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A week ago
Aang was still staying at the North pole. Yugoda had taught him everything he needed to know in regard to healing. He wasn't on the same level as Katara, but he was close enough which wasn't too bad. Aang had been with the northern water tribe for almost two months now and didn't have any plans on where he, Appa, and Momo would go to next.
The air bender never really had a plan on where they would go to. Sometimes he would just have Appa flying aimlessly until he had an idea on where he wanted to go. It seemed likely that they would do that again once it was time for them to leave the north pole. Until he was contacted by his past life, Avatar Roku.
Aang had been meditating in his room within the royal palace. It was a bit extravagant for his liking but Chief Arnook insisted for him to take the room. He was in deep meditation until he heard a voice calling out to him.
"Aang…"
He immediately stood up and turned to see where the voice had come from. There was no one else in his room except Momo, who was sleeping on Aang's bed.
"Over here Aang", the voice spoke again. Aang turned to the mirror in his room and saw Avatar Roku instead of his reflection.
"It's great to see you again Roku!" Aang spoke. It had been a while since he last met his past life and he was happy to see him again.
Roku smiled, "It is good to see you again Avatar Aang, but I'm afraid the circumstances for this meeting isn't well."
"Is something wrong?"
"You may have ended the war, but there are still those who wish to go forward with Sozin's agenda for the fire nation. Your friends are in danger."
"Oh no.", Aang had fought with Ozai loyalists during his travels. He didn't have a problem handling them, but they were a pain for him to deal with it. Aang didn't doubt that his friends could fight them but if Roku was contacting him then there was a reason for him to worry.
"You must hurry back to the fire nation, otherwise your friends will be killed." Roku warned him. Aang didn't think twice about leaving. He informed Chief Arnook, grabbed his belongings and Momo, and took off with Appa. He couldn't afford to waste a second getting to the fire nation.
Four days later
Aang, Momo, and Appa were still in the sky flying towards the fire nation. The sky was dark with a full moon. Aang had been anxious to protect his friends but now was anxious about something else.
Katara.
He was finally going to see her again after almost a year since he left the fire nation. A part of him was happy while another part was worried. According to his what his friends told him on Kyoshi Island, she wasn't the same person. He hated that his departure had made her cry, while he knew that Katara would be hurt he didn't expect it to hurt her that bad. He hoped that she would eventually get better. At least with Zuko by her side then maybe she would eventually be okay. That was what Aang was thinking until he read a letter from Bumi.
Aang had made a stop at Ba Sing Se before flying all the way to the north pole to check if he had any mail and found one from King Bumi. In the letter Bumi had informed him of Katara's visit to Omashu. Apparently she had heard that he visited and asked Bumi if he knew where Aang was, which at the time was Kyoshi Island. Aang couldn't believe that Katara actually threatened to hurt Bumi.
She is desperate Aang, she told me herself how much she misses you.
Aang read that sentence multiple times. Even after all these months, she still missed him.
Katara asked if you were avoiding all of them or just her. I just told her to give you time and she just left right after. If she didn't suspect anything before then she does now.
Aang knew Katara well. She was smart and could put two and two together. Even if Bumi didn't directly answer her question, it confirmed what she thought. At the time he just decided that he wouldn't deal with what he just learned and went ahead with his journey to the north pole.
Now that he knew that he would have to face her Aang was incredibly nervous. He was scared of what would happen. He could just leave as soon as he saved his friends from the Ozai loyalists, but he knew it wouldn't be right to do so. He would have to stay with them for a bit before leaving. Aang kept thinking of ways to avoid talking to Katara.
'Katara will want to talk in private so maybe I should make sure to have our friends around. Or maybe I can pretend to be sick…no that wouldn't work.'
"You seem troubled Avatar Aang" a female voice came from behind him. Aang turned to see a dark skin girl with flowing white hair sitting on the saddle.
"YUE!" he jumped from Appa's head to the saddle and sat in front of her.
"It's good to see you Aang." Yue smiled.
"It's great to see you too. I never got to thank you for helping me when I was stranded in the ocean. Had it not been for your encouraging words and raising the tides then who knows what would have happened to me."
"Don't mention it. I already knew that you would save the world and you did. I'm always happy to help a friend, which you look like you could use right now."
"What do you mean?" Aang asked with a confused expression.
"Your mind seems clouded from what I could tell. You can't go into battle if your mind isn't clear so let's talk about her."
"Her? Who are you talking about?"
"Katara. Who else would I be talking about?" Yue rolled her eyes.
Aang rubbed his neck and chuckled nervously, "Oh yeah…of course"
"You cannot avoid confronting her. It was only going to be a matter of time before you saw each other again."
