#fotm

Summary of FotM [2024] Head count to the right (our left); 4.

Summary of FotM [2022] Head count to the right (our left); 5.

Summary of FotM [2021] Another year, another head count, let's see!

Heads turning right (our left); 7 (If I were to count all the characters on the artworks it would be more but I will count per month!)

Summary of FotM [2020]

Summary of FotM [2019] When it all started!

You've heard of Summary of Art, get ready forrrr; Summary of FotM.

“Those clouds look so soft,” Katara starts, waving a hand leisurely at the whiteness around them, “don't they? Like you could just jump down and you'd land in a big, soft, cottony heap?”

“Maybe you should give it a try.” She glares. He deserves that, just like he deserves her sarcasm.

“You’re hilarious.” She probably is mad he’s trying to joke when he’d usually tell her about his observations. He is weird, and he’s always been okay with that. He does not want to have Aang know just how weird so soon.

Strange lack of focus or over-seriousness switching back and forth like shifting weight? Okay, he can’t really do anything about that, and Katara helps him or he knows she’s gone and focuses up in her absence. His strategizing in every situation even when the others think they’re all safe? He won’t pretend that’s not something he does, because then people won’t know he has skills from practice and isn’t just coming up with random things.

But his tendency to learn about the world by just staring at it long enough? Absolutely not.

“I’ll try it!”

Of course he does.

Aang leaps off, dropping straight into a cloud and out of sight. Moments later, he flies back up, sitting in the back of the saddle and dripping with condensation.

“Turns out, clouds are made of water.”

Katara turns an eye to her brother, who is very not-obviously staring over Appa’s head to gauge their direction and adjust if needed. He’s just making sure they don’t waste time, don’t go wildly off-course!

She hits him anyways.

He snorts, putting away his carvings and knife, and moves to actually take the reins.

“Hey, what is that?” He looks down, and Aang moves to stand between the two. Sokka momentarily notes that he needs to help the boy dry off before he freezes, and focuses back before his sister notices.

A large forest… if it had been burned down.

Destroyed by fire.

He steers them down, because Aang needs to see it. Needs to see the truth about the pain that the war has brought and be just a little more serious. Katara will say something to help the kid feel better, then they’ll keep going, and the Avatar will know when to be the Avatar and when to be Aang a little bit better.

He lets the other two drop first, and keeps a hand on Appa’s side when he follows. They wander off slightly, looking around at the ash and char and stumps and hollowness of sound.

The whole place feels empty. No trees, no Winds or Stones talking, no birds or rodents scurrying about. The plants are fine, because he can see a few places where little bits of green are peeking out of the ash, but something is keeping the animals away.

Something is wrong.

“It's like a scar…” he mutters, because it is.

Rage fills up in him.

It’s sudden and hot and pushes against the sides of his chest, throat, eyes. He wouldn’t be surprised if he was breathing flames with how hot it is. It doesn’t even feel like his own, strong and festered. Infection, despair and grief when there’s no place for safety, vengeance wanted and vengeance too far.

It gets chased from his body by something empty, draining away and leaving behind some thought he can’t touch.

It isn’t his, then. Something in this place is mad, and it made a decision.

He breathes deep, trying to shake himself back to his own feelings, his own thoughts. Katara is holding a little nut, one of the ones that drop from these trees. Hope, then. New life, the sprouts already forming. Life will return here as it never could amongst ice, and that’s something to be positive about.

“Sokka?” He turns to acknowledge her, eyes trying to convey he’s fine now. “Aang says he needs to find Avatar Roku. Isn’t that… isn’t Roku dead?”

“Oh.” He thinks. The Avatar is the convergence of everything, the transition without transitioning. Balance includes a bit of everything. Tui and La are not just the skies and the water, but order and chaos, pattern and spontaneity, feminine and masculine. Similar, never the same.

The Avatar is all four elements at once. That is the obvious part. Most places haven’t seemed to mention the Spirits much, probably because they can talk to other people instead. The Avatar is half Spirit, half human, or so the stories say. Aang had a form that saved him, and it seemed to be that other half.

“The only way to meet Roku, then, is the Spirit half of the Avatar.”

“What?”

“Like what happened when he fell into the Ocean?” Katara says, ignoring both Aang’s confusion and mentioning the grief of the airbender. “He has to figure out how to use that?”

“Yeah, like putting on gloves to touch something. He needs to pull that part of himself forward so he can interact with someone who is accessible to Spirits but not to humans.”

