Disclaimer: I do not own Avatar: The Last Airbender

Author's Note: Am I the only one who suspects that the Earth King wasn't going to have an heir? The man is in love with his bear! Anyway, this is me expounding on my interpretations of the season finale. For the record, I was kind of bothered by this all too convenient way of controlling the Avatar State (why didn't Roku mention the little detail that it was even possible to control in Episode 21?), and I agreed with Iroh that Aang was wise to choose love and happiness over power. However, I'm going with what the episode showed and cutting the guru some slack.

Enlightenment

Aang wavered in and out of consciousness over the next few hours. Every time he came to, Katara was there. When he finally truly awoke, he found himself on sand, his upper body lying half propped up against Appa. Aang automatically tried to sit up, only to have Katara push him gently back again. He let his eyes adjust to what he thought was morning light and looked around.

Sokka, Toph, the Earth King, Bosco, and Momo all hovered nearby. Aang's awakening seemed to have attracted their attention, and they were all looking at him. Behind them, he recognized the encampment of the Southern Water Tribe warriors.

"How do you feel?" Katara asked carefully. Aang thought this over. There were so many ways to answer that question, but he decided on the one that seemed most pressing.

"Thirsty," he said in a whisper. Katara bent some fresh water to him and helped him drink. Once that was done, she stayed beside him and kept touching him as though to reassure herself that he was really alive. Aang didn't blame her; he was having a hard time believing it himself. His memory of what had happened was a little hazy, but he had actually felt the Avatar spirit leave his body. It had been an exceedingly strange sensation, though, come to think of it, everything about being the Avatar was pretty weird. He privately had to agree with Sokka on that.

Aang didn't know how he could be aware of this, but he knew that the Avatar spirit had hovered around him uncertainly. Since he had been "killed" while in the Avatar state, it could not go on to the North Pole to be reborn, as otherwise should have been the case. Instead, it waited and returned to Aang's body when Katara had brought him back to life. He realized that he was wearing ill-fitting Water Tribe clothing, and vaguely remembered that his own clothes had been virtually destroyed.

"Who dressed me?" he wanted to know. It was a little inane, but it was all he could think of at the moment. Katara blushed.

"I did," she answered simply. The Earth King cleared his throat awkwardly. No one really seemed to know what to say.

"Um, maybe we should give them a minute alone," Toph suggested. Aang briefly wondered when she had become so sensitive.

"Yeah. Yeah, right," Sokka agreed. "Let's go." They all withdrew to the camp. Katara's eyes started to spill over, and she pulled Aang into a fierce hug.

"Oh, Aang! I was so…I thought I'd lost you," she sobbed. "I love you so much. I should have told you before. I'm sorry." At her words, Aang felt a surge of strength course through him, and he sat up under his own power and hugged her back.

"Katara, I love you," he told her. She pulled back to look into his eyes. Aang raised his right hand to slide it into the hair that still hung loose beside her face. "I fell in love with you the first time I saw you. So I'm sorry, too." As he said them, he knew the words were true, which confused him. Hadn't he given that up? He didn't have much time to ponder these things, however, because Katara moved in to kiss him. With that, all thought evaporated, leaving only feeling. When she broke away, he put a hand to his head and lay back again. His mind was reeling, but he didn't think it was only from the kiss.

"I'm so sorry!" Katara exclaimed, seeing his reaction. "You probably weren't really ready for that yet." Aang offered her a weak grin.

"That's okay. It's the best way I know of to get dizzy," he paused as she smiled back, blushing faintly. Then, Aang frowned. "You should really go and spend some time with your dad. You haven't seen him in a long time."

"He came over while you were…sleeping," Katara said, looking down.

"Still," Aang insisted, managing a half smile in recollection. "I don't want to come between you and your family." She bit her lip as he saw that she also remembered the last time he'd said that.

"You are my family," she said. "But I suppose you're right. I'll send someone back to be with you."

Eventually, their little group collected again, as the Water Tribe warriors prepared to leave the area. They reasoned that it was not a good idea for them to remain so close to Ba Sing Se with the city under Fire Nation control.

"What do we do now?" Sokka wondered aloud, pacing the beach. "It's going to be even harder now to find places of refuge."

"I'm not so sure," Toph objected. "I mean, we saw how isolated the capital was from the rest of the Earth Kingdom. Princess Evil might announce that she has control of the country, but any orders she issues are going to take a long time to get out."

"That's true," Katara put in. "I have a feeling she's going to be very busy untangling the bureaucracy for a while. And if she does announce that the Fire Nation has taken control, there will be general panic. No one inside the walls has even been told there's a war. It's going to come as a complete shock. Um, no offense, your highness."

"None taken," the king replied absently. He seemed to be in a state of shock himself over the current situation.

"You're right," Sokka addressed his sister. "Azula will probably keep things low-key, at least at first. She has the Dai Li, who already know how to run things, so there's no need to make any major changes right away. It might slow down any plans she wants to put in place."

"We'll go to the Eastern Air Temple," Aang contributed at last, drawing all eyes to him.

"You're in no condition--" Katara began.

"It's not far," he interrupted her. "And we'll be safe there for a while, until we figure out where to go next."

"Is there food there?" Sokka asked doubtfully.

"There seem to be plenty of onions and bananas," Aang muttered.

"Huh?"

"Never mind."

Everyone agreed to this plan, eventually, so Sokka and Katara bid goodbye to their father, again, and Appa swiftly carried them back to the temple. Guru Pathik greeted them, and Aang took the first opportunity he could to speak with him alone. He briefly told him everything that had happened.

