**This story is AU, there isn't an Avatar in this world. We're following how the story moves forward if we take the Avatar out of the picture...and include a lot more bending lore.

The girl surged forward, iced sweat gripping the edges of her spine and stunted breaths clouding the dark air of her small room. Instead of screams that ravaged her throat, though, merely a ragged sigh clawed from her lips; she had grown used to the night terrors years ago. Always striking just before dawn, much like the attack that inspired them. At one point they horrified her, but now she simply used them to start her day-to drive her forward.

She rose, throwing off the thick polar furs and relishing in the frigid bite of the air. Gathering the weasel-rat skin canteen from her bedside and her favorite fur-lined parka, she left her family tent to begin her morning journey. The land was still dark, but watching the light that threatened to break through the horizon she knew dawn was almost upon her village. She watched as the weak light glinted off the icy frost gathered on the remains of her small tribe.

Blue boots crunched through the frost on the ground, cracking and rumbling as she steadily walked on; passing the meager huts of her tribesmen. She trailed through the center of her village, past the smokestacks and their community roundhouse, their practice hunting field came and went and finally she reached the outer limits of her village, signaled by her brother's lumpy "protective wall". She hardly broke stride, though, simply using a crude movement of her hands to bend herself a bridge over the wall, letting it dissolve behind her elephant-seal boots as she walked on.

Behind her village rose a steep ridge that crawled along one side of their lands like the arm of a lover, crooked and holding the village tight. Once, when they had more water-benders, real benders, to aid the village- it had served as a means of escape during an attack. The tribesmen would burrow through the glacier ice and connect with the massive tunnels inside, traveling to freedom; now it only served as a noose, strangling her community's ability to preserve themselves during a battle.

At the base of the ridge, she stopped, craning her head to see the tip of the ice shear through the weak light around her. She took a steadying breath, reaching out to her element, feeling it pulse inside of her and buzz in her veins. Even frozen, the water around the blue eyed girl still had the pull and push of the great ocean it was born from. She seized the raw feeling of the current inside of her and channeled it into her rough bending style, she was no master and there were many things she had yet to learn, but years of watching the push and pull of her element had blessed her with crude but useful practices and forms. She used one now, covering her hands and boots in a swath of liquid ribbons; approaching the glacier she used the holds to climb the ragged side; freezing and unfreezing, clawing her way to the top. Finally, she crested the edge, trembling hands pulling her over the sharp sides; just as the sun pulled higher and breaking across the frozen tundra. She waved her hands and the fresh snow around her flew into a slumped pile, she fell to her knees grateful for the rest and looked out from her perch, waiting. The bite of the tundra winds was hard to avoid from this height, sharp teeth digging into her exposed skin, yet she still waited.

Her eyes wove across the frozen plains, nothing stirred. Then the blue orbs dipped and trailed the village below her. Smoke was just beginning to trail from the stacks, a smudged trail against the sunrise, yet nothing else spoke for any signs of life, so she continued waiting. Letting her eyes roam as, eventually, the sun extended his fingers over her world, cutting long trails of fire in the sky. The rays burned through the air, punching through the white purity of the tundra and letting her bleed out with reds and oranges, staining the lands pink and gold. Katara had no mind for the beauty of the sunrise, though, instead she snapped her eyes to the great ocean; watching it lap at the icy shores and feeling the undulation of her chi responding to her element. This wasn't about admiration, though, nor was this mediation, this was about stretching her senses. Pushing them as far out into the ocean waters as she could, searching for disturbances and waiting.

Life began to stir into the snowy world around her, her tribesmen were beginning to rise for another day on this frozen land- Katara did not rise to join them, though, she didn't sway from her kneeled position - only continued to watch the horizon and wait.

After the first attack, that she could remember as a young child, many of the men from her tribe left, heading to join the resistance far off in the Earth Kingdom. She knew this not from memory but from tales passed through hushed camp fire whispers in the Great Roundhouse when the elders thought the children were no longer listening. She had always listened to these tales, growing the hold in her heart where her culture and people lived.

The second attack, when she was older-almost eleven revolutions of the sun old-was the one she really remembered. How could she not?

That bloody sunrise had changed everything. Her beautiful home had been tainted, a fold of white snow had drifted over her home like a downy blanket; whitening everything else out. Then the white turned black, a sooty stain spreading like poison, decaying her perfect world and smothering her element, her home, her skin-everything dripped with black snow.

