Two days passed both quickly and slowly. Since that night with Hama, Toph had noticed Aang's nightmares had increased until he began looking for excuses to stay up, leaving him exhausted during the day.

It didn't help that he lied about what it was that he saw in his dreams when he did eventually sleep. Even had she not been able to tell he was lying based on his heartbeat, there was no way Aang would have woken up screaming because the Fire Lord was shouting at him for having no pants. Regardless of what he said, he wasn't sleeping, and he wasn't the only one.

Toph couldn't recall the last time she had experienced bad enough nightmares that kept her awake the rest of the night. Sense-images of her friends dying in front of her was the reoccurring theme—by someone like Ozai or Hama, or a disaster like a fire or animal—and rather than waking up when they were about to die, she had to witness their deaths with the knowledge that had she had had the opportunity to stop it from happening and either failed or didn't try. Even the warm mornings didn't stop her from shivering when she recalled those fresh nightmares.

Sokka didn't seem to have been as affected by Hama, but he had his own worries to deal with as Day of Black Sun approached. Thumping footfalls vibrated through the earth as he paced in the middle of the night near a mightily angry, sleep-deprived Toph. He spent nearly all his time with Hakoda and the other leaders except for maybe one meal during the day, and even when he was present it seemed his mind was somewhere else.

It was clear Katara was still shaken by what had happened. Her tone was less sure yet her temper flared much more than before. There were several moments when she wasn't paying attention and stayed unnaturally still until someone else noticed and drew her attention again, usually Aang or Sokka.

Though Zuko was usually the closest person to her, he didn't say more than he usually did, and he didn't say anything about her mental absence when it was much too clear for it to be anything else. One time, they were getting ready to eat around the campfire, and Zuko had taken two bowls from the camp's cook and handed one out to her. When she didn't notice, he sat down and held it until Sokka jokingly asked if she was eating. Something was wrong, obviously, but there wasn't much for anyone to do to help, by Toph's estimation, except carry on like normal.

If nothing else, they ate well, and though they were separate from the fighting men most of the time, meals were when they all could gather together and talk. For the most part, Toph listened to the men, their stories so varied and different from hers yet similar in surprising ways. They laughed at terrible things and reminisced about old times; they told stories, both that seemed too impossible to be true and ones she wished were embellished. They were good men, she found. Experienced fighters and not too serious as to forego making fun of themselves.

And Hakoda was not exempt from the joking either. When he had begun telling an embarrassing story of his son, Sokka tried to tackle him, leaving the two of them wrestling in the dirt for a short minute until Sokka cried out in a strained voice amidst the other men's cheers of encouragement: "Okay! Okay! I yield!" and the two parted, laughing.

"You're a man but don't think you can best him yet, young wolf," Bato said before the father and son sat again.

Hakoda nudged Sokka with his elbow. "You have a few more years before you can think of beating me, but I still enjoy the challenge." He grinned. "Well, the exercise, at least."

"Hey!" But Sokka only followed it up with a laugh. "Fine, old man."

"Hey now, who are you calling old?"

-o-0-

The others had stood to leave for bed, but Zuko saw that Katara remained where she was, frozen in her own thoughts and staring into the fire.

"Katara…" Zuko touched her knee. "Katara."

She gave a small start then relaxed. "What? Sorry," she said, maintaining her distracted air. "I, uh, I was just thinking about—well, I'm…" she furrowed her brow for a second then shook her head, "not much. Sorry. Tired. You were saying?"

Glancing over to the other men by the fire, Zuko saw Hakoda's concerned look. Returning to her, he said, "It's getting late."

"It is," she agreed. "Goodnight," she called to the men and stood to follow Sokka, Aang, and Toph through the maze of campfires and tents back to their more secluded camp.

"Is there nothing I can do?" Zuko whispered, keeping his eyes on the others up ahead.

But her silence made him look. The light from the waning moon cast a shadow on the side of Katara's face. She eyed him, but then dropped her gaze when he noticed.

