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This Kataang one-shot takes place in The Desert. |
Chapter Thirty-Five: Hold My Hand[]
She cannot bear to see him in so much pain and rage.
"I'm sorry, Aang . . ." she murmurs, fighting the urge to tackle him into the sand and hug him fiercely. "I know it's hard for you right now . . . but we need to focus on getting out of here . . ."
His lack of response is terror to her. His voice is flat, dead, numb. "What's the difference?" The words hang in the air, a shadow looming over them all. "We won't survive without Appa . . . We all know it . . ."
A shiver passes through his body, almost unnoticeable, except that she has spent so much time with him that she can see it. The pain and the loss and the grief. First he lost his entire people . . . and now he's losing the last link to them he has. She can feel the tears pressing behind her eyes, threatening to overflow. No. I have to be strong. For them.
"Come on, Aang!" she cries, attempting to rouse him from his state of misery and shock. "We can do this if we work together. Right, Toph?"
The Earthbender snorts in response, and she notices the blank look in Toph's face. Gesturing by wriggling her toes in the sand, Toph snaps, "As far as I can feel, we're trapped in a giant bowl of sand pudding." The Earthbender shrugs nonchalantly. "I got nothing."
Attempting not to let the disappointment in her voice show, she turns to her brother. "Sokka, any ideas how to find Ba Sing Se?" She musters as much hope as she dares.
"Why don't we ask the circle birds?" Sokka answers, giggling, lying in the sand, spreading his arms as if making a sand angel, Momo by his side, equally giddy. She closes her eyes involuntarily as an echo of a memory of the two of them lying in the virgin snowfall, laughing, their snow angels taking shape in their mirth.
But that was before the Southern Raiders attacked.
Before . . .
Before my mother died, she thinks, and she raises her head, a newfound determination sparking in her ice-blue eyes.
He still kneels upon the dunes, arms shaking with the effort of not going into the Avatar State. Her gaze shifts to Toph, whose footing is lost in the shifting sands.
She inhales sharply.
"We're getting out of this desert, and we're going to do it together!" she declares, her voice filled with fire and life. "Aang, get up. Everybody, hold hands. We can do this." She pauses, and something tears inside her. "We have to."
She turns, the barest hint of a smile beginning to appear on her face, as she reaches out to take his hand. She needs him. She can't look at him like—
He offers her his glider-staff.
Hold my hand, say her eyes.
No, say his.
Please, say hers.
But he has turned away.
Notes[]
This one was so sad to write. It's the first I literally had to rewrite more than once before I'd even sent it to Vulmen. Have you ever had an "eye-conversation"? There's so much that can be said about them.
This scene truly shows Katara what Aang can be like, but she loves him anyway. D'aww!
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