Disclaimer: I do not own ATLA or LOK.

The Passing of Chief Sokka, of the Southern Water Tribe

Katara hadn't run this quickly in eight years. She sprinted down the hall of Republic City's newly built hospital, skidding to a halt when she reached the receptionist's desk.

"Chief Sokka," she panted, breathless. "Where is he? What room, what floor?"

"Are you family?" the receptionist asked in a distracted tone, sifting through paperwork.

She gritted her teeth. "Yes," she forced out.

The receptionist flipped through her book of patients, scanning the pages until she found Sokka's name. "Third floor. Room 334."

Katara didn't answer, running instead to a nearby elevator, her little luggage bag jostling uncomfortably against her shoulder. Desperately, she pressed the button for the third floor. She waited the interminable time that the elevator took to rise three floors, and squeezed herself through the slow-moving doors before they finished opening. Her knees screaming in protest with each step as she raced down the hall, stopping when she saw a familiar face.

Toph sat in a chair outside Sokka's room, her head in her hands. At Katara's approach, she stood suddenly, barring Katara's entrance into the room.

"Toph, it's me," Katara explained. "Get out of the way. I need to see him."

Toph didn't move or speak.

Frustration surged through Katara. "Move, Toph," she demanded. "I need to see him."

"Katara," Toph whispered, and the desolation in her voice cut through the haze of Katara's urgency.

Her little bag of luggage slid off her shoulder to the floor, unnoticed.

"Katara," Toph said again. "You're too… it's too late."

Katara stared at her, confused. That couldn't be right. She had made the trip from the South Pole to Republic City faster than she ever had before, covering thousands of miles from the back of a sky bison in just under two days. She had left mere minutes after Tenzin's message had reached her.

But Toph's expression didn't lie. Her face was agony, and tears threatened to fall from her clouded green eyes.

"But I'm here to heal him," Katara said in a small voice.

Katara moved Toph aside. The Earthbender, normally so sturdy, stumbled to the side, falling back into the chair by the door. Toph brought her knees to her chest and cried softly in the brightly lit corridor, in plain view of anyone who could walk by. Distantly, Katara noted how strange that was. Toph would rather die than cry in public.

As Katara opened the door, she immediately felt the oppressive atmosphere of a recent death. It was a heavy, isolated kind of silence, more weight than a person alone can bear. Her eyes took in the quiet nurses at their work, removing poultices and the bags of fluid that hung around the bed. The dim lights barely illuminated the room. She trudged slowly to the chair next to Sokka's bed, and sat down heavily in it.

Her eyes were forward, but unseeing. She reached for her brother's hand, which lay open above his blanket. His hand was cold, as if he had been outside on a winter's day.

"Get out," she told the nurses suddenly. They stared at her, startled. "Get out," she repeated, louder this time.

One of the nurses gave her a look of sympathy and shooed the others out. She turned back to Katara, resting a soft hand on her shoulder. "Are you Katara?" she asked gently, as if speaking to a frightened animal.

Katara didn't answer, her eyes still trained on her brother.

"The injuries were just too much for his body to bear," the nurse said. She looked down at Sokka sadly. "I'm so sorry for your loss." She gave Katara's shoulder a gentle squeeze, then turned and followed the other nurses out the door.

Katara didn't hear her leave. She hadn't even heard what the nurse said. Her eyes saw only the broken body of her brother. He had once been so strong, she remembered. Broad-shouldered and tall. Vital. The embodiment of a Southern Water Tribe Warrior, fierce and cunning and powerful. He was still tall, still powerful, but hollow, somehow. Empty. Her eyes swept up to her brother's face. His gray beard was untrimmed, and gray brows curled over closed eyes, hiding a blue she would never see again. His face was relaxed, his mouth slightly open. He used to sleep like that, she remembered dimly. She used to tease him about it.

