Archive of Our Own

Katara knew something was wrong the moment Aang’s supine silhouette came into view.

For a moment, she’d believed he might’ve been knocked unconscious. There was no staff in sight, and the freshly crumpled ruins coupled with Tagah and Appa’s lack of presence told her that a fight had occurred and her husband hadn’t won it.

Aang was no god, after all. He’d fallen more times than she could count and somehow always came back with a sheepish laugh. It was routine for them at this point. Being the Avatar often dragged him into more danger than the average individual.

Katara slowed to a stop at the mouth of the cavern, eyes rolling over Aang’s still frame. He was half-swallowed by the silver spill of moonlight pouring in through a broken section of the lion turtle’s shell from above. It touched the curve of his head, the slope of one shoulder, and the long line of an arm fallen loose at his side, palm turned upward as though he’d been reaching for something before everything stopped.

But then she saw his eyes, open and dull, and the panic set in so fast it felt like when she'd almost been struck by lightning.

“Aang!”

Katara tripped over her own feet as she made a mad dash for his limp, pale body, nearly face-planting up the uneven steps. Her palms scraped against stone, and pain burst through her knee where it clipped the edge.

“No, no, no, no—”

She dropped hard to her knees beside him, the impact jolting through her bones, and for a moment she could not touch him. Her hands hovered uselessly over his body, trembling so badly that she didn’t know where to put them. His shoulder? His chest? His face? Somewhere—anywhere—to prove that what she was seeing was wrong.

Because Aang's eyes were open, and he wasn’t just not looking at her—he wasn’t looking at anything.

His beautiful grey eyes had always been alive, even at his worst. Katara had seen them in every way a person could. Full of fear. Grief. Fury. Wonder. Lust. Love. She had seen him laugh so hard he could barely breathe and blink awake after nightmares with tears clinging stubbornly to his lashes.

But now, his face was slack, and now, his eyes held no life. No spark. No Aang.

“Aang?” she pleaded. “Aang, sweetie? Hey, look at me.” Katara brought her hands down, and the moment her fingertips touched his cheeks, a chill ran down her spine.

He was cold.

Katara made an unrecognizable sound and cupped his face more fully. “No.” She shook him softly, but his head only shifted limply against the stone. “No, you don’t get to do this. Aang. Aang, wake up!”

Nothing.

“Aang!”

“Katara! Where’d you—”

Her brother’s voice cut off behind her. The running pad of bare feet followed close behind.

“What’s going on?” Toph demanded.

Katara could barely hear her over the roar of blood in her ears.

“He’s…” Sokka said, and nothing else.

Another set of footsteps rushed into the cavern, heavier than Toph’s, slowing to a stop the moment they reached the others. Katara did not have to turn around to know they belonged to Zuko.

“You found him?”

She should close Aang’s eyes, maybe. Address her friends, or at the very least, look at them instead. But she knew, even now, that there was no going back after seeing this.

Would she ever forget this look? Probably not. It’d probably haunt her dreams for years to come.

“He’s…” Sokka tried again, but failed.

There was silence before Zuko exhaled so hard it seemed like the air had been pulled from his lungs unwillingly.

“Spirits.”

“Hello?” Toph snapped, a scared anger in her voice now. “Is anyone going to tell me what’s happening?”

No one answered.

Katara should have. She was the one with Aang’s face in her hands and his body at her knees. But it was like there was a wall between her and the rest of them now, and their voices came from somewhere far away.

“Toph…” Sokka said sympathetically. “Aang is—”

“No,” Katara hissed.

Sokka went quiet as the word cracked through the empty space like thunder.

“No,” she said again, louder this time. Her hand slid from Aang’s cheek to his throat, then to his chest. She focused hard, using all her waterbending teachings to sense any sign of life.

Aang had survived a hundred years in ice. He had survived Azula’s lightning. He had survived the slaughter of his people and being twelve years old with the whole world balanced on his back and no one to tell him how to contact his past lives but himself.

He could not have survived all of that only to end up here. Like this.

Katara’s fingers shook as she fumbled at the stopper of her waterskin. It slipped once, then twice. When she finally pulled it out, the water rose in an uneven ribbon, silver-blue in the moonlight, shivering like it was frightened, too.

She brought it over Aang’s chest, let it spread and curl around him, over his ribs and neck and shoulders, the best it could.

At first, her husband gave her nothing. Stubbornness had always been her greatest weakness, but also her greatest strength, so she searched harder, looking desperately for some place where his spirit still clung to his body.

Katara didn’t know how long she searched, only that she couldn’t stop until she had a definitive answer.

Then, something flickered, so faint she almost missed it.

Then, the water glowed.

Healing light bloomed against her palms, Katara’s whole body lurching toward it. It was dull, yes, but it was still a glow, which meant—

“He’s in there.”

“Are you sure?” Toph’s bare feet shifted against the ground. “I don’t feel him breathing.”

“He’s in there,” she repeated more firmly. “I can feel him.”

Katara let the water return to her pouch, not even bothering to stopper it up again. This place was filled with impossibilities. Things that haven’t been seen for generations. Phenomenon that would’ve been laughed at by the elders of her clan.

Until today, bringing back the dead only lived in dreams and the Avatar cycle. Had she not already done it, Katara would’ve been right there with everyone else. But she had. She’d used the power of this place to pull breath back into bodies that otherwise would’ve never drawn breath again.

Hers. Sokka’s. Toph’s. Zuko’s.

Katara’s gaze dropped to Aang’s chest. If she could do it four times, surely she could do it a fifth. Right?

