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Thanks for the memories (even though they weren't so great)

Summary:

What if Aang was more affected by being a reincarnation than what was shown in the show

Notes:

So, this is based off a post I made on tumblr that people seemed to like. Also I'm a kind of writer that usually lets my ideas run freely through my mind rather than writing them out, so apologies if this isn't the best. But enjoy anyway and let me know what you think ((Edited to actually include Momo))

Chapter 1: chapter 1

Chapter Text

It was a clear aftermoon as the trio flew from the Northern Water tribe. The air was crisp, the clouds white and Aang was almost bouncing as he sat cross legged on Appa’s saddle with Momo sleeping around his neck like a living scarf.

“So, Ruko told me that the spirited I needed to find was Koh, since he was one of the oldest of spirits," said Aang as he retold his adventure on finding the ocean and moon spirits to Katara and Sokka. "But! I had to be super careful because Koh is known as the face stealer, and if I showed any emotion, he would steal my face!”

“Oh, wow Aang,” said Katara who was kneeling in front of Aang, wind whipping her hair loopies around her face, “That’s terrifying.”

Sokka only let out a hum as he leaned his arms on the edge of the saddle and gazed at the sky.

“Yeah! So, I went to find Koh like Ruko told me right,” said Aang to Katara who nodded and Sokka let out another hum.

“Well, I found his lair and as I was going to walk down the entrance, I saw a curly tail Bluenose.”

‘Aww,” said Katara.

“But! When it turned to me,” Aang said and slammed his hands on the saddle, Momo waking up little at the sharp movement and grumbled before going back to sleep. “It. Had. No. Face.”

Katara gasped and clasped her hands to her mouth. However, Sokka only turned his head and looked at Aang, as if the story were finally grabbing his attention.

“Yeah! It was so creepy, its face was just blank skin with fur surrounding it, nothing else.” Aang said shuddering.

“So, what did you do next?” asked Sokka, speaking for the first time since they left the Northern Water Tribe.

“Well, I remembered what Roku said about not showing emotion. So, I controlled myself and walked into the lair, and boy, was it dark!”

“Oh?” said Katara.

“Yeah! I could barely see anything.”

“How did you find Koh then?” asked Katara, leaning a little towards Aang.

“Well I walked down the path I could only just see, and I entered this room with all these roots going through it- Oh! I forget to say that his lair is in a giant dead looking tree- Anyway, I was in the room and without any warning, Koh appeared in front of me! I made sure not to let my surprise show, but it was pretty scary.” Aang looked away and rubbed the back of his head with his hand.

“Could you see what he looked like?” Sokka asked, now sitting cross legged with his hands in his lap and facing Aang.

Aang looked back to the two siblings and nodded “He kinda looked like a giant centipede and his face was set in the middle of the front end of his body. And his face was in an eyelid kind of thing where a lid would cover his face and when it lifted, a new face would be there.”

Sokka and Katara both scrunched up their faces, “Well that’s unnerving,” remarked Sokka.

Aang nodded. “Yep. He showed me a few faces too, one of them he only showed me after telling me that he'd met me before in a past life.”

“Wow, he knew a past life of yours?” asked Katara.

“Yeah, he said it was about 800 or 900 years ago.”

Sokka and Katara both looked surprised.

“He,” Aang bit his lip and looked to his side, “He also told me that my past life tried to kill him then too.”

“What! Why?!” Sokka and Katara said at the same time.

Aang looked back at them and said quietly “He said it was because he took the face of someone they loved, and then showed me a face of this beautiful woman with long brown hair.” Aang then clenched his hands, took a deep breath and shouted, “He didn’t even sound sorry!” Momo flinched awake and tiredly chirped at Aang, slapping a little hand on his face.

“Aang?” said Katara softly, tilting her head to the side and raised a hand out towards him.

“He took her face! He showed me. He even sounded like he thought the memory was funny! But it wasn’t! It wasn’t funny, it wasn’t fair, she didn’t deserve it!”

“Aang?” Said Sokka with an almost puzzled look on his face.

Aang put his hands on his head, looked down and took gasping breaths that sounded as though he was sobbing. Momo now completely awake sitting on Aangs lap, trying to move Aang's hands away chirping hurriedly at him.

“Aang.” Sokka and Katara said at the same again, though Aang gave no impression that he noticed.