"So, I let Katara go and opened the seventh chakra, but I still love her." Aang concluded.

"Of course you do," the guru replied mildly. "I never told you to stop loving her. That would be both ridiculous and impossible. Love is a driving force in the universe; it almost has a consciousness of its own. You and I have no more power to stop it than we do to keep the sun from rising tomorrow."

"Then I'm confused. What, exactly, did I let go?"

"You released those parts of your attachment that were holding you back."

"But she--" Aang began, but he stopped. It was true that Katara had never held him back, at least not intentionally, but he had held himself back for her. It was because of her that he had resisted the Avatar State and didn't want to firebend again.

"I let my feelings for Katara decide who I was and what kind of Avatar I was going to be," he realized. "I needed to figure out and accept who and what I am for myself in order to really love her. And to let her love me."

"Exactly. Now you see."

Aang thought about this a little more, and recalled something he had once been told, though he couldn't remember by whom. He quoted it aloud: "Love does not consist of looking at each other, but of looking both together in the same direction."

"Yes," Pathik agreed. "That is a very good assessment."

Now Aang understood that he had always been looking at Katara before. Now that he had come to terms with his own identity, they could stand together and face his (their?) destiny as one.

"So, they're all still open?" he asked, seeking affirmation. "I mean, I did sort of just die. Would that close them again?"

"It is simple enough to check. Close your eyes, breathe deeply, and concentrate. Picture the chakras in your body."

Aang did so, and he saw the seven pools within himself, each indicated in his mind's eye by a different color. He saw also the white column of energy that passed, unhindered, from the base of his spine through the top of his head.

"Yes, none of them are blocked," he confirmed, opening his eyes.

"Good," Pathik congratulated, though Aang suspected he had already known this. "Now, reach further. See how your energy creates lines of connection from you to others." Aang obeyed, closing his eyes again and expanding his consciousness. The first to resolve itself was the well-established green line extending to Appa, followed by an intricate web of yellow leading to different parts of the temple itself. At his next discovery, his eyes snapped open in surprise.

"Whoa, that's not a line, it's a channel!" he exclaimed. He had seen a wide swath of vibrant purple connecting him to Katara, at least ten times the size of any of the other force lines. "What is that?"

"That is the power of love, as I was just explaining," Pathik answered. "The two of you are connected on many levels. Now you see why that link could not really be broken."

"Couldn't you have just told me that in the first place?"

"No. You had to believe you were losing something, or it wouldn't have worked. It is only through willingly sacrificing something meaningful to you that you can truly possess it." Guru Pathik paused, raising a hand and moving it slowly in front of him with an expression of concentration. "How many times have you saved each other's lives?"

"I've lost track," Aang admitted. His hand moved almost unconsciously to touch the deceptively tiny mark over his heart, where the lightning had entered. This was only the last time she'd rescued him. She'd saved him from drowning on Kyoshi Island, prevented Azula from delivering the final blow in that ghost town…but the guru was speaking again.

"When one person saves another, a bond is formed. It is strengthened when the favor is returned. I can see that this process has occurred several times. Even death cannot separate you from her now."

"I don't understand," Aang said. However, when an answer didn't seem to be forthcoming, he investigated the connection lines again. He could clearly see the energy pulsing in both directions between him and Katara. He also brought into focus the thinner but still solid lines to his other companions: blue to Sokka and brown to Toph. Fainter connections extended out of sight in many directions.

"So…are we done here?" he asked.

"I have helped you all I can," Pathik acknowledged. Aang returned to his friends and stopped in front of Katara, tilting his head to observe her in the light of his new understanding. Her hair was braided again now, and Aang rather regretted that. His fingers itched to run through it, but he supposed that could wait.

"What is it?" Katara wondered, looking concerned. He smiled at her in reassurance

"I was just wondering how to show you how much I love you. There's only one thing I can think of." With that, he pulled her into a long, satisfying kiss, feeling as though he were drinking her essence through the powerful connection between them. There were still many things to resolve and plans to be made, but all that was for another time. For this immeasurable moment, it was just the two of them, and they both ignored the presence of the others.

It was probably a measure of Sokka and Toph's genuine concern for Aang that neither of them said a word.

--

This quote is from Leo Buscaglia, a writer and speaker about love and relationships.

Author's Note: No, I am not going to continue this, so please don't ask. The beginning of this came to me as I thought that Katara might actually turn out to be the first one to say "I love you" after coming so close to losing Aang forever. I don't think she's seen him come that close to dying since he almost drowned at Kyoshi Island, and she didn't know how she felt about him yet. A lot of speculation has been flying around, but my husband and I discussed it and decided that Aang shouldn't have been glowing if he didn't open the last chakra, so we think he did. And yes, I borrowed a little from Harry Potter with regards to the bond formed when people save each other.

I am a firm believer in the idea that you have to know who you are before you can share your life with anyone, which is why I support living by yourself at some point before getting married, at least for a short time. Nothing forces self-discovery like an empty apartment. I guess that's why some people hate living alone. Personally, I loved it. Don't get me wrong; I like being married, and I adore my children. It's just a matter of what's best at different times of life, and I do miss my "alone time" sometimes. Sorry these notes are so long, but just to lighten things up, here is the best quote from the finale:

Sokka: Aang, you go with Iroh to save Katara and the angry jerk. (to Iroh) No offense.

Iroh: None taken.