Disclaimer- I do not own Avatar: The Last Airbender

I expect to write five chapters for this fic, which take place between the defeat of Ozai and shortly after the final scene of the show. The relationships in this fic run parallel to the show (sorry Zutarians). I tried to keep the characters personalities as similar to the show as possible in this chapter (I know, Zuko is not chatty, but in this situation...). A lot of this chapter centers around Katara (she is my favorite character from the show) because I thought that the writers ignored a crutial part of the story when they left a huge gap in the Kataang relationship at the end. She went from being "confused" about her feelings for Aang to making out with him on a balcony in Ba Sing Se. I had so many questions, like: What happened between them after the fall of Ozai? Why are they in Ba Sing Se? Did they exchange words beforehand?

I also thought that they did not develop Katara's POV in this matter. It is obvious that she developed a romantic interest in Aang after the fall of Ba Sing Se, as seen in several episodes of Season Three. But the writers made her "confused" in The Ember Island Playersthen skipped to her giving Aang a loving look at Zuko's coronation speech. This "I'll only like you if you defeat the Firelord" attitude seemed uncharacteristically shallow for Katara's personality. But then I realized that maybe the writers intended it to signal that she was simly scared of losing Aang again, so she didn't want to open herself up to him because if he died, she would lose someone she deeply loved for the second time in her life...

Chapter 1:

Shortly after the defeat of Firelord Ozai-

The night sky over the Fire Nation capital was illumined by burning rooftops from the epic Agni Kai that took place a few hours ago. The dual between Zuko and Azula had burned much of the structures around the Coronation Temple, causing flash fires to burn across the city. The relatively isolated Royal Palace, however, remained intact.

Zuko sighed as he watched Katara frantically pace back and forth between Appa and himself, her eyes downcast and filled with worry. They were awaiting the return of the Avatar and the rest of the Gaang on the Royal Plaza. He shifted from lying on his back to an upright position, every movement caused pain to course through his body. The wounds he received from the fight with Azula had been healed or bandaged an hour ago, but the effects of the lightning still shot through his nerves. He ignored the pain though, because his primary concern at the moment was Katara. She had been beside herself worrying about Aang, so much so that she made him panicky over the return of his new friend.

"Katara… pacing around like that will not make him return any faster, calm down," Zuko said rather harshly.

She looked up at him, her cerulean eyes filled with worry and fear. "What if he doesn't return, what if he…?" Fresh tears began to roll down her already stained face.

Zuko frowned. She had asked him that question five times in an hour. He painfully got to his feet and put a hand on her shoulder.

"Katara, he will return," he tried to comfort her. Zuko had never seen her like this before. "Why have you lost your confidence? While we were flying here, you seemed certain that he would return."

"I was… trying to reassure myself more than you," she spoke in between sobs. "I'm just so scared I am going to lose him again before I can tell him…" she trailed off, her sobs became wails.

Zuko stood still, unsure of what to do and say. Then it dawned on him what she was trying to tell him. "You love him, don't you?"

At that, Katara threw herself to the ground, bent over to hide her face. Zuko knelt beside her and instructed her to take deep breaths. After a few minutes, she regained her composure and sat up to face Zuko, blushing. He could tell that she was embarrassed of her breakdown. He smiled at her.

"It's okay, I won't tell anyone about…"

She smiled back at him and wiped her eyes. Although she was embarrassed for him to witness it, her breakdown had helped her partially release the fear that had eaten at her since the night Ba Sing Se fell. She wondered if talking to Zuko would help her release the rest of that fear.

"You were right, I do love him," she confessed, "I realized that I loved Aang after I lost him at Ba Sing Se. Seeing him… dead... made me realize that I had become dependent on him being with me, and I couldn't lose him. That night, I promised myself that I would never let something like that happen again."

Zuko began to connect the pieces that had been evident in his mind to the information she had just confided to him. "That explains why you were so angry with me after I joined the group. It wasn't just because your hatred of the Fire Nation for killing your mother-"

"You're right. I let those feelings be absorbed into my anger directed at you for hurting Aang. I was furious with you because I trusted you, and then you betrayed us and helped Azula defeat him. I know it was her that shocked him, but you were the one I released my anger at." She smiled. "But you have helped us so much recently. You taught Aang firebending and helped Sokka free Suki and my father… and you helped me find the man who killed my mother." She hugged him tightly, forgetting his injuries. Zuko grit his teeth in pain as she pulled back.

"I figured that you loved him when you threatened to kill me if I touched him."

Katara grabbed her arm and looked down in embarrassment. "Sorry about that."

They sat in silence for a few minutes. Katara's smile slowly faded from her face, sadness seemed to refill in her eyes. Zuko noted this and grasped her wrist lightly.

"Come on Zuko, comforting girls isn't hard. Just say something smooth," he whispered to himself. He blushed, realizing he just spoke his thoughts out loud, but she didn't appear to have noticed. She stared longingly at the horizon over the sea, scanning for any sign of his return. The sky was empty, save for the disappearing stars and a few clouds illuminated by the first few rays of the morning sun.

"Katara, Aang will return." He looked her in the eyes. "Everything he does, what he is doing for the world right now, is not just for the good of us all. He is doing it for you."

