People attention!

The up and coming avatar episodes somewhat conflict with the story I had going here. As a result this story probably wont be updated for another two weeks or so while I edit it. But I'm posting the next chapter now for your enjoyment until then.

With love

.Loon…

Thank you all so much for reviewing, it means a lot and it has some seriously addictive side effects. I love you all.

I'm also so sorry for the delay. I thought I'd have this out a week ago but I totally zoned.

…Oh and this story changes pov a little, but only until Katara comes back into focus.

Chapter Two: No Rest For The Wicked…

Recap:

I watched Aang for a moment before deciding to investigate on my own. I circled the body of the ship and found that on the opposite side to where Aang was, there was a large fragile looking crack in the ship. The water and wind had eroded it until it was large enough for me to slip in. I leant against it carefully with the palms of my hands of the fracture.

"Hey Aang!" I called out to him, slowly placing more weight on the split involuntarily. "I found a way-"

The ship crumbled beneath my fingertips and I shrieked as I fell through, everything turning dark.

…………………………………………………………………………………………..

"Katara?!"

Aang leapt clean over the ship in a single bound, tucking the knife into his clothes. His eyes flicked around edgily, trying to spot her though he saw nothing except a large hole in the ship's hull. Strangely enough it was completely unaffected by the amount of light that should, on all accounts, enter it to some degree. He stepped closer to it, curious. The light should have been bright enough to see something in the ship. Aang couldn't see anything through the hole but a dark abysmal black, as if someone had painted the gaping tear in the body of the ship.

Aang shrugged it off and stepped into the ship hastily, his eyes keen on any blue clothing or brown skin. The ship wasn't as dark as he thought. In fact, when he stepped in it was as if the place lit up a little more. The inner ship was a grey colour, the wood looked as if the brown had been leeched out of it over time. A cloudy, foggy atmosphere in the ship restricted his long distance sight to about a three-metre perimeter. Glancing behind him, Aang felt a thrill of alarm race up his spine. The hole was still opaque. There was no sight of the forest, no sound of the monkey birds calling out to one another. There was nothing but the eerie pale fog, some strange banging noises and the gentle push and pull of the river under the ship.

His Avatar sense started tingling. Realization was dawning on him. Mysterious fog inside a ship, colour has been dulled while there is a strange brightness, no evidence of the outside. It all led to one conclusion.

He was in the Spirit World…

Instinctively, Aang raised his hand to his face for inspection. It was still solid looking and whole, no glowing or anything, though that didn't matter. If he was in the Spirit World then it would look normal anyway, but the action was still involuntary as he still felt as if he was in the physical world. Usual after he figured he'd gone ghost he could feel the difference between the spiritual and physical. It was confusing, like he had been taken, body and soul, into another plane of existence. Experimentally, Aang took a deep breath in and blew it out steadily. The fog swirled about in response and receded back to the nearest wall before it began slithering back into place. Aang grinned. He still had his bending.

Now partially clear, the space appeared to be a narrow hallway, branching off into three larger rooms. Left of him was a room that was probably the front of the ship. He wandered into it cautiously, his staff gripped in one hand defensively. He was still in the spirit world, no telling what was around here. The fog in this part was thick, obscuring his vision of the room to about a few feet in front of him. Aang lifted his staff and twirled it in front of him. The fog spun and was pushed back by the air current before completely leaving the room, for now. The room was very much like the hallway Aang recently stepped out of, grey, bright and nondescript, only larger. It had a bedroll on the floor and some old broken crates littering around. This room had to have been used for storage.

In a fairly dark corner of the room, Aang spotted something that made his heart skip a beat. There was a man sitting on a crate, his head hung so low that not a feature of his face could be made out. His long dark hair that hung about his shoulders was greasy looking, unwashed. In his hand was a large, fairly scary looking Dao blade. Aang cleared his throat nervously.

"Excuse me," Aang started politely, "have you seen my friend? She's about 19, this tall, has hair loopies and-"

Aang trailed off as the man stood up quickly, showing his face clearly as he looked up. The stranger brandished his blade threateningly.

