When Katara awoke she was no longer in the catacombs underneath Ba Sing Se.
"Katara?" whispered a desperate voice "are you okay?" There was a searing pain in her head so bad she didn't dare open her eyes, not yet anyway. She couldn't remember what had happened. Where she was or why her head hurt so badly. "Katara please wake up." she felt a hand lightly brush her face.
Suddenly the memories came rushing back to her with a force so crushing she began to gasp for air. She had been in the catacombs with Zuko, her worst enemy- except he hadn't been that night. He had been different. He showed her a different side and contradicted that belief she had had that all firebenders might be born just a little evil. He showed her that much of who he is, much of his pain, comes from the same place as her own. From the loss of a mother. However, this is where their paths diverged. When Kya died the Water Tribe gathered around Katara and her brother. Every night a family from the tribe brought over different things like Sea Prune Stew and Seaweed Noodles, asking how they could help Hakoda and their family. When Zuko's mother was taken from him he was left with a father and sister who looked at him only with scorn, and an empty palace to ease his broken heart.
Then there had been Aang and the look of heartbreak on his face in caves. Then the battle and Azula. AZULA! Katara's eyes shot open and she sat upright gasping for air. "Whoa, whoa. You're okay!" She had been lying in Zuko's lap, and he caught at her wrist as she lashed out in confusion. She looked around, she was no longer in the catacombs under Ba Sing Se. They were sprawled out in the desert. Sokka tending to a fire, eyeing Zuko suspiciously and Toph standing next to Aang who was wrapped in blankets and laid out on a bed she had earthbent.
"Aang!" she yelled trying to get up. "I can heal him, let me go!" she said, pushing Zuko away. Katara had only managed to go a few steps before the pain in her head became too much and she stumbled forward.
"Katara!" Sokka said, reaching for her. He was too far away to catch her. She never hit the ground, in the blink of an eye Zuko had sprung up and caught her in his arms. However, he didn't lower her to the ground.
He looked at her sadly. "You should rest," Katara opened her mouth to protest but Zuko cut her off. "But I can see that you won't until you've seen him." Zuko started towards the makeshift bed that Aang was lying on.
He gently placed her next to Aang, letting her stand up but left his arm out as if to say you can lean on me if you need to. As much as she hated to, she was thankful and let half of her body sink into Zuko's side. She would feel the warmth radiating off his body, despite the ground underneath her Zuko felt like the only solid thing within miles.
She looked at Aang, his eyes were shut and there were burn marks that started at his hands and made their way up arms, like tiny bolts of lightning. The once smooth skin marred with red. Looking at Aang you couldn't tell that he was breathing, the only indicator that he was alive were his tattoos which glowed a faint blue. Katara let out a cry, "Sokka! Bring me water now, I need to help him."
Sokka said nothing but brought her pouch of water to her. The water rose to her fingers and began glowing. She moved her hands up and down Aang's, trying to close the open wounds and sterilize them to prevent infection. When she was done she realized that the wounds hadn't closed, although she had cleaned up the excess blood, Aang's hands and arms were still torn up. "I need more water!" she said, turning to the others.
"That's all we have…" Sokka said quietly. Katara looked around frantically for some indicator that he was wrong or that he was lying, surely one of the others had their waterskin or there had to be a body of water around. Her hand flew to her neck remembering the Spirit Water, she grasped at emptiness as she remembered it was gone. Then the realization began to sink in, they had fled Ba Sing Se into the desert. Of course, there wasn't any water. She felt helpless, as she had the last time they were trapped in this sandy prison.
She was at a loss. "But we need to help him."
"I know, but we don't even know what's wrong with him." Sokka said quietly. "Is he even-"
"He's alive." Toph said. "I can feel his heartbeat, it's faint. I don't know what's wrong with Twinkle Toes but I know two things: he's alive but he doesn't have long. I don't know how but we have to help him."
"What about spirit water?" Zuko asked nervously.
"Don't be stupid," Katara snapped. "You know as well as I, that I used my only one on you."
Zuko flinched like she had slapped him again but didn't otherwise react. "I meant is there a way to get more?" Katara paused for a moment thinking.
"Sokka how far away are we from the Northern Water Tribe?"
Sokka thought and said, "less than a week's journey."
"It's settled then. We're going."
—-
The gang quickly packed up camping, loading the belongings they had escaped Ba Sing Se with and taking the time to carefully lash Aang to the saddle. Katara and the others weren't likely to get much sleep given everything that had happened, but there was no sense in taking extra risks. After everything was packed everyone clambered onto Appa, Zuko turned and offered Katara a hand. She stared at it for a moment, as though his hand might be an unfriendly otter penguin.
She didn't take his hand, grabbing the side of the saddle and hoisting herself up. When she got to the top she settled herself nearest to Aang and as far away as she could get on the saddle from Zuko. She swept a hand across Aang's lifeless body, and bit back a cry, wishing she could do more to help him. What was wrong with her? First she failed at healing Zuko's scar and now she couldn't close simple flesh wounds for Aang. Normally, healing came naturally to her, like breathing. All she had to do is focus her chi, letting it flow through her and into the person she was healing, unblocking or correcting and harm that might have been done. Katara wondered if her chi had been blocked somehow.
They had flown through the night and well into the midday when they decided to give Appa a rest. By Sokka's estimates they were only another day's flight from the Northern Water Tribe. They could feel it in the air, the hot humidity of the desert had begun to give way to the bitter cold of the north. And in the morning the ground was covered with frost and light pieces of snow.
Appa circled the area and found a grove next to a stream, which would provide shelter and protection should they face any kind of attack. The moment they touched down Katara sprung in to action getting Aang comfortably settled in a nest of sleeping bags on the ground. As soon as she was finished, she straightened up brushing off several day's worth of dust. "I'll be back. I need to be alone." And with no further explanation she headed up the stream, around the bend, and out of sight.
"Ugh women." Sokka said, smacking his face and turned back to the tent he had been putting together with only moderate success. There was a yelp as Sokka stumbled forwarded into his makeshift tent, knocking the entire structure over. "Hey TOPH!"
"What are you yelling at me for? Maybe you should watch where you're going before you try to blame the nearest female for everything." Despite her words, there was a huge smirk on her face and Zuko thought he could see a small bump in the earth receding back into the ground as though it had never been there.
"Uh do you two think she's okay?" Zuko asked, pointing his thumb in the direction that Katara went.
Sokka raised an eyebrow like he wanted to say something snarky or accusatory but was still nursing a big welt between his eyes where his face had struck the wooden part of his tent. "It's been a hard few days for all of us. She just needs some space."
"Are you sure someone shouldn't go after her? She seemed really upset."
"I don't thi-"
"It's a great idea, in fact, why don't you go check on her!" yelled Toph.
Zuko and Sokka both turned to her, a bit confused by her enthusiasm. She shrugged. "Or sit around here wondering, what do I care?"
"Uh, oh. Okay, I'll go check on her." he said a bit skeptical before turning down the path Katara had just gone down.
Zuko wove his way down an unused trail, flowing the faint prints that Katara's moccasins had left in the dust. He wondered if he was going the right way as the prints led away from the main river. Zuko thought he had lost the trail at one point but climbed over a snow covered boulder and found that they picked up on the other side. After a few more minutes of walking he could hear running water again but it wasn't part of the stream.
"Katara!" He called out. Zuko looked around for any sign of her. Strung over a tree was Katara's tunic and it was covered in bright red, fresh blood. Zuko took off sprinting, as quick as he could follow the footprints. "Katara!" Before he had gone very far he found that the solid ground beneath him had run out, toppling off a shallow edge into the water.
Zuko braced himself for the icy chill, waited for it to soak his clothes and drag him to the bottom of whatever body of water he had just flung himself into. It never came. Instead he was met it felt like being flung into a warm bath, albeit he still took in a lung full of water or two before someone grabbed him by the arm and hauled him into an upright position.
"What the hell are you doing here and why are you screaming?" Katara said. She stood in water up to her waist and wearing her white swimsuit that she normally wore for bending practice with Aang.
"I-I-I-" Zuko tried to reply but only managed to sputter out water.
"Oh for the love of Yang Chen." Katara said, giving her wrist a light twirl, bending the water out of his lungs.
Zuko coughed a few more times for good measure. "Um, thanks for that."
Katara said nothing, putting her hands on her hips waiting for his answer. "I was just coming to see if you were okay, you seemed- upset?"
Her eyes narrowed, "Given the past few days, I certainly think I have a good cause to be upset."
"That's not what I was trying to say."
"I also think I said I wanted to be alone." She gave him a hard look, she knew she was being a little mean but the guilt inside her prevented her from being anything but. If she had just been stronger in the catacombs maybe she could've saved Aang. If she hadn't been such an idiot and wasted the Spirit Water on Zuko maybe could've saved Aang. Zuko had proved that he meant them no harm but what was she thinking? She gave ZUKO, the boy who had kidnapped her and her friends on numerous occasions the only thing that would've been able to save Aang. Without Aang the war was hopeless, they might as well give up now. Katara pushed back tears at the thought of being the reason why the whole world is left in chaos.
"I'm sorry, you just-. I saw blood and I was worried."
"Well thank you, but I don't need you looking out for me." She turned away, signaling that he could leave. She wanted more than anything to run and fall into his arms, hiding away from the world. Undeniably they had connected in the catacombs, that was the first time she had felt understood by someone else in a long time. Aang lost his people and Sokka lost a mother too, but it was different. Katara would never know the complete and utter misery of being the last of her people. How suffocating the loneliness must've been. And she would never have the luxury of a sibling that slid into the role of "mother" like she did for Sokka when Kya was killed. But what kind of person would she be if she let herself do that? Her entire focus needed to be on helping Aang. In whatever way she could.