. You've been there, remember."

No matter how much her mother spoke softly or rubbed her back Kya didn't calm down. After a few minutes she slid out of her mother's arms and ran out of the door. "Kya!", Katara called, jumping to her feet and running to the door, but the little girl was just too fast, she was already almost out of her mother's sight. Tenzin began to cry.

When Katara looked back Aang was already behind her, grabbing his staff from beside the door. "I'll get her, all of this is my fault. You stay with the boys. I'll bring her home."

Aang tapped his staff on the porch floor and took off after the little girl. Within a couple of minutes he had caught up with her. He swooped down close to the ground and scooped her up into one of his arms.

"Let me go Daddy!", she commanded as he put her on his back.

The air bender guided the glider higher into the air, "I could do that, but I don't think you would like it."

"That's not fair!" she yelled into his ear, anger dripping from her face.

"Well, it's not fair that you ran away.", he said, thinking about his own childhood, "I guess that's something else you got from me.", he mumbled to himself.

He landed them on the top of the Temple. It was somewhere he would go when he wanted to think. When he landed, he sat on the edge with his little girl still on his back. Kya plopped down behind him in a huff.

"You know," he said, staring out over the island, "just because something bad happened in a place doesn't mean it's a bad place.", Kya said nothing, "Lots of very bad things happened at the air temples after I got trapped in the ice," he slipped into the memory of finding Gyatso's skeleton when he was a boy and shed a single tear, "but I never stopped going back. Good and bad memories are all a part of life. It keeps our world, and us, balanced." The little girl perked to attention when she saw her father's hand move to wipe the tear from his face. "Yes, something bad happened in Ba Sing Se, but great things happened there too.", she stood and leaned against his back with her hands draped across his shoulders and her face resting against his head. They sat there quietly for a minute. "These scars aren't the only thing I brought back form Ba Sing Se that I'll have forever," she looked around at his face, "I brought you back from Ba Sing Se too."

"Huh?", she finally said.

"You were born in Ba Sing Se. That's how I remember that place. Not as a place of endings, but as a place of beginnings."

Kya's eyes popped open in surprise, "I was born in Ba Sing Se?", she asked, sitting by her father so she could look at him while he talked.

"Yes, we were staying there at the time, not far from the Jasmine Dragon."

"Uncle Zuko's Tea shop.", she remembered out loud.

"That's it, but back then it was his Uncle Iroh's shop."

Kya faintly remembered an old man named Iroh that use to tell her and Ursa stories, bounce them on he knee and talk in riddles she didn't understand, but something about the memories seemed like a dream. Perhaps it was the fact that he died shortly before her fifth birthday.

"I think I remember him.", she said as if she was trying to access the distant memories.

Aang smiled at his daughter, "Iroh would bring your mom tea and snacks everyday until you were born. And we were all very excited when you came. He said that we should name you Kya to honor your grandmother.

"I thought mom named me."

"No, but she had talked to Iroh so much about her mother that he made the suggestion. He said," Aang tried to imitate the Dragon of the West's voice, "The beauty of Katara's memories of her mother matches the beauty of the little princess you hold in your arms."

The little girl blushed and laughed at her father's bad imitation, "He really said that."

"He did. When I go to Ba Sing Se, I go to the tea shop and the house we were staying in and I think about Iroh, and holding you for the first time. When I go to a place, I think about the good memories. If I focused on bad memories the I'd never go anywhere."

Kya hugged her father and kissed his cheek, "I'll see you when you get back Daddy."

It only took Aang a few days to handle things in Ba Sing Se, so he was able to come back home early. Katara was surprises when Momo came flying up to her a week and a half earlier than expected. He chattered at her like he always did when he wanted her to follow him, so she gathered the children and did just that.

Momo lead her to the pier where Aang was jumping down from a massive Earth Kingdom ship. "Katara! Kids!", he yelled as he ran to them, "I have them! I finally have all of them!", he yelled happily as he embraced all four of them, spinning his family into the air.

His wife laughed, "You have what?"

"The gates! I have enough to finish them, and plenty of spare ones. The construction crew restoring the Eastern Air Temple found a gigantic storage area under the middle mountain. It was full of replacement gates, books, art, lots of things. Even gliders and clothes that belonged to other Air Nomad Avatars!", he was so excited that Katara saw that little penguin-sliding boy again, "I can teach the kids to use the gates now, this is so great."

Katara looked at him, "I thought you said they were for air bending practice?"

"They are, but just the footwork part. I can set them spinning, the kids just have to avoid getting hit.", he said, so excited about the prospect that he didn't consider how that statement sounded to his wife.

"Hit?", she looked at one of the massive boards being unloaded and got defensive, "My kids are too small to get hit by " she looked at one of the large panels as two men carried it off the ship "that.", she said pointing.

Aang just laughed", that's a beginners tool. The worse I've ever seen anyone get was a black eye."

"What? No, definitely not!"

Aang got serious, "Katara, they're no more dangerous than Bumi's boomerang,"

"I don't know Aang, I guess I'd have to see it first."

Aang instructed the men who came with him on the ship, and together they had the air bending gated up in about an hour. He stood back and marveled at having this piece of history on the island.

Katara, the children, the men who helped Aang and a few Air Acolytes gathered on the grass to watch the Avatar's demonstration. He changed into his training clothes. When he returned he stood back and sent a strong gust of wind through the gates to start them spinning. He reached down, picked up a leaf from the ground and spoke to the crown like the monks had spoken to him and his fellow air benders-in-training. "The purpose of this exercise is to learn how to move like air.", he sent a small puff of wind into the leaf that sent it moving through the currents of air, rotating around the spinning panels, "You have to be the leaf and move seamlessly through the gates." He stepped closer and took a deep breath, "I haven't done this in a really long time, so I may get hit or even fall, but don't try to come in to help me, I'll be just fine."

Katara furrowed her brow. She knew that he knew what he was doing, but, as he said, he hadn't done this since he was a child and he was much bigger and taller now; and besides, the gates seemed like they were moving far too fast."

Aang took a cleansing breath and stepped lightly into the gates. The assemblage gasped as he gracefully moved from one end of the training tool to the other without touching even one panel. He made it form one side to the other and then went back in for the return trip. He was almost done when he stumbled ever so slightly and the unforgiving gate slammed into his back, sending him flying to the ground. His wife ran to him. To her surprise he pushed up out of the ground with a smile on his face., "I forgot how fun that was.", He rolled over on his back and laughed.

"You will not be putting my babies in that thing. It's too fast.", she said just loud enough for her husband to hear.

"I won't spin it that fast for them," he spoke back at the same level, "I just wanted to see if I could still do it."

She smiled, "Well, it looked pretty good to me," she brushed some of the soil from his face, "Until you ate dirt, that is."

"Daddy!", Kya said as Aang lifted himself up from the ground, "Can I go next?"

Katara looked at her little girl, "I don't know if you should try it tonight.", she said in her concerned tone.

"But Mom…"

"Kya, you have to practice the footwork before I can even think of letting you step into the gates.", as always, that tone meant that the discussion was over.