The children screamed in terror as the women of the tribe ushered them into safe homes; far away from the mouth of the village. She watched through young eyes as her brother was taken by their Gran-Gran to one of these homes. She remembered crying, fat tears falling down her rounded cheeks as she searched for her mother.

What was happening?

Her mother found her standing in the middle of the village, watching the men strap weapons to themselves and settle each other with thick Elephant-whale skins. Her mother pulled her up, holding her close and she breathed the smell of her, warm like the fire in the hut and comforting like rabbit-mouse stew. They ran for the back of the village, to the homes Katara knew hid the other women and children. They never made it, though, a deep thunk reverberated through their village and the ice under them shook knocking Kya's feet skidded over the ice. When they hit the snow, they stayed down as her mother, Kya, instead turned them over desperate to see what the men were yelling about. That's when Katara saw what made their home shake.

An iron beast had penetrated the ice of their village, a sharp spike sprung from the boat like a tooth from the maw of a demon, slicing into the ground and letting men in thick red armor spew from the ship's cavernous mouth like a rotting stench. These invaders poured forward, men with bone slits for faces and flames for hands stretched into her small tribal home. Defending, their men sprung on these invaders, tribal blues attempting to smother the sickening flames that infected their home, like a moon salve on a burn. She heard shrill screaming and felt her mother's arm constrict around her as they watched her father, the chief, jump into the battle with the other men, his beaded Wolf tail swinging into action as his spear drove into these men. Just the way she'd seen him do a thousand times before, during hunting season.

The red devils spoke then, as her mother scuttled them towards a nearby hut; out of sight from the battle-it was too dangerous to head towards the safe huts now. Her mother put her down, holding a gloved hand to her lips, a signal to be quiet and slowly she started making her way towards the outskirts of the skirmish. Katara alternated between watching her mother's retreating figure and the battle, searching for her father.

The red devils were still speaking, demanding the last water bender in the tribe. Hope surged through the small girl, she was the last water bender! Maybe if she showed herself, they'd see that she was too young to know how to use her bending, maybe they would leave? She started to crawl forward from her hiding spot, her mother's warning to stay rang in her head but she shook the words away, She could save her village, stop the fighting. She stood, stumbling towards the fight; watching as the fire blazed against the thick hides the men of her village had wrapped themselves in. The sounds of blades ringing against the metal men spread through the air in front of her, clanging around in her head. She skid as she hit a patch of slick ice, stumbling and almost in a daze, she pushed forward. She could do this-they were just men, not demons. Under that armor there had to be people just like her, surely they would understand. She looked for her mother briefly, saw that she had reached Hakoda. They were close together, arms entangled as they whispered urgently. Suddenly, her father's eyes snapped up, looking at her aghast and yelling-but she couldn't hear him over the clamor of the battle.

The other men were too busy defending their homes to notice the little girl coming closer to the battle, closer to the Red Devil calling for the water bender of the Southern Water Tribe. Too busy to notice how her mother had broken away from her father, racing across the snowy plains to reach her only daughter; too busy to see Hakoda having to defend from another attack; too busy to see a child's naivety getting ready to cost her everything.

Her mother overtook the smaller steps of her own child, racing towards the man breathing flames. The woman spared a single glace backward at Katara, eyes wide with fear but mouth set with determination as she flung herself into a bow at the man before them, hands raised. Her tribesmen were becoming overwhelmed, not being able to land any solid offensive strikes and her own father stared numbly ahead at his own wife, simultaneously respecting her sacrifice-the sacrifice of a mother and a chieftess and hating the upcoming cost as a man and husband.

The young water bender watched, confused at her mother's lies and her offered surrender. Why should she lie? Young eyes, wide with adrenaline watched as her father shouted, struggling to reach his wife through the battles around him. Little Katara wanted to race forward, show the red devil how she could make a water globe and make him go home on his smoke blowing ship, but she stood frozen; watching her mother's shuddering figure and her would-be captor's face. Kya's head jerked upwards as the man before her bellowed with a harsh laughter, Hakoda's face drained as understanding coursed through him and he fought harder. Snarling, slicing through clusters of limbs to clear a path.

"Foolish woman, as if we could spare our resources for the likes of you? For some tribal savage?" His voice rang out, laced with hatred and arrogance as a smirk twisted it's way on to his face.

Kya tried to jerk away from the towering man, horror etching itself on her face, but her crawl backward was too slow to escape the reaches of the monster before her. He snagged the hood of her parka, using it to secure the back of her neck and Katara watched in revulsion as he used it to pull her face towards himself. The tribal men around her began revolting at her capture, turning into wraiths on the battlefield, yet it was for naught. Kya pulled herself free, shaking her tribal braids out of the man's grasp before setting her face into a mask of determination. Katara watched her straighten out, the posture of a chieftain entering her bones even as the man cruelly narrowed his eyes.

"We take no prisoners away with us today, water wretch" he spat out, "Your little tribe will remember what it means to defy the graciousness of the Fire Lord."

Innocent blue eyes widened as this man with eyes as yellow as a seeping wound grabbed for her mother's throat, pulling her forward. This man so full of fire and hatred summoned a roaring flame with his free hand, holding it high before releasing it, letting it soar like a comet through the air and delivering such a brutal blow to her mother's still form. A shrill scream tore through her throat and tears fell quick and warm down her face. She raced forward as the red devil threw her mother's blackened body to the ruined snow. She no longer heard the devil's words, too incensed by her own grief as she beat down on her mother's chest yelling, pleading, begging for her to get up. She felt pain explode in her side as the fire demon behind her kicked her with the pointy boots he wore, yelling for her to quit being a fool; making fun of the savage child beating on her savage mother's dead body. She crumpled over her mother, tracing the lines of her parka and listening for a heartbeat that had to be there. Mothers couldn't just leave their children so young, life didn't work like that surely.

The smell of smoke and burned flesh wrapped around her, thick and unadulterated-filing her head and burning her lungs with the foulness. The world and this cruel, evil man faded; the image of her father, fallen to his knees and his men, defeated, left her mind as she fell into a world of blackness; she collapsed into the snow, feeling her mother's final embrace.

She woke later, crusty tear tracks scarring her face and an empty home as her greeting, with her mother's betrothal necklace wrapped around her own throat. She woke no longer a child. Instead, she felt haunted, living on her mother's borrowed time. With agony sweeping through her the thought of rising to join her people was so perverse that she burrowed deeper into the furs around her, blocking out all thoughts except for the way her mother's smooth necklace felt against her skin and how the ribbon it rested upon still smelled like smoke and skin. Later, she fell into a fitful sleep, waking again when her father crept into the hut slumping into his own bed of furs, alone.

He left soon after her mother's death. He and the remaining men had gone off to join the resistance as revenge for her mother, another life burned so short by the Fire Nation. Their departure was painful, Sokka begging to go with them but instead he was told to say and protect what was left of their village. Katara had never seen her brother so shamed looking, his warrior face paint streaked where tears marks cut patterns on his cheeks. Hakoda left then, leaving them with their Gran-Gran and village. Blue eyes watched as her father's ship left port and even as the other villagers filtered away to resume their day, she stayed. Waiting for the ship to disappear on the horizon, it was then that she decided that dawn would never launch with another surprise from the Fire Nation. Their iron demon ships would never again crack the ice of her home, without her village being ready for them.

That attack and the Chief's voyage had been years ago, though, she was almost at her 16th sun revolution; every year was another year her father was missing and the void in her heart from this war grew wider with each day. With each day she woke before the sun, waiting and watching for a ship on the horizon-either her father's or a demon ship that would bring the curse of black snow. Then, every evening, she rose again with the moon; training with her element, straining every kata she could from her surroundings and the glorious moon above her. She was far from a master, but never again would she let herself be so helpless.

Shaking the vicious memories from her mind Katara noted that her village had nearly completely risen now. The women were finishing breakfast and the children would be training; either on the hunting fields with Sokka or in the schoolhouse with Kana, her Gran-Gran. The Blue eyed young woman leaned forward to relax her pitched stance as the sun was nearly fully peaked now and she would soon be needed below amongst her people. She braced to stand, moving her beaded braids from her line of vision. Flexing stiff muscles, she smiled as she headed towards the edge of her cliff; getting down was so much more fun and the climb up. She had just moved into her rough bending stance when the first few sparkles of black snow fell, catching her eye.

TBC... DUN DUN DUN! What did you guys think? Yay, Nay? Let me know your thoughts in a review, where do you think this is headed?

The next prompt is: love, hmmmm...wonder what I could do with that?

~Winds of Chaos