It had been awkward since that first night. Unlike when they were drifting down the river, and she had simply propped herself up against him to sleep, this time she had taken hold of him and pulled him closer. She wanted him. She wanted to be closer to him. Him!

She wanted comfort, he cautioned himself, and I gave it. Nothing more.

But things had changed—for both of them. How he had fallen asleep with Katara resting her head against his chest he didn't know, but when he woke up—he was first to, of course—she was still there, beautiful and wonderful and serene and…and trusting. That was what made him feel lighter than air: having her be so comfortable with him that she could sleep.

But when she woke up, the illusion was broken. She was embarrassed, ashamed, and didn't want to talk about any of it. "I'm sorry," she'd said. "I don't want you to think—"

"I wasn't thinking anything. I was—"

"Good. I mean, with everything that happened I was upset—"

"I know."

"—and Day of Black Sun being so close, I was—"

"I know, you were—"

"Stressed," they finished in unison.

And that had been that. They hadn't talked more than was necessary to each other, and they each buried themselves in training and training Aang.

Zuko managed. "Managed" was as close as he could get because, spirits curse it all, his mind kept drifting back to Katara. What was she doing? What does she think of me? were only a couple of the questions going through his mind. The ones that scared him were along the lines of how he could prove his—his mind deftly avoided a word and replaced it with another: affection.

But what had been a simple solution of distance was instead a bigger problem when he saw Katara become less mindful and more distracted. Her temper also flared more but that was always quickly followed by tearful apologies. He had moved from where he slept beside her so he didn't know for sure if she had nightmares, but the bags under her eyes were enough evidence.

Distance wasn't helping, but what was there to do?

"Please," he said to her, "let me help you. There must be something." She met his eyes, unsure and looking almost scared. "Please," he mouthed rather than whispered.

For a second it looked like she was going to say something, but then her eyes slid from his to the others to finally the ground again, and she quickened her pace. Zuko half-jogged for two or three steps after her but then reason made him slow.

She doesn't want to talk to me.

-o-0-

"You aren't okay, Katara," Aang said, pulling her aside when they returned to Appa and the rest of their camp. "Is it still Hama?"

Hama had affected them all, but Katara seemed to be taking the worst of it. For Aang, he had been left with the obvious problem: if he couldn't defeat Hama, how could he expect to beat Ozai and defend himself from an entire Fire Nation army? His only comfort was that Hama had different abilities than Ozai, abilities that Katara appeared to share.

Bloodbending. He'd heard Hama use the word and he'd felt its influence on himself. It was disconcerting to be sure, being manipulated like a doll, but Hama had said she was the last bloodbender until Katara learned it, and now that Hama was put away and Katara was the last free bloodbender, it was nothing to fear.

But the thing that puzzled him was that even though Katara was the only one that didn't have to ever be afraid of bloodbending, she seemed to be. Witnessing their fight, Aang saw Katara throw off Hama's bending and remain in control; if she could do that, why was she acting the way she was now? In the end, it didn't matter what it was that was bothering her; she needed to get better.

"Or something else?" he probed.

She shook her head, looking anywhere but him.

So it was Hama. "But you were—"

"Do you think," the words burst from her lips, "Hama started wanting to kill them—like she enjoyed it? Do you think she was always bad?"

That threw him. "What—" He still had to take a moment to shift his focus to answer the question. "What do you mean? Like, was she born bad? No, people are born good."

"But do you think she had a choice? Like back when she first bloodbended and hurt someone she didn't have to, do you think she cared? Or—"

"People always have a choice," he reminded her. After all, it had been his choice to spare Ozai.

"I know, I know…" she said, recovering from her outpouring of questions. "I just—I just can't imagine anyone good turning into that, not without something dark already inside her, you know? I wonder if she realized she was turning bad…"

Was Ozai always bad? At one point, he had been a boy—had he been a good person growing up? Had he been nice? What changed? A thought occurred to Aang: Had he been like Zuko? Lost? Confused? Until he wasn't. When had he made the choice to be evil?

"I don't know, Katara," he admitted, "but Hama, Ozai, they already made their choices." Why is she thinking about this now of all times? "Why is it bothering you?"

She looked down at her hands. "I guess I'm beginning to understand a little better why you don't want to kill Ozai and why honoring your people is so important. If we save the world but we lose our morals, our spirits, in the process…"

"Then who are we? Not the good guys."

"No," she said softly, "not the good guys." Then, taking a breath and letting it out slow, Katara finally said, "Thanks, Aang," with a faint trace of a smile. Though it wasn't a particularly happy smile, it was surer than before.

-o-0-

A rift too far to jump lied between Sokka and the battle. A dark, endless ocean separated the two, but the sounds and images of the fights called to him, mocking his inability to cross and leap into action.

Boomerang in hand, he looked for anything that might help him, but he was alone and without aid: it was too high to reach from the sea below, too far to throw a rope if he had one, and he lacked the bending ability to help him cross.

This idea signaled the appearance of his friends passing him and water-, earth-, and airbending their way into battle.

"Wait!" he tried shouting, but they didn't hear him.

They didn't realize they were heading to their deaths. They didn't have the knowledge he had. Ozai was waiting for them—

-o-0-

Sokka's eyes shot open, and he moved under his blanket for Space Sword. It was still dark out, but it felt like several hours had passed.

"Sh!" someone—Zuko?—said some distance behind him.

"What?" Katara. Awake and ready to fight, by the sound of it, though she whispered along with him.

"Can we…?"

The question was answered by the sound of shifting cloth, and their footsteps quickly fading in darkness.

Sokka slowly lifted his head and saw the dark figures move away.

"What do you—"

He flinched at the much louder voice of Toph next to him. He whipped his head around to look at her. She paused, then started again, quieter, "What do you think they're doing?"

He whispered back, "I don't know." He twisted back around and watched their backs shrink as they moved farther away. Then they stopped near the edge of the cliff that dropped back to the sandy beach below, all the while speaking to each other in serious tones and gestures.

Zuko touched Katara's arm and said something. She took it in her hand, replied, and let it fall.

He said something else, this causing her to raise her voice above the ambient noises of the ocean: "I'm not!"

And Zuko, matched her energy, insisted, "Yes, you are!"

"They're going to wake Aang," Sokka commented out loud.

"Nah, he's not waking up."

He looked back. Sure enough, Aang was fast asleep with Momo curled up against him. He lied against Appa's side and on a padded bed of blankets and sheepskin generously given by several of the tribesmen. His nightmare-fueled yells hadn't yet woken Sokka up. No, but I had to be woken up by someone. Can't have one night's peaceful sleep before my presentation. "That's something, at least," he remarked, and turned back to the couple.

Couple. Hm. The descriptor surprised him, but when he thought about it…Maybe? He glanced at Toph. He couldn't read her face so he ventured slowly: "Do you think…?"

"Do I think what?"

"Do you think they…you know…?" But Toph didn't say anything to help him. She hardly moved a muscle. "Are you going to make me say it?"

"What?" she replied innocently, which only confirmed what he thought might be true.

"That they…they like each other?"

Toph, who had been propped up on one elbow, relaxed and turned over on her back. "Finally! Finally, it got through your thick head!" Then she turned over on her stomach, and he saw the big grin on her face. "Your heart's going like crazy right now. And your face—I can't read most expressions but, man, yours right now…"

He could only imagine and hurriedly tried to compose himself. "Wait, they do? And you knew?"

"Of course I knew, Cactus Man!"

But—What— "How? They're…they're…"

"Yes?" She laughed. "Spirits, your face."

"Enough about my face!" Remembering Aang, he lowered his voice some. "It's—Why?" But…didn't it make sense? Glances he thought had been simply that suddenly turned into the possibility of greater meaning. Their walks together every now and then; their arguments, arguments that turned into conversations between just the two of them; everything felt to be proof of something more, something that had been hidden in plain sight.

