Katara allowed her eyes to open as the blinding light finally dimmed. The upper half of the iceberg had seemingly disappeared, leaving only a massive, snowy crater in its wake. And from that crater emerged the glowing human-like...thing, though the glow was quickly fading. Fading, fading...it was just a boy.

He took a step. From the corner of her eye, she could see Sokka raising his club. "Stop!" her brother warned.

As the last rays glowing light finally escaped the boy's body, the boy let out an exhausted sigh and began to collapse, his body fighting to keep upright as he stumbled down the slope of the crater towards Katara. She instinctively gasped and rushed forward and managed to catch the child as his legs finally gave out.

She examined him more closely. A handsome little thing who was probably at least a year younger than even her. His clothes were obviously foreign, though not Fire Nation either; they hung far too loosely on him to properly protect him from the cold, yet his skin was warmer than hers. The once-glowing arrows on his head and hands were blue markings of some sort, obviously permanent too. "Tattoos" was the word; Gran-Gran had described them once. How did a boy like him end up trapped in ice? How did he even survive? Did the glowing mean...

Sokka prodded the boy with his club. "Stop it!" Katara instantly snapped, and her brother quickly shrunk back. She carefully placed the boy on the snow.

His eyes slowly opened, and she smiled in relief. He looked so sweet and innocent, staring at her with an obvious sense of awe and wonder. And then he spoke.

"I need to ask you something..." he said weakly.

"What?"

"Please...come closer."

Katara slightly frowned. "What is it?"

The boy's lips seemed to quiver, and his eyes drooped to the side. Katara leaned in to the boy's face.

The pained look on the boy's face almost instantaneously became a bright smile. "Will you go penguin sledding with me?" he chirped.

Katara's mind froze with confusion. "Uhh...w-well sure!" she stammered. "I guess..."

The boy swooped himself off his own feet in a single, unnaturally elegant motion. A thought from during the canoe ride was weaving itself through Katara's head as she scrambled to her feet, but she couldn't remember just what it was...

The boy surveyed his surroundings, rubbing his head. "What's going on here?" he asked.

"You tell us!" Sokka growled, stepping in front of his sister with his club at the ready "How'd you get in the ice? Why were you glowing?" He poked the boy for emphasis.

The boy lazily pushed the club to the side. "I'm...not sure."

Something growled from within the crater, scaring Sokka into taking a step back. "What the fu-"

The boy smiled and leapt up and over into the crater. "Appa, are you all right? Wake up buddy!"

Katara and Sokka scrambled after him. At the center of the crater, or more accurately, filling the crater, was a massive, furred beast; upon opening its eyes, it gave Aang a big, fond lick.

"Hurray, you're alive!" the boy shouted, warmly hugging the fluffy thing.

Katara carefully slid down the crater to get a closer look at the beast, with Sokka reluctantly following. Mostly white fur, with brown fur running along its back, and six legs. Oh, and a massive saddle on the back as well.

"Holy...what is that thing?" Sokka asked.

The boy turned to face Katara. "This is Appa, my flying bison."

"Right," Sokka said sarcastically, "and this is Katara, my flying sister."

Katara shot her brother a threatening glance.

"So do you guys live around here?" Aang asked.

"Don't, Katara," Sokka warned, raising his club. "Did you see that bolt of light? This guy could be a Fire Navy scout."

Katara rolled her eyes and pushed Sokka's club down. "Oh yeah, I'm sure he's a spy. Just look at that evil look in his eyes."

On cue, Aang shot Sokka his most earnest grin, earning him a giggle out of Katara.

"I'm Katara," she said. "The crazy, paranoid one is my brother, Sokka. You never told us your name."

"Aang," he said, making yet another impossible leap, this time on to the beast's head.

Katara sharply inhaled as her thoughts cleared. "You're an airbender!" she exclaimed.

"Sure am!" he confirmed proudly.

"Giant light beams, flying bison, airbenders..." Sokka groaned. "I've got midnight sun madness. I need to row home where stuff makes...sense..."

