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While his friends have settled inside, Aang finds himself out on a cliffside, deep dark water below and the full moon above. It’s serene, but lonely. Examining more closely, he recognizes that it’s a different night sky than the one he saw 100 years ago. The culprit is the usual—the passage of time. As hard as he tries to relish the memories he had of his childhood, they’re fading. Aang finds himself trying to remember specific details, trying to make complete pictures in his head, but his ability to do so is weakening. How is he supposed to remember the past perfectly when he never expected to lose it in the first place? If he was around when the Fire Nation attacked, would he have- could he have-
An image forms in his head of himself in the Southern air temple during Sozin’s comet, the firebenders riding in on dragons, blazing. Burning his friends. Burning his family. He enters the avatar state, but it’s not enough. He’s only twelve. He pictures Monk Gyatso’s body, the same skeleton he saw days after waking up in this century, but this time there’s skin on the bones, rotting and burnt. The firebenders needed to pay for that. But could he really betray all of his teachings and take a life? Monk Gyatso was surrounded by limp piles of Fire Nation armor. If his mentor could betray Air Nomad teachings, why couldn’t he? Why was Aang so attached to a culture that had died out 100 years ago?
Aang knows the answer. He’s the last living Air Nomad. He has to carry on their teachings. Aang sighs heavily. He closes his eyes and tilts his head down, tears falling silently. After a moment of breathing in and out, he opens his eyes and casts his gaze upwards. Looking at the night sky, he thinks about the Water Tribe belief that those who pass become stars, joining the Moon Spirit in her journey across the night sky. He wonders if Gyatso could’ve become a star, too.
When Aang’s friend Yeshe’s sky bison passed from illness, all the monks mourned with him. Gyatso sat with Yeshe, providing comfort in the form of ancient Air Nomad sayings about loss and healing. One of them always stuck out to Aang. “Time heals all wounds," he whispers to the moon, because if Gyatso said it, it must be true, so if he can just believe it-
"No," a voice behind him. "It doesn't." Aang looks to his right, and it's Zuko. The left side of his face faces Aang, living evidence to the contrary of Gyatso’s wisdom. Aang moves to reassure Zuko that he didn’t mean it that way, but Zuko cuts in first. "I know we're not talking about physical scars, but…”
Zuko breathes in, eyes still locked up towards the sky. Aang's gaze remains fixed on Zuko, curious. From this close, Aang can see it all—the disturbed, dark skin that can only be found from the deepest burns. Not for the first time, Aang wonders how much it would’ve hurt to get a scar like that, let alone get it from someone you trusted. Not for the first time, Aang thinks about how now he’s the same age Zuko was when he got it. Zuko can probably feel Aang’s stare, though he politely doesn’t mention it. After all, he’s trying to make a point.
When Zuko speaks up again, it’s with a clinical distance to his own words, as if they’re something he’s repeated to himself, or perhaps, words someone else has repeated to him many times. "Time can never heal wounds. Not on its own. Wounds fester. Wounds get infected. Wounds often kill before they ever get the chance to begin healing. Some are obvious, and some are below the surface. Wounds cause phantom pains because they never leave the memory of the inflicted.”
Aang thinks of the Zuko he met when he’d just woken up from the iceberg, the anger he possessed. The scar, red and ugly. He hadn’t at the time, coming from a time of peace, but since then, Aang has seen burn scars that healed normally. Zuko’s scar is not one of them.
"Aang," Zuko speaks softly and with a powerful understanding, "The pain will never go away."
Aang crumples, struggling to hold back tears once more. He looks down at the ocean that has consumed him whole. The warped reflections of the stars mock him. "I just… I just wish I could go back,” Aang confesses.
Images of his friends playing games in the Southern Air Temple. They were all just… normal kids. Children, like he was. The monks, too, were just ordinary peaceful monks.The night he left, newborn boys were being transported to be raised and trained at his temple. By their 9th birthday, they might meet their first sky bison. By their 11th, they can go on their first ride with it. By their 13th, they’d have travelled the world. By their 18th, many of them will likely be masters. None of them made it to their first.
“I do too,” whispers Zuko.
No one says anything for a long time.
"I think the worst part," Aang starts, "is how easily they were forgotten. Written records were destroyed. The names of my friends and my mentors are lost to history. The Air Nomad scriptures and the statues are all destroyed. The worst was at the Northern Air Temple. My entire culture was just - painted over. No one cared, because it was so long ago. And they’re all-” Aang’s voice breaks, “they’re all dead.”