“You guys thin- That’s something you think about? The Spirits? I know you said to pray, and you talk about the Moon and the Ocean and all that, but…” Aang trails off.

Katara frowns, putting a hand on the boy’s shoulder. It’s odd to them that no one else seems to pray, but if there’s more help, why would they ask as often? Now Sokka wonders if people out here ask at all.

“Our people tell stories of the Spirits, of the Avatar, of everything. Sokka remembers them better, so I trust him, but even if I didn’t, I remember that bit. The Avatar is balance. You protect nature, but also those who seem unnatural. The Spirits and the humans, fire and water, air and earth. If we didn’t believe in the stories, we wouldn’t be here.”

Wouldn’t be talking to Aang. Wouldn’t believe in the Avatar or airbenders. Wouldn’t think they could help the kid.

But also wouldn’t be alive.

He was five, and there was a blizzard, and the Spirits are why they lived.

~

He didn’t know what to make of it. Should he even think of it? Is that a useful way to spend his time?

The warrior, a tall woman standing behind him.

Yes. If he doesn’t think about it, it will force itself into his mind without stop.

There was darkness, which is typical for him. There was the Avatar Kyoshi, which would make sense when combined with the last sighting he had of the Avatar. Those warriors were strong and skilled, and he hasn’t gotten as close since.

But the slipper… That’s odd. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen that slipper, laying on the ground as if dropped or tossed aside. And immediately followed by a storm, raging around the ship.

Lieutenant Jee bowing, which wouldn’t be odd, except it wasn’t the lieutenant who rose from that gesture. A strange dark figure, with a startling smiling face that didn’t move even though it seemed to laugh at him.

And the same scream.

He frowns. These thoughts lead him nowhere. He can ask his uncle when the other returns. Where is the man, anyways? Shouldn’t he be back by now.

He stands, following the directions of his crew to find the hot spring his uncle found. Sure enough, there is Uncle Iroh. Unrepentant, not wanting to leave, and eventually Zuko just gives a warning about the schedule and moves to leave.

His uncle will make it. It’s not like he’ll actually leave, though. It’s technically his uncle’s ship, after all.

And it seems he does know that slipper. Its pair sat by the edge of the spring.

~

“So, are seed-nuts acorns or are different seed-nuts called different things?”

“I think acorns. It’s simple, right? Makes more sense than calling them a dozen other names or calling them ‘seed-nuts’. That’s just asking for jokes all the time.”

“Oh, like people can’t joke about everything. And anyways, I think that our experiences out here have shown people like to make things more complicated than they need to be.”

“You’re just mad about that Omashu chicken.”

Sokka huffs at her, which only pushes a smile on her face and a giggle out her throat. Jerk.

Aang laughs very loudly at them both, and moves to take the ‘acorn’ from them. He bounces it between his hands, moving the air so it does twirls and loops each trip.

“Technically, acorns are only the seeds of oaks. If it’s a nut, it’s a seed, too, and certain trees get their own words, but that’s because they have different tastes and uses in food. Some are more bitter, some taste like flowers, and some are even sweet! You just gotta learn which are which, and if you’re confused, just call them nuts!”

Sokka snorts.

“What is it with boys and puns?”

“It’s acornerstone of our humor.”

She punches his arm for that. Jokes on her.

Aang taps both of them, drawing their attention. He’s looking away, at an approaching figure. They’re a ways off, moving slowly and steadily, which explains why the siblings didn’t notice.

Predators move slowly and stop when noticed or move swiftly.

“Hey, who are you?” Sokka calls out to the person, who hears and moves slightly faster. Slow, still, and that tends to mean an Elder.

They haven’t had great luck with Elders. Here’s to hoping, he supposes.

“When I saw the flying bison, I thought it was impossible!” Oh. Is this a good intention or a bad one? “But, those markings ... are you the Avatar, child?”

Good ones. The man is an Elder, and a wiser one. He didn’t discount Aang’s status just because the kid is, well, a kid. That means that, at the very least, the man doesn’t mean any harm.

Katara glances at her brother, notes the conclusion in his shoulders, and nods to Aang, who nods at the stranger.

“My village desperately needs your help!”

Oh.

Whoops.

~

The village is, in fact, partially destroyed and with very sleepless-looking villagers. Practically the definition of in need of help.

And that seems to be on top of the nearby forest’s destruction, which is bad as is. Larger animals scared off, any edible plants struggling, and the people’s bodies using more out of sheer stress.