“We need to get him to the water,” she breathed.

“Katara,” Zuko said carefully. “Are you sure you’re strong enough to—”

“The pools,” she cut him off sharply. “The spirit energy is stronger there.”

Katara knew that she probably sounded insane to them, but she had her reasons. Aang couldn’t die yet.

Sokka’s voice crumbled. “What if he’s already…”

“Stop it!” Katara’s hands curled in the fabric of Aang’s robes as she looked at her brother, only then realizing that tears had finally welled up in her eyes. “He’s fine. He’s the Avatar. I can… With the help of the pools, I can save him. I did it with all of us. Let me try.”

No one mentioned how much spiritual energy it must’ve already taken her to bring four people back from the dead, but she knew they were thinking it. Even in a place like this, there are limits to what one can accomplish.

Katara turned back to Aang before any of them could object further, before they could question her, and by extension, make her question herself even more than she already had been.

Her arms slid beneath him, one behind his shoulders and one under his knees.

“Come on,” she whispered. “Come on, Aang. I’ve got you.”

Katara tried lifting him, but his weight barely shifted. A strangled grunt tore from her throat as she tried again, all of her muscles screaming in protest.

The last and only other time she’d ever had to lift him like this had been in Ba Sing Se, when he’d been struck down by Azula’s lightning and left with that nasty scar on his back. Then, he had been much smaller. Or maybe she had been much stronger. But Aang was not that twelve-year-old boy anymore.

Since childhood, he’d grown so much. Taller than her by enough that she had to lift her chin whenever they spoke, and he had to lean down whenever they kissed. He was broader in the shoulders now. Thicker in his chest and arms and thighs. But limp like this, with no awareness or life to help her hold him, he might as well have been fused to the ground.

Katara whimpered. Her arms shook violently and pain lanced up her spine and the cavern tilted in her vision as she tried again, but it was no use. She couldn’t even get him off the ground.

Aang’s body slipped against her chest; Katara sobbed and clutched him harder.

“I’ve got him,” Zuko breathed suddenly, closer now, breaking out of whatever frozen place the sight of Aang had sent him. He rushed up the last few steps and dropped to his knees on Aang’s other side. “Katara. I’ve got him.”

Katara ignored Zuko and tried to lift again. Her arms gave out almost immediately.

“Hey. Hey, hey. Stop.” Zuko’s voice was as gentle as whenever he handled the turtle ducks in his pond. In any other scenario, Katara might’ve been insulted by him underestimating her strength. “Give him here.”

“No.” Her voice sounded petulant, like a child’s.

“Katara—”

“No, I can do it.”

“You can barely sit up.”

“I said I can do it!”

But even as she said it, her grip slipped again. Aang’s shoulder rolled bonelessly against her forearm, his head dipping back at an angle that made nausea crawl up her throat.

Zuko’s hands were there before Katara could panic, catching Aang before he could hit the stone floor.

“Let me,” he said. “Please.”

Katara took a shuddering breath.

“You need your strength for the water.”

She hated that he was right. Actually, she hated it every time Zuko was right, but moot point.

She hated the way her body trembled. Hated the black spots pulsing at the edge of her vision. Hated the uselessness of her scraped palms and aching arms and the terrible, animal instinct to curl herself over Aang and not let anyone else touch him.

Zuko shifted closer, sliding one arm beneath Aang’s shoulders and the other under his knees. He stood on slightly shaky legs, cradling the younger man close against his chest. The movement made Aang’s body fall limp without the ground to support it. His head tipped against Zuko’s shoulder. One arm hung down toward the stone, fingers loose.

Katara almost gagged. There should have been some resistance in him. Some sleepy protest. Some irritated groan. Some breath against Zuko’s collar. Something.

But of course, there wasn’t. His eyes remained open and as lifeless as they had been when she stumbled upon him, and suddenly, Katara couldn’t bear it any longer. So, with shaking fingers, she reached out and brushed them closed.

His lashes rested peacefully against his cheeks, but somehow, this sight was worse than seeing them open.

“Please,” she whispered. She did not know who she was praying to. The long-dead lion turtles? The spirits? All of Aang’s past lives, stretching back through nearly ten thousand years? Any of them. All of them. Someone had to understand that this could not be where Aang ended.

He was too young. He had too much left to do.

Since waking up from the iceberg, Aang hadn’t enough time to be anything but the Avatar.

He had not rebuilt the Air Nomads like he said he would every night before bed. He had not danced enough stupid dances or played enough dumb pranks or tried enough unfamiliar food. He had not spent enough time with their little group.

With her.

And with—

Katara’s hand drifted, almost without thought, to her lower abdomen.

It’d only been a few days since she learned she was pregnant, and it took all of Katara’s willpower to stop herself from blurting it out the moment she’d jumped into Aang’s arms. She wanted to make the announcement special.

But as always, life got in the way.

And after Aang returns from the air temples quickly turned into after Aang stops the Denied from getting the staff.

And then, after Aang brings airbending back to the world.

And then, after Aang stops Tagah from destroying it.

When there was time. When there was quiet. When they were safe. When they were in bed, and she could take his hand and guide it to where hers rested now and watch realization dawn across his face.

So no, Aang couldn’t die yet. He needed to be there to meet his child.

“Katara,” Sokka called softly.

Katara looked up and realized the others had already started moving while she had been busy staring at the ground.

Zuko held Aang carefully against his chest. He kept his eyes forward, watching each step as he carried her husband back toward the tunnel they’d come through. Sokka fell into step behind him.