Katara smirked. The silence of an idiot realizing his idiocy was always satisfying.

"Well..." Aang began. "Do you have a way home? If you guys are stuck, Appa can give you a lift!"

"We'd love to!" Katara said delightfully. "Thanks!" Aang eagerly airbent her up Appa's saddle, enhancing her small hop with a gust of air that carried her to the top.

"No way!" Sokka shouted as he approached the beast. "I'm not getting on that."

"Then you better hope the Fire Nation finds you," Katara quipped.

Sokka opened his mouth, had another moment of silence, and then closed it as Aang airbent him up next to Katara.

"Okay, first-timers," Aang announced. "Hold on tight. Yip-yip!" He whipped the reins, and with a curt growl, Appa soared into the air...

For a few seconds. Then he just flopped back into the water and began swimming. Katara crawled to the front of the saddle.

"Wow," Sokka snickered from the back. "Truly amazing."

Katara shot her brother yet another angry glance.

"Appa's just a little tired," Aang replied, and Katara couldn't help but smile. He smiled back. "A little rest and he'll be soaring. You'll see." Katara tried to turn back, but Aang kept smiling.

Katara shifted uncomfortably. "Why are you still smiling at me?"

Aang immediately looked away. "Oh, I was...I just thought you had a question!"

Sokka softly groaned in annoyance, earning him yet another dirty look from Katara. She turned back to Aang with a soft smile. "As a matter of fact, I do," she said. "You're an airbender. Do you know what happened to the Avatar?"

"No," he said, his voice suddenly solemn. "I mean, I knew people who knew him, but I don't. Sorry."

Katara's eyes drooped with disappointment. "Oh, just curious. Good night."

And not another word was spoken on the journey home.

Zuko leaned hard against the railing, staring into the night sky, daring the stars that had laughed at him for so long to challenge him now.

A metal door behind him creaked. Familiar footsteps pattered. "I'm going to bed now," Uncle yawned. "Yep, a man needs his rest. Getting very cold outside." He smacked his lips and yawned again to show just how tired he was.

Zuko didn't move. He wasn't a child anymore.

Uncle sighed. "Prince Zuko, you need your sleep. The battle ahead will be difficult. Your father, your grandfather, your great-grandfather...all of them failed..."

"Because their honor didn't hinge on the Avatar's capture," Zuko interjected. "Mine does. This coward's hundred years of hiding are over."

Uncle sighed again. Zuko already knew what he was going to say. "I'm just saying, finding the Avatar is only the beginning, not the end." And with that, the old man disappeared back into the warmth of the ship.

"You're wrong, Uncle. It ends tomorrow. I will capture the Avatar, or I will die trying." He gave the stars one last hard look before retreating back into the ship.

Blinded by lightning, deafened by thunder, Aang could barely hear his own screams as he clung to Appa. He hardly noticed when the relentless rain and gusts of wind were suddenly replaced by the unstoppable tides of the sea, or when exactly he had stopped screaming and started drowning, or when his body simply took over for him and encased himself and Appa in a tomb.

"Aang?" a voice called out in the distance, somewhere far away in both time and space. "Aang! Wake up."

Aang shot out of his bed screaming, tossing aside his covers. Some familiar voice kneeling beside him let out a yelp of surprise, averting her gaze.

"Get dressed quickly," she whispered. "The whole village is waiting to meet you!"

Aang let out a loud "Oh" as he realized that he was completely nude, and he felt himself blush. "Sorry, Katara, I...uh...yeah, clothes!" He hurriedly clothed himself and barely managed to grab his glider-staff before Katara dragged him out into the cold.

For a village made of ice and snow, it was surprisingly large; Aang counted at least two dozen villagers greeting him. Oddly enough, they were all female. Aang snickered at the thought of Sokka being the only boy in the whole village, the poor soul.

He smiled and bowed toward the villagers in a sign of respect, but they all seemed to shrink away from him, murmuring amongst themselves.

Aang frowned, leaning towards Katara. "Why are they all looking at me like that?"