The siblings looked at each other. Then, both shuffled closer to the young avatar, each putting a hand on Aang’s shoulders. “Aang?” Katara tried again, this time also shaking Aang a little.

Aang put his arms down on his knees, so as to not hit Momo now patting Aang's face, and looked up. Both siblings gasped as they saw thin wet streams coming from Aang’s eyes.

“Aang, you’re crying.” Katara said softly, with her brows a little drawn.

Aang sniffed and used his arms to wipe his face, knocking off Sokka and Katara’s hands in the process, though leaving Momo be as he decided to curl up between Aang's shoulder and neck. “It hurts,” Aang said and rubbed a hand on his chest, over his heart. “It hurts me right here to know that he stole her face. But I don’t know why. I never even knew her. It was so long ago and it wasn’t even my life. So Why? Why does it hurt so much to know this?” Aang put his hands on his face and burst into tears again, this time stronger and louder.

“Aang,” Sokka said softly, putting his hand back on Aang’s shoulder that Momo was curled up on, “Aang buddy, I’m so sorry.”

Katara put her arm over Aang’s other shoulder, across his shaking back, and gave him a half hug as tears started to fall from her eyes too.

Neither sibling could do anything more, but only hold Aang as he grieved for a love that had long since passed.

Chapter 2

Summary:

The past shows itself in the most unlikely of places, like really what are the chances. Also this chapter is set like just after Toph joins the Gaang.

Notes:

There's also gonna be a second part to this chapter that I'll post separately (It's why I put this story in a series) that I felt didn't really fit what I wanted this story to be. So yeah, the second part is a straight continuation from this chapter too and has a guest appearance that I'm sure you'll be able to guess.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

“Land down here Aang.” Said Sokka, pointing down to forest they were flying over, wind blowing his hair to the front of his face. “It’ll give us some protection against the rain coming.”

“You got it Sokka,” said Aang as he directed Appa to start lowering to the ground.

“How can you guys tell its gonna rain anyway?” asked Toph who was leaning along the back of the saddle with Momo curled up next to her.

“We can see the grey clouds from up here and can feel from the wind that the clouds will be coming towards us,” replied Katara, sitting next to Sokka.

Luckily, the forest wasn’t very thick, and they could land easily without having to worry too much about dodging trees on the way down. Once on the ground, all four unpacked Appa and started to set up camp for the night.

“Alright, Toph,” said Sokka, standing near some trees, “could you raise the ground a little over here near the trees? So, we won’t have to worry about sleeping on soon to be wet ground.”

“Yeah, whatever,” said Toph as she walked over to where she could feel Sokka standing. She stamped her foot and raised her arms to bring up a section of ground, big enough for four people to sleep on, a little higher. Then also did the same again, a little further away with a section of ground large enough for Appa to sleep on.

“Great! Thanks, Toph!” exclaimed Sokka and clapped his hands. “Camping is going to be so much easier now with an Earthbender.” He muttered to himself before shouting, “Aang! come help me put our tarp over this.”

“Sure thing!” said Aang, running from where he had just finished helping Katara set up a small fire pit to hopefully cook some food before the rain came.

With camp finally set up and Appa settled on his little platform bed with Momo nuzzled up on his stomach, the kids went through all the food they had. Which, wasn’t really much.

“Well, I could make a small stew I guess, with the vegetables we have.” Katara stated as she stood over the gathered food with her hands on her hips.

“Stew! Ugh, that’s gonna be so plain and boring,” Sokka said, slapping his hands on his face as he sat on the ground, leaning against a rock.

Katara crossed her arms and turned to Sokka, “Oh? Do you have a better idea then? Almighty Sokka, the greatest chef in all four nations.”

Sokka dragged his legs up to bury his face in his knees and groaned “No.”

Katara nodded “That’s what I thought.” She turned to Aang and Toph, “Do you two have any ideas for what we should eat for dinner?”

Toph shrugged from where she sat with a knee bent up, “I mean, I am, or was I guess, a noble. I just ate whatever fancy food I was given. Even if I wasn’t born a noble, no one would have let me near any cooking stuff in the first place. So, I’m gonna be good with whatever.”

Aang rubbed the back of his head with his right hand “I mean, if Sokka is worried about the taste, we could see if we can find any herbs growing around here to use for some flavour.”