Katara stumbled after them, her legs trembling for a moment.

It wasn’t long before the tunnel opened suddenly into a much larger cavern. Shallow pools of cave water glowed ahead of the group, soft and blue-green in the dark. Their surfaces were unnaturally still despite the water trickling down from cracks high above. The light they emitted painted the surrounding rock walls in slow, shifting patterns.

Beautiful, some part of her might’ve thought any other day. Instead, the sight reminded her only of the horror and relief she’d felt when she found and revived the others. Of Sokka’s first panicked breath back, Toph’s startled curse, and Zuko’s wet cough and miserable groan.

Katara steeled herself. It was time to make the impossible possible again.

Zuko stepped into the water without hesitation. It sloshed around his shoes and darkened the bottom of his pants. He went down to one knee with Aang still held in his arms, careful enough that it felt more like a funeral than an attempt at saving his life.

“Here?” Zuko asked.

Katara nodded, but it took her a moment to realize he couldn’t see that with her standing behind him.

“Yes,” she choked out. “There’s fine.”

Katara bit down hard on the inside of her cheek as Zuko shifted her husband carefully into the water. His body settled into it with no resistance, ripples spreading outward from his shoulder and hips, his robes floating around him almost ethereally. His head tipped slightly to one side before Zuko caught it, palm cradling the back of his skull to keep his face above water.

Once he was settled, Zuko and Sokka got to work removing the upper half of his clothing, so that as much water could be in contact with his skin as possible. The routine was more familiar than she wished it be.

Katara stood frozen at the edge of the pool, watching the careful exposure of his body like it was something she shouldn’t be seeing. Which was ridiculous. She’d seen Aang without his shirt countless times. She’d slept beside him for years now, bathed with him, traced the dips of his ribs and the strong, warm line of his back with her mouth and hands. She’d seen all of him in far more intimate ways.

As the boys finished, and Aang’s chest came into view, Katara couldn’t help but notice how still it was. The tattoos along his arms glowed faintly, though more like the reflections of fish scales and not with Avatar State brightness.

Katara stepped into the pool and waded toward Aang on unsteady legs, each step sending little waves of lukewarm water across his body. When she reached him, Zuko shifted back and let her kneel and take his place.

“Okay,” she whispered, dipping her hands into the water and focusing all of her attention on the small sign of life she’d grasped earlier.

Slowly, the water began to glow a brilliant blue. Bands of light rippled across Aang’s body. Distantly, Katara noted how it had felt easier with the others. Exhausting, yes, but almost eager, like the water wanted to heal and only needed someone to guide it.

This time, however, it resisted.

Katara frowned and pushed harder. She felt the spiritual energy pass through her arms, cold at first, then burning.

Where could he be? Was Aang in the spirit world, fighting to get back? Or was he trapped inside his endless darkness?

Katara made a wounded sound and bent over him.

“Come on, Aang,” she murmured. “Come back to us.”

Flashes of memories played behind her eyelids. She held on to them, directing all thought away from the pale stillness of Aang’s body now. His bright eyes. His toothy grin. His airbender robes whipping in the wind.

Aang trying to carry too many moon peaches in his arms and dropping half of them. Aang falling asleep with his head in her lap after insisting he wasn’t tired. Aang curling himself around her in the middle of the night, sleepy and warm, murmuring sweet nothings.

Aang kissing her wrist. Her shoulder. Her lips.

Aang lifting her off her feet in a spin.

Aang asking if she was alright when she shouted in surprise.

Katara’s breath hitched as she opened her eyes to find the glow surging. Briefly, Aang's tattoos flickered.

But then—

Katara gasped as pain cracked through her entire body, and the light collapsed. She pulled her arms out of the water, feeling as though it had electrocuted her.

“No,” she choked, and dunked them back in with reckless abandon. She just needed to try a little harder.

“Katara,” Sokka called out. “Katara, stop for a second.”

“I can’t stop. I just had it.”

“You’re going to pass out.”

“I don’t care.”

“Well, I do!”

Katara looked up at him then.

Her brother sat by the water’s edge, shaking, his face twisted with fear he usually tried to bury under jokes and being annoying on purpose.

“I can’t lose both of you,” he said.

The words felt like a slap, and for one weak, horrible second, Katara almost listened.

Almost.

Stubbornly, she turned back towards Aang. “You won’t.”

The glow began again, blooming brighter than it had before, and this time, her arms shook, and her vision went hazy. Katara bit back a pained sob and kept going.

Time became strange in that pool. It stretched and folded and blurred, and soon, Katara had no idea how long she’d been kneeling there, the others watching on with bated breath.

Her hands went numb, then burned, then went numb again. Her shoulders ached so badly she thought they might tear from their sockets. Sweat slid down her cheeks. Or maybe it was water. Or tears. She couldn’t tell anymore.

But the longer she searched, the harder she pushed, the more Katara began to lose hope.

A terrible thought came over her before she could stop it.

The new Avatar is going to be born any moment now.

Somewhere in the water tribe, a family would hear a baby cry for the first time. Somewhere, a mother would hold an infant who had not the faintest clue of their destiny yet. Somewhere, the cycle would move on because the Avatar was not one person, no matter how much Katara wanted him to be. Because balance did not care if she was twenty-four and terrified and on her knees in a pool with her dead husband beneath her hands. Her husband, whose entire being would become trapped in the body of someone else.

Aang would become a name in history. The Last Airbender. The Avatar who ended the Hundred Year War. The man who died before he got to know he was going to be a father.

