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It's past midnight, and Jona can't sleep.

It's not the first time.

But, you know, she doesn't mind being awake. Being awake means she doesn't have to dream, and her dreams still leave her shaking and scared and more tired than she was before. (Nobody heals from a death sentence at Highgate Prison just like that. Nobody heals, just like that, from feeling the noose around their throat.) (But she hasn't told anyone. Telling people, she reasons, would upset them. She's one of those annoyingly stoic people who'll pretend not to be ill until they drop dead of it.)

She still loves the sting of the night air on her cheeks (if you look closely, they're tracked with water) and the endless expanse of fields and sky around her reminding her that she's free. So she's wandered, and wandered, until she's reached a faraway field, and the farmhouse is reduced to a black silhouette on a black expanse, discernable only by the way it hides the stars.

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In that field, there is a soft white glow, a small girlish figure bent over her hands, and the occasional grunt of frustration.

Until, suddenly, the girl's head jerks towards Jona and she jumps to her feet, hiding her hands, eyes wide. "Uh ... hi?"

Oh God, what would Sokka do?

"Hello!"

A person! She wasn't expecting a person this late and this far afield. Then again, being around people is the surest way to distract herself from any dark thoughts that might worm their way into her brain, so she's definitely grateful for the company.

"Hello," she says, her mouth spreading in a smile.

The girl's glowing hands? Not weird in the slightest. Come on, it's the Cooper farm. But the fact that she's trying to hide them?

"Are you all right?" She sounds genuinely concerned. That's Jona for you, we guess.

Katara shoves her hands behind her back, looking frantic. "You didn't see anything, did you?" she asks desperately. "They're fine! They perfectly fine!"

(They were ... kind of ... withered. And come to think of it, there is a funny rotting smell in this field.)

Okay, Jona is like the most non-judgemental person in existence, so Katara is safe on that front. But, sadly for the late Water-triber, the Swaran girl is also cursed with epic nosiness.

"I saw them glowing," she says, with curiosity garnished by worry. "That's not a problem, is it?"

(She wrinkles her nose a little at the smell, half-unconsciously, but doesn't immediately connect it to Katara.)

Oh spirits, she saw them glowing! SHE KNOWS!

(It might be noted that at this point, not all the neurons in Katara's brain are firing.)

"I can't help it," she says, face crumpling. "They're just - they're just not working right!" To her horror, she's about to cry. That's precious water! She needs it!

And this woman SAW HER HANDS. What would Sokka do?

... Sokka would make sure she never told anyone, that's what Sokka would do.

"Oh, hey, hey," says Jona comfortingly. "It's all right."

She doesn't entirely understand what this woman's talking about, but in any language, crumpling faces are not a good thing. And Jona's kind of short, so she can't do the whole enveloping thing, but she can still provide comfort through cuddles, right?

(Jona and people's personal space do not always exist on a first-name basis.)

Katara shrinks away into herself, sniffing back tears hard. "Nooo, don't touch me," she protests. "I have to - I have to heal myself, I have to make me right again! But I don't have any more spirit water and I don't have anything to do it with and -"

SNIFFLES. Tears are incoming!

Her hands start to glow again, patchy and faint, and now that Jona is closer she can see, if she's looking, just how discoloured and bloated Katara's hands are. And also her neck, where her skin disappears into her high-necked long-sleeved tunic.

Uh-oh. The natural reaction to upset is to provide comfort!

But Jona has been asked not to touch!

CONFUSION!

She draws away a little, conflicted, and-- yes, now she does notice the terrible (almost corpselike) condition of her hands. That's. Kind of disgusting.

"Can you get any more spirit water?" she asks. A couple of seconds later, she tears her eyes away from the girl's hands to rest on her face -- her discoloured neck -- no, her face.

Gross and smelly. Katara knows, and she's not going to be able to hide it from Sokka for much longer - neither of the Sokkas, or their sharp-eyed girlfriends, or - or -

A tear drops, and falls into her hands, and is immediately part of the glow that's emanating in a patchy, sickly way from them.

And Katara's sniffles stop.