Zuko listens silently, and Aang's grateful—he doesn't think he could handle any apologies or assertions of how awful it is. He knows it's awful. He knows more than anyone.
Aang wonders if the other temples would’ve ended up like the Northern Air Temple with time. All of his culture, reclaimed and reinhabited by those who never met an air nomad. He feels a twinge of shame for hoping that people would move elsewhere.
Aang wonders if all the Air Temples would’ve reached the same fate, eventually. When he visited, the Southern Air Temple had no signs of life. The only reason he knows people must’ve visited is… well, he’s sitting next to someone who was searching for the Avatar for years. The idea of Zuko visiting his home while he was still firmly believing in Fire Nation propaganda doesn’t comfort him at all, though. Zuko would never do anything now, but in the past…
"Zuko," Aang begins unsurely, "You visited all the air temples, right?"
Zuko cocks his head to the side, but nods.
"Did you ever… do anything to the temples…?" Zuko looks like he’s trying to hide his dismay, and Aang trails off. "Sorry, I don't mean to...."
"No, I know. I didn't... mess with anything, if that's what you're asking. Uncle insisted we honor the dead by leaving things be."
Aang feels slightly relieved, but not by much. "I didn't mean to imply you'd do something like that."
Zuko drops his chin, hair hiding his eyes from view. "It was a fair question."
The moon shines higher above them than before. The tide pulls in loudly towards the shore. Zuko’s banishment is something they rarely talk about one-on-one. None of them knew it was the real reason he’d been chasing Aang until after the war, when they were all together at the Fire Nation capital. It hit Aang hard when he first heard that Zuko had been missing from home just like him. Aang speaks up in a whisper that can almost not be heard over the crashing waves.
“Sometimes I think I’d do anything to go back. But I don’t know if that’s even true. And I don’t know which is better and which is worse.”
“I did everything I could to go back to a home I thought existed, and it cost me everything, but…”
“But at the end of the day, you just wanted to go home,” Aang finishes.
“I wanted to go home that was never there,” Zuko clarifies. “I wanted to pretend it didn’t all happen. I wanted to pretend I wasn’t burned and scarred and dishonored by my father. I wanted to pretend my father loved me, and that he wanted me back, and that my mom was found, and that we were still on the ‘good’ side of the war. Every time I was tempted to stray from my mission, it felt like ice water was poured over my head. A reality check. But I chose to live in fiction every time. And that cost me more than I could say.”
“But then,” Zuko continues, raising a hand to his scar and looking down at his lap. “I did return home. My dreams came true. I was a prince again. Nobody discussed my banishment. My father never brought up the scar. And it was… He just… Everyone acted like what happened to me didn’t happen. They could only look at one side of my face.”
Zuko drops his hand and his shoulders slump, his hair falling over the scar. Aang nods sympathetically. “It’s a part of you that can never be changed. Just like my Air Nomad tattoos.”
“Like your Air Nomad tattoos…” Zuko repeats thoughtfully.
They both return to looking at the stars. A particularly bright star catches his eye… ‘Gyatso?’ he pleads in his mind. But the star is fading, blurring, growing smaller and dimmer and it’s dying and-
Tears are falling down his face.
“Zuko,” Aang whispers, “Will it ever get better?” Aang feels Zuko hesitate next to him. “Be honest,” Aang pleads.
"I wish I knew. For me, it uh… didn’t. Not for a long time. My wound got infected. I was always in pain. I was angry and bitter. Even when I realized that what happened to me was wrong, it didn’t feel better. It felt pointless. I thought there was a reason for my pain, but there wasn’t. Ozai just wanted to hurt me. He just wanted me gone.” Zuko’s voice breaks like skin over an old scar. He starts again, determined. “Since then, I’ve tried to channel my pain more healthily. I’ve been making new connections and mending what I can of my family. Still, I have a lot to own up for. Aang, you’ve already done a lot better than me at not letting the pain make you bitter.”
"What if I'm not bitter enough? What if I'm not angry enough at what happened, at the fire nation, at firebenders...at you?"
Zuko looks at him sadly, as if it’s a question he might’ve expected. His shoulders are hunched from the permanent weight of the guilt for everything he and his people have inflicted on the boy in front of him. "You're not. But that makes you the strongest person in the world.”