"You ready to face him?"
Zuko and Katara stood before the iron door that concealed Katara's mother's killer. Zuko's skin tingled in anticipation, the weight of what they were about to do and the importance of his assistance setting in. It felt good, really good to be doing something for someone else in the name of justice. This was one step of many in righting the wrongs of his nation.
Katara's arms were wrapped in writhing tendrils of sea water that mimicked tentacles, and they sprayed him passively as they moved through the air. The spray was hot, mirroring their puppeteers flushed skin. She was later focused on who was beyond this door.
She didn't answer before rearing back and busting the door down. She immediately unleashed a vicious wave of water through the doorway. Zuko jumped in front of her as the water receded, shooting streams of fire from his clenched fists. He was poised to defend her from any incoming attacks. Not that she needed it, but he'd be damned if he didn't stop any rogue attacks before she could. This fleet was among the most savage in the nation, known for separating families and murdering innocent men, women, and children under the guise of strategy. Really, Zuko knew, they did it for sport.
The flames had already consumed them, made them corrupt. Zuko had decided he would never let himself fall to the hunger of his own fire like that.
Zuko parried the fiery attacks of the soldier at the wheel of the ship, dodging and rolling and hoping Katara was out of the way of the blasts. The black fabric of his concealing tunic stuck to his skin with sweat.
"Who are you?" The soldier asked, glaring between them. Katara was standing proud beside him, clearly not having taken cover but instead ready to deal her justice.
"You don't remember her?" Zuko scoffed, still poised to attack. The hellion had murdered so many villagers he had clearly lost track of the casualties. "You will soon."
He shot another blast of orange flame. The man leapt out of the way, spinning to perform a cobra attack Zuko knew well. He crouched to parry... but the man never struck.
His arm trembled, al the muscles in his arm clenched and trembled. The man let out a choked sound of confusion. He began flailing this way and that like a...
like a puppet.
Zuko turned his wide eyes and saw Katara's outstretched arms, her menacing expression. Sweat dripped down her cheeks and made tendrils of her damp hair cling to her face. She almost seemed to glow, reminding Zuko of the giant fish monster Aang had turned into after the moon spirit was killed. Katara emulated the same kind of power now. The power of the ocean, itself.
Zuko glanced out the porthole window at the full, brilliant moon shining outside. Exactly what was Katara capable of tonight?
The helpless man crumbled to the floor, his wrists bent at painful angles. Zuko suspected they might be broken. Katara extended a flexed hand in some sort of uniform technique, and the man's body complied. Zuko swallowed. He knew this woman was a powerful bender, but he had never seen this kind of complete domination of another person before. He thought back to Katara's threat when he had first joined the group:
"You make one step backward, one slip-up, give me one reason to think you might hurt Aang, and you won't have to worry about your destiny anymore. Because I'll make sure your destiny ends … right then and there. Permanently."
Zuko realised just then how many ways she could keep that promise whenever she saw fit. It should have frightened him, but instead he felt a swell of pride and arousal building at his core. He turned to the soldier pinned to the metal floor.
"Think back to your last raid on the Southern Water Tribe," he demanded.
"I don't know what you're talking about... I don't know!" The soldier rasped.
"Don't lie!" Zuko knelt in front of the man's head, looming over him intimidatingly, "look her in the eyes and tell her you don't remember what you did."
This, this element of war was what Zuko was good at. He would deliver. He would make this man beg and cry and wet himself until he admitted his crimes. Zuko was so much better at being the enemy than being the ally.
Katara swirled her arms and shifted her stance, causing the man's torso to roll upwards so that he was looking up at her. Her light blue eyes, visible and shining through her face covering, glared down at the man. Zuko stood and stepped back to be near Katara, to protect her from any unexpected visitors from the open doorway behind her.
She let him go. He crumbled. Zuko whipped around to her in surprise.
"It's not him."
She sounded so young and sad, all the vengeance sucked out of her demeanour. Her eyes shone with frustrated tears, "he's not the man."
"What do you mean, he's not? He's the leader of the Southern Raiders, he has to be the guy!" Zuko eyed the man warily now that he was free from Katara's grip.
Katara didn't look like she'd even heard him. Shaking, the water tribe girl turned and stalked out the door.
Zuko hauled the soldier up and shoved his pathetic body against the wall, twisting his arm and poised to break it. He willed his hands to heat up, enough to scorch the soldier where he gripped him. He could feel Katara's rage and sorrow as if it were his own, and in some ways, it was. He had lost his mother to these men, too. They took whatever they wanted, reaped destruction like a rogue forest fire. Even if he wasn't the man Katara wanted, he still was far from innocent.
"If you're not the man we're looking for, who is?" He growled.
Zuko left the man unconscious and badly burned on the floor of his ship. He'd desperately wanted to kill him, but hadn't he decided not to let that side of him win anymore? Even for Katara, he couldn't let himself satisfy that lust that would turn him into a needless killer.
Katara sat waiting on Appa, the big creature floating in the sea and rocking slightly on the waves. Her back was to him, knees pulled up to her chest.
Zuko could sense her unwillingness to talk or be comforted, he knew it well, himself. Instead, he urged Appa to fly. The full moon showered Katara with light, wrapping her up like a protective blanket after just bestowing her with the power to bend a man's blood.