"I know that I can't keep avoiding her forever. It's just…I'm scared. I feel like I am finally at a point where the pain in my heart doesn't hurt as much as before. I felt like I was finally feeling better and that being away from Katara was working well for me. I accepted that she and Zuko are together but deep down…I still love her."
"You're scared of suffering in that pain again. I understand how it feels to watch someone you love be with someone else."
Aang knew she was talking about Sokka. Yue had to fulfill her duty and became the moon spirit because of it, it cost her a chance at happiness with him and she had to watch over the world while Sokka was with Suki. Yue spoke again.
"While confronting Katara will not be easy it is something that must be done. The bond you two share is special and isn't something you want to lose. She needs you just as much as you need her."
"The war is over, and she has Zuko. What could she possibly need from me?"
"Zuko isn't you"
Aang scoffed. Katara had chosen Zuko, likely because he older, taller, and better looking than him.
"Maybe that's why she chose to be with him." Aang suggested.
Yue sighed, "Even if that was the case Aang, it doesn't mean you are not important to her. Your friends have already told you how she has reacted to your absence. You both have been miserable without each other. You two must confront each other."
Aang looked away. Yue wasn't going to give him much of a choice on the matter.
"Aang look at me", Yue put her hand on his chin and turned his head so that he would look at her. "You are going to save your friends and when you do, you will not run away from Katara when she wants to speak with you. Give me an Avatar promise that you won't run from this confrontation with her."
"Fine! I give you an Avatar promise that I won't run from Katara when she wants to talk", Aang knew that as Avatar he had no choice but to make this promise. Especially when it was the moon spirit making him promise her. Despite that, Aang knew Yue was only doing this because she cared.
"Now that's a good avatar." Yue smiled as she started to pinch his cheeks which annoyed Aang.
"Do you seriously need to do that?", he asked with a deadpan expression.
"Sorry, I can't help it. For someone that is the most powerful bender in the world, you're so cute Aang." Yue giggled.
"I'm not cute…", Aang grumbled, making her giggle even more.
"Want to know a secret?" Yue questioned him with half-lid eyes.
"Sure…" he replied curiously, not knowing where this was going.
"When you first came to the Northern water tribe, I was going to tell my father to break off my engagement with Hahn so that I could instead be engaged to you."
"HUH?!" Aang gasped. While he wouldn't deny that Yue was beautiful, the idea of marrying her was crazy to him. Yue laughed at his reaction.
"It may sound ridiculous but it's true. Marrying Hahn wasn't something I wanted. I figured it would have been nice to be married to the Avatar instead. My father wouldn't mind having you as his son-in-law. But I decided against it."
"Why?"
"I noticed the way you would look at Katara. It was easy to see you had feelings for her back then"
"How could you possibly know that?"
"Because it was the same way Sokka looked at me", Yue smirked.
"Oh…" Aang flushed. Yue laughed again and turn towards the moon.
"It's time for me to go now." She said with a somber tone.
"Oh…well thanks again Yue. Talking to you made me feel better, it's what I needed before I see Katara and my friends again. Is there anything you would want me to tell Sokka for you?"
"No, I already said all that I needed to say to him, he knows that I will always love him. I want you to give a message to Suki instead. Tell her that I'm happy that Sokka has her. She is very good to him."
"I'll be sure to let her know Yue." Aang replied with a smile.
Yue floated close up to Aang and kissed the arrow on his head. "Goodbye Avatar Aang". After bidding him farewell, she faded away from the saddle.
"Goodbye Yue"
Current day
Aang was determined to save his friends but worried none the less. Appa had just flown over the fire nation islands and the fire palace could be seen from far away. Aang didn't want to push his bison any more after flying non-stop all day and the sun was going down.
Aang peered at the palace and notice that nothing seemed out of the ordinary.
"Well guys, it looks like we might have got here before the loyalists could attack", he spoke to Momo and Appa. Neither said anything other than a grunt and a chirp.
BOOM!
There was an explosion on the left side of the palace.
"Monkey feathers! I spoke too soon. Appa fly faster to where the explosion came from!" he ordered his bison. Appa grunted and flew as fast as he could. Once they were close enough, Aang jumped off from Appa's head and used his glider to fly down. Once on the ground and close enough, he saw a group of ten fire benders surrounding his friends. Only one of them was standing up.
'KATARA!'
The enemy fire benders got in position to attack.
"Oh no you don't!" Aang stomped on the ground and raised his right arm up, raising an earth wall between Katara and the fire benders. He didn't waste a second speeding up towards the loyalists. He jumped over all of them and landed in front of the wall.
"It's the Avatar!" one of the loyalists spoke.
Aang swung his staff and blew them all away. Four of the loyalists stood back up and punched their fire towards him but the air bender spun the fire right back at them with his own fire bending.