"The captain don't much appreciate stowaways," the man growled but dropped the sword suddenly and began rocking and swaying before collapsing onto the crate behind him, " We've bin hit, sir! Steady the rudders!"

The man broke off suddenly gripping something invisible in front of his chest. He panted, looking at Aang and muttering something indecipherable before drooping, his head lolling forwards as if lifeless. Aang took a step forwards, his instinct moving him to help the man. He stopped when the man's sword rose in the air and sailed back into its master's hand, which gripped it tightly. The man straightened a little before going into the same position Aang found him in, sitting on the crate, slouched over with his face in shadow.

Aang's eyes were wide as he backed slowly out of the room.

Aang was standing in front of the next nearest room nervously. It was clear to him that these individuals were violent when they died, so they were probably violent in the Spirit World. No pressure.

He pushed the door open slowly, peeking through the sliver as the door open wider and wider. He sighed, feeling a little exasperated. This room had spirits in it too.

Maybe they're friendly!

As Aang stepped into the room, which was obviously used for sleeping in, he heard some banging around behind him. Figuring it must have been Captain Delirious back there; he closed the door behind him and turned to the room. It had four bedrolls on the floor and two more hanging up hammock style from beams. One of the spirits, a short haired young man with tattoos covering his body, was lounging around on one of the hammocks while another, a longer haired middle aged man, was sitting on the floor, his legs drawn up to his chest with his arms wrapped around them and his head resting on his knees. The last spirit was white haired man, banging his head on the wall of the room repeatedly resulting in light, hollow thuds.

"Uhh…" Began Aang cautiously, "Hi. I'm the Avatar and, um, I was wondering if you've seen my friend. She's kinda wearing a lot of blue. And she has these hair loopies…"

The men turned around to look at Aang while he spoke. After he finished, they all turned back to whatever they were doing before, completely ignoring him. He groaned in frustration.

"Okay then maybe you guys can tell me what happened here." Aang valiantly attempted.

For what seemed like ages to the young Avatar, no one moved let alone answered. Finally the pirate on the bed shifted around a little to look at the newcomer. The pirate sighed, exasperated.

"I guess I'll take this one." He muttered to the other two before turning to Aang. "I'm Lee. The idiot sitting over there is Chan and the masochistic one with the wall is Hide."

"Hi!" replied Aang, only to be ignored by the other two. He continued anyway. "So what happened here? And what's with the creepy dude in the storage room with the big knife? And why is Hide bashing his head against the wall?"

Lee grinned as some more disturbing noises began in another room in the ship. Aang figured it was that other spirit again.

"Hide figures that's a good way to pass time, or at least it's better than doing nothing." He paused, thinking about Aang's other questions. "What guy in storage? Oh wait. Ha. That's just Keiji, he's pretty harmless. He's just gone a little stir crazy on account we've been here too long. Can't move on or nothing."

"Why?"

"We're cursed see." Answered Lee in a somewhat bored voice. "We stole this wooden magic dagger from this monk. We didn't really understand what it was for, but we knew that if we sacrificed someone it would become like angry or something. Then it would get real powerful and we'd be unstoppable. At the time we weren't too happy with the captain. And the first mate seemed to be the man for the job. Ha, we were so stupid. Second day on the job and we crash into some freaking rocks. Anyway, we figured we might as well sacrifice the Cap'. Wastes not want not, ya know? Only thing was that the knife was wooden and blunt. Made an awful mess, all over the deck. When she finally died, the dagger turned to bone and we started having some powerfully bad luck."

"She?"

"Aye, the captain was a woman. And what a woman! Blue-eyed devil, we'd call her. Those eyes were blue as the sea and cold as ice. She was part demon, part angel I reckon. Had a sixth sense for where to find trouble and how to avoid it, or exploit it. Just wish she had better luck finding gold…"

…Eyes blue as the sea…

Aang realized with a jolt that he had completely forgotten about finding Katara.

"Oh man!" Aang cried, slapping his forehead. Some friend he was. "I'm so sorry Lee, I forgot I have to find my friend. But I'm going to find a way to help you guys move on."

