#zutaraangweek2020

[zutaraangtastic]

Announcing Zutaraang Week 2020!

A week to celebrate, create and share content of Zuko/Aang/Katara, running from Monday 31st August - Sunday 6th September! Art, fic, graphics, meta, absolutely any type of creation you can think of goes! The date and prompts have been selected through this poll.

Rules:

Tag posts with #zutaraangweek or #zutaraangweek2020 or @ this blog so we can see/reblog it! Make sure it’s in the first five tags so it appears in the search. You can also submit directly to the blog.

Content focused on one pair (Zukaang, Kataang, Zutara) is very welcome as long as it’s within an OT3 context.

Friendship/non-shippy themed creations are also welcome, as well as NSFW (please tag it appropriately.)

There is a Zutaraang Week AO3 collection here which you can post your creation to if it’s on AO3.

Prompts are there for inspiration - feel free to post any other Zutaraang works, and to post works inspired by a prompt after the scheduled day.

The bonus prompt is there as an extra bit of inspiration that can be posted at any time in lieu of or addition to main prompts.

If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to send this blog an ask, or come join the discord for discussion. Happy creating!

Zutaraang Week 2020 Prompts

1. Monday 31st - Jealousy 2. Tuesday 1st - Secrets 3. Wednesday 2nd - Avatar state  4. Thursday 3rd - Tea 5. Friday 4th - Steam(y) 6. Saturday 5th - Worship 7. Sunday 6th - Stars Bonus prompt: Beach

Banner art by @cottoncandyofterror! 

[kuchee]

the courage of stars // a post-aang’s death zutaraang playlist, for zutaraang week day 7, ‘stars’.  ▶️listen on spotify or youtube

saturn - sleeping at last / myth - beach house / 100 years - florence and the machine / better love - hozier / the archer - taylor swift / transatlanticism - death cab for cutie / ocean rain - echo and the bunnymen / fire and rain - birdy / mae - the gaslight anthem / two slow dancers - mitski / peace - taylor swift / ends of the earth - lord huron / sweet disposition - the temper trap 

[thinkingisadangerouspastime]

avatar state

day three of zutaraang week 2020 by @zutaraangtastic! today i tried my hand at some angst (aangst, if you will). i hope you enjoy :)

avatar state: who dares to love forever (oh, when love must die?)

Waiting was the hardest part.

“He was supposed to be back five days ago!” Katara snapped, shoving past the Fire Nation guards to enter Zuko’s personal study. “Five days! And we haven’t heard anything from him!”

Aang had been called to the Earth Kingdom last week to help put down an uprising of hot-blooded Ozai supporters in one of the former Fire Nation colonies - of all places - and had been expected back before the weekend passed. It was a higher risk mission than usual, as some of the firebenders had supposedly convinced earthbenders to join their cause - as to how they’d done that, Katara didn’t have a damn clue - but Aang had promised he could handle it without her and Zuko’s help. Now it was five days beyond his promised return, and neither he nor anyone else had sent word about what had caused his delay. Lagging two or three days behind schedule wasn’t necessarily unusual for Aang, what with him being the Avatar, but not having heard from him? And not having heard anything about him? And then taking into consideration how dangerous the mission had been labelled to be? Katara felt her anxiety was completely justified. And therefore so were her lack of appetite and the sleepless nights she’d been having.

Zuko sighed, scrawling his signature at the bottom of one of the many papers on his desk before placing his pen down and looking up at her. “I know. I dispatched people to the Earth Kingdom two days after his intended return date, and I’m expecting them to send news by messenger hawk that will arrive either tonight or tomorrow morning.”

Katara had to resist the urge to tear her hair out, as that particular display of frustration would get her nowhere. Still, the pent-up stress and fear and guilt for not accompanying Aang when she could have - it demanded release. She slammed her palms down on Zuko’s desk. “There has to be more you can do. You’re the Fire Lord. Something! Anything more than just sitting here, for spirits’ sake!”

Zuko dismissed the aide who Katara assumed had been helping him sort through and review his paperwork, waiting for the door to shut behind them before he addressed her again. “I know it’s frustrating,” he began, his tone even, “but all we can do right now is wait for news to arrive.”

If Katara hadn’t been a waterbender, she would have described her blood as being on fire. She supposed ‘boiling’ would have to do. “‘Wait’?” she repeated, her voice far icier than the hot rage burning inside of her. “How can you possibly expect me to wait any longer?!” She’d waited five days already, and she couldn’t stand the endless delays for even one more second. Her hand dropped to the flask ever-present on her hip. “No. You can’t make me stay here. I’m going after him.” Maybe it was futile, but she didn’t care, at least looking for him was an action, at least she’d be doing something instead of sitting helpless -

“Katara, you are not leaving this palace,” Zuko ordered, staring her down.