Nausea hit her suddenly, like a blow to the stomach. She leaned over the side of her chair and vomited onto the floor. Her breathing came in sharp, painful gasps. A loud metal shrieking reached her ears, and she realized that, in her anguish, she had ripped the water from the plumbing under the sink across the room. It flooded the room with a spray that arched like a pig-rooster's tail, spreading across the floor. Toph ran into the room, grabbing Katara by the arms. She shouted something to her, but Katara didn't hear a word of it. She heard nothing, felt nothing, saw nothing. A thin wail left her and she threw herself into Toph's arms, and cried and cried until there was nothing left of her, nothing at all.

XXXXXXX

Days later, the emptiness and grief was replaced with a smoldering rage and resentment. Violence had now stolen two of her dearest family members. Her mother, all those years ago, in a time of war when brutality and cruelty was the only currency of those in power. And now with her brother a lifetime later, in a city that he had spent his life developing, improving, defending.

How could this have happened?

"Life is unjust, sometimes," Tenzin told her sadly when she demanded the City Council's accountability, her voice edging on hysterical. "I assure you, Mother, we're doing all we-"

"Unjust?" she cried. "This isn't unjust, this is cruel, beyond monstrous. He dedicated his life to this city and now he's dead."

But Tenzin didn't know how to respond, and she turned on her heel and stormed away.

Later, she regretted speaking to him that way. It wasn't his fault. It was that criminal's fault, and now there was one more monster in her life that she would never forgive.

In the days that lead up to Sokka's funeral, she barely ate, and didn't sleep at all. Horrifying images of her brother's death plagued her as soon as she closed her eyes. Her time fighting the war had shown her just how cruel humans could be. All that she had done, all that Sokka had done to save the world, and this was how they were repaid?

Visitors streamed in daily, paying their respects, offering their condolences, but Katara had little time for them. She supposed she should be more understanding; they had all lost someone they cared about, too. But not like her. Sokka had been with her for her entire life. When her mother died, when her father died… when he died. Sokka had been there for the birth of each of her children. He was as much a part of her identity as she was part of his, and she was certain that what little was left of her would soon be buried with him.

Toph came, and her visit was incendiary. She was as angry as Katara, and it felt good to share her pain with someone who understood.

"Lin told me that gang activity was getting out of hand," Toph seethed, two days before the funeral. "I never should have retired."

Katara secretly agreed, but she felt ashamed that she did. He had once told her that they couldn't always be the ones fighting. Eventually, he had once said, it would be time to step aside. At the time, she had agreed with him. It was easier bear the burden of becoming obsolete when her friends and husband were still with her.

"What are you doing here, anyway?" Katara asked irritably. "I thought you were staying with Su in Zaofu."

"I was visiting Lin. I'd heard he was going to be in town for that big meeting he's been talking about. Two raccoon-birds, one stone." Toph shrugged. "I'm glad I was here, though. So he didn't have to be alone."

Katara didn't have anything to say after that. Guilt and anger battered at her with equal force, a hurricane of emotions that tore at her, making sleep impossible. The next morning, she sat in the darkness of her room, blinds closed and door shut. A soft knock sounded from her door around lunchtime. She ignored it, but after a few moments, she heard the door creak open.

"Mother, you have a visitor," came Tenzin's tentative voice.

Katara didn't want any more visitors, and Tenzin knew that. She bit back a sharp reply, instead choosing to remain silent. Perhaps he would go away if she didn't answer. But she heard the muffled tread of light footsteps, and the light in her room flicked on. She squinted against the brightness.

"You can go, Tenzin," said a voice she hadn't heard in over three years.

"I'll be in the kitchen," came Tenzin's reply, already fading as he shut the door behind him.

Katara turned to find Zuko standing by the door. He looked as exhausted, angry, and lost as she felt, but one look at his face indicated to her that she looked far worse.

"Katara," he murmured. "You look… terrible."

His blunt greeting caused a deranged chuckle to escape her. "Thanks," she muttered, sitting up.

