Aang supposed that when he'd first learned he'd been asleep for a hundred years, he had been in some sort of shock. It hadn't registered. A hundred years, he had thought. Huh, that's a pretty long time. I wonder what's changed. I guess the people I know - knew - won't be around anymore. He had even made jokes.

But that night, flying through the dark toward the Southern Air Temple, it had suddenly hit him. The people he had known, all his friends, were dead. Every single one. He would never see any of them again, not ever. Not An-Ming, or Noka, or Kuzon, or Bumi. He would never play with the other young monks again, or learn from the elders, or talk to the nuns from the Eastern and Western Temples.

His breath caught on a sob. He would never see Monk Gyatso again, would never be able to ask forgiveness for running away, would never be able to explain why he had done so. Everyone he loved had left him behind, and everything he had ever known, his whole world, was gone forever.

He had begun to sniffle, then the tears had started, rolling down his cheeks as a wave of grief overwhelmed him. Why had he been so stupid? What had he thought he was going to accomplish by running away, by flying into that storm? The real truth was, of course, that he hadn't been thinking at all. He had been angry, and sad, and scared. He didn't want to be the Avatar. He hadn't wanted that heavy weight of responsibility on him, like a badger-mole atop his shoulders. He hadn't wanted to be different from the other young monks, to be excluded and alone because of who he was, what he was. He hadn't wanted to be separated from the one person he knew loved him unconditionally, who would always see him, Aang, not the Avatar. And now that one person was lost to him forever.

He had muffled his face in Appa's fur and sobbed, wanting to be alone in his grief, hoping that no one would hear. But someone had.

Katara had slid down beside him and wrapped her arms around him. He had clutched desperately at her, burying his face in her shoulder. His heart was breaking, and she felt like the only thing that was keeping his spirit tied to the earth, instead of slipping free from his body and flying after his people. Vaguely, through his own wrenching grief, he felt her own body begin to shake with sobs, her cheek dropping to rest on the top of his head.

At the time, he could not remember being aware of anything other than his own all-consuming sorrow, but looking back, he thought that it was then that he knew he loved her, that he would allow her to keep him here on this earth, that he would allow her to be his people, his family, until they all met again in the infinite expanse of the afterlife.