'Gotta end this quickly!' he thought to himself. Before they could all get up, Aang stomped on the ground again and raised his arms up. The earth under the loyalists rose up and started to encase their bodies. Aang then brought his arms down and earth went down with the loyalists buried within the ground with their heads sticking out. Now they weren't much of a threat to anyone.
Aang looked down at all of them and gave them a smirk. He then remembered his friends behind the wall he made. Katara was behind that wall. He turned back to the wall, ready to bring it down.
Aang was finally going to see Katara again after all these months. He wondered how exactly she was going to react. As he stood in front of the wall, he took a deep breath.
'Here we go…'
Aang bent the wall down and was face-to-face with Katara.
"Aang…" Katara spoke after what felt like an eternity for both of them. Aang had grown since the last time she saw him. Now he was just as tall as her and his facial features had become chiseled and sharp. The new muscles he grew did not go unnoticed.
"Hi Katara", Aang forced a smile. For him, Katara was just as beautiful as ever although she seemed tired and worn out. Under her eyes were bags that weren't there before. Her hair was messy and all over the place. He then turned to see Zuko wincing as he tried to sit up. Aang then looked to where his friends laid unconscious. Before Katara could speak Aang turned back to her and spoke.
"We need to get everyone to a secure area and heal them as much as we can."
Katara was going through a roller coaster of emotions. She felt relief and happiness seeing Aang again after so long, but also sadness and rage because he took this long to come back to her. She had so many questions for him but knew that now wasn't the perfect time to ask them. She nodded her head in response.
"You take Zuko and I'll bring the others one by one." Aang walked to Toph while Katara helped Zuko back on his feet. They all went into a living room area. Katara worked to heal Zuko's injuries while Aang worked on healing Sokka. The palace servants brought in medical workers to help Toph and Suki. Katara was surprised to see Aang using water bending to heal. She wondered if he learned it because he didn't intend on relying on her anymore to heal him. She had so much that she wanted to say to him, but their friends were her first priority. Zuko himself wanted to say something to the air bender but was in too much pain.
"A-aang…", he tried to call out to him.
"Don't speak Zuko. We'll have plenty of time to talk later, right now you just need to rest", Aang assured him. Zuko just nodded his head in return and closed his eyes.
After a couple of hours, they were done. Katara had left to change her clothes, leaving Aang and the others in the room. Suki was the first to wake up and was surprised to see Aang by her side. He explained to her how Avatar Roku warned him a week ago that the loyalists would attack them a week ago. Now that someone was awake, he could leave the room to call Appa and lead him to the stables. When Sokka and Toph would wake up, Suki could just explain to them what happened. As he got up to leave Suki grabbed his arm.
"There is something you need to know Aang. Katara overheard us talking about contacting you to help us with the loyalists." She went on and explained to him what had happened before they were attacked.
"I'm sorry Aang. We didn't mean for her to find out." Suki started to tear up. Aang wrapped his arms around her to calm her down.
"It's okay Suki. I shouldn't have made you all keep this from her in the first place. I put you all in that position. It was only a matter of time before this happened."
Suki hugged him back, still feeling like she let Aang down.
"What are you going to do now?" she asked. Aang leaned back and they finally let go of each other.
"For now, I'm just going to take Appa to the stables. He must be tired from all the flying he did to get me here in time."
"And what about Katara?"
"I honestly don't know yet…I'm going to have to talk to her but I'm not sure what to say."
"You need to tell her the truth Aang."
Aang nodded in return, he knew Suki was right. He walked out of the room and exited the palace through the front entrance. In his mind he was hoping that he wouldn't have to confront Katara anytime soon.
"Leaving so soon?' a voice came from behind him.
He didn't need to turn to see who it was, Aang would recognize her voice anywhere. 'Guess it's now or never.'
"I'm just going to take Appa to the stables…I'm not going to fly off if that is what you're worried about." He replied.
She scoffed in return, indicating that she didn't believe a word he was saying even though it was the truth. Aang turned around to face her.
"I'm telling you the truth Katara."
"I would ask Toph to confirm that, but she's unconscious, but then again she would probably just lie for you anyway." she retorted. "Just like Suki and my brother did."
"Please don't be mad at them Katara. If' you're going to be mad then just be mad at me."
"Oh, trust me I am definitely mad at you!" Katara cried out, "How could you just leave like that?! Do you know how worried I was? How could you leave me?!"
"I didn't want to leave you Katara."
"Then why did you?!", she stepped up to and pushed him, "IF YOU DIDN'T WANT TO LEAVE THEN WHY DID YOU?!"
Katara kept pushing him over and over again. When Aang didn't answer she grabbed a hold of his shirt and started shaking him, yelling at him to answer her.