“This young person is the Avatar!” Sokka appreciates Kay-fon. The guy isn’t the wisest of Elders, but he’s a decent person all the same. Not a fool, not cruel, not even falling for what so many have or will. Announcing the Avatar as young, but not a child, giving hope but also putting a line down on expectations.

“So, the rumors of your return are true!” Must be the leader. “It is the greatest honor of a lifetime to be in your presence.”

“Nice to meet you too! So... is there something I can help you with?”

“I’m not sure…” Okay, that explains some of why Aang was surprised. Do people even believe in the Spirits at all? If they get to the North and none of their sister tribe prays, he will fight the Fire Lord alone instead of dealing with them.

“Our village is in crisis, he's our only hope!” Kay-fon seems to have the most knowledge, which makes sense for an Elder. Still, Sokka fights the urge to block the man’s view to Aang as the boy is addressed.

And then forgets that urge even exists.

“For the last few days at sunset, a Spirit monster comes and attacks our village. He is Hei Bai, the black and white Spirit.”

Monkeyfeathers.

Black and white and angry.

“Why?” It comes out different than he wants, stressed and slightly, uh, aggressive, if the looks on his siblings’ faces tell him anything. Not that he looks that hard.

“We do not know, but each of the last three nights, he has abducted one of our own. We are especially fearful because the winter solstice draws near.”

“When the Spirits come closer to our world,” Katara finishes. They both know the time, the brightest time of the Polar Night when the Stars and Moon and the Lights are all present as they never are other times.

“Yes. There is no telling what Hei Bai might do then.”

Aang is less confused, but certainly more worried. Sokka would be, too, if he had to face off an incredibly enraged Spirit so close to the time when said Spirit is most powerful in the mortal world.

“So, what do you want me to do, exactly?”

“Who better to resolve a crisis between our world and the Spirit World than the Avatar himself? You are the great bridge between man and Spirits.”

“Hey great bridge guy, could I talk to you over here for a second?” Katara pulls Aang over, and so Sokka makes a gesture that they’re talking alone so he can join them.

She’s right to pull aside. Aang’s worry is rarely misplaced (outside learning about the tribe, though that’s more the worry about what answers you’re gonna get), and the boy is trying to hide it. The same shifting and the same lack of frown and lack of smile at once.

How he feels about being the Avatar when he just feels like Aang.

“Aang, you seem a little unsure about all of this.” Katara has already put a hand on the kid’s shoulder, leaning forward to block him from sight outside their little circle.

“Yeah, that might be because I don't know anything at all about the Spirit World. It's not like there's someone to teach me this stuff!”

“Can you help these people?”

“I have to try, don't I? Maybe whatever I have to do will just… come to me?” The statement is definitely a question he hopes is a statement.

“I think you can do it, Aang.”

Encouraging words.

But encouraging words do nothing when there’s no path forward to take. You just get more lost trying and have to hope you stumble on the right path sooner instead of later.

So he grabs the other shoulder, leans in as far as his sister has, and gives the direction for the encouragement to actually work. 

“Hei Bai has a reason. Find the issue, solve it, and that’s all.”

“That’s all?”

He nods. The more steps the mind makes, the harder it is to move forward. One step at a time, as few as possible.

“Also, my birthday is the solstice, so you better get it done before then.”

~

Aang is standing out alone. Everything in him screams to join the boy, because the kid shouldn’t face a Spirit alone.

Shouldn’t face anything alone.

“He’ll be fine. The worst thing that happens is he’s ignored. The Spirits won’t take him when he’s not fully human.”

He tries to fake his shoulders relaxing. It doesn’t work, judging by Katara reaching to squeeze his hand. He doesn’t pull away, moreso to help her own anxious thoughts calm.

“Your sister is right. If anyone can do this, it is the Avatar.”

He doesn’t even acknowledge the Elder.

Aang still waits alone.

And the Sun dips out of sight.

Hei Bai is, without a doubt, the Spirit in his dreams. Starved of something, angry about something, not what it should be. It doesn’t even pay attention to Aang, instead immediately starting to destroy the buildings around it.

He doesn’t wait. The others hiding with him shout but he ignores it because his brother needs help.

“Oy, Hei Bai! Pay attention to him! He can help you!” Boomerang does nothing, not even noticed, and Aang tries to cut Sokka off.

Cold-empty-angry-

No vengeance to take, no safety to make, no room to breathe-

Red-black death, pain and grief burned into cold ash-

Something wraps around his body.

He’s jolted back to his senses by the feeling, and he realizes the mistake that moment of lapse was. Hei Bai has grabbed him in one massive hand, rushing off faster than animals can run. Spirits aren’t animals. Aang is following.