She met his gaze with a cold, steely one of her own. “You have no power over me, Fire Lord Zuko,” she sneered, an ugly, irrational hatred curling through her veins. “In fact, as your esteemed guest, you should be helping me in any way possible rather than refusing to provide me assistance.”

“And what, exactly, do you plan to do to help him, Katara?” Zuko said, standing and crossing his arms over his chest. She could tell he was trying not to lose his temper - Aang had once pointed out to her how Zuko tended to clench his jaw when he was frustrated, and she’d noticed it ever since. “We don’t know where he is inside the colony, or if he’s even in that area of the Earth Kingdom anymore!”

“And? I’ll figure it out,” she snapped, grip tightening on her flask of water. “You’re the Fire Lord, aren’t you? Use that power and status of yours to - to get me an ostrich horse or something! Anything that covers ground fast.”

“No. I won’t,” Zuko said, his shoulders stiffening. “We are not taking any action until the messenger hawk arrives. Only once we have a clear read on the situation will anyone, us included, be allowed to -”

The anger simmering in the pit of Katara’s stomach finally boiled over. “Oh, shut up about ‘we’! Just shut up!” she shouted, her hands clenching into fists at her sides before she relaxed one enough to point at him accusingly, her eyes narrowing in a deadly glare. “There is no ‘we’, Fire Lord Zuko, because apparently I am the only one here who actually cares about Aang since all you want to do is sit here and pretend everything is fine! There is no ‘we’, because you’re incapable of making a decisive choice to try and help him before it’s too late!” She blinked back tears, furiously wiping at her eyes before her fists clenched again. “Dammit, Zuko, Tui and La know that there isn’t a ‘we’, because it’s clear from your - your apathy that you don’t love Aang as much as I do!”

Katara regretted the harsh words as soon as they left her lips, inhaling sharply and biting her tongue less than a second later. But before her mind could piece together a coherent apology -

“How dare you,” Zuko growled, tendrils of smoke and a flicker of fire escaping the corners of his mouth as sparks flew out of his fingertips. If looks could kill, Katara knew his venomous glare would have sent her six feet under. “How dare you suggest that I don’t care about Aang because I have the sense not to take hasty action like you so impatiently want to? How dare you suggest that I’m content with sitting behind my desk and waiting for news to arrive? How dare you suggest that I don’t - that I don’t love him -”

His voice broke, and just as quickly as rage had poured out of him, it dissipated, the fire in his eyes vanishing as a look of deep, aching pain fell across his features.

“You have no idea how worried I am,” he whispered. “I have more power than anyone else in my country, and I’m still helpless. Left behind. Stuck… waiting.”

It took every ounce of willpower in Katara’s body to keep herself from breaking into sobs. “You’re wrong,” she managed to say. “I know exactly how worried you are.” She could feel a tear sliding down her cheek, and she had to bite her tongue to keep the rest from pouring out for fear they would never stop. “I’m sorry.” She took a step away from his desk, holding her arms open.

And when Zuko walked around to accept her embrace, burying his face into her hair as she pressed her own into his shoulder, she couldn’t say when she began to cry, nor did she know which of them allowed their tears to fall first. Not that it mattered. When it came to Aang, it never did.

“I’m so afraid,” Katara said, her words coming out as fractured gasps between heaving sobs. “He’s never - disappeared like this, without saying something or - or letting someone know! If something happened to him, I don’t know what I’ll do -”

It had been hard enough watching him die once. She wasn’t ready - no, she couldn’t watch it happen again.

Zuko’s arms tightened around her. “I know,” he murmured. Katara didn’t miss the unsteadiness, the fear, the pain in his voice. “I can’t imagine life without him, either.”

His words only made her cry harder, and she probably would have cried all night had a messenger not barged into Zuko’s study, panting hard and face red as a tomato, presumably from sprinting all the way down the hall.

“Lord - Lord Zuko!” he gasped. “A - A message! From” - he heaved in a deep breath - “from the Earth Kingdom!”

To his credit, Zuko remained far more composed than she did. No doubt thanks to his royal upbringing. Katara barely managed to quiet her sobs to muffled, hiccuping sniffles as the firebender pulled away from her, though he did keep a hand on her shoulder, for which she was silently grateful.

“Read the message,” Zuko ordered, though without the usual intensity of his regal demeanor. “Please.”

Aang had to be the one driving those manners into him. Aang and Iroh.