"Why are you so pale?" one girl asked. A woman near the front center of the crowd, far older than most of the others, gave the girl a stern look before stepping forward.

"What she means," the old lady began, "is that no one has seen an airbender in a hundred years. We thought your people ."

Aang felt something slightly stir within his heart, like a flicker of darkness trying to warn him of something. But he snorted at the ridiculous idea. "Extinct?"

"Aang, this is my grandmother." Katara was gently tugging the old lady closer to him.

"Just call me Gran-Gran," she chuckled. "Easy on the tongue."

"Extinct?" Aang repeated.

The screaming and giggling of a large pack of boys entering the crowd shook Aang from his thoughts. They found Appa resting in one corner of the village and began attempting to overwhelm him; the beast simply closed its eyes in resignation. Sokka chased after them with his spear, his face livid. "Stop it! Stop it right now!" he cried. "Soldiers! Back to training! There's still a war going on!"

The children largely ignored him, but the flicker in Aang's heart suddenly became a steady flame. "War..." he muttered.

How do you stay warm? What are those arrows? Where are you from? What's airbending? The villagers had become voices in the background.

"What's this, a spear?" Sokka asked, snatching away Aang's staff with rude curiosity. "You can't stab with this."

Aang once again snapped back into reality, and he smiled. He lived in the present, not the past, not the future, so the present was what he should focus on. "It's not for stabbing!" he chided playfully. "It's for airbending."

He flipped a small switch in the staff, and orange wings fanned out of the staff. The villagers let out a collective "Ohhh."

"Magic trick!" one child giggled. "Do it again!"

Aang giggled himself. "Not magic, airbending! I control the air currents around my glider to fly."

"Yeah, sure," Sokka drawled sarcastically. "Humans can't fly."

Aang smirked.

"Come," Gran-Gran muttered, pulling on Katara's coat. "You still have chores."

Katara took another few seconds to stare in awe as Aang danced through the air with his glider. She turned to Gran-Gran. "He's the one," she said excitedly. "He will teach me waterbending."

"You can't learn waterbending from an airbender," Gran-Gran scolded. "Try not to pin all your hopes on this boy."

"But he's special!"

"Oh? How?"

Katara clenched her fists in hope. "I can tell! Maybe he can't directly teach me, but you yourself said that air nomads were a spiritual people. I can sense he has much wisdom."

There was a playful twinkle in Gran-Gran's eyes. "Is that what it's called these days?"

Katara look up to the sky in time to see Aang's glider zip by as he waved. She waved back. He did a couple more loops before barely grazing into an icy pillar and spiraling into the snow.

"Woah careful!" Sokka cried belatedly. "My tower!"

Katara found Aang a couple steps away, rolling in the snow in delight, his staff's wings tucked away safely.

"Great," Sokka grumbled loudly. "You're a bender, Katara's a bender. Together you can waste time all day long."

Aang stopped rolling. "You're a waterbender?" Aang asked, a hint of admiration in his voice.

Katara fiddled with her fingers nervously. "Well...sort of. Not really. I haven't really trained, and...I don't know any teachers. I might be the only waterbender left in the South."

"That's not right," Aang said mournfully. "There should...what about the northern tribes?"

Katara brushed her hair loops in thought. "That's on the other side of the world...and I haven't left home before."

"There's always a first for everything. And I have a flying bison. I can personally fly you to the North Pole!

"I mean...I dunno..."

"Penguin!"

Aang dashed off into the distance at impossible speeds. Katara couldn't help but smile as she sprinted after him.

Zuko kneeled into a combat stance as the two soldiers began circling around him, though it was, in Iroh's opinion, still a little narrow.

"Again," Iroh said sternly, a bowl of roast duck in one hand and chopsticks in another.

The young prince instantly spread out his arms, showering his opponents in flame. He dodged, ducked, and weaved through the soldiers' retaliation blasts, sending more fire blasts of his own as he twirled in mid-air. The blasts were weaker than they could've been, but still enough to force the soldiers back as Zuko landed into another stance.