"Yeah well good luck buddy... I hope ye find yer friend." Lee responded, turning back to his comfortable position on the hammock.

Those guys weren't so bad after all.

Aang rushed out the door and hurried to the last room that branched out from the hall. He burst in, staff poised, ready for action. What he saw there was shocking and mind-boggling.

"Katara?"

Back to Katara's point of view…

I caught myself on my forearms as I fell through the fracture in the side of the ship. Splinters rained on me and littered the floor around me. I coughed a little to clear my throat before I stood up quickly and dusted the bits of debris of my arms and clothes. I brushed my hair out of my face as I looked up to inspect the belly of the ship. I was inside the ship, obviously, but everything was really… eerie looking. There was a weird fog that obscured the rest of the room from my vision.

Before I could begin to explore or go back to get Aang, two hands grabbed me from behind and waltzed me through the fog at an impossible speed. I was thrown into a room, a door closing carefully after me, as if not to make too much noise. After a few seconds of pause I heard quiet footsteps approach me.

I waited for them to get close enough that I could trip them. Unfortunately they seemed to skim around just out of my reach, moving around to face me head on. Presuming I wouldn't get a shot at them from this position, I lifted myself up and got off the floor, dusting myself off again. You'd think I was an Earthbender considering all the time I seemed to spend getting acquainted with the stupid ground. Any way I stood and looked at the person who had a serious death wish.

It was a boy.

He was about Aang's height and age, not more that seventeen. There was a mop of shaggy dark hair that was long enough to almost cover his bright, intelligent amber eyes. He was watching me, calculating my every move. No doubt he had probably seen my intentions to trip me up before. After examining my face his golden eyes widened in disbelief and then narrowed dangerously. I glared back defiantly.

"What are ye doing on my ship?" He growled maliciously. "It's bad luck for a woman to be aboard, especially in such nasty weather."

I frowned, confused. Aside from a rhythmic thud in a distant room there was little noise in the ship and the weather had been clear outside. This guy was obviously about a few marbles short.

"What are you-" I cut myself off as the teen slid a sharp look blade out of its scabbard. I sucked in some air sharply but before I could react he had sliced at me a few times. I jumped out of the way and flicked the cork of my water skin, holding some water at the ready. I was out of arms reach now and I whipped him across the face. I glanced down when I felt movement around my torso and saw fabric fall to the floor, baring more skin than I was comfortable showing. The stupid little man had shredded my clothes.

"It is you." The man spoke sharply, touching his check gently before continuing casually. "I see I'm going to have to kill ye again."

He rushed at me but I was faster. I whipped the blade from his hand and hurled the water at him, knocking him back against the wall. Then I breathed out slowly, freezing the water and him to the wall. I kicked the blade away, towards the door, as I approached him indifferently.

"You've gotten better at those water tricks, m'dear." He said, as if I hadn't just glued him to the wall.

"Have we met?" I asked him sternly, stopping my approach at a safe distance.

"Oh ye don't remember me," The man's eye's sharpened. "Captain."

I raised a hand to rub my forehead, exasperated.

"I'm not a captain." I sighed. "And I'm not your captain, I don't even know who you are. Your just a little off your tree."

The man frowned at me, either unhappy with my response or confused by it. Possibly both.

"What's that mean 'off ye tree'? I was never on a tree luv." The young man responded. "Ye speaking queerly."

"I'm the one speaking weirdly?" I asked a little indignantly, "You're the one speaking like you were born a hundred… years…ago…Damn."

It hit me while I spoke. This had to be some kind of weird spiritual thing that I had literally stumbled in on. No doubt Aang will come and figure it out…

"Aang!" I rushed to the door. I had forgotten all about him.

I stopped short when I realized there was something wrong. There was no door handle on the door. That meant I couldn't get out. I kicked the door in frustration, groaning as my foot thrummed in pain.

"Ow."

"Ye can't get out from in here unless ye have a key. And ye don't have one, do ye child."

"No, but I bet you do." I responded brightly, stalking over to him. "And don't call me child. I'm pretty sure I'm older… looking."