Katara stared down at Aang’s face, tears streaming down her own. He looked as peaceful as he did when they shared a bed. She squeezed her eyes shut and swallowed down a whimper.

She’d… failed. Shame curled in her chest, and it took everything within her to look at their friends. To shake her head and say that it was over.

But when she did, when she finally lifted her chin and opened her eyes, the pool was gone.

Katara gasped and stumbled forward, but there was no water beneath her anymore. For one terrifying second, she was certain she was falling, but then her feet met something soft and warm.

What…?

Looking around, Katara found herself standing beneath a strange, endless sky. There was no sun here. No moon or stars or clouds either. Only a singular expanse of soft blue overhead, rippling like water.

The ground beneath her feet was covered in long, soft blades of grass. They brushed against her ankles, an impossible shifting shade of pale pink and gold, damp with dew that shone silver when she moved. In the distance, there were shapes that might have been mountains, but didn’t quite feel like them.

Her first thought was not awe, but panic.

Where was she? Was she dead? What happened to Sokka? Toph? Zuko? What happened to—

“Aang?” Katara spun around, trying to find any point of recognition that would tell her where she was, but nothing stuck. “No. No, I don’t have time for this. Aang!”

A soft giggle answered.

Katara froze. What… who did that…?

Slowly, after a moment, she turned around to find the source of the sound, and her eyes landed on a boy standing a short distance away.

He was small. Somewhere between seven and eight, she’d guess, but it was hard to tell. Nevertheless, he was old enough to stand with scraped knees, and young enough that his cheeks still had the soft roundness of babyhood clinging stubbornly to them. His hair was dark and messy, sticking up in odd places no comb in the world would ever survive trying to tame. His grin was wide and toothy, but most notably, familiar, even though Katara had never seen this boy before in her life.

But his eyes were what truly caught her attention.

Glassy and full of life, and the exact shade of blue-grey that Aang’s were.

Katara stopped breathing.

The boy rocked back on his heels, hands clasped behind his back like he was trying very hard to look innocent.

“Who are you?” she asked.

The boy only grinned wider.

Katara’s hand drifted to her stomach. She did not know how she knew. But she did.

Impossible. He was barely more than a secret inside her.

And yet, here he was.

“Baby?” she whispered, because what else was she supposed to call him?

The boy’s nose wrinkled, and Katara almost laughed. The sound climbed into her throat, but before it could become anything solid, the boy turned and ran.

“Wait!” she shouted.

Rather than listen, he bolted through the grass with the reckless confidence of a child who could not care less if he fell face-first into the ground.

Katara lurched after him. “No, wait! Come back!”

He glanced over his shoulder once, still grinning, then darted between two low hills that Katara was fairly certain had not been there a second ago.

Grass whipped against Katara’s legs as she continued to chase him. The boy ran ahead of her, always just far enough that she couldn’t reach him, but never so far that she lost sight of him. It was almost like he wanted her to follow him. Like this was not a game at all, even if he was doing a very good job of making it look like one.

“Where are we going?” she called.

The boy laughed again and ran faster.

Katara wanted to be annoyed.

Actually, she was annoyed; she decided then. Terrified, exhausted, heartbroken, and somehow already annoyed with a child who hadn’t even been born yet. A child who was very quickly proving himself to be a menace. This had to be her husband’s fault somehow. What else should she have expected from some spiritual manifestation of Aang’s son?

Katara stumbled to a stop.

Aang.

The memory of his body in the water slammed back into her so hard that she felt sick.

No. She couldn’t be here. Whatever this place was, whoever this child was, she couldn’t be here while Aang was—

Katara looked up, expecting the boy to be far ahead, already disappearing into the strange hills.

Instead, he stood only a mere five feet away. And instead of the empty plains she’d just chased him through continuing endlessly behind him, there was a tree.

It was unlike any tree Katara had ever seen. The trunk was wide and pale, twisted with deep grooves that glowed faintly from within. Its bark looked old enough to have watched nations rise and fall, but its leaves were new and bright, trembling at the ends of long branches in shades of gold and deep blue. Roots spread across the ground in every direction, some sinking into the grass, others curling over each other like sleeping serpents.

Katara’s stomach tightened. “What is this?”

The boy ignored her question, walking up to a crack in the center of the tree’s trunk and reaching in.

“No, don’t—”

But his arm had already disappeared up to the elbow.

Katara took a step forward. “What are you doing?” she asked.

When the boy pulled his hand out, his fist was closed. He turned toward her and came back across the grass, slower now. His small bare feet made no sound, and when he reached her, he held out his free hand.

Katara looked at it.

Then at him.

“What… what are you asking me for?”

The boy huffed, rolled his eyes, and took her hand instead of answering with a scowl like she was instinctively supposed to know that.

Katara made a small, startled sound as his warm palm met hers. He pressed something into her hand and closed her fingers around it before she could see what he’d given her.

The moment it touched her skin, something moved through her.

Whatever the boy had handed her was small, and cool like a breeze, and almost weightless. It hummed softly against her palm, unlike anything Katara had ever bent or held before.

It felt like the first breath before a laugh. Like fabric snapping open in the wind. Like the weightless drop in her stomach whenever Aang took her hand and pulled her into the air without warning. It felt like temple bells and glider wood and the dizzying freedom of empty space beneath her feet.

It felt like Aang.

No. Not Aang. It felt like something that reminded her of Aang.

Katara’s hand tightened around the unseen thing until her knuckles ached. Whatever it was, it was clearly precious.

…And powerful.

