The Gaang starts on the day of preparation, as the penultimate day of the week of celebration, much to Katara's surprise. Katara suggests dissolving the teams, because she's the only good cook, and Aang has all the recipes. The others are incompetent to varying degrees; Toph can't cook, Zuko's repertoire is limited, Sokka likes to experiment, and Suki's cooking is disastrous. Aang, however, states that they will all be on the same team for the day. Sokka and Suki are pleased, although Katara is less than happy about having so many in the kitchen, using the literal meaning of "too many cooks spoil the broth."
The Gaang divides up the tasks, with Toph and Suki in charge of kneading dough, Sokka and Suki in charge of fruity toppings and fillings, and Zuko and Aang in charge of custard. Zuko sees the latter as a good time to teach Aang more about firebending, and Sokka mimics it, much to Katara' and Zuko's annoyance, ending in a massive food fight, which Katara breaks up with the commonsense stick.
The Gaang go to a hot spring and take a bath while cleaning their clothes, and Katara is delighted to see a wet and shirtless Zuko. Zuko apologizes for ruining everything, but Aang takes it in stride, saying that it happens at the Southern Air Temple, and tells them of food fights from a century ago. He then starts to show off his bending-related "party tricks," such as orbiting a pebble, a drop of water and a small flame around himself, which impresses the others, and which he is hoping to do on a larger scale.
After Aang leaves to show this trick to the others, Zuko asks Katara if he's boring, much to her surprise, but she points out that Sokka was teasing him earlier. Katara then thinks about how different forms of bending feel and decides to ask Toph about hers.
The Gaang gets dressed again, and after a broom sword fight between Sokka and Zuko, Zuko and Katara make lunch while Sokka and Suki canoodle and Toph and Aang practice earthbending.
As Toph teaches Aang how to make "earth slice projectiles," and Katara notices that Aang does well when learning fighting moves that are similar to ones that he has already mastered, in spite of how different the different types of bending are. Katara and Zuko know each other's bending well due to letting off steam, and consider holding a four-way spar.
Katara realizes that Zuko has a big smear of custard on his scar, which he doesn't notice because he doesn't look in the mirror, and the skin isn't as sensitive. He lets her wipe it off, and she wonders how much getting the scar hurt. Katara wishes that she could heal it, but used up the spirit water while healing Aang, but hopes to find more for Zuko when there's time. A tender moment follows, and Zuko tells Katara to serve lunch.
Zuko's scar is on Katara's mind during her healing lesson with Aang, and her stomach is fluttering; she wonders if it's indigestion, but no one else has it. Fortunately, it's a "good if weird" feeling, rather than a "bad and painful one."
Katara then discusses the four-way sparring session with Toph and Zuko. Aang can use anything except airbending, and will start tomorrow. The exercise goes well, and a longer session is planned for the next day, with Aang's mind on the feast.
Aang thanks the others for their participation, and they reassure him that it's been fun. Aang then unveils his final event- a treasure hunt that will decide the whole festival. Team Boomerang complains about their lead no longer being invincible, but Aang promises that he and Katara won't cheat. Zuko expresses concern about poisonous animals in the forest, which they'd encountered while there before, and is upset that Aang hadn't asked him first. Aang maintains that they'll be fine, but Zuko insists on poisonous animal safety.
Zuko then gives them a lecture, saying when to scare off the animals, when to stand your ground, and when to run. Katara finds Zuko mesmerizing when he's talking intently about something, enough so that she has trouble listening to what he's saying.
The Gaang splits up and follows different sets of clues- blue for Team Boomerang, yellow for Team Stealthy Badasses, and green for Team Avatar. To make it fair, Aang leaves the clues up to Katara, and she accepts.
Team Avatar proceeds, until they encounter a snake. They try to scare it off, but realize that it's a razorback adder, and are forced to flee. They escape, but find themselves near a mummy scorpidillo and her babies, the former of which is in Mama Bear mode. Aang tries to blast her away with airbending, but she evades it and stings Katara. Aang tries to airbend the scorpidillo away, only succeeding in making her angrier.