"...I bended my own sweat once," she murmurs, very quietly, staring at her hands.

Jona... doesn't have much to add to that. It would require understanding, for one thing. (If Iroh ever mentioned bending to her, it was a long, long time ago, and not in conjunction with any kind of liquid.)

Nevertheless: "Could you do that again? Would it help?"

She does try to be helpful, bless her.

Katara is thinking really hard. If she could heal herself now, just really quick, it wouldn't matter what this woman saw, because there'd be nothing for Sokka to see, and then she wouldn't have to mess around with asking her not to tell anyone because there'd be nothing to tell! And it would work, maybe.

"I can try," she says hopefully, looking up with big blue eyes. "I really could. I think this might work!"

That old woman, the crazy one, she showed Katara how to pull the water from the flowers and grass and trees. Maybe that water was special - because it was alive. Like the spirit water. She could do this. She can!

Encouraging smile!

~~Hibym a Jona + this thread: living proof that ignorance is bliss.~~

"Try it. I'm sure it'll work."

Katara straightens her back, looking determined, and shuts her eyes. It's easier this way: she can sense the living water all around her, feel it flow when she lifts her arms, when she moves juuuust like this, like this. She sways, gathering herself, concentrating on the way the water seems to shine. Like the world exists still, even with her eyes shut, but only in shades of silver.

One sweep of her arms, and a swathe of silver is gone from the scene - but her hands feel better, her arms move easier already. Only a tiny bit easier, but enough.

"It's working!" She opens her eyes for a second to beam at Jona, and then closes them again, drawing herself up very tall and bring her hands around in a wide circle.

All the living water in the area begins, slowly but surely, to leave the plants and animals it's a part of.

No ... all of it.

It's sort of beautiful to watch her move: the grace of it, the precise yet organic flow of her arms, the--

Wait. Wait. There's something tugging at Jona, and her mouth feels dry. Her eyes sting. She feels sick.

"What are you--" she asks, dragging back against the invisible pull, but her words crack out of her throat as a rasp, and she's suddenly afraid.

Katara doesn't even hear, too caught up in the movements, the ebb and flow of the beautiful, wonderful, life-giving water that's rushing through her body, filling her slowly with health, mending damaged tissues and binding together broken flesh. It's like music, her own private opera, and she moves and dances with the moon shining down and the wonderful rushing of the water in her ears.

Then there's a thud, and Katara opens her eyes.

Jona isn't standing there any more.

She's on the ground, her eyes open and dull and powdery, her skin tight and dry as paper across her bones, her spine curled back, her joints tortured. Unmoving.

Katara gasps, hands flying to her face in shock.

"Lady! Oh no! Please wake up, please --"

She falls to her knees beside the dessicated corpse, and her hands, when she stretches them over Jona, are smooth and unlined and warm.

Hey, that's a new thing.

Stranger doesn't see people like that a lot.

She appears out of nowhere in total silence and stares, fascinated, at that-which-was-Jona.

Katara's presence doesn't even register for at least ten seconds. If Stranger ignores people, they don't exist. That's always been how it works.

Katara stares at the newcomer in desperation. "I didn't mean it!"

Blankface.

"Didn't mean what?"

Katara looks back down at Jona, biting into her lip. Sokka will be so mad!

-- biting off her lip.

She stares at the little hunk of flesh that's fallen on the corpse and then hurriedly picks it up and crams it back onto her face. Not as healed as she thought!

And Sokka will be mad anyway - unless he doesn't know.

She looks at Stranger with wide, scared, slightly mad eyes. "...stand still! I need to see if it works again!"

Stranger gives her a look of total bewilderment.

"If what works?"

Wait! Realization dawns. She gestures down at the person-thing. "...Did you make that?"

Beat.

"Cool!"

Katara stares at her.

And then shuts her eyes again, feeling for the silvery flow of the water. It's easier this time - there's nothing in the meadow with any water left in it except for Stranger.

She should feel bad about this. She really should. But, as she raises her arms and the life-giving moisture flows into her, all Katara can think is:

I hope Sokka never finds out.

Oh.

Whoops.

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