The messenger nodded, taking in a few more deep breaths before coughing and then clearing his throat as he opened the parchment scroll. “In a battle against a group of former Fire Lord Ozai’s supporters,” he began, “Avatar Aang attempted to hold them all off on his own to allow civilians to escape the area, as the firebenders made extreme efforts to burn down the numerous houses and shops in the vicinity. However, when forced to enter the Avatar state or else be overwhelmed, he was injured by a rogue earthbender -”

The last thing Katara remembered were her knees buckling beneath her and Zuko crying out her name before everything went dark.

~*~

Katara woke up with a warm, damp cloth pressed to her forehead and a steaming cup of tea on the table next to her… bed?

This was not the guest room Zuko had given her.

“You’re in the palace’s infirmary. Of sorts,” a voice explained. “Right now it’s not much more than a big room of small beds and tables, but we’re expecting to stock it with medicine and bandages before the end of the week. It was still faster to carry you here than to your bedroom.”

Katara groaned, pulling the cloth off of her forehead. “What happened?”

“You fainted,” Zuko said flatly. He was sitting on a chair next to her ‘bed’. “Before you ask, you were only out for a few minutes.” He then sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose in frustration. Or maybe it was exasperation. Possibly both. “Dammit, Katara! How can a waterbender get dehydrated? Aang is going to kill me when he finds out I let his girlfriend forget to take care of herself!”

Katara rolled her eyes as she pushed herself up into a sitting position and - 

Oh. The world was spinning. That was… concerning.

Okay, maybe she was a little lightheaded from not having eaten or slept for the past 72 hours. But she was fine. Or she would be in a minute or two.

“Don’t even try to argue,” Zuko grumbled. He proceeded to hand her the cup of tea that had been resting on the table next to her. “Here. Drink this. I tried to make it like Uncle does.”

The emphasis usually went on ‘tried’ in these scenarios, or so Aang had once warned her, but she didn’t want to seem ungrateful, so she didn’t protest. She was thankful for his help regardless.

A few minutes and a few sips of tea later, Katara felt considerably more alert, and not to mention the world was no longer spinning. She considered herself 100% less likely to faint. Probably. Hopefully.

“Okay,” she said, taking a final sip of tea before placing her cup back down on the small table beside her bed. “I’m good now. What did the rest of the message say? The one about Aang?”

Zuko appeared hesitant to answer. Not a great sign. “I don’t think it’s the best idea for me to -”

“Zuko.” Katara tried to find a middle ground between stern and pleading. “I have to know. You know I do.”

Zuko flinched beneath her steady gaze, then sighed. “It… didn’t really say much else,” he admitted. “Just that Aang was injured in the Avatar state, and when the dust cloud dissipated afterwards, he was nowhere to be seen. No one knows for certain what happened to him.”

Katara’s heart dropped into her stomach, and she suspected it was a good thing she wasn’t standing as she had to bite back bile rising in her throat. “No one?” she repeated after a pause, clutching at the blue fabric on her lap. “How can there be no word about him?! He might be an airbender, but he can’t just disappear -”

“I’ve already got my people there digging for more information,” he promised her, though he didn’t sound confident. Which didn’t exactly reassure her, but it was… better than nothing. Barely. “It’s possibly that he’s already on his way back with Appa already, and that’s why no one has seen him.”

Katara couldn’t help but scoff at his suggestion, which at least distracted her from the nausea rolling in the pit of her stomach. “As if the spirits would ever let us be so lucky -”

“KATARA!”

Her voice caught in her throat at the familiar, frantic tone. She didn’t dare to get her hopes up, and yet -

In a blur of orange, the person Katara had been weeping for less than ten minutes earlier was by her side, leaning over her bed and pushing her hair out of her face. She hadn’t realized it had fallen down.

“Katara, they told me you fainted!” Aang exclaimed worriedly, his eyebrows furrowed in concern as he touched her cheek. “Sweetie, what hap-”

Katara didn’t let him finish, cupping his face with both of her hands and leaning forward to capture his lips in a searing kiss. “I was so worried about you, Aang,” she breathed when she finally had to break away for air. “When I heard you were hurt in the Avatar state, I thought -”

“Shh,” Aang whispered, kissing away the tears that had started to trickle down her cheeks. “I’m fine. I’m okay. I’m here now. You don’t need to worry any more.”

Katara took a deep breath before she managed a small nod. “Okay.”

He looked her over one more time before pushing her hair out of her face again and then pulling away, standing upright to face Zuko, who Katara realized had jumped to his feet when Aang first came rushing in.

“Are you okay?” Aang asked him quietly.