"WHY DID YOU RUN AWAY FROM ME?!"
He couldn't take it, so he pushed her away from him.
"BECAUSE YOU BROKE MY HEART KATARA!"
Katara's eyes widened in surprise. 'How did I-…oh right. Me and Zuko.'
"I figured that you would be hurt but I thought you were okay with us being together. When we finally told you guys the truth, you didn't seemed bother by it at all."
"It's called acting Katara. Something those so called "actors" at the Ember night plays know nothing about. I had already known about you and Zuko before you decided to tell us."
"What?! When did you find out?" Katara wondered. She and Zuko were cautious with their secret meetings.
"I found out the night I disappeared from Ember Island. I came back to the house and I heard you two talking about me", Aang looked down at his feet, "I heard everything you guys said, and then I saw you guys kissing. I just felt like falling apart right there and so I ran out of the house."
"Oh Aang…" Katara remembered that night. To think that Aang had walked in on them and they didn't even notice. Aang looked up from the ground and back at her, his eyes narrowed.
"So much for being confused huh?"
It was her turn to look down, blinking away the tears forming in her eyes. Now he knew that she had lied to him that night.
"Please try to understand Aang. The last thing I wanted to do was hurt you."
"I know that, but it still hurt me none the less. After I finally defeated Ozai, I just knew I needed to go."
Katara looked back up at him, "You didn't have to go Aang. Just because I chose to be with Zuko didn't mean that I stopped caring about you."
"Contrary to what you might think Katara, telling someone that you still cared for them despite choosing to be with someone else just makes it worse. No one ever feels better after hearing that!"
"Either way it doesn't mean that you still had to leave me like that. If you had just talked to me then—"
"Then what? How could us talking about it help at all? It would have just made everything between us awkward. We were already dancing around each other since the ember nights plays. Trying to talk about it would have just made everything worse." Aang replied with an annoyed tone.
"And leaving was the better option?!" Katara cried out.
"It was better than staying and seeing the girl I love be with someone else! I was suffering just being around you once the war was over."
"You were suffering?"
"You ever see those paintings of broken hearts and notice how they are always broken from the center instead of anywhere else? Because that is how it feel, and it hurts a lot Katara! I felt that pain constantly when I was around you, because even then I still loved you."
"I made you feel that way?" Katara asked, feeling guilty. She knew that he would be hurt but not to that extent.
"Yes. If I had stayed then I would have just blown up on you and everyone else after bottling up how I felt. Leaving seemed like an idea that could benefit the both of us. I know that it was selfish of me to just go off like that, but I figured since you had Zuko then you would be okay."
"How could you think that I would be okay with you gone from my life?! I was the farthest thing from okay when you left me." Katara's shoulder started to shake again, "I was miserable without you Aang. Do you have any idea how much it killed me to know that you were avoiding me after all that we've been through?"
Aang didn't respond.
"Just how long were you planning to stay away from me?"
He must have heard that question over a hundred times by now and even then his answer remained the same.
"I don't know", he shrugged.
"Was it working for you?" she asked. Katara wasn't sure if she was ready to hear his answer.
"I did feel better when I finally got out of the fire nation. But I still missed you Katara."
She had already asked him multiple questions, but she still had one more for him.
"Do you still love me?"
The question caught him off guard. 'Why did you have to ask me that?'
Fortunately, before he could answer, they heard a grunting noise that came behind Aang. They looked to see Appa standing there with Momo on his head. Aang couldn't feel more relieved with the bison's timing.
"Hey guys, did I keep you waiting long?" Aang asked.
"Rrrrr" was all that Appa could say. Aang knew that Appa was telling him that he wanted to go to the stables already.
"Appa! Momo! It's so good to see you two again." Katara spoke up as she walked towards the mammals, eager to hug them. To both her and Aang's surprise, they started to snarl at her.
"Guys, this is Katara. You know her." Aang tried to tell them but they didn't seem to care. All that Momo and Appa saw was the girl that had hurt their friend. Momo still remembered how devastated Aang was when he found out about Katara and Zuko and while he didn't understand what was happening, he knew Aang's sadness was caused by those two.
Aang sensed that if he didn't keep them away from Katara, something bad would happen. He took hold of the reins and pulled Appa with him towards the stables. "It's time for you two to get some rest."
He turned his head back to her, "You should get some rest too. You used up a lot of your energy to heal the others"
They left Katara standing there bewildered at what just transpired. She eventually went back inside the palace. She realized that he didn't answer her last question. Their confrontation wasn't over just yet.
Hope you guys liked this latest chapter. If you did then be sure to leave a review, they are what keep me going to write more. I will get to work on "Yandere Katara" as soon as I can, but it might take a while depending on how much college assignments I got.