"That much may be true, little devil." I stopped when he called me that, feeling insulted.

"Don't give me a nickname, I don't even know you." I snapped indignantly, interrupting him from continuing. He just chuckled.

"Ye always were a little firecracker."

I glared at him chillingly. He so did not just call me a 'firecracker'. This guy was obviously a little short on brain cells because we had never met before. That and he thinks he's some kind of pirate from the distant past. I stalked towards him menacingly.

He was silent, grinning at me.

"Well whoever you think I am, your dead wrong buddy." I said coldly.

I thrust my hands into his shirt pockets, searching for a key. The front pockets on his shirt were empty. I frisked his shirt to check the folds, which came up empty as well. I moved my hands to his pants, hesitating.

Don't think about what's in there. Just find the key, just find the key, just find the key…

I slid my hands into his front pockets on his pants, biting my lip. I started to feel around, deeper into his pockets.

He gasped and moaned.

I flung myself away from him so fast I almost pulled my neck out. My face burned as I glanced at his face. He was grinning so gleefully, it made me sick. I stepped up again, determined.

He's only trying to psyche me out. I can do this.

I shoved my hands down the front pockets of his pants and pulled them out, emptying the pockets. The only thing in there was a single earring. I gave a frustrated cry and frowned at him.

"Why don't you have a key?" I asked angrily.

"I do have a key." He answered unhelpfully. I groaned.

Then an idea came to me. A really bad idea.

I gathered up the moisture in his clothes and pulled him forwards, away from the wall. He moved his arms out towards me but I eluded him. When he was about two inches away from the wall I froze him in place again, not comfortable with moving him around too much. I hoped it would hold for long enough because sometimes people with the upper body strength liked to break out of the ice. And that would just suck.

"Don't try anything funny." I warned, giving him a stern look. He just smirked.

I took a deep breath as I stepped between his outstretched arms. His fingers twitched, trying to grab my hair, only the water on his hands was frozen into place. I put my hands behind him as I searched for the entrance to his elusive back pocket. It had to be around there somewhere.

There was a breeze from behind me and a sharp intake of breath.

I froze.

"Katara?"

I jerked out of the frozen man's arms and away from him. I turned to look at the young monk, whose eyes were a little dark. I rushed to his side to hug him tightly, which he returned, before stepping back and succumbing to the overwhelming urge to justify the position he found me in.

"I didn't do anything, I swear!" I began babbling, "I was just looking for his key so I could get out of this room because it has no door handle on the inside and he was trying to kill me so I had to freeze him and search his clothes so that I could get to the key because he was the one who locked us in here so I figured he must have been able to open the door-"

"Katara, calm down." Aang spoke understandingly. I took a deep breath to sort myself out.

"Who are you?" Aang turned and pointed to the human icicle with his staff, not so sympathetically.

"My name is Captain Dijon." The frosted pirate answered. "This it my ship and that knife ye have strapped to yer person is mine too."

"Is not!" Aang retaliated, gripping the bulk on his hip whose cover had blown off, "You're a spirit, so anything we come across that's material, was yours."

I sighed and froze the captain's mouth shut before he could argue. Aang may be the Avatar, but sometimes he just didn't know how to talk to spirits. On the plus side I now know why the crazy dude spoke like he was at least a century old. Because he was.

"Okay Aang, I think it's time to go back before Sokka bursts a vein or has some kind of a break down." I muttered to him, tugging on his robe.

"No Katara I don't think we can."

"What do you mean Aang?" I feared the worst, like that we might be stuck here. He did say we were with a spirit, so maybe we were in some kind of spirit world. That would explain the indoor fog before.

"I can't just leave these spirits here. They need to move on to the spirit world. You should go back though, to reassure Sokka."

"No way. We came together, we'll leave the same way. I would never leave you behind." I said assertively, though I smiled and he returned it.

"So… How do we get a spirit to move on?" I asked. Aang thought for a second.

"I don't know. Usually I just ask them to stop bothering people after sorting out their problems and they go back to the spirit world." Aang explained, probably thinking out loud.