He tries to shout, something wordless pushing past what presses on his mind and throat. Aang needs noise. Noise gives direction. Aang needs direction.

The world shifts, tilts, and he can’t breathe-

He wakes up, and the world is not his.

He knows that the moment his eyes can see. The world he’s from is bright because of the Sun and the Moon and Stars and the green and the brown and the white. It’s bright because of people.

There are only three people with him, and all of them are asleep.

Nothing obvious is wrong, not as individuals, but nothing is right, either.

The air is blue, but more like light through ice in the caves where their ancestors rest. The trees are green and brown, but the roots don’t touch earth where they have in the mortal world. The green is tinged with something that same slightly far-off thing the air has, the brown turned softer than before. There’s a small stream, one of the ones Aang called a creek because he could walk the rocks across easily. The stream is normal looking, and something in Sokka’s gut says that it means the water is from their world.

Meant for them…

Hei Bai isn’t around, but there are signs of the Spirit. Not violent, and therefore not what the Spirit has been showing the Senlin tribe. The Spirit doesn’t mean harm to the people.

The Spirit doesn’t mean harm, but still took them.

And the marks of its presence are trees that are small and skinny, rough and hardy. The trees bear fruit, flowers and full-grown bits, too. Large willows, softer than any Sokka’s known and are of the Spirit world where the scraggly ones are of the mortal world. The leaves are shedding slowly, forming a place beneath where none of the fallen green has withered or hardened away from its origin.

Food. Rest. Water.

Three people for three nights.

Sokka for the fourth.

He stares, just taking it all in for a moment. He can feel eyes on him, but none are the sort a predator makes, nor even a prey. Curious, maybe, but not intent on learning anything in particular or doing anything with that information.

Other Spirits, then. The smaller sorts, the Stones and the Winds and such. He’s wondered what they look like. He doesn’t feel like knowing.

Hei Bai hasn’t been taking people to be cruel, or to seek vengeance. It would have killed someone, even just hurt someone, at least one of the nights. Instead, it has taken people and placed them where they will surely be safe from the dangers of the mortal world.

Of the world where humans fight humans and fire does more harm than it should.

Hei Bai must have been hurt, then, by the forest’s destruction. Sokka can understand grief. He can understand when that grief tries to burn into anger, rage, tries to do something to what the mind says caused it. And he can understand that, in the end, there is no one to fight, no place for that anger to go that isn’t something he wants to help and protect.

The Spirit is scared.

It couldn’t stop the Fire Nation, and the village is so close to the destruction. Make the scene look like there is no village left and put the humans somewhere safe. Protect what’s left, the creatures that never left or died, not like the animals or the plants or even the other Spirits who all went to greener places.

Senlin didn’t. They stuck around.

Hopefully, Aang comes to the same conclusion.

~

He really needs to use the bathroom. It’s been a full day and he hasn’t even drunk anything, but the stuff he drank prior seems to be trying to cause a flood to break out of his torso.

He’s being dramatic, of course, with nothing else to think about. He doesn’t want to be dramatic about not being able to sleep, even more than usual, because that means he has to admit he wishes he could sleep.

The other people haven’t woken up yet. He wonders if there’s a method to that, or if they just have to sleep for a long time compared to in their usual world.

He’s walking out of very thin trees.

It’s a sudden change, and he doesn’t know when it happened, or maybe it only just did. He tries to hurry, and falls through when the stalks end. He’ll need to ask Aang about them late-

“SOKKA!”

He is nearly knocked over by two weights charging into him. He wraps an arm around each to avoid falling.

“Are you okay? What happened?”

“I will answer when I’ve gone to the bathroom.”

He takes a minute at most, and they’re still impatient when he gets back. Really, he wasn’t about to hold it a minute longer after an entire day.

“Okay, I’m fine, it was a bit weird and had no bathrooms. I assume Aang figured out the issue with Hei Bai?”

He gets a babble of questions, information, and random words. He manages to get the explanation that Hei Bai calmed down because Aang showed the acorns, and that’s about it.

Well, it’s all he needs to know. He can get more details later, when there’s no panic or relief getting in the way.

He waits for them to calm a little, and reassures once more he’s fine, and herds them towards the village leader.

Is this one also called a governor? Is that for certain villages?

“Thank you, Avatar. If only there were a way to repay you for what you've done.”

“You could give us some supplies or money.”

“Sokka!”

“We need stuff, Katara, and it’s not like either of you ever let people know.”

