3. Pragmatic: Penguins Sledding, Booby Traps
The snow glistens in the fading light, reds and golds contrasting with the deep blue shadows in the way that the landscape usually does when twilight occurs. The sunsets are long now and the actual days and nights short, but Katara can recognize this particular place regardless of the lighting. The area she stands in now is one of the few places in her childhood that had remained unsullied by her mother's death- mostly because this is the first time she's been here since then. Her mother had often found Katara here with her brother- sometimes she would even join them. But Katara no longer plays.
(Katara can remember the last time she had been playing with Sokka- the last time she had felt like a child, and it hadn't been here. No, it had been closer to home on that last day. That last day- the day when joy ended and Katara might as well have become Koh himself for all the bad luck she seems to bring.)
All the same, Katara knows this clearing. In fact, if she were to crest the hill, she is certain that she'll see some child from the village holding a small smoked or salted fish (pinched from the storehouse) aloft, trying to entice penguins into carrying them around. She can almost hear the children giggling.
No, wait. She can hear laughter.
“H-Hey,” a voice calls jovially, “come on, little guys. Wanna go sledding?”
But that voice doesn't belong to one of the village children. That's Aang. And she's responsible for him, too, so she needs to go make sure he doesn't cause the animals to stampede and get himself hurt. So Katara steadies her breathing and makes her way over, just in time to watch the strange boy lunge for an otter-bird and miss. Aang gets to his feet and smiles at her.
“I have a way with animals,” he laughs, proceeding to make a weird “nark-nark-nark” sound and waddle after the penguins.
A smile tugs at her lips as she watches.
It's been a long time since she got to see a child having so much fun. Even now, the mothers don't really like it when she watches the children, often only allowing her to do so when it's time for them to lay down for a spell or if one of them (one of the mothers) is sick. And otherwise, she has so many chores to do that take her from the village or leave her by herself and can only watch from a distance as Sokka tries and fails to mold the younglings into warriors.
So watching Aang try to catch a penguin is a treat. Right now, he's trying to hold one, but the many-limbed otter-bird just drags him along as he grasps at its feet.
The words leave her mouth before she can think to hold them in, “That's not how you catch a penguin, Aang.”
“Really?” He lets go and rolls over to stare at her.
She swallows. He looks so trusting, she can't help but think, so relaxed. Even the children back in the village don't look at her with so much trust, and Sokka and Gran-Gran never... Katara's face goes blank. “Yeah. Here,” she says, forcing away her other thoughts and unthinkingly slipping into one of the few stances that helps her bending, “I'll show you.” And she plucks a small fish from the water.
Immediately the animals start swarming.
But the boy doesn't focus on them. “You're a waterbender!”
Katara's face remains carefully schooled. “Yeah. I am.” Because there's no point in denying it, really. Because she has waterbended without thinking, again, and put someone in danger, again, and obviously she should have known better because even this strange airbending boy from within the ice would know that a Southern waterbender is nothing but bad luck and now he's going to avoid her too.
But instead he says, “That's so cool! I've never met a waterbender before!”
No, I don't suppose you would have, all things considered.
She blinks. “Well, you're looking at the last waterbender from the South Pole.” Nothing much to look at really. Nothing good comes of being a waterbender these days. For her and those nearby especially.
Aang looks so confused. “But a waterbender has to master water. How can you do that if there's no one to teach you?”
(And Katara remembers then: discussions between her parents when she ought to be asleep. How great it is that the South has a bender again; how proud they are that she's theirs; how they'll find someone for her, because a bender has to learn to bend. Then: discussions between her father and Gran-Gran and the rest of the tribe when they think she's out of earshot. How terrible it is that the raids have started coming more frequently; how terrible that a waterbender has attracted firebenders again and caused so many deaths just as things were getting better.)
(Waterbending is a bad thing. A very bad thing.)
She shrugs, throwing the fish at one of the younger-looking penguins and watching as it is chased around.
“What about the North Pole? There are other waterbenders there, right?”
Katara blinks because, yeah, there would be other waterbenders at the other pole, wouldn't there? But she wouldn't really know- doesn't know if there is a North Pole still. “They're pretty far away. We haven't heard from our sister tribe in a long time.” Not since they refused to send aid at the beginning of the war.
And here Aang smiles, his whole face lighting up like an aurora. “But you forget,” he says, pointing at himself, “I have a flying bison. I can personally take you to the North Pole. Katara, we're gonna find you a master!”
She doesn't know what kind of face she's making right now. “That sounds-” There's no way that could happen. But to leave- to go somewhere where her bending isn't a curse, somewhere where she isn't hated or looked down on or known only as misfortune. To be free-
Would mean abandoning everyone that Mom sacrificed herself for.
“I mean,” her hands come to grasp each other and she realizes for the first time that she has lost her gloves. “I don't know, Aang.” His face falls and she feels so guilty. So she throws him a phrase to placate him, much like throwing fish to penguins: “I've never left home before.” Not without meaning to come back. And if she leaves the South Pole, she isn't sure she would ever return.
He still sounds a bit upset, perhaps disappointed, as he says, “Well, you think about it. In the meantime, show me what you did with the penguins again?”
Katara forces a smile onto her face. “Alright. Watch closely.”
And then the penguins mob the young boy as she bends a fish into his hands.
Shortly thereafter, they stand at the top of a cliff, two penguins following them around in the hopes of obtaining more food.
“Let's do this!” Aang hops on the penguin before she can give him one final warning about sledding, and she has to follow along.
The wind pushing the hood of her parka back and whipping her hair-loops around her face; the churning of her stomach as the otter-bird speeds and swirls around in the tunnels of ice and melting snow without care for the destination; the weight of her responsibilities falling away as the penguins soar with no fear of falling... This is the closest to free that she has felt in ages.
So of course the ride ends on a sour note.
The birds slide to a stop on an icy plain and squawk nervously, struggling to rise from under the two of them. Katara pales as she realizes where their reckless sledding- and Aang does, too, though he only stares in confusion at the sight ahead of them.
“A Fire Navy ship and a very bad memory for my people.” Jagged spires of ice hold the metal monstrosity up, the ice around it so solid that Katara cannot see the ocean below despite being mere feet from the water. “It has haunted my tribe since-” she forces the words past the blockage in her throat, “since Gran-Gran was young.”
The air here... Katara shivers. It almost feels as though Father and Lady Tui are just barely holding back a longnight storm.
Movement from the corner of her eye draws her attention. “Aang, wait!” The boy keeps moving. “We're not allowed near it- it could be booby trapped.”
Finally, he pauses, looking over his shoulder at her and grinning. “To be good a bender, you have to let go of fear.” And then he begins climbing the ice to find a way into the ship. (No, ship is too gentle a word for this giant, metal beast. It's too tame to describe what was one of the first strikes against her people.)
She disagrees- to be a good bender is to know when not to do something stupid. But she's responsible for him, which means that if he goes in there and sets off a trap she will be blamed for it. “Aang! Wait- don't.”
Koh take his face! The boy ignores her, just like everyone else does, and she is forced to follow him.
He pauses for only a moment to help her through a hole in the metal thing's side. The boy is easy to spot as he wanders through the monstrosity- his bright clothing contrasting against the dark walls, his steps echoing.
She has to get him out of here. “This was one of the Fire Nation's first attacks.”
Finally, he stops in front of a weapons shelf. “Okay, back up. I have friends all over the world, even in the Fire Nation. I've never seen any war.” He lifts one of the metal spears, a frown forming on his face.
Katara's blood turns to ice. Never seen any- Friends in the Fire Nation- “Aang... How long were you in that iceberg?”
“I dunno-” Katara can feel her feet freezing to the metal beneath her. “-A few days, maybe?”
“I...That doesn't...” Her breath mists into the air. “I think it was more like a hundred years, Aang.”
“What!” He nearly drops the spear as he finally turns to face her. “That's impossible! Do I look like a hundred twelve-year-old man to you?”
“Just- Think about it. The war has been going on for almost a hundred years; you don't know about it- you would have had to have been in there the whole time. It's- it's the only explanation.” The only one that makes sense, at least.
(The spirits play tricks on people, some of them at least, but Lady Tui and Father are too compassionate and serious, Agni too proud, and the patron spirits of airbenders and earthbenders could never be bothered to move someone through time. And lesser spirits aren't powerful enough to do such a thing.)
“A-a hundred years?” The airbender backs away from her, until his legs suddenly give out and he nearly slams against a wall. He holds his head in his hands, hiding his wide, wild eyes from her. “I can't believe it.”
She kneels down beside him, ice melting into cold water, a hand raised to touch him- to offer comfort. But she draws back. Words, too, fail her; she doesn't get farther than a weak, “I-” Because she has lost her mother, her family, her tribe, but the last two are alive still. He has lost his entire people, his home is destroyed, and all this to a war he had not even known existed. Words cannot make things better; and touch from one such as her- a Southern waterbender, of all people, would only make things worse.
They sit in silence until he draws himself to his feet. “There is a bright side to all of this. I know it.”
Katara's heart twists because, A bright side? Truly, this boy before her is so young. Maybe it's good that he can think that.
He at least has Appa. He has made it to her tribe instead of falling into the hands of firebenders who would only try to kill him. Perhaps, if there is a bright side to be found, the good he is able to see stems from those two things.
Aang staggers from the room. She rises to follow him. They have forgotten which way the entrance is and, while they look for it, his foot catches on a wire that had been hidden in a pile of snow and he winces. Katara freezes again.
Bars slide over the door, hissing fills the chamber. She can hear something being shot into the air with a high-pitched whine and Aang asks, “What was that you said about booby traps?”