The boy looked up at her with eyes far too wise for his age, and for the first time since meeting him, he spoke.

“It’s okay,” he said. “I’ll be fine without it.”

Katara stared at him. “What does that mean?”

The boy smiled again, smaller this time. Sad, maybe, but brave… and proud.

“Hey,” Katara whispered, feeling a wave of dread wash over her. “Hey, wait. What did you give me? What does that mean?”

The boy did not answer.

“Tell me.”

The boy stepped back.

Katara’s grip tightened around the thing in her palm. “Wait. Please. Don’t go. I don’t understand.” Something pulled her gaze down. She looked at her closed fist, then quickly remembered herself and looked back up. But by then, the boy was already gone.

“No.” Katara turned sharply. “No, come back!” She spun in a circle, searching the grass, the hills, the strange sky. “Come back! I don’t understand what you mean!”

Nothing answered.

Hesitantly, Katara looked back at her fist.

Allowing curiosity to get the best of her, she slowly began to open her fingers.

One.

Then another.

Then—

The world surged back to her in a dizzying rush.

Katara’s eyes flew open, though she hadn’t even realized she’d closed them, and the strange sky vanished so violently that she almost thought she might be falling again.

Lurching forward, Katara watched as healing light exploded beneath her palm. The pool ignited in a blue-white light that burst outward from Aang’s chest and traveled through the water in every direction. It spilled over the rocks, reflected off the wet walls, caught in the stream until the air itself seemed to shine.

Katara gasped, but she couldn’t pull away. This newfound energy tore through her in a way that should’ve been terrifying but wasn’t.

Katara looked at Aang; his face pinched.

“Aang?” She called out.

Aang’s mouth moved, and Katara felt her heart stutter.

“Katara?” he croaked.

It was barely audible. More breath than voice. His eyes remained squeezed shut, his face twisted the same way it did when he had nightmares, but he spoke. Aang spoke!

Behind her, someone made a sound. Sokka, maybe. Or Zuko. The scrape of movement came from the shore, her companions jumping up from where they’d been forced to wait and watch, but Katara couldn’t look at them.

She couldn’t look anywhere else.

“Come on, Aang,” she said, and her voice broke around his name. “Come on!”

The water surged around them.

Aang’s body jerked.

“Aang!” she yelled again. “Come on!”

The light flared brighter.

His tattoos blazed beneath the water, so bright that Katara had to squint against them. The air in the cavern seemed to bend around him. The pool rose in little waves, slapping against her thighs, against Aang’s ribs.

Then, without warning, the light vanished and sent the entire cavern back into near darkness.

For half a second, there was nothing. No glow. No sound except the water settling around them. No movement beneath her hands.

Katara’s heart dropped so hard she thought she might be sick.

Until Aang gasped.

His eyes flew open, bright and wide and unfocused, and he shot upright so fast into a sitting position that water spilled from his shoulders and down his bare chest in glittering streams.

Katara didn’t even have time to process what had happened. Only that he was moving. Only that he was breathing. Only that his eyes were open and there was life in them once again.

“Aang!” she cried out in relief, throwing herself at him.

The force of it nearly knocked him back into the water, but Katara didn’t care. Her arms wrapped around his shoulders and the back of his head, one hand clutching at the wet skin between his shoulder blades while the other cradled his skull.

His whole body shook against hers, and every breath rattled in his chest in a way that made her want to start healing him again. But his arms came up after a moment, and then his fingers were curling into the back of her dress.

Alive.

Aang was alive.

Katara sobbed into the side of his neck.

Aang wheezed for a few long moments, his body fighting for air. His chest expanded against hers. Fell. Expanded again. Each breath was rougher than it should’ve been, but it was there.

Aang turned his head then, and Katara pulled back just enough to see his face.

His eyes met hers.

Wide. Wet. Lively. Terrified, yes. Confused, yes. But there was Aang again, staring at her like he was the one who couldn’t quite believe she was real.

Katara’s palm slid to his cheek.

“Katara,” he breathed, as if he had been afraid of losing her too. Wherever he had gone, whatever he had seen, it was clear he had come back just as scared.

Aang threw his arms around her again, tightening so much she almost lost her breath. It was not the way he usually held her, so accustomed to him treating her with gentle reverence, but she’d take it.

Katara let him hold her for half a breath, maybe less, before she pulled away again, desperate to see his eyes. Desperate to make sure the life in them was still there and that she hadn’t just hallucinated the whole thing.

“I was so worried,” she said.

It was an understatement for the riptide of feelings she’d been forced to drag herself through to resurface, but it was all she could get out.

Aang looked at her like he understood anyway.

A second later, their friends crowded in.

“Aang!” her brother cried.

He splashed into the water so fast he nearly tripped, throwing his arms around Aang from the side and knocking Katara into him harder.

“Sokka!” Aang gasped, pleasantly startled.

Sokka held him for one tight second, squeezing like he was trying to make up for every second Aang had been gone. He pulled away with a shaky sigh of relief and sat back on his heels, swiping quickly at his face like no one would notice.

“I knew you’d pull through, buddy,” he said, voice cracking. Katara pretended not to hear it.

Zuko crouched behind Sokka, his face soft with solace. He looked five years younger with his relief.

“Hey, Aang,” he said.

Aang’s eyes lit up at the sight of him, brows pinching. A smile broke across his face so wide that Katara had to bite the inside of her cheek.

“Zuko,” Aang breathed.

Momo flew in from the shore, launching himself onto Aang’s shoulder with a shrill, frantic chitter. He shoved his whole body against him, little paws scrabbling at his bare shoulder.

