Catalyst

Chapter 5: Tentative Tending

Sokka had been doing fine. He woke up rested, about to head to the lake to see how Katara was, and to take one of the many foreseeable baths to wash the stink of the cell from himself and his clothing. Not a terrible way to begin the day—spirits knew it wasn't the worst way he had ever woken up.

And then, as he headed to the water, he came across Zuko and Katara sleeping together? Well, next to each other, but still!

Sokka had the advantage. He tiptoed the rest of the way to Zuko, shouted, "Sneak attack!" and preceded to launch his attack on Zuko's sleeping body, hitting him with the closest object he had available—which was, of course, Boomerang. He stood over the unconscious teen in victory as he started whacking his body left and right. "Take that! And that. And that's for trying to kill us. For trying to kill Aang. Take that, Zuko!"

Zuko's eyes shot open. He met Sokka's eyes for a half a moment, his golden eyes instantly filling with a kind of terror Sokka had never seen before. The expression of pure fear made him pause his beating.

The momentary break allowed Zuko to backpedal away, half-crawling, trying to escape as fast as he could but because he was still injured, he couldn't move fast nor could he seem to find his footing on the sandy beach.

If it had been anyone but the firebender, Sokka would have laughed. It was just so ridiculous. Ah, yes, you'll escape by crawling away. He was hit with a sense of bitter satisfaction. Finally, after all their battles, he had the upper hand. Sokka followed Zuko crawling along the beach, similar to how a buzzardwasp stalks its prey until it was too tired to move.

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Katara as well as Aang and Toph had been driven awake by Sokka's "sneak attack" on the boy they had just saved—the boy Sokka was now addressing as Zuko.

But he can't be Zuko, Katara reasoned to herself. Azula would have freed him as soon as she had taken over Ba Sing Se. Unless that's why she was there—no, I remember, she saw him and didn't recognize him. She relaxed a little. And besides, I healed him last night. I would have realized who he was if he was really Zuko. In any case, she had to stop Sokka from doing something he was going to regret.

The teen was crawling up the beach with Sokka trotting behind him, boomerang in hand. If he hadn't been moving to escape from her brother, it would have been a good sign of his heath because he was acting more alive than ever. He wasn't fast, but even that could exacerbate his condition.

"Sokka!" she yelled as she stood up and began running over to him. She caught his arm. "Sokka, stop!"

"What?" He gestured with his boomerang. "He's the enemy!" The teen had stopped crawling and laid facedown in the coarse sand, wheezing, too tired to continue on.

"He's not completely healed. You're going to make him worse," Katara warned.

Aang and Toph ran up just as she knelt by his side and, as gently as she could, turned him over on his back. Sure enough, Sokka was right. The distinctive scar was blood red in the dim morning light.

Instinctively, Aang and Katara moved back while Toph remained where she was. "Wait, who?"

"Zuko," Sokka answered, not taking his eyes off of him.

"Oh." The earthbender sounded surprised.

All Zuko could do was lay there wheezing and looking at all of them. His eyes traveled from Sokka, to Katara, to Aang. He reminded Katara of a tigerseal stuck in a fishing net: too tired to fight and could only look up at you and plead silently for mercy—whether that be freedom or a quick death. He cried out as if beaten by an invisible hand and turned over on his side, facing the lake.