Iroh rubbed his eyes and stood up. "No!" he barked, placing his food on the table. "What have I taught you?" He circled his hands up and down in a breathing motion a few times before letting loose a jet of fire at his nephew; it dissipated a noticeable distance before it reached its mark, but the concussive force of the blast caused Zuko to stagger back a step. "Power in firebending comes from the breath, not the muscles. Your fire only burns; it has no force. Anyone with sticks and stones could make a fire that burns. Get it right this time."

As expected, Zuko shook his head in suppressed anger. "Enough!" he roared. "I've been drilling the same sequence all day. Teach me the next set! I'm more than ready."

Naive child, his skull was thicker than the walls of Ba Sing Se. "No, you are impatient," Iroh said stoically. "Basics first. Drill it again!"

Zuko spun around and blasted one of the soldiers, throwing him to his feet. "The sages still tell us that the Avatar is the last airbender," he seethed. "If that's true, he'll be over a hundred years old by now. One century to master the four elements. I have to be ready. You WILL teach me the advanced sets!"

For a moment, Iroh considered striking the boy for his extraordinary stupidity. He gave a thin smile instead. "Very well," he conceded, "but first...well, this roast duck won't finish itself!"

"Last time I did this I was just a kid!" Katara laughed as she rewarded the two otter-penguins with a fish each.

Aang scratched his head, staring at the massive metal ship in front of him. "But you still are a kid. What happened to this boat? It's huge."

Katara's smile vanished. "A Fire Navy ship," she stated grimly. "Gran-Gran said it was part of the first attacks. Don't know what happened to this one, or , though personally, I hope some sea monster got them."

The dark dread in Aang's heart rushed back to the front of his thoughts."Okay, back up," he said, walking towards an opening brutally ripped open . "I have friends all over the world, Fire Nation included..."

"Aang, stop!" Katara cried as she chased after him. "You don't know what's inside. There could still be booby-traps."

"If there's one rule all benders have to follow," Aang muttered, suddenly feeling wise, "it's that you can't fear the unknown." He took Katara's hand and pulled her along into the ship. Even thought much of it seemed badly worn or damaged, it still looked fascinating inside, a maze of metal and some wood here and there. He wondered what it looked like when it was still floating."

Aang prodded one of the wheels curiously. "Anyways, what I'm saying is...what war are you talking about?"

"Aang, how long were you in that iceberg?"

Aang shook his head. The dread was twisting his insides. "I don't know. A few days, maybe?"

"The war's been going on for a hundred years!"

The dread exploded into terrible comprehension. He knew. Of course he did; he was the Avatar. The ghosts or spirits or whatever they were inside of him could sense the terrible imbalance in the world the moment he awoke from that iceberg.

Aang staggered backwards until he found a cold wall to slump down on. How many friends had passed. Did Monk Gyatso die thinking that Aang was dead? Did he think Aang was a coward? He wanted to cry, but everything around him just seemed surreal. "One hundred years!" he whispered.

Katara squatted beside him. "I'm sorry, Aang. Maybe...maybe there's a bright side?"

Aang looked up at Katara. "Well...I did get to meet you," he admitted.

Katara smiled warmly as she helped Aang off his feet. "Let's head back, this place is creepy."

The sound of a snapping wire brought the last bits of Aang's mind back to the present. The whole ship seemed to groan, the clicks and whirs of rusty machinery crescendoing into...

A single poof. Something whistled through the air.

"That must've been a flare!" Katara whispered, her voice trembling. "The village..."

Aang nodded in understanding and took note of light pouring from a large hole above them. "On it," he said, grabbing Katara close to him.

"What are you..."

"Hold on tight!" Channeling the air beneath him, Aang jumped.

The two figures in the distance hopped their way off the ship and across the snow, though perhaps "hop" wasn't quite the correct term. Each leap was impossibly fast, impossibly high, impossibly long, and Zuko had trouble keeping track of his quarry. So the Avatar was an airbender. Hiding...where?