For a long moment, they stand still, staring at each other with wide eyes. Then they nearly explode into a flurry of motion as they rush to get away. Aang shouts, “Hang on!” and she has to hold back an instinctive flinch as he grabs for her, even as it becomes clear that he is only using his bending to help them escape from the metal monster before something else can go wrong. She stumbles when he sets her down, and even as she leads him back to the village, she can feel her frozen fingers and toes breaking, feel suddenly unsteady limbs shaking as she struggles to breathe. Her heart is beating too hard and too fast and she can almost taste blood in her mouth.
It isn't until she begs, Father, help me, please, that the sensations begin to fade.
Katara can see that the village has gathered at the gate as she and Aang crest the last hill. The children cheer as they spot the airbender, rushing out to meet him with smiles and embraces and she can only wonder, What did he do?
Because they clearly like him. Even the shy Xuehuu, who hangs back by her mother instead of rushing forward with the others, looks relieved to see him safe.
They like him almost as much as everyone hates me. The thought is mean, edged with hurt and tinged with the color of La's depths in the midst of a storm; she pushes it away. (Or tries to. It stays like the metallic stain of blood on her tongue, and she does not quite know why that hurts more than having had the thought in the first place.)
As excited as the children are to see their new airbending friend, the adults and Sokka are clearly not.
Her brother rushes forward, face darkening with every step. In his eyes, she can see the reflection of the monstrosity's flare slowly falling from the sky. “I knew it! You signaled the Fire Navy with that flare- you're leading them straight to us, aren't you?!”
Katara can feel the blood of the people surrounding her again; she's going mad. “No,” she mutters. Sokka's head snaps towards her, his heart pumps a little harder. She refocuses. “It was an accident, Sokka.”
“Yeah! We were on the ship and there was this booby trap and, well, we boobied right into it.” His posture and voice are a study in regret; Katara stands firm and cold, body language showing no such signs. Though she does wish he hadn't spoken up.
Here Gran-Gran steps forward, a stern look on her face. “Katara! You should not have gone on that ship.” She stares back at the old woman, unflinching. But her grandmother continues, “Now we could all be in danger.”
The words “because of you,” aren't spoken, but by the look everyone but Aang sports, Katara knows that the tribe is thinking them.
Aang rushes to defend her- tries to take the blame upon himself- and that is when she looks away, because the only one who believes Katara to be blameless is not only wrong, he is not of the tribe. He is a stranger that she is responsible for, that she has brought into the village, a warrior, or the Air Nomads' equivalent- based on his tattoos, and he is honor-bound to defend her, if only for those reasons. Blame for his actions rests with Katara and only Aang himself does not know.
“Aha!” Sokka finger points at the airbending boy, but she feels his eyes rest on her. “The traitor confesses! Warriors,” he calls to the children, “away from the enemy. The foreigner is banished from our village.”
Aang looks heart-broken at this, but Katara- Katara feels only fury. Always, she thinks. Always.
“You're making a mistake,” she says without inflection. She can feel every molecule in her body agreeing with this. The snow beneath her hardens into ice, creeps up to steady her feet. “Aang is not our enemy.”
“No, I'm keeping my promise to Dad. I'm keeping everyone safe.”
Am I included in that “everyone?” Another thought to be dragged away by the tides of her mind and frozen out of reach.
She turns away from her brother, trails her eyes over the crowd, and feels her anger drain. “Gran-Gran, please.” She is so tired, suddenly.
But Gran-Gran shakes her head. “No, Katara, you knew that going on that ship was forbidden.” But she hadn't. Not really. Katara had never been told not to go on the ship. Quite frankly, no one had cared where she went until the men left and more hands were needed to keep the village from starving. More than once, one of the warriors (actual warriors, not the children going through Sokka's attempts at training) had even encouraged her to do something that would probably kill her. “I think it's best if the airbender leaves.”
The airbender. Not Aang. No, because he is a bender, and the South has no use for those.
“Fine,” Katara says. Perhaps Sokka can feel a hint of what Katara means. He is the only one who looks at her, the only one who does not turn away as she and Aang stand on the other side of an invisible line drawn in the snow. She has had years to practice burying what she feels, but this... This has been a long time in coming. “Come on, Aang, let's go.” The ice around her feet thaws; the ice around her heart solidifies. She begins walking towards Appa.
“Katara! Where do you think you're going?”
She stops but doesn't turn around. “The North Pole.”
“You would choose him over your tribe- over your own family?”
Her eyes close. Her mouth opens-
“No. Katara,” Aang interrupts, “I won't come between you and your family.” The airbender says goodbye, hardly letting her get a word in edgewise: “It was nice meeting everyone.”
One of the girls rushes forward, begging him not to leave. Katara can't even look at them.
“I'll miss you, too,” he says.