He strode over to her, pulling a chair beside her bed. "How are you?" he asked, the question heavy in the air between them.

She scoffed. "How do you think?"

He turned away, eyes to the floor. "Yea, that's what I figured," he mumbled after a moment.

Katara ignored him. She knew he was here to support her and she supposed the responsible thing to do was to comfort him, too, but she couldn't bring herself to speak. She didn't know what there was to say.

"How is your clinic?" he asked after a while, when the silence became unbearable.

"Fine," she intoned. Who cared about the clinic?

"Were you able to get your roof fixed?"

She blinked, caught off-guard. "How did you know about that?"

Zuko shrugged. "Kya wrote Izumi about it. They still write each other, every so often."

"Oh," was all she could think to say. Then, after a moment, "Yea, the roof is fixed. Right before I left… to come here."

Grief slipped through his faade of polite curiosity, but he recovered quickly. "And how is Korra doing?" he asked softly, latching on quickly to another subject.

Katara could see right through what Zuko was trying to do. Tenzin or Kya must have spoken with him and urged him to get her talking again. It was a technique they had learned from their mother in the first place. Emotions were an easier to burden to bear when they were shared.

In spite of herself, one corner of her lips lifted in the semblance of a small smile at the mention of Korra. "She's fine. She's… precocious."

"She's, what, eight now? Time flies." He picked at a loose thread. "How's her training going?"

Katara's brows furrowed. "Fine," she said. "She's strong."

"What's she working on now?"

"Still water, mostly," she answered, her previous amusement dissipating rapidly.

"No Earthbending?" he asked.

"She started Earthbending last year," she said.

"And is she still struggling with the spiritual aspects of her training?"

"Enough, Zuko," Katara snapped, her patience finally reaching its limit. "What do you want, a full report?"

Zuko flushed, staring at his hands. "Everyone is worried about you," he muttered after a moment.

"Why?" she snarled. "Because I'm upset that my brother is dead?"

"Tenzin says you haven't slept or eaten in three days!" he said defensively.

"So?"

"So," he growled, exasperated, "you're not twenty anymore, Katara! Things like this aren't good for you."

She stood abruptly from her bed and stalked away from him, over to the window. Her brother had been murdered for intervening in a mugging on his way home from City Hall. That wasn't exactly what she would call 'good for her', either. She and Zuko had been close since she was fourteen years old, but right now, she'd never felt further from him. Why wasn't he as angry as she was? Or Tenzin, or Bumi, or Kya? Why was she the only one ready to tear this city apart brick by brick, to destroy it with her bare hands from the inside out?

"You think I don't understand how you feel," he said shrewdly, as if he'd heard her thoughts. "I've had to bury people I love, too. My uncle. My sister. My wife." He paused, knowing how much the next name would hurt her. "My best friend."

"Those people died of old age or disease, Zuko. It's not the same thing and you know it!" She whirled around to face him. "Sokka spent sixty years trying to make the world a better place. Sixty years! And it was all for nothing!"

Zuko stood from his chair, fists clenched at his sides. "It was not for nothing, Katara. Sokka saved that girl's life! And while you've been in this room, the Council has held two emergency reform meetings. Sokka may have become Head Chieftain of your tribe, but you know how important Republic City was to him. These reforms can affect real change, changes he's been trying to instate in all major governments for over ten years."

He walked over to her, his hand extended, to comfort her, to shake her, to plead with her. She didn't know which, and she didn't care.

"I'm heartbroken about this," he said, his voice breaking. "Heartbroken, and confused, and… and furious. But I know that something good might come out of this tragedy. Things Sokka always wanted. Real change, to help people all over the world, not just here, get the care and support they need, so they won't feel like they have to resort to crimes like this." He sighed. "It's a high price to pay, but I think that if he knew what came out of it, he would pay it again."