He watched them closely now, recalling the way Zuko touched her arm—familiar, confident—and Katara hadn't shied away from it either. They had now returned to their muted tones, only Katara wiped her cheek this time.

"This can't be why she's been different lately, is it?" he asked Toph, hoping it be so though he knew it wasn't. You're supposed to be happy when you're in love.

He frowned. It was true that he had been absent most of the recent days, but he hadn't been blind to her change in demeanor when he returned for dinner. Maybe I thought it'd go away on its own. It didn't help that between interrupted sleep, constant strategizing, and working with Dad he had become too exhausted to do more than eat and try to sleep before Aang's nightmares or his own woke him up. But it hadn't gone away; that much was clear. And I didn't do anything to help.

Happiness fading from her face, Toph replied, "No…she's still upset about what happened, you know, before."

He nodded. "But why haven't they said anything?"

Toph turned her head to "look" at him, which he knew was done just so he could properly receive the remark that would doubtless follow: "Besides the fact that you'd try to hurt and or kill him if he told you, and Aang still has a major crush on Katara?"

"Okay, I admit, I probably wouldn't be too happy, but hurt him? Come on, Toph."

Toph gave him a dubious look.

"Fine. Maybe I'd challenge him to a fight—but I wouldn't kill him!"

Smiling, she turned away, satisfied.

"And Aang's trying not to because, well," he continued, shrugging a shoulder and watching the two of them in the distance, "Avatar reasons. He doesn't want her to be used against him and, honestly, I'm glad."

Silence followed for a few seconds, then Toph spoke, finally answering his question: "I don't think they know. Well, they know, but, like, don't know they know." She let out a pent-up breath in a rush of air. "I don't know. People can make themselves believe things they know not to be true. Sometimes people hope so much for something, it might as well be true—it is true for them."

He furrowed his brow. "What are you saying?"

"I'm just saying it's not as simple as feeling for a heartbeat to tell what's real. If we asked them if they like-like each other, she can say one thing because she has it in her head as true and have it be the opposite in her heart. Same for Zuko. But it's been a while since I've asked. Maybe they've realized it for themselves."

"You asked her if she liked him?"

"Once or twice. You were there."

He thought back to it and remembered Toph asking in jest. Even then, Katara's reply had been evasive, purposeful or not: I care for him as a patient.

"Sh! Sh! They're coming back." Toph turned so her back was to them and pulled a blanket up to her chin.

Sokka did the same. Katara returned to her place by his side, and she tossed and turned for several minutes until Sokka fell asleep thinking about the prospect of she and Zuko together.

-o-0-

Something cold touched his arm and Zuko tensed awake. Memories of memories of dreams were banished from his mind in an instant, and it was only Katara's figure that remained in his vision. She leaned over him, kneeling and watching him with her dark blue eyes like a healer searching for signs of life.

"What is it?" he whispered, barely moving his lips. There weren't any immediate dangers from what he could tell, but he couldn't be certain and Katara looked upset; she was on the verge of tears.

She took a steadying breath, then: "You said you wanted to help me."

Her words should have made him relax but they had the opposite effect. He sat up. "I do. Of course. What is it?"

Encouraged, she gathered herself and said, "I want you to promise me something."

He nodded for her to continue, but it took another second for her to start again: "I want you to promise that if I…if I start turning into Hama, you'll stop me."

What? "What do you mean—?"

"Zuko, I… When I bloodbended—"

"You did it to save us."

"That doesn't—!"

Realizing the level of volume their conversation was reaching, he waved his hand down. "Sh!"

"What?"

"Can we…?" He pointed over where the ocean could mask their voices from the others.

She gave him a look but stood to allow him to pull back his blanket and get up. In that short time, his mind—perhaps still half-asleep, he thought—tried making sense of what Katara was saying. Turning into Hama? What made her think that? Who? That was the question that burned itself into his heart. Who would want her to think she was anything like Hama?

Before he could ask his question, Katara started again: "I saved you and Aang, but when I did I…" She wrung her hands, at a loss for words. "I felt…good—no, not good like I had saved you—well, after I did, yes, but—" she shut her eyes and took a breath then let it out slowly. "I felt good about how I stopped her: controlling her. Zuko, I could have made her do anything I wanted. Anything. I wasn't afraid because there was nothing to be afraid of; I had control of it—her, I mean. See what I'm saying?"

You don't like that you weren't afraid? He shook his head. "I'm sorry…"

"She wasn't a person anymore, Zuko! She was just my," she searched for the right word, "puppet! I didn't care about her."

"You cared about us more than her," he replied matter-of-factly. What was the problem?

"I was the most powerful person in the world, more powerful than Aang right then, and I felt nothing!" Her chin quivered, but she pushed through it, adding, "Nothing good. Who…what good person would do something like that? And all I've been able to think about is how despite all that, I want to try bloodbending again—to be that powerful again, to never be doubted again. I know I could do great things with it: I could take down Ozai; I know it, but I…I feel the coldness in me. I know it will spread and turn me into her or a version of her if I do it."

Her eyes, which had wandered as she spoke, returned to his. "So, please, help me."

Zuko took her hand in his, surprised at his own nerve and that she didn't pull away. Memories of his past actions recalled themselves and he couldn't help feeling the accompanying shame. But for all that, his shoulders relaxed. "I don't know if you believe me, but you're a good person, Katara."

She pulled back a little, and he let her hands fall away from his grasp. "I don't know. I'm not a bad person, but I'm not good either."

"You are good."

Katara stared at him, saying nothing. For a second, he thought about saying something more, but he recalled her and Bato's standoff and that it was something Water Tribesmen did. Several moments passed and neither moved but, as if to steel herself, Katara yelled, "I am not!"

He flinched at her sudden outburst but replied, "You! Are!"

She blinked, mouth slightly ajar. Then a doubtful look took over.

Not taking his eyes off her, Zuko didn't wait for her to reply: "Katara, you are the kindest person I've ever met. You think about everyone first. Even now you're trying to protect us from you. You care so much about everyone, complete strangers, that you delayed us getting here because you wanted to heal them." He remembered her reaching out to invite him to join the rest of them by the fire. "You saved me when no one else could, when no one else wanted to."

Shaking his head, he continued, "I don't think you've done anything wrong, but if you think something is happening, something that's making you turn bad then…okay, I promise I'll—I'll try to stop you, but, Katara, you are so…" the words wouldn't come, and he balled his firsts for a moment before letting them go, "…so good." He opened his mouth to say more but closed it. This isn't about me.

But she had caught him. "What?"

"I was just going to say I know what it's like to turn into something, someone you didn't want to be. After my mother disappeared, I had turned into my father before I realized what was happening." Like remembering a bad taste, Zuko didn't experience the hate as he had when it grew in him, but that didn't mean he didn't inwardly recoil at the thought. "I didn't feel him take hold of me. I should have. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I wish, when it was happening to me, that I had been more like you and fought it."

"But I'm not fighting it. I'm just," her chin quivered again, and she wiped a tear from her cheek, "I'm scared. I don't know what to do."

"I don't know either," he confessed, "but it's good you told me. If there's one thing you've taught me, it's that we don't have to do anything alone." And though he had said it at least once, he had to say it again: "You are a good person, Katara. If Uncle were here, he'd tell you that when I was, well, how you first met me—bad—I was never really taken over completely, though I nearly was." You're rambling. "I just mean to say that there's always hope."

Much to his surprise, she chuckled through her tears, and said, her voice still thick with emotion, " 'Always hope'? Who are you and what have you done with Zuko?"

He gave her a small, comforting smile. "I guess you've rubbed off on me."