Zuko didn’t respond at first, blinking furiously in an evident attempt to stop his own tears from falling. He let out a shuddering breath, the tension gradually disappearing from his shoulders. “Spirits, Aang, seeing you alive…” He shook his head. “Not yet. But… I will be. Because you’re here now.”

Aang gave him a soft smile, and even though it hadn’t been directed at her, Katara couldn’t help but feel more at ease. “Can I hug you?”

Zuko nodded, wiping beneath his right eye with the base of his palm. “Yes. Thank you.”

No further words were spoken. But with Aang, there often didn’t need to be. And when Katara was pulled off her makeshift bed and into their hug a minute or so later, she couldn’t say she was surprised.

Waiting was the hardest part.

But as their boyfriend gently kissed the top of her head before pressing a soft kiss to Zuko’s cheek, Katara knew that Aang… He’d always be worth waiting for.

[philosopherking1887]

Secrets

Wrote a “tribble” (my new-ish word for a triple drabble, i.e., a 300-word ficlet; I am going to make this word happen) on the Day 2 prompt for Zutaraang Week 2020. @zutaraangtastic

---------

“You know,” said Toph, “I’m frankly astounded that you’ve been able to keep it secret this long.”

“From the kids?” Aang asked.

“From anyone. You two are the worst secret-keepers I’ve ever met,” she announced, pointing at Aang and Zuko in turn.

“I can keep secrets!” Zuko protested. “My uncle didn’t know I was the Blue Spirit… well, until he figured out I’d been stealing from the villages we passed through while on the run.”

“Uh-huh. How much you wanna bet he didn’t know?”

“Excuse me?”

“Bet. How much.”

“What, you’re going to ask him if he knew I’d been sneaking off the ship? How will I know you haven’t tipped him off about the bet?”

“You’ll just have to trust me, Sparky.” Her shark-like grin wasn’t calculated to inspire trust.

“He kept how he got his scar secret from all of us for months,” Katara pointed out.

“That wasn’t a secret,” Zuko said, looking uneasy. “It was just— private.”

“You’re arguing against yourself now?” Toph said, unimpressed.

“What’s the difference?” Katara asked—not a challenge, simply curious.

“Secrets are when you want to hide something, to deceive people. Privacy is just… you don’t want to tell them. Yet.”

“You’re making my point for me,” said Toph. “You’re good at not telling people things, but bad at hiding.”

“If we’re so bad at keeping secrets, how have we managed to stay hidden for so long?” Aang challenged her.

“One of life’s great mysteries. No one suspects you but the conspiracy-theorist kooks.” She cackled delightedly.

“Maybe you’ll just have to admit that we are pretty good at keeping secrets,” said Aang. “Or we’ve gotten better, anyway.”

“Or maybe we were just not telling a lot of people something that was private,” Zuko said triumphantly.

Toph pfffed. “Try telling your kids that…”

[greenishbucket]

zutaraang week 2020 HERE WE GOOOOO

[moderndaygaang]

Zutaraang Week 2020

Day 1 - Jealousy

Wrote a little something, inspired by @irresistible-revolution’s amazing Zutaraang headcanons. ♥️

@zutaraangtastic

[guileheroine]

A MYSTERY OF HISTORY

a fic by me and @kuchee for zutaraang week, day 2 - secrets (6.7k) 📚

Over a century after the Hundred Year War, a curious student teams up with a professor to make an intriguing discovery about the personal lives of its heroes.

[sometimesiwritetoo]

Zutaraang Week Day 4: Tea

https://archiveofourown.org/works/26214448/chapters/63945508

Rating: M

Warnings: Sex under the influence

Summary: The tea didn't taste great, but this particular variety wasn't drunk for the flavor.

@zutaraangtastic

[zutaraangtastic]

Zutaraang Week 2020 Round-Up!

A round up/rec list of everything submitted for Zutaraang Week this year! (You can still make late posts! They will be added to this list which stays pinned on this blog until the end of the month.) 

Week Collections

✏️  Zutaraang Week 2020 by @hesychia7 (13.2k total) // collection of ficlets of different AUs

✏️  Jealousy by @ithinkicanwritesometimes (7.3k total, explicit) // a variety of smutty ficlets 

✏️  Breviary by @spfuzz (0.9k) // A book of hours, 8 drabbles to match the historic canonical hours in Christianity as well as the prompts

✏️  keep the paper lantern lit by @thinkingisadangerouspastime (13.7k total) //  post-series ficlets with Aang in the middle and platonic Zutara

✏️  Flowers Never Pick Themselves by @slpytea (5k) // a soulmate AU comprised of separate but related ficlets 

