Chapter Text
"I want to thank you for saving me. For saving us."
They were on a boat. A newly liberated boat, surrounded by several others, and all of them filled with people who for the first time in a long while were on their way home.
His soulmate shrugged. "All it took was a little coal."
The boy standing before her shook his head. His face held nothing but fondness. "It wasn't the coal, Katara. It was you."
Beside him, an old, old man reached out. Despite the years of grief that lined his face and wrinkled his skin, his hand on her shoulder felt sure and strong.
"Thank you for helping me find my courage, Katara of the Water Tribe. My family, and everyone here, owes you much."
His soulmate stood at the helm of futures reclaimed. Of history rewritten by her own hand. She straightened her spine and looked the proof of her efforts head-on. She smiled.
In a clearing, a girl and a boy faced each other. The clearing was a different one, and the circumstances were too, but still it mirrored what might've been.
"…Katara?"
Her eyes widened. She took a step forward. "…Jet? Is that you?"
Jet couldn't help but step forward too. Couldn't help the way a grin fought to take over his face, or the nod he gave her.
Whoever moved first, it ended in a tight hug and one excited girl shouting in his ear. "Jet! Jet it's you! It's you!"
He could hold her in his arms. He could hear her voice, real as anything. She was solid and she was alive and real. "I'm so happy you're here," he buried his face in her shoulder.
"I'm happy too! I missed you so much!"
"…You did?"
Katara leaned back just enough to be face to face with him. Her eyes—they were so blue, and they were so wide and so happy—sparkled. "Of course I did! I wanted to meet the boy who saved orphans. I saw when you protected them in the villages, how you taught them to survive no matter what. I saw it when you hugged them after they'd had nightmares, and you singing to a bird and calling it pyaari. You gave them a festival even in the forest. You tried to give them their childhoods back."
Her hands reached up and held his face. "I knew there were good people out here in the world because of you. I didn't just have to hope and believe, because I knew it. Because you exist. You gave me hope."
So did you.
Jet shook his head, not because he didn't believe her but because she didn't know the other side of it. "You were my hope, too. I kept going because of you. I kept on living, even when I didn't want to. I…I kept trying to make better choices. I tried to be that person you'd want to believe in." He reached up and squeezed her hand. Just for the assurance that he could. "I still can't believe that someone as good as you would love someone like me. You've always inspired me."
Those bright eyes of hers welled with tears. She hugged him again.
He could've stayed there forever. He would've frozen time just to keep hugging her.
A throat cleared behind them.
"Aren't you going to introduce us?"
When they parted, it was to Sokka and Aang standing there, Sokka with his arms crossed and Aang looking on curiously.
Katara took Jet's hand in hers and brought him over to her group. "Everyone, this is Jet. He's my soulmate."
Jet made to talk as well, but a small hand reached out and tugged on his sleeve.
"…I know this symbol." Aang's eyes traveled from the sleeve, to the shoulder, to the tie right under his collarbone. Aang's finger reached out and touched it. "It's the sauvastika knot."
"…So that's what it's called."
Aang's eyes lit up. "Does that mean you—do they—?"
"Kind of. I think so, yes." If his contacts were anything to go by. After what he'd learnt, they must've been the real. Jet nodded. "They do."
Aang tackled him in a hug too.
"Can we meet them? Can we go right now? I want to see them! Is it okay if we—?"
"Woah, woah, hey." Sokka interrupted. "Aang, calm down."
"But Sokka, they're alive! Real actual air nomads! What if we—?"
Jet hugged Aang back, which made him squeak. Then he withdrew enough to look him in the eyes.
"I'm not sure if I could call them air nomads. But…there's remnants of it. It might not be how you remember. But they're there."
Jet reached up and held his shoulders. "But more than that, I think there's something you need to do first, right?"
Aang seemed to sag. As if the weight of more than just Jet's hands had sunk onto his shoulders. "…But what if I don't get to meet them?"
For a long time, Jet had wondered if he'd ever meet his soulmate. But despite living half a world away, here she stood beside them. And here Jet stood as well, long after he'd thought he'd be alive.
A lot had changed in two years. Jet had grown taller. Both his clothes and his goals in life had taken a surprising turn. His band of misfits had shrunk dramatically, scattered across mountains that held songs and mysteries and long forgotten traditions in them. He knew more about the world than he'd thought existed in it.
So when Jet stepped back, he gave Aang the words he knew to be true.
"You will find them again. Even if it's not the same, and even if they're not the same people, there are some things that'll still be there. No matter what happens. Go face your destiny and do what you need to do, and know that you're never as alone as it might look. We'll be here."
In the distance, Jet's friends—his family—called out, their voices echoing in the trees. A shape swooped down from the branches and landed on Jet's shoulder. His ear tickled as Pyaari fluffed her feathers at them.
A lot had changed in the past few years. For the first time, Jet had hope that the future was worth looking forward to.
No matter what, they'd always be there. And there will always be hope.