“It would be an honor to help you prepare for your journey,” the leader answers, and Sokka uses that moment to gesture emphatically because he’s right.

Katara huffs and starts talking to Aang so she can ignore him. He’s okay with that. He’s more than okay, really, because he’s back in the right world and his siblings feel well enough to bicker with him.

Oh, he was gonna kill her.

First the insistence on using his ideas, then the Marks. This was it. This was the final straw.

“KATARA! GET THE FU-”

Miki threw a hand over his mouth, gesturing at the children gathered nearby. He gave her a look and pulled her hand off.

“You realize they’ve had lessons with Gran Gran, right?”

“So wait until they say it, then you can’t take the blame.”

“Gran Gran will dispute any claim that someone besides her is a worse influence.”

Miki glared at him for a moment, before breaking off with a huff of amusement.

“Alright, well, I’ll get your sister and you can whisper it to her so we’re both happy.”

“ Fine .”

Sokka waited, arms crossed and stance blocky, as though prepared to fight. Which he was, though not in a physical way as his posture suggested. He wasn’t mad , really, but he was still mad. It-

Katara came to stand by him, hands behind her back, holding back a grin, nearly rocking on her heels waiting for him to speak.

He didn’t, just to spite her.

It took ten minutes for her to break.

“Do you wanna watch the birds?”

He turned his head, glowering at her. She let the grin out, pleased with her work. To her, it was the proper way to end his birthday celebrations.

“Huuh, yeah. C’mon. If it collapses on me, I’m taking you down with.”

A watchtower wasn’t that useful without something to watch for and a person to watch for it. However, standing next to his sister, laughing as she pointed out the best birds for him to hit with Boomerang… it was worth having her gloat about being the best sister ever.

She really was.

~

The siblings got better, as time passed, at everything.

Katas were easily muscle memory. Their bending skills weren’t masterful by any means, but it was adequate, and instinctual, which meant it would help them last.

Both of them became skilled with their needles, though Katara rarely attempted embroidery. She preferred to spend her time training the tribe to fight and hunt and fish like Sokka had taught her, or to practice her bending on her own.

Katara excelled at keeping things clean and orderly and at storing things in the optimal way. This was evidenced by how their tent never got messy, regardless of Sokka’s own excellence in creating chaos.

Meanwhile, Sokka could cook like no one’s business. Kitchi was proud, having come in multiple times to give him traditional recipes to memorize. Though none of the tribe would ever bring it up - or admit to it in any way - many of them “wandered” past their tent at mealtimes when the chief was around. If they just so happened to have something to talk to him about right as he was done cooking, then it was not their fault that he always served them some food as they talked.

Katara had no hesitancy in declaring that Sokka Food was the best food to ever exist. No, she did not take constructive criticism. No, she would not let Sokka take it either.

She also had no hesitancy in asking to have tap-stick moments with her brother.

So they both got practice in on nearly everything, and they both did their best to share those skills with the tribe. The tribe, in turn, did its best to adjust and follow the lead of the chief and his advisor.

~

The Council of Elders had its first meeting three days before Katara’s birthday. It was her present, according to Sokka, though that was actually a new coat made of wolf badger fur with snow rat tails on the shoulders. He hoped she liked it, and the embroidery he did of the animals.

Gran Gran was supportive, both of having a council and of him annoying his sister, as a good grandmother is.

He had chosen five elders to join him, the five that he knew and trusted the best, and the others were understanding of not being picked. In fact, he got an affectionate hair ruffle from Toki over it.

At the twelfth hour, Achak, Kanna, Aputi, Kitchi, and Yuki joined him in a tent that hadn’t been used for a while, due to the lack of people. They each had serious looks on their faces, which he guessed was a courtesy to him.

“Greetings, Elders.”

“Greetings, Chief Sokka,” Elder Kanna intoned, bowing her head slightly. He kept himself from shifting awkwardly at the title. He was chief, and this was a council meeting.

They sat in a circle, facing each other on the same level. Together, they came up with procedures on how to continue with future meetings, the responsibilities the Council of Elders would hold, and the way to choose new Elders to join.

The Council agreed that they would start a discussion on the current ways of the tribe at the next meeting. Sokka was glad that no one commented on his nerves, or on his struggles to find the most eloquent ways to say things.

At least this would all be good practice, should he ever need to meet with another high-ranking person.

If you see my fanfic that I've been posting, and you really can't wait for me to put it here, Flames of The Moon - Chapter 1 - PurpleFireandSteam (chaoticevilbean) - Avatar: The Last Airbender [Archive of Our Own]