Day 1: Jealousy

✏️  The Fear of Death Follows by @smallpenguin19 (3.5k, WIP) // Aang reflects on his mortality

🎧  zutaraang with jealous and pining overtones by @jaystrifes

✏️  A Garden You’ll Never Get to See by @philosopherking1887 (6.4k, WIP) // After years of bearing non-airbending children, Katara makes a difficult decision

✏️  epiphany by @kuchee (1.1k) // 11 drabbles, or 10 times Zuko was jealous and one time he realised it, Heartlines verse

✏️  Hit and Run by @moderndaygaang (3.8k) // Katara, Zuko, and Aang go undercover to expose a group trying to overthrow the government in Yu Dao

✏️  Trip to the Beach by @comradegreenbucket (1k) // An elderly Aang, Katara, and Zuko go to the beach

Day 2: Secrets

✏️  The Fear of Death Follows, chapter 2 by @smallpenguin19

✏️  A Mystery of History by @kuchee and @guileheroine (6.7k) // A century after the Hundred Year War, two researchers  make an intriguing discovery about the personal lives of its heroes

✏️  Secrets by @philosopherking1887 // triple drabble ft. Toph 

✏️  Right Foot Left Stomp by @comradegreenbucket (0.6k) // Aang teaches Katara and Zuko a new dance

Day 3: Avatar State

✏️  how light carries on endlessly by @jaystrifes (1k) // 5 double drabbles, four times Katara and Zuko met Aang's past lives, and one time Korra's past life met them.

✏️  Too Close to the Sun by @philosopherking1887 (5k, explicit, WIP) // Zuko gets curious about sex in the Avatar State.

✏️  White and Blue Spirits by @smallpenguin19 // drabble; Aang enters the Avatar state, only to be pulled back by a lover.

Day 4: Tea

🎨 Zuko got whose number? by @kuchee // modern tea shop AU

🎨  To Die At Any Time by @smallpenguin19 // tea leaf art exploring Aang’s death

Day 5: Steam(y)

🎨  [untitled] by @kuchee // kisses and cuddles in the hot springs

Day 6: Worship

✏️  Worship by @philosopherking1887 // double drabble, Zuko and Katara light-heartedly reflect on the spirits

Day 7: Stars

✏️  space for another by @comradegreenbucket (1.9k) // Katara’s sleeping pod gets too cold on sentient spaceship APPA; bed-sharing ensues

🎧 the courage of stars by @kuchee // a post-Aang’s death playlist

✏️  our place in the universe by @jaystrifes (.9k) // headcanons on relaxation and stargazing

Bonus: Beach

✏️  Nightmares by @smallpenguin19, chapter 4 (7.1k, WIP) // Katara and Zuko comfort Aang after a nightmare

✏️ The Cold Will Kill You First by @slpytea​ (5k, WIP) // Aang saves them from a violent storm in the Far North. They learn just how deep their love runs while they await rescue.

(header art by @cottoncandyofterror​)

[kuchee]

Zutaraang Week day 5, steam(y)!! 🌿

[thinkingisadangerouspastime]

All of my fics for Zutaraang Week 2020 will be published on AO3! The title is keep the paper lantern lit and the fics will be within this one story rather than posted as separate oneshots every day for sake of easier uploading.

You can find “Day One: Jealousy” here!

You can find “Day Two: Secrets” here!

You can find “Day Three: Avatar State” here!

You can find “Day Four: Tea” here!

You can find “Day Five: Steam(y)” here!

You can find “Day Six: Worship” here!

You can find “Day Seven: Stars” here!

You can find “Bonus Prompt: Beach” here!

[philosopherking1887]

Zutaraang Week Day 6: Worship

[200 words: a double drabble or ‘droubble.’ @zutaraangtastic]

Katara walked into Zuko’s room just as he was lighting two sticks of incense on his little altar. He bowed his head briefly, then stood and turned. When he saw her watching him, he looked almost chagrined.

“I don’t know why I still do that,” he said. “It’s not as if I believe Agni hears me anymore.”

“Why not?” Katara asked, taken aback.

“The Moon and Ocean Spirits turned out to be koi living in a pond at the North Pole. For all I know, Agni might be a lizard basking on a rock somewhere in the Si Wong Desert.”

“But that’s not all they are; their power reaches much farther. I believe Tui can hear me whenever the moon is in the sky, and La hears whenever I speak to the ocean.”

Zuko looked doubtful. “The only way Zhao could hurt the Moon was by hurting the fish. What if the fish, or the lizard, is the only way the spirits can be affected at all—including hearing our words?”

“Well, then. I guess you’ll just have to go find that lizard and tell him about all your dissatisfactions with the world!”