It seems as though Aang made a mistake, and now someone will have to come help Katara in her time of dire emergency. I'll give you three guesses as to who one of those people is, and the first two don't count.
Suki and Zuko arrive, with Suki pulling Katara away and Zuko using firebending to repel the scorpidillo; apparently, Team Stealthy Badasses also abandoned the treasure hunt. In the midst of the confusion, and with Katara in too much pain to say anything, Aang tells Zuko what happened what happened.
As Aang retrieves a bandage from the house, Suki asks if Katara knows how to heal scorpidillo bites, but the answer is no; Katara didn't learn everything from Yugoda, and since there aren't any poisonous creatures in the north, curing poison is not in high demand (which seems reasonable; it sounds like first aid is all Katara could have mastered during her time at the North Pole). Zuko then decides to Suck Out the Poison, reducing the burning pain to a dull throbbing one. Zuko says the latter is better, even if Katara is not wholly convinced.
Aang gets back, and Katara insists that she's fine to spare his feelings. She reminds the reader that she isn't making a scene, and, all things considered, this is as calm as could be reasonably expected of her. Zuko sends Aang off to find and retrieve Team Boomerang, while he carries Katara back to the house and Suki picks sun poppies. In spite of the pain, Katara has the presence of mind to enjoy being carried by Zuko.
The group returns to the house, and Zuko lays Katara on the couch. Suki and Katara inspect the bite wound, which looks "terrible." It's only bleeding slightly, and Katara considers healing it, but Zuko advises against it, unsure whether he's gotten out all the poison, and advising against doing anything as "strenuous" as waterbending until she's recovered, much to her displeasure. Zuko then prepares a poultice to draw out the poison, and applies it, which feels good to Katara.
Zuko brings Katara water, jasmine tea and cake. In order to make sure she stays off her ankle for the next two days, he gets her a bell. Katara sends Suki off to fetch the commonsense stick, when Sokka, Aang and Toph arrive. Sokka is beside himself with worry over Katara. Katara, understanding that worry, reassures him that she's alright, noting how ironic it is that she's the one who ends up comforting others. Katara gives Sokka a poke with the commonsense stick, then comforts Aang.
Zuko explains the situation. He says Katara is not dying, despite having been bitten by a scorpidillo. He says his poultice will draw out the poison by tomorrow, but her ankle will be sore and painful for two to three days. The latter is why they have to be "extra nice" to Katara, and do whatever she needs.
Katara's first action as "benevolent bell dictator" is to declare the treasure hunt over, and Team Boomerang the winners of the week (which most likely seems fairly empty at this juncture).
The author mentions that Aang's festival ended disastrously (which is more than a little unfortunate, given that the Gaang seemed to be progressing past reluctantly humoring Aang), and will lead to more Aangst in the next chapter.
The author points out that food fights are inevitable among the Gaang, especially when Sokka is teasing Zuko out of love.
Said scene also gives Katara another opportunity to touch his scar, and the author contends, (as she admits, in defiance of Bryke's position), that Katara is the only position he would allow to do so. The author points out that she sees the scar as two things; 1)A reminder of what Zuko's suffered, and something that Katara should heal to free him of it, or 2)A part of his identity that he shouldn't deny.
This is actually quite an interesting issue. In what cases are painful experiences part of you, and in what cases are they nothing but harmful? Zuko getting the scar soured him and turned him into a person obsessing the Avatar to restore his lost honor. But in the course of the journey, he realized that he was on the wrong side of the war, and the journey most likely never would have started if he hadn't been scarred by his own father, or if he hadn't realized how far his father was planning to go. I'm personally of the opinion that once Zuko has apologized to his uncle, ended the war and started ruling the Fire Nation while setting his nation on a good path, he's free to get rid of the scar, although I suspect that he may have accepted it by then.
The author points out that she wanted to explore how different bendings "feel" to the bender, and mentions that water and fire both feel "alive." She also wanted to break Aang of his reliance on airbending, which, again, seems like a fanfic writer stepping in to correct a mistake they see canon characters making; they tend to have mixed track records, at best.
The author points out that Aang always airbends first, since if bendings are languages, it's like his mother tongue, and will be most natural to him even after he masters all four. I agree, since it's indicated that Aang can never learn the more advanced forms of the other three types of bending, although it's unclear what the advanced form of airbending might be.
The author says that Aang should have firebent at the scorpidillo first, since animals are scared of fire (but it still seems like an overly "convenient" time for Aang's favorite means of bending to fail him), and because he didn't, Katara got bitten.
The author says it's not entirely Aang's fault, but he will feel guilty about it. It seems somewhat unfair that she's laying part of the blame for this in part on his feet, and using this to teach him a lesson about his bending. At the very least, she should make Aang more instrumental to helping Katara.
The author points out that Katara's healing is not a magical cure, and I agree; healing techniques like that seem to work mainly on wounds, rather than poisons (the difference between Cure and Esuna).
And now that Katara can't heal herself, Zuko steps in, to, in my perspective, clean up Aang's mistake, and, as the author points out, show off his "competent, caring" side. He's panicking, but keeps it together and works well with Suki to get Katara back and suck out the poison. The author points out that in her headcanon, Zuko knows what she's doing, and as a Master Poisoner, knows a bit about curing them (although that's a bit like saying an arsonist is good at fighting fires). She also passed down the knowledge in the "vain hope" that one sibling would help the other (Was it vain because Zuko and Azula don't really get along, to say the least? The author doesn't elaborate).
On a side note, if you read my Boys Und Sensha-do, liveblog, you may recall the incident in which Miho was struck by a round during a match and falls out of her tank(She shouldn't have been able to survive that, nor would she have fallen out, but that's beside the point here), almost getting run over by her team's driver, Mako, and getting saved by her Original Character Love Interest, who proceeds to stand up to Miho's mother (who's arguably worse than Toph's parents, but not nearly as bad as Ozai) and care for her in the days following her injury, even though, according to another reviewer, his rescue of her should have made things worse. It's somewhat unfortunate that in incidents like these, other characters' mistakes tend to help characters that the author favors shine.
The author points out that there are many poisonous animals in Australia, and her mother shared some of her knowledge with her, but she did take some liberties with this. The short version is that sucking out the poison is no longer recognized as the best technique. The solution is to wrap the area in a compression (but not a tourniquet), and take the person to a medical facility to recover.
Of course, the Avatar world does not take place in the 1980s, there are no medical facilities on Ember Island, and Rule of Drama is in play. So Katara rests with a poultice on her wound, and her bell to summon the others.
So here's my own breakdown of how each of the teams fared in the "Festival" arc.
- Team Zutara: They lost some points in the angst-fest over the letter and the kiss dare, but Zuko managed to win them all back and more over the course of the rest of the week, especially saving Katara. They hold a comfortable lead, like Team Boomerang.
- Team "George": They slowly progressed over time, with making out and a healthy relationship befitting the Beta Couple. Much like Team Avatar, they may not have taken first place, but they're consistently in the black.
- Team Kataang: They got off on a rough start, and started sliding further and further with the Zutara kiss, and Aang's accident. They're further in the red than even Team WHULP was, and at times, I wonder whether calling Aang a Romantic Runner-Up for Katara is putting it too mildly.
What I liked
- Interesting discussion regarding Zuko's scar.
- The author's candor regarding the Artistic License - Medicine.
What I didn't like'
- Aang causing Katara to get bitten.
- To a lesser extent, it happening at the end of Aang's festival.
- Zuko proving himself superior to Aang in handling the emergency.
- Some bits of the author's headcanon.