“Momo!” Aang gasped, hand flying up to catch him. He pressed his face into Momo’s fur, eyes squeezing shut as the lemur crawled anxiously over his shoulder and pawed at his cheek.

Behind him, Toph crept up slowly. Katara watched her reach out, hesitate for a fraction of a second, and then place one hand on top of Aang’s head.

Aang immediately tilted his head back to look at her.

“Welcome back, Twinkle Toes,” she said fondly, then crouched down.

“Toph,” Aang exhaled. “You’re okay. I—” His words choked off, and he wiped away the tears falling from his eyes with the heel of his hand. He looked around at each of them. “I thought you were all dead.”

“We were,” Sokka said.

Aang flinched.

“But…” Her brother looked down, then raised his head and met her eyes. “Katara saved us.”

Aang turned toward her.

“The spiritual power of these waters strengthened my healing abilities,” she explained.

You put up quite the fight, she wanted to add, but decided against it.

Aang looked at her with fondness bursting from every inch of him, even through the tears still clinging to his lashes. Like she had hung the moon herself. Like she was the one who had done something impossible, when all Katara could think about was how close she had come to failing.

“You’re incredible, Katara,” he said.

Katara smiled. Or at least, she tried to.

Because distantly, beneath the relief and exhaustion and dizzying joy of Aang breathing in front of her, she couldn’t stop thinking about that mysterious boy. Would any of this have been possible without him?

The realization crawled through her slowly, and with it came a fear so sudden that the pool seemed to go cold around her.

What if he had given too much?

Katara’s hand moved before she could think better of it, slipping beneath the water to press against her lower abdomen. Carefully, with what little strength she had left, she reached inward, and for an awful second, she felt nothing but her own exhaustion.

But then, ever so faintly, a flicker of life fluttered beneath her palm.

Relief spread through her so powerfully that she almost doubled over. Their baby was alive. Whatever he had given her, it had not been everything.

“Where’s Appa?” Aang suddenly asked, looking around. Katara looked back at him and furrowed her brows.

“Tagah must have taken him,” Zuko answered quietly. “I’m sorry.”

Tears pooled in Aang’s eyes all over again, spilling over before he could blink them back. “No,” he whispered. “I can’t believe I trusted him.”

Feeling her beloved’s pain, Katara cupped Aang’s cheek and leaned in, pressing their foreheads together. For a second, he held himself stiffly, like he was trying to keep all of it inside, but then he folded into her warmth with a small whimper that nearly broke her.

“We’ll get through this,” she whispered.

Aang’s eyes squeezed shut.

There was nothing else to say. No comfort that would not feel insulting. No promise that Appa was safe when none of them knew that. No way to undo the fact that Aang had been killed by the very person who had made him believe, for one brief and beautiful moment, that he was not alone.

So Katara held him.

That, at least, she knew how to do.

The others moved in around them.

Sokka first, leaning forward and wrapping both Aang and Katara in his arms. Zuko followed a little more awkwardly, more hovering than hugging, but the sentiment was there. Toph reached forward and squeezed Aang’s shoulder, grumbling under her breath about them being dramatic. Momo slipped away from the pressure folding in around him, more content to be wet in Aang’s lap than squeezed to death.

And Aang, still shaking, let himself be wrapped up in as much love as they could manage.

~

Not long later, the group found respite in a small cave that was once the lion turtle’s mouth.

With their airship crushed and their supplies destroyed, there wasn’t much of a camp to set up. Most of what they had left was wet, torn, broken, or lost somewhere in the wreckage. And none of them had the energy to go digging through it.

Zuko got to work starting a fire behind a massive fossilized tooth, where the wind wouldn’t snuff it out immediately. He carefully arranged scavaged pieces of driftwood into a pile that he could light safely without catching anything else on fire. Meanwhile, Sokka hovered over Zuko and micromanaged him, despite the fact that he could not firebend and therefore had no useful input.

Toph, unsurprisingly, reverted to her high society self, stretching out across the ground like a lazy capybara cat in the sun and letting the boys do all the hard work. Though Katara noticed she’d angled her body so her feet were closest to Aang, and both soles were pressed firmly against the ground.

Any other time, Katara would’ve smiled at their little gaggle, all falling into their unspoken roles. It’d been some time since the five of them had gone on an adventure like this. They’d all been so wrapped up in other duties—Toph with her metal-bending academy, Zuko with fire lord duties and dismantling a hundred years of nationalist propaganda, Sokka with… whatever it was that Sokka did. Even Aang and herself hadn’t spent much time together—him off preserving what was left of his culture while she focused her efforts on building up Republic City.

For a moment, Katara could almost pretend things were normal. But one thought kept nagging at her.

Their baby.

Katara’s hand twitched where it rested in her lap. She looked down at the faint tremble in her fingers, then lifted her gaze across the cavern and let it land on her husband.

Aang sat with his back turned toward the group at the edge of the lion turtle’s mouth, his knees pulled loosely toward his chest. His fingers moved absently in a pattern that Katara recognized as tiny airbending motions; he often played with the sky when he was anxious.

Katara frowned.

Should she tell him now? Or wait until this whole thing blew over and Tagah was taken care of for good?

It’d be smarter to wait for a less stressful time. Aang would be ecstatic to find out he was a father, but telling him now risked making him more anxious. It risked him focusing his attention on protecting her and the baby instead of the rest of the world, like he was supposed to.

This sort of news deserved softness and space to feel joy.