Zuko grinned lopsidedly. “Oh, there’s a list.”

[greenishbucket]

1.9k of zuko/katara/aang floof in space 🚀🌌⭐

for zutaraang week 2020 day 7: stars. also on ao3!

@zutaraangtastic

When Katara wakes up, she knows straight away something’s wrong. As far as ships go, APPA isn’t a particularly cranky or noisy one, his hum of engines and mechanics as they hurtle through space easily fading to background noise. Now, there’s a worrying intermittent grinding sound of metal against metal, and her sleeping pod is freezing. The room is pitch black, no lights from the temperature maintenance systems.

A hand in front of the vents confirms it: only sparse, weak gusts of warmish air that do nothing to alter the room overall.

“APPA? You okay?”

The ship groans in response and more air puffs out of his vents like an unhappy sigh. Katara pats the wall of her pod soothingly. “No, you’re not feeling well at all, are you? Poor thing.”

APPA groans pitifully again.

Katara feels the exact same. She would give anything to lie back down and catch some more sleep; they’d only come out the other side of a tricky belt of asteroids and all manner of ship-destroying material not long ago. Stretches like that were never exactly fun (unless your name was Toph) but this particular one had been an experience so harrowing and adrenaline-fuelled they’d all left APPA on automatic and gone to bed as soon as Sokka gave the all clear.

As it is, their spaceship is possibly about to fall apart, so Katara, shivering, pulls herself out of bed, into her slippers, and onto the walkway.

It’s warmer out on the walkway than her pod, but Sokka and Toph’s sleeping pods are still all the way down the other end of it. It’s a distance that seems to stretch miles as Katara sleepily regards it. Across the way from her own pod is Aang’s. That makes her decision for her; Sokka and Toph might be the ones with the most know-how on the mechanics side, but APPA is more than a ship and he’s Aang’s through and through.

Also, his sleeping pod is right there.

Aang hasn’t ever been one for locking his door’s security protocols, so when Katara presses her palm against it it opens smoothly. It’s the right temperature inside but it's dark too, with only the pale blue lights of the pod’s functioning thermostat to see by. “Aang? Sorry to wake you–”

“Katara?”

There’s not much room to move in a pod to start with, but Katara freezes. She can hear Zuko fumbling to turn on the overhead lighting, his lack of familiarity with Aang’s pod giving her a moment of grace to pull herself together. Not that it’s something she should need to pull herself together from – so she’d forgotten that Aang and Zuko, as a couple now, might like to share pods now and again, and she’d just barged in like it was old times. No big deal.

She hears Aang laugh in the dark. “Jeez, Zuko, stop that. Let me.”

The light turns on and Katara is treated to the sight of Aang and Zuko half sitting up and mostly wrapped up in each other, Aang closest to her and still smiling at Zuko’s struggle with the switch, Zuko on Aang’s other side and his bedhead immense. The urge to join them, climb into the space between them, hits Katara like a wave.

“Oh. Sorry,” she says for lack of a single better thing to say. Katara’s never realised how few places there are to look in a sleeping pod when you’re trying to avoid the entire bed area and not look like you’re avoiding looking.

“Don’t be sorry,” Aang says, like it’s as simple as that. Like she hasn’t walked in on them cuddling in their sleep. Which is fine, but not for someone outside to see, such as herself because they’re together, and together not with her. “What’s up?”

Katara forces herself to look back at them. Aang is sitting up properly now, but Zuko’s gone in the other direction and laid back down fully, half hidden behind Aang. Both of them appear one too-long blink away from sleep.

“The temperature control in my pod is down,” she says, feeling awkward even though it’s a legitimate problem. “It’s too cold in there to sleep. I didn’t want to wake up Sokka or Toph, but I thought you should know.”

APPA, though generally far less wheezy sounding from inside Aang (and Zuko’s) pod, makes a creaky sound of agreement. Aang listens to this thoughtfully and lays his hand on the wall, the same as Katara had in her pod.

After a moment or two of communing with his ship, Aang declares, “He seems okay to me.”

APPA moans his disagreement this time. Aang frowns, listening again, and Zuko starts to sit upright, concerned.

“Maybe we didn’t make it out of the belt as cleanly as we thought?” Zuko suggests, and it takes Katara a moment to realise he’s voicing this to her, rather than interrupt Aang. Things have been weird between them since he and Aang got together. If Katara wasn’t secure in the knowledge she’s the one who gets to feel jilted about the whole arrangement, she’d say he was avoiding her.