"And what about the price I'm paying?" Katara shouted. "What about the way I feel? I thought you would understand!" Her voice lowered. "You did, once. You were going to help me kill Yan-Ra."

His eyebrows raised. "I was sixteen, and wrong. And Aang was right," he said quietly.

She flinched when he said his name, but Zuko didn't notice.

"Sixty years later, he is still right," he continued. "It's okay that you feel this way. Let yourself feel it. Then let it go."

Pain exploded inside her. How dare he? Turning away from him, she grabbed the first thing she could find, a small blue vase Pema had bought for her in a small Earth Kingdom market years ago, and hurled it against the wall with all her might. She screamed, a raw, aching wail and dropped to the floor. Tears poured freely down her cheeks, her palms flat against the floor as if they were the only things keeping her grounded, keeping her together, or else she would break into a thousand pieces like the vase that lay shattered beside her.

Zuko knelt down, and put a soft hand on her back, murmuring softly to her as she fell apart. "I know how much this hurts. But you don't have to do this by yourself. We're here; me, Toph, your children. The whole world is grieving. It will take time, years, but we'll heal together. That's the only way. But you have to let this anger go."

"I miss him," she groaned into the floorboards, aching with every word she spoke. "I miss him so much. I miss them both so much. I don't want to feel this way anymore."

"I know," he said gently, rubbing her back. "Every time someone dies, a piece of me dies with them. Part of me is buried under the earth with them, or burned in the pyre with them, and I'm still burning, to this day. I'm living within the bits and pieces of me that are left."

She listened, but said nothing, her cheek pressed against the floor, a pool of fallen tears gathering beside her.

"There's still so much here, though," he continued. "My daughter gives me a reason to wake up every morning, and my grandchildren, too. You. Toph. Knowing that you guys are in the world, surviving just like I am. Knowing that I have you both, even if you're far away." His hand stopped its circular motion on her back, and lay trembling between her shoulder blades. "Knowing that I'll see them again. Uncle, my mother, Mai, even Azula." He chuckled quietly. "Aang. And now, Sokka. I'll see them again, and so will you."

She lay on the floor for what felt like hours, letting herself feel anything and everything. His speech had been the tiniest sip of water to a parched throat; it cooled and soothed, just enough to keep going. He sat on the floor next to her as she allowed his words to wash over her. She knew he was uncomfortable, but he stayed anyway, unmoving. Suffering in silence the way she suffered beside him, enduring his pain as she endured hers. First sharp like a knife, hot like cherry red steel, then dulling to an ache that she knew she would carry for the rest of her life.

But afterward, when her tears had slowed and the discomfort of her position on the floor outweighed the pain she carried in her breast, she sat up. The grief was still there, and it would never leave; it was a dark cloud that shrouded her, but she had found the strength to keep moving, guided there by one of her oldest and last surviving friends.

She pulled him to her, embracing him tightly. He held her for a moment before standing slowly, knees cracking, and extending a hand to help her back to her feet.

XXXXX

The ship pulled from the harbor, blue sails taut in the wind, guiding them away from Republic City, pulling them south. Katara watched them go- the traditional Water Tribe Chieftain burial-at-sea was a sacred ceremony, only for those who had mastered the skills of seamanship. Katara wasn't allowed on board. That didn't bother her as much as she thought it would. Standing at the pier with Zuko and Toph by her side, she could pretend that Sokka was simply sailing away, back home. If she closed her eyes, she could imagine him waving to her from the forecastle, a bright smile on his face and the sunlight reflecting in his blue eyes.

She raised a solemn hand. "Good-bye," she whispered.

Author's Note: This is the chapter I am most nervous to post. I don't know why, but I always got this feeling that Sokka didn't die of old age. Since Bryke didn't decide to share with us just how any of them die, i took some liberty. This one was a challenge to write. This version is VERY different from the first version i wrote. Read, review, i hope you enjoyed... or are at least willing to continue. Two left.