"Oh. So, how do we figure out the problem?" I asked, feeling entirely unhelpful. Aang was the one who dealt with spirits. I had a very limited experience when it came to the paranormal.

Aang bit his lip thoughtfully. His eyes brightened and he strolled up to the captain. The captain eyed him warily, his fingers twitching and a lot of noise coming from his throat. Aang ignored him and raised his hand, gently placing it to his forehead. Everyone stopped moving and I waited with bated breath.

Nothing happened for a long time. No glowing, no gasps or any kind of movement.

Aang groaned in frustration as he moved away.

"I don't know what he wants." He said.

"We can ask." I suggested brightly.

I promptly unfroze his mouth and gestured to Aang to start talking to the guy. Aang looked at me doubtfully, uneasy of whether this was smart. I smiled encouragingly. It was worth a shot.

"Mr. Dijon-"

"Captain. Captain Dijon." The spirit interrupted. Aang cleared his throat a little nervously.

"…Captain Dijon, could you tell us why you haven't moved on?" Aang asked more authoritively. I smiled.

"No."

"What?" Dijon rolled his eyes at Aang's bewilderment.

"No."

"But you must have some idea." I said, a little reproachfully. "You've been here for over a century. Surely that's given you enough time to think about what's holding you back, or why you can't move on."

The captain was quiet again so I froze his lips together irritably. I was fuming a little but I had no idea as to why. Something about this seemed off. This stranger was hiding something from me, something big.

"Mutiny…" Aang murmured. I looked at him quizzically.

"Excuse me?" I asked, still looking at him curiously.

"The pirates here, they lead a mutiny against their former captain and stabbed her with this dagger." Explained Aang, touching the object of his thoughts that hung on his hip. "The other pirates believe it cursed them to a purgatory after making them pretty unlucky."

"Oh. So how do we get them to move on?"

"Well we have to help them make peace with themselves and the dagger I guess."

I sighed and rubbed my eyes, feeling tired and hungry from the journey we made today. According to Aang's stomach bellowing, he was hungry as well. Aang reddened as I glanced over to him and I smiled at him reassuringly.

"I'm hungry too Aang." I told him, hoping to lessen his blush. "If we can figure this out, we can go back and hope that Sokka and Toph saved us something."

Aang grinned at me suddenly.

"Katara I just had a really good idea!" he proclaimed, bouncing slightly on the balls of his feet.

"What is it Aang?" I asked, curious as to his suddenly enthusiastic disposition.

Aang pulled the phurba out from his belt. It was still half wrapped in the pillow sheet material, but it had come loose probably from Aang flying around or running, or both. I looked at him curiously, hoping he wasn't thinking that he should use it. But knowing Aang that was probably his bright idea…

"We can use this!" Aang announced as I thought he would. "A phurba is usually used for these kinds of things, exorcisms and spirit stuff-"

"Aang I don't think that's a good idea." I cut in, eyeing the dagger cautiously. "That thing cursed a whole ship full of pirates for using it in the wrong way and you said before the phurba chose its holder. If we try to use it there's no telling what could happen but I don't think it's going to be safe for us."

"I don't think it cursed the whole ship." Aang tried to convince me. "There's only five spirits here."

"Aang-"

"Katara, how much longer are these spirits going to have to spend separated from where they're supposed to be? It's not right that we should just not try something because it might be dangerous. We deal with danger almost every day. We can deal with this."

I hated when Aang became so bloody persuasive. I sighed.

"You know I'll go along with what you think is best. For now." I surrendered.

Aang pulled the phurba free from its bindings and slipped it out of its sheath. I held my breath as the material floated to the floor. Aang gripped the handle of the creamy white dagger and moved towards the pirate captain a little uncertainly. The pirate's eyes widened as Aang lifted the blade to his chest.

"Aang wait-" I spoke too late.

Aang gently touched the tip of the phurba to the pirate's chest.

The spirit exploded in a puff of fog and shimmering dust, swirling in place like a tornado before being sucked up into the knife. There was a small flash that shot out of the end of the dagger before the tiny light flashed through the ceiling. It reminded me of when Aang's spirit searched for his body five years or so ago in the North Pole, but on a smaller scale. The ice that held the spirit in place was the only thing that remained as a reminder to what had just occurred as the shards clattered to the floor and shattered.