“Maybe,” she agrees. She’s too tired for this; they all are. “Really, it’s not a problem. It’s clearly just mine, so I can go set up one of the spare pods and we can look at it after we’ve all got our rest.”

Aang breaks off his silent conversation with APPA at this point to look affronted and say, “Don’t be stupid, that’ll take ages and we’ll waste resources cleaning it afterwards. Just get in here with us.”

“In here?”

“Uh,” Aang says, flushing a little as his own words register. He shares a glance with Zuko that’s too quick for Katara to overanalyse. “Yeah. If you’re… all right with that?”

“It’s late,” Zuko adds, before Katara can reply. He pushes the covers back, as if to prove there’s enough space in the bed for another person.

And there is. Katara can envisage exactly how pleasantly cosy it would be, an idea so appealing for so many reasons – the main one at that moment being she is so tired and still shivering – that all idea of turning it down vanishes. “Okay.”

One of them turns off the overhead lights as Katara takes off her slippers and places them by Aang and Zuko’s. The sight of that alone had been illicit thrill enough, so it’s probably for the best that it’s dark when she clambers over Aang and fits into the space between him and Zuko. There’s another thrill in the fact that apparently they’d all had the same vision of how this particular sharing would go.

For a moment once she’s settled, the three of them lie there flat on their backs and Katara thinks it’s fully possible the strangeness and various unspoken feelings might suffocate them.

It lasts until Aang yawns wide enough his jaw cracks and turns on his side to get comfortable, and Zuko’s foot brushes Katara’s leg under the covers when he’s clicking his ankles grossly. Katara smiles in spite of herself and lets herself relax. They’re practically as wrapped up in each other as Aang and Zuko had originally been when Aang pats Katara’s head, clearly aiming for the wall, and says, “We’ll fix you up in the morning, don’t you worry buddy.”

Katara is almost asleep again in the warm cocoon of the bed, but she’s pretty sure APPA just hums happily this time, no hint of a groan.

---

The next morning at breakfast, Katara skilfully mentions APPA’s malfunction without mentioning the solution she’d found to avoid freezing to death in her sleep. Even though the problem does seem to have been localised entirely within her sleeping pod, it’s worth mentioning.

Toph heads off down the walkway with her food in hand to investigate, despite Katara’s protests that it can wait. “If we’re about to depressurise and instantly blow up and die in the void of space, I want a little warning, don’t you?”

Sokka watches Toph’s retreating figure with reproach. “Blowing up. At breakfast.”

Toph returns a minute later, food uneaten.

“Quick diagnostics,” Sokka remarks around the massive mouthful of food he can’t have been that put off of. “What’s it look like?”

Toph puts her bowl down with a splatter and kicks her feet up on the breakfast table and Katara makes a specific choice to not say anything. If her pod does need fixing– well, after last night she’s in no rush, but also Toph is the best mechanic this side of the universe.

“Well, I can’t say what it looks like, but what it feels like, Katara, is that APPA has played you.”

The background hum of APPA’s systems go suspiciously silent. MOMO, their mobile robot assistant, goes still.

Katara can’t help but laugh at the suggestion. “Played me?”

Toph shrugs. “That room was toasty warm, not a single thing wrong with the system. Wait, come on. You’ve really never had APPA try and push you out of a room before?”

Katara shakes her head. “No.” Why would APPA try and get her to leave her sleeping pod?

Sokka nods and says sagely, “Not Katara, she’s too much of a goody two sh-"

He cuts off with a yelp when Katara kicks him under the table.

"No fighting," Aang chides automatically, no force behind it.

Zuko takes one look at what Katara thinks of as Sokka's whiney face forming and, in a surprisingly smart choice, asks teasingly, "So is this you two coming out as the ones using up all the hot water?”

"No," Sokka gasps, outraged. “How could you say that?”

“I won’t deny it," Toph replies, shrugging again and unrepentant. "But how would you know about APPA’s little trick for that if you weren’t just as guilty, huh?”

Zuko holds his hands up, condeding, and the conversation moves on. But Katara can’t move past the idea that APPA kicked her out of her own pod on purpose. Not only is she a little hurt, because he may be a ship and Aang’s but she thought they were friends, it’s also just so confusing.

Across the table, Aang has been very quiet. When Katara looks, he’s caught in a staring contest with MOMO. From what she can tell, MOMO loses a moment later (insofar as a robot can lose a staring contest), and Aang goes through several expressions in rapid succession before settling on torn.

“APPA,” he begins, his Captain of The Ship voice on now, which shuts them all up, “I won’t be mad, but did you override all your protocols to make Katara's room too cold to be in just so that she'd–?”