But Tagah had already killed Aang once. What if he managed it again? Without the spiritual power of this place, there was no chance Katara could bring him back a second time.

She knew, deep down, that there would always be an after this, an after that.

But Aang deserved to know now.

Katara’s body decided for her before her mind did; she exhaled through her nose, pushed up on her feet, and slowly marched toward her husband. And if he had noticed she was approaching, he didn’t make that known.

“Aang?” Katara came to a stop right behind him and rested a hand on his head.

“Hm?” Aang answered distractedly, pulling his gaze away from the cloud wall and looking up at her. “What’s up?”

Katara met his eyes with a small smile. “Can I talk to you?”

Aang hummed and nodded, scooting over a few inches to give her space to sit.

Katara lowered herself behind him, tucking her head into his neck and pressing a quick kiss to his shoulder. They sat there wordlessly for a while, soaking up each other’s presence as much as they could.

Eventually, Aang decided to speak up. “Sweetie?”

Katara looked up at him, her head still resting on his shoulder.

“Do you want to tell me what’s going on?”

Katara nuzzled further into his body, and Aang took the opportunity to wrap his arms around her and pull her halfway into his lap.

“I thought I lost you for good today,” she mumbled miserably into his skin.

There was a beat of stunned silence, then, “I’m sor—”

“Don’t apologize to me for that,” she interrupted quickly. “Just… let me talk.”

After another small bout of silence, Katara felt Aang nod.

She squeezed her eyes shut, a few tears escaping anyway, and pressed further into her beloved. Aang, in turn, pulled her fully onto his lap. His arms cinched around her waist, hugging her as tight as he could. He shoved his face into her neck, breathing in her scent and giving her time to work up the courage to say what was on her mind.

Not sure of how else to approach it, Katara pulled away, missing his warmth as a breeze rushed between their bodies.

Aang’s brows pulled tightly as he looked at her; the softness in his gaze was almost too much to bear.

Katara attempted to turn away, but Aang wasn’t having it. His hand came up and lightly gripped her chin, bringing her eyes back to him; the confusion and concern in his were evident.

Katara almost whimpered. This wasn’t how she imagined this going at all.

Carefully, she took Aang’s hand in hers. They laced their fingers together, so in tune with each other that neither fumbled the movement. Then, before she could lose her nerve, Katara took their interlocked hands and guided them down.

Aang’s eyes followed the motion. He let her move him, let her uncurl his hand from hers and take his palm and flatten it right over her womb. Katara covered his hand with hers and held it there.

For a while, Aang only stared.

Until it hit him.

His lips parted, and his eyes snapped back up to hers. “Sweetie?”

Katara didn’t say anything. She watched as he looked down at her stomach again, then back at her, over and over like he couldn’t figure out where to keep his gaze. Finally, after what felt like forever, he seemed to decide that her face was the most suitable.

“You’re—” He rasped. “Are you—”

“Pregnant?” she finished, then smiled and nodded.

Aang’s eyes filled with tears so quickly that it startled her, even after everything. “I’m…” His voice cracked. He swallowed, tried again, and somehow sounded even more helpless the second time. “I’m going to be a father?”

“You’re going to be a father,” she confirmed, nuzzling his forehead. Aang pressed back, and that’s when she felt her tears come freely.

“How long have you known?” he murmured against her cheek, still in utter disbelief.

Katara sniffled, offering a sheepish smile. “Only a few days.”

Aang sat back with his hand still beneath hers, palm spread gently over her lower abdomen like he was afraid of disturbing the tiny life growing there. “Oh,” he breathed, a tear slipping from his eye.

“That’s all you have to say?” Katara giggled.

Aang shook his head quickly, then nodded, then shook it again. “No. I mean— Yes? I mean, I don’t know. I swear that I had words a second ago.”

She raised her eyebrows. “You did?”

“I think so.” A laugh escaped him. “But I don’t remember them anymore. I’m just… so happy.”

Katara smiled through her tears, and Aang looked at her like that was somehow the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen.

“Really?” she whispered.

Aang’s face crumpled. “Katara.”

It was only her name, but it was enough to make her feel foolish for even feeling like she had to ask. Of course, he was happy. She’d even bet this was the happiest he’s ever been in his life.

Aang’s hands flew up to her face, cradling her cheeks and pulling her in for a clumsy and desperate sort of kiss.

Katara made a tiny sound against his mouth and kissed him back just as hard, fingers curling into the fabric at his shoulders. She shifted closer in his lap, her knees pressing into the stone on either side of him as Aang wrapped one arm around her waist and pulled her in until there was no space left between them. The kiss deepened, and for a moment, she forgot everything else. All of it faded beneath the rush of Aang’s mouth and hands and breath and the overwhelming fact of him still being here to kiss her at all.

Aang made another muffled sound, and Katara answered by sliding one hand up the back of his neck. They kissed like that for what could’ve been hours, but likely wasn’t. Their companions probably would’ve said something by now if it had gone on that long.

Eventually, Aang pulled back just far enough for her to gasp in a proper breath.

“Sorry,” he panted, though he didn’t sound sorry at all.

Katara giggled. “For what? Kissing your wife?”

“For almost making her pass out.”

“I’d live.”

“Oh?” His eyes dropped to her mouth again, and despite everything, his smile turned faintly mischievous. “Should we test that?”

Katara narrowed her eyes. “Aang.”

He smiled wider, but then his gaze flicked down to the space between them. His playfulness softened, melting into something else. Awe, maybe. Or nervousness. Or both.