“Great idea Aang,” said Katara, smiling at Aang who blushed and looked away. She then turned to Sokka. “How does that sound to you then, Almighty Sokka?”

“Yeah, that’s fine.” Sokka said with his head still buried in his knees.

“Well come on then, we have to search quickly if we want to be able to eat something before the rain gets here,” Katara said looking up at the cloudy blue sky that could still be seen well amongst the trees, the grey clouds on the horizon getting a little closer.

Sokka stood up with a stretch, arms raised over his head and yawned, “Yeah let’s go, come on Aang and Toph.”

Aang jumped up and went to stand by Katara while Toph remained on the ground.

“Toph? Are you coming?” asked Aang looking back at her.

“Oh yeah, great idea,” said Toph waving a hand over her cloudy eyes, “Get the blind girl to help find some herbs.”

Aang, Sokka and Katara cleared their throats and looked away from her.

“Right,” said Aang rocking back and forth on his feet, “You, uh, stay here then.”

Toph huffed, “You got it Twinkle Toes,” giving a two fingered salute in Aang’s direction.

“Come on guys,” Sokka said, putting his hands on Aang’s and Katara’s shoulders. “Let’s go find some of those herbs.”

In the forest, Sokka, Aang and Katara quickly split up to cover more ground. Though, they made sure they didn’t go too far from the camp site and could still see one another if they looked up. After ten minutes of searching through all the undergrowth, Katara finally found something. Shooting her arm up in the air with green leaves and stems clenched in her fist she shouted, “I found some basil guys!”

“Great work Katara!” yelled Sokka as he ran over to his sister, “Come on Aang, let’s go back. I’m starving!”

But Aang didn’t respond.

“Aang!” Sokka and Katara yelled, both looking around, but neither could see the young Avatar.

“Where did you last see him?” Sokka asked Katara, furrowing his eyebrows.

Katara bit her lip, “That way,” she said pointing to her right. “Same for you, right?” she asked, worry reading easily from her face.

Sokka nodded, “Yeah, same for me. Come on, let’s go find him.”

The two siblings began to walk in the direction they last saw Aang, shouting his name all the while. It wasn’t long at all before they found him, standing behind a tree that had blocked him their sight.

“Aang.” Sokka and Katara said at the same time, relief dripping from their voices and ran up to him.

“What’s up with you Aang, why didn’t you respond?” asked Sokka putting his hand on Aang’s shoulders.

“Yeah, you really scared us.” Said Katara still holding the basil she had found.

But Aang didn’t reply, he only looked away from Sokka, to a small clearing amongst some trees with a small mound in the centre.

“Aang?” said Katara quietly looking back and forth from Aang’s face to the small open space, “What’s wrong?”

But still, Aang didn’t reply, only gazing at the clearing silently.

“Aang you’re scaring us.” Said Sokka putting his face in front of Aang’s. “Say something.”

At last, Aang finally did something. It wasn’t to speak however, only to shrug off Sokka’s hands from his shoulders and walk to the clearing. The siblings looked at Aang in surprise before quickly making their way back to Aang’s side.

“Aang, what are you doing?” asked Katara.

Aang still didn’t respond, his focus seemingly only on the clearing.

Katara looked over to Sokka who just shrugged his shoulders and made a noise of confusion. They looked back to Aang and found that he had stopped directly in front of the mound set in the middle of the clearing.

Sokka and Katara both opened their mouths, ready to shout out Aang’s name again, but were interrupted by something rustling the undergrowth behind them. They turned around to see what it was and saw Toph walking towards them with her arms crossed over her chest.

“What’s wrong with you guys? You were all taking so long and then I heard you both shouting for Aang, but Aang wasn’t responding and then I felt you guys running.” Toph said throwing her arms up in the air, “Just what is happening?”

“Well, there’s something up with Aang,” said Katara, crossing her arms, hand still holding the basil.

“Yeah, I got that,” said Toph rolling her eyes, “But what?”

“It was here,” Aang said, calm as anything.

Sokka, Katara and Toph all quickly looked at Aang.

“What,” Katara cleared her throat, “What was here?”

“This is where it started.” said Aang looking down at the small mound.

“What started?” asked Sokka.

Aang looked over to the trio, his eyes and tattoos instantly glowing white and said, with a voiced overlayed by all those that came before him, “I did.”

Notes:

Second part has now been posted!!! Yay, I did it.

Series this work belongs to: