A. N. : The chakra of the heart, also known in the AtlA canon as the Air chakra, is symbolized by the color green. It deals with love and is blocked by grief. The endless knot is one of the Eight Auspicious Symbols of Buddhism. Trying to find all these titles could almost be enough to make me tired of this arc. Almost. The Big Bad Arc remains my most anticipated moment so far and I am having tons of fun with it (unfortunately for literally everyone in this fic). Anyway, please enjoy some Aangst.
Aang can't sleep.
He should, really, tomorrow will be another full day of flying Appa and he'll need to focus. He has to sleep, get all the rest he can, but all he does is roll on his back and look at the moon.
He can't sleep.
His back hurts.
He… isn't really sure if there's a rock under him, or if it's just the same pain as when Katara talked about his death, the same vague feeling of numbness and spider-ants running up and down his body, from his back to his foot, from burn to burn. The same pain as waking up alone in a metal ship, knowing he failed everyone once more.
Maybe there isn't really a difference. Aang's back wouldn't stop hurting if he moved the hypothetical pebble under it, he knows that for sure.
Sometimes, it feels like the pain is just a manifestation of the weight on Aang's shoulders, a knot of everything he messed up and everything he has to fix and everything that scares him.
Can he be the Avatar, help people as the Avatar, if he can't enter the Avatar State anymore ?
Maybe he should have told the others earlier, about what Roku said and about the knot in his back. Without the Avatar State, the eclipse was probably their only chance at ending the war and returning things to how they should be, and Aang messed it all up again.
It's not fair. No matter what he does, it always feels like the wrong choice – if he'd told the others and Sokka had decided to leave Suki and Zuko's Uncle behind, Aang would've felt just as bad. He knows that.
He knows that.
Aang sits up, closes his eyes, breathes. The past is the past, and what-ifs are but a weight on the mind. Change what you can, and accept what you can't change, for fighting it is to be akin to a badger-mole seeking to fly.
The voices of the monks chant inside Aang's head in an endless choir, and he usually welcomes it but tonight – tonight he just wants to sleep, without the weight of his mistakes and the things he lost clawing at his back.
The knot is here, and the more he fiddles with it and tries to untie it, the tighter it becomes. A good monk would leave the knot alone. A good monk wouldn't have a knot in the first place. A good monk wouldn't worry about messing up, about past and future mistakes, about dying.
A good monk wouldn't worry about being a good monk.
Aang inhales. Exhales. Brings his legs closer and puts his forehead on his knees. In – Out –
It's attachment, he knows. The bad kind, the kind that ties a monk to the world and keeps them awake at night. Attachment to the past, to life, to things Aang can't change. To things that aren't here anymore.
He misses Gyatso.
He misses a lot of people, really, a lot of things from before that just aren't here, aren't possible anymore. But where he can always make new friends who aren't Kuzon in the Fire Nation, can always end the war and restore things to how they should be, peaceful and fun, can always spread the knowledge of the old Gurus to the world… Where all of this is possible, the fact is that Aang is still the only one left who knows how things were. How they should be. The only one left who knows anything about the old Gurus and their teachings and –
He is the only Air Nomad left.
His back hurts.
Aang breathes, in, and then out, and when the tears come he lets them, only careful to keep quiet and not wake the others. Crying is good. It frees the heart. Tomorrow, Aang will wake up a little lighter, ready to take on the day with new energy, ready to let his grief turn into the new love Guru Pathik talked about once more.
Tomorrow, he will be a good enough monk to carry those memories alone. Tomorrow.
But for now, he buries his head in his knees and lets the tears and grief and fear flow freely, in as much silence as he can manage.
He misses Gyatso.
Most of all, he misses not being the only one who can miss Gyatso.