Zuko followed their general direction, scanning left. He eventually spotted what looked like a small village. How clever of the Avatar, though the villagers would provide little resistance in a real fight. The primitive water tribes of the south had been defanged long ago, their waterbenders neutralized in Fire Navy raids on the off-chance that the Avatar was actually a waterbender.

"Wake my uncle!" Zuko roared at one of the soldiers. "Tell him I found the Avatar."

"Yay, Aang's back!"

The village children giggled with glee as they rushed towards Aang and Katara in the distance. But Sokka had other thoughts in mind. He grabbed his spear and stood up as Aang drew near.

"You fucking...I knew it!" he hissed, pointing his spear at the boy. "You're leading the Fire Navy straight to us, aren't you?"

Katara's motherly instincts seemed to kick in as she put herself between Aang and the spear.

"Aang didn't do anything!" she protested.

"There was this booby trap," Aang mumbled sheepishly, "and I guess we...booby-ed right into it."

"Katara, I warned you about that ship!" Gran-Gran said, her voice trembling, and Sokka couldn't help but smile bitterly at Katara's stunned face. "Now all of us are in danger."

Aang began to walk away, and Sokka almost pitied the boy. "I brought here there," he groaned. "It's my fault."

"Foreigner, you're banished from our village," Sokka boomed angrily.

Katara clenched her fists. "You're making a mistake!"

"No, I'm keeping my promise to Dad. I'm protecting you from threats like him."

"Threat? Aang isn't our enemy! How stupid are you? Aang's brought us something we haven't had in years..."

"What?"

"Fun."

Sokka wondered if the airbender had somehow brainwashed his sister. "Fun?" he spat. "How stupid are you? You can't fight firebenders with fun. Mistake or not, he's put us all in danger. His fun has lowered our guard. This is exactly how mo-

"You should try it some time," Aang chimed in with his obnoxious optimism. "I mean the fighting...with, uh...fun...idea"

The boy seemed to shrink and wither under Sokka's enraged glare. "Get. Out. Now." The boy spun around and floated on to his giant, furry pet.

"Grandmother, please," Katara pleaded.

"Katara, your brother is right. The boy must leave."

"Fine!" Katara shouted angrily, turning around to follow Aang. "Then I'm going too!"

Sokka resisted smacking his sister in the head. "Going to where?"

"The North Pole. To find a waterbender."

Aang spun around in confusion. "I...am?" He suddenly smiled that stupid smile of his. "I mean...I am! Great!"

This had gone too far. "Katara, would you really choose him over your tribe?" Sokka asked quietly. "Your own family?"

The words stopped Katara in her tracks, and Sokka sighed in relief. She looked up at Aang and mumbled something about leaving and goodbyes.

"Thanks for sledding with me," Aang said.

"Where will you go?" Katara's voice was beginning to waver noticeably, and Sokka could hear the other children sniffling in the crowd. Part of him wished the airbender could indeed stay. But the risks were too great.

Aang looked up in the air. "Home, I guess...Wow, I haven't cleaned my room in a hundred years. Not looking forward to that." He looked at his bison. "Let's fly, Appa. Yip-yip!"

The beast roared in annoyance and began to trudge away. Sokka turned his attention away from the sad scene and towards his villagers. "All right, ready our defenses!"

The boys in the crowd simultaneously snapped out of their silent sobbing and scurried off to their assigned roles and positions. Except one little boy, who approached Sokka...

"And no potty breaks!"

The boy spun around and dutifully jogged back to his tent.

Sokka glanced back at Katara, who was being quietly consoled by Gran-Gran.

"Katara, Katara" Gran-Gran soothed. "You'll feel better..."

"ARE YOU HAPPY NOW?" Katara suddenly exploded. "There goes my last chance at...at becoming a waterbender." She stormed off furiously, and Sokka felt guilt he hadn't felt since...

But this was not the time for regrets. With one last sigh, Sokka purged himself of his doubts and marched back to his tent to prepare for war.