"Well that was dramatic…" I stated as I unfroze the ice and pulled it into my water skin, corking it.

Aang chuckled before he breathed a sigh of relief and walked past me, grabbing my hand in the process to drag me with him.

"Come on Katara, lets go free the other pirates."

"Well ye must be Katara." Spoke the pirate from the hammock. "The Avatar called yer name a bit urgently a little while ago."

I smiled at him and gave a nod while glancing nervously at the man hitting his head against the wall. That wasn't healthy…

"We've come to help you all move on." I told him assertively, ignoring the other two pirates.

"I've no doubt that ye would be the one to do it." He replied. I looked at him, confused.

"What are you people talking -" I cut myself off and put up my hands in a defeated gesture, "you know what, I don't care anymore."

The pirate grinned his yellowed teeth.

Aang pulled out his magic dagger and walked over to the pirate who was… using the wall. He gently touched the tip of the dagger to the man's back. The pirate exploded in the same kind of swirling fog as the pirate captain, disappearing into the knife before shooting out and flitting through the ceiling. He repeated this with the strange pirate, who was sitting on the floor, whom I realized hadn't actually moved since we entered. The last pirate was still sitting on the hammock watching lazily as Aang poked the other spirits. He glanced over at me and I blinked before giving an embarrassed smile since I was caught staring.

"Ye must be a water bender." The man stated. I raised my eyebrows in surprise.

"How did you know that?" I asked, perplexed.

"Just a lucky guess." He answered, turning away and putting his hands behind his head. "That and I've never seen an earth bender wear that much blue."

I said nothing. Aang must have thought we were having a conversation.

"Hey guys, there's one more spirit I've got to take care of." Aang said before leaving the room. I made to follow him but stopped at what the pirate said next.

"I guess they didn't find the avatar." I paused, turning a little.

"What?"

"Back when we were… stronger, there were rumours in the Fire Nation about finding the Air Nomad who would be Avatar. Rumours about disrupting the cycle. Looks like they were only rumours after all." He tilted his head to look at me before turning away.

Again I said nothing but moved to go find Aang.

"Do ye believe in reincarnation girl?"

I paused again, sighing a little.

"Of course." I said, turning back to him. "The avatar-"

"The Avatar." He interrupted. "Avatars are reincarnation of the Great Spirit. No I meant humans reincarnated as humans."

"No." I answered, my head spinning a little at trying to think about that.

"Well consider it sometime." He ordered. "I used to know a girl. Strong, beautiful, a little violent." I narrowed my eyes

"So what."

"Just that traveling with the Avatar is something me mate would have done. Yer the spitting image I swear."

I scoffed.

"That means nothing to me. I look like my mother." I spoke confidently.

"Must be a water tribe thing then. Do ye inbreed at all?" I stepped towards him angrily, opening my mouth to retort but he beat me to it. "Don't take offense girl, I'm sure yer beautiful people and all."

I glared but remembered Aang so I turned and stalked out the door, intent on finding him. Coincidently he was on his way back so we met, head first, outside the doorway.

"Ow."

"Katara! Oh man, I'm so sorry." Aang apologized, embarrassed.

"Don't be." I replied. "Just go dust the spirit in here."

He gave me a confused look but before he could comment I pushed him into the room.

We stepped out of the ship and back into the physical world. I breathed the crisp air in deeply and looked back at the hole in the ship. The waning moon shone brightly, lighting up the interior of the ship.

"There's no more spirit purgatory in there now." He continued at my confused stare. "Before, there was no light shining into the hole. Now that the light can enter there it probably means that the purgatory moved on as well because there are no more spirits here."

That made sense. I mean there was no point in a purgatory if there were no spirits there.

"We should get back before Sokka comes looking for us." I commented, pulling Aang along with me.

"Hey, why didn't he come looking…?" Aang asked.

I shrugged.

A/N: I hope you guys enjoyed this.

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