Katara gaped at Zuko. She didn't expect any sort of observation like that from the teenager in front of her. Zuko smiled, thinking he had made her feel better, however, his words had the opposite effect. Tears formed in her large blue eyes.

"I… he… shouldn't love me. I don't deserve him," she stuttered. She looked back to see Zuko's confused expression and began to ramble. "I hid my feelings from him and even when he confessed that those feelings were mutual at that play a few nights ago on Ember Island, I told him I was confused and to wait until the war was over because I was scared. But now, I wish I told him because if I never see him again-" she choked up, unable to continue to speak.

Zuko was silenced, unable to say a word. He realized that she had just shared her deepest feeling from her heart with him and he could not muster the words to respond to such a magnitude of feelings.

A cry from Appa awoke both of them from their thoughts. Golden light poured onto the plaza as the sun broke through the night and appeared on the horizon. Katara looked up to see a small black dot in the sky. She shot to her feet, anxious excitement replacing her pain. Appa cried again as Zuko struggled to his feet with the help of Katara. The minutes that passed seemed like hours to Katara as the dot grew large enough to make out the red coloring.

"It's a Fire Nation airship," Zuko said.

As the airship drew nearer to the three, it descended in altitude towards the plaza. Katara took deep breaths, fear creeping back into her mind. "Please be okay, Aang," she whispered to herself. She pictured in her mind her brother carrying his corpse from the airship and began to tear up again. Normally, she would be embarrassed for crying so much in front of others, but she didn't care at this point.

The airship let out heat before landing a few hundred yards ahead of them. Katara left Zuko behind and rushed across the port side to the boarding ramp that was dropped to the ground, her heart beating frantically. She heard footsteps clanking from above as four figures appeared on the ramp.

She felt her heart nearly leap out of her chest. "Aang!" she screamed.

"Katara!"

They met at the bottom of the ramp in a tight embrace. She buried her face in his shoulder, quietly sobbing in relief. Aang immersed himself in her thick, long hair. He had worried about her safety the entire way back to the Fire Nation capital.

"I missed you," he whispered into her ear, his eyes watering from happiness.

"We were so scared that we lost you… that I lost you," she said shakily.

"Katara! You're okay!" shouted a voice above her.

She broke from her embrace to see an injured Sokka, supported by Suki and Toph hobbling down to greet her.

"Sokka! What happened to your leg?! Are you okay?!" she rushed up to him and enveloped him into a hug.

"I'm fine, the injured leg was from jumping from so many airships." Katara looked horrified, but Sokka continued speaking. "Aang was amazing! The Firelord got his butt kicked! Aang went into the Avatar State and beat him around and made a big blue light shine in the sky, and then he took his bending away and pulled the ocean up to end the fires-"

"What?!" Katara was shocked. "He took his bending away!?"

She turned to face Aang, who smiled up at her.

"How did you do that?!"

"A giant lion turtle taught me," he said.

"Wow, you have some crazy adventures," she smiled.

"That's what I said," Toph laughed. "Sorry we're late Sugar Queen, Meathead over here insisted on us finding his 'space sword' and boomerang."

Sokka frowned at this, for they could not recover his old boomerang. Suki noticed his change in mood and smiled.

"We'll make you a new boomerang, Sokka," she said, smiling.

"Well Sparky, you haven't had much to say," Toph spoke up. The others turned to see Zuko at the bottom of the ramp. He had been standing silently below Aang, listening to the others stories and was obviously embarrassed that the group's attention was now focused on him.

"What hapened to you Zuko?" asked Suki, noticing his bandaged torso and shoulders.

"Azula shot me..." he stated simply.

"Looks like I'm not the only one injured," smirked Sokka, who was promptly cuffed on the back of the head by Toph. "Oww".

"I thought you could redirect lightning?" Suki asked.

"He jumped in the way to save me" They turned to face Katara, who smiled at Zuko. Before he could reply, he was speedy rushed and caught in a hug from Sokka and Aang. Zuko awkwardly returned the hug, before shoving them off. Sokka fell to the floor, complaining loudly about his hurt leg.

"Well, you saved me Katara. You defeated Azula and you healed my burn," said Zuko gratefully.

"So everything turned out great, Twinkletoes beat the 'Pheonix King' and your psychotic sister was brought down." Toph said, turning to Zuko as she helped a complaining Sokka to his feet.

"Congratulations Aang," Zuko said.

"Thanks Zuko, I couldn't have done it without you or Toph, Sokka and Suki-" he smiled at them before turning to Katara. "-and especially you, Katara." He beamed.

She grabbed him abruptly and pulled him into a tight hug. "Thank you, Aang. I have to tell-"

She was interrupted by Sokka's shout. "I'm starving! Zuko, can we get something to eat!" Everyone laughed and made their way over to Appa, who warmly greeted Aang with a lick. Suki and Toph leapt atop Appa and lifted the injured Sokka and Zuko onto the bison's saddle. Katara was about to mount, but was stopped by Aang's hand on her shoulder.

"Katara, what were you going to tell me?" he asked.

She was silent for a moment before responding with a smile. "I'll tell you later Aang."

Did you like it? Feel free to review, I respect your opinions!

In the next chapter, Katara will confess her feelings to Aang and- stop... SOKKA TIME! (yes, I'm crazy).