Only Aang doesn’t get to finish the question because MOMO chooses that moment to go bezerk, fling half the kitchen equipment across the room and start shrieking.

Toph and Sokka leap into action, chasing after MOMO and shouting back and forth diagnostic possibilities, but Katara's mind is whirring. Huh. She looks between Aang and Zuko, both frozen at the table like she is, and catches them giving her the same furtive glances.

Huh. Katara decides then and there that no matter how it turns out, even if things are more awkard than before, they absolutely can’t brush off talking about things again like they did this morning. The possibility that APPA, a literal spaceship, is starting to meddle in their business is embarrassing beyond words.

Maybe it’s just because of the suspicion now blooming in her mind, but Katara is pretty sure when MOMO has stopped freaking out and they’ve finally got the kitchen shipshape again, APPA’s background engine humming sounds a little more smug than usual.

[sometimesiwritetoo]

Zutaraang Week Day 2: Secret

https://archiveofourown.org/works/26214448/chapters/63851266#workskin

Rating: E

Warnings: None

Summary: If Aang acted natural then no one else had to know .

@zutaraangtastic

[zutaraangtastic]

for the prompt thing: teaching eachother different dances.

decided to combine filling this prompt with zutaraang week day 2 (secrets) and get a little silly. hope you like it! - mod m

(reminder that we are not accepting new prompts; we received these before July 1)

“I’ve got a secret,” Aang whispers. His tone is aiming for something somber and conspiratorial, only they’ve reached a stage in the evening that’s far too giggly for that.

Zuko is mostly trying really, really, really hard not to look at Aang’s mouth. But Aang’s right there, falling against Zuko on the couch, and Aang might just be drunk on the company of others but Zuko’s had a fair amount to actually drink.

“A secret?” Katara asks from Zuko’s other side, head popping up over his shoulder and her breath against his ear in a way that doesn’t help at all.

“A secret,” Aang confirms. He sweeps to his feet with surprising grace and holds out a hand to both of them. “Come with me. I’ll show you.”

Some eight minutes later, the coffee table has been pushed against the wall and the three of them are smacking into each other and tripping over Aang and Katara’s shitty rug in an attempt at coordinated dancing.

Surprise of surprises, Aang’s secret isn’t whatever outlandish fantasy Zuko hadn’t been having. Aang’s secret, it turns out, is a deep, profound, and confounding love of the Cha Cha Slide.

They’ve already gone through the song once with Aang demonstrating the moves. It had seemed simple enough, but the music tells them to the left and, unreasonably disorientated and like he’s possessed, Zuko goes right.

“To the left,” Katara yells, grabbing Zuko’s arm. She pulls him left and then sharply backwards, the music having already moved on to take it back now, y’all.

“How do you already know all of this?” Zuko asks, doing his one hop a beat too late.

Katara rolls her eyes like she’s not just as new to this dance as Zuko is, like they hadn’t been snorting with laughter at the fact that this is Aang’s oh-so-secret love a minute ago. “Just follow the instructions.”

Aang nods encouragingly and says, “Right foot left stomp,” like that helps.

Zuko only lasts until they’re told to criss-cross before Aang and Katara pause the music and take an executive decision to relegate him to the couch until the next go around of the song.

“But relegation is no vacation, okay?” Katara tells him with the firmness and wagging finger of the truly tipsy. “You’re going to study what we’re doing.”

Aang is outraged. He presses play and yells over the booming sound, “Study? This is a slumber party and we’re dancing. No studying!”

“Okay, you’re right,” Katara agrees, her put-on severe expression melting away. “Time to get funky.” Her impression of the singer as she says it is so bad.

Katara and Aang dance with ease along to the vague call for hands on your knees, hands on your knees! Zuko doesn’t get it; he’s not usually actually bad at dancing, especially not ones where the entire song tells you exactly what to do, but maybe it’s the alcohol. Maybe it’s that stupid right foot left stomp. Maybe it’s Aang and Katara being there, on a Friday night, having a pyjama party with him because they think he’s sad over breaking up with Mai.

Zuko takes a sip of the drink Katara had ruthlessly mixed for him and claps along when the song tells them to. He has to sink back into the couch as Aang and Katara demonstrate some how low can you go even though it’s not like, actually sexy, it’s just– but anyway.  

He laughs along with them when they trip over each other doing reverse, reverse! and when they collapse in a heap on the rug, calling for time out, Zuko helps them both to their feet.

It’s all so sweet, a well-intentioned distraction. Zuko isn’t sure if it makes him more or less at risk of blurting that it’s not his break up that’s been on his mind.

[kuchee]

Zuko got whose number?? little modern AU for zutaraang week day 4, ‘tea’!