Aang brought one hand back down and moved his thumb slightly over the fabric of her dress. After a moment, he looked back up at her with glittering eyes. “Can I…?”

Katara felt her heart squeeze. “Of course,” she whispered.

Before she could ask what Aang was doing, his hands found her waist. With the kind of easy strength he often forgot he had, he shifted them around until Katara was the one sitting with her back against the curved wall of the lion turtle’s mouth, and he was kneeling in front of her.

“Aang—” she gasped.

“Sorry,” he answered immediately.

Katara huffed, but there was no heat in it.

Aang grinned up at her for half a second before his attention dropped again. His grin faded as he slowly lowered himself until he was nearly level with her stomach.

Katara leaned back against the stone, one hand coming to rest on his head.

For a while, Aang just looked. There wasn’t much to see yet. It was far too early for her body to show any visible signs of carrying life, and she had yet to experience any symptoms that came with the hormonal changes. Not to mention it’d take an incredible amount of focus and being in tune with spiritual energy to sense something was there at all.

But still, he looked like he saw everything anyway.

Aang’s hands came to rest on either side of her hips, careful not to press too hard. Then, with a reverence she’d never seen from him before, he leaned forward and pressed his forehead against her lower abdomen.

“Hi,” he whispered. “I’m your dad.”

Katara smiled as he let out a soft, bright laugh.

“Wow. That’s… really strange to say.”

“A good strange, I hope?” she asked with a raised eyebrow.

Aang’s nose bumped her belly. “More than. The best.” His thumbs moved in small, absent circles against her sides. His voice lowered the way it did when he spoke to animals or spirits or small children who didn’t know yet that they could trust him.

“I can’t wait to meet you,” he murmured. “I know that’s probably a while away, and your mom is going to say I need to be patient, which I am very good at.”

Katara snorted, causing Aang to glance up just enough to give her an offended look. “I can be patient.”

She nodded sagely. “Oh, yeah. Sure.”

Ignoring her dig, Aang turned back and rested his cheek very lightly against her stomach. “I can’t wait.”

Katara’s eyes burned again, but this time she didn’t bother fighting it.

“I’m going to teach you so much,” he continued. “Not just airbending. I mean, maybe airbending. I don’t know. No pressure. You can bend, or not bend, I don’t care. I’ll love you no matter what.”

Katara’s mind flashed to the boy again and what he’d handed her. A small part of her hoped it wasn’t what she thought it was, but deep down, it was hard to find any other explanation. Still, she knew Aang would never hate her or their child for that. He was a good man with a good heart.

“—all about our culture,” Aang said, bringing her attention back to the present. “We can visit the temples, and I’ll teach you how to meditate, too. You probably won’t like it at first. I didn’t either.” He paused, and when he spoke again, his voice was a little sadder. “Gyatso would have a field day.”

Katara looked down at him, her hand smoothing over his head. “Aang?”

Her husband nuzzled closer. “I’m okay,” he murmured.

“You sure?” she asked, even though she knew he wasn’t. Not fully, at least. How could he be? Never mind the turmoils they had yet to face waiting outside of this typhoon; Aang’s entire life had been nothing but challenge after challenge. He was strong, but only because he had no other choice.

Aang didn’t answer her question, which told her enough.

“I love you,” he said instead. “Both of you. And I’m going to protect you no matter what.”

“I know,” Katara whispered, smoothing her thumb over the back of his head. “I love you too.”

Aang stayed there for one more breath, cheek pressed lightly against her stomach, his hands warm at her hips. Then he pulled away, sitting back on his heels with tears still drying in his cheeks, and gave Katara a look she was deeply familiar with.

Aang turned toward where the clouds still churned around the lion turtle islands. “We need to stop Tagah before he hurts anyone else.”

There it was. The painful reminder that the world wouldn’t stop for them, no matter how selfishly she wished it would.

Katara hated that they couldn’t stay here forever, with Aang’s hand over their child and his smile still fresh from learning he was going to be a father. Hated that there was always something else. A fight. An impossible choice. A call for Aang to fulfill his duty as the Avatar.

Katara touched his cheek, guiding his attention back to her. “We’ll fix this.”

Aang looked at her for a second, then nodded. “Yeah.” He sounded like he needed to say it out loud to believe it.

Katara leaned forward and kissed him once, gentler this time. Aang breathed out against her mouth, then helped her stand. She swayed a little as she got her feet under her, and his hand went immediately to her waist. Katara gave him a look.

“Just let me dote on my beautiful, powerful, master waterbender of a wife who saved me just so she could tell me that I’m going to be a dad,” he said quickly.

“I didn’t say anything.”

“It was in your eyes.”

Aang’s mouth twitched, and for a second, the serious look slipped enough for him to seem like himself again. His hand found hers, and they walked back toward the fire together.

Sokka looked at them first, pausing his poking at the fire with a stick. Across from him, Zuko sat with crossed arms and legs, and to his right, Toph lay on her side, head propped up by her hand while she doodled little patterns in the dirt.

Her brother’s eyes flicked between them. Then down to their joined hands. “Everything okay?”

Katara and Aang settled by the fire in the empty spot nearby Toph and shared a look. They… could share this news with everyone later. After they handled everything else.

“It will be,” Aang answered vaguely.

Sokka raised a brow, but didn’t comment.

Zuko shifted. “We should come up with a plan.”

“Yeah,” Toph agreed. “Did you find out anything while talking with Tagah?”

Katara pressed closer to Aang, who squeezed her hand once in reassurance, then leaned forward.

“I did,” he said with a much steadier voice now.

“Here’s what we know…”